Solo A woman who doesn't wear perfume has no future!

[Arianthe Swansong]

Time: 12th of Winter 512 AV - 1o'clock in the Afternoon Where: In the Old Part of the city is the Essence of Time. Tagged: Solo In which Arianthe turns her hand to the complicated art of making Perfumes. Xenil had told her not to contact him, that he had to go on a business trip and that he would send a messenger around at some point in the week after her first few lessons to set a time and date for the next three. She had been surprised by the man who had knocked on the door of her university lodgings the day before. Far from the errand boy she had expected, she had opened the door to find herself looking at an undeniably handsome young man, who had presented himself as Valentine Lightouch, Xenil's nephew, before practically inviting himself in. After some light conversation during which he had ventured flirtation which she had rebuffed lightly, he revealed the date of her next lesson and his intentions of maybe paying another visit during the week. Nevertheless, the note he had communicated to her revealed that on the 12th (the next day) the 13th and the 14th of the Season, all at 1o'clock for two or three hours, depending on how the lesson progressed, Xenil would be pleased to educate her. He also advised her to bring a clean apron so she guessed that, at last, she would be allowed to do something more practical. Now she was waiting in the main area of the shop, as around her well-dressed ladies and well-heeled dandies fluttered around like exotic birds. The elegant women, of which she might have been a member if her father's business had not fallen into economic hardship, completely ignored her, looking at her with ill-disguised dislike. A dislike she could not understand how she had earned for, though not dressed in the latest fashion, she looked far from a dirty ruffian that might pick their pockets - she was simply a young woman currently low on funds, not without an education. The affluent men on the other hand looked at her very pleasantly, almost saccharinely so with winks and smiles galore, and she could not help feeling uncomfortable. After all, as well as being famous for perfume, the gossip went around that the Essence of Time was considered the perfect place for wealthy gentleman to find a companion in an illicit affair. The last few times she had been there, the atmosphere had been completely different but, then again, every previous time she had arrived in the early morning when, she supposed, high society were still arraying themselves beautifully for the day ahead. Therefore, those who appeared then must have been an early crowd of the comfortable middle class with less prejudice and less of a judgemental nature. It was therefore with relief that she noted Xenil standing in the doorway, indicating that she join him which she thought she might do at a run, so eager was she to escape from all the looks of the people around her. "Are you alright?" asked he with a smile as she joined him, "Do not worry. The customers are not usually this bad, in terms of snobbery evidently, however seven members of the McPinaulty family are here today because I believe there is a ball in a couple of days for Fiona McPinaulty's twenty-first Birthday and she is a collector of perfumes. Vile girl, but one of my best customers. Oh, and of course, the worse perpetrators in treating their fellow browsers with discourtesy are the eypharian. Fortunately, every delegation I've ever had from Ahnatep have treated me with great respect, which can't be said for the way they treated the assistants at the counters and some of the other customers." "Do you often speak that way of your clients?" "There are very few clients I have ever had as vile as Fiona McPinaulty. I believe she wears so many different perfumes to make up for the fact that she looks so much like a blonde otter that has just swallowed a lemon. Not that that is the issue, of course. If she showed any proof of compassion, gratitude or open mindedness, I might like her, even spoilt and foolish as she is." "The McPinaulty's are rather like that, aren't they?" "Yes, they are. Dreadful Family and so hypocritical to behave the way they do... it's a very nouveau riche family." "Is that not a little snobbish in itself?" "Perhaps, but I can afford to be." Arianthe raised her eyebrows at this, but Xenil continued with an amused smile, "After all, in all else, I am a picture of courtesy and goodness. Now, shall we start the lesson?" Arianthe nodded affirmatively. "We'll do a little theory first, then I hope you have brought your apron?" Arianthe nodded again. "Very well, so sit down." She did so, settling into the same plush red velvet armchair in the centre of the workshop/laboratory/study she had on every other previous visit. Xenil settled down behind his marble desk and started with a warm smile. "I will start by explaining Fragrance Families, though of course grouping perfumes into such restricted classes will never be a wholly objective or final process since, obviously to anybody who has any experience in this area, almost every successful fragrance contains elements of many different families. Even a perfume designated as being of a single flower, such as...?" At this Xenil looked at Arianthe and she realised he wanted example. "Well, examples of popular floral fragrances are Lavender, Rose and Jasmine." He nodded and continued, "That which we would call 'True' singular scents are very rarely found in perfumes since such a thing would require the perfume to be in existence purely as a sole aromatic material. Are you keeping up?" "Yes, indeed." "So these Fragrance families are more of a starting point than anything else when one is trying to describe a perfume, but they cannot by themselves indicate the specific characteristics of each and every individual perfume." "What are the families?" "I will tell you the names of each family and you will tell me what might be in those