Page 16

The fog had thickened since we walked the alleyways. It drifted around the mansion at the far end of the conjured Shadowick like a living thing. The air pulsed with tension, the way it always did when we got too close to talking about Gideon.

The real Gideon.

Not the nightmare versions I saw in dreams, or the whisper I still sometimes heard in the Hedge, or the memories that curled in the corners of my mind like smoke.

No, him.

I stared up at the spectral mansion now, its silhouette looming behind curls of gray. Even though I knew it wasn’t real, my chest tightened at the sight of it.

“That’s where I’ll stand,” I murmured, and this time I got no pushback.

The others looked from me to the building behind.

Keegan stiffened again, but didn’t speak.

Twobble squinted up the hill, his hands on his hips. “A bit dramatic, don’t you think?”

“It’s supposed to be,” I said. “Gideon loves his theatrics.”

Stella arched a brow. “That sounds familiar.”

I didn’t take my eyes off the hill. “I need to feel it. The weight. The shape of how this might actually happen.”

The mood had dipped again. Everyone was quiet, their boots shifting on the cobblestones, eyes darting along the fake village’s skyline.

Then came a voice from behind me.

“Well then, if you want Gideon…”

I turned just in time to see Twobble pluck one of Nova’s black scarves from a bench and dramatically wrap it around his shoulders like a high-collared cloak.

“I shall be Gideon.”

Skonk, from a rooftop perch, shouted down, “You’ll need darker circles under your eyes and a whole lot more emotional damage!”

“Hush, you crypt goblin,” Twobble snapped. Then he straightened his spine, narrowed his eyes, and let his voice drop into something low and cold.

“Maeve Bellemore,” he intoned, stepping forward slowly. “Did you really think you could outmaneuver me?”

“Oh no,” I said with a smile I couldn’t help. “What are you doing?”

He continued, stalking toward me with dramatic flair, head tilted slightly and fingers steepled as if he were contemplating my demise.

“You may walk the Hedge, but I am the Hedge.”

“Lord,” Bella muttered, her voice dry. “We’ve created a monster.”

Twobble stomped up the slight incline toward the mansion, cape flaring with every exaggerated step. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for this moment, Maeve? The Moonbeam bends for me. ”

Nova, watching nearby, murmured to Ardetia, “I thought I was the dramatic one.”

“He’s not far off,” I admitted, shaking my head but laughing. A real laugh. The first since this entire simulation began.

Twobble threw one arm toward the mansion. “I have cursed your father! Haunted your thoughts! Crashed your tea party!”

I covered my mouth.

“And now,” he said with a flourish, “I am here to… Wait. What is it I’m supposed to be doing again? Lurking menacingly?”

“You’re supposed to approach me like he would,” I called out, voice still catching laughter. “Calm, deliberate. With that... unnerving quiet confidence.”

“Oh.” Twobble pulled the scarf tighter and slowed his pace, this time walking like he was gliding, hands behind his back. “Maeve,” he said in a low, measured voice. “You’ve always had potential. It’s a shame you chose the wrong side.”

I exhaled, this time the laughter gone.

Because that part?

That was something Gideon had actually said to me. Long ago. Or not so long. In one of those dreamlike visions where truth and illusion overlapped.

I nodded once. “That’s it.”

Twobble stopped a few feet from me and dropped the act, the scarf now tangled under one arm. “I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s okay,” I said gently. “You helped. I needed to feel it.”

The others started to regroup behind me, murmuring among themselves, reviewing plans. The mock village stretched out around us, ghostly and grim.

But I stayed rooted where I was.

Watching the way the mansion sat on the fake hill, fog curling around its stone shoulders like it knew something I didn’t.

Keegan came to stand beside me again, saying nothing.

After a moment, I broke the silence. “What if he already knows?”

Keegan didn’t ask who.

“Gideon always knows more than he should,” I went on. “What if he knows we’re doing this? What if we’ve already tipped our hand?”

He didn’t answer right away.

“Then we keep going anyway.”

A soft wind stirred the edges of my cloak.

“He wants me afraid,” I whispered.

“And you are,” he said, not unkindly.

I turned to look at him. “Is that supposed to be comforting?”

“No,” he said. “It’s supposed to be honest.”

I managed a soft, exhausted smile. “Thanks.”

Nearby, Bella walked toward us, her steps light, almost too quiet for a human. Her eyes had shifted again, just slightly glowing in the low light. She was still settling back into herself after her patrol in fox form.

Twobble, Stella, and Skonk wandered toward the path leading to the Academy.

“I was listening,” she said as she joined us. “To the wind. The fog. The village’s illusion.”

“Anything helpful?” Keegan asked. “Can you tell us more about the Turning?”

She nodded slowly. “We choose what to carry forward, but it’s not just about breaking curses. It’s about intention. What lives after the light fades?”

I turned to her fully, intrigued. “What kind of intention?”

