Hawthorn Academy: Year One

by D. R. Perry

  For some people, only crisis could create enough vulnerability to bond with a magical creature. I should know since it happened that way for me. Why not Logan? But I had to hope this kitty was more than she seemed to be because if not, Logan's need to appease his family might lead to rejection. In this state, that could kill her.

  The moment we got inside, Bubbe came out from behind the counter. She took charge immediately, rushing the cat back into a room—the one right across from the blue dragonet's, in fact. Logan glanced over his shoulder, directly at the half-open door where the blue-scaled beauty strutted.

  He turned his back on the dragonet without hesitation, following Bubbe and the cat into the empty treatment room. His shoulders were square, his jaw set, but both trembled.

  We all watched, silent and barely breathing as my grandmother worked. She managed to revive the cat, or at least her paws stirred, and she opened her eyes.

  "Peep?" Ember perched on top of the lamp in the corner, casting a winged shadow. She blinked, tilting her head one way and then the other, but she didn't keen again. Considering that dragonets only do that while mourning death, that was a good sign.

  "Cadence, fetch me some water, please."

  "I'll do it, Bubbe."

  "No. You shouldn't touch any of the things we'll use for her at this point. She can't handle any more fire energy in this state, Bissel."

  "I'm water." Logan stepped forward. "I mean, I'm a magus, and it's my element."

  "Well then, no need to fetch a basin." Bubbe gave him a faint smile. "Please conjure an orb for me. They've taught you that much at Hawthorn by now, yes?"

  "Yes, ma'am." He held his hands at his middle, one over the other like in Gym for Bishop's Row. The space between his hands filled rapidly, and without needing to be told, he walked up to the table like he'd been doing this all his life.

  "Now drop it all right on her."

  "What?"

  "Won't she drown?"

  "Who does that to a cat?"

  All those questions came from us, not Logan. He followed orders, drenching the poor critter on the table.

  The next thing I knew, Ember swooped in arcs overhead, singing happily. The cat sat up, her fur clinging to her sides. It was still matted and bedraggled, but her eyes were brighter. The warm, soothing sound of her purr filled the room. She curled up in a cozy ball, gazing up at the boy who’d saved her until he glanced down and their eyes met.

  Logan's entire face lit up. I'd seen that exactly once before, when Noah bonded with Lotan, and that moment had been fleeting. This one was sustained, so grounds for doubt remained, but mostly I recognized the truth because I’d had the feeling behind his expression myself.

  The day I met Ember.

  Logan's familiar troubles were far from over because of his parents, but at least he could stay on the Familiars track at Hawthorn. I watched him approach the table to stroke the cat's flank. When he pulled his hand up, a matted clump of fur came with it. He blinked for a moment, then grinned.

  "A mercat." Logan shook the shed fur off his hand, tossing it in the trash. "I can't believe it."

  "Yes, and it's a miracle you found her in time. I've never seen one this dehydrated in all my years as an extraveterinarian." Bubbe handed him a brush with rounded bristles.

  "Well, she doesn't have to worry about that anymore." He went to work, pulling the bristles gently along her sides. She turned so he could reach more of the matts.

  He brushed them out, and not the same way as with a regular cat, either. Mercats only got like this if they spent too much time without a bath. Like Cadence, they could walk on land, but in saltwater, they had fins and a tail from the midsection down. Unlike merfolk, who could go years without setting foot in the ocean, the cats needed a good drenching every few days. She must have been out on the street for a week with no rain. Bubbe was right—we did find her just in time.

  It wasn't a miracle, though. Finding the cat at the same time Logan came out of the school smacked of coincidence. That was just fate for extrahumans.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  We all sat in Bubbe's kitchen, chatting as the mercat rested in the other room. Bubbe set out a basin of salted water for her to climb into as needed, but the best thing to help her recover was rest.

  "What's her name, Logan?"

  "Uh, I'm not sure."

  "Oh?" Bubbe raised an eyebrow.

  "Yeah. It's not like I bonded with her or anything." He sat up straighter as though remembering something. "I almost forgot to mention, Doctor Morgenstern. I came to find my—"

  Just then, Bubbe tapped her earring. I knew what that meant.

