Now Aelin knew.

  It wasn’t like I wasn’t planning on telling her in the near future; it was just that Trent wasn’t there to put a seal on her, and Aelin liked to talk. I didn’t want her to accidentally slip up and say something at the wrong time and expose me like Ether’s mother had just done.

  Not that I could blame Miel. Aelin was literally the only member of my team who didn’t have a seal. There was a bond that had been put on all of us, but that wouldn’t stop her from discussing it with a spouse, for instance. That was one of Aelin’s justifications for the harem. To keep everything between us even with the loopholes.

  That was when we’d told Aelin that I was a hero class like Rix. The Gods didn’t like the fact that they started out as Godlings, Nephilim, Gibboram, or Sugaru at level one and had to level themselves like everyone else to be common knowledge. If Aelin messed up and someone overheard her say that I was a Sugaru, then the Primus would hunt me down to remove the threat. If someone heard her talk about how I was a Godling, the Primus would kill everyone who heard and everyone whom they might have told. Basically, it was the safer way to explain what I was.

  There was also another reason that I hadn’t brought her in.

  Jenne.

  Until I knew exactly where that woman’s loyalties were, I didn’t want to put Aelin in a position where she would have to avoid topics with a trained spy. Speaking of spies, there was one thing that concerned me. “Should we be talking about this here?”

  “We have a Tier Seven privacy bubble around us. My mother is the only one in the city who could spy on us.” Miel gestured at Aelin. “She didn’t know?”

  “We told her I was like Rix. We thought it’d be safer.” I looked at Aelin. ”Sorry.”

  “Don’t sorry me. Who is this WE?” The short woman stomped over to me.

  I was sitting down and still almost at eye level. Granted, these chairs did have longer legs than most, and I had almost a foot on Aelin, but that didn’t change how it was hard to be intimidated by her at the moment.

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  “It’s complicated why you weren’t told.” I sighed. “And difficult to explain.”

  “Atlas was only supposed to let people who have our mark know about him.” Rix closed the menu on her CB. “Part of the magic Trent put in this thing.” She tapped her chest.

  Leave it to Rix to summarize something I thought was complicated.

  “Right but…” Aelin started holding up fingers while she counted. “Atlas, Rix, Ether, Fray…” She looked at me. “Justia knew too didn’t she?”

  I slowly nodded.

  Aelin grabbed my shoulders and started to shake me. “I’M THE ONLY ONE ON YOUR TEAM WHO DIDN’T KNOW?!?”

  A laugh escaped my lips. I knew she was upset, and I felt bad for lying to her, but the way she was trying to act tough was just… funny.

  “You think this is funny?” Aelin gripped my shoulders tighter and got closer to my face as she eyed me.

  I blew in her face.

  “EWW!” She backed away and started wiping her face with her sleeve. “I just got clean!”

  “You’re about to get dirty again anyway.” I couldn’t stop the chuckles. “Look, if I thought for a moment that you were actually as upset as you’re pretending to be, then I might be a little more serious.”

  Aelin pouted her lip but couldn’t hold it for long. “Fine. I’m basically just upset at being the last one to know.” She gestured at Miel. “She knew…?” She froze, and I could see her replaying the conversation in her head. “You said, Mom. Klix is your mother?! Then that means...!” She turned around and pointed at the bathroom. “You’re telling me that I just took a shower with a Goddess?”

  Rix was the one that couldn't hold in her laugh this time. I was thankful because I wouldn’t have been able to hold mine in without Aelin diverting her attention.

  “It doesn’t work like that.” I thought about it for a moment. “Okay, sort of. When a God has a kid, what the child is depends on what the other parent is. Two Gods have a Godling. A God and an Adventurer have a Nephilim.” I looked at Miel. “That’s what you are, right?”

  Ether’s mother nodded.

  I turned back to Aelin. “Then finally when a God and a Mundane or I guess when a Nephilim, has a kid?” I looked to Miel for help. “ How does that work?”

  “Nephilim substitute for a God unless it is two Nephilim. In that case, the child is also a Nephilim.”

  “So Hayh is Mundane?” I was starting to piece it together.

  “I wanted to try the quiet life for a while.” Miel shrugged.

  “So Ether isn’t a Goddess?” Aelin looked disappointed.

  “Sort of…” Miel shifted in her seat to look at me. “She can be. Which brings me back to the original question. Do you plan on taking a city?”

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