Page 16 of A Witch’s Guide to Love and Poison

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‘A lright,’ Xander said, rubbing his hands together. ‘Let’s get to work.’

She was back at the greenhouse and had laid Deeba down on a small cot Xander had procured from Forest knew where. The advantages of being rich, she supposed.

‘I’m glad to see the freeze potion is holding,’ Xander said, after examining Deeba. ‘Now to make the cure … It would be easiest to run trials if we had the poison to test on.’

‘Right,’ Bisma agreed. ‘Can we extract it from Deeba?’

‘Precisely what I was thinking,’ Xander said. ‘If we take some of her blood, we should be able to separate the poison from it.’

‘But the poison won’t stay alive outside of the body,’ Bisma said. ‘Didn’t you say the blood we extracted from Luna wasn’t viable to examine?’

‘Yes, that is a problem …’ Xander ran a hand through his hair, thinking.

‘What if we manipulate the freeze potion and apply it to the poison to keep it from dying. Would that work?’

‘Possibly,’ Xander said. ‘But I don’t know if manipulating the poison in that way would affect how it would interact with a cure. Also, how would we do that in the first place?’

They both puzzled over it, until Bisma was struck by another idea.

‘Wait,’ she said. ‘What if we simply put the poison on something else living, but make sure it can’t kill the host?’

‘That would work,’ Xander said. ‘With your speciality in growing, particularly. You could make a plant that could survive that sort of thing, and we could inject it with the isolated poison.’

‘Alright,’ Bisma said. ‘I’ll work on that; you work on extracting and separating the poison.’

They both attended their tasks, working in comfortable silence. Bisma was used to working alone, so she anticipated working with Xander to be a nuisance, but she was glad to see that he was just as serious as she was when it came to their magic.

He gave her space, working at a different table, as she tried to create what they needed.

It took some time, but Bisma created a smaller version of an evergreen tree, though of course it was manipulated with magic to become something more. Evergreen trees survived the harshest of winters without dying; this magical plant would survive this poison.

‘I’m just about finished as well,’ Xander said, spreading a fine white powder over a small dish of Deeba’s blood.

Bisma went to watch, standing on her tiptoes to look over his shoulder so she wouldn’t be in the way. The blood was a strange color, a kind of dark purple, red and blue mixed together.

A moment after the blood absorbed the powder, the dish made a hissing sound. Bisma watched as the liquid separated itself, until there was red blood to one side and dark blue liquid on the other.

Xander released a breath. ‘Finally.’

‘Now to test it,’ she said.

Xander put the poison into a syringe and brought it to the other table, where her magical evergreen tree was waiting. It was about a foot tall and perfectly lush, though the green leaves were threaded through with iridescent silver.

As Xander injected the base of the tree with the poison, Bisma held her breath.

The poison spread through the branches, giving the leaves a darker tint. She waited to see if the tree would wither and die, but it continued to hold on.

It had worked!

‘Brilliant,’ Xander said, turning to her. ‘You’re absolutely brilliant, Bis.’

The validation sparked embers deep within her. She lifted her chin, trying not to smile. ‘Was there any doubt?’

He laughed out loud. ‘None whatsoever, but credit must, of course, also be given to me.’ His eyes crinkled. ‘We make a good team.’

The sparks inside her fizzed into a fuzzy feeling at that. She cleared her throat. ‘So this is our test subject,’ she said.

‘Now for the cure …’

They started their work. It was difficult to figure out how to treat something when they could not diagnose what was causing the symptoms. If Bisma knew exactly what the poison was, she could simply grow something to counteract it. Cures were the opposite of poisons; they canceled one another out.

But it was near impossible to make a cure from nothing, which was why they focused on a mixing approach rather than growing.

Bisma’s lessons began, as Xander enthusiastically told her the theory behind the magic, explaining that much of the knowledge witches based their potions or magic on was already pre-established by other witches, kind of like tried-and-true recipes in cookbooks.

‘I’ll lend you one of my beginner-level books,’ Xander said. ‘It has all the common mixtures and their effects. As you learn more, you can use those common mixtures as your base, then add onto it.’

She listened intently, absorbing every word, thrilled to be learning.

‘So for the cure to this poison, I’ve been using myrrh, which is a common base for cures,’ he said, moving to another table, where there was a pile of the sap-like yellow resin.

He threw some into a bowl, then used his magic to turn the little rocks into a thick syrup, stirring it with a spatula. ‘And then yarrow leaves are also often used for cures; I’ve found drying the leaves in direct sunlight helps bring out their properties.’ He had a case of dried leaves, which he measured out into a spoon, which he added.

