All Chapters of Bound by the Cursed Moon: Chapter 571 - Chapter 580

Point of View: Kieran (Male Lead)"Papa, if you let go of my hand now, I will not find my way back. So please hold on, and do not look at his face."I am Kieran, and I held on with everything I had.The room had gone mad. Light poured from the ink bowl in a white rope, and the other end of it was buried in the old man's chest. Alden hung in my arms, his heels drumming the stones. Sable was shouting something. Wren was shouting something else. Beneath all of it, a sound like a hundred doors opening at once."Dorian!" Rhen cried. "Open the thread, quickly, before it breaks!""I cannot." Dorian was on his hands and knees, gray as ash. His voice was almost gone. "If I open it, I cannot close it. You know that.""Then I will close it," said Tam."Tam, no, you are too small a...""Then I am too small." He was crying, and his hands were already moving, looping the gray cord around his fingers. "But I am the only one here who knows the knot. Dorian. Please. Open it."Dorian looked at him. Som

Point of View: Kieran (Male Lead)"Kieran, do not shout. I know you want to. But this is not Petra's fault. Her mother lied to her too, and that lie almost killed everyone you love."I am Kieran, and I was already furious at someone I could not name.We were back in the round room. Morning light slanted through the one high window and lay in a pale square across the oak table. The tally marks looked smaller by day, almost shabby. The ink bowl sat empty and dry. No flame. No voice. But the copper case on the floor still hummed faintly, like a held breath.Wren knelt beside it with her cracked spectacles pushed up on her forehead. In front of her lay the old parchment, unrolled and weighted at the corners with four small stones. She had not slept. Neither had any of us."Show me," I said."Sit first.""Wren.""Sit, Kieran. You are going to want to."I sat. Rhen took the stool beside me. Petra stood against the far wall with her hands clasped, small and gray. Briar sat on the floor with

Point of View: Kieran (Male Lead)"Kieran, whatever you decide, do not decide it angry. A thing made of grief only grows fat on angry councils. Elara."I am Kieran, and I read my old friend's hawk letter three times before I understood it.The bird had come in at midafternoon, a lean brown thing with a message tube lashed to its leg. Wren had seen it first. She had caught it on her glove and passed it to me without a word, and now I stood at the quarry's edge with the little scroll in my fist and the wind pulling at my sleeve. Elara. We had held our pack together through the long winter, back when everything fell apart. I had not thought of her in months. How in the world did she know?"Wren," I said. "Did you write to her?""I wrote to a great many people." Wren came up beside me. "I wanted allies. I did not expect an answer this fast.""She says do not decide angry.""She is very wise.""She is very annoying." I rolled the scroll and tucked it into my belt. "But she is right. Look."

Point of View: Kieran (Male Lead)"Father, Dorian is not answering me. His eyes are open, and he is smiling, and he has never smiled like that in his whole life."I am Kieran, and I ran.Sable's voice had torn me out of a shallow sleep. It was deep night, the moon a thin pale blade over the quarry, and the camp lay in cold silver light. I stumbled across the dust to the cave mouth, my heart slamming. Sable knelt beside Dorian on the stone, her hands clamped around his face. Briar was there too, wrapped in a blanket, eyes huge.Dorian sat upright against the cave wall. His eyes were open. They did not blink. A small, sweet, terrible smile curved his mouth, and I knew it was not his."Dorian," I said. "Can you hear me?""He is not here," said a soft voice from his lips.It was a girl's voice. Warm, sad, laughing."Maren," Briar whispered."Hello, dear heart." Dorian's head tilted. "You were so brave in the tower. I did not like to see it. Do not be afraid. I only want to talk.""Let him

Point of View: Kieran (Male Lead)"Papa, I know what I am asking. I know it is too much. But if we do not give it away today, tomorrow it will be taken."I am Kieran, and my daughter was standing in the middle of the quarry with the future in her hands.Dawn had come cold and clear. The village gathered one last time, more quietly than before. They sat on the stone ledges in the long gold light, bundled in cloaks, eyes shadowed. Nobody had slept. The bell that had rung in the night, far away and from the wrong direction, had settled over everyone like frost.Briar stood in front of them. The braided silver line trailed from her wrist to Alden's chair. In her arms she held the copper case. She was not trembling. I could see the effort it cost her.Beside her stood Petra. She had come early, alone, and asked to be first."I will say it plainly," Petra said. Her voice was thin and clear. "I held this for thirty years. I kept it because I believed one careful person was safer than many ca