Page 169 of Magical Moonbeam
But he was faster.
He blurred through the shadows, his movements liquid, graceful, awful.
His hand caught mine mid-spell, and the chill of his touch nearly knocked me out. He shoved me back, hard enough that my ribs screamed. The world spun.
I barely caught myself on a banister.
And that’s when I felt it, a presence…not threatening,grounding.
Keegan.
He wasn’t near, but he was close enough.
I didn’t see him. I didn’t have to. The tug of our magic hummed in my chest, steady and sure, like the anchor I’d forgotten I needed.
The bond between us sparked, not just magic, but real.Right. His heartbeat in mine.
“I’m here,” his voice whispered, though it never reached my ears. “You’re not alone.”
He knew I was in the in-between. I clenched my jaw and surged upright, power roaring up from the ground again, brighter,truer.
Ibelonghere, Gideon.” I slammed both palms to the stone wall nearest him and pulled fromdeep—from memory, from loss, from love. The Hedge answered in full.
Beams of light tore through the floorboards, cracking stone and forming a barrier of jagged, living wood. Flowers burst open in blinding flashes of silver and green. A Hedge wall erupted between us, pushing Gideon back with a screech.
He writhed, fought it, but for a moment, it held.
And in that moment, I stepped through the moonlight, still clinging to the space between us.
I met him head-on.
He struck with shadow, but I countered with light, using shards of the Moonbeam like knives. I spun the Hedge magic into ropes of gleaming vine and caught his wrist, then his ankle, yanking him down as the floor groaned.
He screamed, a sound that wasn’t quite human, and sent a shockwave of dark magic outward.
The blast knocked me off my feet and into a stone pillar. Stars burst in my vision.
I heard Skonk yelling, someone else chanting a spell.
Why was he here?
Gideon rose again, panting. His form was now more solid, but fractured like glass, struggling to hold water. Every time he drew power, he flickered.
“You’ll lose everything,” he rasped. “Stonewick. The Academy. Your daughter.”
I stood again.
Bruised. Bloodied.
But burning with the oldest, fiercest thing I had.
“No,” I said. “You will.”
I reached out, not with force, but withtruth.
And the Hedge responded, along with the last of the Moonbeam.
From beneath, from above, from the very walls. Vines, ropes, blossoms of moon-fed light. Itclaimedthe space around me.
