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Hello, visitor! I'm Jenn, and I wish to welcome you to this lovely castle, home of Siaiu. I will be your tour guide, and since I'm not one for introductions, let's get started so you can see as much as possible! Here's a map in case you get lost, but one quick thing before we start walking. Let's thank Sarah for the amazing banner you see at the top. :)
And we're off! Siaiu's story takes place within a castle, where she is far from isolated despite its confining, stony walls. She has made some friends during her tenure there, and one cannot adequately tell her story without first introducing her castmates.
All are characters within the same Neopian world, which is not one that you can easily find on a map of Neopia. In this world, which is named Irucien (i-rue-shen), there is a queen, Queen Clemede, in her castle, with the richer members of society living in small but quaint houses nearby. The poorer members of society live on shared land as merchants and farmers. The queen is not evil in the sense that she oppresses the farmers, but rather in the sense that her moods change constantly, and she is commonly seen taking out her sudden anger on those within the castle. 
Many in the lower class resent their position and her lack of action to help them, and therefore she is not well-liked by most people. She is not greedy or jealous, but she is prone to making rash decisions, and that shows her subjects that she is inept and untrustworthy. Her sidekick is the ever-mysterious Kimri.
Promise grew up in the lower class as the daughter of a merchant. Her mother once worked with the Soup Faerie in Neopia Central and taught Promise most of the culinary and sewing skills that she uses in her current position. Promise now lives in the basement of the castle as a servant for the queen. She creates all of the outfits and jewelry that the queen wears, so she is often quite busy, yet she largely enjoys her position and the friends she has made within the castle staff. However, she also has another unofficial job. The queen, being unpopular, gets many letters that either blatantly yell at her for her failures or condescendingly suggest ideas to the queen. Tired of them, the queen mandates that Promise be in charge of the mail and pass along only those letters that are important. Promise is under strict instructions to get rid of any hate mail, even if it describes a plot against the queen, without showing it to Her Majesty; therefore, Promise has possibly the most knowledge of these things of anyone in the kingdom.
Magicless is much younger than Promise and much more energetic and naive. His ancestors were given the power to control fire and make it do things for them, yet Magus is one of the few descendants left today and has never made contact with anyone who has this ability. Therefore, Magus has little control over this unpredictable element but tirelessly keeps trying to improve his talents; one can only guess how much trouble this can cause! One example of this is that Magus used to live in Terror Mountain but was exiled for burning down a forest by accident. He finally found his way to Irucien, where Promise and her family opened their home to him. When Promise was preparing to leave her home forever to work for the queen, however, Magus begged to accompany her and now lives with her in the basement. The queen was slightly annoyed with his presence but allows him to stay as long as he is not a distraction, and Magus often comes very close to being kicked out, or worse. He still tries to control fire and can be found exploring in all hours of the night; Promise tries to take care of him but knows it is useless to try to stop him from wandering.
Mathieau and Biryn's stories are interconnected, beginning with them as Grey and Shadow Kougras, respectively. They lived together in the woods on Mystery Island, for they were siblings who didn't know where anyone else in their family was, or if anyone was still alive. In the forest, Matty got bitten by a wild Hissi, and so the pair ventured out of the forest for the first time ever. Naive as to how to act around people, they inadvertently offended the Techo Master, and a series of events culminated in Biryn's being forced to enlist in Sloth's army while Matty was imprisoned in the Techo Master's home. Eventually, Matty escaped, desperate to find his sister, only to learn that she had been imprisoned by the queen. Her work for Sloth made her seem like a traitor, though she had secretly been plotting against Sloth, and the queen cast a spell on her so that she became a Mutant Ixi, imprisoned within the castle. Matty eventually made it to the castle, wishing to talk to the queen about his lost sister (oblivious that she is actually trapped inside), but was turned away. As he prepared to leave and return the next day, however, a mysterious light illuminated a secret passageway in the castle. He wandered into the dimly lit corridor and walked around, looking for a castle entrance. His search was fruitless, but he did hear his sister's voice from inside the castle echoing throughout the passageway as she muttered something to herself, only to be reprimanded by a guard. So now he stays, afraid to leave the castle for fear that he won't know where she is when he returns. Matty has met Magus a few times, as Magus loves to explore and is often perilously close to causing a catastrophe. Matty feels protective of Magus because Magus is so young, but realizes that perhaps Magus can be his eyes in the castle, wandering and occasionally reporting back to him. While Promise disapproves of Magus's adventures, fearing the repercussions, she is sympathetic to Mathieau's plight. She sometimes sends Magus with food for him and often wonders, as she reads more and more hate mail directed at the queen, if these letters can help Matty. But she is unsure of a way to do this, and so she patiently bides her time, waiting for the answer to become clearer.
