Page 14 of The Spellreader and the Phoenix

“I’m Max, by the way,” he belatedly introduced himself. “He/him.”

The kid nodded. “Alex. They/them. Mostly.”

“Nice to meet you,” Max said. “I really appreciate the rescue. If you feel comfortable, let me know if I ever get your pronouns wrong. Or if you prefer me to refer to you always by your name, I can do that, too.”

Alex nodded one more time, and then their gaze was on the window, taking it all in and looking like they were making plans, which, now that Max thought about it, was probably part of the reason he’d been having trouble.

“You want me to put your bag inside?” he offered.

Alex nodded and handed over their backpack.

“If you need me to spot you, just give a yell,” Max said. “We close at five.” The kid probably already knew that because they were always here. “But I’ll be around for a while.”

He checked his watch and saw that it was just after three-thirty, suggesting Alex had come straight from school. The nearest high school was about a fifteen-minute walk away.

Alex hummed a sound that was probably agreement. Max would stay up front, he decided, and not venture into the back room where he couldn’t keep an eye on them. Magic could do a lot of awesome and sometimes very obscure things, but there were also things it couldn’t do. No divination or fortune-telling. No scrying or long-distance visions, although a modest enhancement to hearing and vision was possible (though still within a limited distance). There wasn’t a spell to win the lottery, although Max had come across spells on occasion that were meant to make people lucky or unlucky.

If Max had been smart, he would have cast a charm to steady the ladder, but casting out in the open was never a great idea. The World Spell would probably ensure no normal person noticed, but it was best to leave the Spell to deal with the emergencies and accidents rather than assume it could cover up day-to-day spells cast out of laziness or imprudence.

Spells that could be considered a curse were generally illegal and could bring the Council down on you, as well as severe sanctions to a living Spellsmith if they were the one to create it. That’s why Max had the safe in the back room, since he never knew what spells he’d come across, and it was protected by as many normal and magical protections as he could manage.

Occasionally, Max destroyed a spell, because while he believed in knowledge, there were some spells that should clearly never have been invented. He wasn’t about to be the reason that something terrible was rediscovered.

Max puttered around the shop for a few minutes and then settled onto his stool behind the counter once more, half checking his emails and half keeping an eye on Alex, because he really didn’t want the kid to fall.

“I should have just tried to draw dots two inches apart,” Max realized as he watched Alex at work. “I could probably have managed that.”

He’d gotten grand ideas that were definitely outside of his wheelhouse. Still, though, Alex seemed like they genuinely wanted to help. Maybe Max could even spin this into getting the help that Evie kept nagging him about.

He took out his phone to snap a pic and then realized he couldn’t do that without asking first. He’d send a photo of the finished art, instead, if Alex was okay with it. It would be excellent proof, too, because his sister would know instantly that it wasn’t something he’d managed to do.

Feeling much better about that, Max went back to his emails. There were a flurry of calls over the next half hour, and Max eventually worked out that one of the nearby elementary schools had set a reading assignment that specifically required reading a second-hand book. Apparently, it was meant to kindle a love of reading and sustainability. It meant that Max had to deal with more people, which wasn’t ideal, but he could get behind the overall message.

He could do without the constant interruptions, though. Maybe if they did this again, they could actually book an afternoon, and everyone could come at once and get it over with? All the parents seemed disappointed that he closed at 5pm today, but he confirmed his hours for the rest of the week and refrained from pointing out that he had a website, and it was actually quite easy to look up his hours without needing to bother him.

He wondered if Evie would be proud of his restraint.

He got distracted enough that it wasn’t until his alarm went off letting him know it was closing time that he really focused on the window and Alex again. His jaw nearly dropped. Although it was all in white marker, a rainbow stretched proudly across the top of the window. Leaves swirled across the glass, with books swept up in the invisible wind, some closed, some opened, pages curling. All of this was worked around the Read for a Spell logo, which was in large gold letters across the glass, perched over an open book with swirling sparkles around it.

It was exactly the sort of thing Max had imagined doing and exactly what he was incapable of producing. Nōwē was intently watching Alex work.

He couldn’t blame her.

Max came outside to look at the design properly. It looked even better from the front with no reflections blocking any of it.

“This is amazing,” Max said. “You’re really talented.”

Alex’s cheeks flushed, and they mumbled, “It’s fine.”

“I can’t believe you were able to do this so quickly. You saw what I managed.”

Alex snorted.

Max grinned. “Yeah, so maybe I don’t have the opinion of an art expert, but it’s exactly what I wanted.”

Smiling, still looking a bit bashful, Alex said, “I’m glad.” They eyed it critically. “It could be better, but I don’t spend a lot of time doing art from the top of a ladder.”

“You’ll get no complaints from me. Thank you for not falling to your doom, by the way. That would be a lot of paperwork.”