Cursed in Love (Nora Moss Book 1)

by Zoe Ashwood

  Levi scrambles to his knees and peers down at the twin puncture wounds in his skin. I could offer to seal them by licking them, but there’s no way he’d let me in his personal space again.

  “Does Nora know?” I choke out, still half blinded by the strength of the memory.

  Levi doesn’t reply but turns his back to me, bending over his backpack and rooting through it.

  Fuck that.

  “Does she know?” I roar.

  He whirls back, his eyes wide, his expression stark. “No! Of course she doesn’t fucking know! How do you imagine that conversation would have gone?”

  Isak Einarsson looks from one to the other, his frown deepening. “What are you talking about?”

  “Nothing,” Levi snaps. “We need to stop screwing around. Nora’s still in there somewhere.”

  His voice breaks over the last words, and his face crumples in misery. I want to take him by the shoulders and shake him until he gives me the whole truth about what I just saw, but he’s right. Nora is more important.

  With potent witch’s blood coursing through my veins, I stretch my healed limbs.

  “Let’s do this,” I mutter without facing Levi.

  I’ll deal with him later—and find out exactly what’s going on.

  But first, I have a tunnel to dig up.

  Thirty-Three

  Nora

  “Levi!” I yell, my voice growing hoarse. “Raphaël!”

  I’ve been calling out their names repeatedly while taking breaks from clawing through this massive pile of rubble. My hands are torn and aching even though I ripped my shirt and wrapped my fingers in strips of linen. I pull at another large rock, and it tumbles down the incline, bumping into my shin because I’m too slow to jump away.

  Crying out, I kick at the godsdamned rock and hurt my toes in the process.

  This isn’t going so well. When I started digging through the cave-in, I fully believed I’d be on the other side by now, in Levi’s and Raphaël’s capable arms, and maybe even walking through the secret sliding door into the evening sunshine.

  But that was before two hours went by and my phone battery died from using the torch function. My headlamp is still working—barely. The light it emits is definitely dimmer than before, and I’m fucking terrified of the moment when it will inevitably go out as well. I don’t know how long I have. Minutes? Hours?

  I’m growing light-headed, but there’s no telling whether that’s from thirst, hunger, lack of oxygen, or just general panic that seems to have taken up residence just below my breast bone and keeps expanding with every shallow breath I take.

  “Godsdamnit!” I scream into the dull void of the space around me.

  There’s no one to hear me. I’m alone—and if this goes on any longer, I’ll die alone.

  For a wild, desperate moment, I wish the god—Set—had eaten me, too. Then I wouldn’t have to live through this stretched-out nightmare. Racking my brain, I try to remember which cause of death is the least painful: asphyxiation, dehydration, or starvation. From what I learned from human first aid classes my dad had me take before he allowed me to apply for my driver’s license, I think my best bet would be to hope that I run out of oxygen.

  Then a thought occurs to me. I could put myself to sleep.

  Cast a spell that would knock me out—and just pass away quietly in the dark, insensible to the pain and fear. Then I’d have the luxury my mom didn’t have when dying: dignity. Her last weeks and days had been a mess, no matter what healing spells our coven members had tried. She’d refused to be put under sedation or magical sleep—because she’d wanted to spend as much time as possible with her family. With us.

  And still I left her to go on some wild goose chase, searching for a remedy that never existed in the first place. I’d screwed up—and missed out on the last precious moments with her, as well as the moment of her passing. I’d left my family to deal with the immediate aftermath alone, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forgive myself for it.

  What would Mom do in this situation?

  Reason returns so suddenly, I gasp at the strength of the emotions.

  What the fuck am I thinking?

  Magical euthanasia is not a solution to my problem. Digging some more might be, though.

  With a groan, I push myself to my knees and shuffle forward again. Tightening the linen wrappings around my hands, I scoop rubble away from the pile, dragging it down and away.

  Raphaël and Levi could be dead. So could Isak Einarsson, the handsome Icelander whose attacker caused this entire fuck-up.

