Updated Nov 6, 2025 • ~8 min read
Sage couldn’t sleep.
She’d tried. Spent two hours lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to the cabin settle around her. But her mind wouldn’t stop spinning through curse theory and magical signatures and the ticking clock that said twenty-seven days now.
Finally, she gave up.
The cabin was dark when she emerged from her room, lit only by the dying embers in the fireplace. She padded to the kitchen in bare feet and pajama pants, planning to make tea and maybe review her notes one more time.
Then she saw him.
Thorne sat at the dining table, surrounded by open books and scattered papers, a single lamp casting shadows across his face. He’d changed into sweatpants and a worn t-shirt, his hair mussed like he’d been running his hands through it.
He looked up when she entered. “Can’t sleep either?”
“Mind’s too loud,” Sage admitted.
“Same.”
She moved to the kitchen, putting the kettle on. “Want some tea?”
“Please.”
While the water heated, Sage studied him. The exhaustion in the slope of his shoulders. The dark circles under his eyes. The way his jaw was tight even now, like he was carrying the weight of both families on his back.
“You know,” she said quietly, “you don’t have to save everyone alone.”
Thorne’s eyes lifted to hers. “Neither do you.”
“I’m just the researcher. You’re the heir. The future leader.”
“Is that what you think?” He leaned back in his chair. “That this is just a job for you?”
“Isn’t it?”
“No.” The honesty wards pulsed. “This is personal. For both of us. We’re not just breaking a curse—we’re trying to save everyone we love. That’s not a job. That’s survival.”
The kettle whistled.
Sage made two mugs of chamomile tea, adding honey to both. She brought them to the table and sank into the chair across from Thorne.
“What are you working on?” she asked.
“Family histories. Trying to find the origin point of the feud.” He gestured to the books. “But the records don’t match.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Thorne version says it started in 1923. Your great-great-grandmother, Eleanor Mitchell, tried to steal our ancestral grimoire during a new moon ritual. My great-great-grandfather caught her, defended the coven, and she died in the magical backlash. After that, Mitchells declared war.”
Sage frowned. “That’s not what I was taught.”
“What’s the Mitchell version?”
She pulled her own family history book closer. “1923, yes. But in our records, Eleanor Mitchell was invited to a joint ritual as a gesture of peace between the covens. During the ritual, she was murdered by Silas Thorne—your great-great-grandfather—who wanted to steal her earth magic for himself. The Mitchells have been seeking justice ever since.”
Thorne stared at her. “That’s completely different.”
“Completely.”
They sat in silence, the implications settling over them like snow.
“One of these has to be true,” Thorne said finally. “Or neither is.”
“Or both are partially true, and the real story is somewhere in the middle.”
Sage pulled out a blank notebook, starting to write. “Let’s compare what we know for certain. 1923, agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“A ritual involving Eleanor Mitchell and Silas Thorne.”
“Yes.”
“Eleanor died.”
“Yes.”
“And afterward, the families went to war.”
Thorne nodded slowly. “Everything else is contested.”
Sage wrote it all down, creating two columns—Thorne Version and Mitchell Version. The differences were stark.
“My family says Eleanor was a thief,” Thorne said, reading over her shoulder. “Yours says she was a peacemaker.”
“Your family says Silas was protecting the coven. Mine says he was a murderer.”
“What if they’re both wrong?”
Sage looked up at him. “What do you mean?”
“What if whoever killed Eleanor—and I’m not saying it was my ancestor, but what if someone did—what if they wanted the families to blame each other? What if the feud was the point?”
The idea sent chills down Sage’s spine.
“That would mean someone’s been profiting from our hatred for a hundred years,” she said slowly.
“Or someone cast a long-game curse that’s only now coming to fruition.”
They stared at each other.
“We need to find out what really happened in 1923,” Sage said.
“Agreed. But how? Everyone who was alive then is dead.”
“Not everyone.” Sage’s mind raced. “The Council keeps neutral records. If there was a death investigated, especially one involving two covens…”
“There’d be a file.” Thorne grabbed his phone, checking the time. “Council archives are closed now, but we can request access tomorrow.”
“We should look for other discrepancies too. Other times our family histories don’t match.”
