“You never said how you escaped the alchemist.” Stafford shuffled over on the cot, making space between himself and Niger.
I shifted on the cot. “It was a blur. They ambushed me when I tried to cut King Magnar free, and Mr. Bacon released some kind of poison into the air.” A shudder ran down my spine. “The gas made my body numb, and he put me on a platform so he could attach a magic-draining collar.”
Niger scooted closer, the outside of his hand brushing mine. “How did you escape?”
“Fyrian sent enough power to burn through the poison, and I used my fire to force him to drop the collar and call off the homunculi.” I hunched my shoulders and dipped my head. At the time, I’d been too furious to consider the pain I had caused Mr. Bacon. His attack had made me relive my memory of having been taken as a child by alchemists. “I used the opportunity to ask him a few questions about what he’d done to everyone.”
“I would have done the same in your situation,” said Stafford.
“I see nothing wrong with Bluford’s conduct,” muttered Niger.
Master Jesper sighed and turned back to the table in the middle of the room to pick up another rack of vials. “Every blood vessel on Henri’s body has been burned. It’s a wonder he’s still alive.”
Despite his words, something didn’t sit right with me. Mr. Bacon was a murderer and a potential slaver of everyone within Mount Fornax. Even though he didn’t deserve mercy, I couldn’t have hurt him so extensively.
A memory dropped into my head, making me jolt. “He took an elixir that gave him superhuman strength.”
“Which one?”
“He called it mandragon. It made him invincible, and the only way to stop him from attacking was to melt his golden eyes.”
Master Jesper paused and let out a deep breath. “That… explains a lot. Thank you, Cadet.”
Niger stood. “You owe Bluford an apology.”
I grabbed his hand. “Let’s not argue. We still have so much to work out.”
Master Jesper turned. “Cadet Griffon is correct. I was hasty in my assessment of your altercation with Henri and prone to give him the benefit of the doubt as he was my friend and assistant. Please accept my humble apology.”
“It’s all right.” I inclined my head. Master Jesper’s torture at General Thornicroft’s hands was probably still fresh in its mind. “We’re all doing the best we can.”
The troll shook its head. “This is my fault. I brought Henri here, not knowing he was the proverbial hollow gift-horse, full of destruction for the entire community of Mount Fornax. Leave things with me. I will fix this mess.”
I grimaced. The only way Master Jesper could fix things was by making more antidotes. It was far too good-natured to go around cracking heads.
Niger squeezed my hand, and his leg pressed against mine. “Are you all right?”
I gulped and glanced around to make sure no one noticed my odd reaction. Evolene and Master Jesper turned back to Mr. Bacon, and Stafford sat at my other side, staring intently at Evolene’s back. “I-I’m fine.”
We stayed up all night, sleeping in shifts and helping Master Jesper prepare a large batch of alkahest using the gold extracted from the King Midas pears. Although it lacked the potency of the Golden Callisti apples, it provided enough of the element to end the suffering of dragons and warriors and to stop the progression of the loyalty elixir.
After we brewed and distributed the elixirs to the healers, Master Jesper reviewed the coded scrolls we had found in the librarian’s secret room. According to his translations, they detailed King Calder of Savannah’s plans to take over Mount Fornax, but they lacked information about antidotes.
Stafford opened his knapsack and pulled out the leather tome. “What about this? We found it in the wagon.”
I pulled out the bottles I’d found. “Are these helpful?”
Master Jesper took the sludgy one with the nutritional supplement label and slipped it in its pocket. “Thank you. This will be adequate for my needs. Now, let me take a look at this.”
The troll opened the book and flipped the pages. “This is Henri’s workbook, which contains notes on everything he formulated in the past seven years.” The troll paused at one page and winced. “I am not surprised he is in such poor condition if this is what the mandragon elixir contains.”
I resisted the urge to ask. The most important thing was the antidote.
“Ah… Here’s how he made the loyalty elixir.” Master Jesper shook his head. “It’s no wonder my alkahest couldn’t reverse it. He used dragon’s venom, an ingredient not available to all, except those with access to green dragons.”
