Aline reached awkwardly into the inside pocket of my coat and pulled out one of the tiny packages. ‘No dear, the hard candy. The soft candy tastes too much like strawberries and it won’t settle with the duck.’
She reached into the other pocket. Her hand was shaking now, but she was trying to mask it, either because she understood what was happening or because she thought I was losing my mind.
‘There now,’ I said. ‘That’s the one.’
Without further instruction she unwrapped it and popped it in my mouth and I tasted the harsh, almost metallic flavour of the hard candy. A sniff of the stuff will wake you up from a deep sleep. A small bite will let you go for two days and nights on the move without sleep. The amount I swallowed at that moment could prevent a paralytic from stopping my heart – if it didn’t make it burst. I made the sounds I imagined one might make when tasting the tits of Saint Laina-who-whores-for-Gods.
‘You certainly seem enamoured of your confectionary,’ Laetha said drily.
‘I am indeed, mistress. I am indeed. I would offer you some, but that was the very last piece. Perhaps you’d like to try some of the other candy I have with me? It’s soft, and tastes of summer strawberries.’
‘Thank you, no,’ she said. ‘As you say, strawberries go ill with duck.’
Aline sat in her chair, inching closer to me each time she fidgeted, looking back and forth between us all and clearly terrified. Radger looked at me from across the table with eyes that betrayed nothing, simply waiting.
Well, fine: I was waiting too. But I still couldn’t move my arms.
‘Where did you say the old woman was again?’ I asked.
‘We’ve told you three times now, she’s out with the others, searching for Aline.’ Laetha’s voice held only irritation, but her shoulders betrayed fear. Radger rose and headed to one of the cabinets in the corner.
‘Right, right – forgive me. And how did you find us again?’ I asked.
‘We told you, it was luck. Just luck.’
‘Of course. What’s wrong with me?’
‘Falcio …’ Aline said.
‘And that drink you gave me – delicious! What was it again? Zinroot?’
‘Yes.’ Laetha looked over to at her husband, unsure of what to do.
‘It was the glass,’ Radger said casually. In his hand he held a thick iron rod, a bit under two feet in length. Each end was wrapped in tanned leather. This was a weapon for disabling a man, perhaps crippling him, but not killing him. ‘In case you’ve been wondering, the poison was in the glass already, not in the drink.’
‘Ah. The glass,’ I said as the paralytic began to assert itself on my limbs and organs. ‘I should’ve realised.’
‘Few would,’ Radger said. ‘It’s how we sometimes get children to take their medicine when they’re being obstinate: put it on the rim of the glass and fill it with plain water, then drink some yourself from a clean glass to make them feel safe.’
‘Radger! What are you doing?’ Aline asked.
‘Shush, girl. You come with me now,’ Laetha said, rising from the table.
Aline jumped from her seat and came behind me. She took the bracer of knives from the inside of my coat and pulled one free, holding it out in front of her.
‘Don’t be foolish, child,’ Laetha shouted.
Radger took a step forward and Aline threw the knife at him. She missed him by a city block, but the knife did give a satisfying thunk as it stuck into the wall. She quickly pulled another one out before Laetha could grab her arm and swung it in an arc in front of us.
‘Where is Mattea?’ Aline demanded.
‘Let’s all settle down now, my sweetheart,’ Radger said.
‘Where is she? You can’t tell me she would do this to me – you can’t!’ With her left hand she started shaking my shoulders, trying to get me to move, but I held, stiff as stone.
‘Aline,’ Radger said, taking another step towards us, ‘it’s time for you to be grown-up now. There’s enough limerot in that man’s blood to stop a pack of dogs in their tracks. So just you go with Laetha and leave me to do what I’ve got to do. I’ve got no call to hurt you, but I will if you don’t stop misbehaving now.’
‘Damn you!’ Aline screamed, waving the knife as Radger took another half-step towards us and Laetha started reaching out, looking for an opportunity to catch Aline’s wrist. ‘Damn you all! You were supposed to be my friends!’ She started reaching back inside my pocket for something and it took me a second to realise she was reaching for the soft candy again.
‘No,’ I said to her, ‘that won’t be necessary. Leave be and step back a few paces, Aline.’
The girl paused a moment and then complied, but she kept the knife in hand.
Radger and Laetha looked relieved. ‘See now, you listen to your man there,’ Radger said. ‘He knows when it’s done. No need to make a fuss.’
‘In case you’re wondering later on,’ I said, ‘it was the candy.’
‘The what?’
‘The candy. You’re an apothecary,’ I said. ‘Haven’t you heard stories of the King’s Hard Candy?’
‘That’s – that’s a myth,’ Radger said. ‘No one’s ever been able to make that recipe.’
‘Fool,’ I said. ‘You stupid. Fucking. Fool. Did you think you were the first person to ever come up with the idea of poisoning a Greatcoat? Did you really think that the King, with all his money and all his apothecaries, the finest in the country, and all his books from the most ancient libraries in the country – did you really think he never thought we’d have to deal with a fucking poisoner? Did you really think we wouldn’t have a way to deal with that?’
‘You’re bluffing,’ he said. ‘You’re trying to bide your time, hoping your stupid little candy will work, but it takes longer than this, doesn’t it?’
‘Take a step forward,’ I said. ‘Just one more step, and find out.’
Radger hesitated.
‘Come on! I’m right here – I’m sitting down! My sword’s in its sheath. On the best day of my life do you think I could get up, draw my blade and stab you before you can take one step and thrash me across the head with that iron bar? So what are you waiting for?’
He looked at Laetha for a moment, then back at me, and with a roar he stepped forward and swung the iron bar.
In my own defence, I did actually manage to push the chair back, get up and draw my sword faster than I would’ve thought possible, but the hard candy moves through the body from the inside out. The first thing to work, thankfully, are the internal organs, then the chest, shoulders and thighs. The hands and fingers are the last to come out of the paralysis, which in this case meant my aim was off and the blade went to the side, and the result was that instead of smashing my brains in, Radger hit the side of my ribs with less impact.
He pushed me hard, and I fell back onto my chair, the rapier dropping from my hand, and he pulled back for a final swing, only then noticing the small knife buried into his side.
‘Aline?’ he said, disbelievingly.
She had snuck in under his blow when I’d stood up and jammed the blade into his side. A big man like that, he could’ve shrugged it off for long enough to finish the job on me. But if you’ve never been stabbed before, it’s bloody painful, and shock takes you quickly.
Radger stumbled back a few feet. Laetha raced to his side. I leaned over and picked up my sword before pulling myself to my feet.
‘Now,’ I said, ‘why don’t you give me the amulet?’
‘What?’ Aline said.
I held my sword point very close to Radger’s bleeding wound. Laetha reached into a pocket in her skirts and pulled it out. She tossed it on the table and Aline ran over and picked it up.