Witch Hunter (25 page)

‘What is it, then?’ George asks, politely stifling a yawn.

‘It wouldn’t happen to be a privy, would it? Or a wine cellar?

Either one would go down a treat right about now—’

‘Certainly not, dear boy. The cathedral is where I keep

all my artifacts.’

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‘Artifacts?’ George’s yawn grows wider.

‘Oh yes. It’s quite a collection! Naturally, I’ve kept

it secret. I’ve got spellbooks, grimoires, alchemy tools, and

other bits and bobs, even an alembic once owned by

Artephius himself! An athame made from whalebone

and some other rare weapons. I’m a bit of an expert,

I’ll have you know. I’ve got spears and staffs and swords

and knives—’

‘Swords?’ Fifer whirls around. ‘Knives?’

Humbert looks surprised. ‘I didn’t know you were

interested in weaponry, my dear.’

‘Of course I am,’ Fifer says.

John raises his eyebrows. ‘Since when?’

‘Since now.’ Fifer shrugs. ‘You never know when you

may have to defend yourself.’ She gives me a nasty look. ‘As

Nicholas always says: There are enemies everywhere.’

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Humbert leads us out of the dining room, back into the

checkered entrance hall. He walks straight to the largest of

the portraits, the one of Venus and Cupid I admired on the

way in. At the bottom of the painting is a pair of masks,

their empty, hollow eyes staring blankly in the distance. He

reaches out and pokes his finger inside the eyehole, and I

gasp – Is there really a hole in the canvas of this priceless

painting? – then hear a tiny click. On the other side of

the hall, a door swings open, just a crack. I’m impressed.

The door is tiny, narrow; the seams so well disguised by the

intricately carved walls as to be nearly invisible. That, or

I’m losing my touch.

Humbert crosses the hall and pushes the door open,

silent on its well-oiled hinges.

‘Come on, then.’ He motions for us to enter. Fifer slips

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through the door first, followed by George. I go next. But

what I see on the other side makes me stop. A narrow

stairway leading down, into darkness. John slides through

the door, glances at the staircase, then at me.

‘Humbert, maybe Elizabeth and I will wait up here—’

‘No, it’s okay,’ I tell him.

‘Are you sure?’

I nod. I’m a little curious to see Humbert’s collection.

And more than a little curious to see what Fifer’s up to. My

guess is she’s going to try to steal one of Humbert’s weapons.

She can’t hurt me, of course, but I worry about her getting

her hands on something anyway. The last thing I need is for

her to hurt John, or George, or even herself in some foolish

attempt to protect them against me.

I look at John. ‘Walk with me?’

He nods, and together we start down the tiny staircase.

Humbert squeezes through the door then, bolting it shut

behind him. Immediately, my hands start sweating.

‘Feel free to start singing any time you like,’ John

whispers. I attempt a laugh, but it comes out sounding more

like a groan.

When we reach the bottom of the stairs, I immediately

see why Humbert calls it the cathedral. It’s a large, circular

room with arched, vaulted ceilings taller than the room is

wide. One curve of the wall is made entirely from stained

glass; another curve holds a large cabinet. The remaining

wall space is lined with shelves, crammed with objects, all

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alive with movement. Jars that bubble and hiss. Clocks that

tick and hum. Globes that whirl and spin. Books stacked

upon one another; some leather-bound, others loose-leaf

and tied together with string. The tools he mentioned are

scattered everywhere: bowls, mortars and pestles, scales,

bags of herbs, and jars of various animal parts floating in

solution like grotesque fish in a bowl. In the centre of it all

is a brick furnace, a tiny blue fire dancing inside.

‘Well, don’t just stand there,’ Humbert says. ‘Have a

look around.’

George walks off to examine the spinning globes,

while Fifer and Humbert head straight for the cabinet. That

must be where the weapons are. I start to follow, but John

guides me towards the furnace instead. There are several

glass flasks set on stands over the fire, brightly coloured

liquids bubbling inside.

‘What is that?’ I ask.

John examines the largest flask, dark red liquid

boiling inside.

‘Aqua vitae, by the looks of it.’

I raise my eyebrows. ‘Humbert’s an alchemist?’

He smiles. ‘Well, he’s not trying to turn lead into gold or

anything. He’s just making wine. Rather, he’s making wine

stronger. This flask over here’ – he points to a smaller one

filled with orange liquid – ‘is brandy. It’ll be strong enough

to melt paint off walls when he’s done with it.’ He watches

the liquid boil, then reaches over and lowers the flame.

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‘No sense in his melting his insides, though.’

I laugh, then remember the book he was reading the

night he fell asleep in my room.

‘You’re an alchemist, too?’

‘Not quite,’ he says. ‘I thought about studying it at

university next year, though.’

‘Where?’ Alchemy is far too close to magic for that to be

allowed in Anglia.

‘Probably Iberia. Or maybe Umbria. I don’t know.

I haven’t decided yet.’

‘So, no pirate apprenticeship for you, then?’

He laughs. ‘No, though my father would love that. He’s

been trying to talk me into it since before I could walk.’

‘No good?’

‘No. I mean, it’s fine. I just prefer healing.’

‘Better wenching in the pirate trade,’ I point out.

He snorts. ‘Yes. Because I am all about the wenching.’

I laugh again. John motions to the shelf holding all the

animal parts. ‘Want to take a look?’

I nod, and we both rush over and start pulling jars off

the shelves.

I read the label on a jar that holds what look like tiny

grey raisins. ‘Mouse brains!’

