Defensive Magic-Chapter 32: The M Word

WINTER TERM - January 21st

I'd like to say my familiar is better behaved than Whim, but Whisper has already chewed Aries's loafers, then found and ate a whole stash of manticore jerky he'd been saving from home.

I'd been under the impression that familiars summoned would be fully-formed, mature, and a kind of representation of their mage. I had limited experience seeing them in real life. It was a little surprising perhaps that Marblebrook's familiar was a pigeon, but maybe she was secretly a bit quirkier than she let on? I don't know.

There was a famous mage, Hamil Crowfoot, who had a lion familiar. I hadn't expected a lion. I don't think anyone who has met me would have expected me to have a lion as a familiar. That's not the point, but a puppy?

I've named him Whisper. He's technically a hellhound puppy. He's not housebroken. He requires an unnecessary amount of attention, occasionally he burps up literal fire, and leaves my bed smelling like smoke.

Naturally, Aries loved him immediately.

Whisper has short black fur and red eyes that glow like embers in the dark. He's smaller than I'd expected for a hellhound, but I guess he's still a puppy. I admittedly have no clue how big hellhounds get, but as of now, he's maybe 20 pounds, only half a head taller than Whim. I took him to Marblebrook's office yesterday to meet her. She confirmed he's definitely a hellhound. Apparently a favored beast of Orendell, because of course even my familiar is tied to him.

He'll get bigger, bigger than an ordinary dog, but not significantly larger than that.

I got an earful from Blackclaw this morning when Whisper lifted his leg to piss on the wood barrel construct he'd brought for us to duel later. Apparently combat classes going forward would be a "familiar-free" zone. How was I meant to know? He's not a pet. He's not on a leash. Even now, as I write this, he's asleep, drooling on my lap. He's kind of just always around. I didn't choose him. I don't even know exactly if I like him. But he's mine.

WINTER TERM - January 22nd

Some days I really just don't know how not to put my foot in my mouth. It was a bad one. A really bad one.

Even Whisper has slunk off somewhere out of sight, because even he knows I don't deserve any kind of company after all this.

It didn't start out terribly. In Blackclaw's Hostile Scenarios class, the Nightmare Brigade had to fend off a trio of golems. After enough rounds with the barrel constructs, we'd figured out a few of their very specific weak points, and given that there would be very few real-world scenarios that might ever involve needing to fight a magically charged wooden barrel, we were moving on to other non-sentient foes. The golems were mud-based, since one particularly unseasonably warm day earlier in the week had melted the snow and left a surplus of slick wet earth over most of the practice field.

I'd say Aries and I were just figuring out how to work as a team alongside Stellan and Nadine. Stellan kept his distance, stayed quiet, and usually deferred to Nadine for a plan of attack. And Nadine was someone I could sometimes forget was a vampire. She was sharp, direct, and quick to delegate. I wanted to hate her, but mostly, when on the field taking on more than one construct, her quick call that told me to focus on just one- usually the one closest to me already- was only reassuring. I really didn't want to have to watch Aries get clobbered by some stupid, mindless magical contraption.

Besides, the whole vampire thing hadn't really come up much. If she could pretend she was just any old student mage attending the Court, then so could I, right?

Anyway, today it was giant mud golems. Delightful. The first one reached up from a puddle on the field, wrapped one tentacled arm around Aries's ankle, and yanked him to the ground.

I felt the wolf growl through my teeth, even as my instincts as a mage kicked in almost as quickly, casting a sharp ice spell into the arm of the slowly forming creature.

Aries scrambled free, and raced to join me in the casting gestures.

"You good?" I asked him.

"Fine, totally fine," he said. I'd thought he'd sounded annoyed but I brushed it off then. We were making short work of the golem together.

"Zeph, help Stellan," Nadine barked.

While the golem that initially grabbed Aries never fully rose to its full height, the other two Blackclaw had conjured stood almost thirty feet. One had begun to twist around Stellan, slowly consuming him, though consuming might have been the wrong word, more that he was slowly sinking into the still-growing mud-person shape. Stellan cast rapid zapping shocks at it, having minimal effect.

"Go," Aries urged. "I've got this." Aries was winding up the gesture for shrouded blade, one of the spells I'd shown him a few weeks ago. It was good. He was fending off the golem. But I hesitated perhaps a second too long.

Two weeks ago, I'd also thought all was fine. But the wood barrel construct came charging and I hadn't pulled him out of the way in time. He hadn't thought to get out of the way in time. I couldn't let that happen again.

"Zeph!" Nadine shouted again.

The golem was worn enough that just casting frostbite would likely be enough to keep it from trying to get back up again. Stellan might have been struggling but it wasn't like he'd shifted. If he were really getting desperate, he'd shift, right?

"You pig-headed prick!" Nadine had cast slow over her golem seemingly for the sole purpose of gaining an extra thirty seconds to yell at me.

The golem that had grabbed Aries was back to being a mud puddle, partially frozen in the grass. And Stellan, half immersed in the mud golem was starting to shift.

Nadine whirled quickly around summoning a sweep of glittering ice daggers that cut through her golem.

At that point, I knew I probably should have been helping Stellan. Even Aries had already begun to cast something in his general direction. "Zeph, come on." Aries brushed past me.

I felt the wolf under my own skin start to bleed through.

Stellan slipped down into the gut of the golem, but just as the mud crossed over the short shorn top of his head, he reared back, suddenly full wolf.

I didn't want to shift. My wolf was raring to go, ready to sink its teeth into the golem and help Stellan tear it to pieces—the kind of thing Blackclaw asked we not do for this class. I was immobilized, stuck between the wolf's wants and my own will.

