The grass sways with a gentle breeze which also ruffles Wester's hair as he eagerly bounds through the field. Every once-in-a-while, since his steps are awkward and he pays no attention to where his feet land, he hits the ground. In the way of small children, whenever this occurs he simply bounces back up and keeps going, accumulating stains and dirt. His little hand, still a bit pudgy with baby fat, guides his toy pteroplane through the sky, imitating the real pteroplanes that he sometimes sees pass overhead. "Vrrrrrrrum!" Wester says as he imagines himself taking off. "Whoooosh, whoooosh!" He angles the toy into wide turns. "Whooosh!" The toy rises until Wester cannot reach any higher, and he roars, "Nyeorrrrrrrw!" as he brings it down in a dive.
Just as Wester is about to change course, he hears people approaching from the direction of the school house his mother has told him he will attend in a few years. A couple of older kids burst into view, both with bright, fiery shocks of hair. They chatter rapidly, sometimes bickering, which leads to them pushing each other back and forth. The boy, who is the smaller of the pair, is easily knocked off-balance and falls on his rump. "Oof. Hey!" he exclaims, pouting. The girl, now a few feet in front of him, sticks her tongue out at him and turns back to the field. She brandishes a wooden sword and charges with a battle cry and a grin as large as the Western Cloudsea, her hair streaming behind her like a banner.
Wester turns to his mother, who is sitting on a nearby bench, to see what she thinks of this rather intimidating comet of energy streaking towards him. If the girl was a threat, Wester knows that his mother would be calling him over to her and swiftly taking him home. He is uncertain what to expect in this case, but he sees that his mother remains placidly seated. She smiles at him and nods; that's their signal to reassure each other that everything is alright. Closer and closer the girl comes, whooping and hollering, with the boy running after her. Wester turns to look at them as his mother calls out, in the tone she uses when speaking to him, "Lira, Caswin, be careful! Wester is only three."
"Yes, ma'am," the girl, Lira, replies, stopping as she addresses Wester's mother. "Okay, Mrs. Territt," the boy, Caswin, shouts just a split second after Lira gets the first word out. While speaking, he forgets that his legs are still running and does not notice that Lira's are not. Caswin's eyes are on Mrs. Territt as he crashes into Lira's back, sending them both tumbling to the ground in front of Wester. Though Mrs. Territt tries to spare their pride by hiding it, her laughter bubbles over at their antics. On the ground, Lira squirms as she attempts to extricate herself from the wriggling cluster of limbs and backpacks. "Caswin," she groans, "get your butt off my arm." Meanwhile, Caswin is rattling off sentences so quickly that Wester can barely make sense of them. He does manage to catch snippets of meaning, such as how sorry Caswin is, how he was just distracted, and how he's trying to get off of her. Caswin gesticulates wildly with his hands as he speaks and somehow manages to get them tangled in Lira's hair. One unplanned tug later, and Lira screeches in pain. She jabs at him with her free elbow, causing him to yelp, and growls, "Shut up, idiot. Just stop moving, and I'll get us out of this." Once Caswin calms down and focuses on Lira's instructions, it takes her less than half a minute to finally separate the two of them.
Lira exhales deeply as she rises to her feet, shrugging out of her backpack and brushing off stray leaves and pieces of grass. As soon as he is free, Caswin leaps to his feet, shouting, "Woohoo!" He then proceeds to revel in his freedom by dropping his backpack and running around the field with his hands in the air, turning the occasional cartwheel. Tentatively, Lira raises her hands to the atrociously knotted bird's nest that is her hair, testing to see whether her mother will insist on brushing it out later. She is not pleased with her conclusion. "Bothersome," she gripes. "It would be better short." Cartwheeling past her, Caswin teases, "You know Mom'll never cut it short!"
