Vivian Hearth was nervous. At least that's what she seemed to me. She had a near identical worried frown to the one Mom wore sometimes.

My nerves, despite the efforts of Fethris' tea, weren't any better.

My heart was pounding as I tried to remain calm. Please. Please let there be something. Anything. I didn't need the power to move oceans, I just wanted to cast basic spells and use runes. Please. Please.

"We have time," Vivian Hearth spoke softly to me. "If you would like the shrine to Hecate is between here at the Healer Wing. I wouldn't blame you if you wished to pray."

For a moment I actually considered it.

"I think I'm okay. I'd rather be a little early than risk being late."

She nodded, "I understand. It seems Lucinda taught you well."

I sighed, "I wish she was here."

"I know I'm a poor substitute, but whatever he says I want you to know I am here for you in whatever capacity you want me to be."

Poor substitute felt like an understatement, but I appreciated the honesty. We'll have to see about the second half of her statement though. "I just want this thing gone. I don't even care how at this point."

"I've never heard of an unbreakable curse, I doubt you'll be the first one."

Yeah and no one expected for Dragon Tower to open and yet here we are.

Thinking about it was making my foot itch.

Vivian was walking with me, but she wasn't leading me. I knew the way to the Healer wing by heart at this point.

I hadn't bothered covering the scars or the mark in any way today. Why bother when it was going to be the focus of the main event in today's schedule.

This was my life. This is the result of my choices.

No regrets.

Vivian opened the door and I stepped into the room filled with the natural light of noon coming in from the glass ceiling above us.

I was glad I hadn't eaten anything because I already felt like puking.

The Curse Breaker was nowhere to be seen.

It was just Healer Sealie fretting at her usual station. In her hands was a very familiar clear glass vial with very, very familiar fangs inside.

I knew she still had those, but what was she doing with them?

"Healer Sealie?" I asked after a second of her not noticing us.

"Serafina," She said with her usual smile, "Right on time. Our guest will be here any moment. Please take your usual seat."

This is my life.

I made this choice.

I could have not come here but I chose to.

I could handle this.

This couldn't possibly be worse than the spider attack. He'd probably run a few diagnostics and then give some dry explanation of the curses details and then we'd make a plan. Or he'd give me a plan.

I'd like a plan.

To know that there some kind of light at the end of this tunnel.

"She's so quiet, isn't she?" Sealie was whispering. Did she think I couldn't hear her? "You'd never know she was Lucinda's."

"No. I'd know. Lucinda may be easier to read, but there's too much of her spirit in Serafina. It's just tempered more carefully. The father's influence I'd bet. Lucinda always preferred quiet ones."

"I can hear you," I announced without looking up from my hands.

Sealie started humming like she was trying and failing to pretend that nothing happened.

"As I said." Vivian Hearth almost sounded smug.

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Hecate help me.

"Ah. It seems I am the last to arrive. My apologies for keeping you waiting." I wasn't sure what I was expecting from Curse Breaker Savas Filo, but this was pretty close to it.

An older man, which backed up Fethris' claim of thirty years of studying, his hair mostly white and his hands covered by thick black leather gloves.

"Curse Breaker," Sealie greeted.

"Healer Sealie, Grand Matriarch Hearth," He greeted to both of them. "The patient, I presume?" He looked at me.

I nodded, "Serafina Stewart." I waved with my left hand.

His eyes narrowed in on the mark.

Good. The sooner we got this over with the better.

"I assume that's the mark of the curse in question?" He asked as he approached me.

"Yes," I told him.

"And no one noticed this sooner?" He pressed into it as he grabbed my wrist and started turning it over. I couldn't tell if he was examining the scars or the mark itself.

"I noticed not being able to cast, but no one even suspected there was a curse involved until…well until the mark got exposed." I explained.

"And how, exactly, did this happen?" He asked.

"The curse or the scars? Because I have no idea how or when the curse got there. The scars happened during an…accident in class." Too much information was better than too little, right?

He looked at Vivian.

"That's as much as we know for certain." She confirmed.

"Grand Matriarch Hearth," there was that title again, "how long has she been experiencing her symptoms?"

Rude. I was right here.

Vivian's eyes darted to mine then to the Curse Breaker, "According to her parents all her life."

"Any change in the symptoms?"

"It's been more aggressive the past couple of weeks," I answered because I was not getting left out of this conversation. I wasn't a little kid who couldn't articulate what was bothering her. "It's been acting up since at least the mark got exposed."

I was ignored, I think. "She's never been able to cast a spell?" he asked.

Vivian Hearth looked at me again and then nodded. I decided that was close enough for permission.

