Welcome to Gaia! ::

Many positive things could be said for Malta, including that she earned her keep. She had three days to spend in the home of the diver and his wife, and she was well kept and fed for that time. It was only right to do favors in return. So when the man's wife needed help with the herb garden, Malta was happy to oblige.

“This house used to be a witch's house.” explained the woman. “She up and died, and when me and Horoun married, we decided why not live here.” she laughed, “It was a mess, but we cleaned it up.” She pointed a hoe at the crazed tangle of a garden, her hands clad in thick leather gloves, “Thats whats left of it. I've no idea whats in there, 'cept I'm pretty sure half of it will kill me.” she chuckled, “But that's a witch's garden for you. Me, I just want some herbs and flowers.”

Malta looked at the garden with an expert eye. It wasn't aesthetically pleasing, but she could tell that whoever had done it was familiar with the living properties of the plants. They were placed in such a way that they sustained each other, though any other person would see it as a mere tangle of plants. “I can definitely get out the ones that will kill you.” she commented to the woman, already noting a few of the viper vines and Thistlethorns and the immature, dormant tufts of fluffotton. Those would bloom at night, and would be very pretty, but Malta had a feeling that this woman would not love them as she would. For her garden, then, to glow blue and fluffy.

“Like I said.” the woman replied, pleased, “I'd appreciate the help.”

Malta nodded, and set out into the wild thicket of plants. Her magic let her control them enough to pluck them out of the ground without killing them or hurting herself, and she made quick work of the dangerous plants, starting on the beneficial plants so that the woman could replant them later.

The woman, for her part, was busy in the other parts of the garden, areas already tamed one way or another, tending to flowers and a few plantings that Malta recognized as vegetables. “The problem is,” she confided to the khehora, “Horoun's job brings back lots of things to sell, but little of it is food, and what food he brings doesn't last real long. If there's a bad crop or a lull in trading, then you can't eat gold or pearls or fish scales, can you?” she sighed, stretching her back after a particularly hard planting, “Still, it's what he does, and I chose to do housewifery. Maybe if he gets enough money we can buy ourselves a plot of farmland, like that up on the ridge and I can make us a living from that. Not likely, though.” she said, sighing, “Our oldest girl – not that apprentice, mind, she's not one of ours, though she be a good kid – she wants tuition to the Arcane university. Our youngest needs equipment to train for Soudana's military, over in the city. That's money, and that bleeds us dry, Soudana bless them, so I'm like to stay in this garden, puttering around...” she grinned, “Might as well make puttering around of some use.”

“Oh.” Malta said, not sure what else to say to that as she forced the last herb into a pot where it could survive until it was ready to be planted.

“I suppose Khehora don't have those sorts of problems.” said the woman, almost wistfully.

“I don't think so...” Malta said. She was distracted by the weeds that remained, and began to dig at them with her claws, scooping them out and dropping them into a pile after making sure they wouldn't just spring back to life as weeds were wont to do.

“Must be nice.” said the woman, taking the weeds to a midden pile that she kept – for composting, Malta realized, impressed. With such a pile, good soil would not be hard to find. The woman chopped the weeds with the hoe to make sure they were dead, their green ooze leaking into the pile. “The wild folk are like you, they lead simpler lives. Sometimes I wonder what it'd be like, but then I figure... my life's good enough.”

“Mmm.” Malta said, looking out at the now pristine and loamy patch of soil she had cleared. She wasn't sure how simple her life was, or how simply any creature's life was. Complexity, she was learning, filled any void.

“Well!” said the woman, looking appreciatively at Malta's handywork, “I think we've earned us a rest and something to eat, haven't we? I'll go in and make us something...” She gestured to the poisonous herbs Malta had set aside, “And you can do with those things what you will. I'll not be wanting them.”

Malta had plans for those herbs.