Mara seats Matt on a low stool inside the herb-filled shed. Bundles of thyme, feverfew, and bitterroot sway overhead as she rinses the blood from his palm.
Mara Vell
Hold still, stranger. The cut is shallow, but soil in a wound becomes a crueler enemy than any blade.
She presses a cool green salve into the cut and binds it with linen. Beside the drying roots, the black-sealed order lies open, its ink stark in the lamplight.
Mara Vell
The scout is secured outside the door, and the other intruder remains beyond the sealed passage. For now, neither can reach us.
Mara Vell
What do you intend to do with that document? I can give you supplies, bandages, and a careful reading of every name and mark.
Mara Vell
I will not demand that you protect this refuge, stranger. But knowledge may show you where the Ledger expects its witness to run.
Outside, the Ledger scout shifts against the shed wall and mutters through the gag. Within, rain taps the roof while Mara leaves the order within Matt’s reach.
“I offer to help grind and jar her herbs with my own kit as we look over the ledger together”
SUCCESS (Mediocre Crafting, rolled +1)
Matt
I will help grind and jar your herbs with my kit while we look over the ledger together.
Matt opens his compact mortar, pestle, and clean glass jars. He joins Mara at the worktable, keeping the bound hand clear while rain whispers over the roof.
Mara Vell
Practical, and welcome. Grind the bitterroot fine, then mix it with the feverfew. The Ledger can wait beside honest work.
Herbs crackle beneath the pestle. Mara sorts thyme into labeled jars while the black-sealed order lies between them, its margins crowded with cramped annotations.
Mara Vell
Here. The names at the top are offices, not hunters. This mark beside the eastern road identifies a relay house, and this notation points toward your village’s old region.
Matt
The ink has been amended more recently than the seal.
Together, they finish sealing the herbs. Mara turns the order toward the lamplight, revealing a faint second impression beneath the written command: a crown enclosed by thorns.