‘Oh, that’s good.’ He peers at it closely, then holds out a

jar for me to see. ‘Look at this one.’

‘Frog eyes,’ I say. ‘Look at them all. Staring at us.

They’re so…’

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‘Judgmental?’

I start giggling. He puts it back and reaches for a bigger

jar, this one filled with something yellow and soft.

‘Cow pancreas.’ I wrinkle my nose.

‘Ugh, it looks like cheese.’

‘Trust me, you do not want that melted on top of

anything,’ I say. And then we’re both laughing, and he looks

at me and I look at him, and suddenly the space between us

seems very small and I feel a little thrill…until I remember

what George told me. About his mother, his sister. Then

that thrill turns into something else entirely and I take

a step back.

John doesn’t seem to notice. He just keeps pulling jars

off shelves and examining them, completely engrossed. I

should probably leave. Go and see what Fifer is up to. I

glance at her, standing with Humbert at the weapons

cabinet – Look at all those weapons! – deep in conversation.

George is still over by the globes, carefully not watching me,

which only tells me he is. I should definitely leave.

‘How did you become a healer?’ I say instead.

John carefully sets the jar he’s holding – sheep intestines

– on the shelf and turns to me. ‘My mother was a healer,’ he

says. ‘She ran an apothecary near our house in Harrow.

When my father wasn’t dragging me out to sea, I would

help her. Sometimes my sister would help, too, but she was

usually too busy getting into trouble with Fifer to be of

much use.’ He smiles a little at that.

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‘Anyway, when I was about nine, she suspected I had the

magic to be a healer, too. So one day she took me to her

shop, told me to make potions for two of her patients. One

had green fever, the other pemphigus. A very unpleasant

skin disease,’ he adds in response to my raised eyebrow.

‘And then she left.’

‘She left?’ I feel my eyes go round. ‘What did you do?’

‘Panicked, of course.’ He smiles. ‘I’d been helping her for

years, but I’d never made a potion on my own before, and

never anything that complicated. I had no idea what to do.

I couldn’t reach the upper shelves without a ladder. I didn’t

even know how to light the furnace. I thought for sure I’d

burn the shop down, or, failing that, I’d turn a potion into

poison and kill her patients and I’d have to live with that

forever. But then…’ He trails off, glancing at the ceiling for

a moment as if lost in thought.

‘What?’

‘I just knew what to do.’ He looks down at me again, his

eyes bright. ‘It’s hard to explain. But there was something

about the shop, the smell of the herbs, the way the light filtered

in through the windows, all dusty, all the jars and books and

the tools.’ He gestures at the shelves in front of us. ‘The magic

took over then, and it told me what I needed to do.’

I’m quiet for a moment, enchanted by the idea of

something stealing over you, settling into you, and telling

you, with absolute certainty, who you are and what you’re

meant to do.

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‘That sounds lovely,’ I say, and I’m surprised to find

I mean it.

‘I don’t think it looked lovely, though.’ He laughs a little.

‘The shop was a disaster. There were herbs and roots and

powders on the counter, the floor; I broke at least three

flasks, so there was glass everywhere, too… My sleeve

caught fire when I lit the furnace, so I doused myself with

rosewater. I was covered in wet petals… I must have looked

like a lunatic.’

I start to laugh, too.

‘And now it’s just me,’ he says, and I stop laughing. ‘I

thought about quitting, but magic isn’t something you can

just quit. Besides, someone had to carry on after she…’

He turns away then, busying himself with the jars again.

I’m quiet for a minute, unsure of what to say.

‘George told me what happened,’ I finally manage. ‘I’m

so sorry. I know how you feel.’ And I do. I wish there were

something I could say to make him feel better. But there’s

really nothing. I could tell him what’s done is done, but I

know that would never be enough for someone like him.

John’s a healer. He knows the difference between a bandage

and a cure.

John turns back to me and nods, as if he knew what

I was thinking. For a minute we look at each other, neither

of us saying a word. The thrill I felt earlier comes rushing

back. I should move. George would want me to. I should

want to, too.

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Except I don’t.

I hear someone clear his throat and I turn around.

Humbert is smiling at us, but Fifer is glaring and George

just shakes his head.

‘I need a drink,’ he mutters.

Humbert steps over to the flask with the orange liquid

and unhooks it from the stand. ‘I’ve got just the thing.’

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The next day passes with no word from Peter. I’m anxious

to begin searching for the tablet – rather, for the thing that

will lead me to the tablet – but Humbert is dead set against

our wandering around without Peter’s protection. He’s

worried about the guards; he’s worried about us, in

particular me – ‘the frail little thing’, he calls me.

I don’t push it. Not because I’m worried but because I

don’t know what to do. I spent the morning with John

walking Humbert’s property, poking through his endless

number of rooms, but came up empty.

I don’t think whatever I’m supposed to find is here, at

least not in this house. It’s not that simple. If it has to do

with Blackwell, it can’t be. Either way, I won’t find it with

Peter and the others trailing behind me. I’ve got to find a

way to search on my own.

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That evening after supper we move into Humbert’s

sitting room. He summons a musician from somewhere,

possibly the last century, by the look of him. Skeletal, wispy

white hair, bony hands clutching a lute. He perches on the

edge of a chair and begins to warble out a dusty tune.

George and Humbert, absurdly, start dancing. Fifer

paces in front of the window, watching the spook lights I

saw the evening we arrived, only tonight they’re green

instead of red. Every now and again she’ll glance at

John, mutter under her breath, and then turn back to the