A Passion for Potions (Petalfall #1)

1. One - The Potion Maker

One - The Potion Maker

Ana

The ornate glass bottle in my hand has started to smoke and the enormous man standing on the opposite side of the counter looks faintly terrified.

“Are you sure it should do that?” Jawn asks, taking a step back, making my floorboards creak.

He’s half giant and barely fits in my shop.

I try not to smile as I cap the bottle and seal it. Sometimes I take a little too much pleasure in horrifying men four times my size.

“I promise that happens every time.” Jawn isn’t usually here when I make the potions for his ailing mother’s arthritis.

His shirt isn’t usually this clean either, which can only mean one thing: he’s going to ask again . And I’m going to have to disappoint him. Again.

I hold the bottle out to him. “The reaction will settle before you get back to the farm.”

He pinches the bottle between two fingers, still watching it uncertainly.

“Is there anything else you need?” I look around my shop, at the balm he occasionally buys for his hands—and his cows—or the tablets he gets in the spring when his hay fever inevitably starts up again.

“Actually…” He glances toward the door like he expects someone to come in and interrupt us. “I was hoping I could see you tonight.”

I try to smile, but the way it strains my cheeks is painful.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He’s a very sweet man, but he is proportionate.

I might not be as tiny as my gnome friends, but I am not big enough to consider the thing hiding in his very large pants. Not without working my way up to it, and he made it clear the first time we took an evening “stroll” that he is not the kind of man to help a lady out in that sense.

“I wouldn’t know how.” I manage not to grimace, but his response still irks in my memory.

I might be in severe need of a sexual encounter, but I am not desperate enough to hurt myself.

“I had a nice time before,” he says. “We could have an even better time this go ‘round.”

Shaking my head, I offer him an apologetic wince. “You would go home frustrated or I would go home in pain. Neither of us wants that.”

His mouth twists in disappointment, but he nods and turns to go. “Let me know when you change your mind.”

The door closes behind him and I take a deep breath. The presumption!

When I change my mind. Not if. Which means I can expect one more attempt at the very least.

“Joy of joys.”

If he asks again, I am determined not to be so nice.

The clock on the wall ticks over to the hour and the little bird that lives inside it hops out to twitter at me.

“Time to go ” the chirps remind me.

Even if the tiny creature isn’t actually magic, it feels like it sometimes.

Other times, it feels like a curse.

Today’s destination falls squarely in the latter option.

The key twists easily in the lock as I close up my potion shop and step out into the square. I take a deep breath of the fresh summer air and ignore the flutter of longing in my chest.

Autumn is right around the corner and maybe—I hope —change will come with the new season.

“Good afternoon, Ana,” Misses Keeling says, hooves clopping as she passes. Her arms are full of bundles and the fresh smell of bread floats around her like a delicious, buttery aura.

“Lovely to see you, Misses Keeling. Off to the inn?”

She nods, her curls bouncing around her small horns. “Dinner simply isn’t the same without my rolls.”

“No, it certainly isn’t.”

I watch the small faun woman hurry away. She might be the busiest person in the village, but she’s thriving.

Walking through the square, I skirt the temple, pausing only long enough to kiss the hands of the Goddess’ statue and pray for patience before continuing on.

I’ll need it.

It’s not the half-dozen people who pause in their work to call hello to me that require that patience.

I’ve lived in Petalfall all my life—and never once had the desire to leave it—but there is always one fly in the proverbial ointment.

I regret that allusion as soon as it passes through my mind.

“There you are!” My mother smiles at me like it’s been days, not hours, since she last saw me.

The elation should put me at ease, but it has the opposite effect. She wraps her arm in mine and I can’t help but wonder what she has planned this time .

“Mina isn’t joining us today?” I ask, hoping for some small respite from her undivided attention.

My mother turns her face away, but not quickly enough. I see the grimace.

“Oh, no. She had better things to do than tag along with us.” She bats at the air and laughs, as if we share some joke about my baby sister. “Besides, that silly girl doesn’t understand me the way you do.”

