Physik

From the Diary of Marcellus Pye:

SunnDay. Equinox.

Today has been a Wondrousyet most Fearfull day.

Though I didst Forecast this Happening in mine Almanac (which will be the Laste Parte of my Booke, the I, Marcellus). Truly, I did not believe that it would come to Pass.

At the Appointed Hour today, Seven minutes past Seven of the Clock this morning, my new Apprentice didst Come Through. Though I was up betimes this morn and made sure that I was beside the Great Doors to Await their Opening, great was my surprise when they did part and Reveal my Glass. Beyond the Glass, dimly didst I see a boy with Feare in his eyes. His garb was a strange green tunic with a silver belt, he wore no shoes, and his hair was ragged but he had a pleasant Face and I liked him well enough at first sight. But what I didst not like, what indeed I hated and feared, was the sight of the Creature behind him. For this Creature I know to be none other but my Poore Self - in five hundred yeares' Time.

The Boy came through the Glass well and is here in my House now. I pray that his Despair will soon abate when he sees the wonders of which he is destined to partake and the good that he will do.

Woden'sDay

It is some three days since my new Apprentice hath Come Through. He seems a promising boy, and as we are Approaching the Conjunction of the Planets for which I have long waited, I do begin to have hope for my new Tincture.

I pray that it may be so, for yesterday I foolishly didst ask my Apprentice, "How was the Ancient Dribbling Ghastliness, my Poore Self, who tookyou fromyour Time? Was he - was I - so very repulsive?" My Apprentice nodded but would not speak. I pressed him to tell me and, seeing my Concern, he did relent. How I wish that he had not. He has a strange way of speech, yet I Feare I didst Understand him all too well.

He didst tell me in much detail how my stench was most unbearable, that I shuffled like a Crabbe and cried out in pain at each step, cursing my fate. He didst Saye my nose was ridged and like unto the hide of an Elephant (though I know not what that Creature be but suspect it to be a most foul Toad) and my ears were like great cabbages and spotted also and full of slugs. Slugs - how can tbis be? My nails were long and yellow like great claws and filthy with hundreds of years of Grime. I do detest dirty fingernails - surely I will not come to this? But it seemeth so. I have Five Hundred Yeares of Decay and Mouldering to endure. I cannot Beare to think on it.

After this I didst detect a lightening in my Apprentice's Gloom, but an increase in mine Own.

Freya'sDay. The Conjunction of the Planets.

A day of Hope. Septimus and I didst mix the Tincture at the Appointed Hour. Now it is set to Ferment and Stewe in the cabinet in the Chamber, and it is for Septimus to know when I may add the Final Part. Only a Seventh Sonne of a Seventh Sonne may tell this to the Moment, I know this now. It grieveth me that I didst drink of my first Tincture before Septimus Came Through. Mama was right, for hath she not always said, "Thy Hastiness and Haughtiness shall be thy Undoing, Marcellus"? Indeed, I was both too Hasty and too Haughty to think that I could make the Tincture perfectly without the Seventh of the Seventh. Alack, it is true (as Mama also do Saye) I am but a Poore Foole. <>I pray that this new Tincture will work and give me not only Everlasting Life but Eternal youth also. I have faith in my Apprentice; he is a most talented and careful Boy and has a great love for Physik, just as I did at his age, though I am sure I was not so given to Despondency and Silence.

Tir's Day

It is some months now since we didst mix the new Tincture and still Septimus will not say that it is ready. I do grow impatient and afraid that something will happen to it while we wait. It is my Last Chance. I can make no more, for a Conjunction of these Seven Planets will not come for many hundreds of yeares hence, and I know that In my State to Come I will not be Fitte to make Another. Daily Mama grows insistent on her own Tincture. She wheedles from me all my doings and I cannot keep anything from her.

Loki's Day

I write with some Excitement, for this Day we do Seal my most Precious Booke, my I, Marcellus. My young Apprentice, who hath now been here One Hundred and Sixty Nine days and hath worked so well, is completing the last few checks upon the final Pages. Soon I must away to the Great Chamber, for all there do Await me.

After I have Sealed my great Work, I shall yet again aske the Boy Septimus to look at my new Tincture. I pray it will be ready soon that I may drink of it. Mama doth grow impatient for she thinketh it is for her. Ha! To think that I shouldst desire Mama to live forever too. I wouldst rather die. Except that I cannot ... Oh woe. Ah, the Bell sounds for Ten of the Clock. I must Tarry no more but make Haste to My Booke.

At the sight of Marcellus Pye arriving, Septimus quickly finished his letter to Marcia and put it in his pocket. He planned to sneak it into the I, Marcellus as soon as he could, before the book was Sealed that afternoon at the propitious hour of 1:33.

