The apothecary master watched the man from the city until he was out of sight, then chuckled to himself.
How long had it been since he saw anyone out? It might have been the very first time since he was appointed head apothecary.
An astonishingly clever man. Is the city full of people like him?
He found that hard to believe. Or rather, hard to imagine.
I knew the city had more people in it than all the dark elves in these woods, but that man has to be among the best of them. Assuming a man of his intelligence is bog standard there, then if our ties to the city deepen and our dealings grow frequent, we’ll have to exercise incredible caution or we’ll be taken advantage of before we know it.
A modest man, he’d put himself down, but if those words were true, he could never talk like that. Given how the conversation had gone and the information that had been exchanged—that was simply not how a stupid man communicated.
So why had he insisted on writing his teachings down? Had he not been concerned that it would provoke the apothecary master and prevent him from learning anything?
The more he’d insisted he was a fool with a lousy memory, the more the apothecary had started to suspect there was something afoot.
After all, he could have just written things down later on. In other words, he had good reason to risk the master’s ire and insist on writing things down before his very eyes. Namely…
It took me a minute, but there were two points he wanted to make clear. First, he’s not hiding anything.
Of course, that didn’t mean the apothecary master took him at his word. He might be revealing one truth to hide something else. For better or worse, they’d just met today, and the master wasn’t quite ready to completely trust a stranger. Yet, the man’s attempts to show his hand and prove he wasn’t hiding anything went a long way toward building confidence.
The second thing he couldn’t say outright—but I took it as a request to teach the hardest brews I can despite the lack of time. Stuff you wouldn’t remember just seeing it done a few times.
The man was no dedicated apothecary, so he had a lot of nerve trying to learn challenging brews. And most of those concoctions used valuable ingredients. Perhaps that was why he couldn’t ask for them directly.
He was clearly a man of propriety.
But the apothecary master didn’t have a problem with that.
From the get-go, this was an exchange for an unknown potion, likely of legendary quality. He’d been ready to share his trade secrets. There were three main categories the dark elves kept under wraps.
First: The brew itself was tricky.
Second: The recipe required extremely rare ingredients.
Third: The potency was too high to be worth the risks.
Those were the three.
He’d mentioned the first as an argument against teaching his secrets. He was now planning on teaching something from the second category.
It was always possible ingredients that were hard to find in the forest were readily available in the city. That sort of thing happened all the time with herbs. But they’d get nowhere if they were too hung up on that little detail. And since the first category was impossible and the third too risky, the second category was the apothecary master’s only real option here.
This was a fair trade for what he’d gained, and if the rare ingredients became valued in the city, that could work to his advantage.
If the visitor went home, ended up talking about the brew he’d learned, and it became widely known that the ingredients had value, then traders from the city might come to the dark elf village seeking those out. The purple potion the apothecary master examined seemed to suggest city brewers were very accomplished. Any chance to pick their brains or obtain ingredients they commonly used would benefit the apothecary master in the long run.
He wasn’t sure the man’s arrival would actually lead to trade with the city. If someone had suggested he agree to this exchange with an eye on profit, he likely would never have gotten on board. If he’d been the kind of man smart enough to break things down in utilitarian pros and cons, the villagers would never have called him ornery and he wouldn’t have reached this age without so much as a wife to his name. Even other apothecaries kept their distance, a fact that bothered him, but not enough to make him change his ways.
The visitor had spoken of ventures and gains. The apothecary master usually loathed such topics. But—and this was the fascinating part—the visitor had framed those terms with an apothecary’s pride. In spite of himself, the thought that his skills would be discredited in some far-off land without him ever finding out was something the apothecary master could not abide.
For that reason, he felt compelled to value the purple potion accurately and return something of greater worth.
The visitor had certainly been persuasive. He’d come at him from both sides, logical and emotional.
Generally, the teacher had all the advantage and a would-be learner had to bow and scrape.
That sure hadn’t happened here.
He had to provide a lesson of comparable value to that potion, but the decision on what counted was entirely up to him. Up to that point, they stood on even ground.
But the man swiftly brought up the subject of notes, exposing himself.
If he did that to prove he had nothing to hide just so he could win my trust…then I’ve got to do my part to win his. But…
That was tricky.
The master settled down at his worktable, scowling.
…I don’t know if I even can.
He was well aware he wasn’t the most social dark elf around.
On the rare occasions he’d taught villagers his knowledge, he hadn’t been the best teacher.
If I wasn’t teaching, I could use those herbs to help myself unclench a bit…
He glanced at a bundle of dried leaves on the shelf and shook his head. They were used to alleviate pain and excelled at banishing stress. But it would hardly be appropriate for a teacher to dose himself before class.
“I’ll just have to do what I can,” he muttered.
Still, the visitor wasn’t much of an actor. He was watching my every move, forgetting to blink… He’s just that interested, I guess? Heh-heh. His features make him look younger than me, and the way he acted makes me confident he is. Kinda cute, really.