That was easy; they’d be like the ace. But Beau couldn’t very well say that.
“They’d be very brave, daring.”
“What else?” Nate prompted.
“A clever strategist,” Beau added. “You know, someone who’s good at making plans. And, uh . . . they’d be good at rallying others. Strong, certain, a real leader. Loyal and clever.”
Nate nodded sagely. “And what are you willing to do to find them?”
“Whatever it takes.” Of that Beau was certain.
Nate sized Beau up, his head cocked to one side, a thinking face. Then he tossed his head—a decision made—and extracted a tightly folded parchment from up his sleeve. “Look at this. Found it stuck to the wheels of a wagon back from the Middlelands.”
Beau unrolled the parchment. “Bounty for the capture of the Villain Doone! 42 coins!” was scrawled above a sketch of a man with straight, dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and a bloodthirsty grin.
Beau’s stomach clutched at the familiar name and portrait. “Doone?”
Nate’s eyes sparkled. “That’s him. You described him perfectly, exactly how I’ve always heard it. They say he’s the last of the Badem, and you know what means, don’t you? It’s in his blood to work for the good of all of us. I heard that when he was young, a charmer cast a spell to protect him from ever being found out or killed. He knows what we face, what we need. He’s brave, he’s clever as a fox, and he’s our best hope. Imagine helping him right the wrongs done to all of us. Working with him to free Mastery House and liberate the Land.”
Beau’s head pounded, and his heart did too. The ace in Fist was sometimes called the liberator because it was the only piece that could free captured guards.
Still, this couldn’t possibly be who Fledge meant. Doone was the enemy Beau had been warned about his entire life. Hiding out in the Bottom, a place riddled with traitors and thieves, Doone was actively plotting to overthrow the Manor, kill Himself and his heir. And with so many guards ill his chances of succeeding were greater now than ever. That Doone could be Beau’s ace was unthinkable, and the very thought of going to the Bottom to look for him was terrifying.
And yet.
This day had already uncovered so many lies that Himself had passed off as absolute truths. In some twisted-up way, it all made sense. It fit. Fledge had only said to go find his ace, he never said where.
“You really believe Doone can free the people of the Land?” Beau pressed.
“Every story I’ve ever heard about him tells how he’s devoted his life to leading us to liberation. They say he even traveled across the seas seeking out allies, building up his strength before returning home again to lead us to freedom. He’s the one.”
Nate spoke with such conviction, such passion and knowledge. A boy raised in that awful Mastery House would have nothing to lose and no reason to lie. There was no question of who to believe, who to trust. While leaving with Nate to find Doone was scary and dangerous, and incredibly stupid, if it meant finding his ace, then it was necessary.
Judging from the last time Barger locked him into his apartment, Beau figured he’d have at least two, maybe three days before Barger came to check on him.
“How long will it take for us to find him?” Beau asked.
“Not long.” Nate spoke with absolute surety, but there was also an air of caution. “You do understand what this means, right?”
“That we have to go to the Bottom.”
“Yeah, but more than that. If we’re going to try this, it means that you know too much about me and I know too much about you. We’re bound to each other now and can never betray the other.”
Beau felt lit up from inside. He’d never been bound to anyone or anything but duty.
“I guess we are.” Beau offered his hand to shake, but Nate seemed unfamiliar with the gesture. Desperate to break the awkward silence that followed, Beau bolted for the ladder, adding, “All right then, let’s go.”
But Nate pulled him back. “Where are you going? It’s not like we can just walk off Manor lands under the light of the sun.”
“Oh . . . I know that,” Beau said. “I mean, I just thought if we keep heading through the fields we’d eventually wind up—”
“Stuck in the tar.”
“Tar?”
“Great wide moat of it circles the border of the Manor, except at the gatehouses where they got bridges over it. We’d never get past it. I know, I’ve tried. Got the burns to prove it.” Nate pulled his pant leg up, exposing a patch of red and raw skin.
