According to the grandmother clock sitting in the corner of the Apothecary, behind the counter and between the dried herbs and empty glass half-jars, it was nearly three in the afternoon. As it turned out, there were really only two ways three in the afternoon could go in the Apothecary. In the first way, the store was quiet. The only sounds would be the music coming from the audioblooms, the squeaks from Ridge’s rag as he made rounds wiping all the surfaces and the windows down, and that thin, breathless whisper of the pages in Harper’s fingers as she turned the pages of her book. It was supposed to be a textbook. Sometimes it was. Mostly it was dime-store novels, the ones about the chappies Athanasia referred to as ‘trash-fire fuel.’
Then there was the second way. The second way consisted of nothing less than orchestrated chaos.
Harper picked up the last ward bag the screaming child had knocked over. They had been displayed on one of the counters in the middle of the store, in neat little rows. There was no time to recreate rows. They would have to stay in a lump.
“Miss, oh, miss? Where are your truth syrups?” The woman was wearing a finely-made dress of expensive fabric and a hat so large people had to dodge under the feathers, but had the look of someone trying to keep a lot of people in line. A madam, then. Nobody liked truth syrups more than madams and mothers.
“Back corner,” Harper said, tossing her head over her left shoulder to gesture to the far wall. Her hands still carried the basket of sweetness charms she had been trying to put on display for the last five minutes. “The half-jars filled with the thin blue liquid. The darker, the stronger.”
But the woman was already walking across the Apothecary, nearly there, and Harper bet herself that the woman hadn’t heard anything after ‘corner.’ Harper weaved through the crowd toward the Apothecary’s front window. There appeared to be people from three separate caravans in the little shop, all vying for space and spells. One group was all men, dressed in rough and lightly colored clothes, mostly around the protection spells and the findmes. Miners, heading for the copper streaks southwest. Another group looked like settlers, picking at the water witches and growfasts. The rest were all finely dressed with smooth hands and painted nails. Harper couldn’t be sure what their purpose was, but she knew their destination was beyond the Cursed Lands, to the Ocean Place. It was a little funny, them being in here. Usually that fine type just going through to the Ocean Place took the boats down, and Castor’s Apothecary on the docks always caught their eye first on virtue of being closer.
This was how it went in Moment’s Peace. If there were caravans in town, the people and the money flowed. If there weren’t, they didn’t. No in-between. As she filled the window display with the sweetnesses, Harper watched out the window. Dozens of people walking up and down the street, ducking in and out of the little stores. She didn’t see a single one she recognized.
As though on cue, two men came from the shop across the way and began walking down the plankwalk. Without realizing it, all of Harper’s attention was now on them. Cornelius and Neiro. Moment’s Peace’s very own chappies, offering up their services to anyone who asked. Cornelius, tall and slim. Neiro, broad but not much shorter. They were in command of the planks. Side by side they walked in a straight line, and everyone else moved. The men slid to one side with a tip of the hat. The women stood to one side and maybe even curtsied, sparing glances for their backsides as they passed. They returned the smiles and greetings, laughing as they went. Most of these people couldn’t know them, but everyone knew a chappy when they saw one.
They turned at the same time and started coming for the Apothecary. Harper quickly finished filling the display and tried to use her reflection in the window to make sure her hair was in place. The door to the Apothecary, held open to let the air move, wasn’t wide enough to allow them to walk in side by side, and after some subtle maneuvering Neiro managed to get through first.
“Mr. Higgins, Mr. Theo. Good day to you,” Harper said, yelling a bit to be heard over the crowd.
“Lovely day to you, Miss Harper,” Neiro said. The grin he had for her was sly and wicked, and when he winked one of those deeply brown eyes Harper wanted to pinch herself. “I do look forward to seeing your smile.”
If she had one of those folding fans she’d be hiding behind it. As it was, she could only stand there and hope the flush to her face looked like heat and exhaustion.
“The usual order today?” she asked, doing very well to keep from squeaking.
“Just so, Miss Harper,” Cornelius said. He ran a hand over his face and Harper could hear the rasp from his beard. “Reckon it’s time I shave. What do you think?”
“I think you shouldn’t touch a single hair,” Harper said, aghast. It was all a show, though. They had the same conversation every time they came in.
