accept the gift her aunt was offering. Completely comfortable, not feeling any danger, the younger Witch was ready to let the transfer happen, but first, she needed her aunt to know she was no pushover. "I know what you're doing, Aunt Gwen, and I'm okay with it. I just need to know that you're sure you should be using magic at all."
"I'm more than sure," Gwen quickly replied. "I need you to see it for yourself. To hear the words come out of their mouths. To feel their emotions and their conviction. This is important."
Relaxing even more, Ellie nodded. She knew there was no way her aunt could exert much power, could whip up more than a minimal amount of magic without drawing unwanted attention. After all, she had been hospitalized, institutionalized because her own mysticism had driven her to self-harm.
She was heavily monitored, but they couldn't take it from her. Magic was part of who Gwen was. It was written on her DNA. The MacLeish enchantment was like the color of her hair and the freckles across the bridge of her nose - there for the long haul. It could've been bound, and some of it was, but no one but the Goddess herself could take it all.
The Council, the doctors, and the Mages took every precaution. There were dampening wards all over the Institute to keep things from getting out of hand.
The professionals knew that letting magic go unused, letting it back up in a person's system could literally kill a Witch. So, there were rules. They applied to only the most improved and trusted patients who'd undergone all the tests and were allowed to use minimal magic within the walls of the Institute.
And if things did go awry, the Mages were there to contain it and take care of the patient. They kept order. They made sure nothing wrong happened. They were the perfect bridge between medical science and the magical world.
Letting her eyes slide shut, Ellie welcomed Gwen’s memories. She saw the outside of the old farm, the house she and her sister had grown up in, the one Celia and Michael now called home. Smiling, her metaphysical body, the one occupying her aunt's in the recollections, stopped to look at the pink balloons with their strings wrapped around the wooden poles on the porch and the sign painted by her dad that read, Welcome to the Family, Baby Ellie.
Slowly climbing the steps, her fingers touched the streamers. Happiness literally filled the breeze of that hot Texas afternoon. Leaning down, she sniffed the massive bouquet of white roses, her momma's favorite, the ones she immediately knew Gwen had sent.
Her heart was full of love, joy, and more than a little melancholy. It was hard to be excited to see her parents and grandparents again, knowing that when she opened her eyes, they would all still be gone. But in the end, she was eager to look at their faces, to be in the same room with them.
Moving towards the door, unable to stop Gwen's journey, Ellie tried to just let the memories flow naturally, but it was no use. Gone was her trepidation. She wanted to see her mom and dad again. It didn't matter that the vision was nearly twenty-nine years old. She needed to look at them. Needed to remember them as they were, full of life, of love, of that special spark that made them such amazing people. Not the empty shells, the husks of flesh and bone, that she and Celia had identified at the morgue.
Engulfed in the scent of homemade biscuits, fresh strawberry jam, and granny’s special blend of chamomile tea, the first floor of the house was little more than a blur. All her attention was on the staircase that led to her parents’ room, to the sound of her father’s deep, rumbling chuckle and her mother’s soft, sweet voice.
Atop the stairs, she took a right, flying into their room just like she'd done so many times as a child. It was then that Ellie realized it was Gwen's excitement adding to her own that made everything speed forward.
Her aunt was overjoyed to meet her namesake, her niece, the little baby whose middle name would be Gwendolyn. Stopping so quickly that the slick bottoms of her sandals slid on the wooden floors, the youngest of the MacLeish sisters promptly apologized. "I'm so sorry. I just can't wait to see your little bundle. I think I drove ninety miles an hour