Chapter 2: Bones, Herbs, and Implants (not that kind, perverts)

The polished bell over the door jingled as I pushed my way inside. That was a good sign, the door being unlocked already. Sometimes Master Alric slept through his scandalizing late opening policy. Again, not that I personally minded, but it was a poor business profile. It wasn’t an immediate problem, though it was tradition for a Master to pass on their venture to the most promising Apprentice. Since I was the only apprentice…well, let’s say I have some thoughts rattling around in the recesses of my head.

“Master Alric?” I called out.

“You’re late!”

Huh?

“I swear to the Mother of Trees, if you persist in showing this little regard for your training, Book, I’ll…” He trailed off. Maybe he was reminded of his habitual tardiness; maybe he just got distracted. He does that a lot, a curse of his brilliant mind. At least, that was what he usually claimed.

I wrestled with my incredulity, and yes, annoyance, doing my best to tamp it down. I’ve been told that I wear my emotions on my face. This early in my apprenticeship, there was no time to put my master’s back up. I’d been the one to beg him for this chance, after all, and I had a long way to go before I could even think about setting out on my own. And pay for my lodgings and food, both of which have been established that I greatly enjoy.

“Yes Master, I’ll do better,” I replied, trying to mollify him. If he even noticed. “What would you have me work on today?”

Boy, it was hard calling someone ‘Master’. My modern (at least in my mind) upbringing cringed every time I said it. When in Rome, so on and so on.

“What? Umm…” he started, before visibly taking control of his thoughts. “Ink. I need more ink.”

“Didn’t we just make some last week?” I asked.

“No,” he replied. “That was good stuff, for proper scrolls. I need cheap stuff, a lot of it.” Alric cast a side look at me, condescension a familiar fit across his doughy features. “You know, the stuff you’re good at making.”

Deep breath; blank face.

“Yes, Master.

I wanted to ask why he needed 'a lot' of the cheap stuff. He usually prides himself on the quality of his own work. Not mine, of course. I must not have kept the question off of my features, and he spoke again.

“If you must know,” he started. “I’ve taken a contract for fifty scrolls of [torchlight].”

Fifty scrolls? Wow.

“Due by the start of Seven-day.” He wrinkled his forehead, pulling at one of his great mustachios. Both were clear signs of his stress.

I understood why, too. The start of Seven-day? The Elves on Planet EH-103—I have got to find a better name, even if only in my head!—lived a nine-day week. Seven on; two off. Alric’s week consisted more of maybe five days on, the rest off. This all meant we’d be scrambling for seven days straight. Oh, again, I just love those Elven naming conventions! One-day to Nine-day. At least I always know how many days till the weekend.

“Well, don’t just stand there,” he said, his sudden glance eliciting a jump start in me. “Go!”

I gave a formal bow, hands clasped together over my heart and bending stiffly at the waist, and scarpered to the back room where all the materials were stored. The beaded curtain clattering in my wake, I paused to surveil the room. There were multiple rows of freestanding shelves, some partitioned into cubicles of ascending size. These were populated with crystal bottles in individual cubbies fit to their size, ranging from the tiniest of bottles, no more than an inch in height, to pint-sized ones. Each contained an ink hand-crafted by Master Alric himself. His pride and joy, more children than product.

Other shelves held bins of the highest quality ingredients. There were dried flowers, herbs, and plants stored in open baskets, as well as air-tight glass boxes. Some were translucent, and others opaque These were for the more sensitive products. Live vegetation grew in a variety of pots and planters, most under sun-gems mounted above them. A few in a darkness so total only magic could achieve it. Even a few live…organisms…secured in tanks of water and various other mediums. I tried not to look too closely at these. Watering the plants, no biggie. Some things had to be fed, though, and what better assignment for an apprentice to oversee? Ugh, lucky me.

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Ignoring all of the more expensive items, I threaded my way through the aisles and headed for what appeared to be a utility closet in the far corner. This was where my ingredients were kept. Yep, a whole broom closet just for little ol’ me. I’m happy it wasn’t a walk-in refrigerator at some fast food joint back home. Been there, done that.

