It had been warm for the last month or so, and sunny. This late in spring, there was no chance of random frost. Her soil was well-drained--she'd checked--and her stakes she'd collected were out and ready.

Time to plant her tomatoes.

She'd started the seeds inside a month ago, placed on a sunny windowsill, so they wouldn't take as long to grow. She took her trusty trowel and dug deep holes for her little transplants, which needed to be almost all the way in the ground for root production. (She'd figured most of this out by trial-and-error.) The first spring-green fuzzy seedling come out of its homemade stoneware pot with barely any effort, and she nestled the plant deep in the rich black soil she'd cultivated over the years of planting.

Gardening was relaxing, and hers. She shared the thrill of hunting with her family, and here she could be alone. No one she knew knew how to do what she did, and no one in their right mind meddled with her garden. That is, after Mattin watered her tomatoes wrong and caused the roots to rot, essentially killing the plant in one go. After all the new seedling were in, she left her yard and went out to where she'd put her water bucket and dipper to warm in the sun.

It had been a beautiful day for Glynn. He had finished his training during the morning and decided to go for a walk around anahu for the rest of the day. Glynn had taken off his loremaster robe and changed into a shirtless outfit to show off his rippling abs. Glynn's old injury was flaring up this week so he needed his cane a lot more this week. Glynn's injury was really starting to hurt really bad now so he decided to sit down on a rock nearby. When Glynn sat down he could see a fence right in front of him with a gate in the middle. When he looked around he could see a girl with a tall body and reddish brown hair not unlike his own. She must be the gardener.

"That is a beautiful garden you have their." Glynn said sarcastically, chuckling a little bit.

"Ummmm...thank you?"
Ailen looked at the shirtless man quizzically. Her garden was mostly dirt and grass, although there were some spring flowers poking up around the edges.

"You do realize I was being sarcastic, right? I mean it is just dirt but you look like you have a green thumb so who knows what this plot of land will look like in a month?" Glynn said in an characteristically nice tone. "I am Glynn of the Ethia tribe and you are?" Glynn said, he always acted like he was 15 years older than he actually was.

"Oh. Oh, very well."
She went back inside the gate with her bucket and started watering her new seedlings.
"I am Ailen Laskal, of the Roek."

"why are you not wearing shoes? You're working with dirt, what if you step on a rock? I wouldn't want to see such a young girl in pain. How old are you, anyway? I am 15 even though I can pull off being 20." Glynn said, pointing at his abs. "Sometimes I think I look better than some of the 20 year old's in Anhau."

A sunny day, a juicy rabbit.

Jyndri spent most of the morning under the cool canopy of the woods, checking her traps. The recent rain and the bounty of sunlight on its tail had caused the weeds to grow like.. well.. weeds. Rabbit food. All the woodland rodents fattened themselves up on the verdant growth, and this particular rabbit had grown too fat to wriggle itself free of her snare.

Rabbit stew tonight. Do we have enough basil? In a few months, we'll be able to put Ailen's tomatoes in a stew...

As she crested the hill to her home, she spotted a young man making what appeared to be a rather rude gesture at her daughter.

That gimp is traumatizing my baby girl!

She jogged up to the fence, spear at the ready. A limp, dead rabbit dangled over her shoulder, evidence of her ruthless nature. This woman could kill cute fuzzy things. And eat them.

"You! Cane-boy! State your business!"

"Um, my business. I am was just talking this young lady. Who might you be." Glynn said, in the most non respectable tone possible. "Cane-boy, couldn't you have come up with a better insult than that. I have heard my grandfather use that insult, thankfully not towards me."

Ailen was beginning to be a little weirded out by this man. Or, she supposed, boy, since he was apparently only two years older than her. Why was he rubbing his stomach? Was he hungry? Huh?
And the way he was talking to her was rather odd.

Oh, thank the gods, it was her mother. Ooh, with dinner! Ailen thought hungrily of the lovely roasted rabbit stews her mother made, all simmered and...
She tried to look discreetly back at her mother in a scared fashion without him seeing, not wanting to be really rude, but wanting to let her mother know that this guy wasn't her friend.

"Insolent youth! Is this what the Ethia are teaching their children these days? To disrespect their elders?"

The woman caught her daughter's frightened glance. That was it. This kid was dead meat. She wanted to string him up and gut him, but it wouldn't do to kill him. She'd have to let his tribe do that.

