Gods & Monsters (Serpent & Dove #3) by Shelby Mahurin

I stared at the spot from which she’d vanished, my mind reeling. She didn’t reappear, however, and no sounds of alarm rent the silence. No sounds of pursuit. “She let us go.”

“To kill us later.”

“She could’ve killed us just then, but she didn’t.” I scowled now, thoroughly disenchanted with his single-minded intensity. It bordered on pigheaded. Had he been this stupid when I’d first met him? Was his mind the addled one? “I don’t know why, but I do know I won’t be looking a gift horse in the mouth. She’s with Morgane and La Voisin,” I added when he tried to move around me. I planted my feet. “Now isn’t the time for this confrontation. We made a deal with Isla—we get in, we get out, and we give her the ring.”

“Unacceptable.” That knife finally pressed between my shoulder blades. “I am not here for a magic ring, Louise. If you don’t move out of my way, I will find another witch to kill.”

I poked him in the chest. Hard. “Listen to me, jackass.” My voice rose at the word, and I hastened to lower it once more. “Isla needs that ring. We need the melusines. The sooner we finish here, the sooner we can unite our allies, the sooner we can formulate a plan of attack—”

“I have a plan—attack. Morgane is here, not in Cesarine.”

“Your mother is in Cesarine.”

“I don’t care about my mother,” he snarled, shouldering past me at last. I stumbled into Jean Luc, who overcorrected, knocking Célie into Reid and plunging me into the corridor alone.

I whirled to face him, swearing loudly—then froze.

Manon stared back at me.

“Hello?” Her eyes narrowed suspiciously, flitting over my dark shape, and she lifted a hand as if to touch me. I scuttered backward. I had no choice. If she touched me, she’d realize without a doubt that I was human. When her frown deepened, I winced, realizing too late that shadows didn’t scutter. “Who’s there?” She flicked a thin blade from her sleeve. “Show yourself, or I’ll summon the sentries.”

Why did every plan I ever made go to complete and total shit?

Lips flattening, I cracked open that door of power in my chest, beneath which the white web shimmered. It would be a risk to change forms, but Morgane was clever. Though she’d undoubtedly realized the Triple Goddess had revoked her blessing, perhaps she hadn’t yet told our kin. Either way, I couldn’t simply stand here with a knife in front and a knife behind, and I couldn’t reveal my true form either. This newfound power would make it easier, surely.

I sought to remember my childhood classroom, wracked my mind for everything I knew of the Triple Goddess and her forms.

Her final counterpart is the Crone, who embodies aging and ending, death and rebirth, past lives and transformations, visions and prophecies. She is our guide. She is dusk and night, autumn and winter.

Fitting, as we’d probably all die here anyway.

I focused on those traits, tried to center myself around them, as other memories consumed—my life in this castle, my blood in the basin, my farewell to Ansel. That feeling of bone-deep acceptance. My transformation into the Maiden had happened easily, without intent, but this transformation came easier still. Perhaps once I would’ve empathized most with the Maiden—and I still did, to an extent—but that joyous season of light had passed. I’d lived in winter for too long. To my surprise, I didn’t regret the change. I relished it.

My hands withered and cracked as the shadows around them dissipated, and my spine bowed beneath years of fatigue. My vision clouded. My flesh sagged. Triumphant—exorbitantly pleased with myself—I lifted a gnarled finger to Manon’s startled face. I’d done it.

I’d transformed.

“Out for a moonlit stroll, dearie?” My voice warbled, unfamiliar and deep and unpleasant. I cackled at the sound, and Manon retreated a step. “Not much moonlight tonight, I’m afraid.” My tongue flicked past the gap in my eyeteeth as I leered at her. “Shall I join you?”

She sank into a hasty curtsy. “My lady. I am sorry. I—I didn’t recognize you.”

“Some nights I must pass unseen, Manon.”

“Of course.” She ducked her head. Too late, I realized she’d been crying. The kohl around her eyes had tracked down her cheeks, and her nose still ran. She sniffed as quietly as possible. “I understand.”

“Is something wrong, child?”

“No.” She spoke the word too quickly, still backing away. “No, my lady. I am sorry to have bothered you.”

I didn’t need the Crone’s Vision to see her lie. Truthfully, I needn’t have asked at all. She still grieved her dead lover, Gilles, the man she’d killed with her own hands. All because he’d been a son of the king. “A cup of chamomile tea, my dear.” When she blinked, confused, I clarified, “In the kitchens. Brew and steep a cup. It will settle your nerves and send you to sleep.”

With another curtsy and word of thanks, she departed, and I sagged against the nearest wall.

“Holy shit,” Beau breathed.

“That was incredible,” Coco added.

“Release me.” Reid broke Jean Luc’s hold swiftly, efficiently, his throat corded with strain. He whirled on him in a storm of fury. “She was isolated. The situation controlled. We should’ve struck—”