Aignan let out a loud sigh before straightening. He nudged open a drawer with his snout, just enough to slip in a paw and pull out a small golden key clenched between his teeth.
“The key to his study,” he explained in a muffled voice before dropping it into his paw. “In the library.” He perked his ears, looking pleased. A grin curled his muzzle. “You know why he never bothered warding it? Fairies hate metal. It was his way of keeping that will-o’-the-wisp out. I’d bet my horn there’s a grimoire in there that talks about your precious tree.”
My eyes lit up. “Aignan, you’re a genius!”
“And it only took you all these years to realize it?”
“This place is a nightmare,” Aignan groaned. His eyes slid over the towering shelves sagging with dusty grimoires, stretching endlessly beneath the vaulted ceiling. He swayed. “It would takedays to search everything. And reading isn’t my thing, so you’re on your own with this one.”
I rolled my eyes and brandished the broom I had brought with me. “Enchanted broom, guide me to the book I seek!”
The broom remained stubbornly still.
Aignan snorted, wandering off to sniff at a corner of the library. “You really thought that would work?”
I stared hard at the broom. “I know I haven’t always been… very nice to you, and you probably don’t like me much. But, dear broom, I really need your help. Guide me to the book of the very first confectioner’s tree. Please.”
The broom twitched—barely. Aignan’s ears perked.
“I command you,” I added hastily, clutching the handle tighter.“Arawn made you obey me, and I can’t do this alone. Just this once, please.”
With a reluctant shudder, the broom lifted into the air, darting at dizzying speed through every corner. I gasped in surprise as it carried me up toward the highest shelves.
“Careful!” I cried when it veered too close to a swarm of flying paper birds (knowing Arawn, they were probably deadly to the touch).
Aignan smothered a laugh watching from below, while the broom thrashed like it had a personal grudge. At last, it stopped abruptly before a leather-bound book with green edges, its title shimmering in golden letters:The Legend of the Confectioners.
“Oh, thank you!” I breathed, snatching the book and hugging it to my chest. “Now we can go back down and?—”
Before I could finish, the broom dove sharply and dropped me two meters from the ground. I crashed with a thud, pink hair spilling across my face as I groaned.
The broom collapsed beside me, completely inert.
“That broom really doesn’t like you,” Aignan snickered, giving it a sharp kick—as if he alone had the right to torment me.
I had flipped through what felt like hundreds of pages while Aignan snored softly, sprawled over the broom. With every breath, he nearly blew out the flickering candle beside us. I froze when an image caught my eye: a massive, majestic tree bearing golden apples.
I shook his paw. “Aignan!”
“Did you set something on fire?” he mumbled sleepily, eyes still shut.
“The original confectioners’ tree!” I cried as I quickly skimmed the lines. “It says it fell ill centuries ago and disappeared. The Crèvecoeurs were the guardians of the ancient forest where the fairies lived. A long lineage of the first confectioners… that died out.”
“And?”
My heart pounded as the pieces clicked together. “Maybe that’s why he didn’t die after eating the cursed apple. His heart was strong enough to resist!”
“Miss Lempicka.”
I jerked my head up. Yeun stood in the library’s doorway. His winged cape glowed with a bluish light in the gloom as he stepped toward me.
“And what are you hiding from us now?” Aignan growled, ears pricking, ready to spring.
I thrust the book in front of me, jabbing a finger at the page. “The Spirits… They’re connected to the lake and to Arawn. The lake of everything forgotten, where the original tree rests in the depths. They’ve been showing me visions of him all this time… but the Spirits have no magic, not like the Cursed. It all points tothis: the Spirits are fragments of Arawn. His humanity, his fears, his inner demons!”
I fell silent, breathless. Yeun said nothing. But in his silence, I saw the confirmation I needed.
“And you said you grew up here. In the orchard. Arawn’s family tended the orchard, didn’t they?”
