Dawn of Chaos and Fury by Melissa K. Roehrich - 11

8

“ S top touching things,” Luka growled, coming back into the main living space of his cave.

Everyone was here. Everyone . There were too many people near his things.

“I’m not touching anything,” Razik retorted, arms crossed over his chest. He tilted his head and leaned closer to a small square tin. “How old is this?”

Luka stalked over, swiping it up. “Stop looking at things,” he snapped, heading to the kitchen and setting it on the counter. Away from his brother.

“It’s not even a bowl, Raz,” Eliza drawled from where she was sitting on the sofa. She’d found a book somewhere, the pages open in her lap. “Stop antagonizing him.”

“And I suppose that bowl just disappeared on its own?” he shot back.

“You probably just misplaced it.”

“I don’t misplace things,” he snarled, smoke furling on his exhale.

She rolled her eyes, going back to her book, and Razik moved along to study the wall of empty frames. Luka tensed, eyes narrowing as he watched his brother. They’d been here a whole two days, and he was hating every fucking second of this.

Forcing himself to tear his eyes away, he moved to the fridge, pulling out various items. Cienna, Gia, and Tristyn had Traveled to Castle Pines and stocked up on food, spare clothing, and other necessities. None of them knew how long they were going to be hiding up here. More than that, Theon seemed to have gone into hiding too. He couldn’t be reached by phone, and the bond wasn’t an option anymore. A part of him wondered if he’d used a Mark to block the bond somehow like Eviana had and that’s why it wasn’t work properly. As for Eviana, he hadn’t been able to get in touch with Lange or Corbin either. That didn’t bode well, but it wasn’t as if he could be in three places at once. He wasn’t exactly sure when this had all become his responsibility.

Placing eggs in a pot of water, he turned the burner on to hard-boil them. While they cooked, he sliced up vegetables, deli meats, and cheeses along with some fruit. There were chips and nuts he dumped into bowls, all the while keeping his brother in his line of sight to make sure the male didn’t touch a single godsdamn thing.

He was just rinsing the eggs when Razik came over to the food spread, although he didn’t fill a plate. He only straightened to his full height and crossed his arms as he said, “Where is she?”

Luka glanced at him before returning his attention to what he was doing. “Xan is with her.”

“And you’re just going to keep her from me until…when?”

Setting the bowl of hard-boiled eggs down with the rest of the food, he mirrored his brother’s stance. “Until I know you’re not going to attack her the moment she steps foot in the same room as you.”

“She’s not your Ward,” Razik sneered, his lip curling up in disgust.

“I’m aware.”

“And she doesn’t appear to be yours anymore,” he continued.

“What’s your point?” Luka snapped, his dragon snarling internally at those words.

“That it’s not your place to protect her,” Razik retorted. “She needs to answer for her actions. Fucking Fates. What is with that bloodline thinking they can do whatever the fuck they want without consequences?”

“The Arius bloodline?” Luka asked in confusion.

“Arius. Serafina. Their godsdamn grandchildren,” he grumbled. “The point is, it no longer appears it is your place to stand beside her and her choices.”

Luka ground his teeth, staring back at the arrogant challenge in his brother’s eyes. As if the male could see the war raging in his soul, he smirked, waiting to see what Luka would do. And what could he do?

When it became apparent he wasn’t going to respond, Razik took a step forward, his arms dropping to his sides. “She destroyed my way home,” he snarled.

“I know,” Luka said.

“I do not want to be stuck in this realm.”

“And what, exactly, do you want me to do about it?” Luka retorted. “I cannot rebuild the Pantheon, and I certainly don’t have the ability to world walk. So what are you hoping to accomplish? More than that, what do you think she will be able to do?”

“She is Chaos,” Razik snapped. “There has to be something she can do.”

Scoffing, he said, “Because she’s clearly in a position to be thinking about world walking. She’s so deep in her power, she grows more mad every day.”

“Madness is how we dream.”

They both turned as Tessa’s voice floated into the room, that eerie ring to it. It hadn’t left. Since the day she’d brought the Pantheon to ruin, that eeriness had been there. It was the most telling thing that betrayed how much control her power had over her right now. But there were things the others didn’t notice as much. The way she always had to be touching something, usually the wall. Her hands always in her hair. The humming. But her mannerisms were growing more erratic, and everyone was taking notice of that.

