Xanadu Weyr - Kitchens
It seems that with the fire that destroyed much of the kitchen, care has been taken to restore it to a condition well beyond what it was orignally. And thus state of the art equipment has been brought in from the various crafts to be used - stoves and large ovens replacing the hearths, while thin metal sheets have been installed over each countertop, for both ease of use and ease of cleanup. A large pantry remains generally open, containing a all the nonperishable goods, while a similarly large icechest contains the perishable goods.
It's a quiet walk from the Wherhandling dens to the Weyr proper, and it's only after the two healers are long out of range that Tenebrous finally risks a glance over one shoulder, snorting. "I do not understand," he murmurs to himself. "But I hope they're happy," he offers a moment later, dancing around a tree. The ground between the forest and the kitchen is quickly covered. "Do you know what a Pillarwood Fern is, Phylicia?"
"What I don't understand," Phylicia says as she follows him, trotting around the other side of the tree, her shorter legs stretching to keep up with him. "Is who was kissing who." Though she doesn't let where he just went go either. "They? Who?" She looks at him sideways, stepping over a felled branch. "Sometimes I'd like to know how your head works." But she'd probably be petrified if she did. Her breath is a little short, having to keep his pace but she's not out of breath. "Pillarwood fern?" She considers this as she walks. "It doesn't really sound familiar."
Tenebrous smiles a little. "Let's see if I can answer these in order." He pushes through the opening to the Caverns and starts towards the kitchen. "I never eat out here if I can help it. I know the cooks. I run fresh herbs and spices for them during the summer months." The doorway to the kitchen is a quick brush open, and soon he's making hsi way to a back prep station and legging a stool out from under it. "As to your questions…" He purses his lips. "One: No one was kissing anyone. Janelle hasn't ever kissed anyone before, not that you need to mention that to anyone. I imagine Hyrlon will change that soon enough." He makes a slightly worried face and then moves on. "Two, you…really don't want to know. How my mind works, that is… And three? Pillarwood Ferns are completely non-toxic, burn cleanly…and they produce nearly charless ash."
Phylicia is a little bit like a pet canine as she keeps to Tenebrous' side as they walk, pausing just long enough to let him go into the kitchens first before following. It takes her just a few moments to locate a second stool and she pulls it up and perches on the edge of it. "So, the ashes it leaves behind are basically white?" She asks to confirm what he just said. It's just as well that sometimes she can be easily distracted unless it's a topic she really wants to know about. "What's so special about a clean burn?"
Tenebrous smiles. "What's so special indeed? I'm not exactly sure, to be honest, and given that it's a plant, you have no idea how much that raises my hair." He nods once to one of the bakercrafters, and soon a simple roll of bread and some cheese are produced, along with a bit of water and a pitcher of water. "Thank you," the Fetch murmurs to the man before turning back to his apprentice. "One of the Glasscrafters has been approached to produce some kind of object, and she was tasked to find a plant that produces suitable ashes for a white dye. It turns out that said plant is…Pillarwood fern. But ferns are warm-seasoned plants, and she needs a bunch of it. Soon. The problem with this is?" He arches a brow before tearing off a piece of bread.
Phylicia smiles at the baker they place the bread and cheese for them both "Thank you." Comes from her in a murmur as well as she cuts off a small piece of cheese to nibble upon first, listening to her mentor with a grin. "No one knows everything." She says before he continues on. And as he finishes an eyebrow quirks up. "Oh give me some credit." She chortles as she tears a chunk off of her roll and pops it in her mouth to chew and swallow. "I do have a brain. Problem is, we're in winter. The ferns have all withered for the season." This time she cuts off a piece of cheese to put in the center of a larger piece of bread. "So, does pillarwood grow only in specific places, or does it grow whereever its warm?" She chews for a few moments on her piece of bread and cheese, looking off at a wall without focusing until she blinks, bringing herself back. "I don't know a much about plants being used for dyes or pigments." She was more concerned with the healing aspects of them, truth be told.
Tenebrous shakes his head. "I don't know much either, beyond the obvious ones, like berries and roots. I think the glasscrafter called what we're looking for a reagent, which sounds an awful like what we use for our tinctures and tonics." He smirks, taking a bite of cheese. "BUt my guess is we're not supposed to eat these." A drink of water later, and he's nodding. "Quite correct. The season has killed any viable samples in this region. BUt your suspician is correct. Pillarwood, like most other ferns, grows just about anywhere that you find heat and moisture." He smiles slyly. "Ever been to the High Reaches before?"
"High Reaches?" Phylicia asks, perplexed. "I thought they were cold there." Or at least when you hear stories of High Reaches it usually pertains to the winter season. The girl shivers, recalling a story of a pretty brutal blizzard from an old auntie. She takes another bite of her roll before takes a few longer pulls of her water. She pauses to think though, her gaze unfocusing as it tends to when she's trying to recall something. "But they're probably in summer, right?" Her brows crease slightly. "How warm does it get up there?" The only place she's been on the Northern half is her home of Southern Boll and the Healer Hall near Fort.
