Magicks & Mortals: Volume One

6 - Familiar

*Reyna*

Reyna groaned sitting up in her bed trying to remember where she is and what happened. She can feel her newly acquired powers running through her. She looked at her hand, flexing it a few times. She giggled at the tingling feel of her newly awakened powers.

Her mother always said when she became of age and went through her right of passage it would feel as though she was born again. Everything would feel new and the magic running through her veins would feel like a second skin.

She lifted her hands and gathered her sparkling cosmic energy in her hands and released it around her in a dazzling display of glimmering starlight. She has never been able to create energy like that before.

Her coven's power comes from the universe, the cosmos. It's why some creatures fear them and the VonCaligos wanted to destroy them. They don't understand how witches with the power to create and destroy worlds can be so humble and peace-loving.

Reyna put her hands in her lap and frowned. She can hardly remember any of her ceremony. She knows she completed it, but where is her familiar?

She heard a painful groan and a soft curse float through her mind. Her heart clenched in her chest, it can't be?

*L...Lucian?* She whispered.

*No, no, no!* He roared and she can hear him stumbling and moving around in the room next to her.

He stomped out of his room and burst open her door, his black hair disheveled and poking out around his horns. His black t-shirt was wrinkled and the loose fitting sweatpants were slightly twisted and hanging off his hips.

She'd laugh at the complete mess he looks right now but the death in his crimson eyes kept her mouth shut and her eyes firm on him.

"What the hell did you do to me?" He roared and she glared at him.

"I didn't do anything! You came to me!" She roared back at him.

"Well I didn't want to come to you! I don't want to be your familiar! Take it back Reyna!" He yelled crossing the room to her, his demon bursting from his skin. His enormous frame towered over her bed, his black eyes peering at her as he reached for her tiny neck. His hand stopped before he could touch her, his body won't let him harm her.

She smirked pushing his hand away and floating up to look him in his black eyes.

"You swore an oath to me, Lucian. I didn't force you, it was your own free will. I can't take it back and neither can you." She seethed.

"I'm a demon, I can't be your familiar." His deep voice mumbled.

"Yet here we are. I don't understand this either." She sighed, shaking her head as shrunk down slowly returning to his humanoid form.

"I don't have to accept this." He grumbled leaving her room and slamming the door.

She plopped down on the bed with her head in her hands. Why did it have to be him?

*Lucian*

Lucian stayed away from her, he holed himself in his rooms refusing to speak to anyone.

How can this be possible? A demon can't be a familiar to a witch. It's unheard of, yet no one seems to think it's strange. He watched everyone in the gardens celebrating the miraculous event.

He spied Reyna sitting off on her own, smiling at anyone who greeted her but she was lost in thought. He saw her tense up as if she can feel him watching her. Her violet eyes slowly looked up at his window.

*I don't want this either.* She sighed and he grimaced closing the curtain blocking her view of him.

*Don't talk to me like this.* He growled, wishing he could block her out of his mind. He doesn't want her there.

He heard her sigh again and felt as if a door slowly closed and his mind went quiet. He winced at the emptiness and silence. He didn't realise he could hear the celebrations because she was there.

Who cares? He is going to pretend this weekend never happened. He doesn't have to have anything to do with her. He's not going to be her familiar.

*Reyna*

Reyna closed the door to her room at the Academy. She hasn't spoken to Lucian since the morning after her ceremony and she doesn't plan on it. He made himself very clear he wants nothing to do with being her familiar.

Their parents assured her that he would come around, but she doubted it.

She shook her head, the one thing she was most excited about for her right of passage was having a familiar. And she ended up with a demon who wants nothing to do with her.

Why didn't her soul just pick a shapeshifter like her parents?! Lucian is never going to want to be her familiar. But he has to, how is she supposed to be a true witch without him. It's already starting to drain her energy keeping up the mental barrier.

She shook her head again, shaking off the brain fog. She'll be fine, she doesn't need him. She's strong enough on her own. She took a deep breath and pushed open the doors to the main hall.

"Hey Reyna! How did it go?" Elowen asked and frowned looking around her.

"Where's your familiar?" She frowned as tears welled in Reyna's eyes.

She quickly blinked them back, she has to keep it together, "It went alright, I guess, but I...don't have a familiar." She sighed as Lucian came striding down the hall, his crimson eyes glaring darkly at her.

"Damn if looks could kill, he just burned you at the stake." Kyrell laughed, sliding up to them.

Reyna sighed, nodding her head in agreement, "Yeah that doesn't surprise me."

"So I take it, it didn't go well at the VonUmbras? And what do you mean you don't have a familiar?" Elowen asked incredulously, "Every witch has a familiar, it's what makes us who we are. They anchor our power. You can't be a witch without a familiar, you won't survive, your power will start to eat away at your body and..
And your soul."

"I know that Elowen...I-I don't want to talk about it." She mumbled, turning away from them and marching down the hall to her classroom.

Leave it to Elowen to voice her concerns and fill her with worry. She's already freaking out about this. She knows it's dangerous and deadly to keep up the barrier between her and Lucian.

But what is she supposed to do?