Chapter Twenty-Two
All I’d wanted was to make it to the circle.
That was the deal I’d made with myself, secretly, somewhere between Gideon saying yes and Celeste texting soon.
Just get there. One step at a time. One spell at a time.
We’d close the circle with everyone willingly participating, the Hollows would hum approvingly, the hunger path would fold in on itself like a bad map, and the priestess could rage from her icy balcony all she wanted.
I’d hug my daughter, drink celebratory tea at Stella’s, and deal with the rest later.
Reasonable? No. Necessary? Absolutely.
But now?
Now the floor was glowing.
The beams of pale light thickened from hairline cracks into narrow, luminous streams, rising from the edges of the cellar door like ghostly vines. They curled upward and then out, tracing patterns along the underside of the table, the pantry shelves, the grain of the floorboards.
And Miora—my rather unflappable, practical, magically competent house elder—sat in her chair with her mouth open and no sound coming out.
Silenced.
Literally silenced.
The universe, it seemed, would not be accepting my sensible “one thing at a time” agenda.
People liked to tell me I was in charge now. Headmistress. Warden-adjacent. Luminary-touched. Wolf’s partner. Goblin’s friend. Take your pick. The magical world, however, seemed deeply invested in reminding me that I was as much a piece on the board as anyone else.
Fine.
If I couldn’t control the game, I could at least decide how I moved.
I straightened my back and stepped away from Miora’s chair.
“Don’t even think about it,” Keegan said immediately.
“I’m already thinking about it,” I said. “I’ve thought about it, and then thought about trying not to think about it, and then realized trying not to think about it made me think about it more. Conclusion: I’m going down there.”
Twobble made an appalled noise. “Voluntary descent into a glowing basement? Absolutely not on my to-do list.”
Skonk scribbled furiously in his notebook. “New data point… Maeve’s hazard threshold continues to be—”
“I will hex that notebook,” I said.
Keegan moved to block the pantry. Not dramatically, just enough that his very solid, very broad body was now between me and the pulsing light.
“Maeve,” he said, voice low, steady. The wolf had receded from his eyes a little, but the intensity was still there. “We don’t know what that is.”
“Correct,” I said. “Which is why I have to look at it.”
“There’s a difference,” he said, “between curiosity and volunteering as tribute.”
“Tribute to what?” Twobble muttered. “Mystical under-floor lighting?”
“I get the reference.” I shook my head.
Karvey hadn’t moved from his post, stone feet planted near the pantry. The light traced around him, wary, like a stream encountering a boulder. The other gargoyles on the roof shifted again; dust tickled down from the beams.
Miora’s knuckles were still white on the chair arms. Her eyes stayed glued to the cellar. She tried once more to speak, with lips forming syllables that never made it to voice. Frustration and fear radiated off her like heat.
That decided it.
I met Keegan’s gaze.
“Whatever this is, it’s connected to me,” I said. “Karvey can feel it. My mark’s reacting. It’s in my cottage, under our feet. And Miora knows what it is but can’t tell us.”
He grimaced. “Which sounds like exactly the sort of thing we should not be walking into.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “We. Should not.”
He narrowed his eyes. “That better not have been you trying to exclude me by grammar.”
I stepped closer. The hum from below vibrated up through the floorboards, into my bones.
“I can’t not go, Keegan. If this is another secret the priestess left lying around, I need to see it before she decides to use it.
If it’s something of Elira’s, I need to know what she kept from us. If it’s something else…”
“That’s three different flavors of terrible,” he said.
“It’s three different flavors of we don’t get to pretend it’s not here,” I countered.
We stood like that for a breath, the cottage listening. His jaw tight, my heart pounding, the light creeping, Miora silently pleading.
My dad let out a long breath and pushed back his chair. “She’s right,” he said.
Keegan shot him a betrayed look. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”
“I am,” Dad said. “My side is also to find the thing before it finds our kid's side.” He reached over and squeezed my shoulder. “You’re not going down there without backup.”
“Absolutely not,” My mom said. “You’re all insane if you think I’m letting my daughter waltz into glowing unknown magic alone.”
“She should go alone,” Karvey said.
Every head swiveled to him.
“Excuse me?” My mom said, in the tone that had once struck fear into PTA presidents.
Karvey held up both stone hands. “With support at the door,” he amended. “But the magic is rising along her line. If we crowd it with too many presences, it might react defensively. Stone, hedge, fae, wolf—all at once? It could see that as attack.”
“So we send just the Hedge, then?” Twobble squeaked. “Excellent. Let’s put the person we like most in danger.”
“We’re right here,” Skonk said.
Miora thumped the side of her chair with her fist, drawing our attention back to her. Her eyes were fierce, wet, furious at her own silence. She pointed at me with a trembling hand, then at the cellar, then back at me again.
Her meaning was clear: You. It has to be you.
Fear slid cold fingers up my spine. I took a step toward Keegan, closing the space between us.
“I’m going,” I said, softer now. “But I want you at the door. I want Mom and Dad reinforcing topside. Twobble and Skonk stay with Miora. Karvey, you put your granite self in the way if anything tries to come up that shouldn’t.”
