As autumn settles over Valenda, Evangeline tries to move on from the aftermath of the wedding disaster. Apple scents remind her of Jacks and the three kisses she still owes him, but Jacks does not return to claim them. Luc also remains gone, and her father’s curiosity shop stays closed.

Evangeline persuades Agnes to let her work in her father’s hidden bookstore. The job gives Evangeline purpose, but her fame is fading: gossip sheets have repeated the rumor that her kiss turns men to stone, and Kutlass is beginning to forget her. Even so, Evangeline refuses to abandon hope.

Evangeline thinks about her mother, Liana, who came from the Magnificent North and taught her that cursed Northern stories began as true histories. Evangeline especially remembers The Ballad of the Archer and the Fox, an unfinished tale about a fox-girl and the archer cursed to hunt her. Liana’s belief that every story has infinite possible endings shaped Evangeline’s own faith that drinking Jacks’s poison was not the end of her story.

When the bookstore bell rings, Evangeline hopes Luc has returned, but the visitor is Marisol. Marisol, now feared locally as the Cursed Bride, is anxious in public and worries people will think she has cursed the books. Other patrons avoid her, confirming how much the superstition around her has grown.

Marisol gives Evangeline an expensive red invitation, explaining that she wanted to make sure Agnes did not hide it. Evangeline feels guilty because Marisol still does not know the truth about why Evangeline became stone. After Marisol leaves, Evangeline opens the note and discovers that Scarlett Marie Dragna, Empress of the Meridian Empire, has invited her to afternoon tea to discuss an exciting opportunity.