Rœkia and Lukina worked their way southward before turning west to cut through the center of Boreas. They'd stopped in the Weeping Woods for the night and when morning rose Rœkia went off to go hunting, leaving Lukina at the makeshift den site. She wasn't content to just sit inside all day so she followed her arctic fox companion, Magnolia out of the den to go learn about white willow bark. She followed along, tail wagging an admiring the sunlight glinting off her companions silver horns. She'd seen several horned wolves since coming to Boreas and she thought they looked so regal.

The little fox stopped near one of the willow trees, reaching out a tiny white paw she tapped the tree. "This is a white willow here. Note its look and its smell." Lukina gazed at the large tree before standing on her hind legs and running her front paws over the rough, grayish bark. The tree was flowering though with the cold weather the blooms were incased in ice. It was both beautiful and sad to see the sunlight winking through the ice encased flowers.

Flashes of black and purple showed through the trees as the Fatalis girl charged uncaring through them. The long spines along her spine were held ridgedly up in her annoyance, and she could feel her claws on the edge of being bared though experience thought her to keep them sheathed while running as much as possible so they didn't fray and wear. "Its stupid," she was complaining loudly to the blue jay that wove theough the branches above her. "She wants us to train on our own but we're kids. We're supposed to be taught. How the fuck am I supposed to train myself in something I don't know how to do?" It had been a common refrain lately from the youth, who was pissed off about the injustice. She'd been deliberately refusing to go crawling to her elder sister to beg for the lessons that should have been given to them, purely out of rebelliousness. The jay, who was used to the refrain, just cackled harshly to egg her on.

"She just doesn't want any of us to be able to challenge her for her rank. She thinks if Dad thinks we are useless, she'll get all his attention and no one will be able to be better than her. Its bullshit! She only got her rank because the last Reaper was too useless to fight for it, and the guy who fought her let her win because he's in loooove." She made a gagging noise. "I mean, you should have seen him at that meeting. He was practically fawning all over her and kissing her ass. She didn't even bother fighting Gossy when she challenged her, he did it for her!"

The cat bounding alongside her shrugged. "If you want to challenge her shouldn't you be finding training instead? She isn't the only one who could teach you, you know. There are plenty of birds in the thicket."

Aris snorted rudely. "Who in the Armada is going to bother actually teaching us now that they think we are getting training? I'd have to go outside the pack to..." She hit the brakes suddenly, so that the cat who had kept running had to backtrack. The jay landed on a thin willow branch, head cocked as he eyed her interestedly. Duh! She was running off anyway, why shouldn't she find a mentor outside the pack? "I," she announced determinedly, "am going to find a mentor."

"About time," the cat muttered, fastidiously licking a paw and running it over her ears. Ari stuck her tongue out at the cat, but refrained from imagining the best way of disemboweling her - Aris' mom had given her Tansy as a fluffy little green-eyed kitten so they'd basically grown up together, and she tried to avoid murdering friends. Besides, Tansy was a badass hunter and a scrappy little fighting partner. She'd be pretty much irreplaceable.

Ignoring the rude tongue, Tansy cocked her head to the side, listening. Ari did the same, and caught the sound of someone talking. This is a white willow here. Note its look and its smell.

"Well that sounds like some fucking lessoning to me, eh?" the jay called down raucously, taking off in a racket of wings and cackling at her as he went his own way, as he often did. The foul-mouthed asshole of a bird stuck around mostly to mock her and teach her bad language, and having her go cadge plant lessons of a stranger wasn't the jay's idea of interesting.

Aris took off in the direction of the nearby voice and nearly blundered into the strange pale pup and her far odder vulpine companion. "Hey!" she blurted out, fascinated. "You have antlers! Cool!"

Rolling her eyes at Ari, Tansy spoke up from behind her - having, of course, had the sense to not nearly knock over a stranger. "We heard you talking about the willows. Are you healers, by chance? Aris is an untutored heathen and could use some schooling, if you are teaching." She directed her velvety purr of a voice at the fox, who of them was clearly the only one old enough to be teaching anything.

Lukina sniffed at the tree, inhaling strongly as she noticed the slight smell of wintergreen as well as a noteable bitterness. She was pulled from her thoughts as she heard something coming towards her. She stumbled back, fur frizzed up in surprise as another pup appeared. Luki quickly noted the saber fangs and the pretty purple hues in the older girls coat. "Wow, I like your fangs!" He fur relaxed as the small cat explained that the other girl, Aris, was looking for some tutoring in healing. Lukina nearly bounced at the news. "Really? That's great! My name's Lukina and I'm learning about healing too. This is my friend, Magnolia. She teaches me when my cousin goes off hunting. She also knows a lot about healing… and not so nice plants." Rœkia had a nasty habit of threatening her with all kinds of strange poisons when she didn't behave. It was mean!

