Chapter 3 #2
“Agreed!” her curly-haired companion exclaims. “I wished he was cooking me dinner!” They share a cackling laugh. “What did you think of his reaction when she revealed that she was with child?”
The woman’s response is lost as I enter a nondescript shop. A silver bell chimes, and the wooden floors gleam in the autumn sun. I breathe in deeply. Lemon, a sharp itch against my nostrils, paired with the mellow fragrance of tarragon. “Good morning, Master Alain.”
“Ah, Min! I was wondering when you’d arrive.” A beefy, brown-skinned man wearing a loose, linen shirt rounds the back counter. Walls of shelving showcase an impressive array of herbs, from the common and familiar to the rare and unique. “The usual?” he asks, accepting my list.
“Not quite,” I say with a tense smile.
He frowns at her ladyship’s penmanship. “Vanishing night?”
“That won’t be a problem, will it?”
“No, but it is an unusual request. Difficult to acquire.” He taps the list against his palm thoughtfully. “Not to worry. I have connections in Under. Occasionally, we get a few fair folk passing through, asking for it. Drifters, usually. See them once and never again.”
Yes, because Lady Clarisse tosses any and all immortals into the cells below the estate. Currently, she has two fair folk imprisoned. There was a third, but after several weeks, the poor soul expired, unable to withstand the prolonged suffering.
After placing my basket on the counter, I browse the offerings while Master Alain gathers my supplies.
Though I work for Lady Clarisse, I’ve known his lordship since I was a young girl.
He and Nan were close friends, having met shortly after my grandmother arrived at St. Laurent from Jinsan, her homeland.
It is then that a curious plant draws my eye: dusky petals, velvet to the touch.
“Black iris.”
I snatch my hand away. “Pardon?”
“The plant you’re touching.” He tugs at his beard. It is spectacularly red. “It’s called black iris. Comes all the way from Ammara.”
“I see.” I’ve heard of Ammara. Realm of sand and sun. “What are its properties?”
“Well, many like to crush the roots, as it is a diuretic if mixed with Ammaran salt. Others prefer to dry the leaves and use them to scent their linens. The petals haven’t much of a taste.” He removes a small envelope from beneath the counter and slips it into my basket.
Interesting. I will see what further research I can uncover on this specimen.
I pay for the items and grab my basket. “Good day to you, sir.”
“And to you, Min.”
As I reach the door, my hand tightens around the knob. Easy—too easy, perhaps—to step beyond the shop, return to the estate, brew the next poison, remain silent as the dead. But the hole into which my dismay floods yawns wider. Something is not right.
Turning, I say to him, “Vanishing night.” I hold up the small envelope. “May I ask what its properties are?”
He studies me a moment, suddenly guarded. “That depends on what ingredients you’re brewing it with.”
“Silk violet, liquid amber, hair of a banshee, tears of a pregnant mortal in her second trimester.”
He frowns, pondering this information. I shift uncomfortably in place. “Sounds to me like a poison to drain a body of strength.”
I blink at him. “Come again?”
“When the liquid is consumed,” Master Alain explains, “it will move through the bloodstream like threads with small hooks, which attach to the victim’s arteries and veins, siphoning all nutrients from the muscles and flesh.”
I am struck mute with horror. Her ladyship’s cruelty is a staple in my life. Artistic ingenuity, she calls it. Why do I continually underestimate her? “But the strength will return, won’t it?”
“Yes, but it may be days before that occurs.”
So Lady Clarisse intends to drain the prisoner of strength, thus removing the last barrier—his will—barring her from the location of his ax. The man—god—will survive, but only long enough for her to bury that god-touched weapon in his chest.
“Good day to you,” I say, then depart the shop swiftly, my basket of supplies banging against the side of my leg.
“My lady?” After wiping the dirt from my loafers, I enter the workshop. The door leading to the basement stands open a crack. A pained shriek splinters from the obscured depths below, and I flinch. Nothing I can do. Not unless I, too, wish to be confined belowground.
As I do every week, I remove the ingredients from my basket and line them across one of the battered work tables. Our Lady of Mercy simmers in a pot on the stove. It reeks of spoiled meat. Once vanishing night is added, the poison requires another ten days to steep.
I fiddle with the powder-filled envelope uneasily.
This is not how Nan conducted business. Her teas promoted healing.
They never inflicted pain or granted one person power over another.
Some nights, when I am feeling particularly daring, I consider the possibility of resuming her legacy: bringing healing back to St. Laurent.
