grainne

And if one day she comes to you
Drink deeply from her words so wise

   Few heralded the shift of spring quite like the ever patient greens of the world. They alone were most attuned to nature's cycle of life and death, and when the winter berries dropped and decayed into fading snow, Grainne knew the time of scarceness and hardship was over, that soon the resources of her trade would be easy enough to come by. So when the snow thawed in the cold moor of Denocte, she ventured out from the Night Court and into Ruris, to the wild and free lands now bereft of snow and ice. Winter had only just begun to fade, yet already life was beginning to return with a vengeance, new shoots of beautiful green parting the dead and brittle blades of brown.

   With care and grace she walked the length of the creek, listening to it's freed waters bustle and bubble merrily in the growing warmth of the midday sun, along with the trilling of birds returning from migration she felt privy to a melody few paused to revel and wonder in. In reverent silence she basked in the sunlight, warming her limbs and feeling the sun's soft kiss on her silvery coat. Truly spring was her season, her time when her strength and spirit was at it's peak, though it too held it's own dangers. With the fading winter, those predators that slumbered in the darkest corners of the world would soon return. Pestilence would be carried on warm and humid winds and biting insects. Reckless, young and arrogant fools would clash and batter each other in the heat of springtime insanity, driven on by instinct and impulse to wound and gouge. There would be no shortage of those needing tending.

   It truly was the season of the witch.

   Once she had warmed up enough, Grainne rose and began wandering down the creek with a purpose, searching out for the hardy plant she sought, easy to detect by it's sweet scent and distinct appearance. Soon enough the smell of rosemary filled her nostrils with each breath, a heady and almost intoxicating aroma when mixed with the crisp smell of water and the rich loamy earth. She knelt before a fair sized bushel of the rosemary, for a moment simply taking pleasure in the smell of it and the sounds of the peaceful creek, before gingerly nipping off sprigs of the plant. She never took too much, and clipped them with the practiced ease of a master at the base of the main trunk. She took perhaps two, three sprigs before rising and tucking them into the satchel about her neck, moving on in search of the next plant, the faintest snippets of a song falling from her dark lips as she walked.