Helen stood, shaking as clouds washed over the sun. She felt cold tears prickle at her cheeks.

She’d been given a second chance.

For years, she’d tried for a child. She prayed, begged, tried everything to no avail. Her husband had banished her, and she’d become a witch far away from home. When news reached her that Eva had married, she had quickly returned. There, marrying Eva, touching her hair, her pretty cheeks.

Her husband.

Now Malvolia, already aging much too fast, she had approached them as they worked in their cottage a few months later. Already Eva’s belly stretched, holding the infant Sioni. She’d told them of the curse, that she’d figured out how to undo it.

She would take their firstborn child, she would take her blood, and the curse would transfer to her. Eva had screamed, and George- her own husband- had chased her from the house. She’d gone into hiding, waiting for Sioni to grow dissatisfied with the tower. Then she’d struck.

Years of misery and hate poured from Helen’s eyes.