She stopped for a moment as another thought occurred to her, one that was frightening. Did normal people know which plants were good to eat? She relaxed slightly as she thought about it because of course they must know. They ate plants. How could they eat the right plants without knowing which ones were good to eat? She tried to imagine it, and her imagination failed because the only thing she could think was that perhaps they got sick and learned that way. It was how most animals did it, after all, if they weren’t born with the right instincts about which to go after. But if it were true for people, then that meant everyone in Pucklechurch had gotten sick from plants at some point, or… they told each other which plants were safe to eat and which weren’t. Isra contemplated that as she moved past the birch trees that marked the start of her territory.
“How do you know which plants are good to eat?” Isra imagined herself asking Mizuki, who seemed to cook.
“My parents taught me,” Mizuki might answer.
“How did they know?” Isra might ask.
“Their parents taught them,” Mizuki might reply, and Isra could imagine a confused or possibly troubled look on the other girl’s face. Or worse, an embarrassed ‘why are you saying that, what is wrong with you’ smile.
“Someone must have firsthand knowledge, at some point,” Isra would have said.
It was difficult to imagine what the answer would be. Perhaps Mizuki wouldn’t know or had never thought about it, or perhaps she would say, “Oh, we pray to the gods about it,” or “Every year we have someone test all of the plants in the area by eating them,” or “We eat what the pigs like,” or something like that.
Isra was within sight of her house when she stumbled upon the obvious: people could just have a woods witch tell them.
Of course, it was entirely possible that Isra was wrong, and people knew which plants were good in the same way that she knew. There were a few conversations with her father that would make more sense if it was a skill unique to her though, times when she had been little and eating berries, only to be stopped by her father. Her father had been, perhaps, confused about whether the berries were good to eat, rather than worried she would spoil her appetite. She had thought that he was just playing at the game of lies, telling her the berries were bad because it was easier than explaining the real reason he didn’t want her to eat them. She had simply accepted that: people told obvious lies sometimes because that was just how things were done.
Isra’s home was relatively small, with a low-slung roof covered with sod. Whoever had originally owned it had dug into the ground quite a bit, leaving the narrow windows sitting just a few inches above the forest floor. When she was little, Isra’s father had complained that this let mice and bugs have an easy way in, so Isra had politely requested that they stay away, and that had done the trick. Bugs were barely thinking things, always ready to obey a plainly stated request, though it did need some repetition, and mice were intelligent and had a skittish courteousness. It was clear now that Isra’s father had complained because he had no recourse against the bugs.
There were three birds perched on the roof above the door. She had asked them to guard her house while she was gone, and though it would have been fine for them to spend their time in the trees, inconspicuous, they were ravens and liked to make a show of things. She hadn’t, as Alfric put it, ‘told them to’. Birds needed negotiation and requests, not instructions. Perhaps, thinking about it, he hadn’t meant to make such a distinction.
“Thank you,” she said, giving a bow. “I’ll bring out some food in just a bit.” The ravens didn’t do it for the food, they did it because they knew each other, but they had given up a fair amount of forage to keep watch over her house, and getting food for them was just basic manners. She went into the house for just long enough to take out three hard-boiled eggs, which she kept in the smaller chiller for just such a purpose, and placed them on the ground, where the ravens began picking them apart.
With that matter settled, Isra returned to the house and put her pack down, then began shrugging out of her clothes. Twenty-four miles over two days hadn’t been particularly easy, and it had left her worse for the wear. Her skin had built up oils and dried sweat, and there was a smell she didn’t particularly like. The clothes would have to be washed, that much was clear, but for the first things first, she would have to wash herself.
The same tank fed both the kitchen and the bathroom and was filled with a single waterstone. Because she’d been gone for two days, the tank was filled up, and she was thankful that the waterstone had stopped itself from flooding her house. They were designed so that they would stop creating water from just the pressure of water in the tank, but Isra didn’t fully trust it. It was odd to think that the pipes they had sold off to the ectad merchant would be used to make something as vital as a waterstone.
Showers were a bit of a process, and when possible, Isra would make a trek out to the nearby river and wash herself there. The thought of walking another mile really didn’t appeal to her though, and so the process needed to be followed. The first step was to take the married heating and chilling elements from the stove and bring them to the tank of water, then unmarry them and put the heating element into the tank. It would take some time to heat, and Isra busied herself with a quick lunch while she waited.
There was quite a bit in the way of food, even though she’d been gone for two days and done no hunting in that time. She quickly ate one of the hard-boiled eggs from the chiller, then opened a jar of pickled carrots that she’d bartered for a few market days prior. Isra loved pickles, perhaps more than any other food. After that, it was a piece of hard, crusty bread, the kind that kept for a fair amount of time, a piece of smoked venison, and a hunk of sharp cheddar, which, like the pickles, had been bought from the market.
She wished she had stayed for stew at Mizuki’s, but there had been too much on her mind, and she did her best thinking away from people. Isra was a barely passable cook, though she was good at smoking and salting meat and could do enough to get by. She made pickles and jams, and other ferments, but hadn’t been able to get the marriage of flavors right, not like the pickle woman at the market.
With her quick, cold meal concluded, Isra pressed a hand against the side of the tank to feel the temperature. Finding it adequate, she began her shower.
The amount of money she’d made from the dungeon was astonishing. There were certain things she’d been saving up for, aside from the nebulous plans for a trip, and now it seemed possible that she would be able to buy them all in a single fell swoop. A second water tank for the house would be ideal, though she had no idea where she would put it. Many houses had two tanks, one with hot water and the other with cold, and Isra had always thought that was an extravagance. Now it was something she could rather easily afford, and without feeling as though the money needed to be saved for other purposes.
There were all kinds of things to replace, as well. She had no practical knowledge of woodworking and needed a new chair for the table. Of the pair she had, one had a wobble, and the other had broken in the spring. The simple stove had only a single element pair, and it had degraded slightly, making it cool to the touch even when the elements were married. The loss of power to the heating element meant that it took longer to get hot water as well. Her savings had bought her a large chiller for meat, which was sitting outside and had taken quite some time and effort to lug toward the house, but it was already full, and she had been thinking about getting another. Beyond that, she had three outfits she wore, and might like another, and there were certainly implements she didn’t have. What she wanted most of all, now that she’d seen the inside of an entad shop, was more entads. Each one was magical and unique, and there was something of a collector in her, as attested to by the shelves that were filled with rocks, branches, feathers, and all other manner of natural materials. The plants she collected had a home in a little side garden, one of each of the major and minor species, but she had begun to run out of room for them even there, especially since she liked to let them expand and grow where they pleased. When she picked up the colored rocks from Alfric, she would have to figure out a proper place of display.