Everybody knows wolves make shite familiars. Even a common dog would be better - stupid, yes, but at the very least biddable. You want a predisposition towards aloofness, you can bloody well pick out a cat. But no: Jasmine is too good for a cat, or a hare, or an owl, or even something salvageably pretentious, like a crow. She just had to have herself a wolf.

Which is how Hickory finds herself half-crouched in the doorway of a woodshed, peering into the gloom, watching Jasmine’s wolf chew meditatively on her own familiar’s throat.

Her familiar, for what it’s worth, is a black hare (sensible, traditional choice) named Pennyroyal (good earthy name). The wolf isn’t killing her yet, thank the Mother, but she has her throat between her teeth and she keeps… sort of… mouthing at it. Both are person-shaped: the wolf to better hold the hare, all four limbs curled around the spindly, twitching body in her lap, Penny because the rearrangement involved in shape-changing would probably take her head off. Her eyes, fixed upon Hickory by the door, are glittering points of terror.

She’s doing a good job on her breathing, though. Usually she hyperventilates herself sick when she gets scared; must be doing the counting thing. Hickory is, for once, actually quite proud.

Well. No sense in waiting. Hickory steps into the shed, floorboards complaining under her weight, and the wolf finally notices she’s here. Stops her chewing and just stares, muscles locked tight, ears pressing against her skull. (It’s creepy how she doesn’t growl.) Hickory straightens her hat, clears her throat, and throws out her left hand, making Penny twitch involuntarily. For this kind of thing, you’re really supposed to use the target’s name, but wolves are basically dogs and dogs just go off tone, so it should still work. Jasmine named her familiar something stupid and twenty-syllabled, it’s not her fault if she can’t remember. It’s not.

“I, Hickory Muir, Witch-in-Making and Apprentice Second Class, command you: Fuck off!”

Something happens that feels like getting hit by a cannonball. By the time her senses disentangle themselves, she’s lying on her back in the grass, boots the only part of her still in the shed, and Pennyroyal is weeping plaintively onto her face.

“Hickoryyy, Hickoryyyy– oh you’re. Um.”

“Ffff.” Hickory flops onto her side and tries very hard not to do any extraneous swearing. Yeah, of course. There’s no way a familiar that size could go out the window, is there. Stupid.

“Hickory I thought I was going to die, and then I thought you died, and, and-”

“You can have a hug if you’re careful with my ribs.”

“Hickorryyyyyy…”

“Ow! Christ!”