Sex: MaleSunny, 78F, late afternoon.
The late spring was an excellent time to collect herbs. Any healer or medic worth his salt knew that, Veho thought to himself happily. He'd set himself traveling northward on a quest for the seasonal harvest, making note of where he found particular plants and what flowers and fruits he'd yet to find. It took him a far way on his calloused paws, but he enjoyed the pleasant weather and warm sunshine. The ancestors were kind to him as he traveled – there were no severe storms, nor was it terribly warm. He found water often enough to keep himself hydrated and was able to keep his belly from becoming to hollow. So when he came upon the Secluded Spring, it was not the water that first caught his eye, but the presence of salmonberries littering the shoreline. While he'd been told about the light orange berry (named, he assumed, for the color of the fish's flesh), he'd never actually seen them in person. An elder had explained they aided in curing ailments of the digestive tract – something important for very young or very old wolves, much more fragile than adults in the prime of their life. Curiosity soon overtook the medicine man as he settled himself next to a bush, reaching out to snuffle the shrubbery. He would memorize faint scent, that it might be easier to track down the fruit in a true time of need. It was important to remember what the leaves looked like, how they were shaped – he was told the salmonberries were available for very long, so it was vital to be able to remember what the plant itself looked like even without its orange ornaments. After this inspection, he reached out gingerly, pulling but a few berries off with his teeth. Popping the sun-warmed fruits on his tongue, he blinked once and shuddered when he realized just how tart the berries still were. "Not yet ripe," he noted, tongue hanging out of his mouth. "But that's not the important part." |