Chapter Fourteen
Keegan’s breathing was the first thing I noticed when the lights were out, slow and steady.
The trees pressed close to the cottage, and the moon turned silver, but the quiet that came with night helped me to stop moving for a few hours.
I lay on my side and stared at the faint outline of the window. The cottage smelled like dried herbs and woodsmoke, and whatever Miora had been simmering earlier, something sweet that had left me feeling almost back to normal.
I told myself I could sleep and that I didn't have to replay the episode with the mirror, but I wasn’t good at lying to myself.
And the images of Mariselle, stroking book spines like she owned the entire concept of knowledge, ran on repeat through my mind. And just when I thought I might have a moment of rest, my older self was walking through halls that weren't mine.
Keegan moved beside me, and his arm slid around my waist, drawing me closer in that steady way he had.
"Sleep," he murmured into my hair, voice rough with the last edge of wakefulness.
I swallowed. "I'm trying."
His lips brushed my hair, and he went still again.
I listened to him breathe until my own breathing matched his.
And I focused on the present with the warm bed and heavy blankets. The cottage Ward hummed faintly beneath it all, a soft undercurrent in the air.
Finally, my thoughts loosened, slipped, sank, and I was somewhere else.
I knew where I’d landed before I dared to admit it.
The air was too smooth, but the fog too thick.
Shadowick had smelled like wet earth and old grief. This wasn't quite that, but it was close enough to make me question my surroundings.
The trees surrounding me were familiar. Tall pines with ridged bark, buckthorn pressed between the clearing, and a few stubborn maples still holding the last of autumn's gold.
A figure moved between the trunks, and my heart did what it always did when the dream found him.
It sprinted.
Gideon didn't enter a space. He claimed it. That certainty of his that was effortlessly infuriating, that made me want to shove him and also, against my better judgment, listen.
"Maeve," he said calmly.
My name sounded different in his mouth this time. It wasn’t taunting or cold.
I stepped forward before I could stop myself, and my body remembered the Hollows. The way he'd held the line against the orcs like it had never been in question.
And now, he looked tired.
This wasn’t the kind of fatigue people joked about because they had a rough night. This exhaustion was the type that lived under his eyes and in the slight slump of his shoulders.
Even when Gideon was worn thin, he had that sense that the world owed him its attention. The arrogance could never completely be removed from the man in front of me.
But tonight, something else stirred behind his gaze.
He was careful, and the caution made my skin prickle. I glanced around, trying to center myself, but there was no reprieve.
"You're back.”
Gideon's mouth twitched, but it wasn’t quite a smile. "Am I? Did you miss me?"
There he was. The man who knew how to get under my skin and irritate me to the point of no return.
I looked around. "Where is this? It almost feels like Shadowick, but not quite."
"It’s not Shadowick." He shook his head, inhaling, and glanced around.
"Then where are we?"
“Close enough,” he said. “Yet far enough.”
He knew how to keep the irritation just alive enough to want to retreat.
My mind tried to map the distance between the cottage, the Flame Ward, Maple Ward, and Stonewick, where the boundary lines I’d walked so many times felt familiar. But this wasn’t there.
I took a step forward again, and the ground beneath my feet gave a faint vibration as if the land itself recognized me.
Gideon’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Don’t.”
I stopped. "Don't what?"
"Don't pull at it," he said, voice low. "Don’t move or sway too much."
“But we’re near Shadowick.”
He flicked his eyes, and I saw it—a brief glimpse of the Stone Ward.
How did he do this?
"You're near my cottage," I whispered. “But it feels like…”
He didn't deny it.
“Enough.”
Gideon held my gaze like I was the one being unreasonable. Even half-dead, he could make me feel like I was failing some standard he'd never actually set.
"She's after you," I said.
His jaw flexed, and he gave a quick nod. "Yes."
His response lifted the hair on my arms.
"You vanished that day after the orcs. After the meeting. We thought—"
"That I was slipping back into shadow?"
I glared at him, unsure of what I thought. "That you were planning something."
"I am."
Of course he was. I nodded, but he lifted his hand with his palm outward. It wasn't theatrical. Just steady.
"Maeve," he said softly. "I’ve been in hiding."
The tone in his voice took me by surprise.
