Completed Remedy

[Ari'Ellin]

62nd Fall, 2020

She knew she was early as she approached the shop, though a smile spread across her face as she walked in, nodding to Kita, the older woman that sat in the shopfront, just waiting for more customers to arrive so she could enchant them with her words and her welcoming personality. It seemed that most of the customers came to the place purely to speak with her and spend their time around a friendly local.

“Morning.” Ari said with a grin, bowing her head to the other woman as she spoke, heading towards the back room of the shop.

“Ari’Ellin, lovely to see you. Have you been sleeping well?” the older woman asked with a warm smile. Ari couldn’t help but stop in her tracks and smile at the woman as she took extra time to try to make sure her sentences made sense.

“I sleep well. It’s good. Thank you. Any you?” she asked the other woman and smiled more as the woman understood her and nodded at her.

“I’ve been sleeping well as well.” the woman said, about to speak more before a customer entered the shop, taking her attention away from Ari as she promptly greeted the new customer and began to engage them in deep conversation.

Politely, Ari nodded a farewell to the woman as she entered the back room to see a series of onions alongside a jar of honey left on the bench.

“My mother found out that soaking onion in boiling water and then adding honey can make a cheap remedy for a sore throat.” the voice of the man that was Kita’s son, came from behind her as she turned around to see Remas pulling his coat on, ready to head out for the day. “I have some things to take care of so could you try to make this onion syrup?” He asked and Ari nodded in silence watching as the man turned and left the shop.

Blinking to herself, Ari shook her head and stepped closer to the onions, spotting that Remas had prepared a chopping board and a knife ready for her, or at least prepared for him to use later in the day. Nodding again she chuckled slightly, picking up one of the onions, this one looking quite purple with an outside that felt like paper.

Looking over the onion, she picked up a knife and sliced off the ugly looking ends to see the inside that went from thin purple lines of rings to white rings of what looked like flesh. Thinking for a few moments she decided it would possibly be a good idea to remove the outer skin first, and carefully she started to peel the skin, frowning each time it feared and she had to find another edge to start peeling away from the purple coloured onion.

One seemingly all of the skin had been removed, Ari furrowed her brows, going to grab a pot and fill it full of water, setting it in the hearth to start boiling before she returned to the onion, now deciding to cut it into halves and keep cutting it until the individual pieces of the onion seemed to be what she thought could be small enough.

Word Count539 Words

[Ari'Ellin]

Once the pieces of onion all seemed to be small enough, Ari checked the pot, happy to see that it was beginning to boil. Nodding to herself, she placed the pieces of onion into the boiling water, watching as the onion chunks caused the boiling of the water to simmer down.

Happy with the result, she grabbed a wooden spoon knelt in front of the hearth and the pot, stirring it gently and mixing the chunks of onion with the water before she watched as the pot started to boil again.

Frowning to herself, Ari’Ellin realised she wasn't certain as to how long to boil the mixture. She thought to herself for a few moments before deciding that she could check to see how the water changed over time. Carefully she used a wooden spoon to scoop up some of the water. She checked the colour of the water in the spoon, nodding at the lack of colour before slowly pouring the water back into the pot and watching it’s consistency as it dripped and then trickled back into the pot.

Happy with how everything looked, Ari left the spoon in the mixture and stood up and moved around the room, grabbing a large pot that she could strain the mixture into. She set the pot onto a workbench before turning and opening a handful of cupboards and drawers until she found a cloth that the liquid could be poured through in order to ensure that the result didn’t have pieces of onion still floating in it.

Looking back at the mixture that was boiling away, she stepped closer to it and knelt down again, grabbing the spoon and stirring the mix again. She scooped up another spoonful of the liquid and saw that it had taken on a little bit of colour, although it was very faint still. Letting the liquid drip back into the pot she noticed no real change in consistency.

Carefully she stirred the pot again before standing up and returning to the fresh pot and cloth, spreading the cloth over the top of the pot before frowning and checking around the room again. She spotted a ball of string and a knife and quickly cut a length of the string with the knife, before using that length of string to tie the cloth around the pot.

