The Princess's Guardian

7

The journey to the palace is not a short one. Sunny informed me early on that the portal is situated in the middle of the kingdom and the palace is in the city centre in the south. One of the royal guards, which I'm still baffled to see is a talking tree, told her that we will stop at one of the cities for rest.

I am still in my lioness form, anticipating my next uncontrollable transformation. Apparently that each transformation can span from a few minutes to a few days, so there is no preparation whatsoever. These next few weeks are the most vulnerable for me as my spirit is getting accustomed to being only Sunny's Guardian. She said that there was one of ancestors made a mistake of letting someone else care for their Guardian during the beginning of the transformations, and the Guardian's instincts made it protective over the carer. 

All I can imagine is a duck hatchling that's attached to a mother cat based on one of the cute animal videos I watched days ago.

Despite Sunny's lack of knowledge on Guardians, she seems to be doing a great job at handling me whenever I feel like I'm losing control once in a while. There's some sort of lioness spirit that's been in my mind that takes over when something catches me off guard. One of those times is when one of the villagers, who happened to be young bear, approach the carriage to hand Sunny a bouquet of flowers and I started growling in warning at the bear. All Sunny had to do was pat my back and told the bear to give some sort of warning before approaching any royal next time. Other Guardians tend to be less nicer to strangers than me, or so Sunny said. 

The Earth Kingdom feels similar to Earth, except that it's more set in the 1600s and without any sort of technology. Animals and trees are capable of speech and mindlink. Heck, the animals, known as Animus, here wear clothes like a real life Zootopia. Sunny seems amused at my reaction when she explains about her subjects. I can also tell that she's proud that everyone here gets along well. 

Not all animals are capable of speech, and some don't have the capability to think like humans do. The talking trees - also known as Gueses - are capable of doing everything a human does besides eating food since all they need is sunlight. They have a lifespan of 500 years before they start slowing down and root themselves to a comfortable spot to become ordinary trees like back on Earth. 

It is definitely creepy to know that all the normal-looking trees that I'm used to are basically dead Gueses. Gueses make up the majority of the Earth Kingdom, followed by Animus, humans and finally the royals. 

"I'm surprised your mind is not blown to bits from the amount of information you've retained in the past few hours," Sunny tells me in amusement.

I growl playfully and nod for her to continue from her rambling. I can tell that she's nervous for whatever's going to happen once we reach the palace. The life on Earth that she's been so comfortable with is gone and she has to now face her new future. The least I can do is distract her while it lasts. 

All my life, I thought I knew Sunny Thornton; I realise how much I don't and I understand why. Sunny's real name would have given away her true identity and the dangers that she could put herself in. She apologised to me many times today for all the lies she had fed me over the years, which I want to so desperately sooth her with words. 

She doesn't need to apologise. If I were in her shoes, I would lie to everyone if I'm in a different planet just to protect myself, my family, and the future of my Kingdom. Now I know why Sunny wasn't keen to meet new people. She didn't want to lie more than she already did. Sunny's personality is so gentle and once she's plunged in guilt, it takes her a long time to recover. 

I purr and follow my instincts to comfort Sunny everytime she cries about how guilty she feels. She feels responsible for basically putting me into danger, changing me and bringing me to a different planet. I know that Sunny can hide her true feelings from others, but when it comes to me, she lowers her guard.