The Spellshop

Chapter Nine

As soon as the jar cooled, Kiela covered it with a square of cloth cut from one of her father’s old shirts and tied a string around it to secure it. She surveyed her work. Pretty enough, she thought. It would be better with a ribbon, but that could be a later embellishment.

“You think the baker will go for it?” Caz asked anxiously.

“I think she’ll recognize that a raspberry croissant would be amazing.” Or a raspberry donut. Or a raspberry tart. Kiela hadn’t seen anything like that in Bryn’s bakery—perhaps there was a berry shortage on the island. It seemed likely, given all the other troubles they’d been having. Larran had mentioned the apple orchards failing; it was logical that other crops had failed as well. Certainly from what she’d seen, there was a distinct lack of jam on Caltrey, which meant that their little shop might be very welcome.

“You don’t think she’ll ask where you’ll get enough berries?”

Kiela peeked out the back window at the riot of berry bushes. With the sun shining on the leaves, they looked like they held a thousand shades of green, cradling the jewellike berries. She could smell the rich scent of the raspberries even from inside. It filled the house, joining with the scent of lavender—she’d filled pitchers with clippings of lavender and positioned them around the house, like her mother used to: on the table, the shelves, and the kitchen countertop. Drying herbs hung from the rafters. “I’ll tell her my family’s garden, left untended, has run wild and flourished.”

He bobbed a tendril in agreement. “Plausible. If you’re sure this is a good idea . . .”

“I’ll be careful,” she promised.

“I’ll have the other jars clean by the time you return,” he promised back.

Tucking the jar into a basket, Kiela headed for the door. Halfway out, she stopped and looked back at the spider plant perched on the edge of the sink. He’d wrapped a tendril around the pump and was about to fill the sink with water. Sunlight spilled through the window onto him, the pump, and the pitcher of lavender beside him. “Caz? Are you ever lonely?”

“How can I be?”

She thought he’d finish with, I have you.

But he said, “I have books.”

Smiling, Kiela headed for the path through the woods. She listened to the birds, the familiar coos and trills. She could parse a few out—there was the two-note call of the charmed warbler, the cascade of the crested parrot, and the . . . Wait, was that a chicken?

Yes, it was. My chicken, she thought, stopping midway down the trail. Peering through the green, she realized there was no way to identify where exactly the wretched bird was and certainly no way to reach the hen before she scuttled away through the underbrush. At least she sounds happy.

Kiela continued on.

She expected that this time, when she emerged from the forest, she wouldn’t be quite so stunned by the view—after all, she’d seen it already. But when she stepped out from the canopy of green, the blue smacked into her, and she stopped and just stared.

It was the vastness of the blue that was so breathtaking, as well as the variation: the bleached blue-white of the sky near the sun, the deeper blue of the sky near the horizon, the slate blue of the clouds, the black-blue and green-blue and fathomless blue of the sea, all contrasted against the pale sand of the shore, the bright colors of the houses, and the dark green of the trees. Far below, at the base of the cliffs, she saw the waves crash in foaming white and then caress the sand. It was high tide, and it reached nearly to the base of the stairs. She plucked a few rosebuds as she passed the bushes and began to pick her way down the steps.

By the time she reached the base of the cliff, the water was lapping at the bottom step. Reaching down, Kiela slipped off her shoes and waded across the beach. The seawater was chilled today, and it nipped at her ankles with each wave like a playful puppy. Sand wiggled between her toes.

Climbing up to the cobblestone streets, she glanced back toward Larran’s house, perched beyond the reach of high tide, and she thought she saw movement through one of the windows. For an instant, she was tempted to reverse direction, knock on his door, and show him the jam she’d made without any help from anyone except Caz, her parents, and the author of the spellbook. But she had a task to perform and no time for a chat with her overfriendly neighbor. She wanted to be back up the stairs before the sun set.

The winged cats of Caltrey basked on the roofs and in the street. She wondered if there was a spell that would help them thrive. A spell for cat-appropriate food. She didn’t think they’d eat jam. One cat with gray-striped fur and orange wings raised his head as she passed and then washed his front paw.

She passed a fisherman with a tackle box in his left hand and a net over his right shoulder, and he glared at her as if she was trespassing. She tensed and then reminded herself it was a public street, she belonged here, and she had a destination. Glancing back over her shoulder, she expected to see him watching her suspiciously, but he wasn’t. He shooed away one of the cats who was lounging on a doorstep and went inside one of the houses without a backward glance. Maybe the look had been unfriendly only in her imagination. Maybe he’d been scowling because she’d looked unfriendly. What had her face been doing when she passed him? Had she smiled? Had it been a weird smile? She practiced smiling and wished she had a mirror. She couldn’t tell if she was curving her lips too much or . . .