Using the basket she had carried the sweetness charms in, Harper began working her way through the shop, weaving around the people, reaching under arms and over children’s heads. They bought the same things every time they came in. Luck, protection, truth and such. All things every chappy needed in their arsenal, she supposed. She’d never dared to ask, only daydreamed about what things they came up against. Once she was sure she had everything she went to the counter. She could have ducked under the gap at the end, but she chose to jump up, spinning her legs and skirts over the counter neatly and jumping down with a perfectly soft sound. Working very hard to not look to see if they were watching, she brought her basket over to the register.
“Let me ring the chappies up once you’re done, Ridge,” she said to the young man. Barely more than a boy, really. He didn’t say anything, only finished giving his last customer her change and then stepping away to give her space.
“There is a line, here, isn’t there?” said a man, one of the settlers by the look of it.
“These are chappies, sir,” Harper called. Her eyes stayed on the register as she pushed the heavy buttons, ringing in everything by memory. “They have more important things to do than wait in line all day.”
The man grumbled some more but didn’t speak up again, and Cornelius and Neiro met her up at the register, giving everyone in the line many thanks and excuses for letting them go up front.
“Thirteen fifty-four,” Harper said, and added before they could ask. “And that includes the chappy discount.”
“You know you don’t have to do that,” Neiro said. He always seemed to be the one with the money, and he handed her a ten and a five.
“My pleasure,” she said. “Have a good day, gentlemen.”
They said their goodbyes and walked out with their new bag of charms. Harper watched them go until they were down the plankwalk and out of sight. She turned to find Ridge staring at her.
“What?” she asked. “They’re chappies. They risk their lives all day for people they don’t even know, they could stand to use a little kindness from the people they do.”
“Uh-huh,” Ridge said. But he had an eyebrow up, and the line of his lips was flat. Too flat. Like if he didn’t keep his lips perfectly flat they’d flare up into a knowing smile. Ugh. He was sixteen. Like he knew anything.
Harper tutted. “Just get through the line, Ridge.”
The window display of sweetness charms was the last thing she had wanted to top up, and it didn’t look like children had dumped any more of their pieces on the ground, so Harper stayed behind the counter. The other end, the end without the oversized silver and copper register and the little baskets of ‘impulse buys,’ was kept empty. The sodawood, dark and shiny, was kept clean, but Harper still wiped it all down with a clean rag and water from the pump before beginning. As it dried, she rolled up her white sleeves in stiff creases, turning up each sleeve three times each to get above the elbow. The list of what they needed made was tacked on the side of the counter. Harper studied it, and then turned to the back wall.
Shelf after shelf, from ceiling to floor, all filled with neatly labeled jars, vials, and wooden boxes. Anybody coming in off the street to steal would be hard pressed to find anything fast enough. There was no obvious order to the way things had been placed. No order at all. Only memorization and muscle memory helped Harper reach the exact right spot every time.
First on the list was heaven’s healing. In quick, snapping motions she pulled down the thunderseed, larkspur, and varmint guts. From the cabinets underneath the sodawood counter she pulled out some empty jars and corks, lining them up along the edge of the counter. Now was the time-
“Miss, which one of these is the strongest?”
Harper put her hands to her side, hiding the fists she had made behind the counter. Not that it mattered. The woman in the large hat was looking between her own hands, each holding a vial. Harper suppressed a sigh and forced a smile on her face.
“The darker the blue, the stronger the syrup,” she said sweetly.
“Very well. I’ll take a case of these.” The woman wiggled the vial of the dark blue syrup and placed both on counter, nearly knocking over the guts.
“Wonderful,” Harper said. “Ridge can help you right over there.”
The woman didn’t move. Her eyes had turned flat, like a snake sunning itself on a rock, and Harper knew what was coming before the woman spoke.
“Why can’t you do it?”
“We only have the one register, ma’am. And Ridge is on it. He can help just over there.”
“Well, what are you doing?” The woman put a hand on her hip, cocking it to one side. A madam, Harper remembered. Certainly used to being in charge of everyone, it seemed.
Harper put on her best smile. The one that was just a little bit too much. Still a smile, but, hopefully, betraying the true anger roiling underneath.
