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She sighed, defeated. “Really? What if I told you I tried to kill a Protector this week?”
I blinked. “Did you really?”
She shrugged. “I kicked Adoration when she was leaning over at the well, gathering energy. She got hurt trying to get free; she almost drowned. And I was glad. Iwantedto hurt her, Baba. I liked it.” Her spirit seemed to crumple in on itself, like a piece of tinfoil. “I’m not good like everyone else here. Sometimes I feel it inside my body, like the Limen is a magnet and so am I, but our poles are facing each other. I’m being pushed away. I don’t belong.”
I didn’t react, but only because I’d had years of practice hiding my pain. I knew her journey was going to take her far away from us. But I would do everything in my power to keep her here as long as possible. To protect her as well as I could. “You do. I promise you belong with the ones who love you. You have so much good in you.”
She shrugged. “You have to say that—you’re my dad. But I know I could never live a blameless life like you did.”
I closed my eyes and sent a prayer up to the Mother of All, hoping I would say the right thing. I was about to admit something I’d only shared openly with my small soulmate.
“I couldn’t either. I cheated.”
Shadow woofed a few times in a row, a sound so close to laughter that I smiled.
Precious was staring lasers into my face now. “No. Way.”
“Yes way,” I replied, fighting a laugh of my own. “I didn’t spend all that time in the Abyss without picking up a few tricks, you know. There are always loopholes, my perfect devil. And when I leaped off the roof of Sanctuary, I went right through a rather large one.”
I closed my eyes, remembering, and told the story. “I was falling from the rooftop of Sanctuary, feeling it die behind me—it was terrifying. I was so scared, alone. I was supposed to become nothing but spirit. I wasn’t meant to have any… direction. But I’d been alive for so long, I kept hold of my center for longer than I thought possible. I knew as I fell, even after the journey to Earth had stripped away my individual memories… I understood that there was something I needed to get back to as fast as I could.”
Precious quivered with curiosity as she listened. I had never shared this with her. I didn’t want her to think of me as a cheater. But today, learning that she held herself to some impossible standard, I realized it was past time for her to see that her parents were faulty, and broken, just like she saw herself.
“Every Protector is born the first time as a human. But I made certain when I directed my soul into an unborn physical form, that I would not live a normal span of years.”
“What?”
I ducked my head. “In my final moments of… awareness, when I still had the smallest hint of my powers, I saw a wealthy family who had everything they wanted, except empathy. They couldn’t feel for those less well off. For those who struggled. I made certain that changed.
“When I was born, I was the child they had always wanted. But as I grew, so did the terrible, life-threatening disease inside my form. My bones broke with almost every movement I made. A coughing fit would shatter ribs. It was a painful, short life I lived. But I was loved.”My heart ached, remembering. “So loved. They poured their lives into trying to save me, and others like me. When I was dying, my parents established a foundation, called Raphael’s Respite. It provided free lodging for any parents in North America who needed to stay near a hospital and didn’t have the funds.”
Her jaw had dropped wide, and I shut it with one finger.“Baba, that would have shifted the balance a lot… right?”
“I would hope so. Without Protectors on Earth now to help the balance, they’ll need all the help they can get.”
“But couldn’t it spoil the balance instead, that you cheated to make it happen?”
That question had haunted me for years now. I shrugged. “I made the choice, and I can’t change it now. Am I glad things worked out as they did, that I was able to return to your mother, you, our family?” I stared directly into her face and told a terrible truth. “I would have sacrificed almost anything to be where I am right now, with the ones I love most. Even the balance of all the realms.”
Her eyes gleamed with what could have been approval or censure. “So the end justified the means?”
“I like to think I was only fudging the rules, Little Glitter. Not burning them all down.”
“Fixing them.” The galaxies in her eyes began whirling faster, like they did when she had an idea, but she didn’t speak, only smiled at the void. I met Shadow’s gaze and thought I saw a matching worry there.
Speaking of fixing things…“What were you trying to change your name to?” I asked gently.
“Who even cares? It didn’t work. And now I’ll be grounded for a year.”
“Possibly much longer.” I stood, holding out a hand. “I think your dad was muttering something about you turning two hundred. You need to apologize to him. And to Perception.” Though I had a feeling he wouldn’t want to get close enough for her to do that in person. Maybe a letter would suffice.
Her cheeks darkened with a blush as she wrapped her wings tightly around herself. “Did Mom tell you? Or Tata Sunny?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“Does it matter?”
