The Familiars of the Lost Witch (ONC 2024)

3. Asha

The sun was already setting, the last rays shining trough the kitchen window and illuminating the room one last time. Cybele would be shocked, if she came home and saw the chaos in her sanctuary. Every surface was covered in flour, the floor too and kitchen utensils were lying everywhere. They really had to clean up first thing in the morning. No, the human had to clean while Asha told him where to put everything.

But now it was time to go to sleep. It had been a long day and Asha hadn't got the chance to take her long naps like usual. She had to supervise the human boy and Kyrell, so they wouldn't damage or steal anything and because of that she felt unusually tired. Unfortunatly she hadn't been able to stop them from causing this mess. Cybele would be very disappointed if she found out.

---

A few hours ago

A grumbling sound struck Asha's sensitive ears. The pained expression on the boy's face made it clear, that it was coming from his stomach. At second glance she could see how thin he was, when was the last time he had a proper meal?

Without another thought she walked past him into the kitchen next door, gesturing that he should follow her. "Let's cook you something. Do you know how to cook?"

"Cook?" The asking tone in his voice and eyes made it clear that he didn't. Hopefully, he would learn quickly.

She hopped on the counter where Cybele had her recipe books. "You just need to follow the recipe, it's easy. Let's see, try this one", she said and tapped a book with her paw.

He took the book for her and opened it. There was a table of contents on the first page. "You don't have any allergies, do you?" As he shook his head, Asha tapped on a recipe with one of her claws, without damaging the page of course. "Then try this one." 

It turned out, he wasn't very good at reading, so she had to not only give instructions, but also read the recipe out loud. His face when he realised she could read better than him was quite amusing.

"We need eggs, salt, flour..."

"I'll get the flour!", croaked Kyrell enthusiastically, of course he had followed them and wanted to help too. Before Asha could stop him, he flew up and opened the cupbourd with his claws.

A white cloud rained down on them, flour filled her mouth that she had opened to warn Kyrell. She coughed and hissed and shook herself to get the flour out. That dumb crow, there was a reason why he wasn't allowed in the kitchen.

---

"You saw it too, right?", asked Kyrell next to her and snapped her out of her thoughts. Obviously, he didn't mean the chaos surrounding them, he didn't even seem particualy guilty. But Asha wasn't sure what exactly he meant, who knew what was going on in his small brain.

"What do you mean?" She didn't have time for games, he should just spill the beans or leave it be. She didn't want to guess. Whatever it was, it wasn't more important than her sleep, she thought.

He pointed in the direction of the door where she could hear the boys sleeping noises. After a warm meal he just dropped on the armchair and fell asleep. He couldn't mean his snoring, he must have seen something related to the boy Asha didn't notice.

"Cursed blood", he croaked.

Now he had her attention. Asha stopped licking her whitened paw, the flour tasted disgusting, and faced him. "He's cursed?"

Kyrell nodded, then shook his head. He really learned too much human behavior from being raised by a witch instead of other birds. "No, he has a curse, but he wasn't the one cursed."

So someone passed their curse unto him, most likely a direct ancestor, interesting. If she had to guess, that was also the reason behind his supposed namelessness.

She didn't like to admit it, but Kyrell had a special sense for all that magical stuff. Asha didn't believe in the supernatural and liked to make fun of Kyrell for his fear of ghosts, but when it came to magic, he had the upper wing.

"Is it a harmful one?", she asked, but on second thought it was clear that it wasn't. Even though Kyrell couldn't see what kind of curse it was, they were sure it could not harm others. If it were harmful, Cybele would never have allowed the boy to come to them. She would never put her familiars in danger.

"Should we trust him?" As good as Kyrells senses for all kinds of magic were, he wasn't very good at reading others intentions. It was easy to gain his trust and he would always assume the best in others. On the other hand, reading people was Asha's strong point and he had learned to trust her judgement.

They still didn't know much about the boy, but Asha remembered she had met him on the streets on her nightly adventures. They didn't interact then, she just observed him from afar. He seemed to be a cat person, caring for the stray cats. For that alone he couldn't be a bad person. Asha would ask her feline friends about him, they should know more and  they still owed her a favor.

"I don't thing he's a bad person and I'm sure Cybele had her reasons for picking him. Maybe she wants us to help him or take care of him? I mean, we don't really need him, do we?", Ash meowed confidently.

That wasn't entirely true, they did need him for the fire, but that was it. They could catch their own food and she could take care of Kyrell on her own.

The boy had seemed so lost and alone when she saw him on the streets, he needed their company far more than they his. Asha was sure about that. And she had to admit, it was nice to finally have someone who really listened to her and did what she said. That was seldom the case with Kyrell and she shouldn't even try to boss around Cybele or she wouldn't get her favorite treats.

Were would this all lead? She didn't know, but she also didn't want to think about it now.

"Let's go to sleep," she said, strutted past the sleeping boy and hopped on the windowsill, Kyrell following her.

Rolling up in her favorite place, Kyrell right next to her. He refused to sleep in his own nest, maybe he was scared they would dissapear on him like Cybele while he slepped. Asha wouldn't say it out loud, but she liked his warmth on her side.

With the soft snoring of the boy and feeling Kyrells heartbeat, she fell asleep as the moon took the place of the sun. Normally that was the time she would leave the house and roam around. Maybe she would do that later, if she could stand up without waking Kyrell, but now she just wanted to stay there and sleep.

___

Word count:
chapter: 1186 words
in total: 4848 words

first half of the second milestone, I hope I can finish on time. ^^"

Please leave your thoughts in the comments and if you see any mistakes, point them out.

Hope you like the story so far. ^^