I do not own Familiar of Zero

A left hand was holding onto a pair of glasses while the other hand rubbed its round lenses with a sleeve. The glasses were brought near the end of a wooden staff. A man muttered a small incantation and waited for the results.

Nothing happened.

Colbert let out a sigh as he set his round glasses back over his deep blue eyes. It seemed that nobody had pranked him by setting an illusion spell on his glasses again. Maybe somebody was currently making him see and hear things? He dismissed that theory quickly. His students around him seemed also just as lost as he was. Only some silent murmurs reached his ears every now and then.

He directed his eyes towards the cause of his lesson taking a turn from a serious rite of passage into the awkward situation they were in. In the middle of the student body and some still slightly panicking familiars, stood the young man named William and Louise who at the moment was showing her best imitation of a statue.

He really wished that the last summoner would have summoned anything else other than a human. Brimir knew she needed to. He remembered how from day one of Louise's school life she had thrown herself at the study. But despite how great her knowledge involving the theoretical aspects of magic was, doing practical magic was… problematic for her.

And if he was being honest, her temper could really use some work. But he understood her. After all, she came from one of the most influential families in Tristain. She had to carry the reputation of her family name on her shoulders and she had to withstand being targeted by other students.

He tried to stop the bullying, he really did. But there was no stopping the young students. And thanks to Louise's temper, she offered plenty of reasons for her being targeted. At least the bullying somewhat got lesser once the students became wiser, or got bored.

Another sigh escaped his lips as he stepped forwards Louise and the young man who was without a doubt, a noble. He just hoped that the situation could be solved easily.

He was in the past, there was no doubt about it. That was what William thought as he saw people around him using wands. And the fact that he was standing right in front of his future mom.

It was either that or he was somewhere far beyond the known land where most of the people still used wands and where there existed a perfect doppelganger of his mother when she was younger. Oh well, he would get his answer once the day turned into the night.

But focusing on more important matters he shifted his gaze towards the pinkette in front of him.

He really should have said something else other than blurting out the first thing that came to his mind. The younger version of his mom looked to be frozen between being dumbfounded and horrified. It was actually starting to scare him how she had ceased to move at all.

"Alright everyone, the class is dismissed! Return to the academy!" His line of thinking was cut off when he heard somebody who he presumed was the teacher exclaim. That caused another wave of chatter circle around them but it stopped as quickly as it had begun once the teacher yelled with a firm voice, "Now!"

Most of the students followed their teacher's order and started casting some spells before levitating themselves towards the castle-like structure. Some tried to stay behind and see what would happen. But after some receiving a glare from the balding teacher, the rest of the students decided to do the same as others.

It wasn't long until the three of them were left behind standing on the summoning grounds. Colbert turned towards Louise who seemed to have regained some of her bearings back. "Miss Vallière. You should return to the dormitory and try to have some rest. I'm sure you need it."

Louise took her time processing Colbert's words. At the moment she really couldn't trust herself. After a minute she managed to give a small nod to her teacher. Louise gave a final glance towards William before quickly walking towards the academy.

Now it was only the two men left standing in the morning sun. William was about to follow the pinkette but decided not to. He didn't think he would do any good by freaking out his future mom even more. It almost made him chuckle as he compared his mom to the young version of her.

The professor beside him took a deep breath before he said, "Welcome to Tristain's academy. I am professor Colbert, who might you be good sir?" The balding teacher even gave a small bow towards him. Colbert couldn't tell what kind of noble he was or what his influence was alike. So the professor opted to be as polite as he could be, just in case.

William just lifted his brow. It wasn't every day he was called a sir nor did he get bowed at. He gave his hand to Colbert. "William de la Vallière and you don't have to call me sir," he said and gave Colbert's hand a firm shake.

As they were locked in a handshake Colbert couldn't stop himself from comparing the man in front of him to the heads of the Vallière family. Despite spending a long minute on it, the only detail that Colbert managed to find on him that could connect him to the Vallières was his pink eyes.

"Alright miss- mister Vallière." Colbert quickly corrected himself. "I'm not sure how such an unfortunate situation as this could even occur but I'm very certain that we can discuss and solve this predicament without any major problems. We should seek headmaster Osmond's advice so I'll have to ask you to follow me."

"Very well, lead the way."

Colbert gave a small nod before turning towards the academy. "Levitation," he said and pointed his staff towards his feet. A feeling of weightlessness grabbed Colbert and soon his feet were off the ground and he was floating towards the academy.

As he was floating he turned in the air just so he could see if William was following. To his surprise, the young mystery man was quietly floating beside him. Colbert hadn't heard him say any incantations and he wasn't using a wand.

