Pitch melded into the shadows as he watched the woman. Alexa had sent him to find out who Nik's grandmother was and if her help was something they wanted to accept. She seemed innocent enough but then again they all did. Nothing of any interest had happened at all and he was tempted to nap or head back to tell Alexa that he had nothing exciting to report. He yawned to himself and stretched out in the sun, he had managed to reduce his size to something acceptable for a large tom cat so he didn't stick out. The old lady had a nice window ledge he could sit outside and watch from. At least Nik had made it easy enough to follow his scent around town. You didn't need to be a bloodhound to use a phonebook for the address and sniff around to recognized his scent. The old lady had putted around the house watering her flowers and making a batch of cookies. They did smell amazing and he watched her curiously. He'd been here for hours and was starving. He was lazing with his eyes closed just listening to the lady's movements when she suddenly stopped right in front of the window. His eyes shot open quickly to find her staring at him.
"You don't think I'd recognize a familiar when I see one?" she asked, giving him a serious stink eye. He slowly stood up and back away. She snorted at his move.
"Obviously you're here watching me for someone. Nik told me about the new girl wanting to join the guild and that she had a familiar even if he may have exaggerated your size a bit." she said. Pitch stopped and watched her closely. She didn't seem too upset that he'd been sitting creepily on her windowsill most of the day. She pushed open the screen.
"Well get in here, I'm not going to hurt you, waste of time really. I'm sure there are plenty of others out there after you and your master though." Pitch tiptoed over the ledge and sat down inside. The lady reached over and scratched behind his ear. He decided then that she couldn't be evil. She offered him a cookie and he gratefully accepted.
"I'm assuming you're here because this girl wasn't sure how trustworthy the advice I sent with Nik was." she said walking across the kitchen to what looked like a wall of cookbooks. she pulled one out and showed him the false cover. It was actually an old spell book on summoning and rituals. She flipped through a few pages and showed Pitch the same list of ingredients and spell Nik had brought to them.
"This is the summoning my family has been using for generations. Same spell components and incantation. There have been a few minor tweaks as you can see in the side notes but the components are essentially the same."
Pitch pawed to the previous page and saw a few other details he already knew, then to the page after, which laid out the binding contract. The old lady scratched behind his ear again. He could feel a little magic from her but nothing compared to Alexa's or Patrick's. She marveled at him a little more.
"Alexa must have magic as strong or stronger than Alistar's was. Is it true she ended him? The world is a better place if he is gone but he is not an easy person to snuff out." she sad quietly. Pitch picked the spell book up in his mouth and looked to her as if to ask if he could take it. The elderly lady nodded and he vanished in a cloud of shadows.
Alexa jumped as Pitch appeared at her side. He didn't usually sneak up on her like that anymore. He stood up and dropped the book into his human hands.
"She seemed to be innocent enough. Definitely wary of Alistar but she isn't a very strong magi herself. This is the spell book they've been using for generations." He said as he passed the book to Alexa. It seemed that spell books were not a common thing to have a lot of. Alexa flipped through it to the page of ingredients and seemed satisfied. Pitch glanced around, Patrick and Kaleth were no where to be seen. They'd left her all alone. Alexa smirked as she seemed to read his mind.
