"She protected her soul?"
"...She tried. Sadia thought that by having her daughter be born later, after her own passing, she could protect her soul from the curse... but the curse found her anyway."
Now that solves one mystery... Also, I don't know how I should feel about witches actually playing around with unborn children's souls, but I guess I'm not one to speak, with my own history. I take a deep breath.
"But it didn't work out, anyway. You stayed alive all these years, Moon Goddess knows how long, just to see your friend's daughter be taken by that curse again. I understand you hate that curse, maybe more than anybody. Wouldn't it be time to stand up and fight now, though? Aren't you tired of being on the damn sidelines?"
"Says the child who came to steal my magic to give it to a wolf..." she hisses, her eyes going down to Nora.
"Borrow," I correct her. "Plus, if you're as old as you pretend, I'm sure you've got plenty to spare. And... and it's raining, for Moon Goddess' sake!"
She can't tell me she is going to run out of Water Magic anytime soon, we're literally almost swimming in a giant mud puddle! I step forward, deciding to end this quickly.
"Naptera, please. I don't care who you do it for, but this curse has to be stopped. You know Sadia wanted to protect her child, how much she sacrificed for it. If she was your friend, why would you stand back when you have a chance to help defeat what she tried to fight?!"
She glares at me, but this time, I see doubt in her eyes.
"...Do you even know what you're risking?" she asks.
I take a deep breath, and look inside to wake my Water Magic, taming my fire at the same time. It gently flows in like a river, and I feel my left eye changing, most likely turning back to that gentle blue again. Naptera looks stunned by my eye, and finally uncrosses her arms. After a while, she sighs.
"...And here I thought you didn't look like her. Freaking Jones... Fine, I'll help you. But if you fail to take down that curse–"
"I won't," I retort, showing how determined I am.
Naptera gives me one more doubtful look for the sake of it, but her eyes then go to Nora, checking the white wolf out. I'd rather act before she changes her mind. I take a deep breath and once again, activate the spell. Unlike Ayesha, Naptera is probably charged with Water Magic, so this will be a bit trickier for me...
“Ready, Nora?”
“Anytime.”
I nod, and after a deep breath, begin the process. Once I reach out for Naptera's magic, I see the difference between a witch who has had several decades of experience and myself. Compared to her Water Magic, mine feels like a furious uncontrolled stream. The flow I touch is like a gentle river, spreading throughout her body like a perfectly controlled tide, so perfectly imbued in her it's as if I was looking at her veins rather than at a magic network. I am impressed, but I am also wondering if I can ever dream of achieving such perfect control over my magic...
I don't have time to gather more inspiration from Naptera's mastery, though. I slowly start pulling the strings of that water stream, trapping more and more of it in my spell, as much as I can entrust Nora with. I feel some resistance, but it's like undoing the knots in a complex network of water strings, and as soon as I manage to pull one little stream after another, more naturally follows. I try to save as much as I can since I don't want to completely deplete Naptera or give Nora more than she'd be able to handle. Soon enough, I reverse the spell, and slowly transfer all of the Water Magic I could gather into Nora's body. To my surprise, her body seems even more easily accepted as a new host by the Water Magic than Ayesha's fire in Selena's. Is it because she has more Royal blood? I am not sure, but her white aura is definitely quickly figuring out how to handle all of it, and the magic starts to resonate with her in a new way.
When I open up my eyes, Nora's body has changed again. Amongst the white fur, I now see very faint, tiny, white sparkles, like... like snow. Nora's white aura seems to have grown even more icy and stronger, as if her body was surrounded by a cloud of blizzard. The air around her really is colder, and I step back after a shiver.
“That's... interesting,” she says, shaking down her body.
"...Ancient blood wakes ancient magic," says Naptera, looking down at the now truly snow white wolf. "Your kind may carry some of the witches' forgotten powers..."
"You mean... there might be more than the three elements of water, earth, and fire?"
"There are only three core elements," she says, "but who said they couldn't be used in different ways, to do... more? You did it before, didn’t you?"
Now that she mentions it... I used lightning and even fog. This was only possible because I could combine both fire and water. Until now, I thought that witches were restricted to the use of only one element, but... in the illusion, weren't the two Lunas using all three of them? They were so much more powerful. Is it still possible we could one day achieve the same thing again? Even if it was centuries ago, as Naptera said, perhaps not all of those powers have been lost, just... locked.
Naptera lets out a long sigh, her eyes going beyond me to where Nora is.
"Perhaps you were right... Perhaps the new generation has more to teach us about ourselves than we thought. Even the ones we thought to be... broken."
Whoa, she's almost sounding nice now. At least she's let go of the whole "Cursed One" thing... I nod, and suddenly, my eyes land on my finger. The butterfly tattoo, it's still there. Now that I focus on it, I feel some sort of energy, but it's very tame, I'm not too sure what's hidden there.... Maybe it would be good to remember it for later, for the final assault. I feel like it’s going to take everything we've got to defeat the curse for real this time. I take a deep breath, and look down at the newly powered wolves by my side. Both Lunas are absolutely... impressive. Selena looks like a lightning bolt, shining so bright it's hard to look for too long, while Nora is winter personified. I smile, and look inside for my own magic. I feel my inner fire, shining in all its full glory again, making my blood boil and ready. There's my Water Magic too, gently flowing like a slow stream inside. I think "touching" Naptera's has made me more conscious of my own, and I quite like the idea of gaining knowledge through other witches' magic...
Naptera slowly steps back, and I turn around, facing the two Lunas and the Black Brothers.
“Ready, ladies?”
“Ready when you are, Mara.”
