Mistaya nodded once more, eager now, excited by the implicit promise of the other’s words.
“Good. Here, then.” Nightshade bent down and plucked a wildflower with its buds still unopened. She held it up before Mistaya. Then she lifted one finger and caressed a tiny bud. The bud shuddered and blossomed into a crimson flower. “See? Magic brought it to life. Now you try.”
She handed the stalk with its multiple buds and single open flower to Mistaya, who took it tentatively and held it before her as if it were made of glass.
“Concentrate on one bud,” the Witch of the Deep Fell said. “Concentrate on how it will look as it opens into a flower. Bring the feeling of its coming to life deep within your body, deep down where there is only darkness and the pictures we form in our imaginations. Concentrate on the flower you would make and then reach up slowly and touch the bud.”
Mistaya did as she was told, focusing every ounce of energy on a mental picture of the bud opening into a flower. She reached up and touched the bud gently, hesitantly.
The bud opened halfway and stopped.
“Very good, Mistaya,” Nightshade offered, taking the stalk from her hand and casting it aside. “Was that so hard?”
Mistaya shook her head quickly. Her mouth was dry, and her heart was pounding. She had actually performed magic. She had felt the bud respond to her touch, had watched it shudder slightly, just as it had for Nightshade. But there had been more. There had been a ripple of something smooth and silvery deep down inside her that caressed like a cat and left her warm and anxious for more.
Nightshade’s slender hand brushed her own. Mistaya did not mind the touch. It seemed familiar and therefore comfortable. “Try this,” the witch said.
She reached down and picked up a black and orange striped caterpillar. The caterpillar rolled into a ball in the palm of her hand, then unrolled again after a moment and began to inch its way to safety. The witch reached down and touched the caterpillar, and it was turned instantly to gold.
“Now you change it back again,” she instructed, holding out her open palm with the caterpillar to Mistaya. “Concentrate. Picture in your mind what it is you intend to do. Reach down inside yourself for the feeling of it happening.”
Mistaya wet her lips, then compressed them. She focused as hard as she could on the caterpillar, envisioning it alive, seeing it turn from metal to organic matter. She saw it in her mind, then felt it in her heart. She reached down and touched the caterpillar.
The caterpillar turned orange and black once more and began to crawl away.
“I did it!” she breathed excitedly. “Did you see? I did it! I used magic!”
She forgot everything in that instant: her doubts, her questions, her parents, and her friends. Nightshade brushed the caterpillar away and bent down quickly in front of the girl, her eyes as sharp as cut glass.
“Now you understand, Mistaya. Now you see the truth of what you can do. But that was nothing, that little bit of magic you just performed. That was only the beginning of what you can accomplish. But you must listen to what I tell you. You must study the lessons I give you. You must practice what I show you. You must work very hard. Are you willing to do that?”
Mistaya nodded eagerly, blond hair shimmering with the jungle damp, eyes as bright as a cat’s in a cave. “Yes, I am. But…” She stopped then, catching herself as she remembered anew the circumstances of her being in the Deep Fell. “My father…”
“Your father knows you are here and will come for you if he feels you should not stay,” Nightshade answered smoothly, quickly. “The question you must answer is whether or not you wish to stay. The choice is really yours now. But before you make that choice, there is something else you must know. Remember I told you there was another reason for your being here with me, for being told of your potential, for exploring your magic?”