In the city of Urulu, where I often went as a young boy, there lived a man named Mot. Him and Dianite were good friends. One day, as I arrived there, 8 years old, Mot told me that he had adopted a girl about my age. I was thrilled to hear it, as my only friend my age was Alva.

The girl was small, only 4 years old. She had long, brown hair and worn-out clothes made of leather. There are two reasons that she stands out as an important part of my childhood. Firstly, we instantly clicked, and she became my best friend as well as Alva's. Secondly, I didn't know what hardship really was until I met her. Her parents had been poor merchants, and couldn't support her. They simply handed her off to Mot, as if she was meaningless. The first time I had felt true sadness was when I heard her story. I made a choice, that day, to always be by that little girl's side. If nobody else, she would always have me. Nothing else would ever harm her.

Or so I hoped.

We were sitting on a bridge in Dagrun, our shoes and socks off, our feet in the cool water below. She was telling me her background, and I was telling her mine. While talking about her past, she no longer seemed 4 years old. She was wise, and could understand and accept everything that had happened to her.

"My name was Country Bat," she said, watching the river run between her toes. "It may sound strange, but it was normal where I came from. Mot said that by coming here, I was becoming a new person. And with that new person comes a new name. He let me pick it, since the new me was all about what I wanted. So I chose Alyssa. It's very different from my original name, since I'm very different from the original me, get it?"

I told her I got it, and was starting to tell her about my family when Alva ran over to us, tears streaked across her face.

"The gods are fighting again," she told us. "This time, the entire family is getting involved. Mom told me to leave, and not let any of us listen in. I'm worried."

"I'm sure it's nothing. They fight all the time, and nothing ever happens," I replied. I have always been a strict optimist, and I hated seeing Alva upset. I hated seeing anyone upset, for that matter. I firmly believed, and still believe, that everyone deserves to be happy.

But maybe that wasn't the right time for optimism.

One year later, which I remember as the last good year, Alyssa and I met up almost every day to escape our families. The people in mine were getting angrier and angrier. Ianite was going crazy, and couldn't control her godly powers anymore. Helgrind was mad at her, and Martha was mad at the family for being mad. I was going mad just listening to them. Alyssa, on the other hand, didn't know what was wrong with her father. Mot spent more and more time locked up in his house, not speaking to anyone. He didn't even talk to Dianite anymore. He didn't speak to Alyssa while she was in the house, so she decided it would be better to leave.

Alva and Freya, however, saw that the situation was getting out of hand and spent long periods of time trying to calm Ianite down. I didn't know what to do, and I'm not sure what I should've done. I'm not sure if I could've done anything.

The last time I ever spoke to Alyssa, we were in Dagrun, walking through the forest. Suddenly, we heard someone behind us calling her. Mot had come out of his house for the first time in a while, and he was telling Alyssa to come home with him. They had somewhere to go. We glanced at each other, confused. I was 10 years old. She was 6. I'm not sure what happened that day, but it was the beginning of my misery.