The Alchemist's Daughter

by Mary Lawrence

  Not a single rat stirred. However, they would soon rouse, and when they did, she wanted them secured in their individual cages. Bianca opened the satchel and dumped the reed cylinders out on the pier. Working quickly, she pulled a rat out by its tail and dropped it in a cage. She tied the opening closed with a length of jute, then poked the rat with her finger to be sure it was alive. The rat bared its teeth, and she dropped it in her sack.

  She grabbed a second cage and a second rat, and it wasn’t long before she had all the rats she needed secured in the makeshift cages. The remaining rats she kicked into the water. Bianca pulled the satchel closed, pausing to blow into her fists to warm them. A dog barked in the distance, and at her feet the river sloshed against the wood pier. She thought how cold she was and rewound her scarf about her neck, tucking the ends into her bodice to keep her chest warm. With a grunt, Bianca hefted the satchel onto her back. Soon she would be back in front of her stove. She was taking a step toward the stairs when an orb of yellow light caught her eye.

  The light moved along the riverbank in an easy arcing swing of someone walking. On closer inspection she saw three men, one carrying a lantern and a pair of oars and another dragging two cumbersome sacks. The third followed, lagging behind the others as he stepped carefully through the muck. Bianca crouched, fearing they might see her, but the men were intent on locating a particular skiff, one dragged to shore and guarded by a lock and chain.

  The man with the sacks hefted them into the boat, then lifted the heavy padlock and asked for the key. The man holding the lantern tossed the oars into the skiff. He held the lamp aloft, illuminating all their faces as he fumbled through a pocket then withdrew a key. Bianca sucked in her breath.

  Wynders.

  Anticipation shot through her veins.

  “Row to starboard,” Wynders said, handing him the key. “The captain is expecting you, though I suspect you will have to rouse them. If they are any less sotted than the other day, I’d be smacked. These mates are long on drink and short of temper. Quarantine does that to a crew.” Wynders glanced at the third man catching up to them, then continued his instructions. “They’ll set down the bodies, and you lay them on the oil rags. Use the rush lights to set it ablaze. And don’t set the Cristofur on fire in the wake of it.”

  The man grumbled something inaudible, and Wynders answered, “I’ll meet you when she’s out of quarantine and pay you then.” He stepped back as the man dropped the chain on the mudflat and dragged the boat into the water.

  Bianca stayed as still as stone, watching the rowboat fold into the fog. How he’d find his way to the Cristofur in this thick she couldn’t imagine.

  Wynders led the other man to a wall next to the quay, where they sat atop their perch, with the lamp in between. If it weren’t for the glow of light, Bianca would have had a difficult time locating them. She could see they kept their attention on the river and spoke little, but how long would it be before they noticed her?

  Bianca glanced about anxiously. A coil of rope nearly as high as her shoulders was her only chance of staying hidden. She crouched behind it and worried the rats might start to hiss and the sound would give her away. She lowered her head at an unnatural angle, trying to hide. Her neck cramped, but she would not leave without her traps, nor could she chance Wynders spying her.

  A rat nosed her foot. She pushed it away with the toe of her boot, but it came back, threatening to climb into her lap. She jammed a fist in her mouth, smothering a shriek that inched up her throat. Glancing at Wynders, she quickly plucked the thing by its tail and hurled it in the water. The men looked toward the splash, and Bianca quickly ducked and held her breath.

  In a moment, she dared a peek and saw that they hadn’t moved. Her neck ached from hunching, and she forced herself to resist the urge to stretch. Instead, she concentrated on the sound of the river lapping at the pilings. She waited.

  The persistent rat found its way back on the pier. Bianca was about to snatch it up again when an eruption sounded across the water. An orange-red burst of flames scorched the night, cutting through the miasma, revealing the hull of a merchant ship. The blaze flickered and reached skyward, a hot searing fire bellowing smoke that raked her nose with the smell of charred wood and something abominably foul. Bianca buried her nose under her arm and watched until the churning inferno was eventually subdued by fog.

