Chapter 3 - Growing Up (Patreon)

The room was quiet except for the rhythmic rise and fall of Quintin and Amalia’s breathing.

I laid in a pile of blankets in a makeshift crib, my body exhausted but my mind wide awake. Every time I closed my eyes, the same questions clawed at me.

Who am I? Why am I here? What am I supposed to do?

They rattled inside my skull, refusing to settle.

Nothing was trying to kill me anymore, and shelter was guaranteed. I was safe, but I wasn’t at peace. The future loomed ahead like a great, black void, and I had no map to navigate it.

Try as I did, I couldn’t remember a single thing about my life before this one. There were fragments of a cage. Some Goddess. A giant hand trying to crush me. But nothing else. Nothing else at all.

Annoying. I thought. It’s not like I can do anything even if I had the answers. It was a miracle I managed to do anything on that beach. This body is so weak and useless. It’ll be a few years before I can achieve anything. I paused for a moment. Learning is my top priority. I basically know nothing. Like it or not, I’m in this world. It may even be the world I lived in before, though I doubt it based on how my mind reacted to certain things. My little lips frowned. Take it one day at a time. You’re alive. You have a name. Take a break. Rest. You deserve it.

Finally, I went to sleep.

Time blurred.

Days, then weeks, then months passed. I was constantly fading in and out of existence, trapped in a cycle of sleep, wake, exhaustion.

I had flashes of moments—

The warmth of Amalia’s heartbeat as she held me close, singing something soft and unfamiliar.

Quintin’s rough hands adjusting a bowstring, the creak of wood and snap of a released arrow just outside our home.

The sound of rain against the rooftop, soft patters lulling me to sleep.

Tiny glimpses of life, stitched together in fleeting awareness.

But then, one day, something shifted.

I stayed awake long enough to realize it.

I don’t feel like I’m going to pass out yet. My time awake is getting longer every day. I thought halfway through a day six months later. Is my body finally adapting to me?

“You want the blanky?” Amalia sat beside me on the floor of our house, the fireplace crackling with soft, comforting embers. The rug beneath us tickled my body. “Come get it!”

I promptly reached out to snatch the cloth from Amalia, but she yanked it away at the last second.

“You want the blanky?”

Yes, obviously, I want it. I argued in my head. Give it to me. I’m bored. At least it’s something to do!

Being a baby sucked.

My mind was sharp, clear, and ready to take on the world. But my body? A useless, sluggish cage. Every movement was slow, uncoordinated, and humiliating. I could think of a hundred things I wanted to do, but not a single muscle obeyed me.

When I first tried rolling over, it felt like being trapped under a weight. I barely managed to shift an inch before exhaustion stole me away.

Sitting up and playing with another person seemed like a miracle after all that effort.

The worst part, though, was the boredom. There were only so many times I could stare at the ceiling before my thoughts blurred into nothingness. Even sleep, which should have been an escape, wasn’t. I drifted in and out of existence without control, my body dictating my fate like some cruel warden.

Free will was a dream. A luxury. And I had neither.

But things were getting better. If I’d learned anything in my time so far, it was that patience was the most powerful tool in one’s arsenal.

“Do you want the—”

I seized the blanket as quickly as possible before Amalia could finish the sentence.

Amalia recoiled, stunned. “Oh, wow! Good job!” She turned to Quintin, who was watching from the couch nearby. “She’s smart.”

“Maybe she’ll start speaking soon,” he replied with a chuckle.

I wish. I thought. The words didn’t come out quite right when I tried the last few times. Will they now?

“Faaaa!” I said. I was trying to say “food,” but the word got jumbled. Annoyed, I pouted. “FAAAAA!” I screamed louder.

“Do you want food?” Amalia asked.

I nodded on instinct as my stomach growled.

A moment of silence flushed within the house. Then—

“Wait,” they both said in unison. “Did she just understand us?

My stomach turned to ice. Oh. Shit. My mind raced through a hundred possible explanations. How much do babies usually understand at this age? I messed up, didn’t I?

Quintin and Amalia exchanged glances.

For a brief, terrifying second, I thought I’d ruined everything.

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•

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As it turned out, no. If I were a human baby, yes, but the fact that I was a devil made them jump to some unnecessary conclusions.

