“Maybe not, but Matteo does,” Layla says, and I wince.
“You don’t really expect me to ask Matteo for help, do you? What are the chances that will go well? He hates me,” I say.
“I didn’t say it would be easy, I said it would be smart,” she replies matter-of-factly.
I exhale. Making it through this one last “normal” day just got more complicated.
I TAKE MY seat next to Layla in poisons class, which is set up like a medieval version of a high school chemistry lab. There’s a large fireplace that warms the room, the flames of which are used to heat and prepare poisonous substances, and a stone basin filled with water. At Academy Absconditi they don’t provide you with safety goggles to protect you from an explosive poisons accident, but they will extinguish you if you set yourself on fire. So that’s nice. The truly shocking part, though, isn’t the school’s lack of safety precautions; it’s that I’ve somehow grown accustomed to its risk-enthusiastic curriculum. I would shake my head at the absurdity of it all, but it wouldn’t go unnoticed by my classmates. Ever since I stepped out of my room this morning, watchful eyes of students and teachers have followed my every step.
I’m certain Aarya made a big show of telling everyone that my parents were the rebel Romeo and Juliet of Strategia—the firstborn daughter of the Bear Family running off with the firstborn son of the Lions, only to be chased by Lion assassins. That, combined with Headmaster Blackwood’s perfunctory announcement that Dr. Conner is dead, and the fact that Ash and I are covered in unexplained cuts and bruises, has made me the subject of a great deal of side-eyed whispering.
“Sit, my beauties,” says Professor Hisakawa, which is the way she addresses us at the beginning of every poisons class. She scans the room from under her blunt-cut bangs, her eyes twinkling. “We have so many wonderful things to discuss. You’re not going to want to miss a minute of it.”
Aarya and Felix sit at the wooden table across from ours. Aarya spins the glass vials and jars in front of her, which are filled with varied horrors, while she whistles. She keeps directing smug looks to Brendan’s back, obviously still gloating about her role in Dr. Conner’s demise. The part that strikes me as unsettling, though, is that if everyone assumes Brendan was involved in the plot to kill me, why doesn’t he suffer any consequences? Does his status as a head Lion really shield him that well, or is there just no evidence to prove it?
I shift my focus to Felix, who, unlike Aarya, is stiff and tensed, causing the long scar on his cheekbone to pull at the skin around it. He looks as banged up as me and Ash, and by the careful way he sits, I’m certain he’s as sore from plummeting through that tree as I am. He’s refused to look in my direction since he walked in the room. I guess it’s hard to look at me knowing he tried to kill me only to later discover that I’d saved his life.
“Atropa belladonna, or deadly nightshade,” Hisakawa says with a smile, reveling in her passion for poisons. “The Gothic siren of any good apothecary and one of the most romantic poisons, if I do say so.”
Atropa, I think, and begin my usual analysis, a name that likely pays homage to the Greek goddess Atropos, who was the oldest of the Three Fates and was responsible for choosing the way mortals die—hence the “deadly” bit. And of course bella donna means “pretty woman” in Italian. I glance at Brendan—poison is just about the only thing he and his friends didn’t try to use on me, although I’m sure he would have if he’d had the chance.
Brendan sits at a table by himself, his shock of white-blond hair standing out in stark contrast to the dark wood and stone walls. Nyx hasn’t returned from the dungeon after attacking me with her sword, and it’s obvious Brendan’s aware of her absence by the way his brow furrows when he looks at her empty chair. He doesn’t make eye contact with me, but his eyes narrow and I’m certain he notices. Layla kicks my boot under the table, which I can only assume means: “Don’t be stupid enough to instigate Brendan when all you need to do is make it through one more day.”
I adjust my gaze back to Hisakawa, who stands in front of the large fireplace with her hands clasped behind her back, rocking from the balls of her feet to the heels and back again. “The thing about belladonna that’s fascinating is that there aren’t that many recorded examples of poisoning. However, my personal favorite concerns eighteenth-century poisoner Giulia Tofana. She made Aqua Tofana, a ‘cosmetic’ sold exclusively to women for more than fifty years to help them kill their husbands. Instead of being applied to the skin, this product was poured into soup. When she was caught and executed, it was believed that Tofana had assisted in the poisoning of over six hundred men throughout Italy.” Hisakawa sighs wistfully, the way some people react to a touching poem. “Now, tell me, why would I be excited about something that has so few examples to teach from?”
Aarya leans back in her chair, the picture of ease. “Because belladonna is readily accessible and grows wild all over the world.”
“Which would have us logically conclude that there would be an excess of reported cases of belladonna poisoning, not a shortage,” Hisakawa interjects.
“Exactly,” Aarya says like she just won a prize at a carnival, “which is what is so great about it. Belladonna is effective. Combine that with the fact that it’s easily acquired and it tells you that the people who use it go undetected.”
“Precisely!” Hisakawa says, and goes up on her toes for emphasis. “Now, why do belladonna users go undetected?”
Layla opens her mouth to respond, but Brendan beats her to it. “Because belladonna isn’t and wasn’t only used to kill. Women used to rub it directly into their eyes to make their pupils dilate, which was fashionable at the time. Mixed with morphine, it was called Twilight Sleep and was used as a painkiller for women giving birth. And we still use it in medicines that treat everything from Parkinson’s to bronchitis.”
“Well said,” Hisakawa replies, and Layla looks disappointed she didn’t get an opportunity to answer. “Belladonna is common. And in being so, it often gets missed as a cause of death. Instead, the death gets assigned to an overdose or an overextended use of medication. An illegal sleep aid, even.”
Brendan soaks in the compliment from Hisakawa and I’m reminded of the scrolls in the library that keep record of the best students in each discipline for the past thousand years. Ash told me that if you can’t excel at the Academy, you’re seen as unfit to rule your Family. And that even after you’re admitted here, you’re not done proving yourself.
Hisakawa runs her fingers along the edge of her desk and leans against it. “It’s like I was telling you in our lesson last week. Capitalize on what is already in your environment. Blend. That’s what Giulia Tofana was doing with her husband-killing cosmetics. But this isn’t just about poisoners; it’s also about poison detection. You will be most vulnerable in a situation where everything seems normal and as it should be.” Hisakawa looks at me and I stare back, trying to read her expression and see if maybe she’s telling me something I need to hear. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s gone out of her way to give me a message from Headmaster Blackwood.