《Demesne》


 1 - Our Unfortunately Named Protagonist

    In the middle of the rains, they finally finished digging out the cave for the core for the demesne.


    Whisperer Lolilyuri, Lori to most, had been in the midst of fortifying the water break around the settlement, the rain dripping down from the wide brim of her pointy leather hat, when one of the children had reached her. The little girl had paused as she''d gotten near, staring at the large beast on the other side of the water break, then at its head a few feet away. Its neck was still venting a little steam.


    "Wiz Lori?" the child said. She was thin, though not quite skin and bones yet. Lori remembered her being much more plump when they set off from Covehold Demesne weeks ago. Now her dress hung loose on her. "Lord Rian says you need to come quick, they finally finished digging."


    "Give me a little longer," Lori said, sweeping her wire-wrapped staff through the shallow trough of the water break like she was sweeping a broom or an oar, the thin metal strand under her hand warm with her magic. Breathe in, channel the magic through her blood and out her oil and sweat glands into the wire, into the water¡­


    "Lord Rian said you needed to come now," the annoying brat insisted.


    "I got the message, now go away before I drown you," Lori said, not looking up from what she was doing. Standing in the wet of the rain was not improving her mood, no matter how much safer it was than being dry.


    Alas, the younger generation had no sense of self-preservation. The brat began to tug on the back of her rain coat as if that would get her moving.


    Lori let out a large sigh. Fortunately for the child''s prospects of being aquatically asphyxiated, she had finished imbuing the waterwisps by then, and they would have enough power to flow for the next day or so before Lori needed to imbue the water again to keep the Iridescence mostly at bay. Enough time to perform the ceremony, especially if there was another rain before the imbuement ran out.


    "Right, fine," she said, feeling her wet socks squish as she caught her breath. It had been weeks since she''d had socks that were dry longer than an hour. "Come on, where''s Rian?"


    "Lord Rian," the child corrected.


    "He''s not a lord," Lori corrected right back. "If he were, he wouldn''t be here."


    Actually, Lori was fairly sure he was, purely on the evidence of his straight teeth, smooth skin, and his inept but good naturedly enthusiastic approach to manual labor. No one who''d ever actually worked for a living would be that bad at it. He was probably rebelling against his father or seeking his own fortune or some rainbow. Well, not her problem. He''d obviously never studied ancient history or ever done any real politics. If he actually had, he was smarter than he looked. Though that wasn''t hard, since he often looked like a fool.


    She followed the little girl back to the settlement, traditionally nameless until it had a demesne and Dungeon to protect it from the Iridescence. The settlement had over a hundred people left, mostly living in crude shelters of canvas and what little wood and metal rods they''d been able to bring, since the wood from the local trees were still iridiated. They had set out with three hundred people and over 70 families. Fifteen families, or what was left of them, as well as a few lone opportunists lured in by the promise of untapped resources, and yes, she included the probably-lord in that category. Lori was one of them herself, here for the chance to lay claim to her own Dungeon, and the power that came with it.


    Right now though, she had to tramp through wet mud that still occasionally faintly flickered in different colors. The sight of it made her shiver, even if it was just harmless trace elements already dissolved by the water.


    The foundation of the demesne had been dug at the base of the stone cliff the settlement planned to eventually put their tower on, but would for now act to protect the settlement on one side, with a river for water nearby. They''d very quickly recalled the importance of water when you were without a demesne to protect you. The cliff had a natural cave at the foot of it, situated such that water did not flood in when it rained, which made it ideal for digging. Fortunately, there had been no iridiated beasts sheltering in it when they found it, so Lori had been able to call waterwisps to blast out the surface Iridescence on the rock and dirt so that people could start building the foundation for the Dungeon.


    The next rain had resulted in beasts seeking the shelter of the cave in droves. They had prepared for it to happen, but had still lost over thirty settlers to lasting injury and ten to death before the rain had washed out enough of the Iridescence to render the beasts attacking them in too much pain to attack. When the rains had stopped, they''d been able to butcher the now-clean animals that had still been alive for meat. The settlers had made a celebration out of it, the first wild beast meat in months, or even years in some cases. For many of them, it had been the first meat they had ever tasted that hadn''t lived all its short life in water. The meat had been good. No one had ended up becoming iridiated over the next few days. That was even better.


    People had still died anyway, lingering in pain, the settlement''s few medical supplies unable to save them. Some had iridiated, their wounds tainted from the beasts teeth and claws. They''d been given the mercy of death, their bones set aside to make undead when the Dungeon was finished.


    Now though, with a place for her to start building a Dungeon to anchor their demesne, that could all start to change. They''d finally have a safe area to build, a place to farm and harvest that wouldn''t taint them just by standing in it. They''d finally be able to use their barrels and buckets and water casks to drink instead of just washing away the Iridescence, they''d finally have a place to call their own without the crushing laws of the old continent that they''d left behind. If she did this right, Lori certainly would. Unless someone had been holding out to a truly suicidal degree, Lori was the only wizard within 25 taums. 30 taums if she was lucky; there''d been a lot of wizards on the ship she''d been on, with more in the other ships that had also set out. Her own ship had left the old continent as one of seven. The settlement itself had set off with three wizards: Lori, another Whisperer who''d seemed another noble playing at being incognito judging by how her nose had been raised so high she had probably been looking out at the world through her nostrils, and a Deadspeaker who''d been nice enough and whose undead beasts had drawn what few wagons the settlers had. Both were dead now (though Lori hadn''t killed them).


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    She''d made sure their remains had been set aside with care. Their help had gotten them alive this far, and it was thanks to the Deadspeaker''s undead and the stone wheels she and the other Whisperer had crafted that their group of settlers were able to travel farther inland than they otherwise would have been able to. She''ll be sure to make them into fine undead for her Dungeon. It was the least she could do.


    She''d also called first pick of their belongings, and now she had all sorts of useful tools. Some she wouldn''t be able to use until she had a Dungeon, but that was true of a lot of things she owned.


    These and other happy thoughts managed to keep her occupied as they made their way towards the cliff face. Men were throwing buckets of water inside to wash out the Iridescence that was starting to grow again. Well, at least they were no longer wasting it by throwing water everywhere that shone of many colors. That was either restraint or growing self-destructive apathy. She''d told them it was moving water that wore away Iridescence, not just getting something wet, but no, old superstitions about water protecting you from being iridiated knew more than the wizard who actually knew what she was talking about, and it was easier to do. Lori was surprised no one was actually standing in¨C no, she''d thought that too soon, there was someone standing with a foot each in a bucket of water, never mind the rain would keep him safe.


    Ah, these people who would be the ones to settle this land. The common clay of this new demesne. Why did they all have to be morons?


    Speaking of morons, probably-lord Rian was striding to meet them. And that was definitely striding, a confident, proud step that probably looked very impressive in the paved streets of the cities but was pretty much a slipping hazard in¨C and he''d slipped and landed on his ass. There was a round of chuckles as he scrambled to his feet, looking chagrined, and a nearby man gave some ''helpful'' advice cautioning him about being careful how he walked.


    Rian had the self-satisfied eyes of someone who''d deliberately made a fool of himself just to get a laugh, probably to help raise morale or something. Lori thought morale would be better raised by everyone knowing the closest thing to a leader the settlement had right then was actually competent and careful, but what did she know? No, clearly he had to slip and do pratfalls. Ugh, no wonder he was here, probably-a-lord or not. The other lords were probably well rid of him.


    "So, you''re done?" she said briskly, leaning on her staff. After standing all day, her feet were killing her.


    "All done, Whisperer Lori," he said, using her official title. "Broke the rock down as you specified and leveled it as best we could with the tools we had. You softening the rock really helped, it was like digging clay. We gave the inside a good wash too, so there shouldn''t be any Iridescence. The rest is up to you." He smiled at her, a confident, trusting smile that made her want to roll her eyes. But no, he''d been polite and even used her official title, so that would be rude.


    "Thank you," she said. "Then I''ll get the things I need and get started."


    As it was her tent wasn''t that far from the cave. After all, she needed to be nearby to supervise and make sure things weren''t going too wrong and she needed to blast the cave with water in the mornings to destroy any Iridescence that had built up while they were asleep. A days'' growth usually wasn''t too dangerous, but it was better to be safe when it came to her Dungeon.


    She could feel the intent gazes as she knelt down to get her pack, the one she''d half-melted into the ground under the canvass tent she shared with two other women, to keep from it being stolen or otherwise tampered with. Never mind that anyone messing with someone else''s things would probably result in a lynching, she didn''t trust these superstitious idiots not to go through her things in hopes of getting who knew what like this was some kind of bedtime story. She''d used to carry the pack around with her until she had tired of how heavy it was.


    She took a breath, breathing in magic around her in the familiar exercise before channeling the power through her bones and out through her fingernails, into the hardened rock trapping her pack. The earthwisps there responded readily, having grown familiar with the taste of her magic, and they swiftly loosened the earth around her pack, making it flow like fine sand. She pulled it out, the stone flowing around it. Lori hefted her pack in her arms, then hesitated. Then she reached down into the still flowing earth and called the wisps in it to her as she drew out a small portion of the ground, pulling it up like clay, forming it into a ball in her hands. The ground hardened again as her magic was consumed by the earthwisps, the part in her hands solidifying into stone even as the wisps that had responded to her call grew still, compressed into rock.


    Straightening, she picked up her staff, pretending not to see the ones who''d been eyeing it.


    "I''ll need about a day to complete the ritual," Lori said as she slung her trusty pack over her back. "Make sure I''m not interrupted, not even for food. If there''s another attack, you''ll have to deal with it yourselves, because if I stop I''ll have to start all over again."


    "Understood, Whisperer Lori," Rian said, an almost comical determined look in his eyes. "Don''t worry, I know how important this is for the settlement. Do what you have to do to keep us safe, and we''ll keep you safe while you do it."


    If anyone else had said it, the words would just have been trite and corny. For some reason when he said it, men that Lori knew had been eyeing her staff¨C likely believing those silly superstitions and stories about how taking a wizard''s staff puts them in your power¨C nodded in solemn agreement and looked determined, some hefting their tools.


    "That''s nice," Lori said. "Oh, could you butcher that beast I killed, just beyond the water break? Best not to waste any meat, the rain will be able to wash out any iridiation still in its muscles. The girl can show you where it is."


    They''d probably have said the same thing for either of the two idiots who''d gotten themselves killed, Lori reminded herself. They didn''t actually like her or trust her, they just wanted safety. Well, she''d give it to them.

 2 - Do-It-Yourself Dungeon

    To make a Dungeon and the demesne that surrounded it was actually relatively simple, provided you were a wizard and could actually do it. A lot of the stories commoners told were of ordinary folk somehow stumbling into a Dungeon and claiming it in ignorance or by accident, becoming mighty and powerful in the process. Rainbows. There was no way to claim a Dungeon by accident. Every wizard knew that. But not, obviously, most ordinary folk.


    Creating a Dungeon and claiming one were based on the same ritual. One merely took longer than the other because of a lack of infrastructure. Infrastructure that Lori would have to build herself.


    After melding her blanket to the stone over the entrance to give herself some privacy and block out the cold winds coming from outside, Lori got to work.


    She began by checking her pack, making sure she still had all she needed. A vial containing the last of her baby teeth. Her brass syringe. A small glass bowl. A phial with a good cork stopper. A cheap clay cup. Five brass-backed glass mirrors. A fat candle which she''d been saving through her whole trip from the old continent. A piece of quartz. Eight gold-plated lead disks, each about the size of her palm and thin as her thumbnail. A sealed glass bottle with a glass stopper containing a glittering powder. Her pillow. Her last pair of dry socks.


    She was NOT doing this with wet feet.


    She''d taken off her pointy leather hat, letting her short dark hair free of the constricting brim to tickle the back of her neck. She''d have to find someone with a pair of scissors she could borrow to cut it again. Something to remember for later.


    The ritual space was as she''d specified. Dirt and surface rock had been excavated to a depth of seven feet, creating a bowl-like space in the rock. She saw tool marks mixed in with the inexplicable handprints and strange mixed strata of where softened stone had been molded by hands and mortaring tools. That wasn''t very common, with most of the shaping work being done by the settlement''s stonecutters and one aspiring sculptor who looked like he cried himself to sleep at night and wished he''d stayed on the old continent.


    Still, it was a good, decent workspace. The floor was mostly level, if not exactly smooth or even, as small puddles of water and dirt had formed. She tapped her staff on the ground, getting the waterwisps in the moisture that had soaked into the wood to spread into the moisture from the enthusiastic washing the eventual core had received. They responded to her readily, obeying her will with almost as much alacrity as the ones in her spit and blood. Slowly, so she didn''t tire herself, she had the waterwisps spread, gathering all the moisture and dirt together into a large cloudy ball at the end of her staff. When she was sure the ritual space was dry enough, she carefully walked up the slope on her bare feet, dipped her feet into the water to get them dry, then threw most of the muddy water outside into the rain. What little water left around her staff, she dripped into her glass bowl, putting many of the waterwisps that had lived in her staff into it. She placed the bowl of water on the front, on top of one of the disks of gold and lead.


    She put down another disk, and onto that she placed the stone from where she had slept and buried her pack for safe keeping. The phial went on another, the stopper lying next to it. Next was the unlit candle, followed by the clay cup turned over so it rested on its open end. She carefully took another, smaller candle and put it down on another disk, then carefully arranged four of the mirrors around it so it formed a box, with the fifth ready to complete the box. On another disk she placed the piece of quartz. It was actually the other Whisperer''s quartz. The one she''d brought was much smaller.


    The seven disks had been arranged in a circle. At their center, she placed the last disk, and on it, the bottle with the powder. Its contents glinted of many colors, and Lori felt an instinctive shiver of fear shake between her shoulder blades and vibrate its way up to her neck. She reminded herself that it couldn''t grow on glass, that as long as the vessel was sealed it couldn''t hurt anyone. Just don''t do anything stupid, like breathe it in¡­


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    Taking a wooden taper she''d cut from a branch and dried in preparation for this, Lori called a firewisp dwelling in the heat of her body and set the paper alight before lighting the small candle. Breathing in once more, she channeled the magic through her organs, through her muscles and out the thin skin on the back of her hands, calling the firewisps drawn by the open flame away, binding them to keep their distance. She took deep, controlled, circular breaths, drawing more and more power from the air feeding it to the barrier of firewisps around the light, until she had a light that burned but didn''t gather firewisps to it. They came close, drawn by the fire, but they were stopped by her binding and barrier. She''d have to work fast.


    With the care of someone who''s done this before but not nearly enough to be casual about it, Lori took her syringe and drew some blood. She mixed the blood into the bowl of water, the waterwisps from her body mixing with the ones in the water that had grown tamed by her power.


    On the stone, she placed her old baby teeth. She channeled magic through it every day of the voyage here, reminding the earthwisps in it they came from her, that the tooth was born of her body. It wasn''t as good as a fresh finger bone, still warm after being severed, but she wanted to keep her fingers.


    Into the phial, she gently blew, calling the airwisps from her lungs and into the container. They moved as obediently as if they were her fingers, bound absolutely to her will. Quickly, she placed the stopper.


    The fat candle, she lit with her magic, drawing firewisps from the warm core of her body. She felt herself grow cold, felt limbs start to shiver, but didn''t stop, gathering the heat and firewisps into flame for her candle. For a fire drawn from her very self, the dancing flame on the candlewick seemed insultingly small.


    Still shivering, limbs still shaking to be warm again, she kept on breathing, giving power to the firewisps left within her to carefully raise her body heat, even as she cupped a hand over her open mouth. Breathing through her nose, she carefully closed her hand, and with delicate movements carefully tilted up the clay cup and slipped her hand into it. She released the darkwisps, drawn from the ever-dark places within her body, into the darkness under the cup.


    As her body slowly grew warm again, she swayed slightly, feeling strangely empty. She couldn''t stop though, she needed that empty feeling. That emptiness was meant to be filled.


    Lori closed one eye and stared at the light in the box of mirrors. She concentrated on her breathing, on the power flowing through her, and channeled magic through her eye. Her sight slowly dimmed as the lightwisps left her, moving faster than thought towards the light she''d bound. She dropped the fifth mirror over the light, completing the box of mirrors.


    She blinked, opening her other eye, and sighed. That one could still see. She closed her other eye to keep from being confused until she adjusted, even as she turned to the last of the elements of ritual. The quartz crystal sat innocently as she lay a hand upon it. Once more she drew breath, drawing in the magic in the air.


    Very, very carefully, Lori channeled the power gently from her lungs, along her nerves that allowed her to command her body, and up to her arm. Then she gathered the wisps there and ordered them to move. Lightningwisps flowed down the nerves of her arms, from her bicep, down to her elbow, down her forearm. They flowed down her hand and through her palms, into the quartz. The quartz began to vibrate in place, even as her arm became numb, punctuated by patches of pins and needles.


    Shaking, feeling drained, Lori collapsed down to sit, throwing an arm out to catch herself. Too late, she realized she was giving orders to an arm that had too few lightningwisps to function.


    "Ow," Lori said, trying to rub the spot on her shoulder blades she''d fallen on and failing. Carefully, she pushed herself up with her functioning arm.


    She wanted to take a moment, to have a drink, maybe eat something. A nap sounded nice too. But if she did, she knew she''d have to start all over again.


    She was so close. A Dungeon of her own. Power and abilities beyond that of mere wizards, the power of a Dungeon Binder, who wielded all four magics!


    Oh, and to make the settlement safe too, she supposed.


    Taking a deep breath, she began the ritu¨C


    She paused, then stood up and grabbed her pillow, stuffing it into her now-empty pack so she''d have someplace soft to sit on. Sitting down, she finally changed her socks.


    Ah. Much better.


    Feeling fortified and more ready to face what lay ahead, Lori, wizard, Whisperer, began to make her Dungeon.

 3 - How to Build a Dungeons Core

    The first thing any Whisperer learned, whether they were a savant or an initiate, was that wisps were everywhere.


    In every speck of dust, every drop of water, every empty space, there were wisps. They clung to the magic in the air, inert and unmoving until a Whisperer offered them magic and bound them with will.


    Not exactly the second thing they learned, more like the 25<sup>th</sup>, or possibly the 50<sup>th</sup>¡­ definitely in the first hundred somewhere¡­ was that all wisps could be found anywhere, even if only in relatively infinitesimal amounts. Within a lake teeming with waterwisps, there would be airwisps and firewisps. In the empty air, waterwisps and lightningwisps would float. In the darkest cave which had never seen the light of day, lightwisps could be found. Also, death by iridiation, but if you went down that deep you were basically asking for it.


    Normally, a Whisperer''s control over wisps was limited. There were the wisps inside one''s body, which were a part of you and had to be used carefully because while they were the easiest for a Whisperer to manipulate and control, they were a part of you and were needed for little things like living. Taking, for example, firewisps out of your body was an easy way to die of cold and hypothermia. Really, only a stupid or desperate person would do it.


    Lolilyuri knew all this, as she was a properly educated wizard who''d learned from one of the many educational facilities in the demesne she''d grown up in. She''d done the work, spent hours in the local library, clubbed classmates from behind to check out reference books before they could, sacrificed nights of sleep, paid in blood, scars and student loans.


    Sure, it hadn''t been a big, old or important school, not like the big ones closer to their demesne''s Dungeon where the Dungeon Binder ruled, but it had taught her the basics, the teachers actually knew what they were talking about and competently answered questions, giving her a firm grounding to build up from, and, most importantly, she''d been able to afford it without prostituting her skills or herself, putting her in debt for years or getting a job that required her to, ugh, talk to people.


    She''d be sure to repay them by thinking about sending monetary support their way once she had a Dungeon in only her mid-twenties and was pulling riches out of the ground as easily as sitting on a latrine. She''d wouldn''t actually send anything, but she''d definitely think about it and feel mildly guilty when she certainly and inevitably didn¡¯t send money. It was the least she could do for their contribution to her success.


    Because dangerous as it was, the school had still taught her that there was some advantage to using wisps from your own body. They responded with alacrity no matter their distance from her, meaning she didn''t have to be in contact with them to make her will known. It also meant that they could be used as a conduit to affect, imbue and bind wisps around them.


    She laid her numb hand on the stone with her baby teeth, breathing in magic and channeling it through her bones and nails to remind the teeth to whom they belonged. They were her weakest link, because she was NOT using one of her bones, and while fingernails were good for channeling power to earthwisps, they wouldn''t do for this.


    Lori breathed in magic, imbuing it with her will, channeled it through her blood, her bones, her teeth, her organs and muscles and nerves and brain, through her lungs and her currently one working eye as she stared at the light of the candle. Then she channeled it outward. The magic seemed to leap through the air, crossing the distance and reached out to the wisps that had been part of her. It wasn''t as quick and efficient as direct contact with her body or conducted through a wire, but it went. The magic she sent spread from her wisps, stimulating the piece of this land that had known her will.


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    Lori took in a long breath, drawing in magic. This was it. The moment before the plunge. That last, fleeting chance to stop something before you throw yourself at the mercy of outside forces for the foreseeable future.


    She wanted this.


    She channeled magic through her wisps, to the matter they had been joined to, through the gold-plated lead, through the ground and air. She spread her magic, carried by her wisps. The matter she prepared burst as the water and blood vaporized, as the cork popped from the bottle of her breath. Light shone from the cracks of the box of mirrors, and a seeming cloud of darkness spread from the upturned cup. Heat bloomed as all the wax in the candle became heat and flame, even as Lori used her wisps to guide the heat around her, dispersing it into the air and stone. Her tooth and the rock on which it lay melted like wax under her hand, becoming one with the stone beneath her as the quartz suddenly shattered as it twisted apart from within, and she felt her hairs tingle and sparks dance on her skin as bits of quartz settled on her.


    Her wisps spread, binding other wisps to her will as she breathed circularly, drawing in more and more magic, spreading it around her, until her lungs needed more air than power, until¡­


    She slammed her wisps, of earth, of air, of fire, of water, of light and dark and lightning, into the sealed bottle of powdered Iridescence, dragging the matter and substance they were part of with them. The bottle shattered as stone, rock, water, air and six discs of metal pulled in with them slammed into it, releasing the powder stored within.


    The Iridescence began growing, greedily trapping her wisps. And in the moment, when as the bane of all life fed on her magic, as it was overwhelmed by more wisps and more power than it could use to grow more of itself¡­


    Lolilyuri, wizard, Whisperer, desperate¡­ bound the Iridescence to her will.


    There was no endless moment where she thought it wouldn''t be enough. No desperate breaths as she tried to push in more magic to overwhelm the Iridescence. No internal screaming as she focused every last drop of her will. She''d studied the ritual. She''d measured the amount of Iridescence she''d prepared. She''d measured her average capacity and the Iridescence''s relative absorption and growth rate. She''d done it right.


    That didn''t mean she didn''t still collapse into a boneless bundle of relief as she felt her binding snap into place, as her wisps became part of the Iridescence and the Iridescence became part of her wisps, as they collapsed into bright light and darkness and heat and cold and strands of melted metal and the feeling of sparks on her hairs as her components collapsed together. Wisps that had been part of her were pulled from the matter they had inhabited, pulled into the Iridescence she had claimed, reinforcing her hold on it as it started to pull magic from the very air, growing in size, pulling in more of the wisps around her¡­


    Before her eyes, her Dungeon''s heart, its core, its center, its focus¡­ it came into being, rising weightlessly into the air, a trickle of melted gold and lead connecting it to the ground. Suddenly she could feel the air around her, the stones at her feet, the water still clinging to the cave''s far walls and ceiling, the melted gold and lead that had been beneath her fat candle. She could feel the dark of the cave and the light shining through the fluttering edges of her blanket over the cave entrance, the potential for lightning in the air¡­


    Beneath her feet, deep within the ground, beyond the touch of the rain and the flowing river, she could feel Iridescence start to break apart, releasing their bounty of wisps. She could feel her awareness growing, spreading in all directions as the demesne''s started to grow, devouring magic out of the air and ground, as the number of wisps bound to her will as if they had come from her own body began to grow exponentially, every pace of distance her influence increased adding more and more wisps to her power¡­


    Lori didn''t know when she started laughing in triumph, but she didn''t stop for a long time.


    Finally, at long last¡­ she had a Dungeon.

 4 - Parts and Advanced Features Not Included

    When Lori finally stopped laughing with, admittedly, a touch too much megalomania, it was to the revelation that as she''d been standing around, her socks had gotten wet.


    She dried them. Then she had to blink, stare, and slowly go over in her head what had just happened.


    No need to breathe in magic, no channeling it through the relevant parts of her body to prepare it to bind to any particular kind of wisp. Magic had simply come from the core straight to the waterwisps in her socks, and they''d removed the liquid from the woolens around her feet. It had been as simple as controlling her spit.


    She nearly broke into maniacal laughter all over again.


    It was exactly like the stories and memoirs and biographies said! Not needing to build up power, because the core would serve both as repository and collector! Having total control of wisps within the spherical area of the demesne! The area they had wasn''t very large, but that was like saying a village wasn''t very large. Even from just the vague feeling of the wisps she could perceive¨C she wasn''t a Horotract with perfectly exact spatial awareness¨C she could tell the demesne she had claimed extended far beyond the water break, and a sizable area of the river. She could feel trees starting to shed Iridescence as the demesne started to break it down¡­


    She took a deep breath, feeling the familiar sensation of pulling magic from the air into herself. She held it within her, not using it and observed in fascinated giddiness as it joined the mass of power in the core as easily as if she was touching it, like it was a part of her.


    Which she supposed it was, now.


    She stood up shakily, then blinked. She could see through both eyes again, could feel that the lightwisps she''d taken had been replaced. She raised her hands. Both moved.


    She didn''t laugh, but she did smile.


    When she stepped out, it was still raining, but she stepped out with dry socks and dry boots. Truthfully, she half-expected to walk out into the sounds of some kind of scene of chaos and violence as wild beasts came for the settlers in the wake of her creating the dungeon. Water immediately started to drip down from the brim of her hat and down her rain coat.


    Surprisingly, people weren''t crowded around the entrance of the cave. In fact, the only one waiting to greet her was the annoying brat.


    "Are you done?" the child said, the rain streaming around animal skin she was using as a makeshift rain cloak. "Lord Rian said to go tell him if you''re done."


    "Okay, obviously someone has to educate you for your own good," Lori said. "Rian is not a lord. Lords have a title, land, and lots of money. The fact he''s out here with us says he has none of that. So he can''t be a lord."


    "He''s got a sword," the child said as if that settled it. It probably did for her.


    "Any idiot can have a sword. Doesn''t mean he''s a lord, it just means he might be an idiot," Lori said.


    "You shouldn''t call people names," the child said. "Bad girls who call people names don''t get dessert when there''s dessert."


    "Just tell me where the idiot is," Lori said tiredly.


    "You''re setting a bad example," the child insisted, but started walking anyway.


    Lori followed after her, trying to see ahead of them. She should have been able to. Everyone knew¨C that is, every wizard knew from historically and academically verifiable sources, not just old bedtime stories and rumor¨C that a Dungeon Binder could perceive everything that happened in their demesne. And all right, technically she was doing that, but there had to be something more refined than feeling the vaguely people-shaped conglomerations of matter and wisps that she hadn''t bound.


    It came to Lori she was a Dungeon Binder now. Her. She was a Dungeon Binder, able to turn corpses into armies, tame beasts to pull her wagons¨C an extravagance¨C or as food¨C an even larger extravagance¨C create new beasts by putting together parts from old ones, create rooms that could heal people simply by being in them, literally make all the money she wanted¡­


    She didn''t laugh, but she did smile widely at the thought. She was no longer just rich, she basically had infinite money!


    Lori reached into her pocket, pulling out her money pouch. She''d been saving it for emergencies, in case she needed to do some bit of quick and nasty Whispering and didn''t have the time to breathe in the magic for it. A lot of them had been spent in Covehold Demesne to buy supplies, and their prices had been predictably extortionate. Right now, her little purse mostly had a bunch of small think beads, the ones commonly used for the lowest denominations outside of rare places like Cathlis Demesne and Open Hand Demesne. She had a few talk beads of both small and large sizes and denominations, slightly less fall beads, and three large wisp beads. The beads of crystalized magic each had a number on them denoting their value in addition to their size.


    And now she could make them. She could make as much of them as she wanted!


    Well, within reason. Something fun she could do later!


    She put away her money as they neared other people. After all, just because she''d been traveling with these people and sleeping near them was no reason to trust them. Actually, now that the core was up and running, she intended to sleep next to it and close up the cave behind her, in case some of them believed the stories of how if you killed a Dungeon Binder, you inherited their Dungeon. There are always ignorant idiots everywhere, after all.


    Their little settlement actually had little in the way of proper buildings. The first batch of wood they''d cut down was still in the river, getting the last of the Iridescence out of it, and until they''d made the Dungeon, any building made of any material that wasn''t glass or ice would start getting iridiated unless regularly washed or, more extremely, burned. Most shelters they had were tents made from canvas that could be stored in water when it wasn''t raining.


    The kitchen was their largest tent, made from several canvas sheets tied together. They had to bring it down after they''d eaten and drag it to the river, then set it up again in the morning. When it was up, it was where everyone who didn''t have anything to do stayed, by virtue of being the largest roofed space. It was often tight, since the canvass wasn''t all that big, but after weeks of being stuck together on a ship making the journey to this new continent, they could take a little proximity, especially when space was only a few steps away.


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    When they got there, the place was full of the usual bustle of people preparing the settlement''s communal midday meal. It was the biggest meal of the day, since most people wouldn''t have been able to eat breakfast unless they''d stashed a fruit of some sort in water to keep. Though there seemed a lot more people then there usually were. Lori was pretty sure that group of people were supposed to be cutting trees and dragging them to the river, and those men should have been on watch for beasts.


    The corpse of the beast she''d killed was being butchered for meat with great enthusiasm. Lori was surprised. Shouldn''t that thing be in the river, getting the iridiation washed off? Why were they risking almost-certain iridiation by cutting it up while it was so fresh? They weren''t inside a demesne, they couldn''t¨C


    Lori paused. Oh, right.


    "Lord Rian! Lord Rian!" the brat called. "Wiz Lori''s here! I brought her, just like you asked!"


    "He''s not a lord," Lori muttered one last time before the probably-a-lord heard the brat and turned towards them.


    Others had heard of course, and the murmurs of conversation died a little as people''s heads turned.


    Rian turned at his name, his dark hair whipping around wetly at the movement. He stepped forward as if representing the others in the settlement. He had his usual easygoing smile on, despite the wet dirt still clinging to him from his previous pratfall. He nodded at the brat. "Thank you," he said, and the brat smiled widely before scrambling to join her parents, her animal skin dripping. Lori almost reconsidered her ''actually a lord'' theory. Lords never thanked you. "Well?" he said to Lori. Just that.


    For a moment, Lori considered proclaiming herself their absolute ruler, owner of all she surveyed, and threatening all annoying brats with death.


    "It worked," was what she said instead.


    "Yeah, we figured when the Iridescence started coming off the meat. And everything else," Rian said, nodding with such assurance you''d think he''d done it himself. "Good to be sure. Does that mean we can start building actual roofs now and stop sleeping in tents?"


    "Yes," Lori said. There were sighs of relief, mixed in with several coughs and sneezes. The past few days of rain, while wonderful for keeping beasts away and Iridescence down, hadn''t been kind to people''s health, and without a Deadspeaker to heal people anymore, ailments were becoming a problem. The two doctors left had been doing what they could, but they were running low on supplies.


    "Civilization at last," Rian said, which prompted some laughs. Apparently some people would laugh at anything now. "Looks like we''re celebrating with meat everyone! Another thing we have to thank Whisperer Lori for!"


    There were more cheers, and the enthusiasm of the butchering redoubled.


    It was only when everyone had happily gone back to preparing food or resting while waiting for food to be prepared did Rian subtly stand next to her and say, in a low voice, "Now what?"


    "Hmm?" she said. She''d been busy looking for a place to sit down. Dungeon Binder or not, apparently no one was going to relinquish any of the rocks or wet stumps they used as chairs.


    "Now what do we do?" Rian asked again. "In case you haven''t noticed, we''re low on supplies, we''re out of the food we''d brought, and we still don''t have proper shelter because until just a little while ago any building we put up would kill us unless we washed it down inside and out every day. Even if we started right after lunch, everyone here would be too tired to finish anything."


    Lori stared at him.


    "What?" he said. "I''m just stating the obvious."


    "I know," Lori said, who hadn''t. Not really. Huh, no wonder the brat had been so thin. "I was just wondering why you brought it up now instead of after lunch."


    "Neither of us are doing anything right now," he said. "We might be busy after lunch. I know I will be. At the very least we need to put up walls for the kitchen so the children and the sick will have somewhere warmer to sleep."


    She supposed he was right. Lori had been planning to start fixing up the cave with the core into a proper bedroom.


    "I suppose I could get started on healing people, then," Lori said.


    Rian gave her a skeptical look.


    "What''s that for?" she said, annoyed. "I''m a Dungeon Binder now. I can do every kind of magic. That means healing."


    "Well, yeah, but¡­" Rian looked troubled. "The¡­ what''s the name¡­ Deadspeakers are the ones who can do healing, right?"


    "Yes, them and Dungeon Binders," Lori said patiently. Maybe he wasn''t rebelling so much as disowned for being slow?


    "But to be a wizard, you need to study for years at a school, right?" Rian said.


    "Yes, that''s one way to do it," Lori said patiently.


    "But you''re a Whisperer," Rian said.


    "Yes, we''ve established that," Lori said, patience twitching. She considered downgrading him to ''brat''.


    "So¡­ you probably studied Whispering at school," Rian said.


    Now Lori was annoyed. "Yes," she said, patience no longer twitching but straining. Why was he talking like he was explaining something obvious to a child?


    "Not Deadspeaking," Rian said.


    "No, of course not," Lori said. "My magic was Whispering, why would I study Deadspeaki¨C!"


    And suddenly she realized.


    Oh, rainbows.


    Those born with magic could use one of its four forms. They couldn''t choose their magic, only hone it. Dungeon Binders were different, however. The act of becoming a Dungeon Binder made one capable of all four forms of magic. It was why every wizard dreamed of becoming one.


    Lolilyuri was a Whisperer. She''d been born with the power to bind the wisps that existed in the world to her will, and through them manipulate the world. Though born with the ability, she''d needed to study so she could use it. She''d learned of the structures of materials, of the states of matter, of the composition of materials. She''d learned how the world around her was put together, how the elements that built it affected one another, so that she could understand how she needed to control the wisps to get what she wanted to happen.


    "So, you didn''t study Deadspeaking," Rian was still saying. "The kind of magic that heals. So even if you¨C"


    "Yes, please stop talking. Please," Lori said, trying to sound calm.


    Mercifully, he did. She could have done without the look of pity though.


    Deadspeaking. It was the magic of wielding power over the bodies of the living and the dead. It healed and it killed, it could change the forms of the living and move the dead. They, supposedly, studied the bodies of plants and animals, and used the knowledge of the commonalities between all living things to manipulate them.


    Lori knew a lot about the human body. The squishy parts were mostly water mixed with dirt. The bones had earthwisps, the brain and nerves lightningwisps, and every muscle had firewisps. Most darkwisps were in the torso and skull, in the cavities. Everything is supposed to stay on the inside.


    She was pretty sure that wasn''t enough knowledge to start Deadspeaking.


    Someone coughed, a pained, wet-lunged sound that felt like a hand squeezing her heart. Then there was only the murmur of happy conversation and the sound of the rain outside.


    Lori sighed, then turned and stepped out into the rain.


    "Where are you going?" Rian asked from behind her.


    "I''m a Dungeon Binder now," Lori said striding forward through the wet, muddy ground. "I''ve dreamed of becoming one since I learned I could do magic. I figure I''d try it out properly."


    She could feel the earth- and waterwisps beneath her. She channeled her will through the wire around her staff, into the ground. Water and earth separated, and dirt compressed, forming solid ground under her feet. She could feel the waterwisps in the rain, claimed as they fell into the sphere of her influence. She didn''t even need to raise her staff, just sent her will upward. After a moment''s pause, water began to fall thickly on either side of her. Directly over her head was empty air. The wind sent drops of water into her face. She willed it and the wind died like a man with his throat cut.


    Lori smiled and went to find some bare ground.

 5 - When a Lord And A Lady Love Each Other Very Much…

    When Lori came back to the kitchen, it was to find Rian waiting for her with a bowl of food. Beast meat that had been cooked over flame¨C it seemed someone had realized they could safely burn wood now¨C served with the stewed grains, wild berries, nuts and root vegetables they''d been eating over the last few days, and which they''d probably started preparing before the meat was butchered. It took a long time to cook stew using hot ingots of metal heated inside a sealed pit so the still-iridiated wood used in the fire couldn''t harm anyone.


    Lori sighed. "I''m going to have to dig a new latrine," she said. "All this meat is going to give people indigestion."


    "Food''s food," Rian said cheerfully. He looked out at the new stone structure she''d been erecting. "I''ve never seen trees explode like that before."


    "Happens when you turn all the water inside them into steam," Lori said, taking a spoonful and blowing on it. "You could do the same by turning it into ice, but not as reliable."


    "Heat expansion. Got it," Rian said, adding another point to the ''probably a lord column''. That wasn''t a phrase uneducated people knew. Some people might know of the phenomenon, but not the phrase. "Couldn''t you have just cut them with that water stream thing? We could have used the timber."


    "Where''s the fun in that?" Lori said, pretending she hadn''t forgotten all about it. She swallowed the spoonful. Still a bit too hot, but her empty stomach ate it up all the same, even as she wished it were a little cooler. She blinked as she felt the firewisps in her body suck out the uncomfortable heat from the food, as well as her tongue, leaving it mildly warm but not burned.


    Ooh. She could get used to this¡­ and probably would have to.


    To her surprise, Rian chuckled. "I supposed. Well, it''ll be good for firewood anyway. At least we''d be able to get the kitchen warm, even if we don''t finish all the walls by tonight."


    "No need," Lori said, as she gave her stew a look and slowly, slowly had the firewisps pull the heat from it. A quick tap with her finger told her when it had reached an ideal eating temperature. She bound the wisps to keep it there as she took another spoonful. Ah, just right. She swallowed. "Most of us should be able to fit in the new shelter I built."


    "Ah," Rian said, looking back towards the stone structure. "I wondered what that was. No windows?"


    "I''ll make light," Lori said. "It''ll only be while everyone is awake, anyway. A closed structure will keep heat in better."


    "What about ventilation?" he said.


    Oh. Right.


    "After lunch," she said. "You can''t expect me to keep working on an empty stomach."


    "We have enough for seconds," he said.


    "Wonderful. I''m glad the beast I killed is managing to feed everyone," Lori said.


    "I don''t suppose there are any more of them?" Rian said.


    Lori frowned and concentrated on her awareness of the wisps in her demesne. It took a while. While the entire demesne reacted with as much alacrity as if it were her own body, it was a body several orders of magnitude larger than what she was used to, such that she''d need a larger measure of volume to quantify it. She narrowed her awareness to the one pace of air immediately above the ground. That helped.


    "I¡­ think most of the smaller ones have left the demesne," she said. Iridiation was proportional to body volume. Smaller creatures would lose Iridescence faster in a demesne, so they would need to flee sooner. "And the larger beasts are moving out as well, I think? Hard to tell, I can''t feel iridiation. But there aren''t any close by."


    Rian sighed. "Well, that''s good. At least we don''t have to worry about an injured beast suddenly coming out of nowhere to eat us."


    "Not near the Dungeon, no," Lori said. Near the edges was another matter. Even in civilized lands, it wasn''t unknown for beasts to cross the border briefly and hurt someone. "Now that we''re not stuck behind the waterbreak, it''ll be easier for people to collect food. There''s a lot of what we''ve been eating growing around, so we should be fine until we can start growing our own crops. Maybe ask people to go seeling at the river so we''d have more meat."


    "I''ll ask around, see who volunteers," Rian said.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction, then paused.


    Ugh. Damned brat.


    "Rian," she said, trying not to scowl. "Do you know where lords come from?"


    "Well, when a lord and a lady love each other very much¡­" he began.


    She glared at him.


    "¡­ they go to a special room," he said, grinning widely. "And nine months later the Dungeon Binder sends them a messenger with their new baby¡­"


    "Could you be serious before I change my mind?" Lori said.


    "Sorry," Rian said. "Where do lords come from? Besides their mother, that is."


    "Historically, the rise of the nobility is linked with the favor of the Dungeon Binder," Lori said. "Barring anomalous places like Crownsbond Demesne, where they have a king whom the Dungeon Binder swears fealty to, people become lords because the Dungeon Binder raises them up to be lords."


    "Ah¡­" Rian said. "Look, I don''t want to become a lord just because we know each other¨C"


    "I don''t like you that much," Lori said, the ''or at all'' going unsaid. "I''m making you a lord because you''re capable and can get people to work. People listen to you. So. I''m making you Lord Rian. Your job is to keep all of us from dying because we''re out of food or out of wood or someone''s son has slept with someone''s daughter because there''s nothing else to do around here and people are taking woodaxes to heads."


    "Isn''t that a lot of responsibility?" he said, for once actually looking alarmed.


    "You''re doing it already," Lori pointed out. "It''s not like I asked you to start digging the cave for the Dungeon."


    "Well, it needed to be done," he said. "The sooner we had a Dungeon protecting us, the safer everyone would have been. And if we helped, you''d be able to keep us safe with the water break while we worked."


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    "And the patrols keeping watch for wild beasts?"


    "That''s just common sense. There are dangerous beasts out there and we didn''t have a Dungeon to protect us yet."


    "And the woodcutting parties?"


    "Well, we needed wood, didn''t we? Someone had to do it, and those guys knew what to do."


    "And having the children be messengers and water runners?"


    "It kept them out of trouble."


    "Well Rian, I need more of that," Lori said. "I need to get people to work while I keep everyone safe. Everyone keeps looking at me like I''m going to set them on fire."


    "Well, you do glare at people a lot," he said. "It kinda makes people nervous. Especially when you''re muttering about drowning people or setting them on fire."


    Oh dear. Had she said those things out loud?


    "Don''t worry, I told them you were just cranky because you had wet socks," Rian said. "You''re always cranky when your socks get wet."


    The words were pulled out of her with rusty hooks. "Thank you," she managed to push out.


    "You''re welcome," he said cheerfully. "We''re all in this together, after all."


    "Uh huh," Lori said. "Well, you''re a lord now. So that brat will finally be right when she calls you ''Lord Rian''."


    "Be nice," Rian ''now-definitely-a-lord-ugh-what-had-she-done?'' said. "Karina tries very hard to smile ever since I told her that if you smile, other people will smile too. She''s doing what she can to help keep morale up. Her parents give her most of their food, so she feels guilty about not being able to do more."


    What kind of strange person feels guilty about getting more to eat?


    "Well, put her on seeling duty or something,'' Lori muttered. "You''re their lord now, you deal with it."


    "I haven''t agreed to this," Rian protested.


    "What are you going to do, stop working?" Lori said.


    "I might," Rian said. Even he seemed to know he didn¡¯t actually believe that.


    "Well, do it after we''ve gotten people moved into the shelter and had a night''s dry sleep," Lori said. "You can quit tomorrow."


    "Fine," Rian said, nodding in agreement. "I''ll be lord for a day¨C well, half a day¨C but I''m quitting tomorrow! I''m not cut out for this sort of responsibility."


    Lori nodded. "I''ll knock out some air holes into the shelter after lunch. You talk to the doctors, see what needs to be set up to make the sick people comfortable without spreading whatever it is they have to the rest of us."


    "Right," Rian said. "When you''re done with the holes, remember to dig up those new latrines? I don¡¯t think anyone wants to dig for a while."


    "Fine. After lunch," Lori said.


    Rian nodded and walked away, already looking around for men he could talk to.


    Smirking to herself, Lori took her second spoonful of food. Ah, still just right. She was getting used to this already.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C.


    After she finished eating¨C and eyed the large pot but ultimately forwent a second helping¨C Lori went back to her first building project as a Dungeon Binder.


    While they weren''t positioned in a flood plain, between the waterworn cliff face and the nearby river, it wasn''t hard to assume that the rock underneath them was likely sedimentary. That meant she had to be careful when pulling the rock out of the ground with earthwisps. It would take more experience with earthwisps in general and this material specifically before she''d be able to identify lines of cleavage and tensile strength without examination and testing¨C read: hitting rocks with other rocks¨C so for the moment, she''d done what she could by making the composition of the stone as evenly distributed as she could before gently pulling it up out of the ground to form the half-cylinder arc of the shelter. It was a good, simple structure where the shape itself provided strength and support.


    Normally, she could have done this in individual arcs, raising the stone up from the ground with support under them, then removing that support once the shape was set and the stone was supporting its own weight. Step to the side and raise another arc next to the first one, then fusing the two into one structure. The more arcs she made, the faster it would get as the earthwisps she bound would grow more and more used to her will.


    She didn''t need to do that anymore.


    With the quite frankly ridiculous amount of power at her disposal, she had cleared trees from a convenient patch of ground between the kitchen and the river that no one had put up their tents on, had the ground roil in waves to carry the felled wood to one side, then proceeded to raise up the shelter all in one piece, with no supports. The supports where there because in the final calculation, it took less energy to raise up supports than it did to reinforce the stone so it wouldn''t fall until the structure was complete


    Energy was no longer a consideration.


    That done, she had excavated the ground under the arced roof, standing aside as mud, dirt, water, rocks and roots flowed as if one mass past her and into a convenient pile, before she''d hardened the floor and walls to the same stone consistency so that they''d support the arcing roof and sealed the openings on their end with more stone, save for a single wide entrance and a ramp leading down to the shelter''s floor level.


    Then she''d finally gone back for lunch.


    Upon returning to her building, she found the floor of her shelter thick with rainwater.


    Ah. Right. She''d forgotten that could happen.


    Collecting lightwisps, she bound them inside the shelter to produce illumination so she could keep working. She pulled the water out of the shelter, and it streamed up the stone-hard ramp and joined with the muddy ground. For a moment, Lori glared at the shelter. The lining she''d made was thick enough that groundwater wouldn''t seep in, but she''d need some other solution for rainwater¡­


    Walking to the pile of excavated dirt, she touched with her staff. It shuddered, then started to flow after her as she proceeded to enclose the whole ramp, then added a recess to divert most rainwater away. Then she reconsidered it and leveled the ramp into steps. People would be stepping in with wet feet after all. They might slide.


    Lori didn''t have a spirit level, so she had to judge each step individually, using the beads in her money pouch to judge if they were, if not completely level, then at least level enough. She''d need to see about making a spirit level. She had a glass test tube raided from that other Whisperer''s things, she could use that.


    That done, she cut another channel at the base of the ramp-like stairs, to catch any water that slipped in, and made a small alcove next to the shelter proper''s entrance to act as a catch basin. Someone would need to clean it every so often, but Rian would take care of it when she told him.


    After that, she set about making windows.


    Putting slit-like openings on one end of the cylindrical shelter was simple enough, since it was a flat wall that wasn''t meant to be load bearing. She took advantage of this to put in a chimney there for a fire so they''d have somewhere to cook. Knocking holes into the sides of the arcing stone structure of the roof was another. She decided to make the airhole-windows stone arcs as well, to try and continue supporting the weight of the roof arc. She had to raise some buttresses inside the shelter to support them and help transfer the weight into the ground, ruining the smoothness of the walls, but after finishing the first one, the structure seemed to be holding, so she felt safe building a few more.


    After all, if it collapsed, it wasn''t like she''d be sleeping there.


    The rain stopped about late-afternoon. Water had condensed on the walls as she''d worked, glistening in the smooth, white illumination of the lightwisps she''d bound. She made the waterwisps vibrate, flashing everything into water vapor and lowering the temperature of the shelter slightly for a moment, before the vapor went out the windows.


    Behind her, tentative footsteps came down the ramp. Rian stuck his head in, tracking in mud. "Is it ready? We don''t have much time before it gets dark."


    "It''s ready," Lori said. "They''ll have to sleep on the ground, but they''ll have air and a place to build a fire. We can fix any problems in the morning."


    Rian nodded, looking relieved. "I''ll get someone to bring in some wood," he said. "Can you make a fire with it while I get everyone ready to move in?"


    Lori nodded absently, looking around the shelter. She''d probably have to put in another fireplace tomorrow, since it might be too big for the single one they had. But right now, she was tired. Her head felt fuzzy from moving magic around all day, and her feet were killing her. She wanted to take off her boots, warm up her socks, roll up in her blanket and go to sleep.


    Outside, people were moving, carrying things to be moved into the shelter. Blankets, clothes, tools that could finally be properly protected from the rain¡­


    Lori wanted to rest. Rest sounded good.


    Still, there was one more thing she had to do.


    She found a nice area away from the river and dug a few holes down, making them nice and deep, with a little water at the bottom. Then she raised some simple dirt walls around them.


    The latrines done, Lori went to tell Rian they needed seats.

 6 - Food and Other Resources to Manage

    The next day dawned and nobody had died.


    Also, sleeping on a pile of sand is still sleeping on rock, only with an infinite amount of sharp points.


    "I need a bed," Lori muttered as she washed herself off. A rock had been raised around the cave opening, with space for air to pass around its edges so she could have a quick bath. She''d briefly debated using the recess the Dungeon''s core floated above as a tub, and the only thing that had stopped her was that it was too shallow. Obviously, she could dig it up, but it was too early for that kind of work, her door rock notwithstanding.


    Lori got dressed, pulling on her hardwearing cloudbloom trousers and shirt before pulling on her rain coat and putting her hat on. Socks had been exchanged. Ah, dry socks! The best of luxuries!


    She could already tell it was raining again. Now that they didn''t need its protection any longer, the constant cold water falling from the sky was now a problem. Still, better rain than a dragon¡­


    As she did every morning after she''d made herself presentable, the first thing she did was make sure her two corpses were still properly on ice.


    Rian found her as she was burying them again, the ice restored to last for another day and a half.


    "That is still immensely disturbing, and I was there when those two died," he commented, adjusting his leather cloak.


    "I said I''d bury them, didn''t I?" Lori said, walking over the loose mud to tamp it down. "They''re buried."


    "It still seems immensely disrespectful," Rian said. "At least make a room for them."


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said. "So, how was the shelter?"


    "A bit tight, although given how cold it was, that wasn''t a bad thing," Rian said. "We were able to fit in more than half the people into it. The rest of us slept around the kitchen and kept a fire going. The shelter could use another fireplace, it''s too big for just one to heat it properly. A second shelter would be even better."


    Lori nodded. "We''ll need more wood, then. If people can get some cut, I can probably get it dried enough to burn."


    They both glanced up at the lightly falling rain. In the distance, a thick wall of gray said it was going to come down harder soon.


    "Don''t supposed you can deal with that?" Rian said hopefully.


    "Too high up. Our demesne isn''t wide enough to reach those clouds," Lori said.


    "Can''t you¡­ make a wall of wind or something?" Rian said.


    "They don''t maintain very well," Lori said. "I''ve heard some demesnes can do it, but this isn''t one of them yet."


    Rian sighed. "Well, dare to dream. I''ll get the men started on cutting wood and as many people as possible looking for food now that we can roam around. Hopefully no one will find something that turns out to be poisonous."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori said. "Sounds like you have a lot to do before you quit."


    Rian paused. "Yeah¡­ But I''m still quitting. I''ll quit this afternoon."


    "Well, make sure to talk to anyone with seeds first and find out what they need to start planting," Lori said. "And make sure no one threw away that beast skull, it''ll make for a good shovel."


    Rian paused. "I thought you didn''t know how to Deadspeak yet?"


    "Who''s Deadspeaking? Bones are basically a kind of rock. You can Whisper those, and we''ll have a shovel that''s light but strong," Lori said. "No one might want to dig now, but I assume planting will involve a lot of moving dirt around."


    "I''ll ask the ones who were cooking yesterday," Rian said. "Speaking of which, we actually have breakfast this morning. We made a big pot of stew and kept it on the fire overnight."


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    Lori''s stomach rumbled.


    "Well, let''s do that first of all then," she said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Breakfast was warm, soft, filling, meaty and officially the best breakfast she''d ever eaten.


    "That''s it," Lori declared as she finished eating. "I''m going out there and killing something again."


    Rian, standing across from her with his own bowl¨C more tables would have to be made at some point¨C gave her a concerned look. "That sounds really dangerous. I think I speak for everyone when I say I''d rather not have our only wizard die in the middle of the wilderness and lose our demesne just because she wants some meat."


    "I don''t care," Lori said, scraping her wooden spoon, trying to get the last little bits still clinging to her bowl. "I want more meat inside me. Lots of nice, warm, juicy meat."


    "There are some here who know how to hunt, you know," Rian said. "How about we ask them to do it instead?"


    Lori pursed her lips. "Better idea," Lori said. "Have everyone write down their name and what they can do so I don¡¯t have to ask you to keep finding out." She''d never really paid attention while they were traveling. She knew Rian because he was an annoying busybody, she knew his admirers Umu and Mikon because they sometimes appeared and argued around the annoying busybody, she knew the brat because she still hadn''t managed to forget the name from yesterday, and she knew one of the doctors, Ganan, because she''d once come down with something and nearly dehydrated to death. That was the extent of the names she was familiar with. She wasn''t some Mentalist who could remember everything that ever happened to her. Some things just weren''t worth remembering.


    "I feel I must point out we don''t have that much paper," Rian said. "And most things we can use to write on are a little wet right now."


    "Nonsense. Our shelter has lots of nice, clear stone walls and we have plenty of burnt wood," Lori said dismissively.


    "Second point, we shouldn''t assume everyone can write," Rian said. "I mean, you obviously can, since you went to school and everything, but not everyone got to do that."


    "The doctors can write," Lori said. "And they''ll be down there taking care of sick people anyway. What''s a little writing on the walls?"


    "That reminds me, they say they need more light down there," Rian said.


    "Noted," Lori said. She started gathering some lightwisps to leave at the shelter. "Anything else I should know about?"


    Rian paused thoughtfully. "What do you want us to do about any eggs we find?"


    Lori gave him a confused looked. "Eggs?"


    "Well, beasts might have left their eggs behind," Rian said. "We could eat them, but if they''re far enough along we could hatch them, then raise the beasts ourselves. It''s the pain and neural shock of the Iridescence leaving their bodies that hurts and kills beasts. Eggs at the right stage of development wouldn''t have the nerves and organs to hurt."


    Lori mentally filed away ''neural shock''. She had to wonder what sort of education Rian had gotten. "Give it a try. If it works, then it''ll be good for us," she said. Domestication? Without Deadspeaking to keep the animal from dying? Well, it was worth a shot. Personally, she didn''t think it would work. Beasts were vicious things.


    As if to punctuate her thought, in the distance was the high, piercing roar of a beast.


    "I should probably get started," Lori said. "Lots to build¡­"


    Rian nodded. "I need to go talk to people," he said.


    They went.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was a full morning for Lolilyuri. The beast skull was found (it had apparently not been brought back to be butchered since she''d decapitated the beast, but had remained where it had fallen next to the now-superfluous water break) and, after knocking off all the sharp, curving teeth, she was able to use earthwisps to flatten it enough to be mounted on a stick as a shovel. The upper part of the skull worked as one too, though she had to flatten it a bit more. She kept the teeth. They were reasonably sharp, maybe they could use them for a saw or something.


    The shelter had lightwisps bound to it, with enough magic to last the day and a little bit into the night so people could get settle down. The children staying out of the way in the shelter cheered when she made the lights. Lori supposed they missed proper, civilized illumination.


    She had an audience watching her, whispering and pointing as she made the second fireplace by reshaping several rocks she''d dragged along for the purpose. Instead of trying to knock a hole through the arcing roof, she figured it was safer to just run the shaft out through a window. That''s what they were there for, after all.


    Then she started building the second shelter. It was faster this time, since she''d already done it once the day before.


    Lunch was a little remaining meat, wild vegetables, and roots, all cooked together into mush.


    Then she went back to finishing the second shelter. This time it had two fireplaces right away.


    When she went back to her cave with the core, she started in bemusement at the dead seel hanging outside the opening on a stick, the long, serpentine body with its thick, water-repellent hair just¡­ hanging there, like a dead songbug her old petbeast had killed. It looked like it had been clubbed to death. That is, someone had held it by one end and clubbed it repeatedly into the ground to kill it.


    She was about to throw it away in disgust, wondering who''d thought this was funny, when something tickled at her memory.


    Gingerly, she turned it around, finding the guts had been scooped out. Not a prank then. Someone had cleaned the seel first.


    "I accept your offering," she muttered.


    A thought wrapped the seel in water, and another changed the state of that water into ice.


    Well, at least she''d have some sort of meat for breakfast¡­

 7 - Suspiciously Sunny Day

    The days passed. As they did, the settlement developed and the number of buildings grew.


    Wood was cut. The kitchen got real walls, and then the walls became raised stone, so the wood was used for a proper roof, and then the dimensions were expanded to be able to seat nearly everyone. Tables and chairs were made. A washing area was set up, and Lolilyuri raised a stone cistern to provide water for it, which she had to refill with river water every few days. One of the men with carpentry skills and tools was even able to make a decent spigot to attach to it.


    It turned out that food was plentiful in the woods and the slopes on the other side of the raised cliff the dungeon had been dug in. At first, the foragers stripped every plant bare, until Rian ordered that the wild vegetables be, essentially, brought back alive so they could try to raise them on the not-bad argument that as plants native to the region, they were likely to grow better than their own crops.


    Lori spent her time exercising her new power by clearing land. She and the ones cutting the wood for the settlement had a deal: they''d cut the wood into planks or pillars and whatever else they needed, and she wouldn''t bring down the trees by turning all the water inside them into steam and making them explode. Apparently they didn''t get a lot of usable wood when she did it that way. Steaming the wood to more quickly cure it wasn''t nearly as much fun.


    It was boring, but she had to settle for using fast, narrow streams of water to cut through the trees so the settlement could use them. Blowing up the stumps just wasn''t the same.


    Also, she learned that you apparently couldn''t till soil by moving earthwisps, since that just made the soil move as a solid mass. Who knew? It turns out properly tilling soil required aerating it, and while there might be a way to use air- and earthwisps to get it done, all she''d managed to do was blow a lot of mud around.


    Well, at least they had shovels to do it with.


    They had more beast-skull shovels now, as they had managed to devise an ingenious system of hunting beasts. It went like this: someone stood on a tall stone pillar on the outskirts of the demesne, equipped with a signal pole and some spears, which were essentially just sharpened sticks. They''d bait any beast that came by¨C and beasts came by surprisingly frequently¨C and raise the pole to let people know they had a beast. While they''d try to keep the beast''s attention, Lori would rush there as quickly as she could and kill the beast before it decided to leave or managed to jump high enough to eat the settler.


    They didn''t catch one every day, but the beasts were big enough that the meat lasted a long time. That meant their numbers of shovels grew. It also allowed the settlement to finally make new clothes using the beast skins. And while the beast feathers were pretty tough, with enough work the down and barbs scraped off the rachis worked as pillows. Not everyone had them, but Lori did. It went with her new wooden bed. Granted, her bed had no mattress, but it was marginally softer than sand or rock.


    After clearing land for wood and planting the wild vegetables came building homes. While everyone was gathering food or resources¨C and in the doctors'' cases, trying to keep sick people from dying¨C Lori started building individual homes for families. She didn''t mess around with elegant stone arcs. She pulled dirt and stone up from the ground, compressed them into walls and floors, knocked out a few holes for windows, stuck in squares of wood for frames before adding dirt back over them and called it done. She didn''t have the time, inclination, or ladder to get high up and put in roofs. If people didn''t want to share her shelters, then they could put the roofs and doors on themselves.


    Honestly, she hadn''t realized becoming a Dungeon Binder meant working on building nearly everything but her Dungeon. So far, it was still a cave with a bed and a hole in the ground for the dungeon''s core. She''d already almost fallen in twice.


    She''d tried moving the core around, but had immediately run into the problem of it not liking being moved, which she half-expected. She could move it if she really, really tried, but it had been a difficult experience. She hadn''t been able to just grab it and pull. Against purely physical forces, it had been resolutely immobile. She''d needed to bind and will it to move, and even then it had caused a strong, nauseating feeling within her, like it was already right where it should be and moving it was a stupid idea. It reminded her of the time they''d been asked to reshape the bones in their own body, just so they''d understand what a horrible idea it was. She''d only been able to move it a few handspans, and by the end of it she was tired, sweating and feeling like her body was the wrong shape under her skin. That feeling faded after a few hours, but it certainly explained why demesne almost never changed location, even though there were a few stories about it being done, usually in truly desperate circumstances that ended either epically great or epically terrible. She gained a new understanding of how desperate the people involved had been, to try and move their core.


    So she used it as a place to hang her hat and raincoat. It might as well be useful.


    Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    That didn''t mean she didn''t try to improve her cave. The ground had been evened out and, using the old trick with water and channels cut into the rock, leveled. That had been pretty much all that''s she''d had time for, in the moments where she was lying in bed waiting to get tired enough to not mind she was sleeping on a pile consisting of her rain cloak over her other clothes. If someone knew how to weave reeds or strips of wood or vines into a more adequate back support than bare, rough planks, Rian hadn''t managed to get them on the wall list yet.


    The wall of the shelter, with the list of names and specializations all written in dirty and smudging wood char lines, had become a sort of part census, part chore list. Rian, with his near-satirical exactness and thoroughness, had written ''Lolilyuri ''Lori''¨C Dungeon Binder, Whisperer, Wizard'' at the top. Beneath that, he''d written his own name next to the word ''Lord (temporary)''.


    After that came a long list of names, trades, useful skills and specialties. Some, like Lori, had only their given names, although Rian had added the nicknames of those who preferred such things, as he had with her (she liked her given name, but had gotten tired of people mispronouncing it). Others had two names, as if they were from a noble house. Oh, Lori knew that in some demesnes the naming conventions where different, like using the name of the demesne the way nobles used house names, which was why she had a carpenter named Yonas Steamfissure and his family, while in other places people had a profession name, like the blacksmith named Lanwei Smith. It seemed ostentatious to her. Also, more annoying names to remember. Why did some people feel like they had to double their names? Well, she didn''t need to remember them. That was what the list was for. Now, if she could just get people to write their names on their clothes¡­


    The ''(temporary)'' amused her though. Rian still seemed to think he was going to quit, even after several days of putting it off. As if she''d let him. He was too useful.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day dawned bright and clear and sunny. No matter which direction Lori looked, no matter how much she bound lightwisps to gather light and magnify the range of her view, she couldn''t see any walls of water waiting to come down from the sky to ruin their day.


    It was incredibly suspicious.


    "I''d call you paranoid, but you''re always like this," Rian said over breakfast. They had tables now, so they sat across from each other. She ignored Umu and Mikon sitting at the table behind him, alternately enjoying the view of his backside and glaring at her. He was just completely oblivious, despite the intensity of their gazes that should have bored holes through his trousers. For alleged romantic rivals, they are awfully quick to join forces against what they thought was a third party. Idiots.


    "So you''re accusing me of being paranoid all the time?" she said. If people still had any spices on them, they were hoarding it, so the meal was flavored with the meat''s natural fat, the bitter acridness of the vegetable''s greenery, and the mushiness of the root vegetables. Lori switched from the stew to the grilled seel meat, washing away the taste the stew left in her mouth. She didn''t know who was leaving a dead seel near her cave every day, but it was just that little bit more meat.


    "It''s a sunny day," Rian said. "Why would you think that anything bad will happen to us because of it?"


    "Because sunny days are when iridescence grows back quickly," Lori said grimly. "It''s hot, it''s dry, there''s a lot of thermal energy to quicken the Iridescence''s growth¡­ don''t have any people up on the beast-baiting towers today. In fact, have everyone stay close by."


    Rian grimaced. "Ah. I forgot, what with all the rain we''ve been having," he said. "I''ll let everyone know. Well, it''s not a bad day to work near the river. Maybe everyone can do laundry or go seeling or have a bath or something. With all the seels we''ve been catching, we certainly have enough tallow."


    Lori suddenly became aware of every itchy part of her body. "We have soap?"


    "The chandler, Chandler, says he has some ready," Rian said. "Thanks to you we haven''t had to make candles yet, so he''s been saving up the seel tallow and ash, and making soap."


    "So our first community fair is going to be a public bathing event," Lori said flatly. "Joy. Aren''t we having enough problems with horny idiots? Do we really need to actually encourage people to get naked and wet in the middle of the day?" She made a note to designate someplace downstream for bathing. These idiots would probably bathe right next to where the children did their seeling from sheer laziness otherwise.


    Lori had recently needed to start leaving the entrance to her cave blocked off after she''d caught two young men trying to sneak in during lunch, in the process of taking their shirts off. From then on, morbid curiosity had her noticing how some people didn''t always attend the midday meal. Or skipped the morning meal. Or skipped¨C or at least were late to¨C the evening meal.? Really, ever since she''d noticed she hadn''t been able to stop. No matter how much she''d tried. Why had her social apathy chosen to abandon her now, in her hour of need? Like some twisted joke, her facial recognition seemed to have improved because of it, even if she still couldn''t name people. She wondered what they got first, a wedding, a baby, or someone with an axe to the head?


    All the children were always present for meals. She''d since insisted on that, and insisted no one start eating until all the children were there, in their special low table in the middle of the room. She wasn''t having any of THAT in her demesne. You always heard stories about some places¡­


    For once, Rian actually looked uncomfortable. "Well, it''s not like people have anything else to do," he muttered. "We don''t even have a bar."


    "Really? You''re telling me in all this time since we set out from Covehold, no one''s managed to get a still running?" Lori said, not believing it.


    "They did, but I appropriated it," Rian said. "We needed the barrel for food storage. Our latitude is low enough that we can probably expect snow, so we should start testing to see which foods keep and for how long."


    "Wow. People must really like you, to not try and hang you after you did that," Lori said.


    "Oh, I told them it was by your authority," Rian said. "Requisitioned by the government."


    Lori glared at him. Rian just replied with a wide-eyed, innocent and earnest smile.

 8 - Minions Require Facilities

    As it wasn''t raining, and therefore people could finally work on putting roofs and doors of the houses she''d built¨C she left the matter of assigning which families got the houses to Rian, as she didn''t care¨C Lori could finally stay in her nice, cool cave instead of working in the hot, sunny, humid outdoors, and develop her Dungeon.


    Step one was putting a binding at the entrance that kept the humidity from getting in. She put in a lot of magic into that so it would last several days. Was there a way to permanently direct power at a binding so it would work in perpetuity? There should be, she remembered there were tools that had bindings placed on them so they only needed wisp beads to function, but it wasn''t something they''d studied at her school. Well, she had a dungeon, a way to make as many beads as she needed, and no other means of entertaining herself, so it was something to remember for the future. The sunlight from the entrance was bright enough, and the floor where it shone was reflective enough from her leveling of the stone that she didn''t need to bind lightwisps to illuminate the cave, so that was one thing she didn''t have to worry about right then.


    She started expanding the room by using earthwisps to soften the stone. She''d gotten a lot of experience doing this from working with the shelters, and the stone flowed like honey. She didn''t know what she''d do with a large, open space, but she''d probably figure something out when she finally had it. She also decided to finally square up the entrance of her cave so she could put a door on it. Raising a boulder to block it was just asking for some sort of asphyxiation accident in the long run.


    The stone flowed across the cave and out the entrance intermittently as she melted off stone from the walls little by little to shape the cave into a proper room. She stacked it up next to her door with her boulder. It wasn¡¯t long before she had a nice, mostly square space with her bed in the corner and the dungeon''s core floating off to one side, next to the door.


    She took that in for a moment, and then went back outside to drag in some of the excavated rock.


    After building a stone wall to hide the core from immediate view of the cave entrance and moving her bed because this had resulted in her bedspace becoming severely cramped, she examined the space again. As rooms went, it was certainly a generously large one, that little awkward alcove with the core notwithstanding. She''d have space for a table, chairs, her own private lavatory (Lori made a note to dig new latrines, it had been enough days for them to fill up again), storage space, maybe her own food storage¡­


    Lori eyed the stone she''d excavated outside.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When lunch rolled around, Lori was still in her cave forming rocks into furniture.


    "Why do you have a sacrificial altar in your cave?" Rian said from the cave entrance.


    She gave him an annoyed look. "It''s a table."


    "It looks like an altar Dungeon worshippers use to sacrifice beasts," Rian asserted.


    "Well, it''s not, it''s simply the best shape when you''re making a table out of stone and don''t want to risk it collapsing on your legs," Lori said. "Did you come here for something besides judging my furniture-making skills?"


    "Lunch is ready," Rian informed her. "I thought you''d like to have the chance to show up, while the food is hot."


    " Ah. Thank you, then." Lori stood from where she''d been making sure the table was balanced and grabbed her hat. She pushed back her hair and tucked it under the brim, reminding herself to find someone with scissors. Maybe one of the doctors? Worse comes to worse, she''d try to cut it with a beast claw.


    "You''re welcome," Rian said. "Also, I think we need to have a community meeting sometime soon."


    Lori blinked at him in the middle of dragging her boulder in front of her cave. Now that the entrance had been squared off there were gaps in the upper corners, but not enough for someone to fit in. "Why?" she asked suspiciously.


    A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.


    "Well, for one thing, we don''t have a name for our demesne yet¨C"


    "''Lori''s''."


    Rian blinked. "What?"


    "The name is ''Lori''s''," Lori repeated. "Lori''s Demesne."


    "Are you serious? Who names a demesne after herself?"


    "Iskandaliya Demesne, capital of the empire of Iskandal the Empire Binder," Lori said authoritatively.


    "All right, first off, the woman was a raging egomaniac," Rian replied. Lori reluctantly increased her assessment of his knowledge of history. "Secondly, that was also the new name given to every other demesne she conquered into her empire. Are you going to tell me you''re going to be equally unoriginal?"


    "''Lori''s'' is a perfectly original name!"


    "Thirdly, I refuse to be a lord in such an unoriginally named place," Rian continued as if she hadn''t spoken. "If you call it that, I''ll quit."


    "You''re already quitting," Lori pointed out. "You''re quitting today, right?"


    "I''ll quit even sooner."


    They reached the kitchen-turned-dining-hall, and Lori headed for the line for the midday stew, Rian following after her.


    "Anyway, forget the name¨C"


    "Never."


    "¨C we need to talk about supplies," he persisted. "We''re running out."


    "We have plenty of food," Lori said.


    "Yes, so we''re unlikely to go hungry," Rian nodded. "It''s everything else that''s running out. We need nails, metals, medicines, new clothes¨C"


    "Haven''t we been treating all the skins and furs?" Lori interrupted.


    "Are you willing to wear leather underwear?" Rian asked pointedly.


    "All right, continue," Lori regretfully conceded.


    "Basically, every product of civilization we left behind, we need," Rian continued. "Right now, only Covehold Demesne will have them. They''re the oldest demesne in this continent that we know of, so they¨C"


    "Wait, ''that we know of''?" Lori said, turning to look at him.


    He shrugged. "I think it''s arrogant to assume no one lived on this continent until we arrived. Have we looked?"


    "You''re not one of those people who think that our ancestors actually did cross an ocean of stars to some kind of promised demesne, do you?" Lori said. "I''m pretty sure that was proven to be a metaphor for the development of tools for navigating by the stars."


    "We know the world is round," Rian argued. "Maybe people arrived on this continent from the other side. And we still need to have a community meeting. We need supplies only Covehold has, unless you''ve managed to find iron inside the hill. Even copper will do."


    "I haven''t exactly had time to go digging," Lori said evasively. "I''ve been busy."


    "We all have," Rian said. "And if we want to keep being busy, we''ll need those supplies."


    "Fine, I''ll start beading money, we can¨C"


    "Won''t work," Rian said. "I don''t know if you asked, but Covehold accepts only old continent beads or Covehold-issued beads, though they hadn''t made those yet when we''d left."


    "What?" Lori demanded, rounding on him. "That''s ridiculous! Beads are a universal standard! Everybody uses beads!"


    "I''m not sure of the exact, technical reason," Rian said, backing away, hands raised placatingly. "But apparently it''s to prevent anyone with a dungeon just beading out a bunch of beads, slapping a ''100'' or a ''1,000'' or a ''100,000'' on it, and buying out all of Covehold''s goods. If we want to trade, it has to be in tangible goods."


    "They''re worried about inflation? Why? Taniar Demesne is in charge of regulating currencies to stop that from happening and they wouldn''t let¡­" Lori trailed off. "Oh. Taniar doesn''t have a presence on this continent."


    "It''s sort of part of the appeal of living here," Rian pointed out.


    "How did you even know this?" Lori said.


    "I asked when we were there," Rian said. "Didn''t you?"


    She had not. "Okay, fine," she grumbled. "Set a meeting for tomorrow."


    "Why tomorrow?" Rian said.


    "So that everyone has time to take a bath, and I have time to build a bath," Lori said. She thought about it. "Make it the day after tomorrow."


    So much for her nice, sunny day off.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After doing it so many times, Lolilyuri had gotten good at raising buildings. She could practically do it while seated next to where the building was to rise.


    So that was what she did, sitting on a slightly compressed block of dirt while beside her, earthwisps made dirt and rock flow, compressing into walls and an arcing roof. In the basic shape it wasn''t that different from her initial shelters. The difference was the long troughs of water high along the walls that fed down to basins inside individual alcoves. On the floor were holes that acted as drains, full of bound waterwisps that would serve to carry the water out against the flow of gravity and out into the field outside, which would likely get very muddy. It didn''t seem smart to bring that water directly to the river. Give the land a chance to filter it out a little. If she had time she''d find a way to make the water pass through sand.


    Rian was in charge of making sure everyone had soap. She figured that was only fair. She had to make two more buildings, after all. With internal plumbing, this time. It would be good practice for making her own private bathroom and lavatory.


    If things went according to plan, at least the community meeting would have everyone smelling clean.

 9 - Naming the Community With Malice Aforethought

    Finally, the day of the community meeting was upon them. The sky was overcast, but not actually raining, though it threatened to, and the ground was muddy from the rain the day before. Only the paths Lori had made to allow her to get to places were hard-packed and dry.


    The dining hall was packed that morning, with only the children on seeling duty and some older siblings tasked to make sure they didn''t fall into the water and drown not in attendance. Everyone seemed to be much cleaner. Lori was pretty sure she wasn''t the only one who used soap to properly do laundry. She''d been making do with a rock to slam clothes on and hot water all this time. Others wouldn''t even have the latter.


    Most were also wearing slightly oversized clothes. It appeared people hadn''t yet recovered from the privations of the trip from Covehold. Lolilyuri hoped they didn''t blame her for that. It had been the dead Whisperer''s idea they travel so far to avoid being surrounded by so many other burgeoning settlements, which had been what had caused them to travel the many weeks away from Covehold Demesne. Most of that time had been spent going in between and around all the seemingly randomly placed demesnes, lest they be shook down for ''visitor''s taxes''. In hindsight, the fact that Covehold only accepted old-continent beads explained why all the demesne settlements near it were trying to extort the money from them.


    Benches were arrayed in rows facing the kitchen, where those washing up after breakfast and preparing lunch were listening to proceedings. A table had been set up in front of everyone, and it was piled with various flats rocks, chunks of wood, scraps and peels of bark, and several wooden boards, all full of writing penned with charcoal.


    Rian stood behind this table, smiling at the murmuring crowd and clapping his hands for attention. Eventually, the crowd grew quiet. "All right," he said. "Hello everyone, and welcome to our demesne''s first community meeting. It''s a historic day for us all, and as soon as someone remembers what date it is we''ll be able to commemorate it."


    Lori pulled her hat low over her face to hide her eye-roll as people laughed. She was having vivid flashbacks to that woman from her childhood who worked at the Dungeon worshipper temple and ran the temple''s children''s daycare.


    Rian continued. "So, while we''ve all been living and working together, I thought we''d do some introductions, in case not everyone knows each other yet. I''m Rian, your temporary lord, as I''ll be quitting soon, possibly later today¨C" there was another round of chuckles at that. Apparently no one believed it any more than Lori did. Rian simply looked befuddled, as if he''d missed something. "¨C um, and this is our Dungeon Binder, Whisperer Lori. Oh, wait, I suppose that''s formally Binder Lori now." Lori nodded in approval at the acknowledgement of the formal term. "Well, she''ll always be Whisperer Lori in our hearts, I''m sure!" The next laugh was merely polite.


    Rian continued making more introductions. On the theoretical level, Lori understood what he was doing, though she wasn''t sure if he did. Acknowledging other people gave them public recognition, pride and perceived value in the community, as well as gave them the illusion of a say in matters. She understood that. She''d read a book about it once, after all, before she''d violently disagreed with it. Why did people need to feel acknowledged and appreciated to do needful work? She did needful work all the time, and she didn''t need acknowledgement and appreciation, only the sense of holding powers of life and death over the people around her.


    Still, she allowed it. It cost her nothing but time after all, and it wasn''t like there was a library nearby she could be reading at for better use of her time. So instead she balanced a thin stone tablet on her knees, actively structurally reinforced with earthwisps to keep it from breaking under its own weight, and sketched out the current layout of the settlement on its surface, using her finger to direct the wisps to make marks on the stone.


    "¨C thank the woodcutting teams for all the work they''ve done¨C" Rian was saying.


    Drawn like this, their settlement was a haphazard affair. The kitchen had originally been set up surrounded by tents, the water wagons that had been for cleaning Iridescence from people during overland the journey, the individual carts and family wagons the various men had taken turns pulling, and the various and sundry tents people had been sleeping in while the place for the core was being dug. Well, the tents were gone now, since most people had moved to the shelters she''d set up. She''d started putting up unroofed houses in their place, arranged along a sort of ''main street'' that led from the now dining hall to her cave, because she wanted a clear path to food. There were the beginnings of side streets, as she planned to build outward from the main, get some proper urban planning down before some idiots started their own building with no regard for proper organization.


    The shelters and baths were off to the side, and she wondered if she had the power to turn the structures the 1/8<sup>th</sup> circle or so it would take to make them align properly with the grid she was making¡­


    "¨C doctors Ganan and Samoth for their tireless work in taking care of our sick and injured community members," Rian was still droning on.


    The river was a vague, uncertain line that she had to redraw a few times because it seemed not to proper scale. Idly, she sketched out planned docks and perhaps a dike or something. She had a feeling they were still a bit too close to the river. What if it flooded, or inundated or whatever it was rivers did? And they''d still need someplace more convenient than the shore for seeling. Maybe a dock so they could use boats and nets. Slightly downriver, she sketched out places for a sawmill, a miller and a watchtower to let them keep an eye on the opposite shore¡­


    "¨C and last but definitely not least¨C actually, they''re pretty much the greatest ever¨C let''s give a warm hand of applause for our kitchen volunteers, who''ve been making miracles keeping us fed with delicious food all these weeks," Rian said, and Lori looked up at the applause, which she belatedly joined. Well, she agreed with the sentiment. They were a meticulous lot, feeding every new possible foodstuff to a seel to see if it was poisonous or harmful before trying it themselves first. The fact the only influx of upset stomachs had come when they''d started having beast meat be a part of the community''s regular diet was a testament to the care that had been put in.


    Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    The men and women in the kitchen probably waved. Lori didn''t bother looking. Instead, she waited for Rian to get to the point.


    "All right, with that out of the way, we can start," he said, settling onto his chair next to Lori and looking down at the table top, where he''d written things using a charred twig. "First order of business, our demesne, our new home sweet home, needs a name."


    "It already has a name," Lori interjected next to him with an annoyed glare. Really, they''d agreed on this.


    "Look, we can''t call it ''Lori''s''," Rian said, which was patently absurd.


    "It''s a perfectly serviceable and accurate name," Lori said, speaking only the absolute truth.


    "It makes you sounds like an egomaniac," Rian said. "We have to put it to a vote."


    "That''s practically naming it by committee," Lori said. "And everyone knows demesnes named by a committee have the most boring names ever. You get places like ''The People''s Free Democratic Councilar Demesne State''."


    "She has a point," some sycophantic but intelligent person in the audience said.


    "Let''s call it ''Seel River''!" a young-sounding voice called unabashedly from the back. It was of course, ignored, as no one ever cared what children thought. Lori found it pettily satisfying to finally be on this side of the matter.


    "One suggestion for ''Seel River''," Rian said, pointing at the crowd and seemingly making a note. Lori stared at him at this base treachery to all of adulthood. "Any other names?"


    That opened the water break, and soon people were throwing names at Rian with reckless abandon, ignoring that the demesne already had a perfectly good and serviceable and perfect name. In addition to ''Seel River'', there was also the usual generic garbage like ''Freedom'', ''Opportunity'', ''Fresh Start'', ''New Beginnings'', ''Riverside'', ''Frontier''s Edge'', ''World''s End'' and such by people who thought they were being poetic and significant instead of pretentious and shallow. She didn''t really pay attention, they were all pointlessly pretentious and not as good as ''Lori''s'', anyway. ''Lori''s'' was clearly the superior, more accurate name. Certainly much better than ''Wet Socks''. What idiot had thought anyone would want to live there?


    Someone even argued that the settlement shouldn¡¯t have a name, as names were a symbol of the Binderarchy which they were all leaving behind, and this would be a new world without the tyranny of binders, who were the cause of all evils, allowing people to truly be equal and build a paradise unlike anything ever seen before.


    Fortunately, the people around that particular idiot were smarter than him and one of his burly neighbors shut him up by some sort of strange hold around his neck that eventually caused him to fall unconscious.


    "When he wakes, someone inform him that if he oh-so-subtly starts espousing my murder again, he''s spending two nights in the Iridescence," Lori said coolly. "I''ll drag him out there myself."


    "He didn''t mean anything by it, your Bindership," someone said.


    "He clearly did, otherwise he wouldn''t have said it," Lori said. "This is his only warning. See that he gets it, will you."


    Rainbows. Now she''ll have to remember that idiot''s name and face, just to be sure he never got behind her.


    "I wouldn''t go that far," Rian said placatingly. "But it is pretty rude for him to say all that after all the hard work Binder Lori has been putting in so that we''d all have someplace warm to sleep and plenty of cured wood to start building with. All we''ve got is each other, everyone."


    There was a moment''s pause as ''Each Other'' was suggested as a name.


    With that came the ''trying to be punny'' names, like ''No One''s Here'', ''It''s One Of Ours'', ''No Solicitors'', ''Hole In The Water'', ''Solicitors Will Be Drowned'', ''Not Dead Yet'', ''Oh Good, We Can Stop'', ''Vacancy'', ''Last Chance To Stop'' and other hilarities, all predicated on the notion of someone else someday encountering them and reading the demesne''s name on its own from some sort of humorous sign. Lori had gone back to drawing on her stone tablet to keep from asphyxiating fools. Rian needed to start writing the names on the floor, as he''d run out of space on the table.


    "Um, I think that''s enough names," Rian said, sounding mildly frantic as Lori remembered to draw in the current woodworking areas and delineate them into a proper sawpit. She considered the river, wondering if they should prepare facilities for a sawmill¡­ "Why don''t we vote on¨C"


    "No," Lori said, not looking up from her tablet as her voice carried. The crowd stilled.


    "What?" Rian said, surprised.


    "They''re not voting to choose a name," Lori said. "You are. Pick a name, Rian."


    "Wait, it''s not fair that I pick the name," Rian said. "Everyone should have a say¨C"


    "They did. They wasted it on nonsense like ''Wet Socks'', ''No One''s Here'' and ranting about the Binderarchy," Lori said. There was some embarrassed shuffling. "All voting does is make it so no one''s to blame for everyone''s stupidity. So, you pick a name. That way, we can all blame you for it being stupid."


    Rian frowned. "I don''t¨C"


    "Yeah, Lord Rian can pick!"


    "Pick one, Lord Rian!"


    "Lord Rian, pick ''World''s End''!"


    Lori''s smile had a touch of malice. Change the name of Lori''s Demesne, would he? "All in favor of having Rian pick?" she said loftily. "Raise your hand."


    She didn''t raise her hand, but enough people did that it was easy to tell it was more than half.


    "It has been voted upon, as you wanted," Lori said. "Pick a name, Rian."


    For some reason, people started to chant. "Pick a name! Pick a name! Pick a name!"


    She supposed people have gotten really bored over having nothing to do for entertainment besides, abortively, each other.


    "Um, well, then¡­" Rian said, looking flustered for the first time Lori had ever seen him. Ohoho! She tucked away this knowledge for future use. Rian didn''t handle pressure from mobs well. He looked at the list on the floor in panic, and Lori could also see the moment when he decided they were all terrible names and he''d really been hoping for a vote to defray responsibility. She saw him close his eyes, point randomly, and look. "Wet Socks?"


    "No," Lori said.


    There was a murmur of non-affirmation from the crowd.


    "Okay, strike that then¡­" he said. Close eyes, point. "Last Chance To Stop?"


    The following murmur wasn''t as opposed, but certainly wasn''t affirmatory.


    "Try again," Lori said.


    "Look, can''t we just vote on it, if everyone is¨C"


    "We did vote, this is what we voted for," Lori said. "Now, pick a name."


    Once more the chant rose. "Pick a name! Pick a name! Pick a name!"


    Sighing, Rian closed his eyes, spun around¨C to laughter and cheers¨C and pointed down at the list. He frowned. "Lorian?"


    Lori blinked, leaning forward to try and see what he was pointing at.


    "Um, any objections to that name?" Rian said, as Lori finally got up to look at the list on the floor. It¡­ did sort of look like that?


    There was a more uncertain but ultimately apathetic murmur from the crowd.


    "All right then¡­" Rian said, still sounding uncertain. "I guess our demesne is called Lorian now."


    More murmurs, with less uncertainty and more apathy. It sounded like a shrug.


    Rian looked at the name once more, then shrugged. "All right then. Let''s continue the first Lorian community meeting."


    Lolilyuri kept frowning at the name, but reluctantly sat herself again. It didn''t matter. This place would always be ''Lori''s Demesne'' in her heart!


    "Well then," Rian said, clearing his throat. "With that out of the way, let''s discuss the material shortages¡­ "

 10 - Material Shortages of Loris Demesne

    Lolilyuri listened as Rian listed the things they were running low on, referring to the various random objects with writing on them piled on the table. His recitation was punctuated by people standing up and justifying why they needed them. Metal; copper, tin, iron, steel. People had brought the tools of their trades, but not all of them. Some had been too specialized and heavy, but now that they were planning to set up, they''d need them, and the smith needed metal to make those tools, as well as others. Cloth; for clothing, for utility, for raw materials. Medicines: the doctors were doing their best, but without some more medicines, they had people who were likely to undergo protracted suffering. The doctors also said they were materially unprepared for a likely sudden influx of childbirths in the future, making many people shuffle nervously.


    She''d also need more glass if she wanted to figure out how to bind wisps to tools, since she''d lost some of her glassware when it had been pulled in to make the Dungeon''s core. Just because she never studied it in school didn''t mean she didn''t know some of its principles. She should be able to work out the others. Until she figured out how to imbue magic from the core directly to a binding to make it run perpetually, bound tools would have to do aaannnndddd now that she thought of it, there seemed like something in the basics of bound tools that would let her do that now that she thought of it¡­


    Yes, she was going to need glass. And metal. And possibly a glassworker who could teach her how to make her own glass¡­


    The meeting progressed, and at one point people transitioned from mentioning what they needed to what they wanted. Others wanted glass too for their windows, nevermind some didn''t have roofs yet. Some of the farmers, having been able to judge the soil and climate, wanted certain crops to plant, since they felt it would work for their demesne. Someone suggested cloudbloom, so they could harvest their own cloth. Lori wondered if the one who made the suggestion actually knew how to do it. Others suggested sweetwood stalks, and Lori could already smell the distilled spirits that would make.


    Rian seemed intent on just writing down this progressively longer wish list. He really was soft, wasn''t he? It was when someone mentioned steamarms for hunting beasts that Lori decided to intervene.


    "You realize we would have to pay for all this with money, right?" Lori said ruthlessly, making the buzz of excitement from the suggestion of hunting down beasts die down. "You know, money? Those round things they use at shops? Physical representations of wealth and power?"


    There was a murmur of disappointed dreams slamming hard into terrible reality.


    "For that matter, we just got here," Lori said. "Are you all so eager to go back the other way? Because someone is going to have to, to buy all this. Without me or any other wizard to keep them a little safe."


    That caused more murmurs of concern. They''d traveled a long way. The last demesne settlement that they had passed had been seven days behind them before they''d found this spot and decided to finally stop moving, mostly because the rains had turned their progress to a muddy crawl. Covehold had been two months before that, as the blue moon turned.


    "Someone needs to go," Rian said.


    "They won''t have money to buy any of this with, the journey both ways would kill them, and given the lack of roads getting here, how would they even find this place again?" Lori said.


    "It''s not that hard," Rian said. "Just go the way we''ve already gone, except backwards." He said it like it was so simple and obvious.


    "Do you remember which way we''ve gone?" Lori asked.


    Rian opened his mouth, then paused. Slowly, his mouth closed.


    "That''s what I thought," Lori said.


    "Um¡­" someone in the crowd said. The two of them turned their attention to the raised hand rising up from the crowd.


    "Yes?" Rian said. "Stand up so we can all see you, please."


    A nervous young man about Lori''s age¨C which meant he could have been anywhere from fifteen to forty¨C stood up, pushing back his shaggy pink hair from his face. "Um, my name is Cassan, your lordship, your Bindership," he said. "I joined this expedition in Covehold?"


    "Yes, I know," Rian said, smiling pleasantly. This seemed to make the man even more nervous.


    "Um, you see, I have some knowledge of astrology and I''ve been keeping charts¡­" he said, fumbling with a notebook he''d been holding, waving it around as if anyone knew what it contained or cared. "And based on my records, I believe we''re no more than 75 taums away from Covehold Demesne. A hundred at the most. If¡­ if you would like, I could provide you a heading to travel towards Covehold." Wait, really? What in rainbows was an astrologer of all people doing here?


    "What is an astrologer doing here?" Lori demanded.


    "I''m n-not really an astrologer, just an amateur," Cassan said nervously. Peering intently at him, Lori saw he was very thin and lacking muscle. In fact, he was noticeably slimmer than most of the men around him, including some whom she was inclined to call boys rather than men. "But I know the principles, and I have my own telescope and compass."


    "Oh yes, that was yours, wasn''t it?" Rian said. "Thanks for lending us that, it helped to know we weren''t going towards Covehold."


    "You couldn''t navigate using the sun?" Lori muttered. "It goes the same way every day¡­"


    "Well, this solves how we''re getting back to Covehold, and back here after leaving Covehold," Rian said cheerfully.


    "Again, I have to ask, what is an astrologer doing here?" Lori said. "I mean, look at you."


    Cassan coughed. "In truth, I was hired as Whisperer Elceena''s assistant, your Bindership," he said. "You see, she was actually¨C"


    "Stop," Lori said, raising her hand. "Don''t want to know, don''t care." Ha! So she HAD been a noble.


    "You should have that cough seen to, it might be something serious," Rian said, looking concerned.


    "Why did she hire you?" Lori asked.


    The man shuffled. "She wanted a secretary to dictate her memoirs to. She was convinced she would found a great demesne and wished to chronicle her rise to power." He sighed. "Then she died."


    "So¡­ she probably hasn''t paid you, has she?" Lori said.


    "No, Binder Lori," Cassan said, looking very tired and pitiful.


    "Well, at least you''re not dead," she said. "That already makes you better off than her." A beat. "You can sit down now." He sat.


    Rian nodded. "With him leading us to Covehold and back, we''ll be able to bring back the materials we need."


    "Again, with what money?" Lori said. "It''s not like everyone is suddenly just going to give you their life savings to go shopping with. Besides, things are expensive in Covehold! You all remember what it was like."


    There were grim nods at that, as people probably remembered their own experiences with getting gouged for beads.


    "Someone still needs to go," Rian said. "What we need is in Covehold. Maybe we can find a way to pay for it there too. After all, if there''s so much money going around, then maybe we''ll have a chance to get some for ourselves."


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Lori sighed. "Well, then, who''s going on this poverty mission? You?"


    "Well¡­ if no one else can go," Rian said, basically guarantying no one else could go.


    "I volunteer to go with Lord Rian!" a feminine voice in the crowd cried.


    "He won''t go alone! I''ll go with him!" another voice cried at the same time.


    Lolilyuri sighed as the predictable reaction from Rian''s admirers occurred. Umu and Mikon''s family members looked tired, but did not object as the two young women volunteered to travel with a man.


    "Um¡­ anyone else?" Rian asked. "Any other volunteers to go?"


    There was much shuffling and averted gazes.


    "Bring the idiot along," Lori said.


    "Um, you''ll have to be more specific," Rian said.


    "The delusional one who seems to think you can build a new world without Dungeon Binders," Lori said.


    "That''s abuse of power!" the semi-familiar voice of the idiot in question said.


    "So you''ll happily leave in protest, then?" Lori said.


    "Um¡­ well¡­"


    "Great, be seeing you, so long and thanks for probably very little," Lori said.


    "In that case, I demand my barrel back!"


    "Rian, give the man back his booze barrel that you confiscated," Lori said.


    "It''s full of seel guts we were planning to use as fertilizer," Rian said.


    "Then bring that along with you to sell, and he can have the barrel back afterwards," Lori said. "You probably can''t sell it in Covehold, but maybe one of the other demesnes not as close to water will buy it for fertilizer."


    "Oh, good idea," Rian said. "And if we increase our seeling, we might even be able to sell the skins and furs. It''ll get us money, hopefully. Maybe it''ll be enough money to buy everything we need. And if not, then I''m sure we''ll find some other way to get the money."


    "If you rob the bank, maybe," Lori said, then paused. "Are you planning to rob the bank?"


    "Of course not!" Rian said, looking offended. "I''m not a criminal!"


    "Well, if you do, don''t link yourself to us," Lori said. The crowd all nodded solemnly.


    "I''m not robbing the bank!"


    Lori resigned herself to disavowing Rian if he ended up robbing the bank.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Beyond the material shortages, there were other matters.


    "Here are the demesnes laws," Lori said, showing the reverse side of the tablet she''d been drawing on. "I''ve put in the basics by order of importance. More will be added as needed."


    Rian took the stone tablet. "No murder, no stealing, no molesting children, no rape, no¡­ loud music an hour after sundown?¡­ no trespassing on other people''s houses without invitation, no¡­ public urination? All punishable by flogging, exile and execution¡­ why does the loud music one call for immediate execution? That seems a bit much."


    "The matter will be reexamined when we finally have music worth listening to," Lori said.


    "Um¡­ we should vote on it¡­?" Rian said.


    "No," Lori said. "If you have to vote on a law against murder and rape, I don''t want you in my demesne. Get out."


    There were a lot of nods at this.


    "Still¡­ public urination¡­" Rian said. "It''s a bit¡­"


    "Next matter!" Lori called. "Come on, let''s get more things done before lunch!"


    "Excuse me, Lord Rian," someone called from the crowd. A man Lori recognized as one of the men who owned the saws they used at the sawpit rose. "My name''s Vargel. I''d like to ask about land. How are we dividing up the land?"


    "Currently, we aren''t." Lori said. "For one, we don''t have the entire demesne mapped and measured yet. Secondly, priority is given to facilities for foods and, if this colorbrained scheme works, on any resource plants like cloudblooms or sweetwood. However, I promise a method for distributing land amongst everyone will be forthcoming. It''ll come a week after I think up a way to charge taxes."


    There were cries of protest.


    "Look, I can already see you all wanting to claim huge swathes of MY demesne just so you can feel rich," Lori said. "Most of you don''t even have wooden roofs yet, much less wooden beds, why are you bothering with land? This isn''t the old continent. There''s no point owning a lot of land because at the end of the day, it''s you who''ll have to work it. Or do you think you can pay people to do all the work on those lands for you?"


    "Oh, so you can own land but we decent people can''t?" someone hidden in the crowd snapped.


    The crowd parted, and the one who''d spoken out found themselves revealed, a square-faced woman who had once been plump but had clearly lost a lot of weight recently, her dark green hair in a braid over one shoulder. She was clutching tightly to her skirts, and glancing around at her neighbors with the betrayed look of a coward who finds others won''t hide them.


    "I''m the Dungeon Binder," Lolilyuri said with the confidence of someone who could kill everyone around her. "I don''t need to own the land. The land is already mine. I just let you all use it because I literally do not have the time or inclination to do everything that can and needs to be done with that land. When I say we''re not distributing land yet, it''s not because I care that some selfish colorbrained idiot is going to try to claim everything he sees. What do I care? It''s not like he can keep the land from me. I can have the land itself kill him. No, this delay in distribution is purely for your own benefit."


    "How?" the woman demanded belligerently.


    "Because when idiots start fighting over it, I''ll have to deal with you, and given how little I care, I might just exile everyone involved to the Iridescence," Lori said and she drew in a familiar breath of magic. Her staff stood in a hole in the ground she''d made. She gently tapped it, and her will traveled along the wire wrapping and into the ground below, into the willing, eager earthwisps.


    The woman yelped as the packed earth under her seat trembled a moment, before she and her chair sank into the suddenly flowing, water-like dirt and stone. People around her yelped, stumbling back as she tried to grab onto them, grab onto the chairs around her. With another breath and binding of will, the area of liquid consistency spread, the chairs around her started to sink into the ground as well. She tried to claw at the dirt, but it parted as easily as wet clay and fine sand.


    "Lori!" Rian exclaimed, standing and facing her so fast his seat fell back. "Stop it!"


    Lori considered, then stood, taking her staff in hand. She walked towards the struggling woman, and the crowd parted before her. Dramatically, Lori raised her staff and slammed the butt into the ground as magic was carried through the wire and imbued into the earth.


    The woman and all the chairs that had sunk in with her were suddenly expelled as the ground stopped having the pseudo-fluidity of water. The chairs clattered on the once-more hard-packed earth as the woman found herself on solid ground once more, her dress and limbs stained with dust and odd patches of hardened, cracking stone.


    Stone flowed up from the ground and around the bottom of her staff, and when Lori raised it next, a stone spear was pulled out of the ground with it. She slammed the spearhead down, and the woman let out a cry as the tip snapped off next to her head.


    "So," Lori continued as if nothing dramatic had happened. "We''re going to delay the distribution so that we can figure out a way to evenly allocate land for everyone that will result in the least need for me to deal with problems. That means mapping out the demesne, figuring out how much land we have to work with, cutting out the parts that will be held communally like the baths and water sources and where we''ll be planting the wild vegetables we''ll be cultivating for winter. Yes, it''s pretty unsatisfactory. If it helps, I don''t want things to be communally owned. I want you all to own your own land, farm your own crops or whatever, sell each other things and pay each other with money so I can tax you all. But we haven''t even survived our first winter yet, much less managed our first harvest, and if each family tries to claim land and survive on their own without everyone else, you''re all going to die because I''m going to strip the land bare for food to feed myself. So, why don''t we hold off the talk about distributing land until we''re actually in a position to grow, and people actually need the land to prosper as opposed to just wanting the land because they''re greedy."


    Lori didn''t wait for an answer, turning away to go back to her seat next to Rian, who was watching her warily. She sat and he stepped away to check on the woman, who was pushing herself off the ground. He picked her up, picked up one of the fallen chairs and set it down behind her, then quickly began resetting all the other chairs.


    Finally, as people stood around uncertainly¨C some had run out of the dining hall and were watching warily from outside¨C Rian turned, and only then resumed his seat.


    "That was uncalled for," he said, not looking at her.


    "I agree, she should have just kept her mouth shut," Lori said.


    "I wasn''t talking about Missus Naineb," Rian said, giving her a reproachful look.


    "Well, I was," Lori said. "Any other things we need to talk about or can I go back to figuring out how to make lavatories?"


    Rian pursed his lips disapprovingly. "This isn''t over," he said, but he turned back to the crowd. "Does anyone else have anything to bring up?"


    There was silence.


    Finally, a hesitant hand was raised.


    "Yes?" Rian said, nodding at the brave soul as Lori tried to get her heart rate under control.


    "Um, Gunvi, your lordship, your Bindership," the man said. "I worked as a potter before coming here, and yesterday I was checking along the river and found clay¡­"


    Slowly, as Gunvi the potter explained how he''d found clay and wanted to set up a claypit and kiln, as Lori let the adrenaline break down and she recovered from her rage-high, people began to cautiously sit back down on the chairs. When the potter finished his explanation and sat down, there was a pregnant pause as Lori and Rian looked at one another.


    "What?" Lori said. "Man wants to set up a kiln and make pots, I have no objections. Less for me to need to make."


    "Well, that''s great then," Rian said, trying to sound cheerful. "Get started as soon as you can Gunvi. I look forward to seeing what you can make with clay. And if you need a bigger kiln, just let us know, I''m sure Binder Lori will be happy to help you make a bigger one. Who''s next?"


    The next hand rose with less hesitance. It was the younger of the settlement''s two doctors. "Your lordship, your Bindership," he said. "The conditions of the shelters you made are no longer conducive to the health of the community''s ill¡­"


    As the young doctor requested a new building above ground be set up for those still ill, one with more air and warmth and less smoke, people slowly began to relax.


    Lori, however, met the eyes of the woman with the braid¡­ and smiled serenely when the woman flinched.

 11 - We Left Living in a Society To Live Here

    The community meeting progressed. As the morning wore on, people began to relax a little more as there were no other explosions of violence.


    Still, there was some subtle movement to try and push through the subject of getting land. Someone proposed that they should, in fact, map out the area. Purely so people wouldn''t get lost, of course. By their current reckoning, the area of the demesne was four taums in diameter, which everyone found impressive and just made Lori smug. She knew it was bigger than some of the settlements they''d encountered just outside of Covehold, many of which were barely a taum wide. Covehold itself had been 10 taums in diameter, with most of it already filling up with buildings. It likely could have been larger: from the placement of buildings in the center of the demesne, Covehold''s core was likely underground.


    When they''d chosen their spot between the cliff and the river, there had been people who''d insisted Lori set up the core right then and there, but she''d refused, since a core out in the open, completely unprotected, was just asking for trouble. Besides, she''d needed time to synchronize with the area''s wisps, or else the resulting Dungeon would have had a significantly smaller demesne¡­


    She remembered the small, taum-wide settlements outside Covehold that had charged them outrageous ''visitors tax'' just to sleep inside their borders for the night and smiled maliciously.


    The one who was currently speaking¨C something about moving the beast-baiting tower to the river since beasts would be more vulnerable when they stopped for a drink¨C suddenly stopped speaking, looking at her fearfully. Lori smoothed her features, looking down at the stone tablet she''d been drawing on. The tablet had been added to, and she had some doodles for bound tools. They''d need wire and glass though, and she''d rather have raw material than try to break down the glassware she had¡­


    At lunch, they decided to finish the meeting so that people could eat and get back to things they needed to do, like cut wood and put up roofs and try to figure out how to make hinges for doors with the materials and tools they had. There was some disarray as tables and chairs were put back in place, while Rian copied the notes he''d written on the tabletop to a plank of wood.


    "Take all this to my cave," Lori said, gesturing at rocks and wood and bark and skins. "I''ll transfer them to something smaller. Especially the list of things we needed."


    "That will be helpful, thanks," Rian said, nodding. He continued writing the notes onto the plank. Shrugging, Lori went to get two bowls of whatever they were having for lunch. She supposed she should get him something to eat. And people liked Rian more than her, so they were probably less likely to poison food they thought might go to him.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lunch was attained and eaten. Neither had been poisoned.


    After lunch, she helped Rian and some people he''d asked for help carry all the various note¡­ objects? Note objects to her cave, careful to not smudge the writing on whatever surface it had been written on. She saw people giving her table suspicious looks, and despite her iterating that it was, in fact, a table and not a sacrificial altar (why would she put a sacrificial altar in her bedroom? It would stink!), no one seemed to believe her. Idiots. She wasn''t a Dungeon worshipper! What was the point of worshipping something you''d made? That she still needed to make, if you wanted to get technical. A Dungeon didn''t normally consist of just a bedroom.


    Everyone filed out of the room, even as they looked around curiously at everything. She shooed them out, walking out after them to get some rock from the pile next to the cave entrance. She''d have to make some tablets, and they''d need to be a little thick since she wouldn''t be around to keep imbuing them¡­


    Lori blinked as she stepped back into her cave. The chunk of rock flowing behind her thumped into the back of her legs, making her stumble and nearly fall. She stepped aside to avoid being trampled her by own rock. "I thought you''d already left," Lori said. She directed the flowing chunk of rock, it''s layers and strata and materials flowing together as she made the earthwisps flow despite not being molten.


    "We need to talk," Rian said, standing on the other side of her table.


    "About what?" Lori asked, bending down to scoop up some stone. It was cold in her hands, as cold as you expected stone in the shadow of a cliff to be.


    "About what you did back there," Rian said as Lori plopped the stone down on a sheet of seel skin she''d unrolled on the table.


    "You''ll have to be more specific, it''s been a long morning," Lori said as she tore off a handful of rock and began spreading it on the sheet to make a flat tablet.


    "I''m talking about how you used your magic on Missus Naineb," Rian said. He sounded heroically firm and determined, like an actor on stage trying to project to the back rows.


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    Lori''s head finally snapped up to glare at him. "Oh, you mean when she challenged my authority and judgement and I put her in her place by reminding her I can kill her at any time and her opinion doesn''t matter to me?" Lori said.


    "You can''t do that!" Rian said.


    "I just did it this morning, so obviously I can," Lori said.


    "Well, you shouldn''t have!" Rian said. "It''s wrong!"


    "Are you saying I should have executed her?" Lori said. "That seems too much for a first verbal offense."


    "No executing! I''m saying you shouldn''t have done it at all!" Rian said.


    Lori sighed. Well, she supposed she''d made him a lord for exactly his expertise in charming these simple fools, so she should probably listen to what he had to say. She willed it, and the boulder outside her cave flowed to block the entrance as the air started to vibrate to obfuscate the sounds exiting the gaps around it. "Well, what exactly do you think I should have done to the person who challenged my authority for the second time that day? Wait for it to happen a third time?"


    "She didn''t challenge you," Rian said.


    "She challenged whether I had any authority to make the declarations I did," Lori said. "She did not recognize my power as the Dungeon Binder of this demesne. I corrected that."


    "That was no reason to drown her!" Rian said.


    Lori snorted. "It''s stone and earth, Rian. Even when acting against its nature by being made to move like a fluid, the density of even packed earth is so much greater than the human body that she was always going to float. The only way she''d have died from that was if someone had held her head under the ground. It was an impressive and terrifying, but ultimately harmless spectacle to remind her who she was talking to."


    "That still doesn''t make it right!" Rian said. "People don''t do that to each other!"


    "People will do that to each other unless they''re reminded there''s a force that will stop them," Lori said. "We''re in the middle of nowhere, Rian. It was only a matter of time before people realized that and started murdering people they didn''t like."


    "No, they wouldn''t," Rian argued. "We live in a civilized society."


    "''Lived'', past tense," Lori corrected. "We left all that behind to come here. This isn''t civilization. It''s what comes before we have enough infrastructure and order to sustain a civilization."


    "You can''t just attack people because you don''t like what they said! It doesn''t matter who you are," Rian said. "There are rules, laws!"


    "Yes, there are now. Because I told everyone what they were this morning," Lori said. "A society only stays civilized because it''s backed by the power to punish those who breaks its rules. And I am that power." She looked at him intently. "Really Rian, think about this. Who can punish me for what I did? You? Them? If they kill me, the Dungeon stops functioning and the demesne stops protecting them from the Iridescence. If they hold me prisoner, I can kill them. If they beat me to try to stop me from Whispering, I can kill them. If they all come at me together armed, I can kill them. And if they actually succeed, and I die, so will they. So how can they punish me? Stop letting me have food? That works for about the time it takes for me to beat someone up and take their food away from them. Stop making furniture for me? I can take someone else''s. It''ll be as easy as taking a barrel."


    Rian winced.


    "This is what all civilizations are built on, Rian," Lori said. "It rests on acknowledging that the Dungeon Binder is the most powerful person in the demesne."


    "Not all of them," Rian said.


    "If you''re talking about the Armada, then I will point out that a completely ocean-going society still needs Whisperers to desalinate fresh water in viable quantities, Deadspeakers to repair the wood of their ships, Horotracts to expand the ships'' internal dimensions to allow them the space to farm, and Mentalists to¡­ well, I''m not sure what Mentalists do in the Armada, but they probably do something," Lori said. "These would make them essential to the continuance of their civilization, making them Dungeon Binders in all but name. Unless you mean those stories of people altered to breath underwater, in which case I find it unlikely we can imitate their example, as such people¡­" Lori frowned, thought of some Deadspeakers she''d known in school, never mind historical examples, and amended herself. "Such people are unlikely to exist in enough numbers or be sexually compatible enough to produce a propagating society."


    For a long moment, there was silence.


    "You''re smart. You''re probably right," Rian said, sounding the more bitter than she had ever heard him be. The brat chiding Lori about bad girls not getting dessert had had more sharpness in her voice, though. "But that doesn''t make what you did any less wrong."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "If you find such things offensive to your sensibilities, then find a way to see that I don''t have to do it again. You still have time before you quit being a lord, after all. These are the sorts of problems lords need to solve, aren''t they? If you can find an intelligent solution, then I will implement it."


    He gave her a look.


    "What? I''d rather not have to do that every time," Lori said. "Violence begets more violence, so I''d rather the violence be rare and memorable. Is there anything else, or can I get to transcribing all these notes into something more permanent and portable?"


    Rian let out a sigh "Yeah, that''s it," he said. "I''ll¡­ let you get to work then."


    "Thank you," she said. "If I don''t come to dinner, please bring me something, I''ll probably still be transcribing."


    "Sure," he said, and she nodded, and willed. The boulder began to move out of the way, revealing the wan sunlight.


    Just outside the cave, Rian paused and half-turned.


    "You''re wrong though," he said, speaking like he was some sort of main character dramatically getting the last word at the end of a chapter. "Her opinion did matter to you. Otherwise you wouldn''t have gotten mad."


    And then he left.


    "Useless thespian," Lori muttered, shaking her head. She willed the boulder back in place.


    Finally alone, she willed the lightwisps to glow brighter, giving her a clear, ambient light that came from no particular direction as she sat on the small pillar of stone jutting out from the floor she used as a stool. Her bed was still the only wooden furniture she had.


    Taking a comforting, familiar breath and channeling the magic through her bones and out her fingernails, she imbued the now-hard stone on the seel skin to soften again so she could shape it into a flat tablet she could write on¡­

 12 - Working with Tools

    Even though they had decided to send a group with Rian to Covehold Demesne to somehow acquire things the settlement needed and wanted¨C and to be honest, most people expected him to have to rob the bank¨C that didn''t mean they would leave the very next day. Supplies needed to be gathered and preserved for the trip. Preparations would have to be made, since they wouldn''t have Lori with them to provide water for cleaning, fire for cooking or stone for wheels. Attempts to dissuade the young women going with him would have to be attempted by their families. Sadly for them, no one seemed to mind that the astrologer or the idiot intent on getting his barrel back were leaving.


    Part of the delay was that, upon their arrival to the current site of Lori''s Demesne, they''d started dismantling the water wagons they''d been traveling with for wood. That meant they''d need to inspect the remaining water barrels still functioning and pick the one that could still roll and needed the least repairs to make it water tight so they''d have water to wash off the Iridescence with.


    "Wait, why do we need a water wagon?" Rian said when this was explained to him. "Can''t we just make a boat and travel downriver? I mean, Covehold''s on the water, so if we just follow this, it''s bound to come out near there eventually. And this way we''ll always have water to wash with."


    ¡­


    Part of the delay was that they needed to build some kind of boat. Lolilyuri couldn''t really help with that. Controlling wood wasn''t a Whisperer thing. At best she could control the waterwisps in the wood, or set it on fire, but actually reshaping it was something only a Deadspeaker could do. Well, a Dungeon Binder could do it as well, but as she still hadn''t worked out how to do anything besides Whispering, the matter was in practice irrelevant. It was very strange. A Whisperer could use Earthwisps to control the form of coal from the ground, but not its close cousin charcoal and wood.


    Well, they had a means of travel, and possibly even a means of getting back, once they worked out sails and oars. Still, it would take time. While they had several skilled carpenters (probably, Lori''s only experience with their work was her bed), by their own admission they didn''t know how to make a boat, and it would require a lot of work to cut the beams and frames a boat would need.


    "Can''t we just cut a big tree and hollow it out?" Rian said. "I mean, that way we wouldn''t have to worry about it leaking."


    ¡­


    At which point Lori just put Rian in charge of making the boat that would take him to Covehold and let him figure out everything.


    Lori herself was, of course, busy. Stone tablets containing the new laws that she enforced were placed in prominent areas, such as into the wall of the dining hall, in the shelters and on the cliff side next to her cave. For some reason, the law against public urination seemed to draw a lot of amusement. Did they think she was making all those latrines because she liked it? Fortunately, after what happened the last time, they seemed to understand she meant business, and aside from the occasional small child running into one of the bushes while in the midst of seeling, everyone used the latrines.


    She eventually just placed a latrine with stone lining the bottom to prevent seepage near where the children liked to catch seels. Flogging a child would probably be fatal, and she couldn''t Deadspeak yet. She even put some bushes in front so it would feel familiar.


    Lori had to put making new houses on hold to build the new¡­ she supposed hospital was as good a name as any. And with that being the case, she figured she might as well make it strong and permanent. She dug upwards into her cave, making stone flow like wet clay as she increased the height of the ceiling of her current abode, reinforcing walls to prevent collapse. So close to the dungeon''s core, she could quickly imbue a lot of magic into the stones to make them be strong, though she''d need to remember to imbue them again every few days. She was probably doing something wrong. Given the things you read about that Dungeon Binders did in their biographies, they probably didn''t need to do this much maintenance of their dungeons themselves. Still, she didn''t have enough wire to test her theories right now. So this brute force, manual solution would have to do.


    At least she now had a nice high vaulting ceiling out of it, which made everything much more airy.


    She made sure to pick a spot where the bedrock was close to the surface, using the varying sensations the earthwisps were giving her to judge. Lori had tried using the same technique to differentiate between rock and metal ore, but so far no luck. She built the foundation first, since this would be an above-ground building, making dirt flow aside until she reached the bedrock, then making the stone she''d removed from her ceiling pile on top of it. The first time, she did it wrong, and ended up with a significant air bubble, so she had to open up the stone to fill in the gap. It probably wasn''t all that significant, but the perfectionist in her was annoyed by it anyway. She built up the stone until it was a hand span above ground level¨C or possibly dirt level¨C before she began trying to smooth it down to something smooth and level.


    This ended with abject failure. While fluids would naturally find an even level when left alone, stone being softened by earthwisps to act like a fluid didn''t naturally act like that, moving more like clay or molten glass. What resulted was a bulging mess not unlike candle drippings. And while she could will the stone to move, there was no way to be sure she was willing it to be level.


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    Lori sighed. She needed a tool.


    After finding the carpenters¨C who were not the sawyers, despite also working with saws and wood¨C and specifying what she needed, Lori left the floor alone to build up the walls, which at least she knew how to keep straight. A weight on a cord as a visual reference, and then she just had to force the stone to rise, create a lip and then sort of¡­ drip downwards. With the right fluidity, the surface along the inside edge would be perfectly flat. Then she just had to thicken it and made sure the strata would bear weight instead of cleaving diagonally or something.


    The building wasn''t finished yet by the end of the day, but Lori considered this good work.


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    The next day, Lori came back with her tool. One of the planks of notes Rian had left behind that she''d already finished transcribing to a stone table had one of its edges cut straight and carefully rounded, lashed to a relatively straight branch with cord made from seel skin and held in place by all sorts of clever joinery. One could have thought it a simple shovel or wooden oar, or even some sort of sign post.


    For Lori, it was her stoneworking tool.


    Holding the tool in both hands, the straight, rounded edge flat on the stone, she willed the stone soft again and dragged her new tool across it, then squatted down to see the result. It looked much flatter than before, though¡­ She softened the middle of the stone, drew a deep line across it with her finger¨C it felt very much like working with strangely cold, dry clay¨C hardened the stone, and then pulled water out of the air, making it condense to fill the line. As she suspected, the surface of the water and the surface of the stone weren''t in line.


    Well, at least the stone was flat. That was something¡­


    Eventually, she worked out a method of using water-filled lines and careful sweeps of her new tool¨C she had to stop every so often to pull off the stone building up on the tool''s underside¨C she was able to get the stone floor mostly properly flat and level, and was even able to use the tool to even the walls a little. When she was done, she¡­ well, she was standing in a large stone box without a lid and a doorway knocked into one wall, but it was a very even box with mostly flat sides. She was just glad it hadn''t rained that day, though from the thunder in the distance that was unlikely to last long. Still, it had a stone foundation, and stone walls. That seemed pretty good.


    Dinner was not poisoned, and was hot enough it was unlikely to matter if it was spat on. She sat in her cave, transcribing more of the notes into stone¨C everyone had a lot of things they said was essential for the Demesne to have¨C listening to the falling rain and having vivid, painful flashbacks to all the nights she''d had to copy down notes from reference books while hiding from people she''d clubbed from behind. They were unlikely to know it was her, but they''d definitely recognize the book¡­


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    After removing the water that had pooled on the stone floor after the night''s rain, Lori sighed and added some texture to the stone in case anyone came in with wet feet so they wouldn''t slip and hurt themselves. She softened a thin layer of the stone on top, and used another rock she''d found to gently press textures down on the floor like a stamp. That took some time, but hopefully it would be a good safety investment.


    After consideration, she also made some internal rooms. A storage room, two side rooms big enough to house a bed and some other furniture so the doctors would have someplace private to sleep, two lavatories¨C she''d figure out how to deal with the waste later. Maybe just pull it out of the base and replace the stone?¨C and a place where she built a water cistern, with a packed-earth stove. Technically it was a fire pit, but as it was elevated above the ground to be level with a table, she felt justified calling it a stove.


    These new internal walls and doors still left plenty of room for beds for sick or injured people. Certainly more than what they currently had in the shelters, even after she finished knocking holes in the walls for windows and putting in fireplaces and chimneys. It still lacked a roof, door and windows, but she felt her part was done.


    When she went to the sawpit¨C really, they couldn''t blame her for getting the carpenters and sawyers confused, they worked right next to each other!¨C she found them all standing around Rian, who was pointing at a drawing scratched out on the muddy ground.


    "¨Cthat way we have a wider, more stable base and are less likely to capsize," he was saying as all the men tilted their heads to the side, as if trying to understand what they were seeing. "We''ll have to make two hulls, but this will give us the capacity to¨C oh, hi Lo¨C er, Binder Lolilyuri," he said, finally noticing her approach. "Hey, quick question, how good are you at controlling fire? Because the fastest way we can hollow out this trunk is to set fire to the insides and scrape off the burning bits once they''ve gotten soft."


    Lori blinked, her inquiries about when they''d be able to put the roof on the hospital now that she''d finished putting up the walls and other bits slamming into Rian''s¡­ Rian-ness. "What?"


    He explained, gesturing towards the drawing on the ground, which seemed to be of¡­ two boats side by side, with poles connecting them together, and some kind of floor laid on the poles, which supported a shelter of some sort? Apparently, the two boats would be made by hollowing out tree trunks¨C Rian apparently already had a tree in mind¨C and was meant to give both buoyancy and stability so they could comfortably travel down the river to the coast. The platform built between the two hulls would allow them to carry cargo and let everyone have plenty of room to sleep in without crowding.


    "Won''t this be extremely heavy?" Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "Yeah, but that won''t matter once we get it into the water."


    "But definitely heavier than four people can carry, right?" Lori said.


    "Well, yeah¡­ but they have docks in Covehold," Rian said confidently.


    "Are you sure it will go down the river, though?" Lori said.


    "Well, it''s not meant to be that long," Rian said. "Or wide. The drawing''s not to scale."


    "What about rapids?" Lori said.


    Rian stared at her.


    "Rapids?" Lori repeated. "You know, when rivers get really rocky or have a sudden drop and¨C"


    "Yes, I know what rapids are," Rian said, turning to stare down at his drawing. "Um¡­"


    Lori left him to it. Instead, she turned towards the carpenters and sawyers. "The hospital''s ready, it just needs a roof," she said. "Thank you for the tool, it worked exactly as intended."


    Leaving Rian to his drawings¨C he seemed to be drawing wagon wheels on his boat¨C Lori went off to have lunch. And a bath. They had a bath house now, and she still had some soap. A bath sounded wonderful¡­

 13 - Advancing Building Techniques

    Days had passed, and Rian had yet to solve the ''what if there are rapids'' problem. On the other hand, the hospital got a roof. Lori had to raise up stone pillars to support the ceiling beams, but that was simple to do.


    She had to raise a bunch of support pillars in the middle of the houses she''d built, too. Apparently, while making them roomy and spacious was all well and good for the families that would be moving in¨C there was a priority list Rian had drawn up¨C it made it hard to put in roofs. Now with the pillars up, the roofs had something to rest on besides just the flat-topped walls. Lori took the hint and started adding in holes for posts to the edges of the stone walls so the roofs would have something to anchor to. Really, people should have just said so sooner. She was a wizard, not a mason, she couldn''t be expected to know about these things!


    "Maybe there aren''t any rapids?" Rian said hopefully at lunch.


    "Well, I''m glad you''re so confident," Lori said, enjoying her bowl of stewed everything. They''d tried making varied kinds of meals, but had run into the problem of lacking spices, or even salt, and so everything came out a little bland unless they threw in a little of everything. Then it came out thick and flavorful. Unfortunately, it was all the same flavor. Even Lori, who liked a little predictable monotony in her life, was getting sort of bored with it. "And I''m sure if you''re wrong you can stop the boat and turn it around in time with your years of sailing experience. You do know how to operate a sail, right?"


    "You''re made your point, can you please stop being so smug about it now?" Rian sighed. "Maybe we should send someone downriver to see. If they stick near the water they should be pretty safe, right?"


    "Until a beast tried to eat them," Lori said. "Or a bug starts laying eggs in their ear while they sleep."


    "That''s not going to happen," Rian said.


    "Oh? Why do you think I used to sleep with my hat covering my head?" Lori said. "You realize no one''s going to volunteer for going downriver, right? You''re going to have to go yourself."


    "I know. That''s part of the reason I''m delaying," Rian said. "I don''t want to leave everyone alone with you."


    "I''m not going to kill them," Lori said, insulted.


    "I''m more worried about what would happen if you had to talk to them," Rian said.


    "¡­all right, that''s fair," Lori said. "Well, keep working on that. We still need supplies." She was pretty sure some of the sick people in the doctors'' care were just lingering on their way to a slow, painful death, but you could say that about anybody, even the Deadspeakers who''d found a way to keep functioning after dying.


    After lunch, she went back to building an expansion to the dining hall. The children had been catching a lot of seels, and while they had a lot more skin than meat, it all added up. Between them and the beasts Lori got called to kill, they actually had a surplus. So Lori was building a cold room. This way they could store the meat for longer. After all, they had plenty of water to make ice with, and this didn''t affect the taste.


    She had to quarry her Dungeon again to get the stone for it, and decided to carve out another room while doing so. This meant she finally had two rooms to her Dungeon.


    When she finished building the simple box of stone, she dragged dirt up and over it on all sides to cover it so the sun''s heat couldn''t reach it. When she was done, the pile of dirt she''d made from building the shelters had shrunk slightly, and the dining hall looked like it abutted a small hill.


    She walked away to get water from the river to turn to ice, and then paused. Then with an impatient sound, she turned and eyed the doorway into the cold room she''d molded. Then she recessed the top and bottom of the doorway slightly, just wide enough for a wooden beam to secure the door to. Nodding in satisfaction, she went to get ice.


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    The next day, she had to come back and put in drainage, because ice melts.


    Then, as everyone was busy putting on roofs, she finally seriously worked on her Dungeon.


    She''d heard stories about famous Dungeons, the strongholds of famous Binders. They were generally underground, built under the cities they protected or deep within mountains next to them, built by ancient Binders in ancient times and meant to be able to house whole populations in times of war or dragons. They had guards with bodies of stone and hearts of fire; incorporeal sentries made of the spirits of the dead; twisted halls and chambers where people walked on the floors, walls and ceilings; furnaces where the very power of the core could be directed to create any substance the Binder needed; Hedon''s Heart Demesne famously had a lake and a tropical island deep underground (not that she wanted one¡­); and even the smallest of Demesnes in the old continent could raise a shield to protect themselves from sudden dragons. Well, protect the important bits that mattered, anyway.


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    Lori wished they''d found a decent mountain to build next to, but she supposed over time she could just build up this cliff side into something comparable. She''d need to steal the lands around her Demesne to build up her mountain, but that was a price she was willing to pay. Still, she had a long way to go before she could build things like that.


    Still, no time like right now when she didn''t have to build anything else! She might not have any idea at all about how to do any of the interesting stuff¨C or even the simple stuff, like basic Deadspeaking, Horotracting and Mentalism¨C but she knew Whispering, and so she''d start there. If there was one thing she could definitively say Whispering could do better than the other branches of magic, it was megalomaniacal building projects!


    Treeshade Demesne notwithstanding, of course. There was probably a good reason why only one Demesne in the world had their dungeon be a giant, living/unliving tree, and it wasn''t because Deadspeaking was better than Whispering.


    First she moved her bed and table into the room she''d excavated while getting stone for the cold room, so that people couldn''t just immediately enter her bedroom. Then she took a moment to completely encase the core in stone, so that no one could just get to it.


    After that, Lolilyuri began to reallocate dimensions.


    Aware of the great weight of the rest of the hill pressing down on her little dungeon, Lori worked carefully, making sure to have earthwisps reinforce the walls and ceiling at all times. High, vaulting ceilings were filled in by flowing stone pulled up from the sides of the open space, reducing her overhead clearance but expanding her floor area. That done, she raised up walls to define rooms. She made a darkroom, its opening closed into a narrow slit, and then another room to act as a storage room, when she actually had her own stuff to store. She thought about making some sort of experimental space, but really, without any materials like glassware or wires it just wouldn''t be worth it.


    She also finally made a private lavatory, delicately making piping through the stone that would bring the waste outside. Not right next to her cave though. She made an underground hollow in the dirt with stone reinforced sides to keep it from collapsing. Then since she was messing around with pipes in the stone anyway, added a stone cistern she could fill with water so she could take baths, a hole for water to drain through, and made a private bathroom for herself.


    Being able to bathe and relieve yourself in the comfort of your own home. Finally, her Dungeon was starting to be civilized.


    She had to make proper air holes along her door, since she was uncertain if sleeping in a new room far from the door could potentially asphyxiate her. Lori had a responsibility to her demesne to stay alive, after all.


    When she left to go to dinner, she found a seel hanging outside her door. She''d long added a hole in the cliff wall from which someone could hang a branch skewering a seel. She noted it seemed a rather large example of the species. Not a juvenile then. She was getting an adolescent today. She supposed the hunter''s skills were increasing. That or they''d just gotten particularly lucky.


    Shrugging, she took it to the kitchen so it could be part of her breakfast tomorrow.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I have good news," Rian said as he joined her for breakfast.


    "Someone found a metal ore we can mine?" Lori said.


    "Better."


    "One of the doctors found an introductory textbook on Deadspeaking?"


    "Fine, just news then," Rian said with a sigh. "One of the sick children seems to be getting better. The doctors say they hear less fluid in his lungs."


    "Oh good, we''ll have a new worker soon. They can go seeling with the others"


    "That''s what you''re taking from this?" Rian said.


    "It''s not anyone I know," Lori said. "All the people I know are at this table."


    "You''re making me both annoyed and sad for you at the same time," Rian said.


    "That''s none of my business," Lori said. "So, how goes finding a way to get to Covehold?"


    "Well, the more I think about it, the more I think we should send someone downriver to scout," Rian said. "Given just the bends we can see, we need to know if the river is actually going away from Covehold. Also, if we''re sharing this river with anyone else, I think we should know before they just show up."


    "Seems sound," Lori nodded.


    "And I think you should come with me when scout the river," Rian said.


    "Absolutely not," Lori said. "I risked my life to finally have my own Dungeon¨C"


    "We all did," Rian interjected.


    "¨C and I''m not letting you take me away from it," Lori finished firmly.


    "You''ve traveled before."


    "Yes, and it was horrible. So I''m never doing it again. I will stay in sight of my cave all the days of my life from now on. "


    "You''re being dramatic," the hypocrite accused. "We survived, didn''t we?"


    "Yes, and I have no intention of jeopardizing that," Lori said. "What if I die and the demesne disappears?"


    "What if everyone else dies and you''re left here by yourself?" Rian said.


    "I can learn to catch seels. It''s not that hard."


    "You¡¯ve never even done it before," Rian pointed out.


    "I''m sure I can learn," Lori said. "How hard can it be? I mean, we have the children doing it, so it''s certainly doable."


    Lori paused and tilted her head. "Actually, there''s nothing I urgently need to build today. Maybe I will go learn how to catch seels."


    "Please don''t make the river explode," Rian said. "The children work very hard every day and they don''t need you exploding their place of work."


    "I wasn''t going to," Lori said indignantly. She definitely had been planning to make the river explode. Shockwaves killed very well in water, after all.


    "Hmmm¡­" Rian ''hmmmed''.


    "Actually¡­ do you know how to go seeling?" Lori said.


    "Are we turning this into a contest?" Rian said.


    "Don''t be silly. This is a needful survival skill, not some kind of game."


    "You realize the children compete to see who brings in the most seels, right?"


    "Good. We can never have too much food and soap."


    "Oh. Too bad. I guess you know you''re going to lose."


    "Just because I intend to learn a child''s job doesn¡¯t actually make me a child, you know. I''m not going to agree to explore the river with you if I lose."


    "Well, unlike you, I''m busy. I have a lot to do before I quit being a lord today."


    "Ah. Well, I''ll see you later then."


    Finishing her breakfast, Lori went forth intending to find some brats and figure out how to catch seels. It couldn''t actually be that hard, could it?

 14 - Lori Goes Seeling

    It was not, in fact, that hard in theory. Or even in practice.


    At least, that''s what Lori told herself.


    Finding where the children did their seeling was simple. She''d put a latrine near there, after all.


    Figuring out seeling was done by using long, pointy branches to catch the seels was easy. All the children stood on rocks above the water near patches of swaying reeds, spears raised and ready above their heads and looking intently into the moving, rippling clarity of the flowing river. Some held that pose for a long time. Some jabbed their spear down often, seemingly on the basis of more attempts increasing the likelihood of one of the attempts being a success. A few seemed to have lines tied to the end of their spears, with the other end tied to their wrist, seemingly for retrieval.


    The brat wasn''t one of the latter, standing there with her arm raised and her spear ready, a comical look of concentration on her face.


    They were being watched, of course. Two boys and a girl in their teens were spread around with the children between them, using knives to carve little wooden hooks. Every so often, one of the children would manage to spear a seel. If they didn''t manage to subdue it right away, one of the teens would help them so they wouldn''t get pulled into the water. They''d then take care of draining and gutting the seel while the child went back to river to catch the next one. They also kept an eye on the adult seels nearby. While the juveniles the children were seeling were only a little bit longer than Lori''s arm, the adults were bigger, almost twice as long as Lori was tall and very thick. More than enough to knock even an adult into the water and possibly rip them apart with their teeth. They didn''t seem inclined to come to the beach and rocks the children were seeling on¨C Lori supposed the water was too shallow and the rocks uncomfortable on their bulk¨C but given their proximity it was better to watch them. They were killing the seels'' children, after all.


    Even from Lori''s vantage point, they weren''t likely to run out of seels any time soon. The water writhed with seels, the long, slinking bodies of the freshwater fursh moving in smooth, side-to-side motions to propel themselves through the water. The surface of the river rippled as the things went up to take breaths, their dark fur looking sleek against their bodies.


    They moved fast, and it was all Lori could do to focus on one through the refraction of the water, the similar creatures around it, and its sinuous, confusing movements. It didn''t help that there were constantly diving into the reeds and other plants growing in the water. They seemed to be feeding on small slugs and little shelled squid.


    Lori took a moment to consider the cyclical image of juvenile slugs and squid being hunted by juvenile seels being hunted by juvenile humans. Was it a cycle, with the humans being eaten by the slugs at some point, or was there a level above that where the juvenile humans would be eaten by the juveniles of something else?


    She considered that and decided the thought was too morbid even for her and went to find a branch to cut and sharpen.


    Most would have wondered why she didn''t just use her staff. Most people were idiots. Her staff was a well-cured hardwood. It had wire wrappings to better channel her magic, inlays of quartz for lightningwisps, more porous woods molded in to hold waterwisps, and a little coalcharm to hold a live coal for when she needed firewisps and didn''t have time to rub her hands together. It had been with her for years, it was a trusted and reliable tool, and it was too heavy for any of that throwing around the children were doing.


    Lori found a tree with branches that seemed sturdy enough, and used waterwisps to make a high-pressure stream of water to cut off a promising branch. She found a convenient rock and bound the earthwisps in it, forming a serviceable knife blade. She might not be any good at making flat walls and floors, but after weeks of traveling, she''d gotten good at making knives and similar shapes without a mold.


    It took her four blades to strip the branch of offshoots. She was fairly sure she''d done something wrong with the rock, like forming it so the cleavage lines were pointed the wrong way. Still, it was faster to just make a new blade than stop right then and figure out the rock''s properties. In the end, getting the branch stripped was important, not the quality of her rocks.


    She hefted the stripped branch, finding the point where it balanced. After trying to cut a point into one end, she''d just given up, found an already reasonably pointy rock, hit it with another rock a few time to see if it was hard enough not to break, and just used more rock to wrap it around one end as a point.


    "You shouldn''t do that," a voice behind her said.


    Lori turned around. It was the brat. Now that she wasn''t being rained on and had to wear a beast hide as rain cover, her bright orange hair had more body to it, and were secured with wooden hair ties. She had a long, sturdy looking wooden spear, one end cut into a simple narrow point. "Why not," Lori said.


    "They break," the brat said. "Then the seel gets away and starts bleeding in the water, and then all the seels get angry because there''s blood in the water, and the big seels get angry and we have to leave before we get hurt. Making the wood pointy makes it go in easier and less likely to break when you pull the seel out."


    "I tried doing that," Lori said. "My knives kept breaking."


    "Don''t you have your own knife?" the brat said. "All the grown-ups have their own knives. My Itay says I can''t have a knife until I''m older."


    "I have a knife," Lori said. She did too. It was good non-oxidizing steel that she''d brought with her own beads before getting on the ship that had taken her to Covehold. It was currently doing nothing, stashed in the bottom of her pack. "It''s just not on me. I don''t usually need it."


    "You should always bring your knife," the brat chided. "What if you need to make a tool or something? A knife is the best tool for making other tools, my Itay says."


    "Well, I have magic," Lori said. "That''s my tool for making tools."


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    "Your tools can''t be very good if they keep breaking so soon," the brat said. "We can borrow kuya Vov''s knife to sharpen your spear. Ateh Krihs has a knife too, but kuya Vov''s is better."


    Were those¡­ titles? "What demesne are you from?" Lori asked.


    "Lorian Demesne," the girl said.


    "No, I meant before you came here," Lori said. "What demesne were you from originally?"


    "Our past doesn''t matter, because we''re going to make a new start in a better demesne where the lords and Binder actually do their colorbrained jobs," the brat said. "That''s what my Itay says."


    The brat''s family sounded worryingly opinionated.


    "Do you want me to teach you how to seel?" the brat said. "Is that why you made a seeling rod?"


    "I realized it might be a needful skill I need to learn, yes," Lori said loftily.


    "Your seeling rod''s too big in one end," the brat said. "It can''t be like that, or else it doesn''t throw right."


    Lori gave her an annoyed look.


    "Don''t worry, everyone makes mistakes," the brat said. "Come on, let''s find you a better branch."


    Lori glared at her, but sighed and tossed the stick away, and followed her as she explained what the right kind of stick needed to be.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After finding the right sort of tree branch and cutting it with a stream of water¨C the brat had gasped with an appropriate amount of awe¨C they''d taken the stick to one of the young men on watch. He had then proceeded, under Lori''s gaze, to methodically strip off smaller branches, then quickly sharpened on a point with a practiced and methodical slash that left the end a simple point.


    "Don''t rest the point on anything," the brat said. "It''ll ruin the point, and then you''ll have to cut it again. It''s fresh wood, so it''s only good once before you need to put another point on it. It''ll get better as it get older and dries out."


    "That seems inconvenient, having to be careful with a new rod every time you use up the old one," Lori said.


    "Oh, we all have branches we''ve cut already," the brat said. "Mine are drying next to my bed. When I can''t use this one any more, I just go back and get one of those."


    Huh. She''d been wondering about those sticks in the shelters.


    "But a fresh stick is best if you''re just starting out," the brat said and Lori could tell she was being consoled. "It''s easier to cut a new point when it gets ruined."


    "What makes you think I''ll ruin it?" Lori said indignantly.


    "You''ve never done this before," the brat said.


    And Lori couldn''t really argue against that, could she?


    She was also advised to take off her boots and socks. After looking at the children and where they needed to stand to be able to hit the seels, Lori reluctantly took off her footwear and rolled up the legs of her trousers.


    The rocks were hot but with her bare feet contacting the stone she was able to get the firewisps to draw out the heat, leaving the ground pleasantly chilly. Standing in direct sunlight like this, she also bound firewisps around her to divert oncoming heat so she wouldn''t get overheated as the brat demonstrated how she was supposed to hold the spear-like seeling rods. Lori watched as the brat looked intently into the water, suddenly jabbed downward, then seemingly in the same motion swung her spear out of the water. A seel was impaled on the point, letting out distressing honking sounds as it wiggled desperately. The brat held her spear in both hands, keeping the point upraised as she waited for it to tire itself out. Then she carefully grabbed the seel by the back of its head and slid her hand down until it reached a point a third of the way from the opposite end of its body. The brat tightened her grip as the seel continued thrashing, and carefully placed the seel''s head on the ground, holding it in place with her foot. With a twisting motion, she pulled out the spear and put both hands around what Lori now saw seemed to be the seel''s hindquarters, where it''s spine and tail met, and where its vestigial rear limbs allowed for a firm grip.


    The brat then proceeded to swing the seel by its whole body to club its head against the ground until it finally stopped moving. Then club it some more just to be sure.


    "And that''s how you catch a seel," the brat said proudly, having never stopped narrating what she was doing. "Now you try!"


    Lori looked into the water skeptically. The seels were dark, darting forms, and she knew that where they seemed to be wasn''t really where they were, because of refraction. Still, she hesitantly got into place, raising the seeling rod up as she been shown, reminding herself she was supposed to jab it, not throw it. Throwing it meant even if she did hit, the seel would just get away, and she''d lose the rod too.


    She eyed the water, trying to account for refraction. She put the end of the rod into the water, noting how much it bent, trying to remember the degree of refraction.


    "Don''t just concentrate on the water in front of you," the brat said, obviously trying to be helpful. "If you aim for the seel in front of you, you won''t hit it. Aim for it before it''s in front of you."


    "Noted," Lori said, trying to keep her annoyance tamped down. She took a deep breath, and tried to be aware of her peripheral vision as she hefted up the rod, staring into the water, waiting for a seel¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "And you cheated," Rian said over dinner.


    "Of course I cheated. It was my first time, I wasn''t going to hit anything!" Lori said. "I''m a Whisperer. If I want to catch something in the water, I''ll make the water hold them in place."


    "Poor Karina," Rian said, still smiling in amusement. "She tried so hard to teach you the right way to do it, and you cheated."


    "Oh please, like you''d have managed it the first time," Lori muttered, taking an angry spoonful of stew.


    "Of course not," Rian said, still looking insufferably amused. "I''d need practice. After all, those children have been doing this for weeks. They''ve gotten pretty good at it. Probably the best. But I wouldn''t have cheated. My ego isn''t so fragile I need to look good in front of children."


    "Well, mine does," Lori said under her breath. "Wipe that smirk off your face."


    "I should have bet you," Rian said.


    "Oh, like I''d have admitted anything if we''d had a bet going," Lori said. "Now will you shut up about it?"


    "Fine, fine," Rian said, still chuckling. "Was it big at least, or did you cheat for an itty-bitty little thing?"


    "Fatter than this bowl and longer than my arm," Lori said. Actually, that had just been luck, she''d just had the waterwisps stop the first thing that moved into her view.


    "Well, at least it was a big one," Rian said.


    "Yeah, well¡­" Lori muttered. "Does anyone here know how to spin fibers into thread?"


    "I think a few people do. Why?" Rian asked.


    Lori reached into a pocket and pulled out the piece of stalk she''d cut. She peeled off the outer layer, showing it to Rian.


    "The children had been using this to make lines for their spears," she said. "It''s from this plant that grows close to the river. Do you think someone could turn this into thread or rope?"


    Rian frowned, taking the outer layer and pulling at it, watching as it separated into long sheets of fibers. "Maybe¡­" he muttered. "People talked about cloudblooms, but there are other plants that you turn into fabric, like tressflowers. Maybe we should see what we have around here before we buy something. After all, cloudbloom might not even grow here."


    "I thought those were raised for oil?"


    "The stalks get turned into thread and fibers too."


    "Huh. So I guess you can put off going down the river a little longer."


    "Not too long," Rian said. "We still need medicines."


    "What about rapids?"


    "If we have to, we''ll drag the boat overland," Rian said determinedly.


    "And on the way back? When it''s full of supplies we need?"


    "Then we''ll be really careful about how we drag. Besides, if we''re somehow successful enough to have all that, maybe we''ll find a way to get back up too."


    "Ah, there''s that annoying relentless optimism," Lori muttered. Somehow, it wasn''t as annoying as it usually was.


    That night, she carefully placed her seeling rod in an out of the way corner so it could dry, one end cut into a sharp, simple point.

 15 - Yes, There Are Dragons

    Lolilyuri felt terrible. Unfortunately, there was work to be done. It wasn''t too bad. She could do the work sitting down for the most part, and it was a steady, repetitive work that she didn''t have to think too much about. The situation was aggravating, but mostly she was angry at herself for losing track of the time. She''d been going to sleep early and not watching the positioning of the moons in the sky, which was why this had crept up on her suddenly.


    The sawpit had been busy, cutting down trees and sawing them into boards and beams. The problem was, as Lori had once learned long ago while working in a lumberyard (one of many, many, many jobs she''d had to pay for school), wood needed to be cured before it could be used for building, or else it could warp as the wood dried out.


    Her job, now as then, was to dry the wood such that it could be used in a matter of hours instead of months. Unfortunately, it wasn''t as simple as just imbuing some wisps and walking away. Different woods cut from different trees would have different levels of moisture, and would have different needs, needing to be carefully watched. Also, they only had the one kiln. Lori had raised it, like she had many things, using packed earth, to better keep the area around the sawpit from being an oven. Green wood was stacked in, and she imbued fire-, air-, water- and lightningwisps in the way she''d learned to increase the temperature of the kiln, circulate the air and control the humidity, draw out the moisture in the wood, and heat the internal parts of the wood for faster curing. It was a delicate and dynamic process, and she had to supervise it lest it be like the time she got fired from her first lumberyard job and have the wood catch fire.


    Still, after many years and many jobs in lumberyards, Lori had become confident in her skill in the process. Drying wood to turn it into kindling was one thing. Turning it into a building material was another thing entirely. Between her, the woodcutting parties and the sawyers, they were managing to keep up with the demesne''s lumber needs.


    So if she looked like she wasn''t doing anything as she sat back next to the kiln with her eyes closed, that was absolutely not the case and she was very much hard at work! It just happened to be something she could do sitting down with her eyes closed!


    Lori told Rian so through gritted teeth and in great detail when he found her sitting next to the kiln.


    "Uh, noted," he said. "Do you need one of the doctors?"


    "No," she said. "Now, why are you here? And I swear, if you start going on about philosophy and why any of us are here¨C "


    "I''m not going to do that¡­ anymore," Rian said, flashing a quick smile. "I thought you''d like to know, we managed to make thread from those plants you showed us. It''ll take a while, but the carpenters are making us a loom, and the farmers are seeing if we can grow the ropeweeds closer to the village. Turns out the seeds are edible, and have a lot of oil, so if we''re lucky we''ll finally have some fried meat that doesn''t taste bland."


    "Yay," Lori said. "All our troubles are solved. I want a mattress first thing." A beat. "Ropeweeds?"


