POV - Azra'il
Birthdays, in this world, were events that occurred every five years with the particular logic of cultures that had decided annual celebrations were excessive for a life expectancy that rarely exceeded sixty years without magical intervention. Every lustrum, therefore, the family paused to acknowledge that time had passed and that its members were still present to confirm that fact, which was considered sufficiently remarkable to merit a cake.
〈Eos, comparative analysis of birthday commemoration systems across cultures I have inhabited.〉
[Summary: of the 2,847 documented systems, approximately 1,203 celebrated annually, 891 at significant lunar cycles, 498 every five years as per the local system, 187 only at decimal milestones, and the remaining 68 did not commemorate birth at all, considering the event irrelevant compared to subsequent achievements. The local system sits slightly below the statistical average but within the expected standard deviation for medieval cultures of low life expectancy.]
〈And the system of considering someone an adult at fifteen?〉
[Technically problematic from a neurological development perspective. The human prefrontal cortex, responsible for rational decision-making, impulse control, and consequence assessment, does not finish developing until between twenty-two and twenty-five years of age on average. Declaring someone an adult at fifteen is biologically premature by approximately a decade.]
〈A fifteen-year-old boy still has a voice that cracks and barely any facial hair to speak of.〉
[Correct.]
〈And a fifteen-year-old girl whose body hasn't even finished developing can already get married and run a household.〉
[Also correct, by local standards.]
〈I have inhabited cultures that considered ten-year-olds adults. I have inhabited cultures that required fifty years of trials before acknowledging maturity. The universal consensus is that nobody knows what they are doing and everyone pretends the system makes sense because the alternative is more trouble.〉
[A precise observation.]
All of this was, evidently, irrelevant to the immediate fact that Zenith had woken before sunrise that morning and the house smelt of something I provisionally classified as apple tart and enthusiastic domestic decisions.
Five years.
For a soul with more than a thousand reincarnation cycles, five years was the equivalent of a particularly short afternoon nap. For the body I inhabited, it was the entirety of existence it had ever known.
The combination of those two perspectives produced something I had learnt to recognise over the past years as one of the most unsettling characteristics of reincarnating at such an early stage: the simultaneity of feeling that five years had been the blink of an eye, and that every detail of those five years was engraved with the clarity of something that had happened yesterday.
The smell of herbs from Zenith's kitchen. The specific creak of the third step on the staircase. The sound of Paul's boots on the stone path. The plaque still driven beneath the courtyard tree with the text I had written in charcoal and that nobody had bothered to remove.
The day passed quickly, and by the time dusk arrived, the dining room had been transformed with the particular enthusiasm of Zenith Greyrat in celebration mode, which meant there were flowers in the jugs that normally stood empty, the good tablecloth that only appeared on special occasions was spread across the table, and Lilia had spent the entire morning in the kitchen with the expression of someone executing a mission she had planned with considerable advance notice.
Rudeus came down the stairs with his hair combed in a way that had clearly required effort and had lasted approximately until the second step, where gravity had reasserted itself. I came down behind him with my customary expression.
"Happy birthday," said Zenith, embracing the two of us with the effusiveness of a woman for whom time passing was something to be celebrated with immediate physical contact.
"Happy birthday," said Paul, in the tone of a man being effusive by proxy.
Roxy was seated at the table with a cup of tea and that expression she used when she was observing the Greyrat family functioning and had not yet entirely decided what to make of it.
"Happy birthday," she said, with her customary plain directness.
Lilia appeared from the kitchen with the punctuality of someone who had calculated the precise moment. "The banquet is almost ready," she said, with the professional formality she maintained even on celebratory days. Then she looked at me for a moment with that expression she used when she had something to say that was not strictly within the parameters of a servant's protocol, affection, perhaps. "Happy birthday, Azra'il."
"Thank you, Lilia," I said.
There was in her tone something that went beyond protocol. I had learnt to recognise that too.
The presents were distributed with Zenith's organisation, she having decided there was a correct order for such things and that order would be followed.
Paul went first.
He brought two packages wrapped in coarse cloth with the clumsy knots of someone who had done the wrapping himself and was not satisfied with the result, but had decided the contents compensated for the presentation.
Rudeus opened his first.
The real sword inside was of reasonable quality by local standards, with a carbon steel blade that a village swordsman could acquire without exhausting the family budget entirely. Rudeus held it in both hands, assessed it for a moment with the expression of someone genuinely attempting to feel something they were not quite feeling, and said:
"Thank you, Father. It is a good one."
It was a technically complete response that communicated, to anyone paying attention, that Rudeus Greyrat had received a sword from his father and that the sword could have been any other object of equivalent size without any measurable difference in emotional impact.
