Aija's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

Aija pulled her notebook from her belt and opened it to a blank page. She needed to start somewhere simple. The villagers at the fire pit had spoken of birthdays, anniversaries, seasons of life. She wrote the first question at the top: "How long do humans live?" Below it, she added another: "What makes each life different?" Her claws made scratching sounds against the paper. The memorial garden had given her numbers, but numbers alone felt empty. She needed to watch how mortals moved through their years, how they chose to spend their time. Her tail curled around the bench leg as she wrote one more line: "Begin with observation." She closed the notebook and stood, her wings catching the morning breeze. The work had started. The villagers had mentioned a place where births were recorded—a pool hidden deeper in the forest. Aija followed a narrow path until she found it. The Mystic Reflection Pool of Serenity sat beneath pale cherry blossoms, its surface mirror-smooth. She knelt at the water's edge and watched images shimmer into view. Birth certificates floated up from the depths, showing names, dates, and family lines. Each one recorded the exact moment a mortal life began. She traced the dates with her claw, calculating the spans between birth and death. Some lived twenty years, others ninety. The differences fascinated her. Back at the greenhouse, Aija needed a place to organize her findings. She found a round table outside, its surface already marked with potion stains and tool scratches. The Enchanter's Round Table would serve her purpose well. She laid out the notes she'd copied from the pool, arranging them by age at death. A jeweled water jug sat nearby, its surface catching the afternoon light. She filled it from a stream and watered the glowing plants inside the greenhouse. The plants would wait. Her research came first. She returned to the table and opened her notebook again. Three sources now: the memorial garden for endings, the reflection pool for beginnings, and the fire pit for the living. She had the framework she needed. Her claws tapped against the jeweled jug as she thought. Tomorrow she would return to the villagers and ask them directly about their lives. The facts were clear now—humans lived in decades, not centuries. What remained was understanding how they filled those brief years with meaning.