“Not as much as I should,” Flavia says. It’s an admission she’d make to a rare number of people, Henri among them; after so diligently cultivating—even accepting—the mantle of a poisons genius, it wouldn’t do to confess any ignorance. “Mostly that you have to be endlessly careful, because so many poisonous mushrooms look just like ones you’d be just fine eating.”

To illustrate, she brushes aside a shock of grass, revealing a fist-sized mushroom, just sprouting from the dirt. “What’s your verdict? Poison, or not poison?"