What followed Kori’s lesson given to her on herbalism was yet more days of mind numbing meetings, afternoons of errands, cleaning, and occasional tests of her memory to write down various details of the herbs that Ortik had lectured her about. These were of course followed by evenings with her tutor, matron Vri, tried to hammer penmanship into Kori’s head. It seemed that Vri had decided to take a page out of the Chieftain’s book in terms of teaching, with difficult and unexpected tasks thrown at her seemingly at random and criticisms launched at her failings. The unfortunate part of this is, it worked, though not enough to earn her the Skill as of yet.

Training calligraphy with charcoals and literal slabs of slate was not exactly the most effective method, there is only so much precision available when your writing implements crumble if they’re too thin, let alone when writing on a coarse sheet of rock. Given the scarcity of paper in the caverns, it wasn’t like they were going to waste it teaching her though. At least not until after she’d acquired the Skill.

These days continued for a week before Ortik announced in the morning before the meetings that they would begin the next lesson that afternoon, her first hands on attempt at processing ingredients for treatment. “Your first task to that end will begin now, go start a fire in the hearth of the workshop with the fire rune and stoke it with charcoal, you will need the coals later.”

While not as bad as the anticipation for the last lesson, she still found that the morning crawled along as if the meetings took more hours than there should have been in the entire day. Ortik was at least coming to avail himself of her services much more frequently over the days at least, sending her off to deliver messages, fetching relevant Kobolds for whatever topic was being discussed, or just to bring himself a cup of tea, though this last one was turning into a much larger chore as the other Elders complained that they were being left out. This at least meant she wasn’t spending her days impersonating a statue quite as much.

“Well, your patience could still use some work apprentice. Today we will continue where we left off.” Ortik points to three containers on his work surface. “You will begin preparing the ingredients within these and I will observe. I will only observe.” Walking to the side of the room to sit on a stool, “Your recollection of the lesson seems adequate from the various tests this past week. You have the remainder of the afternoon to complete the preparations, at the end of this time you are expected to have all three plants either ready for use or in their final stages of preparation to be ready when we begin your next lesson in a week’s time.” Settling himself into the stool and pulling out a small book.

A little flustered at being put on the spot abruptly Kori just stares for a moment, wrapping her head around the task that she suddenly finds in front of her.

“You may begin anytime.”

Seriously?

Trying not to let the incredulity she’s feeling show on her face Kori abruptly turns back to the work surface and inspects everything that is laid out in front of her, opening the containers she sees the near glowingly bright yellow and green moss, a single large mushroom, the cap larger round than her head, and several dull brown leaves covered with pointy looking hairs and jagged edges. Easily identifying these as Luminous Cave Moss, a Drift Mushroom, and leaves of the Stone Nettle plant. She also sees arrayed before her several tools that she recognizes, a scraper for the spores of the mushroom, a sharp knife, a mortar and pestle, several metal sticks a half meter long and long thin stone slates, the bottoms of which are covered in soot, and a little pot full of a whitish liquid with a familiar scent. The one thing she does not see is her usual writing slate.

“Spiritcaller Ortik, may I fetch my slate to make notes and plan the order of tasks?” She asks of her mentor, unsure if he will answer her question or not. Which he doesn’t, raising a brow slightly but otherwise not responding. Taking his lack of response as committal to his ‘only observe’ comment, she decides that if he will not be interfering, then she can proceed as she deems best, and rushes to her own chamber to retrieve her writing implements.

