The Chocolatier's Wife

by Cindy Lynn Speer

  “As you so keenly pointed out, I had my own life that I was living; I certainly was not waiting on you.”

  “And you certainly do not need my troubles,” he snapped back, sounding a little strained. Another second, she realized, and they’d be yelling at each other like fools.

  “Well.” She shook her skirts again. “If you determine a way I can be of service, please feel free to call upon me.”

  “Oh, Tasmin.” He sighed and leaned his head against the bars. “I just wish to be out.”

  She looked away, clearing her throat, trying to calm herself. She didn’t understand any of her thoughts at the moment. It all seemed so stupid and pointless. There was a tug at her hair, and she jumped.

  He was twining a bit of her hair around his fingers. “The second I’m free, truly free—of this place, of suspicion—I am going to marry you. I’m useless at cake-baking, but I know an icing recipe that I’ve saved for the occasion.”

  She started to smile, but instead she snorted softly. “You don’t see me holding my breath. I’m in no hurry for that day to come.”

  “Perhaps not, but I am. I am ready for it; I’ve been ready to be your husband for a very long time. I just wanted to be set up; I wanted to know I could give you a good life. As far as I’ve ever been concerned, the spell picked exactly the right woman for me. I never want you to doubt that.”

  She looked at him again, her lips parting. “You are not a man of spoken sentiment, I know that well. William, what do you know? Did they tell you something terrible?”

  He shook his head slightly. “Listen.” The bells were ringing, hard. They were being rung out of time, and sounded garish. The prison guards opened the door and came down the corridor.

  “No,” she said.

  “Hush.” William went over to the other cell wall. “Goodbye, old man.” The lead guard stopped at the neighboring door and eased the mad man out, into the corridor, and away. “At least he won’t know what hit him, not really. Maybe his family will be waiting.”

  She reached through the cell bars and took his hands. The bells continued to clang.

  “They’ve set the date for your trial, haven’t they?” She felt terribly under-prepared.

  “My trial starts soon. My father read the investigation report this morning.” The bells stopped abruptly. “They have no other suspects. The report says it is very likely that the bells will toll for me in two days time.”

  Chapter 10

  Ferou tenth, Sapphire Moon Quarter 1788

  Dear William,

  Here, at last, is the amulet I promised you. I beg you to wear it well. A thing you should know about amulets is that iron can harm them. Try not to leave it in direct contact with such metal. Copper, brass, gold and silver seem all to be fine.

  Yours, eventually,

  Tasmin

  She couldn’t sleep. She wanted to, but she couldn’t. They wouldn’t give her access to the records, and neither Andrew nor William had been allowed to read them. Apparently they were delivered to the head of the house; the delivery boy waited and watched to make sure nothing was done to the record, even though it was just a copy, and then took it away.

  The lawyer, too, had been allowed to see them, and he seemed fairly grim.

  She tried to reconstruct the matter in her head. Bishop Kingsley was a man with whom William had had a good working relationship but no personal dealings. She’d asked William questions from all angles, and he’d answered them patiently enough. She realized he was thinking, too, trying to make sense of the whole lot.

  The sprites were in rare form, chasing each other around the room. At one point William’s writing quills exploded out of the green glass jar he kept them in, and now the sprites were running through the curtains, the fabric giving a little jump as the hard puffs of air hit them. “Please, please, would you go play somewhere else?” she moaned and covered her head. They were often affected by her emotions, and she realized they were feeling chaotic, as was she.

  So, William was not the killer. But someone wanted to blame him for it. Who wanted to see William hang? If she could figure out who the two men (she refused to use the word victim in connection to William) knew in common, then maybe she could create a pool of suspects from which to draw.

  How could she possibly do that in two days? Both the Bishop and William had grown up here. William had traveled the world for trade, the Bishop had completed many tours for diplomacy. Two years would not give her the time to track down every possible connection.

  Well, maybe she was being a little pessimistic; after all, the person had to have been here to commit the murder, right? And it had to have been someone who really hated the Bishop, or William, or both.

  She leapt out of bed, drew on her dressing robe, and went below. The sprites were playing their favorite game of “let’s open this door and see what’s inside”, which meant that nearly every door in the kitchen was hanging open. One to her left was wiggling as a sprite worked the lock, and it flew open, revealing nothing but the smell of cocoa. There was a coo of disappointment at the empty cupboard. She hummed in consolation, but did not shut the cupboards, knowing they would when they were done, and if they were not in the mood to, well, she could do it just as well in the morning rather than having to repeat the job twice tonight.

  She heated a little milk and added the last of her private stock of cacao powder to it, stirring carefully, and then setting it out for them to drink. “Poor babies,” she said. “I know it’s hard for you, here. Come and have a drink, sweethearts.”

  She felt invisible hands clinging to her, petting her hair before diving down to drink from the wide, low saucer. Someone squealed something, a long, drawn out howl she could have sworn sounded like “wait!” and a door in the stone wall next to her opened.

