Contract? What is he talking about?

"Wait, no, you need to leave!" the unsafe situation we were in brought me back.

"I can't" he said it so simply that I was a little worried that he didn't know the predicament he was in.

"No! That's impossible." My grandmother again caught my attention as she shouted at us. Ulis's arm went around my waist, pressing me tightly against him as my knee gave. My hand was gripping his shirt at his chest. Being this close to him made me noticed he was radiating heat.

"Don't let them!" she told her minions and they all rushed forward.

"If any one of you move another inch closer to him I'll kill you where you stand." I blinked up at him now. His voice was usually a deep soothing tone but now it growled with such lethal intent that it even made me shrink back. The others seemed to feel it too because they all stopped their advance, even my grandmother couldn't make them move.

The feel of something tugging on my chin made me look up to Ulis as he lifted my head to him with his thumb and forefinger.

"Make the contract with me August" then my eyes widened.

"No way" I said in realization.

"I've been waiting twenty two years for you to make our contract and when I noticed that I wasn't feeling your call from the ceremony I knew something was wrong."

"But how did you find me?"

"I've always had a link to you since your birth. Every familiar has a connection to their destine master. Now please, make the contract with me and I can protect you"

In the fading light I could just barely make out his face. His auburn hair, his red slitted eyes that seemed to be the only thing I could see in the dim light. His skin looked to be steaming in the increasingly cold rain.

So he was a familiar? Which meant I could take up the position my mother had last. I really didn't want to. I hated this family. I didn't want to be next in line. But now that my grandmother knew that I could take my mother's place she'd be even more hell bent on killing me.

I glanced back into Ulis's eyes and saw something like desperation but it wasn't for him. It was for me. I sighed raising my head up towards the sky, I felt the rain pelt my face as I let that ancient power of my blood start to flow through me. It was all instinctual as I opened myself up to the magic. A gentle wind began to pick up around our feet.

"No!"

'It was too late, she should have finished me off when she had the chance.' I thought as the breeze became stronger and stronger, starting a tornado like wind around us. Leaves swirled with it sending our hair to whip in our faces. Soon my temperature was rising till I felt like I was burning on the inside.

"Ah" I gasped. This was something different. It was like something was waking up inside me besides the Dana 'Taya blood.

"It's alright" Ulis suddenly whispered in my ear as he held me tighter. "Just let it happen."

I looked up at him with uncertainty but his face was set in a reassuring smile. Tightened my grip on his shirt I did as he said. Not long after I noticed a soft glow spreading up along my skin till I was completely illuminated. I watched it spread from me to Ulis but where mine was a white glow, his was red.

"I'm not going to allow you to!" my grandmother exclaimed once more and soon the air was filled with the loud sound of a gun firing. I flinched hiding my face into Ulis's chest, as if that would stop me from being shot.

Not a second after we were shot at, the ground around us erupted in fire in a perfect circle, like a shield. I watched with wide eyes.

"Dammit!"

"How-" I stuttered.

"Now finish the contract August, it's up to you." Ulis urged.

Reaching my hand up behind his head I pulled his head down, pressing his forehead against mine and closed my eyes.

"I claim this man as my familiar, I claim him as my companion for the rest of my days, till my death sets him free. I ask for his loyalty and I shall give mine freely." I announced letting the wind carry my voice with it to let the universe know that Ulis was mine and I was his; bound together forever.

"Nothing shall separate us and I make this pledge that anywhere my master goes I will follow. If ever he is in trouble, I will protect him with my everything. He is my master and I am his loyal servant, forever in his keeping, I will never betray you." Ulis joined. I could see the chains of the binding words creeping up his from his chest and slowly circling around his neck like a collar.

These ceremonial words had always rubbed me the wrong way with all the master and servant talk but these were ancient words that couldn't be so easily reformed. But I wanted to do something, I wanted to change this ritual in some way.

"But if ever there was a time before my death, that you wanted to leave; you have only to ask and I will grant you your freedom." Ulis's eyes widened then as I added words that weren't part of the ritual. And suddenly the air changed between us. Abruptly my arm was forced away from holding the back of his head, while his was yanked from around my waist. Together our fingers were intertwined. We both gasped as the chains forming around his neck receded and instead made a journey down his arm and onto mine till both of our hands were coiled with the translucent chains.

