Jyx sat in his study in the new rocking chair Eufame had provided. After a week of menial tasks, she’d felt it only fair that Jyx receive some kind of reward. With no other form of seating in his quarters, the chair seemed the ideal choice, and after a day of menial tasks, rocking before a roaring fire was Jyx’s sole point of pleasure. A single book had also been provided to start his new collection, a thin tome about ritual circles. It lay on the bookshelf, discarded once Jyx realised he’d already read it during an illicit browsing session in the Academy library between study periods. He glared at it and snorted—such juvenile material. Even Markus Prady could have understood it.
He felt guilty to suddenly think of Markus; he hadn’t thought of his life before the house very often during his first week. Eufame’s tasks consumed his time during the day, and at night he was so exhausted he fell into a dreamless sleep. Yet with the chair came parchment and a quill, and Eufame allowed him to compose a short note to his mother. Dean Whittaker had sent word about Jyx’s removal to the house, but Jyx wanted to explain further himself. He was careful about what he said, knowing that a judge would be required to read the note to his mother, but he wanted her to know he was safe, and if everything went well, he’d finally be able to provide for them.
The note lay bound in a neat scroll on the fireplace, ready for delivery, and Jyx’s study journal lay open in his lap. Eufame instructed him to keep one, making notes on all he saw and learned in the Vault. After a week, his scratchy handwriting covered just one page of the notebook. So far, all he’d seen Eufame do was unwrap several mummies, but she spoke to them in an alien tongue as she did so, and Jyx noted only snippets of what he thought she’d said. Without access to a library, Jyx had no hope of translating any of it—even if he’d known what language it was.
His single page of notes related to the task Eufame allowed him to do. Sweeping the entire Vault took two days, after which he spent another two days mopping the floor. His decision to separate the ordinary dust from the magickal dust earned him a rare smile from Eufame, and by day five, she allowed him to disenchant the piles of bandages retrieved from the mummies. A Wolfkin took away the remaining linen to be burned in the House’s furnaces, while Jyx caught the enchantments in old glass bottles.
“Those enchantments may be reused, so we might as well keep them. It isn’t exactly safe to burn enchanted fabric. One never knows which charm will activate a rogue fire elemental,” Eufame had said.
She’d told him a tale about a previous apprentice who had done exactly that, and the ensuing flame plague almost destroyed half of the city. Jyx laughed at the requisite points of the story but he couldn’t help hearing a vague warning behind Eufame’s words. He spent the rest of the day storing the enchantment bottles in the cabinets up in the gallery.
He studied his notes, wondering what use he could find for this new skill. Perhaps he could disenchant the fabrics on sale in the Mystic Market, and sell the enchantments to the back street dealers of the Underground City. He tapped his quill against his lower lip, and frowned. There was a flaw in this plan—it required him to leave the House of the Long Dead, and Eufame didn’t even allow him to leave the Vault.
Movement caught his attention by the door. A pair of eyes burned like golden droplets of fire in the pool of darkness near the arch. Jyx closed the notebook and set it on the floor with the quill. Bastet padded into the chamber, flicking her tail as she went. She stopped three feet away from the rocking chair, and sat.
“Hello, Bastet. What are you doing in here?”
She wiggled her whiskers in reply, swishing her tail across the flagstone floor. She caught sight of the pewter plate beside the fireplace, a plate that had, until recently, held Jyx’s supper. The cat mewed, and Jyx tossed her a few morsels of chicken he’d saved from his meal. He’d never been in a position to have scraps to feed an animal before.
“Do you think Miss Delsenza would let me have a pet? I mean, I used to have my brothers and sisters to talk to at home. Well, I didn’t talk to them much, if at all, but they were there if I wanted to talk to them. It’s a bit, well, quiet here.”
Bastet stretched, never taking her liquid eyes off Jyx.
“I suppose you’re right. I’m still new here, and I doubt she’d let me have a pet in case it contaminated something. I just wish I had someone to talk to, or something to do.”
Bastet looked at the bookshelf, and back at Jyx. He followed her gaze to the single book.
“I’ve already read it.”
“Then read it again.”
Jyx looked up to see Eufame framed by the archway. His cheeks burned with shame, and he wondered what she’d heard. He thought again of the skeleton embedded in the upstairs floor.
“Good evening, Miss Delsenza.”
“Good evening, Jyx. I have been summoned to the Palace to give the prince a progress report, and I don’t really have time for it, but he doesn’t like to be kept waiting. However, I did take you on as an apprentice for a reason, so I was wondering if you’d care to expand your repertoire of chores?”
“Of course! What would you like me to do?” Jyx stood up, brushing the crumbs from his robe.
“There is a pot of salve in the Vault. I need you to anoint the eyelids of those mummies whom I have already unwrapped. The salve contains a particular compound that only the dead can see on the spiritual plane, and it will help guide them back to their body. It allows the dead to ‘see’, so to speak. Will you be able to manage that?”
“Of course, Miss Delsenza! What is the salve called?” Jyx snatched up his journal and quill, and dipped the pen into the inkwell on the mantelpiece.
“Aperuit oculos. If you have any concerns, then cease proceedings and ask me your questions when I return. If in doubt, do nothing. I would rather explain it again and use up more time than have you do it wrong. You don’t have any incantations to worry about, or anything of that sort. Merely smear the salve onto the eyelids, and move onto the next one.”
Jyx nodded, scribbling the name of the salve and a brief description of its use in his book.
“Then I shall bid you goodnight, Jyx. Do not wait up for me. I suspect I shall be some time. Bastet will remain here to keep you company, and there will be Wolfkin in the chambers upstairs should you require anything.”
Eufame turned and melted into the darkness beyond the archway. Jyx hurried into his bedchamber to change back into his working robe, and almost ran into the Vault, eager to begin work. Bastet followed him through the Vault and sat on the floor beside the central aisle.
The salve sat on the slab at the farthest end of the chamber beside a tiny corpse. Stripped of its bandages and protective charms, the mummy seemed vulnerable and fragile, and Jyx suppressed a shudder to see its sunken stomach and shrivelled limbs.
“It’s hard to believe this is royalty,” said Jyx, looking at Bastet. She gazed back, impassive as ever.
He dipped a finger into the gooey salve, and held it up to his nose. It smelled strongly of violets and peppermint, with an undertone of something darker, and more sinister. Holding his breath, he smeared a thin film onto both eyelids of the mummy.
“Well that’s one done. Hopefully he’ll be able to find his body now,” said Jyx.
He picked up the pot and moved onto the next slab, mindful of the cat watching him from the central aisle. Gazing down the Vault, he saw that Eufame had unwrapped half of the mummies already. He sighed, glancing at the doorway to his chambers.
I doubt I’ll be getting much sleep tonight.
Still, this was a big responsibility, and Eufame had left him alone to do it.
Jyx anointed the next mummy. Perhaps this would be his big chance to prove his worth, and leave behind the housework she’d made him do so far.