Dark Curse (Darkhaven Saga #5) - Danielle Rose Page 0,28

day.”

“How? When? Why…” I trail off. So many questions are fluttering through my mind. I do not know where to begin.

“I know how important these were to you, and after you…” Jasik sighs. “These are not simply clothes, Ava. Like your necklace and your weapon, they are extensions of you. When you wear them, you become more confident in yourself. That confidence is what you are lacking now. It is what you are missing. You are still that same girl I met that night. You just do not see yourself the way I do. I think this might help.”

I swallow the knot that forms and sniffle. I turn away from Jasik and stare at his gift to me. He is not simply gifting me clothes and shoes and jewelry. He is giving me back everything I lost that night.

After Liv died and I cursed my coven, I walked away from them, intent on never returning. I ignored their pleas as I put more and more distance between us. Eventually, they fell silent. I did not hear their cries or their screams for me to return, to reverse the spell. They were angry, but most importantly, they were pained.

I know that agony, because when they severed the vampire from the witch, I felt it too. That hollowness, that emptiness, that feeling of uselessness. I lived with those very emotions the day they used black magic against me. It was their time to suffer now. They needed to understand my desperation.

But the moment I returned to the manor, with the vampires in tow, I still felt…broken. I did not like who I became or what the witches made me do. Because when I spelled them, I cursed myself in that very same breath. Now, the vampire really is gone. I did not simply suppress the vampire or the witch, I stifled them. I silenced them. I became human in a world doused with magic.

That night, I stripped from my clothes, I tossed them in a waste bucket, and I set them on fire. The vampires surrounded me, watching in awe as I severed my very last links to my family. I ripped my cross from my neck and threw it in the fire too. I dropped my stake into that bucket, and I never looked back.

But now, these things stare back at me. My cross glistens in the low lighting, positioned directly beside a thin, black box.

“I was able to find a similar cross, chain unbroken, but that is your same stake,” Jasik confides.

Confused, I look up at him, frowning. “How? How did you manage this? When did you do this?”

“After you went to bed that night, I cleaned up the mess, emptying the bucket. The stake was unharmed. Dirty from soot but otherwise okay. I cleaned it off and stored it, hoping, in time, you would ask me to get you another one. I always planned to return it to you when you asked for it.”

“But I never asked for it back,” I admit.

“I know, but I could tell you yearned for it. These things are part of you, and that scares you because you think you are different now. You think you are no longer a warrior, but you are. You are still you. You are still that strong, confident, smart, beautiful girl who looked at me and asked me to turn you into the very creature you feared most. All because you were willing to offer the only thing you had left to save your family. You have always been fearless and selfless, Ava, even now. Even when you are scared.”

“You saved it for me?” I ask, awestruck. “And you still replaced these things for me? Even after all this time, you still believed I would come to my senses and want them back?”

“I knew you needed them, even if you did not, and I was willing to wait for you,” he says. “After speaking with Will, I knew this was the time to return them. I wanted you to have everything you need while you make your decision.”

My heart swells, tears threatening to fall. Jasik is right. I did need this. Like any good superhero with a cape and costume, I needed these clothes. They were my armor. Whenever I dressed in them and went out patrolling, I felt confident and safe, like these clothes alone provided some form of essential protection against my enemies. They did not, of course, but I was able to convince myself otherwise