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  Dear God – Oleander – where are you taking me?

  Time to go home, lovely. My home. Our home.

  19

  4th February

  THE PORTS OF PADUA and Venice were closed after word of the attack on the King spread. There was no way out by ship, so in spite of Signora Baglioni’s protests against what she called my “idiotic plan,” on foot I began my journey over the mountains, through war-torn France to the port of Calais.

  I saw things too terrible to describe. Heads of men on pikes at every crossroad. Mobs that roamed the streets, ready to kill anyone – man, woman, or child – whom they thought was opposed to their cause.

  I saw all but felt little. The most terrible acts of humans can scarcely compare to the evils of nature unbound.

  It was not until after Jessamine ran from me and the stupor of desire faded that I realised: I too had been poisoned by some subtle means. By then she was gone.

  I understood both to be Oleander’s doing – the love potion, and her terrified flight. The plants of the Orto botanico would not tell me where he was taking her, but in my heart I knew there was only one answer: He would take her to England. To Northumberland. To the poison garden.

  That is where I am bound.

  The hellish garden has possessed my dreams. Each day I fight sleep as long as I can, for the moment I close my eyes the nightmare returns: the poison garden, made bleak by winter. Bare branches, dead stalks. The ground is thick with snow, except for one spot, where ice will not form.

  In the dream I have wings, like Oleander’s. I descend, and lay my hand upon the spot. Everywhere else the earth is frozen. Here it is warm as flesh.

  Across the whole of the north of England the snow comes down. It blankets the fields and forms tall drifts. Yet in this spot alone, the flakes melt the instant they touch the earth, revealing again and again the terrible outline: the shape of a girl’s body, splayed on the barren ground.

  He has taken her! I shout it to the forest and fields. But the evergreens slumber, and the leafy plants, too, are resting below.

  I lay myself up on the spot, and fit my limbs to the place where my beloved once lay. Senseless to the cold, I let the snow cover me. I cling to the ground as if the world would try to throw me off and send me flying out into the heavens.

  I press my lips to the earth and call her name, again and again, until my mouth fills with dirt and my tears turn to ice on my cheeks.

  Jessamine – Jessamine – Jessamine!

  That is when I awaken, always. Shivering with a cold that knows no end. The bitter cold of a winter that may never more see spring.

  I draw my cloak around me, and go on. Soon I will reach Calais. If the winds and weather permit, a half-day’s sail will take me across the Channel to Dover. Then by land I will make my way to Northumberland. What awaits me there, God and the devil only know.

  From the low grey sky, hour by hour, the snow continues to fall.

  Other Books by Maryrose Wood

  with the Duchess of Northumberland

  THE POISON DIARIES

  Copyright

  First published in paperback in Great Britain

  by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2011

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  THE POISON DIARIES: NIGHTSHADE. Text Copyright © Poison Diaries Ltd 2011. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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