The Perfect Prey
I was dying.
Each step through the forest sent pain lancing up my side, but the wound was a mere inconvenience compared to what spread beneath my skin. I didn't need to look to know the curse was worsening—I could feel it, black veins creeping outward like spiderwebs of poison, turning my own shadow magic against me.
Three weeks since I'd escaped my captors. Three weeks of running, hiding, watching the curse they'd bound me with consume more of me with each passing day.
I pressed my palm against the nearest tree, leaving a smear of blood as I caught my breath. The forest blurred around me, trees doubling and shifting in my vision. Not much time left. Perhaps a couple of weeks, if I was fortunate. Days, if I wasn't.
A bitter laugh escaped me, echoing hollowly among the trees. Fortune had abandoned House Blackbriar a long time ago.
I forced myself forward, one ragged step after another. Dawn was breaking, golden light filtering through the canopy. I needed to find shelter before full daylight—somewhere to rest, to plan. To survive another day, though to what end I couldn't say. The evidence that would clear my family name remained hidden, my strength waned with every hour, and my pursuers closed in with each sunset.
Then I felt it.
The sensation washed over me so suddenly I stumbled, my hand flying to the hilt of my dagger. It was like stepping from shadow into blinding sunlight—a presence so foreign to my senses that every particle of my being reacted. The curse beneath my skin writhed in response, the black lines pulsing with a surge of pain that nearly drove me to my knees.
Light magic. Pure light magic.
Impossible. They had hunted those with such abilities to extinction decades ago. Those with the purest form of light magic had been eradicated years before my capture—or so the stories claimed. Yet here, in this unremarkable forest near an equally unremarkable village, that unmistakable signature of light magic called to me.
To my curse.
I turned toward the source, my breath thin and sharp. The sensation both burned and soothed, the curse simultaneously recoiling from and yearning toward it. Through the trees, I caught glimpses of a clearing, and within it—her.
A young woman knelt among wildflowers and herbs, copper-gold hair falling in waves down her back, nimble fingers sorting through plants with practiced ease.
Even from this distance, I could see the faintest luminescence beneath her skin when sunlight touched her—imperceptible to human eyes, but blindingly obvious to mine.
Unbidden, I found myself noticing more than just her magic—the graceful curve of her neck as she bent to her task, the way sunlight caught in her hair like living flame, the delicate profile visible when she turned her head.
Beautiful.
I pushed the observation aside. Her appearance was irrelevant; only her power mattered.
She had no idea what she had. The way she moved, the casual way she gathered herbs—this wasn't someone hiding extraordinary power. This was someone who didn't know she possessed it.
Light magic. Perhaps even a hint of diluted Lightbearer blood, though that seemed almost impossible given how thoroughly they'd been hunted. Whatever her exact nature, she represented something I'd thought lost to the world—and potentially, a cure for the curse that was killing me.
Survival instinct sliced through my pain with cold clarity. I had found the one thing that could save me—the one type of magic that could break what the Crimson Circle had bound me with. All I needed was to get close enough, to convince her to help me.
My shadows responded to my thoughts before I could control them, darkening and reaching toward the clearing like hungry tendrils before I reined them back with a hiss. The curse flared at the use of my power, sending fresh agony through me. I bit back a cry, tasting blood.
I needed to approach carefully. A wounded nobleman seeking help, perhaps. A traveler caught in bandit crossfire. Half-truths were always more convincing than outright lies.
But as I took a step forward, my legs finally betrayed me. The world tilted sharply, trees and sky trading places. The curse seized the moment of weakness, black tendrils clawing deeper into my flesh. My vision tunneled to pinpricks of light.
I crashed against a tree, the snap of breaking branches shattering the forest's quiet. The girl in the clearing spun toward the sound, rising to her feet.
Her eyes found mine across the distance—vivid green, wary but not yet afraid. I saw her hands rise slightly, defensively, and for an instant, I glimpsed what she couldn't hide—the barest golden glow beneath her fingertips, there and gone so quickly she herself might not have noticed it.
But I had. And in that moment, my path became clear. This girl was my salvation, whether either of us wished it or not.
"Please." I forced the word past lips that felt numb, letting genuine desperation color my voice. Let her see the wound, the pain. Not the calculation behind my eyes. "Help me."
I pitched forward into darkness, my last thought a grim amusement—that after a decade of forced manipulations for my captors, my survival once again depended on my ability to make someone trust me who absolutely shouldn't.
Consciousness returned in fragments.
The scent of herbs—sharp, clean, medicinal. Soft fabric beneath me, not forest floor. A cool cloth on my forehead. The distant crackle of a fire.
And a blessed, temporary relief from the curse's constant burning.
I kept my eyes closed, other senses mapping my surroundings with practiced caution. Small room. Wooden floor. A cottage, likely.
The girl moved nearby—light footsteps, the whisper of fabric, the clink of glass against ceramic. Her presence registered like sunlight on closed eyelids, a warmth that both soothed and threatened.
"I know you're awake," she said quietly.
