Page 86 of The Hopeless Romantic’s Guide to Enchantment

Leanna winked at him and several more veins appeared. “My good sir— Zack.” She almost choked on the word but smoothed it out by clearing her throat, not unreasonable when there was a knife to it. “I have the means to pay my debt.” Holding up a single white rose, the stem was ripped from her hands before she was unceremoniously tossed aside, Edward catching her before she could hit the dirt. “Where are the other ones?” he whispered in her ear and she responded by elbowing him hard.

“Well well well. Where did you get this?” Zack grinned and rolled the stem between his fingers. “A shame. I had such plans for you.” The words sent a shiver through her but she wouldn’t let herself be cowed.

Her body moved in front of Edward to stop him from advancing to kill Zack and spoil her moment. “A shame indeed that you’re walking away with only one white rose, when you could walk away with several.”

She could feel Edward’s eyes burning into the side of her face, but she didn’t dare break her concentration, or compromise her plan.

Zack narrowed his gaze, looming over her. “What do you mean?”

“There’s a whole grove of them just in there.” Leanna picked at her nails as she said it, shrugging innocently. “I’m shocked no one has claimed them yet. You only need take a few steps into the dark wood to get to it.”

The greed in Zack’s expression glittered as he gripped the white rose and stalked for the wood at full speed.

“What are you doing?” Edward whispered, though Zack was well out of earshot now, disap pearing behind the trees.

“One last prank.” She smirked, pulling the rest of the white roses from beneath her skirt and Edward barked out a laugh, tugging her closer. She put her hands around his neck, smiling, feeling joy of the highest order. “These flowers work, I think. I’m so happy.”

“White roses don’t cause joy.” Edward smiled. “They help to light things up with candle wax.”

“Oh.” She responded quizzically, looking the flowers over before glancing at Edward. “Then… This is all us?” It was evidence that what Edward’s mother had said was true: people saw what they wanted to. Real or not. But this, with him, was real.

Edward picked one up and spun her around as she laughed. “It’s all us!” he said with the joy they’d found together in their childhood. And would have for the rest of their years.

“What shall we do with the leftover roses?”

Smiling, Leanna handed one to him, dragging Edward by both hands back to their world. “I know two homes at the end of the drive that deserve some happy memories. Perhaps we plant them there and start something new, and honest.”

Edward’s grin melted her as he leaned down to capture her lips, tilting his forehead against hers. “I believe, my love, we already have.”

THE END

THE LAST TRAIN

FROM FAERIE

By

OLIVIA ATWATER

It was five minutes to midnight on the Whitland station platform. No reasonable human being ought to have been out and about at that hour – let alone the two people who currently waited there, peering down the tracks with anxious curiosity.

Isaac hefted the lantern in his right hand, casting its flickering light across the platform. The lantern’s illumination revealed glimmers of gold in the highlights of his curly brown hair and settled dramatic shadows into the wrinkles of his coat. He frowned uneasily, staring uselessly into the darkness.

“We could still turn back,” Isaac said, sighing heavily. “Really, you needn’t do this, Em. It was a foolish whim that got him into this mess. Let him suffer the consequences.”

Emma offered her brother a stern look of reproval. “I know you don’t mean that, Isaac,” she said. “You are worried about me – I understand that. But if it were my whim and my consequences, you would have sent him after me in a heartbeat.”

Isaac glanced away from her. His expression had grown progressively darker and gloomier with every minute closer to midnight. “Simon is a good friend,” he admitted. “I care for him very much. But you’re my sister, Em, and I care for you even more. You are family, and he… well, he isn’t.”

Emma forced a laugh. “You had better hope he’s family,” she replied, more nervously than she had intended. “All of this might become terribly sticky, otherwise.” She pulled her dark green travelling cloak more tightly about herself, in order to ward off the evening chill. “Now – one more time, Isaac. What are you to do with my hair?”

Isaac grimaced as though he’d bitten into a lemon – but his hand strayed subconsciously to the pocket of his coat, where he’d tucked away a small envelope containing a lock of Emma’s own curly brown hair. “Lock it away in an iron-bound chest with an iron key,” he recited. “I’m not to take it out for any reason whatsoever until you’ve safely returned.”

Emma nodded at him. “And if I do return?” she prompted him. “What if I ask you to unlock the chest for me, Isaac?”

Her brother rubbed at his face with his free hand, already weary-looking. “I’m to hand you the key and ask you to unlock it for yourself,” he said. “An imposter will burn her hand, or refuse the key entirely.”

Emma smiled at him fondly. “You have been listening,” she said. “And here I thought you couldn’t stand all of this dangerous faerie nonsense.”