“Ma’am, a messenger is here for you.”
Hearing her assistant’s voice from the doorway upstairs, Luci frowned reflexively, never liking to be interrupted during her work. However, she was aware Eli wouldn’t do so without good reason, as he was more than capable of running the shop himself while she was busy. Sighing, she set the vial back down on her workbench and ascended the stairs, hoping the visit wasn’t too much of a distraction.
—
Meanwhile, Rizzik was tinkering at his own workstation when a hand belonging to his assistant slapped down a piece of parchment angrily next to him. It turned out a similar messenger had made a delivery moments before, both in the employ of master sorceress Gwynvere. Often sequestering herself in her tower in the mountains north of Durmrin, she made the occasional appearance at balls and special events, but otherwise made little attempt to interact directly with the kingdom’s populace. She opted instead to communicate by written missive, delivered to the most relevant parties and important authority figures in the traditional way, but also to the general public by literally raining the message down from the skies over each city.
“Can you believe this filth that…harpy in the tower is distributing!?” Zevine sputtered, pacing in frustration back and forth across the shop before opening the door for some air—only to groan and slam it shut again when she saw the roads peppered with parchment. On each sheet, eloquent words touting magic as “the jewel of sentient races’ triumph over feral nature”—but, pointedly, also emphasizing its “evolution from primitive, dubious practices of fortunetelling, astrology, and alchemy.”
“Calm yourself, Zevine,” Rizzik consoled her. “Yes, I saw it, but don’t trouble yourself over such trifles. Magic has its place in the world, as does alchemy. We as practitioners of the latter must understand there will always be limitations, and yet appreciate our potential to grow within it. We must not let our ego dictate our studies or our passions.”
Zevine nodded, taking a few breaths and finally slowing her pacing before taking a seat near the workbench next to him. “You’re right, of course. But how can you stay so…composed?”
He shrugged. “Alchemy is a fickle discipline. After a while, you learn patience.”
—
Back in Silvervale, the last pieces of parchment finished fluttering down to the ground like autumn leaves. A few early-morning risers wandered the streets, picking them up curiously to read, though the reaction at Exotic Elixirs, where the message was delivered personally, was a bit different.
With a loud crash, a chair flew through one of the shopfront windows. Behind it, a heavy-breathing woman with a red-hot crimson streak of hair dangling messily in front of her face.
“That…BITCH!” Luci seethed, crumpling up the parchment into an even tighter ball and hurling it across the room for the third time. “‘Primitive’? ‘Simple’? ‘Low-effort’!? Who the hell does she think she is!?”
She whirled around to her assistant, who still stood dutifully nearby, but tucked away in the corner in a near-success of masking his fear. “Eli, get the horses ready, and grab that potion sample I procured from Rizzik. Time to pay a visit to little Ms. Staff-Up-Her-Ass.”
Without a word, he scampered off to fulfill her commands while Luci quickly scanned her store’s shelves and picked out a few bottles of various colors that she stowed in her traveling pack. Striding purposefully out the back door toward her carriage, her frown softened a bit into her usual, confident smile, yet the scarlet locks of hair remained. Let’s see her so-called superior intellect try to keep up with some…improvised experimentation.
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