Storm Front

"Wait a minute. My academia doesn’t just peep – "

I held up a hand. "Save it. I don’t want to hear it."

He grunted. "You’re trivializing what getting out for a bit means to me, Harry. You’re insulting my masculinity."

"Bob," I said, "you’re a skull. You don’t have any masculinity to insult."

"Oh yeah?" Bob challenged me. "Pot kettle black, Harry! Have you gotten a date yet? Huh? Most men have something better to do in the middle of the night than play with their chemistry sets."

"As a matter of fact," I told him, "I’m set up for Saturday night."

Bob’s eyes fluttered from orange to red. "Oooooo," he leered. "Is she pretty?"

"Dark skin," I said. "Dark hair, dark eyes. Legs to die for. Smart, sexy as hell."

Bob chortled. "Think she’d like to see the lab?"

"Get your mind out of the gutter."

"No, seriously," Bob said. "If she’s so great, what’s she doing with you? You aren’t exactly Sir Gawain, you know."

It was my turn to get defensive. "She likes me," I said. "Is that such a shock?"

"Harry," Bob drawled, his eye lights flickering smugly, "what you know about women, I could juggle."

I stared at Bob for a moment, and realized with a somewhat sinking feeling that the skull was probably right. Not that I would admit that to him, not in a million years, but he was.

"We’re going to make an escape potion," I told him. "I don’t want to be all night, so can we get to work? Huh? I can only remember about half the recipe."

"There’s always room to make two if you’re making one, Harry. You know that."

That much was true. The process of mixing up an alchemical potion is largely stirring, simmering, and waiting. You can always get another one going and alternate between them. Sometimes you can even do three, though that’s pushing it. "Okay, so, we’ll make a copy."

"Oh, come on," Bob chided me. "That’s dull. You should stretch yourself. Try something new."

"Like what?"

Bob’s eye sockets twinkled cheerfully. "A love potion, Harry! If you won’t let me out, at least let me do that! Spirits know you could use it, and – "

"No," I said, firmly. "No way. No love potion."

"Fine," he said. "No love potion, no escape potion either."

"Bob," I said, warningly.

Bob’s eye lights winked out.

I growled. I was tired and cranky, and under the best of circumstances I am not exactly a type A personality. I stalked over, picked up Bob by the jaws and shook him. "Hey!" I shouted. "Bob! You come out of there! Or I’m going to take this skull and throw it down the deepest well I can find! I swear to you, I’ll put you somewhere where no one can ever let you out ever again!"

Bob’s eyes winked on for a moment. "No you won’t. I’m far too valuable." Then they winked out again.

I gritted my teeth and tried not to smash the skull to little pieces on the floor. I took deep breaths, summoning years of wizardly training and control to not throw a tantrum and break the nice spirit to little pieces. Instead, I put the skull back on the shelf and counted slowly to thirty.

Could I make the potion by myself? I probably could. But I had the sinking feeling that it might not have precisely the effect I wanted. Potions were a tricky business, and a lot more relied upon precise details than upon intent, like in spells. And just because I made a love potion didn’t mean I had to use it. Right? It would only be good for a couple of days, in any case – surely not through the weekend. How much trouble could it cause?

I struggled to rationalize the action. It would appease Bob, and give him some kind of vicarious thrill. Love potions were about the cheapest things in the world to make, so it wouldn’t cost me too much. And, I thought, if Susan should ask me for some kind of demonstration of magic (as she always did), I could always –

No. That would be too much. That would be like admitting I couldn’t get a woman to like me on my own, and it would be unfair, taking advantage of the woman. What I wanted was the escape potion. I might need it at Bianca’s place, and I could always use it, if worse came to worst, to make a getaway from Morgan and the White Council. I would feel a lot better if I had the escape potion.

"Okay, Bob. Fine. You win. We’ll do them both. All right?"

Bob’s eye lights came up warily. "You’re sure? You’ll do the love potion, just like I say?"

"Don’t I always make the potions like you say, Bob?"

"What about that diet potion you tried?"

"Okay. That one was a mistake."

"And the antigravity potion, remember that?"

"We fixed the floor! It was no big deal!"

"And the – "

"Fine, fine," I growled. "You don’t have to rub it in. Now cough up the recipes."

Bob did so, in fine humor, and for the next two hours we made potions. Potions are all made pretty much the same way. First you need a base to form the essential liquid content; then something to engage each of the senses, and then something for the mind and something else for the spirit. Eight ingredients, all in all, and they’re different for each and every potion, and for each person who makes them. Bob had centuries of experience, and he could extrapolate the most successful components for a given person to make into a potion. He was right about being an invaluable resource – I had never even heard of a spirit with Bob’s experience, and I was lucky to have him.

That didn’t mean I didn’t want to crack that skull of his from time to time, though.

The escape potion was made in a base of eight ounces of Jolt cola. We added a drop of motor oil, for the smell of it, and cut a bird’s feather into tiny shavings for the tactile value. Three ounces of chocolate-covered espresso beans, ground into powder, went in next. Then a shredded bus ticket I’d never used, for the mind, and a small chain which I broke and then dropped in, for the heart. I unfolded a clean white cloth where I’d had a flickering shadow stored for just such an occasion, and tossed it into the brew, then opened up a glass jar where I kept my mouse scampers and tapped the sound out into the beaker where the potion was brewing …

"You’re sure this is going to work, Bob?" I said.

"Always. That’s a super recipe, there."

"Smells terrible."

Bob’s lights twinkled. "They usually do."

"What’s it doing? Is this the superspeed one, or the teleportation version?"

Bob coughed. "A little of both, actually. Drink it, and you’ll be the wind for a few minutes."