She, too, like Valentine (as well as Lavinia) was a legacy. And from what Valentine could feel, it was not one or two generations in Franka’s line who had practiced the craft, but centuries of them.
This was superb news. So much so, it made Valentine smile and look to Lavinia, who she knew felt it too, not only because it would be impossible to miss, but also from the answering smile on the witch’s face.
“Would you care to share what you find so pleasing?” Franka drawled.
Both of them turned back to her. “Your power is already substantial.”
“And you can tell that how?” Franka asked.
“Do you not feel it?” Lavinia queried softly, and Valentine knew she squeezed her hand when Franka looked down at their two hands clasped together. “You must feel it,” Lavinia prompted.
The tip of Franka’s tongue came out and touched her lower lip briefly before she turned her gaze to Lavinia and answered, “I feel it. From you,” her gaze went to Valentine, “and much more from you.”
“We feel it too,” Lavinia told her. “From each other…and you.”
“You come from a long line of witches,” Valentine put in, this gaining her Franka’s attention, and her altered expression showing unconcealed surprise. “The last, not a very good one. Sadly, she didn’t share this proud heritage with you so that you both could enjoy the satisfaction of having such, ma sorcière. But as you stand with two of your own with the same noble lineage, we will teach you exactly this.”
“I’ve never been proud of anything to do with my noble lineage,” Franka shared.
“This is because your lineage was superior as self-decreed, not noble, save the magic it offers the Freys and Drakkars it produces,” Valentine explained.
Franka nodded her understanding of this then asked, “Will all future sessions such as this be conducted in the dead of night, thus the worst of any day’s chill, and carry on a good deal of time? If so, I’ll be forewarned for them and dress warmer.”
Valentine had the odd desire to laugh out loud.
Oh, but she liked this witch. She liked her very much.
“She’s impatient,” Lavinia noted with kindred humor.
“I’m cold,” Franka returned but took a breath and went on, her voice lower, her gaze going between them, direct and steady. “And when this is done, I can be done with her.”
She could indeed.
And that should be seen to immediately.
“Then let us delay no longer,” Valentine decreed.
She looked to Lavinia and nodded.
When she did, Lavinia turned her gaze to Franka.
“Magic is nature. Nature is magical,” she began to enlighten their charge. “What you have flowing through you, millennia ago, was drawn from the earth. From the sky. The air, the dirt. From the seas, the winds, the rains, the rays of the sun. Our originators worshipped these things, walked, breathed, sowed, all with reverence. The elements shared their beneficence for this veneration, offering them power, allowing them to manipulate the magicks they celebrated, to internalize them, to utilize them. And more, they strengthened them through sisterhood, rewarding loyalty, building them along magical lines, enhancing power when used amongst other sisters, communing with them.”
“Covens,” Franka whispered.
“Indeed.” Lavinia smiled. “And here,” Valentine felt Lavinia’s hand tighten, knowing her other did the same with Franka’s, “we sisters stand, in nature, in magic, and now, Franka, my sister-witch, my daughter, my mother, my ally, my friend, I bid you to feel the cold. Feel the snow beneath your boots. The sting of ice in the air against your skin. The cool freshness of it in your nose, down your throat, in your lungs. The strength of the adela growing in the nurturing embrace of the earth. The whisper of the gentle wind in your ear. Close your eyes, my friend, and open your senses. Feel the magic all around you. Celebrate it for it is beauty, and the fact that beauty lives inside you.”
Valentine watched Franka close her eyes.
When she did, Valentine did the same.
It was time.
“We are one,” Valentine declared quietly.
“We are one,” Lavinia repeated after her.
Valentine squeezed Franka’s hand as a prompt.
“We are one,” she whispered, taking her cue.
“We are earth,” Valentine stated.
“We are earth,” Lavinia repeated.
“We are earth,” Franka said.
“We are air,” Valentine decreed, her voice rising.
“We are air,” Lavinia echoed, her voice doing the same.
“We are air.” Franka followed suit.
“We are the sea,” Valentine said, now on a low cry, the winds through their words kicking up as that element, too, celebrated the power in that glade. The cold now biting, their heavy cloaks beginning to sway, their hair getting mussed, and after she spoke, her witches followed with the same words.
And with each additional chant, their voices carried into the air louder and louder, the pine rustling, the powder of snow under their feet catching in the wind and drifting up, swirling around them.
“We are wind.”
“We are rain.”
“We are the rays of the sun.”
And on this decree, the three witches started chanting together. Franka drawn into the magic through her sisters, knowing the words by instinct, their voices ringing straight to the heavens, their words carried up on tufts of wind and whirls of snow glittering in the moonlight.
“We are the light of the moon. We are power. We are strength. We are the dark. We are the light. We are magic. We…are…sisters!”