Page 6 of Magical Mayhem (Stonewick Magical Midlife Witch Academy #7)

The voice faded into the hush, leaving only the thunder of my heartbeat and the glow of the mushrooms all around me. I stood frozen in the clearing, unable to take another step forward, my breath shallow and ragged.

“Maeve!”

A woman’s voice that was sharp and familiar cut through the silence.

I blinked, the spell of the clearing cracking.

“Maeve, where are you?” another voice called, lighter but urgent.

Nova.

Ardetia.

Relief surged so fast my knees nearly gave out. I spun toward the sound.

Through the tangle of plants, a flick of movement caught my eye. A fluffy white-tipped tail swished, winding its way between ferns. The shape that followed was unmistakable.

Bella slipped through the greenery, with her fox ears twitching.

The fear in me loosened all at once, collapsing in on itself like a house of cards. I sagged against a tree, pressing my palm to the bark, dragging in a shaky breath.

“Of course,” I whispered. “Of course it’s you.”

The tension in my shoulders eased as Bella trotted closer, with her golden eyes bright even in the dim light. The sight of her tail, wagging lazily, was absurdly grounding.

I scanned the clearing again, forcing my eyes to search every shadow. Mushrooms glowed, moss shimmered, trees bent close like eavesdroppers. But there was no figure waiting for me. No man to match the voice that had haunted me through the Wilds.

Keegan wasn’t here.

Gideon wasn’t here.

Malore wasn’t here.

It had only been me, chasing the echoes of nothingness.

“Maeve!” Nova’s voice was nearer.

A moment later, she broke through the undergrowth.

Ardetia appeared close at her side.

Both of them were nearly breathless and intent.

Nova’s green eyes locked on me, widening as she took in the clearing.

Her gaze flicked once over my face, then dropped to the ground to the mushrooms.

Her expression hardened instantly.

“Don’t move,” she snapped.

I froze, the command allowing no argument.

The mushrooms glowed brighter at our stillness. The red caps pulsed faintly as though aware of being noticed.

“Nova…” I began.

She cut me off, striding forward and catching my wrists with a grip stronger than I thought possible. Her fingers were cold and sure, but her eyes became fierce.

“Run,” she hissed.

And before I could question, she hauled me forward with startling force. I stumbled, nearly losing my footing, but she didn’t let go. The staff in her other hand slammed against the earth, sparking light that sent a ripple through the mushrooms. Their glow faltered, dimmed, but didn’t vanish.

Ardetia swept to my other side, her long fingers pulling Bella into her arms as the fox shifted into a smaller form to be carried more easily. Even then, Bella’s ears twitched, tail swishing in nervous irritation.

“What’s happening?” I gasped as Nova half-dragged me through the underbrush.

“Not now.” Her voice was low, clipped. “Move.”

Branches whipped against my arms as we barreled through the trees. My breath came in ragged bursts, while my feet slipped on moss and tangling vines.

Nova never slackened, never let go, nearly hauling me behind her with strength that seemed impossible for her slender frame.

I caught flashes of Ardetia to our left as the mushrooms grew thinner here.

“Nova!” I gasped again, tripping over a root. She yanked me upright before I hit the ground, her grip bruising but steady.

“Don’t look back,” she snapped.

So I didn’t.

I focused only on her hand clamped around my wrists, the pounding of my heart, the rasp of branches against my cloak. My legs burned, and my lungs screamed, but Nova’s pace didn’t falter.

At last, the light shifted to a paler, softer sheen and no longer stained crimson.

The edge of the Wilds.

We burst into the open, stumbling onto the gravel path that curved back toward the Academy. The fireflies shimmered faintly above us as I doubled over, bracing my hands on my knees, dragging air into my lungs.

Nova released me only when I steadied myself, though her eyes stayed fixed on mine, sharp with concern.

Ardetia emerged a moment later, graceful even when breathless. Bella turned into her human form as her tail vanished.

I straightened slowly, brushing dirt from my clothes, and forced myself to breathe evenly.

My dark hair clung to my temples with sweat, and my palms stung where bark had scraped them.

“What…” My voice cracked. I swallowed and tried again. “What was that?”

Nova didn’t answer immediately. She studied me, her gaze darting to the faint glow still clinging to the mushrooms deeper in the woods. Her jaw tightened.

Only then did she say softly, “You shouldn’t have gone in alone.”

I flinched, shame burning hot in my chest, though the pull in my ribs still throbbed as if reminding me I hadn’t imagined it.

“I heard.” My throat closed around the words. “I thought…”

Her expression softened slightly, but her grip on her staff never loosened.

Behind us, the Wilds loomed dark and restless, the mushrooms’ glow pulsing faintly in the shadows, as though laughing at us for escaping.

I hugged my arms tight to my chest, trying to find my bearings, trying to shake the echo of that voice.

Nova stood close as her presence shielded me, even as her silence pressed heavily.

We had made it back to the edge, but my heart was still lost in the Wilds.

The world steadied around me, though my chest still felt like it was echoing with the sound of that voice.

