Chapter 13 #2
“I know you better than anyone, Cassian!” she yelled, gripping the desk behind her like it could stop her from slipping out of sanity. “You thought you were being so generous pretending I was a co-owner, but that meant nothing. It’s supposed to be mine.”
“Don’t you see what you’ve done? I’m sorry the inn didn’t go to you, but now you’ve lost me too. And my parents!” I said.
Her eyes widened, spilling tears down her face.
“I—I’m sorry, Cassian. Don’t—” She ran to me, and I stepped back.
Sterling stepped between us, but she shoved him aside to cling to the front of my shirt, falling to her knees.
“I’ll take the curse away. I’ll take it back. I’m sorry. We can work it out.”
Sterling pulled her off me. “That’s enough, Jasmine,” he said, reaching for his shackles.
Jasmine struggled to get out of his grip, but he was stronger. “No! Let me go!” When she spotted the shackles in his hand, she shrieked and let out a blast of magic that sent both Sterling and me across the room.
My back hit the wall hard enough to knock the wind out of me. Sterling crumpled onto a sitting room chair on the other side of the room. I scrambled up to reach him, still out of breath. “Sterling!” I coughed, struggling to inhale. “Are you okay?” I asked, finally taking a sharp breath in.
Sterling groaned. “Don’t let her get away,” he muttered.
Jasmine hadn’t gone anywhere, watching us with huge, crazy eyes. I’d never seen her like this before.
“Jasmine…” I said, standing slowly and lifting my hands.
“Don’t move!” Jasmine pointed at me as if her finger were a weapon, and then she pointed at Sterling. “If either of you comes any closer, I’ll make Sterling forget about you.”
I didn’t dare move. That was a kind of pain I didn’t want to experience.
“You can’t do that,” Sterling said in a hoarse voice. “You’re not a trained witch.”
I turned to shoot him a pleading look, shaking my head. Her lack of training wouldn’t stop her from trying. Whatever she cast would be worse than the real spell. He could forget a lot more than just me.
“I-I mean—” Sterling stammered.
“Isreme Cassian Fibbersnap!” Jasmine yelled, flicking her finger at him. A white blast of electric magic shot forward.
I jumped in front of him to absorb the blast while holding a single word in my mind. I only had to remember to say it. As the spell hit my body, I began to forget why that word was so important. I was forgetting where I was and who I was, but I knew one thing. I knew to say, “Efle!”
The white blast of energy flowed from my palms toward Jasmine, hitting her in the chest. She staggered back, landing on her butt while blinking hard.
I watched in horror as my memory returned, and I fully understood what I had done. I deflected the spell back at her. Jasmine wouldn’t remember me.
Maybe she had cast it wrong. Maybe she wouldn’t forget. But deep down I knew that the way I had forgotten myself meant my cousin was gone.
“Jasmine?” I asked, voice shaking.
Jasmine looked around the room like she could not understand it. Her confused eyes finally found me. For a moment, I thought she remembered me, but then she said, “H-how do you know my name?”
Jasmine had forgotten me.
STERLING
“Jasmine, it’s me! I’m your cousin, Cassian!” Cassian pleaded with her, crouched at her side while holding her shoulders. Her fear remained, but now it was directed at the stranger shaking her and insisting she knew him.
“I don’t have a cousin,” Jasmine said.
“Jasmine, please!” Cassian cried.
I pried my aching body off the wooden chair to stand. I felt for Cassian, but a selfish part of me was grateful it wasn’t me who had forgotten him.
“Sterling, help me!” Jasmine said, watching me over Cassian’s shoulder. “This man is crazy!”
“You remember Sterling?!” Cassian asked.
I crouched to their level, frowning at Jasmine. I didn’t know what to say. “He is your cousin, Jasmine. You shot a spell at me to forget him, but he deflected it back at you.”
“W-what? No… I don’t have any cousins,” Jasmine said.
Tears streamed down Cassian’s face, but he stopped pleading with her.
“Where do you think you’ve been for the last two months, Jasmine?” I asked, wondering how her mind would fold around Cassian when she had spent all that time resenting him and living in his home.
“Taking care of my grandfather’s inn while my aunt and uncle searched for buyers,” she said.
“Why was I there?” I asked.
“To figure out who cursed it,” she said.
