The Spellshop

Chapter Five

Bryn squeezed icing onto a cinnamon bun and handed it to Kiela.

“I can’t afford—”

“A welcome present,” Bryn said. Kiela thought of the basket from Larran with the same buns in them, as well as the same words in his note. If cinnamon buns were the traditional welcome on Caltrey, she liked it. “Or, if you prefer, a good-luck present for your new start.”

A new start. The bite of cinnamon bun hardened into cement in her throat, and she swallowed hard. Is that what this is? She suddenly felt as if her head were spinning, and she was glad she was already sitting. She’d liked her life; she hadn’t planned to leave it. How do I start over?

The baker brushed the flour off her furry cheek before climbing on her own stool. “If you don’t mind me asking,” Bryn said, “why uproot yourself and make such a change? And all the way from Alyssium—is it as grand and glorious as they say? I’ve never even been there—I’m originally from the southern isles, left home after a family issue went bad, came straight to Caltrey, and never looked back.” She chattered so fast that her words tumbled over one another like a stream over rocks, and then when she finished, she waited expectantly, even eagerly, for Kiela to answer.

Not thrilled to be the focus of anyone’s attention, Kiela squirmed on her stool. She did mind Bryn asking, and she had no idea how to answer. She doubted that news of the revolution had reached this far north, so she’d have to explain all of that. She knew how that would go: lots of intense questions about her escape, and it wasn’t an experience she wanted to relive. And assuming she was able to choke out the story, she’d be admitting she was a librarian—what if they figured out she took the books? What if they guessed she hadn’t had permission to take them? What if they thought she’d stolen them? What if they contacted an imperial investigator? Kiela felt a chill thinking about them. Imperial investigators were called in whenever there was a suspicion about the mishandling of magic, and they had near limitless authority to punish offenders. What if they had her arrested and the books impounded? Or worse, destroyed? Illegal possession of spellbooks was a crime with very, very serious consequences. If she were arrested, what would happen to Caz?

Bryn asked with sympathy in her voice, “Was it a lover?”

“No!” Kiela realized she’d answered that too vehemently, and she felt herself blush. “I mean, it wasn’t anyone. There isn’t anyone. It was just . . . time to leave.”

Bryn nodded sagely. “Ah, you don’t like talking about yourself—I understand, and I won’t ask any more questions.”

The muscles in Kiela’s shoulders unknotted, at least a little. “Thanks.”

“Do you like talking about other people?” Bryn asked. “I know just about everything about anyone. I can tell you all their secrets as an apology for my trying to pry into yours.”

Kiela laughed in spite of herself. “No, thank you. I don’t need to know.”

“Hmm . . . All right then. I think I know what you do need.”

I highly doubt that.

“What you need is a savory pastry.”

Well, maybe . . . Her stomach let out a gurgle, and Kiela felt herself blush. She polished off the rest of the cinnamon bun.

Bryn bustled behind the counter. “Starting over is difficult work. You need fuel. Protein. Salt. Nourishing fat.” Humming to herself, she pulled out another pastry, arranged it on a dish, and sprinkled sea salt on top.

As she worked, Kiela noticed that the array of baked goods was decidedly different from what was available in the city. If this were Alyssium, at least half the items would have been baked with jam and sugar-drenched fruit: cherry tarts, raspberry swirls, apple turnovers. But Bryn’s bakery had none of that. Lots of sugar and cinnamon and whatever it was she was preparing for Kiela. But no splash of color from any kind of fruit. She wondered why. Jam was such an integral part of every bakery that Kiela had ever visited.

“It’s my own recipe,” Bryn said, carrying it over to Kiela. “Go on, try it—my treat.”

“You aren’t going to stay in business if you keep offering free food.”

“You’ll upset me if you refuse.” She paused. “Unless you don’t want it, or are allergic to seafood, or aren’t in the mood for more food, and if so, I absolutely would not want—”

Kiela bit into the pastry and was surprised by the burst of salt that prickled her tongue, the garlic that filled her sinuses, and the wonderful sweetness of . . . “What is that?” she asked as she chewed.

“It’s a kind of fish that used to be plentiful around Caltrey, the silver swift fish. I’ve been working on ways to highlight the flavor. Do you like it?”

She’d tasted swift fish before, and it never tasted like this. The fish itself melted into the butter of the pastry, and when she swallowed . . . she felt as if she were inhaling the bright vividness of the sea itself. “It’s incredible.”

With a modest shrug, Bryn said, “It’s ingredients and a recipe. Anyone could do it.”

“But you chose to do it.” She took another bite, and it was just as good as the first.