"You? Hiding?" My gaze narrowed on him, and something crossed his face…irritation, perhaps?
"You think I enjoy this?" he murmured.
For the first time, I saw the faintest tremor in his fingers, which he quickly controlled. It looked like his body was running on sheer will alone. It reminded me of when both Gideon and Keegan had fallen deeper into the curse.
“You’re hurt,” I whispered.
He dropped his hand slowly but kept his eyes on me. “Not in the way you mean.”
His words made no sense and made perfect sense at the same time.
The Priestess didn’t need to stab any of us to break us. She could do far worse with a whisper and a well-placed fear.
“What do you want?” I asked, voice careful now.
His gaze sharpened, as if he’d been waiting for that question. “To give you something.”
“What?”
His eyes slid to the trees again. “Not here.”
“Why?” I demanded, realizing the word came out too loud in the dream-space.
Gideon’s shoulders lifted in a faint shrug. “Because I will not endanger the cottage.”
I stared at him.
My mind tried to reconcile the Gideon who had taunted and postured around Stonewick with the one standing before me now, refusing to bring trouble to my doorstep.
The two didn't fit.
He watched me work through it.
"Don’t worry. There’s nothing to romanticize," he said sharply. "This isn't generosity. It's strategy."
I blinked, and he exhaled.
"If you’re in hiding, why come at all?”
"Because time is running out."
I thought of the mirror, and before I could stop myself, I started. "The mirror showed me something.”
His expression shifted from interest to caution. "Did it."
It wasn’t a question.
My hand moved to my hip without thinking. Even here, it pulsed faintly, like the magic didn't care what plane I was on.
"She was in the library," I said. "I felt her in my cellar."
Gideon's eyes sharpened. "She can project."
"I know," I snapped. "I've experienced it. But—"
"But not like that," he finished quietly.
"How do you know?"
"Because she doesn't waste effort. If you saw her, it wasn't an accident."
Gideon took a step closer, and the air shifted.
"She wants you uncertain," he said. "Doubting your future. Your choices. Your spine."
Anger flared, quick and hot. "She doesn't get to choose who I become."
His mouth twitched. "Good. I didn’t think she’d choose for me either."
And his words hit hard, but they landed oddly.
Something in my chest loosened.
"Thank you," I said before I could stop myself.
His dark brows lifted. "For what?"
He was guarded, like he didn't trust gratitude.
"For the orcs. You could've let that fracture. You could've let her have what she wanted. But you didn't."
He looked at me and didn't say anything, and for a heartbeat, he looked… young. It wasn’t in age, but in expression, almost like a man who had once wanted something that wasn’t power.
But his arrogance clicked back into place like armor.
“You assume it was altruism,” he said lightly.
“I assume nothing, but I saw what I saw.”
“What you saw was me keeping the balance because the balance benefits me.”
Maybe.
Probably.
"Why is she after you?" I asked. "Skonk said she blames you. That you disrupted her plan."
"She believes I interfered."
"Did you?"
"Yes, I suppose I did."
"And she obviously doesn't like losing control," I said.
"No."
A cold thread moved through me. "What did you do apart from the orcs?"
He hesitated, and that was almost worse than any answer.
"I reminded her," he said slowly, "that not all blood is hers to command."
My breath caught.
Blood. Family. The missing kin.
My mother's fear.
"What does that mean?"
He looked at me with no mockery and nothing held back.
"It means she'll come for you more directly now." He shrugged.
My stomach dropped. "You're saying you made her attention shift."
"I’m saying that you already have her attention, and she wants yours. You just haven't accepted it yet."
"She showed me a future," I said. "Me in her compound."
"And you believed it?"
"No," I snapped, too fast.
He watched me. "You saw it as a possibility.”
It wasn’t a question, and I hated that I couldn't answer.
"She plays with reflections," he said. "Possible futures. Possible selves. She'll show you whichever version of you frightens you most."
"And you," I said. "Are you real right now? Or am I dreaming you the way she'd want?"
His eyes flashed. "Maeve, I’m not her. And I’m not your mind's puppet."
“Thank you.”
"I don't have long. She's hunting me. I can feel her threads."
Threads.
"What do you want to give me?" I asked again, slower.
Gideon’s gaze slid past me, toward a darker patch between the trees.
