The book was not supposed to be there.
Lina noticed that before she ever touched it.
The shop itself was a narrow secondhand bookstore wedged between a closed tailor's stall and a phone-repair kiosk that smelled permanently of solder and burnt plastic. She had ducked inside only because rain had begun falling in sudden, angry sheets, the kind that soaked uniforms and ruined notebooks within seconds. The bell over the door rang once—sharp, metallic—and then went silent, as though embarrassed by the sound it had made.
The shelves were chaotic. Old textbooks leaned against romance paperbacks, atlases with torn spines slouched beside cookbooks printed in languages Lina could not read. Dust floated in the dim light like lazy insects. She ran her finger along a shelf, sneezed, and told herself she would leave as soon as the rain slowed.
That was when she saw the book.
It was thin compared to the others, bound in dark green cloth that looked soft rather than worn. No title was printed on the spine. Instead, there was a faint symbol pressed into the fabric—something like a spiral broken by three short lines. Lina felt a strange pull in her chest, a tightening that reminded her of holding her breath underwater.
She reached for it.
The moment her fingers brushed the cover, the rain outside stopped.
Not gradually. Not politely. It stopped as though someone had flipped a switch.
Lina froze, her hand still hovering. She laughed softly, embarrassed at herself. Coincidences happened. Weather was unpredictable. She wrapped her fingers around the book and slid it free.
The pages fluttered open on their own.
Ink rearranged itself before her eyes.
She dropped the book with a gasp. It hit the floor without a sound, landing open to a page filled with neat handwriting. The letters shimmered briefly, then stilled.
"Okay," Lina whispered. "Okay. I'm officially hallucinating."
From somewhere behind the counter, a voice said, "That one's not for browsing."
Lina jumped.
The shopkeeper was an old woman Lina was certain hadn't been there a moment earlier. Her hair was white and braided down her back, her eyes dark and sharp as seeds.
"I—sorry," Lina stammered. "I didn't mean to—"
The woman studied her for a long moment, then smiled in a way that made Lina's skin prickle.
"Five hundred shillings," she said.
"What?"
"For the book."
"But you just said—"
"That it's not for browsing," the woman interrupted. "I didn't say it wasn't for buying."
Lina hesitated. Five hundred was more than she usually spent on anything that wasn't food. But the book seemed to hum quietly, like a sleeping thing.
She paid.
The woman wrapped the book in brown paper and slid it across the counter.
"Study carefully," she said. "And don't show it to people who haven't learned how to forget."
Before Lina could ask what that meant, the bell rang again. When she turned back, the woman was gone.
Chapter One: Things Lina Had Always Known
Lina had always known she was different.
She just hadn't known how.
She talked to animals.
Not in the dramatic way people imagined—no booming voices from the sky, no cats delivering prophecies. It was quieter than that. A feeling, mostly. Intent. Emotion translated into understanding.
The chickens behind her house complained constantly about the heat. The neighbor's dog worried about the smell of strangers. Birds gossiped shamelessly, especially about shiny things.
Lina had learned early not to tell anyone.
The first time she mentioned it, she was six. She told her mother that the goat was angry because its rope was too tight.
Her mother had gone very still.
After that came the rules.
"Some things are imagination."
"Some gifts are dangerous."
"Never speak about this outside the house."
Her father avoided the topic entirely. When Lina asked him why her grandmother's old notebooks were locked away in a trunk no one opened, he told her to focus on her studies.
"Education is protection," he said.
So Lina studied.
She was good at school—too good, some teachers said. She remembered things after reading them once. Numbers lined themselves up neatly in her head. Essays seemed to write themselves.
She did not know yet that she was nudging probability, smoothing paths, coaxing outcomes the way one coaxed dough to rise.
She only knew that when she wanted something badly enough, the world leaned.
The book arrived into this quiet knowing like a stone dropped into water.
She hid it under her mattress.
That night, she dreamed of a woman stirring a pot over a fire that burned blue instead of orange. Animals sat around her in a careful circle, watching.
When Lina woke, her hands smelled faintly of herbs.
Chapter Two: Studying the Impossible
The book did not behave like normal books.
Sometimes the pages were blank until Lina focused. Sometimes the ink rearranged itself depending on what she was thinking about. When she was tired, the letters blurred into meaningless shapes.
It taught her gently.
Not spells at first, but principles.
Intention mattered more than words. Balance mattered more than power. Magic borrowed, it did not create.
Lina practiced in secret.
She learned to warm tea without fire, coaxing heat from the air. She learned that salt remembered things, that wood listened better than metal. She learned that cooking was a kind of spellwork—timing, attention, respect.
Her stews improved dramatically.
Her mother noticed.
"You've been doing something different," she said one evening, watching Lina stir a pot.