‘Can you mix that?’ he asked.

She did as she was told, watching as the dried leaves blended into the myrrh syrup.

Xander looked at the color and consistency, then added in a touch more of the dried leaves. ‘Perfect.’

She stopped stirring.

‘Now, I’ve found that adding fresh flower petals of yarrow brings out different benefits of the plant, which might be beneficial for this. Since the poison is strong, we want our cure to be stronger.’ He brought over a pot with little white flowers. ‘I haven’t tried it yet, so let’s see, but this won’t be nearly enough—’

He stuck his hand into the soil, and the plant grew. Quite slowly actually, compared to Bisma’s magic. Wanting to help, Bisma put her hand in the soil as well, and the plant immediately sprouted, the flowers tripling.

Xander’s eyes widened. ‘I felt some of your magic there,’ he said in awe. ‘It was like a roaring fire compared to my candle flame.’ He blinked. ‘Incredible.’

She bit back a smile, her cheeks warm.

‘Now we want to make a paste of these leaves,’ Xander said. ‘Why don’t you try?’

He slid over a mortar and pestle, then plucked the white petals and added them in.

She began to crush it, and his eyes widened.

‘Goodness, not like that,’ he said, coming closer. ‘Use your wrist. Clockwise and—no, no.’

With an impatient sound, he came behind her, his head above her shoulder.

One of his hands covered hers above the mortar, holding it in place, as he placed his other hand around hers on the pestle. His palm enveloped her knuckles, his long fingers slotting just above hers.

‘Like this,’ he said, his voice soft. His breath moved a tendril of hair against her cheek, and it tickled her jaw. She blinked twice, trying to focus.

His hand moved hers to gently crush the petals in a twisting motion, dragging it across the petals.

She felt the warmth of his chest against her back; she leaned against him, feeling the press of his body. An ache spread through her, deliciously painful.

‘That’s it,’ he said, the words fluttering against her neck.

She bit her lower lip, heart leaping. She continued with the motion he had shown her, both of them moving together. The difference in technique was obvious: the petals crushed more easily this way, dissolving into a smooth sap.

‘Perfect,’ he whispered, his cheek against hers.

She jolted as if struck with lightning.

‘I’ve got it now,’ she said, her face flaming. She brushed him off her, and he stepped back. She immediately felt cold, but she focused on her task, refusing to look at him, despite how her heart thundered.

They continued working. It took some time—there were more than a dozen steps, all with different ingredients. Xander had been testing different combinations and measurements and ingredients, bringing him closer and closer to the cure, but it was not quite there yet.

She was glad to be doing this with him, otherwise she’d have no idea where to begin, and the process was much too tedious for her to undertake on her own, nor was she nearly as organized as one apparently needed to be to concoct such a delicate potion.

As she worked, Bisma considered who might have gone through all this trouble to craft such an intricate poison. The more difficult the cure was to make, the more difficult the poison was. Whoever had done this had put a lot of thought and effort into it.

It was clear the aim wasn’t to get rid of the Unwanted Girls, as some hateful villagers had wished over the years. That would have been much easier and simpler.

In contrast, this was slow and painful … a punishment, almost. And it seemed to be directed at her. Why else would it occur so soon after she had become Baji?

But who hated her that much?

Luna’s father, her first victim? No, he wasn’t nearly conniving nor intelligent enough. If he wanted to hurt her, he would have done it years ago, and he would have been savage but quick about it.

Mei’s family, then? But they ran from town shortly after failing to uphold their end of Mei’s marriage agreement; Bisma had never even exacted revenge upon them.

Deeba’s wards, perhaps? Bisma had gotten retribution in that instance. She had poisoned them with something that made them constantly feel like they were starving, no matter how much they ate, which was a fitting punishment for neglecting Deeba.

Bisma had made them suffer for a few weeks but she didn’t think they ever knew it was her—they had assumed it was some sickness.

Most of her poisons were used on people who could not be sure they were, in fact, being poisoned. Much of Bisma’s reputation came from exaggerated legends.

Unable to pinpoint who might be behind the poisonings, Bisma considered how they were occurring, but she could find no conclusive answers in that line of thought, either. It was impossible to keep track of what the girls touched or ate because they were constantly moving, and there were so many of them.

They spent most of their time in the Enchanted Forest, but the Forest was safe. Only Unwanted Girls were allowed in; the fog around the perimeter ensured that.

