The Cursed Queen (The Impostor Queen #2)(77)

Nisse’s eyebrows rise as he looks at me, and my heart pounds. You could be Saadella, Hulda said. “But surely those things aren’t that uncommon,” I say. “Hulda the Kupari slave had hair this same color.” I point at Thyra. “Thyra has eyes of the color he describes.”

Kauko listens to Halina translate and nods before replying, all the while eyeing me as if I were a succulent roast pig.

“He says there is one more feature that helps identify the Saadella, who becomes the Valtia when the current queen dies—when the magic leaves the dying queen and enters the body of the new one,” Halina says. “She has a—” She presses her lips together, her nostrils flaring.

“Speak, Halina,” Nisse says, his voice a warning.

She gives me a bright, scared look. “He—he says she always has a mark. A red mark. Sh-shaped like a flame.”

Nisse looks puzzled, but Thyra gasps. Like Halina, she has seen my bare legs on more than one occasion. “Ansa,” Nisse says, glancing at the two women with dawning realization. “You have such a mark?”

My entire body is shaking. “This cannot be true. It doesn’t make sense.” My skin has turned icy and my teeth chatter.

“Show it to us,” Nisse commands, rising from his chair as I shrink into mine.

There is no hiding this. There is no escaping it. All of them are staring. Jaspar’s green eyes are so wide and shocked that I have to look away from them. With shaking fingers, I push the edge of my boot down my calf. Kauko blinks and shuffles over, his mouth dropping open. For a long moment, he stares at it, and in that space I plead with the heavens—Let this be wrong. Let this be wrong.

He falls to his knees before me, trilling words exploding from his fat lips. His hands clamp over my knees and he looks up at me with tears in his eyes. “Valtia,” he whispers. “Valtia.”

“Oh, heaven,” whispers Thyra as her eyes meet mine. And in them, I see the truth.

I was not cursed by the witch queen that day on the Torden.

I became the witch queen.





CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


I stand up so suddenly that my chair overturns, and then I stumble over its legs and end up on the ground, frost spreading across the wooden floor. The torches in the room flare as the flames begin to grow.

“I’m . . . I’m not . . . ,” I stammer, backing away as Kauko comes toward me. I seek Nisse’s muted green eyes, because I can’t even look at Thyra now. “Please. I’m not . . .” I’m not the enemy.

Jaspar pulls his father away to the far side of the room, his jaw rigid as he watches the frost crawl across the planks toward them. “Ansa, stay calm. No one’s going to hurt you.”

Kauko is talking to me in that stupid, weak, trilling language that wrenches up memories faster than I can push them down. “Shut him up!” I shriek, covering my ears, but my hands are dripping fire, and I scream again as the flames lick my scalp. Tears turn to steam as they escape my eyes, then become flakes of frost that fall through the air around me.

“He’s trying to help you,” Halina says loudly from across the room, her voice high and terrified. “Please, little red. Let him help before you hurt yourself.”

Kauko is the only person here who does not seem terrified. He kneels next to me, his brow furrowed with gentle concern. He looks over his shoulder and asks Halina a question. “Breathe,” she replies.

He looks down at me again. “Breathe,” he says. “Breathe.” He presses his lips together and his nostrils flare as he draws in an exaggerated breath, then blows it out through his mouth, then gestures for me to do the same as he asks Halina for more Krigere words.

“Not afraid,” he says as I let out a shaky, frosty breath. “Not afraid.”

“Very afraid,” I whisper, laying my head on the floor as the storm inside me rages. This is no curse. This is who I am now, who I’ll be until I die. The knowledge is too painful to accept.

Kauko spreads his fingers, and the frost around my body melts. When it tries to reform, it turns to water again, then steam. He points to the torches, and their flames shrink, becoming docile once again. I stare with envy and awe as he controls the things that so easily control me. “Teach you,” he says, nodding in thanks at Halina for giving him words. “Teach you. Not be afraid.”

Halina speaks in low tones with Nisse, who is nodding. Thyra has her back against the wall and her arms folded over her chest, her mouth set with tension. She doesn’t look happy that I’m not burning to death in front of her, and it resurrects my resentment. Nisse blocks my view of her a moment later, though. “Ansa, Elder Kauko has taught many Valtias how to use the magic.”

“I’m not the Valtia,” I plead. “I’m Krigere. I’m a warrior.”

“Of course you are,” he says. “You are part of my tribe, no matter where you came from. But you must learn to control this gift you’ve been given, so you can use it on behalf of your people. Will you obey me in this? Will you let this priest instruct you?”

I glance at the others, at Jaspar, who looks resolute and hopeful, at Halina, who wears her stark wariness like a veil, and at Thyra, who is biting her lip and staring at the ground. She doesn’t speak up, doesn’t insist I am hers, not Nisse’s. This must have been the final crack in the ice for her. Not only am I not her love, not her wolf, I am not even her people. Defiance rises in me, brittle but bracing. “Yes,” I say to Nisse. “I’ll do my best to learn quickly.”