The Reach of Winter Redux

*Circe* · 02-24-2019, 08:20 PM

Circe was returning to Gambit Briar once more. The last time she had come to this place she had brought Pnuma and together they had collected elderberries. They had gathered all they could get their paws on...and it was a good thing too because Circe had ruined most of them during her attempts to preserve them. She had been left frustrated and more than a little annoyed as batch after batch soured or molded or shriveled. 'Quit' was not in her vocabulary, though, so she was back again today. Assuming there were any left to pick, Circe planned on gathering as many elderberries as she could.

She was confident she knew the best preservation method now. There was only one surefire way to find out, right? Circe needed more test subjects. Berries to test on and berries to preserve once her methods proved to be sound. She thought the best place to start looking was where her and Pnuma had found the first batch. The Briar was a nasty tangle of thorns and sticky vines, and the paths that wove through it were narrow at best and nonexistent at worst. Hopefully she could remember the correct path. Her and Pnuma had traveled all over hitting the jackpot.

Circe paused with a growl as a tangle of thorns whacked one of her back paws. She felt it bounce off the top of her paw and then get caught in the thick fur on her knee. Without turning she gingerly shook her leg in an attempt to dislodge it and then, after it became obvious shaking was not enough, she reached back and attempted to pull it lose. She applied gentle pressure in an attempt to remove it without harming the roof of her mouth, but it seemed the shaking had worked the thorns further into her fur. Her annoyance grew and she pulled harder, ignoring the sting as her fur was pulled loose. At last she wrenched it free and spat it out. The tendril snaked back to the ground and bobbed there; a blob of white fur bouncing on the breeze. Yep, it was official. If she was successful today this would be the last time she visited Gambit Briar.

The giantess set off again and fixed her thoughts firmly on why she was there. Elderberries were useful little drupes. Their purported uses ranged from fortifying the immune system to healing burns. Circe had heard of them being juiced, being mixed into poultices, being cooked and strained to make infusions. Supposedly their uses were numerous. Of course, she had yet to benefit from them in anyway because of her failures so far, but rest assured, she would experiment with them as soon as she was able. When it warmed up she would have to see about picking them fresh as well - just not from the Briar. She would look elsewhere for them when they were in season.

The berries were not without their dangers, though. When raw every bit of the plant was poisonous and while some wolves simply suffered stomachaches after ingesting them, others, she had heard, were laid low by them for several days. The side effects ranged from simple nausea to vomiting, numbness and stupor - all things Circe wanted to explore as much as she wanted to explore the benefits. If she could work out the correct dosage needed to induce specific side effects she could add it to her bag of tricks.

She paused beside a promising looking plant and looked it over. The sprawling bush had all the right characteristics. It was massive and messy, and its many tendrils, through shriveled thanks to the elements, were still noticeably red at the ends. Circe did not, however, see any berries.

Circe nosed around the bush, poking at a tendril every once in awhile and teasing it up from the ground to see what (if anything) was at the end. She struck out once, twice, three times...

The giantess squinted and pawed at a wilted tendril that was hidden in the shadows. She teased it up and found...disappointingly few berries. Circe huffed. Well, it was a start. She carefully plucked them off their stalks and dropped them one by one into her bag. From there she continued to circle around the bush, plucking berries as she went but mostly finding nothing. Eventually she was back where she started so she moved on.

She had brought the bag along this time to make things easier for herself. It was a temporary, ill put together thing, but it would serve her purposes today. At some point she was going to have to make or trade for a better one.

Her eyes lit up as she spied the very thing she was looking for. There, on a nearby bush was a huge cluster of berries. They were wilted and kinda sad looking, but they would do. Hopefully her luck improved further and she'd be able to fill her bag fairly quickly.

"Circe" "Gwydion"

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