“Who would give Mr. Bacon venom?” I asked.
“The librarian must have somehow gotten access to it.”
Niger shook his head. “A green dragon does not freely give their venom to anyone.”
“That’s true,” said Fyrian. “I asked around after Jesper mentioned it, and no one even spoke to the librarian.”
“Fyrian just said none of the other green dragons gave the librarian their venom,” I said. “I always carry a bit of her venom in my parched sword. What if he stole it from a rider of a green dragon?”
“That is a possibility.” Master Jesper scratched its bald head. “But it’s more likely that a warrior associated with a green dragon helped him.”
“Impossible,” said Niger.
“Bribery and blackmail may not work on dragons, but it is certainly effective against humans and ogres.” Master Jesper turned the page and paused.
I leaned forward. “Is that the antidote?”
The troll lifted the book, revealing its torn page. “I believe it was.” Its shoulders sagged. “Oh, dear. It will take weeks to work out how to counter the dragon venom.”
“What can we do to help?” asked Stafford.
“Apart from supplying me with dragon venom to conduct experiments, I’m not—”
A loud groan interrupted what Master Jesper was about to suggest. My gaze snapped to the corner where Mr. Bacon lay under a black sheet. His blackened hand fell out of the cot, making me cringe.
“Henri!” cried Master Jesper. “Please don’t try to move.”
“Wh—Argh!”
“Pain elixir, Madam Evolene!”
Evolene jumped to her feet. “How much?”
“An entire vial.”
She raised her small staff, and the liquid seeped through the sheet. Mr. Bacon groaned and stopped moving.
Master Jesper turned to us and placed a stubby finger over its lips. “Shhhh!”
I shrugged. If the troll wanted to conduct the questioning, I wouldn’t interfere.
“Jesper,” groaned Mr. Bacon. “You found me.”
“No thanks to you, I may add,” huffed the troll. “You meant to kill me!”
“T-that would be the l-librarian, not me.”
I shook my head. Earlier, they had both discussed Master Jesper as though he was a nuisance that needed to be eliminated.
“Listen to me,” Mr. Bacon croaked. “You must save Savannah from the idiocy of the Boy-King. His dealings with dark fairies will ruin us all!”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“The…”
I leaned forward, throat dry. Although I’d heard some of his rantings about King Magnar, I hadn’t trusted anything the man said at the time. Now, on his deathbed, he might reveal something useful.
Evolene rushed forward with a vial of yellow liquid.
Master Jesper raised its hand. “Liquid Effervescence will exaggerate the pain. We must wait for Henri to gather his strength.”
A long breath escaped the man beneath the sheet. “The spriggans. W-we worked out a way to hurt them.”
“How?” Master Jesper’s quicksilver eyes widened.
“It’s in my leather book. Last page.”
Stafford rushed to the table in the middle of the laboratory and flipped open the tome. He raised the last page, revealing the aged, baby head of a spriggan. Aroun
d the illustration were notations and alchemical symbols.
“Is that what a spriggan looks like?” whispered Niger.
Suppressing a shudder, I nodded. Nothing on the page made sense to me, but I assumed Master Jesper would translate when it got the time.
“I have the formula for your loyalty elixir,” said the troll. “Where is the antidote?”
“The librarian has it.”
“Well, something has gone wrong with the elixir. The dragons appear loyal to the Boy King, and not the throne of Savannah. Whatever you have attempted has backfired.”
I chewed on my lip. If Mr. Bacon was King Magnar’s enemy, surely he would help to stop him. There was no predicting the alchemist’s reaction. He was even more deranged than the man he was trying to keep under control.
Mr. Bacon choked. “We need the dragons to save Savannah from what the boy has wrought. F-find the librarian and tell him he must help.”
“Do you know where he is?” asked Master Jesper.
“If everything’s gone wrong, he’ll be at the D-dead Wood.”
“And where is that?”
Mr. Bacon didn’t answer.
Evolene approached with another vial, but Master Jesper waved her away. “We should wait another hour before disturbing his rest, or he will expire.”
