Archie Greene and the Alchemist's Curse

by D D Everest

  ‘That’s disgusting!’ said Arabella, curling her lip at the sight of the huge hairy spider.

  ‘Well,’ said Bramble brightly, ‘we’ve found our new meeting place all right.’

  ‘But it’s filthy!’ moaned Arabella, pulling a face. She picked up a tiny set of leather bellows and examined them. ‘We could catch something.’

  ‘Let’s hope it’s not the plague,’ joked Thistle.

  ‘It’s nothing that a broom, some soapy water and lots of elbow grease won’t fix,’ replied Bramble cheerfully. ‘We’ll have this place looking spic and span in no time.’

  *

  The children set about cleaning the laboratory. Archie brought a broom from the mending workshop, and they used the mop from the cupboard in the bookshop. Rupert tore the dust sheet into strips so the others could help wipe away the grime. Then they set to work.

  Even Arabella joined in with barely a grumble, using the feather duster from the broom cupboard to brush away the cobwebs on the ceiling. They tried not to disturb anything that looked like it might be an important clue, replacing all the glass jars exactly where they had found them. Archie and Thistle carefully collected the books, placing them in a neat pile at one end of the bench. At Archie’s suggestion, they bookmarked the pages that were opened just in case there were important clues.

  ‘What exactly are we looking for?’ asked Arabella, checking the books on the bookshelves.

  ‘Anything that could tell us how to make azoth,’ said Archie, ‘especially Grey’s notebook.’

  By the time they had finished, it was late. The place looked almost unrecognisable.

  ‘There,’ said Bramble, wiping the last of the dust from the wooden plaque and straightening it on the wall. ‘The Alchemists’ Club is back in business!’

  ‘When shall we hold our first official meeting here?’ asked Thistle.

  Archie had a worrying feeling that there was no time to lose. ‘How about tomorrow?’ he said.

  ‘Tomorrow it is, then,’ said Rupert. ‘We’ll meet here straight after we finish at the museum.’

  *

  The next day dragged by. Archie watched the clock, desperate for five o’clock, the time they finished work, to arrive. He made sure he was busy repairing a spell book when the old bookbinder was getting ready to leave. Archie offered to lock up the shop, and the old man gratefully accepted. As soon as Archie was sure everyone had left for the night, he took the black key, which he’d carefully replaced the night before, and hurried along the corridor.

  He unlocked the black door and waited in the lab. He had given Bramble his key to the bookshop so she could let the others in. They were watching from Quill’s and would be along as soon as they saw the coast was clear. They arrived a few minutes later.

  ‘I have some news,’ declared Arabella. ‘Katerina has agreed to show us some advanced alchemy. She was excited that we’d found Grey’s lab.’

  The others exchanged glances. ‘You told her?’ said Archie, annoyed that Arabella had confided in Katerina without discussing it with the rest of them.

  ‘Of course,’ said Arabella. ‘She was the one who told us about it in the first place. And besides, she’s dying to see it. She’s been studying Grey for years.’

  ‘But what if she tells the elders?’ asked Thistle.

  ‘She won’t,’ said Arabella, ‘I told her it was a secret.’

  ‘Did you tell her about the club?’ asked Archie,

  ‘No, of course not,’ said Arabella. ‘But she will be here any minute, so let’s quickly say the oath.’

  They had just finished when the door opened and Katerina strode into the room carrying a large bag. Her eyes were shining with emotion.

  ‘I can’t believe it!’ she exclaimed. ‘Fabian Grey’s laboratory. You found it! All these years, and it was right under our noses.

  ‘And his books!’ she cried, catching sight of where Archie and Thistle had neatly stacked the books from the bench. ‘And what are these?’ she picked up a glass jar and held it up to peer into its murky interior.

  ‘Everything must be catalogued,’ she said. ‘It is of huge interest for magical scholars like myself. We must make an inventory. Have you moved anything?’

  ‘We tidied up a bit,’ said Bramble. ‘The place was pretty dirty.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Katerina, her green eyes glistening in the torchlight, ‘but did you touch anything or take anything away?’

  ‘You mean did we find any azoth,’ Archie said. ‘The answer is no, we didn’t.’

