Electric Blue by Jamieson Wolf

Watchers, I mean her Guide. Who was assigned to her at birth to make sure her magic flowed properly?"
    "Alicia was. She's her partner."
    "She doesn't seem to have filled her in."
    "I've told her not to, yet."
    "Why not?" Cecelia screamed. "We have a month and she doesn't even know what she is yet! How could you be so stupid?"
    "We felt that the situation, delicate as it is—"
    "Bull. You know what she is. You know what she will become. If Poppy changes without knowing what she is or how to handle it, it could kill her. And then you will have your death on her hands," she scoffed. "Your grandmother ran the Coven better than you ever did."
    "But we've placed her in the Coven House to keep her safe—"
    "Oh, great! Put her in a house full of ghosts and dead spirits. If her change doesn't kill her, the house will," Cecelia said.
    "The house trusts her, it's comfortable with her."
    "You know what happened at that house!" Cecelia spat. "How could you let Poppy live there! There is magic in her mother as well."
    "Who? Lucy? No, I think you're mistaken."
    Cecelia smiled. "I am never mistaken. Mark my words. If you don't tell Poppy what she is soon, she will die." She put down her beer and stood up, going to the door. "Don't trouble yourself. I'll show myself out." She smiled. "Have a nice day," she said.
     

 
    Chapter Sixteen
    Alone in the Attic
     
     
    Poppy glanced at the canvas in front of her. It had remained blank for most of the morning. Her mind was on other things. There was something at the back of her head that told her she had dreamed, but she couldn't remember any of it. Every time she tried to close her fingers around the pictures in her head, they floated out of view. She had not told Alicia what the de Bruyns had said; had kept it to herself. She was keeping her own secrets now. It was odd, she thought, how much of our society was based around secrets. She knew that Alicia was keeping something from her, that things weren't being said. She knew it had to do with her use of magic. She could feel changes in her, they were happening inside her. She wished she could find out who her Guide was, that Cecelia and Naomi had talked about. If only she had someone to make sense of the changes going on around her, her world would make a whole lot of sense.
    But why would she need a Guide? What was special enough to warrant something like a Guide to watch over her? There were too many secrets and not enough answers. She would talk to Alicia tonight. She had had enough with secrets, had had her fill of them. She hated to think that Alicia would be keeping things from her, but stuff wasn't adding up. Cecelia and Naomi seemed to know what was going on but were staying Mom on the subject. She had tried talking to Cecelia this morning but had gotten nowhere. "Your Guide must talk to you, dear," she had said. "It is the way things are done."
    Poppy hated that answer. It infuriated her. She had long been doing things her own way and wished that others would do the same. She was about to put her brush into some soft blue paint when she heard a noise. It came from the other side of the attic. She was seated in front of one of two attic windows. The room was a bare space with rafters running along the ceiling. Poppy had brought up a fan; otherwise she'd be roasting in her paints. The attic was filled with furniture and nick nacks that decorated the corners, but Alicia had cleared out a large space in the middle of the room by the window and decorated it with a large, plush blue carpet, and a Japanese screen with a picture of flamingos on it, stretching their legs. Poppy thought that the items complemented the room. There was a certain old world charm up in the attic, surrounded by tons of old boxes, suit cases and stuff from their past. There were tons of boxes already in the attic when they moved in; they had yet to go through them.
    Poppy felt that surrounding was important to inspiration. She had to be comfortable in her space