The moon was high in the sky when Evita rested her fingers on the cobblestones beneath her shop and muttered an incantation, brows furrowed in visible effort. The seeds she had put between the cracks just a moment before sprouted into beautiful night lilies that shined softly in the moonlight. With a wave of her arms, she willed them to crawl all over the front and the roof. She had to be quick, it was time to open.

  When a few of them obscured the shop sign, a flick of her wrist was enough to make them recede into a more suitable position. A few of the birds who had taken residence underneath her roof chirped in alarm, but Evita was careful not to disturb their nests with her magic.

  Standing back, hands on her hips, she observed her work. It was a bit sloppy on the edges, maybe a couple of flowers had come out a bit wonky, some had withered, but it still made for a beautiful picture. She held a flower in her palm and listened to it whisper something about the bees. They had made their hive too far away and the little bud was worrying about it.

  “I’ll talk to them tomorrow, but I don’t have time to chat with you right now, friend.” she said, feeling the shop thrum with energy. The flower in her hand sparkled in response, before directing its petals toward the moon.

  “I have never seen magic like that.”

  A woman, unknown, had come up behind her and Evita found herself aware of it only at the last second, busy as she was with her flowers. Her tutors would have been so cross with her for having her guard lowered in a public setting.

  The witch craned her neck up to look at the stranger properly. She was, other than lean and well-built, also quite tall. A pair of dark eyes met hers, making her feel a bit self-conscious of… she wasn’t aware of what, exactly, but the woman cut an imposing figure, with her black leather armor and short and orderly curly hair. She couldn’t see her very well in the moonlight, but Evita recognized a fighter when she saw one. The stance was a dead giveaway and well, the huge sword hilt she got a glimpse of, peering from her back, served as a good hint, too. Let it be known that she was, first and foremost, a careful observer.

  “Well, I am a witch.” She said, uselessly.

  “I can see that.”

  Evita wet her lips, unsure of what to say, until the stranger continued.

  “Are you open yet?”

  “I am, yes. Just now. Come in.”

  The fire spirit spluttered a bit when they walked in the empty coffee shop, angry they were letting the cold air in. The little rascal had become quite bossy, she thought. But it was pleasantly warm and toasty inside, so she couldn’t really be too mad. Evita motioned for the stranger to sit on one of the stools near the counter while she fetched a log of wood for the fussy wisp. “There you go.” She whispered, watching the spirit crackle and pop happily in response.

  “Is that thing alive?” The woman looked quietly shocked, her eyes glued to the fireplace.

  “That thing is a fire spirit. And it doesn’t really concern itself with pesky, human concepts like life and death. Now, what can I get for you?” she asked, walking back to the counter. Her teas were fully stocked that night, thanks to an extremely good deal she got at the goblin market. She even had some stardust to sprinkle on top of the hot chocolate, harvested from Polaris herself. And thank God for small victories, since it had taken her two hours to walk there: in the woods, over the river and then a bit to the right, inside a small pocket dimension between two boulders, who were neither here nor there. The goblins were extremely good at haggling, but she held her own. Hence, the stardust.

  “I would like…” said the woman, “A Spicy Encounter? With a blueberry muffin.”

  “Coming up.”

  Evita turned around to make the tea, subtly glancing outside the large, glass windows to see if anybody was going to enter the shop soon, while listening to the stranger drumming her fingers impatiently on the counter. The silence was awkward and not comfortable at all, and the witch kept praying for someone else to walk in, simply to relieve her from the embarrassing situation she was in. Customers in Cliff’s Drop always wanted to make conversation, she didn’t understand why this one didn’t at least say something.

  “Here you go,” she said, serving the steaming beverage in a green porcelain mug. The muffin came soon after, summoned by herself with a snap of her fingers and coming to rest on a plate she promptly set on the counter between them.

  The woman took a sip of the drink and Evita noticed the scar that crossed her left eye for the first time. It seemed so out of place on a person so young and with features so soft.

