Sitting across from her dad and Christena, Addie started hiccupping as tears ran down her cheeks. Her mom pulled Addie closer to her side of the cushioned seat, wrapping one arm around her. “Shh, it’s ok.”
“Addie, all Area Lords give their children purpose. It’s the only sure method we know of to keep a soul from cascading during their first bond. I’m sorry I couldn’t find you in the forest, but aren’t you glad you found magic?” Her dad said.
“Yeah,” Addie looked down at Squishy who sat on the floor near her dangling legs.
“We needed a villain. A make-believe villain. So that you could have purpose, so that you wouldn’t die in a soul cascade. Christena agreed to the plan because she knew how much you wanted to find magic. Originally, we only were going to have you alone in your room for a few minutes while I prepared the Kreftt Mouse for you. Then, you would have ‘defeated’ Christena during your bond ignition, and afterward, we would have confirmed the ignition went smoothly— without you cascading. Instead, we spent days looking for you in the forest, and then scrambling to figure out what to do when we noticed you outside Hagal’s house. Our plan could have gone better. We didn’t know if you were already cascaded. We didn’t know anything about the current situation. All’s we knew was that you needed purpose, immediately, and that we needed to exhaust all of your magic. We had no time to plan. I wish I could have done it better. I wish I could have done all of it better. Addie, I’m sorry.” His hand went white on the armrest as he leaned forward with red teary eyes.
“Can you forgive me?” her dad asked.
“I don’t know,” Addie said as she looked away.
“Tom, I think that’s enough for now,” Addie’s mom said with a long sigh. “Let’s give Addie more time to rest.”
Her mom turned her head to Christena, “No lessons for the rest of the week. I want the healer to finish up with Addie’s wrist. I can’t believe you pushed Addie and broke her arm.”
Christena winced, “That, was my fault. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me. Look at Addie.” Her mom pulled Addie in tightly to her side again in emphasis.
“Addie, I’m sorry I pushed you.”
“That’s ok,” Addie said. She still wouldn’t look Christena in the eye, though.
“Come on, Addie,” her mom said as she stood up from the cushioned seat. She held Addie’s uninjured hand and guided her out of the room.
Addie took one last glance into the living room as she went through the doorway. She wouldn’t ever forget her father leaning forward with red teary eyes, nor would she forget Christena’s hunched shoulders as she bent forward in her seat and stared at the ground.
Why was her dad crying? Addie thought all of the sad stuff had happened to her. So why was he so upset?
Leading Addie through the halls back to her new room, her mom said, “Do you still want to join your father and I for dinner?”
“Okay,” Addie said quietly.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
“That’s okay.”
“You are a strong girl, you know that?” Her mom squeezed Addie’s hand. “You are my strongest, bravest girl. Okay?”
“Okay.”
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*Thunk!* Addie flinched, Christena’s meter stick whacking harshly into the chalkboard at the front of the room.
“Fine,” Christena said a little harshly. A small trickle of fear dripped into Addie at Christena’s apparent frustration, “You don’t want to listen to me? We’ll move straight onto practical applications.”
Addie hadn’t been able to listen to anything Christena had been saying all morning. Too many thoughts and fears kept interrupting all of Addie’s thinking.
“Alright, Squishy, you’re coming too.” Christena glanced at the top of Addie’s desk as she saw Squishy’s ears perk up and his attention shift away from his nap.
“Don’t think you’re off the hook, either Fluffy.” The poor Slyfox looked absolutely miffed— she was far too much of a precious beauty to be commanded around at will. Especially from her extremely comfortable fox-sized bed on Christena’s desk.
All of that went completely ignored by Addie, of course. She jumped out of her desk as quickly as she could, only turning back to check on Squishy. Behind her, Squishy stretched his whole body, front legs splayed out in front, back arched, exactly like a cat.
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An initial rush of excitement swept through Addie at the thought of ‘practical applications’. That meant they were going to practice magic!
But, her enthusiasm dwindled almost immediately as she looked back at Christena from the doorway. Maybe Addie needed to find a new person to teach her lessons. A small pit of dread welled up inside her at the reminder of all the awful things that had happened because of Christena
Christena reached her arm out toward the desk, where Fluffy quickly jumped up and climbed onto Christena’s shoulders, looking not unlike a fancy orange fox scarf.
The four of them all made their way towards the back of the giant building. Addie knew they would be practicing outside on the back lawn.
The walk down the manor’s hallways was labyrinthine, and Addie reflected on her father’s words from earlier this week for quite a while, mostly spacing out as she remembered their conversation.
