Black Rock Plant List

Wraith mint is similar to most mint plants with its serrated leaves and heavy aromatic scent. The only difference is that its leaves, rather than being bright green, are transparent. They still hold a faint green tinge, but this is difficult to see, unless you find them on a full moon. During the full moon, the leaves of the wraith mint become a glowing green. It is said that wraith mint is most potent when harvested on these nights.

The wraith mint is a very versatile plant for any herbalist. It carries all of the properties that the average mint plant does with a few extra on top. This mint serves well as a calming aromatherapy, and many will scatter its leaves on the floors of their homes. When the leaves are stepped on, the scent is released and fills the home with its scent and the mind and soul with peace. It is also useful as a cooking herb and in teas.

The wraith mint also has properties that affect ghosts. The mint has a calming effect on the spirits of the dead, and some ghosts claim that they can smell and taste the mint, as they would have in life. This property of the mint has made it popular among spiritists who use it as an incense and an ingredient in their doughs.

Marsh dodder is a common tendril plant that lives only with another plant to act as its host. Its leaves remain small and close to the thin stem, giving it a scaly appearance. Small, tasteless fruit generally grows on the stem in the fall, and the plant flowers in many colors during late spring or early summer. When the plant begins to grow from seeds shed into the soil, it must attach itself to a host within a week or it will die. Once the tendrils reach another plant, haustoria are formed, creating connections between the dodder and its host. Nutrients and water are then transferred between the two.

On Black Rock, this relationship between the two is strictly symbiotic with the dodder living on other plants for years on end and maximizing the other plant's lifespan and vitality. No one can explain it, but whenever the dodder leaves the Isle of the Dead, it becomes a parasite, destroying its host and moving quickly on to another. Whenever it leaves Black Rock and begins to flourish, great sums of Mizas or whatever price the Phylonurist asks are offered to witches to restore the balance of nature to what it was before the plant arrived.

Uses: While the plant itself has no special properties, it does have one attribute that makes it appealing to those in the business of herbalism. The dodder, while transferring nutrients and water from its host, also takes the nutrients and chemicals that give its host its medical and poisonous properties and concentrates them in its fruit. If one’s thumb is green enough, they can stretch this process out, making either very potent cures or poisons. This property also applies to tastes, and it is possible to create a hybrid of fruit flavors.