“Can you tell me more about manbane?”
Lana stopped rummaging.
“I was reading the potion book you gave me,” I said quickly, “and I was wondering why it didn’t mention any poisons.”
“I told you. Witches do not make poisons for malicious intent. It is the one law we have,” Lana said.
“I know,” I said. “But shouldn’t there be something about the one poison that made it into human hands?”
Lana exhaled. “If you must know,” she said in a low voice, “manbane drains years of life. Each day the victim is poisoned, a year is taken from their life. It is painful and insidious. Each night passes in agony and each day with exhaustion. Eventually it kills the victim. But not before inflicting terrible damage on their psyche.”
Perhaps it was the breeze from the window that caused the chills running up my spine and down my arms. Or perhaps it was the emotionless way Lana described the horrors of manbane. To think the queen was suffering through such a poison! Was Duchess Wilhelmina really capable of inflicting such horrors upon someone she called a friend? And the thing that bothered me most...
“What kind of witch would make such a poison?” I asked.
“Perhaps,” Lana said, her voice still stiff and emotionless, “one who was caught up in negative feelings. Perhaps they have repented.”
“Is there an antidote then?” I asked. “Surely there must be if they have truly repented.”
Lana closed the cupboard. “There is not an antidote, nor will there be any use for one. It has been years since manbane got into human hands. The victim, if there is one, would be long gone by now.”
I bit my lip. “She isn’t.”
Lana whirled around. I had never seen her so pale. “What are you saying?”
“Queen Cordelia,” I said. “She was poisoned by manbane recently.”
Her mouth thinned. “How can you be sure?”
I told her everything I had found out, from the scarlet smoke at the Debutante Ball to the results of Erasmus’s lab experiment to the investigation with Ash. I told her of the manbane I had extracted with my extracting potion. I told her that if no one in Witch Village made an antidote for the queen, she would not survive.
Lana stared hard at the spot above my head. “Foolish girl. You should have never told that inspector of your magic. And why are you so concerned about a human queen?”
I blinked rapidly, taken aback by her response. I knew she disliked royalty, but I didn’t know her hatred extended this far.
“If only there’s a recipe for the antidote, I could make it myself,” I said. “You don’t have to—”
“You didn’t make any foolish promises, did you?” Lana interrupted.
“What?”
“You didn’t tell that prince you would save the queen?”
I shook my head. “No, but I’m the only one—”
“Good. Then you are under no obligation to do so. I suggest you remove yourself from this mess. Leave it to the human physicians.”
“They won’t be able to save her,” I said, growing helpless.
“Neither will you,” Lana said firmly. “Manbane antidote does not exist.”
“But—”
“Close the door on your way out.”
I did. My gut was in tangles as I half walked and half ran down the path from Lana’s cottage. If there was really no antidote, Queen Cordelia was doomed to suffer until the manbane killed her. My gut clenched. How could I tell Erasmus? And worst of all, how could I tell Ash?