She looked over it, checking that the fabric wasn’t too tight and carefully retying the string and nodding happily as she carried the pot down towards the hearth, quickly grabbing the honey as she did so.

She stirred the mixture again, this time the smell of onions hitting the back of her nose and the fumes hit her eyes, causing them to sting slightly.

Instantly she recoiled backwards, pressing the back of her wrists against her eyes to try to soothe the stinging slightly. After a few ticks, she removed her hands and blinked a few times, wincing as her eyes started to water and the stinging began to subside slowly.

Frowning, she reached out for the handle of the spoon, keeping it at a distance as she stirred the boiling mixture before scooping out some of the liquid and checking over it.

Word Count534 Words

[Ari'Ellin]

Observing the liquid, it now had more of the purple tint to it, and this time that tint was clearly there. The liquid was now slightly cloudier, appearing a little murky on the spoon. It didn’t look particularly appetising and it didn’t look as though it was something that anyone would want to drink.

Careful not to burn herself, Ari dipped her finger into the hot liquid, before licking the liquid off that fingers, finding that it had a slight onion-like flavour, although it was very mild. By her estimates it had only been fifteen chimes since the water had started to boil, and she decided that should would find something else to occupy her time for another 15 minutes, until the onion and water mixture had boiled longer, hopefully for long enough that the onion would infuse the water with it’s healing properties.

Nodding to herself, trying to be confident in her decision, Ari stood up again and started to look around the room, checking a few shelves of concoctions that had been set to infuse and macerate. Each jar and bottle had a small slip of parchment with a date written on it, and a few directions on what needed to be done.

Reading over them, it seemed that very few of the jars would be ready to filter out the solids, although several of them had various words written on the parchment in large letters.

“Sha-ke often? Sha-ke... Shake!” she mumbled to herself as she made sense of the writings, finally able to read that the instruction was ‘shake often’. “Shake often.” she read again, running her finger along the individual letters of the word, piecing it together and committing the written form of the words to her memories.

Ari grinned happily as she picked up one jar and checked that it was sealed properly. Tentatively she shook the jar, watching to see if anything leaked and when it didn’t leak, Ari started to shake the jar more vigorously, mixing what looked to be a handful of crushed leaves with the oil that the jar contained, allowing the leaves that had been surrounded by other leaves to mix with the oil again, hopefully allowing that oil to draw the properties of the leaves into itself.

She placed the jar back into it’s place on the shelf before she repeated that process with a handful of the other jars, some containing more leaves and others containing various other pieces of plants, before placing them all back into their place on the shelf. Next she checked another shelf and read what she could of the small slips of parchment that had the instructions and dates on them.

The next shelf had no such instructions written on the parchment, instead just a date and what Ari’Ellin assumed was the name of the plant and what it was infusing in. Carefully she looked around the rest of the room, seeing that none of the other mixes were something she could deal with quickly, and so she made her way back to the hearth and the onion mixture.

Word Count519 Words

[Ari'Ellin]

Carefully she stirred the mixture another time, using the wooden spoon to scoop out some of the liquid again and she looked over it. It was definitely different now, with much more colour and it looked cloudier. She waited a few ticks for the mixture in the spoon to cool slightly before she dipped her finger into the liquid and then tasted the liquid from her finger, frowning at the now distinct taste of onion.

Despite the somewhat unpleasant taste, it seemed that the mixture was probably ready, and so Ari’Ellin glanced around, picking up a cloth from beside the hearth and used it to pull the pot out of the fire. She didn’t want to tip the liquid while it was still boiling rapidly, and so she waited for a chime or too, patiently watching the steam that rose from the pot as it grew fainter and fainter. Finally she was confident enough in it’s temperature to begin pouring it.

Carefully she used the cloth to protect her hand and arm from the hot metal of the pot as she lifted it and started to gently pour the the liquid into the fresh pot, through the clean sheet of cloth tied around the fresh pot to filter out the onion debris. She watched as she aimed the water, happy to see all of it flowing onto the clean cloth and quickly disappearing through it into the pot below.

