ARAWN
Perched atop a mountain drowned in clouds, Zelda’s castle floated as arrogant as a forgotten god, too enamored with itself to die. The turrets clawed at the sky, their sharp spires poised to gut the stars.
“Stay close,” I breathed to Lempicka as our turret began its descent.
I extended my arm, and she slipped hers into it. We drifted above hedges trimmed to the line and midnight-blue roses suspended from trellises of crystal. Everything glittered, save for the coils of ash, that grayish veil in the air that betrayed Zelda’s trail.
The turret touched the ground, and the great doors of the castle swung on their hinges. A gust of coal and chimney soot. Asif the place already meant to spit us out before it even swallowed us.
A Cursed, in the form of a lizard-guard, awaited us in the hall.
It had been an eternity since I last set foot here. Lempicka clutched tighter at my arm, flakes of sugar spilling from her. She would never master the art of hiding her emotions—and that was precisely what I cherished in her.
We followed the guard in silence beneath arches of gold, brushing past crystal chandeliers carved like blades. And those damned portraits of Zelda. Always herself. Frozen century after century in her own illusion of eternity. Everything was exactly as I remembered. Hollow.
Other lizard-guards passed, carrying the same boxes as in the sorcerers’ market. Their bloodshot eyes lingered on me, as though waiting for me to finally put an end to all this. Even here, the whispers had reached. Arawn, Zelda’s cold blade, her heartless executioner, had returned.
“What are they carrying?” murmured Lempicka.
“New Cursed. There’s a dungeon. That’s where Zelda injects them with sucremort until nothing of them remains.”
“Can’t we help them?”
I felt the eyes of the lizard guard escorting us shift toward us. I tried to map each pipe and each chamber. I listened. I searched for a single heartbeat. A single call. But I heard several. Thousands. Beating in unison. None of them mine. Yet… I was close. I felt the burning point in my chest.
My heart was not far.
“Yes. By ending Zelda.”
The guard stopped before a staircase and, without a word, gestured upward. Above, the clinking of flutes, muffled laughter. Stained glass of orchards cast golden shards across the frozen marble. The towering windows overlooking the suspendedterraces remained stubbornly shut, smothered by heavy velvet drapes.
“The Mist Sorcerer, and his confectioner, Mademoiselle Lempicka,” another guard announced from the balcony.
Lempicka inclined gracefully, brushing the shimmering fabric of her gown with her fingertips before descending the steps, back straight, chin lifted. All eyes fixed upon her, drawn like moths to a flame, incapable of turning away from the singular glow emanating from her.
“I feel like an animal in a cage,” she whispered, her smile trembling only slightly. “So this is what Aignan felt all those years.”
I caught her hand, my lips grazing her skin in a kiss as light as it was calculated before bowing toward her. I did not greet the crowd. Never. I would not bow to them. But for her, yes.
“They’re only envious,” I cut in, my gaze sweeping the nobles frozen like statues. “None of them could ever hope to bear a curse that reflects their inner beauty.”
No sooner had our feet touched the grand hall than a voice slipped through the air, like poisoned honey. “My dear Arawn.”
Zelda. Draped in burgundy and emeralds, as if jewels and enchanted velvet could compensate for what magic no longer concealed. For the first time, she wore gloves. And beneath layers of powder too thick, the rot she fought to hide.
She had aged.
I tilted my head slightly, a smirk flickering at my lips. Too greedy. Too ravenous. She devoured her confectioners at a pace none could sustain, and now no one of talent remained to stave off the inevitable.
“What happened to you, Zelda?” I murmured.
“I never excelled at curses as much as contracts,” she admitted with a silken tone. “But I must confess…” Her gaze slid to Lempicka, assessing her with the coldness of a collectorweighing a piece before reducing it to dust. “Breaking your heart was worth the price of a hand.”
Lempicka tensed. I bent toward her, a hand behind her lower back. “Magic always has a price. It demands back what it once so generously gave.”
Her eyes widened. Zelda had violated her own rules. By cursing Lempicka, by breaking her contract with Nyla, she had paid the price. A hand. Dead. Frozen.
Zelda’s gaze drifted to the glass jar Lempicka clutched, and her nostrils flared, her long nose sniffing at the confection like a pig smelling its next meal. “And you bring me a gift? How charming!”
