“Lysa! You’re alive!” He wrestled with the lid. “And right on time! This soup was supposed to be for clarity, but I think I added too much dragon-thistle and now it’s acquired a personality. It’s been insulting my waistcoat for the last ten minutes.”
“The soup is talking?”
“Regrettably. And it has terrible manners.” The cauldron let out a rude, wet burp, and Barnaby slammed a heavy book titledTheory of Silenceon top of the lid. He wiped his brow, beaming at me. “There. That should hold it. To what do I owe the pleasure? Here to sell me some of those lovely calm-inducing herbs your father grows?”
“I need an analysis,” I said, fishing the vial from my pocket and setting it on the only clear spot on the counter. The liquid inside was clear, innocent-looking. “Fast.”
Barnaby adjusted his spectacles, leaning in until his nose touched the glass. “Ooh. Mysterious unlabelled bottles. My favorite genre of excitement. Where did you get it?”
“A friend,” I lied. “She said it was for pain relief.”
Barnaby uncorked it with a fluid pop. He removed a tiny glass rod from his pocket, dipped it in, and tapped a drop onto a piece of chemically treated parchment. The paper didn’t turn blue or pink as one would’ve expected. It hissed, turned black, and then crumbled into a pile of fine grey ash that shaped itself into a tiny, screaming skull before disintegrating.
Barnaby blinked. He looked at the ash, then at me.
“Well,” he chirped, voice bright. “If your friend’s definition of ‘pain relief’ is ‘permanent cessation of all biological functions within three seconds,’ then she is a master of her craft.”
My blood ran cold. “It’s poison?”
“Poison? Oh, no, my dear. Poison is pedestrian.” Barnaby capped the bottle carefully. “This isQuietus Essence. Distilled void. Killing you is the lightest thing it does; it severs your connection to the ley-lines before stopping your heart. Very expensive. Very illegal.“ He paused, tilting his head. “Also, it tastes like peppermint. To mask the bitterness of death, I suppose. Thoughtful.”
I gripped the edge of the counter. Kelda hadn’t offered Fenrik mercy. She had handed me a weapon to hollow him out.
Barnaby poked the pile of ash with a quill. “So. Are we going to talk about why you’re carrying around enough liquid murderto assassinate a High Lord, or should I make us some tea? I have a blend that doesn’t talk back.”
I shook my head.
“No? Well, then my advice is to keep it hidden,” Barnaby warned. “And Lysa? Don’t drink the thing.”
I didn’t have the heart to smile. I shoved out into the alley, the vial knocking against my hip bone with every step. I turned onto the main thoroughfare, intent on reaching the Apothecarium, but a wall of bodies blocked the street. I tried to shoulder past another group of dockworkers, but a rough hand clamped onto my forearm.
“Here she is,” a man snarled. His face was streaked with soot, eyes wide with sleeplessness.
I wrenched my arm away. “Let me pass.”
“Pass?” A woman stepped forward, clutching a shawl tight around her throat. “We haven’t been able to pass the bridge in two days. The river’s eating the stones.” She jabbed a finger at my chest. “It was bad before, girl. But ever since you went up to that accursed house the rot has moved faster.”
“It’s not me,” I lied. My presencehadaccelerated it. The house, the curse, the man, they were reacting to me.
“Go back to your master,” someone spat.
I broke into a run, their angry muttering chasing me all the way to the infirmary steps. Inside was madness.
The Apothecarium, a place of quiet bubbling brews and soft whispers, was a cacophony of animal distress. My father wasnowhere to be seen, likely cornered in the back room, leaving the front exam room in chaos.
On the main table, the baker’s herding hound was thrashing, its claws scrabbling against the wood. Dark foam flecked its two muzzles, and I could hear that buzzing dissonance beneath its skin, the sound of the corruption taking hold.
“Hold him!” I ordered the baker, who was weeping openly.
I reached for the sedative on the shelf, it was a simple valerian blend to stop the seizure. My arm extended, but my fingers refused to obey. They spasmed, a tremor I couldn’t get a hold of that radiated up to my shoulder. My hand clipped a ceramic teacup sitting on the prep table. Shards of blue-painted clay skittered across the floorboards. I stared at my shaking hands, horror rising in my throat. I was unraveling. The magic was eating the nerves right out of my body.
The dog let out a strangled yelp, arching its back. There was no time for potions. I slammed my palms onto the hound’s ribcage.Quiet.
I didn’t ask the magic; I shoved it. I reached for the discordant noise inside the beast and crushed it. The reaction was instantaneous. A line of heat seared down my spine, hot enough to make me gasp. Something wet and warm dripped onto my apron. I blinked, and the room smeared into shapeless grey blobs. My nose was bleeding in a freakin steady stream. The world tilted. I gripped the edge of the metal table, my knuckles turning white, fighting the darkness crowding my vision. Beneath my hands, the dog went still. The buzzing stopped, but so did its heart.
I pulled my hands back, leaving bloody smears on the animal’s golden fur. “No,” I whispered. “No, come back.”
The baker’s wife let out a broken sob that cut me deeper than any knife. I stood there, swaying, wiping the blood from my upper lip with a trembling wrist. “I... I tried to stabilize him. The corruption was too deep.”
