Cursed by Malignant Magic (Once Upon A Curse)

Chapter 3

Chapter

Three

A s consciousness slowly returned to me, the fire of my magic burned through every inch of my body. It crackled and surged within me, threatening to burst free from its confines.

My skin felt stretched and strained, as if it were being pulled taut over my bones. The rough material beneath me prickled like a hundred tiny knives, adding to the discomfort.

I fought the urge to move, knowing that any sudden motion could unleash the chaotic energy within. With shallow breaths, I tried to calm the riotous sensation and allow it to settle before attempting to rise again.

Finally, the magic calmed, and I took a few more deep, experimental breaths before I cracked my eyes open.

Ehuna looked over her shoulder at me from the front of her wagon, and I instinctively tried to sit up but fell back with a groan of pain. It had been a very long time since I had overloaded myself on magic so badly, although this time it hadn't been my fault.

I thought back for just a moment before my thoughts shied away from the memory. That had been when I had first met Ehuna, and things had gone just as poorly for me then as they had this time.

I was lucky not to have died from overloading my own magic before, and this? Being caught in an explosion of magic the likes of which I had never seen before? I was lucky I hadn't leveled the city.

Ehuna pushed me back down with her hand to my forehead.

"Quit that," she said firmly, and my body relaxed at her command.

I had been listening to her for so long that my body knew what to do even when my mind scrambled for any explanation as to what had happened. Still, the ache in my body was unlike anything I'd felt before, even when I'd used too much of my own magic, and the barely contained riot beneath my skin certainly wasn't helping my focus any.

"What happened? Where am I?"

She looked down at me for a moment, no doubt considering how to answer, and her horse snorted, ears flicking.

I chanced moving my head to the side, trying to ignore the stab of pain it elicited.

No, wait a moment. A sharp, searing pain pulsed through my entire body from the recent use of magic. Every nerve felt like it was on fire, but there was a distinct throbbing in my forehead that drew my attention.

I brought my hands out from beneath a blanket and lifted them hesitantly to explore the source of my discomfort.

Ehuna's hand swatted mine away before I could fully investigate, but not before I felt the sting of a fresh cut on my forehead. It was as if a hot iron had been pressed against my skin, leaving behind a fiery reminder of the magic I had just wielded.

Or perhaps the cut was not from the magic, but from the explosion itself. That would make more sense.

"Stop that," she said again. "You took a good knock to the head when things exploded. As for where we are, I was summoned to the front lines, so I brought you with me."

I furrowed my brow as I considered her words. The throbbing pain in my head confirmed her theory. I knew my powers were strong, but even they couldn't withstand the explosion of barrels and buildings all at once without being weakened.

The fact that she had brought me with her made some sense as well. I was too useful to leave behind, which I would have appreciated more if every hole in the road the wagon drove over didn’t make my head pound in time with my heartbeat.

Still, when I hurt less, no doubt I would appreciate the fact that she had refused to leave me behind. It meant something, and it eased my fear that everyone who cared for me would leave me behind.

Like so many had before.

I forced myself up onto my elbows, trying to ignore her dark look of censure. Technically, I wasn't all the way up, and with the way my head and my magic both felt at the moment, this was probably as far as I was going to get.

"So what are we going to do when we get there?" I ask. "Somehow I doubt the folks in charge would appreciate a dizzy collie in the midst of a clandestine meeting."

I was more than happy to crash their meeting if that was what she wanted, something that would be true even if I hadn't been injured, but I was also looking for a way to prove to her that I was still capable of being useful. Even if my head was pounding and my magic felt like it was about to crawl up my throat.

Ehuna sighed, raising her eyes to the heavens like the gods were going to help her somehow. "I am going to the meeting I was summoned here for. You are going to rest in the barracks until I have assurances that you are ready to go back into the field."

I opened my mouth to tell her I was ready right now, but she leveled a cutting glare at me and held up her hand to forestall me.

"Assurances from someone who has actual medical experience."

Fair enough.

I stretched back out in the wagon, trying to ease the nausea of my magic swirling so wildly inside me. No doubt I had taken in a serious amount of magic in the process of trying to stop that explosion in the middle of the market, so it made perfect sense that my body would react poorly to it.

I, most likely, had entirely too much magic in my body right now, and the only reason that I was still alive and not overdosing on magic was because of my unique abilities.

Ehuna didn't know about those. No one did, and that couldn't change. If I was examined in too much detail, the healer might notice something was off. I couldn't allow that, but at the moment, I didn't have a plan to stop it.

That would have to come later.

Not too much later, as it turned out.

The moment we arrived inside the fort where the meeting was to take place, Ehuna sent me to the barracks, along with a guard to "escort" me there. She claimed that it was just because she thought I looked like I was still about to fall over, but the long sleep I'd taken in the wagon had helped, and I knew better. She wanted to make sure I did what I was told.

And I tried to. I really did. I even managed to stay in the room allotted for me for several hours, dividing my time between pacing back and forth and trying to sleep.

But after hours of staring at the bed and studying everything in the sparsely furnished room, I was so bored that I had to give up on doing as I was told. I couldn’t anyway because of the sudden giant burst of magic.

It seared through my chest, enough to make me double over in both shock and pain. There was already far too much magic in my body, and it had only just started to settle in. This additional magic was just too much.

And it tugged at me to leave.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, I was going stir crazy just from the few hours that I’d been cooped up in this room, and I felt enough like myself that I could handle stepping out of the room for a few minutes.

I had plenty of excuses for why I felt the need to do it, ranging from the knowledge that I had almost died from something similar and I should check it out to make sure that no one else was in danger, all the way to realizing that the guard outside my door had wandered away and left me unguarded.

If ever there had been a sign that the gods wanted me to do something, it was this. Right now. Besides, I was curious.

Just in case, I looked both ways from the doorway of my room and then moved on silent feet down the hallway. No one seemed to be around, which made sense. Soldiers would be out doing…whatever soldiers other than me did, and those in positions of power, like Ehuna, would be in their very important meeting.

All I needed to do was hug the wall long enough to find my way out of this maze of boring, extremely bland corridors, and I could follow my nose and the yank of magic in my chest.

Following the magic was almost pathetically easy, especially considering that I was still so weak from my recent misadventure. Still, I simply followed the tug, only occasionally scenting the air to make sure I headed in the right direction. It was all so easy, and it didn't occur to me that perhaps it was too easy.

Not until I saw the source of the magic.

My throat closed, horror shivering through my bones as I tilted my head back to look at the massive monster in the sky. I'd been so bored back in the room that I had never considered I might wish I'd stayed there, but that was the only thing I was thinking right now. That, and the obvious:

I should definitely run.