The Chocolatier's Wife

by Cindy Lynn Speer

  “Wonderful idea.” She imitated his move. “And while we’re at it, we shall pretend I have a non-deadly but vicious disease and you’re secretly afraid to touch me for fear of getting it.”

  “You have no spontaneity.”

  “I am a lady, sir. I have not the slightest idea what that word means.”

  Chapter 23

  Julait eighth,

  Gold Moon Quarter 1792

  Dear William,

  While of course I support wholeheartedly any endeavor which will bring yourself and our family wealth and happiness, I would be greatly pleased if next time you would choose to inform me before anyone else. Though I am far too lowly, being only your future wife, to consult before making any life changing plans, it is always much more pleasant for me if, when my mother is waving a around letter from a distant cousin and shrieking that I have caused the ruin of us all, that I am in full understanding of what, exactly, I am being blamed.

  Yours, eventually,

  Tasmin

  William could not sleep, so he spent a good measure of the early morning roasting cocoa Beans. He had bought pure liquor from a trusted source to get him started, but knew to be a true chocolatier he had to make his own. He watched the fire carefully, turning the pods and generally obsessing over the process, worrying over the nibs.

  He had selected two types of beans. The first type, Forastero, seemed to roast faster than the Criollo. The latter was much more expensive, so he watched it with all the more care. When he wasn’t obsessing over getting the roasting just right, cooked thoroughly through but short of burnt, he was thinking about the murder, about his family, and about the Pandora Chase.

  Part of him was having a hard time believing that everything was so closely connected, that the poor Bishop was almost incidental to the whole, save that he had, apparently, held in his possession something Lavoussier (or someone, but he was willing to bet on Lavoussier if for no other reason than the man wanted to destroy his family) wanted very badly. Something he must have gotten on the Pandora Chase, for that was the only time that he and the Bishop ever had any true communication. Any other exchanges between himself and the clergyman had been strictly business in nature, and fruit was gotten readily enough. No need to kill for that.

  He placed the roasting pans on cooling racks, and then cleared off the grinding table. He ran his hand along the saddle-shaped stone. If he set it in place and scrubbed it down, not only would it be ready for him to start the grinding, but more time would have passed, and the hour would be a little more proper for visiting. He even started the project, but he was feeling restless, and the nibs would need hulled and winnowed before he got to the grinding anyway, so he decided to go and change to arrive at family’s house just past breakfast.

  His mother saw him coming down the path, and opened the door herself. “If you wish to see your intended, the answer is no. I have had quite enough of all of this informality.”

  “Give it up, mother. This is a battle you’ve already lost.” He took her by the shoulders and gently pushed her back, then went into the parlor to wait. Tasmin was seated there already, so, without preamble he asked her what had been bothering him all morning. “What do you suppose the Heart of Ithalia is?”

  She blinked, then held out her hand, presenting to him the woman in the other chair. “Aunt Elyria, this is my intended, William of the House of Almsley. William, you may recall my aunt is my mother’s sister, and an elementalist. Aunt, you may recall I told you that William never looks before he leaps.”

  He bowed to Tasmin’s aunt. “My pleasure, ma’am.” She smiled faintly, but he thought she looked amused.

  “To answer your question, William,” Tasmin said, “I have no idea what you are talking about, but perhaps you will sit with us?”

  “I would be honored.” He settled into a chair.

  “For shame, Tasmin, I thought your education a bit more thorough than that,” her Aunt said. “I knew I should have pushed for you to go to Bearboune, you would have done so well.”

  Tasmin rolled her eyes and poured William’s tea, fixing it as he liked without any apparent pause to think about it. He wondered if it was on the list of things women trained themselves to do, like tying cravats and spotting dust on their husband’s jackets at 30 leagues.

  He smiled at Tasmin as he took the cup. “Well, Elemental Lady Elyria, if you would be so kind as to inform us, I would be most grateful.”

  “He is charming. You are right, Tasmin. I shall reserve my judgment on whether he is too charming for his own good until later. Now, let’s see. I am going to assume that you are as sadly educated as my darling niece, here, and start from the beginning, if that suits?” She paused to let him nod, and then she did so, and this is the story that she told:

  “Years upon years ago, a group of witches controlled the seas. They had been cast off of land for their varying and dire crimes, and so they divided the waters amongst themselves to create their own domain. One of them, it is said, was so particularly evil that the others feared her, and so they killed her, and took her heart, and made it into a most powerful amulet. The person who controlled the Heart of Ithalia could navigate through the Strait of Sorrows and the Sea of Pain itself, and find a route to the lands beyond, and wealth unimaginable.”

  This was an impressive feat, for the two places she had named had not been called so out of poetry. Many had died trying to sail the strait, hoping to find a way to the lands and riches beyond. The Sea of Pain was teeming with the most terrible of sea creatures, and those few who survived the strait would probably be taken by the sea.

  William sipped his tea thoughtfully. “It is true that if one could make their way through they could connect to the Empire of Zyrekia and the lands of Sophalia. They would be able to control trade. If one could acquire silk in a month rather than half a year, or all the exotic fruits that one would like to bring back, but can’t because they spoil before they even reach here, one’s wealth would be enormous.”

