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bad could happen to me when
daddy was with me. We sat in silence, his hand on my knee until Mom
came back with a glass of Coke for me. Dad gave me a weak smile as
Mom settled next to him, her grey eyes lingering on me for a long
moment. My heart dropped when I recognized the sadness and regret
churning there.
    “ Before I say anything, I
want to make sure you understand all three of you are my children,
and I love you,” Mom reached out and took Dad’s hand. My mind
flashed back to that overheard argument between my parents, and I
had a nagging suspicion where this conversation was going. Mom took
a deep breath and seemed to flounder for how to
continue.
    “ I think the blunt approach
might be best, love,” Dad said, his expression unreadable. “We’re
not human, Lia, none of us are.”
    I tried to swallow but found my mouth
too dry. I had no idea what to say. I know it might seem naïve, but
it never occurred to me that we were anything other than a
painfully normal family. How could I not know something this huge?
I didn’t have time to linger on it because Mom had a few more
whoppers to drop on me.
    “ Before any of you were
born, your father and I had a little boy named Jonathon. He was
killed because of what we are,” Mom said, reaching out to take my
hand. “We come from a long line of Gaia, a type of nature
spirit.”
    “ Nature spirits?” I asked,
my brow furrowing in confusion. “What like dryads and
nymphs?”
    “ Not exactly,” my mother
said shaking her head, “though they are kin to us. Like apes are to
humans, I guess.” I cocked my head at her in confusion but remained
silent. After a prolonged moment of heavy silence, she continued.
“Every race has a name for nature spirits. The Algonquin referred
to us as the Earth-Mother, the Incans as Pachamama. The easiest way
to think of it is like Mother Nature. It is from the ancient Greek
goddess of the Earth that we take our name. We are
Gaia.”
    My eyes widened as my brain tried to
process this information, but it made no sense. How could I go
through my entire life and not know I wasn’t what I thought I was?
I looked at my father, but his face was still hard and
unreadable.
    “ Nature spirits aren’t the
only supernatural creatures in this world. There're many powerful
beings on this earth that aren’t human. Over the years, we've used
many different names for ourselves, but currently we call ourselves
Otherworlders. And the Otherworld is locked in a heated conflict
that has spawned so much hatred and tragedy.” She paused, her voice
wavering. “I was terrified that any other children we had would
become a victim of the conflict like Jon. When your father and I
found out we were pregnant, we decided we should find a stronger
Otherworlder to help protect our baby. We decided to look for a
child to raise along with our own who would be strong and able to
protect you until you were old enough to protect yourself. We
contacted an agency that specializes in Otherworld children. The
agent returned with two young candidates, one boy and one girl.” I
could see the nostalgia in her eyes as she remembered that long ago
day. “Since we wanted to give you the best protection possible, we
decided to take them both. Xander, a two-year-old djinn and Sariah,
a one year old succubus.”
    “ What exactly does that
mean, Mom?” I asked, my voice thick. “I mean I’ve heard of them
both, but …” I trailed off, unable to articulate what I wanted to
know. How could my siblings be anything other than what I’d always
known them to be?
    “ They belong to a class of
Otherworlder known as demons. A djinn traditionally is rather
monstrous, but Xander is only half djinn. His mother was human.
He’s known what he is for a very long time because his powers began
to manifest before he came to us. His mother abandoned him to fend
for himself when she realized her son wasn’t human.”
    I thought of my brother and all he’d
done for me over the years. I