Kian frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I put you under a love curse.” She met his gaze. “I know it sounds absurd, but my family comes from a line of peris—beings who can influence emotions. I was trying to help my friend Mel. Except I was really irritated, and I lost focus, and the spell ... hityouinstead.”
Kian blinked. Then laughed. “You’re joking.”
Riya didn’t smile.
“Oh, you’re serious.”
“I am,” she said. “It was an accident, but it’s still on me, and I’m—” she swallowed—“so, so sorry.”
“So, let me get this straight. You’re literally magical? LikeCupid?”
“That’s a bit reductive, but basically.”
“Huh.” He rubbed his neck, considering. Then his face broke into a small crooked smile. “You know, honestly, ifanyoneat school was going to have magic powers, I’d have put money on you.”
Riya felt a weird jolt in her chest at the unexpected compliment. She had braced for rage, or disbelief—she wouldn’t have blamed him for either. Instead, acceptance.
“So what now?” he asked, softer.
“If I don’t find a way to break the curse before the next full moon—the 26th—your feelings will completely take you over and become... permanent.”
For a breath, something in Kian’s face brightened, so fast Riya thought she’d imagined it.
He cleared his throat.
“But, if itfeelsreal to me” he said carefully, “doesn’t that count for something? Curse or no curse?”
“Kian, webarelyspoke before any of this.”
“Does that matter?”
“Feelings don’t just change that drastically overnight.”
“Maybe not for you,” he said wryly.
Riya pressed her fingers to her temples. “Look,” she said, “all I’m here to say is that I’m going to do everything in my power to break the curse, before it’s too late.”
“Do you have any leads?”
“I’m working on it.” That part, at least, was true. She’d begun researching nonstop. Like Amara had said, peri magic wasn’t written down—it was passed down through oral tradition, thanks to some paranoid ancestor who probably thought that was safer, even if it meant losing knowledge. But there had to be something about breaking peri curses, somewhere. Not instructions, maybe, but traces. Clues buried in the margins, half-remembered stories.
“I need to check some books in the library first,” she said. “I’m just waiting for my khala. She’s in Finland right now, and she’s the only one in my family who knows anything about peri magic.” Her jaw tightened. “She... helped me before.”
Kian nodded slowly. “And if that doesn’t work?”
“The only other option is that we’d have to form a genuineconnection that overrides the curse....” His expression was blank. “We’d have to fall in real love, before the next full moon. But that’s obviously impossible.” What even counted asreal love, anyway? Was it a feeling, a choice? Something measurable?
“Ouch. Okay.” Kian deflated. “Guess it’s not that simple, huh.”
The two of them watched, for a moment, as Oppy lazily pawed at a dandelion.
Kian sighed. “There is one teensy additional problem.”
Riya’s eyebrow twitched. “What?”
“Damn, maybe I shouldn’t tell you. You look stressed as hell.”
