With an angry father baring down on him, all Lucas could do was to try and back away, holding his hands up as he tried to appease the man in some sort of way. Even without magic, Fay’s father was buff enough to easily destroy him, especially with the shovel he was wielding.

  “No! I swear it’s not like that!” He quickly blurted out.

  “Oh? Are you saying that my little girl isn’t good enough?” The man’s words caused Lucas’ eyes to go wide as dinner plates and he swiftly tried to backpedal.

  “No! No I don’t mean it like that!”

  Luckily, Lucas wasn’t allowed to make a fool of himself for long. Fay was quick to step in between the two and glared at her father.

  “Dad, stop!” It wasn’t a request anymore, but an order.

  “Dear, calm down a bit. You’re clearly scaring the boy. It wouldn’t be nice to scare off Fay’s first boyfriend.”

  “W-What?! No, I’m not- We’re not-” Lucas tried to deny it, but he could barely piece together a single coherent thought to try and clear things up. He tried to fight down the heat he felt building in his cheeks, but he could feel himself blushing.

  While he appreciated the attempt from Fay’s mother to try and get the woman’s husband to back off, the insinuation that he and Fay were dating left Lucas red in the face and even more flustered than before. Fay was incredibly beautiful and he thought that she was really fun, but they’d only just met.

  “MOM!” Fay was even worse, her face lighting up with a bright red blush as she turned her attention towards her mother. “It’s not like that! He’s not my boyfriend; I’m just helping him!”

  Lucas just nodded his head from behind the blonde, not trusting his own words at that point. If he kept trying to talk, he knew that he was only going to make the situation worse somehow. Her father clearly didn’t like him and her mother had her own opinions that were not helping things.

  “If he’s not your boyfriend, why in the world are you bringing a boy into the house?” Her father questioned. Thankfully, he’d gotten rid of the metallic shovel and mostly lost the terrifying grin he’d been giving Lucas…

  Mostly.

  “Because I saved his life and he needed help. He’s a new blood, and I couldn’t just leave him!”

  Fay’s explanation immediately shifted the tone in the room. The jovial, joking, and playful expressions on Fay’s parent’s faces dropped and became something far more serious in seconds.

  “If he’s a new blood, why did you bring him here? Wouldn’t it have been better to send him back through the Mirror he got in through? Is that why it took you so long to get back home?”

  The points that Fay’s father brought up were good ones, and something that Lucas could silently admit that he’d thought about before. But even then, it hurt to know that the man seemed to not want him around.

  But Fay wasn’t backing down at all. “Because it wouldn’t be fair to him, dad! He deserves to see all this!”

  The older man scowled at his daughter, his expression stormy as he sharply gestured behind him. Both he and Fay ducked further down the hall, and Lucas could only hear an occasional word or two of the rather heated conversation between father and daughter. But it also left him alone with Fay’s mother.

  “They’ll be done soon. I’m sorry about that, my husband has a bit of a temper at times. And when he’s in a good mood, he can be a jokester. You’re in no danger in this house, I promise you that.”

  Some part of Lucas relaxed when he heard the woman’s promise. He’d been so tense and nervous about the encounter that he’d subconsciously been holding his breath.

  “It’s ok. I’m sorry for causing you all any trouble.”

  “The only trouble you could possibly be causing us is making us wash an extra plate after dinner. Fay offered you a place here for whatever reason, and my daughter tends to be a good judge of character,” She said as she rested a hand on his arm for a moment and gave him a small, comforting smile.

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  Unlike her husband, Fay’s mother immediately made him feel more than welcome in the house. She so easily offered him a place at her table, even though she didn’t have to. It was nice and the gesture reminded him of how his own mother would often go out of her way to help people. That thought stung, the reminder that he wouldn’t be able to see his own mother for a while.

  “And who is this adorable little one?” The older blonde asked as she reached out and scratched underneath Dusk’s chin. The fox happily leaned into the touch, eagerly enjoying the attention. Lucas could even feel a rumbling from the little fox as she purred almost like a cat.

