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“Well… I might have been feeling just a little anxious,” Saga admitted. She shot a glare at Riddle. If she wasn’t allowed to talk to Leigh about the grimoire, calling her out about her anxiety that was absolutely in part caused by that secrecy did not seem fair. “The tartlets were to help encourage success with this new endeavor. I mean, it couldn’t hurt, right?”

“Mm.” Leigh swept into the kitchen to seek out the source of the smell that had greeted her, descending on the tartlets. “This is delightful. You should make these for the café.” She dropped to a crouch to offer a small bit of ricotta on her finger to Riddle. “So, is he officially yours now?”

Saga clasped her hands behind her back. “How do you mean?”

“Have you taken him as your partner and your familiar?” Leigh asked, watching the way the cat sniffed the ricotta before carefully licking it. “He’s a free agent right now. A wandering spirit, living his days as if he were a normal cat.”

Saga nodded. “As opposed to…?”

“Well, when bonded with a witch, familiars have their full powers. Shape-shifting, minor illusions, small magics that can aid their witch in their spellwork. Familiars can be incredibly valuable—especially ones who have kept a connection to this side of the veil for so long. They ensure knowledge is never lost.”

Guilt sat in Saga’s stomach like a lead weight. “Should you be taking him then?”

“I’ve never had the need for a familiar, to be honest. I worry he’d be bored out of his mind in my home. Beyond religious observation, I don’t cast anymore.” Leigh gently stroked the top of Riddle’s head, thinking something over.

“But you’re still willing to teach me, right?”

“As much as I know,” Leigh confirmed. “Which I’m afraid is not going to be as much as you want, but that’s a bridge we’ll cross when we get to it. Honestly, you won’t need me once you’re able to connect with him. He’s a whole library of information. He’ll be a great teacher. But there are things you should know before taking that step.” The older woman continued to pet the cat with perhaps a little more pressure than needed and Riddle slunk out from beneath the affection to curl around Saga’s feet. “I’ve personally never performed a bonding ceremony for a familiar, but I am willing to help you craft one.” Leigh’s face clouded over. “Perhaps we might even find some of your grandmother’s old spells.”

Riddle placed a paw over the toe of Saga’s house slipper, and she could feel his claws extend as a warning. Do not mention the grimoire.

“Perhaps,” Saga croaked in agreement. She swallowed and returned to a subject that didn’t feel like lying. “What sort of things do I need to know before Riddle and I bond?”

“Well, first, do you know what it means to be bonded?” Leigh plated a few of the tartlets and practically waltzed back into the main room to sit at the table. “Why is all your furniture pushed up against the walls? Were you exercising?”

Saga looked at Riddle, who appeared particularly smug even for a cat. “Something like that,” she replied as she took a seat opposite Leigh. “I know through a bond we’ll be able to actually talk to each other.”

“You’ll be linked—emotionally and mentally. You’ll be able to communicate in full conversations. They become your guide through the veil—a direct link to the other side. The trade-off, of course, being that you are then both responsible for each other should the laws of magic ever be broken.”

Saga’s eyebrows raised. “The laws of magic?”

“Did you think it was without rules? Regulations?”

“Formal regulations?” Saga had always imagined there were rules. Everything had rules of some kind. Even if they weren’t enforced, there were “best practices” or simply an order of operations. There was of course what Avery did, but that seemed less about magical law and more about preventing Mundane discovery when magic was used to break the law. “Is there a magic police?”

“They’re called sentinels, they work for the Winter Council, and if you violate one of the Five Laws, they absolutely will put you on trial, and you will be lucky if your only punishment is imprisonment.”

Ah. Very formal regulations with very formal enforcement then. “Right.”

“Don’t worry, they’re all very basic and nothing you’d ever be at risk of breaking…” She trailed off as her thoughts fled elsewhere, lost in another time or place before she waved the dream away with her hand. “Well, anyway… Number one: Magic shall not end or create life. Pretty self-explanatory. Don’t use magic to kill anyone.”

“But maiming them is fine?” Saga asked with a small, mischievous smile.

Riddle made a purr-like sound that Saga could have sworn was a laugh.

It was a joke that she would have suspected Leigh would appreciate. It was a joke she thought would make her laugh and lighten the mood. It did not.

Saga could not recall if she’d ever seen her aunt look so severe and humorless as she did in that moment. She cleared her throat and took a tartlet off the plate. “What do you mean by the ‘create life’ part?”

“No resurrection, no true necromancy or creating something like a doppelgänger or a fetch.”

“True necromancy?”

Leigh took a deep breath and sat back in her chair as she debated how exactly to answer. “We can reach out to the other side, but it’s illegal to rip someone through the veil and attempt to keep them on the mortal plane, whether resurrecting them into their own body or a different sort of vessel entirely.”

This sounded too familiar. “You mean what Osian Goff tried to do to me? With Eira’s spirit?”

Leigh clasped a hand around Saga’s. “Yes, dear girl, I do.”