"I followed the recipe," Lina lied.
Her mother's eyes lingered on her hands.
At school, Lina experimented carefully.
She did not conjure answers out of nothing. She simply… guided herself. Memory stuck where it might have slipped. Teachers asked questions she happened to have prepared for.
She ranked first.
Whispers followed.
Her best friend, Mara, was thrilled.
"You're a genius," Mara said, slinging an arm around Lina's shoulders. "Promise me you won't forget me when you become famous."
Lina laughed, guilt curling in her stomach.
Mara was curious about everything. She asked questions, poked at mysteries, took apart radios just to see how they worked.
She would love the book.
The thought scared Lina.
Chapter Three: Ancestry Unspoken
The trunk was easier to open than Lina expected.
The lock resisted for a moment, then clicked, as though recognizing her.
Inside were notebooks wrapped in cloth, brittle with age. The handwriting was looping and precise. Symbols filled the margins.
Her grandmother's name was on the first page.
Lina sat on the floor and read until her legs went numb.
Her family had been witches.
Not the storybook kind. Healers. Weather-watchers. Listeners.
Then came the Association.
Regulation. Registration. Disappearances dressed up as relocations.
Her grandmother had hidden her abilities. So had her parents.
Fear soaked the pages.
When Lina closed the notebook, her hands were shaking.
That night, her parents argued in low voices.
"They're watching again," her mother said.
"No," her father insisted. "We've been careful."
Lina pressed her ear to the door.
"Magic doesn't stay buried," her mother whispered. "It leaks."
Chapter Four: The Association Notices
It began with small things.
A man standing across the street too often. A woman asking strange questions at the market.
The book grew heavier.
Animals went quiet when Lina approached.
One afternoon, she found a symbol chalked faintly on the ground outside her school—the same spiral from the book's cover.
She panicked.
Mara noticed.
"Talk to me," Mara said. "You're acting like you're being hunted."
Lina hesitated.
Then she made the worst decision of her life.
Chapter Five: Showing Mara
They went to Lina's room. Lina locked the door.
"I need you to promise not to freak out," Lina said.
Mara grinned. "I live for freaking out."
Lina showed her the book.
The pages bloomed with light.
Mara's mouth fell open.
"Oh," she breathed. "Oh, this is real."
Lina demonstrated a small thing—a match lighting without flame.
Mara laughed, delighted.
That was when the knock came.
Not on the door.
On the air.
The room went cold. Symbols burned briefly along the walls.
"Lina," a voice said. "You have been observed."
Mara screamed.
Chapter Six: Caught
They arrived through the floor, through the walls, through places Lina hadn't known were doors.
The Association wore neutrality like armor.
"You broke concealment," a woman said calmly. "And you involved an unregistered civilian."
Mara clutched Lina's hand.
"I didn't mean to," Lina said. "Please."
The woman's gaze softened slightly.
"You will be trained," she said. "And she will forget."
Mara shook her head violently.
"No," she said. "No, you can't—"
A man stepped forward.
"Not yet," he said. "Memory erasure leaves residue when done too soon."
He turned to Lina.
"I am assigned as your guardian," he said. "Call me Ash."
Chapter Seven: Learning Under Watch
Ash was nothing like Lina expected.
He cooked. He complained about paperwork. He corrected her gently.
"Mistakes are allowed," he said. "Arrogance is not."
Lina learned faster than she wanted to.
She went on missions—small at first. Fixing wards. Calming storms. Listening to rivers.
Mara was warned.
"Do not speak of what you saw," Ash told her. "Silence keeps you alive."
Mara nodded, pale.
But she watched.
And she remembered.
Chapter Eight: Cracks
Lina began to notice gaps.
Things Ash avoided answering. Names crossed out in records.
Magic, regulated, was thinner. Controlled.
"Is this really protection?" Lina asked.
Ash did not answer.
Mara started finishing Lina's sentences.
"You don't remember telling me," Lina said once.
Mara smiled strangely.
"Maybe you forgot," she said.
Chapter Nine: The Choice
The Association decided it was time.
"The civilian knows too much," the woman said. "Both memories will be wiped."
Lina felt sick.
Mara stood tall.
"It's okay," she said softly. "If forgetting keeps you safe."
Lina shook her head.
"No," she said. "I won't let you decide what we remember."
She spoke the truth aloud.
Magic spilled.
Chapter Ten: What Remains
When Lina woke, the world was quiet.
The book lay on her desk, closed.
Mara sat beside her, frowning.
"Did we have homework today?" Mara asked.
Lina's chest ached.
"I don't know," she said.
Outside, a bird landed on the windowsill and tilted its head.
Lina felt something stir.
Not memory.
But trace.
And somewhere, deep in the spaces where forgetting failed, magic waited.