  ‘Yes, well, perhaps the formula is hidden here somewhere among Grey’s papers,’ said Katerina. ‘I can help you find it if you like. The elders don’t need to know. I can say that I found it in the archive.’

  She glanced around the room and shook her head as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. ‘Now, Arabella asked me to show you some alchemy. I brought a few ingredients with me, and there might be some already here.’

  She plucked a jar from the shelf and examined the label. ‘Aha, powdered tortoiseshell. And that,’ she added, picking up another jar with what looked like a coiled snake in it, ‘is slow-worm skin. We can use both of those for what I’ve got in mind. I think we have everything we need to make a slow potion. It will give you an idea of how to combine elements.’

  ‘This should be interesting,’ Bramble whispered to Archie. ‘Arabella says Katerina trained in alchemy at the Prague Academy of Magic.’

  ‘I’ve brought some equipment so you can all make your own potions,’ said Katerina. She took some things from her bag and placed them on the workbench with the two jars.

  Archie peered at them. There were five glass containers shaped like test tubes but with wider flat bottoms, five pestles and mortars for crushing ingredients, and five long glass rods for stirring. In addition, she’d brought some tongs to hold the flasks and several shallow dishes.

  In the first dish were some green leaves; another contained dark blue berries.

  Next to these, Katerina placed a glass phial containing a silvery liquid and a small dish of a gritty black substance. Set apart from the other ingredients was a taller container with an ornate silver stopper. Inside, a clear liquid sparkled.

  Katerina was giving instructions. ‘I’ve measured out the ingredients very precisely. Get a flask each and divide up the thyme leaves equally between you. Then crush them with the pestle and mortar,’ she said, indicating the greenery in the first dish, ‘and put them in your flasks.’

  ‘We can use these to heat the solutions,’ she added, indicating the braziers stacked in the corner. ‘Take one each,’ she said. The children did as she instructed and Katerina poured something into them and lit it with a match.

  ‘That’s it,’ she said, striding up and down behind them and inspecting the bookshelves as they carried out her instructions. ‘Put all the leaves in, Arabella. You don’t want any thyme left over at the end.

  ‘Careful, Rupert. I said crush them, not grind them!’

  ‘That’s good, Archie. Just like that.’ Archie dropped the mashed-up thyme into the flask.

  ‘Now add some of the melted glacier water and heat the solution in the flames.’

  Archie poured in some of the liquid from the silvery phial, and the thyme immediately started to dissolve. Katerina turned to watch Thistle.

  ‘That’s good, Thistle,’ she encouraged. ‘Now, take the sloe berries and drop them in one at a time. You’ll need five each,’

  There was a popping sound as one of the sloes that Arabella dropped into the flask exploded.

  Katerina dodged out of the way as another sloe berry burst, squirting juice all over the floor.

  ‘Steady, Arabella!’ Katerina said. ‘This is a slow potion, not a motion potion!’

  ‘Oops!’ said Arabella, pulling a face as the solution bubbled up over the top of the flask and oozed down the side.

  Archie’s own potion wasn’t going to plan either. Instead of dissolving as they were meant to, the sloe
berries had clumped together on the surface like blue lifebuoys. At that moment, one of them shot into the air and exploded, shooting black juice all over him.

  Katerina smiled and shook her head. ‘Archie, that’s a disaster,’ she said. ‘When you make a potion, it’s important that you combine the ingredients in the correct order. Ah, Bramble, that’s very good. I can see that we have one natural alchemist.’

  Bramble’s solution had turned a dark shade of violet and was bubbling gently on the heat. The sloe berries had dissolved to leave a smooth, viscous liquid.

  Bramble looked pleased at the compliment. Archie remembered the time that Bramble had made a motion potion to get them into the museum. She did seem to have a talent for it. Katerina was standing behind her now, watching as she stirred in the final ingredients.

  ‘The rest of you, leave your own potions and watch what Bramble is doing.’

  Archie saw that Arabella had already abandoned her flask and was watching. He did the same.

