![Tongue S:P](./images/smilies/tongue.gif)
The bell rang in front of Malcolm's store again, but this time, instead of a customer or a patient, a wolf, which Malcolm should be familiar enough, popped through the door. He glanced at the empty counter.
"Hey!" The Kiedrian shouted quite loudly, at least enough for Malcolm and Tobias to hear from the backroom.
"Malcolm? You there? I went herb-hunting again, and I got a few pretty good finds this time!" A dull thud could be heard a few seconds later.
"Whew. That sure was heavy." A slightly audible mutter came after a moment of silence, then a sigh. "I sure am out of practice these days."
Malcolm had only just re-entered the back room when he heard the bell ring and Quentin call out.
"I'm back here. Hold on a tick."Malcolm called back, pivoting on the spot and heading back out to the shop. "Morning, Quentin." Malcolm said, heading behind the counter "What have you brought me today?"
Malcolm pulled on the string tying the bag together, causing it to open, spilling it contents out in the counter. "Let me see." Malcolm said quietly to himself as he quickly sifted through the herbs and plants in front of him. "We've got some blindweed, some butter brush, a nice big stash of Frozen Lavender..." Malcolm went on the list each of the 23 herbs presented to him, sorting the ones he was interested in in one pile and the ones he had no use for in another.
"Right, over all this is a pretty solid haul." Malcolm said happily. "I'm not sure if I can give you anything for the Chetty roots or Fox tongue, however..." Malcolm paused as he carefully picked up one of the green and red thistles, spouting a blue flower. "I'm offering triple the usual price for the Jester Nettles. I've no idea where you found this, but it shouldn't be in season again for at least another seven weeks."
Malcolm reached under the counter to retrieve three bags of coins from his safe. "I'm thinking... 20 gold, 200 silver and... 90 copper for this lot. Seem fair?"
"Yep. That should cover everything I need for the next two weeks." The wolf said as he scratched the back of his head, before pocketing the hefty bags of money. "It is starting to get a little harder than usual to get jobs, especially from humans, with all those anti-Kiedrian sentiment coming around." He shook his head. "But anyway, speaking of that, a wolf with pretty strange markings, strange even for me, came to our town just a while ago. He apparently created quite a commotion at the bar. Weapons were drawn, but good thing that no one was hurt." He grinned. News do travel fast at Ridgegate. He thought. Especially when there are Kiedrian and humans involved. "He had quite a lot of gold on him as well. A rich wolf. Not pretty common these days."
"Anyway, what got you all busy? You are always at the counter at this time." He said.
Malcolm shrugged "You know the usual. I'm just finishing up helping a customer with some stuff." Malcolm paused a moment as he lifted the deceivingly heavy bag of herbs off the counter and into a cupboard. Straining his muscles as he did. "Bloody hell... You weren't exaggerating about this thing." Malcolm scoffed.
The wolf helped Malcolm lift the heavy bag of herbs up by giving the bag a boost. Once the bag was seated safely on the shelve, Quentin wiped his head with his sleeve and took a drink from his water skin.
"Now, where were we?" Malcolm muttered to himself, scratching his chin. "Oh right, the Basitin." he said snapping his fingers "He seems a nice enough guy. Shame we don't have more of his kind come through this way, eh? I bet'd they'd have the most amazing stories to tell."
"A... A basitin?" The wolf exclaimed, nearly choking on the liquid he was drinking. "Can I please go meet him? I..." His enthusiasm suddenly ebbed as he seemed to have thought of something, but the gleam was still in his eyes. "I mean... I have never met one before, and I've only heard of them in books and such, and I really wanted to see one in person..." He lowed his head, seemingly in embarrassment.
"You'll have to ask him yourself. We're just waiting on results for a test now, so he's pretty much just in the back waiting. I'm sure he'd enjoy the company." Malcolm said cheerfully.