An old lady with haggard visage held an infant in her bony hands staring intently at the child's arms and and forehead. This child had just been born to the young beautiful lady lying on the bed, Elizabeth Brooklyn. It was her first child with her husband, Admond Paisley, of only three months.
As peasants, they couldn't afford to pay a professional middle wife to help in the birth of their child. Instead, they had called the village chief's wife, Fay, who sometimes acts as a middle wife to the young women in this village.
Meanwhile, Admond was pacing back and forth in front of the small cottage. He was very anxious of what was happening within this dilipated cottage he called his home. It was already a while since he has been casted out my the middle wife because of his restlessness.
The old crony, acting as the middle wife, gave the infant's bottom a slap, and the child immediately wailed in anguish. Elizabeth sighed in relief upon hearing her child cry. The tension within her dissipated with that sigh.
The other young ladies from the neighbouring farms helped clean the babe and handed him back to his mother, who couldn't help but feel joy and bountless love for child. Just by looking at him, she felt like her child was the most beautiful child she had ever seen. Cute and beautiful. Just like any other parent would feel for their child.
After everything was settled within the house, the middle wife said her goodbyes before seeing herself out. She congratulated the new father and let him in as she mad her way out.
Back when she had just received the child after birth, she had witnessed a phenomenon she had never come across before. Considering that she had helped in child birthing for many years in this village meant that her experience was vast, and her seeing something for the first time definitely meant something.
The runes that had been etched on the child's body had her heart thumbing. What more, the runes were shimmering with a deep purple light, traced with a goldish hue. The runes faded into the child's body leaving no trace of them having been there a moment ago.
Fay had caressed the child's body trying to feel if there was any abnormality to the infant. And finding none, she had decided to keep the discovery to herself, so long as there was nothing else abnormal about the child. After slapping the infant and finding it responding just like any other child, she felt a bit reassured and and let the nurses take care of everything else. Soon after, she had left and walked briskly to her home a few miles out of the Lu family.
The helping hands eventually left too, leaving the new family of three, Admond, Elizabeth and the new babe, and their neighbour Sandra who was unwilling to leave her friend without a female helper.