They formed a circle around Grachi. She closed her eyes and raised her hands, not to conjure a spell, but to feel. She didn't recite ancient words from her spellbook. Instead, she spoke from memory.

Daniel pocketed his phone and nodded. "Laughter."

She snapped her fingers, and the single flame that appeared was small, steady, and warm. Exactly the way she wanted it. She had learned the most powerful spell of all: the one you don't need magic to cast.

The flame on her finger suddenly erupted into a fireball. With a yelp, Grachi lost her concentration, dropped to the mattress with a soft thud, and the fireball shot across the room, narrowly missing her mirror before dissolving into a puff of smoke.

Grachi opened her eyes. The air was clean. The weight was gone. She looked at her friends—her family.

He was right. A secret was eating at her. For weeks, she’d been having dreams of a dark, swirling vortex—a magical echo from a spell she’d broken months ago. A spell that had promised to erase magic forever. She had saved magic, but a shard of that broken darkness had latched onto her, feeding on her anxiety.

A soft knock came from her window. She looked up to see Matías, his silhouette framed by the dying light. He was holding a small, wilting sunflower in one hand and a worried smile on his face.