Chantress Alchemy

by Amy Butler Greenfield

  “All we have is Flamel’s own word for it. And legends. And stories. But that’s not proof, no matter what Sir Isaac thinks. In the end, alchemy’s a gamble—and yet it’s all the King and Council are willing to spend money on.” He paused. “Well, that and Wrexham’s castles.”

  “You mean the fortifications that Penebrygg was talking about?”

  “Yes. Wrexham says these are perilous times, and we need to shore up the old strongholds against rebellion. Shore up his own holdings, more like,” Nat said in disgust. “Almost all the money so far has gone to his own lands. Which grow more extensive all the time.”

  “And the King allows this?” I asked.

  “Some say he’s rewarding Wrexham for putting down the Berwick rebellion,” Nat said. “And for saving his life.”

  “So Wrexham really did save him?”

  “Yes. He’s a fearless warrior, I’ll give him that. When the King’s saddle twisted beneath him in the battle, Wrexham and his men held back the attackers and dragged him to safety.”

  “So the King gives him whatever he wants, in gratitude?”

  “That might be why, yes,” Nat said. “But maybe the King feels he can’t afford to say no. Wrexham’s holdings extend from the Welsh borderlands up through the North of England; no other lord controls so much land. He has the power to split England in two.”

  I hadn’t understood before quite how powerful Wrexham was. It was sobering news.

  “Anyway, there you have it.” Nat ran a hand through his dark hair. “We’re spending every last coin in the Treasury on Wrexham’s forts and Sir Isaac’s alchemy, and there’s not a penny left for anything else.”

  “Alchemy costs a lot?”

  “I’ll say. Flamel’s ingredients cost the earth. We’ve also had to build an entirely new laboratory and an astronomical observatory, all to Sir Isaac’s demanding specifications. And, of course, we’ve had to pay for extra soldiers and guards to protect the whole place.”

  “What would you spend the money on instead?” I asked.

  “Real things. Practical things.”

  “Like . . .” I prompted.

  “Potatoes.”

  I blinked at the unexpected response. I’d heard of potatoes—a new food from America—but I’d never actually eaten them. “Why on earth . . . ?”

  “The blight,” Nat explained. “We need new crops that can resist it. When I was over in Holland, I found some European wheat varieties that might work, but I discovered that potatoes are even better—easier to plant, and a much better yield. But everyone at Court is too obsessed with alchemy to think the idea is worth pursuing. Wait till we can make gold, they keep saying.”

  “Even Penebrygg?”

  “When we talk about it, he agrees there’s some sense in what I say. But alchemy has him dazzled. I don’t see much of him these days. He’s always in Sir Isaac’s laboratory.” Nat looked discouraged. “Like the rest of them, he thinks the Stone will be the end of all our troubles.”

  It was hard to know what to tell him. Perhaps his skepticism in alchemy was justified. But could he really be completely right, and everyone else completely wrong?

  I shifted on my stool. “Maybe it won’t turn out as badly as you fear,” I said. “Sir Isaac could be right, you know. If we find that crucible, maybe he’ll make so much gold we can buy whatever we want. Including your potatoes.”

  Nat put his head in his hands. “Don’t you start too.”

  “I’m not trying to take sides, Nat. But I think we have to hope, for everyone’s sake, that Sir Isaac’s alchemy works. Even if you planted potatoes now, you’d have to wait months to harvest them. And people are hungry now.”

  “Yes, they are,” Nat said, lifting his head. “And a fortnight ago, when I was still in Holland, I found some merchants who can ship us potatoes right away. Not just seed potatoes, but potatoes to eat as well—tons of them, all much cheaper than wheat. I’m talking about real food, Lucy. Not wish-on-a-star alchemy. But we have to pay for it, and the King and Council say they don’t have a penny to spare.”

  “You need the money now?”

  “As soon as possible.” Nat’s jaw sharpened. “If we don’t buy them, someone else will. And it’s our best chance to save people from starving.”

