The Tasters Guild Page 19

  Ivy thought of the horrible infestation directly beneath the Tasters’ Guild and swallowed hard, pushing the image aside.

  Join me.

  It was an order, not an invitation. He narrowed his eyes, and Ivy was acutely aware that she preferred him blind.

  Never!

  He snapped his fingers, and Dumbcane suddenly became alert, his beady eyes falling on Ivy, instantly in focus.

  Thick, heavy ash began blowing by; a wind picked up.

  The wrought-iron fence, a thing of beauty now crippled and twisted, caught her eye. Upon a finial, clasping an orb in its talons, was the figure of a black bird. A crow.

  Just think of it, Ivy. Father and daughter together at last. Ruling all the land with the might and strength of a true King.

  Ivy looked at him in horror.

  You are not my father!

  But she knew. Sorrel Flux had tried to tell her. Axle and Cecil had tried to protect her from it. Vidal Verjouce stepped close now, and lowered his loathsome head until she could see the madness in his face.

  But something else was there, too. With a sick, sinking feeling, she knew it at once. A family resemblance. His eyes—he had plucked them from his own face, ridding himself of any trace. They were the same as hers—her worst fears confirmed. It was as if she were looking in a mirror. She watched his eyes as they mocked her look of horror.

  No! It can’t be true!

  A wave of revulsion threatened to drop her to her knees.

  Truth? The horrible man grinned. You want truth?

  Suddenly, from the gate, a creaking like a rusted hinge, and the snapping of metal. The air whipped about. The iron crow had found its wings and tore itself free from the bars. It busied itself first by flapping and pecking the servant Dumbcane, and then it settled upon the young girl’s shoulder.

  Ivy was so surprised to see her lost Shoo, she was struck mute.

  Listen to the crow. Those who seek, look to the crows, for crows never lie, she heard Vidal Verjouce say. It was familiar, this saying, and it tugged at her.

  Tell the girl, he commanded the bird. Tell her who I am.

  Shoo turned to her then and spoke. But his words were the noises of tarnish, a broken bell. What at first had seemed like her beloved Shoo was nothing more than an iron dressing upon a decorative fence—its eyes were blank and glazed, its weight suddenly unbearably heavy.

  This was not her crow, she realized—her crow was in Caux, trapped forever in the tapestry. This was a bird from her father’s evil mind; its vocabulary was mostly incomprehensible and sent a chill up her spine. It chattered away, her shoulder aching from its grip.

  “Your father! Your father!” the creature rasped.

  Repelled, she fell back, and the world began fading away.

  Crows never lie. You see, I am your father.

  Chapter Seventy-one

  Wilhelmina

  There, there.” Ivy opened her eyes to a sunlit room, a small patchwork quilt, and the tiniest woman she had ever seen. Quite a bit smaller than the tallest of trestlemen, her hostess had about her head a spray of silver curls like a heap of seafoam, and around her neck a choker of ample dark pearls. She wore, Ivy noticed, a smartly tailored black dress, one with sparkles in all the right places and a million small clasps up the back. The alewife—for, indeed, this is what the lady was—was tending to Ivy’s forehead delicately with a damp sea sponge, and just as Ivy began to register that she was in a room of golden sunlight and not the despotic garden of Vidal Verjouce, her head exploded in sharp pain and her body was wracked with chills.

  “Shh,” the lady advised as Ivy groaned. She handed her a delicate teacup, a warm brew of what seemed to be pure gold.

  “She’s been like this all night,” Rowan’s voice said worriedly. He had not left his friend’s side. “She keeps talking about crows. ‘Crows never lie.’”

  “Crows never lie?” the lady said thoughtfully. “Yes, well, I suppose that’s true.”

  There was a knock on the door, and it soon opened. Another alewife, her hair high in a dollop upon her head, looked in. Her expression was stern to begin with, but a storm cloud passed over her face as she allowed herself a moment to take in Ivy and Rowan. She turned sharply to Ivy’s nursemaid.

  “Wilhelmina, come see me, please. Outside.”

  Wilhelmina rose, winking at Rowan, unperturbed at her summons.

  “Drink up, my dear. It’s cinquefoil tea!” Wilhelmina advised Ivy.

