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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

In the sunbeam of a new morning, something wriggled under the brown homespun cloth.

The badger pinched the corner and yanked it away with a flourish to reveal an undulating mass of garden snails. Drab beige-and-brown shells and sleek snails moved purposefully yet slowly over the bed of vegetable peels, fruit scraps, and bits of old soup bones.

“When you didn’t return for dinner two days ago, I had to feed them to keep them fresh ,” Mrs. Bilberry informed pointedly.

“I am sorry about that,” I said tightly. I’d already apologized three times since arriving, and as selfish as it sounded, I had more pressing concerns than the snubbed feelings of a badger. Especially since I’d already tried to make amends.

Last night I’d returned to my room to find no cat. Naturally I’d gone to the fireplace, where the sneaky little thing had hidden himself before, and had discovered a note hidden in the chimney away from rat or mousy eye. Or rather, a brief message written by a claw in the soot that coated the wall: Brickwork. Have help. A familiar paw print signed the message .

Sawyer was at work loosening a brick or stone that would open either above the dungeon or the tunnel. A hob or hobs was helping him in the endeavor.

Sleep hadn’t come easily, and I woke before the first rays of sunlight struck my window. I was up, cleaned, dressed, and had that infernally heavy foraging bag slung over my shoulder and was nearly out the door when I realized I wouldn’t be the only one who’d recognize the change in weight. The bag was bulging.

Where to stash the offload?

Sawyer’s note had given me the perfect place. The soot and creosote in the chimney and surrounding fireplace hadn’t been disturbed by Ossian’s spies—there were no rodent prints. Only Sawyer’s.

Quickly, I unloaded everything I couldn’t risk getting caught with: the bleached tourmaline and the Hunting Spell monocle. They went on the ledge of the open flue, out of sight to all but anyone who crawled down the chimney. Beside them, I placed the rarer items: the Illuminate matches, a vial of shrouding powder, a few other odds and ends. The black tourmaline went into my censer, replacing the dead coal and hiding in plain sight.

Then, I’d gone straight to the kitchen with the primary purpose of inquiring after my cat, but strangely, there’d been no hobs to be found helping the cook this morning. And the more this badger, well, badgered me, the more snippy I was going to get.

I gave the bucket of garden snails an approving nod. “These look wonderful, Mrs. Bilberry. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I—”

“And here the mussels,” the cook said, indicating another bucket nearby. This one was set in the sink, the faucet above applying a steady thin stream of water.

The mollusks inside barely resembled the mussels I’d grown up with at Hawthorne Manor. These didn’t have elongated blue-black shells, rather round and flat and as drab a brown as mud. Heelsplitters, as the locals called them, so named for the sharp lip that could cut your foot if you were wading in their beds.

“I trust you’ll find them still fresh .”

Aaand apparently the badger was still miffed that I’d wanted to inspect them in the first place.

Nodding, I returned to the bucket of snails. “All looks well in hand, Mrs. Bilberry. This one in particular seems very fresh.” I pointed to a medium-sized snail whose only defining characteristic was its speed and vivacity at which it devoured the scraps.

“Feisty is more like it,” the badger said.

The snail clung to the knobby end of a chicken drumstick, its little body bowing in protest as I pulled at its shell to extract it from the others. “I think I’ll let this tenacious little thing live another day and populate another generation of robust gastropods.” After it helped me free a certain bear shifter.

The snail released the drumstick with an audible, if muted, pop and searched— hunted —my fingers for food with gliding strides. Such a vivacious little creature needed a proper name. Angus. Or was it female? Angusina. Better go with the safe bet and call it by the nickname Auggie.

“How honorable, milady,” the badger was saying. “And will you be honoring us with your presence this evening? I’ll not be cooking these up to have you shun their sacrifice by being a no-show again.”

Who knew badgers could be so salty? “I’m curious, Mrs. Bilberry, do you give Cernunnos this much abuse when he misses meals? Or when he doesn’t install you a dishwasher?”

And who knew badgers could blush? “Apologies, milady,” she mumbled.

I was more worried than irritated with her. Her true personality was coming through stronger with each passing day—the benevolent but no-nonsense proprietress of the Candlelight Inn. Her chastising barbs and insistence for mutual respect would be seen as insubordination, and there was only so much that could be blamed on the portal-blast backlash before Ossian and the Brotherhood started looking into the Caer powder.

