The Alchemaster's Apprentice (36 page)
Read The Alchemaster's Apprentice Online
Authors: Walter Moers
Echo gazed open-mouthed at the spacious cavern, whose damp mud walls and ceiling had roots growing through them. The paint was peeling off its multitude of worm-eaten tables, stools, shelves, chairs and benches. Old books and watering cans were lying around here and there, rakes and shovels stood propped against the walls. The pieces of garden furniture were laden with flowerpots and clay vessels, bowls and vases, terracotta jardinières and china mugs, wooden dishes and galvanised buckets. Most of the plants growing in them were unfamiliar to Echo. Although he could have quoted the correct botanical names of a few of them - wild roses, orchids, ferns and cacti - he had never before seen the vast majority of the fungi, berries, mosses, herbs and flowers growing in this subterranean garden. Their colours were as overwhelming as the many different scents that impregnated the air. Izanuela went on ahead, picking her way along the narrow paths between the luxuriant vegetation and pointing this way and that.
‘There are the usual plants that everyone knows,’ she trilled in the best of spirits. ‘Wild garlic and lily of the valley, woodruff and juniper, lavender and poppy, plantain and heptapleuron, saxifrage and soapwort, Auricula and Daggerthistle, Pharsley and Pheasant’s Eye. These look like ordinary stinging nettles but are ten times as virulent. That’s a Twin-Tongued Adderhead, and those two are Bullfinch Furze and Consumptive’s Cough. The blue-and-yellow flower is a Trigonelle. Those are Venus-Hair and Marsh Tea - both deadly poisonous, so don’t touch! The two over there are Cat’s-Foot and Hound’s-Tongue. They shouldn’t really be growing side by side, they simply can’t abide each other.’
Thick roots were growing out of the floor and walls, and many more were dangling from the ceiling. For some reason he couldn’t have explained, Echo balked at clambering over them and tried to give them all a wide berth.
Izanuela addressed herself to another part of her garden. ‘This area is more interesting. These are so-called horrificoplants from the Megaforest - few people ever get to see them. You’ve no idea how hard it is to obtain the things. Ghost Grass, Guillotinea, Graveyard Moss, Devil’s Besom, Trombophonic Toadstool, Executioner’s Axe, Dead Man’s Finger - the very names are enough to give one gooseflesh, but it’s amazing the juices one can distil from them, especially the fungi. I’ve made cough syrup out of this Corpse-Glove here. It doesn’t actually cure a cough, but your hair starts singing so sweetly when you take the stuff, you forget all about it.’
Echo was puzzled. Hadn’t Izanuela told him that the most effective remedy she possessed was camomile tea? These plants of hers could create a whole host of hallucinations.
‘How can all these plants grow down here?’ he asked. ‘In the dark, I mean?’
She plunged both hands in a bucket and held some loose soil under his nose. It was teeming with big, long worms that emitted a bright red glow.
‘Lava Worms,’ she explained. ‘I put some in every flowerpot. They give off light and heat, which is all that the sun does. In fact, they’re even better than the sun because they radiate heat the whole time, even at night. There’s no winter down here, no clouds, no storms, no hail or frost - no bad weather at all. It’s a botanical paradise, an Elysium for anything with roots. If I were a flower I’d like to grow here and nowhere else.’
Izanuela went over to a rough old kitchen dresser draped in a red velvet curtain. ‘Would you like to see something really special?’ she said.
Echo nodded. Of course he would.
‘This is my botanical theatre. It’s horticulture of the highest order. You could also call it a mobile plant theatre, but that would be a misleading designation. All plants are mobile, but most of them move so slowly their movements can’t be detected with the naked eye. These are rather more agile.’
The Uggly drew the curtain aside, pursed her lips together and imitated a brief fanfare.
‘Tarantara, tarantara! Allow me to present the Ballerina Blossom!’
She pointed to a plant on the top shelf. It did full justice to its name. A handsome flower with a red calyx, a long green stem and thin, translucent leaves, it launched into a graceful
pas seul
.
pas seul
.
‘The one beside it is a Cobra Thistle - careful, please, it can strike like lightning!’
The prickly weed made an almost imperceptible movement. Its tense body was vibrating like a coiled spring and Echo guessed how unexpectedly its poisonous barbs could strike home.
‘That one there is a Throttlefern. It’s capable of strangling creatures as big as a thrush, but I’d advise you to stand back. I’m sure it wouldn’t hesitate to attack a Crat.’
The fern lashed the air with several of its tendrils, cracking them like bullwhips. Echo retreated a step.
‘On the shelf below is a Twitching Terebinth. Eat a salad made from its leaves and you develop St Vitus’s dance. You dance for three days and then drop dead.’
The plant shook its big leaves violently to and fro - so violently that the flowerpot wobbled, scattering soil in all directions.
‘It’s absolutely insane,’ Izanuela whispered, tapping her forehead. ‘The billowing stuff in the green bucket is Breezegrass. I like looking at it when I’m in need of relaxation. Watching Breezegrass for five minutes sends me off to sleep.’
