Gossamer helped Ásta with the fire and once it had burned down a little it was time for a lesson on peppermint tea. Gossamer had made tea before but she was still excited to learn about a new plant and to get practice in a skill she wanted desperately to have. She pulled a bundle of peppermint out of the rabbit skin Ásta had swathed them in and set it down in front of her. She licked at her muzzle. Peppermint tasted kind of strong but she liked the smell. She wondered how they were going to make this taste good or perhaps the taste was better watered down than in one big bite.

"Áaaassttttttaaaa…. can we start yet?" The fox looked over with a stick in her mouth. She'd been using it to stoke the fire and she set the stick down carefully. "Patience, Gossy, I just want to make sure we've got a good fire going so it will heat the water."

Gossamer flopped down on her belly and poked at the peppermint with one of her paws.

Ari had been stalking through the grass, playing at being a mighty warrior on a raid, when voices and the smell of smoke caught her attention. Abandoning her game, she began bounding through the grass until she crashed through to see Gossy and her fox friend by the fire she'd scented. She smelled something else, a sweet-sharp-cold scent that came from the leaves Gossy was poking at. "Hey, Gossy! What are you doing?" She meandered closer, alight with curiosity. She ignored the fox, as being followed by her parents' and elder siblings'companions was so normalized by this time that the not-wolves were practically like furniture - just there. Up to this point she hadn't seen one contribute more than tattling and curbing her mischief, so her attention didn't stray towards Gossy's pet either.

The fox sighed and turned back to Gossamer. "Ok, now we can start." Gossamer immediately sat up, her tail starting to wag wildly. However, before the fox could continue Aris arrived. Gossy grinned. "Hey Aris! Ásta's going to teach me how to make tea out of these. It smells so cool!" She grabbed the bundle of peppermint and practically shoved it in her sister's face. She set the bundle down. "You can make some to if you want!"

Ásta, the fox, nodded. "Yes, I think I have another bowl." The fox went over to her travois and pulled out another ceramic bowl which she set down in case the other girl wanted to join them.

"To make peppermint tea we'll want to use the leaves. Go ahead and pull them off and put them into your bowl. The more leaves you add the stronger it will be. Let's do eight small leaves in the bowl for now." Gossamer nodded and set one of the peppermint plants in between her front paws. She then carefully started plucking off leaves and adding them to the bowl until she had eight of them. She could tell already that the smell was strong as well as the taste. However, it wasn't unpleasant.

Natha had of course heard that Zee and Sirius had had another litter. She'd taken to keeping out of the way. She had done her time raising kittens and after that little foray into motherhood she was quite content not to deal with tiny, loud, often smelly little creatures. However, curiosity eventually got the better of her. Natha had picked up the scent of two of the girl pups and she started tracking them down. As she followed the scent she picked up the scent of smoke… and of fire… oh no…

Natha picked up her pace, bounding across the plains in great leaps until she arrived to see the duo messing with plants near a contained fire. Ahh… well, that was better than what she'd first thought. Good to see the little twerps weren't burning the Armada down. Natha scaled a nearby tree and settled on a low branch. "And what are you two up to today?"

Gossamer jumped at the voice that drifted down from the treetops. She had been so focused on what she was doing she hadn't seen the cat. She gazed up at tree where the cat was lounging. "Making tea!" She glanced back at her sister. "Hey Ari, do you got claws like that, can you climb trees to?" She had to admit the thought made her a bit jealous. Suddenly Ásta was prodding her to continue the lesson.

"Next, take a bone or stick and mash the leaves up a bit to release more oil. Then we'll add about eight ounces of water." Gossamer nodded and picked up one of the bones the fox kept on hand. Turning her head she started mashing the leaves with the flatter side of the bone. Once that was done she picked up Ásta's water skin and tipped her head. Water sloshed out into the bowl, fast at first and Gossamer quickly stopped the flow. She eyed the water level out of the corner of her eye then added a little more til it was roughly the amount of water she'd seen Ásta use during one of their previous lessons.

"Ok, now I'll scoot it next to the fire until it starts to steam." The fox used her paws to scoot the bowl toward the fire.