Page 81 of Magical Moonbeam

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He didn’t know I was here.

I was in his world, his domain, or some echo of it, and he didn’t feel me.

He couldn’t feel me.

I took a shaky breath and placed a hand over my heart.

This wasn’t a dream. This wasn’t the Hedge. This wasn’t his crafted trap.

This was me, choosing.

And because I hadchosen, he wasn’t ready for me.

A slow warmth began to bloom behind my ribs, small but certain. The kind of warmth that comes not from a spell or a flame, but from that quiet flicker of knowing you’ve taken back something someone tried to steal.

This is mine, I thought fiercely, scanning the ghost town.This space. This moment. This magic. It’s not his.

He could twist the Veil. He could send shadows. He could manipulate the Hedge and press against my dreams.

Butthis?

This wasme.

The fog curled around my feet as I stepped forward once more, but I didn’t hesitate this time. I turned left, down the crooked alley between the lantern-maker’s shop and the building I still didn’t have a name for. I didn’t need names.

I needed understanding.

I needed a way through.

And maybe this was how I’d get it.

Not by facing Gideon head-on. Not by asking him why. Not even by breaking the curse with some ancient incantation pulled from dragon breath and moonlight.

Maybe the key waswalking here alone, while he wasn’t looking.

Owning what he thought he controlled.

If I could stand in this version of Shadowick without letting my fear drive me, without leaking magic, without spiraling into questions that didn’t have answers…

Then I could do it when it mattered.

Not easily.

Not cleanly.

But I could do it.

The thought steadied me more than any spell I’d ever cast.

I stopped by the broken fountain and looked down into its shallow basin, now filled with rainwater and creeping shadow. My reflection stared back, blurry, soft at the edges, but mine.

Not his.

Not twisted.

Mine.

I whispered, “You don’t own me.”

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