And now for the real story, told by Siaiu. There are not many sentences of dialogue, but those sentences will be in italics.
I grew up a wealthy Purple Aisha, the middle daughter of one of the hundreds of lords dispersed throughout the kingdom. I always wondered how my family could really be wealthy when there were hundreds of people just like my father, all with large families and all hoping to rise. Now I suspect something more, something under the table and unspoken of in public or in private. My mother would always tell me to hush when I asked about money. It's not ladylike to ask, she'd tell me. Concern yourself with your needlework. Indeed, in Irucien, only sewing skills mattered. A girl did not have to be beautiful or intelligent or even well-spoken or polite; rather, she had to be able to create ornate works of art that would cover up her looks or lack of wit. These creations would speak for her, and she would merely look on. I think now that this lack of speech always bothered me a bit as a child, though I only realize the whole value of my voice because of its inability to perform when I am a statue. It's odd that I achieved the same thing - a loss of my voice and freedoms - in such a different way than I had imagined.
But I did not grow up your ordinary rebel, nor was I completely submissive. I'd like to think my way of expressing my thoughts was smarter than either of those two, but I'm not so sure. My younger sister was the needlework prodigy, and while this took her far in society, I wasn't interested in following her and therefore harbored no ill will towards her. My older sister would have been good at embroidery if she had wished to be; she had a natural gift, said my mother, but was completely disinterested. My uncle took her away one summer to give her some work as a farmer and show her how lucky she was, but she enjoyed the work so much that she adamantly refused to return and found a job with someone else. Her choice bothered me. While I wasn't close with her - she was too opinionated for me to feel comfortable confiding in her - she was the first daughter, and therefore received much attention. In her absence, everyone pretended she did not exist, so I was the first daughter, and was suddenly flooded with prying eyes and questions. Overwhelmed, I spent more and more time outside, just wandering. My parents hated it, but they were reluctant to intervene, afraid it would backfire again.
One day I found myself inside a cave. I had been wandering in the forest a few miles from my home for a few hours now, struck not by the beauty of the forest but by its solitude and privacy. I was soaking wet, having jumped into a nearby stream so that when I was exploring the cave, the water dripping from my fur could guide me out again. I didn't take into account the speed of the water nor the state my fur would be in afterward, but I made it fine despite my puffy fur and lack of coordination in the water. I liked the cave, partially because I knew most people didn't have the eyesight or courage required to enter such a gloomy-looking slab of rock. But as I was thinking this, I heard hesitant footsteps behind me and sighed to myself. But it was only a boy, a Green Eyrie in tattered clothes held together by the loose stitches my mother despised. I shrank from him, embarrassed by my wet fur, but he didn't seem to notice. He started talking excitedly once I looked at him, evidently considering that his permission. He absentmindedly started to wander deeper into the cave, and I couldn't help but follow curiously. He was certainly more interesting than the people who seemed to come through my home in an endless loop.