    "That''s what the children call it," Rian said. "Some of those who aren''t as good at seeling have opted to make rope instead, so we''ll hopefully also have more rope soon. I''ll need to talk to them, find out if they''ve found other interesting plants out there."


    "You realize you can have someone else do it, right?" Lori said. "You''re a lord, you have the authority to do that. Well, until you quit later today."


    "Which I definitely will, I''m not cut out for this lord thing," Rian said. "No, I''d better do it myself. No preconceived notions."


    "Have the astrologer guy do it," Lori said.


    "Cassan?" Rian said, sounding surprised.


    "Is that his name?" Lori said. "He looked like he had some kind of academic training. And he has a notebook. Even if he can''t tell if the plant is good for anything, he can write it down and not have to carry a plank of wood with him everywhere. Also, find out who the parents of the ones watching the children are. They obviously haven''t been paying attention as the children have been making rope and they didn''t even notice."


    "They don''t deserve to be punished for that," Rian said.


    "I''m not punishing them," Lori said. "You''re simply going to tell their parents how negligent they''ve been. Anything else is up to them."


    "That''s still going to get them punished," Rian said.


    "That''s a family matter," Lori said. "None of my business, and I don''t want it to be. I only step in when people violate my laws."


    "So, you won''t interfere in family matters, but you''ll come down on anyone urinating in public," Rian said, amused.


    "My demesne is a civilized place, with latrines," Lori said testily. "Use them or leave."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day was a perfectly average morning in Lori''s Demesne. The sun was rising, the songbugs on the outskirts of the demesne were (probably) singing, several children were getting an early start at killing small animals, people awkwardly socialized as they waited for latrines to become available, meals were cooked in the communal kitchen using large stone pots Lori had crafted on the journey from Covehold, Rian was in the middle of finishing his daily morning sword practice while several people enjoyed the sight of him shirtless, and Lori snapped violently awake knowing a dragon was coming.


    She could feel it in the distance, a sensation like¡­ like the breeze that came at the forefront of an opening door, an immaterial bow wave being pushed in front of something more solid. It was a sensation she''d felt before, and as always it jolted her wide awake and filled her with mortal terror.


    Lori stared in horror at her dungeon. Her small, four-room dungeon.


    Rainbows.


    She scrambled to her feet, wincing in residual discomfort as she sat down to put on her boots. She tried to think of what they needed to do even as she hoped that the dragon would pass them, and knew it wouldn''t. Dragons were huge. Not getting caught in their shadow was too much to hope for.


    Lori thrust one arm into the sleeve of her leather raincoat even as she grabbed her staff and rushed out of her new bedroom, crossing the now wide-open space that had formerly been all her living area. Her darkroom, its narrow opening protected by a lip to prevent light from the entrance from getting in, suddenly seemed too small and not dark enough¡­


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    She willed the boulder in front of the door away even as she dispersed the bound lightwisps that illuminated her cave, trying to plunge it into as much darkness as she could. Outside, though the ground was muddy, indicating it had rained in the night, found herself stepping out into a bright, cloudless sky. A rainbow hung on the horizon, its colors sending shivers down Lori''s spine. The air was thick with humidity that would be agonizing when the day''s heat came, although the discomfort lasted only long enough to her to will it away from her with waterwisps.


    There were people about, some going to the river for a quick splash out of habit or convenience, others heading for the dining halls. Only a third of the shells of houses she''d set up had people living in them yet, and even those families weren''t eating there yet.


    Lori debated making a scene. Then she headed for the hospital instead.


    Rian was already eating when she sat down with her own bowl. "Hey," he said, nodding at her. "Good morning."


    "No, it''s not," Lori said grimly as she sat down.


    "Well, you''re dour this morning," Rian said.


    "There''s a dragon coming," she said.


    His spoon paused. "Are you joking?"


    "Do I ever joke?"


    "Well¡­"


    "No, I never joke," Lori said, taking a breath. "It''s not on the horizon yet, so I thought I''d have breakfast before declaring a state of emergency."


    "Ah."


    "Keep anyone from leaving until I finish eating, will you?" Lori said. "And have someone retrieve the children who''ve already finished eating."


    Rian nodded grimly and stood up, leaving to do as she''d said. Then he came back, grabbed his half-finished bowl of food, and left again.


    Sighing, Lori ate. It would probably be her last calm meal until the dragon passed.


    Her hands shook.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "There''s a dragon coming," Lori announced, and waited for everyone to get their fear under control.


    Only the very young children¨C which the village didn''t have, as no child that young would have been allowed onto the ships heading for this continent for a whole host of cost and safety reasons¨C wouldn''t have known what a dragon was. Most demesne had a dragon pass it by at least once every year or two. So to Lori''s surprise, there was surprisingly very little fear. For most, there seemed to be an air of annoyed resignation, as if told they''d need to do something inconvenient but required.


    She frowned at everyone. "You all heard me right?" she said. "A dragon is coming." Even now she could feel it, the strange sensation like waves washing over her. She could feel their direction, and how they were slowly growing stronger. Lori felt like she should be swaying as the sensation swept over her again, all the wisps around her seeming to sway with her. She''d never found anything in any book or study that explained what that feeling was. It wasn''t because of wisps: Deadspeakers, Mentalists and Horotracts all felt it too. Life wavered, thought eddied, and vistas eroded, all as if something were washing it away. "We need to get ready!"


    "Binder Lori, relax," Rian said, once more seeming to speak for everyone. "We''ve all been through dragons before, there''s no need to get upset."


    "I think having a dragon bearing down on us is perfectly upsetting, Rian," Lori snapped. "We need to get to work while we still can."


    "It''s a dragon. We''ve lived through them before. Just get down into the shelters and wait it out," Rian said. "Our biggest problem will be getting bored. Sure, we might have to replace some roofs and dig up whatever falls on us afterwards, but it''s not really that big of a problem."


    Lori stared at him. Then she looked, really looked, at the people of her demesne. All of them bore the same relaxed, self-assured expression as her only lord.


    "Rian, shelters are always built as least twenty paces underground for a reason," Lori ground out, addressing it to him, but explaining it to everyone. "Unless they''re built that deep, it''s perfectly possible for a dragon''s wild manipulations of wisps to tear the ground apart and open the shelter up, and then people die because their bodies start fusing together, or they get caught in a twister and wrung like a dishrag until all their flesh is stripped from their bones, or they fall and never stop falling until they die of starvation or any number of things."


    Rian blinked. "The shelters never seem that deep. You just go down some stairs and there they are."


    "Yes, that''s what happens when you use Horotracting to make a vista," Lori said. "Trust me, they''re that deep, I used to have a job doing shelter cleaning and maintenance, and we always needed a Horotract to get down there."


    Abruptly, Lori slammed the butt of her staff into the ground, using earth- and airwisps to make it echo like thunder. People jumped at the noise, suddenly focusing on her. "Dragons might seem like just any other storm when you''re in a demesne, but those are old demesne, built up over decades and centuries. They have plumbing and sewers and streetlights and ways to protect themselves from dragons. We don''t! Colors of death, people, you know all the stories about dragons that I do! They can tear a demesne to the bedrock and leave no survivors, turn an entire city into a mound of insane screaming flesh that''s killing and undying everything around it, and give you iridiation even from inside a demesne! And that last one is if you''re lucky, so you die fast!"


    Shocked silence filled the dining hall, and Lori finally saw fear.


    "And if you don''t believe that," Lori said. "Believe this." She pointed towards the kitchen and cold room. "All our food is in there, and the only safe place we have to hide from a dragon," she pointed in the general direction of her cave and the dungeon''s core, "is over there! Dragons can take two or three days to pass by, and anyone who goes out in that time is going to die. Do you see the problem?"


    They all looked towards the kitchen. Then towards the Dungeon.


    It was then that the logistical problems finally presented themselves to everyone.


    "And before you all start thinking of moving the food to the shelters," Lori said as the idea seemed to finally dawn on everyone, "consider this: all that damage after a dragon, with roofs fallen in and such. How thick do you think the roofs of the shelters are? And how thick to you think the hill on top of the Dungeon is?"


    She didn''t wait for some kind of moment of realization or someone answering her rhetorical question.


    But neither did she just walk off dramatically.


    "Get all the food into my Dungeon," Lori told Rian. "All the metal tools we can''t afford to lose either. I''ll turn one of my rooms into a cold room for it."


    "What are you going to do?" Rian asked.


    "Something I should have done sooner," Lori said. "Make my Dungeon bigger."


    When she stepped out of the dining hall, a wind had risen. Steady wind that neither surged nor ebbed, rushing like someone''s breath whispering past her ear. It flowed southward, and Lori got the feeling the wind wasn''t being blown in, but inhaled.


    On the horizon, just beginning to rise over the curve of the world, was the dragon.


    For a moment, Lori stared. She couldn''t help it. She''d never seen a dragon with her own eyes before, and the descriptions and sketches and illustrations in books seemed¡­ nonsensical. At first she thought a wall of clouds stretched from east to west, not unlike the driving rains. And then she blinked and suddenly it seemed too thick to be clouds. They didn''t roil like clouds did, getting bigger, or rising or falling slowly. It roiled like boiling water, bubbling and expanding and moving right before her very eyes, faster than any cloud. Bubbles would erupt into eerily silent lightning of many colors. Brilliant green, dull and burning red, even a light-defying dark purple that seemed black, slowly moving horizontally like the reaching arms of some impossibly long, narrow limb.


    Even as she watched, one of the streaks of lightning bent in the middle like an elbow, sweeping it''s already extended length towards the ground before touching the earth and suddenly it wasn''t lightning but a great cone, it''s point touching the ground¡­ and then tears seemed to open all along the cone''s length, and Lori found herself staring at eyes of¨C


    Someone grabbed her and spun her around quickly, breaking her gaze.


    "Don''t stare at something''s eyes," Rian said, looking intently at the ground. "Things never like it when you meet their eyes. They think you''re challenging them."


    Lori took a deep breath and realized she was shaking.


    Then thunder came, not in a sudden crack, but a low, deep, ominous roll that seemed to keep on going and going and going¡­


    "Get to the Dungeon!" Rian cried, his voice sounding surprisingly loud and normal over the continuous bass rumble of the dragon''s thunder as he pushed Lori''s staff into her hands. When had she dropped it? "Get it as big as you can! I''ll take care of the rest, just get the Dungeon bigger!"


    Clutching at her staff, Lori ran, already willing the stone to flow¡­

 16 - The Dragon and the Dark

    Lori felt like her Dungeon was about to cave in and collapse on her.


    That was unlikely to happen, since every earthwisp that wasn''t turning stone into the consistency of wet clay was currently reinforcing the entire hill to increase its structural integrity and not collapse because of little things like ''its own weight''. Still, it was actually becoming problematic for Lori. It wasn''t that she was running out of magic to imbue into the wisps. The power from the core seemed as endlessly inexhaustible as ever. Rather, she was having problems with proximity and multi-tasking. The stone was technically one large contiguous, if heterogeneous, mass, and her dual orders to both structurally reinforce and soften were making the wisps at the border of those two bindings confused. She had to keep both sets of bindings distinct, even as she willed softened rock out of her cave through the newly-expanded opening. It was giving her a bit of a headache, but she had to keep digging. She had to keep digging.


    She dug deeper into the hill, finding rock and more rock, leaving randomly placed pillars of stone to help support the load behind her. Lori kept reinforcing and digging, knowing that they didn''t have much time. It didn''t need to be good, it just needed to not collapse in the next three days. Rian was directing the transfer of the foods they''d already managed to gather into her storage room and new cold room, filled with ice fresh from the river. But that wouldn''t be enough. So after she dug in deep enough the light from outside grew dim and she had to bind lightwisps around her to see, she started to dig down. It wasn''t much, a simple hole two paces wide. but she dug down and kept on digging. Stone flowed up against gravity, rising like some strange, marbled worm, as she made the hole deeper and deeper, drawing more rock from it that she sent out of the cave.


    A hand fell on her shoulder and she gave start, then swayed as legs that had gone numb staying in one position failed her, and she nearly fell into her own hole. Rian''s hand grabbed her bicep, his grip surprisingly strong and pulled her back from the brink.


    "Be more careful," he said. "The food''s all in, and the¡­ the dragon''s getting close. Can people come inside now?"


    Lori looked down into the pit. It was just darkness. She willed the lightwisps bound near her to move and shine their light into the hole.


    Even then, she couldn''t see the bottom.


    "How close is the dragon?" Lori said. She could still feel it, moving ever closer, much closer than before, but still not over any part of her demesne.


    "Well, we have children crying because they see giant eyes in the sky, it''s raining hail, and I saw a giant mouth that seemed to take up half the sky appear full of teeth that turned out to be tentacles that turned out to be heads with a non-symmetrical arrangement of eyes, so it''s too close for my sanity," Rain said.


    "I need to fill this with water so we''ll have something to drink," Lori said.


    "Is there any particular reason people can''t come in while you''re doing that?" Rian said.


    "The possibility of getting torn apart by a stream of water and polluting our reservoir with their blood and offal?"


    "I''ll tell them to wait."


    Lori nodded, considered the length of soft stone still oozing towards the entrance of the cave and decided to leave it be in case she needed to seal off their reservoir to keep people from pissing in it. There was just something about bodies of water that made people want to add their own contribution, and she''d rather that not be the case here. "Come on, let''s be quick about this. And if anyone is in my bedroom, they''ll be evicted to take their chances with the dragon."


    "Well¡­ no one is in your bedroom anymore."


    Lori suddenly stopped in her tracks and rounded on him. "What?" she demanded through gritted teeth.


    "Well, the sacrificial altar really creeped them out," Rian said.


    "It''s a table!"


    "To be honest, it really does kinda look like an altar," Rian shrugged.


    "It doesn¡¯t even have a drainage hole for the blood!"


    "I don''t think they associate drainage holes with altar-ness."


    "If they touched anything or took anything¡­" Lori began, already feeling the rising sense of violation.


    "No one took anything," Rian assured her. "They wouldn''t stay near the alta¨C table! But, uh, I wouldn''t suggest going in there right now?"


    Lori gave him a suspicious look. "Why?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Someone had piled her bedroom full of metal tools. Saws, scissors, knives, pots, saws, pans, cooking ingots, chisels, axes, saws, various hammers, a surprising number of what initially looked like shortswords but seemed to be well-worn machetes, and three huge saws that were longer than she was tall. There was even a box full of paper packages that on examination were nails of various sizes, a pile consisting of wire of various thicknesses, some of which she recognized as spring steel, and¡­ was that bar stock? Why did they need to get back to Covehold if they had so much stockpiled iron and steel?!


    Staring at all this, it occurred to Lori that this was the closest she had yet to get to having a room filled with untold riches. Because all these refined metals were probably the most valuable things the settlement had if you didn''t count the children, and Lori didn¡¯t.


    She briefly considered sleeping on them, then tossed aside the notion. Metal was still just rock, except harder.


    But at least it looked like her pack hadn''t been opened. She quickly checked it and sighed with relief that the glassware was still intact. Then she carefully pushed the pack and its contents under her bed.


    "Have them at least take things off the bed, I sleep on that thing," Lori said, getting back to her feet.


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    "Right¡­ I''ll have them do that as soon as they''re safe in here," Rian said, sounding surprisingly dry.


    "And make sure they bring wood to cook with along with the other supplies they''ll be bringing, we''re not cutting up my bed for firewood," Lori said.


    Rian blinked. "Um, of course. Obviously I thought of that..."


    Lori gave him a look. He averted his gaze.


    Shaking her head, she hurried to bring water inside her Dungeon.


    Outside, the wind had risen from a whisper to a constant driving wind, and chips of ice fell from the sky. It was a small mercy they were only tiny chips instead of heavy stones. The wind still blew inexorably towards the dragon, as if it was sucking in the sky. Lori saw clouds being drawn towards the dragon, and some actually seemed to fuse with it, making the dragon seemed a many-headed thing, and whorls on the cloud started looking like eyes¨C


    Lori tore her gaze away, running towards the river, staff in hand and hair flying free in the wind. She''d had to leave her hat in the cave or risk losing it.


    Her control over water wasn''t as absolute as she would want it to be. Water that had just entered her demesne, such as by having just flowed in through the river or fallen from the sky, wasn''t yet completely in her control. Conversely, water that had just flowed out of her demesne was still a little hers for maybe a pace or so past the official edge of her control. Here, however, so near her dungeon''s core, the water was hers completely. Power from the core flowed through the land, imbuing the wisps in the water in front of her with her will, and the water rose, surface tension as unnatural as the reinforcement of the stone in her cave, holding it all together. Another thought, and the water rushed past her, gushing and flowing up the slope and towards her cave.


    She''d torn one side of the cliff face completely open, and the whole cave, save for the round pillar which had the dungeon''s core inside it, was visible to the outside. The water crashed and broke on the enormous, unnaturally blobby piles of now-hard stone that had been removed in the Dungeon''s expansion. She willed the water to stay a whole and contiguous stream, sending it streaming past the line of beds from the hospital that had just been moved and arrayed along one wall.


    People were already moving in under Rian''s direction, mostly the sick and young children. The rest were milling outside the cave, blocked by the huge piles of stone. Most seemed to have managed to gather up their all possessions, and Lori supposed it had been as simple as just picking them up from the shelters. Other were carrying wood, already cut for kindling.


    Overhead, that strange bass, rolling thunder echoed again, and Lori turned back towards the dragon. It had gotten closer as she''d worked on moving the water to the cave. It had mouths now, horrible torn-slit mouths all over its form, seemingly without heed to things like symmetry or even functionality. She saw eyes inside the mouth, turning this way and that, eyes with multiple corneas, eyes where the pupil was another mouth¡­!


    Lori turned away and focused on providing a water supply for her Dungeon, even as it seemed like she could feel the dragon through the back of her neck.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The skies above had turned glittering shades of many colors, shimmering like an oily poison by the time everyone had been secured in the Dungeon.


    "Everyone''s inside," Rian reported, needing to raise his voice to be heard between the rolling thunder that had risen to a shrill cry like a small animal being tortured and the wind that had been increasing in volume from a whisper to a roar. "With everything we could carry."


    "Have them snuff out any lights," Lori said. "Once I seal us in, we can''t waste air. They don''t need to see."


    "That''ll scare the children," Rian said.


    "Good! This is something to be scared about. And in the dark, people are less likely to move around."


    Besides, she''d be needing the dark.


    As she stood at the mouth of the cave, drawing back the stone to rebuild the door she had torn down, and pulling all the other excavated stone with it to create a heavy stone shell to bury them in so the dragon couldn''t reach them, she stared out over the settlement. It suddenly struck her how much this place had grown. She remembered mud and trees and ramshackle tents little removed from hovels and a large tent where they made food.


    All that was gone now. Where there had been trees and tents, flat hard-packed earth stood, dotted with the shells of houses. While many still waited for roofs, many more had been covered and even had doors and windows of plain wooden boards. The dining hall seemed to stand over everything, a cheerful beacon of comfort. The shelters she''d built stood side by side, and seeming surprisingly close now that all the trees around it had been cleared, and she was surprised to see some flowers of some sort had been planted around them. The bathhouses, a little closer to the river, looked surprisingly cheerful. Since when had there been so many benches and crude treestump tables in front of it? In the distance, she could even make out one of the curing sheds near the sawpit, and a small, earthen chimney that she didn''t remember building close to the river.


    The claypit, she realized. For some reason, she hoped the little kiln survived. She hadn''t seen any fruits from its labors yet.


    At the edge of her awareness, she felt the wisps at the edge of her demesne¡­twist as the dragon passed over them.


    No more delaying.


    Lori stepped back and on either side of her the enormous stone bulwarks that had risen around the front of her dungeon, solid stone paces deep, closed to block out the sight of the Iridescent sky, leaving only a narrow, slit-like tube for air, plunging the dungeon into darkness. She heard the cries of surprise, heard Rian''s voice trying to keep everyone calm, heard the children wail and call for their parents¡­


    In the dark, she breathed in, even as she made the magic from the core move. She passed the magic through her lungs, through her esophagus and mouth and ear canals and nostrils, and out into the darkwisps filling her cave. They filled the dark vaults, lay thick within the dark room she had built, and filled the reservoirs as surely as the water did. They were in the lavatories and crude pipes, in the gaps between the piles of metal tools, under her bed and in the miniscule veins of the wood people had brought. They lay just beneath people''s clothes, hidden in their hair, squeezed in between their toes, filling their pockets.


    Lolilyuri, wizard, Dungeon Binder, determined¡­ bound the darkness to her will.


    She bound the darkness in the cave. She bound the darkness in the empty shelters, in shadows hiding in the corners of roofed houses, in the empty cold room and drainage pipes and cistern and spigot and cold hearth of the dining hall. She bound the darkness in the curing sheds and in the little lips of shadow inside the unfired clay forms, and under roots and in the cracked bark of old trees, and under the shade of leaves and falls of rocks and the hidden nooks and corners and in the lee of broken eggs hidden inside unseen hollows.


    The darkwisps and the darkness responded, flowing through the air hole into the outside, rising from where they hid, streaming and coalescing and growing as all around the demesne darkness answered their Binder''s call. She imbued the dark with magic, made it spread unnaturally into the light of day in defiance of nature. They spread like a shroud, cloaking the stony bulwark and the cliffs, spreading sideways to either side of the hill, growing as the darkness of the demesne joined it. The darkness moved faster than the light, for while the light had to travel, the dark was always there. Air didn''t slow it, didn''t affect it. It had no body, no weight. No sprig of moss so much as stirred even as a flood of shadow erupted, rich in magic, filling with all the power Lori could have the core imbue into it.


    Yet for all that, it did have a limited volume. Not enough to plunge the whole demesne in darkness, as some demesne were capable of doing. Not enough to blot out the sun and cloak them all in night. But enough to wrap around the empty buildings and homes, around the signs of civilization built by hands and sweat and toil and wisps and will. Enough to be a dark vanguard with shields held high in front of a stony bulwark and, as the dragon came, to bear the raw, untamed, chaotic, unspeakably twisted magics of the dragon.


    As the first wave of the unspeakable power and abnormal, eldritch force carrying streams of insane thoughts, impossibly twisted vistas, illbound wisps and rampant life washed over Lori''s Demesne, matched only by the mind and will of its Dungeon Binder, Lori stood in the dark and hoped she was enough.

 17 - Stories In The Dark

    Lolilyuri could hear another dragonborn abomination trying to crawl through the air hole again. There was too much chittering and the sound of multiple wings, and the void it left in her sense of the demesne''s wisps was all wrong to be any ordinary sort of bug. She pushed magic into the darkness she was controlling directly over the Dungeon''s entrance to reinforce it for a moment, then focused her attention in front of her and contracted the air hole from a wide opening into a slit a finger wide. The sound of shell cracking was interspersed with bones breaking, and it might have been Lori''s imagination, but she thought she''d felt a sudden mist as of pulped insides being ejected violently out of a body. The hair on the back of her neck rose as she still heard something moving.


    She took the coal at her side and some wood split for kindling that Rian had piled next to her, and put the firewisps in one into the other. The coal cooled to almost nothing as the firewood burst into open flame that Lori directed into a stream through the little slit. There was sizzling and a nauseatingly sweet smell like burning sugar. She kept the flame going until the wood in her hand was consumed. When the dark came back and she had to blink the bright afterimage burned into her eyes, the air hole was mercifully silent, if smelling like a burnt batch of poisonous caramels..


    Cautiously, she expanded it back to size, and the sounds of the dragon passing¨C of eerie silences, of stoning grinding and rumbling, of trees and wood snapping, of things being displaced, of stranger sounds she couldn''t identify¨C entered though the pitch-black opening with the air. She went back to reinforcing the darkness over the Dungeon and the other structures she still had control over. She''d already lost one of the shelters and some of the houses in a moment of inattention, the chaotic forces the dragon was throwing around wearing away her darkwisps until it had been depleted of the magic she had imbued, breaking apart and letting the dragon''s touch reach the stones she had raised before she could reinforce them. That had been hours ago.


    The structures were still mostly there, but she sensed strange voids of wisps all around them. And there were other voids roaming about outside, voids that did not feel like beast or bug or anything that swam through her river, but she couldn''t focus on them, she had to maintain the darkness. Wind and rain and hail and rocks being lifted up and dropped from the sky passed through her field of darkwisps without any resistance whatsoever, but she managed to hold back the dragon''s chaotic magic. In addition to the force of a storm, the dragon altered the world around it. Space twisted, and time stopped flowing smoothly. Formless, invisible power clawed and ripped and flung the lands as easily as someone''s cloak dragging across the ground as they walked. Gravity inverted and spiraled and magnified and halved and trees started moving as if they had muscles instead of wood. Wisps were bound in ways she didn''t think were possible or sane, producing invisible light that boiled all the water it touched, rocks compacting so densely they warped the very world around them before flaring like the sun and exploding, lightning wisps that came together and broke down all matter they touched into something that was neither stone nor fluid nor air and burned hotter than any fire she''d ever made¡­


    Lori could feel these abominations and more hammering into the bulwark of darkness she had raised, immaterial powers that struck her barriers and were repulsed, leaving the matter they had been bound to slam violently against her shell of stone. They contributed to the unnatural, chaotic, unspeakable sounds she heard through the airway as they shattered or exploded or in some instances were so hot they fused to the stone and would have melted their way in if Lori hadn''t ripped the heat from them. The stone had cracked, and she had needed to frantically repair the damage, leaving her darkness to be worn away without her supporting it¡­


    She''d been at this for hours, sitting in the dark in front of the air hole, eyes unseeing as she relied on her connection to the Dungeon''s core and the sense it granted her of the wisps in her demesne to understand what was going on outside. The stories always said how the Dungeon Binder was aware of everything that went on in their demesne. Lori was starting to think that was either greatly hyperbolic, or she needed more practice.


    Occasionally Rian came, bringing her wood or a skin of water that was nice and cold and didn''t taste pissed in. There was no food but for some fruits the children had brought, something that had been sweet and mushy and runny and made Lori want to strip all the trees in her demesne bare to find more. Also, the children had definitely been planning to keep whatever this fruit was a secret among themselves, the greedy things. She wondered what they had called it.


    She''d had to stop sitting down and start pacing as the hours wore on and she grew tired, her eyelids drooping in the dark, as the sun set still more dragon passed overhead. It wasn''t unheard of for a dragon to be over a hundred taums long. There was a good chance that Covehold was still in the dragon''s shadow with them, under its own shield of darkness. Or¡­


    Lori blink, realizing she''d been staring into the dark for a while now and might have fallen asleep with her eyes open. She hurriedly checked the darkwisps, and hastily imbued them with more magic. In any other situation, what she was putting in them would have lasted the wisps days, but it took power to resist the phenomena that surrounded the dragon.


    As she imbued, she went back to her thought. What sort of wizard had founded Covehold? Had they been any more prepared than she had been? Had they worked out how to use the other forms of magic yet? Because this would go a lot easier if she could use Deadspeaking to cleanse her body of tiredness, or use Mentalism to be partly asleep while the other part kept imbuing. Colors, if she could just Horotract a little, they''d be a taum underground and not need to worry about anything breaking in¡­


    She straightened to find someone shaking her shoulder as she stood leaning against the wall. "Wah¡­?" she said blearily, wondering what he was doing in her room and why did it smell like blood and caramel¡­


    Panic seized her, and Lori reached up, seeing the darkness start to collapse. Hurriedly, she imbued it once more, dragging out the darkwisps that had suddenly snapped back in place in the cave after the magic imbued into them had run out, rebuilding the bulwark. "W-who''s there?" she asked. Her coal had died, but someone had risked a single candle in the cave, and it was just enough light to give the dark contrast.


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    "It''s me," Rian said, voice low, sounding almost as tired as she felt. "I came to check on you when something started trying to come in and it didn''t die right away. Are you alright?"


    "I need you to slap me," Lori said. "Hard. In the face."


    "Practically speaking, slapping someone doesn''t actually make them more awake," Rian said.


    "No, but adrenaline will, on account I''ll be angry at the idiot who just¨C"


    Something struck her in the shin, and Lori let out a cry of anger and dropped her staff. It clattered loudly to the ground as she leaned against the wall. "Breath, that hurt!" she roared.


    "You''re welcome," Rian said, sounding annoyingly cheerful enough to strangle. "And hey, this way, no risk of brain injury."


    "Thank you," Lori snarled through gritted teeth. Well, her blood was up and there was definitely adrenaline in her system, so¡­ success? "Did it get in?"


    "I dealt with it," Rian said. His shadowed outline moved, and something caught a glint of the distant candlelight. There was a sword in his left hand, barely a darker shape in the gloom. Lori bound the lightwisps in her eyes, and suddenly the cave seemed to brighten in shades of black and white, and in his hands, hidden from the rest of the cave with his body, was a sword. A thick, almost tarry substance was smeared on it, slowly trickling down like thickening tree sap.


    "I didn''t know you were left-handed," she said for lack of anything else to say as she rebuilt the darkness outside.


    "I''m not," Rian said, grimacing. Whatever the tar was, some of it had splattered on his hand. "I hope this thing doesn''t etch. I don''t know if any of the blacksmiths can fix it if it does."


    "How long has it been?" Lori said.


    "I don''t know. Midnight? It could be the next day for all we know," Rian said. "I don''t suppose you learned a magical way to tell what time it is?"


    Lori rubbed at her eyes. In the dark of her own mind, she could feel the darkwisps outside, eroding erratically at the dragon''s influence on the world. She imbued it, reaffirming the binding of her will. "I don''t know if I can last¡­" she said quietly.


    "Do you want me to tell you a story?" Rian said, leaning on the wall next to her. He slumped, and Lori realized he must have been as tired as she was.


    "Isn''t that for putting me to sleep?" Lori said.


    "That depends on what sort of story you''re being told," Rian said. "Would you consider yourself a learned person?"


    "Yes¡­?" Lori said, wondering where this was going.


    "Would you be offended at gross ignorance of what you consider basic principles?" Rian said.


    "Where is this going?" Lori asked suspiciously, even as her attention flickered upwards to the darkwisps on the other side of the stone bulwark next to them.


    "Well, there''s this story that I heard," Rian said, letting his back slide down the wall to sit on the ground, the sword carefully to one side.


    Lori rubbed her eyes, but sat down more carefully, still giving Rian a suspicious look as she let the binding in her eyes lapse, and the cave snapped back to darkness. "What story?" she asked, even as she kept one metaphorical hand on the metaphorical staff that was imbuing the darkwisps.


    "Well, it goes like this: a hunter¡­ no wait, it was a miner¨C" Rian corrected himself, "is digging in his mine, searching for iron."


    "Wait, he owns the mine?"


    "Well, it''s his mine, so I suppose."


    "Then why is he digging by himself? If he owns the mine, he should be wealthy enough to hire other people to dig for him!"


    "Maybe he doesn''t have the beads? Spent it all on buying the mine?"


    "That''s no excuse, any bank would be willing to let him put up the mine as collateral for a loan. If he had enough confidence it would make beads, he''d have done at least that already, just to cover overhead and expenses!"


    "Look, that''s how it goes! He''s in a mine, he owns the mine, and he''s digging by himself."


    "About that. That''s very unsafe. What if he had an accident in the mine? He could become stuck there and die because no one knows he''s hurt. You can''t just assume the Dungeon Binder will keep an eye on you just because you''re operating one of their mines."


    "Ah, I knew I forgot something! This isn''t in a demesne, it''s on the outside, so Iridescence everywhere."


    "Okay, this story is becoming even more stupid. You mean he''s mining, alone, by himself, out in the Iridescence? Then he''s obviously got money, at the very least he''ll need a hose and pressure tank to spray the area he''ll be mining with Iridescence so it doesn''t powder and start building up in his lungs."


    "Nope, no washing rig. He''s mining by himself, just his pick axe and his lantern to light his way, mining deep in his mine."


    "Deep in his mine? Rian, are you relating the circumstances of a suicide to me?"


    "I haven''t even finished setting up the story! Just let me finish, okay?"


    "¡­ fine¡­"


    "So, there''s a miner, digging in his mine, all by himself. He''s been excavating for days, but has little to show for it¨C"


    "Obviously, if he''s trying to run an iron mine as a one-man operation. "


    "¨C but every day, he wakes up hoping this will be the day he strikes it rich."


    "Wait, hoping he strikes it rich? Are you telling me he''s unsuccessful not because he''s excavating a seam by himself, but because he hasn''t even found anything worth mining in the first place? This IS a suicide! Your miner is on the path to financial ruin! Next you''ll tell me he''s too cheap to bathe!"


    "Well, the way I heard it, he''s already covered in Iridescence, and he figures he only has one day left or he''ll die."


    "If he''s covered by Iridescence, he doesn''t have one day, he already has brain damage from it affecting the lightningwisps in his brain. This IS a suicide story."


    "Look, it''s not a suicide! Let me keep telling it."


    "There better be a change in his circumstances, or at the very least he turns around and takes a bath to wash the iridiation off¡­"


    "While mining a particularly stubborn and hard wall, he accidentally cuts himself, causing blood to well up from his cut."


    "And dooming himself to death, as that much Iridescence on the skin, and then an open wound¡­ he''s a dead man."


    "The blood smears on the stubbornly hard stone, which suddenly glows with brilliant light. All of a sudden, the iridescence starts melting away as the glowing stone wall reveals itself to be a Dungeon Core! By offering it some of his blood, he had made a pact with it, becoming a Dungeon Binder, gaining powers and abilities far above mere ordinary men."


    Silence. A deep, wrathful silence broken only by sporadic strange and eldritch noises from the air hole leading outside.


    "Rian," Lori said, her tone quiet and threatening, "are you seriously telling me some coloredbrained ''How some ignorant yokel became a Dungeon Binder'' story?"


    "This was the start of his days as a powerful Dungeon Binder, and how he offered just rule and an easy life to all who lived in his demesne," Rian said cheerfully.


    Lori took a deep breath.


    Sleeping people were awakened to the outraged, offended cry of, "THAT''S NOT HOW DUNGEONS WORK!!!!!"


    As Lori began angrily lambasting all the illogical elements of the opening scene of the story alone, Rian leaned back and smiled in the most irritating way possible.


    Outside, the dragon continued to pass over Lori''s Demesne, Lorian, wreaking havoc upon the world with its touch. Beneath it, the bulwark of darkness never wavered.

 18 - After The Dragon

    Lori didn''t feel it when the dragon finally went away, since she had been distracted during the period it had likely happened to note its passing. She had been too full of sheer outrage at the complete and utter nonsensical ignorance of story Rian insisted on continuing to tell her.


    "¨C so he couldn''t just make trees spring from nowhere, especially outside his demesne!" Lori finished her latest diatribe of the story''s utter stupidity. "Even with the dungeon''s core providing power, he''d need seeds for the trees, and he''d need to touch them since outside of his demesne he''ll be operating the same as any other wizard, which he wouldn¡¯t be, but we''ve already talked about that, and¡­" She cut off, her throat sore, and she reached for the water skin for another drink. It was empty, but Lori still put it to her mouth anyway and tried to suck in what little moisture she could still feel inside.


    Annoyed, she willed water to her, turning a part of their reservoir to vapor and drawing that vapor to her before making it condense again in her mouth since her hands were too dirty for her to catch the water in them. It was slow, as she could only gulp small condensed mouthfuls at a time, and was in the middle of such a belabored mouthful when she realized she could just wash her hands, then drink, and did so. The water had that annoying taste of rainwater that hadn''t touched the ground yet, but it was filling and sated her thirst.


    When she''d drunk enough to feel her throat had been soothed, she opened her mouth to continue haranguing Rian for his terrible, utterly stupid story¡­ and realized he was asleep, sitting back against the stone, head drooping forward in a way that was probably going to be very painful for his neck when he woke up.


    "Well¡­ then I win," Lori said, nodding in satisfaction, voice hoarse.


    She didn''t remember what happened after that.


    Lori woke with her head drooping down, a pain in her neck. Groaning, she rubbed at her nape, and nearly fell over as her numb posterior made its numbness known, barely catching herself from smacking into the cold stones of her cave. The air smiled of woodsmoke.


    "Good morning, Wiz Lori," a familiar voice said.


    Lori opened her eyes. The brat was looking down at her, holding a bowl of stew.


    "Lord Rian says to ask you to open the door as soon as you wake up," the brat said. "Because the air''s smoky from cooking, and people are coughing. He said to say please. So, please."


    Lori looked at her blearily. Then she shook her head as last night''s¨C yesterday''s?¨C events came rushing back. She glanced toward the air hole. It was filled with¡­ bits. Dead bits, of things she couldn''t recognize. There was fur like a seel but in strange colors like beast''s feathers, there were shells like bugs that had the texture of bark, there was a circular, toothy maw like a slug¡­ it was all mixed in with thick, syrupy liquids that might have been bright but had now dried into dark, resin-like sludge.


    And beyond that, there was bright sunlight. It wasn''t directly visible, because at some point Lori had made a pair of sharp angles in the air hole to block things flung in by the wind, and then she''d had to close and open the air hole a few times due to things climbing inside, but she could see a reflection of radiance on the stone, bright enough to still indirectly illuminate her through the narrow opening.


    Cautiously, Lori felt the wisps in her demesne. They still wavered strangely to the dragon''s pounding presence, but only weakly, and getting subtly weaker and weaker as it drifted away. She felt for voids in the wisps, ones that moved. She didn''t want to open the Dungeon only to find a dragonborn abomination right next to the entrance that would slaughter them all.


    Fortunately, there wasn''t, though there were some voids moving around in the area of the village. They were far from the cave mouth though, and were large and slow-moving, so she felt they shouldn''t be too much of a problem. So she¨C very cautiously¨C poked some more airholes in the stone. More light filtered in, brightening the area around Lori, though some of the holes she made were still covered by something being on top of them. From how Lori mostly felt waterwisps and earthwisps, it was some kind of corpse, or maybe a tree. Still, it was unmoving, so it was probably dead, and it hadn''t started rotting yet¡­


    "Lord Rian said to open the door," the brat said, when she saw that was the extent of what Lori was doing.


    "Tell him there are beasts out there that we have to deal with first," she said. "Not until I''ve eaten, at least. And there might be more elsewhere in the demesne."


    Thankfully, the brat didn''t argue. "I''ll tell him," the brat said. She held out the bowl of stew. "This is for you."


    Lori took it, and the brat hurried off, presumably to talk to Rian. Lori licked her lips at the stew eagerly. It was a bit cool, but she was able to stimulate the firewisps in it to get it nicely hot again. As she was about to start eating¡­


    "Wait¡­ that brat didn''t give me a spoon!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time someone got back to her, Lori had managed to find several dragonborn abominations in her demesne, purely by looking for moving voids where there were no wisps that responded to her, at least above ground. There were too many seels and other things in the water for her to be able to tell if something there was an abomination or not. She started around the area of the village, moving outward. There were actually very few, and one was in the middle of dying when Lori found it, its wisps being claimed by her demesne as its life slipped away.


    Others were more mobile, and Lori sensed them roaming through the woods surrounding the village, the prairies on the other side of the river, and a few seemed to be flying in the sky. There was one that Lori had to assume was some sort of mobile¨C or at least unusually active¨C plant, given how it seemed rooted to the ground while its upper body moved with energetic, boneless motions. Others seemed like¡­ well, beasts, though given they were likely altered by the dragon she was sure there was something unusual about them.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    Those were just the normal things she found. She found other things as well.


    There was a mobile cluster of bound wisps that was mostly made up of light- and airwisps, though lightningwisps and some firewisps were part of it as well. It seemed to move by itself, as if some other Whisperer had bound it and simply let it loose. Every few moments, Lori felt a strange emptiness in the air as if some other Whisperer was gently trying to claim wisps she''d bound, and they would slip out of her binding and into theirs'', only there were no wisps involved¡­


    When she realized what was happening, her eyes snapped open in shock, eyes staring at the stone as if her gaze could penetrate it and the distance in the deep woods where the strange cluster of bound wisps lay. The cluster that was taking in magic by itself.


    Lori realized she had been perceiving a wispling. A self-sustaining, autonomous conglomeration of wisps, as defined by her text books back in school. Were she seeing it with her own eyes, it would likely be some sort of glowing ball of light. They were mentioned as a byproduct of dragons, and ancient Dungeon Binders had studied them and other things dragons had left behind to create¡­ well, in this case, their own wisplings.


    Once she realized what it was and what it was doing, she screwed her eyes shut and searched out more. She felt them, a cluster of lightning- and firewisps, earth- and lightningwisps, water- and lightning- and earthwisps¡­ there were many of them in her demesne, all strangely mobile. Not all were taking in magic by themselves. Some seemed to be heavily imbued, and were slowly running out of magic as the binding on them and the wisps themselves consumed it. Others, she was shocked to sense, were devouring other mobile clusters, and adding their stockpile of magic to itself. One was seemingly latched on to another, seeming to use the latter cluster to take in magic for it, like a parasite¡­


    Jars! She needed glass jars to hold them all and keep them from running off so she could study them! Argh! They were all under her bed¡­!


    "Hey," Rian said, breaking through her reverie. "Sorry I wasn''t back sooner. Brought you a spoon."


    "Glass," she told him.


    "Sorry, no glass spoons, just wooden ones," he said. "And we''re going to need someplace to wash them soon, or else we''ll all start getting food poisoning¡­"


    "No, I need glass!" Lori said.


    "Um, we have wooden cups?" Rian ventured.


    "No, it has to be glass!"


    "Are you being extra-entitled or are we simply not having the same conversation? Because you''re usually more understandable than this."


    "I need glass!" Lori said. "I don''t have enough sample containers! There are wisplings out there, Rian!"


    "Right, not having the same conversation," Rian said with a sigh. "Lori, shut up and eat."


    Lori blinked at the order. "Rian, I need¨C"


    "Binder Lori," Rian interrupted. "You haven''t had anything to eat for at least a full day, maybe even two. We''ve all been cramped in this dungeon for that long. Even if we can''t all go out of the cave because you say there are dangerous beasts around, that means we need to get started on making this Dungeon livable until we can. The lavatory is already full and dangerously close to overflowing, the water reservoir has gone down at least four paces, we need a place to wash dishes or else we''re going to be having our next meal literally on top of our old one, and everyone needs a bath. Otherwise, people are going to get sick, and in these cramped conditions, that''s going to lead to a very quick and nasty epidemic. Even if it''s just going to be food poisoning, it''s going to get all of us since we can''t wash or get clean. So, I''m sure these wisplings are interesting and probably really cool and magical and will make you stronger somehow, but right now, people need you to eat, get off your ass, and start building them a place to wash and a new place to shit and piss. Then you and I and a bunch of the others who are strong enough will need to get armed and go out there to deal with these beasts so everyone else can leave the dungeon and get back to their lives."


    Rian squatted down and picked up Lori''s stew, which had grown cold again, and stuck the spoon in it. "I know you''re an arrogant, self-centered, egotistical megalomaniac, but you''re our responsible, hardworking megalomaniac. So start eating while I come back with water so we can get to work. Once we don''t have to worry about everyone coming down with food poisoning or sitting on their own feces, then I''ll help you catch these wispling things, all right? "


    For a moment, Lori stared at him. With his oily face, tired eyes, unkempt hair, sweat-stained clothes and random soot stains, Rian didn''t look like the almost heroic figure he usually did. His face wasn''t set in an encouraging smile or a kindly look. He just looked¡­ he looked like he was tired, done with the world, and the next person to annoy him would get punched in the face.


    Wordless, Lori took the stew, stirred the spoon a little to see that, yes, it had grown completely cold, and started getting it hot again with the few firewisps still in it. She put a spoonful in her mouth, and considered. It needed a touch more heat.


    Finally, she said, "At least tell me no one''s pissed in the water yet."


    For a long moment, Rian stared at her. Then he closed his eyes and let out a long breath. When he opened them again, there was a little smile on his mouth. It actually looked real. "Yes, no one''s pissed in the water. Though if someone drops the rope with the bucket on the end of it into the water, I don''t know what we''ll do." His eyes flicked down to her bowl. "If you''re still hungry, you can have seconds. There''s plenty for everyone."


    "That would be nice, thank you," Lori said evenly.


    As Rian took the water skin and walked away, Lori considered the voids of wisps in the rest of the cave. All were mostly staying still. There wasn''t even the low murmur of conversation. Just the tired stillness of people conserving their strength, because there was no food to fill them today. There were small piles of ashes where wood had burned, and a few puddles of wax from seel-tallow candles. There was no breakfast cooking fire, only a pot with some cold liquids and non-earth solids in the bottom, and some cooling ashes under it. Just barely enough for another bowl. Maybe two.


    Rian had lied to her. There wasn''t plenty for everyone. They had plenty of food, but none of it was getting cooked. Because the latrine was full and a little hunger was easier to deal with.


    Sighing, she got to her feet, wincing at the sudden numbness in her posterior, the assorted aches in other places, and the full feeling that said she would be needing the lavatory herself soon.


    There was the sound of small feet, and the brat came back, holding a full water skin, the outside of it a little wet. "Lord Rian said to give this to you," the brat said. She looked at the empty bowl in Lori''s hands. "Do you want more?"


    Lori held out the bowl. "Please."


    The brat took it and walked dutifully off as Lori drank from the skin. After all, she wasn''t some kind of strange person who felt guilty about getting more to eat.


    When the brat came back with a bowl of stone-cold stew, Lori reheated it, and continued eating. She needed her strength, after all. She needed to get everything done fast so she could find those wisplings. If she could capture them, study them, find out how they were self-sustaining¡­


    Lori swallowed one last spoonful and stopped. "Well, I''m full," she said.


    The brat frowned disapproving at the still half-filled bowl. "You shouldn¡¯t waste food," she said, sounding much more intent than any other time she''d ever chided Lori before. "It''s wrong to waste food."


    Lori shrugged, holding the bowl out to her. "You can have it then," she said. "Stay here and keep an eye out through the airholes, will you? I want to know if any beasts or anything else strange comes close. "


    The brat blinked, but took the bowl, staring at the food. There was a rumbling sound.


    Lori knelt down to pick up her staff, then went off into the cave to unclog the lavatory if possible and make a new one if not.


    Behind her, she felt the void of wisps that was the brat start to eat.

 19 - A Mess To Deal With

    The overfull lavatory had been dealt with. Pressure differential had been involved. It had taken a while since something had gotten into the stone pipes she''d made for the lavatory, but had died inside because¡­ well, the situation was inimical to life. It took some concentrating since she had to try to place the positioning of everything blind with only her awareness of wisps to sense it. Fortunately, she''d recently gotten a lot of practice in doing just that, so she managed to unclog the pipe and empty the seat.


    There was probably some sort of smell left, but Lori just bound airwisps to the entrance of the lavatory to keep the bad smells in and out of the rest of the cave. Use at your own risk.


    She, of course, went first, blasting the place with boiling water congealed out of the air to clean it. They were trying to stay clean, after all.


    That done, and with a long line of people eager to take her place, she went to check on the water reservoir, and was glad to see¨C once she''d made some light, because the reservoir was very, very dark and deep¨C that there was nothing floating at the bottom, so no one had been throwing things in it either. As impromptu water reservoirs went, it had done well. She''d have to work on a system to keep the water from getting stale and better placement to prevent contamination, though¡­


    The wash area for dishes was next. She made sure to make it far from the reservoir, with runoffs in the stone to prevent dirty water from eventually flowing to their drinking water. She added a basic stone cistern. People would have to fill it manually, but it wasn''t like they had anything else to do, and she was fairly sure they had more than one bucket. They could make a bucket relay.


    Lori frowned, then went back to the reservoir, judged the depth compared to the amount of water, then shrugged and starting making stone piping in the walls, using a pressure differential to initially pull the water up from the reservoir and have it come out in a hole in the wall about the cistern. She couldn''t keep it perpetually running, but it would be convenient for refilling the water in future. She also added a hole for water to drain out through connected to the drain for her private bath, with waterwisps to pull it out and take it into the fields outside. It would make things outside muddy, but it wasn''t like there was anyone walking on it now.


    Someone was setting up a fire now, and things were being cut to go into the stew pot. After binding some airwisps to circulate air from the air holes in front so people didn''t asphyxiate to death, Lori took a moment to look around. Her cave, despite having a hundred people in it, wasn¡¯t'' actually all that full. Most were clustered together, so there was actually a lot of room to move. What was taking up space was the random piles of things people had carried in with them. clothes, tools, random worthless junk, that sort of thing. It was all a tripping hazard, since more of the place was still dark, and the air holes she made, while bright in their immediate vicinity, didn''t provide a lot of illumination. Since she didn''t need to keep her attention focused outside, she started binding lightwisps to illuminate things.


    That seemed like the signal for more people to get up and start moving. The line to the lavatory grew, and she checked on it to make sure it wasn''t full again. Fortunately, people stayed out of her way.


    She found Rian checking on their sick people. In the light, his disheveled tiredness had become a worn, rugged determination of one who wasn''t giving up in the face of adversity, which some people probably found inspiring. She had to wonder if Rian had ever worked at a theater. He just managed to be so heroic all the time. And not even all the same kind of heroic. It was one of the things that annoyed her about him.


    He heard her coming, nodding to her and finishing what he was saying to the sick person¨C an older woman who looked just barely not too old to go on something as dangerous and strenuous as setting a new continent¨C before getting to his feet and facing her. "Hey," he began, "look, I just wanted to say I''m sorry for earlier. I was tired, but that was no excuse, I shouldn''t have said what I did and¨C"


    "Have you eaten?" Lori said, interrupting whatever pointless thing he was rambling about.


    Rian blinked at being cut off. "Er, not yet."


    "Used the lavatory?"


    "While everyone was asleep," Rian said, looking more confused.


    "Cleaned your sword?"


    "Mostly¡­?"


    "Well, eat something and then find some big, strong men to handle the machetes and axes," Lori said. "We''re going on a beast hunt, and you and they are coming with me."


    "¡­" Rian ''¡­''-ed. "¡­Maybe spears would be safer? You know, since the action will be a long way away on the other end?"


    "Do we have any spears?" Lori asked. "I thought we''ve just been using sharpened sticks for beast baiting."


    "Why risk good spearheads when you can use sharpened sticks?" Rian said.


    "Then why aren''t they in my treasure room?" Lori said


    "Since when did you have a treasure room?"


    "Since my bedroom was converted into one."


    "Okay, first off, it''s not your treasure room."


    "It''s my room, and it''s full of valuable metal wealth, which is treasure, so it''s my treasure room."


    "¡­I''m going to leave that one alone then," Rian said. "And it''s not there because the people were worried for their families and wanted a weapon on hand in case something got in."


    "If something got in, I''d be dead," Lori said.


    Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    "Which is when you''d really want something to defend your family with, don''t you think?"


    Lori couldn''t argue against that logic.


    "Gather them up," Lori said. "You have an hour. Then we''re going to clear out the areas near the settlement so everyone can stop messing up my nice Dungeon."


    "The food''s not ready yet. They just started cooking," Rian protested.


    Lori rolled her eyes. All these excuses¡­ "Fine, two hours then. And get everyone ready to sleep here, since I don''t think we''ll be able to clear enough before sundown. I''ll see about making someplace people can wash."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She had to turn her dark room into a bath, since her private bathroom would clearly not be able to accommodate everyone. It was a simple bath, as things went. A long trough to be filled with warm water, some holes in the ground for the water to drain to the outside (and get the ground even more muddy), and a stern admonition not to waste water. She didn''t have the space to put in individual alcoves as she had in the baths outside (she thought they were still standing, but she''d dropped the darkness around them a few times, so for all she knew something had happened to it), and anyway, at this point everyone had bathed in the open air, washing off a day''s Iridescence with only a line of carts to separate the women from the men, that a little public bathing wasn''t a problem as long as it was sex segregated. That''s not even taking into account whatever different nudity taboos people had brought from their original demesne.


    It took up a lot of time and water, washing everyone and the plates and utensils too, and she was pretty sure most had brought in their clothes to at least beat a little of the dirt out of them, but at least concerns of people getting sick from unsanitary conditions were pushed back.


    Lori wasn''t there for that, as she, Rian, and a group of volunteers, many of who she recognized from those who''d helped dig the original little cave for the core, got ready to go out. Wooden branches that the children had donated from their stockpiles of backup seeling rods, which some had brought with them for reasons that had probably made sense to them and which they were feeling smug about now, and with Lori''s stockpiles of beast teeth had been combined to make spears with earthwisp-molded spearheads and, at Rian''s suggestion, crossguards so that whatever they faced couldn''t just keep impaling themselves on the spears to eventually get close enough to rip someone to shreds. These and the shorter hand tools like axes and machetes were enough to make the volunteers, seven of them in total, feel secure enough to go out of the cave with Lori and Rian and face whatever dragonborn abominations may be out there.


    There would have been nine, but Lori had taken one look at Umu and Mikon''s complete ignorance in handling spears and told them their participation was barred.


    This time Lori had gotten her knife and tied it around her forearm for easy access, since it had a spring that kept the blade in place unless pulled out properly. She''d brought it for exactly that safety feature. She also made sure the coalcharm on her staff, as well as the ones she''d retrieved from her pack, had live coals in them. Her hat and raincoat had been left behind, and she carried a quiver-like pouch with lengths of cured wood in it at her side. The pieces of quartz in her staff buzzed.


    Rian had belted on his sword, which he had managed to clean by laboriously scraping off the gunk that had dried on it. The bodily fluids of whatever he''d killed with it seemed to have more in common with tree sap than blood, including how hard it was to remove. Still, the spear in his hands seemed to be the weapon he planned to use, perhaps a sign of solidarity, or possibly because he realized you can''t really use a sword against a beast.


    "Everyone ready?" Rian said, looking over the volunteers as Lori made sure her boots were on properly. "Lanwei, you get enough sleep? Feeling up to this? Malia, is there someone watching Karina? Yes? Okay then. How about you Pellee, Markes, you feel up to this?"


    "Can''t hide in a cave forever, Lord Rian," one of the men said, gripping his spear nervously.


    "Dungeon," Lori corrected absently.


    There was a sudden silence.


    "Binder Lori would like us to remember this is a Dungeon, not a cave," Rian said, with easy humor. "Caves don''t usually have working bathrooms."


    This got a nervous, sycophantic laugh, and Lori wished she had her hat so she could roll her eyes out of view. But no, it was in her room so it wouldn''t get in her way. Instead she stood and stomped her boots into place, then nodded in satisfaction at their fit. They were relatively new, and had taken the beating of getting here fairly well, but she REALLY hoped someone here knew how to make new shoes.


    "All right everyone, let''s get ready," Rian said. "Ralii, Armis, you''re up front on either side, hopefully whatever''s out there are beast-like enough you can recognize any tracks they make. Missus Malia, you watch our rear, make sure nothing sneaks up on us. Rafel, keep an eye up, just in case something''s in the trees or in the sky, we don''t know what we''re dealing with. Everyone else, keep an eye out everywhere else. Binder Lori should be able to tell if there''s anything nearby, but let''s make it easy on her, she can''t keep track of everything at once."


    Then he looked at her and smiled, indicating she was to lead. Well, fine.


    She''d already checked. There were no voids of wisps directly in front of the cave, so whatever was blocking the light from reaching her new air holes was undoubtedly dead. The nearest mobile void was on the other side of the sawpits, and its view of them would be blocked. Still, Lori was careful as she willed the stones to move aside and flow to make a hallway through the thick bulwark of stone, choosing a spot where there was light. She was about to move forward and step out when she remembered.


    "Rian, up front," she said. "See there''s nothing that will kill me right away."


    Rian nodded, and lowered the spear, holding it level with the point in front of him using both hands. Creeping past her, he approached the opening, then pressed himself to the wall on one side, and quickly darted his head out. He just as quickly pulled it back in again.


    "Well?" Lori asked. "What did you see?"


    "Moved too fast, didn''t see anything," Rian said, smiling sheepishly. There were chuckles from the volunteers. Lori made to kick him in the shin. "Wait, hang on, I''ll try that again."


    Cautiously, he stuck his head out slower. His head stayed there as he looked back and forth.


    "Well?" Lori said.


    "It¡­ could be worse?" he said hesitantly. "I think you can fix most of it. Lots of rocks everywhere though¡­"


    "And the thing in front of the Dungeon?" Lori pressed.


    Rian moved a little father forward, looking out to the side. "Well, it''s big and I think it''s dead," Rian said. "Doesn''t seem to be breathing, or at least I can''t see it from here. It''s really big though. Bigger than your old bedroom. Or your new bedroom. Hang on, I''ll just¨C"


    Lori felt water- and earthwisps move just as the shadows in front of the air holes changed, and something slammed into the edge of the opening in the stone with an explosion of dust and a crack of shattering rock.


    With a surprised cry, Rian just barely managed to keep from having his head crushed, falling back on his posterior as a dark, pointy wedge the size of a barrel snapped at where he''d been. Lori and the volunteers darted back, some dropping their spears in surprise as the dark wedge drew back, then slammed into the opening again. More stone shattered and Lori saw with horror that the opening was getting wider as a deep screech like two stones grinding together echoed through the cave.


    His spear was still in his hands. With a cry, Rian rose to his feet, using the surge to drive the spear at the dark wedge that Lori realized was the tip of an enormous, scissor-like mouth.


    The beast-tooth point struck the mouth and promptly shattered.


    Rian darted back with great alacrity, staring at the broken spearhead. "Well, shit."

 Ryan Is An Isekai! - April Fools 2021!

    If there was one thing he found mildly aggravating about Demesne, it was that people kept mispronouncing his name. They kept going for the short vowel sounds instead of the long one. He''d given up correcting people and nowadays Ryan just rolled with it.


    Still, it could have been worse. At least he was speaking the local language. He wasn''t sure what dark and unknowable eldritch sorcery was involved¨C he''d done his research and Mentalism magic apparently couldn''t be used to just shove information into your brain like that¨C but it was convenient nevertheless, since the last time he''d tried to learn a foreign language that wasn''t English had gone horribly. Olympian-type gods and other sorts of Random Omnipotent Beings didn''t seem to be have involved either, since the two major religions worshipped either the dungeons themselves (considering the Dungeon Binder as something of a living avatar or high priest at best, and not a deific being), or the scientific method.


    Yeah, he''d been kind of surprised about that. Usually one expected it to be the opposite in a fantasy setting¨C and he called this a fantasy setting because MAGIC!¨C but no, the other common, widespread religion dealt with the rational analysis, testing, data recording and widespread dissemination of experimental results and conclusions. It was a proper religion though. There''d been schisms, wars, persecutions of those who believed in thought experiments over empirical testing¡­ all the things a proper religion got around to eventually.


    Despite him being a good Catholic boy, he was on the side of the empiricists on that one. Notes, or it didn''t happen!


    Still, after six years here, he thought he was doing pretty well. He''d found a job at a lumberyard delivering wood to carpenters and furniture makers, one of his coworkers had introduced him to her relatives who ran a boarding house, and he''d been pretty much resigned himself to never getting home or even finding out how the hell he''d gotten here. It wasn''t like there was a convenient legend or ancient mythical being he could easily point to and say ''that done it''. So he just counted his blessings that being sent here didn''t involve getting intimate with any part of Truck-kun and went on with his new life.


    A new life that had started to chafe, to be honest. Because quite frankly, if he was going to live in a fantasy world from now on, then he could do so much more than being an inner-city manual laborer no matter how much he liked the job. He had good pay, good co-workers, he lived in a clean, peaceful city, the local sorcerous overlord wasn''t a tyrannical megalomaniac ruling with fear and blood (he actually seemed a nice fellow, who had recently decided to increase funding to public schools and working on overhauling the steam-powered public transport of the demesne)¡­ all right, it was a significant improvement to living in President Quezon''s wish come true that was Metro Manila. But it hardly had that ''high-school-dropout-by-default living in a fantasy world isekai experience'' shine to it, did it? If he wanted that sort of better life, he''d have moved to New Zealand or Canada after graduating.


    So when news came of the new continent over the eastern ocean, and the new opportunities available for people to set up in the new demesne to be founded, he decided that enough was enough, he was going on an adventure. So he gave his employer his two months notice (because he checked the forecasts and predictions and found it would be dragons season soon, which was suicidal travel weather), and started getting ready.


    That was when he finally learned he lived in a deathworld covered with some sort of unnatural, probably-magical rainbow poison that could only be kept out by Dungeons¨C which finally made sense to him, since he''d been living assuming that the local sorcerous overlords were into some kinky shit¨C and that people were essentially trying to settle a continent full of toxic waste. Full of dinosaurs. Not fun cuddly Flintstones dinosaurs, but man-eating landsharky dinosaurs.


    He was ashamed to admit part of the reason he chose to go was that he really wanted to see and possibly ride a dinosaur.


    Lots of people tried to talk him out of it, of course. His landlord, his landlord''s daughters, his boss, his boss''s daughters, his coworkers, that nice girl who manned (womanned?) the counter of the bakery he bought his lunch, that nice librarian who always helped him out, but in the end, he would not be dissuaded. He was young, he was healthy, he''d been sent to another world (somehow), he was going to have an adventure while he was still young enough to potentially survive it!


    He had to explain this multiple times, but that was all right. People were just worried about him, after all, which was very nice of them.


    His employer at the lumberyard had sighed. "Well, if you''re sure¡­ still, I''ll be sad to see you go, boy. You''re a good worker."


    Ryan had laughed bashfully. "Oh, I''m sure you''ll be able to find someone to replace me boss, inexperienced help isn''t that hard to find."


    "Well, it''ll certainly be hard to find someone with your attitude," his boss had said. "Come with me, I''ve got something that can maybe help."


    And so Ryan had followed his boss to the part of the lumberyard where the boss and his family lived, towards a storage room.


    "Here," his boss had said, presenting Ryan with a sword he took out of a flat wooden case. It was cross-shaped, simple and unadorned, and there were some spots of rust on the blade. "If you''re sure about going, then take this with you."


    "Sir, I can''t take that," Ryan had said. "Doesn''t it belong to your family?"


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    "Belonged to my great-uncle," his boss had confirmed. "Well, he''s dead now, and it''s not doing anyone any good getting rusty here. You take it. Maybe it''ll help keep you alive."


    Ryan had solemnly accepted the blade. He hadn''t had the heart to tell his boss he already had seven other swords from his various coworkers, his landlord''s husband, the baker and that nice librarian.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    And so, down to one sword and with all his worldly possessions on his person, Ryan¡­ sensibly took a boat down to the port city of Iskandaliya By The Sea Demesne, taking the time to read up on the quite frankly megalomaniacal woman who renamed the place, who apparently went into battle riding a kaiju-sized golem that fired frickin'' laser beams from its eyes. While the ticket cost a lot, it was much safer than trying to walk cross country like some loose ten year-old who wanted to be the very best that no one ever was.


    If this were a book, the boat he was on would probably have been attacked by some nebulous force of evil or something, but no, they made it safely to their destination, the air-tight glass canopy and lining of the boat supposedly protecting them from evil rainbow magic poison. His trip across the ocean was equally boring, albeit without any glass and more bathing in salt water. He lost the books he''d brought along to read because they couldn''t be washed to get iridescence out, which was a shame and a waste, but they also didn''t run into any of the giant salt-water crocodiles roaming the oceans or get attacked by pirates or any such excitement, so that was okay.


    Ryan had originally applied to be a sailor on the ship so he could work his way, but had been refused for not being a properly trained and certified sailor. Apparently there was a trade school for that, which he hadn''t been aware about. So with nothing to do to pass the time but looking out over the ocean and staying out of the sailors'' way, he chatted with the other families traveling with him, who were more than willing to chat back since everyone was literally on the same boat.


    A lot of them were from families living on the edges of demesne, on the curved, irregular portions literally right up against the Iridescence that were considered too close to the edge to farm or develop. Many had been farmhands for people who actually owned or ran the farms, or the cultivated woods cut down for raw material. Unlike him, they were doing this not for adventure but to find a better life for their families


    It was a heart wrenching story to hear, and Ryan had really sympathized with his fellow passengers. A lot of them wore really worn and thin clothing, which were not faring well from the daily dunkings in seawater that they and their belongings all had to undergo to get rid of Iridescence. Why, Mikon''s blouses were so thin it was practically transparent even without being wet, and unlike her aunt she had nothing to cover it up until he gave her one of his spare shirts. Umu was just as bad, trying to sit close to him for warmth and always telling him how cold she was at night and how nice it would be to sleep warm. After a few days, his heart couldn''t take it anymore, and he''d given her his blanket to sleep with. He''d made do with the folded canvas he''d been planning to use as a ground cloth.


    At night, while people slept, he liked to watch the moons from the deck. Even after six years of being on Demesne, he still found it fantastic they had four moons in the sky. And they didn''t just look like the regular moon back home with a color filter because of budget reasons. The blue moon was clearly covered in water, and every night it was out the shapes of the clouds on its surface changed, visible to the naked eye. He''d read that astrologers had been keeping track of its weather patterns for thousands of years, and that they discovered Coriolis forces by observing the movements of storms on its surface.


    The storm moon reminded him of a smaller version of Jupiter, covered in rushing clouds and swirls of storms. Bursts of enormous moon-wide lightning flashes that would crawl across the moon''s surface, creating veiny formations of brightness against the slightly darker clouds, burning brilliantly on the nightward side. Scholars and wizards apparently argued back and forth about whether the storm moon was the source or at least the origin of dragons.


    The red moon¡­ well, he''d expected it to look like pictures of Mars, but it hadn''t. Instead, it looked like portions of South America and Africa dyed red, with dark twisty veins of mountain ranges, and white caps on the poles. According to the book he''d read, the redness was from the native plant life of the red moon. Instead of clouds, water in the atmosphere apparently condensed as low-level fog at the borders of its day and night, so its face was never obscured.


    Even the pale moon, the most like the moon he''d been born under, had been alien. It was haloed by a haze that was supposedly a cloud of dust surrounding it, and it had been pure white. From astrological observation through telescopes, it was covered in ice.


    Sometimes he wondered if this wasn''t a fantasy world, but instead a sci-fi world. Surely a fantasy world wouldn''t have such mundane wonders that even a high school dropout who''d used to have a ''just-barely-failing'' average could understand the principles behind? It should have ancient magical artifacts made with arcane secrets that required math that had to account for twenty dimensions and ancient beings with unpronounceable names that made sense in synesthesia. The afterlife should be a concrete, known quantity, and people should be swearing by the gods'' bodyparts and goddesses'' virtues. The moons should be the corpses of fallen gods slain at the birth of the world from doing battle against demons or something.


    They shouldn''t be mere balls of rock covered in ice and plants and weather and water.


    Still, Ryan didn''t feel shortchanged. They were fantastic rocks.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was only when they arrived in Covehold Demesne that things started feeling properly fantasy-esque, if the fantasy you were into was Filipino Human Misery Empathy fantasies. The waters of the docks reeked of pollution, the entire city smelled like human shit and piss, and in his group of people disembarking, at least three people lost possessions when someone in the crowd grabbed one of their bags and ran. It was, as the old desert hermit would say, a wretched hive of scum and villainy seemingly built to take as much as it could from people passing through, then kick them out when they had nothing left to take.


    Ryan was filled with a strong sense of disgusted nostalgia, feeling strangely at home.


    So of course when the next thief made to steal the bundle of possessions Umu was carrying, Ryan had punched the snatcher in the face and took the bag back. Then he''d smiled brightly at the other loiterers just standing around doing nothing and lying in wait for an unattended bag until they got the message and left.


    After all these years, Ryan felt his fantasy isekai life was finally starting properly.


    Hopefully he wouldn''t get eaten by a dinosaur before he''d had a chance to ride one.

 20 - Detritus To Clean

    Throwing lightning is more complicated than simply imbuing lightningwisps, willing them to go in a direction and expecting results. Doing it like that is the common beginner mistake, since it just means a lot of lightning goes everywhere. Despite the popular image of lightning coming down from the sky, or the standard theater depiction of just gesturing at a foe and expecting lightning to leap from one''s hands to strike them down, this is an incredibly inefficient and dangerous method. For one thing, throwing lightning from bare hands means using one''s own internal lightningwisps, which will leave one''s arm dangerously numb and likely in danger of organ failure as the lightningwisps needed by the body to function are depleted.


    The best way to use lightningwisps was with touch, or with a conductive wire. Barring that, if one really needed to throw lightning, then do it the way nature does it: send a stream of lightningwisps to prepare a path, carried forth on a current of airwisps, and THEN throw lightning. It''s slow to do and loses accuracy over distance, but it''s much more controllable than just throwing it out like a rock.


    Lolilyuri knew all this, so as soon as Rian got out of the way, she drew the lightningwisps from one of the quartz in her staff, prepared a path for the lightning to go and, because she learned to do this in school, bound airwisps to her ears to keep from being deafened before unleashing lightning imbued with power from her core. It struck the wedgelike mouth, and there was a smell of strange gases and sizzling water.


    She was rewarded by the wedge drawing back and slamming into the opening again. More rock crumbled as whatever it was kept trying to get in.


    "I thought you said it was dead?!" she demanded.


    "You said it was dead first, I just said it wasn''t breathing!" Rian said, picking up one of the dropped spears. "What now?"


    Lori moved the earth.


    The stone she''d piled in the ground of the cave to act as a bulwark heaved, surging forward to physically repulse whatever was trying to batter its way in. There was a tremendous crash as whatever was out there was pushed away from the Dungeon. The ground shuddered as it rolled, then shuddered again at the sounds of limbs being flailed against the ground. Whatever it was, it was trying to get back to its feet.


    Still, while it was unsettled, Lori took the opportunity to see just what it was that was attacking them, stepping up to where Rian had crouched and sticking her head out the entrance.


    In the empty space in front of the Dungeon''s entrance, lying on its back and struggling to right itself, was a small islandshell. Its pale underbelly gleamed in the afternoon sun, looking like thick leather plates as its fins tried to gain any sort of purchase, its movements making it slide downslope ever so slightly. Its shell alone seemed to be more than four paces long, maybe five, and its eyes were bigger than Lori''s head. Or at least the sockets of where its eyes should be. The eye facing her was gone, leaving a gaping hole in its skull that let Lori see cavities and internal features and what looked like slugs eating its flesh.


    Someone let out a long whistle next to Lori. "Whoa," Rian said. "That''s big. Smaller than I thought they would be, though."


    "That''s because it''s likely an infant," Lori said. "It can''t be more than a year out of the egg. Look, it hasn''t grown any shell spines yet."


    "These things get bigger?" Rian exclaimed.


    "Of course," Lori said. "It''s why they''re called islandshells. From a distance they look like islands. I suppose it became some sort of undead because of the dragon."


    They watched as it kept struggling to get back upright.


    "I guess the dragon must have picked it up from the ocean and carried it along¡­ somehow?" Rian said, sounding skeptical.


    Lori shrugged. "It''s been known to happen. I''ve read of dragons dropping all sorts of things on land. Dilians, graspers, giant graspers, adult islandshells, all kinds of fursh¡­ there have been ships as big as the Armada''s dockships too. One got dropped in the middle of the Shining Desert. Still had people in it. They died before one of their wizards could manage to build a Dungeon."


    "I should be surprised you know all these depressing things, but I''m not," Rian said. "It somehow seems exactly like you. Are you going to put it on ice? Because you still haven¡¯t¨C"


    "No, I''m not putting it on ice," Lori said regretfully. Then she winced. "Ugh, I need to make sure those two are still frozen. If they''re walking around¡­"


    "That would be creepy. I liked Ahnree," Rian said. "Elceena was a bit hard to deal with though."


    Lori frowned at him. "What are you talking about?"


    "Ahnree and Elceena?" Rian said. "The two people whose corpses you have buried in ice?"


    Oh. Just names. Lori didn''t bother paying attention. "Get the pieces of your spear and the volunteers together while I deal with this," she said.


    Rian looked at the islandshell, then at her. "May I ask how? Because that thing is huge, still moving and already dead. How are you going to kill it properly?"


    "Bloodthirsty today, aren''t you?" Lori said. "I just have to keep it on its back until it stops moving. Then we can harvest it for the leather, the shell and the bones. That''s already one house, easy." She stepped out towards the undead islandshell,


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    Rian''s hand at her shoulder stopped her, and she turned to him in annoyance.


    "You already missed one dead thing," Rian said. "What if there are two?"


    Lori stared at him. "Good point. Other people should go first."


    "Can we not phrase it that way?" Rian said. "I mean, it''s true, but phrasing¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once Rian''s spear was repaired, Lori had raised up the islandshell on pillars of rock so that there would not be enough leverage for it to flip itself over, and Rian had given their volunteers some motivating, heroic drivel to dull their self-preservation instincts, they and the volunteers crept out of the Dungeon, and Lori had pulled some stone from the bulwark to form a boulder and rolled it in front of the entryway. That way, if all of them died, at least those in the cave could push it out of the way. Lori stood in the center of their formation, drying and compacting the ground so it wouldn''t slow them down as she kept track of the things she could sense. Rian stood at the forefront, spear in hand, head swiveling side to side and occasionally up and down, as if he expected bugs to suddenly descend on them or for things to pop up out of the ground.


    All this attentiveness meant they didn''t miss the state of the settlement as they checked all the nearby buildings for things hiding in them, living or dead. Rocks, fallen trees, puzzle-like pieces of wood that had come apart in the dragon''s passing, branches and a few whole trees, their trunks shattered stumps, were strewn about randomly. One of the shelters had collapsed, its roof caved in, and reeds were growing out of the opening. Everyone stayed well away from it, as even at a distance they could see the leaves were moving strangely even without any wind, and it was, by Lori''s reckoning, definitely alive. The other shelter still stood, but Lori could feel it was full of water, and from the sounds coming from it, seels and other things had gotten in. The baths were similarly flooded, and Lori felt some kind of waterwisplings inside of it, feeding on each other like starving bugs slowly picking off the weakest among them. The dining hall''s roof had fallen in, shattering the tables and benches that had been too heavy to move, and for some reason trees were growing from it, as well as the small dirt mound that was the dining hall''s cold room. Ralii and Armis, the two with experience with hunting beasts in the wild (as opposed to being baited from a tower) grimly pointed at tracks. Many were the familiar three-toed footprints of beasts, though some, the hunters said, seemed too deep for their size, and were surrounded by strange drag marks.


    To everyone''s bemusement, the field where they''d been digging latrines was full of young saplings, growing so thickly together there was almost no space between them, their roots almost seeming to meld into a single whole. A tall, thick-trunked tree was growing from each latrine hole, rising high into the sky.


    Nearly all of the houses had lost their wooden roofs, the wood ripped from their mountings on the walls, and a few of the houses had collapsed, their mix of compressed dirt and stone strewn about. Lori had to stare at the only one with a roof remaining. The wood seemed to have been turned to a dark stone. She could feel the earthwisps in it, with only a few patches of wood left.


    "Is that coal?" someone asked.


    Rian poked it with the tip of his spear. "Not soft enough," he said. "It''s definitely not wood, though."


    "It''s known to happen," Lori said. "Dragon claws leave patches where matter is somehow altered. Turning trees to stone, buildings to glass, that sort of thing. If we''re lucky, we''ll find some patches of ground turned into metal. Those are rare, though, or so I''ve heard. The rocks are more likely to be metal."


    "Claws?" Rian said.


    "The slow lightning," Lori elaborated.


    Everyone looked around at all the rocks strewn about. Many were clearly regular rocks, but a few definitely looked different. The blacksmith with them, something Smith, who Lori only remembered because he was huge and had his profession as a second name, was eyeing a large reddish brown rock nearby.


    "Right," Rian said. "Beast hunt now, rock hunt later. Lori, you said there was one nearby?"


    Lori pointed with her staff. "Near the sawpit," she said. "It didn''t seem to be moving much, but it was big."


    "Then we go to the sawpit," Rian said. "And hopefully it''ll as easy as that one." He pointed at the undead islandshell, still struggling to right itself.


    "You didn''t do a single useful thing," Lori said flatly.


    "Exactly," Rian said. "Easy, and with no danger to it at all."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Okay, that just looks pathetic," Rian commented.


    Two of the curing sheds had collapsed, but a lot of the wood still seemed to be there, just buried under the debris. The sides of the sawpit had fallen in a little, but that was a minor problem. There wasn''t much you could do to really hurt a hole in the ground.


    This abomination walked on three muscular limbs instead of two, with a fourth limb sticking upward from between its two tails and occasionally kicking as if trying to launch itself to a sudden blinding burst of speed. And it needed the third limb, since its body was so big it seemed obese, with two distinctly different color patterns wrapped around it, contrasting so sharply there seemed to be seams along its sides. It was also lopsided, and had a tendency to list to the left, since there was more weight on that side of its body. Its tails swung, trying to stabilize it, but kept hitting each other and unbalancing it even more. It often stumbled forward, and had to catch itself on its foreclaws. Unlike the legs, all four were in front and seemed fully functional and sharp.


    It had a single head, but was supported by two necks that met at the base of the lopsided skull and again at shoulders. It only had two eyes, one on the side of its head, and one on the top of its head. Both of its toothy jaws seemed capable of biting though, even if one of them was turned sideways and flapping vertically. The colorful frill around its neck was twisted around, and made it look like it had an askew collar. With the way it was stumbling and the piteous, confused cries coming from both mouths, it seemed like a drunkard trying to make sense of where it was. the abomination seemed to be ignoring the sounds made by the undead islandshell entirely, and Lori wondered if it''s hearing had been adversely affected. But no, they probably weren''t that lucky.


    "I feel like we''re putting it out of its misery," Rian said quietly as they tried to stay behind it so as not to be seen. "How is this dangerous?"


    "It might look pathetic, but it still has claws and teeth, and now it has double the dietary needs," Lori pointed out.


    "I suppose," Rian said. "Still, it seems kind of sad. It was just minding its own business, and then a dragon happens, and now it''s deformed and we''re here to kill it just because it''s near where we live."


    "It¡¯s a large predator that''s not writhing in agony from being inside a demesne," Lori pointed out. "If we don''t kill it, it might spawn, and then this demesne will start filling with beasts out to kill and eat us."


    Rian hefted his spear. "Well, let''s kill it and hope the meat isn''t poisonous or anything. After you, Binder Lori."

 21 - Checking On Corpses

    "I said ''after you''," Rian said.


    "And I''m not falling for it, stay in front of me," Lori said flatly.


    "The way you''re gripping the back of my shirt so firmly is concerning, though," Rian said.


    "Don''t get distracted in front of the beast, that''s how people die."


    "That''s what I''m worried about!"


    It would have been trivial for Lori to kill the beast right then and there. She was very experienced at it after all, between the long overland journey, often through high grass that beasts just loved hiding in before launching an ambush, to their little beast baiting that got them meat, skins and useful bones.


    But while it wouldn''t be difficult to drag the beast to the cave¨C the two hunters with them assured her that the individual beasts the abomination was made of were ones they''d eaten before, to no ill effect¨C it would probably be unsanitary to kill it near the sawpits, not to mention the smell of its entrails and such might draw the other abominations in the demesne to the area, and to the dungeon by extension.


    So at the very least, they had to lure it away from the sawpit so that they''d have one less thing to clean up after killing it. Lori and Rian kept an eye on it while the volunteers led by the two hunters Ralii and Armis (names Lori was already beginning to forget) went in the direction they intended to lure it. As far as Lori could tell there was nothing alive that way but trees, but there might be something dead that wasn''t moving but could. They had spears, they could handle any moving dead things just fine.


    When the volunteers came back and waved that they''d found nothing, only then did Lori make her move. She willed the ground under the abomination''s feet to soften, becoming like wet mud, then soaked clay, until its feet started sinking down into it.


    The abomination noticed, of course, and distractedly started pulling out its feet, but after a while it seemed to resign itself and just let itself sink. Lori made it lower slowly, shaping the ground so it wouldn''t completely enclose the feet even as it sank lower and lower. Lori tensed as the abominating adjusted its feet once more, stepping to the side, but she managed to make the ground in that direction part so that the abomination didn''t rise out of the trap. Finally, as the thing settled its feet once more, Lori had the parted ground rush in, trapping its three legs up to the first reversed knee and compacting the stone solid.


    The result was immediate. The beast gave two high warbling cries, one from each mouth, then cut off as its rotund torso heaved. Evidently there was something wrong with its lungs. It thrashed, trying to free itself, but Lori was reinforcing the stone, which held firm. The ground began to flow, and the abomination started sliding away from the sawpit and the settlement. The volunteers hastily moved out of the way of its long tail and reaching neck. The frill around the abomination of combined beasts neck flared wide, and the sideways jaw opened wide, only for it to start choking, and a thick mucus began to dribble down from the corner of the mouth and towards the ground.


    "I think it spits poison or something," Rian said. "Just a guess."


    "Noted," Lori said.


    "Can you please stop using me as a human shield now?"


    "I have no idea what you''re talking about. Now, continue protecting me."


    The volunteers fell in with them, and Rian reminded them to keep watch, especially upward, as Lori continued sliding the abomination away. They didn''t go far. The woods and canopy of leaves around the settlement were still thick, even after the dragon''s passing¨C in fact, Lori got the distinct impression some leaves were comically bigger than they should be¨C and with the low sun, it was soon dark under the trees. She spent the time gathering water vapor from the air, gathering it as mist around her hand.


    When they had walked far enough, she gathered the vapor into water, and used a narrow, pressurized stream to cut off its head.


    Thankfully, the abomination died as it should with its head severed from both necks. The hunters began draining it of blood while the others went back to the sawpit to get something to carry it back to the Dungeon with. Lori found a place to sit with a tree at her back as she watched them efficiently go about turning the beast from a corpse to food and useable materials, keeping watch for any approaching voids of wisps as she helped move the blood along. Now that it was dead, the wisps in its body were hers to claim just like any other. They handled the head carefully, as it was dripping something besides blood that Lori assumed must have been the venom it had been trying to spit. There shouldn''t be much of a problem¨C Rian claimed that venoms tended to not be poisonous when ingested, something the hunters among the volunteers confirmed¨C but since this was meant to be topical venom instead of one injected into the blood, they treated it carefully anyway. Someone put the head in a bag of beast skin so they could get the jaws and teeth later.


    The torso was opened to remove the offal and other objectionable parts being spilled out onto the ground. From experience, Lori had long since readied bound airwisps to keep the smell away from her. After they removed the organs, she helped in cleaning blood from the insides by condensing water from vapor to wash it out. It was a routine she and¡­ well, probably one of these two at some point, but also some of the other people versed in dressing wild meat had become familiar with.


    It was getting dark enough for her to feel the need to bind the few lightwisps left when they finally finished dressing the beast. They had to remove a lot of parts that just seemed wrong, like muscles that seemed to have fused with bone or had somehow become bone, but most of it was in the torso, and everyone agreed the meat there was often too dry, so it wasn''t much of a loss.


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    They loaded the now-dressed abomination¨C no point wasting meat, and both hunters had examined the parts they were bringing along scrupulously, and intended to check it with those volunteering to cook as well¨C on some boards they''d taken from one of the surviving curing sheds. The light was fading, and what Lori had bound didn''t seem enough, so she drew firewisps from a coalcharm and used it to light one of the lengths of firewood she was carrying. It caught, and she was able to bind the lightwisps it produced to add to their light.


    Directionless, radiant light glowed around them, lighting their way back to the Dungeon. The islandshell was still struggling, but it seemed to be weakening. It wasn''t really alive, given that Lori could see its open brain being eaten by slugs and small bugs, and undead, like wisps, would eventually run out of the magic imbued into it. She didn''t know what sort of commands had been given to this islandshell to make it act like it did, but whatever it was, it was consuming the magic imbued into it by the dragon to accomplish it. She figured it would be properly dead by morning if they just left it alone. The next day at the latest. While they wouldn''t eat the meat for¡­ well, probably a whole host of reasons, starting with some of the flesh probably having decayed, and not even getting into what Deadspeaking does to dead flesh, the bones, shell and thick skin would still be very helpful, once it was safe to harvest it.


    They made their way back, and nothing came at them, living or dead. At the Dungeon''s entrance, Lori gave the volunteers the still-burning torch she was holding for light and gestured for them to go in as she repaired the shattered rocks and other damage caused by the islandshell trying to get at them.


    "Come on," she told Rian. "We need to go check on my corpses."


    "It''s very disturbing when you put it that way. You realize that, right?" Rian said. "I mean, most people don''t have a corpse stash lying around."


    "It''s not just lying around," Lori said as she pulled the lightwisps around them and moved them above and behind her head for the best illumation. "They''re safely frozen and buried. Hopefully the ice lasted."


    "If we find either of them walking around, I''m going to scream and run away," Rian warned. "Just letting you know in advance."


    "Noted," Lori said. "Come on, this way."


    The ground seemed undisturbed, if muddy, and a little moving of earthwisps showed that the corpses were still there, though with much less ice and more mud around them. It was simple to rip the water out of the mud and solidify them back to ice. Lori had to carefully redirect the heat this expelled into the ground, but she was soon finished ensuring her corpses were preserved.


    "I suppose I should have asked sooner," Rian said as Lori finished burying them again, this time compressing the dirt above them to keep anything from digging them up, something she should have done before, "but is there something special about their corpses in particular? Not to be callous, but a lot of people, may they rest in peace, died on our way here, but those two are the only ones you''re being careful about preserving. Why?"


    "Does it matter?" Lori said.


    "We literally have no other form of entertainment out here besides¡­ well. And you''ve already shown you hate my stories," Rian said. "So either you try and teach me something, or I try telling you a new story and see how well you like it."


    "Will it be as stupid as the previous one?" Lori said.


    "Only you will be able to tell me," Rian said. "So, why them?"


    Lori sighed, but she supposed it wasn''t exactly a secret. There were even stories about it, although they didn''t seem to be coming to mind for him. "The corpses of wizards can be revived as undead capable of using magic," Lori said. "Not intelligently, and not independently¨C they''re dead, after all¨C but a Binder using them can create an undead capable of enacting simple bindings. If I''d had Elceena''s undead, I''d have likely been able to get more sleep against the dragon and left constantly imbuing the darkwisps to her."


    "Huh¡­" Rian said, sounding strangely thoughtful. "So they''re like¡­ music boxes? Wind them up with magic, and they¡¯ll do this one thing, so you can leave them alone and do something else?"


    That¡­ wasn''t a bad analogy. "Essentially. The stories vary," Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "Of course they do. Why wouldn''t they? Vary how?"


    "Some depict them as simple, like music boxes," Lori said. "Others speak of small forces of dead wizards being led by Binders to battle, and routing numerically superior forces of living wizards."


    "Huh. Well, I''m just some guy, not a wizard like you, so I don''t have any experience with using magic," Rian said. "But if common people can make mistaken assumptions about magic in their stories, why not wizards?"


    Lori gave him a withering look. "Because we actually know what we''re talking about?"


    "And how many wizards know about what Dungeon Binding is like?" Rian said. "Before they become one, that is."


    Lori opened her mouth¡­ and paused, mouth open.


    "Because it seems to me that a Dungeon Binder would have a vested interested in telling outright lies about what they can do so people will overestimate them and leave them alone," Rian continued. "After all, a lot of people would love for them to die so their position will be open for the taking. Why not cut down the numbers by telling grandiose stories about how invincible they are to make people think twice about trying to attack them?"


    Lori stared at him¡­ and eventually remembered to shut her mouth.


    "Just a thought," Rian said with a grin. "It''s not like I went to wizard school and know what I''m talking about¨C"


    "Oh, shut up," Lori snapped. "You make an excellent point, now stop being all humble and smug about it. Perhaps it''s a deliberately untrue story, perhaps something that''s learned with experience and finesse. Either way, I''ll find out once I¡­" Lori cut off angrily.


    "Go back to the continent and spend more years learning to Deadspeak?" Rian said. "And¡­ what''s the other two? Horotract and Mentalist?"


    Lori closed her eyes. She REALLY wanted to tear at her hair and scream in frustration.


    To her surprise, a hand patted her shoulder. Her head snapped up, glaring at a suddenly-closer Rian. "Don''t worry," he said. "You''ll work it out. You''re the smartest, most stubborn person I currently know. If anyone can work out how to do three other kinds of magic from the ground up without so much as a beginner''s guide, it''s you." He smiled at her, the bright, encouraging, stupidly heroic smile that made him look like some sort of portrait of some great hero, encouraging men to their deaths for his glory. Inspiring them to die for his cause despite the forces arrayed before them. "I''ll bet you''ll be doing more than Whispering inside a year."


    "And if I don''t?" Lori said, feeling a strange weight settling on her shoulders, a familiar, painful weight full of her mothers'' smiles and encouragement.


    "Then I''m probably off by a year," Rian said. "But you''ll be able to do it Lori. Because you''re too much of a raging egomaniac to leave the subject alone."


    He smiled a bright, heroically encouraging smile. Forward, stupid minions, die in the jaws of death for my historic glory!


    Lori really wanted to punch those teeth in. They were very annoying.


    Instead, she glared at his hand, and he pulled it back easily.


    "Come on," she said. "Let''s hope no one''s used the water reservoir as a lavatory."

 22 - Rebuilding

    The reservoir was, from what Lori could tell, still clear, and no one had used it as a lavatory. She was almost impressed.


    She had everyone clear a path to the reservoir, with Rian in charge of keeping the way clear, as she sat on a convenient bench she''d formed from the stone bulwark in front of the original cliff face just outside the dungeon and drew water from the river. While the river had looked clear from what they had distantly seen, it was better not to take chances, and turning the water to vapor was the best way to ensure nothing was tainting it. A thick stream of vapor rose from the river, carried on airwisps past her and into the dungeon, where it condensed back into water at the reservoir. After it was filled she''d boil the water just to doubly ensure it wasn''t tainted. That it circulated new, less smelly air into the dungeon was a minor bonus. She''d changed the binding of airwisps at the lavatory so the air in there would be replaced by the new ones coming in.


    It was slow work, but they needed water, and she was refining the process so she wouldn''t have to oversee every step. Bound waterwisps at the river to turn water into vapor, a circulating current of airwisps to move it to the dungeon, and another binding to condense it back again. That made it so she only intermittently needed to devote her attention to each step, leaving her time to sit around and physically do nothing. That was always a good sign of a streamlined process.


    She''d never really seen their settlement at night, having turned in early before now. She''d never had reason to. It wasn''t like they had a nice restaurant or something that made her want to go out and stay up late. As soon as she was done eating dinner, it was back to her Dungeon, and if Rian needed to speak to her about anything, he either knocked on her boulder or waited until breakfast. As she looked upon the wonders of the natural world, she had to conclude she wasn¡¯t missing much of anything. It was mostly lots of dark and nothing, nothing at all like the bright, vibrant lights of the demesne of her youth. Honestly, it was lacking even compared to the time before she''d managed to build the Dungeon. Say what you would about the Iridescence, but it was beautiful, glinting in strange, poisonous colors even in the dim light.


    Now those nighttime colors were gone in the safety of the demesne. Only the blue moon and the storm moon were out, casting their pale lights on the world, and she gathered the meager lightwisps they cast until she could bind enough to light the area around her. Small luminescent bugs flicked back and forth in the night, winking in and out as they danced randomly, sometimes briefly outlining the larger bugs that hunted them a moment before they were eaten. The air was filled with the distant sound of the river flowing, the honking of seels, the slowing struggles of the islandshell, the clicking, chirping and occasional death cries of bugs. The bug population had recovered quickly after the Iridescence had been purged from the demesne, though it was mostly smaller bugs, who had weathered the iridiation leaving their bodies because they''d been eggs or not far enough along in their life cycle to be pained by it. Some of the larger bugs had only just started coming back, gestating from their aquatic stages or slowly coming in from being hatched at the edges of the demesne.


    Lori checked the progress of the reservoir. Filling slowly, since for all its volume, water vapor condensed into very little water. But it was filling, and at a rate that wouldn''t take all night, so Lori let it be. She glanced inside the Dungeon, lit by the cook fire for dinner and bound lightwisps. Despite Rian''s chiding, some of the children were playing in the stream of water vapor, laughing and running and trying futilely to catch the passing cloud. Rian seemed to be trying to get them to sit down. She shrugged. Not her problem. She went back to refilling the water reservoir, and considered making some sort of stone pipe arrangement where the water was vaporized in a vessel before quickly being condensed and flowed into a pipe for faster transfer. Something to try tomorrow.


    She sat there, staring into the dark, occasionally making sure her bindings weren''t deviating from what she wanted it to do. A part of her was mildly aghast at how wasteful the whole arrangement was, just to transport water. It would have been far more efficient to do what she''d done previously and made the water flow uphill. But she had seemingly inexhaustible magic and time, and no reason to be frugal with either.


    She heard a sound from the entryway and turned sharply, clutching her staff. A thin, vaguely familiar man stood there, cringing back from her, some sort of leather case in his hands.


    "What?" Lori demanded.


    "S-sorry to disturb you, your Bindership," he said. "I just wanted to see the stars."


    Lori blinked, then squinted. She willed some of her lightwisps to move and illuminate his face, bringing nervous features and pink hair into view. "Oh, you''re the astrologer," she vaguely recalled.


    "J-just an amateur, your Bindership," he said. "May I step out?"


    "Don''t go too far," Lori said. "There are things out there." She saw him glance toward the islandshell, still flailing on its back.


    "Oh my¡­" he said. "It''s still alive?"


    "No, it''s undead," Lori said. "I''m just waiting for it to stop moving."


    He stared at the islandshell again, but eventually started setting up a tripod. It was a metal tripod of some silvery grey metal, and very light from the how easily he handled it.


    She stared at him intently as he set up his telescope and calibrated it with his compass, then began to check through a notebook in the case, seemingly comparing increments on the base with the compass. After a while, Lori shrugged and leaned back, checking on the reservoir again. It was rising steadily as water fell into it in a steady drizzle¨C


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    Lori blinked, then chuckled as she realized she was making it rain inside her Dungeon.


    Leaning back and raising a footrest for her feet, she watched the moons as she waited for the water to fill.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, they started rebuilding. Or at least clearing. After a night sleeping in an impromptu alcove carved into the stone next to the entrance with a thin opening to serve as an airhole, lying on a bed of rock and a pillow of rock, Lori was very ready to get people out of her dungeon and back to being useful, contributing members of her demesne.


    After breakfast, and another check around the settlement, this time with more volunteers, everyone came out of the Dungeon to start rebuilding. The children, seeling rods in hand, went to catch more food, this time accompanied by more people despite the children''s protests that so many would scare the seels away and make their catch poorer. Of course, no one listened, because they were children and what they said didn''t matter. People were also told to stay away from the baths, since it was still flooded and had waterwisplings inside it. There were far fewer than there had originally been but they were much bigger.


    As people cleared out the rocks, fallen wood, fallen trees, dirt and other debris with the simple tools at hand, setting the stones to one side for either building material or to be examined later, Lori got to work clearing out the flooded shelter.


    There were, in facts, seels in the shelter, as well as a lot of water. Technically there was one seel, all fused together by their tails into a many headed abomination. Some of the smaller heads were dead, devoured by the larger ones, leaving only bloody stumps of fur and bone.


    Lori had asked some of those with hunting experience to be on hand with wooden clubs as she bound the waterwisps in the shelter and had the water flow up and out though the entrance, pulling the seel abomination along with it. As the seel abomination was being beaten to death with clubs, Lori checked inside the shelter. Apart from some wooden debris and mud that hadn''t been swept out with the water, the inside of the shelter was empty. She checked on the structural integrity of the stone walls, curved roof, air circulating windows and fireplaces, and repaired any cracks or structural weaknesses that she found. After some thought, she decided to raise up central pillars to help support the roof, to avoid a collapse similar to the other shelter. It made the space seem more cramped, but she wasn''t going to be sleeping in there, so that didn''t matter. The mud she compacted into the walls, and she dried the wooden debris for firewood, leaving them where they lay. Someone else could cut them up and put them in the fireplace.


    That done, she headed warily for the other shelter, her quiver of firewood at her side and a new coal in her coalcharm. She circled around to the collapsed part of the roof and watched the reeds growing from it. While they superficially resembled the reeds along the river, they moved disconcertingly. It took a while to realize that they sometimes seemed to move against the wind. In the interest of intelligent inquiry, Lori touched one of her coalcharms to one of the lengths of wood she was carrying, transferring firewisps to the latter until a small tendril of smoke showed it as smouldering. Then she stood back and threw the lengths of wood at the reeds growing from the collapsed shelter. It struck one reed a glancing blow.


    Even though she was half-expecting it, Lori still jumped in surprise as the reeds struck at the log like beasts pouncing from tall grass, mouth-like openings full of sharp, beast-like teeth snapping open and embedding themselves in the log. She stared in heartsick shock as more reeds struck at the wood. Some missed and instead clamped onto another reed, many of which snapped off and left strange twitching fibers¡­


    Lori had seen enough. With a thought, she imbued the firewisps in the wood with power, binding them to burn. There was the crack of an explosion as the wood exploded violently in a large, burning ball of heat and light, consumed instantly for energy.


    There were cries of alarm around the settlement, but Lori ignored them, focusing on the reeds. Many had been caught in the blast, and some had even lit on fire. Quickly, Lori bound the firewisps, and imbued them with more magic to make them burn brighter. Small flames, burning feebly on the still-wet plant, suddenly flared to life, and there were sizzles and pops as moisture in the reed exploded into steam, which were thrashing violently. She imbued it with more magic, made the flame hotter, made it consume more fuel despite that fuel being full of water. It was an inefficient, magic-intensive binding, but there was no way Lori was going to get any closer to that plant¡­ abomination¡­ thing. Not until it was dead enough for her to claim every wisp it had and make it boil¡­


    "Everything all right?"


    Lori turned, but it was only Rian. "Fine," she said. "Just burning this."


    Rian glanced at the burning reeds. "Plant monster?"


    "I suppose that''s a concise way of putting it," Lori said.


    Rian sigh. "I don''t suppose you could maybe warn everyone before you start using magic that makes things explode?" he said. "I know you don''t like talking to people, but a few words to keep people from panicking would be very helpful, especially when some of them are holding sharp and pointy objects, or are standing on wet rocks and are likely to fall on more rocks. Please?"


    "Fine," Lori said, hiding her discomfort. Right, safety¡­


    "By the way, can you stop by Lanwei when you have time?" Rian said. "He''s identified some metal ores among the rocks that fell from the dragon, but he doesn''t have a furnace yet, so we were hoping you could help with smelting them?"


    "Which one''s Lanwei?" Lori asked as she made the reeds burn. They were thrashing a bit less violently now.


    "He was with us yesterday, remember?" Rian said. "Big man, clean-shaven, balding in front, hair tied back?"


    Lori frowned, vaguely remembering someone like that. "Don''t know him."


    "Don''t know¨C" Rian sighed. "Well, tell me when you have time and I''ll introduce you. Maybe you can use the ores as a reference so you can look for them underground."


    Lori blinked. That was a thought that hadn''t occurred to her. "I''ll remember that," she said.


    "Right, well¡­" Rian glanced back at the burning reeds, which had stopped moving and were just on fire now. "I''ll let you get back to your pyromania. Remember, please warn us."


    Waving him aside, Lori stepped around and felt inside the collapsed shelter, finding more voids of wisps. It was also, like the other shelter, flooded.


    As she bound the firewisps, pulling them down into the shelter towards the voids she could feel there, she made the water she could bind boil.


    Soon the insides of the collapsed shelter echoed with the sounds of more thrashing.


    Hopefully she''d be able to finish fixing the shelters by lunch. That would give her time to get the baths unflooded and maybe have time to make something to hold a waterwispling¡­

 23 - The Importance of Lunch

    For several days, the entire settlement worked to rebuild. In a way, the fact that not many houses and buildings had been raised was lucky for them, as there wasn''t much that had been damaged. There was still a lot, but not every family had lost their house. Most of what did need structural repairs was left to Lori, which meant she was up and working all hours of the day, and had to go back to a Dungeon that was still being used as a dining hall and hospital. She also still hadn''t gotten her bedroom back, meaning she was back to sleeping on rock in an enclosed, secure alcove, and hoped no one got the bright idea of using smoke to kill her in her sleep. It wouldn''t work, but it might asphyxiate other people in the cave, and that would be annoying.


    Most who weren''t Lori were cleaning up, gathering the debris that had fallen in the dragon''s passing for any valuable or useful materials. The remaining roof that was no longer wood had been stripped off and set aside to be replaced in case it was dangerous or poisonous, and Lori had claimed it for something to study. The fields of wild edible plants they''d set up had¡­ well, some had things fall on them, some had grown wildly, some had fused together with the other plants next to them, but most had been completely unaffected. A lot of the men and some of the women were armed with spears (which Lori had to make) in case one of the dragonborn abominations wandered close, and there had already been three encounters.


    Fortunately no one had died, but a man had hurt his arm from a beastly abomination biting it, and it had been pure luck the thing hadn''t been able to get any of its claws to bear. Lori and Rian had been able to drive it off and later kill it, but now she was down a worker with a mauled arm. It could have been much worse, since when they finally killed it the thing turned out not to have any teeth, but instead crushing ridges in its jaws. It hadn''t been the man''s dominant side, but that still meant he was laid up in her cave, recovering so the arm wouldn''t need to be amputated.


    Really, why did all these things have to happen to inconvenience her?


    Still, after several days and much hard work later, the settlement was finally back to where they had started.


    Tables and benches had been recovered from the collapsed dining hall, and they''d repaired what they could since it was faster than building new ones. The furniture been brought to the Dungeon so the settlement would have someplace to eat while the dining hall was being cleared and rebuilt, and Lori had needed to rebuild the kitchen facilities so they wouldn''t have to keep staining the floors of her Dungeon with soot.


    The reservoir was constantly being refilled using stone piping and waterwisps now, and she''d added more lavatories. When the pit outside the dungeon she''d been pulling the waste into had threatened to overflow, Rian had suggested desiccating the waste. Lori had to admit, pulling all the water out of the waste certainly helped compact it and cut down on the smell. When they could finally start farming, they''d have a good cache of fertilizer, since the latrine field had become overgrown.


    "Ugh¡­" Lolilyuri groaned, lying face-down on one of the rebuilt tables that they''d pulled from the dining hall. They''d rubbed it down with sand from the river to smooth it, but she felt she could still feel the debris on it, and thought it felt lopsided. It probably wasn''t but it certainly felt like it. Her feet hurt, her socks felt ¡­ crusty, the waterwisplings she''d caught had¡­ well, ''died'' seemed as good a descriptor as any, despite her carefully binding and imbuing them, and the reverberations of people eating and talking was giving her a headache and making her long for her nice, big, empty Dungeon. She still hadn''t found time to do her laundry, not helped by the fact most of her clothes were under piles of metal in her room. With things finally rebuilt, that should change later today, and she intended to be on hand to watch in case anyone made off with what little she had. "All this work, just to be right back where we started."


    "Not completely where we started," Rian said, handing her a bowl of food. She accepted it when she saw it had a spoon in it. "We have some new metal now. It''s not a lot, but the smiths think they can use it for more tools. We even found some gold for you."


    Lori supposed that was true. Gold wasn''t useful for much except art since it was too soft to build with, but wizards prized it as a very good conductor of magic. With gold, she could draw wire, and with wire, she might finally be able to start on her ideas for a binding that would automatically and constantly be imbued by her core. It was a nice thought, and actually made Lori smile. It was certainly something nice to look forward to.


    ¡­Even so, her socks still felt crusty. Sighing, she started to eat their usual meal of stewed unspecified meat in unspecified meat stock with added unspecified wild plants.


    "So, I spoke to the doctors, and Mister Havin''s arm doesn''t seem to be getting infected," Rian said. "I''m having him help watch the children on seeling duty so he''ll have something to do while he''s recovering. The dining hall should be finished by tomorrow, and then after that the carpenters can go back to putting roofs and houses. All told, it could all be a lot worse."


    "Does this mean I get my Dungeon back?" Lori said.


    "Yes, we''re moving all the tables out tomorrow," Rian said. "So if you can make the entrance bigger to fit all the tables, we''d really appreciate it. Then you can go back to living alone in your big, empty cave."


    "Dungeon," Lori corrected.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "You actually like living like this, don''t you? All alone in a hole in the ground, by yourself?"


    "It''s quiet and it''s all mine," Lori said. "I''m even willing to be lenient about music past sundown as long as I can''t hear it."


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    "How generous of you," Rian drawled.


    "I''d rather they do it out there instead of in here where it echoes," Lori said.


    "You used to live next to a musician, didn''t you?" Rian said.


    Lori shook her head. "No, our apartment was in too good a neighborhood for a musician to afford to live there."


    "Huh. I''d have thought¡­ why do you have a problem with music, then?" Rian said.


    Because every time a dragon passed their demesne, people would always start playing music and dancing in the shelters while Lori was trying to sleep. "That''s my business," she said.


    "All right, fair enough," Rian said.


    They ate in silence for a moment.


    "Are you getting as bored with this food as I am?" Rian said.


    "It''s all we have, and it''s meat," Lori said, though she was getting bored of it, yes.


    "If you want to increase morale, you can help the children catch one or two of the fat, adult seels, and we can render down its fat for oil," Rian sighed. "I think beast meat would taste great fried."


    "Sounds like a lot of work, and I''m already doing a lot of that," Lori said dismissively. "Fried, you say?"


    "Yup, all we need is a good pan and some seel oil, and we''d have some nice fried beast," Rian said. "Fried leg meat would be delicious. It''ll be all soft and juicy¡­"


    "Rian, you''re already eating, why are you drooling?" Lori said, even as she had another spoonful. Why did the food suddenly taste even more lacking than it already had?


    "Tail meat might be good too¡­" Rian went on, not seeming to hear her, off on his own little demesne. "Not breast meat, that''s always too dry¡­"


    "Rian, I''m trying to eat. Stop mentioning hypothetically more delicious things, you''re turning me off my food," Lori said sternly.


    "It''s too bad we don''t have any flour of anything, flour-covered fried meat is even better¡­" Rian sighed with a lust usually reserved for lascivious fantasies and lewd talk.


    Lori kicked him under the table.


    "Ow!"


    "Stop fantasizing and eat your food," Lori said. "I probably worked hard at some point to kill it, don''t let it go to waste."


    "I''m almost sure this is seel meat," Rian said.


    "Even worse. Do you want the children''s efforts to go to waste?"


    "You don''t actually care about that," Rian pointed out.


    "No, but you do."


    "You''ve got me there," Rian said, and went back to eating his repetitive, brothy stew.


    Lori did as well and tried to put the thought of fat-fried beast meat out of her mind.


    "Speaking of how well we did, I need to talk to you about the Dungeon," Rian said.


    "My Dungeon," Lori corrected.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Fine, your Dungeon. Given our current population, how long do you need to get it ready so that the next time a dragon comes by, everyone in Lorian can just drop what they''re doing and shelter in it? I''m talking ventilation, air circulation, food stores¨C"


    "Not needing to lose my bedroom?" Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "Yes, that too. How much time do you need just working on your Dungeon?"


    Truthfully, it had been a subject Lori had been giving a lot of thought to. A Dungeon was meant to be the demesne''s most secure stronghold in addition to being the center of the Dungeon Binder''s power. It should theoretically be able to hold the entire population of the demesne, or at least the capital city around the Dungeon''s core.


    "I''ll need more space," Lori mused. "More excavating¡­ reinforcement¡­ maybe another floor? Three days? Five? The food stores¡­ it would be convenient if the food was already there instead of needing to be moved from the dining hall." She blinked and gave Rian a suspicious look.


    "You said it, not me," he said blandly.


    "I am not turning my Dungeon into a public space."


    "I wasn''t asking you to."


    "Yes, you very clearly didn''t ask to permanently turn my Dungeon into a dining hall."


    "Again, you said it, not me."


    "We will simply have to divide our food stores," Lori said, ignoring him. "We should have been doing that anyway."


    "I''m sure that''s not going to start any rumors about you hoarding food for yourself while decent people something-something," Rian said.


    Lori glared at him.


    "You asked me to find a way to keep things like that from happening again," Rian said "This is how I''m doing it."


    "I''m not turning my Dungeon into a dining hall."


    "Still wasn''t asking you to."


    "We have a perfectly serviceable dining hall. We just need a plan for quickly getting the food stored there here in an emergency."


    "As you say, Binder Lori."


    "I can make wheels, we can have some kind of cart or wagon."


    "Smart idea, Binder Lori."


    "Rian, stop acting like a sycophant and agreeing with what I say, you sound like an idiot."


    "I refuse," he said with a grin.


    Before Lori could make up her mind about whether she should kick him or not, someone ran up to the table. It was a brat¨C not one Lori was familiar with, she was certain the brat she knew was a girl¨C with his trousers rolled up and mud on his feet.


    "Lord Rian, Lord Rian!" he cried, completely ignoring Lori''s presence. "There are people coming up the river!"


    That drove every other thought out of her head. Lori''s eyes snapped shut, delving into her awareness of wisps. The river flickered, too full of plants and animals¡­ the voids of everyone in the Dungeon¡­ voids rushing towards the dungeon from the river, most too small to be adults¡­ and voids walking along the river banks, coming from down river. They all dripped with water, and the things they had with them seemed soaked with it.


    Her eyes snapped open and met Rian''s. "People coming," she confirmed. "From outside. They''ve been washing Iridescence off themselves for long enough most of what they have is soaked." She grabbed her staff, checked the coalcharm, grabbed the bag of cut firewood she''d set aside to sit down and started tying it back to her belt.


    Rian, meanwhile, stood up. "Everyone!" he cried, gathering everyone''s attention, as if the brat''s¨C the boy brat''s¨C announcement hadn''t already done that. "It looks like we have visitors from outside the demesne." A murmur rose among the people eating in Lori''s Dungeon. "I know everyone''s concerned, but let''s not all panic. For safety''s sake, all the children should stay here. Everyone else, grab what you need and let''s get ready to meet them. After coming all this way, I''m sure they''ll appreciate a warm welcome."


    There were grim nods and for once Lori was glad Rian was so stupidly good at giving heroic and inspiring speeches. People looked determined, but not afraid, and at the back, someone was already handing out spears from the rack near that door that she''d put it because they kept falling over and became a tripping hazard.


    "All right!" Rian said. "Let''s go out there and greet these people, whoever they are, and show them how we do things in Lorian!"


    There was a cheer, that had Lori wincing and rubbing her ears. Still, she had to admit, his words were effective. Whoever these people were, Lori was confident¨C not that she hand''t been before, of course!¨C that she could handle them from the safety of a wall of people!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Hi! Welcome to Lorian. Have you had lunch yet? We''ve got plenty to eat, so help yourselves," Rian said to the strangers as they gathered near the river.


    Lori was fairly certain she wasn''t the only one feeling betrayed as Rian held out a wooden bowl filled with today''s lunch stew.

 24 - The Strangers

    It was the most awkward lunch Lori had ever attended, and that included the time her mothers and she had attended a family reunion in another demesne and everyone kept asking who her father was.


    Rian had had one of the stone cooking pots brought out. It was still a third full, reminding Lori she hadn''t had any seconds yet, and a fire had been lit under it. Wooden bowls of stew were being passed around to the strangers, and many were eating like¡­ well, like they''d had nothing to eat recently but thinly-cut travel rations that had been soaked in water for an hour to get rid of Iridescence. It almost made Lori nostalgic for the days when they''re started eating proper hot food again.


    Rian was moving between the strangers, chatting like they were old friends, offering spoons and asking if they wanted water. The few that were trying to eat while still holding their spears and shields looked extremely awkward and kept clumsily dropping them, as you couldn''t really hold a bowl, a spoon and a weapon at the same time¨C


    Lori paused, examined that thought, and had a moment to wonder if Rian had thought of that.


    Aaand now benches were being brought out and the strangers were being invited to take a load off their feet. Many of the men were reluctant, but a few sat with relief as Rian continued mingling. He was never too aggressively physically, and he made sure to stay on the side they didn''t have a spear or a belt knife or machete hanging from their belt, but he was certainly putting on the charm. He even managed to pratfall twice into the dirt that was being churned into mud by all the slightly dripping strangers. The second time a whole bunch of the strangers helped him up to his feet as he laughed.


    Some of her people were getting in on it, having brought the water and benches at Rian''s orders. Lori stepped back, considering their options. These weren''t all of them, she was sure of it. For one thing, they were all adults and mostly men. No children, or at least none younger than twenty or so. She couldn''t detect any other people-shaped voids along the riverbanks, so were they waiting outside the demesne''s borders, in the Iridescence? Dangerous, if so. There were beasts out there. So probably not just women and children left behind then¡­


    Lori kept her head down, and her staff out of view. Her hat was in her hands, and she was making sure she was standing behind some taller, wider men than her, who all seemed very nervous when she had hissed at them to stay where they were. Why were they nervous? They were big, muscly men with spears, and it wasn''t like they had to hide from any wizards hidden among the strangers like she did. She tried to keep still so movement wouldn''t blur the head to toe covering of darkwisps she''d wrapped around herself to protect against any sudden attacks if they had a Mentalist among them.


    Her eyes were half-lidded as she tried to concentrate on her sense of wisps and watch the strangers at the same time. Rian was talking to who seemed to be their leader, a fit if slightly paunchy man who seemed like someone who''d once worked for a living but had since had to do a lot of paperwork. He was doing slightly better than his fellows at eating while he kept his spear propped on the crook of one elbow while he talked to Rian, who was holding two wooden cups of water, apparently holding on to the man''s drink while he drank from the other one. To show it wasn''t poisoned?


    "I guess it''s been a while since you guys got to eat," Rian was saying over the sounds of more benches being brought out and someone going around giving everyone water. Lori didn''t even have to do anything with wisps, he was just talking that clearly. "Did you lose a lot of your supplies because of the dragon a few days ago? It hit us pretty hard too, but thankfully the food was safe."


    "It did hit us hard, yes," the man, who''d probably introduced himself but Lori had missed it, said. He was already on his second bowl. He was trying to seem casual and relaxed, but it was too forced, his shoulders too deliberately loose. His legs however, especially his knees, were stiff, betraying his tension.


    "I''m surprised you managed to survive, out in the open," Rian said. "We had a dungeon and everything, and it sounded like the end of the world. Things kept trying to get in through the air vents. Your wizard must have been good, to keep you alive out there."


    "Yes, they¡­ they were. We wouldn''t have made it without them." The man looked away from Rian and stared into his bowl, looking tired. He had a thick accent and drew out some syllables strangely, sounding like he was from the far north and west of the old continent, like one of her professors in school, old whateverhisnamewas. Sanclaus Demesne, or maybe Sokossia Demesne, near the Laru mountains. Instead of pressing him, Rian just sat there companionably, one knee going up and down as his foot bounced.


    "Sorry we don''t have anything else," Rian said after a while. "We still haven''t figured out if any of the plants here are good spices, so all the food''s kind of bland. I don''t suppose you guys have figured out anything that can help?"


    "Well¡­" the man said, "I don''t know how much of a help it would be, but our Deadspeaker has¡­" He paused, then pursed his lips and closed his eyes. He let out a breath. "Had¡­ been compiling a list of plants that he identified as edible and poisonous. Perhaps that will help you add new taste to your food?"


    "Actually that would be a big help, thanks!" Rian said. "Can I talk to him? We don''t have much to trade, but for a list like that I''m sure we can put your people up and help feed you for a night or two, let you rest up a little before you continue."


    "He''s¡­ not with us anymore," the man said.


    "Oh," Rian said, and his face became a perfect mask of sorrow and empathy, as if the other''s pain was something he could feel like it was his own. It was stuff like this that made Lori want to keep an eye on the man. It was too colorfully suspicious! "I''m sorry for your loss. Look, if you people need to stay even longer than a day or two, I''m sure we can arrange something." There was beat, probably for the sake of comedic timing. "Um, no offense, but he didn''t happen to die from something he ate, did he?"


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    The man let out a coughing laugh, looking surprised that he''d had it in him. The men with him looked up in surprise at the unexpected sound.


    "Water?" Rian offered. "That sounded like a nasty cough. If you have the time, we have a couple of doctors. I''m sure they can figure that out."


    "No need, no need," the man said. "I know exactly what that was. Though as it happens, there is something you could do for us."


    "I''m sorry, but we don''t have any booze," Rian said. "Someone confiscated our only still to use as a fertilizer barrel."


    "N-no, that wasn''t what I was going to ask, but I am sorry for your loss." The man took a deep breath. "Are you someone in charge?"


    "I''m technically Lord Rian, if that helps," Rian said.


    "Very well, Lord Rian," the man said. "My people and I would like to petition to join your demesne."


    There was no dramatic reactions, no gasps of astonishment. Rian just nodded, as if he expected this. "You realize it''s not up to me, right?" he said. "I mean, I''m not the Binder. This is probably a Binder-level decision."


    "Don''t they trust you to decide these things?"


    "They trust me to bring it to their attention," Rian said. Huh, did she? "Are you sure about this? Wouldn''t you rather found your own demesne with¨C ah."


    "Yes," the man said. "If it helps, we did. It''s downriver, a couple of days travel. But he died. And so did his wife. So we had to find somewhere else to go, or die. We were lucky someone found one of your spears floating down the river."


    "How did you know it was one of our spears?" Rian said as Lori straightened suddenly, eyes widening in realization.


    "It had a rope around it. None of us would have put a rope around our spears, and we had plenty, so we didn''t need to figure out how to make any from the local plants."


    "Yes, I can see that¡­" Rian mused. "One of the children probably lost it. They use it to catch seels."


    "Where was the demesne?" Lori demanded.


    The man did not jump, jerk or comically drop his bowl of stew. Instead he stood very, very still, and turned around to look toward her. Rian did the same.


    "Why do you look like a shadow come to life to kill me in my sleep?" Rian said.


    Lori blinked and looked down, realizing her body was still covered by darkwisps. "Reasons," she said simply.


    "Ah. You''re, uh, not going to kill anyone in their sleep, are you?"


    "If I needed to, that would be the best time," Lori said. "They¡¯re less likely to feel it. Very merciful. Where was the demesne?"


    "Grem, Dungeon Binder Loliyuri," Rian said, for some inane reason making introductions. "Binder Lori, this is Grem, formerly a captain in the Lomabuyar Demesne militia and acting director of the Golden Sweetwood Company."


    Lori gave him a look that conveyed her complete and utter apathy and inquired why he was was bothering her with this nonsense.


    "He''s in charge of these people," he said smoothly. "And he just asked if they could join Lorian. I''m sure he''d like some kind of answer before they needed to sleep for the night?"


    What was he implying? Lori knew he must have been implying something but¡­ no matter. Lori focused on Grem, who stood smoothly in what she recognized from her mother as ''at attention'', Rian helpfully taking his bowl and, when he made no protest, his spear. She supposed the faster she dealt with this, the better.


    "Are there any wizards among your men?" she demanded. Ugh, he was tall. A whole head taller than her, maybe more.


    "No, Great Binder," he said. Lori rolled with the title. "None of my men here are wizards. This I swear."


    "And among the women and children you left outside?" Lori said.


    The man stilled slightly, but took a deep breath. "Among the women, there are none as well. As to their children¡­some are still young, Great Binder. There is no way to say how they will grow."


    Lori gave him an intent, displeased look. It took her a while to realize he couldn''t make out her expression because of the darkwisps. "Open your shirt and step forward," she said imperiously.


    The man didn¡¯t waste time looking confused. Instead, he unhooked the wooden buttons from the loops on the front of his shirt. Lori stepped forward and theatrically rested the tips of her fingers just above his heart, not actually touching his skin. She circulated the lightningwisps in her body as she did so, and she knew he felt it when all his hairs stood on end.


    "Are you, or any of those with you, a murderer?" she demanded. "Answer truthfully or I will know."


    The man looked like he was trying not to breathe. "Some of us have killed, Great Binder. We were militia."


    "But have you, in your heart, murdered?" she said.


    "No, Great Binder," he said. "I am not a murderer, and I know these men and these women. They would not be murderers."


    "Are you, or any of those with you, a thief?" she said.


    "I have stolen in my youth, Great Binder, and I suspect others have as well," Grem said. "The winters were long and hard."


    "Are you, or any of those with you, a rapist?"


    "No, Great Binder. I am not a rapist. None with me are rapists that I know of."


    "Are you, or any of those with you, a molester of children?"


    "No, Great Binder! I am not, and none with me are as well! If they were, I would have killed them myself!"


    "Do you, or any of those with you, play music in the hours of night?"


    Grem blinked. Out of the corner of her eye, Lori saw Rian looking intently at the bowl of stew, biting his lip. "Music, Great Binder?"


    "Answer the question!"


    "Many of us play music, Great Binder! Some can play all night! It is traditional, during long northern winters!"


    Colors. These people might be trouble¡­


    Lori pressed on. "Do you, or any of those with you, urinate in public?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Some of the answers were less than satisfactory. Apparently, Lomabuyar Demesne was very lax about public vulgarity. Still, Lori reluctantly allowed them to join her demesne on a probationary basis.


    It wasn''t at all because she was called Great Binder. That was just a rote, formalized title. He probably didn''t mean it at all.


    For some strange reason, when she announced their probationary status, there was a cheer, both from her people and from¡­ well, her new probationary people, she supposed.


    Ugh, she supposed this meant her Dungeon would have to be a dining hall a little longer, at least she could build a new shelter for more people. maybe they had tents.


    "Grem," she said as everyone cheered, and he faced her, a big smile on her face.


    "Yes, Great Binder?" he said.


    "You said you left your demesne because your Binder died," she said. "I need you to take me there as soon as possible."


    There was a core out there. An unclaimed core, and unclaimed demesne. If she could claim that core¡­


    She just barely managed to hold the laugh in.

 25 - Rians List and Reasons

    Even with the news that there was an unclaimed core lying around, Lolilyuri couldn''t just run off and claim it, adding a second Demesne to her holdings (a second demesne!), no matter how much she really, really, really, really, really, really, REALLY, REALLY wanted to. After all, with it unclaimed, it would be surrounded by Iridescence, meaning she''d need a guide to even find the approximate center of the abandoned demesne, never mind the core itself, which would likely be very well-hidden.


    Still, she took solace in it being extremely unlikely that someone would just trip over it and claim it by accident, despite what all those stories uneducated people liked to tell each other would have one believe. If there were any other wizards in the Golden Sweetwood Company of settlers, they''d have claimed it already, and wouldn''t be here begging for refuge.


    After they sent someone to bring in the women and children waiting outside the demesne, as well as the small barge they were using for transport, the probationary settlers had numbered over 73. Seven families and a lot of unmarried former soldiers who''d retired to other occupations. They had apparently started out with two hundred, with a second, larger group of the company to follow from the old continent in two years once they''d established themselves, which¡­ all right, that was a lot better organized than this group had been.


    Honestly, Lori had just found the cheapest boat to Covehold that gave her a discount for doing Whispering to keep them moving and washing off iridiation, then joined the first group desperate enough to have her. In hindsight, maybe she should have joined one of these settler companies like her Ina had kept suggesting¡­


    Well, too late for that, she was here and doing well for herself! You couldn''t argue with results.


    It also meant she definitely wasn''t getting her Dungeon back any time soon. Rian was suggesting putting them up in the former dining hall and the hospital while she built a new shelter. Which would take at least a day, which would have to be tomorrow, which would mean another day before they could carry the tables out. Colors of death, her Dungeon was supposed to be a mighty fortress, highest seat of her power, not an eating establishment!


    Maybe she should run off and claim that other core after all. She could live there, alone, and just take care of building from a distance. Let someone else have to check the latrines.


    ¡­


    Maybe after she''d turned all the gold into wire.


    She left Rian to make the arrangements of who slept where while she worked on making expansions to the kitchen to handle more cooking, more washing, and generally more, even as it annoyed her to do so. The new kitchen addition to the Dungeon had been built along one wall on the inside of the outer cliff face, for ease of venting heat and smoke. She added a new stove, which was basically a raised stone cube with a hollow in the middle for fuel, a wooden door that she''d smeared rock on one side of to act as an insulator so that they could close it to trap heat, and holes leading upward to the stove top to direct heat. Apparently the kitchen partially cooked each ingredient separately before adding it to the overall stew or something.


    Even though she''d done this before, it always surprised her how long it actually took to build something. By the time she was done, she had to leave so people could cook. Apparently, just because it was her Dungeon didn''t make it her kitchen. That was a familiar argument. She walked away before she did something that would have felt very satisfying but would have delayed dinner, her mothers'' joking arguments about kitchen supremacy wafting from the pit of memory.


    Rian found her sitting near the saw pit, next to one of the newly rebuilt curing sheds still being filled with planks. The sawyers were finishing up for the day, putting away that day''s lumber, packing away the saws to bring them to the shelters to keep them safe and getting ready to wash up at the baths.


    "Hey," he said, putting down the plank of wood he was carrying and leaning back against the packed earth shed next to her. "We need to talk."


    "Did you find someone''s dead body and now we have to figure who here finally snapped and killed someone?" Lori said.


    "Wha¡ªno! Why would you even think that?" Rian exclaimed, staring at her.


    "Just wanted to get it out of the way. Did someone grab one of the children and¨C"


    "Stop!" Rian said, holding up a hand in a gesture she wasn''t familiar with. Must be something regional to his demesne. "No, no one broke any of the laws on your list."


    "Oh, good."


    Rian gave her a sideways look. "I needed to talk to you, temporary lord to Binder¨C" Lori didn''t bother rolling her eyes, "¡ªand I figured you didn''t want me intruding on your beauty sleep."


    "About what?" Lori asked. Beauty sleep? Was that supposed to be flattery or an insult?


    "First, I think you might need to make Grem, or at least someone from the Golden Sweetwood group a lord," Rian said. "I know you''re all about being the absolute power, but this way at least if they have any issues or needs, they''d send just him instead of everyone bothering you individually. Instead they bother him, and he bothers you."


    "Like you do," she said.


    "You''re welcome to actually bother remembering everyone''s names, and what they do, and which name goes with which person¨C" Rian said dryly.


    "I''m not a Mentalist and can''t be bothered to work out how to do it yet," Lori said. "Yes, I suppose you''re right. With nearly double the people, another lord will be of use, and if he''s their acting director, he''ll already have experience dealing with annoying minutiae I don''t want to deal with directly. "


    "You''re welcome." More dryness.


    "What''s the other thing?" Lori asked.


    For an answer, Rian picked up the plank and held it out.


    "It''s been a long day, I''m not standing up to read that," Lori said.


    Rian rolled his eyes, picked up the plank then repositioned it next to her, close enough to read.


    Lori frowned as she started to read, her head titling in confusion. The frown and the tilt deepened as she kept reading downwards.


    "You''ll have to explain, this just looks like a weird list of nonsense to me," Lori said.


    "You made a list of laws," Rian said. "Basically, a list of things that, if violated, you would be extremely unhappy about and would express your unhappiness with flogging, exile and execution. It''s a list that exists not because everyone collectively came together and voted that everything on that list was heinous and should not be allowed, but because you were letting everyone know what you wouldn''t allow."


    "Must you mention your strange voting fetish?"


    "It''s not a fetish, it''s¡­ never mind. The point is, your list was too one-sided," Rian said. "You listed what you wouldn''t let them do. True, it was a list of¡­ mostly terrible things¨C"


    "If you feel that strongly about it, I''ll give you special dispensation to urinate anywhere you want."


    "Funny, but not right now, please, I''m being serious. My point is, you gave them a list of what you most definitely won''t let them do." Rian wobbled the plank. "So I propose a list of things that you will not only allow them to do, but will protect them against anyone trying to prevent them from doing it."


    Lori blinked, then reread his list. "All right, first off, all of these items are needlessly complicatedly phrased."


    "I''m sure we can simplify them."


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    "Secondly, this list is longer than mine!"


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Why am I not surprised you bring that up?"


    "Thirdly, why would I even want to do such a thing?" Lori demanded incredulously.


    "You told me to find a way to keep what happened with Missus Naineb from having to happen again," Rian said. "Something to make violence rare."


    "And this is what you came up with? How is this supposed to keep idiots from challenging my authority?"


    "By explicitly stating that you are using that authority to protect everyone''s personal interests and property."


    "But I''m not. I don''t care about their interests and property."


    "You explicitly have a law against stealing," Rian pointed out.


    "Yes, but that''s supposed to be about stealing from me. They''re lucky I don''t flog them all for just going in and out of my Dungeon."


    "Do you secretly have any children I don''t know about too, then?"


    "If they were secret, you obviously wouldn''t know about them."


    "Ok, I set myself up for that one. Look, it''s one thing to have a law forbidding people killing each other. It''s another to have a law saying you''ll protect them from anyone trying to kill them."


    "But I won''t. I won''t care enough to go around watching everyone to make sure no one is trying to kill them. Besides, punishment after the fact is easier than trying to prevent it from happening. If someone really wanted someone else dead, nothing I say would stop them."


    "¡­" Rian closed his eyes, one hand over his face. He took several deep breaths. Eventually, he put down his hand. "But it will make people think you care, which will make them like you more, because people are naturally more inclined to care about people who care about them. This will make them less likely to think of poisoning you or spitting on your food, or asphyxiating you in your sleep with smoke, or stabbing you in the back and forget about how this means the demesne collapses, and all the other reasons you always make sure we share food and you keep asking me to get your food for you, and that you pick the bowls I''m holding at random, and that I eat from my bowl first before you do, and why you always sleep in a room that''s impossible to get into."


    Lori said nothing.


    "It''s pretty obvious, you know," Rian said. "To me, at least. As paranoid as you are about your safety, you''re not very good at it. Real paranoia means not leaving clues for people to figure out that you''re paranoid, or they might realize you''re on to them. If they''re really out to get you."


    Lori kept saying nothing, very eloquently.


    "Everyone just thinks you''re weird or stuck up, or were born touched in the head so you don''t do well with crowds," Rian said. "Missus Naineb is terrified of you now, but most thought you had a point, even if they think you were overbearing about it. Some think you''re running away from a tragic past that''s made you untrusting of people and that I''m slowly charming you to open your heart to love again¨C"


    He stopped talking as Lori started gagging at the thought.


    "Yeah, I think it''s pretty stupid too. But between making up stories about our nonexistent tender romance and just randomly fucking everywhere, which would you rather they be doing to pass the time?"


    Lori kept on gagging, looking positively ill.


    Rian sighed. "Look, you''re a smart, well-read woman. This is a political move. Pretend to give people something you don''t actually have to give or really care about in exchange for ensuring good will and smoother progression in the future. It''s a foundation. You can always go back on your word later. After all, you''re the Binder, you can do what you damn well please. So why not make them think that what you damn well please is something they want you to do?"


    Lori grimaced, and looked at the list again. Aside from the overly complicated language, which were probably paraphrasing or quoting of actual laws like it, they¡­ seemed to be the sort of optimistic drivel Rian liked to espouse. Very selfless and heroic.


    "Why?" she said quietly. "Why are you helping me? You don''t like things I do or agree with what I say. Why keep helping me do it?"


    Rian was silent. He stared down at the ground, his forehead furrowed.


    "Do you ever wonder if you deserve the food you''re eating?" he eventually said.


    Lori blinked at the seeming non sequitur.


    "I do," he said. "I''m not like you, the one-woman building company. I can''t catch seels like the children, I''m slow as shit when it comes to cutting wood, I don''t have any carpentry training, I can''t cook, I''m apparently completely blind at telling wild vegetables apart from stuff you can''t eat, I don''t know how to hunt or dress an animal and too squeamish to learn, and I can''t even do my own laundry. I''m lucky Umu and Mikon keep making off with my dirty clothes and washing them for me, then sneaking them back into my stuff, and I''m a terrible person for taking advantage of them like that."


    "You sound like you''re completely qualified to be a lord," Lori said.


    Rian chuckled darkly. "Yeah, I suppose I am." He looked up and met her eyes. His were brown, she realized. What an odd color. "I contribute nothing to this settlement," he said definitively. "I don''t build anything, I don¡¯t gather any food, I''m a complete and utter parasite on everyone else here. Literally the only thing going for me, the only work I can do to continue deserve eating food that I didn''t help prepare or provide or meaningfully contribute to, is being your lord and mediate between you and everyone else. And I''m not even any good at doing that! But it''s the only thing I can do, so I''ll do it. I''ll help you protect this demesne, even if it''s from yourself."


    "You''ll help me protect this demesne¡­ from me," Lori repeated, bemused.


    "Well, yeah," Rian said. "You''d be a pretty good leader if you could be bothered to actually deal with people without being annoyed by them. And at the end of the day, that''s all I am. I''m your shield to keep everyone else from annoying you. I''m here so you never have to remember a single face or name, so you never have to hear about anyone''s problems or have to put up with socializing. I''m the one who tells you what you want to hear. Yeah, I don''t like how you''re an absolute ruler with nothing to hold you back but your own conscience¡­ but that''s not personal. I wouldn''t want anyone to have that much power. Power can corrupt. But I also trust your conscience. So I''ll help you. I''ll protect you from them, and protect them from you, until the day you don''t need me anymore."


    "A big promise from someone always saying he''s going to quit," Lori said.


    "And if I promise not to quit?" Rian persisted. "If I promise¡ªif I give you my oath that I''ll be by your side forever, as long as you need me?"


    "Then the gossipmongers will be left feeling vindicated, I suspect," Lori said dryly.


    Rian chuckled. "All right, I better rephrase that. Look Lori, we need this. You want to be a megalomaniacal, all powerful, absolute ruler of all you survey? Fine, I''ll help you do that. And it starts with these. I know it doesn''t seem like it, but the demesne needs you to give them these laws¡­ no, these rights. It needs you to look your¡­ your subjects in the eye as their ruler and protector and promise that these things, these rights, you will use all your power to keep safe on their behalf. Do that, and they will do everything in their power to make you stronger, because when they do, they protect what they hold dear."


    Lori stared at him. Then she stared at the board, where he had written things. Touching her coalcharm, using firewisps to keep from being burned, she scorched a black dot next to six of the items on his list.


    "These six," she said. "I¡­ suppose they''ll do."


    "If I suggest one more law for you to add to your list that you forgot, will you be willing to add in another right?" Rian said.


    "You''re wheedling," Lori said. "What law could I have possibly forgotten to write on my initial list?"


    "No sex or any other acts of indecency in public areas," Rian said.


    Lori blinked and stared at nothing, eyes widening. Then she sighed. "Fine, you can pick another one to add."


    "No, you do it," Rian smiled. "That way you have no one to blame but yourself."


    Lori gave him a level look. "You are a very petty man, Lord Rian," she said.


    But she was smiling slightly as she said it.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    That evening, as the people of Lori''s Demesne, Lorian, had their first dinner with the new probationary people of Lori''s Demesne, Lori walked up to the tablet of laws she''d set into the wall¡ªshe had moved the list of laws to the inside since people were eating there now¡ªand placed next to it another one, then did something to the tablet that had previously been there. Then she left to have a quick bath before dinner.


    In her head, in the part of her that could perceive all the wisps in her demesne, she felt the voids of living bodies crowding around the tablets she''d just left.


    <table>


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="406">


    The following are the Laws of Lori''s Demesne, Lorian, and are enforced by the full power of the Dungeon Binder


    </td>


    <td width="406">


    The following are the Rights of the Citizens of Lori''s Demesne, Lorian, and are protected by the full power of the Dungeon Binder and all others who dwell here


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="406">


    ¡¤ No Murder


    ¡¤ No Theft of Property


    ¡¤ No Molesting Children


    ¡¤ No Rape


    ¡¤ No Loud Music an hour after sundown until sunrise


    ¡¤ No Trespassing into other people''s houses without invitation


    ¡¤ No Public Urination. Use The Latrines!


    ¡¤ No Lewd And/Or Indecent Acts in public spaces and in public view


    </td>


    <td width="406">


    ¡¤ All have the right to life, freedom from confinement, and owning of property, and shall not be deprived without due cause, due process or compensation


    ¡¤ All have the right to be who they are, as they are, and no law shall be made dictating who that must be


    ¡¤ All have the right to exercise worship of any religion, provided the acts of worship are not in violation of laws or rights.


    ¡¤ All have the right to dwell in this demesne or travel from it as they see fit, except as punishment for violation of laws or rights


    ¡¤ All have the right to form unions, guilds, associations, covens, sects, societies, cults, fellowships, leagues, etc. for purposes not contrary to laws or rights


    ¡¤ All have the right to be assumed innocent unless proven guilty


    ¡¤ All have the right to be heard to prove their innocence or extenuating circumstances upon accusation of violations of the law


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="406">


    Violations of these laws are punishable by public humiliation, flogging, exile and execution, at the discretion of the Dungeon Binder


    </td>


    <td width="406">


    Any violation of these rights without the explicit permission of the Dungeon Binder will be met with her full fury


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Somewhere behind her, some idiot who thought he could survive without Binders found himself being given a barrel half-full of seel guts.

 26 - Inconsistency

    It wasn''t much of a ceremony. Grem, the assorted probationary subjects he was eating with, Rian to take over when she was done, and anyone else who might be in hearing range, which from the murmur of voices having breakfast in the Dungeon''s dining hall wasn''t a lot. There was a murmur of excitement in the voices around them that reminded her of the first day of school year at the academy, when classes were slightly reshuffled and people wasted time trying to get to know who they''d been reshuffled with.


    "¡­you are hereby recognized as probationary Lord Grem of Lorian Demesne, under the authority of Lord Rian of same," Lori finished.


    There was a moment of stunned silence followed by applause, but Lori didn''t stick around to have to deal with it. Behind her, she heard Rian sigh.


    "She''s like that," she heard him say. "Probably off to build something. Come to me when you''re finished eating, I''ll tell you what you have to do. It''s not very hard¡­ "


    She was, in fact, building something. The new shelter for the probationary subjects needed to be built, and she''d already built the shelters twice. A third time was routine, if with the modifications she''d made to the other ones after rebuilding them, like pillars and building it with the door higher than ground level and only ramping downwards once inside. She was done by lunch.


    Afterwards, Rian asked her to help with the clay pit. Or to be more specific, the kiln at the clay pit, the original of which had unfortunately fallen when the dragon came. The clay pit discovered some weeks ago had proven surprisingly profitable, and not just because some of the pots and cups and things that had been drying and waiting to go in a kiln, as well as splotches of clay in the pit itself, had been found turned to various materials like metals, salt and lodestone after the dragon''s passing, which had all gone into the impromptu vault of mineral wealth. However, the amount of clay itself had proven surprisingly plentiful. The potter, Gu-someone-or-other, thought the whole bank might be rich in clay. Some delving and checking of consistency with her earthwisps had tentatively agreed with that assessment, and so Lori was going to shore up the side of the pit closest to the river with packed earth in case there was annual flooding they didn''t know about¨C and there probably was, given they hadn''t lived there long enough to say otherwise¨C as well as to help construct a new kiln.


    ''Help'' construct this time, because the potter¨C Gunvi! That was his name, Gunvi!¨C had already put the kiln together. It was meant to be a reusable kiln, and while they apparently didn''t have the right kind of clay to make firebricks, the clay they had would do in a pinch, and they were in a pinch. Lori was at least familiar with the kind of kiln the man had built, one with a firebox underneath that would lead to the chamber where the pieces to be fired would rest. The whole thing had been made of clay, and then had dried for some days to prepare to fire that clay. Only then would it be properly ready to start firing other pieces.


    It was only Lori''s time working at a potter''s herself¨C that had been a hot and exhausting job, and the pay had only barely been worth it¨C that kept her from being impatient with all the time this would need. Even with a kiln heated by firewisps to keep the temperature steady and even, firing took time. And it would let them fire large pieces. Lacking metal for hoops, they couldn¡¯t exactly build barrels, so large clay pots would have to do for food storage.


    They ended up with a kiln arrangement that was a pace high, wide and deep, and had ledges that they could theoretically put metal or pottery grills on for more space for smaller pieces. There was a firebox, tunnel and chimney arrangement that would allow air to keep circulating through, and the direction of the wind was consistent enough for it to be reasonably reliable, even if Lori hadn''t already resigned herself to having to keep firewisps imbued for this thing every time they needed to fire something. Gunvi had been skeptical¨C apparently he''d never worked with a Whisperer to heat his kiln before, which made sense, since not many places on the peripheral edges of a demesne could afford it¨C but after Lori had demonstrated the sustained, consistent heat she could generate, he seemed more amenable to the idea.


    Hopefully this meant she could stop making everything out of rock.


    With a small fire to start with, Lori was able to imbue and bind the firewisps that resulted to maintain an even temperature and spread evenly across the kiln-to-be for however long the thing would need to be fired. Then she sat to wait it out.


    It was not unlike sitting down and maintaining the curing sheds. Sure, she could imbue it and let it persist, but it had been long drilled into her not to leave firewisps unsupervised. She spent the rest of the afternoon sitting next to it, doodling on a stone tablet, while Gunvi checked the temperature and had her increase or decrease the temperature according to how he thought it was doing. Eventually, she had him start putting in firewood so she could go to dinner. She passed someone going the other way to bring Gunvi food.


    Rian met her at one of the tables at the end, away from everyone, and he had two bowls with him. She took one and they both sat down. For a while, they ate in silence.


    Eventually, though she had to speak up. "Who is this?" Lori said, pointing to the young woman eating her dinner while sitting next to Rian. She was probably a probationary subject, as she looked completely unfamiliar, as opposed to looking vaguely familiar but ultimately unimportant. Also, NO ONE ever sat on the same table as her and Rian. Or at least the same table as her.


    "Oh, this is Erzebed," Rian said brightly, seemingly completely oblivious to the glares of the two other women sitting at the table behind him. "She''s with Golden Sweetwood. Riz was telling me about how she used to be in the militia."


    "Great Binder," she said, in the same thick accent as Grem. "I hope I am not disturbing your dinner?"


    "Consider your hopes dashed," Lori said bluntly. "Please don''t do this again."


    That made her blink, and she hesitantly picked up her bowl and moved to further down the table. And then a bit further down when she saw Lori was still looking. Only when she was far enough and at a completely different table did Lori look away and resume eating.


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    "That was rude," Rian said disapprovingly, even as the two women behind him smirked triumphantly.


    "It wasn''t rude," Lori said. "She asked and I answered. I even said ''please''. I was perfectly polite."


    "You''re being deliberately obtuse about this, aren''t you?" Rian said.


    "I have the right to be who I am, and it would be against that right to impose any sort of dictates on my behavior," Lori smirked.


    "Oh f¨C you''re going to be using that argument a lot, aren''t you?" he sighed, dropping his head in his hands.


    "I find your idea of rights to not be so bad after all," Lori kept smirking.


    "This is my fault now?!"


    "Whose idea was it?"


    "You picked them!"


    "And they wouldn''t have existed for me to pick if you hadn''t insisted on bringing them to my attention," Lori said.


    "Well, at least you''re coming around to the idea," Rian said. "So did you have something to talk about or were you just being aggressively antisocial?"


    "Have you gotten a list of the occupations of our probationaries?" she said.


    "Not a complete list," Rian said. "Just some generalities. Six of them are trained medics, and another is an actual doctor. Apparently two others stayed at their old demesne."


    Lori suddenly frowned. "Wait, stayed? Why?"


    "They had injured from the dragon they couldn''t safely transport," Rian said. "Broken bones, things like that, they said. Grem told me after you left. Their families stayed behind to take care of them in the hope that Grem and his group would confirm the existence of another demesne upriver, and come back for them. Grem was telling me about it, asking to go back and get them, and I told him to wait, that you''d want to know before you decided to allow anyone else to be brought here."


    Lori frowned. "How many more are we talking about?"


    "Around thirty to forty people?" Rian said. "Grem thinks there might be less than that now, from succumbing to injuries"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "He wants to bring them here?"


    "If I hadn''t told him you needed to know, he''d have gone back today," Rian said.


    "Why did you wait until now to tell me?"


    "Honestly?" Rian met her gaze. "To see if he''d wait."


    She stared at him, surprised.


    "What? Just because I get along with people doesn''t mean I trust everyone I meet right away," he said. "These are former militia. That''s a big spectrum ranging from a bunch of people getting together and doing patrols as an excuse to try each other''s booze to actual trained and experienced soldiers, and most of them came to us armed. I know some of the men stayed up last night with their spears next to them, and they''re probably going to do the same thing tonight and tomorrow too. By the way, you might want to change your door, give it a few sharp turns when you close it. As it is, an arrow can get to you through it."


    Rian paused to take a spoonful of stew, and Lori realized she''d stopped eating. She followed his example.


    "So he waited," she said eventually. "What does that mean?"


    "It means he has self-discipline, and understands that we''d be stupid to trust him right away," Rian said. "He''s willing to wait a little to earn our goodwill. And his people trust him, because they didn''t bring it up or insist on it, despite those injured possibly being friends or family of theirs. It means they''re disciplined too."


    "They could have just written those people off as dead," Lori suggested.


