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[ 000. Death is a choice ]
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Lian is eight when Ma teaches her about gods.
It's the peak of summer, and Aiaia is thriving. The sun heats the cottage to a point where it gets unbearable. Lian is sweating all the time; it's a damp heat, with dewdrops on the leaves and the buzzing of bees around a nest situated near the lake.
She spends hours picking fruits and savouring their sweetness. From the shore to the caves, then to the barn. Her fingers are sticky from the dried juice, so she decides to wash her hands at the Lake.
That's where she finds him; the God. He's traipsing around like he owns Aiaia, blonde hair curling around his face. She doesn't know what to do; she takes him to Ma. He talks a lot — about how he's deemed Aiaia stagnant, the same after millennia; how it is one of the last left paradises in the world; how he knew Circe.
Circe is a name Lian has heard tumble out of Ma's mouth on countless occasions, never with a story. It must be someone she knows.
Ma's carrying flowers for the brew when she spots them. Lian thinks she's made some sort of mistake because Ma drops the flowers and snatches her arm. She hides Lian behind her body, as if offers any protection, and seethes at the man: "You're not welcome here."
"It is nice to see you, too," the man grins. Lian likes that about him, how he acts as if everything in the world amuses him.
Then Ma sends Lian inside, and after a long ten minutes, it's difficult for her to contain the curiosity. She stands with her ear to the door, listening to them fight about prophecies and gods and Olympus. The worst part is there is nothing she understands.
God. She's heard that word before. Ma says it with her lip curled and eyes loathful. That's the thing; sometimes Lian isn't sure of anything. All she knows comes from what Ma teaches her, but there are subjects out of reach. Whatever lies outside of Aiaia is too far to touch. She learns what Ma decides she should.
Five more minutes and she's practically drenched, periodically wiping her forehead with the back of her hand when she pushes her face into the window to remind them she's still here, boiling inside of the cottage.
