The Golden Solution: The Salon of Enchanted Beauty, #5

By Anna Mittower

Philliya can't help being curious when the shop across from hers acquires a delightful new tenant. The new arrival brightens the street with her flowers, but then a serious "pest" problem arrives in the form of a rich stalker with nefarious intentions and his lackeys who begin to infest the neighborhood, driving off all her customers.

 

The stalker is determined to make the flower seller his, and it's up to Philliya to save her neighbor and the neighborhood from his grasp. Can she do it before both their shops go bankrupt and without being arrested?

This cozy fantasy book is a pint sized short read crafted with care for a single session of reading. The books in this series may be read as standalones.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Quills & Quasars
• Release date: Sep 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9781960598059

Book preview

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Part One

Philliya Wridall flinched, hand paused over cauldron, as a resounding crash sounded nearby. She put the ingredient bottle down, and peered through her shop window to see if she could pinpoint the source. 

Ah, of course. She rolled her eyes. 

The source of the noise turned out to be a fallen flower pot across the road. The person from whom the pot had escaped waved at Philliya and began, face as red as the now homeless flower, to retrieve the pieces of the pot and the poor flower itself. The woman was a new face on the street. The shop directly across from Philliya’s had been empty ever since she’d moved in, but last week it had begun filling with activity. The woman had moved in her belongings and dozens of plants and pots, producing quite the amount of noise including several crashes due to pots breaking.

Philliya waved back, though the woman wasn’t actually looking in her direction. Probably too embarrassed. 

Wyndolin, her wind elemental companion, slipped out through the crack under the door and followed the woman into her shop. The elemental had taken quite the interest in teasing the poor woman as she tried to set up her shop. However, after a very strict lecture, it did stay away from actually breaking anything. The broken pots weren’t its fault. Philliya shook her head and returned to potion brewing. 

This particular batch would be used to make a remedy for a mother who lived two streets away. Her son had survived a terrible illness and, though the healers saved his life, his skin was still marred by pocks and scabs from all the times he had scratched himself till he bled. His mother had commissioned Philliya to create a particularly finicky to brew cure for restoring his skin. Therefore, she didn’t have time to fuss about her new neighbor’s proclivity towards pot smashing.

Wyndolin, or Wyn for short as she could sometimes get away with, eventually returned just as she was putting the stopper into the bottle. 

Did you have fun?

Wyn bounced like a ball around the shop.

And you didn’t cause any trouble?

It shivered in place, blowing itself up with self-importance and outrage at the accusation. 

Alright, alright. As long as you aren’t causing trouble, Wyndolin. She guessed it wasn’t in the mood for its nickname today. She’d been lucky to even figure out a name that it liked in the first place.

I’m off to deliver the potion. You can stay here or come with me. 

It deflated and hovered over her right shoulder. 

Philliya exited her shop and locked it up. The neighbor was actually outside of her shop once more, setting up small tables to display her plants. She met Philliya’s eyes, blushed, and bobbled before dashing inside.

However is she going to attract customers acting like that? But she muttered it very quietly under her breath.

From the looks of it, her neighbor was attempting to set up a flower shop. The usual location for those were on streets with far heavier traffic, but maybe she, like Philliya herself, was broke and needed a cheap place to begin. Thankfully, Philliya was past the days of living commission to commission. She wasn’t rich, but there was always a little extra