Page 12 of Magic Blooms
Still, despite all the sights to be seen, I needed to keep myself on task. It was hard enough for me to get Lorraine to stay focused on the errands she insisted we must finish before even thinking about doing anything else with our day—anything else like finding my path home.
She pulled me into Jasmine’s Candles, Spices, and More. Candles and spices didn’t really seem to go together in my mind, but what did I know? As soon as I stepped in, the warring scents overwhelmed me. There was just so much. I couldn’t say if any individual smell was pleasant because the combined effect ruined them all.
I coughed and settled myself near the door to wait.
The store lay empty except for one woman standing behind the counter. Her hair was long and dark, decorated with feathers and other adornments. She seemed to have put far more effort into her appearance than the other townsfolk we’d passed on the way here. She wore oversized black, round- rimmed glasses that overwhelmed her otherwise delicate features. More is more seemed to be the motto with this one, a sentiment I could definitely get behind.
She wore a low-cut shirt that revealed her ample… assets. I’d thought the oversized clothes I was provided last night were a sign of how modest these people were. I stood corrected.
Jasmine smiled warmly at Lorraine, and I could tell there was a deep history between the two. The woman held out her hands to Lorraine, who happily accepted them as she leaned forward, the two of them exchanging a kiss on each cheek.
“You have perfect timing. Your Butcher’s Broom and Borage Seed Oil just came in yesterday.”
“That’s wonderful, but that’s not why I’m here. I’d like you to meet my guest, Polly.”
They both turned toward me.
“Pollyiela,” I corrected. Though I was fairly certain Lorraine remembered the correct pronunciation. She just chose not to use it.
“Welcome to Elyria,” said Jasmine. Her smile for me was noticeably less warm than the one she’d served to Lorraine.
The affinity I felt for her earlier vanished in an instant.
“Where are you visiting from?” she asked as she swept her way back behind the counter.
“Well that’s what we came to talk to you about.” Lorraine leaned toward the other woman and whispered, “Polly has found herself here quite by accident.”
Jasmine’s thinly plucked brows shot up. We had her attention now. “Like you got off on the wrong bus stop? Or…”
“The other option,” clarified Lorraine after clearing her throat.
“That’s fascinating,” she said, turning her bright eyes to me. Looked like I’d gone up in her estimation.
“More like terrifying.” I crossed my arms over my chest, feeling the sudden need to protect myself.
Jasmine emerged from behind the counter again and started to circle me curiously. “You’re so pretty. And you speak English perfectly. That has to be magic, right? Can you understand animals too, or is it just humans?”
Lorraine answered for me. “She has an amazing connection to animals. Oinkers got loose in the inn, and he came right to her like she was the pied piper of piglets.”
Both women stared at me, one with her jaw hanging open and the other with a proud grin plastered upon her face. I was under their scrutiny, and favorable or not, I didn’t like it.
“I don’t understand them in the same way I understand you,” I said quietly as I glanced toward the floorboards. “But I can connect with them through their hearts. It’s not so hard if you stop to listen to what isn’t being said aloud.”
Jasmine nodded vigorously the whole time I spoke as if she couldn’t wait for her turn to speak. “So are you some type of elemental?”
Now it was my turn to be surprised. “You know about my kind?”
A corner of her mouth hooked up. “I know a lot. Elementals tend to be very connected to nature, both plant and animal life. What type of elemental are you?”
“Earth. The boring kind.”
She snorted. “There are no boring elementals.”
Maybe in a world of limited magic like this one. But back in Vilea, there were earth elementals to spare. Water elementals, like Dante, were the second most common. And air elementals were around, but I rarely ever saw any. They were too much in their own heads, more focused on meditation and studies than socializing. They even had to be reminded to procreate to keep themselves from going extinct.
And fire was… special.
I’d never actually met a fire elemental before. They were only produced by cross-mingling the other magic types. Which was why my joining with Dante was so important. We could only hope that one of our children would be born of flame.
