Page 3 of A Queen This Fierce and Deadly

I’d lost so much. Over and over. But I couldn’t lose him. Couldn’t endure this. It would break me into pieces just as small as the icy shards I stared at now. So I clutched my hourglass until my hand ached and continued to claw at my power with everything I had.

The edges of my soul began incinerating, tiny pieces turning to ash and drifting away. Blinking away the blood dripping from my eyes, I focused on my mate.

Finally, one single second slipped backward. And then another. The edges of my vision dimmed. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. But I used my magic like a rope tying me to him.

And I held on.

I couldn’t fail him. Irefused.

But a strange, dizzying rush swept through my body. And two women were suddenly standing just footspans away, on the ship, their features eerily similar to mine.

A sob rattled my chest. The woman onthe left… If not for the faint lines around her eyes, we might have been twins.

Once, I’d hated Ysara for not showing me her face.

Now, I knew I saw it each day in the mirror.

This was my mother. My real mother.

Some part of me had hoped she’d made it out of that house the night I’d disappeared. That she was alive somewhere. I hadn’t realized until now how foolishly I’d clung to that hope.

Letting go of it hurt.

The woman standing next to her also looked at me with eyes the exact same color as mine. But those eyes were old and wicked, the smile playing around her mouth suggesting she knew the secrets of the world––and was unimpressed by them. This was the woman who had used her power to age her enemies. The one who had lashed out in her last moments, turning Eprotha’s capital into the Cursed City.

My grandmother.

My mother reached out her hand, as if to stroke my cheek. But no warmth radiated from her skin. I would never know her touch.

“Let go, Nelayra. This is forbidden for a reason.” Her voice was soft. Gentle.

“I can’t.”

Her eyes filled with such grief, my chest clenched.

“I love him. I’m—I’m sorry.”

My grandmother’s mouth curved. “Let the child choose her own fate. Just as we did.”

Both of them were dead. Was that a warning? I continued to pull my power to me, and my grandmotherlaughed, glancing at my mother. “Such reckless disregard for the laws. It’s like looking at my younger self.”

My chest hollowed. My grandmother’s rage had leveled an entire city. Was such destruction my fate?

“Please, Nelayra,” my mother begged. “If you do this…”

My grandmother gave her a hard look and then returned her gaze to me. “In the unlikely event that you don’t join us in the afterlife, there will be consequences. Grave consequences.”

I’d known that the moment I’d used the hourglass to begin turning time backward. And nothing would stop me. Nothing.

She shook her head at me, and pity gleamed in her eyes. “You think you know what it is to suffer. You will live with the repercussions of this choice for the rest of your life.”

“I can’t save our kingdom without him.” I couldn’tlivewithout him.

Her gaze hardened. “Do not attempt to justify your actions in such a way to me, girl. You are my blood. And I expect better from my granddaughter than a queen who hands her power over toanyone.”

Shame curled in my gut, and I lowered my head. My mother stepped closer, and this time, I could almost feel the heat of her hand as she cupped my face.

“I loved your father the same way. I wouldn’t have listened either.” She hesitated, and then her lips firmed. She held out her hand, and an amber ball of light appeared, the exact color of all our eyes. With a flick of her wrist, she pressed it to my chest, and I watched as that lightdisappeared within me.

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