Chapter 2

Ten words, one answer

My mother, Raven, was everything to me. She was my rock. The one person that I could go to and complain to about anything and everything, laugh and cry with. I always believed her on everything. And as far as I knew, she had always told me the truth. So after calming down from crying, I gathered up the courage to ask her.

"Who is my father?"

I felt my mother tense up. I let go of her and she was looking at me in shock. Like she never expected that question out of my mouth ever again. My mother stood from the floor and helped me up.

"He's no one important. Sweetie, I told you this long ago. Why do you ask now? After all these years?" she questioned. With that, she walked into the kitchen her back towards me.

I hesitated. Do I dare tell her? Do I dare mention that, when I was telling Yakumo that I would never give him the Power Sphere, I noticed that the King of the Netherworld had the same color of eyes that I had? I decided that I had to.

"Mom, when Spirit World was under water, I had to put the Power Sphere inside me and fly off to Human World. While there, the Human World was attacked and almost made into the Netherworld. And the leader of that little group was Yakumo," I answered.

If I thought my mother had been tense before, she became a statue when I mentioned "Netherworld" and "Yakumo".

I continued, "And I couldn't help but notice Yakumo's eyes. They were purple, like mine are."

"Lots of peoples eyes are purple," Raven replied.

"Name three."

"Koi, Lillith, and Somi," the swift answers came out in a rush.

Koi has brown, Lillith has hazel, and Somi has one blue and one brown," I countered. "Mother, what are you hiding from me?"

Raven sighed heavily. She knew that she had to tell Botan the truth, she couldn't erase her past, no matter how much it haunted her. Raven wanted to take the secret of Botan's father to her grave, even though Koenma had found out and she begged and pleaded with him to keep it a secret from everyone else. He agreed. Raven was glad that Koenma trusted her daughter even though he knew of her heritage. Raven turned towards her daughter, her heart heavy with haunt and guilt. Botan was waiting for her to tell her story. Raven headed over to the couch, sat down, and motioned for Botan to do the same. As soon as Botan sat down, Raven took one of her daughter's hands and held it.

"The last time I saw your father was when we conceived you. At the time, there was a compromise between Spirit World and the Netherworld. Certain ferries were able to take souls or spirits there if the Spirit World couldn't handle them. We had one very strict rule, no talking to anyone. But a certain someone had caught my eye. And I had caught his. I didn't even know who he was until he came up and introduced himself. We ended up talking every time I went to the Netherworld. I broke the important rule of no talking to anyone, but I couldn't help it. I had fallen in love.

About a year into the "relationship" we had to be extra cautious. Situations were getting tense between the Spirit World and the Netherworld so we had to be extremely careful. I ended up sneaking out to the Netherworld one night and meeting your father at the gates. When we would meet up we would usually just talk, but that night he surprised me. He asked if he could kiss me. Speechless, all I could do was nod.

At first, the kiss was soft and gentle like a feather. Then the kiss turned into kisses, getting more and more passionate each time…"

"MOM! TMI!" interrupted Botan, pinching the bridge of her nose, shaking her head as if that would remove the image of her mother making out from her head.

"Ah, sorry, well you get where that was going. Then about a week after that night, things with the Netherworld went south. The compromise ended. No one was allowed to enter or even go near the lands of the Netherworld. Apparently, the ruler had gotten it in his head that he needed to get new land. King Enma banished them further into the abyss. I found out that it was your father that had broken the compromise. Trying to gather an army to invade lands. And then about five weeks after that, I found out that I was expecting a baby…" Raven trailed off.

Botan was staring at her mother. The ruler… the ruler of the Netherworld had broken the compromise by trying to gather an army and taking over new land. She was thankful that there hadn't been an army in the Human World or else the guys, her friends, her human family, would have probably been killed and the Human World would have become the new Netherworld. But she had to know.

"Mom, is my father who I think it is?" Botan asked her mother, silently pleading with herself that it wasn't true. That her biological father wasn't…

Pink eyes full of sadness and sympathy met purple eyes of disbelief, anger, guilt, and sadness.

"Yakumo, the King of the Netherworld, was your father Botan," whispered Raven, looking into her daughter's eyes.