Princess Snow and the Empress

8: The Girl at the Window

*Author's note: It is now autumn, six months since the events in the previous chapter*

Autumn

Snow stood at the window of the cottage and tried to peer as far as she could between the trees in the evening light. The forest, as before, yielded nothing new to her, just deepening shadows and faint shafts of light, and twisted branches shrouded in thick mist.

She turned away from the window and plopped herself at a low square table covered with mounds of dried herbs. With a loud sigh, she continued sorting the herbs into smaller piles.

This herb is used for piles, the other for morning sickness.

This herb when brewed with dried insects rids the body of malicious wind.

This one's an antidote for centipede venom.

More herbs hung in bunches along the walls to dry, infusing the air in the sparsely furnished cottage with a sharp, medicinal scent.

Initially, the herbs and twigs that the dwarves brought in from their foraging expeditions looked all the same to her. But after sorting through probably thousands of varied leaves, bits of tree bark, berries, petals and rhizomes, and after a scolding from Third Brother, she had learned to recognize the more common herbs and their medicinal properties.

On rare occasions, the dwarves came back from their expeditions with animal parts – the gallstones or paws of poor forest-dwelling creatures, or the antlers of small deer, which the apothecaries ground into powder as a remedy for heatiness. The dwarves could then afford to buy cured sausages or a live chicken for the cooking pot. However, for most of the year, they only had leaves, berries and bark to offer.

On the mornings the dwarves were to journey down to the villages, they would hoist a heavily laden basket each on their backs. A week or so later, they would return with provisions – a few sacks of rice, a basketful of gourds, bags of flour and dried beans, a large block of hard tofu, and an earthen jar of pickled mustard greens or cabbage. 

Snow could make vegetable and tofu stew with this fare, though when the rice supply was low, they all took to eating thinned porridge with bits of pickles.

The cottage dimmed; the sun had disappeared behind the mountain range. After scooping the last of the herbs into a shallow basket, she turned towards the cooking area, blackened from decades of use, to find Second Brother peering inside the pot. Hand tremoring, he placed the lid back with a slight clatter. He raised his brows, long and white like cat whiskers, at her. "They should be home soon."

"Oh, right." She got up and went about setting wooden chopsticks and spoons on the table. 

In the Palace, her utensils would have rested on celadon chopstick holders shaped like dancing carp; her bowls made of fine porcelain. Decadent dishes of exotic meats, fish and sweets were the norm for every meal. She was not complaining though; she was just glad to have a hot meal that evening, even if it was just watery porridge with beans and pickles.

If the dwarves had not found me all those months ago, I would have starved to death, or been eaten by a tiger or worse.

Snow's sombre thoughts were interrupted by the sound of shuffling footsteps outside the cottage. The door opened and six grizzled old dwarves trudged in, dumping baskets of harvested leaves in a line against the wall.

"Big brothers, you are home," Snow said cheerily.

Though the dwarves were at least fifty years older than her, she called them brothers, and they called her little sister. In truth, she felt more familial affection towards them than her own princely half-brothers. She didn't know the dwarves' names. They never called each other by name anyway.