A Curse for True Love

He shot a furtive glance over Evangeline’s shoulder before quietly saying, “It’s complicated.”

She followed his gaze to the strange wooden door she’d been curled up against. On either side of the door were two warrior angels made of stone, although they looked more lifelike than stone carvings were supposed to. Their wings were outstretched and spattered in dried blood. The sight of it brought another pang in her chest, as if her body still remembered even though her mind had forgotten.

“Do you know what happened here?” she asked.

For a split second something crossed Apollo’s face that almost looked like guilt, but it might have just been sadness. “I promise, I’ll answer every question you have. But now we need to get out of here. We need to leave before he comes back.”

“Who is he?”

“The villain who erased all of your memories.” Apollo took Evangeline’s hand, holding her firmly as he quickly led her from the room with the door and the warrior angels.

Grainy late-morning light lit shelves of manuscripts tied up with ribbons and tassels. It appeared they were in an ancient library, although the books looked newer the farther they ventured.

Floors changed from dusty stone to gleaming marble, ceilings grew taller, the light became sharper, manuscripts turned into leather-bound volumes. Evangeline once again tried to search for something familiar in the late-morning glow. Something that might make her remember. Her head was clearer now, but nothing was familiar.

She was truly elsewhere, and it seemed she had been for long enough to meet heroes and villains, and to find herself in a battle between them.

“Who was he?” she pressed. “The one who stole my memories?”

Apollo’s steps faltered. Then they picked up faster than before. “I promise I will tell you everything, but we should get out of here—”

“Oh my!” someone exclaimed.

Evangeline turned to see a woman in white robes standing between the shelves of books. The woman—some kind of a librarian, Evangeline supposed—brought a hand to her mouth as she stared. Her expression was one of awe, eyes wide and unwavering as they latched on to Apollo.

Another librarian strode into the hall. This one gasped, then promptly fainted, dropping a stack of books as the first librarian yelled, “It’s a miracle!”

More librarians and scholars came forward, all crying out similar exclamations.

Evangeline curled toward Apollo as they were quickly surrounded. First by the librarians, then by servants and courtiers. Finally, by wide-chested guards in shining armor who rushed in, no doubt drawn by all of the clamor.

The room they were in was at least four stories tall, but suddenly it felt small and suffocating as more and more unfamiliar people closed in on them.

“He’s back . . .”

“He’s alive . . .”

“It’s a miracle!” they all repeated, voices turning reverent as tears began to glisten down cheeks.

Evangeline didn’t know what was happening. She felt as if she were witnessing the sort of thing that usually took place in a church. Was it possible she had married a saint?

Looking up at Apollo, she tried to remember his surname. Acadian, that was what he’d told her. She couldn’t recall a single story about an Apollo Acadian, but clearly there were stories. Upon meeting him, she’d imagined he was some kind of hero, but the crowd looked at him as if he was even more.

“Who are you?” Evangeline whispered.

Apollo brought her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to her knuckles that made her shiver. “I am the one who will never let anyone harm you again.”

A few nearby people sighed as they overheard the words.

Then Apollo raised his free hand toward the rumbling crowd in a gesture that universally meant quiet.

Those gathered immediately fell into a hush. Some even dropped to their knees.

It was uncanny to see so many people fall quiet so quickly—they didn’t even seem to breathe as Apollo’s voice rang out over their heads.

“I can see that some of you are having a difficult time believing your eyes. But what you’re seeing is real. I’m alive. When you leave this room, tell everyone you see that Prince Apollo died and then went through hell to get back here.”

Prince. Evangeline barely had time to process the word and everything that came with it—for almost as soon as Apollo spoke, he released Evangeline’s hand and swiftly took off his velvet doublet, followed by his linen shirt.

Several of those gathered gasped, including Evangeline.

Apollo’s chest was flawless, smooth and carved in muscles, and over his heart was a vibrant tattoo of two swords in the shape of a heart with a name in the center: Evangeline.

