Oracle (Book I)

Fineas At Dawn

Rowan Redbeard, Head of the Oracle Infirmary (and, to this day, still not completely willing to call himself the school nurse), awakened to a strangled cough from somewhere on the floor of the ship's cabin. At least I'm in my room instead of hanging half-overboard, he thought. The calm waters of the Lake of Fineas had rocked him right to sleep as usual. It wasn't as beauteous and comforting as the arms of the wide open sea but it was enough and he was thankful.

As the night's events came back to him, Redbeard readjusted his droopy nightcap and peeked over the side of the bed. Professor Fahim Volkorn lay sprawled on the floor. About as awake as I am, I see. Which was expected, considering how they'd spent the night. Redbeard plopped back down into his pillow again for a while longer before coming to his senses. Coming awake again with a sharp breath, he turned his head and spoke into the pillow.

"I hear that mind of yours turning its gears from here, Fahim," Redbeard said.

"You should've offered me the bed," the other man said, his voice all gravel. The bottles strewn on floor with him clinked as Volkorn stirred.

Redbeard doubted that was what he was really thinking about. Not in his final days, hours, minutes or even seconds. There was no telling when it might happen.

"I didn't say you could sleep over, Fahim. You just stayed. Uninvited, too." It was true but he was half joking.

Cracking open one eye, Redbeard peeked out of the port of the ship's cabin. A dusky morning's dawn was slowly warming Fineas' waters. Across the lake on the shore, he saw robed figures heading towards the waterfront.

"Don't treat me as if I overstayed my welcome, Rowan."

"Your students are coming."

Volkorn rose gingerly with a lot of support from the floor and the edge of the bed.

"About that time yeah. You'd best get dressed."

Redbeard smacked his mouth a few times, longing for something to rinse it out with but unwilling to get up just yet.

"Gotta swab the deck," he mumbled. "They can board when I'm finished."

"Habit?"

"Seems so."

Volkorn cast him a reddened, bleary-eyed glance.

"I won't be seen outside in your company with that thing on your head."

"I like my ears warm." Rowan rubbed his head around in his nightcap until it slipped over his eyes.

As if just realizing how the world felt standing upright, Volkorn groaned in the morning quiet. "Ow, ow my head. You were always a terrible influence."

"I didn't hold the bottle to your face. Bottles, as it were."

"Peppy potion?"

Picking up a cigarillo from the bedside table, Redbeard put the gold tip between his lips and lit it the other end with a flame summoned on the tip of his finger. He shook his hand, extinguishing the flame as he would a match.

"Strongest batch ever concocted in a cauldron is over there on the shelf. More in the patients' suite cabinet if you're in dire need of an extreme wakening. But that ought to be plenty to be getting on with. Gleddy brought it over. Told me the Bilberry lad brewed it. Most monstrously potent stuff I ever tasted, it is."

Over by the cabinet, potion in hand, Volkorn took a drink from the flask he'd found.

Obviously, he instantly regretted it.

Volkorn jumped up and down on the spot, shaking out his hands like mad.

"Whoo!" he shouted.

Every inch of his skin rushed with blood as he was seemingly lit by fire. For a moment he felt like he lost consciousness while still bouncing up and down. The haze of last night slowly wore away and his eyes and mind edged towards wide awake. Standing still and bracing himself with a hand against the cabinet, Volkorn forcibly swallowed the rest of the mouthful of thick, flaming potion.

"Great blazes!" he spat once he was able to speak again. "How many peppy plants did the boy uproot and maim to stew into this gluck!"

"Good, yeah?" Redbeard drew on his cigarillo and exhaled roiling plumes of sweetly scented goldenrod smoke.

Volkorn took another swig, grimacing and nodding.

"Yeah."

While Volkorn sobered up, Redbeard tossed off the covers and pushed himself out of bed. He crossed the room, intending to give his friend some time to pull himself together.

"I'll find the mop and get started." At the door, he stopped at the door and turned back, finding Volkorn still forcing down more of the Bilberry boy's exceedingly efficacious wake-upper.

"Fahim."

"Hm," the other man said distractedly.

"You're switching things up today, so have some fun. All right?"

Volkorn gave a small smile, staring at the half-empty flask in his hand.

"I intend to, old friend. I feel...like I've been sleeping all this time and now I'm finally awake."

"It's a new day," Redbeard said. He didn't like Volkorn's pensive, enlightened air.

Strange, that. How people behave when they are sure they are going to die.

Needing to keep busy and also give Fahim time to get ready for his class, Redbeard left the cabin in search of his mop.