It didn’t take long and soon the boiling pot was empty and the remaining pieces of the onion were left on the cloth that covered the pot that held what should have been clean of any onion debris. Humming softly to herself, Ari put the hot pot down next to the hearth and turn her attention to the string that held the filtering cloth in place.

She pulled the string away from one side of the pot, catching the edge of the piece of cloth before it could fall into the pot, then carefully she used her other hand to free the rest of the cloth, holding the freed edges until the cloth was no longer attached to the pot.

The onion remains still had some water left in them, and hurriedly she turned to the old pot, holding the cloth so that she could squeeze the area with the onions in it to draw out as much of the liquid as she could. Humming to herself while she worked, she alternated between squeezing the fabric covered onions and shaking them in order to try to free some of the liquid, and a few chimes later it seemed that there was no longer any liquid left within the onions.

Nodding to herself, she set the cloth and onions to the side and checked the liquid she had squeezed out. It was a similar colour to the other liquid, although it was much cloudier, even though it did not look like there was much debris left floating in it. Shrugging to herself, Ari tipped the liquid in with the rest of it, and gently stirred the liquid again.

Word Count516 Words

[Ari'Ellin]

Looking at the mixture still, Ari’Ellin reached over to the honey and added a spoonful of the sweet, amber syrup to the liquid, stirring it through and watching it dissolve slowly. It was dissolving too slowly for her, and frowning she tested the temperature of the liquid, finding it had cooled considerably after having been put into a cold pot.

“You idiot Ari...” she mumbled to herself in Kontinese as she shook her head and moved the pot to sit in the fire of the hearth, allowing it to heat up slowly. She knew it could take a little bit of time before it got hot enough again, and sighing she stood up, taking the old, dirty pot to rinse it out and scrub it clean, making sure that any residue from the onion mixture had been cleaned out of the pot, before she turned the pot upside down to drain.

Happy with the state of the pot, Ari’Ellin turned her attention back to the pot in the hearth. She walked closer to it, seeing a few bubbles beginning to form where it was starting to boil, and Ari nodded to herself, adding another spoonful of honey to the mix, stirring it and watching as it dissolved much quicker.

To her, it looked as though the mixture was too watery, and so she thought for a moment. Adding honey could work to thicken it, but not in the quantity that was in the pot. If she could boil off some of the water, she was certain that what was left would be stronger, take up less storage space, and require less honey to take on a more appealing viscosity.

Sitting by the hearth, she avoided stirring the mixture, instead watching as it reached a boil, and kept at a rolling boil as steam rose up from the pot, the water slowly but surely leaving the pot and hopefully concentrating the mixture.

“Still working on the onions?” a voice came, startling Ari as she turned to see Remas, and she nodded slightly in response.

“Think it too watery. Boiling off water.” she said calmly in response as the man stepped closer, looking over her shoulder as she went to stir the pot, not wanting to risk the pot boiling over. “Is okay?” she asked, still watching the man as he nodded.

“Don’t worry, I can watch it until it’s ready, does anything need sorting? How much honey did you add?” he asked and Ari slowly got to her feet, staying silent for a couple of extra moments whilst processing everything.

“Two spoons honey. Not want add more until less water. And labels all not today. Tomorrow day after yes.” she responded and the man smiled in response.

“Good idea.” was all he said as he looked over the pot. “Have you cleaned everything you’ve used?” he asked, glancing around to see what she had left. “I see. Maybe have a look at what herbs we have? When we have this all ready to bottle, I’ll call you over, okay?” he said and Ari nodded and smiled in response, going to check over the rest of the herbs in the shop.

Word Count529 Words

[Oralie]

grade award!

...

Ari'Ellin

Skills

• Socialisation: 2
• Cooking: 1
• Philtering: 2
• Herbalism: 1
• Cleaning: 1

Lores

• Herbalism: Onion and honey for a sore throat
• Cooking: Chopping onions
• Philtering: Sore throat syrup
• Philtering: Straining solids from liquids
• Philtering: Boiling off water

Notes
Another lovely, simple job thread (:
...

Please PM me if you have any questions or concerns and don't forget to edit your grade request!