At first I worried what people might think of him, what my parents might think because he was not only a peasant, but an Eyrie. My parents had some stupid idea that Aishas were one of the few noble species, and Eyrie was not on this short list. But quickly I began to shrug it off - my home was too lonely and prying with my sister gone. Her seat at the table seemed to grow larger every day, my eyes always drawn to it out of both resentment and a bit of jealousy. My mother asked few questions about where I'd run off to after I began to bring my sewing along. He would tell me stories as I sewed, but his words always seemed to run faster than my stitches. Nevertheless, I managed to sew myself a few extra clothes to wear so I could run about yet not dirty my clothes, which I knew from experience would cause trouble. My mother had screamed at me when I came home soaking wet that first day, so loud that half the town could and was listening, so loud that I did actually feel a glimmer of embarrassment for me and empathy for her. It must've been hard to deal with me, or my sister, for that matter, and I made sure I wouldn't upset her like that again. As I sewed I always wondered about his name. He'd acted embarrassed when he told me his name was Flubel. I suppose I was supposed to recognize it as a permutation of a German word for wings, but I didn't until he told me. My family would've said that the people who gave him that name hadn't known the right word for wings -- Flugel -- and would cite that as further proof of the difference between the educated and the poor, but I preferred Flubel. It sounded better. He said his family had called him that as a joke until it stuck. I was curious what his real name was, but he wouldn't tell me, and I didn't want to cause him further anguish.
Slowly, Flubel's stories became more and more upsetting, his ideas became more and more radical, and his visits shorter and shorter. From what I gathered from his short, indignant bursts of speech as he paced, times were worse than ever for his family, and he needed to work. Everyone blamed the queen, not for their problems but for her nonchalance in solving them. I remember looking away from his pained face and thinner frame up towards the sky. Birds were circling above, as they always were. I'd never known if they were anyone's or if they were just wild, but I'd always thought they were beautiful. When they would land, I always tried to approach them, just to watch them. Often they'd almost smirk at me before taking flight, but a few stayed and stared back at me, often silently asking me who I was and could I bring them some food. And then I remember being distracted from my reverie rather abruptly when Flubel spoke of an outrageous plan. He spoke of storming the castle unarmed, not to hurt anyone (therefore the lack of weaponry) but just to draw attention to the widespread poverty. He spoke of it confidently, almost indifferently, but I could tell his heart was invested in it because of the people he knew well, because of their suffering. When I expressed my disapproval, he scoffed at me, saying that I obviously wouldn't understand because I had never seen tragedy of this kind. His eyes then lit up, and when I asked him what he was thinking, he smiled and told me that I'd find out soon.
The next day I came, hoping he would be there because I didn't know what to do without his stories to occupy me - eventually, exploring such a small, compact forest seems rather pedestrian, if that's possible despite all of the life within it. And it had begun to rain. I hated rain because it made life a hassle by puffing out my fur. 
Thankfully, Flubel arrived moments later, but this time he insisted I climb on his back. He flew me to the farmlands, insisting I see the root of his passion for myself. I was shocked for two reasons: one, I had never been in the air before and was hanging on for dear life as raindrops hit me with rocklike force; and two, the people seemed...happy. He was always talking about their tragedies and suffering, but if you didn't look into their eyes and instantly see through them, you would think they were in much better times. They were warm and welcoming, and I very nearly laughed when I heard them call Flubel by the nickname they apparently loved for him - Flubby - until I saw his face blush with embarrassment. I wanted to tell him I thought it was cute, and he shouldn't be worried about it, but I held my tongue, and the moment passed.
Admittedly, I did enjoy my visit. I sympathized with the people and enjoyed their stories and easygoing curiosity. They wore clothes my mother would have despised, with big, looping stitches that coated the fabric in swirling, seemingly random paths, but I liked the simplicity of sewing. Clothes were clothes, and sewing was so that you could wear them properly. The people didn't want to pry into my life, so their questions were polite, not pointed like most people's. But every time I glanced at Flubel, leaning against a chair with his wings humorously splayed in multiple directions, feathers sticking out, I could not help but feel a general uneasiness. I was selfish, I knew that, but my remorse at being so awful did nothing to convince me to reject my feelings. I could not have him go; there were too many things left to chance. And besides, while I was disheartened by the troubles described to me, my visit seemed to show that his family's lives weren't in immediate danger, and they seemed in good enough spirits to validate not wanting Flubel to get hurt. I couldn't allow him to leave, not with this plan and without a safety net should he fall. When I told him, though, his face clouded over, and it was clear that we would not see eye-to-eye. I told him that when he changed his mind I would talk to him again; I had to cut off our friendship before I felt more anxiety.
