Help! My Moms Are Overpowered Tyrants, and I’m Stuck as Their Baby!
Chapter 213: Spells, Siblings, and the Art of Not Panicking

Chapter 213: Spells, Siblings, and the Art of Not Panicking

If there is one universal truth about revolutions large or small it’s that as soon as you resolve one crisis, another is already peeking around the nearest pillar, plotting a dramatic entrance.

By mid-morning, the palace was abuzz with an energy that bordered on the manic. Messengers darted down every corridor, councilors whispered in anxious clumps, and the scent of jam and trampled grass still lingered suspiciously in the air. I had barely settled into my study my stack of letters and “urgent reports” already threatening to mutiny when the door flew open and Mara marched in, a look of grim purpose on her face and both twins clinging to her cloak like barnacles.

“Elira sent word from the Academy,” Mara announced, tossing a sealed letter onto my desk. “There’s been…an incident.”

I eyed the twins warily. “What kind of incident?”

Aeris piped up before Mara could answer. “Magic went kaboom!” she said, eyes round with delight. “The whole east wing is sparkly now!”

Arion added, “And the library books keep singing about shoes!”

Velka, who had been reading quietly in the window, set her book aside with a sigh. “Did anyone get hurt?”

“Only a few egos,” Mara reported. “And maybe the librarian’s sanity. Elira says they need you there, Elyzara. Apparently, the magical wards on the Academy’s archives have started malfunctioning, and no one knows why.”

“Of course they have,” I muttered, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Let me guess rebels, sabotage, or an outbreak of enchanted hedgehogs?”

Aeris and Arion giggled. Mara shrugged. “Could be all three, knowing this place.”

I was about to rise when Riven dashed in, trailing a faint odor of singed hair and clutching a musical spoon. “You’re not going without me, right? Someone needs to document the chaos for posterity.”

“Or for the next gossip column,” Velka murmured, but she was already fetching her cloak. There was no question that she and, by extension, everyone would come.

Within the hour, our little group was whisked to the Academy, greeted by the sight of a thoroughly frazzled Headmistress and a hallway filled with floating shoes, illuminated scrolls, and a portrait of the founder now singing a rousing ballad about revolutionary footwear.

Elira met us at the door, a half-exasperated, half-relieved smile on her face. “Welcome to Tuesday,” she said wryly. “Did you bring a plan?”

Mara nudged me. “Go on, your highness. Time to lead.”

I took a deep breath, drawing the twins closer. “Alright. First, find the source of the magical disturbance. Second, avoid being trampled by animated boots. Third, make sure no one turns the archives into a battleground.”

Aeris grinned. “Can we help?”

“Absolutely,” I told her. “But stay close to Mara and Velka.”

“Wait,” Arion said, suddenly worried, “what if the singing books attack again?”

Mara brandished a jam tart like a shield. “I have countermeasures.”

Inside the library, chaos reigned. Shelves spun on their own, ladders scooted away from would-be climbers, and several students were cornered by an aggressive encyclopedia set. The twins, undeterred, began directing lost first-years away from enchanted pitfalls, giggling when one particularly cranky thesaurus scolded them for “excessive synonym use.”

I pressed forward, Velka at my shoulder, Elira and Mara running interference, and Riven scribbling frantic notes (“Day 153: Thesaurus, dangerous. Recommend nonviolent negotiation with reference material.”).

At the heart of the archives, we found the source: a shimmering magical sigil, pulsing with unpredictable power, and a group of older students faces pale and anxious clustered nearby.

One girl, freckles standing out against tear-streaked cheeks, stammered, “We were only trying to strengthen the wards. We didn’t mean for…this.”

Velka examined the sigil. “It’s keyed to emotion,” she mused. “Whoever tried to boost the wards must have fed it raw magical intent, but without focus or unity, the spell…fractured.”

Mara whistled. “Explains the singing shoes. And the encyclopedia uprising.”

Elira was already pulling chalk from her satchel. “We can counter this. Elyzara, you’ll need to draw the students together literally and figuratively.”

I nodded, feeling the familiar mixture of dread and purpose settle in my bones. I turned to the anxious group. “We need you to focus together. No more working in isolation, no more secret fixes. Magic like this is a team effort, not a test of who can act first.”

There was grumbling, and fear, and even a few stubborn arms crossed but the memory of yesterday’s roundtable must have stuck, because soon enough, the students formed a shaky circle, hands joined, eyes squeezed tight.