Talking to herself as she takes notes, Kori begins to go over the ingredients. “Now, the mushrooms take the most work, so preparing them and placing them over the fire to dry should be the first tasks, then the moss needs to be shredded and placed to bake so that it dries as well, that should be ready in a few hours.” She wracks her brain for a few minutes on the last of the tasks, “The nettle on the other hand has to dry out of direct heat, it’ll take at least a few days… I can’t use the fire to dry them, otherwise I’d have to pile in more fuel every few hours… I think I can use a fire rune for that to keep the heat constant…”

With her notes in order she begins doing as she planned out, holding her breath while she scrapes the spores out from under the cap of the mushroom, depositing it in the little pot with the white liquid, as she fills the pot it slowly thickens towards a paste she recognizes from her days helping the inscriptionists. She manages to not kick up too many of the spores, and holds her breath best she can to avoid ingesting any of them thankfully, still somewhat fearful of Ortik’s warnings.

When she believes the task adequately done she moves on to removing the stipe, skewering the cap with the metal rods and placing it over banked down fire from earlier in the day to begin the initial drying process. Moving on to the easier two processes she quickly shreds the moss and distributes it across one of the baking sheets before moving on to the nettle leaves, scraping off the hairs with the knife and laying them flat on another sheet she moves them to the floor near the hearth but not directly within it, intending for them to get indirect heat while the others are dried and letting them continue drying for the coming days.

Checking progress over the next hour Kori finds things to be going easier than she expected. The mushroom dries relatively quickly, taking it off the heat after less than forty five minutes she lets it cool before submerging it in salted water for the requisite hour and placing it back on the heat, the water turning the colour of mud as it soaks. She ends up having to feed the fire during that time as well.

I probably should have added a bit more fuel when I took the mushroom off… it might be too hot now…

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Taking the moss out of the heat and placing the mushroom at the higher level of the hearth to try to mitigate the difference in heat, she checks over the moss and finds it to be similar in texture to the prepared version she finds on the shelf, so she scrapes that off into the container it began in, one done and two to go.

The rest of the afternoon continues along the same lines, turning the mushroom and nettle leaves to keep the process even, keeping the coals hot enough but not too hot, and cleaning up the work space as she goes. When she believes the mushroom ready she even takes a small cutting and soaks it to ensure that the water remains clear. Believing her work done she adds the dried cap to the container, covers the coals, and places the sheet with the nettles in the hearth, the fire rune glowing softly as it generates enough heat that it could ignite fuel were it present.

“I believe that is everything, Spiritcaller Ortik, the leaves will need to remain until they are dried and ready to be ground, the other two are prepared and stored within their containers.” Pride shining through in her voice as she describes her task as complete.

“Very well. When you believe the leaves are ready proceed with the rest of the process, we will test your product in a week on our next training day.” Unfortunately, Kori cannot tell at all from his tone as to whether she’s completed the task successfully or not.

As the week passes, Kori begins to become more and more apprehensive about whether she had prepared the herbs correctly, second guessing every bit of her process, the level of heat, if she let the cutting cool enough or if she used too much water when soaking it the second time.

On the fourth day she checks on the nettle leaves and they crumble in her hands, the fire rune however is barely glowing at this point and may need to be reinscribed. She spends a few minutes crushing them with the mortar and pestle before adding them to a waiting jar, the fine powder making it hard to transfer it properly without some dusting the worksurface.

As the week ends and her next lesson begins Ortik calls her back to the workshop, “Well, it is time to discuss how you did last week. First, you will be trying a small sample of your moss and then the nettle, alongside properly prepared samples. You will tell me what if any differences you find and what you believe is the cause if there is a difference.” He begins opening the containers laid out with her work and gathering the same herbs off the shelves, tapping a small sample of each into hot water in a mug. “These will take a few minutes to steep. We usually do not drink the moss tincture, its used to treat bandages after all, but there is no harm in doing so.”

“While we wait, describe the process that you prepared these in with as much detail as you can recall.”

Kori begins going over the process, to Ortik’s nods and non-committal sounds, still not giving anything away as to what he thought of her methods.

“These should be ready. Take a small sip of your moss tincture then the clean water, followed by the properly prepared.”

As she sips the concoction, she finds that hers and the proper version are very similar, both taste quite a bit like licking a cave wall, but they taste like she’s mostly licking the same cave wall at least.

