Page 40 of The Spellreader and the Phoenix

Max had tried to convince Alex that all the people who called the shop and blurted out some version of “I need a spell” were part of a D&D-like game that involved a phone component. Alex appeared to believe him, but… more likely, Alex was just humoring them.

Rory or Max tried to answer the phone as often as possible, but sometimes, Alex was the one who got it, and sometimes, the person calling was a witch. Given how entrenched secrecy was in their society, the callers should really have been checking who was on the other end before they blurted out anything magical, but it seemed that people had grown used to it always being Max who answered the phone.

After a couple of phone calls, Alex created a web form that could be filled out online, either by the customer or by Alex, Rory, or Max. It took down all the pertinent information and had things like dropdowns and mandatory fields that compelled people to provide all the necessary information.

“You’re very smart,” Rory told Alex.

They flushed. “Thanks. It just seems silly when they don’t tell you what you need to know and then get upset when they don’t get the results they want.” They rolled their eyes. “They are way too invested in this game.”

Rory agreed. Even knowing it was real life, he still agreed. He couldn’t blame Max for being rude when some of the witches were so demanding. They were asking Max for help, but it was like he’d been created just to serve them, and if he didn’t get them exactly what they wanted instantly, he was doing something wrong.

A witch named Fernanda had wanted a spell to make flowers grow out of a person’s ass. Why would anyone want that? Max had reminded her that spells that affected other people negatively were frowned upon, and then he’d hung up on her as she’d been trying to argue that it wasn’t objectionable under the circumstances. She hadn’t called back. Max had told both of them that they should delete any form submitted by her in future.

Rory had caught Alex “accidentally” deleting a form response when the witch had yelled at Rory while he was trying to take the information down. When an angry Paulo Valdemeer had called back and demanded to talk to the manager and then told Max what a terrible person Rory was, Max had told him never to call again because he wasn’t going to get any service, and then he’d hung up on the man.

“I’m sorry,” Alex said, shoulders slumped. “I didn’t think they’d take it out on Rory. I should have thought of that.”

Max just patted them on the shoulder. “We don’t need customers like that. They can learn to mind their manners, or they can go elsewhere.”

There were rude humans, too, sometimes.

Max sounded exasperated as he said over the phone, “As I’ve already said, once the books are given or sold to me, they’re mine. Relatives can’t simply claim them back.” Max listened, huffed, and then said, “You do that, then… Uh huh… Okay. Bye.”

He hung up, letting the phone fall back into the cradle with a crash.

“Everything alright?” Rory asked.

Max nodded, though he still looked disgruntled. “Yeah, just an entitled ass. They tried to claim that some books had been given to us by mistake when they were supposed to be his. Wouldn’t surprise me at all if he’d been left out of the will because he was a jerk. Couldn’t tell me specific titles or why they were of such deep sentimental value to him.” Max rolled his eyes. “People are assholes.”

Rory actually liked people a lot, but he had to agree that there were ones that weren’t very nice.

And it wasn’t just a case of them being nice if they were faced with niceness. Rory had been reminded over the last two weeks that being polite to people didn’t necessarily mean they were going to be kind back.

But overall, people were nice, and they seemed to respond well to all of Rory’s chattering. He loved to get to know them and what books they wanted and why. He’d gotten better at spotting the ones who were not interested in chit-chat or who appreciated bookshops solely because they were full of books rather than people.

Max consulted with Alex, who designed an updated logo for name tags that could be clipped on with magnets and had their pronouns on them. That way, they could wear more than just the store shirts if they wanted to, and people would still know that they worked there, as well as knowing what pronoun to use, all without singling Alex out.

Alex had also followed through with making Rory an amazing shirt. They’d picked up on Rory’s love of red, orange, and yellow. Rory wasn’t sure if those colors simply made humans think of flames or if Rory was leaving clues he didn’t realize, but the shirt was all fire-themed. The sleeves had been lengthened and turned into leaping flames, and Alex had drawn an open book with flames leaping out of it and curling around the shirt.

It was amazing, and Rory loved it—but Max had already made clear he couldn’t wear the same shirt every day, because that wasn’t what normal people did. Rory reluctantly put it into rotation, and it made him smile every time he got to wear it. (Alex looked pleased, too. They’d also presented Max with one, designed like it had been inked, all black outline work of books with sassy book quotations. Max wore his regularly, too.)

Every night after work, he and Max had dinner, then Max worked on his spellbooks if it wasn’t too late. They invariably ended the evening reading in bed, even if it was only for a few minutes. Rory still turned into a cardinal every night, but he didn’t mind. Bird bodies were very compact, and he never woke up feeling like he’d slept weird or poorly, which seemed to happen to humans quite a lot.

Rory loved all of it.

The phone rang on the shop counter, and Rory happily grabbed it up.

“Read for a Spell, Rory speaking.”

“Hello, Rory. This is Gemma from Brewed Awakening, returning your call.”

Rory brightened, because he’d had the best idea, and he just needed to get the coffee shop on board.

“Thanks so much for calling me back! How do you feel about books?”

Chapter Nine

Max