“How do you know this?”
Oleander’s eyes flash as if they would burst into flame. His voice soars with rage. “I know because it was here he came—without my permission!—to my realm, knife in hand, to shear the tender growth from my loyal subjects and mix their very limbs into an elixir of love that would inflame the blood and erase inhibition! A few sips would all but guarantee that you, you callow, ardent misfit, and that perfectly ripe, lovestruck girl would lose all reason, abandon all restraint—”
“Curb your tongue, evil prince!”
“Evil? I am nearly a saint compared to that clever, wicked Thomas Luxton! He witnessed the spark of affection between you; all he had to do was nurture it into a mighty, consuming flame.” Oleander spreads his great wings fully, until they blot out half the sky. “That you and his quivering, untouched daughter performed so lavishly, even providing him with grounds for a betrothal—why, it must have been more than any proud father could have hoped for! Now you were bound together, in life and in death. Now he could ask anything of you, for her sake, and you, righteous prig that you are, would jump to comply.”
“But to what end would he do this?” I cry. “For what purpose?”
“For what purpose, you ask. How appropriate.” With a powerful thrust of his wings he rises into the air. “You flesh bodies are so obsessed with goodness, yet no other form of life on earth is capable of such cruelty. You need only convince yourselves your transgressions serve some ‘purpose.’ Even if it is only greed, or lust, or the raw desire for power that drives you. You will spill the blood of your kinsmen, lay waste to the earth itself, wreak havoc, and cause unspeakable suffering—any and all sins are justified, as long as they are a means to your precious, righteous ‘purpose.’”
His voice pierces me through. The icy wind from his beating wings freezes my blood.
“So it has been with you, Master Weed. You would do anything if you thought it might save Jessamine; in that, you have proven yourself human to the core. And so it is with Luxton. Once he fixed on his ‘purpose,’ the rest of his misdeeds followed with barely a moment of remorse: First, a venomous toast—”
The earth shifts beneath me. “The absinthe—” I stammer. “The toast for our engagement—the sugar cube—”
“You see how carefully the trap was laid? For, unless you were willing to die for your precious fiancée, you would never have dared come here, to my intoxicating garden of death. Luxton made you willing to kill, even willing to die—all in exchange for a few measly recipes.”
“Recipes?”
“Of course.” His laughter is like a rain of daggers. “Without your heroic efforts, Master Weed, all those pages in the apothecary’s precious book of poisons would still be blank.”
Now in flight, he swoops and circles me like a vulture. “How shocked you look!” he crows. “How horrified! That a man would poison his own daughter to gain power, in the form of a little deadly but exquisitely valuable knowledge—does this surprise you, Weed? Even after all my Poisons have taught you? Haven’t you been paying attention at all?”
He swoops down once more. The tip of his finger, sharp as a thorn, draws itself gently across my cheek. It is no more than the touch of a breeze, but I feel the hot blood well up and drip to the corner of my mouth, until the sharp metal taste is on my tongue.
Now rage fills me, the bile rises. I am poisoned, finally, with my own blood and anger, and there will be no cure for me but killing Thomas Luxton—not with a coward’s secret poisons, but with my own avenging hands—
Speechless with fury, I turn and sprint back to the cottage.
“Off you go, then, Master Weed! Consider it your fourth task.” Oleander’s laughter carries on the wind. “Vengeance against the wicked!”
I feel everything now, Oleander. Every moment is agony. Please—make it stop—
It is what you wished for, lovely. Remember?
I only wished to live. Not to die. And not to stay—oh, have mercy!—not to be trapped eternally in this poisoned half-life, with you—
You can still change your mind. My lips are sweet as the juice of the belladonna berry; one kiss and you will be in bliss, and stay in bliss, forevermore. As will I. How glorious it would be, if only you would let me relieve your suffering and anoint you with pleasure instead. My poison princess; that is what you could be—
You said you would give Weed the cure for me. Did you?
