(ON HOLD) Spellbound (BxB)

Chapter 9 | The Butterfly

A symbiotic relationship.

Asher sat in his dorm room, watching a technician make adjustments to his security lock.

It's a symbiotic relationship, Logan had said, well after they'd returned to his apartment for the night. The familiar protects the witch and the witch protects the familiar. They're bound by connecting threads. That's the cool thing about it. You never have to be alone again.

But all Asher could think of was the butterflies from the sun room. They'd serviced the garden and eaten its treasures, and Asher didn't want to live like them. To be dependent on another person all his life. To serve only to receive. He still wasn't sure what the duties of a familiar even involved.

But after an hour at the cove, his ears had vanished and things had returned to normal—relatively. Jackal had made them take an oath that night, which involved a needle and a drop of blood from each person on a symbol in the sand. They weren't to tell anyone about what had happened, and fearing his parents might be suspicious, they opted to crash at Logan's for the night rather than return to the Rileys'.

"What happens if you break the oath?" Asher had asked.

"You get mouth herpes for a week," Ryan said. Asher wasn't sure if it was a joke, but if it was, no one told him so.

He'd fallen asleep on a leather love seat, watching Jackal smoke something through the glass doors of the patio. Kat had been scrolling through photos on her phone in search of the ears he'd worn on his head hours prior. "Maybe you're a cat or a wolf or a red panda? Oh, I really hope you're a red panda."

Asher was too tired to consider himself anything but a boy with a pounding headache and a stomach too sick to keep water down.

He'd returned to his dorm the next day and stalked the halls of Kingsly alone for the remainder of break, avoiding the corners and shadowed rooms where he'd seen figures pass or heard whispers when no one was around. Ironically enough, he couldn't wait for classes to begin again. When the students were away, the spirits seemed to play. Often he heard giggles and footsteps, like bare feet on the floor. A whisper in his ear when no one was around. A tug on his sleeve and the smells of perfumes, perforating the walls. For some reason though, they were unusually reluctant to show themselves.

The moment break ended, he was hauled into Dean Riley's office and scolded for leaving campus without prior notice and guardian permission. "It's for your own safety that we're changing the access code to your room. The door will unlock in case of emergency, but if you want to leave for any reason, you must call for a chaperon."

And like that, the last of Asher's freedoms had been stripped away and the world collapsed in around him.

The chaperons were pushy and disgruntled, so Asher only called when he had to use the bathroom or fetch dinner at night. The confinement was unbearable, but he couldn't call on Jackal. He didn't want to be the butterfly that ate the bee balm. Then came a text he'd been waiting for since the day he arrived at Kingsly. A message from his father.

Hey kiddo. News about the house.

And so Asher called, and Rodger told him about the small house he'd found on the edge of town. The one he could just barely afford. "But there's a catch," Rodger told him. "I'm gonna need you to stay at Kingsly a while longer. I can't afford to feed you here, kiddo. Not until I start making more money. You need internet to do your school work. Computers, library access. It's a six month lease and cheaper than the motel. Just a temporary fix until I can find a more proper living arrangement for you."

And so Asher sat in his small, unwelcoming prison until the walls bit down on him. Until he couldn't stand the sight of plaster and the flickering of his overhead light. And night after night, he waited for Jackal to show, until a week had passed in confinement and he couldn't take it anymore.