I awoke to the song of morning birds and cool shadows, and told myself, I have been here before, but when or how I cannot tell. I know the grass beyond the door, the sweet keen smell, the sound of sparrows brawling in the eaves.

I rolled over on my pallet and stretched.

Everyone else was up. Thermantia was sorting out herbs and leaves into little piles, eager for me to instruct her in the making of fasciculi, little tufts of sacred herbs used for a variety of kindly charms. To help sell our wares, I had been teaching her and Chia that the composition of each nosegay varied according to its intended use and that the method of weaving and tying the aromatic clusters was of utmost importance.

I rolled up my pallet and stowed it beneath a bench. "Good morning, Thermantia."

The old woman turned around and held up two of my finished sheaves. "Do you want me to make pins for these?"

"Nah, those charms are seldom worn. See how the vine securing the dried violets is tied in a bride's knot? Add a touch of myrtle blossoms, or any herbs sacred to Bona Dea; then it can be hidden beneath a beloved's pillow or cached secretly near the desired-one's doorstep. The love knot gives it that subtle power to attract one's intended lover."

She cackled and laid the badges down carefully. "Best not let Chia get her hands on these."

I nodded towards a basket full of little wisps by the door. "Just remember to keep the ones we did yesterday separate from these on the table. Those're all our protective badges that ward off sickness, fleas, evil eye, theft, and general bad luck."

Thermantia nodded thoughtfully and raised one eyebrow. "Then these attract, those repel." She was an apt pupil.

The men were up from their beds and gone. Dava already sat near her rustic loom, carding a great mound of raw wool piled in the laundry vat, ignoring a conversation she couldn't hear. Thermantia hobbled over to her kitchen box and set about grinding something up in her small hand mill. I went to the corner kitchen gutter and splashed my face in the cold water that flowed from the spring above the house. I shook the water from my hands and began puttering with the sprigs laid out to dry across the oak table. The old woman set about cutting mushrooms and wild celery, and splitting roasted pine nuts for our breakfast. She stirred the sliced mushrooms over a small brazier and sprinkled them with herbs from her pantry nook under the tower-wing stairs.

I said, "All the charms we'll work on today attract good things like a lover's affections. To insure success in the hunt, or to bring about a good harvest or even to catch a fish, one need only carry a talisman of plants sacred to the deity involved."

Thermantia cackled. "And the common folk'll rely on us to tell 'em what's sacred to the deity involved?"

"You scamp." I straddled the bench and began braiding for some hopeful hunter a fasciculus of dittany, fir and pine.

The old woman kneed another bench close to the crooked table, brought over her plate of mushrooms, celery and nuts, and mixed two small cups of sour wine.

Excerpt from The Scent of Hyacinth

© 2005 Sherrie Seibert Goff