“Stella called it a calling path.”
“She’s right.”
“What happened with Miora?”
Her gaze drifted to the window. “Years ago, it shimmered silver and violet, stretched through the trees like a ribbon spun from starlight. It sank into the fields near the cottage.”
“But you didn’t go through it?”
“No,” she said, then smiled softly. “It was meant for Miora.”
“That path called to her the same way this one calls to you. She didn’t ignore it. She walked it. And when she came back, she was changed.”
I sat back, letting the name settle over me. Miora, my cottage companion and distant relative. The caretaker of the place that had held me when everything else fell apart. Quiet, wry, always moving like she was half in one world and half in another.
Of course, it had called to her.
“She never told me,” I said.
“She wouldn’t,” my grandma said. “Not unless she thought you were ready. Miora carries things close, but not because she’ssecretive, but because she respects the magic. And the weight of what it gives.” My grandma sighed. “More importantly, what it can take away.”
I closed my eyes for a moment. “She always seemed like she knew things she wasn’t saying.”
“She does,” Grandma Elira said with a chuckle. “But only because she’s lived through what she doesn’t wish on anyone else.”
My throat tightened.
“What did it change in her?” I asked. “What did the path take?”
“She came back with more clarity. But less certainty.”
“That sounds contradictory.”
“It’s not,” she said gently. “The path showed her what was true. But not how to live with it. Sometimes, they show what has been or what’s ahead.”
I stared into the flickering hearth beside us, the amber light painting shadows across the floor. “And now one is calling to me.”
“It would not have appeared unless something in you reached out first.”
“That’s not comforting.” And then I remembered. “The shimmering inside the Academy.”
“It’s not meant to be,” she said. “Calling paths don’t come for the curious. They come for the becoming.”
The words landed hard in my chest.
The becoming.
I thought of my old life and the fragments of it still tucked into texts from Skye and voicemails from Celeste. The life I’d built was with magic, danger, and wonder. The circle bending, the dragons hiding, and the shadows watching were all part of my new existence.
“I wanted to bring Celeste here,” I said. “But I can’t. I know I can’t.”
My grandma gave a soft sigh. “It’s the right choice.”
“I wanted so badly to share this with her. With Skye. But I would never forgive myself if it hurt them.”
“That’s because you’re learning what we all do, eventually,” Elira said, her voice full of something tender and aching. “That love and protection are sometimes the same thing. And sometimes they’re not.”
I swallowed hard. “And if I go through this path?”