She moved deeper into the space, her bare feet leaving footprints. They weren’t ashes like Auryon had often left behind, but they were similar. Tessa’s were more silver and gold wisps. Luka glanced at his father, who sent him a grim look where he leaned against the back of the sofa Eliza was sitting on, her focus still on her book as though she hadn’t heard the unstable female who had entered. Luka knew better though. There was little that female didn’t notice.

Razik glared at Tessa as she passed him, but she didn’t seem to care. She only swiped up an orange before hopping up onto the opposite counter, her legs swinging as she peeled the fruit. No one said anything because what was there to say at this point?

Her golden hair fell around her shoulders in soft waves, and he watched her fingers tremble slightly as she pulled at the rind. Her fitted dress was casual, with long sleeves and slits up both sides that went to the tops of her thighs. The wide neckline allowed a view of the Mark over her heart. The one that had started all of this. That had pulled him into something he’d tried to deny himself.

“Where were you?” Luka asked.

Tessa didn’t answer, didn’t even acknowledge them as her feet continued to swing.

“I took her outside,” Xan answered.

He turned to his father. “Outside? Why would you do that?”

“She needs to see the sky,” he replied. “There are certain things that will ground her. Things she associates with safety and security. Things she associates with⁠—”

He cut off abruptly, and when he didn’t continue, Luka asked, “And the sky does that for her?”

“There are better options,” Xan said pointedly. “But it is something until she can be pulled from the depths of chaos.”

“And the better options?” Razik inquired, but his stare was pinned on Luka. It took everything not to flip him his middle finger.

“For Akira, a person was always best,” Xan said carefully. “Tessa may be different… I am simply trying to help her find something, and Akira likes to see the sky.”

She wasn’t different. Luka knew that.

Stay where I can see you.

He glanced over his shoulder to find she had finished peeling the orange, but now she was picking at the pith of the fruit. He could see the juice dripping down her fingers, and her lips were moving as she murmured to herself. With a sigh, he closed the space between them, and as he neared, he could make out the mutterings.

“Xan is right, but he doesn’t want us. No one wants us. We did that. Me. You. We just lie and deceive, but they can’t see— No one can see…” she trailed off, a hand coming up. Luka caught her wrist before her sticky fingers went into her hair.

She startled, apparently not having realized how close he’d come. Slowly she lifted her gaze to his, the violet in her irises piercing through the swirling silvers and golds. They didn’t speak, but some words passed between them in that stare. More words than they’d spoken since they’d come here.

He watched her throat bob with a swallow, and he took the orange from her other hand as he felt her power reach for him and try to draw him closer still. The band of light around the wrist he held wound down around his fingers and up his arm instead of hers. The power in her eyes settled some, more of the violet shining through, but more than that, there was a glimmer of emotion. He couldn’t feel them down the bond, but he could see it in her eyes.

Desperation.

Determination.

Regret.

Resignation.

Failure.

Fury.

“Come with me, Tessa,” he said, wanting to take her away from the stares of everyone. Where he was going to take her, he didn’t know. There were plenty of rooms, and she had her own space, but they never left her alone for long.

The last time they’d done that, she’d plotted and carried out a plan to decimate the center of the realm.

She tugged on her wrist, trying to pull it from his grasp. “You can’t see,” she whispered.

“Can you show me?” he countered, fully aware of everyone watching them.

She held his stare as she slowly shook her head. “You don’t want to, and I understand.”

“Razik is angry with you,” he tried again.

Her head tilted, hair slipping over her shoulder. “I didn’t ask you to catch me this time, Luka. I understand I no longer have that right.”

He still held her, was still touching her, and this was the most coherent she’d been in two days. If he hadn’t already known his father was right, this was all the confirmation he needed. It wasn’t enough to pull her back completely, but it gave her a solid footing, if only for a brief reprieve from the lull of the magic.