William couldn't help but chuckle at the professor as his eyes were glued to his hand. William had slightly raised his hand and let his magic flow through it causing his hand to shine in dim white light.

"How are you doing that?" William gave a small laugh at the professor who had just blurted out the question with pure amazement.

Colbert seemed to be a bit embarrassed after he had blurted out his question so William decided to show his hand to the balding man. "I'm currently pushing my willpower in my hand so I can do spells without the use of focus items. It gets rather easy after a couple of years practicing flow control."

Although Colbert didn't show it, he was beyond intrigued by the way the mystery man was doing his spells. For as long as there were mages, they always needed wands, staffs, and other magical focus items in order to do magic. Yet here Colbert floated beside a wandless mage.

The professor made a mental note to ask more questions regarding William's magic. But for now, he decided just to float quietly and let William examine the academy. William was looking at the academy like one of those noble visitors visiting from a different country.

'So this is Tristain's academy?' There were plenty of things that William didn't expect to see during his lifetime. But seeing and actually being at his parents' old academy took the cake.

Louise had a rough day. And it wasn't even midday yet!

Currently, she was in her room lying on her bed. At first, she had tried to get some sleep, maybe all of this had been just a bad dream. But after an hour or two, she realized that she wasn't going to get any sleep, which meant that what had happened wasn't a dream.

She kept staring at the ceiling while occasionally glancing at her desk and at the empty letter on it. She was supposed to write to her family about her familiar. But how could she tell her family that she had summoned a noble who might have hit his head when he arrived. There was no way she could be his mother, he was older than her and they didn't look anything alike!

But one thing was guaranteed, and that was the fact that he was a noble. It wasn't hard to imagine what her parents would do to her once they found out about the situation. Even her sisters couldn't save her from this one. They barely managed to convince her parents to let her go study at the academy in the first place. At this point, the only thing she was good for was to strengthen her family ties, but then again who would want a magicless noble as a wife. She was sure that her current engagement was going to be cut and then she would be given to anyone willing to take her.

Her self deprivation was cut off by some knocks against the door of her room. Wasn't she supposed to try and get some rest? After grumbling a little she lifted herself off her bed and walked to the door.

Once she opened the door she was greeted by a woman with green hair and round glasses over her eyes. She was wearing the same kind of dark robes that the other teachers wore but Louise knew that she was just Headmaster's secretary called miss Longueville.

"Greetings miss Vallière. I was asked to bring you to Osmond's office," Longueville said and waited for the pinkette's response.

Louise tried to hide the turmoil inside her but judging from the secretary's worried look she was doing a bad job at it.

"Is this not good time for you?"

"No, I-I was just not expecting anybody," Louise lied. She knew that this was going to happen, liked it or not. She just wasn't ready to face the headmaster yet. But after a while, she began mentally repeating the rule of steel in her head before taking the few steps needed to go outside and started following the secretary.

If the headmaster himself wanted to see her, it wouldn't be wise to keep him waiting.

"I see, this could be problematic," a very old man with a long white beard said to the mystery man standing in the old man's office next to Colbert.

The old man was known as headmaster Osmond or just Old Osmond for short. Nobody truly knew his exact age and he liked to hear some rumors go around about his age. Some claimed that he was easily over 100 years old while others might claim that it was just his beard and white hair that made him seem older.

But one thing was certain and that was the fact that he had lived for plenty of decades. Yet despite his long life, he had never come across this kind of situation.

He gave a short sigh before raising himself off his seat near his desk. "To be honest Colbert and I already had some doubts but after all, those are only that, doubts." He glanced towards another desk in his office just to be sure Longueville wasn't there to hear them. He had ordered her to go and retrieve Louise to his office while he, Colbert, and William exchanged some serious words. "And she isn't the first or won't be the last mage with problematic magic. But if what you're saying is true then it explains a lot."

"I wouldn't lie."

William's short reply made Osmond let out a heavy sigh. If a word got out of this there was no telling what would happen to Louise. At best she would only be used by the crown to strengthen the political ties or she would be branded as a heretic and suffer a horrifying fate. He gave a small walk through the office, trying to see if his silencing spell was being breached. So far nothing seemed out of the ordinary so he walked back to his desk and sat down.

"Alright, if your river metaphor is true then you can do whatever you see fit. But focusing on the present for now. Colbert, would you be kind and show where he will be staying?" Colbert gave a small nod and asked William to follow him again. Soon both of them had left the office leaving Osmond to be with his thoughts.

He let out a long sigh before reaching out for a secret drawer in his desk. After opening it he took out a decorative pipe. His old friend in Germania had gifted it to him and said that it was supposed to ease the stress. Just as he was about to light it up he heard a familiar pattern of knocks on the office door. He quickly shoved his pipe back to its drawer and waited for his secretary to enter.