I said I would, and unlike some people, I never break my promises.
You told him I was dying?
Of course, lovely. I told him everything. He knows what ails you, and how to save you.
Then where is he?
Hmm. I am not sure. Perhaps he had something more important to attend to….
Oh, I cannot bear it, the pain is too much—I am run through with blades still glowing from the forge, truly these are the fires of hell—Weed!
19
PANTING LIKE A DOG, I search the cottage, the gardens, the sheep meadows. Guided by the whispers of the grass, and the pointing branches of the trees, I finally find Luxton in the stone circle that marks the ruins of the ancient hospital. He crouches on the ground, satchel slung across his body, running his fingers through the earth. Despite the warm weather, he wears gloves.
How fitting it is to confront his evil deeds here, in this ancient cesspit of tainted blood and amputated limbs!
At my arrival he stands, his back to me. A tiny seedling dangles from his gloved fingers. “Monkshood,” he murmurs. “A few leaves on the skin cause tingling and numbness. When ingested, a tiny dose lessens pain, a larger dose slows the heartbeat and respiration, slower and slower, until … well, I am sure you already know.” He looks at me with an arched eyebrow. “After all, you know everything. Don’t you, Weed? But only when it is too late, it seems.”
“You are the cause of Jessamine’s illness,” I spit out. “You have been poisoning her.”
Moving slowly and calmly, he tucks the seedling into his satchel and brushes the dirt off his hands. “Who told you that, Weed? The rhododendron? The daffodils?” He waves some sheets of paper. “Yes, I could not resist knowing. I read your garden journal. How foolish of you to confess your secret there, where anyone at all could see. I took the liberty of removing those pages—for your own protection, and, as it turns out, for my own.”
I cannot speak—it is too late to deny the truth—shall I just kill him to silence him? What is one more killing, once the first is done?
“How I long to know how you do it, Weed,” he says, tucking the pages back into his satchel. “To communicate with plants directly! It is unimaginable, yet I have seen the proof of it. What a shame there is no time for us to talk; there are so many questions I want to ask you. Yet there is only one question worth asking now: Do you wish to kill Jessamine? Or save her?”
“You are the one who kills her!” I cry. “I wish to save her—from you.”
“If I intended to kill her she would be dead.” He takes a step toward me. “And what I have done, I have done for good, nay, excellent, reasons. Reasons that a creature—or, let us be frank, a monster—with your powers could never understand.”
“If I am a monster, then you are surely a demon—”
“I am her father, and I have dominion over her!” His eyes burn. “You wish to destroy me, I can see that. But I wonder: Will the brief thrill of vengeance be worth the cost? An hour ago Jessamine was still alive, though barely. If you want her to die, there is no better way to guarantee it than to kill me right now.”
“Killing you kills the man who has poisoned her,” I exclaim. “That you are also her father erases all hope of mercy. Make your peace with whatever God you dare believe in, Luxton. You are a dead man.”
I lunge for his throat, but he evades me.
“But what of you, my self-appointed executioner?” he taunts. “Kill me and you will surely hang on the gallows.”
“Not when I tell them what you have done.”
“Who w
ill believe you? Not anyone whom I ever healed, and that is half the county. Not the duke, or the duke’s followers. Not Jessamine—especially not Jessamine! My darling, innocent girl. She knows little of the evils of this world; I have made sure of that.” Confident, he takes a step closer. “No, Weed. You will die by the noose, and the hatred of the woman you love will bear you to your murderer’s unhallowed grave.”
“Do you think I care what happens to me?” I reply. “I was ready to die for her before, and remain so. Your words do not move me.”
“Then perhaps this will: When you and I are both dead, what becomes of Jessamine? Who will care for her? Put your rage aside and think of her for a change. Her frail heart will shatter. Would you have her blood on your hands, in addition to the friar, and whomever else you have killed in your time?”
