Completed Another Day at Starry Chalice

[Agnusha]

Timestamping, 64th of Winter 513 She snatched her protective apron and trotted gracefully across “the kitchen”. She was already familiar with Tian’s lab that she didn’t make any clumsy move that normally would shatter a vial or two. She smiled in shame when she remembered those times. The room was full, as usual with tools and bottles, vials and apparatus. Distillation tools letting out pleasant steam that somewhat smelled tangy but not unpleasant from another side of the room while another corner lined with lazy looking cabinet, stared at her waiting to be opened. The master philterer herself was busy at the counter, taking notes and murmured to herself in a low rapid shots of garbled language. She didn’t seem to notice Agnusha for a while, and the Half-Benshira didn’t let out any words. She knew her master noticed her but she needed to short anything that bother her mind before else. It wasn’t the first time, so Agnusha just waited there until her master need her assistance. “We have salves and balms shortage.” Said the master, with huge sigh. At last, after several chimes. Tian handed down a piece of paper to Agnusha. “Take care the salve would you? The essential oil’s in back there” The Philterer pointed at the cabinet in the corner of the room. Agnusha read the note from her master and simply said “I’ll work on it”. It was a note of ingredients she needed to make healing salves. She walked several paces across the room and opened up a cabinet Tian had pointed. Essential oils, distilled water and alcohols, her hands run through several tubes before she find the right one -- a thick purple bottle. The first thing on the list was Leiyona Oil, a herbal extraction of leiyona flower. The plant was native to The Diamond of Kalea, and known to be a good external medicine for cuts and to avoid infection. The thick petal of Leiyona when crushed would ooze thick purply liquid, good enough for first aid if you didn’t have anything else. But the true potential of the herb was best in the hands of proper philterer. Tian usually made the essential oil when summer come, in a way that they will have enough supply for a year. She took the bottle and realize that it weighted less than she thought. Hesitated for a while, she opened the bottle and found that the remaining oil was less than a half of the bottle. Her gaze explored the cabinet to look for similar bottle. “Looks like our essential oil’s running low too.” She leaned up a bit to see lines of oval bottle with slim neck made from pale white skyglass. Placing the leiyona oil bottle at her left hand carefully, She took one out of the dozen white bottle. It was almond oil, another ingredient she needed. Agnusha closed the cabinet and put down the bottle at the table. Now she had to prepare some apparatus. The more difficult process was extracting the essential oil. But since her master was already taken care of it, the next step would be easy enough for the apprentice. Agnusha went to another cabinet and took out some bowl and a skyglass pan, shallow but wide. She poured some water –only enough to fill less than a half of the pan -- and place it atop the stove. With few attempt, she managed to get a nice fire going. As the water began to swell, the Benshira took another ingredients out of the cabinet, beeswax. She put a lump of golden colored wax into a bowl and measure it using Tian’s scale. It was quite easy also, but measuring the oils was rather difficult. Agnusha opened up the purple bottle and took an empty vial. Carefully poured the precious essential oil into the vial. She let the almond oil unmeasured because she needed for the texture. When she done, she put the bowl of wax and put it into the pan of boiling water. It didn’t take long when the wax was began to melt. Agnusha added one, two, three spoonful of honey and stirred the sticky mixture. It smelled good for her. She added spoonful almond oil and stirred them, then added another spoonful after another, carefully not to made it too wet. It didn’t take long before she thought that it was good enough and poured the leiyona essence. The mixture retained the golden color of the wax and pleasant smell of the honey and almond. Agnusha let out a relieve sigh and grabbed the bowl. A second later a yell of pain echoed throughout the room. Geez, she forgot to wear her gloves. “What was that?” Tian’s head looked up from the front door in an expression of horrid worry. “I’m okay, nothing wrong… err.. nothing broken!” She replied in a hurry, still flapping her hands the air. As the master disappeared to the front room, Agnusha murmured a curse to herself and put on her glove. Well, I’m still my old self… I suppose… she thought. She carefully lifted the bowl and put it on the table, clinged a bit when her hands touched the heat once again. The she took some empty vials and started to fill it with the salve. She let the vials in the open air before she could could seal it and sell it.