Tahlena

The woods were eerily quiet in Wispwillow Grove and the lack of cacophony was disconcerting at best. Tahlena the Snapper made her way through the glowing fungai, each hood casting an eerie glow off of the many wraps and drapes upon her; hiding her true colours from view. The witch’s hat upon her head was crawling with arachnids that lived on the brim and she let out a huff as they hung from their webs and obscured her vision.

It wasn’t often she ventured into Wispwillow, but Yvaine had grown ill over the last few days and the clan healers couldn’t figure out what was wrong, so it was the witchy Snapper that took matters into her own claws.

With a rough shake of her head she sent spiders flying like tiny projectiles in all directions so that she could see the fungus that often went overlooked due to the ones that glowed so brightly. Ugly, misshapen things that grew in the shadows of the big, attention seeking fungi. Her teal gaze tilted this way and that and with the spiral horns upon her head she swept across the floor of the grove and uprooted a half dozen fungi in one move.

She reached back with her jaws and delicately pulled the herb pouch from her flank, using careful maw to drop each fungus into the bag before replacing it at her hip and heading back toward the lair.

She stayed in a hut that Kokoro had built for her and within it laid her cauldron and the workstation she needed to concoct the soup that would cure Yvaine from her illness.

The witchy Snapper lit the fire with a gentle kick of a flint at the base of her cauldron and into it she threw many yummy herbs to mask the vile taste of the health giving mushrooms, the mushrooms themselves added only after she stepped on the bag they were in to crush them.

Snappers, lacking fingers or proper claws like Wildclaws or Skydancers, were forced to use their mouths for almost everything and luckily she had long since become a veritable expert at mouth-hands.

She stirred the cauldron with a long wooden spoon and sniffed, gagging at the smell. It wasn’t too dissimilar to a Plague Mirror she’d once met and she couldn’t let poor Yvaine consume such a vile stew.

She shifted across her hut to her herb rack and examined it while the mushrooms cooked, extracting a few things and moving to tip them into the cauldron. A further sniff told her it was much better.

She began to hum as she cooked, a slightly green glow emitting from the cauldron and bubbles began to form and burst upon the air. She instilled her witchy magic into the brew and before long her tail tipped the cauldron and her maw used a ladle to fill up a jar that was firmly corked and taken up into careful jaws.

From her hut to the main lair and right into the hospital wing where Yvaine trembled weakly upon a soft bed of pillows and blankets.

Tahlena set the stew down and whispered to the beautiful Skydancer.

“Drink of my brew, sweet beauty, so that you may fly upon the night sky once more.”

Yvaine let out a weak note upon the air and removed the cork, lowering her pointedly pretty face into the fungi stew, sipping it with a wince and a whimper.

In the days to come, Yvaine improved and by the end of a week she was back to her normal self; every drop of the stew consumed by the Skydancer.

On a shadowed morning she went to the witch’s hut and knocked upon the door.

“Enter.” Was called and Yvaine did.

“I owe you my life.” She whispered to the Snapper who sat so comfortably in the corner near the fire. The Snapper only let out a cheerful laugh and shook her head.

“You owe me nothing. I only did what comes naturally to a witch. To brew and concoct is our one true passion, so really I owe you for allowing me to do what it is I love so dearly.”

Yvaine left confused and the Snapper only let out a deep chuckle.

Oh, they would never understand the true nature of the witches of Sornieth.