Chapter 10
When Riya arrived home, the house smelled, as usual, like sugar and cardamom.
On any other day, it might have been comforting.
In the kitchen, her sisters were locked in debate over Nyra’s latest batch of pistachio cupcakes. Nyra stood protectively
over her creations, while Amara, a second-year law student at Villanova, leaned lazily against the fridge, arms crossed, her
thick black waves cascading over her shoulders.
“I’m telling you,” Amara was saying, “the icing is too Shrek green. Pistachio green should be softer, understated—elegant.”
Nyra scoffed. “What does that even mean?” She spotted Riya at the staircase and brightened, seizing her arrival like a lifeline.
“Riya, help. Do you agree? Do these look too Shrek?”
Riya hung her heavy backpack on the banister. She barely had the energy to process the argument, let alone contribute to it.
But she appraised the cupcakes anyway.
“Yeah,” she said wearily. “I can see what Amara means. This green gives me a headache.” Everything was giving her a headache.
Nyra gasped in betrayal.
“See? Riya gets it,” said Amara. “It’s giving sad Kermit the Frog. It’s giving discounted grocery store cupcakes for a kid’s birthday party and his parents don’t love him.”
“All I’m hearing is my cupcakes have character,” Nyra shot back.
Riya should have rolled her eyes and moved on. That’s what she normally did.
But tonight, the scene felt surreal. Too normal, too small. Like she was watching it from a million miles away.
Her sisters were bickering about cupcake aesthetics.
And she—she was drowning.
Avoidance wasn’t working. Kian’s behavior today made that abundantly clear. And Sirah khala—her only real source of answers—was
still halfway across the world. Not that distance was even the main problem. Asking for help meant admitting everything. Owning
it.
Riya wasn’t ready for that. Not yet.
Still, she needed a compass. Something safer.
That left her sisters.
They loved magic the way they admired a storm from indoors. From a safe distance. They couldn’t wield it, so it had never
turned on them. Maybe that was the tragedy—because they’d have handled it far better than she had.
Still, maybe they could point her somewhere.
Riya took a breath, willing herself steady.
“Hypothetically . . .”
Her sisters swiveled to face her, eyes shining with eagerness.
“Hypotheticallyyyy?” her sisters chorused.
Riya adjusted her glasses, forcing her voice even. “Hypothetically, is there a way to undo a love spell? Ideally, before the next full moon?”
There was a beat of silence. A split second where their expressions flickered, their playful energy faltering.
“Why would someone want to undo their own love spell?” Amara asked finally, her voice a little too light.
Riya’s gaze fell to the floor. “Because maybe it worked . . . unexpectedly. Not in a cute, meant-to-be way. More in a”—she cleared her throat—“miscalculation way.”
“Miscalculation?” Nyra’s brows furrowed. “Magic makes no miscalculations. Like me and my cupcake icing”—she glared at Amara—“Which is actually perfect.”
“It’s neon green, you classless baboon,” said Amara.
“That’s quantifiably untrue,” Riya muttered, cutting in. She cleared her throat again. “I mean—maybe magic itself doesn’t
miscalculate. But people do. Ergo, if people can mess up, there must be . . . contingencies. Some way to undo a spell early,
if they needed to.”
Desperate for an answer, she’d already scrolled through her phone on the bus home, reading half-baked articles until her fingers
left sweaty streak marks on her screen. Though deep down, she knew she wouldn’t find anything concrete.
For once, she almost wished she’d kept up her lessons with Sirah khala.
“The problem is,” Amara said, now serious, “that most of what we know about peri magic is passed down orally. And Sirah khala never taught us how to undo love spells prematurely.”
Riya struggled to keep her voice even. “So you’re telling me there are no safeguards? Nothing built in, in case the person under the spell starts acting unstable or obsessive?”
“Unstable or obsessive?” Nyra echoed, blinking. “That . . . doesn’t sound right.”
Riya stomach iced over. “What do you mean?”
Nyra leaned against the counter, thinking. “Well, love spells aren’t supposed to change someone’s personality so drastically.
They’re subtle. It’s just a nudge. And usually, the effects are mutual, right? If only one person is affected—and acting way
out of character—”
“It sounds more like a love curse,” Amara finished.
