“Because I’m tired, Briana, of your Shadowborn lies and the fun you must be having at our expense. Planting your brethren at our Oath, sending the serpent to take Nicholas under my nose, taking part in our trials.” With every slow step forward, his features turn more menacing and his eyes wilder until he looks more like his hellhound construct than himself. Looks more demon than human. “We both know you don’t care about our mission. I can see it in your face!”

“That’s not true!” I scream.

Sel’s expression is pained, annoyed. “More lies? Even now?” He kneels in front of me, his upper lip curling into a sneer. “I know you Saw the isel before taking the Oath. We both know the First Oath never took, that you sloughed off our sacred commitment like it was nothing. Like it was worthless to you, less valuable than dirt.”

I tremble. How did he know? Did he see—

He chuckles low at my confusion. “You think I don’t recognize my own casting or sense its absence?” He leans close to whisper in my ear. “I can feel them, Briana. The Oaths I’ve cast.” His eyes drift across my face and throat. “And I don’t feel any of me… on you.”

“Get away from me!” I shove him hard with shaking hands, and he laughs, rocking back on his heels. I scramble to my feet, but his hound is right there, its slobbering jaws at my shoulder.

Sel rises. “Nicholas needs to know who you are before he is called to the throne and you make a fool of him. William, Felicity, Russ, Sarah… They all seem to think you might actually belong with us, when we both know you don’t belong anywhere.”

I feel myself shaking. And not just because of what Sel says about Nick or the others, but because of his last words.

You don’t belong anywhere.

After everything that’s happened to me, everything I’ve done to make it this far, to get this close to the truth of my mother’s murder, those words snap something inside me.

My hands begin to flex at my sides, clenching and unclenching. The tips of my fingers feel like they could pop, like there’s a balloon beneath my skin that just wants to expand outward and explode. I look at Sel’s hound and think of breathing fire in the monster’s face and watching it burn, burn, burn. Laughing at its pain, because it’s so small next to mine. I see Sel. See his confidence in his ancient mission and his hunger to take me down.

I may not know my own ancestors, but after seeing Mary and Louisa and Cecilia, all I want is to show him that he’s not the only one with power in his veins.