“To take over the clan.”
“So that’s why my father is in the infirmary? Because of you?”
“He was too strong. I never knew it would take so much to kill him. The last batch didn’t do it. This one is twice the strength. I am sorry, my laird. Please, forgive me.”
Her mouth opened once more and then remained open. Jock gently closed her jaw and then her eyes, standing up and looking taller than ever.
“Beggar’s cap mushroom,” he said, pushing his way past the throng and out the door. The king’s guards went to grab him but the king waved them back, letting him go.
Daisy followed, finding Jock already heading through the door into the infirmary. By the time she got in there he was shouting for Alan who emerged from the preparation room with his parrot on his shoulder.
“God save the king,” the parrot shouted.
“Beggar’s cap mushroom,” Jock shouted. “That’s what took him.”
“I should have guessed,” Alan said, nodding. “It has been a long time since we had a case here. Dinnae worry, my laird. It is treatable. What do I need?” He turned and grabbed a book from the nearest shelf, flicking through the pages. “Cardomon, iris, poppy seeds, ginger.”
He looked up, the color draining from his face.
“What?” Jock asked. “What is it?”
“I am out of ginger. I used the last during the pox outbreak in spring.”
“I have some,” Daisy said too quietly.
“What?” Jock shouted, not hearing her, grabbing Alan by the shoulders. “How can you be out?”
“I have some,” Daisy tried again.
“I am sorry, my laird,” Alan said, tears forming in his eyes. “I have none.”
“Then my father dies,” Jock said, shoving Alan backward. The parrot took off in indignation, flying upward and landing on a rafter, wings still flapping.
“I have some,” Daisy shouted at the top of her voice.
As Jock turned to look at her, she pulled the bag of dried ginger from her pocket. “I was saving it until I opened my…never mind. Here, is this enough?”
Alan crossed the room and looked inside the bag. “More than enough,” he said. “Give me one minute and it will be done.”
He took the bag and ran for the preparation room, calling out the instructions to himself as he mixed and ground the ingredients together.
As good as his word, he emerged a minute later with a tankard filled to the brim with a deep orange foaming drink.
Jock lifted his father’s prone figure into a sitting position as Alan poured the first drops onto his lips, working gently, making sure none was spilled.
The effect was instantaneous. Eddard’s eyes opened, the color returning to his cheeks. He blinked as if waking up from a long sleep.
“Where am I?” he asked. “Jock? Is that you?”
“Yes,” Jock said, sitting on the edge of the bed and taking his hand. “It is me.”
“What happened?”
Daisy squeezed Jock’s shoulder, unable to stop herself from grinning as she watched father and son being reunited.
“You fell ill but dinnae worry. You will be all right now. Everything is going to be all right now.”
“God save the king,” the parrot called out from his perch high above them. “And laird save the parrot.”
