Chapter 2: Love

The magic shop was a peculiar place full of strange things both real and fake. From the dozen of colourful, oddly shaped glass bottles with potions only two of them would change your fate instead of making you dizzy. Or having your stomach turn into a knot.

The inside of the shop was nice enough, warm, all fair wood kissed by sunlight with shiny bottles on display shelves, dried flowers and herbs hanging from the ceiling, pendants on red strings, intricately decorated boxes and candles of various shapes, sizes and colours.

Asa turned the page of his book mindlessly. He was getting bored.

Working in the shop was in no way fun, especially when you were the only person doing any actual work while wearing an incredibly ugly, yellow apron falling apart at the seams. But what else could Asa do? He was twenty-two and cursed, stuck in the forest for the foreseeable future. It felt as if he had spent a thousand years in the shop already.

Asa touched the book, leather-bound and dusty, and wondered how many people before him had held it. One or two? Or maybe none?

The silver bell hung over the door chimed, announcing a customer coming in. Asa pushed The Basics of Time Magic away and straightened up, fixing the apron. Oh, he hated this thing so much he would gladly burn it again.

The woman that had entered the shop mumbled a quiet good morning to the floor and then wandered around, manoeuvring between the shelves and counters. She kept touching various things, dragging her bony fingers over the bottles and wooden boxes until she touched a dusty skull and winced in disgust. Asa wanted to laugh at that, the skull wasn’t even real, it was just a plastic trinket that Harvey had brought from the outside.

In the end, laughter escaped Asa’s mouth. The woman looked at him with surprise, visibly not used to being laughed at.

“Hello,” Asa leaned further on the counter and smiled, cocking his head. “How can I help you?”

In return, he got a confused look, like his help wasn’t at all needed. But it was, of course it was – if the woman didn’t need it, she wouldn’t have found the shop.

Not a lot of people knew that the shop even existed, but if you really needed it, if you had a problem gnawing at your heart, this place would unveil itself to you. It had its ways, plenty of them.

The name of it appearing in your mind for no reason, a little mention of the shop in between the lines of the morning newspaper or a leaflet blown by the wind and hitting you directly in the face.

The shop had its ways to find you. If you were curious and desperate enough, you would visit. They always did.

“I can solve whatever problem you have,” Asa carried on, shrugging. “So, what is it? Are awful nightmares not letting you sleep? Old ghosts in your house? I don’t particularly like ghosts, to be honest, so-”

“Can you really help me with anything?” The woman asked, her interest piqued. She approached the counter, the heels of her shoes clicking on the wood. She was so close that Asa could smell her perfume, ripe plums and honey.

Nauseating and overbearing.

Asa leaned away slightly, just in case, because the woman was staring. Once, there had been a man with the same nervousness flickering in his eyes, and he ended up throwing himself over the counter and at Asa, clawing at his apron. Maybe it had happened because the apron was horrible. Maybe because Asa was mean, but Harvey was the one who had suggested this option.

“Anything at all,” Asa said. “What will it be then?”

“Love,” the woman blurted out. “Can you help with that?”

It’s been years since Asa had thought about love. With every week, it felt like he was drifting further and further away from this, from human emotion. From understanding those mundane problems. Love. How did it feel?

Asa didn’t remember. Did he even experience it in the first place, ever?

For him, love was just another problem that people came to him with, a thing to be dealt with using one of his potions or spells. At times, he could solve it by simply talking some sense into people. Why would he waste magic on things insignificant?

“Love?” Asa pondered. “Did you break someone’s heart?”

The woman tapped her fingers on the counter, red nails meeting the surface. Somewhere in the store, there was a candle that had the exact same blood-red colour.

The woman looked around the shop, her gaze sliding from shelf to shelf before finally resting on Asa. He was used to it, to people staring at him and at the grey ends of his otherwise jet-black hair.

With every year, the grey was consuming more and more of the colour.

“What an odd place,” the woman mumbled. “I want someone to love me more.”

More?

Asa’s eyebrows rose. He’s never gotten a request like this, it was always either a broken heart or making someone fall in love. What did it mean, more?

“She doesn’t love me enough,” the woman continued, spitting the words out quickly. “I mean, she does love me, very much so, but not enough. And she doesn’t speak to me yet.”

“Yet?”

The woman shrugged, looking away awkwardly, biting on her lip hard. She didn’t look like jumping over the counter would cross her mind, though, so Asa leaned in closer.

“You have to tell me,” he murmured. “I need the whole story to help you.”

A lie. There were moments when Asa didn’t really feel like helping, so he would just send the customers on their way with a faux rabbit foot in hand, he didn’t need to hear the story at all. But he was nosy.

And here, something just didn’t seem right.

“It’s complicated, okay?” the woman snapped, her eyes getting bigger. “I need help, not for you to judge me.”

“Alright,” Asa said, no judgement in his voice at all. He had heard weirder things in this place, for sure. “You can trust me.”

The shelves in the back groaned, agitated. Asa put his hand flat on the counter, calming the shop down.

