Nature Will Provide

Because of the nocturnal rhythm of Saratoga’s lifestyle, lunch was a meal enjoyed closer to midnight. But in her budding young wisdom, she had decided to start her march to the mountains without gathering much more than a few strips of dried fruit and meat. Hardly a worthy enough meal for her youthful appetite, even less so for such an already exhausting trip.

This wasn't an issue for the witch, she assumed, as her foraging skills were more than sufficient for her to survive off the land. That didn’t stop Moliugas from questioning her lack of preparedness.

“Why didn’t you pack better?” Moliugas questioned.

“Mother prepares my meals.” Saratoga blushed, recovering from her embarrassment only when fruit bearing flora came into view off the side of the road.

“You don't make your own meals?”

“I have so little time for that,” she replied, inspecting the berries very closely, but having trouble distinguishing them or their leaves while the moonlight was covered by trees.

As a rind denizen, Moliugas was a consistent source of torch light, like a jack-o-lantern. Much to his protest, she picked him up like a child and placed him in front of the bush, gaining a much needed boost in visibility.

“Please refrain from handling me when unnecessary,” he grumbled.

“It was necessary.”

She discovered that the berries were small and red, almost tomato-like in shape. Beside them were tiny flowers with peeled back purple petals and a pointed yellow center jutting out from them. She shook her head when realizing the plant she was dealing with. “Bittersweet nightshade…”

“Sounds edible enough.” Moliugas plucked a handful of berries, but Saratoga was fast to slap them away. “How dare you?” he frowned, glaring with a mean scowl.

“I don’t know what you rind folk eat, but this certainly should not be on the menu. They cause very unwanted side effects in people. In some cases, even death.”

“D-death?” if the rind could have sweated, he would have been drenched in moisture. “I almost ate that… I don’t want to die…”

Adjacent to the berry bush was something a bit more interesting, perhaps much safer. Giant leaves were sprouting from the ground along thin stems. Tiny little wooly fibers grew on their underside. Saratoga began digging out the root of this plant as far down as she could.

"Common burdock... Perfect."

Once she had the whole thing uncovered, she peeled away the surface of the roots and began munching on its core. Moliugas watched in confusion.

“So, those berries aren’t nearly as appetizing as the root of a giant leaf plant?” His brow raised in a nervous, but skeptical motion.

“Foraging is more than just simply picking things that look appetizing.”

A venus flytrap she tended to in her windowsill back home was very appetizing to bugs, but that was a two way street, of which flies usually could not cross to the end.

“Well, I’ve been quite famished since I was cursed, so I’ll try anything at this point,” admitted Moliugas. “Everything I’ve tried so far that was remotely edible merely burns up in me, then I cough and sneeze out the ashes.”

As a demonstration, he took hold of one of the roots and ate it, only to sneeze it back out.

“Achoo!”

The gods wouldn’t have designed a creature to be hungry and yet have no food in nature to satisfy its appetite, not unless they deemed such a soul worthy of torture. There had to have been something available that a rind could eat.

“But what?” She turned all around, trying to decide what might be a good fit. “Perhaps if we find a pumpkin patch…” she grinned, mischievously.

The thought of eating a pumpkin in his current form disgusted him. “I would never sample my own for sustenance!” The fire heart in his belly burned brighter with his anger.

“I was just joking,” she laughed. “However, you did just give me an idea…”