Addie had done a lot of reflecting on the events that she was basically forced into. She had felt a lot better when her dad explained that this entire bonding initialization, had gone way off his original intended plan. During the planning process, as he explained, the confrontation with Christena should have happened minutes after Addie was ‘captured’, where, during the confrontation, her father had a Krefft Mouse prepared and ready to ‘unexpectedly’ turn the tides and allow Addie to win the fight. All of this would have happened in the span of single night, with a lot less time for traumatizing events. More importantly, she wouldn’t have been lost stuck in the forest, or fighting through terror and magical exhaustion. At least, that’s what Addie wanted to believe. Even after all of that, her dad was still her dad. And, she loved him. But, that didn’t mean it would be easy to forgive him, either. Addie still didn’t know if she forgave him.
According to her dad, Squishy was a completely undocumented creature. He wasn’t even sure where in the caste system the small and scaled cat-like creature would land. For all they knew, Squishy was as powerful as a caste two or three bonded. In fact, it wasn’t impossible he was a caste one creature either, but considering only the likes of dragons tended to be that powerful, it was unlikely.
For a moment, Addie’s thoughts paused, and she looked up at Christena’s face. Without realizing it, Addie’s hand naturally held onto Christena’s hand as they walked the hallways. Addie consciously looked down at their intertwined hands; and in a slight panic, she quickly released Christena’s hand. Addie then wiped her own hand off on her skirt.
Christena tried not to show any hurt on her face, but it was clear that she regretted things between the two of them. Perhaps unsurprisingly, things hadn’t gone back to normal after the past week. They may never go back to normal completely ever again, Addie reflected. Maybe, if the original plan for her bonding initialization had gone perfectly, and Addie’s fear had been stamped out on the original timeline her father prepared, things would have been different. As it was, Addie didn’t know if she would ever be able to instinctually trust Christena ever again. It was hard, to see her maid’s face hurt— seeing what was essentially her second mother feel pain due to Addie’s imposed distance. Though Addie knew it was hard on Christena, she was still glad that Christena respected Addie’s choice for space.
Addie wouldn’t ever let herself feel guilty over this, though. Mostly, she just felt tired, and sometimes scared. It wasn’t her fault that Christena’s face sometimes looked more like a monster’s than a person’s.
The nightmares agreed with Addie, too.
After Addie let go of Christena’s hand, the walk became a lot more subdued. Addie just watched her feet with her hands down at her sides. After some time of silence, she glanced up at Christena’s face, but Addie found it somewhat hard to look at. Christena tried to outwardly project a professional and serious air, but mostly her expression came across as guilty and regretful.
She would never bring it up aloud, but a few days ago Addie had heard distant shouting through the walls of her bedroom during the middle of the night. When she and Squishy got up to investigate, using their powers to enter the space between the walls, they came across Christena with tears streaming down her face. Addie would never forget those tears of furious anger streaking her makeup— Christena’s accusing, pointing finger aimed at Addie’s dad, screaming at him.
The words she screamed didn’t matter. Addie knew why she was upset, why she was angry at her dad. He devised a plan where Christena had to be the villain, perhaps unnecessarily. This felt wrong, especially since Addie was still so young, only ten years old. Their relationship might never go back to how it once was, and Christena had seemingly lost a daughter in all but name.
That shook Addie, and she couldn’t keep listening after she discovered the source of the noise, so she quickly left and went back to bed. She wanted to forget she witnessed that, but the memory had kept her awake even after she tried to go to sleep.
Addie didn’t know if their relationship would ever go back to how it was before her Bonding Initialization, but she at least knew Christena was trying. She saw the effort Christena put in to try to make Addie feel safe by respecting her distance, and the effort she put in to be a responsible teacher for magic. Those efforts still made Addie feel warm inside, regardless of anything else.
It couldn’t be helped, Addie smiled to herself a bit and reached her hand back out to Christena, who looked surprised, but happy. Not one to miss an opportunity, she gently cusped Addie’s hand back into her own, and Addie seriously led them the rest of the way out of the manor and into the yard. Addie couldn’t help but notice the unshielded joy on Christena’s face. Just this once, Addie would spoil her. Tomorrow, well, in time they would find out if Christena could be forgiven completely. Perhaps not, and perhaps tomorrow Addie wouldn’t feel comfortable holding her hand. But for now, Addie could be strong. Maybe it would help the nightmares, too.
Regardless, no amount of self-reflection would stop Addie from practicing her magic. Squishy seemed to vibrate as well. His excitement bled over to Addie from their bond, even as Addie’s excitement did the same to him. Their emotions multiplied each other until both of them could hardly sit still.
As they stepped out onto the lawn, Christena started to talk about ‘safety’ and ‘following the rules our predecessors so diligently created for our benefit,’ but Addie barely heard any of that.
It was magic time.