The elf customer left at last, happy with his warmth charm yet still amazed that it would just work without any excessive amount of care. Max came through to the workshop after the customer had gone.

“Sometimes you just have to give the customer what they want,” he said, shaking his head and laughing.

Cal glanced up from the enchanting table. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, just that elf. He couldn’t understand that his charm didn’t need looking after. Eventually I recommended that he give it a really good polish every few days, and he went off happy after that. Sometimes people have such fixed ideas. Anyway, never mind him. What are you working on?”

“Oh, just a couple of basic enchantments. Voice Volume seemed to be a good seller, so I’m going to do a few more of those. I’ve got the potential to make some Stamina pendants as well, but I wonder if there mightn’t be a better vector for that enchantment.”

“Vector?” Max said, then he nodded. “Oh, yes, I remember now. The vector is the object that holds the enchantment, like the pendant or the gloves.”

“Yeah, the vector is the thing that holds the enchantment, but it’s also the thing that distributes the enchantment, the thing that passes the enchantment to the user.”

“You mean it’s more than just storage,” Max said.

Cal nodded. “The vector does hold the enchantment, but it also passes the enchantment to the person wearing it, or the space being affected, or whatever.”

Max frowned. He glanced over his shoulder into the front of the shop to make sure there was no one there. “You said or whatever, but what other kinds of things could there be other than a person or a space?”

“Well, our plants in the growth enchanted pots, for one example,” Cal said. “And there are other things that could be enchanted - sometimes people would add Strength enchanted vectors into things like carriage axles, or the timbers of ships. In those examples, you wouldn’t actually enchant the boards themselves - you’d enchant something small, a ball of glazed clay, for example, or a rod of metal, and then implant that into the wood that’s to be affected. And then there’s this new possibility…”

Cal broke off, looking thoughtfully at the table. He’d been enchanting a Stamina pendant while he’d been speaking, but now he’d finished folding the spell into the clay. He picked the pendant up, attaching the black cord to the pendant and setting the finished item to one side with the others.

“What’s the new possibility?” Max asked, but at that moment there was a rush of cold air from outside as the door opened, and a new customer came in.

“Do you mind getting this one, Cal?” Max asked. “I’d like to get dinner started.”

“Oh, sure,” Cal said. He smiled, and headed out into the front shop.

“Good evening,” he said to the new arrival, a stout, cheerful looking young man in work boots and a stained apron. Then he recognized the newcomer. “Hey, it’s Ben Benson!” he exclaimed. “How are you?”

Ben Benson was a sometime acquaintance from Cal’s time as an itinerant magical repairman at the large rail yard in the south-west of Roon. Before he’d bought the enchanting shop, Cal had made his living fixing and charging the enchantments in the small and poorly-stocked workshop that served the railway.

Train travel wasn’t a big part of life in the city, but there was a yard on the southwest outskirts that served goods transport trains to and from the larger of the industrial settlements out in the flat lands west of Jutlyn. Metal and stone came north from dwarven mines in the far south, generally on flotillas that came downriver to Jutlyn, but far to the west there were huge timber plantations, great belts of carefully managed forest that supplied building timber to the city. To the immediate south and east of Jutlyn, over the river, were the farmlands and the estates of the nobility, then the mountains and the sea, but west of Jutlyn and the Jut river, Roon was a wide, flat country for many many miles before you reached the sea, making it ideal for rail travel.

Dragons sat up front in the railway cars, their fiery breath heating water and forcing steam to the pistons of the great engines that pulled the trains. A steady stream of goods trains flowed east, bringing timber to Jutlyn for use in the city or for export, and another stream of trains traveled west from the city, bringing food, coal, and imported goods to the timber-producing settlements in the west.

Ben Benson worked at the rail yard. He was a blacksmith, and he’d been working full-time there for years. Cal’s work at the yard had been more casual, diagnosing problems with the enchanted components of the trains, and either fixing them up if he was able to do so on the spot, or writing reports of what needed to be done and sending the job to professional enchanters who would be able to tackle the problem. Still, it had been one of the few places he could earn through enchanting work, and so he’d always taken any work he could get at the yard.

