The Cabinet of Wonders: The Kronos Chronicles: Book I (16 page)

Mistress Hild placed damp hands on Petra’s shoulders and pushed her toward one end of the table, where there was a mountain of dirty onions. Petra stumbled. One of the kitchen boys snickered.

“Peel them,” commanded Mistress Hild.

“All of them? Alone?”

“Of course, you stupid girl. Everyone else is busy. Tonight there will be a great feast for thirty people, including ambassadors from Italy, England, and the Ottoman Empire.”

Petra looked longingly at the other servants, who were stuffing small quails, chopping celery, grating cheese, and mincing meat. One lucky woman was blending butter, eggs, sugar, and a dark spice. Several of the kitchen workers gave her smug looks, glad to have escaped the worst task of all. Petra searched Mistress Hild’s face for some trace of pity. She found none. “Where’s a knife?”

“You will peel them with your fingers only. When you are done, you may have a knife to chop them.”

Petra looked with despair at the huge mound of yellow-brown balls. “But what are they all for?” She couldn’t imagine what dish required so many onions.

“Genovese.”

“Jeno-what?”

“Jen-oh-vay-zay.” She pronounced it slowly, like she was talking to someone who had been dropped on her head as a baby. “Genovese is made with onions and meat. It’s a dish from Italy. You
have
heard of Italy, haven’t you?”

A snicker came from a scrawny girl.

Petra shot a dangerous look in her direction, then replied, “Most of Italy’s wealth comes from taxing ships that come into its ports. It often gets attacked by pirates.” She paused, and Astrophil silently helped her. “Italy is composed of city-states. It is divided into several different regions, each run by a duke.” Petra became aware that the noises of chopping and scraping had stopped. Everyone in the kitchen was staring. “Italy—”

“Enough.” Mistress Hild pushed her into a chair and handed her an onion. “Peel.”

When she had walked away, a freckle-faced girl leaned toward
her and whispered sympathetically, “At least you get to sit down.”

After a couple hours of peeling, Petra was covered with papery onion skins. Her fingers were black with dirt. The table now held countless bald onions. Mistress Hild passed by. She handed Petra a knife and an enormous pot. “Chop,” she said.

Petra chopped. She cut the onions quickly and with a grace that was noticed by some of the girls around her. But Petra did not see their admiration, because tears leaked out of her eyes from the tang of the onions. She sniffed to ease the burn in her nostrils and wondered if the prison guards ever used this form of torture on the unfortunate people under their lock and key. She tossed the chopped onions into the pot.

She split open one onion and saw, instead of white rings, a pool of black, reeking goo. Its smell hit her like a slap in the face. Petra paused, wrinkling her nose. Then she deliberately (and naughtily) swept the bad onion into the pot.

Genovese, she discovered, must cook for many hours. After Petra finally finished her task, Mistress Hild set the full pot over one of the kitchen’s fires, adding a few hunks of meat. Then she steered Petra toward a sink heaped with oily dishes. She tipped a kettleful of boiling water into the sink. “Wash,” she said.

Petra washed. To say she was bored would be an understatement. But she was at least somewhat entertained by Astrophil’s continued report on the details of Italy, and by imagining what would happen to Mistress Hild once the Italian ambassador tasted her Genovese.

But Petra was denied the pleasure of seeing Mistress Hild fired, or demoted to Dishwasher-in-Chief or Chamber Pot Scrubber Supreme. Mistress Hild passed by the bubbling pot and dipped in a wooden spoon. She slurped a spoonful. Gagging, she spat into the fire and grabbed a pitcher of water. She gulped at it, and water spilled over her stained apron. She coughed and spat again. Then
she whirled around and saw the woman who had been in charge of selecting and cutting the meat. Mistress Hild whacked the woman’s arm with the wooden spoon. The woman howled. “It ain’t me, mistress! That meat was fresh, I tell you!”

“It was her!” The scrawny girl pointed a long finger at Petra. “She popped a black onion in the pot! I saw her do it!”

