Page 36 of Storm of Secrets and Sorrow

“Do I?” Tessa countered. “If I’m a Legacy, wouldn’t I need blood?”

She watched Luka’s gaze move to Theon, and Tessa turned to look at him too.

Theon was hanging up his jacket, and he started rolling up the sleeves of his button-down shirt as he turned back to them. “That is something we will need to test.”

“Test,” Tessa repeated doubtfully.

“I think we forgo the blood for now and see how much of your reserves have refilled when we do this again.”

“The bands might keep her power from refilling naturally,” Luka said, trying to hand Tessa the orange again.

“Stop trying to feed me,” she snapped.

Luka arched a brow. “You always want to eat.”

“I want doughnuts or pizza or fries, not an orange.”

She could swear Luka’s lips twitched as if he was trying not to smirk.

“Anyway,” Theon cut in, “we were given a deadline to figure out your heritage. Knowing if your power wells will refill on their own will narrow things down.”

Her eyes narrowed. “So now I am some grand experiment for you?”

“That’s not what I said,” Theon answered. “But the sooner we figure out your heritage, the better. We can move forward with other plans, get the other Kingdoms off our backs, and keep the Augury at bay.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Luka muttered. “I’m not talking about this with you again until Axel is with us.”

“That’s fine,” Theon said, moving deeper into the foyer. He grabbed Tessa’s hand and swiped the orange from Luka with a nod. “We’ll see you in the morning.”

Tessa followed because she had questions, like why the fuck Theon thought these Augury people were after her.

“What did they mean when they said ‘the Everlasting War has finally found its way here?’” she asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t know what any of that means,” Theon replied, and she could hear how much that annoyed him.

“Why do they think I have something to do with it?” she pressed.

“I don’t know.”

“You said you know what they seek. You said?—”

Theon whirled on her as they reached the third floor landing. “I know what I said, Tessa. I was there.” She blinked up at him, inwardly wincing at the darkness drifting across his eyes. “Eat this,” was the only other thing he said before forcing the orange into her hand and pushing through the door into their room.

She followed, pausing to slip the riding boots off. Why did he even have riding boots for her here? There weren’t any horses here.

He’d already moved into the walk-in closet, and Tessa sighed, plopping down on the sofa and peeling off a wedge of the orange.

All the books Theon was looking through were stacked on the coffee table. He never left his notes out. She could only assume that was so Ford didn’t snoop through them. She’d tried to talk to the Fae once, but he’d ignored her entirely. She hadn’t bothered trying again.

Grabbing the book off the top of the stack, Tessa idly flipped through the pages. It was some sort of history book detailing the various gods, but she paused when a page mentioned the Chaos they came from. The way it was worded made it sound like more than just the Firsts had emerged from the Chaos. She’d never given much thought to it all, but she supposed it would stand to reason that more than the gods emerged. So what happened to the other beings?

She was still studying the pages, the orange now gone, when she heard Theon come back into the room a few minutes later. She didn’t bother looking at him. He came to a stop beside her, and from her periphery, she saw him slip his hands into the pockets of the loose pants he’d changed into.

Lightly clearing his throat, he asked, “How are you feeling? And I swear to Arius, if you sayfine?—”

“You’ll what?” Tessa muttered, turning the page. “Lock me in a wine cellar?”

He was silent for a moment before he said, “We should discuss everything that happened tonight.”

---