Ordinarily she would have been surprised and delighted to be summoned to her mother’s rooms, but this time she knew why her mother wanted her, and it wasn’t to thank Annie for finding the witch. Annie almost never entered her mother’s rooms. It wasn’t by choice, however. In accepting the fairy Moon-beam’s gift, the king and queen had unwittingly accepted a second “gift” on Annie’s behalf. The same spell that prevented magic from touching her worked as a damper on other people’s magic. Should anyone be close to Annie for any length of time, whatever magic gifts they had been given began to fade, whether it was beauty, charm, or something as simple as the ability to unravel even the most difficult knots. Gwendolyn hadn’t been the only member of the family to be given magical gifts at a christening. Both the king and queen had as many magical attributes as their elder daughter. On the rare occasion that Annie entered the chamber of one of her family members, she was expected to sit in the back as far from them as she could without climbing out the window.