What is happening?
Astrophil lifted the edge of Petra’s cap and peeked out.

Mistress Hild faced Petra, the wooden spoon still in her fist.

Oh my,
said Astrophil.
I think you are about to be fired.

Petra grabbed a large glass of hot, dirty water and faced the cook.
Not without a fight.

But Mistress Hild’s chief assistant crossed the room and began to whisper in the cook’s ear, darting her eyes in Petra’s direction. As she spoke, the cook’s mouth grew into a little smile. And this Petra decidedly did not like.

“You,” Mistress Hild pronounced, “are going to the Dye Works.”

I
’
LL TAKE HER!”
The girl who told on Petra thrust her spindly arm in the air.

“Me! Me!” cried a boy with pig grease on his fingers.

Several of the servants clamored for the right to take Petra to the Dye Works, whatever that was. Petra was wondering about the source of her newfound popularity when Mistress Hild’s response clarified things.

“You all just want to get out of work,” the woman sneered.

“I’ve finished my task,” the freckled girl said timidly. The cream she had been ordered to whip was thickened into white, pillowy mounds.

Mistress Hild nodded. She scribbled a note, passed it to the girl, and jerked her head toward the door. Petra reluctantly set down the glass of oily water. She followed her guide out the door. Astrophil sighed in relief.
At the risk of sounding disloyal, I think a fight between you and Mistress Hild would have ended one way: with her turning you into mincemeat and serving you for supper.

So long as mincemeat doesn’t involve onions, I’d say that there are worse fates.

Once they were in the hallway, Petra sized up her companion.
The girl’s greenish eyes and dappled skin made her look like a woodland creature. Her head was lowered, her eyes focused on her small feet. She seemed a little lacking in vim and vigor, but Petra was very glad to have escaped the company of Mistress Hild and her sidekick, Miss Toothpick Arms. “I’m Viera,” she said. “What’s your name?”

“Susana.” Her country accent, like Petra’s, was as thick as tree syrup. “You’re from the hills, aren’t you?”

“I’m from Okno.”

Susana stopped looking at her feet and gazed at Petra with delight. “Really? I’ve always wanted to go to Okno. It’s supposed to be so lovely. I’m from Morado, but I guess you’ve never heard of my village.”

“Of course I have.” Morado was not far from Okno. Petra had only ever heard of Morado as a town where you would never want to stay longer than the time it takes to ride through it. But she thought that saying so would hardly be polite.

My arm is getting tired.

A little corner of Petra’s cap was still sticking up in the air, propped up by one of Astrophil’s tin legs.

I cannot move.
The spider poked Petra’s head.

“Ow!”

“What?” Susana looked at Petra, confused.

“Nothing.”

Being in your cap is boring. Let me out. If you will not be working in the kitchen any longer, you do not have to wear this ridiculous headgear.

Instructing the spider to crawl to the side of her head facing away from Susana, Petra pulled off the cap and shook her sweaty hair free. Astrophil happily took up his post on Petra’s ear.

They walked up a flight of stairs. Guards waved them past when
Susana presented Mistress Hild’s letter. Petra noticed that the air had grown fresher, and they even passed a window showing a cloudy sky. They were now aboveground. “Am I being promoted?” she asked cheerfully.

Susana gave her an apologetic look. “I’m afraid you’re not going to like where you’re going.”

“Where am I going?”

“The Dye Works.”

“I know that. But what’s the Dye Works?”

“It’s in the Thinkers’ Wing.”

“The wing? Are we going to visit a bird?” Perhaps Mistress Hild planned on having her fed to an enormous goose with a philosophical mind and a fatty liver.

“The Thinkers’ Wing is a section of the second floor. It’s a series of laboratories where the prince’s magicians … experiment.” Susana began to walk more slowly. “The Dye Works is where the castle produces all the colors it uses for cloth, hair, wood, and even stone. The woman who runs it has skin that oozes acid, and if she touches you …” Susana shuddered. “She’s got a terrible temper and is always looking for a new assistant because she fires every one she gets in a matter of hours. She and Mistress Hild
hate
each other. We’re told to spit in the sorceress’s food. I guess Mistress Hild figures you’ll either get burned by acid, drive the Dye Works witch crazy, or get fired quicker than you can blink. Or all three.”

