The Familiar’s Keeper
Familiars. There wasn’t a mage on the continent who didn’t know what they were.
Mystical creatures, densities of mana, summoned to protect their masters. A pact formed between mage and familiar resulted in an undying bond, one of loyalty, trust and companionship.
Mages took care of their familiars, and in return, familiars protected their keeper.
Bang!
“She’s gone!!”
The doors to the living room of Routte mansion flew open.
“Goodness, Ingst, what is the meaning of this?”
The ladies in the room flinched, their afternoon tea almost spilling from their cups.
“Brother, must you be so loud when you’ve just woken up?”
The young man with short, reddish hair came rushing in, his face flushed and clothes barely tidied, as if he hadn’t finished changing yet.
“No, Mother! I can’t find Ruelle anywhere!”
The two ladies turned to him with confused eyes. They set their cups down and stood up to face the approaching young lord.
The son and brother of the Routte county family was breathing heavily, his face weary.
“What do you mean, Ruelle is gone? Did she fly away? Have you tried summoning her?”
His familiar, Ruelle, had disappeared suddenly.
“Of course! I called her all morning and she didn’t respond. Ruelle doesn’t sleep so much!”
The Countess held her son by his arms consolingly.
“Alright, first calm down.”
She spoke calmly, even though the situation was dire.
A familiar’s pact was unbreakable.
“How could I! Ruelle has never done this before. I can’t sense her mana at all…”
He seemed like he was about to cry.
“Haa, Brother. When did you last see her?”
Ingst’s sister, who had her arms folded, sighed and slowly asked.
“.... Weren’t you drinking until you passed out last night? Do you remember seeing her then?”
At her words, Ingst flinched, his face betraying a sense of guilt.
Perhaps he shouldn’t have gotten so drunk. It had been to the point he couldn’t remember if he had summoned her during that time.
But he did remember something… Someone.
“There– there was a person there!”
“What?”
Stumbling down the streets, empty with the late night, Ingst vaguely recalled bumping into someone. A tall person dressed in black, whose face was a blur in his mind.
“It must have been him!”
Ingst suddenly jumped, clenching his fists. A surge of anger rose up within him.
“That Familiar Thief!”
“...!”
There wasn’t a keeper on the continent who didn’t know about the Familiar Thief.
The mysterious man, his whereabouts unknown, was given such a title. It was hardly because many mages knew of his crimes, but rather because he was exactly as described.
A man who stole familiars from their keepers.
An unbreakable bond, only needing a moment to be formed between familiars and keepers.
That fact had been suddenly distorted. An alarming discovery for all keepers had been made.
There existed a man who could break such a bond.
A number of keepers had already lost their familiars to this dangerous man.
Ingst had never expected to be one of them.
“What do I do, Mother? My dear Ruelle…”
Thinking of his small creature that always flew cutely by him, Ingst’s face fell into despair.
However, his mother and sister could not provide words of comfort.
“Ingst… You already know there’s nothing that can be done.”
Fear flashed in his eyes.
Breaking a pact with a familiar. It was something that could be done, but only with the agreement of both parties.
But once it happened, it was as good as death. The two, former keeper and familiar, could never form a pact again.
“There must be something! No…!”
Ingst flashed with rage, the loss of his familiar felt deeply in his chest. His family members looked at him with pitiful eyes.
It was devastating. Truly…
***
“Khhhhh, khhhhh–”
Amidst the tweet of birds and gentle rustle of bright green trees.
The sound of snoring filled the small cottage. Heavy breathing, like a punctured pipe.
Knock, knock.
In that peaceful place, someone knocked gently.
However.
“Khhh…”
Knock, knock, knock.
“Kh-... Hngh…?”
Only when the knocking increased in both sound and speed did the man, stretched out on the sofa-bed, flinch, the book on his face sliding off.
Still dressed in his black cloak from the night before, Rodemaine got up from the shabby-looking bed and sat on the edge.
He groaned briefly, scruffling his black, fluffy hair with a hand. His eyes, that were a striking blue, like holding a crystal to a sunny sky, looked up tiredly at the front door.
Who could possibly have been knocking on that door, so early in the morning?
Stretching his neck, he got up and walked towards the door, past the stacks of books on the floors, the papers and pens scattered messily, various items and instruments tucked away. It was a cramped house too untidy to receive guests, but the young man saw no reason to make an effort.
After all, he rarely had visitors.
Click. Rodemaine unlocked the door.
And when he did, what met his eyes was unexpected.
It was a girl.
