Almost alclass="underline" there was a child peering out from behind a set of curtains. As their eyes met, Sophia felt a sudden pang at the sight of that surprised, rather lost-looking face. She slipped her hands into her pockets to hold her watch and the spool of thread. They calmed her: time was ticking peacefully, and the Fates had been kind. Perhaps they had taken Theo away, but they had given her Calixta and Burr and Mazapán; surely they were weaving some pattern that ensured her safe travels.
The cart turned the corner and suddenly they found themselves in a wide, tree-lined avenue. “This is the road to the palace gates,” Mazapán said.
“Is your shop near here?”
“Very near—but we are not going to my shop. I will leave you with Burton and Calixta at the palace. You can rest there.”
It took Sophia a moment to understand his words. “At the palace?” she asked, confused.
Mazapán smiled. “You are fortunate in your travel companions. Burton is good friends with the royal botanist, and you will enjoy the best accommodations Nochtland has to offer. Much better than my place,” he said, winking. “Look—on the other side of that fence are the royal gardens.”
Across from the long stone wall along the south side of the avenue was a tall, wrought-iron fence. Behind the fence was a hedge of densely planted juniper trees, and beyond that a rank of taller trees stretched to the horizon.
“It is difficult from here, but you might catch a glimpse of the palace through the trees,” Mazapán said. “It is mostly made of glass, and when the sun shines upon its surface it gleams like a thousand mirrors.”
Calixta and Burr, a few lengths ahead, had paused in the cobblestone road at an enormous fountain, a wide, low pool around a jet of water as tall as a palm tree. “We are almost at the gates,” Mazapán said, slowing the cart to a stop.
Calixta dismounted and walked up to them. “You poor thing,” she said to Sophia, “sleeping all night in those wet clothes.”
Sophia heard the pity in her voice. “I’m fine,” she replied lamely.
“I promise you,” Burr said, leading his horse toward her, “breakfast and warm blankets are only a short walk away.” He leaned into the cart. “Mazapán, my friend, we cannot thank you enough.”
“It is nothing,” he replied, gripping Burr’s hand, as Sophia got out. “Come see me when you have finished your errand.” He gave her a wink. “Come by later for some chocolate!”
“Thank you, Mazapán,” she replied, making an effort to smile. “I will.” She watched as the cart rounded the fountain, heading off down the long avenue toward the narrow streets of Nochtland.
“Why don’t you ride the last part while I hold the reins?” Burr asked Sophia.
“All right,” she agreed. He lifted her onto his horse and led it past the fountain to a row of guards who stood before a set of imposing gates. Wrought iron, they arched upward the height of five Nochtland spears laid end to end.
Like those she had seen while half-asleep at the city gates, the guards wore long, hooded capes and masks made entirely of feathers, showing nothing but their impassive eyes. Tall plumes quivered over their heads. Their bare arms, tightly bound with leather bands and painted or tattooed with dense, swirling lines, held long spears with obsidian heads. Sophia remembered Theo’s costume at the circus, and she realized that Ehrlach had been attempting, in his limited way, to re-create the image of the Nochtland guards.
Despite their terrifying appearance, Burr chatted with the guards as if they were pirates on the Swan. “Morning, lads. Here to see the royal botanist, as always.”
“Does the botanist know you are arriving?” the closest guard asked.
“He does not, on this occasion.”
“We will send someone with you, then,” the guard said, and one of the rank stepped forward. “Who is the girl?”
“Just a new recruit.”
Calixta pushed her horse a step forward. “She takes after me,” she said, smiling broadly. “Impatient.”
The guard shook his head, seemingly all too familiar with the Morrises. He opened the gate without another word and waved them on.
They stepped onto a gravel drive that wound through the gardens and up to the palace, the walkways of colored pebbles describing a continuous pattern like a tapestry all along the drive. The path led them through a tunnel of tall juniper bushes, and when they emerged from the tunnel the palace gardens suddenly sprang into view.
Sophia had never seen anything so beautiful. Immediately before her lay a long reflecting pool full of water lilies. On either side of the pool were two gardenia trees dotted with white blossoms, and beside those were lemon trees planted in half-moon beds. Graveled walkways branched off in every direction through the gardens, circling around stone fountains. At each corner of the reflecting pool and along the walkways stood statues of royal ancestors who bore the Mark of the Vine: still faces cut in pale marble, their leafy wings and branching arms white against the green of the gardens.
Beyond the long reflecting pool stood the palace. It was long and rectangular and rose into multiple domes. As Mazapán had said, it was made almost entirely of glass, which glinted in the morning sun like mother-of-pearl. Two vast botanical conservatories of pale green glass flanked it. The guard led them to one side of the reflecting pool, and Sophia glanced down into its shallow green depths, seeing bright fish between the water lilies. The scent of gardenia and lemon blossoms filled the air as birds whirled out from among the branches.
They were led not to the stone steps at front of the palace, where another line of hooded guards stood watch, but to the greenhouses on the right-hand side. The guard left them at a low door in the conservatory wall and departed with their horses. As they waited, Sophia stood quietly, listening to the fountains and the quick calls of the birds.
The door of the conservatory was finally flung open and a small, thin man burst out. “Burton! Calixta!” he shouted. He threw his arms around Burr, squeezing him tightly, and attempted to do the same with Calixta without crushing her hat. The man wore strange spectacles with many lenses, which encircled each of his eyes like petals and winked in the sunlight. Turning his grotesquely magnified eyes toward Sophia, the man asked, “And who is this?”
“Martin,” Burr said, “this is Sophia, from New Occident. Sophia, this is my good friend Martin, the royal botanist.”
Then the wiry man removed his spectacles, and Sophia found herself confronted by a much more ordinary face: narrow, wrinkled deeply from laughter, and topped by a shock of unruly white hair. His long nose, like the gnomon of a sundial, pointed sharply outward and a little to his left. He observed Sophia with his wide brown eyes and put out his hand, bowing briefly as he clasped hers. “Delighted to meet you, Sophia,” he said. “And how wonderful to see you two,” he continued, turning back to Burr and Calixta. “What a surprise. But let’s not stand here. Come in. Come in!”
The botanist led them quickly down the walkway. Sophia noticed that he had a slight limp, but it did not slow him down. Between following Martin and responding to his questions, Sophia barely took in the leaning cacao plants, the mounds of ferns, and the light, fragile faces of the orchids that lined the path. The warm air was bursting with the scent of vegetation. “Did you just come through the city gates?” Martin called over his shoulder.