Chapter 28
The more a sorcerer tries to detach himself, the more his magic remembers what he seeks to escape… and that is when he discovers his only true limit.
ARAWN
My magic betrayed me, slipping, rebellious, as if I were no more than a novice, playing at being a sorcerer for the first time.
Worse still, I could no longer maintain my protective barrier.
And then, there was that splinter, lodged deep in my chest. Not physical, of course, otherwise I would have ripped it out long ago.
No, this one was more insidious, buried in my being, twisting every time I looked at her.
Her. Lempicka.
Each time she crossed my path, the splinter drove deeper.
I oscillated between the urge to banish her forever from my domain and the desire to cage her for eternity—make her mine, only mine—no matter the misery it would bring her.
My humanity and my monstrosity fought a brutal war for her, leaving me raw, broken, furious.
I clenched my fists. I had already ignored my emotions once. I could do it again. Surely, if I unleashed enough destruction, burned a village, ravaged a kingdom, I could smother these unwanted feelings and become myself once more.
I snapped another grimoire shut, exhaling between clenched fangs.
Still no answers. Nothing in the library explained why my magic faltered, or why this damned storm refused to subside.
Only a few days remained before the winter harvest—my moment to remind the world I was terror, a monster. I could not fail.
A tiny glowing silhouette sliced through the air, crackling, soaked and burning with furious brown. “Where is Aignan? Let him go or I’ll—”
“I ate him,” I replied flatly.
“That’s not funny!” Yeun flared crimson, darting at me.
“I told him to leave.” I sighed. “In exchange for sparing his pitiful life, I let him tear my lair apart and escape with yet another basket of silk. He didn’t even bargain. Pathetic.”
Yeun dropped onto one of the countless piles of books, dimming back to blue. “This place is a disaster. And you must stop this storm. Do you know that Miss Lempicka picked apples under this downpour? She’s going to make herself sick!”
I slammed another book shut with such violence that pages tore free and rained around me. Outside, the storm raged harder. The windowpanes rattled in their frames.
“You’re creating a tornado, Master. You need to calm down.”
“If I knew how to stop it, Yeun, don’t you think I would have already?” I growled, my voice low and edged. “Is she ill?”
“She’s stronger than you,” Yeun retorted, shaking a tiny heart-shaped pastry.
“Lempicka baked this for me. Isn’t that sweet?
She won’t stop cooking, probably trying to distract herself from…
all this.” His flames gestured toward the storm outside before narrowing at me with a grimace.
“You look awful. Have you even showered these last few days?”
I shot him a murderous look. I had never appeared so disheveled.
The ribbons of my shirt hung loose, long past caring about being tied.
My hair, nearly brushing my shoulders, grew wild and unkempt.
I hadn’t even bothered to saw down my cursed horns.
I didn’t care. The more hideous I was, the easier it was to avoid Lempicka—my pride could not bear for her to see me like this.
“You know, your magic is bound to you, and therefore to your emotions,” Yeun said. “The more you ignore them, the more everything collapses.”
“Ridiculous,” I snarled, though my black claws tightened.
“Magic doesn’t care about logic. It comes from the soul. And yours, sir, is having the worst tantrum I’ve ever seen.”
For a moment, I considered throwing the little will-o’-the-wisp out the window. But Yeun was right. Or rather, he was saying aloud what I had been denying while devouring every book in this cursed library. The truth was a cruel, immovable shard. My magic faltered because of her.
I exhaled slowly, resigned to admit it. “My mind is made up. I don’t see why my magic is collapsing.”
Yeun smiled. I skewered him with a glare.
“What the hell are you smiling at?”
“You’re terrified,” Yeun said, inching closer.
Terrified? Me? The notion was absurd.
“Impossible,” I scoffed. “I fear neither death, nor anything else.”
“Not death, no,” Yeun conceded, unflinching before the venom in my tone. “But you’re afraid of losing your humanity. You cling to it, whether you admit it or not.”
I opened my mouth to retort, but Yeun darted forward, silencing me.
His flame flickered violet. “And now that you’ve tasted what it means to have a reason to live, to actually be alive after centuries of emptiness…
you’re afraid of losing it all. Of losing her.
And you can’t admit it. I felt the same when I lost the last member of my family.
He was my best friend. Every day, I prayed he would come back… I still do.”
“You don’t think he’s probably dead, after all this time?” I asked, bored.
“You really have no empathy. Not even for the dead.”
I swallowed stiffly. “Sorry.”
Yeun burst into laughter. “That’s the first time I’ve ever heard you apologize.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
The weight of his words settled between us. Outside, the rain ceased, though the mist remained, thick and unyielding. I lowered my gaze to my black claws, inhuman, a reminder of what I was. Darkness crept further, dark violet veins crawling now up my neck.
I flexed my fingers. No more gloves to hide the truth. If I wanted my magic back, I had to face it—face my fears, my weaknesses—and annihilate them once and for all.
“You’re right, Yeun,” I finally muttered.
Yeun nearly lost his flame with excitement. “I’m so glad you admitted it!”
I cut him a look sharp enough to cleave steel.
“Don’t celebrate too soon. I won’t change my mind.
” I slumped against the floor, a thin dry bitter smile, pulling at my lips.
“Absurd, isn’t it? To finally understand the worth of being human, just when I must renounce the only dream I’ve ever had. In my dreams, it’s not so terrible.”
“When you close your eyes… you see her, don’t you?”
I didn’t even bother denying it. Instead, I simply nodded.
Yes, I was afraid. Terribly afraid.
Afraid that once fully Cursed, she would be erased from my hearts.
But if that happened, she would seduce me all over again so easily. I would know her. Anywhere. Anytime.
“For the first time, both my hearts agree on something. At first, I wanted an end. For Zelda. For me. But now…” A dry laugh escaped me.
“Now it drives me mad how much I care for her. How much I want to stay alive. For her.” I inhaled slowly, exhaled, my shoulders sinking.
“But I must do it for another reason. One far more important than simply ending this.”
“To protect her?” Yeun had shifted to his human form, stretching out on the floor beside me.
“I thought what I felt was just the bond between a confectioner and a sorcerer. Because, in theory, I’m incapable of feeling anything on my own.”
Yeun tilted his head, amusement glimmering in his butterfly-like eyes. “Is that why you keep slipping away to the human world? You’re plotting something, aren’t you?”
I allowed myself a true smile at last. Sharp, resolute, with a touch of cruelty (aimed only at myself).
“At last, Yeun. I have a purpose.”
I would protect her.
Even if it meant protecting her from me.
Even if it meant losing her.
Even if it meant renouncing the fragile thread of humanity I had barely begun to hope for.
I rose in a single movement. “I will face her.”
“Face her? Who? Miss Lempicka?” Yeun gaped.
“Who would have thought she would be my most formidable adversary? She’ll hate me when I tell her the truth. But honestly, that might not be the worst thing.”
Yeun choked, clutching his collar as though he had swallowed wrong. “You are the strangest being I have ever met, sir. It’s almost as if you enjoy your own misery.”
A dry laugh slipped past my lips. “Perhaps I do. After all, I don’t deserve her love. The least I can do is make sure my selfishness doesn’t destroy her.”
“And how do you intend to do that?”
“She must know about Nyla.”