Barren? Honey, I'm Just Getting Started
I said, sliding two more twenty-dollar bills across the counter.
Maeve grunted, reaching into a lower cabinet to pull out a dark stoneware jar filled with a thick, grey paste that smelled intensely of crushed copper and burnt pitch.
"The ash wash stings like lye and smells of a burnt smithy," she replied, slanting a milky eye up at me. "But a tracker could stand three feet away and think you're a sack of cold coal."
While she worked, measuring out small spoonfuls of black powder into the jar, I glanced at a smaller shelf near the wall. Row after row of small glass vials were labeled in messy ink: Joint Ease, Night Sleep, Blood Flush.