“Ma’am, I’m the mage,” Harper said. “I was about to get to work. I cannot help you. But Ridge can.”
The woman looked Harper up and down, and did no work in hiding her sneer. “Aren’t you a little young for a mage?”
Aren’t you a little ugly to be in charge of whores? It ran through her mind but Harper couldn’t say that. Right?
The woman’s sneer deepened, and Harper was afraid she picked up the thought.
“And just what is that smile?”
No, no magic, she had simply used her eyes. Harper had such a terrible poker face. What she did have, though, was an excellent furious face and very little patience.
“I just find it funny when people are rude to mages,” Harper said.
The woman opened her mouth again, but snapped it shut without speaking. The lights in the store were dimming, except there were no lights in the store. Only the light coming through the front windows and the holes in the ceiling, and it was still afternoon. A hush fell over the other folks still in line, and they all peered out to see if a storm was coming. There was sun, sure enough. Just not in the Apothecary.
“Especially when they’re standing in the mage’s home,” Harper said. “Especially when they’re asking for something.”
With a shaking hand, the woman scooped up the dark blue syrup, and pointed to Ridge.
“Just over there, then?”
Harper wiped the fury off her face, replacing it with that same sweet smile. At the same time she released her grip on the darkness, letting it settle back into its corners and shadows.
“Yes, that’s right. Ridge can help you.”
She left the syrup she didn’t want on the counter. Harper let it slide, wanting to be done with her. She pitied the women who had to report to her.
Before Harper could even remember what it was she was about to make, a man she had noticed before came to her counter from the other side of the line. He was one of the miners, with a large mustache and gritty looking overalls.
“Did you say you were the mage here?”
Harper’s heart skipped a beat and despite the heat a chill crossed her back. She tried to ignore it, and stood up straight.
“Is there something I can help you with?” she asked, crossing her arms and trying to look dignified.
“Yes, oh, yes,” the man said. He almost leaned on the counter and then backed away, hands up, like he thought it would burn him. “I need a healing incense.”
Harper swallowed hard.
“You mean a balm? A cream?” Those she could make.
“No, no, an incense. It’s my lungs. I cough. I cough so much my throat burns and my back aches. Sometimes I can bruise a rib.”
“You look okay.”
“A mage in Pitter’s Plot made me some. They’ve carried me all this way down the river. But I need more to last me the next three months out in the mines. Please, I have the money. I know it’s expensive, but I have the money!”
The money wasn’t the problem. It wasn’t why her lower back suddenly felt tight and her vision had darkened around the edges. Was she hyperventilating? It felt like she was hyperventilating. The woman with the large hat was still in line. She was looking forward, toward the register and Ridge, but Harper knew. She was listening to every word.
“I’ll need to go in the back,” Harper said, trying not to stumble over her words. She backed up slowly, moving to the door. “Please wait here.”
She turned away, as much to find the door as to not have to look at the man’s face – or see the woman’s. All of the good feelings, that feeling of knowing her place and being in charge of it, all of that was gone. Now, she was a trembling little girl.
The back was kept quiet and dark, and Harper had to wait by the door for a few seconds to her eyes to adjust. Once the kitchen was in view, and it became plain it was empty, Harper dragged herself across it, to the first door on the left. She didn’t bother knocking, as knocking never did anything.
She heard the snoring before she saw the lump. With a quick twist of magic she lit the lantern on the little table next to the bed, illuminating Athanasia. Harper hadn’t heard her come home the night before and had only checked on her this morning to make sure she was in her bed and alive. A client a little down river, she had said. And quite the trek to get to this client and back, it would seem, given how exhausted and bloodshot she always was when she came back.
Harper steeled herself. “Athanasia?”
The woman continued snoring, and Harper realized she had barely been louder than a mouse. She straightened her spine and took a couple small steps forward.
“Athanasia?” And when she kept snoring, Harper screwed up all the courage she had. “Athanasia!”
Athanasia snorted and jerked her head up, her hair all in her face.
“Ugghhhhh. Ugggghhhh. Ugh. What time is it?”
“Half past three,” Harper said, rubbing her arms. Athanasia always kept her room so cold despite how much magic it must have taken.
“Only?”