Ben was a good sort, always kind and friendly to Cal, but they’d never been particularly great buddies. Cal was pleased to see him, but he was a little surprised.

It turned out that Ben was equally surprised to see Cal.

“Hey, it’s you!” Ben exclaimed, doing a double take. “I never expected to see you here. I heard about this new enchanting shop and thought I’d take a look, but I didn’t realize it was Cal Markwyth who ran it. Nice!”

He looked around, taking in the cozy space, the gleaming enchanted goods on the shelves, and then looking back at Cal. “Moving up in the world, eh?” he said with a wink. “Never thought you made enough at the railyard to be able to afford a place like this!”

“I didn’t, not really,” Cal laughed. “But I got this place at a very low price, because the previous owner disappeared mysteriously and they wanted to get rid of it. The shop was in a pretty bad way, but I’ve put the work in to make it nice again.”

“I see,” Ben said thoughtfully. “You certainly have managed to make it nice. So what kind of things do you have to sell? I’ve never been to an enchanter’s shop before. Always felt they weren’t really for the likes of me, if I’m honest. But I heard that this shop was a friendly one and the owner wasn’t haughty or conceited the way enchanters usually are. A bit more of a welcoming atmosphere and all that.”

“I’m glad you heard that!” Cal said. “That’s the idea. I always wanted to make enchantments available to people who were a bit more… well, a bit more like me. Just regular folks, you know?”

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“I do know,” Ben agreed. “It’s us regular folks who keep the whole city running. Crafters and singers and weavers, and yet the enchanters don’t seem to want to sell to anyone but the rich! Hmph. Well, anyway, I’m glad to see you’re doing this. Maybe it’ll cause other enchanters to change their ways a bit, eh?”

“I don’t know, Ben,” Cal said. “I don’t think the words enchanter and change go well together. It would be nice if that happened, but you know, I’m not out to change anyone else - let them do things however they want. I just want to do things my way.”

“And if your way happens to bring in a bit more business than the other way…?” Ben suggested with a wink.

Cal laughed. “Well, then it’ll be no bad thing!”

They spent a little time looking over the enchantments that Cal had available, but there wasn’t anything immediately suitable for Ben’s use. Ben was a blacksmith who spent most of his day at the forge, so he had little need for a Warmth enchantment. He worked alone, and though the rail yard was noisy, he rarely needed to shout at anyone, so Voice Volume wasn’t something he needed either. He was a well-built, robust young man, his strength in need of no extra boosting.

“What about a Stamina enchantment?” Cal suggested. He darted into the back and grabbed the enchanted pendants he’d just been working on.

“That’s an idea,” Ben said. “I sometimes do wish I could keep at it for longer. I’m strong and I’m good at the job, but still I tire quickly in the heat. I’m not sure about this, though…”

“What, you mean the pendant?” Cal asked.

Ben nodded. “I don’t like wearing things around my neck, especially at work. They just end up itchy, you know? I guess that means I can’t benefit from enchantments.”

“Not at all,” Cal said with a grin. “I can enchant all kinds of things. Actually, before you came in I was just wondering whether I might not be better to put the Stamina enchantment into something other than a pendant. Do you wear anything in particular when you’re smithing? I mean, anything you don’t wear at other times?”

“Why, I wear a good pair of heavy leather gloves,” Ben said.

“Do you have them here?”

“No, no, I leave them at the workshop. They’re dirty, and I have no use for them at home.”

“Bring them tomorrow,” Cal said. “I’ll enchant them with a stamina boost while you wait. How about that?”

“How much would you charge?” Ben asked.

Cal thought about it for a moment, then quoted him a price for the job that seemed to please Ben well enough.

“Friend’s rates, is that?” Ben said. “It seems cheap.”

Cal shook his head. “No, not friend’s rates. Can’t afford to do that at the moment,” he said. “That’s just how much my time costs, with a bit added to cover the cost of material.”

“Very reasonable,” Ben replied happily. “I’ll come by tomorrow then, and bring my gloves.”

When Ben left, it was full dark outside. The spirit street lamps were on and the other shops had all put their lights out and closed their shutters if they had any. Cal could hear whistling and singing and the sound of chopping and frying coming from the workshop. Max was cooking.

Cal went up to the front door and looked out.

