CHAPTER FIVE

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CHAPTER FIVE
GOODNIGHT


*:・゚✧*:・゚✧


     After Tessa had shapeshifted into Jessamine, she was forced to indulge the London Institute residents by answering all of their questions. Evangeline only asked two or three before she started to notice how overwhelmed and exhausted Tessa seemed to be, and so she fell silent. She tried to get Will to be quiet too, but he wasn't much paying attention to her now, and Evangeline felt a flash of annoyance each time he ignored her elbow jabs. She understood Henry's fascination—he was prone to wanting to understand things nobody else could—but Charlotte, Jessamine, and Will's fascination was odd. Will wasn't fascinated by much aside from himself, Jessamine didn't like magic at all, and Charlotte—well, Charlotte was perhaps the only truly polite one at the table. The fact she hadn't noticed Tessa's growing exhaustion yet was surprising. It did nothing but prove how unique Tessa's ability actually was, and Evangeline got the feeling Tessa knew that. How could she not? Powerful Nephilim, who were supposed to know everything about the Shadow World, was fawning over her like she was some kind of new attraction at the circus.

"So you must be holding something that belongs to the person you're transforming into?" Charlotte asked for the second time, and Evangeline sighed, picking at the slice of pound cake that Sophie had placed in front of her. No one had really touched their dessert, or the tea that had accompanied it. Evangeline took a sip of her tea, then wrinkled her nose when she realized it had gone cold before she'd gotten the chance to put any sugar into it. Setting it down on the saucer, Evangeline crossed her legs beneath the table and debated whether to step in for Tessa's sake or not.

"I explained that already," Tessa sighed to Charlotte, fidgeting slightly in her seat. "I must be holding something that belongs to them, or a bit of hair or an eyelash. Something that's theirs. Otherwise nothing happens."

"Do you think a vial of blood would do the trick?" Will asked curiously, and Evangeline shot him a frown, her eyebrows going up.

"Probably," Tessa said, then she sighed again. "I don't know. I've never tried it."

"And you're saying the Dark Sisters knew this was your talent? They knew you had this ability before you did?" Charlotte demanded. Evangeline tilted her head. Tessa herself hadn't known about her ability until the Dark Sisters had kidnapped her, so Evangeline wondered who could have told them. Tessa's demon father, perhaps, summoned from Edom and then sent away. But that seemed unlikely. Demon fathers didn't much care for their warlock children, from what Evangeline knew.

"Yes. It's why they wanted me in the first place."

"But how did they know?" Henry asked, shaking his head. "I don't quite understand that part."

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