In Loki's Honor

Life 9

Fuck dragons.

Qui-Gon was right. "There's always a bigger fish."

I thought that at the end of the rush of memories, grudges, happiness, more grudges, despair, anger, accomplishment, and struggles that composed the corpus of my various lives. I was immersed in a liquid, warm liquid. I heard a heartbeat.

This didn't happen before. Was it because my Attributes were improved? To gain consciousness still in the womb was strange. I felt an urge and tried to breathe and nothing came. I felt a tug on my neck. Damn, was I with my umbilical cord wrapped around my neck? Where is that 110 Luck when I need it?

I tried to move but I could only scrape the cord. A baby's muscles and motor control are too underdeveloped. The heartbeat I was hearing became erratic. Suddenly the pressure increased and the fluid started to flow. I was suffocating. The umbilical cord was almost entirely blocked by the knot.

The fluid was all gone. I was being pressed by the womb. The contractions came and clamped on me. The heartbeat stopped. Then resumed. The contractions came and went, irregular as well.

An external force was being applied. Someone, maybe a [Midwife], was kneading the belly, trying to make me come out.

The heartbeat stopped again. This time for good. The suffocation started for real. Without oxygenated blood on the other side of the placenta, I was domed unless I could get out. I heard sounds of flesh being cut. Differently from the cultists, they were being careful. A hand touched and pulled me out.

I lost consciousness from lack of oxygen.

Life 10

Confused, I had no idea how long it was, but I breathed. It was painful and I cried. Someone wrapped me in a soft cloth and moved me. I smelled of cigar smoke.

"It is a lovely girl, Eirana!" A woman's voice with the raspiness of old age cooed.

I was put next to a woman that smelled too sweaty to be giggling like that.

Aww. Hold on for a second.

Everything was black. I blinked. My eyelids moved. I could feel them moving. Oh, great. I discovered I was blind this time around. Maybe shifting could fix it.

"What would be her name?" the old lady asked.

"She will be called Rosewise," the sweat-smelling woman said.

I decided to lead a normal life this time. Unless the Universe conspired, I would grow, get a job, earn some money, live my life. Not marry, because I wasn't sexually attracted to men. Rosewise was blind and I couldn't shift to see if it would fix the blindness. Eirana Honorcoin was my mother's name, she was a seamstress. My father was Temus Honorcoin, and he was a baker. We were halflings. My family was not struggling to make ends meet. The community we lived in was called Tosbush and were predominantly halfling. Or Eleons, as we called ourselves.

They used shoes outdoors. The average halfling's height was about a meter tall, and their frames were a bit rounder than a human's. Our head was closer to a human's in size and that led the halflings to look like children to outsiders.

There was at least one change to the System. I couldn't access my perks and Skills without activation. Previously, they were all there, I just couldn't pull the status page. No more wonder babies, it seemed. My titles weren't showing either, thankfully. A baby with a tag saying "hero" or "queen" would be awful.

These first two years as a baby and a toddler were a good opportunity to unwind. I did baby and toddler things. Not too precocious, not standing out either. Moving around in the darkness wasn't easy but I adapted to it. Mother always made sure to put everything in the same place, always. I had some wooden block toys that I could pile up. By the texture, there might be something written or painted on them. I could feel the straight lines on the blocks where the paint was thicker.

One day, I asked my mother, "Mom, what color is my hair?"

"A beautiful shade of brown, just like a tree's bark," she answered.

Not silver. That was important to know. A pang of fear hit me. What if I didin't carry my Status with me this time? What if Wyxnos finally found a way to make me "normal" and mortal? This could very well be my last life.

Rosewise's infancy was normal. For a blind girl. Some halfling kids played outside, but I seldomly joined them. Their play was mostly running around in a game that sounded like tag.

"Rose, don't you want to play with the other children?" Eirana once asked me.

"That is fine, mother. When they want to play with me, they'll come. I can't run around like them. I like to sit here and listen to the wind and birds."

I couldn't tell her the truth. That I died to a trio of dragons and probably died in childbirth in-between. I was on vacation.

One day, Eirana asked me if I wanted to hear a story. I answered, "Death Princess!" and I heard she sigh.

"No story from the scorched continent is worth telling, daughter. Another one."

"One with a kingdom of elves!" I fished.

"There's no kingdom of elves in these parts. They come mostly from Pekothas on the other side of the ocean," she replied.

That gave me a place. I was in the third inhabited continent. The requirements for the [Cartographer] profession was to visit the three continents. I knew Apricot lived in what is now called the Scorched Continent, Lily, SIlverstreak, and Alloralla in Pekothas, which left the third continent as the one I lived in as one of my non-humanoid lives. Since I never heard about the Auvani, I believed I was on that continent.

"How is this land called?" I asked.

"This continent, Rosie, is called Auvamar."

Close enough.

When I was old enough, Eirana tried to teach me how to sew. I had the skill to use with my threads but I was blocked from accessing it. I tried to make my stitches and Eirana only encouraged me. I could run my hand over the fabric and check if they were all the same size and in the right place.

More time passed. I completed ten years. I wasn't looking forward to activating the System. I wished that my vacation could continue for more time. My stitching improved greatly. I could help Eirana with minor clothing repairs. Close holes, patch gashes.