“Glad you like it,” Bryn said. “We so seldom have new arrivals that I have forgotten how to make a new friend without scaring her off. I’ve known everyone on Caltrey for ages. Know everything about them, and I mean everything: who snores, who eats with their mouth open, whose feet smell . . . but I’d hoped . . . that is, I believe that a proper pastry can make up for a wealth of social blunders.”

A new friend. The words were such a surprise that Kiela nearly dropped the fish pastry, which would have been tragic. I’m not looking for a friend. I have Caz. And my books.

Traitorously, a part of her whispered, But I would like one.

“I would like to know one thing about Caltrey,” Kiela found herself saying. “What’s changed here? I don’t remember it being so . . .” She searched for a word that wouldn’t be offensive.

“Desperate?” Bryn supplied.

It wasn’t the word that Kiela would have chosen, but it would do. She nodded.

Bryn sighed. “Politics in the capital.”

Kiela felt a prickle on her scalp. “Oh?”

“It used to be that the emperor would send his sorcerers on a regular rotation to tend to the outer islands, and they’d cast spells that balanced out whatever nonsense they’d done in the capital city to throw the weather out of whack, but then they stopped coming. Fish began to get scarce, and the merhorses—you’ll notice our local herd has dwindled, which makes the fishing even worse. All our weather patterns have changed, due to city-magic nonsense, and without a sorcerer to correct for that, our farms don’t produce what they used to.” Pausing her breathless speed for a moment, Bryn nodded at the shelves of baked goods, and Kiela noticed for the first time that not only were they lacking in jam, they were only half full. She would have guessed the other half had been bought already, but perhaps not. “It’s not that we’re starving, but everyone worries that if the sorcerers in the south don’t decide to pay attention to the empire’s citizens again . . .”

Kiela had heard a little about that, but she hadn’t paid much attention since it wasn’t library-related. Over time, the emperor had withdrawn his sorcerers from the other islands and canceled their circuits of the outlying farms and villages. A waste of magic, he’d called it. There had been arguments—she’d read some of the discourse in the pamphlets written by the revolutionaries. The empire was hoarding magic, and the outer islands, whose economies had become dependent on the renewal of particular spells and on reliable weather patterns, were suffering because of it. She hadn’t thought of what that meant on a practical day-to-day level.

While the elite used magic to build their palaces and fuel their lavish lives, ordinary people suffered. That was the crux of the argument for the revolution. The world and its resources belonged to everyone, they said—which included everything kept locked up inside the Great Library. All that knowledge, the power to make lives better, was shelved away. Reserved for use by only the wealthy, when it should belong to everyone. And that’s why I never really believed they’d hurt the library—and why I don’t understand why they did. They knew books were power.

Kiela wondered what Bryn would say if she knew that a sliver of that power was currently sitting in crates in a run-down cottage beyond the cliffs.

She also wondered what the emperor would say.

Or would have said, before recent events.

She remembered early in the revolution, a man—really, a boy; he couldn’t have been more than seventeen years old—had tried to liberate one of the spellbooks from the first floor of the Great Library. He’d said in his trial that he’d wanted to use it to end a drought on one of the eastern islands. As his punishment, he’d been forced to drink water until his body convulsed. She didn’t know if he’d survived or not. She did know that his image had been printed in the revolutionaries’ pamphlets the following week.

“That’s why some of the villagers aren’t so happy to see you,” Bryn said. “They blame all cityfolk for the emperor’s new policies, but don’t you worry—they’ll warm up to you once they open their eyes and realize you’re just another islander like them and not a Big Bad City Dweller who kept magic locked up away from them.”

That was . . . uncomfortably close to Kiela’s job description. She wanted to protest that it wasn’t a librarian’s choice who accessed the books, but it was easier to nod and agree.

“Now,” Bryn said with another of her enormous smiles, “what can I help you with?”

Kiela climbed the stairs up the cliff with a sack full of supplies, including a loaf of bread, a bag of sugar, a pot of honey, several bars of soap, and several packets of seeds. Also, she had a chicken under her arm. She hadn’t actually meant to buy a chicken—she’d been thinking of the eggs that her new neighbor Larran had left her and how nice it would be to have a regular supply of them when the word had come out of her mouth, and Bryn had insisted on it.

Thinking of the baker, Kiela smiled. The woman was a force to be reckoned with. Kiela didn’t know if the village had a mayor, but if so, they were clearly overshadowed by Bryn. Or at least overwhelmed by the flow of her words. She’d cajoled everyone until they’d produced everything that Kiela thought she needed: flour, sugar, salt, butter, seeds for her upcoming garden, as well as soap and candles. Also a loaf of Bryn’s bread. And, of course, the chicken. Kiela had used up the vast majority of the coin she’d brought with her to Caltrey, but she felt, with Bryn bargaining for her, that she’d gotten a good price. Even on the chicken.

