“Master, why is it that sometimes your eyes glow and I hear voices?”

Isemberd stopped writing something on a very old scroll and glared at the owlet.

“Voices?”

“Yes. Some weird sighing and whispering. As if someone were talking too low for me to understand.”

The mage’s eyes were menacing for a moment. After a long and thoughtful pause, he asked:

“Any specific place around the house?”

Gillibert retracted a bit, tilting his head on his master sudden anger.

“Near our room.”

Isemberd sighed. He took a glance at his scroll thinking while finishing a weird note in the corner of it. He left it on his office desk, took a clean sheet of paper and waved for Gillibert to get near him. The owlet flew to him landing nearby to observe.

The mage drafted a rough sketch of the house and the grove around it.

“Here” he pointed “this is us.”

“Right master!”

“Our room is here.” he marked a small x on the place and Gillibert widened his eyes. “if you’re hearing voices, they can only come from here…”

He pointed to the woods.

“From the deepest parts of the woods.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Spirits cannot talk to us, like we do. They have to resort to different and usually weird methods of communication.”

The owlet looked at him.

“Are spirits trying to talk to me?”

Before the mage could explain himself, Gillibert blinked twice and chirped really loud making the right conclusion by itself:

“Wait! Not to me! To master! What are they trying to say?”

Isemberd shook his head.

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“Calm down.” He drew a few more trees around the house. “I made a deal with one of the spirits of this grove. That if she agreed to tell me in advance should any danger enters the woods. I would do a few favors for her in return.”

In a few trees, he started drawing opened eyes.

“These trees are the ones she marked for us as our territory. I can use them for a spell so other spirits can't get closer without she knowing beforehand.”

The owlet seemed confused again.

“Is the spirit a girl?” it asked.

“It introduced itself as one.” Isemberd explained “But we should never trust in most things spirits say. We can only trust on their deals.”

They spent a few more minutes refining the draft of the house’s structure.

“Spirits also cannot interact with our world without special conditions.” He continued saying “But they can see things if they want to.”

He made a small cut on the tip of his finger with a quill, letting a droplet of blood fall over another clean sheet of paper. He then drew a weird sign around it that remember a knot. Along the line, he marked six small stars and then added two bigger ones. Raising his hand with the cut finger, Isemberd made a different magic sign, with three fingers together in a circle and the rest of them spread straight.

“With a few tricks from the Spirit Constellation, we also can see things over their realm.” He said, using his right hand to touch the owl’s head.

The mage’s eyes and the owl’s both got covered by a purple substance that resembled a membrane. Isemberd’s blood over the sheet of paper started glowing and boiling.

“Right now, we’re looking at things through the spirit realm.” he said.

“Wow! Master! That is so fun!” Gillibert said, blinking a few times.

Their vision was seeing outside their house, as if they were standing in place of one of the trees the mage showed in the map. Isemberd made them see the house through the perspective of all four trees the spirit allowed him to use.

“It makes my head ache a little.” he complained. “But is really useful.”

“Master, there is something on our window.”

“Ignore it.”

“But…”

“Trust me. Leave him be.”

Gillibert chirped.

“Is a strange man, with a big shabby hair and an angry-looking face.”

Cleaning his throat and raising his hand, Isemberd first undid the magic sign as he closed and opened his hands in a claw motion. The spell was undone while he shook his head with a grimace. The little owl didn’t seem to be bothered by it’s vision sense going back and forth from the spirit realm to normal.

“Don’t worry, spirits cannot harm us in any way.” Isemberd said. “Specially with me here.”

Gillibert waved his wings a little, chirping and saying a bit angry:

“I don’t like them getting near Master! Neither our small window upstairs! How audacious!” Gillibert walked a little and added “When are we going to clean over there?”

Isemberd laughed and it was such a rare thing that the owlet goggled and seemed to calm down with just that.

“They stay away from me as much as possible.” he said. “Come, I need some tea now that my head is hurting.”

He didn’t want to spend too much time filling the owlet’s mind with information about the spiritual realm. The mage was afraid of whatever consequences this would result from that sort of thing.