Mancini shook his head. “But we’ve only been pretending the boy is! You expect me to keep up the ruse forever? To continue to deceive the king into thinking the boy is something he’s not? I couldn’t possibly . . . !”
Ankarette closed her eyes, breathing softly, as if she were in great pain. “You must, Dominic. Because I tell you, I tell you truly, the boy is Fountain-blessed!” She opened her eyes, piercing the spy with her gaze. “I know what I speak of. He can hear it. He can sense it. He must learn how to become what he has the potential to be, and for that, he will need help. It really takes one who is Fountain-blessed to teach another. Tunmore trained me. I won’t be alive long enough to teach him that.” She turned to Owen, running her hand along his arm. “That is why the Fountain sent me to you. From the very moment of your birth. Owen, it takes years to learn about your powers. To be able to control them. To fuel them. It takes a rigor of will and self-discipline that most simply do not have. That you can already tap into this, even slightly, is a sign you’re just as special as I’ve always thought you were.” She gazed at the structure he had made out of the tiles, unable to hide a pleased smile. “But for someone like us, the rigor of it is not even work. We enjoy it.”
Owen’s heart was on fire. He grabbed the silk fabric of her dress, the lacings at her front. “You have to come! I . . . I can’t do it without you! Please, Ankarette! Please! I can’t do this!”
She gave him a sympathetic but firm look. Her hand rested on his shoulder. “You must, Owen.”
Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. “No! I’ve lost Elysabeth Victoria Mortimer. I’ve lost my parents. I can’t lose you too! I need your help! I won’t know what to do if you are not around to tell me what to say!”
“The boy is right,” Mancini said darkly. “I’m a poor substitute for your cleverness. Besides, you have not upheld your end of the bargain. You promised me your story! You promised me the tale.”
She sighed and patted Owen’s shoulder with a trembling hand. “I gave him the story,” she said to Mancini. “If you want to learn it, you must keep him alive.”
Mancini ground his teeth in frustration. “You tricked me.”
“No,” she said. “I always deliver what I promise. In my own way. But you of all people know it is a double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.”
He gasped when she said this and Owen didn’t know why. The look he gave her was full of incredulity . . . and respect. Something she had said had shot straight into his heart, leaving him flummoxed. Ankarette slowly rose.
Mancini was stuttering. “You are the most duplicitous, the most conniving, the most scheming . . . the best spy I have ever met!” He gave her a grudging smile. “You’ve read my journal. Even though it’s written in Genevese ciphers.”
She gave him a slight curtsy and a triumphant smile.
“I’ll be blessed,” he replied with a belly laugh. “Well, lad. I hope Tatton Hall has a decent kitchen and a wine cellar. I’m off to bed.” He chuckled to himself as he staggered to the steps.
When he was gone, Ankarette knelt again, looking Owen directly in the eyes.
“There is something I didn’t tell you,” Owen said nervously. “About the cistern.”
“What is it?” she asked, smoothing the front of his tunic in a motherly way.
“I’ve been there before with Evie. When I jumped into the water, I saw a treasure.” He told her of the treasure he had found—how at first he could not reach it, but then he clung to a chest to keep himself and Evie from being swept away in the flood.
The queen’s poisoner listened carefully to his story, watching his face most intently. There was something about her keen interest that intrigued him. From the look in her eyes, it was as if he were sharing the most interesting story imaginable. She waited patiently until he was done and then she grew serious.
“Was the treasure real, Ankarette?” he asked her at the end of the story, hoping she would say yes.
She reached out and rubbed the sides of his arms, holding him fast. “That you can even see it means many things, Owen. People see many things in the water. Sometimes glimpses of the future. Sometimes of their own death. I don’t know what you saw or why. I don’t know if it’s real or not. But I do believe the Fountain is trying to speak to you. Your powers are blossoming even faster than I expected they would. Your life is about to change.”
He wasn’t sure he was ready for it.
“Please come with me,” he begged her.
She licked her lips, then let out a painful breath. She gazed at the floor for a moment. “I will try,” she whispered, and Owen felt his heart jump with a thrill.
“You will? Oh, Ankarette!” he gushed, throwing his arms around her neck and squeezing her in the biggest hug he had given her yet.
She leaned into the hug, patting his hair. The panic he had felt rising all day began to subside.
A wagon. A wagon—this bloody kingdom for a ride in a wagon!
—Dominic Mancini, Espion of the Ribald Horse
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Strawberries