“Why did you curse it if not to get back at your cousin?” I asked.
She shook her head, tears falling down her face. “Sterling, you’re scaring me. I don’t know this man.”
“Then why did you do it?” I asked.
“I didn’t—how did—?”
“Why are you in Ladiall right now? How did you get here?” I asked.
“To—to—” She stared at Cassian like she was fighting to remember him. “I don’t know.”
“You came here with me, Jasmine,” Cassian cried. He sniffled and wiped his tears on his sleeve. “Why did you curse the inn?”
“Because Grandpa didn’t leave it to me, and I was jealous,” she said.
“Because he left it to me,” Cassian said.
Jasmine shook her head rapidly. “This isn’t funny. I don’t know you.”
I took Jasmine’s hand and helped her up. “You just confessed to the crime, so I have to take you in,” I said, slapping the shackles onto her wrists before she exploded again.
“Wait—I didn’t—” she stammered, and then she stopped. “I’m sorry.”
“Who are you apologizing to?” I asked, leading her into the sunny street outside.
“I… don’t know.” It was like Cassian was still in her mind somewhere, but she couldn’t access those memories.
I brought Jasmine straight to Commander Decker’s office with Cassian following close behind.
“Thorndrop. You found her,” Decker said, standing from her desk chair when we entered.
“She confessed to the crime, but she can’t remember Mr. Fibbersnap due to a spell,” I explained.
Decker rounded her desk to approach us quickly, eyeing each of us individually. “Who cast the spell?”
“She did, but Mr. Fibbersnap deflected it,” I said.
Decker examined them each harshly. “The two of you are mages?” she asked.
“That’s not against the law,” Cassian said, stepping up beside me.
“No, Mr. Fibbersnap, but it is suspicious. I’ll have to take you both in for questioning. A mind-altering spell cast without consent is a serious offense, and your deflection of it falls under that realm.”
I stepped between Cassian and Decker. “He did it out of self-defense. I witnessed everything. He’s innocent.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You are involved with him, aren’t you, Thorndrop?”
I didn’t know what to say, but lying didn’t feel right.
“I’m afraid I can’t return you to your position as an investigator knowing you’ve had relations with an involved party on a case. You can either break it off or you’re fired, Thorndrop. Completely. Even from patrol,” Commander Decker said.
I turned to Cassian, who watched me with a lowered gaze, like he couldn’t look directly at me. I didn’t want to quit the Force, but Decker had backed me into a corner. This job gave my life meaning where there was none before, because I could spend my days helping people.
But I could live without this job. I couldn’t live without Cassian.
I pulled off my borrowed Force jacket and handed it to Commander Decker. “Then fire me.”
Her mouth fell open. Clearly, she hadn’t expected that.
“Sterling, you’re just going to leave me here?” Jasmine asked, still shackled by Commander Decker’s desk. “I need your help.”
“My job was to catch you, not help you,” I said.
Cassian stepped forward. “You really don’t remember me, Jaz? At all?” he asked.
She frowned, inspecting him carefully. “I don’t know you, but your face makes me angry for some reason. Maybe I do remember.”
“Angry…?” His heartbreak flooded his expression, but he didn’t wait for her answer. He ducked his head and turned to leave the room, cloak swishing behind him.
“Goodbye, Jasmine,” I said, nodding at her. “Ms. Decker.” It felt good not to call her my commander.
“Sterling, get back here! You can’t quit!” Decker shouted after me.
I did not turn around. Cassian was my biggest concern.
I found him on the footpath outside, facing the building with his face in his hands. His shoulders shook, and his stifled sobs told me he’d be crying a lot harder if he weren’t in public.
“Cassian,” I said, placing my hand on his back.
He turned around to collapse onto me, fully sobbing against my chest. “Sterling,” he cried, squeezing me tight. “Sh-she hates m-me…” He sobbed harder than before. “I j-just wanted to help her. I w-wanted her to be happy.”
“I know,” I said, petting his head as I held him. I wanted to absorb all of his pain. The sorrow in his voice broke my heart. This betrayal would stick with him for a long time. Possibly forever.
I let him cry on me until he couldn’t cry anymore.
When he peeled himself away, he brushed my damp shirt like he could dry it with his hand. “I’m sorry,” he said in a congested voice. “Your shirt is soaked.”
