I looked up, exasperated. Blackwood watched me with a flat, unreadable gaze. He could give the Sphinx lessons in inscrutability.
“This interests me.” I shoved my papers under his nose. “There’s a skinless madman out there who wants us all dead. We’ve a carriage full of otherworldly weapons, and a book that’s supposed to tell us how they all work. At the moment, skinless madmen, weapons, and books are about all I’ve time for. So if Magnus wants to marry a turnip on Thursday next, I will show up for the ceremony in my best bonnet. All right?” With that, I went back to studying some incomprehensible diagram that showed the scythe’s best elevation for attack, and I bloody enjoyed it.
“I’m not sure you were clear enough.” Blackwood sounded bemused. “That’s the last you’ll hear about it from me.” He smiled and took one of the papers. Outside, torrential rain pounded the carriage roof. Lightning snaked across the sky, followed by a startling boom of thunder.
“How do you think it went today?” I finally asked.
“Apart from the blood and pain?” Blackwood didn’t say it with anger, though. He took up the tiny dagger and inspected it. “They could be useful, once we adjust to them. But I feel we’d be better served falling back into our own ranks, not looking outside for help.”
“So we hide under a ward again?” He handed back the blade, which I put on the seat next to me.
“No. The time for hiding is past,” he said, gazing out the window at the storm. “But strength comes from unity. In a strange way, I wish Whitechurch had fought harder to keep us from using the weapons. He let himself be swayed too easily by the queen. By you as well, when you brought him that painting of Strangewayes.”
I frowned. “I don’t understand. You think he’s weak?”
“Definitely not,” Blackwood said. “But when you consider the greatest Imperators of history—John Colthurst in the Wars of the Roses, Edward Wren during the Restoration of Charles the Second—they all understood that a man must not yield to the people he leads.”
“So the Imperator should never compromise?” This didn’t feel right. Blackwood picked up my training sheet once more.
“Good leadership requires compromise. Most of the time.” With that, he read until we arrived home.
Once home, I went upstairs to check that Maria was comfortable. The door to the apothecary was ajar, and I heard murmuring. I peeked inside.
She’d finally put on a dress. The gown was a light blue that had been washed so often it had gone gray. She still hadn’t put her wild hair up and had now even taken to sticking bits of flowers in it. She picked a purple flower from her curls and crushed it in her hands, dusting the petals over a wooden bowl filled with some strange concoction.
Maria muttered to herself in a voice that was not quite her own. It sounded deeper, older somehow.
“That’s it, my love. Now the oil. Quick, don’t let it sit too long,” Maria said to herself in that rich, womanly voice. She took a flask beside her and sprinkled the contents over the bowl. Grabbing a wooden spoon, she stirred quickly, smiling. “There it is. You see it now?”
I pushed open the door, and her trancelike expression vanished.
“Is Rook here?” I tried to look innocent, but Maria was too smart.
“It’s all right. You saw Willie.” She took a jug of water and poured some into the bowl, making a paste of the powder.
“Willie?” I sat opposite her, watching as she took a bit of cloth and spread the paste onto it. Folding the cloth in half, she mashed the top of it.
“I’ve not had many friends,” Maria said. Her cheeks tinged pink as she unfolded the cloth and cut a square of the paste. “I was five when I was taken to a workhouse in Edinburgh. Ran when I was ten. Then on, I survived mainly on my own.”
“You were in a workhouse?” And at five? I knew enough of the appalling conditions children in York had suffered, slaving from dawn until dusk at looms or wheels without proper food or clothing. At Brimthorn, whenever we felt hungry or cold, the head teacher, Miss Morris, would remind us we were more fortunate than most.
“Aye. After I left, I had to live off the land, learn to hunt, fish, protect myself. So you might say I made a friend in my head.” Maria shrugged.
“Why call her Willie?”
“I was never sure.” She placed the square of cut paste on the table in front of me. “She always felt like a Willie to me.”
Well, far be it from me to tell anyone they were odd. “What’s that supposed to do?” I eyed the paste.
“Lavender oil, verbena, water, and gingerroot to strengthen Rook’s body.” She rubbed her stomach. “Flush out the poison.”
There was a small racket by the window, startling me. A cage that I’d not noticed before hung from the rafter, and inside the cage a cream-colored turtledove flapped its wings. Maria made a shushing sound as she got up and unlatched the door. The bird hopped obediently into her hand, and she sat at the table again, stroking the dove’s soft head with the tip of her finger. She trilled and whispered, and it watched her with shining black eyes.
“Where on earth did you get a turtledove?”
Maria shrugged. “There was a man selling caged birds, wandering up and down the street. This one called to me.” Maria didn’t take her gaze away from the creature. “This city is too hard. Soothes me to have something pure and alive near at hand.” She cradled the cooing dove against her chest.
Maria whistled gently, the sound like a soft, rushing wind. That bone-deep energy flooded the room again, the kind I’d felt the night I’d seen her rid herself of the Familiar’s venom. This was gentler, though.
“Did you have pets when you were little?” I reached out a finger to stroke the dove. It ruffled its feathers in response; it wanted only Maria.
“I don’t remember much of my grandmother’s coven, but I recall the animals. The turtledoves flocked to us especially. I’d many before the burnings started.”
Her warm brown eyes darkened as she placed the dove on the table.
“I don’t understand how the sorcerers could be so savage against your kind,” I said, unable to help myself. Dimly, I realized I’d said “the sorcerers”—not we.
“We celebrate life, yes. But death as well.” Maria took another purple flower from her hair and twirled it between her fingers. “You saw what I did with that shrub. For one to live, one must die.” Maria’s voice dropped once more to that strange, womanly tone. “That’s a dangerous power to have.”
The door opened, and Rook entered. His eyes were so bright and his face so flushed that for a moment I was afraid he was feverish. But the wide, brilliant smile on his face told me he felt no pain.
“Where’ve you been?” I asked as he slid onto the bench beside me. His hands were trembling, but he looked excited.
“Wonderful day at work.” He leaped up and walked around to Maria. “Have we anything to try yet?”
Well, at least I could be here for Rook’s first treatment. Maria handed him the odd-colored square of paste. “The taste’ll be strange, but you must have no water for at least ten minutes.”
Rook ate the thing in one go. His face puckered.
“Will it work soon?” There was such hope in his black eyes. He sat down beside me again, and his hand found mine.
“We’ll find out, won’t we?” Maria said. “For now, don’t worry.”
That seemed enough for Rook. But until the shadows receded, I would keep worrying. There was no way to make me stop.
—
FOR THE NEXT WEEK, THE BOYS and I met in the barracks’ courtyard and practiced with the weapons. We avoided the flutes and the lantern but did our best sparring with the blades. Dee gave up on using the scythe when it wouldn’t stop making that horrid noise. Every night when we disbanded, I wondered if we were using them properly. I would read Strangewayes’s journal and grow more puzzled. His mind had been a fragmented mess. None of us could be sure.
Then, on the seventh day, the bells rang at dawn.