Behold this beautiful little flower. So unassuming, so innocent, soft and purple. I wouldn't touch this foxglove if I were you, not unless you wear gloves. You may not like what the sap can do to skin that may have cuts, or otherwise be permeable. -- Anon Guest
Beautiful to look at, wonderful to behold. But if you touch... your end is foretold.
Consider a field of flowers. Pink, white, or purple. The soft petal bells bear little spots, and multitudes of them hang innocently from a single stalk. In the right measures, it can help an irregular or slow heart.
Like all things, the devil is in the dosage.
Goodie Harlowe always kept a stock of them for heart troubles, rat troubles, and what she called "upright pests". If you were lucky, you never found out what that meant. Her latest patient seemed one in need, but as ever - not for herself.
Her husband was a known cad, always gadding about after other skirts, yet accusing his wife of adultery. He had her cowed and bruised most of the time, and greeted the birth of a new babe by siring another on her as soon as possible. It was a small miracle that Juni had been brave enough to venture out to Goodie Harlowe's cottage.
"I didn't mind when it was just me," her voice was a ghost, just enough in there to prevent it from being a whisper. "I can weather pain. It's just that he's started on hurting my eldest. He's got it in his head that he and I..." Juni could speak no more, shaking her head.
And her second-eldest child was a daughter.
Goodie Harlowe felt the creeping suspicion that Addur Makken's wandering eyes would begin wandering horrifyingly close to his home. And since every healer had a duty to protect the suffering from more of the same... there was one cure.
"Comes home drunk, doesn't he?"
"Aye," murmured Juni. "And he wants more drink ere he does his business on me, most often."
Goodie Harlowe took some time and care with the flowers, grinding them into a paste and mixing it with the purest alcohol that she possessed. She had a fancy bottle and some other good liquors, the potion and the booze both mixed well in there. She did the whole thing up with ribbon and a little bit of sparkle. "Tell him you paid a passing fancy lady for this with some of your knitting or needlework. Gift it to him and be sure he's the only one who has it. It's guaranteed to end your worries from that man."
It would end the man with them, but telling Juni that would make her reluctant to employ it.
The next day, there was a new widow in the village. Beside herself, true, but everyone knew she was better off without her husband. The women and girls of the area were eager to help her out and ease her woes. Thankful that a plague on their days was cooling in the graveyard.
Her voice started to come out of hiding after a week.
"I should be weeping," said Juni as she served some fresh cake to Goodie Harlowe. "I should be sorry he's gone. I was scared he'd be angry, but... I'm just relieved."
"What did you do with the bottle?" wondered Goodie Harlowe.
"I couldn't afford millet for his afterlife loaf so... It's buried with him. He did love the taste of it ere he died."
The millet loaf was meant to sustain a soul in the journey to Death's lands. Goodie wondered what a bottle of poison would do for one.
Ha. This one probably deserved whatever it was.
[Photo by David Young on Unsplash]
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