The Alchemical Child

Chapter Four

The procession shuffled into the courtyard from the eastern corner of the cloisters. It was there that the greatest number of candles had been arranged, their wax puddling between the cobblestones like bone around muscle. The courtyard had been designed to represent the University's Aristotelian understanding of the world and its composition of the four elements. Fire was in the east, followed clockwise by air, water, and earth. Although, the courtyard's alchemical namesake was usually forgotten for the large hawthorn growing at its centre.

Roots from the hawthorn burst through the cobbles like serpents leaping from the ocean. Its trunk was twice the width of a person, and its branches twisted into the sky as fingers would to pluck down the stars. Taller candles had been moulded into the soil around its base, and their flames shuddered and spat at the approaching figures.

Sage recognised the man at the head of the procession, despite his robe of plain, black velvet and hooded face. It was the Chancellor of the University, whose grey beard was always plaited with the golden medallion around his neck. Those who followed him wore similar robes, and they all walked with their fingers threaded and heads downcast.

Without a whisper, they formed a circle around the hawthorn tree. In the flickering candlelight, Sage could see the wink of iron rings against gnarled knuckles. She could hear the shuffle of tired feet, even as hers remained in place on the library floorboards. Her eyes strained to catch a brush of movement, but nobody moved.

So absorbed was Sage in the procession, that she did not see the final figure emerge from the cloisters. She was dressed in the plainest robe of them all, ragged edges sweeping across the cobbles. The candles seemed to flare brighter as she passed, delighting in every inch of her languid, fae form. Her head had been left uncovered, so her long, gold-spun hair shimmered with each soft step.

She was a woman of tattered elegance, and on her brow rested a circlet of golden leaves.

Sage's heart trembled as she realised she was watching the Prince's fae bride. The crystal window abruptly felt like too thin a barrier between herself and the private ritual, yet she couldn't look away from the fae. Even without gilded adornments or elaborate braids, she was entrancing. The only finery she wore were the dark spider-silk gloves disappearing under her sleeves, and between them, Sage noticed that she clasped a jar. She would have thought the pottery pretty in any other circumstance, but in the hands of the bride, it looked pale and trite.

The fae halted in front of the knotted trunk of the hawthorn. Her face was strangely illuminated as she kept her head lowered, opening the jar before sinking to her knees. White wax dribbled between her legs as flames licked close to her fingertips, but she didn't flinch and her skin seemed not to burn. She only held the jar aloft, then tipped its contents onto the soil.

It looked like dust to Sage at first. But then something pearly white fell amongst the roots, and with a wash of horror, she realised it was ash. Ash from a dead body burnt before its flesh, left out in the air, could come apart. A body that was washed in water, burnt in fire, then returned to the earth. 

No, not just any dead body—the Crown Prince.

Sage had never witnessed a death ritual, despite its recognition as one of the oldest hermetic traditions. It was revolting and beguiling, a sickening thrill. Her head became light as her heart thudded against the grimoire. She felt obscene. The flush was rising towards her temple when her eyes found those of the bride. The woman was staring directly at Sage. Her face was drained of all blood, absolute grief and agony caught in the strain of her lips. Beneath her glimmering circlet, her eyes were black and wet as oil.

Sage felt her knees give way. Her shoulder slid across the window until she knelt on the cold floor. Shelves loomed all around her, dark and endless. She thought of faceless figures in long, black robes emerging from the shadows, their fingers no longer threaded as they reached out to bind her limbs.

She staggered to her feet, turning her head to the library doors and refusing to blink until she was out into the marble corridor. Sage couldn't think of what to do, but she knew that she wanted to be as far away as possible from the hawthorn tree.

Portraits spun past as she lurched into a vestibule draped with velvet curtains, and then down the main staircase to the Great Hall. She almost tripped on the final steps and thought of her body, sprawled out on the tile, left to bleed until the Scholars arrived after breakfast.

Sage burst outside, shivering so hard that she didn't feel the bite of frost as she grasped her bicycle and pelted into the city. In the dying glow of the street lamps, she mapped her way to the eastern embankment. There were no lights above the river aside from the stars, but her home overlooked the bridge and she knew the path from memory.

Hands peeling from cold and strain, Sage finally slowed beside a tall and narrow house built from russet brick. Her fingers fumbled at first for the lock, but then the door swung open smoothly and she propped her bicycle beside the stove.

She felt immediately better to bolt the door behind her. "Hermes, I'm home."

Something clattered to the floor above her, showering dust into the sink as a bronze form flew down the stairs. It hurtled towards Sage, but missed her by several inches and crashed into the kettle.

"We agreed you shouldn't be flying until we've fixed your wing, you beastly bird," Sage scolded, scooping the mechanical creature into her hands.

Hermes chirped indignantly and a wire sprung out from his tail.

Sage replied, "You're fortunate I found cogs by the river this afternoon, otherwise you would've ripped yourself to scraps by the end of the week."

Ignoring her last remarks, Hermes hopped up and down on her wrist.

"Not tonight. It's been a long day and I've got reading to do." The bird pecked her elbow. "Ouch! You won't win any favours with that bad attitude."

Hermes let out a squawk that sounded more like the grinding of gears. He stepped off her wrist, unfurling his one good wing, and thudded gracelessly to the floor.

"Oh, don't be like that. It's not like you can go off in a sulk."

Without turning his sea glass eyes to Sage, he started back up the stairs, laboriously hopping from one to the next.

"I promise I'll fix it tomorrow!" Sage sighed, groping around her fridge. The bare room had no windows, but she didn't bother to light the lamps—the darkness of her home was comforting in its familiarity. Besides, the room looked almost exactly as it had on her first night three years ago. Her only addition was a clock on the sill above the sink. She had built it when she was twelve, and it had been maddening and mesmerising to fit together all of the pins and wheels until, finally, they had clicked into perfect synchronicity.

The clock's ticking had marked her life for ten years and, as Sage went upstairs with a pastry and her satchel, its hands slipped as one onto midnight.

A/N Hello! This is just a note to say that I know next to nothing about clockwork/mechanics (despite attempting to make it a central part of my story for some reason hahah). I've been watching tutorials while writing, but if anyone does know a little about it and/or recognises a mistake when I describe something (in mechanism, vocabulary, or anything else), I would be forever grateful if you could correct me!! :')