Chapter 7 #3
Portia let out a snarl, felt the magic gathering beneath her skin, undirected and angry. If she blasted Seb’s raven out of the air, it was his own fault.
Before the spell could release, Jade rose on her hind legs, wings spread wide and gave a shriek of her own, far louder than should be possible for so small a creature.
The bird rolled back through the air, a ball of feathers and shock, and crashed into one of the bookshelves. He came up, cawing in anger and distress, flapping about wildly to regain his equilibrium.
‘Well,’ said Seb, appearing around a corner from one of the back rooms, with a book in one hand, his glasses perched on his head, almost lost amongst his unruly curls. ‘I’ve never seen that before.’
‘Get that bird under control,’ Portia snapped at her brother.
Seb just shrugged. ‘Funny you think I have any sort of control over him at all. Besides, you and the dragon seem to be the aggressors here. Come on, Lore. Get yourself together, you silly old thing.’
The bird cast him a baleful look and hopped back up onto the counter, moving closer to Seb like he might protect him. He shuffled back and forth, making soft grumbling sounds until Seb reached out and scratched the back of his head.
‘Don’t pick fights you can’t win, mate,’ he said affectionately. ‘How many times?’
He looked smaller in here, her little brother.
Soft around the edges. Blurring into the shop their uncle had saddled him with.
He was dressed in old clothes which hung off his slender frame, probably Art’s clothes.
They looked like the kind of thing an elderly professor would pick, not a young man in his twenties.
His light brown eyes glowed like amber in the dim light and she could sense the magic in him, swirling, undefined, barely under any kind of control. Much like the shop. He looked… tired, if she was honest. Worn.
‘How… how are you?’ she asked.
Seb smiled wanly which was an answer in itself. ‘All right. You?’
That was the question, wasn’t it? How was she? Because if anyone knew a fraction of what she was going through with the Academy, it was Seb. ‘Not great. I’m still waiting to see if they’re kicking me out or not.’
There was a long moment of silence. Something she couldn’t read flickered in his eyes and the air around him shivered.
Chaos magic, they called it in the Academy, and that was on the nicer end of what they said about the power bottled up in Sebastian Starling’s body.
He didn’t mean to cause problems but somehow they happened all around him.
And the more he tried to contain it, the worse the eventual eruption was.
Here in the shop, it felt more controlled, as if the emporium itself was able to syphon the worst effects off somehow.
But in the Academy…? That had been a disaster.
She wondered for a moment if he would ask about Milo – how he was, what he was doing, had he mentioned Seb at all? – but he didn’t. If the words played on the tip of his tongue, he swallowed them down quickly, before they could slip out.
Instead, Seb gave a soft laugh, self-deprecating, sad rather than mirthful.
‘At least it’s still a question of if. I’m sorry, Portia.
It’s not fair. They’re fools.’ She had once said something very similar to him.
The pain of it all hung between them. Not to mention Milo.
Seb had been besotted with him and Milo had seemed to feel the same way.
But after everything that had happened… She didn’t know when they had last spoken.
She didn’t dare ask either of them. Seb had left.
Letters went unanswered. Hearts were broken.
There was no need to rake through the pain.
‘Tea or coffee? I’ll put the kettle on. Come through.
Don’t worry about Lore,’ he said as she hesitated.
‘You’d think he’d have learned his lesson by now.
Don’t bully teacup dragons. Just because they’re smaller than you, doesn’t mean you can take them.
’ He grinned at Jade who was still standing on Portia’s shoulder, chest puffed out, wings flexing.
‘Especially not that one, it seems. Looks like you’ve found your perfect match, Portia. ’
Portia petted the dragon again and felt the purr through her skin. She shouldn’t feel quite so proud of Jade putting the raven in his place, but she did.
‘I need to consult Art’s book,’ she told Seb, and tried not to notice the way he froze for a moment.
Would he say no? She couldn’t imagine Seb denying her anything, but this man – and he was very much a man now, rather than the boy she had known – well, now she wasn’t so sure.
‘And I need some equipment for an apothecary’s laboratory. ’
‘Setting up shop?’ he asked with a studied kind of lightness. But when he glanced at her there was an unexpected twinkle in his eye.
Portia raised one eyebrow and found a smile on her lips. ‘Afraid of a rival business on the island?’
Seb laughed and before she knew what was happening, her brother threw his arms around her and pulled her in for a hug. He was bigger than she remembered, though still as thin as a rake. ‘Good god, Portia, I’ve missed you so much. It’s been far too long. Tell me everything.’
And she did, over tea and biscuits. Though she noticed he skirted carefully around any mention of Milo Leyton the whole time.