Free Scholar's Plot by Hilari Bell

Not just the lad she was courting, all of them. Fortunately the effect vanished when we smashed the stone, but… I asked one of them later, a happily married man in his fifties, what it was like. He said that it was as if everything he’d ever wanted, ever yearned for throughout his life, had been made real in the person of one, rather ordinary servant girl.”
    I sighed. “No, he can’t roam loose.”
    “I’ll send someone to open the door when you knock,” she said. “All the staff have keys.” After I went through she locked it shut behind me.
    The curtains were closed, keeping out the light he hated, but a dim glow leaked around their edges. The musty scent was the same as in his old room — I’d attributed it to the rats he’d kept, but it must be him, quite distinct, even though I felt a draft from one of the windows.
    It took some time for my eyes to adjust to the darkness, and there was no sound in the room. But once I could see I spotted him immediately, sitting frozen at a big table covered with tools, and scraps of wood and wire. The moment my gaze found him he relaxed. His clothing rustled as he reached for a mug that sat beside a tray, which held the remains of a decent luncheon.
    “So you’ve stepped through the world once more.” His voice was the same too, harsh and breathless. But his hair, once so wild, was pulled into a ragged queue. “Stepping on toes again, I’ll warrant, cracking snails, cracking nails. Always the way, with you.”
    “I came to see how you are,” I said, without any hope of a sensible answer.
    But I got one.
    “Not too bad, for being mad. They want me to perform sometimes, but I can pick my trick. The girls are kind, and the furry ones.”
    As my eyes continued to adapt, I could see more of the room. It wasn’t the cluttered magpie nest of his previous quarters, but he’d only been here a few months. Already a handful of bright scarves had been nailed to the rafters, along with a mass of cut vines that dropped leaves onto the floor as they dried. But mostly there were cages, almost a dozen, made of scraps of wood and wire. Some hung from the ceiling, with the vines, still others were stacked on chairs, the desk, a bureau, and four or five were piled in a corner. All of them were empty, their doors open.
    “The furry ones. Do they let you work with their rabbits?”
    Could they be that stupid? Unless they wanted him to work magic on the rabbits, in which case I pitied the Heir’s mistress.
    “Rabbits! Never touch ’em. I don’t have what they want, that’s why they leave me alone, a stone, a bone. It’s those cheating rabbits have what they want. But they lie, they lie. Rats, now, rats will tell you the truth. But they won’t let me catch any.”
    So what were the cages for? I was about to ask, but the answer came through the window, brightening the dim light briefly as a squirrel’s body pushed the curtain aside.
    The jeweler, usually so voluble, fell silent instantly, watching the squirrel scamper along a chest to a plate with half a dozen nutmeats on it. Instead of snatching one and running off, it sat on its haunches, staring back at us as it ate and whipping its curly tail.
    “Do you get a lot of such company?” I asked softly, though it was clear he did. The chest had been dragged over to the window to provide them with easy access, and the shells removed to encourage them. The squirrel chose another nut, nibbling busily.
    “The sun and snow, they come and go. Some will eat out of my hand, if I hold like water. Been bitten too, but I don’t mind.”
    The squirrel grabbed a third nut and whisked away. There was no cage anywhere near the plate … and all their doors were open.
    “Thank you,” I said. “I’ve seen all I need.”
    His eyes turned back to me, unexpectedly shrewd. “I don’t have what you want either, but that don’t mean you should trust those lying rabbits.”
    “I won’t.” I went to the door and knocked. I hadn’t been