They turned a corner. The corridor presented many doors that echoed down the hall like two lines of dominoes. They reached a door that would have looked perfectly ordinary except that it had two handles, one made from plain iron and the other painted a vibrant red. “You see?” Susana said, pointing to the red handle. “She needs to have her own special doorknob. The iron one would melt under her fingers.” She knocked on the door. Silence ensued. She
knocked again and they both heard a screech: “Go away!” Susana looked like she heartily regretted volunteering to escort Petra. Petra, however, felt more curious than afraid. She gripped the iron handle and pushed the door open.

The room was like the moon in the middle of the month. It had a domed ceiling and was split into two halves, one sharply bright and the other as dark as a cave. A black velvet curtain separated the two sides almost entirely. It was not quite drawn, and as Petra squinted against the sunshine pouring in from skylights cut into one half of the ceiling, she thought she detected some movement in the shadows behind the curtain.

Susana gasped when a gray head popped through the opening in the curtain. Two circles of thick glass took up almost all of the old woman’s small, pale face. “What?” the woman howled.

“Mistress—”

“I’m very busy! This is a crucial moment! If my lavender turns to purple you’ll pay for it!”

“Yes, but … your new assistant is here,” Susana explained.

“Ah, excellent! Dash the lavender! I can always make more later.” She stepped past the curtain and snapped it shut behind her. “Let’s have a look at her.” As Petra walked forward, the woman pointed at Susana. “You! Go find something else to do! Shoo! Get out of my laboratory!”

Susana gave Petra a look that said “Sorry, but what can I do?” and scurried out of the Dye Works.

“Now, now, now. What have we here?” The woman stepped closer to Petra, but kept a distance of two feet between them. “Hands!”

Uncertain, Petra stood still.

“Hands, I say! Hold them out.”

Petra lifted her hands and began to extend them toward the snowdrop-white woman.

“Not so close, cellar brat! There. Now flip them over. Ah. Good hands. Very good, I believe.” She turned her attention to Petra’s face. “Decent color. The nice pink of country life. You’ve got a healthy look about you.”

“So I’ve been told.” Petra thought of Harold Listek’s ramblings. “What are you wearing on your face?”

“And the girl’s polite, too!” The woman’s eyes were two foggy pools behind the glass, but Petra thought she saw an eyebrow quirk. “They are spectacles. Are there no spectacles in your hinterland of a home?”

“What are they for?”

“For? They help me see, obviously. But these are no ordinary spectacles. Come here.” She pointed Petra toward a table and tapped a metal pot filled to the brim with liquid. “What color is that dye?”

“Blue.”

”‘Blue,’ she says!

Try again.”

“Um, light blue?”

The woman whipped off her glasses and plunked them on the table. “Pick them up.” They were heavy. “Now look.”

Petra hooked the wire stems over her ears and gazed into the bowl. The liquid was swarming with spots of colors—bits of pink, streaks of white, sprinkles of green, and a nice fat glob of violet.

“You see?” crowed the woman. “There you have the exact proportions of the different colors that go into making that particular shade of blue. You may very well say that the bowl holds light blue dye, but think how many light blues there are! A robin’s egg, a spring sky, and an aquamarine are light blue. But what a difference lies between the colors of all three!”

Petra watched the colors surge and mingle like strange fish. “It’s amazing.”

Perhaps the woman recognized in Petra’s voice the true ring of
someone who can judge good work and beauty, for she nodded. Petra placed the spectacles back on the table. The woman blinked, her eyelashes fluttering like two small dusty moths. Then she put the spectacles back on, turned to Petra, and paused.

She was looking into Petra’s face so intently that the girl felt uncomfortable. But after a few seconds the woman averted her stare and twitched her mouth. As odd as it may seem, Petra felt as if she had passed some exam without even knowing what she was being tested for.