Page 55 of Must Love Scones and Secrets
And with that, the fairies departed.
Elder Thornberry smiled widely at me. “Prince Bjorn of Frostfjord in our humble hollow! What an honor. Prince, had I known your true identity?—”
“Please,” I said, finding my voice at last. “That’s not… I didn’t come here as a prince. I just came to help the unicorns.”
But it was too late. The damage was done.
“I think I need to rest,” Rosalyn said suddenly, her voice unnaturally even. “That took more out of me than I expected,” she said with a forced laugh, then turned to Kellen. “Thank you for your guidance. And to you, Elder Thornberry, for your wisdom.” She nodded politely to each of them. Finally, she looked at me. Her eyes shone with unshed tears, but her chin was held high. “Goodbye, Your Highness,” she said, the formality a wall between us.
Before I could respond, she gathered Merry in his basket and took to the air, her wings carrying her swiftly away from the clearing.
“Oh my,” Elder Thornberry said, looking between me and Rosalyn’s retreating form. “Did I say something?”
Kellen placed a hand on the elder’s shoulder. “Perhaps we should give Bjorn a moment,” he suggested tactfully.
Alone in the clearing save for Smoke, I sank to my knees beside the Thread Stone. The runes on my skin still glowed faintly, though the intensity had faded with the ritual’s completion.
One fairy that had dawdled at the back of the group, studying a flower the Ley line magic had caused to bloom, paused and looked back at me. Her brow furrowing, she joined me, hovering in front of me.
“Thou hast done most admirably, Charmed Prince,” she said, studying me with eyes ancient as starlight. “And yet, methinks thy heart is now as tangled as the Ley lines once were.”
“Can you fix it?” I asked, only half in jest.
She shook her tiny head. “Some magicks lie beyond even our ken. The heart’s path must be walked by its bearer alone. Yet, as with the Ley lines, ’tis courage that begins the mending,” she said, laying a delicate hand on my shoulder. “Our deepest gratitude is thine. The balance is restored. Now go and restore thine own world.”
She gave me a crooked smile and then disappeared, leaving me with my thoughts and regrets.
Smoke nudged my hand with his nose, whining softly.
“I know, boy,” I said, scratching behind his ears. “I’ve made a mess of things.” I looked in the direction Rosalyn had flown. “But maybe it’s better this way. A clean break.”
Yet even as I said the words, I knew they weren’t true. Nothing about it felt right.
The Ley lines might’ve been fixed, but the connection that mattered most to me was more broken than ever.
And I had no one to blame but myself.
CHAPTER 17
ROSALYN
Islammed another ball of dough onto my flour-dusted counter with perhaps more force than necessary. The kitchen was hot, even with the door open to the cool evening air. I’d flown straight back from the Whispering Woods and immediately started baking, my favorite way of coping with emotional turmoil. The Sconery was filled with the scent of my Forget Me scones, a recipe I’d created for customers suffering from heartache.
“Stupid royal runes,” I muttered, pounding the dough with my fist. “Stupid prince. Stupid me for not realizing the absurdly handsome man with perfect manners might possibly be more than a unicorn expert.”
Merry watched from his perch on top of the flour canister, his tail swishing back and forth, sending up little clouds of white with each movement.
“Don’t judge me,” I told him. “You didn’t figure it out either.”
He meowed in what sounded suspiciously like disagreement.
“Oh, so now you’re claiming you knew all along? Funny, I don’t recall you warning me before I made a fool of myself.”
The recipe had taken me months to perfect. A pinch of ground starshade petals collected during a waning moon fordulling painful memories, crushed strawberry blossom crystal for sweetening bitter thoughts, and just a hint of silverleaf dust for bringing clarity. They wouldn’t make anyone truly forget, of course. That kind of magic was both dangerous and dishonest. But they eased the sharp edges of heartbreak, making the pain more bearable until time could do its work.
“Maybe I need to eat the entire batch myself,” I said, violently shaping the dough. “One for every minute I spent thinking about his lips, one for every time I imagined our future together, and at least three for that night in the cabin that I am definitely not thinking about right now.”
I sighed.