“Time to close up, I think,” he called, but Max didn’t hear him over the sound of frying onions. Cal smiled, locking the door and heading back in.

He took the lockbox from under the counter and carried it and the sales ledger back into the workshop and sat down at the desk.

“You’ve closed the shop up now?” Max asked. He hadn’t heard Cal speak earlier. Cal nodded and began counting up the day’s takings. The sounds of cooking mingled with the sounds of gold coins clinking and Cal’s pen scratching the calculations.

“We’ve done well today,” Cal said smiling as he sat back and stacked the coins away in the larger of the two lockboxes. “We’ll keep the daily takings in the smaller box behind the counter, and collect the larger amount here, in this bigger box which we can keep in the workshop.”

Cal had a few small cloth drawstring bags for the purpose, and he counted out a percentage for the adventurers, a percentage for tax, and put the remainder aside to use for ongoing expenses.

“We’ll not need to get more pendants for a while,” he said, “but we could do with getting more plant pots. Nobody commented on the plants today, but just wait til they’re in flower.”

Max served up the dinner and they sat in their regular spot, one on each side of the fire, to eat. As they ate, they chatted about the day, the prospects for the future, and the things they needed for the shop. Conversation about the bits they needed to buy turned into conversation about the things they’d like to buy, which was much more interesting.

Soon, they were laughing and discussing an internal stairwell, an extension on the bathroom, and a new window for the back of the workshop.

“And shutters!” Max said, snapping his fingers. “Big wooden shutters. Loads of the other shops have them, and it would make a big difference to the temperature when it comes to sleeping in here at night.”

“Ans to security and privacy, too,” Cal agreed, “once we start holding a bit more cash on the premises it would be good to be able to close the shutters at night. We can’t be going to Goldhammer’s bank every day, but that means being a bit more secure and private after hours.”

Max nodded. “You’re right.”

“By the way,” Cal said, “you mentioned about shutters making a difference to the warmth overnight, but I think the best thing we could do for that would be to get you a better place to sleep than the floor in front of the fire.”

“It’s okay,” Max protested, “there’s no need to worry about that just yet.”

Cal held up a hand. “I know it’s okay,” he said, “and we’ve discussed this before. I know you don’t mind, but hear me out. While we’re talking about aspirations, I was thinking about the empty lot next door.”

“Ahh!” Max exclaimed. “I see! Yes, I remember Loruk mentioning that the other day when he was here. You said you had never really noticed it before. Neither had I. Odd we never noticed it before, now I come to think of it.”

“Was the lot empty like that when you were here with Darkworth, before?”

Max nodded. “I think it’s been like that for a long time,” he said. “It doesn’t look like it’s only recently closed up.”

Cal thought for a moment. “Don’t you think that’s weird?” he said.

“Weird how?” Max asked.

“Well, look at it. This is a desirable location. Sandweaver Street, near the market square and on a good busy thoroughfare through an affluent shopping district. Here’s this place, the Enchantery, up for auction only six weeks after Darkworth abandoned it. And yet there’s a place next door closed and locked up for apparently much longer. And now I think about it - how often do you see closed up commercial property in this part of the city? I mean, really, this kind of place is in demand. People want shops in this part of town. The only reason I was able to get this place was because of the enchanter’s seal, because unless you’re willing to shell out money to have the seal removed, the shop is useless for anything else. Why isn’t next door up for sale?”

Max narrowed his eyes and drummed his fingers on his knee.

“You know, that is really weird,” he said. “I can’t think of another derelict lot like that anywhere in this area. When one shop closes, people come in and snap it up as quickly as they can. I mean, look at Mephisterion. If it’s not a private trader like you buying, it’s someone like him, someone who owns a bunch of property already and wants to expand. For that matter, he wanted to open a grinning gremlin coffee shop here - why didn’t he buy that place and do his thing there?”

The more they talked about it, the more unusual it seemed. They broke off, both turning to look at the wall of the room in which they sat. They could see the cozy hearth, the crackling flames, the tightly-laid boards of the wooden wall paneling. But through that wall, they both now realized, was something else. Something new. Something strange.

The empty lot next door suddenly became a mystery that they both wanted to solve.