Page 211 of Storm of Secrets and Sorrow

Learning everything it could.

Luka appeared, stepping from the very air, but she didn’t move. Neither did he as he stared back at her.

“Look at you,” he rumbled, the growl a possessive thing she felt in her soul, and she could feel… Want? Desire?

Her head tilted in realization, another betrayal snaking through her. “I can feel you.”

He nodded, slowly prowling around her, as if he wasn’t sure what to expect from her.

Probably wise.

“How?” she demanded.

“The second Mark. You were too powerful. Theon couldn’t do it alone. I had to help, and somehow?—”

“I am bound to both of you?”

“We are unsure.”

“Where is Theon?”

“Waiting for you. He couldn’t come.”

She scoffed. “Couldn’t or wouldn’t?”

That had Luka pausing. “He was with Valter. So close to the third Mark and with everything to come, we don’t want to make more trouble, Tessa. He sent me.”

“They’ll never stop coming for me.”

“No, they won’t,” Luka agreed. He took a step closer. “We’ll figure all this out when we get home.”

“What is there to figure out?” she asked. “I am forever to be hunted. By them. By him. By those who want me, and those who only want me dead. A wanted unwanted. How ironic.”

“You’re wanted, Tessa,” he said.

“I’m wanted when it’s convenient. For my power. For my blood. For leverage.”

“No, little one?—”

“Take me back,” she demanded.

“I don’t think you’re ready, Tessa.”

“Take me back!”

“I can’t until your power is under control,” he snapped. “I am still his Guardian.”

And what could she say to that?

He slipped his hand into his pocket. “I can put these back on if you can’t?—”

“If anyone ever tries to put those on me again, I will kill them,” she hissed, some of the light coiled around her arm unwinding.

Never again would she be at the mercy of those bands.

Never again would she be at the mercy of anyone.

With a shuddering breath, she closed her eyes, whispering to her power, pulling it back into herself. The only thing left when she reopened her eyes were two single cords of gold light wound around her wrists where the bands usually sat.

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