1875-06-22: Into the Fire
Into the Fire
Summary: Alia perfects her formula.
Date: 1875-06-22
Related: All of Alia's fire lacquer work.
NPCs: Millicent Durant, Guild Alchemist and Alia's former master.
Players:
Alia  

"Do you remember the first time that I sat here, Milli?"

Alia looked up from where she was setting out the mortar and pestle on the old and scarred workbench, her gaze settling on the white-haired woman who had arranged herself at the fireplace. The bench had not been replaced in the nearly sixteen years since she had first arrived at the guild, though it was much mended and deeply polished. Alia's fingers traced the line where the older, darker wood met a, not new, but a newer addition. She recalled watching the craftsman joining the new wood to old, and feeling terribly that she had been the cause of the near destruction of her new master's favourite workspace.

Her former master's voice was rich with her usual tart humour. "I recall that you had no eyebrows for a good two months, and you kept pulling your cap down so far you could barely see trying to cover up the lack. Of course, you might also have been covering up that dreadful fluff of hair that was all that was left after we had to cut your hair off to remove the burnt ends." Millicent Durant had been younger then, but already one of the most skilled and accomplished alchemists that the Guild had accepted into its membership. Capable enough to oversee the training of the precocious eleven year old Lady who had been accepted for tutelage. It had taken quite a bit of conversation and no amount of reassurances of fair payment for the woman to agree. But in the end, Millicent had taken Alia on and they had both been the better for it.

Alia lifted her hands in an almost unconscious gesture, fingertips smoothing over her eyebrows, which had, thankfully, regrown and left her none the worse for wear. Her hair as well. The burns and blisters that had resulted from the explosion had, of course, long ago faded. It was the first time, but not the last, that she had made use of the medicament that alchemists, some of whom were apothecaries as well, were known for to repair damage she had done to herself. It was unlikely to be the last and was why she had worked so hard to master the brewing of fleshknit, which she always carried on her person.

Alia reached past the mortar, retrieving the linen mask she had crafted to cover nose and mouth, eyes scanning the notes she had taken from the treatises that Master Kalen had found for her. None of them had dealt with her particular project specifically, but there were notions and advice to mine in the preparation of the materials of those other formulations; what to add, when, and in what condition. There had been a particularly interesting treatise on the creation of a potion which provided some immunity from cold that had been particularly illuminating. Alia considered the skin, coated with a fine plating of scales, as it sat in the pestle. They appeared no different from any other reptile's skin, and yet, when she had cut one open, it had looked entirely inorganic, more like the volcanic rock on the slopes of Mount Tharsis where she had gathered the Devil's Tongue, than anything which she had seen from a snake.

"Have you taken your draught?" Millicent's question came as Alia set to work grinding the final ingredient for her attempt, hand working in precise, clean circles as she worked the ash serpent skin, which had been a gift from the Guild, a repayment in kind of her own gift of goblin reagents, which had given her enough material to continue her work. She might have done so at home, in Paras, but she had decided against it. Millicent's presence, her knowledge and advice were a gift that she would not waste.

"Yes," came the slightly muffled reply as Alia worked. She did not wish to inhale the powder to which she was reducing the skin, knowing, from her first experience that it would choke her and leave her coughing for hours. "I do not need to use it hardly at all, anymore, but I don't wish to have an accident." "Good," Millicent replied as she watched the young woman work. "You have grown so much since you left me, Alia. I was afraid for you…and perhaps a little afraid for them as well, truth be told, but you have done well for yourself and become more than I had hoped, but everything that I knew you could be." She glanced down at her right hand, at the signet ring which lay there, entrusted into her care while Alia worked, her thumb rubbing over the Imperial eagle on its face. "So your Darius is not the monster that was whispered about in Four Corners."

Alia smiled, though the movement was only visible in the lifting of her cheeks, and she did not look away from her work, nor stop the steady and precise movements of the mortar, "No, he is nothing that I thought he would be." She paused, "No, that is not true. I knew him to be an accomplished soldier and a skilled sorcerer, but the more I get to know him, the less those seem the most important things about him. He is wise, and kind, skilled with words and a master of both military strategy and diplomacy." She took a moment of silence, "He has endured so much pain, seen so many horrors and the weight of an Empire rests on his shoulders and yet…he will not be bent, bowed, or broken."

Millicent had never lied about her reservations about Alia's choice, and she did not feel badly about questioning the woman she would always think of as a girl about the decisions she had made. "And the Empire?"

"The Empire is a pit of vipers. The Colonias are a good place, a just place. With the strength to win out against the troubles that plague it. But the Remnant? That, I do not trust at all. There is a hunger for power there, and some…madness, some evil there that I mean to rout. I believe they mean to hold Darius' family hostage, to ensure that he does as they wish him to do and not as he needs to do, and I will not stand for that." Alia set aside the mortar, allowing the dust to settle, resting her arm which was already growing sore, before she would begin again. "He is the Emperor in waiting and he has been waiting too long."

"You got what you wanted. An army to fight an army. And you took back what was taken from you," Millicent continued, changing tack, "Can you not stop now, girl?"

"No. I thought…when I first hatched this mad plan, I thought…I will take back my home and be done with them. But…this has become much more than what I thought. It has become about more than just me….and they need me. And, perhaps I need them. They have given me a purpose, Milli."

