Chapter 20

Sara stares at the screen,one hand rubbing her temple while the other continues to scroll down the webpage. There's a headache brewing, a tension spanning over both her eyes, telling her to rest. She ignores it, instead.

The library is only open for another hour and she plans on using every minute. After that, she'll go to the coffee shop across the street and continue searching there. Somewhere, in some dark corner of the web, there has to be the answers she's looking for. There has to be. The thought of Google failing her now, when she really needs it, is nothing short of horrifying.

Finding nothing of use on the page, she closes the tab with a little more force than strictly necessary—frustration pulling at her chest. She huffs, her eyes leaving the bright screen to trace over the rows of books to her left. The library was blessed with large windows, and the evening light casts warmth over the little nook she's chosen for herself. If her reason for being there hadn't been so daunting, Sara suspects she would find it beautifully romantic. A perfect picture. She makes a mental note to bring her camera next time.

"A library, Princess? I never thought to see the day."

She stills, lips parting around a curse. Of course, Seth would find her. Of course. Despite the fury in his eyes when he blinked away last night, he has been nothing but civil since reappearing this morning. Still, in every interaction there's been a shift Sara can't quite shake… a reserved hope, an anticipated dread, hiding behind his candid smile.

She hates it almost as much as the idea of being stuck with him for the rest of her life. So here she is—at the library with a stack of books at her elbow and a slew of webpages on screen. Incriminating her. Seth hovers over her shoulder, no doubt scanning the titles of the multiple tabs she has running. All of them centered on one thing:

How to break a curse.

Sara closes her eyes, mouth dry, as she waits for the inevitable.

"Ah... I see." She refuses to look at him, but she senses him shift. Leaning against her desk, his stare is uncomfortably focused on her face. "Dare I bother asking?"

Sara glances at him before she can remind herself to resist. His eyes are dark—knowing—his left brow quirking towards his hairline. She tears her gaze away, chewing on her bottom lip and fidgeting in her seat. Her name escapes him, a breathy admonishment, and she gives up on ignoring him.

She pulls the laptop closer and opens a word document. The library isn't all that busy, but it's quiet enough for her to be wary of speaking out loud. Her finger taps against two of the keys.

‘No.'

The corners of his mouth curling into a sardonic half-smile. "Cheeky." His fingers drum, obnoxiously silent, against the edge of the desk. "As... flattering as your concern is, you're wasting your time."

She frowns. ‘How do you know?'

He gives her question only the briefest of glances before shaking his head, a dark chuckle escaping his lips. "Honestly, Princess. Do you think I never looked?"

‘How?'

He rolls his eyes. "Little miss expert now, are we? Have you considered, perhaps, that my time is limitless?" He gestures, flippantly, to her screen. "What you're reading is second hand information that I've already collected straight from the source."

She flushes, typing, ‘Have you considered, perhaps, not being an ass?'

His grin dimples. "Only on very rare occasions." Standing, he adjusts the collar of his overcoat. "Now that we have that sorted, I do believe it's time to toddle on home. I have it on good authority that someone's been putting off their reading assignment. Again."

Another day she may have scolded him for spying on her classes, but today she finds herself nodding instead. Silently, she closes her laptop and slides it into her bag, before stacking the books she pulled and depositing them on the designated library cart.

During the walk home, her mind buzzes with questions—her eyes flitting to him between each thought. There is so much she doesn't understand, but she wants to. Somewhere in the last few weeks, Seth has become less of a burden and more of a—

She can't bring herself to finish the thought.

Chewing her bottom lip, she stifles the questions burning at the tip of her tongue until the exact moment she closes her apartment door behind them. "Do—" She swallows thickly, a sour attempt to sound confident. Ansel meows at her feet, rubbing himself against her ankles. "Do you know why?"

Seth scoffs, collapsing in what is slowly (but surely) becoming his chair. "Why?" He makes a motion with his hand—his eyes staring unseeingly up at her ceiling—and Sara realizes her folly.

"Why you were cursed," she elaborates.

Something in his expression shifts. Ansel, seeming to realize that he isn't going to be immediately fed, abandons her to rub his face against Seth's draped hand. His fingers curl, scratching against the cat's cheek, until a rumbling purr breaks the silence. "I refused to marry."

"Oh." That definitely wasn't one of the (many) answers she had envisioned on their walk home. Tentatively, she sits on the couch across from him, fingers drumming on her knees. "That... doesn't really seem like a good reason to curse someone."

He mutters something incomprehensible under his breath.

"What?"

"She was with child," he grumbles, still refusing to meet her eye.