    Rian was already shaking his head. "Soldiers, good soldiers, have traditions about leaving people behind. They don''t," he said simply. "It''s a bad precedent to set. After all, the person getting left behind might be them some day."


    "You know an awful lot about soldiers," Lori said.


    "I did have a life before coming here, you know," he pointed out.


    "But if they don''t leave people behind, why didn''t he tell me about them when I asked him to show me where their demesne was?" Lori said.


    "I don''t know," Rian said. "And that''s worrying me. Maybe he just didn''t want to ask favors of you right away. Maybe he always intended to ask for help for them and it just slipped his mind right then because your little interview weirded him out. Maybe I''m completely wrong and he did leave those people behind to die, essentially writing them off and only now bringing them up out of guilt. Or¡­"


    "Or?" Lori prompted.


    "Or there''s something about the people left behind," Rian said. "Something he''s not telling us. Something he needs us at his back for. In which case, they might not have been left behind because they were injured. They might have been left behind because of a disagreement."


    "You are being very pessimistic and untrusting," Lori said. "It''s vaguely disturbing. Will you kindly please stop it?"


    Rian fell silent, going back to dinner. Lori did as well.


    Eventually, he said, "What do you want to do?"


    Eventually, she answered. "You''re suggesting either this is all a result of Grem either being polite and holding off a request, being forgetful, having some sort of change of heart, or having a fundamental disagreement with these people ostensibly left behind in their old demesne. Well, it doesn''t matter. Either way, there''s an unclaimed demesne out there, and I want it."


    "And if the story of an unclaimed demesne is bait?" Rian said softly.


    Lori frowned at him.


    "It¡¯s a story too good to be true, for a wizard," Rian continued. "An unclaimed demesne, ripe for the taking. The only thing a wizard might possibly leave their demesne for."


    A heartsick cold gripped Lori''s heart. She sat there, filled with a twisting disquiet, as around them the sounds of dinner, of vague conversation, of random laughter and the other sounds that she''d learned to take for granted surrounded her, a comfort she hadn''t realized she''d come to rely on.


    She took a deep breath, drawing in the familiar feeling of magic dissolved in the air, filling her lungs, letting it pass through her body and out again, binding the air around her breath by breath. The familiar exercise didn''t calm her so much as ground her, giving her something to concentrate on as she waited out the sudden tension in her body.


    If they were lying about there being another wizard¡­ if they were lying about their demesne collapsing¡­


    She could see it all too well. After all, she''d been willing to jump at the mere mention of an unclaimed demesne. If, instead, she had a chance to lure another wizard out of safety so she could take theirs and add it to her own¡­?


    Lori found she honestly didn''t have an answer to that question ready. But then she recalled the sheer desire she had when an unclaimed demesne was mentioned¡­


    Eventually, she said, "Do you trust them?"


    "I want to," Rian said. "They seem like nice people. But I have to think of these things in case you didn''t. If I''m wrong, you''ll just be angry at me for wasting your time. If I''m right¡­ then we have a big problem."


    Lori took one last deep breath. "You''re better than me at judging people. If you say they seem like nice people, they probably are."


    "And if I''m wrong?"


    "Then I''m blaming you," Lori said flatly.


    "Putting all the pressure on me?" Rian said.


    "It''s called delegating."


    Rian snorted. "I should have quit when I had the chance. What''s the plan?"


    "I''m delegating that too," Lori said.


    He rolled his eyes. "Wonderful. There goes a good night''s sleep." Sighing, he finished his bowl quickly. "Well, in that case, there are people I need to talk to¡­"


    Giving her a nod, he rose and left the table.


    Lori didn''t watch him go. She just stared at her bowl and forced herself to eat.


    When she finished, she went to add two right angle turns to the slit she used as a door into the small alcove she slept in now...

 27 - Loris Boat

    With the probationaries telling them that there was, in fact, no rapids between her demesne and their previous, now unclaimed one, as well as the assertion there were wounded left behind, Lori was¡­ all right, still worried this was a trap. But the possibility of an unclaimed demesne was worth the risk¡­ but someone would know that, that''s why they thought it was a trap, and the supposedly unclaimed demesne was the bait¡­ but if it wasn''t a trap¡­


    For the first time in her life, Lori was starting to understand why even a reasonably intelligent person might fall for a scam.


    But the story of how there was (supposedly) wounded left behind had spread, and while Lori was, of course, completely immune to social pressure, Rian had no such resistance.


    "We''re going to have to go after them today," he said over breakfast. "I know it''s not ideal but if there really are injured and we''re just being paranoid¨C"


    "Ugh, fine," Lori said, feeling very put upon. "If you want to rescue these supposedly injured people, then you can. But I''m going with you. If there is an unclaimed demesne, I''m taking it."


    "Wouldn''t it be safer for you to stay here and wait for me to come back with confirmation?" Rian said.


    "I''m sure I can handle anything they throw at me," Lori said.


    "Even another wizard? Or another Binder?"


    "I''m a Whisperer," Lori repeated haughtily. "I can handle anything they throw at me."


    "You haven''t been outside the demesne since you set it up," Rian pointed out. "Can you even adjust to not having whatever boost it''s giving you?"


    All right, Lori was getting tired of this discussion. "We''re going, that''s final."


    Rian rolled his eyes, then chuckled. "I should have realized."


    "Realized what?"


    "That you were recklessly ambitious too," he said, an outrageously baseless accusation, "Or else why would you come to this continent instead of staying back home taking advantage of the opportunities available only to an educated wizard?"


    "You sound like my parents," Lori said, rolling her eyes. "Besides, you''re here too."


    "Yes, but I had absolutely no prospects or any marketable skills," Rian said. "What''s your excuse?"


    "I wanted a demesne," Lori said simply.


    "You could have set up next to Covehold," Rian pointed out.


    Lori snorted. "Oh, please. Those colorbrained idiots are too close. They''ll be killing each other to claim each other''s demesnes within a year."


    "As opposed to you, who waited for someone to die of natural causes."


    "Exactly," Lori nodded. "Why fight when you can scavenge?"


    "How does that fit into ''handle anything they throw at you''?" Rian said.


    "Finish eating, we need to get started this morning," Lori said. "Have you picked out who''d be coming with us?"


    "Three of the boys will be coming along," Rian said.


    "Any particular reason for choosing them?" Lori asked, uncertain if he meant actual boys or just other males close to his age.


    "They were chosen on the strength of their demesne apparently having encouraged quarterstaff fighting as a pastime for bored young people," Rian said. "Or perhaps better to say an inability to discourage it." He paused. "And it''s just occurred to me that you don''t actually have a law against people hurting each other, only killing each other."


    "I believe everyone should have the right to punch idiots in the face for being idiots," Lori said.


    "And the reason you''re not worried this means people willing to punch you in the face¡­?"


    "I''m not an idiot. But they are for trying to punch me. So they get to be punched in the face."


    "Ah. Sounds about right."


    "We will be using the barge, once I make some modifications."


    Rian raised a single eyebrow, which made Lori blink in surprise. "What sort of modifications?"


    "We want to be fast, don''t we?" Lori said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The small barge the probationaries had brought with them to carry supplies and luggage had obviously been made by a Deadspeaker. It was all one piece, with no seams or joins, and was clearly made from three different types of wood.


    Lori really wanted to be able to do that. It would be SO convenient! She''d finally have furniture not made from rock!


    It was, however, still a barge. Wide, flat-bottomed, and more built for space than speed. It handled like a log, and while it definitely displaced enough water that someone standing at one of its corners wouldn''t cause it to capsize, it was still a barge.


    She could work with that.


    Only Deadspeakers could work with wood, whether living or dead. Living, to accelerate and control growth, induce flowering and fruiting, or reshape and alter even the bloodtraits¨C not that trees had blood, but they apparently had bloodtraits. Dead, to be reshaped and molded as she would stone or ice.


    Given she had to make some modifications to the barge to make it more suitable for her use, this was a problem. But only a minor one.


    The modifications were minor and intended to make it easier to make the thing move straight. Barges were usually towed or pushed, usually by another boat or from land by people with ropes. While they could be self-propelled, this one wasn''t. It had been pulled from the shore and maneuvered with poles.


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    Lori didn''t want to do the same.


    She had to be quick, since they had to leave by lunch at the latest.


    Most of the beast skulls had been turned into shovels. Some of the bones had been cracked for marrow and broth. Others had been made into tools like knives, needles for sewing the seel skins, hooks, all sorts of needful things that they didn''t have metal for or didn''t want to use metal for. But beasts had a lot of bones, and so did the seels, and so had that large undead islandshell, once it had FINALLY stopped moving and she''d desiccated the fleshy parts before they could rot. And bones had earthwisps.


    She made her way around the cliff, in the direction away from the river, towards where they stored bones. It was mostly a recess in the ground next to the stone face not deep enough to be called a pit, where bones were left to dry. People were mostly free to take what they needed, though Lori had prior claim on all beast teeth and claws.


    Absently pulling some of the rocks from the cliff face to make a work surface for her to lay things on, Lori quickly got as many big bones as she could. She swiftly identified which side had bones that were dry and not disgusting, going for the ones broken open for marrow. These she methodically piled on her stone surface.


    She had a nice pile by the time Rian found her.


    "As you keep telling me, you don''t know how to Deadspeak, so this big pile of dead things is mildly worrying," Rian said. "Not as much as your corpse cache, but getting there. I thought we were leaving?"


    "Not without propulsion," she said as she stepped back from the pile and grimaced at her hands. She condensed water out of the air to give them a quick wash. "I''m not rowing." She claimed the earthwisps in the bone and began to reshape.


    "Wait, are you¡­ magicing bone? That''s¡­ new? I thought Whispering couldn''t manipulate bodies, living or dead."


    "Whispering can''t manipulate living body functions and structures," Lori said. "Otherwise you would have things like taking the lightningwisps from someone''s brain and killing them. This, however, is dead bone. Bone is used to align with earthwisps when Whispering."


    "So¡­ it counts as a kind of rock?" Rian said. "Oh, right, you were able to reshape teeth, weren''t you? And teeth are like bone¡­ But why bone?"


    "It''s lighter than stone and can be as strong as metal," Lori said.


    Rian tilted his head. "Are those¡­ panels?"


    There were four, thick as a finger, wide as her forearm and twice her arm''s length, meant to be attached to the sides of the barge to stabilize it and keep it going straight. "Yes. Take those to the barge, and be careful with them. Don''t drop them," she warned.


    "Yes, Great Binder!" Rian said in an overblown attempt at the probationaries accents, but did as he was told, taking the panels one at a time as Lori continued working on the last piece.


    It was long and vaguely shaped like a vase, a much larger version of something she''d once made to demonstrate principles of propulsion. It was uneven, since she didn''t have any tools but her hand to shape it, but it didn''t have to be perfectly shaped. Holes in the front to draw in water, lengths of fused bone to mount it to the barge, enough thickness to make it less likely to break¡­


    She carried it back herself, not trusting Rian to hold it right.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Is that some kind of¡­ egg?" Rian said, staring at the object Lori was carrying. With him were Grem and three of the young men, looking in their late teens, maybe twenty at best, all carrying beast-tooth spears. Rian and Grem were wearing swords in addition to spears, the latter wearing it much more comfortably that the former.


    "It''s a means of propulsion so we don''t have to row or be pulled along," Lori said, walking up to where the barge had been beached. It had been emptied of contents and looked much bigger out of the water, coming up to Lori''s waist. In addition to small packs of personal supplies like blankets and maybe a change of clothes, there were jars filled with stewed meat submerged in broth to serve as rations, boxes of dried meat, dried firewood, rope (from among the probationaries'' supplies), long poles for pushing the barge along, oars for when it was too deep to do that, skins of water, a couple of sealed sacks, and folding buckets made from seel skin and wooden ladles for washing away Iridescence. Her staff was already there where she''d left it, and she put her hat in as well. "With luck, we''ll be able to get up to enough speed that we''ll arrive where the wounded are and claim the demesne by nightfall."


    "Will it work outside the demesne?" Rian asked, gesturing at what she''d made.


    "Are you questioning my capabilities?" Lori glared.


    "Yes," Rian said bluntly.


    Why did he have to be so annoyingly honest?


    "It will work outside the demesne," Lori huffed.


    "Well¡­ if you say so¡­" Rian said. "How does it work?"


    Lori gave him a frustrated look, then sighed. "Well, I suppose I''d better test it, just to be sure. Help me get this in the water."


    By which she of course meant Rian was to put it in the water. Carefully, he set the long, vase-shaped construct of bone in the water. As he steadied it from behind by holding on to the two long projecting struts of bone, she bound waterwisps at the inlet holes.


    Water and vapor erupted from the open end of the construct as the waterwisps bound to the inlets pulled water in. The bone construct leaped forward, pulling a surprised Rian forward to fall face-first into the water as the bone bulb scraped along the muddy ground and seemingly darting up the slope to dry land before it ran out of water to propel it.


    Lori hurried forward, checking the bone construct, and sighed in relief as she found it hadn''t been damaged, though little clumps of water still clung to the inlet holes, their binding holding them in place and waiting for more water to propel down the tubes. "It''s fine," she declared.


    Rian was slowly pushing himself out of the water. "Oh good," he said blandly, completely soaked. "I wouldn''t want anything to happen to it. You could have warned me, you know."


    "You wouldn''t have understood," she said.


    "It''s a water jet. It sucks water in from one end and shoots it out the other, propelling the whole thing forward as long as it''s submerged," Rian said, voice still bland. "What''s hard to understand about that? It''s basically shaking a beer bottle and then knocking off the cork to send it spinning, except it never runs out of beer. Please warn me next time, I might have stood in front of it, and then you''d be down a lord."


    Grem looked aghast. "Who does that to beer?"


    "People too bored to drink it," Rian said.


    Lori sighed and pulled some beast teeth from one of her belt pouches. "Will you stop talking about weird beer games and help me put this thing on?"


    "I''m fine, by the way. Completely unhurt, nothing broken, just a little wet."


    "How nice. Do you want to go and claim the demesne or do you want to talk about how wet you are?"


    Sighing and muttering something about holding out for more rights, Rian got up and helped her install the water jet to the barge using the beast teeth to grip the wood and clamp the jet in place by the bone struts. The panels were similarly installed at the corners with their own teeth-studded bone clamps, to serve as fins to keep the barge going straight. Thankfully whoever had built the barge had included a rudder, if only as an aid to being pushed around by poles or pulled by ropes.


    They were about to push the barge into the water when Rian suddenly said, "Wait! Does this boat have a name?"


    Lori, Grem, and the three young men, as well as the inevitable onlookers milling about stared at him.


    "What?" he said. "Where I come from, it''s bad luck to travel on a boat with no name. I''m almost sure that''s a thing. We need to give it a name."


    Lori stared at him. "Surely you can''t be serious?"


    "I am serious. And my name is Rian."


    One of the young men chuckled, quickly stifled.


    Lori rolled her eyes, and turned reluctantly to Grem. "Does it have a name?"


    He shrugged. "We just called it the barge."


    "Bad luck," Rian repeated. For some reason, people started nodding as if agreeing with him.


    "Ugh¡­" Lori groaned. "Fine! I hereby name this ''Lori''s Boat''. Now can we get it into the water now?"


    "Are you just going to name everything after yourself?" Rian said. "You''re not going to name this ''Lori''s River'', are you?"


    Lori looked thoughtful.


    "Push the boat in before she actually does it!" Rian cried, and suddenly people were pushing and Lori had to scramble along so she''d be in position to get herself on Lori''s Boat before it got too deep. She was first on board, wincing as she heard her things ground. Eventually though, it was in the water, and the men were scrambling to pull themselves in, with Rian going last as he was completely soaked. He immediately had them grabbing poles to push them deeper as people on shore called and waved.


    Lori found a nice place to sit and began imbuing her water jet.

 28 - Beyond the Demesne Again

    There was much screaming, holding on to the sides of the barge and lying down next to the pile of supplies crying about how they were going too fast.


    "You''re all being overdramatic," Rian sighed.


    That was rich coming from him, but Lori couldn''t help but agree in this instance


    "Seriously guys, relax," he said, trying to coax the other four men on the barge into something like a dignified position as Lori handled the rudder. "You''re missing out on a great view."


    Her fins had worked, sort of. The barge had gone straight. Unfortunately, it had then made turning difficult, as the barge kept wanting to go straight, and the rudder hadn''t really worked to turn the barge against the force being exerted by the water jet. They''d stopped for a bit to reluctantly take the forward fins off, which had given them just enough leeway that the rudder would actually make them turn. They had also moved the water jet to one side, making the barge slightly unstable and requiring careful adjustments of the rudder, but this at least made the stupid thing turn.


    Now that they had a viable configuration, all Lori had to do was imbue and imbue and imbue the waterwisps pulling water into the jet''s intake holes. The barge moved so fast the front was actually starting to rise out of the water, and they left a frothing white wake behind them as Lori kept imbuing. An active binding such as this consumed more energy than a relatively passive binding like reinforcing stone, but while Lori was still in her Demesne, she could imbue the waterwisps with an overabundance of magic and¨C


    "I think we''re getting to the edge," Rian suddenly said.


    That brought Lori up short. With a start, she realized he was right. They were getting closer and closer to the edge of her awareness of the demesne''s wisps.


    In fact, she could see it. Before her were the dark browns and vibrant greens of the demesne''s plant life. But beyond that, after a certain, knife-sharp point¡­


    Colors.


    Literally.


    Along the river bank was a discernible corridor of noticeably shorter Iridescence growth, the path that Grem and the other probationaries had broken through to reach Lori''s Demesne. Only the river and the parts of the river banks where water lapped with some regularity was free of it. Everything beyond the demesne was coated in the nauseatingly familiar, manifold colors of the Iridescence. It hadn''t rained in some days, and the taint was thick. Delicate-seeming crystal growths like very fine salt grew on everything that didn''t move.


    Leaves and branches dipped towards the ground, weighed down by glittering lattices of Iridescence that could extend more than a finger''s length from the branch. As she watched, a leaf fell, too withered and browned under the layer of crystal covering it to continue supporting its weight, and a huge chunk of crystal fell off, the delicate structures readily turning to dust as they struck other leaves and branches on the way down, some of which were falling as well, before slamming into the ground in an explosion of multi-colored powder, crushing crystal lattices on the ground and sending up clouds of prismatic dust. A moment later the wind rose, huge clouds of glittering rainbow colors wafting into the air as leaves and branches shook and Iridescence broke as a result. Lori instinctively covered her mouth and nose and averted her eyes, even as the dust ceased to be as the cloud crossed the border of the demesne.


    The skies above the Iridescence was alive with the buzzing of bugs and the high, whistle-like calls of beasts. Every movement caused small puffs of still-delicate iridescence growth to powder as bugs landed on trees to rest their wings, consume leaves and fruits, and swarm unfortunate members of other species, breaking through their shells to consume what lay within. There were flickers of movement in the trees as beasts rested in the day''s heat, grooming their feathers to straighten them or sharpened their claws on trees, casually tearing through Iridescence and bark. They were covered in a glittering layer of crystal growth kept short due to their activity, but the iridiation no doubt went deep into their bodies. When they stood still, they seemed to be part of the landscape, the coating of Iridescence on their bodies perfectly blending with all around them.


    Only the seels looked the same, swimming in the water and sunning themselves where they could easily slither back into the river, where the beasts were unlikely to pursue them.


    Lori realized she had stopped the barge, and they were all just staring out into the death beyond the border.


    "Lori¡­" Rian eventually said. "Do you need some time for¡­ whatever magic thing you need to do to the water jet so it won''t run out of power? So it''ll still keep going fast for a long time when we exit the demesne?"


    Lori glanced towards the little bit of wire jutting out from one of the struts of bone, taken from her precious reserves. "I¡­ think that would help, yes. I didn''t realize we''d reach the edge so fast. I thought I''d have more time to imbue."


    Rian nodded. "Why don''t we all take a break. Give Binder Lori time to make some magic, and we can all have an early lunch because I doubt we''d want to eat while the barge was moving. To be honest, I did not miss walking through the rainbow glitter of death where more death might be hiding everywhere. I''m totally fine with putting it off for a little while. Those wounded will keep."


    Lori blinked as everyone else quickly agreed. The anchor was thrown overboard, a hook molded from a treebranch around a rock to give it weight. More Deadspeaking from the previous dead Binder of her probationaries. As they did, Lori did as suggested, settling down to imbue the waterwisps in the jet. There was, theoretically, no upper limit to how much a binding of wisps could be imbued, only how long someone would be willing to breathe in magic and imbue it into the binding..


    Rian opened one of the jars of rations, pouring the broth and stew into bowls, and letting Lori have first pick. Lori took one of the bowls at random, and everyone started to eat. They listened to the sounds coming from beyond the border, of wings, of cries, of occasional death screams as a lucky beast caught a seel, dragging it to land and tearing it apart with teeth and toe claws¡­


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    For some reason, the three young men were turned off from their food. Really, they should know better and just eat what was in front of them.


    She sat and willed power to the binding, eating her lunch slowly. Lori sat at the back, next to the bone mount of her water jet, and everyone else spread around the boat so they wouldn''t tip over to one side. The food was cold, but it had enough firewisps left that she was able to reheat hers before she went back to imbuing the water.


    It all felt very familiar. She''d gotten a lot of experience imbuing water while she''d waited for the site of her Dungeon to get built. Lori was tempted to start running her hand through the water to get in the familiar rhythm, then remembered just in time that seels liked to bite at fingers. She hadn''t been willing to lose a finger for her dungeon, she wasn''t losing one to a seel.


    "I don''t suppose you left any fields of grain crops in your old demesne we could bring back with us?" Rian asked Grem. "Because honestly, I''m getting a bit sick of meat. I''ve been fantasizing about bread with salt for the last few days¡­"


    "Mashed tubers," one of the young men said despondently. "Steamed until soft, with butter and cream¡­"


    "Fruit jam¡­" another said. "Sweet fruit jam¡­"


    "Nice, fat, juicy larva meat¡­" the third sighed.


    Everyone gave him a disgusted look.


    "Look, it''s a traditional food in my demesne, all right?! At least try it before judging!"


    "Whatever, slugeater."


    "Look, larva are not slugs, they''re the immature form of bugs! Lord Rian, tell him!"


    "Please leave me out of this," Rian said. He looked at Grem hopefully.


    "Of course we have grains and tubers!" he said. "Why wouldn''t we? They''re good, tasty food that grows easily anywhere! Don''t worry, we brought it with us. A little planting and in a few months, as the blue moon turns, we shall have bread, beer and tubers. No larva though, that''s disgusting."


    Lori closed her eyes. If she pretended, it was almost like she was having lunch back in the dining hall¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Leaving her demesne felt strangely like leaving her own body. Lori gasped as they crossed the border between her demesne and the Iridescence at high speed, the water jet propelling their barge faster than a man could pull on a rope or row with oars. It¡­ it felt like she was leaving a large part of herself behind, venturing forth in a small, lonely island of infinitesimal size.


    "Are you all right?" Rian asked her, soaking wet again and handling the rudder at her request in case... well, exactly this. The men had all elected to jump into the water one at a time to get themselves completely soaked, as if getting prematurely wet would prevent them from getting iridiated for just a bit longer. They''d doused the supplies and the inside of the barge too, forcing Lori to bind the water sloshing at the bottom and turn it into vapor. Idiots.


    "Yes, just¡­ I wasn''t expecting that," Lori said.


    "Do you want us to stop?" Rian asked, concerned.


    Some part of Lori gibbered, wanting to go back to the safety and security of her demesne.


    "Keep going," she said through gritted teeth.


    There was a demesne out there, she reminded herself. An unclaimed demesne, just waiting for her to get her hands on it¡­


    Unless Grem was lying. Unless this was bait for a trap. Unless¡­


    Lori closed her eyes and reminded herself she couldn''t actually feel Iridescence growing on her.


    "Can I ask you a technical question?" Rian said as they navigated the thankfully gentle curves of the river.


    Lori glanced at him, even as she put one of her hands on the bone strut with the wire she''d laid in. She didn''t need it yet, as the waterwisps of the jet were still heavily imbued¨C she thought they might actually be able to travel through the night¨C but she felt compelled to check that she could use it if she needed to. It had been weeks since she''d had to use a wire to imbue. "That depends on how technical, but go on," she said.


    "You made the Dungeon by¡­ well, doing some sort of magical thing that you never really specified," Rian said. "Can''t you just do the same thing again by stepping out of the demesne and moving a little way off? Why do you need to claim this demesne instead of making another one?"


    Lori frowned. Rian¡­ Rian didn''t sound like he was asking a question. He sounded like one of her teachers, the kind that pointed out something you did wrong and asked you what it was, expecting you to not so much answer him as confirm what he already knew.


    "Because I can''t," Lori said.


    Rian nodded that annoying ''I guessed that'' nod. "Some mysterious and technical magical reason?"


    "Probably," Lori shrugged. "But whatever that reason is, we don''t know it. Just that no one who has ever been able to found a demesne has founded more than one. Attempts to do so¡­ fail. Not catastrophically, but they fail. Consistently. It''s not mentioned in any biography, since most foundings happen far enough in the past that warfare and time has likely destroyed those records. The same holds for anyone who''s currently a Binder of a demesne. If you''ve claimed a demesne, you become incapable of founding a new one. It''s why some demesne had a practice of having a succeeding Binder claiming an area outside of the demesne they''re meant to succeed, to allow them to take advantage of their one opportunity to enlarge the demesne. Nowadays in the old continent demesne are too close to do that without violating treaties about unclaimed zones, so it''s only just a ritual."


    "That¡­ sounds like a really arbitrary declaration," Rian said. "Don''t people do tests on this?"


    "I speak from experience when I say the Dungeon Binder has too many colorful things to do to waste time on it, and anyone trying it out for themselves requires them to make a demesne twice," Lori said. "Given doing it even once near any of the demesne across the ocean is regarded as anything from treason to a declaration of war, it''s not the sort of thing they let you test."


    "You can test it out here," Rian pointed out.


    "And finally, if you could do it, I don''t think Covehold or any of the demesne around it would still be perfect circles," Lori countered. "Because someone would have tried it then started doing it repeatedly for some kind of advantage, and then there''d have been one large, strangely-shaped demesne where Covehold is and a lot of bodies for Deadspeakers."


    "I¡­ suppose you have a point there," Rian said.


    "But¡­"


    Rian and Lori looked towards the other four people on the barge, and most especially, at the one with the temerity to join their conversation. Well, Lori supposed they had been speaking loudly enough and from far enough apart to not really be having a ''private'' conversation.


    "Yes?" Lori reluctantly prompted. The boy¨C young man, whatever¨C had a boringly generic face and dull, forgettable blue hair, and only the fact he was talking made him stand out from the other two.


    "But that''s not how it goes in the story of¨C" was as far as he got.


    "STOP!" Rian called out, frantically shaking his head for emphasis. "Trust me Landoor, you do not want to finish that sentence! Don''t do it, I''m begging you!"


    Lan-something blinked. "But Lord Rian, in my favorite story, about the tailor who found a dungeon in the desert¨C"


    "Landoor, what did I just say?!"


    "¨C she managed to claim that dungeon, and then made one hidden under the black forest, and another one inside the mountain of ice¨C"


    Twitch.


    "No, she moved the dungeon from the black forest to the mountain of ice," another idiot said helpfully. Twitch.


    "Oh right, she did, she put it on a cart on rails and moved it," the first idiot said. Twitch.


    Rian glanced at Lori and sighed.


    "You brought this on yourselves," he said in a resigned voice. "I tried to save you, but you didn''t listen." He settled back to operate the rudder.


    Lori''s cry echoed over the water, making beasts on shore glance up and startling bugs into flight. "THAT''S NOT HOW DUNGEONS WORK!!!!!"

 29 - Obviously, Grem Lied

    "¨C according to her biography!" Lori ranted. "So, it doesn''t work like that!" She panted and reached for the water skin for a drink to soothe her throat.


    Landoor¨C and his name would forever be burned into her head for his utter stupidity¨C said, "But in the story¨C" and that was as far as he got before the other two hurriedly clamped hands over his mouth and shuffled him off to the far side of the barge from Lori, hissing urgently. She made a note to try and remember their names if it came up next time. It was good to know there was some basic intelligence around.


    Lori grabbed the wooden dipper, carved from a single piece of wood, next to her and skimmed it over the water rushing past the boat, splashing herself in the face. The mild, thick, unclean feeling of Iridescence growth was already making her skin feel grimy. The water brought her some relief, and she resolved to take a bath that night. Or just jump into the river too, she had to get it out of her clothes as well after all. She took off her hat, doused it in water, and put it back on her head. The water flowed down her hair and she sighed in relief from both the sense of grime and the sun''s heat. Looking down at the water now sloshing beneath her, she absently willed it to go over the side, then sighed in frustration as it didn''t happen and she remembered why.


    She fell back on old learning, taking deep, even breaths, channeling the magic she drew in through her veins and letting it out through the pores in her hands, which she submerged into the water sloshing on the deck to bind their waterwisps. The resistance from the waterwisps was jarring after having been so attuned to the wisps of her demesne. It reminded her of when she''d first started learning, and it had been so frustratingly hard to get the wisps to do as she wanted¡­


    Yeah, no. She was a Binder now, she wasn''t taking this sort of attitude from a puddle.


    She bound the wisps to her will, wrapping the water around her hand like she was picking up a towel, continuing to breathe until she''d gotten it all, then held her hand over the side. The water collapsed from around her hand, falling back into the river and leaving her hand nice and clean.


    Nodding in satisfaction, Lori sat back and glanced at her lords, both of whom had been utterly unhelpful in helping her educate the ignorant. Indeed, Grem was sleeping, a wet cloth over his eyes to try and prevent Iridescence growth as other parts of him began to take on a light, dusty texture. Rian was somehow keeping the barge stable despite the fact it was continuing to move at a speed even she found worrying, his arm almost casually draped on the rudder as if it was the back of a couch he was lounging on and adjusting their course with only the most minute motions that made the barge turn smoothly to follow the contours of the river.


    On either side of the river, the plants and stones glittered poisonously, and Lori was pretty sure she was missing beasts in plain sight because they were standing still. Rian kept them to the center of the river, since that let him see turns and possible obstacles well ahead of time. Occasionally, there was a bump from beneath as adult seels hit them, seemingly curious, but beyond that they were unmolested.


    Lori reached over and placed her hand on the wire that stood out from the bone strut supporting the water jet, connecting through it towards the waterwisps powering the jet. They were consuming magic evenly, but still had a lot imbued, and continued to respond to her with alacrity. She sighed, once more regretting leaving her demesne.


    The late-noon sun was low and more than halfway down to the horizon as they continued to speed along.


    "It''s getting late," she told Rian. "Maybe we should stop and find a place to anchor so we can get ready for the night?"


    "It''s probably safer for us to just stop in the middle of the river," he said. "No need to worry about beasts that way. But if you can make us some light, we can just keep moving all night. The barge doesn''t need to stop for us to sleep." He nodded at Grem.


    Lori blinked. The thought hadn''t occurred to her. She thought she''d stop the jet so they could rest during the night, change the binding on the wisps to conserve magic while they slept. She eyed the sleeping¨C or at least resting¨C Grem. "Can he steer us without crashing?"


    Rian shrugged. "It''s not that hard. Just be relaxed and remember small adjustments are all you need. Though actually, we might not need you to make light. Between the moons and how reflective the Iridescence is, he should be able to see well enough for us to not crash."


    It sounded like a good idea. But as she glanced at Rian, he subtly shook his head. Ah. Yes, he didn''t want to leave himself asleep and in Grem''s power if this was a trap.


    "I don''t want to risk crashing in the dark," Lori said. "Actually, perhaps we should wake him. Given how fast we''ve been going, we might have already passed it. They said it only took them a couple of days, didn''t they? That''s not far."


    "They had the river," Rian pointed. "Walking along the banks would be faster than going overland, since it would be slightly easier to see beasts since they weren''t hiding in tall grass. Slightly." Still, he nudged at Grem''s leg slightly with his boot. "Grem, wake up. We need you to tell us how far we might be from your wounded."


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    Grem muttered incoherently, pushing Rian''s foot away and settling back to sleep.


    Rian sighed and nudge him again. More incoherent muttering. Rian rolled his eyes, glanced at Lori, and mouthed ''hold on''.


    Wordlessly, Lori held on to the side of the boat and did just that.


    Then Rian began wiggling the rudder from side to side. There were cries from up front as the three young men grabbed at the boat''s sides and Grem rolled over before jerking away, grabbing his cloth from his face and going for his sword before falling over with a curse as Rian shook the rudder again.


    "Good afternoon, Captain Grem," Rian said cheerfully as he finally stopped wiggling the rudder, allowing Grem to push himself up. "Had a nice nap?"


    "You could have woken me up normally," the older man grumbled, glaring at the other lord.


    "I did. This way actually worked," Rian said, then gestured at the bank. "Anything look familiar?"


    Still muttering, Grem wipe the cloth over his face, and then looked around. He frowned, getting up on his knees looking around. "I don''t think we¡¯re there yet," he said. "We set up River''s Fork at a confluence of rivers. And¡­ yes." He pointed, and in the fading light, Lori saw some distant peaks in front of them. "Those are too small yet, but we''re getting closer. We won''t make it today, but we should be there late tomorrow morning."


    Lori and Rian exchanged looks. "That close?" he said.


    Grem nodded. "We''re already a lot closer than I thought we''d be. This goes so fast! Do you have more like it?"


    Lori put her hand on the bone strut a finger on the wire. "Sit down Grem," she said. "You might fall off."


    He glanced at her and sat down, one hand on the side of the boat.


    Lori reached through the wire, touching the bone down below and binding the earthwisps in the bone, reinforcing their strength. Then she reached towards the bound waterwisps, and altered her will on the binding.


    The barge noticeably lurched forward, getting faster as she increased the suction of the water jet.


    "Well, in that case," Rian said easily, seemingly unperturbed as their already fast boat started moving even faster, the front rising higher out of the water. "If we hurry we might make it by tonight."


    Grem gaped at them. "Tonight?" he said, surprised.


    "It''s much safer for us to sleep in a demesne than out in the open," Lori said. "We just go in, I claim the core, and then we can sleep not having to worry about beasts coming at us in the night. I''m sure the injured you left behind would appreciate the safety."


    "Actually, I should have asked sooner, what sort of shelter do they have?" Rian asked. "I mean, they''ve been there for days. Are they crowded in? What supplies did you leave them? You said you planted grain. Any chance they have flour?"


    "We left them some¡­" Grem said, shuffling. "We brought a lot of it with us since we had more people, but we left them supplies."


    "And you intended to come back for them, of course," Rian said, nodding. He shifted the rudder as the river curved again. "You didn''t intend to leave them to die."


    "Are you implying something?" Grem said.


    "Is that how it came out?" Rian said with theatrical innocence. "Sorry if it came out like that. But we''re here now, and you brought us here. Don''t worry Grem, we''ll take care of your people. Well¡­ The five of us will take care of your people, Binder Lori will follow as soon as she''s made the core her toy."


    Well, of course. She was there for the core, after all.


    A thought occurred to her.


    "Your deceased Binder," she said. "What did you do to their body?"


    "Lori, no," Rian said sternly. "No desecrating! Use the ones you already have first!"


    Lori rolled her eyes, but he probably had a point. Besides, if the corpse hadn''t been put on ice it might be too degraded to use by now. Supposedly an intact brain was needed to make magic-capable undead, and soft tissue like the brain was always the first to go.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At around sundown, when the dark was encroaching on the light, Lori stopped the boat, letting it drift on momentum and the current. A little while later, the anchor was thrown overboard


    "Grem," Rian said levelly. "Didn''t you say your Binder was dead?"


    "I wasn''t lying," Grem said. He was fairly calm for a man with three spears and a ball of water pointed at his chest, because even if the spears were held nervously, the ball of water had anger behind it. "Our wizard, our Dungeon Binder Koshay is dead. He died protecting us from the dragon."


    "And yet you don''t really look all that surprised by the fact there''s a demesne in front of us," Rian said.


    Even in the fading light, it was clear that a hundred paces in front of them, the world had stopped being brilliant and glittering as green leaves and brown trunks swayed in the wind, and no poisonous dust rose into the air with every movement. The difference was abrupt and seemingly cut as sharply as a knife.


    Grem pursed his lips, staring down at his feet. "We didn''t think she could do it. She wasn''t a wizard, she''d just found out she could do magic the day before. The Great Binder is right, it''s not like the stories. You don''t just spill your blood on a rock and become a Great Binder. You need to know what you''re doing. But they said she was going to try. They must have found a way."


    "Do you really expect me to believe that?" Lori demanded, her ball of water ready to burst into a stream and pierce through his heart. All she needed to do was will it.


    "It is the truth," Grem said. "Touch my heart and know, Great Binder."


    "I am not going to get close enough for you to grab me," Lori said flatly.


    From the resigned look on Grem''s face, he couldn''t argue with that reasoning. "The demesne is still open to you, Great Binder," he pleaded. "All you have to do is take it. I did not lie. All our wizards are dead. The one who has claimed this place, she is not a wizard. Only someone with too much power and no understanding of what they''re doing. I cannot leave my friends to someone like that, Great Binder. It invites catastrophe."


    Abruptly he knelt down so fast one of the spears cut a tear on his shirt. The point was made of beast teeth, after all. Forehead to the floor, his voice was pleading. "I have angered you. Take my life, if you must. But please¡­ claim this place and save my friends."

 30 - This Place Isnt Civilized

    It was very tempting to boldly say ''No'', throw him into the water, then turn around to go back to her demesne.


    But if what he was saying is true¡­


    "How did no one rob you blind in Covehold?" Rian said.


    Lori blinked at him. "What?"


    He gestured vaguely in the general direction of her face. "You practically have ''greedy mark, please swindle'' written on your forehead." The lord glanced at the other three men leveling spears at Grem. "It''s not just me, right? You can see it too, right?"


    Landoor looked confused, but the other two avoided Rian''s gaze.


    "See, they think so too," Rian said. "You''re a disturbingly easy mark, Lori. Or is this just because demesne expansions are involved?"


    "Additions," Lori pedanted. "Expansions involve increasing the size of the current demesne by way of outward growth."


    "¡­ noted," Rian said dryly.


    "And incidentally, I have never been swindled," Lori said. "I''d never give anyone my beads for any reason."


    "I feel I should have seen that coming," Rian said, nodding. He took, a breath, sighed. "So, I can almost guess, but I have to ask: what are we going to do now? Because knowing you, either we throw Grem into the water, go back home, and start massacring the new arrivals ''just in case''¨C"


    "Wait, what?" Landoor said, shocked.


    Lori glared at him "What do you take me for?"


    Rian winced. "I¡­ sorry, that was wrong of me. I shouldn''t have¨C"


    "We wouldn''t just ''go back home and start massacring'', we''d kill them in their sleep," Lori said. "Much safer, and they''re less likely to fight back."


    Grem looked up, aghast.


    "I''m fairly certain she''s not actually planning to do it," Rian told him. "She''s just saying how she would if she did¡­ even as I say it I realize that''s probably not comforting. But, getting back to the point¡­ what now? Do we go back or do we keep going? Because either way, we have to pick what we''re doing for the night."


    She supposed he was right. Lori had to make a decision.


    She stared towards the demesne. The other claimed demesne, standing in the middle of nowhere.


    "We go in," Lori said. She turned intense eyes down at Grem. "You had better be telling the truth."


    The man kept his head bowed.


    Rian sighed quietly. "Well, I suppose it''s safer to camp in there than out here, no matter what we do. And we have Grem with us, so any people in there will probably not attack us on sight." He paused. "Unless someone got here first and they''re the one who claimed the demesne after killing everyone inside."


    Grem''s head snapped up again, and even Lori gave him an incredulous look.


    "What?" he said. "It''s a possibility. After Grem and his people left, some other wizard and their settlers came along, claimed the place and killed everyone."


    "Why would anyone do that, Lord Rian?" Landoor said, aghast.


    "No idea, but it would certainly explain why they didn''t send anyone to go after Grem''s group and tell them it''s safe to come back," Rian said. "Unless there''s some sort of politics involved, and the people here didn''t actually want you back or weren''t waiting to for you to come back to them, in which case¡­" He looked down towards Grem. "Well, it''s only a thought. I''m sure your friends aren''t dead, Grem."


    Grem didn''t seem comforted by that statement.


    "In the meantime, you''re to disarm," Rian said. "Because right now, you''re all sort of suspicious. We''d have to be a special sort of idiot not to think so. So until we can straighten this all out properly, please take off your belt and give it to me. I''ll give it back when I''ve gotten the sword off."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They pulled up the anchor and let themselves drift into the demesne, using oars to conserve strength. Once on the other side of the boundary, Lori took a deep breath, claiming the air. It felt¡­ normal, the way she''d gotten used to doing it ever since her school days. It was the familiar sensation of doing Whispering in a demesne.


    Lori had to conclude she''d become spoiled, and preferred the sensation of Whispering in her demesne.


    After moving some distance from the edge in case a hungry beast decided to endure the pain for a chance to get at them, they beached the barge on the bank opposite from where Grem said the settlement of River''s Fork had made their Dungeon. The men helped pull the barge out of the water and started to unload as Lori bound lightwisps against the fading daylight. While it wasn''t that dark over the river ¨C the storm moon and the red moon were out and giving plenty of light, albeit tinged pink¨C they were in the shadow of the woods, which cut down on the amount of illumination that came to them.


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    A fire was made using the firewood they''d packed along, adding to the lightwisps Lori could bind. It was a slow process, since she had to be careful and breathe now, but this was how she''d been doing it for years. It was just falling back on it.


    Breath, she missed her demesne.


    With the light in place, they were able to unpack and lay out sleeping rolls. Lori twitched at seeing that. If there was one thing she regretted, it was not buying a sleeping roll before she got on the ship to this continent. All these months, she''d been sleeping on the ground on top of her rain coat. The only reason she had a blanket and pillow was because she''d taken it from a dead woman''s stuff.


    "I''m sleeping on the barge tonight," she told Rian.


    He nodded. "Yeah, I figured you would," he said. "Do try to save us if you hear us screaming for help."


    Lori shrugged. She was a heavy sleeper. "I''ll try."


    He sighed. "I suppose that''s the most I can ask for." He then held up his spear. "I don''t suppose you can magic a light around this?"


    She stared at him blankly. "Why?"


    He shrugged. "What can I say, you''ve spoiled me. I want to take a bath and I don''t want to do it in the dark."


    Rolling her eyes, she breathed in, stared at the fire, and began gathering lightwisps in front of her eye, imbuing them so that they''d glow brighter as she felt for a rock on the ground, and then physically bound them to that. "Here," she said handing him the rock that seemed to possess a bright, fiery glow. "Be quick, that won''t last very long."


    "Thanks!" Rian said cheerfully, taking the rock. "Come on boys, Grem, let''s spare Binder Lori the sight of us so she can eat in peace."


    They didn''t go very far, just to the other side of the barge to undress and splash into the river, but it was far enough that Lori managed to feel she was private. She breathed a sigh of relief as she sat down with her back to a tree, opened a jar of rations, filled a bowl, and began to eat. As she did, she considered the possibilities before her.


    The demesne had been claimed. That fact was incontrovertible. Grem had claimed he hadn''t known it would be, but hadn''t been that surprised to see that it was, either. In that, his actions were more trustworthy than his statements. He had expected the demesne to be claimed. But he also wanted them here, to... what? Rescue wounded? With the demesne up, surely they could just come back, even if they had begged to be part of Lori''s demesne. Yet instead, he was actively encouraging Lori to take the demesne for herself, asserting that the current claimant would be untrained.


    Some sort of savant? That was really the only way anyone could ''suddenly'' turn out to be a wizard. Lori wasn''t a savant herself, but she''d read up on them. Unlike initiates, who had to be identified through standardized breath tests and subsequently trained, savants manifested some sort of instinctive use of magical ability. It wasn''t anything special, just a knack to do one thing with magic, maybe two if they were lucky. Sparks of light, making ice, healing cuts¡­ small, weak manifestations that could be accomplished with small magic, equal to a breath or two. They still needed to be trained and taught anyway, they just ended up being easier to find.


    So, assuming that Grem wasn''t completely deceiving them, only intermittently¡­ a savant. A savant of unknown magic was controlling this demesne. Lori could almost see it. At its heart, claiming a demesne relied on the most basic of principles: taking in magic, and releasing it to bind something to your will. Using it to create a core required a certain level of advanced expertise to know the right technique. But claiming an established dungeon was much simpler, since the infrastructure had already been put in place, and all a wizard really had to do was to make it theirs by the most simple act of magic. Someone could¨C and it pained her to admit it¨C potentially get lucky just by doing magic around the core, or in contact with the core for long enough.


    An inexperienced Binder, as she had found, really had only one advantage: endless magic to draw upon without having to breathe it in. They didn''t learn to use magic instantly. They''d still need to be taught. A savant with a demesne¡­ was still just a savant. They''d know only one, maybe two things.


    Lori had actually gone to school. She had actually been recognized as a qualified Whisperer. In the olden days, she''d be considered a journeyer, meant to hone her understanding of Whispering, but certainly not an apprentice anymore. She could learn for herself, instead of simply being taught.


    Against a savant, even a savant who knew how to make undead, or to send out piercing light, or could trap her in time, or create a twister¡­ she could defend herself against them. And from there she could attack.


    She could¡­ kill.


    And there was nothing to stop her.


    Lori realized she was staring at her bowl, at the meat lying in the broth. In the slightly pink light cast by the red moon, the meat looked bloody.


    Well, this was in the middle of nowhere. It was only a matter of time before someone realized that and started murdering people they didn''t like.


    Lori decided she didn''t like whoever had claimed this demesne instead of her.


    By the time Lori was finished eating, the men had finished with their wash, wearing new clothes while they hung their used ones to dry on cords of rope, made from ropeweed. When they eventually got around to some money-based economy, some brat was going to be¡­ well, at least securely employed as a roper.


    "Anything try to eat you?" she asked.


    "The usual. Just stay out of the grass so the slugs can''t suck your blood," Rian shrugged. He somehow looked cleaner than any of the others. "Did you leave us something to eat?"


    She rolled her eyes and handed him a bowl of hot stew. "Keep them away," she said, "I''m taking a bath."


    She supposed she''d been spoiled regarding that too.


    "Got it," he said. "Uh, you might want to bathe slightly upriver of where we were, just in case."


    She gave him a quizzical look.


    He shrugged. "Look, nature called. We waited until after taking a bath, at least. We''ll all probably take care of the, uh, other matter later."


    Lori''s face twisted in disgust. "Well¡­ at least I don''t have to dig a latrine," she muttered. "We have a shovel. Make sure they bury it."


    "Yes, Binder," he said, looking mildly embarrassed.


    Why did she think leaving her demesne was a good idea again? Ah, right, someone said there was an unclaimed demesne. Next time, she was going to stay home¡­ and have Rian check the place first to see if it was worth leaving.


    Shaking her head ruefully and muttering to herself, she picked up her staff and went to have a bath.

 31 - Rivers Fork Demesne

    She slept on the barge, anchored securely out in the middle of the river. With all the supplies removed, there was plenty of room for her to stretch out. She had her rain coat to lie down on, her old pillow, her blanket, and her hat to put over her head so bugs wouldn''t lay eggs in her ears, not that there were any bugs in the demesne yet. As sleeping arrangements go, it wasn''t bad. When they had been originally travelling, she usually slept under a water wagon in case it rained, but that changed after she became the group''s only Whisperer and was able to lay claim to whatshername''s tent.


    She wondered what had happened to that tent. Ah, well¡­


    Lori thought it would be like sleeping on a ship, but it was actually more stable than that. It moved when she shifted, true, but as long as she kept to the relative center of the barge it wasn''t so bad, and it would quickly right itself when she stopped moving. The rocking motion of the barge going up and down on the water was actually pretty relaxing. It reminded her of her childhood when one of her mothers would sway her to sleep¡­


    This was much better than Grem''s situation. He had to sleep with his hands tied behind his back, which were in turn tied to a tree. Rian had used their shovel to dig a hole under the man''s sleeping roll so he could lie down while still having his hands behind his back, but Lori had to wonder how her first lord knew to do that. Did he have much experience with having men sleep with their hands tied? She supposed it was the sort of things lords were taught before they decide to run away from home and pretend to not be lords.


    With the sounds of not-so-distant bugs, the splashing of the river against the hull, and rocking to lull her, Lori went to sleep.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She woke up to water dripping on her forehead. Her hand came up blearily, the water that had pooled on the various contours of her face dripping off as she moved, and she looked around in confusion.


    Rian''s face and one arm peeked out from over the side of the barge, grinning as the arm dripped water from the fingertips onto Lori''s face. "Done with your beauty sleep?" he asked. "Because I don''t think you want to miss breakfast, and we sort of need to pack."


    Lori blinked at him, then abruptly sat up. "How did you¡­" She paused. Sitting up, she saw she was still in the middle of the river. Rian''s naked upper body¨C the state of nudity of his lower body indeterminate right then¨C hung from the side of the barge, which was at least thirty or forty paces from shore. She glanced at the water suspiciously. While the water had been clear yesterday, her current angle didn''t let her see very deep. "Is the river shallow here or something?"


    Rian blinked at her. "I swam," he said as if it was obvious.


    Lori gave him a confused look. "What, like a seel?"


    "It''s not that hard," Rian said. "The human body is basically a bag of dirty water."


    The confused look intensified as Lori looked at her arm. Yes, they''d taught her that the body was mostly water in school, but¡­ She felt the waterwisps in her blood and veins and pores and...


    She blinked as she suddenly became aware of her body, at all the water and waterwisps in her skin, in her flesh, inside her bones¡­ all just lying there. She felt it in her stomach and her gut and her liver and in her nose and ears and¡­ how had she never connected waterwisps and her bladder? It should have been so obvious! It was as if all her life she''d been staring at the dust moving in the wind and finally focused on the dust inert on the ground.


    "Lori? Demesne to Lori, you still with us?" she heard, and suddenly realized Rian was waving his hand in front of her face.


    She shook her head rapidly to clear it. "I''m fine," she said, as she finally understood how she channeled from her blood to her fingertips even if they weren''t sweaty. They''d never really explained that in school, only that magic worked like that. "That doesn''t explain how you can swim."


    "Since it''s mostly water, the body is naturally buoyant, since most of it is basically neutrally buoyant in the first place," Rian said, looking amused. Lori twitched on the inside. "So after that it''s a matter of kicking in the water enough to keep your head above it. Hanging from a boat helps."


    She looked at him, then at the water again, but the ripples still prevented her from seeing the bottom. "Rainbows," she declared. "It can''t be that easy, or else everybody could do it."


    Rian tilted his head. "Lori, can you¡­ not swim?" he said.


    "Seels swim. Squids and graspers and dillians swim," Lori said. "People don''t swim."


    Rian chuckled. Idiot. "Okay, fine, don''t believe me. Breakfast is ready though, so you better come ashore, and you should have enough time to get washed up while we pack up the boat. I''ll save you some of the coals for your staff."


    Lori nodded. "I''ll be right there," she said.


    "Do you want me to pull you ashore?" Rian said, grinning. "So you don''t have to mess around with the oars?"


    Lori shook her head. "If you''re here, it''s obviously shallow enough to use the pole," she said.


    "Yeah¡­ good luck with that," Rian said, chuckling. Lori watched in horror as he let go of the boat, not even keeping a hand on it as his entire body slipped under water.


    "Rian!" she cried, diving for the side, her knees extremely annoyed with her as she bumped into the wood hard and she almost toppled over herself as she peered through the water, hoping he was still near enough to reach, taking in deep breaths as she channeled through the waterwisps in her blood¨C


    Something broke through the surface three paces away, flinging up a spray of water as it began moving towards shore. It slammed back into the water, only for something else to rise up and spray water everywhere, the water behind it starting to churn


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Lori stared at the churning water as it moved steadily for the shore, before Rian suddenly rose out of the river, completely naked and dripping and moving towards a cloth weighed down on a rock¡­


    "Colors of death," she muttered, actually impressed despite herself. "He actually swam." Not like a seel or an island shell, but it was definitely self-propulsion through the water without sinking. She hadn''t known that was physically possible.


    Shaking her head in honest wonder at learning something new, Lori pulled up the anchor, then unhooked the pole secured to one side of the barge, holding it securely as she tried to reach bottom so she could push herself along.


    After a while of flailing at the water and not feeling ground, Lori pulled up the pole and stuck in her staff, breathing in a circular, rhythmic way to build up magic as she bound the waterwisps to push her boat towards shore¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After generously not punching the smirk off Rian''s face, and accepting the bowl of stew, Lori quickly ate. Inured to gender-segregated public nudity or not, it was too bright out in the day, not to mention the lack of privacy-screening cover, for her to be comfortable bathing in public, no matter how briefly. She''d settled for taking off her shirt and her chest wrapping and splashing water on her face, torso and hands and calling it a wash. Hopefully she''d have time to do the rest later.


    By the time she''d gotten dried and dressed, the barge was ready to be pushed off again. Grem''s hands had been untied, but his sword hadn''t been returned to him.


    "You shouldn''t need it after all," Rian said with bright cheer that managed to be almost sincere even though everyone except possibly Landoor¨C and yes, Lori wasn''t getting that idiot''s name out of her head¨C knew it wasn''t, and as the spears he and everyone else were carrying called out the lie with brilliant pillars of light. "After all, you''ll be among friends, right?"


    "You are a hard man, Lord Rian," Grem said, though he seemed to find the situation amusing in a dark and morbid way.


    "Just Rian, Grem. We''re both lords, after all. Onward, to adventure or whatever!" he declared as he took his place at the rudder and dramatically pointed forward while Lori reactivated the water jet. The imbuement had lessened during the night, consumed to keep the wisps bound, but it was a minute loss all things considered. She''d have to spend some time imbuing it again before they went back home, but she would have needed to do that anyway.


    She paused as she realized what she''d just thought.


    Home.


    Lori''s Demesne was home now, wasn''t it?


    Her heart felt strangely light as the water jet rose to life once more, and Lori''s Boat began to move forward once more, slowly accelerating over the water as the river moved between two rising hills.


    They found the settlement of River''s Fork demesne soon after. It was sort of obvious.


    Rian threw the anchor over the side to at least slow them down as Lori shut down the water jet, starring at the tangle of trees that was apparently River''s Fork Demesne. It stood on the base of a thickly wooded hill, at the triangle of land between the aforementioned fork, the confluence where the river they were on and another river met, forming an even wider river that cut through rocky hills. The settlement looked like someone had taken a dozens of different trees, planted them in a wide circle large enough to cover the area between Lori''s Demesne''s dining hall and the Dungeon''s entrance, and started growing and pruning and melding their branches together to create a large, dome-like canopy, all centered around a lone, massive tree that towered high above all those around it.


    The central tree''s trunk seemed ten, maybe twelve paces in diameter, and all around its trunk the living wood had been carved into steps leading to platforms that housed small houses. Other buildings had been raised at ground level. Some were around the bases of the circle of trees, while other had been raised in the shadow of the dome, little mushroom-shaped buildings seemingly shaped whole from a single piece of wood. Others had been hung from the living, wooden dome, like fruits on the branch, some with slender stilts of wood bearing their weight, but many just hanging from the thick, weaving branches. The buildings reminded Lori of their barge. The mushroom-like building extended outward, towards the rising hill behind the dome where they dotted the ground that had been cleared of trees, replaced with unnaturally regular fields of high grass in the making.


    "Someone was taking cues from Treeshade Demesne," Lori noted. "A pity about all the dragon damage."


    A third of the trees on one side of the living dome had been shattered, trunks in pieces, and only their melding and connections with the trunks around them was keeping them up. One of the shattered trees seemed to have been partially turned to some kind of pale stone, and was so heavy it had pulled itself down so its shattered trunk to rest on its shattered stump, making the whole dome lopsided. The dome had holes torn through it, broken branches exposed like wounds, and several large stones nestled incongruously atop the surprisingly sturdy branches. Other stones lay conspicuously underneath the holes in the dome, and a couple had flattened mushroom houses. The remains of fallen hanging buildings lay scattered about, still being cleared up, and Lori spotted telltale clearings where others had probably fallen but seemed to have been burned in lieu of clearing them. Despite all this, there were people walking between many of the surviving standing structures, while smoke rose from a few of the surviving buildings.


    It was all very concerning. There didn''t seem to be anything like a proper dungeon or shelter in sight.


    "Look, we''ve got a welcoming committee," Rian said, pointing.


    Indeed, they''d been spotted, and people who''d been walking started running. Lori could vaguely hear the distant sounds of people calling to each other, and there was a lot of pointing.


    "That''s a lot of people walking around," Lori said tranquilly. "Especially since they''re supposed to be too wounded to travel."


    "Perhaps there have been developments," Grem said, staring straight ahead.


    "They seemed friendly," Rian said, still sounding jovial. "I think we''ll be fine."


    Lori snorted. "Somehow, I don''t think they''re going to offer to share their lunch with us," she said. "Landoor, give me your spear."


    The confused idiot blinked, but obediently did as ordered. Lori reluctantly handed him her staff, which he nearly dropped. "Careful! If that falls into the water, you better jump in after it to get it back to me. You hold that and¨C no, not like that, you''re holding it upside down! The end with the coalcharm is the top! Yes, like that." Lori sighed, already regretting this. "Right. Landoor, from now on, you don''t talk. Just keep your mouth shut and stand between Grem and Rian. You got that? Just nod."


    Landoor nodded, still looking confused, but at least he was holding her staff the right way around. If he lost any of the accessories¡­


    "Rian, you do the talking," Lori instructed as she took off her hat and her rain coat. Hopefully no one on the shore would remember she''d been wearing them. "If anyone asks, Landoor is our Binder."


    Landoor''s eyes went wide, and he opened his mouth.


    "No talking," she snapped. "You job is to stand and hold the staff and look impressive. Can you do that?"


    Landoor nodded. Strangely, he suddenly seemed excited, looking eager and, ugh, fondling her staff, stop doing that, you''ll knock the quartz off!


    Behind him, the other two exchange looks, then nodded at Lori. She nodded back, not exactly sure what she was nodding about, but apparently they weren''t too concerned about Landoor.


    "A hard man and a hard woman," Grem said, as if commenting on the weather.


    "You swore to be of my demesne now, remember?" Lori said.


    "I will not hurt my friends, Great Binder," Grem said. "I want to save them."


    "I don''t care about your friends enough to bother hurting them if they''re not in my way to the core," Lori said. "So make sure they''re not."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Grem said.


    They let the current carry them to the shore, towards the group of people congregating to meet them.


    One of them would be the new Dungeon Binder. Now Lori had to figure out who it was.

 32 - The Doctor of the Demesne

    Rian was the first out of the boat and over the side, pulling it up onto the shore to beach it properly so it wouldn''t drift away. Grem scrambled down to help as Lori and everyone else tried to keep from falling over. Some people in the crowd helped, pulling them up, and one grabbed the anchor and stuck its hooks onto the ground. She heard greetings in the thick, northern accent, on the theme of ''Grem, you''re back!'' and ''You''re still alive!''.


    "Everyone!" Grem cried with a big smile on his face as Lori tried to get back on her feet, opening his arms wide in greeting. "I''ve come back! Rejoice! We have found a new demesne not far from here, and a new Great Binder! We are here to bring everyone back with us so they can all be safe!"


    Lori had never been one for public events, but didn''t rejoicing usually sound louder?


    As Lori straightened, gripping her spear¨C how was she supposed to hold this? Should she hold it like she did her staff? Would that look suspicious? Would that point her out as the actual Binder?¨C she saw people shuffling awkwardly and looking at each other, as if daring someone else to say something first "Grem!" someone said from the crowd, stepping forward. A man stepped forward from the crowd, his pale hair unevenly trimmed, as if he''d had to cut it himself, or at least had a barber who''d had no idea what they were doing, but he had a welcoming smile on his face. "You''re safe! Thank the alknowledge for that! We were just about to send someone to go looking for you!"


    "Lasponin!" Grem cried, opening his arms wide, and he and other man¨C probably this ''Lasponin'' person, but for all she knew that was some kind of informal greeting from their demesne¨C engaged in some sort of fierce, nearly martial hugging ritual or greeting with a lot of laughing and slapping each other on the back. "You''re alive! And everyone else is still alive too! This trip has been worth it already!"


    Lasponin smiled at Grem, then turned that smile towards Rian and everyone else. It was a curious, pleasant smile, not exactly welcoming but merely waiting to see if a welcome was appropriate. "And who are all these fine people?"


    Grem laughed and pulled Rian into a one-armed hug that looked a lot like a choke hold. "This fine fellow is Rian, the lord of the demesne that we found upriver!"


    "Help¡­" Rian said, making exaggerated choking sounds. "Save me¡­ I can''t breathe¡­ losing consciousness¡­!"


    Laughing, Grem released him, and Rian took big, heaving breaths, theatrically bending over with his hands on his knees. He feebly waved a hand in greeting. "Ah¡­ hello everyone. Uh, we come in peace?"


    Grem let out a laugh. "Hah! He doesn''t seem like much, but he was very kind. Greeted us with bowls of stew and chairs when we arrived at their demesne, and not a word about visitors'' tax!"


    "Not that we''re implying you should reciprocate," Rian said, finally straightening and offering one of his charming smiles. "Though not having to pay visitors tax would be nice, as we''re flat broke. Besides, we just had breakfast. Oh, where are our manners?" He turned and started pointing. "Um, that''s Lori, don''t worry about the glare, she''s always like that." Glare? What glare? She wasn''t glaring, her face was tranquil and blank! "The skinny one is Deil, and next to him is Tackir. And may I present his Bindership, Binder Landoor. He, uh, doesn''t talk much. Not really any good at public speaking. Or any sort of speaking at all, he''s awkward when he talks to people. But he''s a nice guy, and even came all the way out here so we''d be able to bring the wounded back with us faster."


    Lori kept herself from nodding in approval. Good, an excuse for the idiot not to talk. And he looked like he even understood it, since he was keeping his mouth shut¡­ and for some reason was raising his nose even higher in the air, like he was trying to see people through his nostrils. Ugh, was this behavior based on some stupid story he liked?


    As intended, everyone focused their gaze at Landoor, looking nervous. Really, that ''looking through your nose at them'' wasn''t doing you any favors, you idiot. Lasponin gave the idiot a nervous glance, glanced at Grem (who nodded encouragingly), and sketched a bow, "Um, welcome to our humble settlement, Great Binder," Lasponin said nervously. "We are honored by your visit. If it pleases you, we can speak about this further in my office?"


    Landoor imperiously acknowledged with a nod, then seemed to just ignore the man, staring at Rian. Rian in turn gave Lasponin an apologetic smile. "Like I said, not good with talking. But he takes care of us and he works hard doing it, so we like him anyway." He turned to Landoor and bowed. "Your Bindership, perhaps you should stay by the boat, rest your legs, while we go and talk to Lord Lasponin here, find out the state of the wounded for you?"


    Landoor nodded, vaguely waving a hand in a stupid-looking way as if trying to convey meaning without talking, then sitting down. Argh, don''t just put the staff on your knees, you idiot! You''ll chip the quartz!


    "Great!" Rian said cheerfully. "Lori, you come with me, in case I need a runner. Deil, Tackir, stay with his Bindership will you, you know how he gets lonely."


    The two nodded. Lori did as well. Her lord was showing his capability to think and adapt, and she approved, especially the excuses he made to explain away Landoor''s muteness. Good thinking, that. She might even tell him so, if she felt like it. Giving the idiot one last glare that promised unpleasantness of a vague and unspecified variety if he did anything to her staff, she scrambled down from the boat, careful not to impale herself on her spear.


    "Oh, you can leave that Lori," Rian said, gesturing at the weapon. "We¡¯re through the Iridescence, so we don''t need to watch for beasts anymore, now that we''re safe in civilization."


    She gave him a flat look, but hefted the spear back onto the boat. Well, it wasn''t like she knew how to use one of those things properly anyway. That done, she followed after him, standing behind him like she''d used to follow her mother when they''d gone to market.


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    Lasponin had been speaking quietly to some of the men while Grem waited politely at a distance where he probably couldn''t hear what was being said. Did they distrust him now? They should, he was full of lies. Lies and pretty promises. Eventually the man waved to them, and Grem followed him confidently, Rian and Lori trailing after. Lori tried to concentrate and sense any voids of wisps behind her, before she remembered she couldn''t do that, as this wasn''t her demesne.


    Yet.


    Still, she did glance back, and sure enough four people just happened to casually be walking in their direction, with some more around the boat even as the rest slowly dispersed. Lori quickly turned back as if she hadn¡¯t noticed them and quickened her pace to catch up to Rian.


    Lasponin''s office turned out to be a house on the trunk of the main tree inside the dome, situated off the ground. They had to climb stairs composed of thick branches sticking from the main trunk, sticking out and flattened like steps for a pace before eventually splitting and beginning to grow like proper branches. Lori paused, taking in the blatant disregard for sustainability even as Rian and Grem both followed the pale-haired man up the stairs like they''d seen it all before. Already little sprouts of new growth were sticking out of the steps. Shaking her head, she followed them inside.


    The floor was made of smooth, living bark, and the walls were made of living wood as well. There were round, knot-like holes of windows that were shaded leafy canopies layered like shingles that were clearly growing unnaturally. It went deeper into the main tree than it seemed from outside, forming an entry room that seemed like a general use space, while a curtain door showed more rooms had been carved into the tree. Sleeping quarters and food storage? That seemed the most likely.


    The outer room they entered had simple wooden furniture. Not living wood, but simple benches and a low table held together by joinery and carpentry skill, not unlike the furniture they had in Lori''s Demesne. Lasponin offered them the benches first, as a good host, and waited for Rian and Grem to sit down first. Lori sat down in another, smaller bench. It was a bit low for her, and she had to place her legs awkwardly. But it was a chair.


    Finally, the pale-haired man sat down. "I''m sorry I can''t offer you anything to drink," he said. "But we had to reserve our alcohol stores for medical purposes."


    "Sure," Grem said with a wink. "''Medical'' purposes. Right."


    "I''m serious," Lasponin said as Lori looked around, noting the design of the place. It smelled¡­ wooden. Parts of the floor''s living wood was getting trampled and torn, obviously too delicate for dedicated foot traffic. "We had to use them to keep infection out of wounds. With the demesne down, the air was full of dustlife again."


    Rian frowned. "Sorry, my medical terminology is¡­ well, practically non-existent, but dustlife¡­ you mean those small things, eats flesh, makes things smell bad, causes disease, invisible to the naked eye?"


    "Yes, but that''s a common misconception," the man said. "They''re not invisible, just too small to see. They''re visible through a parvusight of sufficient enhancement, and some Whisperers can see them too, with the correct binding on their eyes."


    "Ah, thank you for clarifying," Rian said, nodding as if he actually knew what any of that meant. He probably did. Her useful lord was full of surprises like that. "Wasn''t sure if I was thinking of the right thing, since I''d only read about it in passing in a book once." Rian, what sort of bizarre books do you read? "But given your familiarity, can I assume you''re a doctor?"


    "Yes, I am," Lasponin said. "I''m the senior-most of the doctors in River''s Fork."


    Rian nodded. "We came here to help transport the wounded to our demesne because we didn''t know about¡­ well, this," he said, waving at everything. "But since we''re not on any sort of time limit anymore, there''s no longer any rush. What can we do to help?" His face was earnest and sincere and all that heroic rainbow.


    "Are you serious?" the doctor said.


    "No, I''m Rian," was the quick reply.


    Lori snorted as Grem let out a chuckle. "See?" he said, thumping Rian on the back, making the smaller man wince. "A good man, this one."


    "We brought some boxes of preserved meat in the boat," Rian said. "It''s not much, but it should keep you fed for a while until more people can get back on their feet and hunt, or whatever you did for your food before all this."


    "That''s¡­ very generous of you," Lasponin said.


    "Nonsense," Rian said, waving away the words. "We''re neighbors, right? It''s only civilized we help each other. We''re the only ones out here, after all. Who else can we turn to?"


    Lasponin frowned. "Is your Binder aware of this generosity?"


    "My Binder has entrusted me to handle all negotiations and dealings with other people," Rian said guilelessly as Lori tried to stare a hole into the side of his head. Sadly, no piercing light came from her eyes. Stop just giving things away and find out who the new Binder was! "Has yours done the same?"


    The doctor frowned. "What?"


    "Well, you''re negotiating with us," Rian said. "So while I can assume that you''ve officially been entrusted to do so, I''d better check, just in case. I don''t want to be wrong and have your Binder mad at me for not going through proper channels or anything like that."


    "I could ask you the same," the doctor said. "How do I know that your Binder truly has entrusted you to negotiate on their behalf, Lord Rian?"


    Rian gestured, and for a moment, Lori''s heart jumped as he seemed to be pointing right at her, before she realized the boat with Landoor and the other two was somewhere behind her. "We can ask them, if you like. In fact, we can have it written down. It''ll be on a stone tablet though, we''re kind of low on paper right now."


    "I¡­ no, that won''t be necessary," the doctor said.


    "If it''ll be a problem, this doesn''t have to be anything official," Rian said with a friendly smile. "Just some people talking amongst ourselves in maybes and possibilities. In my experience, Binders are seldom unhappy about a problem being already solved by the time they find out about it."


    "Ha! Koshay liked solving problems," Grem said. "Why do you think we have all these trees like this? He made it to keep the rain off while we built."


    "It seems¡­ kind of inefficient," Rian said.


    "Well, he liked solving problems. He just wasn''t very good at it," Grem said.


    A pained look came over Lasponin''s face.


    "Ah. Sorry, I¡­" Grem trailed off.


    "Yes¡­ sometimes I do too," the doctor said.


    There was a heavy silence.


    "Um¡­ should I come back at a better time?" Rian said, looking between the two of them.


    The pale-haired man shook his head as if to clear it. "No, no, now''s as good a time as any," he said. "I don''t claim to speak for our Binder, but I''ll bring your proposals to them and they can decide."


    Rian nodded. "Sure, that works for me," he said. "Now, Grem wasn''t very specific, but there was mention of broken bones. Our boat isn''t very big, so we can''t take many, but how many of those whose families had to leave them behind are fit to travel even a little? No offense doctor, but I''m sure they''d much rather spend their recovery time with their families, if at all possible."


    "Well, I''m glad to say that it''s all of them," Lasponin said. "Our Binder was able to heal them soon after they claimed the demesne."


    Deadspeaker. Likely a savant. Likely a healing savant.


    She could take them.

 33 - The Savant

    "Healed? Your Binder healed all of them?" Rian said, sounding appropriately amazed at such a convenient occurrence. "Well, that''s convenient. They''ll be able to travel on their own, then."


    Grem, however, looked like he''d been condemned to death. "Lasponin¡­ you didn''t¡­" he said pleadingly. "You didn''t¡­ not her¡­ I hoped I was wrong, but¡­ you actually got her to become the Binder?"


    "It was necessary, Grem," Lasponin said. "Besides, Shana wanted to do it."


    "She''ll die, Las! She''ll die like her father did, and all of you with her! She won''t be able to do anything when a dragon comes again! Koshay couldn''t do it, and he actually knew what he was doing!"


    "We were dying! What would you have had me do?"


    "What we discussed! Wait until we can find the demesne upstream and bring their Binder here to claim the core!"


    "They''d be a stranger! How could we put ourselves under an unknown tyrant when we left to get away from exactly that?"


    Well, they''d have to anyway once she killed whoever this woman was and claimed this demesne. From the sound of it, she''d be doing everyone a favor, if their previous Binder had been unable to protect them from the dragon. How had they survived then? Well, however they had, it had clearly claimed the life of their Binder. Really, killing this completely ignorant amateur would be a kindness and a mercy for these people¡­


    "How did you even manage it?" Grem demanded.


    "It wasn''t easy, but I remember what my brother used to do when he began learning to be a wizard. All those colorful breathing exercises, at all hours of the day¡­ and I was there when he made our dungeon. Helped him and Laven set everything up, and I was there when Laven took his place, saw what she did. It took us a while, and several tries, but we finally managed to figure how to do it yesterday afternoon."


    "Yesterday af¨C" Grem choked. Rian winced, looking guilty for some reason. "So all you had to do was wait one glittering day¡­!"


    "It''s not like we knew you were coming!" Lasponin said. "You all left us to survive on our own."


    "We''d have come back!" Grem said. "I did come back!"


    "Then no harm done," Lasponin said.


    "No harm¨C you put an untrained person as the Binder of a demesne!" Grem said. "You might object to tyrants, but an incompetent is worse!"


    "I''m there to help her," the doctor protested.


    "You''re a doctor, not a wizard!"


    "Should I leave and let you two hash this out in private?" Rian asked.


    The two turned to him, as if surprised to see him there.


    "No need, Lord Rian, we are done," Lasponin said.


    "We''re not¨C" Grem began.


    "Great!" Rian said, obliviously bright and cheerful and just a bit forced. It was strange, seeing him need to force cheer. Unnatural. "I was wondering if we could meet with some of the people who''d been injured and needed to be left behind? While we wouldn''t force anyone, we have to go back home anyway since you all seem to be doing fine, and we wouldn''t mind giving someone a ride to be with their family, perhaps make arrangements for the rest if there''s more than our boat can bear."


    "Technically, it''s our boat," Lasponin said. "My brother made it."


    "I''m not agreeing or disagreeing with you, but either way, can we leave that conversation for after we''ve brought people back together with their families?" Rian said. "Because I have a feeling the boat in question is going to be key in doing that."


    They all seemed to have forgotten Lori was there. Like she didn''t matter. Which was, of course, as intended. After all she was supposed to be just some runner, but it grated. Rian wasn''t even looking at her for cues. Not that he should, because that would reveal their subterfuge, but still!


    She hated it, having other people decide what she could do.


    She glanced outside, wondering how she was supposed to identify who the Binder was as Rian and the doctor talked about¡­ stuff, she didn''t really care. Usually you could tell a wizard by the accessories they carried: staffs, charms, the fact most Deadspeakers smelled nice because they never let their skin rot, the odd grace and quickness by which Mentalists moved, that sort of thing. But those were all learned mannerisms from going to schools and becoming familiar with their power. A savant, an uneducated one, wouldn''t have any of those signs. They''d look just like anyone else. All that Lori had to go on was that they were female and were the daughter of the previous Binder.


    Lori blinked and frowned, glancing at the doctor. The doctor had made mention of a brother, learning¡­ his niece then. It wasn''t much, but it helped narrow things down. The man had pale white hair and eyebrows, and hair color ran in families. There was a one in three chance the woman in question would have pale hair as well, if she hadn''t inherited her mother''s hair. And if her father had also had pale hair¡­ alright, it wasn''t much of a way to narrow things, but it was something! Find a young, pale-haired woman, she''ll likely have a high probability of being the Binder of this demesne.


    Then, after figuring if it''s the right person, kill her, then claim the core. She could do that. A healing savant, untrained? All it would take was a stream of water. She was good at that.


    Lori could do it. She knew she could. All she had to do was find them. Then she''d be able to claim this demesne.


    "I''m sorry we''ll have to impose on you for lunch," Rian was saying. "You really don''t have to, we brought out own supplies."


    "Nonsense, it''s the least we can do," the doctor said. "And we can make the announcement about you willing to bring people back with you then. You can even spend the night, if you wish. No visitors'' tax."


    "That''s very generous of you," Rian said, "But we might not all be able to accept. Our Binder is¡­ mildly paranoid? They might opt to sleep alone on the boat in the middle of the river."


    Lasponin rolled his eyes at Lori''s perfectly reasonable measures of personal safety. "And this is the man you want leading you? Having power over you?" he asked.


    "Paranoia is a good thing," Grem said staunchly. "Keeps Binder alive instead of dead and buried and people having to put incompetents in charge."


    Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    "My niece is not incompetent, she''s merely untrained," Lasponin snapped.


    "Yes, exactly. Not competent," Grem snapped back.


    "I will be training her!"


    "Oh, have you secretly been a wizard all this time? Doctors aren''t Deadspeakers."


    "I helped Koshay study to become one, I know as much as any man who is not a wizard!"


    "Hah!" Grem declared. "You always wanted to be a wizard like Koshay! You can''t do it yourself, so you''ll live through Shana!"


    "What sort of man do you take me for?"


    "A fool who''s willing to have his niece and everyone around him die just so he can feel important for a few months more!"


    "Stop it! Don''t fight, please don''t fight!"


    Lori''s head snapped up, looking towards the curtained door, which had been pushed aside. A girl about the size and age of the brat stood there, with long, slightly dirty, pale white hair.


    Pale white hair¡­


    Grem moved surprisingly fast for a man of his bulk. He leapt at the girl, but the doctor was there first, and there was a scalpel in his hands, slashing at Grem''s face. The bigger man snapped his head back, then raised an arm to protect his eyes and tackled the doctor. The knife went into the meat of Grem''s bicep, and the rest of him slammed bodily into the smaller man, slamming the doctor into the wall next to the girl, knocking the wind out of him. "That''s her! Kill her, now!"


    The girl screamed, diving back behind the curtain, out of sight. Lori heard footsteps on the stairs leading up towards them, turned and barely recognized the four people who''d been following them. She leapt up, kicking the bench she''d been sitting on towards the open doorway, where it tumbled down the stairs and slammed into shins as Rian leapt up from his bench and¨C


    ¨Cpunched Grem from behind so hard his head slammed into the wall and bounced back. The next punch took the bigger man in the temple, knocking him to the side and away from the doctor as Lori stared at her subordinate in surprise. Indeed, the doctor was glancing back and forth with equal surprise, looking between Grem, Rian and Lori as Rian bore the larger man down, punching him in the head as opportunity arose and causing his head to bounce on the floor.


    "You fuck! You coward! You knew, you coward! You knew she was a child!" Rian was yelling between blows.


    The people coming up the stairs finally untangled themselves from Lori''s bench, only to stop as Lasponin raised a hand toward them. Not the one with the scalpel, Lori saw, which was bloody.


    As Grem''s head bounced off the floor against, Rian managed to get his arms around the dazed man''s neck, putting it in a triangular hold as he pressed down with both arms.


    Pale white hair¡­


    Realization came over Lori. Her head snapped towards the curtain door, in front of which the doctor was still standing. The doctor, noticing her glance, held up his bloody scalpel warningly. Lori ignored him, still staring at that curtain.


    Eventually, Grem stopped moving, his face bloody from all the times it had bounced off a surface after being punched. Still, Rian didn''t let him go, grimly holding on as he slowly began counting¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I apologize for that," Rian said as two former militia stood to either side of him, both casually holding short lengths of firewood that did very well for clubs. "I swear I didn''t know he was going to do that." Grem had been dragged away, still unconscious, apparently to be taken somewhere he could be held.


    "I''d like to believe you," Lasponin said, two other former militia standing behind him. A third was in front of the curtained door, armed with a naked sword blade. Rian had been divested of his sword, which was now leaning on the wall behind the doctor. Despite the fact they were all wearing simple trousers and shirts like them, with no identifying marks of any kind, they were definitely former militia, since they stood with watchful patience and held their clubs as if they knew how to use them.


    "I did punch him repeatedly," Rian said. "In fact, I punched him more than you did."


    "Yes, he might be concussed," the doctor agreed. "Despite my oaths as a healer, I can''t really bring myself to care right now."


    "What a coincidence," Rian said. "Despite my responsibilities as his lord, I can''t bring myself to care either. See, we''re a lot more alike than we are different. I''m sure this will lead to a beautiful friendship in future."


    Lori sat at the back next to the door, only one former militia standing guard over her. She tried to ignore the woman, but it was hard. She had a really annoying intent stare, and kept rubbing her shins for some reason. Still, Lori kept taking even breaths, drawing it in and letting it out in a calm fashion.


    "Recent events have cast doubt on your kind desire to reunite families, lord Rian," Lasponin said.


    "People can have more than one reason to do something," Rian said. "In fact, it''s preferred. And I''ll admit, the fact we were told there was an unclaimed demesne in the middle of nowhere was a consideration for our Binder, or else they''d never have left. And Grem knew that too." Rian titled his head. "If we''d gotten here sooner, would you have let us claim the dungeon instead of pushing it on a child?"


    "So you admit you were here for the dungeon," Lasponin said.


    "Our Binder was here for that," Rian said pointedly. "I literally just said so. I wanted to see if I could help."


    "Do you consider trying to kill our Binder help?"


    "Again, I was hitting him more than you were," Rian pointed out.


    The doctor grunted, unable to really deny that inconvenient fact. "You could still be in league, trying to get us to drop our guard."


    "Drop it more than having you up against the wall while one of us could have run past you?" Rian said, nodding towards the curtain door.


    "Are you threatening my niece?" the doctor said.


    "Okay, I''ll bring up ''punched him more than you'' one last time," Rian said. "We''re a civilized people. We don''t hurt children."


    "Grem did," Lasponin said.


    "He tried. And wasn''t he from here originally?" Rian said blandly. "Look, the fact is, our Binder could have killed yours at any time and didn''t. Grem aside, we came here with peaceful intentions. We wanted to help. If the Dungeon had been unclaimed, we''d have claimed it, gotten the rainbow death out of everyone''s systems, and worked out a way to co-exist as a people under the same Binder. When we saw it was claimed, well, our Binder was disappointed, but killing was never part of the plan. We came here to help reunite people with their families, if they wanted to."


    "You''re obviously lying," the doctor said. "No one can be that na?ve."


    "What does your Binder say?" Lori suddenly said.


    Everyone turned to look at her.


    "She''s there, right behind that curtain, listening to what we say," Lori said. "I can see her feet." Everyone looked in time to see the feet shuffle back. "What does she think? Doesn''t she get a say in deciding the fate of the man who just tried to save her?"


    "Shana is too young to have to decide this," the doctor said.


    "But not too young to be a Dungeon Binder, obviously," Rian said. "Not too young to be responsible for keeping everyone in her demesne safe."


    "I''m her uncle!" Lasponin snapped. "I decide things for her."


    "Oh?" Lori said. "I thought you didn''t claim to speak for your Binder?"


    The doctor opened his mouth¨C


    "Uncle," a small, scared, but surprisingly firm voice said.


    The curtain was pushed aside, and a young girl stepped out. She wore a simple, faded brown skirt and undyed blouse, and her boots were worn and had obviously seen long use. Pale green eyes regarded them, but she took a deep breath. "I''ll take it from here."


    Lasponin frowned. "Shana¨C"


    The hand of one of the former militia¨C though now that Lori thought of it, they might be shedding the ''former'' part of that title soon¨C placed a hand on the doctor''s shoulder. The doctor looked in surprise at surprisingly firm eyes.


    Reluctantly, he stood aside, leaving the bench in front of Rian empty. The girl took a deep breath and sat on it as the militiaman with the sword moved to stand beside and slightly behind Rian, and the two that had been willing to flank the doctor from behind suddenly stood between the lord and the young Binder.


    The girl coughed nervously. "You are¡­ Lord Rian?"


    "That''s right, your Bindership," Rian said, somehow managing not looking awkward at having to show respect to a little girl.


    "On behalf of River''s Fork demesne, I greet you, Lord Rian," the girl said. It sounded like something she was repeating, like a line from a play. "I am Dungeon Binder Shanalorre."


    Lori coughed.


    Rian turned his head ever so slightly in her direction, but kept his gaze on the young girl. "My apologies, your Bindership¡­ or do you prefer ''Great Binder''?"


    "Um, either is fine," the girl said.


    "Then I must apologize, Great Binder," Rian said. "But it''s not me you should be talking to."


    Glancing warily back at the militiaman standing behind them, Rian stood, leaving a vacant bench in front of the girl.


    Lori stood. The militiawoman moved to bar her way, but Rian was suddenly there, smiling at her, keeping her from Lori as the Whisperer walked past him and sat down on the vacant bench. Lori was aware of the man with the sword behind her but¡­


    Well, Rian was there. She trusted him to act heroic should it be needed.


    "Greetings, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said as the doctor and militia stared at her in dawning comprehension. "I am Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri of Lorian Demesne." What had that phrase Rian had used been? "We come in peace."

 34 - She Remembered Someones Name!

    The girl Shanalorre was staring at Lori curiously. "You''re a wizard?" she said. "Like Tota and Tyatya?"


    "I am," Lori confirmed, ignoring the two militiamen in front of her who were hefting their clubs nervously. She kept her breathing even and circular. "Though I''m not sure how ''like'' those two I am. I was a Whisperer before I became a Dungeon Binder."


    Shanalorre frowned slightly. "I thought Dungeon Binders were supposed to be more¡­ scary?"


    "Do you feel scary?" Lori asked. "Because you''re a Dungeon Binder too, unless I misunderstood the conversation leading up to all the violence."


    The girl¨C the Binder¨C lapsed into silence.


    "So," Lasponin said, "you lied about your Binder."


    "Binder''s orders," Rian shrugged. "Have to do what my Binder tells me. It''s part of living in a demesne."


    "Living under a tyrant," Lasponin said.


    "What a horrible way for you to describe your niece," Rian said. The little Binder flinched.


    "Shana is not like that! She''s different!" the doctor snapped.


    "Stop it!" the young Dungeon Binder interrupted, and the man subsided, especially when all the other militia looked at him pointedly. She turned back to Lori, trying to look brave and mostly looking constipated. "Why did ninong Grem do that? Why did he hurt uncle? Did you tell him to? Tell the truth!"


    "I didn''t tell him to do that," Lori said. Telling the truth wasn''t a problem, in this instance. "He did that on his own. He wasn''t trying to hurt your uncle. He was trying to hurt you. Your uncle was just in the way."


    The girl¨C Shanalorre, her name was Shanalorre, don''t forget¨C flinched again. "You''re lying. Ninong Grem would never hurt me. He''s nice!"


    "You said to tell the truth, so I did," Lori said. "Even if you don''t want to believe me, that doesn''t change the fact I told you the truth."


    The look of constipation progressed to a look of painful diarrhea.


    "That being said," Lori said, "as his Dungeon Binder, though I do not endorse his actions, I must ask what you intend to do with him."


    Shanalorre frowned, not seeming to understand. "Do with him?"


    "He tried to kill you," Lori said. "Under your legal code, is this an act of assault or is it attempted murder? Will you have him beaten? Flogged? Exiled? Executed?"


    The younger Binder looked more horrified with every word. "B¨C no! No one is beating ninong Grem! No one is hurting anyone!"


    "So you''re pardoning him then?" Lori said.


    "He''s not going to be pardoned," Lasponin interjected.


    Lori glanced at him, then looked back at Shanalorre. "Does he speak for you?"


    Shanalorre glance at him, then back at her with confusion. "He''s my uncle," she said.


    "But does he speak for you? Does he make the decisions for you?" Lori pressed. "Is he the one in charge? Or is this your demesne?"


    "You''re trying to trick her into saying what you want," Lasponin accused.


    "And you''re interrupting a conversation between two Binders, one of which is your ruler," Lori said. "Don''t be rude."


    Rian made a small series of coughs.


    "I don''t understand what you''re asking," Shanalorre said.


    "It''s simple," Lori said. "Are you going to be punishing Grem for what he did? For attacking your uncle and trying to hurt you?"


    "Ninong Grem didn''t try to hurt me," the girl said. "He just¡­ I don''t know what he was doing, but I''m sure he wasn''t trying to hurt anyone! Ninong is nice!"


    Lori opened her mouth to speak further, but a hand came down on her shoulder. She glanced at it, recognizing the hand as Rian''s, and frowned at him.


    "Maybe this isn''t a good time to talk about this," Rian said, sounding surprisingly gentle. "Binder Shanalorre¡­ have you had lunch yet?"


    Lori gave him a look that asked if he''d taken leave of his sanity.


    There was no comical grumbling or gurgling noise, but the young girl raised a hand to her stomach.


    Rian made a show of looking outside as the militia tensed. "It¡­ looks like it''s almost lunch time," Rian said. "Perhaps you should go eat and talk to us when you''re feeling better? We can wait until you''re at your best to talk. Take all the time you need."


    If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    The girl hesitated as Lori kept frowning at Rian.


    Surprisingly, one of the militiamen said, in a soft, gentle voice, "He''s right Shana. You shouldn''t make decisions on an empty stomach. Why don''t you go down to see Enna, she''ll be finished cooking lunch by now, she''ll get you a bowl."


    "Um¡­ well¡­" the young Binder said, glancing at Lori.


    Lori opened her mouth to press the issue, but Rian''s hand squeezed gently but insistently on her shoulder. She gave her lord an annoyed look, and for some reason he shook his head. He leaned down and hissed, "Trust me, let her eat."


    She gave him a look intended to express her annoyance at his behavior but said, "We will be willing to wait on your pleasure, Binder Shanalorre." Well, no reason not to eat. And she could check just how much food her irresponsible lord had just pointlessly given away for nothing.


    Two of the militiamen went with the young Binder, and she held their hands as they went down the stairs. They''d both left their improvised clubs behind, not that they would be any use to Lori.


    Lasponin glared coldly at them as he returned to the seat his niece had vacated. "I don''t know what you''re trying to pull," he began, "but¨C"


    "Why are you talking to us?" Lori said, giving him a puzzled look.


    That seemed to confuse him. "I have every right to¨C"


    "No, you don''t," Lori said. "Your Binder has made it perfectly clear you are merely her uncle, and not someone she has authorized to speak on her behalf or represent the demesne in any way."


    "I''m her uncle!" he said. "My niece is my responsibility!"


    Lori turned to one of the militia left. "Is that supposed to mean he has some sort of authority to unilaterally deal with the Binder of another demesne in place of his demesne''s Binder? I''m from Taniar Demesne originally, and so I don''t know what traditions and governmental structure your demesne''s governance is based on."


    The doctor glared at her, obviously angry at being ignored, but before he could say anything more the militiaman Lori had directed her question at laid a hand on his shoulder, giving him a warning look. The pale-haired man turned towards the militiaman in shock.


    "While we, of course, understand that Grem cannot go unpunished for his actions," Rian said brightly, "as his lord, I am obligated to ensure he receives the due process of a hearing or trial, and a chance to explain his actions before the one who would judge him. As it would be improper for us to interrupt your Binder''s meal, could you please relay this message to her? I wouldn''t want her to feel threatened or come to any misunderstandings due to our proximity."


    "I will consider it," the militiaman said stiffly.


    "That''s all I ask," Rian said. "We''ll both stay here so you don''t have to worry about us roaming around and causing trouble for anyone."


    "This is my office," Lasponin said.


    "Oh," Rian said. "Will that be a problem? Is a patient due to arrive soon and you need the space?"


    "We appreciate your willingness to cooperate," the militiaman said. "We will have food sent up. Please do not attempt to leave until our Binder has decided on what to do."


    "Thank you! That''s very nice of you," Rian said. Lori couldn''t see his face, but he was probably doing his friendly, sincere smile. If anything, the militiamen just looked at him even more suspiciously.


    It was slightly gratifying that she wasn''t the only one who found his easy smiles so suspicious, but this was a very inconvenient time for it.


    The militiaman left to pass the message on, at least.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Why?" she asked him intently. Her glare should have been making his already tanned skin even browner.


    Rian pointed to the militiamen¨C including the one with the sword¨C still in the room with them. "Should we really be having any sort of conversation right now?"


    Lori glanced at them, standing across the room but obviously watching the two of them, and dismissed them. "Why?" she insisted.


    "Wow, we''re really having this conversation here and now," Rian said. "Why what, then? You''ll have to be more specific."


    "Why did you initiate a premature end to our conversation with Binder Shanalorre?" Lori said.


    Rian blinked. "Did you actually remember her name?" he said, sounding amazed.


    "Of course I remember her name," Lori said, rolling her eyes. "It''s one name, how hard is it to remember one name?"


    "You actually remembered someone''s name!" Rian gasped. He clasped his hands together and looked upwards for some reason. "It''s a miracle! Or possibly even maturity! Our little Lori''s growing up¡­"


    "I''m almost certain I''m older than you," Lori said, giving him an annoyed glare. She had even odds of it, certainly. Either she was older or she was younger. Good odds.


    "Does that mean that when we get home, you''ll start remembering everyone else''s name t¨C" Rian began.


    "That''s not one name, that''s a hundred names," Lori said. "Besides, it''s not like it matters if I remember any of them."


    Rian sighed. "Ah, so close¡­ still, it''s progress! If I can get you to remember a new name a day¨C"


    "That''s your job, I''m delegating it to you," Lori said flatly.


    "Too late!" Rian said, sounding bizarrely happy. "You''ve learned how to remember names, I''m not going to let you get out of this one!"


    Lori decided to just ignore this nonsense and get on with her question. "You still haven''t answered me. Why did you end my conversation with Binder Shanalorre?" she said.


    Rian sighed. "Lori¡­ her father just died, remember?"


    Lori blinked. "How do you know that?"


    "Her uncle is the doctor. The doctor''s brother was this Demesne''s previous Binder. Now, she''s the Binder," Rian said, saying each sentence simply and slowly, as if explaining to a child. "Unless there''s a way to stop being a Binder I don''t know about, which I admit there very well might be¡­ "


    "Ah," Lori said, suddenly feeling foolish for forgetting the obvious, especially since she''d thought of looking for people who might have been related to the doctor.


    "It took me a while to realize, but it seemed unkind to push the girl, given that," Rian said quietly. "The fact her uncle seemed to be in charge of her implies something happened to her mother too, recently or otherwise."


    Lori grunted. She turned to the militia who''d been listening. It was hard not to, given they were right there. "Is that in fact the case?"


    They all stayed resolutely silent.


    "If you stay quiet, this one might end up assuming the little girl is fine after all and start pushing too much, saying thoughtlessly painful things that she otherwise wouldn''t if she happened to know for a fact the girl''s just lost her father and¨C" Rian said brightly.


    "Yes, she''s the late Binder Koshay''s daughter," one of the militia, the woman who''d been glaring at Lori, said. "There, you know."


    "Thank you very much!" Rian said brightly, then turned to Lori. "She''s hurting. Let''s be not-terrible people and keep from pushing her hard?"


    "Why are you phrasing it like that?" Lori said, annoyed.


    "I know you''re not a terrible person, but you do sometimes need reminding," Rian said. He was actually giving her an encouraging look.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Idiot. As if I need to be told."


    "I''ve learned to not simply assume with you," Rian said.


    She glared at him. He just kept on smiling.


    They both sat down to wait, the militia watching them with unrelenting eyes¡­


    "Want me to tell you a story?" Rian said brightly.


    "Don''t you dare!"

 35 - Winter Plans

    Eventually, as promised, food was sent up to them for lunch, since aside from Grem''s actions, they were apparently still considered guests.


    River''s Fork demesne had bread.


    That alone made all this worth the trip.


    "I might have to leave your demesne," Rian said, staring down in salivating wonder at the baked good in front of him. "No offense, but Lorian isn''t being completely fulfilling for me¡­"


    "Those are terribly ungrateful words," Lori said absently as she licked her lips, taking in the smell of bready goodness. It was flat bread, dough heated on a hot, flat surface with nothing to make it rise but the air that had been mixed in from kneading, and it smelled wonderfully fluffy despite it.


    "I have a right to my opinions," Rian said, reaching over and waving his hands over the still-warm bread.


    "No, you don''t, that''s not on the list," Lori said, already finding she would miss the smell and sight of this bread once it went through her mouth and into her stomach.


    "Well, I have the right to travel, and I''m thinking of traveling here," Rian said.


    "Remember that list is contingent on you being my lord," Lori said. "You negotiated it that way."


    "Curses. My path to bready paradise is thwarted," Rian said.


    "You people are weird," one of the militiamen having their own lunch said.


    Lori, and Rian, both ignored the obviously incorrect people as they stared at the meal before them. In addition to bread there were boiled vegetables and tuber not unlike what they had in Lori''s Demesne, bread, grilled seel and beast meat, bread, some sort of fruit, and bread. It was laid out on wooden bowls not unlike what they used themselves back home, save the absence of bread. Because there was bread.


    "If you just keep staring at that, the bread''s going to get cold," one of the other militiamen said.


    That finally got them to start eating.


    As Lori ate, she watched Rian. He''d washed his hands with a little water they''d been provided and had put meat into the middle of his bread and rolled it up, forming a tube. He was eating it lengthwise like some kind of sausage. She supposed that was more efficient than tearing off bits of bread and pilling stuff on it, but it looked vaguely childish. The militiamen seemed to think so, glancing and snickering among themselves.


    Still, it took little time for their plates to be cleared of food. Rian even offered to wash the dishes, an offer that was declined as one of the militiamen took everyone''s plates away.


    "So," Rian said as they settled back to keep waiting. "How do you think everyone''s doing at home?"


    "They''ve probably taken this opportunity to play music into the night," Lori said, maintaining her breathing. A light breeze began to waft around her, cooling her face. "Though I''m more concerned that the sudden inrush of new people will be straining our food reserves, not to mention how it affects our supplies for winter." She gave him a flat look for that. "Particularly in light of wasteful use of said reserves."


    "We''ll be fine," Rian dismissed. "Winter isn''t for another seven blue months. That''s plenty of time to stock up on food, and figure out keeps."


    Lori blinked at that, and the militiamen perked up as well. "How do you know that?" she asked.


    "I asked around Covehold while I was there," Rian said. "Didn''t any of you? It''s been a while, but we should have at least seven blue months left. Six at worse, they said something about the winds possibly making it come early."


    Lori twitched. "Why don''t you bring up important things like this sooner?"


    "I thought you''d know," Rian protested. "How hard is it to ask how long we have until winter?"


    Lori gave him a look.


    "Yes, I remember, you don''t like talking to people and they probably didn''t sell calendars marking the seasons, but still!"


    "Seven months, you say?" one of the militiamen said.


    "Close enough?" Rian shrugged. "I don''t exactly have a calendar either, I''ve just been making a mark on the wall for every day I''ve been here. Had to start all over again when the dragon knocked the wall down, so I might be off by a day or two, since I''m still not sure how long the dragon took to pass, I was too sleep-deprived and asleep¡­"


    "Yes, weren''t you supposed to be keeping me awake so we wouldn''t die horribly?" Lori said blandly.


    "We''re alive, aren''t we?" he said. "Besides, I responsibly waited for all the weird sounds to stop in the middle of your ranting before passing out." He frowned suddenly, leaning forward to peer at her. For some reason he stuck a finger in his mouth and held it up in the air, while she leaned back, disgusted. Eventually he set it down, wiping the finger on his trousers. "Huh¡­ anyway, we have time. We might need a bigger, dedicated cold storage room for it though, some place where food goes in but doesn''t come out until winter. It''s a good thing we have you, Binder Lori. Otherwise we''d have to build it by hand, and we wouldn''t be able to make the ice that would let foods like meat keep for that long."


    He said that last in a bright, happy voice that seemed a touch insincere to her ears. Was he mocking her?


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    "Which reminds me¡­ with all the people who''ve moved in from River''s Fork, we might need a new bathhouse," Rian said thoughtfully. "Do you think we can have a different design, maybe pools people can soak in hot water in, or a nice steam room? I''ve had some design ideas I''ve been wanting to run by you, and I was wondering how hard they would be to implement¡­"


    "What design ideas?" Lori asked warily.


    "Well, pools for people to soak in, for one thing," Rian said. "I figure with a few changes of features, we can make the baths a proper social center. You don¡¯t notice since, you know, you use your private bathroom, but a lot of people like to linger in the baths and chat after a long day of tramping through the woods looking for wild vegetables, trying to grow the wild vegetables we''ve transplanted, putting up roofs, tanning seel and beast hides, cutting wood, cooking for everyone and not urinating in public, people just want to relax and chat, and with a few minor changes to the design of the baths, they''d be able to do that."


    "Baths are for bathing," Lori pointed out.


    "Look, just trust me on this, all right?" Rian sighed. "A nice, steamy bath will do wonders for morale, especially when winter comes and we have rain at best or thick snow at worst. When that happens, even you won''t want to stay in that cave you call your bedroom and will want to go out into the nice, hot baths and soak in the nice, hot clean water. Ooh, and speaking of winter preparations, do you think we can set up a farm in your dungeon?"


    "A¡­ farm?" Lori said.


    "Yeah, you know, somewhere we can plant small wild vegetables and tubers indoors so we can augment our diet with fresh vegetables in the winter," Rian said. "A little heat to simulate the climate, a little magic light to make the plants think they''re in sunlight, and we''d be able to use the dungeon to grow crops all year round, like the big demesnes! Then we won''t have to be dependent on scavenging plants for food!"


    Lori opened her mouth to protest¡­ and paused. She tapped her lips thoughtfully,


    "It''ll be a lot of work, but we''d have six months," Rian said. "Plenty of time to prepare so we don''t die horribly over the winter."


    "I suppose¡­" Lori said, digesting the thoughts slowly in her head. "It should be doable, with a proper schedule." She sighed. "Fine, get me some drawings of the designs you''re thinking of for the baths. Though it''ll be your job to keep people from fornicating in there."


    "What, you want me going into the baths for women?" Rian said.


    "Deputize someone if you have to," Lori said.


    "Not gonna do it yourself?" Rian smirked.


    "I''m the Binder, I would literally have other things to do," Lori said.


    Rian sighed. "Maybe I can ask Riz to do it, she''d probably have peacekeeping experience," he muttered. "Ugh, we''re going to have so many issues to deal with when we get back, aren''t we? I have to check the progress on making thread, need to see how the furs we''ve been gathering have been doing¡­ I think you were waiting for something so you could finally make wire?"


    "A draw plate," Lori said. "You talked to the smiths about lending me one of theirs, remember?"


    "Oh, right," Rian said. "I suppose that''ll give you something to play with in the winter, since we''ll all be stuck indoors anyway. Maybe I can get the carpenters to carve board games so the rest of us will have something else to do¡­ "


    Lori sighed. She glanced out the window. The sun looked like it had barely moved. "How much longer do we have to wait?"


    "Traumatized little girl," Rian said, not looking outside. "Dead father. Don''t rush her."


    Lori sighed.


    "Take a nap," he said. "I''ll wake you up if anything happens. Somehow, I don''t think anyone''s in a rush to get things moving right now."


    He glanced towards the militiamen, who all looked back stoically.


    "Yeah, take a nap," Rian said. "Who knows how long this''ll take? Best you get rested for when someone finally talks to us instead of being exhausted waiting."


    Lori glared at him. "I''m fine." She didn''t plan to be asleep unless it was behind stone walls or in the middle of the river. Still, she did sit back and lean against the wall, facing the militia, who faced her back. "We''ll continue waiting," she said, getting comfortable in her seat.


    Still, there was no harm in resting her eyes¡­ just a little. She didn''t need her eyes to listen for people coming at her, after all¡­


    Lori sat back, closing her eyes to rest them, concentrating on her ears to hear the slightest noise¡­


    Someone nudged her and her eyes shot open alertly, blinking at the hand resting on her shoulder. She glanced up at Rian. "Whugh¡­?"


    "So, it turns out the local Binder has an aunt as well as an uncle," Rian said. "And she''s been spending most of the afternoon getting her niece settled down from being upset. But now she''s free, and while she''s not exactly claiming anything on the Binder''s behalf, she wants to talk to us about what happened to her niece and husband. Purely as family, I''m told. She''s not blaming us¨C yet¨C she just wants to hear the sides."


    Lori blinked several more times, purely because her eyes had become so well-rested they needed to get the blood pumping into them again. The cloud of airwisps she''d been surrounding herself with all day was still there, imbued and ready to act at her will, whatever it may be, though the imbuement was less than it had been when she''d sat down to n¨C rest her eyes. The light outside was more orange than yellow, and they definitely wouldn''t be making it back to her demesne even if they started back right then. "Ugh¡­ I see. All right then, let''s go talk to her¡­"


    "How kind of you to make time for me, Great Binder Lolilyuri," a female voice said, and only then did Lori noticed there was someone else with the militiamen too. "I hope you enjoyed your nap?"


    "She''s here, by the way," Rian said brightly.


    "Yes Rian, I can see that," Lori said. She stood, and if the movement was slow, it was definitely not because she''d been awakened form a nap¨C she''d merely been resting her eyes¨C but because her posterior had fallen asleep and numb. She casually straightened her shirt as she stood, back straight and unimpressed. "You are Dungeon Binder Shanalorre''s aunt, then?"


    "I am," she said in a tone that made Lori twinge inside, just a little. It reminded her far too much of when her mothers were scolding her. Her face seemed naturally set in a severe expression, dark green hair pulled back in a bun. "And I am here to find out why my husband is covered in bruises and why my only niece came back home upset." She didn''t raise her voice, didn''t scowl extravagantly, didn''t say anything that wasn''t perfectly reasonable. She just sounded determined. Lori had to forcibly resist the urge to start looking down at her feet. She frantically tried to remember this woman''s name, came up blank, panicked for a moment, then internally sighed as she remembered she hadn''t been told yet.


    The doctor, Las¡­ Laspodin? No, Lasponin, that was it¡­ he had given Lori the impression for trying to be the power behind the core. Trying incompetently, but trying. This woman gave the definite impression of being the power behind the trying to be power behind the core. Lori firmed her resolve and reminded herself she was a Dungeon Binder, and a learned wizard, who''d gone to school and been recognized as a wizard by her peers. She knew exactly how to deal with this woman''s mother-reminiscent intimidation!


    "Lord Rian here was speaking to your husband and can give you a full account of what transpired," Lori said, reaching behind her and pushing a surprised lord in front. "Rian, tell Binder Shanalorre''s aunt everything she needs to know, as you were the closer witness between us." This was definitely a ''talking to people'' situation, and that was Rian''s job. He should deal with it.


    Mercifully, the woman turned her gaze toward Rian, who shuffled nervously. "Very well, then. Lord Rian, was it? Tell me, then, why my husband and my niece were attacked this morning¡­"

 36 - The Aunt and the Niece

    Lori had never seen Rian so nervous. It wasn''t a state she associated with her lord. He was confident, charming, kind, oblivious to other''s advances, could easily be mistaken for making advances, annoyingly insightful, straightforward, theatrical, helpful, determined, and had a strange fetish for voting, but never nervous.


    He was nervous now as he explained the chain of events that had led to violence to her husband, being very careful to emphasize his non-involvement until it came time to heroically rescue the man from the clutches of betrayal and save her niece from the sudden attempt on her life in the process. The woman didn''t speak, didn¡¯t ask questions, just stood listening quietly with a stern look that seemed to imply that no matter what he said, he was in trouble. Lori just sat back and let it happen, and most certainly did not have terrifying visions of the times her mothers had made her explain herself.


    The militiamen, for their part, looked slightly amused at the exchange, although Lori noted they made sure to stay behind the woman when they smiled.


    "¡­and that''s what happened, Missus Vyshke," Rian finished, shuffling and clearly needing to constantly remind himself to make eye contact rather than look down at his feet. "We had no idea he was planning to hurt your husband and niece the way he did, I swear! We just came here to help get wounded people back to our demesne with their families and claim the dungeon, back when we thought it was still unclaimed. We didn''t even know your niece was the Dungeon Binder until Grem attacked her and her uncle intervened."


    "That doesn''t explain why she was upset," the motherly Vyshke woman said. "She said a woman was saying all sort of horrible things about beating people."


    "That was our Dungeon Binder trying, in her own ''not-good-with-children'' way, to find out how Grem was going to be punished," Rian said. "He''s one of ours now, so we have a responsibility towards his well-being, even if he probably deserves everything that''s coming to him."


    The Vyshke woman turned her gaze towards Lori. Lori reached over, grabbed Rian by the top of his trousers, and pulled him in front of her.


    The woman probably made a face, because Rian sheepishly said, "She''s not good with older people, either. I''m here to answer any questions you have on her behalf."


    "And this is the woman who leads your demesne?" There was clear skepticism in the words.


    "She was the only wizard still alive when we finally had to build our Dungeon," Rian said. "I''m sure you know what it''s like to not be spoiled for choice."


    There was a tense silence.


    "She made my niece cry," the Vyshke woman said.


    "Mom¨C Ma''am! With all due respect for your niece''s pain, her father had recently died," Rian said. "If she wasn''t inclined to cry and be upset, I''d be worried for her sanity. It sounds callous, but it''s true. We regret our part in making her cry this time. But we only asked questions that had to be answered to settle Grem''s fate."


    "Oh, him. I have yet to get to him," the Vyshke woman said.


    "Can we come along?" Rian said. "We''d like to know what he has to say too."


    There was a moment of silence. Rian was blocking Lori''s view, so she couldn''t see what the Vyshke woman was doing with her face.


    "I''m sure someone will tell you," the Vyshke woman said.


    "As his lord and Binder, if your Binder isn''t going to give him a proper trial for what he''s done, then we''re obligated to," Rian said. They were? "And if you''re going to couch this in terms of parental concern, then as the ones in authority over Grem, we''re the ones responsible for him. That means getting his side of events. That''s not an unreasonable request, is it? And if we go together, we can all be sure we''re being told the same thing. I just punched the man repeatedly into unconsciousness, which is a first for me, and I''m not even sure if he''s still alive. At the very least, I want to know why I had to do that. Wouldn''t you?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    River''s Fork Demesne didn''t have an established jail, as apparently this was the first violent altercation that had necessitated it. Previous violent altercations, they had been told when the lack of facilities was explained, had all been in good fun and not required incarceration. The Vyshke woman led the way after a quick conversation with the militia guarding them. while no orders were given, the militiamen had suddenly said it was quite reasonable that they be allowed to see Grem to hear his side of things.


    Lori suspected that if nothing else, the Vyshke woman was much more respected than her husband.


    In lieu of proper holding cells, Grem had been put in the nearest abandoned house, of which there was a surplus. It wasn''t a large surplus, as many had been destroyed by the dragon during its passing, but given that the demesne was housing only a fraction of what it originally had, people were hardly wanting for sufficient shelter. There were more former militia guarding it, actual swords at their waists and grim expressions


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    The fact the door was open was slightly concerning.


    "Vollis!" one of the militiamen in the group escorting them snapped, addressing one of the militia standing guard. "Why is that door open?"


    The man''s hand jerked as if to make an abortive salute. "Yllian, sir," the man said. "The Great Binder wanted to see the prisoner. Don''t worry, Mylls and Yvenne are with her to make sure nothing funny happens." Then she glanced, saw the Vyshke woman, and swallowed nervously. "Missus Vyshke. D-don''t worry! We made sure he was unconscious first! He still hasn''t woken up from his beating."


    Rian coughed. "Oh, that''s¡­ slightly concerning. I hope I didn''t give him a concussion or brain damage or anything¡­"


    The militiamen eyed him warily. Grem had not been a small man, and Rian, while fit, was not a large one. He, for his part, simply smiled at them, which seemed to make them nervous.


    The Vyshke woman frowned, but stepped into the house. It was a small house, seemingly made from a single, living tree that had been modified with Deadspeaking to have internal hollows that could be used for a dwelling. Presumably recently cut parts of other trees had been added to it to give it mass, given that some of the bark on the outside had different textures. After a moment, Lori and Rian were allowed to follow. The house was a single large room, about six paces in diameter. Niches for bunks had been carved along one wall, and there was some kind of firepit in the middle made from sand and rocks, blackened slightly from when it had been used.


    Grem was lying, still unconscious, in one of the bunk niches. There were still bloodstains on his face, now dried dark brown. Next to him, with two men standing between her and Grem, was Binder Shanalorre, looking like someone who''d been caught with a staff raised to club someone in the library. Not that Lori knew what that was like, of course.


    "Shana," the Vyshke woman said. "I thought I told you to stay at home, while I found out what was going on." The tone, rather than being angry, was disappointed.


    Lori could feel her heart writhing at that rainbowed colors tone, and she had to remind herself repeatedly this woman wasn''t one of her mothers and had no power over her. From his expression, Rian looked to be doing the same.


    The girl shuffled nervously, but held her ground. She drew herself up, not that she reached very high, and met her aunt''s gaze. "I asked, and was told that ninong Grem had not yet been treated for his wounds," she said, managing to keep her voice even. "As the Great Binder, I am responsible for the health of all in this demesne, so I came to heal him. He had head wounds." Her lips quavered slightly. "Tyatya said headwounds always needed to be healed first, or it could be very bad, s-so that''s what I''m doing!"


    The Vyshke woman nodded, as if in understanding. Lori was instantly wary. Mothers were never understanding when they were disappointed, they were just setting you up for more guilt! "I see¡­ well, you should have asked first. Especially since I told you to stay home."


    "I am Great Binder n-now," Binder Shanalorre said, clenching her teeth and briefly blinking back tears. She hastily wiped them from her eyes. "This is my demesne. I don''t need permission to go anywhere."


    "That''s as may be, but if I didn''t take care of you, your father will rise from the ashes to haunt me for¨C" the Vyshke woman began.


    "Well, maybe that''s what I want!" Binder Shanalorre suddenly exclaimed. The tears were back, and she rubbed at her eyes angrily. "I want tyatya to rise from the ashes! So stop taking care of me so he''ll come back!"


    For a moment, the Vyshke woman looked like she was about to retort back, just like one of Lori''s mothers would have¡­ but she kept silent, and waited as the young Dungeon Binder stood there and cried.


    "We all miss them, Great Binder," one of the militiamen said tenderly, raising one hand to gently squeeze the girl''s shoulder. The other man offered her his water skin.


    Rian, for his part, looked incredibly awkward, staring up at the ceiling as Lori waited through the emotional drama and hoped she didn''t have to contribute anything.


    Eventually, the tears stopped. The young Binder still looked absolutely miserable, her stomach and shoulder still heaving from sobs, but there was a limit to how much water the body was willing to lose to tears. Finally, even those subsided, and Shanalorre took deep, steadying breaths that shook only slightly. She gave her aunt a wary, defiant look, then reached for Grem, putting her little hands on his head.


    There was nothing to see as she used Deadspeaking. Nothing to hear, no great sonorous gong as it was often depicted with in theatrical performances. Lori didn''t feel anything through the cloud of airwisps she''d surrounded herself with and spread across the room, no displacement as other imbued wisps made contact with them. Was that because she was yet untrained in Deadspeaking herself? She thought she''d have at least felt something, now that she was a Binder¡­ but no, it felt the same way as it always did whenever a Deadspeaker used their magic around her: nothing.


    Yet clearly something happened. The livid bruising on Grem''s face faded away, replaced with healthy skin tones, and that was probably the least of what she was doing. Lori had to wonder how it was done. General introductory texts, given to everyone so they could start learning how to breathe in and circulate magic, spoke of what other wizards put their magic into. Whisperers imbued them into wisps, Horotracts used it to define vistas, Mentalists somehow put it into their thoughts, and Deadspeakers turned it into¡­ life? The texts had been generally vague, and while Lori had skimmed the parts not about Whispering in curiosity, once it became clear they were absolutely no use to her she''d put them out of her mind.


    She was slightly regretting that now. Slightly.


    Grem''s breathing changed just as the young Binder drew back, and the militiamen with her, as well as the ones who had accompanied them, became more alert, all their eyes on the man.


    Grem''s eyes opened slowly.


    "Good afternoon Grem," Rian said brightly, making Shanalorre jump in surprise. "Had a nice nap? Because it''s been a long day and we''d really like to know what you thought you were doing this morning?"


    "Lord Rian¡­?" Grem said, sounding disoriented. "Did you do it? Did you kill her? Is everyone safe now?"


    Lori became aware of glares being directed towards them. She took deeper breaths, trying not to be obvious about it.


    "I swear I have no idea what he''s talking about," Rian said.

 37 - Grem Explains Himself

    The Vyshke woman moved to stand over Grem, glaring down at him. As he finished blinking and came fully conscious, he started returning the favor.


    "Grem," she said curtly.


    "Vyshke," he said in the same tones.


    "Is there any particular reason you tried to kill my husband and my niece, or were you just extremely drunk again?" she said coolly.


    "I am not a drunk, woman! You just can''t hold your beer!"


    This level of personal attacks did not bode well for the neutrality of this discussion.


    Fortunately, Rian stepped in. "Grem!" he snapped, punctuating it with actually snapping his fingers in the man''s line of sight. "Focus. We''re not here for your nonsense."


    Grem''s gaze focused on him. "Lord Rian¡­" he said.


    "No talking," Rian said curtly. "You''ll have time for that later. For now, you''ll listen. Is that understood, soldier?"


    There was an abortive jerk of hand. It was only then that Lori noticed his hands had been bound by their wrists in some manner, and that he couldn''t move them from his sides. "Yes, lord," he said instead.


    Rian nodded. "This woman is going to ask you questions. You will answer them. There will be no nonsense with monosyllabic answers, no holding back information by omission, no refusing to answer. You will answer, completely and honestly. Is that clear?"


    "And if I refuse?" Grem said.


    "I''m your lord. You don''t get to refuse," Rian said. "But since you''re trying to wiggle your way out of this, then if you don''t, we''ll consider your actions as treasonous for unilaterally trying to force Lorian Demesne into war with River''s Fork, revoke your rights and our authority over you, and leave you to their mercies. You''ll have gained absolutely nothing beyond destroying your reputation and honor, and most likely a painful death, with two places that could have been your home instead becoming your enemies, united in disgust against you. All your life, in ruins, and no one will even be sad about you, because the last thing you did was seemingly to murder a child for no reason." There was a beat. "I could threaten you with mutilation and torture, but honestly, I think all that sounds terrible enough. Don''t you?"


    Despite keeping his face smooth, Grem''s throat moved as he swallowed. Rian nodded and gestured.


    "He''s all yours, Missus Vyshke," Rian said. He gave Grem one last look. "Remember, be honest."


    The woman nodded curtly as Rian stepped back. Lori looked at him and mouthed ''treason?'' slightly incredulously.


    Rian shrugged.


    "You heard him, Grem," the Vyshke woman said. "So, out with it. Why did you attack my husband? Why did you make my niece cry?"


    "It''s Lasponin''s fault," Grem said, sounding almost petulant.


    "You always think things are his fault," she said. "You''ve never really liked my husband."


    "I like him," Grem protested. "In small doses¡­after drinking¡­ when his brother is around."


    "But you blame him anyway."


    "It''s his fault! If he''d only waited¡­ that man has always thought he knew better than everyone, that everyone around him was an idiot and if they''d just do what he said things would be better. We had a plan, and he turned around and did what he wanted as soon as we were gone!" Grem snapped.


    "You left us to fend for ourselves," the Vyshke woman said.


    "Because he insisted on staying!" Grem said angrily. "And only because he wanted to play at being Great Binder by taking advantage of his niece! We came back, didn''t we? We were going to claim the core so that people could keep living here safely. But he just had to trick her into becoming one with the core, just so he could pretend to be in charge because he''s her uncle, telling people what to do."


    "Some would say he''s in charge because he''s one of the two doctors we have left, after you all took the rest," the Vyshke woman said.


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    "That means he''s a medical authority, nothing else," Grem said dismissively. "Anything else is arrogance."


    "Is that why you attacked him, then? He angered you, and now there was no Koshay to keep you both apart, so you attacked him?"


    "Is that what he said? Hah! Even in this, he has to make himself seem important," Grem sneered. "I only attacked him because he got in my way. I was trying to get to Shana."


    "Ah, yes, this." the Vyshke woman said. "Why were you trying to get to Shana? Trying to separate her from her foolish, self-centered uncle?"


    "Because she was the Binder," Grem said. "She had to be. Her parents were Koshay and Laven. If there was someone to suddenly arise as a wizard who could be the Binder, it would have been her. So she had to die."


    The room was completely silent then as everyone stared at the man with some mix of horror and anger.


    Lori, however, was looking at the young Binder standing behind the wall of militiamen. She didn''t look saddened or shocked, or betrayed, or even on the verge of tear. Instead, she looked... dead. Resigned. Broken. Like one of the corpses Lori had buried.


    The little girl shook¡­. then ran out of the room.


    Her aunt and Grem didn''t notice, too busy glaring at one another. Huh. Usually Lori was the one who didn''t register things like that. Three of the militament had gone to follow after her, looking concerned.


    "Had to die? Had to die? Are you listening to yourself?" the Vyshke woman snapped. "She''s a child! She isn''t even a woman yet! What''s going through the stupid head of yours that you think killing a child is a good idea?-!"


    "The fact that without a competent Binder to protect this place, a real Binder, one who would actually know what they''re doing, everyone who refuses to leave this place will die the next time a dragon passes us!" Grem snapped. "You were there, woman! Koshay couldn''t protect us! Laven did, but she died doing so in her turn as our Binder!" What? "Now you want a little girl who doesn''t have a single colors-tainted idea of what she''s doing to be the Binder of this place? How will she protect us? She doesn''t have any of her father or her mother''s learning, and Lasponin is a fool if he thinks he can teach her anything to keep a dragon back from finishing this place off! The only way to save this place was to kill her and have a real wizard claim the core."


    "I''ve met your ''real wizard''," the Vyshke woman said. "I am not impressed."


    Lori twitched, directing her glare at the woman''s back. Rian sighed for some reason.


    "You''ll live to change what you say," Grem said. "No one died in her demesne, and she lived through the dragon''s passing. As much as it pains me to say, having Shana as the Binder of this place will just leave everyone to die the next time it happens again. I was saving lives!" He turned away from her, gazing passionately at the remaining militiamen and women. "You all know it''s true! How many of you actually think she can protect you when another dragon comes? Koshay couldn''t and he was a learned man, a man we all know would have done everything in his power he could to protect us! And the best he could do was to kill himself and pass the title of Binder to his wife, and even she died. Now the lesser brother is giving himself airs and trying to do what Koshay couldn''t, and it will get people killed! What is one life compared to all the people who could be saved?"


    "Then why didn''t you kill her yourself?" Rian suddenly said.


    "You saw how it happened, Lord Rian," Grem said. "Her uncle got in the way¨C"


    "Liar," Rian snapped. "The doctor stepped in front of you, but when you tackled him, you hit him into the wall, even though Shana was directly behind him. You could have kept on going straight, slammed right into her, and taken as many hits on his dinky little knife as you needed to while you snapped her neck. Even if he cut your throat, as long as you got hands on her, you''ll live long enough to kill her. But instead, you pushed him aside and left the way to her open. Open for us."


    "I thought that if I kept him occupied, you could¨C" Grem began.


    "Shut up!" Rian snapped angrily, and he was angry. Lori had never seen him angry before. "You coward, you just wanted us to kill her for you because you didn''t have the balls to do it yourself! You started the fight so that we''d panic and go for what seemed like the nearest solution. You made sure we could pass through the door next to you, and that you had a plausible reason not to do it yourself because you were ''occupied''. This wasn''t just about you killing a little girl, this was about trying to get Lori to want to claim this demesne so badly she''d be willing to kill a child for you to do it! It''s why you kept bringing it up, why you kept trying to appeal to her desire to expand her demesne¡­ all so you could keep your hands clean. Even though it was your plan all along."


    "I didn''t¨C" Grem protested.


    "You knew who the Binder was, but you never actually told us," Rian said. "Not until she was right there in front of us and you''d already started a fight. I guess we were supposed to catch on that it was her when you told us to kill her. Just go with it and not think anything of the fact she was a child. Or if we did, you hoped Lori would be greedy enough to kill her anyway. Not that you said anything to that effect. What, did you try to kill her and then got cold feet at the last moment, so you hoped we''d take the hint and do it for you? You didn''t just want to kill a child, you were also too much of a coward to do it yourself!"


    The words hung in the air, and Grem said nothing.


    Instead, as he lay there, he seemed to¡­ deflate. Like a water skin fallen and leaking out its contents, he just seemed to get smaller. His eyes met Lori''s gaze, and for some reason, there was hope there.


    "What?" she said, meeting his eyes. "Are you still hoping I''ll kill her? Why bother? You said it yourself. This place is doomed with her as its Dungeon Binder. I can just wait for the next dragon and claim this place for myself then."


    Grem''s jaw dropped open. "But¡­ everyone here would die!" he pleaded.


    "I fail to see why I should care."

 38 - Dont Mention Your Fetish

    "Any idea what''s going to happen to him?" Rian asked.


    They stood around the outside of Grem''s impromptu prison under the light of the late afternoon sun. It felt¡­ strange¡­ to Lori to not have any work to do at this time of day. Usually she''d be desiccating the contents of the latrines and emptying them to make more room, or checking on the various stone plumbing for leaks or blockages, or curing wood so they could be used within the next few days.


    The Vyshke woman shrugged. "That is not my decision," she said coolly. "My niece is the ''great''¨C" Lori could feel the quotation marks, "¨C Binder now. As she does not seem to want to talk to me at the moment, I should go see to my husband. Good day to you Lord Rian. I thank you for your assistance, and for choosing not to murder my niece."


    She turned and walked off, not even acknowledging Lori.


    "Soooo¡­" Rian said, glancing at the militiamen around them. "Are we under arrest? Do we have to leave the demesne?"


    "The Binder will have to decide," the man who''d seemed in charge said. "When she gets around to it."


    "And if, hypothetically, she doesn''t?" Rian said. "Purely in the spirit of inquiry, not pressuring her or anything."


    The man grunted. "You''re free to leave if you want. She hasn''t said anything. But that one stays." He jerked his head at Grem''s prison.


    Rian nodded. "If we, uh, were to spend the night¡­ do you have any objection to us camping out in front of here? Or would we be obstructing a public road?"


    The man eyed Rian suspiciously, then Lori as well for some reason¨C why? She wasn''t anywhere near as suspicious as Rian!¨C before grunting. "You can all stay in there," he said, pointing at another Deadspoken wooden structure within sight of Grem''s prison. "No one is using it anymore since the family moved out. Just don''t do anything stupid."


    "Thank you Mister Yllian," Rian said, making Lori wonder who he was talking to before realized it must be the man''s name and promptly forgot about it. "Uh, if something is decided about him, could you inform us? It''s for paperwork purposes, need to witness what happens and all that." They did?


    "Get out of here," the man said, shooing them off.


    Rian did just that, walking back towards their boat. After a few moments, he turned around and started pulling Lori along after him. Having nothing better to do, she let him


    "So¡­ what now?" Rian asked. "About Grem, I mean."


    Lori glanced at him. "I hope you don''t expect some sort of foolhardy rescue mission or any sort of heroic nonsense like that."


    "No, he can rot in there for all I care, but I''ve learned not to assume I know what you''re thinking," Rian said. "So, in lieu of heroic nonsense, what kind of nonsense should I expect?"


    "Why do you assume it will be nonsense?"


    "You used the word ''nonsense'' first, I just assumed it was a blanket term for any sort of plan we come up with."


    "I thought you''d learned not to assume?"


    "Clearly the lesson didn''t stick very well,"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Let''s get back to the boat and make sure the idiot didn''t damage my staff. I need to think."


    "And I need to find someone who will actually answer my questions about people who want to reunite with their families who are now at Lorian," Rian said, sounding exasperated.


    "Do that after you find out if they''re feeding us for the night," Lori said. "And see if you can get more bread."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Thankfully the idiot didn¡¯t damage her staff, although the butt was wet and covered in dirt from negligent handling. Each of the quartz also had a little dark stain. It took her a while it realize it was dried blood. The idiot Landoor also kept looking down at Lori through his nose until Rian had pulled him aside and told him that they weren''t pretending he was a Binder anymore. Surprisingly, the idiot had protested until one of the other two, Deil, had kicked him hard in the shin, and there''d been a quick, frantic, three-way conversation that had Rian''s hand on his face.


    Lori had looked upon this and turned to the other sensible person on the trip, Tackir. "That idiot believed some weird story about how having my staff put me in his power, didn''t he?" she said.


    "Worse, your Bindership," Tackir said with a sigh. "He believed a stupid story about how a Binder''s staff was the source of their power, so now he was your heir."


    Lori nodded solemnly. Really, she was surprised this kind of nonsense hadn''t happened sooner. "Feel free to foist off as much work on him until we get back to the demesne as you want, as long as it doesn''t slow us down," Lori said. There was nothing in the rights about work distribution, after all.


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    Tackir blinked, then smirked. "Yes, your Bindership. Justice and discipline, coming up."


    "Don¡¯t hurt him," Lori reminded. "He has rights, after all. Just make him suffer."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Tackir said, sounding much more cheerful.


    Petty? Extremely, but that idiot needed to be dissuaded from believing in baseless stories, especially when they made him rub his blood on Lori''s stuff! He was a grown man, after all!


    Lori watched in some annoyance as the boxes¨C made from valuable cut planks slotted together with joinery, when had someone found time to make them?¨C of preserved meats were hauled out of Lori''s Boat to be given to whoever was in charge of the food at this demesne. Surely there was someone, right? Still, there was nothing to be done about it. Despite his annoying initiative in not consulting her about this use of their resources, it probably wouldn''t hurt to try and buy cooperation and influence with food.


    She sat on the boat, guarding the stuff they were definitely not giving away, one elbow casually resting on the metal wire poking out from the bone support strut. The bone was still in good condition, with no breaks or any structural problems, so she left that be, though she reminded herself to reinforce it when they set out. The water jet had bled off some imbued magic since she''d deactivated it this morning, and she took the time to imbue it again for the journey back. They wouldn''t need much. At worst, they could leave early and get back to at least the border of Lori''s Demesne by nightfall. That was actually a fairly convenient travel distance, all things considered. A part of her sighed in despair at not being able to claim this place for herself. Hopefully the probationaries had also brought grain crops with them and were even now planting it in her Demesne so they''d eventually have bread¡­


    Huh, actually, she hoped they hadn''t planted yet, she hadn''t had time to consider a good site for a more established field. They had some plots for wild vegetables, but those were small, experimental things as people tried to figure out how to best grow them. An actual field for crops would be different¡­ but wait, the probationaries probably didn''t have that many on them to safely transport¡­ did they? Ugh, she''ll have to ask Rian and see if he knew how much the probationaries had managed to bring with them¡­


    These regretful thoughts filled her as she sat back on the boat, imbuing the water jet and waiting for everyone to get back so they could unload the rest of the things on the boat for the night and finally let her push it back out into the river to sleep, because there was no way she was going to sleep in the same room as them. No, not safe, not safe at all. She might not be inclined to kill their Binder, but she wasn''t quite sure the reverse was true. Although¡­ sleeping in the middle of the river would leave her vulnerable¡­. Ugh, where could she sleep where she was safe?-! Maybe she could find an abandoned house in the middle of the night and sleep there? Though that left the problem of doing so unseen¡­


    She was still considering the problem when Rian came back. "So, wonderful news," he began with a bright, happy smile.


    "Bread?" Lori asked.


    "Bread!" Rian sighed with pleasure.


    The two grinned at each other before Lori coughed and looked aside, mindful of her dignity. "Ah, wonderful news indeed," she nodded, trying not to salivate at the thought of bread for dinner. "Was that it?"


    Rian nodded. "Still no word on what''s going to happen to Grem. Though I''m getting the impression it''s being kept quiet right now. The only ones who seem to know are the two of us, Missus Vyshke, her husband, and those militia. I guess they don''t want anyone taking matters into their own hands without their Binder''s decision. Personally, I think they should all get together and come to a rational decision as a group¨C"


    "Please don''t embarrass me by espousing your ridiculous voting fetish to the people here," Lori said


    Rian gave her an incredulous look. "You think I''ll embarrass you? And it''s not a fetish, it''s a rational, intelligent way of making decisions¨C"


    "It''s a bizarre fetish the way you fixate on it," Lori said flatly. "Please don''t encourage the power-mad uncle by enabling him with a childish fantasy of how a demesne could be run by ignoring the decisions of its Binder in favor of other people."


    "Is that how you see it?" Rian said.


    "A demesne that defies its Binder is already asking to get messily murdered by that Binder," Lori said. "A demesne encouraging another demesne to defy its Binder is asking for a war after the messy murdering. Let''s not complicate Binder Shanalorre''s life any further, shall we?"


    "But¨C"


    "Rian," Lori said sharply. "That''s enough. Leave it be. You probably think you''re helping. You''re wrong. Whatever they decide to do here, we can''t be accused of being part of it. Understand?"


    Rian blinked. "Oh¡­" he said in a small voice. "This is one of those ''can''t do anything because anything would look bad'' situations."


    "Finally," Lori said. "Yes, Rian. Theoretically, any sort of organized decision making will help¡­ but we can''t be seen to have influenced the formation of that organization. It would erode Binder Shanalorre''s authority and credibility."


    "Weren''t you planning to let her die the next time a dragon passed by so you could claim this place?" Rian said blandly.


    "I''d rather not set the precedent that people can erode my authority by gaining the support of another Binder and living to tell about it," Lori said. "So no ''innocently'' telling people about voting, understood? If they come up with it, it must be by themselves. We have nothing to do with it." She paused. "That is not an oblique hint that you inform them so in secret. You are not to inform them at all. Understood?"


    "Almost childishly clear," Rian said dryly. "Fine. So we just sit down, not get in trouble, let Grem hang to whatever justice they come up with, and go home, right?"


    Lori nodded. "I suppose you can still look for those wounded left behind by their families," she said.


    "Not left behind completely," Rian said. "The ones left have at least one family member staying with them, at least from what Grem told me on the way here. Though, since she''s a healer, they''re probably not wounded anymore. We might still have to take two trips though, probably three, depending on how many and how much stuff they have."


    "I will, of course, leave you to take care of that," Lori said.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Of course. Do you want to go see the house we''ll be staying in or do you want to risk sleeping out here. It''s kind of bare, but it has an internal wall dividing it into two rooms, so I can help you barricade yourself in."


    Lori blinked, considering. "Yes, I suppose that will do," she said. "You''re sleeping in front of the door."


    "You sure you trust me with that?" Rian said, with a twisted smile.


    "Probably not, but you''re all I have," Lori said.


    "Your faith in me makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside," Rian said blandly.


    "You should talk to a doctor about that, those can''t be healthy symptoms."


    "Should you really be irritating the man you plan to have guard your door?"


    "I''ll give you a little of my bread."


    "How little?"


    "Very little."


    "Fine, I''ll take it."


    Feeling like she won and lost at the same time, Lori followed Rian to see where they would be sleeping for the night.

 39 - Runaway

    The day had been full and exciting, and by the end of it Lori felt gritty and unclean. Not the gritty and unclean feeling the Iridescence left, which felt like being covered in fine, needle-like sand that had managed to embed itself on your skin, slowly penetrating inside you into your brain and entrapping her body''s wisps, but the other kind, made of sweat and dust and too much exertion and excitement. She had gone out to the river with one of their seel-skin buckets to get water and use that to give herself a brief scrub in the small room she was to sleep alone in, the doorless doorway blocked by darkwisps and dire threats of violence, but it just wasn''t the same as a proper bath. Still, it made her stop feeling too grimy to sleep, even if she still had to wear the same clothes.


    She also found that Rian was a surprisingly fierce haggler as he quibbled how much ''very little'' bread amounted to. It was surprisingly a lot, almost a 1/16<sup>th</sup> wedge of a round flatbread! Ugh, the man had better guard her door properly.


    When it was time to sleep, the curtain of darkwisps came up again so she wouldn''t have to put up with anyone staring at her when she slept. She put it in front of the window too. It wouldn''t last long, barely an hour, but it was the principle of the thing!


    It took a while to fall asleep, since the darkwisps obstructed light, not sound, and so she had to listen to the talk coming from the other room, low as it was, as Deil, Tackir and Rian repeatedly tried and failed to remedy Landoor''s colorbrained belief he was now Lori''s heir or something until she finally put the cloud of airwisps around her to use and bound it with the darkwisps to block out sound. Only then did she manage to fall asleep.


    Lori and everyone else were awakened in the middle of the night¨C the bindings of both the darkwisps and the airwisps had faded away¨C by the sound of fierce knocking on the door of the wooden house. As Lori fumbled for her staff, she heard someone stumble awake and head for the door.


    "Did Grem escape?" Rian said, his sleepy and tired. "Or did Binder Shanalorre run away from home?"


    Lori rubbed her eyes to clear them as a suspicious voice said. "How did you know that? Did you do something to her?"


    She heard Rian sigh. "Lori, their Binder ran away from home! I''m going to help them look! That all right with you?"


    "How did you know she was gone?" the suspicious voice demanded again.


    "Because she''s an upset little girl who''s just had a terrible day and probably wants to get away from a lot of things," Rian snapped back. His good cheer had apparently been diminished by the late hour. That, or he just couldn''t be bothered to put up his usual cheerful act when he''d just been woken up in the middle of the night. "Now come on before she falls into the river and drowns. You three, with me. Yes, you too Landoor, stop trying to see through your nose, Binders can''t do that and real ones don''t bother. Get up, there''s a little girl who might be in trouble. "


    For a moment, Lori considered going back to sleep and only getting up when the demesne collapsed so she could find someone to tell her where the core was. Then she sighed, sat up in the dark, and pulled on her boots over her fresh socks. Throwing on her rain coat against the chill of the night and grabbing her bag full of lengths of firewood, she stepped out of the house, following the distant sounds of people and the light from the fire that had been made near the base of the central tree. People were gathering around the fire, some trying to make torches using wood and wax. The moonlight was dim, most of it blocked by the dome of living wood above,


    There were only a few lanterns, filled with seel fat and smelling because of it, which didn''t really do a lot to dispel the darkness. Vaguely-familiar militiamen were directing people to form a search line, sweeping from the dome and outwards up the hill, while two other groups were being directed to search along the riverbanks.


    Lori breathed in, going through the familiar exercises of gathering and building up magic before she channeled them up to the lightwisps in her eyes. Carefully, she imbued them, careful to keep them in her body, and the night slowly got brighter and brighter. The formerly insufficient lamps blazed bright, and from above bright shafts of colorful moonlight glowed though openings in the dome. With everything more visible, she looked around, looking for Rian or anyone who looked vaguely like one of her people, sticking to the shadowed edges of the crowd. She found that idiot Landoor, standing around looking lost and ignorant and not paying attention to the voices giving directions, one of the other men with him, who was paying attention. Granted, Lori wasn''t either, but she wouldn''t be searching with the group.


    Eventually she saw Rian, walking quickly back from the direction of the river. He walked up to the militiamen organizing everyone with something closer to his usual self-confidence and assurance. "We checked our boat," she heard him say as she got closer. "It''s still there, so she didn''t use that to get away. I have one of my men stay with it, just in case. I looked as best as I could, but I couldn''t see any signs that someone might have fallen in the water."


    "Let''s hope she didn¡¯t", a vaguely familiar man said gruffly. "Demesne''s still up, so good chance she''s not in the river. Get ready to move, we''ll start with a house by house search and then sweep up into the woods."


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    "I''ll see if I can beg for some better lights from my Binder," Rian said.


    "Better you than me," the man said.


    "She''s much nicer once you get to know her," Rian lied, though Lori couldn''t understand why.


    Rian stepped away from the man, looking through what must have been confusing light and shadows. Lori stayed exactly where she was, standing next to an empty house at the edge of the space. Finally, Rian seemed to spot her, and began walking towards were she was standing.


    "There you are," Rian said. "I don''t suppose you have any magic that can conveniently solve this problem, do you?"


    "Why would you think that?" Lori asked, confused.


    "I don''t, but I felt I had to ask in the infinitesimal chance the answer was yes." He seemed to have managed to recover his mask of good cheer and enthusiasm. "I think I managed to convince them that we have nothing to do with this. Though it would help if you''d shed a little light on the situation."


    Lori gave him a withering look. He just smiled.


    She reached to her side for one of the lengths of firewood, handing it to him. "Light the end of this and get back to me," she said.


    Rian grabbed it and did just that, coming back with¡­ well, it could be considered on fire. Little flames were licking on the wood, but it was hot and that was what mattered. She took it and held her staff diagonally, touching the fitful flames to the coalcharm on the end of her staff, which was in turn connected to the wire that ran along its whole length. Lori breathed in, gathering magic and passing it through her core, her muscles, out her hand and through the wire. At the last moment, she remembered to close her eyes with its bound lightwisps before binding the firewisps in the wood and causing them to burn.


    The temperature of the firewisps shot up substantially, fueled by the magic she''d imbued, and the end burst into open flame, consuming the fuel available to it to feed the sudden heat.


    Eyes closed, still breathing, Lori drew in magic, filling her lungs again and bringing the magic up to her eyes. She let the binding there dissolve as she pressed the staff to her face, pressing the wire to the thin curtain of her eyelids. Magic flowed through the wire of her staff and into the blazing light of the flame, and began gathering and binding the lightwisps emanating from the flame to her will. The end of the crude torch started to blaze with light, so bright she could see it through her eyelids.


    "Nothing to see here folks, just a little magic," she heard Rian say as she kept imbuing with magic so it would last some time. "Why are you looking here? There''s a little girl out there who needs help, remember?"


    Finally, she pulled the staff away from her eyes, warily opening them to see the bright torch of light she''d bound to the end of the length of wood, which was still fitfully burning at the end. "Here," she said. "Is this enough light for you?"


    "Is there any way you can have all the light going in one direction?" Rian said. "So that, you know, I don''t blind myself using it?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The lightwisps now bound to send light in a cone so that Rian, as he said, wouldn''t blind himself using it, the search parties went off, Rian and three others equipped with torches of bound lightwisps as they went traipsing through the dark.


    Lori, of course, didn''t join them. She might hurt herself, after all, which would be terrible for Lori''s Demesne. And if that girl died suddenly, then who would claim this demesne in her stead? Obviously, the safest place for Lori was to stay behind.


    She''d gotten a lot of colorful looks at that, but so what? It wasn''t like what those people thought mattered.


    Not that she was the only one who''d stayed. Several of the younger people had stayed behind to watch over the children and get the ones who''d woken up from the excitement to go back to sleep. Neither of the doctors had gone with the search parties, Binder Shanalorre''s uncle among them. She''d gotten a very colorful look from him in particular before he resorted to pacing around the bonfire in the front of the tree. The other doctor, a much less cantankerous man, had found a place to sit down on one of the stairs of branches around the central tree and had gone back to sleep, seemingly confident that if someone was injured enough they needed him, they''d wake him up. Very intelligent fellow, that one.


    Lori had found her own place to sit, her back to one of the wooden houses, trying to stay awake since without Rian she didn''t want to risk sleeping. At least she''d gone to sleep early, as was her custom, and so she was actually fairly well rested right then, even if she wanted to go back to bed and sleep the remaining night away.


    She stared up at the central tree, covered in strange, shifting shadows from the light of the moons shining through the dome of interwoven branches above. In one of the artificial, Deadspoken bulges on the tree that were being used for living space, a light shown from a window, probably some kind of candle. People had climbed up and down the tree, systematically searching each of the built levels for the Dungeon Binder, before dispersing to do a door to door search of all the buildings that Lori hadn''t bothered to join. The fact they didn''t come back with the girl in question meant it was a smart decision, for the search would have just been a waste of energy on her part.


    In her opinion, it was a futile endeavor. Binder Shanalorre no doubt possessed some kind of awareness of the demesne that would allow her to know where everyone was, and could use that to hide accordingly. It would be a simple matter of her hiding where no one had been yet, then going around them to where they''d already searched. They wouldn''t find Shanalorre if she really didn''t want to be found. Everyone was hopeful she could be found, however. After all, the Demesne was still up.


    Still, Lori had to wonder: where could she be? The Dungeon Core? The Vyshke woman and her husband had said they had checked there¨C implying it was within the dome, and possibly under the main tree¨C and hadn''t found her, although she really wasn''t sure if that man actually would tell anyone if he found his niece¡­


    Lori yawned, then grimaced and stood, pacing back and forth herself to stay awake. She stayed away from the pacing doctor. Beyond the dome, she saw the lights she''d made sweeping back and forth piercing through the darkness. People were still searching, then. She shook her head. If this were her demesne, they''d have found the girl already.


    But then again, if this were her demesne, the girl might not have had reason to run away. She''d have just been an ordinary girl. All right, she''d have been a Savant, and one who''d lost her parents, but she wouldn''t have mattered.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Eventually, the sun rose. The Dungeon Binder had not yet been found.

 40 - Fruits of the Morning

    Lolilyuri waited. And waited. And waited.


    Eventually, as the sun continued to rise and everyone continued to sleep with no sign of anyone bringing them food, she had to face the terrible truth.


    No one was bringing them bread for breakfast.


    How ungrateful this demesne was! She''d allowed her citizens to stay up half the night helping them look for their Binder, she''d even contributed with light, and no one so much as showed up with breakfast? Truly ungrateful.


    All the searchers had straggled back in by morning, not long after Lori had woken up from her restful sleep, reported their complete lack of findings, and then finally crawled back into their beds. In the light, Lori had finally been able to tell where the house all their stuff was in was located, and had helped Rian and the others go to sleep while she''d waited for breakfast. Alas, there was none.


