The Konig Cursebreakers

by Brenna Lyons

  Talon trained cold eyes on her, and Erin shivered before she could stop herself. He nodded grimly then faced the other Warriors. “We’ve been walking on eggshells around Erin. That will stop now. From what I just overheard between her and Curtis, I would guess her pure gall would see her through any interrogation we make of her.”

  Erin swallowed a sick swirl. “As you wish,” she managed weakly.

  “In this matter, you are absolutely correct. Now, I heard very little of their conversation, so I will admit to both interest in and apprehension about the rest.”

  Erin groaned, and he shot her a venomous look.

  “I’ll make this as painless as I can. Tell us everything that happened after your brother lost consciousness. Don’t try to play it down or sugar coat it. Don’t make me drag it out of you like Curt had to. I want the brutal, honest truth about every single move you made with that beast. After you finish, we will question what we will. Do you understand me?”

  Erin nodded slowly. “I understand.”

  “Good. Then you may begin.”

  She waited for him to sit with the other Warriors, but Talon stayed where he was, an intimidating shadow over her. Erin moved her eyes to Curt, hoping for one friendly face in the crowd, but he looked as scared as she was.

  There was no reaction from the crowd when she told them about her fake hysterics, cutting her hair, or slicing his cheek to get away. Erin told them everything, every thought and every move. When she outlined her plan to save them both, the Warriors exhibited a mixture of shock and anger that made her distinctly nervous. Erin pressed on, desperate to finish her story and allow them their questioning so she could escape to her room.

  She watched, frozen for a moment in time, as Hunter lunged for her. She had been describing how she sawed through the buckle, when her brother bellowed in rage and threw himself toward her. Erin covered her head with her arms, sure that he would forget himself and strike her. When no blow fell, she looked up shakily.

  Hunter was flat on his back beneath both of their parents and Kord, fighting their restraint with all his strength while his eyes burned in bloodlust. He locked his gaze with Erin’s and roared at her as he tried to wrench free again.

  “Release it, Hunter,” Jayde ordered. “Release the Blutjagd. This is inappropriate. She is not your enemy.”

  Hunter’s eyes closed. He shuddered and lay very still, no longer straining against their grip, though he panted and a tear ran down his face. Erin wondered if the tear was in pain, sadness, or some other emotion even he couldn’t name. His breathing slowed, and he turned his head and regarded her miserably.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered to her.

  Erin nodded and blinked away her own tears. She hadn’t wanted this. She hadn’t wanted to hurt Hunter. She only wanted to save him. “I understand,” Erin assured him, dropping her gaze to the floor and wrapping her arms around her stomach. She felt nauseated and shaky, and she wanted it to be over.

  “I relieve you, Hunter,” Talon informed him. “You don’t have to stay here for this.”

  Erin heard the rustling as everyone moved off of her brother and he pulled himself up.

  “No. I want to hear the rest. I’ll control myself. You have my word.”

  She wanted to scream. Hunter should leave, now. Erin couldn’t face him and say the rest. She couldn’t hurt him worse than she already had.

  “It gets worse,” Talon warned him. “Right, Erin?” he asked pointedly.

  Erin met her brother’s eyes, and he sucked in his breath at the sight of her. “Yes. It does,” she admitted. “I’m sorry, Hunter. I couldn’t let him kill you.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Answer me one question. Did he take you?”

  “No,” she replied in horror while her stomach rebelled at the idea. “I’d rather turn that blade on myself first.”

  Jayde nodded her approval.

  Hunter sighed in relief. “Then, I can stay,” he decided. “I can control myself for anything else.”

  He sat next to Kord, and Jayde took her place, pinning him between them. Talon took up a stance in front and slightly off center of her position, a clear warning to her brother to keep it under control or face him. The other Warriors moved closer to the center and tensed to stop Hunter if he moved again, and Curt gave her a nod that told her he’d be first in line to land on the dog pile.

  Hunter smiled viciously at her description of Lorian relaxing his guard and her driving the blade home and ripping it free. His face darkened at the news of the beast’s answering blow. She admitted that her next blow came while she was still felled, bleary-eyed and grunting at the pain shooting through her shoulder as she brought the blade up. Hunter considered that blow grimly and nodded at her to continue.

