The Tasters Guild (28 page)

The alewife had stopped. Ivy marveled at the woman’s pluck. Wilhelmina was quietly motioning to someone inside, waving and jumping about on her delicate black shoes. Then she stepped aside.

A great shadow filled the stone archway as someone advanced upon them quickly. The shadow grew and stretched, and soon fell upon Ivy. As the darkness enveloped the girl, a
harrowing chill spread about Ivy’s chest. The image of Vidal Verjouce and his awful Mind Garden lurched before her.

The shadow paused, waiting.

The curtain of darkness pulled away slightly, and her mother’s white face materialized, enormous, like a moon. She wore a dress of such blackness that it sucked the very light out of the air. It was a thrilling thing—the deepest smudge of black velvet that wrapped itself around her white shoulders and encircled her waist before losing itself on the floor below. Her long hair, pulled back in a bun, was now as black as a raven.

She looked at them with an oddly blank expression.

“Yes?”

“Clothilde, I have brought you a visitor.” Wilhelmina smiled. “Look who’s here—it’s Ivy!”

“Hello, Ivy.” Clothilde smiled.

A moment passed, and Ivy frowned. Why was Wilhelmina talking to Clothilde as if she were a child?

“So nice to meet you,” Clothilde added, an afterthought. She looked agreeably from the alewife to the girl.

This was bizarre behavior indeed. Her mother’s character was one of such force and will that this polite and quizzical figure before Ivy seemed like a stranger.

“This is
Ivy
, Clothilde,” Wilhelmina clarified. “Your
daughter.”

“Daughter?” she repeated. “Surely not. I would remember having a daughter!” Her laugh was that of a little girl.

“Ah, but you do remember!” Wilhelmina explained patiently.

“I do?”

Clothilde turned to inspect Ivy, running her pale hand through Ivy’s gold-flecked hair, touching her cheek. A flash of emotion passed across Clothilde’s face.

“A daughter,” she whispered. Her eyes settled on Ivy’s shoulders, and she recoiled as if stung. “Where did you get that dress?” she whispered hoarsely.

Ivy opened her mouth but then snapped it shut. Even if there had been enough time for her to explain, she felt the mysterious urge to quote a recipe for sarsaparilla soda.

“Never mind the dress for now, Clothilde—” Wilhelmina seemed about to deliver instructions when it suddenly became clear that the piano had stopped its playing. And the person who was no longer tickling the ivories had now made his way over to them.

“Ah,” Mr. Foxglove said in a voice like an oozing fungus. “The entertainment has arrived.”

It was a voice Ivy was incapable of forgetting.

A shrill, nasally one, belonging to her onetime taster and general miscreant, Mr. Sorrel Flux.

O
nce, really not that long ago, Rowan Truax had commented that he doubted seriously a cat might do anything useful at all. He had remarked upon this—either to himself or to anyone who happened to be nearby—on at least three separate occasions recently: on the
Trindletrip
, in the sewers of Rocamadour, and in the chambers of Verjouce, where Six was happy to befriend his enemy. Cats, he was fond of saying, existed merely to please themselves and were given entirely too much credit otherwise.

But Rowan was about to do something he never thought possible: apologize to a cat.

Six was still waiting under the ribbon tree when Rowan stumbled back toward the town from the lighthouse. It became apparent to the taster that the cat was waiting for
him
. Once Rowan realized this, he was in a quandary. Should he trust a cat with suspect loyalties? (Didn’t all cats have suspect loyalties?) Did he really have a choice?

“Have you been waiting for me, then?” Rowan asked.

Rowan was horrified as Six came up and rubbed his filthy coat upon his legs. Clumps of hair stuck fast to the black suit Wilhelmina had made for him, like burrs. With a mad purr in his throat, Six looked up at Rowan, and stepping away, he slowly blinked. Puzzled, Rowan took a step forward. The cat, too, took a step—toward the small village.

“After you.” With a resolute sigh, followed by a sneeze, Rowan gave in. He followed the matted beast through the village. Although he had made his way along this very street twice earlier in the day, now, with the growing darkness, it was a passage transformed. Looking about as he kept behind Six, the shops and signs were glowing with an opalescent eeriness, and Rowan found to his great displeasure that the signs were no longer legible—the words were much longer and made up of an impossible number of odd letters and harsh consonants.

