Healer's Garden

The air grew still. It felt as though the slightest breath could shatter the world into a million tiny slithers of glass. Flashes of light rolled inside the dark belly of the clouds, like a hideous monster moving restlessly inside its mother's womb. This was not lightning. Purples... Reds... Old Ways preserve us, but this was like nothing we had ever seen before. That's when the rain started. As it touched our plants, they started to wither before our eyes. Everything was dying. They took everything from us... Everything...

— The account of a Varsii immigrant in Rykfontein

Two decades ago, a terrible sickness was inflicting upon the Varsii Kingdom of Man. A Faerii curse was rained down over the inhabitants of Halwithick. Grass withered. Trees rotted. Fields that had been bountiful with crops, were destroyed. Worse still, when the Healer realised what was happening to the plants, she ran back to her home... to find her Healer's garden a desecrated graveyard of skeletal, useless plants.

A Healer's Garden

I used to find such peace in my garden. I would find healing for my heart and mind as I tended to my flowers and herbs. When I sat on the ground, I imagined that I was sat on Our Lady's lap. The grass was Her skirt - softer than the finest silk. The wind was the gentle lullaby She sang to me. The warmth of the sun was Her tender embrace. Old Ways know how I yearn for that feeling now, in this cold, stone prison of a city. I pray that one day, my sweet girl, you will feel Her presence as you help me tend our planters. I have to hope Raskvaerii and their imaginary Saints have not scared our goddess away...

— Rosenwyn MacKerrow's note to her daughter in the Codex Healartum

by Vero Photoart

A Healer's garden is their pride and joy. They will spend hours toiling under the merciless sun and the freezing rain, tending to their plants. They cultivate and harvest a vast array of herbs, fruits, flowers, moss and fungi in their raised plant beds, which they nuture throughout the entire year. Plants that do not flower or produce fruit in autumn or winter can be dried for posterity, and the inside of a Healer's home is always beautifully decorate with bunches of flowers and herbs strung across the rafters and walls.

Saeric 'Hobby Gardens'

While other Saeric countries reject the idea that Faerii Power caused the disease that wiped out all vegetation in Halwithick, Healer's Gardens have become quite the fad in countries like Kredashmi and Lormont. Ladies of the upper and middling classes enjoy recreational gardening projects that seek to emulate their poorly-conceived notions of their layouts and purposes. While some women manage to grow mint for making tea and lavender to crush for aiding sleep, they will be unable to maintaining anything remotely close to the Varsiis' complex and sacred gardens.

by Thomas Smith

by Annie Spratt

Forgive me, my beautiful daughter. I was powerless to stop the destruction that the Fae sent to us in that terrible storm. And yet, when I look into your laughing eyes, I see my father's face... my grandmother's face... I see the faces of all our ancestors who ever cared for and loved that garden. I cannot help but weep.

— Rosenwyn MacKerrow's note to her daughter in the Codex Healartum