Page 7

Keegan stood inside the Academy as the lamplight caught the edge of his dark jacket and the scruff on his jaw that hadn’t been there the last time I saw him. His hazel eyes flicked to mine, steady and unreadable.

The laughter and clinking of glasses from the feast echoed down the hall, muffled by distance and thick stone, but in this quiet space, something far more profound settled around us.

It wasn’t silence.

It was certainty.

I watched him watching me, and something in my chest shifted. Not the flutter I always felt around him, not the sweet ache of affection, but something sturdier.

Something true.

And then it hit me, slow and sure.

The perfect teachers weren’t out there in some distant forest or hidden realm. They were standing right here.

Keegan tilted his head and raised his brow. “What? What are you staring at?”

I blinked at him as my breath caught halfway between a laugh and a revelation. “You.”

“Me?”

“You,” I said again, a slow grin spreading across my face. “You’re one of them.”

“One of… what, exactly?” he asked, clearly suspicious now.

I didn’t answer right away.

My gaze flicked to Stella, who was making polite conversation with a passing student.

Then to Ember, who stood quietly, eyes taking in every detail of the entry hall like she already knew the secrets it hadn’t shared yet.

And my dad, Frank, who had taken up his usual stance, planted loyally at the base of the grand staircase, snoring like he’d lived here all his life.

The answer formed in my mind before I could speak it aloud.

They belong here.

All of them.

Stella, with her warm hands and warmer heart, her magical brews that calmed nightmares and healed more than just bruises.

She could teach the women here how to remember joy, how to find strength in rituals as simple as brewing a proper pot of tea.

How to stir intentions into honey and find healing in the mundane.

It didn’t hurt that she had all the skills of a perfect kitchen witch.

Recipes were no longer disasters under her helm.

Ember, quiet and clever Ember, who could pass between walls like mist through trees. She knew the difference between hiding and surviving, and how to teach someone to do both without losing themselves. She never raised her voice but had an entire presence that could silence a room.

And Keegan.

Keegan, whose very blood hummed with wild magic like shifting, grounding, fierce, and unyielding. A warlock who was strong, loyal, and unrelenting. Who better to teach women craving the magic?

But more than that, he resisted the pull of the other side.

The darker one.

The one Gideon leaned into like it was a throne.

Keegan had every reason to fall and didn’t. His family, friends, and clan all abandoned him, and he stood strong.

Stonewick needed more of that.

The Academy needed more of that.

He was the quiet reminder of why the curse needed to be broken and why the Academy stood open.

And my dad, sweet, stubborn, snoring Frank, who’d spent most of his life misunderstood, underestimated, and cast aside by his clan for his breed and bulldog bulk. Maybe he didn’t look like a wolf, but he was loyal, smart, and protective. But most of all, he was kind and empathetic.

Who else could teach a classroom of midlife women who’d been told they were too loud, too emotional, too old, and too late when really they were just getting started ?

I stepped toward Keegan, my pulse steady now, my decision a warm glow beneath my skin.

“You’re not just here to visit,” I said, quiet but sure.

He blinked. “I’m not? I’m pretty sure that was all I had on the docket.”

I chuckled and shook my head. “No. You’re here to teach.”

His laugh was startled, rough around the edges. “Me? Teach? Maeve, I’m barely housebroken.”

“Exactly. You’re perfect.”

He opened his mouth, closed it again. “What would I even teach?”

“How to resist the shadows. How to stay tethered when everything around you wants you to slip away. You’re the most powerful warlock I’ve ever met.”

“Am I the only one you’ve met?”

“Very funny.” I shook my head and trailed my fingers along his arm. “Your power is always simmering, ready to tap. We need more of that skill.”

He went still at that, something in his eyes shifting from confusion to understanding.

I turned toward Stella next, who’d caught the tail end of the conversation.

“You too,” I said. “You’re more than brews and gossip.”

She scoffed, but her blue eyes softened. “I mean, my gossip is pretty top-tier.”

“Stella. You’ve held more people together with tea and stubbornness than half the covens in the faction combined. You know what magic people need when they don’t even know they need it.”

She crossed her arms, her expression somewhere between flattered and intrigued. “What would I teach? Magical Hospitality 101?”

“Something like that,” I said with a wink. “You’d be surprised how many students don’t know how to set protections with herbs and joy.”

