Page 22 of The Messengers of Magic

Chapter Sixteen

T he sun filtered in through the overgrown ivy, working its way across the old bookshop windows.

It wasn’t the sun that woke Pen, though; it was the loud chimes echoing from downstairs.

He jolted upright from the chair, heart racing, disoriented.

For a moment, he forgot where he was. The lingering fog of sleep, the unfamiliar space, and the sudden noise had his head spinning.

With the morning light now streaming in, it was the first time he’d truly seen the shop, and the sight stopped him in his tracks. Dust spiraled lazily in the splotchy rays filtering in. The place had an eerie, forgotten charm, as if it had been abandoned by time itself.

The room was painted white, a deep navy-blue trim framing each doorway and window, echoing the weatherworn shutters and front door.

Dark walnut-stained bookcases lined the walls and formed orderly rows down the center of the shop.

From his vantage point, he could see the massive storefront windows occupying nearly half the front wall, nestled snugly between the tallest shelves that almost reached the second story.

Two long ladders clung to the cases, mounted on brass rails, their metal tarnished and dulled with age, yet they still looked sturdy, guardians of the uppermost shelves.

Suspended from the tall open ceiling, a wooden model airplane and a sailing ship hovered above the shop floor, as if forever in mid-voyage over a sea of stories.

Cobwebs veiled most corners, and dust blanketed the shelves, but there was no sign of water damage.

The books, too, appeared untouched by mold or decay.

The shop’s interior had held up better than its weathered exterior, almost as if time had forgotten to pass within its walls.

Turning, Pen surveyed the neatly labeled rows of books before him.

He was standing in front of the Foreign Religions section, with Folklore they’d cherished it.

He set it back down gently and left the room.

In the kitchen again, Pen crossed to the three windows spanning the wall, overlooking the street below. Ivy had crept up to these windows as well, partially obscuring the view with its green tendrils, making him lean to see out.

The street was coming to life as the small shops opened their doors and turned over their Open signs.

His gaze drifted to the apothecary. The door swung open, and a woman stepped outside.

She looked to be in her forties, with long dark hair, and dressed in a green smock-like dress that brushed her calves.

Pen watched as she unfolded a wooden sign that read Tea Blends .

There was something about her that reminded him of his mother, something quiet and sad around the eyes.

She didn’t look like his mother, but something in her expression mirrored what he’d seen in her for years: a muted grief for a life never fully lived.

The ache for something unspoken. He wondered, just for a moment, what his mother’s life might’ve been like if she hadn’t married his father.

Maybe she would’ve ended up doing something like this woman, running a roadside stand selling her famous blueberry pies or secondhand books.

Happy and free. The idea left him with a heavy feeling in his chest.

After his mother’s death, Pen hadn’t grieved, not properly.

He’d deliberately kept himself busy, burying himself in work and caring for his brothers to avoid confronting the void left by her absence.

Ward had told him to slow down, to feel it, but Pen couldn’t bring himself to face the silence she left behind.

Instead, he threw himself into maintaining the tin-can, cooking for his brothers, and keeping the household running.

He’d stepped into his mother’s shoes so fully that he forgot to lace his own, skipping out on college at Bates, settling for the job at the gas station.

Now, standing alone in the stillness of the apartment, he found himself wondering if he was doing it again, running from the grief, this time from Ward.

Perhaps he was. But this trip wasn’t just an escape.

It was a step toward the life Ward wanted for him.

His wish for Pen to embrace adventure and forge his own path.

He turned from the window and made his way back down the stairs and into the heart of the bookshop.

In the full light of day, the shop felt different.

Less haunted. The shelves, though bowed with age, stood proud beneath their burdens.

Books leaned together like old friends whispering secrets.

The shop seemed to breathe, quiet and patient, like it was waiting to come alive again.

Pen stood, listening. Maybe it wasn’t some crumbling store filled with forgotten pages.

Maybe, just maybe, the Feather Thorn was the start of a new chapter, the beginning of his own story.