  The stern alewife turned, her hair bobbling as if of gelatin, and after Wilhelmina passed beside her, she gave the children another reproachful look and shut the door.

  “Wilhelmina?” Ivy looked to Rowan for confirmation.

  “Yes! Peps’s Wilhelmina.” Rowan nodded, leaning in. “Ivy, I was so worried!”

  Ivy smiled weakly. “So we’re in Pimcaux?” she asked.

  “Of course! Where else would we be?”

  Ivy thought for a moment of the dismal Mind Garden, relieved that it was perhaps a dream.

  “We came through the Doorway in the catacombs—don’t you remember?” Rowan found himself happily babbling, so relieved was he that Ivy had emerged from her swoon. He rambled on about escaping Snaith, and talked even of his own experiences in Irresistible Meals, and then eagerly described his flight over all of Rocamadour in his springform wings.

  “I still have them, of course; you can never be too sure when you might need to fly. Ivy, we’re in Pimcaux—just think! But the oddest thing—you have on the most peculiar black dress!”

  Ivy’s stomach sank as she looked first at her arms, then the rest of her. She was indeed bound in the erratic black lace. Her feet were tucked into shiny black shoes, and there, in between them, lay the strangest thing of all: Six, curled upon the bed in a patch of sunlight. Her head pounded and she shut her eyes, breathing in the sea breeze.

  “Alewives,” Rowan explained, “rule over troubled waters. They are the ones to appeal to, should you ever find yourself shipwrecked or drowning. I guess it’s only natural they live in lighthouses.”

  Ivy smiled weakly. “We are in a lighthouse?”

  “Yes! Isn’t that amazing? From what I can tell, it’s quite a spectacular one. Ivy,” Rowan began tentatively, “what does it mean—‘Crows never lie’?”

  With a sinking heart, she thought of Shoo.

  “It was in Uncle Cecil’s letter. It’s an ancient writing of some sort. Those who seek/Look to the crows/For crows never lie.” She paused. “I miss Shoo,” Ivy confessed. She did, terribly—even more so after her experience in the Mind Garden.

  Rowan nodded numbly, thinking of the magical panels and the crow’s uncertain fate. He squeezed her hand. They continued chatting in hushed tones until the door was again thrust open—this time affording the children a bit more of a view—as the alewife returned to her bedside vigil.

  “Well, imagine that! Who knew? You have the most refreshing smile!” Wilhelmina approved. “This is the first time I’ve laid eyes on it. I do see why those handsome D. Roux brothers were so taken with you.”

  Ivy brightened even further at the mention of Axle and Peps.

  “And that charm—what memories! I am glad to see it again. How you convinced Peps to give it up, I’ll never know.” Ivy felt for the alewife charm Peps had given her what seemed like so long ago. The ribbon was warm and comforting around her neck.

  “You had a close call,” Wilhelmina confided. “Closer than you might imagine.”

  Ivy’s smile was extinguished at the memory of her detour.

  Wilhelmina leaned in further, after looking once at the door behind her.

  “They are not happy that you’ve brought scourge bracken here,” she confided. “Not happy at all.”

  Ivy’s heart sank.

  “Once you ingest it, its darkness grows inside you—takes up residence. It is now a part of you forever. Ivy, you will never feel right again in the shadows.”

  Ivy shivered—the thought of such darkness made her flesh craw
l.

  “But”—the alewife smiled brightly—“you’re now a wounded healer! Isn’t that just wonderful? And none of that will matter much to them when you’ve cured the King!”

  To truly heal, one must know grave illness. That is what Rhustaphustian must have meant, Ivy realized. She sat up, ignoring a sharp pain in her ribs. The dress was maddeningly tight. She looked quickly at Rowan.

  “The King! Where do we find him?” she asked Wilhelmina urgently.

  The alewife looked pensive and then upset.

  “Well, there is a small problem.”

  “Problem?” Rowan asked worriedly.

  “Yes, problem. I’d consider Foxglove a problem indeed.”

  “Foxglove?”

  “Mr. Foxglove,” Wilhelmina sighed. “King Verdigris’s new advisor.”

  “Advisor?”

  “Advisor and biographer. He’s writing a book—although, come to think of it, we’ve yet to see a single page.”

