Chapter Text
Prologue
The Winds blew gently over the docks in this dispossessed region of the world, watching as its people retired for the night. The Winds found this city beautiful despite its polluted and rotten nature. She especially adored it at night, when the lights shone like the twinkling stars you could only just make out through the smog that clouded the sky.
The Winds had been to many cities and kingdoms in her long existence, but this place, a place its people called the Undercity, had spoken to her in a way none other had. She admired their struggle for freedom--sympathized with them.
Though she had been born into this world by the prays of fisherman and sea fairer, she felt as if this place was where she was meant to be--like it was her calling to help and guide these people on their journey to freedom.
It was a calling that came from deep within her. From the arcane powers thumping in her veins. A thumping that called out to her as she came upon a dock on the outskirts of the city.
A young human woman, no older than eighteen years old, stood there, looking out over the near pitch-black waters. Tears streamed down the girl's dirt-smudged cheeks, though she didn’t look the emotion that tears normally fell during.
The Winds moved closer, trying to get a better look at the girl. She brushed up against the girl's cheek, finding it warm.
The human was angry.
Angry and sad.
The Winds had seen humans get this way before. It was one of her least favorite human emotions because of how complicated it was. It was not straightforward like happiness. Not even as straightforward as anger on its lonesome.
A small sound rose up from the bundle of blankets the girl was carrying. The Winds circled lower, brushing against the small human in the girl's arms. It was a baby who looked as if it had just been brought into this world mere minutes ago.
The girl’s brown eyes snapped down to the babe, hatred boiling in them. The Winds didn’t understand why the human would hate such a small, helpless thing, but it wasn’t in her nature to try and understand.
“I promised…I promised…” She hissed, her eyes squeezed shut. The babe in her arm grew fussy, a cry escaping its mouth. This just seemed to anger the girl further. “I can’t--Talie I can’t!” She screamed up at the night sky. “She--it--killed you! I can’t be near it!”
How could such a small, defenseless creature kill a full-grown human? The Winds looked back on her long existence for an answer.
She’d once seen a woman give birth to a babe such as this one. It had all but ripped her to shreds. The woman had bled out slowly and no one could do anything. The Winds had been younger then and unable to help in any way as she watched human turn pale and blue.
Maybe that has happened to this Talie? This small babe had left its mother weak and bleeding.
“I’m sorry.” The girl sobbed and, to the Wind's surprise, tossed the screaming babe into the cold, polluted waters below. The human hardly watched the babe disappear under the surface before she was sprinting away, sobbing and screaming hysterically.
The Winds hovered over the water where the babe had sunk, the thumping in her veins refusing to let her follow after the girl. Her magic was trying to tell her something, something about this babe.
The Winds quieted her being and let the magic be her guide. And she let it guide her into the freezing depths after the babe. She danced through the toxic waters until she found the small creature floating deeper in the murky mess.
The Winds became a whirlwind of bubbles and in a flash of blue light, became something flesh and bone.
It was a form The Winds called Janna.
Janna grabbed the still babe in her long arms and, summoning her wind, shot from the dark waters of the Undercity. She floated back onto the dock, letting her wind die down once her bare feet were safely on the wooden dock.
It was always strange to be in this form, but Janna couldn’t focus on the weight and solidness of her body at the moment. Not when she held a too-still babe in her arms. Janna gently ran a thin finger over the babe’s too-cold cheek, brushing water and dirt away as she did.
Why had her magic sent her to retrieve this small thing? It didn’t seem like much, but her magic was never wrong.
Janna placed her hand over the small one's chest and closed her solid, light blue eyes. She summoned her winds and magic, letting them flow through the babe’s small form. Her winds gave the child life while her magic healed what had been damaged. Her eyes shot open as the babe gave a wailing cry.
She knew then why her magic had called her to this babe.
Their magic called out to one another.
They were one and the same. Brought into this world by different means, but ultimately for the same reason: help the beings of Runeterra. Be their guardians in a world that only sought to destroy them.
Janna looked over the now dry child in her arms. The babe was healed, but the toxins in that water were cruel. Its wicked sickness had found a way to latch onto the child, presenting itself in her eyes and hands. Red irises shone in a sea of inky black and her fingertips were tainted in that same black.
Janna hoped the water's taint would fade, but knew she could do nothing about it. Her magic had already been through the babe’s body and healed what it could.
She couldn’t worry over that now, not when she had bigger problems to deal with.
That being how she was supposed to cease this child's ear-bleeding screeches.
Janna thought back to a human with a simpler babe in their arms. Thought of how they had eased its crying with a simple rock and flashy toy.
Janna had no flashy toy, but she could try rocking the child.
It felt too unnatural to be moving in this way--to even be holding this child but…but something in Janna’s chest warmed. It was a feeling she never had experienced…though she never once experienced what the things humans did.
Huh…new. All this was so new.
“Who are you, little one?” She asked once the child calmed. Its eyes were still filled with droplets of tears, red-flushed face slowly fading to its natural color.
The small child gave a great wiggle in Janna’s arms, mouth spewing spittle from its mouth as it gave a soft noise. Janna didn’t know what this meant and wiped the spit from the babe's lips.
For the first time in Janna’s existence, she was at a complete loss for knowledge.
She had never stuck around families long enough to watch them raise their young.
Was she to raise this child?
The Arcane was silent, giving Janna no such answer she sought.
Janna would figure it out, as she always did, and having this small thing gaze up at with such adoration gave her the will to do so.
“We will see, yes? How…” Janna tried to find the word for what she was feeling. Was she feeling? “How exciting it will be.”
Janna turned her gaze back towards the dark night and forced on the task at hand.
Find shelter and comfort for her child.