Beastie promptly followed Roan, and Abigail sighed, planting her hands on her hips as she surveyed the tavern. There was no way of knowing how long it would take to break this curse, especially if Roan couldn’t remember the conditions of it.
Most curses had a failsafe woven into them, and it was only a matter of time until they figured out what this one’s was, but until then, things might get sparse.
While there was no way of knowing how long it would take them to break this particular curse, she had heard of curses that lasted years. And if they couldn’t leave the tavern, she and Roan would have to become self-sufficient.
She made her way to the kitchen and reached for the back door carefully. She didn’t want to bounce off a barrier the way Roan had. But as she carefully opened the door,she was delighted to find that she was able to step through it into the back garden.
While they hadn’t used it for much, it wouldn’t be hard for her to plant a couple more things, in case the curse lasted longer than she wanted.
Not that there was too much time left in the short growing season of the Northlands…but anything would be better than nothing.
Abigail took a deep breath of the fresh air and turned to enter the tavern in search of seeds, but stopped when a ball was thrown over the back fence.
She made her way over to throw it back, picking it up and hefting it in her hands.
It looked familiar.
Too familiar.
It looked exactly like the homemade ball made of fabric scraps that had been thrown over the back wall a few days ago. She remembered it because Beastie had brought it to her, shredded into many pieces.
But how could that be?
The only way the same ball could have appeared was if whoever had cast the spell was dabbling in much stronger magic than they ought to, and an involuntary shiver raced down her spine at the thought.
Surely they hadn’t been sent back in time. Was that even possible without using dark magic?
But it fit with everything else she knew about this curse.
Abigail left the ball where it was. Beastie would find it later and destroy it just as she had the first time, and hopefully Roan would remember what had happened before the time ran out on this curse.
She didn’t want to think what it meant if he didn’t.
Chapter three
Roan
Roanpacedbackandforth in his office, struggling to remember anything past the moment when the man had pointed the wand at him. He hadn’t thought magic was real until today, but now it was plain to see.
Not only was it real, it was dangerous.
What had happened, and how was he going to break the curse that held him trapped in his tavern?
What was he going to do if the doors never opened again?
Would he and Abigail die of starvation?
What would happen to the sleeping men in the tavern? Would they wither away in front of him? Would he be forced to watch as the few people he knew and liked, thefew people who didn’t hate him, remained forever trapped in a sleeping curse?
He fought the urge to retch as Beastie flopped into the corner and watched him silently, no longer putting in the effort to try to keep up with him.
Would she be able to go into the back garden, or would he end up with a pile of dog excrement in the corner of his office?
He should have checked if they could get into the garden or not. Maybe he could scale the fence and get out that way.
Or maybe this was all a bad dream, and he would wake up soon.
That made much more sense than a ruffian with a magical stick attacking him in his own tavern.
