The Doorway and the Deep (10 page)

He didn't sound accusatory, but he did sound upset.

“I'm really sorry,” Lottie said, “but I have to. I care about all of you, and about Albion Isle, but Eliot is—I mean, Eliot could—he could—”

“No one's angry with you, Lottie,” said Oliver. “You don't have to explain.”

Lottie wanted to say,
But
I'm
angry with
myself.

“How long will you be gone?” Adelaide asked.

“Nothing was definite,” said Lottie, “but we'd planned on staying several weeks at least.”

“How will you even get back here is what I want to know,” said Fife. “The Tailor's hardly going to let you come waltzing back through his silver-boughed tree after you refuse to cooperate with his plan.”

“I don't know,” said Lottie. “I don't
know
. I need to talk it over with Mr. Wilfer.”

“You'll figure something out,” said Oliver. Then, in a tone of voice Lottie knew all too well, he said, “You are the master of your fate; you are the captain of your soul.”

Though Adelaide had stopped crying, a heaviness still hung over the tree after the boys had left for their own yew.

Adelaide lay on her back, squinting up at the chandelier. “I've been thinking,” she said. “I keep trying to work out how things could've happened differently. How the pieces could've fit in other places so that none of this ever came to be, and my world was the same as before, and Iris Gate was ours again, and Father was the king's right-hand sprite. I would still have my daily lessons with Tutor, and I could walk down to Gertrude's Dress Shop and look at the newest patterns to arrive. It's impossible, but I think about that.” She tilted her head to Lottie. “Is that terrible of me?”

“No,” Lottie said softly. “I used to think that way all the time, back in New Kemble. I thought that way about my parents. Sometimes, I still do.”

“Hm,” said Adelaide. “Well, coming from you, that's not much of an assurance that I'm not insane. No offense.”

“Oh no,” said Lottie. “Of course not.”

Even though Adelaide had just insulted her, Lottie couldn't help but smile at her for making a comment that was so—well, so very
Adelaide
.

It wasn't long before Adelaide had dozed off. Lottie waited until she was quite sure she was fast asleep. Then
she laced her boots, took a lantern from its peg, and left the yew. She had questions for Mr. Wilfer, and those questions couldn't wait until a new dusk.

Lottie may have grown accustomed to waking at dusk and going about her daily tasks throughout the deep of night, but that hardly meant the shadows of Wisp Territory didn't still unsettle her. Tonight, the wood was far more deserted than usual, and the thought of a blood-draining whitecap—or something else—made Lottie shrink and shiver every time the wind blew too strongly or a branch swayed too close to the path. Though Trouble was flying ahead of her, Lottie could barely make out his black body in her lantern light.

Mr. Wilfer had still been in conference with the Tailor, the Seamstress, and Dorian Ingle when Lottie and the others had left the Royal Bower. She hoped that by now he would be back at his cottage. If anyone could help stop the anxious twisting inside her stomach, Lottie felt sure Mr. Wilfer could. He was a healer, after all.

The only entrance to Mr. Wilfer's cottage was a tall door decorated by wood-carved vines. Lottie knocked once on the door, then waited, hoping for Mr. Wilfer to be in. She did not want to walk farther still to the glass pergola, especially
not past the place where they had found the bloodied body of the wisp guard.

The door creaked open. Mr. Wilfer poked out his whiskered face.

“Lottie!” he said, opening the door wider. “I thought you might come. Though alone? I told you the wood is dangerous right now.”

“I know,” Lottie said dismissively, “but this is urgent.”

Mr. Wilfer showed her inside. The cottage was cheery, lit by a half dozen hanging lanterns. Two tables stretched across the room, strewn with glasses and vials, herbs and flowers. There were other, stranger sights, too: a plate of half-eaten French toast, a collection of shoestrings of varying lengths, a jar filled with pink pebbles, a box of used birthday candles, and a fluffy pile of what looked a lot like cotton candy. Mr. Wilfer was wearing a pair of leather gloves, and he held a strainer in one hand.

“Please,” he said, motioning to a pair of wooden chairs in the corner. “Have a seat.”

Lottie sat as Mr. Wilfer set down the strainer and peeled the gloves from his hands.

“I hope I haven't interrupted something important,” she said.

“It's no matter. Just another experiment. I'm trying to capture my own hiccups.”

“Is that an ingredient in the cure?” Lottie asked, wrinkling her nose. She still hadn't gotten used to the idea of how Mr. Wilfer made medicine—with giant scrapbooks and ingredients like limericks, watch hands, and violin strings.

“It's a theory of mine,” Mr. Wilfer said. “We'll see how it turns out.”

“I guess you know why I'm here,” said Lottie.

“I believe I do. Though I must warn you, dear, there's no easy solution to the decision you face.”

“Limn does mean very much to me,” said Lottie. “It's just that Eliot means the most.”

“I see.”

“Are you disappointed in me?” Lottie asked.

“Disappointed? Why ever would I be disappointed?”

