Chapter 37

Chapter 37

FEY

I f Fey had been expecting the morning rain to dissuade her students from attending her lessons this morning, she was woefully disappointed.

There must be six hundred Witches here , she thought in shock, staring at the groups gathered on the palace lawn. Maybe even more.

Where were they all coming from? And why, for Goddess’s sake? Why were they all here, all so eager to learn from her?

“These are all Witches who were given Allium?” Fey asked Leandra, staring in wonder at the crowd gathered in the steady rain. They looked uncomfortable and mostly wet, though a few had managed to make their own makeshift shelters and umbrellas out of Air.

Leandra pulled a face. “Well, actually, no,” she admitted quietly. “Your lessons have become rather popular, if I’m being honest, and the other covens asked if we wouldn’t mind accommodating a few other students from their temples. Ones who might, not necessarily, have had any of their powers taken away from them by the Queen, but who want to attend your lessons for other reasons.”

Fey cast a sidelong glance at her. “And why do they want to do that?”

Leandra’s lips twitched. “Fey… whether you recognize it or not, you ar e an effective teacher. You’ve taken Witches with barely any powers at all and turned them into forces to be reckoned with. I think you'd be surprised at how many Witches in this city want that for themselves.”

Frowning, Fey looked out at them all again. Witches willing to brave the freezing rain just for a chance to learn from her. “Clearly,” she said.

She pivoted to face the class. But before she could begin, Leandra stopped her.

“May I ask you a personal question, Fey?”

Fey paused, turning to regard the High Priestess with narrowed eyes. She gave her a brief nod.

Leandra took a breath. “Sana informs me that you have… stopped attending her sermons. Your absence has been noted by the congregation.”

Fey waited. When Leandra provided nothing more, she said with a quirked eyebrow, “I don’t think that was a question.”

Leandra gave an exasperated sigh. “You know Sana, likely as well as I do. She overthinks. She’s concerned about you. About why you’ve stopped coming.”

“Again, is there a question coming or?—”

“Why have you stopped?” Leandra asked, bluntly. “A few months ago, you told me yourself that your visits to the temple were good for you. That they helped you feel grounded. More in control. So why did you stop?”

Fey considered it.

She could lie. She could say it was because of the congregation. The swirling voices that called her queen. The Witches who looked at her and dreamed she was something more.

Or?

“I don’t need to visit the temple to feel in control anymore,” Fey admitted. Fire and Earth pulsed beneath her skin, constant and familiar companions to her now. “I hold the Goddess inside me wherever I go, now.”

After a moment of scrutiny, Leandra nodded.

“I’m glad,” she said, giving Fey a tight smile. “And I’ll pass along the message to Sana to save her worries for someone who needs it.”

Fey nodded her thanks, before turning back to the wafting crowd .

Time to begin.

“Alright,” she called, voice traveling over the lawn. The effect was instantaneous. Conversation died immediately as they turned toward her. Hundreds of Witches, young and old, watching her expectantly.

“Since it’s raining, I figured this is a perfect day for my favorite element.” Fey paused, waiting long enough to let them grow a little restless. Then, calling Water, she reached out to the falling rain…

And stopped it.

She could only hold it for a few seconds, and only for a small area. But it was enough to cover the entirety of the group, enough to earn gasps and murmurs as the Witches looked around the lawn in wonder. They stared at the tiny beads of water, halted midair, glimmering like stars.

Releasing a shaky breath, Fey let her hold drop, and the raindrops fell to the ground with an audible splash.

“Water Witches, you’re with me today,” Fey called, raising her voice to be heard over the gasps and murmurs of the crowd. The Witches were all talking now, chattering excitedly to one another. Shooting Leandra a quick grin, Fey continued. “And the rest of you? The High Priestess will be taking over your instruction. Let’s begin.”

It was an exhausting day.

By the time the palace bell tolled the late afternoon hour, signaling the end of their daily lessons, Fey felt on the verge of collapse. Goddess save her. She could run five miles a day, and usually trained for hours with Alice and Joy each week, but she never felt this worn out, this exhausted.

Thankfully, the clouds had finally broken, and the sun came out just in time for Fey to enjoy it on her walk to her sisters’ place from the palace. It made the walk infinitely more pleasant, and she took her time, deviating from her normal route to slip through a new neighborhood.

Jasper would be proud , she thought with a smile as she walked.