  Wynders and the man saw it, too. They stayed until the fire died, then hopped off the wall. Wynders took up the lantern.

  A gut feeling told her to follow.

  Bianca blew into her hands to warm them, then lifted the satchel of rats. She was settling her foot on the first step of the quay when unexpectedly the whole structure shuddered. Bianca froze until the rumbling stopped, but three words came to her. Had she remembered them carved in stone on a building or etched on a grave? Peculiar how they suddenly came to mind, or were they whispered in the vaporous night? She spun around and scanned the water, but all was silent and dark, shrouded in mist.

  “Fortes fortuna iuvat.” She couldn’t say from where the words had come or why she had thought of them. But she knew what they meant. Fortune favors the brave.

  CHAPTER 26

  Bianca followed inconspicuously—or as discreetly as a girl could toting a satchel full of hissing rats. She followed the men from the wharf up to Botolph Lane, where it appeared Wynders handed the man a pouch. She saw them part ways and decided to follow Wynders toward Wool’s Key. Warehouses lined the waterfront, and he entered one of them. She sneaked as close as she dared, then flattened herself against a wall where she could peek around the corner from a safe distance. She wasn’t sure what she’d learn about Wynders, and certainly, as the night wore on, she was no closer to discovering what killed her friend. But perhaps if she knew more of this man’s business and his habits, she could piece together his intention.

  The massive oak door muffled the sound of his movements, and Bianca wondered if she should even stay. She didn’t know how long he would be, or whether he’d come out anytime soon. There were no windows or openings to peep through. She set the bundle of restless vermin next to her and kicked it once to silence them.

  The night air needled through to her bones, and her nose ran from the cold. She rubbed her hands together to thaw them, wishing she had remembered her gloves. Mercifully, she did not have to wait long before Wynders emerged.

  He drew the door shut, securing it with a length of chain and a lock. Testing it for security, he reworked the chain and lock, then took up his lantern.

  Bianca plastered herself against the wall as he walked past, unaware. She held her breath until he turned and was out of sight.

  She hurried after to gauge his direction, assuming he probably headed home for bed. She watched until he turned a corner where wealthy merchants and tradesmen lived, then returned to the warehouse. The door had been secured with a chain that allowed barely more than a hand’s width of opening, enough for Bianca’s thin frame to slip through. She sucked in her breath and squeezed inside.

  No light penetrated the interior. She hesitated, allowing her eyes to adjust, when she whiffed a putrid odor permeating the air. An undercurrent of musty sacks of grain merged with a caustic stench. She buried her nose in her scarf, trying to smother it.

  She was able to sense wooden chests stacked before her and touched them lightly as she stepped past. Along the walls, the barely visible outlines of crates towered above. She moved warily through aisles jammed with containers and barrels, wishing she could see well enough to know what their labels read. Her nose clogged from dust as thick as smoke. More than once she removed her scarf and took a mouthful of the odious air, then rewrapped her mask of rough woven wool.

  An odor that would have repelled the fainter of heart did not deter Bianca, who long ago had grown accustomed to noxious fumes. However, this smell was not one with which she was familiar. Her eyes burned and her throat seized, but she had to know its source.

  The smell grew stronger as she ma
de her way into the cavernous expanse of warehouse. Her surroundings grew darker still, and she tripped, stumbling into a crate, jostling it loose. It gave way, jarring the surrounding crates. She lost her balance but managed to land on her rump while throwing her arms over her head to protect it. An object rolled from the top of a disturbed crate, landing square in her lap. She shrieked, frantically brushing it off, imagining the worst. It rolled to a stop, and she eased her breathing when it didn’t move. Tentatively she reached out and felt a long bundle of twigs. A rushlight.

  Where there was a torch, there must be a flint, but without a light how could she find it? She snickered at the irony. “Oh for a flint to chase away the black.” She was about to toss aside the useless torch when she remembered she might have one. She was forever misplacing her flint when she was lighting her dung fires, only to find she’d dropped it in her skirt pocket. She reached in her pocket and smiled.

