Page 34 of A Lady’s Guide to Fae Kings

Her moth flared blue, then red, shimmering as it danced between them. Magic sometimes reacted oddly to strong emotion or to anxiousness. Truthfully, Lachlan ought to count himself lucky she had not set his cravat on fire when he kissed her.

“Are you chortling, Miss Cavendish?” he asked softly.

She sniffed. “Certainly not. Librarians do not chortle, sir.”

She had definitely chortled. But she would set her own tongue on fire before explaining herself.

The kiss was a simple spell, a convenient tracking device. It had meant nothing to Lachlan. And, frankly, it was none of his business what it had meant to her.

He raised an eyebrow. “And did you now just growl at me?”

“Of course not. Must have been the wind.”

“Hmm.”

“Or the goblin who lives under the stairs there. I have heard he does not care for Faery kings.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“See that you do.” She should not feel inappropriately lighthearted just because Lachlan seemed momentarily flummoxed by her.

There was a missing book to find. Dismemberment by the Wild Hunt to elude.

A Fae Labyrinth to solve.

She was rather busy, thank you very much.

Unfortunately, it appeared that every previous Tithe had also been under a binding spell.

There was little useful information to be found on the Labyrinth. There were historical notes on how the Tithes were formalized, how magic bound them, but with no details on the kind of magic, and certainly no helpful annotations regarding a grimoire where such spells might be located. The binding spell that muted her own mentioning of it was clearly not a new phenomenon. From what little she could gather, it was kept secret so that no one could claim an advantage, even if the trials changed every time the Labyrinth was walked. It was, in effect, a treaty of war.

One she had entered into willingly.

It left a hollow ache to look at the statues on their decorated pedestals between the rows of books and know she might never see them again.

“Cavendish.” An aristocratic voice pinched her name like it tasted of rotting fish.

Pippa sighed.

Algernon.

And where he went, Sidney was there. Two unfortunate and unpleasant peas in a pod, drunk on what little power they had as assistant professors and cousins of a titled lord. Pippa kept her expression polite out of long habit. The iron on her cuff burned. She tucked it behind her back and tried not to wince. “I am not on duty.”

She was no longer a Librarian, technically. But she would bite her tongue clean off before admitting any such thing to these two. Even if not having to deal with them was an unexpected benefit of her new predicament. Professor Marwick’s assistants did not think any more of her than he did. And they delighted in showing it.

“Don’t be tedious. Professor Marwick needs the encyclopedic set of magical kelp.”

“I am not on duty,” she said again. “And solstice loans are on hold without a prior request. As per usual.”

“It’s for a professor, you little drab. So just run along and fetch it like a good pet and we won’t write you up.”

“It’s not like you have anything better to do,” Sidney added.

“Shame such a face is wasted on a talentless spinster.”

She gave serious consideration to shoving him into the fountain at the foot of the nearest Muse statue. It was usually sticky with honey offerings. It was not as if she could be reprimanded or released from her duties, after all. It was important to see the positive.

In the end, she did not have to. Lachlan was suddenly there, his shadow edged with frost where it hit the floor.