A Familiar Face
It took several splashes of cold water on my face to clear my head enough to start back. On the way, I tried to chase away thoughts the freezing water hadn’t dismissed. But nothing in the world could cure what I was feeling now. I was desperate to act normal, as though my entire being hadn’t just been stripped away and twisted into something I didn’t recognize.
Who was this girl who became weak-kneed? This princess who swooned in the arms of a man? This weakling who gave in to Lust?
I’d never thought I would bend to Lust’s will so easily, submitting to petty emotions like jealousy, which the Legion taught so severely to evade. It disgusted me that I couldn’t touch him without feeling a ripple of pleasure and dizziness shoot through me. And worst of all, I had stood there ready to give in to a kiss off the battlefield. A kiss I’d vowed never to trouble myself with until I was sent to Freida.
It was painfully apparent that one glance from Zach was more exciting to me than any Kiss I’d ever shared with another prince.
The truth of it all made me want to roll into a ball, cowering on the forest floor until winter came and snow hid me from the rest of the world.
More disgraceful still, I was disappointed. Disappointed Zach had not followed through with his kiss. Why had he backed away? Did he somehow believe I would lure magic from him if we tried? He needn’t have worried. I hadn’t been able to summon normal words—let alone a spell.
Shame burned through a wall in my stomach. How could I even call myself a princess of the Legion?
“Milady!”
Bromley jogged toward me, concern etched on his features. I wondered how long I had been washing my face.
“Sorry,” I responded on reflex. Zach was already on his horse, his face turned away, careful not to look me in the eye. “I—got a little lost.”
Bromley didn’t question it, but his pursed lips showed he didn’t buy the obvious lie. I was just glad he kept quiet. I had nothing left in me to lie again.
…
The village to the north of the woods was much larger than the other village we’d passed through, but quieter.
The houses and shops of the village were made of beautiful sanded wood, a testament to their trade and the surrounding forest. In the middle of the square was a handsome old cobblestone well. To the north was a large structure with many windows and painted accents of red, green, and blue. It was either the Town Hall or perhaps a tavern that served as the general meeting area for the residents. Spanning to the east and west were shops with colorful wooden signs and houses lined up neatly, each with little spice gardens or some kind of vegetable patch.
“It’s quiet,” Zach commented, winding the reins of his steed in one hand and scanning the surroundings.
“It’s barely dusk. Someone should be out and about, right?” Brom said.
I nodded. “I don’t even hear any animals.” Then it came to me. Yana had said they’d avoided a village under a curse. With my mind on…other things, I had completely forgotten.
My Sense was vacant in the face of a witch’s curse—only a slight feeling of nausea—so I had no clue what kind of curse we were up against.
A door opened across the square, and a small child emerged then quickly shut the door behind her. Gathering her skirts, she scampered down the house’s little path and into the spice garden out front. She fell to her knees and started rooting through the garden with speed, almost in a panic.
I let go of Lorena’s reins and hurried toward her. Not wanting to frighten her, I slowed about twenty paces away. “Hello? Little miss?”
The child looked up, clutching a bundle of weeds to her chest. Her face was smeared with either dirt or soot, and her fair hair was bundled up in a bun, like mine. Her eyes were wide with fright, and I felt guilty for scaring her. “I won’t hurt you,” I said, holding out my hands.
Zach came up behind me, but I remained focused on the little girl. “I just want to know if we can help.”
The girl’s bottom lip trembled, yet she kept quiet.
“Can you tell me what’s wrong?”
Her large eyes darted from me to Zach.
“Why is this place so quiet?” I tried again.
The girl dug her hands in the earth, pulled out some roots, and then bolted back inside, stumbling on the way, then latched the door.
“A curse,” Zach said softly.
“The one Yana mentioned,” I agreed.
Zach and I looked at each other, our eyes meeting for the first time since that moment in the woods. We both had the same thought: what curse was it?
He nodded to the central structure. “Shall we?”
As our little party approached, I admired its architecture. The darkest, richest wood of the oldest trees had been used for the building. It was impressive for a town almost a week’s journey from regular trade routes. Beautifully carved designs decorated the outer edges of the windows and doors. Above the large oak double doors hung a sign that read Pelken’s Town Tavern.
I balled my fists in preparation for what lay beyond those doors.
Zach rapped his knuckles on the wood, and the sound echoed into the empty square. We waited. There was nothing. He glanced at me then knocked again, harder.
Before his fourth knock, the door opened, and a woman with dark hair and sunken eyes glowered at us from behind a crack. “I heard yeh the first time,” she snapped in her heavy northern accent. “Yeh think it’s easy to drop what I’m doing to answer a blasted knock? Come in ’ere yehselves if yeh’ve got a death wish.”
Zach lowered his hand awkwardly. “I’m sorry, we didn’t mean—”
“What’s going on here?” I interrupted.
The woman opened the door all the way to reveal a slightly swollen belly. “Travelers. Far south?”
Her pregnant belly made me pause, but I quickly answered, “As far as the Crown City.”
Her sharp eyes darted to my cloak, and seeing the Legion crest, instantly her persona changed. She brought a hand to her stomach and leaned against the doorframe. “Blessed Mounts of Wu-Hyll, yeh’re from the castle?”
By the wind wisps. I should’ve thought this through. Now this woman was eyeing me with a look I had seen many times, a look I usually reveled in—one of hope. She hoped we were Royals able to lift the curse on their village with a Kiss.
There were at least two problems with this: one, we didn’t have long until the dragon hatched, and two, even if we took the time to investigate what kind of curse it was, and what kind of Kiss was required, Zach would refuse.
Still, I couldn’t lie to this woman and watch the hope shatter in her eyes.
“Yes.” I straightened. “My name is Ivy Myriana, a princess of the Royal Legion. This is my page, Bromley, and my partner, Prince Zachariah. Please, tell us what’s happened here.”
The woman beckoned us inside, sniffing and fighting back tears. “Thank the sacred wisps.” She wiped at a stray tear. “Princess, we’re under a curse. People are fallin’ ill every day. Practically everyone is infected. It’s been so long since a Royal from the Legion came this far, I hadn’t dared hope. She’s been a blessing to us, o’ course, but she’s no Royal—”
“I’m sorry,” I interrupted as Zach, Brom, and I stepped into the cavernous hall. “She? Who’s she?”
Before the woman could answer, a voice from above rang through the hall.
“Look who decided to show up.”
The entrance hall was sectioned off into an east and west wing, but north of the hall was a winding staircase, the top floor cut off from view by large wooden beams crisscrossing over the high ceiling.
Together, Zach and I stepped to the foot of the stairs and looked up.
Leaning over the rail, black hair curling down and deep azure robe rolled at the sleeves, was the female mage.
Chapter
Twenty-One
The Curse of Venera