My father, who could carry entire trees across his massive shoulders, had died from a cut on his leg.He had been our world, and now he was another casualty of the poverty and sickness that plagued Red River.He once told me it was iron in the dirt that made the river run red, but I knew better.It was death that made it bloody.
The scream came from deep inside, where all my bitterness and anger had been hidden for as long as I could remember.I had always felt the Darkness inside me.I hid it from my parents because I wanted to be good and worthy of their love.
The cottage walls trembled around me.Timber creaked in protest, and a loud crack came from the large beam above us.My parents’ bed shook, forcing my mother to emerge from her grief.
I couldn’t see or hear her cries of alarm; all I saw was my father’s lifeless body.A small table and chair lifted into the air and circled the room, hitting each other and crashing into the groaning walls like a tornado had entered the room.My hair whipped against my face as I focused all my senses on the ball of Darkness and power that was building deep inside my chest.It was like a crack had opened something that had been lying in wait for me my whole life.
The rough stone under my cheek was wet with my tears.My arms trembled as I pushed myself into a sitting position and wiped my eyes with my sleeve.
I had brought the ceiling of our cottage down on our heads with the Darkness.My mother had only escaped being crushed by crouching beside the bed where the largest beam fell, pinning my father’s corpse.The same beam caught the back of my head, but my mother had found a way to drag my unconscious body out of the ruins.My head injury was severe enough that she had thought I would die, but the wound knitted itself back together at an astonishing rate.When I awoke and saw the destruction I had caused, I vowed never to lose control of the Darkness again.
Unable to free my father’s body, we’d had to make the house he built for my mother his final resting place.I remembered my mother taking a torch to our cottage and everything we owned – even now, guilt wrapped around my heart like a thorn-covered vine.She might not have insisted we find my people to ask for their help if I had not destroyed our home.We would never have met the man with icy blue eyes if I had not done what I had done.Maybe she would still be alive.
Letting the Darkness out had consequences.
‘Caris?’Cillian’s panicked voice cut through my inner torment.
He appeared around the counter, and his frown softened when he saw me on the floor.I gripped the carved white rabbit my father had turned into a necklace when I had grown too old to play with toys.
Cillian gently reached out, pulling me up under the armpits like a child, and then wrapped his arms around my quivering body.
He buried his face in my hair.‘You smell like lavender and ash.’He stroked my head soothingly, and we stood wrapped in each other’s arms until someone behind us cleared their throat.
I jumped, my heart lurching out of my chest.Had someone come to take me away already?
I was surprised when I twisted to see it was the young soldier from outside.
Cillian hadn’t hurt him.
The soldier was fidgeting nervously with his sword at his waist.
‘What do you want?’Cillian growled, making both me and the soldier flinch.I had never heard Cillian sound so …dangerous.
‘I’m here on behalf of Captain Torgrin to collect Lord Warwick’s sword,’ the young soldier declared uneasily.
The nervous request was unexpected, and I watched Cillian’s face go blank.
I didn’t know whether the soldier was stupid or if he was simply more afraid of not following Captain Torgrin’s command than he was afraid of a Cursed woman.
I moved to retrieve the sword from across the room, and the soldier sprang back with a yelp.
I froze.
Poor man.He really was scared of me.
‘Hellfire.’Cillian snarled and went to fetch the sword.
The soldier took the sword and thrust a bag of coins at Cillian.Then he hurried out of the shop as if the underworld was opening beneath his boots.
Cillian turned to me.‘You must leave.Now.’
Hurt pierced my heart at his words.
‘Don’t look at me like that, Caris!’He pushed his unbound hair back from his forehead with a shaky hand.‘They will come for you, and they will call you Cursed.I have been through this before, and I cannot see another woman I care for die at the hands of frightened men!’
I took in a sharp breath.‘Your wife was like me?’
‘I don’t know if there is anyone like you, Caris, but yes – she could do things.She could heal wounds and make sick people well.’
