Sleeping Dragon wildwood

hoping to work on trades and stuff! :)

An array of flowers and dried up leaves were spread before her in a messy ensemble -- her resources were obviously dwindling despite her hard work to find them. In fact, for all the time she had spent, she had not found too much at all. A few leaves, some flowers, and of course, her stone from Portia. But that was it. If she wanted to pursue the path of a healer, she'd need to have a lot more than just a few dried plants. 

However, she didn't want to lose what she already had, though it was not too much to worry over. Lucia picked up her belongings, carrying them over to a different spot. She began to dig -- small, close together holes in the earth, more wide than deep. She'd have to keep her stuff somewhere, and medicinal caches would have to do. She sorted each herb, putting the ones with similar qualities in the same space and setting the others in their respective places. 

After she was done, she covered the area with a wide, flat stone just light enough for her to be able to move. Lucia sat, covered in dirt, planning where she would go to find some more supplies.

Every time he'd a lesson from Portia, he was left with a greater interest in plants. It wasn't their medical properties that interested him, no, but just the plants themselves. He knew not yet how his interest might develop as he grew, and so he'd focused on just taking in whatever knowledge he could in the meantime. Thus far, he'd been told about bees, pollen, dandelions, and lavender. Everything he'd been told had been reluctant to leave his mind, even if he might not necessarily need the information throughout his development. No matter, the lessons themselves were enjoyable, and so he continued to seek the plant lady out as often as he could. This time, however, the lesson would go a bit differently.

Prior to seeking out the pallid woman, the boy had detoured. Distracted had he become by a strange plant, which had taken it upon itself to wrap around the trunk of a tree. He had approached and nosed at the raindrop-shaped leaves that were on the ground, sniffing them here and there but finding nothing about them to be remarkable. Still, he was curious, and so Hvit had decided to pluck from the vine a mouthful of leaves, and then continued with his trek. Unbeknownst to him, he'd just filled his mouth with poison ivy.

As Hvitserk continued, he'd noted how his muzzle and the inside of his mouth had started to itch. Several times had he been made to stop in order to scratch at and around his maw, but never had the leaves been released, since he knew not for certain if they were to blame. Luckily for him, he'd spotted a pale figure up ahead and had quickly scrambled closer, only to realize at the last second that it wasn't Portia. Frowning around the leaves, he'd taken a few steps back, but stopped again no more than a meter away from the female in order to scratch at his face. In the process of doing so, a single leaf had fallen from his mouth and was left to lay on the ground, its escape having gone by unnoticed.

It seemed she had a visitor, though she was not at all prepared for the spectacle that had arrived before her. Her eyes did a quick scan of the new face -- he was a pup for sure, and she wondered for a moment why he had come to see her. Then, she caught a glimpse of his mouthful of leaves, and they weren't just any leaves. That, in fact, was poison ivy, and a lot of it. Her eyes widened, two amber orbs gazing down at the pup in horror. He had poison ivy in his mouth, for goodness sakes, and she was starting to wonder how he could tolerate it. 

She hurried over immediately, trying to keep her composure though appearing obviously distraught. "Hey, I need you to spit those leaves out, can you please do that? They are bad leaves," she explained hurridly, not knowing how much of it the pup would understand. "Very bad leaves," she said again, putting emphasis on the whole sentence. The sooner he spat out the leaves, the sooner she could treat him. The sooner she could treat him, the better chance there was of the itching going away.

The woman before him was not the wolf that he'd been searching for, and so he was fully prepared to turn away and look for Portia elsewhere. However, the itch had prevented him from doing so as quickly as he would have liked, thus having allowed for the other to approach. He'd paused with his scratching and stared up at her, listening to what she had to say. The words were understood, but her request had not been answered. In fact, he'd done almost the exact opposite, his grip on the leaves having tightened. While the inch was already present and clearly bugging him, he knew he couldn't let the greenery go since it was needed for his next lesson. To learn about the leaves was what he wanted, and the only one he knew that could teach him was his mentor.

Hvit gave a shake of his head, making it clear that he didn't plan to drop the bundle of ivy. Eyes began to trail around the area, searching for an escape route. There weren't any that really stood out to him, and so that left him with one option: run. Without a word, the boy had thrown himself forward, attempting to dart around the adult.

Unfortunately, he did not drop the poison ivy. She didn't know if he realized that the source of his discomfort was in fact coming from the leaves he held so tightly in his jaws or not. This much irratation would take a while to heal, and by holding the ivy in his mouth even longer, it would just complicate the matter. Not to mention the contact he made with the plant while scratching, which could spread the rash even more. Lucia groaned.

