Chapter 8: Seven

“I need to get to work,” Abigail says as she slips on an apron over her dress. The piece of clothing looks constrictive and annoying to wear.

You know this because Abigail, in her infinite cruelty, forced you into a dress and it is constrictive and annoying to wear. Unlike the jacket, it does not even have the benefit of smelling like your summoner. It’s too big for you, reaching all the way down to your ankles while the waist is pinched around you by a thick belt, the only thing stopping the dress from slipping off you.

It is uncomfortable and demeaning. You never had to wear clothes in the places between places. There weren’t any clothes there to begin with. These stupid mortal rules are stupid.

“I’m going with you,” you tell her. You will earn many mortal currencies for your hard work and you will buy the prettiest dresses with them.

“I, I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Abigail says. She looks at you, then past you to the rest of the apartment. The rooms are all still warped, bigger in some places and smaller in others, the few lights she has insufficient to brighten the whole room up.

You think that maybe changing the room’s size made her uncomfortable somehow. The silly summoner.

“It is a good idea,” you say. “I will earn many coins with which to buy things.” That is what work is for, or so you’ve come to understand.

“I... fine, but only if you promise not to do any... any sort of magic in the main room.”

“Okay.” That’s an easy promise to make. You’ve never used magic before to begin with.

Abigail fidgets with her cuffs, then smooths out her apron. “Okay. Okay, we’ll just have a quiet morning, and then in the afternoon we’ll go see Daphne. Daphne can help.”

You don’t know what she’s supposed to help with, but that’s hardly your concern. You follow Abigail down the flight of stairs to the first floor, then into the main area of Madam Morrigan's Artifices, Tinctures and Ingredients. The shop is a quiet, dusty place this early in the morning, all the jars and platters sitting silently and waiting for people to show up and buy the stuff.

“What are these things for?” you ask as you point to all the shelves. Most are pretty yummy, but something tells you this isn’t a market for foods.

“Oh, I guess you wouldn’t know,” Abigail said. “Um, do you know how circle magic works? Sometimes it’s called Alchemy, or Symbiosy?”

“It all sounds silly. Just make the world do the things you want it to,” you say. It’s an easy concept to grasp, you don’t know why your summoner would have a hard time with it, or why she’s giving you such a strange look.

“W-well, I want to go to the Academy to learn more, but I can explain the basics,” she says after shaking her head. She reached up and tied her frizzy hair in a bun, then straightens her glasses. “Magic comes in three parts: instruction, material, source. The circle holds the instructions that tell the spell how to act, the materials of the spell need to be in contact with the circle and the source comes from Aether, that’s a sort of liquid willpower that everyone makes just by being alive. It’s a lot more complicated than that, though.”

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That all sounds very silly. “Does Aether taste good?” you ask.

“I don’t know. Some nobles drink it, or add it to their food. It’s kinda hard to get it though. Every month, everyone needs to go to the tax office to pay their Aether tax. They drain you of a bit of Aether. Or you can pay a fine instead. Um, students of the Academy don’t need to give as much because you need more of it for lessons.”

“They suck your magic juices?” you ask.

“When you hit puberty, yeah. Everyone does it, it’s normal. The Aether is bottled for later, sold to nobles and war mages and used for important things.”

You’re frowning, you realize. If Abigail says it’s normal, then maybe it is. Who are you to tell the mortals what to do with their magic juice. But it still sounds wrong. You might need to investigate that later.

Abigail walks to the front of the store and unlocks the door, turning a sign as she does so. “We sell materials here. The things you need to cast different spells. Though Madam Morrigan doesn’t sell any of the really exotic stuff.”

You nod along as you follow her across the shop. Your tentacles drift around you, nudging things in place, resorting shelves, rubbing away smudges from glass jars, tossing yummy things towards you so that you can snap them out of the air with your mouth, dusting off the corners of shelves.

Abigail whips around half a second after you slip a few eel eyes into your mouth. You keep your mouth shut and hope that she doesn’t notice that your cheeks are full. She eyes you, then your tentacles that have just finished with one shelf.

“O-okay,” she says. “No tentacles on the floor. But if you want to help, there’s a broom and dustpan in the back. Here, let me show you.”

You follow Abigail, chewing on the eyeballs as you go. When you actually manage to squish one without it slipping between your teeth, it makes a great ‘splat’ feeling in your mouth and releases some juicy goodness all over. Not only yummy, but fun to eat. The perfect snack.

Abigail opens a small cupboard at the back and passes you a broom which you grab with two tentacles. She sighs, then shows you a metal dustpan. “This is a dustpan,” she confirms. “See the circle inscribed at the bottom? If you press your thumb on this part of the handle and push some will into it, it turns all the contents of the pan into harmless smoke. Don’t put your fingers on the circle and then press it. I don’t want to have to bring you to a clinic because you lost a finger.”

“Okay,” you say as you grab the pan with a tentacle. What does she think that you can’t follow simple instructions? What a silly summoner.

Now, what does this harmless smoke taste like?

And would it work on a tentacle?

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