  Cocoa-milk splashed, but she didn’t see it, she was too busy looking at the door she’d never seen before.

  She took a candle over and looked inside. The police had missed the place as well, she could tell from the lack of marks in the dust. She leaned in, one hand on the wall of the opening, careful to keep the door open as she assessed the space.

  A puff of air settled on her shoulder, she heard the roar of wind on the waves as invisible wings fluttered next to her ear and knew the clan chief himself, Nee-no, was taking an interest in what had been found. She could step inside, then, and if the door did close, surely he would get her out?

  So, taking a deep breath, she walked into the room, letting the door shut and darkness settle. “Well, let’s see how easy it is to get out?” She turned around and pushed the stone, and it opened again, easily, on well oiled and well hidden hinges. She let it go, and it shut again, silently.

  “It’s not very big.” Even with the candle, she felt herself taking rapid breaths, and she knew a long limbed man like William would go mad in such a small space. The clan head left her shoulder, yet she could still hear the roaring of the waves in the small space, doubtless the echo of the chief’s wings. She coughed, feeling smothered. “Enough!” The door opened for her and Tasmin ran out, panting. It was more from the dust, she thought, than feeling trapped in such a small space; her mouth felt as if it were filled with cotton. Behind her, the chief was too far away for her to understand his words, but there was an imperious squeal. The dust from the room was being collected, the sprites outlined in gray as the particles stuck to them, and for the first time in a while, she could see them, charming little Tatu with her pig-tails, Moru with his single braid of hair and fierce, always displeased expression, and the great clan head Nee-no. There were many others, at least thirty strong, but she realized that their bellies were distended with dust, dust that had to go somewhere. The shutters flew open before she could unlatch them, the sprites huffing years of dust out into the street. She winced, and hoped no one was looking, but felt pleased. No one could de-dust a room better than her sprites, and she di
dn’t like the idea of anyone breathing dirt, for even her best efforts on her own would not be good enough to get every bit.

  Her thoughts caught her. Why would she be worried about people breathing dirt? What use would this place be put to? And then an idea, a bit mad, blossomed in her head. The chance for it to be used might never arise, but she knew she had to try. She decided that tea would get the filth out of her throat, so put some water on to boil before beginning to gather what she could for the place she now called the safe-room.

  There was a smaller bucket in the pantry, looking quite new, so she took it and one of the buckets from the kitchen proper, deciding that she might as well fill one for use as well as one for the safe-room. The sprites kept watch and opened the door again when she approached the back of the shop with her burden. The new bucket went into the safe-room, with a cloth draped over it, along with an old chamber pot she found in storage. She gathered spare blankets and a summer cloak from the sea chest and made a narrow bed. A small stool finished it off, and she stood back, a bit amazed at herself, not because of the room, but because of the firmness to which she held the insane plan.

  “I wonder if it will work,” she murmured, running her hands over the skirt of her nightgown. It was crazy and dangerous. But if it would buy William time—keep him from the noose—then she was willing to do it. She left the room, and the door closed again, invisible even to those who knew it was there.

  “Father of the Ieechee sprites, would you be willing to help me?” she asked out loud, formally, for even though they acted as if they were her pets, she did not like the idea of taking them for granted. And he was a king, of sorts. She made tea for all of them, a preparation of black tea, apples and cinnamon she favored because the very scent of it calmed her down. They liked it very, very sweet, far sweeter than even she did, which was rather saying something, so she stirred honey and expensive sugar from William’s stores into theirs, while she treated hers with honey alone. “Here is my plan,” she said. “I beg you, tell me what you think?”

  They seemed to be pleased with it, so the next day she wrote a letter to Andrew.

  Dear Brother to Be,

  I beg you to allow me to have dinner alone tonight with William. I wish to discuss things of a far more tender nature than you would wish to hear. I promise, nothing too very improper, but things we should discuss. I will not weary him or upset him before his trial; indeed, speaking of something else for a time may well strengthen him.

  Your sister in spirit,

  Tasmin

  The response was quick. She was carefully putting things away in the cupboards, still trying to make sense out of the chaos the soldiers had left behind, when a young man came to her door, the son of Andrew’s cook.

  Tasmin,

  This is most unusual. But very well. It will give me a chance to sup with my family, which I have not properly done this many weeks. You have promised not to upset him, and I hold you to your word. I do not have to tell you how greatly his state of mind at the proceedings tomorrow will matter. Also, I must beg you, for the sake of the name you shall soon bear, not to do anything foolish. William may not give a fig, but that does not mean you should not.

  Andrew

  She rolled her eyes. “That man is such a prig. I do hope I shall be able to survive William’s family. About the man himself, I worry not. But his family!” Moru landed on her shoulder. I will take care of them if they try to hurt you, he growled. Noru, his twin and the sunnier of the two, landed on the other. You are ours.

  “Behave, my little loves,” she said, “I beg. They cannot hurt my body. But I do worry about my sanity.”

