Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet (9 page)

She isn’t in the forest. She isn’t in the trees or the lake or the doe or the fawn.

CHAPTER 9

I’m up early the next morning, despite the deep exhaustion yesterday’s work infused into my body. There’s just enough sun to banish the blue of predawn. The rough grass of the grove bends with dew, which fortunately hasn’t affected my gingerbread. I must be thinking the right things when I bake it.

I walk outside, leaning on my cane, and survey for any sign of Fyel. I don’t expect to see him, but when I complete my search, I’m disappointed anyway. Dragging my heavy, booted leg, I approach the edge of the grove, where I found my crystal. The dew turns my bare and bandaged feet cold—Allemas has still refused me any sort of footwear. I circle the grove, going as far as twenty feet out, searching for any telltale glints between tree roots or among the grasses. I even scan the treetops for anything iridescent hanging from their limbs, but my search proves fruitless.

“What are you doing?”

I glimpse Allemas standing in the center of the grove, watching me in alarm, his face paler than usual. Now that I think of it, I’ve never seen him flush.

“Not escaping,” I say. “Stretching.”

“Stretch here.
Here.
” He points to the grass at his feet. Suppressing a sigh, I limp toward him, studying him as I go. What is it that Fyel expects me to learn from this man? Have I misjudged what Allemas may know about me?

“Do you go home every night?” I ask once I reach him.

“I go places,” he answers.

“What places?”

“Too many questions.” Allemas presses his palms to his ears and shakes his head, humming quietly to himself. He stops after a moment, drops his hands, and grins at me. “I came now; I came last night. The house is being built. You look like a person. I am a good master.”

I look past his shoulder. He returned in a different direction from the one he used to leave. Surely Allemas is not the one who bespelled these woods. His customer, perhaps? Is she some sort of witch . . . or someone merely gifted, like me?

“If you deny it, you will be lost.”

Deny
what
?

Allemas pushes the tip of his index finger against my nose until I look at him again. He repeats, “I am a good master, hm? Hm?
Hm?
” He nods enough to make his wiry hair bob over either ear, though his hat stays secure.

“You’re tolerable,” I say. I back up a half step, my splinted limb sluggish to follow.

He doesn’t seem angry at my answer. He rubs his chin for a moment and answers, “I am a better master than you.”

I’ve never been a master
, I think, and
I rub the back of my neck to drain the anger building beneath my scalp. My hair is starting to get long; it reaches midway to my shoulders in the back. Maybe I can convince Allemas to bring me some scissors.

Arrice was always the one to cut my hair, though she likes it better long. A sore, sucking sensation blooms in my chest.
Please, please be safe
, I pray, but again my silent words hit a wall looming over me. They bounce back to the earth, slicing through me on their way down.

Allemas whirls around on one heel and marches to the edge of the grove like a soldier, his gait still without pattern. I notice, for the first time, that his right arm is slightly longer than his left, and it doesn’t move as well. It doesn’t swing as high, and the fingers are limp. Past injury, or a birth defect?

I follow him a few steps, watching it. My stomach tightens. There is a definite
wrongness
about this man. Perhaps, if I can unearth the core of Allemas, I might learn whatever it is Fyel wants me to learn. Perhaps I’ll even discover the antidote to my captivity.

He stops just past the edge of the grove and turns about once more. He races toward me, his eyes and smile wide. He looks like a mad beast, and my immediate instinct is to duck and cover my head with my arms.

But he doesn’t touch me. Instead he crouches to my level and looks me in the eyes. “I changed my name! Just now,” he explains. “Now you’ll call me Alger. That is a good name, is it not?”

My lips part. The dew makes me shiver. “I . . . suppose?”

His countenance falls like the skin of a tree’s last apricot. “I thought it was good. Hmmm. Alger, for now.”

And he stands and marches away, disappearing into the maze of trees.

I wonder if Allemas is not his real name, either.

