A bitter frost carpeted the ground as Odessa mounted the pied gelding. Her scarf was wrapped tightly around her neck, covering her mark wholy. She had bathed in the ocean and rescented herself with the meadowsweet she had taken from the garden a few days prior. That morning she had donned a thick pelt, a dull tawny deer pelt, littered with small white pock marks. The hood was deep, secured tightly around her face so that it didn't fall away as the horse bolted forward. Odessa sat on the end of the cloak, as Keshi's riding rug had been knocked from where it sat and now needed a wash, she would do that this afternoon once she'd finished her garden work.
Odessa had been riding for an hour or so when she reached the place she first found the patch of earth where the Valerian grew. It had been next to a small grouping of old houses. Odessa had been careful to assure that nobody laid claim to the patch, but even before she checked the houses she was sure it was safe to take a few plants seeing as it was majorly untamed. The mottled girl dismounted, letting Keshi have free rein around where she knelt, knowing that he wouldn't bother to move far away. Using her thin fingers she pulled the plants up from the ground one by one and gently placed then in a few plastic pots, in turn placing them in the saddleless saddle bags. Mounting her steed again she returned home.
More or less two hours later, Odessa found herself approaching the garden. She had dismounted Keshi a few moments ago, and now lead him with the thick rope head collar she had been gifted with alongside him at his purchase. She tied him up at a tree stump not far away, not wanting to risk him ingesting any of the plants. The mottled medic laid a few handfulls of bluejoint at his feet, before retriving the bags and moving towards a spare patch of land.
The girl set to work, using a dainty hand to trowel up the soil, placing each of the three plants in the hole, spacing them out. It didn't take her long to finished recovering them, and so after fetching a bottle of water, she watered them. Odessa stepped back, dusting her hands down. She almost considered taking a drink from the bottle, as there was a mouthfull or two left, but she decided against it as it had been in the bag for some time. She took a small dried sliver of meat and ate it, something she prepare before she left.
Pleased with her work, Odessa retrieved her books and pencil from her bag. She sat down on a patch of grass, gazing up at the sky as it finally began to lighten up and sunbeams shined down half heartedly. Odessa glanced around, and seeing no one, she began to jot down the species of plant she noted in the garden, looking them up in the two other information books before adding in potential uses and ways to prepare them.
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