I could feel Father Nathanial’s anxious gaze upon my back as I handed Gideon the last ingredient. Around us, the huddled walls of the Duke’s library seemed tired and still, as if waiting for our latest potion to explode into our faces. 

 

A thick book of potions was laid in front of me. Beside me Gideon fiddled with flasks and chemicals while Father Nathanial waited by the door. Bookshelves wrapped in bed sheets lined the walls cast in shadow by the one magic lamp, whose feeble light had me thinking that it had seen better days. There were no windows, no way to tell what time of day it was. The room was deep in the interior of the stone stack of the castle, and I knew from personal experience how easy it was to miss the tolls of the bell and stay up until late at night. 

 

It should puff and bubble. Gideon said. But it shouldn’t break over the top. 

 

I nodded, though I still pulled back as he dropped it into the small cauldron. I joined Father Nathanial at the door, and together we shared a brief nervous glance. If it did end up exploding it wouldn’t be the first time, and neither of us wanted to be doused in potion fluid, gone in seconds or not. 

 

As it turned out, the duke’s personal library was one of the most isolated rooms in the whole of the castle, as it was hidden down so many turns that it normally took me ten minutes just to walk to it from the outside rooms. Duke Belvan had granted it to us to use as a study after I’d asked, though he probably hadn’t imagined that we’d use it to practise potions. 

 

True to Gideon’s words, the cloudy liquid began to bubble and pop. Each popped bubble belched small puffs of smoke into the air, but Gideon didn’t move from his perch over the cauldron. 

 

There was nothing poisonous in there, of course. We weren’t stupid, after all. But it still worried me to watch him get so close. Who else was going to do all my history homework if something happened to him?

 

“I thought you’d be working through the academy work when you asked for the room.” Nathanial muttered. 

 

“I mean, that’s what we do normally.” I lied. “You just have horrible timing.”

 

The priest was the very same one who’d treated me back after the demon incident, brought on full time to ‘aid me’, though I was pretty sure it was just because Andril and the Duke didn’t fully trust me. I’d hoped originally that I could avoid both him and the other servant assigned to me by coming here, but it had only taken two days before Nathanial had walked in on us concocting more stamina potions in the middle of the study. Or rather, he had walked in on our potion attempt exploding into a roomful of smoke. Thankfully he didn’t do more than scold us for not covering the shelves, but he had made a habit of checking up on us whenever he thought we might be in here.

 

Thankfully, this time the potion seemed to take and settle, eventually settling into a powder at the bottom of the cauldron. Gideon nodded to himself as he scooped some of it out with a vial in this teeth and looked towards me expectantly.

 

The danger passed, I took the vial, filled it with water, stoppered it, and shook it violently before doing the same to the next couple as well. By the end of it all we had five portions of cloudy white vile vials, and the sharp smell of bronze in the air. Nathanial stood over my shoulder as I set the last one down, a flash of familiarity on his face as he breathed in.

 

“Ah, that explains why they’ve been so unstable. Why boil the shavings instead of burning them?”

 

“Eh…”

 

I stared at him blankly before turning to the dragon shaking his head.

 

Burning them degrades the quality. They don’t hold magic as well if you burn away the outer coating put on from the previous step. It shouldn’t be so volatile, however. I’m not sure why it’s reacting like it does.

 

I repeated what he said to the priest.

 

“You bathed it in hali sap before, right? I think I’ve heard of them doing that down by Cyrstil, but the hali that grows here isn’t the same. It’s tougher up here, and slightly sweeter. I’d bet money that it’s too thick and the extra’s overreacting with the catalyst.”

 

Gideon nodded to himself.

 

I did think it looked different from what the book described… Gideon nodded to himself. Interesting, I hadn’t thought there would be differences in the same plant between two relatively close places. Ryder, ask him about the vetrio root we used the other day, see if that’s different too. I think that was from the Cyrstil book as well.

 

“No, that one should be the same.” Nathanial said after I finished. “Vetrio’s cultivated in the lowlands around here. Actually, what I think happened with that one was that you didn’t adjust the solution for the higher altitude here. Cyrstil’s off the plateau, some thousand enchia closer to sea level. I’d bet a couple australs you used to much of the catalyst instead.”

 

Gideon massaged his forehead spines with his paws, looking somewhat like a squirrel to me.

 

Of course! It’s so obvious! How did I not think of that? The book even mentioned that it reacted with oxygen!

 

“That was obvious…?” I asked.

 

How did that even make any sense? How could a lack of oxygen make something explode?

 

Gideon held up a paw as if to say ‘stay right there’ before bounding over to one of the bookshelves and diving into a tome. I turned back to the priest, who wore the slight grin of someone who thought themselves clever.

 

“Are all priests this experienced in alchemy?” I asked. “Is it a healer thing?”

 

“There aren’t many potions useful for healing, actually. They’re all slower than magic or more expensive than traditional means.” He explained. “No, this is a personal hobby of mine. My father was a court alchemist in Fangpeak, so he taught me the trade.”

 

“Alchemist to priest is a bit of a leap.” I said.

 

“Ah, he… he died before he could finish teaching me. I’ve picked up the rest after joining up with the church.”