Velka gave me a subtle nod. “Now, Elyzara.”

I stepped to the center, closing my own eyes and feeling for the core of the spell a humming, nervous thing, as uncertain as its creators. I spoke softly but firmly, guiding the students in a slow, steady chant. Elira traced counter-runes, Mara kept time with an improvised rhythm, and the twins hummed backup, pure and innocent and oddly in tune.

The magic pulsed wild, for a heartbeat, then gradually steadier. The shoes dropped harmlessly to the ground, the books quieted, and the founder’s portrait gave a final, triumphant chorus before lapsing into snores.

I exhaled shakily. “That’s…better.”

The Headmistress hurried in, face a mixture of fury and awe. “If anyone ever tries to ‘fix’ the wards without supervision again, you’ll spend the rest of term recataloguing the entire library. In alphabetical order. By author. In three languages.”

Mara stage-whispered, “That’s cruel and unusual.”

The students, chastened, slunk away, and I couldn’t help but notice how even the most rebellious cast me a grateful look as they passed.

After the cleanup books reshelved, shoes sorted, magical residue swept into jars for later analysis the twins tugged me aside.

“Were you scared?” Aeris asked, her voice small for once.

“Terrified,” I admitted, kneeling to their level. “But I’m never alone.”

Arion grinned. “Us either! We’ll help you with every spell!”

Riven wandered over, arms full of enchanted cookbooks. “I found these in the shoe section. I sense a magical cross-contamination.”

Velka took my hand, steady and sure. “You handled that beautifully, you know.”

“I fumbled through,” I corrected, smiling.

“That’s all anyone ever does,” she said softly, “when it matters.”

As we left the Academy, the twins skipping ahead and Mara debating with Elira whether jam tarts should be classified as magical focus objects, I looked around at the strange, loyal group around me family by blood and by bond.

The path back to the palace wound through the city’s heart. At this hour, the cobblestones gleamed with dew and sunlight, and the marketplace once thick with suspicion was now alive with cautious optimism. Vendors eyed us warily at first, but then someone recognized Aeris (or perhaps just her very dramatic poster of “ELYZARA THE BRAVE” still clutched in sticky hands), and the tension dissolved like sugar in tea.

We paused by a baker’s stall. Mara, her energy undimmed by magical negotiations or running battles with library furniture, declared, “Research shows that post-crisis recovery is 78% more effective with pastries.” She produced a coin, grinning, and ordered enough buns to make the twins deliriously happy. The baker, a sharp-eyed woman with flour on her nose, slipped an extra scone to Velka “for courage,” and I noticed with secret delight how Velka’s cheeks actually colored.

Elira, meanwhile, sampled a jam tart with exaggerated care, delivering a pronouncement worthy of a royal judge. “Acceptable spell focus provided one is prepared for a certain degree of stickiness.”

Mara clutched her heart. “You wound me. This is the foundation of all my magical research.”

The twins, meanwhile, pressed their faces to the glass, discussing at high speed the relative merits of buns, brioches, and croissants as tools of revolution. Arion announced that any kingdom run by his sister should have daily cake mandates; Aeris began planning a menu.

Riven, notebook still open, mused aloud: “Perhaps what we need is a new school tradition. The Annual Great Bun Summit. A day of peace, dialogue, and competitive eating.”

Velka leaned close, voice pitched for my ears alone. “You realize,” she said, “that you’re probably the first royal in history whose coup d’état will be commemorated with cinnamon rolls and questionable singing shoes.”

I let myself laugh a real laugh, the kind that chases out old ghosts. “If peace is built on pastries and odd company, maybe it’ll last longer than the last regime.”

She squeezed my hand gently, and the world seemed to steady around me, if only for a moment.

We passed through the city gates and into the familiar palace gardens, the same ones where, hours ago, we’d negotiated with gnomes. The twins raced ahead, waving their pastries and new, crumbly treaty napkin with pride. I heard the gardener sigh heavily and mutter something about “reforming the Statues’ Union,” but even he looked a little less grumpy than usual.

It struck me then, the way history could hinge on such small things: an apology, a treaty on a napkin, a smile from a baker, or a scone for courage. None of this was how I’d imagined royal life, back when I was just a lost girl thrown into the body of a princess with a fate as heavy as the crown itself.

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