The Connelly Curse

by Lily Velez

  The cave shuddered as the storm raged outside, everything convulsing as this incomprehensible power we’d awakened continued to build and build. Then, in one final explosion, the magic released in a surge of radiant energy, like being at the center of an imploding sun.

  Scarlet arched up from the floor, gasping for breath. Coughs sputtered out of her, and I held her up as she gulped down air. With a moan, her head fell onto my shoulder, but her breaths were deep and even, and her color was already returning.

  I pulled her close to me, breathless, speechless, still trying to make sense of what had just occurred, ultimately grateful for the warmth of her, the life in her.

  Kai, uncharacteristically quiet, stared at me, his usual wisps of smoke slowly trailing up and down his edges. “You called her from out of the darkness,” he said plainly.

  “She did the same for me at Uisneach.”

  This took him aback. There was a long pause. “She did it for you, and now you’ve returned the favor. There’s only one reason why two witches would be able to pull each other from death’s door.”

  But already, I could feel my energy dimming. A weight fell upon my eyelids, and I sagged against a wall of the cave, though my arms remained tight around Scarlet.

  She was here. I was here. For now, it was all that mattered.

  38

  Scarlet

  Fire filled my vision.

  The flames trembled and snapped, casting quivering shadows against a far wall. I blinked slowly as they sharpened into focus, as the cobwebs of sleep gradually fell away. Frowning, I sat up, wincing at the tenderness that seemed to be in every part of my body.

  A faint pain particularly burned at my right hand and left upper arm. When I checked those areas, I found bandages made from torn fabric. They covered the bites I’d earned from the Warglings, which, miraculously, weren’t swelling the way I would’ve expected them to be.

  I tested my weight on the ankle a Wargling had attacked. A tight soreness was present but nothing completely debilitating. All things considered, I was in remarkable shape in light of what I’d been through up until this point. Even my hunger seemed to have receded; there but barely noticeable.

  Indeed, every possible discomfort seemed to be blanketed by a warm sensation that buzzed just under my skin from the top of my head to the soles of my feet.

  That same sensation tugged me in the direction of the cave’s opening, and somehow, I knew it was leading me to Jack, as if something in him called out to something in me.

  The rain fell in clamorous sheets outside. During my time in Morrígan’s kingdom, I’d been amazed by the climate disparities from one region to the next. Nightfell presently weathered a savage winter. The Cave of Nightmares had been dry and humid. The Everwoods was an eternal spring—flowers blooming with pride, streams sparkling in the sunlight, and water occasionally pouring from the sky without mercy.

  Despite the poor visibility, I could still sense him in a way I never had before.

  And then, there he was.

  He was making his way back to the cave, carrying a bundle of branches over his shoulder, presumably for the fire inside. His dark hair was plastered down with rainwater, the dripping ends of it slightly curling against his long lashes. His shirt clung to him like a second skin, the wet fabric defining the toned muscles of his arms, chest, and stomach.

  I tried to swallow, but my throat was suddenly parched. I couldn’t keep my eyes from practically feasting on the sight of him, on how heartbreakingly masculine he looked. Though my thoughts were private, I was almost embarrassed by how badly I wanted to be near him, by how much I needed to be near him, as if it were a craving.

  When he noted my presence, he came to a halt, our gazes locking. For a few long moments, all we did was stare at each other across the short distance separating us. That warm sensation from earlier intensified. It felt as if my soul were glimmering, as if it were fashioned from radiant sunlight. Again, that tug, pulling at my core. Again, that inexplicable, consuming desire to be closer to him.

  Finally, when I could bear it no longer, I canceled the abominable space between us, rushing up to him until I was so close I had to tilt my head back to meet those mesmerizing, brandy-colored eyes.

  Even then, the closeness wasn’t enough. I wanted to be closer still. My fingers ached to touch his face, my arms wanted nothing more than to wrap around his neck. And yet a part of me screamed, What are you doing? What about The Cave of Nightmares? Yes, there was still that, that wretched destiny of mine.