  "Someone's in the lobby. Hang on a moment." She rose and headed out.

  We all heard the murmur of voices out there. And of course, everyone recognized the new one. Dylan arrived early. He followed Bubbe in and leaned against the wall because we’d run out of chairs.

  "They let me out of work because I got deliveries done so fast." He grinned at Cadence and Izzy. "Good to see you two ladies again."

  Everybody said hello, the girls getting up to give Dylan hugs. Of course, I’d just seen him the day before, so I didn't bother. Logan didn't either, but he did stand up to share a handshake.

  "You were saying, Logan?"

  "Yeah, I'm here for my dragonet. Well, technically he's my parent's, but they sent him here with me, so he's my responsibility." He pulled his painting from the tube slung over his shoulder. “That’s him.”

  "That’s a handsome little fellow, and yes, he’s here, although I’m not sure he’ll be happy to see you, Logan." Bubbe raised her eyebrow. She’d seen him turn away from the dragonet then, just like I had.

  Dylan's mouth dropped open. He closed it before Logan, Izzy, or Cadence noticed, but I did. Ember too. She fluttered off my shoulder and over to Dylan's, rubbing her head against the side of his head, tousling his hair.

  "What's up with that?" Izzy pointed, blinking at my dragonet's disloyal behavior.

  "I don't know?" I slumped against the back of my chair. "She's never done that before. Bubbe?"

  "Hmmm." My grandmother sighs. "I think it's time you all met our scaly runaway. Come along, everyone."

  She led us down the hall toward the back of the office. The last room on the left was unoccupied and clean. Bubbe asked us to wait there, then left, heading back toward the blue dragonet's room. She returned in moments with the creature in her arms.

  "So, here's the little man of the hour."

  Logan was about to speak, but the dragonet cut him off. Instead of peeping like Ember he had a chirping voice. He clearly had no regard for the magus he’d come to Salem with, either. In fact, he squirmed madly, trying to get out of Bubbe's arms so frantically I was worried he'd scratch her.

  Before anything like that happened, my grandmother let go. She was a good doctor and has developed a way with just about every type of magical creature over years of practice. It might not even be mysterious to her why Logan's parents would try to pair him with a dragonet that wasn’t even representative of his water element. But then again, it was her business to understand magical creatures, not the minds of magi in showbiz.

  The dragonet flew up and down the hall a few times, flitting past the doorway as we watched him. He shimmered in the lights of the hallway, clearly frustrated that this wasn't open sky. Air creatures were like that. Coop them up for too long, and they got downright hyperactive.

  After three laps, he divebombed Dylan.

  Ember leaped off his shoulder, getting out of the way but leaving Dylan off balance. That was why he tumbled to the floor, nearly as tangled with the dragonet as I had been with my own the day she’d found me.

  Moments later, their eyes met. It was just like what happened between the mercat and Logan in the other room, but of course, Dylan had no reservations about this occasion, unlike his roommate. Or at least he was free of them at the moment.

  "His name is Gale."

  "Oh, no." Logan crossed his arms on
the examination table and leaned forward, burying his face in his arms. “My parents—”

  "Sorry, Logan." Dylan looked up from the floor, eyes wide and face slack. "Didn't mean it."

  "Yeah, it just happened." His voice was muffled, hard to hear the tone in it, but I caught the hitch between words—trying not to cry. "I get it."

  Bubbe was like someone watching a ping-pong match. Her eyes moved from the boy by the table to the boy on the floor, her face as still as stone. She grew up at a time where all magic, including bonding with familiars, was totally secret. From her perspective, an unbonded familiar could choose any magus. Maybe she didn't automatically understand what was wrong here, so I decided to explain, but not with everybody just sitting here. This was Logan's business, though clearly, he shared it with Dylan too. But not Izzy and Cadence. He’d just met them.

  "Hey, girls?" I stood up. "I was thinking we ought to go for pizza, but considering everything that just happened here, we need takeout."

