The Alchemist's Apprentice Read online

  Ginny nodded, slowly. “Not all men are like that, you know.”

  “I know.” I felt a flash of sudden bitterness. “But my parents aren’t going to contract a marriage for me, are they?”

  “They might,” Ginny said. “You do have some advantages.”

  I shook my head. My stepfather wasn’t going to pay a dower for me. He’d be furious at the mere suggestion that he should pay my dower - let alone pay for a wedding - when he had daughters of his own. And he certainly wasn’t going to enter into marriage negotiations for my hand either. His daughters came first. He’d stand to gain a great deal more if they, rather than I, got married. It wasn’t as if I was going to urge my future husband to support him.

  Not that it matters, I thought, wryly. My stepfather talked often of going into business himself - he worked down at the docks - but there was no way he’d be able to raise the money to open a shop of his own. Anyone his daughters are likely to marry is unlikely to be able to actually help him.

  “Not enough to matter,” I said, firmly. “And how many prospective husbands would overlook my ... my blood when they marry me?”

  “You never know,” Ginny said.

  “I suppose not.” I took a sip of my hot chocolate. It was nice, but not the sort of thing I’d drink on my own. I could buy several bags of tea leaves for the price of one bag of chocolate beans. “Are you really going to quit the Hiring Hall?”

  “If Rupert opens a shop, someone is going to have to be there and take the money,” Ginny said. “And things will be tight for a while. I dare say we won’t be able to hire a shopgirl for a few years.”

  If at all, I thought. There weren’t many Potions Masters in Water Shallot, but there were quite a few printers. Rupert was going to be competing against older, better-established, businesses right from the start. Even with Ginny’s help - and her contacts - it was going to be hard to find any traction. You’d need to spend a great deal of money before you could start to make money.

  “And besides, there have been changes in the hiring rules,” Ginny added. “You know we have to test everyone for magic now? Anyone who scores above ten or fifteen pulses on the scale has to be sent to Magus Court.”

  I cocked my head. “That’s odd,” I said. Ten or fifteen pulses was respectable, but hardly anything special. I was probably somewhere around twenty. A full-fledged magician like Reginald would probably be somewhere between fifty and a hundred. “Did they say why?”

  “No.” Ginny smirked. “Half the city is going to be heading to Magus Court.”

  I grinned. Shallot had long been famous for its magicians. There weren’t many people who rated below ten pulses. Magus Court was going to have a lot of visitors. It still struck me as odd, though. What could they possibly want with so many low-power magicians? It wasn’t as if there was a shortage.

  “It’s getting a little harder now,” Ginny added. “Do you hear the whining about the servant problem? All those upper-class ladies moaning because their servants are not properly respectful to their exalted rank? You just can’t get good servants these days.”

  “Oh, what a shame,” I said.

  Ginny giggled. “There was a girl I placed only a fortnight ago. Good character, good references ... very eager to work. She left a week after she started and do you know why? They made her up a bed next to the dogs! It wasn’t as if they didn’t have the space to give her a room of her own. I suppose they thought they were putting her in her place.”

  I rolled my eyes. Master Travis had given me the garret, which was practically a palace compared to sharing a room with my half-sisters. It was small and cramped, and I was at risk of banging my head against an oak beam if I stood up too quickly, but it was mine. Master Travis had made it clear that he wouldn’t enter the room unless it was an emergency. I would have happily traded half my wages for that assurance of privacy, if he’d asked. He’d never even thought to ask.

  But I might have had second thoughts now I know the value of money, I thought. There had been a time when I’d thought that a single silver was a veritable fortune. Now, I knew that Master Travis had to pay over a hundred silvers per month to keep the shop. It might have seemed better to keep the money rather than be assured of privacy.

  “They do have other options,” I said. “Don’t they?”

  “Depends.” Ginny shrugged. “It’s a delicate balancing act. The girl can find employment elsewhere, if she looks. Lots of shop-jobs going around now, as you know. But she won’t find someone who will give her a place to stay. Not now.”

  I nodded, sourly. A servant who was dismissed had no hope of receiving a good character from her former mistress - and one who left, without notice, would have to fight to get any sort of referral. Legally, a mistress was supposed to give a written character; practically, it was hard to force them to write one. Not for the first time, I reflected that laws meant to help the poor actually made life harder for them. A serving girl might be able to take her mistress - or her former mistress - to court, but there was little hope of a fair judgement. A well-connected lady would have no trouble getting the case thrown out, perhaps with some penalties thrown in for the unfortunate girl.

  “It’s easier to place men,” Ginny said. “But it’s harder to find boys who want to be bootblack boys when they can go to sea instead. Or join the army. They prefer to be shouted at by sergeants than lords and ladies.”

  “I don’t blame them,” I said. I could see at least one advantage to the military life. “They might become sergeants one day.”

