Page 58 of The Crow Games

“Yes. That doesn’t make me particularly popular either. Neither does the gray magic. That was the one thing I couldn’t give away, my god-born spirit. After that, hiding was the only path left for me. The occasional god spy turned up to make my existence Hel, but otherwise life was peaceful. And then I met Lisbeth . . .” When I glanced over at him, he’d finally turned around. I felt his fathomless gaze on my face, but I couldn’t meet it.

His billowy shadows went suddenly still. “But what about our coven? Ruchel favors Fria. Why keep it a secret from her?”

My shoulders slumped forward. “Because I’m not Fria anymore. Lisbeth named me Maven when she was 16 because she thought I was such a ‘know-it-all,’ and that’s who I am now,” I said, smiling faintly at the distant memory. But the smile was short-lived.

“The fear in you—I can still feel it,” he said, flattening his palm over his heart and the tear there in his waistcoat. “You’re not a danger to us here. Gods are easily distracted. They wouldn’t come to the Otherworld to bother you after all this time.”

“I don’t want to be a god. Asher, Ihatethe gods. I can’t tell the rest of them,” I said quietly. “They’ll want me to save them from all of this, but I’ve nothing left to give. I can’t save anyone. Not them, not my priestesses, not Lisbeth. You saw it all inside my head. You know.”

“The White One,” he said solemnly.

The god of cold and frost.

I cringed at the name and had to shut my eyes a moment. “I don’t want to talk about him. Please?”

“I won’t make you . . . I just . . .” He worked his throat. “I hate that you blame yourself for what he did to the Whitten women.”

I shook my head sharply. “Don’t call them that. They weren’thiswomen. They were mine. They tried to warn me about the encroaching cold, about his threatening behavior, and I ignored them because I was as selfish and arrogant as every other god.”

“I could feel it in your mind,” he said, “and I don’t know how you stand it. All those emotions . . . They’d have smothered me long ago.”

My eyes stung, and I had to squeeze them shut again. “Of course I blame myself,” I said, breathless. “I was their goddess. There’s no one elsetoblame.”

My thoughts went whirling down into darker places. I brought forward my mental mortar and pestle and ground my fist into my palm, breaking down the sour feelings until the tightness in my chest slackened.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“It’s . . . it’s silly, but it helps.” I showed him the gesture again and explained it.

Staring down at his own hands, he mimicked the movements like he didn’t think it was impractical at all.

“If you’re ready now,” he said after a time, “I have a task for you.”

I blinked up at him. “A task?” I knew he’d have something for me eventually, but I wasn’t expecting it quite so soon.

“I saved you from the shades,” he reminded me.

“And I’m grateful—can’t you tell?” Sitting up had become too much of a chore. I sprawled across the mattress. “Can it wait until I can stand on my own for longer than a minute?”

“I don’t think so. Our coven is falling apart, and I want you to fix it. Ruchel and Emma argued late into the night before you woke. Nola believes the blessed wax you used during the first trial was sabotaged.”

The bed beneath me was feeling too comfortable, even thin as cardboard as it was. My eyelids fluttered. If I could have slept for another decade or two, I would have. “Emma probably did sabotage me,” I said dryly.

“How can you be so certain?”

I shrugged. “It’s what I would’ve done.”

“Remind me never to wrong you.” A chortle rumbled out of him, bringing out the blush undertones in his fair skin. He was handsome when he laughed, less Otherworldly. “Go and fix it. We need our coven whole again, and every time I’ve tried to intervene, I just get all of them shouting at me. I don’t want any more shouting.”

“Fine.”

His amusement brought a lightness to my limbs that hadn’t been there before. His shadows swallowed him whole, and he melted away under the crack in the door.

* * *

My appetite returned with enthusiasm. I was on my second fruit plate, headed back to the lounge with my breakfast, when the arguing reached my ears. I hurried through the next dining car, sidestepping a beast-born with pointed ears and a furry face, satchel bouncing against my hip.

“Stop avoiding my questions,” Ruchel groused at Emma. They faced off in the center of the car.

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