Phantom of the Library - Lidiya Foxglove Page 0,31
a minute to chat over her coffee,” Billie said.
“That’s Jasper,” I said. I couldn’t believe she wasn’t able to tell them apart. By now they looked completely different to me.
“Oh. I thought Jake was the snarky one.”
“Jasper tries to keep up,” I said, as Jasper gave us both the finger. We laughed, our spirits heightened by the confusing mixture of triumph, danger, and hot sex.
We brought Billie up to speed on the new development. I broke it to her gently. I knew what she would be thinking.
“So my familiar…maybe wouldn’t have died…if…” Billie dropped her head into her hands. “Oh, no.”
“Sounds to me like a good reason why familiars should be free,” Jake said. “It always did bother me. Maybe being shifters ourselves, it seemed weird that witches had shifters who serve them.”
Bevan reappeared with the seven familiars right in the midst of the living room for a meet and greet. “They’re all going to stay in animal form so they don’t get in your way,” he said. “But they’ll just keep sentry around the house and if you run into trouble, they all will fight for their lives rather than return to their captors. I brought some grains and some lettuces so you have food to put out for them…”
“Aw, Bev! You’re like our nanny when we were kids, with the snack sack!”
“I am definitely not like your nanny. But I know you don’t have time to get them food right now.” I was still seeing a different side to my familiar, one that was so human that it actually shook me a little. I realized that as much as I loved him, I thought of him more like a talking bat mascot than as a person. I think that was how he wanted me to think of him, though. He never appeared to me in human form or tried to involve himself with my real life. And I never asked him about his either. What did he do all day? I had no idea.
“We’re so grateful for the assistance,” I said, looking at the nervous, huddled group who were all gazing at us nervously like they had never seen other people before. Maybe they rarely did. The witch and familiar relationship did tend to get very private from puberty onward, and I guess that made it very dangerous for these poor souls. I felt bad to even ask them to fight. We had a robin and a sparrow, a skink, a toad, a weasel, a chipmunk and a prairie dog. Sheesh. Not even one badass hawk or anything.
“We are so very thankful to you kind people for giving us shelter,” the chipmunk piped up. “We’ll fight for all we’re worth to protect the maps. I’d rather die than return to my master.”
“I just hope we’re of some use,” the skink said. “I know we’re a pretty pathetic group of familiars.”
“Don’t doubt yourselves. Don’t ever listen to the people who tell you you’re pathetic,” Graham said. “They’re wrong.”
“I don’t know…”
“It’s great to have you all on the team and I truly believe that when we all pull together, we can make a difference. This world might not always live up to our ideals, but when many people work toward a common goal, we can move mountains and build bridges. Nothing that has ever been accomplished in this world has been done without the efforts of the humblest of people, doing the smallest of actions.”
“Oh wow, is that really true?” the toad said earnestly in a little female voice. “I will do anything you ask of me, sir, if I can help accomplish something!”
“You don’t have to go that far,” Graham said. “Don’t do it for me. Do it for yourselves.”
“Thank you, sir, but I am just a humble servant and it would be a waste to do anything for myself. It would please me greatly if I died in your service.”
“Damn,” Graham said under his breath. “I still don’t really understand this wizard familiar thing, but whoever told you that is a piece of shit, okay? You are not going to die for me or anyone else in this room.”
The toad looked a little cowed, but nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“My campaign speeches might come in handy after all,” Graham said to me. “Except that last part, that was the ad lib portion, and the part I would get in trouble for later…”
“I think they might need one every day,” I said. “But I guess this is a start. And I