Opening Day

“NO NO…I SAID HANG IT STRAIGHT! THAT END NEEDS TO GO UP. NO UP! “Mallion yelled at the crew hanging the banner over his new shoppe. He needed everything to be perfect for the opening of his latest venture and it seemed that the buffoons that he hired to help him get everything ready were bent on his demise.

“HEY, YOU” he yelled at a tall slender youth “I’m paying you to be the crier, now cry, so PEOPLE CAN HEAR YOU!!”

The youth rolled his eyes and thought of yelling back at his employer, then thought better of it and began his job in earnest.

“COME ONE COME ALL TO MALLION THE MAGNIFICANT’S HOUSE OF MAGIC.” He yelled, took a breath and continued.

“SPELLS, CHARMS, ENCHANTMENTS, POTIONS. ALL THIS AND MORE JUST OUTSIDE YOUR FRONT DOOR. ITS ALL AT MALLION THE MAGNIFICENT’S HOUSE OF MAGIC”

As the youth continued, Mallion smiled, just a little, maybe the crew he hired wasn’t completely full of buffoonery. Buffoonery, was that a real word? Mallion didn’t know, but he thought that it was accurate, so he stood by his accusation.

People were starting to take notice. Mallion smiled a little more. This was going to be a good day. He had put everything he had into opening this store. He needed this store to be a success, if it wasn’t, he was flat broke. He was sure that this newest business would be a sure-fire success. He had pulled out all the stops. He purchased this two-story house on prime real estate and lived upstairs as he converted the bottom floor into the shoppe. He had gathered all manner of magic orbs, potions, scrolls, anything that even looked like it had something to do with magic. He gathered it all in boxes and packed it into the shoppe and organized it. He customized each section, tailored to each type of magic item so each area had a different feel to it. In the back of the house, he created a magicy looking garden spot, very serene with a fishpond and exotic flora.

Was ‘magicy’ a word? He would have to contemplate the merits of that word when he had more time.

“MAKE YOUR LIFE A LITTLE EASIER WITH A LITTLE MAGIC FROM MALLION THE MAGIFICENT’S HOUSE OF MAGIC” the crier proclaimed as more people took notice and began to make their way towards the shoppe.

Mallion was beginning to like this guy. He made everything magic and implied that he, Mallion, was the magician without every saying it. Mallion was no magician of course, not a single magical bone in is body, neither did anyone else in his family. Sure, he dressed the part, right down to the robes and pointy hat, but he was a businessman, a trader of goods and now specifically he was a trader of magical goods. It didn’t really matter to Mallion whether the goods were magical or not, if he could make a coin in the transaction, all was good in the world.

The banner was now straight, and people were starting to form a crowd to find out what all the ruckus was about. Mallion smiled large enough to show teeth at a housewife who was passing by.

“Morning m’lady” Mallion said and tipped his hat slightly. “Might I interest you in a magic broom? It will sweep the house for you while you tend to more important things. There are all kinds of time saving magic just inside the door”

The lady stopped and considered Mallion’s offer. “Sounds…interesting”

Mallion smiled his best salesman smile. “Mallion is the name. The shoppe will be open shortly please do come and visit. Ask for me by name and I will personally find what you need. Now I must excuse myself to make sure the final preparations are complete. Good day fair lady”

With a nod and a flourish, he was on his way to the shoppe, knowing without even waiting for a response that the lady would indeed be coming to see his wares. Inside was still dark. At the exact time of opening, magic lights would burst forth light and bathe the shoppe in colorful dancing lights that tinkled lightly. First Mallion wanted to check on the crown jewel of his enterprise. He paid a small ransom in gold to obtain this relic, but it was worth every copper coin he paid to Alistar Cromdale to get his hands on it. Mallion approached the middle of the store, an open area with a single pedestal. On the pedestal was a square glass case. Inside the square glass case was the eye of Teussus.

The eye of Teussus…a orange orb about the size of Mallion’s fist with a small black line running through the center of it. It is said, the eye is old as the land itself, created at the same time the foundations of the earth were introduced to the sea. It is said by others, to contain old arcane magic used by creatures that no longer exist. Still others claim that the eye was forged in fires within the heart of the mountains. The most prevalent rumor, and the most likely, is that it was the eye of a dragon. How someone managed to take an eye out of a dragon and lived to tell about it, he would never know. Sceptics said that the dragon was likely dead at the time, but he felt that it wern’t. Wern’t, Mallion was sure that word did not exist, wasn’t was probably the correct one.

 As Mallion was contemplating his word choices, the magic lights burst to life. A little too exuberantly. Several displays were knocked over and Mallion was blinded for a few seconds. The light slowly dimmed to its proper brightness and the colors with the tinkling began. As the spots slowly disappeared from his vision, he looked around the shoppe and frowned at the damage. Well, that’s what I get for buying lighting from the back of a discount carriage.

“Kaia” Mallion yelled with some urgency in his voice. Kaia, Mallion’s part time helper and full-time pain in the neck, slowly made her way from the back of the shoppe, clearly not sharing the urgency. “Please clean this mess up post – haste!”

Post haste…he did use that phrase correctly, didn’t he?

“Yes sir” Kaia drawled and began to pick up a display of spell books just as the first customer opened the front door.