The hen squirmed a bit under Kiela’s arm as she climbed, but once they were halfway up, the hen settled down, as if realizing she’d be in peril if Kiela dropped her, which at least showed some modicum of common sense.

She’d been gone longer than she’d intended—Bryn liked to talk, especially at high speeds, and it felt as if everyone in the village who was on shore wanted to meet the daughter of the nice, young, and foolish couple who’d left for the capital—but she thought that Caz would be proud of her. And she was looking forward to not having to talk to anyone but the spider plant for a nice long while.

As she made her way through the thick forest growth, following the trail hacked clear by the farmer, Kiela thought she heard voices ahead. Must be birds, she thought. Certainly no one was at the cottage besides Caz, and he didn’t have a history of talking to himself.

Closer, though, it sounded like words, not birdsong.

My imagination? She’d been part of more conversations today than in the past . . . well, in a very long time. The voices were still ringing in her head.

Except that sounded like Caz. And Larran?

He couldn’t be back again, could he? So soon? She’d just finished talking with people! Lots of people! She wanted to burrow into her house and not have to worry about what she’d say and what he’d say and all of that back-and-forth talking nonsense.

Stepping out of the woods, Kiela saw Larran up on her roof. He had a tool belt strapped around his waist, he was shirtless, and he was streaked with soot. Her brain caught on the shirtless detail for a moment, and she stared with her mouth open. She’d never seen quite so many muscles, and they all seemed to be in use as he worked on her chimney. No wonder I shrieked when he appeared so unexpectedly. He’s huge. In close quarters . . . those were a lot of muscles.

Belatedly, she realized that Caz was perched on the roof with him, his tendrils sprawled on either side of the ridgepole to keep himself balanced. He was telling Larran about the time Kiela had accidentally lost her balance while at the top of one of the library ladders and instead of falling backward and merely injuring herself like a good little librarian, she’d grabbed the nearest books and somehow succeeded in knocking over the entire bookshelf. It had fallen onto the next and the next, cascading into the most humiliating moment of her professional life.

“Caz,” Kiela said sternly.

“What? It was funny.”

In hindsight, yes. Hilarious. But was that really the best anecdote to choose to tell their new neighbor? Especially since she’d been so careful to dance around the fact that she was a librarian in her very recent conversations with the other villagers?

How much did Larran know? Had he seen the crates? Calm down, she told herself. Caz wouldn’t have been foolish enough to have allowed that. He was even more of a worrier than she was. Still, it was a risk, having a stranger anywhere near the spellbooks.

Scowling at both of them, Kiela snapped, “What are you doing up there?”

“Your chimney was clogged,” Larran said. “Thought I’d fix it.”

And who had asked him to do that? Not me. And it’s my chimney. Of course, it had needed fixing, and she’d had no idea how to fix it. But still. He hadn’t known that.

“You shouldn’t start a fire in a stove with a clogged chimney. You’ll get a lot of smoke.”

She’d noticed that. Between clenched teeth, she said, “Thanks.”

Caz said, “I tried to tell her.”

“You didn’t,” Kiela said. “You know less about chimneys than I do.” At that moment, the chicken let out a squawk and, with a concerted effort, spurted out of Kiela’s arm. “No!” She’d nearly gotten it all the way home!

Dropping her sack, she chased after the chicken.

The hen dodged left as she grabbed for it. She felt feathers as the chicken slid through her grasp. It dashed by with an indignant squawk.

She was aware of Larran and Caz both watching her as she zigzagged across the yard after the chicken. She lunged forward as it turned right—again, she nearly caught it. And then with a burst of speed, it plunged into the brambles.

Kiela skidded to a stop.

Panting, she stared at the greenery. “That went well.”

“If you leave out feed, it’ll come back,” Larran suggested.

Yay, more advice. “Great. Thanks. I’ll do that.” Catching her breath, she straightened and returned to her sack, which thankfully didn’t have anything within it that could escape. Although what she really wanted to do was to tell him to go away, she had to ask: “What do chickens eat?”

He gawked at her. “You bought a chicken without knowing how to feed it?”

“I lit a fire in a stove without knowing the chimney was clogged,” Kiela pointed out. “I think it’s safe to assume I don’t know what I’m doing.”

He laughed, a very nice laugh. She appreciated that it didn’t feel like he was laughing at her. “Corn, oats, beans, but only if they’re cooked,” he said. “Any kind of fruit. Whatever scraps you have from your meals. They’ll eat just about anything.”

