Ayalal eventually fell asleep on Lysa's lap. Carefully she stroked his dark hair. She felt sorry for simply taking him to the room where the rest of the children were resting. The same children who tormented him. She hesitated, but in the end she picked him up and she wnet to the older girls' room. There were four of them, counting on her, and all of them had grown up in the orphanage, under the tutelage of Headmistress Drane.
She laid him on her bed beside her, and cuddled him. Ay curled up, as he always did, looking even smaller.
“Sweet dreams,” she whispered to him, before she closed her eyelids too.
*
Ay ran ahead, while Lysa had just climbed the staircase leading to the top of the tunnel. The boy had a strange energy, despite his pallor, especially when he was excited. She followed the path punctuated by light and shadow, and she caught him standing in the middle of the crossroads, frowning, watching the path that led into the darkness.
“I thought I saw something,” he said, as Lysa stood beside him.
“Som... something?” Her voice trembled. “There's nothing there, Ay...”
“I'm sure I saw something,” he insisted, stepping into the darkness.
“No!” Lysa grabbed him by the shoulders and turned him slightly, pushing him to the side where Master Yurdah’s house was. “It was just a feeling”.
Ayalal puffed his cheeks, but he did not insist, glancing over his shoulder at the blackness they left behind. It was not forbidden to go there, but no one dared to do so. They had not even bothered to turn on lights. Or had there been lights and someone or something had put them out? Curiosity gnawed at him.
When they reached the bottom of the tunnel and knocked on Yudarh’s door, he was slow to receive them. They knocked again. Insistence was the key to being received. At last the door opened.
“I already told you...”
“We came to pay you a visit, master,” Lysa said, not allowing him to finish the usual phrase. Both thought Yudarh was too isolated. So much that Ay, worried, asked him, from time to time, if he could not live in the orphanage too.
Ayalal nodded at him.
“And we brought you something,” he said, reaching into his worn coat with sewed elbows that had been worn by other children. Ay produced a wrapping of cloth that Lysa recognized and held it out to the tiefling.
Yudarh frowned, taking the offer, and pulled the cord with a claw, revealing the cookie that was hidden inside. He raised his eyebrows for a moment, glancing at the child, before storing the unexpected present.
“It's been four years since I started taking care of Ayalal,” Lysa said, putting a hand on the top of the child's head and brushing his hair. “He decided to share his gift with us.”
“I see...” he hesitated, running a hand over his chin, thoughtful. “I was about to leave. Do you want to come?”
Lysa blinked.
“Where?”
“To the surface.” One of the corners of Yudarh's lips rose faintly as he saw Ayalal's eyes glow with enthusiasm.
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