23. Rosalina
23
Rosalina
W ith staggering steps, I enter the library and my heart takes flight. I spin in a circle, wanting to absorb everything. “It’s magnificent,” I breathe.
The castle’s library is filled with autumnal wonder. Trees grow inside, ablaze in reds and oranges and yellows, the leaves falling in gentle cascades to the ground. Some trunks merge into high shelves, filled with row upon row of books.
It’s the biggest library I’ve ever seen in my entire life. There are more books than my boss Richard could fucking imagine.
I let out a squeal and rush forward to stand beneath one of the stacks. There’s a ladder—a ladder!—needed to get to the very top. And it’s even got wheels. I am so going to be using that.
“Do you like it?” Farron asks sheepishly.
“I love it.” It’s not just the mere size of the library, but it’s opulence. The leaves rustle in the breeze as light gleams through stained-glass windows, and I can imagine how cozy it would be during a storm, hearing the rain pound against the glass. Murals decorate the walls, depicting each of the four seasons: a flower-strewn meadow filled with does and fawns, a raging ocean hitting a sandy coast, an autumn floor covered in red leaves, and a frozen lake lit by moonlight. Couches and armchairs surround a huge fireplace, and there are tables and chairs throughout.
And the books themselves… The spines are beautifully colored, from the lightest pastels to the richest royals. The lettering is exquisite, some in gold leaf, others in silver that shimmer like starlight.
The only distraction from the library’s beauty are the bundles of purple thorn bushes snaking up the stacks, creeping along the barriers, wrapping around the fall trees, and bursting through the bookshelves.
Farron stands in the middle of it all, a sweet smile upon his handsome face.
I can’t make sense of it. The few times I saw him with the other princes, he seemed cowed by their presence. Even now, there’s something a bit awkward about him. In an endearing way. How do I reconcile this man with the monster from the other night? And even if I can’t… He’s still a fae prince.
He’s still imprisoning me.
But I’m going to need his help if I have any chance of breaking the curse.
“You do much reading where you’re from?” he asks.
“I basically live in books.” My finger trails down a gold-lettered spine. “I work in a bookstore, but it’s like a fraction of the size of this place.” Turning to him, a mischievous grin appears on my face. “Hey, are there any romance books here?”
He laughs and tugs on my hand. My face heats as his warm fingers lace with mine. The floor is covered in a blanket of leaves that crunch beneath our feet as we walk. He pulls me around one of the book stacks then reaches up to grab something above us. His shirt lifts as he does so, revealing a toned stomach and a trickle of warm brown hair dipping below his pant line. A jolt of electricity runs through me.
He pulls the book down, revealing a gorgeous light blue tome. “The fae love legends of romance,” he says, and his voice is breathy. “This one is about a princess from the Spring Realm who was betrothed to a prince of Autumn.” He leans down, shoulder-to-shoulder with me so I can see the pages as he flips through. Rich notes of aged paper and ink, and a hint of orange and cinnamon linger in the air, along with the faint musk of the old book. The art is breathtaking, like an otherworldly Mucha piece. “But right before her wedding, she left the castle to ride her horse by the riverbank and came upon a carpenter who lived deep in the woods. In that moment, her mate bond awoke in her chest.”
“Her mate bond?” I repeat breathlessly.
“I don’t believe they occur in the human realm,” he says, looking at me through his dark lashes. I shake my head no. His brow creases and he looks upward, as if trying to figure out how to describe how to breathe. “A mate bond is very rare and sacred. It’s said to be the calling out of your soul for another; the melding of hearts; the quintessence of life itself.”
Farron stares at me intensely and raises a hand to my mouth. His fingers tremble over my bottom lip, down my chin, and along the curve of my throat. He lays a hand flat on my chest, cresting over the mounds of my breasts, pushed up from the tightly laced dress. I wonder if he can feel the pounding of my heart.
“It’s said you feel the mate bond here,” he murmurs, his voice husky. “Like a second heart.”
“So she lived happily ever after with her carpenter?” I whisper, if only to distract myself from Farron’s hand upon me, his warm palm rising and falling with my rapid breaths.
“Hmm?” Farron quickly pulls back and clears his throat.
“The fae princess?”
“Oh, yes. No. She didn’t live happily ever after.” He slams the book shut. “When her betrothed discovered she’d been mate-bound, he killed the carpenter in a fit of jealousy. The princess then killed her betrothed and took his throne for herself.”
