Page 25 of A Silenced Midlife

"Let's get to it," I said, unable to keep the edge out of my voice. "A shifter was forced to shift in public at the grocery store today. I turned it into some act for a costume shop," I threw my hands up in frustration, "but enough is enough. Forcing a shifter to shift in public is dangerous. Most predator breeds don’t always have full control over their animals, especially when they are forced to shift. We can't keep doing damage control every time something like this happens."

"Agreed," Drew said.

"Any ideas on how to stop these incidents?" Mayor Brown asked, turning towards us with a hopeful look.

Olivia held up one finger. "What about a ward?"

"Ingenuous." The Mayor's eyes brightened.

Drew nodded. "I've never set one up, but I've seen them work."

I frowned. "What kind of ward?"

"It's like... a magical bubble," Olivia explained. "My dad mentioned it. It makes people who don't know about magic either not see it or forget it right away."

"Then why haven't we done this before?" I asked.

"I didn't know about it until recently," Olivia shrugged. "And it wasn't an issue before."

"Looks like we have a plan then," I said with a glimmer of hope.

I leaned against Drew's desk, thinking back to the chaos at the graveyard. The night I couldn't control my necromancer powers and raised a whole army of skeletons. Someone must've seen that who shouldn't have, but it was too late for regrets now. "So how do we do it?" I asked, looking around the room.

Olivia bit her lip, her eyes losing a bit of their usual spark. "I'll have to find out," she admitted, slumping just a touch.

Melody shook her head. "I don't know how to do that one."

Mayor Brown crossed his arms, frowning. "That's outside of my abilities," he said, clearly wishing he could offer more.

"Don't worry about it," Olivia reassured us with a wave of her hand. "I'll get with my father and figure out how to set up the ward."

"Great, that's settled," I nodded, a small weightlifting off of me, only to be replaced by another pressing concern. "But what do we do to figure out who is causing these things to happen?"

"Could you do a tracking spell?" Drew asked.

I nodded. "Yeah, it shouldn't be too hard. It's just tweaking a locator spell."

"Next time we get an incident like today," he said, scratching his chin thoughtfully, "we track the magic instead of dissolving it."

I shot him a sly wink. "That's why you're so sexy. Your brain."

Olivia couldn't hold back her snort. "Yeah, and that bod.”

Drew just rolled his eyes, but she was not wrong.

12

OLIVIA

I closed the portal in Ava’s kitchen then opened one into my house. “Call me if you need anything.”

The scent of brewing coffee greeted me as I stepped into the kitchen. Lucifer and Phira were there, quietly talking until I walked in.

"Okay, listen up," I started without preamble. "We're on high alert. Ava and Melody are holed up working on a tracking spell. As soon as the next crazy thing happens, we’re going to trace the magic back to the source."

Lucifer leaned against the counter with interest. Phira, with her pale skin reflecting the morning light, gave a nod, strands of blonde hair framing her face.

"Dad, we need a ward," I continued, "one that'll make anyone who doesn't know about magic forget they saw anything magical. Tourists, visitors, whoever is in Shipton Harbor or anywhere on the island. Can you show me how to do that?"

---