Page 74 of A Curse for True Love (Once Upon a Broken Heart)

“She’s acting strange. Do you have any more of that memory elixir?” he asked. And he hated himself for asking.

Aurora scoffed as she strode closer, her long silver skirts sweeping the forest floor. “You think that was an easy potion to come by?”

“You’re a Valor.”

“Yes. But our magic is not limitless. Do you imagine I just carry around bottles of magic with me?”

“You did that day.”

Aurora briefly pursed her lips shut. “Do you want to keep asking silly questions, Prince? Or would you like to become the sort of man your wife will never dare to think about leaving?”

33Evangeline

After Apollo left Evangeline in the tent alone, she studied the glass cuff that wrapped around her wrist. It was magical. She’d assumed as much, but she hadn’t known what it did until she’d seen Apollo double over in pain.

She held the glass closer to the candlelight. She had seen it light up with curious writing when Apollo had been clutching his stomach. She couldn’t make the letters appear again now; all she could see were the little cherry blossom flowers etched into the glass.

She wondered if it had been specifically enchanted against Apollo—if that’s why the strange words had appeared minutes ago when he’d touched her and she hadn’t wanted him to. Itseemed like just the sort of enchantment Jacks would place on an object.

What she didn’t understand waswhy. If Jacks didn’t want Evangeline with Apollo, then why did he leave her with him?Why didn’t Jacks take me with him?she wondered. But she already knew the answer to that.

You and I aren’t meant to be.

Sorry to break your fairytale, Little Fox, but ballads don’t end happily, and neither do the two of us.

Every girl I’ve kissed has died, except for one. And you are not that girl.

I want to erase every moment you and I have spent together… because if I don’t, I’ll kill you, just like I killed the Fox.

Jacks had already given her all his reasons for leaving.

Although the last reason she recalled gave Evangeline pause. Jacks had wanted her to find all the Valory Arch stones, not so that he could open the Valory, but so that he could use them to turn back time and be with Donatella, the one girl he’d kissed who he hadn’t killed. But Jacks hadn’t done that. If he had, she wouldn’t have ever met him, and he’d be with Donatella in Valenda right now.

Whathadhappened, then? There were four arch stones. Each one had a different magical power, but when all four stones were combined, they had the power to turn back time. But they could be used for this purpose only one time.

Had Jacks changed his mind about turning back time? Was he waiting to use the stones? Or had they already been used?

Before she’d gotten her memories back, Chaos had told her:I’m here because a friend of ours needs help—your help. He’s about to make a horrible decision and you need to change his mind before it’s too late to save him.

Clearly he’d been speaking about Jacks. But what was the horrible decision?

Evangeline had been heartbroken and terrified when she’d learned that Jacks wanted to go back in time and change the past so that she and he had never met. But this didn’t sound as if he was going to do that—this sounded like something else. Something possibly worse.

Evangeline needed to get out of this tent and find him.

She considered setting the tent on fire and then escaping in the melee. But fires could too easily get out of control, and she didn’t want to hurt anyone.

Unless it was Apollo. She did want to hurt him.

“I hope you appreciate just how much trouble I’ve gone to in order to break into this tent,” said a wonderfully familiar voice as Evangeline’s tent flapped closed.

She hadn’t even heard it open, but it must have. A girl dressed like a guard stood in the center of the tent, hands on her hips as she scanned the lavish space with a shrewd twist of her lips, which were painted with a sparkling gloss.

“LaLa!” Evangeline exclaimed, too loud. But she could not contain her excitement at the sight of her friend. “What are you doing dressed like a guard?”

“I kept trying to visit, but they wouldn’t let me. Some nonsenseabout how you were too overwrought to seefriends.So I had to fashion a costume.”

LaLa twirled around, and as she did, her three-quarter-length skirt lifted just enough to reveal that underneath the plain burgundy fabric was a shimmery sequin petticoat that sparkled like firelight. She’d also added little puffed sleeves to her bronze jacket, and a matching belt that tied into a bow in the back.

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