I opened my eyes, finding her standing at the foot of the surprisingly decent-sized bed, arms crossed, expression wary but not unkind.
The copper-gold hair I'd glimpsed in the forest was now partially braided away from her face, revealing high cheekbones dusted with freckles. But it was her eyes that held me—bright green and far too perceptive.
"How long?" My voice emerged as a rasp.
"Since you collapsed? A few hours." She moved to a small table, pouring water from a pitcher into a cup. "I had help bringing you here. The blacksmith's son carried you."
I tried to sit up, a mistake that sent pain lancing through my side. The wound there had been cleaned and bandaged—I could feel the poultice against my skin—but the curse remained.
I glanced down at my bare chest, seeing the black veins still spreading beneath the skin, though slower now. Being in her presence was already having an effect.
Incredible.
"You should remain still," she advised, approaching with the water. "That wound needed stitching, and whatever else is wrong with you..." She hesitated, her eyes falling to the visible evidence of the curse. "I've never seen anything like it."
I took the cup, our fingers brushing briefly. I didn't miss how she pulled away at the contact, nor the flicker of golden light beneath her skin that she quickly suppressed.
That brief touch sent an unexpected jolt through me—her skin warm against my cooler temperature, the gentle brush of her fingertips against mine strangely disarming after years of touches laced with manipulation, fear, or ulterior motives.
My shadows stirred restlessly in response, and I forced them still, concealing my reaction behind a careful sip of water. Such a simple thing shouldn't affect me—a weakness in my composure that wouldn't happen again.
"Thank you," I said, summoning the persona I needed—grateful, slightly bewildered, harmless. I took another sip of water before continuing, using the moment to regain my composure. "I'm in your debt, Miss...?"
"Ivy," she supplied, though her guarded expression suggested she debated giving even that much. Smart girl. "And you are?"
"Sintony." The name felt strange on my tongue after so long. "Sintony Blackbriar. Though most call me Sin." A truth offered freely—the best foundation for the necessary lies to follow.
Recognition flickered in her eyes. "Blackbriar? Isn’t that one of the noble houses?"
So my family name still held meaning, even here. Interesting. "Once," I acknowledged, allowing a carefully measured amount of pain to show. "Though that was... before."
She studied me with those too-perceptive eyes, and I could almost see her weighing my words, deciding how much to believe. I needed her to trust me, but not completely—not yet. Complete trust invited questions I couldn't afford to answer.
"These markings," she said finally, gesturing to the curse's visible trails. "They're magical, aren't they? Not a disease."
I hadn't expected such directness. After a life navigating the veiled conversations of noble courts and lately the calculated manipulations of my captors, her straightforward question caught me momentarily off-guard.
There was no subtle probing, no circling the subject with metaphor and insinuation—just a clear question expecting a clear answer.
It was disarming in its simplicity.
"Yes," I admitted.
"And they're killing you."
Not a question. I met her gaze steadily. "Yes."
Her expression softened almost imperceptibly. "I've done what I can for the physical wound, but this..." She reached toward the dark veins, stopping just short of touching my skin. "I don't know how to heal this."
But you do. I watched the barely perceptible glow that appeared at her fingertips when she got close to the curse. You simply don't know it yet.
"It's a curse," I said simply. "One I've been trying to break."
"Who would curse you?" The question held genuine concern, not mere curiosity. Dangerous, how easily she seemed to care for a stranger.
I looked away, letting shadows darken my expression. "Those who wished to control me. And when they couldn't... they ensured no one else would benefit from my freedom."
Another partial truth. The best lies always were.
She was quiet for a long moment. "The village healer will want to see you," she said finally. "Orma has been my teacher for years. She might know something about your... condition."
I suppressed a grimace. Another witness, another person to manipulate. "I would be grateful for any help," I said instead, layering sincerity into my voice.
Ivy nodded, her gaze lingering on the curse-marks. "Rest for now. I need to gather more herbs for your poultice."
As she turned to leave, my shadows betrayed me—stretching ever so slightly toward her retreating form before I reined them in. She paused at the threshold, glancing back as if she'd felt something, but seeing nothing amiss.
"Ivy," I called softly, and she turned. "Truly. Thank you."
She offered a small, hesitant smile that inexplicably tightened something in my chest. "Rest, Sin."
The door closed behind her, and I released a careful breath. The first step was taken—I was in her home, under her care. Now I needed to nurture her compassion, her healer's instinct to help, while learning how much she knew of her own abilities.
I eased back onto the pillow, feeling the curse writhe beneath my skin like a living thing, chafing at the temporary respite her mere presence provided. It would worsen again the moment she was too far from me—I couldn't afford to let that happen.
I needed her. Not just her power, but her, close to me, until I understood how to channel her light magic to break my bonds permanently.
What I hadn't anticipated was the momentary slip in my focus when she smiled—a hairline fracture in defenses I'd spent years perfecting.
For a heartbeat, I'd forgotten to calculate, forgotten to manipulate. I'd simply... responded.
A dangerous lapse. One I couldn't afford again if I intended to survive.