“And pie,” she added.

“Especially pie.”

Ember was last. She said nothing, just watched me like she’d been expecting this all along.

“I can’t sneak between walls like you,” I said. “But I know people who need to learn how.”

She nodded once. “Not just the how. But the why.”

“You’ll teach both.”

And then I knelt beside my dad, who cracked open one eye and huffed like I was interrupting something important.

“You, sir,” I said, scratching behind his ear, “are going to change lives.”

He grunted.

“You’ve got more empathy in your jowls than most people have in their entire bodies. These women, these students, they need someone who understands what it’s like to be told you’re too much. Or not enough.”

Frank licked my cheek.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

When I looked up again, the four of them watched me.

None of them laughed. None of them questioned it.

And that’s when I knew I wasn’t wrong.

The Academy had opened its doors not just for learning but for healing.

And the best teachers weren’t always the ones with glowing staffs or polished syllabi.

Sometimes they were the ones who’d been through it. The ones still healing themselves. The ones who brought laughter to a dinner table, calm to a brewing storm, wisdom wrapped in sarcasm, and side-eyes.

They were mine.

And now they were theirs, our students.

“You’re serious,” Keegan said, stepping closer.

I looked at him, really looked, and smiled.

“More than ever.”

I couldn’t stop smiling as a newfound euphoria slipped through me.

I’d tried for about three seconds. But it was impossible to keep the grin off my face as I marched back through the Academy’s front corridor with Frank, who trotted in front like he was leading a parade and entirely convinced the gravy fountain was his reward.

The sound of laughter and silverware clinking drifted from the banquet hall ahead, cozy and alive, like a living pulse thrumming through the ancient stone. The Academy was awake. Fully. Vibrantly.

And it was full.

I threw the banquet doors wide open, and the room went quiet.

We had barely walked into the banquet hall when I felt my dad freeze beside me.

One second, he was barreling forward like he intended to sample every dish in the room, and the next, still.

Perfectly, utterly still.

“Dad?” I whispered, glancing down.

He wasn’t looking at the feast. He wasn’t looking at the tables or the floating pies or the gravy sprite now riding a ladle as if it were a ship on the high seas.

He was staring across the room, ears perked, tail unmoving, breath caught in his broad chest.

I followed his gaze.

And standing near the far end of the spiral, bathed in the amber light of a floating lantern, was Grandma Elira.

His mother.

Her hand rested lightly on the back of a chair. She was speaking to Ardetia, her profile graceful, the silver threads in her hair shimmering like a crown.

She hadn’t seen him yet.

But he had seen her.

And I saw it, then.

The moment the spell of years cracked open.

My dad gave a low, tremulous huff.

A sound I’d never heard from him before.

Then he moved.

He wasn’t barking or bounding. He had a determined walk with every muscle carrying the weight of decades.

No one noticed at first, too wrapped in their conversations, which started again.

But my grandma must’ve felt it.

She turned just as Frank stepped in front of her, stopped short, and looked up with those wide, dark, too-human eyes.

Her breath caught. I saw it ripple through her shoulders.

“...No,” she whispered, a hand reaching out as if in a dream.

My dad let out a soft whine.

“Son?” she said, her voice breaking on the name like it was both a prayer and a question.

He nudged her hand with his snout, slow and careful.

And then she crumpled.

Not in pain, not in fear, but in love and recognition.

She dropped to her knees, cloak pooling around her like waves, and gathered him into her arms.

“Oh, my boy,” she sobbed, pressing her forehead to his. “My darling boy.”

My dad gave one of those huffing sighs and pressed closer, before curling into her lap like he'd never left it.

No one spoke. The room had gone still again.

Very few, if any, of the students truly knew the significance of this, but they were reverent and knew that something special was happening.

Even the gravy sprite stopped mid-ladle.

Tears prickled in my eyes.

She’d been locked away in the Academy for so long and cut off from her child, her family, her life for so long. And my dad had carried that same loss in silence, never once telling me who he’d been before he was turned.

Until now.

I put a hand to my chest and held it there, just to remind myself my heart was still inside.

And still beating.

Because sometimes, magic wasn’t loud.

Sometimes it was as simple as a mother and her son, finding each other again beneath the glow of old chandeliers and fresh beginnings. At other times, it was nothing more than a kiss or a wave, conveying everything about love and life in that one moment.