Wilhelmina hurried back to her room, her escort hustling to keep up with her. Alexandra’s words were sharp hooks sinking deep into her mind and heart.
Have you ever really seen your so-called sister? A monster. Not even human.
It couldn’t be true. Could it?
Why would Alexandra lie?
The High Lord of Hell didn’t waste any time helping Alexandra return to Chaillot, along with all the people who had come with her. Philip and Leland had gone with the rest of them, without saying anything to her.
There hadn’t been time to make a decision, to figure out what she really wanted for herself. She’d come to Kaeleer to find answers—or something. Instead, she’d found Jaenelle living among dangerous, frightening people. And Blood who weren’t people at all. She’d found the sister she’d thought had been lost forever.
But the sharp hooks of Alexandra’s words kept sinking in deeper and deeper.
Have you ever really seen your so-called sister? A monster. Not even human.
Alexandra was mistaken. Wilhelmina had to believe that. Otherwise, she’d just traded the rest of her family for someone she hadn’t seen in thirteen years—and had never understood.
Not even human.
What did that mean?
Wilhelmina followed one of the footmen to the Craft library, where Jaenelle was working on . . . something . . . and was alone. She didn’t need to be told that finding Jaenelle alone was a rare occurrence, which meant her sister had anticipated that this discussion might be difficult.
“What are you doing?” Wilhelmina asked as she looked at the open books that covered a large table. Some were printed in the common tongue. Others . . . She couldn’t begin to guess the language in most of the books.
“I’m looking for an alternative to war,” Jaenelle replied. She closed one book, set it aside, then stepped back from the table. “How are you feeling?”
“How should I be feeling?” Wilhelmina snapped.
Those sapphire eyes stared at her. Stared into her. Stared through her.
“All right,” Jaenelle said. “How is your body feeling?”
“You’re supposed to be a Healer. Can’t you tell?” Where was this anger coming from? Why was she looking for a fight?
Something odd came and went in Jaenelle’s eyes. The air in the room cooled until it was almost chilly.
“All right,” Jaenelle said. “Let’s take a look at you.”
She started to move around the table. Wilhelmina stumbled back.
Jaenelle stopped. “Be careful, Wilhelmina. Right now, you’re still talking to your sister. Don’t draw a line that requires me to continue this as a Queen.”
Was that a threat?
“Is that what you did with Alexandra? You forgot that she was your grandmother, that she was family, in order to make pronouncements as a Queen?”
“The bloodlines say she is a relative, but she is not family. Not to me.”
Wilhelmina heard the warning, but she couldn’t stop. “You broke her. You stripped her of her power. How is she supposed to rule Chaillot?”
“She probably won’t be able to. Then again, I didn’t have the impression that she had the support of Chaillot’s people anymore, especially the other strong witches and Queens.”
“You broke her!”
“Are you forgetting that she had either given the orders or given tacit consent for you to be abducted?” Jaenelle snapped. “Are you forgetting that a young Warlord Prince was killed trying to protect you? Osvald killed Dejaal, but Alexandra is responsible for allowing it to happen. I could have ordered her execution, but that wouldn’t have paid the debt. Not all of it. The loss of her Jewels, the loss of her power? That was a debt she owed not just for Dejaal but for all the girls in Briarwood.”
“But those girls are dead, and Dejaal was just—”
“Just what?” Jaenelle’s eyes filled with a cold fury. “Just an animal? Just expendable? Not worthy of holding a human responsible for his death? If he’d been a human boy who had been killed trying to protect you, would you be saying this? Thinking this? Maybe you would. Terreilleans are very selfish and single-minded when it comes to having what they want, regardless of what it costs the people already living in the lands they covet. Well, I rule Kaeleer, which means a tiger is as important to me as a human boy, and as the Queen, it is my duty to protect everyone in my Territory, especially those who serve in my court. Queen’s price, sister. I don’t get to pick and choose who is worthy of my protection based on if he has two legs or four. Everyone who serves in my court is under my hand—and my protection.”
And that makes Alexandra expendable?
Words churned and swirled. Dug deep until there was only one way to pull free of them. “I want to see your true Self.”
The person looking at her was no longer her sister. Oh, Jaenelle looked the same, but colder. Less . . . civilized.
“No, you don’t,” Jaenelle said too quietly.
“I need to know who you are.”
“Why?”
How to explain to someone else what she couldn’t explain to herself? “I need to know.”
Silence. Then Jaenelle said in a midnight voice, “Very well. The truth.”
One moment they were standing in a library at the Hall. The next moment there was nothing but pitch dark and biting cold. And then . . .
Mist. A stone altar. The sound of a hoof striking stone.
What walked out of the mist . . .
Wilhelmina stared at the creature that was part human and part . . . many things. What horrified her the most were the sapphire eyes. No mistaking those eyes.
“The living myth,” Witch said quietly. “Dreams made flesh. But not all the dreamers were human. This is who I am, Wilhelmina. This is who I’ve always been.”
Wilhelmina shook her head. “No.”
“This is the sister who protected you when we were young. Who gave you a Sapphire Jewel to protect you when it was no longer possible for me to be there.”
“No.”
Come to Kaeleer, the creature had said. So she had. But to come here and find this?
“You’re not my sister,” Wilhelmina cried. “You’re not human.”
“Not all of me, no,” Witch replied.
“Now I understand how you could break Alexandra as if she were nothing.” She felt reckless—and something pushed her to spew the words. “I wish I’d never seen you again, never seen . . . this thing that you are. Our lives would have been so much better if you’d just died in Briarwood!”
What she said horrified her—and filled her with a strange exultation when she saw how those words, words that had come from someplace inside her that she didn’t know existed, sank in and cut deep. She’d been able to call in a debt owed to Alexandra and her family by inflicting a mortal wound on this inhuman creature.
She and Witch stood there, in that place of mist and stone. Then . . .
Pitch dark. Biting cold. And Wilhelmina stood in a library in SaDiablo Hall.
Alone.
Saetan walked into Jaenelle’s sitting room and felt the Ebony shields and locks snap back into place, keeping out everyone who served in the Dark Court. The only thing keeping Daemon from exhausting himself against shields he couldn’t hope to break was Ladvarian’s ruthless herding. The Lady needed alone time, so they would give her alone time—and they included her mate.
Of course, the reason Daemon—and the rest of them—were yielding was because they all knew if the alone time went on too long, the Sceltie would find a way of getting through those shields, or raising such a commotion that Jaenelle would have to come out and deal with it.