“They both have a very… earthy? Taste, similar but maybe a bit stronger in yours?” Kori responds with a bit of uncertainty.

“Yours is decent, for an apprentice, you did not shred the moss evenly which led to uneven drying, yours will spoil sooner but is otherwise fine. You do however, fail on this task. I asked you to prepare the moss, there are two methods of preparation, dried like this and ground fresh for a poultice.” Shaking his head with the same tone she’s coming to hate.

“Now, to the nettle. Clean the mugs and refill them with hot water from the kettle.” Ortik sits on his stool while he waits for her to ready the mugs for the next test, adding the barest pinch of each powder to the water when she returns.

“Now, the nettle is used as an antidote for poisoning, but it has its own effects, not dangerous but not desirable if unnecessary, so when you taste these, do not swallow.” Pushing the mugs back over to her.

Tasting her own, swallowing is the last thing on her mind when the acrid burnt taste fills her mouth and she nearly spits it out by reflex. Relieving herself of the mouthful she quickly rinses out with the fresh water. “I assume it’s not supposed to taste like I’m eating the ashes out of the hearth, Spiritcaller Ortik?”

Laughing to himself as he watches her antics, “No, no it is not. The other will have a slightly sweet taste to it.” She tries and is able to confirm that quickly, nearly forgetting and swallowing it. “You should not of used the fire rune, leaving the sheet on the floor next to the coals was the proper course, the leaves would finish drying on their own over the course of the week without any additional assistance.”

“Now, the final ingredient. You will try your own only, if you have a pleasant nap, then you did well, if you did not, I’ll go over what you did wrong. Either way, the rest of your day is free. There are a few things you did wrong in general that you will need to correct. First,” Raising a single claw on his hand, “The slate was a good idea, but you did not wash the dust from the charcoal from your hands before handling the ingredients, as such the drift spores were ruined. Second,” Raising a second, “You did not mix the spores thoroughly before storing them, this will reduce their longevity. And lastly,” Raising a third, “You did not wash the containers between storing their raw ingredient and the processed, this does not effect these particular ingredients but it could.” Shifting his voice to a bit more of an approving tone, “You did however manage to not agitate the spores too much when harvesting them, though your antics holding your breath and puffing your cheeks out was a bit much.”

Pushing the container with the mushroom cap forward, “Now, cut a portion the size of one of your claws from the mushroom and chew it for a few minutes then spit it out. It can be crushed and swallowed if administered to a patient, but should lessen the effects if it turns out you made a mistake if you do not do so.”

With a great deal of apprehension Kori does as she’s told, slicing off a wedge of the shriveled grey cap and slowly raising it to her mouth. “Spiritcaller Ortik, can’t you just tell me if I did it right?”

“I could, but you wouldn’t learn as much.”

I swear there’s a bit of a laugh in his voice… I really hope I’m not gonna be seeing things and vomiting for the rest of the night…

“Well… Here goes…” Popping the leathery mushroom flesh into her mouth and beginning to chew, it’s not nearly a bad as she expected, a bit earthy but also a savory flavour that’s almost nice, not something she’d want to eat regularly, but not entirely unpleasant either. Spitting out the mashed up remains, “So how long until I know?”

“Soon, maybe another 5 minutes at most. I recommend laying down, either way really. Though I’d try not to vomit on your bed pads.” Amusement threaded through his voice.

Kori’s anxiety spikes over the coming minutes as she rushes to her bedding and lays down on her side, as the minutes tick by she finds the anxiety fading and not seeming quite so important anymore. Trying to roll over her body seemed to weigh triple what it should. The last thing she remembers is a genuinely mirthful Ortik chuckling from her doorway as her vision fades and she fell asleep. Her last thought that she must have made a mistake after all and be hallucinating, since she wasn’t sure that was even possible, and wondering what that little blinky light in the corner of her vision was.