She would age.
She would grow old.
She wouldlive.
The thought nearly dropped me to my knees.
I trudged through the grass, bending down to pet Reaper as we neared the house. There’d been another storm this morning, one that woke me from a restless slumber. As Reaper and I walked the hills, letting the rain soak through my shirt, I felt it. I stumbled on the path, clutching my chest as if the organ that shouldn’t have been there had been pierced by a flaming arrow, searing through phantom flesh and lighting my veins on fire.
I knew it as well as I knew her, inside and out. She’d done it. Broken her curse.
And for so many reasons, I had been wrong. Wrong to love her. Wrong to punish her. Wrong to let her go. Wrong to leave. Wrong…
Day stood on the porch, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his dark jeans. “What the fuck, dude?” he shouted.
With a grimace, I motioned Reaper on ahead, letting him greet our guest first. The last thing I wanted to do was argue with Time.
Day crouched, rubbing Reaper’s belly as I approached and opened the door for them. Both followed me in—one bounding down the hall, to muck up my sheets, no doubt. The other, silently brooding, chest puffed, arms crossed. Day had an impressive form and size, but he was not intimidating, no matter how hard he tried to be.
“Astoria broke her curse,” he said, rocking back on his heels.
I hung my coat, my expression unreadable. “Mhm.”
“You knew. Of course you knew.” He raised his arms above his head, stretching them back as he spun in a slow, frustrated circle. “Well? Aren’t you going to go get her?”
I said nothing, taking a seat on the bench to remove my boots. My fingers trembled as I jerked the laces loose. I didn’t owe an explanation to anyone but Astoria. And I’d already given it to her.
“You aren’t… are you?”
“No.” I stood, wiping my hands down the front of my pants before heading into the kitchen.
“I don’t understand, Grim.”
I paused, my slumped shoulders straightening as I craned my neck back toward him. “Do not—”
“Explain it to me. None of us have ever been given a thread of fate, and here you are with two. You fall in love with the most incredible girl—someone you have history with, someone who finally sees you. Seesus.And you cut the thread that ends happily ever after for both of you.”
“That depends entirely on what you’d consider a happily ever after. This is mine.”
“Astoria doesn’t deserve that. She’s suffered enough.” Day’s power bloomed in the space around us, loud and insistent, pressing against the walls in protest.
“Do you not think I know that?” I shoved a finger into his chest, every fiber of me straining to hold the rest back. “Fate’s funny that way. It was never really a choice. One path, she suffers. The other, she gets what she always wanted. Neither changes what I did.”
Day rubbed at the spot on his chest, his expression shifting from shock to something almost grieved. “You could have gone about it differently.”
I winced. Fuck, I could have.
I could have taken Beatrice again right then, stolen her from her mother’s arms. And what happened after… that wasn’t planned. Although I still didn’t regret it, James deserved worse.
I didn’t expect Astoria to shoulder the blame, to chalk it up to her curse like some kind of cosmic tax. But that’s exactly what she did. And I—
I was furious. Not just at her, but at the sheer audacity of a human daring to challengeme.
Still, a soul was marked. And a soul, I took.
I warned her. More times than I can count.
“She loves you,” Day murmured, like that was supposed to fix anything.
