Page 53 of Between These Broken Hearts (Cursed Stars #2)

The Grimoricon was a heavy book when Jasalyn took it from the Midnight Palace, but in the time it’s taken her to call her goblin, get to

Elora, and walk to the witch’s hut, it’s changed into a slime exuding the stench of rotting flesh and a heavy stone so big

she had to use her cape to drag it behind her. Now it’s a cat that’s burrowed itself against her chest and is purring loudly

enough to block out the cacophony of the noisy village of Fairscape .

The moment she steps into the witch’s cottage the purring stops and the cat curls its claws into her flesh, hissing. In the next second, Jas is holding a black rat with red eyes and a long,

fat tail. She drops it without thinking, and it scurries to the door they just came in. The witch throws up a hand and the

door swings shut before the rat can escape.

“You found it,” she says, stepping around her worktable and reaching for the creature. It shrinks down to mouse size and skitters

up Jasalyn’s skirt.

The witch glares. “You want your ring? Give me that book.”

Jasalyn’s stomach twists. She suddenly isn’t so sure of anything.

Will her sister forgive her when she realizes the Grimoricon is missing?

Will this witch’s ring really work? Could anything take away the fear she carries around all the time?

“You’ll give the book back, though, right? After you’ve made the ring?”

“I never promised that.”

“But my sister—”

“Will never suspect you stole it.” Her smile is anything but kind.

The mouse has its claws deep in her flesh beneath the skirt, but Jas doesn’t attempt to pull it away.

“Do you want this ring or not?” the witch snaps.

She swallows but the lump of dread doesn’t leave her throat. “What exactly is the deal again?”

The witch slides a roll of parchment out from behind the clutter of apothecary bottles on the wall and unrolls it on the table

between them. “By accepting the ring,” she says, tapping the page, “you agree to forfeit your immortal years by surrendering

this life of yours on the eighteenth anniversary of your birth. In return, for as long as the magic holds true, whenever you

wear the ring, you will carry the kiss of death on your lips and have numbness replace the fear in your heart.”

The deal says nothing about Abriella never getting the book back. Maybe she will. Or maybe it will find its way back to her.

As if already sensing her decision, the mouse drops to the floor and runs to the door.

The witch intercepts, scooping up the creature.

It squeals and sinks its big teeth into her finger.

The witch curses and mutters something in a language Jas has never heard before.

A small girl emerges from the corner and holds out her hands, her eyes full of terror as she takes the rodent from the witch.

They exchange a few more words in that unfamiliar tongue.

The girl disappears into the darkness again and the witch turns her attention back to Jas.

“I need an hour to complete your ring, then you can come back for it”—she taps the unrolled scroll —“ and our deal will be complete.”

Chaos rules every hall and passage of the palace today, and it’s after lunch before I finally find a space that isn’t already

occupied with Konner’s soldiers or Brie’s advisors or some other group of people I don’t have the energy to talk to.

The room is small—the only door off a tucked-away alcove—and I exhale in relief as I sink into a chair and soak in the silence.

I shouldn’t be here. I should be tracking down the queen and figuring out what I should and shouldn’t say when the general

comes. But the truth is, I don’t know what I’m going to say if I run into Misha.

Hey, it’s okay that maybe you wanting me was like seventy percent about me and thirty percent about what you need from me.

That’s more than I ever could’ve hoped for anyway.

Or, I was too busy being angry yesterday to hear all the sweet things you said, but I think I need to hear them so could you just

run that down again?

Or worse, I don’t care why you want me because I don’t know how not to want you.

“You okay there?”

I look up and see Konner lowering himself into the chair across from me. He blows out a breath. “Felicity,” he says. “I almost

thought you were Jasalyn, but”—he taps the skin around his eye—“that gives you away. Why are you in this form today?”

“A favor for the queen. What are you doing here?”

“Looking for a quiet spot to clear my head, if I’m honest. You?”

“Same.”

“I’ve been wishing we had time to talk, but it seems like there are too many fires to put out or coming storms to prepare

for.”

I huff. “No kidding.”

His eyes soften and I think of all the times he got that look on his face in the illusion. “I know you probably still haven’t

forgiven me for putting you in that stasis, but I’m dying to know what it was like.”

I lean back and fold my arms. “That seems like a weird thing for you to ask, given that you’re the one who put me there.”

“It was a risk, you know, giving you an alternate reality to make you understand me better. Who knows? Maybe I was a jerk

and it could’ve worked against me.”

I frown. “Alternate reality? Don’t you mean illusion?”

“It’s nothing I constructed, if that’s what you mean. I can’t choose what you see when you dream.”

I’m baffled because his face is all sincerity. “Then how...”

“I can focus on a moment in the past and change one thing about it. Then you’ll dream the life you would’ve had if things

had unfolded from there.”

Everything inside me slows down. “And what did you change for my dreams?”

He cocks his head to the side. “You already know.”

When I close my eyes, I can practically feel our mother’s hand on my shoulder, the warmth of her hugs and the beauty of her smile. “Our father—this was if our father had died. And that was why Mother was still alive.” My heart twists as I look up at Konner. “And our sister, Aster.”

He draws in a breath. “That’s right.” His throat bobs. “What was it like? That life?”

A flood of emotion makes me want to hug Konner.

My brother. “Mom raised us in the palace, and we... you and I were close.” And I was being courted by the king of the Wild Fae, who wanted me just for being me.

“I thought it was an illusion. I thought you’d crafted this whole life and all the details. ...”

He shakes his head. “No. I focus on a single moment. In this case, I went back to the ritual our father did for power and

immortality. I imagined him failing and dying as a result. It was a risk, but I hoped you’d have a chance to see me for who

I really am, perhaps even see how good a world without Erith could be.”

“I’ve never heard of such a power.”

“You’re given a memory in a dream when you take another’s shape, right?” he asks, and I nod. “Well, I think this is a variation

of that power. It takes the memory, the history, and spins in a different direction.”

“That’s... fascinating.”

“It makes a weird sort of sense to me,” he says. “For instance, you know how when you get your dream, it can be different

than what the person remembers?”

I frown. “It can?”

He nods. “Well, yes. Our memories are imperfect. They’re an impression of that moment that’s obscured by all the things we’re

thinking and feeling at the time. But what an Echo gets in the dream isn’t really a memory so much as a recounting of the event as if we’re reliving it. The Echo is aware of the subject’s emotions while also seeing the truth of it.”

The hair on the back of my neck prickles. “Konner, that’s it.”

“What’s wrong?”

My mind races as I mentally recount the words from my dream over and over. I have to be sure. If I’m wrong, it could be catastrophic.

“I dreamed of the day Jas gave the Grimoricon to the witch and finalized their bargain.”

“She misremembered the terms, didn’t she?”

Offer your meals when you have no meals and you give nothing. Offer your life when you have no life and you give nothing.

My stomach flips with nerves and adrenaline and hope . “I need to find the princess.”