Chapter 3

I hurried down the street, my breathing becoming continually heavier. As my body began to sweat excessively, I realized something was wrong. A wave of dizziness ran through me, making me stumble. It came and went quickly, thankfully allowing me to keep my feet underneath me. Had whatever I’d touched made me sick? I had to get back to the library, I decided. My father would be angry and disappointed with me, but he would know what to do, at least.

I ignored the shivers that began to spontaneously run through me, an unnaturally cold feeling tickling my limbs. The dizziness came back, more gradually this time yet more persistent. The world began to shift sideways, and I had to stop myself from falling flat to the ground as my sense of up and down began to make less sense. My run slowed to a shaky walk, and the direction forward to the library became confusing and uncertain. If I didn’t get there soon, I worried I would end up stumbling around in circles. Or just stumbling flat to the ground.

Just as I thought that, the ground itself began to feel less stable. The packed cobble street began to shake and vibrate. I took a step back as the street in front of me began to crumble. It rose up into the air toward me, and as I blinked, I plunged forward, through the earth and into darkness.

The Void swallowed me, thickening as I fell. Time expanded eternally. Space and distance became mere concepts without a definitive meaning. Yet I continued to fall, or to sink, until eventually, I felt as though I were floating deep in a pool of nothingness. When I realized I’d been holding my breath, a slight feeling of panic ran through me. I feared trying to breathe in whatever it was that was around me. Stretching my arms out, I began to swim. Though whether I went anywhere, I had not a clue. I couldn’t tell up from down.

I could not see in the proper sense of the word. Yet strange visions met my mind regardless. Massive mountains, rolling hills, and endless forests and deserts all flashed through my mind like places I had been to before but had forgotten, or perhaps places I could one day visit. Mixed in were places too strange and foreign to understand, things which even a small flash of took a toll on my mind. A commonality began to appear in them. A girl of varying ages and appearances, sometimes as young as myself, sometimes much older began to pop up. She felt like a different person in each one, sometimes appearing so unrecognizable that I was almost certain it had to be someone else, or increasingly often, something else. It all flashed by too quickly to truly get a good look at her. Yet I had the sense that despite how different each vision was, it was all the same girl, the same strange woman.

As the visions continued to assault me, I began to feel as though I was perhaps getting somewhere in my swim through the void. I kept going, hoping desperately that the direction I was headed was upward. My lungs were becoming increasingly desperate for air, and I began to wonder if I would die down here, suffocating in this strange empty darkness.

Just as I was close to giving up hope, my head broke through to the surface. Greedily, I sucked in air in desperate full-body gasps, not caring what sort of air it even was. I still could not see, but as I glanced around me, I intuitively knew that the void around me was endless. A deep shiver full of dread ran through my body.

My eyes opened. Not the eyes of the me in the endless sea of darkness but my real eyes: the me that still stood somehow upright on the street. My body was falling forward. I braced myself, catching the tightly cobbled street below in my hands as pain lanced through my palms. Several deep breaths swam through my lungs, each just a little calmer than the last. I was back in my normal little town, or perhaps I’d never truly left. Was it possible that all of that had happened in the mere blink of an eye? Had it been real, I wondered, or a simple vision, a hallucination?

I stood up on shaky legs, a slight ache lingering within my body. Whatever that inky stuff was that had gone into me, it couldn’t have been good. Just the fact that it had come from the sorceress was enough to make that clear. Now that I had time to think, I wondered if perhaps it was something worse than I could have imagined. Was it possible… Had I been cursed?

“You alright, dear?”

Glancing over, I saw a woman who appeared to be in her thirties, a large basket circled in her arm. She stared over at me, a gentle look of concern on her face.

My eyes widened. “‘m fine,” I muttered, bending nervously in a futile effort to hide my body as I took a step back.

I needed to get home. Quickly.

Taking another step away from the woman, I realized that whatever had just happened to me might not have been over. A stabbing pain rushed up my leg. I winced as I put one foot in front of the other, and rushed away as quickly as I could. The woman said something else, but as I jogged away from her, her words were lost to the breeze.

My breath quickly became ragged in my weakening state. The small ache that had begun in my legs spread throughout my body, until everything hurt and only sheer willpower kept me moving.

The library finally came into view. As I came through the doors, I nearly collapsed in relief. Thankfully, I kept my feet beneath me, sucking in several breaths as I pressed my hand against the door to my back.

“Back already?” My father looked up from whatever he’d been reading, peering down his spectacles at me.

“I, umm, yes,” I replied. My back straightened, and I edged toward the stairs, doing my best to keep my face passive. My father had always been an expert at realizing when something was wrong.

“You’re looking a little pale, son. Are you feeling alright?”

I winced as another intense bolt of pain ran through my body. “I, umm, stubbed my toe.”

