Chapter 18

F ive months ago…

"Blast it straight to the hells," Bella said, throwing one of the two potions at the stone wall. It smashed, splattering and dripping down the dining room wall.

She startled at the wide-eyed wild haired man as the door to the kitchen swung behind him.

As she turned to face him, her hands instinctively went to her hips, immediate remorse flooding her. How could she have been so foolish and reckless? He was one of the few who had stayed behind when everyone else fled the castle, and she couldn't shake off the guilt of trapping him there. Yet, in that moment, she also felt a surge of anger towards him for witnessing her moment of weakness and putting himself in harm's way. She didn't know how to make it right by changing his curse and giving him freedom. She sighed and rubbed her forehead.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to make such a mess for you to clean up," she said, waving a hand to activate a silent spell. The spell opened the drawer to the buffet table and out flew several napkins. She used the animated napkins to wipe up the wall as Ignot rubbed his heavily wrinkled forehead.

"I take it the newest potion isn't ready?" His wry question made her snort and shake her head. He'd never treated her like the queen, since he'd often snuck to the tavern to drink when the royal family wasn't in residence. She'd known him since she was a child.

"No, Ignot, it's not ready yet. It's too dangerous," she admitted. There was one bottle left, but the one she'd thrown had bubbled on its own, growing bigger and bigger. Part of throwing it had been to dispel the magic as quickly as possible, as it'd shown signs of impending explosion.

Still, it didn't make the regret of her decision fade. The weight of the world was on her shoulders, and nothing had gone right since she'd met the king. She was already so weary after only a few weeks stuck in this form.

"Are you sure, your highness? I'm not sure how much longer I can hold on."

He stiffly walked across the room, holding tightly to the broom as he slowly swept the broken glass.

Her hand fluttered in her skirt. "What do you mean?"

"I feel less and less human every day. Soon I'll just be an empty husk of a knight."

"No, don't say that. We'll figure this out."

When the castle curse had settled, he'd been merged with a metal knight in the hallway. His skin was metal, his white hair sticking out oddly from his head, and his movements stiff and awkward.

His eyes remained human, and it was unnerving. He'd been the under-butler before, his old age preventing him from taking the prized position of head butler. Having armor for skin pained him greatly, though he was too proud to complain about it.

"Are you sure we can't just try this other bottle?" He didn't meet her eyes as he knelt to the floor.

"I'm sure. I tested it on the stuffed eagle in the hall. It didn't work," Bella said bitterly as she put the dirty napkins on the edge of the table for Sharlo to find and clean later.

Ignot waved the broom handle to the potion still sitting on the table. "Perhaps you should test it on the cat or any of the dozen kittens, then."

Bella shook her head and gripped her skirts in both hands now, staring at the dining table. What had once held grand dinners with dignitaries and nobles now was strewn with ingredients and supplies for potions.

It had been too difficult for Ignot to go up and down the stairs. After he and Sharlo had cleaned up her room from all the rotting flesh and blood, she'd wanted to make things easier on them. So she'd moved her workshop down here so they could still assist with collecting ingredients.

The guilt gnawed at her as they sat trapped in this cursed place. It was her decision that led them here, that turned Ignot into a rigid metal knight and Sharlo into a dangerous hat stand. The pregnant cat's transformation into a footstool only added to the weight of her regret. How could she have known the consequences of her actions? It was all her fault.

One footstool kitten pushed through the swinging door as Ignot knelt to sweep the glass into the dustpan. The kitten snuggled against his clunky metal leg, and Ignot scratched its head.

"I can't risk them," Bella said. She was so afraid to test the reversal potion on anything living. She'd already tested it on the plants that had morphed and merged with inanimate objects.

The chives and lavender had merged with the stone bench in the kitchen gardens. She'd watered it with the last potion, only for it to die and turn to dust.

The hydrangeas in the flower garden had merged with a bucket that had been abandoned by a servant. She'd tested the next potion on it, only to fail yet again.

