A Lesson in Making Shadows

Aranelle and Evilie left the grocer’s, two bright red-headed girls with unruly hair and equal height in prim black dresses. Their pockets were full of candies and their mouths sticky. They chattered about school, what each was learning, and who was mean or nice to them. Though no one was ever nice to Aranelle; the best she could hope for was to be ignored. She, of course, could care less – she had Evilie, after all, even if it was only at home. At ten years of age, Aranelle had never had another friend besides her sister.

Aranelle licked her fingers clean of a particularly sticky cinnamon ball. She stopped at a shop to make sure her face was clean; not that she cared what others thought, but because her father would be angry if he knew they’d used their allowances on candy. Instead of seeing her reflection, her eyes caught on a refraction of sunlight, spraying rainbows across the walls inside.

She fell into a trance, watching the colors swirl; in that inter-space, she felt like anything could be possible. She floated in a sea of colors. She reached out to touch a light crystal and it shattered into a thousand pieces, all different colors. Aranelle could sense that here lay a potential for great power, for great possibility, and for freedom. She had to know more. She had to learn how to create this on her own.

Evilie realized her sister was not with her and turned around. “Aranelle! Come on! We’ll be late for lunch.”

Aranelle broke free from her trance with a shock, like cold water on her face. “You go on. I want to check this place out real quick. I’ve never noticed this shop before.”

“I don’t want to be late, Nelle. Come on! You know Father gets angry when we’re late.” Fear crept into her voice, behind the whine.

Aranelle looked back at the light refracting. When she spoke, her voice sounded far away from her brain. “It’s ok. You go on ahead. Tell Father we got separated and you don’t know where I am. You won’t get in trouble.”

Evilie shuffled her feet, unsure, hesitant to leave her best friend in such a precarious position.

“It’s ok, Ev. Go on. I’ll be home before too long.”

“Are you sure, Nelle?

Now frantic to get inside, she spoke harshly – something she’d never done with Evilie. “Yes, Ev. Go home. I’ll be fine.” Before Evilie could say anything further, Aranelle moved quickly, opening the door and slipping inside.

The shop was dimly lit. Looking around, she saw potion bottles covered in dust, and books amongst spiderwebs. But most entrancing was the crystal ball, where the light crystals burst out of, drawing her in. She danced beneath them like she and Evilie used to dance beneath the firebugs during the summer.

Spent, she turned full circle, looking closer at the books – she wanted to know their titles, but even more, she wanted to know what secrets they revealed.

“Whaddya want?” A gruff voice growled from the shadows.

She tried to peer into the shadows but the darkness resisted her, almost like someone was using magic.

She opened her mouth and spoke the first words that came to mind, breathily. “I want to know how to do magic.”

Surprising both of them, the man laughed, deeply, from his belly. “That’s a big wish for such a little girl.”

Aranelle drew herself up, straightened her back and neck, and spoke with conviction. “I will not always be a little girl. And when I am a woman, I want to know everything. ”

Alchemist Brangle walked out of the shadows, dispelling them with a wave of his hand as he exited. Behind him were shelves and shelves full of potions, glistening as though freshly scrubbed, all different colors inside, even some with multiple colors moving around each other.

The man himself was short and round, his white beard braided on the sides and his equally white hair shooting up out of his head at all angles. He held a cigar between his teeth, though it was not lit, and his fingertips were stained black. His clothes – once-white robes and brown baggy pants – were also stained with every color imaginable. Despite his unkempt and bizarre appearance, his eyes were kind and Aranelle instantly liked him.

“What do you want me to do about it?”

“Teach me. Everything you can, as quickly as you can. I want to do magic like you.”

He laughed again. “I didn’t get much farther with magic than potions. I know a few tricks, like this.” He held up his index finger, blew on the tip, and it lit up with a tiny flame. He used it to light up his cigar. “Comes in handy on occasion, I guess.”

Aranelle nodded. “I need to start somewhere. Will you teach me potions and the spells that you do know?”

Alchemist Brangle hummed and asked, “What’s in it for me?”

“What do you want? My father is the architect, I can acquire anything you desire.”

He shook his head. “I have no desire for things or money. I have enough to last me the rest of my life.”

“Well, then, is there anything I can do?”

He pondered the question for several minutes. Aranelle’s anxiety stayed internal, on the outside presenting a composed and patient child.

Finally, he came to a decision. “Let’s test your aptitude first. Come.”