"Yes, I know," Lira snaps at him, crossing her arms huffily. Seeking a distraction from her predicament, her eyes sweep over the field, landing on Wester. She stares down at him with narrowed gaze as if the world's greatest mystery stands before her and it is her duty to figure it out. To Wester, it appears that nothing else exists for her in this moment but him. He stares back at her, wide-eyed and unnerved. "So you're Wester," she says, and it is more of a statement than a question. Wester mumbles, "Yes, 'm Wethter. 'M three," holding up three fingers to show her. That seems to relax her slightly, and she grins at him. "My name is Lira, and I'm eight." In a reciprocal gesture, she holds up eight fingers. Caswin whirls past them again, shouting, "I'm Caswin! And I'm –" "He's six," Lira interjects. "Aww, Lira," Caswin whines, "No fair!"
Lira speaks directly to Wester, but loudly enough that Caswin knows she's talking to him too, saying, "That's my stupid brother, who doesn't think to look where he's going." Caswin rebuts, "I already said I was sorry!" Lira opens her mouth, about to argue with him again, but her eye catches on the toy in Wester's hand. "Wow," she exclaims, "is that a pteroplane?" Wester nods at her, tongue-tied. Craning her head, she asks, "Can I see it?" Still wordless, Wester holds it up to her. Lira beams, the stars in her eyes practically doing backflips. Her head tilts, continuously shifting position, as she tries to examine the toy from every possible angle. "Where'd you get it?" With her smile, Wester finds his words again. "Daddy made it," he announces proudly. "That's so cool," she gushes as she lifts the toy out of his hands. "My dad flies a pteroplane like this! He's a fighter pilot." Lira zooms the toy through the air, demonstrating, as she continues, "He goes out and battles the Accipitrans. They all come at him like, 'We're gonna kiiiillll yooouu,' and he's like, 'Haha, no.' Dad shoots them all down! Like this: pyu, pyu, pyu! My dad is the best pilot in the whole world!" Lira spreads her arms wide to make her point, but, though Wester is fascinated by her tale and cannot look away, she is not looking at him anymore. So caught up in her fantasy battle is she that she starts to run around flying the toy.
"Lira," Mrs. Territt breaks through to Lira with her mom-voice, "did you ask Wester if you could play with his toy?" That makes Lira pause. "No," she sullenly replies, deflating slowly. Suddenly, Lira brightens again, turning to Wester to ask, "Wanna play together?" After a second, Wester nods his assent, and Lira springs over to him. "Look over there, Wester," she says, pointing at Caswin as she hands Wester his toy and picks her wooden sword up off the ground, "It's an Accipitran soldier! We must defend Pandion!" Caswin, taking a break from his cavorting to catch his breath, objects. "What? I don't wanna be an Accipitran!" Lira retorts, "I say you are one!" At the sight of Caswin's tongue protruding from his mouth, she continues, "I'm the older sibling and I say so!"
"But I wanna be the monkey king and send my monkeys on a quest with you!" Lira snorts at that. "Monkey king? There are no monkeys in war!" She taps Caswin on the head with her sword. "Ow," he exclaims, rubbing at the spot, "that hurt! Meanie."
"I barely touched you," she sniffs, turning up her nose. Lira looks at Wester, then sets her gaze on Caswin again as a scary grin settles across her face. "Now you better run, Accipitran dog, before I do worse!" Caswin does not need to be told twice; he bolts away in fear. Wester feels Lira grab his wrist and drag him along as she charges after her brother. Somewhere along the way, Caswin and Lira ease up and begin to giggle at all the very, very serious dramatic posturing they do as part of their roles, and Wester giggles with them, though he is not always sure why. All he knows is that this fey girl has swept him up in her adventures and he thinks he could do this forever.
Caswin dies when Lira pokes at him with her sword. His death is appropriately melodramatic, and Wester enjoys it, but cannot help but stare up at Lira as she stands triumphant over the body of her enemy. He sees the fire in her and is in absolute awe.
With the battle finished, they need a new adventure. Lira thinks for a second, then comes up with a scenario in which they get to explore the whole world. It happens to include monkeys. She will not admit to any reason for her choice that is not, "I just felt like it." Caswin smiles widely at her anyways.
This is Wester's earliest memory.