As for the Forest itself, there were, of course, some berries, mushrooms, and plants that were harmful if eaten, but the girls knew those like the backs of their hands. So if not from the Forest, the poison had come from town, but there was no reason for that, either. Neither Deeba, Luna, or Mei had got sick after a trip to town, where they could have ingested or touched something.

So then how ? How was the poison getting in?

To make such a poison also required a skilled witch, and the most skilled witch in town was—without a question—Eleanora Chapman. There were a handful of other garden-witches, as well, but none clever enough to sell potions as a business as the Chapmans and Bisma did, so there was no way any of them could concoct such an intricate poison.

Bisma thought about how the poison had changed from Mei to Luna, how Eleanora could easily have adjusted the poison when she saw Xander heal Mei. But why would she do so?

And then came a horrifying thought: was Xander complicit? He was the only witch with power to rival Eleanora’s. The pair could be working together to create such a poison.

But then why would he help her create a cure? Deep down, she did not believe he would do such a thing. He was insufferable, not deadly.

Eleanora could create a poison on her own … but why? Bisma thought through her previous customers and anyone affected by her poisons, trying to see if there were any links between them and Eleanora.

But she didn’t know her customers that well; they told her their blights and she gave them solutions. Bisma did not ask them personal details.

Rubbing her temples, Bisma groaned. This was so frustrating.

At least running through her tangled thoughts kept her busy.

Soon enough, the cure was ready.

‘Only one thing for it, now,’ Xander said, taking a deep breath. Bisma held her breath, as well, hope creeping up on her as he injected the cure into their testing tree.

At first, nothing happened. Then the tree began to lose its branches. The trunk splintered.

Xander swore, rubbing a hand over his face.

‘Lovely,’ Bisma said, her eyes slitting. Her back hurt. They’d been at it all day, and it hadn’t even worked.

Xander frowned. He was practically wilting at the edges, his earlier excitement long gone. More than that, he looked exhausted.

An idea planted itself in Bisma’s mind.

‘Why don’t you take a nap?’ She blurted out the question before realizing how out of character it was.

Xander gave her a funny look. ‘Since when are you so attentive to me?’ he asked, though he did not seem suspicious. Rather, he looked quite pleased.

Bisma made a face that portrayed just how ridiculous she considered him.

‘You look horrible,’ she said, trying to bring back the usual bite back to her tone. ‘And I’d prefer if my partner didn’t drop from exhaustion in the middle of a trial.’

Though she had insulted him, he only grew more pleased. ‘I’m your partner now, am I?’

She rolled her eyes, not bothering to give him a response.

‘No, no, I can’t take a nap,’ he said, sighing. ‘I might have some tea and take a break, however. And I’ve got to drop something off.’

That would work for her plan. ‘To whom?’

‘I have my own private clients,’ he said, sounding quite pleased with himself by the fact. ‘I like to experiment with new techniques, and since Mother doesn’t want me to take such risks under the official Chapman Apothecary name, I do so with my own personal clients.’

‘What’s the case?’

‘The patient has shaking hands, and the Apothecary doesn’t have anything strong enough for it. We have potions to help with the pain, and some to help with mild shaking, but none for his condition. I think I’ve puzzled it out, though.’

He went to a cabinet, rummaging around bottles until he found a short, fat one.

‘I used a base of dried chamomile leaves and celery seed, then mixed in vanilla and nettle,’ he said, removing the cap and showing her the salve.

She smelled it. ‘Hmm, seems good to me,’ she said. ‘I wonder if it’ll work.’

‘Only one way to find out,’ he replied, putting the cap back on. ‘I was meant to head over hours ago, but …’

He would be gone, which meant she could investigate Eleanora. She recalled what he’d once said about guest rooms in the house.

‘You should go now.’ Bisma yawned, a bit theatrically. ‘While you do, perhaps I’ll take a nap.’ She rubbed her eyes for good measure.

‘Of course,’ Xander said. ‘Make yourself at home.’

He gestured to the bed in the greenhouse, which was really just a mattress on the floor. It had no frame, just an abundance of blankets and pillows. At the moment it was a mess, which made her think of Xander lying there, sleeping.

Her face warmed at the thought. Her gaze jumped away from the bed. He seemed to follow a similar train of thought, for his face turned pink, as well.

‘We have guest rooms in the house, as well,’ he added quickly.

‘Oh.’ She pretended to think about it. ‘Is anyone home?’

‘No, Mother’s at the Apothecary, and Father’s away on business.’

Perfect.