Page 129 of Traitor Witch

"Official letters, bearing the seal of the Queen and addressed to Glenna, some of them even mention you by name. Is that enough proof?" Her raised eyebrows tell me she knows she's bringing my world crashing down around me.

I've never felt so numb.

The handwriting is so ornate that it's hard to read, or maybe that's just my hands shaking.

But it's all there, the Queen's seal. Glenna's name.

My name.

The names of my targets.

I drop the bundle of papers in a daze.

I took innocent lives.

Not for my Goddess. Not through divine will or to protect others.

I killed them for nothing. To satisfy the whims of a human monarch.

"It wasn't our fault,"Opal whispers."How could we have known?"

"Nothing to say?" Petra doesn't seem happy about this, but there's a satisfaction in her gaze that makes me angry.

"Fuck you."

"Eloquent."

"If you knew all this time, why didn't you stop me?"

"Because I didn't know," she admits. "The first time the Goddess alerted me to any of this was a month before the winter solstice when the Moon Mother called me out of retirement to give me the task of killing Glenna and Felicity."

That part didn't make sense.

"Why Felicity?"

"Because she also knew. But instead of doing something about it, she chose to turn a blind eye rather than risk a bloody confrontation with Glenna. It went against the edicts of her Goddess and ours."

"She offered me a place in her coven. Maybe she was trying to stop me in her own way."

Petra scoffs. "Too little, too late. Even the Goddess of Life agreed. High Priestess Sophie gave me her blessing before I left for my task. The Goddesses decided a purge of Coveton was the only way to redeem the temples there." She pushed to her feet, groaning. "We will eat, then begin your training."

I gape at her. "But I still have questions..."

Petra rolls her eyes. "We all have questions, girl. Doesn't mean we deserve the answers. The only question that matters right now is this: will you answer the Goddess's call and kill the Eagle of Galmere?"

She phrases it like a question, but there's never really been any other option. How could I say no when the Queen is blackmailing my harem and trafficking siren body parts? How can I refuse when I saw what happened to the Lunar Temple in Ilyani?

I take a deep breath and nod.

"Good. Then I will train you. Learning to become a true Shadow takes years, but hopefully Glenna taught you something worthwhile because we don't have that much time." She sighs and points towards the archway. "Follow the steps back down, one of the others will lead you to where you'll be staying. I have to perform the dusk prayers, but I'll join you afterwards."

She dismisses me easily, sliding the rest of the way into the pool, which starts to glow with the light of the rising moon.

Chapter Thirty-Four

NILSA

There's a Lunar waiting for me at the bottom of the steps. One I vaguely recognise as the one who snatched me from the ocean and flew me here.