I decide to finish an entire wall instead of working my way up the house. This way I can determine if the foundation is strong enough to support additional gingerbread, and work out any problems I may have now instead of later. I assume this method will work best, but the tallest thing I’ve ever made before now was a seven-tier wedding cake for the miller’s stepdaughter.

I smile at the memory of strawberry filling and pink gum flowers, but the pleasant thoughts don’t last, for I find myself wondering if that family made it out of the marauder attack alive. The stepdaughter certainly did. She moved away after the wedding.

I think about weddings as I mix the next batch of gingerbread, of white lace and wreaths of yellow roses. I’ve been to two that I can remember, both in Carmine, both of which I catered, though I only made the actual wedding cake for one. It took me a week, and I unknowingly poured so much excitement into the ingredients that the party guests, myself included, stayed up nearly until dawn dancing with newfound energy. It made me so sick, I didn’t eat sugar for three days afterward.

That wedding was the night I had my first real conversation with Cleric Tuck. The cake undid us both, and the excitement of it has infused our relationship ever since. I don’t want to think about where Cleric Tuck is now—if he’s still in the pens, if he’s been sold, or if he palmed that key and freed himself. I don’t want to think about whether or not I’ll ever see him—or the others—again.

I frown as I pull the gingerbread from the oven. It isn’t robust like its brothers. It isn’t anything but gingerbread mixed by a distracted chef. I set it aside. I’ll snack on it later and stow some away in case I change my mind about fleeing.

Perhaps he perceived my thoughts, for just as I finish scraping off the still-warm pan, I spy Fyel outside my window. My chest constricts and my legs prickle, feeling full of wasps. I nearly drop the pan as I limp for the door, wiping sweat from my brow as I go.

Still unsure of how to greet my ethereal visitor, I start with, “I couldn’t find it. The crystal. I looked, but I couldn’t.”

A nod accompanies his frown. “That would be too easy, it seems.”

“Why do I need the other one?”

“Because it is important,” he answers. He studies me, mulling over his words for a moment before continuing. “Because it, too, is yours.”

“But—”

“Please,” he says, and his voice is wispy and husky at the same time, as though it, too, were a ghost. “I beg you to be careful of what you say. Not just with me. Treat your words with care.”

Patches of gooseflesh rise on my arms. “Because of what you said about denying who I am.” It’s not really a question.

He nods. “Follow me.”

The water-like wings above his elbows flap once, and he floats toward the edge of the grove, in the opposite direction Allemas—Alger—took that morning.

I limp after him. My leg doesn’t protest as sharply as it once did, but the cracked, mistreated bones still ache. “He says he’ll know if I try to escape,” I say.

“You are not escaping.” He gestures toward the wood. “Can you make it?”

“The forest is enchanted.”

“I can see through it.”

“What are you?” I ask, limping forward, nearly stumbling when my cane pierces a gopher hole. Fyel moves forward as if to assist me, then remembers himself and pulls back. If he’s a ghost, he hasn’t been dead for very long.

Fyel floats forward once I regain my footing, guiding the way. I haven’t the slightest idea where we’re going, but I said I would trust him, and so I do. And so I must, for I desperately need someone to lean upon during this absurd trial, and he is the only one available.

“Are you dead?” I try.

He smiles at that. “No. I am not of this world.”

“So you’ve said. Then . . . a spirit. A sky spirit, maybe. A messenger for one of the gods?”

He doesn’t answer.

I follow him in silence for a long moment. Save for the buzzing of insects and arguing of fowl, the thump, drag, step, thump, drag, step of my walk the only sound. I have the urge to join them, to chatter as they do, for between all the days I have spent locked in cellars and bedrooms and this strange cottage, I’ve done very little talking at all.

“Did you know he’s making me cover that old house in cake?” I ask, keeping my voice a few degrees below normal. I glance around, almost expecting to see Alger among the trees, but so far we are alone.

He nods. “I feel sorry for the children.”