  “This is good, what’s in it?”

  “Ginger and cardamom with a dash of honey, to balance out the sour taste, you see. There’s also a pinch of courtly intrigue to make you feel a tad giddy with adrenaline. It should perk you right up.”

  “Mmh. What about the muffin?”

  “It’s just a muffin.”

  The stranger nodded again and took another sip, careful not to burn her tongue, before speaking. “You haven’t been open long.”

  “A few months, give or take.”

  “It was fuller last night. Lots of people. You’re certainly making bank.”

  Evita tightened her mouth into a thin line, her voice acquiring a steely tone, “Are you a tax collector?”

  “…No?” the woman looked at her with a puzzled look on her face, “I just figured you could answer a few of my questions. I’m a traveler, see. Newbies have to stick together, and all that.” She said, giving Evita a charming smile that threw her off for a second. It looked like she had flipped a switch of some sort, going from brooding warrior to a perky, girl-next-door type. The dimples and her olive complexion really sold the whole thing, too. This sword? The expression she wore said, Nothing but a prop.

  “…Sure. Ask away.”

  “The lighthouse seems interesting. What do you know about it?”

  Evita narrowed her eyes, taken by surprise. Of all the things she could tell her about Cliff’s Drop, she wanted to know about the lighthouse? The first two things travelers usually asked were if mermaids were real and where to find a room for the night. “It’s just a decrepit old building.”

  “Ah. Have you ever gone near it? People say it’s haunted. Do you think it’s haunted?”

  “It’s just a building.” She repeated. Something about the woman wasn’t right. Her heart-shaped face and bouncy curls made her want to trust her and Evita was immediately wary of that.

  The woman kept blabbing, undeterred, “I figured that a witch would know. Witches always know when something supernatural’s at play, right? You can, huh, detect things like that? With your necklaces or whatnot?”

  “I don’t know anything about it. Why are you so interested in an old building, anyway? Travelers are usually here on business, certainly not for tourism.” Then, after a searing look at her black leathers, she continued “You don’t seem to be here for either, truthfully.”

  “I am not a tourist.” She spoke. Her left eyebrow twitched, and her smile dimmed.

  “Huh. The lighthouse has been closed for a long time, anyway. I don’t know the specifics.”

  The smile disappeared from the woman’s face as fast as it first appeared. Evita was spooked, to say the least. The scar looked more prominent than ever, and her brown eyes suddenly acquired a steely quality they didn’t possess before. Her long fingers flexed around the mug before she stood up. Evita noticed she had purposefully slouched, hunching her shoulders to look unthreatening, only when she straightened up. Danger, her brain supplied her with.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  “Understood. Thank you for the tea, then.” She said, airily, fishing in her pocket for a few coins that she then settled on the countertop before leaving the shop in long, fast strides. The witch noticed she had taken the muffin with her.

  “Well, that was quite the meeting.” she muttered. Honestly, she certainly didn’t think everyone had to be friendly and chatty all the time and to everyone. She certainly wasn’t. But that was a matter of being polite, which the stranger hadn’t been! One couldn’t just act like… that. Interrogating her in her own shop. And the sudden change in her demeanor had been so uncanny, too.

  “Whew, what are you doing to customers to make them run away like that?” Evita had been so busy ruminating over the multiple ways she had been disrespected in less than ten minutes, that she didn’t see or hear her friend Sasha enter the shop. She really, really had to start paying attention to her surroundings again.

  However, she decided to cut herself some slack. Sasha was a dwarf. She couldn’t even reach the counter properly. Sometimes, when she got on her tiptoes to talk to her, Evita could see her blue eyes and ginger hair peek from beneath the wooden panel. It would have been cute if she didn’t know that Sasha could smash someone’s head flat with her battle hammer and sweat only a tiny bit.

  “Want to find out?” she said, watching as her friend pulled herself up on the same stool the stranger had sat on just a few moments before. Evita cleared the empty mug and the plate with a wave of her hand before wiping the counter with a rag, listening to the fire spirit as it crackled happily in the fireplace. It really liked Sasha, for some reason.