She wanted to ask what to do if the chicken didn’t like her cooking and preferred whatever it found in the wild, but she decided she’d already looked ridiculous enough in front of him for one day. “Well, as soon as you’re done . . .”

He patted the chimney as if it were a well-behaved pet. “Just about done now. Let’s try to light the stove. If it works, I’ll cook us those eggs.”

“You mean, the eggs you gave me?”

He smiled. “Yes.”

“As a gift. Those eggs.”

“Yes, I’ll cook them.”

“And eat them,” she said. He wanted to eat the eggs he’d given her as a gift, which made it not quite a gift anymore, didn’t it? “Fine. You fixed my chimney. A few scrambled eggs are better payment than coin.”

Confused, he frowned. “I didn’t ask for any payment.”

And I didn’t ask you to fix my chimney. “Let’s get this over with.” She didn’t want to owe him for this unasked-for favor.

He finished up as she went inside. After a day of cleaning, it didn’t look overly terrible, especially given the years of neglect. Caz had made additional progress in her absence as well. She noted that the quilt was back on the daybed and that pockets of dirt were piled neatly in various spots around the room. Caz made himself at home. That was a good thing.

Also a good thing: it no longer smelled like smoke.

Peeking into the back bedroom, Kiela noted that the crates were still covered by the tarp. They didn’t look as if they’d been disturbed. Reassured, she returned to the front room and eyed her nemesis, the wood-burning stove. “Ready to dance again?”

“Are you talking to the stove?” Larran asked as he came inside, ducking through the doorway.

“Were you talking to a plant?” she countered.

Caz entered, walking on his tendrils. “Hey.”

Opening the stove, she saw it had been cleaned out. Fresh wood was inside, as well as wood shavings ready to be tinder. No piles of dust and no leaves. She wondered if this was due to Caz or to Larran. Regardless, it was done. She told herself to be grateful, not annoyed. Taking the fire-starter off its hook, she knelt in front of the stove. You can do this, she told herself. She wished she didn’t have an audience.

On the other hand, if the cottage filled with smoke again, this time it wouldn’t be her fault. She struck the fire-starter and sparks flew onto the kindling.

“Blow on it,” Larran suggested.

Kiela blew on the tiny flames, certain she was going to blow them out, but no, they grew larger and the flames spread, dancing onto the other tinder and curling onto the logs. Sitting back, pleased, she shut the stove door.

As they waited for the stove to heat, Larran helped himself to a glass of water from the sink. She watched him drink it while trying not to look like she was watching him. Now that he was inside, he seemed even taller than he had before. He was a lot of person, filling her space, and she had no idea what to say to him. She felt as if she’d used up all her words in the village. When all this talking is over, I’m not going to speak for a week.

Of course, she could thank him for fixing her chimney. That was an obvious thing she could say. She knew she should be grateful, even if it had been unsolicited help. “Thank you for fixing my chimney,” she said at the same time as he said, “What did you think of the village?”

And then they paused awkwardly, and she said, “It was very nice,” at the same time as he said, “You’re welcome. It’s what your parents would have done for me.” And then: “You knew my parents?” she asked as he said, “I’m glad you liked it.”

Caz slid between them and held up his leaves. “Gah, stop! This is painful. Don’t either of you know how to have a conversation? Let the plant teach you. First you talk, then you talk, then you . . . ”

Kiela blushed, and Larran laughed. It really was such a nice, warm laugh. She wished she could forget she was annoyed at him. But he’d invaded her privacy—a dangerous thing when she had stolen spellbooks just a room away.

“You don’t remember me, do you?” he said. She realized she must have been staring again, thinking about his laugh. “I was about ten when you moved away. I watched your family sail off from that tree over there.” He pointed out the window at a curved tree trunk that bent out over the cove.

“Glad you didn’t fall off,” she said.

“I have a good grip.”

“That’s useful,” Kiela said, and then winced inwardly. First she chased a chicken around the yard, and now she was conversing like she’d never had supper with a person before. She really, really should have practiced talking to people more in the library.

She tried to think of the last time she’d had a meal with anyone but Caz, and she came up with nothing. Huh, that’s rather sad. She’d never thought of her life in the library as sad before, and she wasn’t sure she liked that point of view. I was happy there, without anyone. There was no reason for her to need to be making friends left and right here.

“You were kind to me when others . . . weren’t,” he said. “Your parents as well.”

Kiela blinked at him. She had no memory of being kind or unkind to him. “I’m sorry. I don’t—”

He smiled. “It was a long time ago. Suffice it to say, I owe your family.” He turned toward the stove. “I think it’s hot enough.” Cracking the eggs, he whisked them and poured them into the pan. As she watched, he mixed in scallions that he produced from a pants pocket, as well as a tomato.