Tenebrous grins. "It can get VERY cold there. Colder than Xanadu, especially up in the mountains. But right now, I have certain…assurances that the season should be perfect for what we're looking for." His grin fades a little. "Someone's offered to transport us across the ocean and help us track down what we're looking for." He's still for a long moment before murmuring, "It's a lot of ground to cover, and we'll need more samples than I can gather myself. There are other kinda of ferns that usually grow near Pillarwood." He gestures to her with a piece of cheese. "If we split off into teams, I'll need someone with green feet to keep the others out of trouble."
Phylicia blinks, slightly in confusion. "You can't just name names, can you?" She sounds almost testy at that even if she's smiling, but she doesn't really press the matter of names as she nibbles off a chunk of cheese this time. Her face falls into an expression of disbelief as he mentions teams. "Wait, what?" She blinks, cheese paused half-way to her mouth. "Teams?" Even if she didn't mess up the rescue, this has nothing of the importance of Not Screwing Up. Or at least not as much. "I don't know what pillarwood looks like, Ten." And she might secretly be pulling for not being in charge of other people, especially if they're older than herself. Who listens to an apprentice, afterall?
Tenebrous snorts. "Phylicia, don't you think I can show you? We've been working together for enough time that you can pick it up. You're not stupid, so I'm not even going to pretend. I've got a bit of a sample left back at Stormhaven that I can teach you with, and you know enough about poisonous plants to keep your feet away from where they don't belong." He grins. "Making a person drop her pants does that, I hear." He takes another drink of water. "I don't know who'll find the Pillarwood first, Phylicia. I don't know how much we'll find. I can't have people trapsing all over the woods without supervision. And I trust you more than I trust anyone else in the woods." He pauses before, "If you really don't want to go, I'll see about finding one of the journeymen from the local hall…"
Phylicia delivers a bit more of a sour glace as he reminds her of their first meeting. "Oh, so now you say I'm not dense after I prove I know what season it is." She's teasing now, as the sour look leaves her face. "I'd like to go and help." She says seriously as she sets her cheese down, picking up her glass instead and looking at the water for a moment. Part of her feels like she's running away, but the more prominent one is happy at being able to do something. Learn something. "You do know I'm only fifteen?" She asks, looking up at him through her eyelashes instead of gazing at her water. "No one'll listen to me." She's just pointing out a potential issue here, really.
Tenebrous sighs, and for a moment, any pleasantness leaves his features in exchange for a kind of resigned frustration. "We're…going to Coldstone, Phylicia." He drops his bit of cheese to the table, apparently no longer hungry. "It's…where Thea's from." One side of his face gets rubbed before he murmurs, "She's the one that's leading the transport wing. You, me, Thea, the glasscrafter Morianna, and the other dragonrider." He takes a deep breath. "I sincerely doubt that anyone will refuse to follow your orders. You speak with my authority. And thread forbid that's not enough, I have very little doubt that you'll speak with hers…"
Phylicia's brows furrow a little bit in confusion at his frustration, but by no means does the man have to explain every one of his emotions to her. "Oh." Simply comes from her. She raises her glass to take a sip, some of the seriousness falling away from her face. "I thought maybe you'd be sticking me with locals or something." Which would have likely been horrible. "I don't know this Morianna, but if the group is that small…" Her shoulders lift in a small shrug. If they don't listen to her, she'll likely have permission to clobber whomever upside the head. But she does eye the cheese as he puts it back on the plate. "When's the trip?" She finishes off her cheese, leaving the slightly tougher heel of her roll untouched.
Tenebrous murmurs, "I'll be going to see the Weyrwoman tonight…We'll make final arrangements, but I don't imagine the trip will wait much longer. There was a great deal of importance placed on gathering the fern samples." He takes refuge in his glass of water for a moment before looking back up at the other healer. "The other day…when we were bathing together. She didn't just…leave me there, Phylicia. She wouldn't do that…"
Phylicia nods in response. "Well, I'll just have to talk to M'nol today then." She's really not so flustered in her relationship to just leave without telling him. The fun of the earlier conversation seems to have faded away as her face falls into a neutral listening visage. "No, it wouldn't be like her to." She agrees softly, but otherwise saying nothing, waiting to see what else happens to come out of her mentor.
Tenebrous waves a frustrated hand around, his tone almost…restrained with what he's saying. "I just…don't want you to think poorly of her. It was an accident." His voice grows soft. "She…couldn't stay the whole night." Then he takes another drink of water, voice growing a little more firm. "She's a Weyrwoman, after all. Wouldn't look good for her to be camping out with a Fetch for no good reason."
