Jeraldine Hogsmutter's Arc

Chapter 4 of 4

The gate near Marshwood was sealed now, shut tight with binding sap. That solved the breach. It did not solve the boy. Aleia's list had named one caster above all: Oliver Lopes, a half-blood foster child whose father, Darren, once studied at Galaria. Oliver sat on the mortal side of a gate Jeraldine had just closed for good. The sealed gate held Galaria's empty seats as far away as ever. Jeraldine found the boy at the old Marshwood Inn. Broken shutters hung loose. Dust covered the floor. Oliver sat on a crooked stair, a thin boy with his father's eyes, waiting because a stranger had asked him to. He did not know he carried magic. He did not know his father's name meant anything. "I can't take you the simple way," Jeraldine said. "That door is closed now. For good reason." The boy only watched him. Reopening the gate would undo everything. It would invite the pull back. Jeraldine would not trade a sealed breach for a filled seat. He scried Galaria. Magnifiso Swindles answered. The founder of the house of Charisma wore maroon and gold, a red cardinal perched on his staff. The two had built this school side by side, yet Jeraldine braced for a hard word. Magnifiso gave hard words slowly, then only once. "You sealed the gate," Magnifiso said. "Now you want a way through a sealed gate." He waited. "There's another road. Older. The founders walked it before the gates. You never liked it." "Teach it to me," Jeraldine said. "A cloak pin. Silences the crossing so no mortal feels it. And a signet ring. The founders' seal. The old road only opens to a founder's hand." Magnifiso paused. "I kept mine. Take the boy slow. Rush it and you lose him in the between." Jeraldine pressed his own signet ring into his palm. The seal read Stay Close. He had worn it since the beginning and forgotten what it asked. He pinned the silencing clasp to Oliver's collar. "Hold my arm," Jeraldine said. "Don't let go, whatever you see." The boy gripped him. Jeraldine turned the ring against the inn's cold wall. Stone softened to gray mist. No gate cracked. No pull answered. The clasp drank every sound. They stepped into the mist together, and the old road closed behind them clean. They came out on Galaria's grounds. Oliver swayed, pale, but whole. He stared at the towers, at a sky that was not his sky. Ronny Echo was already crossing the lawn toward them. The young scout had cleared the mortal houses before the gate failed. Now he did the work he signed himself up for, guiding the lost. He stopped before Oliver and did not crowd him. "First day," Ronny said. "I know. Looks like a lot." The boy nodded, unsure. "Lost three students my first run. One found her own way back." Ronny shrugged. "Won't lose you." He led Oliver toward the First-Year Dorm Tower, an old cobblestone spire marked over the door. Inside, warm light. A bed that was his. A muggleborn girl Ronny already guided waved from a stair. Oliver could shelter here, safe, until he learned what he was. Jeraldine watched the boy climb the steps and did not reach to hurry him. Magnifiso met Jeraldine at the tower door. "One seat filled," he said. "The hard way." "The right way," Jeraldine said. "No gate reopened. No one chased. We walked him through ourselves." He turned the signet ring on his finger. "I built this place to bring casters home. I almost tore a hole in the world to do it faster. Agatha was right to ask what shortcuts cost. So was Aldric." Magnifiso studied him. For once he said nothing hard. Jeraldine looked up at the tower, where a found caster slept under Galaria's roof for the first time. The empty seats had haunted him since the beginning. He had chased them across sealed gates and borrowed knowledge and bad choices. Now one was filled, and the method was clean enough to use again. Aleia's list held more names. Magnifiso knew the old road. Ronny would meet each new child at the door. Galaria would not be the fastest academy to rise in the hidden world. It would be the one that did right and paid for it, seat by seat, until no gifted child was left waiting alone. Jeraldine turned the ring once more, read the two words on the seal, and this time he kept them.