The Unnaturalists

CHAPTER 20

When Syrus had presented himself at the kitchens a few days ago, he’d been worried that Cook might not take him on. But Bayne had been right that the great estates always needed kitchen help. Cook had ushered him into the kitchen’s sweet-scented hell with barely more than a growl and a gesture of her hammy hand.

He had been put to work, first on a spit with a broken pulley system, then arranging trays and carrying them out, then flinging the kitchen offal to the Virulen hounds, and so on. Syrus wondered why the Virulens didn’t have more kitchen wights, as was the fashion these days. He’d heard rumors that, for all their finery, the Virulens were rather poor. It was hard to believe, looking around, but the state of the kitchens, the lack of wights, made him think perhaps the rumors were true.

He was sore today, and his foot ached. But the fever that Truffler had nursed him through showed no sign of returning. It was just the craving he couldn’t seem to banish. Every night since the bite, he woke with it—the urge to be in the Forest, to roam its dark byways, to discover things he’d never even thought to seek.

Bayne had asked him if he felt any ill effects from the bite, and he had said no. And Truffler thankfully hadn’t needed to ask. Syrus couldn’t bring himself to admit his fear—that somehow the werehound’s bite was slowly changing him into one. He’d realized there was just too much at stake for his fears to overcome all that needed doing.

I won’t let it happen. It can’t happen again. It became his touchstone saying as he hoisted the joints of meat, stirred and kneaded the giant buckets of bread, sliced and gutted the still-gasping river carp. Nainai had been fond of touchstone sayings, but he doubted she’d ever wanted him to have one like this.

Because last night was the first night he’d actually changed and knew it for more than a fever-dream.

He’d woken at dawn, curled in the low window of the communal servants’ quarters, stark naked. He’d found his clothes all around the room and had collected them red-faced before anyone else was awake. In the process, he’d nearly stepped in a relatively fresh pile of dog turds.

The door was bolted from the outside. There was no dog here. He’d looked frantically around again, but everyone was still asleep. He’d gotten the mess into the chamber pot as best he could, but the fear still lingered.

Syrus was certain he must have changed. It couldn’t have been anyone else. And certainly no dog could be hidden in the gallery that passed for a room, unless it had been smuggled in and out during the night.

Cook grabbed him by the collar, shaking every thought out of his head. Her giant arms were lobster-red, one of them tattooed with an anchor. “Get out there!” she yelled over the roar of the roasting fire. She slammed a tray of jellied calves’ feet, pickled eels, and salmon roe, among other things, in his hands and shoved him toward the dining hall door.

He recovered himself from stumbling just before the door swung open and spat him into the dining hall. The maitre d’ coughed and gestured discreetly toward his hair. Syrus smoothed it with one hand as best he was able. He straightened the jacket of his itchy new uniform. He longed for his Tinker clothes, but they had been taken from him almost as soon as Cook dragged him into the kitchen. Luckily, he had hidden his darts and knife outside Virulen before he’d walked up to the servants’ door.

One of the ladies nearest him saw his fidgeting and frowned.

He set out his dishes, looking for the witch.

She was farther down the table, exchanging pleasantries with a man twice her age. She looked pale and uncomfortable.

How to get her alone?

Syrus moved around the table, setting out the little salvers and dishes of roe, jelly, and eels. A woman leaned across the table and snatched up the dish of eels almost as soon as he sat them down. She very nearly caught her hair on fire in the old-fashioned candelabra.

He leaned between the witch and the gentleman she was speaking to, causing the old man to harrumph in consternation. He caught her eye, heard her swift intake of breath as she recognized him.

For once, she didn’t scream at him about her toad. She just looked at him, her eyes full of words, her fork hovering above her plate.

WC, he mouthed.

She nodded almost imperceptibly.

He continued down the table, not looking in her direction again, hoping everyone was too busy in their food to have noticed. He stiffened when he passed Charles Waddingly, but the warlock didn’t look at him or give any indication that he knew who he was. The urgency of his mission nearly made him drop his tray, grab Vespa’s wrist, and run for the Forest. If Charles was here, that meant it was only a matter of time before he pressed Vespa into getting the Heart for him. Syrus didn’t even want to think about what he would do to achieve that.

Syrus snuck back into the kitchen, sliding the tray onto a table and looking around before slipping toward the corridor exit. Cook was screaming at one of the scullery maids who had cracked some of the fine plates in the washing tub, and the maitre d’ was outside the door, his hawk eyes on the table. If Syrus didn’t go now, he probably wouldn’t be able to.

He snuck out into the corridor, making for the ladies’ water closet. He waited a few minutes, his every sense on pins and needles. If he was caught here before he had a chance to speak with her . . .

The witch tiptoed out in her fancy shoes, her skirts whispering along the stone floor. Her hair was done up fancy too, so high that it seemed to double the size of her head. He liked it better down.

The look in her eyes made Syrus back up a step. “You’re not going to pull the alarm again, are you?” he asked.