  “Do you think Lavoussier would consider that? Be willing to risk everything he has on the chance the story is true?” Tasmin looked quite thoughtful.

  “Of course it’s true. My mentor saw it herself.” Elyria shrugged, and took some more tea.

  “She went to the Bearboune,” Tasmin said knowingly, and William nodded as if everything now made sense.

  “What was it like?” he asked. “Not Bearboune, but the Heart,” he added with a smile.

  “She said it was amazingly plain. Like a stone. Square shaped, gray.” Elyria shrugged. “But she also said that, placed at the prow of a ship, it would part the weather. And that, my children, is something I’m sure people would kill for.”

  “Would it protect a ship, even if not on the prow?” he asked, leaning forward.

  “Probably. It does need to be controlled, though. It needs the wishes of someone to pull from, if for nothing else because it feeds off intentions and energies, like a parasite.”

  He got up and began pacing. “But it doesn’t make sense. If the pirates had such a device, why did they not use it to defend themselves?” He looked at his hands, moving them as if along imaginary waves, reenacting the battle in his head. “We caught the weather gauge. The wind brought us right about and we were able to blow her to matchsticks. If I had such a thing, I would have taken the wind right from my enemy’s sails, left them in my wake, not engaged in a three-day-long chase.”

  “Well,” Elyria said, “she was evil. Perhaps perversely so.”

  Tasmin didn’t quite like that idea. “Or perhaps the person who knew how to control it was killed in battle? Magic items often get an affinity for things, for people. Perhaps the death somehow shocked it? I remember there was a wand that no one could use because it mourned the wizard who used to wield it.” William was looking at her oddly, and so she asked, “What?”

  “You speak almost as if these things
become alive. Granted, the amulet of which we speak was once a heart, but, talk like that, ‘tis like saying the ship’s wheel misses me, or the quill has become dull and lifeless and won’t write well any more because I have turned to another that I favor more. Things do not have life.”

  The look the two women gave him was such that he was tempted to feel around to see if he’d sprouted a new body part.

  “Well. Maybe it does miss you. Have you never been on a ship that handled poorly at first, but as time went on its improvement was marked?” Tasmin spoke quite reasonably, as if certain she could convince him.

  “That’s because you learn the ship’s ways, not because it decided it liked you, dear.”

  Tasmin sniffed and waved him off. “Anyway, it is possible that the pirates found it and made off with it. Where was it when your mentor heard of it?”

  “I don’t know,” Elyria admitted. “We don’t even know that it was, in fact, on the ship. It may have sunk to the bottom of the sea when your young man took the Pandora.”

  “No,” William said, “it was on my ship. There was a storm off of the vales, near the Strait of Sorrows. There was no way we should have survived it, but all of a sudden, the veil of storm parted on either side of us, and we were safe. Later, I saw the Bishop, looking both exulted and terrified. I teased him about it, said that he didn’t have to be scared now, ‘twas a sunny day. I thought the amulet Tasmin sent was the reason for our survival, but later when I thanked her she did not seem to think it was powerful enough for that.”

  “It wasn’t,” she said. “Anyway, would Lavoussier know if either you or the Bishop had it?”

  “He thinks so, because he marked it on the manifest. You see, the Bishop and his assistant crossed over after we took the Pandora. We thought, or at least I did, that he was coming over to help the injured and say a few words for the dead, but he would have had plenty of time to search the ship.”

  “Well, we can assume William doesn’t have it, am I correct? You’ve been through all your things since you came back ashore?” Elyria looked worried, and if what she said about the stone was right, they all should be.

  “Positive. Nothing in my bags I couldn’t identify. Besides, over a year later, we ran through a storm that almost killed us all. That bit of fortune, that we survived, could be credited to your work, Tasmin. In any case, neither the Heart nor the Bishop were on the ship.”

  “He had ample time and excuse to search the Bishop’s home from top to bottom, because of the murder, but would someone really kill a man just so he would have a legal excuse to spend ages searching ... oh, do stop staring at me, it is a valid question, and I suppose you both think the answer a resounding yes.” Tasmin frowned at them both.

  William snapped his fingers. “And that’s why he framed me, because he wanted to have me put away long enough for him to search every crevice of my shop.” He grinned, a tad embarrassed. “I guess this wasn’t about Lavoussier’s dislike for me at all, was it?”

  Tasmin patted his leg. “Of course it is about you, dear, at least a little, so don’t feel too badly that the evil mastermind’s plot wasn’t set up to specifically make your life misery.” She stood up in a rustle of cloth. “We should go back to the shop and take another look.”

  William frowned. “No offense, but he had three weeks. We’ve also cleaned it quite thoroughly.”

  “True. But I believe that another search might just provide the answer to another question. Why did the Bishop buy a shop on Market row?”

  “To hide something in plain sight? But I would have seen it. Or you would certainly have sensed it.”

  She held out her hand. “Indulge me?”

  He heaved himself up out of the chair. “Very well. Perhaps your aunt will accompany us?”

  “Only far enough to give you a veneer of propriety, then I must meet with my companions. You will tell me what you find?”

