The Alchemaster's Apprentice (37 page)

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Authors: Walter Moers

BOOK: The Alchemaster's Apprentice
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‘No,’ Echo said.
‘It means I’m a qualified Uggly with five necromantic stars, that’s what! I wrote my doctoral thesis on the capillary system of the Witch’s Hat Toadstool. I studied prophosophy for thirty-four terms - that’s prophetic philosophy, a subject only Ugglies can study. Only one Uggly in a hundred is awarded five necromantic stars. My mentor was the legendary Kora Kronch.
That’s
what it means.’
Breathing hard, Izanuela pointed to a gold cup on a shelf. ‘You see that cup? That’s the Green Thumb of Watervale, the most highly prized award in the field of floristic botany. Guess who was nominated for it three times and awarded it once! I’ll give you a clue: the person who’s standing in front of you, bears my name and is the only Uggly left in Malaisea.’
Izanuela had delivered this harangue with her head held high, squinting like mad and waggling her ears excitedly. She still seemed proud of having pulled the wool over Echo’s eyes, but that was fine with him. Better a well-qualified Uggly than the worst one in Zamonia.
‘Is there anything else I should know?’ he asked. ‘Now that we’re partners, I mean?’
She looked down at him with a smile.
‘I really must congratulate you, my young friend,’ she said in a condescending tone, ‘on your good manners. There’s one question you must be itching to ask me.’
‘What’s that?’ said Echo.
‘Well, how the staircase works. But you don’t dare, eh?’
‘It would certainly interest me to know,’ Echo admitted.
‘Then look around you. Which is the biggest plant down here?’
Echo looked around the cavern.
‘That big blue cactus over there,’ he said. ‘That’s the biggest.’
‘Wrong.’
‘But there isn’t anything bigger.’
‘You aren’t using your eyes properly. Where do you think all these roots in the ground and the ceiling come from?’
‘A tree of some kind, I suppose.’
‘Well? Have you seen any trees in Uggly Lane?’
Echo thought hard. No, there were no trees at all in Uggly Lane.
‘The nearest trees are in the municipal park,’ Izanuela said with a laugh. ‘That’s half a mile away. No trees have roots that long.’
‘You mean …’ Echo looked up at the ceiling.
‘Exactly,’ said Izanuela. ‘This house is the biggest plant here. All the houses in Uggly Lane are plants and they’re alive. Very much alive.’
Picking up a flowerpot, she brought it down hard on the fat black root writhing around her feet. The bark split open in several places and some big, melancholy eyes came to light beneath it.
‘An Ugglian oak,’ she said. ‘One of the oldest plants in Zamonia. Only the Ugglies know of its existence. Which makes you an Uggly too, in a manner of speaking. Can you keep a secret?’
‘Of course,’ Echo said hurriedly.
‘Good. You wouldn’t like to hear what would happen if you blabbed.’
Izanuela subjected him to a long, piercing stare and he felt genuinely scared of her for the first time. Her eyes were incandescent with the millennial power of Ugglyism. He grew terribly cold, as if a giant shadow had engulfed him, and for one brief moment he thought he heard the weird music that had assailed his ears the first time he set eyes on her house. Her gaze was like an unspoken threat, a curse. He shivered.
Then the light in her eyes went out.
‘These trees existed many thousands of years before Malaisea was founded,’ she continued, squinting good-naturedly now. ‘Only the Ugglies realised that they were habitable, and they were also the only living creatures the trees would accept as tenants. The Ugglian oaks came to look more and more like houses as the centuries went by, until no one would have guessed they were really plants. The town of Malaisea grew up around the Ugglies’ colony, but they kept the secret to themselves and passed it on from generation to generation.’
The eyes in the roots slowly closed as if the tree were going to sleep.
‘Living inside living plants isn’t a bed of roses, believe you me. They have their idiosyncrasies, their moods, their quirks, their habits. You have to be able to put up with them or you’d go mad. Things are in a constant state of flux. Walls become displaced, windows close up, roots suddenly appear where there weren’t any before - you trip over them and fall flat on your face. This tree also hums to itself at night, that’s why I wear earplugs.’
Echo looked around nervously. It wasn’t a very reassuring sensation, being inside a living creature - it was like being swallowed by a giant. He now understood his instinctive fear of the Ugglies’ houses.
‘Don’t be frightened,’ Izanuela told him soothingly. ‘It’s thoroughly good-natured. At least, I’ve never known it to lose its temper.’
She climbed over the root and went to a big trestle table groaning under the weight of numerous flowerpots. Echo would have liked to hear more about the living houses, but Izanuela seemed to have exhausted the subject.
‘This is the medicinal section,’ she went on. ‘That’s another misleading designation, of course, because almost any plant can be used for medicinal purposes, even the most poisonous. These are particularly effective, though. They range from the simple Runny Nose to the Crazy Courgette, but there are many more.’ She indicated a cucumber that had tied itself in knots. ‘That one can cure serious mental illnesses, but it can also induce them if incorrectly administered. When Ghoolion’s castle was still a lunatic asylum, the patients there were fed on it. No wonder it all ended in chaos.’
She pointed to a few inconspicuous plants. ‘That’s Disinfectant Knotgrass and that’s an Anaesthetic Sponge. The juice of this cactus can combat hair loss, but the patient’s head grows prickles instead. Turdwort, Thistlegut, Black Uncle … I’d rather not tell you what ailments they’re good for.’
