Souja

Souja Chapter 3

"And when Grayson first came in, he was so hungry- I swear he was hollow- the way he downed all the food I gave him. And as long as he is always with food in hand with either an apple or an orange or a stuffed bun or roll, he's content. I've never seen any folks that look like him so I don't know where he came from and no one understood anything he said at first and even now he tries to write in strange letters that make odd sounds when he shows them to me. And he keeps making the same letter or symbol over and over again but when I painted the symbol over his bed, he seemed to sleep better in it. I even had the symbol put into his window so that when the sun shines through, it casts the shadow of the symbol on the floor and he likes to sit in it when it's on the floor, I guess he must have been only two or three, maybe four considering the learnin' he had when he came at the time as well. But he's been mine ever since though and I'm 23 now so my guess is Grayson is at least six or seven and Lena is about 9 or 10. I just celebrate their birthdays on the days that they chose me to be their Ma." You answered with a shrug as you traced the symbol on the table as Johnny seemed intent on watching your finger movements, imagining what the symbol would look like if you had paint on your finger. But he recognized the symbol and confirmed his suspicions about Grayson at least before he quickly carved that symbol into the back of the little figure.

"This?" He asked.

"Yeah, that's it." You confirmed with a smile.

"Ok, here I thought some bastard must have took ye and laid with ye when you was a child to have kids that old already. I was ready to hunt him down for doing ye so wrong." Johnny admitted which got you to giggle.

"No, they're mine sure as the day, but I didn't birth em me-self." You grinned.

"That would explain why they don't take after you too much then, and why you'd have a qunari halfling for a son." He slowed down as he considered what you told him.

"A-what, now?" You asked.

"Your son, Grayson, he's a qunari. I've only ever seen them a few times. Very fierce warriors. They usually sail on dreadnoughts, which are these huge battleships, some of the largest ships that sail on the seas. Besides the last invasion of the wars over a century ago, most qunari stay to their homelands of Par Vollen and Seheron. Which both of those places are at least a month's sailing north west of here, kind of remote actually. Although a quite few have been known to be mercenaries. They're usually ex-soldiers. And judging by the looks of Grayson, he's probably the son of one of the traveling qunari mercenaries. Otherwise how you got a youngling, is a mystery to me because they usually keep all the younglings together in the homeland. But he doesn't look full qunari, which leads me to believe the mercenary theory. All the qunari I've seen otherwise are metallic skin toned, like silver, gold, bronze or pewter. But Grayson looked more drab and subdued coloring to me. But that white hair and those horns are unmistakable." Johnny informed you.

"Huh. Well he did speak a language that none of us had a clue what he was saying, but with more of the common tongue he learns, the more of his native he loses. Which is a shame, because no one should be divorced from their roots. He's had a hard time learning the common tongue." You revealed thoughtfully.

"Well that language is most likely qunlat, it is a very distinct language, but very few of the qunari speak the common tongue and they're usually unsettlingly quiet. They're whole race is about mastery of all things, no matter what it is." Johnny revealed.

"Oh, that explains a bit. Thank ye- Johnny for telling me about him. You're the first to look at him and know what he was. Most just assume he's some kind of tiefling on account of the horns. Lena is a tiefling hybrid herself and taking care of her came with certain challenges, but I was up for it. Mostly she loved climbing the walls and sat in the corners on the cielings and hissed like a snake. And thus, how she could get up into the rafters so easily and why only other tieflings could get to her and bring her back down. But the greater Souja family has a lot of tiefling members so they warned me and coached me through a lot of how to be a good parent to one." You revealed as you gestured to the corners of the room and the rafters in the middle of the main hall for emphasis.