Page 8 of Magic Touch
"This is very fine." I take my hand away and face her. "Do your parents live nearby?"
"My father died many years ago in an accident at the mill. My mother, just last year, from illness." While her voice is steady, sorrow lurks in those extraordinary eyes.
I want to go to her and ease her pain in some way, but it isn't my place. "I'm very sorry. I lost my father several years ago, and I miss him every day. My mother has never been the same. She resides at my country house. It's not far, but distant enough that she is away from the society she no longer enjoys."
She crosses to the chair and sits. "I suppose losing our parents is inevitable. It doesn't make it easier, but we do expect it at some point."
I sit across from her on the sofa. "I suppose so. You were very close with your mother?"
Esme glances at the box and nods. "Yes. We often disagreed, but she was the person I needed most in this world. Now I must fend for myself." She looks at my glowing hands and lets out a long sigh. "I have made a mess of this."
With every reason to be angry and agree with her, all I can do is shake my head. "You will find a way to fix this. We don't even know what caused the phenomenon. If I am willing to be patient and sort it out, you should be kinder to yourself, Esme."
"Must you be so nice?" Her lips pull up in the first smile I've seen from her tonight. It warms my heart.
"Perhaps I can be foul tempered later, or tomorrow, to make you feel better," I tease.
"You would have every right." With a sigh, she takes my hands in hers. "Let's see if we can control this."
Just that simple touch shoots through me as if she is lightning, and I’m the tallest tree in a vast field.
The green of her eyes deepens, and she stares. "Did you feel that?"
"I feel it every time you put your hands on me, and even sometimes when you look at me." I'm being far too honest, but I can't seem to help myself. There is something about us together that is alluring and almost irresistible.
Keeping my hands in hers, she nods. "I thought it might just be me."
The blue glow around my hands deepens, and I clear my throat. "What must I do to control this?"
She draws a long breath and closes her eyes, only opening them after she releases the air. "Do you feel the magic, or is it just the glow?"
It is the strangest thing. Even earlier, I wasn't afraid, only shocked. Then anger filled me. Once it faded, I wondered about the science of such a thing, if there was any. "It feels as if something new, yet familiar, is coursing through my veins."
Squeezing my hands, she smiles. "Good. That's good. Now concentrate on that and put it into a small space outside your body."
"What do you mean?"
"Picture a bubble in the space between our hands and send the magic to the bubble." She pulls her hands from mine. "Like this." Above her right hand floats a pale blue orb. It bounces and pulses with light and energy.
"What is it?" I ask.
Opening her eyes, she bobbles the ball up and down before it erupts and flows over her chest like water and absorbs into her. "It's my magic. Or at least, a manifestation of my magic."
All my life, I have only believed in what I can see and touch. My father frowned upon any fantasies that might take me away from my studies. He'd said not to be mired in imagination. It was the road to Hell. Nothing about Esme is evil. Of that, I'm certain. Goodness flows around her like a warm blanket. "What can you do with it?"
"A great many things, but I'm a healer, and my magic is in kind with that vocation."
With anything good comes bad as well. I learned that in war. Though most of what I saw was bad. I don't want to ask, but I must know. "Then, if it can heal, it can also harm." I close my fists, wishing the blue light away, but only succeed in making it stronger. "I've harmed enough in my life, Esme. I'll not allow whatever this is to hurt a living thing. I'll do away with myself before that."
Intensity flashes in her eyes, and she grabs my hands again, pulling my attention back to her. "This magic doesn't control you. You are its master, William. 'Do no harm' is a way of life. If you fail in that, it would be a great disappointment. However, the first step before we learn how to remove what I left in you, is to control it."
My heart pounds a staccato, but I nod and close my eyes. In my mind, I envision the bubble she made, and push the new sensations rolling through me toward a similar ball in my hands.
Calm settles over me for the first time in years. I open my eyes, and there above our joined hands is a ball of blue light, a darker shade than Esme's was.
"That's quite good. Now command the ball smaller and bring it inside yourself." Her voice trembles with excitement or pride. I can't be sure.
I think about a smaller light and the bubble responds. Then I ask that it go away, and it erupts in a sparkling fountain and fills me again. My skin shines like a sun for a moment, then fades to the blue again.
