Alex Hale Book 1 by Spielar

Chapter 3

After 2 weeks I was born, which just so you know the baby screams because of the massive amount of pain it is in. My lungs inflated in my chest causing my ribs and heart to feel pressed on, my skin felt like I was getting stabbed by glass all over. I have experience with that. I essentially felt like I might be dying then and there, but I screamed out in pain and was then roughly washed and put in a blanket as I continued to scream out. After I was swaddled in the blanket and my skin was no longer exposed to the air I could finally calm down a little.

I squinted my eyes open a little to see my mother and father. They looked very plain, at least in my opinion. They were neither good looking nor ugly. They both had things about them that looked good such as my mothers lips and eyes or my fathers strong jawline and smooth and glossy hair.

My mother was sweaty as expected from a woman who had just gave birth and looked beyond exhausted. She and my father kept cooing at me and calling my name, telling me how beautiful I am. Of course I'm beautiful, I'm the fabulous me.

I ended up falling asleep shortly after, you would be surprised how tiring be born is for a baby.

The next few months were spent with me getting used to the new life and body. I would start the day being bottle fed and changed. I would then lay in my crib moving my body as best I could to build up whatever muscle I could. I fell asleep a few minutes later but my time awake was growing more and more.

I can also say that I was rather lucky since my parents were both wizards. My father worked in the ministry as a desk jockey. I know he has an official title, but it boiled down to him just being a paperwork guy. He was however on his way to being the office head since he would occasionally help out his co workers by pointing out any mistakes they had made which saved them from getting chewed out by the higher ups. The woman in charge right now was 80 something years old and was planning to move to Wales to live with her son and grandchildren. She had already all but told my father he would be the next in line for her position which everyone in their office agreed with.

My mother worked at a magical animal store. They apparently had to collect pets for wizards, do house calls for sick animals, and were basically a mix between veterinarians and shop keepers. I was brought into her place of work 5 months after being born and was coddled by all the employees.

Half way through the ordeal I was picked up and carried off by a shadow cougar. My mother almost fainted from the fright, though that was nothing compared to my own. I would like to say I had pooped myself because I was a baby, but honestly being in the literal jaws of a cougar kind of scared the crap out of me.

The cougar took me up to its nest and just looked down at me. I stared it in the eyes figuring if this was how I went out I was at least going to go staring death in the eyes. The cougar leaned down and started licking me which was very ticklish.

I laughed out not being able to stop myself and started to pet the cougar. The dang cougar actually started to purr like a cat and rub up on me.

My mother and the other workers all stared at us in shock, they were even more shocked when the cougar stood up and climbed into my shadow. I was confused for a little bit since I saw the cougar seemingly go head first into the floor, but that only lasted a second when I heard one of the workers tell my mother that the shadow cougar had just bonded itself to me.

It is apparently exceedingly rare for a shadow cougar to bond with another living creature since it means that it is giving its very life to that individual. A shadow cougar will live in the shadow of its bonder until the day they die and will protect that person with their life. A shadow cougar feeds on regular food, but also feeds on the leftover mana emitted from a wizard or other magical creature and are capable of living on nothing but the mana so long as it is dense enough.