Chapter Twenty-Two
The library was warmer than usual.
Not temperature, exactly, but more like the hush of early morning sunlight and old magic had thickened, layering over the shelves like a wool blanket. Dust floated lazily in the air, catching gold in the light from the high windows. I pushed the door closed behind me and let the silence settle.
It was the kind of quiet that made you whisper, even if you were the only one there.
I made my way past the tables, most empty except for a few half-finished scrolls and a teacup that looked like it had gone cold two days ago. The book sprites must’ve been distracted. Usually, they kept this place tidier.
I ran my fingers along the spines of the older volumes. The ones with cracked leather and faded lettering. I wasn’t even sure where to start. The Maple Ward wasn’t exactly a popular topic. Most records I’d seen in the past barely mentioned it. Just a paragraph here or there, usually sandwiched between more glamorous accounts of the Flame Ward or the Butterfly Ward.
But I wasn’t looking for drama. I was looking for roots.
“Not often I see you wandering these shelves without a cup of tea and a mood,” a voice said behind me.
I turned and found Grandma Elira stepping into the light, her robes trailing like soft smoke behind her. She didn’t look surprised to see me, just amused.
“I’m trying something new,” I said. “Rather than being rushed and hurried, I thought I’d roam.”
“Ah, uncaffeinated research?” She arched a brow. “How’s it going?”
I laughed. “Well, I’m less jittery or maybe that’s because my dad isn’t being held captive by Gideon.”
She stepped closer, brushing one hand along a row of thin green-bound tomes. “What are you looking for?”
“The Maple Ward,” I said. “Its history. Anything on how it works? Why is it failing?”
That last word caught her attention.
“You’ve felt it too?” she asked.
“I’ve seen it.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. “You went into the Ward?”
“I didn’t go in on purpose,” I said. “It opened for me.”
That stopped her.
“Grandma, the tree—” I exhaled slowly. “It’s dying. Whatever’s left of its strength, it’s holding on by threads. But there’s a sapling. Just one. Small, but alive.”
Her face went still in that way she did when something hit her hard.
Not blank, exactly…just suspended.
“A sapling?” she repeated. “Inside the chamber?”
I nodded.
She stepped back slightly, steadying herself with a hand on the table.
“That means… oh, Maeve. That means it’s trying. It’s still trying.”
I waited.
“It must’ve known. It must’ve understood that it would vanish entirely if it didn’t pass on part of itself or didn’t root something new. The Wards aren’t just protections, they’re living. They’re woven into us. If the Maple fades completely…”
“The others fall with it,” I said.
She nodded once. “Eventually. The Maple connects the rest. Its roots run beneath Stonewick, Maeve. Beneath the school, the village green, the edge of the northern cliffs. It’s the quiet pulse beneath everything.”
I felt the weight of it settle across my chest. “So, if the Maple Ward dies…”
“It won’t just be this Ward that collapses,” she finished. “It will unravel everything. Piece by piece.”
As if in response to her words, a pair of book sprites popped their heads out from the top of a shelf. One had paper stuck in its hair. The other had ink stains on its cheeks like war paint.
They blinked at us. Then scurried down the shelves, muttering and squeaking, darting in and out of the bookcases like caffeinated squirrels.
“I think we’ve been heard,” I murmured.
Elira smiled faintly. “They’re faster than any index.”
Sure enough, within minutes, one of the sprites had dropped a thick leather-bound book onto the nearest table with a sound that echoed louder than seemed appropriate. The other was already flipping pages, clearly impatient for us to catch up.
The book’s title had worn away, but the inside was surprisingly crisp. The pages smelled like maples and something even sweeter.
I leaned over it while Elira pulled a stool next to mine.
The entry came about halfway through the book. A hand-drawn map of Stonewick covered two full pages. Except instead of the usual roads and landmarks, it showed something entirely different.
Roots.
Dozens of them. Thick, branching lines drawn in dark ink, spreading out from a central circle labeled Heart Grove.
“That’s it,” Elira said, pointing to the center. “The original maple. The one that anchors the rest.”
“The one I visited, and these…” I traced one of the lines that extended beneath the village bakery. “These roots go everywhere.”
She nodded. “Some of the houses were built around them. Others grew into the gaps. That’s why strange things happen when one of the Wards weakens. The roots carry more than magic. They carry memory. Emotion. Even time.”
There were annotations in the margins. Notes about pruning, restoration rituals, and something about a bloom cycle that hadn’t happened in decades were scribbled hurriedly.
One line near the bottom made me stop reading altogether.
If the Heart Grove cannot be revived, a new seed must be planted and rooted in truth. The Ward will not survive on false ground.
“What does that mean?” I asked quietly.
Elira’s fingers traced the line, soft and slow.
