Page 29 of Hemlock & Silver

Clever, I thought, watching the maid leave. That’s one way to get a few moments of privacy. But why would she use that to eat this apple? And why was it so important that she tried to cram as much in her mouth as she could before I got to it?

It couldn’t be the only such thing she’d eaten. But hopefully, with enough tests, I could figure out what was in the apple and if it was the source of all our woes.

And the saints help me if it isn’t and I’ve just manhandled the king’s daughter over nothing.

No. This has to be it. I’m sure of it.

Eight hours later, I wasn’t quite as sure.

None of my reagents, applied to the peel or the flesh, turned up any sign of poison. Granted that didn’t necessarily mean anything—there were still many poisons that no one could test for, arsenic among them. Still, it would have been nice if it was easy.

I sighed and cut a quarter of the apple loose, wrapping it in wax paper for later. Then I set about poisoning the rooster.

The rooster was surprisingly wary of the apple. He pecked it once, then shook himself, his neck feathers flaring up, as if it had an unexpected taste. I leaned forward, my pen poised. Was there some odd flavor? Something that alerted him that this apple wasn’t quite right?

After a minute or two, nothing had happened except that a blob of ink had fallen on my page.

The rooster took a turn around his cage, noticed the apple again, and tried another experimental peck.

This time, apparently, it passed muster.

He ate up every bit of flesh and then pecked happily at the core. I sat down to watch him and take notes.

By that evening, he was bored by his confinement and had demolished the apple core, but he otherwise seemed healthy. I was ready to tear my hair out by the roots.

For a few glorious moments, I thought that maybe he was getting listless.

Then I realized that night had fallen and he was going to sleep.

I propped lanterns up near the cage, which woke him up again, but he still wasn’t doing anything suspicious, unless you counted trying to repeatedly jam himself between the bars as suspicious.

“It has to be the apple,” I told the rooster. “It has to be. I’ve eliminated everything else.”

The rooster cocked one suspicious avian eye at me, then went back to trying to fit his body through the bars of his cage.

“It’s got to be something cumulative. The dose is so small that it didn’t affect you, but it’s built up in Snow. That’s the only explanation.”

The rooster had no opinion about this.

“I suppose she could be eating the seeds…” I had set them aside in an envelope.

I peered into it now, disconsolate. Apple seeds had long been known to contain prussic acid, but the symptoms were all wrong.

“She’d be having rapid breathing and convulsions.

And the doctors would probably have noticed that her blood was bright pink. ”

The rooster had his head stuck through the bars and tried to back up, which ruffled his feathers in a way that he didn’t like. He made a hostile sound and tried to turn around without moving his head, which didn’t work well at all.

“Prussic acid also doesn’t tend to be cumulative. Mostly because people just die of it.”

He slapped his body against the bars, decided that he was under attack, and attempted to kick his hypothetical opponent. One of his spurs got stuck in the wickerwork, a clear sign of enemy action, and he kicked wildly until it came free.

I picked up the last quarter of the apple and unwrapped it. The bone-white flesh had turned brown, but the peel still had that otherworldly silver gleam to it. It practically glowed, even in the dim light of the laboratory. I stared at it, willing answers to come.

The rooster managed to extract himself from the bars and began making a hostile murr-urr-urrrrr sound at the cage, in case it got any further ideas.

I’d done everything I possibly could with the sample I had. No alchemist or physician could do more. There were no tests I hadn’t tried… except one.

It might not work. If the dose was cumulative, I might not feel anything. I was a good deal larger than Snow, after all, a plump adult rooster to the girl’s half-grown bantam.

But it was just possible that I might feel enough to recognize the substance.

The odds were quite good that it wouldn’t be fatal. The rooster was fine, after all, for a value of fine. “Of course, your liver might explode tomorrow,” I informed him. The rooster seemed unconcerned by this possibility.

I sighed, noted down the time and the weight of the apple, then popped it into my mouth and chewed.

It tasted… cold. Almost like mint, the way it chilled my mouth, but the flavor was nothing like mint.

It was apple all the way through, but apple with frost on it, almost painfully crisp, as if I’d bitten into glass instead of fruit.

Even after I swallowed, the coldness lingered in my mouth, and I felt each bite going down my throat like ice.

I wrote all of it down, then sat for about ten minutes to see if I was going to die.

When I didn’t, I gave the rooster a handful of corn, checked on the chime-adder, then went back to my room to see what would happen next.

I spent the time waiting for the poison to take effect by writing a letter to the king. I wanted to explain to him about Snow and the apple, in case she wrote to him to say I’d attacked her in the garden.

It’s surprisingly difficult to compose a letter like that. Dear Majesty… No, damn it, that probably wasn’t right. Your Majesty, I have discovered… What? The source of the poison? I couldn’t be sure that the apple was the source.

Your Majesty,

I have made a discovery that I suspect is related to your daughter’s condition. I found Snow in the garden eating an unusual fruit that does not grow in this area. She refused to tell me where it came from or how she had acquired it. I fear that…

That…

I stared at nothing, which in this case included the mirror. The woman reflected in it had her upper lip curled in exasperation.

I fear that whoever provided the fruit to her may be the source of the poison. I am currently testing it for contamination.

That last line was just this side of falsehood. I’d tested it and found nothing. Unless I started to feel results in the next few hours, I would have to admit that the apple had either been harmless or was so cumulative that it would take me weeks to prove anything.

Frustrated, I wadded up the sheet of paper and flung it aside. A streak of gray shot from under the bed and pounced on it. I watched the one-eyed gray cat kick a few times, and then he rolled to his feet and began to stalk off, carrying his prize in his mouth.

“Oh no, ” I said, seized by a sudden vision of the scene that might ensue if my letter was found lying in some distant corner of the manor and somehow got back to Snow. I reached for the cat, who eeled out of the way and bolted for the balcony door.

“Cat, no!” I said, which had about as much effect on the cat as it would have on a goldfish.

I lunged after the beast, who skittered sideways toward the wall.

I thought I’d lost him, but I got a handful of fur and turned to scoop him up against my chest. I was bent nearly double, though, and the motion overbalanced me.

My head struck the immense mirror, and I fell through into silver.