“We might catch them in the act!” I stood and paced the room. We were ahead of the game, for once. If we played this right… we might bring the whole conspiracy down.

“So what’s the easiest way to poison someone at a party?” Sally said.

I knew that answer already. “The wine.”

We hurried back to Berkshire House.

CHAPTER 33

“IMPOSSIBLE,” THE STEWARD SAID.

We’d ridden to Berkshire House as fast as we could. Leaving our mounts at the stable, we’d hurried inside. Sally had stopped us in the doorway, pointing to the banner over the mantel in the entrance.

“Look.”

The third symbol was right there in the heraldry. Confident now that we’d got the riddle right, we’d run straight to the steward, Mr. Dencourt. He was responsible for organizing tomorrow’s party. We’d told him we were worried that someone might poison the king.

At first, he’d threatened us with a thrashing for playing pranks. It had taken all our powers of persuasion to convince him we weren’t joking—and I doubted we’d have succeeded if he hadn’t recognized Sally as the king’s new ward. Now he was just dismissive, blaming our fears on overactive imaginations. My holding a pigeon probably didn’t help him take us seriously.

“But—” Sally said.

“It simply cannot happen, young lady,” Dencourt said. “Our precautions are beyond reproach.”

“All it takes is one mistake,” I said.

“Which is why we shall make none.”

“It’s not like it’s never happened before.”

He was beginning to lose his patience. “If you are referring to the events in Oxford last autumn, that is exactly why it won’t happen again. Come with me.”

He led us into the wine cellar. Four racks stretched into the musty damp, holding hundreds of bottles. He motioned to the rack on the left. A guard, leaning against the wall, snapped to attention as we approached.

“This is the wine for the party,” Dencourt said. “As you can see, I have set a man to watch over it. What’s more, after the poisoning at Oxford, I have implemented an entirely new system.”

He pulled a bottle from the nearest rack and handed it to me.

“First, each bottle is inspected—by me, and me alone—for tampering or defect. If I find none, I stop the cork with wax, and seal it.”

He showed me his ring. It was silver, its face engraved with a scrolled D—for Dencourt, I assumed. The D was pressed into the seal atop the bottle.

“When the party begins,” he continued, “I will again inspect the bottle and the seal. If there are no indications of tampering, only then will I pour the wine.”

“Couldn’t someone put poison in after that?” Sally said.

“Or in the glasses, even,” Tom said.

“That still wouldn’t harm the king. Because, you see, His Majesty shall drink only from the first glass poured from a bottle. And I will be the only one to serve him. If a blackguard could somehow intrude on the party—which he could not—then whomever he poisons, I assure you, it will not be the king.”