“H- hello.”
The girl with greyish hair and minty-green eyes looked up meekly. She was dressed in a simple, white chemise, reaching down to her ankles. Even if it was summer, it was an odd choice of clothing.
The young man in front of her stared at her. A long, gemstone earring dangling from one ear, the rich teal colour complimenting his piercing eyes.
“Who…— no, that doesn’t matter. How did you find this place?”
Rodemaine's low voice spoke.
His eyes narrowed slightly at the sight of the girl. He couldn’t help but feel there was something familiar about her, but he was confident that he had never seen her in his life.
“That… I followed your mana! You were the one who helped me yesterday, right?”
At that, his brows furrowed further.
Because…
“You’re mistaken. I don’t have any mana.”
He spoke so firmly that the girl even doubted herself for a moment.
However, she was certain. There was no way she had mistaken that trail.
“No, I am a Familiar! Familiars are very good at sensing mana!”
The shock only seemed to be getting worse.
A human familiar?
It was unheard of. Familiars were mystical creatures that only resembled small animals and birds.
Rodemaine frowned deeply, his eyes crinkling.
Not noticing his growing confusion and frustration, the girl continued to speak.
“Once we form a pact with a keeper, our ability dulls slightly and we can only focus on our keeper’s mana, so that we can be summoned quickly. But once it was broken, I began to see a lot more!”
So she looked for the trace of the person who was there at that time.
The one who had broken her pact for her.
“It was strange… Your mana seemed very different from others. That’s why I was able to find it again so easily.”
She seemed pleased, her green eyes shining.
“....”
Rodemaine pressed his lips together, listening to the strange girl’s words.
Then he finally spoke.
“You’ve been saying nonsense since earlier.”
“Yes?”
His blue eyes had turned dull, almost cold.
“I said it. I’m not a mage. I do not have any mana. At all.”
“....”
As he was about to shoo her away with another cold sentence, the girl clenched her fists.
“No– you do!”
She spoke as if she knew him better than himself. Rodemaine almost felt like scoffing.
“I can tell!”
“Alright.”
He suddenly grabbed her by her wrist and pulled her inside. Unexpectedly gently, he guided the girl through the small house.
Before she could glimpse the magic tools and crystals cluttered about the open room, she suddenly stood in front of a window.
Sunlight streamed in, warmth hitting her. The window was strewn with vines and leaves, much like the rest of the cottage.
“This plant.”
The man started talking about the plant pot on the window. It was the only pot, with an azalea shrub growing in it. She had seen much of that flower in the surrounding forests on her way here.
“If I had mana, do you think I could grow it? Earth magic, water magic. I could grow it with that.”
Then he suddenly looked up behind her.
“Those wind chimes. With wind magic, I could make them sing.”
He lifted his hands to the twinkling tubes.
Silence. Nothing happened.
The girl wasn’t convinced…
“Aren’t you just holding back your magic?”
“Then I’ll show you.”
He turned his attention to the azaleas again.
This time, when he touched the flowers…
‘…Sorry, Gramps. I’ll grow them again.’
She definitely saw it, the fluctuation of his mana in his heart.
But…
Srrrk.
The azaleas shrivelled up. They withered and they died.
“...!”
“That’s not mana. It’s a curse.”
He said it simply and heartlessly.
“My ability is to take life.”
“....”
***
Mana flowed through all living things. Trees, animals, birds. Every human had mana. When a person’s mana exceeded a certain level, they were called a ‘mage’. Mages unlocked abilities based on four elements — earth, fire, wind and water.
Mana was the system of life.
It was the same mystical energy that allowed such powerful pacts to be formed between familiars and keepers. In the same way, even mana could not break that bond, like a sort of repellence.
A string that could not be cut.
Rodemaine discovered at a young age that he was cursed.
Everyone around him had mana. Mages had the ability to protect their loved ones from harm, keepers had familiars closer than family.
He alone was a child without mana.
When he looked within him, he could feel a sense of eternity. A deep abyss, pitch black. An endless depth of nothingness.
There was not a trace of mana to be found within him.
It was unfair.
He wanted to be like others.
So one day, he tried to take what they had.
He could unconsciously sense it - the lingering light of mana within all living things. So he ventured into the forests, where the plants and trees swayed in the wind.
An azalea bush, bright and colourful. The flowers in full bloom were undoubtedly brimming with mana.
With a gentle touch, he held a flower.
Only a little. He just wanted to take a small amount of mana from it.
The small boy closed his eyes and took a deep breath through his nose.