  Erin pressed her back into the wall as she described her final run at Lorian. Hunter’s eyes narrowed dangerously and his jaw tightened. She watched his hands as he fisted them, and the other Warriors closed on his position again. She finished as quickly as she could, trying to avoid an outburst. Erin flicked a glance at his eyes then looked away before he could lock on her. Even if Hunter didn’t do it, he wanted to hit her — or worse.

  “Is that it?” Hunter asked in a strained voice. “Is that all of it?”

  “Yes. He left with a warning that he had all the time in the world to get even with me. I swear that’s all.”

  “Good. I’m not sure I could take much more,” he informed her.

  “Neither could I. I was shot. I’m not sure I could have attacked again. I would have. I mean, I think I would have, but I don’t know how.”

  “Do you have any concept how close you came to dying?” Hunter asked calmly, raising his eyes to meet hers.

  He was angry, but there was more than that. He was scared. That gave her pause.

  “Yes,” she admitted. “But, if it came to death or him taking me— You know what his plan was.”

  Hunter nodded. “I do. I hate to admit it, but it would have worked.”

  Lewis caught her eye. “You really think Lorian would have taken your arm and risked losing you to the blood loss?”

  “You didn’t see his eyes. He was only holding off on the slim possibility of forcing my compliance some other way. Lorian fully planned to follow through if he had to. You don’t need your hand to have a baby,” she reasoned.

  Erin bit it off and closed her eyes as an oppressive wave of nausea assaulted her. She felt chilled, and the sweat beading on her brow only made her feel worse. The air seemed thick and hard to draw into her lungs.

  “Erin?” Kord called in a way that made her wonder if he had called before and was repeating himself.

  She forced her eyes open slowly. “What is it?” she asked, her voice foreign in her own ears.

  “When you were attacking, did you feel Blutjagd?”

  Erin furrowed her brow. “I don’t know what Blutjagd feels like. How would I know?”

  “Was it a choice to act or a compulsion? Could you stop yourself?”

  “When I went at him bare handed, I knew it was insane. I wanted to laugh hysterically and cry at the same time. Some rational part of me wanted to run the other direction as fast as I could.”

  “But, you didn’t. It wasn’t a conscious choice on your part, was it?”

  “Only as far as the thought that he couldn’t be allowed to kill Hunter or to take me. Beyond that...” She shrugged in exhaustion.

  “You couldn’t stop fighting until he went to ground or died. You knew that was true. It was your driving force and nothing — not pain or rational thought could stand in the way of that. You couldn’t stop fighting, could you?”

  “No, I couldn’t,” she admitted. “I have no idea why, but I couldn’t.”

  Kord’s jaw tightened, and Erin was afraid that she had said the wrong thing though her mind couldn’t seem to work out what the wrong thing was. He looked at Talon, and Erin shook her head in confusion at the way Kord’s outline seemed to fuzz, at the glow that seemed to encase his bod
y. How sick was she? Was she sick? Erin rubbed the sweat from her brow, trying to make sense of this feeling.

  “I was afraid of this,” Kord grumbled. “She’s changing. A trainee’s first Blutjagd are weak, almost impossible to sense, but they are absolutely uncontrolled. The trainee hasn’t learned the control he needs to make it work with his mind.”

  “You can’t know that for sure,” her father exploded. “Her healing—”

  “Would be the last thing to change. It is with the boys. Why wouldn’t it be that way with her? She’s fast, strong, easily enraged, and showing signs of Blutjagd. Consider the possibility, Talon.”

  “Not ‘til sixteen,” Hunter thundered. “The curse doesn’t manifest until sixteen.”

  Erin pushed a shaky hand through her hair. She was sweating heavily, and she felt feverish. If she could have stripped off her clothes and jumped in the lake, she would have. She wished she knew why she felt so damned sick. It couldn’t just be stress, she realized.

  Lewis waved a hand for quiet. “It makes sense. Girls develop younger than boys in many ways. They mature emotionally, intellectually...” He sucked in his breath as he met her eyes.

