Read Online Scarlet in the Snow by Sophie Masson - Free Book Online

asked.
    ‘No. Only two have reached the hedge. I didn’t like the look of them. I have to be very careful, you see. I made sure to conjure up a picture of an impenetrable wilderness beyond the hedge, and they turned back. Nobody has ever come as far as you.’
    ‘Why me?’
    ‘I saw you in the mirror. I consulted it to see who you were. I thought maybe you were different,’ Luel said carefully. ‘And I watched how you behaved when you first entered here.’
    I’d been right about the watching eyes yesterday, I thought.
    ‘My lord did not know of your presence,’ she went on. ‘He did not know till you were in the garden. That bush, you see, has never given a flower before. I couldn’t make it, for though all the others bloomed, it stayed dry and bare. Then, two weeks ago, he noticed a tiny bud on it. He’s been watching that bud ever since – watering the plant, caring for it. When it finally opened, it gave him real joy for the first time in so long.’
    I swallowed. ‘I am truly sorry. I only wish that I could –’
    ‘Listen,’ Luel said impatiently, brushing aside my apology, ‘the very day – no – the very moment such a beautiful flower blooms on a bush that has always been barren,
you come
.’ Her eyes grew bright. ‘I knew you were here for a reason. Now I know why. There is something powerful in you, something very special. I can feel it.’
    ‘No, you don’t understand. I have no magic powers, nothing special.’ I took a deep breath. ‘Though my wordswere rash and unthinking, I haven’t changed my mind. I really do want to help. And if I am to do so, then you must allow me to ask questions.’
    The old woman looked at me. ‘Very well, as you wish. I can tell you about the past and about this place.’
    ‘But?’ I prompted.
    ‘Let us come to that when we do,’ she said, evasively. ‘Now, you must be hungry. Shall we have some lunch? While we eat, you may question me and I will answer as best I can. Agreed?’
    ‘Fine,’ I said, trying to speak lightly.
    I wasn’t surprised to see the table in the dining-room already set for two, and laden with all kinds of good things selected from the delicious bounty of the waters, from succulent prawns to crayfish served in their shells with golden mayonnaise, pike-perch whose whiteness of flesh contrasted with the coral blush of river trout, and a sturgeon soup so fragrant that it made my knees knock together from pure pleasure. Add to that fried potatoes and onions, sour-sweet red cabbage, and a large salad stuffed with olives and tomatoes and different kinds of greens, and you had a feast which made my mouth water immediately.
    ‘How do you do it?’ I asked, as we sat down. ‘There are no servants here to do the work.’
    Luel smiled. ‘That’s so. There is no-one here but us. But, really, this is the easiest magic of all.’
    I waved a hand at the food. ‘You conjure all this up from nothing?’
    ‘Of course not. Does it taste like food made of air?’
    I shook my head.
    ‘It’s not enchanted,’ she went on, ‘except in the manner of its arrival. It’s come from the very best tables, you see.’
    I stared at her. ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘I go to the mirror and I ask it to show me who’s having a feast that day – not just in this region but all over the country – and I devise the day’s menus from it, choosing only the best. Naturally.’
    ‘Naturally,’ I echoed, helping myself to some lobster. ‘But how do you get it here?’
    ‘I call it to this table,’ she said, as though it were the simplest thing in the world. ‘And it answers the call.’
    ‘Oh,’ I said, dazed by the strange picture this conjured up of Luel snapping her fingers and dishes flying through the air like obedient dogs to their master, ‘but they – the people whose tables you’ve lightened – do they not notice?’
    ‘I daresay they do,’ she said with a shrug. ‘But I never take more than one dish from any one table. They probably put