Back in my room, I kept the lamp close while I packed. The gray patch in my vision had spread, and I needed to leave before it covered the doorway.
Few possessions were worth the weight. I took a spare tunic and the dried wildflowers Kaelen had picked on our first anniversary.
They crumbled at the edges when I wrapped them, but I could still remember their scent.
The Ice Shard waited beneath my pillow. Cut from the heart of a frozen mountain, the crystal hung from a leather cord and carried a steady cold against my palm.
When Kaelen gave it to me, he had said, *“It will guard your heart when I cannot.”* For three years, its magic had held back the curse's final stage.
On the worst nights, that patch of cold against my skin was the only way I knew the spell had not won yet.
I tied it