"I've tweaked the formula over two dozen times with the same result. If I had even one success with the plants, then maybe I'd test it on a kitten," Bella murmured, twisting her skirt and staring forlornly at the supplies on the table.

"But what is left to change?" She wondered aloud. She'd adjusted the amount of magic she'd used, one word at a time of the old spell she'd found in the spell book in the library.

Lost in her own thoughts, she didn't pay any attention to the clank of metal behind her until it was too late.

The kitten's cry rang through the room, and she spun in horror, the walls shaking as her breath caught in her chest. Ignot had poured the potion onto the floor and the kitten had licked it up. It took two steps, weaving as if drunk. It hacked and choked, and Bella's eyes watered.

"What have you done?" She choked out past the knot in her throat.

Ignot's cold blue eyes didn't meet hers, which she was grateful for. He crossed his arms and stared at the cat. "You wouldn't have done it. Someone had to try."

She held her breath as it shuddered and hacked. The fur ball finally fell out of its mouth and rolled on the tile, then it jerked violently as it separated into two halves.

The kitten fell to the ground, unmoving beside a small footstool. Two separate beings.

She sucked in a breath. "It worked," she whispered.

Ignot knelt and stroked the cat's side as he sighed. "Sort of. They separated but the cat's dead, poor thing."

Anger made her shake, and the chairs in the dining room followed suit. "Poor thing?" Her voice was deceptively soft but rose quickly.

"Poor thing! You had no right to test that potion on it! I told you it's not ready."

"I know that, your highness, but—"

"But what? There should be no but. I'm the queen, or have you forgotten? If I say do not touch something, do not blasted touch it. Do you understand?"

The cold eyes finally met her own as she fisted her skirts, trying to hold on to her emotions. He nodded slowly, but his gaze was stubborn.

"I know you are, but I had to try, your highness. Every minute is torture. I can't take it anymore."

The old man's wiry white hair pointed in every direction, and his eyes were wild and chaotic. Desperate.

Bella held her hands out shakily, palms up. "You think I'm enjoying this state of being? I'm working day in and day out to find a solution, but it has to be safe. Fisica protect us—"

Her rage reached a crescendo, and she flew out the open dining room door. She had to get outside before she blew.

Her emotions were building, and her control was fractured at best. She reached the terrace and fled down the steps to the garden. It stretched all the way to the castle wall, but before she reached it, she screamed.

Loud, angry bellows that made a handful of bricks on the wall crash in front of her as she stumbled to a halt. She yelled again, her hands wide as she released the anger, heartache, and despair over her failures.

This was bullshit. She'd simply wanted someone to see her worth and teach her magic. She'd trained with the priests and had been allowed to read all their books if she kept the church in town clean. Then she'd trained as a healer with Lailant, the crazy old woman whom some whispered was a witch.

Bella hadn't cared. She'd just wanted to know more, needed to know more. If she'd known more at five, maybe she could've helped save her mom and everyone else from the fever. If she'd known more, maybe she could've followed her dad to war and saved him too.

Now she was cursed. And she'd been the one to curse who knew how many people and animals and plants. The entire town had been destroyed.

Despair washed over her as the tears fell. She rested her head on the wall, but she tumbled through it. Damn, she hadn't animated the wall; thus, she couldn't interact with it.

She laid on the dirt outside the castle walls and blinked as a dark cloud slowly crawled toward her from overhead. She winced and scrambled to her feet. She shuddered, took a deep breath, and ran through the wall again.

Cold washed through her, and she shivered, blinking as she appeared back in the garden. She did not feel up to battling the shadow creature today. She was too raw from losing the kitten.

But it had died as a kitten, not a monstrosity footstool kitten.

There had to be a way to separate a living and non-living thing that had been magically joined. Perhaps she'd been going about this all wrong. The spell book had been vague, after all. Perhaps it was a combination of spell and potion?