  "Sure, we'll pick it up." Izzy grabbed Cadence by the shoulder, shaking her. "I'm short on cash, though."

  "Here you go." I dug in my knapsack, took out my wallet, and got the money Mom and Dad had left for me this morning. I handed that to Izzy. "I think we'll need more than one pie."

  "Yeah, I remember how much Dylan the bottomless pit eats." She chuckled. "Come on, Cadence. You have to help me carry pizzas because I'm not gonna be able to bring that many myself."

  "Thanks, Izzy."

  Having a psychic friend insured that she always got it when you couldn't say what you meant. I missed her so much at school. My friends from town headed out, leaving me alone with Bubbe and the boys. Once I heard the door between the clinic and the waiting room close, I explained.

  "Logan's parents wanted him to bond with a dragonet, and Dylan's parents left it up to him to find a familiar on his own." I sighed. "I know this is super-complicated and not what you're used to dealing with. Honestly, I didn't think it would go this way myself, or at least, I’d hoped it would be better. I'm sorry, you guys."

  "It's not your fault." Logan looked up, his eyes rimmed with red and his face tear-stained. "It's mine."

  "You bet your bottom dollar it's not." Bubbe crossed her arms over her chest, her expression sterner than I'd ever seen it. "This is on your parents. I've never heard of such a thing, trying to force a bond. Who do they think they are?"

  "You haven't heard of the Magical Menagerie? I mean, it's on TV and everything." Logan shook his head. "That's my parents. Or it might as well be, because as far as they're concerned, the show is their life. It's supposed to be mine and my sister's too."

  "Noah never said anything about Elanor going through anything like this."

  "That's because my sister bonded immediately with the firebird they picked for her. The creatures they keep around never want anything to do with me, and they never let me near more understated critters. They say those won't look good on the show. It's all my fault. There must be something wrong with me."

  "I may have just met you today, young man, but that's absolutely incorrect." Bubbe stepped across the room, placing her hand on Logan’s shoulder. "The empathy and concern you showed earlier indicates you’re a good lad with his priorities straight. You saved that mercat just in time."

  "Mercat? Did you seriously rescue one? That's awesome!" Dylan tried to coax Gale out of his shirt. "Come on, dude, get out of there."

  "Yeah, her name is Doris." He scratched his thumb again, mangling the cuticle and the nail this time.

  "So, you did bond with her." I sighed, trying to muster some form of consolation for my friend. It was what Bubbe would do, after all. "Logan—"

  "My parents are gonna kill me for this. Me and Doris will never look right."

  "If they so much as try to harm a hair on your head, Logan Pierce, you come straight to me." Bubbe's color heightened, her eyes bright with righteous anger, her hands aglow.

  I never thought I’d see my grandmother like this—fierce and protective. My whole life, she'd been solid and caring like a rock, and here she was, acting like...well, like me in the cafeteria.

  "Wow." Dylan gazed at her, then at me. Even Gale stopped to stare.

  "Do you really mean that, ma'am?" Logan put his hands flat on the table.

  "I protected other students from your school years ago, and I told your headmaster I'd do it again if it ever came to that."

  I didn't dare ask what she meant by that or bother clarifying that there was a new Hawkins in charge at Hawthorn Academy this year. She’d given my friend a choice, same as she'd do with a critter in need.

  "Thanks, Doctor Morgenstern." Logan straightened up, pulling down the hem of his shirt. "If you don't mind, I'd like to go check on Doris now."

  "Come along, then."

  Bubbe led the way out the door and down the hall. As I followed, my phone beeped. It was Brianna from Walgreens. I showed Bubbe the message and explained. Once I had permission, I invited her over to have pizza with the rest of us.

  As we walked toward Doris' room, Dylan grabbed my hand. I stopped and turned, blinking at him since that was the last thing in the world I would have expected. We stood there staring at each other until Bubbe's and Logan's voices started up again, crooning at Doris and chatting about her care.

  "What's up, Dylan?"

  "I didn't want to say this in front of your grandma or act like my problems are worse than Logan's, because they're not. But—"

  "Look, your problems are valid, and I already said you could talk to me."