Since neither of them had raised a devil before, didn’t know someone who had, nor had someone they could ask about me, they concluded devils must mature faster naturally.

I started pressing the limits of what I could do from that point forward. With my consciousness fully in my control, I started acting to regained my autonomy. I tried speaking whenever I was in their presence. It took a few months, but eventually, my mouth could form garbled versions of words. Walking was easier than talking; I mastered that before I was even one.

Amalia and Quintin pampered me throughout the process; however, Amalia was the worst of the two. Just because my body prevented me from talking or acting as I wanted, that didn’t mean I wasn’t absorbing every conversation I heard around me.

The two of them tried having a baby for years. I knew that without being told. It was in the way Amalia lingered just a little too long when she held me, the way her fingers curled protectively around mine as if afraid I’d vanish.

They even tried again while I was in their room in my crib—hope, desperation, and resignation all wrapped into one.

But no child came.

At some point, Amalia stopped trying.

And me? I became enough.

That’s why, when I got older and kept asking to go outside, Amalia was very hesitant. She likely wanted to keep me inside, safe, forever. Even so, she knew I couldn’t do that. Sooner or later, I’d need to leave the house.

Thankfully, by the time I wanted to see the outdoors, my hair was already coming in. Like the woman who birthed me, it was long, thick, and dark like the feathers of a crow. It easily hid my ears, especially when Amalia helped me style it.

At some point, I started to enjoy my life and routine. I had a family, a safe place to stay, and some freedom.

Then I turned three.

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•

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“Devils are lesser than man,” I read from one of the only books in our house. It was a large, leatherbound book describing the tenets of this world’s religion, the Pantheon. “Absolute bullshit.” I tossed it aside. “Agias is the source of this garbage, huh? A whole country run by religious zealots. So stupid. That’s why Zalevet is better,” I realized, puffing up my country. “Money rules the world. That makes more sense to me.”

When I could, I spent my time learning. Since there weren’t any worthwhile books at home, I had to ask lots of questions or snoop on people when out in public.

I currently lived on the Human Continent, which was comprised of four countries: Zalevet in the south, Brosnock in the center, Agias in the north, and Viorna, the jagged peninsula to the east.

Probably not surprisingly, given how I arrived in these lands, I was in Zalevet on the southwestern coast in a little town called Sandy Branch.

Zalevet was a single kingdom built around a market-driven monarchy with an advisory council of ranked nobles. It had massive ports, a good geographical location, and the strongest connections with other continents. Brosnock, Agias, and Viorna routed all their products and trade through Zalevet to the rest of the world and vice versa.

It was a land ruled by humans…which I was not.

“Did you throw that book again?” shouted Amalia from downstairs. I was in my space, a lofted area above the living room. It had a bed, furniture, and places to store clothes—basically, it was my room.

“It annoys me,” I complained, my squeaky, three-year-old voice spread downstairs.

“Then stop reading it!”

“Why do you even have it?”

“You never pass up a free book,” replied Amalia sternly. “They have machines to make them in the cities, but the nearest one is Port Prosper. That’s days away. The market for them out here isn’t as high, so they’re expensive.”

Yeah. No school, no books, no education. I thought. If people didn’t have codexes, I bet everyone would be illiterate.

Annoyed, I sat up, picked up the shitty book, placed it nicely on my desk because I felt guilty, and went downstairs. “Can we go to the market?” I asked. “I’m bored.”

Amalia stared at me. Her eyes went directly to my ears. “Fix your hair first.”

“Oh?” I quickly bolted back upstairs until I was in front of a mirror. My ears were sticking out from my hair—pointed and long. They were only getting longer and harder to hide with age. I quickly messed with my hair, brushed it, then tied it into a low ponytail. Then, I headed back downstairs. “All done!”

“Let me look.” Amalia examined me all over. She even tugged at my hair. “Okay. We can go.”

I was basically bouncing in place as Amalia opened the door for us to leave. I zoomed outside, childish energy surging through me as the fresh, warm air surrounded me. A breeze cast over me, fluffing my clothes and hair. I couldn’t hide my smile. Being outside was the best.

Every year, right at the end of the harvest season, all the local farmers and merchants that came in to buy crops put up a small market in town. There were stalls with all different kinds of goods and food I couldn’t find any other time of year.

