Page 10 of The Stygian Crown

Kara had to ask a palace guard for directions to Salizar’s workshop. She’d expected it to be in one of the seven spires, like Serena’s, but the guard directed her to the palace cellars. She followed a stone path off the kitchens that led through an extensive wine cellar and ended at the door to a circular chamber. Perhaps he liked his drink readily available.

Kara took a deep breath and knocked on the broad oak door to Salizar’s workshop. She’d have to tell him she was marked, but hopefully he’d be discrete. She’d pay him off if she had to.

There was a curse from inside. A few minutes later, the door creaked open. The man who peered around it was younger than Kara expected, with tousled black hair that fell into his eyes and a sharp, straight nose. He was sallow-skinned, as if he rarely saw the sun, and his eyes were a striking pale green. Was he Salizar’s assistant?

“Is Salizar in?”

“No, he’s halfways out. Do I know you?”

The man himself. He looked to be in his twenties still, with an attractive, fine-boned face. She’d expected the creator of the antidote to be older. “I’m Lady Grey of Briarcliff.”

Salizar laughed. “Of course you are. And how do you come to find yourself here, Lady Grey?”

Kara had grown accustomed to people bowing or curtsying when they first met ‘Lady Grey,’ and when Salizar didn’t, it unsettled her. Did he have suspicions about her true identity, or was he just rude? “Serena referred me. May I come in?”

Salizar glanced behind the door into his workshop, then slid his head back out. Something that smelled like burnt hair sizzled within. “I’m rather busy at the moment.”

“I won’t keep you long.”

Salizar swung the door open and gestured her in. “Fine, fine. Do what you want.”

Kara stepped inside the workshop, and Salizar rushed over to a teeming cauldron threatening to boil over—the source of the burnt hair smell—and began stirring it with a spoon the length of her leg.

“Close the door behind you,” Salizar snapped. The dangling sleeves of his over-sized robe threatened to dip into the cauldron’s contents as he stirred.

The workshop was badly in need of cleaning. Cobwebs clung to the dark stone walls and wooden rafters, and a fine layer of multicolor powders coated the floor. Merry was going to be displeased at the state of Kara’s hemline.

The cauldron wasn’t the only thing brewing and secreting smells. There was an elaborate array of lab equipment lining the far wall. Smoke bubbled atop beakers and flasks filled with brightly colored liquids, and thin rivulets of steam escaped from vibrating metal pots. Clear glass piping looped above the glassware, depositing drops of liquid that sputtered and smoked. Shelves studded every free wall in the room, teeming with jars that contained an assortment of macabre ingredients. Kara read the labels on the ones close to her—bitterweed, badger blood, widow’s teeth. One jar held a human eyeball suspended in a clear jelly. The iris was the same deep red as Logan’s when he was losing control to the curse. As Kara moved past it, the eyeball turned, tracking her movements. She shuddered, and a line of sweat began to form down her spine.

“Whose eye is that?”

“I can’t say. It was donated to me.”

Where would he get the living eye of a Namirahn? Victus?

“Have you just come to poke around in my things and gawk, then?”

“Serena told me you might have a way to suppress Namirah’s curse, avoid the monthly toll.”

Salizar looked up from his stirring, thick eyebrows raising. “I might. Who’s asking?”

“I am.” Kara unclasped the silver cuff on her left wrist and bared her mark to him.

Salizar smiled. “Well well, Lady Grey. Aren’t you full of surprises? I didn’t know you suffered from the curse. Then again, no one knows much of anything about you, do they?”

Kara stilled. Why was he so suspicious of her? Perhaps Calim had let something slip about her identity. “I don’t like to advertise the fact. I’d appreciate it if we could keep it between the two of us.”

“Of course, my lady. I have been…experimenting, lately, with varied results, on a potion that acts as a kind of block for the curse.”

“How varied are these results?”

“No one’s died yet.” He grinned and licked his incisors. “A few of the court ladies come to me for it when they’re having a lover’s spat and would like to avoid keening for a month, but there’s been little prolonged testing.”

“And the side effects?” Serena had mentioned women falling ill.

“In order to block the negatives of the curse, one must also block the positives. I’ve yet to find a way around it. You will feel weaker because you’ll be weaker. Your senses will be less heightened. You may find you get sick more easily. But some find those drawbacks well worth the sacrifice.”

“I’d like a dose of it. As long as that’s not it,” she said, nodding towards the caustic contents of the cauldron. Kara had no plans to take the antidote yet, but she was curious to see if it actually worked. Not having the pressure to feed the curse slowly consume her thoughts each month would be a welcome relief. And she wouldn’t be burdened by having to rely on someone else.

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