  She climbed back up onto a stool, packing things in one of the cabinets, then sighed when she realized she’d missed yet another mold. Even though chocolate candy making was a new concept to their land, other lands had a plethora of molds, and it seemed William had obsessively tracked down and collected every single one. At least it felt like it as she stepped down from the stool, grabbed the offending mold off the table, and climbed back up to place it with the others.

  “I am under so much worry. When the worry ends, and we are back to, well, the way things should be, I will be perfectly able to deal with his family.”

  She shut the cupboard firmly.

  “After all, would-be mages going through the angst and pain of trying to grow up and harness their power have nothing over a group of snobbish, southern, priggish ... merchanters.”

  She slid a look around the room at her invisible friends. “Please don’t tell William I spoke so.”

  With that, she grabbed her cloak. She was already dressed very plainly. Like every other lady of sense she had pockets, small pouches attached to a belt and tied around the waist, filled with the things she would need for her day. She slipped her hands into the slit seam in her dress and made sure she had her tiny knife, the one she used for pruning, and her money pouch. She left by the back door, which opened and shut without her lifting a hand, and went to the prison.

  Once there, she forced herself to be nice to the guards, speaking to them for a few moments while she made a point of hanging her cloak next to the door. She was making sure that both the men present knew she did not have a basket, a purse, or anything that might be remembered later when the authorities investigated. If either of them noticed that her hair, even in its tight updo, was waving in an unseen breeze, no one said.

  When she finally went in to see William, he was buried in his notes. Papers were spread across the cot he was sitting on, one leg on the cot, one leg on the floor. He looked casual, but his expression was intent, and he did not notice her as she laced her wrists through the cell bars, watching him. “William?”

  He looked up and smiled at her, standing carefully so as not to disturb things. “You’re here early! I was just looking over my old ship ledgers; my brother brought them from the warehouse and I was hoping I could find something of use.” He bowed when he reached the bars, and she returned a curtsey that made the sprite sitting on her shoulder squeak and flutter to rebalance itself. “Are you well?”

  “Quite, though I can’t stay long, and you shall not see me later. I don’t want the guards to think I had time to pass you something or witch the bars or whatever.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Miss Bey, what are you planning?”

  “Nothing, nothing,” she waved her hand dismissively. “Now, I am going to spend the day trying to find some information. Where should I look?”

  “I certainly do not wish you to poke around. I couldn’t stand it if you got hurt.”

  She nodded, as if he’d said something completely different. “You’re right. I shall go right to the port admiral and see what he has to say about all this.”

  “Don’t you dare.” His eyes turned dark. “Please, don’t. You are a very clever person, but he is cunning and he will trap you before you know it.”

  “Then to whom? William, please, give me something to do.”

  “Andrew’s promised to begin speaking with people today. Meet with us for dinner, and perhaps we can think of something.”

  She shook her head. “He won’t be here, either.”

  “Bloody ... why not?”

  “Business doesn’t come to a stand still just because a son who is no longer important to it is in jail,” she said, as if mimicking someone.

  “You sound as if you’ve met my father.”

  “Not had that pleasure, no.”

  “What are you doing, Tasmin?” He looked into her eyes. “You have some scheme brewing, and I won’t take no, or nothing, or you’ll see don’t worry for an answer.”

  She took the vibrating, warm puff of breeze off her shoulder, and placed it next to his neck. “Take care of her, she’s fragile.”

  “What is she?” he asked, his eyes widening. If Tasmin knew Tatu, she was now patting her small, warm hands along his jaw.


  “A friend. Take care, William. I am sorry we shall not see each other for dinner.”

  He grabbed her hand. “If you leave, you may not see me again.” For murders of this nature, the prisoner was taken to the court. He would stay there until the trial was over, and if he was found guilty, it would be straight to the gallows. They would never have another chance to speak again.

  “I will,” she said, firmly.

  He waited a long moment, then let go. “As you wish. Fare well, Tasmin.”

  She gave him a comforting smile and left. She wished she could tell him of his future escape, but she didn’t want to risk being overheard, or the plan somehow being discovered. It was overcautious, perhaps, but she was frightened. The man they’d hanged yesterday had been dangerously mad, apparently he’d run through the market place howling and randomly biting people. They had kept him long enough to see if his malady could be cured, and when they concluded it was not possible, and that he would only continue to be a danger to all (it was, William had told her, the third time he’d attacked people, this final time being the most severe), he was taken out and executed.

  Standing near the gibbet where that poor man had lost his life, she thought this an unjust, terrifying place. Surely they could have done something else? And if they were so cruel to those of addled minds, what more would they do to someone in control of his thoughts?

  She passed under the shadow of the gallows on her way to the main market street, and shivered. What would they do to a man who escaped, or the woman who aided him?

  The main market street began at the entrance of town, the grand arch of stone and iron that had once been part of a huge wall. It crossed the main square where merchants and farmers and peddlers set up their stalls on market days and ended in a small park overlooking the harbor. William had bought a store in the better district, almost halfway between the gate and the central square.