  ‘Okay, Bramble,’ said Katerina. ‘Now, add the tortoiseshell flakes – that’s the brown powder – and the slow-worm skin. They are both slowing agents. Then, when you stir it, the slow potion will be ready, but before you do, I want to show you the antidote.’

  She indicated the dish with black powder on it. ‘That’s quicksand. Watch how I mix it with some quicksilver and some rapids water to make a quickening potion. We’ll need it to undo the effects of the slow potion.’

  Katerina poured the quickening potion into a cup. Then she returned her attention to Bramble, smiling as the final flakes of slow-worm skin dissolved.

  ‘Now give it another good stir,’ she said.

  Bramble did as she was told, whisking the potion rapidly with the glass rod. A dense cloud of pungent brown gas billowed from the flask and hung in the air. The apprentices coughed and spluttered.

  Katerina poured the liquid into six cups. ‘It’s very powerful, so you only need a sip,’ she said. ‘Go on, it tastes better than it smells.’

  ‘Watch me.’ She took a tiny sip and smiled.

  Archie held his nose and tipped the cup until a small amount of the liquid spilled into his mouth. It did taste better than it smelled – but not much. The flavour reminded him of burnt vinegar.

  The others sipped from their cups. For a moment nothing happened, and then Archie felt a strange disruption in the air around him. He tried to move, but he felt as if the air was as thick as treacle. He heard Thistle calling him, but the words came out distorted, as if he was a toy that needed new batteries.

  ‘Archieeeeeeeee. It’sssssssss theeeeeeee potionnnnnnn.’

  Archie turned his head. Katerina was saying something now.

  ‘Anddddd sooooo aaaassss yoooou cannnnn seeeee, theeeee sloooowwww pooootioooon isssss woooorkkiiiing!’

  Her lips drew back in a very slow smile.

  ‘Nowwwww driiiink theeeee quickennnniiiinnnng potioooon!’

  Moving at glacial speed, the apprentices drank some of the quickening potion. Archie felt the air around him speeding up. When Katerina spoke, her voice still sounded slow, but it was almost back to normal.

  ‘Take another sip of the quickennning potiooon,’ she urged.

  She took another sip. ‘That’s better,’ she declared, sounding like her old self again. The others did the same.

  ‘Good,’ said Katerina, smiling. ‘All back to normal now! Well, I hope that was helpful. Now if we could just find the formula for azoth …’

  ‘Believe me, we’ve looked,’ said Thistle. ‘We went through all of the books, but there’s no sign of the formula or the spell.’

  Katerina was staring at something on the other side of the room.

  ‘Wait a second,’ she said. ‘What’s this?’ She walked across and plucked a notebook from a shelf.

  ‘It looks like … Yes, it is! Grey’s notebook!’ she exclaimed, beginning to riffle through it. ‘This is it. We’ve found it! And look, here is the spell for making azoth!’

  Archie glanced at Thistle. They’d looked through the pile of papers and Arabella had checked the bookshelves. How could they have missed the notebook? Katerina interruped his thoughts. She’d started to pull jars from the shelves, frantically reading their labels as she searched for the ingredients she needed to make azoth.

  She picked up a test tube with a liquid in it. ‘Rain from on high,’ she muttered. ‘And the salt of the earth. The breath of life.’

  She examined the leather bellows and checked the notebook. ‘Yes, it’s all here,’ she said. ‘All the ingredients have been sitting here on the shelves all these years.

  ‘What’s missing?’ She consulted the notebook again. ‘Next we need some embers from the Flame of Pharos.’

  ‘That can be arranged,’ said Archie. ‘I’ll be right back.’

  He returned a little while later holding some glowing embers in Old Zeb’s protective glove, and placed them in a glass bowl on the bench.

  ‘There,’ he said.

  ‘Brilliant,’ cried Katerina. ‘But where’s the last ingredient?’ she said, her voice rising in frustration.

  She rummaged among the jars on the shelves, her face creased in concentration. ‘Here it is,’ she cried, lifting down a flask containing a small quantity of a golden dust. ‘Last but by no means least, the essence of magic!’

  ‘Quick, bring the flames,’ she urged. Soon the five flaming braziers had been placed in a circle. Katerina opened her bag and took out a crystal chalice.