She walked slowly back to the castle, her mind not stopping for even a second to take in the beautiful overgrown garden or the grass growing between the cobblestone walkway.

Four months ago…

Bella bit her lip and carried the magical bowls up the stairs to her sitting room. She'd untangled another kitten, and it'd lived the past three days.

Hope blossomed in her stomach, but she couldn't let Sharlo or Ignot know yet. It would devastate them if it didn't work out, and the kitten had been weak ever since.

She went through the open door—the servants had long since left all doors open so she wouldn't have to walk through them—and set the bowl on the floor by the empty hearth.

The kitten's eyes didn't open at the smell of milk and fish. She pulled a spoon she'd affectionately nicknamed Gus out of her pocket and used it to prod the kitten, stroking awkwardly down its back.

Its eyes opened slowly. They looked feverish, but she couldn't feel it to see. Perhaps a healing potion in the milk would help? It was worth a shot.

She went to her bedroom and the vanity that had changed her life forever. She pursed her lips and animated the bottle the healing potion was in. It slipped into her pocket, and she turned back to the kitten.

She paused at the door and blinked. No, it couldn't be. She looked back at her vanity. The potion bottle she'd used on the cat sat empty where she'd left it. Its match… was gone. It wasn't where she'd left it.

Sharlo didn't come upstairs anymore to clean, the layer of dust evidence of that. In fact, the servant tried to stay as far away from Bella as possible. But Ignot…

Ignot.

Her chest ached and the windows rattled. There was no telling when he took it. She hadn't been in her bedroom in at least a day, maybe two.

A soft mewl drew her attention, and she went to the tiny ball of fluff in the next room. Her steps slowed as she neared.

It lay still, no breath rising from its chest. She was too late.

Ignot.

Maybe she could still save him. She raced out the door and down the hall, yelling his name. Had she seen him that day at all? She'd been holed up with the cat, documenting the kitten's changes by dictating to the magical pen.

A scream rent the air, and Bella turned toward the kitchen, dread filling her stomach like a lead weight.

Two months ago…

Bella stood silently, tears running down her cheeks as Sharlo buried the last of the kittens in a pot in the kitchen garden. It'd loved to chase the mice in this spot.

She rocked on her feet, hands twisting in her skirts. She'd been so close to finding just the right spell combination and ratios of ingredients for the potion.

This kitten had lived for three weeks, and it'd been strong the entire time. No fever that she'd seen. It'd been so happy with boundless energy. Ignot would've been so excited.

She'd followed the little thing around every day, had watched over it as it slept. And this morning, she'd looked up from her book, and it had just been gone. Dead between one chapter and the next. No complaining, no mewling, no convulsions like the others. Just gone.

She'd animated an ash bucket to pick him up and take him outside. Sharlo had found her using an animated shovel to dig a hole, but her magic wasn't enough to get the angle right. Her hands had been shaking too much, her tears too thick to see enough.

Sharlo had started silently weeping, and here they both stood as the last dirt settled on top of the hole. Sharlo leaned on the shovel, her shoulders shaking.

Bella wanted to reach out and offer comfort, a hand, a shoulder. She wanted so desperately to not be alone anymore. But even if her current form had allowed such a gesture, Sharlo never would've. Her family had all worked at the castle for generations. She'd been horrified by the low-born Bella becoming queen.

"I'm so sorry," Bella whispered to the kitten as she wiped her cheeks.

Sharlo's hands tightened on the shovel's handle, and her voice was harsh as she said, "Nothing for it now, your highness. No time to dilly dally. Let's gather all the ingredients you'll need for the next several batches of potions, shall we?"

Bella blinked at the servant as she walked to the smokehouse, leaned the shovel against it, and picked up a bucket to gather whatever herbs Bella pointed out. "I—I have enough for this week, Sharlo. I've been neglecting my duties in making any more, since I was monitoring the—cat."

Sharlo's shoulders haunched, and she bowed her head. Then she turned to Bella, her square jaw firm, her lips pursed, and a line between her forehead as she frowned.

