Happy (late) Thanksgiving to those of you who celebrated it! I had a nice quiet day with my mom decorating cookies yesterday. And then today I’ve slept a lot and avoided any sort of stores. Oh, and also I’ve made a lot of progress on my NaNo project, which is awesome. I don’t usually like running right up until the end of the month with it, but the remainder is pretty manageable and I’m honestly really proud of how much I got written with a brand new story and batch of characters.
“Finn?” Eshin tilted his head to try to meet his gaze.
Finnraal didn’t know how long he’d been standing there staring. His body ached and he was tired right to his bones. He shook himself off and took a steadying breath, if only to stay awake until he could get himself home safely.
“Still Finn, right?” Eshin asked again, this time quieter and with a deeper understanding.
Finnraal nodded absently, then blinked. “Yes. Finn, at the moment. Mostly.”
Eshin smiled. “I wanted to introduce you to someone I met when I arrived here,” he said, before turning just enough to reveal the small figure hiding shyly behind him.
It was a young human child, wispy and shaky. One of her hands had been replaced with a mechanical one. The fingers on it twitched in constant, jerky motions as if not calibrated quite right.
“This is Elodie,” Eshin said quietly, even as Finnraal knelt down to be on her level. “Elodie, this is Finn. The one I told you about.”
Elodie scanned Finnraal with a guarded expression in her too young and too knowing eyes. She’d been through quite enough already, and she inched closer to Eshin before she found the bravery to speak. “You have a house for … little kids like me?” she said. Her voice shook as if she might cry at any second.
Finnraal smiled and held out a hand. “Little kids like you, and big kids like Eshin,” he said. “Sometimes it gets a little noisy, but if you don’t mind having a lot of brothers and sisters, it’s not so bad.”
