Page 157 of Rain of Shadows and Endings

“How much do you know about Arius and Sargon?” Theon asked instead.

Tessa glanced up at him. “Arius is the god of endings and who you descend from. Speaking of which, how far back does that go? Like a few generations up your family tree, and we’d find Arius or…?”

Theon barked a laugh. “No, Tessa. The original demigod our family is descended from lived literally thousands of years ago. Before this world was even created. I don’t even know how many generations back we’d have to go to even come close to figuring that out. Likely hundreds.”

“And Sargon is the god of war and courage,” she said.

“Yes,” Theon replied, his eyes flicking to the front seat where Axel and Luka were listening intently. “He also commands Arius’s armies, including his elite guardians.”

“Elite guardians? And what do you mean by Arius’s armies? Wouldn’t Sargon ultimately answer to Achaz since he is the ruler of the gods?”

“Why the sudden interest, little one?” Luka asked, and she was surprised it came from him. He tended to let Theon and Axel deal with her, only interfering if Theon was being a special kind of asshole.

“It’s just this Guardian Mark thing…” She paused as she read more, her feet beginning to tap on the seat again. “I don’t understand why they would incorporate it into the Source Marks. How would that work?”

“There are different types of magic throughout the worlds, Tessa,” Theon said, watching her closely. “Some are not as readily found here because the gods do not interfere with our world, but that does not mean our own magic hasn’t evolved in various ways. We have found ways around that.”

“What does that mean?”

“How do you think advancements are made with tonics and technology?”

“We were taught the gods gave their Legacy the best from all the worlds before they dumped you all here,” she replied, her eyes going back to the screen.

“You phrase it so eloquently, baby doll,” Axel teased.

Tessa shrugged. “So the Guardian Mark was a real thing?”

“It is a real thing,” Theon answered.

“In theory.”

“It is a theory that the Guardian Mark was somehow incorporated into the Source Marks, but the Guardian Mark itself is not a theory,” Theon clarified.

“How did it work?”

“Guardians are always of the Sargon bloodline. They were often bonded to Arius descendants, but the strongest of Sargon’s bloodline were bonded to gods or deities to protect them.”

“Deities?” Tessa asked, glancing up at him.

Theon gave her a soft smile. “Deities were the result of a god having a child with a magical bloodline.”

“A magical bloodline? Like the Legacy?”

Theon shook his head. “The Legacy all have mortal blood. We are descended from demigods, the result of a god and a mortal. We may have worked hard over the many centuries to make the mortal blood as insignificant as possible by carefully arranging Matches, but it doesn’t negate the fact that we will always have some mortal blood, even if only a drop at this point.”

“So what kind of magical bloodline then?”

“The gods created worlds,” Luka chimed in. “You think they only created a few forms of life and only in this realm?”

“I guess that makes sense,” she mused. “What other magical bloodlines are there?”

Theon shrugged. “Who can really say at this point? With the gods agreeing to not interfere in this world, it is not as if we can know of anything going on in the other realms. It is said Legacy could once travel between places by simply willing it, as if they walked through the air. But they took that ability from us when they brought all their Legacy here.”

“Travel between places? Like between kingdoms?”

Theon shrugged. “Between kingdoms. Between worlds. That is something we will likely never know, I suppose. I’ve found texts that suggest more than the gods emerged from the Chaos.”

“So back to this Guardian thing,” Tessa said, sitting up a little straighter because this was truly fascinating. Of course she’d known there were other realms, but she’d never really thought much about it. What would be the point when her entire purpose was to serve the Legacy? But entire other bloodlines and races? Even though it made complete sense, it was still hard to wrap her mind around. “Gods and deities just picked a Guardian? Then they were given this Mark and what? How did it work exactly?”

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