Luka let her go, her power clinging to him long after he’d taken a step back. Picking up another orange, he began peeling it, keeping himself between her and Razik as the male stepped closer. Luka expected Razik to be the one to speak first, but it was Tessa.

“You have something to say to me?” she asked. And gods, Luka could swear the air in the room thickened with tension.

He turned back to Tessa to find she’d shifted so that she now sat on her knees on the counter. Her power had wound up her arms, a gold mist hovering as she studied Razik.

“You destroyed my way home,” Razik growled.

“I destroyed the way in for the Fates,” she countered.

“And my way home,” he reiterated.

“Surely you knew that was a risk when you chose to interfere here in the first place?”

Luka almost laughed because she wasn’t taunting him. It sounded like a genuine question.

“Of course I knew it was a risk,” Razik snapped.

“Then you should be upset with yourself, not me,” she said simply, her fingers dragging along the countertop.

“Serafina told you there are other ways in. You accomplished nothing but trapping us here.”

“If there are other ways in, there are other ways out,” Tessa replied with a shrug of her shoulders. Then her lips tipped up in a small, unnerving smile. “But I’ll find those too. I’ll destroy every avenue.”

“You want this world to have a reckoning,” Eliza said, coming up beside Razik. Her grey eyes were pinned on Tessa. “Why not simply leave and let the Fates do just that?”

“Because the innocent here deserve to have justice, not die alongside those who only saw their value in how they could use them,” Tessa hissed, power bouncing from her fingertips.

Eliza nodded, far calmer about this entire situation than her twin flame was. “You want to dismantle the Legacy.”

“Do you not think the Fae here deserve to have the freedom you enjoy in your own world?”

“I do,” Eliza agreed.

“Excellent answer,” Tessa said, her gaze sliding to Razik as a smirk curled on her lips. “Seeing as you are now stuck here for the foreseeable future.”

“You’re lucky I don’t—” Razik started, but he snapped his mouth shut when her power thickened, coiling into a whip in her hand. Light and dark crackled, sparks of energy and embers of something other flaring off it.

“Tell me,” Tessa crooned. “Tell me all about the luck I have, Razik Greybane. Is it the abandonment at birth? The time spent in small spaces to think? The friends who used and deceived me? The Lords and Ladies who did the same? Or was it the not knowing what I was, having no way to figure it out, while you had all your books and teachings? Then you come here and act as if we are beneath you for not having the knowledge you were so freely given.”

“Tessa,” Luka said quietly in warning, stepping towards her as her power swelled more and more around her. Phantom winds swirled, the food platters clanking and some flipping to the floor as thunder cracked somewhere outside.

But Tessa ignored him. Instead, she moved fast, no one expecting it as she leapt from the countertop and landed in front of Razik. The male cursed, shoving Eliza behind him at the same time that Luka wrapped an arm around Tessa’s waist and hauled her back against his chest, the orange plopping to the floor, forgotten. Her power bit into his skin, and his flames rushed to the surface, to meet her magic or protect him, he wasn’t entirely sure.

“Or am I the lucky one because despite promises and gentle touches, I let myself believe I’d finally found a home, only to learn that’s not my fate in the end?” Tessa went on, venom dripping from each word, but Luka felt her body tremble slightly as she spoke. “I think the lucky one here is you , Razik Greybane. You have a home you will do anything to return to. More than that, you have people who want you. People who want you despite you not returning the sentiment. I’d be careful with that. Eventually they stop trying and stop wanting you, and you realize too late you wanted them all along.”

The room had gone utterly silent. Eliza was peering around Razik’s body, her hand gripping his forearm. There was no doubt the pair was communicating down their bond, but Eliza appeared ready to intervene should her mate attempt anything.

Not that she would need to. Luka was positive that if he let Tessa go, she’d be more than capable of holding her own against the male with her magic so volatile right now. As the silence stretched on, Luka slowly lowered her back to her feet. She smoothed her hands down her dress, then she reached for her hair before stopping herself.