This neighborhood was a little fancier than her own, and even with the desegregation of the city, almost all the people she passed were from the Witch Faction. Fey recognized a few of her students walking back to their own homes. She smiled when they waved at her excitedly.

Maybe she’d stop by one of the stores here and grab herself something to eat from a new bakery. She had plenty of time before Joy and Alice expected her at their place for family dinner. And she was hungry. Famished, even. She could?—

Fey froze, staring at the man nailing something to the wooden signpost at the end of the block.

She recognized him. An aristocrat who had frequented the palace back when she was a Blade. A sniveling coward of a man, always a little too effusive in his praise for Queen Edelin. But, more importantly, she recognized the poster he was putting up.

“What are you doing?” Fey asked in a hollow voice. A dark storm formed in her chest as she stared at the image of her own face.

OUR TRUE QUEEN, the poster said.

The man turned, ready to tell her to mind her own business. But when he saw her—recognized her—he did the most peculiar thing.

He smiled.

“Your Grace!” the man greeted her, his grin stretching ear to ear. The same unctuous, pandering grin he’d given the old queen. It made her feel ill. It made her feel angry. “How good to see you on this beautiful day!”

“Are you the one putting these up?” Fey asked, fingers flexing. She felt so cold, suddenly. Like ice had started to creep down her spine, and through her nerves.

“One of many,” he told her, dropping his voice to a conspirator’s whisper. “You have many fans among the old guard, believe me, Your Grace.”

“Don’t call me that,” Fey whispered. But the man wasn’t listening.

He reached out to grab her wrist, thick clubbed fingers holding her. Touching her.

The gentle breeze that had been moving through the city streets stopped. A stillness hung in the air, unnoticed by the aristocrat before her.

“When you are ready, we will fight for you,” the man told her. Something uncoiled in Fey’s chest, something dark and dangerous. “We will drive these Fallen scum out of the palace, and you can take your rightful place on the throne.”

Her skin felt hot where he held her. Hot and cold all at once.

“Take your hands off me,” Fey warned him in a dark voice.

Her words were lost on the man, who turned toward the crowded streets and shouted, “Our queen! Our queen has come! Salvation is at hand!”

The crowd of people on the street turned to stare. Some smiled at Fey and this fat aristocrat. This disgusting man who thought he had the right to touch her. To put his hands on her. Others looked from her to the poster and scowled. But many, far too many, came closer, their eyes hungry.

These were the Witches who wanted her to take the throne.

Deep in the crowd Fey spotted a Shifter girl, barely knee high, who hid behind her father’s legs. He led her away, shooting fearful glances at Fey over his shoulder.

Fey’s stomach twisted.

There were murmurs in the mob gathering around her, growing louder and louder by the second. Their words felt sharp. Dangerous.

Our queen.

Our savior.

“She will save us from the growing Fallen influence!” the man holding her arm continued. He squeezed his hand tight around her, shouting with joy. “She will right what the council has done to our city! She will?—”

“I’m not your fucking queen,” Fey interrupted. She felt that rage rise in her chest, unleashed and raw.

It took no effort at all to grab the man’s arm and snap the bone, releasing herself from that sickening touch.

The voices of the crowd went dead silent as he screamed, and Fey let all that delicious rage out.

Alastair was right. They shouldn’t kneel to me.

They should cower.

The ground around her crunched as she fractured it, the stones under her feet splintering outward like a spiderweb.

“How dare you touch me,” Fey told the mewing man. Those fractures grew, fissions forming in the street, spreading through the stone and concrete. Clutching his arm, pale-faced and scared, he stepped back away from her.

“My queen, he only—” someone else said in the crowd, and Fey turned, rage flashing in her eyes.

“Queen?” she asked. Fire came to her, pouring from her skin and down her arms. It danced over her hands. She took a step closer to the crowd, smiling as they shrank back. The stack of posters lying forgotten on the ground caught fire, vanishing into ash.

“I told you I’m not your queen,” she said, venom dripping from her words. “I killed your queen. And I’m no one’s savior.”

The fire turned to lightning, sparking from her fingertips and leaping to the ground around her, striking the fractured stones at her feet. There was shouting and panic from the crowd.

“I’m not your salvation.”

She took another step, the very ground shaking beneath her.

“I’m your fucking reckoning ,” she spat.

It was oh so satisfying to watch them run away. To hear their screams.

To know that—this time—they saw her for what she really was.