Echo was fascinated. This was in every respect a counterpart to the Alchemaster’s laboratory. Ghoolion’s morbid realm was filled with stuffed corpses and dangerous chemicals, pathogenic substances and preserved death rattles, whereas this was a celebration of life, a living, proliferating, breathing world in which everything served therapeutic medicinal purposes. What a contrast between the Alchemaster’s acrid alchemical fumes and the vernal fragrance of Izanuela’s flower garden! Echo felt like making his home there right away.
‘But that’s enough about diseases,’ Izanuela said firmly. ‘It’s an unpleasant subject.’
They came to a big table laden with gadgets, all of which might have come from the Alchemaster’s laboratory: flasks and test tubes, phials and mortars, coloured liquids and powders, microscopes and tweezers. Compared to Ghoolion’s equipment, however, Izanuela’s was just a child’s chemistry set.
‘This is my distillation plant,’ she said with a grin. ‘I certainly can’t compete with Ghoolion’s laboratory, but I can brew a potion or two. Incidentally, about my so-called
Placebo
Wart Ointment: it is, in fact, the most effective wart ointment in the whole of Zamonia. Apply some to a wart and it’ll drop off the next morning. There’s nothing to touch it anywhere on Apothecary Avenue. Here, this is a cold cure distilled from Snotgrass. Take some and five minutes later your cold will be gone. I’d like to see the doctor who can prescribe such a medicine.’
She held up a test tube containing some green powder.
‘There’s no such thing as a cure for hangovers, right? You just have to let them wear off, right?’
Echo thought of his wine-tasting session with Ghoolion and nodded.
‘Wrong!’ cried Izanuela. ‘A spoonful of this powder in your coffee and you’ll be as clear-headed as a teetotaller. This tincture cures any migraine. That pill banishes any toothache. Here’s a liqueur that will heal stomach ulcers. Appendicitis? Chew this root and your appendix disinflames itself. Chickenpox? Simply rub my chickenpox ointment on your spots and they stop itching within seconds. Jaundice? Drink this potion and your liver will be back in order immediately.’
She spread her arms wide.
‘Down here I’ve devised remedies for most of the diseases Ghoolion is concocting up there. Not that he knows it, the two of us are engaged in an everlasting duel.’
Echo had been carried away by her enthusiastic recital. ‘Let’s get down to work!’ he cried. ‘When are we going to brew this love potion? Now?’
The Uggly made a soothing gesture.
‘Not so fast,’ she said. ‘First I have to familiarise myself with the relevant literature.’
She picked up a huge leather-bound tome and slammed it down on the tabletop so hard that it set all the retorts and test tubes around her jingling.
‘The Ugglimical Cookbook,’ she explained. ‘It contains every Ugglimical recipe in existence. In Old Ugglian.’
She opened the book at the title page and read out the motto:
‘“
Nyott stropstnopirni hapfel zach; hapfel zach stropstnopirni!
” Can you translate that too?’
‘We don’t live to learn; we learn to live!’ Echo replied.
‘Correct,’ she said. ‘Let’s see now …’
She turned over the pages for quite a while.
‘Toadstool Soup … hm … Henbane Rissoles … Crab-Apple Cocktail … hm … Muddlewater Cordial … Adderthistle Salad with Larkspew Dressing …’
She tapped a page with her finger and uttered a triumphant cry. ‘Here we are! Ugglimical Love Potion, Extra Strong!’
‘Have you found it?’ Echo asked excitedly. ‘Is it really in there?’
‘Phew,’ Izanuela said to herself, ‘this is a tall order. We need some Gristlethorn … some Treacletuft…a spoonful of Champagne Rennet … a Clubfoot Toadstool … some Prickly Wormfern…a Twelve-Leafed Clover…a Graveyard Marsh Anemone … Arctic Woodbine…a pinch of Old Man’s Scurf … some chopped Toadpipe … a pound of Pond Scum … some Sparrowspit …’ She mopped her brow. ‘Heavens, what next! A Funnelhorn … Quail’s-Eye Wheat … Tuberous Stinkwort … Devil’s Clover … Inflorescent Cabbage … some Ranunculaceous Nectar … two Shadow Shallots … hm … hm …’
She looked up at last.
‘It’s as I feared, my friend: this isn’t going to be a stroll in the park. All right, I’ve got most of the ingredients here and the rest I can get from Ugglies of my acquaintance. But there’s one that’s almost impossible to obtain. It’s a plant that has become almost extinct. No Uggly knows where it’s still to be found.’
Echo’s heart sank. All his elation had gone. ‘What’s it called?’ he asked dejectedly.
‘Cratmint,’ she said. ‘An extremely potent herb.’
‘Cratmint?’ he exclaimed. ‘I know where to find some!’
‘Really? Where?’
‘On Ghoolion’s roof. A big clump of it. In full bloom.’
Izanuela looked relieved. ‘That’s wonderful. I thought we’d had it.’
‘I can pick a few leaves and bring them to you. No problem.’
She perused the book again.
‘Hm …’ she said. ‘A few dead leaves won’t do. I need the whole plant - alive. You’ll have to dig it up, roots and all.’
‘But I can’t,’ Echo said miserably. ‘It’s far too big for a Crat to manage.’
Izanuela gave him a long look. Echo stared back. Profound silence reigned for a while. Everything was so quiet, the Graveyard Ghost could be heard whispering to itself.
‘No,’ Izanuela said, ‘you can’t be serious!’
‘Yes,’ said Echo, ‘there’s no alternative: you’ll have to come up on the roof with me.’
Cratmint
T
here was only one time of day when Echo and Izanuela could risk an excursion to the mother of all roofs, and that was when the Alchemaster was at work on his dinner menu in the kitchen. He would be so preoccupied that they could sneak through the laboratory unobserved. The Leathermice would already have left at twilight.
The following evening found Echo waiting impatiently at the castle entrance, ready to guide the Uggly to the roof. She turned up late, as he’d feared she would. There was something different about her when she finally walked in. Her lips looked glossier than usual and her complexion less greenish.
‘What took you so long?’ Echo demanded.

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