The Peculiar Alchemist

16 || The Crow

Casting a spell was something so simple, so minor, but it was so big for Aubrey who thought he could never do it before. It was frustrating because the magic was there, felt in his hands, but nothing ever happened no matter how hard he tried.

He spent an embarrassingly long time last night trying all kinds of spells, but nothing worked. The result was the same, failure.

However, he was certain that there was something. Potions did not react to desires, they reacted to spells, and that potion he made was most likely useless. It was mixed so badly that he suspected it was the spell that gave it a healing effect, not the potion itself. Aubrey could remember it not working on Kellen initially before he wished that it healed everyone but him.

It meant that he failed his first potion, but he succeeded somehow in casting a spell.

Because Kellen annoyed him.

And the fact that Kellen was involved in his first known accidental spell just annoyed him even further as he all but tore the plant in his hand viciously before he dropped it in the small cauldron Agnes had given him. This time he was making a poison, hopefully a very painful and deadly poison. Aubrey would like to think that his mentor's vast collection of poisons inspired him as he pretended to not be thinking about Kellen as he seethed.

There were no specific ingredients in what he was making, so he decided to try his luck with every deadly combination known to man. Then it occurred to him that the deadliest component of them all was the white powder Agnes keeps stored in her cupboard when she's not around.

It didn't take a genius to figure out that the white powder is crushed human bones.

Aubrey was probably retrieving the remains of that dead woman, Samantha, whose bones were now going to be used for his next project. He was going to use just a tiny amount, something Agnes wouldn't notice, but he was surprised to find a shriveled up black petal that fell on the white powder he was about to take.

Looking above, the beautiful blue flower that he remembered his mother having sat on the shelf that was right above the small plate containing the crushed bones, and it was obvious what had happened. That didn't explain how the petal withered away so quickly while the flower remained in an impeccable condition.

It made him linger there for a few seconds before he scooped it up, noticing that some traces of the powder remained on it. Flowers rarely affected potions, so he thought that there would be no harm in using it on the poison he was crafting. That little amount of bone powder that stuck to the petal should be enough, and he'll be done with his poison once he finishes mixing it.

Then he could fantasize about killing a certain someone after he's done.

After making sure that he left no trace of his little theft there, he closes the cupboard and quickly went back to his cauldron to drop the newly-acquired petal inside. The moment that he did so, the door was kicked open by Agnes who made a few things rattle around the place when the door slammed back on the wall, and she called his name making him sit up in alarm.

Thinking she somehow knew about what he just did, he slowly approached her as she struggled with something large she was carrying. "Yes?"

The nervousness he displayed went unnoticed when Agnes shoved a large bird cage into his arms making him stumble back in surprise and he looked down to see a crow cutely looking up at him.

"Put him anywhere, I don't care." Agnes huffed, sounding breathless, before she strode outside once more. It sounded like she had exerted herself doing something, but Aubrey didn't pay that much mind as he smiled down at the crow who cawed at him when he tapped its cage.