The Angel of Elydria (The Dawn Mirror Chronicles Book 1) (3 page)

“You saw
nothing
out of the ordinary?” Penny demanded, growing defensive.

“Nope! Everything was perfectly fine. He even wished me a pleasant afternoon. Must be my lucky day.” Maddie came to an abrupt halt as they stepped into the wet parking lot. “Now, do you want me to take you home or are you walking over to the shop?” she asked in a business-like tone.

Penny stared down at her worn gray low-tops and exhaled. “The shop…”

“Well, have fun at work. Bye.” She waved a half-hearted goodbye to Penny and stalked away. Penny ran her fingers through her damp hair and shut her eyes, disturbed by the possibility that what she had seen could have been the product of an unsound mind.

P
enny maneuvered down the rain-slick pavement, still involved in a fierce argument with herself. The storefronts she passed were foggy with perspiration from the rain, which had eased to a light drizzle. A handful of people walked the streets of the small Oregon town with their heads down and their hoods up.

Penny settled into a state of numb disbelief and reached the decision that what she had witnessed at the college was a hallucination. It was a bitter pill to swallow.

Sleep deprivation. It must be sleep deprivation.
She nodded as if trying to convince someone else as she walked past the aged community theater that from time to time hosted near-intolerable productions of plays like
The Importance of Being Earnest
or
Annie
. The marquee’s feeble lights tried their hardest to pierce the gloom, but it went unnoticed by the trickle of street traffic. On the other side of the theater stood a hole-in-the-wall coffee shop that Penny frequented when she had time or money to spare. The sputtering neon sign fixed to the front blazed the word ‘Open’ beside a litany of peeling adverts. She squinted at the sign, struck with inspiration.

A strong dose of caffeine. That’s just what I need.
Penny pushed aside the shop door and was greeted by a welcome wave of warmth. She stood in line, ordered a double cappuccino, and settled at a table with a brimming cup of hot, frothy milk and coffee.

As soon as the warm beverage touched her lips she started to calm down. The rain came and went in sheets, and she busied herself watching the preoccupied pedestrians shuffle by in their trench coats and boots. Penny was just beginning to hope that she might be able to recover from the shock of her bizarre hallucination when a peculiar man strutted into the coffee shop.

A sleek, black magician’s costume clung to his frame, complete with top hat and bow tie. He stopped just inside the doorway, rainwater flowing off his hat and onto the floor of the shop, creating a mess. He peered around as if searching for something, earning annoyed looks from the employees. He was an inch or two below average height, and stroked a thin brown mustache and goatee.

Ah. Of course. A magician,
Penny thought with a frown.
I’m going to try not to read too much into that.

A small burst of adrenaline jolted through Penny’s already shaken system when the magician’s gaze fell on her.
Oh please, no. Not me. I don’t want to be the lucky volunteer from the audience. Don’t look at me.

The man in the top hat strolled up to her table, his shiny black shoes clicking on the floor. Penny went rigid as a soft smile flowed onto the man’s lips, causing his skinny mustache to curl upwards. His hands slid into his pocket and with one fluid motion he pulled out a deck of playing cards.

“Excuse me Miss, would you be so kind as to examine these cards for me and confirm that this is, in fact, a normal deck of playing cards?” He bent over and handed her the cards, looking around at the customers in the shop in an attempt to capture their attention. A few curious people drew nearer.

Penny glanced through the flurry of hearts, diamonds, clubs, and spades. The gaze of unfamiliar eyes upon her began to make her sweat, and she grew clammy as he gestured with a strained smile for her to answer.

“Uh…yeah. Um, they’re real,” Penny stuttered, hating the attention.

The man swiped the cards from her palm and spread them out in a neat fan.

“Now―pick a card, any card,” he grinned, and Penny felt her cheeks burn. She pinched the top of a glossy card from somewhere near the middle of the deck, then peeked down to see the Ace of Hearts resting in her palm. She looked into the magician’s face, awaiting further instructions. The man appeared to be only a few years older than she was, with hair a dark shade of sienna and warm brown eyes. The smile which he glinted at Penny had an irresistible, devil-may-care quality to it.

The magician put a hand over his eyes. “Now show it to the crowd without letting me see, and place the card on top of the deck.”

Penny did as she was told, and watched as he set the deck down in front of her. From somewhere within his cloak and cape, the man in the top hat produced a silver wand with a crystal set onto one end. It gleamed in the dull lights of the coffee shop as he swung it around his head while mumbling nonsensical spell words under his breath. Penny bit her tongue from laughing at his serious expression. The man struck the cards with the tip of his wand and flipped the deck over.

Every card in the deck had become the Ace of Hearts. Some scattered applause echoed around the shop and the magician grinned with satisfaction.

“Thank you, ladies and gentlemen! If you liked that, then you will be sure to enjoy the show at the Gonzago Theater, right next door! Tonight and tomorrow only, folks!”

Penny assumed he would leave then, and was astonished when he sank into the chair in front of her with a smug smile.

“Impressed?” he asked as he pocketed the deck.

“Um,” she said with a shrug, her mind racing to think of a suitable compliment. “Y-you’re a regular David Blaine?”

The magician’s expression dampened. An awkward silence descended over the table for a moment. It was this familiar sense of discomfort that always seemed to occur when Penny encountered new people. She couldn’t think of a single thing to say to the man, so she stewed in her awkwardness while staring at her knees.