  “Not really. I like this place. Can I get my usual?”

  “Sure.” She said, looking for the dried chamomile flowers she needed. “Long day, today?”

  “Hah.” Scoffed the other, “Yuliya got her ass kicked in the ruins today. Do you know, by chance, if something weird is going on? They were alive today. I mean, more alive than usual, you know?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I’m not the magic expert here. They tried to eat her. One moment she was walking, axe in hand, right? Then a rock wall just came down and rebuilt itself around her before our eyes! She was being buried alive, Eve. The wall was going to eat her.”

  Evita blinked, offering a pumpkin muffin to her friend, which she accepted gratefully. Now, that was unheard of. Buildings who had been around magic or had been built by magic tended to be alive, in a sense, so they could certainly be capable of mischief. She still had bruises from the time one of her chairs disappeared from underneath her and left her sprawled on the floor like a rag doll. But outright maliciousness? Murderous intent?

  “Cursed ruins are a thing.”

  Sasha shook her head, “No, we’ve been there thousands of times. That same exact passage, even. We never had any problems other than the occasional rogue spirit, and we always make quick work of those.”

  The witch looked outside the window, lost in thought, and noticed that it had started to drizzle. The little tip-tap of raindrops against the window only made the atmosphere cozier. She knew people would soon seek refuge from the rain inside her shop. Cliff’s Drop storms were often delicate, but insidious. You could get soaked in seconds.

  “I could give you a luck charm for a price and some advice for free. Avoid that particular place for a while. Nothing’s going on, as far as I know.”

  “Thank you. I could’ve asked the Queen’s witch this afternoon, if I knew you were going to get snarky. Maybe she knows if the Order of Mordecai or whatever that’s called is up to something.”

  Evita blinked twice. Her sister had been in town, and she hadn’t come over to say hello? Verbena had taken her move and her refusal of the Adler traditions much harder than her parents, but surely, she must have accepted it by now. The shop was a success. The townspeople respected her. So, why?

  “Are you alright? You were staring at me-”

  “Morgana. The Order isn’t of Mordecai. It’s of Morgana.”

  “Ah, I don’t really-”

  “What did you say the Queen’s witch was doing here?”

  Sasha furrowed her brows, “I did not say. But she was checking out the lighthouse. She was early to her yearly check up of the old thing. Maybe the Queen’s gonna destroy it? That building’s an eyesore.”

  The lighthouse, again? What were the odds? Suddenly, the stranger’s apparition and their weird conversation became a lot more interesting than just a matter of rude clientele.

  “Why was she checking out the lighthouse?”

  “How can you not know? You’ve been here for months now. You really need to start talking to people about more than whatever’s ailing them so you can cure it.” she said, before continuing, “Anyway, it’s been sitting there locked since the end of the Great War. Nobody ever found a way to get in after all this time… so the Queen sends her witch every year to check that the enchantment that keeps it sealed is still holding on. We don’t know what’s hiding inside. It could be like Pandora’s box and unleash another plague or something.”

  Pandora, thought Evita with some irritation, had been her ancestor and her story had been totally mistranslated. A witch as powerful as her certainly hadn’t opened the box by mistake, thank you very much. It was on purpose, and rightfully so! And anyhow, there were no plagues. In the traditional sense, at least. Maybe a few blood curses if she recalled correctly, or a few generational jinxes. Maybe a couple of environmental disasters, too? It was a known fact that every old magical family had to have a few bad apples in its history and Pandora was too interesting and peculiar for people to misconstrue what had happened!

  “Huh. I’ll probably have to visit it, then.” She said, instead of the tirade about her history she was about to go on.

  “I mean, it’s really just a building in the end. But suit yourself. The amulet shining in the night is very pretty.”

  “Amulet?”