  "Okay." He nodded. "Remember when I said they had me tested? For magic ability?"

  "Yeah. You said it was average, right?"

  "Yeah, but well." He pointed at his midsection, where Gale had wrapped himself, clinging to Dylan's belt with his claws. "How?"

  "I mean, he's an air dragonet, and you're an air magus?"

  "That part makes sense, but don't they need to bond before they reach a certain age or something?" He scratched his head. "And aren't I going to have trouble? He's not exactly docile. I'm worried I'm not strong enough to work with him."

  "You were there the day I met Ember." I arched an eyebrow. "Did I control her then?"

  "She got caught in your hair." He smirked. "And no, you didn't."

  "Opposite of docile." I grinned. "And then she got hurt, which sort of forced her to chill out. But I think that would have happened eventually anyway, so maybe give it time?"

  "I don't have much of that. Gotta go back to work. Most of my hours are on the weekends. What if he flies off into a no familiars area and I'm not strong enough to stop him? Or something? I need the work-study, or I'll have to drop out and go home."

  "I can't say I know what it's like, working through school, but you're not alone. You'll meet someone in a little while who's in the same boat. Anyway, as far as training your dragonet, it’s got nothing to do with magic."

  "Really?"

  "It's all about caring, which you're good at. The whole magic power thing is just what gets their attention in the first place, and Bubbe says those early tests aren’t too accurate."

  "So, all I have to do is care?"

  "Help Gale. Play with him, give him affection. Let him pretend to be a wardrobe accessory." I pointed at Ember, who was dozing on my shoulders. "Half the time she thinks she's a scarf. Let him be a belt or whatever."

  "Okay, I'll try it." Dylan let go of my hand, then used it to pat Gale on the head. "We're gonna be friends, okay?"

  "Cheep," said Gale. Or at least, that was the closest approximation to the sound he made.

  "Do you wanna meet a mercat? We can watch her get a bath."

  "Okay."

  We made it down the hall finally, peering over the half-closed door. Logan was in there with Doris on his lap. Bubbe put the collar that used to be around Gale's neck on Doris’, their magic mingling as she helped the pair with that last formality to make their bond official.

  As she straightened, we saw the mercat fall asleep.
Logan stroked her back with the brush. Most of the matted fur had come away, revealing her actual coat. Instead of dull gray, Doris's flanks looked something like a cross between a tabby and a seal. Her markings were silver with shimmering blue stripes that almost looked like scales.

  "Woah, Logan." Dylan whistled. "She's adorable."

  "Yeah, she's awesome. But I'm totally biased, and my parents aren't gonna agree." Logan sighed. "Cute's not enough for them."

  "Hey, but at least we get to stay in the Familiar program at Hawthorn."

  "Good point."

  "Do you want help with Gale's collar, Dylan?" Bubbe asked. "Even if we don't get to that today, I can still write all the familiar license paperwork up before you two go back to campus later."

  "Um, I don't—"

  Bubbe's earring went off again. The aroma of pizza wafted under the door to the back of the office.

  "We'll have to wait for now." She opened the door to let Izzy, Cadence, and Brianna in.

  Cadence chattered at Brianna in a run-on sentence about the new changeling Bishop’s Row team and how she ought to go out for it. Brianna smiled, at ease enough that her glamour totally covered her faerie traits. That was a big difference in demeanor from the stressed-out girl I’d met at Walgreens the night before.

  So, I guessed I had met my good deed quota for the day. I smiled as we all headed back to the kitchen to pig out on pizza. Bubbe made her rounds, leaving us to our social time. Logan was quiet, but my friends from town probably thought that was because he held the sleeping Doris in his lap. Only Dylan and I knew better. Logan Pierce just wasn't a social creature.

  Dylan was another story. He spun a yarn about some interaction he’d had, working in the café. Somehow, he effortlessly made it sound larger than life. He was in his element here, interacting with a group of people his own age. Most anyone would think all his problems were solved.

  The boys went back to campus after finishing their pizza, when Bubbe’s signatures on their familiar licenses were dry. Trouble still loomed on the horizon for those two, but it was distant for now.