The first time Riven met his brother, the nursery blazed with light that should have been impossible.
Aether conduits pulsed across the ceiling in geometric patterns, bathing the room in a cool blue glow that made the white marble floors shimmer like water.
Riven lay in his cradle, three months old now but with a mind that calculated and observed with relentless precision. His tiny fingers clenched and unclenched as he tested the boundaries of his motor control, still abysmal, but improving by approximately two percent each week.
The door swung open without warning. Riven's eyes, now capable of focusing properly, fixed on the small figure who entered.
A boy, perhaps three or four years old, stood framed in the doorway. He wore miniature imperial regalia, a scaled-down version of the formal court dress, complete with the eleven-pointed star embroidered in gold thread across his chest.
His hair was pure silver, not the faded gray of age but a metallic sheen that caught the Aether-light and reflected it like polished steel. His eyes were a piercing blue, almost luminous in their intensity.
'Crown Prince Alaric Valoria,' Riven identified immediately. 'Born 709 V.C. Eldest son and heir apparent.'
The boy approached Riven's cradle with careful, measured steps that betrayed formal training beyond his years. His spine was ruler-straight, his chin tilted at the precise angle that courtiers spent decades perfecting.
"So you're my brother," Alaric said, his voice high but remarkably articulate for his age. He leaned over the edge of the cradle, studying Riven with the peculiar intensity of children who haven't yet learned to mask their scrutiny.
Riven stared back, cataloging details. The boy's cheeks still carried infant roundness, but his jawline already hinted at the sharp angles that characterized the Valoria bloodline.
His small hands bore the first calluses of weapons training, a practice that historical records indicated began for imperial children at age three.
'He's already being molded,' Riven thought. 'The perfect heir, precisely as the histories described him.'
The nursery door opened again, and Riven felt a shift in the atmosphere, a subtle tightening, as though the very air had come to attention. Emperor Titus Valoria entered with two attendants trailing several paces behind.
"Father!" Alaric exclaimed, turning with a formal bow that seemed both practiced and genuinely enthusiastic.
The Emperor's gaunt face transformed. The stern lines around his mouth softened, the shadows beneath his eyes seemed to lighten, and his entire posture relaxed by degrees.
It was subtle but unmistakable, the shift from Emperor to father, a transformation reserved exclusively for the child before him.
"My son," Titus said, his voice warm as he placed a hand on Alaric's silver head. "I see you've come to meet your brother."
"Yes, Father. I wanted to see if he has the Valoria eyes."
The Emperor laughed, a sound so rare that even the attendants glanced at each other in momentary surprise before resuming their careful blankness.
"And does he? Come, let us look together." Titus guided Alaric back to the cradle, where they both peered down at Riven.
Riven observed the Emperor's face with clinical precision. The warmth remained, but it dimmed perceptibly as his gaze shifted from Alaric to his younger son. Not coldness, precisely, but a return to formality, the difference between sunlight and moonlight.
"He has Mother's eyes," Alaric declared. "Green as the gardens in summer."
"Indeed he does." The Emperor's hand descended to touch Riven's cheek briefly, a gesture of acknowledgment rather than affection. "He seems alert for his age."
"Will he be strong, Father? Will he learn to fight with me when we're older?"
"Perhaps," the Emperor replied, his attention already drifting back to Alaric. "But that is many years away. Today, I've come to see your progress with Master Tellius. I hear you've mastered the first form already."
Alaric's chest puffed with pride. "I have! Master Tellius says I'm the quickest learner he's ever taught."
"Show me," the Emperor said, guiding the boy toward the center of the nursery. "Demonstrate the form."
Riven watched as Alaric moved through a series of precise stances, his small body flowing from one position to the next with remarkable coordination for his age.
The Emperor circled him, occasionally adjusting an elbow or the angle of a foot, his face alight with focused attention and unmistakable pride.
They had forgotten Riven entirely. Or rather, they had never truly acknowledged him beyond the most cursory inspection. He lay in his cradle, perfectly silent, watching the interaction with calculating eyes.