“You have nothing to apologize for,” I said, taking his face in my hands and planting a kiss on his forehead.
“I’m just grateful I get to be here for you.
And I’m grateful I remember you. You made a huge sacrifice for me, and I’m sorry it hurts, but gods…
That brief second I thought I might forget you… I’ve never been so scared in my life.”
Cassian smiled through his tears. “For you, I’d do it again.”
I don’t know if he understood how much that meant to me.
“I’m sorry you had to quit the Force. I know you loved that job,” Cassian said.
I sighed and pulled him into another embrace, resting my chin on his shoulder. Working in the Force had given my life meaning, but now, my life had a new meaning. Cassian was everything to me. “For you, I’d do it again.”
Cassian squeezed me tight, burrowing his face in the crook of my neck. Maybe he did understand.
We stopped at the marketplace on the way home to purchase supplies to make him a dinner of honey-baked potatoes and roasted chicken, drizzled with a raspberry sauce.
He had a sweet tooth, and it was the sweetest meal I could think up.
I prepared him strawberry tea with honey to go with his meal, which he picked out.
I wanted to make the evening as nice as possible to make up for the terrible day, but there wasn’t much that could ease this kind of pain.
He still cried himself to sleep in my arms.
In the morning, I suggested we visit Gertrude after our coffee and tea. Cassian was very excited at the idea and dragged me out the door the moment I finished my drink.
“Cassian! I was just preparing to visit you!” Gertrude said when she opened the door, pulling him into a hug. “Please tell me you’re back to finish your training.”
Cassian laughed beneath the hug. “Sorry, I’m just here to visit.”
“Pity,” she said as she released him. Her eyes landed on me. “Oh. Hello, Officer.”
“He’s not an officer. He quit the Force to be with me. Isn’t that sweet?” Cassian shined his bright smile right at me, and I knew I made the right decision.
Gertrude raised an eyebrow. “They didn’t like that your boyfriend was a witch?”
“Oh, yes. They loved it,” I said.
Her harsh frown turned into a smile, and she stepped aside. “Come in.”
Cassian and Gertrude spent a while catching up. Cassian tried to bring me into the conversation occasionally, which I appreciated, but it always wandered back to unfamiliar topics. I didn’t mind. I was just grateful to be beside Cassian.
When they inevitably reached the reason for Cassian’s visit to Ladiall, he broke into tears. He explained everything that had happened with Jasmine, and Gertrude just listened. I rested my hand on his back, trying to support him however I could.
“I’m so sorry, Cassian,” Gertrude said when he finished. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Cassian began wiping his tears away, but I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket to dab his tears, afraid he would get a rash from how much he rubbed his rough sleeve over his beautiful face. It was more intimate than I expected, but he seemed grateful.
“Do you know how to locate the rune stones?” Cassian asked Gertrude, sliding his hand into mine.
“Didn’t your boyfriend tell you? I’ve been finishing up my orders so I could come to you. I might have a method that’ll work,” she said.
Cassian glanced at me, and I squeezed his hand when I spotted the lingering guilt in his eyes. “Things have been a little crazy. I’m sorry,” he answered. “But of course you’re welcome anytime, Gertrude. I’d love to have you.”
“Great. I’ll be there before the end of the week. When are you heading back?” Gertrude asked.
Cassian exchanged an uncomfortable look with me. We hadn’t discussed our future yet. “As soon as I can. I can’t keep my staff waiting much longer.”
Gertrude wished us goodbye, promising to see us again soon. I held Cassian’s hand as we walked back to my house in unusual silence.
“So, um…” Cassian said, looking at me sideways. “What do you plan on doing now that you aren’t an investigator?”
“Hmm… I don’t know. I became an investigator because I wanted to help people, but you’ve shown me how much you can contribute to the community in other ways. Maybe I’ll find a job at an inn.”
Cassian fully turned his head to me, now smiling. “Oh yeah? You know, a position just opened up at Fibbersnap Inn.”
“You don’t say.”
Cassian giggled. “Maybe you’d be interested?”
“Are you sure? I’d have to find a place to live, and you would have to teach me everything.”
Cassian stood on his tiptoes to kiss my cheek. “You can stay with me, and I’d be happy to teach you.”
His kiss lit my face with a smile. “I’d love that.”