As one of the highest ranking healers, or maybe the highest ranking he wasn’t quite sure, Indigo led the expedition of wolves outside the packlands. It was winter so the maned man didn’t really believe they would be finding much in this season, but he was by far big enough to help move the snow back for the rest of his group to look at the frozen plants.

He didn’t think about how familiar it felt to the days of the roaming nomad band, if he did he knew how easy it was to get carried away with his emotions. He’d mourned what he’d lost long enough, now was time to focus on the future. Not just his own either. Indigo was quite honored Manea had the faith in him to entrust him with this task.

He gave Satira a grin as he waded into the deep snow and like the bison, began to use his huge head to move the snow out of the way of the ground. At the very least they might be able to harvest some roots if they could tell what was under it all.

"Speech"

Satira still felt very much like a rookie when it came to her healing skills. Her father, whom had been the bulk of her education on the subject, made his presence scarce, and thus her lessons and skills had suffered for it. She tried her best to practice and rehearse what she had learned, but with no formal training beyond the basics, she still felt very green—pun intended—when it came to identifying helpful herbs and how to best use them in medicinal applications. Today, however, her limited skillset would be put to use helping out the pack her family's little caravan had decided to bunker down with through the duration of the winter. Elysium wanted to expand their borders south and take the Firefly Lake into their fold, and she had been tasked to help identify medicinal herbs in the area the pack could make use of. Even better, her Uncle Indigo was the one leading the expedition! And so, with a bright smile and eager eyes, Satira set forth from the island and out to explore the wild lands.

Indigo led the charge, bustling through the dense snow like a massive purple mammoth and clearing a path for the tiny Tira to trudge easily through. With all the heavy snowfall in the north of the continent, it was hard to find any plants, let alone identify them properly! But dammit, they had to try for Manea! Indigo used his bulky head to clear out patches of snow for her to sift through with agile paws, upturning snow and dirt to find any foliage or roots hidden beneath the snow and ice. As he shifted about a patch, she spotted a flash of red, and quickly began to dig through the snow and dirt, feline claws helping her excavate the herb to the surface. She recognized the valerian root from her lessons with her father and almost cheered with delight as she plucked it from the frozen earth. "Look, Uncle Indy! Valerian root!" she exclaimed, stashing it away in the small satchel she carried around her side. "My dad said it was good for the immune system, and helps bring you energy when you're tired."

"Satira"

With Merrick back on his feet, Keelin was free to continue her efforts in growing more comfortable being a pack wolf and learning more of the wolves that they lived with. When a group began to form to go out and scout the new land that Manea had begun to stake her claim on for healing herbs she volunteered to come along. Following along at the back of the cluster that was lead by a large violet man that she had learned was named Indigo, she let her ruby gaze begin to scan the landscape to find any herbs that might have managed to survive the winter well enough to harvest. It was going to be slim pickings this time of year, but she had hope that once the weather warmed again they would have better luck. She glanced up when the smaller girl that was with them, Satira she believed she was called, mentioned finding valerian root it encouraged Keelin to keep looking. Looking over the rush of cattails, she spotted a willow tree near the edge of the lake and she went over to it, quickly realizing it was a White Willow. The long branches were not much more than gangly sticks right now, but that didn't matter much since it was the bark she wanted. Hopping up so that her paws were resting on the trunk, she began to break and pull away pieces of the bark from a section of the tree, tucking them into her satchel as she went.

"Keelin"

When Scylla had been asked to fill in for someone else in the aspect of healing, the girl was a little surprised. Well, more than a little surprised. She was less of a healer and more of a...taker-aparter. A puter-backtogetherer. Something like that. Still, when she was asked to accompany the group, she did so without complaint. She was supposed to be here making her father proud or something.

The others dug around in the snow to see if they could find anything useful while the small fae padded out onto the ice of the lake. With one dexterous little paw, she wiggled a tall stalk sticking up through the ice. "Cattails," she explained loud enough for the group to hear. "The roots can be cooked and the puffy tops can be burned to keep insects away." Useful stuff since a lake was bound to be bug infested.

"Scylla Klein"

Satira followed behind him, having much easier of a time in the snow as her huge uncle pushed it all out of the way for her tiny paws. He smiled as he looked back over his shoulder as her as she parsed through all of the frozen plants he revealed. Indigo was slow going, so he hadn’t gotten more than a step or two when he heard Satira’s soft voice behind him.

She easily gained his attention, and the maned man turned around, blue eyes falling on the frozen plant. He was very impressed she could so easily identify the plant with it being so damaged from the cold. Valerian root. Indigo grinned proudly at her as she carefully harvested the plants from the cold ground. The snow had actually acted as protection and insulation. "Your dad was right, good job in remembering." He praised her softly before his attention shifted to Keelin as she harvested Willow bark a ways off and the young Scylla spoke up about the cattails that she had found. Indy wasn’t about to go out onto the frozen water, so she was the perfect she wolf to gather the useful plant.

