“I’m fine,” I say, but it doesn’t help. In fact, it has the opposite effect that I want. Kierra looks even more distressed while Alana’s already grim expression darkens further. “You two. It’s alright.”

“Tell that to your face,” Alana grumbles before letting out a deep sigh. Then it’s her turn to grab my hand and lead me, though it’s only the short distance to the bed. I smile as she pushes me onto it, anticipation welling up as she climbs on after me. But to my confusion, she doesn’t strip or reach for my clothes. Doesn’t even kiss me. She simply puts her arms around me and lays her head on my chest.

I’m not complaining. Cuddling is also very much welcome. I put my arms around her and immediately feel my body relaxing. It’d be so easy to fall asleep like this. But I can’t because there’s so much to do. The house has to be packed up. We have to get a room at the Golden Feathers. The lord of Quest has to be dealt with. So do the hunters. And now I have to talk to Fen. She’s going to tell me how Father died. And give me his head. But not the rest of him.

Where’s the rest of him?

“Tell me about your father,” Alana asks, dragging me from my thoughts.

“What? Why?”

“Just do it, honey.”

“…alright. Um. He’s a decent man—"

“Not like that. Tell me a story about him.”

A story? I don’t have many memories worth recounting. Doubt she wants to hear about me walking in on my lonely father with the women of the night. Ah, there’s that. “Have I ever told you how I became interested in summoning?”

“No.”

“I was, er, eleven when my father introduced me to summoning. By then, I’d already made up my mind that Luke Tome was a thoroughly bitter man and that I hated studying. So, when he tells me that he wants to introduce me to the family tradition, I wasn’t very impressed. In fact, I snuck away the first couple of times he tried.”

I chuckle at the memory and something in my chest tightens. “Finally, Father got tired of it and had Pete, one of our family knights, catch me. He threatened to tie me to a chair with rope if I ran off again. A tactful man, my father isn’t. Wasn’t.”

It feels like something’s lodged in my throat again, but I swallow past it. “The threat was enough to stop me, though I wasn’t happy. I was a surly brat.” With good reason, but it doesn’t change the facts. “Father takes me to his summoning room and sits me in a chair. Then he starts to ramble about the art. About how it’s our legacy, the wonders of the other realms, the responsibility of summoners, all of that. I’m treating him the same as my tutors, staring at him with a blank look and letting the words wash over me. But then he gives me a demonstration.

“Watching him make the circle caught my attention because I never took my father for an artistic man and the pictures appealed to my childish self. I was so amazed when he channeled his mana into the circle and the pretty picture became prettier, glowing with power. Then he spoke his invitation and the air trembled.

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“You’ve watched my summonings. When a summoner invites an elemental to this realm, something else opens the way. And for a brief moment, you can feel it. A higher being.” A succubus is very different from the average person, but they aren’t necessarily superior. The Guardian is different. It’s…more. “It sounds crazy—"

“It doesn’t,” Alana assures me. “Keep going. What happened next?”

“Oh. Ah, well, the elemental he summoned entered the circle. And he didn’t pull any punches. Called a boreal skyfish from the Blizzard Peak realm. It’s always winter there, on a single continent dominated by a mountain whose top stretches far beyond the clouds. In fact, there’s a sea of clouds near its base.”

“Must be massive.”

“It is, so we hear. Anyway, the Cloud Sea is where the skyfish live. They’re exactly what they sound like though they tend to have a couple extra eyes and fins. Sounds strange but it doesn’t matter because their scales are so beautiful. They’re as clear as glass but they shimmer with all the colors of the rainbow. They swim through the air and they leave behind trails of sparkles…it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.

“To little Lou, whose life was a series of dull days and deprivation, it was…everything. And my father, my boring father, my average father, my father that was never allowed to achieve anything under the tyranny of the Grimoires, had done this thing. This incredible thing. As I watched this magical creature swim through the air, I knew I, his daughter that was every bit as average as he was, could do it too. That I wanted to do it. For the rest of my life.

“But you want to know the most amazing part? That summoning was the first time I saw my father come alive. He smiled and his eyes sparkled. Seeing my amazement reflected in his face, I…”

It’s a struggle to keep talking but Alana’s waiting eyes as she raises her head motivates me to try. “I…felt…I knew…we were the same. We were family. That was the first time I really thought of him as my father.”

Something wet runs down my cheek. Alana brushes it away with a finger, tears welling in her eyes. It takes seeing that to realize I’m crying.

“I don’t understand,” I whisper as more tears fall.

“I know.” Alana switches from wiping the tears to kissing them away.

“Why am I crying? I’m not sad.” I’m not. I was never close to my father. He hasn’t been a part of my life for a year and I’ve never thought about it. Never regretted it.

But…before this last year, before I met Kierra in that monstrously beautiful forest…he was all I had. We were an odd family, some might even say cold, but I spent every day with him. We always sat down for dinner, even if we never spoke over our meal. He got mad at me when I did something reckless out of concern for my well-being. He shared with me what he values most, summoning.

He was always there.

But he isn’t here anymore.

I’ll never see him again. Never talk to him. Never be annoyed with him. I never told him about Geneva and the role I played in the fall of the Grimoires.

He died without knowing how much his daughter loves summoning.

Ah. That feeling, the one that roiled in my stomach while I grappled with my confusion. I recognize it now. It’s just been so long. After we were kicked from the capital, I told myself that heartache was pointless. Tears never helped me so I stopped crying. I stopped caring.

Or I thought I did.

“Why?” I ask, the question quickly followed by a sob. I try to hold it back but the second one forces its way out. Alana shushes me as she pulls my head to her breasts, holding me so hard it would hurt if I wasn’t so strong. “I don’t understand.”

I don’t understand but it doesn’t matter. For all my power, for all my advantages, this is one thing I can’t beat. One thing I can’t change.

My father is dead.

And he isn’t coming back.