“Myra doesn’t know me,” the woman admitted in the end. “But I know her, I do. And I love her. I know her work schedule, I know what she has for breakfast, I know how she smells. I know how her scarf feels on my neck, I borrowed it once. And I know for a fact that she would love me. I’m sure she already does, but not enough to see it. Not enough to see me. Can you help me?”

Truth be told, Asa had no idea what courting looked like in this day and age, but he was quite sure it wasn’t that.

Obsession. Not love.

“Why won’t you talk to her first?” Asa asked.

The woman smiled. “I want her to make the first move. I want her to want me.”

“You really love her, don’t you?”

“You get it?” The woman’s eyes shone with excitement. “I knew someone would. Will you help me?”

The shop was always there for you. Asa had no choice but to help.

He nodded and went around the shop, gathering what he needed. Two tall and slim candles, never used before, as well as a silky red ribbon.

“Here,” Asa said, putting the candles down on the counter while the woman stared at them curiously. “This will help only if you do exactly what I say.”

“I will, I promise,” she responded immediately, without a thought. “Anything for her.”

Asa had a feeling that she meant it. If Myra told her to drink poison, this woman would, without even speaking to her. What she was doing, however, was toxic enough.

While the woman watched, Asa tied the ribbon to the tops of the candles, just under the knots, to give the fire a moment to exist and burn. Then, he lit a match and lit both candles.

The fire was flickering, eating the knots away, a red glow reflecting in the woman’s fair eyes. She looked possessed.

“Say your name,” Asa whispered, handing her one of the candles. She gripped it carefully, watching the wax starting to melt away already. Magic candles, so unreliable.

“Emily.”

The sun rays peeking through the window disappeared as if the sun got covered by a storm cloud. Emily looked around nervously, scared.

Outside, an owl sat down on a tree branch, watching the shop with careful eyes.

“Look at me,” Asa scolded. He hated when people were getting distracted. He passed the other candle to Emily, the slender fingers of her right hand curling around it. “Say her name.”

Emily’s voice was shaking when she whispered:

“Myra.”

The candles burned brighter, the fire changing from red to yellow, devouring the wax without mercy.

A shiver ran down Asa’s spine. It was working, it was working. He tried to push the magic back into his veins, he couldn’t let it show.

Emily’s breath wavered, her hands shaking.

“Don’t drop them,” Asa warned. “The ribbon has to burn.”

“But the wax is dripping, it will hurt when-”

“You wanted this,” Asa reminded. “You wanted her to love you, didn’t you? Love is pain, remember?”

The flame licked the ribbon, tasting it at first, before starting to destroy it. Yellow sparkles kept grazing Emily’s fingers, a red glow bouncing off her face. She looked like a daughter of all that was evil.

The ribbon started to turn black, its pieces falling off, and then, the fire finally tore through it, breaking it in half and following up, devouring it completely.

Asa felt the wave of sparkling magic overwhelm him. The tips of his fingers got numb as if he got shocked with electricity, and his heart sped up, wanting to beat out of his chest and escape.

Suddenly, Emily looked into his eyes and yelped, dropping the candles mindlessly, jumping back. But it didn’t matter at all, the spell was done.

Asa blinked a few times, quickly, trying to go back to normal. The sun was shining again, as it did every day. As if nothing had ever happened.

“Okay,” Asa summed up, nodding. Overall, a job well done, but now he had to clean the mess and apologise for the burn marks on the floor. “That should do it.”

“Your eyes were yellow,” Emily blurted, stumbling over her words. “They turned yellow.”

“Yours turned red, and what about it?” Asa sighed. “It was the fire reflecting. How are you feeling, Emily?”

Emily watched as Asa flicked the burned ribbon pieces off his counter. She stood there and stared like she was waiting for something more to happen, something unnatural – but everything was normal. Just a boy, cleaning the counter, his eyes plain brown.

“I feel… alright,” Emily said, but it sounded like a question. “How much do I have to pay you?”

“Nothing at all. I’m here to help, that’s my job.”

Emily hesitated for a moment, looking around at the dried-up flowers and wooden boxes, like she was still considering buying one of them. She had a confused expression on her face, but it was nothing unusual after a spell this deep.

A spell that tore her feelings out with the root. The connection was broken. It would never return.

Sometimes what people wanted wasn’t what they needed. And Asa had the freedom to do what he thought was best.

“Your calendar,” Emily murmured eventually, pointing at the battered calendar nailed to the wall behind Asa. “It’s wrong. It’s June, not October.”

“Oh, you are right,” Asa smiled politely. “I’ll fix it in a moment. Thank you for noticing.”

Emily nodded and swayed from side to side, thinking. Then, she shrugged to herself, said goodbye and left the store, the silver bell chiming once more. She would find her way out of the forest in a moment, and then she would forget ever visiting the shop. She would never come again.

Asa craned his neck, looking over his shoulder, eyeing the calendar. But the calendar wasn’t wrong. Here, it was October.

It was always October.