Quote:
- Maleficent moved nimbly, the mud and water barely rippling beneath her hooves. She had adjusted well to the swamp she, tentatively, began to consider familiar, if not quite a home. Where she might have once spent hours lost within the mangroves, she now found Garland's hut with ease.
Garland was Fume's mate, a stallion nearly—but not quite—as versed with herbs and poisons as the mare that tutored him. He was always busy, always working—for a "cure," he'd told her, and she thought perhaps she didn't understand the meaning of the word, for his subjects were often worse off after his ministrations than before.
A stallion burst forth from the hut's entrance just as she reached it, blooms of red across the whites of his eyes, made more prominent by the pinpricks of his pupils. Frayed rope trailed from his scarred ankles, reddening the water. Maleficent sidestepped as the stallion pelted away; she squinted through what passed as a door and used a wing to wipe the fleck of bloodied drool that had landed on her shoulder.
"Another experiment, Gar?"
Quote:
- "Is that you, Mallie? I apologize," Garland said, his eyes never leaving the parchment. Arranged around him were cups of paint. He dipped a hoof and made a series of symbols in different colors, detailing the results of his latest test. Four marks to reference the recipe he'd used, colors to signify the variations from the original potion, another two to specify the dose, and cross to indicate the condition of his subject before his escape. The language would be alien to Maleficient, more painting to her than script, but perhaps one day she'd learn.
"I didn't know you were coming. Are you hurt?"
Quote:
- "We told you yesterday," Maleficent said with a roll of her eyes, stepping in now that she was sure no other screaming quarry would burst forth. "Red Ronda's coming around—well, came. You're late."
Quote:
- Garland's head snapped up, looking first at her and then at the angle of sun outside. He threw his parchment on the drying rack, the page almost tearing in the process, and began flinging herbs into his satchel. "So soon? I'll have to let the subject go, I suppose—how time flies!"
He paused for a moment, head inclined as he looked down at her. She assented to his silent request and walked against the room's perimeter, gathering the dried plants and bones he would need while he rummaged through his notes. It wasn't long until they had everything he needed.
"You've learned much," he commented as he slung the strap over his neck.
She made a noncommittal shrug.
"Your mother might teach you if you asked; will you consider it?" She looked away, and he didn't have time to see if an answer would come. He merely nodded, turned away, and left.
Quote:
- Maleficent stayed in the hut a moment longer; his materials and concoctions had grown tangled in their haste, and in the quiet she nosed them back into place. In between she heard one thump, then a second, from the room Garland kept his subjects in. She affirmed the security of the lock, lest he lose two that day. When she was satisfied she took her own leave, Garland's words hanging about her ears like flies.