She straightened, all her power disappearing into her aside from the light bands at her wrists. Then she lifted her chin, holding Razik’s stare as she said, “I don’t have the luxury of luck, and the Fates are determined to end me. I will not apologize for fighting for my survival, nor will I apologize for not allowing others to become a sacrifice for me. And I certainly will not ask forgiveness for⁠—”

She snapped her mouth shut, clearing her throat as she looked around the room. “In all things, there must be balance, but how does that come to be when one race rules all? Keeping others locked away in the dark beneath them? They tell us Achaz is wrong, that he wants to rule the realms, but then it stands to reason we must resist him. If we are to resist him, then it must start here.”

With that, she wandered away, as if there hadn’t just been a confrontation that had nearly ended in magic being thrown around. Her fingers trailed along anything she could touch—the sofa, a side table, the walls—and she started humming as she went, making her way towards a passage that would take her to the guest rooms. The opposite way from his own room.

Luka waited until she disappeared from view before he followed, easily catching up to her with his long strides. She was muttering to herself, and he couldn’t make out the words until he was nearly on top of her.

“We damn one to save hundreds. We damn ourselves to save them. That’s what we do when we love…” She trailed off, flattening her palm against the wall, watching darkness seep from her fingertips. Except it wasn’t darkness. It was swirling black mist and gold embers. Then she nodded to herself. “This is what happens when you let yourself be loved. That’s what they taught us. No. Yes. I can’t…” Her hands wound into her hair, pulling at the roots.

“Tessa,” Luka said, something in his chest aching at seeing her like this, but he shoved the feeling aside.

She whirled, and he could swear there were pools of silver glimmering in her eyes as she stared back at him before she blinked them away.

“You didn’t eat anything,” he said when she didn’t speak. Her head tilted, but she didn’t reply. “Have you tried to reach him?” Luka asked, taking a different angle at talking to her. Her gaze darted to the side at the words. “He won’t deny you,” he added, reaching to pull her hands from her hair, but she lurched back a step.

“He already has,” she retorted, lightning flickering in her irises. “He’s…perplexing,” she murmured.

“I think the feeling is mutual, little one.”

If she’d lurched back before, she stumbled back now as if he’d struck her. He knew why. Knew she remembered what he’d told her about that particular pet name. But he needed to remind himself. He couldn’t trust her. She’d kept him in the dark about his father. Hadn’t told him of her plans for the Pantheon, not that he could blame her on that one. Every one of them would have attempted to stop her. But he needed to keep a distance between them, even if he would wind up being her Guardian in the end. He would do that. It had been Theon’s last request of him, and he would do that because it was the duty of his bloodline and his family.

She nodded to herself again, and he found himself wishing he could hear her thoughts. Wishing everything wasn’t so fucking broken. But he wasn’t sure he’d ever feel whole again, even if things were different with Tessa. Not without his family. And he didn’t mean the blooded family out in the main room.

“Tessa, I⁠—”

“Where is my bow?” she interjected.

Luka’s brow furrowed in confusion. “What?”

“My bow. From Auryon. It’s ours.”

“Ours,” he repeated slowly.

She nodded, bouncing on her toes. “She left it to us. Said it was our birthright.”

“Tessa, maybe you should get some rest. When was the last time you slept?”

She shot forward, pushing onto her tiptoes as she spoke inches from him. “Do you know what I see in my dreams, Luka?”

“No, Tessa,” he said carefully. “I don’t know what you see in your dreams. Not anymore.”

She fell back, moving to the wall and dragging her fingers along the stone. “I see all the things that will never be. They torture us,” she murmured. “Light and dark. Beginnings and endings. My dreams haunt us. They are nightmares. I do not like it there.”

“You still need to sleep,” he insisted. “I know you just filled your power reserves, but you still need to rest. If you’re not taking care of yourself, it’s easier for your power to take control. It is why Theon was neurotic about your diet and schedule.”

She whirled at his name, lightning flickering in her eyes. “He no longer wants me.”

“Tessa, that isn’t⁠—”

“There you are,” said a male voice that had both of them spinning as Tristyn came into view down the passage.

“Keeper of Lies and Deceit,” Tessa greeted, her eyes narrowing.

“Wild fury,” he answered in kind, a mocking note to his tone. Thank the gods he’d finally stopped coddling her.

“I’d ask where you were, but you’d simply lie about it,” she replied with a sneer.