Athanasia, with a little effort and a lot more grunting, flipped over in the bed. She got all tangled up in the bedsheets and cursed as she pulled them from her limbs and nightgown. Finally, she was sitting up on the edge of the bed, elbows on her knees. She snorted and spit in the corner.
“What is it? Emergency? Fire? Whole town’s dead? Whole town’s an emergency?”
“Um, no, nothing so dire.” Harper swallowed, and when she spoke again the words poured from her as fast as a waterfall. “There’s a man out front who wants a healing incense and I can’t make it.”
Athanasia looked up at Harper. Realized her hair was still in her face and brushed all the curls back.
“Harper. I thought that sounded like you. But when you asked for something I knew you know how to do, I thought perhaps Ridge had come to me with a high voice and a dress.”
Without realizing she was doing it, Harper’s fingers worked together, as though piecing together a tiny puzzle that wasn’t there.
“I have done some incenses, yes. But not ones we’ve sold. I haven’t put in enough practice.”
Athanasia sighed as she lowered her face into her hands, followed by a short groan.
“Harper, we’ve been over this. Green magic is like cooking, not baking, remember? If you do something wrong-”
“You can add in something to make it right,” Harper finished listlessly. “But what if I mess up something and I don’t know it? He’s going out to the mines. If I don’t make them right, he could die out there.”
“Then there won’t be anyone to complain,” Athanasia said. She meant it as a joke, but Harper didn’t see anything funny. With another groan, Athanasia stretched out her arms over her head. “Fine, fine. Give me a minute to get presentable, then.”
It took closer to ten minutes before Athanasia joined Harper in the kitchen. Her hair had been pulled back tightly against the nape of her neck and she had put on another one of her loose flowing dresses, this one without so many wrinkles. While waiting for her, between pacing around the wooden table and trying not to pick at her nails and failing, Harper began to think she might blow a blood vessel in her brain and not have to worry about it anymore. She kept picturing the man, waiting at the counter, wondering what was going on. Maybe he had given up and left. Gone to Castor’s at the docks. Athanasia would just love that. The only silver lining was the woman in the large hat. Surely she had left by now.
“Right,” Athanasia said, making sure each of her copper rings were in place. “Shall we?”
“He’s a miner, with a big beard and overalls. He’s probably still standing-”
“Oh, no. You are coming out with me, my dear.”
Harper’s stomach lurched. “You don’t need me for this.”
Athanasia tutted. “No, but apparently you still need me. So you will come and watch, and I will go over all the steps in great detail.”
“But-”
“Not another word about it! We can’t have you being afraid of such basic things. Come, come.”
Without another word or glance in Harper’s direction, Athanasia flung open the door to the Apothecary. The sunlight pierced through the doorway and directly into Harper’s eyes, making her flinch, but Athanasia didn’t so much as blink. Dragging her steps, Harper followed Athanasia out into the store.
The miner was still there, his mustache wiggling under narrowed eyes. Harper only had eyes for that awful woman. As she stepped up behind the counter her eyes went to Ridge. The woman was not at the register. Nor was she in line. With a barely suppressed sigh of relief, she took her place next to Athanasia.
The woman with the large hat was on the other side of the miner, just slightly behind him. Almost like she had been hiding. She took a step forward now, though. Her smile was bitter.
“Who needed the incense?” Athanasia asked.
The miner looked from Harper to her. “Who are you?”
“I am Athanasia Atrella, Green Mage, learned in the trade under Posey Pouell. This is my shop.”
“She said she was the mage,” the woman in the hat said, pointing her too large and well-manicured hand.
“Harper is my apprentice,” Athanasia said. “Quite skilled, but still…immature. So, I shall make these incenses, and she shall learn.”
Her face was red all the way to her hair and ears, she could feel it. The woman in the hat’s smirk had become razor thin. The miner didn’t really seem to care who was making the incense as long as it was getting made, but shot Harper quizzical looks as Athanasia worked.
“Yellow thistle– You must do this, Harper, always remember this part. And once that is done, you can do this – are you paying attention, girl? Tell me what I just said.”
