The cold water trickled down my throat and eased the pain ever so slightly.
“Thanks,” I croaked as he pulled it away, and I glanced back toward Grimsworn. “What kind of curse?” My words were barely a whisper, but he heard me.
His eyes darkened as he leaned back and crossed his arms. “It’s a dark magic curse, and a rather nasty strain of it.”
I flinched.
“It’s designed to kill you slowly,” he continued, “to eat away at your magical essence and then your life essence until there’s nothing left to devour.”
Nebula growled lowly in a way I’d never heard him do before—he was pissed.
“Can you break it or not, Grimsworn?” Dad snarled in his direction from the doorway.
It was only then that I realized we were in my old room at Dad’s manor. My mates, Nebula, Dad, Jenni, and Grimsworn were in here with me.
How long had I been asleep?
“It’s breakable, yes, but…there’s acomplication.”
“What complication?” Hunter shouted at him, raking a hand through his messy dark blond locks.
The silence stretched as Grimsworn hesitated, his gaze sweeping toward each of my mates and back to me.
My heart thudded weakly. Each beat sent a ripple of pain through my ribs. “What complication?”
He leaned forward again. “You have unbonded mates, Pandora. Breaking this curse would shatter your soul without those matebonds in place to stabilize your essence. If I broke it now, it might even shatter the souls that are attached to yours.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Skel croaked, his green eyes meeting mine with worry.
The cold ache curled tighter around my chest. Each breath felt fragile, like the shallow flutter of a hummingbird’s wings.
It felt like I really was dying.
“Breathe,” Nebula instructed in a pained tone. “I know it hurts, but you have to breathe through it.”
I barely had the strength to breathe.
Grimsworn’s expression softened. “Your magic—your magical essence, rather—it’s intricate, and it’s tied to those you’ve been fated with. Surely you’ve seen this?”
I nodded, flicking my gaze to Dad briefly. As soul eaters, we could manipulate that magical essence…but Grimsworn didn’t need to know that.
“The matebonds aren’t just romantic, fairy-tale bonds; they’re tethered to the very fabric of your soul. Imagine a delicate web. Each strandliterallyconnects your spirit to theirs. Without those connections being fully established, breaking a curse of this nature would leave fractures—holes—in your very soul. I don’t know if you’d recover, and I don’t know if those holes would be big or small. A big enough hole would destroy your soul—and thus, your life.”
“Impossible,” Reed muttered brokenly.
“He’s right,” Nebula confirmed the warlock’s words. “Dark magic decays souls. Mine must be decaying now. Dark magic can even destroy established matebonds. The only chance you have for Grimsworn to break your curse is to bond your remaining mates, Pandora.”
“Essentially…” Grimsworn thinned his lips into a line. “If I break the dark magic curse now, youandyour bonded mates could perish. If we do nothing, you surely perish. If you bond your remaining unbonded mates, then have me break the curse, you actually have a fighting chance.”
I tried to grasp the concept, tried to wrap my mind around marking and bonding Bram and Dex instead of letting it happen naturally. “So…my two remaining mates need to mark me?”
“Yes,” Grimsworn confirmed.
Dex and Bram flinched and glanced down at their feet while Dad glowered at Grimsworn.
“Stop glaring at me, Death. I know what I’m talking about.” Grimsworn rolled his eyes before focusing on me again. “Once they mark you, their souls will bind to yours. It will create a web of your souls that will be strong enough to sustain the backlash of breaking this curse. But without those bonds…” he trailed off. “You have little chance of making it out of this unscathed—or alive, really.”
“You’re the strongest wizard in Kalista, and you can’t break this curse as she is?” Dad asked condescendingly with his brows drawn together.
