Soup for the Spirit
Irvina was one of those towns that looked as if someone had accidentally put it in the middle of the forest and then forgotten to take it away. The houses had moss-covered roofs, the cobblestones protruded unevenly from under the leaves, and the people - although theoretically part of progressive Erinna - were tied to old rituals, mainly those of stock-taking and distrust of strangers.
Sharon Elcrest, a newcomer from the south, a sorceress with a dubious penchant for queuing, was just standing in one of them, outside a shop called “At Aurelian's - Soap, Potions, Flour”.
The name, it must be said, was sincere.
The queue was moving slowly, which meant that they had moved maybe two people in the last quarter of an hour. Sharon was trying not to look like she was about to turn someone into a frog, but it wasn't working out so well.
- 'Did you hear that Lord Delvra's daughter ran off with the elf again? - said the old woman in front of her, lowering her voice, but only enough for everyone within a three-metre radius to hear her.
- Elves can at least speak in full sentences, - replied her companion with a sneer. - Not like that last bachelor of hers, who only asked her for pictures of her feet through message spells.
Sharon raised an eyebrow. Erinna, land of modern magic and academic progress.
- Are you a witch? - asked suddenly a boy who had been watching her for a long while. He was maybe ten years old and his face expressed exactly what he had in mind - which was nothing subtle.
- “No,” Sharon replied, smiling slightly. I just have a face that magic likes.
Finally it was her turn. Standing in front of her was a counter man in an oversized apron and glasses that slipped down to the tip of his nose every now and then.
- What can I do for you? - He asked with the mannerism of someone who could have been past his second coffee, but wasn't.
Sharon glanced at the shelves behind him.
- 'Do you have any dried mountain irony leaves?
- Of irony? - He furrowed his brow. - 'That herb doesn't exist.
- Well it does, she replied with a slight smile. - In that case, I'll have some drops of sleeper root and a packet of unscrewed tea - the kind that supposedly works, but only if you don't look.
The cashier looked at her as if she had just demonstrated a rare knowledge of local jokes. Or she was completely mad. He searched the shelf.
- All that was left was tea. And a sleeping bag.... there was a trail. Yesterday.
- Then I take the tea, she said, tossing a coin. I... a bag of lavender. Just not the one with cucumber in it.
- The lavender without the cucumber, he repeated, handing her the fragrant bag.
Sharon put everything in the bag, nodded and left before someone asked her again if she was wearing linen or banshee leather robes.
The street was quiet. And it was going to stay that way until she heard:
- Miss sorceress!
The voice was nasal, draggy, and belonged to a man in brocade and with a cane that said “adornment” rather than “support”.
- Yes? - she turned around slowly, as if considering several possible spells to deactivate social conversation.
- “Lord Emilien de Volran, at your service,” he introduced himself, bowing with exaggerated elegance. ‘I have seen that you have an understanding of strange things.’
- Depends on what you mean by that.
- ‘Soup!’ - he called out conspiratorially. - ‘The spirit demands soup.’
Sharon muttered.
- Please repeat yourself.
- I have a ghost in the basement, he said, quieter now. Not a threatening one. At least not really. But persistent. He doesn't want to leave the house until he gets the one soup his mother supposedly cooked. The problem is that the ghost can't remember the exact recipe, and my cook only knows three things: meat, salt and pride.
Sharon was silent for a moment.
- And you thought that I ... sorceress... should cook soup for a dead man?
- No, no, not at all, but you can talk to him. Or read something out of the steam. Magic, meditation, I don't know. Alternatively, if you can... drive it away. But humanly, you know.
- Humanly.
- I have wine. And a very comfortable library.
Sharon looked at the sky, then at the man, then again at the shop, where the queue still numbered seven people.
- Fine, she said. 'But if he bites me, you will have to give me something more than wine.
- “Soup and reparation,” replied Lord de Volran with a nod. "How ... erinine."
Lord de Volran's house looked as if it had been built by someone who really wanted to show that he was not poor. Black wood balustrades, stained glass windows depicting ancestors who probably didn't live by the ethics of magical research, and above the door a coat of arms: a silver spoon stuck in an open book.
- The family motto? - Sharon asked, raising an eyebrow.
- “Wisdom through consumption,” replied the lord proudly.
The interior smelled of old paper, rose perfume and understated family drama. Sharon looked around the drawing room, where every piece of furniture looked as if it cost as much as a small merchant ship. Lord de Volran poured her wine into a goblet that might as well have served as a ceremonial helmet.
- Is the ghost in the cellar? - She asked, carefully sniffing the drink.
- Yes. Are you coming down now, or do you want to get acquainted with the... first? history? - He asked hopefully, reaching for an album full of portraits of his ancestors.
- I like surprises, Sharon said and started towards the stairs.
The cellar was cool and stony, lit only by a levitating ball of light that crackled from time to time, as if it had had enough of the place. A ghost sat on one of the barrels - translucent, dressed in an outfit from a previous era, with a bow tie and the expression on the face of a perpetually disgruntled literature professor.
He looked at Sharon as if she were a late student.
- Late,' he burbled.
- I didn't know ghosts had a schedule - she countered, facing him.
- It's not the schedule that rules, it's the hunger. Hunger for memories. Taste. Aroma. Love in the soup!
Sharon looked at him closely.
- Soup. What kind of soup exactly?
- It was thick. It smelled of parsley and.... something else. Smoked? I was seven years old. Then my mother died in a fire. All that was left was this soup. And the vanilla stick she tried to add, thinking it was nutmeg. It was awful.
- And you want...?
- To have that taste again. Then maybe I'll go away.
- Maybe?
- All right. I will leave. But only if you try it yourself. I need to make sure I'm not the only one feeling this.
Sharon sighed.
- 'I never thought I'd die because of a culinary curse.
- The lady hasn't died yet.
- That comforts me.
They spent the evening in the kitchen - Sharon, the ghost and a personally offended chef who claimed he “doesn't cook under pressure from the afterlife”. Sharon took charge, brewing a soup based on the description from the afterlife and her own intuition. She threw things into the pot with a certain alchemist's nonchalance: a little parsnip, a pinch of thyme, one stick of vanilla “for remembrance” and a drop of wine “for courage”.
After an hour, the whole house smelled of childhood, smoke and something unexpectedly warm.
The spirit floated over the steaming bowl. He dipped his ‘hands’ in the aroma, closed his eyes.
- This... that's almost it.
Sharon tasted a spoonful. The taste was strange - nostalgic, slightly bitter, but warm. Like a memory you don't quite know is yours.
The ghost looked at her, smiled for the first time and disappeared. All that remained was a slight hint of vanilla in the air.
As she left, Lord de Volran was waiting with a glass.
- Had it been successful?
- He's gone,' Sharon replied. - 'I don't know if it was magic or... home cooking. But he's gone.
- Are you going to stay for dinner? I've got a chef who knows three courses and he's already furious.
Sharon smiled crookedly.
- 'No, thank you. I have my own demons. And tea made from unscrewed leaves.
- Whatever that means.
- It means that sometimes all you need is some warm soup to make the soul go away.
She moved towards the exit, and Lord de Volran's house closed the door behind her with a quiet click. A calm evening hung over the rooftops of Irvina, and Sharon felt again that magic could sometimes be very human.