“I look forward to dinner tonight,” I reassured her, “but I’ll need breakfast to go. Whatever you have that’s portable, please. I’ll just feed the sourdough and then get out of your way.”

“No one wants a civilized meal at the breakfast table anymore,” the badger muttered.

“Is Cernunnos not dining this morning?”

“He’s gone, milady. Took his horse at daybreak and I’ve been told not to expect him back until this evening.”

He’s actually hunting down Wystan! And that would explain the absence of the hobs—there was no need to prepare a twelve-course breakfast when it was just me dining.

As the badger bustled off, I set Auggie where I could watch it and pounded my fist three times as inconspicuously as I could against the nondescript stone door of the servant passageway. There was no immediate response, so I knocked again.

“Did you hear something, milady?”

“Just fumbled this flour jar.” I let it slip through my hands again, forcing a hearty rattle. “Oops!”

“Hmph.”

“Come on, Roland,” I muttered, checking over my shoulder to make sure Mrs. Bilberry was appropriately preoccupied.

After a third knock, I could put off the starter no longer. After removing the cloth cover, I added flour and water to Bruno’s jar and beat it in with a heavy wooden spoon. The greedy starter smelled heavily of strong, healthy yeast and bubbled happily as I fed it breakfast. Then I slid it back into its warm place by the ovens and harassed the servant passageway one final time.

There was a click and a release of gaseous pressure, then Roland’s whiskered face poked through the crack between door and wall. “He’s still at it, lass,” he informed without my needing to ask. “Joe and Walt are helping him.”

The breath I seemed to be holding since last night exited my lungs in a rush. “Thank the Green Mother.”

“I still can’t believe you let a cat in here,” he hissed, taking a look around the kitchen in case the cook was watching.

No doubt the other woodchucks knew about Sawyer—except Dale, as he was quite the chatterbox—but Mrs. Bilberry didn’t know about the cat. The hobs seemed adamant to keep it that way. Of all the castle staff, she interacted the most with Ossian, and they wanted no nervous slip of the tongue to incriminate them all.

“But he’s not like anything he made him out to be, is he?” I whispered back, careful not to invoke Ossian’s name, just in case.

“No,” Roland admitted begrudgingly. “And I suppose Ricky’s worth it. Cantankerous old ’chuck that he is.” He ducked his head back into the passageway and started closing the door. “Breakfast’s ready.”

“Tell him to hurry,” I whisper-shouted after him. “And that I’ll be at Shari’s!”

The wall became a seamless expanse of manilla stone once more, and I had enough time to adjust the massive sourdough starter jar and retrieve the snail before Mrs. Bilberry could see anything suspicious.

Or so I’d thought.

“Talking to your starter, milady?” she asked, her dark eyes skeptical.

Well that was close. “As a fabulous cook, I’m sure you know the importance of treating your food with love.”

“Hmph. Here you are, milady.” She handed me a deboned chicken that she’d sandwiched between the two halves of an entire loaf of bread, all wrapped up in brown parchment paper. The cook added an apple, a pear, and an entire round of Brie cheese on top of the package, making it clear without words that I was to stay out of her kitchen for the rest of the day. Or until it was time to feed Bruno again.

No doubt so I wouldn’t question the freshness of any of her other ingredients.

“Thank youuu!” Cradling the food close to my chest, I scurried out of the kitchen.

With breakfast, lunch, my snacks, and snail in hand, I trotted up the spiral staircase. It would be a short jaunt to the foyer, then the courtyard and the bridge beyond. I should stop by the stables to get a headcount on the horses and see just how many Brothers were out there helping their fae king hunt down the hobgoblin. While I’d declared my intentions to have another dress fitting, I didn’t want to skulk to Shari’s hut if I didn’t need to. Ugh, especially with Shane in tow. It was mind-fraying to constantly worry about being surveilled or spied upon or—

“Oh!”

A Brother, not Alec or Shane, shoved away from the archway where she’d been leaning. Brother was more of an affiliate term here, as the magic hunter before me was female. She was the one I’d seen outside the Magic Brewery, the one who’d suggested harassing Emmett.

Carissa.

She stood half a head taller than me and wore her hair shorn along the sides and long on top. That length was always plaited in a fishtail braid to keep it out of her eyes. Eyes that were dark and glinted like flint.