Then it moved at the same time to our ring fingers, it spiraled from the base, down past the knuckle changing shape as it went. Glowing a bright red against our skin in the darkening light I could make out the shape of a dragon? Confused we both looked into each other's eyes unsure of what just happened. This wasn't the mark of the familiar. The caster wasn't supposed to have a visible mark. It was usually placed where no one could see it or find it easily. Only the familiar carried the mark for all to see and it wasn't supposed to be a ring. It was a collar. Was it because I had changed up the words at the end? As it settled there, making a dark solid tattoo like band something inside of me tightened with it and I instinctually knew it was our bond forming, tying our souls together. There was no going back now. He was tied to me and I him.

The fire around us died abruptly as Ulis got down to one knee, my hand still held in his. Leaning forward for my grandmother and her cloaked minions to see, since the fire shield was gone, and placed his lips against the mark on my finger. It burned at the touch of his skin. Shooting up my arm and vibrating encasing my whole body in warmth. I instantly felt safe and comforted.

"We are bound now and nothing shall harm what I vow to protect." So this is what having a familiar felt like. He was like a lost puzzle piece, perfectly shaped to fill the empty void that had always been inside me.

His wild red hair flowed gently still in the wind I had made, as it slowly came to a stop. The ceremony was complete. Reaching out I placed my hand atop his hair. Caressing back the soft fiery strands as he still held his head over my hand.

"I leave myself in your care Ulis" I whispered as the last of my energy drained from my body and collapsed, unable to keep myself awake any longer. The last thing I remembered was strong arms catching me before I could hit the ground and a deep soothing voice.

"Don't worry, leave everything to me"

********

I woke with a start, shooting up in a sitting position on a bed.

i turned my head over to find none other than Nobu sitting on a chair next to the bed. His hair was lite up by the light outside streaming through the window. Even his brown eyes were illuminated to a deep brown honey color in the sunlight.

"Nobu? What are you doing here?" he snapped his head up from looking down at his phone in surprise and quickly put it away and smiled at me.

"Finally, you're up! And that's kind of a long story but short version, I was the one that brought you and Ulis back to your house."

"My house?" my traveled around the room and yes in fact it was. The barren room was familiar as I took it in. I think this was the first time I had slept in this bed.

"Wait, how do you know where I live?" the question just dawning on me. I had never brought Nobu over or have I ever told him my address.

"How did you-"

"We'll get to that later. How are you feeling August?" he asked getting to his feet and leaning over the bed. He reached his hand out and touched my forehead.

"Good, it's gone down"

"What?" I frowned lifting my hand up to my own forehead and touched it.

"You had a fever after we brought you back here."

"I did?"

"Yep, Ulis was super worried."

Ulis! Right, I almost forgot. He was my familiar now. Blinking I shifted my legs over the edge of the bed and noticed that I felt no pain as I moved. I should be in so much pain I shouldn't be able to move.

"Wait I was pretty banged up how am I better?"

This brought him up short as he tilted his head in confusion.

"Your hurt? Where?" his eyes traveled down my body now as he tried to find wounds.

"I don't see anything." He frowned looking back to me again. Mirroring him I did a once over on myself and noticed that I didn't have a scratch on me.

How was that possible? I had busted my knee when falling from that hill and jumping from that stag had did a number on me as well.

Then all of a sudden I remembered something but it was almost like a dream

*****

My body was hot, too hot. I woke up with a hiss as I was consumed by pain all over.

"Hold still just for a moment longer." An unfamiliar male voice spoke and I opened my eyes with a frown. From the echo of his voice around us and the constant drip of water somewhere off in the distance, it sounded like a cave.

"Who are you?" I asked almost deliriously as my eyes refused to focus on him.

"Your familiar is outside checking for enemies" he said placing a firm warm hand on my shoulder to keep me in place while his other hovered inches from me, roaming all over.

That didn't answer my question.

"No," I cried weakly trying to push him away. "You're with her aren't you?"

They were going to finish me off. Where was Ulis? Did they kill him when I fell unconscious?

"Calm yourself August, I'm not here to hurt you"

"Ugh" my body was on fire now, "What are you doing to me?" my eyes were starting to clear but it was too dark to make him out. All I could make out was that his unusually waist length long hair was silver in the moonlight and it obscured my vision from him.

"There, the next time you wake up you should be pain free." Suddenly he was standing above me. His face shaded between his curtain of hair. He starting down at me quietly for a moment before he waved his hand above me and without warning I was once again thrown into the black voice of unconsciousness.

"I'm sorry"

*****

"Let's go down stairs and get you something to eat." Nobu said watching me closely, bringing me out of my head and that dream... memory? I didn't know.

Who was that anyway?

"Plus there's a really worried someone who's been pacing the floor so long he's going to make a permanent grove with his feet." He laughed and helped me to my feet. I guess it was officially time to meet my familiar.