Septimus Heap, Book One_ Magyk - Angie Sage [176]
Holding the tube at arm’s length, Aunt Zelda inspected it warily. A sudden stab of horror ran through her—clinging to the end was a glistening white clutch of Great Hairy Marram Spider eggs. Aunt Zelda screamed and did a wild dance, shaking the tube violently, trying to dislodge the eggs. However, the slime had coated the silver tube and it flew from her grasp, traced a graceful arc across the room and sailed through the open kitchen door. Aunt Zelda heard the telltale splash of something landing in brown-beetle-and-turnip soup, which now became brown-beetle-turnip-and-spider-egg soup. (That evening Aunt Zelda boiled the soup and had it for supper. At the time she thought the flavor much improved by the extra day it spent sitting on the stove, and it was only afterward that it crossed her mind that maybe spider eggs had something to do with it. She went to bed feeling somewhat nauseous.)
Aunt Zelda was about to rescue the tube from the soup when, out of the corner of her eye, she saw something move. Two huge, hairy legs were feeling their way out from the space beneath the flagstone. With a shudder, Aunt Zelda heaved up the flagstone and let go. It slammed down with a thud that shook the cottage—and parted mommy spider from her babies forever.
Aunt Zelda retrieved the silver tube, then sat down at her desk and revived herself with a cup of hot cabbage water into which she stirred a large spoon of Marshberry jam. She felt shaken—the spider had reminded her of what she had sent Wolf Boy off to do and what she had once also been dispatched to do by Betty Crackle. She sighed once more and told herself that she had sent Wolf Boy off as well-prepared as she could—and at least she hadn’t written the note on cardboard, as Betty Crackle had done.
Carefully Aunt Zelda wiped off the brown-beetle-turnip-and-spider-egg soup from the tube. She took out a small silver knife, cut the wax seal and drew out an ancient, damp-stained piece of parchment with the words “Indentures of the Intended Keeper” written at the top in old-fashioned, faded letters.
Aunt Zelda spent the next hour at her desk Naming Wolf Boy in the Indentures. Then, in her very best handwriting, she wrote out her Petition for Apprenticeship for the Queen, rolled it up with the Indentures and put them both into the silver tube. It was nearly time to go—but first there was something she wanted to get from the UNSTABLE POTIONS AND PARTIKULAR POISONS cupboard.
It was a tight squeeze in the cupboard for Aunt Zelda, particularly in her new well-padded dress. She lit the lantern, opened a hidden drawer and, with the aid of her extra-strength spectacles, she consulted a small, ancient book entitled UNSTABLE POTIONS AND PARTIKULAR POISONS CUPBOARD: KEEPERS’ GUIDE AND PLAN. Having found what she was looking for, Aunt Zelda opened a small, blue-painted drawer of Charms and Amulets and peered inside. An assortment of carved precious stones and crystals were laid out neatly on the blue baize cloth that lined the drawer. Aunt Zelda’s hand hovered over a selection of SafeCharms and she frowned—what she was looking for was not there. She consulted the book once more and then reached deep inside the drawer until her fingers found a small catch at the back. With a great stretch of her stubby forefinger, Aunt Zelda just managed to flip the catch upward. There was a soft clunk and something heavy dropped into the drawer and rolled forward into the light of the lantern.
Aunt Zelda picked up a small, pear-shaped gold bottle and placed it very carefully in the palm of her hand. She saw the deep, dark shine of the purest gold—gold spun by the spiders of Aurum—and a thick silver stopper inscribed with the single hieroglyph of a long-forgotten name. She felt a little nervous—the small flask that rested in her hand was an incredibly rare live SafeCharm, and she had never even touched one before.
Marcia’s visit to Keeper’s Cottage to collect the potions for Ephaniah and Hildegarde earlier that morning had left Aunt Zelda feeling very twitchy. After