Niger stood. “I know the Dead Wood.”
“Where is it?” I asked.
“On the dry side of the mountain.”
“Fyri, do you know what he’s talking about?” I asked.
“I’m not sure, but I’ll meet you outside the Healer’s Academy.”
Niger, Stafford, and I rode Fyrian down the side of the mountain we used for flying classes. Morning sunlight streamed through the patchy cloud cover on to an expanse of exposed sandstone. The terraces at that side of the mountain consisted of thin walkways, eroded back to stone.
“Do you know why this part of the mountain has no vegetation?” I asked Fyrian.
“It gets the most exposure to the afternoon sun,” she replied. “The water doesn’t stay in the soil for long over here.”
“Right! And since there’s very little to do around here, people don’t visit,” I added.
“Making it the perfect place for a villain to hold secret meetings!”
“Have you written to the Prince Regent?” Niger sat at my back and whispered into my ear.
“Not yet.”
“But you must—”
“I doubt there’ll be anything he can do to save me from the damsel denial,” I murmured back. “But I’ll contact someone as soon as I get a spare minute.”
Niger nodded, and I relaxed a fraction. I hadn’t seen Prince Magnar since the day before, when Master Fosco dragged him away, and I hoped not to bump into him until we had helped Master Jesper to complete the antidote to the loyalty elixir.
Fyrian landed at the bottom of the mountain in a patch of parched earth. A few yards ahead lay what looked like a grove of thick-trunked trees that stretched up nearly a hundred feet. Multiple branches at the top of the trunk jutted out like shrugging arms. It was hard to see the vegetation, but in the harsh sunlight, its leaves looked brown.
“Now I know why they call it the Dead Wood,” muttered Stafford.
“What’s this area for?” I asked Rufus.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “No one ever uses it.”
“Let’s see if we can find a hut or a secret passage somewhere.” I turned to Fyrian. “Will you be all right out here in the heat?”
She shook her head and leaped into the sky. “I’m still a bit sore from the plague, so I’ll fly around to the other side for a drink. Keep our connection open, so I’ll know when to come back.”
We headed for the grove of giant trees. The sparse vegetation on the treetops cast us in shade and provided decent protection from the sun. I walked between the two males, stealing glances at Niger whenever I could. Although his features were similar to his brothers, as they all had strong, masculine features and auburn hair, Niger scowled a lot less than Rufus, who never seemed to smile.
Niger turned to me and grinned.
A flush exploded across my cheeks, and I glanced away.
Stafford nudged me in the arm. “Do you think they’ll cure Mr. Bacon?”
“I hope not. Why?”
“His plan to restore King Calder to the throne isn’t bad. If King Magnar made a deal with spriggans to usurp his father, he doesn’t deserve to rule.”
Rubbing the back of my neck, I grimaced. “It wasn’t as simple as that.”
“What do you mean?” asked Niger.
“King Calder kept his wife and daughters locked up because they were witches. King Magnar didn’t know about his sisters until a spriggan entered his dreams and brought him to their basement. He spent over a decade of night-times with them, thinking they weren’t real, until the spriggan manipulated him into making a deal.”
“I don’t understand.” Stafford picked up a fallen branch that had been fashioned into a staff. He twisted it in his hands and frowned at a knot in the wood.
“The spriggan got him to eavesdrop in a meeting where King Calder discussed his plan to steal the girls’ magic and become the most powerful being in the Known World.”
“Then Magnar made the deal?” muttered Niger.
“Actually, King Calder announced that he had no need for an heir and locked King Magnar up. That’s when the spriggan approached him.”
Stafford snapped the staff on his knee. “King Calder is no better than the Snow Queen!”
“That’s why King Calder can’t get his throne back.” I spread my hands wide.
Niger stopped me in place with a hand on my shoulder. His brow lowered into a scowl. “Are you in support of King Magnar?”