“I can’t do it here,” he repeated. “Not while the cottage’s Ward is listening. She might hear since she’s already touched you through the pedestal.”
“Then where? You came to me. You called me in my dream.”
His mouth tightened, and his eye darkened. “I didn’t call you.”
My blood ran cold. “What?”
His eyes held mine. “You came to me.”
I stared at him.
“No… I didn’t.”
But the air around us… It did feel like it had been waiting for me, somewhat like a pull, like the pull to the pedestal.
Gideon’s gaze sharpened.
“The Priestess isn’t the only one who knows how to reach through reflection,” he said softly. “She’s just the one who taught everyone to fear it.”
My heart started hammering.
“Who else?”
“If you want answers, you need to stop thinking of her as the only player,” he cautioned.
“Then tell me who else is.”
His jaw tightened again. “Not yet.”
“Gideon—”
A sudden sound cut through the dream.
I heard a scraping and heavy thud, but it wasn’t between Gideon and me. It was deeper, more physical.
Gideon’s head snapped up, eyes narrowing toward the trees.
“She found the edge,” he muttered to himself.
My blood iced over. “What?”
His gaze fixed on me, urgent now.
“Wake up,” he said sharply.
“What—”
“Wake up, Maeve,” Keegan’s voice bounced through my brain, replacing Gideon’s.
The world lurched, the trees blurred, and the air snapped like a cord breaking.
I was ripped upward, gasping, and a crash sounded above me.
It wasn’t inside my dream.
It was above the bed…on the roof.
My eyes flew open into darkness, faintly lit by moonlight through the window.
For a split second, I didn’t know where I was, only that something had been right there, close enough to touch, and now it was gone.
Another scrape echoed through the space, but it was longer this time.
It was followed by something dragging across shingles.
The cottage. I was back in the cottage.
It's Karvey, just Karvey shifting position.
But Karvey usually moved with weight. A thud. A solid, stone-bodied hop.
This was different, lighter, and faster.
It was almost like claws or boots.
Keegan stayed still as his eyes connected with mine.
“You heard it too,” I whispered.
Keegan’s breath was quiet. Controlled. “Yes.”
Another thud, then a low, frustrated huff. It wasn’t human and not quite an animal.
Keegan sat up, ready to move, and I grabbed his wrist. "Wait."
His eyes caught the dim light, and they turned golden.
"It could be Karvey," I whispered, though I didn't believe it.
Keegan tilted his head, listening.
Then: tap tap tap. Directly above us. It was like something was testing the boards.
His jaw tightened. "That's not Karvey."
My stomach dropped, and a low vibration moved through the cottage.
It wasn’t a strike or a probe.
My birthmark warmed, sudden and sharp.
Keegan's eyes moved to my hip. "Maeve."
"I know," I breathed.
Above us, something moved again, quick and purposeful.
But then the sound that stopped my blood scratched through the boards, carefully and long.
It wasn’t random or frantic.
Keegan slid out of bed without a sound. I followed, with my heart pounding and my legs forcing themselves to work.
From downstairs, I heard the faintest creak, like a floorboard shifting.
My breath caught. “Did you hear—”
Keegan lifted a hand, stopping me as his eyes were fixed on the ceiling, listening, then flicking toward the door.
Above us was the scraping, and below us was the creaking.
And we heard nothing from Karvey, which was odd.
In my head, Gideon’s voice echoed, urgently, Wake up.
And then Keegan’s telling me the same.
Keegan’s gaze met mine, and in it I saw the same realization settling.
Whatever was on the roof wasn’t alone, and the cottage, our safe, cozy, warded little refuge, had just become the center of someone else’s attention.
As if whoever was up there knew we were awake.
Keegan’s lips parted, a soundless breath, and his hand found mine in the dark—steady, warm, anchoring.
From directly above our heads, something shifted, and the roof gave a low groan from the weight, as if something new had just landed.
Keegan’s grip tightened.
And then, from the roof, a single slow knock sounded.
It was deliberate, like a greeting or maybe a warning.
Keegan drew me a fraction behind him, body a shield, and in the dark, I felt his voice more than heard it.
“Stay close,” he murmured.
The knock came again, but this time from the door.
Everything went still as though whatever had come… was waiting for us to make the next move.