  The dark receded from the smoky flame, and Bianca now had the means by which to navigate. She pushed ahead in the direction of the foul odor, grateful the smell of the burning rush managed to help mask it.

  She wove her way through an aisle of crates labeled with ports of origin and destination. She stopped to read one label written partly in foreign tongue. Familiar with the look of French, she knew it was not that. She’d seen plenty of the script at Boisvert’s, and John was practiced in it. No, this looked more floral, more Latin. Italian. She searched the end of the crate and read, “Porto di origine, Genova.”

  The rushlight would only allow her so much time, and she chided herself for her curiosity. Sometimes it did little to advance her cause and much to delay it. She pushed herself forward to the back of the warehouse.

  As she neared a platform of barrels, she heard a strange sibilation—a hissing noise, a skirmish. She stopped cold. The rasping grew. She took a cautious step forward. If her skin had not been attached, she would have jumped out of it when she heard a scratching, then a thump.

  She held the torch aloft but saw nothing. It was then that she heard a noise come from behind, and she whirled around, sweeping the rushlight in a wide arc.

  But for her chest heaving, she stood still as stone. Her imagination was not making this easy. She wondered if Wynders had returned. She held the scarf over her nose and gulped a mouth of putrid air.

  Eventually she convinced herself the sounds were coming from in front of her. She crept forward between the walls of grain sacks towering overhead. The stores of grain made a formidable barrier, and she stepped toward an opening, focusing on the dark gap. But a sudden scurry and weight on her boot made her jump. She swept up her kirtle and swung the light, searching for its source. A rat ran along the bottom of the sacks of grain and disappeared into the dark. She paused to catch her breath, then continued forward, inching closer to the opening, the torch lighting her way. Now a whisker’s length from the gap, she jabbed the torch around the corner and followed, peering past its orb of light.

  For a second she couldn’t fathom what she was seeing. It was surreal, like a night fright brought to life. She threw her hand over her mouth.

  There, in various stages of decay, lay more than a dozen corpses. Strewn in sinister repose, some lounged as if sleeping off too much drink, some lay with limbs askew, and some were rump side up. If their poses were not macabre enough, even more disturbing were the rats feasting on them.

  Hundreds of vermin hissed and ripped off skin, crawled and sated themselves. Some yanked while others pulled. The bodies jerked and their limbs moved as the vermin tore them apart, feeding like maggots.

  Bianca’s stomach heaved. She turned and ran for the door to the warehouse, running like a madwoman through the aisles of crates and barrels.

  She tripped—narrowly avoiding setting the place on fire with her torch. But even that didn’t slow her down. She stopped to vomit, not caring she soiled the hem of her kirtle in her haste to keep moving.

  Was this what Wynders had come to check? For what purpose did he warehouse the dead? If Bianca had had more nerve, she might have stayed long enough to see that the bodies were all men. If she had had a stronger stomach, she might have stayed long enough to note their dress. But as it was, she had seen enough to realize Wynders did not want these bodies found. And for Bianca, that was plenty.

  She reached the entrance and pushed against its massive oak frame.

  It wouldn’t budge.

  Frustrated, she drove her shoulder into it, trying to force open a thin gap so she could squeeze back out. Still, the door remained secure.

  The chain had been secured more tightly since she had gotten in. Wynders must have returned. Did he know she was there?

  Bianca let loose a scream that shook the gibbets at Aldersgate. Stealth and covert snooping be damned, she wanted out.

  CHAPTER 27

  John never tired of polishing coins. Being surrounded by money and touching it was a pleasure, but Boisvert’s unwarranted harping quashed any joy he was having bringing a shine to silver. The metallurgist lectured him on women’s wiles as if he had never seen a female and had been pent up in a monastery all his life. Not that Boisvert’s sage words fell on deaf ears; it was just when it came to Bianca, his advice wasn’t relevant.

  Bianca was and always would be unique.

  From the moment he first saw her picking pockets at Cheapside, he knew she was the one for him. They had been only twelve, but Bianca had filched his heart as sure as she’d lifted sausage from under a butcher’s nose.

