Page 13 of The Spellreader and the Phoenix

“Asshole,” Max muttered. “I even have a section in bold that they have to tickbox to say that they accept the spell as-is based on the description provided in the document. Why do I even bother?”

Rory rubbed his head against Max’s neck, trying to soothe him. Max petted him some more, and he did relax a bit. He went back to his work at the computer.

Nōwē seemed to tire of the toy and came to jump up onto the display area in front of the window. It wasn’t super sunny yet, but it still offered a nice view of everything that was going on outside.

After noon, a few customers came into the shop, including a group of older ladies and two men who were apparently in a book club who liked extra spicy books, which Rory eventually figured out meant they had lots of sex in them. (He hadn’t thought normal people had started eating books, and he hadn’t been able to see why paper would be spicy, but people did things that confused Rory all the time.)

There were several parents with babies or toddlers in strollers who seemed to be grateful for the opportunity to sit down for a few minutes. More witches called with spell requests. And a man with a box of very clearly damaged books got annoyed when Max told him that they were fit for nothing but the garbage given that he’d taken such poor care of them. Max wasn’t very diplomatic, but he was quite truthful.

Max popped up to his apartment to get a sandwich in the early afternoon, and he put more seeds out for Rory—and then gave Nōwē a bit of food, because she didn’t think that she should be the only one not eating.

It stayed quieter in the afternoon, to the point where Max decided that he might as well get to work on the design for the window. He lugged a ladder out of what proved to be a small storage closet in the back, then set it up on the sidewalk in front of the window.

He climbed up, explaining, “The instructions online say it should be drawn on the outside of the window where the birds are in danger of hitting, as that offers maximum visibility. I assume that also means it will wear off more quickly, but hopefully it’ll last long enough for me to order the dots.” He stared at the window. “Although it would be cool if the design could be something for the bookshop, I suppose. It might even attract customers.” He huffed a disgusted breath. “Not that I really want to attract customers. But Evie insists that’s kind of essential when you run a business, and she’s not exactly wrong. Unfortunately.”

Rory rubbed his head against Max’s neck again in commiseration. His mate didn’t seem to be as worried this time that Rory was going to fly away.

About thirty minutes later, however, he was growing increasingly concerned that Max was going to run away.

“Ugh!” he yelled at the window. “Why am I so bad at this?”

Rory already knew that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with his mate, but he had to admit… the man was not an artist. He was stubborn, but he was not an artist. Nōwē had prowled back and forth inside the window display at first, watching what Max was doing, but then she gave up and curled up to go to sleep.

“It’s fine,” Max muttered to himself, sounding like it was definitely not fine. “I’ll just try again, for the… ten millionth time.”

And then a voice offered quietly, “I can do it, if you want.”

Chapter Four

Max

Max turned sharply and wobbled slightly on the ladder, which was steadied by the person standing below him. It was the teen enby, the one who always came into the shop. They’d never talked to Max before, and Max just stared at them, stunned, for a foolishly long moment.

And then he climbed down the ladder and pressed the marker into the kid’s hands, even as he realized they were slightly taller than he was. If the kid was past 5’10” already, Max wondered how tall they’d end up.

But that didn’t matter right now. All that mattered was that their artistic skill be at least slightly better than Max’s.

“I will pay you money; please don’t fall off the ladder and die,” Max begged. “It would be so amazing if I didn’t have to be the one doing this.”

The kid smirked, a rather endearing expression on a face that Max had mostly seen shadowed by hair as they ducked and didn’t make eye contact. They eyed the window critically.

“You were trying to do… what, exactly?”

Max grimaced, but he couldn’t really blame them for not being able to figure out his awful scribbles.

He explained, “I need a design that doesn’t have gaps more than two inches wide to reduce the chances that a bird will hit the window because they don’t see the glass.”

The kid’s eyes flicked to the cardinal perched on Max’s shoulder, but they didn’t say anything.

Max’s hands came up to pet the bird reflexively. “Red hit the glass and was knocked unconscious yesterday. Thankfully, they weren’t killed. I don’t want that to happen to any other birds.”

The kid nodded. “Got it.”

Waving his hand vaguely at the window, Max said, “I was imagining I could do something book-themed, but clearly, not my skillset.”

The kid’s lips twitched, and they agreed, “Definitely not. But that’s what delegating is for.”

Max liked this mouthy side to them. He wondered if they’d been quiet just because it was a bookshop. Maybe they were nervous or shy—or maybe they just hadn’t had anything to say before, but they took pity on fools who thought they’d suddenly acquire artistic talent.