As he expected, it wasn't long before miss Longueville stepped inside the office with a trouble maker he had met plenty of times before. His secretary took a seat near her desk and began sorting through the reports on her desk. Meanwhile, Louise just stood in the middle of the office looking like she had walked into a lion's den.

Osmond cleared his throat before addressing the student. "Miss Vallière I'm sure you know why you're here this morning."

Louise's face took up a scared expression. "Y-yes, I'm here because of the su-summoning ritual," she answered with a quivering voice like a child who admitted doing something bad.

It made Osmon feel a bit weirded out. Usually, when they met in his office, it would be because of her explosive magic. He had lost the count of how many times she had caused some property damage. And despite the damage caused by her wasn't too serious, it started to make a hole in the academy's budget. Sure the academy was supported by many noble families and the crown itself, but hiring some earth mages every time to fix the damages was starting to get on his nerves.

So usually, he would scold her for her lack of carefulness and that would be that. But he never expelled her from the academy. She came from one of the most influential families in Tristain and was a prime example of a model student that he wished there were more of at the academy. Of course minus the destructive magic.

"Yeah, you are correct. And I'll just get to the point." Louise's fear rose as the headmaster took up a more serious expression on his face. "As you know the Springtime Familiar Summoning ceremony is a rite of passage. Failing it would prevent advancing to the second year. In other words, you couldn't continue studying here.

"And despite the fact that you… managed to summon a man. It is only half of the ritual. In order for you to pass, you would have to bind him. But unfortunately for you, he is a noble and it is ruled by the crown that "no mage shall use magic to affect other mages free will". Therefore you can't bind him and I can't let you pass. I apologize but your status as a student will be taken away."

As Osmond finished Louise's face lost all of its colors and she kept staring at the floor while millions of thoughts rushed through her head. She was supposed to finally learn to do magic at the academy. She was supposed to figure out her problem and fix it. But what was she supposed to do now?

Her thoughts became darker and darker as she thought about how her family would react. If it wasn't for Old Osmond's cough she would have cried right then and there. Already slightly bloodshot eyes raised their gaze off the floor to the old man who had a small smile on his face.

"However." He stretched the word before continuing. "The circumstances involving your summoning ritual are truly otherworldly. You managed to summon someone from time that has yet to come to pass. And he has shown us magical techniques that could revolutionize the way we do magic. It would be foolish to let this kind of chance slip between our fingers. But first, we should get familiar with his magic and who better to do that than a student with remarkably good skills in theoretical aspects of magic!"

Louise was at a loss for words as she tried to proceed with what the headmaster was saying. "You mean-"

"Yes, there is a way for you to continue to study here!" He cut her off before explaining it more to the confused looking pinkette. "He has agreed to teach you. And although you might not be a student anymore, you can choose to be an apprentice instead. But only if you are willing, I've… heard what he had said about you. So, you can refuse if you want."

With that, he left the question in the air and waited for Louise's answer. In the meantime, Louise was pondering about if she should do what the headmaster suggested and become William's apprentice, or if she should deny the offer. She liked to think that she took a good minute before answering but in reality, she had already come up with a decision the second Old Osmond had stopped talking.

"Yes. I-I accept."

"Wonderful!" Old Osmond exclaimed before turning his gaze towards his secretary. "Longueville. Could you pass me miss Vallière's registration." The green-haired woman stopped writing what she was writing and used her quill as a wand and made a piece of paper float to Osmond's desk. He thanked his secretary and took out an empty form before he started filling it with some information from the paper given to him.

He then presented the new form to Louise and gave her his quill in order for her to sign it. Without a second thought, she wrote her name on it and let Osmond store it on his desk.

"Congratulations. You can still keep your room and use the services provided by the academy. And before I forget I should tell you that Mister Val- your new teacher has asked me to inform you that he would like to meet you next morning. But for now, I suggest you take a day off and get rested. And if you have any questions, ask them now."

Louise didn't ask anything. She just gave a short goodbye to him before walking out of the office.

As soon as the office door closed Osmond let out a sigh of relief. This was going to be an interesting year. He heard a small squeak coming from his desk and he reached for a white mouse that had climbed on his desk. He left his palm open letting his familiar jump on it and raised it in front of his face.

"What is it Mótsognir?" he asked from the mouse. It squeaked something which made the headmaster raise his brows. "Purple you say? Never thought Longueville would do something like that."

If looks could kill, Old Osmond would have already turned into dust by the green-haired secretary's glare directed at him and his mouse.

AN:

I have no excuses as to why it took me so long to write this. Anyways my English is far from perfect so feel free to point out any grammar errors that I've made.