Whereas as Val had been expecting an attack, Tavras provided demonstration.

“You have seen me make a barrier out of water before. You can do the same thing with your aura but more efficiently thanks to the flexibility of the material.”

With his hands to help the motion, Tavras pulled up tons of water from the surf. The water started swirling around them both so that Val could look on the underside of the watery shell in which she was encased.

Her eyes followed the wavering, rushing motion.

Though he had no need to do so, he kept up the hand motion. “When you’re first starting out, modeling the movement with your hands helps. Let’s see. I can do my classic spherical barrier. This one is more advanced. I can also do walls of water.”

Tavras collapsed all of the water down into a puddle at his feet, then brought it up in an explosive display. The water fell back and splattered out wider than before, much of it pouring over the shell of the turtle. “Try making a wall flicker into existence just like that.”

Focusing on manifesting her energy like she did before, Val flung out aura from around herself. ‘Forcefield’ would be this ability.

The disc formed as strong as the one that had severed Tavras’s strand of water, flying like a saucer for him.

Tavras leaped away, narrowly having the disc of aura blow past him. “Easy, Val! You’re supposed to be working on defense—not offense. Were you trying to slice me in half?”

“No,” she said innocently.

Though she had almost done something worse than that to Iharu, Val expected more from Tavras. A more powerful god like him, she could not actually hurt or so she refused to believe. At the same time, she would try to be a bit more careful with her flying discs.

Next, her disc went vertically into the sky. A flash reflected along its rim in the sunlight, out of sight.

“Well, at least that one was not aimed at me,” Tavras said with his head tilted straight backwards.

Likewise, Val had her gaze fixated upwards. She trusted that it had dematerialized at some point, not that the projectile would come back down with the force of gravity.

They kept trying until Val could produce a shimmering shield in front of her like a frosted piece of glass.

“Hooray! I finally did it—”

Before she could finish celebrating, Tavras threw an arc of water hard enough that it shattered her shield. Her frontside became soaked with water, though her shield had taken most of the force out of the blow.

Droplets dripped from Val’s clothes and the ends of her hair. “Thanks a lot, Tavras.” Sad and dejected, she mused, “I just wanted one whole second to feel proud of myself.”

“It’s supposed to be the purpose of the thing. I couldn’t resist.”

“Let me try to create a stronger version,” Val said. Squaring off her stance, she used both hands like a mime to create the barrier.

“That looks good.” Tavras walked around it in slow appraisal. “Let me know when I can test it!”

“Just wait.” Her eyes felt shut to better imagine the strongest walls that she could produce not only as a physical manifestation, but also within herself. “Tavras?” her small voice whined.

“Yes, Val,” he whined back in mimicry.

What an ass, she would think if not for how well she knew Tavras. He was only kidding around, so she forced on a tight smile.

“There’s something I feel really bad about. Arius told me something, but I don’t know if I would want to confirm it in the past.”

“What is it? I’m listening.”

Her hand followed the surface of the Forcefield. “Is my father really dead?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

Only the crash of the waves against the serpent snapping turtle resounded until he spoke again.

“I liked your father. He fulfilled his role as God Supreme much better than Suvier. He actually regarded me and the ocean as our own entities and did not impose asinine restrictions on us.” Nodding along, Tavras said, “A lot of gods liked him. He kept order and balance for a lot of people, obviously not with Suvier, but that’s the way it goes.”

Looking to her with a tilt of his head he said, “Obviously, I knew your father. I can tell you anything that you would like to know about him.”

“Thanks,” she muttered. The durability of aura seemed to harden as she spoke. “I just feel bad because all this time, I assumed that my father had been some selfish, derelict god who did not care about my mortal mother or his kids to have any presence in my life. I was always hostile to the very thought of him. I didn’t know that he was… dead.”

Tavras tilted his head in consideration. “Val, I know the constant feeling like you have been missing something all your life, but you are too young to torment yourself like this. Let me reiterate: I knew your father. He was a very reasonable and compassionate person and would understand. He would not hold anything against you that you said or thought about him because you had no way to know any better.”

Her brow pinched inward with guilt and concern, relaxing as she saw Tavras open his arms up for a hug.

The barrier of her aura dissipated so that she could rush into his arms. “Tavras!” Her own arms clasped around him in a vice so that she could cling onto his trunk. “I really didn’t know any better. How was I supposed to know?” Even her Past Insight would fail her there, never knowing what to look for in the past.

“Hush. There, there, child. As you said, you had no way to know any better,” he reiterated in a kindly whisper.

Having cried more than enough today, she had no tears left to cry but felt grateful for the prolonged hug nonetheless. This had been what Tavras had been trying to get her to understand all this time.

He was never meant to be a lover to her but a mentor. Tavras was the father figure that she had never had, and only now realized that she wanted.

“Do you think that my father would have been okay with you looking after me like this?” Val stilled against his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart whilst she waited for his reply.

“Yes. All around, Balduino was a better person than me. He would have been an excellent father to you, but in his absence, I think that he would be glad for someone to take an active role in looking after you and helping along in your training.”

“Your father did trust me.” The lightness in Tavras’s voice was overshadowed by regret. “I have not always done the best job at it, but I want to do honor to his memory in looking after you.”

Val pulled a little away from Tavras so that she could look into the depths of his wizened eyes. In perfect clarity, she could now see why he could never do such a thing as return her romantic affections for him.

A smile lifted to her lips, grander than any happiness that she could derive from back when she had fostered feelings for him. Steadfast, Val now held a familial love for him and henceforth, this would never change.

“Thank you, Tavras.” Val enwrapped herself back around him to resume their hug. “I love you—um, in the way that I love my mom.”

“Ouch,” Tavras said. “You’re really throwing me down the rungs of the ladder, aren’t you?”

The joke glanced off Val rather sorely.

“I love you too, kiddo. Now excuse me while I wash my mouth out with salt water.” He pulled away from the hug and dove flawlessly into the ocean, his form disappearing as a shadow beneath the surface.

With a laugh, Val swiped at her own mouth and restrained herself from spitting into the sea after where Tavras had gone. That had been a gross thing to say, but she realized how weird the words had felt only as soon as she had said them. Though they would probably never say that again, at least Val and Tavras had expressed their real love for each other—more enduring than any romantic love could have been between them.

She could not feel happier with how she felt in part at peace with her father. One thing still concerned her, and that had to do with what Tavras had joked about: her mother.

As it so happened, she had Tavras who knew her mother too. Val saw no better time than to ask these questions aside from now.