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Linh waved her comment away. “You’re fine, child.” Fey’s jaw was pressed together so tight she worried she might chip a tooth. “I’m only pointing out the obvious. The Fire Coven has always been overrepresented among the Blades. And, again, you bring us another Fire Witch. Why not another Air, eh? Or even Water, hm?” Linh gestured at Fey.

The look Fey gave her could have killed, but Linh paid it no attention.

“And why should my Witches be punished for our strength?” Leandra smirked. “Fire is power. Aggression. Does it not make sense that the Blades should wield the strongest element?”

“I think Fey’s presence on the Blades disproves the very notion that Fire alone is the element of aggression, Leandra,” Sana responded, her voice soft but somehow rising above the hum of discussion. She was looking straight at Fey—had been since they’d entered the room. Fey refused to meet her eyes.

“Exactly!” Linh pointed at Fey triumphantly. “A Water Witch, just as deadly as a Fire Witch, eh? Why not bring us another? Bring me an Earth Witch, a full Earth Witch, just as bloodthirsty as this one. Now that’s a Blade I want to see!”

Leandra argued, and as the Priestesses spoke over one another, Fey wanted nothing more than to turn and walk out of the room. She even considered it briefly before Lilith spoke up.

“You all seem to be under the impression that your opinion here matters.”

The Priestesses stopped and turned as one to look at her. Joy, too, snapped her gaze to Lilith, eyes narrowing.

Lilith met their stares, the very picture of calm. “It doesn’t,” she told them with a haughty shrug. “You have no say in who becomes a Blade and who doesn’t. We are telling you that Willow will be inducted this afternoon. We are not asking.”

Linh’s mouth opened and closed in outrage. No one spoke to the High Priestesses like this. Not even the Queen. Her mouth gaped like a fish as her mind struggled to put her indignation into words. “Now see here, you disrespectful little?—”

“You serve at the pleasure of the Queen,” Lilith snapped, speaking over her. There was steel in her voice, harder than anything in Linh’s. The Priestess stopped. Stared.

“We,” Lilith continued, gesturing at Joy and Fey at her side. “We serve at the pleasure of the Queen. And today the Queen herself will induct whoever the fuck we say she will into our sisterhood. If you have a problem with that, I suggest you take it up with her. But never forget that you serve at her pleasure.”

Everyone gaped at Lilith as she continued.

“And if the day comes when she no longer claims the pleasure of your service—” Lilith shrugged, but her eyes were glittering dangerously. “Well, then you might find yourself learning exactly what the Queen’s Blades are capable of.”

And with that, gasps of outrage rising behind her, Lilith turned and walked out of the room.

Fey barked a laugh, shocked, while Joy made a quick apology for their sister before bowing hastily and pulling Fey from the room. The door behind them closed with a sharp, painfully loud crack.

“You’re fucking insane,” Joy shouted after Lilith’s back in the hallway, hurrying after her. “That wasn’t necessary, Lilith, and you know it.”

Lilith shrugged, stopping to let them catch up. “What’s insane is that they think they can talk to us like that. If I wanted to be criticized by a sex-starved old crone, I would have stayed at home with my mother.”

Joy opened her mouth to continue her berating, but whatever she was going to say was interrupted by a soft cough behind them.

A hand caught Fey’s elbow, and she turned.

Sana stood there. The very last person Fey wanted to see.

“Fey,” she said softly. “Could I have a word?”

Great.

Fey had managed to avoid Sana successfully since her induction to the Blades. She was the youngest of the High Priestesses, having just taken over from the last head of the Water Coven shortly after Fey came to the Eternal City.

Fey inclined her head. “Of course,” she said, and she gestured to Lilith and Joy to continue. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“It’s good to see you, Fey,” Sana said as Fey’s sisters disappeared down the hall.

She always sounded so… sincere. But Fey knew she was lying. Sana didn’t think it was good to see her.

Fey made Sana uncomfortable. She wasn’t what a water Witch should be—she wasn’t a healer, wasn’t interested in the calm, soft energy Witches of her coven should exude. She didn’t use her power the way it was intended, and Sana knew. To Sana, Fey must be the ultimate form of blasphemy.

A Witch who used her power over Water to kill.

“I haven’t seen you at the Temple, recently.”