When the time came for the group to leave the next day, the Rosenbugs gave them a filling breakfast and supplied them with more food and water. With a thank you and goodbye the traveling party was back on the road.
As they were traveling down the road, Lidya started humming a song to herself. As time went on she started muttering the lyrics,
"Suantraí sí, a linbhín. Luasc go mall sa chliabhán. Lú lá luí, a linbhín Dún do shúil, a naíonáin..."
The others, Izarra included, looked at her curiously,
"Seoithín seoithín seoithín seó...-"
"What are you singing?" Axle asked after a time.
"Hm? Oh, it's an Irish lullaby my mother used to sing to me."
"What's Irish?"
"It's another language that some people in my world speak, albeit you have to go pretty far from America to get to its place of origin." Lidya explained.
"Hm, odd." Acer looked thoughtful, "As far as I know there's Only one spoken language in this world."
"There is," Axle confirmed, "I remember asking my father the same question, and he said that in all the world known to us- there's only one spoken language. But there are a few different written ones."
"Really?" Liday asked. "There's at least a hundred in my world."
"Maybe for what your world lacks in magic, it makes up for in languages." Acer joked. Izarra barked and Eryd translated,
"Yeah, how many of those languages do you know Lidya?"
"Well... give me a second to think about it." Lidya thought back to all the languages her parents taught her when she was growing up, some she learned right alongside English, others she was taught as she encountered them during her parents travels.
"Well I obviously know english and irish, theres spanish, chinese, japanese, french, portuguese," she started listing them off, counting on her fingers to keep track of them all, "swahili, a bit of hindi and russian, hawaiian, dutch, icelandic, greek, german, italian, and Mom did teach me romanian but i've forgotten most words."
"That is a lot." Acer said in awe.
"Well my parents took me all over our world and wanted me to be able to talk to everybody. They also taught me ASL and BSL."
"And what is that?"
"American sign language and British sign language. British is still English except they use some different words than Americans do."
"Like what?" Acer asked, curiously.
"Well, instead of pants they say trousers, instead of package they say parcel, and instead of candy they say sweets. I think they're just more formal sounding." Lidya explained.
"Your world sounds so strange, interesting but strange." Eryd said.
"I think the same of this place, I've seen all over my world- I know what almost every 'grand' or 'exotic' place looks like, but this place is like nothing i've ever seen before. I've seen things here that I've only heard about in stories- and sometimes they're things not even my story books have told me of. This world is really amazing." Lidya said energetically.
Then, Izarra looked off into the forest and wined. Eryd looked down at her,
"What is it?"
Izarra glanced up at her and then back at where she was staring. They didnt stop or slow their walk, and all had an uneasy feeling.
YOU ARE READING
The Kingdom of Orenda
FantasíaLidya is forced on an adventure unlike anything she's ever seen in her mundane Kentucky home. When the pond in her Aunt and Uncle's back yard becomes a whirlpool and drags her under, she wakes up in a strange land called Orenda. With the aid of some...