Caz scooted forward. “You had a tomato in there?”

Larran shrugged. “You never know when you’ll need one.”

“I think you really do know,” Caz said. “How many tomato emergencies do you encounter?”

“Actually, I’d forgotten it was in my pocket until now. I’d harvested it right before I saw all the smoke billowing up from your house. I didn’t want to take the time to put it in my kitchen.” He sounded a bit sheepish. “I thought you might be in danger.”

He’d rushed here to save her. Very neighborly indeed.

In a few minutes, he had it all assembled: egg, scallions, and tomato, on toast that he’d sliced and tossed on the hot stove while she was busy marveling at the fact that someone had come to save her. When the Great Library burned, the place where she’d spent over a decade of her life, no one had tried to help her, no one checked on her, no one warned her. If Caz hadn’t been alert, she wouldn’t have even noticed that the other librarians had fled. Not one of them had said, “You should come with us. Or at least save yourself.” But this man who had known her for all of five minutes . . . or since childhood, if that was true . . . he’d rushed here, not knowing if he’d have to pull her from a burning fire. She stared at him, unsure what to think of him, as he placed her plate, heaped with food, on one side of the table.

“One second . . .” He ducked out the back door to the garden and returned a moment later with a fistful of daisies. He plopped them into a canning jar, filled it with water, and set it on the table as a centerpiece. From one of the kitchen drawers, he produced napkins decorated with little blue flowers. He laid mismatched forks and knives on the napkins and then sat on the other side of the table. “Hope you like it.”

She stared at the daisies then at the eggs, while he began to eat. Belatedly, she cut herself a wedge of toast with omelet and lifted it into her mouth. It was nearly-but-not-quite hot enough to burn her tongue. She tasted the sharpness of the onion, the smoothness of the egg—somehow he’d managed to make it light and creamy, unlike the rubbery eggs she’d eaten in the library—and the tang of the tomato. He knew both how to fix chimneys and cook.

They ate in silence for a moment.

Kiela tried to think of what to talk about. “You said you herd merhorses?”

He smiled, and his smile lit up his face. “I do. I can show them to you sometime. You could even ride one, if you’d like.”

Half of her wanted to say no. I’m not here to make friends. She was here to lie low in a safe place, as unobtrusive as possible in case the chaos from the capital city spilled outward. She was here to hide until it all passed by. Besides, she wasn’t even sure she liked him, despite the fact he’d been helpful and friendly and was a good cook. How did he make the eggs so cloudlike? Regardless, he didn’t seem to understand the concept of keeping a polite distance and waiting to be invited.

On the other hand, what harm could it do? They were a very long way from Alyssium, and she’d always wanted to see a merhorse up close. “Thank you. Maybe sometime.”

“Great,” he said.

“That wasn’t a yes.”

“Oh. Uh—okay?”

Taking a breath, she told herself to quit being ornery. It was nice of him to invite her. Just because she was tired was not an excuse to be rude. “Sorry. I just . . . Never mind.”

He ate another bite and then gestured at the stove. “You know, the next time you need help with anything, you should just ask.”

Any goodwill she might have felt drained away. “And the next time you want to help with anything, you should ‘just ask,’” she snapped.

He blinked.

She pointed her fork at him. “I didn’t ask you to come over and tromp around on my roof. I didn’t want you here. Especially when I wasn’t home.”

He reeled back. “I . . . I was just trying to help.”

Caz chimed in. “He did fix it. And I was here.”

She knew that. It was just . . . Ugh, if he didn’t understand, she didn’t know how to explain it to him. “You invaded my privacy. Multiple times.” She waved her hand at the stove, the eggs, the daisies, the napkins.

“Ah.” It was a syllable stuffed with hurt and confusion.

Kiela squeezed her eyes shut. She reminded herself that her chimney was fixed, the eggs were delicious, and the crates were undisturbed. No harm had been done. Yet. He had to understand, though, that this wasn’t acceptable. “I don’t want you to get the impression that it’s okay to come over whenever you want. We aren’t friends.”

“Ah.”

She opened her eyes. He was staring at his plate, clearly unsure what to say, and she was torn between wanting to take all the words back and being glad she’d spoken up. He had to know he couldn’t keep dropping by, poking his nose wherever he wanted. It wasn’t safe, not with the secrets she was keeping. She couldn’t afford uninvited visitors.

They fell into another even-more-awkward silence.

Caz spoke first. “So, do merhorses eat plants?”