  ‘Stand behind the flames,’ she instructed them. The five children took up positions, facing one another. Katerina placed one of the ingredients in front of each of them.

  ‘Now we are ready to begin,’ she said, and began to read out the instructions from the notebook.

  The scene resembled the one Archie had witnessed in Pudding Lane. He felt a slight migiving. Things were moving a bit too fast for his liking. He didn’t want to repeat the same mistake that Grey and the other alchemists had made. Katerina caught his eye.

  ‘Are you all right with this, Archie?’ she asked. ‘I don’t mean to take over.’

  Archie smiled. ‘You’re the expert,’ he said. ‘Go for it.’

  Katerina smiled. ‘Right, then. Onwards and upwards. Azoth is made of the four elements: water, earth, air and fire,’ she said. ‘Each of you must add your ingredient in the correct order, starting with you, Bramble.’

  She passed the chalice to Bramble, who read the label on the glass jar in front of her. ‘Rain from the highest mountain in the Himalayas,’ she said, emptying the last few drops into the crystal chalice.

  ‘Excellent,’ said Katerina. ‘Now you, Rupert.’

  ‘Soil from the crater of a volcano,’ he said, sprinkling the last granules of the dust-dry powder into the water.

  Arabella was next. She held up the tiny leather bellows and put its nozzle into the glass. ‘The breath from a newborn babe,’ she said, as she squeezed the last gasp from the bellows, sending bubbles of air to mingle with the other ingredients.

  ‘And now you, Thistle.’

  Thistle added some glowing embers. ‘A light from the Flame of Pharos,’ he said, emptying the glimmering cinders into the mixture.

  ‘And finally,’ said Katerina, ‘the secret ingredient, the essence of magic itself. Archie?’

  Archie sprinkled in the last of the golden powder. The flame went red.

  ‘Now read the spell,’ urged Katerina, pressing the notebook into Archie’s hand.

  Archie read out the words on the page:

  ‘Powers of the universe

  Drawn by Nature’s right

  The moment of Creation

  All of magic’s might.’

  The solution began to boil. There was a roaring noise like a flame rushing up a chimney and a blinding flash. The solution inside the flask glowed golden.

  ‘We’ve done it!’ cried Katerina. ‘We’ve made azoth!’

  *

  That night as they walked home, the children were fee
ling very pleased with themselves. By using up all the ingredients, they had managed to make a flask of azoth. Katerina had taken a small amount for her research, along with the notebook to see if it contained any other useful information. What remained of the azoth was in a crystal inkwell hidden in the laboratory.

  ‘That was brilliant!’ said Bramble, still buzzing from the excitement.

  ‘You were brilliant with the slow potion,’ said Archie, admiringly. ‘The rest of us weren’t so great.’

  Bramble looked pleased. ‘Beginner’s luck,’ she said, grinning. ‘But I don’t think we could have made the azoth without Katerina.’

  ‘All we need now,’ said Archie, ‘is an enchanted quill. And we know where there are some of those. In the Scriptorium!’

  14

  The Dark Quill

  When they arrived for their next session with Gloom a few days later, Katerina was waiting at the door to the Scriptorium.

  ‘Professor Gloom,’ she said, flashing her big eyes at him, ‘may I sit in on your assessment? I have recently discovered some interesting papers in the Archive that may be of help,’ she said, winking at the children. ‘I think they may shed some light on how Grey was able to write magic.’

  Gloom didn’t seem his usual upbeat self. Archie wondered what was on his mind. He seemed distracted. ‘Erm, yes,’ he said. ‘Why not? We have to find a way to speed up our work.’

  The others had picked up on it, too. The five of them exchanged looks. They wondered what had happened that made the assessments suddenly so urgent.

  When they had taken their places, Gloom smiled. ‘Today, I will be assessing your ability to write spells.’

  ‘The first step towards writing magic is creating spells. When those spells are written with azoth, they will become master spells. But we don’t want any … accidents. Forewarned is forearmed and all that. So today we will be practising with disappearing ink.’

  On the desk he placed three crystal inkwells with golden lids. ‘The ink will last only until it dries. Then it will vanish, leaving no trace.’