He walked to the back of his shop without checking if she was following. She walked slowly behind, her eyes lit up with all the treasures she saw as she walked. Up close, she could see the labels on the potions, like Suadere, Armatura, Remedium Alacium, and Praesidium. Her fingers itched to touch them and her heart itched to learn how to make them.

They arrived at a workshop in the backroom. A large wooden table, strewn with papers and used-up bottles, took up a large portion of the center of the room. Along the walls were low cupboards, about hip height, and above those were shelves full of magical ingredients. Beetle carapaces and snake molt, bird feathers like the majestic keret, even a shell from a larmat. Her eyes took it all in, not waiting for her brain to process it. She would have time for that later.

Alchemist Brangle slapped the table. “Alright.” He picked up a piece of paper from the top of a heap and passed it to her. “Let’s see if you can make a Shadow potion. If you make it wrong, it will burn your skin so be mindful.”

She nodded solemnly and scanned the instructions. She was surprised his handwriting was so artfully done, the same as the labels on the potions.

               Shadow

2 Drops of the Gray from a Storm Cloud

        3 Smoke Fish Scales

         Heart of a Chameleon

         The Essence of Shadows

She walked over to the shelves full of ingredients, scanning for each one. She found the first three, but despite scanning the shelves multiple times, she could not find the fourth. Finally, she turned to the alchemist and asked, “Where would I find The Essence of Shadows?”

He grinned. “If it’s not on the shelves, where might you find it?”

Aranelle pondered this, setting the other ingredients down and leaning up against a cupboard while she did so. “Well…” She began slowly, then quicker as she became more sure of herself. “Well, if it isn’t something I can find in the material world, it must come from the immaterial. Something that comes from within me.”

Alchemist Brangle looked pleased. “So, how would you access it then?”

She chewed on her thumbnail as she thought. “I think… I think it will come to me as I make the potion. Can I try?”

He nodded and stepped back, folding his arms across his chest as he watched.

She collected a fresh potion bottle, added a few tablespoons of water, and set it on the work table. She removed the stopper from the Gray from a Storm Cloud and collected two drops, letting them drip into the water. As she did so, she kept a clear image in her mind of a shadow – a deep one, an impenetrable one; a shadow that she’d seen once, when walking through the house at night, in the corner by a window where no shadow should have been.

Next, she tweezed three Smoke Fish Scales from their bottle and let them fall into the solution, thinking still of deep, dark shadows where shadows shouldn’t be; like when she’d been walking in their garden at noontime and stumbled into a section she couldn’t remember ever being in, and there, hovering around a stone bench, was a black haze that her eyes could not see into.

Finally, she opened the Heart of a Chameleon and plucked one out, a deep red blob barely bigger than the tip of her finger. It was squishy and cold; if she were to squeeze, it would burst open and spew blood upon her. Instead, she thought about deep, dark shadows; shadows like the one she and Evilie had seen last year in an abandoned building, the one crouched in the corner that turned and, with its blacker-than-black eyes, stared at them. She let the heart slither into the bottle and when it touched the other ingredients, the heart melted and the whole solution began to fizz and bubble, emitting a strong odor that said Sleep and Hush, and she almost did. Instead, she turned back to Alchemist Brangle and offered him the potion.

He shook his head. “You must try it on yourself.”

She pulled it back to herself. It wasn’t fizzing or bubbling anymore but still appeared to swirl concentrically. She looked at him. “Do I drink it or pour it?”

“In this case, I would pour it; on your legs or arms would probably be best. Don’t drink it unless you want to change the alchemical makeup of your very body.”

She did not shudder visibly. Calmly, with the barest twinge of fear in her belly, she poured it over her left arm. Together, they watched as her arm became shadows, as those shadows spread up over her face and down over her legs and enwrapped her torso. She looked at him through a murky veil. He looked at her and saw only shadow.

“Well,” he said, “I suppose that was an ok job. If you want to be my apprentice, I will take you on. You will need to start with collecting ingredients for potions. I am an old man now and could use someone to help me. Eventually, we’ll work up to potions, and if you can get the knack of that, I’ll teach you what little magic I know. I’ll notify the Guild that I’ve taken you on, I’m sure they’ll be pleased. They’ve been bothering me about it for at least a decade.”

She placed her hands together and bowed deeply. “I accept, Master. When can I start?”

He folded his arms across his chest and attempted to look stern. “Don’t you need to check with your parents?”

Aranelle shook her head. “No. I will tell them, and they will let me because they want me to have an apprenticeship. It will make getting an internship easier and pave the way for a mastership. Maybe then they can be proud of me.”

Brangle harumphed. “I would be proud of you now.”

She shrugged.