I decided, on reflection, that adults made their own hells and often forced children to live in them. I thought of Kanesha’s father.

Then I wondered if she’d be the same person, remotely, if he hadn’t been the way he was.
Then I wondered who had shot him and whether I’d ever find out.

For right now, I at least had no more supernatural visitors – I’d been starting to wonder if everyone wanted to talk to me. The next few days passed in the closest to quiet normalcy my life could get. I mean, nothing was ever normal for me, but this came fairly close. I appreciated the downtime. I couldn’t fully relax, but I could relax some, and apparently even goddesses can get a bit stressed out.

Maybe especially goddesses. I did sometimes envy the ordinary people, people like I thought I was so briefly. They didn’t have nearly as much…

But then, weren’t my worries just theirs on a different scale? What woman didn’t, at some point in her life, have to chase off an unwanted suitor? And in this city, who wasn’t messed up in politics?

It was just that the stakes were a bit higher and everything was, somehow, bigger for me. Maybe that was the way it was supposed to be.

A few days of quiet and then Seb called.

“What’s up?”

“Had to deal with a fire giant harassing Clara.”

“Harassing in what sense?”

“Harassing. Telling her that she was at risk of being mixed up in their politics and that she should cut ties with you.”

I laughed. “And you’re calling me not her?”

“Because she’s storming around and throwing things and asked me to do it.”

“As long as those things don’t include spells.”

“A couple of those too.”

Clara, apparently, hadn’t wanted to inflict her irritation on me. “Well, if she wants to stay out of fire giant politics.”

“I think she wants to design a fire giant repellent spell.”

“Hrm. As long as it doesn’t end up working on me, I want some of that. Should I come over?”

I heard Clara’s voice in the background. Then Seb away from the phone. Then her voice again, “Yes!”

“Who’s place are you at?”

“Mine,” Seb informed.

I took that as please come over and headed there as quickly as I could. I wondered how Clara’s parents felt about her spending so much time at Seb’s place. I supposed it depended on whether they liked him or not.

Seb was pretty likeable.