Magnolia cleared her throat. "You're welcome to join us. Since we're surrounded by so many willow trees I thought we'd discuss willow bark today. All willows can be used medicinally, but I'm focusing on the bark of the White Willow." The little fox reached out and patted the tree that they'd been looking at. "The bark of a willow tree can be chewed to help with pain. Though, you must be very careful in letting someone under a year old ingest it. It could cause a terrible reaction." She looked pointedly at Lukina, knowing the pup really enjoyed chewing on just about everything she could fit in her mouth.

"I'd like to have you girls do more than just listen to me prattle on. We're going to make a poultice for injuries like bruising, mild lacerations, and headaches. This can be done by mashing up the bark or leaves, or making a strong tea to place over an injury." The didn't have any fire as Wolf was with Rœkia hunting but they could do without for the purpose of this lesson. The little fox started digging around in a hide bundle that had been sent near the den entrance. She pulled out a ceramic bowl and brought it over to Aris. Lukina fetched her own.

"Go ahead and gather some of the bark and leaves. You can use your claws to scrape at the bark."

"Ah great, thanks!" Ari plopped herself down next to the other girl, ready to learn. Get this education started. She grinned at Lukina, bearing the thick oversized teeth the girl had been admiring. "I'm Aris Fatalis! But call me Ari. I'm from the Armada, my dad's the alpha there. This is Tansy, she's my cat. So... your cousin knows what like... poisons?" The spark of interest was obvious in those blue eyes, but when Tansy poked at her with a warning hsst she settled back for her edicating - though she stuck her tongue out at the cat.

She leaned forward to study the icy tree in more detail. A terrible reaction eh? "Neat! What kind of reaction?" The possibilities with that one were endless... She gave the fox her most charming smile in the hopes of being enlightened.

Of course the actual uses were pretty good too, so the girl committed them to her admittedly formidable memory along with the sight of the tree and its species. Take care as she pushed the borrowed bowl ahead of her she went to a tree. Her claws sprang free of their sheaths, the natural feline weapons she kept carefully sharpened gleaming wickedly. Not knowing Lukina had her own secret retractable weaponry, she gave the albino pup a sly grin and flexed her paws so the claws showed off to their best advantage, then ran them delicately along the trunk to peel off strips of bark. Watch a boring normal wolf's claws do that! The leaves were easy, just run the thin branch between two toes so her paw pads caught the leaves and stripped them off. Easy peasy. She flexed her forepaws a couple more times to clean the bark from the gleaming surfaces before resheathing them with a flourish.

Lukina nodded at Ari's question. "Yea, she's always threatening to poison me if I'm not good. Sometimes I think she's making stuff up but then Magnolia will say its true. My cousin's a poophead." Lukina made a face. Cousins could be a pain some times. She liked this new girl, her companion though was a bit unnerved as Aris leaned in for more details on the reactions. Magnolia looked at the girl, expression serious. "It's rare but in some children it can cause the liver and brain to swell, even leading to death. At any age too much is dangerous as it could cause internal bleeding and liver damange." She glanced to Lukina to make sure the girl was listening before continuing. "Often times the line between a healing medicine and a poison is in the dosage."

Lukina listened as her companion spoke, heeding the information as a tale of caution to help prevent her from accidentally hurting patients instead of helping them. Lukina took her bowl, teeth delicately clasped over the lip, and trotted closer to the tree. She set the bowl down and glanced over at Aris as the girl stretched up the tree and her claws unsheathed. Lukina gasped then grinned. "Hey! Cool, you have claws like I do!" Her delicate white paws touched the bark and a second later, ivory claws hooked into the bark. Scratching down she worked off pieces of the bark before scooping them into the bowl and also adding a few leaves.

"Ok, now there are a couple ways to make the poultice. You can chew the leaves or bark to help break them down into a paste. Just note that you will be affected by the plant using this method. The other way is to soak them in water to make them more pliable. Warm water would be ideal but I'm short a fire. Go ahead and add some water then start mashing it with one of our bones"

Lukina grabbed the water skin from the travois and set it between her paws. "Ummm… how much?"

"Just enough to get things moist to start out with, you can always add more later." Lukina nodded and poured in the water. She then grabbed a deer fibula and tibula and trotted back over to where her mixture and Aris were. She set the bones down, grabbing one before tilting her head and trying to mash it. Ugh… this was hard. Deciding that was too much of a pain she started using her claws and paws to mash the materials into uhhh… not a paste. The leaves were pasty, the bark not so much.