Page 49 of Quiver of Cobras
I nodded and returned my attention to my plate. At least my breakfast wasn’t going to make any criminal demands on me, even if it did cause a bout of heartburn later on.
Rubus ambled over until he was right next to me. It was just as well I’d almost finished eating because I could swear his aftershave was even stronger today than usual. ‘Do this for me, Maddy,’ he said quietly. ‘And I might be more inclined to trust you properly again.’
Again? From what I’d heard from Artemesia, he’d never really trusted me the first time around and that had been after years of this sort of shit. I sighed. ‘I just can’t stop thinking about what you told me last night. That all this…’ I sneaked a look at the other faery in the room. He appeared absorbed in crisping up his bacon but I couldn’t be too sure he wasn’t earwigging at the same time. I dropped my voice. ‘That all this is my fault.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Rubus said, clapping me on the back. ‘I didn’t tell anyone then and I won’t tell anyone now. Not if you stay in your place.’ He winked at me as if all this were nothing more than a great joke. Ha bloody ha. Then he strode over to the cooker. ‘That bacon looks good,’ he murmured. ‘I’ll have it.’
I really wanted the Fey to kick up a fuss and complain at losing his second batch of food but he was too eager to please his lord and master. I watched him bob his head eagerly and rolled my eyes, before pushing back my plate and standing up. It appeared I had a mission to complete, as distasteful as it was.
Drug dealing was just so … dirty. Murdering innocent bogles and sending a thousand Fey into exile were more my kind of business. Apparently.
***
Carduus was in the laboratory when I arrived, wearing a pristine white coat as if he were some kind of vaunted scientist and frowning at a steaming beaker filled with nasty-looking purple gunk.
‘Cardy, baby! How’s it hanging?’
He didn’t even deign to answer me with a glare, so he went up a notch in my estimation. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Try this.’ He took a spoon and pulled out a gloop of purple and offered it to me.
‘Uh, no.’ I smiled sweetly. ‘My mother told me never to accept sweets from strangers.’
He frowned. ‘You remember your mother? Has your memory returned?’
I mentally lowered that notch back a level again. ‘I thought scientists were supposed to be smart. You have the IQ of lint.’
Carduus still looked confused. ‘What’s lint?’
‘You spend far too long inside this laboratory, Cardigan,’ I told him.
He sniffed. ‘That is not my name. And I do whatever my lord requires.’ I could only presume by ‘my lord’ he was referring to Rubus. This place was like a damned cult.
He jiggled the spoon at me. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘try this. It’s mugwort enhanced with a sprinkle of lavender and essence of anemone and bound up in an old spell. It doesn’t taste as bad as it looks.’
Somehow I doubted that. I folded my arms defiantly. ‘I’m not putting that inside my mouth.’
‘You’ve had worse.’ This time I definitely registered a leer. ‘It’s something I’ve put together myself. It might help your memory to return.’
‘You’re going to have to do better than that before I slurp it, mate.’ I patted by belly. ‘Besides, I’ve just had breakfast. I’m really not hungry.’
Carduus pushed his glasses up his nose in irritation. ‘It’s supposed to be taken on an empty stomach.’
‘Well, that is a shame.’ I couldn’t have sounded more flat than a pancake on Shrove Tuesday. ‘Another time.’
‘Tomorrow morning,’ he ordered. ‘First thing.’
‘Yeah,’ I murmured unconvincingly. ‘Sure.’
He emptied the contents of the spoon back into the beaker. There was a definite acidic hiss when the gloop landed and I stepped backwards. It seemed prudent to put as much distance as possible between the foul concoction and myself.
‘I need some pixie dust,’ I informed him. ‘I’m going to hit the streets and do some selling.’
He gestured at the shelf. ‘It’s over there. Help yourself.’
I did as he bade, locating the familiar sparkly grey dust quickly enough. Rubus had been right; there wasn’t much of it. In fact, by the time I found Vandrake I doubted there’d be any left. ‘Do you have a bag?’
Carduus muttered and pointed behind him. I located a crumpled pile of old plastic bags and selected one at random. As I did so, my eye was caught by three large jars filled with a colourless liquid. I tapped the nearest one. ‘What’s this?’
He glanced up and his nostrils flared slightly. ‘Nothing that concerns you.’
