Cavern Scents Journey

Chink……  chink……  chink……

The quiet tink of glass rod on glass rim penetrated the drawn out wind-like sound I heard as I breathed in.

Chink…….

Leaning forward I inhaled the new combination of scents.  Ooof…  too much pine.

“Rats.”

Well, let it cook.  Smell it again in a few hours.  I thought about the painting — something different would be revealed today as the layers of oils and pigments interacted with each other.  These layers would interact, too, and in a day I would know in which direction the fragrance would go.  Perhaps it would not be so much for uplifting as for opening.  The pine would stay; maybe the rosemary would go.

I capped the test bottle and set it on the shelf.  “I’m sure you’ll let me know what you’ll be. “  For now it was test blend #54.

As I turned away, the cobalt bottle on the left caught my eye.  I nearly pulled away from it this time before reaching out to pick it up.  For some time I looked at the faded label, trying once again to make out the D’ni word.  It had sat on this shelf for a year now…. yes, it was nearly a year ago I had discovered it wedged between the rocks at the bottom of the ravine.  Holding it up to the light I could see the liquid inside and the thinness of the glass that belied the strength of the container.  I searched again for the scratch I knew wasn’t anywhere on the glass.

“How did you stay in there?” I asked again of the stopper.  The graceful curve of the three-edged stone top showed some wear, but gave no indication of its age.   There was one tiny chip in one of the edges that indicated it had fallen, but not the force of the impact.   In one moment the stopper seemed to have been carved, in the next to have been shaped and fired.  The ambiguity of D’ni materials no longer surprised me; still, I thought for the hundredth time about taking a needle tool to a very small section just to see if it would scratch.  Instead, I brought the bottle to my nose and sniffed the rim.  Such a faint scent that I couldn’t tell what it was.  Question after question marched through my thoughts — what was it?  Was it an absolute or a blend?  Cut or pure?  Was it dangerous?  A medicine?  A poison?  Who lost it?  Are they looking for it?

What does it smell like?

I could almost feel the intensity of the substance through the glass, at once beckoning me to make some use of it and warning me of its potential.  There was in it a feeling of something larger than affect — some power that was greater than any knowledge I had at present.  But for one thing I knew without doubt:

Opening the bottle would most certainly bring change.

Setting the bottle back on the shelf, I knew I would continue looking for answers.  The overgrowth on the road up above the rock outcropping had suggested a long duration of disuse.  What had been a small village some distance away was little more than crumbled huts abandoned for some time as well.  What timbers stood on their foundations of stone demonstrated the soundness of the construction.  Weeds, grass, thorny bushes kept prying hands from easily overturning its secrets.  Nothing had indicated who or what had been responsible for the bottle or its contents.

Travelers, perhaps, as I had been.

I breathed in again, enjoying the immediate sense of balance and peace that accompanied attending to the action.  Jurel was right about that — one cannot listen to their own breath and simultaneously think about anything else.  Or worry.  I nearly laughed at the simplicity of it and breathed in again, listening to the wind-like sound in my ears.

Yes, yes, ok, you are right about that one.  I will follow your advice this time.  Yes it does work.  Yes, yes, I’ll keep quiet about it.  Are you breathing or worrying about me talking too much?

We had both laughed that time.

The insight flashed and was gone before the smile on my face was fully formed.  An instant later it had given way to an open-mouthed “Oh….”

“No.”  I picked up test blend #54 and smelled it, opening my nostrils so the molecules of scent would reach the back of my nasal passages.  “Let it keep cooking,” I said as I replaced the bottle on the shelf and quickly exited the room.  “I don’t have time.”

Be careful, Ghaelen.  You’ll know things when you listen to your own breathing.  It’s the kind of knowing you can ignore, but you can’t un-know.

Yeah, yeah.  I know.  I mean, I know that you said that would happen, but not what it would… oh crap…

I heaved a breath, trying not to listen to it, knowing that, too, that I would listen.

I knew as well that I would go.  “Damn…”