Until that moment, everything had felt a bit like a fever dream she might have woken up from. But her name on his chest felt permanent in a way that Apollo’s words had not. He wasn’t a stranger. He knew her intimately enough to mark her name across his heart.

He turned around then, showing off another sight that stunned not only her, but the entire crowd. Apollo’s beautiful, proud, straight back was covered in a web of violent scars.

“These marks are the price I paid to return!” he cried. “When I say I went through hell, I mean it. But I had to come back. I had to right the wrongs done in my absence. I know many believe that it was my brother, Tiberius, who killed me, but it was not.”

Shocked whispers moved through the crowd.

“I was poisoned by a man I thought to be a friend,” Apollo roared. “Lord Jacks is the man who killed me. Then he stole the memories of my bride, Evangeline. I will not rest until Jacks is found and he pays for his crimes with his life!”

Chapter 2

Evangeline

Voices echoed against the walls of stretching bookshelves as the library erupted with noise. Guards in armor vowed to find the criminal Lord Jacks, while polished courtiers and robed scholars shot out questions like showers of arrows.

“How long have you been alive, Your Highness?”

“How did you return from hell, Lord Prince?”

“Why did Lord Jacks steal your memories?” This inquiry, from an older courtier, was directed at Evangeline and punctuated by a narrow-eyed glare.

“Enough,” Apollo cut in. “I did not tell you about the horror my wife has gone through so that she could be attacked with questions she has no idea how to answer. I shared this information because I want Lord Jacks found, dead or alive. Although right now, I would prefer him dead.”

“We won’t fail you!” shouted the guards.

More declarations involving justice and Jacks rattled the ancient library shelves and pounded against Evangeline’s head, and suddenly it was all too much. The noise, the questions, the flood of unfamiliar faces, Apollo’s tale of going through hell.

More was said, but the words turned to ringing in her ears.

Evangeline wanted to cling to Apollo—he was all she had in this new reality. But he was also a powerful prince, which made him feel less like hers and more like everyone else’s. She was afraid to bother him with more questions, though she had so many. She still didn’t even know where she was.

From where she stood, Evangeline could see an oval window seat tucked under an arch of bookshelves. The window was a soft pale blue glass, and outside were full green needle trees as tall as towers covered in a picturesque layer of snow. It rarely snowed in Valenda, and never as thick as this, as if the world were a cake and the snow was dollops of thick white frosting.

As she had noticed before, the fashion here was different as well. The guards looked like knights from old tales, and the courtiers wore formal clothing similar to Apollo’s. Men were dressed in doublets, while women wore elaborate velvet gowns with off-the-shoulder necklines and dropped waists decorated with brocade belts or strings of pearls.

Evangeline had never seen people dressed like this. But she’d heard stories.

Her mother had been born in the Magnificent North, and she’d told Evangeline countless tales about this land, fairytales that made it sound as if it were the most enchanted place in all the world.

Unfortunately, Evangeline felt far from enchanted at this moment.

Apollo met her gaze then and turned away from the shrinking crowd surrounding them. It seemed people had already left to spread word that Prince Apollo was back from the dead. And why wouldn’t they? Evangeline never heard of someone coming back from the dead. A thought that made her feel quite small as she stood next to him.

Only a few people remained, but Apollo ignored them all as he gazed into Evangeline’s eyes. “There’s nothing for you to be afraid of.”

“I’m not afraid,” she lied.

“You’re looking at me differently.” He smiled at her then, a smile so charming she wondered how she hadn’t immediately known what he was.

“You’re a prince,” she squeaked.

Apollo grinned wider. “Is that a problem?”

“No, I . . . just—” Evangeline almost said she’d never imagined herself married to a prince.

But of course she had. Only her imaginings weren’t as elaborate as this. This was beyond every pastel dream she had ever had of royalty and castles and faraway places. But she would have traded it all to remember just how she’d gotten here, how she’d fallen in love and married this man and lost what felt like part of her heart.

