Her Beasts

Rainy Days Part One

The next few days were filled with constant rain. Iris couldn't go out without worrying her mates that she might get sick. Thus, she could only hold up in their home and entertain herself with indoor activities.

Ember went out to hunt once or twice every day. When he did so, he would always be sure to fly over to the fields for Iris. He had stayed in many other tribes before, including those who farmed, and he had picked up a thing or two. He might not know how to do the actual farm work, but he could easily check for flooding and animal tracks.

Luckily, neither appeared to be an issue. The rain was constant but it was not terribly heavy. The trenches were easily able to funnel excess water into the river and prevent the crops from becoming flooded. The fences and territory marking seemed to be working, but Ember made sure to remark the territory every few days in case the rain washed the scent away.

Caspian and Basil occasionally took turns hunting. As males often only got to eat their fill while out on the hunt, it would be difficult to never go hunting. Besides, they felt it was only fair to share all household duties rather than letting any one person do everything.

Iris was excited because today was finally time for the weekly banquet. After the cold season passed, much fewer people showed up as they'd feel guilty making Iris's family prepare so much food for them. However, Holly always turned up and often brought a few other females and their families with her.

Due to the rain, Iris hadn't had the chance to go out to find forageables. However, both Caspian and Ember were currently out hunting to gather enough food for tonight. Ember would never let his mate go hungry and Caspian was as doting as ever to Iris.

Iris brought Basil to the kitchen as they discussed what to make for the feast.

"Sadly, I only really have acorn flour and cattail roots in the house. I don't know what they'll bring back from the hunt, but that'll cover the meat side of things. I usually like to prepare soup in the extra large soup pot in the banquet room as well as one or two other things.

I've made desserts before when I had fruits and honey available, but that's impossible currently. I have plenty of sweet root and honey now so I could try making something else.

Besides that, I usually make either a savory pie from flour, animal fat, water, and a thickened soup like filling or a roast of some sort. It'll be hard to plan a savory dish without knowing what they'll bring back, though."

Basil wrapped his tail around Iris's waist as he pulled her into his arms. Basil felt disappointed that he couldn't fix the lack of food variety for Iris. However, he was sure that something could be sorted out. He hesitantly suggested

"Well, what about those Jujui berries? Maybe you could make whatever a dessert is with those? You also said you wanted to experiment with the umai leaves before, right?"

Iris nodded as she pursed her lips. It was true that she did have the strange sour berries that Basil found. If it was lemons, Iris could imagine a few different uses from lemonade to lemon bars to lemon meringue. The last two were impossible due to a lack of eggs among other ingredients, but perhaps a shortbread cookie with a slight citrusy addition could be doable.

A shortbread of sorts could be formed using flour, honey, animal fat, and salt. Then Iris could make the jujui berries into a sort of jam by cooking them down with water and honey before mashing them into a fine paste. This jam could then be placed in the middle of the shortbread cookies to make thumbprint style cookies.

If Iris also mixed some of the jam mixture with water and strained it through a grass mat then she could serve a sort of lemonade like drink with the cookies. Yes, Iris nodded satisfied with her plan. She then carefully got to work on making a few dozen cookies alongside Basil.