“I heard someone,” I whispered. “A man. He called my name. It felt so real. But no matter where I looked, I couldn’t find him.”

Nova’s gaze sharpened. She took one slow breath, then gave a short nod. “Yes. The mushrooms.”

I blinked, my pulse tripping over itself. “The mushrooms?”

“We haven’t seen them in the Wilds for at least fifty years,” she said quietly, her eyes still scanning the trees behind me.

I turned to look at the forest again, the faint red glow still visible between the trunks, pulsing like embers.

“What are they? And why didn’t anyone warn me?” My voice pitched higher than I meant, but the question burned in me like fire.

Yet again, the secrets only revealed themselves when I walked right into them.

Nova turned back to me, her expression steady but heavy. “It never occurred to me they would come back. They were thought to be gone, wiped away when the Wards first fractured. None of us believed they would bloom again.”

I swallowed hard, throat dry. “So what… what are they?”

“They don’t affect animals,” Bella said firmly, her voice carrying that sly fox-edge even when she was serious.

“That’s why I shifted. I could walk through the clearing and feel nothing.

But for witches…” She glanced at Nova, then back to me.

“They give off particles. A kind of spell in the air. You breathe them in without even knowing it, and the effect is… well.” She gestured at me.

I wrapped my arms tighter around myself. “Hallucinations.”

“Not exactly hallucinations,” Nova corrected, her tone more careful.

“The spores are old magic. It takes a lot of practice to avoid their temptations. They seek your mind’s weakest thread.

They pull forward your worries, your fears, and make them flesh.

Not truly, not fully…but real enough to make you doubt what you know. ”

“And you managed to avoid the pull?” A shiver traced down my spine.

Nova gave a quick nod.

Nova’s staff tapped against the ground, deliberate, commanding. “Who were you hearing, Maeve?”

I closed my eyes. The voice rang in my memory again, curling around my name, soft and sharp at once.

“At first…” My breath shook as I forced the words out. “At first, I thought it might be Keegan. It was softer, almost warm. But then the pull felt stronger, heavier. Like Gideon. Or worse, Malore.”

Ardetia’s eyes widened slightly.

Nova’s green eyes narrowed, her concern slipping through the cracks of her usual composure. “And you believed it?”

“It felt real,” I admitted, my voice cracking. “Not just a whisper. It was in me. It pulled at me, Nova, like a hook set in my chest. I could feel it in my bones.”

The air thickened between us, and Nova stepped closer. “That’s the danger. The spores weave sound and sensation so tightly into your fears that you cannot tell where truth ends and illusion begins.”

“But it wasn’t just an illusion.” My hands shook as I lifted them. “It was real enough to drag me into the cemetery. It was real enough to make me think…” My throat closed around the rest.

Nova studied me.

Finally, she exhaled. “It was the Sillipa mushroom grove. A rare kind. Found in very few places in the world. Always deep within wild magic.”

The name landed heavily in my chest. “Sillipa.”

She nodded. “They are not of darkness entirely, nor of light. They simply… are. But their gift, if you can call it that, is cruel. They do not invent fears. They reveal what is already within you and dress it in flesh. They make you walk to the edge of your own mind and wonder if you will fall.”

The words sank like stones in my gut.

Bella placed a hand on my shoulder, gentler now. “That’s why I shifted. Animals aren’t tangled in human fears. The spores have nothing to cling to. But you,” her voice softened further, “you carry a lot right now, Maeve.”

My throat closed. Gideon. Malore. Keegan. All swirling in my chest like a storm.

Nova’s eyes flicked toward the glow of the mushrooms still visible through the trees. “It is troubling they have returned. Troubling, and deliberate.”

Ardetia’s voice was soft, lilting. “Deliberate?”

Nova nodded once. “The Sillipa do not bloom without reason. Something in the Wilds wanted them awake again.”

Her words crawled over my skin.

I forced myself to meet her gaze, even as my heart pounded. “Then what I heard… it was only the mushrooms?”

Nova hesitated just long enough to make my stomach flip.

“It was the spores,” she said finally, though her voice was quieter now. “Nothing more.”

But the shadow in her eyes told me she was not as certain as she wanted me to believe.

And I know what I heard.

I pressed my arms tighter around myself, trying to hold my chest together as the memory of that voice curled once more through my mind.

Maeve.

I shivered, but I didn’t speak the name that still haunted me, the name that felt too real on my tongue.

Nova glanced back at the Wilds, then turned sharply to me. “We must avoid the grove from now on. It cannot be allowed to draw you in again.”

I nodded numbly, though my body still buzzed with the echo of the voice, with the impossible pull of it.

Bella leaned close, her golden eyes steady. “Whatever you heard, whatever you felt, it wasn’t the truth. Don’t let it claim you.”

I swallowed hard, forcing the words out. “I’m not sure I believe that.”

No one answered. The silence was louder than anything.

And though the Sillipa grove was behind us, the voice still lingered, stitched into the marrow of my bones.