and give a probability readout on whether the person being scanned is a witch.”
Ginia nodded. “It only works for elemental and mind powers. Aunt Jennie said it wasn’t a good idea to scan for some of the other kinds of power.”
Nell blinked. “Aunt Jennie helped you with coding?”
Mia giggled. “Mama, don’t be silly. She helped us with the scanning spell, cuz Ginia didn’t know how to do that yet. Then Ginia spellcoded that to hook it up to the rest of what we’d done.”
Okay, that made more sense. Aunt Jennie was awesome cool, but a spellcoder she was not.
“So, what do we do with this fancy new toy?” Jamie asked.
“Use it to scan Elorie,” said Ginia. “Except we need a little help to make it work with a trackpad if she doesn’t use a mouse.”
Jamie laughed. “I think they’re still using mice in Witch Central East, although maybe not one quite this old.”
Ginia paused for a moment, looking suddenly shy. “And we wondered if maybe you could use it in Enchanter’s Realm.”
You didn’t need to be a mama to read the hope gleaming in three sets of eyes. Nell felt her own misting over. She and Jamie had been the primary coding team for their gaming world for almost fifteen years. It looked like they had just gained an assistant staff of three.
Jamie looked over at Nell and grinned. “Oh, I think maybe we could find a use for it.” He pointed at the graphics on his screen. “We might have to tweak your design a little, though.”
Shay looked at the screen in confusion. “Why? What’s wrong with it?”
Nell did the smart mama thing and slipped out to make lunch. Jamie could handle the explanation of why Realm wasn’t pink and glittery.
~ ~ ~
Nell: Moira, have you had a chance to talk to Elorie?
Moira: Not today. She disappeared to the beach this morning, looking for more of her sea glass.
Nell: Hmm.
Sophie: What’s up?
Nell: Well, I spent the morning digging into the fetching spell with my girls. It’s clearly picking up power traces from Elorie, and I can’t find any errors in their coding.
Moira: There must be, Nell. I’m not trying to tell you how to spellcode, but I wouldn’t have missed a witch who practically lives under my own roof.
Nell: Exactly. Which is very puzzling. The girls have rigged up another nice piece of programming that might help. I was hoping I could run the test on the two of you.
Sophie: I’ll be your guinea pig. What kind of test?
Nell: It’s a virtual scan. They took a regular scanning spell—Aunt Jennie’s, in this case—and twinned it with some snazzy programming code. Let me activate the spellcode, and then all you should need to do is hold onto your mouse.
Sophie: Should I be using power?
Nell: No, not necessary, although I’ll have you do that in a minute so I can see how the readings change.
Sophie: It’s not easy typing with one hand. Should I be feeling anything?
Nell: I’m done. It shows you have strong earth power, a little water, and an unidentified power source. The girls only have this set up to test for elemental and mind powers right now, so that would be your healing talent.
Sophie: Wow. Think how useful this would have been in the spring with Lauren!
Nell: I’m guessing Jamie’s pretty happy he had to go to Chicago, but yeah. It’s a pretty cool toy.
Moira: Can you really see Sophie’s powers through the Internet, then?
Nell: More or less. It’s not all that different from what the fetching spell does—it’s just giving us more information.
Moira: I don’t want to sound suspicious, but are you sure it isn’t just reading your knowledge of Sophie? That’s always a risk when we scan in person.
Nell: Do you have a spare witch nearby? We can test them without you telling me who it is.
Moira: In fact, there are witchlings eating cookies in my kitchen. Let me go get one.
Sophie: You so have to put this in Realm.
Nell: Jamie’s already on it, with three very willing assistants.
Moira: All right, I have a volunteer. He just needs to hold this wee mousie, then?
Nell: That’s all. Give me just a minute… Okay. The scan is picking up fire, water, and air power, with a little mind power as well.
Moira took the mouse back from Kevin and switched to video chat. She was getting pretty comfortable with all this modern gadgetry for an old witch, but some things were much easier done face-to-face. Nell and Sophie’s faces