You find most of what you need by foraging, and Sionag's spell makes up the difference with no culinary pleasures whatsoever. The plants are edible alright, when there is nothing else to eat.
You reach the Humber in high spirits. The foragers have managed to trap a few rabbits, so that you can look back at a few hearty suppers with meat. Your packs OTOH holds only the emergency supply of roots and leaves. Even Betula has cause for concern; there are better veggies than this. Those with a little journey will know that it is harder to forage in the densely populate hinterland of York. The current supplies will keep you fed, but not pleased, through this area.
As mentioned, if you don't want to approach the settlements and ask for a ferry, you have to go upriver, all the way to the highway before you can ford the Ouse. It is not so much of a detour, since I am sure some of you have enough area lore to plan ahead. It is just that that wilderness between the road and the water isn't there to give you cover.
You can pass hamlets and villages at respectful distance, and nobody disturbs you until you have crossed the river, and see a small group walking towards the ford with a handcart. «Hello travellers,» shouts the man at the front, studying their rough appearance after days in the wild. «Are you looking to trade, by any chance?» he asks. «We have a load of dried cod, and maybe a new dress. Best Yorkshire wool,» he adds looking at Betula's well-worn attire.
Betula turns to the others and says in Latin, "I believe we should trade. What we have may keep us alive but at worse than the subsistence level we have been at. Hopefully the witchhunter's men are not here, so far North of Nottingham."
The peddlar quotes an unsurprising war-time price in silver for the fish. The dress price is less affected by war-time scarcity. The exact price would be affected by your bargain, but it matters little in the big picture.
«You have been a long time on the road, haven't you?» he asks. «Are you returning home to Yorkshire?» He keeps the small-talk up as you weigh the silver and the fish, and Betula inspects the dresses. He has two that are new; one in a rather unexiting cheap grey/brownish colour, and a more expensive one in a pleasant shade of green. «I have shirts and tunics too, if you need.»
“Just travelling about, entertaining where I can, how about yourselves? Would you like to hear a tale, for a consideration in your fine fish maybe?” Replies Finn
«I would appreciate that. Maybe we can move down to the riverside; it is only fifty paces. We should refill the waterskins. What can you tell me about the lands South of the river? Yorkshire is not very welcoming to strangers these days. Wulfric the Witchhunter came into the city two days ago, and people point accusations at anyone that can draw his attention away from themselves.»
“Much the same my friend, Wulfric was causing the same trouble around Nottingham, his soldiers were arresting anyone that seemed strange, bad business all round.”
Storytelling+Com roll of 15.
Bargain+Com roll of 7
«All around, you say. Sounds as if we should travel through Mercia as fast as we can. Do you know of any good places to trade on the way?» The peddlar and his family is happy to trade gossip and stories for hours. Without specific prompts, you end up with lighthearted faerie tales, and you can excuse yourselves and head on at your convenience.
Avoiding every village in Yorkshire is challenging, but guarded as they are, the peasants you meet do not challenge strangers.
Anything else before you arrive at the village on the edge of the bogs?
If Sionag can, she will help peasants during their road against food or some money. She clearly doesn't racket them, she is more in "give what you think it's fair" way instead of "This is the bill". Knowing about the witchhunter, she won't use her magic, only her herbalism and medecine / chirurgy skills.
Sionag finds the peasants very guarded and rather ungrateful. With modest folk ken (+ perception 6+) she, and others who watch, may realise that the peasants do not know the difference between Herbalism and Hermetic spells, even if nobody actually words an accusation or even states their position.
Even if the area is densely populated, there are enough wood patches at polite distance to any fields and cottages, where you can make camp, and towards the end of the next day you arrive at the edge of the marshlands where you suspect the Black Boar may be found. You see a village, and with little hope of finding the Boar in the Bog without further information, I assume that you approach.
About forty paces outside the village you pass a small cottage or a shed, with a suspicious odour of sewage. The village has a good twenty cottages. A carpenter is working in the village square, making a big box about six feet long. Other villagers are harvesting fields further away and just within sight.
The carpenter gives a sheepish glance. «Coffin,» he says. On the question about news, he makes a longer answer, «Cynebald. Killed in the Bogs.» He points to the odourous shed. And you think you can see the carpenter shedding a tear before he stoops down to fit another plank.
"Would you know anything about it - the animal or where the attack occured? Or would anyone in the village? We have good hunters. Maybe we can try and track the animal so this doesn't happen again."