For an answer, she shook her head and opened her palm. On it sat the jade toad.

“How did you—?”

“Charles Waddingly returned it to me,” she said.

Syrus frowned. Granny Reed had said the toad was terrible bad luck. He’d been only too happy to sell it and now here it was again, having survived the burning of Rackham’s hexshop. Charles must have taken it when he took the cursed jar. “Get rid of it,” he said, his voice rising in fear.

Vespa looked around. “Come,” she said and dragged him by his elbow into the WC before he could protest.

It was a large, spacious water closet with its own sink and even a fainting couch, but it was still a ladies’ water closet. Syrus shrank against the door, wishing he hadn’t suggested it. A toilet wight offered them a towel and a mint and looked perplexed when they refused both.

The witch peeled him off the door and latched it.

“Syrus,” she said. “That’s your name, isn’t it? You can just stop now, because I’m not getting rid of that toad. It belonged to my mother. It’s the only thing I have left of her.”

“Miss Nyx . . .” he began. He scratched his head; he was still thinking about how and why Charles would have returned Vespa’s stolen toad to her. Charles seemed the sort who would want to withhold things from people who wanted them, just for the sheer pleasure of tormenting them. Syrus was worried that this boded very, very ill for what they were about to do. He resolved to steal it back from her again at the first opportunity and dispose of it once and for all.

“Now, let’s not speak of this toad thing further. You’ve tried several times to speak to me and I’ve not listened,” Vespa said. “But Bayne said I should, so . . . I’m listening.”

Syrus swallowed. He eyed the wight hovering by a basket of toiletries. Would it report their conversation? He’d never heard of such a thing, but he was beginning to understand that one could never be too cautious.

“I realize this is a most inconvenient place for conversation, but don’t be tongue-tied,” she said. “We haven’t long!”

He cleared his throat. “Well, like I said before, the Manticore wants to see you. She says she needs a witch to help free the Elementals and I’m to lead you to her.”

“Apparently, everyone needs a witch for something.” Her smile was tight. “She won’t eat us, will she?”

“Well,” he offered. “She didn’t eat me when we talked about my bringing you to her.”

“Could that be because she wants to eat me instead?” It was becoming warm and swampy in the closed room. She opened her fan and fluttered it in front of her face.

He considered. “Well . . . I suspect maybe it has something to do with what Charles was trying to get from Arthur Rackham before he killed him.”

She snapped the fan closed. “The Heart of All Matter? Charles killed Rackham over it?”

Syrus nodded.

Vespa was silent for many moments, her gaze turned inward, as if remembering something too horrible to speak aloud. Bayne must have told her of the murder of all the Architects.

Syrus thought again about the last story Granny Reed had ever told, about Athena and the Heart and how her father the Emperor had put her to death for giving it to the Manticore.

“But why?” Vespa asked.

“Charles needs it for his experiment—something about catalyzing a power source. I don’t know. Perhaps the Manticore knows some spell you can use to help stop him,” Syrus said.

All this thinking and talking was giving Syrus a headache and making him irritable. He longed to run through the dark alleys of the Forest, his nose to the ground, his paws . . . He grabbed Vespa’s hand. “Well, then, let’s go!”

He tried to pull her toward the door but she dug in her heels and refused. She was taller and heavier, and like a mule, couldn’t be budged.

“Not now!” she said. “We’ve been gone long enough as it is!”

Syrus scowled and was about to retort, but she followed quickly with, “Look, I’ll meet you, say, in a week. It would be too obvious if we disappeared now. We don’t want to arouse suspicion. Will you lead me there and back a week from today?”

“Yes.” He wasn’t pleased that they couldn’t go right away. He had no intention of returning here once his mission was complete, and one less night spent in the servant’s gallery was one less night of worrying that someone might discover the truth about him—if, in fact, he’d become a werehound, which he still couldn’t bear to believe.

And then the door to the water closet rattled.

Vespa’s face was already white with powder but her pale eyes glittered with terror.

“Open the door, please!” a lady said.

The toilet wight drifted forward uncertainly.

“No, no, don’t,” Vespa ordered in a low voice. It hovered between her and the door, confused, its hand rising and falling as it tried to decide whom to obey.

“Quick,” Vespa said. She helped Syrus into the cabinet under the sink. He crammed himself between towels, baskets, and bottles of scent, glaring at her.

“In the garden in a week,” she whispered, as she closed the door tightly on him.

He heard her straighten and then he heard the door unlock. There were murmured apologies, sniffs of disdain, and after an ominous silence, the most horrid sound Syrus had ever heard.

The noble lady had unleashed a gigantic fart.

The smell came next, washing over him in an eye-watering, throat-gagging wave. He couldn’t stay here. He couldn’t breathe!

He crawled out from the under the cabinet. The lady, still enthroned, screamed. The wight moved to apprehend him, but Syrus scrambled away and out the door.

He ran back to the kitchens, gulping fresh air like water. Next week couldn’t come soon enough.