Ahead was the fountain and beyond it the bakery. Kiela dropped her face into a neutral expression and hoped that none of the bakery customers had seen her smiling inanely at no one as she walked through the streets.

She nodded at Eadie, the centaur woman, who was seated in the same bench as last time and had another cup of tea in front of her. The boy with goat horns was here again too, cross-legged on the street, absorbed in peeling potatoes. The skins were piling up next to him. Everyone else from the other day—the multi-armed woman, the grumpy man with scales, the older woman with more wrinkles than a raisin—was absent, thankfully.

“Hello, Binna’s girl!” Eadie called. “How’s the cottage holding up?”

“Surprisingly sound,” Kiela said. “I thought it would be full of mice or badgers by now, but the only unwanted residents I’ve met so far have been spiders.”

“You want to keep at least a few to catch the spring flies.”

“Um, thanks? I will?” She didn’t say that Caz despised spiders, due to the number of times the library spiders had tried to spin webs between his leaves.

“Once you’re all settled in, I’d love to stop by and see the old place,” Eadie hinted.

Kiela tensed. She hadn’t thought about the possibility of other neighbors stopping by her home . . . but then, if she intended to turn it into a shop, she supposed she was going to have to get used to the idea of welcoming customers. Oh my, she hadn’t thought about that aspect of her plan. If it was to succeed, she was going to have to interact with any number of people. She swallowed and hoped that Eadie couldn’t tell that her hands had started to lightly shake. “That would be very nice,” she said. “Once I’m all set up.”

And then she fled inside the bakery.

She exhaled once she was safely within. The scents of bread and cinnamon curled around her, and it was impossible to feel anxious. Being in the bakery felt like sitting by the nicest fireplace in the nicest reading room of the library. It was warm and welcoming, like the baker herself.

Bryn smiled broadly at Kiela. “It’s the cinnamon rolls that drew you back so soon, isn’t it? Either that or my sunny personality, but I vote cinnamon rolls—no one can resist the allure of butter, sugar, and cinnamon.”

Now that Kiela was here, her idea didn’t feel quite so grand and sparkling. Who was she to start a business, especially one with a possibly slightly (or very) forbidden side? She didn’t know anything about jam or shops or this island or people or really anything but her section of the library. Who was she to think she could transform her parents’ home into a store and welcome in neighbors—strangers—and sell to them? Her throat felt clogged as she searched for the words that she’d been so sure would be easy to say.

“Hmm, if it were cinnamon rolls, you’d look happier to be here,” Bryn said. “Is something wrong? Is it the cottage? An issue with your roof, your stove, your water? Once, after a storm, I had holes in my roof—I live above the bakery—holes as big as my fist and so much rain came through that I expected to find a fish in my bed. Reinforced the roof since then, of course. You have leaks? If so, you’ll want to get them patched up before the next storm.”

Kiela shook her head and wondered why all the words had fled her. She hadn’t had any problem talking to the baker when she’d been asking for seeds and such, but now, with so much more at stake . . . It had seemed such a shiny, lovely idea before, but what if Bryn thought it was nonsense? What if there was no jam in her bakery simply because she didn’t like jam? What if no one on Caltrey liked jam? What if Caz was right that this was all a terrible idea? Instead of speaking, Kiela pulled the jar of raspberry jam out of her basket and held it out.

“Ah, lovely!” Bryn took the jar, removed the cloth from the top, and sniffed. “Raspberry! You have raspberries? My crop has been measly for the last three years.”

“They grew, left wild . . .” Stop being ridiculous, she told herself. Pull yourself together, Kiela. “I had an idea, to start a shop, to sell jams and . . . little remedies, to help with plants and such . . . But mostly jam. There are a lot of berry bushes behind the house, and I have a recipe . . .” She felt her cheeks blushing red and wished she’d practiced this on her walk into town. Why was it so difficult to ask for help?

While Kiela was stammering all of this, Bryn was already busy smearing a spread of the jam onto one of her pastries. “Eadie!” she hollered through the window. “Come and try this!”

Eadie trotted up to the window, and Bryn handed her the pastry.

The centaur bit into the pastry, her eyes closed, and she let out a little moan.

Bryn turned back to Kiela. “If you have more, I’ll buy it.”