They dove back into the records, comparing dates and events.
The more they read, the more differences they found.
Small ones at first—disagreements about who started a particular skirmish, whose magic was stronger in a duel. But then larger gaps. Whole incidents that appeared in one family’s records but not the other’s.
“This is surreal,” Sage said after an hour. “It’s like we’ve been living in completely different realities.”
“We have been.” Thorne ran a hand through his hair. “I was taught that Mitchells were power-hungry, that you’d do anything to steal magic that wasn’t yours. That your earth magic made you manipulative—able to poison and control.”
Sage’s stomach twisted. “I was taught Thornes were violent. That your shadow magic made you cruel and cold. That you enjoyed hurting people.”
“Do you still believe that?”
The honesty wards hummed.
“No,” Sage admitted. “You’re protective, not cruel. Strategic, not cold. And the only thing I’ve seen you enjoy hurting is the curse.”
Thorne’s expression softened. “You’re curious, not power-hungry. Compassionate, not manipulative. And your magic is…” He paused, searching for words. “It’s like watching the earth wake up. Everything you touch comes alive.”
Heat flooded Sage’s cheeks.
“How much of what we were taught was lies?” she asked quietly.
“I don’t know. But I’m starting to think it was most of it.”
They sat with that for a moment. A hundred years of hatred, built on stories that might not even be true.
“I used to get in trouble,” Sage said suddenly, “for asking why we hated Thornes. I was seven, maybe eight. I asked my grandmother why we couldn’t just talk to them, try to make peace. She told me that some things were beyond forgiveness. That Thornes had killed our family, and wondering about their side made me a traitor.”
Thorne’s jaw tightened. “I asked my father once why we didn’t just share territory. Let Mitchells have the eastern forests, Thornes take the western mountains. He said Mitchells couldn’t be trusted with that much power. That they’d use it to destroy us.” He looked at Sage. “I was nine. And I believed him.”
“Of course you did. He was your father.”
“And your grandmother was your matriarch. We were children. We didn’t know any better.”
“But we know better now,” Sage said. “We’re working together. Trusting each other. And the world hasn’t ended.”
“Yet,” Thorne said with dark humor.
“The curse doesn’t count.”
He smiled—real and warm. “Fair point.”
Sage smiled back, and for a moment, everything else faded. The curse, the families, the impossible situation.
It was just them. Two people who were supposed to be enemies, drinking tea at midnight, realizing they’d been lied to their whole lives.
“Can I ask you something?” Sage said.
“You’re going to anyway.”
“True.” She gathered her courage. “If we break this curse—when we break it—what happens after?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean us. This.” She gestured between them. “We go back to our families. Back to being enemies. Do we just… pretend this never happened?”
Thorne was quiet for a long time.
Then: “I don’t think I could pretend. Not anymore.”
“Me neither.”
“But our families—”
“Will expect us to.”
“Yes.”
They looked at each other, the weight of the future pressing down.
“We could try,” Sage said. “To change things. Show them that Mitchells and Thornes can coexist.”
“They’ll call it betrayal.”
“Probably.”
“We could lose everything. Our positions in the covens. Our families’ trust.”
“I know.”
Thorne searched her face. “Why are you willing to risk that?”
Because you’re worth it, Sage thought. Because this—whatever this is between us—feels more real than a hundred years of hatred.
But saying that out loud felt like too much.
So instead, she said: “Because I’m tired of living in a world where children are taught to hate before they’re taught to love. Because the feud has taken enough from both our families. And because—” The honesty wards pulsed. “Because you’ve shown me that everything I was taught about Thornes was wrong. And if I was wrong about that, maybe there’s hope for everyone else too.”
Thorne’s eyes were intense in the lamplight. “You’re going to change the world, Sage Mitchell.”
“We’re going to change it,” she corrected. “Together.”
“Together,” he agreed.
His hand moved across the table, palm up. An offering.
Sage placed her hand in his.
His fingers closed around hers, warm and solid and safe.
They sat like that, hands linked across research and history and a hundred years of lies, while the fire died down and the moon set outside.
And for the first time since the curse started, Sage felt something besides fear.
She felt hope.
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