Still, I made Mama Ami watch over all my bindings that day and double check Dammit’s work-up before I felt comfortable starting his binding process.

Between work and the emotional drain of the past two days, I collapsed onto the couch next to Trick, feeling like an empty soda can. The kind someone had already stomped on. Trick held Dammit cradled against him. Van’s ferrets were running over the back of the couch, chittering advice at me. I hushed them, because I really didn’t need any help second-guessing myself right now.

“What do I do?” Trick held out a treat for Dammit to eat. The fledgling snatched the treat away, which happened to be a lump of charcoal. You could use charcoal briquettes in a pinch, but they can have chemical additives that might upset Dammit’s gut. I’d recommended Trick keep his food as natural as he could. If Dammit had still been with his parents, they would be feeding him charred bits of nesting material. The charcoal would do fine, nutritionally, but it was a little sad that he wasn’t getting this time with his parents.

I smoothed my scrubs—I’d come straight from work and hadn’t bothered to strip and shower yet. Normally, I changed right away. I got peed on a lot at work. Or worse. Today I’d managed to come through relatively unscathed. Besides, I didn’t want to put this off any longer. “Concentrate on Dammit. Try to make your intentions clear. He probably won’t get words on the first go, but he’ll get the basics.”

Trick stroked Dammit’s chin, cooing at the bird softly.

This was one of the harder aspects of my job, but also the most satisfying. A good familiar was a partnership, a symbiotic balanced pairing. Dammit would be smarter, live longer—not just because someone would be taking care of him and offering security, but because of the magic bond itself. His life would be lengthened, and in return, he would assist Trick in his magic.

When the bond was finished, they’d be able to communicate on a psychic level. Trick would get a helper—an assistant who would aid him with spells, share their intuition and insights, and even their magic when needed. The bond was intimate, but not entirely even. Trick would gain the ability to command his familiar. That was one of the many reasons we took such care pairing a creature with a witch. The witch would be in a position of power and we didn’t want them to abuse it.

If they didn’t approach it as a sacred bond, no licensed animal mage would bind them. There weren’t necessarily a lot of rules in what I did, but the ones we had were important. The witch had to be approved, the health of both examined to make sure they could handle the process, and the familiar always, always was an animal.

To bind any Uncanny, whether it be a fawn, a shifter, or a minotaur like Jim, was unthinkable. It would be like taking away a vital part of their humanity. They’d lose autonomy. Not that we had to worry much about that last rule. Only a truly evil person would do such a thing.