Chapter 5
THEON
He was working on borrowed time.
He knew that.
Not only from the Fates, but from his father.
Luka had told him his father had been freed when they’d rescued Xan.
He’d told Luka they didn’t need to come up with a plan, that the Fates would take care of it, but who knew when that would be.
While the warnings from the prophecy all seemed to be aligning, indicating that it would be sooner rather than later, soon could be days or decades for immortal beings.
Theon was certain the only reason he hadn’t run into his father yet was because he was off searching for Eviana.
He didn’t know the specifics of why he couldn’t find her.
There’d been no time for detailed explanations before he’d left them all at the Pantheon.
If he’d waited any longer to leave, he was sure he wouldn’t have been able to do it.
Tessa’s screams had echoed down the passages as he’d left, and now they haunted him.
Waking. Sleeping. It didn’t matter. He heard them all the time.
Theon had been staying at the penthouse in Rockmoor, trying to formulate some semblance of a plan.
And he had one. Sort of. He’d tied up some loose ends, moved funds around in accounts, and stocked up on blood rations, because without a Source, he was going to need them.
More than that, he’d purchased a new phone, shutting off his old one.
He couldn’t risk being tracked, and Luka kept trying to contact him.
A male could only resist temptation for so long.
This needed to be a clean break. The only thing he couldn’t control was the bond between the three of them, and wasn’t that ironic?
The thing was broken, and he was both grateful and irritated by that.
It was a double-edged sword. He wanted to know if they were all right, but he needed to let them both go.
He’d entrusted her to Luka, and he couldn’t interfere with that.
Not anymore. Besides, they should be long gone from the realm by now.
It’d been two weeks. It was the last thing he’d asked of Luka.
But now he was ready to track down Axel in the Underground.
He needed to fill his brother in on what was happening, and honestly, he wanted to be with the only two people he considered family with Luka and Tessa gone.
If their world was going to end and he was going to meet Arius, he wanted the remaining time to be spent with them.
So he’d watched Arius House from afar for the past several days, making sure his father hadn’t returned.
Once he was certain only the staff remained, he’d gone in under the cover of night.
Theon methodically worked through his father’s study, packing up books and maps.
Anything that might prove valuable. He wished he could just move this entire room, along with the library in Arius House.
Countless hours were spent poring over these volumes.
Sometimes with Luka. Sometimes with Axel.
Usually by himself. But he had to travel light.
He couldn’t take all of it as well as his personal effects.
Not to mention some of Tessa’s belongings he wanted to keep.
That red dress she’d dropped the night she’d taken control with one hand.
The fleece blanket she often wrapped herself up in on the balcony.
The necklace she wore the first time they faced his father as a united front.
The coffee mug with the cracked handle she favored.
The godsdamn bright purple flip-flops.
He was on a rolling ladder searching the top shelves when he heard the footfalls.
Immediately tensing, he slowly descended, setting aside the three books he held and sliding his hands into his pockets.
The footsteps drew closer, and he tilted his head in interest. These weren’t the heavy steps of his father or the hesitant and quiet movements of the staff.
“Hello, Mother,” he sneered when the door opened, Cressida standing in the doorway.
How foolish of her considering they’d learned she’d been working with Cordelia and Rordan for years now. Not to mention she’d helped set a trap for Tessa to bring her to heel and ruin.
“Oh. It’s you,” Cressida sighed, her disappointment evident. “I thought your father had finally returned home.”
“You mean the male you’ve been double-crossing for… How long has it been?” he replied, his tone cold and dark. “From the very beginning?”
But his mother only smiled in return, something just as icy. “You think you have this all figured out, don’t you, Theon? The academic and the clever one of the family.”
She moved deeper into the room, her long black dress clinging to her figure.
It was a casual piece, but she still wore her heels.
They clicked loudly with every step until she reached the desk, picking up a decorative paperweight.
She spun it in her hand, gaze fixed on the object as if she wasn’t worried about her son’s calculated temper in the least.