It hit her then. In fairytales, there was always a price for magic. Nothing came without a cost; peasants who turned into princesses always had to pay. And suddenly Evangeline wondered if her lost memories were the price she had paid for all of this.

Had she traded her memories, along with part of her heart, to be with Apollo? Could she have been that foolish?

Apollo’s smile softened, turning from teasing to reassuring. When he spoke, his words were gentler as well, as if he sensed part of what she was feeling. Or maybe it was just that he knew her well, even though she did not know him. He did have her name tattooed over his heart.

“It will all be all right,” he said quietly, firmly. “I know it’s a lot to take in. I hate to leave you, but there are a few things I need to take care of and, while I do that, my guards are ready to escort you to your suite. But I’ll try not to leave you alone for long. I promise, there is nothing more important to me than you.”

Apollo pressed another kiss to her hand and gave her one last look before he marched off, followed by his personal guards.

Evangeline stood there feeling suddenly alone and bursting with more questions than she had answers for. If Apollo had just come back from the dead, how did he already know what had happened to her? Maybe he was wrong about this Lord Jacks stealing her memories, and Evangeline was right about having foolishly traded them—which left her wondering if she could trade them back.

This question haunted her as she followed the guards that Apollo had assigned her through the castle. They didn’t say much, but they did tell Evangeline that Apollo’s castle was called Wolf Hall. It had been built by the first king of the Magnificent North, the famed Wolfric Valor, making her think of all her mother’s Northern stories.

Compared to where Evangeline had grown up, the North felt incredibly old, as if every stone beneath her feet held a secret of a bygone era.

One hallway was lined with doors that all had the most elaborate handles. One was shaped like a little dragon, another looked like fairy wings, and then there was a wolf’s head wearing a pretty flower crown. These were the types of handles that tempted her to pull them and made her suspect they might be a little alive, like the bell that had hung outside the door to her father’s curiosity shop.

Evangeline felt an arrow of grief at the thought of it—not just the bell, but the shop and her parents and everything that she had lost. It was a dizzying torrent that hit her so suddenly she wasn’t aware she’d stopped moving until a guard with a thick red mustache leaned close and said, “Are you all right, Your Highness? Do you need one of us to carry you?”

“Oh no,” Evangeline said, instantly mortified. “My feet work just fine. It’s just so much to take in. What is this hall?”

“This is the Valors’ wing. Most people think these were the rooms of the Valor children, although no one knows for sure. These doors have stayed locked ever since they died.”

But you could open us.

The strange voice sounded as if it came from one of the doors. Evangeline looked at each of her guards, but none of them appeared to have heard it. So she pretended she hadn’t heard it, either. Evangeline was in a difficult situation as it was. She didn’t need to make things worse for herself by saying she heard voices coming from inanimate objects.

Thankfully it didn’t happen again. When the guards finally stopped in front of a pair of ornate double doors, the jeweled doorknobs sparkled but didn’t say a word. There was only a gentle whoosh as they opened up to the most opulent suite of rooms that Evangeline had ever seen.

It was all so lovely that she felt as if harps should be playing and birds should be singing. Everything was glittering and golden and covered in flowers. There were boughs of harlequin lilies framing the two-story fireplace and vines of white starmires curling around the bedposts. Even the great copper tub Evangeline spied in the bathing room beyond was full of flowers—the steaming water inside was violet and covered in soft white and pink petals.

Evangeline walked to the bath and dipped her fingers in the water. Everything was perfect.

Even the maids who entered to help her bathe and dress were all perfectly lovely. There were also a surprising number of them, nearly a dozen. They had sweet voices and gentle hands that helped her into a gown as delicate as a whisper.

The dress was an off-the-shoulder confection of blush tulle with sheer sleeves adorned with dark pink ribbons. The same ribbons lined the low neckline of the gown before twirling into little rosebuds that covered the bust of the fitted bodice. The skirt flowed and fluttered down to Evangeline’s toes. A maid completed the look by braiding Evangeline’s rose-gold hair into a crown and then decorating it with a circlet of gilded flowers.