  “Sexually,” she added for him. Erin pushed to her feet unsteadily. “If he had taken me?” She let the question hang between them.

  Lewis cleared his throat. “I don’t know where in your change that would fall. Boys are just — able. It might have been too late,” he admitted.

  The dizziness assaulted Erin full force. Arms encircled her as her knees buckled, and her rescuer fell with her to their knees, cradling Erin to a broad chest.

  “It’s all right, Erin,” Hunter soothed her. “We won’t let that happen.” His hand brushed her cheek then over her wet hair. He murmured something that sounded of confusion, but she was too busy biting back the urge to vomit to note what it was.

  The debate continued in the dark fuzz that surrounded her. “She’s too young for her autonomy,” Jayde noted.

  “So, don’t give her autonomy until she’s sixteen,” Kord reasoned. “Precocious or not, human children can’t drive a car until they are sixteen, vote or buy cigarettes until they’re eighteen. I don’t see a difference.”

  “How can we be sure of what we’re seeing?” Talon questioned.

  Lewis called for a moment of peace. “The stone confirms it. She is changing,” he told them.

  Erin pushed weakly at her brother’s chest.

  “What is it?” he asked. “What do you need?”

  “To throw up. Please. I can’t do it here.”

  Hunter nodded and cradled her to his chest as he got to his feet.

  “How far into the change is she?” Jayde asked as Hunter swept her away.

  “The stone doesn’t see the change in stages as we do,” Lewis replied. “To it, there is only human or cursed. Anyone who has begun the change is cursed.”

  Hunter left the discussion behind. He lowered her to the floor in the downstairs bathroom. “Do you want me to leave?” he offered.

  “No. I don’t want to pass out. Keep me up.” Erin white-knuckled the edge of the toilet as she let her stomach win the silent rebellion it had been staging. After flushing, she stayed with her head on the seat, feeling weak and spent.

  Hunter started to rub her back but drew his hand away abruptly, mumbling his apologies.

  Erin groaned. “No, rub it. It’s the best I’ve felt in over an hour,” she pleaded.

  “It isn’t too sore?”

  “No. Feels better today,” she managed.

  “Can I check it?” he asked urgently.

  “Sure. Why?”

  Hunter didn’t answer. He pulled the back of her button-down shirt from her jeans and dragged it up. His hand ran lightly over her lower back. “How’s that feel?” he asked.

  “Good. Your hands are cool,” she murmured, wondering if she was really feverish or just imagining that.

  He pulled her shirt back down. “Can you walk?”

  “Do I have to?” Erin complained.

  “We have to go back to the training room. If you can’t walk, I’ll carry you.”

  She nodded at the air of decision in his voice. “Help me up. I need to wash my face.”

  Erin surveyed her face in the mirror: pale with high patches of color, shadowed beneath the eyes, the eyes themselves too bright, and — no longer human? She closed her eyes and splashed cool water on her face. After she rinsed her mouth, Erin braced her arms on the sink and bowed her head. She wasn’t prepared for this. She lost four years, and impossible as it was, she wanted them back.

  “Do you need to be sick again?” Hunter asked quietly.

  “No. I’m done with that, I hope. Let’s go.”

  The other Warriors were still debating the various permutations of her change and what it meant in general, when Erin made her way unsteadily back into the room with Hunter’s guiding hand on her lower back. Jayde smiled at her warmly as Talon started speaking.

  “Obviously, Corwyn had the right idea. We need to begin real training. I just wish we knew how far into the change she is.”

  Hunter cleared his throat. “I think I can answer that, but you won’t like the answer.”

  Every head turned to him, including Erin’s.

  “What are you talking about?” she asked him nervously.

  “Turn around and show them the bruises on your back,” he told her.

  “Hunter, Mom checked it last night,” she protested. “She knows what it looks like.”

  He met Jayde’s eyes. “And?”

  “It was sickly purple and green. Her back was much worse than her face,” she confirmed for everyone.

  “That’s what I thought you’d say. Show them, Erin.”

  She edged away from him. “How much better are we talking, Hunter?”

