Chapter Twenty One
A Meeting of Minds

 

Eventually, the worst had to happen. It was unavoidable. Eventually, they had to go back to class, although they did get the rest of their morning off. The air of victory and elation stuck with them, people nudging Jenna and, to a lesser extent, Emily, on the way to their first class of the afternoon. That air was released like helium out of a balloon when they all walked into the next classroom. 

The blackboard was covered in scientific diagrams, sine waves, and all kinds of formulas. Their collective, audible groan bounced off the Headmistress Lalonde’s indecipherable expression. “Take a seat, everyone,” she said. “Welcome to Magical Theory. This course will be followed up by next semester’s Applied Metaphysics, so I do recommend you pay attention.”

With a sigh, Jenna sat down at the desk and pulled up a wicker bowl for Emily to sit in, which he did gratefully, curling up into a comfortable loaf. According to his schedule, this course was mostly for his Witch’s sake, but his attendance — and his attention — was still mandatory. “It’ll be okay,” Emily mumbled to Jenna, who responded by softly petting his head. As rewards for saying the right thing went, this one was definitely up there. 

“So, magic,” Ms. Lalonde said. “You went over what it is in an abstract sense with Miss Falls. To approach its practical existence, however, you will need a basic understanding of mathematics, physics and a smattering of quantum mechanics. Not to worry, we’ll take our time to work through this.” She stood in front of the blackboard, her hair in a steely bun, like a teacher straight from the Victorian Era, but there was an air of patience around her. “I’m sure you have a lot of questions,” she added. 

“Yeah,” Benjamin said, frowning. “Quantum physics?”

“Okay,” Ms. Lalonde said as she pointed at a formula. Emily had seen it before in physics, although he’d be hard-pressed to actually explain it to someone. E=mc² was one of those things that looked science-y enough for television to get its point about science-fiction without anyone having to actually understand what it meant. “To illustrate: who can tell me what this formula is, who wrote it, and what it means.” Several hands went up. Ms. Lalonde pointed at Jacob. 

“That’s Einstein’s theory of relativity, Ma’am,” he said. Dennis looked up at him in surprise. The little pup clearly had no idea what any of that meant. Ms. Lalonde nodded at Jacob to continue. “It’s a formula about the relationship between mass, energy, and the speed of light.”

“The speed of light in a vacuum, exactly,” Ms. Lalonde said. “The reason this is important is because magic is… energy.” She pointed at the big E in the equation. “This is where we’ll start. Now, you may be wondering: ‘people didn’t know about this formula a millennium ago, and they did magic just fine, why should I have to study it?’” A wave of chuckling went through the room. 

A curious thought went through his head. Magic had only existed for fifteen-hundred years, right? So, if it really was energy, how had it been created? That was maybe a question he’d have to ask later. 

Ms. Lalonde continued. “You’re right. People didn’t know that. They just studied every possible spell, entire libraries worth of books, and how energy-intensive they were, on a case-by-case basis.” She tapped on the blackboard again. “If you study a new language, we don’t just give you a dictionary. You learn pronunciation, sounds, script, grammar. That’s what we’ll be doing in this class. You can, technically, just stick to one or two spells you know that work for you. Some will be easier. Some will be harder. If you want to know why some are easier or harder, why it takes more or less energy, and most importantly, if you want to create your own spells, I recommend you pay attention.” She put her hands on her hips. “Now, who can tell me what the different states of matter are?”

More hands went up, including Dennis’ excited little paw. Even he knew this one. As class progressed, Emily tried to keep up, but he occasionally found his attention slipping. Sure, he’d be helping Jenna come up with stuff in the future, maybe, but it didn’t really pertain to him. Besides, she seemed to be keeping up with ease. Her hand flew across the page as she took notes and then notes for her notes in the byline. 

Instead, Emily focused on trying to see the flow of magic again. See how visible it was for him. If he focused, he could see it, ever so gently. If he didn’t pay explicit attention to it, it was easily missed, like motes of dust in the corner of his eye or a slight flutter of motion in his blind spot. It was like trying to see water-currents while submerged. There was something there, if he really tried and put his mind to it. Rippling through the air, surrounding everything and everyone. He also saw it flow into him, and an almost tangible bond between himself and Jenna. Magic seemed to ripple through her too, and some of it was left behind, but most of her magic seemed to be coming from Emily. 

Sure, they’d been told all this, but it was still cool to see it in action like that. He tried to feel it, too, but that was harder. Maybe it was because it had been with him all his life, or maybe magic was just that subtle. The closest he could get was trying to extend his reach, to see magic flow around that invisible hand. 

Ms. Lalonde was explaining something called the “triple point of water” while Emily experimented with his magical perception. He became more aware of his own shape, a cat in a bowl, tail twitching slightly. While he couldn’t see himself, he was still able to acutely perceive himself. He poked himself with the invisible hand. He could feel his short, soft fur. For a brief moment, he considered the absurd idea of giving himself a pat on the head, but it wouldn’t be the same. 

