Page 42 of Garden of Poisoned Delights

Eli had wondered if that was true.

“Rose de Rue is certainly exceptional,” Emile said, in a tone that suggested that he, too, found her boundless energy a little overwhelming. Eli wasn’t sure he liked having that in common.

“I trust her more than I would trust Aline de Valois,” Eli said, and Emile let out a sound that was dangerously close to a laugh. “Rey likes to say I’m a contrary little shit sometimes. Apparently he likes that.” Eli got up to check the saddlebags they’d dumped next to Unicorn’s stall.

“Bazyli says something similar so far as I’m concerned,” Emile said.

“Yeah, well.” Eli pulled out a bottle from their supplies. It was a nutty liquor from East Staria, one of Rey’s favorites. “So maybe I’ll do what my mother would hate instead.” Eli returned to Emile, took a swig, and passed it over. “There, no poison.”

“Does poison affect you?” Emile asked, wiping the rim of the bottle with a cloth from his pocket.

“I don’t know. I’ve never swallowed poison before.” He didn’t think drinking ash counted.

“I have. I wouldn’t recommend it.” Emile took a sip from the bottle, looked at the label, and smiled.

“What?”

“Oh, just checking the maker,” Emile said, handing it back.

“No, that’s not it. It’s something else.” Eli searched Emile’s face. He looked far too smug for a man shivering on a pile of hay.

“We have a few bottles of this inside,” Emile said. “That’s all.”

“Great.” Eli took another sip. Now he’d have to swear off it.

“Planning to toss your supply in the midden?” Emile asked. Eli felt a flush rise to his cheeks. “What would your mother despise?”

“Sharing a drink with her enemy.” Eli toasted him with the bottle before tossing it over. “Not being a noble anymore. Wearing pants.”

“A far better choice overall,” Emile said. “She didn’t have the best taste.”

“She married my father.”

Emile flapped a dismissive hand. “That was ambition, not taste. If you really wanted to make her turn in her grave, you’d take up the sword and terrify half the nobles in Staria into behaving themselves.”

“That sounds dangerously like a compliment.”

Emile just smiled.

“She would hate this,” Eli said, leaning against an empty stall opposite Emile. He tapped the sword at his hip, with its twisted, polished hilt. “Sabre was bad enough. She locked me in my room for days when she found out I’d sent de Mortain a letter asking for lessons.”

“You could always send him another one,” Emile said, passing him the bottle. “Your form wasn’t…the best.”

“It was raining and you had a gun to my head,” Eli said, but the terror of that moment didn’t rise to the surface as it did some nights, when he woke up in a cold sweat with his hand grasping for his sword. He just took another drink. “I almost beat him last time.”

Emile gave Eli an arch look.

“All right, I was closer.” Eli tossed the bottle, and Emile caught it with both hands.

There was a creak by the door, and Eli turned to find that the shadow made by the snow was gone, and something was making odd scratching sounds against the wall. He approached the door carefully, and when he tested it, it swung open without resistance. For a second, Eli saw something green scuttling out of view, and he squinted through the whirling snow to get a better look.

“Were those vines?” he asked.

“Most likely,” Emile said, getting up from the hay bale. He pressed the bottle into Eli’s hands and passed through the door. “Come, de Valois. As delightful as your company is, I have no intention of staying in that stable all night.”

* * *

Baz had that smug look on his face, the one he wore when he was absolutely sure he’d done something for Emile’s own good that Emile hadn’t enjoyed, and it didn’t falter when Emile crankily stomped the snow off his boots. “Oh, stop that.”

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