  But I’m not dead yet, so there’s no way I’m giving up. If there’s the slightest chance I could see Dad, Lily, and Elliot again, I’m going to do everything I can to make it back in one piece. We’ll have so many Sunday dinners together, and I’ll make sure to hug each one of them extra-tightly.

  Then I’m going to return to Ballendial Castle and burn it to the ground, library included.

  Okay, maybe not the library.

  I snort. Thinking of revenge fuels me in ways I hadn’t expected. And if that’s enough to keep me digging, then I’ll imagine every medieval torture technique and how I’d apply it to those motherfucking elitist assholes.

  Scoop. Lift. Dump. Scoop. Lift. Dump.

  The moment I make it out of this desert, I’m going to drink all the water. Cold. With ice.

  Scoop. Lift. Dump.

  And eat so much ice cream, I’ll make myself sick.

  Scoop. Lift. Dump.

  And take a two-hour bath until all this grime washes away.

  Scoop…

  “Nora!”

  A faint voice breaks through my monotonous exercise, and I pause, almost certain that my tired brain has made it up.

  “Nora!” The call comes again, barely audible but definitely there.

  Scrambling up the pile of rubble, I shine my light at the topmost part. Is there a passage through?

  “Levi!” I call. “Can you hear me? Raphaël? Isak?”

  “Nora, are you there?”

  I can’t distinguish the voice yet but I don’t fucking care. Someone is alive on the other side, and judging by the fact that the sound carries through, they’re not too far away.

  “I’m here,” I scream as loudly as I can. “Wait for me, I’m coming through!”

  What if whoever is calling is in danger? Maybe they got buried by rubble, too, and can’t move. Maybe they need my help. And I nearly gave up, wallowing in self-pity.

  A sob rips from me, painful because I’m so thirsty, my throat is dry as dust, and I don’t think I have any tears left in me. But I have my hands, my arms, to get myself out of this tunnel and finally find out what happened to the guys.

  I dig, hoping someone is digging on the other side as well because my entire body hurts. I reach into the dirt at the top of the tunnel and instead of grabbing a rock, I touch something warm.

  Something that snatches up my fingers and holds on.

  “Nora!” Raphaël calls through the narrow opening. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah,” I croak. “I’m alive.”

  Cheers sound from the hole, and I’m pretty sure it’s both Levi and Isak I hear. Tears stream down my face—I guess my body still had enough moisture left to form them.

  “Move back,” Raphaël instructs me. “We’ll get you out of here.”

  Too tired to argue, I scramble off the pile and search for my backpack and phone. The obsidian scarab—the token that nearly cost us everything—is still in its place in a zipped-up pocket, thank the gods. At least this wasn’t all for nothing, even though I never would have gone on this mission if I knew what waited for us in the end.

  Does that mean we’re giving up?

  Fidgeting with the strap of my headlamp, I consider our options. The Scottish witches clearly weren’t joking when they said that no one was supposed to mess with the other teams’ tokens. Would the god, Set, have let us leave in peace if that mercenary hadn’t tried to steal the last obsid
ian beetle?

  And does that mean that the fourth team, whoever they are, won’t be able to reach their goal if their token is buried under all this rubble?

  Another thought occurs to me. Maybe the organizers will come to clean this place up and somehow beat Set into submission. Or they might accidentally release him into the world.

  A shudder passes over me, the fine hairs on the back of my neck lifting. There are no sounds apart from the scuffling from the guys’ side, but I swear I can feel a menacing presence not far from me.

  Ugh.

  The men work on removing enough rocks and dirt for me to crawl through. It doesn’t take them long. Minutes later, I climb the dusty little slope again and pass my backpack to a grinning Levi.

  “Good to see you, Moss,” he says.

  Then I shimmy through the narrow opening as best I can, helped by Levi and Raphaël who gently pull my arms. The rocks scrape my stomach and hips, but it only takes a couple of seconds, and I’m through, collapsing into Levi’s arms.

  He holds on to me too tightly, his fingers digging into my back, and buries his face in my hair. “Gods, I thought…”

  His voice hitches, and he shuts up, then squeezes me against his chest.