  Money. I was so used to not having any that it took me a moment to remember my circumstances had changed. Along with my refuge in Norfolk, the King had granted me the estate that had belonged to my godmother before Scargrave had stolen it. It was a substantial inheritance. “Why don’t you borrow some money from me?”

  Nat shook his head. “The sum I need is probably more than you’ve got, and I doubt the Council would let you give it away, anyhow. They’re holding the money in trust for you, or so I’ve heard. Besides, there are others who can afford it more.”

  “Who?”

  “King Henry, for one. He has far more palaces than he can visit in a year, and half of them are filled with treasures he never looks at.”

  “And he won’t give any of them up?”

  “Left to himself, I think he might. But Wrexham’s always at his ear, saying it would look like weakness, that it would set a bad example. And of course it would be a bad example—for Wrexham. He collects estates and jewels the way some people collect skipping stones, and he doesn’t want to have to yield up a single one. But if he and his friends all gave a little, we’d have enough.”

  “You make it sound as if there’s no need for alchemy,” I said.

  “There isn’t.” Nat was emphatic. “Even if it does work—and I doubt it will—it’ll just create more problems.”

  “What kind of problems?”

  “To start with, no one knows for sure what the powers of such a Stone would be.”

  “Sir Isaac says—”

  “He thinks he knows,” Nat said. “But how can he? Everything about the Stone is shrouded in mystery. If it turns out it really can make men immortal, what do we do then? Who will we give it to? Who will control it?”

  “The King?” I ventured.

  “Perhaps at first. But how long would that last? Even if all the Stone can do is make gold, every man in Europe will be after it, and probably half the rest of the world, too. And the moment the Stone falls into bad hands, where will we be?” He shook his head. “It may look like a solution, but we’re better off without it.”

  Gently, I said, “I think maybe you’re worrying too far ahead.”

  “Someone has to.”

  “But why you?”

  A slightly rueful note entered his voice. “Because I’m built that way.”

  Too true. Nat never just accepted an idea. Instead, he thought it through from every angle, and he had a skeptic’s talent for asking awkward questions. To ask him to be different would be to ask him not to be Nat. Yet in this case, I feared he was just borrowing trouble—for himself, most of all.

  “I’m worried half out of my mind about you as well,” he went on. “This alchemy obsession keeps the Council from thinking straight. How could they ask you to sing the moonbriar song like that, as if there were no consequences? And what will they ask you to do next?”

  “I’m worried about that too,” I confessed.

  He leaned forward on his makeshift seat, every line in his body tense. “I swear I’ll do everything in my power to keep you safe, Lucy.”

  His fierce concern made me catch my breath. Yet when I leaned toward him, he stood up without a word, fists clenched.

  “Nat?” I rose too, but I misjudged the small space. My shoulder bumped against his, and he put out a hand to steady me. I had a moment to wonder what was in his eyes, and then his arms were around me, and we were kissing as if we could not bear to stop.

  Oh, those kisses! So heady and bittersweet. In them I tasted each day we’d spent apart and each letter gone astray.

  But he was here now, I reminded myself. Here with his deft hands tangled in my hair. Here with his warm lips on mine. My heart raced as our kisses deepened.

&
nbsp; Yet when I reached to pull him closer, he broke away. “I . . . can’t,” he said, sounding dazed. “I shouldn’t. Not when—”

  Still dazed myself, I waited for him to finish, but he didn’t.

  “Not when what?” I asked.

  “We have to get you back.” He sounded shaken but determined. “You’ll be missed.”

  “But we—”

  “I’ll show you the way.” Pulling back from me, he peeked through a spy hole in the panel, then opened the door and slipped out.

  There was nothing I could do but follow him.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  SYBIL

  Within minutes we were skirting past the massive pillars again and threading our way through a doorway I hadn’t seen before. As we padded down quiet staircases and echoing galleries, I was reminded of the many expeditions we had taken through Gadding House when he was training me in spycraft last year. Then, too, he had kept a certain distance between us.

  But why was he keeping his distance now? The question ate away at me.

  At last we halted in the shadows of a quiet room that I vaguely recognized as being near my own.

