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move past the harm she’d caused that day.
    That day seemed a million years ago, although in truth it had taken place in July, a mere four months ago. And a month before that, I had been an entirely different person. It seemed that an enormous gulf stood between the girl I’d been and the person I now knew myself to be. I felt proud of the woman I had become, or was at least in the process of becoming. Still, a part of me missed the girl I had been. Sure, I had led a privileged and sheltered life, and maybe I was a lot less mature than I ought to have been. But there had been something magical about that girl, her innocence and open heart, even if I had failed to see it at the time.
    The thought of all that had occurred since the solstice morning I stumbled onto Ginny’s corpse nearly made my head spin. I could barely wrap my mind around it. How could it have only been this last summer that I doubted my feelings for Peter and believed myself to be in love with Jackson? That this counterfeit emotion could have seemed real enough to me to send me out to Jilo’s crossroads to seek a conjure to turn my heart away from Jackson and back to Peter? Now I knew it had all been part of an elaborate lie, and the love I felt was not for Jackson, but for the magic that had been denied me. Maisie had fed Wren on my magic, helping him to grow and evolve until he could take on a new guise, that of Jackson. I had sensed my connection to this misappropriated magic and interpreted it as love for the man.
    Even though the line had helped me bring Maisie home, she had not returned in good shape. Physically she was fine, but still she had spent several days in a coma following her return. Abigail had advised caution, since we had no idea what state of mind she would be in upon waking. So in much the same way that Ginny had diverted my power away from me, we—my aunts, my uncle, Abby, and myself—siphoned away Maisie’s magic until we could determine the lay of the land.
    Even after Maisie awoke, she remained still and unspeaking. Abby spent a few more days alone with her, commencing a course of treatment that we all hoped would provide a lasting cure. Abby started by leading Maisie in guided mediations, then moved on to good old talking once Maisie found her voice. It was only in the last few days that Abby felt comfortable allowing Maisie to reconnect to her powers, so we unkinked the hose a tiny bit, allowing Maisie’s magic to begin to return to her in a slow and controlled flow.
    None of us even knew how much of her own power Maisie actually had. Even before the two of us were born, Ginny had begun stealing magic from me and feeding it to my sister. My gut told me that my great-aunt’s goal hadn’t been to strengthen Maisie, but rather to weaken me; Ginny only intended to use Maisie to prime the pump, until she could manage to pull away my magic. Her goal was to feed it into the neighboring plane and ground it there.
    There was evidence that Ginny realized the process didn’t work entirely as planned, that even though the bulk of my power did pass harmlessly through Maisie and into the realm where Ginny grounded it, a good portion of it fed directly into Maisie. The rest of us had believed Maisie had been born a magical wunderkind with a dud for a sister. The truth was the energy was overwhelming her, destroying her from the inside. Ginny evidently realized she couldn’t undo the attachment to Maisie without breaking the flow and returning my power to me. Whatever Ginny believed about me, she believed it strongly enough to risk destroying my sister.
    Perhaps it was poetic justice that Wren killed Ginny. Ginny stole from me and damaged Maisie. Regardless of the source of Maisie’s problems, she used the stolen magic to feed the monster that killed Ginny. God help me, I hated the old woman. Perhaps even more than Emily. I couldn’t help but wonder if Ginny’s evil had somehow infected my mother as well. Still, I had no idea why my