That was what it felt like without my magic. My other half.
Alone.
And I didn’t let anyone see this side of me.
“See you like what?” He was refusing to do as I asked. “Hurt? Scared? Weallfeel those things.” He shook his head in disbelief. “Is that what you think? That something is wrong with you?”
I didn’t respond. I simply glared at him, biting back the words I couldn’t say.
Strong emotions like this made me unstable. They made me dangerous. And when I couldn’t control them, they became my weakness. My magic may have healed my injuries over the years, but the bruises and scars still lined my body beneath the surface. The sting of rejection still pierced my skin.
And the proof of that was forever branded onhisskin now too.
He ran his tongue along his lower lip before straightening his shoulders. “I’ll leave you alone, if that’s what you want. But there’s nothing wrong with whatever it is you’re feeling, Clarissa. Everyone has moments that are hard to face, even the strongest of us.” He brandished a hand toward me at the last part.
I let out a scoff. “None of this would be happening if I wasstrongenough.”
“You can’t honestly believe that.” When I stayed silent, he raised his voice in irritation. “I don’t know what’s happened to youto make you think you’re not ‘enough’ of anything. I barely know you, and I can already see how you’ve givenallof yourself, not only to your own people, but to a kingdom you’ve spent barely a few days in. A lesser person wouldn’t evenconsiderdoing what you’re doing. You’re strong for everybody else in your life, Clarissa Aris.” He was only a foot away from me, his jaw tight as a tendril of dark hair escaped from its strap and drifted down the side of his face. His breath was hot on my nose and cheeks, but his next words left me cold.
“Who is strong foryou?”
I blinked up at him, my shoulders sagging as he took a step back. Then he pivoted on his heel and walked toward his horse, a slight limp still in his gait.
My eyes closed. I told myself I’d gotten what I wanted. To be left alone in the aftermath of this horrid day.
I wouldn’t let myself be weak. I wouldn’t let myself be helpless. Not in front of the rest of them, anyway. But right now…right now, I could let myself feel.
I sank to the ground and let the tears come.
25
Clarissa
“Alright, now tell me whatactuallyhappened to you,” my mother said the second the door to our suite in Silenus Manor shut.
I sighed and dropped into a cushioned chair. When I finally left the solace of the trees, I found her, Vespera, and Thorne in the village, working on damage control and getting the citizens settled again. I borrowed a cloak from a kind farmer and fed them some story about tracking down the starting point of the blight and getting caught in a bramblebush, then stayed silent the entire ride home.
She gestured to my torn dress and Thorne’s bloodied shirt. “You’re a mess, sweetheart?—”
“Gee, thanks, Mother.”
“—and the rumors from the farmers…is it true?” She scanned me from head to toe, coming closer to put a hand on my shoulder. “Did you shift?”
I paused, then nodded.
Her slight intake of breath was the only sign of surprise. “How?”
“Thorne and I got stuck near the edge of the blight.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. Fates, I forgot she didn’t know about thecurse. I hadn’t had time to tell her everything I’d learned the night before. I didn’t even know where to start.
I leaned back in the chair. “You may want to sit down. This could take a while.”
I spent the next quarter of an hour telling her of my conversation with Thorne last night, how we’d stumbled on the hedge in the back gardens that had rotted, and I pressed him for the truth. How I’d confronted Galen and learned the Fates had cursed his ancestors, and a marriage alliance with the Veridian Empire was the only way to break it. How his curse had grown and was affecting the entire kingdom.
“There’s been magic in Mysthelm all this time,” I said. “It’s just been confined to the Grimaldi line. And when the rot touched me, the magic of the curse sort of…funneled into me, I guess. I got my magic back, stronger than ever before. Thorne said the field and hill came back to life, too, like me siphoning up that power cured the rot. It—it took away the curse.”
“And your magic is truly back?”
I forced my features not to fall. “Not anymore. I don’t think it’s permanent.”
