exploratory kidnapping

[alicornucopia]

In this room are two women, one gray and sixty years old, one just thirty and red-haired, both wearing elaborate outfits. The younger casts a spell.

In this room is now also a third person. (On whom the elder woman promptly also casts a spell, which she had at the ready.)

Comments

[alicornucopia]

"This is just pure water," says Raha. "And this is pef tan, which is a flavor enhancer, because people do have to drink their elixirs. And this is lemon peel, and this is grass salt. It doesn't actually matter what kind of salt you use, but I use grass salt because of a religious dietary law. Four ingredients."

[missnicegirl]

Matilda nods solemnly.

[alicornucopia]

"A small batch of elixir base is one measure of water and one pinch of everything else," says Raha, and she gets a little bowl. "It doesn't even need to be heated. But if I don't do any magic to it -" She scoops some water into the bowl and takes a pinch of each of the other three things and stirs them around. Nothing happens. "They just float there. The salt dissolves, but not particularly fast." She sets that bowl aside and dips up a new measure of water. "Witchcraft means waking up the ingredients so that they'll behave. In the case of elixir base, we want them to behave two ways - we want the lemon peel and pef tan to dissolve along with the salt, and the whole thing to thicken. I don't cast any spells, so there's nothing much to look at, but -" She stirs, pinching salt into the water. It just about vanishes on contact; the viscosity goes up. She adds pef tan and lemon peel; they do the same thing. Now she has a bowl of something about the consistency of maple syrup, just barely yellow-green, nothing floating on it at all. "See?"

[missnicegirl]

"Magic!" says Matilda. "But how do you do it?"

[alicornucopia]

"That's the part that's hard to explain! Most of it is just paying attention. Here." She gets a third bowl. "Dip up a measure of water for yourself - it works best if you're doing all the moving around of the ingredients."

[missnicegirl]

"Okay." She dips up a measure of water. "I wonder if it would be better or worse if I did any of my magic to it. I think probably it's simpler if I don't."

[alicornucopia]

"Probably," agrees Raha. "I guess you could use it to stir, sorcerers can do that and it doesn't interfere, but we're trying to find out if you can make elixir base the usual way. Stir the water around and note how thin it is. You can taste a little if you think it might help -" She gets a spoon. "It needs to be thicker so you can add other things to it later and make elixirs. If you stir it a little slower, as though it were resisting you, you can imagine how it will be when it's all done, like I showed you - and then pinch in the salt and stir even slower..."

[missnicegirl]

Matilda nods. She stirs. She contemplates the properties of water. She pinches in the salt.

And the salt just-about-vanishes, and the mixture becomes noticeably thicker.

[alicornucopia]

"There you go! Now, just the same with the lemon peel and pef tan."

[missnicegirl]

In goes the lemon peel. In goes the pef tan. Now she has elixir base.

Matilda beams.

[alicornucopia]

"Very nicely done! So you can learn to be a witch. We will have to go back and teach you all the ingredients and lab procedures, of course," says Raha. "But the magic clearly works just fine for you."

[missnicegirl]

"Hooray!"

[alicornucopia]

Raha laughs. "So we should schedule your lessons. I can rearrange things within my work day, which is first-and-naught to tenth-and-same, if that would make it more convenient."

[missnicegirl]

"Well, what time is it now?"

[alicornucopia]

Terali's time spell is still up. She reads it. "Right now it's sixth-and-four."

[missnicegirl]

"Okay," says Matilda. "May I have a pencil and paper, please?"

[alicornucopia]

This being Raha's office, Raha finds her a graphite stick and some paper.

[missnicegirl]

Matilda begins writing things down!

It goes about like so: 11:00 AM August 6th - 1&12 day 2, and so on down the page. She didn't ask for the date because she expects the calendar to be more complicated than the time system, but as long as all days are the same length, her calculations should bear out. And she has sensible times for lessons that fall within Raha's work day once per day until the fifth of September.

"That should do for the next month," she says. "In September is when my regular school starts and then I'll have to recalculate everything. 'Day 2' is tomorrow. Does that look all right to you?"

[alicornucopia]

Raha looks it over. "Yes, this looks fine."

[missnicegirl]

"Miss Honey?"

"Yes," says Miss Honey, "that looks fine to me too. Congratulations, Matilda." She pats Matilda on the head. Matilda beams.

[alicornucopia]

"So that's a schedule up until the end of Sutaahel. I'll get you an ingredients reference and a basic recipe book for next time," says Raha.

[missnicegirl]

"Thank you!"

[alicornucopia]

"You're welcome!"

"Do you want to go home now or do you have more questions?" asks Terali, holding out her hand for the schedule.

[missnicegirl]

Matilda hands the schedule to Terali.

"I have lots more questions! Are you going to try to find someone to give me language lessons too? Are there any more kinds of magic in your world besides witchcraft and wizardry and sorcery?"

[alicornucopia]

"Since nobody here speaks English," Terali says, "except for dragons, we'll have to find a dragon to handle the language lessons, and that might take a little longer. There aren't that many dragons."

"There are also lights and mages," says Raha. "And some that you have to be particular species to use."