Read Writers of the Future, Volume 28 for Free Online

there, for it was impossible for Lan to see what he was taking out.
    There were hundreds of books to go though, most of which had at the very least a few legible pages, some with whole sections that’d not been burned. It took Lan weeks of working every night to collect them all as he cleared out the ash.
    It was midsummer when the house was finally back in order. Nothing like it’d been before Haigh had died. Too empty for that. But it was clean, as if ready for a new Apothecary to take up residence. Lan walked the rooms for a few nights dusting shelves that didn’t need dusting, finding imaginary specks of dirt that required cleaning, until he realized the dull feeling rising up inside of him was an echo of how his head felt on a daily basis. Empty. Hollow.
    Lonely.
    He mentioned the feeling once to Jaddi, who didn’t look up from where she was easing a layer of skin off the back of her hand, a grimace upon her face. “Were you feeling that all along ? ”
    He thought for a moment, then said, “No. Not at all. Just recently when the house became clean and there’s nothing left for me to do.”
    “Nothing ? Maybe that’s the problem.” She looked up at him and raised her hands. “Don’t you know how to make that cream he was always giving me every week ? ”
    Lan shrugged. “Sure.” He knew it better than Haigh probably did these last few years, considering he’d been the one making it.
    “Well, why didn’t you say so before ? ” She looked almost cross. “Would have saved me a bit of frustration. This—” She waved a hand in front of his face again—“runs in the family.”
    It took all of an hour, spread out over a few nights as he had to dry a few things and grind them down, but it was an hour where the headache eased and the loneliness slipped away. Worth every second he spent.
    So thanking Jaddi profusely, he filled the dead of nights with collecting and drying. He found the old trees he’d been collecting sap from and hung new buckets, preparing for when it started running. There was no recreating some of the things Haigh had stored around his workroom, many of which had been ordered from out of country, with some, Lan suspected, on the underground market. Though, those that hadn’t been bought illegally were just as expensive. But he took to stocking what he knew he could find.
    Despite that not being very much, he still quickly ran out of jars and had to walk farther into town to visit the potter about more.
    “It’s been a long while since you’ve stopped by asking after those,” he said. Kiag was a short man, with a straight face and quiet disposition, one of those who always had Lan wondering what it was he thought about a man made entirely of woven wood and baskets.
    “Yes.” Lan bobbed his head as he spoke. “But many of Haigh’s things had been broken, and I’d like to replace them.”
    Kiag raised his eyebrows just enough for Lan to be able to tell they’d actually moved. “Have you found out what happened to him ? Losing him was a blow to this town. Anyone who’d been his client has had to either send from the next town, costing at least three times as much, or suffer in silence.”
    Lan shook his head slowly. “I don’t know.”
    The potter hmm ed to himself. “I’m not one for gossip. I can assure you I’d been letting the things being whispered about him wash over my back. However, if you’re taking up his mantle, I’ll be sure to spread the word.”
    Stuttering a thanks, Lan quickly put down a payment to get the potter started on his order and backed out of the shop, too flustered at the thought of doing half of what Haigh had. It was only after he’d walked halfway back to Jaddi’s house and had noticed a few people dodging his glances that he remembered the other half of what Kiag had said and wished he’d thought to ask.
    He started to ask Miss Amain when he saw her. Then, feeling all his baskets turn a notch and their contents shifting inside him