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“No,” I said firmly as the one word leaped automatically to my tongue. “Irefuseto live my life looking over my shoulder to see Jack standing behind me with a knife in his hand. My ex-husband wants to control my powers, Fiona’s powers, and everyone else’s powers in the universe. Why do ya think I did what I did to him?”

“If you can talk Jack into finding his birth father, his guardian father would help convince Jack to use his energy for better purposes.”

“Ya’re crediting me with more tolerance than I possess. I nearly killed Jack for using blood from Rasmus to turn himself into a guardian monster.”

Orlin nodded. “Yes, Rasmus told us what Jack did to himself. He said he reversed the changes.”

“Sparing his life that day used up any lingering compassion I felt for him. Jack betrayed me and used demon magick on our daughter. Now, he will never hurt either of us again.”

“There are long-term consequences for Jack if he never makes his own decisions. We’re all hoping you’ll eventually change your mind about leaving him in his current condition.”

“Ya know what? I’m done talking to ya, Orlin. Go away,” I commanded and made a shooing motion with my hand because I was beyond caring about being rude. “Ya’ve successfully stolen my peace of mind in a way even Jack never managed to do. The divorce gave me peace for the first time since I met that wretched man. I will not be undoing what I did to him. Do not ask me again.”

“Your heart is not that hard, Aran. Whenever you need to talk to me about this, or anything else, just hold my feather in your hand and say my name. I’ll come as soon as I can. I would never task you with all these things and leave you to deal with them alone. I’ll help you if you will let me.”

“I don’t see how ya think ya can help me when everything ya just told me were all things I got no say in. Guardians talk a lot about free will, but I think ya’re only talking about exercising yer own. No one bothered to ask what I wanted or needed—not even Rasmus. And I certainly don’t appreciate yer assumptions about my daughter and Jack.”

I closed my eyes to avoid watching Orlin’s human body rip itself apart and reform into a giant man with enormous bird wings. When I heard them pop out into the air like sails snapping to catch the wind, I opened my eyes to see a real guardian in all his radiant glory. The powerful creature who claimed to be part of my family nodded, lifted a hand to wave, and then launched into the sky like a rocket.

How was I ever supposed to think ofthatas a normal part of my existence?

I missed The Dagda something fierce at that moment because I trusted him. If The Dagda was here, I’d ask him about Orlin and why he went to the guardians for help. Whatever The Dagda’s thoughts, he’d share them with me no matter how unflattering to the guardians or how dangerous they might be to me.

I leaned my head back against my chair and wondered how I was going to deal with what I’d learned. Maybe this was the moment where I went bonkers because one stupid thing kept going through my overloaded mind, and it wasn’t the news Orlin delivered.

“If all that crap ya learned wasn’t craziness enough, Aran O’Malley, ya just saw yer own grandfather naked twice in one night. That’s certainly one extra life trauma ya didn’t need to experience.”

But meeting Orlin had explained why Murieann never replaced him. My sadness over that was also why it was doubly hard to accept that Orlin couldn’t see the wrong in what Rasmus did. Orlin would have been wrong as well to have gone back to my grandmother as a stranger. No one deserved that.

I stared into the sky and wondered where on Earth Rasmus was at that moment and how he was ever going to find me. He certainly wouldn’t be flying back to me in guardian form. But what did I know? I was just a human to him—a lowly human who couldn’t see the big picture. Only a guardian had big enough stones hanging between their legs to do that.

With sarcasm choking me and no one to direct it at, I rose and went inside. If there was a pan of brownies cooling in the kitchen, I’d probably eat them all.

* * *

The next morning,I woke up on the couch with the throw covering only the top half of me. I smelled coffee in the kitchen, and for a sleepy-headed moment, my life looked a little brighter.

Then I remembered Orlin’s visit.

What the guardian told me was as overwhelming this morning as it had been last night. My mind got fuzzy after my biological grandfather left, but it shut down completely after I came inside from the yard. Or maybe eating half a pan of brownies by myself put me into a sugar coma that brought on fitful sleep.

Whatever the true cause, I felt hung over this morning. This was going to be a three-cups-of-coffee kind of day.

Over breakfast, I shared what Orlin told me with Conn and Fiona. Well, I didn’t share the part about Fiona taking on the ring later in her life. I also didn’t tell either of them that Da was the son of a guardian.

Although... it occurred to me this morning that the guardians being involved with the ring may have partially explained why the demons didn’t recognize it. Nothing ever got by Conn, but the ring did. Even without Orlin’s explanation, I would have watched over it to keep Ma from having to. But I refused to trust it completely.

I meant to spill my guts, but all I ended up sharing was the news about Rasmus getting completely stripped of his guardian life. I passed along the caution I’d received not to let Rasmus know we knew him before. Conn and Fiona both thought we needed some sort of solid cover story because Rasmus had been sharper than average even when he didn’t know who or what he was. I told them I still had trouble believing that the guardians could pull off a whole life makeover as well as they claimed.

The news of Rasmus was shocking enough that we followed our eggs with finishing Fiona’s brownies. After all the ones I’d eaten last night, eating more brownies this morning felt like a ‘hair of the dog’ approach for my hangover. But I was too shocked to go against the flow of normal life today. So once again, I ate my share.

Based on how often I was eating my emotions lately, I wasn’t getting back into medium leggings soon. A home gym needed to go on the list of necessities for any new home we bought.

“What are you going to do when Rasmus shows up, Mom?”

There was concern in Fiona’s voice and I loved her for worrying about me in all of this. I tried to smile reassuringly at my daughter. “It’s not like they gave me a choice. I’ll deal with him the same way I did when he came to harass me at the cottage.”

“Didn’t you spell his hair and turn it purple?”