If I didn’t know better, I might be able to believe the cheerful tone and her put-on smile as she drags open the door to Mirella’s shop—wood scraping on the stone lintel. Luckily, Mina doesn’t understand her the way I do.

She wouldn’t have wanted to come with us if she knew this was our destination. The place gives her the creeps, and I don’t entirely blame her.

The building is crooked, listing to one side, and I know it’s because of the sheer number of failed spells that have been performed inside its walls. Mirella doesn’t even trust the roof enough to sleep here anymore. I’m still amazed it hasn’t burned down.

Unblinking eyes watch us from every wall and window.

“Mirella?” my mother calls out, and the woman emerges from one of the canyons carved between the overloaded and haphazardly balanced shelves that hold her curious inventory.

Most of her wares are fraudulent, but an uneasy prickling settles on my skin as I watch the swirling magic inside a casting orb that’s perched high enough up, it would certainly break if it fell.

“Staci, my dear, and Ana. So lovely to have you in my store for once.” Mirella stands at almost as crooked of an angle as her shop.

She refuses to let the doctor straighten her spine, and not even the counterweights she tries to wear help anymore.

I nod in both greeting and acknowledgement, and she watches me warily for a moment.

Mirella and I exist in a tentative tolerance.

Before I have to ask why we’re here, Mirella pulls out a tome bound in cracked and brittle leather and drops it onto the counter. Dust flies away from it in a theatrical puff.

She runs metal-sheathed fingers over the cover, petting it like a cat, but the book makes a burbling sound instead of purring.

“It took me a while to source these,” she says as she opens it, revealing the thing my mother brought me here for.

A pair of half-heart trinkets that fit together as if they were once one but have been broken apart.

My mother squeals as she lifts them from the page where they had acted as bookmarks.

“Joining charms,” Mirella says. “For two who shouldn’t wish to be parted.”

Giving Mirella a handful of coins, my mother clutches them close, beaming. “They are fantastic!”

They’re fake.

The way Mirella glances at me as she counts her payment... She knows I’m not fooled.

But my mother looks at them like they’re going to solve all of her problems. And between my father’s will and her weekly winnings from beating travelers at cards, she has enough money to buy foolish things, so I don’t try to stop her.

Mirella is one of my more frequent customers. I’m sure those coins will wind up in my pocket sooner or later.

“It was a pleasure doing business with you.” Mirella gestures toward the door.

If I wasn’t with her, I don’t doubt that Mirella would have offered up other counterfeit trinkets to my mother.

As long as she skirts the truth instead of telling outright lies, I won’t contradict her.

She gives me a tight smile. It’s all the thanks I’ll get for keeping my mouth shut.

My mother titters over the pieces as she drags me back out into the brightness of the day.

“I’m always afraid that place is going to fall down around us.” She chuckles nervously, looking back at the facade.

“Some day it might.” And none of us will be surprised. Mirella, least of all.

“Here!” Handing me one of the charms, my mother curls my fingers around it. “Keep it on you always.”

Her smile tightens when her gaze brushes past the chain around my neck. The pendant I keep tucked away between my breasts is the only thing I keep on me at all times—a promise I made to my father on his deathbed.

“ This will protect you,” she says, “Not make you prey to any passing vagabond.”

“Mother…” It’s an argument we’ve had a hundred times.

“Don’t ‘mother’ me. I am determined to keep you safe.” She smiles and draws me close to her, hugging my arm tight. “Who else in this town is lucky enough to have found their very best friend in their own daughter?”

It guts me every time she says that. She is my mother, and I hate how often she tries to forget it in favor of making me something more akin to a sister.

Dropping her head to my shoulder, she steers me back toward the tea house beside my shop. “Promise you’ll never leave me, Ana. I couldn’t bear to let you go.”

Mirella isn’t the only one who skirts the truth with her. “I’m not going anywhere.”