For some nefarious reason.
A horrid feeling churns in my stomach, but I try to dismiss it as paranoia. History cannot be repeating itself, can it?
No. I destroyed everything connected with sentient houses and unwilling soul transfer magic. Every scrap of knowledge, every ritual, every fragment of instruction. Much of what I used to twist the spell came from my own innate magic, born of desperation; that is why it worked in the first place.
But I cannot stop thinking:what if Meredith was hunting the mythical wizard’s house?When her coven failed to capture me, they turned to the next easiest target—someone isolated, someone vulnerable, someone powerful.
Me.
And when that failed, when she ruined her career, exposed herself and lost control, with nothing left to lose, she moved on again.
To Knox. To his people.
She cannot intend to recreate the magic. She cannot.No one knows the sentient house was once a paper mage. No one ever did. Unless… unless she is part of the Magic Collective.
But Meredith is too young.
Horror washes over me. I never hunted the families. Even at my angriest—burning with grief and rage—I could not punish innocent people for the sins of others.
Fate, it seems, has other plans.
What if that knowledge were recorded and stored beneath a paperweight? I would not know of its existence. It could still be out there, poised to let this nightmare begin anew.
I tell myself I am overthinking; trauma makes you see patterns everywhere, turns coincidence into conspiracy. Live too long inside a nightmare and you start to believe the whole world is built from it.
Projection.That is all this is.
Isn’t it?
Yet if Meredith believes the house was lost to the ley line—if she thinks that magic has vanished forever—would she try again?
Would she use Knox instead?
Paper mages are hated. Would anyone care if there were one less?
I have tasted Knox’s magic. He is strong, but not strong enough for that spell. It would shred his soul. The thought makes my chest ache. No one deserves that.
I hope I am wrong. I need to be wrong. But if there is even the slightest chance that I am not, then I have a moral obligation to act.
Knox and his people were willing to help me; now I must help them.
We head to the chapel, and I tell Lander I need to use my magic to check on things. He nods, pulls a laptop from his bag, and starts typing with brisk, practised efficiency.
I sit cross-legged on the living room floor. I steady my breathing and slip into a meditative state. My filaments stretch outward and…
Nothing.
I cannot find Meredith, Samuel, or any of the coven from yesterday. All of them have vanished. The island is worse. Knox is hidden from me. Where I should sense his presence, I feel only a void, an absence so absolute it makes my skin prickle.
Meredith must be using additional paperweights to keep me out and maintain control of Knox. The three I failed to reclaim at the chapel cannot be the only ones; this much deadened magic would require more. Either she had others all along, or she haslearnthow to make new ones. I never checked the age of the originals. That was a mistake.
There are documents online about the island. None current, but all predating Knox’s arrival—records tucked away in obscure databases across the Human Sector, forgotten by everyone except the sort of people who like to hoard information. I track them down and forward the files to Lander’s email.
He makes a strange noise when the message appears. I can feel his gaze on me, but he does not interrupt while I work.
His laptop keys clatter beside me, the screen flickering. I glance over as he connects it to the television and opensthe digital maps, the screen filling with satellite views and outlines.
I have already done a deep dive on the island; I know it well. And my memory—well, it is better than it should be. I have stopped questioning things. I simply use them.