“Aren’t you going to ask my name?” the man broke the silence and Penny looked up with a frown.

“Erm, what’s your name?”

“Glad you asked!” he chorused, regaining his sense of boundless energy. “I am Simon Shaw, master magician and illusionist
extraordinaire!
” The pose he struck after he finished this well-rehearsed introduction was too much for Penny. She laughed behind her hand, and the man called Simon frowned again. She stifled the laugh with a cough.

“Sorry,” Penny offered with an apologetic grin. “I didn’t mean to―you just sort of took me by surprise.” Simon’s expression softened, but he remained quiet. “Um…is there something I can do for you?”

“Oh, it’s nothing really. I just can’t stand to see a beautiful girl sitting alone on a day like this.” He shot her what seemed to be his trademark smile, and it was Penny’s turn to frown.

This is just the sort of person my mother always warned me about…

“Sorry, I’m late for work. Gotta go,” she lied, rising from the table and heading for the door.

Simon inhaled through his teeth and scrambled up behind her. Ignoring his pursuit, she walked away from the shop and turned onto Willow Street in the direction of her mother’s shop.

“W-wait! Come back!” he shouted after her, but she kept moving and pretended she’d heard nothing.

“Hold on, Penelope! Please, I need to talk to you.”

Penny stopped dead, her heart picking up what now seemed to be the popular tempo of the day. She swiveled around to see Simon staring at her. Quiet words flew from her mouth before she could cage them. “I don’t remember telling you my name,” she said, more to herself than to Simon, but he heard anyway. His expression became serious.

“I―just let me explain, don’t run,” he began, and Penny took several cautious steps backward. His eyes were wide and every muscle in his body seemed taut as he advanced on Penny, his hand extended.

Instinct took over. Penny sprinted down the slippery sidewalk, alarm sirens wailing in her head. With all the courage she could muster she shouted back at him over the slap of her wet shoes on the pavement, “
Leave me alone!
” In the distance a sign with the words “Willow Street Wonders” swung in the wind.

Her mother waited inside that shop; behind those walls was safety. Penny reached the door and groped for the handle, wrenching it open and bursting inside the shop as if she were riding a fierce gust of wind.

Paulina was reading behind the counter and looked up with a start, her glasses slipping off her nose and onto the glass display case. Penny scrambled behind the counter, panting. Paulina looked at her, her mouth agape. “Penny! What in the world is the matter with you? What are you doing here so early?” she asked with surprise.

Penny took several sharp breaths and fought to speak. “There’s a man coming! A magician or something,” she sputtered. “D-don’t let him in!”

Her mother’s brow furrowed and she looked at Penny with concern, and then rose to peer out the front window. “There’s nobody out there, kid.”

Penny scurried over to the window and pressed her face against the glass. The street was deserted. She backed away, befuddled.

“Two magicians came by earlier doing tricks and left some flyers. Was that who you saw? I think they’re just promoting their show,” Paulina continued in a tone that tried to comfort.

Penny exhaled and hung her head. It was the second time that day she’d come off as deranged. She kept her face as straight as she could, but she was beginning to feel sick, panicked, and vexed all at once. “Sorry. I could’ve sworn…it’s just that he…never mind,” she mumbled as she leaned against the counter.

Her mother gave her a reassuring smile and waved it off. “No big deal. You can never be too careful, eh?” Paulina handed Penny an apron, which she fastened with shivering hands. Her mother removed her own apron and bustled into the backroom through a sparkling, beaded-curtain.

“You seem better. That migraine’s all gone?” Penny inquired, her heartbeat returning to normal.

“It is, actually. Seems to have cleared up completely,” Paulina called back. Penny leaned up against the wall of the shop and inhaled. The fragrant air in the shop always had a calming effect.

The walls of Willow Street Wonders were piled high with herbal oils, scented candles, and dried sage wound into bundles. A huge trough of what Penny assumed was every type of incense known to mankind stood by the door. Bottled rosewater and glass containers of wild herbs lined the walls, glittering in the gloom. Paulina always kept the lights turned low in their shop, saying that it created a mystical ambience. Penny suspected she did this so the customers couldn’t see what a sorry state most of the books were in.

Over their eight years of business, Penny had become a bit fed up by her mother’s blind devotion to supernatural nonsense, but she had to admit there was a certain romance surrounding a life spent in the dusty, dreamlike world her mother had built for them, brick by crumbling brick. After a few moments of noisy rummaging in the back, Paulina returned holding her handbag and several books underneath her arm. She took an exhausted breath and displayed her most confident smile for Penny.

“Might as well get to the airport early, just in case,” she said.

“Isn’t it a bit
too
early, though?” Penny couldn’t keep the anxiety out of her voice, wondering if the magician might come poking around again.

Her mother nodded, as spirited as ever, then turned serious. “Now, you know the drill. I sent the tarot readers home early, so don’t worry about them. And
please
do not forget to lock up properly.”

Penny nodded, trying hard to keep from rolling her eyes. Her paranoia would never allow her to forget such things.

Paulina grinned wryly and put her hand on her hip. “Got a message for Grandma?”

Penny scoffed. “Oh, I’ve got a message for her all right, but I don’t think she wants to hear it.” Her mother gave her a reprimanding look. Penny scowled right back at her. “The woman
hates
me, why would I have a message for her?”