"I've cast a spell once. I used a fire spell when under attack by Aranaea Imgifalso spiders." He didn't need to know about Red. Or Dragon Tower.

He scoffed, "Preposterous."

Did he just call me a liar?

"There were spider ashes at the scene and she is somehow unfortunate enough to have fallen into a nest," Vivian Hearth interjected.

Then he removed one of the gloves.

I scrambled back away from him.

The mark.

He had it.

A sinisterly familiar dark green etched into his skin like a tattoo. No. Not like a tattoo. It was one.

I nearly fell off the cot when he tried to reach for my wrist again with the hand that had a tattoo of the same symbol that indicated my curse and also was apparently used by a group of people that hated people like me.

Only in the seventh hell.

"It's alright Serafina," Vivian Hearth was behind me. "If he still had ties to the Mists I wouldn't have let him step foot in this school."

That only helped a little.

"I need to test the curse," He stated.

"Start the spell, and then she might be able to relax," Vivian Hearth said.

I thanked whichever god had given her the ability to understand my hesitation.

The exposed hand glowed with a soft white that was almost blue.

I let out a sigh of relief.

Not the dark green of the curse.

Okay.

I relaxed and shifted forward and back into the reach of his hand.

The moment his magic touched me I felt it instantly. It felt like someone had poured a pot of boiling water onto my entire body.

I clenched my teeth tight enough to make my jaw ache.

"It's going to be alright Serafina," Vivian Hearth's voice reached me, it sounded so distant.

I couldn't answer her. If I said a word I would scream.

There was a crackling noise. Louder than thunder in my head.

I yanked my left arm back just as a bolt of the terrible dark green exploded from the mark and into the glass above our heads.

It rained down around us as I struggled to breathe.

Dots swam in my vision.

"Heavens above…" The Curse Breaker said.

"Miss Stewart!" Sealie yelled.

I started to fall over before being caught. It didn't feel like a person. Probably someone in the room used magic.

"Goddess's wrath," That sounded like Sealie. I didn't have the energy to open my eyes to check.

"Someone's wrath, that's for sure," Vivian Hearth spoke.

"It isn't broken," The Curse Breaker said. "That was meant to be a simple test to see how deep the curse goes."

"And what did you find out?" Vivian Hearth asked.

"It's a generational curse. Breaking it won't be possible. Not without putting the patient in danger."

I think leaving it would be putting me in even more danger. I couldn't feel my left arm. The rest of me was sore. I blinked as I tried to get up from where I was laying.

"So, there's nothing we can do?" Vivian asked.

I interrupted. Because fuck that. "What would you need to do to get rid of this thing?" I demanded. I didn't care how weak I sounded.

I was not living the rest of my life like this.

"You don't know what you're asking," The Curse Breaker told me.

"Then explain it instead of dismissing me. It's not going to get better, it's been getting worse and it's probably going to continue to get worse. So what if the fix puts me in danger? I've been in danger since getting here! I'm not going to just leave this thing! I'm here to study and practice magic. I didn't let a nest full of deadly spiders stop me and I'm sure as the hells themselves not going to stop trying now. Besides, what proof do we have that this thing isn't going to detonate and kill me anyway?"

All three of them were silent. I felt light-headed but was proud of my ability to stay sitting upright.

"From what I found, you are under a generational curse. And it's the first manifestation of the curse, meaning it is at full strength. To make the situation even more delicate it is connected to your mana veins and feeding off of your magic. That's what's blocking your ability to cast, presumably. I suspect the only thing that would allow you to cast is entering the Awakened state." He explained.

The adrenaline from the spider attack might have done that. It wouldn't be the strangest story of Awakening I had ever heard.

"So how do we get rid of it?" I asked.

"Removing it all at once would absolutely kill you. Your best chance of living curse-free would be to slowly unravel it. But as we've learned outside magic makes the curse react violently," there was a crunch from the glass.

It was everywhere.

"The safest option, and your only one if you're that determined to be free of the curse, is to unravel it yourself. That is unless you can find the original castor and get them remove it." He concluded.

Except I had no idea who that even was.

I gripped the mark tightly. I still couldn't feel that arm.

My hands felt something warm and wet.

I pulled my hand away to find not blood, which would have been par for the course, but a strange liquid the same shade of dark green as the magic from the curse.

"Uhh…is this normal?"

Sealie sprung into action and started wrapping my scarred wrist in long white bandages.

Nobody answered my question.

Once Sealie was done with my arm she patted me on the shoulder. I think it was supposed to be comforting but I was too irritated for that.

"Why don't you go join your friends for lunch?" Vivian Hearth suggested. "We'll clean up here."

"Fine," I figured staying was just going to upset me more and considering how that's gone so far…Vivian had a point.

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