@panhellenios asked to say hello!
She came from a land without gods.
--Specifically, there were no French pagan gods; by Ninny’s time, it had been so throughly a Christianized nation that even her kind, les dames blanches and les lutins, they had no names of ancients to pray to. It had been a bit of a surprise upon being scooped up by the selkie Too-Ticky that there were other gods than the Catholic one to pray to. Too-Ticky, who dutifully prayed to the Irish pantheon, had gently encouraged her to learn about those who ruled over mythological creatures such as themselves, and Moominpapa had graciously given her a children’s book on Norse and Greek gods.
But Ninny struggled to pick who she was supposed to pray to. Aphrodite, perhaps, to deal with her confused crush on Too-Ticky? Queen Hera, to wish her foster mother would adopt her? That both meant she had to face actual things that caused her anxiety, and Ninny didn’t want that. Not right now, at least.
There was a god of travelers, she knew, and Ninny was a foreigner in a new land. That was something that she’d like sorted out. The trickster, wasn’t he? Hermes was the prankster of the gods, and mischievous Ninny certainly aligned with that. It couldn’t hurt to pray to him, unless he was the malicious sort of trouble-maker. Ninny hoped not.
The pisky-girl lit the tiny candle Moominmama had given her, kneeling down in the dirt, her hands awkwardly clamped together like a Christian. Was there protocol for this? How were you supposed to pray to a Greek god? What if he couldn’t understand her French accent? What if he didn’t speak Swedish or French? What if--
“Hello? Umm--” She squinted at the candle, hoping the breeze didn’t puff it out. “Hi, my name is, um, Nanette Delacœur, I’m nine years old, and I’m a traveler. But I think I’d like to stay here, in this valley. Is that, um, alright? Um--”