"Appearances." Phylicia grunts, only minorly put off by some of the restrictions put on Thea. "Thread return and score me if by some fluke of nature I ever impress to a gold." She has a feeling she wouldn't like half of the duties that go along with the status. She turns around on her stool to lean back and put her elbows on the prep surface, letting it support some of her weight. "Well. Now I know better, don't I?" She asks rhetorically, letting a soft smile speak for her though her lips quirk downwards for a moment, her tone serious. "You - sir - are more than just a fetch." She pauses letting her smile return. "You're also my mentor. And a friend."
Tenebrous offers a sharp breath of laughter. "You'd be amazed what people will do…for the sake of appearances, Phylicia." He shakes his head, standing slowly. "Do you know what the expression 'Diplomatic Liability' means? I didn't, before I came here." There's a fair little bit of pain in his voice. "Everyone here's concerned with appearances," he says, suddenly irritated. One hand grabs his satchel and swings it up onto his shoulder. "And they wonder why I never come out of the woods."
Phylicia's easy manner evaporates as the pain in his voice is audible to her. She's on her feet a moment later, carefully pushing the stool under the counter so no one trips on it. "I can take a guess what it means." She says in response to the 'diplomatic liability'. Her face falls from its smile as she watches him. "What's wrong?" She ventures softly, ready to withdraw if he doesn't want to answer her.
Tenebrous raises a hand for a moment before lowering it again. "Lots of things," he says, his voice level. "And I can't fix any of them." For a moment, he looks like he's about to say more, and then he just shakes his head. "If you think you're going to be in over your head, you don't…have to go, Phy, I just…" One hand pulls his hood up angrily, and he begins to tug his gloves on. "I got used to having you around. I just assumed you'd want to go." He exhales once and then takes a deep breath before turning to face her again. "This isn't about you…I'm just learning new things a little faster than I can take them right now."
Phylicia crosses her arms under her chest, which he can probably recognize now as her 'stubborn' stance. "You assumed right." She states as she looks at him. "I want to go. I will go." She pauses for a moment, her crossed arms loosening slightly. "I just wanted to," She presses her lips together, thinking. "To make sure people wouldn't get hurt if they /did/ think I was too young." That's what she was afraid of. People getting hurt because they wouldn't listen to her. She watches him for a few more moments, and then hopes to kill some of his anger by offering a bright smile. "At least I'm not the only one learning things around here." It might be a dangerous thing to tease about, but she's trying it.
Tenebrous ehs. "It's all I do anymore. I got out of the healers' hall as quickly as I could, thinking my life would be easier if I could just roam freely in the woods beyond Xanadu." He smiles a bit ruefully. "The first time I came back to Master Fraille after a Spikeroot brush, I found out otherwise. It's only been in the last few months that the learning about local flora has slowed down, and…my time has been filled with other subjects."
Phylicia exhales softly as she gets him to smile and giggles. "Well at least you didn't have to beg to come." Her eyes roll as she remembers all the hoops she had to jump through in order to get to Xanadu in the first place. Much less all the other hoops when she got dragged back to the Hall for a few months not too long ago. She pauses, looking around for a judge of time. "Speaking of learning," She lets out a long, forlorn sigh. "One of the classrooms is calling to me." There was a small thing of still taking normal classes when she's actually at the Weyr proper.
Tenebrous waves a hand. "Run along then. Try not to get stupid while you're gone." He tries for another smile. "I'm going to try and break a trail back to Stormhaven today so that I can pick up a few things, but I should be back in our room tonight by nightfall." He raises a hand. "Don't worry. I'm not planning on staying there. I have other accomodations."
Phylicia takes a few steps forward before his words have her turning in slight confusion. "Our room?" She asks, laughing. "Your room. I'm just … hiding there." Well, there's a chunk of the truth right there. His mention of other accomodations also has her curious, but she doesn't pry. Instead she waves a hand in the air almost loftily. "I'll be sure to ignore them when they move onto herbs and the like." She laughs, looking back over her shoulder. "If you want your room back, all you have to do is say so. I /can/ go back to the dorms." It wouldn't be the end of the world.
Tenebrous makes a face. "Eggs and stones, why would anyone ever want to go back there." He slips his other arm into a strap. "The worst time of my life was at night, when I was standing for search a few turns ago…All of those young idiots packed into as small a room as possible, tilting at one another about who would impress what…" He shakes his head. "I'll buy you your own room before I subject you to that…"
Phylicia's cheeks flush nice and red as he offers buying her a room, but she shakes her head with a smile. "You wouldn't have to do that." She says with an embarrassed laugh as she walks out the door towards her class. "Anyways, if you haven't noticed I'm pretty good at tuning conversations out." Is her last comment as she takes off at a trot, before she's late to her class.