23/13/78
Church of Aelith Entry number 34, by Father Celdric.
One week ago I found the most surprising thing upon the altar of our goddess: a baby with physical qualities I had never seen before.
The baby was a girl with white hair, red eyes, and elven blood.
When I found her she was very weak. She did not look older than a week and had survived an entire winter night alone upon the goddess's altar, yet even after all of that she was smiling, and the room was warm.
At first I did not know what to do about her. I was paralyzed, confused by the sight of the child.
Then Sister Mayreel entered the room and, as efficient as ever, she started a fire, left me with the baby near it, and went to search for milk.
The baby began to cry.
"Shh, you will be okay," I said to the little girl in my arms while I tried to calm her.
This did not work. She began to cry harder.
I was panicking, and my panic only made the baby cry louder. I did not know what to do apart from talking to her and gently rocking her in my arms.
It was not working.
Then a warmth spread all around me.
The baby calmed down and began to laugh.
At that very moment Sister Mayreel returned, slightly breathless, a small flask of goat's milk clutched tightly in her hands. She stopped at the doorway when she saw us-the child laughing in my trembling arms, the air around us still faintly warm despite the modest fire.
"Father Celdric?" she asked carefully. "Is she...?"
"She has stopped crying," I answered, though my voice sounded distant even to my own ears.
Mayreel wasted no more time. She knelt beside us, poured the milk into a small feeding cup, and carefully guided it to the child's lips. The baby latched onto it eagerly, drinking with surprising strength for one so small and frail only moments before.
As she fed, her red eyes seemed to glow in the firelight-not menacingly, but with a strange awareness. Sister Mayreel noticed it too; I saw her hesitate, just for a heartbeat.
"She is no ordinary child," Mayreel whispered.
"No," I replied. "She is not."
When the baby finished, she gave a small contented sigh and curled her tiny fingers around Sister Mayreel's thumb. The warmth in the room lingered, gentle and steady, as though the goddess herself watched over the child.
I cannot yet say what this means.
After a reunion with the other members of the church, we decided to put up search notices in the nearby villages to help her parents find her. Brother Halven suggested adding a small drawing of the child, but as none of us possess any artistic talent beyond illuminating letters, the idea was quickly abandoned. It is better no parent sees such a drawing and assumes we have found a forest goblin instead of their daughter.
During the meeting, Sister Mareen proposed that we give the girl a name-even if only a temporary one for the time she remains with us. "We cannot keep calling her the baby," she argued. "It sounds as though we found her in a basket of turnips."
She was correct.
Three names were proposed.
Claire. Proposed by me. A simple, respectable name. Easy to write. Easy to pronounce. Unlikely to summon ancient powers by accident.
Lira. Proposed by Sister Mareen. She claimed it sounded musical and light.
Aelindra. Proposed by Sister Mayreel, who insisted the child deserved a name "worthy of prophecy." She said this while the baby was attempting to chew on her sleeve.
At the end, the rest of the church voted.
I would like to note that Brother Halven voted twice, claiming "divine inspiration" the second time.
The vote was still counted.
The name that won was Lira.
And so she is now Little Lira of the Church of Aelith-white-haired, red-eyed, eater of sleeves, and bringer of inexplicable warmth.
I only hope Lira's parents find her soon. They must be very worried.
Though, if they are the sort of people who misplace glowing elven infants upon sacred altars in the middle of winter, I suspect we may have a longer stay ahead of us than first expected.
End of entry.
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6/14/78
Church of Aelith - Entry number 37, by Father Celdric
It has been three weeks since the child we have named Lira was placed upon our altar, and I find myself writing more about feeding schedules and sleeping patterns than scripture.
The first days were... chaotic.
None of us were prepared for the volume a creature so small could produce. Sister Mareen insists her cries echo differently in the chapel-"like a choir of offended mice," she says. Brother Halven claims they carry surprising authority for someone who cannot yet hold her own head upright. I am inclined to agree.
Despite the noise, Lira has grown stronger. She feeds well, sleeps often (though rarely when we do), and has developed a firm and uncompromising grip on any finger offered to her. I have lost feeling in my left index finger twice this week alone.
Yet there is something we have come to understand, slowly and with heavy hearts.
Lira does not see.
At first, we thought her merely calm. She did not startle at sudden gestures or follow the movement of candlelight as most infants do. Sister Mayreel tested this gently, moving her hand before the child's red eyes. There was no tracking, no flinch. Only that small, peaceful expression.
We tried again in different ways-soft light, brighter light, shadows upon the wall.
Nothing.
Her eyes are clear. Beautiful, even. When the firelight touches them they gleam like polished rubies. But they do not focus. They do not search.
When Sister Mareen dropped a spoon beside her cradle, Lira startled at the sound immediately, turning her head with remarkable accuracy toward it. Her hearing, it seems, is keen. She quiets at the sound of our voices and grows especially calm when Sister Mayreel hums evening hymns.
But she has never once looked at any of us.
I confess this realization struck me harder than I expected. A child abandoned upon a winter altar is tragedy enough. Blindness feels like an additional cruelty.
And yet... she does not seem troubled.
When she laughs-which she does often now-it is in response to touch, to warmth, to voices. When I rock her in my arms, she reaches up not randomly, but deliberately, mapping the shape of my face with curious fingers. Yesterday she found my beard and held it with such triumph that the entire clergy bore witness to my defeat.
"She does not need sight to know you," Sister Mayreel said softly.
Perhaps she is right.
There are moments, particularly at night prayers, when the chapel grows warm around her cradle, the same gentle warmth as the day I first held her. It lingers longest when she smiles at nothing we can see.
I no longer believe she was merely left here.
And I no longer believe her blindness is an accident.
