"You're late," Brianne said as soon as the wind rustled behind her. "Clothes are at the chair by the TV."
"I'm not, I come at this time every day," Sam countered back. He took the clothes and wished, once again, desperately for magic. He used to be able to teleport himself anywhere, now all he can do is rely on Brianne's portal which only opens every 3 AM and closes at exactly 4 AM. He combed through his jet black hair with his hands and took the opportunity to look at the mirror and see himself as a human. He wasn't vain. It wasn't as if he eagerly wanted to check out his slim figure or his clean shaven face, where the stubble was already showing after his shave yesterday. He needed a shave. Anyway, that's off topic. Again, he wasn't vain. But once in a while, when you haven't seen yourself for like 23 hours in a day, a person would eventually miss looking at himself in the mirror. He needed a cut as well, his hair was already almost at his eyes, he wondered if he could get Brianne to cut his hair again. Oh well, he thought. Better get back to Brie.
"Yes, and I tell you to come earlier every day so you can help me look for the answer longer," she complained, scowling at him.
He smiled. But Brianne knew that the smile was tinged with sadness. "I'm sorry Brie, I know that I've burdened you with this task but I just need, at the very least, 10 minutes with her, as a human."
She sighed. "I know, I know. Let's get started then."
Brianne was his closest cousin. When the whole family disowned him because of his sins it was only his immediate family and Brianne who stood by his side. He could not burden his mom or dad with the task that he has given Brianne as that would mean risking them getting disowned as well. He wouldn't have asked Brianne to help him either but she has already started to try and find him when they met. She insisted on helping when she found out what happened to him. And once Brianne has made up her mind, there was no stopping her from doing what she wanted. He decided it was safer for Brianne if he worked with her instead of forbidding her because she would've tried to help him with or without his permission. At least this way if he felt like she would be putting herself at risk, he would know it immediately and stop her before anything happened.
"What have you got?" Sam asked, hoping there is news.
"I found an old text referring to a spell that could counteract a curse, invalidate it altogether. But the tricky part here, other than this is once again black magic, is that invalidating a curse would invalidate all magic connected to that curse. So…"
"Meaning that Caitlyn would die again. No, that is not an option." He turned towards the kitchen and poured himself coffee. He sniffed at the rich dark scent and slowly drank from the cup. At least he got to drink coffee an hour a day.
"If only there was any way to summon Adrianna. That would be the quickest way to help you, for her to just turn you back to a human and not undo the rest of the magic," she complained, fixing her green eyes at him while he drank his coffee. Frustration was slowly eating at her, they have been at this for nearly a year and still nothing.
"You know that she only comes when there is something for her. She knows if you summon her only to trick her or catch her, that's what makes her so dangerous," he responded, walking back to Brianne's desk and looking at the manuscript that she has been reading. "Any way we could rewrite the spell?"
She smirked at him, "if I knew how to rewrite black magic I would've just written one in the first place and got this stupid curse off of you."
"What's gotten into you anyway? You're grumpier than usual."
"It's been a year Sam, and where has that gotten us? Nowhere but to this manuscript which is completely useless," she shoved at the manuscript, rubbing her hands over her pale face then pressing her fingers against her temple where a headache was starting.
Sam smiled. When you were a cat more often than not, you start to crave the feeling of being loved by someone. It didn't matter if it was romantic love or any other kind of love, just the feeling of someone caring for you and he could certainly see and feel that from Brianne at the moment. "Come," he said, motioning towards the door. "Stand outside with me."
"We have 30 minutes left, Sam, we can't just go gallivanting whenever we want to," she said, frowning.
"Come on, Brianne," he urged, tucking her long brunette hair behind her ear and pulling at her hands to get her out of where she was sitting. "You need air."
She sighed again, shaking her head. "Fine," she said walking with him towards the porch.
Once out he breathed in the fresh air. It's not like he couldn't enjoy this while being a cat, but have you ever tried to breathe deeply when there are fur balls in your mouth? It wasn't pleasant. So he relished the feeling of being out and about and human. "Don't stress yourself out, cousin," he smiled at her.
"I miss you, Sam. I want you back, and not just for an hour each day. When mom and dad died almost 15 years ago you don't know how lost I was at that time." A tear started to slide down her face and he wiped it away. She closed her eyes and held his hand to her cheeks as the emotions started to flow out of her. "I was so lost, you didn't understand but you made sure you were there. You didn't leave me and you became the brother I never had. I love you and I just want you to be happy. I know that the way to do that is if you could come back and be able to meet with Caitlyn again. I want to help so bad and it's so frustrating that I can't find anything to help."
He hugged her, touched by her concern. "I miss you too, Brie. But you can't let what is happening to me rule your life. It can't be your main purpose. You need to live. You have your whole life ahead of you and me, I'm ok. I'm with Caitlyn almost all the time anyway. It might not be in a way that I want but still, it's better than nothing. If helping me means you throwing away your life for this, then I don't see how it can be worth it."
She leaned her head on his shoulder and looked out at the horizon. "I'll find another manuscript. Are you sure that both of you will die if I told her about you?"
"Adriana hasn't said anything that have not yet come true, she may have omitted some things but anything she has said happened. So there's no reason to doubt her now." He hugged her, rubbing her arms to comfort her. "I won't be coming tomorrow by the way. I wanted to roam around a little, make sure Caitlyn is safe when she goes out tomorrow."
"Sure, I'll combed through the rest of the manuscripts that I found. I may have missed something."
"Ok, give me some to read too. I can try and read tomorrow. I've got to go. It's almost time." He motioned to go in but stopped when he felt Brie's slim hands on his arm.
"Be careful out there, Sam. Stay safe. We'll get you back."
"Yeah, I can't wait for that day to come. I'll grab a couple of the manuscripts before I go back and maybe borrow a couple of your books for research."
She nodded and watched her cousin go back to the house, heard footsteps, saw a bright light and knew he was back at Caitlyn's house, as a cat. She prayed to all the gods that they find the way to fix this and soon.