She felt outside of her body really, like she was looking down at herself in Oskaren’s arms. Maybe she was a ghost, and her unfinished business was Oskaren, because all she wanted with whatever shred of soul she had left was to take the girl’s pain away.
There was a strange glow over Oskaren’s chest, a barrier of dark blue laced with silver lightning. The curse. Thia didn’t know how she was certain.
A benefit of being dead maybe.
And behind that glittering barrier was Oskaren, in her true essence. Thia wanted to free her. She reached a phantom hand to that blue wall.
The Oskaren that held her, the flesh and blood girl, yelled like she was on fire. Her pupils dilated, contracted, then dilated again. She gathered Thia’s body tighter to her chest, shuddering a pained sob. Her tears fell harder, and she kept screaming, while Dess and Thran observed, helplessly.
Her mouth was forming words. Thia could just make them out; she wasn’t sure if it was with her real ears, or her spectral form. “Don’t leave me,” Oskaren was saying. “Don’t leave me.” Trembling and shaking, she pressed her lips to Thia’s.
At the touch, soft and fragile, Thia returned to her body. She examined Oskaren from below, just in time for the girl to pull back with a cry, as though the kiss had burned. The barrier was still visible, but it was between them now, and Thia reached out a real hand to it. Her fingers passed through, and though her bones felt scrubbed raw, she lifted her arm further, fully beyond the barrier with agonizing slowness, and placed her palm on the girl’s scarred cheek. “Oskaren,” she croaked.
The girl’s face lifted, almost fearfully. The barrier surrounded them now, shifting and growing as it tried to encapsulate Oskaren’s entire body. But Thia could feel the real girl within, and she would not give up. She raised her other hand, shoulder screaming in agony, and clutched Oskaren’s face so that she was compelled to meet Thia’s gaze.
“Ren,” she said, more forcefully.
The girl’s eyes blazed.
Using every last ounce of her strength, Thia pulled Oskaren down to meet her, and kissed her back.
Oskaren gasped against Thia’s mouth. She tasted of salt and blood—Thia didn’t know whose—but the barrier was weakening. She could feel it, the shreds of lightning dimming, the blue wavering, flickering in and out.
Her hands tangled in Oskaren’s hair, and the girl shuddered against her, cursed and uncursed selves at war. She bit Thia’s lip; Thia cried out, but did not let go. Then, suddenly, a wave of heat exploded from Oskaren’s chest. It seared everything in its path, the barrier, Thia’s hands, her skin. But she clung on, her lips unrelenting as her body became an unbearable blend of fire and ice.
Then there was nothing but Oskaren. The girl was still cradling her, gently now, foreheads pressed together, crying her name.Thia.
The barrier was gone. The curse was over.
Oskaren was free.
Thia couldn’t have said how she knew, but she knew it was true with the same certainty with which she’d known that the strange barrier was the curse itself.
“Ren,” she said, letting her hands fall, too exhausted to continue holding the other girl.
“Thia,” Oskaren said, the word a ragged sob. “It’s gone.”
Dess appeared in Thia’s view; he crouched beside her, his cheeks damp. He slipped a hand into hers. “I thought you were dead.”
She squeezed his fingers—or tried to. She was so weak. “I thought I was dead too.” She focused on Oskaren, on her dark eyes that were big and wide and childlike. “We broke the curse.”
Dess stared between them. “Ren.” His gaze roved his sister’s tears, the fragile curl of her shoulders. “Is it—is it true?”
She nodded. “Yes.” When he continued to seem aghast, her voice turned hesitant. “Dessfar. It’s me. It’s over.” She held out her arm.
He waited one more second, and Oskaren’s chest shuddered. Then he launched himself at her. Still in the girl’s lap, the embrace nearly crushed Thia. But she didn’t mind, not as Oskaren hugged him back, clasping the back of his head like he was still a little boy, not as she heard him say, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” into her shirt. When they pulled away, they were both crying afresh.
“Thran,” Thia said, wanting to see the older man. He crouched as well, his weathered face haggard. “You killed her.” With her free hand, Thia reached for his, and he took it, enclosing her small one in his large one. “You did it.”
His voice was gruff, but all he said was, “I said I’d see you home, lass.” There was something tucked under his arm—Mavrel, alive, but nursing a broken wing.
Dess let out a wild laugh. “We’re alive. All bloody five of us.”
They were. Thia wanted to weep, with joy, with relief, with hope. They had killed Xercae. She could go home. Dess could have his memories back. Thran could start his school. Oskaren was free.
Oskaren was free.
“Can you stand?” Dess asked her.
