Page 98 of The Messengers of Magic

Chapter Seventy

N ight fell sooner than Pen had wanted.

By the time they emerged from the forest, the sky had already turned, a heavy charcoal blue, dense with the weight of a storm about to break. They walked back to the cabin mostly in silence, fingers laced together, both lost in thoughts of what lay ahead.

Pen couldn’t stop replaying something Adelaide had said earlier: that tomorrow, they could stay in bed all day. And the next. And the next, until he was sick of her.

She had no idea. No idea there wouldn’t be a tomorrow for them.

If the ritual were successful, if the watch were destroyed, then time would reset. The rip would close, but time would pull them apart, back to wherever they were meant to be if the watch had never existed.

He should tell her. She deserved the truth.

But how could he take that hope from her? That hope, fragile as it was, was all she had left to hold on to. How could he tell her that the future she saw for them was nothing but an illusion?

As they stepped into the cabin, a wall of heat wrapped around them. The fire still smoldered in the hearth, and with the rising temperatures outside, the space felt stifling.

“What if we get there and it’s too late, what if everything’s already gone?” Adelaide asked, breaking the silence. “What if the watch is gone?”

Pen exhaled. “I don’t think that could happen. The watch is the cause of all this. It has to exist both here and in the other reality.”

She nodded but didn’t look convinced. “We’ll find out soon enough, I suppose.” She reached for a glass, poured herself some water, fingers tightening around it. “When should we leave?”

Pen glanced out the window at the darkening sky. “We should go now,” Pen said. “The sun will be fully down within the hour.”

She hesitated. “And we need to stop by the apothecary before it closes, for the herbs.”

“Good thinking. Let’s move.”

They left behind the blankets and supplies they’d taken from Carolyn’s and headed to Adelaide’s car.

The drive back to the Feather Thorn passed in silence. Adelaide kept her eyes on the road, and Pen kept his eyes on her. He still didn’t know whether to tell her or let her believe they had more time.

Because this time, there would be no letters slipped into the old letterbox. No messages in fogged-up windows or echoed through typewriter keys. This time, it would be final.

Why did this have to happen? Maybe he was cursed. Maybe this was penance for some forgotten sin in another life. Like standing at the gates of Heaven, told he could step inside but only to look around, to see its glory, before being turned away.

As they pulled into Helensburgh, the town was unrecognizable.

The familiar outline of the Feather Thorn stood in its normal place, the apothecary, along with a few of the homes that lined the street.

But everything else had shifted, like a town rebuilt from a faded photograph, familiar in shape, but wrong in all the details.

Roofs shaped at odd angles, lampposts flickered with candlelight, and entire buildings appeared warped, reshaped into forms that didn’t quite belong to this century or ones past. The sky was streaked with strange blues and purples twisting like ink spilled in water, speckled with too many stars, like they were looking up at another galaxy altogether, and maybe they were.

They passed a few people, cloaked in what looked like seventeenth-century attire, tricorn hats, long coats, lace at the collar.

Two of them turned and stared as they drove by, their expressions flickering with surprise, while the rest carried on as though moving through some dream, unaware of the world beyond their own shifting.

Two stone buildings stood ahead, buildings that hadn’t been there the day before.

One looked to be a butcher’s, the other a cobbler’s, though Pen couldn’t make sense of the signs hanging in the windows.

They weren’t written in English, or any language he recognized, just jagged lines and looping symbols.

As Adelaide pulled up beside the shop, unease curled in Pen’s gut.

The blue trim was gone. The sign, too. The Feather Thorn no longer looked as it had.

But it wasn’t just the paint or the missing name.

It was something deeper. An uncanny wrongness that made the building seem like a bad translation of itself.

Like a fish gasping on land, still a fish, still recognizable, but stripped of what made it whole.

“We need the journals, if we’re going to make sure we are doing this right,” Adelaide said as she shut off the engine.

“You’re right.” Pen reached for the door, following her out and into the Feather Thorn.

The once cozy space lined with bookshelves was gone; the hot forge loomed in its place. The man was still there, sweeping the floor as the forge’s embers faded to a dull glow. Just like before, they were still ghosts to him.

Adelaide moved toward the stairs. And there, just as it had been in the real Feather Thorn, was the trapdoor.

She exhaled, hope returning to her eyes.

She pulled on the ring, and the door opened.