    Well, at least they still had travel rations. That was¡­ something.


    ¡­


    Maybe they had a centralized cooking area she could get bread from.


    Faced with the alternatives of doing nothing and eating travel rations (she never thought meat would ever lose its appeal, but eating nothing but had managed to accomplish the impossible), Lori decided to risk going and finding some bread she might be able to beg off someone. Taking her staff, in case she had to hit anyone, she slipped out of the wood house.


    Actually, was it a hut? It was one whole piece of wood with an outside like tree bark, with a roof that was simply the walls coming together in a dome. That was a hut right? You probably needed more right angles to be a proper house¡­


    Outside, Lori''s disappointment grew. Despite the sun being well up in the sky, she seemed to be the only person out and about on the streets of River''s Fork Demesne save for the two militiamen¨C a different pair from earlier, both looking tired and just sitting around outside¨C guarding Grem''s prison, who looked at her warily but didn''t challenge her. She shook her head, adjusting her hat to block the glare. Did these people have no work ethic? No matter how late they''d stayed up the night before, there was work to be done, civilization to be raised from the ground up, food to be cooked, guests to be fed¡­


    Stomach grumbling, she headed out to walk around the town, smelling for bread, trying to catch the elusive smell of baking. Or¡­ was it cooking bread? It was a flat bread, probably heated in a pan, so it was cooked rather than baked, since baking needed an oven¡­


    Sadly, she only heard the sounds of snoring through the open, unglazed windows of the other wooden homes as people slept in, wasting the day away. So disorganized. Was the greeting they''d gotten yesterday, with so many people up and about, an aberration of some sort? No smoke blew from chimneys now, unlike yesterday.


    Movement caught her eye and Lori turned, finding herself looking at one of the tall trees whose branches wove part of the wooden dome above. Smaller branches were already growing from the weave, making the pillar look fuzzy and freshly green. Several children were climbing the woven branches of one particular tree pillar, while others stood below, holding the bottoms of their skirts and shirts out to make an impromptu net and walking underneath the climbers or calling and pointing at something above. Bewildered, and sighing at seeing children left dangerously unsupervised¨C what if something happened to them?¨C she made her way towards them.. As she got closer, she saw they were apparently picking fruits from the tree, some sort of small blue fruit with¡­ yellow tendrils?... that grew in clusters hanging beneath the branches, and which the climbing children were carefully picking and dropping down to the ones waiting below. A lot of the fruits hit the ground instead of being caught by the nets, but from the resulting laughter and how they were picked up and added to the nearest child''s catch, this didn''t seem to adversely impact the fruit''s edibility. Some of the younger children, who apparently possessed less impulse control, had peeled some open, revealing a translucent, pale yellow flesh around a long red seed. The flesh they ate with great relish, while the seeds were all thrown into a pile.


    Lori eyed the tree. She didn''t know what kind of fruit it was, but it was clearly edible. She wondered if it was native to the region or if these settlers had brought it with them from somewhere else. That tree though¡­ she looked down at her shoes. They were scuffed and rather unsuitable for climbing trees. Indeed, on a second look, the children were climbing barefoot. Still, even if she copied them, she doubted she''d be able to pull herself up the tree like they could. Maybe she could use jets of water to get some to fall off? But she''d have to go back to the river first, since she could hardly just pull vapor out of the air here¡­


    "Tah! Stranger! You with the hat!"


    Lori blinked, and it took her a moment to realize she was being spoken to. She look around, but no one seemed to be facing her way.


    "Up here!"


    She moved her gaze upward, following the voice. Near her, on an outstretched branch that honestly looked too narrow to bear his weight, was a boy who for some reason gave a strong brat-like impression. He was hanging upside down by his legs and one arm, his dark purple hair pointing at the ground as his other arm held a huge cluster of the blue and yellow fruits.


    "Can you catch this? It''s too much for anyone else and I can''t hold on and throw it down at little bit at a time," he called.


    "Do I get to have any?" Lori asked.


    He gave her a strange look, made harder to identify from being upside down. "Why wouldn''t you?" he said. "It''s not like anyone owns the tree."


    Well. All right then. Perhaps she''d found breakfast. Carefully setting aside her staff, she considered trying to catch it with her hat¡­ but no. It was a useful hat, and if she tore it, there probably wasn''t a milliner for taums. As the boy swung impatiently, she took off her raincoat and held the lapels and hem, making a depression. The boy threw the cluster of fruits, which she barely caught, almost having it roll off her raincoat. The fruit was a bit heavier than she had assumed, and she adjusted her grip on her coat to any subsequent fruits wouldn''t fall off.


    For the next little while she walked back and forth, following the boy and, when other children saw how much her coat could carry, others as they called for her to walk under them, throwing pieces of fruit in and cheering when they managed to get it into the growing pile she was carrying. At first she was worried one of the fruits would break open, but the skin turned out to be much tougher than she had assumed. Very firm, certainly. Thankfully, breaking off the fruits didn''t seem to release much sap, for which she was grateful.


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    Eventually she had to put down her coat, as her arms were tiring greatly from holding it up. She sat down at the base of the tree pillar, the roots of which had apparently been shaped, most likely by the late Deadspeaker, into surfaces at the right height to function as seats. Lori noted that on closer inspection the trunk itself had convenient-looking spurs, as if from the stumps of branches, for climbing up to pick the fruits. She wasn''t alone, as the girls and boys not adventurous enough to climb the tree themselves sat with her, dumping the fruits from their skirts and shirts and beginning to crack them open with great appreciation and relish.


    Up close, while the yellow-tipped tendrils were¡­ well, slightly disturbing to look at and mildly unnerving to touch, it wasn''t that bad. On closer inspection, the dark blue of the skin had a dry, leathery appearance punctuated by the tendrils, which were actually quite soft and pliable. She held the fruit between two fingers like the children were doing and squeezed.


    Nothing happened.


    "You have to put more force into it," the boy who''d first called out to her said as he sat down opposite the pile of fruits, tucking his bare feet under him. The pile was much smaller than it had been when she''d first sat down, since other children had taken bunches for themselves. Despite that, it was still a sizable pile. He picked up one and twisted it off the stalk it was still attached to. "Like this," he demonstrated, squeezing hard. The skin tore open, and the fleshy inside nearly flew out of the skin. He barely caught it, then popped the whole thing in his mouth, chewing carefully, before turning his head aside and spitting out the seed so it flew with precision on the pile nearby. "And you have to put the seeds there, so it can be planted again."


    "Noted," Lori said, examining the fruit in her hand before turning it slightly and trying again. This time the skin tore, revealing the translucent yellow flesh underneath. She raised it to her mouth using the skin to hold it and, rather than popping the whole thing in, took a careful bite.


    Her front teeth dug into the juicy flesh, scraping along the seed in the middle, and she tore off and swallowed the bit of fruit in her mouth. It was wonderfully soft and sweet, with a deeper sweet aftertaste. She chewed once and swallowed, enjoying the flavor. It was delicious!


    Lori examined the half-revealed seed, which was red and smooth, and covered with yellowish fruit juice. She popped the whole thing into her mouth like the children were doing so as not to waste a drop of flavor, spitting out the seed to place it next to her. In the time she''d eaten one, the boy across from her had already finished four more and was popping open a fifth. What had once seemed like a sizable pile suddenly seemed insufficient for two people as Lori grabbed another fruit and started to pop it open¡­


    For a while, there were only the wet sounds of fruit being popped and eaten, with the occasional spit to the seed pile.


    "Thanks for the help, stranger," the brat-esque boy said between spitting out a seed and putting a fruit in his mouth.


    "It was nothing," Lori said between one fruit and the next. She spat out a seed and put it on the pile next to her. "I was hungry anyway. No one was making breakfast."


    "Yeah, everyone''s tota and tyatya are still asleep," the boy agreed. "I guess something must have happened."


    "Binder Shanalorre ran away from home last night," Lori provided, putting her fruitskin neatly to the side. The boy had been following her example after just tossing it at first, so now they had another pile between them.


    "She did?" the boy looked surprised. "Why?"


    "I have no idea," Lori said, popping a fruit into her mouth and working the seed out of the flesh, popping the seed onto her hand before she chewed the fruit with gusto. She swallowed. "Everyone was looking for her last night to ask her."


    "If she''s hiding, no one''s ever gonna find her," the boy said with the air of someone who knew what he was talking about. "Shana''s really good at hide-and-find. She can climb anything and hide for forever."


    "Her aunt will be very distressed," Lori said. She picked up another fruit and began to squeeze. "This is delicious. What do you call it?"


    "Hairy blueballs," the boy said with a grin. "Wiz Kosh named it."


    "Ah." Lori looked up at the huge tree pillar they were beneath. "Did he do something to this tree besides the obvious? It seems to have a lot of fruit on it."


    "Yeah, Wiz Kosh did some magic on it, said it would keep makin'' lots and lots of blueballs," the boy said. "A lot of the trees are blueball trees. We go to a different tree a day, and by the time we get back the trees got new blueballs hanging on it for us to squeeze the juice out of." The boy grinned, as if expecting Lori to be shocked.


    "Ah. So the name is deliberately vulgar," she said. "Did the late Binder Koshay find it very funny?"


    "Oh yeah, Wiz Kosh loved dirty jokes like that," the boy said. "Really scraped Wiz Laven raw though, especially since she couldn''t stop people from using the name."


    Lori paused. "Wiz Laven?" she said. The name sounded vaguely familiar, like it had come up before but she''d forgotten about it. "I thought Binder Koshay was the only wizard you had."


    "Nah, we had Wiz Laven too," the boy said, tapping his head. "She was a mentyist."


    "Mentalist," Lori corrected out of habit.


    "Yeah, one of those," the boy said. "My tota says Wiz Laven saved us all when Wiz Kosh couldn''t, and that''s why they''re both gone now."


    I was there when Laven took his place, saw what she did¡­


    Oh. Ah. Lori should have realized. Shanalorre had mentioned wizards ''like tota and tyatya''. Two wizards. She''d been hearing it, but it hadn''t been able to put it together. Binder Koshay was one wizard¡­ and this Laven, Wiz Laven was the other. Both were dead, leaving Shanalorre to be the Binder, because there was no other wizard¡­


    Her parents were Koshay and Laven¡­ Grem had said that, hadn''t he?


    For a moment, Lori just sat there, and forced herself to imagine what it would be like to lose both her mothers¡­ and immediately stopped. It was too¡­ impossible a feeling.


    No wonder Binder Shanalorre had run away. No wonder she had been crying and tired and¡­


    The fruit pile got smaller as Lori sat there, staring at nothing as the boy kept on eating fruit. Finally, only a little bit of the pile was left.


    "Well, thanks for the help stranger," the boy said, getting up. He politely kept his bare feet off Lori''s coat. Other children were getting up as well, their piles of fruit finished. They took the skins and seeds and carried it with them, its intended fate unknown. The boy picked up the skins of the fruits he and Lori had eaten, but left her seeds alone. "Most old people yell at us and tell us to climb down when we''re picking hairy blueballs."


    Lori shook herself out of her stupor. "Well, you said you''d give me some," she said. "And I was hungry."


    The boy grinned. "I''m Vari," he said, holding out his hand.


    "Your hand is sticky," Lori noted.


    The boy looked at it and tried to wipe it on his shirt, but that didn''t help. "We''ll shake some other time," Vari said. "What''s your name, stranger?"


    "Lolilyuri," she said.


    "That''s a long name," he said. "Don''t you have a shorter one?"


    "Lori."


    "See you around, Miss Lori," the boy-brat said with a wave. "Maybe you can help us get some blueballs again." He walked off, still in his bare feet.


    "Vari," she called while the name was still fresh in her mind. He turned, walking backwards to face her. "Where are your shoes?"


    "Don''t need ''em," he said. "Climbers climb with their feet! Shoes make you fall off."


    The children all walked down the streets under the dome, leaving Lori to her little pile of fruit.


    She looked at the pile, then took off her hat and put them all inside, supporting the cone of the pointy hat with one hand. With so little, it was a much better fit. Then she set it down and pulled on her raincoat.


    As she looked back over River''s Fork, she saw smoke starting to rise from some chimneys. Finally, people were getting up.


    Shaking her head, Lori picked up her hat and staff and headed for where Rian and the others were probably still sleeping. Hopefully the lack of breakfast would be corrected with some lunch. It was either that or¡­ rations.


    Maybe she should keep these blueballs for herself¡­

 41 - The Promise of Breakfast

    Rian and the others weren''t awake yet by the time she got back, so she left the fruits on top of the pile of supplies next to them, resolving to eat the blueballs if she came back and they were still there.


    Then, still with nothing better to do, she wandered out again.


    She sighed regretfully as she walked about River''s Fork. The remaining damage from the dragon¨C the large boulders still lying around, the destroyed houses, the holes in the dome, the precariously shattered trunk of the tree barely being held up by its place in the weave of branches¨C was such a marked contrast to her nice, restored demesne. Really, if she''d claimed this place, given it a nice new name like Lori''s Crossing, and established her authority, she could be spending her time clearing everything, reinforce that shattered trunk with earthwisps so that the dome would be less likely to fall, maybe get started on more fireproof housing or at least a dedicated kitchen area so more people could be fed efficiently.


    Ugh, she really needed to get back to her demesne. Now that there was no core to claim, this was all just a terrible, pointless waste of her time


    She found herself back in the space in front of the central tree. In the light of day, it was obviously some kind of central gathering space, maybe for community meetings or something of that vein. The remains of the fire was a pile of ash now. She looked around, debating, and walked towards the central tree, climbing the stairs sticking out of it so she could see above the houses. Despite the smoke coming from some of the houses, there didn''t seem to be that many people rousing, though beyond the dome she could see some people seemed to be tending the field of grasses. Crops of some kind? Is that what the plant that grain came from looked like?


    "Good afternoon, Dungeon Binder," she heard the Vyshke woman say from somewhere slightly above her.


    Lori turned and found the woman a few steps up. In her hands was an empty leather bucket. "Barely," Lori said. "It''s almost noon."


    "So it is," the Vyshke woman said.


    "Do people usually sleep in this late?" she said.


    "Everyone must still be tired from looking for my niece," the Vyshke woman said, giving her that scary mother look, the one that said mother disapproved about something.


    "She''s fine. The Demesne''s still up, isn''t it?" Lori said.


    "That''s all you care about, isn''t it? The chance to take this place for yourself?" the Vyshke woman said.


    "Why else would I be here?" Lori said. "The world-famous local library? The many centers of learning? The theaters with its famous actors and shows?"


    "And is your demesne any better?" Vyshke said.


    "Yes," Lori said simply. "My demesne has a Binder who knows what she''s doing."


    The woman gave her a level look. Then she began to make her way down the stairs. When she reached Lori, the wizard stepped aside. Purely to be polite of course, not because mothers were scary or anything.


    "Have you eaten yet, Great Binder?" the Vyshke woman said.


    "Not yet," Lori said. Fruits didn''t count as a proper breakfast in her opinion, which was the only one that mattered. "I''d rather not break out the travel rations if I can help it."


    There was a look of what seemed like sympathy in the woman''s face. "Then come with me. You help me cook, I''ll make you breakfast."


    Lori eyed her, then looked around. Still little in the way of movement that wasn''t leaves in the wind. "The library is closed anyway," she shrugged. "Why not?"


    She fell into step beside the woman, her staff joining her feet in a familiar three-step tread.


    "Has Binder Shanalorre made her presence known yet?" Lori asked.


    "Shana hasn''t reappeared, no," the woman said with a blatant lack of respect. "If she''s safe, we might not see her for days. Her father made sure we had a lot of fruit trees around the demesne. She could walk to literally any tree for something to eat."


    Lori sighed. "So the issue of Grem is unlikely to be settled any time soon, then."


    "I think the men had already mostly decided to hang him," Vyshke said with undertone of¡­ something. "They just have to wake up and get everyone together. You will, of course, be invited to witness, as you requested."


    Lori nodded. "I''m glad Binder Shanalorre was able to delegate the decision to someone before she made herself unavailable."


    For a moment, they walked in silence.


    "You''re going to insist on this, aren''t you?" the Vyshke woman said. "You''re going to insist on having my niece judge a man who bounced her on his knee before she''d learned how to walk, so he can escape justice?"


    "I don''t give a breath whether he lives or dies," Lori said. "She''s your Binder, and as a Binder hers are the only decisions I''ll respect. Whether she judges him herself or she gives you permission to do it for her, all I care about is she said it be done that way."


    "And why is that?" the Vyshke woman said. "Why do you care that her will be done?"


    "Because that''s the way a sane world works," Lori said. "The Binder is obeyed. Otherwise there are consequences. It doesn''t matter she''s a child. She''s the Binder. As a fellow Binder, I can''t recognize anything that subverts her power. It''ll seem like I''m trying to subvert her demesne."


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    "You stated it was your intention to claim this place should she fall to the next dragon," the Vyshke woman said.


    "That''s just common sense," Lori said. "She''ll be dead, after all, why waste a perfectly good place to establish another community? But while she lives?" Lori shrugged. "I''m not a murderer."


    "Merely a scavenger," the Vyshke woman said dryly.


    "You say that like it''s somehow worse than being a murderer," Lori said. "Would you rather I had tried to kill your niece?"


    They walked in silence.


    "You are right, Great Binder," the Vyshke woman said quietly. "I apologize."


    "Show your contrition with bread," Lori said.


    They reached the outskirts of the dome, and came upon an open shack, inside of which firewood had been stacked in orderly cords. The Vyshke woman gestured for Lori, and she held out her arms, holding her staff between them as firewood was stacked for her to carry. Lori was annoyed but not surprised she ended up carrying the larger stack. If asked, she''d probably be told there was no one to stack wood in the Vyshke woman''s arms.


    At least the pile wasn''t so high it blocked her view. Arms already burning¨C was this any way to treat a guest?¨C Lori followed the woman back to the central tree¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After Lori had helped the Vyshke woman with the firewood, bringing them up the large central tree to the house where she apparently lived near the top and used some lightningwisps from her quartz to make a flame for the woman''s stove, Lori was allowed a moment to rest her arms before being drafted to help knead the dough for the bread while her host prepared the rest of breakfast. A breakfast that was late enough to be considered lunch, judging from the sun.


    As she''d guessed, they had nothing to make the bread rise, so there was a lot of folding and kneading involved. She was still kneading as the smells of some kind of meat and wild vegetables filled the air. Lori kept on folding and kneading as ordered.


    Behind her, she heard some noises that indicated other people were waking up as well. Lori didn''t turn as she heard footsteps behind her that stopped abruptly.


    "Lasp, put a shirt on, we have a guest," the Vyshke woman said. "Yoshka, wash your face, there''s still some water left. Verik, we''re out of water, put on your shoes and get some more."


    "What is she doing here?" she heard the doctor''s voice said.


    "Being a guest, what did I just say? Now make yourself presentable, you''re supposed to be a doctor, not a yard worker!"


    "Speaking as a former lumberyard worker, we were expected to be presentable too," Lori said, not looking up from her kneading.


    "Hear that? You look worse than a yard worker! Go put on a shirt!"


    There were grumbles that stalked away, presumably to put on a shirt.


    "Were you really a yard worker?" the Vyshke woman asked.


    "I had to pay for school and supplies somehow," Lori said, still kneading.


    "And now you''re a Dungeon Binder."


    "It''s apparently not that hard out here. Even a child can be one."


    There was a snort at those words. The meat and vegetables were taken off the heat and the pot was placed on the table near Lori. She was handed a spoon.


    "All right," the Vyshke woman said. "Here, let me show you how to stuff the dough¡­"


    Lori followed the woman''s example, making a wrapper with the dough, stuffing it with the meat and vegetables, and pinching it shut. She, the Vyshke woman and a young girl who seemed at least half Binder Shanalore''s age and was introduced as Yoshka all worked to fill the dough with the stuffing, and then the excess dough was put on a hot pan to cook and become bread.


    "Dungeon Binder," the doctor said as Lori finished washing her hands and, lacking anything else, discretely dried them on her shirt.


    Lori turned. "Doctor," she said.


    "I don''t recall inviting you to breakfast," he said, giving her an unwelcoming look.


    "Speak with your wife on the matter," Lori said. She walked around him towards her staff, leaning against the wall next to what appeared to be benches for guests. They were wide, comfortable things, obviously meant for entertaining and obviously made by a Deadspeaker. The legs and seat were made of three different woods braided together. She sat down, trying not to salivate at the smell of cooking food. In the kitchen, the doctor and the Vyshke woman were having a low, obviously intense conversation, with much gesticulating.


    Across from her, the young girl sat on the other bench. Like her cousin, she had pale hair, although hers had a light green tinge. She was looking at Lori with polite interest.


    "Hello," she said as her parents were gesticulating in the kitchen.


    "Hello," Lori said.


    "Are you really a Great Binder?" the girl asked. "Like Shana? And dyadya Kosh?"


    "Yes, like Shana," Lori said. "Do you know where she is?"


    The little girl shook her head. "She''s hiding," the girl said. "She hides in her room a lot, or in her house, or just hides. She''ll be back."


    "People don''t seem to think so," Lori said.


    "She''ll be back," the little girl insisted. "All her stuff is here."


    Lori had to nod. Made perfect sense to her. It was why she''d have to go back to see her mothers, someday: to get the rest of her things.


    But not any time soon.


    There was grunting from the stairs, and a pale-haired young man with sleepy-looking eyes came up carrying a leather bucket of water. "Got the water," he grunted. "Yoshka, can you open the urn?"


    The girl got up to do as her brother asked, holding the lid of the wooden urn¨C Deadspoken, of course¨C as he carefully poured the water into it. Lori continued waiting patiently, breathing in the smell of the bread as the doctor and the Vyshke woman finished their discussion. From the doctor''s disgruntled look and glare at Lori, he''d lost.


    The little girl made to sit in front of Lori again, but her father said, "Yoshka, get away from her." Pouting, the girl did as ordered, and her mother called her to start helping set the table.


    Eventually, breakfast was ready, and Lori sat with the family on the opposite end of the table from the doctor, the sleepy-eyed young man to her left. As the breakfast¨C flat bread and the pastries filled with meat and vegetables, which the little girl helpfully told Lori was called Empanara¨C was being passed around, Lori politely only taking as much as everyone else, there was a pronounced creak from somewhere in the house.


    As everyone but Lori looked up in confusion¨C she didn''t know what sounds this house made¨C Binder Shanalore stepped out of one of the rooms, looking tired, slightly dusty, and with some kind of dried, yellowish juice around her mouth.


    "Shana!" her uncle exclaimed. "Where have you been all night?"


    "Alone," she said curtly. "Good morning dyadya, mushka, Yoshka, kyra Verik." She looked at Lori. "Binder Lolilyuri."


    Lori nodded politely. "Binder Shanalorre."


    "I have come to a decision about the matter, and will discuss it with you later," she said, voice detached and lofty, as if she was trying to sound mature.


    "Answer me, Shana!" her uncle demanded. "We were worried sick, everyone was up all night looking for you, and you were just hiding in your room?"


    "I wished to be alone," Shanalorre said. "So I went somewhere I would be. I apologize for any undue worry it caused."


    "Undue worry¡­!" her uncle said. "You can''t just do that Shana! What if something had happened to you? You can''t¨C"


    "I can do what I want," Shanalorre interrupted him. "I am the Dungeon Binder, and this is my demesne. Not yours, not anyone''s. Mine." Lori nodded in agreement.


    For some reason, the doctor gave Lori a hateful look.


    "Shana¡­" he said, visibly swallowing some intense emotion. "We will discuss this later. For now, come here, sit down, have breakfast."


    "No, we shall not," Shanalorre said as her aunt, and cousins gave her strange looks, but walked to the table and sat down at the empty space next to Lori. "Binder Lolilyuri, be informed that my uncle''s opinions and statements are his own and he does not speak on my behalf or on behalf of this demesne. Assistive executive power will be conferred, however, to my mushka Vyshke, decisions subject to ratification by me."


    "So noted, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. "Bread?"


    "Yes, please."

 42 - The Binder of Rivers Fork

    Lori had a wonderful breakfast, only occasionally marred by the doctor''s impolitely unconcealed hostility and his insistence at arguing with his Binder and niece. The former was crass, the latter was suicidal, but this wasn''t her demesne. The life expectancy of the people in it was not her problem.


    It was clearly making his daughter uncomfortable, although his son endured with the complete and utter apathy of someone who wanted to go back to sleep. The Vyshke woman did not interfere beyond the occasional warnings, but Lori knew mothers. She wasn''t supporting him or letting him have his way. She was practicing what she was trying to preach and saving her violent incandescence for when the guest was gone.


    As a thoughtful guest, Lori ate cleanly and politely, filled her conversation with compliments as to the quality of the cooking the way her mothers had taught her, and politely tried to excuse herself at the earliest possible juncture with the pretext on checking up on her men. The Vyshke woman kindly gave her the remaining pastries and bread in a bowl with a polite request for the bowl''s return, which Lori politely thanked her for.


    When she made to leave, Binder Shanalorre stood with her, rushing to her room to her get shoes. "We have things to talk about," the young Binder¨C the younger Binder¨C said. "I will walk with you."


    "Shana, you stay right here," her uncle said sharply.


    "No," Shana said simply as she sat to put on her shoes. Lori stood patiently, waiting for her to finish, the bowl in one arm, staff in one hand.


    "I am your uncle, and I''m telling you to stay!"


    "I am your Binder. Obey," Shana said, standing as she finished securing her shoes. Her face was placid as she nodded to Lori, who nodded back and gestured for her to lead, as this was her demesne.


    Muttering a vile oath¨C which got him a very displeased look from his wife, since his daughter was in hearing range¨C the doctor stood, brushing past Lori, who had to step back lest she drop the bowl, and grabbed Shana by one small bicep. "Shana¨C" he began sternly.


    There was a blur of movement as Shana stepped hard on his toes, slammed a kick into the side of his knee, drove a fist into his groin, slammed an elbow into his stomach, and thrust the heel of her hand up into his jaw. She was just barely able to reach the last, which was probably why the strike was only disorienting instead of stunning. It made the doctor release her arm though as he stumbled back in pain, collapsing back to sit on one of the guest benches, wheezing as Lori stared in surprise.


    "Shanalorre!" her aunt exclaimed, thunderous.


    "I apologize, my aunt, but I will not be intimidated," Shana said. She turned to her uncle, who was staring at her as if he''d never seen her before. "I will return to heal you once I have finished my conversation with Binder Lolilyuri. In the meantime, take a moment to consider what you did wrong. You are excused from any medical duties for the day."


    Nodding to herself, Binder Shanalorre turned and began to descend the stairs, Lori following after her. Her descent was careful, as she had the bowl to mind, which Shanalorre seemed to appreciate, as she made no attempt at conversation until they reached ground level.


    "I have considered the matter of n¨C of Grem''s attempt on my life," she said evenly as they began to walk to where Rian and the others were sleeping, "and his attempt to manipulate you and Lord Rian into it on his behalf. I have decided you two were genuinely ignorant as to his intentions, and so only he will be punished. I also wish to commend Lord Rian for the actions he took on my behalf, and to thank Lorian Demesne for the meat you delivered to us."


    "I am sure he would be glad to know that," Lori said. "Do you wish me to convey your words to him, or would you do so yourself?"


    "I shall do so," Binder Shanalorre said. "On the matter of Grem, I have decided that though he is guilty of attempting to take my life, his reasons were understandable. As such, I have chosen to not have him executed."


    "That is¡­ merciful of you," Lori commented.


    "This place has seen enough death," Shanalorre said. "However, he is to be exiled from this place and never return. In addition, my residents will be informed as to his actions and will receive permission to do with him as they will should he ever be found in or near the demesne of River''s Fork, even unto death. I request that Lorian Demesne accept his death in these circumstances as stemming from either natural causes or suicide. Beyond that, I leave the matter in your hands, Binder Lolilyuri. He will be detained until it is time for you to leave, at which point I will release him to your custody. Do with him as you will."


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    "I accept these terms," Lori said, "with the addendum that, in the course of future trade and contact, I request that the residents of River''s Fork do not disclose to residents of Lorian, or potential residents of Lorian, the reason for his exile. I would not have my own residents be motivated to harm him."


    "Is that not your problem?" Shanalorre said.


    "It is," Lori asked, "but there''s no point in exiling him to live only to give the people at his destination reason to kill him. If you wish him dead, do so yourself."


    The younger Binder took a moment to ponder this. "Agreed," Shanalorre said. "I will have my people agree to not disclose his crime, and allow him the possibility of a new life." She looked at Lori. "He will be your responsibility after that."


    "That is acceptable," Lori said. "I should disclose that he is a probationary lord of my demesne, as I needed someone whom the new arrivals would respect to act as an intermediary for me. If this revelation causes you to rethink any of your decisions, I am willing to wait on going forward with this proposal."


    Another moment to ponder. "Is that why you have been vocal in your defense and insistence that I judge him?"


    "He is one of mine now," Lori said. "I have made¡­ declarations. To allow him to come to harm with no attempt to avert it would set a precedent that could be used against me."


    Shanalorre considered her words. Lori wondered if she had the vocabulary for it.


    "Explain the word ''precedent''," Shanalorre said.


    "It means I did it before, so people will expect that I do it again, even if the situations and circumstances are dissimilar, merely because it''s simpler than actually thinking of the new circumstance," Lori said. "People can be idiots that way."


    Shanalorre nodded slowly. "Thank you. I will be summoning my residents this afternoon to make an announcement clarifying my position as Dungeon Binder of this Demesne. If you and yours still plan to arrange passage for those once wounded who wish to be reunited with their families¡­"


    Silence.


    The wind blew and leaves fell.


    Silence.


    Lori blinked at the lengthy pause. "Binder Shanalorre?"


    The younger Binder shook her head. "If you and yours still wish to offer passage, I will announce your intention and availability later, and they may make arrangements with you. I give them my blessing to become residents of your demesne." There was a pause. "Please take care of them."


    "Of course, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. After all, it was hard to get work out someone not cared for. Some effort needed to be put into worker maintenance for them to perform adequately. A thought occurred to her. "I should warn you that some people may not be satisfied with my rule for their own irrational reasons. With the availability of your demesne, some might decide to make the journey to try and live here instead. I ask that you reciprocate their care."


    "I see," Shanalorre said. "Very well then. Should they wish to come, they would be welcome in River''s Fork."


    Lori nodded. Well, that got the idiot with the barrel and the delusions about not needing to live in a binderarchy off her dungeon. "Thank you, Binder Shanalorre."


    They walked in silence, passing the hut where Grem was incarcerated. The two on watch started in surprise, getting to their feet, but Shanalorre gestured for them to sit, continuing on with Lori. The two looked at each other in confusion, and one of them headed for the central tree while the other remained at watch, his gaze intent on Shanalorre, and especially on Lori.


    Eventually, they arrived at the hut Rian and the others were staying. From the sounds inside, people were still sleeping.


    "Could I leave with you?" Shanalorre said, a mild quaver in her voice. "Just leave this place, live in your demesne?"


    "You could," Lori said. "But your uncle would likely follow, and I''d rather not meet him every day. Still, if that''s what you want, I''m sure we can arrange something."


    Silence.


    "You need not make your decision right now," she said gently.


    Shanalorre blinked, then nodded. "I¡­ see. Thank you, Binder Lolilyuri. I will¡­ consider."


    "Please leave a note explaining why when you leave, so your demesne does not assume I simply had you abducted, despite not having the resources to do so," Lori said.


    "I will remember."


    They stood in silence in front of the hut.


    "You''re doing very well," Lori said quietly. "But why start now? Why not before?"


    Silence.


    Eventually, Shanalorre turned to Lori. "I''m tired," she said, her face completely impassive even as tears slowly slid down from her eyes, "of not being able to do anything."


    Lori nodded in understanding.


    "You think I''m going to die," Shanalorre continued. "That¡­ that Grem was right. That a dragon will¡­ will¡­ " She shuddered. Her little fists clenched. And then she straightened. Her face was impassive again, even as more tears slid down it. "If I die¡­ please take care of my home. Please save my people."


    "I will," Lori said. She remembered that time in the dark, of staying awake through pure indignation and outrage. "If I fall, I ask you to do the same."


    "Agreed," Shanalorre said. She held out a hand.


    Lori stared at it. Wizards didn''t shake hands among themselves, as a rule. Magic required contact, especially for Deadspeakers.


    Gingerly, she raised her own hand. Palms met, fingers closed.


    They shook on it.


    "Why is your hand sticky?"

 43 - Shanalorre Rising

    One of the waterskins in the hut still had a little water, and the two of them used it to wash their hands. Lori set down the bowl and, deciding they''d had enough sleep, began to clap her hands noisily. "All right, all of you, wake up," she said. "Get that dust off and wash out, or the colors will take root in your brains! It''s the afternoon, and the food''s cold!"


    She was really sounding like one of her mothers at this point.


    "I''m on vacation, leave me alone," Rian muttered.


    "The bread will get hard," Lori said.


    "What the bread does on vacation is its business," Rian muttered and turned over, rolling off his sleeping roll and face first into the wooden floor. "Sleep is divine and I''m worshipping."


    "You''re making that up," Lori said. "There are no sleep-based religions."


    "I''m starting one. Go away," Rian muttered.


    "Is that any way to talk to your Binder?"


    "Please go away, your Bindership," Rian groaned, grabbing his pillow and pulling it over his head, still facedown on the wooden floor.


    Lori shrugged, turning to the three who were at least sitting up. "Fine. The three of you can have his bread and stuffed meat pastries."


    Rian was suddenly upright like a seel leaping out of the water. "All right fellows, get up, get up, it''s a new day, time is wasting!" he said with manic cheer. "Where are these pastries and¡­" he blinked. "Why is Binder Shanalorre here? Who found her?"


    "No one. She was never lost," Lori said.


    Rian gave her a look, then knelt down to meet Binder Shanalorre''s eyes. "Blink twice if you''re being held against your will," he said in a mock whisper.


    "You realize I can hear you, right?" Lori said flatly.


    "Lori, please, we''re having a private conversation," Rian said.


    Binder Shanalorre gave a small smile. "I am not being held against my will, Lord Rian," she said, "but thank you for asking."


    Rian blinked at that, but nodded. "Well¡­ nice to see you''re fine and not hurt. Have you let your aunt and uncle know you''re back?"


    "They have been informed," Shanalorre said. "Lord Rian, I thank you for acting as you did and moving to protect me yesterday. Without you, the attempt on my life might have succeeded."


    Rian blinked, and for some reason glanced at Lori. "Um, you''re welcome," he said. "It was the right thing to do. I''m just glad you weren''t hurt."


    "I am physically unhurt," Binder Shanalorre said. "It was nice to meet you, Lord Rian. I hope our future meetings are more pleasant." She turned to Lori and nodded. "I will see you later, Binder Lolilyuri. I must make arrangements for my announcement. I hope you have a good day. "


    "And you as well, Binder Shanalorre," Lori aid.


    The younger Binder left.


    "Is she all right?" Rian said, sounding concerned.


    "Yes," Lori said, frowning down at him.


    He noticed her gaze. "What?" he said as he stood up.


    "You never kneel for me," she said. She wasn''t petulant. Not at all.


    "We have the same eye level, I don''t need to kneel to talk to you face to face," Rian said.


    She supposed that made sense¡­ and really, ritualized kneeling sounded like a pointless waste of time anyway.


    "Did anything about her strike you as¡­ strange?" Rian said, still looking towards where the little Binder had gone.


    Lori shrugged. "She seemed like a perfectly reasonable, level-headed, sensible person."


    "And¡­ you don''t see anything strange about that?" Rian said.


    "Well, yes, but it was probably about time I met someone else who was reasonable, level-headed and sensible," Lori said.


    Rian didn''t reply, still staring after Binder Shanalorre with a slight frown.


    "I brought fruit," she said, gesturing towards the hairy blueballs.


    He gave her an intent look that was mildly disconcerting. "So the pastries were a lie?"


    "They''re in the bowl," she pointed.


    "You''re the best Binder ever," he shamelessly flattered. "Hey, you three save some for me!"


    Landoor was summarily dispatched to get more drinking water as the other three sat down for the very late breakfast¨C alternately, lunch¨C of bread, meat and vegetable pastries, and hairy blueballs. While Deil and Tackir were perplexed at the fruit''s appearance and how to open it, Lori wasn''t even surprised when, after taking a moment to marvel at its appearance, Rian squeezed it in the middle with both hands, splitting the skin open and revealing the yellow flesh inside.


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    She was a little concerned when he popped it into his mouth, gently chewed once, and his eyes went wide.


    "What? What is it?" she said.


    Rian gestured vaguely and took another, slower chew, before spitting the seed into his hand and quickly chewing the rest. "I''ve found a reason to live again," he said, staring at the seed like it contained endless wonders. "Lori, we need to grow these on Lorian. We need to! Otherwise I don''t know how I''ll keep on living!"


    "It''s only a fruit, Rian," Lori said, wondering if her lord was losing his sanity. Was he having some sort of allergic reaction? Some kind of strange mind-altering substance that formed from leaving the fruit unattended?


    "Blasphemy!"


    "There aren''t any fruit-based religions."


    "I''ll start one!"


    "I thought you were starting a sleep-based religion?"


    "We need something to worship during the day, don''t we?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I shall begin by apologizing for causing you all undue worry," Binder Shanalorre began, addressing the assembled people of River''s Fork Demesne. There were much fewer than the number of people Lori had in her demesne, which was¡­ well, mildly satisfying. "I had not considered how you would all react to my sudden disappearance, and for that I''m sorry¡­"


    She spoke on, while the people of her demesne kept glancing at each other in confusion and paying insufficient attention. Really, their Binder was speaking! They should mind her words. Granted, they weren''t words Lori herself would have ever bothered to use, but to each their own, she supposed.


    "¨C is no excuse. I will no longer be lax in my duties as this Demesne''s Binder," Shanalorre continued as Lori leaned back on one of the wooden huts. "I know I am not the Binder you wish for, but I am the one you have. If you are dissatisfied with my leadership, then there are two options before you." She pointed, and Lori realized she was pointing in their direction. "Binder Lolilyuri and Lord Rian are here as representatives of their demesne, who were kind enough to take in our people who left. If you feel you do not find the idea of my rule palatable, then the first option is that you make arrangements with them to transfer and reside in their demesne. They have limited space on their vessel, but Binder Lolilyuri has assured me that she will accept anyone who wishes to do so."


    There were murmurs and glances towards Lori, who remained impassive and leaning against the hut at her back.


    Finally, someone called out, "What''s the second option?"


    Binder Shanalorre looked impassively over her people. "The second option is for one of you to kill me, here and now, and have Binder Lolilyuri replace me."


    There was a much louder eruption of voices at this. In the front, Binder Shanalorre''s aunt and uncle looked very upset, and even the militiamen around her looked uncomfortable.


    "Did you put her up to this?" Rian said, his voice low and very, very flat.


    "It would be convenient for me, but no," Lori said. "Stop Landoor."


    Rian glanced at the idiot, but apparently Lori''s concern was unwarranted. The fool simply looked as stunned as everyone else. She''d been worried he''d take her up on her offer in some misguided delusion that he could claim this place''s core for himself.


    "You! What have you been telling my niece?!"


    The violent exclamation drew both of their attention, Rian letting his left hand drop but not actually touching his sword. The Binder''s uncle, Lasponin, was pointing dramatically at Lori like this was some sort of climactic moment in a theatrical play, his face full of outraged indignation.


    "Uncle, stand down," Shanalorre said. "You are being rude to our guests."


    "They''ve done something to her!" her uncle cried, ignoring her. "Ever since they¨C"


    Shanalorre took off her shoe and threw it with unerring accuracy, interrupting her uncle in mid-exclamation by slamming into his throat. "Do not ignore me, doctor," she said. "I am no one''s puppet, and certainly not Binder Lolilyuri''s. I give my people this choice because they deserve the option of choosing it." She faced the people. "Choose, people of River''s Fork. Choose now and be done with it. Either I am your Binder and command your trust and obedience, or I am not. In which case, strike me down, here and now, and follow someone else."


    In more theatrical circumstances, that announcement would have been made in eerie, dramatic silence, letting the audience take in the full dramatic import. Instead, it was by undercut the people speaking to each other in confused, upset tones. Her uncle tried to speak, but seemed to be unable to, only making strangled sounds of his throat while his wife examined him and apparently tried to keep him from choking.


    "No one? Will no one end me?" Shanalorre said, looking out over the crowd. "Will no one have the courage to make their objection known? Will you truly obey a child?"


    She stood there until the murmurs lessened, growing quieter until they vanished, the only sound the wind and her uncle trying to breath.


    "So be it, then," Shanalorre said. "In that case, a few announcements. As of now, the only one authorized to speak in my name is retired captain Yllian, on matters of internal discipline, with punishments subject to ratification. Others will be announced as I ascertain their trustworthiness. Be informed that Doctor Lasponin is NOT authorized to speak in my name and is only to be considered an authority on matters of medical care. We are also beginning recruitment for the local militia, on a purely volunteer basis. Please speak to Captain Yllian if you wish to volunteer. As of now, the mines cannot resume operation, due to a shortage of labor. Instead, we will be redirecting our efforts towards securing food¡­"


    Lori listened as Shanalorre went from establishing her authority to using that authority to set the necessary tasks to keep her demesne alive. Her people didn''t seem very cowed, but neither did anyone take her up on her offer, so far. Perhaps someone would come later, too cowardly to do it with so many people watching. Was it a little hypocritical to make that offer, and keep the man most likely to take it imprisoned? Possibly, but Grem had clearly erred by trying to do it before the offer had been made. Really, if he''d just waited a day¡­


    Ah, well¡­


    "I''ll be at the boat, imbuing the water jet," Lori told Rian. "Stay here and make arrangements for those who want to come with us. We''ll leave tomorrow morning, bright and early so we can be back in my demesne before nightfall. Prioritize those with few belongings."


    "Uh, right¡­" Rian said, who was watching Shanalorre with a vaguely disturbed look. "Are you sure you didn''t put her up to anything? Even accidentally, or by implication? The way she''s acting¡­"


    "No, I didn''t," Lori said, rolling her eyes in exasperation. "I don''t harm children. And don''t forget to bring those fruit seeds with us, all right?"


    "Uh, sure¡­" Rian said, still watching Shanalorre. "As if I''d forget."


    Shrugging, Lori headed for Lori''s Boat, to spend the afternoon imbuing the water jet¡­ as soon as she''d rigged up some sort of sun shade¡­


    Behind her, Shanalorre continued to speak, her voice calm and reasoned, and her words perfectly sensible.

 44 - Youre Wrong

    Lolilyuri retired back to Lori''s Boat, keeping it anchored but pushing it into the water so as not to damage it when she climbed on. She sat next to the water jet and began imbuing more magic into it for the trip back. Her raincoat''s hood had been draped on the end of an oar and the oar held in front of her while she leaned back on the hem, using that as an improvised shade. Her staff lay across her knee, the ash catch of her coalcharm pointed down to keep the boat from accidentally catching fire. It sufficed, and there was enough wind that she didn''t feel hot. So she just sat there, imbued, and thought.


    She closed her eyes and felt for her demesne. It was there, in the back of her mind, an awareness of distant wisps like a part of herself. She traced the feeling, of the long stream of waterwisps that was the river, the enormous half sphere of earthwisps that was the land, the complementing half-sphere of airwisps that was the sky above. She was even aware, to some degree, of the waterwisps on the waterjet, which had come from her demesne and had been imbued there, maintaining her claim. Now that her business was done here, she really wanted to get back and return to properly building things. She still needed to expand her dungeon for the next time a dragon appeared, get proper shelters up for all her new people¨C hopefully no one broke any laws while she was gone¨C get food stores ready for winter¡­


    Lori wanted to go home.


    She just sat there, falling into the state of mindlessness she''d perfected while working many, many, many wisp-imbuing jobs to pay for school and school supplies, and the occasional silence bribe when she''d been caught clubbing people for reference books in the library. Breathing in magic, passing it through her, imbuing. Over and over and over as the world and the light changed around her¡­


    "Lori, are you asleep or are you ignoring me?"


    Lori blinked, her imbuing tapering off as she turned towards the voice. Rian was standing next to the boat, which had been pulled closer to shore, looking a little tired. "Are you done?" she said.


    "Mostly," he sighed. "I think one of us has to stay here to keep making arrangements while you ferry the first group back to Lorian, and then come back."


    Lori stiffened. "Come back?" she said.


    "Well, yeah," Rian said. "It''s not like you can put some kind of switch on the water jet to make it shut off, right?" He frowned. "Can you? Because otherwise the thing would be on all night and we''d have to row back upriver. So you''ll need to come back with the boat when we pick up the rest of them¡­"


    Rian cut off, staring at her. "Are you all right?" he said.


    "Of course I am," Lori said, expertly hiding her feelings about needing to leave her demesne again just for some stupid, pointless people.


    Rian gave her an intent look. "How about I tell them we''ll come back in seven days?" he said. "Since you probably have lots of responsibilities and things to build, and will need time to recover from the trip."


    "I have no objections to that," Lori said, expertly hiding her relief. "But why seven days? Why not just a week?"


    "Long enough to rest, short enough to feel reasonable," Rian said. "And it gives you time to recover from this little misadventure. We won''t be able to bring too many people with us anyway, since right now the barge¨C"


    "Lori''s Boat," Lori corrected graciously.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "The egotistical boat will be full of supplies and isn''t very stable. This way I can have our carpenters make a stabilizer outrigger, and on the next trip we''ll go with less people so we can carry more passengers. I made sure to tell them they can''t bring any furniture and any big, heavy things, but I have a feeling they''ll try to get them on anyway, so tomorrow we''ll be going back with a formerly-injured child and his mother, get them back with us since they don''t have a lot of stuff."


    Lori made an apathetic sound. "Noted. Is that all?"


    "It''s also almost time for dinner," Rian said. "Shana said she''d be sending us food for tonight''s dinner, then tomorrow we need to start helping with the work around the demesne or leave."


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected. "Grem will be coming with us tomorrow. Binder Shanalorre exiled him from River''s Fork and passed him to us."


    "What are you going to do with him, then?" Rian asked.


    "Keep him away from this place, of course. That was the agreement," Lori said.


    "And¡­ anything else?" Rian sounded like he was probing for something.


    "Why would there be?" Lori tilted her head.


    "He did try to kill a child. That¡¯s against at least two of your laws," Rian pointed out.


    "It wasn''t one of my children," Lori shrugged. "Besides, he''s still acting director of the Golden Sweetwood Company. If we want their next group of settlers to come to my demesne, we need him to direct them there instead of here." She waved her hand vaguely around at River''s Fork.


    "You can''t be serious," Rian said flatly.


    "As you yourself said, I''m always serious," Lori said.


    "He tried to kill a child!" Rian, to his credit, said this in a hiss, obviously not wanting to draw attention.


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    "Given the circumstances, it''s unlikely to be the precedent for future child murder," Lori said. "So the children of my demesne are probably not in danger."


    "Why are you making excuses for him? He tried to manipulate you," Rian reminded her, as if she needed it. "Lied to you. Use you to murder someone. Doesn''t that at least make you mad? Peeved? Annoyed? Mildly insulted at thinking he could use you for his own ends?"


    "Of course." Obviously.


    "So why are you just letting him get away with it?" Rian said, sounding exasperated. "You''ve looked more annoyed at Landoor being stupid than Grem trying to use and manipulate you. You were angrier about Missus Naineb challenging your authority in public. Why aren''t you angrier? He tried to use you to hurt someone."


    Lori was silent.


    "Lori?" Rian pressed.


    What could she say? That she''d been thinking of doing exactly as Grem has been suggesting? To kill the Binder and take this place for herself? That she''d been actively looking for who the Binder might be and had planned to kill them as soon as she saw an opportunity?


    There was a thud as Rian threw his boots on board, and the boat rocked as he scrambled in after them. Lori blinked in confusion as Rian, the bottom of his trousers wet with river water, sat down in front of her, causing the boat to list from their combined weight.


    "Lori, talk to me," he said. "Why aren''t you angrier at Grem for trying to use you?"


    "I am angry at him," she said.


    "If you were, you''re being very strange about it," Rian said. "You''re usually a lot more vindictive and petty when you''re angry. You''re treating Landoor worse than Grem, and he''s just believed too many stories. Why?"


    "I don''t want to talk about it," she snapped.


    "I figured," Rian said. "But I think you need to."


    "What are you, my parents? I said I don''t want to talk about it, so stop asking! That''s an order!"


    Rian was silent, for which Lori was glad. Finally, she could just tell someone to leave a matter alone and they would.


    "Why are you equating me with your parents?" he said.


    Lori glared at him, but she supposed that was a fair question. "You were nagging. Pressing. Trying to get me to talk when I didn''t want to. Just like them."


    Rian nodded. "But you didn''t want them to."


    "No," she nodded curtly.


    "Because they wouldn''t understand, they weren''t you."


    Lori nodded again, no longer glaring at him, but merely glaring in his general direction.


    "And besides, in the past, when you''d tried to explain your reasoning, to tell them why you did what you did, they ignored what you said, ignored your perfectly reasonable arguments, and tell you how you were wrong. They''d say things like how they understood, but obviously they didn''t understand because then they''d tell you what or why you did something was wrong, and you should have done something else, except what they told you was something stupid or irrational or didn''t benefit you or had to do with someone else''s feelings," Rian continued.


    Her head jerked up, glaring at him.


    "What? I had parents too, you know," he said. He was looking up at the sky, at something over her head. "You know they only do that because they want what''s best for you, right? It never seems like it at the time, when they''re telling you all the wrong things you did and how they''d have done something else and you can''t help thinking they''re saying how much better they are than you, but when you let yourself calm down, some part of you knows they just want you to not get hurt, or not get in trouble, or fall into bad habits or bad company."


    He brought his gaze down, his expression¡­tired, for some reason. "You don''t want to talk about it. Okay. I''ll leave. But I think you can''t properly decide what to do with Grem until you think about whatever it is you don''t want to talk about and come to some sort of conclusion. It doesn''t have to be a conclusion you explain to me, doesn''t have to be one I agree with. But it has to be a conclusion you reach. And until you do, I don''t think we should bring Grem with us, because I don''t trust him, I don''t want him in our demesne doing who knows what, I don''t want to waste resources on him by putting him in some kind of prison, and I don''t want to let him be some sort of wandering danger by letting him loose out in the Iridescence."


    They sat in silence at those words. Rian waited expectantly. She said nothing.


    He sighed, picked up his boots, and got to his feet.


    "I would have killed her."


    Rian paused and sat down again.


    Lori''s head was bowed, and she was staring down at her staff on her lap. "I would have killed her, if she''d been older," she said quietly. "If I''d realized who she was sooner. I was looking for her. I was looking for someone with pale hair, someone related to the doctor." She let out a bitter laugh. "It''s ironic. If Grem hadn''t attacked as soon as he saw her, if he''d merely confirmed she was the Binder, she might have died like he wanted. I''d have killed her myself."


    "Why didn''t you?"


    She continued to stare at her staff. "I don''t know. I suppose I was surprised. By the time I realized who she was, it was too late. We were surrounded, and it was too big a risk to attack."


    She had wanted to kill this place''s Binder, sight unseen. Back when they''d been an abstract, unknown person, Lolilyuri had wanted to kill them and take this place for her own.


    Grem hadn''t been manipulating her. Nothing he said had made her want to kill the binder of this place. That desire had been born in her own heart. He''d simply been helping her reach what she already wanted. The path he''d been leading her through was one she''d walked willingly, and only ignorance of who to kill had kept it from being a run.


    Rian nodded. "Are you glad you didn¡¯t?"


    She glanced at him, but he didn''t have that look of smug self-righteousness that sort of question usually came with, like of course the answer would be yes. He seemed to genuinely be asking her.


    "I don''t know," she said, looking down at her staff again. She still felt that frustration, the want to make this place hers¡­ a part of her wished for another dragon, just so this place would fail as she and Grem believed¡­


    Rian nodded again. "Correct me if I''m wrong," he began, "but it sounds like you don''t want to punish Grem severely because you feel it would be somehow hypocritical, that he''s being punished for something you wanted to do anyway."


    Did she?


    "I don''t know¡­" Lori said, her eyes following the wire wrapping.


    Rian nodded a third time. "You know what you need?" he said, his voice surprisingly gentle.


    She looked up tentatively.


    "You need a nice dinner and a good night''s sleep," he said. "This is probably not the sort of thing you should force yourself through on an empty stomach."


    As if in response to her words, her stomach twinged. She became conscious of how dry her mouth was as she swallowed.


    "Come on," Rian said, a little bit of his usual enthusiasm in his voice. "Let''s get this box back on land and go back for dinner."


    Tentatively, Lori looked up. She nodded.


    Food. Yes, food sounded good. And afterwards¡­


    "If it helps, I think you''re wrong," Rian said as he pulled at the anchor rope to tug them back closer to land.


    A twinge, a feeling of betrayal. She was wrong, he said. He was telling her how she should have done it¡­


    "I don''t think you''d have had it in you to kill Shana even if she''d been older," Rian said as the bottom of the boat began to scrape on the short. "You''re not like Grem. You both thought about it, but you didn''t do it, and you didn''t try to make anyone else do it when you found out you didn''t have it in you to do it. You''re a good person, and you did the right thing, even if you think you just hesitated."


    Lori stared at him.


    Rian grabbed his boots, leapt over the side and pulled the boat the rest of the way.

 45 - Grems Sentence

    Rian had had two of the jars of travel ration stew opened and heated, so when they got back, there was warm stew to dip the bread in, and along with more meat-and-vegetable filled pastries that had been sent to them courtesy of Binder Shanalorre ¨C a different taste from what Binder Shanalorre''s aunt had made¨C they had a small feast. The stew was actually delicious again when eaten with the bread, and Lori sat back and enjoyed the sounds of the three men and one idiot eating. It reminded her of dinners in the dining hall back home, something normal to build her days around. Someone came by to pick up the bowls the food had come in, and they made ready to sleep


    They had the same sleeping arrangement, Lori sleeping in the small room with Rian ostensibly guarding the door to her. This time the men didn''t linger in conversation, as if afraid they''d be woken up again and wanted to get as much sleep as they could. Soon only Lori was left awake, listening to the sounds they made as they slept as she pondered Rian''s question.


    Why aren''t you angrier at Grem for trying to use you?


    She probably should be. Objectively, Grem''s actions were horrendously offensive, and in defiance of her authority. He had initiated hostilities on his own initiative, without previous orders. He had used omission of information and incomplete information to prompt her to courses of action that he wanted. He''d manipulated her to his own ends.


    He wouldn¡¯t have been able to if she''d done the smart things, the reasonable things, the intelligent things. If she hadn''t let her greed do her thinking. If she hadn''t been so stupid as to not realize¡­ no, to be willfully in denial of the fact he was taking advantage of her greed.


    But he had taken advantage of her. Grem had taken advantage of her ignorance.


    For the first time, anger began to seep into her at the thought.


    She tried it again. Grem had taken advantage of her.


    More anger.


    He''d taken advantage of her, lured her out of her demesne, put her in a vulnerable position, baited her along, all to set them up to kill a child he thought should die¡­ it didn''t matter whether she should or not, the fact was he''d made the decision and tried to inflict it on Lori. He''d tried to tell her what to do, to dictate her actions, as if he had any right to command a Binder¡­!


    In the dark, a vindictive smile came over Lori''s features¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    As they were finishing breakfast¨C just stew now¨C there was a knock on the door. Everyone looked up, wary. Rian pointed at Deil, then to one side of the door, pointed at Tackir, and behind the door, then grabbed one of the water skins that was still partially-full and tossed it to Lori. She understood, beginning to breathe in magic and pass it through the waterwisps in her body as the two men moved to where he had pointed, where they would be out of sight of anyone entering. She stuck her finger into the skin, and turned it to touch the water.


    Only then did Rian open the door with a smile. "Binder Shana? This is an unexpected surprise. Um, people know you''re here and aren''t going to think we kidnapped you, right?"


    "Yes Lord Rian, my people are aware," Binder Shanalorre said. "I am here to invite Binder Lolilyuri and yourself to arrange a transfer of personnel."


    Rian glanced back at Lori, who nodded. "Um¡­ sure. Just give us a moment, we need to put away the bowls." Rian said, finally stepping away from the door and moving with alacrity towards the food bowls, where he began hurriedly eating the food that was left.


    Binder Shanalorre stood outlined there, and she nodded to Lori in greeting. "Binder Loliyuri," she said.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori replied, hanging the water skin into her belt. "You mentioned a transfer of personnel?"


    Shanalorre nodded. "Yes. In regards to those who will be traveling with you today and over the next month. I would like to speak to you about final arrangements. If you and Lord Rian will come with me?"


    Lori stood, taking her staff as Rian finished eating, mouth still full but chewing quickly. He handed his bowl to Landoor with a muffled "You wash everything," and followed after her, sword at his waist.


    The light of the sun cast the inside of the dome of woven branches in a cool, indirect light, and outside the tops of the hills were beginning to be bathed in luminance. Other huts had smoke rising from them as people made breakfast and got started with their day. The four militiamen who''d been standing on either side of the door the way Deil and Tackir had been on the inside stepped back, still surrounding their Binder as the two of them came out of the hut and door closing behind. Shanalorre led the way, and they all followed after them.


    "So¡­" Rian said. "Just to be clear, this is about Grem, right? Or are you taking people moving away very seriously and making paperwork for Lori and us to look over?"


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    "Yes, this is about Grem," Shanalorre said. "I will be informing him about his sentence and officially passing his parole to you."


    Rian glanced at Lori, looking at her in concern. She made a gesture, telling him to mind his own business.


    That made him smile for some reason. Her first, and currently only, lord was a very strange person a lot of the time. Useful, but strange.


    "Regarding that matter, Binder Shanalorre, is it still your intention for Grem to live in exile?"


    Shanalorre looked over her shoulder at her, nodded. "Yes, it is. I have not changed my mind. His punishment is still exile."


    Lori nodded. "Understood. However, I must inform you that I have changed my mind. I have decided to void his citizenship in my demesne and have declared him exiled for treasonous actions, and deliberately manipulating me by use of misinformation and committing violence against another demesne while my representative. After you exile him, we will no longer be taking him with us."


    Shanalorre stopped, then turned abruptly. "That was not our agreement," she said.


    "No, it is not," Lori said. "However, I find it pointless to waste time transporting a man only to have to exile him at journey''s end. However, if you do not wish him to be near your demesne, I am agreeable to transporting him to a point between our respective demesnes and exiling him there."


    Binder Shanalorre stared at her. "He would die," she said.


    Lori nodded. "As he is no longer under my authority, as a demesneless individual, such is neither of our concern."


    "I had hoped¡­" Binder Shanalorre said slowly, "that he would have an opportunity to live somewhere else."


    "That is, of course, your prerogative," Lori said. "However, that place cannot be my demesne. I shall not tolerate one who would subvert and defy my authority so blatantly. We will accept anyone else, but not him. With so many new people, we cannot spare the resources to either hold him prisoner, or the discontent or disorder that would be caused if we kept him as a penal laborer. He must contribute to reside in my demesne, and given his actions, any contributions he makes are suspect. So I will exile him. As this was not our initial agreement, I bring it up in case you have any objections."


    "I¡­ I¡­" Binder Shanalorre shook for a moment, bowing her head. She took a deep breath, then another, and another, falling into a rhythmic breathing exercise for gathering magic, a method wizards commonly used for calming themselves.


    Lori guessed her uncle must have taught it to her, so she would have the magic needed to claim the core. It was simple enough you didn''t actually need to know magic to teach it. After all, it was just breathing.


    One last breath, and then stillness. When she looked up again, Binder Shanalorre was calm. "I understand your reasoning. Very well. I accept your offer of¡­ of¡­ of transport."


    "Understood," Lori said.


    "Um¡­" Rian suddenly said. Lori blinked, turning to look at him for the sudden interruption. Binder Shanalorre did as well. "Permission to advise?"


    "Since when have you ever needed permission?" Lori said blandly.


    "I probably deserve that, but I meant to Binder Shanalorre," Rian said. "If she wishes."


    "What do you advise, Lord Rian?" Shanalorre said.


    "Lorian is planning to send an expedition to Covehold, for supplies and materials," Rian said. "Once we have a suitable boat large enough that can carry both people and supplies, which¡­ well, we still have to build it, but it shouldn''t take too long. If you want him to go to exile somewhere he can actually live, if you''re willing to wait, we can bring him to Covehold and leave him there. I mean, we''ll be passing through here anyway¡­" He shrugged. "But that''s just a thought."


    Lori blinked at him, wondering what in the nine colors he was talking about before she remembered that he was in charge of that endeavor. She considered it. "I suppose that is an option. Though personally I would suggest we just exile him to the colors. More efficient, and you don''t have to waste food on him."


    "That is my decision," Binder Shanalorre said.


    "I acknowledge that," Lori said. "If you wish to undertake this course, I''m sure we can discuss passage once our expedition is ready."


    "Speaking of passage," Binder Shanalorre said, "thank you for returning the boat my father made that was lent to Grem and those who left my demesne."


    Lori blinked, and her eyes started to narrow. "Are you referring to Lori''s Boat?"


    That made Binder Shanalorre blink. "Wait, did you name the boat after yourself?" she said in tones of disbelief.


    "It''s a boat and it''s mine," Lori said. "Hence, it''s Lori''s Boat."


    "What are you, a child?" the child said.


    "I''m an adult, obviously," Lori said. "You can tell by my height."


    Rian, why are you putting your hand on your face?


    "Um, may I speak to my Binder a moment, Binder Shanalorre?" Rian said. Lori gave him a look. Wasn''t he supposed to be asking her that?


    Still, she allowed herself to be pulled aside, giving Rian a look that said she expected this to be good.


    "Look," he said, "I can already see where this is going. She''s going to threaten to take back the boat¨C"


    "Lori''s Boat," she corrected.


    "Really? Now?" Rian sighed for some reason. "She''ll threaten to take back Lori''s Boat, the two of you will bluster, at some point you''re going to realize she''s got a militia in arm''s length and you don''t, so you''ll have to swallow your pride and ask what she wants, she''ll say she wants a guarantee that we''ll bring Grem to be exiled. Can we skip all that so we can head back for home well before noon?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    As Rian had predicted, the price of finally ceding any remaining claims of ownership of Lori''s Boat was a promise to assist in exiling Grem to Covehold at the earliest opportunity. Given that wouldn''t be for some time, Lori was willing to agree, especially since the expedition was in Rian''s charge, and therefore transporting Grem would be his problem. In the meantime, Grem would be held prisoner by River''s Fork, and would be made to work for his food.


    They finally left River''s Fork at mid-morning, accompanied by a child who Lori vaguely recognized from that morning picking fruit, and his mother, who was clutching both her son and the boat with a white-knuckled grip. Their few belongings were loaded onto the barge, near the front to try and keep the prow from rising when they sped up.


    "It''s perfectly safe, I assure you," Rian assured her as he handled the rudder. "Just don¡¯t stand so you don''t fall off. And please stay down so I can see where I''m going."


    The woman looked like she was seriously reconsidering her decision to reunite with her husband and the rest of their family as she pulled her son tighter against her side as he kept cheering for them to go faster, and held on.

 46 - Home Is Loris Demesne

    The trip back to Lori''s Demesne, Lorian, was slowed by the fact they were traveling upriver, against the current. Lori had to carefully increase the output of the waterjet, and then imbue it since the greater speed and increased load on the boat was using up magic faster. Thankfully, with the early start compared to their previous journey, they were able to reach the borders of her demesne by late afternoon.


    There was nothing dramatic when Lolilyuri crossed the border back into her demesne. There was no sudden rush of strength, no more increased feeling of power than usual. She merely felt¡­ complete. Like a woman who''d been limited to one finger suddenly being able to use her whole arm. She breathed in deeply, feeling their airwisps all around her, the waterwisps beneath her, the earthwisps beyond that.


    She felt the earthwisps in the bone of the water jet, and imbued them, binding them to her will. There were small fractures in the material, places where it was starting to crack. She bound the bone, reinforcing its structure. Then she imbued the waterwisps she''d bound to the jet.


    Lori''s Boat roared forward, the water jet pushed beyond the limits it had previously had.


    "While I''m as glad to get home as you are," Rian said, voice slightly raised as he gripped the rudder in both hand, "I''m not so happy I could die! Can you slow down a little? I don''t think I can make turns going this fast! "


    Lori frowned, but reluctantly reduced the speed of Lori''s Boat. "Better?" she asked.


    "Barely," Rian said. "If you want to go this fast, you have to keep an eye ahead so you know if you have to slow us down." Still, he relaxed his grip on the rudder. "Well, we''re home, at least. Ugh, I''m really looking forward to a hot bath and a change of clothes."


    Ah, hot baths. Lori was looking forward to that as well.


    The trip seemed so much faster with no one yelling in fear about how they were going too fast. It seemed almost no time at all before they rounded a bend and ahead was the familiar cliff-face and buildings of home. Smoke rose from the chimneys of the dining hall''s kitchens, and from bonfires that burned in front of bath houses. The air was rich in the smells of cooking meat and stew.


    Rian frowned. "Wait, why is everyone cooking outside?"


    "I have absolutely no idea," Lori said, keeping her smirk on the inside.


    As Lori''s Boat drew closer, people spotted them, and soon people were coming from¡­ wherever they''d been previously to wave and cheer their coming. The crowd drew close as the boat moved to beach itself as Lori deactivated the water jet.


    "Get back!" Rian cried. "Get back or you''ll break your legs!"


    Fortunately, they seemed to hear, because they stopped crowding in at the last moment, and they coasted on momentum as the boat slid up onto the riverbank. The bottom of the boat scrapped on the ground beneath, and they ground to a halt.


    Lori gave the mob crowding around her boat a bland look and turned to Rian pointedly.


    He rolled his eyes. "All right all of you, get back, get back, we need room to step down!" he called. "If you want to help, help us gets Missus Elina''s things down and someone call her husband!" He stepped to the side of the boat with the assurance of someone that knew people would step out of his way, and they did. Then he turned and helped the shaky mother¨C presumably Elina¨C and her son find their feet and step over the side of the boat to the ground.


    Rian then started pointing at the nearest people in the crowd and directing them to unload Lori''s Boat as Lori stepped off the boat herself. The side she was on still had a little water on it, but it took only a moment to bind the earthwisps directly underneath her to raise up the dirt, mud and stone, and compress themselves into step for her to walk on. When people moved to crowd around her, she gave them a level look and crossed her arms over her chest, making her impatience clear.


    "If I find any signs of shit or piss in my dungeon, all of you will be held responsible," she said levelly. Then she walked forward.


    People parted before her as, with a spring in her step, she walked the last few steps home.


    The gaping maw of the dungeon was cold and very, very dark as she walked towards it. Humming to herself, she reached into the sky and began gathering lightwisps in the fading afternoon, binding them to her will and making them glow brightly. The clusters of lightwisps drifted down to her as she entered her dungeon, and she scrunched her nose slightly as she smelled unaired woodsmoke, and a whiff of latrine. Many tables and benches near the entrance were missing, and there were small piles of char and ash, as if the remains of bonfires irresponsibly lit inside an enclosed cave with a low ceiling and not much natural circulation.


    When she went to check, the bound lightwisps trailing after her, the latrine still had days-old human waste in it, but from the looks of it no one had used it in the last two days. She sealed the smell as best as she could behind a barrier of airwisps. The baths also held a mild stink of human waste, as if people had been pissing all over the floor. From what she could feel through the wisps of the demesne, the drain was clogged with¡­ well, it wasn''t liquid, so she could guess.


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    Really, she left for a little while and people started treating her dungeon like some kind of tavern¡­


    Well, she supposed she didn''t actually find signs of shit or piss outside of the latrine, so she wouldn''t need to have everyone in the demesne flogged. Still, this couldn''t continue¡­


    She heard footsteps in her dungeon.


    "Ah, there you are," Rian said as he walked towards her, one arm raised to shield his eyes from the lightwisps behind her. "So, I was sent here to petition you to bring back the hot water for bathing, the lights, and to make more ice for the food stores, the ice that''s left is nearly melted all the way."


    "Have they at least been putting food in the food stores, rather than just taking it out?" Lori said.


    "Does the seel meat the children catch count?" Rian said.


    She gave him a look.


    "In their defense, our population sort of doubled," Rian said. "And most people have been busy clearing land for the new crops people brought from River''s Fork."


    Lori sighed. "We''ve been gone only a few days and everyone falls into chaos." She smiled. "How much of the cured wood meant for building was cut up for firewood so people could have light?"


    "We''re down one curing shed''s worth," Rian reported, tilting his head. "But you knew that, I suppose."


    "Not really," Lori said, "but I guessed." She nodded towards the charred remains of a bonfire.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Well, you''ve made your point, you do a lot to make this place livable and people should love and worship you. Can we have the hot water back now? Or are you going to keep the hot bath all to yourself?"


    "I suppose¡­" Lori said. She looked around. "Tomorrow, start formulating a schedule. If people are going to be using this place as a dining and communal area, then it will be communally maintained. The latrines will be physically emptied according to a schedule, the floors swept... that sort of thing. I''m sure not everyone is actually cutting trees or looking for wild vegetables or other needful things. Put them to work. They need to deserve the food they eat, after all." And she''d best drain the reservoir and start again fresh instead of trusting people didn''t act foolishly while they had been out of her sight for that long.


    "Yes, your bindership," he said wryly.


    They both took a deep breath and sighed.


    "It''s good to be home," Lori said, smiling.


    "Home," Rian agreed.


    Closing her eyes, Lori restored the hot, running water in the baths.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After the most crowded bath since she''d first built the things¨C people had apparently not misused it like the facilities in the dungeon, but had instead been manually carrying in water to bathe with from the river, so it was in a usable state¨C Lori found herself eating outdoors, on the tables and benches that had been dragged outside from the dungeon after the lightwisps she''d left had run out of imbued magic and the bonfires people had made for light had made the place too smoky to stay in. It seemed people had decided to make do until she returned, and there were a lot of temporary benches made from planks and rocks, which people were sitting on as they ate and chatted. Most of the newcomers from River''s Fork didn''t seem to mind the lack of tables, just holding their bowls in their hands and eating as they stood or sat, chatting with the people near them.


    Rian appeared, two bowls of food in his hands. He sat across from her, putting down both bowls, and Lori picked one at random. The two of them began to eat.


    They didn''t say anything, didn''t make plans for tomorrow, didn''t talk about any of the work that would inevitably need to be done. They just ate, enjoying the stewed meat, wild vegetables, mushrooms, and other things that the late and lamented Binder of River''s Fork had apparently identified as edible.


    Behind Rian over at the next table, Umu, Mikon, and some vaguely familiar young woman all sat together¨C well, at the same table, anyway¨C staring at Rian''s back with satisfied smiles.


    As they finished their food, setting aside their bowls and leaning back, one of the children¨C the brat, Lori recognized¨C came by, holding two more bowls of full of some sort of yellow-orange vegetable mush, with new spoons in them. It took a moment for Lori to recognize it. It was that fruit the children had been keeping secret, the one that was sweet and mushy and runny.


    "Lord Rian," the brat said. She made a jerky bow to Lori, as if she''d heard of it but didn''t know how they were done. "Wiz Lori. Welcome back. Please have some happyfruit." Happyfruit? Seriously? Is that what the children were calling it? Well, she supposed the name fit. She''d certainly be happy to eat it.


    "Thank you Karina," Rian said, smiling with charisma and sincerity and charismatic sincerity. "This¡­ looks like a lot. Did you pick this yourself?"


    A nod. "I went to find some as soon as I found out you''d come back," she said, her little chest puffing out proudly. "I climbed the trees and picked them for you myself. Then I peeled them and cut them up and put them in a bowl for you, so you''d only have to eat it."


    Lori took the bowl in front of her and took a small spoonful of the mashed¨C no, ''cut up''¨C fruit. It was as she remembered. Yes, happyfruit was certainly a fitting name. "Thank you, Karina," she said. "It''s delicious."


    The brat beamed. Turning, she headed for the stew bowl, and started getting herself some dinner.


    "Did you actually remember her name?" Rian said, staring at Lori.


    "Why wouldn''t I?" she said. "She''s the only one who pays her taxes. Karina''s been leaving me a fresh seel in front of my door as tribute practically every day since she learned how to catch seels. It''s made good eating over breakfast."


    Rian blinked, then turned and stared after the brat.


    Lori took another spoonful of the mushed happyfruit. Later, she''d have to open up her bedroom again, get some air circulating so she wouldn''t asphyxiate in her sleep. Tomorrow, she''d have work to do, getting her dungeon''s facilities cleaned, reconfiguring them to be maintainable by manual labor, draining and replacing the water in the reservoir, expanding the dungeon so she''d finally have a more properly private area to herself, restoring all the bindings she''d allowed to lapse so people would feel her absence from the demesne¡­


    Right then and there, however, Lori listened to the vague and non-specific sounds of her demesne having dinner, the distant sounds of bugs in the dark, and ate her happyfruit.


    ¡­


    "You tell everyone what happened to Grem," she told Rian.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Yes, your bindership," he said.


    "But tomorrow," she said. "You can put that off until tomorrow."


    "Joy," Rian said blandly, and ate his happyfruit.

 47 - Finally Back At The Dungeon

    "I''m never, ever, ever, ever leaving my demesne again," Lori groaned as she laid her head down on the table, listening to the sounds of people settling for dinner. "For any reason!"


    "That''s what you say every time we go to River''s Fork," Rian said with annoying cheer that made her want to tear his face off with her bare hands.


    "I mean it this time!" Lori declared. "I don''t care what Shanalorre offers me to make repairs, I''m not going back there!"


    "Hmm¡­" Rian hummed in a way that implied he had a smirk on his face. "Well, that was the last trip. It took most of a month, but all the people who got wounded when the dragon passed over and had to be left behind are back with their families now, and you''ve finally finished raising those supports for the trees that got damaged so the dome''s less likely to collapse. Except for having to stop by there when we head for Covehold, our balance sheet with River''s Fork is even. So you don''t have to go back there unless you want to."


    Lori sniff. "Why would I want to?" she said.


    "The bread?" Rian suggested. "They managed three whole harvests before the dragon happened, so they''d got a lot of grain for it." He gave her a challenging look. "How''s that deadspeaking coming along?"


    "I''m working on it," Lori grumbled.


    Rian sighed dramatically. "I still think you should have worked out a deal to get Shana¨C"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    "¨C to teach you," Rian said. "At least learn how to heal. If anyone gets seriously injured, you''re going to have to bring them to River''s Fork for treatment."


    "We''re not going to ask River''s Fork to heal our people for us," Lori said stubbornly. "We have more doctors than they do, we''ll be fine. Especially since all the people not worth keeping left."


    "You realize we lost one of our big saws because Missus Naineb''s husband was one of the sawyers and didn''t think living in a demesne where the Dungeon Binder had threatened his wife was a good idea, right?" Rian said.


    "Not worth keeping," Lori repeated staunchly. "They''re Shanalorre''s problem now." Twenty three people, about four families, had left as word had gotten out about River''s Fork Demesne''s existence, and how its binder was a child, leaving group by group.


    "If they made it," Rian said. "I still don''t think it was right, making them walk to River''s Fork when we could have brought them along with us on the boat."


    "Lori''s Boat," Lori corrected.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Yes, that. They could get hurt out there walking to River''s Fork. We saw beasts along the river."


    "They want to leave my demesne, they can. They have feet, they can use them," Lori said dismissively. "We can barely make the whole trip back and forth in a day, I''m not going have Lori''s Boat be slowed down by useless dead weight."


    "Are you ever going to get tired of doing that?"


    "Doing what?"


    "Referring to your boat by name. You don''t need to use a proper noun ALL the time."


    Lori actually raised her head form the table to look at him. "What''s a proper noun?"


    "A basis for grammar jokes," Rian said.


    "What kind of sad person makes jokes about grammar?" Lori said, confused.


    "The kind of sad person who tries to feel they haven''t wasted their life." Rian moved, probably to look around. "I''ll go get our food. You try to wake up some more."


    "I''m perfectly awake," Lori protested.


    "Lori, your eyes have been closed during our entire conversation."


    "I don''t need my eyes to be open to be awake," she declared, but reluctantly raised her eyelids. She hissed. "Why is it so bright?"


    "Apparently, it''s what happens when a Dungeon Binder makes light with their eyes closed," Rian said, getting up. His hair had grown long over the last few weeks. So had hers, come to think of it. She had to borrow a pair of scissors again. "Fix it, please?"


    Lori grunted, changing the binding on the lightwisps so they wouldn''t be so bright.


    "Thank you," Rian chirped annoyingly as he headed over to get them breakfast.


    Lori sighed and laid her face on the table again.


    The last few weeks had been¡­busy. She''d spent the next day after arriving from River''s Fork restoring the bindings on the lightwisps, waterwisps, firewisps, and airwisps she''d allowed to lapse while she was gone from the demesne, and left the inquiries of why Grem wasn''t with them to Rian. According to him, there had been general disbelief from the probationary citizens, until the next batch of people from River''s Fork had shown up and confirmed their story.


    Some people had voiced their opinion that Grem was right for trying to kill Binder Shanalorre¨C at least, that he had the right reasons¨C but thankfully hadn''t taken it beyond that and asking Rian to bring along letters to friends remaining in River''s Fork, trying to convince them to move to Lori''s Demesne, Lorian. Given they didn''t have a papermaking industry of any sort and seel skins were too useful to be used for mere letter writing, Rian had to lug around a huge sack full of rocks, leaves, beast bones and occasionally planks with charcoal writing on it.


    Lori had also reorganized her dungeon. The latrines had been altered so that people could manually empty them, and people, usually those with no other useful skill, had garnered some sort of minor punishment from their parents, or just people who didn''t have anything else to do and had to make themselves useful. Lori wasn''t sure how it worked¨C Rian was in charge of that¨C only that people on latrine duty were allowed to skip the line for the baths.


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    Despite how unsanitary she thought the whole thing was, pools of warm water in the bath houses were surprisingly popular, though she had to bind more wisps so that the water in the pools would be gradually replaced to keep them from becoming breeding grounds for disease. The third bathhouse¨C which Rian was actively designing so it wouldn''t be ''an underground tube with stalls'' as he called it¨C was due to be built, and in the meantime, there were ''shower stalls'', outdoor stalls where a raised stone aqueduct constantly sent down a stream of water like a waterfall. Lori supposed it was a good stand in for real showers, since she didn''t have the patience, time or inclination to make individual stone piping and shower heads. Rian was surprisingly imaginative about things like that.


    There was a thump, and Lori reluctantly opened one eye. Rian was back, holding two bowls of breakfast. It was¡­ well, it was still stew, but the new vegetables and such they had available to them now meant it was a different kind of stew. She was amused at the look of distaste on Rian''s face as he looked at the vivid blue cubes of some sort of cut up gourd vegetable, before his face settled in resignation.


    "I would never have pegged you to be a picky eater," she said, reaching for one bowl, then grabbing the other one at the last moment.


    "All species are picky eaters, lest they eat something poisonous to them," Rian said loftily. He grabbed his spoon and began to eat.


    Lori stared at him. "Are you actually holding your nose so you can''t taste the food?" she said. "What are you, a child?"


    "I''ll eat it, but I can''t pretend to like it," Rian said. "Life is too short for that kind of self-deception. The best I can do is be thankful it''s keeping me alive." He had to stop eating to breathe, since he was still holding his nose. "Ugh. Why did these have to be edible?" He gave Lori a pleading look. "Can you please exclude this from the dungeon''s farm?"


    She allowed one side of her mouth to twist into a smirk. "I rather like it."


    "I choose to believe you''re just saying that to annoy me," Rian said flatly. "Consider it successful. Besides, it wouldn''t be efficient if we''re farming for the winter. Roots and tubers grow much faster than gourds."


    Lori made a face.


    The two stared at each other.


    "How about we just agree to never to cook for the other unless it''s meat?" Rian suggested.


    "Excellent idea," Lori nodded.


    They went back to their food, one enjoying breakfast much more than the other.


    "If you hate gourds so much, why are you eating them first?" Lori asked, gesturing at the pile of blue, mushy cubes in Rian''s spoon.


    "Better to get rid of them first so I can enjoy the meat," he said, putting the whole spoon in his mouth, chewing quickly, and swallowing.


    "If you choke, it''ll be your own fault," Lori warned.


    "That''s a risk I''m willing to take," Rian said.


    "Well, I''m not. Eat slower and chew more."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Yes, mother."


    They ate, Rian at one point reaching for his cup of water and visibly washing his mouth out. At least he had the good taste to swallow instead of spitting it out.


    "So, what''s on your agenda today?" he asked, getting started on the meaty, leafy, and rooty bits of his stew.


    "You realize just because you ate the gourd bits doesn''t mean its flavor didn''t soak into the stew?" Lori pointed out.


    "Ignoring that!" Rian said. "Agenda? Please? Still working on the dungeon?"


    Lori had devoted herself to that in the past weeks, when she hadn''t been dragged with Rian to get people from River''s Fork to Lori''s Demsne, Lorian. With the increase in their population¨C even with the people who''d gotten it into their heads they''d rather live in River''s Fork¨C they needed a larger dungeon that would accommodate the entire population comfortably¨C that is, comfortable for her¨C when it inevitably happened again. Making the lavatories manually cleanable and moving them to the front of the dungeon near the entrance was only part of it.


    After the first near-collapse, Rian had gathered every stoneworker, everyone with any sort of masonry or building experience, and even two former militia engineers, and had sat them down with Lori so they could discuss how to prevent such a thing from happening again. Fortunately, Lori had not been hurt, but was clear her strategy of binding the earthwisps to greater cohesion to reinforce the stone wasn''t working as effectively as she wanted when she had the weight of a whole hill to bear.


    Regular pillars, with arching supports to transfer the weight to the ground, were now to be found in her dungeon. They didn''t need to be that close together, but they were apparently needed to prevent any more collapses. She''d also been advised not to put floors of the dungeon directly beneath each other. They''d had to make a small, earthwisp-formed model of her plans for the dungeon so she could be advised about the design.


    So far, there wasn''t much. Just the original open space, which had some of the tables and benches returned to it for people to eat, the so called ''treasure room'' where the metal materials not actively being used was stored, so that they wouldn''t need to move it there again in case of a dragon, the long-term storage cold room next to the kitchen area where food was only supposed to go in, and not out until winter, the more open pantry and everyday cold room that they tried to keep stocked with at least a week''s worth of food in case of another dragon, the lavatories (and she still had to figure out where the contents would go in a dragon situation), and the pit that was the reservoir, which she''d drained (removing anything loose in it with the water), and partially sealed off as a dark room. She had plans for a larger, less accessible reservoir, but that, along with everything else, were still just plans.


    What she HAD done was to build an isolated set of rooms for herself, where she''d moved her private bath, private lavatory, private bedroom, private study, private living quarters, private treasure room¨C consisting of the gold and other metals and materials the dragon had shed, at least those no one else had been able to drag off because it was too big¨C private ventilation, and a long hallway and private stairs that she could block off with stone for privacy and security. She''d dug upwards, putting her bedroom just above the pillar of stone hiding the dungeon''s core, near the front of the cliff face, so that she wouldn''t have to walk far to leave, as well as put it just that bit further up from floods. Rian had declared it ''paranoid on a self-entombing level'' and had advised her to devise a way to escape her own rooms in case someone decided to besiege her.


    Half the second week had gone into building just that.


    "I''m going to get started on digging out the second level of the dungeon," Lori said. "Hopefully it won''t flood, but¡­"


    "But if it did, at least we''d have a new reservoir," Rian said cheerfully.


    "Right. Sure. That," Lori said, as if that had always been plan.


    "Once that''s built, are you going to open up a second entrance?" Rian said brightly. "So that people can evacuate into the dungeon faster?"


    Lori coughed. "Of course I am. It wouldn''t be an efficient evacuation if people get bottlenecked by the dungeon''s entrance."


    Rian nodded, seemingly satisfied about something, though Lori had no idea what. Maybe he was just being strange again. "Well, if you need help, you know where to find everyone," he said. He blinked and tilted his head. "You, uh, do remember who all the engineers and stone masons are, right? I mean, you probably don''t know their names, but do you at least remember their fa¨C"


    Lori hurriedly finished her stew. "Well, time flows, I have to get to work," she said hurriedly, grabbing her staff and binding the nearest group of lightwisps to the end of it. "Need to go on digging, and you need to supervise people building houses and things!"


    "You have a terrible memory, Lolilyuri," Rian said blandly.


    "Can''t talk, dungeon needs to be built!" Lori declared, heading for the corner of the dungeon where she''d decided the stairs down to the next level would be.


    "See you at lunch then, I guess¡­" Rian shrugged, and finished eating his breakfast.

 48 - The Next Level

    Lori began constructing the next area of her Dungeon.


    Technically, she''d already started by putting together a plan of what she intended to build rather than just digging out space and hoping for the best, so that there would be less risk of the ceiling collapsing, as well as refining her first floor so more of the actual structure bore the weight instead of relying on reinforcement by earthwisps, but now she was getting started on the actual digging.


    The hallways she''d been expanding that lead to the reservoir-turned-dark room before it had collapsed¨C she hadn''t been in it, but had seen it happen¨C was fixed now, the ceiling arched instead of flat to keep it from happening again. She still glanced up warily as she passed it. People were still eating behind her as she made measurements with a length of knotted rope, measuring out paces and feet, marking them on the ground with black charcoal. The wall next to her intended stairs, meant to be a reference held the many, many, many sketches and diagrams of arches, pillars, and how levels were to be positioned. Thankfully, the children had stopped drawing on it, adding their own little additions like stick figure people, castles, trees and little houses.


    After marking off the area, she bound the earthwisps inside her lines and made the stone soften, her handy stone-smoother and leveler tool in hand as she made the stone flow out, revealing a square depression that was¡­ well, unevenly deep, but she''d expected that. She''d had a visual reference for the length and width, but not for the depth of the stone to be bound. Still, it wasn''t meant to be perfect right away. Marking off a line, she bound and softened again, pulling up stone from a slightly smaller plot. Bit by bit, she made stairs that descended downwards.


    She''d originally been thinking of just cutting a ramp down and adding stairs to it later, until Rian had pointed out she''d need to make stairs anyway if she wanted to get out from the bottom of the ramp at the end of the day. So, slow, painstaking stairs it was.


    Lori began to dig into the stone that made up the wall so she could continue her stairs, making sure the ceiling was a load-bearing arc to distribute the weight down, and using her stone-smoother tool to square off the corners between floor and wall when they were too obviously off for her satisfaction. The next level was intended to be larger and able to comfortably hold more people when a dragon came. Comfortable, in this instance, meant they wouldn''t have to sleep on the floor. Personally, Lori wasn''t sure about Rian''s suggestion to make sleeping nook, since it would still be stone they''d be lying down on, and no matter how high off the ground it was, sleeping on stone was still uncomfortable, but she supposed it did beat sleeping on the floor where people might step on you.


    Every so often, she had to stop digging to drag out the stone she''d excavated outside, piling it for later materials. The settlement outside was boisterous with the sound of all her new dependents finally all putting up roofs on the houses she''d made seemingly so long ago, cutting trees to clear land according to the plan she, Rian and the farmers had worked out, and carrying those cut trees to the saw pit. There were cries of pain as they tried to tend to sweetbugs they''d found nesting within the demesne, and others sounds of demesne life.


    The relative silence except for the sounds of food being prepared and lunch being cooked as she entered her Dungeon again to get back to work was wonderful.


    Lori double checked how deep the bottom of the stairs was¨C six paces¨C before finally moving horizontally and beginning to excavate. She kept an eye on the lines of cleavage, the layering, and the composition, in case there were any spots where the sudden release in pressure would cause the stone to shift and potentially collapse. However, instead of making a large open space with random pillars of stone, they were placed in a deliberate grid pattern, with supporting arcs in between to bear the weight of the ceiling.


    She''d excavated a decently-sized room, with a ceiling higher than she could reach even if she jumped, by the time Rian called her up for lunch.


    "So, how''s the new dragon-survival shelter?" Rian asked as they sat down and he brought her lunch.


    She stared down at lunch, poking it with the wooden spoon. After months of use, the wooden spoon was decently smoothed out. "What is this?"


    "What''s what?" Rian said innocently.


    She held up her bowl. "This," she said, pointing her bowl at his face. "These¡­ bits."


    "Oh, that," Rian said. "Shelled and crushed ropeweed seeds."


    Lori put the bowl down, looking at it skeptically. "Ropeweed seeds?"


    "As a general rule, the seeds of most plants are edible and nutritious, and the ones that are poisonous are surprisingly rare and usually obvious because you want to spit them out," Rian said placidly. "Grains are seeds, after all."


    "You want me to eat ropeweed seeds," Lori said uncertainly.


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    "It''s food," Rian said. "Besides, we''re trying to see if they''ll make for good bread."


    Lori blinked and looked down at the crushed seeds mixed in with the stew in her bowl.


    "Ropeweed grows everywhere along the river, so I''ve been having the clearing parties gather them up and bring the fibers for rope and weaving, and the seeds for food and replanting," Rian said. "I don''t know how well they store, but we can eat it before the stuff we know will store for longer, so we don''t feel tempted to keep getting from winter stores. Though once the Dungeon''s expanded I''d like to see if we can grow it in here. It''s a relatively prolific plant, so hopefully it won''t be too hard to grow underground. "


    Warily, Lori took a spoonful and chewed. Well, at least it changed the flavor of the stew enough to be different.


    "How is it?" Rian asked.


    Lori just grunted, proceeding with eating.


    "So, while you''re here and can''t get away," Rian said brightly, "you should know we had a few altercations. There were¡­ well, I''m pretty sure there were fights, but everyone around swore that there was no fighting and people were just ''arguing enthusiastically''. " He sighed. "So I''m pretty sure I''m being given the officer treatment."


    "Officer treatment?" Lori asked.


    "Kept in the dark and told plausible stories," Rian said, "so that I don''t press any further, and so the men can deal with the problem among themselves. You really need to raise a new lord from among the Golden Sweetwood people. This is the sort of thing that damages your authority."


    Lori paused. "How?" she asked intently.


    "It sets a precedent of non-interference on your part," Rian said. "Which isn''t bad, if it means you don''t manage and control every part of your people''s lives, but it also means a culture of ''anything is okay as long as the lord and Binder doesn''t hear about it'' can set in."


    Lori pursed her lips thoughtfully. "Do you know what they were supposedly arguing about?"


    "Shana and whether Grem is right," Rian said. "No one''s actively wishing she were dead, but they either blame Lasponin for setting her up or Grem for screwing up killing her. They didn''t say as much, but I could read the mood."


    "Does anyone think I should have killed Binder Shanalorre and taken the demesne regardless?" Lori asked.


    "If they did, they survived," Rian said, "so no one probably outright said so. And if anyone thought it, they''re keeping it to themselves. Though a few seem to think the new level of the Dungeon is to make space for the people of River''s Fork when the next dragon happens."


    "That''s absurd," Lori said. "That''s¡­ absurd! Why would I care about what happens to the people of River''s Fork? They''re not my responsibility."


    "Because you''re friends with Shana?" Rian said.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected. "And don''t you be absurd too. We''re not friends. We''re simply two Binders who''ve decided not to directly kill each other and just wait for the other to die to claim their core."


    "In a lot of places, that''s considered very friendly, between two Binders," Rian said.


    "Well, we''re not in those places, are we?" Lori said. "We''re in the middle of nowhere."


    "I remember someone saying something about being in the middle of nowhere increasing people''s inclination to murder other people they didn''t like," Rian said. "Who said that, I wonder¡­?"


    "Rian, shut up and eat."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Construction continued after lunch, expanding the new space and reinforcing the ceiling with pillars. On looking back, the pillars weren''t perfectly aligned, but they were close enough for the ceiling to hopefully not collapse. More and more stone was excavated out, and rolled along outside to be piled up next to the Dungeon''s entrance again. It was quickly becoming a large pile.


    Lori had to bind more lightwisps outside and bring them in with her to illuminate the new level as she continued to build it. It was much slower than her original construction of her Dungeon, since she had to stop and specifically shape the supporting pillars and arches, but that was better than having the stone collapse on her. After all, she''d have to pass through here a lot in order to build all that her Dungeon needed. Best she make it safe for herself.


    By the time Rian came down to get her at about mid-afternoon, she had a little chamber about ten paces long and five wide, though all the sides but the one that had stairs up were a bit rough since she still intended to keep expanding, and so there was no need for her to smooth or flatten them.


    "Sorry I''m late," he said, his voice echoing slightly in the enclosed space as Lori looked up from pilling the soft, excavated stone into the middle of the hollowed out room. "Lost track of the sun. It''s time."


    "I''ll be right there," Lori said absently as she rolled all the stone she''d excavated together. It made for a sizable clump. She was really glad she had Whispering to do this. She didn''t want to think about how arduous digging up a Dungeon would have been if she''d been a Deadspeaker.


    "It''s looking pretty good down here," Rian said with a nod as he looked around the excavated room, and at the thick pillars supporting the ceiling. "Definitely a lot more space than we had last time. Though now we''re going to have to block this place off, or else people will start sneaking in here while you''re out to get into all sorts of trouble."


    Lori blinked, then sighed as she realized her lord was right. She looked at the last load of excavated stone. "I suppose I can use this to block off the stairs," she said.


    "That will probably keep people out," Rian nodded. "By the way, the stonemasons want to talk to you about the big pile of rock you''ve been leaving outside."


    "What about it?" Lori said.


    "They want to know if they can cut it up for building material," Rian said. "With you busy building the Dungeon, and the houses so far not nearly enough for all our needs, they want to see about building their own."


    Lori sighed, but it wasn''t a bad suggestion. "I''ll review their proposal first," she said. "I want to know where they plan to build. It might need to wait until we can clear more land for it."


    "I''ll tell them," Rian said.


    Making the stone flow, Lori headed for the stairs, Rian falling in beside her as the excavated rock followed after then, and Lori used it to seal off the stairs she''d just made to keep people out of her new construction. "What was it again? Wood curing?"


    "Yeah," Rian said as they climbed the stairs. "The curing sheds are full again, so they need you to cure the wood so they can use them soon¡­"

 49 - Other Business

    While Lori had to expand her Dungeon, there were still other things she had to do to keep her demesne functioning. Doing maintenance on the wisps she''d bound, making minor repairs to the stone walls of the houses she''d made because the stonemasons had needed to gouge out a divot or something to fit the roof more securely, double-checking on things like the water temperature in the baths or the amount of light her bound lightwisps were generating so they wouldn''t be blinding¡­ things of that nature.


    A lot of it was tedious, minor matters that took up more time walking to them than actually doing them. It was frustrating. She felt there should be a way for these things to maintain themselves. Technically, she could do many of them without needing to move to where they were, but as Rian had said, some things she actually needed to perceive to adjust properly. The firewisps in the water could make it hot, and she could maintain those at a distance, but she needed to actually see and feel the result to be able to know if the water was dangerously scalding hot. And the lightwisps needed to be adjusted according to the time of day, since it would be hard for many to sleep if she kept them shining all night.


    It was something she could probably get better at adjusting remotely, with practice, but it was occasionally frustrating she had to do it at all. Surely not all Dungeon functions had to be manually supervised daily? Was this what wizards employed by the Dungeon Binder really do? Just¡­go around all over the Dungeon, adjusting wisp outputs and settings, so the Binder didn''t have to do it, like working-student part-timers? That was¡­ that was¡­


    That was a horrifically plausible scenario, Lori realized, to her mounting dread.


    "So, I''ve been thinking," Rian said, breaking Lori out of her terrifying reverie. "Could you make wheels?"


    Lori glanced at him. "Did you hit your head?" she said. "Of course I can make wheels. How do you think we got here?"


    "Sorry, wrong question," Rian said. "Would you please make some wheels? We''ve got a lot of stone for it, and I think we might be needing some kind of handcart soon, if only to make emptying the latrines more sanitary and less malodourous. Most of the ground''s firm enough you shouldn''t have to pave it¡­ and even as I say it I''m starting to think of places it could do with a little paving."


    "If people want paving, they could put it all down themselves. I''ll give them the rock," Lori said.


    "You mean ''rocks'', right?"


    "No, rock. They''ll get one big rock, they have to quarry the paving stones themselves."


    "Ah. Well, it''s better than a single small rock, I suppose," he said.


    "I''ll see if I can make some while working on the curing shed," Lori said.


    "No, you get some rest," Rian said. "It''s not urgent yet."


    "Then why bring it up?"


    "I wanted to tell you before I forgot about it," he explained.


    "See, that''s what happens when you waste your memory on remembering names. You don''t see me having problems forgetting important things," Lori said.


    Rian looked at her sideways. "When was the last time you did your laundry?"


    Lori opened her mouth to reply¡­ then paused, trying to remember.


    "Laundry''s not important," she declared.


    "As the one who sits closest to you during meals, I beg to differ."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori resigned herself to needing to do her laundry later that night. She supposed it was about time to change clothes anyway. No matter how hard-wearing her clothes were, being made of tough cloudbloom, there was a limit, and she didn''t want to have to go around wearing rags. That would be bad for her dignity as the Dungeon Binder.


    She made a note to see how well weaving ropeweed into fabric was doing. They should have enough threads by now, right?


    She sat on a pile of compressed dirt next to one of the curing sheds filled with cut lumber, overseeing the bindings of air-, water-, fire- and lightningwisps needed to cure the wood quickly, having just finished inspecting the temperature so the wood wouldn''t warp or catch fire. The large tree trunk Rian intended to hollow out into a boat lay not too far away, in its own binding. It seemed a waste to cure the whole trunk if they were just going to burn and hollow it out, but this was Rian''s project, and the outrigger they''d made for Lori''s Boat had already proven the concept.


    Lori listened to the comforting sounds of wood being sawed through as today''s latest tree was cut to size. The last curing shed was being opened with some regularity to keep putting new planks in, which was why she had to be present to keep adjusting the bindings to deal with the altering heat, humidity, and so that people wouldn''t die from the lightningwisps. This occupied her for the rest of the afternoon as she regularly went from shed to shed, examining the wood and adjusting the bindings.


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    She was adequate at this, if she did say so herself. Very few of her planks came out split or warped, and the thick blocks the carpenters were asking for so they could make pulleys and other tools were cured all the way through in only a few hours.


    Lori had to do this several times already, as their new arrivals proved themselves much more adept at building than her original people. Rian attributed it to their militia experience, since their original demesne before they''d left for this new continent had apparently used their militia as a mobile engineering brigade to deal with blocked roads, landslides, avalanches, collapsed bridges and other excitements. They had a lot of experience with building.


    Needless to say, they went through the wood in the curing sheds quickly, meaning more wood had to quickly be cured by force. Fortunately, they had their own sawyers, and so the number of sawpits cutting, and the number of curing sheds, had increased to accommodate the new demand, even with one of the sawyers taking his saw (and wife and family) to River''s Fork.


    As the day drew to a close, the day''s wood was all loaded inside the sheds, and Lori was finally able to stabilize the conditions inside so she could set the wood to cure overnight. Which didn''t mean they''d be unwatched. A shed had been set up for a few men to sleep near the wood in case of fire, with buckets of sand and water just in case. Lori was confident enough in her skill that this was probably unlikely, but she''d rather not lose several sheds worth of wood, so there they were.


    As the men talked and joked and congratulated each other on a day''s work, Lori went to do her rounds, adjusting the brightness of lightwisps in the shelters and the dining hall-turned-shelter now that the natural light was fading, increasing the amount of water that was being drawn from the river to the baths because of the sudden influx of bathers, and then adjusting the firewisps heating the water to account for the increased volume.


    Rian passed her and gave her a nod, informing her that all the children were accounted for and back from seeling before he continued on to whatever else he was doing.


    Only then did she head back to the Dungeon, bind and will the stone blocking the way to her new rooms to move aside, and head up to her bedroom to take a bath.


    She sighed as she sat naked on the stone bench along one wall of her private bath and let the bathwater, pulled from the river, wash over her from above. The water was warm, of course, and it felt good after a long, sweaty day of work. Willing the flow to cease with a thought¨C why bother with plumbing fixtures when you had Whispering?¨C Lori grabbed her river rock, smeared some soap on it, and started to scrub herself down. After a long day, it felt good to get clean. Especially in private, where it was peaceful and quiet, and she didn''t have to put up with anything.


    Still, even in this solitude, her mind couldn''t help but wander to the things she still had to do. Finish excavating the new level. Put in ventilation tubes and bind airwisps to keep the air moving, and keep the temperature even as well. Put in the sleeping spaces and new emergency bath and latrine facilities. Dig out a new water reservoir, one that, at Rian''s suggestion, would be above the facilities meant to use it so the water would flow because of gravity instead of waterwisps. Check the progress of the fixtures that they''d be using for this, since she didn''t want her Dungeon to leak. Make drainage, for when it inevitably does leak. Start the underground farm as soon as possible, so they''d have more winter reserves. Build wheels for carts to lug around the dirt the farm would need, since using earthwisps to move soil tended to ruin the soil¡­


    Lori realized she was just sitting there, her rock motionless. Instead of going back to scrubbing herself. she let the rock fall, and it narrowly missed her foot as it clattered on the stone floor of her bath. She watched as water moved towards the drainage hole she''d made, which was covered by a stone grill to keep things from falling in.


    She felt so tired¡­


    For a moment, she considered just¡­ sleeping. Just sitting there in her bath, naked, and going to sleep. And when she woke up, she wouldn''t go downstairs. She''d put on new, clean clothes, lie down on her bed of dirty laundry, and then sleep some more. She thought of doing that for several days. Just stay curled up in bed and let Rian handle everything¡­


    One hand came up and slapped herself soundly across the face. Then she did it again for good measure.


    Lori stood up, and a part of her noted how little her body jiggled as she moved. Was that more muscle, or just loss of fat?


    Bending over, she picked up her rock and determinedly continued scrubbing. Methodically, systematically, she scrubbed every part of her body with soap, water, and her rock.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Hey," Rian greeted her as she finally came down from her room, dressed in fresh clothes and dry socks. "What kept you? Anything I need to worry about?"


    Lori waved away his worries as she sat down. "I''m fine," she said.


    Rian tilted his head. "Well, if you say so," he said. "So, I''ve got good news and better news."


    "Oh?"


    Rian nodded enthusiastically, his smile wide and for once not making her want to rip it off. "The foragers found a bunch of hairy blueball trees, and brought back a bunch," he said. "So we have that with dinner tonight. And NOT in the stew, I made sure to specify that."


    Lori perked up slightly. "That is good news. What''s the better one?"


    "Those hairy blueball seeds I''ve been collecting finally germinated," he said. "So, uh, I was wondering if we can start growing half in the Dungeon? So we don''t lose them all when a dragon comes along?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, I''ll make some pots, you can move them in the morning. Try not to get dirt everywhere."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    He was so disproportionately happy about having some fruit seeds start to sprout. Honestly, her lord was such a child sometimes.


    "It will be your responsibility to water them and keep them fertilized," she continued. "At the very least, you have to assign someone to do it. I''m merely allowing you the space and lightwisps to grow them."


    This time he rolled his eyes. "Yes, mother," he said.


    She reached over and flicked him in the forehead, making him start. "No talking back to your mother," she said blandly. "Now, go get dinner."


    "Yes, mother."


    She raised a hand to flick him again, but he was already slipping off the bench to get the food with a laugh. Shaking her head¨C such a child¨C Lori put her elbows on the table and closed her eyes, listening to the slightly echoing sounds of a flourishing demesne.


    Her demesne.

 50 - Laundry Day

    Lolilyuri had not been looking forward to this. Quite the opposite, in fact.


    "I hate laundry day," she grumbled. She looked at Rian across the table blearily. "When are you doing your laundry? Maybe I can just mix my clothes in with yours and take care of it that way."


    Rian, who was tugging on each of his fingers to make the knuckles pop and flexing them in satisfaction afterwards, twitched. "Don''t even joke about that," he hissed, leaning forward even as he frantically looked around everywhere, even directly behind him¨C Umu, Mikon and Riz (and she was annoyed at realizing another name had somehow snuck its way in again, ARGH!) all pretended to be casually talking even as they glared at each other pointedly and all they did was flap their mouths and make nonsensical sounds¨C as if afraid of people overhearing them. "Do you want weird rumors to start?" He paused. "More weird rumors, I mean."


    Lori knew she shouldn''t ask, but¡­ "What weird rumors?"


    "You don''t want to know."


    "Probably, but I''m morbidly curious anyway."


    "Well, there''s still the one that made you gag," Rian said, listing them on his fingers. He counted strangely, using the whole finger instead of each knuckle. Did no one teach him to count properly as a child?


    "Which one was that?" Lori said, before remembering and gagging. "N-never mind, I remembered and wished I didn¡¯t."


    "I told you that you didn''t want to know," Rian said, not sounding sympathetic at all and seemingly taking pleasure in her pain. "There are the rumors that grow from that, like already being married¨C" She gagged. "¨C secretly having children¨C" More gagging. "¨C you secretly being a man¨C"


    "Wait, what?" Lori said, blinking.


    "You are apparently so unfeminine that people wonder if you''re a man, and if I therefore prefer men by extension," Rian clarified.


    "That''s literally the stupidest, most idiotic thing I''ve heard all month," Lori said.


    "And you just suggested mixing our laundry together because you''re too lazy to do it yourself," Rian¡­ agreed?


    "I''m not too lazy to do my own laundry, I''d just prefer not to," Lori corrected loftily.


    "My apologies," Rian said, glancing towards the kitchen, which was just finishing up the food. "I can accuse you of many things, but laziness isn''t one of them."


    Lori nodded sharply, then paused. "What things?"


    "No people skills, bad communication skills, bad at socializing, bad at remembering people¡­" Rian started listing again.


    Oh. She''d thought they were actual criticisms, not nonsense. "That''s what you''re for," she said.


    "And you''re surprised there are rumors we''re secretly married," Rian sighed, rolling his eyes.


    "What does that have to do with anything?" In her experience, people got married so they could outnumber their poor children.


    "If you have to ask, then you''re too young to understand."


    "I''m fairly sure I''m older than you."


    "Maybe, but you''re not my sister, so it doesn''t count." What? What did that mean?


    Rian went up to get breakfast, leaving Lori in peace to put her head down on the table and close her eyes. Once upon a time, when she''d been on a ship heading for this new continent and thinking what she would do once she was an all-powerful Binder, she had decided she would never wake up before mid-morning again. What had happened to her convictions?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Breakfast was adequate and involved some new fungus that Lori had never tried before, but had apparently been on the late Binder Koshay''s List. It was nice and firm and lent a nice new flavor to the stew. Lori made a note to herself to save some spores before people ate all samples of it, since fungus growing was traditional in a Dungeon. Then told Rian to do it so she wouldn''t forget.


    Then she had to go back to her room, and her private bathroom, to do her laundry.


    It was long, grueling work, and she had to keep taking bits of stone from her wall to bind and reform into containers for hot water, soaking water and washing water as she took her scrubbing rock and soap¨C the runny kind, not the hard kind¨C to soak her clothes and pound the bits that weren''t dirt off. She did this by hand, since even after weeks and weeks and weeks of trying, she still hadn''t managed to come up with a binding to clean her clothes for her.


    It was never something she''d had to devise, growing up and learning to do magic. She and her mothers had lived in an apartment, and had taken their clothes to a laundry to get them cleaned. The closest Lori had been to ''doing laundry'' had been bringing their laundry to the old woman who ran the laundry shop and picked them up later when they were clean.


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    Someone had needed to teach her how to do laundry after they''d left Covehold and had already traveled for several weeks. They had stopped to do repairs and Lori had imitated the other women doing laundry, getting her clothes wet and hitting them on rocks. Fortunately, someone had taken pity on her and had shown her how to do it properly, using ash mixed with oil, or just ash if nothing else (but that was harsh on clothes), how to scrub the fabric to keep it from being damaged¡­


    The woman had died at some point on the way to where they were now. At least, Lori assumed so. That or Lori had just forgotten what she''d looked like. That was a very real possibility.


    Perhaps Rian had a point, and she should put some effort into remembering people?


    No, that would be a silly waste of time. The woman probably just hadn''t introduced herself. If Lori remembered her, but didn''t have a name to go with the memory, the name obviously hadn''t been given to her.


    She went back to hitting her clothes with a rock to get them clean.


    At one point, she thought she heard someone calling her name, but as she was naked and completely wet with laundry soap and water and was getting into a good rhythm, she ignored it. It eventually faded, meaning it couldn''t have been very important or they''d have kept bothering her for whatever stupid reason.


    Finally, after long, tiring work, Lori finally finished her laundry. It wasn''t all her clothes¨C that would just be silly¨C but it was still a lot. She had to take care because until they managed to start viably producing some sort of fabric from ropeweed, then the nearest source of new clothes was Covehold and that was a long way off.


    While she couldn''t devise a binding to wash and clean her clothes, drying them was easy. No messing around with long cords and poles and drying lines. Just binding the waterwisps in the clothes and gently drawing them out, pulling the water out with it, and she was done.


    After that came the time-consuming flattening and folding so she could pile it all on her bed and later put her raincoat¨C which she''d oiled recently to keep the leather from cracking¨C over it so she''d have something soft to lie down on.


    She was balling up her socks for last when she suddenly frowned in displeasure. Finally, the worst possible thing had happened. One of her socks had a hole in it.


    She''d brought a sewing needle, right? And thread?


    She set aside the one sock and its pair¨C she guessed it was its pair, all her socks looked alike¨C and folded the rest, checking the other socks for holes too. Fortunately, none of the others had holes in them, which was a relief.


    Lori then had to go through her non-clothes things and the spoils she''d liberated when the other two wizards had died before she''d finally found her sewing kit. It was a small, round metal tin with a tight-fitting lid, to keep the contents from spilling out. It had used to contain shoe polish, a long, long time ago, before she''d repurposed it in her school days to hold quartz, coals, and other materials, before she''d been able to afford glass containers and cases. Now it contained her sewing kit, such as it was.


    After twisting it open, she found she had more than one needle. She had several, of differing sizes, as well as curved ones for surgeons that she''d bought on a whim, several pins, and some large buttons.


    She had to go through her things again to find the tin that contained the threads.


    "All right," she muttered, sitting down on her stone chair in front of her stone table that bore no resemblance to any sort of sacrificial altar whatsoever, and moving the bound lightwisps behind her head for light. "How do you sew up socks¡­?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Where were you?" Rian asked as she sat down irritably. "You missed lunch. You never miss lunch. I was looking for you all day. I was worried you''d gotten secretly murdered and we''d have to send someone to River''s Fork for Shana so she could claim the core."


    "I told you, I was doing laundry." Lori said, still annoyed.


    "It took you that long to do your laundry?"


    She gave him a very level, piercing look. "And how long does it take you to do your laundry?"


    Rian looked aside. "Okay, that''s fair, you have a point, obviously you needed all that time to do your laundry." He sighed. "Maybe you should put up a sign. ''I''m in my room, go away''."


    "I shouldn''t need to put up a sign, it should be obvious people should go away from my room," Lori huffed, taking out her sock, the needle still dangling from it by a thread, and started trying to sew the hole this time without folding the material.


    "Is that a sock?" Rian said, leaning back.


    "It''s freshly laundered," Lori said. "Don''t be dramatic."


    She held the sock flat on the table with one hand as she carefully used the needle to pry up the fabric and stitch only the hole and not anything else. She''d learned the past four times, so she was sure she could do it now¡­


    "You have no idea how to sew socks, do you?" Rian said blandly.


    "What makes you say that?" Lori said.


    "The fact you sewed one side of the sock to the other three stitches ago and still haven''t noticed."


    Lori stopped, then sighed. Carefully, she began to undo the stitching.


    "Are you¡­ trying to get the needle back in through the same hole to undo a mistake?"


    "It worked the last four times," Lori said.


    Rian let out an annoyed breath. "Oh, give it here, or you''ll be stuck on that all night!" he said holding out an impatient hand.


    Lori paused and gave him a look. "You can''t do laundry, but you can sew?" she said skeptically.


    "Why not?" he said. "You do it the other way around. Come on, give it here." He beckoned his fingers in a vaguely obscene way.


    Shrugging, Lori handed him the sock. She watched as he stuck his hand inside her sock and pulled the fabric taut, then began carefully but confidently stitching in a vaguely circular way. "Where did you learn how to sew?"


    "I''m an unmarried man without his parents who lives alone," he said, not looking up from the sock. "The world has forced the necessity of learning upon me. Did you get anything done today?"


    "I got my laundry done. As the one sitting in front of me, be grateful. That''s what you said, remember."


    "Colors. How can I argue against you throwing my words right back at me?" Rian said blandly. "So, I take it those pots for the hairy blueball seeds have been moved to tomorrow?"


    Lori stared at him. Then she sighed. "I''ll be right back," she said, and headed out towards the large pile of excavated rock outside the Dungeon.


    By the time she got back, Rian had finished with her sock and had it folded neatly on the table, the needle keeping it folded like a pin, next to three bowls of food.


    She frowned. "Why three?"


    "Didn''t you miss lunch?" he said.


    She considered that and pulled two of the bowls towards her.


    "Your pots are outside," she said, and dug into a food.


    "Thank you," he said, and joined her.

 51 - We Need More Houses

    "What do you mean, we need more houses?" Lori asked.


    "We, pronoun, meaning the speaker and at least one other person," Rian said. "Need, verb, to require something as essential or important. More, determiner, meaning an additional amount of something. Houses, noun, plural form, a building for human habitation, typically with a roof and at least three walls."


    Lori stared at him for a long moment. "Was that supposed to be a joke?"


    "I was breaking down the sentence into individual words in case it was a specific part you were having trouble with," Rian said.


    "Are you mocking me?"


    "Lori, if I were mocking you, I''d point at you and laugh," Rian said. "You are, however, a unique existence and I sometimes have to genuinely stop and wonder if you do, in fact, understand what I''m saying."


    "That still sounds like you''re mocking me," Lori accused.


    "I told you ''we need more houses''. It was a simple declarative statement with little possible ambiguity, and you don''t seem to understand," Rian said with a shrug.


    "I understand the sentence, I don''t understand what you mean by it," Lori said. "We have a lot of houses, people just haven''t finished building them yet."


    "Oh, we''re done with those," Rian said. "The last one was roofed while you''ve been digging your Dungeon. All the houses you put up are roofed now. But we need more houses, because our population grew."


    Lori scowled. "Can''t people stay in the shelters?"


    "It''s drafty, it''s crowded, the floors are cold, and they can''t decorate," Rian said. "Also, we need those houses to head off civil unrest. The reason the work has gone so much faster now than it was before was because of the former militia people in the Golden Sweetwood company doing the work, but the original housing list was made to prioritize people with large families and those with family members in essential jobs, like the children, sawyers, carpenters, and the cooks. They''re happy, because they have their own house now, but the people who actually built those houses want their own houses, or else they''ll feel cheated. So, we need more houses, or else there''ll be fighting in the street, general unrest and bad feelings all around." He paused, then added, "Which will be bad for overall productivity and really bad in the long run. So, we need more houses, and we need them now. The militiamen are willing to keep building, so long as they know they''ll get their own place soon, but I think it''s only fair we bump them up to ''essential workers'' and have the next batch of houses they make be their own."


    "So why don''t they?" Lori said. Why did she have to deal with this over breakfast?


    "Because you raised the walls of the last batch, which meant most of the work was putting in the roof, doors and internal furnishings," Rian said. "If you do it again, the work gets done a lot faster, and there''ll be less to bother you with. Also, it will seem like you''re treating everyone equally, since you have everyone living in stone-walled houses, which are more secure and less likely to burn than wooden ones. And they took the brunt of the dragon very well."


    Lori scowled. This sounded suspiciously like a ''fairness'' thing. The world was fundamentally unfair¨C everyone said so¨C so why did people insist on ''fairness''?


    "Look, just look over the proposal I made first," Rian said, picking up a tray-sized plank of wood. It had become a familiar sight, with Rian washing it off and writing on it every day when he needed to show her something, like lists or just notes. "I''ve already marked out the area to be cleared so they can build the houses there, and I''ve got the new housing list drawn up. I just need your approval for the site. You don''t need to start building today, since they still need to clear the trees."


    Reluctantly, Lori held out her hand, and Rian handed her the plank. It was heavier than she''d thought, but Rian didn''t let go of it until she was holding it with both hands.


    The sketch on it was simple but seemed to be to scale, and had even helpfully marked the sawpits, the current farm fields, the projected farm fields, and where she''d stashed the corpse of the baby islandshell. The leather parts hadn''t been recoverable, but the bones and shell would still be useful¡­ once she thought of a use for it.


    She looked over it critically. "Why am I looking at a long box?"


    "I figured it would be more efficient to make the houses a single long building that share walls," Rian said. "Makes building it simple. Admittedly, it cuts down on the number of walls that can have windows, but this way you have less building to do, and it''ll be easier for them to put on a roof."


    She looked at another drawing. "And the reason the walls will be five paces high?"


    "It''ll give people the option to put in a loft or attic, or even a second floor, if they feel like it," Rian said. "More space."


    "I can already hear the people who have houses now complaining their house isn''t as nice," Lori said. She gave him a look. "You handle those."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said.


    "I suppose we''ll have to find a new use for the shelters after this," Lori mused.


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    "Actually, I have an idea for that," Rian said. "We''ll just make it storage and housing for people without families. Bachelor quarters, sort of thing. Just put in internal walls so we''ll all have our own room. We can turn the other into storage, or for growing mushrooms or whatever."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm''-ed. She pointed at another square near the new houses. "What''s this?"


    "The proposed site for the new bathhouse," Rian said. "That way it''s convenient, and we won''t have so many people crowding around the current bathhouses. By the way, people are also requesting we build a shaded roof between the two old bathhouses, so they''d have a better place to relax."


    "Why do you keep bringing me so many requests?" Lori sighed. She still hadn''t finished her breakfast.


    "Well, you''ve made it perfectly clear that you want to be the absolute authority, so people are complying with that by not making any decisions without bringing it by you," Rian said. "And since you literally won''t talk to anyone but me unless you have to, they pass it to me, and it gets passed to you. And this is just the stuff I don''t dismiss out of hand for being silly or self-serving."


    "Like what?" Lori asked.


    "People want to know if they can own land."


    "They''re still on that?" Lori scowled.


    "They never stopped, they just know better to than to bring it up to your face," Rian said.


    "We don''t even have money," Lori said. "We don''t even have a barter economy! What would they possible need discrete ownership of land for?"


    "Bragging rights? Status symbol? Wish fulfillment?" Rian suggested.


    "Tell the next person who asks that I''ll be awarding them the location of the latrines and they''ll be personally responsible for maintaining them," Lori said.


    "I know you mean that as some kind of ironic punishment, but I can already see them trying to charge people wood or fruit or rope or sexual services for the use of the latrine," Rian said.


    Lori grimaced. "It''s too glittering early in the morning for this," she muttered.


    "Hey, you asked," Rian said. "Have more faith that I know what you''ll think is silly and pointless."


    "Noted," Lori sighed. She looked at the map. "Inform me when the land is cleared and I''ll inspect it before commencing building. And add spots for latrines and people assigned to maintaining them."


    "Got it," Rian said, nodding.


    Grumbling, Lori went back to her breakfast. When, exactly, could she stop building things and just bask in her power?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The excavation work continued. It soon became rote. Soften stone, draw it out, form a pillar with arcs to support the ceiling, drag the stone outside. Repeat again and again until lunch. Repeat until mid-afternoon, then do something else. Curing wood. Making ice. Checking on all the wisps she''d bound to make sure their output wasn''t too hot or too bright. Making stone axe heads to spare their metal ones from wear and tear. Wonder how she was doing more work for less pay as a Dungeon Binder than she had been as a student.


    Occasionally she had to stop and make sure her floor was properly level, which involved making a grid of channels, filling them with water, then molding the stone to match that. It was tedious work, but the perfectionist in her made her do it. And honestly, it felt much nicer to walk across.


    When enough land had been cleared, she''d taken a break from excavation to inspect it with Rian. It was on the other side of the dining hall, which was finally being used for its intended purpose again, though the number of tables and benches was less because the carpenters were busy with other things, and could only make one set at a time. The rest were still in the Dungeon, and Lori was resigned to them being here permanently. At least she didn''t have to walk far for meals now, and the food stores for dragons and winter was building up nicely, mostly with smoked meat and edible seeds like ropeweed, though there were some cut that had been sealed in ice. For something nice in the middle of winter, she''d been told.


    There was some variance of elevation at the proposed building site, but nothing that wasn''t fixable, especially with earthwisps, but definitely something she''d need to adjust for, given Rian''s suggestion of how she should build this. Honestly, it wasn''t bad, now that she''d thought out it. A simple build, and with all the wood they had now, she could use planks to brace the tops of doorways and windows.


    "Why do the houses need to face that way though?" she asked as she examined the stripped branches that had been thrust into the ground to mark the boundaries of the proposed build. "It doesn''t line up with the grid established by the other houses."


    "The sun angles down from that side when it it''s climbing and setting," Rian said. "Might change as the year progresses, but it''s there now. This way the light will naturally angle into people''s houses in the middle of the day. It''ll let anyone doing indoor work like spinning, weaving or making rope have a decent amount of light. We still don''t have that many candles, mostly an emergency stash for the next dragon if you''re too busy to make light, since what fat and oil we''re getting is being used for soap, cooking and lubricant. A few people have been trying to catch sweetbugs that were born inside the demesne, so they can harvest bugswax, but that won''t really be viable as a source for some time. Plus we''ll either need to ready a space for them in the Dungeon in case of dragon or have some in the Dungeon itself, and without flowering plants, they won''t have much reason to build their hive."


    Lori sighed. Still more work to do. "What''s that?" she asked, pointing to another line of sticks.


    "Road," Rian said. "At least, the planned road. We''re planning to mark out a course that connects through the road we currently have that runs in front of the houses and past the dining hall towards the Dungeon. We''re, uh, hoping you''ll find it in you to compact it down, so that there won''t be any slipping accidents when people bring up the materials for the roofs later."


    Lori looked between the road and the site of the new houses. "They seem to be rather far apart," she pointed out.


    "Planning for the future," Rian said. "We''ll eventually want a wide road, and it would be nice if it didn¡¯t come up right to people''s doorsteps. And the four paces of space gives people a nice garden plot to grow vegetables or something. Once we figure out how best to grow vegetables, anyway. "


    "And all the stumps?" she said, eyeing the many fresh tree stumps all around.


    "Well, if you''re going to be moving the earth anyway¡­" Rian said, looking aside.


    She gave him a level look. "I''ll soften the ground, but you have to arrange for them to be dragged out of here," she said sternly.


    "That''s fair," Rian said meekly. "And we''d have more usable firewood than if you just made them explode."


    She kept staring at him, but nodded. "Anything else?"


    "Well, we have a lot of felled trees now, and they need curing to be useable¡­ "


    Lori rolled her eyes. Of course. They probably had more logs stacked than the sawpits could handle right then. "Fine. I''ll go and see about curing the logs."


    "Also, people are asking for someplace they can put all the wood with mushrooms they''ve managed to cultivate, so the spores won''t spread on the new wood on the houses and what furniture we have¡­"


    Yes, she was definitely doing more work now than when she''d been merely a student. Almost, she wished one of the two wizards who come with them hadn''t died so she''d have someone to push some of this magic work onto.


    Almost.

 52 - Foundations

    Lori thought having to build more houses would be irritating. Thankfully, the heat wasn''t that much of a problem. Her demesne wasn''t large enough for her to manipulate clouds unless the clouds were really low, but she had more than enough to control the wind, and she''d been having a nice breeze blowing for her as soon as she''d had to step out of her Dungeon.


    Wearing her hat to prevent overheating, she started the building project. She''d managed to produce a surplus of stone from her excavating, and from the calculations she''d made she just barely had enough to make at least the new housing, and the rest of the excavation would let her build the bath house. The first thing she had to do was to move the excavated stone up to the building site. She had to do it in batches, since she wasn''t sure she could control the whole mass well enough that it wouldn''t start to slip on the packed dirt paths they used as main roads, though she was able to move incrementally larger batches as she made more trips back and forth.


    It took her most of the morning to drag a sufficient amount of stone to the site that she felt she could get started laying down a foundation properly after lunch. The place was full of holes from all the tree stumps that had been dug out and chopped up for firewood, so she had to fix that first. Then she could pack down the earth and lay down the foundation for the rest of the building¡­


    Should she put in fixtures for internal plumbing? No, that would just be too complicated. And she didn''t want to have to maintain a sewer system on top of everything else.


    Thankfully, Rian didn''t bring up any issues during lunch¡ªeither there weren''t any or he''d thought it wasn''t the time¡ªas she spent it looking at the plank with the proposal drawing and muttering to herself about dimensions. Most would be sleeping on the floor at night, since beds were less of a priority and everyone had bed rolls, but that meant having enough free floor space for a family of ten to sleep on the ground¡­


    Rian had to prompt her to eat three times, then had to ask for his plank back, since he was still using it for notes.


    After lunch, Lori got to work. She bound light wisps and placed them over the sticks marking the boundary so she could remove the sticks and start compacting and leveling the soil, leveling out out the variances of elevation. The whole site was on a slight incline, but nothing she couldn''t deal with. She''d have to level the floors of each segment individually once the internal walls were up, but that was simpler than trying to get everything perfectly flat.


    She finished putting down only a quarter of the stone foundation by the time late afternoon rolled around and she had to stop because it was dark and she was feeling sweaty. It wasn''t leveled, compacted or otherwise rendered structurally sound, with no bubbles, just laid down. She''d have to pack it down properly tomorrow¡­


    "How''s the house-building coming along?" Rian ask as she lay face-down on the table.


    Lori groaned in response.


    "You''re being dramatic," Rian said, the heartless abomination. "You''ve done this before, it can''t be any worse than a¨C" he let out a softer groan.


    She managed to find it in her to raise her head and glare at him.


    "See, you''re feeling better already," Rian said cheerfully.


    "Get the food or I''m going to kick you," she warned.


    "And there we have the violence inherent in the system," Rian said with a nod as he got up. "Relax, the workday is done. You have the rest of the night to sleep or whatever it is you do all alone in your room with no one to hear."


    That didn''t make Lori feel better. She wasn''t looking forward to another fruitless night trying to work out how to do even the basics of Deadspeaking, Mentalism or Horotracting. The bare summaries she remembered from her old books were being very unhelpful in aiding her attempts to access the other forms of magic.


    The thought was all immensely frustrating.


    Not for the first time, she wished her two corpses had left some kind of texts she could use, but like her, they had no reference books on them. Any books they''d had likely hadn''t survived the crossing over the ocean.


    She tiredly picked one of the bowls, and started to eat. For a moment, there was nothing but her chewing and the noise of everyone else eating as well.


    "Was the day really that bad?" Rian asked.


    "I don''t want to talk about it," Lori said, putting another spoonful into her mouth.


    "Hmm¡­" Rian ''hmm''-ed. "Well, if you''re sure."


    "Yes, I''m sure," Lori said tersely.


    "You don''t have another hole in your sock or something, do you?" Rian said.


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    "If I did, I''ll let you know," she said. "Can I eat now?"


    Rian sighed for some reason. "Yeah, sorry for keeping you."


    They ate in silence again.


    "Thank you," Rian said as Lori was finishing her bowl.


    She gave him another look. That was strange thing to say, even for him. "For what?"


    "For everything. The hot water. The lights. The ice. The shelter," Rian said. "Just¡­ thank you."


    "All right¡­?" she said. She pushed the bowl towards him. "I''m going to sleep. If anyone starts playing music, flog them."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said, taking her bowl to bring it back to be washed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Lori woke up the next day, she was feeling much better. Still irritated, but better. Breakfast was stew and happyfruit, which she had to peel herself. Rian, color him, peeled off the outer skin as if he''d been eating it his whole life and ate the flesh inside almost daintily. She made such a mess of it she had to go back to her rooms to wash off all the juice.


    When she got back to the building site, she was finally able to pack down the floors properly, even digging a few holes and sinking a few stone columns to anchor the foundation in case rain softened the dirt below. It shouldn''t¡ªshe''d packed it hard¡ªbut a Whisperer knew better than anyone how insidiously destructive water could be. They''d studied it in class, after all.


    Lori had to wonder how many of the nameless unimportant nobodies she''d shared that class with had ever needed to use that knowledge.


    She finished laying out the foundation that day, all six paces by forty, compressed so tight it was almost part of the ground. It was all between the marks where the sticks had been, anyway, and she used her stone-shaping tool to keep the edges more or less straight.


    ¡­


    She was going to need to spend tomorrow morning checking the measurements, wasn''t she? Ugh.


    Still, it was with some relief that she sat down for dinner, more satisfied after a good day''s work that was actually done properly, even if it was incomplete.


    "You''re looking better," Rian noted.


    "What are you talking about?" she said, leisurely eating her dinner.


    "Yesterday you threatened to kick me," Rian said.


    Had she? "You probably deserved it at the time," she said.


    "If you say so," he said. "So, while they''re waiting for a house to build a roof on, some of the former militia and the hunters want to go into the Iridescence to hunt beasts. We''ve been catching less and less with the baiting towers, and it seems the beasts have caught on to that."


    She blinked in shock. "Is that safe?"


    "Probably not, but they all say they''ve done it before," Rian said. "And quite frankly it''s a much more proactive approach then leaving someone high up and hoping something tries to eat him. We need the meat. And the leather. And the bones. And the teeth. And the claws. And we need to get it now before the beasts migrate for the winter."


    "They do what for the winter?" Lori blinked.


    "Migrate. Move to warmer climes," Rian said. "I mean, they''ll hardly be able to survive the winter cold, right? So they''ll probably go somewhere else. The same for the seels, actually. We might have to see about trapping some and growing them in the Dungeon so we''ll have fresh meat for the winter." At her look, he shrugged. "How do you think they survived outside of a demesne in winter?"


    "I never thought about it," Lori shrugged.


    "Well, we''ll have to, that''s our primary source of meat we''re talking about," Rian said.


    Lori sighed. "It''s one thing after another."


    Rian shrugged. "It''s living. Would you rather be back in the old continent, living in some apartment the size of this table, doing¡­ whatever jobs there are for wizards when they get out of school, balancing your pay, your taxes, your rent and your food money?"


    Lori stared at him. Then she looked around at her Dungeon.


    "You make an excellent point," she said. "Fine, they may go, but tell them that they are to prioritize conserving irreplaceable resources, like metal and rope."


    "And their lives?" Rian said.


    "I suppose, but only after they make sure they don''t lose any metal."


    "I''ll find a better way to phrase that," Rian said, though he chuckled for some reason. "So, how long do you think it''ll take you to finish the walls of the houses?"


    Lori made a contemplative sound. "A week? Perhaps less, if I fall into a rhythm. The most time consuming will be making the doors and windows."


    "Maybe we can get you assistance for that," Rian said thoughtfully. "Knock out the hole and have someone else evenly cut it all? We have stonemasons, after all. They can do it when they do the roof."


    "I suppose¡­" Lori said. "But doing it that way might compromise the structure¡­"


    "Well, tell me if you want me to set it up," Rian said. "I''m sure they''ll be glad to have something to do."


    "I''ll remember," she said, going back to her stew. He did as well.


    Lori finished her stew and reached into her pocket for a happyfruit that Karina had offered her earlier. Giving the fruit a determined look, she started trying to peel it. Carefully, she peeled the skin back to expose the juicy fruit and took a careful bite.


    This time the juice didn''t go everywhere.


    "You realize I can just cut that up for you, right?" Rian said. "Most of us cut it up to eat it Lori. Only the children don''t because they eat it near water so they can wash up."


    She stopped and gave him a level, annoyed look. Then she took another bite. "Tomorrow. I''m enjoying this."


    "You''re just stubborn," he said, sounding amused.


    "You eat it like this," she said.


    "My knife was dirty and I was hungry," he said, shrugging.


    Lori ignored him and focused eating her happyfruit. She would manage to eat this cleanly.


    "Thank you," Rian said as Lori took another bite if the sweet, juicy, mushy happyfruit.


    She chewed and swallowed. "For what?" she said absently as started to peel more of the fruit for the next bite.


    "For everything. The hot water. The lights. The ice. The shelter," Rian said. "Thank you, Lori."


    She frowned at him. "Didn''t you say that already? I''m fairly sure you said that already."


    "Yes," he said. "But you deserved to hear it more. Don''t you think so?"


    "You want to thank me, pay your taxes," Lori said.


    "We don''t have taxes. We don''t even have money. We barely have a favor-based barter economy, mostly so people don''t waste each other''s time" Rian said. "The children are the ones pulling in raw resources often enough to actually be pretty rich, but they''re good children who''ve all been taught to share, so they''re basically giving it all away."


    Lori opened her mouth.


    "Do you really want to deal with all the paperwork having a tax scheme will cause right now?" Rian said.


    Lori closed her mouth, and went back to focusing on her happyfruit. She took another bite.


    Bliss.

 53 - Building On The Foundation

    Depressingly, Lori realized she had to reduce the intensity of her nice, cooling breeze, because the wind was making the wall she was trying to raise buckle and bend. Wrapping herself in firewisps to draw off the heat just wasn''t the same, somehow.


    Still, it was predictable progress, once she''d measured out a pace on the handle of her stone-leveling tool and fixed the dimensions of her foundation. She''d dragged more stone up and raised what felt like the longest wall she''d ever made¡­ twice. It had taken two days, intermittently using a weight on a cord to make sure the walls were straight and therefore distributing their weight straight down properly. Measuring the internal dimensions to lay out the internal walls that would divide the houses took the next day, using small bumps of stone to mark where the walls would be, and led to the annoying, predictable but somehow unexpected revelation that her measurements hadn''t accounted for the thickness of the internal walls. So she basically had nine and one-fourth houses instead of ten.


    Lori decided to properly build the last incomplete house in the row later.


    With the walls marked, she spent the next day and a half knocking down doors and windows, putting in arches at the top to take the weight of the stone wall above. It was shorter than Rian''s five paces¡ªa little under four¡ªmostly because she didn''t have that much stone, and having walls that high seemed pointless. She''d have more when she excavated, but she wanted to use that to put more mass between the Dungeon and any dragons passing overhead.


    Only when she had doors and windows to pass through did she start putting up the internal walls that divided the long structure into individual houses, since she''d no longer have to worry about trapping herself in a box. That took another two days.


    When she was done, she proceeded to level the floors inside, cutting channels of water to find the level, then moving around the stone until the floor was more or less flat. It was sweaty work since the stone walls got hot very quickly, especially without a roof to give her shade, and she brought up a wind again to cool herself off after the walls were done. It wasn''t as refreshing, since the wind had to pass through doors and windows, but it was better than nothing.


    When she finally finished the last house on the end, adding more wall and foundation to make it the same dimensions as the others, she''d let out a sigh of relief and stopped working to have an early bath.


    "Congratulations on the new houses," Rian said as she sat down for lunch. "Does this mean I can have them start planning how to put the roofs in now?"


    "Yes," Lori said, freshly bathed and in her first clean set of clothes since she''d started building. Ah, her nice, cool Dungeon! "They should be able to handle all that now, right?"


    "Hopefully, though we might have to call you to embed the wooden components into the stone for added stability," Rian said.


    "As long as it''s not tomorrow," Lori said.


    "No need to worry, they''ll probably need this afternoon and tomorrow to plan how they''re going to do it," Rian said.


    "I thought they already knew how to put on roofs?" Lori said.


    "They do," Rian said. "Which is why they plan, so they can do it efficiently and safely."


    Lori considered that, and shrugged. "Well, not my problem," she said as people started coming in for lunch. It was beast meat today, since the new hunting party had been productive again. "Is the food ready yet?"


    Rian stood up and briefly looked towards the kitchen, then sat down. "Almost, I think," he said. "Just a little longer. So, now that the houses are done, what are you doing the rest of the afternoon?"


    "Nothing," Lori said with happy finality.


    Rian chuckled. "So you''re going to live the dream of not needing to work for a living, just sleeping the day away in your cave?"


    "Dungeon," she corrected.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Lori''s Dungeon?" he said, sounding amused for some reason.


    "Obviously," Lori said.


    "Well, at least you''re sticking to the naming scheme," Rian said. "If you''re not doing anything else this afternoon¨C"


    "I just said I had plans," Lori said flatly.


    "¡ªcould you look over this idea I have for water distribution?" Rian continued as if she hadn''t said anything. "So you have something to do while you''re lying around doing nothing?" He held up a piece of wood.


    Lori sighed at the impertinence of some people but reluctantly took the wood. She frowned. "What am I looking at?"


    "Something to bring water up to the area around the houses you just built," Rian said. "I figure it''ll help with the third bathhouse, since it''s too far from the river for you to use underground pipes, and it''ll make maintaining the agricultural field easier, since bringing water down is a lot easier than carrying it up from the river."


    And then the drawing, slightly smudged, fell into place.


    "This is an aqueduct," Lori said flatly. "You want me to build a twenty-pace tall aqueduct?"


    "It doesn''t have to be that tall," Rian said, not even denying that was, in fact, what he was proposing. "It''s just that a tall aqueduct would be the most efficient structure to carry the water¨C"


    "No," she said.


    "You''re going to have to bring water up there anyway for the bathhouse, why not like this?" Rian pressed. "This way you also provide easily accessed water for drinking, washing, and irrigating the fields."


    "I am not building a twenty-pace tall aqueduct," Lori said firmly.


    "What about a string of three-pace ones?" Rian wheedled.


    "I''m having lunch," Lori declared. "Then I''m going to my room¨C"


    "Lori''s Room," Rian said brightly.


    "Yes, that''s what I said," she said, tilting her head and giving him a look. That was strange, even for him. "Then I''m doing nothing until dinner, then I''m sleeping, then tomorrow, I''m going back to excavating my Dungeon. I still don''t have a new reservoir ready. If a dragon appeared, we''d have to use the old one."


    Rian got a thoughtful look on his face. "What if," he said, "The Dungeon reservoir provided the water for the aqueduct that would bring water up to the third bath house? That way, when a dragon comes, all we need to do is seal off the outlets, and this way we''d keep the water in the reservoir from going bad due to stagnation¡­"


    "We don''t even have a reservoir yet," she said, rolling her eyes in exasperation.


    "Then it''s a design feature we should think of now, right?" Rian said brightly. "While we''re in the pre-planning stage?"


    "Just go get the food," Lori said flatly.


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    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori''s afternoon was not as relaxing as she''d intended it to be.


    Rian had left the piece of wood with her, and with nothing better to do but to either lie down on her bed¡ªwhich was hard and stiff on her¡ªor sit in her own private pool of water in her bathroom, shaped using earthwisps¡ªwhich eventually started feeling silly¡ªshe eventually had to decide between considering the proposal drawn on the wood or once more try to perform the basics of any of the other three forms of magic.


    She went with the less frustrating choice.


    It was actually a decent solution, one that required an application of wisps in only one place, to get the water to the top of the aqueduct. From there, it would naturally start to flow down, and the various spouts on the side of the aqueduct would let it fall down to basins, which it would circulate to remain clean, before eventually flowing to a runoff channel directly under the aqueduct that would bring the water back to the river.


    That last wouldn''t do. Some of the random notes around the drawing had things like ''clean latrines?'' on them, implying that Rian was considering using the runoff to wash the latrines. The same runoff they were going to send back to the river. They got their drinking water there, was he insane? Besides, River''s Fork was downriver. She didn''t want to have to put up with accusations from Binder Shanalorre that they were deliberately tainting the water going down there.


    Clearly the runoff would have to be passed through some sort of filtering medium, like clay or sand¡­


    Actually, why keep it in the demesne when they could just dump it outside, away from the river? Though that would be an extremely long¡­


    Lori twitched and cut off that line of thinking.


    All right, she grudgingly had to admit the idea had merit, but the proposed aqueduct was too high! It would take more stone than she''d used so far in all her building projects just to build the support columns to keep it stable, never mind the actual aqueduct itself! No, it would be much more sensible to make a stone pillar in the river where water could be drawn up, then used columns of compressed dirt instead of stone for the columns on land. For the actual aqueduct channels, they could use planks of wood coated with stone to waterproof it¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori barely managed to keep herself from throwing the piece of wood at Rian when he approached their table for dinner.


    "I hate you so much," she said, glaring at him. "You ruined my afternoon."


    "Sorry," Rian said with a wide smile that said he wasn''t sorry at all. He had another piece of wood under his arm, and was carrying a small sack that seemed full of something solid. Lori eyed that wood warily. If it had anything written on it, she was just going to set it on fire¡­


    "What''s that?" she pointed at the wood accusingly. "It''s not another color-brained idea, is it?"


    "Hmm?" Rian ''hmm''-ed. "Oh no, this is something I asked one of the carpenters to make. I think we might have a boredom problem soon, and I wanted to head it off before people started playing music and risking a flogging."


    Despite herself, Lori glared at the piece of wood curiously. "What is it, then?"


    "A game board, basically," Rian said. "You can play this on the ground too, but this is neater."


    It wasn''t like the gameboards Lori had seen before. There was no flat board with semi-circles denoting demesnes, no lines marking out grids. Instead, recessed bowls had been carved out on the arm-long length of wood, seven pairs all along its length, with larger bowls on either ends. Definitely not for playing chatrang or lima or even pincer, which was the extent of the games played on boards that she knew of.


    "What kind of game can you play with this?" she asked skeptically.


    "It''s something I used to play when I was younger," Rian said, turning the sack and dumping out a pile of small, smooth river stones.


    Some sort of noble children''s game, then? Well, that would certainly explain why she''d never heard of it before, or even recognized the board. She watched as he started putting the stones in the paired bowls.


    "Are you asking me to play?" she said.


    "Oh no, not at all," Rian said as he put down the stones. Whatever this game was, color didn''t seem to matter, since he was mixing stones of different colors together. "I know you don''t want to stay down here after dinner any longer than you absolutely need to."


    Oh. Well¡­ good!


    "Oh. Well¡­ good!" Lori said. "Why are you setting it up, then?"


    "Well, I''m hoping someone gets curious and asks to play," he said, still putting down stones. "If they don''t, I''m going to have to randomly ask people, and that''s just going to be embarrassing."


    She didn''t think there was any problem at that. Already people were glancing and looking at what Rian was doing, and the three women behind him were all standing to get a better look at the strange game board.


    "So you''re just going to leave it there while we''re eating?" Lori said.


    "Best way to get people''s attention," Rian said, putting the stones in the last bowl. He hadn''t put in all the stones, but he put the rest back in the sack he''d been carrying them, setting them down on the bench next to him. "I''ll go get our food."


    He walked away towards the kitchen to get their food, leaving Lori alone with the strange, stone-filled game board.


    Her wait seemed longer and more annoying than usual as it seemed like everyone in the demesne casually walked past and back again to look at the board. The children didn''t even make that much attempt as subtlety, just walking up to the table and staring at the board, and a few particularly brave ones poking at the stones in the nearest bowls. They all dispersed as Rian came back, holding a bowl in each hand.


    Lori picked one and started to eat, not looking up from her bowl at all. "So, what came up today that I have to know about?"


    "Well, we''ve got a lot of rope now," Rian said. "The Golden Sweetwood people had a roper with them, and he formed a partnership with the children who''d been making ropes using the ropeweed. They''re learning from him for now, so they''re technically apprentices, but it''s on record that they''re his partners since they know how to find and harvest the ropeweed. They''re already starting to argue with the weavers for priority, since the weavers need the ropeweed for thread too. Right now, I have the ropers getting their weeds upriver and the weavers getting their weeds from downriver. So yeah, that''s clearly another plant we need to start farming. I''ve been having them dividing the seeds for planting and for eating."


    "Are we really using that much rope?" Lori asked.


    "It takes a lot of work and fibers to make a good rope," Rian said. "I''ve also had them doing cords too, something not as thick for tying up foods for smoking and storing. So that''s another industry we have. And that''s just with half the demesne''s resources. We still haven''t really been able to get at the resources on the other side of the river yet."


    "I''m not building a bridge," Lori said flatly.


    "Not asking you to," Rian said. "No, I''m having the ropers make a rope long enough for us to stretch over the river so we can make a ferry that we can just pull across. Arak is taking care of that."


    "Who?"


    "The master roper," Rian said. "Well, technically he''s a journeyman, but he''s worked on big ropes before, so now he''s our master roper. The others are working on cords."


    Lori noted the name and let it slide away as not important. "Anything else?"


