Herbalists' Cache das lied von der erde

blackthorns. nanny apple. the words and their sounds intrigued mahler; they were a colorful sort, without the throaty nature of his own mothertongue. filing away what the oma had said in regards to walking corpses, mahler turned his attention to her lineage, and her question.
"i have not met a blackthorn before," the gargoyle intoned. "mahler. swiftcurrent." he gestured vaguely in the direction of his packland, but offered no other information. why had she come? was she too searching for plants, or only conversation? the first he could offer, the second was something with which the creature struggled.
"have you been here for many years?" he inquired, opting for directness over a clumsy attempt to parse out a coherent sentence.