Free The Doctor Witch (The Ward Witches) by Lauren McMinn Page B

think it’ll work,” Timothy said, and Skylar nodded. The other four, including an older man named Josiah, walked out, patting Skylar and Timothy on the shoulders.
    “ Good. I’ll leave you two to it. Best of luck.”
    “ So Skylar, I’ll go first. I’m a fire witch. My mother was a witch, and my father was not, but they resonated with each other and loved each other very much. They were both pleased when I shared my father’s fire magic. After I finished high school, I got a degree in criminology. That landed me the position as second to Justin in Coven Security.”
    “ Do you like it?”
    “ I do. A lot. But when Justin asked me if I wanted to take my first student, I figured I had to at least try. That’s why I’m here.”
    “ Are you excited about having a student?”
    “ I’m not sure yet.” He grinned.
    “ At least you’re honest.”
    “ What is your experience with magic, Skylar?”
    “ Very limited, unfortunately. My father was a witch, and after he died, my mother showed that she really hated witchcraft. She forbade me from ever practicing my magic. As a child who both wanted to please her mother and to stay out of serious trouble, I obeyed. It was hard, knowing that there was this power in me that wanted to get out. But then I learned some meditation skills to keep it all suppressed until I couldn’t use it even if I wanted to.”
    “ Then our first priority is to fix that barrier. I understand that Justin did some meditation with you yesterday to work on loosening it.”
    “ Yes.”
    “ If you’ll let me, I want to try something that would probably do it faster, but it’s more invasive, and quite possibly painful. Basically, since we’re both fire witches, and we’ve got the student-teacher bond starting to form, I want to burn away the wall around your core. See yesterday, Justin had you quietly coaxing it away. It’ll take a long time to do it that way, and as I understand it, we only have a little less than six months. In that time, we need to learn control and some skills. I’ll leave it up to you which method you want to do.”
    “ Let’s light it up. I want to know what I can do, and I’d rather have it now, even if it’s painful to get to, than waiting a long time to shed its protective wall.”
    “ I knew I liked you,” he laughed. “Sit on the floor here and begin your meditation.”
    She crossed her legs on the floor and the room fell away. She felt rather than heard Timothy’s voice telling her to breathe in and out. Then his finger of magic went questing back into her chest to find that core while he pressed his hand to her chest to guide it.
    Breathe in, breathe out.
    There was more exploratory poking around until they both had an idea of what kind of preventative measure she had built through her meditations. Then the fingers of magic became a kind of hand that gripped her core and burned as it squeezed. As if it were a wall of bricks, her barrier exploded in shards all over her chest, and she felt it go.
    Screaming, she fainted.
     
    When she woke up, Timothy was reading a book.
    “ Welcome back, Skylar.”
    She was woozy, and had a hard time sitting up, so Timothy helped her.
    “ What happened?”
    “ A huge success.”
    “ Then why does it hurt so badly?”
    “ We destroyed that barrier in an explosive manner. Your body wasn’t quite ready for it, and no one’s would have been, which sent you to the ground.”
    “ How long have I been out?”
    “ About three hours, which, plus the time in the spell adds up to it being four in the afternoon now. Impressive, by the way, you stood up to quite a bit of magical trauma, if you will.”
    “ I feel...” she looked around the room, noticing that something was off. “What happened to the room?”
    “ Your magic was so suppressed that it was affecting how you saw the world. Ideally, you’ll see the world better.”
    “ I feel more alive, certainly, which is weird.”
    “ Again, you’ve been crippling