"Don't step in the flour," Guinevere commanded, pushing Puccini's head back. "In fact, why don't you just get off the counter?" Sulkily, the cat allowed himself to be put on the floor, giving Guinevere an ornery eye. "This isn't your cake," she told him sourly. "You didn't lose an arm or get stitches, even. Come back when you've been seriously wounded." Guinevere was the kind of girl who talked to her cat. It wasn't a sensible thing, but it was less lonely than talking to herself, and cats were smarter than dogs anyway. It seemed less futile than scolding a poodle would have been.

"The blood is curious," she muttered, more to herself than the cat. "Black, too. Moving and black, like it has a mind of its own, even." She flapped her wings, the blades that had memories she had never been a part of, that sometimes seemed to think for themselves. "Anyway, I'll have to visit more often." Niven's sacrifice was the most potentially dangerous one she had seen so far besides hers, and unlike hers, his powers hadn't made themselves clear yet. She worried about him. There was the possibility that it could be worse than her own, which was just a sleep-losing nuisance at the best, and a depressing wake up call at the worst.

If it was, there was nothing much she could do about it, apart from baking more cake and being there for support. She could learn all she wanted about Heralds, but what could she actually do if one of them had a problem? What help could she offer when she couldn't even deal with her own powers without getting a migraine and she still accidentally got wing cuts when she wasn't careful?

She kneaded the dough thoughtfully. She could figure something out, she supposed. She had started carrying around bandages when her blades grew in, and she learned to sew so she could make her clothing fit better. She was good at sensible solutions, and maybe by some chance, she could think of something sensible for Niven. For any other Herald that needed help. She could have common sense enough for everybody, and take notes on what she could do for when she had to deal with it again.

She looked at the list of college courses on the kitchen table. There was that, too. She reminded herself to keep the Heralds she had met so far in mind when choosing classes, the broader knowledge base she had, the better. She would make herself useful in some way, whether it was easy as cake or not.