Page 18 of Pets in Space 10

The ceiling shimmered with enchanted starlight — an illusion mimicking Enyo’s midnight skies.

Tiny constellations drifted across it in silent patterns, calming and surreal.

The cool, filtered air hummed faintly with familiar energy, tinged with lavender and the sharp, clean scent of crystal-infused magic.

Healing stones.

The knowledge teased the edges of Harmonia’s consciousness as her lashes fluttered.

The world felt... wrong.

Her limbs ached like she’d been crushed by a mountain, and every breath scraped against her throat. Even her skin felt tight, like she was wrapped in too many layers of silk. As she turned her head, the soft rustle of fine linen whispered against her cheek. Smooth sheets. A feather-filled pillow.

No… this wasn’t the cabin.

Not the bayou.

Not his world.

Her eyes opened fully — and the familiar setting shattered her heart.

The realization slammed into her with the force of a crashing wave.

She was on Enyo.

In her own apartment.

In her bed.

The intricate golden arches above the carved wooden doorway, the tapestry woven with sigils of the Mage Council draped across the far wall, the glowing orb-lamps dimmed to twilight mode, and the floor-to-ceiling shelves overflowing with spell books and crystal specimens... this was home.

But it wasn’t where she was meant to be.

“Landry?” Her voice shattered, brittle as glass.

Her hands clawed at the silk coverlet, trembling as she tried to sit up. Pain arced through her body like lightning, and she gasped, a sob ripping from her chest.

“Landry!”

A blur moved beside her.

She violently trembled when a gentle hand pressed against her shoulder, guiding her back against the pillows.

“Harmonia, no — lie still,” a soft voice urged.

She blinked, her vision clearing just enough to see Eirene, her mentor and friend, sitting beside the bed. The older woman’s face was etched with worry, her pale eyes luminous with quiet strength. She reached out and took Harmonia’s hand, her fingers warm and grounding.

“You’re safe,” Eirene whispered. “You’re home.”

“No,” Harmonia moaned, turning her face away. Her body shook, a silent scream trapped within her fragile frame. “No... no, I was with him. I was with Landry — why — why am I here?” Her voice was broken, frayed at the edges. “Where is he?”

Tears welled in her eyes, hot and blinding, spilling silently down her cheeks to soak into the pillow.

Eirene’s own eyes filled with sorrow. She rose from her chair and sat gently on the edge of the bed, reaching up to brush the damp hair from Harmonia’s temple. Her touch was light, but it carried the weight of truth.

“You began to fade,” Eirene said quietly. “Your magic was depleted, your body broken when you healed your young man and took his injuries as your own. You slipped into a sleep so deep… we feared you wouldn’t return. If we hadn’t brought you home, Harmonia... you wouldn’t have survived.”

“I don’t care,” Harmonia rasped. Her voice was raw with grief. “I would’ve stayed. I should’ve stayed... with him.”

“I know,” Eirene murmured, her thumb gently brushing Harmonia’s knuckles.

“I know, love. And I am sorry. We made the decision... I made the decision to bring you back. I couldn’t take the chance of the other council members discovering what you had accomplished.

It wouldn’t have been safe for you or your family. Please, forgive me.”

“Why?” she choked out, staring with confusion into Eirene’s eyes.

Eirene soothed a hand over her forehead with a look of regret.

“I sent you because I knew that you would do whatever was necessary to find and stop Ceto.

The dark magic… none of the other council members would have had the courage, much less the strength, to use and command it without becoming tainted by the lure of it. I knew you could do it."

Harmonia’s throat closed. The ache in her chest fractured into a thousand pieces.

She turned her face toward the wall, her shoulders shaking as the room blurred behind her veil of tears.

The air felt too clean, too still. No soft scrap of dragon nails on raw wood planks.

No scent of wildflowers and cypress. No creak of the old floorboards. No warmth of Landry’s arms around her.

Only silence.

And the sound of her heart breaking.

“Please tell me… what happened… after Ceto — ” The plea was pulled from her raw throat.

What if she hadn’t destroyed the other mage?

What if the serpent was still alive? Who would protect Landry, Hog, and the others?

What had happened to Lilypad and Pug? There were so many questions that she needed answers to that she didn’t know where to start.

Eirene didn’t answer immediately. The elder council member remained seated beside her, her hand still wrapped gently around hers, her gaze distant, as if reaching back into memory.

The heavy silence pressed between them, broken only by the soft crackle of the wall hearth, the flames enchanted to flicker without heat.