Slowly my visits to the forest became rarer -- while the forest was pretty, I couldn't appreciate all of its unique sounds and motion without missing the sound of conversation. Sometimes I thought to myself how silly it was that I was so worried about Flubel, given that we'd only met a few months ago, but I'd let myself see what kind of people there were outside the borders of what my family let me see. I was hopeful. The people I'd visited were so quintessentially happy and carefree, and to an extent I worried about the plan because if he did succeed, perhaps all of the community would lose that attribute when they received aid, for I'd known people who were fairly well-to-do all my life and had rarely seen it. That's not to categorize my life and his as black and white; I knew plenty of people in my society who didn't fit, as my mother put it, because they had aged and evidently learned something wise. I'd always been curious about that wisdom, unlike my mother, who told me that I shouldn't ask, let alone think about it, and instead spend my time more prudently. A few times I disguised myself in my handmade clothes and was able to walk around freely; no one in my parents' inner circle would think it possible that someone in such a poorly-crafted outfit could be anyone of importance, and so they wouldn't look very hard, and even if they recognized me, they would be deemed fools. The only truly difficult thing about it was knowing which way to go to get away from my current life and to find something new, and then to have to turn around and find a way home again. I loved my home, but it couldn't hold my interest for long.
Some time later, I was at home. My aunt and sister were both sick and I hadn't left the house in a while because I was tending to them. Another thing I felt guilty over was how much I enjoyed this time of silence: there were less visitors due to the illnesses, I enjoyed caring for people, and I much appreciated how illness took the rough edge off of everyone's voices. There were still arguments, but someone who'd been around the group as long as I had could hear the slight hesitation before every remark, the instant of consideration that occurred but changed nothing. I still appreciated it; it could change, it just wouldn't quite yet. I rose from my sister's bedside and headed into the kitchen to fetch a fresh cloth with which to wipe her brow. From the kitchen I heard a few hushed words between the men in the living room - my uncle, my father, and a few of his distant friends who I'd never been introduced to before. I started to tune them out until I heard something about a castle. I stopped, suddenly aware of the eerie pause that I perceived between that sentence and the next, and conscious of the fact that my hand was somehow clenching the towel as if it was irreplaceable. The men didn't divulge much information - apparently their interests were elsewhere - but they did remark on the absurdity of unarmed commoners protesting at the castle and expecting change. "Well, they are commoners," one remarked, evidently meaning to say that their idea was naturally stupid. Nonchalantly they also glossed over the fact that one was injured, not overly worried or concerned. I dropped the towel. Aware that I should be back to my sister, I tried to control myself, telling myself that Flubel was only one of hundreds, and that there was no way it would be him.
A few weeks later, the sickness had been tossed aside, just as anyone or anything my father deemed "beneath us" had been for as long as I could remember. I took a stroll, not bothering to change into my handmade clothes. It was hot and sunny, and my clothes were made of heavy fabric rather than the light, soft silk my mother imported for my dresses. I took a walk but soon decided to go swimming; the heat was the kind that was heavy as a trunkful of cloth on your back, that pressed down on you until you escaped it. I wished then to escape the heat, but I've found a permanent escape now that could be worse.
When I finished swimming, I reached for my straw hat that I'd bought once from a merchant - my mother hated that hat, but I always wore it on my walks because I felt like I stuck out a bit less. But my hand stopped moving when I saw a beautiful ivory-colored bird sitting inside it. What a huge bird! I remembered thinking just before I saw two more birds arcing overhead, one beige and the other a pearl color. Swooping towards the ground, one landed in a tree a few feet from me, and he seemed almost to laugh to himself. The other one landed behind the tree but emerged a few seconds later with a companion clad in a deep purple gown adorned in rare pearls. 
