“Once you have the distilled oil, you add it to a bottle of one-hundred-proof alcohol,” the Crone said. “Store the distillate in a dark and warm room to sit for a month.”
He wondered how he would get hold of one-hundred-proof anything.
“Next is a very important process. The preparation of the tincture. You can’t rush this,” she said. “The distillate will be very potent and toxic, so you must make a second batch of one-hundred-proof alcohol mixed with whole hypnos flowers. This batch must steep for a week and must not be distilled. This is what will give Absinthe its green color. To make Absinthe, you mix in equal thirds the distillate, the tincture, and water. Not the water that you drink or bathe with.”
“Why not?” he asked.
“It has a trace of salt. Your water travels from the ocean in pipes before it goes into the desalination plants. There’s a little bit of saline in it, but it’s what you’ve come to associate with the taste of water because you’ve been drinking it your entire life. Pure water doesn’t have any taste.”
“So where do I get the water?” he asked.
“Melted snow from the mountains. In the spring when the snow melts, the water travels into the ravines in the nature preserves.”
“What?” he asked, his voice high.
“All the Sandmen before you had to do this. It’s the only way.”
The first time he went on what he came to call “the water pilgrimage,” he brought a large drum that he carried on his back. He chose the nature preserve in Elara, the quietest and the least populous of the cities, to keep away from prying eyes. Elara is different from the three other cities. It’s raw and natural—the way a California desert is meant to look. He had trekked through rough paths of boulders and scraggly cacti in search of a riverbed and found it near an area where two large oak trees stood.
The last time he was there was in the spring, when an explosion of wildflowers painted the valley in shades of pink and yellow. The next time he sees it—if he ever sees it again—he will not remember having seen it. Next spring will be Tabula Rasa.
The verdant liquid colors his vision, tossing and catching possibilities like balls. The Crone had forbidden him from forcing Absinthe on Aris. The Crone believes in choice and consent, something that was denied her. But why could he not offer Aris Absinthe as a choice? The temptation—a shortcut, a way to bypass the time required to reacquaint her to him—pulls like a magnet.
You must go to her only as Metis, the Crone’s voice echoes in his ears.
Aris looks at her watch. The pending arrival of the scheduled rain has emptied the pathway to her building of people. Darkness drips down like black ink around her, making her feel apprehensive. She does not like the dark. It’s an irrational fear, she knows. From the corner of her eye, she sees a flash of shadow darker than the surrounding night. It’s probably trees swaying in the wind, she tells herself.
Her footsteps echo against the concrete path. Wind rustles trees and sends chills through the gaps in her coat. She hugs her jacket tight against her body and quickens her steps.
She had spent more time than she wanted with the trinitite man. Aside from having the sample, there was nothing about him that struck her as interesting. She only stayed because of the little piece of earth in his possession.
Holding the trinitite in her hand was at once awe-inspiring and terrifying. It reminded her of fossils but with a glassy sheen. Its surface had a thin sprinkle of fine sand with little bubbles inside. Sandstone, quartz, and feldspar melted together under the extreme heat of the atomic blast. The same blast that pockmarked the face of the world during the Last War.
She can only guess at the temperature that once coursed through its atoms, disfiguring it into its current form. The minimum for sand to form glass is 1,470 degrees Celsius. The passage of time has allowed her to touch it.
Sprinkles of rain land on her cheeks. She wipes them away and looks up at the sky. More drop on her face. She does not remember the last time she felt rain. She stops, mesmerized by the strange, cold wetness on her skin and hair.
Suddenly rain begins to lash down in sheets, drenching her. Her wet clothes stick to her body, replacing heat with a veil of ice. Her muscles contract and her teeth begin to chatter. She looks for the lights of her building and runs toward it.
She hears footsteps apart from her own. Or is it the clapping of branches on trees? The thought of company should make her feel safer, but it does not. It is almost an instinct—the distrust of another human in the cloak of night. She speeds up. The whipping wind and rain make it hard for her to see where she is going. She only knows she is going forward.
Her body hits against something firm. She bounces off, losing her balance. She’s falling backward. The sound of her scream is lost in the howling wind. Vice-like hands grab hold of her upper arms. They yank her forward, smothering her against a wall of warmth. She struggles to release herself.
“Let go!” she yells.
She feels the heat lifting off her. Cold air floods in. One of the hands is still on her arm, sending warmth through the jacket to her skin. She wipes the rain off her face, sees his, and remembers. She steps away from him, freeing herself from his grip.
“Are you hurt?” he asks, his hand reaching forward toward her face.
“You’re Metis.” As soon as the words leave her, she realizes they were an inappropriate response to his question.
His hand drops. She sees something flash in his eyes. Is it pain? Did she run into him that hard? In
