Page 31

CHAPTER 31

AURORA

“A urora,” Cadel called softly, pulling her from her sleep. “ Pain is here. She has the next names.”

Aurora sat up and stretched the soreness from her muscles. Thane was asleep next to her. A soft smile tugged at her mouth. Even in his sleep, he looked a bit broody, and his mouth held on to its pout. If she didn’t love him so much, she’d dread the third name on that list. The one whose heart needed to break. She slipped from the bed, rubbing the warmth back into her arms.

“She’s in the throne room.” Cadel looked at Thane . His brow furrowed. “ Why didn’t he tell me?”

Aurora grabbed a wrap and slipped it on. “ What would it have changed?” Even if she knew of Thane’s curse, she still would’ve fallen in love with him. That’s how love worked. There was no rhyme or reason to it. No talking oneself out of it once Love wrote your name in her book. You were bound to be with that person or god no matter what Fate tried to change.

Aurora followed Cadel out into the hallway. A warm breeze carried with it the scent of lavender and freesia. Manere was quiet, the sky filled with grays and indigo. The nightingale waited like the rest of the kingdom for its master to awaken.

Cadel paused outside the throne room. “ I wouldn’t have felt so stupid. I thought she was waiting for me.” He paused. “ If you need anything, call someone else.” Cadel slipped down the dark hall.

Aurora watched him fade into the darkness, just another shadow. If her father and Death only knew how much power Love wielded, they’d be more afraid of her than each other. In the throne room, she found Pain pacing the floor. “ Did you come here to gloat?” Aurora asked, walking over to the liquor tray.

“No. Sorrow sent me to kill you.”

Aurora poured a shot of whiskey into the glass. She held it to her nose, inhaling its sharp scent. It reminded her of Thane . “ Can you do that?” Aurora set the glass down. “ If you could, we can end this all right now.”

“I can’t.” Pain looked down at the floor. “ I have the next three names.” Pain held out a piece of parchment.

“I don’t even get a day’s rest.” Aurora turned and took the list. One of these would be the heart she needed to break. There were only two names. Queen Sove and Marcus McCoy . The last name simply read X . That was the mortal whose heart needed to break. There was no name, no location. “ Where is the third name? I need the third one.”

“You need to be more worried about the queen. She’s cursed,” Pain blurted out.

“Of course she is.” Aurora fought the tears of frustration. She couldn’t even deal with Thane’s curse now. She had another to break. “ Your father’s again?”

“Not this time. This is an old curse. One from when there were only four gods and Death was still young. He was outsmarted by a witch.”

“Not the witch from the woods?”

“No. They happened to be sisters.” Pain shrugged. “ You’ll need to break the curse in order to reap the queen’s soul.”

“What is it with curses? Is there nothing else? Has the plague and scurvy gone out of fashion?”

Pain shrugged. “ You are asking the wrong god. This is Death’s oldest debt, and no one has been able to collect. Not even Thane .”

Aurora laughed to keep the tears at bay. If Thane , the god whose duty it was to reap souls, couldn’t do it, how would she? “ This was what you wanted. Right ? For me to fail. Death will get what he wants, and you will get Thane . Gods below, Pain , I didn’t know that you loved Thane . And if I had, I would’ve never?—”

“What? Fallen in love with him?” Pain snapped. “ You think you can control that? It was already decided. It was already written in my mother’s book. My father had already woven him into your life.”

“Then why are we here?” Aurora yelled. “ If you knew Thane was not yours to have, why the curse? You are the daughter of Fate and Love , the two gods who decide all our futures.”

“Because!” Pain yelled back. “ He was my first.” Pain walked over the dais and flopped down on the steps. “ I know, I know, how very mortal of me to think sex and love are the same thing. In my defense I was a young god, and my mother left because she couldn’t face what she and my father had created. Do you have any idea what it is like to be raised by two gods who never should’ve been together?”

“You think being raised in the shadow of Life and Moon is any easier?” Aurora’s father was the creator of most things in the mortal world. And he made sure everyone remembered that.

