Page 61 of Magical Moonbeam

Only what you already carry,the silver said.Your name. Your magic. Your trust in yourself, or lack of it. You cannot fake your way through the Veil, Maeve Bellemore. The Moonbeam sees without bias. And it will show you what you are, whether you want it or not.

I looked down at my hands, which were small and callused from work.

I wasn’t sure I knew what I was yet.

But I wanted to.

And that, maybe, was what mattered.

I raised my eyes back to hers.

The silver dragon tilted her head, an echo of something gentle and knowing.We will not cross the Veil with you. That is not our place. But we will watch. And we will remember.

“Why me?” I asked the old question blooming from my chest before I could swallow it back. “Why do I matter in all of this?”

The silver dragon shifted forward slightly, her immense face now just feet from mine.Because the curse did not begin with death, it began with forgetting. And you… They are beginning to remember.

A silence fell between us, and I wasn’t sure I could carry it, but knew I would try to anyway.

Return when you are ready,she said.We will not tell you what to do. But when the Moonbeam touches you, choose to be whole. Not right. Not righteous. Just… whole.

I pressed my hand to my heart again, and this time, I didn’t speak.

There was nothing left to say.

Only to become.

And when I left, I carried something I hadn’t arrived with.

Resolve.

Chapter Fifteen

Morning sunlight poured through the tall windows of my office, catching in the flecks of mica embedded in the stone walls. The air smelled faintly of spring and rose tea, thanks to the fact that Nova had left a steaming mug by my desk earlier.

The scent calmed me as I leaned back in the worn leather chair, an old thing Twobble had proudly declared Hedge witchy when he rearranged the furniture last week.

I glanced around the office now and tried not to laugh out loud. The walls were newly bedecked with crookedly hung portraits of frogs in monocles, a crystal chandelier that twinkled too aggressively every time someone walked by, and a rug shaped like a book, complete with actual pages that flipped open if stepped on in just the right spot.

It gave me insight to what Twobble’s abode must look like.

I looked down at the lines of students on the paper. Trying to figure out how to balance classes, teachers, and students was overwhelming if I thought too hard about it, so I tried not to.

We had more students than we’d ever dreamed of when the Academy first reopened. Some were local, some from distant corners of the country, drawn to Stonewick by whisper, byintuition, by the Academy’s slow pull. I scanned the latest numbers. Our incoming class was double what we’d expected for the next session.

And the staff?

I chewed my lip, scratching a note beside the list of instructors. We were spread too thin already. Ardetia was taking on double shifts. Bella was juggling fox patrols and defensive magic. Nova, brilliant and mysterious as she was, couldn’t run on burnt sage and tarot alone.

We needed help.

Just as I was circling the wordspossible recruitment,a commotion rose outside.

The window beside me was cracked open to let in the morning air. The scent was fresh with lilac and damp moss, and through it came the unmistakable sounds of Twobble squawking in confusion, Skonk muttering indignantly, and a whole lot of unfamiliar voices rising in a chorus of chatter.

I stood, pushing back the chair, and stepped to the window.

And blinked.