Page 99 of Legion
“Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”He dipped his face to hers, pinning her gaze with his own.“Don’tsay that it isn’t my business, Naomi.I declared you mine—I was very fucking clear about it.Any possible danger to you is absolutely my business.”
She let out a heavy breath.“I said nothing for two reasons.One, I didn’t want to drag you into this mess unless I absolutely had to.Two, I couldn’t have told you the full truth; I would have had to lie to you.”
“About what?”
She thought about blowing off the question.After all, he wasn’t going to stay.He hadn’t even addressed what he’d witnessed her do, shocking though it must have been, as if to block it out.Which meant he couldn’t accept it.
Her demon urged her to keep quiet, feeling it owed him no answers.It wasn’t merely angry with him, it was angry with itself.Because it had begun to believe that just maybe he would be able to look past Naomi’s need to drink blood.The fact that she apparently didn’t matter enough to him for that to be the case made her entity want to claw his face off.
And ithurt.
You don’t know that he can’t accept it, a voice in her head whispered.You’re making assumptions because you’re bracing yourself for the worst.
True.Was she doing him a disservice by deciding that he wouldn’t overlook it?Maybe.The reality was that she couldn’t truly know what his reaction would be unless she told him everything and helped him understand.If she didn’t do that here and now, if he walked out as a result of that, she’d never know for certain.
And she found that she wanted to know.
“About what?”he repeated.
She dragged in a preparatory breath.“The prophecy isn’t actually inaccurate, the clerics just didn’t properly translate it.It doesn’t state that I’ll birth the child of the devil.It says that Iamthe child of the devil.Which is true.”
He went completely still.“You’re Lucifer’s daughter?”
“Yes.”A whisper.
“TheLucifer’s daughter?”
“Yes,” she repeated, her voice a little stronger this time.
“I thought that all his offspring lived in hell.”
“I’m the exception.”She worried her bottom lip again.“And as you saw for yourself, I inherited his curse.”
Luka frowned.“Curse?”
“I don’t know if this applies to all fallen angels or just him, but he was cursed when he fell.Cursed to need blood as much as he needs food and water to survive.And when passing his DNA onto me, he also passed on that.”
“So you drink from people?”he asked, an edge to his voice that was jagged with possessiveness.
“Normally, no.My bite is venomous.It doesn’t kill, but it causes alotof pain.Tobe has vampiric connections who make bottled drinks that contain blood and vitamins and stuff.They sell him batches of them every so often, and he gives them to me.”
Realization visibly dawned on Luka.“Your smoothies.”
“My smoothies,” she confirmed.
A pensive glint entered his eyes.“You bit me the other night.”
“I didn’t draw blood, but it was a close call.”A littletooclose.“I think you can understand why I’ve kept all this quiet from most people.”
“Who does know about it?”
“Only the people who are also fully aware of the cleric situation—which includes Lou.He thought he’d killed Kushiel during his recent spree of murdering dark practitioners, but that clearly isn’t the case.”He was gonna be furious when he learned that.
Luka was silent for long moments, his expression still unreadable.“Acceptance.You said that your demon needed me to accept something.This is what you meant.”
“Yes.You can’t tell anyone about it, Luka.”
An affronted anger rippled across his face.“Do you honestly think I’d do that?”
