Luc glanced at Élise, a silent conversation passing between them. This was her world, the world of stories, reaching out to pull him in.
“I have an agent,” he said, turning back to Chloé.“Sophie Mercier. All inquiries should go through her.”
“Understood,” Chloé said, handing him her business card.“But I’m glad I caught you. Sometimes, it’s nice for a creator to hear it directly from a reader. It’s a magnificent book.” Her eyes flickered to Élise.“And the dedication… it’s hauntingly beautiful.”
With a final, appreciative glance around the library, Chloé left, the bell jingling softly behind her.
The silence she left was different from the one Camille had poisoned. This silence was electric with possibility.
Luc looked down at the business card in his hand, then at Élise.“A film scout,” he said, disbelief colouring his voice.
“They see it,” Élise said, her own heart soaring.“They see what you built.”
He shook his head, a slow smile spreading across his face.“No. They see what we built.” He tucked the card into his notebook.“I’ll give it to Sophie. Let her handle it.” He reached out and took Élise’s hand, his thumb stroking her knuckles.“But the first person who truly read it, who saw its soul… that was you.”
The unexpected reader had come and gone, a herald from a future that was expanding in thrilling, unimaginable ways. But as they stood together behind the counter, surrounded by the stories that had started it all, the core truth remained unchanged. No matter how far his story traveled, its home, and his, would always be right here.
Chapter 33:
The Dedication Revealed
The buzz Chloé the scout had mentioned was not an exaggeration. A short, glowing article appeared in a prestigious literary magazine, hailing Luc Valois as "a stunning new voice" and Les Oubliettes du Silence as "a work of profound, architectural melancholy." The article mentioned the book was "inspired by and largely written within the historic Bibliothèque Lafleur."
Overnight, the library saw a subtle shift. A new type of patron began to appear—not students or academics, but well-dressed Parisians who would glance around with a curious, almost reverent air, as if visiting a holy site. They would often linger near Luc’s usual table, though he wisely chose a more discreet spot in the archives during this time.
One such woman, clutching the magazine article, approached Élise. "Is it true?" she asked in a hushed tone. "Is this where he wrote it? The dedication... it's to a librarian, isn't it? It's so romantic."
Élise felt a blush creep up her neck. The dedication page, which she had cherished as their most intimate secret, was now being dissected by strangers. "The library inspires many people," she said, her standard, evasive reply.
The woman sighed dreamily. "‘The silence and the song.’I wonder who she is."
Later, when she relayed the conversation to Luc, he frowned. "I didn't think about that. The dedication was for you, not for public consumption."
"It's part of the book now," Élise said, though the exposure made her feel strangely vulnerable. "It's beautiful. Let them wonder."
But the speculation only grew. A culture blog ran a short piece titled "The Muse of the Stacks," playfully theorizing about the identity of the mysterious librarian. Monsieur Deschamps, far from being annoyed, seemed quietly amused by the notoriety.
"It seems our library has its own ghost story now," he remarked to Élise, a twinkle in his eye. "A much more pleasant one than most."
The attention was flattering but unsettling. Their private world was becoming public property. One evening, as they worked in the library after hours, Élise voiced her fear.
"Does it bother you?" she asked, gesturing to the empty space where curious visitors had stood. "That our place is becoming... a landmark?"
Luc put down his pencil and came to sit beside her. "This?" he said, looking around. "This is just the shell. The walls, the shelves. The real place," he took her hand and placed it over his heart, "is in here. And that is a private collection, with access granted only to you."
His words soothed the unease in her soul. The public could have the story, the dedication, the myth. They could never have the quiet reality of his hand in hers, the shared looks across a sunlit room, the key that let her into their silent kingdom.
The dedication was no longer just a line in a book; it was a shield. Let the world see it. Let them be inspired by its romance. They would never truly know the depth of the silence, or the beauty of the song, that it represented. That was theirs, and theirs alone.
Chapter 34:
The Storm of the Past
Just as they had grown accustomed to the new, flattering kind of attention, the past stirred once more, not with a lawyer's letter, but with a headline.
A popular Paris gossip website, known for its salacious takes on the art and literary world, ran a story. The title was brutal: "From Ruins to Bestseller: The Phoenix Story of Luc Valois—And the Partner He Left in the Ashes."
The article recounted the failure of his architectural firm in lurid detail, heavily implying that Luc had abandoned Camille to shoulder the blame and financial ruin while he cavorted with his "mysterious librarian muse" in Saint-Germain. It painted Camille as the wronged, business-savvy partner and Luc as the irresponsible artist, fleeing his problems into a fairy tale.