“It means the next sapling, the one you saw, it can’t just grow. It has to belong. It has to be placed in trust, not ambition. Rooted in something real.”
“And if it’s not?”
“It’ll fail before it begins.”
I leaned back in my chair. The air around us felt heavier now, as if the library itself was listening.
The book sprite had curled up near the corner of the table, already asleep, ink still smudged across its nose.
Must be a hard life, being a sprite.
I thought about the tender leaves of new beginnings.
The sapling wasn’t just hope. It was a last chance.
I thought back to my own life. I divorced, my daughter was starting her own life…I could have chosen to wither, but instead, I searched for new beginnings.
Or maybe they searched for me.
And just like me, the sapling had chosen to grow in the shadow of what came before.
I glanced at my grandma.
“I need to go back,” I said. “To the Ward.”
“You won’t be alone,” she said softly.
I smiled at my grandma and nodded. “Nova said the Flame Ward has started to strengthen again because of…”
“You,” my grandma said simply.
“Well, partly because of that.”
“You’re too modest, mylove.”
Grandma Elira and I didn’t talk much on the way back to the Maple Ward. The halls didn’t ask for conversation, and I wasn’t sure I had words for the knot sitting under my ribs anyway. Just knowing the tree was trying… that it had enough will left to grow something new… it stirred something in me that felt older than grief and heavier than hope.
She walked beside me, steady as ever, one hand brushing the stone walls now and then like she was saying hello to the building. I swear sometimes the Academy breathed differently around her.
I had the spell tucked into my pocket—simple, but strong. Nourishment. Not the kind for garden herbs or window box violets. This one had been written for deep roots and tired ground. It pulsed faintly against my birthmark, wrapped in parchment and tied with old twine. I’d added the comfort charm just before we left the library. A little warmth for the elder tree. Nothing fancy. Just something to ease the ache of old age.
We’d just turned the final corner when someone nearly collided with us.
“Are you serious? ” Bella said, stopping short, arms flailing a little to keep her balance. She blinked at both of us. “You're going in there?”
“Good to see you too,” I said.
She looked me up and down, then shifted her gaze to Grandma Elira, who nodded politely like we were just out for a nice stroll and not headed straight into the ancient, creaking heart of one of the oldest magical systems in the village.
Bella pointed toward the Ward door. “Its maple buddies grabbed me.”
“I remember,” I said. “But I don’t think it was trying to hurt you. I’ve already visited it once. I know it meant no harm. I was too busy scurrying from one mess to the next, not realizing how much the Maple Ward needed our help. You were just the unlikely target.”
Bella scowled. “You ever been hugged by a root system? Not exactly cozy.”
Elira smiled faintly. “Sometimes trees know more than people.”
Bella blinked at her, then at me. “Is that… am I supposed to feel better now?”
I chuckled and stepped forward and touched the door. It opened on its own.
Of course it did.
“I’m not asking you to come in,” I said. “But I have to go inside.”
She stared at me for a long second, then gave a sigh that sounded far too dramatic for the moment. “Just don’t let it eat you. I don’t want to explain that to Keegan.”
My grandma laughed, low and warm. “I’ll keep watch.”
I stepped inside, noticing the air hadn’t changed much. Still dim and close. Still filled with the scent of wood and damp earth and something older than memory.
But something was different.
The sapling had grown .
It was only a little, just a few new leaves, maybe an inch higher, but it was enough to catch my breath. It had heard me. Or felt me. Or simply decided to keep trying.
The elder maple loomed above it, quiet and still. There was peace in it now, which I hadn’t felt before, as if it had exhaled some of the weight it had held for so long.
I knelt next to the sapling and unwrapped the parchment. The spell sat in my palm, warm and pulsing—not in a dramatic way, but steady, like a heartbeat.
“Nutrients, stability, memory,” I whispered, tracing the runes lightly before pressing the paper into the soil beside the roots. “Let it find what it needs.”
The parchment glowed softly, then sank, disappearing into the earth like it had always belonged there. The sapling shivered once, merely a whisper of motion. Its leaves deepened in color.
I reached for the second spell.
This one wasn’t written so much as spoken into being. A gentle murmur of warmth, light, and rest. I shaped it above the old tree’s roots, slightly remembering my mom doing the same when I was young in our back yard.
“For what you’ve carried,” I said, letting the magic fall like a blanket, “and for what you’ve kept alive.”
The roots glowed faintly beneath the bark. Just for a moment. Just enough.
And then it happened.
The summoning bell rang.
I turned sharply, breath caught somewhere between my ribs.
Outside, I heard Elira’s footsteps and rose slowly, one hand still pressed against the tree trunk.
The bell rang again. Lower this time.
Calling.
Not just to me.
To all of us.