Page 95 of Cursed

“Tavi says the injured are healing. No one died.”

Relief fills me. They were brave beyond measure.

Branden grimaces and tells us the news that I know Hollis is skirting around. “We might be arrested for any crimes they believed we committed unjustly. So when we return, it might be a shitshow.”

With a frustrated sigh, Shayla falls out of Arden’s lap.

I attempt to reassure her, “It’ll be okay. I won’t let them take you.”

She looks at me, eyes soft. “But they might arrest you.”

I pull her into my lap, then worry that I shouldn’t assume she’ll want to be there. But when she burrows her face into my neck, I relax with relief.

“Shayla’s status with her untested control over her abilitiesisa problem,” Hollis says gently. “And with Drake’s conditions of her schooling hanging over her head, she might be in trouble for fleeing the school.”

“Under duress!” I feel my anger rising. “Istole her away for protection.”

Hollis holds his hands out as if surrendering. “You should be able to use your betrothal to override your father’s orders. But he was on the council. And his authority still holds until we can prove his nefarious intentions.” He pauses and says with an awkward tone that I’ve never heard from the professor before, “You could claim your own authority and responsibility for Shayla’s welfare,ifyou werefull-fledgedmates—”

“No,” I protest a bit too loudly, startling everyone in the room, including Shayla. I hurry to explain myself and tighten my grip so she won’t run before I can tell her why. “I won’t force you to mate with me. We’ll find another way to protect you. Take my treasure, and you can all hide away—forever.”

Tears well up in Shayla’s pretty lavender eyes. She twists in my lap and cradles my cheeks. “You wouldn’t be forcing me. I want you, but only if you want to be with me.”

I press my forehead to hers, breathing in her sweet scent. “Of course I do. I’ve wanted you since the second I saw you.”

And at that moment, I know how to finally make her mine.

28

DO OVERS

SHAYLA

“We don’t have to leave until the morning,” Quade informs us. “So let’s get some rest tonight. Ms. Boyd believes Myra will be strong enough to travel by then. She can also identify her captors, as we thought. She remembers both Lewellyn and Shade draining her.”

As if summoned, Arden’s healer aunt peeks out from the small adjoining room. “Shayla, she’s awake now and asking for you.”

I rush past the healer and into the room.

A soft glow of a lantern warms Myra’s still sunken face. My friend looks more like herself than she did in the hospital, but she’s not herself yet. I worry that the party girl might never be the same.

“Myra!” I sweep her tiny frame into my arms and do my best not to crush her. She was always smaller than me, but now she feels brittle too.

“Goddess, Shayla, I thought I’d never see you again,” she cries.

My tears fall too. “You? Girl, you scared me so bad.”

“I heard.” She raises her eyebrows. “Apparently you are some crazy powerful mage who almost blew up the hospital.”

I wince. “I suppose I’m a bit of a menace. But I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to stop them from hurting you.”

“There was nothing you could do.” Myra shakes her head. “I was stepping through the Elfhame portal, then boom, the next thing I know Council members Shade and Lewellyn were draining me at some dark room.”

I grab her hands. “Goddess, that must have been terrifying.”

Myra squeezes my hands tighter. “It was…. but Shay, in my coma, Ifeltyou. You were like a blast of bright sparkling light in my mind. I think you might be the only reason I eventually found my way back—why I woke up.”

Then I remember in the hospital… how she shook when I had touched her.Did I do that?

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