An Affair of Poisons(47)

“Don’t!”

He tosses his hands into the air and blows out a frustrated breath. “How am I supposed to assist you if I’m not allowed to touch anything?”

“You’re not.”

“But I thought—”

“You thought wrong.”

He drags his fingers through his hair. “How are we supposed to unite the people if we cannot even unite ourselves?”

“Simple. You manage your side of the bargain and I’ll manage mine. Once you’ve convinced Louis to give the common folk the same consideration as the nobility, I’ll start working on your antidote to Viper’s Venom. In the meantime, I’ll be making curatives. As planned.”

“If you recall, I betrayed my brother and my best friend in order to free you from the sewer, which means I’m not exactly welcome to return anytime soon.”

I heft a gallipot to the hearth and arrange the sad remnants of half-charred logs into a pile. Then I strike a bit of flint to start a fire. “You’re going to have to face them eventually if our plan is going to work.”

“I know that. But I think they’ll be more inclined to listen if we’ve laid the groundwork first—if we can show them the commoners are open to the idea of reinstating the royal family. I don’t know why you’re being so difficult. I thought we were past all this.”

“You thought we were past all this?” I turn to face him, my arms crossed and my voice low. “Just days ago, I was tied up in the sewer and you were prepared to kill me.”

“But I didn’t. And we’ve been—”

“Then once I was supposedly ‘free,’ you followed me because you still didn’t trust me—even though I had proven myself, twice, by healing your sisters and Desgrez. Forgive me if I’m not ready to hand over my most prized possession and the secrets of my trade. Trust goes both ways.”

Josse opens his mouth, and then promptly closes it. Speechless for the first time in his life, I’d wager. “If I can’t assist you and I can’t return to the sewer, what do you expect me to do, exactly?”

I remove a kettle from one of the satchels and hold it out. “I need water. I saw a trough behind one of the gambling halls. And once you’ve done that, you can collect firewood.”

“Anything else?” His voice has taken on a cold edge and he yanks the kettle from my hand.

A fingertip of guilt needles my side as he storms out of the millinery. It was low of me to relegate him to the role of a servant, but it’s not as if he’s treated me as an equal. Why should I be the first to bend?

I begin chopping watercress and fennel leaves for hunger tonic, expecting the familiar work to blot out the world and lull me under its spell as it always does, but my gaze keeps returning to the door. That invisible finger keeps jabbing my ribs.

Eventually Josse returns, banging the full kettle down on the table and tossing an armful of wood beside the small fireplace. Then he skulks to the far wall and plunks down with a thump. “Is this far enough? Or am I still too close?”

“That’s fine,” I say. Then I add, softer, “I don’t mind if you watch.”

“How magnanimous of you.”

I set my pestle down and look at him. “I’m not trying to be cruel. It’s difficult for me to trust anyone. Surely you understand?”

He laughs. “I’m afraid you’re sniveling stories and quivering lip won’t work on me.”

“I was trying to apologize.”

“Were you? An apology usually includes the words I’m sorry.”

“Perhaps you should heed your own advice—you have just as much to be sorry for.” I take up the pestle and resume dashing it against the mortar bowl. Pretending it’s the princeling’s head.

Neither of us speaks for well over an hour. I finish the hunger tonic, portion it into phials, and begin a vermifuge of agrimony and garlic.

“What are you making now?” Josse asks. “It reeks to high heavens.”

“I thought you weren’t interested.”

“Well, I’ve nothing else to do—you’ve made certain of that.”

I stifle another twinge of guilt. He was brimming with excitement when we first returned from the Louvre, and now he’s slumped in the corner like a whipped mule. I sigh and offer him a sliver of information.

“It’s a vermifuge.”

“And that is?”

“It expels worms from the gut.”

He grimaces as he gains his feet and slowly makes his way to the counter. “That explains the smell. And that other remedy you made?”

“A hunger tonic. We distribute it to the poor to ease the emptiness in their bellies and provide enough sustenance to keep them from starving.” Josse is silent for a long moment, watching me stir the viscous mixture. My arms ache and sweat pours down my cheeks. I wipe my face on my sleeve and readjust my hands, but it’s too late. Angry blisters are bubbling across my palms.

“Alchemy looks like backbreaking work.”

“I am more than capable,” I assure him.

He holds up his hands. “I never said you weren’t. I didn’t realize the Shadow Society provided actual remedies. I thought it was all love potions and inheritance powders.”