I frowned. “Not sure I like that.”
“I don’t, either,” she said. “But if I know, it’s a safe bet that Mab knows, too.”
That made me feel distinctly uncomfortable. Mab tended to manipulate me with all the subtlety of a swinging axe. But if she had that kind of intimate emotional knowledge of me, she might be operating on more subtle levels, too. Maybe her arm-twisting was mostly a smoke screen for her working me more discreetly.
That I hadn’t considered the possibility until now scared me a little. If true, it put me several…well, years behind her in my thinking.
“Thanks for the warning,” I said quietly.
She nodded. “Sure.”
“I feel like it’s my fault,” I said quietly.
I wasn’t talking about Maggie, or the Winter Queen.
Molly’s bright eyes studied my profile. “It wasn’t you. You were in the midst of war,” she said softly. “And Rudolph was supposed to be one of the people you were protecting.”
A flash of pure hatred went through me at the name.
Molly saw it.
“You haven’t taken vengeance,” she said.
“Wouldn’t bring her back.”
“It might let you move forward,” she noted.
“Into becoming what?” I asked. I shook my head. “He left town. That’s enough for me. It’s got to be.”
“You’re lying,” she said softly.
I mean. I was. I wanted to tear his arms off. I wanted to shove his face into the earth of Murphy’s grave and keep pushing until he ran out of air. I wanted to kill him.
But Rudolph wasn’t a monster. He was something less than that, and worse: A fool. An idiot. A coward.
I exhaled slowly.
And my pain was not unique. Was not special.
“You haven’t let her go,” Molly said gently. She was silent for a moment, then seemed to make a decision and took a breath. “I know what that feels like. I’ve done that. With someone I loved.”
I looked down. I couldn’t have met her gaze.
“I got very lucky,” she said. “He came back. But if he hadn’t, I’d have…become something I very much would not want to be.”
I could feel what she was talking about.
Deep down, there was a part of me that wanted to sayscrew it. That being a decent person was too painful, too harsh, too self-destructive. A part of me that wanted to take my power and use it to start crushing my enemies. Or anyone else who wanted to hold me back. Including me. Especially me.
I closed my eyes.
I said the same thing I said to that part of me every time it stirred:Not today.
“There he is,” Molly said very quietly, as if she could sense the direction of my thoughts. “Part of what you’re feeling is the Winter mantle,” she said. “Pure, primal rage. Someone took your mate. The mantle wants them dealt with appropriately. It’s adding pressure.”
“Fun,” I said.
“Mab wants me to tell you to go kill Rudolph. You’ll feel better, she says.”