My father stared at me, and for a moment, I was sure he’d seen through me. “Right.” He gave out a gentle sigh. “Well, don’t let me hold you up. Go ahead upstairs and check on your toe.”

I rushed up the stairs before he could change his mind. If he noticed me stumble slightly, he thankfully chose not to say anything. Perhaps he attributed it to my toe.

As I finally made it to my room, I began to strip, tossing my clothes to the floor until I was completely nude. Like that, I stood in front of the tall stained mirror. It was old and cast everything in a sepia-colored light, but worked fine. Glancing at my body, I saw my regular brown hair and eyes followed by tanned skin. This time I winced not from pain but my appearance. I’d always felt I looked just a little too dull, too boring. Now, I worried that something had changed. My body appeared to look normal, but I still held my breath. Curses were said to work slowly; I wouldn’t just become a monster in a single breath. They preyed on your weaknesses, corrupting you until one day you were an evil fiend of darkness in both mind and flesh.

Perhaps my body had already begun to change, and I simply couldn’t see it yet. Biting my lip, I turned to my back, looking over my shoulder. At first glance, everything seemed normal, and I nearly let out a sigh of relief. But then I saw it. Just above the left cheek of my butt, a small black circle had formed with a strange pattern around it. My eyes widened in horror. Shakily, my fingers traced along the spot.

I’d been cursed; I’d really been cursed. I rubbed the palm of my other hand against my eyes, partly due to how tired I was beginning to feel, yet hoping that the sight in front of me would disappear. It didn’t.

I shuddered. What was I going to do? Was this the end? Was I destined to become some kind of monster?

Deliberately, I took several breaths as I pulled my eyes away from it. No, no. I had to be strong. What did everyone say about curses? They fed on weaknesses: greed, lust, hatred, and other vices. I just had to be strong. I could beat this. Closing my eyes I took another deep breath. I had options. There wasn’t a whole lot known about curses, as far as I knew. Some people said that so long as someone was at heart a good person, a curse could be fought off. Of course, others said that curses didn’t affect the good-hearted at all, that it was only those with darkness in their hearts that could be cursed in the first place. I wasn’t sure if I believed either of those at this point. It was possible that a priest could get rid of it, I thought. They gave out totems that helped to prevent curses and banish spirits, so maybe they knew a way to remove them?

I shook my head. No, it was better to try and beat this myself first. If I went to the priest here, the whole town would find out, and that was the last thing I wanted. He wasn’t exactly the most tight-lipped man. Even I knew that.

Would the sorceress know something? My eyes opened, and groggily, I moved to sit down on the bed. As one of the cursed herself, she had to at least know how they worked. The fact that she had some strange liquid that could curse someone in the first place suggested so. If anyone might know how to remove a curse, it would probably be her. I rubbed my face and then blinked as a curious thought hit me.

Of course! This was all a part of fate; a matter of my destiny. Becoming cursed was simply the beginning, a catalyst to figuring out the evil plot the cursed sorceress was cooking up. By solving the mystery, I would both stop her devilish plans and find a way to cure myself. I simply needed to get back into her room and find more information. I was certain that I could beat this.

I laid across my bed, the pain rolling across my body coming to the forefront of my mind. As my eyes blinked closed, I decided that first I should have a quick nap. It wouldn’t do to try and break back into her room while my body felt so tired and weak. Curling the thick blanket around my naked body, I drifted into unconsciousness.

— — —

In a dimly shaded room, a maid nervously stood, not daring to move a hair. Several feet away from her, a hand as dark as the night sky with pure white reptilian scales scattered up its length tapped against a sleek wooden desk. Each tap left the tiniest slice from the deadly sharp claws, imperceptible to the naked eye: to regular human eyes, at least.

“I’m sorry, ma’am. He said to tell you that the search is still ongoing,” the maid said, doing her best not to stutter.

“Then Virgil still hasn’t a clue who broke into the room,” a silken voice responded. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, given the state of things. Though do let him know that I expressed my disappointment that he couldn’t come to give me this message himself.”

“Yes, ma’am. I — he also wanted me to, um, express how the search might be easier if he knew exactly what it was that had been —”

A hand brushed through the air giving a clear dismissal of the idea.

“I told him earlier that I would not divulge it with him. It was a personal item of mine. Nothing else need be said of it.”

The maid bowed in a small curtsy. “Yes, ma’am. Of course.” She stood hesitantly for a moment, as though unsure whether to continue. A quick gesture gave her permission to speak once more. “There was also the matter of the servant you requested. Several girls have been selected for you to choose from. They’ll be here in the morning.”

A sigh left the woman’s lips and her tapping claws ceased. “I doubt they will meet my requirements, though I do appreciate the effort. Give him my thanks.”

“I’ll let the Reeve know.”