  John knew he was destined for disappointment along the way, for he was schooled in the harsh realities of life. His father had been killed in a tavern brawl, and his mother had abandoned him for a Danish sailor. Left to fend for himself, John begged for scraps at an inn on Old Fish Street Hill and slept in an empty barrel in the back alley. He had a good heart, as good as any rascal who’d had to live by his wits to survive.

  If he hadn’t helped Boisvert one night after the French metallurgist escaped the point of a dirk, both Boisvert and John would have fared much worse. Boisvert was new to London and ignorant of its customs and cuisine. That night Boisvert had ingested one too many ales and slices of dubious kidney pie. He bragged too much of Frenchwomen and French ways, and so, when he tripped out the door to weave his way home, it wasn’t long before he found himself at the end of a menacing blade. John watched as Boisvert was robbed, then kicked senseless for throwing up on his assailants. Wondering if the man had any coin left on him, John ventured out of his barrel and searched his pockets. When Boisvert’s eyes fluttered open, John saw an opportunity to rob the man’s rent once he helped him home. It was with some effort he got the pudgy greenhorn home to Foster Lane, and once he did, the metallurgist thanked him with a preemptive slam of the door.

  John vowed never to help a Frenchman again.

  Nothing would have come of it if Boisvert hadn’t sought his young rescuer to become his apprentice. When he found him, John followed as if called by Christ himself. And he never regretted it.

  Except when Boisvert preached about women.

  “Boisvert, contrary to what you believe, Bianca does not want to be taken care of. She has her own rent.”

  “My friend, you are so naïve.” Boisvert shook his head with the arrogance of an experienced romancer. “It is not that the fille doesn’t want to be taken care of. Every woman, sans exception, wants that. It is because she doesn’t want . . . you.”

  “Oh, I know she does. I know she wants me.”

  “How so? You do not live with her.” Boisvert watched John for a reaction. “It is a curse, this love. It is true what they say—that this ‘love, she is blind.’ You saw it come, but you do not see it go.”

  “Boisvert, Constable Patch is after her!” John threw down the polishing cloth. “She’s a wee preoccupied of late.”

  “But can you tell me before this happened, before she saw a noose dangling, did she treat you as you wanted?”

  John hated when Boisvert posed questions. It always
got him thinking in ways that made him squirm. Bianca and he were different. They didn’t have to be crawling over each other to show how much they cared. Though, he had to admit, a little more crawling would have suited him.

  “Bianca would never fawn over anyone. She hasn’t the time.”

  Boisvert tsked. He hung a metal mold on a hook next to the forge. “Then, that is a problem.”

  “Perhaps for you. If Bianca acted like she couldn’t live without me, I wouldn’t want her.”

  Boisvert looked on him with overt skepticism, which only further incensed John. The Frenchman had succeeded in wearing him down. He was worried about Bianca, and getting prodded by Boisvert wasn’t helping to allay his fears.

  “Boisvert, I’ve had enough.” He lifted his jerkin off a hook and, ignoring Boisvert’s protests, headed out the door.

  John had no intention of monopolizing Bianca’s time. He only wanted to peek in her window and see that she was safe. The last time he had done that, he had expected to see her working on one of her concoctions, not sprawled on the floor naked and unconscious. An uneasy feeling slithered down his spine as he wondered what he might find this time.

  She had told him that helping her meant leaving her alone. Only she could do what was needed to save herself from a swing at the end of a rope. It bothered him to leave her, and he had done so reluctantly. John believed that Bianca would be able to avoid Patch for a day, and so he was able to go about his work at Boisvert’s without much worry. But John wouldn’t stay away forever. He sought his own reassurance in this matter, and he would help without her knowing.

  He crossed London Bridge and passed into the seedy borough of Southwark, feeling his disquiet grow along with the number of stray dogs and runagates eyeing him.

  Once he turned onto her lane, a whiff of Morgan’s Lane stream worked its foul magic. His breath caught in his throat, and he pinched his nose closed. Bianca was made of sterner stuff than he, living in Southwark.