“N-not really.” I stared into his hard eyes. Words of denial bubbled up to the back of my throat. I neither liked nor supported King Magnar, but even an arrogant, spoiled brat would be a better leader than a madman who would keep his daughters as fattened calves to slaughter. I couldn’t say any of this without the damsel denial magic squeezing my heart. Instead, I said, “King Calder would be a danger to all the witches in Steppe.”
He grunted, and we continued through the Dead Wood. Our feet crunched on dried leaves and the occasional twig, making a gentle rhythm that broke the silence.
“I suppose everyone was wrong about King Mag—” Stafford’s words were broken by his yell, which echoed below us and grew distant by the second.
I whirled around and nearly stumbled into the broken twigs that made up the edge of a pit. Niger grabbed me around the middle and pulled me to safety.
My heart beat thudded in my throat. “W-what was that?”
“I do not know… But Stafford will be in danger unless we act fast.”
Chapter 5
I edged closer to the pit with Niger at my back, ready to grab me if the ground gave way underfoot. The hole where Stafford had disappeared stretched about four feet in diameter and appeared to have been concealed by thin twigs and dead leaves. When I peered into its depths, I found what looked like an infinite expanse of black.
Clutching my roiling stomach, I said, “It’s got to be deep, considering how long Stafford screamed as he fell.”
“I fear the same,” replied Niger. “Call for him, and I will watch your back.”
I lowered myself to my knees, placed both palms on the warm, dry ground, and stuck my head into the hole. “Stafford?”
My voice echoed down the pit, reverberating in unison with the dread climbing up my gut. What in the Known World could be down there? My mind conjured up an image of Stafford’s broken and bleeding body lying atop jagged stalagmites, which made me want to gag. Without a witch, we had no way of raising him to the surface.
“STAFFORD,” I shouted, desperation raising my voice several octaves.
Niger patted my back. “He is likely unconscious. See if you can get Fyrian to send help.”
“Fyri, could you—”
&nbs
p; “No,” she snapped.
“What?”
“I don’t approve of the company you keep,” she replied. “First that brutish Niger attacks poor Magnar, then that idiot Stafford says he’s unfit to rule. I wouldn’t help either of them.”
I frowned. “But you’d help me?”
“Of course. You’re Magnar’s bride.”
“As King Magnar’s future bride, will you help me help my friend?”
A smoky sniff passed through our bond. “It doesn’t work like that.”
My shoulders slumped, and a frustrated whimper tore from my throat. My Fyrian would never leave a friend in peril. After facing death for a crime she didn’t commit, she knew exactly what it felt like to be helpless and reliant on someone’s help. That wretched elixir had twisted her mind. It hadn’t just made her unfeasibly loyal to King Magnar, now, she lacked compassion for others.
“Problems?” asked Niger.
“She’s not helping because we haven’t been nice to King Magnar.”
He knelt beside me on the ground, keeping one hand on a thick root for security. “Are you serious?”
My shoulders slumped. “It’s the loyalty elixir.”
“I’m just doing what’s right for Magnar,” she said.
Niger shuffled back to firmer ground and pulled me away from the pit. We sat at the trunk of one of the massive trees on a root as thick as a basilisk. He placed his hands on my shoulders. “Is she listening?”
I nodded and calmed my thoughts so Fyrian could concentrate on what Niger would do or say next.
Pulling the same kind of stern expression Rufus wore, Niger said, “Fyrian Lacerta, the majority of dragons, warriors, and witches are still suffering under the plague and unable to provide King Magnar the protection he needs to regain his Kingdom.”
Interest sparked across our bond. I gave Niger an encouraging nod. “She’s paying attention.”
“We need to find the complete antidote to the alchemists’ poisons,” he said. “Master Jesper’s alkahest is only a partial solution, and we do not know how long it will last.”
“I thought it was a cure,” she said.
“It’s untested. Nobody knows how long it will last,” I replied. It wasn’t a lie, as Master Jesper had only perfected the alkahest with the use of Golden Callisti apples. It had removed the symptoms the alchemists had inflicted to disguise the loyalty elixir, but it hadn’t gone as far as to neutralize its effects.
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