He sent her a smirk as he slipped his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket. There was a faint sage glow to his russet eyes, making them appear almost hazel. The male may have dropped the coddling act, but he was still prepared to face Tessa as the deity he was.

“Where are you off to?” Tristyn asked, looking around the passage as though he wasn’t monitoring what kind of threat she was in this moment.

“Shouldn’t you know the answer to that?” Tessa sang, dancing back from them to press a palm to the wall once more. Her power snaked out of her, winding along the rock, and Luka reached out, yanking her hand away.

“The gods help you if you destroy this cave, Tessa,” he growled.

She didn’t even look at him as she said, “The gods never help me. I don’t see why they’d start now.”

Tristyn cleared his throat, sending a warning look to Luka as he said, “I think you’re confusing me with my sister, wild fury. She’s the one who can see the ever-changing.”

Tessa hummed, pulling her wrist from Luka’s grip. Her hands fell to her sides, where she fisted them in the fabric of her dress. “Then what do you want?”

“I’m glad you asked,” he said with a hint of mischief. He pulled his hands from his pockets, opening one before her. In the center of his palm were two rolls of lull-leaf.

Her eyes narrowed as she met Tristyn’s gaze once more. “Is this how your father keeps the peace as well?” she asked, picking up one of the rolls and twisting it between her fingers.

Blackheart’s eyes darkened. “My father views peace as optional in most cases, and he decides when it’s a weapon to wield.”

She only hummed once more. “Then what is this? A peace offering?”

“Without pizza and agaveheart ?” Tristyn scoffed. “What kind of a peace offering is that?”

Seconds ticked by, the passage falling eerily silent until she held the lull-leaf back out to him. “I don’t trust you, Tris,” she said with a sigh.

The male’s arrogance faltered, but only for a moment, before he took a single step forward. “What do I need to do, Tessa? I’ve sworn loyalty to you. What can I give you in penance?”

In the next breath, her entire face lit up as she said, “A story.”

Tristyn’s face paled at the words. “I think stories are more your thing, wild fury. Not mine.”

She stumbled forward, somehow tripping on the length of her skirt. Luka moved to catch her, but she was already clutching at Tristyn’s arm, crushing the lull-leaf roll in her hand. “You have to tell me a story,” she insisted, panic and mania creeping into her voice. “We’re the same. You are alone. And I’m alone. And you survived. I need to know how to survive being alone. We were alone for so long, and then I thought… And then we weren’t, and now we are. And I know it’s my fault, but⁠—”

She stopped speaking abruptly when Tristyn reached up and ran a hand down her hair, hushing her with a soothing sound. “All right, Tessa,” he said softly, and Luka knew he was using his gifts on her right now. “I’ll tell you a story.” She nodded, her body still too tense even with his power. Meeting Luka’s gaze, Tristyn said, “I’ve got her. Take a break, Mors.”

“Take a break,” Tessa murmured. “He doesn’t want us. We struck too deep. We chose destruction.” Before he could say anything in response, her head snapped up. She lurched from Tristyn’s hold, suddenly in front of Luka. Her hands fisted in his shirt, and she clung to him, saying, “But I saved him for you.”

There was a pleading in her voice he didn’t understand as he clasped her upper arms, trying to ease the white-knuckled grip she had on his shirt. “Saved who, Tessa?” Luka asked.

But she was shaking her head, back to mumbling. “He can’t see.” Lifting her gaze to his, grey was peaking through the violet and gold that often hid the color from them these days. “You can’t see.”

“See what, Tessa?”

Her smile was small and sad as she released him, slowly backing away. Shaking her head, she murmured, “He can’t see.”

Then she was drifting down the passage away from him, back to humming and sliding her hand along the wall, her fingers and bare feet leaving a trail of magic behind her.

“I’ve got her. Seriously, Mors. Take a break for a while,” Blackheart said with a grim smile.

“She’s in too deep,” Luka said.

“I know,” was all the male replied before he turned to follow the fury of chaos.

Luka stayed rooted to the spot long after they had disappeared. He wasn’t even sure where they’d end up.

You can’t see.

Stay where I can see you.

I saved him for you.

