Page 150 of Magical Mischief

“Will more teachers come?”

Yes. Some will arrive like they never left. Others will find their way through strange turns. Some will stumble into your arms, and you will know them by name before they speak it.

“And the students?” I asked. “How will I know when it’s time to open? When we’re ready?”

The light in the room flickered and changed to a softer cast.

The Academy does not open with ceremony or spell. It opens with presence. Once the first student steps onto the threshold, the doors will know. They will not close again to those who seek midlife wisdom with true hearts and truer intentions.

I felt it a low thrum beneath the floorboards. The very heartbeat of the building shifting gears. Preparing.

That first student will be your companion. The most loyal. They will ask more questions than you are ready to answer. They will challenge, and comfort, and become a tether when you forget where the ground is.

A student who would be mine. Not like property, but like an echo. Like truth finding truth.

I closed my eyes.

The room was still humming.

I was humming too.

The words faded not into silence, but into memory. The way water fades into stone. Nothing vanished. It became a part of me.

I stood slowly and walked to the pedestal that pulsed once beneath my hand.

The light in the room shifted, becoming softer at the edges, like dusk coming through a quiet window.

I sat back down on the sea of cushions.

But I was different now.

The Academy had spoken.

And it had named me Headmistress.

Not as a title.

As a promise.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

I’d gotten more answers in these few minutes than I had since I’d arrived. My head spun with what to do with the information as I sat in the beautiful room and reflected.

I heard footsteps before I saw her.

Soft, measured, the kind that gave you warning but not alarm. The kind of steps that had walked these halls long enough to be part of their rhythm.

I turned toward the arched doorway just as my grandmother stepped inside.

Grandma Elira paused just over the threshold, her silver hair caught in a shaft of soft light, her cloak pulled tight against her shoulders.

Her eyes moved slowly around the room, taking it in as the glimmering driftwood beams overhead cast a warm shadow that still clung to the space.

She smiled, small and full of something I couldn’t quite name.

“I thought I might find you here,” she said.

“I didn’t know this room existed. Not until today.”