  Which meant there was a recklessness to this moment. That much I couldn’t deny. But that didn’t make me turn around and hurry back into the cave, no matter how much my rational side demanded it. A bigger part of me was determined to remain rooted right in this very spot.

  Impossibly, the rain fell harder. It was nearly deafening. My hair and clothes were already soaked, but the cold didn’t faze me. I just kept looking at Jack, my eyes combing over the perfect angles of his face as if committing them to memory. The freckles, the cheekbones, the jawline, the shadows under his eyes, which seemed darker than usual.

  Jack slowly set the bundle of wood down before straightening again. His eyes were riveted to me, cluttered with thoughts I couldn’t have possibly guessed at. I did recognize the decision in his gaze, though. It came a second before he reached for me.

  It was meant to be a simple, gentle touch, a palm to my cheek the way he’d done so many times before. But my pulse spiked, that destiny flashing in my mind with bared teeth, and despite how I longed to feel his skin, I jerked back.

  The hurt in his eyes pulverized my heart so that I could barely breathe.

  “I’m sorry,” I quickly offered, my throat pinching.

  He shook his head. He almost looked defeated, which only crushed me further. “You have every right to be afraid.”

  “Afraid?” Is that what he’d thought all this time? Guilt chafed me. Of course it was. He’d confessed as much before we’d even stepped foot into the Otherworld, expressing his concern that I was frightened by him or his curse or both.

  “I know you must’ve seen a vision of me in The Cave of Nightmares. Maybe of what I’m destined to become?”

  “No,” I declared, a bit more vehemently than I’d intended.

  “You didn’t see a vision?”

  “I mean, I did, but that’s not the reason for…I haven’t been keeping my distance because of…” I groaned, covering my face with my hands. This wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t want him to know what I’d seen, so ready was I to take it to my grave. I was afraid it would change something between us, that it would change something within him.

  You’re afraid he’ll want nothing to do with you once he knows. You’re afraid you’ll be all alone.

  I was, I realized, the truth staggering. And that was entirely selfish of me. Because withholding the truth from him was its own type of aloneness, wasn’t it? A festering, dishonest aloneness that would only turn my insides to rot. I dropped my hands, knowing what I had to do.

  “It’s not you hurting me that scares me,” I said miserably, speaking over the din of the rain. “It’s me hurting you.”

  And then I told him the truth, the heart-wrenching, devastating truth I’d been carrying all this time. I spared no detail. I told him of my supposed role as a Daughter of Brigid, I told him of the glowing dagger I was to wield, I told him of the battle that pitted us against each other with only one combatant meant to survive. As much as my heart protested it, I told him everything, all of it.

  When the last words left me, I wrapped my arms around myself, only now feeling the cold from my rain-soaked clothes. Rivulets of water raced down my neck and arms, and puddles steadily formed all around us, reflecting the slate-gray sky as they collected more water with deep, thirsty gulps. The rain had since eased up, lightening into a soft shower that was no less freezing but at least somewhat tolerable.

  Jack had said nothing throughout my entire confession. He said nothing n
ow. Brow furrowed, he mulled over my words, as if parsing them to uncover some sort of hidden meaning or escape clause. Convinced there could be none, I braced myself for the inevitable, for him to tell me that this had to be where our paths diverged.

  Instead, he said, “That makes sense.”

  I blinked, waiting for him to elaborate. He didn’t. “Why aren’t you as shocked as I thought you’d be?”

  “Because I think I understand how all of the pieces fit together now. For so long, witches have believed that the era of the Daughters of Brigid was long gone. After all, the last of them lived during The Burning Times. It would take something incredibly significant for Brigid to call forth a new warrior. All this time, it wasn’t just about the Reaping. It was about this. The Dark Lord’s ascension and my role in it. Brigid knew that if it came down to it, I would have to be stopped.”

  I shook my head. “Then she’ll have to find someone else because I would never do that.”

  “You may have to,” Jack said. “I saw things in The Cave of Nightmares too, Scarlet. If I were to ever become the Dark Lord’s puppet, I would rather someone end me than for me to be the weapon by which countless innocent lives are destroyed.”