It was also when the local inn, Beginner’s Rest, experienced its largest influx of adventurers staying in town, eager to tackle the Forest of Beginners a few hours away. Adventuring and farming were Sandy Branch’s primary sources of income, making it busier than ever during this season.

Dozens of people filled the central part of town, where the inn and shops were located. The once vacant, dusty streets, barely populated with slow-moving locals, were now brimming with locals, visitors, merchants, and adventurers.

Amalia held my hand as we carefully moved through the stalls. Quintin wasn’t in town at the moment. He had been picked up by a group of adventurers to serve as a guide through the Forest of Beginners. That was how he kept us clothed and fed. Quintin was a former knight in his past life before settling down with Amalia. Apparently, it was love at first sight.

I kind of wish he was here, too. I thought as we looked through the stalls. A halved and curled piece of corn on a stick, loaded with spices, sat in my free hand with large chunks already taken out of it.

A group of adventurers crowded outside Beginner’s Rest. The owner, Tannin, and her husband Bruno had set up outdoor seating and served drinks to those who wanted them.

The reason they caught my attention was because, out of the six of them, two were devils.

One was a tall man with long blonde hair. Like me, he had pointed ears. He was a devil—specifically a forest devil—yet he smiled and chatted with the rest of his party.

Why do I have to hide my ears? I found myself wondering. Are they really that bad?

The other devil was a female with gray rabbit ears sprouting from her head and a small ball-like tail from her backside. She wore very…light clothing and appeared to be the drunkest among the group.

That’s a beast devil. I recalled. She looks happy.

I played with my ears beneath my hair.

Amalia spotted this and immediately stopped me. “Don’t do that.”

“But they don’t have to hide anything,” I said, gesturing at the two adventurers.

“They’re strong, and they don’t live here. They’re also adults. People are afraid of them. You are a small child who can’t use mana,” argued Amalia forcefully, tightening her grip. “Keep your ears hidden.”

Honestly, I didn’t believe her. The only devils I’d seen treated poorly were the ones with the Mark of Enslavement on their bellies. But they were slaves. If there were just devil slaves, that’d be one thing, but there were human slaves, too.

Maybe I just don’t know enough yet. I decided, opting to listen to Amalia. The last thing I want is to ruin my peace.

“Okay,” I said. “Sorry.”

Satisfied, Amalia softened her grip on my hands. “You want to buy some colorful ribbons for your hair?”

My eyes sparkled. “Yeah!”

We continued walking through the market until we reached the section where jewelry and clothing were sold. I stood a little way behind Amalia as she bought me a pretty, bright red ribbon to tie my hair.

Then, something hit me.

I fell to the ground hard, my face mushing into the dirt and my back grinding against little rocks. “Oww,” I moaned, rubbing my head before sitting up. “Why?!” I complained to whoever, or whatever, hit me.

“Oh, sorry, kid, I—” It was a merchant. He reached down to help me up, but something caught his eye. His sorry gaze turned to one of disgust. He spit on me. “Watch where you’re going, freak.”

I stared after him, stunned, as he stepped over me like a piece of trash and carried on his way down the road.

The voices of bystanders passed through my ears.

“Isn’t that Quintin and Amalia’s kid?”

“What happened to her ears?”

“It’s a devil?”

“Gross. How could they have one of those…things in their home?”

“Is it their pet?”

“It must be a slave.”

“My kids wanted to play with that thing. Better tell my wife so she keeps ‘em away.”

I knew what had happened as my hands launched to the side of my head. I could already feel cool air against the tips of my ears. My fingers touching them without the presence of hair confirmed it all.

Everyone could see my ears.

The locals were starting to chatter amongst themselves. Word spread like a wildfire in only a few seconds.

Amalia reached down to grab me and pull me up. “Let’s go home.”

“I’m sorry,” I squeaked.

Amalia didn’t say anything. She pulled me along through the streets. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me.

Then, out of nowhere, something struck me on the side of my head. Food. Some type of pie.

I stared forward, stunned.

Amalia immediately stopped and turned to me, kneeling. She wiped what she could away before turning to the crowd. “Who threw that?!”

I gazed into the crowd, too. Unlike before, I couldn’t spot a single kind eye in the crowd. Some were filled with disgust, but most were indifferent, like I didn’t even exist. Like I was beneath them.

