Page 60 of The Witch Queen

Desperation hums beneath her words, so raw that it could be real. But Malum rumbles a warning in my chest and my shadows wrap tighter around me.

Do not fall into her trap,they urge.

“Perhaps. But have you considered that Nerissa might just have run off on her own?” I ask. “Maybe she tired of having a daughter who was such a disappointment.”

Pain flashes across Jacquetta’s features. I feel it slice through my own heart as well, but quickly smother it. Let her hurt. Let her bleed.

“The wayyoudisappointed Cassandra?” she returns. “And Rhea?”

My shadows leap and dart around me.

“Don’t youdarespeak her name.”

“Why not?” Jacquetta raises her eyebrows. “Afraid of what she might think of you now,Your Majesty?”

My power surges inside me and I do nothing to hold it back. My shadows slam into Jacquetta’s chest, burrowing instantly into the pulse of her latent magic. With the iron shackle, she can’t fight me off. Just a little farther and her power would snuff out like a candle flame.

Do it,that voice again.End her.

But as the seconds drag on, I do not push the shadows. Instead, I release my hold. Jacquetta crumples to the ground.

“Most witches last about three days before the iron poisoning starts to show,” I say. “After that…Well, you already know what happens to witches in this realm.”

With that, I turn to leave, my shadows trailing behind me.

“I thought you died,” Jacquetta calls after me. “On the night the Veilfell. I thought you died and for so long, I blamed myself for it. And then, when I learned the truth of what you’d done I…”

“Well?” I ask over my shoulder.

“I wished you had.”

The words pierce deeper than any arrow she could ever fire. But I blink back the tears before they fall. Hold my head high and keep walking, ignoring the throbbing pain in my chest.

And the truth that, sometimes, in the loneliest, darkest part of my heart, I wish it, too.

Chapter Seventeen

Blodwyn

That night, the court celebrates the victors of the first trial.

Music and laughter fill the Great Hall, everyone behaving as if we all hadn’t nearly been murdered mere hours ago. Sir Weston and a number of other courtiers chase one another around the long tables, battling with wooden swords in a ludicrous reenactment of the Followers’ attack. Even Aunt Margaret is applauding, like the incident was no more than a game.Everythingis a game to these people, it seems. But I cannot bring myself to join in.

“Blodwyn!” Verity spots me and hurries over. “Congratulations! I knew you could do it. Is it true what they’re saying? You managed to fight off aNevenwolf?”

Despite the heat of the hall, gooseflesh breaks out between my shoulder blades. Flashes of the hunt cycle through my mind: The Nevenwolf’s snarling teeth. The rank odor of it as it prowled toward me, like rot and death and decay. The glow of its crimson eye. Years ago, I’d glimpsed a similar pair of eyes staring out at me from the palace gardens. It’s been so long that I convinced myself that perhaps it was all a dream. Today proved that it wasn’t. The Nevenwolf was real then and it’s real now. What if it was the same beast? What if…

It was huntingyou,a deep instinct whispers.

“Are you all right?” Verity asks. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Fine,” I reply, banishing my thoughts of the creature. “I’m just still a bit sore. And tired.”

“That’s hardly a surprise after what you endured,” Verity says. “Come and sit with me. I want to hear all about it.”

Reliving the trial is the last thing I want to do, but I allow Verity to loop her arm through mine and steer me away. We don’t get far before another voice reaches my ears.

“Anyway, I don’t see what all the fuss is about. The princess didn’tactuallywin.”