2 Feb 2012
Sellaphix ApothecaryHe was a regular,
Simon Kúzlo. A shifty fellow who enjoyed being the one to tell you as if he was some sort of information broker. In reality, he was one of the printing press tinkers for Obscurus Books and his fingers were perpetually stained black.
This afternoon, Simon sauntered in, weaving between the barrels and stacks hands in his pockets. Zelda was polishing the dustier vials up on the upper tier. She wasn’t the type to greet with a friendly smile, but she did acknowledge her most loyal customers. Kúzlo had been with them through thick and thin.
“Simon,” she said and stepped to the railing.
“Ahoy ahoy, Missus,” he said cheerfully in his thick Slovakian accent. “It’s a dark day, a dark dark day.”
“Then why do you sound so happy?” she asked with her usual lack of enthusiasm.
Simon held a sachet of herbs up to the light as if he was actually there to shop.
“It’s my poor cousin,” he said. “He took a turn. He’s a werewolf, you know.”
Zelda provided the obligatory conversation fillers.
“That’s too bad.”
“Completely avoidable, too. I told him not to buy his potion on the street, but …”
Zelda paused in her polishing. She and her husband took pride in their work. They strived to the best, and that quality was important. It earned them discretion, it allowed them the freedom to fire clients, but mostly it was their greatest defense against meddling by the Ministry of Magic. An important way to ward of scrutiny was ensuring tranquility in the market. If someone was disturbing that quiet …
“Which street?”
“He wouldn’t tell me …”
“But you found out.”
“Aw, Missus, I can’t be sure. I wouldn’t want to speak with half a fact.”
Zelda, still looking down on the meandering customer, tisked at him.
“Tch. Since when?” Zelda scoffed and Simon pretended to be offended.
“Well, I did find this,” Simon said coyly and pulled a folded paper from his pocket. Zelda made her way down the stairs to look.
It was a hand-made advertisement hawking potions, but other than that, there was nothing to indicated whose it was.
[1] “The old Dankworth house,” Simon supplied looking over her shoulder. A small vacant house crammed in down the way.
At first Zelda said nothing. The flier must belong to a potion-maker who’d sold Kúzlo's cousin bungled Wolfsbane Potion. What a bleeding idiot. There were few surer ways to draw the eye of the Ministry of Magic - especially these days - than to meddle with homebrew Wolfsbane. If the Ministry found out about this, and they would, they’d come poking around and Sellaphix’s would be their first stop.
Suffice it to say, this had to be
handled.
“Thank you, Simon,” Zelda said cooly and handed back the flier.
Simon held his hand up to indicade she should keep it, then said, “just trying to do the right thing, you know me. I’m community minded you know.”
Zelda nodded then, as if the discussion hadn’t happened she asked him if he’d like the usual.
[8 Feb] Preserving the Tranquility