Septimus knew Marcellus Pye's book well; he had read it many times over the seemingly endless days he had now spent in Marcellus's time. The book was pided into three sections: the first was Alchemie which was, as far as Septimus could tell, completely incomprehensible - although Marcellus insisted that it gave clear and simple directions for transmuting gold and finding the key to eternal life.

The second part, Physik, was different, and Septimus understood it easily. Physik contained complicated formulae for medicines, linctuses, pills and potions. It had well-argued explanations of the origin of many diseases and wonderfully detailed drawings of the anatomy of the human body, the likes of which Septimus had never seen before. In short, it had everything anyone would ever need to become a skilled Physician, and Septimus had read, reread and then read it again until he knew much of it by heart. He now knew all about iodine and quinine, creosote and camomel, ipecacuanha and flea-seed, and many other strange-smelling substances. He could make antitoxins and analgesics, narcotics, tisanes, emollients and elixirs. Marcellus had noticed his interest and given him his own Physik notebook - a rare and precious thing in that Time as paper was very expensive.

The third section of the I, Marcellus was the Almanac, a day-to-day guide for the next thousand and one years. This was where he planned to hide his note - in the entry for the day that he had disappeared.

Septimus was dressed in his black and red Alchemie Apprentice robes, which were edged with gold and had gold Alchemical symbols embroidered down the sleeves. Around his waist he wore a thick leather belt, fastened with a heavy gold buckle, and on his feet, instead of his lost - and much-loved - brown boots, he wore the strange pointy-toed shoes that were fashionable and made him feel very foolish. Septimus had actually cut the ends off each point because he had kept tripping over them, but it did not exactly improve the shoes' appearance and made his toes cold. He sat huddled in his winter woolen cloak. The Great Chamber of Alchemie and Pnysik felt cold that morning, as the furnace was cooling after many days of use.

The Great Chamber was a large, circular vault underneath the very center of the Castle. Aboveground there was nothing to show but the chimney that rose from the great furnace and spouted noxious fumes - and often rather interestingly colored smoke - day and night. Around the edge of the Chamber were thick ebony tables, carved to fit the curve of the walls, on which great glass bottles and flasks filled with all manner of substances and creatures, alive, dead - and halfway between - were lined up and neatly labeled. Although the Chamber was underground and no natural light reached it, it was full of a bright, golden glow. Everywhere great candles were set burning and the light from these reflected off a sea of gold.

Set into the wall near the entrance to the Chamber was the furnace where Marcellus Pye had first transmuted base metal into gold. Marcellus had so enjoyed the thrill of seeing the dull black of the lead and the gray of the mercury slowly change to a brilliant red liquid and then cool to the beautiful deep yellow of pure gold that barely a day since had passed when he did not make a little gold just for the fun of it. Consequently, Marcellus had amassed a large amount of gold, so much that everything in the Chamber that could be made of gold was - hinges on the cupboard doors, drawer handles and their keys, knives, tripods, rushlight holders, doorknobs, taps - everything. But all these little golden knickknacks paled into insignificance beside the two largest chunks of gold that Septimus had ever seen - and wished he never had - The Great Doors of Time.

These were the doors that Septimus had been pushed through one hundred and sixty-nine days ago to the day. They were set into the wall opposite the furnace, two ten-feet-tall chunks of solid gold covered with long strings of carved symbols, which Marcellus had told him were the Calculations of Time. The Doors were flanked by two statues brandishing sharp swords, and they were Locked and Barred - Septimus had found that out soon enough - and only Marcellus had the Keye.

That morning, Septimus was seated at his usual place, the Siege of the Rose, next to the head of a long table in the middle of the Chamber, with his back to the hated Doors. The table was lit with a line of brightly burning candles placed down the center. In front of him was a pile of neatly stacked paper, the results of his early morning's work that had involved the last, laborious checking of Marcellus's astrological calculations, which were the final touches on what he called his Great Work.

At the other end of the table sat seven scribes, for Marcellus Pye had a thing about sevens. Normally the scribes had little to do and spent much of the day staring into space, picking their noses and tunelessly humming strange songs. The songs always made Septimus feel terribly alone, for their notes were put together in an odd way and they were like nothing he had ever heard before. Today, however, all seven scribes were fully employed. They were scribbling furiously, copying out in their very best script the last seven pages of the Great Work, desperate to meet the deadline. Every now and then, one stifled a yawn; like Septimus, the scribes had been hard at work since six that morning. It was now, as Marcellus reminded everyone as he strode into the Chamber, ten o'clock, or ten of the clock, as he put it.

Marcellus Pye was a good-looking, somewhat vain young man with thick black curls of hair falling over his brow in the fashion of the day. He wore the long black and red robes of an Alchemist, which were encrusted with a good deal more gold than those of his Apprentice. That morning there was even a dusting of gold on his fingertips. He smiled as he looked around the Chamber. His Great Work - the I, Marcellus that he was sure would be consulted for centuries to come and make his name live forever - was nearly finished.