Paul had been paying attention. His expression made that particular descent of a father who had invested hope in something and found polite courtesy in its place.
Then I opened mine.
The sword was similar to Rudeus's in quality, with some differences in weight distribution that Paul had clearly adjusted for my size and build. I took it by the hilt with my right hand, felt the balance, tested the flexibility of the blade with lateral pressure, assessed the edge angle with my thumb at a safe distance.
"Carbon steel with manganese addition judging by the lustre," I said. "Centre of gravity positioned approximately one third of the total blade length from the hilt, which favours tip control over impact force. Well-suited for precision styles." I executed a test movement, the basic arc Paul had taught me on the first day of training. "The balance sits slightly towards the blade side, which will require wrist compensation for fast downward strikes. Correctable with adaptation."
I looked at Paul.
He was looking at me with the expression of someone who had just received more technical analysis of a sword than he had received in his entire life as a swordsman.
"It is a good sword," I said at last, because it was true and because there were other things to say that I preferred not to say in front of everyone.
Paul smiled. It was that wide, unguarded smile of his, the kind that appeared when something had gone better than he had planned.
Beside me, Rudeus was looking at me with the expression of someone who had received the same sword and had said three words.
"You analysed the sword," he said, in a low voice.
"Someone had to."
"You made Father happy by accident."
"I made an honest technical assessment."
"They are the same thing in this context."
I did not respond. But he was not wrong.
Zenith was next.
For Rudeus, an advanced magic book, the bound volume with the dark blue cover I had spotted in the pile in her room over the past weeks when she had forgotten to conceal it with the discretion she had planned. Rudeus opened it with the genuine enthusiasm of someone for whom books were still events.
For me, Zenith brought a light wooden box with brass clasps that I had not seen before.
When I opened it, the scent arrived before the sight.
Herbs. Not the simple herbs from the garden or the village market. Quality herbs, dried with the care of someone who understood the process, stored in ceramic pots with airtight lids that preserved the aroma without contamination. There were orange blossom petals of significantly higher quality than what Lilia bought in the village. There were rosehip petals of a colour only achievable in varieties cultivated at altitude. There were spices I had requested once and never mentioned again because they were too rare and difficult to obtain. And there were imported herbs. I recognised the container by the material of the pot, that specific clay that only came from an eastern region I had read about in Roxy's books.
At the bottom of the box was a white porcelain teapot with blue detailing and four matching cups, wrapped in soft cloth for transport.
I looked at the contents of the box for a moment.
I raised my eyes to Zenith.
She was looking at me with that smile she had when she had done something she knew was right and was waiting to see the confirmation.
"Thank you," I said. It was a simple word. It was also the first time in five years I had said it to her without any layer of calculated neutrality underneath.
Zenith did not resist. She rarely resisted anything that involved embracing her children, and this time there was additional reason. She bent down and held me in both arms, that familiar smell of sunlight and clean herbs and healing magic that I had catalogued in the first days of life and that had remained constant through five years of everything that had changed.
I did not step back.
Lilia was after, with the punctuality of someone who had calculated the precise moment within the sequence.
For Rudeus, a set of quality clothing that he received with the genuine gratitude he reserved for practical gifts. The fabric was good, that was visible, and Rudeus had learnt to distinguish quality fabric with the precision of someone who had spent years watching Lilia assess materials with that professional eye of hers.
For me, Lilia placed on the table a box smaller than Zenith's but wrapped with a care that Zenith's had not had, each fold of the paper exact, each knot of the ribbon symmetrical.
Inside were embroidery threads.
Not the threads from the village market, which were functional and had their virtues, but which I had learnt to use within the available limitation. These were different. The twist was consistent from one end to the other, the colour fixation had been achieved through a process I had not seen available in any local commerce.
Lustrous. The kind of lustre that ordinary threads cannot achieve because the brilliance comes from the base material, not from the dyeing process.
I looked at Lilia.
She had her customary upright posture and the expression of someone who had done something entirely within professional parameters and was not emotionally invested in the result.
I had learnt to read Lilia.
"It was difficult to find," she said, with the neutrality of someone reporting logistics.
"I know," I said.
"The merchant in the city said they come from a kingdom to the north."
"I know that too. Thank you, Lilia."
Lilia nodded with the minimal satisfaction of someone who had completed a task successfully and required no further comment than that.
Roxy was last, with that particular smile of someone who had been saving something and was pleased with the moment they had chosen to deliver it.
Two packages. One for each of us.
