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I glared at the unmoving void until I was sure it had been only my imagination.
Precious was wheezing when she finally asked, “Do you mean to tell me that this is The Talk?”
When Sunny and I both nodded, Presh fell over laughing, leaving small streaks of dark purple glitter all over the surfaces around her.
Sunny held out a million-thread count handkerchief. “Wipe your face, be quiet, and listen,” she ordered. “There’s no way out of this conversation.”
“Why now?” Presh wiped her face. “I mean, is there something going on I don’t know about?”
“Yes,” Sunny said, drawing out the word. “I mean, you might know.”
“I’m sure you’ve suspected something,” I added. She had been sneaking off a lot to the void edge recently, but I was sure she hadn’t missed what was going on near the Celestial wall.
“Wait. This is really The Talk? And you think… I need it?” Presh stopped breathing for a second. “Is there someone who’s said they might want to date me? Someone… likes me?”
“Everyone loves you, Presh,” Sunny retorted. “It’s literally a part of your name, Beloved of All Realms.”
“Yeah, but somebody wants toknock bootswith me?” She squealed, like this was an exciting possibility.
I hissed at the thought. She was still a child, even if she’d aged… slowly. Seraphiel had assured me that Protectors aged just like her, gradually over the course of a couple of centuries. It had been a few decades since we’d arrived in the Limen, and she still looked about seventeen or eighteen, though her adult wing feathers had finished growing in.
She and her dog Shadow were by far the youngest inhabitants of the realm, and while age gap romance was all well and good, she was my baby girl. Sure, I was an infinite number of years younger than my oldest mate, but the thought of her getting busy with a crusty old Protector… I grabbed hold of Sunny, slightly dizzy. What if she liked aGuide?
Oh, Great Mother of Kazoos, I should have unmade all of those perverted ashholes when I had the chance back in Sanctuary.
Sunny flicked my head. “Chill the eff out, birch. And no, Presh, there will be no knocking boots. It’s just… we can’t put this off any longer.”
Precious slumped down, fidgeting her bare feet on the clouds. She asked in a near-whisper, “Is this because I tried to kiss Perception?”
What. The.Fudge.For the millionth time, I wished I could delve into my daughter’s mind and see her thoughts. But she was closed to all of us. None of us were sure if she’d done it on purpose, or accidentally, but years ago her mental voice had gone silent for all of us.She said it was fair since she couldn’t read our thoughts, but I was positive she’d been lying about that. I suspected she had picked up a few thoughts from some of the younger Protectors’ minds before. Either that or she’d forced secrets out of them in some more nefarious way.
Beside me, Sunny was losing her shit, her wings flaring. “I’ll fucking kill him,” she raged. “He never said a word. He knew I’d unmake him; that’s why.”
Precious curled up into a ball. She was trembling. Was shecrying?
Sunny, chill. Something’s wrong,I thought, wrapping an arm around my daughter’s shaking wings. “He didn’t tell us anything about it. Should he have?”
“Why would he?” she said at last. “It’s not like he kissed me back. I thought he was going to tear his lips off after.”
“What happened, baby?” I breathed.
“He didn’t know who I was at first. It was dark. When he saw who it was, he was disgusted. He said he hadn’t consented. That he thinks I’m a ch-child with no impulse control.” She burst into tears then, and Sunny and I both wrapped our arms around her, holding her as she wept. I could barely make out her words, but I tried to put together her meaning from the fragmented, sobbing confession.
Of the two of us, Sunny was surprisingly the more contained at the end of Precious’s meltdown.“So after your classes were over yesterday, instead of coming home, you hid by the hot springs near the Celestial wall until it was dark. You waited until Perception got into the water, and then you slid in behind him,” she restated calmly. But Sunny’s calm was the terrifying kind, like when the eye of a hurricane is directly overhead. “He was naked, yes?”
Precious nodded.
“And you were wearingwhat?”
She hiccupped. “The swimsuit I was born in?” she said, like it was a question.
There was no visible wind, but glitter swirled all around us in an angry tornado, the tiny particles stinging my skin. I glared out at the void, wondering where that had come from.
“He should have told us,” Sunny said aloud once she’d gotten control of herself. “Hope and I will be having words with that man.”
Precious shrieked. “Oh my glitter, no! Tata, I will literally die of shame.” She pulled away from Sunny and clung to me like a purple barnacle.
I melted into her arms, soaking up the unusual affection. “Sunny, I think you should go. Get dinner ready. I’ll talk to Presh about the other thing.”Catch up with Percy and find out what the heck happened.