Whatever purpose fate has for this child, it has not been diminished.
If anything, it feels sharpened.
End of entry.
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23/5/79
Church of Aelith - Log number 53, by Father Celdric
Lira has been attempting to speak for several weeks now.
At first it was only determined babbling-strings of sounds delivered with great seriousness, as though she were reciting ancient doctrine in a language known only to herself. She sits by the hearth, tilting her head toward our voices, shaping syllables with careful concentration. When corrected, she grows indignant, which I take as a promising sign of intelligence.
Her walking progresses as well.
Her blindness has not slowed her as much as we once feared. She maps the chapel with her hands and feet, counting steps from the altar to the pews, from the pews to the doorway. Sister Mareen stitched small variations in the rugs so Lira may feel where she stands. She runs her fingers along the stone walls as if reading them.
She falls, of course. Frequently. But she rises with stubborn resolve that would shame seasoned knights.
There are moments-many, in truth-when she stops in the center of the chapel and smiles upward toward the vaulted ceiling. The air warms faintly around her when she laughs. Not always. But often enough that we no longer pretend it is coincidence.
She hums hymns she has heard only a handful of times.
She reaches toward the altar unerringly, even when carried in from outside.
Her connection to the goddess is not taught. It is... remembered.
This morning, however, brought an event of far greater consequence.
Lira was seated beside me while I prepared notes for evening prayer. She was unusually quiet, which should have warned me something was coming. She touched my sleeve, then my hand, then my beard-still her preferred method of confirming my identity.
She took a breath.
"Da... Celdric."
I smiled automatically. "No, Lira. It is Father Celdric."
She frowned in concentration.
"Dad... Celdric."
I opened my mouth to correct her again.
And then I understood what she had said.
There was a long silence in which I am certain my expression resembled that of Brother Halven when confronted with advanced arithmetic.
I informed her, very calmly, that I am Father Celdric.
She responded by patting my face and repeating, with unmistakable certainty:
"Dad."
I did not cry.
This is an official record of the Church of Aelith, and it shall state clearly that I did not cry.
There was merely... moisture. In the air. Possibly from the fire.
The rest of the clergy, having witnessed this exchange, later proposed that if Lira insists on the matter, it may be appropriate that she bear my surname.
I reminded them that such matters require contemplation and prayer.
They reminded me that she has already decided.
I shall reflect upon this.
End of entry.
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23/5/79
Supplemental Entry - Sister Mayreel
For the sake of accuracy in the church archives:
Father Celdric cried.
He cried immediately after Lira said "Dad," though he attempted to disguise it as a coughing fit and then blamed the incense, despite there being no incense lit at the time.
He lifted the child as though she were made of glass and held her so tightly that Sister Mareen had to remind him she still required oxygen.
Lira, for her part, appeared extremely pleased with herself.
The proposal that she take his surname was suggested while Father Celdric was still attempting to regain composure. He objected weakly. No one listened.
For the record, the warmth in the chapel during this event was stronger than usual.
Also for the record, Father Celdric has been smiling at absolutely nothing for the remainder of the day.
End of entry.
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14/13/79
Church of Aelith - Log number 78, by Father Celdric
Today we celebrated Lira's first birthday.
As we do not know the true day of her birth, the clergy agreed that the fourteenth day of the thirteenth month would be hers. It felt right to choose a day in the heart of winter-the season in which she was given to us.
She is one year old.
One year of warmth. One year of small hands reaching without fear. One year of a voice that has reshaped this quiet church more thoroughly than any sermon.
Lira does not understand the concept of a "birthday," of course. When we told her the day was special, she responded by attempting to chew on the corner of my sleeve and declaring "Mine?" with great authority.
Sister Mareen baked a small honey cake. Lira was allowed to touch it before we placed it on the table. She examined it with careful fingers-pressing gently into the icing, tracing its uneven edges, discovering Brother Halven's decorative "star," which she identified as "sticky."
She approved.
At one year, she walks-carefully, stubbornly, magnificently. She counts her steps in soft whispers. She knows the chapel by memory now: six small steps from her cradle to the third pew, twelve to the altar rail, four more to the place where the stone floor changes texture. We have sewn subtle patterns into her clothing and rugs so she may feel direction beneath her palms.
She falls less often.
When she does fall, she scolds the floor.
At dusk we gathered near the altar where she was first found. I carried her to the center and set her on her feet. She reached outward until she found Sister Mayreel's hand on one side and mine on the other.
Then we began to sing.
Lira cannot see the candlelight, nor the way the fire flickers against stone. But she hears everything. The tremor in uncertain notes. The breath before a verse begins. The way voices blend when we finally find the same key.
As we sang, the warmth in the chapel began to change.
It did not simply grow warmer-it responded.
When our song rose, the air brightened with gentle heat, brushing against our faces like sunlight through winter glass. When the melody softened, the warmth softened too, settling around us like a shawl. It shifted with the rhythm, pulsed faintly with the harmony.
Lira stilled in my arms.
Her small fingers tightened around mine.
And she laughed-bright, delighted, as though hearing someone join us that the rest of us could only feel.
The warmth moved in time with the music.
Almost as if it were singing along.
When we finished, the air lingered warm for several breaths before easing back into the ordinary chill of winter stone.
We helped Lira blow out the candle. She does not understand flames, only that we take a breath together and make a rushing sound toward something she cannot see. She blew with impressive enthusiasm in entirely the wrong direction. We adjusted accordingly.
She clapped for herself.
Tonight she fell asleep quickly, one hand wrapped in my robe, the faintest smile still resting on her face.
One year ago she lay alone upon cold marble.
Now she sleeps surrounded by voices she knows by heart.
If the goddess sings, I believe Lira hears her.
End of entry.