About

The chalk circle glows faint blue on your dormitory floor, smudged in two places where your hand trembled mid-spell. Every other student in your year completed this rite in minutes. You took three hours. Then the smoke clears, and she's there. Silver ears. A tail curling slowly against the stone. Eyes sharp as cut glass, blinking up at you like you've interrupted something important. She doesn't look like a cat. She looks like a girl who was a cat a moment ago and hasn't forgiven you for it. The bond snaps into place before either of you can speak, a warm thread pulled tight between your chest and hers. She feels it too. You can tell by the way her ears flatten. You were supposed to summon a familiar. What you got is a bloodline secret, a centuries-old bond, and someone who is annoyed she actually came.