When my gaze landed on the two devils by Beginner’s Rest, our eyes met. They stared at me with immense pity before averting their gazes, ashamed.

Amalia picked me up in her arms and walked me back to our home.

Quintin came home later that night. By the time he got to the house, the news about what had happened had already reached him. “Are you okay?” He asked me as soon as he saw me at home. “Are you hurt?”

“No,” I muttered. “Someone knocked me down, and another person threw a pie at me. Tasted terrible, though.”

Amalia was sitting on the couch with a bottle of wine, half-drunk beside her. She spent hours crying and apologizing to me after we got home. Then she passed out. When she came to, she cooked dinner, ate with me, hugged me, and then started drinking.

Quintin rubbed my head. He glanced at Amalia. “We were never going to be able to hide it forever.”

“I just want her to live a normal life,” said Amalia in a weak, broken voice laced with sorrow.

“And she will.”

Everything changed.

I finally knew what it meant to be a devil.

The ones at the inn weren’t treated like I was. It wasn’t because people respected them but because they feared them.

I needed that fear, too, if I wanted a normal life. I had Quintin and Amalia, but what would happen if they weren’t around? Could I survive on my own? Will I do good in the future? I wasn’t sure.

Suddenly, a goal for my future finally entered my head.

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Days after that incident, I asked Quintin a question I already knew the answer to: “What’s with all the marks on people’s wrists and fingers?”

We were outside. Quintin was chopping firewood, and I watched him while enjoying the cool air.

Quintin glanced at his wrists. Thick black marks were etched into his skin. They wrapped around the entire wrist in a perfect, even circle. “These? I guess it makes sense you’d be curious.” He placed his axe against his woodpile and kneeled before me so I could examine his arms. “They’re Mana Rings.”

“Mana Rings?” I repeated slowly, questioning the words.

He nodded, tracing the ones on his wrists. “When a child comes of age, these bands appear around their wrists. It’s called an awakening. Once you have these, you can use mana.”

I pointed at his fingers. There was a band on each one near his knuckles. “What about these? And why do you have four? Mom only has two.”

“These?” Quintin pointed at each of the circular, permanent bands on each of his fingers on both hands. “They let me change mana into a different element.”

“Like the fire you use for the fireplace?”

“That’s right.” He gestured at his ring finger. “This one represents fire. Because I have it, I can do this.” He held out one of his palms, and a small orb of flames danced in his hand. “See?”

I had seen him and Amalia perform magic plenty of times before. They acted as if it was normal, and I wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t for me. The only time I ever asked about it was how I could do it, and both of them said I couldn’t until I was older.

That’s about all I’d invested in the topic until now. They never lied to me, and I was more curious about the world than the ability to make fire. It was like asking why I could breathe: I could, so it didn’t matter. But now that people knew I was a devil, and I understood the implications of that, knowing more about mana seemed like a good idea.

“What about the other fingers?” I asked.

Quintin gestured to his pointer finger. “This one lets me control the ground.” Then to his middle. “This one’s for water.” He skipped the ring finger and went to his pinkie. “Wind.”

I pointed at his thumb. “Why isn’t there one there? And why does mom only have the water and fire ones?”

“The thumb is for special people,” explained Quintin. “And mommy only—”

“Stop telling her these things,” interrupted Amalia as she came out of the house.

“Oh. Sorry. I only thought—”

“She’s too young. Let her enjoy her childhood.”

“Sorry, my love.” Quintin sighed and patted my head. “I’ll tell you when you’re older.”

“But—”

“Yen, come inside and help me with dinner,” ordered Amalia. She’d become overprotective ever since the incident at the market.

“Coming…”

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Time marched on.

Two more years passed by.

My trips outside lessened since the incident in the market. The little freedoms I had were snatched away. I spent more and more time indoors. When I wanted to go outside, I had to be supervised.

It wasn’t an entirely unwarranted thing. Adults were colder to me. Some even called me a “monster” when we passed them in the streets. Oddly enough, whenever kids saw me outside, they still waved and said they wanted to play. I wasn’t sure why that was.

For two years, I tried my best to get whatever knowledge I could about mana and fighting from Quintin. At each attempt, Amalia cut him off before he could say anything, or he told me to “wait until I was older.”

