Chapter 3
S he scurried into work, head down, thoughts of ginger molasses cookies crowding her brain so much her obsessive thoughts of a god were shoved aside. Isa wasn't in until about 4pm, so she had to do things a little differently. As she prepped the store and handled customers, she worked on packaging, creating the labels she'd use. They were beautiful; a stark gold, red, and green plaid background with a bold black serif font reading: A Ginger Christmas. The candle itself would be white, with flecks of gold glitter and small chunks of dried ginger. The mock-up on her computer was gorgeous, and she hoped the product looked as good.
Lily sold and gift-wrapped, completed paperwork and inventory, and wrote out a formula to test later in the day. She also made new pages for the product on her Etsy, but didn't make them live. Not yet. Not until she had something on hand to sell. Her toes tapped to the bluegrass Christmas music softly piped into her storefront, her mood far better than it had been all season.
When Isa breezed in a few minutes before the official start to her shift, Lily spared her a few words then hurried off to her lab. She'd already printed out a handful of the labels, jars were prepped and ready as they always were, and she had a solid formula in hand. Now she needed to make a prototype to ensure it all blended together as she thought it would and the process would be complete.
Her candle creation lab was in a 10x10 storage room she'd converted. She kept stock in what was supposed to be her office, mainly because the temperature control functioned better in there. The lab could get a little warm, especially in the summertime, so it became where she created. She hated paperwork anyway, so she kept most things rolling on the laptop she used while sitting at her shop counter.
In here, she got to do what she loved. Create. She designed the space as a blank canvas, much like the shop itself. Same white walls and pine floors, but with the addition of waist-high pine tables stacked with ingredients. White shelves, constantly stocked with all the bits and bobs for making candles, took over one wall: the rustic ball jars she loved, specially stamped lids with her logo, wicks and wax, and everything else she might need. Beside it, on a small table, sat her fancy-pants printer where she made her own labels for the candles and printed out shipping labels, postcards, and other paper promo products she occasionally used. She went through ink like a squid when she was busy, and she hoped that printer'd be humming soon enough.
A large table the length of the room, held the products cooling and ready to be put into boxes for inventory or shipping. Perpendicular to it stood a smaller table, about six feet long, where she made her prototypes. She placed it close to the door so she could keep a lookout if need be, but when she locked into creative mode, little could drag her away.
She threw her small floral notebook on the table, tightening her slightly loosened denim apron as she did, but her pretty little book slid down the slick pine and bumped up against a different book. One she'd never seen before. It was old, worn leather. As in ancient leather–more ancient than she'd ever held in her hand. The pages appeared yellowed with age and thicker than modern book pages, as if handmade from pulp. Latin spread across the pages, or what she guessed to be Latin from her limited experience in an anatomy class. A hint here and there of something like really old English also popped out at her. An English so old it wasn’t even from Shakespeare’s time. English old enough only a few words here and there were somewhat recognizable. The cover, however, read all Latin. Bright gilded letters twinkled in the light on the front and spine. The same letters: Liber Desideriorum . She pulled out her phone to see what it meant, and to confirm it was Latin. The name made her stomach flutter. Liber Desideriorum: The Book of Desires .
The oddest thing, though, was the literal shock she felt when she first picked it up. Not like lightning or static or anything, more like a warm, hard pulse of radiant heat. Surprise at the feeling became confusion when the book flipped open in her hand to a page she couldn't read. It looked similar to a recipe from a cookbook or one of her candle formulas.
"Isa!" Lily yelled out, turning the book over in her hands.
"Yep, boss lady," the teen chirped as she stuck her head in the door.
"This yours?"
Isa shook her head in answer. Weirder and weirder. Lily then remembered the basket of wild ginger on her doorstep. The gust of wind that seemed to magically flip the pages. More importantly, she remembered the wind god she’d met the day before and the way his heat radiated deep into her, and felt at ease all of a sudden.
She might've been creeped out by things left on her doorstep or in her shop or knowing a god traipsed through her life. Instead, her gut clenched and her cheeks heated at the idea. She waved Isa off with a muttered "nevermind" when the girl raised perfectly sculpted, dark eyebrows her way then placed the book securely on the small secondary shelf under her table. Lily had work to do, despite the tingles she got thinking about Boreas and his gifts. Pushing her hair back with a headband she kept in her apron, she rolled up her sleeves and started her Christmas candle for the season. Better late than never, as they say.
H er first trial ended up fabulous. No tweaks to the formula needed. That Monday, she stayed late into the night, making two dozen candles before she left. When she did lock the back door and moved to her car, parked mere feet away in her tiny lot, she felt eyes on her. She circled in the chilly winter darkness, looking for who might be out there in the shadows of the night. It didn't feel good, not like the feeling she had when she thought Boreas left her presents. Lily trusted her gut, so she hurried to her car and hopped in, locking her door before she even started it up. Not waiting for the car to warm up, she booked it home, her shoulders tensed as if she could still feel those not-nice eyes on her in the dark.
L ucky for Lily, she forgot about the odd experience as business picked up. By the end of the week, she'd made dozens upon dozens of her new Christmas season candles and sold every one, either in her shop or online. Jed had been loaded down with boxes when he left her shop on Friday afternoon and looked happy about it. Or at least happy for Lily because of it.
She made candles as quickly as she could, even asking Betty to come in for an hour or two here or there to watch the front so she could make more. She'd sell them as soon as they were done. A Ginger Christmas quickly turned into the most successful Christmas candle by a country mile, and she was ecstatic. Only one thing bugged her: her wild ginger store dwindled every day. She might need to go back. To where she met Boreas. Kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. Grab some more ginger and possibly see the god again. The god whose scent and touch called to her back to him like a dull, persistent ache in her belly.