A love . . . curse?
“But I—that can’t—” Riya forced a breath into her lungs. “What does that entail exactly?
“Curses don’t gently nudge,” said Amara. “They completely take over. They twist someone’s emotions until there’s nothing left
but the obsession.”
Riya could still feel it—the moment she cast it. The single thread she’d pulled. Her focus locked on Kian and only Kian.
It had felt wrong even then. And she hadn’t stopped.
Why hadn’t she stopped?
Peri magic was emotion magic. It responded to intention, to instinct. That was the danger. One moment of weakness—one slip—and now she’d unleashed something she didn’t know how to contain.
“But even a curse fades on its own after a month, right?” she asked, nails digging into her palm.
“No,” Amara said darkly. “Love curses grow. Like wildfires—feeding on emotions until they’ve consumed everything in their
path.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “If it’s not broken by the next full moon . . . the curse becomes permanent.”
No. No, no, no. This wasn’t—this couldn’t—
The kitchen suddenly felt too small, the air too thick. It was already October 3. The full moon was on the 26th. Barely any
time. Was her calendar not full enough as it was?
“There has to be a way to break it.” Riya’s voice barely sounded like her own. “I mean, just . . . out of curiosity.”
“There is,” Amara said slowly. “But . . .”
Riya’s heart stuttered. “But what?”
“The only way I’ve ever heard of is if the caster genuinely reciprocates the cursed person’s feelings.” Amara exhaled. “And
that’s the thing—people don’t usually curse the ones they love.”
The words landed like a slap.
Fall in love?
With Kian?
She imagined that goofy, love-drunk grin. The black petunias. That mortifying poem blaring over the intercom.
Absolutely not. Even the thought made her nauseous.
And yet—Kian’s future, maybe even his sanity, depended on her fixing this.
She cleared her throat. “Okay, but, hypothetically, Sirah khala would know something, right? I mean, she helped me last time.” When she’d unraveled Riya’s magic on Jake Townsend and his friends. When she’d fixed her mistake.
Nyra shook her head. “Yeah, but that time, Sirah khala was undoing a very basic emotional manipulation spell. You were younger
then, too. Less powerful. And guilt is . . . simple, compared to love.”
Amara’s voice cut in, grim. “If someone tried to undo a love curse the wrong way, they could sever a person’s ability to connect.
To love. To be human.”
Something cold curled at the base of Riya’s spine. She’d always scoffed at the idea of love being sacred—but if it really
was what made someone human . . .
She hadn’t just cursed Kian. She was stripping something essential away.
What happened when the curse kept growing? When obsession hollowed him out?
What would be left of him by the next full moon?
Nyra’s voice softened. “Maybe there’s another way we don’t know. Something Sirah khala could tell us when she gets back. But
Mom said she’s completely off the grid right now.”
Riya’s breath hitched. Of course she was.
So what—she was supposed to just wait? Hope Sirah khala got back from Finland in time? And even if she did, what then? Would
Sirah khala still see her as someone worth helping?
“If this wasn’t hypothetical—” Nyra began, then shook her head. “I’d tell that person it’s going to be okay. Magic can be messy, especially when emotions are involved. But I don’t think it acts without reason. Sometimes, it just . . . finds a better path. One we didn’t plan for.”
“I fail to see how any of this could be better,” Riya said.
“Sure,” Nyra said, smiling faintly. “But you’re actually talking about magic again. That hasn’t happened in years.”
Something in Riya’s chest took a sharp, traitorous nosedive. She looked away.
Amara nodded. “She’s right. We’ve missed this part of you.”
Riya scowled. “This is just . . . an academic inquiry.”
Nyra sighed and grabbed a cupcake. She plopped it into Riya’s hands. “Just remember, magic has a mind of its own. Sometimes,
all you can do is trust it.”
“Even if it’s ugly and neon green,” Amara added.
“Oh my God, Amara.”
Riya shoved the cupcake into her mouth. On a normal day, she’d appreciate the rush of sugar—sugar helped her study. Fed her
brain.
Now, though, it tasted far too sickeningly sweet.