    "We might need more buildings for workshops," Rian said. "The weavers are working from their homes right now, but the ropers are working around a tree, and they might need to move if we have to clear land again. I was wondering if they could move into the Dungeon''s next level until we can set up someplace for them? They need someplace they can keep their tools, and space to stretch the ropes."


    "The excavation isn''t even finished yet," Lori said.


    "Hence why I was only wondering," Rian said. He hesitated. "To be honest, we might need to hold another community meeting soon. Now that we have food more or less under control we have whole new issues we have to deal with."


    Lori groaned.


    "Yeah¡­" Rian said. He actually sounded sympathetic. "Not looking forward to it either. It''s a lot for just me to deal with." He sighed. "I really wish Grem hadn''t tried to kill Shana sometimes. Another lord would be so nice to have right now¡­"


    "Find me one," Lori said. "We''re not holding another meeting until you find me a new lord to help deal with this."


    "The last time I recommended a lord, he basically tried to commit treason first chance he got," Rian said. "Maybe you should do it. Your last pick for lord turned out to be a wonderful, hardworking person."


    "Stop flattering yourself and find me someone," Lori said. "Or else I''ll have to make Karina a lord. Lady. Whatever."


    Rian paused. "Why Karina?"


    "She''s the only one¨C" Lori began


    "¨Cwhose name you remember," Rian interrupted her, rolling his eyes. "Why am I not surprised."


    Lori gave him an annoyed look for the interruption. "Actually, I was going to say she''s the only one who pays taxes."


    "So, you''re letting yourself be bribed," Rian said, looking amused.


    "If you think you can do better than her, find me someone," Lori said as she finished her bowl of stew.


    "Challenge accepted," Rian said. "Though maybe she''ll be good in a few years when she''s older."


    "What will a few years change?" Lori said.


    "She''ll be older? Not a child?" Rian said.


    "And that should matter¡­ why?"


    Rian opened his mouth. Paused. Closed his mouth. "Huh. You''re right. Right now, I''d only suggest not raising her because I think we need someone from the Golden Sweetwood people so they''ll have someone to represent them and their concerns properly¡­"


    He lapsed into silence as he finished his stew, obviously trying to think of someone. Lori handed him her bowl for him to take back to the kitchen to wash.


    When he came back, the game board was in the middle of the table in front of her.


    "Oh, wipe that smirk off your face," she said as he sat back down. "I have nothing better to do and I''m bored. How do you play this game?"


    "Well," Rian smirked still, reaching over and turning the game board by a quarter circle so that each side with the seven bowls faced them both, "first, you turn it this way¡­"

 54 - Work and Play

    The game was childishly simple, once explained. The players picked up stones and dropped them one at a time into each bowl spinwise, with added rules about if they could keep doing so or had to stop, and whether they could claim stones on the paired bowl opposite. Each player owned one of the bowls on the ends of the board, and whoever had the most stones in their bowl when all the other bowls were empty won. A simple, childish game, which probably appealed to a certain kind of possessively avaricious person or young children proud of being able to count.


    "One more game," Lori declared.


    "You haven''t even counted your stones yet," Rian said.


    "43, I lose," Lori said, not needing to check. Besides, her pile was obviously smaller than his. "I want a rematch!"


    For some reason, Rian rolled his eyes. "Can''t remember names to save your life, but you can keep track of how many stones you have¡­" he muttered.


    "Of course," she said. "It''s how you win, after all." She stopped waiting for him and just started putting the stones back into the smaller bowls.


    "I pre-emptively surrender," Rian said, holding up his hands. "It''s late and I have work tomorrow. I need to sleep."


    She glared at him. "It''s not that late," she said.


    "Lori, both your eyelids are drooping," he said. "Everyone else packed up to leave nine games ago." Directly behind him, Umu, Mikon and Riz were asleep at their table.


    "Just one last game," she declared.


    "We already had it and I already surrendered." He gave her a look. "Don''t you have Dungeon-building to do tomorrow? You know, that thing you''ve been wanting to get back to, digging holes in the ground?"


    Lori thought about having to sleep on her barely cushioned bed and groaned. "Just one more?"


    "Go to sleep, Lori," he said. "We can play again tomorrow." He pushed the board and stones towards her. "Here. You keep it. Maybe asking other people to play with you will get you to talk to them."


    He stood up stiffly and gave a yawn that had to be purely for effect. He couldn''t really be that tired, could he? Still, she supposed she was a little tired. Probably best to sleep.


    Lori stood up and almost fell over as she realized her posterior had grown a little numb. Had she been sitting that long? Carefully, she picked up the game board¡ªit was strangely heavy¡ªand was about to head to her rooms when she realized the three were still sleeping at their table,


    Lori glared at them, then rolled her eyes and put down the game board, the stones rattling at little. She walked towards the three and, reluctantly, began to shake them awake, starting with the one in the middle, Mikon.


    "Tah," she called. "Tah, wake up."


    The other woman groaned, her pink hair over her face for a moment, before she jerked upright and looked around blearily. "Wh-what¡­?"


    "Dinner''s over," Lori said blandly. "Go back to wherever you live and sleep there."


    The woman froze as she heard Lori''s voice, looking up to meet her eyes as she did so.


    Lori pointed towards the Dungeon''s entrance. "Go. The food is gone, so if you would please leave¡­"


    She started shaking the other two as the pink-haired woman tried to get to her feet and nearly fell over before she realized she was hemmed in from both sides. From the way she was moving, parts of her had probably gone numb


    "Get up you two, it''s late," Lori kept chiding them. "Rian already went to sleep. Don''t you have some kind of work to do in the morning?"


    She stepped back as the three started to groan themselves properly awake. Absently, she checked the bound lightwisps stuck to the ceiling and various corners of what she was now resigned to being the demesne''s new main dining hall. They were always there now, at all hours of night and day, and the front entrance was now always open. It was only her rooms that sealed off now. Her Dungeon had become a public space. Really, the only reason she was rousing these three was she didn''t want them waking in the middle of the night and making enough noise to bother her.


    Lori''s steps were evening out as her numb posterior managed to revive, and she picked up the game board with all the stones on it, careful not to have them fall, since that would be very inconvenient to pick up. The little bag was missing from Rian''s side of the table, so she had nowhere else to put the little things. She wanted it complete for her future games.


    She yawned as she moved aside the stone blocking the way to her rooms, and she was so sleepy she was four paces away before she realized she hadn''t put it back and had to turn around to do it.


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    Putting the game board on her table¡ªwhich was NOT a sacrificial altar!¡ªcarefully, she took off her coat, put it over her laundry on the bed, dimmed the lightwisps she had illuminating her room, and tried to go to sleep before her laundry cushion started feeling hard.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian jerked in surprise as she lay the game board down between them the next morning.


    "Another game," she said, sitting across from him.


    "You''re really bored with work, aren''t you?" he said blandly.


    "If you don''t make a move, I will," she said.


    He held up three fingers. "Three games," he said firmly. "One now, one over breakfast, one after we finish eating. Then you put the board away and get back to work. Deal?"


    "You''re just afraid of losing," Lori said.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "We''ll play another three at lunch and how many more you want after dinner until I need to go to sleep." He reached into a bowl, picked up all the stones, and started dropping one each into the bowls spinwise. "But later, all right? We still have to work."


    Lori didn''t pout. After all, she was a grown woman, an adult and a Dungeon Binder, who definitely didn''t pout for any reason. "Fine," she said, watching him put down stones, counting the stones and bowls for when it was her turn. "What did you say this game was called again? Sunk?"


    "Hmm," Rian ''hmm''-ed as he finished his move. "Your turn."


    She lost again, but she''d got 46 stones that time, which was getting closer and closer. Lori eagerly reset the board as Rian went to get their breakfast, and she''d already planned out her opening move when he came back, giving him a smug look as she took two turns that ended with her taking the contents of one of his bowls.


    "You realize that''s the most predictable opening move ever, right?" Rian said, putting both bowls down. She picked one.


    "Well, it obviously works," she said, starting on her breakfast as she watched him intently.


    "Only for this version of the rules," Rian said as gathered the stones of one bowl in one hand and began dropping them while eating with the other. "There''s a version that uses half as many stones, for example, preventing the possibility of a tie, though to be honest the only real difference there is the stone distribution. There''s also the version of the rules where both players take their turns at the same time."


    "How do you take turns at the same time?" Lori had to ask. "It''s taking turns."


    "I didn''t make the rules," Rian shrugged. "I''m pretty sure there are more, but those are the ones I know. Your turn."


    Lori looked down, and realized Rian had finished. Stuffing one last spoonful into her mouth, she grabbed the stones in one bowl¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian staunchly refused to play after the third game, even making an almost unseemly retreat out of the Dungeon to underline his refusal, and Lori had no choice but to put away the board and get back to work. She could have asked someone else to play¡ªseveral people had watched their game, and seemed to have taken note when Rian had explained the rules¡ªbut she wasn''t so desperate for a challenger she''d actually start talking to random people.


    Still, if Rian insisted on this ''only three games'' nonsense, she might have to¡­


    Well, he had a point, she supposed. She did need to get back to excavating. She took the game board with her to the excavation site that would be the next level of the Dungeon, setting it next to a pillar she''d already finished as she took up her weighted line and stone leveling tool and began drawing out the softened stone.


    The excavation was almost complete. Soon she''d have excavated an area that, combined with the space already present above, would be able to house everyone in the demesne with a reasonable amount of space, and that would be from the floor area alone. She had other plans too, of creating segregated niches to allow people to organize by family, of sleeping alcoves along the walls so that the floor would be clear¡­ she might even be able to put in storage for people to bring their belongings without having to crowd everything, so they''d be less likely to lose anything useful when a dragon came. Maybe she''d put in tables so people wouldn''t be so crowded eating above¡­ maybe put bowls on the tables so they could play sunk if they brought their own stones¡­ or a grid so they could play lima or pincer...


    Lori paused and shook her head. Why was she thinking about that? She hadn''t played either of those games in years since she started learning magic and didn''t have as much time to devote to non-essential activities. She focused back on excavation.


    The pile of excavated rock had greatly decreased since she''d used it to build with recently, but that morning''s work was going towards rebuilding the pile. Up the incline, she saw men piling cured boards next to the stone walls she''d raised, while other men were huddled in the secondary dining hall, discussing something. That was probably them planning how best to raise the roofs on the new homes. Lori put the matter out of her mind as she went back into her Dungeon to get back to excavating.


    She did take a break from her excavating to switch to putting in a ventilation tube for air, since it had been getting annoyingly hot and still down where she was working. The ventilation tube let her bind airwisps to circulate the air properly, giving her a nice breeze as she worked, and bringing in the smells of cooking from the kitchen, as well as a few sounds of activity.


    Lori had actually been able to tell it was coming on lunch time when the sounds of people coming in and talking had started to increase. She looked at the pile of stone she''d been building up¡ªshe''d been making pillars to support the ceiling and keep it from collapsing¡ªand decided to leave it there until after lunch. The game board was still where she''d left, and she carefully picked it up to carry it upstairs.


    Rian found her counting the stones, dividing them into two piles. "Don''t tell me you managed to play someone to a draw? Did you actually talk to someone?"


    "Of course not," Lori said, setting one pile of stones aside. "Show me how the version with only half the stones is played."


    "I''ve created an abomination," Rian muttered. "I regret showing you this game."


    She rolled her eyes at his dramatics. Why did her lord have to be such a useless thespian? "Too late now," she said. "Show me."


    "Definitely an abomination," Rian muttered. "I should have just made a pincer board. Only really bored people play pincer." Sighing, he began putting down the stones.


    He won the first game, of course. Which was to be expected, Lori was still learning the rules, so it didn''t count!

 55 - Adequate Ventilation

    It wasn''t long before more game boards started appearing on the other tables, cut from scraps of plank. With the building being done on the new houses, there were apparently a lot of scraps to work with. Some were copies of the sunk board, but most were the familiar grids of chatrang, lima, pincer, and even Iskadaliya''s Conquest, or simply conquest. The pieces were simple, made of circular bits of wood cut from branches and either marked or lightly burned dark to show opposing sides. Apparently no one had either the skill or time to make the more familiarly shaped pieces Lori was used to seeing.


    Soon, she and Rian weren''t the only ones playing over breakfast and lunch, and the dining hall was soon filled with half-finished games as people left their games in progress to go do¡­ whatever they were supposed to be doing. Soon it seemed like half the tables had a board of some kind, and people started crowding around certain tables to watch games, eating standing up and forming crowded knots. There was no betting, but only because no one had any beads to bet with. It was not surprising to see small fruits changing hands after a game of chatrang or lima was resolved, and someone had started a list on the wall, counting some of the more prolific players'' wins and losses, and at what games.


    Lori would have told them to be quiet so she could go to sleep peacefully, but more often than not she was there as well, sitting at her table challenging Rian to games of sunk. For some reason, he seemed to grow progressively more bored with each game, even though he still won more than her. Lori put that down to his no doubt years of experience playing this game back when he was a child noble.


    She''d managed to finish excavating the new level of the Dungeon by then. It had more than twice the floor area of the current dining hall level, meaning they had room for everyone in the event of a dragon and more besides.


    "Huh," Rian said once he''d gone down to see the level when it was finished. "Well, this is nice. Plenty of room for everyone, and we won''t need to crowd."


    "It''s not really finished yet," she said as she bound lightwisps produced by the lightwisps she''d already bound to more thoroughly illuminate the space. "I still need to put in ventilation, latrines, and places to wash and bathe, even if only for a few days. And I was thinking of putting in a second stairway to the dining hall level, to help with circulation."


    "Good plan," Rian said. "And while it''s not being used for that, we can put some of the mushroom crops down here where they won''t be disturbed."


    "No," she said firmly, shaking her head at his ignorance. "It''s not safe to just have a mushroom farm connected to normal living quarters. The spores make people sick. Any mushroom crops will need to be in a completely different self-contained area, or else the spores will cause lung infections."


    "Huh," Rian said, looking surprised. "I didn''t know that. How do you know that?"


    "I worked at a mushroom farm, obviously," she said. It had been a terrible job.


    "Ah, that makes sense," Rian said. "I suppose we''ll have to convert one of the shelters when the families move out, then."


    "Not just the shelter," Lori said. "We do need one in the Dungeon, so that we have spore stock if the other one is altered into some sort of abomination or destroyed. It just can''t be too close or sharing the air with the living quarters. Especially not my living quarters."


    "So, what, you''re building a third level?" Rian said.


    "That was never in question," Lori said. "We need to centralize production facilities like ropemaking and such. I want you to see about having the ropers and weavers set up their machinery here, so that we don''t have to move them in the event of a dragon. Anything else we can reasonably move here while still allowing it to be useable as an emergency shelter, at least until I can make a third level and make this level into a permanent production level."


    Rian nodded. "Makes sense, I suppose. And it would be much cooler to work in here than outside, provided you set more active air circulation. Though that means we''ll need to put someone in charge of maintaining order in the work area. At the very least, someone needs to be in charge of making sure the floors get swept and everyone at least keeps their things in their areas. "


    "And make sure the non-kitchen areas of the dining hall is kept clean," Lori said.


    "The women who cook are already doing that," Rian said.


    "Well, they shouldn''t have to," Lori said. "Find someone who''s not working and put them to work. Given how late people are staying in the dining hall now because of their games, we need someone who makes sure they go back home to sleep."


    "Fine, I''ll find a bouncer for our dining hall," Rian said. "You know¡­ when you first decided to come here and start your own demesne¡­"


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    "Yes?"


    "Did you ever think it would feel so much like managing a tavern? We have to worry about food, cleaning, a bouncer¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Getting adequate ventilation for the new level was harder than she thought it would be. All the air came through the dining hall, which got all its air from the front entrance and the ventilation holes that she would seal up in the event of a dragon. Adequately ventilating the second level meant either increasing the amount of air passing through the dining hall or creating a new vent to bring air directly into the second level, which meant another place she''d have to seal up in the event of a dragon.


    In the end, she went with the first option, opening that second stairway down to the new level and binding airwisps to draw air down one stairway and have air be expelled out the other, creating a constantly moving current of air. It made both levels very windy as a result, and she had to adjust the binding to keep dust from being drawn in through the ventilation holes near the kitchen and getting dirt on the food. It also made the dungeon a bit too cold at night, requiring her to add a binding of firewisps over the vents to heat the air up to a comfortable temperature. Still, she was glad she managed to make an elegant solution.


    "Those stairs are a menace," Rian said as soon as she showed him. "I mean, the stairs are breezy enough to potentially push you over. That''s just asking for trouble."


    Lori created large ventilation slits parallel to the stairs to draw in and expel air, allowing air to circulate without making the stairs themselves too windy to traverse safely. She also added a small ventilation hole to the hallway that led to her rooms, to keep the air fresh.


    With that done, she began sectioning off the second level. Walls were raised between support pillars near the wall, creating small rooms that she estimated were large enough for at least one family, to discourage people just setting their things down at any open space and blocking the way. Lori drew out stone to form niches in the wall that resembled the sleeping niches in the huts in River''s Fork, to serve as added sleeping space in addition to laying on the floor. She also raised stone benches along the walls to either side, to serve as seating or another place for people to sleep.


    "Those look really uncomfortable," Rian said when he said as he was calling her to dinner. "Wouldn''t it be better to make the benches from wood? I mean, you can still raise the legs out of stone, and we''ll just have our people lay planks over them. They''d be softer, lighter, and at less risk of collapse. That would be much less work on your part."


    At which point she put him in charge of organizing the workers who''d be putting down the wooden fittings to make the benches and sleeping niches after she raised up the stone supports to lay them on.


    "Speaking of which," she said over dinner, "I thought you were building a boat to go to Covehold Demesne for supplies? What happened to that?"


    "It''s a reduced priority," Rian said, reaching towards the game board and starting his turn. "With all the wood we need right now for planks, it''s a bit wasteful to make a boat by hollowing out a whole tree, especially since we need every bit of wood we can get. Besides, no one has time for it. Everyone, especially the new people, are very motivated to have adequate preparations for the next dragon."


    Lori nodded in approval.


    "By the way, I won''t be able to play with you tomorrow night."


    Lori froze. "What," she said flatly.


    Rian leaned forward and hissed a barely audible, "I have to fold my laundry."


    Lori continued to stare flatly at him, unamused.


    "Don''t look at me like that," he said. "I really do need to do it, or else it''ll drive me insane. Look, how about I arrange for someone to play with you in my place?"


    She kept giving him a flat stare, then let out a huff. "Fine," she said reluctantly. "As long as I don''t have to talk to them, and they understand I get the first turn."


    "Conversation will be purely optional on your part," Rian assured her.


    Lori grunted. "They''d better know the rules at least. I''m not explaining it to them."


    "I''ll be sure to find someone who fits your very special needs," Rian said. He finished his move, adding stones to his bowl. "Your turn."


    Lori was already regretting this.


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    The next day, Lori continued on with the development of the second level, dragging in excavated stone and using that to raise walls along the edges of the room to partition them into alcoves. It was tempting to also raise the stone supports for the benches and eventual sleeping bunks, but that would be too time consuming. For that day, she focused on the larger-scale works. The walls were simple and could be done quickly, and so she did.


    When dinner arrived, Rian quickly came with food, walking away as soon as she picked a bowl. She watched him go, annoyed and resolved to chase him down if the replacement he''d chosen was insufficient.


    "Wiz Lori?" a child''s voice said. "Lord Rian says you need someone to play with?"


    She turned. It was the brat.


    Lori hadn''t actual seen her in a long time. It had mostly been in passing or at a distance, since she ate with people who Lori presumed was her family. The girl had filled out in the past few month, though she was no longer plump. Instead, she seemed to have acquired solid, lean muscles, and her skin had taken on a dark, tanned shade. With her sun bleached orange hair, she looked like a piece of kindling someone had lit on fire. She was holding a bowl full of stew for herself.


    "Do you know how to play sunk?" Lori asked, getting right to her purpose, her stew half-eaten next to her.


    The brat nodded. "I watched you and Lord Rian play," she said. "And Lord Rian made sure to tell me the rules."


    Lori gestured across from her. "Show me then," she said, taking another spoonful of dinner as she waited for the brat to round the table. She watched as the brat put the stones into the bowls¡ªRian had apparently taught her the 49-stone version, since that was the one they''d been playing lately¡ªthen waited for Lori expectantly when she finished.


    "You move first Karina, I''m still eating," she said, waving a negligent hand.


    The brat immediately reached into a bowl, taking all the stone and dropping them all turnwise around the board.


    "You realize that''s the most predictable opening move of all, right?" Lori said as the brat finished her turn, setting aside her spoon and reaching for one of the bowls to make her move¡­

 56 - House Envy

    Lolilyuri studiously ignored Rian as she considered her next move, the game before her taking up all her attention. This time she would be victorious!


    "So, has she won against you yet?" Rian asked her opponent.


    The brat shook her head, eating lunch from her bowl. She sat patiently as Lori studied the board, considering every possibility.


    Finally, Rian sighed. "Lori, it''s sunk, not chatrang. You literally have only one bowl left. Just make your move so you can call the game? Karina has work she needs to get back to."


    Lori kept ignoring him. If he didn''t want to play with her, then fine.


    However, she graciously played her last move, taking the remaining stone and dropped it into her bowl at the end of the board.


    "Congratulations Karina, you''ve won," Rian said.


    "Thank you for the fun game, Wiz Lori," the brat said, giving her the same victorious smile she had before. Did she have to be so smug about it?


    "Another game," Lori demanded.


    "Lori, she needs to go to work," Rian said. The brat nodded. "And you need to finish eating, and then go to work." He pointed at her bowl, still half-full.


    "Fine." Lori did not pout, sullenly or otherwise. She began to eat her food like a mature, responsible adult should to keep their strength up. "Off with you then."


    "Thank you, Wiz Lori. See you later," the brat said with a bow, turning to go back to killing and letting them eat every seel in the river.


    Rian began resetting the board. "I''ll play one game with you, if you want," he said.


    "Oh, are you finally playing with me now?" she said.


    "I told you, I had something to take care of," he said. "Also, we might have a problem."


    She paused in her eating. "Might have a problem?" she repeated. That was new.


    "It''s definitely problematic, but I''m not sure it counts as an outright problem just yet," he said. "If it''s the latter, it needs to be dealt with, and if it''s the former, I''d rather keep it from becoming the latter. Less trouble that way."


    "I''ll be the judge of that." Lori said, looking down at her stew, deciding it was a bit too cold, and binding the firewisps in it to start increasing its temperature slowly. "What''s the problematic?"


    "All right, you know the new houses?"


    "The ones I made, yes. I know them, shocking as it may be," she said flatly.


    "You''re really that mad at me for missing one round of games?"


    "I have no idea what you''re talking about. What about the houses?"


    "All right¡­ so, we told the militia people that the new houses are for them, they just have to finish the roof," Rian began.


    "How is that a problem?"


    "That''s not the problem, this is just context," Rian said. "So, since they''re building the houses for themselves, they decided they could do better than just putting on roofs. So they decided to give each house a loft space and a roof deck."


    Lori considered that and nodded approvingly. "An excellent idea. Good use of space. I wish I''d thought of it."


    "You and everyone else who already had a house," Rian said. "Some of the ones who already have houses are growing resentful that they don''t have a loft and roof deck balcony, just four walls and a roof. I know there''s been at least one fight about it, and I''ve had some people come to me asking to be moved to the new houses when they''re finished, because the houses are nicer and they have ''seniority''. They didn''t seem to like the answer I gave them. They might eventually try talking to you about it, when they work up the nerve."


    "Ah," Lori said, seeing what was so problematic about the situation. "Yes, it would be a problem if I had people trying to talk to me."


    "¡­" Rian ''¡­''-ed. "Sure. Also, this might give rise to feelings of inequality, leading to unrest."


    "As I told you they would," Lori pointed out. "Inequality is a given."


    "Yes, but no one likes when it''s pointed out, especially if they''re on the lesser half of the inequality in one way or another," Rian said.


    Lori supposed he had a point there. She certainly hadn''t liked being regarded as merely being equal to others. It was why she''d bound a Dungeon, after all. "Well, this is a ''dealing with people'' problem, so you go solve it so I don''t have to level all the houses and make everyone equal by having them live in the shelters again."


    "You won''t like how I want to solve it," Rian said.


    "Undoubtedly. It has to do with dealing with people, after all," Lori said. She checked her bowl. Just the right level of warmth. "But it will be you doing it, not me, so I don''t care." She took a spoonful and ate.


    Rian nodded. "You want to make the first move or should I?"


    Her hand instantly snapped up to take all the stones in a bowl and began dropping them spinwise.


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    Rian smiled and nodded.


    It wasn''t until much later that she realized he''d never told her how he wanted to solve the problem. By then, it was too late.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When the brat came to Lori as the dining hall was filling up for dinner¡ªshe''d already given the big seel the girl had left her to the kitchen to be added to breakfast tomorrow¡ª Lori started setting the sunk board, half-resigned to hearing that Rian still needed to do his laundry.


    "Wiz Lori, I''m supposed to ask you about what''s being done about uppity new comers who think they''re better than those who settled here first and sweated to build Lorian to what it is now," the brat said.


    Lori blinked. "What?"


    "I''m supposed to ask you about what''s being done about uppity new comers who think they''re better than those who settled here first and sweated to build Lorian to what it is now," the brat dutifully repeated.


    "Why are you supposed to ask me?" Lori asked.


    "Someone asked me to," the brat said. "I was going to go back to work after our game, but these people stopped me and told me I had to tell you that." She paused thoughtfully. "They said a bunch more things they wanted me to tell you, but I can''t remember them, they were all too complicated, and I was in a hurry to get back to work."


    "I see," Lori said. "Can you see these people now?"


    The brat looked around carefully at the other tables. "Yes," she said.


    Lori nodded. "Play with me while we wait for Rian," she said, setting the board.


    They were halfway through the game¡ªat least, around half of the stones had been claimed by one or the other¡ªwhen Rian finally came. He looked at the brat and gave her a smile. "Hey, Karina," he said. "Playing with Lori again?"


    The brat nodded. "We were waiting for you," she said.


    "Oh?" he said. "What for?"


    "Karina," Lori said, "could you go and take Rian to all the people who told you to ask me about uppity newcomers?"


    Seemingly between one blink and the next, Rian''s pleasant smile was gone replaced by a narrow-eyed, sharp look. "Oh?" he said, and for once Lori felt she understood her lord perfectly: he was very annoyed.


    "Apparently there are cowards who lack the courage to approach me themselves," Lori said. "Please explain to them, and any who might be listening, that trying to get children to do their work for them is¡­ ill-advised. The children are much too busy contributing to my demesne to waste time on such nonsense. If the children felt as they do, they would likely approach me themselves."


    The brat frowned. "Did I do something wrong?"


    "No Karina, you did nothing wrong," Rian was quick to reassure her. "Some people are just too lazy to do their own work, and tried to get you to do it for them when you already had something else you had to do. Why don''t we do as Lori asks and you take me to these people so I can talk to them? Please?"


    The brat nodded amiably, though she still looked confused. As she led Rian away, Lori looked at their half-completed game.


    She''d forgotten whose turn it was.


    Grimacing in annoyance, she reset the board, putting the stones back into the starting position.


    As she was finishing putting the stones back into position, there was a change of tone in the buzz of conversation. A touch of curiosity entered the sound, slowly turning into confusion. The buzz became a murmur as people eased off on what they were saying to watch curiously. They never quite stopped talking, but there was a reduction as people watched rather than speak.


    Lori glanced up. Rian was talking to a man and a woman, the brat at his side. They had stood from their table, and seemed to be protesting, and Rian was just talking over them, as lords do, no doubt¡ªwell, hopefully¡ªputting the fools in their place. Some other people were throwing dissatisfied looks at Rian''s back, no doubt people he''d already talked to.


    Eventually the two sat down, looking sullen and Rian moved away for a few paces before kneeling down to speak to the brat, who nodded. Rian nodded back, and the brat walked towards who Lori presumed was her family, who''d been looking towards her curiously.


    Rian stood and looked around, seeing he had everyone''s attention. "All right," he said in a loud, carrying voice, helped some by the acoustics of the dining hall. "I know we''ve had some changes over the last month or so, and it''s about time we addressed them. So tomorrow, after breakfast, we''re holding another community meeting, right here in the dining hall. That way we can resolve this matter before someone does something stupid." He paused. "Even more stupid, I mean. From where I''m standing, it''s stupid already. So, tonight, we''re all going to have dinner, have our friendly games, then go home and get a good night''s sleep, so we''re all fresh and ready for tomorrow. I''ll hear your grievances out then, in public and in front of everyone, and settle this matter once and for all."


    He paused, looking around them room. Lori did so as well. Many people looked surprised, as if knocked out of a happy, carefree complacency by something they didn''t even know was the matter. Others looked resigned, as if something they''d been expecting had finally happened. A few¡­ a few looked strangely, viciously eager, as if they were getting something they wanted.


    Surprisingly, the brat raised a hand, then waved it around to get attention.


    "Yes, Karina?" Rian asked.


    The brat stood, as if to be seen. "Lord Rian, do we have to go too?" the brat asked, gesturing at herself, a bunch of younger children around her, and somehow including all the other children in the dining hall in the gesture.


    Before Rian could respond, Lori cut in. "Yes," she said, her word magnified by airwisps to be heard by everyone.


    The brat nodded and sat down.


    "Well," Rian said, clapping his hands together as if in emphasis. "You heard Binder Lori. Everyone be here after breakfast so we can talk out any problems we''re having like mature, reasonable adults."


    "And if you can''t, you can go live in River''s Fork," Lori added. "Be someone else''s problem." Everyone heard that too.


    "Well, that''s all for tonight, everyone," Rian said hastily. "Let''s all have our dinner in peace and think of what we''re going to say tomorrow. No swearing, there will be children present. Anyone who violates that rule gets automatic latrine duty for a blue month."


    With that, Rian turned and headed for the food line, and only had to wait a moment for the first of the food to be presented to him. He came back holding the two bowls, putting them down on the table for Lori to choose.


    "A community meeting?" she said with distaste.


    Rian shrugged, taking the other bowl for himself. "We had to do it again sometime."


    Lori thought the exact opposite, but it wasn''t her problem. Instead, she reached towards a bowl full of stones and started her turn. "Well, have fun," Lori said dismissively.


    "Why do you say it like that?" Rian said.


    "I''m obviously not going," Lori said. "I have better things to do, like make a mushroom farm or build an aqueduct."


    "If you''re not there, I''m going to have people solve this by holding a vote," Rian said languidly. "Possibly several. There''s no way of knowing how many things we need to make a decision on."


    Lori stared at him, aghast.


    "So, should I expect you there?" Rian said brightly.


    "You and your bizarre fetish," Lori said. "Fine, I''ll be there. Ugh."


    Rian nodded serenely. "So¡­ I know why you''ll be there," he said. "Going to stop me from going against the natural order of might making right¡­ but why did you say the children had to be there? I''d have thought one more group of people whose opinions you don''t care about wouldn''t matter."


    "They''ve been working hard almost every day for months to provide us with food," Lori said. "That deserves to be recognized."


    "We''ve all been working hard," Rian pointed out.


    "Yes," Lori agreed. "We''ve all been working. That includes the children. They have as much right to have their complaints be ignored as anyone else."


    "Do you have to put it that way?" Rian sighed, even as he chuckled despite himself.

 57 - Minions Need Maintenance

    The next morning, Lori didn''t even have time to bask in her victory against Rian in their game (yes! She won! She won, she won, she won! Ha!). The sore loser (she won!) had immediately run off to hide his shame at her victory and had gotten everyone to settle down for the meeting. One of the tables had been moved to the far wall, which Lori supposed was where Rian would put his notes and sit.


    The meeting started after Rian finally stopped gesturing at her, stood up and dragged her over to the table with him. Well, all right, he asked nicely, but Lori felt like she was being dragged, and from the look on his face only a healthy fear of imminent death at her hands kept him from actively dragging her himself. Still, she could be a gracious victor and indulge him by sitting in front of her demesne while he talked.


    "All right, settle down." Rian said, and people quieted. There was a much more relaxed feel to the proceedings compared to last time. For one thing, a lot of the children were ignoring what was going on and were playing games quietly, though a few adults¡ªlikely their parents¡ªgrabbed the game boards, pulling them away. "Now, before we get started, I would like to thank our kitchen volunteers who have been cooking for us all. Every morning, I, and everyone else, can look forward to a wonderful, warm and hearty breakfast, and later on lunch and dinner. Would you all please stand up? Let''s give them all a round of applause."


    The men and women in question stood, smiling in embarrassment as they were applauded.


    "Yes, thank you all," Rian continued cheerfully. "If it weren''t for you, I''d have to eat my own cooking, meaning I''d be a dead man." Lori recalled Rian mentioning he could cook, so this was clearly just flattery and an attempt at humor. People laughed anyway. "All right, maybe not dead, but I''d probably be wishing I was." More laughter. Lori tried not to hang her head in embarrassment, berating herself for forgetting her hat in her room.


    Rian continued on in this vein, praising the sawyers, the new ropers, the weavers (despite her still not seeing evidence of their work), Gunvi the potter and his apprentices, the farmers raising their crops (which were looking very well now, though not yet ready to harvest), the chandler for all the soap, the latrine cleaners (despite it being a punishment duty), the doctors (no one had died, most had recovered, and even the ones with broken bones were just waiting for them to heal) who were now helping prepare meals to be more balanced, the scouts who''d laboriously mapped out the demesne''s terrain (wait, they had those?), the hunters and tanners who were making leather and furs¡­


    The pointless flattery went on so long Lori felt like taking a nap. She really wished she could have just called the brat over to play a game as Rian droned on. Or had her hat to cover her eyes so she could take a nap.


    "¡ªand of course the children, who''ve been keeping us old people alive every day by causing a minor genocide of the seel population," Rian said. "Without them, I''m not sure even the kitchen volunteers would be able to keep us alive."


    The children stood up with great enthusiasm to be applauded, and Lori was amused to note at least one switched out one or two pieces on the board while the other player was distracted.


    "All right then," Rian said. "Everyone can sit down now. We''re going to get to the part everyone''s been waiting for."


    The longwinded pointless praise and empty flattery had lightened the mood, but even so there was an increase in tension at those words.


    "We''re happy to announce that the second level of the Dungeon is close to completion," Rian said brightly. "It still needs a few civilized comforts, but as it is, if a dragon suddenly appeared on the horizon tomorrow, no one will have to worry about being left outside." There was some small applause and sighs of relief at this. "Also, if a dragon does appear on the horizon tomorrow, it''s definitely not my fault for invoking it, so please don¡¯t blame me."


    There were a few laughs at the mention of the silly superstition.


    "On a related note, the petition for moving all the mushrooms everyone''s been growing into the new level of the dungeon was denied," Rian said. "Now, before anyone gets up in arms about it, it appears I wasn''t told that the spores from mushrooms could cause illnesses, especially prolonged contact. So no, we''re definitely not going to store growing mushrooms in the same place that many of us eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. I''m pretty sure our doctors are just going to get mad at us for both wasting their time and deliberately putting ourselves in danger."


    Lori saw one of those she vaguely recognized as one of their doctors¡ªwhy were they making her think of haircuts?¡ªgive a curt nod. "Mushrooms are good to eat, some of them, but not exactly healthy to be breathing the same air as for long," he said.


    Rian nodded. "And we''re going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume this suggestion was made in ignorance and not the very subtle first attempt to assassinate Binder Lori, since she''d be living closest to said mushrooms."


    Lori jolted upright, her eyes suddenly narrowing in a glare.


    "Ah, from the way the people involved are paling, it looks like you really didn''t know, or you''re all really good actors," Rian continued, still sounding cheerful. "That''s good."


    "Give me their names," Lori growled.


    The crowd sat very still, as if not wanting to draw her attention.


    "Would you even know who they were if I did give you a list?" Rian said.


    Lori glared at him, but had to concede the point. She swept a look over everyone. "This had better not happen again," she said levelly.


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    "Of course, your Bindership!"


    "Please don''t kill us, your Bindership!"


    "It was his idea!"


    "They were your mushrooms, you little uhog, I was just suggesting we keep them safe from dragons¨C!"


    "All right!" Rian declare brightly. "So, bad idea made with ignorance and the best of intentions. A dedicated mushroom cave will be excavated as soon as convenient¨C" he glanced at Lori, who made a negligent gesture "¡ªeventually. In the meantime, people growing them are advised to not store them inside the house, or else you and your family will get sick." He looked around. "As soon as this meeting ends, I suggest stacking the wood outside and airing the house. If anyone in the house or nearby starts feeling sick, see one of the doctors immediately, don''t just hope you''ll feel better. Understood?"


    There were murmurs and nods.


    "All right then," Rian nodded. "Next order of business¡­" He checked the plank he was holding. "We''ve been getting complaints about messy latrines. Be reminded that in addition to emptying them, those on latrine duty are supposed to be keeping them maintained." He held up a hand. "I know, I know, it''s hard to do without water, we''re trying to address that. But that''s no reason to smear the stuff where people have to sit." He glared out over the crowd, who glared back in agreement. "The sad thing is the latrine next to where the children seel never has this problem, and they''re the ones who maintain that, so whoever this is, they''re an adult. Supposedly." He glared. "So basically, calling whoever is doing this an immature child would be a grievous insult to the actual children, who''ve all been hardworking and responsible."


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    "So, Binder Lori willing," Rian said, glancing at her. She inclined her head slightly to show she was listening. "Effective immediately, latrine maintenance will no longer be a punishment detail."


    There were some relieved cheers at that.


    "Instead, latrine duty will become an official job, to be occupied by¡­ well, you know who you are," Rian said. "They will officially be held responsible for the state of the latrines." He held up a hand as a few people started making discontent rumbles. "Not finished. Punishment duty will be assisting those in cleaning latrines, as it would be literally unsafe to have you assisting anyone else, and that includes the children. Yes, I know who''s been doing it. If you don''t clean up your act, and you can take that any way you want to, the next step will be releasing your names and having you be the one to take the blame for messy latrines from this point on, whether or not you actually did it."


    He waited. No one said anything.


    "Good, you''re not actually going to say anything about how unfair that is and tell everyone who you are now," Rian said. "First smart thing you did. Yes, this means you''ll still be doing the same job. Only this time, there will be someone to watch you to make sure you do it right. And this takes care of the water problem, as now there will be an assistant to go get water." There were grumbles of indifference verging on assent. "There is a latrine right now that someone thought would be funny to smear. By the time this meeting is over, it''s going to be dried, caked on, ripe, and extremely unpleasant." Rian smiled brightly. "You know who you are. I know who you are. More importantly, the person you''ve just been assigned to¡ªassignments will be given out later¡ªknows who you are. Clean it up after this meeting." Rian turned to her. "Unless her Bindership has anything to add?"


    Lori didn''t know who she was looking for, so she didn''t look out over the crowd. "If you do that to any of the latrines in my Dungeon, I will have Rian find you, and I''ll drown you in shit," she said, examining her fingers and scowling in distaste at the thought of the sort of degenerate who did things like that for, apparently, amusement. "Are we clear?"


    Silence.


    "Good answer," Rian said brightly. "If this smart streak continues, I foresee good things in your future. Other ways to materially improve matters to reduce the, let''s face it, yuck of latrine duty are being pursued. I''ll let you know which one we decide on." Rian examined the various things on the table that''s he''d written on and picked up what appeared to be a clay pot that had been a container of travel rations for their trip to River''s Fork.


    "Lord Rian!" someone called out, raising their hand.


    "Yes?" Rian said cheerfully, looking up towards the person in question.


    "Aren''t you going to¨C"


    Rian raised a hand. The man in question quieted, as if unwilling to interrupt him.


    "In time," Rian said. "We''ve got a lot of things to go over. One thing at a time." He lowered his hand.


    "But Lord Rian¨C!"


    "Ah!" Rian interrupted. "Here it is. Booze."


    The voice immediately went quiet.


    "Good, I have your attention again," Rian said. "The weavers and ropers are tentatively going to be given a temporary workspace in the Dungeon, once arrangements have been made as to where. This will allow us to secure the necessary equipment so we don''t have to try moving it in the event of a dragon. I don''t know when we''ll be ready to receive you, but it will tentatively be within the week." He glanced at Lori. She thought about it and nodded. "Right, a week it is. The move will be done in stages, so you''ll have time to¨C"


    There was a minor commotion, and Rian cut off, frowning and standing to get a better view. Lori followed his gaze, annoyed.


    It was the man who''d interrupted Rian. From the looks of it, he''d taken the game board that his daughter and another boy had been playing on, and was now hissing furiously at them.


    "What''s going on back there?" Rian demanded.


    "Nothing, Lord Rian, just telling my daughter to put away her toys and listen," the man said hastily. He looked at his daughter and said, in a voice meant to carry, "you''ll get this back after the meeting. You''re here, so pay attention!"


    Some of the other children in room who''d been playing during the meeting hesitated as the adults around them gave them ''there, you see?'' looks.


    It made Lori''s blood boil.


    "Whose board is that?" Lori demanded.


    Rian, about to sit down, hesitated.


    "Uh, what, your Bindership?" the man said.


    "Whose board is that?" she asked, louder. The man was either deaf or stupid.


    "It''s mine!" the girl said.


    "You''re sure? It''s not your father''s and you''re just borrowing?" Lori said.


    The girl nodded. "I made it," the girl said definitely.


    "Did you?" Lori asked.


    The girl shrank back for some reason. Then, even more strangely, she turned to look at someone else in the crowd. Lori followed her gaze and was surprised to see her looking at the brat, who was nodding encouragingly.


    The girl turned back to Lori. "Yes, your Bindership," she said. "I made it. I asked around for a piece of wood from the sawyers and carpenters that they weren''t using, then I cut in the lines with a rock. It''s mine."


    Lori leveled her gaze at the man. "Give the girl back her stolen property."


    The man stared at her as the murmurs became a buzz. "What? I''m no thief!"


    "Literally everyone around you just saw you steal that girl''s game board," Lori said. "I did as well. Are you calling me a liar?"


    "I''m not a thief! She''s my daughter, I was just taking away her silly game so she''d pay attention," the man said.


    "And now everyone here has heard your confession to theft," Lori said. "As well as her testimony that board is hers. Flogging it is."


    "Lori¨C!" Rian called, getting to his feet.


    The man spoke faster. "Your Bindership, I respect you, but she''s my daughter. As long as she''s living in my house, she''ll follow my rules, and that includes not playing when there''s serious matters being discussed."


    "Actually, it''s her house, you''re just living in it," Lori corrected. "The priority list was conceived according to who was actually actively contributing to the demesne. In addition to the people who''d been cooking all our meals and the sawyers cutting our wood, all families with children were housed purely on the strength of the fact their child has been providing the demesne with food by catching seels." She looked at the man holding the game board away from the girl. "So give that back, because the only reason you''re not still sleeping in the shelters is because of your daughter. Technically, it''s her house, you just live in it. She can live in it very well without you."


    "I''ve been helping prepare our fields!" the man protested.


    "And have we eaten anything from those fields yet?" Lori said. "Come back when we have bread. In the meantime, give her back her game board." Lori stared at the man until he complied. Then she turned back to the child. "Go back to your game. It''s probably the only rest you''ll get for a while."


    The girl nodded, giving an awkward bow as she sat down again, inching just a little bit away from her father, who was still standing there. Lori ignoring the frustrated, aggrieved look the girl''s father was giving her.


    "That was why you had me reorganize the housing list like that?" Rian said next to her in a carrying voice.


    "The children do good work," Lori said. "I''m not going to let them be taken advantage of."


    "I''m surprised you didn¡¯t threaten to flog everyone who''d taken a game board away for theft," Rian commented.


    Lori stared at him, then bound airwisps to increase the volume of her voice. "Anyone taking a game board from a child that the child can prove they own is in violation against the law against theft and the child''s right to own property. You have until the end of the day to return it or you will be flogged by the owner. Being their parent does not entitle you to ownership of the child''s possessions. And be reminded that a gift is the property of the receiver to keep, not the property of the giver to take back. Children, if you have been stolen from, inform Rian after the meeting."


    Rian sighed at the tumult this caused. "Why?!?!" he groaned, sounding aggrieved.


    "Why what?" Lori asked.


    "Just, ''why?!?!''," Rian sighed. "Why do you have to turn every parent against us?"


    "Everyone has the same rights. That''s what you asked for," Lori said.


    "Yes," Rian groaned. "I did, didn''t I?" He looked up at the ceiling for some reason as the tumult grew. Then he sighed and started banging his hand loudly on the table to get people''s attention. It took longer than it usually did, which was very unusual. "All right!" he cried. "Next is the matter of the complaints about the new houses being roofed!"

 58 - Material Restitution

    There was a restlessness in the air as Rian finally got people to pay attention to the next item in whatever unknown list he was working through. Lori ignored the looks people were giving her as she sat back down and went back to being disinterested, even as she enviously eyed the children who could at least play games during this boring, pointless meeting.


    "All right," Rian said, sounding reluctant. "As you know, but some people might need reminding because they don''t care to pay attention to the things going on around them¨C" For some reason, there were chuckles at this. "¡ªthere have been some complaints about the new houses in progress further from the river."


    He paused. "I''ll admit, I don''t remember all the particulars of the complaint. There were a lot. So why don''t we have Etwart explain them to us? Come on up here Etwart."


    The man who''d so tastelessly tried to steal from his daughter stood up, walking towards the front of their table, and in front of everyone else as well. He had the same look many people had, of having lost weight and only recently regaining it again. His skin was sun-darkened, no doubt from working the fields as he''d so recently mentioned, and he had a small work knife at his waist.


    "Lord Rian," the man said, "something¨C"


    "Stop," Rian said, and the man did, looking frustrated. "You don''t need to explain to me, Etwart. I heard you the first time." Rian pointed. "You need to explain to everyone else."


    The man Etwart hesitated, then reluctantly turned, facing the other people sitting in the benches of the dining tables.


    "Well, go on," Rian said. "Tell everyone what you told me. I''m sure that it would be best if they heard it from you."


    The man looked around nervously. Clearly he thought he''d be directing his words toward Rian, with everyone merely watching. Hadn''t he realized he''d already be speaking in front of everyone in any case? Why did having to face them make any sort of difference?


    "If you don''t want to, you can sit down and we can move on to the next matter," Rian offered. "We still need to talk about the new bathhouse and the expedition to Covehold, so if you have nothing to bring up, please sit down."


    The man hesitated a moment more, then turned to face everyone. "A-as I told Lord Rian, something needs to be done!" he said, his voice shaking and nervous.


    Somewhere at the very back of the crowd, someone called out, "Speak up, we can''t hear you!"


    There were some more laughs, and the man flushed. "Something needs to be done!" he cried just short of yelling.


    "About what?" someone else called out.


    "About¡­ about newcomers who''ve only been here a short time being treated better than the good people who settled this demesne and sweated to make it what it is now!" the man said, some actual enthusiasm in his voice as he got to his subject.


    Lori found herself nodding. Finally. It was about time.


    "While we live in little shacks, they live in large houses like rich townsfolk, and don''t have to forage for food in the woods," the man continued. Wait, what? "They¨C!"


    Lori ignored what he was saying from that point on, as he apparently hadn''t been talking about her. Well, she supposed the ingratitude would continue. At least it wasn''t total ingratitude. The brat paid her taxes. That was something.


    The game board thief droned on, talking about nothing important as Lori wished she had her hat to cover her eyes so she could sleep. Maybe she could just dim the lightwisps?


    She sighed and let her mind wander. Where would she put the mushroom farm? It would need to be connected to the main Dungeon so they could access it during a dragon¡ªand winter, she realized¡ªbut it had to be separate. A door? Or would she just open and close the opening as needed? It would definitely need a second entrance so it could be accessed from the outside without passing through the dungeon, so mushrooms could be brought in and people could tend to them. And it would need to be humid so the fungus could grow, without the humidity affecting the rest of the dungeon. And if she was doing that, she might as well put in a binding of airwisps to keep the spores out of the dungeon for the times the door was opened. Actually, the door might need to be made from bone, since a wooden door would soon have mushroom growing on it¡­


    "All right!" Rian said, and Lori blinked, realizing she''d dozed off. "Thank you Etwart, that was¡­ voluminous. I''m sure you left no opinion and thought unspoken. Why don''t you sit down?"


    Huh, how long had she been dozing? The board thief was sweating, and his voice was a bit hoarse when he said, "Yes, Lord Rian," and moved to go back to where he was sitting. Then had to find somewhere else to sit when he found some other children playing with his daughter, and watching the game as Lori discretely rubbed her eyes.


    When she was finished, she found Rian turning to look at her. "So, how much of that did you hear?" he asked.


    "Absolutely nothing," Lori said.


    There was laughter at her words, but Lori didn''t let herself be offended. Let other people waste their time with nonsense.


    "All right, let me explain again," Rian said, then paused. "No, that would be too long. Let me sum up. You remember how you built the original homes before the dragon arrived?"


    "The ones that took a strangely long time to get finished, yes," Lori nodded.


    "Well, most of our original settlers live in such homes, except for the ones like me who still live in shelters because we don''t have families or only have a spouse," Rian said. "And because we were all working like crazy so we don''t starve, building the houses took a while, because we only had some of the carpenters and volunteers who''d show up if they felt like it."


    Lori nodded.


    "Then the dragon happened and some houses had to be rebuilt again, and there were even fewer workers because of all the other things we had to fix," Rian said. "Then the people who used to live in River''s Fork arrived. And while not any more experienced with building roofs than some of our people, they were willing to work, knew how to use tools, some had experience in the militia''s engineering banners, and weren''t already doing anything else. So thanks to them the houses were finally finished and the people on the list for them were finally able to move out of the shelters."


    "Yes Rian, I''m aware, I was there," Lori said impatiently.


    "So of course, we marked the next group of houses for these people who''d done so much for us by helping other people build their homes," Rian said.


    "Yes Rian, I was there as well, I built the colored walls," Lori said. "Why is this worth wasting my time about?" Everyone''s time, really, but her time was what was important, since it was hers.


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    "Well, since the next group of houses they''d be building would be their own, they decided to put a little more effort into it to make it nicer," Rian said.


    "Yes Rian, you''ve already explained this yesterday," Lori said, getting annoyed.


    "I''m explaining for the benefit of the children who might not know," Rian said.


    Lori was about to retort they were smarter than that and weren''t listening, but she saw the brat paying attention and relented. "Fine, what happened next?"


    "Well, then some people became jealous that their own house wasn''t as nice," Rian said.


    "Of course," Lori said. "The houses were never meant to be nice, they were meant to be livable. If they want their house to be nice, they need to put in actual effort. As it is, I don''t think any of the houses are currently ready to face winter. Did people even remember to put in windows?" Murmurs rose at that.


    "Not that I can recall," Rian said mildly. "However, some people have raised an excellent point. The new houses are consuming more wood than the old ones, since more building material is being used for all the added features, which is unfair allocation of resources."


    Lori considered that. "Who are the sawyers and the ones cutting down the trees for the sawyers?" Lori asked.


    "You want their names?" Rian sounded surprised.


    "No, of course not, what would I do with their names?" Lori said. "I asked who they are."


    "I don''t see how I can do that without telling you their names."


    Lori sighed. Sometimes, her lord was just useless. She decided this was one of the rare times she wouldn''t try explaining so he could handle it for her. "Everyone who works in the sawpits and those who have been part of the logging group in the last month, stand up," she said.


    There was a tone of confusion to the noise people were making, but one by one various people who looked vaguely familiar from her time curing wood in the storage sheds stood up.


    "As the ones actually doing the work in cutting, gathering and sawing the wood in question being used, do you agree with the opinion that it is unfair the new houses are consuming more wood?" Lori asked. "If you don''t, sit down."


    The men and women all looked at each other, and one or two hesitantly almost sat down before standing back up again.


    Lori almost rolled her eyes. Groups could be so stupid. "Very well. As the ones being directly impacted by this, and consider yourself aggrieved, you deserve to be compensated." She turned to Rian. "The ones who did the work on the roofs and are the ones doing the building on the new houses. Do they have a leader, someone in charge?"


    "That would be Captain Kolinh, retired, formerly of Lomabuyar Demesne''s militia engineering banner," Rian said. "Kolinh, would you please stand up?"


    A man stood up who also looked vaguely familiar, and Lori was at least able to recall him from those planning meetings Rian had insisted she had with the masons so she could make a more structurally secure Dungeon. "Yes, Great Binder?" He had a softer, more relaxed voice than Grem.


    "Engineer Kolinh," Lori said. "In order to repay these men and women for the added work they will be putting in to provide materials for your construction, you and your group will, at their request, provide assistance in renovating their current houses, within limits." She ignored the buzz of conversation that arose as she pointed at the people still standing. "Those limits are that the modification must be based on one of the finished constructions¡ªI assume that the homes are not all identical?" Kolinh nodded. "¡ªbased on one of the finished constructions. In short, in exchange for the materials they provide, you will provide labor to assuage their envy. But ONLY upon request."


    She gave the sawyers and loggers a look. "Your renovations will not begin until their homes are completed, at Rian''s discretion and scheduling. I suggest you take the time to consider with your families if you really do want or need to live in the shelters again for however long it takes for the renovations to get done. Is that clear?"


    "Yes, Great Binder." "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Wait!"


    Lori looked towards the sound of the protest. "What?" said sharply.


    "What about the rest of us?" a man demanded. He was also vaguely familiar looking.


    Lori tilted her head in confusion. "What about you?"


    "What about the rest of us? What about our houses?" the man persisted.


    Lori gave him a long, level look. "You are not being affected by the work being done. You''re not a sawyer, who has to cut more planks, or a logger who has to cut more trees. You are not impacted by this. Therefore, you have four options," Lori said flatly. "You accept the house you''re living in now, that you didn''t have to build. You ask Engineer Kolinh and his workers nicely in a few weeks, and arrange with them to have your house renovated after some exchange of services, provided they''re willing and have forgotten who you are." Lori paused. "Somehow I doubt that, people waste so much effort remembering faces. I could reduce your house back to dirt and rocks, recover the wood used on the roof for something else, and you can live in the shelters again, knowing that I am annoyed for having wasted the time. Or you can move to River''s Fork, which have many unoccupied houses last I checked. Perhaps if you''re lucky, they''ll still be available. Does anyone else want to come forward and declare their greed?"


    Her gaze swept across the tables, wondering if anyone was actually stupid enough to stand and be recognized. Fortunately, no one left in her demesne appeared to be that stupid, not even Landoor. "Very well. You may all sit down now."


    They sat.


    "Look everyone, I know it seems unfair, but can you really fault people for putting more effort into building their own home compared to working on someone else''s house?" Rian said. "This isn''t a competition, it''s about making sure everyone has a roof over their head and their own space. If you want your house to have a second floor and balcony too, why not ask and find a way to work it out?" Rian paused. "After, you know, apologizing a lot and meaning it, if you need to."


    A few people shuffled at that, looking aside.


    "We can''t have any grudges here, people," Rian said. "I know it''s hard bordering on impossible, but we just can''t. There are three things keeping us all alive." He held up three fingers. "The demesne. The fact that Binder Lori actually knows how to work for a living. And that everyone here works together and shares. This demesne will literally die if any of those three things stops working." He fixed his gaze on them. "Can you imagine how much worse off we''d be if Binder Lori suddenly stopped doing everything she''s been doing for us? No lights. No stone buildings. No hot, running water. We''d have wood, sure, but it would all still be green without Binder Lori around to cure it. We wouldn''t have ropeweed, because the children might still not have mentioned it. We''d have no winter supplies, since we wouldn''t have ice and cold rooms to store food."


    Yes. Praise her, praise her!


    "Imagine if people stopped working together and only did things for themselves," Rian continued. "If the children all kept the seel catches for themselves instead of giving it to the community to share? If those with saws and axes didn''t let anyone else use them? If Binder Lori only built things for herself and left all of us to live in tents and whatever sticks we can pick up and rip out of trees because people aren''t lending each other their tools? You all remember living in tents, right? I sure do. The shelter now might be like living in a cave, but it''s a dry, warm cave, full of people I trust not to rob me or hurt me when I''m asleep."


    Ugh. Go back to praising, Rian.


    Rian stood and gestured, in full ''dramatic hero speech'' mode. Lori kept herself from rolling her eyes. "I trust you. I trust everyone in this room. I trust the sawyers to keep cutting the wood, because they know everyone needs it. I trust the children to keep going out, day after day, and bringing us back seels to eat as long as the seels are there to catch. I trust everyone to wake up every day and contribute to the demesne however they can. I trust Binder Lori to watch out for us in her own way, especially when she thinks we''re being idiots who need to be looked after." All right, Lori had to roll her eyes then. Useless thespian. "I know some ways of thinking are hard to shake. That if someone is getting more, you think it means you''re getting less. That we have to keep track of what we''re ''owed'', and if we don''t get it then we feel cheated. I know it''s hard. It''s hard for me too, since it''s how I was raised. But setting that aside and working together is how we built this demesne."


    "And if you can''t do it," Lori interrupted, because the dramatic speech was getting long, "then River''s Fork is downriver. Can we get on with this, Rian? The matter''s been settled, so move on."


    For some reason, Rian looked up and sighed. "She''s just taking care of us, in her way," he said.


    "No, I''m impatient and want a nap," Lori said. "Get on with it."


    "See? Sleepy and still wants to get work done. She really is watching out for us," Rian said brightly.


    "Get on with it!"


    People laughed at Rian being scolded for his slander as he referred to his notes. "All right, now that the house thing is settled, I have an update on the third bathhouse¡­"

 59 - Post-Meeting Details

    "Well, I think that went nicely," Rian said happily as he carried his various planks and rocks with notes on it down to one of the alcoves she''d made in the new level while people put the dining hall back to the way it usually was and the volunteers got started cooking lunch. So close to midday, with not enough time to get any substantive work done, people were taking a cue from the children and resting, enjoying the free time until they had to work in the afternoon. She would transcribe the notes on the things into stone tablets later, once Rian had gone over them to ascertain what was worth preserving. "You didn''t actively have to actually threaten anyone with death, I think people are going to get along better now, except for the selfish ones who would be hard to get along with in any case, and you basically legally emancipated every child in the demesne and explicitly made them majority homeowners over adults." Rian tilted his head thoughtfully. "I''m not sure I want to count that last one as too much of a win."


    "They contribute to my demesne, why would I consider them as less important than any of the already unimportant people?" Lori said.


    "You can''t fool me," Rian said. "Or else you wouldn''t wait until no one but me can hear you before saying things like that. Aren''t you worried I''ll quit after you keep saying I''m unimportant?"


    "If you quit, I''m revoking everyone''s rights," Lori said. "That was the agreement. I don''t care about it but you do."


    "Oh yes. How silly of me to forget," Rian said. "Well, I''m still happy with this. Though it does bring up a few things I need to talk to you about."


    "Doesn''t it always?" she said.


    "You were the one who wanted to be the Dungeon Binder of a demesne," Rian said. "Did you think it was all board games all the time?"


    She stopped. "Board games?" she said.


    Rian shrugged. "I don''t know anything you like doing for fun besides your new obsession with sunk." Sometimes she wondered about his accent. It made him pronounce words strangely. "I mean, you don''t seem the type to just sit around with a glass of pretentiously expensive drink and look at yourself in the mirror."


    "Sit around with a drink and look at myself in a mirror?" she repeated again. "Is that what you think Binders do?"


    "I think it''s what people think Binders do, when they only listen to the stories and don''t stop to consider all the administrative work that goes with being the head of the government," Rian said.


    "If people only listen to stories, they probably think Binders spend all their time conveniently dying and losing their dungeon''s core for some lack wit story character to somehow fortuitously find and bond," Lori retorted.


    To her surprise, Rian chuckled. "I can''t argue with you there. But still, it was a good meeting. Hopefully people will be able to work out their differences among themselves in the future instead of complaining about it and getting angry with each other. "


    "You''re just happy because you got to give another heroic speech," Lori said.


    Rian blinked at her. "What? I wasn''t giving a heroic speech. I was just telling people how things were!"


    Lori stopped and stared at him.


    "Why are you looking at me like that?" he said.


    "Never mind," she said, rolling her eyes and not needing to worry about hiding it.


    "Never mind what?" Rian asked, looking confused. "Lori, never mind what?"


    "If you don''t know, I see no need to inform you," Lori said.


    "The most terrifying words a woman can say to a man, short of ''I''m going to rip off your balls''," Rian said. "Fine, don''t tell me. But if I don''t know, you can''t blame me for not knowing! Because you didn''t tell me! Whatever it is!"


    "Noted," Lori said dryly. "Come on, I want to take a nap, all this nonsense made me sleepy."


    "Having trouble sleeping?" Rian asked, tilting his head.


    Lori thought of her hard bed and the seeming hours she lay there staring at the stony ceiling, trying to get any magic besides Whispering to work! "The meeting bored me," she said. "So I want to nap."


    "Well, sorry if it didn''t hold your interest," Rian said, rolling his eyes. "Should I arrange for a snack intermission in the middle next time?"


    "Yes, that would be nice," Lori agreed. She yawned. Yes, she definitely needed a nap. "Wake me up when the food is ready," she said, heading for her rooms.


    "How?" Rian said behind her. "You don''t exactly have a door bell!"


    Her nap was quite enjoyable, and she woke up in time for lunch.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "All right," Lori told him at dinner as she started setting up her game board after an afternoon of excavating, adjusting water flows and temperatures, and curing wood. "Tell me."


    "Tell you what?" Rian said as he sat down to wait for the food to get ready, massaging his hands.


    The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    "Tell me what new thing you think we need that''s going to keep me from having a wooden cup of pretentiously expensive water and looking at my shadow on the wall," Lori said.


    Rian took a moment to consider that. "Huh. We really don''t have anything to drink besides water, do we?" he mused. "We don''t really have enough fruit to make juice. I don''t know if anyone has a mirror either¡­"


    "If you don''t tell me now, I''m going to ignore you if you try to bring it up tomorrow," Lori said. "I already need to finish the Dungeon''s new level and make a mushroom farm."


    "So, we need a bridge," Rian said briskly.


    "A bridge," Lori said blandly.


    "A bridge," Rian confirmed. "The river cuts the demesne in two. Half the resources are on the other side and there''s no easy way to cross. At the very least, if we can get a bridge up we''d be able to collect the edibles, ropeweed and trees on that side, and we''d also be able to use it as more farmland." He considered. "Actually, it might be good to make the other side our industrial area, give the tanners and other people someplace distant from food preparation and living quarters to keep their chemicals.


    "I thought I made it clear I wasn''t going to build a bridge and you''d had a long rope commissioned for a ferry?" Lori said.


    "At the very least, we could at least put in a dock, so we can use a boat¨C"


    "Lori''s Boat."


    "A boat, not necessarily that one," Rian stressed, "to cross between sides. Or are you seriously going to call every boat we make ''Lori''s Boat''?"


    "What''s wrong with it?" Lori challenged. "''Lori''s Boat'' is a fine name."


    "I''m not going to argue with you about this," Rian said, which was the first sensible thing he said, "but regardless of how, we need to see about making an easier way to cross to the other side. It''s not like we can just wade across. It''s too deep for that, and just swimming across won''t let us bring along necessary equipment." He tilted his head. "Maybe you can use magic to make a tunnel of air under the water so we can just walk across?"


    Lori stared at him. He stared right back.


    "You''re serious," she said blandly.


    "No, I''m Rian, we''ve been over this already."


    "You want me to use magic to make a tunnel of air," Lori repeated.


    He shrugged. "I don''t know your limits. For all I know, you could, you just haven''t thought about it."


    "Air goes up in water, Rian," she said. "Any airwisps I push into water would¡­. Well, it wouldn''t last."


    "And if you used magic to have the water sort of create a tunnel?" Rian said, making a vaguely lewd gesture in the air with his hands.


    "Which force do you want to hear destroying this tunnel, the weight of the water pressing down on it, the insufficiency of tension and cohesion, or the fact the air in the ''tunnel'' would be buoyant and try to rise?" Lori said. "And no, before you ask, I''m not going to try tunneling under the river through the stone. While possible, it would be much too time consuming. The rope to be used to pull a ferry across would be woven faster."


    Rian shrugged, not seeming to care he had been shown to be ignorant. "I didn''t know, so I asked," he said. "You can''t blame me for thinking about it, the way you can drag around water like a toy on a string."


    Lori coughed. "Yes¡­ well. While I am, of course, very powerful and certainly impressive, some things I just can''t do quite yet. Perhaps when I''ve learned Horotracting."


    "I''ll look forward to it," Rian said. "Well, if we can''t have a bridge, then can we have a better road? Or at least regularly compress it down if you''re not going to pave it with stone, it keeps breaking apart."


    Well, that was certainly doable, but¡­ "Why?" she asked.


    "Dragon preparation," Rian said. "Our cured wood is stored a long way away from the Dungeon. If we had a road leading straight to the Dungeon from that area, than in the event of a dragon, we could¡­ well, maybe not bring in all the wood, but at least a fair amount so we''d have a strategic reserve for repairs after the dragon leaves. That way, we''d have material to build with while new wood is getting cut."


    Lori considered that. "That sounds reasonable¡­" she mused. "And it won''t be too difficult to make enough wheels for them to have some kind of cart to move the wood with."


    "And the same road can be used to transfer crops to the Dungeon for storage," Rian said. "Well, uprooted crops, anyway, if the dragon appears in the middle of the growing season, which it very well might. But the road first. It''ll make everything much easier."


    "I can do it tomorrow, it will only take a little compressing, and maybe a layer of stone to keep it in place," Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "Now, have you thought about the aqueduct? I know it''s a lot of effort, but an open, gravity powered system¡ªmagic to get the water where gravity can pull it down not withstanding¡ªwould require the least maintenance, and the sun-exposure will be better for keeping the water clean than running it through an enclosed pipe. And with the new houses, we definitely need a way to get water up there, especially for when the third bathhouse comes up. We could sink a well, but¡­"


    "Someone would throw shit into it," Lori said.


    Rian sighed. "Yeah¡­ at least this way, if someone throws shit into the water, the flow will wash it out a lot sooner."


    Lori shuddered at the thought. "I''ll consider it," Lori said. "It doesn''t need to be a single raised aqueduct. Perhaps multiple low aqueducts, staggered along the way, each subsequent one rising to a higher level."


    "At least the elevation isn''t too high," Rian said. "Less risk of it falling over in the event of a dragon."


    That hadn''t occurred to Lori. "Of course," she said. "That''s why I thought of it."


    Rian nodded, completely believing her. The gullible fool. "Smart. Glad you thought of it before I did," he said dryly.


    He yawned, covering his mouth for some reason. "Well, I think that''s it, besides the boat we''ll be using to get to Covehold, and I need to wait until enough of the houses are done so we''ll have more people free."


    "Do you really need to wait?" Lori inquired, genuinely curious.


    "We need the workforce," Rian said. "They don''t know how to build a boat, true, but they can work together, they know how to use tools competently, and they can do heavy lifting, which is really important because we don''t have any cranes for lifting things. If we''re going to brute force a solution to the boat problem, then we need brute force."


    "Well, try to get it done sooner rather than later," Lori said. "You were the one who suggested bringing Grem to Covehold and leaving him there. Don''t be the one delaying things now."


    "Yes, yes, make it my fault," Rian said, rolling his eyes.


    "It is your fault," Lori pointed out. "Otherwise we could have left him to die in the middle of nowhere."


    "So noted," Rian said. "Don''t worry, we''ll get it done. Though my optimistic estimate we''ll be able to do it before winter is looking less and less likely."


    He glanced towards the kitchens. Lori followed his gaze, and saw the food was ready and being handed out. He stood up. "Well, I think that''s enough for now," he said. "This was nice. I''m glad you thought that discussion was important enough to warrant not playing games while we talked."


    Lori blinked, then glanced down at the untouched game board in surprise. "One game!" she immediately demanded.


    "We''re having dinner together, of course we''ll be playing," Rian said, rolling his eyes. "Really, can''t we play something else?"


    "I don''t have a board for anything else," Lori pointed out. Really, he got her this board, he should know that.


    "You could borrow one," he pointed out.


    Lori gave him a level look.


    "Right, that would involve talking to people, got it," Rian said, shaking his head for some reason. "You better hope I never get sick or else you''re going to starve to death."


    He went to get their food.

 60 - Priorities in Construction

    The next day, Lori began excavating the mushroom farm.


    She seemed to be doing a lot of excavating lately. Which, in hindsight, should have been obvious¡ªmost Dungeons, with rare exceptions like Treeshade Demesne and Skykeep Demesne, were underground¡ªbut she hadn''t realized she''d be doing all the actual digging. Shouldn''t she have minions and underlings doing this for her, sworn vassals who bowed to her will and used their Whispering to¡ªoh.


    Rainbows.


    Had her ancient predecessors, the ones so far back in time their biographies hadn''t survived and they were only known by fragmented stories that were as much inaccurate misconceptions about magic and stupid wish fulfillment, have to do this too? Had they needed to dig out all the dirt because they hadn''t yet gotten any of the other magics to work, and couldn''t afford to have another wizard anywhere near them?


    Why had they not had the decency to write down something to warn future generations seeking the might and power of a Dungeon Binder that starting your own Dungeon was all drudgery and construction work? That was really inconsiderate of them! How dare they inconvenience her so!


    She grumbled about incomplete historical records as she walked around the cliff face, passing the bone pit, the pile of rocks over her frozen corpses, and the new hillock where she''d frozen and buried the shell and bones of her islandshell for some nebulous future use. Lori turned, looking around. With a lot of the trees cut down and no longer obscuring lines of sight, she realized what had once been an out of the way corner of the woods wasn''t really all that far from everyone.


    Well, at least it wouldn''t be a long walk for all the people who would need to tend the mushrooms they wanted to grow. And it was close enough to her own dungeon that she could connect to it in an emergency.


    Excavating was easy in this instance. It was just a simple cave, so she only had to soften the rock and have it pull itself out, though she had to fuse the crumbling outside into a single solid surface first.


    It was a quick and lazy build, by her new standard. No attempts at structural integrity beyond a vague curve to the tunnel going inward three paces before she opened it up to a low, cramped-seeming space that made her vaguely nostalgic for her old, one room dungeon. It was never noisy and exactly as she liked it, and she didn''t have lightwisps shining at all hours, since the only light she needed was her core¡­


    The intended mushroom farm was bigger than that single room, of course. She had, unfortunately, needed to personally inspect just how many rotting pieces of wood had edible fungus growing on them to get a sense of how much space they''d need, which had taken half the morning. She was mildly annoyed to see some of them were being grown on the roof planks themselves, in the shadowed side away from the sun. Rian better set them straight on how that was not structurally sound, like she''d told him too, before he went back to whatever thing he was doing at the carpenter''s shed next to the sawpits.


    He better not get a splinter stuck in him and get infected. She wasn''t sure they still had any antiseptics left, unless someone finally managed to get the right dustlife cultured so they could ferment alcohol. If he inconvenienced her by falling sick and not being able to deal with people for her, she''d demote him back to probationary lord and promote a child in his place!


    Grumbling to herself, Lori finished pulling out the last of the rock. It was a long room, five paces by ten, and she''d put a single pillar in the middle for safety''s sake, but it was cold and, with the binding''s she''d put in, hopefully damp enough to grow fungus. Dark and damp was usually a safe bet with fungus, though not always. She''d made sure that the entrance was angled towards the sun, so that there''d be indirect illumination in the cave, but that was it.


    She left a pile of rock next to the entrance for sealing it in the event of a dragon and dragged the rest down next to the river, where she stood for a moment, contemplating the flowing body of water before her. Then she turned and regarded the small settlement behind her.


    Actually, with the roofed houses in place, it could actually be called a small village now, with its population of over two hundred people (Rian probably had the exact number somewhere). The main road of packed earth she''d taken a moment to compress firmly first thing that morning, the houses on either side, the large building that was the dining hall, situated upslope at the end of the road, and the row of houses going up behind it after the road took a detour to continue on. Already a few seemed near completion, and she could almost understand the envy some people had been having. The houses did look fairly nice, with a tall, townhouse look she recalled from some of the older neighborhoods back in Taniar Demesne, the ones preserved for their ''architecture'' and ''atmosphere'' and used as tourist bait.


    Come to think of it, those houses also had stone, Whisper-worked walls¡­


    Shaking her head lest she fall into a contemplation of urban architectural history, she turned back toward the water. With the way the community curved, it would be most efficient if she made an aqueduct that brought water to the top of the current arrangement of living communities, near the houses currently being constructed, and then have it all flow down from there to the rest. Efficient, but¡­


    Lori glanced at the pile of excavated rock near her dungeon.


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    ¡­but probably not very doable or very secure. The base would need to be wide for stability, and would in totality result in her using up more rock than all building projects to date combined. On the other hand, a series of low, staggered aqueducts would require very little stone, but she would need more bindings of waterwisps, since each new aqueduct would need water to be brought up to the top of it.


    The simplest way of doing it was to simply cut a canal running alongside the main road and bind waterwisps to make the water go up against the orientation of weight¡­ but no, that was just asking for people to throw things into the water, or even to piss in it. Because of course people would do that. They wouldn''t be able to help themselves. So that option was completely ruled out. Even if they covered the water and made it a pipe, it was just asking for a seel to swim into the tube and get stuck.


    Lori knew what she wanted to do, for all she had complained when Rian had first proposed it. Built correctly, it was a smart, elegant solution, which would require little energy investment beyond occasional maintenance once she had it set up, and which she''d thought of all by herself!


    It wasn''t what she needed now, which was the doable, present solution that would need a lot of upkeep and could easily be interfered with but was better than literally nothing, and which they needed now for water and to keep the latrines from being so smelly.


    When she''d been growing up, she''d heard her mothers complaining over breakfast and dinner about this and that public works projects, spearheaded by the command of the Dungeon Binder or this or that district lord or lady, and how the projects were always insufficient to solve the problems they claimed to be solving, as if someone had made off with half the budget to go gambling or something. A nigh-impossibility, since Taniar Demesne relied on having the most secure finance and banking facilities in the known world, where every bead of money was accounted for, so the project''s budget must have been underfunded right from conception.


    Looking at the solution she would out of necessity have to implement, Lori could already hear her mothers talking about it over breakfast, shaking their heads and complaining about the inadequacy of government infrastructure projects.


    Still, she assured herself it would only be a temporary solution. Once she had expanded the Lori''s Demesne and gotten more raw material, she''d build the aqueduct she actually wanted to build and they could finally do away with this awkward, multi-leveled thing.


    She nodded to herself, and began feeling for the earthwisps in the river, feeling for the bedrock so she could build on it¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Oh no. I know that look," Rian said as she sat down.


    "What look?" she said irritably.


    He pointed. "That look, the one you have on your face? The one of restrained self-loathing that says you had to compromise your morals and you hate yourself for it. What happened?"


    She glared at him. "I do not have a look of self-loathing on my face."


    "No, I''m pretty sure that''s self-loathing, possibly disgust. Maybe disappointment, though that might be pushing it," Rian said thoughtfully. "What did you do, and do I need to worry about it?"


    "Nothing," she snapped. "I''ve been working, like I''ve been doing every day since we settled here. Did you talk to those people about caring for their roofs?"


    "Yes, they''ve been told how that¡¯s bad for their roof," Rian said. "In their defense, they hadn''t checked, and were quick to clean it off when it was pointed out."


    "Good," Lori said, nodding sharply. Absently, she began to set up her game board.


    "So, what did you do?" Rian asked.


    She glared at him and flicked one of the stones, bouncing it off his forehead.


    "Ow," Rian said flatly. "The violence inherent in the system returns. Fine. Don''t tell me. Uh, it doesn''t involve you finally snapping and killing someone, does it?"


    She glared at him. "No, I didn''t kill anyone," she said curtly. "Why would you think that?"


    "Well, we''re in the middle of nowhere," Rian said brightly. "I was told that''s where people become inclined to snap and murder people they don''t like."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "This isn''t the middle of nowhere," she said. "This is my demesne. There are laws."


    Rian opened his mouth, paused, closed it, opened it again, and stared at her.


    "What?" she asked.


    "You still think of this place as Lori''s Demesne, don''t you?" he said in the tones of someone coming to some great revelation.


    Of course. That''s what it was. "Don''t be silly," she said, waving a hand as if wiping away his foolishness. "You chose a name, so it''s your fault this place is called Lorian now. Besides, a name is mostly pointless. The only other people who know this place exists and need to refer to it by a name are those in River''s Fork."


    "Shana''s Demesne," Rian said.


    "Shanalorre''s Demesne," Lori corrected with a nod. "Yes, exactly." He was smiling. Why was he smiling? "Is the food ready yet?"


    He glanced over his shoulder at the kitchen. "In a little bit, I think." He turned back to her as she finished setting the board, reaching across the table for the stone she''d thrown at him. "Not that I don''t enjoy playing with you, but we really need a new game."


    "I like this one," she said, making her move.


    "Let me guess: you were never any good at chatrang and lima, and pincer is a too simple for you," he said, waiting her to finish.


    "I''m just fine at chatrang and lima," she said loftily, refusing to admit she''d almost never won at either. "I am simply unable to find a player at my level."


    "Because that would involve talking to people and asking them to play."


    "Exactly."


    Rian nodded as she finished, reaching over to make his move. "Well, I''ve only ever seen it played. I don''t really know the rules myself. If I get a board and pieces made, can you teach me?"


    She restrained the urge to smile in eager, predatory anticipation. "I suppose," she said aloofly. "It''s not like we have anything else to do. Really, what other way do we have of passing time?"


    "More work?" Rian suggested.


    She twitched. "Let''s teach you chatrang," she said. "Once you have a board."


    "I''ll see what I can do," he said, glancing back to the kitchen. Apparently it wasn''t ready yet, since he turned back to the game. "By the way, I saw the aqueduct. Looking good. I like the arches for letting people walk under it, very nice. Though maybe we should find some colorful rocks, this place is looking a little monochromatic in regard to building materials. Do you mind if we put benches under it? Seems like a good place to sit in the heat of the day."


    Lori twitched, and tried to concentrate on her game.


    "There it is again!" Rian said. "There''s that look!"


    "You''re imagining things," Lori said flatly.


    "But¨C"


    "Shut up and play the game, Rian."


    Stupid, inelegant, shoddy aqueduct.

 61 - The Map

    Lori tried to make the best of things while she built the shoddy, stupid, inelegant, awkward aqueduct that future generations will probably hate or use for tourism purposes, and will be equally inconvenient in either case. It was simple enough, in regards to construction. The stone pillar in the river was anchored to the bedrock, and had a hollow tube where waterwisps drew water up to the aqueduct, with bars made of stone to keep at least seels from getting in. Once drawn to the top, the water flowed down a wide, deep stone channel. Half the water fell into a stone basin people could collect water from, situated next to the still-occupied shelters. The rest went up another pipe in another stone pillar, and would flow along another channel to its destination, next to the outside dining hall.


    Building it, contrary to her expectations, had been the easy part. After all these months, using magic to make structures from earthwisps was literally routine. It was the water flow that was giving her problems. Without any sort of accurately calibrated measuring equipment, she could only make rough estimates, but it was clear that the further down the chain of aqueducts and basins she went, the longer it took for the basin to fill. The day after she finished the rainbowed aqueduct, she had to do a lot of climbing back and forth from the river to the topmost basin to compare the rates the basins filled as she adjusted the bindings on the waterwisps.


    Weren''t Binders supposed to be able to see and perceive all that happened in their demesne? Why couldn''t she do that? Actually, now that she thought about it, how was that supposed to work, anyway?


    She still wasn''t completely satisfied with the flow rates she managed to get, but the last basin, the one near the homes still being finished¡ªshe had to admit, the former residents of River''s Fork worked very quickly¡ªat least filled at a rate that was reasonable. The flow was constant, since it was the best way to keep the water fresh, meaning she had to rig up a means of letting the excess flow out without having the ground turn to mud.


    And so she had to make a poor mockery of her elegant, top-flowing aqueduct idea and make a series of drainage channels. The ones above the fields with all the wild vegetables and crops they planted she directed to a cistern for irrigation. Lori put in a big sign warning that the water was dirty and should be for irrigating only, not drinking, but it would not surprise her if people didn''t bother to read it. She warned the doctors¡ªwell, she had Rian warn the doctors¡ªto be ready for a sudden rush of indigestion and other digestives problems from people being stupid enough to drink tainted water.


    The ones from the basins lower than the fields, she just made a straight channel back into the water, with a sign warning the water had been used and was not for drinking. Perhaps in future they could put a water wheel on it, once they had enough leeway to build other things.


    "I hate water," Lori groaned as she lay with her face on the table, her hat next to her. She''d remembered to bring it with her this time, and it had been a big help with the sun so hot. "I never want to have to work with it again."


    "Do you want me to get your pillow or something?" Rian said. "I''ve always thought that lying on that must be uncomfortable."


    It would not be the first uncomfortable thing she''d had to make do with. Lori considered letting him go up into her room to get her pillow.


    "I''m fine," she said instead.


    "You know, every time you do this, you end up with the wood grain stamped onto your face," Rian said conversationally.


    For a moment, Lori lay still. Then she blearily raised up her head and felt at her face.


    "It''s on the end of your nose too," Rian said with a bright, helpful smile that was probably mocking her on the inside.


    Lori glared at him, pulled her hat, laid it down in front of her, and put her face down again.


    "Good idea," Rian said. "I could use a break from playing against you."


    "You''re not getting a break," Lori said. "I''m merely taking this time to refine my strategy."


    "Take all the time you need," Rian said. "Actually, that''s something I wanted to talk to you about. When was the last time you had a rest?"


    For a moment, she just lay there. Then she reluctantly turned her head so she can aim one eye at him. "I take a rest every night Rian," she said blandly. "It''s called ''sleeping''. Everyone does it."


    "Hmm¡­" Rian ''hmm''-ed. "Lori, I think you need a day off."


    She wasn''t going to be allowed to just wallow in her tiredness the way she wanted, was she? Sighing tiredly, she raised her head, laying her elbows on the table to support herself. "A day off what?"


    "A day off work," Rian said. "I think tomorrow you should stay in bed, sleep until noon, and when you finally do come down you need to just eat and then do absolutely nothing else but resting. Or at least, do literally anything but productive work."


    "That sounds like an unproductive waste of time," she said. "I still need to finish the next level of the Dungeon, get a water reservoir up and running, begin excavating for an in-Dungeon farm¡­ besides, my bed is not nearly comfortable enough to make sleeping until noon enjoyable."


    "Well, all right, if you can''t sleep until noon, than do something different again," he said. "Go seeling with the children, climb the hill¡ªactually, have you even climbed the hill on top of the Dungeon?¡ªor just walk around and see the place. Anything but work. You need the variety. It''ll be good for you."


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    "I can''t afford to rest," Lori said. "There''s too much work to be done."


    "Lori, you''re the Dungeon Binder," Rian said. "If ANYONE needs to rest when they''re feeling tired, it''s you. No one wants you to get sick, after all." He gestured vaguely around them. "It''s not like anyone can say you don''t work, so rest when you need to. A little rest won''t have the demesne collapsing into chaos and murder, and if there''s a dragon tomorrow¡­ well, the dragon would have shown up whether you planned to work or not."


    Lori allowed herself to entertain the thought. Just¡­ not working tomorrow. Sleeping until noon, as she had resolved to do all those months ago.


    "There''s too much to do," she repeated.


    Rian gave her a flat look. "Okay, how about this," he said. "The scouts finally finished transcribing the map of the demesne onto something bigger. Why don''t you take the map and take a walk around the demesne to check it for accuracy before we make it official? After all, you''ll probably want to check the map is correct and they didn''t decide to hide a vein of iron ore so they can stake a claim on it later. It''s work, but it''ll be slow and not too intensive. Just you walking around with a map checking that everything is where it''s supposed to be. You can even take the boat and see if the land on the other side of the river is accurate."


    Lori frowned. "We have a map?"


    "We have the best map currently possible," Rian said. "Some of the people who used to be in the militia were scouts, and learned how to draw good maps. I asked around, found out who made the best maps, and sent them to survey the demesne on both sides of the river. I mentioned it during the community meeting. Weren''t you¡ªno, of course you weren''t."


    "If you were telling other people and not just me specifically, it couldn''t have been that important," Lori said. "If it were actually important, I''d have been the first to be told."


    "I want to say the world doesn''t revolve around you," Rian said, "except you''re Binder, so it kind of does¡­"


    Lori smiled. "Obviously," she preened. Then she frowned. "Why didn''t you inform me there was a map sooner?"


    "Because I literally just found out today," Rian said with a shrug. "This was the first opportunity I had to tell you. I''d have told you sooner, but you were acting depressed and moping on the table, so I had to make sure you hadn''t worked yourself until you got sick first. Anyway, with the map done, it''s only a matter of time before someone asks the scouts to show them their draft copies, and then we''ll have people asking about owning land again. I told them to keep the map secret, but¡­" he shrugged. "Well, I''m resigned to it getting out eventually. After all, we have so little entertainment this will actually be something people will talk about, for lack of anything else."


    He reached down beside him and brought out a large roll of thin leather. It had the look of seel leather, since it didn''t have any of beast leather''s distinctive bumps.


    "Your Bindership, I bring you one map of your demesne," Rian said, putting the roll in front of her. It had been secured with a long leather thong. "Lori''s Map, since I knew you were going to call it that anyway."


    He was learning.


    "Also, I think it''s best you keep this, since I still sleep in the shelter," Rian said. "I don''t think anyone would actually steal it, but I''d rather not leave it lying around."


    She picked up the roll, hefting it. "Have you seen it?"


    He nodded. "Cassan was willing to let us use some of his ink, and they used that to draw it, at least when it came to the major physical features they probably wouldn''t need to alter, though the scouts drafted it in charcoal first, with his help. Elceena made Cassan bring a lot of ink with him before leaving Covehold. I suppose she was really looking forward to being a Binder."


    Lori frowned. "Who?"


    She watched as Rian''s head dropped to the table like a toy cut from its string, no doubt imprinting the wood grain to his forehead as he let out a groan. "The female corpse you have on ice," he said, still face down.


    Lori blinked. "Oh. Was that her name?"


    "Yes."


    Well, she was dead, so no point remembering it. "Well, if it needs to be done¡­ I suppose I can check its accuracy tomorrow."


    "Do you want me to find someone to accompany you?" Rian said. "I think we found all the beast eggs that were in the demesne, but better to be sure, and there still might be an abomination or something hiding in the underbrush. Or even just bugs. Bug stingers are nasty. "


    Lori considered that. "Very well," she said. "Not Landoor."


    "You remember his name?" Rian looked surprised.


    "He was too stupid to forget," Lori said. She put aside the map and began setting the sunk board on the table. "Is dinner ready yet?"


    Rian was looking at the board and sighing. "Don''t you want to refine your strategy a little more?"


    "Go get dinner, Rian," she said.


    "I really need to get you a different game," Rian muttered as he stood up. "Or a toy of some kind¡­"


    He was muttering to himself as he joined the line for food¡ªRian never stood long, since everyone knew who he was and who he was getting food for, but he always insisted in getting in line for some reason¡ªas Lori finished setting up the board, idly looking forward to unrolling the map and seeing it herself once she was back in her room.


    Rian came back with the food and let her choose which one she wanted as he considered the board, where she had already made her move. "By the way," he said, "I saw the aqueducts. They looked great."


    "I suppose," Lori muttered, filling herself with stew so she wouldn''t have to be filled with resentment at such a terrible design.


    "I know you''ll be busy resting and confirming the map tomorrow," Rian said, taking the stones form a bowl and making his move, "but what are your plans to finish it?"


    She glanced at him, frowning. "What do you mean? It IS finished."


    "Oh. I thought you were going to find a use for that spent water beyond just draining it away," Rian said. "Like a communal laundry area."


    Lori paused. "What?"


    "A communal laundry area," Rian repeated, putting down the last stone into a bowl. "You know, to take advantage of all that water that might not be drinkable but is still pretty clean. Don''t you have people taking laundry into the women''s baths to clean them?"


    "I have my own bathroom," Lori said.


    "Ah. Silly me, I should have realized you''d do that to minimize your contact with people."


    "Yes, you should have," Lori said.


    Rian sighed. "I''m probably a terrible person for suggesting this immediately after I just told you to take a rest, but would you consider having all that water drain into a cistern for people to specifically wash their clothes? Otherwise I can already see people washing at the basins, and while they''ll clear up because of the constant flow, it''ll make them undrinkable while it''s happening."


    "I suppose that would be as good a use for the water as anything else," Lori considered. "A dedicated wash area for clothes and¡­"


    They both glanced down at their stew bowls.


    "You know, we never really ask if¨C" Rian began.


    "Don''t. Let''s not think about it while we''re eating," Lori commanded.


    Rian nodded.


    They ate and tried not to think about it.

 62 - The Laundry Area

    Lori had decided to take her lord''s advice. Both pieces of it, really, but one after the other. First, she''d build a dedicated laundry area that would use the runoff water, since she could always build something for a water wheel later. Then, tomorrow, she''d go check the accuracy of the new map, which was now securely locked in her room.


    So, after a good, hearty breakfast¡ªactual amount of beast or seel heart in the stew unknown¡ªshe''d grabbed her stone-shaping tool, bound some of the stone next to the Dungeon''s entrance to follow her, and gone off towards the end of the runoff channel to start building a laundry area.


    The first thing she had to do was build a whole new runoff aqueduct a little bit further downriver and redirect the runoff to pass through that instead. Now that it would be an area that people were meant to occupy, there were new design considerations. The old runoff was too close to the claypit. While she could have built the laundry area on the side away from the claypit, that was the sunny side, and if she had to be outside to do her laundry, she''d want to be under some shade. Short of trying to move a tree, the best she could provide was the shade of the aqueduct itself.


    So, she moved the aqueduct a little further down so people could sit under it for shade, then used the stone to start building a cistern to hold the runoff. It was a long, wide trough of stone that would fill from the runoff, and when it was overfull the water would then fall into one last runoff channel to take it to the river.


    Lori found herself nodding in satisfaction as she finished it. Then she stood there awkwardly, staring at it. She imagined herself doing her laundry here.


    No, it wouldn''t do, it wouldn''t do at all. She used more of the stone to pave the area around the cistern for about a pace, cutting little lines so that the water would drain away and keep from being slippery, using the edge of her stone tool to put in a slightly rough texture on the rock to give people traction.


    She looked down at the ground. She looked at the cistern. She knelt down and imagined herself doing her laundry. She mimed taking imaginary clothes and laying them down on the ground, then hitting them with an imaginary rock¡­


    Lori didn''t even finish miming before the texture she''d cut into the stone started making her shins hurt. Grimacing, she stood, softened the stone, and smoothed it out. She knelt down again. Better, but now people were more likely to slip, which could lead to injury, which would lead to lowered productivity¡­


    She eyed the cistern. From where she was kneeling, it was too high and too far away¡­


    Lori cut down the cistern''s size to be only a third as tall so it would be more accessible to people kneeling on the ground, then changed the design to make it deliberately overflow down to lower basins deep enough to soak a lot of clothes at the same time. From there, the water would finally fall down to a stone gutter that would catch the water and direct it to the river. That way, it was convenient for both people who were kneeling and needed water to soak clothes, and those standing with a bucket of some sort. On consideration, there needed to be more than one cistern, which people could kneel around and get water from while they beat their clothes clean. They''d have to bring their own rocks, but that was their problem.


    Maybe she should have just taken the map and gone for a walk after all, this was starting to get irritating.


    Using the stone she''d removed by cutting the cistern''s size, she built another one, with basins beneath it, paving the area around that as well so people wouldn''t have to kneel in mud. She looked around with a frown. Actually, she''d need to pave the whole area, not just the area directly around the cistern, or else the place would still get muddy and inconvenient. While it wasn''t her convenience that would be affected, she was disinclined to make a place that would potentially make it easier to track mud into her Dungeon. They had people whose job was to clean the floors now, but the quality of the brooms they could make from twigs and a ropeweed cords wasn''t the best, so any mess could be prevented was best prevented.


    She twitched. That last thought sounded far too much like one of her mothers scolding her after she''d come back home during a rainy day.


    Lori walked up to the cistern and mimed filling a bucket full of water. No, that wouldn''t do, now it was too low¡­


    She decided to put a high-sided round under the flow of water from the aqueduct, sized for people just filling up buckets, that would then overflow down to the low cistern for people kneeling and doing laundry. That way, there was a convenient source of water at all heights. She narrowed the cistern too, allowing her to make it longer, making more room for people to do laundry¡­


    Maybe she should move a tree there, it was getting really hot.


    No, that can be something for other people to do later. She''d put up some pillars, they could put some kind of roof covering on it.


    She finished moving earthwisps and inspected her handiwork. The low cisterns came to just under her knees, which was just accessible enough for someone kneeling down. The low basins were halfway down from the ground, just high enough to be reachable without bending, and the gutter that caught the water to channel it back to the river was below that, a hand''s-width off the ground.


    It all seemed right. She''d use it to do her laundry. All nice and convenient, with a lot of running water¡­


    Not that she would, she had her own bathroom and water source for that. And in her room she didn¡¯t do it while drying out in the sun.


    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    She shrugged and decided it was a job done, and went off to have lunch.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I saw the laundry area," Rian said as he came with their lunch. "It looked nice."


    "It''s going to need a roof," Lori said, picking one of the bowls. She''d already finished her move.


    "I''ll tell people to be ready to make it," Rian said, delaying his inevitable defeat by having a spoonful of food first and swallowing. "Still, it looks really good."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm''-ed as she ate thoughtfully.


    "Is something wrong?" Rian asked as he made his move.


    "No, nothing''s wrong," Lori said.


    "Hmm¡­" Rian said, finishing his move. "Well, could something be better, then?"


    Lori blinked. "Be better?"


    "Yeah. Something might not be wrong, but it could be better," Rian said. "Like, this stew isn''t wrong, but it would be better if there were fewer pieces of blue gourd¨C"


    "Eat your food and be thankful you have any, Lord ''do I deserve the food I''m eating''," Lori said, rolling her eyes.


    "Aw, you remember that conversation," Rian said. "Why do you have to bring it up in the context of blue gourd?" But he did eat the blue gourd.


    Lori made her move as he made faces, trying to force the gourd through his mouth. Useless thespian.


    "So," he said as she dropped stones into the boards bowls. "What''s not wrong but could be better? I assume it''s the laundry, but it''s never safe to assume anything with you."


    Lori gave him a level look, then grunted. "I finished the laundry area but I don''t know how useable it is. It looks useable, but¡­"


    "It¡­ looks very useable," Rian said.


    "And you can tell from your extensive laundry experience, I''m sure."


    "Ow," Rian said, miming grabbing something stabbing him in the chest. "Harsh. True, but harsh. Well, if you want to know, ask someone. Someone besides me I mean, despite my extensive laundry experience."


    She gave him a level look.


    "Yes, that would involve talking to a human being besides me, but do you really want my extensive experience on the subject?"


    Lori grunted, looking down at her bowl and taking another spoonful to eat.


    "Wow, we''re only discussing talking to another human being and you''re already acting like you''re talking to someone other than me," Rian said. "And Karina, I suppose. Maybe you can ask her? She''s probably helped her mother with the laundry, right? I mean, I''m guessing, but it''s even odds she''s helped with laundry before."


    Lori paused, tilting her head thoughtfully. Then she shook her head.


    "Okay, not Karina," Rian said. "Who else do you know by name? And who can apparently do laundry, so they can give an assessment of the usability of the laundry area?"


    Lori blinked and stared at him. Then she tilted her head.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was not the first time Lori had debated ignoring her lord''s advice.


    Some had been easy to ignore, like his occasional suggestions she indulge in his weird voting fetish, or that she try and remember people''s names.


    Then there was times like now, where he had given her a usable, serviceable course of action¡­ but she really didn¡¯t want to do it because it was distasteful. On the other hand, the alternative was having something mildly annoy her about the laundry area, but not knowing what. And that would be with her forever every time she saw it, reminding her that she didn''t do it right¡­


    So, unfortunately, there was only one thing to do. At least knowing the name would finally be good for something.


    As Rian took their bowls back to the kitchen to be washed¡ªto hopefully be washed, and oooh, was that what the area needed, an area for them to wash the dishes?¡ªLori put away her board by the simple expedient of sinking it into a hollow in the floor under the table, instead of taking back up to her room. If she spent the time to do that, they might be gone and she''d have to look for them, and this was bad enough as it was without her having to waste more time too. She stood up and rounded the table they''d been sitting at, towards the table next to them, the table situated behind Rian. The others at the table saw her coming, of course, and eyed her warily. All but the ones she was there for. They were busy watching Rian''s backside. By the time they noticed her, she was sitting across from them in the spot where no one ever sat, because it would have blocked their view, and so people had apparently learned to stop sitting there.


    For a moment, there was a twinge of uncertainty and annoyance as she tried to remember how her parents had kept telling her she should talk to strangers, how she should be respectful and polite and¡ªbut then she remembered she was Binder now, so she didn''t have to follow stupid rules made for lesser people.


    "You two," she said curtly, making the three of them who''d been staring at her lord jerk in surprise. She ignored the third. Lori wasn''t sure she knew how to do laundry. "Yes, you two," she repeated as their gazes fell on her, their eyes going wide. "Umu and Mikon. You two."


    "Y-your Bindership!" Umu managed to get out a little before Mikon did, so their words weren''t completely synchronized, resulting in an annoying dissonance. "W-what can we do f-for you"/"W-what do you n-need?" Yes, very annoyingly dissonant.


    "The two of you know how to wash laundry, correct?" she said, though she was fairly confident they did, and was rewarded with jerky nods. "Excellent. The two of you, come with me."


    Amber gold and bright green eyes somehow became even wider. "Y-your Bindership?" Mikon repeated.


    "I didn''t do anything wrong!" Umu cried. "She did it! She did it, whatever it was!"


    Whatever speech and thought impediment they were experiencing, it wasn''t enough for Mikon to miss the fact she was being covered in colors as she managed to direct a glare towards the blonde next to her. "Why you¨C"


    Lori gave both of them a withering look, already regretting this. "I didn''t say you did anything wrong, I said you two are to come with me." When it looked like they were going to stay where they were, she snapped out, "Now!"


    They both jumped, and then got tangled between the bench and the table causing the bench to slide loudly as they pulled themselves out and got to their feet. People were staring now, but Lori ignored them as she pointed towards the Dungeon''s entrance. "Follow me," she said.


    Some people¡ªlike that really short, really stern teacher she''d once had who could silence a room with sheer sarcastic corrosion even before she resorted to airwisp amplification¡ªcould probably have walked on, confidently secure in the certainty that they''d have done what she said with no other prompting. Lori really wanted to be that sort of person¡­ but unfortunately, she wasn''t confident these two were smart enough to know they should do that, and so she had to look over her shoulder every so often to make sure that they were, in fact, following her, relying on her sense of the demesne''s wisps and the voids people produced to make sure no one ran into her.


    It was only when they were all three out of the Dungeon and walking that she finally stopped looking back at them, content to rely on the sense of the void they made to tell her if they tried to run away.


    "Y-your Bindership? W-where are we going?" Umu asked.


    Lori glanced over her shoulder at the blonde. "We," she said, pointing towards the laundry area, "are going there. I need your¡­" She almost said opinion, but then remembered they weren''t her parents or anyone that mattered. "¡­ assessment of its usability."

 63 - The Laundry Area, Revised

    "This is a laundry area?" Mikon said, looking around and seeming nervous and a bit confused. Her pink hair whipped about in the wind, longer than Lolilyuri thought was sensible, but then not everyone was as reasonable and intelligent as she was. And as soon as she could borrow some scissors again, her hair will reflect her reason and intelligence.


    "That is the intention," Lori said. "As among those intended to use it, I need your assessment on whether it can be used conveniently as is."


    Umu straightened at this, her chest protruding even more against her blouse and showing the lines of her wrappings. Her face was set in an indignant expression for some reason. "What, did you just assume we''re laundresses even though you don''t know us?" she said. Mikon kicked her in the ankle. "Er, your Bindership?"


    "No, I know you''re laundresses because you keep stealing Rian''s laundry to wash it," Lori said.


    They started in surprise, suddenly looking fearful. Why¡­ oh, they must think she intended to flog them for theft.


    "We put it back!" Umu said, confirming her suspicions.


    "She did it! It was her idea!" Mikon cried, hiding behind the smaller blonde.


    "Why, you treacherous¨C!"


    "Yes, yes, which is why you''re not being flogged for theft," Lori said, and the two of them relaxed slightly. "But that''s irrelevant to this discussion." She pointed. "The laundry facilities. What is your assessment? Pretend you''re going to use it to wash stolen clothes."


    Hesitantly, they looked at what she had made. The water catch, the cisterns, the basins¡­They walked around them, put their hands on surfaces, watched the way the water was flowing to subsequently lower levels¡­


    "If you say there''s nothing wrong, I will be ignoring any future complaints," Lori said. "This is your only chance to point out anything you see as problematic." She wouldn''t, but this would prompt them to actually say something if there was anything wrong. She was inclined to think there would be.


    "Uh, your Bindership," Mikon said, "how did you expect this place to be used?"


    Lori frowned. Shouldn''t that be obvious?


    "You kneel here to soak the clothes in those basins for scrubbing," she said. "And you can fill up buckets there."


    "So¡­ we''re supposed to kneel?" Umu said, frowning. "Well, I suppose we can have a table here in the middle later¡­"


    "Why would you want a table?" Lori said.


    "Um, so we don''t need to kneel while scrubbing, your Bindership," Mikon said. "It''s easier if we stand. Hurts less."


    Lori twitched as she remembered her most recent day of kneeling in her bathroom with her laundry. "I see," she said, keeping her face neutral. She glanced towards the pile of rock she''d left off to the side as excess building material and imbued the earthwisps in it through her core, binding them to move.


    "You mean like¡ªwhat are the two of you doing there?" she demanded irritably once she looked back at the two woman and saw there were now standing next to the pottery kiln. "Get back over here!"


    She built a stone table not unlike the one in her room, and which she had to repeatedly stress to the two idiots with her was not a sacrificial altar. The drainage was strictly for water and not blood!


    "I''m not going to sacrifice you," she said in exasperation. "So come here already! Is this table high enough or do you need it higher? Wider? Come on, be useful!"


    The two reluctantly stepped closer to the table. "Um, a bit higher, maybe?" Mikon said, laying her hand on its surface briefly, flinching back as if she expected it to burn her. "We''d still have to bend to reach it properly otherwise."


    Impassively, Lori raised up the level of the tabletop to about belly height.


    "That''s¡­ better, I think, your Bindership," Umu said.


    Lori looked at the table, then at the two women. "All right. You two stay there while I do this."


    "Um, we really need to go back to our looms¡­" Mikon said, stepping backwards, back towards the kiln and the other houses.


    "Stay," Lori ordered, then got to work.


    The second cistern was dismantled for raw materials, the water that had filled it flowing out over the ground before she caught it with waterwisps and remembered to sculpt away the second outlet on the aqueduct above. That done, she raised the level of the remaining cistern again, and gave it extended sides to make it into a table with water in the middle. She added a raised lip to try and keep the water from going over the side, and had the water drain down one end and towards the river.


    "That¡­ looks more convenient, your Bindership," Mikon ventured, stepping towards the table and putting her hands on it. she mimed some motions with her hands. "Yes, I can see myself washing here, no problem. Though we''d need somewhere to put the clothes we''re not washing and the ones that are done. At the very least, someplace convenient to put the laundry on until it''s time to wash it?"


    The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    "Maybe a bench?" Umu suggested. "A stone bench people can put things on?"


    Lori looked to where she was pointing, at the space off to the side of the washing table/cistern, behind where someone doing laundry would be. It all sudden fell into place in her head. A long table with a cistern of wash water in the middle, the cisterns lightly higher than the level of the table. A drainage gutter between the cistern on the tabletop to channel waste water away. People on either side dipping clothes into the water, then scrubbing them on the tabletop, with a lip to prevent the water overflowing and getting their socks wet¡­


    "Er, your Bindership?" Mikon said, pulling Lori out of her thoughts.


    "What?" she said.


    Mikon jerked back, but seemed to rally. "Er, if it''s not too much trouble, perhaps you can turn the table into a washboard as well? To, ah, help with laundry?"


    A what?


    "A what?" she asked, confused.


    "A washboard, your Bindership," Mikon repeated, as if that would help. "It''s¡­ for washing clothes."


    "Yes, so I gathered from the blatantly obvious name," Lori said. "What is it that I can make the table one and how can it help with the laundry?"


    "It¡¯s a wooden board with ridges on it, your Bindership," Umu said. "It helps with scrubbing. You rub it back and forth on the ridges, and it helps get dirt out."


    Lori frowned. "Show me."


    "Um, I can run back home and get ours¡­?" Mikon offered.


    Lori gave her a long look. "Come back quickly," she said.


    Mikon ran, hiking up her skirts to do so.


    "You," Lori said, pointing at Umu as she stared after the other young woman. She jumped and turned to face Lori. "What else does a laundry area need?"


    "Uh¡­" the blonde said, looking around frantically. "Washing lines! Where are the washing lines?"


    What?


    "What?" Lori said.


    "The washing lines, where you hang clothes on lines to dry in the sun," Umu said, giving Lori a strange look.


    Ah. So that''s how other people dried their clothes. She just used waterwisps to draw the water out of them.


    "I''ll have Rian handle that, that''s going to need line," Lori said, dismissive. She looked around. She might as well build the bench¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time Mikon returned, there was a stone bench on either side of the long washing table/cistern.


    "I''m sorry it took so long your Bindership," Mikon said hurriedly, "I had to tell my aunt you called for me. Here''s the washboard, your Bindership!"


    Lori accepted the proffered piece of wood. It was surprisingly small, only a little bigger than the plank of wood Rian used to write things on. It had a simple frame, with the majority of it consisting of lengths of wood packed together so as to present their edges, forming a wavy, bumpy surface not unlike those wooden shutters they''d had back in the apartment she''d shared with her mothers.


    "And¡­ this helps with washing, how?" she asked.


    Mikon hesitantly reached for the board, and Lori gave it to her. "You run the clothes across it like this, your Bindership," she said, miming passing something over the bumpy surface, "and that helps get dirt and stains off easier."


    "Why not just beat it with a rock?" Lori asked.


    "Rocks are heavy," Umu said. "Washing is tiring enough as it is without using rocks too."


    Lori twitched slightly at that. "Ah. Of course." She looked at the washboard, then at the table, contemplating how to¡­ "All right," she said, handing the washboard back to Mikon. "You''re dismissed. I have work to do." She put them out of her mind as she grabbed some stone and began to shape it into a long, narrow stone slab.


    It took some working, but she was eventually able to cut more or less regular wavy teeth into the stone, forming a kind of comb. Carefully, she softened just the top surface of the tabletop around the cistern and swept the teeth of the comb across it. When she was done, there was a pattern of raised lines on the tabletop, the points carefully dulled and curved to prevent injury and breakage.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. Now, she just had to do all the tabletop surfaces¡­ and build a second wash table/cistern¡­ and more benches¡­ and pack down the ground to keep it from being muddy and prevent undergrowth¡­


    She really should have just grabbed the map and verified its accuracy.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She lay face-down on the table and groaned.


    "I thought that may be the case," Rian said, "so I came prepared!"


    She heard a bowl being set down in front of her, and reluctantly raised her head. Then she blinked and stared.


    "A little tax payer was kind enough to help me get some happy fruit," Rian said, sounding smug and self-satisfied for some reason. "I peeled, mashed it, then put it in a bowl and put that bowl in the cold room for storing meat."


    "So¡­ you made frozen happyfruit mush," Lori said blandly.


    "Cold food is sweeter than warm food, everyone knows that," Rian said. He pushed the bowl towards her. "Come on. You''ve had a busy day. Indulge yourself. Have the sweet stuff before dinner." He theatrically leaned closer. "It''s not like your parents are around to tell you that you can''t."


    That was an excellent point. Lori straightened up on her bench, grabbing the bowl and spoon that had been stuck to it, and after poking and mixing around the cold mush took a tentative bite.


    She let out a moan.


    "I''ll take that to mean you like it," Rian said, leaning back with a sigh. "So, saw the laundry area again. It''s completely different from what it looked like before lunch. Did you really rebuild the thing in one afternoon?"


    "There were usability issues. I fixed them," Lori said, taking another spoonful and chewing with enjoyment before swallowing. "Make a note. In addition to a roof for shade, it''s also going to need washing lines for drying the clothes in the sun."


    "I think we can get some poles cut for that," Rian said, nodding. "Though it would help if you used magic to put them in rock to make them secure. I''ll schedule it and tell you when."


    Lori gave him a level look, not breaking her gaze as she had another spoonful of delicious, cold happyfruit mush.


    "I mean, I''ll get people ready and talk to you to find a time that''s convenient for you," Rian amended. "Sorry, slip of the tongue."


    Lori nodded sharply. "Which won''t be tomorrow," she said. "I''ll be verifying the map tomorrow."


    "Do you want me to tell off some people to accompany you?" Rian said. "It''s never a good idea to be wandering into the woods alone, in case you get injured."


    Lori scowled, but couldn''t deny the logic. "Fine. But make sure they know I don''t want to talk to them."


    "I''m sure Deil and Tackir already know that," Rian said.


    Lori titled her head then nodded in approval. "They''ll do," she said. "But no Landoor!"


    "Your contempt is noted," Rian said. "I''ll go get dinner, you finish dessert before it gets warm."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She forwent playing sunk with Rian after dinner, opting to retire early. Her lord had looked relieved, no doubt because he realized that today was the day she would defeat him three games in a row and wanted to delay his utter humiliation at her hands.


    In her room she entered her private bath, and picked a wall. Then she pulled stone from the outermost layer of the wall and formed a table surface at about belly height, just the ideal elevation so she didn''t have to bend down. Taking the toothy stone comb she''d brought to her room, she softened the table surface and began to sweep a long pattern of raised lines on it¡­

 64 - Lori Gets Ready To Explore

    Lori hummed to herself as she laid out the map on the table while waiting for Rian to come back with breakfast. She had to admit, whoever had made this map had done good work. She recognized the bends in the river from the times she and Rian had needed to go to River''s Fork, and could even point to the spot where the children liked to go seeling. With the map in front of her, she was able to put context to what she was feeling.


    As she looked at the map, she let herself become aware of the earthwisps that made up her demesne. Looking at the map, she was able to contextualize some of those sensations. Or maybe those sensations put context to the map? In any case, it was interesting, feeling both the size of the hill her Dungeon was under and seeing its extent on the map to give her a better idea of how big it was. She''d never really explored it, just gone around to one side or another. According to the map, it was a part of a chain of hills going up and down away from the river at an angle, though the river had worn away at the end where her Dungeon was now. The other side of the river was much flatter, though a note had been added that it still had some hills, merely of lower elevation.


    The area was so thickly forested the scouts had marked out where the trees weren''t, which mainly consisted of the area they were settling, and a few large patches with rocks that were probably from when the dragon had passed overhead. The scouts couldn''t tell what the dragon scales were made of, though apparently one of the samples they''d brought back had been identified as some kind of copper. At the very least, she had to mark those and bring them back with her, since they were too big to carry. The scouts had come back with some of the smaller bits they''d encountered, which was now in the metal vault. If they could bring those back, they might have enough of a surplus buffer that they could risk using metal. A circular saw they could attach to a water wheel would be nice¡­


    Might as well ask for a complete education in Deadspeaking while she was at it, if she was wishing for things.


    She blinked as someone placed two bowls on the map, and looked up to glare at Rian. "That''s rude, you know," she said.


    "Well, you kept ignoring me, and I didn''t want the food to get cold," Rian shrugged. "That would be wasteful."


    "Are you sure you''re not a parent?" Lori said. "You keep talking like one."


    "I think that''s called ''adult responsibility''," Rian said. "And I feel old just thinking about it. And no, I''m not a parent. It''s not like I have a willful child who makes me worried all the time who I have to take care of or anything."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Otherwise you wouldn''t have as much time working for me."


    "Yes. Yes, that definitely would be the case," Rian said blandly, taking the bowl she didn¡¯t choose. He looked down at the bowl and frowned. "You know, I just realized, do we actually have any plates? When we have more food than just ''stuff to throw in the stew'', will we have any plates to eat them out of?"


    "That¡¯s what you''re thinking about?" Lori said, giving her lord a confused look.


    "I''m pretty sure it''s part of my lordly duties to try and avert the No-Plate Crisis of Eventually," Rian said. "It could be terrible for our morale, having no plates when we finally have something else to eat."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Useless thespian. "Are you done?"


    He paused a moment, looking like he was actually thinking about it. "Yes, I think that''s all I can squeeze out of that joke," Rian said. "Did you want something? Because usually I''m the one telling you things at breakfast."


    "I''m simply reiterating that I will be out confirming the map today," Lori said. "So unless you have something urgent you need to tell me that developed in the hours I''ve been sleeping¡­?"


    "No, nothing urgent," Rian said. "Go, enjoy your day off work. Though don''t leave right away, I have a few things for you."


    "It''s not ''something to consider'' is it?" she asked warily.


    "No, I figured you''d want a water skin in case you got thirsty," Rian said.


    "You realize I can just pull water out of the air right?"


    He gave her a level look. "Go ahead. Drink that water when you have an alternative. I dare you."


    She met his gaze, but nodded in admission. "A water skin would be convenient," she said.


    "I''m also having the kitchen fill up some ration jars for you so you don''t have to come back for lunch if you don¡¯t want to," he said. "Just heat it up and eat it out there. You wouldn''t be able to go as far if you had to come back for lunch, then go out again. Are you planning to take the boat¨C"


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    "Lori''s Boat," she corrected.


    Rian sighed for some reason. "¨C that, to go upriver or the other side, or will you just be walking?"


    She shrugged. "I hadn''t thought about it. I was just going to go and get those dragon scales."


    Rian looked at the map, tilting his head sideways to read the notations. It was so nice to be able to read small print written in ink instead of charcoal. "Well, be careful. We don''t know the terrain there. I wouldn''t want anyone to get hurt trying to drag those things back home."


    "You realize I''m a Dungeon Binder, right?" Lori said.


    "Yes, but what does that have to do with not wanting people to get hurt?"


    Lori opened her mouth, paused, closed her mouth, opened it again¡­ then just decided to give up and eat her breakfast.


    "Don''t forget to bring your hat," Rian said. "I know we have a lot of trees, but you''d be surprised how much sunlight can get through tree cover."


    "I worked outside yesterday, Rian, I think I know better than to not have my hat," Lori said, making a note to go back up to her room and get it.


    Rian nodded. "Don''t forget to bring your knife too."


    "Why would I need my knife?" she said, beginning to get exasperated.


    "In case there''s an emergency," he said.


    "What sort of emergency could there be I couldn''t solve with magic?" Lori demanded.


    "What if you get a thorn from a plant embedded in your skin and need to cut it out?" Rian suggested.


    "Then I will stay away from thorny plants!" Lori huffed, making a note to dig up her knife when she went up to get her hat.


    "What if one of the people accompanying you gets a thorn embedded in their skin?" he said.


    "Then they can use their own knife!"


    "You''d trust them to bring a knife?"


    Lori hesitated. "Fine!" she snapped. "But tell them they can''t bring along any knives!"


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said brightly.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, she went upstairs for her knife, hat, and her bag of lengths of firewood, just in case. She also brought along her case containing her metal utensils, which she hadn''t had to use in a while because of the dining hall''s spoons. Rian would probably have spoons to go with the ration jars too, but just in case¡­


    Afterwards, she went downstairs to find Rian with two familiar young men. Lori didn''t like Deil and Tackir, any more than she liked Rian. But they had shown themselves tolerable by being smarter than Landoor¡ªor at least not as stupid¡ªthey''d adequately obeyed orders before, they knew better than to talk to her directly unless she talked to them first, and they didn''t seem to be eager to be somewhere else, unlike those two yesterday, which was already vastly less irritating.


    They were also carrying a bag containing carefully sealed ration jars with their lunch, as well as some hairy blueballs and happyfruit for snacking on if they got hungry before then. Rian handed her a water skin filled with water and suggested she put a little ice in it to help cool her down if she became hot.


    "You have your hat, good," Rian said, nodding as she secured the water skin to her belt opposite the firewood. "Are your shoes comfortable? Do you want a towel to wipe away your sweat with? Are you sure it''s a good idea to have this walk while wearing that coat? Won''t you get hot?"


    "I''m fine, Rian," she snapped. "Stop being so smothering, you''re sounding like my parents again!"


    "I''m just worried, that''s all," Rian said. "If anything happened to you, we''d have to go beg Shanalorre to be our Binder."


    "Well, stop worrying, because nothing is going to happen to me," she huffed. "I''ll be fine. It''s my own demesne, why wouldn''t I be fine?" She held out her raincoat to him, which he took as she wrapped her arms in darkwisps to keep them from burning without her coat''s sleeves to cover them. "I expect you to return that to me at dinner."


    Holding the map in her hands, she looked over Deil and Tackir. They carried their own waterskins, and Deil had the bag with their lunch, while Tackir had the snacking fruits and their own waterskins. She nodded in satisfaction, then fixed Rian a pointed look as he carefully folded her rain coat over his arm. "Now. I''m going. Unless you have something else to say, like a sudden emergency you became aware of in the last ten heartbeats¡­?"


    "No, nothing''s come up," Rian said. "Be careful you three. Remember to watch your step, especially when you''re going up slopes, slipping and falling is the easier way to get hurt when you''re walking through the woods. You two make sure she doesn''t get hurt, or else we''re all doomed, all right?"


    "Don''t worry Lord Rian, you can rely on us," Deil said determinedly. "We''ll make sure nothing happens to her Bindership." Tackir nodded in agreement.


    "It''s the woods, Rian. It''s not like we''re going out in to the Iridescence where the beasts are," Lori said, rolling her eyes. "We''ll walk, we''ll find some rocks, we''ll check the map a few times, we''ll come back. It''s supposed to be restful, not exciting."


    "Don''t stay out too late, and turn back before it gets dark," Rian said. "Magic lights or no, it''s dangerous to walk in the woods when it''s hard to see where you''re going. And remember to watch your step¨C"


    "We''re going!" Lori said, turning and facing away from her lord, who seemed to be losing his mind. "Come on you two, we''ll climb up the rise to the new houses and then start heading for the edge. The first dragonscale should be up there." She took a step forward, then paused. She turned to them and pointed. "You two walk in front of me."


    The two looked bemused, but did as she said, beginning to climb up to the new houses where the work on the various roofs, balconies and second floors seemed to be progressing well.


    "I''ll see you when you get back," Rian said, stating the obvious. "Be careful! Don''t forget to drink water so you don''t¨C!"


    "Rian, get back to work!"


    The man had the gall to roll his eyes, but started walking himself, thankfully not towards Lori, even as he kept glancing at her as she followed after the other two, her feet sure on the compacted dirt and molded stone of the road as she regarded the map and their first destination, the dragon scale that the copper sample had supposedly come from¡­


    She stumbled a little when the road leveled out as it reached the new houses, but that was all right. Stumbling was not tripping, and she was perfectly fine!

 65 - Lori The Explorer

    Lori walked into the unknown, armed with nothing but her map, her wits and her will, boldly going where no one had gone before, exploring the furthest reaches of the unknown!


    "Put your clothes on properly and go do something productive," she said sternly to the two who been in the midst of¡­ well. "And if I catch you two doing this again, I''m flogging you both. And take a bath!" At least they hadn''t been completely naked, merely strategically moved aside certain¡­ well.


    As the young man and young woman frantically pulled their clothes into place, stumbling to leave¡ª"Go that way, I''d rather not stumble over you again on the way back!"¡ªLori sighed. Twenty steps. They''d barely taken twenty steps into the woods from the cleared area where the houses were being roofed¡ªshe could still hear all the carpentry work happening behind them¡ª before walking in on that deplorable sight, the two up against a tree and¡­ well.


    "This idea is rapidly losing its appeal," Lori muttered, then shook her head.


    As she checked her map, since the surprise had mildly disoriented her, she heard her two guards talking. "I didn''t know those two were getting together."


    "Should we tell their parents when we get back?"


    "What, and get mixed up in their nonsense? No, no, too much trouble. Her Bindership will know what to do."


    "Her Bindership is likely to do nothing."


    "Well, that''s probably the thing to do."


    "All right," Lori said, interrupting whatever nonsense the two were talking about. "This way! Follow me." She took two steps and stopped. "You two walk ahead to clear the way."


    They looked at each other for some reason, but just said, "Yes, your Bindership," And began walking in the direction she indicated.


    "No, a little bit more to the left¡­. There, that''s the way," she said as she double checked the map, and proceeded to follow after them.


    Rian was right, she was annoyed to find. Despite the trees, sunlight streamed through enough that she did need her hat to keep the heat off her head. After many months, the trees were alive with the sounds of songbugs, the snaps of more predatory bugs eating songbugs, and the buzzing as bugs flew through the air, eating leaves and going from flower to flower. There was the occasional rustle of leaves as small, verminous beasts barely the size of her hand darted through the undergrowth, no doubt hatched from eggs the foraging groups missed. Still, over the months, life had managed to return, insidiously sneaking its way into her demesne. Hopefully the coming winter and Rian''s prediction that beasts wouldn''t be able to survive the cold would take care of them. They''d managed to find plenty of eggs by the large, predatory ones that made for good eating, but they''d eaten those, those ones not far enough along to have developed. The rest they destroyed so there wouldn''t be any large, predatory beasts in her woods.


    Her footsteps paused as she realized they hadn''t managed to do that on the other side of the river, and made a note to have Rian tell a hunting party to go there and clear them out before they became a problem. Well, at least they had a lot of former militia to take care of it now. And she''d be able to kill some too, behind a nice, thick wall of other people between the beasts and her¡­


    Lori had the two stop a few times so she could check her map. A normal person might have gotten lost, but she was a Dungeon Binder. With the direction of the sun, she was able to get her bearings, and her awareness of the position of the core, the position of the river, and her wisps located in the aqueducts, the shelters, the bathhouses and the Dungeon gave her waypoints to orient herself again, if at a distant remove. Still, it was enough to be able to roughly ascertain where they were on the map. They were nearing the dragon scale, at least, and were only a little bit off-course, which she corrected for as she set off again, the two in front of her so she could keep an eye on them.


    When she surmised she was near, she reluctantly said, "Be on the lookout, you two. We''re looking for large rocks in a clearing with a shattered tree."


    The two started in surprise at her voice, one nearly tripping over a fallen branch as they turned to stare at her. "Er, could you say that again, your Bindership?" Deil said.


    Lori sighed, and repeated herself. "It''s a dragon scale," she said. "Copper at least, maybe something else."


    "Er, we don''t have to carry it, do we, your Bindership?" Tackir asked nervously. "Just the two of us?"


    She waved away his worries. "No, I''ll be moving it. Just help me keep an eye out for it, and any other weird rocks you might find." She thought for a moment. "And if you see a hairy blueball tree or a happyfruit tree, remember where it is so people can come back to it later,"


    "Yes, your Bindership," they chorused, sounding relieved.


    While people had probably come this way before several times, it had likely been with the intention of looking for easily gathered mushrooms, wild vegetables, tubers, and other food, not useful rocks. Even during the clean up after the dragon''s passing, they''d only really gathered the valuable minerals that had fallen near the village, so it didn''t surprise her that there were still more somewhere in the woods. Possibly a few had even been found by one person or another, and had been kept quiet or hidden with the intention of coming back for it later or something, when they had finally had money in their economy and one could actually make a tangible profit from it.


    It was Deil who found it, pointing towards the break in the tree cover the clearing caused. A tree had been shattered midway up the trunk, by lightning or some other phenomenon the dragon had been flinging at random, and had fallen over while still connected to the tree as if hinged. While the fallen top half was dead, the bottom half seemed to still be growing, with young supple branches bearing richly colored leaves sprouting from its bark and growing upwards towards the clear sky.


    Lori frowned and checked her map. Ah, now she knew where they were. They''d gone a little bit too far to the right by her reckoning, and had missed their intended destination, though in hindsight the map had been accurate enough. This clearing with its broken tree had been marked on the map, at least, so she knew where they were. Well, she''d have wanted to come here anyway. It had also been marked with dragon scales, though there had been no indication of what kind. Just a vague note written on the side of the edges of the leather about the rock being ''mixed''.


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    As promised, there were a lot of large rocks, which despite the months were still clearly out of place in the clearing. They were the wrong colors and had strangely curved shapes, like they had been liquid droplets that solidified in midair, but of enormous size. Definitely dragon scales of some sort.


    "Sit," she ordered absently. "I have work to do. Don''t get in my way. "


    As they sat down on the edge of the rocky clearing¡ªwhich wasn''t all that big to begin with¡ªLori began examining the rocks. Copper was easy enough to identify by color even if some of it was coated blue, and iron only a little bit harder. Many of the stones were the latter. At the very least, she was able to confirm they were all metal, since both lightningwisps and magic passed through them easily, though the smiths might be able to tell for sure what kind.


    There was even a small, head-sized chunk of gold¡ªit felt lighter than it should, so it was either hollow or wrapped around something else, but it was definitely gold and not pyrite, from the heat test she did¡ªwhich was something she could add to her stores. She''d have a nice stock to draw wire from when winter came.


    One of the chunks that had originally been dark on the outside and brighter where she''d scratched it had even turned blue when she''d heated it to test what it was, and she''d immediately darted back and equalized the heat back down as best as she could when she saw. Fortunately, a little color change was all it did. Anatass was a dangerous metal to heat. Supposedly it had to be small amounts to ignite, but she wasn''t taking chances!


    After that, she stopped test heating the bright metals in case they were anything else that could catch fire. Instead, she went around, identifying all the pieces using lightningwisps. It occurred to her she''d never gotten around to Rian''s suggestion of using the ores they''d collected to look for metal underground, but they''d been so busy¡­ Even the smiths has been too busy repairing what metal they had to try and smelt the ores they''d gathered. She''d have to order them to set aside time for it. Or, well, she''d have Rian order them to do it.


    Lori shook her head. This was supposed to be a restful walk collecting big hunks of mineral wealth and confirming the map. Why was she thinking about work?


    She bound the earthwisps in the clearing and had them start contorting the ground to push the dragon scales together, so they''d all make one large chunk, and used the dirt under her control to push a few of the relatively smaller ones on top of the relatively large ones. Once that was done, she covered them with dirt and compressed the dirt to hold it all in place.


    Nodding in satisfaction to herself, she climbed on top of the resulting compressed dirt boulder¡ªit was far wider than it was tall, for stability and because not all of the dragon scales could be put on top of each other¡ª and sat down with her legs crossed, then opened the map on the surface in front of her. She hummed to herself, then bound the earth under the broken tree and imbued it. She didn''t make it do anything, she just wanted to mark where the tree was in her mind.


    "All right you two, follow me," Lori said. "I want to get to the next spot, then we can have lunch there." Using the bound wisps at the tree, the core, and the other places in the demesne to triangulate again, she picked a direction and bound the earthwisps directly under her boulder.


    The ground began to flow, and her boulder slowly began to pick up speed.


    "Um, your Bindership, are you sure that''s safe?" Deil said.


    "Why wouldn''t it be?" Lori said, just as her boulder passed over something that wasn¡¯t earth she could bind and lurched sideways as a result. She was thrown off-balance to the side and instinctively tried to catch herself, but the boulder was too small and curved, and her hands came down too low to right herself.


    Lori didn''t even have time to cry out as she fell over the side of her boulder, skidding down on her side and slamming shoulder-first onto the ground, which was hard and messy with undergrowth. The boulder kept moving under its own momentum before coming to a halt.


    "Ow," Lori groaned in pain. She grit her teeth and clenched her eyes as her arm and elbow screamed at having to be the first to land to protect her head, her shoulder protested loudly against this mistreatment, her side complained that it had not liked the experienced of hitting and sliding against rock and the bag of firewood she''d had at her side, and her legs gave the postscript that they hadn''t liked getting dragged along behind the rest either, even if they had weighed the least and fallen the most gently. The rest of her just wanted to lay there until all the very vocal parts of her shut up about how they''d suffered.


    "Your Bindership!" someone cried. "Are you hurt?"


    "Of course I''m hurt, I fell," she wanted to say sarcastically. Instead, all that left her lips was another pained groan.


    Why did this hurt so much? She''d fallen before, when she had been younger, and it hadn''t been this debilitating. Gingerly, she tried to stand, and her limbs responded, even as the parts of her that had hit things redoubled their complaining. She vaguely heard someone swear, and it wasn''t her.


    Belatedly, she thought to check if she''d broken any bones, but a quick sense of all the earthwisps in her body told her they were all whole as they were meant to be. No, the pain was all in her skin and muscles and¡­ why was her arm sticky? Wincing, she unbound the darkwisps on her and tried to get another look at the arm she''d fallen on. She saw red, and suddenly the pricking pains she felt along there made more sense. She''d fallen on something sharp, likely rocks, and cut herself.


    Oh. Well, that was bad. She almost wished for the broken bone. Lori was almost certain she could mend that with wisps alone¡­


    This however¡­ an open, bleeding wound, right onto undergrowth¡­ cauterize? No, that would be agonizing. Pull out all the lightningwisps in her arm and then cauterize? No, that was probably bad¡­


    "Deil?" she said, voice shaking only slightly. "Tackir?"


    "I''m here, your Bindership," she heard one of them say. "Tackir ran to get help like Lord Rian told us to if anything happened. Don''t move, you might have broken something. Er, if that''s all right with you, your Bindership. Please don''t get mad at me."


    "Nothing''s broken Deil," she said. "Deil, I want you to pick me up and run me to the doctors. Now. I need to get this wound cleaned before it gets infected." It probably already was¡ªshe''d fallen on rotting undergrowth, after all¡ªbut she had to try.


    She felt someone kneel next to her, tentatively try to pick her up, then pull back as she hissed. Why had she let Rian talk her into taking off her coat? It might have helped¡­ "Pick me up," she ordered. "Don''t be squeamish. I won''t get angry."


    "Um, I don''t think I''m strong enough, your Bindership," he said, sounding upset. "I might drop you. Please don''t be mad, your Bindership!"


    She closed her eyes. He looked strong, but maybe that was just looks after all. "Then help me up," she said. "We''ll start walking. Leave the food." She raised up the arm that didn''t hurt.


    This time there were no excuses. She felt two rough hands grab her hand and pull her up like was a sack on the ground, but to his credit, he immediately slung her arm over his shoulder. She got her feet under her, and though one side ached, the other didn''t and she was tentatively able to put weight on that as Deil waited for her to get on her feet.


    "All right," she said, wincing at the pain on her sides. She pointed with her bleeding arm, towards the core and her dungeon. "That way!"


    She took a step forward. The side of her half ached like it had been struck painfully, but that was all. The leg moved as it should. Really, if the rest of her didn''t ache, she wouldn''t need help¡­


    And then the bag of firewood at her side slammed onto her leg and she winced, hissing painfully. "Wait!"


    He sat her down on the conglomeration of dragon scales as she used her uninjured hand to undo the buckle of her firewood bag, reluctantly letting it drop to the ground. She''d have to send someone to get it later¡­


    Lori sighed, and resolved never to take a day to relax again, if things like this were what happened. Next time she needed rest, she''d lock herself in her room and just go to sleep, uncomfortable bed or no.


    One foot after painful foot in front of the other, they headed back to her nice, safe Dungeon.

 66 - Lori Goes To The Hospital

    It was, by Lori''s estimation, more than a taum and a half away from the center of the demesne in a straight line, through uneven terrain and thick foliage. It was a long walk, made longer by the fact her legs throbbed, her side hurt, and her arm was bleeding. The latter she was able to restrain by binding the wisps to stay in her veins, which was basic Whisperer medicinal magic, but it still hurt, every step jarring her and making her aware there were earthwisps in her wounds that she couldn''t concentrate on getting rid of right then.


    Tackir must have been a fast runner, because it wasn''t long before he came back with Rian and some other people. She vaguely recognized at least three of the medics. When they came close, someone began unfolding a large canvas she recognized as one of the old tents, laying it out on a bare stretch of ground.


    Rian reached her first, and would have grabbed her other arm to pull over his shoulder if she hadn''t pulled it back with a pained hiss and a glare. Fortunately he got the hint, calling for water to wash her wound and for everyone to get ready to start carrying her. Ah. Right. She should have remembered they still had some water. That was stupid. She should have remembered.


    The water stung as it was poured over the wounds on her arm, and she winced, gritting her teeth. Someone grabbed her hand and she nearly pulled it back before she realized it was one of the medics, reexamining her wounds.


    "There''s matter in the wounds," he said, his words clipped and professional through his northern accent. "We''ll need to debride, Great Binder."


    "Please tell me we still have some kind of antiseptic," Rian said, hovering behind them, just tall enough to see around them.


    "We''ll have to check our supplies," another man said as the people Rian had brought finished laying out the canvass. "Great Binder, can you walk?"


    "I can," Lori said. "I''d rather not. It hurts. Though I don''t think anything is broken."


    "We''ll be the judge of that, Great Binder," one of the other men¡ªanother medic¡ªsaid.


    She was laid down on the canvas, and one of the people there¡ªa woman, thankfully¡ªbegan prodding her limbs, checking for broken bones. Even just through her clothes, the prodding at her right side drew pain, but eventually they concluded that nothing seemed broken, though they lacked the equipment to know for sure.


    "I need to look into your eyes, please," the medic said, pulling out a small mirror.


    "I didn''t hit my head, I''m not concussed," Lori said.


    "You don''t need to hit your head to become concussed, your Bindership," the medic said. Lori recognized him. He was the one she borrowed scissors from. "A sudden stop will do. Please hold still and let me keep you alive."


    Lori pointedly waited, and when he didn''t just grab her head to do it anyway, acquiesced. "Fine," she said, trying to relax as her head was held and eyelid peeled back, while the doctor tried to use the small steel mirror to reflect light into her eyes.


    Well, if she was going to be stuck here, she might as well be useful.


    "Rian," she said. "Have Tackir go back to the clearing we just came from, there''s a large conglomerate of dragon scales there. Have him mark it so that I can recover it later. And have him pick up my bag and hat!" She''d only just noticed she''d lost her hat in the fall.


    "The dragon scales you just got hurt from by falling off?" Rian said, some kind of restrained emotion in his voice.


    Lori would have nodded, except her head was being held still. "That one. Make sure he marks it, I''m fairly sure at least one of the dragon scales is made of anatass."


    She heard Rian sigh. "Go do what she said, Tackir. Walk, don''t run, you''ve done all you can. Be careful on the way back. Koe, go with him so that if anything happens he''s not stuck out here alone."


    Lori heard a pair of "Yes, Lord Rian", and someone apparently walking back the way they''d come.


    "This anatass is worth nearly getting yourself killed, I hope?" Rian said. He sounded¡­ very, very sarcastic.


    "No, of course not," Lori said. "Nothing is worth nearly getting myself killed."


    "Ah. So it wasn''t the anatass that had you joyriding such that you could have broken your neck and died," Rian said, nodding. "Well, I''m glad to hear that. I''m sure whatever reason you had for nearly getting yourself killed was worth it and sure to be a great boon to the demesne."


    She gave him a sharp look that was ruined when she hissed as someone patted her wound dry, then quickly began wrapping her forearm in a soft, fluffy bandage. "I didn''t think you were capable of sarcasm," she said.


    "I didn''t think you were capable of suicide," he said. "Today is full of surprises. Tackir said you hurt your side. Where does it hurt?"


    "Guess," she said flatly, wincing again as the bandaged was secured.


    "I used to think it was safe for me to do that, but clearly I was wrong, since I never guessed you''d get yourself hurt after so many reminders to be careful," Rian said. "Now, which side is it that hurts?"


    "My right," she snapped.


    He nodded curtly. "All right, you heard her everyone. Be careful with her right, she hurt herself there." He sighed. "Lie down on the canvas and we''ll carry you back. Tuck your arm against your chest so it doesn''t flap around.¡±


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    Lori glared at him, but she ached too much to really put him in his place. Maybe later, when¡­ yes, when her arm wasn''t slowly staining a bandage red, most of her right side didn''t feel like it was melting from pain, and it didn''t hurt to bend her knee¡­


    She lay down gingerly on the canvas, trying not to feel like a specimen corpse being brought in for educational dissection before it was Deadspoken into a useful undead. They''d tied the side of the canvas to poles, the kind they''d used to make spears with beast-tooth heads, which the men on both side of her bent down to grasp. At a countdown, they all lifted the poles, pulling Lori and the canvas up with it. She let out another hiss as her side was jarred, then jarred again as the group started moving briskly back to towards the Dungeon.


    Lori just lay there, wincing every time a break in the tree cover let the sunlight fall directly onto her eyes, and eventually she just closed them, protecting her vision. She started breathing in evenly, drawing in magic, trying to keep herself calm and centered, to have something to focus on besides the pains in her side as she was jostled across the uneven ground. She could hear Rian next to her letting out an unending stream of prattle, occasionally warning her of bumps or slopes, though it was never as bad as he seemed to be warning her¡­


    When she next opened her eyes, they were in the shadow of the hospital. These days, it was mainly the residence of the unmarried doctors and former militia medics, guarding what few medicines they still had, and trying to grow medicinal plants that had originally been brought from River''s Fork. The latter was barely more than headache medication, as no one was likely to come down with a heart attack any time soon, and the doctors had intelligently not brought any of the addictive anesthetics with them, since they''d originally had a Deadspeaker.


    There was a brief moment of confusion as they tried to fit her stretcher through the door, but eventually she was inside the cool shade of the hospital and being laid down on a bed and oooohhhh lying down on the cushioning of a bedroll felt soooooo good. The comfort of lying down on something that was actually soft and meant for lying down on almost eclipsed the pain of her arm and side¡­


    Lori winced as someone grabbed her bandaged arm and started to unwrap it, pulling her out of the happy softness and into the painful reality of her current situation.


    "Stop glaring, it''s not going to make the pain go away," Rian said, sitting next to her bed.


    "Don''t you have work to do?" she said.


    "Yes, that''s why I''m here," he said. "I''m supposed to keep you alive, remember? I thought you could do your part in that, but since it turns out you can''t, I now have to do twice as much work. What were you thinking?"


    Lori directed her glare at him. "Watch your tongue," she warned. Perhaps she''d been indulging him too much, with how free he was being with it.


    "My Binder has shown idiots and their idiocy shouldn¡¯t be tolerated," Rian said. "I''m following her example. Were all the reminders about being careful and watching your step so you didn''t break your leg so offensive to you that you wanted to try breaking your neck instead?"


    "It was an accident," Lori snapped defensively.


    "An accident you could have easily avoided by not sitting on a moving rock, from what Tackir was able to tell us," Rian snapped back. "For someone who insists on being the most important, irreplaceable person in the demesne, you seem to have forgotten you''re the most important, irreplaceable person in the demesne!"


    Lori''s caustic response was delayed by someone brushing a liquid on her arm that burned, and she nearly screamed, instinctively trying to pull her arm away from a suddenly iron grip before she recognized the alchemical agony of antiseptic on her wounds. She grit her teeth, trying to breathe through the pain, taking in magic in the familiar exercise.


    "Your Bindership," the doctor holding her arm said as one of the medics continued cleaning it with antiseptic. "I''m afraid there are debris in your wounds. Unless we remove them, infection is all but certain. Do we have your permission to operate on your arm?"


    "I can get them out myself," Lori said, gritting her teeth.


    "With all due respect, your Bindership, you shouldn''t. Some of the debris isn''t rock, and it still needs to be cleaned. And, again with respect, your Bindership," the doctor said calmly, "if you could treat this, you''d have done it already."


    If she could treat this? What did they¡­?


    "Doctors," Rian said suddenly, "are educated people. And generally not stupid. The stupid ones just focus on making money, and even they have to be pretty smart to do that. And you''ve only ever used Whispering."


    Lori blinked, then stiffened on the bed, a heartsick cold filling her.


    They knew.


    They knew!


    "As Lord Rian has said, your Bindership, we are not stupid," the doctor said. "I don''t know if anyone else knows, but my new colleagues all relate that their former Binder only ever used Deadspeaking after setting up their demesne. And all you''ve ever built has been with Whispering. Lord Rian has spoken to us about not spreading the matter, and we have not. That being said, your Bindership, do I have permission to begin debriding your arm?"


    "Debriding?" she asked, trying to place the word.


    "Removing the debris, your Bindership, else we will not be able to prevent infection," the doctor said calmly as the vocabulary fell into place. "Some are embedded, and we might need to use our scalpels. I fear you might assume that was an attempt on your life, so we are notifying you. I also regret to inform you we are out of anesthetics, topical or otherwise."


    Lori didn''t whimper. She was a grown adult and a powerful Binder. Those do not whimper in fear of pain.


    Eventually, she said, "Do it." And if it was with gritted teeth, well, her side hurt.


    She was already immensely regretting riding that rock. How could she have been so stupid? Not that she''d tell Rian¡­


    "We shall have to immobilize your arm, your Bindership," the doctor said. "Please don''t try to move. We will try to be as quick as possible."


    "Just do it," she said.


    The doctor nodded. "I¡­ would strongly suggest you avert your gaze, your Bindership," the doctor said. "Seeing your own flesh be operated on can be quite distressing and is known to intensify the sensations, as well as cause people to struggle." The doctor hesitated. "If you think you can risk removing the lightningwisps in your arm to deaden your nerves, then I leave that to your judgement."


    "Noted," Lori said through gritted teeth.


    Her arm was secured to some sort of armrest attachment that they secured to the bed. Her arm rested on warm copper fittings that had likely just had boiling water poured on it to sterilize it. She didn''t remember them having this device before, so it must have been made from the demesne''s precious copper stores. Antiseptic was wiped over her wounds one last time.


    Even if Lori wanted to keep an eye on the person who was about to start carving at her flesh with knives and tweezers and strange little picks and forceps and other tools, the way her arm was position prevented it, naturally forcing her to lay on her left. So she was looking directly at Rian as she felt the warm blade of the copper scalpel on her skin¡­


    She grit her teeth and hissed through it. If this was a way to lower her guard so they could sever her wrists, she wanted all the warning she could get.


    Eventually, Rian held out his hand.


    Eventually, Lori took it and squeezed, holding on as she tried not to scream¡­


    "I blame you for this," she hissed. "The map was your idea."


    He rolled his eyes. "Noted."

 67 - Wounded

    Trying to manipulate the wisps in one''s body after a painful surgical operation had begun was an agonizing experience Lori never wanted to repeat again. It also revealed how little she actually knew about the interactions of lightningwisps and her body. The first painful lesson was that the ones that let her move her arm were distinct from the ones that let her feel her arm. She wasted a lot of time finding out the difference.


    Even when she managed it, it was surprisingly hard to maintain. Her previous experience was that once your limb goes numb from you taking the lightningwisps there and moving them someplace else to use them¡ªfor example, for throwing lightning¡ªit took some time for the lightningwisps to replenish and sensation to return. Her connection to the core, however, mean that magic constantly caused the wisps in her body to replenish and equalize, so she had to constantly manipulate the wisps in her arm to maintain numbness, which meant that pain would occasionally break through.


    The plate on the device that was restraining her arm was apparently there in case she made some kind of mistake doing exactly that, and was meant to draw the resultant lightning to the metal and into the ground and not, for example, the doctor holding the copper scalpel.


    If nothing else, the exercise gave her something to focus on, especially when she wasn''t able to restrain a new surge of lightningwisps and feeling returned. Between that and Rian, her mind was quite occupied.


    "Still think you shouldn''t have asked to exchange pointers with Shana about how to do magic?" Rian said as she tried her best to break his hand solely with the grip of her left.


    "Shanalorre," she corrected through gritted teeth. "Are you still on that absurd idea?"


    "You could have at least asked," he said. "You could really use knowing how to heal right around now."


    "Because the entire idea is nonsensical," Lori said. "In addition to the fact she''s another Binder, and has absolutely no reason to teach me anything, and several reasons not to, she''s a savant. They don''t know what they''re doing until they''ve been properly educated and are taught the basics, and sometimes¡ª" she hissed as sensation returned at an inopportune time, and cut off her line of thought to pull back the lightningwisps.


    "Sometimes?" Rian prompted.


    "Sometimes they need to learn more advanced principles first as well," Lori said. "Considering she''s a completely uneducated wild savant, the possibility of her teaching me anything is less than nothing."


    "You should have still tried," Rian said.


    "Your delusional optimism is amusing only up to a point."


    "You too," he said dryly. "Does it hurt?"


