Anuk Ridgewalker

The sun was low over the Crossroads and the grunts at the north gate were loud about something. Anuk heard it from inside the healer's tent. She finished tying off a bandage on a young orc's arm and told him not to scratch it. Then she ducked out under the flap to see. Two grunts had their axes half up. Between them stood a Forsaken in a dusty robe and an apron, holding a basket. He looked like he had walked a very long way. He also looked like he was trying to be polite about it. Anuk walked over slowly. She was taller than all three of them. "What is the trouble," she said.

Wendel Ashcombe

"Oh, thank goodness, someone tall," said the Forsaken. He gave a little bow, and something in his neck clicked, and he paused to make sure it was still all attached. "Wendel Ashcombe. Of Brill. You won't have heard of it, it's very small and mostly dead, like me." He held up the basket. It was empty except for a cloth and a loaf of bread that had seen better days. "I'm looking for earthroot and mageroyal. The fresh kind. I was told the Barrens had plenty, and I was told, at the zeppelin, by a goblin, that the Crossroads 'sells everything'. Your friends here disagree." One of the grunts muttered something in Orcish about the plague. Wendel smiled at him, which did not help.

Anuk Ridgewalker

Anuk looked at the basket. Then at his hands. The skin on the backs of them was split in a few places and he had wrapped them in strips of linen, not very well. "Nobody sells those here. People pick them." She said it plain, not unkind. To the grunts she said, "He is one person with a basket. I will talk to him. Go back to your post." They didn't love that. But they went back a few steps. "Come sit in the shade," she told Wendel. "Then tell me what the herbs are for. Do not tell me the apothecaries want them. I have heard about the apothecaries." ((hope it's ok if Anuk is a little suspicious at first, she warms up))

Wendel Ashcombe

"That's fair, I've heard about them too, and I *work* for them," Wendel said, and followed her into the shade of the tent, ducking under the flap even though he was nowhere near tall enough to need to. Habit, maybe. From some door he didn't remember. He sat on the edge of a cot and held up his wrapped hands. "These are for me, actually. Not the apothecaries. Earthroot and mageroyal, boiled down with a bit of fat, makes a salve that keeps the skin from... well. Going. It helps the kneading. I make bread, you see." He paused. "Nobody eats it. But I make it." ((Wendel's being honest here, no plague stuff, he's just falling apart a bit lol))

Anuk Ridgewalker

Anuk sat down across from him on an upturned crate. She didn't say anything for a while. Outside, a kodo groaned and somebody shouted about water. "Give me your hand," she said finally. She unwrapped the linen carefully. The skin under it was gray and cracked, and dry like old leather. It did not bleed. She turned his hand over, looked at the palm, and pressed one big thumb along the knuckles to see how they moved. "Your salve would help," she said. "A little. Earthroot is good. Mageroyal I am less sure about." She looked up at him. "I have earthroot. Peacebloom too. They grow near the oasis. I do not have mageroyal right now."

Wendel Ashcombe

"Peacebloom! I'd forgotten about peacebloom." Wendel looked genuinely delighted, as delighted as a face with that few working muscles could look. "My mother used to put it in... something. Tea? A pie? It was definitely something, and someone ate it." He watched her poke at his knuckles with the polite interest of a man watching someone inspect a cart wheel. "I can pay. Not much, but I have a few silver, and I have bread. Very good bread, technically. Structurally sound. You could build a wall with it, probably, in a pinch." He nudged the old loaf in the basket toward her. "Ignore that one, it's been on a zeppelin."

Anuk Ridgewalker

Anuk almost smiled. It was hard to tell with a tauren, but the corner of her mouth moved. "Keep the silver." She got up, went to a chest at the back of the tent and came back with two small bundles tied in grass. "Earthroot. Peacebloom. Boil them both a long time. Then the fat. Not too hot, or it separates." She put them in his basket. Then she took the old loaf out and looked at it. Knocked on it once with her knuckle. It made a sound like wood. "I will keep this," she said. "For the grunts at the gate. They should try it."

Wendel Ashcombe

Wendel made a small strangled noise that might have been a laugh. "Oh, they'll love that. Tell them it's from me. Tell them it's a peace offering, from Brill, and that it's mostly flour." He tucked the bundles under the cloth, very carefully, then stood up and rewrapped his hands himself. Badly, again. He looked at the wrapping, looked at her, and sighed. "You'll want to redo that, won't you."

Anuk Ridgewalker

"Yes." She sat him back down and did it properly, linen snug but not tight, the ends tucked under so they would not catch on things. It took her a few minutes. She did not hurry. "Come back when the salve runs out," she said when she was done. "Come to the tent. Not the gate. I will tell them you are my patient." She paused. "Bring bread if you want. Fresh."

Wendel Ashcombe

Wendel flexed his fingers. They moved better already, or maybe he just felt better, which for a Forsaken was hard to tell apart. "Fresh bread," he said. "For the healer at the Crossroads. That's a real order. I've got a real order." He picked up his basket and bowed again, slower this time so nothing clicked. "Thank you, Anuk Ridgewalker. I'll be back before you know it. Well. Before the zeppelin crashes, anyway." He went out past the north gate with his basket on his arm, and gave the grunts a little wave on the way. They did not wave back. One of them was holding a loaf of bread and looking very confused about it.