  “I should leave you here,” Nat whispered. “It’s still unwise for us to be seen together. More so than ever, I imagine, given how the Council session went. Can you find your way back?”

  “I think so. But Nat—”

  “What?”

  Why did you stop kissing me? It was too bald a question; I couldn’t ask it when his eyes were so remote. Instead, I said, “You never told me: Why wouldn’t the Council let you visit me?”

  “Tomorrow,” he said softly. “I promise I’ll explain everything tomorrow.”

  I thought for a second that he would reach for me, but instead, he moved away.

  “But where will I find you?”

  “I’ll find you. It’s safest that way.” By now he was moving out of whispering distance, but I could see his lips shape the words. “Take care. Watch your back.”

  “And you.”

  I kept up a brave face, but as he disappeared from sight, my fears about Wrexham and his spies rushed in on me. What if they had seen Nat escorting me back here?

  Knock on wood they haven’t, I told myself. And if they come across me now, at least I can make sure they don’t see me staring after him.

  Mustering up all my resolution, I walked toward my rooms. I was nearly there when I heard someone behind me.

  “Lucy? Is that you?” The voice, young and sweetly tuneful, was the most beautiful I’d ever heard.

  Startled, I turned to find a tall girl about my own age coming up to me. Rosy and dimpled, with golden-blonde hair knotted in artful curls, she had a face as lovely as her voice.

  “Oh, Lucy! It is you.” Her rich soprano was full of joy. “You do remember me, don’t you?”

  Remember her? As I stared, she smiled. “Oh dear, I see you don’t. I’m Sybil Dashwood. You stayed with me for a whole summer when we were seven, at Dashwood Hall. All of you came to visit: you and your mother and Norrie.”

  I had no recollection of her at all. But that didn’t mean much. To protect me, my mother had once sung a song-spell of forgetfulness. It had worked only too well, destroying many of my childhood memories, especially the ones that involved my mother herself in some way.

  But was it really possible that an entire summer of my life had been wiped away? Maybe this beautiful girl was lying to me. I would have to tread carefully.

  “Oh, I am sorry,” I said. “I didn’t recognize you. It was a long time ago, I’m afraid. And, er . . . you’ve grown.”

  “So have you,” she said, laughter in her voice.

  “Not as much as you, I think.” Although I told myself that appearances didn’t matter, I felt a twinge of envy. Tall and radiant, Sybil was wearing a rose-and-gold gown that fit her curvy figure beautifully.

  “Fine feathers, that’s all.” She dismissed her silken flounces with a grin. “Underneath, I’m still the same girl you knew. Cross my heart, three times.”

  The silly saying had the ring of a childhood vow. Had it been ours? I smiled at her in case it was. “You know, I don’t remember why we came to visit you—”

  “Chantress business, I suspect,” Sybil said calmly.

  I looked at her in astonishment. “Are you a Chantress too?”

  The words burst out of me before I had time to think them through. Maybe this was something I ought to have known already, something Sybil would expect me to remember. But fortunately, she didn’t seem taken aback by my question.

  “Oh no.” Sybil shook her head so vigorously that it set her golden ringlets bouncing. “I know they had hopes for me, back when I last saw you, but the magic died out with my grandmother, I’m afraid.”

  “So your grandmother was a Chantress . . . and yet you aren’t?”

  Sybil nodded. “Grandmama was very wise, but she wasn’t a very powerful Chantress, by all accounts. And not a single one of her daughters inherited the gift. Mama hoped I would be a throwback, but I haven’t a bit of magic in me.”

  She smiled, but beneath the charm I saw a certain sadness.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Oh, heavens, don’t think it’s a worry to me! Quite the opposite, in fact. Magic’s a terrible responsibility. All things considered, I’ve had a lucky escape.” She put a hand to her mouth. “Oh dear. I shouldn’t have said that, should I? To you of all people.”

  She looked so horrified that I couldn’t help it—I started to laugh. With an air of relief, she joined in.

  “It’s still my besetting sin,” she confessed. “I’m forever putting my foot in my mouth.”

  It was hard to believe someone so frank could be lying to me. “Never mind,” I said. “It’s true: magic is a terrible responsibility.”

