Before I can hesitate, I add a rune of my own: a tight return loop nested inside the pattern. A siphon and release. I thread it back to the nearest ley line, sending the power home, clean and contained.
The circle shudders.
For an instant, the floor seems to drop away beneath me. Power surges down the new path; the chalk flares white-hot—then collapses into mundane dust.
A flick of my fingers, a spark of power, and the dust wipes itself away. Gone.
With a wave of my hand, the handwritten notes andbooks scattered across the floor rise. Pages flutter, covers tremble. Ink bleeds from the sheets, letters unravelling. Spines crack; parchment curls. One by one, the words vanish.
Fear and horror fill Meredith’s eyes. “How can you be so strong? How do you know this magic? Who the hell are you?” she whispers.
I smile. It is not a nice smile.
We leave the house together. I am sure Lander heard Knox’s words; he is guarding Meredith like she is a queen, never more than an arm’s length away. Beside us, Meredith rants—lawsuits, Ministry threats, promises of ruin—but we ignore her fury and keep walking.
My hand twitches towards the knife strapped to my thigh, fingers brushing the hilt. One small movement, one clean strike, and this would be over. I wait for an opening that never quite comes.
In the end, Lander lifts his paper gun and fires a single round—clean, precise, and silent. Meredith drops bonelessly to the ground, unconscious before she hits the grass.
His idea, not mine.
Now all the coven members have been hit by my magical bullets.
When I finally can, I sag against the wall of Knox’s house, lower myself to the floor and close my eyes, exhaling a long breath.
To an observer, I must look merely tired, but inside I reach for my power. My filaments unfurl, touching the spell that keeps everyone asleep.
Each person struck by my magic glows in my mind like a pinpoint of light. They are all fast asleep, all safe. Thecoven are clustered in the staff block, and I easily find Samuel and Meredith.
I will not kill them; that would be barbaric.
Instead, I tweak their memories.
The beauty of magic is that, once it sits inside someone, you can reshape it if you have the skill. Nested within the sleep enchantment is a secondary spell: a memory modifier. Harmless while dormant, it sits like a tiny bomb, waiting to be triggered. Now is the time.
I activate it, erasing the past few weeks from their minds—short-term and long-term alike. The guards and police I leave untouched, but every mage, witch, and wizard who saw that circle, who worked on that spell, forgets it entirely.
No one will remember the spell. That is how I want it. Let them keep their miserable lives, without the knowledge to endanger anyone.
“Harper, are you all right?” Riker asks softly.
I release the magic—mission complete—and open my eyes to find the shifter’s worried gaze.
“I’m fine, thank you. It has been a long night.”
“It has,” he agrees with a tired smile. “Lander’s on the phone, calling it in. He has all the evidence, so we no longer need to keep things covert. We’re just waiting for the cavalry to haul this lot away.”
“That is good. I am glad we do not have to squeeze everyone on the boat.”
He chuckles and offers his hand. “I wanted to say goodbye; I’m taking the boat back to my boss.”
I lean forward to shake it. “It was lovely to meet you, Riker.”
“You too, Harper.” He smiles, then the big blondshifter turns and walks off. A pang of guilt pinches as I watch him go.
Dayna, Jill, and George stand nearby, smiling. George already looks better; his personal shields are down, and the colour is returning to his face.
The guilt presses harder.