Kiela felt her knees wobble, and she let out a little laugh. She sank into the nearest stool. “Yes, that’s . . .” She took a deep breath. “I’d like to open a jam shop. I have berries and jars, but I lack a supply of sugar, as well as wax to seal the jars. I was hoping, in exchange for a cut of my product, that you could provide the sugar and wax.” She took another breath, encouraged by what she saw in Bryn’s eyes. “I came here to ask if you’d like to be business partners.”

Slathering another pastry with jam, Bryn handed it out the window to the boy with horns. He stuffed it in his mouth in one bite. “Chew before you swallow,” she told him. To Kiela, she said, “You just met me. I could be a terrible business partner. You don’t even know a single one of my flaws.”

Jam on his cheek, the boy piped up. “You’re bossy. And you talk a lot.”

“Hush, you,” Bryn said. Then: “He’s right. Admittedly, Eadie can talk circles around me”—from outside, Eadie called, “I heard that and agree!”—“but I do like to talk. When I was a kid, I heard a story about a hermit who held so many words inside that eventually he burst from the pressure of all the unsaid thoughts. Years later, they found his bones scattered and thousands of words burned into the stone walls of his cave. Ever since, I’ve been afraid to hold too many words inside.”

“That . . . is not actually possible.” Kiela might not be a trained sorcerer, but she knew that wasn’t how magic worked. “Accidents can happen when you work magic, but you can’t just have magic happen accidentally—spells have to be cast, with very specific words and ingredients. It has to be done deliberately.”

Bryn gave a little snort, halfway between disbelief and interest. “No one deliberately causes the magic storms, and yet they happen, loudly, often.”

“Yes, but magic storms are caused by the buildup of improperly balanced spell residue,” Kiela said, unable to keep herself from sounding like one of the scholars who visited the library. “And they don’t recoil on the sorcerer.” She forced herself to stop talking. I shouldn’t be revealing I know so much about magic.

Unbothered by Kiela spewing out magical knowledge, Bryn shrugged. “Facts didn’t matter at the time. I was five. The story stuck, as well as the one about the fish that ate a boat.”

“Okay, that one could be true.” All sorts of creatures lived in the sea. Those books were on the second floor of the east wing. Kiela’s specialty was natural sciences, but her collection didn’t include the ocean, except for where it impacted the land. She’d once gotten into a nearly heated argument with the librarian on the second floor about those volumes that could have been shelved in either section. A scholar had shushed them. It had been quite embarrassing.

“I am a mess of nerves on a boat, which is an inconvenient phobia when you live on an island. You should have seen me when I first arrived. Kissed the ground and got a mouth full of sand. That was the main reason why I set up my bakery—knew I’d never make it as a fisherman. Also, I love to bake.”

Kiela took a steadying breath. “Would you love to bake with jam?”

Bryn grinned. “I haven’t scared you off yet?”

She shook her head. An assertive business partner who talked a lot sounded ideal to her; less need for Kiela to fill the silence. And selling jam had nothing to do with boats. She didn’t see what the problem was. “You get fifty percent.”

“That’s terrible negotiating,” Bryn said. “Offer me ten percent.”

“Um, ten percent?”

“That’s much too low. Why are you insulting me with such a low offer?”

“Forty?” Kiela said.

“Okay, you are not good at this at all. Fair is twenty, plus I supply the sugar and wax, and you provide the berries, as well as the labor of making and canning the jam.”

Kiela smiled. “Twenty. And once my shop is open, you recommend it to your customers and neighbors.”

Bryn nodded. “I’ll spread the word and tell everyone it’s worth the climb. In return, you need to tell me how you convinced Larran to take you on a ride on one of his merhorses, because my nephew Tobin—he’s the smart-mouthed one who somehow managed to get jam in his eyebrow fur—has been drooling over those horse-fish for years with no luck.”

She hadn’t known that was a coveted invite. “I . . . He just asked me.”

“Hmm . . .” Bryn studied her so long that Kiela patted her hair to make sure it wasn’t sticking up. “Perhaps Tobin would have more luck if he tried being less annoying.”

From out the window, Tobin called, “I heard that!”

Bryn grinned. “Why don’t you help your mother with the nets?”

“Because that’s work, and she won’t pay!”

“How about I pay you then?” Bryn offered. “You help Kiela here carry a bag of sugar up the cliff steps, and you can eat the very first raspberry croissant I bake.”

“I don’t need—” Kiela began.

“Hush,” Bryn said. “Let the boy be useful. It’ll make him feel important, and as an added bonus, it will make your climb easier.” Louder, she called out the window, “Deal?”

He whooped and shouted, “Deal!”

