The Book Without Words Read Free Page B

said: his secrets are in his book, but they can be read by a green-eyed person.”
    “What he said was: we needed to keep the book away from green-eyed persons.”
    “Then you,” said the girl, “are as vacant of brain as that skull upon which you sit. You said he was confused. He must have been talking about himself. Well, then, his secret is in the book. We need to find someone with green eyes to read it.”
    “Are you actually suggesting,” said Odo, “we walk about this wretched city peering into people’s eyes?”
    “If we want those secrets, we will.”
    “Sybil, alchemy is illegal. It’s considered sorcery. A hanging offense.”
    “But you said if we didn’t learn how to make gold we’ll perish,” returned the girl. “Now, be still. I need to think how to find a green-eyed person.”
    “You can’t think, so don’t waste your time. You’re nothing!” said the raven, and he retreated to his skull to sulk.
    9

    Sybil went to her favorite place—she could only go there when Thorston slept—the small, round, thick-glassed front window. She looked out. The weather with its dark, cold fog was, as always, nasty. How she longed for spring with its soft breezes, flowers, and warm sun.
    Shifting slightly, Sybil caught sight of her likeness in the glass. Despising her looks; despising the fact that she was a worthless, ignorant, homely girl; despising how dependent she was, she turned away. Odo was right: she was alone in the world. A nothing. But Odo was right about another thing: knowing how to make gold would change her life.
    She started: for a moment she thought she saw someone standing in the courtyard shadows, observing their house. A small person. A child, perhaps. She looked again. The figure was gone. I’ve become as addle-pated as Master, she thought.
    Leaning on the window, she resumed her musings. If a green-eyed person was needed, how could she find one? Seeing the person in the courtyard gave her an idea.
    “Odo,” she said, “I think we should seek out a green-eyed child.”
    “A child? Why?”
    “Children are easy to control. They won’t ask questions.”
    “But few can read.”
    “It’s only green eyes that are necessary.”
    “And how do you intend to find such?”
    “I’ll invent something to say to the merchants from whom I market.”
    “What of Master’s rule that no one know of his existence?”
    “Your eyes are black. Mine, brown. Our sole hope is to find a green-eyed person.”
    “Hope!” hissed Odo. “Nothings don’t hope.” “I
    won’t be nothing,” cried Sybil. Eyes welling with tears, she ran into the back room and threw herself upon her straw pallet. If I’m to survive, she thought as she smeared away the wetness on her cheeks, I need to find a green-eyed child. With that, she began to compose the speech she would give to merchants on the morrow. She would start with the apothecary, Mistress Weebly. She was closest.
    10

    Odo, on his skull, stared at the pot that sat upon the brazier. He was convinced gold was in it, gold that Thorston had made. Not that Odo had any intention of sharing it with Sybil. Not a grain. But, he told himself, to get it will take patience—and cunning.
    11

    In another part of town, Ambrose Bashcroft, the city reeve of Fulworth—the man in charge of the city’s law and order—lay in his quilted bed propped up by a dozen goose-down pillows. The bed, curtained round with heavy wool, provided him with an effective cocoon of self-importance.
    A big man, Bashcroft was broad as a barrel and not much taller, his bulky body much given to jigs and jounces. His head was rooted upon a short, wide neck, and was beetle browed with bristling eyebrows, one slightly lower than the other. With pendulant jowls and enough chins to serve as palace steps, Bashcroft looked more bullish than most bulls.
    “Dura lex, sed lex” was the sole Latin legal phrase Bashcroft knew, but, liking its meaning—The law is hard , but it is the law —he used