me about everything that happened. And about you. Through dreams. Tell Professor Norwood that Director Maskelyne knows that I am no longer here. I had to say goodbye to her too. Now she won't hold him back.

I managed to get out of the habit of her abstruse manner of expressing myself. By the time I realized it, the ghost had completely melted away. Only a barely noticeable piece of fog swayed in the air – and disappeared under the first rays of the sun.

– Something happened, right? – asked Dougal. “Magic background.” Not that it’s broken… Strange. It seems to me that I have already felt something similar. I don't remember when or where. “He fell silent, as if trying to find the right words to describe his own feelings.

– Charlotte. She said she could leave. Which is easy now. That our future is just beginning. And… she disappeared. Not like she disappeared before. It just evaporated.

“Easy,” Dougal repeated thoughtfully. – Exactly! Light, barely noticeable excitement. It looks like ripples on the water. It is now clear. I felt it at the academy. Close to you.

– She told me to tell you. Maskelyne knows she's gone. It means something? Something important?

– My contract. One of the points, she insisted on it. Miss Blair is my assistant. Violating anyone means freedom to me.

– And… what now? All?

– All. – He looked at the sun. A huge golden sun that slowly rose over the ocean. – Do you like happy endings, Miss Freya Sullivan?

– Adore!

– Then tell me – what is there at the end according to the laws of the genre?

“Happily ever after,” I smiled wider and wider. – Boy and girl. Sometimes there are all sorts of tests, but this is nonsense.

– It later. And at the beginning?

“At first…” I think I blushed. Truly, uncontrollably, brightly, as the naive girl Sally, who still believed in real miracles and true love, once blushed. – Kiss?

– I hate the laws of genres. – He turned around, and I froze, trying to understand: it seems that now I see the main, most impossible, incredible and unreal miracle of this magical world. Dougal smiled. Wide, reckless, completely boyish. Just as Dr. Norwood, a professor at the Panacea Academy, certainly couldn’t smile.

Did he step forward first, or did I hang on his neck first? What difference does it really make when I heard something as incredible as his smile:

– But I like this one.

EPILOGUE. One year later

It's amazing how everything around you changes when you don't have a fatal curse hanging over you. When your whole life is ahead – your life, your own, and not borrowed from a hysterical ghost. And you can learn magic, do what you love, discover a magical new world…

The year has flown by faster than that terrible week. Exciting, interesting, filled with new impressions and relationships.

A year… yesterday we celebrated Sabella’s birthday, and today I am again walking through her beautiful park, heading to the lake – the abode of the malicious “creature of ancient magic.” Ever since Kels accepted me as a member of the family and deigned to communicate without a “translator,” I loved visiting him. The ancient kelpie has an interesting view of the world. Inhuman, paradoxical and, perhaps, very sensible. Dougal even joked once that it was time to be jealous.

Today I have a strange topic of conversation. But more people understand kelpie magic, if only because he himself is concentrated magic, and feels it as clearly as people feel heat or cold. He felt then, at our first meeting, both the curse and the fact that Dougal and I had every chance to overcome it…

I couldn’t help but smile, remembering my return from Sydney. How Sabella and I laughed and cried in our arms, and then it was as if something was dragging me to the lake. And the neighing kelpie conveyed that one must be careful when speaking out loud promises backed by magic. And now he waits impatiently and really longs for me to start begging. If I start immediately, so be it, by the summer he will agree to take me for a ride.

And how Dougal had fun retelling his flowery images!

Kels is caring in his own way, although he will never stoop to show it. He knows that icy autumn water is not good for people, even if they are magicians. But then I was not a larva of a magician, but an embryo. No matter what Charlotte says about this…

I am still just learning. But I can maintain my true appearance without much difficulty and even without Dougal’s potion. After all, this potion is not a manifestation of the essence, as I thought then. It just stimulates the memory and helps to concentrate extremely much to create the desired illusion. Nothing that cannot be learned with desire and a good incentive. But I had an incentive, and not even one.

Not only the desire to see herself as real and the dislike of Charlotte’s body. As soon as I understood and believed that I would linger in this brave new world, the question arose – who would I be here? Charlotte Blair? It was unfair, it was wrong, my whole being was against it. And her parents are unlikely to be happy about this turn.

Freya Sullivan? ? who is she? Where did it come from? Why without documents, without that “paper trail” that leaves the life of any person: born, studied, applied to some institutions, spent money and topped up a bank account, bought tickets or ordered portals…

And what can you do with the fact that along with Charlotte’s body I inherited her magic? That very “magical aura signature” that verifies even an application to a bank or payment for an order by card, even magical oaths, contracts or vows.