I subconsciously admired her dress even as fear coursed through me. She just looked imposing; without her saying anything, I wished I was anywhere but right in front of her. I listened, holding my breath, as she finally began to speak, clutching the plushie I brought everywhere with me behind my back. It was a gift from my mother when I was young, but it would do nothing to assuage my fears now as it had so wonderfully done many years ago. The woman haughtily reminded me that she was the queen of Irucien; although my family was wealthy, I had never seen the queen in person before, unlike most of the older members of my family. Hastily I dipped into a curtsy, but I could tell my gesture would not help my standing any. I felt like I was watching this conversation as a third party rather than being the victim of her anger. I could not move, and I kept glancing at the birds rather than directly at her. The birds seemed much more sinister now, though the sky, surprisingly, hadn't darkened any since their arrival.
You've been outed, she said simply. Your friend did indeed storm the castle, and he was injured. You did nothing to stop his advance. You were complicit. Yes, I have proof of this, young one. He was injured, and his fever caused him to say things in his delirium. He kept muttering your name, often with touches of rage. And my faithful birds have seen you in the forest, so don't even try to deny the truth.
There is a courier who should be arriving at your parents' home any minute. He will tell them that you have committed treason and that you have been banished from Irucien forever. He will not explain further, and they will never see you again. But really that is a lie, for I think that banishment is much too easy a punishment for a crime of this scope. Banishing you would make you free. Your friend has been turned into..well, almost nothing, really. He is permanently invisible. He cannot talk, and he can hear nothing spoken directly to him, should anyone find a way. He can only float; he cannot beat his wings or stretch a paw. He can merely observe what his life could have been if he had been careful and fortunate. Now, as for you. I admit that you did not storm the castle with him, but your acts are certainly similar and you will be punished severely.
It took me a long time to figure out what to do with you. I didn't want a ghost in my halls, and you couldn't be invisible should you come across your companion. At last, I found a solution, as my halls are in desperate need of decoration. She smiled at me, almost sweetly. You are to be a simple statue of an elegant Chocolate Aisha. You will lose your power to speak and move. Just like your friend, you may only observe. You will soon find just how imposing these limitations are, and I'm sure your attempts at freedom will show you the permanency of your actions -- there is not much allowed to you anymore. Be grateful for the small liberties which you are afforded.
My head spun. I could barely process this information before the birds encircled me and produced a puff of black, ashen smoke. I kept my eyes open, but I could see nothing and the dust bothered my eyes as I hoped for a miracle.
It was not to be. Somehow my eyes had shut, and I had become just another statue. My fur was metallic now, a deep brown color, and I knew I would soon grow tired of seeing the same wall for the rest of my life.
All drawings in this section are by my sister. Click on the adoptables for credit.
Now Siaiu is stuck in the queen's castle. Many castle hallways have stiff statues or suits of armor, and this castle is no exception; the only difference within this castle is that there is life within them. The queen turned Siaiu into a Chocolate Aisha, a marble statue that convinced the whole world of the queen's wrath but also of her protectiveness of her position. Yet magic never seems to work perfectly.
The queen wanted Siaiu to be stationary and silent, no more than a statue with just enough brainpower to realize how annoying being a statue truly is. It's true, she cannot talk or move in her statue form, but on occasion she can leave her cold body and become a ghost, or be truly invisible. Then she can whisper, move, and breathe. The designs on her marble body are also slightly different than an ordinary Chocolate Aisha statue - the design on her back still shows the patterned dress she wore on her last day as a Purple Aisha (as well as the scarf around her neck), and the blue spots are water droplets, frozen in time. Her eyes have also remained a greenish color, though time has muted the color to a far dimmer shade than what is seen in the background picture. It was Siaiu who showed Matty the way into the castle, twisting herself into a ball of ghostly light, but she would not say anything to him. She was still afraid of the queen, and still is, to an extent. But now she understands more. She took a liking to Magus as he explored, and when he was alone she showed him her ghost form. Young ones like ghost stories, she said to herself, and she told him all about her past because she was lonely. He, of course, found it fascinating, calling the castle enchanted. But that meeting gave Siaiu hope, hope that, if the queen could be wrested from her throne, her power would remain with her crown, and Siaiu could live again.
