Page 120 of Blood Beneath the Snow

My breath hitched in my throat. Freja didn’t know. She didn’t know I had a Lurae.

For a moment I considered lying. Could I bear to watch the light in her eyes turn to distrust? Betrayal?

Maybe not, but she would find out soon enough.

I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and started talking. As I spoke, the scene flashed through my mind again: Erik’s flesh melting away from bone, Björn’s hushes while he carved my face, and the beautiful, ethereal singing that accompanied my new magic.

It swirled in my stomach, whispered in my ears, begged to be used. I ignored it.

“Bloodsinger.” Freja’s voice was breathless.

I opened my eyes. “What did you say?”

Her eyes were wide. “That’s what Valen called you when I was released. ‘Tell the Bloodsinger Queen I said congratulations.’ I didn’t understand. But Valen knew.”

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. Valen had known I was Lurae.

A knock sounded at the door and Volkan poked his head in. “Freja, Revna needs to rest. Why don’t we let her sleep?”

Freja stood to go. The window she walked by showed a glimpse of the pink and purple skies scarred by smoke, the sun setting in the distance.

“Wait,” I called. They both turned back to face me. “Before I sleep, there’s something I need your help with.”

Valen sat across the smalltable from me in what used to be my father’s office. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this conversation, but an immediate comment on my face wasn’t it.

“I always wondered where the scars came from,” they said, gesturing to the bandages on my face.

Without consciously deciding to, I brushed a hand against the wrappings. They were starting to get annoying, blocking out enough of my vision to exacerbate my headache.

“When did you plan on explaining you’ve been having visions of me?” I asked, hands folded in my lap. The chair I sat in, intended for a person of my father’s stature, was far too big, and I made an extra effort to keep my posture straight and regal. This was my first act as queen, after all.

Valen chuckled. “I planned to tell you from the moment I met you. Unfortunately, said meeting is occurring now and not twenty-one years ago.”

“Why don’t you start from the beginning?” I settled back and gestured for Valen to do the same. “I’d like to hear the whole story.”

The Seeing One settled in, rubbing their wrists. “Considering your predecessor, I take it I’m the only Seeing One you’ve had the pleasure of knowing.” When I nodded, they continued. “Seeing is unlike other gifts. Most Lurae are fairly standard, operating on a principle of magic wound into your deepest biology. It’s an imprecise science—the worst kind. But when you have the Seeing Lurae, it can take a number of forms. Some Seeing Ones have no more knowledge than what will happen at a random location in the next two minutes. Others detail great prophecies of events to happen hundreds of years in the future. There are some who cannot function or lead normal lives because they are constantly stuck in the future while their physical forms remain here.”

The Seeing One sighed, their wrinkled hands finding their place on the armrests of the chair. “And then you have me. My Lurae is focused on one person in particular: you.”

My brows shot up. “Me? What exactly have you seen?”

“Only bits and pieces,” they confessed. “When my Lurae presented my first true vision, it was of you winning the Bloodshed Trials. As Seeing Ones, we have a responsibility to share our visions with the appropriate parties, so I traveled here to see your father despite knowing of his hatred toward my kind. When I told him I came bearing a prophecy about the child his wife was carrying, he sent me to your prison without hearing anything I had to say. His prejudice overwhelmed his interest in knowing your fate.”

I gaped. “That’s horrible.”

They laughed. “It was what I expected. I’ve been in that cell ever since—for over twenty-one years. But imagine my surprise when you showed up to see your friend and I realized you were Nilurae.” Shaking their head, Valen said, “In my vision, you had clearly used your Lurae to kill your father. I thought perhaps I was wrong, but when I caught a glimpse of you, I knew it would happen. You would compete and somehow magic would flow through your veins like it never had before.”

“Why?” I choked on the word. “Why do I suddenly have a Lurae?”

Valen sighed. “I’m not sure. I’ve seen other snippets of your future, but they are few and far between. I do know this, though: you will fulfill the prophecy of the first Seeing One. They were called Tam, a contemporary of Callum and Arraya who fought against their rule and formed our band of Seeing Ones.”

“Fulfill the first prophecy?” I tried not to show how stunned I was. “What was the prophecy, then?”

Valen’s eyes turned grave. “No one living knows the answer to your question, unfortunately. Tam was incredibly secretive about the prophecy, and the other Seeing Ones respected their decision.But then they were taken captive by Arraya during the attempted revolution of the Fjordlands. Arraya forced Tam to be her personal Seeing One, torturing them when they wouldn’t confess the prophecy.”

I was surprised to see Valen’s eyes brimming with tears. Tam had lived hundreds of years ago…Surely they hadn’t known each other. Were all the Seeing Ones so emotionally close?

“What happened then?” I asked, afraid to know the answer.

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