Although there wasn’t a breath of wind in the cavern, the grass stirred as if a gentle breeze were blowing through its stems. Echo found this had a soothing effect on him too. He was gradually becoming accustomed to his strange surroundings.
‘Growing in the yellow flowerpot is a Clapperatus Applaudiens. I can’t help it, but it’s a bit too obsequious for me.’
When Izanuela pointed to it, the tuliplike flower broke into applause, clapping its leaves together like a maniac.
‘I think it’s amusing,’ Echo said.
‘That Asparagus Timidus is the absolute opposite. Another specimen from the Megaforest. It’s as shy as a blushing bride.’
The tip of the asparagus turned red at the touch of Izanuela’s outstretched finger, then buried itself in the mossy ground and stayed that way.
She sighed. ‘Mobile plants are becoming increasingly popular with people who find normal plants boring but are too lazy to keep a pet. Personally, I think they should be declared a protected species. It’s cruelty to plants to allow such people to own them. They’re bound to start teaching them tricks.’
‘Could they do that?’ asked Echo.
The Uggly studied her fingernails. ‘Well, I must confess I taught that Trampoline Fern down there a little trick. The temptation was too great.’
She clicked her fingers. The Trampoline Fern withdrew its roots from the flowerpot, climbed out of it, turned a somersault and climbed back in again.
‘Encore!’ Echo cried delightedly.
‘Certainly not,’ said Izanuela. ‘This isn’t a circus, it’s a serious botanical theatre.’ She drew the curtain and looked around. ‘Let’s see … What else have we got?’
She hurried over to a long red wooden bench. ‘This is a collection of especially fragrant plants: Lemon Balm and Thyme, Rosemary and Sage, Poppy Orange and Blossoming Nutmeg, Gingerbread Japonica and Sprouting Vanilla, Marzipan Potato and Cinnamon Citronelle.’
Eagerly, Echo applied his little nose to each plant in turn. They all smelt divine.
Izanuela made her way across to a crude wooden cupboard overgrown with ivy and opened the door. ‘I keep the more evil-smelling plants shut up in here,’ she said. Echo backed away, repelled by the vile stench that came drifting out of the interior.
‘Garlic Breath and Cheesefoot, Sulphurous Sumach and Perspiring Tulip, Horse-Apple Hosta and Common Turdwort, Fernfart and Stinkboot. Pooh!’ She fanned herself. ‘I have to admit I always speed up a bit when I’m watering this section.’ She slammed the cupboard door and went over to a set of shelves. Unlike the others, they were made of some silvery, richly decorated metal.
‘Take a look at these beauties instead. They’re Crystalline Orchids.’
Echo gazed at the wonderful plants. Their flowers resembled magnified snowflakes, each unique in shape.
‘Please be careful of this magnificent cactus. Although it changes colour every second, it fires off its poisonous spines like arrows when it’s out of sorts. It hit me in the backside once and I had heartburn for three days. Beautiful, though, isn’t it? It glows in the dark.’
Izanuela pointed to various flowerpots and reeled off the names of their occupants: ‘Golden Leafling, Ladykiller, Cupreous Rose, Nightingale Crocus - that one can actually sing when it’s in the mood. Angel’s Hair. Blonde Princess.’
She turned to a tub which seemed to be on fire.
Issuing from the peaty soil was a wonderful, balletically flickering blue flame. ‘A Graveyard Ghost,’ she said in a whisper.
As Echo and the Uggly looked more closely, he saw that the flame had a childlike face and was whispering softly to itself. It was a while before the two of them could drag themselves away from this mesmeric apparition.
‘But where there’s light, there’s darkness as well,’ Izanuela said in a low voice, beckoning to Echo to follow. ‘Come with me. I’ll show you some plants that aren’t as good-looking.’
She led him over to some flowerpots standing on a rustic bench beneath a table. ‘I have to confess I keep them hidden,’ she said. ‘Their appearance tends to depress me.’
Echo looked at the plants. They really were remarkably unattractive. Suppurating sores had developed where flowers once grew. Their leaves were shrivelled or dung-coloured, their stems misshapen and prickly.
‘Humpbacked Gnome, Python’s Fang, Death Cup, Septic Verruca, Mouldering Morel, Slimy Susan, Athlete’s Foot. You can’t help feeling sorry for them. The majority were almost exterminated, simply because they’re so ugly, but they’re highly effective medicinal herbs if administered in the correct dosage. That one cures rheumatism.’
Echo could restrain himself no longer. ‘You told me that camomile tea was the most effective remedy you possessed,’ he blurted out, ‘but this garden of yours is full of the most miraculous plants.’
Izanuela eyed him with a pitying expression. ‘You really are gullible. I only said that to get rid of you. I also said I was the worst Uggly in Zamonia. That was another lie, of course.’
‘Really?’ Echo pricked up his ears.
She pointed to a framed document hanging on the wall ‘See that diploma?’ she said with a tremor in her voice. ‘It was awarded me by the Ugglian Academy in Grailsund. I graduated with five necromantic stars. Do you know what that means?’
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