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With the untimely loss of her mother, Maya also loses her native Belarusian language. She doesn't understand her Austrian aunt, who takes care of her in a remote Austrian village. In her aunt's secluded home, the girl's childhood passes in a monotonous way. Only Marek, a neighbour who was taken from Poland to Austria for forced labour during the Nazi era, is able to create an atmosphere of security and human warmth for Maja. The sound of his mother tongue evokes memories of her own lost roots and lost language, which she will later go in search of.

Language indirectly acts as one of the leitmotifs in the short story The Owls Fly Silently. Its protagonist, Jakob, grows up in the oppressive silence of his parents' home. The few and brief contacts with the outside world give the frightened boy the idea that winter nights are not so long outside the forester's house. Jacob's subconscious desire to escape from his fears and his father's abuse cannot but have fatal consequences.