Amara held the power of the world between her hands; the strength of raging oceans and the whisper of growing flowers both. With delicate fingers, the young witch condensed the power into a clear glowing orb—a sphere the color of tears that coalesced in her palms. A smile flickered at the corner of her lips and she clasped her hands together, hiding the magic from her watching sisters. Then, lowering her lips to her cupped hands, Amara incanted—drawing old words from old places. Blowing onto her fingertips, she opened them like a petal to the morning sun. And from her hands, flew a butterfly, its wings as blue as a robin’s egg.


     Her sister Fae delighted, reaching out for the butterfly as it fluttered around her golden hair. Her ice-blue eyes followed the creature as it looped and twirled and danced over the summer meadow.


    “Better, Amara,” said Mother, no delight in her voice. Just cool approval as her middle daughter cast.

    Fae, youngest, all spring air and happiness, nodded with mock seriousness before side-eyeing her sister.


    “You have set a tough challenge, I will have to work hard to beat that!” said Fae, though the smile on her face conveyed that she already had something magical in mind.


    “Wait,” Amara said, middle sister, serious, dark and brooding. She raised an eyebrow. “I am yet to finish.”
Amara lifted an elegant hand, the long sleeve of her ebony dress falling past her elbow to trail the soft grass below. The butterfly flew to her like a jaunty, happy tune, and alighted upon her fingers. At her touch it multiplied, two, three, six, a dozen butterflies of every color flourished around her, creating a gentle breeze of fluttering wings. By the time Amara turned to her mother to check her assessment, thousands of butterflies danced in the quiet midday sun, and her mother’s face exploded into a rare grin.


    “Stupendous, Amara! That’s my girl.” She clapped her hands together like an excited child, and continued, her voice full of wonder. “That’s my clever witch.”


    Amara took a deep bow like a master showman completing his pièce de résistance and stepped aside for her youngest sister Fae to take her place on the stage of meadow grass and bluebells.


    “No,” Mother said, turning to Morganne, eldest sister. “You need to try.”


   Morganne sighed, turning away. “I’ve already tried, as you well know, and nothing happens—ever.”


    “Then try harder,” Mother ordered, commanding Morganne with one angry finger. “Here. Now.”


    Morganne rose with a heavy sigh, tossing a knot of daisies she had been fumbling between her fingers, to the ground.


    “Mother, there is little point. I have in common with my sisters nothing but the same birthdate. We may be triplets in blood, but not in magic. I don’t know why you keep putting me through such torture.”


    “I do it for you to learn. Now, try.”


    Morganne stared at her hands, her pale, pale hands adorned with freckles and hopelessness.


   Breathe, she thought to herself, trying to center her focus. She closed her emerald eyes and imagined the power of nature coursing through her blood to her fingertips.
Yet she felt no change.

    
She willed magic to her palms, please, she begged in the quiet of her mind, but not an ounce of power rose from her blood to the surface of her skin. She stopped trying, but kept her eyes closed, not wanting to see the look of disappointment on her kin’s faces.


    “That’s enough,” Mother said, her voice laced with displeasure.


    Morganne gulped, opening her eyes but diverting them from stares she could feel penetrating into her worthless, non-magical soul.
 When she did glance up, Mother shook her head. Fae attempted a weak smile of condolence, and Amara turned away, embarrassed.

    
“As you were, Fae,” Mother said, her voice stern with vexation. “Morganne, sit down and pay attention instead of fiddling with daisy chains or staring off into nothingness.” Mother’s attention turned back to Fae, opening her hands to welcome her youngest daughter to begin.


    Fae, abashed by her eldest sister’s reprimand, concentrated while the gentle river babbled alongside her; summer birds and busy wrens fluttered overhead, chasing Amara’s butterflies away. But Morganne, eldest sister, once the voice of reason, did not stay to see what her other clever little sister could do. She did not stay to observe what her witch heart sister cast with magic and beauty and that old, old power. Instead, she rose from her cross-legged position, tied her unkempt, flowing red locks into a scruffy knot at the base of her neck, and walked barefoot toward home.


    “Morganne!” Her mother called. Demanded. “Stay here. You may learn something from your younger siblings. Fae has such delicate accuracy with her casting, not as flamboyant as Amara perhaps, but her technique is faultless.”


    Morganne bit the words flaming in the back of her throat like wildfire and burning dreams. Morganne was powerless, and as her mother focused back to Fae, with an illusion surrounding her youngest sister of snowy mountain peaks and white skipping foxes shimmering under the midday sun, she realized she was not only powerless but pathetic too.


    Nobody tried stopping her as she meandered home alone. Nobody even noticed she had gone.