With a sigh, and with her eyes down on her shoes, Harper repeated Athanasia. In a loud rolling voice, avoiding the commands to speak up she knew would come if she didn’t. Truth was, Harper could have been the one giving instructions. She knew how to make an incense, down to the quarter sprig of windfoam. But knowing how to do it, and actually doing it, were two very different things. Harper didn’t know how to get Athanasia to see that.
By the time the incense was done, the midafternoon rush was over. The miner and the horrible woman were the only ones left. The miner was only grateful for the incense, and made sure to pay Ridge in full. The woman was still standing there. If she smirked any harder she was going to pull something.
“Is there something I can do for you?” Athanasia asked, dusting off her hands with a towel.
“No, I was just…watching the show.” Harper could hear the crocodile in her.
Athanasia snorted mightily and spit. “Show costs. Pay or get out.”
The woman in the awful hat turned her nose up to the air and sniffed. Still, there was a very happy curl to the sides of her mouth as she took her bag of truth syrups and finally left out the front door. Harper, Athanasia, and Ridge were the only people left.
“What a terrible human being,” Athanasia remarked to no one in particular. She put down her towel as she turned. “Harper-”
She finally had the courage to look away from the floor. “I know what you’re going to say-”
“Yes, you do. That’s the problem. I say it over and over and you can repeat it back to me, line and verse. But that doesn’t matter if you can’t do it. And I know you can. You have this mental block, Harper, and I don’t know how to get you over it.”
Harper bit the inside of her cheek to keep from tearing up. There was something new about the way Athanasia was talking to her, and looking at her. Some frustration that hadn’t been there before. Clutching her hands behind her, Harper realized it wasn’t new frustration at all. It was the old frustration, from her very earliest days of being an apprentice. That light in Athanasia’s eyes, and the way she was constantly tidying her hair, just the way she had when Harper couldn’t move something, or if her syrups had come out too thin. Harper had promised herself she would never see that in Athanasia again.
Perhaps she had been waiting for Harper to say something. Or maybe she was waiting for some sign the block had broken, just like that. A fog clearing in Harper’s eyes, or some rainbows shooting out of her mouth. Of course, there was nothing, and Athanasia held her elbows in her hands and sighed.
What am I going to do with you? flashed in Harper’s mind like an emberfly, there and gone.
“Doesn’t look like there’s anything else for me to do. Ridge, go home for the day. Harper, tidy the place before you lock up.”
Athanasia took one last look at Harper before turning and going through the door to the rest of their apartments. As soon as the door clicked shut Ridge let out air in a huge sigh, as though he had been holding it.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “I could stay and help. Mama’s not expecting me for another half hour.”
He was a sweet boy, a little too much so for a town like this. Taller than Harper and Athanasia but too thin, and with that baby face. Certainly not mage material. There didn’t seem to be a magical bone in his body. Maybe that was why Athanasia had hired him. Outside perspective.
“No, Ridge, I’m all right. You take your pay and go on home. Maybe stop by the general store. All these caravan folk must mean new sweets, right?”
Ridge’s eyes flashed at the idea, but he still kept his face somber as he took his money and put on his hat. There was a little skip in his step as he left, though, waving at her through the front window.
Harper flipped the little sign on the door window to ‘closed’ and locked the door behind him. Technically, the apothecary should be open for another hour or so. But with the rush over, the folks from the caravans were either packed back up and hoping to make it to Wren’s Alley by nightfall, or had all tucked themselves in at one of the saloons. Hardly anyone ever this late in the day, and if there was an emergency they could always come around back and knock. Apothecaries had hours, mages didn’t.
She set to work on the counter first, brushing off the loose windfoam onto the floor to sweep up later. She soaked a rag in the bucket of water that was kept in the corner and began wiping the counter down in smooth, circular strokes. Harper had always liked this part of the day. She turned the audioblooms off and soaked in the silence. After hours of crowds, her ears buzzed like all the chattering lingered after the people were gone, but it wasn’t magic. Just nerves.
Her face was still warm all the way up to her ears, and as she cleaned she made glances up at the windows. Like that woman would be there again, watching her scrub away like some servant in a fairy tale. Harper would show her. Show Athanasia, with her frustration, and Ridge, with his kind looks, too. She wasn’t a servant. She was a mage. Well, she would be. And she was going to be a great one. No, not great.
Harper was going to be perfect.
High Urban Fantasy Jazz 