technique. They would never dream of testing themselves against one another, and you can serve their needs admirably. And if you watch while I instruct, you may learn enough to fend against them. Can your determination take day after full day of that?'
'It can,' Alodar said. 'It will have to.'
Cedric gave Alodar one last look. 'A hero and a fool,' he muttered and walked out of the courtyard.
CHAPTER SIX
Luck of the Potionmakers
ALODAR pushed the cork into the last flask and sat down on the small stool beside the workbench. He shook his head to clear the numbness and looked through fatigued eyes at the two rows of transparent liquid that barely covered the bottoms of their containers. Only sixty-three, he thought, sixty-three small flasks to represent the results of over five months of labor.
Saxton placed a fleshy palm on Alodar's shoulder and rose on his tiptoes in a back arching stretch. 'Well done, my lad,' he yawned. 'You have been an apt pupil and we have accomplished much. Four steps completed and six more to try. If all the rest go right half of the time, then we have about three chances in four of producing the ointment. And with fewer repetitions to run at each stage, we will progress all the more swiftly.'
'From such speed we can well benefit,' Alodar said. 'The monotony of repetition bothers me less than the time remaining before we must make good the loan from Basil.'
'There is an additional matter for concern,' Saxton said. 'I have traded what useful stock I could for ingredients to get this far but can continue in the same manner no longer. The sixth step requires peat tar dug in darkness and Basil virtually monopolizes the entire supply. Either we deal with him or attempt instead to use a substitute.'
'I would rather not give him further claim upon our futures when we have come this far on our own,' Alodar said.
'Nor would I,' Saxton replied. 'I have escaped the snare in which he has entrapped others by bartering but modestly and then only when I had no other choice.'
He stopped and ran his hand over his head, his eyes frowning in thought. 'And by the laws,' he said, 'we may as well try. There is more danger if we substitute in a formula this potent, but if we do not, we increase our risk as well. Let us look in the almanac and see what signatures must be provided.'
Saxton reached up on the shelf and pulled down one of a matched set of volumes placed in a neat line amid his jumble of assorted grimoires.
'Yes, peat tar, here it is,' he said. ' 'Thick, sticky black liquid with pungent odor.' Well, the thickness and stickiness are well enough understood. Almost all of the more complex formulas that have many diverse ingredients need some substance to bind them together. The other properties are a little more ambiguous, depending upon the final objective. For transfigurations, black provides the animal's coat, for invisibility, the quenching of light, and so on. Ah, this is the entry. For heat-shielding, black gives the dissipativeness of empty space. Let us see, for the pungent odor there are likewise many interpretations but they all seem to deal with repulsion. In our case, yes, here it is. For shielding ointments, the odor repels heat.'
Saxton slammed the book shut and replaced it on the shelf. He closed his eyes, folded his arms across his chest and rocked back and forth on his heels.
'Sap from the maple tree,' he said at last. 'I have some here. And if somehow we could use the powder of distaste with it, the signature should be close enough to work.'
'You have the powder as well,' Alodar said. 'I came across it while looking for more of the syrup of narcissus.'
'But as you said, we can ill afford the labor,' Saxton replied. 'The powder binds but poorly with any other substance. It would float on the surface of the maple sap like oil on water. We would have to force each gram into the liquid one at a time and hold it there until it was soaked through and would stay. And for each of our flasks we need hundreds of grains. Your task with the spider eyes was a small effort by comparison.'
'Does the soaking require an activation,' Alodar said, 'or merely the effort to bring it about?'
'There would be no alchemy in the preparation,' Saxton said. 'That would follow when we had the peat tar substitute ready for use.'
'Then I have the solution,' Alodar said excitedly. 'What you describe is but a perfect application of thaumaturgy. We can hold one grain in a bead of sap and, with a simple spellbinding, the others will follow.'
Saxton wrinkled his nose and frowned. 'I have no need for another craft,' he said, 'and certainly not for another craftsman. Besides no thaumaturge would accept an invitation to my shop even if I were to extend one.'
'I can do what has to be done,' Alodar said. 'Let us pour out the sap and I will show you.'
Saxton looked at Alodar a long time, then shrugged his shoulders and pointed to one of the shelves. Alodar slid off the stool and retrieved a glazed jug with a stopper crusted with mold and hardened streams of sap running down the sides like candlewax about a bottle. He decanted a generous amount into a large shallow pan and, sucking on a glass tube, extracted a droplet to place in a vial nearby. He found the powder of distaste and grabbed a pinch between thumb and forefinger. Like a cook spicing a stew, he sprinked the dark black powder over the open dish. Then, with a pair of tongs, he extracted a final grain from the small square tin.
He looked at the anthanor flame burning nearby and spoke the words he had not used for the long months he had labored at his new craft. Then, with a sudden motion, he plunged the tongs into the vial and turned to watch the surface of the pan. The powder disappeared from view, sinking into the darkness of the sap and leaving sluggish ripples in its wake.
Saxton crept closer, his squinting frown replaced by eyes wide with curiosity. He looked at the uncluttered surface of the liquid in the pan and then to the tongs in the vial. 'The quarter part of an hour should be enough,' he said quietly as he studied the mixture.
Some time later, Alodar released the connection and pulled the empty forceps from the small vial. The grains of powder remained where they were, floating in suspension. 'We are ready with the substitute peat tar,' ha said with a smile.
Saxton grunted at Alodar's success and motioned him aside. He picked up the first of the stoppered flasks and carried it across the room to a ring above a small smoking flame. The soot immediately began to blacken the bottom of the glassware and send wisps of carbon up the sides. Saxton removed the cork and added to the clear solution some of the impregnated sap, using a large bulbed pipette. Then as he watched the liquid simmer, he began to copy a parchment scrap onto clean paper.
'By the signatures, why must the good formulas all be such a bother?' he wondered. 'Ten steps in this one, each with no more than an even chance of proceeding correctly. Ten steps, by the laws. One thousand setups for the first, so we get about five hundred successes. Five hundred successes so we can have step two go right in about two hundred and fifty. Here we are at the fifth and must try it no less than the full sixty-three times just so we have two chances of having the final activation succeed. Were the stakes not so high, I would be tempted to make one lot and be done with it. Would that these formulas could be multiplied as are those of a cook without a corresponding decrease in their potency.'
Before Alodar could reply, Saxton had completed all but the final symbol and raised his pen-hand high. All was ready, and Alodar tensed as the quill descended to the paper.
The room suddenly exploded in light, and Alodar's eyes pulsed with pain. He blinked once and then twice more. All was strangely dark except for a dull glow in the direction of the flask, which remained even when his lids were closed. Saxton lurched against him, and both fell to the floor in a crash of splintering boxes and the tinkle of broken glass.
'Hellfire,' Saxton coughed. 'We have to get out.'
Alodar opened his mouth to reply but quickly shut it again, gagging on a thick, stinging vapor which burned the linings of his throat. He raised one hand to cover his nose and felt a trickle of fresh blood on his palm. He stood upright, crunching glass, and flailed blindly with his free hand until he found Saxton's arm. The doorway should be behind them. As he pulled the alchemist to his feet, he began to grope towards the exit.
