Page 39 of No Charm Done

“Well,” Scarlett said quietly, watching the group disappear down the garden path, their laughter growing distant. “I guess we better figure out how to make the impossible happen. I get enough error messages from the Wi-Fi router, I’m certainly not accepting them from my spells.”

Luna nodded as she tried to push Elias from her mind. After all, she’d succeeded, hadn’t she? She’d gotten him out of the Void, which was all she’d set out to do. But if she was honest, there was also a kind of longing, an inexplicable pull towards him that left her feeling exposed.

She wouldn’t expect a magician—even a charming one—to be particularly useful in saving the world. Let him go perambulate around the square with Mama, if that’s what he wanted. She didn’t need him anyway. Luna was perfectly confident that she and her sisters could save the world on their own . . . even if she couldn’t remember why.

So why did she feel a twinge watching him leave?

Chapter 13

Old Salts

A walking tour of too-cute-by-half Oak Haven was the sort of experience Elias usually lived to avoid. As Kelly Melrose guided him along cobblestone streets lined with cutesy shops, he could feel his molars start to ache.

But even his practiced cynicism faltered when they paused at Spellbound Books.

The window display featured an actual working beach scene. Not a painted backdrop or a collection of props, but honest-to-God sand and surf within the confines of the storefront window. Miniature waves rolled gently onto a shore no bigger than a dining room table, leaving behind foam that sparkled like diamonds dissolving into the sand. Elias could swear he caught the scents of salt air and sunscreen.

Scattered across this impossible beach were dozens of small figures, each no taller than his thumb. A rabbit in a blue jacket was building an elaborate sandcastle, while a girl with gravity-defying pigtails performed handstands in the surf. A regal lion was attempting to retain his dignity while an elephant in a green suit sprayed him with seawater. Above the scene, enchanted words floated across the sky: HAPPY SUMMER! READING IS MAGICAL!

The whole scene pulsed with gentle, childish joy, the kind of window display that would stop traffic, if Oak Haven had such a thing. All of a sudden, Elias felt oddly wistful for a childhood he’d never quite been allowed to have.

“And this,” Kelly moved on, pointing out a shop with a door painted in swirling blues and greens, “is All Who Wander. It’s Luna’s favorite, of course, since it’s a travel agency. She’s been pestering them with imaginary trips since she could talk.”

Elias studied the window display, which featured a spinning globe that had sprouted tiny wings and was trying to fly off its stand. “She’s an ambitious young woman.”

“Too ambitious, if you ask me.” Kelly’s tone carried a note of maternal exasperation, the particular tiredness of a mother whose child insists on dreaming in the wrong direction. “And no practical sense whatsoever. The mess she’s made of our reservation system . . . my goodness.”

“Mrs. Melrose,” he said carefully, “if I may⁠—”

“How many times have I asked you to call me Kelly?”

“Of course. Kelly. Forgive me, but I think you were pretty hard on Luna back there.”

Her expression turned cool. “I beg your pardon?”

“Well, she did rescue me from the Void. It annoys me to admit it, but I’d still be there if not for her. And she’s pulled my bacon out of the fire several more times since then.”

Somewhere, Elias could hear a sword being removed from its sheath. “Nevertheless, Mr. Shaw, I think I know my daughter better than you do.”

“I’m just saying, she might benefit from a bit of encouragement. She’s clearly capable of remarkable things.”

She studied his face with the intensity of a banker examining a counterfeit bill. “Luna has the potential to become the most powerful witch Oak Haven has produced in centuries. The raw magical ability she possesses could reshape reality itself. That kind of power . . .” She paused, choosing her words carefully. “It’s intoxicating. It makes you believe you’re above the struggles that shape ordinary people’s lives. And we’ve all seen what happens to children who are never told no.

“Do you know why I have her working the reservation desk? The gods know it’s not because she has any affinity for it whatsoever. But she needs to understand what it feels like to be frustrated. To deal with mundane problems that can’t be fixed with a wave of her hands. She needs to know what it means to fail.” Kelly’s voice softened slightly, but her resolve was firm. “Empathy, the real empathy that comes after knowing failure? That’s what will keep her from becoming a tyrant.”

Her certainty was so complete, Elias almost believed her. But then he remembered Luna’s face when she’d opened that portal to save him: not triumphant or power-drunk, but scared and determined and hoping desperately that she had the strength to do what was needed. Hardly the face of some tyrant-in-waiting.

“I think there might be a middle ground between dangerous arrogance and crippling self-doubt.”

“How fascinating. A confidence man, of all people, lecturing me on arrogance.”

Can’t debate that one. “Fair enough, I suppose.”

“In any case. Shall we continue our tour? I believe you’ll find our hardware store particularly interesting.”

Elias had never found a hardware store interesting, not once in his life. But he wasn’t going to be picking another argument with Kelly Melrose anytime soon.

Williams Hardware was a squat old building with weathered clapboard siding, a wraparound porch that sagged here and there, like a structure that had done its best for centuries and would appreciate a nap. A hand-painted sign declared “Williams Hardware—EST. 1724—NO SPELLS” in cheerful yellow letters. But what really caught Elias’s attention were the three elderly men sitting in rocking chairs, drinking coffee from mismatched mugs and arguing with the intensity of Athenian philosophers.