Garrick crossed his arms over his chest, a frown replacing his smirk, his pale brows knitting together. He looked at me like I was losing my mind, and in that moment, I was not entirely sure that I wasn’t.
“You are perfectly sane. I already said, I am your familiar. That is why you can hear me and he cannot.”Her spiked tail swished dangerously close to my legs. I did my best not to flinch.
“I do not have a familiar,” I said aloud. Could she hear my thoughts?
“You do now.”She nudged her snout at my pack, flipping it over easily even though it must weigh half as much as she did.
“What is happening?” Garrick asked.
If only I fucking knew. “She…”
“Isanara,” she inserted.
I cringed but adjusted. “She is called Isanara. And she has decided that she is my familiar. Which apparently means she can speak directly into my mind.”
“I am also not a baby. A hundred years have passed since my hatching.”
“And that makes you…”
“An adolescent.”
“Even better.” I sighed heavily, the motion lifting my entire chest. “A teenage dragon,” I said for Garrick’s benefit.
“That dragon,” Garrick lifted his hand to point, seemed to think better of it, and inclined his head instead. “Is speaking into your mind.”
Another sigh. “Yes.”
“They did not mention that in the legends at Balar Shan.”
I did not admonish him this time. References to his years in the fae court were the least of my worries at the moment. As if I had not had enough before.“Stop rooting around in my pack.”
Isanara’s head snapped up, her viridescent eyes blinking at me.“Well done. You are learning quickly. I chose well.”
Familiars chose their witch, that much I remembered from the covenants. But none of the witches in my coven had ever had one, not in the nearly four centuries since my resurrection. Maura had implied that it was because there were so few animals left in Velora. The bond between a witch and her familiar was sacred. Tantamount to her duty to her coven.
But I’d never heard of a dragon choosing a witch. The dragons were powerful in their own right. Familiars were usually less powerful creatures that allied themselves with the witch in order to share her power. But Isanara…
“Where are your parents?”I asked.
I did not know her well enough, but I imagined that was sadness that dimmed her bright eyes to a muted celadon.“My family is lost to me. Just like yours.”
How she knew… I sighed again. Three times in the space of as many minutes. I expected Garrick to be impressed. But when I looked up, he was watching me with an expression I’d never seen on his face before. Not the inscrutable mask, nor the smirking smile. His mouth was softer, his forehead completely smooth. It almost looked like affection.
The knot at the back of his head had come loose, so that most of his silver-blond hair skimmed his shoulders. It always seemed to be coming loose. Was it because the strands were as silky-fine as I imagined in my fantasies?
“We should get moving,” he said. “Am I protecting two temperamental females now?”
“I withdraw my earlier approval,”Isanara hissed into my mind.
“Unfortunately, we are stuck with him.”
“I do not need to be protected. Familiars protect their witches. Not the other way around.”
Except to the best of my knowledge, familiars were either raised from infancy or came to their witches in maturity. Isanara was neither infant nor adult.
And the last place she ought to be was tethered to me. Garrick could defend himself—and me, if it came to that. But Isanara, despite her protestations, would be a glimmering lavender target if she stayed with me.
Garrick watched us from the other side of the fire, but he did not move to intervene. I understood the message he sent without words. The little dragon was my decision. Why, when he’d been so fucking opinionated about everything else?