She paused, noticing that the pup seemed on edge, his eyes darting around as if he were in search of something. What was he looking for? Someone else to help him? That's when he bolted past her unexpectedly, going surprisingly fast for someone who seemed like an innocent blob of fur with short legs. Shit. She managed to whip around and grab the boy by the scruff of his neck, making sure not to hurt him. Lucia managed to keep her balance -- turning around to grab an object moving at high speeds was hard to do, especially if you weren't prepared for it. Lucia could only pray that the pup wasn't terrified of her now -- she only wanted to help him.

Forward he had gone, but he'd not succeeded in getting very far at all. Teeth had fastened themselves around his scruff, yanking him back in the process. His own momentum had caused for the sudden stop to hurt, a sharp yelp slipping out past his lips in response to the pain. Of course, the opening of his mouth had provided the perfect opportunity for all of the leaves to fall out, and so down onto the ground they'd floated with the breeze. Panic rose within his chest, knowing that he needed to recollect them so that he could carry on with finding Portia. The stranger, however, didn't seem as if she'd allow for him to do as he wanted, which automatically made her the bad lady. Didn't she know that he needed to show the greenery to his mentor? Obviously not, since she wouldn't let him go—also, probably, because he hadn't said anything to her about it, and most likely never would.

Hvit did not turn docile in response to her having scruffed him. Rather, he'd done the exact opposite. He'd started to squirm and pull, trying numerous times to twist himself out of her grip. Several times, however, he'd stopped to scratch more at his face, as well as his neck. He was worsening the rash, but didn't yet see an issue with his actions, as his mind was focused only on retrieving his leaves and taking them to Portia.

The young boy was resilient, eager to show that he would not just go along with being grabbed by the scruff. There was some understanding there, but she couldn't just let him carry on with his day with a mouthful of poison ivy. Thankfully he had spit the leaves out, and she made sure to carry the squirming pup well away from them. Lucia couldn't help but wonder why he wanted to keep the leaves so badly. Obviously they were the source of his discomfort, so was he so attached to them? She feared she'd never understand pups, thinking back to her joining process where she told Wildfire about how she didn't see herself ever being a mother. 

After a bout of squirming, scratching and protesting, she quickly set him down and cleared her throat. "Excuse me sir, but what exactly do you want with those leaves?" she asked, raising a brow. She knew she probably had already made a bad impression on him, but he needed to be stopped.

Despite his squirming and multiple attempts at being let go of, he'd not felt the ground beneath his feet. The woman had carried him away from his leaves, which had resulted in him moving around even more. Where was she taking him, and why? The questions lingered within his mind for a moment before having been chased out, the present situation taking precedence over all else. It didn't matter what her intentions were, all that mattered was that she'd ruined his plans. Now he'd have to go find more of the leaves after she left, that way he could show them to Portia and ask her about them. No matter how irritating they were, he was curious, and so it was of great importance that he be taught.

When he'd been set down at last, Hvit spun to face the woman, a glare having eased its way into his eyes. A question was asked, but he did not answer it, nor would he ever. The time meant to be used for a response to be made had instead been taken up by another attempt at getting away. Forward had the boy darted, moving in an arch as he'd tried to—once again—get around the lady. He needed to go get his leaves.

He gave her this glare, like a kid that had just had his candy pried away from his hands and was now treating her with a silent protest. In this case, the "candy" was the poison ivy and it was pried away from his mouth. A different situation entirely, which justified the nonchalant stare she sent right back to him. She opened her mouth to explain herself, "Uh, OK, those leaves that you had--,"

Before she even got to explain herself, the pup was on the run once again. This time, she wasn't fast enough to grab him. He was making a beeline straight towards the goddamn poison ivy, causing her to intercept before he could stuff it in his jaws again. She now stood, on edge, between the pup and his bounty. 

"I don't know why you want this stuff so bad," she muttered, making sure she stood directly in front of the ivy, "But you aren't getting it, sorry."

He did it! He got passed the mean lady! He could gra– oh, wait. No, he still couldn't grab the leaves. While he'd succeeded in darting passed her, her legs had still been able to move quicker than his own. Between the boy and the poison ivy the woman had stationed herself, causing for Hvit to huff. A glare never left his eyes, head having tilted back so that he could stare up at her face. What had he done to her to make her so cruel? He couldn't remember having ever acted against her, for rare was it for him to act out at all. There was no reason that existed for her to treat him as she did, which made the whole situation extremely confusing.

Opening his mouth, he'd acted as if he was about to speak, but nothing came out—not right away, anyways. In his frustration, he'd muttered, "Portia." He wanted her, not the stranger. The plant lady didn't steal from him, she only taught him things. She was his favourite teacher, whilst Lucia had easily earned herself a place as his least favourite wolf in all of the world; his world, at least, which wasn't that big at all.