“That’s awful.” Beau tried not to wince.
“It’s only ugly. Doesn’t hurt much.” Nate shrugged. “But see, I’ve tried to run enough times now that I’ve come up with a foolproof plan.”
Beau liked the sound of that.
“If you can truly help me find my . . . Doone, I’ll be forever in your debt.”
“There’s too much of that around already.” Nate sank down into a pile of hay. “But you do need patience. You have any of that?”
The boy who’d spent his entire life waiting nodded. “Plenty.”
“Good. I don’t, but I do have a lot of good ideas. Only reason I’m alive now . . .” Nate paused and stroked the thin blush of hair above his upper lip. “I can’t call you by that name though. Just thinking it makes me angry. I think I’m going to call you . . . Crafty.”
“Crafty?”
“Sure, you’ve got a craft, and it was pretty crafty to try and pass yourself off as the heir to those goons. What do you think?”
Beau let the name roll around in his mind for a moment, then he smiled.
“I like it,” he said, for it was more fitting than Nate could ever know.
Chapter Nine
Talent in the Bones
There were countless places Cressi imagined Barger might be taking her when he marched her out of the dungeon.
Cook’s pantry wasn’t one of them.
There wasn’t a servant in the Manor who hadn’t heard about the finely furnished room located just off the kitchen, or about the glorious meals Cook prepared for a chosen few. Cressi understood immediately why the place inspired awe in so many. A large hearth dominated one entire wall, in front of which was situated a satin-covered settee and matching chairs—furniture far too lush for the servants’ halls. But it was the shelves running the height and breadth of the opposite wall that enchanted Cressi. An array of brightly colored bottles, crocks, and lidded pots were arranged in size order on the shelves—a virtual treasure trove of herbs, elixirs, dried flowers, and extracts.
Were it not for Barger’s ironclad hold on her arm, Cressi would’ve already been upon the shelves, opening every jar she could reach. And the pawn apparently felt the same way, for as soon as they’d stepped into the pantry it turned warm in her apron pocket, as if it recognized where it was.
“I was correct.” Barger held up his nearly healed hand. “As I always am.”
It was only then Cressi noticed Cook, standing proudly behind a large worktable laid out with neat piles of bowls, bottles, and jars.
“I never doubted you,” Cook cooed, but her tone and temperature cooled as she pulled Cressi to the shelves. “I know all about you charmers. All your tricks and traps. You’re not gonna pull anything over on us. Understand?”
Cressi nodded, though all her attention was focused on those glorious bins, bottles, and boxes lining the shelves.
“I got three combinations mixed up here.” Cook set three small bowls out in front of Cressi. “From what I know, any one of them could work for our purposes. You’re gonna give them each a sniff and tell me which one is gonna do what Barger wants.”
“And what is that?” Cressi asked.
“You don’t need to know that. Just sniff, we’ll know the answer when we see it.”
Cressi looked at the bowls. They each contained a combination of dried herbs, crushed flowers, pieces of bark, and other various fungi and flora. She recognized some of the components while m
any were unknown to her. Yet somehow, she felt as if she knew them all.
“Go on,” Cook goaded. “Smell.”
Cressi picked the bowls up one by one. The first two had pleasant aromas that evoked a sense of serenity and order. They were soothing and sweet. But the third was as rancid as week-old milk. Cressi recoiled, nearly dropping the bowl to the floor.
Cook grinned with pride as she plucked the offending mixture from Cressi’s grip. “This is the one.”
“That was easy enough,” Barger said. “Brew it up, girl, and let’s see if you’ve got the true touch of a charmer.”
Cook ordered Cressi to empty the bowl into a small pot of water boiling over the hearth. Her nerves still on edge, Cressi took hold of the wooden spoon Cook thrust at her and mixed the concoction. As the brew began to boil and froth, the pantry filled with the vilest odor—a wretched combination of tar, rotting meat, and an overfull outhouse.
