Page 14 of Tempest of Wrath and Vengeance

She snapped her mouth shut, familiar fury starting to build.

It’s not your place to know.

Same words, different meaning. She was still a vessel being used. She wasn’t stupid.

“And my mother?” Tessa asked, trying to sound nonchalant, but she was desperate to put these final pieces of her lineage together. Toknowwhere she came from, and what she was, andwhythis was her purpose.

Achaz’s head canted to the side. “What of her?”

“Who is she?”

The smile that filled the god’s face immediately told her she’d revealed too much. He saw right through her false indifference.

“Fulfill your purpose, granddaughter, and I will bring you to her,” he said.

“What?” Tessa stammered. “How… You cannot come here.”

“No,” Achaz agreed. “Not at this time anyway. But you, blood of my blood? You have the power to change that, don’t you? And beyond that, even if I can never step foot in Devram, you can certainlyleavethe realm.”

“How?”

“Fulfill your destiny. Find me again when it is done,” was all he said before his image started fading.

“Wait!” Tessa cried, lurching forward once more and pressing her hands to the glass.

But he was gone, and she was left alone all over again.

It took her a few minutes, her brow pressed to the cool glass as she worked to stifle the fury and power pressing at her soul. But when she stepped back from the mirror, she smoothed her hands down her dress and made her way back out of the Pantheon. She needed to get back to the Tribunal building anyway.

Roan was waiting for her, falling into step beside her as the three of them wound their way through the Acropolis streets once more. Every footfall was filled with renewed determination.

Fulfill her purpose.

Collect more currency.

Correct the balance.

All of this was reckless and impulsive and wild. But that was exactly what she needed to be if she expected to survive.

Because she’d stopped playing the games of the Legacy and had entered an arena with gods, and if she failed, her only purpose was death.

4

LUKA

“This is fucking stupid, Theon,” Luka griped as he yanked his tie off and threw it across the room. His phone was on speaker, sitting on the coffee table before his sofa.

“It’s not stupid, Luka,” Theon replied. “What’s stupid is you calling me right now. I told you not to contact me. Not to tell me anything.”

“What exactly have I told you? You felt her emotions as much as I did,” he answered, shrugging out of the suit jacket. He hated wearing all this, but he’d had no choice in the matter when he was meeting the rulers of the realm as the representative of Arius Kingdom.

“Then why are you calling me right now? To tell me what I already know?”

A frustrated growl escaped him as he started working the buttons of his shirt. When he finished undoing the final one, he sank onto the sofa, his shirt falling open as he swiped up his phone and brought it to his ear. “She was there.”

“Where?”

“At the Tribunal hearing.”

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