  “Ow,” I complain on a laugh. “I’m fine, but please don’t break my ribs.”

  He releases me with a rueful smile, and I turn to Raphaël.

  “Thank you,” I say, grasping his fingers, “for not giving up on me.”

  He shakes his head and closes his hand around mine. “Never.”

  My throat’s still tight with the joy of being saved from what I thought would be my grave, so I turn to the last man who’s standing a little farther away, barely illuminated by the glow of Levi’s headlamp.

  “You stayed,” I say, making it half question, half statement.

  The tall Icelander grimaces. “It was the least I could do after my, uh, associate caused the whole thing in the first place.”

  I really want to get the whole story from him—who was the man, and how on earth did they end up working together—but not here. Not now.

  “I think we should leave,” I say. “I’m surprised the rest of the tunnel hasn’t caved in by now.”

  My words spur the men into action. Levi gathers his backpack, which looks completely wet, and Isak grabs his. We move toward the exit, Levi in the front and Isak bringing up the rear. Raphaël still hasn’t let go of my hand, and I can’t quite bring myself to release him either. The knowledge that I’m not alone anymore feels better than waking up to find Yule presents under the tree when I was a kid.

  The dark corridor is joined by another from the side—we’re at the point where the path forked on our way down. I lost all sense of distance and time in the dark, so the opening to the chamber with animal mummies stacked on the shelves comes as a surprise. It spurs us on, because it means we’re so, so close to the surface.

  A shape explodes from the wall in front of Levi, shadows coalescing into a fully formed stone statue of a half-naked man. I shriek, scrabbling back and pulling Raphaël along on sheer instinct. Levi recoils, puts his hands up, and tries to block the thing with a spell, but it just keeps coming.

  Then Isak roars, a deep, rumbling sound that rolls through me like thunder. He charges forward, ducks the statue’s flailing arms, and tackles it to the ground. In one swift move, he’s back on his feet. He grabs the statue’s legs, heaves it up, and swings it against the wall of the corridor. The statue smashes, breaking up in an explosion of dust and rocks.

  Isak is left standing with two broken-off legs. His broad chest expands with a breath, and he throws the legs down on top of the rubble. Then he slowly turns to look at us.

  Total silence descends as we all stare at each other. That—that wasn’t normal. The statue was easily as tall as Isak and made of stone. It must have weighed… I have no idea how much it had weighed. But neither Levi nor I could have done that. I glance at Raphaël. He could have swung that statue around, maybe, if I hadn’t been hanging off his arm in terror. But I don’t think Isak is a vampire.

  He might not be a witch, either.

  Which has me wondering about his identity. His very nature.

  Isak clears his throat. “We should get out of here,” he says, his melodic accent thicker than before.

  That breaks me out of the moment. “Yeah.”

  We rush forward, on the lookout for more murderous statues. But the other sculptures we see are all inanimate, still attached to the walls. Finally, the beam of Levi’s headlamp falls on a sheer wall in front of us. The stone seems just as unbroken as before, as though the door doesn’t exist at all. There’s no seam, and the wall isn’t marked with an ankh from this side either.

  “Fuck,” Levi says suddenly, turning back to us. “Our water’s gone.”

  Eyes wide, I stare at him. “What do you mean, gone?”

  I was just about to ask him for a sip because I’m still parched.

  But he points his thumb to his backpack. “I landed on my back when the tunnel collapsed. Both containers burst.”

  Panic spreads through my veins at the news. “So we can’t get out?”

  Isak steps closer. “I have plenty of water left.”

  Levi narrows his eyes at him. “Yeah, saltwater.”

  Wait, what?

  I take the bottle that the big Icelander offers to me, open the cap, and take a small sip. My mouth curls in distaste.

  “Gah, what is this?” I ask. “Why is your water so salty?”

  The man shrugs. “Electrolytes.”

  That’s not a great answer since this water isn’t fit to drink. But maybe it will still work for this purpose. I draw closer to Levi and splash Isak’s water on the stone wall in front of us.

  And nothing happens.

  The door remains unmoving, and darkness presses on us from behind like a malevolent presence. We can’t get out.

