“What have you done?” Evangeline demanded.
“Exactly what you asked.” Another bite of his apple. “I made sure the wedding didn’t happen.”
“You need to fix it.”
“Can’t.” His tone was laconic, as if he’d already grown tired of this conversation. “A friend of mine who owed me a favor did this. The only way it can be undone is if someone takes their place.” Jacks cut a look toward a patch of grass next to the gazebo, where a brass goblet rested on an aged tree stump.
Evangeline stepped closer to the drink.
“What are you doing?” Jacks shoved off the trellis, no longer indifferent as Evangeline eyed the chalice.
If she drank from it, would it fix everything?
“Don’t even think about it.” His voice turned sharper. “If you drink that and take their place, no one is going to save you. You’ll be stone forever.”
“But I can’t leave them like this.” Although part of Evangeline agreed with Jacks. She didn’t want to become a garden statue. She couldn’t even bring herself to pick up the goblet as she read the words etched onto its side.
Poison
Do Not Drink Me
The smell of sulfur wafted from it, and she wasn’t even sure she could drink the foul liquid. But how could she live with herself if she let them all remain cursed?
Evangeline’s eyes shot from the bird still pecking at Marisol’s wedding crown, then back to Luc and his frozen plea for help. Luc’s parents stood on either side of him. Then there was the unfortunate marriage minister, who’d picked the wrong union to officiate. Evangeline didn’t want to feel bad about Luc’s three friends or about Agnes. But even though her father had not married Agnes for love, he would have hated all of this. Both of her parents would have been so disappointed that this was where Evangeline’s faith in magic had led her.
“This wasn’t what I wanted,” she whispered.
“You’re looking at this the wrong way, pet.” Jacks dropped his half-eaten apple, letting it roll across the gazebo floor until it hit Luc’s stone boot. “Once this story spreads, everyone in the Meridian Empire will want to help you. You’ll be the girl who lost her family to the horrible Fates. You might not get Luc, but you’ll forget about him soon. With your stepmother and stepsister stone, I’m guessing you’ll inherit some money. By tomorrow morning, you’ll be famous, and not poor.”
Jacks flashed both dimples as if he really had done her a favor.
Evangeline felt sick again.
In the stories, the Fates were wicked gods that only wanted mayhem and chaos. But this was what people should have been scared of. Evangeline looked at these human statues and saw it as a horror, but Jacks saw it as helpful. The Fates weren’t dangerous because they were evil; the Fates were dangerous because they couldn’t tell the difference between evil and good.
But Evangeline knew the difference. She also knew that sometimes there was a murky space in between good and evil. That was the space she’d thought she’d entered that morning when she’d gone into Jacks’s church to pray for a favor. But she’d made a mistake, and now it was time to fix it.
Evangeline picked up the goblet.
“Put that down,” Jacks warned. “You don’t want to do this. You don’t want to be the hero, you want the happy ending—that’s why you came to me. If you do this, that will never happen. Heroes don’t get happy endings. They give them to other people. Is that what you really want?”
“I want to save the boy I love. I’m just going to have to hope he’ll decide to save me, too.” Before Jacks could stop her, Evangeline drank.
The poison tasted worse than it smelled—like burnt bones and lost hope. Her throat closed as she struggled to breathe and then to move.
She thought she saw Jacks shake his head, but it was difficult to be sure. Her vision was breaking. Black veins were filling the garden, spreading like escaped ink. Darkness, darkness everywhere. It was night, without any moon or stars.
Evangeline tried to tell herself she’d done the right thing. She’d saved nine people. One of them would save her, too.
“I warned you,” Jacks murmured. She heard him take a frustrated breath, heard him mutter the word pity. And then …
She heard nothing.
4
At least Evangeline still had the ability to think. Although sometimes that ability hurt. It usually happened after days of endless nothing, when Evangeline imagined she finally felt something. But it was never what she really wanted. It was never warmth on her skin, tingling in her toes, or the touch of another person letting her know that she was not completely alone in the world. It was usually just an arrow of heartbreak, or a pinch of regret.
Regret was the worst.
Regret was sour and bitter, and it tasted so close to the truth she had to fight sinking into it. She had to battle against believing that Jacks had been right—that she should have left the goblet alone, let the others stay stone, and played the role of victim.
Jacks was wrong.
She’d done the right thing.
Someone would save her.
Sometimes, when she was feeling especially hopeful, Evangeline even thought that Jacks might come to her rescue. But as hopeful as Evangeline was, she knew the Prince of Hearts wasn’t a savior. He was the one people needed saving from.
5
And then … Evangeline felt something that was not heartbreak or regret.
6
Something like light tickled her skin.
Her skin.
Evangeline could feel her skin.
She hadn’t felt anything for—she actually didn’t know how much time had passed. For so long, there had been so much nothing, but now she could feel everything. Eyelids. Ankles. Elbows. Lips. Legs. Bones. Skin. Lungs. Heart. Hair. Veins. Kneecaps. Earlobes. Neck. Chest.
She was trembling from her chin to her toes. Her skin was coated in sweat, and it felt incredible—cool and damp and alive.
She was alive again!
“Welcome back.” A solid arm wrapped around Evangeline’s waist as her wobbly legs adjusted to being muscle and bone.
Her vision came into focus next.
Perhaps it was just that she hadn’t seen a face in a while, but the young man who’d wrapped an arm around her was extraordinarily handsome—dark brown skin, eyes fringed in a thick rim of lashes, a smile that hinted at an arsenal of charm. His shoulders were cloaked in a dramatic green cape lined in copper leaves as dazzling as his face. “Can you speak?” he asked.
“Why—” Evangeline coughed to clear some gravel from her throat. “Why do you look like a forest mage?”
She cringed as soon as the words were out. Clearly some of her senses—like the filter on her mouth—weren’t doing their job yet. This stranger had saved her. She hoped she hadn’t offended him.
Thankfully, the man’s brilliant smile widened. “Excellent. Sometimes the voice doesn’t return immediately. Now tell me your full name, darling. I need to make sure you have your memory before I let you go.”
“Go where?” Evangeline tried to take in the rest of her surroundings. She seemed to be in a laboratory. Every worktable and apothecary shelf was littered with bubbling beakers or foaming cauldrons that filled the air with something like resin. This wasn’t her mother’s garden. The only familiar thing in the room was the Meridian Empire’s royal crest painted on one of the stone walls. “Where are we? And how long was I a statue?”