Take it.
Like breathing in air.
He imagined the mana flowing from the flowers to his fingers. Through his lungs and to his heart.
For a moment, he thought he tasted light.
But in an instant it disappeared. Like a candle swallowed up by darkness.
His eyes flew open, shining irises trembling.
And in his small hands, the azalea lay dead. Shrivelled up and withered completely.
No, the entire bush…
He quickly let go of the decayed flower, and it dropped to the dry ground.
Young Rodemaine stumbled back, clutching his hands to his chest. He tripped backwards and fell, unable to catch himself.
The instinctive fear that everything he touches will die had already burrowed deeply into his chest.
If he touched a human with those hands…
“Heuk.”
Rodemaine found himself gasping for air, and he ran into the forests.
Away, further away from the towns behind him.
To a place where he won’t touch humans.
It wasn’t until many years later that Rodemaine would return to the towns.
***
“So you see. I’m not a mage.”
Rodemaine repeated the words he had been saying for a while now.
“....”
The girl was now silent, looking at the dead flowers.
Still, Rodemaine couldn’t help but feel conflicted.
He had proven to her that he wasn’t the mage he was thinking of. She couldn’t have followed a trail of mana that he left behind. In the first place, he lacked mana.
Within him was only a void that sucked the life out of living things. In reality, he absorbed the mana in those things which ultimately led to their deaths.
But she had said something that kept bothering him.
— You were the one who helped me yesterday, right?
— I’m a Familiar.
‘No, it’s impossible.’
He had never seen or even heard of a human familiar.
‘Who is this girl?’
He thought back to yesterday.
He went about his business as usual, studied magic, attempted spells, and went into town in the evening.
He had heard reports of another familiar belonging to a noble.
With a bitter heart, he approached his target on the streets, clad in a black cloak and his hood drawn,
It was late at night, the torches glowing ominously orange.
The man, staggering with intoxication, mumbled incoherently.
“Ugh.. Come out, Rue. Ruelle.”
Whoosh.
The man’s familiar appeared.
A pale creature that resembled a bat, with epidermal wings and pointy ears.
It flew around him.
“Ruelle— Ack!”
The man hit something solid. In front of him, someone stood there.
“Ugh! Hey, watch it–”
The drunk man’s face distorted with irritation.
“Rue. Get that jerk.”
“....”
The bat-like familiar flew in circles around the drunk young lord. Flashes of light twinkled about it. It was communicating with its keeper.
“Huh?! You won’t? He hit me! … He did! I’m telling you to attack him!.. I don’t care if you can’t sense any hostility!”
The man raised his voice, almost sounding sober.
The familiar continued to circulate on the spot.
“Ugh! Why aren’t you listening to me!”
Then he suddenly grabbed the mystical being.
“Hey.”
Then Rodemaine’s low voice called out.
“Want out?”
“What?”
Twinkle, twinkle.
“... I can. I’m a bit special, you see.”
“Huh? The hell are you talking about–”
“Alright. That’s all I need to hear.”
Whoosh!
In one swift moment, Rodemaine harshly grabbed the drunkard’s wrist.
“Argh! What the-!!”
He pulled him close, right up to his face, and a smirk could be seen under the dark shadow of his hood.
Tap.
He touched the man’s chest, where his heart was.
Take it.
Steal it.
Just enough.
After a moment of disarray, something had changed.
Like a taut string suddenly being snapped.
“Ah!”
The man felt it too, the loss of something.
“You… You cur! What did you just…”
Rodemaine pushed him away.
But before he let go…
Maybe just a little more.
“Urgh…!”
The man slumped, passing out on the spot.
Rodemaine looked around the street, confirming that it was all clear. Thankfully there wasn’t another soul in sight.
The familiar he had freed had also made her escape.
Yes, something had felt familiar about the girl in front of him.
But it also made no sense.
“Are you really the Familiar I freed yesterday?”
The sea-coloured eyes of the girl sparkled.
“Yes! I came here to thank you!”
Rodemaine sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“No, wait. Then why are you human?”
Rather, how?
Was it even possible for a familiar to be human?
Most familiars were small animals or birds since it was easier to maintain their internal mana flow.
A human body was far too complicated to handle.
“...That’s, because I just can?”
The girl spoke, tilting her head.
“What?”
Wait.
Rodemaine suddenly remembered.
“Don’t tell me…”
Something he had read once, in a book about magic and familiars.
A creature capable of taking on a human form.
‘... A Dragon familiar?!'
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