“Because I'm a Fiske,” Lottie said. “Fiskes are supposed to be great and noble and do important things, and now I won't even go on a trip north when I'm asked.”

“Lottie,” said Mr. Wilfer, “as a halfling, you belong to the human world as much as to ours. Neither I nor any of your friends can fault you for having split loyalties.”

“But I feel like they do fault me,” Lottie said. “And what about the Tailor? Won't he try to stop me going back?”

“He should never have made that deal without consulting you,” said Mr. Wilfer. “You and you alone have the right to choose your steps. All the same, the Tailor is powerful,
and you are in his territory. I fear he might try to send you north by force. If he's going to change his mind, he'll need some convincing from a persuasive party.”

“You mean you?” Lottie guessed.

Mr. Wilfer smiled tiredly. During the time she'd known him, Lottie had discovered that Mr. Wilfer was always suffering from some degree of tiredness.

“Lyre might be the Tailor of the Wisps,” he said, “but I am the only healer at his disposal—the only chance of a cure for the Plague. He knows that now more than ever, after returning empty-handed from the Northerly Court. I have no small degree of leverage.”

“Are you close to finishing the cure?” Lottie asked.

“It's coming along slowly. Since the vital ingredients used to make sprite inoculations are long gone, I've been forced to invent an entirely new recipe. Some ingredients will take time to produce. Some I may be wrong about. There's one ingredient that may not even exist.”

“What is it?” Lottie asked.

Mr. Wilfer settled back in his chair, the wood groaning beneath his weight. He clasped his hands across his stomach.

“There is a fable,” he said, “concerning Queen Mab, the first of the new order of sprites and your ancestor.”

Lottie leaned forward. “Yes?”

“It's said that Queen Mab had a fascination with the human world. This was back when there were far more
silver-boughed trees, and when sprites and humans freely traveled between the two worlds. Queen Mab was also said to be barren, and she longed for an heir to carry on her line. One day, when she was roaming a human wood, she came across a cabin, and in that cabin was a newborn babe. The moment she set eyes on the child, Queen Mab fell in love. She decided to steal the baby in the dead of night, while his parents slept.”

“That's awful,” said Lottie.

“That was also the opinion of her husband, King Aldrich,” said Mr. Wilfer, nodding. “He insisted the queen return the child to his home, but Queen Mab was entranced by the human boy. Then something happened that Queen Mab could not prevent: the child grew ill. She realized it was impossible to keep a human baby alive in Limn. She was forced to return the child to his parents. Afterward, she was inconsolable. She wept for weeks and weeks. Then, one day, she dried her tears and returned to her throne, and she vowed to do nothing but good from that day on.”

“And she became very famous,” said Lottie, “and had poems written about her.”

“Yes, indeed. And as it so happened, many years later, Queen Mab discovered that she was not, in fact, barren. She gave birth to a daughter, and so the Fiske line continued.”

“Good news for me,” said Lottie, smiling.

“Good news for you,” said Mr. Wilfer. “But the matter
of note in this story is the queen's tears. That is the one ingredient I've lost the most sleep over.”

Lottie frowned. “Queen Mab's
tears
? But that's impossible! She lived hundreds of years ago, didn't she? Who would be standing around to collect her tears?”

“Then you see the source of my frustration,” said Mr. Wilfer.

“Well, I'm sure you'll figure it out,” said Lottie. “You weren't the king's right-hand sprite for nothing.”

Mr. Wilfer's expression darkened. “No,” he said. “No, indeed.”

Lottie studied the floor, which was nothing more than hard-packed white soil.

“Mr. Wilfer,” she said. “What happened to that human baby—that's what happened to my father, isn't it? He stayed so long in Limn that he got ill.”

Mr. Wilfer gave a slow nod.

“And that's what will happen to Eliot,” she said, “if he stays in Limn for too long. I've noticed it already. His cough has gotten worse.”

“I've noticed it, too.”

“He and I have to get back to Kemble Isle,” said Lottie. “But if we do, will the Tailor let us return?”

“I've no idea,” said Mr. Wilfer.

“Well, why can't you just tell him I'll go north after Eliot and I get back in a few weeks?”

“Lyre is working under a hard-pressed timeline,” said Mr. Wilfer. “Many say King Starkling plans on invading Wisp Territory. Or something even more terrible. So in Lyre's mind, time is of the essence.”

“And in
your
mind?” asked Lottie.

“I've learned from experience that you shouldn't give credence to fearful rumors. And yet, I know Starkling. I do believe him capable of anything. He's long been at work on a secret project—one that not even I was privy to during my time as his right-hand sprite. I wouldn't put anything past him.”

“So you think it's right, what the Dulcets are doing? You think the addersfork will work?”

“Using addersfork is a risky business,” said Mr. Wilfer. “It's dangerous enough to obtain, and the actual process of administering the poison . . .” Here Mr. Wilfer flinched, his face clouding over. “But Lyre believes addersfork is the only foolproof way to kill Starkling, because it is the only poison that can be used remotely.”