“You are wrong about the friar—” I cry, but I stop. Does it even matter? For I have surely killed—what right have I to Jessamine’s love, now?
His eyes glitter with ambition. “What knowledge you must possess! To poison at will, to kill and leave no trace. If you could only put aside your righteous, stubborn anger, Weed! I know men who would pay any price for this knowledge. Together we could have such power, such riches—”
His words are worse than poison—I can bear no more. “Murderer! Poisoner! Your own daughter is near death because of you! Do you imagine that your deeds can go unpunished? I will not listen to you argue for another second—”
I seize him and knock him to the ground. My hands encircle his throat, ready to silence him for good. His life is mine to take, all I have to do is squeeze—
“There is a way to save her,” he croaks in desperation. “I will leave England and never return. You stay and care for Jessamine. Tell her whatever fiction you like about my departure. Or tell her the truth, if you are that selfish and cruel. But if you love her at all, you will carry the burden of what you know alone.”
Now which of us is the monster? I think as my fingers tighten. Even with my hands wrapped around his throat, he counsels deceit and plans his escape—
“I would leave my home and my daughter behind forever, in order that Jessamine may live in peace,” he gasps. “But it seems you would rather take vengeance than do what is best for her. It’s plain—which one of us—loves her more—”
Now he can no longer speak. His eyes start to bulge and roll upward. Rage shrinks the edges of my vision. All I can see is his lips, moving uselessly like those of a fish flopping in its death throes on the dock, desperate for a last, lifesaving swallow of air.
KRAAAAAAAAAAH!
The cruelest sound in the world stabs through me, forces me back, loosens my grip. Now freed, Luxton rolls to his side, gasping as the raw breath sears his lungs.
“Weed!” Oleander’s winged form erases all light as it hovers above us. “Forgive me for interrupting this charming scene, but surely you have forgotten something important?”
“Leave me, evil prince!” I bellow at the heavens.
“If you wish me to leave, I will—but I believe your beloved Jessamine will be needing this. If she is to live, that is.”
I gaze up and look more closely. A bundle of herbs and roots dangles from his fingers.
“It is an antidote to the dreadful brew her father has been using to poison her. He thinks himself clever, too clever to kill a girl by accident—but he is, as they say, only human. He overestimated her strength. He has made her too ill to recover, even if the poisoning stops. Without this cure, she has less than a quarter-hour to live.”
He rises, and the bundle flies out of my reach.
“Give it to me!”
“Only if you let Luxton go.”
“He deserves to die!”
“So do we all, I’m afraid. Yet some of us live on, and on, and on—”
Luxton watches me, transfixed. “Who are you talking to?” he whispers in hoarse amazement. I ignore the wretch, for Oleander still dangles the antidote just out of my reach.
“Fine. I will let him go,” I say desperately. “He is free! Look, I have released him; he can go where he will. The farther away, the better. Now—please—”
“You misunderstand me, Weed. Luxton must stay here and care for Jessamine, of course. And you must leave, now, and never return.”
“What! Why should I be the one to leave?” This final cruelty is too much for me. My knees buckle and pitch me to the earth.
“You know why. You are lost, Weed. A killer, a monster. You are no longer fit to be a husband for Jessamine Luxton, if you ever were—and what else could you be? You love her too much to be a servant, or a friend—”
“But she loves me, too,” I insist.
“She loved you before. But now? Now there is blood on your hands, Weed. She deserves better, so much better, than you—if you truly loved her you would see that.”
The antidote bobs in the air.
I am trapped. Oleander has plunged me into the very pit of evil, where there is no power to do right. And yet I must do something. I am at the crossroads again, but the four directions lead to ruin, misery, loneliness, death—
“All right!” I cry, my heart breaking even as I say it. “I will go. I will leave.”
With a graceful swerve, Oleander drops the antidote into my outstretched hands. He rises up above us then, and circles higher and higher, until the black speck of evil disappears into the hellfire of the sun.