We always had good clothes and warm fluffy bread for breakfast. Temus made sure to bring the first bread of the day to his own table. We woke before sunrise and went to bed a little while after sunset. At least I went.

The first confirmation that I had my full status but it was locked was when a plague swept through the village. It wasn't a strong one but it was seasonal. Every twelve years, it would return. It caused generalized inflammation, fever, and muscle weakness. They knew how to treat and you could only catch it once. All the children fell sick, except me. I pretended weakness to use as a smoke curtain but I couldn't fool Eirana.

"Rosie, why do you feign sickness?"

I felt bad for the falsehood, but my path was set. "All the sick children were getting attention, I wanted some of it too. To feel what they felt."

I heard Eirana sniffle, then a hand caressed my forehead. "Yes, child. We are saving money on time already. We'll take you to a priest."

Priests and I mix as well as dragons and me. Or pirates and me. Or kings and me. "No. No priests. Tell me, mother. Are my eyes different? Milky?"

She sighed, "Where do you keep hearing those things?"

"I have good ears. I hear what people say."

She didn't buy it. "No. Your eyes are lovely.

"Who does the priest work for?" I manage to say because I was thinking of the secular structure of the church, not the deity.

"She's a druid. A priestess of Yznera. She'll be here next month."

"An elf?"

She laughed. "No, silly. Elves don't come this far. He's an Eleon like ourselves."

The day the wandering druid visited our village, my parents took me to see him. I made them promise to first make a token donation.

"Come, child. Rosie, is it?" The druid said with a soft voice.

"Yes," I answered but didn't move. "Honorable druid, thank you for your time. I would like to speak with you alone, if possible."

My mother's grip on my shoulder tightened.

"I can't see why not. Mr. and Mrs. Honorcoin, would you allow little Rosie this small mercy?"

They agreed and left the room.

"Speak your mind, child."

"What do you intend to do with my eyes? What Skill or Perk will you use?"

"I'll pray to Mother Yznera for her wisdom."

"Can you talk to your mother? Hear her?" I spoke thinking of his birth mother.

"She never spoke to me directly. No."

"Honorable druid, I ask you to use the minor of cantrips on me."

This would reveal my location to Yznera. What she was going to do with that was anyone's guess but I couldn't have that happen in front of Rosie's parents. I had no idea how they'd handle the surprise.

"Why is that child?" He asked me.

"Your mother will know if you do that," I frowned as I said. It was hard to speak about something thinking of another. "There's little harm in it. I ask you to use your magic and wait. Something will happen."

I felt a hand touching my forehead. The spell went off and the energy was siphoned. The druid gasped. I raised a hand.

"Easy now. Let's wait."

He gasped again. "Mother!"

A familiar and feminine voice spoke. "Quinvias, you have served me well. I need you to go outside and never speak of what happened here. I'll talk to you soon."

I heard the druid leaving. The door closed.

"I'm sorry if I don't offer you a handshake. We need to talk," I told the Goddess.

"That we do, child. That we do," She spoke softly. Motherly.

My first thought was about Fulgen. How I left abruptly. "How are the elves?"

"They prosper, thanks to you."

"The rangers I took up the mountain, what was their fate?"

"All of them returned safely. Your battle with the dragons was seen for leagues away."

"The red one, he came for me, didn' he?"

"Understand this, Old Soul. While you settled for peace with the pantheon, there are those among us that are less pleased with the agreement. Those that sponsored your Class, in those you can rely upon. I would suggest caution around the others. The Brood Mother is leading those against you."

"She's a goddess too," I affirmed, not asked.

"That she is."

"Did you put me in the elf princess' body? It was too convenient my incarnation was right where and when the third Demon Lord was about to be summoned."

"Yes, at a great cost. We owe you a debt, champion. We still hadn't recovered from doing that. Trust me when I say we won't be manipulating your rebirth anymore. Wyxnos almost exhausted himself controlling all the random variables to make that happen."

"You can expect me to collect that debt later. Not now, though. I think I'll live a quiet life as Rosewise, the blind Eleon. No crazy stunts, no cataclysms."

"I wish you the best," Yznera's voice had a smile.

"Please tell Sariandi I'm sorry. Also that they shouldn't go after the dragons."

"I'm afraid it is too late for that. The People loved Queen Alloralla. But I'll convey your sentiments to Queen Sariandi. Our time here is at an end. Just being near you is taxing."

"I'm sorry it has to be that way. I'm having difficulty breaking my chains," Once again I summon the mental image of how hard it is to break by hand an actual metal chain. I couldn't talk about my curses directly.

"Please call my servant back. I must talk to him."

I nodded. "I'm going to the door. Please don't be near me."

"Farewell, Old Soul. Until we meet again."

I called the druid back and he rushed inside. I felt my parents' hands on me.

"Rosie, what happened? What did you do to the honored druid?" Eirana asked me with concern.

"Nothing bad, mother. If he hadn't told you that much, we can wait here and ask him later. My eyes won't be healed today. I'm sorry but I want you to know I don't mind."

Eirana's hand squeezed my shoulder. We waited for the Druid to finish talking to his goddess, and he came out. He insisted on clearing the misunderstanding and said he was sorry he couldn't help me.

Two years later, Rosewise would get her first period. In Earth years, I was sixteen, twelve in this world. The System activated for her and she found that even though her eyes couldn't see, the System windows were a visual hallucination. I spent most of this life with the windows wide open.