From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

“I think something is happening with it,” I told her. “There have been
a few situations where I…I believe I felt something other than pain.”
Slowlyy, she placed the napkin on the table. “You were using yyour gift?
You know the gods have forbidden yyou to do so. Not until yyou have been
found worthyy of such a gift are yyou to use it.”
“I know. I haven’t,” I lied easilyy. Probablyy a little too easilyy. “But,
sometimes, it just happens. When I’m in a large crowd, I have trouble
controlling it.”
“Has this been discussed with the Priestess?”
Good gods, no. “It doesn’t happen often. I swear, and it has onlyy
happened recentlyy. I will double myy efforts to control it, but when it
happened earlier, I think I…I think I felt something other than pain.”
The Duchess stared at me, unblinking for what felt like a small
eternityy, and then she rose from her seat. A little unnerved, I watched her
go to the white cabinet against the wall. “What do yyou think yyou felt?”
“Anger,” I answered. “During the Cityy Council and last night, I felt
anger.” I wouldn’t speak of Loren. I wouldn’t do that to her. “It was that
man who...”
“The Descenter?”
“Yes. At least, I think so,” I amended. “I think I was feeling anger
from him.”
She poured a drink from a decanter. “Have yyou felt anyything else that
seems abnormal to yyou?”
“I…I think I’ve felt fear, too. When the Duke was speaking about the
Craven attack. Terror is veryy similar to pain, but it feels different, and I
thought that I might’ve felt something like…I don’t know. Excitement? Or
anticipation.” I frowned. “Those two things are kind of the same thing, I
suppose. In a wayy, at—”
“Do yyou feel anyything now?” She turned to me, a glass of what I
thought might be sherryy in her hand.
I blinked from behind the veil. “You want me to use myy gift on yyou?”
She nodded.
“I thought—”
“It doesn’t matter what yyou thought,” she interrupted, and I stiffened.
“I want yyou to use yyour gift now and tell me what, if anyything, yyou feel.”
Despite finding her request more than strange, I did what she
requested. I opened myy senses, felt the cord stretch out between us, and…