Slight Rest For The Maybe Wicked III

Since Irwin had missed Thanksgiving, a fit punishment for his folly of hubris, he had decided to use the incoming slew of hunters as an excuse to engorge himself with turkey and other foods one may eat at a Thanksgiving dinner.

Sure, it was an excuse so as to not have Ella at his neck, calling him "greedy" or "fat pig" or, more aptly, "Glutton Incarnate"; yet the more he thought about it, the more it sounded as a great way to ingratiate himself back into the loving folds of his sister.

Much to his delight, Annalize, through their powerful druidic intermediary, was overjoyed at the sudden onslaught of food in the kitchen. The girl, through the memories imparted by Richard before he went to Heaven, had been one to love parties, a facet of her life she had yet to take back ever since the werewolves tore her brother to pieces at one such party.

In fact, Irwin had asked around and the little boy and girl that was with her that night had seemingly ceased being friends with her. It was definitely a traumatic experience, having to leave in the middle of the storm due to a blood-curdling scream and gunshots reverberating every so often not far from their bed chambers, so Irwin couldn't find fault for what happened.

Still, he thought that maybe Annalize needed new and, more importantly, better friends; preferably one of her age, and wasn't deeply traumatized by blood and gore. He had hoped that the meeting with the new hunters would prove fruitful and also hoped that one of them had daughters or small boys, a thought that he dared not think aloud lest he became even more of a pariah in his family.

It still felt weird, calling them "his" family. It hadn't occurred to him that he had changed his possession of them, but he grew confident that it would not matter to them due to the talk he had with the adults in the family. Only Annalize remained and, frankly, he was more afraid of talking to her than he was of Lady Anastasia and Ella combined.

There was a certain expectation he had on her answer, a rejection that he could not take. Yet he knew that he owed it to her to explain his situation.

The rest of the day was dealing with a few errands for Archibald, talking to an incessant 'Frog' Collins, part-owner of the Frog's junkyard, about his still missing son–who Irwin still didn't know if he was part of the Ancestor's pack–and calling back everyone he knew to say that he was spending the rest of Christmas in town if they ever want to visit. It was a rhetorical suggestion, of course, but he knew Joaquin would certainly use that as an excuse to check his swordsmanship.

Night had become even colder in Lisbon Valley, but with his room being warmed by someone figuratively and metaphorically hot, it would seem everything was going to be alright.

●●●●●●

The fourteenth of December had almost rolled by, with Irwin waking up an hour before noon. If not for Ella barging in loudly and kicking him in the shin, Irwin thought that he could have slept until Christmas.

As an apology for hurting him, she brought cookies and warm milk along with a prototype pigs-in-blankets the mother and daughter and Garth were making downstairs. Seeing as the hunter had no immediate family to take care of, it had become a habit of his, these past few months, to lovingly meddle in the Greythorne's events–a series of actions silently approved by Lady Anastasia and Archibald.

As she was about to leave him to his thoughts, Irwin called out to her and asked, "Hey! Maybe it's time we put a label on our relationship…"

She barked a condescending laugh, flipping him off with two hands. "Very funny, asshole." Then she left.

"I… wasn't really joking, but sure, let's go with that." He muttered under his breath, fearing she'll hear his words.

It wasn't an hour past noon that Irwin left the manor, heading towards Junkyard with his Andy in tow. Not much had changed since a week ago; only that the ripe smell from decades of car rust and a month of rotting corpse had been removed, replaced by citrusy dew and the taste of air freshener that thoroughly lingered in Irwin's mouth.

He had always sprays like these as he had a sensitive tongue yet found himself in need of adequate space for experimentation.

"I guess I'll just suck it up." He muttered under his breath as he prepared his spell components.

The rest of the day was spent in training by giving potioneering a go. Even back before his capture, he'd always find something else to do or find himself in a situation in which he was unable to craft a potion; but no more, he said to himself. 

He'll try it even if he was terrible at it.

He had borrowed a novice tome from Lady Anastasia, one that entailed how a beginner could practice alchemical witchcraft. After all, a witch's brew was half their fire power. He still thought about the flying squadrons back at Dagon's Island and how they effectively quartered the Demon Prince's forces by dropping numerous potions atop the sky.

From poison gas to acid salves to gravitational sludge, the squadron had controlled the flow of the battle from start to finish. That was, of course, before Malkanthor's Garrison destroyed them without so much as hesitation aforethought.

In any case, his first brew was Merlin's Conjoined Vision; the Welsh witch partook in Avalon's well and had been given the gift of pre- and retro-cognition, which, after decades of research and deals with demons and fairies alike, he then distilled into three successful brews.

Irwin didn't know why his system had given him such an impossibly difficult potion as his first recipe, but he was never one to look a gift horse in the mouth. Still, it had taken a few nighttime readings during his respite after returning home to actually understand how to brew the potion.

His ingredients were fairly simple yet incredibly difficult to procure; the iridescent tear of a Leprechaun whose gold had been timely snatched away; a slug of magma from an active volcano long overdue its eruption; and an act of defiance against God crystalized in a monolith. Irwin was familiar with the last one and had a friend who lived near the second one, yet nearly found himself out of wits about the first one.

Truthfully, back then, he was much obliged to just buy whatever was needed from his Trade store, which he resisted. Now that it's been two months, his patience had finally borne fruit.

The fulgurite had arrived at the start of November, all fifty pounds of it; the owner of the piece was a collector who had debts up to his long neck, so he was more than happy to relieve himself of the item in exchange for ten thousand dollars. Honestly, it wasn't even worth that much, but said collector was deeply embedded into the world of occult and unique items enough that him being in their pocket was worth that much money.

The slug was hand-delivered by Garth and placed under the Junkyard's crucible. Lady Anastasia had bothered Archibald enough to buy a crucible from a blacksmith near San Diego, which she then enchanted to keep the magma in a constant semi-liquid form; an act of kindness Lady Anastasia had told and intimidated everyone not to speak of in front of Irwin.

Luckily, Andy was more afraid of him than of her. 'A terrible mistake', Irwin thought.

The tears were bought off the Trade Store at a low, low, low price of two hundred credits. Irwin didn't even know that the Store had something that specific and had thought that maybe he was not using its function to the full extent of its capabilities.

"Start making that turtle do backflips, Andy." He warned the Special Child as he secured himself in an airtight room, away from the hubbub of modern life, and deeply deposited his concentration within the potion brewing.

According to the recipe, he had to distill seven liters of spring water into its most purified form for eighty-nine hours. A lot of time for someone like him, so he cheated a little by using Tears of Vestia, which allowed him to create enchanted water.

While the distillation process was supposedly happening, Irwin was to grind the fulgurite into sand before mixing in the Leprechaun's tear, chanting esoteric hymns in A flat. The moment he did so, the mixture began to glow with wild abandon and erupted in foam that covered the whole steel bowl.

Irwin thought that he had screwed up and was right when he saw the foam eating through the bowl, finishing it in seconds, before it hungrily dripped to the table.

Having learnt what to do in case of an active regeant–the proper term for potion ingredients–done incorrectly, Irwin steepled his fingers and invigorated his magik, causing a surge of power to come out of his mouth. The slow yet meaningful incantation halted the foam's hunger as it slowly deactivated before becoming neutered.

A sigh of relief escaped his mouth as a grin bore anew.

"Potioneering is fun!"