“Good morning,” I said with false cheeriness, stepping around her. “Busy day at the dressmaker’s and then it’s off to the gardens—”

Carissa stepped in front of me, blocking my way to the foyer and the sweet, sweet winter-laced freedom of open air. With a sneer, the magic hunter produced a container of fizzy red liquid. “Cernunnos wanted to make sure you had your tonic this morning.”

“I’m not drinking that.” I would’ve crossed my arms over my chest had I not been carrying a literal armful of food. The salty badger hadn’t given me a basket, but I should’ve insisted on one. “I don’t know where that’s been.”

Carissa’s eyes narrowed at the implication. “If you don’t drink this, then you’ll be confined to your quarters.”

Snorting, I channeled my grandmother and gave her my most scathing up-down glance. “And you’ll make me?”

The bluish-green markings on Carissa’s skin illuminated and came to life, twisting and wriggling like freshly unearthed worms. “Yes.”

The flat response gave me pause. I was not so confident in my own power that I could blatantly ignore any threat posed my way. Ossian was still formidable with arcane magic at his disposal. There was a distinct possibility he’d given something akin to a heretic’s fork to Carissa to use at her discretion.

“And you’re not leaving this castle,” the magic hunter informed me. “Not while Cernunnos is away. The dressmaker will be brought to you, and there’ll be no off to the gardens .” She wrinkled her face in disgust. “They’re dead at this time of year, and if they’re not dead yet, they’re full of slimy wet things anyway. Disgusting.”

“Well, no reason to get nasty,” I said. “I don’t get fussy about your hobbies.”

Carissa was known to be blatantly promiscuous. Though, I didn’t know a Brother without a poignant vice. The magic and power they stole always made them hungry for their next fix, and that didn’t always translate into a magical boost.

I made sure to give her another judgmental up-down glance that told her in no uncertain terms exactly what I thought about those fae-like markings on her skin. Stolen magic. “And I can’t very well drink that with my hands full. Hold this.”

Without waiting for her consent, I started unloading my breakfast, lunch, snacks, and snail on her.

“Now wait just a—”

Carissa screeched as the intrepid garden snail scooched along the brown parchment-paper packaging right at eye level. Oh, thistle thorns, had I placed a slimy wet thing right there so I could free up a hand to take the tonic?

The magic hunter stumbled back, flailing. My breakfast, Auggie, and the bottle of red fizzy drink-me-not launched into the air.

That’s when I struck.

My magic was so fast now I didn’t need to ground myself anymore to concentrate. I was grounded already, to the magic oak tree. Vines, too many to count, shot out of me. They snatched my food, the garden snail, and the bottle before they could hit the ground, and one helped Carissa stumble back even further and crack her body against the stone wall.

The magic hunter slumped to the floor, head lolling to the side.

The vine that had shoved her now encircled her like a serpent, its tip crooking under her chin to lift her face. Carissa groaned, eyelids fluttering. “Damn . . . sna—”

Her words slurred as I blew uncut Caer powder into her eyes. Then I pinched her bottom lip, pulled it out away from her mouth to expose her bottom teeth, and sprinkled dried valeriana petals against her gums. They would dissolve over time, ensuring a deep slumber that would give me the unsupervised and uninterrupted time I needed with my friends.

Straightening, I plucked the bottle of fizzy red nasty from where the glittering green vine still suspended it, uncorked it, and poured it into a dark corner. Then I wedged the empty bottle into Carissa’s slack hand and retrieved Auggie and my rations. The magic vines winked out of sight, and I began my trek to the porcupine’s hut. Since I clearly wasn’t supposed to be out and about unattended, I had to skulk yet again in case there were any spies. Where was Shane, anyway?

A shadow passed overhead just as the stick hut came into view. I choked down a yelp and shied away under the boughs of a nearby cedar, but the creature had already seen me. A blackbird?

Gertrude the robin!

Her nest was nowhere near here and she was twittering up a storm and—

I broke out into a run. Forget the possible spies.

A minute later, I was smacking aside the red curtain door and ducking inside the hut. Shari was crocheting manically on her cot and Daphne was crying big horse tears that rolled down her long muzzle to drip off the end of her nose and sizzle against the logs in the firepit.

“Oh, Meadow,” the mare sobbed. “Flora’s been taken !”