  “What sort of book?” Rowan asked.

  “A kind of memoir, he says. Of the King. He’s forever jotting down notes in his journals; he seems quite thorough.”

  “Why is this Mr. Foxglove a problem? Surely he would want what’s best for the King?” Ivy cried, knowing at once that, sadly, there were people who sometimes wished hurtful things upon those they pretended to serve.

  “Best for the King?” Wilhelmina drooped. “Mr. Foxglove only wants what’s best for Mr. Foxglove.”

  The alewife looked from one child to the other.

  “But, here, let us not get ahead of ourselves. I’m sure your mother will be of great help, Ivy!”

  Chapter Seventy-two

  A Change of Attire

  Wilhelmina busily tidied the small chamber and would not talk further—Ivy needed to rest. At the mention of her mother, Clothilde, Ivy’s stomach turned over and she sagged back into the soft cushions feeling utterly exhausted. She barely knew her mother, but what she did know she was not sure she liked. A reunion seemed unthinkable.

  “Perhaps, Rowan, you would like to explore?” Wilhelmina asked the taster. “Pimcaux is really such a lovely place to visit—all sun and sea—and I’m sure you’re eager to get started.”

  Rowan hesitated, looking at Ivy.

  “She’ll be fine,” Wilhelmina assured him. “You’ve been a good friend to Ivy—that is plain to see—but now she needs to recover her strength.”

  Rowan reluctantly agreed and rose stiffly—he had been sitting in the small chair for entirely too long.

  “But first”—Wilhelmina assessed his clothing—“you’ll need a change of attire. Your mourning wear—Ivy seems to have come prepared.”

  “My morning wear?” Rowan was confused. He thought briefly of his favorite combed cotton pajamas and matching robe, a gift from his mother—and a luxury of the past. He looked around helplessly.

  “Mourning wear,” Wilhelmina explained perkily. “We are all in mourning here, have been for some time. In sympathy. The King lost his daughter, you see.”

  “Oh!” Rowan understood. Come to think of it, the alewives were all wearing black. “I don’t have anything,” he pointed out. He now realized just how tattered and dirty his olive-drab apprentice robes were.

  “Not a problem. Come with me.” And she ushered the taster out the small, rounded door frame into the bright landing beyond. There was a spiral stair, and he followed her down it to a small room, cluttered with buttons, pincushions, and notions. It was a bright and happy workshop, with rolls of fabrics and tailors’ torsos poked with pins. Heaps of quilts and embroideries cascaded from tables and baskets alike. The room had a pleasing smell of clean, bright oil and industry.

  As she unrolled a silver tape and began to take the taster’s measurements, Rowan could not help but notice the most captivating collection of rings upon her fingers. One looked as if it were a bubble of the purest water.

  “Wilhelmina?” he asked.

  “Yes, dear?” The alewife selected a lightweight linen the color of summer shade, and Rowan thought about the reason behind the dark suit.

  “I read in Axle’s book about Princess Violet. That she was poisoned.”

  “Indeed,” she said through a mouthful of pins. “She ate from a roast that was cut with a poisoned knife.”

  “How is it no one else died?”

  Wilhelmina rummaged through the cluttered basket, rejecting various spools of black thread, until she found one of which she approved. Then she looked the taster in the eye.

  “Only one side of the knife was poisoned.”

  Rowan thought of Defensive Dining, a gruesome requirement at the Tasters’ Guild. There are as many ways to be poisoned as there are poisoners to think of them.

  “But her killer was never caught.”

  “King Verdigris doesn’t know who murdered his only daughter?” Rowan asked quietly.

  The alewife shook her spray of curls. “No. King Verdigris is in hiding. It’s whispered that his grief at Princess Violet’s death has overcome his senses—his magic is potent and unpredictable, out of control. If the cinquefoils and weather are any measure.”

  “The cinquefoils?”

  “Yes. They grow everywhere. The King’s flower has become, well, a bit of a nuisance.”

  Rowan found that hard to imagine but kept silent.

  “They say he will not recover until the murderer is brought to light. So we wait for news, and for the time when we might be permitted to discard these dreary mourning clothes for something more lively. Instead”—Wilhelmina’s voice grew sadder—“we got Mr. Foxglove.”

