“Magic has a way of settling into stone, and this place has been listening for a very long time.”
“That sounds a little ominous,” I said.
“It’s honest,” Nova replied, shrugging.
Stone ground together as the door pushed open.
Inside, the hall was dim. Small floating lights drifted through the air, steady and soft. Along the walls, shallow niches had been carved into the stone. Each one held something small—a shard of glass, a ribbon, a feather, a smooth stone that glowed faintly.
Nova stepped inside first, alert without looking tense. Ardetia followed, light on her feet, her eyes already scanning the room. I lingered on the threshold for a moment before making myself step through.
The air felt different in here. Old magic lingered in the stone, and it felt quiet and layered, as if the room had been holding on to things for a very long time.
Nova stopped at one of the niches and lifted a small flat stone from it. The rock looked ordinary enough. It was smooth and gray, but the light above us flickered the moment it left its resting place as if it was connected to the building.
“This one records movement,” she said. “Paths taken near Ward boundaries. Crossings. Thresholds.” She looked back at me. “If you want to reenact what happened, we start here and let the Academy show us what it remembers.”
Ardetia glanced at me. “Are you ready to see?”
Was I?
My mother’s note flashed through my mind.
Don’t mistake this for loyalty to her. It is loyalty to you.
And beneath that memory, another one surfaced where the Priestess stood in the mirror’s reflection, claiming the library as if it belonged to her.
“I’m ready.” But would I ever truly be ready for this?
“Stand here.” Nova guided me to the center of the hall, where the stone floor was etched with faint circular patterns. I hadn’t seen them at first, but now they seemed to brighten as my feet crossed into them.
The Academy responded the moment I stopped moving.
Nova held the movement-stone in front of her and closed her eyes. Her lips moved in a quiet spell. I couldn’t hear the words, but something in the air shifted, tightening slightly, like the room was listening.
Ardetia raised her hand near the stone, adding her magic to Nova’s.
The lights in the hall softened, and without thinking about it, I moved my fingers above the stone, letting them hover. My fingertips heated with recognition as I let my mind drift to my mother and everyone’s separate accounts.
I looked around the room and noticed it had dimmed. It didn’t turn into darkness, but it started to feel like the walls and floors were a little out of focus, and the air seemed to ripple.
Nova’s voice cut through my thoughts, steady and clear.
“Show us the last crossing,” she said. “Show us the path tied to Headmistress Maeve Bellemore’s blood.”
The Academy didn’t resist, and the air in front of us shifted as the walls widened until the hall fell away.
A moment later, I was looking at something else entirely. I saw a path in the early evening, with barely any moonlight sprinkling across the grass.
An uneven line of stones led through the gardens as trees stood in near darkness.
Someone moved along the path, and my breath caught.
It was my mother.
She looked just as she had that day. Her steps were deliberate and steady. Her back was straight, and her chin was up as if any decision she’d made was set in stone. She wasn’t rushed or hurried. She seemed…calm.
She wasn’t fleeing. On the contrary, it felt like she knew exactly where she was going.