Pen followed her down, but when they arrived at the bottom of the stairs, it wasn’t the hidden room they knew waiting for them.

No desk. No books. No typewriter. No journals.

Just a single oil lamp casting shadows over sacks of grain and potatoes.

“Shit!” Adelaide spun, eyes wide and frantic. “What happened to everything? The watch, the journals, Pen, are we stuck here?”

“I don’t know?” he said, fighting to keep his voice calm.

“But we will figure this out.” His mind played back everything he had read, piecing together every detail from Dee’s notes.

Then it came to him. John Dee’s hiding place.

A loose stone in the wall. He’d mentioned it only once, but still, if the building had been rewound, maybe it was still here.

Pen stepped up to the cold stone and ran his hands along the wall.

“What are you doing?” Adelaide asked as she watched.

He didn’t answer, just kept feeling the damp stones, silently praying. Please, let it be here.

Then, a stone shifted beneath his touch, only slightly, but enough. “It’s loose,” he said, as he wiggled it free.

Behind it, tucked in the dark hollow, lay the journal and a leather bag.

“Oh, thank God,” Adelaide said as he pulled them free.

“We should keep these with us now. No more chances,” Pen said, handing the items to Adelaide and pushing the stone back into place.

She nodded, still pale. “We need to get over to the apothecary soon.”

Adelaide passed the journal to him, and Pen opened it, turning to the last page.

“Okay, we need lavender, chamomile, cedar, and cinnamon,” he read aloud.

“Got it.” Adelaide checked her jacket pocket and pulled out a few coins.

“Let’s hope this place still takes pounds.

If they’re trading in goat’s teeth or salt stones, we’re in trouble.

” She offered him a tight smile, but the tension remained, heavy as they made their way back up the stairs and outside.

Across the road, the Purple Thorn glowed soft under the altered sky. Just as they approached, the door opened; Carolyn stepped outside, taking in her tea shop’s sign for the night.

“Pen, do you think she should see you? What if she freaks out?” Adelaide shot a whisper to him over her shoulder and slowed.

“She isn’t the same Carolyn as our version, remember. If she doesn’t know you, she certainly won’t remember me.” He gave her a slight nudge. “Let’s keep moving.”

“Excuse me, are you still open?” Adelaide asked.

Carolyn looked up, catching the streetlamp’s glow in her crystal-blue eyes. “Yes, come in,” she said, holding the door wide. “I was just getting ready to close up for the day, but you’re more than welcome to browse for a few minutes.”

Pen followed Adelaide inside, doing his best to act natural, though being this close to her made his blood run cold.

He’d seen her from the bookshop window, white hair, an aged face weathered by sorrow, but now, standing just a few feet away, she looked only slightly older than when they’d met in 1955.

It unsettled him. As if time itself were flipping a coin.

As he stepped past her into the shop, she studied him, tilting her head slightly. “Do I know you?” she asked, curiosity flickering in her gaze.

Pen felt his stomach drop. She was looking at him too closely. “No, I don’t think so,” he said, forcing an easy smile. “We’re not from around here.”

Not a complete lie. But still, a lie.

Carolyn narrowed her eyes. “You look an awful lot like my tailor over on Copper Lane. Pen Turner. You wouldn’t happen to be related to him, would you?”

Pen Turner. His name. His heart stopped. Adelaide spun around, her eyes wide.

How? How did this version of Carolyn know his name? Did he exist in this reality? Had another version of him lived a full life here in Scotland?

For a heartbeat, hope rose. If another version of him was here, did that mean there was a chance, however small, that he could find his way back, that some part of him belonged here, that there was a version of his story that didn’t end tonight?

But then Rowland’s warning slammed into him.

When your past and present selves share the same space, the danger isn’t in your proximity; it’s in knowing. If you both become aware of each other, the tether weakens. And when that breaks, so does reality.

“No, I’m sorry,” Pen said quickly.

Carolyn studied him for a beat longer before giving a small, thoughtful nod. “Strange, you look like you could be his son.”

She moved to the windows, shutting them one by one, the faint warmth of the dusk breeze slipping away with each latch.

“You can feel the seasons changing,” she said with a wistful smile, returning to the counter. “So, what is it you two are looking for?” she asked, though Pen could still feel her eyes on him, curious, assessing, not quite convinced.