    "Obviously," she hissed, needing to pull the lightningwisps from her arm again.


    "Good. Maybe this''ll keep you from trying to ride any more rocks."


    "It was an accident!" she snapped.


    "Accident or not, we''d still have a dead Binder," he snapped right back. "Seriously, you have one job: don''t die! How hard is that to do? Everyone else is managing it!"


    "Are you questioning my authority?" she said threateningly, or at least as threateningly as she could on her back, one arm strapped down, and holding his hand.


    "Your authority is undisputed, I''m questioning your survival instincts!"


    "I wasn''t supposed to fall off!"


    "Well, what did you think would happen when you sat down on a moving rock and became the highest thing on it? It''s not exactly the most stable platform!"


    Lori glared at him, and he glared right back, though they were interrupted with another twinge of pain erupted from her arm.


    It wasn''t enough she was having her arm cut up. It wasn''t enough her right side ached and her shoulder was throbbing terribly. It wasn''t just that Rian seemed to be actively mocking her today.


    On top of all that, she was hungry. They''d left their lunch behind, after all.


    <hr>


    Eventually, after more time and pain than she thought was reasonable, a small copper bowl that had been filled with pieces of leaves, wood and stones¡ªhow had she not noticed she''d fallen on so much rock?¡ªand another burning wash of antiseptic solution¡ªsomething else they were running out of¡ªher arm was bandaged and her partially dislocated shoulder was snapped back in place¡ªthat explained why it hurt so much without being broken¡ªLori was so exhausted she just slept, her arm held elevated for medical reasons.


    She woke up to pain as the right side of her body continued to throb, and she resigned herself to widespread bruising. Also, someone had been trying to strip her naked in her sleep.


    "No," she said flatly as the woman with pale, lightly pink-tinged hair¡ªshe vaguely recognized her as one of the medics that had come in with the people from River''s Fork¡ªstarted taking off her shoes.


    "Great Binder," the woman said, her northern accent mild and clipped, almost brusque. "My name is Daising. We need to clean you and get you changed, or it will inhibit your recovery. Someone provided clothes for you, although if these are insufficient, Lord Rian says to inform us so and open your rooms so he may recover other garments for you."


    "I can get them myself," Lori insisted, attempting to sit up.


    Her right hip protested with everything short of actual violence, with other rightward parts of her body expressing their solidarity.


    As she lay back down on the warm, slightly sweaty bed completely of her own volition and no other reason, Lori supposed it was about time she allowed the people of her demesne to serve her by attending to her whims.


    However, she drew the line at nudity.


    "My trousers stay on," she said.


    "If you wish, I could bring you the skirt and you can put that on before removing your trousers, Great Binder? They''re staining the bed."


    Lori blinked and looked down, realizing her trousers were stained with dirt and mud. Ah, that must have splashed on from washing her arm. She looked down at her shirt, realizing it had bloodstains on it. That was never going to come off, not with the soaps they had here. Taken altogether, she was a bit of a mess. She supposed it was time to change clothes in any case. It had been some days.


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    "What time is it?" she asked.


    "The sun is setting, Great Binder," the medic said. "People are putting away work and going to the baths." That last was a bit too pointed.


    "Yes, yes, I understand," she grumbled. "Where are the clothes?"


    They had been folded on a stool next to the bed. Lori had to wonder how many stools had been made by the carpenters, how much time that had taken from putting roofs on houses, and why hadn''t she gotten one? Not that she needed one, since she didn''t entertain in her bedroom and her bed was fine to sit on, but it was the principle of the thing!


    Still, the blouse seemed like it would fit, and the skirt could be adjusted for her waist. Really, all that was missing was socks and underwear, and hers were still relatively new.


    Lori sighed and started trying to take off her clothes.


    It was agonizing. Her time asleep seemed to have allowed most of her right side to become one large bruise, and she needed help getting her shirt off. She kept glancing at the windows, but fortunately no one was peeking through them. Once her shirt was off, the medic helped her wash her upper body with a cloth and a bucket of water. Lori grit her teeth as her injuries were wiped down, then again as her chest wrappings were put back on. Or rather, the wrappings someone had brought. Ugh, she''d have to figure out whose it was so she could return it. She wasn''t looking forward to that.


    She had to get more help slipping the blouse on. A part of her was pettily glad it was only as comfortable as her own shirt. She also had to get help putting on the skirt. It had been so long since she''d last worn one, she had to be reminded it could be put on over her head. After finally settling it slightly above her waist, she finally undid her trousers, then had to breathe through her nose to try and control the pain as they were pulled off. After that, she had to endure the woman washing her legs, which went up almost uncomfortably high.


    Finally, however, the suffering ended, and she was able to lie back down on the bed. It still smelled slightly of sweat, but once she flipped the pillow over to its other side that became tolerable, as the medic folded her clothes and set them aside for later. Then it was time to change her bandage. The blood had dried and parts had scabbed, and Lori had to numb her arm again as the inner bandage had adhered to her wound and had to be tentatively pulled off, which of course hurt. Everything had been hurting. This whole day seemed to be nothing but hurting.


    There was more hurting as the wound was washed, even more hurting as antiseptic was used on it, and then a relative twinge of agony as it was wrapped with new bandages, still warm from being boiled. She was also offered some osiel bark for the pain, which she took reluctantly. It was tough to chew, but it did help, a little.


    "I also recommend putting ice on your injuries, Great Binder," the medic said. "Though you will need to create the ice. I have some water here, and a mold to form it."


    Lori scowled in annoyance. She was tired, hurting, hungry, and now she had to make ice? Well, at least it was going to be used to her benefit.


    And she had to admit, the leather bags full of ice on her wound, while initially painful when laid on, felt very nice¡­


    When she woke up again, the medic was taking off the bags of mostly water, and Rian was sitting on the bed opposite her, his legs crossed and balancing a plank of wood, writing with a twig that still smoked slightly. Next to him on the bare wooden bed were three wooden bowls of food, as well as a pitcher of what she could tell was full of waterwisps, and two cups. Between them was a single fat candle, usually kept in reserve in case of a dragon. Most of their fat was used for soap.


    For a moment, she just lay there despite her left side feeling numb from lying down on it, staring at her lord, who seemed to not have noticed her attention yet. At some point, someone had pulled a sheet up to her waist.


    "What are you doing here?" she said eventually. That caused the medic who''d been straightening her blouse to pause for a moment, before removing her hands.


    Rian looked up from his writing board. "You hungry?"


    "Obviously," she said. "What are you doing here?"


    "My lordly duties," Rian said, setting aside his plank and his twig. "Keeping you from having to talk to people, keeping people from having to talk to you, and keeping you alive."


    "You did a terrible job," Lori said.


    "Who do you think told medic Daising what she should say to not annoy you?" Rian said, nodding over her and presumably to the medic, who Lori could feel behind her as a void of wisps. "Thank you Daising. Why don''t you go home, I''ll take it from here. If something happens I''ll wake one of the others."


    "As you say, Lord Rian," the medic said, and Lori felt her walking away, heard the door open and close.


    "Can you sit up?" Rian asked. "I have food here."


    "I saw," Lori said. "What makes you think I''ll eat it, after your insolence?"


    "Because you missed lunch and dinner, same as me," Rian said, "and you''re not the type to inconvenience yourself to spite someone else. You prefer it the other way around."


    Lori kept glaring at him, then slowly lay down on her back, careful of her right. It still throbbed, but seemed to hurt that little bit less. She sighed as feeling started rushing back to her left. Rian stood, and she watched him warily as he picked up a strangely wide tray and laid it over her legs, where it stood like some kind of table.


    "They had this made for people who couldn''t get out of bed," he said, "so they can eat. Which bowls do you want?"


    "Do you think I''ve forgotten?" she said. "My sleep wasn''t that restful."


    "What, me questioning your survival instincts?" Rian said. "Given the stunt you just did, I think I had a legitimate right to question it. If you''d been doing so much work you''d rather die, you should have at least told me about it. I could have done something."


    "It was an accident," she repeated insistently.


    "A completely avoidable one, from what I heard," Rian said, putting the three bowls on the strange tray, all three with spoons in them. He''d folded up the edges of the bedroll she was lying on so that the tray rested on the table, so it didn''t move when she shifted. "Am I sounding like your parents again?"


    Yes.


    "Yes," she said coldly. "You are not. You serve me."


    "And this is how I''m doing it," he said. "By reminding you so much you become sick of it that you''re not allowed to risk your life. I can''t serve you if you''re not alive to serve, Lori."


    "This insubordination is service?"


    "Well, you are bad about being paranoid for your safety," he said. He pointed. "You haven''t even noticed that knife yet."


    She turned, following his gaze, and saw her knife, the one he''d insisted she bring along in case of an emergency. Next to it were her utensils.


    "It fell off when you did," Rian said. "I suppose you didn''t secure it very well. I thought you''d want it brought back to you sooner and not later when you realized it was missing. See? Service. You should probably put that under your pillow or something. Wouldn''t want it just lying there tempting people, after all."


    She glared at him and reached for the knife.


    Agony erupted in her right arm as she remembered her wounds too late. She hissed, and it took her a while to remember to draw out the lightningwisps to numb the pain. That caused her arm to collapse like a dead weight, however, as the muscles in it ceased being able to function under her control.


    Rian rounded the bed to her right side, moving aside the stool where the clothes she was wearing had lain as she breathed in phantom pain and anticipation of pain, letting her right arm rest on her chest. "Do you want me to hand it to you?" he said.


    She glared at him. "Fine."


    He picked it up, and held it to her, handle first. She took it and awkwardly tucked it under her pillow.


    "See? Service, you ungrateful pain in the ass. Now, which of the food are you going to eat so I can finally have dinner?"


    She glared at him, because she hadn''t ordered him to skip dinner until she ate, and what if he was so weak with hunger that he fumbled messily in delivering the food, then struggled to sit up. He wordlessly reached for two more pillows just lying on the bed behind him and tucked them behind her back to help hold her up. They were small and worn, but they helped. She picked a bowl and slid it towards him.


    He took it and sat down on the stool, eating a spoonful as she touched her food, judged it was too cold, and began to warm it. Despite the fact the food was likely cold, congealed and unappetizing, he ate it as if it was fresh from the kitchen, and was already halfway finished when she judged her food was warm enough for her, the smell of warm stew filling her nose.


    She reached for a spoon and nearly screamed in agony as the injured edge of her right arm struck the wooden tray.


    As she leaned back, hissing through her teeth and trying not to shed tears in pain for one too many times that day, Rian put down his empty bowl and picked up one of the bowls she''d just warmed. As she glared at him, he stirred the bowl and took a small spoonful.


    "Open your mouth," he said.


    "I''m not a child," she said.


    He didn''t say anything else. Just sat there patiently


    Eventually, angrily, she opened her mouth.


    She burned her tongue.

 68 - Oh, Rainbows

    When Lori woke up, her initial confusion and almost panic at waking up in a strange place was detoured by the fact she hurt. Her right side throbbed and felt stiff, as if solidifying, and her right forearm¡­ it didn''t throb, it had been dipped in molten wax and someone had opened her veins to push that wax into her veins. It pulsed, keeping time like a painful heartbeat, and the bandages felt too tight. She also had a headache for some reason, and she was thirsty.


    For a moment, she just lay there on the bed, recalling the events that had brought her there and stewing in immediate regret.


    Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. She shouldn''t have ridden the dragon scale conglomerate, no matter how much her feet ached from walking. It had been such a dangerous, stupid idea, and now here she was stuck on a, admittedly very soft and comfortable and so much nicer than her own, bed.


    And now she had to relieve herself, and she had a feeling that one way or another, this was going to be very undignified.


    As she thought of struggling out of the nice, soft bed, there was a thump next to her, and she painfully turned her head¡ª pulling at her right side, ow¡ªto find Rian sleeping on the bare wooden bed next to her. The thump was his bent leg inexplicably kicking the planks under him, even as his eyes stayed closed and the rest of him lay tranquilly.


    She watched, bemused, as he kept kicking the bed despite giving all signs of being fast asleep. Absently, she heard a door open, and one of the doctors came out, blinking, to see what was wrong. He took one look at Rian, turned around, and went back to his room, shaking his head.


    For a moment, she just lay there with nothing but Rian''s strange sleep-kicking and her pain to keep her company. Why was her neck hurting? That was one of the few part of her right side she hadn''t hit¡­


    And then her body reminded herself it had other functions with which to make her uncomfortable.


    Wincing, she tried to get to her feet. Her right arm still worked, despite pulsing with agony, and if she held it against her chest, it wouldn''t swing around and hurt. No, instead it would stay in place and hurt, but at least it was hurting because she was keeping it under control, not because it was just hanging loose. Her hip hurt from moving, but it was not incapacitating. It was¡­ pain. She could live with it.


    The stone floor was cold under her feet, and for a moment she wondered where her socks were. The thought was fleeting, however, as her standing up seemed to give added urgency to her needs. Fortunately, she''d been the one to put the latrine here, and she''d been back recently to alter it so the waste could be cleaned out from outside, so she knew where it was.


    It was dark in there, but she was a Whisperer. Light was not a problem. Taking off her skirt was harder, because she hadn''t worn a skirt since she could stop and had to remember how to get it off¡­


    Putting it back on was also a challenge, but having one less thing hurt let her find the strength to do it. Limping across the cold stone floor, she contemplated¡­ what? Going back to her room in her bare feet to get new clothes? Which she''d have to put on one-handed? Work through the day like this, her right arm beating like a second heart that only pumped pain?


    ¡­


    Sighing, she tried to look for her shoes and socks without needing to bend down so she could go outside.


    She was trying to remember how to make a reflective binding with lightwisps so she could see under the beds without bending over when she heard someone say, "What are you doing out of bed?"


    "Looking for my shoes," she said, finally remembering that it was simple redirection and making the necessary binding, swaying a little as she bent down to look though it. "I have work to do. I need to finish the second level so the people can start moving there." No, her shoes weren''t under the bed. "Where are my shoes?"


    "I had them washed," Rian said. "And someone with cobbling tools is going over them for any damage."


    Oh. Well¡­ good!


    "What about my socks?" she asked.


    There was wooden creaking, and the sound of bare feet on the stone floor. "Getting washed, along with the rest of your clothes. People are very happy with the new washing area, by the way. People had already put up washing lines yesterday. I think we''re going to have far fewer incidents of people ''borrowing'' each other''s washboards in the bath house. How did you know about that?"


    "Know about what?" she said, trying not to move her head too much. It seemed to ache from inertia when it had to stop.


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    "Ah. Never mind, then,"


    She frowned, annoyed. Why did he waste her time when she was trying to find her shoes? No, wait, he''d already told her¡­


    "Lori, why don''t you go back to bed and I''ll get you some breakfast," Rian said. "I''ll get you some water too, how about that?"


    He held out his hand.


    She glared at it. "I''m not decrepit," she said. "I don''t need physical assistance getting to the bed."


    Rian nodded. At least he was acting reasonable now. Whatever color had gotten into his head that had made him such an insolent little bug seemed to have washed away. Not that she was going to forgive him, but at least he wasn''t making things any worse for himself. "Do you want me to get you that water then?"


    "Fine¡­" she grumbled, swaying slightly as she turned to return to the bed. "I''ll just¡­ wake up all the way first before going back to work¡­"


    "I''m sure the weavers and ropers can wait a little," Rian said as he went to step out. "I''ll have Daising come and put ice on your bruises again. Does it still hurt?"


    Obviously.


    "Obviously," she said, sitting down carefully since the bedroll on the bed was thin and the bed''s planks hard. Her brief time away had given the thing time to cool, and now it felt nice under her as she took a moment to get her dizziness under control, using both hands to keep from swaying too much.


    Her head ached. Why did her head ache? Though it was also nice and cool, if a bit uncomfortable because it was against something hard¡­ oh. Her face was against the floor. Why was her face against the floor? She tried to push herself up, banged her right elbow on something, and screamed in agony as her right arm decided it was a good time to be carved open and spill acid all over the floor...


    "Lori?-! Lori! Where-! Lori!"


    Ugh, Rian, don''t be so loud, you were in the same room, there was no need to yell. Argh, be gentle, that hurt¡­!


    "You''re burning up¡­ shit¡­ Doctor! Samoth, Ganan, anyone, I need help!"


    Again with the yelling. Why was he yelling in her ear?


    "Stop yelling," she said tiredly. "I can hear you just fine¡­"


    "Did you hurt yourself anywhere?"


    Yes, obviously, she''d hurt herself yesterday¡­ her right side ached, and come to think of it so did her the side of her neck and her armpits and¡­


    She felt herself gently being pulled up, winced internally as she heard the commotion of the doctors coming out of their rooms. Together, the three helped her get back on her bed. She was perfectly capable of doing it herself, of course, if it wasn''t for the pain on her right, and um¡­ something¡­


    "Lori¡­" Rian was in front of her. Why was he so close? She could smell his breath, and ugh it stank¡­ "Lori, how do you feel?"


    "Ugh¡­" she moaned.


    "That''s a bad moan," she heard him say. "That''s a very bad moan... Lori, we''re going to take off your bandages and clean your wound again, all right? This might hurt a little."


    More pain. Wasn''t she in enough pain? She tried to tell them no, but she could already feel the bandages being unwrapped and¡­ ooh, that felt a little better, maybe this wasn''t so¡ª


    She felt something dribbling down her arm. Was she bleeding? Argh! Argh! Stop poking, that hurt!


    "Infected," she heard someone say. "This is bad, Rian. Her arm¡­"


    Lori tried to open her eyes¡ªwhen had she closed them?¡ªbut even that simple movement seemed to make her head swirl dizzily, so she had to close them again. Where was Rian with that water? She was so thirsty now¡­


    Someone set her right arm on cold fire, and she cried out, trying to pull it away but it was held tight, and she felt so weak¡­


    "Lori! Lori calm down! We''re trying to help you! Lori, calm down!"


    Rian?


    "Y-yeah, it''s me Lori, it''s me, calm down."


    Rian¡­ it hurts¡­


    "It''ll be all right Lori, we''re just cleaning your arm. Hold my hand, it''ll be over soon¡­"


    She tried to twist her body away, and immediately regretted it, her right side and her armpits and her neck and her groin all punishing her and making her suffer. She felt a hand on hers and held it tight¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Lori woke up, her initial confusion and almost panic at waking up in a strange place was detoured by the fact she hurt. Her head felt like it was being squeezed, random parts of her body pulsed and ached, the whole of her felt like it had been set on fire, and her right arm¡­ Never had she felt like she wanted to rip off a body part and cast it as far away from her as possible, but she wanted to do just that now. Her right arm wasn''t hers anymore. It was clearly a traitor, sent by some unknown enemy to destroy her from within.


    For a moment, she just lay there on the bed, clenching her eyes shut, trying to remember¡­ something¡­


    "Are we ready to launch?"


    "The boat''s ready, Lord Rian. Food, water, the new oars, the tent¡­"


    "Then let''s get started¡­ hands under the bedroll everyone¡­"


    Lori felt herself stomach lurch as she left it behind somehow, her head flopping back as her pillow fell from her head¡ª"Shit, someone grab that!"¡ªand her headache descended to new depths of disorientation. She felt her right arm on her chest, in fresh agony as if her wounds had all been torn open all over again¡­


    Suddenly she was in the sun, and it was hot, so hot, she was sweating, her headache pounding even harder from the new heat, and there were murmurs of people like in the bunkers, hot and bright and noisy, and dread filled her as she knew that any moment now, people were going to start making noise and call it music¡­


    She heard splashing, and suddenly the swaying stopped, her legs dropping on something, even as the rest of her went down a little more gently. She felt her pillow being tucked back behind her head, and she wanted to look, but even though her eyelids it was so bright, and she knew if she opened them the sun would be in her eyes¡­


    Lori felt a gently swaying back and forth, and suddenly, darkness and coolness. Her body was still hot, but no longer from the sun, even as she felt wind against her sweat, cooling her gently¡­


    Thuds. Crunching. Rocking sideways, and suddenly she felt like she was bouncing as well as rocking and swaying as voices sounded around her confusingly, and her headache couldn''t take it, make it stop, please stop¡­!


    One voice rose above the confusion, and she focused on it, trying to hear.


    "Oars in the water! We''ve never done this before, so we have to learn now, and we can''t stop! Down, pull, up, forward, down, pull, up, forward¡­"


    She knew that voice¡­


    Lori fell back into sleep to the sound of uncoordinated splashing.

 69 - The Cost of Treatment

    When Lori woke up, her initial confusion and almost panic at waking up in a strange place was detoured by the fact she no longer hurt.


    Bewildered, she raised her right arm. The bandage was gone, and there was only unmarred skin on her forearm. How¡­?


    That''s when she realized she wasn''t inside her demesne.


    Lori jerked up to a sitting position, looking around. She was in a room with walls made of wood. Not wood planks, or cut logs, but one contiguous wall of wood, all of a single piece. The floor was wood too, smooth and whole and melding seamlessly with the wall. She was lying on a bed¡ªa normal bed, made from carpentry instead of Deadspeaking¡ª atop a sweat-soaked bedroll, and none of that mattered because she couldn''t feel the wisps around her. The bed was one of two, and the other bed was just bare wood. The windows were small and round, looking like knots in the wood, and there was a single door marring the smoothness of the walls.


    She started breathing in barely controlled panic, taking in magic, letting it build up inside her, giving herself something solid to focus on. She had nothing to readily work with but airwisps, lightwisps and darkwisps, but that was fine. The most basic methods of self-defense magic were blinding and deafening your foe.


    The door opened, and she leapt to her feet, magic from her core rushing through her as she bound the airwisps in her breath and around her head, blocking her ears to keep from being deafened as she¡ª


    ¡ªtripped on the skirt she was wearing and stumbled, falling face-first on the floor as she lost control of her wisps in her surprise. There was a loud snap¡ªas opposed to the deafening bang there would have been¡ªas the airwisps she hadn''t finished binding released the magic she''d partially imbued into them.


    "Gah!" she heard someone¡ªRian?¡ª cry out, their words muffled. "Oh, you''re awake. That was fast. We thought you''d still be asleep."


    Lori blinked, and released the binding over her ears as she looked up to see Rian holding a tray and¡ªBREAD!


    No, no, she had to stay focused! She wasn''t in her demesne, she was in danger!


    Also, why was she wearing a skirt?


    ¡­


    Oh, right.


    Rian put down the tray¡ªshe saw it was just the writing plank he carried around being used as a tray¡ªto help her up. Normally she wouldn''t have needed his help, but she hadn''t worn a skirt in so long she kept stepping on the hem, almost pulled the skirt down her waist, and fell over trying to keep herself from becoming stripped indecent.


    "Careful," he said as he caught her, preventing her from falling on her face twice in one day. "We just got you healed up. Stop trying to break your neck so soon."


    She glared, though since she was still bent over, it wasn''t directed at his face, and so he missed the full effect. After making sure of what her feet were stepping on, Lori straightened and pulled herself out of his grip. "Where are we, Rian?" she demanded.


    "River''s Fork, where else?" Rian said, turning around to pick up the improvised tray. Lori twitched when she saw the three pieces of flatbread on the tray, as well as a bowl of various chopped fruits, and another bowl of what looked like stew. "It was the only place we could take you."


    "Why?" she said, trying to growl the word out through gritted teeth to keep the panic in check.


    "Your wound had gotten infected despite the antiseptic, which we ran through a lot of, by the way. You''d gone feverish and delirious, and we were all out of medicines to treat an entrenched infection," Rian said. "None of the doctors and medics were sure they could keep you alive. So I made the decision to take you here to try and get you healed. I figured having you alive to be mad at me was better than literally any other alternative that involved you dead."


    "Mad? Why would I be mad?" she said. "After all, you just decided to remove me from my demesne and put me in the power of another Binder. Why would that possibly make me angry?"


    She was snarling as she finished, binding the air around her, wondering if she should risk drawing lightningwisps from her arm to throw it at him. It would just replenish thanks to her connection to her core, after all.


    "It was the logical thing to do," he protested. "If you died from infection, we''d have needed to go to her to try and convince her to claim the core anyway. Anyway, you can calm down. She obviously healed you instead of killing you, didn''t she?"


    "That doesn''t mean it was what you should have done!" she snapped.


    "Well, you should have left orders for what we should do if you were ever incapacitated and unable to make decisions," Rian said. "You made me lord, so I made a lordly decision to bring you here and see if she''ll heal you, which she did."


    "She is unlikely to have done that for free," Lori said darkly.


    "No, she did not," Rian confirmed. "But don''t worry, I haggled her to something you''d accept."


    "Oh." Lori coughed. "Well, I''ll be the judge of that! What does she want in return for this?"


    "Well, she originally wanted to do it for free, but I managed to convince her you''d be really suspicious about that, so I talked her up to three sets of stone wheels for carts and you listening to a proposal she has," Rian said. "No agreeing, just listening. And I even got her provide you with meals while we''re here. Just you, don''t worry, everyone else is taking care of their own food arrangements. They all have friends here, so they''ll be eating with them." He sighed. "More ration stew for me."


    Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    Lori latched on to the only thing she had to be suspicious of. "What proposal?" she demanded.


    "She didn''t say," Rian said. "But don''t worry, you only have to listen, there''s no obligation to go through with it."


    "There better not be," Lori said.


    "There isn''t!" Rian said. "I made sure of that. Honestly, as far as medical treatment, meals, and a place to sleep tonight goes, wheels and a conversation are pretty cheap."


    Lori crossed her arms, then glared down at the blouse she was wearing. It was far too loose on her frame. "Well then, where are my shoes?"


    "In the bag," Rian said, pointing behind towards the foot of the other bed. Lori looked, and saw a leather satchel that she hadn''t noticed from her previous angle. "Your socks are in there too, along with the rest of the clothes you were wearing when you had your completely avoidable and surely never to be repeated accident. Umu and Mikon washed them with your nice new laundry area."


    "Amazing," she said blandly. "See, you can talk to them and ask them to do laundry for you."


    Rian, in the process of bending down to put the tray of food on the bare wooden bed, paused. "Are you seriously making sarcastic comments about me being unable to talk to people? You? The woman who specifically has someone¡ªme¡ªto talk to other people because she doesn''t like doing it herself?"


    "I dislike talking to people," Lori said. "What''s your reason?"


    Rian put down the tray. "Well, at least you''re feeling better. Any headaches? Lingering pains? "


    Lori frowned and rotated her right shoulder. There was no sudden explosion of agony. She poked at her right side. The flesh beneath was soft and did not erupt into burning fire that made her want to turn the blood there into ice. "None," she said. Even the slight ache in her back from sleeping on her bed with only her laundry and raincoat as a mattress was gone.


    "Well!" Rian said. "Definitely worth some wheels and a conversation, don''t you think?"


    "Hmph," Lori ''hmph''-ed contrarily.


    "Anyway, eat up," Rian said, straightening up and leaning on the wall next to the bed. "I helped Shana make the bread, so you don''t have to worry about it being poisoned or anything."


    "She''s a Deadspeaker, she doesn''t need to poison it to kill me," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, she could have not healed you," Rian said brightly. "But I figured you''d still like to know I watched to make sure it wasn''t poisoned."


    Well, yes¡­ but he didn''t need to know that.


    "Shana says you can rest and wait until tomorrow to make the wheels," Rian said. "The doctors say you need to rest too, since your body''s been through an ordeal. They say they''ll be bringing you a lot of fruit and bread to try and bring your body''s reserves back up."


    "We''re leaving tomorrow," Lori said. "So I''ll make the wheels today and then listen to her proposal. What time is it?" It was a bit hard to tell from the light at the window, since the dome over River''s Fork had an effect on the sunlight coming down.


    "Not yet noon," Rian said. "So this is technically breakfast and lunch."


    Lori frowned. "Not yet noon? How did we get here so quickly? It usually takes us half a day to get here with the waterjet."


    "I''m flattered you think we got here that fast," Rian said. "But you were down and just this side of being a corpse. Doctor Samoth said you were dangerously feverish several times. It''s a good thing we had to keep splashing you with water to get rid of Iridescence, or you might have overheated."


    Lori blinked. "Then how did we get here?"


    "We rowed," Rian said blandly. "I had oars made when it looked like your wounds might be infected, just in case, and we traveled on eight manpower for all day and part of the night. It''s a good thing someone had a good mirrored lantern they were willing to lend us. And that this place was downriver. Everyone is completely exhausted."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "You don''t look like it."


    "I accidentally took a nap while you were unconscious after Shana healed you," Rian said. "I''m really glad no one killed you in my sleep, or else I''d be really embarrassed."


    Lori blinked and took a closer look at her lord. His eyes had a slightly unfocussed look, and he was swaying slightly.


    "You haven''t slept yet," she realized.


    "I told you, I had a short nap while you were asleep," Rian said.


    "Rian," she said, pointing at the bedroll she''d just vacated. "Go to sleep before you fall where you stand."


    "Is that an order?" he said.


    "Yes," she said. "That''s an order."


    "You sure? What if you need someone to watch your back?"


    "Then I''ll put it against a wall. Go to sleep, Rian."


    He nodded. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori watched him take his shoes off before he collapsed onto the bedroll she''d been sleeping in and closed his eyes, an arm over his face to block the light through his eyelids. After a moment, he pulled the pillow from beneath his head and put that on over his face.


    By the time Lori finished the first disc of flatbread, his breathing was smooth and even. When she started on the sliced fruits¡ªthere was happyfruit, hairy blueball, and a few others she was surprised to recognize from the old continent. There was a pink lady, and¡­ yes, that one was a golden bud! She loved those! Had the Golden Sweetwood Company, or at least this place''s previous Binder, managed to bring seeds with them? That¡­ maybe if she threw in another pair of wheels, Shanalorre would let them have some seeds?


    It was something to consider.


    By the time she finished all the food, Rian''s foot was twitching on the bedroll.


    For a moment, Lori sat there, and had to wonder whose bedroll she''d been sleeping in all this time. It wasn''t like the village had any spares. In fact, considering she didn''t have one, there was a definite deficit. Someone had to have volunteered their bedroll for her to be laid down on.


    She sighed, adding them to the list of people she had to offer restitution to, along with the owner of the clothes she was wearing. Something to have Rian find out for her later.


    Lori gave him one last look, then started taking deep breaths. When she''d taken in enough magic, she bound some lightwisps for illumination, and then covered the windows with darkwisps for some privacy, and changed clothes. After putting on her shoes and socks, she folded the skirt and blouse neatly and stuck them in the bag with the jars of rations and water skin in there, before dispelling the darkwisps.


    She took a deep breath, already planning how to make the wheels. There should still be boulders in the river she could use as materials, provided she could get close enough to touch them. More than enough for three sets of wheels. Simple. Then she could listen to whatever proposal Binder Shanalorre had in mind and be away in the morning. Lori''s Boat was still their only vessel, so they must have taken that, and the water jet was still attached. They''d be back by midday tomorrow.


    Lori wished she had her staff with her, if only to make her feel better. She always felt better when she had a long, heavy stick to hand for hitting people with if she needed to. But no, she''d left that in her room in her Dungeon, because she hadn''t thought she''d need it during a walk¡­


    She shook her head, reminded herself she was a grown woman and a Binder, and stepped out of the room into the pre-noon sun.

 70 - An Altercation

    River''s Fork was different from how she''d left it last time. For one, there was a lot more traditional carpentry construction visible, rather than just buildings made from Deadspeaking. There were more people bustling about as well, carrying things. The dining hall that had just been completed when they''d last been there was full and had seemingly been expanded, with benches and some sort of cooking area¡ªa grill?¡ªoutside of it.


    She''d learned how to navigate River''s Fork, a little, from the time they''d been ferrying people to her demesne. It involved using the central tree as a reference point, and recognizing which side of it was facing you. She was about a quarter turn away from the beach where they usually kept Lori''s Boat, which was her first destination. She needed to make sure that nothing had happened to the waterjet, lest she have to make another one¡­


    Also, she had to find a latrine, apparently she''d been unconscious for more than one day¡­


    Well, at least she was close to the dining hall. They had a row of latrines near there, if she recalled correctly.


    The dining hall was starting to fill up with people as she finished her business. While River''s Fork apparently still expected each family to make their own meals using food rationed from a central store, lunch at least seemed to take place centrally, so that people could eat quickly and go back to work. The air was filled with the smells of sweat, sawdust, and food being cooked as Lori skirted the edges, going around the place so she could head to her destination and absently stepping around people who weren''t watching where they were going and had gotten in her way. The sooner those wheels were done¡­


    Lori came to a sudden stop as someone grabbed her wrist in a tight grip, causing her to stumble in surprise and confusion.


    "Tah! I''m talking to you!" the green-haired woman who had grabbed her said.


    Lori frowned. "I think you''ve mistaken me for someone else," she said, trying to pull her wrist free, but to her surprise the woman tightened her grip almost painfully.


    "You don''t remember me, do you?" the woman said, sounding surprised and angry. "You nearly killed me and you don''t even remember."


    "I think you''ve definitely mistaken me for someone else," Lori said, trying to be reasonable as she took deep, even breaths. "Now, please let me go, I have work to¡ª"


    The blow swung at Lori''s face, but she managed to pull back, and it missed, then there was a flash of pain as the woman settled for a hammer blow to the bicep. The woman was stronger than she looked, because it hurt, as did the second blow to almost the same place, and the third.


    Lori didn''t let there be a fourth.


    Lightningwisps were imbued, and Lori''s arm went numb, deadening the pain from the blows as the violent woman started shaking violently, her hand tightening momentarily around Lori''s arm in a grip she didn''t feel before she let go, stumbling back in confusion and leaving herself open.


    Lori, with precision, malice, form and her own anger, stomped the woman in the side of the knee.


    There was a distinct crack of something breaking, and the woman collapsed like an argument no one was listening to, screaming in pain. Lori took a step back and got ready to kick the other knee, or possibly the woman''s face, whichever¡ª


    Someone grabbed her and pulled her back, and then someone was at her other side doing the same, both of them disjointedly yelling, "Calm down!", "Relax!", "Stop, stop!" and other silly nonsense. Lori tried to free her arms, but if anything they held on even tighter and kept pulling her away from the woman, who was now wailing and clutching at her knee, surrounded by people and pointing at Lori, saying something unintelligible because of her crying. Lori imbued the lightningwisps in her arms again, about to force them to release her, when¡ª


    "What is going on here?" someone demanded in a firm, authoritative, carrying voice that reminded Lori far too much of some of her old teachers.


    The people around her clearly hadn''t had any similar experiences, because instead of closing their mouths shut, they all started trying to talk over each other at the same time, the injured woman most of all, sounding completely incoherent as she pointed at Lori while trying to cradle her knee and then stop cradling her knee because it had shifted and suddenly hurt even more. The man who stepped forward looked vaguely familiar though, and Lori was definitely sure she''d seen him before. Now, where¡­?


    The two men had loosened their hold when the man had appeared, and Lori was finally able to pull her arms out of their grip, giving them an annoyed glare as she straightened her shirt. Maybe she should have found a length of firewood or a stick for her to carry or something she could set on fire¡­


    "Binder Lori, is this true?"


    Lori blinked, and realized the vaguely familiar man was talking to her. "What is true?"


    The man pointed at the fallen woman. "Naineb claims you attacked her without provocation."


    "Ridiculous. She attacked me," Lori said. "I''ve never even met her before, and she just grabbed me as I was walking, rambled about nonsense, and then attacked me with her fist."


    "And her broken leg?"


    "The woman is clearly violent and not very smart," Lori said. "I had to defend myself and put her down so she stopped being a threat to my person." She frowned. The familiarity was really nagging¡­ "Who are you?"


    "I''m Lord Yllian," the man said, sounding vaguely tired. "We''ve met before."


    Lori blinked. "We have?"


    The man sighed. "I''m going to have to ask you to come with me to speak with the Great Binder so she can make a judgement on this."


    Lori huffed in annoyance. "Very well."


    Really, this was so inconvenient. She just wanted to make some wheels so she could leave tomorrow!


    Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.


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    Apparently, Binder Shanalorre normally had lunch alone in her home, cooking her own food. Lori would have wondered whether that was the best use of her time, but then remembered the person in question was an uneducated savant who only knew healing. Currently, she was a figurehead and someone to keep people from dying. Not that Lori wasn''t grateful to be kept from dying of infection, but even so, there was only so much Binder Shanalorre could do. So she probably had plenty of time to eat lunch alone at home.


    That lunch was being interrupted as Lori, the woman who''d attacked her, Lord Yllian, and some of the local militia were made to wait in the house that Shanalorre used as her ground-level office. It was surprisingly very office-like, with a wall full of writing of what looked like¡­ some kind of tally? It had a Deadspoken table that was full of sheets of either parchment or small scraps of seel leather with more writing, and there was even a basket with ''to wash'' written on it full of sheets. There''d been a bench outside, and in her previous visits Lori had seen that bench full of people who wanted to talk to Shanalorre.


    Why she didn''t have a lord or lady to keep annoyances like that away from her, Lori had no idea. Maybe she was just so lacking in things to do she had to handle talking to her people herself.


    The woman had needed to be carried, since she couldn''t put any weight on her knee, and she alternated between wailing piteously and swearing vividly at Lori as she was jostled repeatedly on the way to the office. Since the woman seemed to be focusing on accusing a hypothetical father of disturbing sexual practices that resulted in Lori''s existence, Lori didn''t bother to respond. She didn''t have a father.


    They''d also been joined by a man who smelled of sawdust, was covered in sawdust, kept giving Lori angry, threatening looks and who kept trying to comfort the injured woman. From the context, he seemed to be her husband. They''d brought the bench inside, and the woman lay on it, trying not to jostle her leg as one of the two doctors left in the demesne¡ªnot Shanalorre''s uncle, Lori could tell that much¡ª examined it. Apparently, Lori had been unable to break the knee. The crack had been something tearing.


    Lori, for her part, kept breathing evenly, taking in magic and readied to unleash the lightningwisps in her arms should it be needed as she leaned against one of the walls. She wished she had her staff with her, or even just a coalcharm. Though if she was wishing, she might as well wish for mastery over all forms of magic¡­


    The door opened quietly, and when Shanalorre stepped inside, she almost seemed furtive, but that was just a product of her size. When she entered, everyone''s gaze was on her, as it should be. Even the injured women seemed to try to stifle her whining and moaning in Shanalorre''s presence, then ruined it by giving an annoyed look at the back of the younger Binder''s head when she just passed by with no comment or deviation.


    Shanalorre went behind her table and after a moment''s awkwardness settled herself on the tall stool that let her, if not be eye level with adults, at least probably let her be close to it for seated adults. Her gaze was not childlike. It was serious, even imperious, and it looked at everyone in the room, even Lori, like they were wasting her time. The fact her hands were still slightly wet, no doubt from needing to be washed, did not detract from it at all.


    "Lord Yllian, please report what happened," she said calmly. Then, she glanced at Lori. "Binder Lolilyuri, please try not to have your mind wander and pay attention."


    Lori was mildly offended at the accusation, and resolved to recall how to hide her wandering thoughts better. She used to be able to hide it in school¡­


    "Great Binder," Lord Yllian said, coming to attention. "During the midday meal, I became aware of an altercation. Unfortunately, I was on the far side of the dining hall, so I wasn''t able to witness any of it myself, only the aftermath. I found Naineb on the ground with an injured knee and Binder Lolilyuri being restrained and pulled away from her. I went to Naineb first to ascertain her injury, and she claimed that Binder Lolilyuri had attacked her suddenly and without warning, and had been pulled away before she could do more damage."


    Lori became aware of the more intense glare the husband was directing at her and frowned at him. Surely he didn''t believe that nonsense? He married the woman, he of all people should know she was irrational.


    "When I spoke to Binder Lolilyuri," Lord Yllian continued, "she testified that Naineb attacked her, that she had never met Naineb before, and that she had been accosted and attacked while walking, and had merely defended herself."


    "That liar!" the Naineb woman cried through gritted teeth. Lori, her own injuries fresh on her mind, could almost sympathize with her pain. Almost.


    But she didn''t.


    "I see," Shanalorre said, nodding as if she agreed. "And what do you say really happened, Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "I was on my way to the river to make wheels," Lori said succinctly, "when this woman grabbed my arm." She held up the arm in question. Unfortunately, there was nothing so dramatic as a bruise in the shape of a hand. "I told her she''d mistaken me for someone else, and she began ranting nonsense about my trying to kill her. When I politely asked her to release me again, as I had work to do, she attacked me. I forced her to release me, and then incapacitated her, since she was clearly violent. That was when I was then assaulted by two more people from behind, and they restrained me despite my being the defending party."


    "That''s not how it happened!" the woman cried.


    "Kozya Naineb, be quiet and wait your turn," Shanalorre said levelly. She was being much more patient than Lori would have been. "Binder Lolilyuri, what were you doing at the dining hall? You say you were on your way to the river to make wheels, but the area of the river with the rocks you prefer to use is on the opposite side of the house you were placed to recover in from the dining hall."


    "I needed to use that lavatory, since I''d been unconscious for more than a day," Lori said blandly.


    Binder Shanalorre nodded. She finally turned to look at the woman, who seemed to be shaking from more than pain. "And you, kozya Naineb? What do you say happened?"


    The woman pointed at Lori, then winced as this seemed to change her balance and put pressure on her knee. "I-I was j-just minding my own business when she just kicked me in the knee!" the woman lied outrageously, her voice shaking and stuttering slightly. It would probably be attributed to the pain. "Just like that! I didn''t even see her coming! She was going to do it again too, but some decent people pulled her away from me before she could do more. I know she wanted to! I could see the murder in her eyes."


    All right, maybe Lori had been aiming more for her head than her knee.


    For his part, the husband rounded on Lori, and only some of the militiamen and the doctor physically barring his way kept him from getting too close to her. His words still reached though. "You leave my wife alone, you hear me!" he roared, playing that intimidation game of where he made it look like he was trying to force his way past three men, but allowing himself to be pushed away. "You leave her alone! Haven''t you ruined our lives enough?"


    That required a response. "I don''t even know you people," Lori said blandly. "Why would I even have anything to do with you?"


    For some reason, the man gave her the same look of surprise and anger his wife had earlier.


    "They were previously from Lorian Demesne," Binder Shanalorre said, as if by way of explanation.


    "That means nothing to me," Lori said. "And if they left, then they''re clearly not my concern anymore. They are yours, Binder Shanalorre." She gave Binder Shanalorre a level look. "One of your people attacked me. I demand restitution for this unprovoked attack on my sovereign person, or we shall be at war."


    War. It was a dramatic statement, and in a proper theater performance or novel, it would the point where there was a dramatic silence as the parties involved all felt the full horrific¡ªand dramatic¡ªimport of such a statement. Words like ''unthinkable'', ''grim'', ''portentous'' and other adjectives would have peppered mental narration and monologues, and there might even have been musical accompaniment.


    Alas, this was neither a theater performance nor a novel.


    "Duly noted," Binder Shanalorre said with a distinct lack of hesitation, drama, quaver, grimness, or any other fittingly appropriate emotion.


    Lori wished Rian was there with her and not sleeping. He could have made that statement sound properly dramatic.

 71 - That Would Have Been Nice To Know

    Though the woman deserved it, Lori had initially been glad when Shanalorre had finally healed whatever-her-name''s leg, so she didn''t have to listen to the piteous moaning, crying, sobbing, wincing, hissing and groaning anymore. After that, Shanalorre had stepped out with Lord Yllian, ostensibly to consider things, leaving Lori and the woman, her husband and a whole bunch of militia alone in her office to wait. The husband had sat down next to his wife when her leg had been healed, on the side closest to Lori, while the militia stood in the center of the room, glaring at both sides. Lori relented and grabbed the stool in front of Shanalorre''s desk to sit on it. While she was annoyed that Shanalorre hadn''t made a decisive proclamation immediately, she supposed the younger Binder had wanted to show she would not do things at Lori''s convenience. Lori could respect that. If Shanalorre ever came to her demesne, Lori made a note to make her wait too.


    As Lori sat, she hoped the tool she''d made for making wheels was still there. She''d made some before, in exchange for bread and some raw grain for them to try and grow in her demesne, but there was always a use for wheels. The tool wasn''t much¡ªbasically a convenient rock she''d shaped to put the would-be wheel on so she could get it properly round¡ªbut if she had to make another one because some idiot had taken it to use as part of an oven or something¡­ well, she''d make another one, but she''d be annoyed about it!


    Shanalorre and Lord Yllian soon returned, and once more took her place at the desk. She nodded towards Lori, who hadn''t stood up when the other Binder had entered, even though the woman and her husband had. Lori was amused to note that on their respective seats, she and Shanalorre were at eyelevel. She wondered if that was deliberate.


    "I have spoken with witnesses," she said. "After sorting through inconsistencies and lies, I have come to a conclusion."


    Shanalorre turned to Lori. "On behalf of myself and my demesne, I apologize for the unauthorized assault on your person. Lord Yllian, please arrest kozya Naineb and confine her to the stockade. I will decide her fate at a later time."


    "What? NO!" the woman cried. "I didn''t do anything wrong!"


    "I have witnesses confirming you indeed antagonized and assaulted Binder Lolilyuri unprovoked, kozya Naineb," Shanalorre said coolly. "That is ''wrong'', as every other child in my demesne knows."


    "I protest," Lori said. "Why is this woman not being exiled? Given precedent, that is the established punishment for her offense of attempted bodily assault on a Binder."


    The woman let out a scream and suddenly charged at Lori, only to find the militia in her path, trying to restrain her. They almost succeeded, at least until her husband weighed in on her behalf, knocking the militia aside, roaring about getting their hands off his wife. Lord Yllian moved to his Binder''s side, pulling her behind him as he drew the stick he was wearing at his waist like a sword, calling for the militia outside.


    Lori, unfortunately, had no one to do the same for her as her lord was currently asleep, on her orders. So when the woman managed to slip around the militiamen while they were preoccupied by her husband and come charging at Lori, she had no one to protect her.


    Lori opened her mouth, and darkwisps inside her and airwisps around her head she''d been binding and imbuing came together, binding around each other before streaming towards the woman''s face. The dark, smoke-like stream slammed into the woman, the darkwisps blinding her even as the airwisps made a loud snap. Blinded and hopefully disoriented by the deceptively gentle sound that Lori knew was a lot louder when it occurred right next to one''s ears, the woman stumbled, and Lori rose and smoothly grabbed her stool by one of the legs in the same motion, swinging it up to slam under the woman''s jaw.


    As the woman stumbled, Lori moved sideways slightly to position herself, drew back her foot and methodically repeated the same stomp that had stopped the woman before.


    There was a crack and another, more pained scream.


    The woman''s husband let out a cry, trying to push through the militia towards his wife, who''d once more fallen and was again clutching her knee. For a brief moment, he managed to push through, and knelt next to his wife, who was crying and screaming "This is her fault! This is her fault!" again and again, her face still blinded by darkwisps as the door opened to show more militia.


    He was promptly tackled from behind by the militia he''d just gotten past, and who were promptly joined by the ones coming in through the door. His wife''s cries gained a new dimension of agony as they all promptly fell in a pile on her and her once-more-ruined knee. It was all very prompt.


    Lori watched warily, but it seemed like the militia would actually be able to handle this now. Still, she stepped back carefully before examining the stool she was holding. The seat had popped off the legs slightly, but nothing a little light hammering couldn''t fix. The demesne''s woodworkers could probably take care of it.


    "That''s twice," Lori said, giving Shanalorre an unamused stare. "Both times unprovoked."


    "Duly noted," Shanalorre said, looking with disapproval past her lord.


    "Will she be exiled now?" Lori said. Beneath the pile of men trying to restrain the spouses, screaming that were almost words resounded.


    "I wish you had not pressed the issue," Binder Shanalorre said quietly, almost too quiet to be heard over the screaming. "But yes. She will be secured with Grem and exiled to Covehold when the time comes." There was a pause. "Her relations are welcome to stay, though I find it unlikely they will do so."


    "Why?" Lori said. "If they had wished to stay at Covehold, they''d have never joined the expedition to settle my demesne."


    For a moment, Shanalorre and Lord Yllian gave Lori a look.


    "What?" she said.


    "I suppose that is a logical statement to make," Shanalorre said eventually. "But people are seldom logical."


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    "No, they''re often idiots," Lori agreed. "Shall we discuss reparations?"


    Shanalorre blinked. "Reparations?"


    "Indeed," Lori said. "When a member of my demesne attacked you, we took immediate action and successfully prevented bodily harm to your person. That was not reciprocated in this instance. I had to defend myself. Twice. Reparations for allowing this to happen while within your demesne are necessary, to show you are truly regretful of the oversight."


    The two of them stared at each other for a long moment over the sounds of the husband finally being subdued and the wife getting her knee looked at again.


    "I''ve healed you," Shanalorre said.


    "The payment for that has already been negotiated, and will be paid. I was in fact on my way to do so when I was attacked," Lori said. "This is a separate matter."


    There was a mild commotion at the door as several militia dragged out the husband, and tried to get the wife on a proper stretcher instead of the improvised one Lori could vaguely remember she had been carried on. She was making it difficult for them not ceasing in her howling in pain and moving her leg.


    "I see," Shanalorre said eventually. "Yes, I follow the logic there."


    Lori did not smile triumphantly. This wasn''t a stage performance, after all. "I''ve noticed you possess certain fruit¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was nearing dusk by the time Lori returned to the house where she had left Rian, now escorted by a pair of militia. She''d been able to finish the wheels, though she''d needed to rush a little to finish them in time. It had been necessary, since she wanted to be gone the following day after listening to Shanalorre''s proposal and claiming her loot¡ªer, reparations. Still, the wheels were symmetrical, round, with a hole properly sized for an axle. They were even the same size as the wheels she''d provided before, in case they were to be used as a replacement. All of them had been officially received by River''s Fork in the person of¡­ someone, so the debt for her healing was almost discharged. She''d only have to listen to Shanalorre''s proposal now, and then she could go back to her demesne and never have to leave it again!


    She tried not to remember she swore the same thing the previous times she''d left.


    She collected some lightwisps before she stepped inside, and so she had a glowing binding of lightwisps on her forehead to provide her light to see by in the now-darkened house. Despite everything, there were still some unused houses in River''s Fork. More than enough to suit any idiots that decided they didn''t want to live in her demesne anymore.


    She still wouldn''t be taking them here by boat. They want to leave her demesne, they could walk for the privilege. She wouldn''t stop them.


    Rian was still passed out on the bedroll when she came in, the pillow he''d used to cover his eyes fallen half off his face. She unbound the lightwisps from her forehead and stuck them to the wall, adjusting their output to not be overly bright. Then there was nothing for it but to sit and wait for the food Rian had said he''d negotiated with Shanalorre. To have something to do, Lori looked through the bag that had contained her clothes, and now contained the clothes she''d worn while indisposed, pulling out two of the earthen jars of ration stew. They were both cold and slightly congealed from sitting in the bag all day, so she went outside to find a rock that was still warm from the sun to draw firewisps from.


    She got strange looks from the militia there, but so what?


    Rian was still asleep when her food arrived¡ªbread, another bowl of fruit that was so pretty and colorful she wanted to douse it in sweetbug gold mixed with water and call it a jewel, as well as what seemed to be pan-seared seel meat¡ªwhich she ate with enjoyment. Especially the bread. Ooooh, the bread.


    She was in the middle of eating when Rian finally woke up with a groan. "Bread?" he groaned.


    "Good evening Rian," Lori said, trying to ignore his post-waking erection, no matter how funny it looked. "Your dinner is ready." She pointed at the jar of rations she''d used firewisps to heat when she''d seen him start rousing.


    "Hmm?" he said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. "Oh, did you save that bread for me?"


    "No," Lori sad blandly, taking a bite of the last piece of bread.


    "You''re a terrible person for not finishing that sooner and actually letting me hope I was getting bread," Rian said, looking grumpy.


    "Would you rather I make the stew cold again?"


    "Thank you Binder Lori. Your kindness and graciousness to your people knows no bounds," Rian said, bowing dramatically. "Please don''t make me eat cold food, it feels disgusting in my mouth."


    Lori nodded, pushing the warm jar towards him. Then she sighed, tore a 1/16<sup>th</sup>piece from her bread and put it on the plate the bread had come in, pushing it towards Rian.


    "Awww, you do care. How nice," Rian said, even as he plucked the piece of bread like he was afraid Lori would take it back. It¡­ wasn''t an unreasonable caution. She was already regretting doing that. "So, what did you do while I was asleep, and do I have to worry about anything."


    "I made the wheels, so we can leave tomorrow," Lori said. "Also, a reminder that we have to uphold our end of exiling Grem to Covehold."


    Rian sighed. "I know, I know. Well, at least nothing happened while you were out. That''s good."


    "Oh?" Lori said flatly. "What are you afraid might have happened?"


    "Well, you might have been attacked," Rian said. "I mean, they weren''t here the last time we were because they were trying not to die on the bath next to the river from Lorian, but even just from the boat to where Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    "¡ªright, where Shanalorre treated you, you were getting a lot of nasty looks from people I recognized who''d moved here from Lorian. Maybe they think you tricked them into moving here or something. There was this one woman, Missus Naineb¡ªdon''t know if you remember, you drowned her in the ground once as an example¡ª"


    "You exaggerate," Lori said, finally remembering the woman. "She sank, but didn''t actually drown. Drowning involves lungs filling and preventing air from coming in, which didn''t happen."


    "¡ªwell, actually drowned or not, the woman blames you for how bad her life is, from what she was yelling," Rian said. "I think Elceena promised her land and that''s why she and her family joined the expedition. She was actually throwing rocks at you, her husband had to hold her back¡­"


    "Ah," Lori said. "Well. That would have been good to know sooner."


    "You did order me to go to sleep, my generous and caring Binder," Rian said.


    Lori nodded. "So I did. And now it''s my turn to go back to sleep."


    So saying, she took off her shoes and lay on the bedroll that had just been vacated. It was still warm and squashed form having Rian lie on it, but it was much softer than her laundry, and she had to keep herself from groaning¡­


    "You know that''s my bedroll, right?" Rian said.


    There was a long pause.


    "Your Binder thanks you for your sacrifice and assures you that you will be compensated," Lori said eventually.


    "I''ll hold you to that," he said, sitting down on the other bed. "Well, go to sleep then, you had a long day and a long illness. I''ll make sure no one kills you in your sleep. It''s not like I have anything else to do."


    Lori nodded, not getting up, She raised up her head, fluffed the pillow, and settled it in place.


    Then she sighed, breathing out darkwisps to block the light from reaching her eyes.


    "That''s creepy," Rian said conversationally. "You look like you''re smearing your soul on your face."


    "Noted. Now be quiet, I''m going to sleep. Unless you brought the game board?"


    "Shutting up, your Bindership. Good night and pleasant dreams."


    For a long while, Lori lay in darkness and quiet.


    "Rian?"


    "I''m still here."


    "Thank you for saving my life."


    "It was a group effort. But you''re welcome."


    She fell asleep.

 72 - The Proposal

    It was only in the morning that Lori realized she should have taken steps to protect against Rian while she was unconscious¡­ but immediately dismissed the thought. He was completely blind to those two, and now the third one, staring at his posterior for months. He either preferred men as the rumors said, or his libido was completely non-functional.


    Speaking of her lord, she looked at him in bemusement as he lay face-down on the other wooden bed, one leg twitching. Why¡­?


    Shaking her head, Lori got out of the bed, sighing happily as she did so without the pains of sleeping only a layer of laundry above wood. Ah, she''d miss this when she had to give Rian back his bedroll. It was a nice bedroll, with some kind of cushioning froth material.


    Shaking her head again to clear out the possessive thoughts, she carefully folded over the bedroll and stretched. Then she went out to find a latrine.


    She was back very soon, as a latrine had apparently been dug in sight of the house sometime during the night. Actual digging was involved, as there was a pile of dirt and small stones next to the hastily moved outhouse that stood over the hole. Whoever had done it must have been working in the dark. It hadn''t been there when Lori had brought out the plates from last night''s dinner to be taken care of.


    Digging through the bag, Lori pulled out a jar of rations for Rian, putting the firewisps she''d managed to gather from a ray of sunlight to warm it as she waited for the negotiated breakfast.


    Shanalorre had better give her proposal soon so she could go home.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was midmorning before Shanalorre had time for her. Lori and Rian were taken to the younger Binder''s office under escort. It was a bit too late, since the attack had already happened, but she supposed it was a sign that River''s Fork was developing functional government. After all, how often had her mother complained about measures being put into place AFTER what they were supposed to prevent had already happened?


    Actually, did River''s Fork even have codified laws? She couldn''t see anything like the list of laws she''d put up near the Dungeon''s entrance¡­


    It was just the four of them in the office this time. Lori and Rian faced Binder Shanalorre and¡­ what was his name¡­ Yllian! They faced Binder Shanalorre and Lord Yllian over the table room''s table. The two men were warily watching each other and the Binder opposite them. At least, Lord Yllian was. Rian had his usual friendly, cheerful smile and gave the impression he was merely listening attentively, while Lord Yllian looked ready to kick the table over at the slightest move towards his Binder. Notably, the table was bare but for a few cut planks of wood.


    "Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre nodded. "Good morning. I shall not take up more of your time, so I shall go straight to my proposal. I want to borrow Lorian Demesne''s manpower. River''s Fork is currently suffering a labor shortage, and while we have just enough people to allow us to survive, we do not have enough people to do more than that."


    "I have no intention of telling my people to come back here, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. "They are mine."


    "I am not asking you to, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said. "I am asking for Lorian Demesne to enter in a partnership with River''s Fork for a mutually enriching venture." She glanced at Rian momentarily for some reason. "You might be unaware, but River''s Fork is in possession of a mine. Indeed, this site was originally specifically chosen because we identified signs of ores in the water and some of the nearby hills."


    Lori turned to stare at Rian.


    "Yes, I knew they had a mine," Rian said. "I just never brought it up because it was never relevant."


    Lori let her stare linger, before turning back to Shanalorre. "What is this venture?"


    "We have a mine, but not enough people to work it," Shanalorre said simply. "You have people. We would like to request you send some of your people to work the mine until at least the first snows. In return, we shall house, feed and provide for them. Those are our investments in the venture. In return, any copper that is extracted during that period, we divide between us. Four in ten parts for you, six in ten parts for us, measured by weight. We can renew the arrangement again after the thaw, provided both parties find it has been acceptable."


    Lori stared at Shanalorre.


    Metal. They had metal. No, wait¡­


    "Is there actually metal there?" Lori said. "You said you had a mine, but in the time you were operating it, did it actually produce in useful amounts?"


    "It did, actually," Shanalorre said. "This specific mine was excavated because there was an exposed copper ore seam. Operations only shut down because of the aftermath of the dragon. I''ve inspected the site myself. The copper ore is still there. With workers, we can resume operation even with hand tools."


    "I will require my own visual confirmation," Lori said. "I want Rian to be shown the alleged copper."


    "Me?" Rian said, sounding surprised.


    "Of course. I''m not entering a hole in the ground I didn''t dig myself. That would be unsafe," Lori said. There might not be sufficient structural supports, meaning the ceiling could collapse! No, she couldn''t have that.


    "Lord Yllian, could you please escort Lord Rian to inspect the mine?" Shanalorre said. "I will stay and answer Binder Lolilyuri''s questions."


    The older man glanced at his Binder then, for some reason, at Rian. From the corner of her eye, Lori saw Rian glance at her, meet the older man''s gaze, shrug and start moving towards the door. A moment, and the older lord followed. Lori returned her attention to the other Binder across from her.


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    "Does River''s Fork actually possess the tools for mining?" she inquired.


    "We do," Shanalorre said. "Many of the tools were stored in the mine itself. Presumably, those who left the demesne intended to retrieve them after another demesne was found, as they were heavy and had no immediate use during the evacuation."


    "What became of the ore previously mined?"


    "We were able to smelt some of it, but it is now almost depleted," Shanalorre said. "That was part of my impetus to bring this proposal to you. Had you not arrived, I would have been forced to send a messenger to make the trek upriver to your demesne."


    "My injury was fortuitously timed for you," Lori said blandly.


    "I hope you are not accusing me of attempted assassination," Shanalorre said, equally bland. "As I understand it, the circumstances were self-inflicted."


    There was a moment of silence as they just looked at each other.


    "As I understand it, mining is a dangerous, potentially lethal occupation," Lori eventually said. "What sort of reparations can I expect should one of mine¡ª" Heh. "¡ªexpire while in your care?"


    "You would trade human lives for material gain?"


    "You started it," Lori said.


    Shanalorre tilted her head, clearly thinking. "Yes, I did, didn''t I?" She twitched slightly, shaking her head and taking three deep breaths, her eyes closed. When they opened, her gaze was once more composed. "I request we postpone this discussion until such an event occurs. However, in the interest of prevention, I will station myself near the site at all times to minimize potentially fatal injury, as well as begin operations with a rigorous structural integrity check. However, in reciprocity, I will require you to render aid in securing worker safety as well."


    "In what way?"


    "Air will need to be circulated in the mine to prevent asphyxiation. I request your contribution be a means for insuring this air circulation. The mine had a manually-operated pump that was intended to pump air through a series of fabric hoses, which would bring fresh air down to the other end, deep in the mine. Unfortunately, this pump was damaged during the dragon, and we have been unable to repair it due to lack of technical expertise. The replacement we have managed to devise is crude, more labor intensive, less efficient, and very likely to break. Since it has been shown you are skilled enough to create a means of propulsion for your boat, perhaps you can concoct a similar means to propel fresh air."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "What would you have done had I not brought up the issue?"


    "As I said, the current replacement is lacking," Shanalorre said. "A better replacement is in progress, but it requires more seelskin, and further construction. However, I have been advised that at the current depth of operations, the current replacement will suffice, and will only be a precautionary measure. I am sure a replacement pump can be procured at Covehold, which can be reached soon. Surely before winter arrives."


    They both stared at each other.


    "I will research a means of providing usable air circulation, though I make no promises as to anything usable," Lori eventually said. "At worst, we will provide the necessary seelskin for the improved replacement, according to how much is needed by the design proposal that will be submitted."


    Shana tilted her head and nodded. "And any necessary replacement, should it need repairs."


    "According to the repair proposal."


    They both tilted their heads, then nodded.


    "Now¡­" Lori said, "As to the minimum requirements of ''feeding'', ''housing'' and ''providing for'' my people¡­ "


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Well, there does seem to be copper," Rian said after he returned from being shown the mine. His trousers were dusty, and his face was stained with sweat.


    "Are you sure?" Lori pressed.


    Rian shrugged. "How would I know? It''s not like I know what it tastes like when I lick it. It looks like metal, it''s orange-ish, and it''s definitely a part of the wall." He held up a small stone. "This is a part of it that had fallen. I thought maybe you''d be able to tell. At worst, we can ask the smiths back home."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at him. "How did you think I would be able to tell?"


    "If this is really a copper compound, I figure you''d be able to tell by seeing if lightning passes through it," Rian said. "Then unless we''re REALLY unlucky, that it would probably be a metal of some kind."


    "Let us not upset our hosts by utilizing lightning indoors," Lori said blandly, taking the bit of stone. It did look metallic, and between her fingers, Lori moved a few lightningwisps from one finger and to her other finger through the stone. They passed through.


    "That would be very appreciated, yes," Shanalorre agreed.


    "You know what I mean," Rian said, standing beside Lori.


    "I will take back this sample to check if it does in fact contain copper," Lori said.


    "Of course," Shanalorre said. "And the proposal?"


    "It is¡­ agreeable," Lori said, "provided that the split be forty-five parts in a hundred for me and fifty-five in a hundred for you, of ALL metals and minerals extracted from the mine by weight, not simply copper." She held up the stone. "Copper ores usually contain either iron or brimstone, or both, either of which would be useful to me."


    "Four in ten and six in ten," Shanalorre countered, "and I will provide healing at request for all members of Lorian Demesne, not simply those who would be working here."


    Lori ignored the strange sound Rian made.


    "Forty-five and fifty-five," Lori said, "and I include three cubic paces of ice a blue month until the first snows."


    Shanalorre tilted her head. "Make it five."


    "Done," Lori declared. "Conditional on this ore in fact containing copper."


    "Done," Shanalorre agreed.


    They both nodded.


    "Shall we draft the agreement, then?" Binder Shanalorre "I believe we still have some ink and paper left in this demesne¡­ somewhere. Yllian?"


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    Actual paper? Huh, she hadn''t seen real paper in literally months¡­ "Yes, that would be for the best," Lori affirmed. "An agreement must be notated, witnessed, and confirmed by both parties or else it is not official."


    "Paperwork, or it didn''t happen," Rian¡­ agreed?


    "That is very mistrustful," Shanalorre noted.


    "Of course," Lori said. "This is commerce."


    Shanalorre raised an eyebrow as both Rian and Yllian nodded in agreement.


    "The reason paper is used for this purpose is that it cannot be manipulated by a Deadspeaker or Binder without there being obvious marks, Great Binder," Lord Yllian explained. "The same for why ancient agreements were written in fabric with paints. It prevented tampering, and as long as both copies agreed on the substance, then it was proof that neither had been altered after the fact."


    "I see¡­" Shanalorre said, nodding.


    "Though obviously that doesn''t rule out blatant forgery and replacement of copies," Rian said. "But everyone knows that. There are stories about it. So, keep it in a box or something."


    "Noted, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said.


    As the paper, ink and pens¡ªactual pens! Not just burnt bits of wood!¡ª arrived, Lori realized something.


    "Binder Shanalorre," she said slowly, "can you write?"


    For a moment, the other Binder looked nervous. "Um, a little? I was learning, but¡­" She fell silent.


    Eventually she shook her head, her face smooth once more. "I can read, and I know how it is done in theory¡­ but I would hesitate to call it legible."


    Lori sighed. They''d spoken of a LOT of things while their lords were away¡­


    "I will draft the agreement," Lori said. She looked down at her stool, then at the tabletop. "I will need a taller seat."


    "Use mine," Shanalorre said, rising and vacating the taller stool in front of her desk table. "As recompense for the work, I''ll make you some bread. For the journey home."


    Lori winced. Hopefully she would be able to do this quickly¡­ then remembered they would need at least two copies, possibly four so they both had a duplicate, and then the word-by-word inspection for any possibly deception¡­ "Thank you," she said.


    She wasn''t getting home until nightfall, was she?


    She should have turned down the proposal!

 73 - Home Again

    They arrived home after nightfall.


    As Lori had feared, drafting four copies of the agreement had been time consuming and painful. It had gone faster after the first one had been finished and she could just copy that, but remembering all the details had been difficult. So she''d just written down the details she remembered¡ªthe ones that favored her¡ªShanalorre had interjected with the details she remembered, and when it was all written down, both of them had been satisfied with what they read, so it had at the last been¡­ agreeable.


    It had also taken until almost midafternoon, and Shanalorre had been obliged to provide lunch as well. Lori had at least been able to tell Rian to get Lori''s Boat packed and ready to go, and to make sure the reparations from Shanalorre for yesterday''s assault was on the boat. Her lord had tried to ask why she was getting six sacks of fruit, but Lori had waved him off, busy drafting the agreement, and he''d relented his inquiries to get all the people they''d brought with them together.


    So it wasn''t until midafternoon that the almost overburdened former barge was underway. It had an outrigger for stability now, and three waterjets made from bone for thrust. Everyone fit, as well as all the loot¡ªer, reparations¡ªthough Lori had to wonder how so many had managed to row using the oars now stacked on one end of the boat. There was the doctor who had come with them, the youngest and chosen because among the doctors and medics they''d had, he weighed the least. Then there''d been the six other people, all young men with large arms who had apparently rowed non-stop, and then with brief rest shifts so they could row in the night.


    Now all those men were all sleeping where there was space, leaning on each other''s backs so they wouldn''t fall into the water as Lori powered the water jets and, once it started getting dark, the binding of lightwisps that cast light ahead of them while Rian operated the tiller. It was actually a familiar arrangement, from the month they''d spent bringing people up to Lori''s Demesne to reunite with their families.


    The village came into sight not that long into sunset and for the first time in a long while, Lori saw her demesne at night.


    The outside dining hall, entrance to the Dungeon, and the two bathhouses glowed with light. Her lightwisps at work. This time she hadn''t deactivated them, and had all been heavily imbued, so they hand''t run out while she''d been¡­ indisposed. The houses were dark, people obviously asleep, and so there was no one to greet them as Lori''s Boat beached itself on the shore, and Lori deactivated the water jets.


    For a moment, there was silence but for the sound of the river and the wind.


    "We''re home," Rian said redundantly in a quiet voice.


    Ignoring his silliness, Lori reach out to the rock beneath them and created a long, jutting finger of rock behind the boat that she slowly, gently moved so it pushed them a little bit more ashore. The sound of the boat dragging on the rocks and ground beneath it roused the sleeping men, who looked around blearily.


    "We''re home, everyone," Rian said cheerfully. "Though I think we missed dinner. Come on, everybody off so we can all take a bath. I don''t think we''ll be allowed back in if we don''t at least wash up. "


    Blearily, in the light of the moons¡ªall four were out tonight, making it quite bright, with multicolored shadows¡ªthe men stumbled out of the boat. They had no packs or anything of the sort, merely the clothes off their backs. The only things on the boat were Rian''s bedroll, furled tightly so as not to come loose, some empty jars of rations, Rian''s bags which contained the unopened jars, and Lori''s sacks of reparations. They made to pull the boat further ashore, but saw it wasn''t needed. For a moment, they looked around in some confusion, as if wondering why the demesne was so empty.


    Rian coughed and drew their attention. "Well men,'' he said with a cheer that rang hollow and silly in the empty night around them. "We made it back home, and our Binder didn''t die. So I guess that''s our epic quest accomplished." He began to clap his hands together in bizarre self-applause. It seemed to rouse the men however, and they all joined in, despite how absurd an image it was, eight men applauding nothing in the dark, lit only by the moons and the lightwisps that were still bound to the front of the boat. "Now we can all go to sleep and figure out what tall tales we tell everyone else tomorrow. Remember, agree with everyone else''s story, but don''t make it too big, we want it to be believable even if nothing happened. So, if anyone asks, we fought only three beasts, not more, all right?"


    There was sudden laughter at this, as everyone seemed to find the idea agreeable for some reason.


    Rian clapped his hands once more to get everyone''s attention. "Get some sleep, everyone. And if you don''t feel like it, rest tomorrow. You''ve earned it."


    There were no cheers, but there was a tone of genial agreement. And despite the fact they''d been sleeping all afternoon and part of the evening, the men moved with weariness as they walked back towards their homes. They didn''t seem to notice as Rian relaxed and let his shoulders slump tiredly.


    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    "Wait."


    She spoke softly, almost timidly, as if hoping she wasn''t heard¡­ but she was. Then men slowed, and then turned as if just noticing her.


    Lori had remained sitting in the corner of the boat, where she could power the water jets. Now she stood and gingerly climbed down from the boat, her feet crunching on rock. They looked at her as she straightened and faced them. They didn''t look at her nervously or warily, just¡­ tiredly, as if they wondered what she wanted. Some seemed to notice the sacks on the boat and barely concealed a wince, likely expecting to be told to carry.


    Lori did not cough. She wasn''t nervous. She didn''t need it. The deep breath she took was simply so she could speak, not to settle her nerves. "Thank you for helping save my life." In plays, there was usually some gesture involved. Someone bowed, sometimes knelt, but that was just theatrical flourish. There was no actual societal convention beyond bowing to the Binder as an act of submission to her power. So Lori did not bow. That was literally beneath her now, as Binder. But she might have nodded her head slowly. "May I have your names?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Carrying a large sack of heavy fruit as she was, since she didn''t know where any of the demesne''s wheeled carts were, Lori was in no mood for Rian''s nonsense. Fortunately, beyond a sigh and a muttered, "Why me¡­ oh, right," when she''d told him to stay and help her get her sacks of reparation fruit out of the boat, Rian was remaining quiet. Which was very helpful, since she was busy repeating the same seven names under her breath.


    Samoth.


    Royin.


    Sani.


    Cymbelry Mason.


    Tamas.


    Arto Smith.


    Rafel.


    She hated doing this. It was a pointless waste of memory.


    Samoth.


    Royin.


    Sani.


    Cymbelry Mason.


    Tamas.


    Arto Smith.


    Rafel.


    The Dungeon was brightly lit and empty, the floors swept and the cooking surfaces clean. Rian moved to deposit the sack on the nearest table, but Lori said, "Not there, follow me," and began climbing up the stairs to her room, the stone blocking it flowing into the floor and making it a bit thicker.


    "Huh," Rian said, his voice echoing slightly in the short hallway. "So this is your secret private room. It''s¡­ nothing at all like the rumors said, and exactly what I thought it would be. Ah, I see you still have your sacrificial altar. Should I be concerned for my safety?"


    "Shut up and put the sack down," Lori said grumpily, then winced as her sequence of thought was disrupted. She started repeating the names again.


    Samoth.


    Royin.


    Sani.


    Cymbelry Mason.


    Tamas.


    Arto Smith.


    Rafel.


    Was that right?


    "Maybe you should write it down?" Rian suggested brightly.


    "Shut up and get the next sack," she said.


    He smirked for some reason and left.


    When she came down, he was already coming back holding a sack. Lori made him wait, as she didn''t want someone going into her room without her, and got another sack from the boat, then laboriously carried it back to where Rian had stopped to wait, and they went back to her room together. He looked around the room as if looking something, but Lori didn''t indulge him. Instead, she dragged him back, and the retrieved the last of the sacks.


    "Need me for anything else?" Rian asked as he put to down the sack next to the others.


    "How many rations do you still have on the boat?"


    Rian frowned, trying to recall. "Three, I think."


    "Bring them downstairs, I need dinner, and I might as well feed you while I''m at it," Lori said.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully.


    He came back with his bag over his shoulder and his bedroll under his arm, putting them on another table as be brought the three jars to Lori. Rian had been very ready to bring her to River''s Fork, Lori realized in hindsight. They had left seemingly as soon as possible, and yet had jars of fresh rations prepared¡­


    "What did you eat on the way downriver?" she asked as Rian came back with utensils raided from the kitchen. They seemed clean¡­


    "Happyfruits," Rian said as she heated the jars of stew with firewisps. "Two of us would stop rowing and eat in shifts. It was a lot of hard work getting you there without the waterjets, so it was nice you let them know you appreciated it."


    Lori shrugged negligently. "As you said, it was a group effort. Who do the clothes I was wearing belong to?"


    "Umu and Mikon, though I don''t know who gave what. Actually, I''m not even sure it''s theirs," Rian said. "I just asked them if they could find some clothes in your size because I didn''t want to try mining into your room to get your own."


    So it probably belonged to them, since they''d want to impress this oblivious idiot. It was quite sad, really.


    "Give it to me," Lori said. "I''ll return it."


    Rian blinked. "Do you even know who Umu and Mikon are?"


    Lori did not answer that with the punch to the face it deserved. Instead, she held out a hand. "I need to wash it," she said.


    "Well¡­ all right. If you say so."


    Yes. She did indeed say so.


    The rations finished warming. Lori took two for herself, and left the other for Rian as she popped it open and began to eat.


    She would need the energy. She still had things to do.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori finally lay in bed, very tired. The time was probably closer to sunrise than sunset. Still, she was done.


    On her table, which was definitely not an altar of any sort, lay several newly made bowls, all full of fruit from her reparations. There were pink ladies, golden buds, and micans, all fruits they didn¡¯t have in her demesne. She''d done her best to make each bowl look polished, and a different name had been carved on the rim of each bowl.


    They were the same names she''d carved on the ceiling over her bed, and which she was staring at now.


    Samoth.


    Royin.


    Sani.


    Cymbelry Mason.


    Tamas.


    Arto Smith.


    Rafel.


    Umu.


    Mikon.


    Daising.


    Tackir.


    Deil.


    Tomorrow, she''d have to find a way to subtly extract from Rian the names of the ones who''d carried her to the hospital. Subtly. If he realized what she was doing, he''d become annoying because of silly expectations.


    For now, Lori dimmed the lights and went to sleep, her room filled with the smell of fruit, and the sound of her breathing and dripping laundry in the bathroom.

 74 - The Morning Of A Sudden Holiday

    The next morning, Lori gave her lord an unamused, intent look. She had come down from her room to have breakfast to find something so odd she hadn''t been able to ignore it: several people peeling, cutting and mashing fruit into bowls before adding the resulting mash into one of the large stone-and-metal-reinforced pots that they used to make stew, all while breakfast was seemingly in progress. Weren''t people supposed to be eating to prepare for the day''s work, like she was about to?


    "Why are we wasting precious food resources we should be holding in reserve for winter?" she demanded after pulling him next to the stairs leading to her room.


    "You don''t want us celebrating the fact you''re not dead?" Rian said. "Besides, it''s not precious food. Those fruits are just starting to go overripe since they fell from the trees. I''m having them mashed up and we''ll put in the cold room to chill. Later, they''ll be a sweet, fruity desert made of food we otherwise wouldn''t have been able to eat. We''ll break it out at lunch when we have whole roast beast and seel, which doesn''t take from our stores because they''re freshly hunted¡ªI had some men go out this morning to get a beast, and I talked to Karina, she''s sure she can get a big one¡ªthen at dinner, more of the same."


    "I fail to see how any of that celebrates my survival," Lori said.


    "All right, I admit, it''s an excuse, but what holiday is really about what it''s about? Everyone knows it''s an excuse for taking a break," Rian said. "People have been working hard, and they do need a break. One day won''t hurt, and it will be good for morale. The food that they normally don''t get to eat and not needing to work much are all part of it. And if it''s all linked to the idea that you not being dead is a good thing, then they''ll be even more glad you''re not dead."


    That¡­ all seemed needlessly convoluted.


    "That all seems needlessly convoluted," Lori said.


    Rian shrugged. "It''ll work. People were worried they''d have to move to River''s Fork or at least ask Shana to be the new Binder when you got sick, especially those who were from there. They know what''s it''s like to lose their Binder. All that worry built up and even though you survived, we need to get its effects out of them, and this is the way to do it. Don''t tell me they didn''t have holidays in¡­ wherever demesne you came from?"


    "I know what a holiday is," Lori said, rolling her eyes. Did he think she was ignorant? "I usually stayed at home and read." Holidays should be used to do advanced reading for school after all, according to her mothers. Not that she did it much. The biographies of ancient Binders were more interesting. Thankfully they always assumed the ones she''d been reading were for school.


    "That explains so much about you," Rian sighed. What was that supposed to mean? "Well, I don''t have any books for you. And neither does anyone else, so they can''t celebrate holidays that way either. Come on. You''re the Binder now. Haven''t you ever wished there were more holidays in a year? Trust me, as your lord in charge of dealing with people. Everyone needs this. I''d actually string it out for two days, but we''d run out of things to do, unless we made the second day just a day of rest." He tilted his head thoughtfully. "Which actually wouldn''t be so bad, but people might get rowdy since we''d be out of food for them to eat when we''re not resting. Maybe just make tomorrow a half-day where people rest in the afternoon before going back to work the day after¡­ "


    Her look continued to be unamused.


    "They really do need the break Lori," he said quietly. "If you, who''s much more stable and well-balanced than they are, have been working so hard you decided riding on a rock moving at high speed was a good idea, what about them? I mean, without this, they might start doing something stupid. Or they might start making mistakes and hurting themselves. The children especially need this. I mean, they''ve been the ones working the hardest, doing the same thing day after day, every day¡­ I can still cancel it if you like? I haven''t made an official announcement yet¡­"


    She groaned, waving him away. "Fine, fine, they can eat gluttonously today and laze around doing nothing tomorrow," she said. She well remembered the seething hatred within her when holidays were essentially cancelled for school activities. "But I expect my laws to be followed! No music at night, they use the latrines, and no public indecency."


    "I''ll see to it they behave," Rian said brightly. "But we''re allowed music during the day, right?"


    "Fine, fine," she said. "But it stops after sunset!"


    "We''ll probably be too busy eating by then," Rian said, "so it shouldn''t be a problem."


    "Yes, yes, fine, whatever," Lori said dismissively. "Now, do we have breakfast or is everyone too busy having a holiday to cook anything?"


    "Don''t worry, we have breakfast," Rian assured her. "It''ll be a bit smaller than usual since we''re using the one pot, and hopefully they''ll finish washing the other pot that''s already empty so we can stick that in the cold room too¡ªoh, which reminds me¡ª"


    "Yes, yes, I''ll make the cold room colder," she said. "This is supposed to be a holiday. Why does it seem like I''m being asked to work?"


    "Everyone knows holiday work isn''t the same as real work, so it''s not as tiring and doesn''t count," Rian told her as if it was obvious.


    "That makes no sense whatsoever," Lori said flatly.


    "It''s holiday logic," Rian said, shrugging. "Normal logic doesn''t apply."


    Lori¡­ couldn''t really refute that. Even she had been guilty of it in her younger days. Only her younger days, of course! She was an adult now, and thus lived much more sensibly.


    "Can I get you breakfast now so I can go back to organizing preparations?" Rian said.


    "No," Lori said.


    That actually seemed to take her lord by surprise. "No?" he repeated.


    "No," Lori said. "I need you to come upstairs and help me with something."


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    For a moment, Rian was silent. "I''m almost completely certain that''s not a euphemism for anything," he eventually said slowly, "but could you please clarify what you need help with? And will it take long? I haven''t really told everyone that it''s a holiday yet, and I want to catch them before they start working so they''ll know they don''t need to."


    "I need help bringing things down," she said, rolling her eyes.


    "Oh, you''re going to share your fruit loot with everyone?" Rian said hopefully.


    "No, don''t be silly. They''re reparations to me, why would I share?"


    "Generosity?" Rian said, even as he sounded like he was just being facetious.


    "What did I tell you about being silly? Now come on, there''s a lot to bring down."


    Rian sighed, but obediently followed her back upstairs to her room, where he paused at the doorway.


    "Are those¡­ bowls of fruit?"


    "Yes, obviously," Lori said, frowning.


    "Are those names engraved on them? Is that gold inlay? Wait, did you do this last night?"


    "Obviously. When else would I have done it?" Lori looked at all the bowls, each with some fruit from her loot¡ªer, reparations¡ªand shook her head. "Now come on, grab two bowls and bring them to our table."


    "Wait, wait, wait!" Rian declared, looking strangely flustered. "Hold on, I''m still trying to understand what''s going on¡­ are these thank you gifts?"


    Lori scowled. There it was. The expectations. The misguided belief she was following social conventions instead of doing what she wanted to do, which simply happened to coincide with those conventions. Now she''d have to destroy these just to make a point that she would not succumb to¡­ it wasn''t even peer pressure. No one here was a peer. She was the Binder, after all.


    A pity. Some of them looked really nice. She''d put a lot of work into them¡­


    Rian glanced at her. "Oh, wait, no, I''m obviously wrong, these are clearly something else," he said.


    What?


    "I don''t know what they are, but they''re probably not thank you gifts," Rian continued. "Maybe they look like them, but they''re not." He seemed to think. "You''re not building a harem or something, are you?"


    Lori went from rolling her eyes at Rian''s inability to understand the obvious¡ªno matter how convenient it was for her¡ªto annoyed. "Pick up the color-tainted bowls, Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said, heading for the table and gingerly picking up a bowl. The bowls weren''t very big, somewhere between a soup bowl and a serving dish, but she''d made it as thin and strong as she could. It wasn''t like she didn''t have a surplus of beast teeth anyway, and it gave the bowls a nice bone gloss. "So, are you handing these out yourself, or do you want me to do it for you so you don''t have to talk to anyone? If you''re handing these out, I mean, I could be very wrong and these are just some decorative bowls to give the dining hall a splash of color¡­ which actually wouldn''t be so bad¡­" Rian started to mutter.


    They got some curious looks as they brought the bowls down, but everyone knew better than to interfere in her business. Still, there was a murmur of curiosity around them as they went to their usual table, which was empty. They put the bowls there carefully, and Lori pulled some darkwisps from under the table and the shadows under her clothes to cover the bowls in lieu of a sheet. No reason to let people see and give them strange ideas.


    They went back upstairs to get more bowls.


    "Huh, these don''t have names," Rian said as he procrastinated. "Are these not finished yet?"


    "Why wouldn''t they not be finished?" Lori deflected.


    Rian nodded. "Of course, of course," he said, lifting two of the bowls in his hands. "So, I was talking to Parndal, Konco and Daising, you know, the three medics who helped get you to the hospital?"


    Lori blinked. "Who?" she said.


    "Parndal, Konco and Daising, the three medics who helped you get to the hospital after you had your accident," Rian said, ignorant of the fact he was telling Lori what she needed to know. "Well, Koe, Deil, Vom, Drelyn and Baroshota Sawyer were there too, but they just helped carry you, the other three were the ones who helped treat your wounds¡­"


    "The contents of these bowls are wrong," Lori said abruptly. "You go back to the table, I''ll fix it." She turned away, muttering the new names over and over under her breath, voice barely making the sounds as she repeated them in her head. Parndal, Konco, Daising, Koe, Vom, Drelyn, Baroshota Sawyer¡­


    "Well, all right then, I''ll just bring these bowls downstairs and come back," Rian said brightly. Lori waved him off, and felt him leave. As soon as he was gone, she quickly wrote down all the names on the wall next to her bed with her finger after softening the stone. Only then did she realize that Daising was on both lists, and scowled, erasing the name so there wouldn''t be any repetition. Then she quickly got to work on the bowls that were still blank. She had one bowl too many, but that was all right, she could keep that in her room, it would be nicely decorative¡­ no, she could put the stones she used to play sunk there, even better¡­


    Rian took a slothfully long time to put the bowls on the table and come back up. By the time he did return, Lori had managed to write the names on the rest of the bowls and inlaid the writing with some gold. Just a little. She needed it for wire, after all.


    "Sorry it took so long, I was trying to get the bowls under that darkness you left without letting them be too near the edge of the table," he said brightly. "But I''m here now." He picked up two bowls, holding them carefully and taking the lead as Lori followed after him.


    Together, the two of them were able to bring down all the bowls to their table, where the cover of darkwisps grew with every trip, covering the bowls under their opaque shadow. People kept glancing their way, but Lori ignored them as usual, and while Rian nodded and smiled at them in acknowledgement, at least he didn''t deviate to waste time by talking to them. Soon, all the bowls were down and on their table, and Lori finally let herself sit with a sigh.


    "I''ll go get food," Rian said. "I''ll be right back."


    Lori nodded, waving a hand dismissively, and he left to do just that. In the table across from her, the three turned their gazes to follow him. Idiots.


    Shaking her head, Lori moved the darkwisps a little, trying to find¡­ ah! There they were. Two bowls, one with a clean folded blouse on top, the other with a clean folded skirt. To be honest, she wasn''t sure which belonged to whom, but they could just deal with it among themselves. She picked up the bowls and navigated around the table.


    Riz saw her coming this time, eyes widening before she subtly tried to move away. Unfortunately, there was someone sitting next to her, and all she managed to do was to squirm right up against them as Lori finished rounding the table and reached the empty space across from where the three sat.


    Umu and Mikon saw her just as she put the bowls down on the table. "Y-your Bindership!" they both exclaimed in surprised.


    Lori spoke before they managed to start speaking again. "Thank you for the clothes," she said, pushing the bowls towards the two of them. Everyone at the table blinked, staring at the two bowls with the clothes¡ªblouse, skirt and chest wrappings¡ªon top. "Yours." With one last slow nod¡ªBinders did not bow, peopled bowed to Binders¡ªLori turned and went back to her usual seat.


    She did not raise the darkwisps a little so she wouldn''t have to look directly at the two as they kept looking between the bowls of fruit with their names on them and then at her sitting directly opposite them. The opaque shadow cast by the darkwisps was already that high to begin with!


    Not even Rian coming back and sitting in front of them stopped the two women from their ogling. They actually leaned to the side to look around Rian as he lay the bowls of breakfast in front of her. Lori picked one of them and started to eat.


    "So¡­" Rian said brightly. "I have absolutely no idea what those bowls are about, but do you need help with them?"


    Lori frowned at him. "Why would I need help? With anything?"


    "Ah, so you can match people''s faces to the names on the bowl?"


    Lori paused.


    She sighed.


    She glared at Rian. "You will do exactly as I say," she said evenly.


    "As my Binder says," Rian said brightly.


    This was why she hated remembering people''s names. It wasn''t actually just the names that you had to remember!

 75 - Holiday Morning

    "Good morning everyone, and I hope you enjoy today''s holiday!" Rian called after getting everyone''s attention. "We''re here to celebrate our Binder not dying from infection." There was a cheer at that. Rian could make anything sound like something to cheer for, it seemed. "We''d have done it yesterday when we arrived, but we didn''t think people would appreciate starting the party in the middle of the night. Besides, we''re not allowed to play music after sundown, and who wants a party without music?" More laughter. "But we''ve got the whole day¡ªand tomorrow!¡ªahead of us, and we''ve have plenty of daylight until sundown, so let''s make the most of it! Rest have fun, maybe take a dip in the river¡ª" abruptly Rian turned to face Lori, "¡ªer, is that all right, or does it fall under lewd acts?"


    Lori thought about it, and she was mildly unnerved to realize people seemed to be actively paying attention to her answer.


    "No touching of any things below the stomach and above the knee and I''ll allow it," Lori declared. "Though people really shouldn''t go naked, what if a seel bites something? Or a slug attaches somewhere delicate?"


    There were winces.


    "She''s says it''s all right!" Rian declared cheerfully, followed by people doing their own cheering. "Hunting party, are you ready?"


    There was a loud, affirmative-sounding roar from a group of people, a mixed group of men and women.


    "All right! We''ll be eating beast tonight!" Rian declared. "And for lunch! And tomorrow! Not that we don''t already eat beast, but roast sounds good, doesn''t it?"


    There were more cheers.


    Lori hoped they had some kind of sauce they could put on the meat with it was roasting, lest it come out dry and tasteless. Would the fruit do, if they boiled it? They''re probably have time¡­.


    Wait, why was she thinking about this? She didn''t care!


    Lori sighed, and went back to eating as Rian continued to talk. "We''ll be planning some games for tomorrow since today we''ll all probably be too busy eating and¡­ well, probably doing literally anything else other than working, so when we eat later, be sure to be very nice to the hunting party for doing any hunting at all." Another roar from the mixed group who had apparently volunteered to hunt beasts.


    "Well, that''s it. So, in conclusion, let''s all be glad that Binder Lori didn''t die and celebrate it by staying away from her and not talking to her as we all have fun for the next two days!" Lori found herself nodding at that. "Really, that''s the best way to show your appreciation. Well, that and remembering to stop playing music after dark." Lori nodded again, then caught herself and went back to eating.


    Rian made to sit back down to eat, then abruptly stood up, "Oh, and can the following people talk to me one at a time after we''re done eating? Nothing important, just a minor matter." He named various people, and only then did he sit down.


    "So, now what?" Rian said, eating slowly.


    "People come, I thank them, I give them the bowls, they go away," Lori said. "Then everything is done and I don''t have to remember their names anymore."


    "And you started so well, too," Rian sighed, rubbing his eyes.


    "Did you sleep at all last night?" Lori said flatly. This was all looking a bit too organized for something Rian had just put together that morning.


    "I got enough," he said, exactly like a student who''d stayed up the night before and as swaying at his desk before the big test. "I''ll be fine. The walk will wake me up."


    Lori gave him another stare. Rian didn''t seemed to notice, intent on eating. If she hadn''t been looking for it, she wouldn''t have noticed the sway.


    "So you''re going with the hunting party, then?" she said.


    "Well, I am the one asking them to work on a holiday, so only fair," he said.


    "A holiday that was entirely your idea," she pointed out.


    "Exactly! Only fair I help out too."


    Hypocrite.


    She finished her food, watching patiently as Rian ate his. People were talking excitedly at other tables, some leaving in groups. At one corner, several people had gotten together and were playing their board games, finally able to play as long as they wanted.


    Someone approached their table, a man who Lori wasn''t familiar with. "Lord Rian, you wanted to speak to me?" he said.


    "Ah, Drelyn, good. Yes, thank you for coming," Rian said. Lori immediately shifted the binding on the darkwisps, letting her see the bowls from her side. "Actually, Binder Lori asked for you."


    The man shot her a nervous glance as she scanned the bowls, before carefully grabbing the right one.


    "Er, what can I do for you, your Bindership?" he said nervously, stepping as if to put both the table and Rian between the two of them.


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    Lori snorted, and gestured for him to lean forward.


    "Go ahead," Rian said as the man¡ªDrelyn¡ªglanced at him. "She doesn''t bite. She just ate after all."


    For once, one of his tasteless jokes didn''t elicit a laugh. Still, the man stepped around Rian and leaned forward.


    "Here," she said, holding the bowl out to him. He took it, confused. "Thank you for carrying me."


    "Y-you''re welcome, your Bindership¡­" the man said, surprised.


    Lori nodded.


    The man just stood there, staring at the bowl and the fruits in it.


    "I think you can go now, Drelyn," Rian eventually said.


    "O-oh! Yes, Lord Rian. Your Bindership." He bowed to her then walked away, much to Lori''s satisfaction.


    One down more down.


    Seventeen more to go¡­


    They started coming in ones and twos and threes. Rian always managed to find a pretense to say their name, usually by exclaiming it when they approached, and soon Lori was able to dispose of all her bowls. Some had tried to give it back, the ingrates, and others had thought she was only giving them the fruit and they''d have to return the bowl. Really, why would she want a bowl with their name on it?


    People talked, of course, when they saw some people being given bowls of fruit, and a few had even tried to line up as if expecting to get some themselves, but Rian had thankfully managed to get rid of those. Eventually the table was empty, every bowl of fruit gone. Their breakfast bowls had been taken to be washed before the kitchen volunteers, as they had cheerfully declared, would be doing nothing but nothing for the next two days.


    "I''ll have to find some people willing to help me clean those," Rian sighed. "Just because we''re changing food doesn''t mean we won''t need all those spoon, bowls, cups¡­ "


    "Lord Rian?"


    Someone else approached had their table, and Lori wondered who this was.


    "Oh, hey Dormin," Rian greeted.


    Not a name she knew. Not important.


    "Are you still joining us on the hunt?"


    "No, he''s not," Lori said. Lori fixed her gaze on the newcomer. "He didn''t get much sleep last night since he was up preparing for this holiday. If he goes with you, he''s likely to get himself killed. Go without him."


    The man blinked, then looked at Rian.


    "I slept plenty," he said.


    "He''s swaying," Lori pointed out.


    The man smiled and clapped Rian on the shoulder. "Get some sleep, Lord Rian. It''s a holiday. You shouldn''t be working."


    "You are," Rian said, even as he looked a bit relieved.


    "This isn''t work," the man said with a smile. "This is a hunt." He turned to Lori a bowed. "Great Binder." He walked away.


    There was a moment of silence.


    "I could have gone," Rian asserted.


    "Hypocrite," Lori repeated. "Don''t get yourself killed, I don''t want to go back to River''s Fork so soon."


    Rian huffed. "Fine, I''ll take it easy," he said, then yawned.


    Lori considered that. "I don''t believe you," she said.


    He blinked. "Er, what?"


    "You clearly need minders, or else you might start working with sharp objects or climbing trees to pick fruit or something," Lori said.


    "I need a minder? You think that I need a minder?" he sounded indignant, offended and disbelieving.


    "Yes. I''d rather not have you falling unconscious and being left out in the sun to burn. Or trying to go beast hunting as soon as I take a nap," Lori said. "Either you go to sleep and get your energy back or you bring someone with you to make sure you don''t fall asleep somewhere dangerous, since I''m reasonably certain you''ll force yourself to keep doing things despite it being a holiday. Which reminds me, take some of the mashed fruit and cook it so we have some kind of sauce for the roast."


    "Ooh, good idea¡­" Rian agreed. "And please don''t change the subject, I don''t need a minder."


    Lori ignored him and tilted her head to look past him. "Umu. Mikon," she called.


    There was a minor racket as the two young women climbed over the table in front of them, ending up on either side of a surprised Rian as they leaning over the bench and table towards her. "Yes, your Bindership?" they both said. It was almost harmoniously synchronized this time.


    Lori pointed at Rian. "For the rest of today, I want the two of you to stay with Rian and make sure he doesn''t exert himself," she ordered. "Grab his arms and don''t let go if you have to. He''ll probably try to organize things for the holidays, and that''s fine, but under no circumstances is he to help carry anything or do anything that requires exertion. For all I know, he might have stayed up all night."


    There was a clatter as a third young woman scrambled over the table as well. Riz-something looked like she didn''t want to draw Lori''s attention while at the same time wanting to step forward to volunteer.


    "I didn''t! I did sleep, you know," Rian protested, only for his own body to betray him as he yawned. He tried not to let it shown by keeping his mouth shut and breathing in through his nose, but the forcibly opened eyes were a giveaway. "Not tired at all," he sighed out, emptying his lungs.


    "If he falls asleep, try to make him comfortable," Lori said blandly. "I''m sure you''ll think of something." She did not pointedly stare at anything as she said it.


    "Yes, your Bindership!" Mikon said with a wide grin, grabbing Rian''s arm and twining both of hers around it.


    "You can count on us, your Bindership!" Umu said, doing the same for his other arm. They both glanced at each other for a moment.


    "Can I help too, Great Binder?" Riz said. "In case he needs something carried." She seemed to think what needed carrying was Rian himself given how she''d latched on to Rian''s back.


    Lori waved a negligent hand as the two women on the arms glared at the newcomer, who didn''t glare back because she was looking at Lori. "Fine, fine," Lori said. "If that''s what you want to do for your holiday."


    "Don''t I get a say in this?" Rian said.


    "You can go and sleep in the shelter," Lori pointed out. "I''m sure these two will help see to it you''re undisturbed. But if you insist on going around doing things in a sleep-deprived state, then you will be attended to so that you don''t do yourself an injury. Now, go and see to that fruit sauce and whatever else you''re having done. I am going to make the cold room even colder and then take a nap." Her back ached as she remembered her bed. She mentally added ''find someplace nice to take a nap'' to that chain of events. "Now, I''m going. Enjoy your sudden holiday, Rian." She headed out to the river so she could get ice for the cold room. It was already very cold, but more ice never hurt.


    Actually, that gave her an idea¡­


    Behind her, she could hear them talking.


    "If you need to wake yourself up, Lord Rian, why don''t we go have a dip in the river?" she heard Umu say brightly. "I''m sure that will wash the sleep colors from your mind and have you up and lively!"


    "Ooh, yes," she heard Mikon agree. "I haven''t had a good dip in ages! Stripping down and taking a dip in the river would be wonderful¡­!"


    "And the Great Binder even said it would be all right as long as there was no touching¡­" Riza said.


    She hoped those two remembered to bring their bowls home, at least. She had worked hard on those.


    Lori stifled her own yawn. Right! River water, cold room, then nap!

 76- Things People Do On Holidays

    The cold room was made colder after Lori dragged water up from the river, took out all the impurities she could, and solidified the water into ice. The Dungeon actually had two cold rooms: one where they put the food that would be used for cooking, and another, larger room that was slowly being filled up with meat for winter reserves. She''d have thought the amount of food in the latter was too much until Rian pointed out that they needed to feed over two hundred people for more than a hundred days.


    That had gotten her to expand the winter storage cold room. Twice.


    Thankfully, that wasn''t their only food storage room, but it was certainly the one that needed her personal attention most, due to the need to keep it cold. The fruit mush was cooling in the other cold room though, along with a few cuts of meat that was likely intended for today''s meals were it not for the sudden holiday.


    That particular work done, Lori set out to finally do what was important: finding some place soft to take a nap.


    Now that she was done with the ice and came back out to the river, there were already people frolicking in it. They were all in various degrees of undress. Some had gone into the water fully clothed, some had kept on trousers or skirt, some had some sort of loincloth on, and many were just fully naked. There were piles of clothes scattered about, some getting muddy from lack of forethought as to placement.


    Someone had started a fire, and a large stone pot was being place over it. From the smell alone, she could tell it was mashed fruit. She saw some mushrooms being added in as well, as¡­. Huh. It appeared some people had managed to keep hold of spices and salt, and had decided this was as good a time as any to use them. At a nearby table bench, someone was cutting mushrooms.


    Rian was supervising this, or at least trying to. It seemed he was having difficulty, what with the three women on him. He was also swaying a little, but that could have been because he was finally growing tired or because the two were leaning on him and one was making him lean on her by holding him from behind. He tried to ignore it, continuing to talk to the person stirring the pot, but all around him, people were amused and bemused.


    Lori ignored all this as she started drawing more water, pulling it out upriver from all the people frolicking. While she didn''t need the water to be completely clear, a part of her was repulsed by the thought she might be using water someone had done something unsanitary in. As the tendril of the large glob of unnaturally viscous water sat beside her, Lori bound airwisps and vaporous waterwisps, mixing them together in a binding, one she''d learned in school as an example of multi-wisp processes. Though there was no visual sign to mark it, air began gusting from a spot in midair, blowing so fiercely it was noticeably cooler than the air around it,


    Lori took the water by her side and passed it through the binding.


    There was a momentary jet of cold water before the airwisps dispersed it into a conical spray, and then white powder started blasting from the invisible binding. To the casual observer, it would look like Lori was simply make the water next to her turn into snow, ignorant of the waterwisps being used to compress and organize the structure of the water into ice, of the airwisps mixing in minute droplets and vapors of water to build around that little bit of ice, causing them to form into snow.


    The spray of white blasted forward as Lori began drawing more water from the river to feed through her binding, before she aimed it at the side of the cliff face next to the river and just let it spray. It was best to let the pile form on its own. Trying to gather and manipulate it with waterwisps had an unfortunate tendency to turn it into slush and ice.


    It didn''t take very long. Soon she had a nice, shining white pile of snow.


    Momentarily ceasing the spray, Lori reached down and tested the snow. Not quite like a natural fresh snowfall, but good enough. Lori stepped on it to test it, and her foot went down a ways before it finally stopped.


    Thicker it is, then!


    Bringing her bindings back to bear, Lori blasted out more snow.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori woke from her nap on what had been a refreshingly soft and cool snowbank. Now it wasn''t as soft anymore, having conformed to the contours of her body while she napped. Her rain coat, lain on top of the snow to keep her from being in direct contact with it, was chill under her, but it had kept most of the meltwater off.


    In the distance, she could hear people still splashing in the water, loud noises that she tentatively identified as attempts at music. Enthusiasm was apparently being substituted for talent and ability, bringing back all sorts of horrible childhood memories about waiting for dragons to pass over their demesne¡­


    Blinking, she pushed herself up, her raincoat sliding on the wet snow beneath her. The hems of her trousers and her socks were wet, having lain in the snow, and Lori sighed as she felt her shoes squelched. Still, a small price to pay for a good nap. A pity she couldn''t replace her bed with a pile of snow, but that was far too much upkeep and water.


    Sighing, she got up, squelching through the wet around her snow pile and putting her coat back on. As expected, she didn''t feel refreshed but even more sleepy, as if her body wanted to go back to the nap that had been interrupted. But she was rested, and while she was perfectly willing to indulge in another nap, she could do that later. Unless she missed her guess, it should be about lunch time. The air was filled with the scent of wood smoke, and the fruity smell from earlier was gone. Instead, something else had taken its place, something that had the original fruity smell as part of it but merely as part of a more complex scent¡­


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    Eh, as long as the meat was juicy, she didn''t care.


    As she rounded to cliff face, she was amused to find many people were using the laundry area in various states of undress, trying to get mud out of clothes that had been left lying on the ground. Many were doing it awkwardly while being spoken to or chided by someone else. She supposed the ones who usually did the laundry for their family decided it was a holiday.


    There were more fires out, and on top of several were large pieces of dismembered beast slowly rotating on long wooden shafts. In others, there was meat being held over hot coals with smaller lengths of wood. Several of her new bowls were being used to hold sauce so that people could baste the meat they were cooking using bundles of reeds to act as a brush.


    Hopefully someone was taking care of the head for its skull and teeth. She needed more teeth after all those bowls.


    It looked like none of the meat was ready to eat yet, so she diverted into the Dungeon to take care of her socks.


    Inside, she was surprised to find people using the kitchen. Instead of stew, however, they were using the stoves to cook¡­ she sniffed. Yes, someone was frying mushrooms, vegetables, tubers, gourds and other things in seel fat. Many of the tables were also occupied, as people who decided they wanted to play games had claimed the tables as their demesne. There was a lot of excitement, competition, name-calling, cries of victory and groans of defeat. It almost made her want to ask if she could play.


    Almost.


    Finding an unoccupied bench, Lori took off her shoes, then her socks, resisting the strange urge to smell it. She knew it would smell like wet socks, so why did she always feel like doing it?


    Carefully, she bound air- and firewisps together to gently blow hot air into her shoes to dry them. She''d long since learned her lesson of just ripping all the waterwisps out of leather shoes. The socks, she bound with waterwisps and slowly made the water boil before finally turning the moisture into steam.


    It would still be a bit ripe, but at least it was warm and fluffy again. She put on the now-warm socks with satisfaction, followed by her now-dry shoes. Now, she just had to find Rian so she could get him to get her some food. Since they weren''t using the kitchens anymore, she had no idea how they were doing the food distribution, so she had to find Rian so he could find out for her.


    A thought occurred to her, and she stood up and headed down to the second level, which was still technically in progress. Her injury had delayed the weavers and ropers moving in, so the entire level was still empty except for Rian''s pots of seedlings. When she reached the stairs, however, she heard people below. Climbing down, she found several children playing some kind of game that involved a lot of running and trying to tag one another, then going back to seemingly arbitrary positions to start again. Thankfully, when she checked the alcoves, no one was doing anything lewd in them. She did find some people napping in the wall niches though. Why they chose there, she had no idea, but at least they were using them for the intended purpose.


    Her worry assuaged, Lori headed upstairs to find her lord, and found him directing some people bringing down tables from the outside dining hall, putting them near the cookfires. No benches, just tables. As per her orders, he wasn''t actually carrying anything, as both his arms were still restrained. He seemed to be ignoring that now, and the people he was directing all looked amused at his circumstances. Riz, she noted, was helping carry one of the tables and looking displeased.


    "Rian," she said, walking up to him. "Food."


    He blinked at her brow furrowing, and she sighed. She looked at the Umu, who was closest. "Did he get any rest at all?"


    "No, your Bindership," she said. "We''ve tried, but Lord Rian keeps saying he has things to do."


    "And I do. Really, you should go enjoy the holiday without me," Rian said.


    They all ignored him.


    "Has he eaten, at least?" Lori asked.


    "I''m right here. You can ask me," Rian said pointedly.


    Lori looked at him. "Have you eaten?"


    "I''ve been busy," he said.


    "He hasn''t had anything except for trying the sauce for the baste," Umu said helpfully.


    "Rian, go and get something to eat, and then get some rest," Lori said. "That''s an order."


    "You are being surprisingly involved and insistent about my well-being today," Rian said. "Are you sure you''re not still sick?"


    "You tried to go on a beast hunt while lacking sleep," Lori said. "You clearly cannot be expected to take care of yourself right now, and I''d rather not have to find a new lord. Again. I still haven''t replaced the last one."


    Rian opened his mouth. Paused. Looked thoughtful. Seemed to realize something. Finally spoke. "All right, when you phrase it that way, you might have a point¡­"


    "And you still haven''t gotten any rest," Lori pointed out. She turned back to his minders. "Has he done anything to enjoy himself? Gone to take a dip? Played a board game? Just sat down and ate?"


    "No, your Bindership," Umu said. Mikon settled for just shaking her head.


    "There was work to do?" Rian said. "I mean, it''s not like I can expect you to talk to people, present company strangely excluded."


    "Oh? And what were you planning to work on next?"


    "Making sure everyone gets something to eat," Rian said instantly. "Sure, the hunting party bought back four beasts, and another group went out to get more, but will that be enough?"


    Lori nodded. "Perhaps next time don''t plan a holiday in the middle of the night?"


    Surprisingly, he frowned. "Yes, yes, it''s my fault, rub it in, why don''t you," he said, then yawned hugely, covering it with his hand.


    "You''re clearly too tired to be calm," Lori said. She looked at his minders. "I assume you know where he sleeps?" They nodded. "Take him there and make sure he sleeps. Sleeps, understand?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," they said, nodding.


    "I still don''t get a say in this?" Rian said.


    Lori gave him a long look. "Say something, then."


    Rian opened his mouth, and a yawn came out. He covered it again.


    "Succinct," Lori said.


    Rian sighed. "Ugh, fine. I''m too tired to argue. There, I said it. Happy?"


    "Not particularly," Lori said. "Get something to eat too."


    "Isn''t eating before going straight to sleep bad for you?"


    "Only if you overindulge like a glutton," Lori said, rolling her eyes.


    Umu, Mikon and Riz all nodded. Wait, when had¡­?


    "And you three," she said. "Eat something too. Maybe it''ll encourage him."


    "Which is it you want me to do, sleep or eat?" Rian said. He tried to roll his eyes, only for his head to loll tiredly, and he rapidly shook himself awake. "Right, sleep it is! Guess I''ll just have to hope there''s still food when I wake up."


    Lori watched the four go, reasonably certain she didn''t have to worry about Rian being molested in his sleep.


    She sighed. Now how was she going to get food?


    "Wiz Lori?"


    She looked down. The brat was holding a bowl filled with steaming beast meat, mixed fried things, and what seemed to be a tuber cooked in its own skin, slightly damp as if it had been dunked in water. It probably had. Tuber cooked like that was put in among the coals to cook.


    "I thought you''d like something to eat," the brat said.


    Lori accepted it gratefully. "Thank you, Karina," she said, relieved.


    The girl nodded with a smile, bowed, and went off, hopefully to get more food for herself.


    Perhaps this holiday had been a good idea after all.


    Humming to herself, Lori went to find a bench so she could eat, giving serious thought to the idea of making the brat a Lady.

 77 - Loris Bored, So She Goes Seeling Again

    After lunch, the general excitement of everyone at not having to work quieted. Some went back to the river for another dip, but many followed her previous example and took a nap. Some sat in the shadows of the aqueducts or outside the bath houses, talking, sewing, using knives to whittle at small pieces of wood, and in one instance weaving a hat out of some long strips of soft river grasses. Many curled up in the unoccupied benches and tables in the Dungeon, and she found that the finished niches in her second level had all been occupied, the children having moved their noisy game outside of the Dungeon to let people sleep. Other children had found what was left of her pile of snow and expended it on one another.


    Some people were still doing things, though. A different hunting party had gone out for meat for dinner, and a few had gotten together to discuss the inadequacies of lunch and how they''d cook dinner to be much better. At least, that seemed to be their topic of conversation when Lori passed the group discussing with the seriousness of a major portfolio investment.


    Lori, for her part, found herself with absolutely nothing to do. With Rian hopefully taking a nap on her orders, she couldn''t even play sunk. The alternative was to take another nap, and she wasn''t really that sleepy anymore. She could work, but¡­ No. This was a holiday, sudden as it was. She was NOT working on a holiday. Especially one ostensibly celebrating her, even if she hadn''t asked for it.


    ¡­


    She really wished she had a book to read. Lori had spent her best holidays that way: curled up in her room, a book on her lap, pillows behind her, just¡­ reading. When she''d been younger, she hadn''t been able to. Her mothers had kept dragging her to places that were supposedly fun but never were. They were just a lot of tiring walking, noisy people, food she was only ever allowed one of, and more walking. At least when she''d gotten older she''d been able to tell them she had to read something, even if occasionally they''d still try to drag her out.


    Lori let out a huff of both nostalgia and resentment, and focused on the present. Sitting alone at the usual table where she ate with Rian, surrounded by lots of sleeping, snoring people, with nothing to do but nothing¡­ inactivity was turning out to be much more boring than restful. It was starting to be like those old holiday events her mothers had dragged her to, only without the food and footpain. The lack of both evened out, and it was still boring, and therefore felt like a frustrating waste of her time. The sounds of the few people still playing games¡ªif at a more tranquil, less excitable pace, and with fewer onlookers¡ªtaunted to her, and a part of her regretted making Rian rest. With him so tired, if she challenged him to a game of sunk victory would surely be hers¡­


    Wait, the brat knew how to play sunk! It was desperate, but Lori literally had nothing else to do. And she knew the girl''s name and what she looked like anyway, so it was hardly like talking to people at all! Lori looked around, but while there were some spots of bright orange hair around her, a cursory inspection showed none of them were the brat. Maybe she was outside? Lori had been outside when the brat had given her the bowl of food, after all.


    Speaking of which, Lori really had to put away this bowl¡­ ah, but the kitchen staff were on holiday¡­


    She didn''t have a wash rag, but there was a pile of ash for cleaning near the laundry area, so Lori threw some on her bowl, held her squeamishness as she rubbed it into the stains on the bowls by hand, then blasted it all away with water that was well below the force needed to cut through wood until everything had been scoured off. That chore out of the way¡ªit wasn''t work, it was holiday work! Normal logic didn''t apply!¡ªLori continued on her way to find the brat so she could have someone to play sunk against.


    The brat wasn''t taking a dip in the river, nor was she sitting under the shade of the aqueducts. A quick in and out showed she wasn''t in the bath house, the safer, warmer alternative to taking a dip in the river. Lori ignored the women seated next to each other who had moved apart when she''d come in. She couldn''t prove they were touching and had no desire to look to find out. And if they were so thoughtless as to do it in a publicly used pool of water¡­ well, Lori didn''t bathe there anymore, so that wasn''t her problem.


    She had thought to check the houses next, but after she''d gotten close she saw all of them had some sort of garment hanging from the door and backed away. Lori very much hoped the brat wasn''t in one of those right then. Checking the outside dining hall revealed no brat, just a smaller amount of people either sleeping or playing quiet, thoughtful games. She turned right around when she saw the still unfinished houses also had some sort of garment on their doors, those that had doors. Those that didn''t just had a something on a stick leaning diagonally across the doorway as a symbolic barrier.


    Given the way she immediately turned around, it was probably fair to say it worked.


    She sighed. Well, at least no one was doing it in publ¡ª!


    Lori paused, then against her better judgement concentrated on her awareness of the demesne''s wisps and the voids of wisps caused by people.


    ¡­


    ¡­!


    Lori pushed away her awareness of the demesne''s wisps. Why there? Why in the woods? People were within ten feet of each other, there was no way they couldn''t see or hear each other, why¡­!


    She closed her eyes and ran her hands through her hair. All right, just¡­ ignore it. The way the woods were, any public indecency would be a self-inflicted crime. There were no victims, only perpetrators. She resolved not to act on it unless there was a traumatized child at dinner or something¡­


    Still, checking for voids hadn''t been completely unhelpful, and mostly disturbing. She''d felt a lone, upright void along the river, near where the children seeled. A small void. Child-sized.


    Sighing, she did put the brat out of her mind to do the responsible thing and make sure the child wasn''t unsupervised. Really, what were they doing there? Shouldn''t they be enjoying the holiday or something?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori found the brat perched on a rock overlooking the river, her seeling rod in hand, arm upraised and eyes staring into the water. Her skirt had been girded around her loins, and she moved carefully, deliberately, as she scanned the water around her.


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    "What are you doing here?" she called, raising her voice so it would carry.


    The brat''s head jerked up, but that didn''t seem to affect her balance at all as she turned to look towards Lori. "Wiz Lori?" she said, surprised. "Why are you here?"


    "I asked you first," Lori said.


    The brat considered that and nodded. "Lord Rian asked me to get some seels for roasting," she said. "He asked me to get the biggest one I could so that there would be enough for everyone, but¡­" she sighed. In annoyance, from the look on her face. "None of the big seels have come near me, so I have to keep waiting. I wasn''t able to bring one for lunch, so I''ll bring one for dinner." She nodded, as if satisfied. "Your turn."


    "I noticed someone was all alone near the river without any supervision and decided they needed to be stopped from getting into an accident that would get them killed," Lori said. "Especially since they were here without adult supervision, or even someone else to call for help."


    "Everyone''s busy having fun," the brat said, as if that explained everything. "So I came by myself."


    "That''s dangerous," Lori said. "What if you''d slipped and fallen into the river? Who''d be there to help you?"


    The brat frowned. "I would have been fine. I''d done it before and I know what I''m doing."


    Lori gave her a level look. "If you''d caught one of the big ones," she said, pointing to an enormous adult seel, at least six paces long, which she was fairly sure was NOT what Rian had meant, "how would you have carried it back by yourself?"


    The brat opened her mouth. Paused. Frowned. Looked thoughtful. Huffed. "I''d have called for help," she said. She waved vaguely. "There are people at the fruit trees, trying to get more fruit. I could have just gone to them."


    Lori sighed. This girl¡­ She shook her head, and bound the waterwisps in the river. "Come here," she ordered.


    The brat frowned, but did as she''d been told, carefully making her way over the rocks and onto dry land. She picked up her shoes and carried them as she moved to stand in front of Lori.


    The waterwisps surged upward, bringing the water with it, and one particularly large specimen of seel adulthood was promptly lifted off the rock it had been resting on by the rising water, which also dispersed the only slightly smaller seels around it. Before it could move its powerful body, however, Lori pulled the waterwisps around its body together, encasing it in ice. She waved her hand in a purely unnecessary gesture, and another surge of water brought the large block of ice ashore, sliding and grinding over the loose river rocks before it slowed to a stop. In addition to the big seel she''d been aiming for, she''d also partially caught another. It''s head and a quarter of its body was stuck in the ice, leaving the rest of it to writhe and wriggle violently as it attempted to free itself.


    "Is that enough, do you think?" Lori asked over the sounds of the fursh''s tail slapping the ground and water in panic at its asphyxiation. She glanced at the brat, and was surprised to find them glaring at the captured seels with a look of¡­ determination? Envy? "Karina?"


    The brat blinked, and the strangely dark expression was gone. "Yes, that should be enough for dinner, I think," she said. She grimaced. "It might be really fatty, though. I should catch another one¡ª"


    Lori made another unnecessary gesture. Her lord wasn''t the only one who could do things for dramatic effect, after all. There was another surge of water, another seel lifted and encased in ice, then the ice was propelled to the riverbank. It slid and came to a stop when it struck the ice that was already there.


    The brat glared at the block of ice with a seel in it like it had personally offended her, her lips pouting. It was all very childish.


    "That should be enough," she said through her pout.


    "Excellent," Lori said. "Help me get this back to the village so people can start preparing it for dinner."


    The brat nodded. "I think we need more people to push them, though."


    "Who said anything about pushing?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori used earthwisps to push the frozen seels¡ªthe tail was still flapping around¡ªinto town and in front of the dungeon, with Karina being her spotter to tell her if there was anything ahead. Not that she was in front of the blocks, of course. That would have been dangerous and irresponsible, having someone stand in front of a mostly-frictionless large mass as it was being propelled forward. No, Lori made sure the brat was well to the side and having her shout course corrections, which probably also did double duty to warn away people hiding in the brush that they were approaching. The brat gave no sign she encountered anyone, at least.


    There was a stir as the blocks of ice, flapping tail and all, slid to a stop in front of the Dungeon, bumping a table on the way. People looked up and pointed, a few standing to come nearer.


    The seels were still alive in there, Lori was bewildered to realize. They were still voids in her senses, so they were still alive, as if the still-moving tail wasn''t a clue. Well, can''t have that. Food was best dead and unmoving so that it wasn''t inconvenient.


    "How do you usually kill these things?" she asked the brat.


    The brat moved to where the head of one of the fursh were, pointing through the ice. "You hit it there," she said. "You can break the neck there, in the small ones, and if you can''t do that, it can also bleed to death."


    Lori scowled. The ice was warped, and wasn''t perfectly clear. She had no idea where the brat was pointing. "Will cutting its head off affect the flavor?" she asked.


    The brat shook her head. "No, it will still taste the same."


    Lori nodded, beginning to pull water from the river to her. "Stand back!" she called to no one in particular, habit and practice from several jobs taking over. "Water cutting hazard! Stand back!"


    She moved to the side of the seels that was away from the river, the water from the river reaching her and arcing upward as she ascertained the cut she was to make. "Karina, get behind me," she said as she carefully took aim.


    The brat dutifully did as instructed, and Lori pulled at earthwisps to either side, forming depressions there as a wall of compacted earth rose in front of her to about chest height. A thought, and a narrow but weak stream of water began to flow from the mass she''d pulled from the river, and she used it as a guide to correct her aim. Once she was satisfied, she nodded, made sure again the brat was behind her, yelled out, "Cutting!", ducked down behind the barrier, and poured power to the binding.


    What had been a weak stream became a cutting jet that hissed out like flowing sand. Water sprayed as the jet cut, and she began to angle it upwards, cutting through the seel''s head. She didn''t stop until she heard something fall to the ground. "Flow stopped!"


    She and the brat peered around the barrier. The head of one seel lay on the ground, surrounded by the shattered ice that had encased it, blood trickling around it. From its body, more blood flowed from severed arteries and veins as Lori was treated to a cross-section of a seel''s neck.


    There was a lot of pale fat. She really hoped they wouldn''t use ALL of it for cooking. She hated it when she got a fat-induced headache.


    "Karina, could you find the ones who usually handle the seels after you catch them, if you will?" Lori said. "And tell them to keep most of the fat for the chandler. I''ll cut off the other heads."


    The brat nodded, staring at the decapitated dinner in morbid fascination, before turning to find¡­ whoever.


    Lori was already examining the partially trapped seel. This would be an awkward cut. It might be better to remove it into its own block, or else she''d damage the other one. She didn''t want that. A seelskin that large would be useful.


    She found herself humming a tune she''d learned in one of her old jobs¡ªworking as a water cutter at a metalworking shop¡ªas she started extracting the seel so it could be decapitated properly¡­

 78 - Something To Do Tomorrow

    By the time Rian finally woke up, still surrounded by his three minders, the air was filled with the smell of seel meat sizzling from its own fat as the sun gently began to dip to the horizon, the first of the moons beginning to tint the demesne with its colors. Pans had been placed under the meat to catch the fat dripping down, for frying mushrooms, vegetables, and the more dry beast meat. They''d cut out a lot of the fat for the chandlers, but some had deliberately been left to flavor the meat.


    Lori was halfway through a dish of sizzling seel meat, a smaller cut of beast thigh, some fried fungus and plant stuff, and a nice, cold drink when Rian had planted himself on the bench opposite her.


    "I don''t remember us having dishes like that," he remarked.


    Lori looked down at the square stone dish she was eating from. "I made it," she said, ignoring the three who''d sat down on either side of him. "Bowls are not the best way to eat large hunks of meat. Insufficient preparation was made to avert the No-Plate Crisis of Eventually. Fortunately, many people had plates and appropriate dishes stored away, so it is not impacting morale as terribly as feared. Still, this was an obvious failure on the part of the one responsible for planning for this."


    "So, translated: this is my fault," Rian said dryly.


    "These were part of your lordly duties," Lori nodded. "You said so yourself. I didn''t even assign it to you. You should have done better at a task you chose to set out to do."


    "I should have stayed in bed," Rian sighed.


    "We should have," Umu said.


    "We should have," Mikon nodded.


    "We should have," Riz repeated.


    Rian blushed as all three women nodded. "You know, I''ve rested," he said. "You don''t need to keep following me anymore."


    "Keep following him," Lori said. "Make sure he gets a good night''s sleep tonight."


    "Yes, your Bindership/Great Binder!" they chorused.


    Rian looked up at the sky for some reason, muttering to himself. Eventually, he looked back down. "Why?" he asked.


    "I don''t trust you to not stay up late planning something for tomorrow again," Lori said.


    "When did this lack of trust start to happen? You''ve always trusted me before."


    Absurd! She''d never trusted him, that was why she closed off her rooms at night.


    "When you started thinking it was a good idea to go beast hunting while sleep-deprived," Lori said.


    "Says the woman who tried to ride a rock," Rian said flatly.


    "I didn''t want to walk. What''s your excuse?" Lori said.


    "I¡­! Uh¡­"


    "See," Lori said triumphantly. "You don''t even have an excuse. Shows how much thought you gave the matter."


    "Oh, come on! It''s not nearly the same thing!" Rian protested.


    "Yes, I stopped you from doing something stupid," Lori said. "Be thankful."


    Rian sighed, rubbing his eyes. "All right, fine, fine, I''m too tired to argue."


    Lori frowned. "I thought he slept?" she asked the nearest of his minders.


    "He did, your Bindership!" Umu said.


    "We were there to make sure," Mikon confirmed.


    "You didn''t need to hold me down," Rian said.


    It was times like this Lori had to wonder if her lord was truly ignorant or just pretending. Or, as the rumors suggested, into men.


    "Go get something to eat while there''s still something left," Lori ordered. "I worked hard catching those seels and I''m not having them go to waste. Also, get me another cut," she said, holding her plate out to him.


    "It''s a holiday, why do I have to work?" Rian said. Nevertheless, he took the plate before she had to stare him down and headed to where someone was tending to a fire and making sure meat didn''t burn.


    The three immediately got up and followed after him, likely to get their own food, or make sure Rian got some for himself.


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    Almost immediately, she regretted telling Rian to just get her meat. The mushrooms had been good too, and she felt like having more. A pity all they had was water. A sweet drink would have been wonderful with the meat. Well, she had golden buds. She could put slices of it in water, give herself a little sweetness and flavor¡­


    Rian came back, a bowl stacked awkwardly with too-big pieces of meat and other things in one hand, her plate in the other, carried like it was a tray. Besides meat, it also had a little of everything else on it, something that actually made Lori smile eagerly.


    For some reason, Rian slowed down, staring. So did his minders.


    "What?" Lori asked.


    "Were you¡­ smiling?" Rian asked. "I wasn''t imagining, that right? It wasn''t a trick of the light? She was actually smiling."


    "I saw it too," Riz said.


    Umu and Mikon both nodded, their bowls of food in hand.


    Lori rolled her eyes and held out her hands for the stone plate. "Food," she demanded.


    "Maybe I imagined it?" Rian said as he put the plate in her hands.


    "If you did, Lord Rian, it was a shared delusion," Umu said, before chirping happily, "Something we have in common!"


    Then she let out a more distressed sound as she realized Riz and Mikon had managed sit on either side of him, the former even giving her a smug look. Lori ignored them. There was food to be had. Back home, most of her meals had been padded out with bread and boiled dough¡ªwhich was delicious of course, especially since she hadn''t had any in literally months¡ªbut meat¡­! Now that her body had adjusted to all this meat, it was absolutely delicious and she couldn''t get enough of it.


    Everyone seemed to agree, given how she had noticed people were going for more than one serving. She''d thought they would have to preserve the seel meat in the cold room since it would be too much for everyone, especially with the beasts the hunting party caught, but now it looked like they''d have nothing left but bones.


    Had everyone been secretly starving? She''d thought getting a bowl of stew three times a day had been enough. She''d certainly felt full afterwards. Lori looked down at her plate full of warm, juicy meat that she wanted inside of her, and intended to enjoy every moment of the process of it doing so.


    Well, she supposed there not being any leftover meat would be understandable.


    Soon, her plate was empty again. While she definitely wanted more¡­ she could wait, maybe let her stomach settle a while. Licking her lips, Lori wished she had something to lean back against.


    Argh, she missed the old couch from ho¡ªfrom the apartment she''d shared with her mothers! She was probably not going to see it''s like any time soon. Probably not in the next decade, at least. She didn''t even have a proper mattress for her bed, hoping for a nice, stuffed couch was probably impossible.


    Why had she come all the way out here again?


    Oh, right, absolute power and supremacy as a Dungeon Binder. Well, she could put up with a lack of amenities for that. Well worth it.


    "So," Rian said abruptly as he put his utensils down on his bowl. "About tomorrow¡­"


    "I''m on holiday. Talk to me the day after," Lori said.


    "Oh, all right. I suppose I can wait until after the degeneracy and violence happens to talk to you about how to avert it," Rian said, nodding. He made to stand up. "I should go get some more steak while¡ª"


    "Sit down," Lori said coldly. "Explain."


    "After today, it''s going to be clear to people that there''s not a lot to do around here but work," Rian said. "Tomorrow, if something isn''t done, all people will have to do for the holiday is eat, sleep, splash around in the river, that thing you made illegal to do in public, or get into fights because they have too much time on their hands. And since we all seem to have had our share of eating and sleeping today¡­ well, people would be bored of that tomorrow, so it''s probably violence''s turn."


    Umu and Mikon blinked, staring at him. Surprisingly, Riz was nodding in agreement. Perhaps she was just being sycophantic.


    "He''s right," she said. "Anyone in the militia will tell you that people get in trouble when they''ve got time on their hands. Er, according to what I''ve heard, Great Binder."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "So what do you suggest?" she said blandly. "You always have a suggestion."


    "Nothing onerous," Rian said. "We just need to have a few activities planned. Maybe a chatrang tournament, have someone officially declared the demesne''s chatrang champion. Some competitions, something with rules that people can play for fun. Really, they just need an activity they can either be part of or will enjoy watching. That will keep most people out of trouble until we eat, than another activity until dinner, then we all go to sleep because there''s work the next day."


    Lori twitched. "Are these ''play with other people'' things?"


    Rian paused and stared at her. So did his minders.


    "Ah, of course," Rian said, nodding. "I should have realized. Right¡­ all right, leave the games to me. You don''t have to play if you don''t want to."


    That was a lie. It was always a lie¡­


    Lori resolved to sink anyone who tried to make her play games into the ground and leave them there.


    "Well, that should take care of the violence by giving people a semi-violent outlet for their energy¡­" Rian said. "Mostly. I''ll ask around, see how many people are interested in what, and what we can play with what we have now¡­"


    "So, you want to make people do things," Lori said.


    "I want to present something they can do so that if they were inclined to do something, they''d choose to do that instead of letting them come up with their own ideas, which might get messy," Rian said. "Someone dead set on doing something stupid will probably still do it, but this way they can''t drag as many bored people with them to it."


    Lori gave him a bland look.


    "It''s a ''dealing with people'' matter," Rian said tiredly.


    "I''ll leave that to you, then," Lori said. She frowned. Was she forgetting something¡­?


    "I''ll get to work on it after dinner," Rian said with a nod.


    Lori pushed her plate forward.


    "Seriously? You were able to get the first one before I got here!"


    "But you''re here now, so I don''t have to," Lori said.


    Rian sighed and picked up the plate. "After this I''m done. I''m going to go and talk to people about tomorrow."


    Lori tilted her head thoughtfully. "Get me double what you did last time, then."


    Rian rolled his eyes as he walked away, his minders going after him, grabbing their own bowls, and his as well.


    Once more, Lori wished she wasn''t sitting on a bench. She really wanted to just lean back and relax.


    Even the amateurish music wasn''t as irritating as it usually was¡­


    She was still going to get them to stop it after sunset so she could go to sleep though.

 79 - Breakfast Swimming Prizes

    Come the morning, Lori found out what her lord had deemed appropriate semi-violent outlets for people''s energy.


    "Tournaments?" Lori said. She was sitting at her usual table out of habit, with Rian across from her. His side of the table was more crowded than usual this morning, but Lori ignored that. There were fewer people about, as many seemed to be sleeping in, and those present seemed to be waiting for something.


    "Technically, a tournament is more organized," Rian said brightly, though his brightness was emitting from a flickering source this morning. Perhaps it had something to do with the women sitting on either side of him. "This is basically to be a bunch of friends messing around with a bet on the line. These are competitions at best. We''re holding the board game competitions in the morning and the physical competitions in the afternoon."


    "When it''s the hottest," Lori pointed out.


    "Makes people tired faster and saps their ability to make trouble," Rian said cheerfully.


    Lori blinked. "Oh¡­ how cunning of you. And the physical competitions are¡­?"


    "Quarterstaff fighting, stick fighting¡ªtechnically sword fighting, but we''re using sticks so no one gets horribly gutted¡ªwrestling, and I figure a short footrace," Rian said. "But even a competition has prizes. We have nothing we can give out that people can''t get for themselves much easier by going into the woods, which is where you come in."


    "I am not giving up more fruit from my reparation loot," Lori said, annoyed. "I haven''t even had any yet!" She''d thought to indulge in one or two or three last night, but had returned to her room so full that she hadn''t had any room in her.


    "You realize fruit only stays good for two to three day before it starts to go bad and¡ªyou have a cold room in your rooms," Rian finished blandly.


    "I have a cold room in my rooms," Lori confirmed.


    She wasn''t sure what to do with the little sack of grain that had been in one of the sacks of fruit. She hadn''t asked for that, and technically it was taking up space that could have been fruit instead, but grain made flour made bread, right?


    "Which reminds me," she said, pulling up a bowl she''d had with her. It was made of stone since she hadn''t had enough teeth, with a name inlaid in gold, and filled with fruit. "Yours."


    "Oh, I get one too!" Rian said. "I wondered about that."


    She''d had to get the forgettable names written down first, and had maybe forgotten to make one for him.


    "Yes, yes, thank you for helping save my life," Lori said.


    "Is this your subtle hint I use my own fruits as the prizes?" Rian said.


    "It''s yours. Do what you want with it," Lori said.


    Rian looked down intently at his bowl as if considering doing exactly that.


    "If you need it, I can give you some of my fruits, Lord Rian," Mikon said to his left.


    "I can give you all of my fruits, Lord Rian," Umu said to his right.


    Lori was treated to the sight of Rian looking uncomfortable. "T-there''s no need for that, you two! Lori gave that to you, you deserve to keep it! This is my problem."


    "But we want to help," Umu said.


    "That''s right, Lord Rian," Riz said, once more on the other side of Umu from Rian. She seemed to be trying to lean over the slightly smaller woman to be closer to Rian. "So please, take all the fruits you need!"


    "Don''t just casually give away my hard-earned reward from her Bindership," Umu said flatly, glaring at the northerner woman.


    "Speaking of which¡­ why do I still need minders?" Rian said. "I''ve had a good night''s sleep. They held me down again to make sure I slept. Why am I still being followed?"


    Lori gave him a level look. "If you don''t know, I see no need to inform you."


    Rian gave her a horrified look. "Why are you telling me that? I didn''t DO anything! I''ve been a good person! I don''t deserve to be told that!"


    Lori rolled her eyes. Useless thespian.


    "What''s taking breakfast so long?" Lori asked pointedly.


    "Oh, no one''s cooking," Rian said. "We ate the beast and seels last night, so there''s nothing to cook except the stew stuff in the cold room. And no one wants to make that right now, though if people haven''t eaten by lunch, we might be desperate enough to do it. So everyone''s sort of waiting for food. I did see Karina going seeling though, so maybe we''ll have some meat soon."


    "Alone?" Lori said sharply.


    Rian blinked. "Um, I didn''t see anyone with her."


    Lori checked her awareness of the demesne''s wisps, and found only a single void above water where she had found the brat the day before. She sighed and got up.


    "Lori? Where are you going?" Rian called as she stomped out of the Dungeon.


    "To keep someone from drowning," she said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When she came back, it was with four more large seels trapped in ice and the brat.


    "Oh, finally, breakfast," Rian said brightly. "Should we expect more of the same for lunch?"


    Lori considered it. "Fine, fine," she said. She DID feel like eating more meat. "But first, I need you to deal with this brat."


    "I thought you knew her name?"


    "Stay on the topic at hand, Rian," she said. "Teach her how to swim."


    Rian blinked at the order. "Excuse me?"


    "You can swim, correct? You showed me," Lori said impatiently.


    "Y-yes¡­" Rian said.


    "Teach this one how to do it too," Lori said, pointing at the brat. "She insists on going alone, without anyone to help should she fall into the water. If she''s going to do that, she might as well know how to survive it. So, teach her how to swim. You have until sunset."


    "Wait, you want me to teach her to swim in one day?" Rian said, alarmed.


    "Well, she''ll be busy tomorrow," Lori said. "So it has to be today."


    The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Rian looked at the brat uncertainly. "I can¡­ see what I can do¡­?"


    Lori nodded and went over to decapitate the seels she''d caught.


    "Can you really swim, Lord Rian?" she heard the brat say behind her. "That doesn''t sound like something people can do¡­"


    Fortunately, there were people who were willing to take over the butchering and cooking once they saw there was meat. Soon the air of the demesne was full of the smell of roasting seel and bubbling fat again. She''d even authorized the rest of the mashed fruit that Rian had been thinking of using as some kind of dessert treat to be put to the flame and made into a sauce, since she had thought it would have made a good accompaniment to the seel meat the night before.


    There was something different about this morning though. While people still moved leisurely, relaxing in the shade or disappearing out of sight into the trees, some people were using sticks and rocks to mark out a square in a relatively flat patch of ground in front of the Dungeon, talking and laughing as they did it. A few others were using knives to peel the bark and protrusions from long branches while talking casually, occasionally handing off what they were doing to someone else so they could eat. Unlike yesterday''s air of lethargic indulgence, today felt like there was¡­ direction.


    In the Dungeon, she could hear more people playing, and even a quick glance inside showed someone had written something new on the wall, next to the other usual game win-lose counts. Apparently, the chatrang competition, lima competition, and pincer competition were being played in the Dungeon, with people paired off and playing against each other in a tournament bracket format. There were even some people playing sunk, using the rules Rian had demonstrated that involved moving at the same time, which looked nightmarish, though they did not seem to be taking part in any sort of competition. Apparently there wasn''t enough interest in playing sunk to form a proper competition.


    Speaking of her lord¡­


    Lori took her stone plate and filled it up with more meat, the person tending the fire smiling and nodding to her, which she returned. There was no speaking, and she was glad of it. They only had meat, no tubers and mushrooms, since no one had gone looking in the woods yet for any that morning, and they weren''t touching the stores. Plate refilled, Lori headed over to where she could get a good view of the river.


    It was strangely amusing, in an incongruous way. Rian was standing waist-deep in the river, fully clothed, surrounded by the brat, Umu, Mikon, Riz, several other children who''d thought it looked fun, and a few curious adults. All were fully clothed because, as Rian had said, this was meant to be preparation in case someone fell into the river, which would probably happen while they were dressed. The girls had all girded their loins, tying their skirts in front of them as they were wont to do while seeling.


    "¡ªly float," Rian was saying as he had the brat lying face-up in the water in front of him. "Even in mildly turbulent water like the river on a windy day, you''ll float as long as you don''t panic, splash around or try to keep your arms above water. If you do that, your arms become a heavy weight that will push your head down, and you don''t want that. Make sure your arms are lower than your head, since this makes it easy to keep your head up. You all right there, Karina?"


    The brat''s hair was spreading around her in the water, but to Lori''s surprise her voice was perfectly audible as she said, "I¡­ think I''m doing it, Lord Rian."


    "Good," Rian said as everyone craned their heads to see. "Now, for those people who can''t see, I have my hand on her back holding her up, but this is the sort of relaxed posture you need to float. Really, just relax, just let your arms and legs flop and concentrate on keeping your head above water by not letting anything float higher than your head. Now, Karina, close your eyes, take a deep breath and hold it in."


    The brat exaggeratedly took a deep breath and puffed out her cheeks.


    Rian pulled back his hands, holding them above the water and everyone cried out as Karina stared to sink. "Stay calm everyone, this is perfectly normal, Karina just has to find her balance again, and¡­ see, there we go," he said as the brat''s head bobbed up again, her mouth opening wide to take a deep, audible breath. "Karina, blink if you can hear me."


    Presumably, the brat blinked.


    "Okay, blink once for no and twice for yes. Do you feel all right?" A pause. "Do you feel like you can keep floating for however long you need to?" Another pause. "Do you still feel scared?" Pause. "What, really?" Pause. "And you''re still doing this? Wow, you''re being very brave right now, Karina. All right, get your feet under you and¡ª"


    Whatever else he said was drowned out as the brat sank down, only to shoot back up out of the water, now obviously standing on the riverbed, panting and wiping water from her face. Several people applauded, even as she shivered.


    Lori considered it and started pulling firewisps out of the air.


    There was a stir in the water, people looking down in surprise. Rian, however, looked around, spotted her and waved. "Thank you, your Bindership!" he called.


    Lori replied with a dismissive wave and went back to her food.


    "All right," Rian said. "Let''s all practice floating¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By noon, most of the people who''d gone to learn from Rian could at least manage to float on their back, and a few, the brat among them, could swim. Others just watched and cheered them on, or went into the water themselves for a refreshing dip. This time, most people seemed to have decided to go in clothed, possibly moved by the fact so many people were already doing it, and possibly out of a desire to keep from having to do more laundry.


    The few that had managed to learn how to swim didn''t wiggle through the water like seels, but they floated, they could breath, and they moved in the water about as fast as someone walking, only without needing to have their feet touch the riverbed. A few had dared try moving deeper towards the middle of the river, only to stop when they hit the cold water and turn back around, necessitating a quick lesson in how to change direction.


    Lori had lost interest near the end and had gone to catch more seels for food. The big ones were clearly well above the size of what the children could catch, but made the best eating. She even got cheers when she walked back to the area in front of the Dungeon with them being pushed in front of her. She usually never got cheers. It sounded so good¡­


    She looked up as Rian sat across from her with a bowl of food, still dripping slightly from his morning in the river.


    "Enjoy your dip?" she said.


    Rian actually seemed to take a moment to think about it as Umu, Mikon, and Riz sat to either side of him. "I did, actually," he said. "It was nice, teaching people something I know that they don''t. Thanks for heating the water, by the way. I wouldn''t want anyone getting sick because of the cold."


    Lori just grunted, making a dismissive wave of her hand as she speared another piece of meat and brought it up to her mouth to chew. She reached under the table and pulled out a stack of seven bowls one at a time, stacking them on top of each other. Each was made of stone, with a glossy surface. A differently colored stone had been used to inlay the word ''Winner'' into the rim of each bowl.


    "Here," she said. "Something for people to win."


    "Oh." Rian stared at the bowls and smiled slightly. "Well, it''s¡­ very generous of you, your Bindership," he said.


    "I was bored and between meals," Lori said, looking aside. "Besides, we have plenty of rocks."


    Rian nodded. "I think I might have enough to put one fruit in each of the bowls," he mused.


    "You can use the fruits in my bowl too, Lord Rian," Umu said.


    "If you don''t like the fruit, just say so," Lori said.


    Umu and Mikon, who had her mouth open and was likely about to say the same thing, both froze.


    "Stop scaring them," Rian said. "You said it yourself. It''s their fruit, they can do what they want with it." He turned to the two. "Though really, you don''t have to do that. This is my problem. Enjoy your fruit, I''m sure it''s delicious."


    "But Lord Rian, what about the prizes?" Mikon said.


    "If I run and get lucky, maybe I can find some happyfruit that''s edible," Rian said. "Though I think we might be starting to leave fruit season for those trees¡­ "


    "Why do you still need fruit?" Lori said, exasperated. She resisted the urge to jiggle the bowls, since they were heavy. "You already have something to give."


    "It just seems¡­ sad to give an empty bowl as a prize, when a bowl is supposed to contain something," Rian said. "Comes across like a very pointed and depressing metaphor. I mean, would you like to win an empty bowl as a prize for something?"


    "You''re sounding like my parents again," Lori said flatly. The only difference was at this point her parents would have stopped trying to pressure her and would have just seized her property for use according to them. Those had been HER snacks! She''d gotten them from the snack table herself! Why had she needed to give them up to people too slow to do the same?


    "One day, I hope to meet them and give them what they deserve," Rian said.


    They had it: less one daughter.


    Lori buried the memories in the taste of meat.


    For some reason, Rian sighed. "Well, thanks for the bowls, your Bindership. You didn''t have to and it was very generous of you."


    "Yes, it was," Lori agreed. "So stop asking for more. It''s greedy."


    Rian nodded. "Yes, I suppose after a certain point it is," he said. "The game competitions are nearing the final stages, so I''d better go and put some fruit in this for the winners."


    He stood up.


    "Seize him," Lori said, pointing.


    Anywhere else, she''d have been unsure people would have reacted fast enough to that order to keep Rian from leaving.


    Umu, Mikon and Riz, however, reacted instantly, grabbing Rian where convenient as soon as the words were out of her mouth. "I''ve already slept!" he said nonsensically.


    Lori pointed at his bowl. "Finish your food," she said flatly. "It''s wasteful just leaving it half-eaten. I worked hard to catch those seels. Don''t waste it." Really, given his strange quirk about feeling like he needed to deserve to eat, leaving food uneaten was just hypocritical on his part.


    "Now who sounds like a parent?" Rian said, rolling his eyes.


    But he did sit back down and finished his bowl.

 80 - Competitions

    Rian left after finishing his food. He was followed, of course, but they''d finished their food as well, so that was fine.


