The Velvet Mansion and the Discovery of Magic

By Shelby Rhodina

When Nav Green moves out with his best friend Robert to run an antique store, they're expecting more freedom, lots of noodles and getting to explore their town better. Instead, they make friends with art-store neighbours, run rings around The Velvet Mansion, and eat much better food than either of them expected. Nav finds living with Robert is e

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shelby Ward
• Release date: Nov 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9780645355215

Book preview

1

Moving Day

On Rosemary Route, in between an art shop and an abandoned black house, lay an unusually wonky flat. This flat was particularly special, as it had a lower floor under street-level that contained the oldest antiques store in the town of Ebonwick. The town itself wasn’t really what you’d expect. Though it had formed on the coast of England, Ebonwick was invisible to the outside world. Split into four quadrants around its centre, the whole town was basically a maze, and very few ever found it on purpose. Our story, as you may have guessed, starts in Ebonwick, on Rosemary Route, in the flat above The Velvet Mansion, as the antiques store was called.

Unfortunately, I had already lost my roommate. It wasn’t very difficult, considering the amount of cardboard boxes that filled the snug living room. I decided he must have gotten lost amongst the rubble and fallen asleep somewhere. Not wanting to trip over him, but needing to put down the heavy moving box, I set it down on the floor and waded my way towards the kitchen. The kitchen was like the living room, small and snug, and because this was our first day the kitchen was probably the cleanest it would ever be in future. It was spotless, the only appliances on the bench being a bright red toaster and a glass kettle.

I fired up the kettle, watching it glow as it started to heat up. The water rose and bubbled, but before it was finished I groaned to myself. I hadn’t unpacked my tea mugs yet, and we didn’t have any tea to drink anyway. Why didn’t I think about that before? I slumped back against the kitchen counter and crossed my arms miserably. I guess that was just something I had to get used to, now I wasn’t living with my parents.

Thinking about my parents sent a harsh shiver down my spine. We hadn’t had the happiest of goodbyes when I told them I was moving above The Velvet Mansion. To say that my parents were disappointed would have been a major understatement. We must have argued for hours, the three of us all having a turn at screaming at the top of our lungs. My mother’s words had been the harshest, and for good reason I suppose. She was the financial support of the family, and she was always very money conscious. That meant that whatever I enjoyed had to have a basis in being able to make money off it, otherwise she didn’t consider it as an important pursuit for my intelligence. That was a problem if I worked in The Velvet Mansion, because it didn’t pay anywhere near as much as teaching pottery classes at the University, which was what my mother did.

My father hadn’t been concerned about how much I would be paid. He was more worried that I was going to be living with my best friend, Robert Bard. I guess he must have thought Robert was a bad influence on me, but my father never understood our relationship. Robert was more like my brother than my real younger brother was, and he really wasn’t a bad influence. If anything, he was a better influence on me than my parents had been.

Since our row I’d barely spoken to my parents. I’d kept to myself, making sure to pack up everything I owned in the house to take with me. The only time I surfaced was to get food, and even then I would go out of the house so that I wouldn’t bump into my parents. I knew the argument would have just fired up anew if I did. I felt like I was a ghost in my own house. Though I was only moving out, what I’d left looked like I’d never lived there at all. No one had acknowledged my presence as I shifted the boxes out the door, and my younger brother had only glanced at me from across the room. He hadn’t gotten into the initial argument, he never did. But he did listen to everything, and most of our childhood he’d been the reason for my parents and I arguing in the first place.

It was much easier moving out than it was to move in. Especially when I’d had to unload all the boxes pretty much by myself, twice as many because I’d moved Robert’s too. I hadn’t been too angry with him though; I knew he hadn’t slept well from the moment I’d seen him that morning. He’d arrived at my house with unkept hair and deep black eyes. We’d agreed to spend one last night at our parents before we moved out, and it had clearly taken a toll on him. His parents never really noticed, but something about their house always kept him on edge. I doubt he’d slept at all last night, but that was another story.

Hey! A voice whispered behind me.

I jumped, my arm swinging upwards to defend myself. My elbow flew across the person’s face and sent them backwards, before they tripped over a box and landed on the floor. I frowned when I realised who it was. I crossed my arms, waiting patiently for him to sit up. He was already laughing, holding his nose with one hand as he lifted himself up with the other.

Well, thanks roomie, but I ain’t attacking you, he said. He was still laughing as he searched for a tissue.

Serves you right for sneaking up on me, I said, still vaguely annoyed with him. He kept looking around for a tissue, and I finally gave in to hand him one. I leaned against the kitchen bench, watching as he started looking around for something else. What are you doing now? I asked.

We ain’t got anywhere to sit, he complained.

We just moved in, I replied, thanks for the help, by the way.

I got confused by all the shapes, I had to have a nap to remember how to get out of the box maze, he excused himself with a sly grin. He finally settled on a box tower, sitting on one that said ‘clothes’ because he knew he wouldn’t break anything as he sat down. How come I scared you anyway? I’m not that stealthy, he added.