Overcome, Cressi covered her nose and mouth with her apron. Even the pawn reacted, turning hot as a coal plucked from the fire. But Cook and Barger hardly looked bothered at all.
“How can you bear it?” Cressi asked through her makeshift mask.
“We don’t smell or hear the plants same as you,” Cook drawled.
“What do you mean hear them?” Cressi pressed.
“Talking!” Cook snapped. “You can hear them telling you what they can do, can’t you?”
“I . . .” Cressi hesitated. She’d never thought of it that way. It wasn’t so much that she heard plants talking as she felt them, intuitively understood how they could be used to heal, or to harm. When she’d once told that to Fledge, he broke out into the widest smile, pride beaming like the noonday sun. At the time she thought he was just being kind, supportive. “Maybe, but not in words.”
“Of course not words!” Cook spat. “A lifetime of practice and all I can do is poison and sicken, but you—”
“Cook!” Barger scolded.
Cook nodded dutifully to Barger and pulled a red-glazed canister off a high shelf. “Look here. Foxglove: useful to reduce swelling and heal new or green wounds. Can also be poisonous when mixed with complimentary herbs, such as that.” Cook pointed to a glass bottle on another high shelf. “Wolfsbane: a poison with a strong taste and a nasty habit of making one bleed from the eyes.”
A wave of nausea washed over Cressi.
“Now, this is what you really want.” Cook stepped up on a stool and reached for a small black canister from the highest shelf. She climbed down, handed the canister to Cressi, and stepped back.
“Add a pinch to your brew.”
Cressi pulled the cork and was nearly thrown back, overwhelmed by the smell of death and decay.
“Glorystem.” Cook grinned. “See, when used by the likes of me, a person with no talent for charming, a few drops floods the blood with bile, turning it black and putrid. An awful way to die. But when handled by the likes of you, glorystem releases her secrets. Go on now, add it.”
Daring not to disobey, Cressi added a small pinch to the boiling concoction. The odor that had been so vile turned sweeter, almost placid. “So now it will release its healing powers?”
“If robbing someone of their will is healing,” Cook snorted. “The body looks the same, they sound the same, but the mind isn’t theirs anymore.”
Cressi’s mouth ran dry. “That’s horrid. And you want me to do that to someone?”
“We simply want to teach you, help you understand what is possible,” Barger said. “You do want to be useful, don’t you?”
Cressi swallowed. She needed to keep herself in check long enough to take what they were giving. She’d figure out how best to use it all later.
“When you did what you did to the guard and the heir, what were you thinking?” Cook asked.
“To relieve their pain,” Cressi replied.
“That’s not what I mean!” Cook pursed her almost nonexistent lips. “When you made one of our fiercest guards break down like a wounded puppy, what were you thinking? Truly thinking about him. Was it that he’s a cruel beast who deserved his wounds and you wanted to make him suffer? Or maybe you saw the scared boy he once was who deserved to be healed.”
How did she know that?
“You charmers see people as they truly are, not as they want to be seen,” Barger explained. “Everyone and every living thing is hiding something, a truth they don’t want known. Pain, shame, lies. Only your kind can hear and see it, like you do with the plants. Then you get to decide if you want to use someone’s pain to heal them or control them.”
Barger retrieved a small, tightly sealed cask from the shelves along with a small crowbar. “Think of charming as a kind of hand spike, like this one, and this tightly sealed cask as someone with a truth to tell, information vital to the safety and well-being of the Land. I need what is inside. Now, I could smash the cask open, but in so doing I’d spill all the contents. Lose too much. It’s easy to imprison, torture, and starve someone. Yet even then I can’t force them to fully expose their secrets, to surrender their will. I can’t ever truly know their mind, what they’re thinking, what they’re hiding. Who they’re protecting. I can’t ever make someone behave how I want. But a charmer can. A charmer is the most powerful weapon there is.”