  “Perhaps,” Ginny said. Her lips curved into a smile. “All those parades ... it really did something to the men.”

  I snorted. The aftermath of the House War had seen the king’s finest troops patrolling our streets. I’d kept away from them, but others had been more impressed. The prospect of a uniform, three square meals a day and a career someone could be proud of sounded better than a life spent working by the docks or carting goods around the city. I didn’t really blame the young men for being interested. Perhaps I would have been interested too, if I’d been a man. But I had a feeling the recruiting sergeants would have turned a great deal nastier as soon as the new recruits were in barracks.

  “Maybe,” I said. I checked the clock on the wall, then rose. It was later than I’d thought, late enough that I had to hurry to get home before night fell. Master Travis would need his dinner. He’d eat if I had to feed him with a spoon. “I’ll see you later this week, perhaps on Saturday?”

  “Sunday,” Ginny said. She smiled, a warm smile I knew had nothing to do with me. “I’m walking out on Saturday.”

  With Rupert, I thought, trying to suppress a pang of jealousy. Ginny was one of my few real friends and now she was slipping away. And then you’ll be married and you won’t have any time for me any longer.

  Ginny touched my hand, lightly. “I’ll see you then,” she said. “And good luck.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Good luck with Rupert.”

  “We don’t need luck,” Ginny said. “We just need a lot of money.”

  I laughed. “Money can’t buy you everything,” I said. “But it can sure make life easier.”

  “How true,” Ginny said. “How true.”

  I grinned, then hurried home.

  Chapter Four

  I barely saw Master Travis the next few days.

  He got up early, he worked in his workroom - barely eating the food I put in front of him - and went to bed late. He seemed to spend most of his time scribbling notes, inscriptions that appeared to be deliberately encrypted. I did everything I could to make up for his absence, to the point of taking an hour off to refill our stocks, but it was starting to wear on me. I’d grown too used to being able to brew without feeling pressured to hurry.

  Or being able to refer difficult customers to Master Travis, I thought one morning, as a particularly argumentative customer glared at me. She seemed to think that her beauty potion, which she had bought at huge expense, should have given her
the pick of the young men around her. He always knows what to say.

  “And I’m telling you the potion did nothing for my looks,” the woman thundered. “I demand to speak to your master.”

  I told myself, firmly, that there was nothing to be gained by telling her that nothing short of a minor miracle would do anything for her looks. There was no point in putting lipstick on a pig. The hell of it was that she wasn’t actually ugly - a diet would have worked better than the potion - but her face was permanently twisted into an ugly sneer. If she tried to be more positive, perhaps she’d look more positive. But she wouldn’t welcome that advice from me.

  “My master is busy at the moment,” I said, instead. “He’ll be able to see you later in the evening.”

  “Hah,” the woman snapped. “I shall be sure to tell all my friends about your inexcusable conduct. The Lord of the Docks is a personal friend of mine and ...”

  I tuned her out as she turned and crashed through the door. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard grandiose claims of political connections - and threats of ruin - and they no longer terrified me. Master Travis had told me, when I’d fled to him in a panic, that very few of our customers had any real connections at all. Even if they had, he’d pointed out that they could hardly bring a complaint without admitting where they’d been going. The woman’s reputation wouldn’t survive a rumour that she’d been patronising an apothecary in Water Shallot. Who knew what she might have been buying there?

  Beauty potions are merely the tip of the iceberg, I told myself, as I savoured the silence. The empty shop felt heavenly, even though I knew that no customers meant no money. She might be in the market for a love potion instead.

  I smiled, although I knew it wasn’t really funny. A basic love perfume was harmless, as long as the wearer was careful, but one of the stronger love potions could be really dangerous in the wrong hands. Master Travis had told me there were some recipes that could not be countered, let alone cured. The victim would never be able to free himself from the potion’s influence. Even a hint of a rumour that someone had used such a potion could utterly destroy their reputation. Master Travis had told me that I’d be kicked out on the spot if I tried to brew a fixation potion. They were just too dangerous to be used.

  The door opened, just as I was contemplating another mug of tea. I squelched my annoyance and studied the newcomer with interest. She - I was sure she was female - was wearing a hooded cloak that concealed everything, save for her face ... and that was covered by a protective glamour that was flickering slightly as it interacted with the shop’s wards. It was a crude piece of work, I noted, but it was strong. Most glamours failed the moment they came into contact with Master Travis’s protections. I tensed, barely resisting the urge to take control of the wards or summon Master Travis. There was no visible threat, but that didn’t mean that one wasn’t there.

  “Come on in,” I said. It was raining outside, great sheets of water crashing to the ground and splashing down the gutters. No doubt the mystery woman had passed completely unnoticed as she made her way down to the shop. The handful of people I’d seen passing the windows were either wearing cloaks themselves or simply using magic to banish the rain. “What can we do for you?”