Her thoughts grind to a halt, face paling. "You had a kid?!" she blurts.

He goes silent for so long, she wonders if he will refuse to answer. "No. No, she—she lost it." His exhale is a shaky, bitter laugh—tainted with self loathing. "She lost it, and my first reaction was to uncork a bottle and celebrate. Thank the universe for letting me off the hook." His eyes meet hers, dark in ways Sara can't name. "My miracle, her curse. Do you understand now?"

My miracle, her curse.

The words echo in her ears; a cacophony of painful understanding. Her stomach sours, bile rising in her throat until she can nearly taste the acid on her tongue. "That's why there's a price," she murmurs, barely audible over the rushing in her ears.

Seth's jaw clenches. "Yes."

She hugs her knees to her chest, resting her chin there. "That... that was pretty terrible of you."

His eyes close, pained. "I'm aware."

Sara looks at him—really looks—and wonders. "Do you regret it because of what happened or because it was wrong?"

A long moment passes between them, Seth staring upward as if the answer were hidden in the shadows playing off the ceiling. Ansel jumps into his lap, offering a demanding mewl until Seth's fingers scratch behind his ears. "Both," he confesses, turning his attention to her. "I'm... not sure if I would have arrived at one without the other."

"Then... at least you're a better person because of it. Right?"

The laugh he gives is short and breathy. "If you consider me a person at all."

"You are," she says, surprised by her own conviction.

The smile teasing his mouth is soft—sincere in ways that make him look painfully human. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," she murmurs, hugging her legs tighter. There's an odd feeling curling in her chest, coiling dangerously around her heart. It sets her on edge. "So," she says, desperate for distraction, "was it your, uh, lover? That cursed you?"

"No." Seth shakes his head, both hands now working under Ansel's chin. "Her grandmother." He frowns, lips pursing as if tasting something bitter. "The crotchety old bat."

"How do you know?"

"She spent her last five years on this earth rubbing my face in it," he grumbles. "She was the only one who ever saw me despite never having struck a deal."

Sara stares, eyebrows raised. "And?"

"And what?"

She can't tell if he's being purposefully dense or not. "How do you break it?"

Seth snorts. "As much as I appreciate your optimism, I'm not entirely sure it can be."

"She—the grandmother never told you?"

He goes quiet, gaze drifting to the window. "I asked once, if it was possible. Do you know what she said? ‘Time will tell.'" His eyes are like flint—sharp at the edges and ready to strike. "As if that's any answer at all."

"Well, it could be worse. She could have just said no."

Seth looks at her, his gaze piercing. "If the doctors told you, with certainty, that David would never regain his memories, would that truly be worse than never knowing? Doesn't it hurt?"

Sara sucks in a breath. Her first instinct is to lash out, to let the pain sharpen her answer to a point, but there's an openness in his expression that makes her pause. There's no mocking smile, no cruel edge in his tone, and Sara knows his question was an honest one.

Doesn't it hurt?

Every day. The thread of hope she carries is so thin, it cuts. When she's alone and things are quiet, she feels like she's drowning—clawing for the surface, for the light, when it would be so much easier to let go. To sink.

"I don't know," she murmurs, but she can't meet his stare while she says it. When she looks up, his eyes are too deep. Too knowing. Curses weren't the only thing Sara looked up at the library. Judging by his clothes he's had over two hundred years experience with tentative hopes—has had to face them every time someone looked through him, every time he spoke, knowing no one could listen.

Sara wonders how deeply the thread he carries cuts; if there are scars left over or if it's still bleeding freely.

The way hers are.

Sara takes her time.

Scouts out the best hill to plant herself on, sets up the tripod, measures the light. Sunset is still an hour and a half away, but she doesn't mind the wait. Here, overlooking the city, the quiet almost matches the fields surrounding Oma's home. The wind whistles a bit through the trees, and the grass doesn't share the same nostalgic rustle of thousands of swaying cornstalks, but the feeling of solitude—of peace—is the same. Both are things she's been sorely missing lately.

"You know," Seth says, slanting her a look. She hates that he's followed her here, but she can't even summon the energy to tell him to buzz off. "You should really be spending the evening catching up with Mr. Darcy and Miss Bennet. I do believe they've been rather neglected by you as of late."

‘Neglect' is probably a lot kinder than she deserves. She hasn't made it any farther than the fifth page, and the deadline for the exam has only been creeping closer. Still. "There's always the movie," she quips, trying to sound more confident than she is.

"And here I believed you to be above cheating." Sara can't tell if he sounds disappointed or impressed. "You don't know what you're missing, truly. Miss Austen is a treasure."

