Kione roamed this interesting place with Rusalka.  The various plants and herbs offered a pleasant scent, much better than that earlier land they had been to.  Strange stone flat rocks could be seen at points, ccracked with weeds pushing their way through.  The scent of prey was easy to find and Kione imagined any predator with an empty belly would do well here.

The sun was shining high in the sky, a warm pressure blanketed his back.  Later on he’d have to take a swim to cool off and just because there was no such thing as a bad time when swimming.  Scenting the air there was no hope of even a lick of rain in the near future as far as he could tell.  The ground was parched with a number of weeds brown and crackled under pressure.  "I know a nice spot for a swim after this if you're interested."

"Kione"

As she and Kione continued their exploration through Auster, they landed in a spot that was far more pleasant than the dormant volcano they had been to before. This was a lush garden that was only interrupted by some stones that worked their way through all the foliage and pieces of what looked like they had at one point been stone walls. The heat of Auster had certainly done its handy work on this place and it was very much sun baked right now, but she imagined that during the rainy season this place was practically over grown with different plants. She recognized a bunch of them as they wandered through the garden because of growing up with two very skilled healers around her all the time, but she hadn't really taken to healing the way her mother or Aunt Siren had. Ruse glanced back at Kione and gave him a grin with a nod of agreement when he offered a place to go swimming after this. "Yeah! That'd be fun." They could definitely use the cool off after being in the sun all day.

"Rusalka Alondra Klein"

Kione grinned at the girl as she agreed to go swimming, “nothin' better than a good swim, especially if you can get a good dive into the water, not just some shallow spot.” Kione looked back in front of them and after a few strides paused looking at an odd path of stone that formed a straight line.  Most of the stones seemed to be the exact same size and shape, or once had been.  As elsewhere they seemed to be losing a battle against the terrain.  After a moment he decided it had to be for decoration.  Had a pack once claimed this landscape or was it something else?

“It’s like a garden but for rocks,” tapping one of the stones, “not that I’m much for caring for a garden but I think I’d rather just have plants.” The painted wolf glanced at Ruse, “well sis, would you want a garden of stone?” If she did they certainly already found a source of stone though it would be a bit of work to take these.  


"Speech"

As they wandered around some more they found a row of evenly spaced, squared off stones. They were far more regular and even than she had ever seen rocks be, although there were some more "decorative" stones and things around the island where they lived because of the structures that populated the island before they got there. She wondered if they were something like those, but she grinned and chuckled at Kione's assessment of this being a garden for rocks. She tapped one of the rocks when he offered them to her and she replied, "Well... As nice as they would probably look in the greenhouse... That's kind of a long way to carry a bunch of rocks." They had plenty of rocks on the island already, but it did give her ideas of stuff she could do for her mom and aunts though. She looked to some of the more hardy plants that were growing everywhere that had survived the hot sun so far, adding, "But what we could take is some of the plants. I know my mom and aunts always appreciate getting some herbs and stuff like that so it'd be a good gift to bring back... and wouldn't be nearly as heavy as the rocks."

"Rusalka Alondra Klein"

It was indeed a long way.  As she seemed to consider it Kione had to wonder if he was going to need to figure out how to get a bunch of rocks back home.  In the end, she came to the same assessment of how that would be a difficult task.  However, she had shown interest.  If she liked them he’d get them for her later as a surprise.  

Kione turned his attention from the rocks to the plants all about them.  “I recognize the appearance of a good number of plants that I’ve seen in my travels but I only knew a few of their names and less about what they are good for.”

Kione nudged a nearby plant that would have once been green but was dried up and falling over on itself under the hot sun.  “Some of these are dying.  Are the dead ones still useful for whatever their use is or do we need to only get live ones?”  Just because the girl was younger didn’t mean she might not know more than the wild dog in some areas.  “I’ll grab whichever ones you want to take back with us.”

"Kione"

Ruse nodded in agreement when Kione mentioned that he knew the look of some of the plants, but not really the names or their uses. "Yeah, I recognize a lot of them from the greenhouse... but I kind of stopped paying attention when mom was trying to teach me names." She chuckled and tossed Kione a grin before she came over to examine the plant he was poking at. It was definitely in pretty rough shape. She gave a little shrug when he asked if the dead ones were okay or if they had to be alive. "I'm... not sure. Mom and the others do dry some of the herbs to put them in different things so... is this like drying them?" She hummed and mused over it for a few moments before shrugging again and deciding, "Well, they look kind of the same as the dried herbs they use so maybe we just take some back and see. Maybe my mom can figure out a use for them." She looked around a bit and found a few that didn't look awful and with Kione's help they gathered up a couple of bunches to carry home. How they could go swimming as a reward!

"Rusalka Alondra Klein"