Chapter Eight #2
The man’s expression fell like a curtain. “Yes. A terrible, terrible day. I am at your service, Miss Lockwood.”
The floor behind me squeaked as Foxcourt began to pace. The steps filled the silence like the tick of a looming clock.
While I knew what perfume had likely been used, my curiosity, as usual, got the best of me. “Could you tell me how you believe the King was poisoned? Does he apply his own perfume?”
Vernon’s face turned ashen. “No, that responsibility usually falls to his valets. The fragrance is applied to his clothing,
rather than his skin, as he prefers.”
Responsibility. The divinely appointed ruler of Albion couldn’t even splash a bit of perfume on himself? How had the kingdom survived this
long?
“The clothing is chosen and laid out the night before,” Vernon continued, glancing toward Eleanor and waiting for a nod before divulging more. “I always ensure it has been done before retiring for the evening. A valet named Milton was responsible for the task that evening.”
“And he’s innocent?” I asked.
“Yes,” Foxcourt said firmly. “Everyone with access to the King’s chamber was questioned with the use of one of your grandfather’s
perfumes, Crown of Veracity.”
Vernon’s smile became a grimace.
Finally, I twisted around, leveling Foxcourt with a look of disbelief. “You actually used that god-awful perfume on them?”
Mama had written of her disgust for the perfume in her journal, horrified at witnessing the cruel way it forced the truth
out of its scenters. When asked a direct question, if they dared to withhold the truth, or, worse, lied, the perfume made
it feel as though a crown of burning thorns was piercing their scalp and lodging into their skull.
“Hugh!” Eleanor straightened, her eyes narrowing. “You said it wouldn’t harm them!”
“And it didn’t,” Foxcourt said unrepentantly, “because they told the truth.”
The princess blew out a hard breath. “I do not like to be lied to.”
“I’m aware,” Foxcourt said. “But it was the only way to verify their accounts. They eagerly volunteered to be subjected to
what they believed to be an old fairy perfume to prove their innocence.”
Ah, but of course. The House of Rosebourne’s magic perfumes were not to be revealed to lowly maids and other attendants. They
were only allowed to suffer its ill effects.
Vernon gave a weak noise of agreement, looking as if he might dispute that account.
“When you inspected the clothing the night before the poisoning,” I said, turning my attention back to the poor man, “did
you detect any unusual scents?”
“No,” Vernon began slowly. “Though I’m afraid to say such scents were not wholly unusual—that is . . .” He cast an anxious
glance toward Eleanor.
She held up her hand, gesturing for him to continue. “I appreciate your instinct to protect his privacy, but we are past the
need for it now. Please speak freely.”
Still, he hesitated.
“Was the odor sweet in the way of rotting fruit?” I asked, and felt Foxcourt’s eyes flick to me once more. “Or sweet and sour
as a candied lemon might be?”
Vernon thought for a moment before answering, “Neither.”
“A perfume changes as it’s worn,” I explained. “The top notes disappear first, then the heart notes, and as the hours wear
on, usually only the deeper base notes are present. I’m trying to confirm my suspicion about the perfume, but I caught a mere
hint of what I believe to be the top note.”
Vernon nodded, considering this. “Milton described it as being like the licorice tea his mother drank.”
I sat back at that, trying to recall the odor wafting off the King. There had been a sickly-sweet note like licorice in the air, but it was sometimes difficult to parse from what was merely decay. In
perfume, that licorice note was usually anise—but there was no star anise oil in the poison. Not that I could recall.
Foxcourt inhaled sharply. “You’re sure?”
“Why?” I asked. “Do you recognize it?”
His gaze slid toward me. “Yes. There are several DeForest perfumes that carry a licorice-like scent.”
Until that moment, I hadn’t considered similarities between the old DeForest fragrances and the Rosebourne scents to be anything
other than two rival perfume houses attempting to best each other. But knowing the truth of the DeForests now, it was remarkable
there weren’t more commonalities between their offerings.
These perfumes had been passed down through the descendants of fairies. Many of the formulations likely stretched back thousands
of years in the fairy realm, as shared knowledge. While each family may have perfected or toyed with the original formulations,
both were likely working from a shared trove of scents.
The Rosebourne perfumes always had the barest hint of rose woven into their base, the way a painter would sign their masterpieces.