He wondered if it was only touch he could extend like that. Could he throw his voice, like a ventriloquist in a cartoon? Or smell something in the next room over? He tried to focus, reach out, thinking words as loudly as he could. Something simple, so he’d be sure he’d be able to pick up on it himself. 

“Emily,” he said, trying to whisper his own name softly without using his voice. Jenna’s head snapped to look at him. 

“Was that you?” she whispered. Emily looked up at her, his eyes wide. He was sure he hadn’t said anything out loud. He nodded. “I heard a voice in my head!” Jenna whispered excitedly. “It didn’t sound a lot like your voice though. It was a lot lower, and a little louder.”

Emily squirmed a bit in his basket. He didn’t like the idea that the voice she’d heard was the low, croaky one he had when he was in his human form. Was it something he had control over? After all, Sarah and Simon had mentioned that it was possible for him to bring elements of his Familiar shape into his human shape. So maybe he could do that to his voice, somehow? He focused on the voice he’d projected, and tried to put the cat one in there. “Hello?” he tried, straining to keep it light and soft, like it was when he spoke out loud.

“Hi!” Jenna whispered again. “That’s you! Now I recognize your voice!” She clamped her mouth shut when Lady Lalonde looked at her with a raised eyebrow, and she went back to taking notes. 

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“Nod if you can hear me?” Emily said, taking care to make sure the voice he was projecting was the right one. Jenna nodded, biting her lip in excitement. “Okay, so I’m trying to reach out, like, whispering without whispering. Can you see if you can do the same?”

A frown appeared on Jenna’s forehead as she stared at the page. After a second, Emily heard something loud in his head, like a loud humming. He had to stop himself squeaking in surprise.

“Almost!” he said. “That’s loud! Words! Use words!”

“Like this?” Jenna said. Emily looked at her. Jenna’s mouth hadn’t moved. 

“Yes!” Emily said. The two of them looked at each other in excited surprise. Jenna turned back towards the teacher, making the motions of taking notes, but Emily could still hear her voice in his head. 

“Oh my gosh,” Jenna said, “this is SO cool!” 

“Yeah!” Emily said. He was having a hard time containing his excitement, but it was pretty clear that Ms. Lalonde was onto them in some way, shooting them a look every few seconds. “Let’s try to focus on class for now? But heck yeah, this is really cool!”

“You just… figured that out, Emily?” Jenna asked, the voice in Emily’s head as excited as she ever was. “I have to be the luckiest Witch in the world, with you as my Familiar. You’re smart as heck!” 

Emily giggled softly over the link they had between them. Jenna’s reluctance to swear was adorable. “Thank you,” he said, “but you’re the one who talked back, so clearly this goes both ways. Besides,” Emily added, “you’re the one taking notes on all this stuff while talking.” 

“That’s not that impressive,” Jenna said. “I used to be really into science stuff as a kid. I didn’t really get out much.” She shrugged a little dismissively. “I didn’t have a lot of friends, so I just liked to hang out online and learn everything I could get my hands on.”

Emily looked at Jenna. She didn’t seem at all upset, but he could relate to that kind of isolation, at the least. It wasn’t like he’d had a lot of friends. Like he’d been allowed to go to sleepovers or parties, or like he’d had any at his own place. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I wish we could have been friends before.”

“Eh,” Jenna said. “It’s okay. I’m glad we met now! I’m way happier now, and you wouldn’t have had to hang out with a gross boy!” She chuckled to herself. “Not that I was one, but you know, I didn’t know that back then. So I’m glad you got to meet the real me.” 

“Yeah,” Emily said. “Me too…” He took a deep breath, hoping to dislodge the sudden appearance of a stone in his stomach. He didn’t like the idea that she’d one day see him in his human form and see that he was one of those gross boys. To call that a disappointment would be an understatement. “I mean, I’m glad we met now too,” he said. “And I’m glad you’re my Witch.”

Jenna reached over and put a hand on his head. “And I’m glad you’re my Familiar, Emily. I think we make a pretty good team!”

Emily smiled internally. He did have some nagging questions though. Especially about the way Jenna had grown up. He already felt protective about her, but with the way she’d been kicked out of the house, that she’d realized she was a girl. Speaking of which… “Hey, Jenna?” 

“What’s up?”

“How did y—

“I would like to remind everyone,” Lady Lalonde said, “that I do request that people not speak during my class. While I will not name names, some of you are starting to figure out ways of communicating silently. I can’t overhear you, but I can tell what you’re doing, and I’ll ask that you don’t. The last thing I want is to restrict all magic in my classroom, but I will if I have to. Do I make myself clear?”

Emily and Jenna looked at each other with the embarrassed grimace of those caught doing something they weren’t supposed to. The question was going to have to wait. For now, diagrams.