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“Then you know what it’s like to live without them,” Nadine said through gritted teeth. “Give me a chance to watch my sons grow up. Give me the chance you never had.”
“The curse didn’t take my wife,” Autumn said in a broken tone. “It was a stroke, six years ago. Her grave is behind the house.”
Nadine pushed past me and ran outside.
I glared at Autumn. “This book is the only reason you kept me alive, isn’t it? So you had someone to pass your knowledge down to.”
Autumn didn’t answer, and that told me all I needed to know. Our connection be damned. She was not my master.
“Then I guess your job is done,” I stated flatly. “Don’t bother trying to save me anymore. No amount of saving me will save you.”
I stomped out of the cottage and followed Nadine into the forest behind the clearing. Nadine stopped at a gravestone marked Summer Loren.
“Summer took her wife’s last name,” Nadine remarked as she knelt beside her grave.
As Nadine ran her fingers over Summer’s grave, I flipped through the Reaper Records, just to be sure. “She’s the last one. We broke the curse on all the others. Once you break this piece of the curse, it will be gone forever.”
Tears welled in Nadine’s eyes. “Finally.”
Nadine placed her hand in the dirt over Summer’s grave. Tendrils of magic worked their way up her arm. I held my breath and remained on high alert, so I could respond quickly if anything went wrong. I expected Nadine to pass out, or for the ground to break like it had in the cemetery the night Nadine broke the curse on the other women’s bones.
Instead, a black cloud of magic materialized from Nadine’s chest, and another drifted up from the grave. The clouds merged together, swirling into one. A gust of wind breezed through the clearing, and the magic dissipated.
It was like I was taking a breath of air for the first time in twenty-two years. A massive weight came off my shoulders, and the colors around us seemed to brighten. I couldn’t explain it, but I felt like a completely new man.
Tears sprang to my eyes, and I fell to my knees beside my wife. “You broke the curse; I can feel it.”
Nadine curled into my arms, weeping. “I feel it, too. Our babies are saved!”
I held Nadine close as our tears fell into the dirt. Relief didn’t begin to describe our feelings. I thought for sure we were going to have to make an impossible decision tomorrow morning, but a miracle had happened, and we’d been spared from the greatest heartbreak of our lives. Autumn said she didn’t know what was going on behind our wards, but by the Goddess, she’d been an answer to our prayers, whether she knew it or not.
We’d been faced with two dark choices, neither of which we wanted to make. Now, we didn’t have to, but I couldn’t help but think of what might’ve happened if we hadn’t found Autumn today. Would I have become like her, if I’d been forced down one of these roads? Perhaps there was more to what she’d said than I realized.
“I think Autumn may be right about all these choices being gray areas,” I admitted.
Nadine wiped her eyes. “Yes, except some shades of gray are darker than others. In the priestesses’ case, it’s pitch black.”
I chuckled. “We’ve had to make a lot of hard decisions, and I’m still trying to get used to the idea that we can’t save everyone. I don’t want to become like Autumn, but what if we’re left with no choice?”
“Maybe making a difficult call doesn’t make us bad people,” Nadine said. “Perhaps it’s like Autumn said, that every decision harms and hurts. The thing is, even if we win, someone’s going to lose. We just have to do what we believe is the right thing, to save as many innocent lives as possible.”
“I want to do the right thing,” I told her. “I’m not used to the idea of war. Other cultures like the fae are practically born with a sword in their hands. They don’t question what they have to do out of duty or loyalty to their country. I wasn’t taught what to do when the coven divides. In my house growing up, if there was ever a fight, I was taught to keep my head down and stay out of the way. I can’t do that anymore.”
I ran my hand over her stomach. “Now we’ve got these kids on the way, and we have to figure out all over again who we’re going to be, because as parents, we’re not going to be the same people we were as college students. The choices are only going to get harder to make.”
“Then we’ll make them together,” Nadine promised.
I didn’t know if Autumn was right or not. All I knew for certain was that Nadine had broken the curse once and for all, and because of that, our family would survive.
“Can breaking this curse really be as simple as it was?” I asked. “There was no earthquake, no struggle.”
“I’m getting stronger,” Nadine said. “And now that this curse is broken, we’re stronger than ever. I know you’re scared of what kind of dad you’re going to be, but no matter what happens or how long it takes, we’re in this together.”
I smiled as I squeezed her hand. “Together.”
Chapter Eighteen
NADINE