Bryn ducked through a door, dipping her head so her antlers didn’t scrape the top of the doorframe, and returned a half minute later with a sack of sugar slung under one arm and a jar of wax in her other hand. Kiela took the wax, and Tobin darted in to take the bag of sugar. It was nearly half his size, but he hefted it up without complaint.

“I’ll be back when I’ve made more,” Kiela promised.

After saying goodbye to Bryn and Eadie, she followed the boy with the sugar out of the bakery and through the streets. He was, she quickly discovered, as fond of talking as his aunt, but he preferred questions. “Where are you from?” “Did you come by boat?” “Have you ever seen a kraken?” “Have you met the emperor?” “What’s the palace like?” “Is it true the streets of Alyssium are made of flowers?” “Do you know any nobles?” “Have you ever been in the palace?” “Do you know any sorcerers?”

Not really wanting to answer any of that, but especially the last question, she redirected it back at him. “Do you?”

And he was off.

He hadn’t seen a sorcerer since he was a kid, he said (despite still being a kid), but back in his youth, he remembered one who dressed all in purple—Tobin seemed to feel it very important that she understood how very much purple: purple cloak, purple pants, purple socks, purple belt—who would visit on her regular rotation once a season. Everything was better then, he said his parents said, because the magic was all spread out across all the islands. Fewer storms. Better crops. More fish. She’d stopped coming about three years ago, maybe four, because he hadn’t learned to skip rocks yet. Since then, everything had gotten worse. Everything was unbalanced, and that’s why he had to eat kelp porridge, even though it tasted like slime mold. He concluded with: “If you need a jam taster, I volunteer. Are you really going to sell jam?”

“And remedies,” she said.

“For what?”

For asking too many questions, she thought, but she said, “I’m still figuring it out.”

At the top of the cliff stairs, he dropped the sugar bag on the ground and stretched his arms. Kiela looked back at the village and the sea beyond it. The sun was dipping low, enough so it looked as if it were about to drip into the water.

“Whoa, what is that?” Tobin asked.

She turned to see Caz propelling himself toward them with his usual method: reaching out with his tendrils and then flinging his bare root ball forward. Seen at a distance, he looked a bit like a very hairy, very green dog with a very dirty belly. Closer . . . he just looked like a pot-less spider plant about the size of a dog. “ Who, ” Kiela corrected. “He’s my friend, Caz.”

“Wow, he’s awesome. Is he a plant?”

“ Chlorophytum comosum,” Caz said, reaching them. “And you are—Goat horns? Are you a goat?” All of his leaves began to shake, and he waved his tendrils in the air. “Kiela, did you bring a plant-eater back with you?”

Before Kiela could explain, Tobin had his hands up in surrender. “I am totally not a plant eater at all. You can ask my mom. I never, ever eat my vegetables. Except candied carrots, because those are delicious. But I would never, ever eat a talking chlorophy . . . what?”

“Spider plant,” Caz said, lowering his tendrils slightly. His leaves continued to tremble. “Are there others like you who eat plants?”

“No one on Caltrey will eat you,” Tobin promised. “Not even a nibble.” He knelt down to see Caz better. “Sorry for scaring you. I’ve just never seen anyone like you. My name’s Tobin.”

“Well, I’ve never seen anyone like you either, Tobin. I apologize if I was rude.”

Kiela grinned at both of them and then asked Caz, “Is anything wrong? I thought you were going to stay at the cottage.”

“I just got worried about you,” Caz said. “I didn’t know you were making us friends.”

Delighted, Tobin cried, “I’m friends with a spider plant!” He jumped to his feet. “I can’t wait to tell Aunt Bryn!”

“You can head back,” Kiela told him. “We can take it from here. Thanks for your help.”

He hesitated. “You’re sure? You won’t tell Aunt Bryn that I was unhelpful?”

“You were very helpful.” She did appreciate not having to haul the sugar up the stairs by herself, while carrying the wax. Plus he hadn’t been terrible company. His relentless chatter reminded her of a bird excited for spring. Maybe it was going to be okay, talking with people more than she used to. And maybe Caz would feel more comfortable here, now that he’d met a boy with goat horns and hadn’t been eaten. “If I do need a jam taster, I’ll let you know. You can head on home.”

“Nice to meet you, Caz.”

“You too, Tobin.”

Waving at both of them, he scurried down the stairs twice as fast as she ever went. She waited to make sure he reached the bottom safely, and then she lifted her eyes to watch the sunset. Golden, the sun oozed like molten jam into the sea.

And then, with Caz by her side, she headed home, carrying sugar, wax, and hope.