'First data point confirmed,' he thought. 'The historical accounts were accurate. Emperor Titus's preference for his heir was absolute and unambiguous.'
He observed the subtle markers of hierarchy: the Emperor's tone, warmer and more animated when addressing Alaric; the touch, lingering and corrective for the elder son versus the brief, perfunctory contact for the younger; the omission, the way Riven's existence faded from their awareness once the formality of introduction had been satisfied.
It was succession politics in its most primal form, disguised as paternal affection. The Emperor was not merely loving his firstborn; he was investing in the future of the empire, pouring his attention and approval into the vessel that would carry forward his legacy.
For the first time since his rebirth, Riven felt something beyond analytical interest. A twinge, sharp and unfamiliar, pierced through his scholarly detachment. Not quite hurt, but the recognition of a pattern that would shape his existence in this life.
He was secondary. Auxiliary. The spare heir, necessary only in the event of catastrophe.
As the Emperor and Alaric moved toward the door, deep in conversation about training schedules and future lessons, Riven's infant eyes tracked them with perfect clarity.
"I will visit him again tomorrow.."
Alaric said suddenly as to the emperor as they continued their march outside, his statement momentarily shocked the nursemaid.
She had been standing silently in the corner moved to check on him, apparently surprised by his stillness.
"Such a quiet baby," the nursemaid murmured, adjusting his blanket. "Watching everything like a little owl."
Riven's gaze remained fixed on the closing door. His analytical mind had already identified the first systemic bias of his new existence, the hierarchical structure that would define his childhood, his adolescence, his place in the imperial court.
'Interesting,' he thought, as his body's infant limitations finally asserted themselves and his eyelids grew heavy. 'In my previous life, I documented this pattern from historical records. Now I will experience it firsthand.'
The Aether conduits pulsed overhead, their light dimming as evening approached. In the soft blue glow, Riven Valoria, second son, secondary heir, overlooked prince, began to plan.
That night, when the nursemaid had retired to her adjoining chamber and only the night guards remained in the distant corridors, Riven lay awake.
The nursery had fallen into the quiet hush that marked the deepest hours, when even the palace seemed to breathe more slowly.
Above him, the Aether conduits had dimmed to their nighttime setting, not extinguished, but reduced to a soft, pulsing glow that traced geometric patterns across the ceiling.
In the near-darkness, their blue-white light seemed more substantial somehow, less like illumination and more like... something else.
Riven stared upward, his infant eyes surprisingly well-adapted to the low light. The conduits followed precise mathematical arrangements, concentric circles intersected by straight lines at perfect angles, forming an elaborate lattice. He had observed them for months now, but tonight something felt different.
The gentle hum that accompanied the Aether flow, normally a background vibration beneath the threshold of conscious attention, seemed to call to him. Not in words or even sound, but in pattern.
'Curious,' he thought, focusing his attention more intently on the nearest conduit.
As his concentration narrowed, something unexpected happened. The background hum shifted frequency, becoming more distinct. Not louder, but clearer, as though his mind were a radio tuning to the correct station.
Riven felt a peculiar sensation, his thoughts becoming sharper, more precisely defined. The foggy constraints of his infant brain seemed to temporarily lift, giving him access to cognitive processes that had been frustratingly out of reach since his rebirth. It was like stepping from a dimly lit room into sudden, perfect clarity.
He focused harder, attempting to isolate the cause. The Aether itself? No, not the substance, but the pattern of its flow. The mathematical precision of its movement through the conduits created a kind of resonance that his mind could somehow... align with.
Experimentally, he traced the flow with his attention, following a single thread of energy as it pulsed through the network.
To his astonishment, he could perceive not just the visible light, but the underlying structure, the way Aether curved and split and rejoined in perfect, elegant sequences.
Information. It was all information. Not energy in the crude sense he had understood in his previous life, but something more fundamental, the mathematical fabric from which reality itself was woven.