  He sighed. “It’s healed, Erin. It’s completely gone. You’re sick. You feel sick right now. It’s Krankheit. You’ll feel better in a day or two.”

  Her mind whirled as Hunter started describing her fever and sweating to the assembled Warriors. Krankheit. It sealed the change. It was too late now. Erin sat down heavily, staring at her hands lying on her bent knees. Her mother was suddenly at her side, and Erin felt them pull up the back of her shirt to look at the bruises that were no longer there.

  “It will be all right,” Jayde told her.

  “No, I don’t think it will, Mom. I don’t think it will ever be all right again.” A cold certainty that her life was effectively over stole into her heart. “I want my life back,” Erin whispered. “I was supposed to have four more years. I want them back.”

  “It’s the fever talking,” Jayde assured her. “Hunter will take you to bed until it passes.”

  The voices rose, pressing in on Erin until the blackness gave her peace.

  Chapter Five

  January 6, 2025

  Sarah Kaufmann strolled along the dark street, fingering the amulet beneath her bracer nervously. The beasts were everywhere. It seemed they were congregating in this place. She seethed. Kohl knew it. She was sure he knew it, because she could read it in his shimmer. Still, he brought her here.

  “Why, Kohl?” she growled at the man next to her, her house lord and adoptive father.

  “We’re searching for someone,” the old man replied absently.

  “A Warrior? Alone here?” Sarah’s mind whirled at the thought. Even if most of the beasts were ghosted — and her power wouldn’t tell her that, many were of low enough level that they couldn’t be ghosted. The Warrior had to sense them, at least. Whoever he was, he was sorely outnumbered. “Who would do so foolhardy a thing?” she demanded.

  “Our König prince,” he informed her.

  Sarah sucked in her breath and her eyes widened. “Hunter? We’ve come to see Hunter?”

  His almost imperceptible nod sent a spike of pure pleasure through her. Sarah had heard such stories about the Königs! They were bold and practically invincible. Each of them had survived — some even killed elder
s.

  “How many do you sense?” Kohl asked suddenly, reminding her of her job.

  She furrowed her brow, completing a new sweep. “Seven yellow and ten red,” she reported, indicating the number of low-level and high-level beasts respectively. Sarah poked her gloved hands into her coat pockets and watched her breath curl before her mouth.

  Kohl grunted. “Can you see König yet?”

  Sarah searched her mind shimmers again, annoyed that he hadn’t asked her to check on her last sweep. Kohl had never truly appreciated how her power worked. The shimmers came again at her bidding: the seven yellow, the ten red, no black elder. Sarah had seen black elder once, and she hoped never to see it again. She returned to her examination of the shimmers. There were two green human forms — food, she thought wryly, entertainment. No blue sensitives. She hadn’t really expected to see another sensitive. They were rare. Kohl was his usual silver. She started to say she didn’t see the young prince when his shimmer hit her, white hot and brighter than any she’d ever seen. It hurt to concentrate on it.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “Down this alley about half a block.”

  As if confirming her determination, the prince took on an enclave of the beasts, three reds at once. Sarah gasped, her mind tracking his fluid motions, noting numbly that the first fell within seconds of engagement.

  Kohl grabbed her hand and dragged her along. Sarah held her breath, anticipating the moment when she would enter the active range of the beasts. She hated that part. Going into the midst of the beasts was always nerve wracking for her. In close quarters, the shimmers were with her always, unable to be shut down by anything but her medication. It was painful and draining after a time.

  Sarah knew the moment the beasts circled them. Most of the shimmers were yellow. Two were red. Kohl motioned her back so he could battle. At sixty-two, he was still as fit as most young Warriors were. In battle, she always obeyed Kohl. Not so much at other times, but at least in battle.

  As he took the heart of the first beast she directed him to — a yellow, the young prince turned their direction, abandoning his own prey abruptly to make a run for them. One level of her mind continued its direction of Kohl, ordering him to kill three low-levels before switching strategy to order him to an edgy red getting ready to move on them. The movement of the shimmers told Sarah unerringly which beasts would be most easily taken, and the codes to set Kohl in motion flowed from her lips smoothly.