“What children?” Alger has
children
?

“The ones who will eat it,” he clarifies. “This way.” He gestures around a thicket. I grab tree boughs as we walk to ease the burden on my ankle.

We slide down an incline covered in rotting leaves. Fyel hovers and frowns as I try to pick my way down with my cane, wincing each time I bang my splint. We’re going much farther than I expected. I might not make it back to the house before sunset, and then I’ll have to find an excuse for my lack of progress.

A cold, spikelike fear inches from my chest into my belly. What will Allemas—Alger,
Alger
—do, if that is the case? Break my other leg? Cut out my tongue? Beat me?

He doesn’t seem like a wanton person, so at the very least I don’t have to worry that he’ll force himself on me.

I shudder.

“I’m sorry.”

I glance up at Fyel, wondering if he can see through me as easily as I see through him. “For what?”

“Not finding you sooner. I was not sure—”

He stops abruptly, hiding yet another piece of truth.

“I won’t deny it if you tell me,” I try. Hope.

But he shakes his head. “With you, Maire, I take no risks.” He pauses, and I stumble through his legs as though he isn’t there at all.

For a brief moment, I wonder if he isn’t, but if I have indeed gone mad, it certainly doesn’t feel any different from sanity.

“What?” I ask.

“Do not tell him about me.” His translucent body tenses.

“I haven’t. I won’t,” I promise. Then I laugh, a single, dry chuckle. “Why would I?”

He relaxes a fraction and gestures to the east. “Here.”

He slips through a space between pine and ash. I try to pick up my pace and follow after him, but my bad leg has grown remarkably heavy, and it’s a pathetic struggle to pass into the glade.

Fyel hovers a few feet ahead of me.

It’s a handsome glade, surrounded by very tall and very old trees. The sun cuts through their close-knit branches in a pretty manner, and the skinniest of brooks passes through the wild brush just off center of the oval-shaped clearing. A few butterflies dance about the brook, and a falcon studies me with one eye from a high perch.

“This could almost be romantic,” I say, and then grunt as I shift my splinted leg forward for better balance. Dead leaves and a twig have wedged between my foot and the wooden boot. Sweat trickles down my back as I pick my way toward Fyel.

A small smile touches his pale lips. He sinks closer to the ground, hovering just over its plants. It’s one of these plants he gestures to: a small bush of half-bloomed scarlet flowers, its leaves long, narrow, and covered in tiny thorns.

“What is this?” he asks.

I eye him for a moment, wondering why he brought me so far only to ask such a simple question. I limp closer to the plant. “It’s regladia. It’s technically a perennial subshrub, and it blooms from spring through autumn. They’re somewhat rare, which is unfortunate, because its leaves are a natural analgesic.”

I perk up at my own words and close the distance between the regladia and myself, using my thumbnail to pry free several of the spiked leaves. These will help treat my injury and the sore muscles I accrue daily.

“Thank you,” I say, shoving the leaves into my pocket.

“Maire.”

I glance at him.

“How do you know so much about this plant?”

“Because I—”

The words escape me.

How do I know?

There is no regladia in Carmine.

I’ve never seen this bush before.

My skin pebbles into cool bumps, and I stumble away from the scarlet flowers, nearly tripping over my cane. My head whips back toward Fyel. “I don’t know.” My chest constricts. “I don’t know. I don’t know.” My eyes water. My heart speeds. Why is it so hard to breathe?

“Maire—”

“I don’t know,” I whisper, grabbing the sides of my head. It hurts suddenly. Hurts like my leg does, dull and constant and pounding.

In my mind’s eye, I see hands holding the stems of these flowers, hands that are almost the same color as the crimson buds.

And then the picture is gone.

My knees feel like cake batter. I almost drop to the earth, but a sharp pain in my ankle pulls me back to myself, and I stumble forward instead, staying afoot. I suck in several deep breaths, trying to put together a puzzle to which I have no pieces.