Page 62 of Beasts of Shadows #1

When we return to Van Ritten, the campus is fittingly foreboding. Gray and white have soaked away the color; mounds of snow keeping people trapped inside. Flurries lash our coats as we step off the ferry, biting and blinding. I can hardly see a foot in front of me.

I can hardly see a foot in front of me when we step off the ferry. I swallow my fears, trying to think through everything I know.

When a figure emerges from the snow, I reach for the sword Malec gave me. The one that can kill Calea.

I can only hope Nikolai was wrong about only Reema being able to wield it.

Bri’s face looms before us, her jaw tight. Whatever she plans to say, it trickles off when she sees me.

She launches, pulling me into a hug.

“Everyone said you were dead,” she breathes.

“It seemed like the best lie at the time,”

Cat mutters from behind me, kicking snow off her boots.

Bri releases me with a half-sob, half-laugh and then immediately pulls Cat into a breathless kiss.

“Everyone’s been called to the assembly hall. I’m on security detail, otherwise I’d be with them. No one knows why, but given this weather, it wouldn’t surprise me if—.”

“Calea’s here?” I ask.

Bri gives a reluctant, almost fearful nod.

“I heard the faculty talking. They say she wants to address the school. It’s not unusual for the mother goddess to come, but this feels…”

I look toward the great stone facade of the assembly hall—its spires coated in rime, its windows glowing dimly behind frost. There’s no smoke. No sound. Just snow. Quiet. Heavy.

The kind of silence that comes before something breaks.

Nikolai takes my gloved hand in his, threading our fingers together.

“She already knows you’re alive,” he murmurs. “Best not to make her wait.”

#

The doors groan as we push them open.

Warmth hits me first—artificial and cloying, like a trap set with honey. Then the silence.

Hundreds of students packed shoulder-to-shoulder in the grand pews, but no one is speaking. No coughing. No shifting. Just rows of stiff backs and bowed heads, like a funeral without a body.

“Daughter.”

I focus on the front of the room, where her aged voice came from.

She stands alone in the center of the stage. No podium. No guards. Just a woman—if you could still call her that—draped in frost and impossibility.

Her dress is ink-black and shimmering, like a crow’s wing dipped in oil. The fabric floats as though underwater. Ice crystals spiderweb her lashes, and her lips—painted with something too red, too alive—curve into a quiet, monstrous smile.

She must have been beautiful once. Just like they all are.

That’s how they trick us, the kids at school used to say.

But that beauty’s gone sour—stretched too thin over something ancient.

Her skin has the waxy sheen of a corpse.

pulled tight over brittle bones. Her cheekbones jut like shards of flint. And her eyes…

Gods, her eyes.

Milky at the edges, like her own winter cursed her from within. But at the center—cut glass. Cold enough to shatter truth. Sharp enough to sever futures.

She’s not beautiful anymore. But power still clings to her like a desperate lover—starving, haunted, and unable to let go.

Nikolai gives my hand another squeeze.

A freezing blast blows my hair in kinked coils behind my head as I step further into the hall.

Despite the fact that there are at least hundreds of vicious beings crowded into the room, the only thing making me nervous is the sight of the figure at her side.

Ravi.

Is he there because she made him? Or by choice?

“I hear you’re going to kill me today,” Calea calls, bringing my attention back to her.

Heads turn. Disbelief ripples across the room. No one, no matter how ambitious, would dare to challenge the queen.

I ignore her accusation.

“You’re not my mom.”

Calea tuts.

“Yes, I heard about your loss. I’m so sorry. The bond between a mother and daughter is so special .”

Is she really going to act like she wasn’t behind it?

The frost in the room begins to trickle. Slowly, like tears from a stone. At first I think it’s a trick of the light. A shift in the wind. But then I see it clearly—the icicles lacing the ceiling crack, shedding slivers of white like broken glass. The silver fog thins.

My breath catches, the air warm on my skin. Not by much—but enough. Enough to realize the truth.

It’s me.

I’m making the frost retreat.

I’m pushing back against her cold—quiet, steady, furious. Not fire. Not yet. But something deeper. Wilder. Like the echo of spring clawing its way out from beneath the snow.

Calea’s smile falters.

“Word has it you met a similar fate. I’m glad to see that was untrue.”

I swallow, peering at my classmates.

“Why don’t we let them go,” I say, catching Picca’s face in the sea of others. She doesn’t seem quite as steady as usual—eyes darting, lips pressed thin. “This is a family affair, isn’t it?”

Calea’s clawed hand rests on Ravi’s shoulder.

“But who will see your victory? Name you, and your feral husband my successors?”

“Callie,” Ravi begins. Her claw digging into his flesh, drawing blood, stops him.

“I find it fitting that my husband left me for a newer model, and now you have done the same.” When she smiles her her lips stretch over too-white teeth. “Finally, something I can be proud of you for.”

“I’m not Bea,” I say at last.

“No,” Calea agrees. “Bea had spine. It made breaking her so fun .”

Stella catches my eye. Her jaw tightens—not with fear, like many others, but fury. The fury only a mortal can understand. A flame stoked only by injustice.

She doesn’t look away. And when she gives a subtle nod of approval, something clicks into place inside me—solid and electric.

The frost recedes another inch.

I just need to do what I’ve done all school year. Wait it out. Take advantage when my opponent is weakest.

“I’m going to be honest with you, because I think someone needs to be,” I say at last to Calea, taking a few more steps closer.

“I don’t care about your realm. I don’t care about the shades who think I’m weak.

