Did you know that babies possess scandalously sensitive skin?26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqCgeE4n7Fi
I, regrettably, did not.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm1V5tuiPyi
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,26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYrD32AQD8K
"This will make her smell less like... sour milk and unidentifiable bodily fluids."26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTzk9VbnNtc
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIkqI5AFzlI
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQdwfWfXr4P
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSyGbm9i66n
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?"26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvnrNqC5gw1
"Bathed," I growled.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDM3nG2KZA9
"With what?"26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡubiZTGwiDw
I hesitated and shifted my weight from one foot to the other. "Sandalwood soap. From Al-Mahrak. I thought..."26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHVL3Uq54qS
"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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKyQB39198H
Then he reached into his robe and pulled out a small, greasy vial.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL69RXxrowU
"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"26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtKCfUrvT79
He handed it to me like it was the Holy Grail. I took it.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4VbILGmVvL
And bowed... inwardly.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6jKSmQWRL8
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡASODzChZtC
26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWv1IRpbybc
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmE0rjPVMWF
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtQvzoAXM2j
I remember closing the book and watching you sleep by the fire.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMsGylfgyAK
"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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb0QluUqCox
And then, finally, you smiled. A toothless grin aimed directly at me.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7t6owelhTv
No fear. No confusion.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4IaqK3HpJm
It was pure recognition.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjvXciCXwC2
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCe7P8noL10
But... babies?26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ52JbJcw3YB
Babies are chaos incarnate, wrapped in blankets and sweetly scented.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUzWESDBPt8
You cannot negotiate with a baby. I tried, believe me.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5ojwdim0b5
I genuinely thought, "If I speak to her calmly and rationally, she'll grasp the futility of this tantrum."26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ41mVJxByFf
So I stood there saying things like, "Now, child, if you would only consider the inevitability of this diaper change..."26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡp6xuriHzWG
Screaming intensifies.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZL6fuV2Zho
They don't negotiate. They demand. Their logic is ancient and absolute. Hungry? You scream.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡelAN0Uinxq
Tired? Scream louder. A wisp of cold air? Summon the dead with your cries.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcKhB9Oy7kL
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7A5HJPeBes
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8gWKUjkJXN
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf3NfPLLGLs
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. 26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkImwhCCPm4
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLNhegM0AeL
Your rhythm became mine.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡveOlLNnU29
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGHi2JmaWTL
There were moments when I looked down at your sleeping face and thought: What have I done? But those thoughts passed.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6SPeeUeGum
Because you lived. And that, my little experiment, was the only victory I needed.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf6VsFOqjTs
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLkMZWIktUC
Quiet. Adorable. If wet nurses could do it, so could I. Or so I arrogantly thought.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7xw71cLljV
No. Babies demand engagement.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUA5Q5gMeZN
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWdoPQeBa8Y
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).26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡETRhDjzkuf
I sang dramatic opera arias, what fragments I could recall. With more drama than voice.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjPrQ4o2LjD
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.26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZtj17Ucko6
And perhaps I had.
26Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8sIz8EvmUM
然後按「加至主畫面」