 

“Ah…”

 

“It was a while ago, I don’t mind.” He said quickly. “But I have to say I’m surprised to find a summarkan noble like yourself practising it. Alchemy is often seen as a peasant’s profession.”

 

“It’s less me and more the dragon.” I said. “He just drags me around to carry cauldrons. A real slave driver he is sometimes.”

 

That cauldron is perhaps five pounds, Ryder. If I had thumbs even I could pick it up.

 

“A dragon that practises alchemy is even more surprising.” Nathanial shook his head. “Heavens, I’d thought I’d seen everything the Star could send me, but never did I think a dragon hatchling doing alchemy would be mine to witness.”

 

“Hatchling?” I glanced over to Gideon as he quickly scanned through the book. “Silst is stupid old.”

 

You know, maybe Amelia’s right about you.

 

Well, it was true, wasn’t it? Gideon had often spoken of how old Silst actually was, and it was certainly decades, if not a century. A little disappointing, size wise, but he certainly wasn’t a ‘hatchling’.

 

“Oh yes. Dragons only reach full size when they’re over a millenia old. Why, there’s one that visits Celrion’s Peak every year or so, and he’s the size of a house. It’s a mystery how the whole of the Northspines aren’t devoid of game.”

 

“Really?” I looked back at Gideon and tried to imagine him blown up to the size of a house, but found I couldn’t. Would he just look like a bigger Gideon? Or would he transform into some monstrous thing? It’d be a shame if he stopped looking like a cute scaly cat.

 

I shook my head. What was I thinking? Sometimes I forget that Gideon used to be human. He wouldn’t be growing up into anything dragon-like if we had any say about it.

 

That did make a bit more sense, though. I had memories of quite a few roman… quite a few of Saphry’s novels that described dragons as huge, but I’d  just chalked that down to the race being so uncommon in Verol proper. It did make me wonder: why did Silst come to Andorlin anyway? What was the dragon getting out of it? Did Silst come of his own will? Actually, Saphry’s brother Corto had a dragon following him around as well, so was it just a markee thing? I certainly hadn’t seen any other dragons following nobles around and Gideon had attracted his fair share of attention whenever I walked out with him.

“Wait, you said one visits Celrion’s Peak?” I snapped back to the priest. “Why? What’s it like? Can you understand it?”

 

“It’d be a poor diplomat if we couldn’t understand it.” Nathanial sounded amused.

 

“Do they gain the ability to speak?” I asked.

 

Nathanial shook his head.

 

“No, his bond partner speaks for him.”

 

“Bond partner? Like Silst and I?”

 

I jumped as Gideon dropped the tome he was dragging and let it slam upon the table. When I looked over, I found him giving me a suffering look.

 

“What?”

 

Just how patchy is your memory? Did you really not remember anything about our meeting?

 

“Not really. Most of the mem-” I glanced towards Nathanial. “No, I don’t. Not much before the capital.”

 

Really? Gideon looked taken aback, as if he hadn’t expected that answer. I guess that isn’t too hard to believe… I only got the relevant memories after we arrived in Minua. In basic terms, some dragons come to bond with a single human or dwarf to gain the ability to communicate with the lesser races. Well, through a way other than writing, that is. In return you get biological immortality. A good thing too, because if you die I’m out of luck. Can’t bond to more than one of you scaleless.

 

I nodded absently. All of that sounded relatively close to what I thought it was, though the… wait.

 

I blinked.

 

“Did you say immortality?”

 

Biologically. Getting stabbed will still kill you.

 

A huge grin replaced my previously stoic expression.

 

“Immortality! Seriously?!” I cried. “Why didn’t you say anything when you found out? Why the hell would you keep something like that to yourself?”

 

Well, Saphry’s like twenty, so it doesn’t really matter for our purposes…

 

“Still! That’s huge! Why doesn’t everyone do this? This could have so many implications…”

 

Gideon looked somewhat offended.

 

Dragons don’t exist purely as youth potions. He grumbled. We only choose a select few to bond each generation, and those mostly go to either Doux-Burgund, Summark, or the Blue Mountains. It’s not something we offer to everyone.

 

Fair enough, I suppose. But that made we wonder even more: how in the pitching abyss did two of them end up with Saphry’s brother and herself? Wait, did Saphry’s father have a bonded dragon? Was he immortal? There was even a chance that he was old as hell too! Was that was why he hadn’t written to me yet? Was he just jaded with centuries of experience crushing down upon him? No, that didn’t make much sense, he seemed caring enough in the couple memories I had of him…

 

Nathanial cleared his throat, and the two of us looked back to find him standing there awkwardly.

 

“I hate to interrupt...”

 

I cringed. I really had to stop doing this in the middle of talking to other people. 

 

“Sorry about that, I get a little carried away sometimes…”

 

“I’ve been around enough bond pairs to know the feeling well.” He said with a slight smile. “It’s more amusing than rude to me now.”

 

Just what was this guy’s job normally like…?

 

Gideon jumped up, remembering something.

 

Ah, the alchemy! Ryder, can you ask him about this passage here? I want to know what he thinks about the…