I’m extremely grateful for that aspect of my new home world. Making it as a professional writer while paying off student loans would have been much harder on Earth. It took both luck and persistence, on top of any actual talent or skill, to make it. Unless you were born into money (not me) you still had to make a living somehow, someway. I suppose I could have gone to work at a Barnes & Noble with my English degree, I wouldn’t be the only one, but it was getting harder and harder to find a real brick-and-mortar store in the digital age. Here, I suppose it would be stone and timber. At least it wasn’t wattle and daub! Ha, I crack me up.

Focus, man! Back to work. Time to make the donuts. Soonest begin, soonest don…if distraction was the sign of brilliance, I’d be diamond rank for sure.

Sighing, I took in what my closet had to offer. Master Alric provided me with the most basic ingredients, as per the Master-Apprentice code, but anything fancier would have to come out of my monthly stipend. Now, it may sound like Alric was the worst Master in existence, but in reality, Master Alric would fall firmly in the upper-middle class of Masters. From what I’d heard, some were the epitome of actual slave drivers. Besides, let’s not forget the time-honored convention of gripping about the boss. It was an underling’s, or in my case an Apprentice’s, prerogative. Nay, not just a prerogative, but a fundamental aspect of a healthy psyche. Who’s to argue with evolution? Not even bioengineering could change that.

Speaking of, I gave a mental push to the implants nestled behind my eyes. Reading my intention, the HUD plastered across my vision lit up with a bright green overlay. The words labeling everything in my sight typed themselves out one letter at a time. The style looked straight out of the 1980s, ripped from an ancient, 64-bit computer. That old movie, ‘Wargames’, always pops into my mind when I see it. When my dad made me watch it, I’d laughed uproariously through the whole thing. I knew it was supposed to be a serious take on hacking. If that was true, I could have hacked NORAD back when I was six, just like anyone of my generation. I could have done it with my phone, for Christ’s sake! It’s a wonder how the world survived us human caretakers and made it through the turn of the century.

Enough of that. The last thing I needed right now was reminders of home and family. I don’t need any misty eyes blurring the Orcish high-tech I’d been blessed with. I had a new home now, and I guess I could call Tess family, even if not in the way I’d used to dream of. I was firmly in the friend zone there. We both knew how I felt about that, an unspoken awkwardness hanging over our heads like a dangling sword. If mentioned out loud, it could sever the fragile balance we both clung to so we could survive our new ‘normal’.

Brushing a forearm across my eyes, irritated from the dust no doubt—Dust I say!—I forced myself to concentrate. Outlines traced around the ingredients needed for a basic, magic ink, the kind used for—guess what!—basic scrolls. A dim green, back-lit glow pulsed to the rhythm of my heartbeat behind the outlines. It was more than useful when shopping for items where the only lighting was what you brought yourself. It saved me from using my personal supply of [torchlight] scrolls.

The recipe pulled up along the right side of my sight, under the mini-map floating there. Shopping list: charred and ground gryphon's bones, boiled and reduced linseed oil, deer-hoof glue, clear varnish, and silver-leaf pigment. All this for the base. Next, I needed a couple of pinches of sulfur and potassium nitrate for that certain, sparkling burn. By far, my favorite part was seeing the parchment flash and smoke as the ink burned through. Pure awesomeness!

Making a basket by hiking up my robes and pouching them at my waist, I held the fabric with one hand and started grabbing items with the other. I had to slow down after a minute, ash coloring my midsection from knocking the lid off a jar. There goes another handful of coppers getting my robes laundered. At least I caught it before needing to replace the whole jar. Gryphon’s bone wasn’t exactly expensive. Did I really just say that? Gryphon’s bone?! Still, at this stage in my life every penny, or copper, mattered.

I took my loot, with the addition of a large crystal carafe, to my workstation. The hardwood tabletop was scarred and pitted from spills. Not all mine. Master Alric got it used, of course. One leg looked like it used to belong to some mannequin. Not creepy at all. It was perfectly level though. Exactingly level. Alric was a genuine Master, as well as cheap. He demanded perfection in the execution of all wares originating from his shop. Great for learning, if annoying in practice.

I grabbed a mortar and pestle that I kept in the upper left corner of the worktable. There was a ring-shaped scar from a former owner etched into the wood, making it the perfect resting spot. Chipped and made from pink marble, this muller was the new constant in my life as a [Scrivener]. Getting to work, I let my mind start to wander during the now-familiar process of making ink by hand.

Exactly how much did Master Alric mean by ‘a lot’ of ink?