Previously: Aurora’s parents had a hard choice to make, but they were willing to do anything to save their daughter. Aurora noticed weird things through the years leading up to her parents’ death on her graduation day.
Shortly later, Aurora finds out her life is nothing like she thought. She’s magical.
Episode 2: Family Secrets
Now let me tell you something, learning that magic exists, my parents were a witch and wizard from the equivalent of royal families, and that I have magical powers was a little much for my brain to comprehend. I mean motherpupper! How was I supposed to respond? I felt slighted. I felt violated. I felt freaked the heck out! I was having the identity crisis of the century.
This woman thought she could just prop herself up and tell me all this, but I just kept thinking that I had to be dreaming. I mean, wouldn’t that be your first response too? I’d been through an awful lot.
“Get out. Get out now!” I yelled at her.
She practically recoiled from my shout. “Now Rory, you need to calm down.”
“Don’t you dare call me Rory! My mom is the only one that was allowed to call me that. GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!” I hollered.
She just shook her head sadly. Then, she was frozen in place. Well shit. I needed to figure out how to stop doing this. I walked around her shaking my hands at her. Nothing happened. I touched her. Still nothing. I got frustrated and kicked the cabinet. While I was jumping up and down holding my toe, she unfroze. She turned around and looked at me.
“Oh no! You’re hurt!”
“I’m fine. Don’t...” I said as she reached out to help me. I smacked at her hand, and she hissed at me. Yes, Sammy the woman was definitely also a cat. “Jeez, don’t hiss at me!”
She sighed. “Stop being so difficult. Your parents really saddled me with quite a mess.”
I sat back down, and we looked at one another. “Can you turn into any other animals?” I asked.
Her face crinkled up in humor. “No, that’s not how familiars work. We have one form that we turn into.”
“How old are you?”
“About 359, give or take a few years. After a while you stop counting.”
“WHAT? 359 years old? Are you immortal?”
“Not exactly. We tend to live around 1000 years or so.”
“Oh, just a 1000 years,” I muttered under my breath. “Not that long or anything.”
She smiled. “I know this all seems overwhelming, but it will come naturally to you. It’s in your blood. You are destined to be great.”
I stood up suddenly. I needed some space. I couldn’t take anything else in. “I’m going to go take a shower,” I said. She nodded. It was like she knew better than to follow me from the room. I walked out of the kitchen and back upstairs to my room. I gathered clothing and went into the bathroom. I turned the hot water on full blast, got undressed, and climbed under the stream of water. I stood there until the water went cold, and then I climbed out and reached for my towel. It was gone. This was the third time this week that I’d ended up towel less.
I peeked me out in the hall. I didn’t see anyone, so I streaked into my room. My towel was on the floor. How did it get in here? I grabbed it up and wrapped it around me. I dug through my closet for something cozy to wear. I found sweatpants and a t-shirt. I wasn’t planning on leaving house today, so I didn’t need to look good. I decided that I would work from my room so I didn’t have to talk to my cat. My familiar, my weird lady that I guess lives with me. This was going to take some getting used to.
The good news was that as a freelance writer, I could pretty much set my own hours and locations. Today’s location would be my bed. I gathered my laptop and lap desk up to settle in. I’d barely turned on my laptop when Sammy came sashaying into my room, in cat form, and started taking a crap in the litter box that I had in the corner of my room. Uh, no.
“Hey, could you do that in the bathroom now? I mean, it seems weird...”
She hissed at me. Dear God, she was a little bit of a temperamental cat woman. “Fine,” I groaned. She streaked off when she finished smelling up my space. At least I knew it was time to move the litter box. After all, with my parents dead, I could put it any place I liked.
I didn’t know how long it would take for me to not feel like screaming when I thought about my parents being dead. I was angry at them for leaving me. I was angry at them for hiding who I truly was from me. I was furious that they lied about who they really were. I’d never felt so alone as I did in that moment. I tried to work on the article I was writing for a client, but my mind was too overwhelmed.
I got up off the bed and wondered back down to the kitchen. Sammy was on the counter licking her paws. I stared at her for a minute. Did she understand me when she was a cat?
“Uh, do you understand me?” I asked. Sammy turned and looked at me. She nodded her head, but she continued licking her paws. “Can you do your thing? This is creeping me out.”
She leaped to the ground but as her feet hit the floor she grew up and up and up as her features morphed into that of a human. It took maybe two seconds, but it was the weirdest thing I’d ever seen. I clutched the cabinet as her whiskers disappeared into her face.
“Yes?” she inquired. I opened and closed my mouth a few times. Where to start?
“What can I do? I mean like, I’m a wizard,”
“Witch. You’re a witch, dear.”
“Okay, witch. What can I do? What are my powers? What do I do with them?”
“Well, every witch has different powers. Most have one or two primary powers, but there is no limit. Your powers will continue to develop and grow, and sometimes that means they manifest as new abilities the longer you have them. On the other hand, your powers have been bound until about six weeks ago, so I have no idea what the progression of your powers will look like. Only time will tell.”
“Okay, what about mom and dad?”
“Your mother had the primary ability to freeze time. Your father had the ability to start fires and explode things. It’s unclear what any secondary abilities you may have, but your primary appears to be freezing time, like your mother. As for what you do with them, some people teach other witches and wizards. Some protect innocents. Some work as cops. Some continue on like they don’t have powers, but that’s rare. Also, your parents were important people in the magical community. Now that you have your powers, you’re marked.”
“I’m what?”
“Marked. You are now on demons, warlocks, other witches and wizards, as well as the rest of the magical community’s radar. I’ve been warding off demons for you recently, but it’s only a matter of time.”
“Demons? You’ve got to be kidding me!” My mind raced. Was every scary thing I thought was nothing but a nightmare really real? “What did my parents do with their powers?” Were they like Buffy the Vampire Slayer? I was not brave enough to add that last part out loud, in fear she might laugh or say yes.
“Your father was the Dean of Mavericks Magical Academy. Your mother was the head librarian there. They served as co-chairs to the Council of Magic, or essentially, they regulated the use of magic, worked to keep the magical community secret and safe, and had a role much like president and Vice President of the magical community.”
I said nothing. Finding out your parents were Mr. and Mrs. president of magic wasn’t something you could really prepare yourself for. “How did they keep it secret from me?”
“Honestly, they had to give you potions to erase your memory a few times over the years.”
“They erased my memory?” I said with venom leaking from me. “They had no right!”
“Well that’s neither here nor there, dear. It’s done. They did it.”
I was getting annoyed again. I mean, she really could be more sympathetic to my plight here. I was trying to take in a lot, and she was acting like I was being a big old baby about it. I mean I wasn’t like a million years old, so I was having to learn how to deal with all this crazy.
“Well, I feel like I know nothing. What on Earth were they thinking not telling me?”
“I honestly don’t know. I thought you had the right to know once you were a teenager, but I was told it wasn’t my place.” She hesitated and said, “I have to go. Another WIT needs me.”
“Another what?”
“WIT, or witch or wizard in training.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I can feel it. It’s just something a familiar knows. Stay home and I will be back later. Go in the basement. That’s where you can find information your parents kept down there.” Then she turned back into a cat and sashayed out the cat door.
So that was why my parents had always kept the basement locked. They told me it had mold, and I wasn’t to go down there. I always wondered why they didn’t just call in someone to take care of it, but I grew up being told it was nothing but mold so I assumed it was nothing to think about.
I like that her familiar has a bit of an attitude. It will help with the training, I'm sure.
Beautiful story!
Very intuitive
👍🏾