Sourvine Steward

THE SOURVINE CELLAR

Barrovax the Rot-Vintner bottles the kingdom's grief by the year, and a cellar of that size wants stewards. His are cellarmen pickled in their own stock — vinegar-veined, vine-wrapped, courteous in the old trade manner as they rack the casks of sorrow. They will recite the vintages to anyone who descends. They will not, under any persuasion, let a visitor near the '06.