“I think I have a pretty good grasp on things at this point,” he finally gritted out when she only continued to toy with the decor.
“Always researching and scheming,” she went on, as though she hadn’t been waiting for him to speak. “Digging into things you needn’t have bothered with. If only you could have done as you were told. Been what your father had tried to train you to become.”
He went utterly still. How many times had he said such similar words to Tessa?
She sighed dramatically, “This would have all been taken care of if you hadn’t insisted on Selecting that wretched cu—”
She didn’t get to finish. Theon was across the room before she could blink. His hand wrapped around her throat, he cut off her words and shoved her back into the desk.
“Do not ever speak of her like that,” he snarled. “Then again, you won’t be speaking much longer. You set her up. You worked with Cordelia to break her and cage her. You fed information to Rordan to take her from me. Did you really think I would never find out?”
She choked out a gasp, and he loosened his grip to let her speak.
With a derisive laugh, she said, “You’re just like your father, Theon.
Too wrapped up in your own agenda and power to notice what’s going on around you.
You didn’t even realize the female wasn’t Fae until it was displayed to everyone at the Emerging.
For someone so clever, you miss what’s right in front of you every single time.
” She paused, then added, “Although, I suppose that’s not entirely your fault. Considering what you are.”
His hand tightened again, and a sharp gasp slipped past her lips when his power seeped from his palm, adding to the pressure. “Tell me everything, or I kill you right now.”
“You…can’t,” she choked out.
His darkness wound up from beneath his hand, crawling along her jaw and making its way to her parted lips.
“You think I care because you are my mother?” he asked. “You’ve never been affectionate towards me. You’ve never cared. You are my mother by title only, and you hurt her. Tried to take her from me. The cost of that transgression is your life.”
She sputtered, and his power eased a fraction. “I raised you,” she rasped.
“Caris raised me, and then Pen when she was murdered. Try again,” he sneered, removing his hand altogether to let his power do the work.
Her lip curled into a sneer of her own. “I raised you even though you weren’t mine. You won’t kill me, Theon, because killing me will kill the one who actually birthed you. Then you will never have answers to questions you didn’t even know you had.”
“What are you talking about?” he demanded.
She shifted, and he felt a hand brush his thigh. Looking down, he found her pulling up the skirt of her dress. He lurched back a step, his darkness keeping her pinned to the desk. “What the fuck are you doing?”
She said nothing as she pulled her dress higher. Then she shifted just enough to show him where a Mark stood stark against the flesh of her inner thigh. It was in a place few would ever see, and certainly not him, and it was one he’d never seen before.
“What does it do?” he asked sharply.
“It binds my life to hers. Consider it my…safeguard,” she rasped out, his power still coiled at her neck.
“I would have never known if you hadn’t said something,” he countered.
“Not a safeguard from you,” she replied, straightening as he loosened his power even more. “From your father.”
“Who else knows?”
“No one,” she replied. “At least not that I have told. He bound me with a Secrecy Mark, but it faded when he was not the Arius Lord for a short time.” Lifting her bare arm, she showed him where a Mark had once graced her flesh above the crook of her elbow for the entirety of his life.
True to her word, it was gone. He’d never questioned it.
His father forced others to take Secrecy Marks all the time.
He’d had some of the same Marks on his flesh at various times in his life.
“If she still lives, then where is she?” he asked, narrowing his eyes.
“Now why would I tell you that?” Cressida asked, a smirk lifting at her newfound leverage.
“And Axel?”
“Axel is mine,” she said fiercely.
That made sense. She always favored him, while she seemed to tolerate Theon.
She would sometimes intervene on Axel’s behalf, leaving Theon to fend for himself against his father.
Axel had the auburn undertones to his dark hair thanks to Cressida’s dark red locks, while Theon’s hair was the pitch black of his father’s. But still…
“We look nearly identical,” he argued.
“Genetics are powerful,” she said simply. “Your father made sure his Match…had certain characteristics.”
He shook his head. “I don’t believe you.”
“Believe me or don’t,” she said with a shrug. “That’s your prerogative.”