Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
One Year Ago
The world tears. For one blind instant I am nowhere—no bricks, no beams, only magic stretched so thin it might snap.
Then gravity slams back.
My foundations punch into new ground, pipes bite soil, and the garden unfurls in a rush of roots and turf. Flowers: not a single petal lost. Wards sting as they re-knit. Windows: intact. Roof: whole. Spells and sentient objects: present and accounted for.
I sigh through my joists. I have done it again.
“Where did the sentient house go?” I almost wish I could see the Magic Hunter’s face when he returns with a coven and finds nothing but an empty plot.
All around sprawls wasteland: broken glass glittering among thistles, a rusted washing machine half-sunk in mud, scrubby trees twisted by wind.
A road curls away through miles of scrub.
A few miles to the east it meets the official crossing between the Human and Vampire Sectors.
Entry to the Human side demands visas and permits; the Vampire side offers only tarmac and a sign that might as well read Come for dinner. We won’t bite… much.
With no buildings nearby, I stretch my wards wide, casting for information. The sudden quiet jars after the city’s bustle—loneliness aches.
I dispatch a note to Beryl.
Beryl,
Do not approach the Enterprise Zone. The Magic Hunter, Councillor Lander Kane, visited. Do not worry, and please do not hunt him. I folded. Here is the new address…
—House
I am tempted to drift, to let time wash over me for a decade.
Then I remember his voice and what he said: “Technology has changed, and I can track you down. By the time I’m finished, I will know everything about you.”
Very well, Councillor Kane—let us see what your technology can do when the words themselves do not like you.
Those rescued slivers of soul I have gathered over the years have fused with my magic. Technomancy brushed against me and stuck. Once I could read only ink; now computer text appears exactly like print, and phones too.
My magic has adapted.
I gather the last scraps of power, and my filaments get to work. I follow telephone wires, fibre-optic lines, the hum of routers. Ministry servers bloom as towers of digital parchment: search logs, surveillance reports, tickets—a river of text. I slip between packets of information like smoke.
There, his name: Kane, Lander – Council Hunter, Magical Enforcement Division. Photo: that infuriatingly handsome face. Service record, commendations, a handful of disciplinary notes. Current assignment:
Investigate anomaly – suspected sentient structure, Enterprise Zone. Possible illegal human-to-derivative transformation.
Beneath, the tools meant to track me: satellite heat sweeps, magical sensor grids, CCTV cross-checks, a ‘wizard house incidents’ database.
He was not bluffing. He has cast a net to catch me.
So I place my filaments upon the net.
The system churns. A map, dots marking past sightings; beside my old Enterprise Zone address flashes a bold tag: subject lost.
That was fast.
I slip into the code that draws the map and write.
A new entry blooms in the far north, deep within the Shifter Sector’s inner border—coordinates that, in truth, belong to a mountain valley where shifters suffer no visitors.
Anomalous Ward Signature Detected – possible relocation of sentient structure
Status: inaccessible – shifter blockade. Further investigation pending Alpha Prime’s permission.
Good. Go bother the shifters.
I do not stop there.
A separate system holds threat assessments on extremist groups. Human First has a file thicker than my family spellbook; they have bombed more Ministry buildings than I have windows. I slide a rumour into an intercepted message chain, set to surface in a few days:
HF-Cell 9 believes wizard house acquired as covert base – sentient fortress, capable of teleporting. Source unconfirmed.
Elsewhere, in the ‘wizard house incidents’ table, I add another timed cross-reference:
Possible link: Human First activity spike in the Midlands. Unverified claims of derivative-killing sentient house in their possession.
Let the Ministry chase that.
And more.
In a CCTV archive, I nudge a timestamp so a stray flare in the Magic Sector resembles the afterimage of a teleporting building.
In a shifter complaint log I translate a shepherd’s grumble—‘weird glow behind the second wall’—into a formal notice of unusual wards.
In a routine Vampire Sector bulletin I drop a line:
Minor disturbance in western quarter – resident reported ‘house that wasn’t there yesterday.’ Patrol found nothing.
Over the next few months the map will glitter with leads: northern anomaly, Human First whispers, vampire disturbance, odd signature near the Magic Sector. Not enough to scream trap—just enough to make a hunter itch.
A nasty little thrill runs through my rafters. Enjoy the wild goose chase.
My magic flickers—thin now, colours washing out. I drift back from the scrolling text until I am only myself; the wards settle to a low, steady hum.
I am hidden. I am alone. For the moment, I am safe.
My magic flickers low, and I surrender to the quiet.