What if this stranger-my-Charlotte’s magic doesn’t allow me to resign from the Academy?! Then Dougal will remain attached to her?! After all, his only chance to leave there by terminating the contract early is if the headmistress violates one of the clauses. We have the item "Miss Blair is Dr. Norwood's assistant." If you can’t “break” him, there’s no point in expecting new mistakes from Maskelyne.

Dougal then only shook his head after listening to my chaotic reasoning. Said:

– Leave it to me. I know what to put pressure on and what to threaten with. She doesn't need any fuss about the death of the professor's assistant within the Academy. If she tries to keep us, she will get everything she fears and even more. I will ensure close public interest and a massive outflow of students.

I will probably never forget this wonderful scene with Dougal the Menace and me as Freya Sullivan in Maskelyne’s office. But, perhaps, we must give the headmistress her due. She knew how to lose with dignity. Moreover, the publicity of the reasons and conditions of Dougal’s contract, either now or later, also categorically did not suit her. But Dougal promised to remain silent if she immediately canceled both contracts, both with him and with me. Maskelyne agreed. And as a “gesture of goodwill,” or rather, so that the truth about Charlotte’s death would remain true only for a narrow circle of people and would not in any way affect the good name of Regan Maskelyne, she herself offered to talk to Mr. Blair.

– He is a sensible person. The loss of his daughter, of course, will be a terrible blow for him, but I think we will find a solution that will suit everyone. He probably won’t want anything to do with the woman who has taken over the body of his “dear Charlotte.” And you, as I see, have already found a solution. Temporary, I guess?

“I hope it becomes permanent,” I assured. – I have no desire to walk in someone else’s guise and use someone else’s name.

Mr Blair insisted on talking to me – he wanted to make sure for himself that his daughter was no more. A painful meeting. How would I have survived it without Dougal's support? We swore an oath of secrecy – Mr Blair, Maskelyne, myself and Dougal. I received new documents, I don’t know how Mr. Blair got them, and Charlotte received a different fate, about which I know nothing.

– She is alive. The rest doesn’t concern you,” he said, and I, of course, did not object.

That evening, Dougal and I spontaneously, without saying a word, reached out to each other, as if we both needed a good dose of human warmth and affection. As a cure for the chilling cold that reigned in my soul after meeting Charlotte’s father and the headmistress. But the “medicine” very quickly turned into pleasure, and that night was the first of many – we felt good together, very good. It was then that the fear that now, freed from the curse, we would look at each other differently disappeared. And the last doubts disappeared.

And two weeks later there was a wedding. Quiet, chamber ceremony: Dougal said that the noise around his name would be enough for him for several years to come, and I knew almost no one here at all. Chester is the best man, Elsa is the bridesmaid, and the only spectator is Sabella. The ring on my finger felt… strange. Finally, but not as “it’s all over”, but as “now it all begins.” Happiness with a taste of anticipation…

No, everything did not become easy, simple and wonderful, as if by magic. But Dougal and I wouldn’t want to end up in a cloudless fairy tale. Is it possible to enjoy the sun if it shines around the clock?

“Dougal and I”… Yes, with him it was easy and natural to move from “mine” and “yours” to “we” and “ours”. Not in everything, of course – it’s still “your work and mine”, but this does not interfere with anything. Quite the contrary.

Mrs Freya Norwood has not yet made a name for herself as a journalist. It doesn't happen that quickly. I get to know the world, gain impressions, and at the same time explore interesting topics. Honestly, it’s much more difficult than it was at home, because here I’m interested in everything. Even alchemy conferences, which I went to several times with Dougal. And even though I still only understand prepositions and individual words in reports, conversations on the sidelines are something! You won’t hear anything there, from debates about the advisability of creating the philosopher’s stone (here, by the way, it is considered not a legend of alchemy, but a paradoxical scientific curiosity) to a caustic discussion of the unforgettable “tidal pebbles.”

And Dougal Norwood is a world-famous scientist, one of the leading experts of the Patent Commission, the inventor of one and a half dozen fundamentally new potions and one and a half hundred successful modifications of well-known recipes. Honorary member of five Academies, which does not include the Panacea Academy. Maskelyne bites his elbows in frustration, but cannot do anything. She has no access to Sabella’s house, much less to our London apartment. And when they happen to meet in public, Dougal only bows to her mockingly and politely and suppresses any attempts to start a conversation.

Here is the lake – a magically blue surface under a cloudy sky, a sunny glare, although the sun is not visible behind the clouds. Kels is curious and has already sensed my presence. We still have to wait out his usual water show with special effects, but I know how to speed up the conversation. It is enough to recall the incident that I want to talk about.

I was looking for something unusual as a gift for Sabella. As light, sonorous and magical as she herself. I don’t know how I ended up in an art gallery—a painting would have been the last option I thought of. If only because I don’t understand painting at all.

There I saw… him.

The same portrait.

She froze, clenching her fists painfully, convincing herself that it seemed to me, I imagined it. This is not a dream… not that creepy