Page 57 of The Hopeless Romantic’s Guide to Enchantment

So many questions raced through Verda’s mind: were they love letters from his admirers? No, they were all written by Lin – then, was he placating others he thoroughly kissed for a few nights each week? Had he duped her into being part of his ‘stable’ without her knowing? But nothing beat how she thought she would go into cardiac arrest when she spotted a letter addressed to Agreha. Luckily, it was short; her eyes skimmed over it and caught on the signed name at the end: Ordoher, Agreha’s fiancé who owned a perfume shop in town. What was going on here?

That was when Verda thought to test the second of her proposal spells, the one revealing the writer’s thoughts. They would echo in her own mind, but in their voice. She pulled the folded spell from the notebook she carried around with her and activated it.

That’s trite, but I’m not getting paid to improve that.

Paid? So Lin got paid to write this elegantly flourished letter from Ordoher to Agreha?

Maybe I should add that as a service? But on second thought, that feels like a lot more work.

So he was able to afford his furniture by also writing love letters for others? Interesting. Verda was resolved to tease him about it later.

Wonder what the Sun Court would think if they knew that their youngest prince was still alive and moonlighting as a calligrapher of sappy love letters to make a little extra?

What?

“I see you’ve discovered my other profession,” Lin said into Verda’s ear, making her jump. She whirled around and stared at him; clad in just tunic and trousers, ink staining his fingertips, he seemed amused. “Didn’t mean to hide it from you. It just never came up. But I swear I get more fun commissions from wealthier patrons too—”

“You’re a Prince of Quarendell?” Verda blurted.

Lin’s face fell. He spotted the spell in Verda’s hand, tucked behind the letter to Agreha. “Ah. Good to know the spell works.”

“‘Lin’ is short for ‘Lindrion,’” Verda said slowly, recalling a bit of news she’d heard. She backed up two steps. “You’re the prince who left Quarendell during their succession war and went down with a ship during a storm.”

She couldn’t say she was too surprised. The first time she ever saw Lin, during a morning jog on the beach two years ago, he was just a body lying face-down on the sandy shore among broken planks and other bits of debris, clothed only in the torn and sopping remains of a tunic and trousers. No shoes, no identification, no nothing. Even then, she’d thought him exceedingly handsome – too much so to be an ordinary person – and she’d wondered what genre of tale she’d unwittingly walked into: an adventure or a romance. Either way, a distraction. She’d decided then and there that in her quest to become Head Librarian, she had time for neither. And so, while she’d pumped seawater from his chest and lungs and ran away to notify the Library’s Health Office, she’d been putting distance between them ever since.

“All right, it’s true,” Lin admitted with a sigh, scratching the back of his head. “Was true, anyhow. I told my brothers I didn’t want the throne, but I don’t think they believed it even after I left. It’s better that they think I’m dead.”

“And were you ever planning on telling me?” Verda asked.

“One of these days, I was. But you know, I’m not the only one hiding something here,” Lin said, stepping close to her.

“What do you mean?”

“Tell me the truth,” he all but pleaded, hands on her shoulders. “You’re the one who saved me, aren’t you?”

Her eyes widened. “How do you know that?”

“First thing I saw when I woke up on the beach was all this silvery hair. And then golden eyes. They belonged to the coldest, most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. I thought it would be all right if I died then, if death was as lovely as you.” Lin said it all so simply, so unflinchingly, that Verda felt spellbound. The tale she’d been avoiding could not be avoided for much longer. “I’ve loved you ever since.”

Verda scrutinized him, thought back on all their time together, evaluating whether Lin was truly a distraction from her goal. She decided she didn’t care. ‘Distraction’ wasn’t what you called someone you loved.

“Good,” she said, her voice coming out hoarse. She threw her arms around him and buried her face in his chest. “It would be awkward if I were the only one.”

* * *

Verda thought waiting for Lin to bring the golem was the hardest part. It made her tap her foot and bite her thumb in agitation as she stood in her hiding spot behind some shelves that placed her directly to the right of and behind the spell circle she’d drawn.

Then she thought the hardest part was hearing Lin burst into the room and sprint past the circle – with an interval of the golem thudding in, its beam zapping the floor – then skid around to face the creature.

But the actual hardest part was when he glanced directly at her, the side of his face illuminated by the charging crystal, and over the loud, escalating whir of the sentinel golem mouthed, “It’ll be all right.”

She wouldn’t get to him in time, and they had no Plan B.

Suddenly, the whirring sputtered, croaked out of rhythm and died. Lin’s face was still lit by the crystal, although its light had dimmed.

Verda emerged from her hiding place, taking with her the closest three-tiered stepstool. The golem stood perfectly still at the center of her spell circle. It looked like it could attack at any moment. She positioned the stepstool between its ginormous iron feet and climbed to the top.

In Aarakese, the word for breath was ‘yui.’ Written as ‘yuinen,’ it meant life. Inside the golem’s mouth was a deeper depression where a palm-sized slab of red granite – the ‘tongue’ – bearing the word ‘yuinen’ had been inserted. In the future, as Head Librarian, she would come to appreciate the make of it and order the replication of these golems for Library defense purposes. But right now, as a mere senior librarian, its face unnerved her.