“Are you open for business?” Asked the lady that Mallion had talked to in front of the store just a few moments earlier. Putting the salesman smile back on his face, Mallion gestured for the lady to come in. “Yes, of course we are. Please excuse the mess. Follow me if you will” Mallion made a second gesture “over here to the Household Helpers section. You were interested in a magic broom, yes?” Mallion chose a broom off the rack and presented it to the lady.

“Look at the craftsmanship on this beauty. The handle made from the darkest oaks from the Dark Forest. And the bristles made entirely from the hair of a unicorn’s tail”

“it’s beautiful, the lady replied. How does it work?”

“Glad you asked” Mallion proclaimed “There are three settings on this beauty one for light dusting, a second for medium mud, and the third for high density dirt. So, let’s say the kids tracked in some sand from the back yard and on to your kitchen floor. All you need to do is stand the broom up like this and say ‘Sweep broom, clean up this room’”

No sooner had Mallion finished the incantation, the broom took off wildly sweeping the floor, the shelves, the walls. Knocking more displays over and sweeping the tipped over stuff into piles.

“KAIA, HELP” Mallion yelled while trying to grab the broom and stop it from doing further damage to the store.

At the same time the lady shrieked, put her arms up and turned away from the newly formed disaster trying to protect herself.

Kaia casually looked up from her work and smiled an amused lopsided smile. After pausing a moment to take in the entertainment she yelled back “Finish broom, clean is this room”

The broom completed its wild dance and floated gracefully back onto the broom rack.

Mallion cleared his throat, “Well, maybe a broom isn’t right thing for you.” Composing himself and straightening his robs, he made is way to the end of the isle and around the corner. “Follow me if you please”

Mallion noticed that there were now several other customers in the store. ‘Good’ he thought, ‘this is going to be a good day after all, considering how the day started’ Mallion did not notice that the customers were all staring his direction, not looking at the merchandise but rather gradually making their way his direction to see what would happen next.

Down another isle, but still in the ‘Household Helpers’ section, Mallion stopped in front of a large wooden bowl. “This, M’lady is the ‘Instant Bistro Bowl’. It makes meal preparation a snap. It is a quick three step process. First, find your favorite recipe in this free companion cookbook.” Mallion demonstrated with a recipe had picked out ahead of time and prepared the necessary ingredients for the recipe.” Second put all the ingredients in the bowl at the same time.”

By this time, a rather large crowd had begun to gather to watch the demonstration. “Third say ‘Bistro Bowl, a bowl of zeal, prepare this extra tasty meal!”

For a moment the bowl just sat there, not moving. Then it began to shake a little, and then shake a lot. The bowl started spinning one direction and the food started spinning the opposite direction. Slowly at first then picking up speed the food spun faster and faster and started rising out of the bowl forming a food tornado. The food tornado rose out of the bowl getting bigger and bigger, spinning faster and faster until it rose to the roof.

Nobody moved. They were rooted in place by the sheer strangeness of what they were seeing and curiosity of what would happen next. Suddenly the food tornado blew itself apart sending food in all directions splattering the store and the patrons with the stuff that Mallion put in the bowl and some stuff he was pretty sure he did not! And it smelled horrible.

Now the customers were heading away from Mallion, trying to find an open window or door, anything with fresh air.

Suddenly the colored lights stopped tinkling and turned grey. The light in the entire building turned darker…like it was losing its power. Everyone in the shoppe froze and stared at the figure that walked into the front door. The figure was tall and dressed in a black robe from head to toe. A hood covered its head and pulled low, so the face was shrouded in darkness. The figure slowly began to glide towards Mallion. As it did so the customers that were still in the shoppe made their way out, so that by the time that the figure was standing in front of Mallion there were no customers left. Even Kaia did not stick around to see what would happen.

Mallion tried working his mouth, but it was dry, and words were not coming out at all.

“You have something that belongs to me” the figure said in a deep dry growly voice that did not sound human at all.

Mallion worked his mouth again, and this time two words managed to squeak out “I do?” Mallion had done many dealings over his business career, not all of them could be described as “above board”. He had found himself in similar situations, but none with a character as frightening as this one.

The figure simply nodded turned and made its way to the center of the store. Mallion slowly followed but kept a safe distance watching the character with equal parts horror and curiosity. The figure stopped in front of the display that held the Eye of Teussus.

“Hey” Mallion yelled, a little braver now “That is not yours, I came by that honestly and I paid good money for it too!”

The figure did not acknowledge Mallion, but simply removed the glass case and discarded it on the floor. Mallion took a couple steps closer to the foreboding figure, not knowing what he would do, but he would not let anyone take away the crown jewel of his store if he had anything to say about it.

Just then the figure did something completely unexpected. It very gently and carefully picked up the Eye of Teussus and slowly raised it off the display and deposited it into the darkened area underneath the hood. And as the creature put the eye back in it’s socket it transformed from a human shape into its dragon shape. As it transformed the room seemed suddenly very small. Rows upon rows of shelves were destroyed as the dragon grew to its full size. Fixtures crumbled. Windows broke. The dragon, with an ear-piercing cry opened its wings, crouched and launched itself through the ceiling, second floor apartment and roof out into the open.

Suddenly everything was extremely quiet. Dumbfounded, Mallion looked around the ruins and began to sob. He plopped himself in the rubble and held is head in his hands.

“I’m broker now more than ever” Mallion sobbed. He was aware that he used the word ‘broker’ incorrectly and he didn’t care.