It frustrated me to no end.

But I was a stoic practitioner of immense patience. Being a baby ingrained that within me. Sooner or later, they’d crack. They’d have to.

I needed to get stronger someday if I wanted the freedom those devils at the inn had. Magic seemed like the best way to achieve my goal.

I didn’t have a choice.

My ears weren’t the only things wrong with me anymore.

I laid on my bed upstairs, rubbing my head. Little bumps were forming just behind my hairline. At first, I thought they were bug bites or something, but they didn’t hurt or itch. I tried putting creams on them and having my parents check them, but nothing came of it.

They just kept getting bigger and bigger, a fact I kept to myself after a while. It was probably something devil-related that was better kept to myself.

Frustrated, I violently roughed up my hair before rolling over in bed.

But I was close to the edge.

I slammed into the ground.

“Godsdammit,” I whined as I rubbed my nose. It had smashed right into the wood at full force. “Am I bleeding?” I dabbed the area under my nostril. “No. Thank the Gods.”

“You okay up there?” Quintin called to me.

“Y-Yeah!”

“I take it you’re ready to go then?”

Without responding, I thumped downstairs with a smile on my face. “Absolutely!” I was already dressed. We were headed into the town for groceries, and I’d wormed my way into the expedition through intense whining and begging. “All ready!”

“Fix your hair,” said Amalia immediately. She tossed me a hat. “And put this on.”

“No,” I replied immediately.

“That was not a suggestion.”

“Hats hurt my ears,” I pouted. “And everyone already knows what I am.”

“Even so, it’s better to hide them. There’s no reason to remind people.”

My face firmed. “It’s not like I chose to be like this.”

Quintin and Amalia flinched.

It’d been two years since the incident in the market. Most people were used to me and ignored me. Some people still insulted me in public, but they were easy to ignore. Words didn’t hurt or affect me. It’s not like I could change their minds. Their lives didn’t matter to me, and no one has tried to hurt me since the pie.

What did I care?

It didn’t stop me from pursuing power, though. I wasn’t stupid. Violence was the key to peace if the adventurers I saw were any indicator. Or at least the key to maintaining a healthy distance between those who wished to harm me.

Regardless, I knew Amalia and Quintin thought I was holding in all my feelings and acting tough. Little comments like these softened them into giving me whatever I wanted.

“Fine. But you still have to fix your hair,” said Amalia. “Let me help you.” She tossed and touched my locks until only my face showed through my hair. She turned to Quintin, who was already holding open the front door. “We’re ready.”

“Good morning, Quintin! Amalia! Little Yen!” said Albus as we walked outside.

“Good morning!” I spoke first with a chipper, childish tone. It kept up appearances and made me look less like a freak. My arms thrust toward Albus. “Gifts?”

Albus chuckled. “Not today, little lady.”

“Awww,” I pouted.

“Come now to Uncle Albus.”

“Not a chance,” said Quintin. Before I knew it, I was lifted into the air and placed on his shoulders. “Papa is the only one who gets to carry her.”

“Papa!” I said, excited, forcing a goofy grin on my face as I lightly batted his head. “So tall! Hee hee!”

“I never get to hold her anymore,” complained Albus.

“That can’t be true,” retorted Quintin.

“It is!”

“Mhm. Maybe another time. We’ve got things to do and stuff to buy. Suspect everyone has got the same idea, or will sooner or later,” said Quintin as he deftly changed the topic. “Winter’s coming, after all.”

The three of us said goodbye to Albus and strolled down the main street through town. People greeted us along the way. The lone baker, Greta, gave me a piece of bread. The blacksmith, Harkin, who had one of the only continually busy businesses year-round, waved hello and gave Quintin back his bow he had dropped by earlier in the week to get repaired. Everyone else offered us waves or warm greetings.

"Yen! Play with us!” shouted a flock of children from the village. Six of them were running through town and passed us, laughing, as they thumped by.

I stared after them with no intention of responding. I may have been a kid in body, but the idea of frolicking mindlessly through the village like an idiot wasn’t something I wanted to do. I doubted Amalia would let me even if I wanted to.

We soon arrived at one of Amalia’s favorite stalls in the town’s market. She looked through the ingredients and picked up vegetables for dinner.

A brilliant, bright book floated just above her left hand. It was her codex, a personal log made of mana.