She sneered haughtily at the boy. "No, it cannot be so. I would would not insult their honor by claiming you are their doing. It seems a rat has snuck into the rice paddies. I shall have to alert your elders..."

Jyndri stood at her full height, glaring resolutely. She swung the non-pointy end of her spear at him in a gesture of finality, with plenty of space between them. Though her blood boiled with anger, the woman had restraint. She could not really harm him. It was not the way things were done.

"Now go."

"Fine then, I was just trying to strike up a conversation with another wick." Glynn was appalled at the threats. When he had sat down he had not expected to see another wick let alone be threatened by her mother. As Glynn struggled along he wondered if all people in the Roek tribe were this rude. Well off to my next misadventure.

Ailen was absolutely shocked at the boy's remarks to her mother. Who did he think he was, disrespecting her like that? He was barely older than her, and speaking to her mother as if she was a child and he was her major!
Inside, she was fuming, but figured it would be better not to say anything. She hadn't really met any people from Ethia, but if they were all rude like this, she didn't want to meet any others.

As if reading her daughter's thoughts, Jyndri said, "What a poor excuse for an Ethia. Most of them are respectable people who teach their children the proper way of things. That one must have slipped through their fingers."

She watched the boy go, contemplatively tapping the end of her spear on the ground. "Maybe they were soft on him because of that limp. Let this be a lesson to you, Ailen: some sympathy is good, but give a child too much, and he will grow to expect it from everyone." The mother smiled, slightly apologetically. "That is why I have sometimes been harsh on you in the past."

Sometimes too harsh...

To stave off parental guilt, she asked, too cheerfully, "How are your tomatoes, dear? I see you have put some in the ground."

Where had her daughter gotten the green thumb? Certainly not from her mother. Jyndri knew little about gardening, even though she used herbs, vegetables, and fruits in her cooking. The process of turning inedible seeds into food was a complete mystery to her. Where plants were concerned, she was at her daughter's mercy.

"That is good. I would hate to think there was an entire tribe of rude people out there. Think of them talking to each other!"
Ailen imagined a large family, young and old, all throwing insults to each other across the dinner table, while shoveling food in their mouths.
Because, naturally, if you didn't know how to speak, your parent's couldn't have taught you good table manners, either.
"I have, Daoa! I am almost done, and I am watering them now."
She gave the garden plot another shower with her dipper.
She'd never really figured out why she liked gardening, but she'd taken it up on a whim after her accident. It was amazing to grow things, instead of kill them. And it was hers; the rest of the Laskals couldn't garden worth beans. She loved the trial-and-error parts of it; they were a slow, drawn-out version of the split-second decisions made when hunting. She'd developed a system over the years that had made her tomatoes tart and juicy, and she was sticking to it.

Jyndri started to imagine it, but her mind refused to consider such chaos for very long. "Let us be thankful it does not happen."


"Good girl." She nodded approvingly, not sure if watering was the correct step to take, but trusting that her daughter knew these things.

The two family banders, which she had taken with her on the daily gather, were still some distance behind. Bored, they had begun fighting playfully. Yot pinned Ret and gnawed gleefully on his letter-mate's head.

"Yot! Quit trying to eat your sister!"

While Yot was distracted by the yell, Ret bounced out from under him and bounded to Jyndri's side. She whined softly to the witch, a banderese 'thankyou,' and scrabbled at the garden gate with her claws, desperate to escape her stronger brother.

"Neither of you are going in there until you calm down. We cannot have you stepping all over Ailen's hard work." She crossed her arms, steadfast against the pups. Much like children, they needed boundaries, or they would destroy the world with their stupidity.

Ailen giggled at the banders' antics. She remembered when she and her brother had play-fought as children.
"Did you catch anything else in your traps this morning, Daoa?"

"Just this," the trapper turned to one side, revealing a plump pheasant hanging from her back. The bird was clearly a male, and a healthy specimen, from the colorful plumage on his head and his long, thin tail feathers.

"He will fetch a good trade at the market, and I will be heading there soon. Is there anything you need? Or would you like to come along?"

Ailen finished off the watering with a flourish. They'd gotten around the amount they'd needed to grow right, she thought.
"I am finished planting for now, hmm? We can go whenever you are ready, Daoa. I always want to come with you! The market is interesting."