He fixed her with a stare and for a moment she made eye-contact, an awkward silence settling between the two. She quickly shifted her gaze as if she were looking at a very interesting blade of grass, a quiet "....uh" escaping her lips. What the hell? She wasn't trying to become this pup's archnemisis, she just happened to be really, really, bad with pups. She knew he didn't understand that she was just trying to help him, and it seemed he didn't correlate his rash with the ivy. Well, maybe he did. She had no idea.

He opened his mouth as if to speak, and she leaned in a bit. The pup managed to utter a name, Portia. Lucia's mind drifted back to the freckled woman, who was quite pretty now that she thought about it. "Portia? I know her," she stated simply. Hopefully the fact that she knew Portia would make her seem less like the devil in Hvitserk's eyes. She assumed Portia was the good lady, and she was.... the bad lady.

The boy had continued to stare, an attempt being made at ignoring the itching feeling. His lip twitched, however, and his skin always seemed to crawl beneath his fur. For as long as he'd been able to, he'd kept still and just continued to look ahead, before having finally given in. In an instance, his butt had been plopped on the ground and his leg went up, head tilting to the side so that he could scratch at his face. He'd done so until it's started to burn, and at that point he'd needed to force his leg back down so as not to risk causing any damage.

Lucia spoke, telling him how she knew his teacher. If she knew the other woman, though, then why couldn't she understand that he needed to get the leaves to her? Rather than explaining himself with words, he'd used his nose to point towards the plant, then fixed the adult with another stare. He needed to get those to Portia so that she could teach him about them. It was unlikely that his message would be gotten across with how simple of a gesture that he'd used, but he was far too troubled by the situation as a whole to have realized that.

He broke his resilient stare as he went the scratch at his face, giving Lucia a child-like sense of triumph. He couldn't have fought her on the matter forever, and even he had to get that. Fortunately, it seemed as if he knew when to stop scratching. Excessive irritation to the area could spread it or even worse, contaminate it which would lead to infection. Maybe he finally understood why the poison ivy was bad. Maybe, finally, he'd leave it alone. Of course she was wrong.

Hvitserk gestured towards the plant and fixed her with his angry toddler stare. She groaned, suddenly wanting the plant to just burn already, not seeing any correlation to the plant and his mention of Portia. "Look. Poison ivy means itch," she stated. "Poison ivy. Itch. Poison ivy. Bad," she said slowly, gaze switching from the plant to Hvitserk. Did he not get it? He had to get it. Maybe there was something she was missing, but she sure as hell didn't know what that was.

She hadn't understood.

The boy's attempt at silently explaining to her why he needed the leaves hadn't been comprehended like he'd expected it to be, which left him feeling frustrated—even more so than how he'd felt when she wouldn't give him his plant back. Rather, she'd started to talk about it, having called it poison ivy and, in a way, told him that it was the cause of his itching. The way in which she'd spoken had been nothing like how Portia spoke to him, however, and so he'd ignored all that had been said. It was often that he understood more than what was expected of him, and perhaps even more than what he should. It was all thanks to his ability to reason well for a child his age, and so he enjoyed listening to the adults speak as they normally would, rather than in some simplified variation of their chosen language.

Sighing, it became apparent that he'd not get anywhere unless he used his words. It bothered him far more than it should have, but perhaps that was only because Lucia was viewed as the enemy. Once again, he'd gestured towards the leaves, but this time he'd added, "For Portia," to the end of his motion. "She teaches." Everything he'd said had been shortened a great deal, his inner thoughts being far more elaborate. Unlikely it was, though, that he'd ever actually speak to someone else in the same way as he thought to himself.

He spoke, finally. It was about time, and she was glad that he did. Just those few words make everything make so much more sense -- if only he had uttered those words earlier so much time could have been saved. She could have also saved her reputation, seeing that the growing misunderstanding between herself and the boy had led him to become quite disliked by him. She sighed with relief as he mentioned Portia. At least they were dealing with someone she had met before.

"I know Portia," she reassured, hoping that would give her some sort of magic points towards her reputation. She really didn't want to be disliked by any of the pups. "Do you want me to call for her?"

Luckily for the both of them, the bad lady knew Portia. That made a small difference, but nothing great enough to make the boy dislike her less. He’d never observed the two females interacting, so he knew not if the wolf before him was a friend of his mentor, or if they’d just seen one another in passing. Without that knowledge, he couldn’t trust her, or find it in himself to even try and like her. Already had she done so much against him that, even if she did turn out to be a friend of his favourite lady, he wasn’t entirely sure if he’d be able to go easy on her.

Rather than nodding, however, Hvitserk glared at her for a moment longer. After deciding that he couldn't just sit around with the stranger and wait for Portia to possibly show up, he shook his head, and then the boy was off. His leaves were left behind, but it would not be the last time that he saw them. Once his enemy was gone, he'd simply go back and get some fresh leaves and show those to his teacher. Until then, the boy would hide away and scratch at his face.