Evelyn Ford squatted in front of Zoe, studying her seriously.
"Auntie, it laid an egg."
Evelyn was exasperated. "Well, you hold on to it tight. Auntie has a question for you. Can you understand what the hens are saying?"
Zoe tilted her head, processing the question.
"They said they can only lay one egg a day. I said no, they have to lay two, so they pecked me."
Evelyn’s eyes lit up. "What are they saying now?"
"They’re saying bugs are yummy, and vegetable leaves are yummy too."
Evelyn called over the two wolfhounds from a short distance away, then looked at Zoe.
"Zoe, can you understand what they’re saying?"
Zoe patted the wolfhounds’ heads, giggling happily.
When she grabbed their ears, the dogs winced and bared their teeth in pain. Zoe quickly apologized, but her hands didn’t loosen their grip one bit.
The wolfhounds barked twice. Seeing Zoe’s reaction, Evelyn knew she didn’t understand them.
’Looks like she can only understand chickens. Still, that’s a pretty amazing ability.’
Evelyn told Ronan Kendrick about it, and even he was a little surprised.
"If she can understand animal language, that means she can perform Beast Taming."
"But she can only understand chickens," Evelyn sighed.
Ronan smiled and pinched Evelyn’s cheek. "That’s already an extraordinary gift. If she can understand chickens, she might be able to understand other birds. You should let Lola out tomorrow and have her try."
Ronan paused, then continued, "Can she only understand them, or can she communicate with them?"
"She can communicate, it seems. She said she told the hens to lay two eggs a day, and they pecked her."
"That’s an incredibly powerful skill." It was rare for Ronan to praise someone so highly.
"Perhaps when she’s a bit older, around six or seven, she’ll be able to master Beast Taming. Beast Taming allows one to gather information from nature. If we ever need to flee again in the future, it would be a huge help. Birds and beasts have a much stronger ability to predict natural events than humans."
Evelyn nodded. "Okay, I’ll let Quincy and Wyatt Vaughn know."
"Don’t let too many people know about this."
After all, people’s hearts are unpredictable.
The next day, Evelyn found Quincy and Wyatt and told them about it privately. However, neither of them believed her.
"How is that possible? Zoe can barely string a sentence together. How could she possibly communicate with chickens? Evelyn, are you pulling our leg?"
Evelyn shrugged. "Why would I joke about that? Everything I said is true. Zoe can not only understand chickens, she can also communicate with them. But don’t tell anyone else about this."
After calming down, Quincy thought what Evelyn said made sense. After all, she wouldn’t joke about something like this.
"So Zoe has a cheat ability, too."
"A cheat ability?" Wyatt asked.
"Uh... nothing. But this is a good thing! We have to help Zoe develop her potential. She might be a genius. Evelyn’s right, we can’t let too many people know. It’s just too incredible."
Evelyn nodded. "Exactly. How about this? I’ll lend you Lola for a while. Let her and Zoe interact more."
"Wait, Lola is a bird. Can she understand and communicate with her too?"
"Let’s give it a try. Chickens and birds are pretty similar, after all." After returning to her place, Evelyn let Lola out of her space and had a little talk with her.
She handed Lola over to Quincy, who found Zoe and immediately ran a test.
Sure enough, Zoe could communicate with Lola. But she was still young, her speech wasn’t clear, and her vocabulary was limited. Lola quickly lost her patience.
"Zoe, what did Lola say?"
Zoe got very angry, her eyes welling up with tears. "She said I’m a little fatty and that she’s going to eat me!"
With that, she burst into tears. Evelyn froze for a moment, then looked at the culprit. Lola’s round eyes darted left and right before she flapped her wings to fly away, but Evelyn caught her.
"You have the nerve to call Zoe fat? You’re so fat you look like a ball! I’m honestly worried you won’t be able to fly."
Wyatt and Quincy were also at a loss for whether to laugh or cry. They never expected Lola to be such a sharp-tongued little bird.
After being scolded by Evelyn, Lola, afraid of making her angry, quickly flapped her wings over to comfort Zoe. In just a little while, they had made up. Zoe even fed Lola the bugs from her broken bowl, and Lola nuzzled her hair.
"She says we’re friends now."
Zoe grinned happily. By the end of the day, Lola was completely exhausted—more tired than from fighting the other animals in the space.
"Ronan, Zoe can really communicate with Lola. It’s just incredible." That evening, after soothing the utterly exhausted Lola, Evelyn told Ronan about what had happened during the day.
"She can probably only communicate with avian animals. Otherwise, you’d see her talking to the bugs she digs up every day."
Ronan chuckled lightly. "Most likely."
"By the way, have you felt the temperature drop? It’s been colder these past two days than before. Is it raining or snowing outside?"
"No. If the temperature drops too sharply, another cold front might be on its way."
Evelyn sighed. "I’m really worried I’ll get arthritis when I’m older. And without sunlight, I might get skin problems too. Oh, right, I need to take more calcium and vitamin D supplements. Staying out of the sun for so long could cause health issues."
None of this affected Ronan. Evelyn took out her supplements and started sorting out her own regimen.
"You really start to fear death once you reach a certain age."
Ronan couldn’t help but laugh. He then took out a mirror and had Evelyn look at the person inside.
She looked a little haggard, and her face had thinned, but she was still very young.
"My face might not have changed, but one look at my eyes and you can tell they’ve seen some things. Look, they’re even bloodshot."
Ronan silently took out some eye drops and put them in for her.
"It’s better to be a little chubbier. You should get more nutrients. You’ll have more energy if you gain some weight."
Evelyn had noticed this problem too. After losing weight, she looked somewhat listless.
"I need to eat more sweets. Did you know that people can easily get depressed if they don’t see sunlight for a long time? Sweets can make you happy."
Ronan, in fact, had no such worries. Whether there was sun, or rain, or snow, it had no effect on his mood.
As long as he was with Evelyn, he was happy.
"Oh, right, I need to cut your hair tomorrow. It’s getting a bit long. How about you just grow it out? We could tie it in a little braid."
Every fiber of Ronan’s being screamed refusal. "I’m not growing my hair out."
"But long white hair would look so good."
"Sloppy."
"Fine, I’ll cut it short for you tomorrow."
"You haven’t knit me a sweater this year," he said, a hint of disappointment in his voice.
Only then did Evelyn realize he was still wearing the red sweater she had knit for him many years ago.
"Okay, I’ll get right on it. What color do you like?"
Evelyn was terrified he’d say green. After all, he once said he wanted a green hat.
"Red."
Evelyn nodded. "No problem. Anything else you want?"
Ronan turned to his side to look at her. "I want you to hold me."
It slowly dawned on Evelyn that she had been so busy lately, she hadn’t hugged him in a very long time.