My throat tightened. My stomach rolled. A wave of nausea hit so suddenly that I swallowed hard and tasted acid.
And I knew that I was watching my grandmother walk the aisles of Stonewick Academy’s library.
“No…” I whispered.
And then the scene changed, like a page had been flipped.
I was still in a library, but it wasn’t the one I’d just viewed. I saw aisles, shelves, and sprites, but now the focus wasn’t Mariselle. It was someone else walking between the stacks.
Someone with my gait.
My posture.
My hands.
It took my brain a full heartbeat to accept what my eyes were seeing.
Me.
Older.
Not ancient—just… older than I was now. There were faint lines at the edges of my eyes, more confidence in the way I held my shoulders, and my hair was pulled back with a practicality that suggested I didn’t have time for loose curls and wishful thinking.
I wore clothing I didn’t recognize. Darker fabric, fitted at the waist, layered like someone who expected movement and danger at any moment.
I spotted a pendant at my throat that pulsed faintly with light, and when I turned, the glow reflected off the spines of the books like moonlight.
My birthmark burned as I watched myself, magical folk moved through the library in a tense, purposeful stream.
A vampire woman with a braid down her back and a satchel slung over one shoulder stared at a chart. A goblin man with ink-stained fingers clutched a rolled map. A young shifter with a child on their hip, the child’s wide eyes glowing faint gold, looked through books.
But none of them were familiar, and yet they moved like a unit.
It felt like I was watching a group that had been through something together, and I was there, but I didn’t recognize them, and I didn’t see anyone I knew now.
I was their leader.
The thought hit me so hard my stomach lurched again because this wasn’t the Academy’s library and nothing was familiar.
I watched myself head toward a doorway at the far end of the library, where an arch carved in black stone, threaded with silver veins, pulsed faintly.
I watched myself approach it with calm determination and step through it.
The world beyond the arch wasn’t the Academy.
It wasn’t Stonewick.
The air changed immediately into drier, colder, and scented with incense and old blood and something acidic beneath it that made my skin crawl.
The walls were dark stone, polished to a gleam, etched with symbols that looked like charms. Torches burned in sconces, but the flames were pale, almost colorless, as if starved of warmth.
Older Me walked down the corridor with the group close behind her.
And then she turned the corner.
My blood froze.
Because the hall opened into a wide space that looked like a cathedral made by someone who’d never believed in mercy, pillars rose like ribs, and a dais sat at the far end, carved from the same black stone as the walls. Curtains hung in heavy folds, swallowing sound. And the air hummed. It wasn’t cozy Academy magic buzzing through the breezes. It was tight and controlled.
