Maybe it was my pointing out her teasing, or maybe she had decided to get nervous. I had no idea, but now wasn't the time to be diving into another problem.
I would have to talk with her more on the boat if we were leaving in a few days, but Missy wasn't as important right now as Tiga and Jessabell. I was still trying to figure out what I was going to do about the Omniphobic Minostien.
There was Tiga, the Manitken, and her father to deal with, who might or might not be an idiot. All more things to add to the stack, but I was making progress, and soon I would be off this island, and I could relax for a bit once we were on the open sea.
[Relax? Good luck, but you are right about having some less violent excitement for a while, at least. At some point, you will have to move off the beaten path, and you will be back in the thick of it again. Trouble and people with problems seem to gravitate towards you, and even on the open sea with no land in sight, I am sure you will find that type of thing.]
That was more than likely going to be the case, but that didn't mean I looked forward to not running around. Though, I understood what Hero meant; There were the girls to take care of, and some would be more difficult than others on the open water.
Mary got herself comfortably settled around my waist and hanging off my back, but she felt bigger now.
Not from the pregnancy; no, it was too soon for that, but an overall sense of her size. Maybe it wasn't her, but me that had changed, and I couldn't remember the last time that I had looked at myself in the mirror.
The two of us left the girl's room and then headed downstairs, leaving Missy in the pool. It wasn't like she would do very well out of the water, and I was sure that Mary needed a break.
I was hoping that when I could confirm her as one of my Girls, she might go through some changes. Missy should get help over this problem like Lizy, Kerri, and Veronica when it happens, but there is no guarantee that it would work.
I wondered how the girls were when I wasn't around? I never really heard anyone complaining about the others, so they must get along when I am gone.
They must wait for me to get back to start acting up and getting wild, but there were worse things. I would far sooner have them act up around me so I could meditate rather than when I wasn't around to prevent any accidents.
"Did you get lost up there?" Jilly asked as I came down the stairs, but Mary spoke up before I could.
"Ka...sblf...came to see me, and told me that'sss I isss cute!" Mary said beside my ear, and I twitched as one of her snakes stuck their tongue into my ear.
"Really? Well, I suppose that is a lot nicer than what I would have called you. Where is your sister? Dead? I don't know how the two of you can stand each other without killing each other!" Jilly said with a grin, and I agreed but kept my mouth shut.
"I will tell you how! The two girls have the same forces protecting them, so when the two fight, I think it is more dangerous for anyone who isn't them! You weren't there in the water; when that happened, everything went crazy, or something like that. It was more like they had finally realized that they were a group of creatures that considered things smaller than it to be lunch!" I explained, getting a bit into it with my hand waving in the air as I described everything.
"Hmm, that is bothersome, but I am curious to know if the rest of her sisters have the same thing; you do know that there are at least three more that I know of, right?" Jilly asked, and as she did, Nushi closed her book and dropped it as she stood up.
The book disappeared as soon as it left her hand, and Nushi came over to see us. Something in the conversation must have piqued her interest and drew her over.
"Since I can talk to my grandmothers, and I know that Grandmother Nixi is no longer trying to eat me, I have been asking questions while you were gone. From what I have learned about Mary, and her sisters, is that every one of their mothers has gone missing," Nushi explained.
"Missing? Didn't your father say that Mary was abandoned by her mother?" I asked curiously as I remembered back to Mex and me talking about it, but strangely, Nushi nodded in agreeance, confusing me, until she explained herself.
"Yes, that is what we were told when we found Mary, and Missy, and the other three, but all of them had the same story. Mother had abandoned them, and then The mermaid had dropped them off, but no one had ever put them all together because we didn't meet the girls all at once," Nushi explained, and my eyes went big.
"Wait, wait, wait! You found Mary? And her sisters? On this island, right?" I asked but already knew that I was wrong.
"No, we found each of the girls on different islands and very spread out. Some of the girls didn't find out that they were the girls' sisters until we left the island. I think that there are some large forces at play here, and I don't think that these mothers left their daughters," Nushi explained, and I thumbed my chin as I mulled this information over.
"Does that mean that it might have something to do with the Nauticus?" I asked, and Nushi let out a cute gasp, and I could feel the air start to charge and crackle.
"How do you know a name that is older than any demon on the planet?!" Nushi squeaked out.
Hmm, looks like I hit the nail on the head, and Hero was right.
[For your sake, I would have preferred to be wrong.]
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