Chapter 31
The warmth of the house greeted Riya the moment she and Sirah khala stepped inside.
Golden lamplight pooled out of the living room. Her parents were curled on the couch, a baking show murmuring in the background.
In the kitchen, her sisters moved with a practiced ease that Riya envied, passing plates and joking as they rinsed the last
of the dinner dishes.
Her mom looked up, then frowned. “Are you all right?”
Riya shrugged off her jacket, the house’s heat loosening her limbs. For once, she wished her parents didn’t care so much.
She wanted to disappear upstairs, crawl into bed. But their gazes pinned her in place. Riya felt something inside her curl
into a tight, protective ball.
“Yeah,” she said thinly. “Sky wasn’t as clear as we hoped.”
Her mom’s eyes flicked to Sirah khala. Riya knew that look—the one that could pry truths from silence.
“Turned out there were lots of clouds,” Sirah khala offered.
Her mom rose from the couch. “But you were gone a long time.” She crossed the room and cupped Riya’s cheek. “Why do I smell
smoke on you?”
Riya flinched. “Maybe one of the neighbors had a bonfire or—”
“Or you were lighting candles.” Her mom’s fingers lingered. “Riya, you’re shaking. What happened?”
Dishes stopped clinking. The air went still.
“I just need to sleep,” she said.
“Honey.”
That one word almost broke her. Her throat ached with the effort to hold herself together.
“I’m fine,” she muttered, pulling away and heading toward the staircase. But Nyra’s hand, still damp from the sink, landed on her shoulder.
“Hey.” Her sister’s voice was gentle. “You sure you’re good?”
“I said I’m fine.” But Riya’s voice splintered, and her eyes—God, her eyes were stinging. She blinked hard, furious at the
heat building behind them. But it was too late. A tear slipped down her cheek, hot against her skin, still chilled from the
night air.
She swiped it away roughly—except another tear followed. Then another.
You’ve got yourself a soggy bottom, came a voice from the baking show. That’s why it collapsed.
“There’s chalk on your face.” Her mom’s voice came softly. “Riya, sweetheart—?”
“Don’t.” The word snapped out sharp, like it had teeth. She winced. “Sorry. I just, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
She couldn’t look at them. Not with everything falling apart inside her.
“What happened?” asked her mom, expression serious.
“I messed up. I—I swore I’d never use peri magic again.
Not after . . . after what I did before.
To Jake and those other boys. When I made them—” She closed her eyes, remembering Jake’s tear-streaked face.
You’re a monster. “But then Mel asked for help, and I thought, just a little push.
Nothing big, nothing serious. I thought I could control
it this time.”
The words were tumbling out of her now. Her hands twisted in front of her like she was wringing the truth out of herself.
“But then it turned into a love curse. On Kian. And if I don’t break it in five days, it’s permanent. He’ll be stuck like
this because of me.”
She felt Nyra’s and Amara’s eyes on her. Riya already knew what they were thinking.
Her mother turned to Sirah khala. “And you knew about all this?”
Sirah khala didn’t flinch. “She asked me not to tell you.”
“So you listened to her? She’s seventeen, Sirah.”
“It’s not Sirah khala’s fault,” Riya whispered.
“But you could have told us, Riya,” said Nyra, brows drawn together. “Instead of presenting it as some silly hypothetical.”
“I—I was scared. I thought I could fix it.”
“Alone?”
“How was I supposed to talk about it?” Riya said. “It’s not like any of you talked about magic with me, either. Not since . . .”
“We just didn’t know how to help,” her mom said softly. “We thought if we gave you space, maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much. But this”—she shook her head—“this was too big to handle on your own, Riya.”
Riya looked down. “I know. I thought I could fix it by myself. And I almost did. But then when we finally figured out how
to break the curse, Kian stopped me. Because—because I would have had to give up Caltech.”
She rubbed her arms, shivering. She felt cold all over again. “Isn’t that ridiculous? Why would he stop me? What am I supposed
to do now?”
Nyra rubbed her back. “It’s okay. You’re talking about it now. That’s a step forward.”
“Is it?” Riya said, wiping her nose. “I thought magic was supposed to help people, but it’s like every time I try to fix things, I make it worse.” Kian had sounded so sure they’d figure it out. But now, with him gone and the adrenaline fading, reality was setting in.
“You’ve been trying to fix this like it’s an equation,” said Sirah khala.
“Maybe. Because it’s what I know. Equations don’t change on you.” Her eyes stung. “I just thought if I stayed calm, calculated, maybe I could undo it without . . .” She trailed off,
her hands curling into fists. “Without it turning into a monster.”
“You’re not a monster. You didn’t mean to hurt anyone,” Sirah khala said. “Not then, and not now. None of this means you’re
dangerous. It means you care.”
“Or maybe I don’t deserve magic at all.”
“Like it or not,” Amara chimed in, “it’s a part of you. You can’t carve it out and leave only the parts you like.”
Nyra sighed loudly. “Honestly, we should have known something was wrong. But you were still getting perfect grades, still running Student Council like it was a machine. We kept telling ourselves you were fine.”
They had all pulled back, thinking it was kindness. Maybe it was. But it hadn’t made Riya feel safer. Just . . . unreachable.
Her mom sighed. “Just . . . promise us you won’t keep carrying this alone anymore.” She didn’t say it as a reprimand, just
as a truth. A plea.
Riya nodded once. “. . . Okay.” She wiped at her eyes again. “Okay. Thank you. I should get back to work. There’s still time
to fix this. Barely. It probably won’t change anything, but I can’t just sit here.”
Sirah khala gave the smallest nod. No instruction. No comfort. Just unwavering belief.
Riya moved toward the stairs—but as she reached the first step, she paused. Her hand closed around the banister, cool beneath
her fingertips, leaving chalk marks on the wood.
And then the memories came.
Not all at once. Not like a wave. But like a thread—tugged loose from somewhere deep.
The way she’d stood outside the principal’s office in eighth grade, fists clenched, heart thrumming, waiting to tell someone—anyone—what she’d seen.
The way her hands had trembled later, after the spell.
The way she’d crumpled into Sirah khala’s arms when the consequences caught up: Memories erased. A scar that never quite faded.
And the boy. The one whose name she’d never learned. The one who’d disappeared.
She turned back to the room, her voice soft. “Do you—does anyone know what happened to that boy who’d been bullied? The one
from eighth grade?”
The question hung in the air, suspended like dust in sunlight. Then Amara tilted her head, her expression soft, unreadable.
She and Nyra exchanged knowing looks with their parents.
“I think that’s his story to tell,” Amara said finally.
Riya didn’t look away. Not immediately. But after a moment, she nodded—once, slow, in acknowledgment.
She knew. Maybe she’d known for a while.
And for a moment she wondered if—just maybe—the magic had known, too.