Perhaps anise was used by the DeForests in the same way.
“And you weren’t affected by the poison?” I asked, my gaze falling to the hands folded in his lap, to his well-manicured fingernails.
“Not at all. I cannot make sense of it,” Vernon said. “I would give anything to change places with him, to have been struck
down by the scent before it had the chance to affect him.”
Sadly, I didn’t doubt that. But Vernon’s life was just as important to me as the King’s. “I believe you.”
“Could such a perfume be tailored to affect only one person?” Eleanor asked.
“Yes, but to do so, you’d need a drop of that person’s blood,” I explained. “Even still, the magic can affect others to a
lesser extent. The only person completely immune to its effects is the perfumer who made it.”
“Really?” Foxcourt asked, intrigued.
“Then it wouldn’t rule out one of the DeForests as the culprit who applied the perfume,” Eleanor said with a swiftness that
impressed me. “But then how would they have gotten inside the palace? How would they have gotten the King’s blood? Only someone
close to him could have managed that.”
“Was he cut while one of his valets shaved him?” Foxcourt asked. “Or perhaps he broke a wineglass?”
“No.” Vernon paused, then straightened. “But he did cut his hand while hunting this past week.”
Eleanor and Foxcourt shared a look.
“What?” I asked, exasperated by the silent communication. Foxcourt only waved an infuriatingly dismissive hand.
“You’re certain you’re all right?” Eleanor asked the valet, her expression tight with worry. “It truly didn’t affect you?”
The older man’s smile returned, his eyes softening. “You are too kind, Your Royal Highness. Yes, I am certain. And if I may
speak freely . . . it is with some regret that the other gentleman who was present that dreadful morning remains hale as well.”
My mind latched on to that statement. Interesting—a rival servant or a hated courtier, perhaps?
“Yes, it’s curious, isn’t it, that he was there at such an hour,” Foxcourt said wryly. “It seems he has been spending more
time at the palace.”
Eleanor’s hands, delicately folded in her lap, tightened around each other.
“The household has taken notice, certainly,” Vernon said, in that light-footed way servants had of dancing around a truth.
“Perhaps it might be useful to you, my lord, if I were to keep you apprised of other such changes, as well as the whispers
one hears.”
Foxcourt was silent for a tense moment. “Yes. That would be quite useful, as I suspect no correspondence from the princess
leaves the palace without being first read.”
Eleanor looked positively gray now, and it played out in her scent: disgust, dread, and fear. I watched her, more alarmed by their implications with each passing moment.
Eleanor may have been the presumptive heir to the throne, but she was still a woman. Royal ladies were hostages to their supposed
good fortune, traded away to foreign courts, or reduced to broodmares, or simply puppeteered by the men around them. Eleanor
was on the cusp of marriageable age. The wolves were no doubt circling.
Finally, I couldn’t take another moment of this cloak-and-dagger nonsense. “Who are we speaking of, exactly?”
“It is not for you to know,” Foxcourt said coldly. “Your focus is to remain on your task.”
If it hadn’t been for Vernon’s presence, I might have picked up the small statue of the dancing fairy on the table before
me and thrown it at his head.
“Yes, of course,” I said acidly. “How foolish to wonder who wished such a slow, painful decline on the King.”
In the silence that followed, I realized my mistake. Foxcourt came around the back of the couch at once, his expression frighteningly
alert. Eleanor was watching me closely, too, looking almost afraid to summon the question now rising in her.
Hell’s tits. I hadn’t meant to tell them that I’d recognized the perfume; the implications were terrible.
“You know more about this poison than you’ve let on, Miss Lockwood,” Foxcourt said. The leather of his gloves creaked as his
fists clenched at his sides.
“You never asked if I recognized it,” I shot back, feeling my own anger rise. “In fact, my thoughts have mattered very little to you in all
of this.”
“That certainly hasn’t stopped you from shamelessly turning the King’s misfortune to your advantage,” Foxcourt scoffed.
I inhaled sharply. This nib had the gall to slap my hand and deride me as grasping when he was the one to have brought me into this?
“Miss Lockwood,” Eleanor began, her fingers knotting in her lap, “you said it would be a slow decline . . . ?”
The hope in her voice cooled whatever heat had been building in my blood. At the edge of my vision, Vernon leaned forward,
eager to hear the answer himself.