Spring 88: scullery

Beloved Zann,

This is the vision I had, lying on the floor of the oubliette, dying of thirst in the dark. Maybe I’ll tear this page out later; it could get me killed if anyone saw it. But I know I have to write it down for you now.

My mind was trying to find anything to fill the darkness, to make sense of the lack of everything around me. All was stone and pain and need and black. I was thinking of my childhood, of you, of Wande, but it was all gone as quickly as I could conceive of it.

And then it all went away, and I was back in the great house of Lady Lightcandle. I hadn’t known her name until now. I worked as a servant in her manor during the Great Nap. I knew I had, but I only remembered a few details, and never so clearly as this. The Lady herself was tall for a lauran, and beautiful, which they all are, and stately, which only some of them are. I worked in the kitchen, mostly scrubbing pots. I can’t imagine I liked it, but it was the Great Nap: none of us were paying enough attention to know whether we liked anything or not. I remember the kitchen was a sunny, clean place with flowers at the windows. It was a lauran house; even the scullery was nice.

But this particular day there were important visitors. I never found out who they were, but thinking back on it, it must have been one of the Valnelatar family. I can’t imagine the house going to such trouble for anyone else. The cooks were running all over the place preparing their fanciest dishes. The flow of pots through my scullery increased to the point where I could hardly keep up with it. And I overheard one of the lauran servants saying something about “permission to make the Sauce”.

I didn’t know what it was at the time. I still don’t know all that much about it. But I could tell he was saying something important, and even though it was the Great Nap, I was curious.

That evening, the two senior cooks, both lauran, shooed everyone else out of the kitchen. I could hear them murmuring to each other as they prepared this special brew. It seemed very delicate. I suppose, from where I was, I had the perfect place to eavesdrop from, but if I learned any details of how the Sauce was made, I’ve forgotten it. A servant called from outside the kitchen, “Is it ready? The mushrooms are being served!” The cooks couldn’t really go any faster, but I could tell that they were working urgently. I could smell the spices. Ginger, or an ingredient much like it, and then something earthy, and a third thing that I couldn’t actually smell but that my nose knew was present. I wanted some.

I know now that the Sauce is the highest form of lauran magic, that it’s the summary of the highest potential of their people, expressed in the form of food. It is only ever to be made in small amounts, and is only meant for the delectation of the royal family and their chosen intimates. The recipe is a secret only revealed to a few, and those few can be killed out of hand if they pass it on to others. It is certainly not for humans. I heard a story once of two humans who were speculating about the Sauce, and one said he’d like to try pouring some on his skillet cakes, and a lauran overheard them. Killed them both for daring to aspire so high.

Anyway, one of the cooks finally said, “There! Perfect!” and the other one fetched a tray. I leaned over my basin so I could peer through the doorway at them without looking like that’s what I was doing. The first cook balanced a small silver sauce dish in the center of an ornate tray, and put a long spoon in it. The second cook said, “I’ll clear the way!” and bustled out of the kitchen. The first cook followed, carefully, but caught her foot on the edge of the mat and stumbled a little. The long spoon clattered to the floor. “Piss from the stars!” she said, put the tray down delicately, and got a clean spoon. She flung the first spoon into a water-filled basin, with all the other saucepans they had used, retrieved the tray, and hurried out.

The kitchen was empty. I slipped in and picked up the basin of dirty pots that had been used for preparing the Sauce. It was my job! There was no trace of the Sauce itself in any of the pots or sauciers or cocottes. The cooks had been too thorough about rinsing them. But I could see the long spoon in one of those pots, leaning against the side.

It had a thick red drop halfway up the handle, above the waterline. A dark red drop.

I didn’t hesitate. I caught the drop up on a fingertip and put it in my mouth.

And the world opened all around me.

It tasted like everything. Everything good, bad, strange, and familiar. I don’t mean it wasn’t a good taste; it was wonderful. But all the bad tastes were in it too, and that was fine, because they weren’t bad anymore. It tasted like the hottest fires and the most soothing cool water, the sweetest delicacies and the richest broths. And the taste was only the start of it, the door that the Sauce opened into my mind.

Everything I looked at showed me hourglasses and spirals and rainbows, salty and smooth, fragrant and melodic. I could hear the colours and feel the flavours. I could see the stars that were blocked by clouds and the clouds that were blocked by stars. The gods themselves were skeletons of numbers, clad in sugar; the earth was a riot of crystal and lust; time itself a laughing waterfall of lambs and war and textures.

But the edges of my perceptions were ragged. All that was before me was disintegrating in my eyes and ears. I could see myself, the cluster of eyes and arms and knives and leaves that made me Ybel. And I could see the Sauce, and that I was trying to touch the Sauce and it was trying to touch me. And we were touching, in some places. But there were other parts of me that could never touch it. Parts of me that just weren’t right, or at least they didn’t fit right, or shone with the wrong light. And I knew I could never truly, fully, experience the Sauce unless I changed. Became a different person.

I came back to myself. I was, again, a half-asleep servant in Lady Lightcandle’s scullery. I looked for another trace of the Sauce among the pots and pans. Nothing.

I don’t remember anything about how I came to leave Lady Lightcandle’s service. I know that I did change myself, not long after that. (I’m still changing, I suppose.) I don’t know all the details about that time. And eventually I found myself in the Wallentorp army and the Great Nap ended.

And now I need to taste the Sauce again. I went to Crideon because it was closest to the Valnelatars’ palace. And I accepted Candur’s offer of a place in the Rosolla Guard to get into the palace. I’m a patient man. I’m ready for the experience, now, and I just have to find a way to do it. It could take a very long time. But I can do it.

Or, at least, I could do it if I wasn’t dying in an oubliette less than half a mile from the Valnelatars’ High Kitchen.

Love,

Ybel