The Warlock

Rain in Kadagv

As it turned out, I had come upon the Warlock on a day he was indulging in alchemy. When I entered the hut, I found it in disarray, with ingredients strewn everywhere, strange smells emanating from the cauldron in the fireplace, and an odd aura in the air. It was the aura of an incomplete potion—and the Warlock was already back to his craft. He stood in the center of the large room, at an oak table, sorting through the chaff of some herb. I approached him, and stood across the table from him.

In the darkness of the hut, the Warlock's stature was even more haughty and larger-than-life. The hut was built for a person much shorter than he was. As he stood at the table, his back was bent forward, and the top of his head was touching the thatch roof of the hut. His blonde locks of hair scratched against the thatch, and his eyes stared down from the ceiling at me, forking lightning.

"What is this herb, apprentice?" He asked me, his voice flat and curt in the enclosed space.

I looked down at the chaff in his hands. The stems half a foot long, tips diffuse, flowers dry, brittle-brown... roots thin, white, without dirt.

"Kaleidoscope Nettle?" I asked, tentatively. The Warlock's gaze had not faltered from me, and he nodded, slowly. Without another word, he went back to sorting the chaff. I was just glad to be correct. My alchemy was a little rusty.

After sorting, we went to the cauldron together. I tried to figure out the aura and composition of the potion. The water dull purple, the smoke gray-on-black, the smell burnt. No bubbles, smooth, mirror-like surface. I frowned. I had never seen such a potion before.

"You're wondering what this is," the Warlock said. "I said I would teach you to make love-potions."

"But... I don't understand, Master," I faltered. "This is no love-potion I've ever seen."

Slowly, the Warlock nodded. "Indeed. Most common love-potions are gilded in Witch's Worrywart and Fireweavel Dust. But this is no common love potion."

I did not feel the need to say anything. I wondered what this potion was made of. The dull purple suggested herbal base, but the water was as smooth as glass...

"Tell me the main effects and powers of love-potions, apprentice."

I pulled out every bottom-drawer of my mind in search of the effects I had learned from the Grimoire. Love... love...

"They place the object into a trance controlled by a subject, through the medium of hormonal disruption and stimulation of erogenous zones."

"Close enough, yes," the Warlock said. His head was bent over the cauldron, and he was slowly dropping the Nettle into the water, one strand at a time, and churning the mixture, slowly. "What you realize is that the effect of a love potion is a purely physiological effect. It can be equated to a magickal handjob."

I tried to blink away my shock as the Warlock continued—

"This love potion, however, performs a psychological effect. It is a much milder... more ethical effect, in my opinion."

"I—I see..."

I thought I understood what he was saying, but I was still just shocked to hear the word handjob spoken by a master witch.

"Using this love-potion on a man is akin to getting him drunk. However, it is not the intoxication of the alcohol I am talking about. This potion—you ought to be writing this down—rids its object of any inhibitions they have towards the subject."

I was frantically searching in my robes for some paper, but found none.

"No matter, I will let you use my quills and ink."