    Lori ate her fill, then stopped so she wouldn''t get a headache from all the fat. After washing her plate, ignoring people looking at her strangely as she did so, she decided to go up to her room for something sweet to chase all the meat with.


    She came back down with the bag she usually used to carry lengths of firewood tied over her shoulder instead of at her hip, filled with some of her loot fruit. She''d found it sort of pushed around the edge of the stone she used to obstruct the way to her rooms. Rian''s work, probably, or something he''d had done. Her hat had been there too, as well as the map. She was relieved she hadn''t lost anything in that debacle. Lori had been afraid her things had just been left there where they had fallen.


    A rather cold pink lady in hand, she came down to the dungeon''s main level to find the game competitions had been whittled down to the last matches. She''d honestly expected the ones playing pincer to finish first, but apparently the players were taking as much time as the others in considering their moves.


    Pincer was a simple game, in essence. A board divided into a hundred square spaces, enough flat pieces to occupy every space on the board with each piece painted or decorated an opposing mark or color on either side¡ªin this case, each piece had a line carved on one side and a circle on the other, since they were made of wood chips cut from a branch¡ªand two players. The goal was to have as many pieces on the board in your colors¡ªor in this case, mark¡ªby the end of the game. Players moved by putting down their pieces on unoccupied spaces on the board and bracketing or pincering your opponents pieces between your own, either horizontally, vertically or diagonally. Any number of opposing pieces caught in that was flipped over and considered yours, and every move must flip over at least one opposing piece to be considered a legal move. The game continued until there were no more legal moves for either player, at which point the winner was the one who had claimed the most pieces on the board.


    It was a stupid game, and Lori didn''t think that because she had too many memories of staring at boards with maybe five or six pieces in her colors by midgame.


    Two children were the finalists. She did not know if they had managed to defeat every adult they had encountered¡ªwhich seemed highly unlikely, as adults who played pincer were cheating cheaters who cheated, in Lori''s opinion, and the years since she had formed that opinion had given her no cause to change it¡ªor, more likely, only children had been part of the pincer contest. Certainly it was mainly children who surrounded the two, giving unsolicited advice or playing their own games. Most of the adult spectators were gathered around those playing chatrang and lima, of which two games each were still being played. Likely the winner of their respective game would challenge each other.


    Whichever was the case, the children looked much closer to finishing their game than the ones playing chatrang and lima. All the corners had been occupied, as had the edges. They were now working on taking over the few remaining empty spots in the centers of the four quadrants. At a casual glance, circle had a clear majority, though it seemed line did not wish to concede and was fighting to absolute occupation, a stance Lori was very familiar with. Some of her most memorable¡ªonly¡ªvictories in pincer had been finding that last space that allowed her to pincer large numbers of her opponents pieces at the last moment.


    Three of the bowls Lori had given Rian had been placed on a table that faced where the games were being played, each rotated so that the inlaid ''Winner'' was pointed at the ongoing games. While the chatrang and lima players¡ªLori was surprised to recognize one of the lima players as medic Daising¡ªkept their concentration on their game, the two playing pincer occasionally glanced at the bowl oriented towards them, their desire clear.


    Lori approached the bowls, looked inside and nodded. Each bowl contained exactly three fruits. Rian had clearly placed one of his fruits in each bowl, and Umu and Mikon had followed in his example. It was ungrateful of them, to not appreciate the gift they had been given, but it WAS their property, and they could do with it as they wished. Though at this rate, they wouldn''t have anything left for to enjoy for themselves.


    Shaking her head, Lori took a bite from the pink lady in her hand, which was still pleasantly cool. The insides were a far more vivid pink compared to the outside, almost fleshy in appearance. Its texture had changed slightly due to cold storage, but it was sweet and fibrous and wonderfully chewy. While not quite as sweet or soft as she was used to eating, since it hadn''t been preserved in syrup, it was still delicious. A worthy prize to have negotiated in reparations, indeed.


    A pity about the lack of syrup. If she had syrup, it would have tasted better. Also, she''d have been able to store her fruits for a much longer period of time.


    Realistically, even she wouldn''t be able to consume that many fruits in the time frame that they would last even with cold storage.


    Not that she''d admit that to Rian. Or anyone else for that matter. That would be showing weakness and complying with the expectations, setting future precedent.


    Case in point, it was entirely for her own reasons, in this case to prevent waste by spoilage, that she placed a pink lady, a golden bud and a mican into each bowl from the bag over her shoulder. Not for any other reason. Certainly not because Rian had been asking her earlier. Quite the opposite.


    It was still not enough to fill the bowl. She had made the bowl large, the way she had seen certain kinds of trophies be large. She hadn''t had time to put in a base or handles, since she was mass producing, so it was just a large, wide bowl. Always useful, containers. Whoever won this would probably find a use for it.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


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    Not that long afterwards, the pincer game ended, to various cheers from the children spectating.


    To her amusement, various small fruits, coils of crudely made line, and what looked like rocks were exchanged among the spectators. Apparently the children had bet on who would win. Predictably, a few tried to run off rather than pay their debt, which led to very loud running around as the winning party gave chase.


    The players, for their part, seemed to have ended their game amicably. One, a boy she vaguely recognized, was cheering at having won, while his opponent had wilted almost dramatically once the final tally of the game had become clear.


    Rian seemed to just suddenly appear as he loudly declared the boy the winner of the last match and officially the demesne''s Pincer Champion, raising up the boy''s hand for some strange reason. Riz and Umu came up, carrying one of the bowls between them, which was presented to the boy. He was unable to lift it and had to place it on the table next to the pincer board as Rian congratulated him.


    This was because the bowl was full, and nearing overflowing. Just on the side Lori could see, in addition to being piled high with happyfruit and hairy blueballs, there was a fist-sized candle, a dark ceramic cup that shone with glaze, a wooden plate, and various other things. Rian was surprised when he saw the bowl, and stepped aside for Mikon, who was carrying an armful of things that had apparently fallen off when the two had been carrying it to where the newly dubbed Pincer Champion was. More fruit, a hat woven from reeds, what looked like carved pieces of wood¡­


    Even as Lori watched, one of the nearby children put a coil of crudely made line in the bowl, then patted the winner on the shoulder.


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    "Huh," Rian said as the two of them stared down at the two remaining bowls for the winners of the chatrang and lima competitions. The last pair of players from each were facing off against one another now, surrounded by a rotating crowd who kept going from one game to the other to watch the progress. "I''ll admit, this is unexpected. Very welcome and affirms my belief in the basic good to be found in people, but unexpected."


    The bowls contained several of the things Lori had seen in the bowl for the winner of the pincer competition¡ªa candle each, a wooden plate, a glazed cup, a folded sheet of plain undyed cloth, what looked like a whetstone. The fruit had been pushed to the side so they wouldn''t be bruised by the heavier things. Left to stand, the contents just barely managed to not fall off. She fingered the undyed cloth. Was this what the weavers had managed to make using the ropeweed fibers?


    "This wasn''t your doing?" Lori said mildly. "You didn''t pester everyone else in the demesne to contribute?"


    "No! What do you take me for?" Rian said.


    "You pestered me," she pointed out.


    "Er¡­ that doesn''t count?"


    She gave him a flat look.


    "Sorry¡­" Rian said weakly. "I guess people found it in themselves to be generous."


    "Yes," a voice behind them said brightly. "Especially after I asked them to, Lord Rian."


    Both Lori and Rian turned around to find Riz looking very self-satisfied.


    "Riz?" Rian said.


    "I talked to my friends about how you needed help finding prizes for the winners of today''s competitions," the woman said proudly. "Asked them to spread the word and maybe find something small that would be worth winning for someone. And it looks like they did!"


    She looked triumphantly at the bowls like she had personally provided each and every thing there.


    Behind her, Umu and Mikon glared at her murderously. Umu was making thrusting motions, as if fantasizing about stabbing her in the back with a knife.


    "This is probably a good time for you to check the bowls for the winners of the other competitions," Lori told her lord.


    "Yeah, the fruits might be getting bruised," Rian agreed.


    "Also, the longer you leave them unwatched, the more likely some idiot decides to add shit to it," Lori said.


    Rian, Umu, Mikon and Riz stared at her, Umu still making thrusting movements.


    "We had people putting shit on the latrine seats, clearly there are people who think it''s amusing," Lori reminded her lord.


    "I want to say you''re wrong, but I''ve seen proof you''re not," Rian sighed.


    "What happened to your belief in the basic good to be found in people?" Lori said.


    "As is depressingly common, it was overridden in my belief that people will do stupid things, like ride on moving rocks."


    "Or try to go hunting while sleep deprived?"


    "Have to go check the prizes, excuse me!"


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    Fortunately, no one had put shit in the prize bowls. Given they were standing out in the open on a table next to the square that had been marked off earlier, this was perhaps reasonable, since any twisted person trying to add it would be in full view of many people, including some who would probably be competing and would not want their prize befouled in such a way.


    Outside, the air was still full of cooking smells, but not a lot of cooking was going on. It seemed everyone was still satisfied by breakfast, and Lori really couldn''t blame them. She might have to put off catching more seels for later.


    For some reason, Rian looked around and sighed. "I have to go check that someone is cleaning the latrines," he said. "All this eating, they''re probably filled up, and people who usually clean them are probably taking their holiday too." He turned to Lori, wringing his hands. "Can I beg for help? We need those things functional, or else we might have a small epidemic from the unsanitary latrines, and that''s NOT how I want to start using the promise of healing you managed to negotiate."


    Lori frowned, but supposed her lord was right. At the least, she could desiccate the contents of the latrines, compacting them so the latrines could last longer. She had nothing better to do anyway, and with her full of food, she couldn''t even eat to occupy her time. She might as well do something productive for her demesne''s infrastructure. "I''m not doing all of it," she told him flatly.


    "We could wait until after the chatrang and lima competitions are over so I can help you," Rian said. "I''d help you right now, but it seems wrong to award their prizes while smelling like cleaning latrines. Might turn them off the fruits in it."


    "We can help her, Lord Rian!" Umu said.


    Mikon nodded, patting the blonde woman on the shoulder. "That''s right, I''m sure Umu will be glad to help her Bindership with this, Lord Rian. Unfortunately, I, uh, have something to do, or else I''d be there myself. I''m so sorry."


    "Huh?" Umu said, blinking in surprise.


    "It''s a shit job, but good on you for volunteering," Riz said, nodding.


    "W-wait¡­" Umu said as she began to realize what she''d done.


    Lori gave Umu a flat look. "Rian, where are the equipment for cleaning the latrines kept?"

 81 - Holiday Logistics

    Some people would have thought that the Dungeon Binder going off to clean the latrines while her lord stayed behind and awarded prizes was backward. These didn''t realize that awarding prizes meant talking and, judging by the way Rian had done things, touching people.


    Which was not to say the task wasn''t odious. It was extremely odious. It was the baseline by which odious was measured. It was still far better than the alternative.


    Especially since she had a volunteer to do the more physical, odorous stuff for her.


    The wheeled barrow the carpenters had put together wasn''t that hard to push. The pair of stone wheels, on stone bearings, lubricated with seel lard not used for soap and sealed as tightly as the carpenter''s lathe and her own Whispering skills could manage, spun easily and their position directly under the center of gravity of the conveyance meant only a minimum of strength was need to push it. In addition, it was empty right then, containing only a shovel made from a beast skull. Lori had even blasted the shovel clean of the accumulated and crusted foulness using waterwisps, leaving it possibly the cleanest it had ever been since it was made, and she''d done the same for the barrow.


    Umu still had her face scrunched up in distaste despite all that and muttering to herself. Really, if the woman didn''t want to do something she shouldn''t have volunteered for it.


    "If you didn''t want to do this, you shouldn''t have volunteered for this," Lori said irritably. The blonde winced. She was walking in front of Lori to make sure she didn''t try to just sneak off, since it seemed very likely that she would. "Hurry up, those latrines aren''t going to clean themselves."


    "Y-yes, your Bindership," Umu said, clearly pouting and sullen.


    "In future, I suggest against being the first to volunteer," Lori said. "Rian doesn''t realize what you''re doing anyway, so you might as well spare yourself the effort."


    Umu didn''t trip, stumble or otherwise give any physical cue she was surprised by that statement. This wasn''t a cheap play after all, and the quality of her paving was excellent. Umu did stop speaking though, even as she continued pushing the barrow downhill.


    The demesne had several latrines. Once, they had been simple pits in the ground with a wooden seat and hole above it, and low walls to shield one''s modesty. Now, however, they were a bit more sophisticated than that, though the original hole and seat arrangement remained. The walls were higher, it insides were more spacious, there was a roof for when it finally started raining again, a door that closed, and bound lightwisps that provided light to those who had to dispense with nature in the middle of the night.


    Each row of latrines stood on a raised platform of stone¡ªher work¡ªthat was hollow underneath. At the back of each latrine platform was a wooden door with the most airtight seal they could currently manage, through which the waste could be shoveled out for transfer to the fermenting pit for use as next year''s fertilizer. A crude chimney allowed the gasses generated by the waste inside to vent upward, mildly alleviating the smell in the latrine proper¡ªthe doors were to be left wide open when not in use to both vent the contents and to tell people it was available¨C so that no one died of gas or fire. Some plants had been transplanted around each row in case liquid seeped into the soil, and to try and obscure the scent. Saw dust and dirt were used to soak up any loose liquids¡ªthere always was¡ªso it wouldn''t poison the ground water.


    Rian had been petitioned by the farmers and the people with tanning experience for the solid and liquid to be separated, since the gold water was of more immediate use for them, but so far the best he and Lori could devise were latrines that were meant for piss only, positioned near the field and near the dining halls. That at least seemed to be sufficient for now, though the pottery vessels they had for handling it were awkward and prone to splashing. Still, it wasn''t her problem.


    It was a far cry from the water driven affairs Lori had grown up with, but they simply didn''t have the plumbing to make those practical.


    Normally, the sanitation crew assigned to this handled it unfortunately fresh. However, with only Lori and one very reluctant volunteer, many latrines to see to, and lunch coming up, she had no time for a thorough cleaning of the latrines. That wasn''t what they were doing.


    "Pay attention. I''m going to explain what we''re going to do," Lori said as they reached the first latrine. The row of latrines were positioned to serve the sanitary needs of the homes people were currently occupying. There were eight in each row, since people would need their release at any hour of day or night, and not having enough latrines meant people would find other places to release their inner dissatisfaction, a habit they had gotten into during the overland journey from Covehold.


    "I know what needs to be done. Er, your Bindership," Umu said. "We have to shovel out shit, right?"


    "No," Lori said, annoyed at being interrupted, and Umu blinked. "We have to make the latrines useable until at least tomorrow. That doesn''t require cleaning them out. There just has to be enough space inside for them to last that long. Hopefully, we will be done before lunch." One way or another, they would be, since Lori planned to stop when she got hungry. The sun was fairly high in the sky, and while people were likely still full from the late breakfast, they''d want to eat again eventually.


    "How will we be doing that, your Bindership?" Umu said.


    "We will be opening the lower latrine and desiccating¡ªdrying¡ªthe contents," Lori said, then frowned. "Correction. We will be desiccating the contents, and then opening the lower latrine. While there will be a burst of stench, it should not last."


    "Hold my breath," Umu said, nodding in acknowledgement despite her lips twisting in distaste.


    "Yes," Lori confirmed. She wouldn''t need to, since she''d be binding airwisps around her head, but it was good advice for the other young woman. "Once everything is completely dried, we will check the lower latrine. If it is more than half full, you will use the shovel to pull some out until it is less than half. Then we will seal it and move on until the barrow is full, at which point you will drop the contents into the composting pit." That was filled with sawdust from the sawpits and carpenters in addition to the waste, as well as the smaller odds and ends of wood that couldn''t be used, what little bits of tuber and vegetable couldn''t be eaten, seel and beast innards that were same, and anything else. "We repeat until lunch, at which point we stop."


    Umu looked relieved, but she glanced at the single shovel.


    "If you prefer," Lori said dryly, "you can dry the waste and I can use the shovel instead?"


    The blonde looked sickly but resigned. "I''ll shovel, your Bindership," she said.


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    If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    There was, as hoped but not actually expected, very little in need of shoveling. After getting people to finish their business and telling those approaching to take their business somewhere else, since cleaning was in progress, Lori went to work. While it would have been convenient to begin desiccation at a distance, in every lavatory simultaneously, she didn''t think this was safe to do when people were actively sitting on the latrine in question. So, one row at a time.


    As Umu kept people back and diverted them from the latrine, Lori bound the waterwisps in the waste. She couldn''t just pull them out to dry everything, as she would pull water from mud. The waste was too organic, and while there were little bits of earthwisps there, the matter it corresponded to was minimal. Physically moving the water would pull a large amount of dissolved matter with it, creating a slurry, and the particles in the slurry would pull on larger particles, and¡­ well. Physically pulling out water wasn''t very helpful, but neither was it completely useless.


    Binding airwisps to pull in air through the hole in the seat so that the smell could be contained, and setting another binding at the outlet chimney to start actively pulling the air out, Lori pulled together the disgusting slurry she couldn''t actually see, increased its viscosity, and began making it spin. Her control of the waterwisps kept the liquid together while any particulates were pulled outwards. It wasn''t enough to physically hurl anything but the largest particles out of the water, but it did ensure most of the more solid filth was on the edges of the water.


    That done, she stared vaporizing the water in the center of the binding.


    Pale white vapor began to jet upwards with great force from the chimney, blasting high into the air as she turned it into steam once it was in the open air to help create a pressure differential that would help draw out more of the vapor. Inside, she could feel the amount of water lessening. Impatience made her want to turn everything into vapor in a moment, but there was a technical term of that, and it was ''explosion''. So she made haste slowly as she rendered the water into vapor. Eventually, no more vapor vented from the chimney and there was little enough water left that she was able to boil it away into steam


    "Done," she said, pointing at one of the access doors in the lower latrine where some steam had been escaping earlier. "Check if anything needs to be shoveled out."


    Fortunately for a reluctant Umu, the simple bar latch that doubled as a handle for pulled the access door open was clean, but the blonde had to pull surprisingly hard to get the door open. At first Lori was confused, since she had been careful to direct any heat, steam or vapor away from the doors so it wouldn''t warp, until she realized it was the pressure difference from sucking the vapor up the chimney. Something to remember for the next row.


    A quick inspection of the insides of the latrines showed there wasn''t as much as she feared, and after inspecting them all, Lori told a relieved Umu that she could seal it up and they would move on to the next.


    At the next site, the procedure was repeated, then again, and again. Unfortunately for Umu, two of the sites needed shoveling, even after being desiccated, but the waste had been desiccated to the point that it almost looked like sun-dried, parched earth, and so was relatively easy to move. It didn''t even smell that much, which Umu was probably grateful for.


    Lori spent the time Umu was shoveling to check around for leaks and possible seepage. Fortunately, she didn''t find any, but she took a moment to use firewisps to heat the ground around the latrine to hotter than boiling to a depth of ten feet, just in case, especially if the ground looked a little muddy.


    She''d have to look into building some sort of underground barrier to prevent potentially tainted water from the latrines getting into the river. Another thing to add to the list of things she needed to do.


    But tomorrow. She was on holiday right then.


    At last, as the sun neared its apex, Lori accompanied Umu as she pushed the barrow towards the pit near the fields, full of only mildly unpleasant-smelling waste, holding the shovel for the blonde since the barrow was too full to let it rest at anything but an awkward angle. Despite this, Lori was considering taking a bath to at least refresh herself, perhaps even get a change of clothes. There was just something about being near human waste, no matter greatly reduced in foulness, that made her feel unclean even if she hadn''t touched any of it herself.


    "Your Bindership?"


    Lori blinked, wondering if they were at the pit already, but no, they were still walking up the slope. She looked curiously at Umu, who looked strained. She had twisted to barrow so that the wheels were at right angles to the slope.


    "Can we stop for a moment?" she said. "I just need a rest¡­"


    The barrow started to roll. Umu''s face went from tired to panicked instantly as she felt the barrow moving out from under her grip. She bent and frantically grabbed the barrow''s handles, trying to brace her feet to hold it in place.


    With a thought, Lori bound the earthwisps underneath the barrow and made the ground under the wheels sink slightly, trapping it in a rut so it wouldn''t move. It wobbled slightly from inertia, but otherwise remained in place.


    "Be more careful," Lori chided.


    Umu winced. "Yes, your Bindership," she said weakly.


    Lori nodded. Then, because the sun was high in the sky and she''d left her hat in her rooms, she bound the darkwisps in the shadow under the barrow and imbued them. The binding of darkwisps became completely opaque, and she raised it over herself and, after a moment, Umu to shield them from the sunlight.


    Lori waited patiently as Umu caught her breath. Around them, the sounds of people enjoying themselves could be heard, of people talking loudly and laughing, of the occasional indecent-sounding moan coming from the houses, many of which seemed to have an item of clothing stuck between the door and the doorframe. Wouldn''t that ruin the clothes?


    "Your Bindership?"


    Lori blinked, and turned towards the person she was sharing a shadow with, who had slipped out of her mind. "Ready to push again?"


    Umu frowned, flexing her hands. "N-not yet, your Bindership," she said. Then, taking a deep breath, she continued quickly, as if realizing she was about to lose Lori''s attention, "Does Lord Rian really not notice?"


    "Notice what?" Lori said blandly.


    "Notice¡­" Umu faltered. Then she took another deep breath. "Notice that we''re interested in him."


    "Why would he?" Lori said, tilting her head. "You''ve never informed him you were, to my knowledge."


    Umu made a strange face. "Th-that''s too forward!" she said. "You''re only supposed to be that blunt when you''re acknowledging another girl''s interest!"


    And suddenly the time-consuming, rambling, pointless subplots of so many plays and novels began to make a twisted sort of sense.


    "He noticed you take his laundry, if that helps," Lori said distractedly as she recalled one strange plot twist after another involving characters suddenly expressing their love for each other out of nowhere, even though they never spoke about arranging to have a relationship at all¡­


    Umu paled and suddenly covered her face with her hands. A whimpering sound came from the general area of her mouth. It was mildly unpleasant.


    "Why are you surprised?" Lori said. "Of course he was going to notice, since he never does his own laundry but his clothes kept getting clean." If anything the whimpering intensified. "If you really want him to notice you, just stop hiding the fact you do his laundry."


    The whimpering suddenly cut off. Slowly Umu''s face rose, her face set in an expression of dawning revelation. "Really?"


    "Of course," Lori said. "Rian is very susceptible to peer pressure. Publicly do it even once and he''ll be compelled to compensate you somehow."


    Umu''s eyes widened, even as she seemed to stare through Lori.


    Lori frowned and waved her hand in front of the blonde''s face, getting her attention. "Can you continue pushing now?" she said.


    Umu seemed to remember the barrow in front of her at last. With surprising new enthusiasm, she gripped the handles and got read to twist so the barrow pointed up the slope. "I''m ready, your Bindership!"


    Lori released the barrow from its ruts.


    It turned out that a heavily laden barrow that has lost momentum is not an easy thing to push up a slope from a standing stop. Lori had to raise an upright projection of stone and earth from the road to push the barrow up the rest of the way, while an abashed Umu held the shovel. Once on level ground, Umu took control of the barrow again, dumping it into the composting pit before bringing it and the shovel back to the storage shed.


    By the time they finished, a hunting party had come back with five dead beasts on poles, to muted enthusiasm. Still, there were plenty of volunteers to strip the beasts of feathers and begin butchering it for a late lunch, or possibly a mid-noon snack.


    Lori and Umu weren''t among them, Lori because she never volunteered, and Umu because she had excused herself to take a quick bath, apparently feeling as tainted by the proximity to waste as Lori was. Hopefully it was also because the other woman had learned the dangers of reckless volunteerism. Better late than never.


    Humming to herself, Lori headed for her room to have her own quick bath.

 82 - Just A Thought During Holiday-Appropriate Semi-Violent Outlets

    The board game competitions had proceeded at their own pace while people had been eating in the morning. The players had gotten together, played their games, and crushed each other in pursuit of supremacy and victory, and Rian had given them their prize for winning. Simple, straightforward, and only those who wanted to watch or had any interest had spectated.


    For some reason, Rian chose not to follow this simple and easy to understand format.


    "Welcome to the first Lorian holiday games!" Rian called out from where he was standing on top of the pile of excavated stone to one side of the Dungeon''s entrance. People, of course, cheered, the way they always did when Rian allowed a long enough pause. Lori had to admit, he projected his voice very well. His throat was going to be sore by dinner, but that was his problem. "This afternoon, we are going to be witness to some of the finest action this demesne has ever seen! Quarter staffs! Swords! Well, wooden swords, but close enough! Wrestling! And racing!"


    Rian paused to let people make their noises as Lori tore off some beast meat into a bite-sized piece and popped it into her mouth, savoring the taste. After her quick, refreshing bath, and a brief debate with herself over whether she should put on new clothes or continue with the ones she''d already been wearing for the day¡ªLori had picked the latter, in case she had to sweat some more¡ªshe had grabbed her new stone plate and her hat, and went downstairs for lunch. The prize bowl with assorted fruits and things for the winners of the chatrang and lima competitions had been gone, awarded while she and Umu had been outside handling infrastructure work. She had been happy to find there was still some seel meat left over, Not that she didn''t like beast meat, but it was more likely to get a cut that was a little dry. People had seemed to be eating lightly, and many seemed to be too sated to eat. In fact, most of the meat was being marinated in the fruit sauce for cooking later tonight, while people were only eating small portions right then, apparently still full from breakfast.


    Lori had just been about to sit down to eat her meat when Rian had shown up and asked her, with dramatic obsequiousness, if she would please sit on the table had had been set up in front of the marked off square in front of the Dungeon.


    "Why?" she had asked, fully prepared to stay exactly where she was.


    "We need your glorious person to provide prestige to the proceedings by being at the forefront watching what was happening," Rian had said. "You don''t even need to say anything, just sit there and eat and occasionally give what''s happening a bored look. Yes, like that one right there!"


    "I have a perfectly good seat right here," Lori had said, a bit annoyed at being asked to move.


    "It''s really close to someone who''s cooking both beast and seel," Rian had wheedled. "You''re almost out of food anyway, why not get more there, and then just sit at the table? Please? You literally won''t have to do anything you wouldn''t have to do already anyway."


    Lori had considered the table he had indicated, then sighed. "Fine," she had sighed. "But the beast better not be dry."


    "Don''t worry, I made sure they had thigh and tail," Rian had assured her. "The juiciest parts!"


    So far, the juiciness was as promised, and her new table was actually shaded by the cliff wall behind her, so she was willing to admit it was an improvement over her previous position. Really, the only annoyance was Rian''s loud announcing.


    "The first event is the quarterstaff competition!" Rian announced from behind her on the rock. "Participants will duel, aiming for body strikes, or for their opponent to let go of their quarterstaff with at least one hand! Either of these is worth a point, as is pushing your opponent out of bounds or causing them to fall. Also, I''d like to apologize for the lack of proper staffs. Next time, we''ll have some staffs of the same length and material ready so it''s all even. But for now, consider your choice and ability in making your own staff to be part of your skill. Is everyone ready?"


    There was a roar from the crowd, especially from a group holding what had just that morning been freshly cut branches and saplings. Few of the crude quarterstaffs were completely straight and some still had more weight or were too narrow at one end, but those wielding them seemed to find them sufficient¡­ or just didn''t know what a proper quarterstaff was like. Her own staff had been expensive to have made, since she''d picked a nice hardwood for the material, but it had lasted her for years, and would hopefully last years more.


    Lori suspected that the latter group of people, barring extreme luck, would be the first to be eliminated.


    "Let the preliminary bouts begin!" Rian then started announcing pairs of names, most likely people who would be facing each other. From the way people were stepping into the marked off area, the preliminaries would be conducted with two pairs of people at a time, facing their opponent at opposite ends of the square, with a buffer space between the two pairs so they couldn''t interfere with each other. The first to score three points would move on to the next stage, and because of the rules, many had wrapped cloths around their fingers as padding, though they were checked to make sure the staff was being held by their grip and not because it had been tied to their hand.


    It also appeared like some sort of guidelines had been established beforehand¡ªlikely what Rian had been doing while she''d been cleaning the latrines¡ªas to what was permissible, because while people swung in the general direction of their opponents head, their swings when they did so were obviously slower and easier to block, and no one aimed for the groin. Which she supposed was sensible, else the first thing she''d be doing tomorrow was bringing people to River''s Fork to be healed¡­


    Oh, right.


    Rian had scrambled down from her rock pile and was drinking to soothe his throat from all the announcing as the participants of the preliminary rounds got down to trying to earn their three points. They weren''t completely unsupervised. Two people stood in the space in the middle of the square, between each pair, acting as referee for one of the bouts and calling out points. One she vaguely recognized as the one in charge of the building crews¡ªretired captain something?¡ªthe other unknown to her.


    Lori poked Rian in the side just under his ribs to get his attention. "Tah," she said, "remember to announce that we need volunteers to go to River''s Fork and work at the mine there."


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    "Don''t worry, I haven''t forgotten," he said over the sound of quarterstaffs being wielded enthusiastically and with some skill. "I was just wondering when you wanted to make the announcement. Would around dinner suffice? Give them the night to think about whether they''ll volunteer or not?"


    "That would be adequate," she said. "Also, you need to make the ship for going to Covehold a priority."


    "I thought you didn''t really care for that one?" he said.


    "Whether I do or not is irrelevant," Lori said. "It''s part of our obligations to River''s Fork and I won''t have it be said I do not live up to my agreements."


    "Don''t make you look bad, got it," Rian said with a nod. "To be honest, the bottleneck in that plan is making the boat fast enough that we can reach Covehold and back without needing too many supplies. Too bad you won''t come along, a water jet to propel it would be useful¡­"


    "No," Lori said flatly.


    "I know, I know," Rian sighed. They both briefly turned to look as one of the referees declared the match he was watching over. The two competitors shook hands¡ªLori wasn''t sure which of them had won or lost¡ªand stepped out of the demarcated space, to be replaced by another pair. "It''s really too bad. And if we did have a waterjet, it would only last so long, especially since we couldn''t shut it down to conserve energy."


    "If I could make a bound tool, I would," Lori said. "But I don''t even have enough raw materials to experiment with making one, much less actually making one."


    Rian frowned. "Could you actually make one?"


    "I know the basics," Lori said. "What follows will merely be experimentation and optimization. But I need raw materials."


    "Which would be in Covehold," Rian sighed.


    "Which would be in Covehold," Lori confirmed.


    "It''s a pity there''s no way for you to power something at a distance," Rian said. "Then you''d be able to power a water jet and stay right here."


    Lori opened her mouth¡­ and froze.


    Rian blinked, and tilted his head. He stilled and began staring at her.


    The other referee called the match, to great cheers, and the two competitors stepped out of the demarcated area, one cradling his hand and walking towards the river, to be replaced by two more competitors.


    Eventually, Lori shut her mouth. "Why are you staring at me?" she said distractedly, since his staring had grown persistent enough to be commented on.


    "You thought of something," Rian said. His face was hopeful. "I didn''t want to interrupt you¡­ but you thought of something, right? Right?"


    Lori gave him an annoyed look. Still, despite herself, a smile began to curve her lips triumphantly. "I thought of something," she admitted.


    "Something that¡­ maybe¡­ involves waterjets?" Rian said, voice almost plaintive in its naked hope.


    "Maaaybe¡­" Lori said slowly, savoring the word, the idea. "It needs to be tested."


    Rian looked towards the competition in front of them. "Now?" he asked. For once, she couldn''t tell if he was asking because he wanted her to stay or go.


    Lori shook her head, even as she kept her excitement in check. This was still just an idea. Just a thought, really. Sure, it was supported by basic principles, but still¡­ No, it was untested. She needed to be sure, otherwise¡­ well, it might still have uses, but¡­


    Lori forced herself to sit still, to very carefully consider. Surely this was too simple, right? Surely if it worked, it would be something people did regularly? It would be mentioned in books and histories about things famous Whisperers had done, right?


    Only¡­ it had been mentioned, obliquely, in some of her texts¡­ And hadn''t they been told they weren''t allowed to do this very thing in one of her old proficiency examinations¡­?


    "You''re getting more excited," Rian said. "Should I get excited too?"


    His voice steadied her, reminded her where she was.


    "It''s too early to say one way or another," Lori said, trying to be realistic. It might not work. They might not have the materials they need. It might work, but might not last long enough for what they needed. It might break down on entering someone else''s demesne. So many factors¡­ so many tests she needed to do¡­!


    Rian was still staring at her face, head tilted almost horizontal, face set thoughtfully. Then he nodded. "I''m going to get excited," he said, turning to watch for grown men hit each other with oversize sticks with a smile on his face.


    She blinked. "Feeding yourself false hope, Rian?" she said. Really, his optimism¡­


    "Nothing of the sort," he said with a smile. That smile seemed almost¡­ serene. "This idea¡­ is it a Whispering thing? Not engineering, not carpentry, not sailing or any other kind of magic. Just Whispering, pure and simple?"


    Lori nodded.


    Rian did as well. "Then I''ll trust that the idea is probably right," he said. "After all, you''re the Whisperer. This is what you learned, what you studied. If even a little part of you thinks it''ll work, if you have to actively tell yourself not to get excited, to do tests first¡­ the idea probably has merit. So I''m going to be excited, because you might not know how to talk to people or know how to remember people''s names, or¡­ well, a lot of things, but you do know what you''re talking about when it comes to magic."


    Lori stared at him, and it took her a moment to remind herself not to be taken in by his heroic-sounding dramatic speeches.


    "You''re doing things in the wrong order," she declared, turning to watch the competition herself. The taller one in the pair on the right wasn''t setting his feet properly, she noted, and sure enough his opponent pressed him in front, causing the tall one to stumble backwards out of the demarcated area. "You''re supposed to get excited after we have a successful test, not before."


    "I''m getting the excitement out early," Rian said. "What''s the difference?"


    "After a successful test, we can be excited about what we can do with the results as a foundation to build on," Lori said. "That''s properly exciting. There''s nothing solid to be excited about now."


    "Tell you what," Rian said. "I''ll be sure to be even more excited when you finally get a successful test about what ever this idea you still haven''t told me about is. What is it, anyway?"


    Lori looked at him. "Blood," she said.


    "Blood?"


    "Blood."


    Rian nodded. "I have no idea what it means but it definitely sounds exciting," he said. "Can I do the test with you? Always helpful to have a more than one observer in case you have to blink and miss something."


    "Can you take notes?"


    "I was already planning to," Rian said as the referee called the results of a third quarterstaff match.


    "You don''t even know how I''m going to test this yet," Lori said.


    "Doesn''t matter, you should always make notes during a test."


    Huh. She hadn''t known he followed the Mysteries of Alknowledge. But then, she didn''t really care.


    Filled with excitement, Lori sat back and allowed herself to really watch the quarterstaff competition in front of her. She almost felt like she could tell who had been part of a militia simply from how they moved. There was a certain¡­ pragmatic aggression to the way they fought that she approved of. They parried and deflected better as well, and occasionally shifted their grip to hold their makeshift staff with one point forward ready to jab, like a spear. Riz was in the competition, she was surprised to see. The woman was one of the more aggressive ones, winning by two body blows¡ªpulled, Lori saw¡ªand pushing her opponent out of the demarcated zone with an aggressive charge after a quick exchange that had disoriented her opponent.


    Lori had to admit¡­ it was enjoyable to watch people engaging in violence. Almost, she wanted to grab a staff and try her luck¡­


    No, she''d be eliminated at the second round, at best. Possibly even the first, if she was fighting Riz or someone equally skilled or aggressive.


    But it was fun to watch anyway.

 83 - The End of the Holiday

    Lori was honestly surprised that Riz won the quarterstaff competition. Not that she didn''t deserve it, the woman had been good at switching from spear-like jabs to swings¡ªshe''d picked a good stick for how she wanted to fight¡ªbut there''d been another competitor who''d been much more skillful and had only been defeated because he hadn''t paid attention to his footing and ended up out of bounds. Lori joined in the accolades, clapping her hands politely as Rian awarded Riz the bowl overflowing with prizes people had donated for the winner of the competition. Some helpful person had even added a sack to gather the things that kept falling off the bowl. They were simple things¡ªthe candle, more fruits, tubers, a hunk of greenish raw bugwax, obviously from one of the bugwranglers trying to start domesticating some of the wild bugs around¡ªbut quantity and rarity have a quality all its own.


    The next was the sword competition¡ªalso using sticks¡ªthat used the same rules, with the addition that strikes to the arm or leg were worth half or a whole point at the discretion of the referee. Some of those who''d competed at the quarterstaff competition joined this one as well, their staffs¡ªor someone''s staff, at least¡ªclearly cut down between the two competitions to act as makeshift swords. Some wooden swords were longer or shorter than others, and there were fewer participants this time. Most clearly former militia, though she recognized two of the sawyers, one of the blacksmiths, and Deil among those.


    Several people were looking towards Rian expectantly as he finalized the brackets assigning who would be fighting who. They all seemed to be expecting him to do something.


    "Aren''t you going to join in too, Lord Rian?" Mikon asked, handing Lori her plate of meats and other foods. She had been the one tending to the firepit near where Rian had wanted Lori to sit, and while she didn''t have to cook much¡ªmost people didn''t seem to be eating. Their loss¡ªwhat she was cooking was delicious.


    "Hmm?" Rian ''hmm''-ed, looking up from his plank where he''d been sketching out the brackets. "Join what, Mikon?"


    "The sword competition," Mikon said. "Don''t you know the sword too? You practice with it every morning." He did? Lori supposed that was before she woke up.


    "Not really," Rian said absently. "I mean, I can use it, but I''m not very good at it."


    "Mah? But you move so well when you practice, Lord Rian!" Mikon said, looking surprised and disappointed.


    "I did say I could use it," Rian said. "I''m just not very good with a sword. I''d probably just end up embarrassing myself. Done!"


    That last was said with cheer, and Rian stood up, scrambling on top of the pile of excavated rock. "All right!" he called out. "The competitors in the preliminaries are¡­!" He began calling out names in pairs again, and the people in question stepped into the area.


    Lori wasn''t as familiar with sword fighting as she was with staffs. She hadn''t had time to learn. Had she wanted to, because of all the stories, historical and fictional, of Dungeon Binders and even ordinary wizards wielding swords with integrated bound tools that allowed for things like water-powered cutting edges, constant healing, and blades that changed shape? Of course. But she had needed to be practical at the time. A staff was what she had, not a sword, and so she had prioritized.


    Still, despite her relative ignorance, she could appreciate the showing of the people participating. By which she meant they moved very nicely while they were trying to hit each other. Footwork was important, after all.


    Someone won. It wasn''t Deil, but a surprisingly small man who had moved smoothly during his bouts, deflecting with minimal effort and then quickly getting into his opponent''s guard to strike repeatedly. He seemed to struggle to hold up the bowl, but his family was there to help him hold it, what seemed to be siblings, in-laws, and many children holding the bowl to bring back to their house.


    After that, there was a break and instead of the wrestling competition, there was the footrace. It was the strangest, most convoluted footrace Lori had ever heard of, and judging from the strange looks other people had made as Rian explained the running conditions, she hadn''t been the only one. She supposed it was a good way to make a race exciting when they didn''t have a very long stretch of open ground that would still be interesting for the people spectating, but¡­ no, it was still weird. However, that very weirdness seemed to make it exciting for the children involved, and their eagerness seemed infectious.


    "The race is from here," Rian pointed at the square were people had been competing, "up to where the new houses are being built," he pointed, "then the table" there was a table just barely visible from where Lori sat, " and back down again. The first pair to run between these two benches that mark the starting and finish line will be declared the winner. The course has been marked by benches and you cannot run unless you have your partner and your hairy blueball! Everyone understand?"


    There were some bemused looks, but the men and children representing their families¡ªevery family was competing because this was meant to be ''for fun'' and needed no special training, just running¡ªall shouted their understanding.


    "Great!" Rian said. "Will the children please come forward to collect a spoon and a hairy blueball from Umu?"


    The children crowded around the blonde, who handed out the implements and fruits and Rian demonstrated how to they should hold the spoon and balance the fruit on the bowl of the spoon. A lot of time was consumed as the children all amused themselves.


    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    "All right!" Rian called as the men representing their families stood at the starting area, the children carried on their backs¡ªmost of them were young girls or otherwise the smallest child in the family¡ªwhile said children each trying to balance a hairy blueball on a spoon. "On your marks! Get set! Run!"


    The men all broke into a run, and nearly all the children dropped their hairy blueball.


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    Lori was not familiar with the family who won the footrace, which wasn''t surprising. She hadn''t really gotten to know anyone. She''d been too busy trying to pull water out of the air at night, keeping the wheels of all the wagons rounded, killing any beasts that got too close, and putting one foot in front of the other because she had to walk. but they seemed happy so she supposed good for them.


    For such a race with such a short distance to run, it had been very loud and taken an inordinately long time. Part of the rules had been the adult couldn''t run unless they had their child relative on their back, and the child relative had to be the one to go down to get the hairy blueball back if they dropped it. Needless to say, there was a lot of climbing down, picking up the fruit and putting it back on their spoon, then climbing back on the adult''s back only to have to reverse the process again because the fruit fell off. There was a lot of backtracking when they progressed enough that they reached the slope, because even if hairy blueballs were not ideally shaped for rolling, they rolled down a long way after getting dropped.


    It was all very loud and the children had a lot of fun, which given their lack of involvement in the previous two competitions might have been why Rian had insisted on the format.


    The wrestling competition was the last one as the sun crossed the border to past mid-afternoon. Lori had long since gotten full, but could already see herself¡ªand everyone else¡ªgetting hungry for dinner. Rian didn''t even seem to notice as she wandered off in the middle of him setting down the rules for the competition.


    "¡ªpunching, kicking, biting, eye-gouging or pulling," he was saying as she headed towards where the seels were. "To win you need to push your opponent out of the marked area or get them down on the ground and keeping them from standing for a count of five¡ª"


    The rest faded away as Lori adjusted her hat. She might even catch some seels for tomorrow morning, put a little extra meat in their stores for winter.


    She was almost at her destination when she realized she wasn''t alone.


    As Lori reached the still uncut trees that separated where the children liked to seel from the rest of their established areas, she checked her connection with the core, looking for voids that might be people¡­ well. She was glad to find there were significantly fewer people using the woods to be private¡ªthere were some couples, and a void that seemed much too large and oddly shaped to be just two people¡ªbut was surprised to find there was also a void trailing behind her. It was, however, a small void.


    When she turned to look, she found the brat trailing several paces behind her. "Are you following me?" Lori asked.


    The brat nodded. "Yes, Wiz Lori," she said.


    "Why?" Lori asked flatly.


    "To see if you''re going seeling," the brat said simply.


    "What if I am?" Lori said.


    "Then you shouldn''t go seeling alone," the brat said, sounding mildly disapproving. "It''s not safe. You might fall into the water and hit your head and drown."


    Lori gave her a long bland stare. Then she shrugged. "Fine," she said, turning around and resuming her leisurely walk. After several steps she stopped and looked over her shoulder. "You might as well walk next to me, it''s creepy having you follow me like that."


    As the brat rushed forward, Lori resumed walking again, the brat settling at her side. "I''m glad you didn''t die, Wiz Lori," the brat said as they walked.


    "I''m glad I didn''t die too," Lori agreed. "Thank you for all the seels and fruits, Karina."


    The brat smiled happily. "You''re welcome!" she said. "I''m glad you like them."


    Lori didn''t actually eat the seel herself much anymore¡ªshe usually left it with the people at the tanning shed to skin and butcher for cold storage¡ªbut the fruits she kept. After all, it''s not like they could store them for long without spoiling, even in her cold room.


    Idly, she reached into the bag she was carrying and seeled out a pink lady by touch. "Want one?" she said, offering it to the brat.


    The brat smiled. "Thank you!" she said, accepting the pink fruit and biting into it.


    Humming to herself, Lori pulled out another fruit and did the same.


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    They came back with six seels trapped in ice, the biggest haul so far. Most probably wouldn''t be eaten today, but with the animals on ice, they''d keep until tomorrow, when people would be working again and someone could properly skin and butcher the fursh for cold storage. The brat kept miming stabbing them with a spear and holding out her hands as if measuring the seels, muttering about needing a longer stick.


    Lori left them frozen just outside the cleared space since the area in front of the Dungeon was still occupied by wrestling. The current competitors were rolling around on the ground, trying to keep their chest or back pinned down or be rolled out of bounds.


    "You''re back? You came back?" Rian said, looking surprised as Lori just slipped back onto the bench. "You actually came back?"


    Lori shrugged. "I left my plate," she said. Indeed, it was still right where she left it, covered in congealed oil since she''d been too full to get up and wash it. She''d have to melt the oil a little before adding wood ash to it so they would properly mix. "Besides, it''s not like we have a library I can go to instead." She offered him a pink lady.


    For a moment, Rian stared at it, as if not knowing what it was. He took it gingerly. "Do I peel this, or¡­?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. Who peeled a pink lady? "Just bite into it," she said, grabbing one for herself and demonstrating.


    Rian did as instructed. His eyes grew wide. "Suddenly, I''m regretting my generosity," he muttered.


    "Ah," Lori said blandly. "Much is explained. Only a fool who has never tasted pink lady would so callously give them away."


    "Do you know how to grow its seeds?" Rian asked, staring at the dark red stone his bite had revealed.


    "I''m sure you''ll be motivated to find out for yourself," Lori said.


    "Yay, more work," Rian said. He took another bite, chewing slowly. "Fine, it''ll be worth it. Inside the dungeon to start with? So it''s safe from being dug up?"


    "You take care of it," Lori said. "I''m providing the light already."


    "Tomorrow," Rian said.


    "Tomorrow," Lori nodded.


    They watched the wrestling, and all Lori could think of was someone would have to launder those clothes, which were getting so stained from the dirt the two were rolling around in¡­

 84 - The Holiday Is Over, Back To Work

    Lori didn''t recognize who won at wrestling, but they were tall, big and heavy, which sounded about right for winning wrestling.


    With the day so late, dinner preparations immediately followed. Lori decapitated the seels, and people set out to skin, gut and drain them. She had to help with that, as the blood had either frozen or congealed from being in blocks of ice while the wrestling competition ran its course, but once she was told it needed to be done to improve the flavor, she resigned herself to it. Admittedly, forcing water though blood vessels was a novel new experience. As there was no horrible taste in her meat, she presumed it worked.


    Someone started playing music again, and Lori instinctively checked the sky. Not yet proper sundown. They had time before she had to make them¡ªwell, make Rian¡ªstop doing that.


    "A lot of people will probably go to sleep soon," Rian commented next to her. "They''re full, since they''ve been eating a lot. People might actually look forward to regular food tomorrow." He looked at where the seels were still in the process of being butchered. "I better go make sure they''re ready to store most of that. It''ll be easier to get food out of storage if people want to eat some more than it is to put it in storage once it''s been sitting around a while¡­"


    "I need you to make another announcement while everyone is eating," Lori said.


    Rian groaned. "My poor throat¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "If you can''t speak the actual words, find someone who can. I need you to ask for volunteers for our part in River''s Fork''s proposal about the mine. Make it clear that they will still be part of this demesne, they''re just working there."


    "Can''t that wait until tomorrow?" Rian asked.


    "They''ll be up late letting their stomach settle, they might as well have something to think about," Lori shrugged.


    "You''re giving them homework? You cruel, cruel monster you," Rian said with a small, amused smirk.


    "A necessary cruelty, I assure you," Lori said.


    The announcement was made, and the call for volunteers came out. Lori had decided on a maximum of thirty, but would be very surprised if that many people volunteered. She was hoping they''d get around fifteen. It would not surprise her if no one volunteered though, and she would need to find the people doing the least work¡ªwell, have Rian find the people doing the least work. There were always some, simply from human nature if nothing else¡ªand somehow ''volunteer'' them. Or at least entice them somehow¡­


    Lori sighed as she realized she might actually have to do something she''d been putting off.


    Still, the announcement was followed with an interested murmur in the crowd. Some people even went up to Rian to ask for details, very politely ignoring her completely and not bothering her as she ate. It wasn''t like sitting at their usual table in the Dungeon. For one, it was windier, and as the sun set more, she had to make bindings of lightwisps and have them float in midair to illuminate where people were eating. Still, Lori and everyone else made no move to go eat in the dining halls.


    Eventually, it had to end. There were disappointed sighs as Rian called for people to start moving tables and benches back into the dining halls. Not all the tables had been removed, but a lot of the benches had been, including a few that some jokers had put in the river for some reason. She hoped that hadn''t damaged them.


    Still, the return of the furniture proceeded smoothly enough. The tables all went back, but some of the benches remained for people to sit on. Well, not her problem. The benches at her table had stayed right where they were in the Dungeon.


    As night fell, the music all fell away, leaving only the sounds of the songbugs, the sound of the river, the distant sounds the seels and voices raised in song. A drinking song at that, despite the lack of booze to accompany it.


    Well, it wasn''t music. Lori let it be.


    After cleaning her plate with oil and ash, and giving Rian the stones of the pink ladies as well as other seeds, she went up to her room to sleep.


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    Lori lazily woke up to the now-familiar discomforts of sleeping on a wooden bed with nothing but her laundry and her raincoat to cushion her back. Was it her imagination, or did her clothes no longer provide the cushioning they once did? She very much hoped it was just her imagination¡­


    With a sigh, she stiffly got up, stretching and getting to her feet. If she had a proper bed with any sort of softness at all, she might have been tempted to just turn over and nap a little more. That was not an option, however, since her bed was very uncomfortable as it was. She went to her bathroom for some water to wash her face of oil, then got dressed for breakfast.


    She tried not to think about stealing Rian''s bedroll or keeping it for her own use. Or wishing she''d managed to get the bedroll of someone who''d died when she''d had the chance. She didn''t remember being this uncomfortable when they''d been traveling from Covehold¡­ but then, she''d always managed to cut a nice pile of grass to lie down on.


    Maybe she should start doing that again¡­


    Grumbling to herself, Lori headed down, game board in her arms. Thankfully, the Dungeon''s dining hall was rich in the smells of cooking, though it was strangely quiet as well. Many people seemed to be sleeping on the tables, waiting for the kitchen staff to declare that the food was ready.


    The board had been set up by the time Rian came in, looking like he wanted to sleep more. He took one look at the board, lingered, and shrugged. "Eh, why not," he said, and sat down. "So how''d you sleep?"


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    "The same as I usually did," Lori said, which was true. She made the first move, taking stones from one of the bowls.


    "Then you''re in a good mood?" he said hopefully.


    Lori sighed. "What do you want this time, Rian?"


    "It''s not for me," he said, affecting innocence. "It''s for all your hard working, frustrated citizens."


    "The weavers and ropers can start moving into the second level as soon as they can, as long as they keep their equipment contained in the alcoves," Lori said. "Make sure they know that in the event of a dragon, that''s the alcove they and their families will have to occupy, so they need to keep themselves neat. I''ll begin construction of the third level as soon as I''ve transferred miners to River''s Fork and have researched the air circulation question. If that is successful, I expect you to prioritize boat construction."


    Rian paused. "I''ll be perfectly honest, I''m actually surprised you remembered about that."


    "Why wouldn''t I remember?" Lori said.


    "As I probably once said already, I can''t just assume things with you," Rian said. "I wasn''t talking about that issue, though I''ll get the word out. But no, I don''t mean any of that. "


    Lori sighed. "Of course you didn''t."


    "No, we have a different immediate problem," Rian confirmed. "Er, over the holidays, did you perhaps notice how people were¡­ ah, how do I say this¡­?"


    "How what?" Lori said blandly. "How people were sneaking off into the woods in twos and threes, uncaring if the children happened to stumble over them?"


    Rian blushed. "Wait, threes?" he said.


    "It was either that or they had a living seel with them," Lori said blandly.


    "Threes," Rian nodded. "Wow."


    "One group seemed big enough to be at least four."


    "Were you watching?" Rian asked, looking aghast and horrified.


    Lori twitched. "What kind of pervert do you take me for?" she said. "I could tell from my connection to the demesne. Nothing so sordid as actually seeing them with my eyes had to happen."


    "I''m not sure if that''s better or worse¡­" Rian muttered.


    "Get to the point, Rian," Lori snapped.


    "Right! I think people need a place to do¡­ that," Rian said. "I know technically people can do it at home, but¡­ well, a lot of them have children and relatives. It''s just not normally feasible. It worked yesterday because the children were out, and I think¡ªI hope¡ªthey took turns, but given the number of people in the woods¡­ well, that wasn''t an option for everyone."


    "So you want me to build a brothel?" Lori said flatly.


    "No, of course not," Rian said. "It''s not THAT kind of place. Just¡­ some place people can go to be private. You know, a place that''s not ''public'' according to how you''re going to define your law so people can be as indecent as they want¡­ within reason, no kids, purely voluntary and consenting people only," he added hastily. "It''s going to keep happening, and unless and until people get bigger homes, it''s going to be an issue due to lack of privacy, especially when winter comes."


    Lori blinked. "Why ''especially when winter comes''?"


    "Well, even if people manage to sufficiently fortify their homes," Rian said, "that''s whole families with months at home with little to do. And it''s not like we have any reading material lying around, unless we go buy some in Covehold¡­ which I still need to build the boat for¡­ "


    Lori held up a hand to stop him talking. "I''ll consider it," she said. "As it is, it''s a much lower priority than anything else we have, and that includes getting benches installed in the second level and no, I am not going to have people doing that in the second level alcoves." She recognized the thoughtful tilt of Rian''s head.


    "It''s just a thought¡­" Rian said defensively.


    "I will acknowledge it is an issue," Lori said. She sighed. "I''ll consider it. Anything else?"


    "Can you tell Umu, Mikon and Riz they don''t need to make sure I go to sleep anymore?" Rian said. "I''ll be sleeping normally again, so there''s really no need for them to make sure I lie down and wait for me to fall asleep."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "I didn''t tell them to do that."


    Rian blinked. "Then why are they doing it?"


    "Amusement, possibly?" Lori said blandly. "As you said, there is little to do here."


    Rian groaned. "I''m going to have to start worrying about people pulling pranks on each other out of boredom, aren''t I?"


    Lori gave her lord a long, blank stare. "Go get the food," she said. "It should be done by now."


    "I know you were getting your own food for most of yesterday," Rian said.


    "Holiday logic," Lori said. "Normal logic doesn''t apply."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine." He went off to get food.


    Lori stretched, then frowned, realizing Rian had never made his move after she did. Did that mean he forfeited and she won?


    Rian came back, holding two bowls. Lori picked one and was about to start eating when she frowned. "Does the meat look like a strange color to you?"


    "I think they seared it before they added it to the pot," Rian said, looking into his bowl. "Maybe they''re trying something new?" He took a spoonful. "Tastes good, though."


    Skeptically, Lori took a spoonful and put it in her mouth. It was a different texture than usual, but actually easier to bite through, and a bit more flavorful¡­


    She was still considering whether she liked this change or not when someone sat down next to Rian.


    "Good morning, Lord Rian," Umu said brightly. "Did you sleep well?"


    Rian stared at her. Lori stared at her. She was fairly sure the people on the tables on all sides stared at her.


    Humming to herself, Umu started eating her stew.


    For some reason, Rian looked at Lori.


    Lori watched the blonde warily, but Umu seemed to have no intention of talking to her. Shrugging, the Binder went back to her food.


    "Ah, Lord Rian, your dirty clothes have probably piled up, haven''t they?" Umu said. "I''ll take care of them for you later, all right? They''ll be on your bed, folded and clean by the end of the day."


    Rian stared at her, looking¡­ guilty, for some reason. "Ah, you don''t have to¡ª"


    "Nonsense," Umu said, turning to smile at him. "You obviously have no idea how to wash clothes, so I''ll do it for you. Though you should really wash your bedroll too. Perhaps you can help me with that. We wouldn''t want it to get washed away in the river, would we?" A smile, and Umu went back to eating.


    Rian stared at her as she ate, then for some reason turned to Lori.


    "What?" she asked blandly.


    He didn''t say anything just waved one hand in Umu''s general direction.


    "Yes, you should eat too," Lori said. "Or do you need someone to remind you to eat?"


    Rian stared at her. He was doing a lot of staring instead of eating. "You''re not¡­?" He didn''t continue the thought.


    "Not what?" Lori said, fighting back amusement. All right, it was amusing to see Rian so ignorant, but still¡­


    Rian made a hand gesture in Umu''s general direction again.


    "Rian, use words, not whatever strange signs you''re making," Lori said.


    "You don''t mind?" Rian said.


    "Why would I mind where she sits?" Lori said. "Clearly there was no other space elsewhere." The empty space directly behind Rian proved that a lie, but he never looked there anyway. On the opposite side of that table from the empty space, Riz and Mikon were both glaring at the back of Umu''s head. The people on either side of them shuffled away slightly, clearly remembering the table-leaping of days prior.


    "Does that mean people can sit next to you now?" Rian said.


    "Your jests are weak, Rian," Lori said. "Eat and put some meat in your stomach, and maybe you can think of better."


    For some reason, Rian stared up at the ceiling. "Am I still asleep?" he said. "Is this some weird dream?"


    Lori shook her head. Useless thespian.


    She ate and got ready for her day.

 85 - Unfinished Business and Experiment Preparation

    Before her injury, Lori would have gone back to digging out the niches and alcoves of the second level, which were only partially done. It wasn''t strictly necessary¡ªpeople had slept on the floor before, and since they''d have their belongings with them, they could just lay out their bedrolls on the ground¡ªbut it would be more space efficient, getting sleeping people off walking and standing areas.


    Now that had to be put on hold. Priorities had changed.


    Her demesne needed metal. Technically, they already had it, but they needed a secured source of it, not just limited supplies. It was why they were so sparing with the metal stock they had. It was why Lori had agreed to Shanalorre''s proposal. Metal was one less thing they would need to buy from Covehold, and could become something they could sell to Covehold instead.


    Given she was still working on how to create beads¡ªanother gap in her education that in hindsight she should have remedied, if it could have been remedied¡ªand it was extremely unlikely people would just part with the beads they had for buying supplies¡ªif they still had any¡ªthey would need some products to sell. Lumber was not an option, as it weighed too much and was too big for any vessel they eventually made, and food was unlikely to be travel well. They had, at best, seel pelts and skin, although given how small the seels the children had been catching, the sale value was questionable.


    But metal¡­ metal traveled well, had good value and unless Covehold had managed to set up an actual regulatory body of some sort¡ªwhich was unlikely¡ªas long as they could find the right buyer they''d be able to sell it at a reasonable price.


    That meant getting it out of the ground.


    If River''s Fork had been a demesne Lori controlled, that would have been simple. Earthwisps would have pulled it out of the ground easily, and refining would also be simple, since firewisps would reach the temperatures metals needed to start smelting. Admittedly, that was as far as she knew where metallurgy was concerned.


    She had Rian go see one of the smiths¡ªor even all the smiths¡ªto get the ore sample confirmed. "If they need it melted, tell me and I''ll make time after lunch. There''s no point in doing this if this is just useless shiny rock like gold."


    "Gold is still¡­ better than nothing?" Rian said hesitantly. "We can make lighter cooking pots with it. Well, relatively lighter. And it''ll be useful once we have acids. Or even just for putting in people''s mouths as replacement teeth, since it won''t rust."


    Lori tilted her head. "Huh," she said. "A sound point. I''d still prefer copper, though. It''s hard enough for use in tools. Acid vessels are good, but nails, blades, needles and work knives would be better at this point."


    "Hope for copper, got it," Rian said.


    "And find out who had previously worked in the mine before the dragon occurred," Lori said. "If any of them survived, that is."


    "That''s morbid," Rian said. "What will you be doing?"


    "Resource management," Lori said.


    "Meaning?"


    "I''m going to get the dragon scales that I had to leave behind due to my injury."


    Rian gave her a flat stare. "You''ll be taking Deil and Tackir along so you don''t decide to sit on it again. If you''re too lazy to walk, have them carry you. In fact, I''ll tell them that myself."


    "I''m not going to sit on it," Lori said irritably. "I don''t need minders."


    "Yes, well, this is government at work: taking action to prevent something that''s already happened," Rian said. "Don''t forget to bring your hat."


    "If you start acting like my parents again, I will sink you into the ground."


    "The violence inherent in the system will not stop me from doing my duty to keep you alive."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Oh, fine. But not them. It''ll be a waste of their time."


    "You don''t even know what they do."


    "They smell like sawdust, they''re either carpenters or sawyers." Lori tilted her head in consideration. "More likely the former, I don''t remember seeing them in the sawpits. There''s no need to remove two of our carpenters from work they need to do just to indulge your paranoia."


    "I can accompany her, Lord Rian!"


    Riz was suddenly there at Rian''s other side, having scrambled over the table. "I''m sure I wouldn''t be missed much," the former militiawoman said.


    Behind Rian, Lori could see Mikon visibly thinking very hard if she should scramble over the table too.


    Lori let out an impatient breath. "I''m going to get my hat," she said flatly. "If she''s coming, she better be ready when I come down." She turned and went to get her hat and the map. Then went back to get her board and take it to her room with her. They hadn''t even managed to play.


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    She put on her coat this time, to physically protect her arms. Not that she''d be riding any rocks, but still. As Rian had joked, governments took action to prevent something that had already happened. And she was the government, after all.


    When she came down, Rian was in the midst of giving Riz hasty instructions. The latter seemed to actually be listening, nodding at his words.


    "¡ªher uninjured, all right?" she heard as she approached. "It''ll be embarrassing to go back to Shana after only three days to get her fixed again."


    "You can count on me, Lord Rian," Riz said. "I''ll make sure nothing happens to the Great Binder."


    "I won''t hold you to that," Rian said with a sigh. "That''s what the other guys said last time."


    They looked towards Lori expectantly, but she just walked past them.


    "Ah," Rian said. "Better follow her, she''s not going to wait. I''ll take care of bringing your bowl back for you."


    Lori heard footsteps following after her.


    Why did it feel like people were watching her go?


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    She got back before lunch, completely uninjured.


    Lori had gone straight to her previous destination this time. She''d only wanted to get the aggregation of dragon scales she''d made last time. That was it. No detours, no riding on rocks or whatever Rian was afraid she''d do. Just go straight from Dungeon to clearing, gather all the dragon scales, and bring it back to store in the treasure room.


    And as soon as Riz tentatively volunteered to read the map for her when they ended up in what turned out to be the clearing she''d been aiming for last time, they did just that!


    Really, Rian was needlessly worrying about nothing.


    She''d dismissed Riz, and extracted the dragon scales from their covering of packed dirt by herself, taking the materials to the treasure room. Technically, there were two treasure rooms. There was one that stored the ingots of metal and other material resources the other people in the demesne had brought, kept safe in the dungeon in the event of a dragon since metal was heavy and after the first time, no one wanted to try lugging them from their house in a hurry. This contained packets of nails, bar stock, ingots and other things, all neatly labeled and separated, with a stone tablet only Lori could alter recording who owned how much of what. Rian had half-jokingly compared her to a bank that didn''t offer any interest to anyone.


    She had to admit, that had been funny.


    The other, more important treasure room contained the things that she had claimed. Dragon scales and altered materials touched by dragon claws, mostly. While many had been identified¡ªiron, copper, tin, gold and now anatass¡ªsome were curiosities, like the black material that had once been a house''s roof. She wasn''t sure what she''d do with it, though a part of her was already resigned to parting with the iron and copper if they really needed it for anything.


    The only consolation she had was her treasure room was fairly large. Certainly larger than the first one, although that was because she really couldn''t stack things very high, since she was reluctant to alter their shapes¡ªmetal was hard to alter with earthwisps alone, you also needed firewisps to do it properly¡ªand so she''d been leaving them on the floor and occasionally stacking things if they seemed stable. They often weren''t. A lot of it was very irregularly shaped. Hence why her personal treasure room was so much bigger: she needed the floor space to lay out everything.


    Still, it was a satisfying morning''s working, completing something that had been left unfinished, and Lori was in a good mood as she met Rian for lunch.


    "Are you doing anything this afternoon?" she asked.


    "Yes, but it''s not urgent," Rian said as he put down two bowls on the table. Lori picked one and he kept the other. "Do you need me for anything?"


    On either side of Rian, Umu and Riz both paused in their eating. Behind them in the next table, Mikon had a strange look on her face, and empty space on the bench around her.


    "You''re to take notes," Lori said. "You volunteered for it, remember?"


    Rian''s eyes widened and a smile spread over his face. "Oh, you''re doing it now? This afternoon?"


    "After lunch, as soon as I get the equipment I need from my room," Lori confirmed. "After that, we''ll have to see."


    "We''ll be doing it outside then, not in the Dungeon?" Rian said, looking strangely happy.


    "You''re not doing anything," Lori told him. "I will be conducting the experiment, you will simply take notes."


    "I''ll be learning," Rian said cheerfully. "That''s not nothing. That''s the key to making dreams come." He frowned. "I''m going to need a bigger plank. I don''t want to run out of writing space just when things starting getting interesting."


    "I think you''re overestimating how much writing needs to be done," Lori said.


    "It''s not like we''re using pens and paper," Rian said. "If I need more writing space, I want to know sooner instead of later. Wood is heavy."


    "Well, if you insist, you can put it in the boat," Lori said.


    Rian blinked. "We''re taking the boat?"


    "We''ll need to," Lori said. "I can''t conduct the experiment inside the demesne."


    Rian stared at her. Then he sighed. "See, this is the sort of thing that needs to be written in the experimental notes. ''Experiment was not conducted inside demesne''. Are we going to need the ladle and buckets?"


    Lori opened her mouth to respond then paused for a moment. "Actually, yes, I think you will," she said thoughtfully.


    "Well, I''m glad I found out now instead of later," Rian said blandly. "Otherwise we''d have needed to go back and get them."


    "I don''t think your laundry will be ready by the time you get back, Lord Rian," Umu said. "They''re still a bit wet. Maybe tomorrow morning."


    Rian blinked, as if remembering someone was actually sitting next to him now. "You really don''t have to Umu. Really, you don''t."


    "Nonsense, Lord Rian," Umu said. "If you actually knew how to do your own laundry, you''d have done it before now. Just leave this to me, all right?"


    "Rian, focus," Lori said, getting his attention back. Reluctantly, he turned towards her. "Get the boat¡ª"


    "Lori''s Boat?"


    Lori rolled her eyes at the interruption. "Yes, of course that one, it''s the only one we have right now. Get the wood you think we need and put it on the boat and get it ready to move. I want us on our way as soon as we finish eating."


    "Is that your way of telling me to eat faster and then go get things ready?"


    "It''s my way of telling you to eat at all," she said, pointing at his untouched bowl. "Eat."


    "Now who''s acting like a parent," he said, taking his spoon and starting to eat.


    "If I were your parent, I''d be giving you embarrassing advice for getting women to go to bed with you," Lori said blandly. He obviously needed it.


    Rian nearly choked on his food.

 86 - Experimental Preparation and Contextual Exposition

    "Did your parents really give you advice for getting women to go to bed with you?" Rian asked later when they were alone.


    "I was being facetious," Lori said as she carefully held the box of glassware on her lap. It was padded, but there was no sense taking chances. "None of the advice they gave me would have worked for you." She paused, considered her words, then amended them. "Little of the advice they gave me would have worked for you. I doubt you would look attractively arousing in a skirt that showed off your ankles, much less your calves."


    "You''ve obviously never seen my legs," Rian said as he operated the tiller. He actually sounded serious. "How old were you when that happened? Because otherwise I''m going to have nightmares about you being given that advice at eight years old or something."


    "It was when I started attending school to learn Whispering," Lori said. She sighed. Really, her parents had told her to devote all her time to studying to the unreasonable exclusion of all else with one breath, and encouraging her to charm boys and girls with the other. It hadn''t been helpful at all. Quite the opposite. "Why? Do you need more advice on how to get women into your bed?"


    "I think we can both agree it will scar my mind to hear it and reopen terrible wounds for you to remember it," Rian said. "So, how about we compromise and just never speak of it again?"


    Lori considered. "I will consider it."


    Lori''s Boat moved lightly over the water. With just the two of them, the occasional waves and swells of the river seemed to affect the boat more. The front was certainly bobbing up and down a lot more than Lori was used to.


    "You might want to slow down the boat," Rian said. "We''re almost at the edge."


    And so they were. Approaching them was the edge of the demesne, the curving line that marked the literal sphere of her influence. Beyond it were the glittering colors of death, shining in a multitude of shades and hues, twinkling like stars as they moved, as the wind made the trees sway, sending shining dust falling from its leaves and branches.


    Lori wanted to tell him to keep going, to beach the boat on the river''s edge outside¡­ but movement caught her eye. Beasts, somehow so still the layer of Iridescence on them had blended with the trees around them, at least until one had blinked right when she''d been looking at it. Even knowing where it was, it was disturbingly easy to lose sight of.


    Rian seemed to have seen it as well. "We might have to clear a safe area before we can do anything," he said. "By which I mean you, oh great and powerful Binder, wielder of great and powerful magic."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Shut up and beach the boat," she said, reducing the speed of the waterjets.


    "Couldn''t we just stay here in the river until all the beasts are dead?" Rian said, looking worried.


    "If we did, the boat would be dragged along in the flood," Lori said.


    Rian blinked. "What flood?"


    "The flood I''m about to cause."


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    She caused a flood.


    To be more precise, it wasn''t exactly a flood. She claimed the waterwisps in the river, bound it to increase its viscosity and so it would stop flowing and start rising, made the water just short of boiling, and then threw it at the shore just outside of her demesne.


    It was childishly satisfying to see all the Iridescence just¡­ wash off of the trees, rocks and ground, revealing the admittedly muted tones and colors of what had been underneath. The beasts¡ªthere were surprisingly many of them¡ªall let out cries of pain from the hot water and ran into the woods. A few stumbled into her demesne, but then started crying louder and stumbled their way back out again.


    Rian lowered the spear he''d been holding. Lori wasn''t sure what use he thought that would be, though she was glad he''d moved to stand between her and the beasts. "Well, that¡­ worked? I think?" he said doubtfully. "Now what?"


    Truthfully, Lori hadn''t expected beasts. She''d thought they''d find a nice, cleared space to do their experiment, takes notes, and come back. She really should have known better. After all, hadn''t they just come this way two days ago?


    Not that she''d tell Rian that.


    "Now, we clear a space where we can conduct the experiment without worrying about the beasts," Lori said.


    "Please tell me by ''we'', you mean ''you with me as a spectator''?" Rian said. "Because I don''t think I have the tools to be of any help."


    "Yes, yes, I''ll do it," she said, rolling her eyes. "You just keep an eye out for beasts coming near."


    "Right. I can do that. Though next time, I''m bringing a bow and arrows instead of this stupid stick. What was I thinking?"


    "I could not possibly comment as to your private thought processes."


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    She cleared a space.


    It was more complicated and time-consuming than it sounded. The banks of the river were thick with growths of ropeweed, while behind them loomed tall, ancient-looking trees whose branches constantly dropped a rain of fine Iridescence dust from the small beasts and bugs that lived among their branches.


    They wouldn''t need to cut any trees, only a small patch among the ropeweed that they could comfortably stand in to conduct the experiments. Lori was glad of that. She wasn''t quite sure how she''d move that much wood outside her demesne, especially with beasts nearby.


    She''d cut the reeds along a stretch of the river at the border of her demesne with a narrow, powerful stream of water from the river, moving in a swift, cohesive line that punched through any matter in its way. Plays and stories made a big deal about bolts of lightning and fiery explosions, but that was only when a Whisperer didn''t have any water nearby.


    "Rian, what are you doing?" she said as she watched Rian start bundling the fallen ropeweed together.


    "Not being wasteful," he said. "We need this stuff for rope and weaving! It grows fast, but we need every bit we can get."


    "You realize there are beasts about, don''t you?"


    "You realize that if we build a boat, we''re going to need a lot of rope for it?" Rian shot back. "Just keep the beasts off my back while I do it, it won''t take long."


    It took a while, and by the time Rian was done, their previously empty boat was half-full of ropeweed, which was extending over the front and back. Lori had to drive off beasts several times with arcs of hot water and steam from the river, and once Rian had to run back inside her demesne while she decapitated a beast that charged towards them on its two thick, heavy legs. While not one of the fast, sharp-toothed predators, its huge size and long tail meant they still had to deal with it.


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    Draining the blood and encasing it in ice also took a while. They''d float it back with them to add to the food supply.


    Eventually, however, Lori lost her patience and told Rian to leave the rest of the ropeweed be so she could get on with her experiment. She''d raised a flat-topped finger of stone to act as a convenient table for her, and used earthwisps to push it along the ground past the border of her demesne, about the length of her foot from the edge. She didn''t need it to be far, only outside her demesne.


    "Can you talk me through what you''re doing?" Rian said, holding a plank of wood in one hand, and a slender branch the length of a hand and about a finger thick in the other. One end of the branch had been whittled to a rough point, and then set on fire to create a rudimentary writing implement. "For the record?"


    Lori looked up from where she had opened the padded box of glassware on another stop finger she''d raised to act as another table. It was well inside the demesne, in case another beast became curious and overcame its discomfort at losing the iridescence within it and got too close. "I''m going to see if I can use my blood to imbue water."


    Rian nodded, and wrote that down. "Great. Now, would you please have mercy on an ignorant, uneducated lord and give me the context for why and how you think this is going to work? So I can write it down for the benefit of future generations?"


    Lori gave him an exasperated look. "Why? It wouldn''t affect the results."


    "But if you don''t tell me, how will I understand how great and amazing and intelligent and full of genius the Dungeon Binder I serve is?" he said. His face was utterly innocent and guileless.


    "You realize I know you''re using base flattery, right?"


    "So¡­ you don''t want to explain to me how great and amazing and intelligent you are?"


    "If I tell you, will you stop with the ridiculous stage-performance baiting silliness?" she said, exasperated.


    "Of course, your Bindership," he said. "You need only say so."


    "So," she said.


    Rian paused, tilted his head, and chuckled. "Good one."


    Lori shook her head and picked out the glassware she was going to use. She closed the box, then put down her syringe case on top of it. filling the glassware with boiled water from her waterskin, she placed the syringe in it, and proceeded to make the water boil. "Whisperers," she explained as she watched the water bubble as it slowly turned into vapor, "manipulate the wisps in the world. We do this by taking in magic, passing the magic through parts of our body that contain the sort of wisps we want to manipulate, and then channeling the magic out of our body and into the wisps in question to bind them to our will."


    Rian nodded. "All right, sounds simple enough."


    "However, this poses certain difficulties," Lori said. "For example, let''s say we want to bind the wisps in a pot of boiling water. We would have to touch the water in question."


    "I''ve seen you control rock and water without touching them," Rian said.


    "That is because we are a Dungeon Binder," Lori said. "We''re different. To a Binder, the entire demesne is like their body. As long as it''s inside the demesne, we are technically already touching it."


    "But that''s limited to inside a demesne," Rian said, nodding. "So outside, like in River''s Fork, you need to actually touch something to use magic on it." He tilted his head. "Is that why you touched that rock to your eye when you made it light up? You need to pass light through your eye and even as I say it I realize why."


    Huh. Once more she had to acknowledge her lord''s intelligence. "Yes," she said. "Your eyes are where light passes through. Binding lightwisps uses the eyes. It''s very inconvenient, really."


    "What about the ears?"


    Lori blinked at the nonsensical question. "What?"


    "Your ears," Rian said, tugging at the flap of skin and soft bone in question. "Light sort of passes through it right? Not like glass or water, but some light clearly passes through the other side if the light is bright enough."


    Lori stared at him. "Don''t get distracted," she eventually said, even as she was suddenly very conscious of minute amounts of lightwisps on the tips of her ears where they peeked out of her hair. "You were asking about the experiment."


    "Right. A Whisperer needs to be touching something to bind the wisps in it, which is difficult if it''s too hot, or something otherwise not safe to touch. A Dungeon Binder doesn''t need to, because they''re sort of already touching it already," he said. He frowned. "Wait, I''ve still seen you manipulate water without touching it even before you became a Dungeon Binder. So¡­ there''s another way."


    Lori nodded. Was this what her teachers had felt like when she had, of course, immediately understood what they were trying to teach? "Metal can conduct magic. It can act as a channel between a wizard and whatever they want to bind."


    "The wires wrapped around your staff," Rian said instantly. "And the metal cap on it. It''s not just to keep it from being damaged, it''s so you can use your magic through it."


    "Yes, yes, you''re very smart and observant," she said. And he was, she supposed.


    Rian''s head turned to look towards Lori''s Boat. "That''s what the metal sticking out of the water jet is for! It''s so you don''t need to stick your hand into the water, just touch the wire!"


    "Are you done?" she said.


    He smiled nervously, clearly chagrined. "Sorry, teacher. Please keep teaching me?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "There are other factors, but those are the basics. A Whisperer needs to be touching something to bind and imbue it."


    "Question," Rian said. "What is ''imbue''?"


    "It''s the process of feeding the wisps in the binding magic to be able to control them," Lori said impatiently.


    "Fuel," Rian said, nodding. "Like adding firewood to a bonfire. You need to imbue, or the binding¡­ doesn''t work?"


    "Say rather that the wisps immediately come unbound," Lori said. "Binding is in itself an act of imbuing, just as the act of grabbing something already puts pressure on it, but not as much as deliberately squeezing with all your might."


    "Ah," Rian nodded, writing notes on his plank. Lori wondered if he was actually fitting everything in. "Thank you for clarifying. So binding would be like trying to start a fire, and imbuing is giving that fire something to burn."


    "If that lets you understand it, then yes, I suppose that''s close enough," Lori said. She glanced down and stopped boiling the water. "So, we have a problem."


    Rian began writing again. "And this problem is?"


    "Technically, we have two problems," Lori said. "The first is a means of powering the waterjet without me. I can imbue it with a considerable amount of magic, but that will still be a finite amount. If I''m not there to further imbue it, it will run out and the water jet becomes useless. Also, without me, the binding on the water jet is locked to the last thing it was set to do, meaning it will keep on trying to draw and thrust water, thereby consuming the magic it was imbued with."


    "Question," Rian interrupted. "What happens if we take it out of the water so it''s got nothing to draw and thrust?"


    Lori blinked. She frowned, tilting her head. Finally, she shook it. "No, that won''t work. It will just try to draw in the waterwisps in the air, and will still be using up energy at the same rate."


    Rian sighed. "Well, it was worth asking," he said.


    "It was," Lori agreed.


    "Is there any way we can get the binding to¡­ stop thrusting?"


    "Yes," Lori said dryly. "It''s called ''making a bound tool''. Something I still haven''t managed to do."


    "Ah," Rian said.


    "I have thought about the problem, Rian," Lori said. "I don''t actually like going to River''s Fork so that I can be sure the waterjet doesn''t run out of magic."


    "Uh, you mentioned a second problem?" Rian said.


    Lori nodded. "The second problem is the same as the first, but for a different kind of wisp. Binder Shanalorre asked for a way of providing air circulation so that the mine could be properly ventilated. That is an easy binding, but with a considerable problem."


    "You can only imbue a finite amount of magic, and you can''t make it stop to conserve power," Rian said.


    "Exactly. It''s the same problem. A limited power source used inefficiently."


    "And¡­ this thing we''re about to test¡­ it will solve that?"


    "It should," Lori said, gingerly touching the syringe. A bit warm, but no longer boiling hot. "All that I''ve learned tells me it should work."


    "Then¡­ why are we testing it?"


    Lori hesitated. She considered obfuscating. Lying. Ignoring the question.


    Instead, she said, "I''ve never done this before."


    "Ah," Rian said, nodding. "Good a reason as any. If the first step doesn''t work, there''s no second step to go to."


    Lori began pulling her left arm out of the sleeve of her raincoat, exposing her skin there.


    "Do you want me to take your coat?" Rian offered.


    Lori hesitated, remembering the last time he''d made that offer. "Yes," she said, taking the coat off. "Put it on the boat."


    As Rian turned to put her coat on the boat, Lori took the brass syringe, ascertained by the waterwisps in her body were her vein was, drew away the lightningwisps that conducted pain, took a breath to brace herself, and jabbed herself with the syringe to begin drawing blood.

 87 - Rian and Lori Experiment With Each Other

    She''d just pulled the partially-filled syringe¡ªit contained only a small amount of blood, only a cubedrop¡ªfrom her arm when she heard Rian let out a high-pitched scream of alarm.


    Startled, Lori whirled, only to find her lord staring at her in horror, a finger pointing at her. No, not at her. At the syringe in her hands.


    "Did you just inject yourself?-!" he cried shrilly.


    Lori would have described Rian in many ways. Until now, ''shrill'' had never been one of them.


    "I did not inject myself," she corrected. "I drew blood." She watched, bemused, as Rian had a full-body shiver. "How did you think I was going to get the blood for this experiment?"


    "I don''t know!" Rian exclaimed, still sounding a little shrill. "I thought you were going to¡­ prick your finger or cut this bit!" He tapped the fleshy juncture between his thumb and forefinger. "Not stab yourself with a needle! Doesn''t that hurt?"


    "As you said, I stabbed myself with a needle," Lori said. "Of course it hurts." She took the small bottle of disinfectant from her personal supply, and used the brush that came with it to lightly daub it over her wound to prevent infection. Once was too much already. "Now, stop being squeamish. It wasn''t like I took the blood from you." Lori was treated to another full-body shiver.


    She sighed. "Oh, just grab that plank and start writing."


    Rian shook his head, but picked up the plank and the burned sick. "Right. What''s this experiment going to be about?" he said, hand and branch poised to take notes. "What is our premise, what is the intended result?"


    Lori nodded. "This is not a true experiment, as we will not be comparing two groups against each other. Properly, this a proof of concept test. My education says it is possible, but given how many things people have said about being a Dungeon Binder has been¡­ incomplete, best I make sure before we build any long-term plans around the idea." She held up the syringe. "This is my blood. It naturally contains a mix of waterwisps, airwisps, darkwisps and negligible amounts of earthwisps and firewisps." That last was purely academic, as they were so miniscule as to be of no use.


    "To clarify," Rian asked. "Is that because it''s your blood, or would blood from anyone also contain the same amount of¡­ wisps?"


    "Anyone''s blood would contain the same," Lori confirmed. "However, as a Whisperer and now Dungeon Binder, I am able to utilize my blood in ways others cannot."


    Rian tilted his head, and his eyes widened. "It''s a part of your body," he said.


    Huh. Lori was surprised he came to that conclusion so quickly. "It is," she said. "Today''s test will be to verify whether I can bind, and more importantly imbue using only my blood at a distance. And due to my connection to the demesne as a Dungeon Binder, it would not be a valid test unless the blood was outside the area of influence of my demesne."


    Rian was nodding over and over as he carefully wrote on the plank, using gentle movements so as not to break the burned writing tip. "Yes, yes, I think I see¡­ If this works¡­ yes I can see how this fixes some of our problems¡­ I have some ideas, but I''ll wait until after you finish to bring them up, in case this doesn''t work."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. Well, given his recent performance, she supposed they might be worth hearing out. It wouldn''t be the first time. "All right, grab the spear. We need to step out of the demesne for a moment, and I need you to watch my back."


    Rian nodded, carefully putting down the plank and grabbing his spear. After carefully scanning the area for beasts¡ªthe lack of colors on the undergrowth and ground made this easy, as their iridiated bodies stood out from all the muteness¡ªthe two of them carefully stepped out of the demesne''s borders. Lori was careful not to shiver as she passed through, lest she drop the glass bowl and the syringe she was holding.


    "No beasts and nothing in the water," Rian noted. "Since this experiment is using blood, I assume you''re going to use water for this?"


    "Correct," Lori confirmed. Both their heads were looking around for beasts, or at least movement that could be beasts, so she couldn''t expect him to see her nod. "I need to get it some distance from the edge of my demesne, to make sure there''s no residual connection to the core." Checking the water and concentrating on her sense of wisps, she bent down and carefully scooped up some water in the glass bowl with one hand, being very careful not to have it slip from her fingers. "I have the water. Note, for reference, that I was careful not to touch the water in the bowl with my bare skin. This was to prevent the possibility of binding the water by accident. The container is glass, a substance that does not act as a conduit of magic."


    "I think I remember something about that," Rian said. "Is that why we use it for beads? Since it can''t be altered by a Whisperer, so it can''t be counterfeited that way?"


    Lori gave him a puzzled look. "Beads aren''t made of glass," she said. "They''re made of solidified magic."


    Rian blinked. "Really?"


    "Yes," Lori said. "Otherwise they''d be completely useless for providing fuel to bound tools."


    "Huh," Rian said. "I might need to ask you to look at my beads for me, otherwise I might have been robbed."


    Lori waved a dismissive hand. "If you came to that conclusion from a cursory examination then yes, beads have a superficial resemblance to glass. No one would use glass to make counterfeit beads, however. Too expensive." Really, he should know this.


    Moving carefully, Lori lay the glass bowl full of water on the pedestal-like finger of stone she''d raised outside of her demesne. It trembled slightly on the slightly uneven surface until Lori set it right.


    "Take notes. I am now adding my fresh blood," she said. "The syringe used is made of brass, and was previously sterilized by boiling to exclude dustlife. The blood is unbound and unimbued, and no intention is made to bind or imbue it or through it."


    So saying, she carefully pushed on the syringe''s plunger, adding half of the blood contained within to the bowl of water. The water immediately darkened, the seemingly crimson bead spreading and staining the slightly murky water a dark brown.


    Carefully, Lori stood just inside her demesne, staring at the little bowl of dirty water, so like the one she had used to claim her demesne those months ago. "Beginning experiment," Lori said for the benefit of Rian''s notes. "Attempting to claim, bind and imbue without contact, outside my demesne."


    This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    Lori took a deep breath to steady herself, and reached inside, to her connection to her Dungeon''s core, her link to her demesne and its wisps. She pulled that seemingly-endless magic into herself as if she stood outside of her demesne, her always-hidden strength whenever she went to River''s Fork, the source of endless power she used to imbue the water jets of Lori''s Boat to allow them to make the journey at speed. If she''d had to breath in all that power, she''d have needed to practically pant the whole way.


    She took that magic and imbued it with her will, channeled it through her blood. Then she channeled it outward.


    For the second time in a year, the magic seemed to leap through the air, crossing the distance and reached out to the wisps that had been part of her, in the blood that had spread through the bowl of water. It wasn''t quick. It wasn''t efficient. It was nothing like reaching through her connection through the core or through a wire, but it went. She felt the wisps that had come from her body fall under her control, and it was a relief as they responded to her claim.


    "Contact and claim, successful," she said absently. "Binding established. Beginning imbuement."


    She channeled magic through her wisps, to the matter they had been joined to. The transfer was still a struggle, but the thread she had established in the initial claim seemed to act as a channel, letting her push the energy towards the binding. It was a narrow channel, and tight, but power flowed, reaching its destination¡ª


    Was it her imagination, or did the thread thicken ever so slightly?


    Lori focused, continuing to imbue. It did seem to get progressively easier as she continued to push, and soon it was almost as easy as doing it through a wire, in the same way as walking up a slight incline is almost as easy as walking on level ground.


    "Lori?" Rian said.


    Lori blinked, shook her head. "Imbuement successful," she said. "I have successfully managed to claim, bind and imbue at a distance through my blood. The first test is finished and successful."


    "Congratulations!" Rian said. He had a bright smile on his face. "First test implies a second test, though."


    Lori nodded. "The second test is an extension of the first. Having managed to claim, bind and imbue the waterwisps in my blood, can I now use them to claim the waterwisps and water in which they are dissolved?"


    "Let''s find out!" Rian said, looking genuinely excited. "If you can, this means you can at least imbue the water jet no matter how far away it is, right?"


    Lori shook her head. "Right now, it means that I can claim and imbue from a distance of three paces away," she said, which was the approximate distance to the bowl of water outside her demesne. "There is marked difficulty in imbuing at a distance compared to imbuing by touch, imbuing by wire, and imbuing as a Dungeon Binder. We shall have to test if distance is a factor in the difficulty. "


    Rian was nodding as she spoke, only to stop. "Wait¡­ imbuing as a Dungeon Binder? What does that mean?"


    "It means I can imbue any binding within my demesne," Lori said. Really, wasn''t that clear?


    "No matter where you are? No matter how far?" Rian asked.


    "Yes, of course," Lori said. "The core is connected to me, and functions as my connection to the demesne. I am always connected. In practice, the entire demesne is my body, and as such, I am connected to every wisp in it."


    Rian was giving her a narrow-eyed look. "So¡­ when all the hot water, running water and lights failed when we were in River''s Fork the first time¡­ "


    "Moving on!" Lori said loudly. "Second test! To ascertain the efficacy of claiming other waterwisps through the connection to the waterwisps in my blood!"


    She ignored the blank-faced stare Rian was directing as her as she began the second test. Lori was glad to find it wasn''t any different from claiming water normally. Her claim spread from her initial point of contact, spreading from waterwisps she''d claimed, expanding outward in all directions until it stopped at the limits of the glass. She could even claim upwards slightly, binding the vapors of water that made the air so humid and thick around the river. The difficulty in imbuing remained, though. She could only directly imbue some of the wisps in the water, and she suspected those were the ones that had come from her blood. So, in a way, the propagation of imbuement remained the same, originating at her point of contact. A pity. If she could simultaneously imbue ALL the waterwisps she had claimed¡­


    Still, her overall bottleneck seemed to be the overall volume of waterwisps from her body compared to the waterwisps from the river. So it was likely that she would be able to increase her ability to imbue if she used more blood.


    "Second test, successful," Lori proclaimed. "All the water has been claimed, bound and imbued. Make a note for future experiment: see if overall imbuement capability could be increased by using more blood."


    "Noted," Rian said. "Question: is there any reason why this couldn''t be done using spit, sweat, or latrine water?"


    Lori stopped and paused to think about it. "I would say that such fluids might not have as much affinity with my body as blood¡­" Lori said slowly, thoughtfully, "but¡­ it''s all fluids that contain water, is it not? I chose to use blood because it''s the example and material we learn of when using this at school, and even then, we are cautioned to only use this with blood and waterwisps. The other wisps are too intrinsically connected to essential bodily functions to be spared, normally."


    "Normally?" Rian prompted.


    "The firewisps in your body are bound to its warmth," Lori said. "Reducing or increasing that warmth is extremely dangerous. On the other hand, the body can spare blood, taken sparingly and given time to recover. Of course, a dying man with nothing to lose might not care."


    Unless, of course, they were a Dungeon Binder. But she wasn''t saying that. She''s said too much already today.


    "Ah, one of those ''taking you with me'' things," Rian said, nodding. "Hmm. If something didn''t have enough affinity, what would that look like?"


    Lori shrugged. "It would be like binding wisps normally, requiring contact to claim and imbue."


    "So¡­ something to test, then?" Rian asked.


    Lori nodded. "Something to test," she agreed. "Though in practice, if the volume test proves fruitful, then any future uses will be conducted with blood. Spit and sweat will be unlikely to be available in sufficient volume immediately, and as to the last¡­ " She gave him a flat looks. "You might have to touch it."


    Rian twitched. "Piss or blood¡­" he muttered. "How can I ever choose¡­?"


    "I''ve chosen, and I choose blood," Lori said. "Much more dignified."


    "When you put it that way¡­" Rian muttered. "So, what else? Distance test, to see if it affects your ability to do wizardly things to it?"


    "Longevity test as well," Lori said.


    "You''ll have to explain that one," Rian said.


    "Affinity begins to be lost once removed from the body," Lori explained. "That is part of the difficulty in using spittle. To amass sufficient amounts, it will have to be stored and added to. While that is happening, it could be losing affinity."


    "Could?" Rian said, latching on to the word. "You''re not sure?"


    "I was able to attain affinity using my childhood teeth, which had fallen from my mouth years ago," Lori explained. "However, this was after a long period of channeling magic through it, essentially renewing my affinity. Affinity can be lost, and I''m not sure how long it takes for it to reach the level of being able to imbue at a distance."


    Rian tilted his head. "So, wait¡­ you say the demesne is, magically speaking, equivalent to your body when it comes to ''contact'' for doing magic, right?"


    "Yes¡­?" Lori said, wondering where he was going with this.


    "Does that mean that, if we take a rock that had been in the demesne after years and years of it being your demesne, and took it outside, it can act as a conduit for you? After all, wouldn''t it be ''part of your body''?"


    Lori blinked, her eyes going wide as she realized what Rian as saying. At the same time, she remembered some mentions of certain feats in the bibliographies she''d read¡­


    "If¡­ if that were possible¡­" she said, thinking of the possibilities¡­ "No, no, even if it were possible, it would need extensive time to reach the sort of affinity your describe. Though¡­ "


    Dark rooms. Why did demesnes have rooms where no light was to ever enter, sealed and untouched for years¡­?


    "I think that might be beyond the scope of these tests for now," she said faintly.


    "I suppose you''re right," Rian conceded. "Though if we kept a sample of water in your demesne and just let it sit there for years and years, seal it so it doesn''t evaporate¡­ "


    They both turned to look at the bowl filled with blood.


    "Something we could come back to¡­" Lori said, still sounding faint. "In time. We have more pressing, immediate needs."


    "Agreed," Rian said. "So, next test?"


    Lori shook her head, trying to bring herself to the here and now. "Right. Right. Next test. Now, we test what effect an active binding will have on both the rate of imbuement and the affinity¡­"

 88 - Tests, Tanks and… Taxes?

    Active binding test: successful.


    Change of active binding test: successful.


    They had time for one last test before they had to go back for dinner: the longevity test.


    Lori was unsure how long she could maintain a connection to the waterwisps from her blood. While it was certainly useful to imbue at a distance outside her demesne, there would be far less practical use¡ªwhich was not no practical use¡ªif the affinity and connection faded away too quickly. So the final test they were conducting was a test of how long her connection to her blood would last.


    This was to be the most expensive test, and therefore Lori had to take special care in the preparation. She dragged earth and stone from her demesne and formed a hut outside the border, which she hoped would be sufficient proof against inquisitive beasts. Inside, she put in two glass bowls of water. One contained the water and blood with which she had been experimenting with, the other contained fresh water and the remaining blood in her syringe. The latter was imbued and left to stand while the former was left as it was. Then the protective hut was sealed to prevent entry.


    Then they went home.


    Lori''s Boat wallowed slightly from all the ropeweed they were carrying, but it wasn''t anything the vessel couldn''t handle as Lori imbued the water jet and set it for speed, while Rian handled the tiller. Rian had carefully laid the planks with all the notes on top of the pile of ropeweed and he kept glancing at it worriedly, as if afraid it would fall off and get smudged.


    "So¡­" Rian said eventually as they managed to build up speed, heading upriver back to the Dungeon and the settlement around it. "What does this mean? The results of the tests, the experiment¡­ where are you going with this?"


    "Depending on the results on the experiment we left behind, I will hopefully be able to imbue my own bindings at distance to some degree," Lori said, one hand on the wire leading to the jets out of habit. She had thought of using blood and wire to expand the area of contact she could effectively have at a distance, but she''d had no wire to attempt it. Best to remember for later. "How long the connection over distance exists and what factors affect it is the question, as is whether the connection is substantially affected by entry into another''s demesne. If I maintain my connection even within another''s demesne, I might have a semi-viable means of providing the air circulation for the mining proposal. Otherwise it would have required regular maintenance and my going there to imbue it manually. However, I will need your assistance."


    "What do you need?" Rian said immediately.


    "I need you to find me someone in our demesne capable of designing mechanical systems and understands their construction," Lori said. "Preferably one who understands how to build things using our limited resources. I can envision how to create a binding the can be used to power a mechanism. However, I will need someone with actual experience building such things to ensure it will not break."


    Rian frowned, tilting his head. "So¡­ you want to build an air pump?" he said. "Why not just make a¡­ binding? A binding that lets you make air flow and power it with your blood?"


    "In case of failure," Lori said. "A mechanical system would be operated manually in the event that a binding runs out of imbuement. A system reliant on a binding means I''ll be bothered every time something happens to it."


    "Well, when you put it that way¡­" Rian said.


    "Besides, I know blood and waterwisps works, and works at usable levels," Lori said. "I''ll need to experiment with working with airwisps, since I''m not sure how efficacious using blood as a conduit to air is."


    "Work with what you know," Rian said, nodding. "Well, I don''t really know the subject well enough to argue, so I''ll trust you know what you''re talking about." He tilted his head as he considered something. "Shana said that they had a backup plan in mind for the air circulation. Maybe you can find out what it is and integrate it into whatever you''re thinking of building? Maybe they''re just reluctant to use it because it would be too labor intensive. If you can provide an alternate means of powering it, that''s our commitment fulfilled, right?"


    "Something to consider," Lori thoughtfully agreed. "I''ll have to see what we have to work with in regards to the mine''s established air circulation implements."


    "I wish I can tell you, but I forgot to look at the specifics," Rian said. "Though it looked like they had a system of wooden air ducts in place. Probably made by their old binder. I forget the specific dimensions. Sorry."


    She waved it away. "We have time. Ensure the safety and structural integrity of the mine will come first. But this is all moot if we have no workers."


    "Yeah, about that," Rian sighed. "Lori, I think we might have a problem finding volunteers. Everyone working together worked fine when all the work could be directly be said to benefit everyone in the demesne in some way, but we''re sending out people to work somewhere else. Even if they''re getting fed and housed, that''s not directly beneficial to the demesne, and it''s taking people who could have helped improve the demesne directly."


    "We''d have metal," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, but that would, at best, be owned by the demesne as a whole or you specifically," Rian said. "Even if we gave them direct equal shares of the metal, what would they do with it? They''d still need to give it to one of the smiths to turn it into something useful, and that means the smith has to be compensated for his work too somehow. I know you''ve worked before. How would you feel about being asked to work a difficult job in exchange for a place to sleep and eat to keep doing the job, while¡­ while your parents get to reap the benefits of the payment?"


    "That''s called childhood, but I see what you mean," Lori said. "Some kind of specific gain needs to be presented as compensation, but¡­"


    "But we have nothing to offer," Rian sighed. "Even if we paid them in beads, they''d have nowhere to spend it, making it useless and the same as not paying them. And instituting some sort of placeholder for beads to act as money will seriously mess up the social dynamics we have right now, not to mention get people to start thinking in terms of money again, which will get ugly."


    "Couldn''t we just establish it as an extension of work to support the demesne?" Lori said. "The demesne benefits."


    "How?" Rian said. "Working in the mine doesn''t benefit them. The demesne getting metal doesn''t benefit them unless that metal is clearly used as a net benefit to everyone in the demesne. Even then, human nature will incline them to want it to be a benefit for them specifically."


    "They ARE benefiting," Lori said. "They get to stay in an improved demesne¡ª"


    She stopped. She tilted her head thoughtfully.


    "Lori?" Rian said. "This sudden and abrupt silence is ominous. Talk to me, please."


    "Every single person in my demesne save one has not yet paid their taxes," Lori mused.


    Stolen novel; please report.


    Rian made a strangled sound.


    Lori leaned back and began to think.


    "Lori? Your Bindership?"


    "Hush," she said absently. "I''m thinking¡­"


    What sounded like a whimper came from Rian.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was still thinking about it when they got back to the Dungeon and she unloaded her box of glassware and other tools, leaving Rian to handle all the ropeweed he''d brought. In her mind, she could still feel the first bowl of blood of water, the feeling of the imbued binding not dissimilar to the bindings all around her that she had set all over her demesne. It even felt like her distant demesne when she was in River''s Fork, if at a much smaller scale.


    Of the other bowl, lightly imbued, the feeling was much more faint. Some kind correlation to the amount of imbuement to the affinity, or to the distance? Truthfully, this was a test to see how long she could leave her blood untouched before she could no longer use it. The next test, which she''d conduct tomorrow, would be keeping up an active binding at a distance. After that would be the final test: whether she could maintain the bind and imbue, at a distance, within someone else''s demesne.


    She was hopeful of that last, since she had learned to Whisper within someone else''s demesne, but she wanted to be sure. Truly, the final test would be if she could maintain control while her wisps were in the demesne of someone who was actually capable of Whispering. Hopefully the usual claim principles would still hold then¡­


    After storing her remaining glassware in her room and cleaning her syringe of blood, Lori took a quick bath. The experiments had been hot and humid, and while she had been tempted to set up some bindings for a cool breeze, she had not wanted to worry about possible distraction. Well, it was time to change these clothes anyway¡­


    Getting dressed, Lori came down to dinner a bit later than she usually did. The meal was in progress as people conversed, played games, sighed about the day''s work, and occasionally actually ate.


    Rian was already there with two bowls waiting for her. He seemed to have also taken a bath, given how wet his hair looked. One could not tell by his clothes, which looked exactly the same as what he''d been wearing before, and it was only when she drew close did she note it seemed to be cleaner and less sweaty.


    He was also engaged in conversation with Mikon, who was apparently offering to make him a new shirt in restitution for something. Lori didn''t really pay attention as she met Rian''s eyes and took one of the bowls for herself, beginning to eat.


    The subject did remind her though¡­


    "Rian," she said, causing the pink-haired woman to abruptly cut of what she was saying. "The weavers. Have they managed to move into the second level?"


    "They finished this morning," Rian said, glancing at the now studiously silent Mikon. "So did the ropers. I''m a little worried about putting them in together, though. It seems to me that putting two groups who use the same raw material together is just asking for them to start pettily stealing from each other."


    "That would be against my laws," Lori said. Mikon and Umu both studiously ate their food.


    "Yes, but that sort of thing has never stopped people before," Rian said.


    "Yes, well, please let them know I will not tolerate such things in my Dungeon," Lori said. "Are they still arguing about who gets priority when it comes to ropeweed?"


    "I made sure to divide the ropeweed we cut evenly, if that''s what you''re asking," Rian said.


    "It wasn''t. I asked if they are still arguing about the matter," Lori said blandly.


    "I was able to get them to agree to settle the matter by having one group get their ropeweed from upriver and the other from downriver," Rian said. "Though to that end, I think we need another bit of infrastructure."


    Lori sighed. "What now?"


    "We need a retting tank," Rian said, and Mikon and Umu both turned to stare at him.


    Lori turned the unfamiliar term over in her head. "Does that have to do with your proposal yesterday?"


    "No, this is something else," Rian said. "Basically, both the weavers and ropers need more ropeweed fiber. But to get it, they need to rett the stalks to get at the fibers. Well, rett them faster. They''ve been making do with large water-filled vessels from Gunvi and letting them dry in the sun, but the latter takes a while and the former only lets them rett a small amount of ropeweed. So in the interest of future productivity, I''d like to ask you to consider making them a retting tank. It will increase the amount of fibers that can be retted, meaning there won''t be as much fighting between the ropers and weavers, and it will let us begin spinning more thread, and therefore weave more cloth."


    Lori stared at him. "How long have you known this was an issue?" she asked.


    "Since we got here and I had a talk with Master Arak and Missus Taji about the ropeweed supply," he said.


    "And why should I?" Lori asked. She knew Rian always had good reason, she just wanted to know what it was.


    "Retting more ropeweed means more fibers. More fibers mean more fabric and ropes. More fabric means we can repair our clothes, make new ones, and possibly even have sails for the boat to Covehold in case other means of propulsion fail," Rian said. "More ropes means¡­ well, increased productivity all around. Literally any industry or process can find a use for rope to make things do better or go faster. "


    She nodded. "All right. Find out what the dimensions need to be, and where best to put it. I''ll find time." She bent down to eat.


    Rian nodded as well, then made a strangely childish sound of surprise as Umu and Mikon wrapped their arms around him from either side, nearly upsetting his bowl.


    "Thank you, Lord Rian!" Umu cried, laying her head on his shoulder.


    "N-no, I didn''t do anything," Rian protested. "Besides, Binder Lori''s the one who''s going to do all the work! You should thank her!"


    The two women glanced at Lori, who gave them a blank look in turn.


    Mikon unwrapped one hand around Rian and performed a seated bow, her head dipping low, and mouthed, "Thank you, your Bindership" at Lori. Lori responded with a nod. Umu smiled and mirrored the bow, but didn''t say anything. Lori reciprocated and went back to eating. On the other side of Mikon from Rian, Riz continued her meal, studiously avoiding her gaze.


    Rian looked between her, the blonde, the pinkhead, and Lori. "Did I miss something?" he said, sounding confused.


    "If you did, you obviously wouldn''t know," Lori said.


    Rian gave her the look the comment merited, then cleared his throat awkwardly. "Um, Umu, Mikon, I need to eat¡­?"


    Umu sighed, but reluctantly let Rian go, though she sat much closer to him now. Mikon extricated herself with no such theatrics except a smile, then turned to her other side and began to engage Riz in conversation by asking her how work was progressing.


    Rian began eating while his hands were free. "No board?" he asked. "I''d have thought you''d want to continue with routine."


    "Not tonight," Lori said, and left it at that.


    Her meal passed pleasantly uninterrupted, and she was able to just sit and listen to the sounds that had become routine in her demesne. Of people¡ªher people¡ªsafe, happy, well fed, and looking forward to a night''s rest after a productive day''s work.


    Lori finished her food, thoroughly cleaning her bowl.


    Perhaps it was time to remind them they should be grateful for such things.


    "Rian," she said, finally coming to the end of her wire of thought. "I need you to make some announcements."


    "I''m listening," he said.


    "First, clarify that the deadline for volunteers to come forward is the morning after tomorrow, as we will be departing for River''s Fork before noon. No children are eligible to volunteer," she began, causing Rian to nod. "Those who are essential workers are also ineligible. These include primary food providers, the kitchen volunteers, the sawyers, those who have been butchering and preparing the meat that is being brought in, the doctors and medics, those who are the sole practitioners of their trade, and taxpayers."


    "Taxpayers? Really?" Rian said.


    "I don''t want to lose my taxpayer," Lori said blandly.


    Rian rolled his eyes.


    "Secondly, inform everyone that those who volunteer are eligible for payment, should they wish for it," Lori continued.


    On either side of Rian, heads perked up.


    "However, as they are now being paid, they and their families will now be required to pay rent on their homes, pay for the food they are eating, the use of the baths, will need to buy soap for themselves, and finally pay their residency taxes." Lori tilted their head. "And there will be other fees, once I think of them."


    For some reason, Rian started laughing. He tried to stifle it with a hand, but was unsuccessful.


    Lori waited with amused patience.


    "R-right," he choked. "Got it. Anything else?"


    "Should there be no volunteers on the morning in question, conscription will be practiced," Lori said. "However, I am not unmerciful. Those who are conscripted will be able to avail for the option of being paid."


    Rian started snickering again.


    "I am going back to my room to make design drafts," Lori said. "Please inform everyone before I leave the room."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said.


    "And Rian?" She gave her lord a bland stare. "Make sure to convey my words EXACTLY before adding your own post-announcement embellishments."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian repeated.


    Lori nodded and got up to go to her room as Rian stood up and called people''s attention for an announcement.


    "Taxes," she heard Rian say behind her.


    The horrified silence was absolute.


    "Good. Now that I have your full attention¡­"

 89 - Successful Test

    Lori actually spent some time at her table, working on making bearings of an even size. She''d long since made a bearing mold using her beads as a template, carefully filling in and smoothing out the denomination markings until she had smooth spheres. A pity she hadn''t unlocked the abilities of a Horotract yet. Having an exact sense of physical dimensions would have been so useful¡­


    Also the ability to alter the flow of time, the expansion of space, and the direction of down, but really, after all the building she''d been doing, she found she wanted that sense of exact physical dimension more than those other, admittedly useful, things. Never having to stop and measure anything again! Not needing to kneel down and mess around with water to find out whether a floor was level or a wall was straight! Such power!


    She''d be assured of making much more perfectly round bearings then!


    As Rian had said, it would be easy to just bind some airwisps to propel air, just like she had done for the air circulation systems in her demesne. The problem was imbuing it. Optimally, she wanted to only have to return to River''s Fork once a month until winter came, to deliver the promised ice, but she didn''t think she could imbue a binding to last that long. For one thing, she would need to imbue it constantly for an unfeasibly long time. Days, literally. That would be too inefficient in the long run.


    While mechanically impelling air to move had its own inefficiencies, like friction heat, wear and stress on the material, she was reasonably certain that it would last long enough for her to look it over for maintenance when she came with the ice, especially if she made it from repairable materials. She''d have to experiment whether stone or bone would be better. At worst, she might have to ask to melt down the ruined air pump for building material.


    One thing was certain though. Whatever she built would need wooden components, such as fan blades and a shaft. And unfortunately, she had never been good at woodworking. She could intellectually understand the purposes of hammers, saws and chisels, but her experience with shaping wood was acting as a water cutter to cut several planks into shape at once. And even then, someone else physically moved the wood into her stream for the actual cutting.


    She made several small stone models on her table, trying to make a design that pleased her sense of aesthetics, and then other designs for if there were area restrictions. A simple waterwheel connected to a fan seemed simplest, but it would probably needs some kind of gear system to rotate the fan quickly enough for the sort of air flow that would be needed, meaning it would need to be either a large or long wheel so that it would have sufficient torque¡­


    She fell asleep at her table, and in the morning it was slightly disconcerting to have to wonder whether that had been more or less uncomfortable than actually sleeping on her bed.


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    "Congratulations," Rian said with dry amusement as she sat down for breakfast, this time with her board. "People are now actively talking about volunteering to go mining. The threat of your bringing back fees and taxes worked. Though now it''s probably going to be harder to institute some sort of money system when we finally get too big to ensure no one is getting taken advantage of. But that''s a ''Some Other Day'' problem."


    Lori nodded as she put the stones in the bowls. "Do you think we''ll have enough volunteers to properly mine?"


    "The minimum number of people needed to mine is one," Rian said. "More just makes it easier, safer and quicker. But Riz put me in touch of some of the men who''d worked the mine when they first opened it, and they seemed willing. We might actually get more miners after the deadline. I''m told the houses will be finally finished within a week, save for proper waterproofing, but everyone''s roofs have that problem. The trees with the right kind of sap¡ª"


    "Resin," Lori corrected.


    Rian blinked. "Isn''t that the same thing?"


    "All resins are a sap, but not all saps are a resin," Lori said, remembering getting the same explanation once. "Only certain tall, straight trees produce resin that can be used for woodworking. Give orders that these trees are not to be cut down and see if we can start cultivating them. At the very least, start planting whatever they use as seed in cleared areas we''re not using."


    "Ah, more work to do when the current work is done," Rian nodded. "Probably still preferable to paying taxes, though not as preferable as getting paid and not paying taxes."


    "Also, I need a carpenter," Lori said.


    "We have several," Rian said. "What do you need them to build?"


    "A fan for moving air," Lori said. "Possibly a waterwheel. And gears."


    "I''ll ask if anyone can do it," Rian said. "It would help if you had a design they can refer to."


    Lori nodded. Yes, no carpenter liked having to envision what you wanted in their head. They wanted plans, at least a sketch and rudimentary directions. "I should have something tomorrow evening or the day after, when I''ve inspected what''s left of River''s Fork''s air circulation equipment. In the meantime, I''ll build something temporary for them."


    A binding of airwisps for moving air might not last long, but it would at least last for long enough.


    Lori reached into a bowl in her board and made her first move as Umu sat down next to Rian with a yawn.


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    "Good morning, Lord Rian," she greeted. "I''ll have your laundry ready after breakfast."


    "You don''t have to," Rian said, looking pained for some reason.


    "Nonsense, Lord Rian," she said. "I''ve already done it. It would be a waste to leave the work unfinished." She glanced at the board in the middle of the table. "Isn''t it your move?"


    Lori made her impatience clear as Rian sighed and reached into a bowl to take his turn.


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    After breakfast and three close games¡ªARGH!¡ªRian promised to get back to her with details for the retting tank and if anyone could build what she wanted, while Lori went to consider her next step.


    There was, admittedly, a lot she could do. Build the new bath house, for instance. Get started on the isolated debauchery area that Rian had been so delicately suggesting. Dig up a new water reservoir. Check up on her experiment. Wait for someone to die so she could lay claim to their bedroll and FINALLY have a comfortable place to sleep.


    Most of those would take time, however, and would be interrupted by tomorrow¡ªand she''d have to prepare her experiment equipment to bring with her tomorrow, wouldn''t she? Her syringe, at least, and a container of some kind. Just stone, maybe since she wasn''t willing to leave one of her glassware behind. It might be considered an added variable, but at the moment she didn''t care. Besides, if it worked, then she''d just make sure anything she did in the future included stone she''d shaped.


    She went back to digging more sleeping niches on the second level. It was a different experience with the ropers and weavers there. While their equipment was there¡ªshe recognized the looms from a play she''d seen, and the tool whose exact name she didn''t know from one time she''d applied for work at a ropewalk¡ªonly some of the weavers seemed to be actively using them, Mikon among them. Many seemed to be using long sticks and turning bundles of twisted fibers into cord. Strangely, both the weavers and the ropers¡ªshe could tell the ropers because they were all male, and three were children¡ªseemed to be using similar tools for the process, with minor differences attributable to aesthetics.


    The digging occupied her until lunch, giving her a nice pile of stone to work with. Out of boredom, she''d tested if they could pass lightningwisps, but sadly there didn''t seem to be any metal ores in her Dungeon. Not where she''d been digging, anyway.


    At lunch, Rian had finally given her the details needed for a retting tank. It turned out it didn''t need to be very deep, but it did need to be stagnant and able to submerge a lot of ropeweed stalks so they could decay and release the fibers that were used from making thread.


    "Apparently the water left after that happens is good for plants," Rian said. "Just don''t drink it or get it on your wounds."


    "Noted," Lori said blandly, considering the layout of the settlement currently. From the sound of it, it would probably be a good idea to keep the resulting water away from their drinking water in case of seepage.


    There was just enough space between the sawpit and the fields to put in the requested retting tank so the used water could be directed towards the fields. Speaking of which, she supposed the fields were looking good. Not all the crops were the same height, since some had been planted as seeds, others had been uprooted from River''s Fork and transplanted, and a few had been wild vegetables replanted, but there was clear organization, if nothing else.


    There also didn''t seem to be anyone working there beyond a few who were watering the plants using clay pots filled with water. Did crops really need so little upkeep, or was everyone just lazy?


    Sighing, she inspected the space. Bedrock wasn''t too deep down, so she could anchor the retting tank, and it shouldn''t be too hard to make some sort of pluggable drain so the water could be released down to the fields. She''d have to build some kind of storage cistern though. Maybe just extend the current irrigation water cistern? Or would mixing the retting water and relatively clean water be bad? She''d have to get Rian to ask¡­


    The specifications she got wasn''t much of a tank, in her opinion, more like a shallow wading pool, but apparently it was what was needed since their demesne had no naturally stagnant bodies of water. Moving the dirt out of the way¡ªusing compacted dirt for this was probably not structurally sound in the long run¡ªto reveal the bedrock, Lori began transferring and shaping excavated rocks to make the pool. It wasn''t very deep¡ªonly about up to her knees¡ªbut it was fairly sizable so it could hold a lot of water and therefore ropeweed.


    Lori wasn''t sure she understood the processes involved, but then again, she''d never worked in this industry. The retting pool was finished well before dinner, a seamless, stone basin that would apparently be manually filled with water. The runoff water for irrigation was close enough that people could make their own arrangements for filling the tank. Lori had at least made sure the stone surfaced had a rough pattern to help with traction and footing, so that there''d be no accidents from people slipping on smooth, wet stone.


    After that, she had a restful afternoon sitting near the curing sheds, drying the cut timbers. Just her, sitting there maintaining and adjusting her binding so that the wood would cure evenly, doing familiar work.


    Then, as the sun dipped low and Lori estimated its angle to be the same as when she and Rian had left the samples outside of her demesne, she closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on finding her link to her blood outside of her demesne. It was a struggle for a moment, trying to reach for wisps of her body but outside herself and her demesne, trying to remember how to make the connection again, but¡­


    There! Two mostly contiguous groups of mostly waterwisps. While one was much more¡­ tenuous?... than the other, both were in her awareness despite the overall distance from herself¡ªand now she realized perhaps that didn''t matter, because there were both very close to her demesne''s edge, after all. Still, it was a good sign. While the one she''d been experimenting with for longer was easier to perceive, likely a result of greater affinity from use and greater imbuement, the sample that had simply been imbued was still there as well.


    Cautiously, Lori reached for the latter sample, and met the same narrow sensation that she had felt at first as she tried to re-establish her claim and imbue it. Beyond that, however, there was no difficulty repeating her first test of the day before, and soon she was actively imbuing the waterwisps, their presence seeming to grow stronger in her awareness.


    She opened her mouth to announce the results¡ªand then snapped her teeth shut in frustration as she realized Rian wasn''t around to take notes. Sighing, she reached down, compacted some of the dirt underneath her into a compressed block, and began writing the results on that. She''d add it to the rest of the notes later.


    It wasn''t over yet. Each successful test led into another thing she had to test. But at least this was a good progression, and what she''d discovered already boded well for the third incarnation of the water jet and the eventual Covehold mission.


    Pushing herself to her feet, passing the men who were putting away their tools and equipment¡ªsome bowed to her, and she nodded back in acknowledgement¡ªLori headed for dinner, already thinking of making stone bowls and stone tubes she could bind airwisps to¡­

 90 - Privacy, Privies, and Winter Worries

    "So, good news, we have volunteers," Rian said as he sat down opposite her for dinner. "They''ll be ready to go with us tomorrow. Though it took some negotiating, since they don''t want to be away from their families until winter. How do you feel about different batches of volunteers, each batch doing week-long shifts? We only have ten people in the first batch, but since it looks like the houses will be done soon, we can expect more people in subsequent batches."


    Lori considered that thoughtfully. "So, I have to keep going back there every week?" she said blandly.


    "Haven''t you learned enough from your tests to build something so that you don''t need to?" Rian said as Umu casually sat down next to him, massaging her fingers tiredly.


    Lori brightened at that reminder. Yes, he was right, wasn''t he? She''d have to go this time to convey people, see what she had to work with in regards to an air circulation system, and set up her final test, but after that would be her last time once she''d put some sort of air circulation device in. She''d be able to modify the water jet with her blood so that Rian didn''t need her to keep it imbued, and from then on he or someone else could do it, even the ice delivery! "Yes, I suppose you have a point," she murmured. A thought occurred to her. "When the houses are complete¡­ will we be able to move everyone else to only one shelter?"


    "I was sort of hoping we could still use both so that people would have more space to themselves," Rian said as Riz sat down on his other side, smelling of sun, sweat and sawdust.


    "Answer me Rian," Lori said sternly. "Will the remaining people be able to fit in a single shelter?"


    Rian sighed as Mikon sat down next to Umu, also massaging her fingers. "I suppose they can. It''ll even be a little roomier¡­ but I still think people would like it more if they had more space."


    "Inform people that as soon as people have moved out, the second shelter will be converted to private rooms," Lori said.


    "Oh. Well, that''s nice¡ª"


    "For the purposes of private intimacy. Inform the carpenters that I will need doors. Many, many doors. Unless people are fine with others being able to look in¡­?"


    Rian stared at her. So did the three women. Then they glanced at Rian.


    "What?" she said. "This will solve the issue you brought up, won''t it? Inform people this will commence as soon as the second shelter is no longer occupied. The sooner the houses are done, the sooner I can get to the modifications. Perhaps that will encourage them to work faster. People will have to bring their own bedroll, but perhaps we can see about laying out some planks to keep them off the cold floor." She paused a moment. "Children will, of course, be strictly forbidden entry. For ANY reason."


    "I want to say that should be obvious from what you''re describing, but I can already hear the mothers saying ''Go get your uncle'', or aunt or brother or whoever," Rian sighed. Umu, Mikon and Riz all nodded.


    Yes, that''s exactly the kind of thoughtlessly traumatizing things mothers would do, in addition to not locking doors, not having younger siblings until years later, and giving unasked for advice about how to get girls to sleep with you.


    "Assign someone to guard the door," Lori said. "Perhaps one of the medics, in case someone hurts themselves."


    "I¡­ want to say that''s unlikely, but yeah, people are likely to end up hurting themselves from overexcitement." The three stared at him again. So did Lori, for that matter.


    "How could you possibly know that?" Lori said.


    "It''s an energetic physical activity," Rian said blandly. "That''s really all the prerequisite you need for someone to get hurt by accident."


    "I defer to your no doubt superior understanding of the subject," Lori replied in the same tone. "Going back to the previous topic, after the houses are finished, we must begin preparations for winter."


    Rian frowned. "In what way?" he said.


    "Have you considered how the cold and snow are going to affect latrine use and maintenance?" Lori said.


    "WAIT!" Rian said. "I can vaguely see what you''re getting at, but can we NOT discuss latrine-related stuff while we''re about to get ready to eat? Pick something else. Pick ANYTHING else, please, I beg you! We can talk about it on the way to River''s Fork tomorrow."


    Lori frowned, about to reprimand him for such silly behavior¡­ and then remembered they were going to eat stew.


    "All right," she said, making Rian and the three sitting next to him sigh. "When the houses are finished, you''ll be able to begin work on the boat we will bring to Covehold, correct?"


    "Hopefully," Rian said, sighing. "But as things stand, I''m not very optimistic. Any boat we build before winter would be relatively small, maybe just a bigger barge with outriggers. We wouldn''t be able to bring a lot of cargo, just the seel skins. In hindsight, I''m not sure we''re be able to sell those for as much as we''d want." He gave her a sideways look. "Really, off the top of my head, the dragonscales are the best thing we have to trade, and given that other demesne might have had a lot of those drop on them too, I''m still skeptical about it being worth the trip. But we NEED medicines, tools, and materials¡­"


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    "Then don¡¯t expect much," Lori said. "The boat will be untested, the route will be untested, the crew manning the boat will be untested. Don''t think of this as primarily a trading mission. This is an attempt to see if we can even reach Covehold. If that is successful, we can take the opportunity to find out what goods are in demand and available, and then come back with them after winter, preferably in a better boat."


    Rian frowned. "We''ll still need medicine, though," he said. "Especially nine months from now, at the latest."


    Lori blinked. "What happens nine months from now?"


    "Well Lori, when a man and a woman love each other very much¡­"


    "Oh, that," Lori interrupted. Right. She''d forgotten.


    "Yes, that," Rian said, not seeming to notice the intent stares coming from either side of him. "Traditionally the way to increase your demesne''s population. We might need to make more houses again."


    "Not before we''ve prepared the ones we have for winter," Lori said. "They have roofs and doors right now, but no windows and the walls are all bare stone."


    "Yes, whose idea was that?" Rian said blandly.


    Lori ignored that. "At the very least, some sort of fireplace will need to be added in, or a central hearth," she said. "Otherwise I''ll have to heat and light everything. Food''s ready."


    Rian blinked. "What?"


    Lori pointed. "The food''s ready. Go get some."


    "Oh! Right, right," he said, getting ready to stand up, before pausing. "Uh, Umu, Riz, could one of you move a little?"


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    By the time Rian came back with the food, Lori had come back from her room with her sunk board.


    "Ah, I thought something was missing," Rian said when he saw it, putting down two bowls. She picked one and pulled it towards herself, then reached over and made her first move, dropping stones into shallow bowls on the game board. The others all sat back down, though not in the same places as before.


    As Rian made his own move, Lori said, "About winter preparation, how ready are we?"


    "We''re¡­ progressing¡­" Rian said slowly. "But to be honest, I''m worried we won''t be able to stockpile enough food stores before the seels migrate away."


    Lori blinked. "Why would the seels go anywhere?" She made her next move.


    "For the same reason as the beasts," Rian said. "Winter is coming and they''re be more comfortable somewhere warm. So they''ll swim off and go live somewhere else."


    Lori stared. "They do that?"


    "Didn''t you ever learn about this?" Rian sighed, reaching over to do his turn.


    "No, we learned Whispering at school, why would we need to learn what beasts and fursh do in winter?" Lori said. "Maybe Deadspeakers would know, but I doubt it."


    "Right, well, lack of knowledge on the subject on your part or not, I''m worried about it happening before we have enough to last us the winter, plus some buffer in case of emergency," Rian said. "The children can''t catch the biggest seels¡ªthough Karina keeps trying¡ª and those are the ones worth catching for how useful they are."


    "So, you want people to start helping the children catch seels when the houses are done?" Lori said, making her next move.


    "That too," Rian said, "but actually, I was thinking we catch a bunch of seels and keep them penned up so we''d have live meat in the winter. Why kill it and worry about storing it in the cold room when it''ll stay fresh by keeping it alive?"


    "You want to domesticate wild seels?" Lori said.


    "Domesticate implies we actually know what we''re doing," Rian said. "No, I was thinking we get a few of the biggest ones, gather them up together, you raise big pillars of rock they can''t pass through around them, then just leave them to feed themselves, then come winter we make sure they don''t starve to death until we''re ready to eat them."


    "Why don''t I just raise bars across the whole river then, and trap them here?" Lori said dryly.


    Rian paused. He tilted his head thoughtfully.


    His silence went on for some time.


    "Lord Rian?" Umu said, glancing at him.


    "Hmm?" he said, glancing at her.


    "It''s your move, and her Bindership is waiting for you to say something."


    "Whu¡­? Oh, right!" He reached over, picked up the stones from a bowl, and began dropping them one at a time as he progressed. "So, you raising bars to block them from going down the river sounds very tempting, but wouldn''t they just go around it by wiggling on land?"


    "Killing them now and storing their meat seems less insane," Lori said, voice flat. She made her move.


    Rian shrugged. "It was just an idea. I agree having people concentrate on hunting the big ones and storing their meat now is the most sensible course of action. Maybe we can try it next year, when we have more people."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori said. "Well, I''ll leave it to you to tell the children that you''re devaluing the worth of their contribution to the demesne."


    "I''m¡­ what?" Rian said, blinking in confusion.


    "Well, if you''re going to ask people to start hunting seels¡ªI assume with catching the large ones in mind?¡ªthat that would naturally make the children''s efforts after that point near-worthless," Lori said. "After all, it''s not like they can learn to hunt beasts instead."


    "I''m¡­ sure they''ll understand?" Rian said.


    "They''ll probably get all the cleaning and latrine duties forced on them afterwards," Lori continued. "After all, it''s not like they can do anything else."


    "Are you¡­ trying to make me feel guilty about putting other people on seeling duty so we''ll have enough food for winter?" Rian said.


    "Of course not. Why would you think a silly thing like that?"


    "The way you were speaking before?" Rian said.


    Mikon coughed delicately. "Ah, Lord Rian?" Rian glanced at her as Lori had another spoonful of stew. "With the new retting tank that her Bindership made now available for use, we would very much appreciate it if people could be assigned to cutting, gathering and retting more ropeweed. It would give us more material to spin and weave with, which would allow us to provide everyone with more blankets for winter, and perhaps new other things as well? I''m sure the children can do that¡­?"


    "It would go faster if we had other people to spin thread for us as well, Lord Rian," Umu said. "Then we could concentrate on weaving¡­ all¡­ day¡­" Umu had the look of someone hearing what she was saying and regretting it.


    Rian glanced at Lori. "Does that sound like a good idea?"


    "Why are you asking me?" Lori said. "How would I know?"


    "Well, you might have some strong opinion you wanted to express," Rian said.


    Lori shrugged. "I never worked in textiles. There''s no work there for Whisperers. They mostly employ Mentalists and Horotracts."


    Rian blinked in surprise. "Really? Why?"


    Lori shrugged. "Fast reflexes for working the looms, fitting more workers into a workshop and dragging out the day so they need only pay workers for a day''s work after making them work a day and a quarter."


    "That sounds unethical," Rian said disapprovingly. "And illegal." From the faces Umu and Mikon were making, they probably agreed.


    Lori shrugged. "Those were only rumors I heard. As I said, I never worked in textiles."


    Rian sighed. "Well, we have time. I''ll¡­ talk to the children. Who knows, they might be agreeable."


    Lori shrugged. "Your move."


    As Rian did just that, reaching for one of the bowls, Mikon watched him intently. Finally, she said, "Lord Rian¡­ how do you play this game?"

 91 - The First Miners

    The next day, Lori woke up and resigned herself to needing to leave her demesne. Again.


    She promised herself this would the la¡ªsecond to last time she''d ever need to leave her demesne ever again, ever, for any reason! And this time she''d keep that promise!


    But for now, she had commitments to fulfill, things to do, people to meet, things to build¡­


    Sighing, she pushed herself out of bed.


    Her boots were still holding out. The soles were getting more worn, but at least the uppers hadn''t cracked or separated. That was good. Rian had said he''d had someone look her shoes over, but she had no idea what she''d do once they needed replacing.


    Her socks though¡­


    She frowned down at her increasingly thin socks. There was another hole she''d just noticed, one she''d have to sew¡­ or ask Rian to. She had to admit his sewing, when it came to socks, was better than hers.


    She wondered how much socks cost in Covehold. Surely they wouldn''t be too expensive, right? Or did anyone in her demesne know how to make socks?


    Actually, how did you make socks¡­?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori felt her whole body go tense in annoyance as she looked upon the volunteers to go mine in River''s Fork. There were eleven of them, most of them young men who were making a lot of noise as they talked to each other. A few she actually recognized, and one of them she could actually name.


    She grabbed Rian by the shoulder, dragged her surprised lord a little way off, and hissed, "What is he doing here?"


    "Uh, you''ll have to be a little more specific," Rian said. "There are seven people there that could apply to."


    "Him! The idiot! Landoor!"


    "Oh," Rian said, nodding. "Well, I think he wants to mine because he thinks it will let him find a core buried in¡ª"


    That was as far as he got before the aggrieved scream of "THAT''S NOT HOW DUNGEON''S WORK!" ripped itself from Lori''s snarling lips.


    "Ow. Too loud," Rian said, sticking a finger in his ear and wiggling it around as if to clean it. "I know that, and you know that, and now I''m pretty sure most people know that, even if they don''t know what part specifically, but you know how he is. He still half-thinks he''s your heir from¡ªplease don''t yell again, I don''t deserve it!"


    Lori managed to grit her teeth back against the next exclamation that wanted out. "Who''s in charge here?"


    "Um, you?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "I meant among the miners."


    "There''s no one really in charge, though Karina probably comes closest. They really respect her."


    Lori sighed. "I said miners, not minors!" She pointed for emphasis.


    "Oh¡­ OH!" Ugh, why did Rian have to pick this morning to be useless? Did he not get any sleep again? "No one''s in charge, really. I mean, they all showed up because they could be spared for a week."


    Lori sighed. "Find the most responsible one and put him in charge to make sure they don''t do anything stupid. We''ll do two trips so the boat isn''t dangerously full."


    "Ah. Well, it''s been a while since we''ve gone really fast. Though if I start screaming, stop the boat immediately, it''ll mean the tiller finally broke off."


    She gave him a piercing look. "Is that likely to happen?"


    "We''re going fast on what was originally a barge meant to be pulled along the water by people," Rian said. "I''m surprised things haven''t broken yet."


    Lori gave that some thought. "I''ll grab some bones so we can repair any leaks."


    "I''m¡­ not sure how they''ll take that, but yeah, a few might be good."


    "We''ll be able to talk about the latrine situation on the way."


    "Oh, right, I forgot about that¡­"


    Lori sighed. "Well, I''ll go get the bones, you make sure they have their bedroll, blanket and clothes for the week. We should be ready to go when I get back."


    They were not ready to go by the time she got back.


    It turned out some of them had assumed that they would be brought to River''s Fork in the morning and brought back to her demesne at night. As a result they wasted time waiting for people to come back with the necessary implements.


    The delay didn''t put Lori in a good mood, but they were able to set off with the half that had managed to get everything ready first. This time Lori made it VERY clear that they would be coming back for the next batch, and they had better be ready by then.


    The ride passed in uncomfortable¡­ well, not silence, there was the usual screaming by people not yet used to Lori''s Boat''s speed in the water. Lori knew better than to tell them to shut up. They seemed to insist on screaming for longer when she did that. That''s what it felt like, anyway.


    They passed the compacted stone dome Lori had put the bowls with her blood inside. Already a glittering layer of Iridescence was covering the surface of it, and Lori knew a similar layer would have appeared in the space inside, on everything but the glassware she had put her bloody water in. She''d come back to get them on the way back. The stone bowls she''d made the day before, as well as the case with her syringe and other things, lay in the pack at her side. Next to it was the hollow stone cone of the funnel she had made.


    Thankfully, Rian''s prediction about the tiller breaking didn''t come to pass, and they arrived at River''s Fork well before noon, despite the distance. From their previous trips, as well as Rian''s conversations with the former militiamen who''d made the journey on foot, they estimated that the path along the river between the two demesne was around forty taums, though given all the curves and bends, a straight-line between the edges of their respective demesne was probably closer to thirty-five taums, perhaps even just thirty.


    Lori intended to have her demesne expand to cover every one of those taums.


    This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    For now, however, it was a wild frontier covered in tainted colors, which they were thankfully able to just move quickly through. They didn''t even need to stop to splash themselves with water to wash off any iridiation.


    People were clearly waiting for them when River''s Fork came into sight. Lori adjusted the speed of the water jets, slowing them down to a relative crawl and letting their own momentum beach them. There was a harsh skidding as the flat bottom of the former barge dragged across the mud and river stones, but she had long since cleared this beach of anything that could damage her boat.


    "We''re here everyone," Rian said in the overly cheerful tone of his he used when he wanted to improve people''s spirits. "Everybody off!"


    He stood up, stepped over the side of the boat, and then reached back to help the nearest person follow after him. Despite it being a simple box that barely moved now that it was partially beached, for some reason people seemed very reluctant to get off, and it took some coaxing on Rian''s part to get them to step down and from the boat and began unloading their bedrolls, blankets and clothes.


    Binder Shanalorre was among those waiting for them, looking unassuming in a plain, undyed dress. Lord whatever-his-name was standing next to her on one side, with Shanalorre''s aunt¡ªLori remembered that much, though the name currently escaped her¡ªon the other. There was no distinctly arrayed militia with them, though there was a small crowd behind her.


    Lori gave the other Dungeon Binder a nod from where she sat, impatiently waiting for the boat to finish unloading so they could get the next group and be back before sundown.


    After a while, Binder Shanalorre seemed to sigh, then gestured to her lord, indicating Rian. They spoke briefly before Shanalorre walked towards Lori.


    "Binder Lolilyuri," she said.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori replied in acknowledgement, not getting up from where she was sitting, putting herself under the other Binder''s eye height.


    "I expected to hear back from you sooner," Shanalorre said.


    "We set no definite time-frame as to the start of this cooperation, only a tentative endpoint," Lori said. "Besides, it took time to gather volunteers. Incidentally, we will be returning next week to take this batch back with us and bring in another batch."


    Shanalorre frowned. "That wasn''t part of the agreement."


    "Which is why I am informing you now rather than just coming back next week," Lori said. "Apparently, no one wanted to be separated from their families for longer than that. In future, we might be able to leave them here for longer than a week, but for now, that is what we have to work with."


    "I¡­ see," Shanalorre said. "Very well then. Those conditions are acceptable provided the transition occurs smoothly."


    "I can''t promise that," Lori said. "The second batch will likely be as ignorant as this batch currently is, and will need to be informed of proper procedure. The third batch as well, if members of the first batch decline to volunteer again."


    "If we need to educate a new workforce every week repeatedly, the mine will never be efficient," Shanalorre said.


    "Perhaps you would rather our people supplement your workforce in other areas while you train a dedicated mining group of your own people?" Lori said blandly.


    For a moment, Shanalorre frowned, her eyes growing unfocused. Then she shook her head. "I will need to ask for greater continuity in the work force in future and shifts to be at least a minimum of two weeks."


    "They are a volunteer force," Lori said. "Unless you can incentivize them by offering them payment, they are unlikely to change their mind and agree to those conditions."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Wait, you''re not paying them?"


    Lori tilted her head. "Say, rather, that I''m not taxing them or instituting new fees that will require them to part with any payment they receive." She tilted her head the other way. "If you cannot incentivize them with payment, then I suggest you make the food you feed them something besides stewed meat with assorted other things. I believe you have sufficient variety in food resources to allow you to accomplish this without significantly altering the amount of food you would have fed them anyway?"


    Shanalorre seemed to consider that. "I¡­ see. I will confer with our quartermasters and assess your suggestion. Now, where is our ice?"


    "I will bring it with the second batch," Lori said. She glanced toward Rian, who was speaking to Shanalorre''s lord. "If you will have my people directed to their quarters and towards whatever safety training they will receive before mining, my lord and I will retrieve the rest."


    "One pace cube of the ice now, the other two when you get back," Shanalorre said insistently.


    Lori considered that. Then she sighed. "Fine," she said, getting up and slinging her pack over her shoulder. Its contents were a reassuring weight as she started to breathe in magic, holding her staff with the wire pressing against her palms as she dipped one end into the waters of the river.


    She had to do the block by stages, dragging pieces of ice onto the shore and stacking them up to about the right dimensions, then using water to progressively fill in the cracks until the whole thing was solid. Lori made sure there weren''t any bubbles inside as she filled in and froze, lightly imbued bindings of waterwisps keeping it solid and cold.


    She used a marked notch on her staff to ensure the dimensions were all one pace¡ªshe even generously added two fingers width on top to make up for any unevenness from the ground¡ªbefore she nodded and turned to Shanalorre. "One pace cube of ice, as agreed," Lori said.


    Shanalorre nodded, took out a knotted cord from her pocket, and began measuring.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Is it just me," Rian said loudly from the tiller, "or are we going faster than normal?"


    "I have other things I need to do," she told him, "so we need to hurry. Now, on the subject of latrines."


    "Yes¡­?"


    "They need to be prepared for winter," she said. "For one thing, we need to keep the contents away from snowmelt, or it will contaminate the snow and ground around it. While it''s unlike to spread into the river, if the ground freezes, it will certainly affect the immediate area."


    Rian blinked, then groaned. "I miss city plumbing," he sighed.


    Lori nodded sympathetically.


    "So, what are you thinking?" he said. "Build a secondary roof over all the latrines to keep snow off them?"


    "That or pave the ground around them with stone, and institute mandatory snow removal around them," Lori said.


    "We''d have to anyway, so that people can get to them," Rian said. "Actually, all of that will need a whole new bunch of shovels specifically for shoveling snow." He titled his head. "Covered walkways between the houses and the latrines? And the Dungeon, dining hall and baths too, I suppose."


    "That will need more roofs," Lori pointed out.


    "Maybe you can sink all the houses underground and open tunnels between them¡­?" Rian said.


    "Now you''re just being silly," she said. "Focus on the latrines."


    He sighed. "Yeah¡­ right, winter latrines¡­ you might have to use magic to keep them warm, otherwise the waste is going to freeze over and we won''t be able to clean the things¡­ actually, where would we even put the waste? And pushing the dung barrows through the snow is going to be a nightmare for whoever ends up doing it¡­ "


    "We can assign larger groups of people to it," Lori said. "After all, by that time we''ll have a lot of tree cutters, sawyers and other people not doing much work since it''s too cold, right?"


    "Throw people at the problem and just brute force it?" Rian said. "People to keep shoveling the snow, people to clean the latrines¡­ the waste will still be a problem. You might need to dig new pits just before winter for us to dump the waste into during, since it doesn''t become fertilizer in the cold."


    Lori blinked. "It doesn''t?"


    "It doesn''t," Rian confirmed. "Same reason why meat doesn''t go bad when on ice. Too cold for rot to set in. Actually, it probably won''t even smell. During winter, anyway, We''ll know spring is here by all the stink it makes. Hopefully we survive that long."


    For a moment, the two sat in silence.


    "Wait¡­" Rian suddenly said. "Why are we worrying about this?"


    Lori gave him a look. "Because it deals with the survival of the demesne?"


    Rian waved a hand in negation. "No, I mean, why are we bothering to think up solutions to this? We have people from the north, who''ve probably lived with snow their whole lives. Let''s just ask them how to handle this situation! No, better! We ask them to deal with it! No need for the two of us to get creative!"


    Lori blinked, then brightened as she realized what her lord meant. "That could work¡­!"


    "And if it doesn''t, because we don''t like their solution," Rian said, "then we actually bother with thinking of something."


    Lori tilted her head, but had to accept that addendum. "Find someone to ask," she said. "I''d rather not have to build anything when winter actually starts."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "Maybe I can ask Riz¡­?"


    "No," Lori said flatly. "First, because you might do it during meals, and we''ll be eating. Secondly, find someone who actually knows how to construct the measures, not just someone who might only have used them."


    "Good point," Rian agreed. "Someone else then¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes as Lori''s Boat continued to speed back to the demesne for the second batch of workers.

 92 - The Mine

    They arrived back in River''s Fork a little after noon. From the looks of it, lunch was over. Fortunately, Rian had prepared for this and had had some of breakfast saved for the second batch to eat, in case they missed lunch at either demesne.


    Someone in River''s Fork appeared to be as forward-thinking, for they were greeted with warm bread and other foods as well. Lori noted, however, that the number of foods was equal in number only to the second batch of miners, and did not include any portions for her and Rian. At least they had something to eat. Lori had even, against her better judgment, been generous and gave Rian one of the pink ladies she had brought along as a snack. Let that remind him of what he''d been missing when he''d foolishly given away many of the fruits she''d given him as tha¡ªrestitution for the use of this bed roll!


    After a brief break to eat¡ªRian saying something about needing to design the boat to Covehold to be stable enough to eat in properly¡ªLori started making the other four cubes of ice that was part of their agreement with River''s Fork, since their blacksmiths had confirmed that the ore sample they''d brought back had, in fact, contained copper.


    It took a while, but Binder Shanalorre had provided some boards to lay the ice during construction so that it would be level, which at least helped with the getting it to the proper dimensions. Lori had even put a binding on the cubes with enough imbuement that the ice should reasonably reach whatever they were using for a coldroom long before it started to melt.


    After that, Lori asked to be shown the air circulation arrangements for the mine. Which involved actually seeing the mine itself.


    "Why does this need air circulation?" Lori said, sending light through the cave-like entrance on the side of the hill with the binding of lightwisps at the end of her staff. Unlike her dungeon, the entrance was supported by wooden beams, which seemed a bit unnecessary, since¡­ "It''s barely bigger than two of your houses put together."


    That might have been a bit of an exaggeration. At a pace and a half wide, two paces tall and¡­ well, she wasn''t a Horotract. Deep enough that her light was just a bit too dim to each the end of the excavated mine? Call it maybe twelve to sixteen paces. Lori wasn''t sure how much ore they managed to extract from this, but it was probably not equal to all the excavated space.


    "Part of the air circulation is to keep it from growing too hot," Shanalorre said. "And while it doesn''t seem that deep, I am told its deep enough that a group of people will quickly find themselves lightheaded, especially if they''re doing demanding physical work."


    Lori grunted. Well, she supposed it was a reasonable precaution to take.


    She looked at the air circulation system they already had in place. It seemed to consist of tubes of either seelskin or canvas that hung from one of the upper corners of the mine. They hung limp now, but it was easy to imagine them bloated and filled with air. At intervals, usually where one tube connected to the next, the wooden tube used as a connector had a hole on the side to release air.


    Lori could see it working. After all, in principle it wasn''t that different from the air circulation arrangement of the second level of her demesne.


    It was also immediately obvious why they''d asked for her help in providing air to circulate to this system.


    "These are what you were going to use to as a backup system?" Lori said blandly, staring at a pair of large bellows that had been secured to some sort of wooden frame just outside of the mines. Leather hoses connected the nozzles of the bellows to the long hose of tubing already in the mine. She''d seen them coming in and had hoped they were for use in something else, but alas, that hope was Iridiated and left to go mad.


    "These were the bellows used for smelting the metal we managed to unearth," Shanalorre confirmed. "With men constantly pumping, we believed it would provide some air circulation, provided we closed all the vent holes in the tubing system so air would only escape from the end of the tube, forcing the old air out of the mine. We acknowledge it''s insufficient for our needs. We were going to build a much larger one as soon as the wood had cured."


    "Speaking as a man just looking at this thing," Rian said. "I wouldn''t want to place my safety on this. I don''t even think it''s sturdy enough to take the constant pounding you''re implying it''ll have to take for ventilation to happen! If I had to rely on this, I wouldn''t go into that mine."


    "What happened to the original ventilation equipment?" Lori said. "You implied that it was destroyed when the dragon passed, but was there anything left of it? Perhaps it could still be salvaged or repaired?"


    "A dragonscale fell on it," Lord Yllian said blandly. "The metal itself is useable but completely beyond our ability to repair. And besides¡­" He looked sideways at Shanalorre for a moment.


    "Tell them, Lord Yllian," she said, looking aside.