A codex could store items, create contracts, keep notes, manage money, and relay basic personal information to its owner. It essentially served as a journal, backpack, and bank rolled into one magical, personal, real-time book. I had been allowed to examine Quintin’s and Amalia’s codexes a few times and generally understood how they worked. Most people did since they were vital for survival.

I didn’t have a codex and wouldn’t until I awakened my mana. It meant that if I needed to, I could not buy or sell goods because I couldn’t access the commonly used currency. Of course, there were ways around that, yes, but it was inconvenient.

“Look at it,” I heard a woman hiss as she passed us in the market. “Acting like it’s one of us. Monster.” I heard her spit. “Why do they treat it like a person? Disgusting.”

I ignored her. Her words hardly phased me.

Quintin, however, clenched my hand. He let me down a while ago and has been keeping me close to him since we were in public. “Don’t listen to them,” he said calmly.

“Stupid people don’t matter to me,” I replied.

Quintin chuckled, relaxing immediately.

Suddenly, an idea popped into my head. “Are people going to treat me worse when I get older?” I asked Quintin suddenly.

Quintin’s steps slowed. “What do you mean?”

“People don’t really bother me now like they did the first time people saw my ears. Most kids treat me fine, and even some adults don’t seem to care. But the people who do?” I hesitated, then forced the words out. “They don’t see me as a person. They never will.”

Quintin’s jaw tightened.

“They tolerate me because I’m small and harmless. But what happens when I grow up? Will they suddenly hate me? Will they—” I stopped myself.

Quintin didn’t answer right away. Instead, he ran a hand through his hair before exhaling sharply. “No. It won’t get worse.”

“You don’t sound sure.”

Silence.

“I need to learn how to defend myself,” I said, essentially laying out my reason for wanting to learn to use magic and fight. “I don’t want to wait until something happens and then regret it.” I turned to him, my voice firmer. “You were a soldier. You know how to fight. Teach me.”

“Absolutely not,” Amalia cut in, rejoining us from the market stall. Her tone left no room for argument. “You’re five. You’re too young.”

“That’s arbitrary. What other five-year-old acts like me? Age is irrelevant. I’m special,” I said arrogantly, though, objectively, my words were correct. More importantly, I was tired of this damn argument. “If I wait, it'll be too late by the time I actually need those skills. Why not now?”

“Because you are safe.” Amalia’s voice softened, but her expression was resolute. “You have a home. A family. We won’t let anything happen to you.”

“Can we really say that?” Quintin murmured, his voice barely above a whisper. “You know what she is, Amalia. She’s experienced it firsthand. You know how people—”

“We’ll talk about it later,” she interrupted.

“Which means we won’t,” I muttered.

Amalia sighed. “Yen, listen to me. I want you to be happy. I want you to have a childhood.” She crouched down, meeting my eyes. “You’re obviously different from other kids, even putting aside your ears. You are intelligent beyond your years. But if you start training now, if you take that path, you won’t ever be able to step away from it. You understand that, right?”

I did.

But I also knew I had no other choice. So did she. I could tell. Even so, she didn’t relent.

“Then if I’m so safe, I’ll just become an adventurer tomorrow,” I said, feigning innocence. “Sure, I can’t use mana, never used a sword, never hunted an animal, and don’t even have my codex yet, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out. After all, it’s not like this town revolves around hunting for food and killing monsters to survive.” I flashed her a too-sweet smile. “Oh, wait.”

Amalia closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, then smiled. “You’re grounded.”

I blinked. “What?”

“You heard me.” She patted the hem of her dress and stood. “There will be no talk like this until you’re older. But…” She glanced at Quintin and then back at me. “I guess…I guess you can learn to hunt animals. Just deer and target practice for now. And only with your father. If you disobey him once, no more. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, mom.” I paused. “So…when I’m older—”

“You’re pushing your luck.”

“Sorry.”

It was a start.

“Am I wrong?” I asked Quintin once Amalia had walked ahead of us.

He chuckled. “Your approach? Yeah. Your point? Not at all.”

“As long as I got what I wanted.”

“Brat.” Quintin ruffled my hair. “Come on. We’ll make you a bow together after my next job.”

I smiled. “Promise?”

Quintin grinned. “Promise.”