Inside Rudeus's was a wand. The stone at the tip was red with that specific translucency of material worked with care, and I had read about that type of stone in Roxy's magic book during one of the sessions where she had left the personal library available. It was the kind of material that amplified mana flow with minimal resistance, suited for someone with Rudeus's absurd reserve who needed an outlet without limitation.
Rudeus held the wand in both hands and looked at it with the expression of someone receiving something they had hoped for without knowing they had been hoping.
"Roxy-sensei," he said, in a slightly different voice from usual.
"You are going to need it," said Roxy, with her customary plain directness. "It will be your spell partner."
Inside mine was a wand similar in shape but different in material. The stone at the tip was blue, not the common blue of quartz, but that specific blue I associated with concentrated mana, the colour that appeared in my eyes when I activated them.
I picked it up.
The flow was immediate and unexpected. Not because the wand did anything extraordinary, but because the material of the stone had an affinity with the specific type of mana I worked with that I had not anticipated finding in a local object. It was like holding something that had been made for this particular pair of hands.
I looked at Roxy.
"How did you know?" I said.
She smiled with that smile she used when she had done something she knew was right but could not fully explain. "I did not know with certainty. But I have observed the two of you closely for the past two years."
〈She paid attention to the channels.〉
[To the mana usage patterns. She is good at what she does.]
The banquet Lilia had prepared was the kind of meal that happens when a competent cook decides an occasion merits her finest work and there is no budget sufficient to dissuade her.
The table was full with the particular generosity of medieval households on days of celebration, each dish positioned with Lilia's precision and Zenith's warmth, and there was in that specific arrangement the quality of something that had been made with intention.
The conversation at the table had that texture of family meals where everyone is in good humour simultaneously, which was rare enough to be noteworthy. Paul told a story about a mission that had gone wrong in a way that was evidently funnier in memory than it had been in reality. Zenith laughed with the laugh she had when Paul surprised her by being unintentionally funny. Rudeus made a remark that made Roxy laugh properly, the laugh she rarely let out completely.
I drank the herbal tea that Lilia had prepared with Zenith's new herbs, using the correct technique of temperature and proportion, and there was in the flavour something I would classify as satisfaction if I were the kind of person who classified such things.
I was not.
But there was something of the sort.
When the plates had been cleared and the dessert had come and gone and the table had that quality of after-feast where everyone is too comfortable to move, Roxy set her cup on the table and looked at Rudeus and me with that expression I had learnt to recognise as her professional mode coming through beneath the personal.
"Tomorrow," she said, "will be your graduation assessment."
The silence that followed had the particular quality of silences that arrive when a sentence changes the tone of a room without warning.
"After that," Roxy continued, with the directness that was her way of respecting people, "I will have nothing left to teach the two of you that you could not discover on your own."
Rudeus was looking at the table with the expression of someone processing information they had known was coming and still were not entirely ready to receive.
I was looking at Roxy.
"Understood," I said.
Roxy looked at me for a moment. Then she nodded with that quality of mutual recognition between two people who understand the same thing without needing further words.
Rudeus continued looking at the table.
The night in the Greyrat house had that quality of silence that comes after long, full days: the adults already retired, the hearth fire low, the world outside quiet with the particular quiet of the countryside in late autumn.
Roxy and I were lying in bed in the dark with the silence that had become comfortable over two years of shared nights.
"Azra'il."
"Yes."
"These two years have been the strangest and most interesting of my career," said Roxy, in the low voice of late-night conversations that exist in a different space from daytime ones. "Normally when I accept a tutoring position I know more or less what will happen. I arrive, I assess, I teach, I leave."
"That is not what happened here."
"That is not what happened here," she agreed. There was in her tone something I classified as genuine affection attempting not to be too obvious. "The two of you opened things I did not expect magic lessons to open."
I did not respond immediately. There was an honesty in the phrase that deserved more than a quick reply.
"You were an excellent teacher," I said at last. It was true, and I rarely said such things directly.
Roxy was quiet for a moment. Then, with the gentle movement of someone who had decided to do something before hesitation could reconsider, she turned in the bed and held me.
It was not Zenith's warm, effusive embrace. It was quieter. More careful. The embrace of someone who had learnt that people who appeared to need things least were sometimes those who needed them most, only in different ways.
"You were an excellent pupil too," she said, her voice muffled by the silver hair. "Even when you blew up the laboratory."
"The experiments were technically valid."
"They were technically valid and practically dangerous."
"The intersection of those two states is where knowledge advances."
Roxy laughed, low, the kind of laugh that comes out when something is both funny and true.
I did not pull away.
We stayed like that for a moment I decided not to measure. Then Roxy shifted slightly, but not entirely, and there was in the silence that followed the quality of someone who had something more to say and was choosing how to say it.