Siaiu's personality has changed during her life as she has met people such as Flubby and experienced things that have changed her life. As a child, she was often restless but always had a great deal of self-control. She had to suppress feelings that would upset others but did this more often out of worry that they would be genuinely upset by her comments than out of fear of the repercussions of their anger. (One example of this later in her life would be when she began sewing her own clothes secretly so as not to upset her mother.) One of her major faults is that she, while enjoying trips to the countryside or similar excursions to places very different from her home, feels extremely uncomfortable. This stems from her parents' labeling of those different than them as weird or subservient, and so she feels that she cannot relate to other lifestyles. This fear has been lessened by her stay in the castle; although the castle is just a more upscale version of her home, her new lifestyle is unquestionably different from the relative freedoms she had when she wasn't encased in marble, and she has been forced to adjust. She harbored a bit of a grudge towards the queen at first, understandably, but in the present moment, she has been trapped for fifty years and has accepted her position. She still holds out hope and has learned to better appreciate very small moments in time, such as when a servant walks through the hall and she notices a stain on his or her uniform, prompting a daydream about the origin of that stain.
Flubby also wanders the castle in his invisible form, and Siaiu finally learned from a few other ghosts that he cannot see other invisible or ghostly beings, and even if he could, he could not speak or move his limbs. However, she gained this knowledge only after her feelings were hurt when she'd tried to speak to him, resulting in no recognition. Siaiu has also received advice from her fellow ghosts about everything from rooms to visit to how to escape her statue form: Siaiu cannot become a ghost or turn invisible from her own free will; rather, it is left to chance, as she will only change when something scares, excites, or surprises her. Once she is out of the statue, however, she can reenter the statue or shift between ghost and invisible at will. Over the years she has stayed in the castle, she has become better at shifting and has found a few artificial ways to provoke fear or excitement, but these means are not fully reliable. All ghosts are also unable to leave the castle boundaries (in any of their forms), so she longs to see the sky and her home again.
The drawing at the beginning of the section and the poem are both from Seraph. :D Thank you!
The black and white traditional art was done by me for Divinity's weekly challenge.
Dear Flubel,
It's been a year now. A whole year. Since you tried something, not since I stopped moving. I know we haven't exactly talked in over a year, but that's my fault. Assuming you read this far, I hope I can make you at least a little proud; I think I am finally figuring things out. I'm not apologizing for caring about your safety, but I am apologizing for figuratively clipping your wings.
I don't feel sorry for myself for being stuck here, given what you've been through, but I've begun to feel sorry that I have been stuck like this all my life, without realizing it. And I don't know why you chose me to try to fix, but I'm here now, trying to fix myself, and I think it's just so sad that I was so closed off to the idea until it was too late for you to see your influence. I realize how you felt – I feel it, every day, when my cost of being able to move freely is my loss of identity. The only way to change things is to move, yet without an identity how do I make my presence known? I can blink from my statue position, but blinks constrain me – I can answer yes or no questions, but again I'm dependent on people to ask the question, and to phrase it correctly. How can someone believe that they are doing something of any worth if their actions are so dependent on others'? And how can one live knowing their imprint is invisible?
I'm going to do something, not for my imprint but for yours. Maybe mine will be made in the process, but it is important that yours is left regardless of what happens to mine. Being invisible has had its benefits – I have the eyes that you never had – but I still find myself hesitating, wondering if there is more to know. There's little to do save actually doing something, but hope is gone as soon as you start – it's all skill and luck – and I sort of want to keep that hope that I can succeed rather than facing the reality of either having done so or having failed. Having failed you, and having wasted every chance I ever got. It's a lot on my shoulders, but I know you had at least as much, and you took the step forward that I am so afraid to take.
Did I look up to you, and cut ties with you, because you were so admirable in the face of danger? Because I was jealous, and afraid of facing my own irrelevance?
