Title: The Arms of Lakshmi
Rating: K for some references to death.
Author's Notes: Inspired by the movie 1408. I think I pretty much bludgeoned Hindu mythology but it was fun going over my old notes again!

xx

“What are you doing out here?” An Ashe not of seven crept along the grassy side of the gardens, both hanging and grounded, almost afraid of her stilted, awkward movement and how it would break the silence and the spell the night’s majesty had cast.

Amasis held her ill-weary face to the sky. Would it that the stars would rain down on her, bringing her closer to the legends and further away from the mortal coil where her body – oh, damn that body, that ever weightiest toil and those coughs intermingled with blood – lagged unmercifully against the cobblestones. Burn my body, she thought, and let my soul fly ‘twixt the gulls after they’ve had their meal of my remains. Seconds passed as sound and memory mixed, seconds ne’er too late and she wore a smile as she turned her head. “Come here,vishnev,” she spread her arms, and tugged her daughter – her youngest, her likeness – into her embrace. “I’m watching the stars,” she whispered into Ashelia’s hair, taking in the scent of oil and apricot and sweat.

“They’re not doing anything,” the tiny princess pouted her confusion.

“Na, vishnev,” Amasis said in the same hushed tone with a gentle shake of her head, “they do more than we can ever see. They have a story to tell us but we don’t know all their words. If we don’t watch…” she paused, guiding her daughter’s vision upward as a single glowing line streaked across the black sky, “…we will miss everything.”

Her choked out squeal was a fair illustrator of her awe and Ashe’s expression went from skeptical to excited. “It was a shooting star!” she pointed excitedly out into the sky, and then tilted her head to look up at her mother, “I read about those! The direction it moves in predicts a change of fortune!”

“Mmhmm, that’s right.” Amasis took the smaller hand, still pointed, in her own and guided the gesturing finger left. It was an accurate representation of where the star had flown just moments before and she could almost feel Ashelia’s awe in the way her skin hummed. “It moved that way – ”

“Left!”

“ – so what is it called?”

Ashe’s brow wrinkled deeply in her thinking as she considered the question. “A ge- guh- grim- you know! The thing,” she insisted by way of answer.

“Agrhmveis-etauche,” the queen gently corrected, giving her daughter’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “And if goes right…” she directed the tinier hand again across the sky, this time in the opposite direction, “…it is a grhmveis-etroite.”

“What about the ones that just stay still?” Ashelia wondered aloud – or possibly asked. The girl was forever thirsting for answers, at times too impatient to fully commit to the work required by the questions. But she loved to learn and Amasis loved to teach, bringing her mind to the forefront and abandoning the tedium of her body even as her grip grew slack around the girl. She smiled then, even as the chill of the night sunk into her bones as she dare not shiver.

“They are people,” she whispered, “just like us. But you cannot tell anyone. The sky is their palace, they cannot find peace elsewhere. If they were disturbed… the grhmveis would grow angry. Stars would rain.”

Fire would rain.

Burn my body.

Let my soul fly free.

“I’ll never make the grhmveis angry! And I’ll tell Reque not to, either!” the princess announced with pride in her small voice. Amasis pressed a gentle kiss to the top of her daughter’s head, feeling straw-like hair press down underneath her lips.

“You are my anchor, little vishnev.” She held tight, so tight, reminding herself that her ill body could still feel and still cherish. “I will not let go and you will not either and we will keep the grhmveis happy, yes?” Take me now, Shiva, with the vishnev in my arms. Take me while I know your brother, the Faram. I have been twice blessed, more than I deserve.

“Tell me about the stars.” It was more demand than request but Amasis could not find it within herself to care.

“The first one – ” she pointed to a particular star near the horizon that seemed to begin the sky, “ – is the eye of Lakshmi. She was once the patroness of the grhmveis, before the ascendance, and is now the patroness of Ivalice. Originally she was favoured by Shiva, said to be the daughter of the river who upon death would return to the river. They said that looking in water gave her sight to see things beyond time and motion. Beyond her eye – ” Amasis then gestured up to four different tentacles of stars, all heading out in different directions, “ – is her four limbs, so that she may bless her children on each corner of Ivalice without losing her way. Beyond her is Vasuki, the serpent who guards the river Ksheersagar.” The queen drew imaginary lines between a wavy set of stars. “It waits by order of Shiva for Lakshmi to reclaim her other eye so that they may be together in ascendance once more. Next to Vasuki is Airavata, who forever waits for the serpent to be released of its duty. They are brothers without a gender, bound together in sin and salvation both. Their duties prevent them from true ascendance.”

There was a pause and then: “Your grandfather, my vajha, did this for me atop our estate in Bhujerba. There… it is unlike anything else. The stars surround you, make you feel like you are one of them.”

Ashe wriggled with tentative excitement. “When you get better, can you take me there?”

Up there, in the place of her birth, Amasis felt more like the bird she longed to be than ever. She could again stand on the balcony and feel the wind against her face, not have to feel the grounding, gripping Hume world beneath her feet. “Yes, vishnev. We will fly there in the grandest airship in all of Ivalice and Uncle Halim will welcome us with a great fete.” Ashe’s mild squirms increased as her awe did. “We will become one with the grhmveis, The stars will be the mummers and us the audience.”

“ – May she find ascendance in the arms of Lakshmi – ”

Amasis’ vision swam and began to blot out, darkness enwrapping her from every damnable corner. Not yet, she found herself begging, grhmveis grant me time, time with the vishnev, the likeness, the anchor -

“ - and know peace unbeknownst to those who walk Ivalice – ”

She tried to strengthen her grip around Ashe, only to find her arms empty. There was no squirming, curious little girl full of demands and cheeky ripostes to bind her to life, to remind her of the flesh and blood she would be leaving behind. She had asked to be taken while peace had swam in her skin, making her feel love of child and flesh-mother that would bleed out of her skin before it stopped in her soul. No, she thought, panicked, not now, not without her, don’t bring me back to them –

“ – Faram.”

But it was too late. She was dead and gone.

And held by naught, an Ashe of exactly seven wept.