"May I ask you something?" she said. "Something I have been curious about since the beginning, but felt was not my place."
"You may."
"Your eyes." She paused, organising her thoughts. "From the very first day I noticed they were different. But especially when you are concentrating on magic, when you are performing a more complex spell. The mana around them changes. They become brighter in a way that is not simply a reflection of the light."
I was quiet for a moment.
There was the question I had known was coming since that afternoon in the courtyard, when Roxy had looked at my eyes with that particular attention and had filed the information away with the patience of someone willing to wait for the right moment.
I decided how much to tell.
"You must have noticed that I am different from the rest of my family," I said. "The hair. The eyes."
"I thought it might be some form of albinism at first," said Roxy. "But albinism does not explain the luminescence."
"It does not," I agreed. "I was born this way." It was technically true. I had been born this way in this life, and the fact that the origin was more complicated than that phrase suggested was a distinction I did not need to make right now. "The eyes do something that ordinary eyes do not."
"What?"
I activated the eyes at a low level.
The world shifted in a subtle but immediate way: Roxy's mana meridians became visible with the clarity of something illuminated, her channels glowing with the constant flow of a well-trained mage at rest, the central reserve pulsing with the gentle rhythm of a system that had found its equilibrium.
"I am seeing you now," I said. "Your meridians. The mana flowing through the channels. The central reserve and how it is distributed. If you were to begin conjuring a spell right now, I would know which one before you finished forming it, from the activation pattern of the magical channels."
The silence that followed had the particular quality of someone integrating information that was simultaneously impossible and entirely consistent with everything they had observed.
"You can see mana," said Roxy, in the voice of someone confirming something aloud so that reality makes the fact more real.
"I can see mana," I confirmed. I deactivated them. The familiar tingling appeared behind the eyes with its usual reminder that this body was still too small to sustain that for extended periods. "I cannot use them constantly. It overloads the body. Headache, tingling, sometimes pressure behind the eyes if I push too hard."
〈The current body is still far too underdeveloped for what these eyes are capable of.〉
I did not vocalise the thought.
"I have never heard of anything like it," said Roxy, slowly. "In no text I have studied, in no account from any mage I have met... Do you know what blessed children are?"
"Blessed children? No."
Roxy settled slightly, assuming the tone she used when she was teaching something new but not in a lesson context. "In some cultures, especially the older ones, there is a belief that certain children are born with characteristics that go beyond the genetic. Powers or abilities that cannot be explained by family lineage. The common explanation is that they were blessed by some deity or higher force before or during birth. I think Rudeus would be considered one, because of the mana reserve. You, because of the eyes."
I processed that.
There was considerable irony in the possibility. A sorceress who had fought against curses in another life, an entity who had accumulated power across enough cycles of existence to make the concept of divine blessing a comically inadequate simplification, being classified as a blessed child by local standards.
〈Actually, it is rather convenient.〉
[Please elaborate.]
〈Blessed children are born with inexplicable abilities that nobody questions because the official explanation is divine. If I am classified as one, nobody will go looking for the origin of the eyes, the mana reserve, or anything else I might eventually need to use without explaining where it came from.〉
[A narrative cover that already exists within the local cultural system and requires no active maintenance on your part.]
〈Precisely.〉
"Perhaps," I said aloud to Roxy. "It would be a reasonable explanation."
Roxy nodded with the composure of someone who had received an incomplete answer and had decided it was sufficient for now.
"It makes sense," she said.
We were quiet for a moment, each with our own thoughts about what had been said and what had not.
Roxy yawned with the discretion of someone attempting to be discreet and not quite managing it. "Tomorrow is going to be a long day."
"It is."
"Are you worried about the assessment?"
"Not in the slightest."
"Of course not," she said, in the mildly amused tone of someone who had anticipated exactly that answer. "Good night, Azra'il."
"Good night, Roxy."
The silence of the night returned, quieter now, with that quality of after important conversations that have given what they had to give.
I lay on my back looking at the dark ceiling.
A birthday celebration. Gifts chosen with care. A late-night conversation with a teacher who had seen more than I had planned to show and had kept it with respect. A graduation assessment tomorrow that would close a chapter.
〈How long has it been since a life cycle had a first five years worth having?〉
A pause longer than usual.
[I am checking the archives.]
〈It may take some time.〉
[It may.]
I closed my eyes.
Beside me, Roxy's breathing had settled into the even rhythm of someone who had found sleep with the ease of a person not avoiding anything.
Tomorrow there was an assessment. After the assessment, there would be other things. There were always other things.
For now, it was enough to have arrived here.