I saw Aries cast shrouded blade again, this time at the golem half wrapped around Stellan. He was clearly trying to maneuver the spell carefully to avoid hitting the huge wolf attempting to maul the golem, but as a result the slice of the blade missed more than it hit.

The wolf in my head howled. I couldn't move.

At that point, Blackclaw stepped in. His golems collapse back into mud puddles on the field, no longer fighting. "I'm calling it," he said. "Someone grab the wolfsbane solution. They're both going to need it. Ashbourne's bugging out."

I meant to reach for the flask in my pocket but Aries was quicker. The wolf had locked onto Stellan and I could hardly think with its barrage of racing half thoughts - curious, hello, friend?

Aries tipped the wolfsbane solution to my lips. A single mouthful was enough to shove the wolf back down and give me some level of control back over my limbs. I grabbed the flask from him as soon as I could and brought it to Stellan next.

Blackclaw had already zapped him, so Stellan was down, still a wolf, rolling in the mud on his back and groaning. I was going to have to wrench open his muzzle to get him to drink this.

It was surprisingly not terribly dissimilar to wrestling something out of Whisper's mouth. Only he was about ten times the size of Whisper. And also, my classmate.

He started shifting back as soon as I could manage to get him to swallow some of the wolfsbane solution, writhing in the mud through the shift. It looked like it hurt. I mean... it did hurt. I knew that already. Did I look like that?

When he'd finally finished shifting, Stellan shot me a hard glare and spat a mouthful of wolfsbane solution into the dirt. One sleeve of his shirt was still stuck around his shoulder but the rest of the clothes were pretty much gone. "You didn't have to make me drink so much," he grumbled.

"You were trying to eat a mud monster. Is that really such a sticking point?"

Stellan got up slowly. Suddenly the rest of the class was gone. I'd missed it apparently but Blackclaw dismissed them when Stellan shifted. Best keep accidental maulings to a minimum. I resented it, but understood.

"I get that you're fucking him, but acting like his bodyguard for training exercises is moronic," Nadine shouted. I didn't need her scolding. Aries scrubbed his face with his hands.

I didn't think it had really been all that big a deal until Blackclaw pulled me aside. "Ashbourne, you're coming with me."

Blackclaw waited until we were in his office to speak. It was one of those conversations. He shut the door behind me and took a seat behind his desk. On the sideboard today, he had a few new dark red bottles, blood. I didn't have to wonder, the wolf knew the smell.

"Is Nadine coming for dinner?" I asked.

I should have been more concerned about this private chat in Blackclaw's office, I know, but it was Blackclaw. I had a hard time feeling anything other than annoyed.

"We're talking about you today, Ashbourne," he said. Very serious. I rolled my eyes.

"Did Stellan have a talk with you at all? I've been saying this would be better coming from him-" I'd been expecting sass from Blackclaw, but he fidgeted in his desk chair.

"Uh, no? He and I aren't exactly friends."

Blackclaw huffed. "Nadine brought this to my attention. Apparently he'd mentioned something to her the other day. It's not a problem exactly but we're talking about this now before it becomes one. Ideally so we don't have to talk about this again."

Was he nervous? Blackclaw was the first to tease me about all things werewolf. What did he have to be shy about? The man had already seen me naked an uncomfortable number of times.

He went on, "I knew even before he asked to be a part of this class that you and Aries were close."

That got my hackles up.

"And he's from Fel. He knows about werewolves," Blackclaw said. "Or he should anyway."

Even as he was clearly trying to be careful with his words, I was waiting for him to say the thing that would make me want to tear into him. He was being too weird for that not to be the thing coming next.

"I mostly go out of my way not to learn about the private lives of my students, but well, you're a hormonal, new werewolf. You're not subtle."

"Your point?" Because there had better be one.

"I recommended this class for you for a reason. You know that? You kept showing up to class with bruises. You have anger issues, mood swings, and some of those spells you've learned? Don't think I missed the fact that they're dangerous. You have a penchant for destruction."

"So, you're keeping an eye on me," I said.

"Yet I still somehow completely missed the fact that you went out of your way to find a mate."

"Oh, he's not- I mean, it's casual," I said quickly.

Blackclaw sighed. "Werewolves... Why the fuck am I the one stuck explaining this? Ashbourne, you are a werewolf. Somehow it still seems you can't wrap your head around the fact that that means more than just the necessary obligation to turn into a wolf once a month. You are always a werewolf. It doesn't have an off switch. You still can't even get through two combat drills without having to shift!"

"I didn't even shift this time!"

"You were so stuck not shifting you might as well have just done it to make yourself useful!"

Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

"I'm not here to scold you. I'm saying you don't have it all together as much as you think. And that makes sense. You're new. You make mistakes. I know I've been frustrated over them, but you're going to figure it out. Eventually. But, back to my point, you're a werewolf now. Werewolves don't do casual. Werewolves are pack animals. They get attached."

I didn't want to talk about this with anyone, especially Blackclaw. Yet here we were, gritting our teeth through the whole damned conversation. Blackclaw kept talking. "Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't bring any of this up. Whatever happens between you and Aries is your business and I really don't want to know, but you're acting reckless and it doesn't seem like you understand."

"Understand what?"

"Zephyr, you struggle to keep from shifting in the middle of class on a good day. You sip so much wolfsbane solution from that flask you keep on hand half the school must think you've got a drinking problem. You're reactive and impulsive - and this is your baseline. Gods forbid we ever see you in the throes of a break up."

I hated every single thing about this. I wanted him to stop talking, but it seemed after all that maybe he did actually have a point.

"So, what do you propose I do about it?"