Luxton stares at me, and past me. His eyes scan the sky, but he sees nothing. He looks even more terrified than when I had my hands on his throat.
“Give her this mixture at once; make haste!” I shove the antidote roughly at his chest. “It is the cure to your filthy poisons. Give it to your daughter now, or you will surely die. And beware, Luxton,” I add, my voice dripping with menace. “There is nowhere on this green earth you can go but where I will have news of your evildoing. Every patch of moss, every blade of grass, every weed that grows in the stone walls of your home is my spy and ally. If you ever harm one hair on Jessamine’s head again, you will die a death more horrible than even your wildest nightmares could imagine.”
Time is wasting, Weed—
“Go!” I scream it to the heavens. “Go now, for the next time I lay eyes on you, I swear, it will be to kill you.”
I give Luxton a violent push. Even as he coughs and gags, he climbs to his feet. His eyes fly up in terror, but he cannot see Oleander. Where the Prince of Poisons was, there is only an absence, a place with neither light nor shadow. It is a kind of emptiness that has not existed since before the world began.
With scarcely a backward glance, Luxton makes his way to the path and half stumbles, half runs back to the ancient ruins of his home. The antidote is still clutched tightly in his hands. I watch until he disappears over the crest of the hill.
Live, Jessamine. I will it, with every drop of strength I possess. Live, and remember me. I will never be far, and my friends—the flowers, the trees, the tender vine that curls around your window and guards you while you sleep—they will always be watching. And so will I.
As I stand, awash in rage and despair, a low, sad rumble from the distant forest offers me a refuge. I will go, for I too must live. My life’s purpose now is to watch, and protect. And, if need be, to avenge.
I step onto the path and turn my back to Hulne Park, to the cottage, to Jessamine—to the only happiness I have ever known.
Luxton’s satchel lies in the dirt before me. I lift it. I can tell by the weight and shape of it what it contains: his book of cures. Thomas Luxton’s poison diary. Filled with the information I gave him, purchased nearly at the price of his daughter’s life.
It was his most precious possession.
Now it is mine.
Alas, my Jessamine; we do not have much time left.
What does that mean, Oleander? Does it mean I will die?
I don’t want you to leave me, Jessamine. There is so much I have yet to tell you.
You have already told more than I c
an bear.
We have hardly begun. The truth of things is so cruel, so beautiful—so much more thrilling than you can imagine. Stay with me. I will reveal dark secrets you never dreamed existed. We will fly everywhere you ever longed to see. Stay. You will not be sorry.
What secrets? Oleander—I cannot see you anymore—the silver mist turns to darkness—is it the end? Oh, I am afraid! Perhaps you are right, perhaps I should stay—for my father is a murderer, and Weed has abandoned me—why should I return to them? And you, Oleander—cruel and strange as you are—you have told me only the truth… you have tried to help me, I see that now…. Oleander, I reach for you, where are you? I clutch something in the darkness, but it is only a leaf come loose in my hand—
Too late, I am afraid. Good-bye for now, lovely lady. When you are ready to meet again, come to the poison garden…. I am always there…. I will be waiting….
My eyes open. Curtains flutter in the breeze, and bright yellow sunshine floods in my bedchamber window. The light stings. Tears form, blinding me again. But not before I see Father’s face hovering above me.
He looks like an old man. A frightened, evil old man.
And Weed is nowhere to be found.
I feel my leaden body, shackled to the bed by gravity and mortality. I ache everywhere. The sheets are damp with my sweat. My joints ache, my belly is full of pain, my head throbs.
I am alive.
About the Author
MARYROSE WOOD began writing fiction after many years performing, directing, and writing for the theater. Her novels for teen readers include WHY I LET MY HAIR GROW OUT and MY LIFE: The Musical. For younger readers she wrote THE INCORRIGIBLE CHILDREN OF ASHTON PLACE: BOOK I: The Mysterious Howling, the first book of a new series.
The Poison Diaries Page 14