I wish there was room for baby steps. I wish there was time for you to sweep me up and show me everything again, and give me something to do, some confidence, an answer. But I cast it away – I have to come to terms with why before I can act, I suppose. I want to act only for you, to honor your beliefs and strength, but I can't until I figure out how to understand, and act for, myself. This is the paradox.
Rest in peace, dear one, and I hope you don't think badly of me for taking so long to reach step one. I feel steadied by your memory, and will make it stand out for everyone else too.
S
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This statue seems to have one, at least! Besan the Plushie Kimbi is what most would call a petpet, a simple companion to a Neopet so that the pet does not get lonely. But Besan is not merely a petpet by this definition; she does so much more to help Siaiu than merely be a form of entertainment.
Sure, Besan was once merely that. Besan started out as a nondescript plushie given to Siaiu by her mother when Siaiu was quite young; the plushie had no life within it whatsoever but fueled Siaiu's imagination and was constantly within an arm's reach. Siaiu's mother told her that the plushie's name was Rose, after a wonderfully elegant flower, but Siaiu was a bit unsure, for she had disliked roses ever since she had inadvertently pricked her hand on a thorn. She mused as to what to name her new toy, finally deciding that she should name it after a daisy since she thought those were cheerier and less dangerous, but she didn't wish to hurt her mother's feelings. Shortly after that decision, one of her uncles came by for a rare visit; he was an infrequent guest since he spent much time involved in middle-class and lower-class life, and the family viewed him as somewhat of an outsider. Yet they were not rude to him, since his wife was still well-respected and influential in society, and when he came by to drop off a gift from his wife, he encountered Siaiu. She was sitting on the kitchen floor while a few servants did dishes, and she was musing to herself about how to name her doll. 
Siaiu's uncle bent down to her eye level and she explained to him her problem. He then asked her if she knew that there were other languages in the world than the one she spoke. Siaiu, being very young still, looked up at him with a bit of bewilderment and shook her head. There are other words for daisy, he told her. Like paquerette and ganseblumchen. Siaiu wrinkled her nose at the sound of the first one but attempted to sound out the second. Being a long word, she had little success, and over the span of a few years, the word became blurred in her mind, eventually shortening to Besan (bay-sahn) and becoming much easier for Siaiu to pronounce. It also was convenient in that it had an 's' sound just like rose, so that Siaiu's mother would think nothing of this new name because of her disinterest in really listening to and understanding her child's games with the toy.
Besan continued to be Siaiu's favorite possession as she grew older and still accompanied her on every excursion, much to her mother's disapproval and wonder. It came along on the trip to meet Flubby's family, and it was also present when Siaiu ran into the queen and her curse. However, as Siaiu noted in her story, magic never works perfectly. As Siaiu's life changed, Besan gained some of the life she had lost in her statue, such as powers to speak, move, and breathe. (However, Besan does not speak in a way that most can understand; her speech is composed of mostly grunts and squeaks, like many traditional petpets.) Besan became a petpet, so to speak, in the sense that she was not a lifeless toy anymore, but a living and breathing being. Besan also has received blurry, vague memories of life as a doll, so she is as attached to Siaiu as Siaiu is to her. In short, one of the silver linings of the queen's magic is that the imaginary relationship Siaiu had with Besan when Besan was inanimate is now real and tangible, as Besan is alive and able to interact with her and others.
Flowers have ... countenance as much as men or animals. Some seem to smile; some are pensive and diffident; others again are plain, honest and upright.
--Henry Ward Beecher
The first piece of art in this section is by me, and the second is by Hannah.
And that is where we must leave you, reader. Thank you for coming, and please return again at your leisure.
And now for the credits that have not been mentioned already.
Thank you very much, Sara, for allowing me to adopt. Siaiu's arrival was a dream come true. Thanks to Kaie for providing the base coding for this page! Thanks also to Tammi, Leah, and especially Jenypher for additional help. (:
The headshot of Siaiu in this section was a surprise (I never ask for fan art for apps, but for some reason people keep offering or just surprising me) from bon_dizzle. Thank you!
Oh, and take a link back?
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