  “But it’s one you’ve handled well.” Her heart-shaped face was full of honest admiration. “If it had been up to me to defeat Scargrave, I’d still be cowering in a corner somewhere. Or, more likely, vanished into that Raven Pit of his.” She shrugged in self-deprecation. “I suppose it’s just as well Mama and I moved to France before he ever came to power. Having a Chantress grandmother was as good as a death warrant during his reign. And he didn’t care overmuch whether there was any magic left in the family or not.”

  “But you found safe haven in France?”

  “Well, to a point. Scargrave had a long reach. Even in France, it was necessary for us to be discreet about our origins. And you can imagine just how hard that was for me.” Her lips quirked, but again I saw the sadness in her eyes. “I had a habit of saying the wrong thing to the wrong people, and then we would have to move again. Mama was so frustrated with me.”

  “Is your mother here with you now?” I asked.

  The sadness in Lady Sybil’s eyes deepened. “I’m afraid Mama died last spring, in Paris.”

  It was my turn to feel as if I’d said the wrong thing. I knew all too well how terrible it was to lose a mother. “I’m sorry,” I said awkwardly.

  Sybil acknowledged my words with a gentle nod. “You’re very kind. She’d been ill for some time, so it wasn’t unexpected, but I miss her a great deal. And, of course, it’s been rather difficult moving back here.”

  “You’re living with your father?”

  “No. He died just before Mama and I left for France. But his sister has taken me in. And her husband, of course—but it’s Aunt Goring who made the decision. She was quite a bit older than my father, and her children are all grown up.” With an openness that would have surprised me in anyone else, Sybil added, “I think she’s hoping I’ll make an advantageous match, and be of use to the family. In fact, that’s why I’m here at Greenwich. Aunt Goring wished me to be presented at Court. We only meant to be here for a few days, but then the crucible was stolen, and we were all commanded to stay. I’ve been here ever since. And by now, of course, I’m out of my mind with boredom.”

  Her face was so comic I couldn’t help laughing again—and oh, how good
it felt to do that, after all the fearful events of the day.

  I said impulsively, “Why don’t you come to my rooms, and we’ll have some supper together?”

  “Oh no. That wouldn’t be right. Why, anyone can see you’re half wilting from exhaustion. And no wonder, after your long journey. Besides, Aunt Goring will be wondering where I am.”

  “Well, then come and see me tomorrow.”

  “I will,” Sybil said. “With the greatest of pleasure. But for now, get some rest.” She grinned. “And remember to put some bay leaves on your pillow for Valentine’s Day.”

  “Valentine’s Day?”

  “It’s tomorrow. They say if you pin the leaves onto your pillow, then you’ll dream of your true love tonight.”

  I’d never heard of this, but then I knew barely anything about Valentine’s Day. “And if I don’t have any bay leaves?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t worry,” Sybil said, laughing. “It’s just an old tale, you know. They also say the first man you meet on Valentine’s Day will be your sweetheart—and goodness knows that’s hardly ever true.” Quick as a bird, she kissed me on the cheek. “Sleep well, dear Lucy! I’m so glad we’ve met again.”

  Only after she left, and I was out of the orbit of her charm, did I wonder if I’d been right to be so friendly with her. After all, Wrexham had told me point-blank that he had spies everywhere. Maybe Sybil was one of them.

  Or was I just seeing spies everywhere?

  I need rest . . . and food.

  Rounding the corner, I was relieved to see the gilded lions that marked the entrance to my rooms. I was disconcerted, however, to learn quite how accessible those rooms were. The first door bristled with an assortment of locks, but none of them appeared to be in use. At any rate, I’d received no keys for them, and they had all been left open. I halted for a moment in the tiny antechamber to examine the second door. This had no locks at all.

  I opened it and stopped dead. There was someone in the room.

  Caught between panic and anger, I sized her up: a girl all in gray, perhaps a couple of years older than I was. Although she was short, you could see the strength in her wiry body, and in her well-muscled forearms and wrists. Her face, cold as the North Sea, gave nothing away.