“Not exactly your classic fairytale ending,” I say. Goosebumps bloom on my body where his hand had been.
He gives a sheepish smile. “No, certainly not.”
“So, Prince Farron, where do we start?”
“Just Farron, please.” He pulls me back into the main foyer of the library. “I’m not much of a prince these days. Hard to rule your realm when you turn into a slobbering beast each night.”
“You’re from the Autumn Realm, right? Isn’t there an Autumn King or Queen or someone to rule?”
He grabs a book off a shelf and hands it to me, then leaps up the ladder and throws me down two more. “It’s not like that. All four realms—Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter—are part of the Enchanted Vale. And the Enchanted Vale was ruled by a queen who lived in this very castle. She anointed four High Rulers for each of her realms. The queen disappeared five hundred years ago, though.”
I struggle to keep up with the heavy load of books Farron keeps piling into my arms. “So you’ve been ruling the Autumn Realm for five hundred years?”
He laughs. “No. There’s been many different rulers throughout the years. My mother was High Princess, but she’d had enough. She passed the title—and the magic that comes with it—down to me as her eldest child.”
Ezryn had also said he’d inherited the blessing of Spring from his mother. Did that mean Dayton and Keldarion received blessings from one of their parents, as well?
With a sigh of relief, I heave the books onto an oak table and collapse in a chair. “Okay, faerie politics are crazy. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that there’s like this whole alternate dimension literally sitting in the forest outside of my home.”
Farron smiles at me, his expression almost boyish. “Trust me, it’s better that our world is kept a secret from yours. The magic in our realms…” He looks down and runs a tongue along his bottom lip. “Let’s say it’s safer for humans that we keep our distance. As you well know.”
“Not that Keldarion cares about humans.” I blow a curl away from my face. “I have no idea what he wants from me. Why he won’t let me go.”
Farron scoots a chair up right beside me and grabs my hands. I straighten, surprised by the intensity on his face. “Listen, Rosalina. When we were first cursed twenty-five years ago, there was some hope at the beginning that we could break it. That we could return to normal. But as the years past, the other princes… They’ve lost hope. And none so much as Kel. But maybe, just maybe…” His eyes sparkle. “A little human interference is the kick he needs in his stubborn ass.”
“Well, if it means being free of him, I’m all for it.” I walk over to a thatch of thorns creeping along a windowsill. “These are part of the curse too, I imagine?”
“Actually, no.” Farron comes up behind me, his warm breath caressing my neck. “These are a gift from Caspian. The Prince of Thorns.”
The Prince of Thorns. Ezryn had accused me of being his spy when we first met. “Everyone seems so afraid of him.” Or in Marigold’s case… horny and afraid. “Who is this guy anyway?”
Farron shakes his head. “A villain from the Realm Below. The curse not only traps us in beast form every night, it weakens our magic. Caspian has used it as an opportunity to spread his dark evil with these thorns.” Farron gestures around the library. “They take over everything, sapping Castletree of her magic. Our home is more special than you could possibly imagine. It’s her magic that gives strength and vitality to the four realms. Caspian would see our lands become barren with briars and covered in shadow.”
Wow. No wonder Ezryn was so upset when he thought I was a spy.
I turn away and march back to the book stack. “Okay, well, we can only deal with what we can control. Once the curse is broken, you guys will have your full magic back and you can kick this Prince of Thorns’ thorny ass.”
Farron gives a lopsided smirk. “I like your style.”
“Give me more details. What have you tried to break the curse?” I pull my hair back, ready to focus.
“What could we do? We are monsters.” Farron’s eyes stare distantly at the ceiling. “Especially in the first years. Back then, even the others had no mastery of the beast. We stayed in the castle. Ran free in the wilds of the Briar at night. At least then, the only beings we hurt were the goblins.”
“Surely you guys have tried to find your mates.”
“Dayton, Ez, and I did, in what ways we could. We each assigned our realms vassals to watch over while we’re trapped here. No one knows about this curse except for those in the castle. Everyone else thinks we’re here trying to stop the thorns.” Farron closes his eyes. “My parents are ruling the Autumn Realm right now. As the blessing of Autumn has already passed to me, it’s a grueling job. It’s difficult lying to them. But if they knew the truth…”
I reach out and grab his hand. “We’ll figure this out, Farron. I promise.”
He tucks a curl behind my ear. “I hope so. For all our sakes.”