“Personal ones,” she said. “We whisper them into the fog. Bury them at the base of a tree. Let the Moonbeam sort truth from fear. If you’re entering Shadowick… you might want to consider it.”

I exhaled slowly.

Because suddenly, that sounded like exactly what I needed.

A moment of clarity. A thread to follow. A root to plant in the dark.

“Thank you,” I said. “I might do just that.”

Bella gave a quiet smile and returned to her place.

But even as the moment settled and the team refocused, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were still walking too close to the edge.

And that soon, Gideon wouldn’t just be a game played in fog and illusions.

He would be real.

And I’d have to face him.

The air shifted the moment we stepped out of the conjured streets of Shadowick.

One breath, and the world softened. The cold cobblestones beneath our feet gave way to mossy earth, the fog thinning like silk pulled from the shoulders of a ghost. The illusion behind us still pulsed with quiet magic, but I could feel the difference like a current shifting course beneath my skin.

Shadowick faded behind us, but not completely.

Nova was already raising her hands to the edges of the illusion, her expression unreadable as threads of moonlight and sage-green energy curled from her fingertips.

Ardetia stood on the opposite side of the grove, eyes closed, her presence a ripple of old fae magic that hummed low through the roots of the trees.

Between them, a hush fell.

The boundaries of the conjured Shadowick shimmered once, and again, and then it began to sink, not into the ground, but into the folds of magic itself.

The village remained, but it folded inward like a sleeping creature, cloaked in warding and softened with concealment.

Still there, still real in its own way, but protected.

Tucked away for when we needed it again.

Nova lowered her arms, exhaling slowly.

Ardetia opened her eyes, glowing faintly.

“It’s done,” Nova said. “No one will stumble across it or enter. Not even Skonk. Unless you wish it.”

The spell settled like dew across the grass.

I turned to both of them, words suddenly tangled in my throat.

“Thank you,” I said, meaning every syllable. “Truly. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you.”

Nova offered a small smile. “You’d have figured it out. But we’re better together.”

“Always,” Ardetia added with a nod.

We began to walk back toward the Academy, the path through the woods marked now by soft lantern lights and the rustle of leaves stirred by a friendly wind. A few sprites drifted above us, one lazily carrying a ribbon it had stolen from Ember earlier in the day.

The longer we walked, the more the sounds of life returned. Laughter echoed through the trees, boots crunched on gravel, and someone called out in the distance for a runaway food basket.

And then the towers of the Academy came into view.

Warm golden light spilled from every window, the courtyard full of students heading to and from afternoon classes, books in hand, familiars at their sides, their magic humming like a song just under the surface.

It stopped me in my tracks.

I stood still for a moment, watching.

This was why.

This was what I was fighting for.

Not just to stop Gideon. Not just to free the Academy or understand my magic.

But this.

The future.

Laughter. Learning. Safety. Belonging.

I felt Keegan slow beside me, his hand brushing my elbow, grounding me.

Then a bark cut through the air, low and happy and unmistakable.

I barely turned before my dad barreled toward me, his stout legs flying at full speed. His paws kicked up little puffs of dirt and grass as he galloped, ears up, tongue out.

I dropped to my knees just in time for him to crash into me with all the force of a furry comet.

“Oh, Dad,” I whispered, wrapping my arms around his thick neck. “You found me.”

He grumbled and licked my chin, snorting like he had a list of complaints but was too relieved to voice them.

My throat tightened as I buried my face in his fur.

My dad.

My father.

Trapped in the shape of a bulldog, cursed and silent and waiting. Still him —in those eyes, in his warmth, in the way he always found me.

But not whole.

Not yet.

The memory of Shadowick’s twisted buildings loomed in my mind, layered with the mansion, with Gideon’s voice echoing through the fog. I pressed my forehead to Frank’s and made a silent promise.

I would end this.

Not just because I was angry. Not just because I was afraid.

But because he deserved more than this. Because I did. Because the girl I’d been before Stonewick, the woman rebuilding herself now, needed her father back.

Not in fur.

Not in fragments.

Whole.

“Three nights,” I whispered to him. “That’s all I need.”

He gave a quiet grunt, like he understood.

Keegan crouched beside us, one hand gently brushing Frank’s back.

“He was waiting by the gate,” Keegan said softly.

Twobble walked over. “Wouldn’t leave it.”

Of course, he had.

I scratched behind my dad’s ears and finally stood, the weight of him still leaning against my leg. The others had walked ahead now. Twobble and Skonk bickered. Nova and Ardetia were deep in quiet discussion. And Stella floated toward the tea pavilion as if nothing had happened.

But I lingered, taking in the sight of the Academy once more.

The students.

The sky.

The Wards were humming like old lullabies.

“I have to win,” I said aloud.

Keegan didn’t ask what I meant. He just nodded once.

And that was enough.

We turned toward the doors.

And walked forward into the last calm before the Moonbeam.