“If I do say so myself, you look lovely, Your Highness.”

“Thank you—”

“Martine,” the maid supplied before Evangeline had to fumble around to try to find the name. “I’m also from the Meridian Empire originally. His Highness the prince thought having me here might help you adjust a bit more.”

“It sounds as if the prince is very thoughtful.”

“I think, when it comes to you . . . he tries to think of everything.”

Martine smiled, but the bit of hesitation in her words gave Evangeline a second of pause, a flutter of a feeling that said Apollo was too good to be true. That all of this was.

When Evangeline was alone and looked in the mirror, she saw the reflection of a princess. This was everything she could have wanted.

Yet she didn’t feel like a princess.

She felt like the idea of a princess, with the dress and the prince and the castle, and yet she also felt without. She felt as if she were simply wearing a costume, that she’d stepped into a role that she could simply step out of, only there wasn’t anywhere else to step to. Because she also didn’t feel like the girl she’d been before, the eternally hopeful girl who believed in fairytales, love at first sight, and happily ever afters.

If she had been that girl, it might have been easier to accept all of this, to not want to ask so many questions.

But something had happened to that girl—to her. And Evangeline couldn’t help but think it went beyond her missing memories.

Her heart still hurt, as if it had been broken and only jagged bits remained. She put a hand on it, as if to keep more pieces from breaking off. And once again, she was struck with the inescapable feeling that among everything she’d forgotten was one thing more important than all the rest, more important than anything.

There was something absolutely vital she needed to tell someone. But no matter how hard she tried, she could not remember what it was or who it was she needed to tell.

Chapter 3

Evangeline

Evangeline was only vaguely aware of the setting sun and the slow darkening of her rooms as she paced across the carpets, fighting desperately to remember anything at all. She hoped that when Apollo returned, he’d be able to give her more answers. But when the door to her rooms finally opened, instead of the prince, she was greeted by an aged physician and a couple of his younger apprentices.

“My name is Dr. Irvis Stillgrass,” said the senior physician, a bearded man with spectacles perched on the tip of his pointed nose. “Telma and Yrell are my apprentices.” He motioned to the others. “His Highness wanted us to ask you a few questions to see just how many of your memories were taken.”

“Do you have any way to bring them back?” Evangeline asked.

Dr. Stillgrass, Telma, and Yrell all pursed their lips at once. A response that Evangeline took to mean no. She wasn’t surprised, which was almost as disturbing. Evangeline almost always felt hopeful, yet she couldn’t summon that hope today. Again, she wondered what had happened to her.

“Why don’t you take a seat, Princess.” Dr. Stillgrass motioned toward a tufted chair near the fire, which Evangeline dutifully took.

The physicians remained standing, towering over her as Dr. Stillgrass asked his questions.

“How old are you?”

“I’m . . .” Evangeline had to pause to think about it. One of her last clear memories was from when she was sixteen. Her father was still alive, and she could faintly remember him smiling as he opened up a new crate of curiosities. But that was all she could recall.

The rest of the memory was blurry around the edges, like a dirty pane of glass that gave the impression of an image without actually showing what it was. Evangeline was sure her father had died some months after this weak memory, but she couldn’t recall any of the particulars. She just knew in her heart that he was gone and more time had passed since then. “I believe I’m seventeen.”

Telma and Yrell appeared to jot down notes about her answer, while Dr. Stillgrass asked another question. “When is your first memory of meeting Prince Apollo?”

“Today.” Evangeline paused. “Do you know when we actually met?”

“I am here to ask, not to answer,” Dr. Stillgrass said briskly before continuing with his questions: Did she recall her engagement to Apollo, her wedding, the night he died?

“No.”

“No.”

“No.”

It was the only answer Evangeline had, and whenever she tried to turn the questions around, Dr. Stillgrass refused to answer.