"I took the potion and said the spell two days ago," Sharlo said harshly.

Bella's stomach knotted and the gardening tools around them began to shake. Her vision tilted as dizziness swam through her.

"No," she whispered, shaking her head.

Sharlo's face twisted into a bitter grimace. "Yes. The cat was fine for three weeks, so I took it. I've been fine, have felt fine, still feel fine. I've made the same amount of daily progress on the caved-in escape passage in the cellar as I have every day for the past four months."

Bella's mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out. Sharlo was the last living, moving thing in the castle. There were no more cats, no one else to talk to. She'd be utterly alone after she died.

She was a fool, a selfish fool, to think such a thing. Her head ached and her stomach twisted to imagine what Sharlo must be feeling right now. More tears fell down her cheeks. She'd cried so much in the past four months, more than she had in the previous four years combined.

Sharlo waved a gnarled and straightened into the ramrod posture only a servant can maintain. "None of that now, your highness. When I go, I go and not even the gods can change it. Let's get you set up with anything you might need before I kick the bucket. Perhaps you can even use more potions on me and see if these hooks will at least disappear."

Bella frowned and nodded, following Sharlo into the herb garden. Her mind latched onto that last detail. Sharlo took the same potion and said the same spell that Bella had used on the last cat, which had separated into a normal cat for three weeks.

But the cat had separated within just a few hours.

"You did it two days ago, you said? And the hooks are still there?" Bella asked, a million questions running through her mind. Sharlo should've separated from the coat rack by now. Maybe she wasn't dying and would be fine. Maybe Bella could save her with another spell or potion. There was still hope.

One week ago…

Bella coaxed the fork and spoon to pour one more ingredient into the bottle.

"That's it. Thank you so much. You're invaluable. Priceless. I appreciate you so much," she murmured.

A few kind words went a long way with semi-conscious inanimate objects. She only wished she'd praised Sharlo more while she'd been here. Losing her had been the hardest to take, possibly because she'd been so accepting of it. When she hadn't checked in before going to bed for the night, Bella had gone to find her.

She'd fallen in the cellar, chisel and hammer nearby.

Bella had animated a carpet and wrapped her in it, then magically flown it outside to the hole Sharlo had dug. Bella's stomach clenched at the memory, how she'd argued with Sharlo but the woman had demanded Bella stay practical.

Indeed, the lessons in practicality had helped her tame her wilder emotions. In those last weeks, the woman had opened up about her life too. It had given Bella even more perspective on the past year's events.

The fork and spoon clicked together in a series of sounds as they talked to each other. These two were now permanently animated as she didn't have the heart to make them go back the way they'd been before. Then she'd be truly alone.

She'd had enough of death in the past few months. Her husband, Gastone, had been killed in her bedroom right in front of her. Then she'd wrapped his killer in her sheets and squeezed the life from him until he burst all over the room.

There'd been dozens of dead in the courtyard and throughout the bottom floor from the rebellion. Sharlo and Ignot had helped dispose of them, but then she'd lost Ignot, the cats, and finally Sharlo.

She shivered, throwing off the memories as the lights in the room flickered. She clapped as the fork and spoon finished pouring the precious liquid into it. It was the last of the cat's whiskers. After this, there would be no more potions available to test the separation spell. She'd gone back to testing the dead animal heads on the walls in the hallway, but had had no success.

She sighed and said the spell to heat the stone underneath the bottle to a low boil. The fork tapped his tongues together in a clacking that somehow translated into her brain.

There was no explanation for it. Magic hadn't worked normally since that fateful day when she'd lost her body to a mad magical mirror.

She rubbed her forehead and waited for it to boil. Once all the supplies were gone, she'd have to start pulling down the books that had been out of reach. She'd focus on reading every blasted book in the library. Perhaps there was an obscure spell book or something to assist in her search to reverse the curses. Ideally, she'd find something to help her get her body back.