"Speech"

Satira beamed proudly when Indigo smiled and confirmed that she had indeed remembered the correct uses and applications for valerian root. Yes, score one for the wolf-dog! Around them, Keelin and the girl she didn't know from the southern pack were also looking about for healing plants they could make use of. The Elysian wolf found willow bark, and the Fenmyrian found cattails—although maybe "finding" them was a bit of a stretch of the word, since they were all readily poking up out of the ice covering the lake. Still, credit where credit was due. Wasting no time, Tira bounded through the trenches in the deep snow her uncle was leaving in his wake to help her navigate the snow-covered fields. Making her way over towards the pebbly shores of the lake, Satira started to look around at some of the aquatic plants that sprung up from the ice, almost all of them frozen solid in place. Really, this expansion would've been significantly easier if they waited for the spring thaw, but she wasn't about to start questioning the decisions of their hosts. That wasn't her place.

Pushing through some dried tall grass and cattails, Satira found some dark green shoots of horsetail growing along the moist soils of the shore. Another helpful herb! Grinning to herself, the sable yearling rushed over and flexed her paws to extend her feline claws, using the razor sharp weapons to slice through the frozen stalks with some effort. "Got horsetail over here!" she shouted out to the group, gathering up a few stalks to take back with her. The horsetail would make good binding agents, but also contained a good amount of biotin to reinforce claws.

"Satira"

The willow bark was difficult to harvest with everything being so cold and frozen so it took her longer than she would have liked to collect a good amount, but eventually she was satisfied and she hopped back down off of the tree trunk. Turning back toward the group, she went back around the edge of the lake to see that the others had slightly more interesting luck than herself. Valerian root, cattails, horsetail... Considering the fact that it was the dead of winter they were making out very well. As she rejoined Indigo, she said conversationally, If we're finding this much now, imagine how it will be through the spring and summer." After living on the ship for so long she had never really had a readily available assortment of herbs in her life so this was a welcome change. Already with the gardens that had been constructed on the island she had a decent supply, but she was interested to see how this land around this lake developed in the warmer months.

"Keelin"

Having snapped off the cattails that stuck through the ice, Scylla made her way back to the group, tossing the stalks in a basket that lay there. The young fae's mismatched gaze shifted around them. Plants were difficult to find in all of the snow, but trees weren't. "There's a lot of river birch," she pointed out with one dexterous digit. "It's good for building and the sap is good for adhesive." It was something at least. "You can also use fresh, green twigs to make tea." Scylla needed honey in her tea though. Birch tea was very... grassy.

Keelin spoke and the slate girl nodded. "A good territory to claim. Greenery aplenty. Fish in the lake. Fresh water source. Prey will come to drink. Very wise." She didn't know how long she'd be here, but it would be a nice place to explore for a while, at least.

"Scylla Klein"

Their success was much more impressive than what Indigo could have anticipated really. The she wolves around him were finding frozen plants with ease. As Keelin said, if they were able to gather this bounty in the dead of winter what would this be like when the warm months had their return? Not that Indigo was certain he would even see that day. He wasn’t sure how long Aslatiel and his niece and nephew would want to linger here in Elysium.

The yearling girl was quite astute, as she trotted back over to the group with her findings she mentioned the birch by the river. There wouldn’t be much sap in the trunks right now, but if he could dig up their roots… "We could wait to gather the birch until we begin to really build.” There wasn’t much use putting all of the effort for now when winter was the worst season to build. "Do we need anything else? I can carry everything back.” He offered as he looked around to his packmates.

"Indigo"

As they all began to gather again with their respective finds, she looked toward the birch trees that Scylla pointed out with a nod. They were much easier to build with than the pine trees that mostly populated the island so it was good to know that there was a diversity of trees here as well. Indigo made a good point in that this season wasn’t a good one for those kinds of materials though so they would have to come back at another time for that. Indigo asked if there was anything else they wanted to get and she gave a small shake of her head. “I’m satisfied with what I’ve seen here.” She was still impressed with what they managed to find today, but she was mostly just eager for the spring thaw so she could come back and really stock up on valuable herbs.

"Keelin"

Scylla sighed and shrugged as Indigo spoke of collecting the wood later. She hadn't meant for them to collect it now. It was simply something useful that would be a resource to the pack. The sulky little teen checked to see if her cattails were still in the basket and then began to move back towards the mountain. She'd done her part, had located useful things, now she would head back so that she could focus on things that she wanted to do rather than things that she was obligated to do. The small girl followed the same path back that the giant purple bulldozer had made, figuring they'd all be able to find their own way back. On the way, she picked a few more cattails and took them back with her.

"Scylla Klein"

After she had finished harvesting a good bunch of the horsetail she had found, Satira moved back to rejoin with the rest of the healer expedition group. Scylla had found some birch and willow bark, all useful for homemade remedies and medicines. The other tawny woman from Elysium that Tira didn't know pointed out that if they were able to find this much selection in the dead of winter, then spring and summer would be a veritable boon of a harvest of the medicinal plants. It seemed as if they were all wrapping up, so Satira bounced back through the snow to rejoin her uncle at his side. Indigo offered to carry any of the herbs the group had gathered, and while Satira appreciated her large uncle's gesture, she simply shook her head and patted her satchel with a tiny paw. "I've got all my stuff, Uncle Indy! I'm good to go!"

"Satira"