  “Oh, you know,” Sasha said, munching on her muffin, “The thingy that keeps the lighthouse locked. You know what I’m talking about, you’re a witch.” She swallowed, “This is very good.”

  “Thank you. So, do you still want that luck amulet for the ruins?”

  “Depends, what do you want in exchange?”

  Evita bit her lip, watching as more clients arrived and settled down on the divans. She had to make this quick.

  “Well, you know, I might need some undersea silence for my-”

  Sasha looked at her sternly, “Listen up, witch, I’ll say it again since you seem to be deaf or have memory problems. Dwarves. Don’t. Swim. We’ve talked about this. Bones,” she gestured to her short and stocky stature, “Too thick! That means I would drown. Is that what you want? Ask a mermaid, I already told you that.”

  “But mermaids don’t like me,” she huffed, “They hate earth witches.”

  “Flirt with a merman, then. I hear they’ve become quite adventurous.”

  When the witch spluttered out her indignation, she continued, laughing, “I’ll pay with coin.”

  “Fine.” Grumbling, Evita made the empty mug and plate disappear, “But remember I’m an expert in poisons and that I’m in the food industry. Do the math.”

  Sasha scoffed and left some coin on the countertop, including the payment for the charm. “Don’t threaten me with a good time, witch. I expect the charm to be at my house tomorrow. See you.”

  And she was off.

  Evita sighed, thinking about the fact that she’d have to bribe a mermaid into getting her some undersea silence. She had no idea what mermaids liked; they really didn’t want to speak to her. The first time she went on a walk near the beach, a shimmer of merfolk was lounging on the smaller cliffs, rainbow scales glinting in the sun and skin glistening from the water. They disappeared cursing her out in their language, all tiny clicks and shrieks, the moment they saw her. Completely unapproachable. She wasn’t privy to the dietary requirements of the merfolk, but she was fairly certain they could and would eat her for dinner if given the chance.

  Impending death at the hands of sentient fish aside, there were customers to take care of. The shop was filling up fast thanks to the storm raging outside, which had gotten worse during her chat with Sasha. The violent pitter patter of the rain against the large windows was almost deafening, and Evita thought that she’d have to soundproof the room with an enchantment if it kept up for long. Some of the people present were notorious complainers and she really wasn’t in the mood to put up with them.

  The witch worked all night long, grateful for the existence of magic and for the fact she was one of the lucky ones able to use it. One simply cannot man an entire shop on their own without some aid. Evita thought that it was maybe time to hire someone, just to help with the load during the busy days. Maybe go visit her Aunt’s hut in the woods and see if one of the pixies inhabiting it wanted to work for her? She really didn’t want to get the faeries involved if she didn’t have to, but they do say that necessity is the mother of invention for a reason.

  And yet she couldn’t help but wonder, between making coffees and teas, what was so special about the lighthouse to warrant the Queen’s attention and consequently, that of her sister.

  She and Verbena had never been extremely close, but neither had they been distant. They were simple, generic siblings. They quarreled, sometimes they made up, sometimes they didn’t, sometimes they jinxed each other or scarred themselves for life. They didn’t really stay angry at one another long, or at least, Evita didn’t. Why hadn’t Verbena come to visit? She had to have walked right past her shop to reach the lighthouse, there was no chance in the world of her missing it. Evita had been careful to send her a letter with a written invitation. Granted, she hadn’t responded, but she figured it was because her duties were keeping her so very busy to not even have time to respond to a letter. It made sense. A whole lot of it.

  And what was so interesting about that derelict, old building, anyway? It loomed over her shop like a death trap, threatening to fall down on her and kill her in her sleep. It certainly couldn’t be in accordance with current security regulations, could it? She was pretty sure part of the roof had fallen down, one night. It could have hit her shop! What then? Her insurance didn’t even cover dental.

  She’d go check it out in the morning, she decided. She would grab Killian, bribe him with some fresh blood and make the short hike to the lighthouse. Too many people seemed to be interested in it and she certainly wasn’t the type to miss out on opportunities.