"Bookbinder!" Marcellus snapped his fingers impatiently as he surveyed the Chamber in search of the missing craftsman. "Pray, you dullards and dolts, where hideth you the Bookbinder?"

"I hideth not, Your Excellency," a voice quavered from behind Marcellus. "For surely, I be here. Even as I have so stood upon these cold stones these last four hours or more. Indeed, I was here then and still I be here now."

Several of the scribes stifled giggles, and Marcellus spun around and glared at the hunchbacked elderly man who was standing next to a small bookbinding press. "Spare me thy twitterings," said Marcellus, "and bring the press to the table."

Seeing the man struggling to lift the press, Septimus slipped down from his place and went to help him. Together they heaved the press onto the table with a thud, sending ink flying from the inkwells and pens leaping to the floor.

"Take care!" shouted Marcellus as spots of deep blue ink landed on the last pages of his Work. Marcellus picked up the page, which the scribe had just finished. "Now 'tis Despoiled," Marcellus sighed. "But the Hour is against us. It must be bound as it stands. 'Twill show that, tho' Man may strive for Perfection, he will Ever fall short. 'Tis the Way of the Worlde. But a few Spottes of Ink will not pert my Purpose. Septimus, now is the time for your Task."

Septimus picked up the great bundle of parchment and, doing exactly as Marcellus Pye had instructed him earlier that morning, he took the first eight sheets, folded them and handed them to the nearest scribe. The scribe took out a large needle already threaded with thick linen thread and, with his tongue stuck between his teeth in concentration, he sewed the sheets along their fold. Then Septimus passed them to the Bookbinder. And so the process went on for the rest of the morning, all seven scribes sewing and cursing under their breath when the needle pricked their fingers or the thread snapped. Septimus was kept busy running from one scribe to another, for Marcellus Pye was most insistent on Septimus handling the pages himself. He believed that the touch of a seventh son of a seventh son could impart powers of immortality, even to books.

They were now working their way through the Almanac and as they approached the page for the date of his capture, Septimus grew nervous, although he tried his best to hide it. He desperately wanted to get a message to Marcia and to try to make contact with his own Time. Septimus had resigned himself to the fact that it was probably impossible for Marcia to help, for - and this is where his brain always turned to mush - if she could retrieve him from this Time, surely she would have already done so and he wouldn't still be here, over five months later ... would he? But whatever Marcia could or couldn't do, Septimus wanted to tell her what had happened.

Suddenly Septimus realized that the next sheet of paper was the day. With shaking hands, he pushed it into the middle of a group of eight other sheets - slightly out of sequence, but that could not be helped - and then he passed it to the nearest free scribe for sewing. As soon as the scribe had finished sewing, Septimus took the folded sheets and slipped his note inside. Guiltily, he glanced around him, afraid that all eyes would be upon him, but the steady work of putting the book together continued. The Bookbinder took the sheets from him with a bored expression and added them to his stack of parchment. No one had noticed.

Trembling, Septimus sat down and promptly knocked over an inkwell.

Marcellus frowned and snapped his fingers at one of the scribes. "Go, thee, fetch a rag. I will not have this Work delayed."

At 1:21 the Bookbinder finished binding the I, Marcellus. He handed it to Marcellus Pye, accompanied by a few low whistles from the scribes, for it was a beautiful book. It was covered in soft leather, the title was tooled in gold leaf and surrounded by various Alchemical symbols, which Septimus now understood, and wished he didn't. The Bookbinder had edged the pages with Marcellus Pye's very own gold leaf and had laid the book on a thick red silk ribbon.

At 1:25 Marcellus heated a small copper pot of black sealing wax over a candle flame.

At 1:31 Septimus held the book while Marcellus Pye poured black sealing wax onto the two ends of the ribbon to tie them together.

At 1:33 Marcellus Pye pressed his signet ring into the sealing wax. The I, Marcellus was Sealed and the whole Chamber breathed a sigh of relief.

"The Great Work be done," said Marcellus, reverentially holding the book in his hands, almost lost for words.

"My stomach rumbleth." The Bookbinder's petulant voice broke into Marcellus Pye's dreams of greatness. "For 'tis well past the time to break Bread. I shall tarry no more. I bid you Good day, Your Excellency." The Bookbinder bowed and left the Chamber. The scribes exchanged glances. Their stomachs were not entirely silent either, but they dared not say anything. They waited while the Last Alchemist, lost in dreams of greatness, cradled his Great Work in his arms, gazing at the book as if at a newborn baby.

However, despite Marcellus Pye's great hopes, no one ever looked at his book again. It was Sealed away after the Great Alchemie disaster and never again opened - until Marcia Overstrand ripped the Seal off on the day her Apprentice was snatched from his Time.