WHYLLSTIBLE FLNKENSTOLIB TA VWOT L’STRUUBE

read the sign at the end of the small alley that earlier held the Four Sisters’ Haberdashery. Rowan saw nothing as he remembered it, and scowling into the dimness, he could see that there was, apparently, no shop at all but rather an old dilapidated shack, a few torn fishing nets strung up beside it. With growing confusion, he was tempted to explore the alley further, only Six was but a mere lurking shadow ahead and he
dared not lose him. Rowan was vaguely aware of being watched, and although he saw no one, he could not shake the feeling that there were people—many people—gathered behind the dark windows that he passed by.

Cat and taster emerged finally upon a small path at the sandy beach in the twilight. Built of wood slats and lined with fragrant clumps of wild-growth yarrow, it meandered pleasantly along sea- and cliffside. Rowan followed Six for what seemed to be many, many miles, even after the path ended and became rocks, and led them beside a wondrous waterfall that dropped thrillingly from high above, ending in a deep pool nearby. Then, up—up, almost climbing. The cat seemed to wait as Rowan found his way, until they emerged at a beautiful mansion of polished stone.

Rowan knew at once that Ivy was here.

“Six,” he said, ignoring the persistent tickle in the back of his throat, “thank you for being my guide. I owe you an apology. How can I ever repay you?”

To which the cat swished his tail and, of course, said nothing.

But Six was not finished with his tour. Great shadows stretched out from the lighted windows, sprawling themselves unfavorably upon the lawn. Six walked through these, beckoning in his way for Rowan to follow. Reluctantly, the taster did.

There was a series of outbuildings to the compound—a gatehouse that straddled the road, a caretaker’s cottage with a
small garden, and further away, upon a slight hill, a grange. As they neared the barn, a chill ran down Rowan’s spine.

Although Six led him on, they never seemed to get any closer. The place was entirely uninviting—dark, broken-down. It smelled of pasture. But that was not the most repellent thing about the eerie barn. Rowan somehow knew it to be occupied. Had he not known Ivy Manx as he did—had he never met her at the Hollow Bettle, had he remained a servant of the Tasters’ Guild for all his days—he could not have understood what it was he was sensing.

He realized the grange was deeply enchanted.

W
ell, well, well.” Mr. Foxglove—or Flux, as the case may be—gestured with a manicured hand as the guard led Ivy and Wilhelmina into the large parlor with the aid of a long, barbed spear. “I’ve been expecting you. Although, I’ll admit, I can’t imagine what took you so long.”

Ivy stared at her former taster.

Sorrel Flux, she noticed, had undergone a transformation of sorts. His appearance, once quite an afterthought, seemed to be of some new import to the scrawny man, and he now donned a showy boutonniere in the buttonhole of a slick black suit. Upon his head there was no longer a tatty Guild hood but a small beret at a canted angle. A stain populated his thin upper lip—either an odd patch of hair or some forgotten snuff.

“You’re Foxglove?” she asked, incredulous.

“Mr
. Foxglove, to you.” Flux sneered. “I’d offer you something—a bite perhaps—but I’m still recovering from our little stay together.”

“I should have finished you off when I had the chance.” Ivy glared. Her fingers twitched and ached for her poison kit, sitting useless back in Rocamadour.

“Manners, manners. Is that any way to talk to your host?”

She looked at Clothilde, standing beside him, her face unreadable.

“I see you have met my muse,” Flux purred.

“Muse?” With a jolt, she realized he meant her mother.

“Every writer has a muse!” Flux condescended. “Someone to inspire them, guide them—fetch them tea.”

“Mother.” Ivy cringed to hear her voice crack. “Where is the King?”

But Clothilde had not heard her.

“She can’t tell you,” Flux announced gleefully. “My darling”—he now spoke to Clothilde—“isn’t it time for your … 
medicine?”

He snapped his fingers, and the guard cautiously approached. He proceeded to skillfully dispense a thimbleful of a sickly yellowish syrup into a small glass of water, holding it out to Ivy’s mother at arm’s length. Clothilde grasped the tumbler, and for a moment it appeared as if she might drop it.

“The poor dear—she was suffering so when she left Caux,” Flux reminded Ivy. “But my many years at the Tasters’ Guild endowed me with a vast repertoire of—shall we say—
medicines
with which to treat her. How lucky that I came upon her—just in time.”