Pain looked up at Aurora . “ Yes . You have the power of the stars. Mortals don’t curse your name. You have beauty. You are the brightness after the darkness. You have Thane’s love. I am the consequence of two gods who thought they could retie their own threads.”

Aurora walked over and sat down next to Pain . She , too, had thought love and sex were the same thing once. But her mother, an expert on sex, had explained the difference. “ But why Thane ?”

“I was lonely. Thane and I did everything together. We trained and ate together. We sat through council meetings and dealt with his father’s desire to kill everything together. I told him about my mother, and he told me of his father’s cruel ways. I thought that was love.” Pain shook away that thought. “ But then he saw you, and that was all he could talk about. He even forbade his father, knowing the consequences of doing so. For you.” Pain snorted out a laugh. “ I tried. But he wanted nothing more than a friendship. I was stupid.”

Aurora couldn’t picture Pain as anything other than the confident god that stood next to Death or followed mortals around. “ Thane could’ve… well, Thane is Thane . And sometimes he can be a bit callous.”

“A bit? He is also arrogant.”

Aurora rested her elbows on her knee and her chin on the palm of her hands. “ I agree. But I love that about him. I don’t know why.”

“You’d love him if he had a horn growing out of his head and lost all his teeth.”

Aurora thought. “ A horn might be useful. And if you’ve ever eaten the food here, you’d know he wouldn’t need teeth.” Aurora sat with Pain in the quietness of the room. The souls crept in and out of the room. “ Why a curse?”

“I thought if he could feel what it felt like to have a broken heart, he’d come back. I think my father was just looking for a reason to get back at Death and your father. He used my heartbreak as an excuse to curse Thane . Thus causing you both pain.” Pain looked at her empty glass. “ Did you know a curse is two-sided? What you give is what you get?”

“You have a broken heart too?”

“No. But I won’t find love until the curse is broken. Which is fine. Love looks like a painful affliction that I do not want.” Pain nodded to herself.

“The right love isn’t an affliction. It’s a…” Aurora tried to put into words what loving Thane was like. It was misery and joy, contentment and chaos, pain and pleasure all wrapped up in the form of a god. A god her body ached to be with when they were apart. A god she would risk everything for. It was selfless and selfish at the same time. “ You’re right, it is an affliction. But I don’t want the cure.”

“Says the god that has two curses to break.”

“Right.” Aurora watched a couple shadows creep closer, sniffing the whiskey. “ So what is the curse?”

“The kingdom of Casse is a fairy tale.” Pain’s voice was low.

Aurora turned to Pain . “ Are you serious?” Fairy tales existed in a place neither here nor there. A world that fed off mortals’ hopes and dreams, which was why gods were not allowed. They had neither. “ How did Death get into a fairy tale?”

“How would I know? He’s Death .” Pain shrugged.

“A fairy tale. Gods above, I hate this!” Aurora yelled up to the sky full of stars. She hated fairy tales. Nothing was ever as it seemed. Animals could talk, the sky could be the sea. Plates were made of dreams and food out of sand. But the worst parts of the fairy tales were the curses and how they needed to be broken. “ How do I get to a place that is made of smoke and nothing?”

“You should be more worried about figuring out what caused the curse in order to break it.”

Aurora groaned. “ I don’t have time to find a shoe or turn straw into gold.” The reason for the curse was always buried in some task or riddle.

Pain stood and walked over to the whiskey. “ Maybe you’ll have to slay a dragon. Another drink?” Pain held up the bottle.

Aurora stood and walked over to Pain . “ That would be better than…” Aurora took the glass. “ What if it’s love?” That was the most common problem in a fairy tale. Some unrequited or forbidden love. And the only way to break it was a kiss. “ That would mean…”

“You’d have to kiss a prince. Or an ass. You should wish for an ass since you are well-versed in kissing Thane . Cheers ?” Pain tipped her glass to Aurora’s .

“If Thane finds out…” Aurora felt the tears burning. So this was how her curse would break her and Thane this time. It was more than a simple kiss. It was love’s true kiss.

