Page 8 of Fate's Sweetest Curse
Then again, at least I wouldn’t have to worry about seeing Noble around every corner. Avoiding the object of my unrequited love was certainly an upside to this adventure.
2
Curse
Noble
Noble let out a guttural, throat-tearing growl and fell forward onto his hands and knees. Pain seared his fingertips as his nails elongated, sharpening into charcoal-black claws. His temples ached with a pulsing, budding pressure. When he reached up with one hand, he felt the knob of a horn growing from his skull, threatening to split through the stretched skin. His eyes felt like hot coals inside their sockets.
A woman with golden curls spilling down her back was walking down the forest path ahead of him, barefoot. Her ivory dress glowed white in the moonlight; he could see the silhouettes of her slender legs veiled by the thin fabric. At the sound of Noble’s next pained growl, she turned, her kind face distorting into an expression of wide-eyed horror.
A foreign and grotesque instinct welled up inside Noble, clouding his logic and sense of self. He crawled forward on the dirt, snarling. He wanted to pounce. To bite. To shred. To—
Noble woke suddenly, shoving off the mattress into an upright position. His bare chest was slicked with sweat, rising and falling in quick, panicked pants. With his nightmare still clinging to his mind, he looked down at his hands, half expecting them to be claw-tipped. They were flecked with pale scars from years of knighthood and metalworking, with veins that were a little too pronounced—but otherwise they were fine.
Just fine.
Noble sighed heavily, then stood, padding over to the front door of his tiny guesthouse on the edge of Waldron-on-Wend. Hinges squeaked.A crisp spring wind gusted in, smelling of pine and pollen. The sky was a deep cobalt stretching over the jagged treetops of the Western Wood. The Fates had gifted every person on the continent with a drop of magic, a single heightened sense; his gift was sight, and his magic—semi-nocturnal and incredibly keen, even from a distance—spotted no lurking threats in the underbrush.
Another chill swept over his naked form, but he embraced its bite. It made him feel alive.Human.
The nightmares used to be few and far between, but their frequency had increased as of late, the images and emotions becoming more vivid. He’d been living in Waldron for a full year, studying with Richold for eight to ten hours per day, six days per week, and what had his efforts amounted to?Fuck all.
Noble lingered in the doorway a moment longer, then shuffled back inside. Crouching beside the bed, he slid out a shallow basket. Inside it were twelve identical vials. All empty except for one.
“Shit,” he grumbled, holding the final vial up to the moonlight. The glass was indigo, making the syrupy plum-colored liquid inside appear black. Noble removed the cork with an unceremoniouspop, drank a third of the sweet and botanical tincture, then replaced the cork and shoved his shame back under the bed.
By his estimate, he had three weeks until he needed to replenish, which was just barely enough time to get to Fenrir City to visit his alchemist.
Noblereallydidn’t want to travel to Fenrir City.
Not because of the inconvenience—though itwasinconvenient—but because of Hattie. She’d started her apothecary apprenticeship in the capital barely a month ago, and while it was unlikely that he would run into her during a quick visit to the alchemist who supplied him with his tinctures, he felt guilty for constantly haunting Hattie’s steps like a Fates-damned shadow.
The past year in Waldron had been hard enough.
In that time, they hadn’t spoken more than a few scant words to each other—but for Noble, encountering his childhood obsession around every corner, continually witness to her radiance, had been a constant punishment. Hattie had always been a beam of sunshine in his otherwise shaded existence.
No matter how forcefully his parents and tutors had engrained in him the importance of pushing her away—no matter how dangerous their shared history and how wretched his present affliction—he’d never found iteasyto feign disinterest.
Itwasnecessary, though. They might’ve grown up in the same castle, but they were not of the same pedigree, and where Hattie came from, that mattered.Greatly. Her identity mattered, too. So much so that she’d been stripped of her name and married off to a lesser-born brute before rumors of her true parentage spread.
It’s why he’d been horrified to find her here in Waldron, why—on the day of their first encounter—he’d taunted her with the affection she didn’t realize was mutual. What he’dwantedto do was tug her into his arms and crush her against his body, soak up all her warmth after an eight-year winter without her presence—but he couldn’t. As the lesser born of the two of them, it had always been up to him to keep her at arm’s length. So, he pretended to think nothing of her desire—even though, in truth, it waseverything.
His callousness that day had had its desired effect: for the first three months of his time in Waldron, Hattie had ignored him (with a stubborn haughtiness that was, in all honesty, a turn-on).
Summer changed their chilly standoff.
When Noble could no longer deny Richold’s kindhearted offers for a drink at the Possum after their long days at the forge, he’d had no choice but to break a rule and enter Hattie’s domain. His appreciative groan when he’d tried her signature concoctail—an exquisite blend of liquor, syrup, and bitters—hadn’t helped matters. Between moments of forcedcongeniality to keep up appearances as veritable strangers, she’d glared at Noble with a mix of surprise and hurt and vengeance in her oceanic blue eyes.
Then she’dflirtedwith him.
Mercilessly.
Hattie was not one to balk at her own emotions, and so—just as she had in their childhood—she’d weaponized them against him. A teasing, frisky, unceasing barrage of stolen glances and suggestive quips.
You still love me, he’d said.
What a major inconvenience for you, her actions seemed to retort.
