Page 96 of Castle of the Cursed
“I can help, too,” says Cyclops. With a tilt of their head, a horrible snapping sound fills the air, as Antonela’s right knee bends at a painful angle. She cries out in agony and falls to the floor.
“Stop!” I shout, running over to shield my sister with my body, but no one can see or hear me.
Another student shears off her hair, while someone else blinds her in one eye, turning the brown iris white.
I look to the hooded figure in desperation, but the instructor watches stoically, as if this is part of the lesson.
I have to turn away from my sister’s suffering because standing powerless as she’s tortured is more than I can stand. I’m going to tear my eyeballs out if I don’t get out of here right now. I don’t want to see more. I want this to end—
“That is enough.”
The students disperse, and the instructor approaches Antonela, who’s writhing on the floor, bloodied and bruised and bald. As they move their hand across my sister, she begins to heal and revert to her original form.
“You are not a naturally gifted spellcaster,” says the instructor. “I would advise you to focus your energies on perfecting one technique. It is better than being terrible at everything.”
Antonela stays on the ground, her breaths shallow, eyes wide from the trauma.
“It was for your own good, you know,” adds the instructor in a lower register, without helping my sister up. “We must cure you of your humanity before it kills you.”
I don’t want to see anything else. I don’t need to watch more scenes like these to get the picture. I want to end the spell and leave this place as soon as possible.
But if I do, I’ll never know the rest of Antonela’s history.
After what she’s endured, the least she deserves is for someone to bear witness. As her twin, I owe her this much.
So I kneel beside her. Even if this isn’t happening right now and she can’t sense me, I don’t want to leave her alone. I search her eyes, expecting to find her expression distant and defeated—but to my surprise, she seems focused and determined.
She looks like me when I’ve found a new lead.
My sister begins staking out a particular door that I learn is a place called the Atrium.
It seems to be off-limits to students, since only larger beings in black hooded cloaks ever go through the door.
Her hood over her head, Antonela stands in front of a thick black vein that cuts across the fleshy red wall, her gray cloak almost blending in with the background. She watches as instructors come in and out of the Atrium.
She waits until the hall has completely emptied, then she peels away from the wall and steps into the open. It looks like she’s going to try the Atrium door—
There’s a flutter of movement nearby, and Antonela freezes.
Someone else is here, and they seem to have materialized from thin air, like they were concealing themselves with a glamour. Antonela ducks, and I hope she hasn’t been spotted.
Not one but two someone elses step up to the Atrium door—Red and Cyclops. They approach quickly, like they’re attempting the same break-in as my sister.
Cyclops grabs the doorknob. When they twist, blood drips down their hand. The door doesn’t budge.
“My turn,” says Red. Their blood joins their friend’s on the doorknob, but again it does not twist.
“What are you doing here?”
We all stiffen at the instructor’s voice, even me, and I’m not technically here.
“Nothing,” says Red quickly.
“Only full-fledged casters can open this door, and as talented as you may be, you have more to learn,” says the instructor. “Now go!”
My sister waits until the hall is empty to take off. Yet as she peels away from the wall, the wall pulls her back.
A pair of hairless arms wrap around Antonela’s torso. An outsider trying to break into the castle.