She hovers over her camera bag, rifling around for her case of lens filters. "I'll take your word for it."

Seth chuckles, hands disappearing into his pockets. "Honestly, it wouldn't be half as terrible as you make it out to be if you'd take a moment to stop griping about it."

Rolling her eyes, she pulls out the desired filter, perched between her thumb and forefinger, and carefully places the case away. "Look. Just because boring old books are your happy place doesn't make them mine. I'm never going to like it."

"Well, not with that attitude, you won't."

Sara could argue, remind him that she'd hate literature even if she was all sunshine and rainbows, but she screws the filter onto her lens with a quiet shake of her head. The last thing she wants to do is taint the peaceful atmosphere with his literature obsession.

She expects him to fill the silence (he always does) but his hands are tucked in his pockets, his posture so relaxed he'd almost be slouching if he didn't somehow manage to still look elegant doing it. His face is turned toward the horizon, the evening light casting a glow on his pale skin and the shadows highlighting the cut of his jaw.

For a second—only a second—she thinks it's a shame he can't be captured on film.

Swiftly, before he can catch her, she turns away. Finds reasons to fiddle with the shutter speed and aperture even though she knows it's fine. She holds her breath, presses the release, listens to the sound of the shutter closing, and pulls up the preview to inspect it. It's good, but not perfect. A little bit longer on the exposure and—

"You must love it."

Her head snaps up. "What?"

Seth must be gesturing to her camera, but somehow she feels like she's included in that fluid flick of his hand. His head tilts. "You have this terribly odd look on your face when you're clicking away."

Sara frowns. "Gee, thanks."

He makes a disgruntled sound in the back of his throat, as if he has the nerve to be irritated with her. "You're at peace, doing this. Open. Vulnerable." His brow furrows, chin raising as he regards her. "As if everything else just… disappears."

Sara stares, her heart twisting in her chest. Seth turns back to the horizon. She can hear the strain in his voice when he admits, "I envy that look."

Releasing a shaky breath, she forces herself to stop searching for answers in his face and turn her attention back to her camera—gaze caressing the familiar curve of the lens, the fading labels on the body.

"Every time I release the shutter I feel..." she trails off, searching for the words in the shifting colors painting the horizon, fingers twiddling with the camera strap. "It's like I'm taking a single moment in time and I'm… I'm immortalizing it. Making it stay." She smiles, a sad and wistful tilt of the lips. Photography lets her take a beautiful moment and make it last forever. She lowers her face to the viewfinder, adjusting her settings.

Seth scoffs, but the sound is more sad than cruel. "Immortality isn't half so romantic as it sounds." He drinks in the view, head tilting. "But I understand your meaning. Moments are fleeting. Particularly the beautiful ones."

She thinks of the day she brought home the doves; of carefully chewing around BBs while she ate with her parents on the back porch. Sara remembers her father laughing, amused by her expression when she found one. Pulling away from the viewfinder, she swallows—willing the tightness in her throat to ease. "When I was little, I used to wish I could make the days last longer. Sometimes, I thought if I wished hard enough I could keep the sun up for just that much longer."

The corner of Seth's lips curl into a minuscule smile, one she may have missed had she not been looking for it. His eyes, which had always looked black to her, are transformed to a warm chocolate by the sun's lingering touch. "Even you can't stop the sun, Princess."

For once, she sees no trace of his usual taunting. There's a fondness in the curve of his mouth; a softness in his gaze. Both terrify her. She hides behind the viewfinder, heart fluttering anxiously in her chest. The light—it has to be the light. Nothing more.

Silence hangs between them, broken only by the occasional click of the lens, until the world turns more silver than gold. Packing up her equipment, Sara chances a glance at her forced companion. Only a quick look, but enough to convince herself that he belongs in this landscape. His eyes are meant to look black, and his smiles are supposed to be cold, because there is nothing warm about him. Nothing at all.

She heaves the camera bag over her shoulder and grabs the tripod with her free hand. There's foxtails sticking to her socks, pricking at her skin, but she's too eager to leave to think about pausing to remove them. Sara only makes it a few yards before his voice stops her.

"Might I ask why you never come for the sunrise?"

For a moment she is perfectly still, a statue in a landscape of tall, swaying grass. The sun was the closing of the day—an ending to a chapter. The sunrise was the opening scene for something new. New and entirely unknown, when all Sara ever wanted was to remain in the comfortable embrace of the familiar. She licks her lips, tries to ignore the pressure on her chest.

"It's too early," she murmurs, hating that it's only a fraction of the truth.