Saved who? His father? He’d done that. He was the one who had gone to get his father after learning where he was. Not her.

Gritting his teeth, he turned and went back the way he’d come. Reaching the main living space, he found Eliza had disappeared somewhere, leaving him with only his brother and father. Which was great. He’d been hoping they all would have fucked off somewhere after the confrontation with Tessa.

Xan was in the kitchen cleaning up the food spread that few people had touched. Luka suspected it was simply to have something to do. It appeared sitting around doing nothing wasn’t something their bloodline was accustomed to. All three of them were restless and itching to act. To do something . It wasn’t in their nature to hide. It was in their nature to protect and fight for those they viewed as theirs.

“Apparently she didn’t need you to protect her from me after all,” Razik drawled from the sofa, sitting in the same place Eliza had been.

“I don’t think Eliza needs your protection either, yet you still shoved her behind you,” Luka retorted, stalking past him to help their father.

“Eliza doesn’t need me to protect her,” his brother replied, an arm draped along the back of the sofa as he watched them over his shoulder.

“Yet you do so anyway.”

“She is mine,” Razik replied simply. “She comes before all else, including myself and my Ward.” With a glare in their father’s direction, he begrudgingly added, “She is, indeed, my inevitable.”

Luka ground his teeth, turning away only to put himself in the path of his father.

“She’s not wrong, you know,” Xan said. “Achaz looks to conquer and divide individual realms. It’s what he’s been doing for centuries. The only way to survive it is for a realm to come together and resist him.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Luka ground out, bracing his hands on the counter’s edge, his head falling to his chest.

Xan moved to stand beside him, leaning against the counter and crossing his arms, wincing as the collar bit into his skin. Guilt washed over Luka at the realization they still had done absolutely nothing to even attempt to remove the thing.

“What do you wish she would have done? Left?” Xan pushed.

Luka didn’t know how to answer that. Leaving is what would keep Tessa safest. It was what he should want, but…

He wasn’t upset. He should be, but he wasn’t. He wasn’t even entirely sure he would have tried to talk her out of it. If he was upset about anything, it was that she hadn’t included him in her plan. Irony at its absolute finest.

“Can I speak plainly?” his father asked, pulling him from his thoughts.

He glanced at the sofa to find Razik gone. The only reason he nodded was because they were alone. He had a feeling this wasn’t a conversation he wanted anyone else around for.

“An inevitable bond is not forced, Luka,” Xan said. “There is a pull you both feel. It is overwhelming, but it is not like a twin flame bond. It is not something destined by the Fates. It is as wild and untamed as the Chaos it comes from, and it only appears when two souls need it most. But in the end, it is still a choice.”

“And you think I would be foolish not to choose it,” Luka said bitterly. “That I would be throwing away something others will only ever long for.”

“You put words in my mouth, son,” Xan said, pushing off the counter. He paused, gripping Luka’s shoulder and squeezing. “I think you have experienced much loneliness, loss, and torment in your short years, and it has shaped how you view the world and what you value. And I think the hardest part of all of this for you is that you know she is the same. A mirror of what you are. The hardest part for you is that if you fault her, you must also fault yourself.” He squeezed his shoulder once more before releasing him. “You still care, and that eats away at you. You feel out of control, drawn to something you don’t want to want, but torn between what you believe is your duty. So I will say this: remember the bond only comes to be when two souls need it most. It is a bond born of Chaos.”

He left Luka standing in the kitchen, crossing the room and making his way to the passage that would lead to the cave entrance. But he paused before he disappeared from view, turning back to Luka once more.

“For what it’s worth, she still claims you,” he said. “In the only way she knows how.”

“She doesn’t know what it means to claim someone,” Luka retorted scathingly.

Xan’s only answer was a resigned nod that made a sense of shame crawl up Luka’s spine. He could tell his father was disappointed, but he didn’t understand. He let Razik hold his grudge, but faulted Luka for this?

With a growl of frustration, he stalked towards his room. He needed to fly. He needed to breathe. He needed to talk to his godsdamn best friend.

And he needed to get away from the temptress that had upended his entire world.

She wasn’t the one for this. Just like he’d said all along.