  The statement didn’t surprise me. It was very much the sort of thing Jack would say. His earnestness in saying it didn’t surprise me either. He meant every word. What surprised me was the stunning clarity that suddenly befell me.

  I’d seen a possible future in which I was to take Jack’s life, and my first response had been to stay away from him, so certain was I that it would come true. I thought it had been a reasonable response. Now I only saw it as cowardly.

  Jack had said that being a witch meant acknowledging and owning your inner power, and yet I’d so easily given mine away. And if I bought into this would-be destiny of ours, wasn’t I doing the same? Where was my voice in all this? Where was my right to make a decision for myself?

  “No,” I said.

  “Scarlet, it’s all ri—”

  “No,” I said again. “I’m not going to let you be some sacrificial lamb on the altar of the gods. Why should we have to play the roles that others have cast for us? I’m not a puppet, and I have no interest in being one.”

  “You’re talking about changing fate.”

  “And rewriting our destiny,” I said. “To what we want it to be. Haven’t we already done that? Morrígan said no mortal has ever survived The Cave of Nightmares, and yet together, we did. She never expected us to survive The Everwoods, and yet here we are. We’ve already defied fate. When we stop Alistair from breaking the last seal, we’ll do it again. And when we find a way to free you from your curse, we’ll do it one more time.”

  Jack’s eyes were faraway as he considered something. “We’re stronger together,” he finally murmured to himself.

  I nodded emphatically. I hadn’t expected him to subscribe to my way of thinking so easily. “Exactly!”

  “No, we literally are stronger together. At Uisneach, I should’ve died. You challenged death itself and pulled me back. A few hours ago, I did something similar for you.”

  Though I hadn’t awakened with that memory at the forefront of my mind, his speaking of it now called it forth. “I remember,” I said as the vivid bits and pieces started to unspool. “I felt your magic all around me. And then it intertwined with mine.”

  “I’ve never experienced anything like that before,” Jack said. “I didn’t understand what was happening initially. Not until our magic merged. That was when we destroyed the Wargling venom, Scarlet. Together.”

  My heartbeat quickened. That warmth inside me reached a fever pitch. “Is that why it feels like my soul is humming right now?”

  “You feel it too?”

  I couldn’t answer. I was stuck on the revelation that every sensation I presently knew was mirrored in Jack’s body.

  “I was ready to dismiss it,” Jack said, “thinking it was only a side effect of what happened, but as I stood here listening to you talk about defying the gods themselves, it rallied something in me. Apart, I’m almost sure the destinies we were shown will come true. But if we stand as a united front, maybe you’re right. Maybe we really have a chance at changing the future.”

  “Your battles are my battles,” I whispered, the words more relevant than ever.

  “Your battles are my battles,” he agreed. “There’s a reason you came to Rosalyn Bay. Our paths were always meant to intersect. In a world of billions, the two of us were destined to find each other for this very purpose.”

  My chest swelled with emotion. I had always believed as much, but hearing Jack convey the same sentiment had me feeling weightless. “I should’ve never kept my distance from you after The Cave of Nightmares,” I said. “I thought I was protecting you.”

  “I would’ve done the same. And in a way, I did. After all, I didn’t fight against the distance. I thought I was keeping you safe from my own dark fate. I thought it would be best that way. This pure energy between us, though…”

  That energy he spoke of continued to thrum in my veins. He can feel it too, I reminded myself, thrilled by the thought.

  “The truth is there are any number of reasons why we shouldn’t be together,” Jack said. “I’m Marked by darkness, you by light. My namesake is cursed, you carry the namesake of the holiest of goddesses. I’m destined to be a soldier of the Dark Lord, and you were chosen to be a warrior for good. And maybe all of that does mean that when the end comes, we’re fated to stand on opposite sides of a war. But that doesn’t change this powerful connection between us. And it doesn’t change how much I care about you, Scarlet, or what I feel for you.”

