SHE UNDERSTOOD HER SISTER HADN’T THE MEANS TO DECIPHER WHETHER LIFE COURSED THROUGH HER VEINS OR IF SHE,        too,        were burned at the stake for witchcraft.        ❛    danger? no. i merely thought you were dead.    ❜        it reigned half a jest from her lips.        when gwen were revenge wrought and prepared to crucify those responsible,        she had indeed believed sylvia to be nothing but ash among the many.        ❛    which brings me to think i should be the one asking you how you’re here.    ❜       how,        oh,        how was it possible?        as far as any of their family bore concern,        not a single one of them had gone back in search of her for fear of further exposure.        cowards,        she’d called them.        as sylvia continued though,        the list of questions she harvested over the time they spent apart were placed on hold.        gwendolyn figured she ought to start with,        ❛    who the hell is catherine? what kids?    ❜        just how much did she miss?        just three hundred years…

VERY FEW TIMES IN HER LIFETIME HAD SHE LISTENED WHEN TOLD SHE COULD NOT ENACT UPON SOMETHING---        the word no strayed rather far from her vocabulary,        especially when it came to her wife and children.        ❛    you cannot be serious, sylvia…    ❜        oh,        but she knew with absolute certainty by the way sylvia’s timbre fell to solemnity,        her expression grave to the bone,        that she hadn’t any intention of affording catherine allowance to offer succor.

the passage of time existed simultaneously in a wave of slow motion and as something catherine wished she could hold onto for even just a moments longer.        their daughter had expelled her last breath and her wife very well could be nearing hers.        the grip she procured onto sylvia were incomparable to the way she held her in any past time,        fingertips white as she clung to her.        if this was the last time their lips met—        she halted her train of thought in its tracks.        it’d never come to a choice between adanine or sylvia for catherine would summon    every last bit of strength    from within every witch roaming the society in order to assure both their hearts continued to beat.

❛    you can do this. i believe in you.    ❜        after all,        sylvia stood her equal.        there wasn’t another soul on the planet who she held on a higher pedestal.        she stepped back,        giving her room to perform as needed.        all that was left to do was hope.

THE TRACKER HAD LED HER WELL.        the amount of hours in a day that this very moment went through her mind were insurmountable.        to foretell whether or not it would ever see the light of day happened to be far outside of any ability gwendolyn possessed.        should her powers still flourished within her vessel,        dark magic would have enlisted its doings,        but she hadn’t wielded the art for as long as it had been since she last laid eyes upon sylvia.        now though,        now all that stood between the sisters were about five measly steps and about three hundred years worth of lost time.        ❛    sylvia. you’re alive…    ❜        it weren’t a question.        see,        sylvia and herself were once thick as thieves.        perhaps there had been a point where gwen caught herself wondering if it were merely a sick,        desperate need that existed to believe that her younger half still walked this earth,        however,        staring at her now    she felt grateful to have hung onto the presumption nonetheless.        her own eyes became home to tears.        the first to wet the space in centuries.        she crossed the short distance for a long overdue embrace.        ❛    why else would i be here? for you…    ❜

❛    gwen?    ❜    it   was  a  name   she  never  thought  she’d  utter  again.   they  hadn’t  seen  each  other  in over  three  hundred  years.    truth  be  told,  there  was  a  massive  hole  in  her  heart.   how  had  she  found  her  way  here,  to  the  occult  society?       ❛    i   ....   what  the  hell  are  you  doing  here?   ❜    tears  had  already  begun  to  well  up  in  her  eyes.   she  had  missed  her.    but  there  was  so  much  she  didn’t  know.  sylvia  was  a  different  person   now.