  “Told you,” Levi mutters.

  I nudge him in the ribs, even though his smirk lightens my anxiety somewhat. “Not now.”

  Raphaël draws closer and runs his palm over the rough stone. “Maybe we could move it?”

  “Move what?” I ask. “The door isn’t even visible. And it swung inward when we entered, so you can’t push the slab out either.”

  He purses his lips but doesn’t argue. In the dim light of my and Levi’s headlamps, his hazel eyes appear darker than usual.

  Then Levi inhales sharply through his nose. “Nora. If the door’s enchanted, I could just break the spell. Then we’ll at least see it.”

  “How depleted are you?” I ask. “From the searching you did on the way down, I mean.”

  Wincing, Levi rubs the back of his neck. “I’m running pretty low. Want to try that magic meld thing?”

  Without hesitation, I take his hand. My magic is only a shallow pool now, still running dangerously low, but if I can help him, I will. I’m only dimly aware of Raphaël and Isak who step back to make room for us, then I’m opening up to Levi, letting him in. It’s a different kind of closeness. I’d taken magic from him today, but that hadn’t required me to surrender my defenses and give him access to the innermost part of my being.

  He’s gentle with me. His presence is so familiar, my heart leaps at its touch, and he gently scoops up my magic to twine it with his. It’s a weird sensation—when my magic gets used, I’m normally the one wielding it, so it’s strange to be nothing but a bystander.

  “I couldn’t sense it from the outside,” he murmurs absently. “Look how beautiful it is.”

  For the first time, I witness Levi working his magic from his perspective. And if I’d respected him before, I’m in awe of him now. The attention he brings to breaking this awful spell that has us trapped inside the tomb is incredible. Since he’s not at full power, he’s not going to try and blast through it because he has no idea how much energy that would take. Instead, he unpicks threads of power one by one, removing them from the larger magical working that holds the door closed.<
br />
  Again, he takes my magic from me, and I feed it to him willingly, eager to be done with this. My hand trembles in his, and I squeeze his fingers tighter. The spell is complex and old, so old. Whoever cast it was very competent, and I try to follow along with what Levi is doing, reverse-engineering the spell so I’ll at least be able to describe it for our open magical database. It’s almost a pity to destroy an antique like this, and I wish I could preserve it somehow for posterity. Gods only know whether this knowledge has survived in some library somewhere.

  The web of magic covering the door wobbles and nearly fails. Levi grits his teeth and draws another handful of magic from me. I sway from the effort, then steady myself against the wall. We can do this. We have to do this, or we won’t get out of here.

  Then, without warning, the spell snaps, and the recoil throws us both back. I hit the ground hard, my tailbone protesting, but I manage not to smack my head against the stone floor.

  Raphaël rushes forward to help me up, and Isak offers Levi a hand up. My best friend groans but takes it, hauling himself to his feet.

  “That sucked,” he says, rubbing his back. “But it’s done.”

  He’s right. The seam in the wall is clearly outlined in the light of Levi’s lamp, with a splash of water in the middle from where I poured it earlier.

  “What now?” I ask.

  Raphaël steps up to the door and peers closely at the rock. Then he fits his fingers in the crack, positions himself, and pulls. The corded muscles of his arms and shoulders pop, straining, and the door moves a quarter of an inch.

  With a triumphant “Ha!” Raphaël grips the door tighter and tugs again.

  Isak approaches him. “Let me help,” he grumbles.

  For a moment, I think Raphaël is about to object, but he makes room for the Icelander, and together, they heave at the door. It slides an inch, then two, and with each pull, they open it wider. A sliver of light falls through the crack, golden and bright. At the sight of it, my throat clogs up again, and I squeeze Levi’s hand.

  He wraps me into a side hug and presses a kiss into my filthy hair. “We made it.”

  Isak and Raphaël give the door one last tug, and it opens wide enough for us to squeeze through. The moment we find ourselves out in the open, I’m able to fill my lungs again. The desert air is still hot and dry, but it feels refreshing after being locked in the tunnel for hours.