families. We can do it in alphabetic order. Aquatic?" "Reminiscent of the Sea?" "Yes, though I must stress to add that that means a clean, fresh, often androgynous scent rather than that of salt, sailors and rotten fish." Arianthe smiled at this, realising quickly that he had said the last with humour. "We progress on to Citrus?" She considered this for a moment before replying, "Fresh, like Oranges and Lemons?" "Yes, I personally don't like them. They're too acidic for my taste and it's a very lucrative business to deal with them, mainly due to the low endurance of these acidic essences. The next, Fern, I would not expect you to know, so I'll tell you, it's anything built on a base of coumarin, lavender or oakmoss. Also, there are some in this category which smell more like cut grass, cucumber and leaves. And so... there are two different types of floral. Single Floral?" "Fragrances that have only one scent from one single flower?" "Correct. As opposed to Floral Bouquet, which is...?" "Fragrances which have a combination of several flowers in one scent." "Fruity?" "Fragrances which are made up of scents relating to fruit." "Yes. For example, my personal favourites are apple, peach, cassis, mango, passion fruit and raspberry. Leather?" "Fragrances which include elements such as tobacco, wood and honey. Sometimes they bear resemblance to the aroma of leather." "I could not have said it better myself. Of course, there is often the misapprehension that the Leather Family is purely for male perfumes, which is completely wrong. I often use elements of these in my Female Perfumes. The last two of any importance are Oriental and Wood." "I suppose Oriental is rather like how one would imagine an Eypharian would smell, with sweet scents such as that of ambergris or labdanum. Maybe a little incense, strong and very exotic. Wood, I imagine, is the complete opposite as in scents which are dominated by tree-like scents. Quite self-explanatory." "Very self-explanatory though I will note that typically sandalwood and cedarwood are used. Patchouli is very useful to achieve this affect too." At this he stood up very quickly and walked over to where Arianthe was sitting, "Put on your apron." Arianthe obeyed, taking a white apron out of her little bag and put it on before following Xenil (who had likewise put on an apron though, he assured her with an air that he was lightly teasing her, it was more to protect his clothes from her mess rather than his own. He, apparently, had too much experience to make a mess) over to the back of the large room where there was a wooden desk on which was resting a pair of golden scales, some distillation equipment, little glass jars - some empty, others with flower petals or a little liquid in them - cutting equipment and a couple of pestle and mortar. Xenil immediately passed her the better quality, marble pestle and mortar and assured her with a warm smile that he would be fine with the simple stone one, though he indicated that they would not be using them. The next couple of hours hailed a journey of bliss and discovery for Arianthe. Xenil had picked out all the ingredients for the perfumes beforehand and placed them on the workshop so they would be able to get down straight to the technique. It was also so she had the best idea of what to do, he said, that they were making the same perfume. He had opened a little book with a marble cover to the thirtieth page or so and placed it on stand so they could both clearly read the instruction written in Xenil's immaculate handwriting. "This is the simplest of my popular perfumes." said he with a smile, "I thought we would try preparing it today. It uses a distillation technique." With this, he launched straight into his practical lesson. He lit a strange metal instrument that was not unlike a candle and a hot flame flickered out. Then he placed a tripod over this with a little metal grid. On top of the grid he placed a glass jar. He had several of each item in boxes and indicated that Arianthe do exactly the same which she did, although she jumped a little at the speed with which the flame came into being over the metal instrument. Once they both had their equipment in place, Xenil went to fill up both of their jars with clean water which, he explained, had to pre-prepared to make it as pure as possible. It took a few minutes for the water in the jars to boil and, once it did, he placed a second metal grid over it. At this, Xenil picked up a handful of pink and white rose petals, specifically choosing those least bruised and indicating that Arianthe do the same. It took her quite a while more than it had taken Xenil, but she was happy with them. Xenil placed two glass funnels around each of the jars so that the petals were completely covered though not actually touching the jars, he explained, so that excess air could escape. The glass funnel was attached to a long glass tube which went around and was itself attached to a sort of large glass bottle with a single long neck and a round bottom, which Xenil called a Florentine flask. "You see, the steam from the boiling water is passed through the raw material, in this case the rose petals, which forces out the volatile fragrant compounds which they contain. The condensation of scent comes up through the tube until it settles back into liquid form in this flask." He pointed to the Florentine flask. "When the process is finished, the perfume essence will have gathered there. To make any significant amount of a good quality usually takes a few days but, in this case, I think we can just do with a few drops for experimental purposes. Ahem. This process is most usually used for fresh plant elements such as leaves, stems and, of course, flowers." "Now, what happens?" "Well, we wait for some liquid. And, I think, in the meantime you can smell some more perfumes and tell me what they remind you of. Oh, and since you have learnt it now, you can explain to me what family you think they belong to."

