Did you know that babies possess scandalously sensitive skin?17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuf5gYl9RAc
I, regrettably, did not.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5hWkw90FAN
I once used an exotic soap. For you and your cloths. Sandalwood-scented, expensive, decadent, from a faraway land. I used it one evening to wash your linens, assuming,17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡt5PHi494rJ
"This will make her smell less like... sour milk and unidentifiable bodily fluids."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTZPWrtXCik
What followed was a furious, red, diabolically itchy rash across your thighs and back that had you crying non-stop for nearly two days. A rash no demon could have conjured better.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJlqrg5sQFn
I was beside myself. I applied everything I had: witch salves, cold compresses, whispered apologies.
Eventually, I called Grellborn. Not because I wanted to. I had no other choice.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJbI3C35anT
I saw him wandering over the field to my little castle, as always, in an invisible fog of damp moss, old smoke, and the faintest memory of lavender and other herbs my sensitive nose couldn't identify.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxJboXqZS9j
He looked you over briefly with a skilled look. Your red, irritated skin, your flailing little legs, your furious wailing. Then he looked at me. For a long time. Finally he said, "What... did you do?"17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWMsR4N2bka
"Bathed," I growled.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKW2DmQAiuZ
"With what?"17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWVuCVoCjIm
I hesitated and shifted my weight from one foot to the other. "Sandalwood soap. From Al-Mahrak. I thought..."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8pTzZS9Ixu
"Of course you thought that," Grell interrupted dryly. "A baby's skin is as delicate as a spring flower. Too much sun and it wilts." He sighed in disappointment and shook his head like I'd just violated the fundamental laws of alchemy.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBIzPMHdJ6J
Then he reached into his robe and pulled out a small, greasy vial.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYWOjGKTo7L
"Here. When you said she had a rash, I quickly prepared this. A concentrated infusion of oats and calendula. Pour it into her bath, soak a linen cloth in it. No magic. Just plants. Usually that's enough. Godbless"17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUGddP0bvBc
He handed it to me like it was the Holy Grail. I took it.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQMkogsccGy
And bowed... inwardly.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZNiZ2hXQkk
Outwardly, I raised a single brow. He smiled. He knows that's all the humility he'll get from me.
Once your skin returned to normal, I reverted to the plainest, most boring soap I could find: unscented, colorless, uninspired. And that was perfect for you.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOzxzJ68jyH
17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHsIXlEgpN2
I read deep into the night: Anatomy. Psychology. Human development. Hormones, the stages of the mind. It became part of my research. You were no longer merely a child. You were a living doctoral thesis.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJqqoLKFbBN
I read obsessively during those early months. Everything I could uncover about human development. Midwives' journals. Alchemists' charts on bodily humors. Even a musty, dust-choked scroll on the "connection between womb and spirit."
What remained with me was the theory of a long-dead scholar. He could've been Grellborn's tidy, better-smelling, academic cousin, that touch shapes the infant brain. That skin-to-skin warmth builds trust. And that neglect in the first months can permanently distort the capacity for empathy.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡV1wgGtntjq
I remember closing the book and watching you sleep by the fire.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNbg6uiJHnO
"Very well," I murmured. "Let us see what cold skin makes of you."
I tested your grip. Your gaze. Your response to stimuli, as prescribed in the medical tomes. I was oddly pleased to find that you appeared completely normal. You were a healthy baby.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfj0k9gxGuj
And then, finally, you smiled. A toothless grin aimed directly at me.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgyYvNocFAK
No fear. No confusion.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKUp1Zg8IfV
It was pure recognition.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr3s5jIgN5H
Strange, isn't it? To be seen by a creature.
You must understand... I had centuries of knowledge. Philosophy, languages, politics, necromancy, court etiquette, even the subtleties of seduction.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb8wLQwMuNa
But... babies?17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYl2jsdbIef
Babies are chaos incarnate, wrapped in blankets and sweetly scented.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNNL8a1p8WK
You cannot negotiate with a baby. I tried, believe me.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7TQMHrBZe5
I genuinely thought, "If I speak to her calmly and rationally, she'll grasp the futility of this tantrum."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡa1LQLnhp4F
So I stood there saying things like, "Now, child, if you would only consider the inevitability of this diaper change..."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkZcJuavpXM
Screaming intensifies.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡe8DSQO2dwC
They don't negotiate. They demand. Their logic is ancient and absolute. Hungry? You scream.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMwCsN136Bj
Tired? Scream louder. A wisp of cold air? Summon the dead with your cries.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4oAaxgukdL
Sleep was the most peaceful time. Yours, not mine. I sat by the fire, reading old folios, pretending not to glance over every few minutes just to make sure you were still breathing. And yes, once or twice I pressed a cold finger to your chest, just to feel the heartbeat beneath. You were that peaceful sometimes.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyWD5m7rFiZ
Pure precaution of course.
Grellborn once told me about babies who fall asleep at night and never wake up, and no one knows why. I didn't know whether it was true or if the old man was just trying to scare me.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡy1qgJpW1ax
Sometimes, when the nights were long and the wind howled around the house, I whispered to you. Never lullabies, by all the dark gods. Never. They were stories. Of ancient cities that rose and fell. Of monsters. Of hunger and blood. I thought that if I fed your mind with my world early enough, you'd grow into it. Become something other than a fragile human. Something... mine.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYePSdFDhLA
But it wasn't always like that.
I was naive enough to believe I could gently ease you into a kind of rhythm. A daily structure. A ritual. You sleep, I read. Everything would be neat, quiet, harmonious. I was so wrong. 17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOg4IToGIyP
You laughed in my face. Repeatedly. At 3AM. While the moon tucked herself behind the dark clouds in what I can only assume was secondhand embarrassment, you delivered a kick to my ribs.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL2Ph0yuui8
Your rhythm became mine.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrXorwJbahU
And I began to understand why sleep deprivation is used as torture.
And your tantrums? I learned quickly. I carried you against my chest, tightly swaddled, murmuring nonsense in a voice soft as dark wine... and you grew quiet. Not from affection, mind you. I suspect it was merely the rhythm of my voice. Grim, cold, but consistent. Always there. As if it were the only constant in your world.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz6Df6dBKli
There were moments when I looked down at your sleeping face and thought: What have I done? But those thoughts passed.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwlPkn5iN8c
Because you lived. And that, my little experiment, was the only victory I needed.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFnsIQCiCjC
Still, I had underestimated my undertaking. Severely. I foolishly assumed that as long as you were fed, clean, and warm, you would simply... lie there.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡErPMhchPF5
Quiet. Adorable. If wet nurses could do it, so could I. Or so I arrogantly thought.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWgTRcvjBqn
No. Babies demand engagement.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbAiH0I331A
You wanted someone to speak to you. To read to you. To show you the world. You were so eager to discover the wonders of this world.
One day I left you with a rattle. When I returned, you were furious. How dare I leave you unentertained.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡanbD96BODw
From that point on, I read aloud to you whatever my shelves offered: grimoires, treatises, even lewd poetry (not that you understood any of it).17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQ68VZccflx
I sang dramatic opera arias, what fragments I could recall. With more drama than voice.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTwK0lnUDOV
And I invented absurd, grotesque, spontaneous fairytales. Of toads that devoured mad kings. Of witches who stole babies that cried too loud.
Sometimes you laughed. Sometimes you looked at me as if I'd gone utterly mad.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZZdLAHDHLm
And perhaps I had.
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