Page 66 of The Blood Queen

My rage is not just because my father and the whole damned fae realm turned on Samson in a flash, despite the fact that I vouched for him.

It’s deeper than that, even if it was seeing the way they treated him that broke the dam inside my soul.

I’m in the goddess’s face now, so close I can feel her breath, colder than snow. Her one eye is focused on both of mine, and while she appeared with a storm, ready to confront me, there’s something else in her gaze now.

She reaches up, her fingertip touching my cheek. The tear that had leaked down turns to ice at her touch, and when I wipe it away, I see the glittering gem of my sorrow before it disappears under the warmth of my skin.

Warmth?

I’m dry now, no longer shivering. I whip my head around to Samson, and he’s not only dry but staying dry. Above us, a shield hovers, hail bouncing over the top.

“That’s not mine,” Beira whispers.

I frown. I don’t remember consciously pulling up that barrier; I don’t even know how to dry my skin after dunking into the icy sea.

“Your power grows,” the goddess continues, a real smile quirking on her lips.

“I wasn’t calling on magic,” I mutter, still confused.

“No,” Beira concedes. “But you were calling on your rage. And there is magic in righteous fury.” Her single eye shifts, looking past me at Samson. “As well you know.”

I let out a breath, and with it, some of my anger. It’s not Beira who betrayed me.

It was my father.

He did not even give me a chance to explain. I understand why he might not trust Samson—the fear of Red Caps is too ingrained in us all—but he should have trusted me.

Because even if it was every fae in the realm chasing after us, it was the way my father turned on me and Samson in an instant that cut the deepest. No matter how many years pass, no matter how much I know his heart is fickle and dismissive of me in particular…

It still hurts.

“Oh, no,” Beira says, reaching out quick as an adder strike to cup my cheek. “Don’t let go of your fury now. You need it more than ever.”

“If all I feel is rage, I will burn up,” I whisper. I feel it now, deeply. The exhaustion. Not just in my body but in my heart. It pulls on my soul like the whirlpool, threatening to drown me.

Her palm on my skin is so cold it burns, but I lean into the touch anyway.

“Burn, then,” Beira says. “You are made of stronger stuff than fuel.”

I huff a bitter laugh, and Beira drops her hand. I have no doubt my cheek is red, my blood trying to counteract the freeze. But as she watches me, her eye glittering in the dark, I realize that while I am so, so tired, I also feel…

Strong.

Beira nods in approval, then strides forward, leaving a trail of slick ice on the rocks in her wake. When she reaches the edge of the shore, where the waves sputter up at her in protest, she points out to the whirlpool.

Samson reaches for my hand, his touch injecting me with a different sort of warmth in the midst of this wintry storm. Together, through the sleet and snow and darkness, we look at the portal again.

And this time, I don’t see swirling water.

Now, the churning waves are white and jagged, not from natural forces but from hundreds—thousands—of bean-nighe, the washerwomen who foretell death. I scan the frothy crowd, hovering magically in the water as they wash. And beyond them, distant on the other shore, I think I see something else—three figures, obscured by mist. One drops a spindle, smoothly pulling fleece from a distaff. Not only is the whirlpool full of the clothes of the soon-to-be-dead, but they are making more cloth, more life…all fated to be killed violently?

“Come,” Beira says. Without looking back, she strides onto the water, which instantly turns to ice under her feet, forming a solid bridge from the shore as she walks straight toward the whirlpool.

Samson and I step out onto the ice. It’s slick and dangerous, some of the waves cresting the top and threatening to knock us back into the sea. But Beira didn’t tell us it was safe; she only told us to follow.

“The war is coming,” Beira says, her voice soft but somehow still able to be heard through the screaming storm. “And you cannot stop it.”

She’s right. The washerwomen continue to toss garments into the swirling water. All stained in blood. A red-stained cloak, trousers with long cuts, shirts with bullet holes or gashes, the ends ragged, the edges crimson. Each one symbolic of a person killed violently.