Nor the monsters called teachers who pit us against each other in the dark, when we cannot hide. ”

A hush ripples across the room.

“I never wanted to be part of your world, and I’d be so happy to let you keep all of it.”

Calea’s gaze flits to Nikola, now standing beside Cat in one of the side aisles. If he’s worried by my confession, I can’t tell.

“I don’t think your lover would like that.” Her voice is velvet draped over steel.

“Probably not.” I look away. “You’ve made a lot of enemies over the years. And a lot of your kin—people who would happily have hunted me on any other day—are now counting on me to end your winter for good.”

Her smile is almost sweet. Bordering on motherly. “Do you believe you can change how they think if I’m gone? Is that what this is?”

I can’t bring myself to look at Ravi or Nikolai.

“I’m not going to kid myself into believing that monsters can change. They’ve had millennia to do just that, and here we are. In a murder school.”

A few students flinch at the words. A teacher coughs into their sleeve.

Calea’s smile doesn’t falter. If anything, it deepens—proud, almost indulgent.

“And yet here you stand,” she says, “fighting for a place in it.”

“I’m not fighting for a place.” I glance out at the students, watching with rapt attention. “I’ve just been fighting to survive it. I don’t like it. But that’s what we are. Predators.”

Something in her expression flickers—just slightly. Not fear. Not guilt. But recognition.

“Some predators,” she says at last, “are wolves in sheep’s clothing. Isn’t that right, daughter of bargain and blood?”

No. Please, not—.

Calea’s eyes linger on the front row. Where the leaders of each class sit.

“

A hum of laughter rises around the room. Or maybe it’s a shiver. I can’t tell.

Calea stops a few feet from us, head tilting slightly to the side. Her eyes—icy blue, void of warmth—pin me in place.

“You think this is about you?” she asks softly. “How quaint.”

Her gaze slides to Nikolai.

And changes.

Not fondness. Not hatred. Just interest. Pure and sharp.

“Nikolai. You look exhausted.” She clicks her tongue. “Poor dear. Marriage doesn’t suit you.”

His jaw twitches.

“I didn’t invite you,” he says. “You’re trespassing.”

“Oh, my sweet boy,” Calea sighs. “I go where I please. As you will, when the throne is finally yours.”

“I don’t want your throne.”

“No,” she agrees. “You want her.”

Calea turns to me again, this time with something closer to pity. It doesn’t suit her.

“You always were a complication,” she murmurs. “Even before you were born.”

My fingers clench into fists. “Say what you came to say, Calea.”

She smiles wider now. “I’m not here to speak. I’m here to witness.”

She turns to the students. “You’ve all trained for war. For gods and monsters. But the true test of power…” She walks slowly across the stage, dragging every gaze with her. “Is sacrifice.”

She stops again, directly in front of me.

“Prove it.”

And then—before I can speak, before I can move—she lifts her hand and snaps her fingers.

The ground beneath me pulses once. The windows blow open. A freezing gust barrels through the room, scattering papers, snuffing candles.

And Reema appears at the center of the room.

Alone.

No weapon. No warning. Just Reema. Face pale. Eyes wild.

Like she’s been summoned.

Like bait.

#

Malec peers between the two of us, standing on the dais of the great hall where the gods are still drinking. Still reveling. No one even notices us in their haze, thankfully. I’d prefer not to have any witnesses to this conversation, but at least I’m sure no one will take note of what we’re saying.

“Yes,” he says at last.

My heart drops. I’d hoped…

“Cody was the second-born demigod.”

“And Reema was first.”

Malec risks a peek in Nikolai’s direction. His second affirmation takes longer to come, but it does.

“Her mother made a deal with the Phoenician god of fertility. Bale. Financial stability for a one night tryst, I believe. Nobody could have guessed that something would come of it. We couldn’t have children. Everyone knew that.”

Nikolai licks his lips.

“It took a lot of work to keep me off the radar. How have you hidden two demigods all this time?”

“They’re not the only ones,” Malec says sharply.

“There have been at least twelve, known, since Reema broke the first seal. Some children were placed with mortal families, their divinity bound until they come of age. Others…their parents were accommodating.” Malec drops his head back.

The sound echoes in the room, drawing a couple curious eyes, before the return to their games.

“The secrecy gave them a chance at life. Calea would have killed them if she knew. Even the later ones.”

“Do they know? Reema and Cody?”

Apparently, the question hits another wall that Malec was hoping to keep up.

“Cody knows enough.”

“That’s not helpful.”

“They’re not together,” Malec says sharply. “And I need you to know that I wish they could be. Things like what they could have, like what you and Nikolai share, are rare. Especially among deities.”

I peek at Nikolai from my peripheral, wondering what he makes of that.

“Mother said Nari had to kill Calea.”

“Yes,” Malec allows, sitting up with renewed energy. “If Nari kills the mother goddess tomorrow, we will all be free. And you will have your empire.”

“And Thantos?” I prompt.

Rather than look at me, Malec plays with his fingers.

“Reema’s his bride.”

“You’ve got yourself a clever one there, Nicky,” Malec laughs, though it’s clearly forced.

“So…what does this mean?” Nikolai wonders, mirroring the same question I’m puzzling through.

“ Nothing . As long as your friend stays away from everything tomorrow, you two can lead the next era of deities into the future we’ve been long robbed of.”

“And if she’s there?”

Malec sits back, his features, so like Cody’s, growing serious. It’s an ill-suited look.

“Make sure she’s not.”