Karvey nodded once. “Gladly.”
Twobble opened his mouth, likely to protest staying behind, then caught sight of Miora’s face and shut it again. He padded over to her and rested a green hand on her knee.
“You’re not allowed to die,” he told me, voice wobbling.
“I’ll do my best,” I said.
Skonk straightened his spectacles.
“I’ll document everything,” he said. “From a safe distance.”
Mom was already moving, sleeves pushed up, fingers tracing sigils in the air around the doorframe, muttering under her breath. Her magic smelled like rosemary and ozone, snapping against my skin. Dad joined her, laying his hands on the wood, lending steady, earthy strength.
“If anything tries to break out,” he said, “it hits the Ward and us.”
“Comforting,” I muttered.
Keegan stepped aside—reluctantly.
“I’ll be right behind you,” he said. “If you scream, I’m breaking all of Karvey’s rules.”
I took one more breath, centering myself. The hum from below thrummed in my bones, keyed specifically to something in me. My butterfly mark was a steady burn now, not quite pain, not quite comfort.
“Okay then,” I whispered to no one in particular. “Let’s go say hi to whatever is under this house.”
The line of light outlining the cellar door was bright enough now that I could make out faint symbols etched into the wood—previously invisible. Circles within circles. A spiral. A pattern I recognized from the Academy’s oldest diagrams.
Elira’s work.
Of course.
My hand shook a little as I gripped the iron ring and pulled.
The trapdoor lifted easily, far more easily than it had any right to, considering the last time we’d opened it.
The light beneath spilled up around the edges, bathing my face in stark, silvery glow.
Cold air flowed out, but not the damp chill of earth, but a cleaner, sharper cold. It smelled faintly of old stone and something like moonlight on water.
Not Shadowick. Not quite the Academy either. A third thing. A cousin.
I glanced back one last time.
My mom stood by the table, hands still hovering in charmed positions, eyes bright with fear and pride. Dad at her side, jaw set, ready. Twobble and Skonk flanked Miora, who watched me like she was memorizing every line of my face. Karvey loomed near the opening, solid as the foundations.
Keegan squeezed my hand once, hard.
“I love you,” he said quietly, no theatrics, no lead-in, just truth.
It hit me like the first real breath after being underwater.
“I love you too,” I said. My voice didn’t shake as much as I thought it would. “If something explodes—”
“I’ll come get you,” he said.
“That is not what I was going to say.”
“I know.”
He kissed my forehead, quick and fierce, then stepped back just enough to give me space to go first, but not enough that I couldn’t feel him like gravity at my back.
I turned, put my foot on the first step.
The cellar stairs were wooden, steep, and much longer than they’d ever felt before. Each step echoed, wood complaining under my weight, the light growing brighter as I descended. The air cooled with every rung down, but it didn’t feel hostile. Just… expectant.
Halfway, the hum intensified. My mark flared. I pressed my free hand flat against my hip, breathing through it.
“Maeve?” Keegan’s voice, from above, already a little distant. “You okay?”
“Define okay,” I called back, because habits are hard to break.
My voice distorted slightly, stretched by the acoustics of the space below. It sounded like two of me speaking at once for half a second. That wasn’t unsettling at all.
I reached the bottom step and stopped.
The cellar… was not a cellar.
Or not anymore.
The last time I’d peered down here, I’d seen shelves, a pedestal, dust, some herbs, a jar of something sparkly from before I’d moved in.
Now the room had stretched, dimensions warped by whatever magic had awakened.
The walls were smooth stone, veined with faint glimmers of quartz and something brighter.
The air shivered with lines of power, like cobwebs made of light.
In the center of the chamber stood the pedestal.
Light rose from it in steady beams, shooting up to meet the floor above, then out, tracing those patterns through the house.
And standing with her back to me, hands moving over the surface of the pedestal, was a figure.
Same height as Miora. Same way of standing—weight on one hip, shoulders slightly rounded as if used to bending over books and cauldrons. Her hair, gathered in a loose knot at the nape of her neck, was silver threaded with darker strands.
For a second, my brain tried to slot that shape into the safest option.
“Miora?” I said, even though I knew it wasn’t her. Knew, because Miora was upstairs. Knew, because the magic around this woman felt different. Familiar, but in a different key.
The figure’s hands stilled.
Slowly, as if bracing herself, she wiped her palms once more over the glowing surface, like someone finishing a spell or smoothing a tablecloth.
Excitement punched me in the sternum. Confusion rushed in after it, knocking into sorrow. Elation tangled with dread. It was like every part of me had been waiting for this without admitting it.
“Maeve,” Keegan called softly from the top of the stairs. “What do you see?”
I couldn’t answer. My tongue felt thick.
The woman turned.
Light slid across her face, catching in the fine lines at the corners of her eyes, the familiar set of her mouth, the little crinkle at the bridge of her nose I’d inherited.
Grandma Elira stared back at me.
Alive.
Or something close enough to make my knees threaten to give out.
“Hi, sweetheart,” she said, and I gasped.