Note from the Author:
This is really different from the stuff I usually write. Generally, I write fluffly little one-shots, but this is going to be longer, and far more serious. At least ten chapters. The story was born of my inability to wrap my head around the picture presented in the game of Raine and Genis' life in Sylvarant. There were just too many unanswered questions, and so I began to formulate their back story in my mind. This is just me committing it to words. I hope you enjoy it, and please, read and review!
ArtemisUndergoingMitosis
Raine Sage didn't understand what was going on. Her mother was dragging her quickly towards a small, rickety boat, despite the storm that raged around them. Her baby brother Genis was safe in her mother's arms, and Raine herself struggled to keep up with her mother.
"Mother, what's going on?" Raine cried as they reached the boat.
"Shh…Raine, don't wake Genis. Just take the paddle; we need to get to that island."
"But why? Where are we going? I want to go home, Mother."
"Don't worry Raine, where you're going, you will be so much happier."
"Don't you mean where we're going?"
"Yes, yes, that's right. Where we're going." Raine looked at her mother, searching for reassurance, but she found none. What she saw was a wild determination, a look that transformed her mother's familiar face into something threatening. Between the storm and the look in her mother's eyes, a feeling of dread shot through Raine, and the eleven-year-old half-elf suddenly felt nauseous.
She didn't have time to talk to question her mother further. As soon as the bottom of the boat scraped the sandy beach of the storm beaten-island, her mother handed Genis to her, and started to push off, back out to sea.
"Where are you going!" Raine called desperately. Her mother was leaving her, leaving her to die on this island alone, surrounded by the ruins of some ancient site.
"Please Raine, take care of your brother! Go through the gate when it opens. Life will be good for you there, I promise. I love you, my Raine." Those were the last words Raine Sage heard her mother say before she tumbled through the Otherworldly gate, clutching her now crying baby brother, into an unfamiliar world.
Raine woke up in a bed. She looked around, searching for anything familiar. Nothing seemed right. She was sure that this was not her home, and yet, she couldn't remember what home was. There were flashes of recent memories. The storm, the gate, the ruins. Her mother leaving her on that little boat, her brother crying in her arms. Raine sat up quickly, panic shooting through her.
"Genis. Where is Genis?" she called, and only then did she realize that she was not alone in the room. An old woman sat in the corner along with a girl only a few years older than Raine herself, who was holding her baby brother.
"You're awake," the old woman said. "Thank Martel, for I feared that you would not wake."
"Is my brother safe?" Raine asked desperately. He was the only thing that mattered right then. Her mother told her to take care of him, and she would.
"Yes, yes. He's a very resilient babe. He's fussed a little, but other than that he's had no trouble. It's you I'm worried about. You had quite the blow to your head."
"Can I see my brother?"
"He's right here child. Look, he's fine."
"I want to hold my brother," Raine said, setting her jaw. It was her responsibility to care for Genis, no one else's.
"You better hand her the babe, Cara, or we'll never hear the end of it." The girl glanced at the old woman nervously, but handed the child to his sister, and Raine took him gently. He smiled up at her and cooed in contentment, waving his arm until he got ahold of a long lock of Raine's pure white hair. Raine let him tug gently on it, and turned again to the old woman.
"The priest said he found you unconscious on the road, bleeding from a wound on your head quite a lot. He said he wouldn't have found you if this little bugger hadn't screamed so loud. He called me in from Iselia. My name is Kita Bove, and this is my apprentice, Cara. I'm a healer, and I've been practicing the arts a long time, but you, my dear, were a hard one to save."
"Th-thank you, I suppose. Where am I?"
"In a House of Salvation, near the village of Iselia." Raine thought hard, but Iselia did not sound like any place she was familiar with.
"How did I get here?"
"I was hoping you could tell me." The old woman looked at her levelly, and Raine could see the girl sneak glances at her out of the corner of her eye, trying not to stare. But Raine could think of nothing but the storm and the ruins.
"The last thing I remember is the storm and the ring of stones, standing straight up," Raine said slowly, still trying to conjure memories of before that, or after.
"Girl, it hasn't rained here in weeks, and I have never heard of any 'ring of stones.' Are you sure that wasn't a dream?"
"But Mistress Bove! Father did say that he found her and the babe soaking wet, and their clothing smelled of salt. Maybe they came from the sea!"
"Cara, please don't open your mouth unless you have something intelligent to say. The ocean is far too long a ways for them to still be wet when they arrived here."
"My name is Raine," the half-elf said suddenly, and the old woman raised her brows at the white haired girl. "And my brother's name is Genis," Raine finished more quietly.
"It's good to know that you remember your names. How old are you?"
"Eleven. And Genis is six months."
"Very good. Where are you from?" Raine opened her mouth to answer, and then realized she couldn't.
"I don't know." Cara glanced at her sideways again, and Raine wanted to disappear into her blankets.
"That's fine. It will come back. Can you read?"
"Yes. I know math, too, and I know a little of the Angelic Language,"
"Well, that's something! Very rare for a village girl to know all of that. I'm sure you're parents will be searching far and wide for you." Mistress Bove looked satisfied, but Raine knew it wasn't true.
"No," Raine whispered, a tear escaping down her cheek.
"Hmm? You mustn't be so negative. They will find you, no doubt about it."
"My mother abandoned us." The healer and her apprentice exchanged glances. "At the ruins. In the storm."
"Don't worry, child. It'll be alright. When your memories start to come back, we can get you home where you belong. For now you need to rest. Cara, take the babe and put him to bed, and then you can go home. We could all use a little rest."Cara came and took Genis away, untangling him from Raine's long hair. Genis cried a little as he was taken from the familiar arms, but he settled in the crib across the room quite easily. Raine had to admit that she was tired, but she didn't want to see her brother go.
After Cara left, Mistress Bove looked Raine directly in the eyes again. The half-elf felt like the old woman was looking straight into her soul, even though she knew that was impossible. She saw the woman's eyes dart to the side of her head, and then back to her eyes. Raine bit her lip and smoothed her hair of the pointed ears self-consciously.
"Girl, it won't do any good to hide them. I've seen them already. What are you? Elf or half-elf?" Raine looked around wildly, searching for an escape, but quickly realized that it was ridiculous. Her head was pounding and she was sure she wouldn't be able to walk out the door on steady feet, let alone escape the building. She didn't even know which door led out and which was merely a closet. She considered lying, but she knew that the sharp old woman would know if she were not truthful.
"Half-elf," she whispered. The old woman sighed and shook her head, looking off into the distance as if she was thinking hard. That was hardly the reaction she had expected. Somehow, even with her fuzzy memory, Raine knew that telling people she was a half-elf generally led to hisses and cries of hate. She waited for that to come, for the information to sink in, but it never did.
"Best not tell the others about this. It would be easier if you just told everyone that you and your brother were full-blooded elves. Much simpler."
"But…you're not going to run away? You're not going to call the police?"
"Girl, I don't know where you are from, but around here, we won't do that. Still, most people are stupid, and to them, every half-elf is a Desian. Now go to sleep. You need your rest." Raine nodded, and her last thought before she drifted off to sleep was that she had no idea what a Desian was.
