The medikua frowned at the liquid, which beaded atop his skin rather than soaking into the pores and puckered seam of the sutured flesh. “I… do not know, Your Highness.”
The ropes of tendons within Renard’s neck tensed along with his voice, his hands balling the duvet in his fists. “If you don’t know, you best figure it out.”
The medikua’s gaze caught upon the threat of his nearest fist and smartly turned away. “Let’s try the other bottle.”
Again, she retrieved a vial. Again, she released the stopper from sealed wax. Again, she dribbled out the serum in a conservative drop.
And again, the serum simply beaded atop the flat black of his skin without effect.
The woman’s bird-like body froze at his side. She chewed her lip with sagardoa-stained teeth. “It may not have reached potency.… Though, the ledgers Prince Taillefer kept were precise—these vials are each two years aged.”
Renard’s fury lapped at his edges.
“And we’resurethese are the two-year bottles?”
“He only made the serum once, per the ledger.” The medikua’s voice was flat, her irascible nature hardening just like her stance. She was a deer going still before finding an arrow in its eye. Only her hand dared to move, as she raised the tincture and sniffed the bottle. “My sense of smell is not what it used to be… but perhaps the contents have beenaugmented.”
At the drop of the last word in her sentence, the thinly controlled fury within the king surged and snapped.
Renard leapt from the bed, and purposely bumped the old woman, so that she had to stumble back to steady herself. He towered over her, the anger within him simmering to the surface. “Augmented by who? Someone, like you?”
That brave little goat straightened and looked him in the eye. “Your Highness, I would not damage the serums. Any of them.”
“Would you not? I have all but jailed you here.”
“You haveemployedme. I am old enough to know the difference.”
Anger rolled against his skin like another set of muscle and sinew, with a mind of its own, independent. “Let us confirm that, shall we?”
More carelessly than he should have, rage driving his movements with little finesse, Renard rushed into the adjoined library, where he kept the repacked crates, wrenched the nearest one open, and pulled out a vial of the putrid fire swamp. He thrust it into the face of the medikua, who’d trailed him into the room on short, stubborn strides.
The unnatural green serum sloshed against the belly of the vial, a threat.
“Give me your hand.”
The medikua’s eyes were hooded with age, but as they caught on what he had in his palm, they shot wide open, the clouded darkness of her pupils and the yellowed whites around them naked in the morning light.
“No, Your Highness, this is unnecessary—”
His hand lashed out and grabbed her wrist, the bones beneath his palm fragile, simple to snap. “It isnotunnecessary to test your hypothesis. You’re the only person here to have personal contact with each vial. If the ones we need areaugmented,surely the others will be as well?”
The healer struggled against Renard in such a way that made him sure her wizened old hand would be nothing but a lump of seared flesh in a few moments’ time. If so, she would deserve it.
“Please, my king, I beg of you. Test it on the table, the floor, a book—”
“Oh no, I would never damage my books.” Renard drew the medikua’s hand flush against her body and forced her against the sliver of bare wall between a bookcase and the door. “Now, hold still. Move too much and it might splash upon your face.”
The old woman’s struggle immediately ceased—her small, soft body going still. Those hooded eyes were pinned tightly on the bottle in his hand, cataloging the pop of the cork, the slow march of the contents, the unmistakable vibrant green appearing at the mouth of the vial.
A drop of tincture rolled off the lip and straight onto the top of the healer’s hand, spotted and gnarled with age. She flinched as the weight of the serum made contact, all the veins and tendons tensing under the vise grip of Renard’s hold.
They both watched it—touch, sink, smear.
Nothing.
No smoldering. No smoking. No reaction of any kind.
Renard dropped her hand in disgust, and the medikua pulled herself closer to the wall, tight enough to the stone to seep into the cracks if she could.
