Stavanger Bay she brought the sugar and the mint

Szymon curled his haunches beneath his lean frame, watching Doe — Doctor Doe, in this particular moment — work. She sealed the sand with kelp, creating a bowl from the flesh of the earth itself, and he watched with a keen eye as she layered plums, mint, and Jimson weed in an ambrosial concoction that teased at his senses. Jimson weed and mint were familiar to the boy, who had learned medicine partially because he was often the one in need of patching up. Fortunately, he had never had to be on the receiving end of the herb’s hallucinogenic properties. He had been bloodied and bruised, but never so gravely wounded that he needed to be put under during a healing. His eyes flicked nervously to the female, but she seemed to have a solid understanding of the plum whiskey’s potential dangers.

“ — but if it does, a white wolf from Donnelaith has helped me get the antidote.”

A white wolf from Donnelaith. Unbeknownst to Szymon, there were several wolves fitting this description — but he knew of only one, and thus he mouthed the name as Doe pronounced it. Deirdre. Szymon had been half mad with panic when he’d first met the white witch of the wood, but he remembered her green eyes plainly. He nodded when Doe asked of her, a grin of understanding playing about his kohl-lined lips. The warmth that had leapt from Deirdre’s tongue upon pronouncing the Leviathan’s name still rang in his ears. Though he did not understand the relationship fully, not being one to pry, it was clear that the trillium-cloaked daughter of Donnelaith bore a deeper understanding and affection for Skellige than most.

And that, to Szymon, was fine — so long as Skellige wished it so.

Would Skellige, Szymon wondered, have qualms against the growing friendship between the Witch Doctor and her — what? he taunted himself. Errand boy, protector, acolyte — what am I to be to you, Doe? What am I to be to anyone? It was a dark thought, the sort that often ran circles around Szymon’s mind, and he didn’t even bat an eyelash. “J-J-Ju — l-l-l-lep?” repeated the auriferous-eyed male, his throat locking around the word and shaking it from his jaws in a fit of strangles. He recalled her song from earlier and hummed it, finding the melody itself far safer than the words.

I brought the sugar and the mint,
I brought the sugar and the mint.
Now you bring the whiskey
and ask for his blessing,
say, “Yes, sir, I know she’s
heaven’s julep…”