“Make sure he doesn’t.” Pain refilled her glass.

“But he’ll know. He knows there’s a curse.”

“He’s never gotten close enough to know what it is. You could say you had to find a shoe or a golden egg.” Pain looked down at her glass.

“Why did he never get close enough?”

“The castle is guarded by the seven virtues that gods lack. Thane has never made it past them.”

“And you think I will?”

“Yes. Because a fairy-tale prince cannot resist a fair maiden in distress. I know.” Pain looked down at the glass.

“How do you know this?”

“I’ve been there.”

“Then tell me what I must do.” Aurora’s voice pitched higher.

“I can’t because…” Pain looked away. “ I didn’t have whatever he needed to break the curse.”

“He?”

“The handsome prince. I guess he’s a king now.”

“So it is love.” Aurora stepped away from Pain , cursing Death . Of course it would be. Death loved games. Most of the old gods did. They loved irony and the lesson these games forced upon everyone.

“You don’t know that. It could be something else. It could be those three bears or helping that girl wandering around in the woods in the red.”

“All things you could’ve done.” Aurora set her glass down. Defeat tasted bitter, especially this close to the end. “ This is where Death wins.”

“I guess if you were lazy, yes,” Pain said.

“Lazy,” Aurora gritted out. “ I have until the sun rises in the mortal world to not only solve a fairy tale but to somehow find a way into a kingdom where gods cannot go. But yes, you are right. I am lazy.”

“Okay, then you are dramatic.” Pain crossed her arms over her chest. “ Rules don’t apply in fairy tales. When you collect it doesn’t matter. Take the next ten lifetimes for all I care. And I can get you in and out of the fairy tale.” Pain set the glass down. “ I know a way. I’ll get you there and back.”

“At what cost to me?” Her command over the stars made her vulnerable to the whims of the gods. “ I will not grant you any wish that will hurt Thane .”

“As tempting as that is, I’m not interested in wishes. One day you will have the ear of both the underworld and the heavens. And one day I may need that ear.” Pain stuck out her hand.

“Do you really think so?” Aurora looked at Pain’s hand.

Gods didn’t have friends; they barely had spouses. They might have allies but not a friend. Mortals were lucky in the sense they were able to form bonds with others over nothing more than a shared interest.

Aurora took Pain’s hand. “ If you betray me, my father will know your name and so will Sorrow . You will have no peace in either the heavens or the underworld.”

“I have none now.” They shook on it. “ We’ll leave for the frozen kingdom before the sun rises. Dress warmly; you’ll need it. I suggest you make sure Thane is well protected. I am the only one who can bring you back from Casse , and I won’t be able to if Death hurts Thane and Sorrow banishes me to the Valley of Shadows .”

“Thane will be safe.” Aurora waved off Pain’s concern. That would be the easy part. “ You better not be lying to me.”

“I want this over as much as you do,” Pain said before disappearing in a plume of smoke.

Aurora climbed the stairs again. Thane lay on his side, still sleeping. The bruises had started to fade, but the ache they caused was still there. She lay down next to him, memorizing the angles of his face. The fullness of his mouth. “ I hope you’ll forgive me.” She looked up at the star, searching for the right one.

The stars above her hushed their chattering, waiting to see which one she’d choose to grant her wish. She found one not too big and not too small. It fluttered down and landed on the palm of her hand. Its sharp feathers cut into her soft flesh. Its golden eye searched the room and those around it.

“I wish for Thane and all of Manere to sleep. That no god can enter. Neither Life nor Death shall visit until I have reaped the soul of the frozen queen.” Aurora blew on the star, sending it into flight. It flew around the room, then out the window. Stardust cascaded from the sky and rained down on Thane and his kingdom. A quiet hush settled over everything. The nightingale tucked its beak into its wing. The night jasmine closed, taking its scent with it. Even the stars seemed to yawn. All was in a peaceful slumber. If she failed, Death would lose too. His son would sleep for all eternity.

Aurora rolled over and watched Thane sleep. He was so beautiful.

Darkness covered in starlight.