  I was breathless. Totally and completely breathless. Surely I had to be dreaming. Surely Jack Connelly hadn’t just confessed that he had feelings for me. Actual, true feelings for me. Was this what it meant to feel like you were flying even when your feet were still on the ground?

  I dared a small step forward, no longer afraid of our close proximity to each other. The connection between us instantly strengthened, my cheeks flush in spite of the rain. Jack watched me. He swallowed. It was a sensation a lot like being on the very edge of a precipice, knowing there was no turning back once you took that final step.

  I took it.

  And with it, there was no longer any space between us. The rain continued to fall all around us, glistening beads of it dripping from Jack’s hair, splashing onto the bridge of my nose, onto my cheeks. The cold wind shrieked, and the sky swelled like a bruise, but my attention was fastened on nothing and no one else but the boy in front of me.

  As far as I was concerned, there was only me and Jack, standing at the center of our own universe, anchoring each other in a reality where we were strong enough to defy fate—and possibly even win. The roots of what we felt for each other reached deep into the earth, holding us steady in the storm that was and the storm that was still to come.

  He was all I saw, all I could think about, and seeing the way he looked at me, I knew he felt the same. That sugary knowledge cascaded down my soul, enveloping me with a decadent, delicious warmth that made me feel light and airy like a swirl of cotton candy.

  Jack took my face in his hands, and it was all I could do to keep breathing. My fingers clutched the wet fabric at his chest as our eyes met once more. I saw a new beginning in his gaze. A new beginning for the both of us. Because from this day forward, we were in this together, in every possible way.

  Your battles are my battles.

  Your everything is my everything.

  Jack’s eyes dropped to my mouth and darkened to liquid amber.

  In the next moment, his lips were on mine.

  Everything else ceased to exist.

  He kissed me sweetly, with care. So tender, so delicate. As if I were a fragile thing, a thing he couldn’t stand to break, a thing he treasured above all others. I melted against his body at once. The hard planes of his chest met the softness of mine, and we were a perfect fit, two pieces finally
coming together. Once separated by thousands of miles, now separated by nothing.

  His perfect lips were soft and seductive as he sealed his mouth to mine. I was feverish all over, and the heat emanating from Jack’s own body was only kindling to the fire. It ignited something low in my stomach, and a moment later, there was a sharp, wicked pull in a deep, intimate part of me. I couldn’t help the sound that escaped me.

  It hummed against Jack’s lips. He tensed for a single heartbeat, and then he suddenly pulled me as close against him as humanly possible, his muscled arms rippling as they tightened around my waist. I threw my arms around his neck and gripped a handful of his wet hair as our kiss deepened further.

  The way his fingers clutched the fabric at my waist, the way he held me firmly in place against his body—it unraveled me. That pulsating energy that linked us grew frenetic, grew as wild as my crazed, galloping heart. It was insatiable.

  His lips parted, and mine followed suit, and I nearly dissolved. He tasted like spearmint and sweet promises and new beginnings. Everything that I felt for him was magnified a thousandfold until I burned like a pyre, my heart a well of passion that overflowed until that same passion was trickling down my soul—no, pouring down my soul. Perhaps pouring straight into Jack’s soul too.

  We briefly broke apart only to catch our breaths, to change the angle of our heads, and then his lips quickly crashed back into mine. We were one body in the rain. The water was everywhere, skating down our arms, running down our cheeks. It skirted the corners of our melded mouths, but we kept kissing. We kept kissing until we were dizzy from it. We kept kissing until we were breathless from it.

  All the while, that buzzing energy that enveloped me—that enveloped us—continued to swell. I found I loved the feel of it. I found I loved the feel of a lot of things.

  I loved the feel of Jack’s strong arms around me, securing me firmly against his body. I loved the strength and power that radiated from his solid build, the way I could feel his muscles tense and shift against me. I loved the silky smoothness of his mouth, the smell of the forest on his skin, the way I came undone piece by piece the longer he kissed me until I was sure there would be nothing left of me when it was all said and done.