Cressi shuddered. Life in the Land was already beyond horrible, but if the Manor came to possess this kind of power, present-day nightmares would look like fairytales in comparison.
She’d never do what he was asking of her, but he needn’t know that.
“I am here to serve you, sir.” Cressi dropped a curtsey. “And eager to learn all about the brews.”
“You’ll learn only what we need you to know,” Barger snorted. “You just do the charming the way we tell you to.”
“Of course.” Cressi bobbed in submission.
“Pour your brew into this teapot,” Cook ordered. “Then you keep your mind thinking only on being dutiful, loyal, subservient while you serve it to the heir. Understand?”
Cressi nodded and offered a sweet smile.
“Good. Now bring the tray and follow me.” Barger headed for the door. “It’s teatime.”
Chapter Ten
Prodders at the Gate
Beau and Nate remained tucked away in the hayloft waiting for dark to fall. Nate slept, but Beau was hardly able to sit still as the remaining hours of daylight slowly ticked by. This was unlike any waiting he’d ever done before. Time was no longer marked by lessons, meals, or duties, but by the shifting of the sun, the cooling of the air, and the calls of birds. The expectation of a bold move.
When, at long last, the bells tolled eight, Nate rose and stretched. “I think this is our time, Crafty. You ready?”
Beau nodded and let Nate lead the way out of the barn into the cool of the evening. But just as they rounded the side, Beau stopped. There was something he had to do first.
“What are you doing? You can’t back out now,” Nate warned.
“No . . . it’s silly. Don’t laugh, but I want to untie those calves. They looked so miserable tied up.”
The sounds of the calves’ bellows echoed in the near distance.
“All right,” Nate agreed. “If we’re to be liberators, might as well begin with the beasts. Plus those two rump-faced dolts will get in deep for it too.”
The boys raced through the hedge of tall grass to the calves and unwound the tethers. Yet once untied the calves only stood there staring at the boys, wholly uncertain what was expected of them.
“Go!” Nate shooed.
The calves didn’t move.
“Run!” Beau said.
Still, they stood looking at the boys.
“Like this!” Beau started loping a wide circle around the calves.
“You look ridiculous!” Nate called from the sidelines.
“I know!” Beau crowed.
He ran until the calves finally understood and took off, their long uncertain legs gaining confidence with every step.
“
Nice work, Crafty,” Nate said. “But you know, I’m the one with the good ideas.”
“Oh.” Beau stepped back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“Relax.” Nate gave Beau a playful shove as he led the way across the pasturelands under the cover of a darkening sky. “I’m just having a laugh.”
“Right.” Beau nodded. “I knew that.”
He had so much to learn.
As they walked, Beau tried to keep track of the ever-increasing number of stars appearing above. He’d never been under the wide-open night sky like this. Himself always warned that the night was “home to revolutionists and would-be kidnappers, like the ones who killed your mother.” And so Beau had always been locked inside his apartments when the sun went down, safe from those who’d wish to harm him.
More lies added to the ever-growing list.
The boys continued across the fields in expectant silence. But soon the lights from peddler’s gate came into view. The guardhouse was lit up like a beacon of doom in the distance, making the reality of what they were about to do suddenly very real.
“It’s much brighter than I thought it would be,” Beau said. “It’s nearly as big as the main . . . I mean merchant’s gate.”
“Don’t worry. We’re going to catch a ride in one of those outbound wagons, I can feel it.”
“But won’t they check the wagons?”
“They might, but I’ve got a way around that. See that outbuilding, there?” Nate pointed out a small shed tucked into the shadows on the Manor side of the gatehouse. “The one on this side of the road by the tree line? On my say-so, we slip down that embankment there. Watch yourself, it’s made of slick rocks and riddled with glass shards and rusted spikes. If you fall you might never get up again. But once we’re down, we tuck in behind the shed. That’s where we’re going to get our plank.”
“Our what?” Beau asked.
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