And so I wonder. Might I obtain the information Lady Clarisse seeks without forcing a poison down the deity’s throat?
What makes you think you have the authority to question my work?
My hand trembles. The envelope slips from my grasp. It hits the table, and powder clouds the air, the floor, the front of my apron. I snatch the envelope, peer inside. Less than a teaspoon remains.
Dread. Dread like nothing I have ever known hardens my stomach to stone. Her ladyship will kill me. I know this as a truth of the world, like the easterly sunrise, the flow of water downstream.
Tiptoeing toward the basement door, I press my ear to the crack. A dull roar floods my eardrums, my heartbeat a cacophonous thump, thump, thump.
“Again,” Lady Clarisse snarls. Crack! A weakened cry crumbles, petering out beneath the hiss of the simmering brew. I recoil, nausea ringing my throat. I’m sweating so profusely the envelope wilts in my dampened palm.
Seconds later, the creak of wood pricks at my awareness. Footsteps, ascending the stairs.
Move, Min! She can’t learn of my mistake.
My body lurches into motion. Two steps, and I reach the open window, nearly dropping the envelope in my haste to empty the remaining powder onto the overgrown hedges. A gentle wind wipes all evidence away.
Envelope clutched in hand, I spring toward the supply cabinet and select a powder of summer thyme, a harmless ingredient similar in color to vanishing night.
I add five tablespoons to the empty envelope—the amount required for the draught—and shut the cabinet door seconds before Lady Clarisse stomps into the kitchen, her boots marking bloody prints on the scuffed floorboards.
“Oh.” She blinks. “You’re back.” After peeling the soiled apron from her front, she tosses the garment into a basket in the corner before washing her hands in the washbasin. “I trust Master Alain had everything in stock?”
With her back to me, I’m able to slip the envelope amongst the ingredients unnoticed. “He d-did.” Breathe. Just breathe. “I… didn’t w-want to disturb you.”
My employer ignores me as she stirs Our Lady of Mercy, wisps of steam rising to moisten her pale face. As though sensing my attention, she glances toward me in irritation. “Well? Don’t just stand there. Fetch me a glass.”
As she dumps the envelope’s contents into the pot, I retrieve a copper mug from the cupboard, accidentally hitting a stack of plates in my haste to comply. The sharp clatter causes her head to whip in my direction. Her dark eyes promise pain, always pain.
“S-sorry,” I whisper.
“Hurry up,” she snaps.
I place the mug on the table, and she ladles the poisoned tea into the hammered metal. A drop of liquid slides free of the rim.
“I th-thought the tea needed an extra ten d-days to steep?” I ask tentatively.
“Our Lady of Mercy requires ten days to reach full strength, but I need to test a sample, make sure everything is in working order.”
My hands fist behind my back, fingernails cutting deep into my palms. She will force the substance down the prisoner’s throat. With his wrists shackled, his ankles, he will be helpless to escape. Not that it will matter. She will soon learn the poison is defective. “My lady—”
She brushes past me, and the swish of her dress vanishes up the stairwell leading to the northern tower. My knees wobble. I collapse onto a chair and wait, heart in throat, for the sword to fall.
A furious shriek heralds doom. I lurch to my feet as her ladyship stomps downstairs. Should I flee? No, that would surely mark me as guilty.
Catching my arm, she yanks me up the stairs with impossible strength. When we reach the cell door, she flings me onto the ground.
“It didn’t work,” she snarls. “Tell me why the poison didn’t work.”
I scramble onto my back. “I d-d-don’t know, I—”
“What do you mean you don’t know? You informed me Master Alain had all the ingredients. Did you lie?”
My mind is a frozen wasteland. Nothing roots. All I know is this: she cannot learn that I replaced vanishing night with a completely different substance. “N-no! Perhaps M-Master Alain gave m-me a d-d-different powder by mistake?”
“I see.” Her upper lip curls. “That is unfortunate.”
Sweat drips beneath my arms, and I gulp in air. Lady Clarisse has enormous influence in this town. If she believes Master Alain to have sold her the wrong ingredient, she might think it intentional, a means to steal her coin. It would not take much to blacklist his business.
“I-I-I’ll go b-b-back,” I whisper. “I’ll inform h-h-him of the m-mistake.” By which I mean, I will purchase another five tablespoons of vanishing night with my own meager funds. New shoes will have to wait. “I’m sure he’ll be h-happy to accommodate.”