  Soon Rowan was outfitted in a tidy suit and vest with mother-of-pearl buttons and a wide-brimmed hat. Wilhelmina escorted him down a further stair to a small stone door. Opening it wide, the taster was introduced to the bright sea air.

  “Just down the path, you’ll find the village,” she chimed. “Oh, and do take an umbrella. The weather is slightly … unreliable.”

  Rowan squinted. There wasn’t a cloud in the achingly blue sky. The tall gray lighthouse—a stalk of stone—sat atop the seacliff. Overwhelmed, he stood, looking around. From behind he felt a gentle shove—Wilhelmina was ushering him across the threshold.

  “Go on!” she urged. “While the sun’s still in the heavens.”

  Apparently, if Rowan’s eyes were not lying, the sun was not only in the heavens—it was everywhere. The landscape of Pimcaux was a stunning one, a collaboration of rock and water, sun and air. A shocking, vibrant golden light permeated the atmosphere. It was as if the sea, in its vastness, took up the sun’s reflection and dashed it against the shore—and from it the cinquefoils grew, sprouting by the millions, yellow, golden, growing upon rock and field alike. They sprouted from the worn stone path, the rock face of the cliffside—even upon the tiny windowsill beside him. An abandoned gull’s nest cradled the King’s flower. The small, magical blooms defied all natural law, taking up residence where they chose, flourishing, seemingly, on thin air.

  Rowan set off for town with their perfume as his companion.

  Chapter Seventy-three

  The Ribbon Tree

  By the time he’d scrambled down the zigzagging path—edging through dangerous jackknifes, past curious nesting birds—Rowan was quite hot. Which is why, when the rain came, he welcomed it, at first. But this was no normal rain—no Cauvian rain, at least.

  It splashed him with enormous teardrops, and although impossible, it appeared to be seawater. He fumbled with the small black umbrella Wilhelmina had thrust upon him, and soon enough he had raised it, although its proportions were designed for tiny hands. He had walked a small path along the rocky shore, past clumps of windlestraw and grazing sheep in a salt marsh. Before long he had reached the town. The rain was gone, the sun was again shining—and over the broad frosted sea, a rainbow had settled.

  Here before him, in this most beautiful of moments, was the entrance to the town, marked by two things.

  First, an archway.

  Second, a
very odd tree indeed.

  The tree was gnarled and ancient—of what sort Rowan could not tell, and he absently wondered if it grew only here, in Pimcaux. If it were an old lady lifting her skirts, the tree could easily hide a horse and carriage beneath her petticoats. And further, from every available branch hung an impossible number of silken ribbons, every color under the sun, streaming out in the sea breeze, putting the rainbow to shame.

  Rowan looked around at this strange sight and entered the town.

  He was grateful now for the shade of the small streets, and he advanced along the walkway that led through the village toward the gleaming sea, window-shopping happily. The town appeared to be a fishing village, the storefronts a weathered clapboard. His feet crunched on the small crushed shells that made up the path. He passed several quiet shops: a breadmaker, a broadcloth merchant—for sails, Rowan reasoned. A small store that sold notions—mostly pearl buttons and silver clasps in its display. A fishmonger.

  A slight man gripped a homemade broom, whisking away the cinquefoil petals that littered the ground. Rowan nodded and kept on.

  A few storefronts weren’t immediately obvious. One shop in particular caught his eye. It was at the end of a small alley and partially boarded up. No one had been inside for years—the drifts of sand and clumps of sea grass upon the steps were further proof. Old gilt lettering still graced the thick wooden door, proclaiming the establishment to be that of a family of weavers. The peeling paint read:

  Four Sisters Tapestries of the Ancients and Royal Haberdashery

  Through the window he could see dusty looms and tattered rolls of silks and ribbons—ribbons just like those from the tree Rowan had seen at the town’s entrance. Empty spools and piles of bent or broken needles littered the floor, forming a dangerous carpet. Cruel-looking metal combs lay discarded upon the table—perhaps used at one time to tear and shred ribbons into thread, Rowan thought. A searose bush had somehow found its way between floorboards and had taken up position beside the cracked window—its wondrous scent reaching Rowan’s nose.