"And does he need you too, Alia? Or are you simply a convenient wife in an unstable time?" Millicent's hand closed over the signet, holding it so tightly her knuckles whitened. Alia might well have outgrown her apprenticeship, but Millicent had not wholly given over her charge to keep the girl safe and give her instruction where it was needed. And trust Millicent to cut to the heart of the matter.

The expression in Alia's eyes as she worked was both troubled and hopeful. "I hope that he does. It began as a political match," something Millicent knew, "But…I hope that it is both more and less than that now." Millicent smiled at the reply, though her eyes were still troubled. "I will not attempt to dissuade you from your course, only…be careful Alia. That is all I ask."

Alia returned to the grinding of mortar in pestle as they spoke, occasionally testing the fineness of the grain of the dust. It took only a few more minutes for it to be as fine as she required. And then the true work began. Adding the ingredients in the right order, warming them to the precise temperature, allowing them to blend and steep together for precisely the right amount of time before she added the next. That was the true test and the ultimate magic of alchemy. That spark of creativity and intuition that allowed the most mundane of ingredients to become something extraordinary.

"I will not say I am always careful," for the very idea of running to the Empire had been the least careful thing that Alia had ever done, "But I promise to be thoughtful."

"That is all I can ask of you then, girl. I only hope that you will find what you went there looking for, in the end."

Alia smiled, as she finally pulled down the mask, leaving it around her chin, "I think I already have. Only I did not know it until it came to me."

"That is well then. Now, take some time to eat and we will see what this will become."


Why did time always pass so slowly when all you wished to do was race ahead? It had seem that an age of the world had passed as Millicent and Alia waited for the lacquer to reach the proper boiling point and then the wait for it to simmer was even longer. Finally, it had been ready for application.

Alia painted the leather square with painstakingly precise strokes, for the application was as much a part of the process as the creation, eyes glancing briefly up and finding her old master. "Milli, if this test fails…" The white-haired woman's lips pressed together, and for a moment, she sounded much more like the master she had been than the friend and partner she was now, "Then you will try again. And again, and again, as many times as you must until you have mastered this." And accept the risk of injury or death that came with it. That was what it meant to be an alchemist.

Alia did not dip her head at the censure, but the feeling of it was in the lowering of her eyes back to her work. It would take her the better part of ten minutes to paint the entirely of the small square. To ensure that each stroke was precise that every inch of the leather was evenly coated. Once it was done, she set aside the square, allowing it time to dry while she put away her tools and what small amount of the lacquer remained. "We should take it to the courtyard. When I first attempted this, I nearly…the explosion was terrible. This is not the same formula of course…"

"I have already prepared a space for your testing." Millicent rose to her feet, smoothing her robes in an thoughtless way, as she allowed Alia to clean her workspace. That had always been her charge. Simply because she was no longer an apprentice did not mean she could leave her detritus for others to mind. "Come. We can carry it out and see what we will see."

It took the women some time to make their way up into the courtyard, for the corridors were as busy as ever and the leather was delicate. Or perhaps, fairer to say, it was precious and not to be damaged before it could be tested. Alia handed the square to Millicent as she moved over to where the fire had already been laid, stoking it with more wood. Had she not taken the draught, she might have simply done it of her own will, but this needed a more steady heat and even a great fire such as Alia could produce would not suffice without the fuel to keep it burning. Only once the fire was so intense that she could only withstand a few seconds close to the flames, did Adia retrieve the leather and set it into the fire with a pair of tongs. She knew the original recipe was sound and that it could withstand a few minutes, and so she risked setting it into the flame, rather than casting flame at it from a distance.

The leather, for what it was worth, sat within the flame, resting on the coals as though it were entirely inert. Long enough for Alia to move to a safe distance and then to wait. Far enough away that she could not properly see what was becoming of it.

It was the longest quarter of an hour of Alia's life.

"Now you are just stalling, girl. The fire is already burning down." Millicent prodded Alia in the back with the boniest of her fingers, pushing the girl into moving back to the flame. A frown was all that was on Alia's face, as she withdrew the tongs from the flame, bringing the leather with it. It was entirely unburnt. Alia's face lit with delight, as she fair flew back towards her old master, "Milli, look." She brandished the leather in the other woman's direction.

Indeed, the leather was unburnt, but the fire had altered the lacquer which had been a pale, smokey grey, the colour a muted version of the skin and scales it had been made from. Now it carried a faint iridescence. "Well done, girl. But we will leave it in the fire a while longer, overnight if we have to. I will set some of the apprentices to watch. And you will be called each time the fire needs to be rebuilt." Millicent was not so foolish as to let the apprentices do anything but watch, even if she believed that the recipe was sound.

"Of course, Milli." Alia looked properly chastised. She had allowed herself to fall into her old habits. She knew how important this was, and how much counted on this being absolutely right. Lives and a war depended on it. It could not be rushed. This was no idle wager. When she brought this back to the legion, it would be the lives of each and every soldier who used it that she would be wagering, her own husband's not least of all.

"Then I will sleep, and wait for them to wake me." Millicent nodded, "I will stay with you." She smiled, looking more the kindly woman she was, when the master was not required, "And while we work, you can tell me everything that has happened to you since you've been away."

Alia nodded, carrying the leather back to the fire and setting it deep into the heart of the flame. There would be a long night ahead, but if she had been quick enough, and mindful enough, and if she had drawn enough of herself and her skill out when it was needed, in the morning, she would return to Paras a success.

Millicent finally uncurled her hand, offering Alia the signet she had held safe for her, watching with worried eyes as Alia slipped the ring back onto her finger before the two women turned to make their way back inside.

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