  “You can turn off your wards,” a light voice said. It was surprisingly high, but unquestionably female. She sounded younger than I’d thought. “Please ...”

  “I can’t do that,” I said. It was true. Only Master Travis could take the wards down completely. “But I can guarantee your secrets are safe with us.”

  “You don’t understand,” the girl said. I mentally revised my estimate of her age downwards again. “I can’t afford to be caught!”

  “I think you’ll find that’s true of most of our customers,” I said, dryly. We wouldn’t have stayed in business for so long if we’d been in the habit of betraying our confidences. Master Travis had made it clear that I wasn’t to share anything I learnt about our customers to anyone. “You have my word, for what it’s worth, that your secrets are safe.”

  The girl inched forward. “I have a list of ingredients,” she said. “Can you supply them?”

  A hand emerged from her cloak, holding a sheet of paper. It was very good quality paper, I noted; the pale hand belonged to a girl who had to be at least two or three years younger than me. I thought I caught a glimpse of red curls behind the glamour as I took the paper and scanned it thoughtfully, but it was hard to be sure. The glamour might have been designed to trick anyone trying to peer through it into believing that they had peered through it. I put the thought aside and studied the list. It was hard, very hard, not to laugh.

  The girl’s voice was hushed. “Can you supply them?”

  “Yes,” I said. Meadowsweet and calendula, beeswax and base liquid ... a handful of primed oils ... it wasn’t going to be difficult. The girl was planning to make a healing salve or I knew nothing whatsoever about potions. “We have more than enough of each of these in store.”

  I hesitated. “Do you want us to provide the salve directly?”

  The girl flinched, as if I’d reached across the counter and struck her. “No, please. Just the ingredients.”

  “As you wish,” I said. I turned to the jars and started pouring out the ingredients. Master Travis had a standing order for meadowsweet and calendula, along with hundreds of other staples of the brewer’s trade. “The oils have been prepared by us personally. Is that going to be a problem?”

  “No,” the girl said. “Just ... give me what you have.”

  I finished bottling and bagging the supplies, then put them in a cloth bag. The girl took them gratefully, counting out the money from a simple leather purse. My eyes narrowed when I saw it. The girl was clearly from a wealthy family, which made her request for potions ingredients all the stranger. There were quite a few apothecaries in North or South Shallot she could have visited without risking Water Shallot. The dangers were considerable. It certainly didn’t look as if the girl had brought any bodyguards.

  “Thank you,” the girl said. She turned to head to the door. “I ...”

  She stopped, dead. “I can’t be seen here,” she said. She sounded panicked. “I ... he can’t see me here!”

  I looked past her. Reginald was strolling down the street, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. I couldn’t see any bodyguards, but that was meaningless. They might well be following him at a distance. Besides, his livery was protection enough against most streetpads and thugs. No one wanted to bring the Great Houses down on their heads. But the girl - the girl I was increasingly convinced came from a Great House herself - wasn’t wearing any livery.

  “Stay in the corner,” I said, altering the wards slightly. Reginald shouldn’t be able to see her. “You can slip out after he enters and ...”

  The girl opened the door and scurried off down the street. I opened my mouth to shout after her, then decided it was none of my business. Getting caught up in the affairs of the Great Houses was a good way to end up dead. Reginald’s handsome face didn’t change as he walked up to the door and stepped inside. He smiled at me as I stepped out from behind the counter and curtseyed. I resisted the urge to say something nasty as he looked down at me. He seemed to like seeing me on my knees.

  “Rebecca, is it not?” Reginald’s smile grew wider, but there was something in it I found distantly unpleasant. “And who was that most ... curious ... customer?”

  “I can’t tell you,” I said. I stood, even though he hadn’t given me leave to rise. I didn’t like him looking down at me. “We don’t talk about our other customers.”

  “Come now,” Reginald said. He reached out and touched my chin, lifting my head until I unwillingly met his eyes. “There are no secrets from me.”

  I forced myself to stay in that position, even though etiquette demanded that I drop them in the presence of my betters. “If I told you about her, might I not tell her about you? Or anyone about you?”

  Reginald’s face reddened. “And if I t
old your master to beat you for cheek,” he snarled, “what would he say?”

  I managed - somehow - to hold his eyes. “My master can beat me for cause,” I said. It was true, even though Master Travis had never laid a finger on me. “But he cannot beat me for following his orders.”

  “Really?” Reginald took a step forward. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” I said, although I wasn’t sure. Reginald could bring a lot of pressure to bear, if he wished. “I’m sure.”

  “Hah,” Reginald said. “And are you sworn to secrecy?”

  “Yes,” I said. I had the feeling he meant something different - a magically-binding oath, perhaps - but I didn’t care. I’d given Master Travis my word. I wanted it to mean something, even if it was just between the two of us. “And I won’t break my word.”