Take a closer look at that soup...

I decided to take a closer look at the soup, trying to make out each ingredient. I thanked the heavens for all that time my Master had spent forcing me to read and memorize the Four Classics of Herbology. Most of the ingredients were normal. Stringy meat (probably rabbit), Carrots, sunips, yellow cabbage, wild spear-leak, parsley, John´s greens, angosia... nothing suspicious. Swallowing back the flood of saliva caused by the delicious smell of the soup, I looked closer until I found something I couldn´t make out, small greenish-black flakes, like ground peppercorns. But that was impossible. Pepper was an unimaginable luxury in these parts. Even in the Grand Bazaar of Al-Thracis, good, uncut pepper was well worth its weight in silver. Up here, it would be paid for in diamonds, or in blood.

I cautiously took a sip of soup. It was delicious, each simple ingredient used in the best possible way. Then I found what I was looking for - a strange, spicy aftertaste, almost like pepper, but earthier and darker, more bitter than hot. Suddenly it came to me in a flash. I darted to my feet, hand wrapped around the handle of my janbiya, ready to draw.

"Wellripple!" I gasped, to excited to even properly articulate my accusation. My brain was frantically going over the entry from de Mauritte´s Herbaria Nordica again and again: ´Wellripple, a type of lichen, native to the northern deep-forest. Known for its powerful sedative, aphrodisiac and psychoactive properties, used by the heathen clans of the Ancient North in orgiastic rites and referred to as "Evening Fire". Culinary use unadvisable, but taste is described as similar to pepper. Antiflatulent.´

"You tried to poison me using Wellripple!" I yelled, poiting an accusatory finger at Solmina. The young witch didn´t seem to react, she just gazed resolutely at me, blue eyes stony and expressionless. "You tried to poison me!" I repeated stupidly, aught off guard by her lack of reaction.

"That I did." Solmina said, voice calm, "And...? What are you going to do about it, foreign wizard man?"

"I..." I sputtered, not actually sure of what I was going to do. I´d faced plenty of supernatural threats, ghosts, zombies, the occasional demon and on one memorable occasion even a lesser Djinn, but I´d never actually faced a human foe. "Th-That is wrong..." I continued lamely, "You should not poison people." I blushed. Nice work Solomon. Real smooth. I can tell you´re a real winner.

"Don´t be so sensitive. Wellripple isn´t poisonous, it just knocks you out. I wasn´t going to poison you, I was going to **** you." the young witch replied in an impatient tome of voice, "There´s a difference."

"Well, you shouldn´t **** people either!" I shot back, "You tried to feed me a sedative at your own table! Is that what they call hospitality up here!?"

Solmina stood up and drew the mighty bearskin up around her slender shoulders. The mass of thick, black fur gave her a threatening appearance, with only her pale white face and hands standing out against a mass of shadow. She looked straight at my face. Though I could make out fear and nervousness in her young eyes, there was a clear challenge there.

"Are you gunna do something about it, Wizard Man?" she said in a low voice. "I can tell you why I wanted to **** you; what I need you for. Hell, maybe you´ll like what you hear... Or, we can do this the hard way. On my turf." Her fists clenched, though in preparation for combat or to hide her nerves I didn´t know, "So you can take your hand offa that weird, bendy knife of yours, stop drawing runes behind your back and sit down so we can talk this over like nice, proper gentlemen. Or we can do this the stupid way, which, frankly, neither of us really want to do."