"What the hell is this?" My mind tumbles with confusion as I try to piece together what's going on.
I wrote this journal.
I wrote in this journal many times.
I've been in this castle many times. Been the queen …
I'm cursed …
Everyone is lying to me …
Pieces of sharp and broken memories flicker through my mind, but I can't connect all the shapes and colors, as if I'm under a blocking spell. Maybe I am. A single, faded memory brinks through the barrier, though. One of Rhyland giving me the choker on my birthday. Just like he did in my dream.
No, not a dream. A memory. From this life?
I open my jewelry box, and my heart cracks. The velvet choker with the rose pendant is lying inside.
"It really happened." I rub my hand across the pendant, and then return to the notebook.
I fan through the pages, stopping toward the end.
If you don't figure this out soon, you're going to die all over again. You'll die on the day you're crowned, after the party. Don't doubt me on this one. It's the one thing Fate never changes. And I know Rhyland knows the answers to some of this. He's the key to all of this. But either he won't-or can't-tell you. Whatever the reason, you need to figure out a way around it. Figure out how to break him like he's done to you over and over again. Do whatever it takes to get to the truth.
I sink down into a chair as my legs give out on me and glance at my bed. Rhyland put a sleep spell on me right before I passed out. Why? And where is he getting the magic from? Who is Rhyland?
Who am I?
Bits of answers break through the wall, but they only create a jumbled mess of thoughts, just like the ink staining the notebook pages. But I vow to myself to make sense of it. To figure out what's going on.
I won't die this time around. I'll survive to the end. I just need to find out how.