  “This is Dusk. She’s-”

  Before Lucas could say much more, Fay and her father came back into the room. Fay’s head was hung low, and she looked ashamed, while her father looked frustrated.

  “Lucas, correct? I’d like to apologize for my daughter’s actions. You should have been brought back home when she found you instead of putting you in more danger. I can arrange for you to be sent home tomorrow or the day after.”

  The offer was not what Lucas had been expecting. And when he looked towards Fay, he could see her looking even more downtrodden. The offer was tempting, incredibly so, but there was one thing that held him back from agreeing.

  “Thank you… But I can’t go back yet,” Lucas admitted, much to the surprise of Fay and her parents. “Fay was right. If I go back, then I’ll never be able to come back to this world again without getting myself killed. And after seeing all this,” He gestured vaguely towards the world outside the house. “I can’t just go back to living my normal life ignoring that magic exists.”

  Fay was now beaming, a bright grin splitting her face as she realized what Lucas was staying.

  “If you’ll allow me to, I want to stay the month that Fay suggested. I want to learn enough magic to defend myself, so that I can come back here again in the future,” He explained.

  The two adults turned towards one another, sharing a silent conversation between them for a few moments. Eventually, though, they turned towards Lucas and Fay’s father sighed. Fay just seemed even happier, practically bouncing in place.

  “We can’t force you to go back home, Lucas. But if you’re serious about this, then Fay won’t be the only one teaching you while you’re here. My wife and I will be helping to make sure that you’re able to take care of yourself by the time you leave. Your training will be difficult, I can promise you that much, but when the month is over, you’ll be ready.”

  It was more than Lucas could have expected. He’d been planning to rely on Fay to learn whatever he could but having her parents help as well would be even better. Though, while he didn’t want to leave just yet, that didn’t mean that he wanted to leave his parents to worry for an entire month.

  “I’d love that, thank you so much! But Fay mentioned that it might be possible to get a message to my family. Is that something we could actually do?” He asked, his tone sounding a bit more desperate than he would have liked.

  Luckily, Fay’s mother had an easy answer. “We can. It shouldn’t be too hard. If you can write up a letter and give us the address, we can have someone in town get it into the mail on the other side of the Mirrors. As long as you know your home address, they should get it in the mail soon enough.”

  Sending his parents a letter wasn’t what Lucas had been expecting, but the more he thought about the suggestion, the more sense it made. No one in Helstrum likely knew where he lived, so the mail system was the best way to actually get anything to his family.

  “Now then, you two arrived just in time for dinner. We can shelve all this serious talk for later, but for now, I’d like to eat before the food gets cold,” The older woman explained.

  The mention of dinner got both father and daughter to perk up, and Fay was quick to rush out of the room and towards the kitchen.

  “Seems like she missed your cooking, dear,” Fay’s mother joked, nudging her husband before turning to Lucas again.

  “Come on, then. My husband made some steaks and he’s quite skilled when it comes to cooking,” As she turned away to head towards the kitchen, the woman paused and looked back over her shoulder. “And you can call me Lissa while you’re here, Lucas. It’s quite nice to have you here.”

  “I’m Magnus. And my wife has the right idea. Food’s going to get cold and you’re going to need plenty of energy for tomorrow,” The now named patriarch suggested.

  Having only fed on jerky and some berries over the last few days, the idea of a warm, fresh, home cooked meal sounded particularly good to Lucas.

  “That sounds good, thank you.”

  Lucas went to follow after the others to get some food for himself, but before he could, he was stopped by a firm hand landing heavily upon his shoulder. Dusk just barely dodged out of the way in time to avoid it. She didn’t seem to like the intrusion and growled at the offending hand, though she restrained from biting at it.

  “And if you ever hurt my daughter outside of sparring and training, then that shovel will be the least of your worries. There are plenty of things I can make that are much sharper than a shovel, after all.”

  The man’s expression had darkened as he made his threat. But the moment he’d made it, the normal smile was back and Magnus gave the young man a nudge on the arm.

  “Now come on, let’s eat.”

  Thoroughly intimidated, Lucas followed behind the terrifying father. He began to wonder just what he’d managed to get himself into now…

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~