Cursed: Briar Rose's Story - Kaylin Lee Page 0,30

could see all the way to the truth stitched over my heart, to the curse that controlled my every breath.

Look out for her! The curse laughed wildly. Yes, we will look out for her, we certainly will—

I nodded and looked away, grabbing for an apple from the table to take my mind off the curse’s elation.

“Go wake her.” Mom sipped her coffee, apparently having decided not to destroy it yet. “She needs more practice.”

I took the stairs two at a time, then knocked on Alba’s door. When I heard her muffled, tearful response, I went back downstairs to eat my apple. The repetitive chewing motions bored the curse, quieting its laughter, and I found myself oddly encouraged when Alba entered the kitchen a moment later, fully dressed, with neatly braided hair, dry eyes, and a stubborn set to her jaw.

Mom put her to work practicing a self-defense move using expellant magic. I listened to them argue and drill as I finished my apple and threw away the core. Neither of them seemed to suspect the Masters were behind this assignment, and Mom hadn’t mentioned anything about leaving Asylia to accompany us. That was good.

And Alba … she was strong when she needed to be, wasn’t she? I thought of how she’d placed her trembling hands on Prince Estevan’s back five years earlier, healing him from aurae overuse like a professional healer instead of a shaky, self-taught thirteen-year-old.

I spun the cap of my canteen off to distract the curse, then washed it carefully, scrubbing every inch of the bottle’s rim with obsessive, repetitive motions. The curse rested, bored.

Alba was strong. I nearly nodded to myself. She’d even managed to convince a Procus lord to violate every social convention and become enamored enough with her to introduce her to his parents. It was a dream she’d been talking about since we were children, and now, though she was barely eighteen, she’d somehow made the wish come true. She was paying for it today, of course. But a weak, helpless girl wouldn’t have made it this far, right?

Perhaps she’d survive the Badlands and the Masters, all on her own. I just had to keep my curse from taking her down with me.

The curse began to stir. I put my canteen into my pack. “It’s time to go.” I tried to ignore Alba’s flinch as I felt the curse surge with excitement at my words. “Get your stuff.”

Mom went to the fomecoach out front while Alba rushed upstairs for her boots and coat.

I looked around the dim, silent kitchen. This was goodbye, wasn’t it? I’d never set foot in this villa again.

My hands tightened into fists as I surveyed cold, quiet space. I hated this kitchen. It was the room where I’d made the worst choice of my life—the choice to leave my family in a fit of stupid, vain self-pity. And it was the room where I’d hurt my family a thousand times over the last five years, smothering any attempt they made to love me, compelled by the curse’s ruthless need to keep me isolated from anyone who might be able to stop it from being fulfilled.

Another memory slipped into my mind, a different kitchen, a different moment …

Stay, stay! I thought of Tavar’s grandfather turning to face me from the stove, recalled the warm, spicy scent of his stewed meat.

If you want to stay, you can. Don’t know if you’ll like our Western food, though. I pictured Tavar’s apprehensive, vulnerable expression as he watched me take my first bite of their dinner, and my eyes drifted shut, longing pressing hard against my chest.

That was the kitchen I wanted to remember—the warm, safe little tenement apartment where the curse had once left me alone, unconcerned by the vanquished Western people and their traditional dishes, not yet suspicious of Tavar’s attention to me.

The curse shot an angry stab of pain into my chest, then another. I ignored it. I had one day left before eternal sleep claimed me. What did it matter if I thought about Tavar now? I had nothing left to lose. And surely the curse wouldn’t kill me now, just one day before fulfillment.

My mind turned back to the last time we’d sparred in preparation for the Sentinels’ exam a month earlier. I thought of Tavar’s dark-red hair drenched with sweat, hanging loose over his forehead, his muscular chest heaving as we finished our last sparring match the day before the Sentinels’ entry test. Well done, Bri, he’d said when