At some point during the interview, a new gentleman entered the room. Evangeline hadn’t even seen him slip inside, but suddenly he was there, standing just behind Telma and Yrell. He was dressed much like them, in a long brown leather tunic worn atop fitted black pants and belted with two straps of leather that secured a series of knives and vials to one hip and a harness for a book to the other. The book appeared to be in his hands now, but something about the way he jotted things down in his notebook was different from the other apprentices.

This young man wrote with a flourish, swishing his feathered pen in a way that kept drawing Evangeline’s eyes. When he caught her staring, he winked and brought a finger to his lips, gesturing for her not to tell.

And for some reason, she didn’t.

Evangeline had a feeling this man wasn’t supposed to be here, despite his similar manner of dress. But he was the only one of this group who seemed to feel anything for her as she struggled for answers. He nodded encouragingly, smiled at her sympathetically, and whenever Dr. Stillgrass said something particularly unkind, he rolled his eyes.

“I can confirm that your memories of the last year are entirely gone,” Dr. Stillgrass said self-importantly and quite callously. “We’ll report this to His Highness, and one of us will return each day to see if any memories come back.”

The trio of physicians turned to leave. Dr. Stillgrass swept past the young man without a glance, but Yrell and Telma finally noticed him then.

“Doctor—” Telma started.

But Yrell, who looked slightly dazzled by the interloper, yanked the sleeve of her robe, stopping her from saying more as the trio exited.

Only the nameless young man lingered.

He sauntered toward Evangeline and pulled a rectangular red card from his pocket.

“I would not have believed it if I had not seen it with my own eyes,” he said softly. “I am sorry for the loss of your memories. If you’d ever like to talk and perhaps answer some questions, I might be able to fill in a few blanks for you.”

He handed her the card.

Kristof Knightlinger

Southern Morningwatch Tower

The Spires

“What kind of questions . . . ?” Evangeline started to ask as she finished reading the curious card.

But the gentleman was already gone.

The fire crackled.

Evangeline felt herself startle awake, although she hadn’t meant to fall asleep. She was curled up in the fireside chair where she’d puzzled over the little red card from Kristof Knightlinger. She could still feel it in her hand.

She could also feel something else. A man’s arms sliding under her, carefully picking her up and holding her close to a chest that smelled of balsam and something woodsy.

Apollo.

Her stomach dipped.

She couldn’t be entirely sure it was Apollo picking her up. Her eyes were still closed and she was tempted to keep it that way. She didn’t know why she had this urge to pretend or why her heart beat faster as he carried her. Apollo had to have answers to at least some of her questions. Yet she felt unexpectedly afraid to ask them.

She wasn’t sure if it was because he was a prince or because he was still a stranger.

His arms tightened around her. Evangeline tensed. But then suddenly she felt as if she was starting to remember something. There wasn’t much there, just a vague recollection of being held and carried, followed by a thought.

He would carry her through more than just freezing waters. He would pull her through fire if he had to, haul her from the clutches of war, from falling cities and breaking worlds . . .

The thought made something unclench inside her and, for a second, Evangeline felt safe. More than safe, actually. But she didn’t quite have words for the exact feeling. She only knew it wasn’t something she’d experienced before—this deep level of protectiveness.

Slowly, she cracked open her eyes. Outside it was now full night, and inside there was only firelight, leaving most of the room cloaked in shadows, save for the prince who held her. The light clung to him, gilding the edges of his dark hair and his strong jaw as he carried her toward the bed.

“I’m sorry,” Apollo murmured. “I didn’t want to wake you, but you looked uncomfortable on the chair.”

Gently he laid Evangeline on a downy quilt. Then he brushed a quick kiss to her cheek. It was so soft she might not have felt it if she weren’t so acutely aware of his every move, of the slow slide of his warm hands releasing her body. “Sweet dreams, Evangeline.”

“Wait.” She grabbed his hand.

Surprise briefly colored his features. “Did you want me to stay?”

Yes probably should have been her answer.

They were married.

He was a prince.