A duke found his bride-to-be’s servant bound to a chair in a cottage with a theft charge. But the girl slipped a folded note into his pocket — and it named the poison meant to be poured into his wedding goblet, purchased through the very household he was about to marry into.

 PART 5

The bell above the door rang thin and bright as Norah stepped inside, and the smell hit her at once — dried herbs and beeswax, and something sharper beneath it all. The particular bitterness of tinctures left too long uncorked.

Shelves lined every wall from floor to ceiling, crowded with glass jars labeled in a cramped hand, their contents ranging from ordinary chamomile to substances Norah could not begin to name. Behind a narrow counter stood a stooped man with spectacles perched low on his nose, counting coins into a small wooden box with the unhurried patience of someone who had done the same task every morning for thirty years.

“Good morning,” Norah said, pitching her voice into something warmer and more assured than she felt — the voice she imagined a wealthy house manager might use when addressing a tradesman she considered beneath her notice, but useful nonetheless. “I am told your shop carries the finest botanicals on this stretch of coast. My mistress sent me to secure a particular remedy for her joints. Something rare, not the common tonics sold at every crossroads stall.”

The shopkeeper looked up, his expression brightening at the prospect of a discerning customer willing to pay for quality.

“Corwin has served this port for two generations, miss. Whatever your mistress requires, I dare say we can provide it, provided you can tell me what troubles her particularly.”

“A stiffness in the joints, worse in damp weather,” Norah said, drawing on half-remembered complaints from elderly relatives long past. “Though she is particular about her tonics. She once purchased something similar through a household order delivered by courier rather than collected in person. I wondered if your shop kept a record of such arrangements, so I might request the same preparation again without troubling her to describe it twice.”

It was a delicate lie, built on the assumption that a shop proud enough to stamp its wares with a royal license might also keep careful records — the sort of pride that made men careless with the details they chose to share.

Corwin’s brow furrowed slightly, considering.

“We do keep a sales ledger, miss. Though I cannot simply hand over another customer’s private business without knowing your mistress’s name.”

“Of course not.” Norah allowed a note of mild offense to color her tone, as though the very suggestion of impropriety wounded her professional pride. “I would not ask you to breach any confidence. I only hoped — if I described the general nature of the order — you might recall whether such an arrangement passed through your books recently. My mistress is not a patient woman, and I would rather return with useful information than empty hands.”

The shopkeeper’s expression softened at her apparent distress, the particular sympathy tradesmen often showed toward servants caught between a demanding employer and an impossible task.

“Well, I suppose there is no harm in glancing through recent entries. Provided you understand I will not read out names that are not yours to hear.”

“Naturally,” Norah said, and stepped closer to the counter as he turned to retrieve a thick, leather-bound ledger from a shelf behind him.

While he searched — murmuring to himself as he traced a finger down columns of cramped handwriting — Norah let her eyes wander the shop with practiced casualness, noting the layout, the position of the door, the small back room half hidden behind a curtain where deliveries were likely prepared before being sent out.

When Corwin finally paused, tapping a particular entry with evident satisfaction, Norah leaned forward as though merely curious, though her heart had begun to beat faster.

“Here we are. Three weeks past. A private order, quantity specified precisely, collected rather than delivered, if my memory of that morning serves. A gentleman’s manservant, well-dressed, paid in full without haggling over price — which I do remember, as few customers pay the full asking rate for goods of this particular rarity.”

“Did he give a name for the record?” Norah asked, keeping her voice light.

“Household accounts rarely list a manservant’s own name, miss. Only the estate he serves.”

Corwin turned the ledger slightly — enough that Norah’s eyes, quick and practiced from years of reading household inventories in service, caught the entry before he thought to close the book again.

The estate’s name was written plainly enough. Along with a description that matched, unmistakably, the household of Vivien’s own family seat — the very estate where her father still resided as head of the line.

Not Sebastian’s household. Vivien’s own family.

Norah’s breath caught, though she kept her expression carefully neutral, aware that any sudden change might raise the shopkeeper’s suspicion.

“That is most helpful. Might I trouble you for a written copy of the entry, so my mistress might see the arrangement matches what she recalls?”

Corwin hesitated only briefly before shrugging, more concerned with the coin Norah produced from her satchel than with any deeper question of why a house manager would need such precise proof.

“I suppose a copy causes no harm, provided the name of the purchasing household remains between us, and not gossiped about the docks.”

“You have my word,” Norah said — and meant it, though not in the way Corwin likely imagined.

He copied the entry onto a fresh scrap of paper in his own careful hand, the details of quantity, date, and household matching precisely what the courier note had described, before folding it and passing it across the counter along with a small paper packet of ordinary chamomile, added as a courtesy for her trouble.

Norah thanked him warmly, tucked both items into her satchel, and left the shop with the bell ringing once more behind her.