Page 87 of Blood Beneath the Snow

My eyes skittered to him, then narrowed. He sounded odd. Wouldn’t meet my eyes. “What?”

“There’s only so much time left before you have to go back.” He glanced at me, trepidation in his look that swiftly transformed to earnestness. He approached me until we stood face-to-face, only a step apart. “If I am going to train you to use your Lurae, we have to start now.”

For a long moment, his words didn’t register. “My Lurae? I don’t have one.”

He pursed his lips. “I thought you trusted me now.”

I frowned. “I do. What does this have to do with trust?”

“Everything.” Patience, his new normal now, was swiftly descending into irritation. His hand closed into a fist at his side and I wanted to step back, put distance between us. “You can tell me the truth. I want you to tell me the truth.”

I put a hand on my forehead. “What in the gods’ names are you talking about? Do you hear yourself?”

“You have a Lurae,” he growled. He took a deep breath, made a concerted effort to calm himself. “I know it. I know it’s powerful and that you’ve hidden it for far too long. I know you’re probably scared. But I have taught you how to wield a weapon. And I can teach you how to wield your power as well.”

Søren stepped forward and reached for my hand, but I pulled back. This was the Hellbringer standing in front of me, not the unmasked man I’d come to care for. And despite his wounded eyes, I would not budge. “You think I’m lying?” My voice quivered, the anger barely contained. “You think somehow I’ve hidden a Lurae for the last twelve years?”

He only watched me.

I screamed. A wordless, feral thing. “Howdareyou?” I howled. “You think I survived on scraps, claimed an entire people as my own, and it was a lie? I would never have let my father and brothers abuse me if I had the power to fight back. I amnothing. I clawed my way into the Trials, and if I lose, it will cost me everything. Do you understand?”

Søren stood expressionless, the only crack in his façade an almost imperceptible downward twitch of his mouth.

And then it hit me.

“The queen only wanted me because she thought I had a secret Lurae.” The words sounded ludicrous, absurd even, but they sent dread coursing through me like ice water poured over my head. “Gods. This is fucked. And you don’t even believe me.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “I want to believe you. Really, I do. But the queen…she is convinced. And she is never, ever wrong.”

“What evidence does she have?” I demanded. “There is not a drop of magical blood in my veins. Believe me, my father has seen enough of it to know.”

He winced—finally. “I don’t know. You think she would tell me? I’m a tool in her arsenal. She trusts me as far as she can use me; that’s it. I wish I knew more.”

I took another purposeful step back from him. “And that’s why you’ve been trying so hard to get me to trust you, isn’t it? So I would show you my Lurae.” I snarled the words, hoping the devastation wasn’t visible through the cracks in my façade.

I channeled the burning behind my eyes into fuel for my fire. “You’re despicable.”

“No. I wouldn’t do that.” He was adamant, but I didn’t care.

Summoning everything left in me, I steeled myself. “Who am I even talking to right now? Søren? Or the Hellbringer? Because the Hellbringer would. He would do anything if it meant pleasing his damn queen.”

The hurt in his eyes was overwhelming. Instinctively, part of me wanted to take the words back, deny them. I wasn’t sure if they were true. But the thought that they might be was ripping me to shreds. If I voiced the words, then surely they would hurt less.

I turned away from him. The longer I looked, the more I wanted to melt against him, to seek comfort from him despite his betrayal. And I wouldn’t give in—I wouldn’t show him weakness now.

When I dared to glance back over my shoulder again, he was gone.

22

When a weight sank theother side of the mattress enough to wake me, I acted entirely on instinct. In a millisecond, a dagger occupied my dominant hand and I rolled onto my side, kicking off the blankets to knee my attacker in the stomach. They let out an “Oof” and lost their balance, the perfect opportunity for me to launch myself onto them. The momentum carried us off the bed and they landed hard, flat on their back.

My eyes adjusted to the semidarkness as we sat there, both breathing heavily, my knees rammed into the Hellbringer’s rib cage, my dagger at his throat.

Søren studied me, not nearly as surprised as he should have been. By some instinct, his hand had moved to palm the back of my thigh. I hated it. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

I rolled my eyes and rolled off him. “I wish you hadn’t.”

“Wait, Revna. Please.”

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