[Arianthe Swansong]

Time: 13th of Winter 512 AV - Half past one o'clock in the Afternoon Arianthe was running late, half an hour late, when she arrived at the shop and she was flushing violently because of the strenuous nature of the exercise. She had to straighten up her skirts before entering and found, with no great surprise, that Xenil had gone out to see a client and would not be back for at least a quarter of an hour but then would be happy to take the lesson. Although the atmosphere still made her a little uncomfortable in the shop, it was not half so bad as the day before, and she soon forgot her nerves and looked quite happily around at the perfumes bottles surrounding her. She didn't dare to open any of them, though around her sophisticate ladies were pulling off stoppers left, right and centre. Well, she supposed with a cynical smile that they could afford to buy them. She was quite happy, looking at the selection of names... some named after goddesses or notable women, but there were many more intriguing and she supposed less obvious ones - Symenestra's Tongue in a tall, ice blue bottle, Dawn's Paradox in a lightly golden bottle with a spherical base, then tons more: Lady of the Lake, Guilt, Mirth, Desperate Romantic, Azura, Blue Feather, Ghost, Valley of Secrets, Watchtower, Orlando, Forgotten, Enduring Memory, Sweet Dreams, Cold Dreams, Spiced Dreams, Sugar Dreams... There was a whole section of 'dreams' all in beautiful, small, slightly misshaped bottles. "Miss Swansong." Arianthe turned around at a soft voice suddenly very close to her and saw Valentine standing there, smiling lightly. "Can I help you? My Uncle should return very soon." "No thank you, though it's kind of you to ask." "You had problems getting here?" Arianthe flushed, being reminded of her tardiness, "Yes. I was halfway here and had an accident with a woman and a vat of cold soup which she was carrying on her head. I had to go home and wash my hair, then change." "I imagine that even with soup over you, you looked charming." Arianthe did not reply. Rather, she nodded in response to the compliment, smiled apologetically and turned back to looking at the bottles. Valentine smiled in turn and looked like he was going to say something else when Xenil entered and Valentine was called back to a counter by an elderly women with small, circular spectacles balancing a tiny red vial on the palm of her left hand. Xenil walked over and greeted her, kindly making no mention of her tardiness. They went over through into the back room and went straight onto the practical side of learning. They found the flask containing the liquid where the evaporation and distillation process had been going on continuously for almost 24 hours. There was more than enough liquid for a mild perfume. With Xenil's guidance, she turned off the flame and, after a minute, removed the flask on the other end which was half full. Before she placed a piece of square cloth over it and tied it securely with an elastic band, she noted that a light and pleasing scent of roses was emanating from it. The cloth, Xenil explained, served to keep the essential oils in and helps to remove the waste. There was then a while to wait in which Arianthe cleared the area, returning the items to their places and the tripod to the window sill from which one could see the back garden of a grand house. She wondered who it might belong to. Finishing this and wiping the surfaces clean, she returned to the flask. Carefully, very carefully, very painstakingly, she poured the contents of the flask equally into ten long, thin tubes. She put a stopper on these and then, at Xenil's suggestion, poured molten wax over nine of the tubes in order to seal them. She put these nine into a little stand and Xenil stored them in a cupboard. The tenth she placed steadily in a wooden frame. Xenil nodded and asked her which other essential oils and essences she would like to add to the rose one. "I think I would like a little lemon essence. Something zesty, though I know that citrus scents are difficult to deal with..." she changed her mind as she considered this, "Actually passion fruit would be fine." Without saying a word, Xenil went to a different cupboard and drew out a little tub with 'Passion Fruit Essential Essence' scrawled across the label. Slowly, with a pipette she placed six drops of the passion fruit essence into the rose liquid, smelling the concoction after each drop to make sure nothing was overpowering. Pleased with the result, she brandished it in Xenil's direction. Coming over, he inhaled then smiled but said nothing and handed it back to her. "Would you like to add anything else?" "Watermelon essence?" "I ran out of that this morning. We can make some more tomorrow." Arianthe flushed and nodded. "Put a stopper on this perfume, put it away then sit down and tell me what you would do about marketing. What would you call it? What sort of bottle would you have it in?" Arianthe hadn't thought about this and said so, but at his insistence, she turned her mind to it and, with his encouragement, eventually came up with an idea. "I could call it Ingénue and I would imagine it in a sort of curvy, light orange bottle with a little gilded top." "Ah?" "Yes. This may seem strange, but in order to make it slightly different and iconic, maybe a bottle in the shape of a wrist and a hand, a hand in a sort of graceful, upright curve." Xenil smiled and raised his eyebrows but let her continue. "Like this." She indicated with her own hand how she imagined it, "But light orange, a warm orange, and with gold ornamentation." There was a little more conversation on the particulars of how this bottle might work, then the lesson was finished for the day.