Clara's was next and this one he had been looking forward to.
He thought about what Clara needed. She was a young girl, beautiful in a way that was going to be increasingly visible to the world, fiercely capable of looking after herself and deeply unwilling to admit when she couldn't, with the specific stubborn independence of someone who had decided that needing help was a concession she was not going to make easily. Whatever he built for her needed to not look like protection. It needed to look like something she chose to have rather than something assigned to her.
He thought: what would Clara choose to have, if the option existed?
He thought about his previous life — specifically about the games he had played, the fantasy worlds he had loved, the specific category of creature that had always struck him as the most perfectly designed combination of appealing and terrifying. The cat sith. Small enough to fit in a palm, ancient enough to be unknowable, with the specific quality of something that looked like it should be harmless and was in fact the opposite of harmless.
Clara would love a cat. Clara would especially love a cat that was secretly the most dangerous thing for miles.
He worked smaller this time — the troll bones filed down to fine material, the construction delicate, the form taking shape with the precision of someone doing close work. A kitten. Not a grown cat — a kitten, the size that fit in a palm, with the specific proportions of something newborn: large head, round eyes, the soft uncoordinated look of something that had not yet grown into itself.
Clara had long blonde hair. He matched it: a fine golden coat, the color of late afternoon sunlight, long enough to be soft to the touch. The eyes he made a vivid gold to match — the specific amber-gold that caught light and held it, that made people look twice and think: unusual.
The spells went in: the same comprehensive catalog he had built for the retriever, adapted for a cat's form and capabilities. Physical strength calibrated to the frame — which meant that the kitten, at its small size, could exert the force per unit area of something considerably larger. At full extension, which required the size-expansion Arthur built in as a separate capability, the cat sith could reach the size of a large tiger with all the force enhancement still active. The magical arsenal was, if anything, more diverse — he had leaned into the offensive capabilities more than he had for Edric's companion, because the situations Clara was most likely to encounter were the situations he had been thinking about since the festival.
Anyone who tried to take Clara was going to have opinions about this.
The teleport failsafe went in last. Then the mind — warmer this time, more playful, with the specific quality of a creature that was going to be genuinely fond of its person rather than simply loyal to them. He thought about Clara's personality and tried to match it: confident, expressive, not given to unnecessary subtlety.
The kitten opened its eyes.
Gold, as designed. And behind them, that same new flicker of presence, this one with a slightly different character than the retriever's — quicker, brighter, already curious about the world it had just arrived in.
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Lyra's, he thought about most carefully.
Lyra was perceptive. Lyra noticed things. Whatever he made for Lyra was going to be examined closely and questioned thoughtfully and the questions were going to be good ones, because Lyra's questions were always good ones. He wanted to make her something that matched her — something with depth and elegance and the specific quality of a thing that rewarded close attention.
He thought about the elemental foxes from the literature of his previous life — the creatures that were built from natural forces rather than from flesh, that carried elemental affinities as part of their fundamental nature, that grew their tails as they aged and developed, the nine-tailed fox of a hundred legends being a creature that had simply had enough time and experience to become extraordinary.
A fox. Small enough to lay along Lyra's shoulders like a scarf, to nestle against her neck, to perch on top of her head with its small legs dangling. The form he settled on was longer-bodied than a natural fox, lower to the ground, almost mink-like in its proportions — built for agility rather than speed, for the specific grace of something that moved through the world like water moving through narrow spaces.
Pure white. It came to him immediately and felt right: the clean white of new snow, of moonlight on still water, with fine silver streaks along the tail. The tail itself split at the tip — two points now, with the capacity to grow more as the creature aged and developed, the full nine a distant possibility but a real one, each new tail a mark of genuine growth rather than a constructed attribute.
He built the elemental affinity in carefully, woven through the body at a deeper level than the spells — not a spell the fox could cast but something it was, the way Arthur's shadow affinity was something he was rather than something he did. Wind and light, he decided: the clean cold elements, the ones that moved through the world without taking up space in it.
The spells went in — the same catalog, adapted for this form, with particular emphasis on utility and support rather than direct offense. Not because he was skimping on Lyra's protection, but because her companion's greatest capability was going to be its elemental nature, being able to float with the wind, provide a healing touch with light and protect Lyra with everything it had.
The small white fox opened silver-tinted eyes.
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Thomas got a black labrador because Thomas was mostly with dad and was most likely to take over the family farm. He was practical and a black labrador was the most practical dog that had ever existed. Arthur built it with the same care as the rest. The mind he gave it was steady and reliable and genuinely fond of the quiet, which matched Thomas exactly.
His mother last. And here he paused, because his mother required the most thought.
Mira Voss was twenty-eight years old and looked twenty and was the most perceptive person in the Voss family by a margin that Arthur had long respected. She noticed things. She noticed them without appearing to notice them and she filed them and she waited, with the patient certainty of someone who understood that answers eventually came to people who were paying attention, for the moment when the filing became understanding.
She was also Clara's closest companion. The two of them moved through the world together — the village, the market, the neighbors, the dozen small domains of a farm wife's daily life — and what Clara encountered, Mira was usually nearby for.
Another cat sith. They would be a pair too, which felt right: his mother and his sister, each with their own small fierce companion, the two cats able to coordinate between themselves through the connection to Arthur if something required coordination.
He built her a short-haired cat with grey fur and white spots scattered across it like a handful of snow had landed on her back and stayed. Big blue eyes — his mother had big blue eyes and he made the cat's a match, the same clear vivid blue that he had seen every morning of his life. Smaller than Clara's — more compact, more settled, the form of something that had already decided exactly what it was and was comfortable with the decision.
The personality he built in was the one that arrived naturally when he thought about what would suit his mother: confident, self-possessed, with the specific quality of something that was affectionate on its own terms and not on anyone else's. Dignified. Unhurried. The kind of presence that walked into a room and immediately owned it without making any particular effort.
The blue eyes opened.
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