Page 69 of Frayed Owner

“Of course. I agreed with your worries about eyes on what Mark Oliveria might pull and too many cooks in this particular kitchen. Which is also why I’ve done this on my own on the side without consulting anyone, even Tracey.” She chuckled when I frowned. “You have too much pressure on you, Bevin. Sometimes it’s nice just to try things out without it being a project.”

By the gods, I couldn’t agree more. Now I was excited to see what she’d thought of.

I was stunned when I saw it was bags and bags full of the yarn I’d been using for the familiar comfort blankets… But it was already woven as we would need. I glanced from her to what I was holding in my hands.

“No one knows,” she promised. “I asked the staff of a human friend to help and paid for them to do it extra saying it was for a group exercise at the college I’m starting to mentor at. She took the bait and was just happy for the extra money for her staff. They won’t ever know since they’re not in our world.”

Fair enough, but it didn’t explain the plan.

But then she did and I was totally in. If this worked, it would be huge.

It would be beyond huge and handle a massive logistical issue that we hadn’t been able to figure out. So yeah, I was actually excited while trying not to get my hopes up and put pressure on myself.

That would go against the idea of doing it quietly after all.

“Do you need to focus while you do this?” she asked as I got set up.

“No, but I probably should for this test,” I hedged. “I normally listen to the familiars talk about their problems and issues they’re having or just zone out. I zone out a lot when I use my magic for work.” I bounced that around a bit. “Actually, I don’t know that you zone out and come up with answers. I tend to come up with new toys or ideas or…” I shrugged.

“I used to do the same when I knitted,” she said, seeming to understand. “You basically give your brain free rein to go where it wants and don’t focus yourself. At least mentally.”

“Yes. I just need the vibe of my magic. The rest is whatever.” I left it at that even if it didn’t explain that much. I sat in the middle of the emptied bags of finished skeins and started working on a skein of my own.

“Keep going,” Mrs. Reid guided quietly when I got to the end of the first one. “Just go with the flow and keep going. Talk if you want and I can take notes or whatever. Get things off your mind if you can. That’s what I’m seeing you need.”

That seemedverydismissive to the head of the council’s mate, an accomplished witch in her own right, but she was also my advisor and tutor in a way, so I would trust her. I tied off what I was working on and tossed it with the others before grabbing a new skein. I focused on comfort and then after a minute started talking.

I told her that I needed to update Tracey and Taylor on what I did with Jean and that Wyatt helped. Also, that I wanted to have a different type of treat for cats and dogs. We could do more than cookies because the factory said the machines—they couldn’t keep up. So we could do other treats.

I thought we could do yogurt ones since all we did was mix anyways. A rolling freezer or something that came to that setup to have with fruit cats or dogs could eat. Simple but branch out.

Next, I talked about how I wanted to change some of the plans for sessions and I didn’t know how to do it. People were too used to the format too fast like the gym. It was always evolving and so was my magic. Taylor needed another session where I basically held him up walking over their bridge like the first one.

It was a lot more magic, but they needed the confidence boost. That’s how I saw it. They were about to hit a plateau, and I wanted to skip that after how rough of a time they’d had. When Link and Loki had reached a plateau, they had bulldozed through it in a flash, both of them motivated and competitive.

That was why they had jumped so high so fast.

Taylor and Cheese werenotLink and Loki. Same with Emma and her familiar. But everyone talked and now they all said how their sessions were and acted like they were the authority. I didn’t even blame them because I was an eighteen-year-old kid.

I really wasn’t mad this time. I just didn’t know how to handle it. I wasn’t confident enough inmyselfto feel like I could adjust and pivot like a trained professional. There was no professional familiar bond therapist basically. But it was what was needed. So I needed the confidence.

And I probably should already have that. We’d figured out how to “sabotage” the brushes now so they were only the level of toys. I’d known how to do that after a bit. I’d done so much.

Why couldn’t I value myself more and have the confidence?

I pivoted again and said how hard all of the sessions were. Everyone wanted more and some were getting a bit lazy again. I was glad they were going to pay more, but they wanted more because they paid. It wouldn’t work if they didn’t put in the effort, and I didn’t want to waste my limited time if they wouldn’t.

Screw the money. I could make a ton more spending that time making toys. Or hell,restingso I could recharge and do other things. I could finally have some of those normal dates and things Kelton talked about instead of always rushing off to meet a member of the council or their mate.

That wasnotnormal college kid behavior. And some of them needed to get off their asses and seriously get to work. Not ask that I come plant the seed of magic in their own land or keep asking when I was going to do it for the council.

That made me circle back to ideas I had for the future. I did want to do a familiar assessment in the future. Not tell people who it was, but say we did have someone on staff who could talk to animals now, and if they wanted to really get an assessment of what their familiars were trying to tell them, they could. For a price, but that was fair.

Or a group one for cheaper even if that would give me a headache. It probably wouldn’t be bad if I had like five of the same species of animals unless they were a super hyper and loud animal like Mrs. Oliveria’s familiar.

I talked about several other things like wanting to work with Mrs. Daly’s daughter and being glad that Dr. Haskins accepted my extra credit. Sometimes I felt like he was speaking a different language to me still, but I wasn’t completely lost in class, so that was nice, amazing even since the first class had made me want to cry I’d been so far behind.

I got to the end of a skein and realized I was really thirsty, tying off the yarn and letting out a long breath.

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