Chapter 4 – Caelum Morgan 1
Sigh…
So I'm really reincarnated into another world.
Even now, the thought feels like fiction — the sort of fantasy one indulges in while staring at the ceiling at 3 a.m., wondering what life could've been if the rules of reality bent just once. Reincarnation… Another life… A second chance.
I never believed in any of it. I studied cold facts, dissected motives, laid bare the darkest truths men could hide. I believed in blood types and trace evidence, not souls and karma.
But here I am.
One week old.
One week of silence.
One week of utter helplessness.
And in that time, I've discovered that the life of a newborn is… quite boring.
Not because there isn't enough to see — on the contrary, everything around me is unfamiliar and screaming for analysis — but because I can't do anything. I am trapped behind fragile bones and underdeveloped muscles. I can't hold up my head. I can't speak. I can't even roll over.
All I can do is observe. Piece together the fragments.
And think.
God, do I think.
---
The days in this world are longer than Earth's. I've tracked it — not precisely, but enough. The light that pours through the stained glass windows in the mornings comes later and leaves later. I estimate each day is about 26 hours. My internal clock has adjusted to it far more easily than I expected, but then again, I don't exactly have much of a routine.
Sylvia, the woman who birthed me — who I now accept is my mother in this life — keeps me close almost constantly. She only lets the maids take me when she absolutely must. She sleeps beside me on a broad, canopied bed, her hand resting on the side of my swaddle like she's afraid I'll vanish.
She rarely speaks to me. But when she does, her voice is always quiet — soft, almost distant.
Her language still eludes me. It flows like water over polished stones — graceful, lyrical, yet sharp in the consonants. I've heard enough now to notice recurring patterns. Certain phrases she repeats when feeding me, or holding me, or when the servants enter. I've started mentally categorizing them. Syntax. Tone. Inflection.
I don't understand them yet, but I will. Language is a code. All codes can be broken.
---
On the third day, I noticed the emblem on the drapes — a silver embroidery stitched into deep green velvet: a stylized hawk circling a flame. The same emblem appeared on the robes of the maids and the tall men who visited twice. One wore a pin on his collar inlaid with a tiny red gem. He bowed low to Sylvia and said something I couldn't understand, but his tone was stiff, formal.
Nobility?
Sylvia didn't look like a servant. Her garments were too fine, her posture too refined. Even exhausted, she carried herself like someone used to being watched.
The maids call her "M'lora" or "Mor'an." Always with reverence. That much is clear.
She's important.
And so, perhaps, am I.
---
I've studied her face endlessly over this week. She has high cheekbones, a narrow nose, and a gaze that rarely softens. Even when she holds me, even when her fingers are gentle, her eyes remain elsewhere. Far away. Haunted, almost. As though I'm a memory she's afraid will disappear.
She doesn't smile often.
But once, on the fourth day, I stopped crying — not because I wanted to, but because I was too tired to continue. She leaned over me, lips parted slightly, and whispered something that made the maid beside her freeze.
Then, Sylvia smiled.
Not a happy smile. A cracked one. Fragile and pained.
It was gone in a second, but I saw it.
I've solved murders from a photograph. From a flicker in someone's pupils. I know what hidden grief looks like.
Sylvia Morgan has it buried deep.