“I felt the power of the dark magic. I’ll confess, it…

frightened me,” Eirene finally said, her voice barely above a whisper.

“The moment your magic shattered across the mage line was like a thunderclap. I was preparing the Circle’s warding stones when it hit me — like a quake through the soul.

Something had happened. Something... cataclysmic. ”

Harmonia turned her face slightly, enough to glimpse Eirene through her tears.

“You nearly died, Harmonia. In that moment, I knew. I felt the thread of you unraveling, fraying so fast I could barely reach for it. I called for your father. I knew Arastan could trace the power of the Stormhold magic to your location. Once we knew, I created a portal,” she explained, her eyes serene and stern, yet filled with compassion.

“You wouldn’t have made it back on your own.

Your body collapsed. I’ve never seen a mage’s aura so still. .. so silent.”

Harmonia’s throat burned with a thousand unshed words. She tightened her fingers around Eirene’s, a silent thank-you — and a question. Eirene understood.

“You fought a kind of magic we thought long lost. Forgotten. But it wasn’t gone.” Her voice darkened. “It was forbidden. The council... we’d theorized, but never imagined anyone could wield it again. Ceto did. And she did so masterfully.”

Harmonia flinched at the name, the weight of it landing like a stone in her stomach. Her voice came as a whisper, hoarse and hollow. “A human died.”

Eirene’s released a heartfelt sigh and nodded. “Yes, but without you, it could have been much worse.”

Harmonia’s gaze drifted toward the window. The colorful shades of dawn’s pale light seeped through the sheer curtains creating a rainbow prism. It was so different from the realm she had glimpsed when she opened the portal contained in the ring that Lilypad had given her.

“Ceto knew she’d be trapped in the dark realm for eternity if she failed.

She couldn’t risk being nothing. She stole the rings my father had created but not enchanted yet.

I suspect that she created a portal spell to pass through the dark realm, hoping that if one of the rings was found and used, she could use it to escape.

The curse bound her physical body, but she had found a way around the one on her magic.

The entrapment wards didn’t recognize the water dragons or the serpent.

Because of that, she was able to embed her essence into the serpent and escape the dark prison without being detected. ”

Eirene nodded. “Yet, there was the disturbance in the mage line because of the dark magic.”

“She was lucky. If Lilypad and Pug had gone through the portal instead of the serpent, she would have still been trapped. Their souls were too pure. Ceto couldn’t use them — not directly.

But the serpent... that creature’s soul matched her own.

It killed for pleasure. She was able to slip in and become a shadow wearing a corpse. ”

Eirene’s face tightened. “The council will review what has happened so that it can’t happen again.”

Exhausted, Harmonia struggled to keep her voice from slurring. She had to make sure Eirene and the other council members understood what Ceto was doing.

“Ceto knew she couldn’t return to her physical body.

She was planning to create a new one — piece by piece.

First her magic... then her mind. Then she would find a suitable host. She wanted me, but I was too powerful and my mage line would resist. She would have used a human — if she had found one strong enough.

But first, she needed chaos. The dark magic demanded it.

It fed on death, destruction, and fear.”

Silence fell again, but it was thick with emotion now. Alive with pain, pride, and a current of understanding so ancient it hummed beneath the walls of the apartment like old magic breathing.

“That was what defeated her. Your human’s love for you.

He was willing to sacrifice himself to protect you — to protect those he loves.

The dark magic cannot stand strong in the face of such powerful, good magic,” Eirene said after a long moment.

“Now that you have severed her essence from her soul, splitting them between two dark realms, they cannot find the other. She has no way back.”

“Purgatory,” Harmonia murmured. “Forever.”

Eirene looked at her, her eyes shining. “You are your parents’ daughter. You’re a Stormhold. And you’ve done what few could have imagined. You didn’t just defeat her — you saved many lives.”

Fresh tears slid down Harmonia’s cheeks. She closed her eyes. The weight of exhaustion pressed into her bones, but it was no longer from magic.

It was grief. For Jack. For Landry. For everything she’d gained and everything she feared she might have lost.

Her voice broke. “He’s still there, Eirene… I left him behind… How long has it been?” she asked fearfully.

Eirene leaned forward, wrapping her arms around her and holding her as gently as a mother would hold a broken child.

“Not long, child, not long. Don’t give up hope. He misses you as much as you miss him,” Eirene murmured. “A mage is only as powerful as his or her soul. If it is shattered, if his or her heart is broken, there is only one thing they can do — ”

Harmonia’s eyes opened, filled with renewed fire.