Soaring Over The World (Soaring Saga #2)

**Chapter Fifteen~ Airplane Convos**

     I wanted to be furious.

     I wanted to be terrified.

     I wanted to hug him and never let go.

     I wanted to bombard him with a million questions.

     But I did none of those things. All I did was stare. I think I also began to hyperventilate.

"Cirocco?" He asked. I nodded, trying to swallow the lump in my throat. 

"Daddy!" Angelo cried, running past me and struggled to get onto the net. Dad grabbed him under the arms and hauled him up and into a hug.

"I'm sorry I had to leave you here, Ange," Dad told him, smiling, "The griffin was getting to close to the city, and I needed to help. But look who it brought to us!"

     He gestured to me, and with misty eyes, I slowly walked over to the net, carefully yanking myself up and collapsed like a little kid onto Dad. He hugged me tight.

"Is it really you?" he whispered into my ear.

"Yeah," was all I managed to croak out.

"Look how big you are!"  Dad noted, "You've got to be seventeen by now!"

"My birthday was a couple weeks ago," I told him, the shock beginning to fade.

"Are these your friends?" Dad asked, gesturing around and up.

"Yes, this is Ari, Neil, and Raina" I explained, pointing to each one in turn, "and up there is River, Audra, and Lennox."

     I heard my dad whisper 'thank you' at them. We sat there for a bit, silently. No one needed to say anything.

     Once the initial shock wore off, I recognized I was feeling a lot of things from them, and once I sorted out in my brain who's was who's, I adressed my own issues.

"But... why did you not come back for me?" I asked, slipping out of the hug, "Why would you never talk to me, why'd you just leave me with humans?"

"It would be dangerous in our world," was his only reply.

"Um, I'm pretty sure it's more dangerous for a child with shrinkable wings to be hidden in with humans," I retorted, "Do you have any idea what could've happened?"

"Cirocco, trust me," Dad continued, "If you were living in Argentum, you would've grown your power, not surpressed it."

"Why would you want me to surpress my power? What power?" 

"Your Essence," Dad explained, "It was really strong when you were a baby, and I couldn't do anything about it but try to find a way for you to hide it. It could have been extremely dangerous!"

"Riiiight, the Captain Marvel-style superpower that had supposedly been recycled from Ruby Palloko? I would be safer with humans? That I didn't even have in the beginning?"

"Yeah, actually. I get you're angry, but--"

"No, you don't get it!" I cried, beginning to let it all out as my face heated up, "I was born in Sweden, raised in Canada, and then moved to Norway, all while trying to hide and run away when something happened! I've had to do that since I was a child! Only when I'm going to move out on my own soon do you come back?"

"I understand I was a horrible father when I you were younger, but I panicked! I couldn't do anything! Besides, your mother was human, and the plan was to have you live with her--"

"Wait," I gasped, doing a double take, "My mom was human? I was supposed to live with her?"

"Of course you were, we weren't just going to leave you with random humans, were we?" Dad stated.