Page 4 of Shadow Lord

The next customer is an elderly man called Gerald, who comes in most days and always orders the same thing, a plain black coffee, small, no fuss. He’s not much of a talker, but he always asks how my day is going, and actually waits for the answer, which puts him leagues ahead of most people who ask that question purely out of habit.

“Exam went well,” I tell him, sliding his coffee across. “I think I might actually be good at law.”

“Good lad,” he says, the way he says most things, like he’s conserving his words for something more important later. He drops the exact change into my palm and shuffles off to his usual table by the door, the one with the wobbly leg that Felix has been meaning to fix for a while now.

My shadow watches him go too, I notice. He watches everyone go. I sometimes wonder what exactly he’s looking for. Whether it’s threats specifically, or just information generally. Some enormous catalogue of every person who’s ever walked through this door, quietly filed away behind those amber eyes. I’ve never asked. It’s not really the sort of question you can put into words easily, not without sounding like you think something’s wrong, and nothing is wrong. I just find him fascinating, is all. A person is allowed to find their own shadow fascinating.

The lunchtime rush comes in like it always does, all at once, like the entire population of Bristol decided simultaneously that now was the moment for coffee. I make cappuccinos and flat whites and one truly enormous hot chocolate for a child who eyes me with deep suspicion the entire time I’m making it, and I’m right in the middle of steaming milk for the sixth latte in a row when the wand catches the side of my hand.

“Ow,” I say, mildly, because it’s not a bad burn, just a hot little sting across two knuckles, the sort of thing that happens to baristas roughly weekly and barely counts as an injury in the grand scheme of things.

The espresso machine starts shaking.

Not a little. Properly shaking, the whole steel bulk of it rattling on the counter like something underneath it has decided to have an opinion about the situation. Cups jump in their saucers. The milk jug slides a full inch sideways before I catch it. Felix grabs one corner of the rattling machine. A customer near the till takes a startled step back.

“Whoa,” I say, mostly to the machine, and then, more quietly, angling myself so my back is half turned to the shop, “it’s fine. I promise it’s completely fine.”

The shaking doesn’t stop.

“It’s a burn,” I say, holding up my hand so my shadow can see it properly, two small pink marks, nothing more, already fading. “This happens to me at least once a fortnight. You cannot fight a coffee machine on my behalf. It hasn’t done anything wrong. It’s just doing its job, same as me.”

The rattling eases, slowly, reluctantly, the way a kettle sounds when you take it off the heat before it’s finished boiling.

“There we go,” I murmur. “All better. Nobody needs defending from steamed milk.”

Felix straightens up, looking between me and the now perfectly still machine. His expression isn’t confusion, it’s long-suffering resignation, the look of someone who’s had this exact conversation before and would rather not have it again today.

“Tell him if he breaks another one of my machines I’m billing him,” Felix says, already reaching for the first aid box under the counter without being asked. “That’s the second time this month.”

“He says sorry,” I say, straight-faced.

“He does not say sorry. He’s never once said sorry for anything in his life.” Felix takes my hand and turns it over, unbothered and brisk. He murmurs something under his breath while he dabs a cool, faintly silvery salve onto the burn, the kind of thing that definitely isn’t sold in any ordinary chemist. The sting fades almost instantly. “There. You’ll live. Try not to maim yourself again before your shift’s even properly started.”

I watch him do it, same as I always do, with a small private thrill I’ve never quite gotten over. An actual witch. A real one, not a costume or an aesthetic, tending to my hand with genuine, functional magic as if it’s the most ordinary thing in the world, because to him it is. I grew up around people who talked about power constantly and possessed approximately none of it. Felix has never once mentioned being powerful and demonstrates it about four times a shift.

“I make no promises,” I say.

“You never do,” Felix says.

I glance towards the corner by the plant. My shadow has gone still again, but there’s a particular quality to his stillness that I’ve learned to recognise, the stillness of something faintly embarrassed by the fuss it just caused and hoping nobody mentions it further.

Out of kindness, I don’t mention it further.

Felix is still holding my hand a moment longer than the burn strictly requires, turning it slightly under the light like he’s checking his own work. It strikes me, not for the first time, how fond I am of him. I love most people, honestly. That’s not an exaggeration or a nice thing to say. It’s just true. I find nearly everyone fascinating and worth being kind to. But Felix gets something extra. A fiercer, more specific sort of fondness. Felix, who called me deranged within thirty seconds of meeting me and has never once taken it back. Who pretends constantly not to care and then appears with a first aid kit before I’ve finished saying ow. Who is standing in the middle of his coffee shop, threatening to bill an ancient shadow being for damages, entirely unbothered, because for him this is simply normal life.

I don’t say any of that out loud. Felix would combust.

“Right,” he says instead, releasing my hand and stepping back. “Go finish that order before it goes cold, Bunny.”

“Yes, boss,” I say.

“Don’t call me boss,” Felix says.

“Yes, Felix,” I say.

“Better,” Felix says.

I go back to the machine, humming, my hand only slightly stinging now. My shadow settles further into his corner. Beside me, Felix is already scowling at the next customer in the queue with the particular ferocity he reserves for people who take too long deciding what they want.