You can say that again, I said, watching him grin, I was just thinking.

About what?

My parents.

Oooh, he said. He knew it was a rough topic, especially today. Okay, well, think about something else.

Thank you, oh wise one, I said, I’ll try.

Good, he nodded. He discarded his tissue then, looking over at me as if he expected me to say something. When I didn’t say anything, he decided he’d have to change the topic for himself.

Hey, it’s nice in here, isn’t it? he asked. We both looked around the flat. Though his statement wasn’t the most eloquent, he was right.

The flat was small, with a black, iron spiral staircase in one corner that ran from the level above us to The Velvet Mansion below us. There was one wall painted the colour of cherries, and the wooden floors were a dusty grey. The kitchen was white, with a bench top the same colour as the wooden floors, and apart from all the boxes the rest of the living area was bare. We definitely had to get some furniture from somewhere. In between the kitchen and the staircase was a hallway that lead to the two bedrooms, the bathroom, and the office. I didn’t know what we’d do with an office, because neither of us needed it, but it was nice to know we had the extra room for something. We’d probably use it as storage eventually, but for now it was just an empty, blank room.

Nav, you blanked on me again, Robert said. I shook my head to unlock my eyes from their glazed stare.

Sorry, I said, It’s just a lot to get used to.

I like it, he said. Sometimes he seemed to talk just because he needed to hear something, rather than because he needed to say it aloud. He often spoke like that when he was thinking about something other than the conversation.

Robert, you’d like any old flat, I said.

No! he stiffened, I’m incredibly picky.

Uhuh, I said, says the guy who just slept on the floor, surrounded by moving boxes that could crush him at any moment.

That’s different, he snapped.

How?

Well, he was flustered for a moment before his face lit up. Napping is different. It’s only temporary, but a flat is longer than that.

How long do you think we’ll be here? I asked. I hadn’t thought about it myself, how long we’d be living here for. I suppose because neither of us really had ideas of going anywhere yet. I was curious to know what Robert was thinking though, because he sounded absurd when he talked about ‘our future’.

Robert gave me a shrug. Maybe forever, he said, or until we have a falling out.

We’re not going to fall out, I assured him, We’ve been friends for far too long, I don’t think we could live on without seeing each other.

I was sure I was telling the truth. I had to be, otherwise I was in for a miserable future if Robert and I weren’t friends. We’d been friends since kindergarten, and we’d seen each other almost every day for the last seventeen years. Robert had practically lived at my house for almost the entirety of our high-school years. If we hadn’t fallen out then, I didn’t think anything could break us. His doubt did make a little bit of sense to me though, because we’d never lived together on our own before without any proper adults with us. Who knows what kind of trouble we’d get into?

You’re right, he nodded, you’d be a mess.

Don’t make me hit you again, I smirked.

No! he flinched away from me, protecting his face with both hands like a little kid. I laughed, and he relaxed a bit, though he was still giving me a wary look. He knew I wouldn’t hit him, but then again, I thought he wouldn’t scare me like he had done before. So, what’s downstairs again? he asked, looking at the staircase.

Have you really forgotten why we moved in here? I asked.

It was a very powerful nap.

Come on then, I said. I had to drag him to his feet, which took a lot because he was heavier than I was. Once he’d gotten up off the box I tugged his shirt so he’d follow me down the staircase. I couldn’t understand how he’d forgotten we were now employed at The Velvet Mansion. He must have been really tired, I’d decided, and his brain had just distracted him from the reason he’d moved out of his parents’ house. I couldn’t blame him really, I would have liked a distraction too.

Are you sure there’s not going to be a dead body down there? he asked, walking slowly behind me.

If there was a dead body, Robert, I wouldn’t have set foot in this flat, let alone moved in.

True, but-,

Robert, just trust me, I looked up at him, you’re going to love it.

2

Post-Magic Stress Disorder

Nav! We’re living above a time machine! Why didn’t you tell me?

It’s not a time machine, I replied, It’s an antiques store.

Oh, like The Velvet Mansion? he said with an absent tone.

My hand reached up to tug at my hair. I only pulled my hair when I was annoyed. I couldn’t believe him. Sometimes I wondered whether I had just made up his intelligence. Of course, Robert was never academically smart, but he was always good at fixing things, no matter how complicated they were. When I saw his face grinning at me, I realised he was only playing. I rolled my eyes at him to show I had realised what he was doing.

I hate you, I muttered.

Nah, Robert replied. He was grinning from ear to ear, his cheeks looking like he had water balloons hidden in them.

I shook my head, my annoyance falling away as I started looking around the antiques store. The Velvet Mansion was the oldest antiques store in Ebonwick. It was beautiful, with curios, objects, and artefacts as old as the Medieval era. Naturally, over the years the store had become a kind of unofficial museum for Ebonwick too. I wanted to look at everything, and so did Robert.

Robert made a