It was true, the last time Ivy had seen her, Clothilde had looked unwell, desperate and stricken as she called out to Ivy from the door to Pimcaux.

“What are you making her drink?” Ivy demanded. Her former taster had a fondness for potions—he had poisoned the visiting sentries at her uncle’s tavern when she and Rowan were fleeing it, as well as countless others in Templar.

“Your concern for your mother is touching. Misplaced but touching. This is the very woman who tried to drown you in the waters of the Marcel! You were a mere baby—but no doubt just as much trouble. Ah—if only she had succeeded, this tedious conversation could have been avoided.”

Turning to Clothilde, he coaxed, “Now, now. Be a good girl or I shall lose my temper and require that dreadful child of yours to drink some, too.”

The fog that clouded Clothilde’s eyes seemed to clear somewhat as her gaze settled on Ivy. But in the next instant, she smiled sadly and swallowed the draft. Her expression again became oddly waxen, retreating to a vacant place.

Appalled, Ivy narrowed her eyes at Flux.

“You’ll never get away with this! You seem to have everyone here fooled, but I’ll tell them just who you are—”

“Then, Ivy, you shall never see another birthday.” He pinched some life back into the crease of his pants leg and yawned.

Ivy looked at her former taster crossly. Talking was
getting her nowhere. She took a deep breath. Ivy had an idea. It was a terrible idea, one that she knew would greatly upset her dear friends in Caux (and one that was surely breaking a promise to a trestleman), but the Prophecy was at stake. She needed to distract Sorrel Flux, and she would do it with ink.

Ivy summoned a smile to her bright face. “You are a writer, you say? I did not know you were a wordsmith,” she said sweetly.

“I am.” Flux nodded defensively. “See?” He pointed to what was impossible to ignore—the vast room was filled with the detritus of a scholarly profession: everywhere were papers (mostly doodles, it seemed to Ivy), pens and ink bottles, broken quills, all in great disorder. Tacked to the walls were incomprehensible scrawls and half thoughts. Leather-bound journals were stacked haphazardly to the ceiling. In a corner, crumpled balls of parchment formed a small mountain. It was evident that Flux considered his surroundings as proof enough of his profession, for he wore upon his yellowed face a look of complete satisfaction.

“How wonderful!” Ivy enthused. “Writers command such great respect.”

“Indeed.”

“What do you write?” Ivy asked shyly. “The biography of the King?”

Flux eyed the girl evilly but could not resist answering. “Something like that.”

“Of course, it is such a lonesome profession, one filled with self-doubt and anxiety. So very difficult.”

Flux hesitated.

“What would you say if I told you I knew of something that would make it infinitely easier?”

Flux polished his nails upon his shiny vest. This child was so immensely tedious, he thought. How he had endured her company for an entire year, he had no idea. She was persistent, and pesky, and needed to be punished.

“Vidal Verjouce has this special
ink—
”

Flux’s pasty mouth snapped shut at the mention of his former master; his eyes grew wide and calculating.

Ivy paused modestly.

“Yes?” He leaned forward.

“Well, whoever uses it finds himself capable of great genius—and amasses incomparable fortunes. No more toiling over the empty page—the ink will instead do all the work for you, while you collect the glory.”

Ivy watched as Flux digested this information.

“What is it made from, this ink?” he asked, skeptical.

“Oh, it’s the simplest thing. Scourge bracken!” She smiled agreeably.

“Scourge brack—” Flux coughed the words. “But that’s impossible! It is long extinct.” His pasty face had settled into a look of suspicion.

“Apparently not! And your former master has great vats of
it,” she continued, warming up to her deception. “I’ve seen them myself, in Rocamadour. In fact, he’s making more as we speak. He’s amassed an army of Outriders to assist him. I, for one, don’t see why he should have it all for himself.”

“Rocamadour. You don’t say.…”

“But first,” Ivy continued piously, “about King Verdigris …?”

Flux drummed his fingers for a short second. If what this awful child said was true, his former master had been successful in uncovering the most potent weed ever known. Vanishing were his scholarly ambitions, replaced by ones of tyranny and power—kingly dreams.

Ivy held her breath. She had come to her own conclusion about her former taster. Were he to get his hands on the deadly weed, he would be no match for it. And, certainly, nothing would be worse than it was currently—with Vidal Verjouce already in possession of its powerful forces.