  “Of course! Which will be nothing, but I shall make the best of things by introducing dear Tasmin to the wonderful world of cocoa bean husking.”

  “It will be most educational to watch you, I’m sure, but perhaps I should take a book to read, instead.” Tasmin allowed him to put her cloak on her before stepping outside. She truly wanted to ask what her aunt made of William, but there would be no time now.

  “You could read to me!” he said cheerfully as he shut the door to the house, and they went down the path.

  “I could. A stirring fable about how a shepherd won the love of a princess.”

  “Or a moral tale about a woman’s duty to her husband?”

  “Careful, I could still run away, couldn’t I, Auntie?”

  “I refrain from commenting on relationships, dear, even yours. But now our ways must part. Take care of yourself, William, but most especially take care of my niece.”

  “I shall.”

  “That means no enforced labor,” Tasmin said, after her aunt had left and they were on their way to the chocolate shop.

  “But of course!” He grinned at her. A few moments later he asked, “What will you be doing, once we are married?”

  “I’m not sure, really. Keep up with my herbals, though sitting around and eating chocolate and looking pretty all day has some allure.”

  “You would be quite decorative; perhaps you’d even bring up my sales, for they would say, ‘look there at that beautiful woman. Perhaps eating chocolate will make me just as lovely.’”

  They approached the shop, but for the first time in ages, no sprites opened the door for them She wondered where they were, as William took out the key and slipped it into the lock. The place was so cold it was as if her very marrow had turned to ice. Then she saw them, floating, suspended in air.

  “I can see the sprites.” He gently raised his hand, where one lay, mid back flip, hovering in place. They looked like etched glass, white outlines of legs and heads and back and bellies, frozen in shock.

  “We must ... ” She paused and swallowed. “We must gather them up. Someone froze them, the water in their bodies is frozen, that’s why we can see them. They are really very little more than magic and moist air.”

  He’d already crossed the room, watching his step as he went to get a basket from behind the counter. She saw him get a towel, as well, to weigh them down and keep them contained. She began carefully plucking them out of the air and placing them in the basket, the heat from Tasmin’s and William’s bodies slowly making the air shift. Now, as they moved, the sprites began to bob a little, the spell that kept them in place beginning to lose its power.

  “We shall have to reheat them gradually.” Tasmin could not hide her upset. They were like children to her, and she felt angry and helpless at the same time. “I will finish. I have a feeling that the stove has been put out, would you mind?”

  “Not in the least.” William gently placed Moru under the cloth in the basket.

  She counted the little bodies as she collected them, each one felt hollow and delicate, like a snowflake itself. It was as close as she had ever come to really knowing what they looked like, their pointed ears, their huge eyes and long, delicate limbs. She searched diligently and finally found the last one, hiding uselessly against a table leg.

  She tucked the cloth a little tighter, then held the basket in her lap, feeling a bit frozen herself. She’d never heard of anyone freezing a sprite. They were so delicate, so innocent, she felt as if she had failed in a very important charge. She huddled around the basket, hoping her body heat would help.

  “Moist air?” William mused, bringing in a bucket of water from the well. “We could boil some water, perhaps hold the basket over a cauldron or something?”

  “Maybe?”

  “All will be right, sweetheart.” He stroked her hair before getting a pot and putting it on the stove. Next, he rigged a chain from a hook buried deep in the ceiling beam, then took the basket gently off o
f her and suspended it over the pot. “There. That will do it. No sense you holding it.”

  “They’ve been with me for so long. I feel so guilty, leaving them here to be attacked by some monster.”

  “And I feel angry, wondering who the devil broke into my home. Nay, I’m not wondering, I know who, and I am greatly vexed. He had three weeks to turn this building over stem to stern. How bloody dare he keep coming and going like he owns the place?”

  “Maybe he feels like he does.” She got up and went into the back. There was the pantry, the cooling racks in their tent of wool. She tried to remember exactly where the door had been, and as she approached the wall, she called forth some of her basic elementals training, placing her hands on the rock. Her eyes fell closed, and she thought of herself as inside the stone, part of it, seeking the patterns in the stone. If one was good enough, one could urge a hidden door to reveal itself. It was like walking through a cold, ungiving maze, and wading through the mire to do it, but it was not something she would give up on.

  William pulled her gently back from the wall, out of the way as the door opened just a crack. She let out a breath and smiled.

  “Your aunt would be proud of you for finding this. I had no idea this was here.”

  “Neither did I until, well, the first night I was here, or was it the second? The sprites were playing and found it by accident.”

  He took a lamp and lit it, peering into the tiny room. “Did you think I was going to make you sleep here? Or were you looking for a hiding place?”

  “A hiding place, indeed. You see, that was my clever plan, the day they set you free. I was going to have the wind sprites undo the lock so you could sneak out, and then you could hide here!”

  He did not look overly impressed.

  “I thought you were going to get yourself executed. I was desperate.”

  His expression changed abruptly, and he kissed her forehead. “Of course, sweetheart, I meant nothing. I was thinking this construction looked a bit newer, see? The stones aren’t the same type.”