The Bright Future (COMPLETED)

Enchantments

She touched the golden rings on her front claws, the bracelet on her right wrist, and the crescent moon earring on her left ear.

All enchanted. Every spell I cast on those, recorded in my scroll. 

She felt the brown leather pouch with her spell scroll thump against her chest. 

Keep flying. You're almost there.

*Two years earlier*

"Enchant these ten rocks to turn into ten gold rings, fit perfectly for my ten front claws," she said, tapping each of the rocks in front of her.

In a flash of light, the rocks did exactly that.

"Oooooooh. Shiny." She slid them onto her claws and made the first note in her scroll.

Enchant these ten rocks to turn into ten gold rings, fit perfectly for my ten front claws, she wrote. "Now. Enchant these rings to have long, thin, and sharp silver knives come out of them whenever the wearer snaps his or her claws three times in a row. Enchant them to go back in whenever the wearer snaps his or her claws three times again." 

She snapped her claws three times. 

Long, thin dagger-like knives jutted out of the ring. 

She smiled with delight and snapped her claws again.

The knives sprang back into the ring.

She wrote down the exact words of the enchantment in her scroll.

She turned to a blade of grass she had prepared. "Enchant this blade of grass to turn into a gold bracelet that will fit perfectly onto my wrist." It did, and she wrote that spell down in her scroll too.

She put a spell on her new bracelet to turn her and whatever she was wearing  invisible whenever she said "hide me" and back when she said "show me" --also recorded in the scroll. 

Then, she turned a rock into a small gold crescent moon earring.(The words for that enchantment were wrote down, too.) The spell on it gave her a little mental jump whenever she was in danger.

The idea of the scroll was to keep track of all of her spells. She would be an orderly animus, a proper one instead of a soul-being-eaten-by-magic-one. 

In fact, she had only cast seven spells in her entire life. (One to test if she was an animus, the rest just now.)

She rolled the scroll into a leather pouch with her name written on it in jagged letters. I can never let anyone find out about my magic. Dragons are terrible, and they might try to use me. If they try to hurt me, then I have my defense. She snapped her claws three times and the sharp claw-knives jutted out of the rings. I can have magic, but be responsible with it. I won't go evil, I won't. If things go the right way, I'll never have to use my magic again.

*Back to the present*

Now, she thought that she actually might need to use her magic again.

But evil... whispered a part of her.

No, no, she thought, trampling down her terror. I won't be evil I won't I WON'T! I have only cast seven spells. If I need to use my magic, it will only be one spell. Maybe two. Right? Right. And... I have to face it. I need to tell Jerboa about my magic.

She didn't believe in soul protection spells. Those didn't work. She knew that from research. She didn't need protection spells, she needed management. A scroll on animus magic had stated: "Magic doesn't turn one evil. Greed does." So as long as she was responsible, it would be fine.

And her thinking had brought her to Jerboa's hut. She circled above it, then landed, tucking her shiny black wings in. Then she took a deep breath and opened the door, walking in.