“Cursed?”
“Because my mother died when I was born. That hardly ever happens, and when it does, it means there is something wrong with the child. Or that’s what we believe, at least.”
“I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous,” said the Weftwich. “Utter nonsense. That’s what comes from letting heart magic run wild—everyone relies on magic and forgets common sense.”
She shook her head. “Even the most basic knowledge of human anatomy and medicine will tell you that your mother’s death could have been for any one of a number of reasons. It happens here all the time, because we’re not living under your so-called ‘protections.’ It is always a tragedy, but no one iswrongfor it, and there is certainly no one to blame.”
I let out a long breath. “I thought it was what made me different.”
“Well, I don’t know about that, but the amount of magic resistance you have is certainly unusual, and it would probably have given you some trouble as a young one without someone there to guide you. Here, a young woman like you would be apprenticed to someone like me, to learn how to use her gift. Because it is a gift, my dear, and not a curse.”
“Then why did Sylvester—or some part of him—pick me out of all that crowd, if I were resistant to magic?” I asked. “Surely I’d be the last person he’d seek out to harvest.”
She tapped her index finger against her bottom lip, frowning in thought. “Accident. Or fate, if you believe in that sort of thing. Either way, it was good luck for us.”
“And can you indeed repair the hearts? I was told ...”
But she was already shaking her head. “I am sorry, my dear.”
I sagged. “Then there is no hope. We thought—we were told—that you could repair all the hearts, and those whose hearts had been taken.”
“No,” she said. “But I might be able to help you keep it from happening to anyone else.”
She was looking at me with a strangely bright, direct look that made me want to dart my own eyes away. “What do you mean?” I asked, still reeling from the news that I was going to live out the rest of my life with half a heart.
I thought I had hardened myself to the possibility that I would never be whole again, but I suppose some part of me had held out hope that Basil’s promises were genuine. When I thought about it, though, it seemed absurd.
“Have you wondered about the corruption, at all? Where it came from?”
“You know about that?” I asked, startled.
“Dear child, I helped create it. All of us here have been working on it for a long time. We needed something to slow the spread of your kingdom, and to stop your king in his tracks. It has taken us decades, but we finally came up with a concoction that would cause his store of hearts to sicken and slipped it through the mist whenever we were able.
“As I said, some are able to get through the mist without being consumed, and they were willing to make that sacrifice, despite them not surviving long on the other side. We got enough of the corruption through to take hold of the king’s store.”
“You made it?” I said, unbelieving. “But it just made things worse! The king is just going to harvest more hearts! It won’t stop him! All you have done is doomed all the ordinary, nonmagic people in our kingdom!”
“Perhaps not,” she said. “It isveryfortunate that you should have come here. You see, spreading the disease in your kingdom was only half the plan. The other half was to rid us of the king and hischildren,” she snorted, “altogether.”
I stared at her.
“We had hoped that the corruption we created would work on them, too, but it wasn’t strong enough. Luckily, since then, we have been able to create one even more powerful, that will work beautifully.”
She looked at me carefully. “The trouble is, we need to get it through the mist, and the weak points we used before have been much harder to breach since the king realized he was under attack and tightened up his wards against us. We managed to get a few letters through, hoping to reach those who had already been caught in the magic-workers’ spell, and tempt one through to help us take this new corruption back.”
“The map,” I realized. “Basil had a map with your name on it.”
“That’s it,” she said. “We thought we may have to wait a decade or more before someone from the Invisible Kingdom made it through to us, if they made it at all. They had a better chance of getting back into their own kingdom afterward, and taking our new concoction with them, as the king would not be looking for one of his own people.”
“You tricked them?” I said. “The Snagged?” I saw them fall in my mind’s eye again—Basil, Nat, Em, all of them, tempted by a false promise of hope and healing, and rage rose in my gullet.
“It was the only way,” said the Weftwitch. “And it worked, didn’t it?”
She looked at me with her small, bright eyes.
“Wait ... You wantusto take it back?”
She spread her hands. “What could be more perfect? You want the king gone as much as we do.”
