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right. It was getting to that point where it was starting to curl over the tops of my ears and I looked like I was twelve years old.
    “I’ll have it buzzed before I come back down,” I assured them. “Gotta look my best, you know? Speaking of, I need to go crash for a few hours because I am pretty sure I look like death.”
    They both got this gleam in their eyes at the same time and I knew I was about to get a face full of sass. “Oh, that’s right ,” Mom said with an evil smile. “There’s that thing tonight.”
    “For the knights ,” Dad said. “For a specific knight.”
    “I am going to ask that the King grant me a secession from your parentage,” I warned them both. “He will say yes because he thinks I’m wicked awesome and I’m the future King’s Wizard. And then I will curse you both so hard. You’ll have extra fingers. Coming out of your faces.”
    “Make sure you wear that red tunic tonight,” Mom said, ignoring me completely. “It brings out your eyes and skin so well. And those tailored black pants. Shine your boots.”
    “And don’t buzz your hair totally,” Dad said. “Leave some length. Makes you look more distinguished.”
    “For the feast,” I said, because I refused to believe my parents were attempting to pimp me out.
    “Yes,” they both said, “for the feast.” Totally pimping.
    “So many curses,” I mumbled. I hugged them both and promised I’d see them later that night. I turned and headed back into the castle, wondering if I’d have enough time to grab something to eat, but deciding against it in favor of sleep.
    So there I was: looking like crap with what I’m sure were large bags under my eyes and dirt smearing my face. Grumbling to myself about parents and Morgan and best friends who got snarky and murdered evil wizards to protect me. Yawning so wide that my jaw cracked.
    Of course, since I was looking my absolute worst and talking to myself like a crazy person, I ran into the one person I didn’t want to run into. Ever. Well, that’s a lie. I totally wanted to run into him while I looked absolutely amazing and he’d say something like “Hey, Sam, I have this extraordinary fascination with your equipment. Let’s go somewhere and I’ll show you what it feels like to have your balls worshipped.”
    But there was no sexy running-into. There was a flail of limbs and a questionably manly squawk as my face collided with a chest undoubtedly built from pieces of my dreams, and a surprised grunt that fell from lips that angels themselves must have had a hand in creating.
    Knight Ryan Foxheart. Soon to be Knight Commander Ryan Foxheart. The dreamiest dream to have ever been dreamed. The current holder of all my masturbatory fantasies. (“Oh, who’s a bad knight? You’re a bad knight. You’ve been so bad that I’m going to joust with your butthole.”)
    He said in a surprised voice, “Sam.”
    So I said, “Meep,” because apparently Knight Delicious Face knew my name and any and all command of the Veranian language was gone at such an impossible thought. It made me have feelings . Massive, throbbing feelings .
    “You okay?” he asked, sounding worried, and I thought that maybe if he had one flaw, it was that his voice wasn’t as deep as what someone of his size and stature should have. But then I remembered that it was the most perfect voice I’d ever heard, and he was always so soft and quiet that it didn’t matter to me in the slightest.
    And, of course, that’s when I realized my face was still pressed against his chest because he was a single step above where I stood and that he smelled amazing , like sweat and metal and horses and hay and grass and leaves and fires, and I really needed to stop doing that before we had an inappropriate situation on our hands. So, in a move graced with pitch-perfect dignity, I pulled back sharply, slipped on the stairs, and fell onto the stone ground, knocking my head a bit. Because my life couldn’t get any more