Page 86 of Magical Mischief

“I won’t let anything happen to them,” I said.

And I meant every word.

Chapter Twenty-One

The Academy’s halls had grown welcoming again with energy. Not haunted, exactly, just brimming with life. It felt as if someone had stirred up the dust of a hundred years and left the door open to see what might wander out.

I wasn’t looking for anything in particular.

Just… walking. Breathing in the quiet.

Sometimes that was enough. Sometimes that was when the Academy showed me something I’d never dreamt.

I rounded a corner near the old knitting nook and almost collided with a blur of brown coat and maple leaves.

“The trees are following me,” Bella muttered, yanking her scarf free from the doorknob.

She looked up, saw me, and froze.

“Don’t,” she warned with a smile.

She looked like she’d gotten into a scuffle with a maple tree, and she didn’t come out on the winning end of it.

“What? I haven’t said a word… yet.” My brows lifted.

“You’re thinking it.” She wiggled her finger. “I can see it.”

I held up both hands. “Thinking what?”

She tugged her coat straight. One of her boots had bits of moss stuck to it. A leaf clung to her hair, and she looked nothing like the graceful fox form I’d grown accustomed to.

It was….refreshing.

“Let me guess,” I said. “Tree trouble?”

She stared at me, exasperated. “Maple grove. I thought it was a shortcut. It was not.”

“I’m assuming it involved roots.”

“Itate me,Maeve.” She shivered. “It was alive.”

I snorted.

“I’m serious! I stepped into what looked like a hollowed-out path, and the tree closed around me. Trapped. Fully stuck. Like one of those sticky flytraps but with bark.”

“You okay?”

“Now? Sure. Then? No. I had to call for help. I would’ve yelled, but the tree muffled my voice like it had manners.” She shook her head. “And you know who showed up first?”

“Twobble?”

Her eyes narrowed on mine. “How’d you know?”

I cleared my throat. “He told us.”

“Well, he just left me hanging. I don’t understand what he has against me.”

That image nearly killed me.