    The man sighed. "It was powered with beast''s legs mounted to a frame that Binder Koschay had made undead to keep turning the handle of the device. Otherwise we''d have needed at least two people working together to get the thing turning."


    Rian titled his head as if trying to imagine the mechanism, looking slightly disturbed. "Legs? Like, just pieces of beasts cut off and nailed to a frame?"


    "Of course not," Shanalorre said, and there were a note of pride in her voice. "My father was a learned and experienced Deadspeaker. He found a way to fuse a beast''s hips to wood, and from there the leg operated as if it were still whole."


    Rian twitched. "Well, I''m sure it worked¡­?" he said hesitantly, glancing at Lord Yllian.


    "It worked very well, yes," the other man said.


    "If you can disconnect these things, I can install a temporary replacement that will last until the next day or so while I get to work on building a more permanent solution," Lori said. "I assume you''ll want to do the removal yourself to preserve materials?"


    Shanalorre nodded and gestured to her lord, who waved. Some men who had been loitering nearby approached, and he began directing them to disassemble the bellows and frame. "What else do you need?"


    "I might need help with carpentry and carrying when I come back," Lori said. She looked at what the men were doing and frowned. "Disassemble the frame, but keep it nearby. It might be suitable for the solution I have in mind. For now, I will install a temporary measure as soon as it is disassembled."


    They all looked at the stone funnel cone Lori had had carried from Lori''s Boat.


    "So, just to be clear, are you really just going to stick that on one end¡­?"


    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    "It will draw in air from the wide end and force it out the other side," Lori said. "As a result, air will move."


    Shanlorre gave it a skeptical look. "How do we activate it?"


    "You don''t," Lori said. "I do. Once it''s activated, it will continue circulating air until it runs out of imbuement."


    "That seems¡­ wasteful," Shanalorre said.


    "Hence why it will only last two days, at most," Lori said. "It will continue on through the night, not stopping, circulating air until the airwisps run out."


    "Is there no way to make it last longer?" Shanalorre said.


    Lori shrugged. "I can reduce the intake rate," she said. "That would extend its duration by another day. But once it''s activated, it''s activated. There''s no deactivating it unless myself or someone else capable of Whispering overrides my claim and binds it to stop."


    "So it will run through the night, while the mine is empty and it isn''t needed¡­" Shanalorre said.


    "It''s meant as a temporary measure until I can build something more permanent," Lori said. "You''re welcome to do it yourself. Or simply using the bellows is an option. I suggest you decide, as I do not wish to linger, and I intend to leave as soon as I install this and activate it."


    Shanalorre let out a breath that sounded impatient. "Fine. I suppose we have no alternative."


    It wasn''t that simple, of course. The frame that had held the bellows were repurposed to hold the funnel stable¡ªthey simply lay it on the beams so that the wide end served as a base¡ª while Lori altered the narrow end and a leather tube was affixed to it. Lori made the stone bulge slightly so that the tube wouldn''t just be tugged off. Then, once it was secure, Lori activated it.


    It was mildly anticlimactic.


    The airwisps she had bound to the interior of the funnel and imbued when she had made the funnel yesterday, a distinct layer that took up the entire interior of the funnel, began to draw in air, similar to the ventilation systems she had in her Dungeon. They watched the leather tub that had been secured to one end of the funnel suddenly bloat like a fat slug, and from the inside of the mine they heard the sound of rushing air.


    "All right," Lori said. She picked up a rock off the ground and bound the lightwisps she''d had on the end of her staff to it. "Rian, take this and go in there to the end. I will begin reducing the output, and you yell if you can no longer feel sufficient movement from the end of the tubes. Hopefully that will allow this to last longer."


    Rian sighed. "You know, when I agreed to this, I could have sworn you said I only had to deal with people¡­" he said, but he went into the mine anyway.


    It took far longer than Lori thought it would, since the sound of the air actually managed to muffle Rian''s words, and Shanalorre had to condescend to having the pair who dismantled the bellows to go into the mine and stand at intervals so they could relay Rian''s message. Eventually, however, they were able to find a level of output that allowed the binding on the funnel to be active for the next four days, perhaps five.


    "I hope that''s enough," Rian said as Lori took a moment to deactivate the binding and imbue a little more into it. "It''s a bit windy, but people should still be able to breathe even with some kind of open flame burning."


    Lori blinked. "Why would there be an open flame burning?" Lori said.


    "They''ll need light for when they''re digging," Rian said, "And it''s not like they have any other way to make it, right?"


    Lori considered that. "The binding will last for four days, but no longer," she said as she bound it to a slightly higher level of output. "Hopefully by then I''ll be back with a replacement for this." She glanced at Shanalorre. "I might need the assistance of your carpenters to fit it into place."


    "I will notify them," Shanalorre said. "I suppose you''re leaving now?"


    Lori shook her head, reaching into her pack and pulling out a stone bowl. "Not quite," she said, taking her waterskin and pouring some of it into a bowl. "May I ask you to put this somewhere it won''t be disturbed? It''s for a test I''m conducting. It will help in determining the efficacy of the device I will be constructing to replace this." She gestured towards the dormant funnel.


    "I¡­ suppose I can find a place for it," Shanalorre said hesitantly.


    "Excellent," Lori said, reaching into her pack and drawing her syringe case. "If you will wait one moment¡­"


    She had boiled it clean before they left and kept the container sealed. The container itself she had blasted with steam. Hopefully that would be enough.


    She pulled one arm out of her coat and concentrated on her body, feeling for waterwisps¡­


    "Lori? What are you¡ª NOT AGAIN!" Rian cried shrilly as she jabbed herself in the crook of her elbow and began to draw blood.


    "Eeeeh!" Surprisingly, Binder Shanalorre cried out as well, running to hide behind a surprised Lord Yllian and hiding her face. Lori and the lord exchanged a brief look.


    "Rian, please act like an adult," Lori said as she withdrew the needle from her arm, wincing as pain bloomed. She had jerked involuntarily at the cries, and now the site of the extraction throbbed.


    "Doesn''t that hurt?" Rian exclaimed.


    "Of course it hurt. It hurts more when someone surprises me and makes me tense," Lori snapped as she pressed on the plunger of the syringe, sending all the blood down into the bowl of water.


    There was an ''eep'' as Shanalorre, who had started to peek around her lord, hurriedly hid her face behind him again as she quickly breathed in and out.


    Lori cleaned the syringe with the last of the water before putting it back in its case, her mind already claiming and imbuing the waterwisps from the blood in the water as she did so. Well, that was already partially a success. She could, in fact, claim and maintain a connection even within another''s demesne. Next would come seeing if the connection held when she left the demesne, and again when she re-entered her own¡­


    "Shall I heal you, Binder Lolilyuri?" Binder Shanalorre''s voice said, her face now composed again. "While your wound is again self-inflicted, it could still become infected, and antiseptic is a scarce resource until we have managed to cultivate enough sweetbugs and honey."


    Lori glanced down at her arm. "If you do not mind, Binder Shanalorre."


    Shanalorre nodded, and reached out to touch her arm. Lori wondered why the small Deadspeaker wasn''t doing this through her link with the demesne. Perhaps she hadn''t worked out how? Or was this just more familiar and therefore reassuring for her.


    Fingers touched her skin, and Lori felt the familiar¡­ dissonance of Deadspeaking being used on her. It was always so strange, being touched by a magic she couldn''t counter or affect. She felt the wisps in her seemingly ripple slightly, as if sand moved by the waves, but every sense she possessed told her there had been no wave.


    She thought that would have changed since she became Binder, that she''d at least feel something new, but she supposed she was still too unfamiliar with Deadspeaking to perceive what was being done to her.


    She wondered if it was equally unnerving to Shanalorre, the feeling of Lori performing Whispering in the child Binder''s demesne? The demesne was an extension of their bodies, after all, so¡­


    Lori shook her head to clear the thought away as the stinging pain and pulsing throb receded, and she watched the small puncture would close. "Done," Shanalorre informed her, before turning to look at the now dark-tinged stone bowl with morbid fascination. "May I ask what that was in aid of?"


    "A test of an idea I have been experimenting with," Lori said.


    "This isn''t some strange, subtle attempt to wrest my demesne away from me by making me touch your blood, is it?" Shanalorre said blandly. "I think I remember that from some story¡­"


    Lori barely managed to keep herself from screaming. "That''s not how dungeons work," she managed to say in a normal tone. "No, this is merely a test of basic principles over time. I merely need it somewhere it will not be disturbed to minimize the possibility of bad results."


    "Will an empty house do?" Shanalorre said.


    "That will be suitable, provided it is covered," Lori said, taking out a second stone bowl from her pack. She hadn''t had time to modify it to fit as a lid, but they were roughly the same dimensions, so it should work as a cover. Carefully, she placed it over the bowl.


    "Could you find a piece of wood to use as a tray, Lord Yllian?" Shanalorre said, still looking at the bowl skeptically. "To make it easier to move?"


    As the bemused older lord turned and had someone do just that, Lori finished putting everything back in her pack. "I believe it is time to go," Lori said, looking up at the sun, which indicated it was about mid-afternoon. "I hope you can begin soon, Binder Shanalorre. I will return within four days with a replacement air circulator."


    "I look forward to it, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said.


    Lori nodded, shouldered her pack, grabbed her staff, and gestured for Rian to follow her as she began heading back for Lori''s Boat.


    "Uh, your Bindership?" Rian called out to her. "Shouldn''t you activate this air thing again before we leave?"

 93 - Subcontracting To Experts

    At about mid-morning at a demesne some call Lorian, the day after its numbers had been temporarily reduced, a scream of frustration rose over the land. It was a scream of anger and rage, of a desire to impart endless suffering, of someone badly in need of new socks. Truthfully, it wasn''t that loud, and barely registered with most people close enough to hear it.


    Lori might have felt like punctuating that scream with some sort of explosion, but between several emphatic lessons about how random, unprepared explosions were A BAD IDEA, and any ''safe'' explosion likely to not be as cathartic as wanted, she settled for letting out another scream. And then a third.


    Afterwards, she had to sit and drink water to ease her throat, because screaming into the air with the force of all your hate and anger at an uncooperative world, while slightly relieving, hurts. She glared at the object of her ire.


    It was, quite literally, a pile of rocks. Oh, it had been shaped by her Whispering and whatever tools she''d been able to find¡ªa branch, a bone, a conveniently-sized jar used for rations that she''d have to bring back to the kitchen so it didn''t get lost, another rock with a flat plane from being hewn by her water cutter¡ªbut it was still clearly a pile of rocks.


    The idea was simple enough: a water-powered mechanism that would use water with her blood mixed in as a source of physical movement. With her blood, she could keep the water imbued from a distance almost indefinitely, or until doing so finally allowed her to learn the theretofore unknown limitations of how long doing this lasted. The waterwisps would be bound to move, in the process moving the paddles of a water wheel, which would be transferred to a propeller fan, which would be placed so as to blow large volumes of air into River''s Fork''s extant mine ventilation arrangement.


    Yesterday, she had given Rian the sketch for such a fan for the carpenters to build, now with measurements. Some of the measurements were general rather than specific, like the thickness and length of the axle the fan blades would be mounted to, and she had informed Rian he was to make clear that she was to be informed if the carpenters needed anything done to make construction of the piece faster. Hopefully someone was working on it at that very moment.


    She, for her part, had been trying to build a model for how it was all supposed to work. While she had made sketches on flat sheets of rock, in the style of the diagrams she had seen while working in carpentry workshops and smithies¡ªshe was certain what she had made, while probably not industry standard, was probably good enough to understand, since that was the purpose of the format¡ªfinding the one that actually worked was essential, as she would need to build it onsite at River''s Fork.


    The simplest way to build it, which she had already tried, was to build a water wheel, then attach the propeller fan directly to the axle. The small model made of stone had immediately shown problems that her more promising initial models of stone and bone had not. A wheel that spun quickly enough to turn the propeller at sufficient speed to create enough air movement was¡­ well, was unlikely to be driven by the water she would be using, or at least unlikely to be driven with enough torque to turn the fan. It was obvious some sort of gears or ropes would need to be involved to make the fan turn at an adequate rate.


    She had tried to make small mockups using the materials at hand but¡­


    Well, she''d started screaming.


    It wasn''t long before Rian stepped into the clearing next to the bone pit, looking in bemusement at her stone water troughs, stone axles (not perfectly round since she''d had to roll them out by hand, with a wooden stick or two inside to keep them from breaking), stone wheels with stone paddles to catch the flowing water in the stone troughs, and a few attempts at stone gears. "Not going well?" he said.


    "How nice to know your eyes and ears are perfectly functional," Lori said, glaring at her last attempt at a gear, which had cracked in half. Either it had been too thin or there had been an unfortunate seam. Just as well. The protruding pegs to catch the other gear Lori had made weren''t straight or even anyway, and the stone peg it had been mounted with wasn''t centered, which had probably contributed to it breaking.


    "Ah," Rian nodded. "I''ll just go tell everyone you''re all right and need a bit more extra isolation than normal, than come back to help you. Incidentally, the carpenters want a permanent, roofed workshop so they can stop worrying about the lathe and other tools. They figured you asking them to build something was as good a time as any to bring it up."


    Lori sighed. "Fine, fine. They''ll have to put on their own roof, and I won''t be able to start on it until I finish this."


    "I think they understand that. I''ll tell them you''ll get to it¡­eventually," Rian nodded. He turned to go.


    "Rian."


    He stopped, and looked back.


    She was still staring in annoyance at her pile of stone scrap. "Inform the carpenters and smiths I need to speak to people who can make gears and know the construction of water wheels. And I might need axles. Also inform the ropers and¡­ whoever we have making leather that I might need something to act as drive belts to transfer power to a water wheel."


    "Really?" Rian said, surprised. "That''s a lot of people. You sure you want to deal with that many?"


    "There are things I can''t build," Lori said, then added, "Not yet, at least. And I will admit making things perfectly round is difficult. Best to have people with the right tools making them." Her experience with wheels aside, trying to make proper stone gears would require her to make the tools for it first. Best to check if someone else had those tools already."


    "And the ventilation equipment will be one of them?" Rian asked.


    "And the ventilation equipment will be one of them," Lori confirmed. "Inform them I will meet with them after lunch."


    "That soon?" Rian said. "Well, I suppose this is a rush job. If you don''t finish this soon, you''ll have to go back to River''s Fork and lose a day filling that thing you build with more magic."


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    Lori grimaced at the reminder. "Yes, unfortunately."


    Rian nodded. "All right, I''ll find the right people," he said.


    Lori gave a sharp nod, still staring at the broken gears.


    Eventually, she sighed, got up, and went to her room. She had copies to make.


    <hr>


    Lolilyuri was not nervous. She was merely annoyed at the prospect of having to talk to people.


    Rian had been as good as his word, and had gathered together a list of people, all already seated at one of the now-vacant tables after she came down to retrieve the stone tablets she had prepared over the rest of the morning.


    There were a lot of them. Some she recognized vaguely from back when she''d been responsible for replacing the broken wheels on the water wagons. They''d been there to fit them into the axles. Not carpenters, what was the term¡­ cartwrights.


    Rian intercepted her before she reached the table and wordlessly handed her his writing plank. She glanced at it, wondering what he wanted, then blinked. There was a sketch of a rough square, with eight circles each on the long side. Each circle had a name and profession written next to it. A little off to the side, there was a flattened shape labeled ''Dungeon entrance''. She glanced towards the actual entrance, then towards the table of waiting people. There were four people on each side of the table. She even recognized one of them: Tackir, still covered with some specks of sawdust he hadn''t been able to brush off. One of the circles was named ''Tackir ¨C Carpenter''¡­


    She glanced up, but Rian was already walking towards the table ahead of her. Frowning, she glanced down at the stone tablets she was carrying. She''d only made six¡­


    Well, she supposed some people would have to share.


    She walked to the table carefully, despite binding the earthwisps in the tablet to strengthen them against breaking. She wasn''t sure they''d be proof against hitting the ground. It was still stone, after all. The people at her destination watched her approach, some hesitantly getting to their feet, which prompted others to do the same. As Lori''s hands were too full to wave at them to sit down, she just sighed internally as she headed for the head of the table that faced the Dungeon''s entrance. A bench had been dragged there from one of the nearby tables, making an unfortunate right-angled shape that jutted out on one side.


    Lori sat at the impromptu head of the table after laying down her burden, holding up Rian''s wooden blank so she could see it at all times. "Sit, all of you," she sat, and they all sat, some after making nervous bows. Rian was putting wooden cups full of what appeared to be water next to people, starting with Lori. Why? Just¡­ why? "I have had Lord Rian gather you all here because I need something built that I lack the experience and tools to build myself, and he has assessed that you possess the skills needed to do so." She pushed the stack of stone tablets with the copies of her design diagram forward. "Unfortunately, I was not told how many would be here, so there isn''t enough for everyone. Make do."


    The rust-haired man to her right, who according to Rian''s plank was a blacksmith named ''Wyte'', gingerly pulled the stone tablets towards him, took one and passed it down, keeping the last one for himself. Soon they had been passed around and Rian had finished giving everyone water, moving to stand beside her.


    There was a brief silence as the assembled artisans perused her diagram.


    "Um, your Bindership?" Tackir finally said, glancing at her in some confusion, "what exactly are we looking at? Just to be sure? Because it looks a fan and a water wheel in a trough. Though I guess this is that fan we''ve been working on¡­"


    "Essentially correct," Lori said, nodding. "This is a waterwheel that is meant to directly power a fan. Its purpose is for air circulation. The waterwheel is in a trough since magic will be used to move the water."


    "The place it''s going to be used is far from the river," Rian said from next to her, "and setting up a system to bring water up isn''t practical. So Binder Lori made a design where a small amount of water can be used to keep turning the wheel indefinitely." He was looking at the tablet laid out in front of Wyte, and could apparently decipher it well enough even at the angle he was viewing it at.


    There were some sounds of understanding at the explanation as people looked at the diagram in that light.


    "If that''s the case, wouldn¡¯t it be better if the wheel were bigger?" Lori checked Rian''s plank. If the labeling was correct, the one who had spoken was a carpenter named Sani, an extremely tall man with sun-darkened skin and blond hair. "According to this, the waterwheel is only a pace across. Wouldn''t it be more efficient for it to be double that, your Bindership?"


    "While it would," Rian said, "The parts would need to be transported on the boat, and the parts themselves need to be finished within three days. They also need to be relatively simple, since the people putting them together on the site will most likely not be carpenters. Or even have more experience than ''don''t hit thumb with hammer''."


    "You really shouldn''t try to build something like this by yourself lord Rian," someone else said. According to the plank he was ''Onezto ¨C Carpenter''.


    "I maintain that picking whichever end of a hammer to use to hit something is a matter of taste," Rian said with exaggerated loftiness. "But it''s a practical matter. When the parts are all loaded onto the boat, there won''t be any room for anyone else. Surely you don''t expect Binder Lori to put these up herself?"


    "Wouldn''t be surprised," one of the men muttered, still looking thoughtfully down at the tablet he was sharing with the man next to him. He was noted on the plank as ''Jeordoj ¨C Blacksmith''. "Her Bindership''s built most of everything else¡­"


    "Probably about time for us manly men to start helping her then," Rian said cheerfully. "The equipment here is important. Without it, the people who volunteered to go mine at River''s Fork would be doing so in dangerous conditions, at risk of their air going bad. When we complete this and bring it there, they can rest at ease and not worry about that. "


    The men all looked down at the designs as Lori wondered if she really needed to be there, and if perhaps she should have just handed the designs over to Rian and have him tell them to build it.


    "It''s simple enough, broken down like this," Sani the carpenter said. "We need to build the waterwheel, gears to get the fan up to speed, and the frame to hold all this."


    "Don''t bother with the frame," Lori interjected. "I''ll build that with stone onsite."


    "Perhaps we can test it by installing it into a stone frame here before we transport it," Rian said. "After all, we''d need to test it anyway."


    "That will mean two days to build the components, and another day to see if it all fits together," Lori said.


    "Two days?" Tackir exclaimed.


    "I know it''s not a lot of time," Rian said apologetically. "So we''ll have to keep everything simple. No curves, just sticking planks to a central shaft. Her Bindership has already stated her willingness to watercut any parts that need it. "


    One of them men listed as a cartwright¡ªKerz Cartwright¡ªstroked his chin thoughtfully. "Well, watercutting timbers to be the right size for the lathe will be faster than waiting for the sawyers to cut it down to size. Though we''ll have to set up a proper watercutting tank for it¡­"


    "Easily done," Lori said dismissively. It was just a pool to catch the water to keep if from damaging anything else, after all.


    The talk quickly became technical as the men started discussing how to build the water wheel, the need for bearings for it, and how to best build it quickly.


    It was¡­ comfortingly familiar, in a way. While some of the places she''d worked at had her staying in place to cut wood or metal, once or twice she had been employed in a workshop that had gotten an emergency order, and the Master Carpenter had called them all in so that work allocations could be discussed and reshuffled. Lori hadn''t participated much, beyond acknowledging whether or not she could accommodate a particular altered workload, but she had fond memories of those meetings. Mostly because they involved her getting paid to sit down and do nothing but listen, and then later got a small bonus because of the emergency work¡­


    She''d have to give people a bonus for this emergency work, wouldn''t she? Lori signed in resignation, then leaned forward and listened to the plans being made.

 94 - Lori Does Carpentry

    The planning meeting didn''t finish until mid-afternoon. The smiths had bowed out of any actual building, as everyone silently agreed this wasn''t important enough to use their precious metal on, but had remained in an advisory capacity, being familiar with mechanical systems and their construction. It was only when they finally had a plan for something that the woodworkers felt they could build did they adjourn to begin building.


    In general, the carpenters didn''t have their own specific work area, instead setting up their equipment next to where the work was, which in this case was close to the long row of houses getting roofed. Many looked quite finished to Lori, though the wood looked pale and a little rough around the edges.


    The lathe the carpenters had built was smaller than the ones she was used to seeing in her workplaces. Instead of being powered by a bound tool or a steam driver, it was connected to a treadle which turned a large wheel. It was also smaller, and was made completely of wood. It had wooden screws to secure parts so they wouldn''t move and wooden wing nuts to tighten them, all almost comically oversized. It was also mounted on wheels so it could be easily stored in one of the storage sheds that had grown around the sawpit.


    "When I build a permanent carpentry workshop building," Lori commented when she saw the lathe, "we''ll need to build a bigger one of those and see if we can connect it to another waterwheel. A bigger one, since we won''t have any size or time limitations."


    The carpenters all perked up at this announcement, looking hopeful. "That would be wonderful, your Bindership," one of them said. Which one, which one¡­ Onezto? Possibly. He wasn''t Tackir, and he wasn''t Sani¡­


    "Well, let''s get this built for her Bindership first," Tackir said matter-of-factly. "We''ll get the wooden parts ready your Bindership."


    Lori waved him away absently as she dragged the stone she''d be using to build the watercutting tank to an empty, level spot. It wouldn''t be permanent¡ªshe''d dismantle it when she was done¡ªbut right now it was needed so she could do this safely. The watercutting tank was a pool of water that served two purposes: it was a source of water to cut with, and it acted as a backstop for the cutting stream so it wouldn''t go through walls or the ground or anything like that.


    The water in the tank didn''t have to be deep, just deep in the area beneath the cutting stream. Lori just made a simple depression in the middle of the stone cistern she had made, where the water would be deeper and able to blunt the force of the stream. Then she simply filled it with water, which was also quite simple, since the basin of the aqueduct was nearby.


    Normally, a Whisperer hired to do watercutting would have a steel nozzle on the end of a hose for her to use, with water coming through that hose from a tank (which had also been her job to fill). The nozzle would have been stationary, and she''d have used a metal conducting wire that ran through the hose to control the waterwisps so that they came out in a powerful, coherent stream. The work would have needed to be done slowly, in controlled bursts, with the nozzle being moved carefully along guiderails that was thankfully someone else''s job to control.


    They didn''t have all that, so Lori had improvised. A raised platform of stone half a pace above the tank, with wood reinforcement inside since they had the wood anyway, that supported a stone reservoir with one very, very narrow hole. The idea was that Lori would fill the tank with water, use gravity to make the water go straight down in a line, and from there they''d have a reliable straight cut that would only need topping up of the water in the tank. They''d mixed in some fine clay from the claypit into the water as an abrasive, since they didn''t have the sort of abrasive they used in the shop. Lori felt they didn''t need it, since she could now put substantially more power into her water jet, but fine.


    Lori wished she could skip all this, but without something to guide her, she wouldn''t be able to properly align her water stream to cut straight, and she definitely wouldn''t be able to hold the stream properly stationary. She''d learned that a long time ago. People made tools for a reason, and those reasons were precision, accuracy, and repeatability. This way she''d be able to make a cut that was straight and consistent.


    The first test¡­ sprayed. So did the second test. And a few more after that. It stopped spraying as Lori finally made a pointed stone nozzle to keep the water from being inclined to go sideways.


    She supposed the nozzle being pointed had a use after all.


    While she''d been doing that, the carpenters had been devising rollers, shaved out on the lathe. They didn''t intend to cut any complicated shapes out of the wood¡ªthe wooden gears were being made by hand, and indeed, had already been finished by the person doing them, someone whose name she didn''t know¡ªso just having rollers to move things under the stream would be sufficient to their needs.


    Lori tested the new nozzle, with its now non-spraying stream, by passing a branch through it. Besides a quick jerk under her hand, there was no resistance, and the cut was smooth. Wet, but smooth.


    Unfortunately, that was all the time they had for that day. They had spent a lot of time at the dining hall planning the design of the wheel, how to property counterweight it, the bearings to be used, whether stone bearings could take the weight¡­


    It had almost been like one of her old jobs, except she wasn''t being paid because she was the boss, but she had to make sure everyone had what they needed, and compensate them for pulling them out of their duties¡­


    At least Lori had little she needed to clean up. The pile of unused rock was left there in case she had to add anything the next day and she didn''t feel like needing to drag up any more. She''d also idly noted a spot where she could put up the carpentry workshop building.


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    Still, she felt unsatisfied as the sun fell towards the horizon and she headed for her room to clean up.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "This is taking too long," Lori declared as she sat at her table.


    "It''s the first day," Rian said, letting out a sigh as he took his own seat. She¡­ wasn''t quite sure what he''d been doing while she''d been building the improvised cutting rig, but it had involved holding one of the tablets that had been softened a little so the workmen could make sketches on it with their thumbnails and talking to people. "Of course it looks like it''s taking too long, it''s mostly been setting up and getting ready to do actual building. Besides, they only had¡­ what, half the day to work on it, and half of that was spent drawing and planning. As projects go, I think we''re making good time."


    Lori frowned. It sounded like an excuse. Though, given the time¡­ "Fine," she grumbled. "But I expect more progress tomorrow."


    "You''ll probably get it," Rian said as Riz came up behind him and tiredly sat down next to him, carefully keeping her head down, avoiding Lori''s gaze. "Shaping the beam for the axle seems to be the most time-consuming part. I don''t know if you saw, but they''ve already managed to build most of the wheel, they just need to mount it to the axle. And since you asked for it earlier, the fan''s already almost done, they just need to mount that to an axle too."


    Lori sighed again, remembering she still had to make ball bearings for those. "Don''t forget to talk to the chandler so we can get some fat for lubricant," she reminded him.


    "Might be easier if you just catch a seel yourself," he suggested. "We''d get more fat that way."


    That prompted another sigh. "You would think we''d have all that we''d need already."


    "Technically we do," Rian said. "It''s just that it''s all already been allocated for something else, like soap. So we need to get a bit more of it so we don''t interfere with what little industry we have."


    She sighed again. "Fine, I''ll catch a seel."


    "Our food stores thank you," Rain said cheerfully. "Are you all right? You''ve been sighing a lot. Maybe you need more sleep."


    Her back pre-emptively protested. "I''m fine," she said. "Just tired."


    "Hence why I suggested more sleep."


    "I sleep just fine, it''s the day that''s been tiring," Lori retorted.


    "Then may I recommend you go straight upstairs after eating and have some of that fruit you''ve been hoarding?" Rian suggested. "Might as well eat it, or else it''ll go bad, cold room or no."


    Lori brightened at the reminder of her loot. "I think I will," she agreed. "Where''s the food?"


    "They were just finishing it up when I came in," Rian said. He looked displeased for some reason. "Someone found more gourd."


    "If you don''t think you deserve the food, you don''t deserve to complain about what''s in it," Lori said flatly.


    It was Rian''s turn to sigh as Riz gave him a curious look. "I suppose. Really looking forward to next year when we have more variety in the food. We should have our own flour by then, right?"


    "We can hope," Lori said, thinking of the little bag of grain in her room. If she got really bored or desperate, maybe she''d find out how you turned it into flour this winter¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After a dinner of no particular note, Lori headed up to her room.


    First, she got some golden buds from her cold room, and spent a pleasant little while going through three, enjoying the simultaneously sweet and sharp taste of the bright yellow fruit.


    Then she got to work.


    She took the mold she had made for making stone ball bearings and began using it for just that, dropping the finished stone ball into the bowls of her sunk board, since it was convenient. It was boring, repetitive, necessary work, and not for the first time she chided herself for not having done this earlier on some of the nights she''d had nothing to do, so she would have a ready supply of bearings. But then, it wasn''t like she was being paid to do this. Quite the opposite, actually¡­


    It was while she was doing this that the thought occurred to her that perhaps the people formerly from River''s Fork had a spare bedroll or two. After all, they''d lost a lot of people when the dragon came, right? Surely that meant there were bedrolls not being used? Or whatever it was they used for sleeping on. Surely they didn''t sleep right on the ground¡­


    She had to redo a few bearings as she got distracted by wondering how she was supposed to acquire one of those bedrolls for her own use. Maybe two so she''d have something to use for padding on a chair or couch¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next morning, after breakfast, it was back to where the carpenters had set up. While Lori would have loved to get started right away so it would all be done by midday, leaving her with more time for something else, unfortunately there were safety checks to do, cleaning of the nozzle, testing if it cut properly on expendable pieces of wood that would probably be used for firewood, and making a new nozzle once she realized the force of the water was wearing out the less durable stone.


    As this was happening, the carpenters had rigged up more rollers to either side of where the stream would cut, so that there would be no bend in the wood to affect the cut. Thankfully, she didn''t have to worry about the actual maneuvering of the wood through the cutting stream, beyond keeping watch for anyone whose hand was getting too close¡­


    "Maybe you can have light or darkness as a stand-in for where the stream would be?" Rian suggested, "and maybe use light to color the stream when you''re actually cutting, so people get a better sense of where it is?"


    Lori spend a rather enjoyable few moments working out how to bind lightwisps to the stream of waterwisps so the stream would glow a bright, noticeable color to discourage people from losing extremities to it.


    When they finally did get around to cutting the wood into beams, it was using a glowing stream of water that was far too coherent and narrow to be natural. Lori stayed out of it, keeping her attention on reinforcing the stone nozzle, pressurizing the stream, keeping it coherent while at the same time trying not to affect it such that it remained straight, coloring the stream with lightwisps, and constantly drawing water from the tank back up to the reservoir behind the nozzle so that the stream was constant. It was a constant expenditure of power she wouldn''t have been able to afford before she had become a Dungeon Binder, at least not without consuming a wisp bead.


    As the large bits of dead tree were passed through the stream, however, and came out the other end wet but neatly cut all the way through in a fraction of the time it would have taken the sawpit to do it, she couldn''t help the feeling of silent satisfaction at a job well done washing over her.


    It was a satisfaction that was a bit hard to maintain over the multiple passes needed to cut the wood down to the size and shape they wanted, but that was the nature of work.

 95 - Craftsmanship and Cleanliness

    The parts came together over the course of the next two days, and no one lost any fingers or larger extremities.


    Once all the pieces had been cut, Lori had switched from operating the water cutter to helping the blacksmiths set up an impromptu forge for making nails once it became clear joinery would be insufficient to the task of affixing all the pieces together. They could have used the nails that¡­ someone¡­ had brought with them, but¡­ well, those seemed too good for this project. Those nails were high-strength steel! Best that they keep that for their own use. Lori had retrieved some iron from one of the dragon scales in her stores for the purpose. At least, she assumed it was iron. It was starting to rust a little, after all.


    With the impromptu forging area and herself providing heat, the smiths were able to start making nails. It was loud, ringing work, and it involved her walking from anvil to anvil putting on bindings of firewisps to heat the metal to the point it became malleable and then taking off the binding once it had been shaped and could be cooled. She also had to make adjustments to ensure the metal wasn''t too hard or too soft. Fortunately, Lori had experience there, though it hadn''t involved making nails specifically. Still, she had some experience in annealing and hardening metals, and with the constant heat and some extra malleability afforded by a concurrent binding of earthwisps, they were able to produce a lot of nails before lunch that day.


    Afterwards, Lori had to reconfigure the stone she''d used to build the water cutting tank to act as a steam box so they could bend wood into a frame for the fan. The frame could be used to anchor a leather hood so the air could be funneled into the ventilation system. She had less experience with this, since most workshops that hired Whisperers didn''t need them for their steam box. Indeed, if it weren''t for the time constraints, the carpenters could have simply build a wooden steam box to prepare wood for bending. However, that would have taken time, time which would divert from the parts they needed, so after Rian relayed the problem to her, she set about building a stone box they could seal with a lid. After that, all she needed was water to turn into steam for the box.


    It was a busy two days that left her little room to bring down her sunk board to get Rian to play. She just finished eating, took a not-quite-a-nap until the dining hall was quiet¡ªwhich meant everyone had gone back to work¡ªthen went back up to the work site. The water wheel was assembled, first with joinery, then with the nails she had helped make. The water wheel was attached to the axle using multiple spokes, which had been lathed to make room for ball bearing for when it was mounted.


    More stone had to be dragged to the site so they could test-mount the waterwheel and axle, and to ensure that the ball bearing were not simply crushed by the weight. Then they mounted a counterbalance on the end of the axle so that the wheel wouldn''t wobble¡­


    The most difficult and tedious part was carving holes along one rim of the water wheel and inserting square pegs into it to act as teeth. The teeth would turn the gear attached to the fan so it would spin quickly enough for what they needed. It was relatively quick work using the steel chisels that the carpenters had, but there were a lot of them all along the wheel¡­


    "I saw the parts," Rian began as she sat down at their table at the end of the second day, face and hair still a little wet from the quick wash she''d had to get the sweat off her. She could have dried herself with waterwisps, but Lori enjoyed the cool feeling of the water drying on her skin. "I think we''ll be able to test putting them together tomorrow."


    "We can hope," Lori said absently, her mind still in the memory of the carpenters quickly and systematically making square hole after square hole. A sort of cylinder with protruding teeth to catch those pegs had already been made for the fan''s own axle. It had been interesting, watching the smiths and carpenters take so many measurements of the circumference of the wheel at various distances from the axle, and watching them calculate the exact number and distance between the pegs to be mounted. "Otherwise all that work would have been a waste."


    "Not waste, I think," Rian said. "Just¡­ a foundation. I mean, the wheel works, the fan should work, so getting the two of them to spin together is the last hurdle. At worst, tomorrow they have to remake the gear for the fan, to make sure it meshes with the wheel properly, or they''d have to make more gears because the fan isn''t spinning quickly enough."


    Lori grimaced. "More time lost," she said.


    "Hey, at worst you go back to River''s Fork and spend a day basically sitting around and doing nothing but putting magic on the rock you have there already so we have more time to work," Rian said with a shrug. "That''s hardly work. That''s practically a break."


    Lori scowled. He had a point, but she didn''t like it. "I''d rather not leave home." Her test with the bowl she''d left in River''s Fork had been a success, as she''d maintained the connection even after exiting that demesne and returning to her own. Even now, she was still connected to it. It proved that after setting up this equipment, she wouldn''t have to leave again to imbue it.


    Rian opened his mouth, then paused. "Well¡­ our carpenters are good," he said, sounding awkward. "Maybe you won''t have to."


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    Lori ignored that for the shallow platitude it was. "Remind me to make a permanent structure for the smiths as well once this is finished."


    "Will that be before or after you build the third bath house?" Rian asked dryly.


    "After," Lori said.


    "Oh good," Rian said. "I didn''t want to bring it up, but the baths have been pretty full lately. I''m worried people haven''t been able to bathe properly. In fact, at night, the laundry area becomes an outdoor bath for people in a hurry and don''t mind the cold."


    Lori frowned. "What?"


    "Don''t worry, no one''s been doing anything they''re not supposed to," Rian said. "I asked Riz to keep an eye on things. It''s cold after all, no one wants to hang around outside any longer than they need to."


    "Not that," she said. "People have been bathing outside at night? Don''t they know they''ll get sick in the cold?"


    "That''s why they hurry," Rian said.


    Lori sighed, stood up, and left the table, muttering to herself.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time she got back from binding firewisps into the water that fed into the laundry area so that it was as warm as the water in the bath houses, raising up a wall of darkwisps around it to give people privacy, and putting some lightwisps on the other side of the wall so people wouldn''t be blind, Lori found Rian with the usual women seated on either side of him trying to get his attention in conversation. There were two bowls of stew in front of him, both untouched while he awkwardly tried to respond while having his attention pulled towards two different conversations on either side of him.


    They quieted as she approached and sat down on her side of the table, grabbing one of the bowls in front of Rian.


    "You," she said, pointing at the sole male at the table, "should have told me about the bath situation sooner. I thought our current capacity could handle it? Isn''t that why we installed the showers?"


    "We could," Rian said, "but people needed to stay up late just to be able to use the baths. We sort of devised a schedule of shifts where some people ate, some people took baths, and then they switched out. When you built the laundry area, the women claimed it for their own so they and the children could have more space for bathing."


    "I''m pretty sure I made a law against that," Lori said.


    "You meant people getting intimate with each other when you wrote that law, not bathing," Rian retorted. "Besides, it isn''t much different from how we all bathed on the way here. And anyone who tries anything stupid would have had an angry mob on them."


    "You still should have told me," Lori said sternly. "Any health benefit from being clean was endangered by being exposed to the cold. I''m surprised the medics did not tell you that themselves."


    "It didn''t seem like something you''d care about fixing," Rian said. "Apparently I was wrong. And to be fair, most of the medics are from a very cold northern climate. This is probably perfect outdoor bathing weather to them, all things considered." To his left, Riz nodded in agreement. "See?"


    Lori glared at him. "Anything else you haven''t told me?"


    "Well, people have been asking about land still."


    "Ask them how they plan to pay taxes on it. If they give a suitable reply, I''ll consider it," Lori said. "Provided they understand that means they''ll need to use that land to pay for everything they currently don''t have to pay for." She ate another spoonful. "What else? Any health issues?"


    "Does people complaining about the smell of the dung carts count? They''re asking for the carts not to use the main road when bringing the waste to be composted."


    "They''re all free to make such a barrow-only road themselves, with my blessing," Lori said. "Until then, the carts go where they can be pushed."


    "Cleaning the latrines is hard enough as it is," Umu muttered. "People have no right to complain!" She glared at Mikon and Riz, as if daring them to gainsay her.


    "Um, yeah¡­ well, that''s pretty much it, off the top of my head," Rian said. "Can I eat now?"


    "Are you sure you deserve to eat that?" she said blandly.


    "I''m earning it on credit."


    "Doesn''t that usually accrue interest you also have to pay?"


    "Is this your way of punishing me by not letting me eat? I''m pretty sure I didn''t do anything to deserve it¡­"


    "I just asked if you think you deserve it," Lori said, taking a spoonful from her bowl.


    Rian stared at his bowl for a very long time before he started eating again.


    "You," Lori said, pointing, and the three women on either side of Rian froze. "Riz. You''re making sure nothing happens in the laundry area while people bathe, correct?"


    "Y-yes, Great Binder?" Riz said, eyes darting sideways to the other two women on the bench pleadingly.


    "Good. Do that from now on until I can get the third bath house up. I''ve put some lights so people can see and a wall of darkness for privacy. The darkness won''t stop anyone passing through, just looking. I trust you can take it from there? I see you''ve managed to have a bath already."


    Riz nodded jerkily. "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Good," Lori said, looking back down towards her food. "Be sure to warn everyone I''ve made the water warm."


    Riz blinked. "I''ll be sure to tell them, Great Binder."


    Mikon, sitting next to the other woman, patted her on the shoulder. "Don''t worry, I''ll keep you company so you don''t have to do it alone." This was followed by an encouraging smile.


    Lori blinked, and the joined the other women at the table at staring at the pink-haired weaver.


    "What?" she said, very carefully not facing Lori when she did so.


    "What are you up to?" Riz asked suspiciously.


    "I can''t be nice?" Mikon said, pouting with clearly-false hurt. "Would you really rather stand around out there alone?"


    Riz looked like she was seriously contemplating it.


    "I''ll keep you company too," Rian offered. "It''s the least I can do after asking you to do it."


    Riz blinked, brightening. "Well, I wouldn''t say no to that, Lord Rian."


    "Good," Mikon said, seemingly satisfied, "I''m sure the three of us will be able to while away the time."


    Lori shook her head and went back to eating as Umu quickly proclaimed to keep Riz company as well, ignoring the conversation that followed. Nothing that had to do with her. She ate quietly, trying to remember the number of people who''d been working on the water wheel, fan, axles and gears¡­

 Omake - Can You Fly?

    The question was asked innocently enough.


    "Hey Lori, can you fly?" Rian asked over breakfast.


    Lori sighed. "Why do people keep asking that? No, Whisperers can''t fly. We leave flying to Mentalists, Horotracts, bugs, kites and hot air sacks." No matter how much she had tried when she''d first started¡­


    "Yes, but that''s regular, normal wizards," Rian pointed out. "You''re a Binder now."


    Lori blinked. Her eyes slowly widened.


    <hr>


    "I take it back, I take it back, I don''t need to know if you can fly!" Rian said frantically as Lori stood in the middle of a rising wind.


    "Well, I do," Lori said as she finished tucking her shirt into her trousers so they wouldn''t billow upwards in the air. Really, there was no other option for a Whisperer-turned-Dungeon Binder trying to fly without Mentalism. Lightwisps, darkwisps, firewisps and lightningwisps were essentially immaterial, waterwisps would make this swimming, and earthwisps¡­ while they would certainly lift her up, that would simply be a form of standing.


    To fly, to defy the force of the world pulling her downwards, she needed to be untethered. Until she could learn to lift herself with her own thoughts or redefine which way was ''down'' for her, that meant airwisps.


    And moving anything with air and airwisps meant moving large volumes of air against her surface area.


    ¡­well, not really. After all, there were to ways to move something with airwisps: either have the air push the thing one wants to move, as in the case of sails, or have air be pushed from the thing one wishes moved. The problem with the latter was it required shapes and features human bodies didn''t really have. It was all well and good for stories to say that a Whisperer ''made their feet light as air'' or ''stepped on the air as if it were solid'', but neither were actually possible. Air was air: loose, variable density, compressible, and prone to moving about. The only way to solidify so it could be stepped on was to compress the air such that it actually did become solid, leaving you with an ice-like chunk of solid air¡ª


    Oh.


    She''d have to remember that for later.


    Pushing air from her body was¡­ not possible. A binding of airwisps that propelled the air was not actually physically connected to her body, and would have no means of transferring the force of that propulsion to her physically. If she bound the airwisps to her skin, as she bound the waterwisps she used to propel Lori''s Boat to bone, it would greatly limit the angles at which that air could be propelled. Not to mention putting her at risk of tearing her skin off as force sufficient to lift a human body were directed laterally on where the airwisps were bound. Attaching the binding to her clothes had even more problems, not the least of which is her clothes had no wisps she could attach them to. As woven plant fiber, she''d need Deadspeaking to affect them¡­


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    So, she was left with the other alternative. Instead of pushing with air, she had to be pushed by air. The binding was simple enough. Airwisps were blasting air upwards with great force as if a dragon or storm neared, shaped into a cylinder five paces wide about knee-high from the ground so that the air wouldn''t go every which way at random. The initial test had sent every speck of dust hurtling into the air, and it hadn''t had the decency to go straight up, spreading into a cloud all around. However, as the binding kept blowing, and with the wind from another binding that blew the dust away, the air was cleared, leaving a surface more or less scoured of loose dust and dirt.


    The binding had been mildly displaced when she''d walked into it, of course. After all, her legs were solid, not air, and so the binding had nothing to work with where she was standing. Thankfully, the minute airwisps in her body were also unaffected, a body''s natural resistance to binding protecting her in that regard.


    "Look, have you thought about what could happen if you get pushed out of the wind?" Rian said frantically, voice raised to be heard over the rushing wind. "I mean, you''d fall on your face onto the ground! And we can''t even put bedrolls and things to cushion it because the wind would send it flying!"


    "I''ve bound the airwisps to create a wall of air pushing everything towards the center," Lori said, face perfectly straight as she began doing just that, her voice amplified by a binding.


    "That won''t help once you get to the top!" Rian pointed out.


    "Obviously, I will not raise myself above the level of the wall," Lori said as she tentatively spread her arms. "The air isn''t even lifting me yet, I obviously need to increase the force exerted by the binding."


    Rian sighed. Loudly. "Of course it''s not enough, you''re standing up straight! The air''s just going around you. If you bend over so it can push on your front, you''d feel more force."


    Oh! Rian was right. She tentatively raised her arms, and they were nearly blown upward at the force of the wind catching them and pushing them upward. She forced them down, held them out to her sides. Yes, it definitely felt that something was pushing her up. Tentatively, she leaned forward, and what had been a mildly annoying wind over her body suddenly became a powerful force that made her bounce back to standing straight, then overcompensate by leaning back, only to be pushed straight again.


    Lori tilted her head curiously, her dark hair pushed upwards tickling her scalp strangely. Then, arms still spread, she slowly leaned forward. She could feel the air pushing hard against her body, and she was amused to note that she didn''t even have to try to keep her balance. The air was managing to hold her up. She kept leaning forward, ignoring how Rian seemed poised to start running for some reason, making all sorts of funny sounds¡­


    Frowning, she concentrated and altered the binding to increase the force of the wind. The wind continued to push her up, such that she was standing almost diagonally to the ground, her legs almost outstretched¡­


    Lori increased the forced of the wind one last time, then grinned as her toes lifted off the ground. She laughed, the sound stolen away by the roar around her, as she hesitantly began to straighten her body, hovering facedown with her limbs outstretched, her hair steaming upward¡­


    And then the binding ran out of imbuement.


    There was a thump and a crack as she fell face-first into the hard packed dirt.


    "Ow¡­"


    <hr>


    "You broke your nose doing what?" Shanalorre said incredulously.


    "Flying," Lori said, wincing at the pain as she focused on breathing though her mouth.


    There was very long silence as Shanalorre bit at her lip. Eventually she said, "You, ah, know only Mentalists and¡ª"


    "I know!"

 96 - Emergency Order Bonus

    The final test assembly came the next day. They were almost out of time, after all. While Lori hoped that they''d be able to bring the components to River''s Fork and assemble it that day¡­ she wasn''t holding out much hope. In fact, she''d already resigned herself to having to go back to River''s Fork to imbue the temporary measure she''d put there.


    "I''m going to have some people cut some fresh ropeweed," Rian said as they ate breakfast. "When we put the part on the boat, we''ll need cushioning so they don''t damage the boat."


    "Will that really help? Either the boat can take the weight of the parts or it won''t," Lori said.


    "It''s less about the weight and more about the possibility of it shifting and unbalancing the boat," Rian said. "Also, it might poke holes in the hull when it shifts. If we get a hole in that thing, I don''t think we''d be able to patch it up."


    "Right. Get the ropeweed," Lori agreed. "I''m sure the weavers will be able to use it later."


    On either side of Rian, Umu and Mikon nodded. "As long as it''s not cut up too short, it should be fine," Mikon said. "Er, Lord Rian."


    "I''m sure Lori appreciated you not talking to her directly," Rian said, giving Lori a bland look.


    Lori nodded.


    "That''s probably the most affirmation you''re going to get from her," he told the weaver.


    "I got more," Umu said smugly.


    The other three on her bench looked at her. "You''re making that up," Riz accused.


    "Why would I lie in front of her Bindership?" Umu smirked.


    They all looked at Lori.


    Lori ignored them and continued eating.


    "Lord Rian, is that a ''no'' silence or a ''yes'' silence?" Mikon asked.


    "Could be either one, or it could be an ''ignoring you'' silence," Rian said. "I''ll be honest, I don''t think I know her well enough to interpret just silence without more clues."


    Lori finished her bowl, pushed it towards Rian to deal with, grabbed her hat from next to her on the bench and went out towards where she''d left the water wheel yesterday, grabbing some more rock from the pile near the dungeon entrance as she passed it.


    The waterwheel on its stone mounting was still where they had left it the day before. The wheel jutted out from one end, the rest of the axle stuck out the other, at the end of which was some stone Lori had used earthwisps to wrap around the end as a counterweight. She examined it as people started working on the houses nearby, touching the wheel and getting it spinning, listening to the sounds of the stone ball bearings rolling inside. She''d needed to raise the dividing grooves the bearings ran on blind, but it seemed to have worked. The wheel rolled smoothly, and kept turning for a bit after she''d let it go.


    She frowned, concentrated on looking at a single point, and turned the wheel again. Square pegs flashed by, all blurring together into a seemingly solid line. It looked like the gears teeth were all in line. That was a good sign, right? Hopefully that meant it would intermesh with the gears for the fan¡­


    "Your Bindership?" someone said hesitantly.


    Lori looked towards the voice. Thankfully, it was someone whose name and face she knew. "Yes, Tackir?" she said. "Have you seen the fan?"


    "We put it in the shed with the lathe, your Bindership," he said. "So it wouldn''t get stepped on."


    Lori nodded. Ah, yes there it was, being carried by some men. Hopefully the fact it was being carried by two people was because it was long and unwieldy rather than because it was heavy. Rian would have to carry it in River''s Fork, after all.


    The fan needed two stone mounts, though fortunately neither needed to be very high. One just behind the fan, and another at the other end to hold it steady so that the gear teeth could properly transfer energy. Lori had to adjust all the mounts slightly so everything aligned. By mid-morning, however, everything was aligned properly, and when they turned the water wheel around the whole way for two revolutions, all the teeth continued to mesh together, turning the fan all the way through.


    There was no cheering. Carpenters, in her experience, tended to be serious, no-nonsense men when it came to their work, so all the waterwheel and the fan garnered were approving nods as good work done well. Off to the side, someone was already putting together a box of gears to add to the wheel and fan in case the fan didn''t revolve at a sufficient rate.


    With that done, Lori filled up the trough under the water wheel with water, and bound the water to flow, pushing the water wheel with it.


    ¡­


    Yes, just connecting the fan straight to the waterwheel wasn''t nearly enough.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It took most of the day, but by mid-afternoon, it was finished. The waterwheel turned, the spokes on its side turning a gear in the gearbox, which turned another gear, which turned the fan quickly enough that Lori concluded it was an actual physical hazard and someone might lose a hand. A finger, at least. There was nothing they could do about that, since a protective grille was beyond their time and resources, but then, anyone stupid enough to stick their extremity into something turning that fast was just asking to lose it.


    Then came the hard part: dismantling it, cutting the axles of the waterwheel and propeller fan down to size, remembering how it was supposed to be put together, and then loading into Lori''s Boat to bring to River''s Fork the following day. Lori''s part in that was quick, and merely needed her to dismantle the stone structures on which the parts were mounted, as well as collect the stone ball bearings so they wouldn''t get lost, taking them to her room for safekeeping that night. The carpenters took care of the rest, showing Rian¡ªwho had been called to remember how to put it together so he could assist Lori the following day¡ªhow the parts fitted and how they would need to be mounted. They nodded in approval at the fresh ropeweed that had been brought in to act as cushioning for the parts that would go on the boat. The parts¡ªwater wheel, propeller fan, and gear box¡ªwere all moved to the dungeon to be loaded on Lori''s Boat the next day.


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    As the carpenters were beginning to put away their tools for the day, Lori came back from her room, a sack slung over her shoulder and held with both hands. While she didn''t know everyone''s names, faces were still on the forefront of her memory and a glance showed all the carpenters were still there.


    She opened her mouth¡­ and paused. Argh! How did talkative people do this? Rian just basically said ''Everyone, look at me!'' and they did! If she was that sort of person, however, she wouldn''t need Rian in the first place. Said lord, unfortunately, appeared to be gone.


    Sighing, she glanced about, found a person whose name she did know, and went over to them. Tackir was carefully handling a set of very sharp and well-maintained chisels, one of them large enough to be mistaken for a spatula if it weren''t for the thick metal and keen edge, putting them away into a wooden toolbox.


    "Tackir," she said, and the man looked up at her call, hastily putting down his toolbox.


    "Yes, your Bindership?" he said. He seemed less nervous now, and indeed was almost relaxed. Perhaps it was the proximity to where carpentry had so recently happened.


    As people glanced at them curiously, Lori said, "Everyone did very well working on the parts that I needed, today and the days before," she said. "You were all able to build a viable design under a strict time limit and get it done. You are all very good craftsman in your respective fields and should be proud of that."


    It was, Lori had to admit, a very clunky compliment. Certainly nothing like the elegant praise she''d heard of in plays where characters were complimenting someone''s skill. It was certainly nothing like the easy but sincere flattery that always seemed to roll so easily out of Rian''s mouth. She didn''t even have the advantage of seeing Tackir straighten proudly or any sort of easy cues like that.


    All he did was smile and say, "Thank you, your Bindership." No straightening whatsoever.


    "If we were in a more civilized place and I had money, you and everyone else who helped build the fan and waterwheel would all be receiving a bonus for completing such an emergency order," Lori said. "However, as I don''t have that¡­" Carefully, she heaved the sack down from her shoulder, and the ground rose up in front of her "Here. It''s the only thing I have to offer that you all can''t make or get yourselves. Open it."


    Tackir took the half-filled sack¡ªwith only one hand, Lori was annoyed to see¡ªas the other carpenters abandoned the pretense of not listening, getting up and moving closer to see. He opened it and reached inside. Out came a pink lady, beaded with condensation from being removed from her cold room.


    "I''ll trust you divide the contents fairly among all who helped contribute," Lori said as people leaned forward, one even peeking into the bag. "Yourself included."


    Tackir finally straightened, and then unexpectedly bowed, a full tilt from the waist and dip of the head. "Yes, your Bindership. You can count on me. And thank you, your Bindership. These look delicious."


    Lori nodded. "Please return the sack to me at dinner when you''re done."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    She nodded again, turned, and headed towards her room to finally take a bath and get dressed for dinner.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori found a sack on the table when she came down after her bath. She placed it next to her on the bench as she sat down, putting her sunk board on the table as she waited for Rian to arrive. Finally, it was done. Not that it was the end of her commitments to River''s Fork. There was still the monthly ice, and the next set of volunteers next week. Still, many of the new houses looked done, and she suspected people would start moving in from the shelter soon, possibly as soon as later this week, so there would be a surplus of manpower to send.


    She glanced up as she heard someone sit, but it was only Mikon. Lori sank back into her thoughts. On further thought, perhaps she shouldn''t make a new building for the carpenters and just house them in their own alcoves in the second level? Each carpenter could take one alcove, or two could share one, and in the event of the dragon, their family could be assigned that alcove. And tools like the lathe would probably need their own dedicated alcove, where the tools could be moved to make room in the other alcoves. The smiths would definitely need their own area though, since they''d be working with combustibles and heat, and therefore would need to be able to vent their smoke to the outside so that it wouldn''t fill the Dungeon¡­


    Restlessly, she reached for one of the stone-filled bowls on the board, picked up all the stones, and started dropping the stones into subsequent bowls as if she were making a move. She''d finally be able to challenge Rian to a game tonight, instead of being so tired and frustrated she just went straight to bed¡ª


    Lori blinked as a hand reached into one of the bowls opposite her own, grabbed all the stones, and started dropping them into bowls as well. She looked up, eyes narrowing slightly as Mikon gave her a wide-eyed, innocent look before casually averting their gaze to the side. Eyes narrowing, Lori took the contents of the next bowl¡­


    By the time Rian finally got to the table, Lori was claiming her first victory.


    "Am¡­ I interrupting anything?" Rian asked, glancing back and forth between them. Behind him, Riz and Umu were doing the same, the latter giving the other weaver a suspicious look.


    "What took you so long?" Lori asked.


    "I was making sure we had enough lard for lubricant," Rian said. "The jars are with the other parts. Don''t get them confused with the jars with our lunch and just-in-case dinner and breakfast."


    Lori looked up sharply as Mikon quietly reset the board after her loss. "Why is there dinner and breakfast?"


    "Just in case, as I said," Rian said. "So I checked the dimensions, and even with the parts I think we can bring one, maybe two people with us. How do you feel about one of the carpenters coming along in case something breaks or something?"


    Lori considered that as Mikon finished and sat back and gave Rian a smile of greeting. "I have no objections," she said.


    Rian nodded. "Good. Good¡­ okay, I have to ask, are you two playing together?"


    "I''m playing sunk," Lori said.


    "But are you playing it with Mikon?" Rian asked, eyes still going back and forth between the two of them.


    "You took too long to come back and I got bored," Lori said.


    Rian made a face. "Is that what it takes for you to actually talk to other people? Boredom?" He paused. "Now that I say it out loud it both sounds stupid and makes a lot of sense¡­"


    Lori gave him a look. "Why would I need to talk to anyone?"


    Rian stared at her, then sighed. "Are you seriously telling me you two played a game together without even talking about playing a game together?"


    "I was just waiting for everyone else to arrive, Lord Rian," Mikon said with a smile, "and trying to remember what you told me about how to play sunk."


    Rian looked up at the ceiling for some reason. "Ugh, whatever. Lori''s interacting with another human being. I''ll count that as a net positive in the grand scheme of things. Keep at it for as long as she lets you, I suppose."


    "That''s up to her, isn''t it?" Mikon said.


    Lori responded by reaching forward and making her opening move. Mikon moved in kind.


    "I''ll¡­ go get dinner," Rian said, still looking confused as he headed towards the line for the food.


    That night, Lori won four games in five. Her one loss was a test to see if Mikon was actually trying to win.


    It was a good night.

 97 - Fulfilled Obligations and Bedroom Hygiene

    "And done!" Rian declared, giving the waterwheel an experimental turn. It moved MUCH more smoothly than it had before in her demesne when they''d been testing it, thanks to the rendered seel fat they''d added to the bearings as lubrication. "It''s all yours now, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded as she finished filling the water trough under the wheel. Rather than just an open trough, it has a small partition in the middle, dividing the water into two areas. When filled, the water was essentially ring-shaped, with an amount of water at the bottom, the partition right under the water wheel that was open on either end, and then the water at the top, into which the water-wheel was partially submerged.


    Lori took the bowl of bloody water that Binder Shanalorre had returned to her, untouched and still imbued heavily and connected to herself, and poured it into the water already in the trough. She touched the metal-capped end of her staff into the water, the metal conducting her will, and between that and the bloody water, she began binding waterwisps, still imbued and claimed by her. Slowly at first, then with increasing speed, the water began to flow under the waterwheel, pushing against the paddles submerged in the water. the wheel began to turn, and the fan with it. A leather hood secured around the curving, bent wood around the fan funneled the air it was blowing into the mine''s ventilation tubes.


    "It appears to be working, " Binder Shanalorre commented.


    "It will take some time to get up to speed," Lori commented. From the mine entrance, she could hear sounds of pickaxes and shovels as her people dug into the stone of the hill. "The water will push against the water wheel, flow down, over, and up again, in a constant flowing stream. With the thick rock, we shouldn''t have to worry about erosion for some time, though you might need to add more water. You see that mark?"


    "The one you''re pointing at?" Shanalorre said blandly.


    "The water needs to be at that level for optimum flow," Lori said. "Have someone check every so often and add more water as needed. As long as there''s water, the wheel will turn, and so will the fan. In the meantime, try to keep it covered to prevent dust, bug droppings and other things from getting into the water."


    Shanalorre nodded. "And this mechanism will simply move constantly?"


    "Yes. So do not try to stop it, alter it, or do anything except occasionally add water or rendered fat to the ball bearing for lubrication. Most especially, do NOT try to stop it so you can connect it to a lathe, mill, or whatever else. You have a perfectly good river right there," Lori pointed downhill. "The gear ratio has been calculated to operate the fan and the fan only. Any additional load on the waterwheel would be detrimental."


    Shanalorre looked at the fan. "It''s already spinning fairly fast."


    "That current rate of rotation is not nearly enough for all the air my miners need," Lori corrected. "The water wheel is still getting up to speed."


    Shanalorre nodded slowly. "I see. I will have my people find something to cover the trough then."


    "And we are going back home," Lori said. She could feel her connection to the waterwisps¡ªor at least the ones from her blood¡ªshe had bound to maintain the constant cyclical flow of water that pushed the waterwheel. The effort to imbue them without using her staff as a conduit was marginally more difficult than doing it normally, but she knew that would even out in time. And if it didn''t, she''d give Rian some of her blood to pour in when he came with the next batch of miners! "Come on Rian, Tackir, get everything and start packing up the boat."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said, helping Tackir with the tools he''d brought and the jar with the lubricant. It turned out the man had needed to get a quick adjustment to the protective shroud of the fan to keep the leather hood from slipping off constantly. Her lord glanced up at the sun. "You know, if we hurry, we might be able to have lunch in our own demesne."


    Lori glanced up to herself, noting the angle of the sun. Huh, Rian was right. At worst, they''d arrive a little after lunch was finished, which meant she''d still have most of the afternoon.


    "Our business is done here, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said, nodding to the other Binder. "Rian will be coming at the end of the week to cycle in the next batch of miners."


    "I will see you then, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said, returning her nod.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The days leading up to exchanging the next batch of miners were oddly relaxing to Lori. There was no need to rush¡ªbeyond the usual preparations for winter and unexpected dragons¡ªand Lori was able to slip into a routine. Between curing wood, heating the pottery kiln to bake the clay pieces that had been finished¡ªthere were plates and platters now¡ªchecking on the binding of waterwisps in River''s Fork, and finishing the alcoves on the second floor, she was able to relax and just be for a while.


    That said, there was still specific work she needed to do. She had to make more showers, for one thing, since Rian had pointed out the crowding in the current bath houses. And now that she had proven it effective, she had added blood to the bound wisps in the water jet of Lori''s Boat meaning she no longer had to accompany it on trips out of the demesne. They just left it running. While this was convenient for her, it also required her to find a way to stop the boat while the water jet was still running. This had led to flaps that could be lowered into the water to act as a brake and a mechanism that would let them raise the whole water jet assembly in and out of the water so that it would stop having anything to push against. This took some doing, since they had to mount it on Lori''s Boat without using nails or otherwise cutting into the hull, since they wouldn''t be able to repair it to the same quality.


    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    "So your solution was to extend the boat?" Lori said as they waited for dinner. She reached over and made her next move. The game was almost finished. There were few stones left.


    Rian shrugged. "I figured if we couldn''t risk damaging the hull, then add something to the hull that we could risk. The joins are surprisingly tight as is, they almost didn''t need the bugwax. The extension fits around the back and side of the boat and locked in place with this sort of hook and wooden pins you push down on to squeeze the boat and the new part together. The new part is where we anchor the swing arm that will raise and lower the water jet out of the water."


    "I''ll look at it later," Lori said.


    "Please," Rian said. "We''ll need to test how well it can take the strain of the water jet, how it affects steering, and whether we can use it to get the water jet out of the water. Besides, you''re the only one who can take off the water jet from the boat. Tomorrow, please?"


    "Fine, fine," Lori said. She made her move and claimed her victory. Her opponent immediately began resetting the board.


    "You know, you two are creepy when you play like that," Rian said. "Seriously, do neither of you talk to each other at all?"


    Lori gave him a bland look. "Why would talking be needed?" Mikon finished resetting the board. Once more, the pink-haired weaver made the first move. While Lori disliked not moving first, that also meant she hadn''t lost the last game. "Besides, I''m talking to you. How soon before the houses are finished?"


    "We''ve got some people moving in already." Rian said. "So you''ll soon be able to get started on¡­ um¡­"


    "Yes. Um," Lori said, responding to Mikon''s move. "Please tell the carpenters we''ll need doors. And feel free to tell them what the doors are needed for, so they can be motivated."


    "I''m sure it will be very motivating," Rian said, not seeming to notice the blush on the women sitting next to him. "Hopefully after that we can focus on building a boat to go to Covehold. The boat will need to be specifically designed to have a water jet built into it, rather than as an external attachment."


    "I will be the first to admit I have no idea how to build a boat," Lori said as Mikon considered the board. "Never worked in the industry."


    "That''s fine, most of us have no idea what to do either."


    "Most?"


    "One of the carpenters once helped the late Binder Koshay shape the boat we have now," Rian said as Mikon finally made a move. "A good thing too, or else its hull might not have been so thick. He wanted to make it thinner and just use magic to reinforce it or something."


    Lori kept herself from looking up at the ceiling, now reinforced by pillars. "How unsafe," she said, reaching towards the board, hesitated, then made a different move as she realized the previous one would have given Mikon an advantage. "Then after that comes the third bath house. I suppose for the sake of fairness, I should make it as dark, cramped, and utilitarian as the previous two."


    "Please don''t. Please, I''m begging you." A thought seemed to occur to him. "When are you going to rebuild the baths in the Dungeon? You know, for when dragons come. It got pretty desperate here last time."


    Lori grimaced. "I supposed I''ll have to," she said. "And a new water reservoir, come to think of it. I should probably do that before the bath house."


    "Eh, knowing you, it won''t take that long," Rian said. "You''re finally finished with the second floor, right?"


    Lori nodded. "I think the carpenters can set up shop on the far end so they don''t get in the way of the ropers. There''s plenty of clear space among the pillars to lay things out. They just need to remember that water won''t conveniently drain away." A thought occurred to her. "Do we have brooms?"


    "A few," Rian confirmed. "They use beast feather shafts as bristles, since we have a lot of those right now. A bit stiff and scratchy, but they work. You need one?"


    Lori shook her head. "Just wondering." She used blasts of air to clean her room as needed.


    Umu tapped Rian on the shoulder. He gave her a curious look.


    "The food''s ready, Lord Rian," she said, pointing towards the kitchen.


    He blinked, then glanced that way. "Ah, thanks Umu." He glanced at Lori. "Should I¡­?"


    "Yes, you should," Lori said blandly.


    As Rian and the other two women stood to join the line for food, Mikon glanced up, looking towards the kitchen, then at Lori, then at the board. Lori waved her off, and the weaver stood up, heading towards the kitchen with the others.


    Now alone at the table, Lori stretched her arms upwards, and sighed in contentment. She wasn''t quite sure what the weaver was doing with this, but it was nice to play with someone besides Rian, so she was willing to allow it. Though if Mikon thought this would grant her any special favors, she was sadly mistaken.


    When Rian came back with her food, she greeted him with, "Rian, when the second shelter has been converted to um, we''re going to need people to clean the rooms regularly."


    He looked at her blankly, before his eyes went wide, and a slightly sickened expression came over his face as she took one of the bowls and began eating. "Oh right. It''s going to need that, isn''t it?"


    "It will be necessary for health reasons," Lori said. "Unless you have a better idea?"


    "Make them shower rooms instead of bedrooms?" Rian said. "That way, they''ll have soap."


    Lori stared at him as Umu, Mikon, and Riz looked away with blushing faces and raised eyebrows. "My mothers warned me about the minds of men."


    "You asked!" Rian protested, blushing himself.


    "And how quickly you answered was disturbing. Still, it does seem like a sound suggestion¡­"


    "Or we could just have it cleaned twice a week." Rian paused thoughtfully. "Three times a week."


    "Will you be able to find enough people to clean it that regularly?" Lori said, half-wondering if any of the three women would volunteer.


    Umu half-heartedly opened her mouth. Mikon reached behind Rian and put a finger over the other weaver''s lips, shaking her head. Umu closed her mouth and nodded, giving Lori''s current sunk opponent a grudgingly grateful look.


    Rian noticed none of this. "Oh, I''m sure the people who''ve made enthusiastic use of the facilities would be very happy to keep them maintained, especially if they ever want to use them again," he said, voice bright, cheerful, and vaguely vengeful at those hypothetical people.


    Lori couldn''t help it. She chuckled. "I''ll leave that to you then. And feel free to excuse yourself from the cleaning duties should you ever find yourself using the um. A lord should have some privileges, after all."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "That''s probably never going to happen, but thanks. Will all lords get this privilege, or am I just special?"


    "I''ll tell you as soon as I make more," Lori said blandly. "Eat your dinner."

 98 - Miners Home Again

    It was with a happy heart that Lori watched Lori''s Boat, full of¡­ well, full of part of the next batch over miners who''d be mining in River''s Fork for the week moving downriver. The rest were still packing, doing last-minute laundry, or were making themselves useful by watching the children and making sure they didn''t get hurt or anything. They''d be ready to go once Rian came back.


    The new mounting for the water jet had been finished yesterday, and had undergone testing in the water. The swinging arm was able to smoothly lift the water jet to essentially deactivate it. The bone tube she had made was now encased in a hollowed out log for protection, structural integrity, more secure mounting, and to keep the binding from damaging the tube by trying to siphon off the waterwisps absorbed into its structure.


    Rian had wanted to somehow combine the water jet and the tiller so that turning would have the full power of the water jet''s thrust behind it, but they had not had the time to properly build the sort of mounting such an idea would require in the time they''d had. Still, it seemed a promising idea for the ship they would eventually come to build. The sudden panicked look that had flooded across Rian''s face when she''d reminded him to compensate the carpenters for the extra work had also been entertaining.


    The water jet didn''t feel separate yet, not like the water in the trough of the water wheel, since it was still in her demesne. That would only happen when the boat actually left her demesne''s confines. But she''d done the experiment to see if the connection would still occur if the binding and bloody water were in the process of leaving her demesne, and so she wasn''t worried. As to the water in the trough¡­ well, she''d managed to imbue it at a distance, and it wasn''t any more distracting than doing so for any of the other bindings currently active in her demesne. Even the sense of strain at having to imbue into something separate from herself, not touching, was easy to get used to.


    She was also finding herself inspired. What other things could she do with this new method? New to her, at least. After all, this method and its derivatives had been something she had been strongly cautioned not to use when she''d merely been a Whisperer. Blood was an extremely minor loss to pay for extracting useable internal waterwisps, after all. And yes, internal darkwisps was no loss at all, since there was no consequence to losing some inhabiting her stomach, lungs and her body''s few other internal cavities. Loss of lightwisps would lead to blindness, and while that was relatively benign, the fact one had to use one''s EYE to claim and bind lightwisps meant one risked rather more physical blindness since you''d have objects near your eye. Not to mention an instinctive desire to see would make one pull the lightwisps back in place anyway. But losing firewisps meant loss of body heat, which WAS deadly. Lightningwisps would lead to dangerous numbness and potential loss of function of bodily organs. Removing airwisps would lead to collapsed lungs as the lungs were never truly empty of air. And earthwisps were channeled through teeth and bone, not something she wished to lose. Nails, despite being used to channel them, had very little actual affinity for earthwisps, and were much more ephemeral than blood, as body parts went.


    However, now that she was a Dungeon Binder, the loss of any of those internal wisps, with the exception of bone (and only until she learned the Deadspeaking needed to safely extract parts of and regenerate her bones), was much less fraught. She''s used her body''s lightningwisps to defend herself, after all, and the resulting numbness had been a momentary thing with the power of the core renewing her. Lori didn''t dare experiment with firewisps, but lightning- and lightwisps seemed safe enough for now.


    That was more than enough.


    And there were other experiments she needed to try. Previously, she had wondered if she could keep a binding constantly imbued by connecting it to her core by a length of wire. Now, however, that idea had taken on a new logical conclusion she would need to test¡­


    As soon as Rian got back with the boat.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The second level was growing lively. In one alcove, tucked into the corner where it would be out of the way in the event of sudden evacuation, sat the stone pots containing seeds that Rian had wanted to try growing underground, the lightwisps above them shining bright in imitation of sunlight, lacking only heat. The soil in the pots, a mixture of dirt, rotting leaves and some wood chips, was moist, the water smelling slightly of the retting tanks. Among the alcoves they had claimed, several women were weaving with impressively quick and skillful movements, the array of strands in front of them slowly turning into a light off-brown fabric of some kind. Umu and Mikon, with no Rian to distract them, were weaving skillfully, hands moving with practiced ease on their frames. In one corner, several women and a few children were taking ropeweed fibers and spinning them into thread using¡­ sticks? It looked like sticks, anyway. Different kinds of sticks, certainly. Three were using a small devices with a wheel on it. It didn''t look like the spinning wheels she''d seen in theaters, but that''s what it probably was.


    She was amused to note some children were playing lima with their feet, entrapped pieces being left where they were due to the difficulty of picking them up with their toes.


    The ropers had claimed a literal corner since they apparently needed room for making rope. Like textiles, ropemaking wasn''t an industry Lori was familiar with. The few listings for it she remembered had been looking for Deadspeakers. Seeing how the ropes were made, Lori could guess that the Deadspeakers were for fusing the fibers together to prevent unravelling. Like the weavers, they too had more people, mostly young boys, who were spinning fibers together.


    Lori made a note to make the¡­ spinners? To make the spinners into one group, irrespective of whether their finished product was to be used by weavers or ropers. She''d have to have Rian check, but this was starting to seem like a petty rivalry in progress.


    The carpenters had occupied alcoves in the middle of the room, and while their area was the most messy¡ªthere was sawdust everywhere¡ªthe work there was clearly organized and neat. The wheels on the lathe had been removed in favor of permanently securing it to the ground, and additional reinforcing had been added to be able to support a large stone flywheel, both done with her assistance. If she understood correctly, it was currently at work to make the pieces for a second, larger lathe. Some were making small wheels, probably for spinning thread. Those not engaged in that, she was amused to note, were making doors and wooden locks.


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    Thankfully, no one was complaining about the noise all this was producing.


    This sudden influx of people was why she was adjusting the bindings on the airwisps that functioned as ventilation for the level. While the bindings were doing their job in making sure the air was kept fresh, the pressure caused by all the air coming in through one end of the level and all going out the other end create something of a constant breeze. While the ropers didn''t mind¡ªthey said it was refreshing¡ªthe breeze tended to send unattended raw ropeweed fibers flying. That had just barely been an issue, and had resulted in the older women chiding the younger to secure their raw materials better. With the addition of the carpenters, however¡­ While she''d never seen one herself, she''d heard about sawdust explosions. Also, she didn''t want any of the stuff to get into the kitchen and the food, or worse, into her room.


    Fortunately, it didn''t take long. Lori merely had to reduce the intensity that the air was being draw in. She also stole an idea from River''s Fork and made stone tubes imbedded into the ceiling that both pulled in and drew out air, reducing the tendency for all the air to move in a single direction and therefore create a constant breeze. This made the currents of air in the second level completely random and unpredictable, but it kept the sawdust from spreading, and that was what counted.


    By the time she was done, Rian had come back with the first batch of returning miners.


    She watched from beside the dungeon''s entrance, shaking her head as Lori''s Boat approached the beach where it usually landed. Lori made a note about building a proper dock as the new pivoting mount lifted the water jet into the air. The outflow end sputtered, spitting out water, until it was empty of all but the water that was part of the binding of waterwisps embedded into the bone. Even so, Lori knew, occasionally a few drops of water, drawn from the vapor in the air and condensed by the binding, would be spat out the end at great speed.


    There was a crowd gathered at the water''s edge, and for some reason many people were cheering and crying as part of the first group of miners came down. Really, they''d only been gone a week, why were people making such a big deal about it? There was work not being done.


    Still, she better make sure.


    Sighing, and adjusting her hat, she headed down for the beach, planning to talk to Rian. Fortunately, he managed to see her coming, getting off the boat and stepping to the side so that she wouldn''t need to try pushing through the crowd, though he had to splash through water to do it.


    "You''re getting careless with your clothes now that you have someone else laundering them for you," she said as she drew close.


    That got a wince, and he looked at his trousers, soaked almost to the knee, a guilty expression on his face. "Yeah, that''s a bad habit I''m getting into," he sighed. "I''ll have to apologize."


    "You could offer to return the favor," Lori said blandly. "I''m sure she''d greatly appreciate you washing her underwear."


    "Only if she wants them ruined," Rian said. "I don''t know how to do laundry."


    Lori had a reply ready, but stopped herself. No, poking at him at his inability to recognize when a woman was lewdly flirting with him would have to wait. She had duties. "Was anyone injured in River''s Fork?"


    Rian shook his head. "I had Pellee keeping an eye on everyone. The closest thing to a serious injury was someone tripping and bruising their knee, and apparently Binder Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    "Why I can I call you Lori but I can''t call her Shana?" Rian said, giving her a look that implied she was being strange. "That sounds really backward."


    "I have people call me Lori because I know most people mispronounce my full name atrociously, and I''d rather not have reason to cringe every time my name is called. I''d rather you not make the mistake of getting into the habit of referring to her disrespectfully. She might take offense and have you killed."


    "¡­ fine, sure, let''s go with that," Rian eventually sighed. "But picking up from where I left off, she was there and she healed him. I''m told they also got pretty good food with lots of bread to help keep their energy up for mining, so at the moment we don''t have to worry about our people being worked to death with insufficient nutrition. I''m pretty sure a bunch smuggled some bread in their packs, though I''m not sure they''d be worth eating, buried in sweaty clothes."


    "Tell them to bake it again," she said. "It should be enough to purge anything clinging to it, though I doubt it will make it more edible." She frowned thoughtfully. "Do you think the generally favorable conditions will make them willing to do two-week shifts? Because if we have to face this sort of pointless drop in productivity every week¡­"


    "They just missed their family, and their family missed them," Rian said. "After all, they haven''t seen each other in a week. It''s understandable."


    "I disagree," Lori said. She hadn''t seen her parents in months and knew she wouldn''t react like this if they just happened to show up. Quite the opposite. "Load up the boat and come back quickly. I have a test I need to do."


    Rian''s eyes widened eagerly. "Oh, sounds fun. Same place as last time?"


    Lori nodded.


    "I''ll try to get back by lunch or so, then," he said.


    Nod again. Then she remembered what she''d been about to say. "If you truly feel guilty about taking advantage of someone washing your clothes, perhaps you could learn to wash your own clothes. I did, after all."


    He blinked in confusion for a moment at the sudden shift in conversation before seeming to recall. "So, are you offering to teach me?"


    "No," she said bluntly. "However, we have a laundry area full of women you can ask. Why don''t you start there?"


    He looked at the indicated place warily. Sure enough there were people there doing laundry, and someone was stringing up a new drying line. They were running out of places to hang those up. She might have to make more. "I wouldn''t want to bother anyone¡­"


    "As opposed to bothering someone by having them wash your clothes for you?"


    He considered that, then sighed. "You''re right, I suppose."


    Of course she was.


    "Of course I am," she said. "Now get moving, we still have that experiment to do."


    It took much more time than she would have liked to get people dispersed and the remainder of the next batch of miners loaded onto Lori''s Boat¡ªby which she meant it took time at all¡ªbut soon she was watching her boat moving downstream again, loaded with more workers clutching packs of spare clothes and bedrolls.


    She wondered if they would be able to wash their clothes, or would just need to wear them out over the week?


    Perhaps she should have Rian bring it up with Shanalorre¡­


    Shrugging, she went to gather the things she needed for her experiment.

 99 - Blood, Wire and Water

    It was lunch and Rian still wasn''t back.


    Lori grimaced as she made her move on the sunk board impatiently, trying to ignore the smell of the stew her opponent was eating. Without Rian, the three weren''t sitting so closely together anymore. In fact, Umu and Riz were literally sitting at opposite ends of the table.


    Fortunately, no one thought this meant they could just sit next to them. The relative silence around Lori was kept.


    ¡­


    Maybe she needed a smaller table? Come to think of it, a table meant for twelve only being used by five people was a bit excessive. Not to mention the benches. Maybe she should just start eating in her room¡­ or just make a personal nook for herself. She''d always wanted one of those, why hadn''t she made one yet?


    Oh, right. No books, so she''d have nothing to read besides stone tablets, inventory lists and reports. Yes, best not to torture herself with a private nook without books to read.


    Lori repressed a sigh as Mikon finished making her move, and replied with her own. While she was hardly hungry, the smells of the food were getting to her. How had she never noticed how good the food smelled?


    She had never been more glad to see Rian walk into the Dungeon.


    <hr>


    After a quick and filling meal¡ª"I really have to worry about how you''d feed yourself if I wasn''t here."¡ªit was her turn to ride on the boat named after her and head back to where she''d done her experiments a few days ago.


    To her surprise, the little protective dome was still there, though now covered by a much thicker layer of Iridescence. The ropeweed she''d cut were also starting to grow small shoots, though it was unlikely they''d be back to the same height as before any time soon.


    "So, what are we going to do today, your Bindership?" Rian said after she''d sent another flood to scare off any beasts nearby¡ªthankfully there didn''t seem to be any¡ªand beached the boat.


    "A brief experiment," Lori said, putting her padded box on the same finger of stone as last time. She looked over the contents, double checking everything, and nodded. "Or test, rather." She drew out the brass syringe, and couldn''t help smirking a little at the look of combined disgust and wariness Rian made. "Rian, it''s not going to spontaneously leap at you and try to draw your blood."


    "That''s just what it wants you to think," he said grimly, somehow able to keep a perfectly straight face at the absurd statement. "Just you wait. As soon as your guard is down, it will turn against you and poke!"


    It was clear her lord had some sort of disturbed and irrational fear of syringes.


    "Grow up," she told him sternly as she continued to unpack the box. Bowls and a length of gold not quite narrow enough to be wire that she''d compressed and pulled using rocks and earthwisps to get it the right length.


    "You''re telling me to grow up¡­?" Rian said, sounding incredulous. Had he not heard himself just now, talking about syringes like they were alive and murderous?


    Best to just show him an example of what a proper grown up should act like.


    "All right," Lori said as the syringe finished boiling. "Pay attention. Today I''ll be testing if fresh blood can imbue waterwisps through a conductive connection." She held up the gold for emphasis. "This is gold, whose conductive properties are exceeded only by platin. I''ll be using this as a ''best case'' conductive material in the test. "


    Rian made a note. "So, we''re working with waterwisps again? How is this going to work?"


    "As simply as possible," Lori said as she waited for the syringe to cool enough to not burn her on contact. "I will take two glass bowls, fill it with water not taken from the confines of my demesne, place the gold so that one end is submerged in each bowl, put blood on one, claim, bind and imbue the water in that bowl, then attempt to connect to the water in the other using the gold."


    Technically, she knew it could be done. Claimed wisps could be used to claim similar adjacent unclaimed wisps. Whisperers could use conductive metals to claim, bind and imbue wisps not directly in contact with their bodies. If the blood, or at least the waterwisps with affinity for her in the blood, could be used to act as her body, theoretically it could also claim, bind and imbue through a conductive metal.


    However, this fell under the purview of ''something she''d never done before'', because she had been cautioned not to do it when she''d been taught. It had just been something too dangerous to do in principle and therefore the logical extensions of it had been unnecessary. However, circumstances had changed now¡­


    She handed Rian the bowls. "Go get water so you don''t need to see me draw blood."


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    It didn''t help. Rian still flinched and started twitching when he saw the syringe. Thankfully, he didn''t drop the bowls. Lori flattened the top of the dome to lay the bowls on, put in the gold to connect the two, and then added the blood.


    Lori then sat down inside her demesne, and began to process of claiming, binding and imbuing the bloody water. Then the real test began.


    At first, she tried to do it the way she would have if she''d been holding her staff: taking in magic into herself, then sending it coursing through her veins to align it with water before letting that magic conduct through the wire under her hand, wrapped aound her staff, and into the waterwisps she wanted to bind and imbue. This initially ended in failure, as the magic reached the water wisps and just¡­ stopped, being taken in and imbuing the wisps without passing through the gold to the other bowl.


    However, when she thought to physically bind what waterwisps from her blood that she could to the gold, that worked much better. While the magic still partially diffused directly to the waterwisps, some were able to trickle though the gold into the next bowl.


    "Rian, make a note," she said, and Rian dutifully grabbed his plank and charred wood. "Conduction works, but requires the blood to be directly on the gold, or other metal being used, I assume."


    "Well¡­" Rian mused, "that¡­ makes sense? I mean, if we go with the premise that that blood is ''your body'', then of course it needs to be touching the gold. Unless you can stick your hand in water, then use that contact to reach through a wire you''re not touching to claim another bit of water the wire is touching¡­"


    "A good point," Lori said with a nod, reaching for the syringe. "Perhaps we should test what happens when the blood is directly on the gold."


    "Boil it first, it''s been lying out in the air!" Rian cried shrilly.


    A quick boil later¡ªdustlife was potentially dangerous unless one was a Deadspeaker, in which case you laughed at its feeble attempts to dictate terms to you¡ªand there was a new drop of blood applied directly onto the gold. That was more fruitful, and once Lori had properly bound the waterwisps to stay cohesive and bound to the gold, submerging the blood in water allowed it to both claim and imbue the water and reach through the wire into the other bowl.


    "I suppose the trick is not letting the magic pass through a ''non-body'' wisp before it reaches the gold," Rian mused, making a note. "If it does, it just gets sucked up¡­ what now? Are you going to test if you can use blood to control other kinds of wisps?"


    That¡­ was a thought that hadn''t occurred to her. after all, using the metal as a conductor, it allowed for contact with substances besides water¡­ She closed her eyes and tried to reach for the blood, tried to identify other wisps¡­


    She shook her head. "Unfortunately, a drop of blood contains too little of anything besides waterwisps to be useful, and it seems exposure outside of the vein has allowed the other wisps to disperse. While it might be possible with more blood¡­ it would likely need to be specially prepared or directly claimed and imbued while in the vein." She gave her lord a flat look. "I''m reluctant to try right now, as I doubt that would be a safe amount of blood to lose."


    Rian nodded. "Yeah, that sounds smart. And probably explains why you were still discouraged from doing this with your blood in school, even if we''ve proven it''s relatively safe. The amount you''d need to be able to do more than just water might be too dangerous. Still, this is good news! We''ve found a way to turn off the waterjet!"


    Lori blinked. "What?"


    "You''ve been imbuing the water directly by adding your blood to it, right?" Rian said. "With this, you can keep your blood separate from the water in a gold container, and we can just connect to it the water jet with a wire aaaand you''re shaking your head no, why won''t this work?"


    "That will only work when I am actively imbuing through the blood and from there through the wire," Lori said. "The waterjet doesn''t need a constant imbuement of magic, it can hold all the magic it needs already. Separating the blood from the waterjet would not affect the waterjet''s output, only my ability to imbue it or alter the binding while absent."


    Rian slumped. "Oh¡­" He sighed. "And it was looking so good too¡­"


    "I don''t doubt such a thing is possible," Lori said. "That''s how bound tools work, after all, with a bead mounted as a power source and a controllable connection using conductive metal to activate when and how strongly the tool draws magic to perform its function." She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "In fact, I see no reason why I can''t use this principle to use blood to replace beads in a bound tool, as long as I''m paying attention to the tool in question¡­"


    "So, we can possibly use bound tools without using up money, which is good since you haven''t worked out how to make money yet," Rian said blandly, "except we have no bound tools, and you don''t know how to make them yet either, and even if you did, you don''t have the supplies for it."


    "Succinctly accurate," Lori said.


    "So, while it''s useful, it''s not useful now," Rian sighed.


    "Don''t be a fool," Lori said. "More than you are already, I mean. Why would I want to test this if there wasn''t a use for it? Scholarly curiosity?"


    "I''d love to hear the reason, it would be nice news," Rian said.


    "This means I can redesign the water jet to be more efficient," Lori said. "It also means that I have a means of powering a small cold storage device on the planned boat that doesn''t require adding my blood to water to create ice, which I agree is disgusting to consider when it will be used to store food."


    Rian suddenly stood very, very straight. "Lori¡­" he said, his eyes wide, and just the slightest bit¡­ unhinged. "I know how we can build our boat. I know how we can make it as big as we need. I know how we can get it the shape we need. I know how we can integrate the water jets. And I know how we can do it when we have absolutely no experience with shipbuilding."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Do you now?" she said.


    Rian nodded, his gaze distant, as if seeing something only he could. "Lori¡­ ice floats."


    "Yes, Rian, ice floats, because it''s lighter than water of the same volume." Her tone was one for talking to annoying children and classmates who needed to get to the point before she walked away.


    "Ice floats¡­ and you can make it! Shape it, like you do rock! Keep it cold no matter how hot it gets!"


    Lori blinked. Her eyes widened.


    And suddenly she could see what Rian could.


    She''d had always thought Rian was too theatrical in his speech and manner. This time, however, she thought it completely appropriate as he yelled out what they had both realized, pointing dramatically into the air, "We can build a boat out of ice!"

 100 - Ice Boats and Housewarming

    "It doesn''t need to be completely ice! We make a wooden skeleton that the ice can wrap around for structural integrity!"


    "What about impacts? Damage?"


    "Wooden boards mounted on the outside! It doesn''t matter if they crack as long as they protect the ice underneath!"


    "People will slip."


    "Rocks or boards for decking! The ice can be underneath, they never need to touch it."


    "It will be cold."


    "Then we insulate the insides and build fires! It doesn''t matter how hot they make the inside of the boat, the ice won''t melt since your magic will be keeping it together!"


    Lori resolutely tried to keep herself from becoming enthusiastic about this insane idea as they rode Lori''s Boat back to the center of Lori''s demesne, but it was becoming very hard when Rian kept countering her objections, sometimes even as she managed to think of an answer for herself. Indeed, the more it sat on her mind, the more plausible, convenient and easy it sounded¡­


    There had to be some horrible downside. Besides the obvious, that is. After all, there was probably some very good reason why boats aren''t all made of ice with wooden planking over it! Maintenance, for example. Why, it would take a whole team of Whisperers taking shifts at all hours to keep the thing from melting! Or a prohibitively expensive amount of wisp beads!


    Not that they were going to use wisp beads¡­ and they didn''t need a team of whisperers, since the plan as Rian had been babbling about it would only need her blood mixed into the ice to constantly imbue a binding that would keep the water of the ice frozen solid and unmelting¡­


    No! Don''t get drawn in by the colorbrained idea! Downsides! There had to be downsides! Or else more people would be doing this! And she would definitely have remembered boats made of ice bound to stay solid against heat!


    "Talk to the carpenters about this," she said. "Surely it''s detrimental for wood to be soaked in water or ice like that for long periods of time."


    "It won''t matter, the ice will¡ª"


    "Find out!" she snapped. "And calm down. Valid idea or not, you''re too excited to think about this rationally. Sit down, make some drawings about how it will be done, show it to the carpenters and other men who know about things like the sorts of load wood can take, and then get back to me. I don''t want to hear about this until the houses are finished and people have started living in them, is that understood?"


    Rian sighed, as if this was some great difficulty for him. "Yes, your Bindership," he said.


    Good.


    "Good," Lori said, nodding decisively. "The idea is not without merit¡ªI''m still talking¡ªbut it''s best we don''t come to obsess over the idea. Do something constructive first, like find out how deep the river is or if there are any rapids to overcome."


    "Oh, I found out about that as soon as we met with the River''s Fork people," Rian said. "They came up by the river from the sea, since they got lucky and found a hidden bay. The only reason they didn''t claim the bay itself was that it was too visible from the ocean if they''d made a demesne there, and they wanted time to grow first. And since they didn''t have a Whisperer at the time, a more reliable source of fresh water. From what I heard, we could go all the way down to the sea, and then turn and head for Covehold."


    "Well, then, design a better way to steer," she said, exasperated. "Somehow I doubt a rudder like that," she gestured at the wooden board with a handle Rian was holding, "would be able to properly control a larger boat."


    He sighed again. "Yes, your Bindership." A beat. "Can I pick the name of the boat, this time? It''s not like you can just call it ''Lori''s Boat''. Then we''d have two, and that would be confusing!"


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, at breakfast, Lori looked blearily at Rian, shook her head as if that would help, slapped her cheek gently to make sure she was awake, then gave him a bland look. "Repeat that, so I know I heard you correctly."


    "The houses were finished yesterday," Rian said cheerfully. "So people are planning to spend today moving their things from the second shelter, and apparently it''s traditional to have a party and invite all your neighbors when you first move into a new house. It''s supposed to be good luck. Though I think there''s an element of celebrating the fact that this means you''ll get started on turning the second shelter into an¡­ um¡­"


    "I get the idea," Lori said. On either side of Rian, Umu, Mikon and Riz were studiously not meeting anyone''s gaze.


    "People are really looking forward to it?" Rian said, looking mildly embarrassed. The three next to him all reluctantly nodded, seeming equally embarrassed. "We might have to impose a time limit, lest people just stay in there all day."


    "Have you handled the details of the cleaning duties for it yet?" Lori said.


    "I''ve made it known that it will be on a ''you use it, you''ll help clean it'' basis," Rian said. "People seemed agreeable to the arrangement, so I doubt we''ll lack for users, and therefore cleaners. Especially since we''ll be keeping records of who goes in. I think we might have to ask the medics to take charge of the place. They''re used to writing, they can handle any¡­ accidents of over-excitement, and they''d probably be used to most of the human body to be able to act rationally in the event of some sort of accident or something."


    Lori sighed. "I''ll handle that tomorrow. What you were you saying about a party?"


    "Ah, people are petitioning to have an outdoor party, similar to what we had during the holiday," Rian said. "They also want to move the tables and benches in front of the new houses for the duration so they have someplace to put the food, as well as go out and hunt beast meat for it, then serve it roasted. They''ve even volunteered to hunt some big seels for it themselves." He got a bemused look on his face. "They actually asked Karina for permission to do that, and she said she was fine with it as long as they got your permission and she can join in. I think she really wants to bring down one of the big seels by herself. She has not-that-subtly been asking if she could get a spear."


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    "Is she likely to use it on someone?" Lori said.


    "No, she''s not that kind of girl. I think she''s just realized merely pointy sticks might not go through adult seels very well."


    "Then she can get a spear so she can she join in."


    "I¡­ don''t think we have one in her size."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Then I''ll make a spearhead, and someone can help her put it on her backup seeling rod, it should probably be cured enough." She thought about it. "Riz, you do it."


    "Me, Great Binder?" the woman said, surprised at being talked to. At least she didn''t stutter nervously this time.


    "I assume you know how to put a head on a spear, having been militia?" Lori said.


    "Yes, Great Binder¡­?"


    "Good. Help Karina with that, she needs experience killing the big ones," Lori frowned. "Keep her from drowning. And if your mothers make a big deal of why you''re not helping move, tell them you''re on seel duty and I said so."


    "I have¡­ yes, Great Binder," Riz said before Lori had to hear unwanted details about her family life.


    "And they may have their party," Lori said. "But there will be no more parties, or excuses to have them, for the next month. Storm month, not blue month. If they want to celebrate anything, they do it at meal times, as long as it doesn''t interfere with work."


    "No partying for the next 36 days, got it," Rian said, nodding.


    "Thirty-seven," Lori said.


    "You''re rounding up? That''s cruel."


    "Do we have enough food for winter?"


    "No partying for the next month, storm month, got it."


    Lori nodded. "Now, where''s breakfast?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Calling it a ''party'' was adequate but lacking. They called it a housewarming. She supposed warmth was an important consideration where they came from. Apparently, northern custom¡ªor at least the custom of the demesne they were from, she''d forgotten the name as irrelevant¡ªwas that a new home must have all doors and windows opened and for as many people as possible to come inside and see as much of it as possible. This was meant to allow people''s good luck, warmth and happiness to be shared by the new home so that it would be better able to shelter the family who would now be living there.


    Wizards of any stripe are said to bring extra blessings when they warmed a house with their presence: Whisperers would let the home be warmer in cold times, Deadspeakers would prevent anyone from becoming sick, Horotracts would allow the house to always fit the family inside it, and Mentalists would allow anyone who lived there to always remember the way home (from the tavern, was the unsaid rider). The food was meant to be a repayment for things visitors shared with the new home, so that they would not be lessened by bestowing their gifts.


    Obscure tradition said a Dungeon Binder visiting meant that a wizard would be born to those in the house. It did not specify if they granted all the other blessings as well. A cynical part of Lori wondered how intimately the Dungeon Binders of old that had started this tradition had come to know the house''s residents.


    Still, she went inside and toured the various houses. While she''d built the walls and floor, and had come in when the doors and initial beams for the roof had been fitted so that the stone would flow and hold them in place, that had been very early in the process.


    The variety of ways the insides had changed were therefore very surprising. There were folding tables, folding bunks, elevated sleeping areas along the walls, second floors (in one case even a third floor, though you could only crawl there instead of standing), ladder-like stairs, and at least two rooftop decks. Not all in the same house, but the number of interesting, if mechanically simple, ways wood had been arranged to provide more space for more people to live in made the apartment she had shared with her mothers seem even more cramped in comparison.


    While she was watched, no one had talked to her, for which she was glad. And all right, the food was pretty good. She might have to ask the kitchen staff¡ªwell, ask Rian to ask the kitchen staff¡ªif they could grill the meat instead of stew it sometimes, just for variety.


    Still, Lori supposed this was a significant turning point. While there would still be construction work¡ªshe didn''t doubt that the people who had felled trees, the sawyers who cut the wood, and others Lori said needed to be compensated for the additional work they had to do because these houses had needed more than roofs and doors to be built were carefully taking note of elements in the houses that they wanted for their own¡ªthis meant that a substantial amount of manpower had just been made available for other work.


    Originally they had needed that manpower for building the boat to Covehold, but with Rian''s idea¡ª


    No, don''t think about it!


    ¡ªbut now that manpower was available for other things. More hunting parties to gather food, skins and bones. More people to gather ropeweed for fibers. Actual adults who could now be assigned to hunt the bigger seels. More people available for mining. They might even be able to start working on getting wood and ropeweed from the half of the demesne on the other side of the river, which they hadn''t really crossed over to before now.


    Lori bit into the grilled seel, enjoying the taste of the meat and marbled fat that couldn''t be cut off for the chandler. She swallowed with great relish.


    But tomorrow. After all, she''d authorized this party, she might as well enjoy it!


    Everyone else seemed to be thinking the same thing, as nearly everyone in the demesne was there, and¡ª


    She paused, feeling the lone void of wisps in her awareness. She frowned. Why was someone in the laundry area alone?


    As it turned out, they weren''t in the laundry area, but near the clay pit. It was a shallow pit, or so she was told, barely two paces wide and that much deep. It didn''t even need a ladder to get out of, though someone had tied a short rope nearby. Airwisps deadened the sound of her feet as she approached the figure sitting on the rock the potter used while turning clay, playing with a glob of wet clay lying on the ground with dirty hands.


    "¡ªwide and shallow will probably be more balanced," Rian was muttering to himself. "But would it end up being top heavy, if we put on a roof? Then it would just tip over anyway¡­ deep, weighted keels are supposed to be better for balance¡­ right?" His hands kept shaping they clay, making vague, awkward shapes that looked half completed as his hands tried to unskillfully sculpt ideas that his mind had already moved on from.


    Lori bound the earthwisps in the clay, and Rian let out a start of surprise as all the clay he''d been handling suddenly flowed together, forming into a ball that began to flow. It tumbled into the open clay pit and splattered when it hit the bottom.


    "If I have to attend this, so do you," Lori said. "This is the sort of occasion where you say something inspirational and tell people to band together because we need each other, is it not?"


    Rian turned to look towards her, looking guilty for a moment. "Sorry, I just¡­ I can''t get the idea out of my head. Besides, the houses are finished and soon to be occupied."


    Lori glared at him as she let the binding deadening the sound of her footsteps lapse. "Please tell me you weren''t thinking of making a clay boat."


    "Of course not. That would be silly," Rian said. "Though I''ll confess, I did think about making the hull plating stone instead of wood."


    "That would sink it," Lori pointed out.


    "Not if the boat''s displacement was big enough! And it would be perfect for protecting the hull from scraping if it''s in shallow water¡ªI''ll shut up about it now."


    "Good," Lori said. "Now, come on, my food is probably congealing."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian chirped as he fell into step with her.


    They began walking up to where the party was happening.


    "How did you know I was down there, anyway?"


    "You were the only one who was far away from everyone and alone," Lori said. She looked at him sideways. "Everyone else away from the party was with someone else, not willing to wait for me to get started on the renovations to the second shelter."


    Rian blushed. "Um, please don''t flog anyone¡­?"


    "I can''t see them, so they''re not public," Lori shrugged. Rian sighed in relief.


    Rian did, in fact, give a speech. It was probably inspirational. There was a lot of cheering, anyway.


    Lori just sat back and ate her meat, thinking about the work she had to do tomorrow.

 101 - Lori Builds The… Um…

    When Lori came down for breakfast the next day, there was an undercurrent of eagerness in the air. Usually, most people focused on their food or conversations, but this morning, even without paying attention, she could tell that many people were glancing towards her.


    "People are certainly¡­ eager this morning," Lori commented to Rian as she reached her table. To her surprise, there was already food waiting for her, despite the kitchen seemingly still in the midst of preparations. One bowl was filled with grilled seel and beast meat that had been cut thinly, the fat on them still sizzling. The other bowl had what looked like vegetables and roots fried in fat. They look nice and soft and edible.


    "Apparently, people want you to get an early start on the day," Rian said, looking torn between amusement and embarrassment. "You, uh, probably don''t have to worry about this one."


    Lori looked down at the food suspiciously. Well, they had clearly been grilled and fried, and none looked spat on¡­


    Sighing, she sat down and start cutting up the food. Rian let out a sigh.


    "Hold out your hand," Lori said.


    Rian blinked but did so. Lori starts putting small pieces of meat and vegetables on it.


    "Ah, hot, hot!" he exclaimed, blowing on his hand. "Oh, come on, Lori!"


    "Taste it first," she said.


    Rian rolled his eyes, but after giving the food one last blow, popped them into his mouth and started chewing. He swallowed. "There. No weird taste or anything. Happy now? And I''m glad I washed my hands before coming here¡­" he muttered.


    Lori peered at him, then started eating.


    It was delicious, if a bit oily. She ate slowly so she didn''t get a headache.


    "So¡­" Rian said as she ate, "and I''m only asking because a lot of people asked me to ask you¡­ when do you think you''ll get done with the¡­ um¡­"


    "I will finish when I finish," Lori said. She tilted her head thoughtfully. "I might need to quarry more materials from the second level. Perhaps a hallway leading towards the third level, if the stone we have left isn''t enough." Between the aqueducts and basins, the houses, the retting tank, the laundry area and the latrines, she''d actually managed to use a lot of the stone, she realized.


    "I have been asked to ask if making the walls out of wood would help get it done faster," Rian said.


    Lori rolled her eyes as Umu and Mikon sat down on either side of Rian. "Tell them they''re grown men and women, and they have other things to do," she said. "Like hunting for food. Or cutting trees. Or weaving. Or spinning. With all the people now available since the houses are finished, you can take some across the river and clear a space there, get a second saw pit started, cut more ropeweed¡­"


    "I notice all of your suggestions are of very physically demanding work of the sort to keep people occupied," Rian said.


    "Do we have any other sort around here?" Lori said. "It''s not like we have much in the way of book keeping."


    "Actually, I have people keeping track of the wood, food, skins and furs coming in and being used," Rian surprised her. "And I asked Mikon to keep track of how much fabric has been woven. It''s mostly so we can estimate how much material we''re using and need in future, and so that we can be able to predict when we''ll likely to run out of something but I figure it''s best to not let people get into the habit of thinking they can just help themselves to materials because no one is counting." Behind his back, Umu glared at Mikon. The latter, for some reason, didn''t look very triumphant.


    Lori frowned. "What are they using for recording?"


    "Burnt stick and offcuts of wood," Rian said. "I take the total every day, and they wipe it all down. Not very secure, but it''s the habits being formed, not the results. It encourages people to ask first and have a good reason for needing it. Thankfully, no one had to be told¡­ much."


    Lori nodded.


    "The carpenters have already stacked doors outside the shelter," Rian continued. "With hinges attached. You just need to mount them and they''re ready to use and I just heard what I just said."


    "What interesting choice of words," Lori said blandly.


    "I''m pretty sure there was no good way to phrase that," Rian said. "And if there was, it''s too early in the morning for me to think of it."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Are we sure the shelter is now empty? No stragglers, no one hid anything in a hole they gouged out?"


    "I checked yesterday before going to sleep," Rian said. "They only thing left are the lights you made and the wooden slides someone carved out to slip over them to dim them when people are going to sleep."


    Ah. Well, at least they''d made their own solution.


    "There''s lots of writing on the walls, casual graffiti, lines marking areas and such," Rian continued, "but it looks like it did the day you rebuilt it."


    Lori nodded, thinking as she ate. Altering the shelter would be relative simple. She''d simply have to drag in stone to make internal walls. It would actually be more structurally stable by the time she finished, since the internal walls would be able to bear the load of the stone ceiling. The first step would probably be measuring out the total length of the shelter and then deciding to divide it into rooms.


    "Tell the carpenters to stop making any new doors for the moment," Lori said absently. "We don¡¯t want a surplus of doors."


    "I''ll tell them, but I''m sure a use for any extra doors can be found," Rian said. "Like giving me something to knock on to get your attention in your room. Or maybe we can use them in the third bath house. Or in some storage room¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Well, at least tell them not to give me thirty doors or something. I doubt the shelter can fit that many rooms." Yes, definitely measurements. The shelter was only wide enough for a row of rooms maybe just long enough for someone to roll out their bedroll on, and a connecting hallway so people don''t step out into the outdoors. And a hallway leading to a single entrance will let them restrict who goes in or out, and most especially keep children out, parents telling them to go in and get people be colored. There would need to be light and air circulation as well¡­


    <hr>


    After she finished her breakfast, Lori headed for the now-empty shelter, her staff in hand. She''d come back for her stone-leveling tool later.


    The shelter had changed since she''d last been inside, For one thing, the stairs leading down now had wooden steps, their surface left a bit rough instead of rubbed smooth so that people wouldn''t slip. They''d been put on top of the original stone steps she''d hardened, and she had to admit they felt more secure under her feet.


    Past the door, the shelter was empty. There were marks on the floor and walls: scratches, scuff marks, a simplistic map of the demesne drawn with a shard of broken pottery, and lines on the floor and partway up the walls that was probably some sort of boundary demarcation. Someone was clearly trying to claim land, if only in their own minds.


    Should she clean that?


    Lori considered it.


    No, she didn''t care.


    The shelter was five paces wide and thirty long, though the fact that the roof was an arching curve meant there was more floor space than head space. Still, there was certainly enough room for a hallway and rooms. And a tall person would even be able to lie down in the room with some space to spare, provided they were careful of the arc of the other wall. If each room was two paces wide¡­ no, wait, remember the thickness of the walls¡­ all right, two paces wide in total, accounting for walls¡­ So, they''d have room for fifteen rooms¡ªno, wait, fourteen rooms, since there''s need to be space in front of the door for whoever would be watching the door for children and keeping track of those making use of the facilities so that their names would be up for cleaning the places¡­


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    Lori did some quick numbers, then softened part of the floor so she could start making marks, drawing lines on the stone to denote rooms, doors and the hallway with her staff. She''d have to close the small windows along one wall, as well as completely close up the fireplaces¡­


    After retracing the lines on the floor to include the intended widths of the walls, Lori nodded to herself in satisfaction, and headed out to get the stone she''d need as well as see about the doors that had been made. She''d seen them on her way in, and they''d irritated her, since she''d have to find a way to fit the doors into the doorways, forcing the dimensions on her¡ª


    She stepped outside and blinked at the crowd. Many of the carpenters had their toolboxes in hand, looking eager, and while others were just standing there with an air of eager but undirected helpfulness. In front of them was Rian.


    "¡ªsure Binder Lori will tell us if she needs any sort of assistance," he was in the middle of saying. "But in the meantime, there''s still lots of things that need to be done and¡ª" He must have noticed he''d lost their attention and they were now looking at her, because he cut off and turned around, looking embarrassed and exasperated.


    Lori sighed. "Rian, a word inside? Also, tell everyone if they have nothing better to do, go and help the children hunt seels or cut ropeweed." She turned and went back inside the shelter.


    "You heard her, everyone!" she heard Rian. "Go do something else! We''ll call you if you''re needed! Come on, you all know this is the exact sort of silliness that will make her not build this and turn the shelter into something boring like a storehouse!"


    Hmm, yes, she did need to do that, didn''t she? At the very least, they needed better storerooms than they did now, better protected against dragons¡­


    She stepped out again. "Rian, tell everyone if they want to be useful to move all the cured wood to the second level so that if there''s a dragon tomorrow we''ll have something to repair with."


    "You heard her!" Rian said. "Get all the cured wood to the Dungeon''s second level. Put it in the middle of the room, not in any of the alcoves, those are for people. Come on people, you wanted something to do, there it is!"


    Eventually, Rian stepped into the shelter as Lori heard the people outside dispersing. She was leaning against the wall that held the door, as the curve of the other walls made doing that difficult, and she didn''t want to compromise the integrity of the structure by pulling stone from the walls to make a seat. "Thank you for that," Rian said with a sigh that was almost a groan. "It was all I could do to keep people from going inside and ''helping''. Or offering to help. I know you hate that."


    "People must really want to get this building made," Lori commented dryly. "They''re actually willing to help build it this time instead of waiting."


    "I think they think if they help, it''ll be finished by tonight," Rian said, looking torn between embarrassment and amusement. "I''m almost tempted to ask you to delay so they''d calm down, but you have too much to do already¡­ "


    Lori was very tempted to do just that herself.


    "I''ll go get the stone," she said tiredly. "You go ask the carpenters to stop making more doors until after I''m done. And bring those doors in here."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "Permission to recruit other people to help me do it?"


    "As long as they know not to irritate me," Lori allowed. Those doors had looked heavy.


    They split up to get to work.


    <hr>


    The pre-made doors were looking like a bad idea.


    Given the measurements she had made for the length of the rooms and the corridor they would all connect to, the doors that had already been made where just short enough to not hit the curve of the opposite wall, but it was a near thing. She told Rian to have the carpenters cut off the corner so that it wouldn¡¯t end up actually brushing the walls when they inevitably swelled with moisture.


    Still, the work was relatively simple and easy. After removing the windows and fireplaces along one wall so that there were no gaps in the structure and completing the curve of the arc, she dragged in the stone to raise the wall that would act to separate the rooms from the corridor outside, with Rian and a volunteered Riz holding the doors up so she could make gaps in the stone. It wasn''t properly mounting them, but it let her get the wall up without having to worry about structural integrity.


    Once that was done, Rian had the carpenters come in to measure for the rest of the doors while Lori then started raising the walls between rooms, starting from the end furthest from the door. From the sounds when Lori stopped for dinner, the carpenters were putting a lot of effort into the job, working even through dinner. She wondered if someone had brought meals for them, or if they''d just eaten really quickly. They were still at it when she went up to go to sleep.


    It took three days of work, all in all. During those three days, her breakfast was already waiting for her when she came down, meat grilled and fried things. It added another temptation to slow the work down, but she ignored it, since the aggravation of people constantly coming up to their table and asking¡ªat least they knew to ask Rian instead of her¡ªwhen the renovations would be finished were sufficient to make her want to get it over with quickly.


    She finally ran out of stone and had to go down to the second level, picked an alcove that pointed away from the river, and started excavating at a slight downward incline so she could have more building materials at hand. Lori kept it simple, a tunnel with a curving ceiling to take the weight of the stone above, and when she''d excavated to a depth just a little over the total thickness of the walls she needed to build, she stopped and told people¡ªwell, had Rian tell people¡ªnot to throw any water down there, because it would not drain out and would flood.


    By the afternoon for the third day, however, the walls were done. Each room was lit by lightwisps bound to a small hole at the top of the wall between room and corridor so that the light would illuminate both, as well as act as a small vent that would let airwisps constantly pull air from the corridor into the room. Some of the sound would leak out, but given what the place would be used for, it would at best act as a warning that the room was occupied. In the bottom corner of the corridor, she''d built a low stone tube with openings where airwisps would draw in air from the front of the shelter near the entrance, keeping the structure and rooms properly ventilated now that all the windows had been covered up.


    The rest of the day was taken up by softening the stone so that the carpenters could fit in the doors¡ªand the locks¡ªin place and putting planks over the doors so that Lori could fill in that gap with stone. She will admit, it was helpful to have someone else¡ªRian, because he was taller than Riz¡ªhold her stone-leveling tool up to serve as a backboard while she just applied softened stone to it like mortar, letting her flatten the stone easily.


    By the end of the day, it was finished. The shelter whistled slightly with the sound of air coming from the vents as the corridor and rooms were lit up. The floors were still bare stone, but anything else was up to the carpenters, who''d gone back to start making low wooden beds.


    "People are already asking to use it," Rian sighed as Lori did a final inspection, making sure the doors swung freely, air was properly circulating, and the light was adequate. "We literally have people lined up outside holding bedrolls and pillows."


    "Have there been any fights yet?" Lori asked.


    "There might be soon," Rian said with a sigh.


    Lori shook her head. "Do you have one of the medics ready to sit in front and manage this place yet?"


    "Not yet. They''re all¡­ sort of willing, but¡­ well, some of them want to use this place too," Rian said. His persistent state of low embarrassment since the start of the renovations peaked slightly.


    "Well, you''ll have to manage it until you can start assigning other people to do it properly."


    "Me?!" Huh. Rian sounded shrill, and there was not a syringe in sight.


    "Consider it incentive to resolve the matter quickly," Lori said blandly. "It''s not that hard. Just sit in front, assign people to rooms and make sure they don''t stay there the whole night. I''ll even build you a water clock to keep track of time." She paused. "Tomorrow. I''ll still need to calibrate it, after all¡­"


    "Maybe we can let anarchy reign?" Rian said desperately. "Just for tonight? So that when we lay out rules for how things should be done tomorrow, people will see it as an improvement?"


    "Making people suffer to make any alternative seem palatable? How cruel of you, Rian."


    "Didn''t you deactivate all the lights, water and hot water in the demesne once?"


    "Of course not. They just ran out in my absence. Which is perfectly natural."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "You realize the two of us being in here so long is going to get people thinking we''re testing the facilities, right?"


    "We are testing it," Lori said, swinging a door open into the hall and shutting it behind her to demonstrate, then using the simple wooden key¡ªbasically a flat, thin piece of wood that could lift the simple latch that locked the door from the other side by passing it through the gap between door and frame¡ªto open the door.


    "Not the kind of testing people will be thinking of," Rian said, looking aside and blushing.


    Lori stopped, and directed a glare towards him. "Go out there and correct them," she said. "Now."


    "Historically, that''s never helped these kinds of rumors," Rian said, still looking aside.


    "Then inform them that anyone mentioning that nonsense within my hearing will be my signal to level this entire building, now or in the future."


    "That will work better. I''ll go tell them."


    When Lori finally stepped out, her inspection done, people studiously avoided her gaze. She nodded, satisfied, then turned and softened the stone above the door and began writing with her staff.


    When she was finished, the stone had a simple sign on it that read ''Um''. Lori turned as people gaze at the sign curiously. "The Um is now available for use," she said. "No children are allowed inside the Um for ANY reason. No, not even just telling someone to come out. ANY reason."


    She turned and headed for dinner.


    "Have fun," she heard Rian say, much too cheerfully, before his footsteps fell into step behind her.


    "The ''Um''?" he said incredulously.


    "Well, what would you have called it?" Lori said.


    "Well, I''d have called it the¡­ um¡­"


    "Exactly," Lori said, letting herself smile. "Best to use the first thing that comes to mind."


    Behind them, the first yelling¡ªsomeone had apparently cut in line¡ªstarted.

 102 - Thank You

    "¡ªand the Um will be closed every fifth day for cleaning," Rian said cheerfully. "Let''s all follow these rules so that we do not have any more unfortunate accidents, shall we?"


    Rian was being very parental again. Lori was just glad that this time it wasn''t at her. No, this time the air of ''I''m not angry, I''m disappointed, you were idiots, you know you were idiots, I know you were idiots, but I''m not going to call you that and somehow that makes it worse'' he had wrapped around him was instead directed at the adults at breakfast, some of whom were clearly bruised from the early morning scuffle that had woken nearly everyone else up. Not Lori, of course, since she''d been in her room, but everyone else, certainly. By the time she''d come downstairs, Rian had been partway through detailing the rules they''d hashed out over last night''s dinner over the use of the Um.


    She still had to make some water clocks. While making vessels was simple enough, calibrating the hole so that it would take the right amount of time for all the water to be expended was¡­ well, it would be time consuming, if only because she''d need to watch the waterclock to make sure it did last about that long. Making a sun clock was easy enough, and they even had a compass to help them point it precisely north, but it would be unhelpful in the enclosed confines of the Um.


    Fortunately, Rian met her with good news once he was done announcing the rules.


    "So, I spoke with Gunvi," he said, "and he told me he has experience making water clocks. They''re not as precise as properly calibrated sand clocks or mechanical ones, but he says he can make one that will measure out about an hour easily enough, and we can calibrate it by the sun. He has enough pieces to be fired too, so he''s asking for help with that."


    "Tell him I''ll be there at the usual time," Lori said, sitting down and accepting one of the two bowls Rian offered. She liked the potter. He kept to himself, was able to get all his materials himself, and only needed help every few weeks when it came time to fire all his pottery in one large batch, since firewisps did it much more efficiently and evenly than setting things on fire. Slowly but surely, the demesne''s supply of simple pottery plates was growing, even though they were currently being unused since they were mostly eating stew, and bowls were better for that.


    "Got it," Rian said. "By the way, there''s a change to the plans I want to propose."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Go on¡­"


    "I want to put one of the former militia there with the medics to keep an eye on the place," Rian said. "I just realized that some people might be¡­ not exactly forced, but also not completely sure they want to go there. I want someone other than the medics there to tell them that they can''t come in if that''s the case."


    "I''ll do it, Lord Rian," Riz said immediately. "I know the type¡­ ''you''ll like it once you''ve tried it'', ''I''ll show you how it''s done'', ''you promised you''d do it, so come on and do it'', ''you''ll want to once it starts to feel good''¡­" Her face was scowling instead of intent on Rian''s reaction.


    "Yes, exactly," Rian agreed, nodding. "I don''t think we''ve got anyone here that bad¡­ but people not listening would be enough, even without malicious intent. I just want someone there who can deal with it without risking our medics. But are you sure you want to do this, Riz?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian," the woman said with a firm nod. "In fact, I can think of a few other friends who might be willing to take shifts with me on it. They''d know the type too. "


    Rian opened his mouth, then paused. "I''ll have to meet them before I agree to it. It''s a fine line between someone reluctant and doesn''t want to go, and someone reluctant because they''re nervous and working up the nerve for it even though they do want it, so whoever else willing to volunteer will need to be able to tell."


    Lori gave him a bland look. "And how, may I ask, would you know the difference?"


    Rian coughed, looking aside. "All right, good point, but I''m pretty sure it''s there!"


    "A conclusion drawn from your copious experience at this sort of thing, no doubt?" Lori said, smirking.


    "All right, all my knowledge is theoretical," Rian admitted, blushing. "But I refuse to believe you''re any better!"


    Lori shrugged. "I''m not the one making statements about how people think. But go ahead, this seems a needful measure."


    Rian coughed again, but nodded. "Well, I''ll still need to meet them. The Um is supposed to be where people can¡­ relax¡­ and if they''re met by someone at the door who puts them off by being too¡­ intense¡­ well, it''ll need to be someone understanding and a good judge of character, is what I mean."


    "Of course, Lord Rian," Riz said. "I''ll talk to my friends and see who''s willing and can meet your needs."


    "Don''t take too much time with this, Rian," Lori said. "You need to get started on the boat. At the very least, draw designs I can test on a small scale so we know it will float.


    "Of course it''ll float, it''s ice!" Rian exclaimed.


    For some reason, Riz raised an eyebrow. "Boats made of ice?" she said, sounding¡­ tired?


    Rian nodded enthusiastically.


    "Lord Rian¡­ those things melt," she said gently. "And I doubt the Great Binder wants to be stuck in one keeping it solid all the time. You need to weight the keel so it doesn''t just roll over, and that will only last until the ice around the weights melt and the whole thing capsizes¡­ believe me, we have a lot of young, stupid whisperers filling the rivers with little ice boats and trying to make a big one for some reason or other. They always melt."


    "But this time it won''t melt," Rian said. "Binder Lori was able to think of something."


    "If it''s blood, so does every young Whisperer with time on their hands," Riz sighed, making Rian stare at her as Lori suddenly straightened. "Everyone tries blood sooner or later. It''s in all the stories, after all."


    Wait, what? But she¡­ she thought¡­ in school, they said¡­ she was told it didn''t¡­


    "I hear they''re not supposed to do that, since it''s dangerous for some reason, but you know how young fools who''ve heard too many stories are," Riz shrugged. "But maybe it could be different, if it''s the Great Binder doing it¡­" By her tone, she was clearly just trying to placate Rian.


    "Uh¡­ well, we still need to try!" Rian said, though he looked like someone had taken the steam from his driver. "After all, how else are we supposed to build a boat?"


    "I''m sure you''d know best, my lord," Riz said, with the sort of smile you give to children who say that they''ll become a Dungeon Binder someday. It was a look Lori was very familiar with.


    "No, I don''t, that''s why we have to actually try the idea first before we can really say either way," Rian said. "At worst, ice will still work as floatation elements. They still float, after a¡ª"


    "Rian!" Lori interrupted. "Eat already!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was time to start digging again.


    Between the aqueducts and basins, the row of houses, the retting tank, the laundry area, the paving, the latrines and the Um, they''d finally managed to use up all the stone Lori had excavated in digging up the second level, save for the reserve pile to armor the dungeon with should a dragon arrive. Since she still needed to build a third bath house to relieve their still-overburdened hygiene facilities, it was time to dig again.


    She started by expanding their food storage areas.


    Lori had blocked off the hallway that had led to the original reservoir, in case a dragon arrived before she could dig a new one. Now she partially opened it again, and began to dig side corridors. After all, it was best that the food be kept in the same level as the kitchen, to make food preparation easy. The long-term food storage cold room there was nearing capacity. Soon they''d have to either start eating it or seal it off completely until the food had to be eaten. Either way, they needed more storage space.


    Coincidentally, they also needed more building material. So it all evened out!


    By lunch, she''d managed to excavate a large amount of stone for any further building projects as well as made a new storage space. While it was small¡ªnot even a twentieth the size of the second level¡ªit was more space for storage, and as soon as the carpenters could build a door for it, she''d be able to make it into another cold room for more food.


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    And when it was eventually filled, there was still the wall across the hall to excavate.


    Hopefully this would be enough to build the third bath house. The location had been long chosen already, a spot near the saw pits so that those working there, as well as cutting down trees, would be able to have close access to it, with the expended water to flow down and irrigate their crops, which were turning out well. It was also being made with an eye towards the future, since she planned any future homes to be built in the same area¡­


    But that was a later consideration. For now, she had to work as a pottery kiln.


    Not immediately, of course.


    First she checked the pieces that Gumvi had already finished and had dried for any lingering moisture. After all, they were kept near the laundry area, there was a possibility of some kind of misting that added moisture to the clay. After checking, he and his assistants would load it into the kiln, carefully laying them out on the few racks there.


    The last piece to go into the kiln were the water clocks, which she had to carefully dry by drawing out the waterwisps from them while taking care to keep from ripping apart the clay. A small spout was sticking out of the side near the bottom, and both she and Gumvi had checked it to make sure it wasn''t blocked before putting it in the kiln.


    Afterwards, they had sealed the kiln with mud packed and shaped by earthwisps, then lit the fire beneath it to start gradually increasing the temperature and adding ash to the inside of the kiln. Once it grew hot enough, Lori bound the firewisps so that they would continue to slowly increase the temperature while the potter carefully checked the color of the glowing pottery through a small hole. When he gave her the signal, Lori stopped increasing the temperature and instead bound the firewisps to maintain the heat while the hole was closed to prevent contamination and further temperature changes. The same was done for the hole where the wood was inserted.


    By the time they''d closed the hole and bound the firewisps to maintain the temperature, it was already dark. At that point, they could leave the kiln to go eat, and Lori''s part was mostly done, with the firewisps imbued with enough magic to last them until the middle of the night, with a little binding of lightwisps to warn when the binding faded away. The potter and his assistants would take turns watching the kiln, and once they saw that the lightwisp was gone, would start adding wood to it so it would cool down slowly and evenly. Then there''d be a few days while they waited for the kiln to cool down completely, painted it with ash, and then fired it again one more time to let the glaze set.


    But for that night, Lori''s part was done.


    She headed into the Dungeon, where dinner was in full swing, and headed straight to her room to bathe. Her skin felt sticky with oils, sweat and ash, and it was probably time to change her clothes. She''d have to do laundry that week again as well¡­


    When she came down a little later in fresh clothes, feeling much cooler and cleaner, Rian was standing at the base of the stairs leading to her room. She was, of course, immediately suspicious that something had gone wrong.


    "What happened?" she demanded.


    "Why do you think anything happened?" he asked with a smile.


    "You''re here instead of at the table," Lori pointed out.


    Rian shrugged as if to acknowledge the point, but he didn''t stop smiling. "There''s something you need to see,"


    Lori let out a loud huff of exhalation. "Who died and who was found near the body?"


    That made Rian blink, his now obviously-fake smile slipping a little. "W-what?"


    "I suppose it was inevitable that people would finally start murdering each other," she said. "It was probably jealousy, someone saw someone else going into the Um with a third person and became irrational with emotion¡ª"


    "No one died!" Rian interrupted. "Nothing bad happened and I''m not trying to show you a corpse that we''re trying to keep secret to keep people from panicking. AND no one''s anything was stolen¡­ that I know of. No, I just need to show you something."


    "Rian, if it''s something in your trousers, I am kicking it," Lori said blandly.


    "Well, it''s not something in my trousers," he said, sounding exasperated. "Will you just come so I can show you? I promise it''s a good thing! Please?"


    Lori sighed. "This better be worth delaying dinner."


    Rian, color him, just smiled.


    He led her down to the second level as she focused on her sense of the wisps around her, feeling for voids sneaking up behind her. To her surprise, there were many people in the second level, just standing there as if waiting. Was this a trap? Some kind of ambush? Rainbows. She still hadn''t found a second lord, and now she''d have to replace Rian once he made his treachery clear.


    She pushed through the way that thought made her heart clench as she kept her face smooth to keep from betraying her realization, getting ready to soften the ground to sink everyone into it¡­


    However, they were all just standing there, their hands clasped in front of them. None seemed to be carrying weapons, and she ignored the way her heart clenched further as she recognized many of the people there. She could almost, almost think of their names¡­


    "Tah dah!" Rian said, gesturing towards something standing on the floor between them and the waiting people. "What do you think?"


    Lori blinked and focused a little lower. It was¡­ a bed?


    "Is that a bed?" she asked, confused.


    "It''s a bed," Rian confirmed.


    And indeed, it looked bedlike, with four legs raising it just high enough to sit on comfortably. However, instead of a normal bed with several planks laid out to form a flat surface, there was instead a rectangle of wood around an empty space. Across that empty space were cords. They went back and forth, up and down, and even diagonally in both directions, coming in and out of a series of holes that had been drilled into the wooden frame. The cords wove together, creating a series of octagonal holes between them. There was even a short and decoratively useless headboard at one end.


    "Go ahead," Rian said as she stared, "touch it. It''s really springy." He bent down to demonstrate, pushing down on the weave with his hand. The whole weave flexed slightly at his touch but seemed remarkably taut. Hesitantly, Lori did the same. The cord felt rough but strong under her hand as she pushed.


    "Interesting," Lori said, keeping a part of her attention on feeling for voids of wisps. Still no one was coming up behind her, though there were some people at the stairs they''d gone down. Archers? "But what''s the point?"


    "Well, it''s yours," Rian said. "Your new bed."


    What.


    "What?" she said.


    "It''s your new bed," Rian repeated, suddenly grinning. "The weave is much softer than wood, so even without a bedroll, you can lie down on this and relax without getting a sore back. After all, we can''t have our Dungeon Binder coming down with back ache. It took a lot of people to spin the ropeweed for this until we could make cord, then I had to weave it all like this because this isn''t just something the weavers could put together. Their weaving is completely different. It took me weeks, and my fingers hated me, but you needed a new bed. Everyone here helped make it." He gave her an apologetic look. "Sorry I didn''t realize how uncomfortable you were sooner."


    Lori could only stare, first at him, than at the strange woven bed, then back at him again, then finally at all the people standing opposite them, on the other side of the bed. She could recognize some of the weavers¡ªMikon and Umu were there, looking at her instead of Rian¡ªmany of the carpenters¡ªDeil and Tackir where both there, looking expectant instead of nervous¡ªthe ropers, and a few other people¡­


    She didn''t need a new bed, what she had was fine. Yes, this was nice, but completely unnecessary¡­


    All she could do, however, was push down on the woven cords making up its surface again, noting how much give it had despite being so firm, so not like the wooden planks under the completely ineffectual layer of laundry and raincoat¡­


    Lori opened her mouth¡ª


    "Also, we have a bedroll for you," Rian said brightly, and her head turned to look up at him so fast she swore she heard something in her neck ''snap''. "It took a while because Umu and Mikon had to weave the fabric for it, then had to sew it together by hand, but it''s new and no one died on it."


    The two in question stepped forward, holding something large between them, and laid it out on the bed. It was¡­ a bedroll, in the same way her staff was a twig. The large rectangle of fabric was thick. Extremely so. This wasn''t a bedroll that had been worn down by months of travel and made to be compact as well as barely functional. It was practically a pillow, it was so thick. The fabric was the same pale brown color of the fabric she''d seen being woven of the looms, and it had been sewn together with tight, precise stitching. A lot of work and effort had gone into this¡­


    She thought back to Umu and Mikon massaging their fingers at dinner.


    "You¡­ made this?" she said before she could stop herself.


    Umu seemed hesitant, but Mikon nodded. "Yes, your Bindership," she said. "When Lord Rian explained you didn''t have a bedroll¡­" The pink-haired woman shook her head. "Well, you deserved something better to sleep on than a hard bed, after all you''ve done for us. This was the best we could make, with what we have."


    "The hunters have been separating all the down they could gather from the beasts we''ve been eating, and we''ve put them all into this," Rian said. "So until it goes flat, you officially have the softest bed in the demesne. You don''t even need a pillow, you can just double it up under your head."


    A bedroll. They made her a bedroll. A bedroll¡­


    Her eyes welled, and it was all she could do to keep the tears from flowing down her face as she turned them into cold vapor.


    "Thank you," she said, keeping her head bowed and glancing away so that the vapor wasn''t obvious. "Thank you for¡­" she swallowed.


    Rian loudly clapped his hands together. "Well, come on men, let''s bring her Bindership''s new bed up to her room, she won''t be able to carry it there herself. Step back please, your Bindership, let us handle this while you open the door."


    Open the door. Open the door to her room, yes¡­


    It took remembering the fact that all of her laundry was spread out on her bed to dispel the strange fugue from her mind and make her rush ahead of them to her room, leaving the door open behind her for them to bring her bed up. By the time they arrived, she was able to bundle up all her laundry into her rain coat, which had been stashed in her bathroom.


    The old, hard wooden bed was removed, and the new bed, with its strange woven surface, was put in its place, the old one carried out. Umu and Mikon put the new bedroll¡ªher new bedroll¡ªon top, as well as a folded sheet.


    "It''s a spare blanket," Umu said, not meeting her eyes and almost seeming to speak to no one in particular. "For when winter comes, or you need to launder yours¡­"


    Lori nodded. "Thank you."


    The blonde twitched and stepped out after with everyone else, leaving Lori alone in her room with her new bed.


    Slowly, hesitantly, she sat down, sighing almost comically as her posterior sank into the thick bedroll, at the feeling of the weave flexing beneath her¡­


    She was still sitting when Rian stuck his head back in through the doorway. "Are you coming down any time soon? Because dinner is going to get cold."


    Lori blinked through her tears. At some point she''d stopped turning them to vapor. "Yes, yes, I''m coming down," she said, glancing at him. He nodded and stepped out, his footsteps walking down the hallway, and she was finally able to wipe her face.


    She got to her feet and paused. Then she turned and opened her private cold room, pulling out one of the sacks of fruit she still had left. It was cold as ice under her hand, and her clothes got wet as she lifted into her arms.


    Closing the cold room behind her, she headed down for dinner.

 103 - Obvious, Insight and Brilliance

    Lori didn''t want to get out of bed. She really, really didn''t want to get out of bed. Her bedroll was thick and soft and warm, and despite what the fabric looked like, it was so very smooth and comfortable and she didn''t want to leave. She just wanted to lie down and make up for all those months she''d been sleeping on her laundry on top of a plank of wood¡­


    Groaning, she sat up, then almost groaned again at the lack of stiffness on her back. It felt so good¡­ her bed actually flexed under her, and it was all she could do not to bounce on it. She didn''t want to risk damaging the cords that wove together to form her bed. It was too nice to risk!


    No, she had to get up, there was work to do¡­ laying down the foundation of the bath house, the glaze firing of the pottery in a few days, she had to stop and imbue the water wheel in River''s Fork¡ª


    She stopped her stream of thoughts to check on that in panic, sighing in relief to find it still imbued. Ah, but there was so little. She''d need to do that today¡­


    The panic had woken her up enough that she finally stood, stripping down and going to her bath room for a quick rinse of her face and the rest of her. Her coat and laundry were still there, and she hastily checked the former for cracks and drying, sighing in relief when she found no new ones. She''d have to do laundry soon¡­


    Dressed, refreshed, purged and hungry, Lori headed downstairs to eat.


    Midway down the stairs, she turned around to get her sunk board, and then went downstairs to eat.


    "Good morning, Lori," Rian greeted her cheerfully as he pushed two bowls towards her. She picked one. "How''d you sleep?"


    "Wonderfully," she said as she put the board on the table and started putting the stones in the bowls. Mikon reached over to help her, doing their respective sides. "And you?"


    Rian shrugged. "Same as usual. All right, less need to pretend I don''t hear things happening in the middle of the night thanks to the Um, but beyond that, it''s all the same." A strange look came over his face. "Are we really going to keep calling it that?"


    "It seems to work fine," Lori said. "Unless you can manage to call it anything else?"


    "I will admit, I cannot," Rian nodded in acknowledgement. "But it seems to be working anyway. Still some teething troubles, complaints other people take too long, but right now everyone is being very understanding." He snickered. "And people keep going straight for the bath house, and then to the laundry afterwards to wash bedrolls."


    "Has it significantly impacted productivity?" Lori asked as she made her first move, then started to eat.


    Rian wiggled his hand back and forth. "Eh, it evens out. Only so many people at a time can go there and wait for someone to get done so they can get a room, and we have more people working now thanks to the houses being done. And after a certain point, standing around outside holding a bedroll starts being embarrassing." He titled his head. "Actually, we''re cutting a lot more trees than we were before. We need all the wood, especially for warming the houses come winter."


    Lori gave him a look.


    "Don''t glare at me like that, it''s the truth and nothing to do with the quality of the houses," Rian said. "Stone might be strong and, in your case, quick to build with, but they get cold and stay cold. Unless you want to use magic to heat up every house for the whole winter, we''ll need lot of fire wood. There''s also building material for furniture, tools¡­" he shrugged. "The work never ends, and we always need more of everything. No one''s needed to ask to get their metal yet, but it''s probably only a matter of time."


    Lori sighed. "I''ll have to make storage for that, then," she said. "Not just huts, we''ll need something that can protect it against dragons¡­"


    "I thought we''re storing it all here?"


    Lori waved a hand, then reached for the sunk board to make her next move as Mikon finished. "That''s an emergency stockpile for if a dragon''s arrival manages to destroy all the wood we have outside, but we can''t keep everything in here. We still need room for people and other facilities. No, better if I make a larger store room near the sawpit." She hummed thoughtfully. "Actually, I should do just that. It will give me more stone for making the baths."


    "Well, be careful," Rian said. "Make sure it doesn''t flood."


    Lori paused. She sighed. "Maybe I''ll just build the storage room into the hill¡­" Rainbows. And it had been such a good idea too¡­


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    The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Good idea or not, she had to start on the third bath house. The site chosen was near the long row of houses, on a plot of land that had long been cleared by all the tree cutting. The stumps still had to be pulled out, but with earthwisps to soften the ground and lots of manpower to push and pull the stumps out of the way, it was quickly cleared in two days, the hard roots cut up into small pieces by her water jets once it was ascertained they were too hard to risk their saws on, ready to become firewood once it had dried in the sun enough. After that, she was able to use earthwisps to clear aside the dirt on her chosen site to reveal the bedrock. Always best to build on the bedrock, or else your building might slip. True, a lot of the bedrock had been broken apart by roots, but it was a trifling matter to fuse it all together so it could act as a solid foundation.


    Technically, it was two bathhouses, built in the same long, half-cylinder style as the original shelters and the bath houses they had now, but instead of being separate, they were connected in the middle, with the curving roofs meeting at a thick stone wall to bear the weight and transfer it to the ground. Like the other bath houses, it would need the water to be constantly flowing, which¡­ all right, that might actually become problematic. While it wasn''t that far from the river, it was uphill, even if the slope was fairly mild. The first bath houses used underground tubes formed into the bedrock to act as pipes to bring in water, and the runoff was filtered through the ground¡­


    (Actually, she might have to change that. It might be affecting the clay pit, since they were close together¡­)


    Instead of long troughs of water high along the walls that fed down to basins inside individual alcoves, there would be two long basins filled with water in each section, to be used with wooden dippers, which thanks to the carpenters'' lathe was much easier to make now. People would sit or stand on either side, getting water from the central basin to wash themselves. She hoped this open design would keep people from using the space for things besides bathing.


    That took up about four days of work, one of which was spent excavating more stone, since she''d run out again. Fortunately, she was able to use the dirt at the site and compress it to make it part of the roof, so that helped.


    By the end of it, it was still completely unusable.


    "Still needs water, huh?" Rian said as they ate.


    "And a place for the water to drain to," Lori sighed as Mikon made her move. The weaver was getting better at this. Lori was still winning, but the score was getting closer each time


    "Can''t we just fill the basins with water in the morning and just refill them when it''s needed? I mean, that would use up less water."


    Lori glared at him. "That just means that I''ll need to personally come in to refill the water every time it runs low." She reached over and picked up the stones in one of the bowls, beginning her turn.


    "Not necessarily¡­" Rian said thoughtfully. "All right, correct me if I''m wrong, but I''m assuming you use a binding similar to the one on the water jet to draw the water we use in the baths, right?"


    "Basically the same," Lori confirmed as she continued to drop stones.


    "So, the binding doesn''t need to be on the whole pipe, right? After all, the water coming in will push the rest of the water after it."


    "Yes Rian, that''s how hydraulics works," Lori said blandly. No more moves. Mikon''s turn again.


    "I wish I had something to draw with¡­" Rian sighed, then held up his hands. "All right! What if you make some kind of tube mounted on a pivot or something. Stone, wood, bone, whatever. And in that tube you put in the waterjet binding. When we need water, someone, anyone, puts one end of the tube into the river, it pulls water up and that water goes all the way to the bathhouse to fill the basins. When it''s full, they take the tube out, and the basins stop filling. That way, you just need to keep the tube imbued like anything else, and someone else can take care of moving it around to fill the basins." Rian''s hand finally stopped making gestures that he seemed to think would help illustrate what he was describing, but just looked random to Lori.


    She stared at him as the simplicity of it set in. "That''s¡­ that''s¡­"


    "Brilliant?" Rian said smugly.


    "Obvious!" Lori exclaimed, making her lord sigh and slump. "I should have thought of that!" Why hadn''t she thought of that?


    "I''ll still take credit for coming up with an obvious idea you didn''t," Rian said.


    "Yes, yes, you''re insightful," she said, waving him off. It might not work very well with the system of basins and aqueducts she had, since that needed the water to be constantly flowing at all points for it to be pure, but if she could refit the old bath houses to this¡­


    "Actually, it wouldn''t even need to be manually operated," Rian mused. "With the right arrangement of weights, floats, swing arms and ropes, you could do it so that once the level of the water of the basin dropped below a certain point, the tube would swing into place automatically until it was full¡­"


    ¡­


    Her lord was brilliant.


    Not that she''d tell him out loud.


    "That sounds¡­ complicated," Lori said instead.


    "Well, it''s not something we have to come up with ourselves," Rian said. "We have carpenters, smiths, militia engineers¡­ lots of people whose work has them try and solve puzzles like this." He shrugged. "I wouldn''t be surprised if some of the children can think of a simple way to do it, once you explain it to them. Children are smart like that. Actually, I wouldn''t be surprised if things like this are used in some specialized processes in industries that you never got to work at because the role needed dedicated training."


    "It''s a distinct possibility," Lori agreed. Then she sighed. "But that still leaves getting the water up there... I suppose I''ll have to make a new pipe after all."


    "Eh, you can do it," Rian said. "You''ve done it before. Or would you rather be stuck bringing people back and forth between here and River''s Fork?"


    Ah, contrast. "I suppose you have a point," she admitted. "I''ll have to make a pipe, then a mechanism for the water like you described¡­" She might have to make a dedicated building next to the river for it, or at least a shed. She could even envision the mechanism, a tube that can be lowered into the water to fill a basin that fed the pipes. Or, even simpler, just the basin, with a sluice that controlled water going into it to be drawn into the pipes¡­ firewisps could be used to keep any remaining water from going bad or stagnant¡­ Or maybe¡­


    "Lori, eat. Your food''s getting cold, and Mikon''s waiting for you to make a move," Rian sighed.

 104 - Making Better Plumbing

    Lori decided to finish the third bath house first before she went about altering the plumbing in the other two already in use.


    Making the pipe from the river to the third bath house that would supply the bath water took some time. Fortunately, the area was far enough from the Dungeon that she didn''t have to worry about this affecting excavation that would happen in the immediate future. It still took a day, most of it spent excavating the pipe itself. She spent most of that time with her eyes closed, making the pipe with her senses, compressing the sides for strength and doing her best to round it out.


    One end was directly behind the bath houses, covered by some stone so that nothing would fall in after she was finished making it. The other end came out near the Dungeon''s entrance. While it would have been much shorter to just have the pipe lead towards the closest point of the river, that was slightly downstream of the bath houses and all the other water-using facilities, and she didn''t want to risk drawing in water that had already been used.


    If she was building as she had been when they had just established her demesne, she''d have just opened the pipe into the river, bound some waterwisps to pull water from it and considered the work done.


    However, the demesne was growing, and needed better foundations to stand on.


    "So you''re building a¡­" Rian tilted his head. "What, exactly?"


    "A centralizing location for drawing all the water the demesne will need," Lori said as she ate her dinner. "This way, it''s easier to keep track of where our water is coming from, and to keep it free from impurities. I don''t want to make the mistake of getting water from somewhere only for people to start getting sick because it''s downriver of our wastewater. After I finish with the third bath house, I will alter the pipes of the other two bath houses to draw water from the same location. "


    "All right, that makes sense¡­" Rian said slowly. "I would think that that best place to put that is the most upriver point of the demesne, but I suppose that''s too far away to be practical right now. "


    "Perhaps in future," Lori agreed. "But I will need assistance." She reached down beside her and picked up a stone tablet, placing it on the table between her and Rian. She had planned this conversation, and it was important enough that she''d forgone playing sunk with Mikon.


    Rian leaned over and studied it. "What exactly am I looking at?"


    "My initial thought on how to implement your idea for using wisps bound to movable pipes," Lori said. She pointed. "This pipe is filled with a binding that will draw water from the river, and can be lifted from the water to keep it from doing so. When lowered, it fills this basin, which also has a binding, and that binding will take the water to the third bath house and into a reservoir, from which the basins in the bath house can be fed. This way, someone can be in charge of filling the reservoir without my having to be involved."


    Rian was already shaking his head. "Won''t work," he said. "With a setup like that, there''s nothing to stop anyone from just leaving the pipe in the water and walking away. Sure, it can act as a way to break the flow, but with a river nearby, there''s no incentive for people to not simply leave the water flowing. And the switch is to too far away from the bath house. How will they know the reservoir they want to fill is full and stop it?" He must have seen the annoyed look on her face. "The design is effective, but the logistics make it a bit impractical in application."


    Lori scowled, but it was easy to see what he meant. Her nice, comfy bed seemed to have blinded her to the base idiotic behaviors of people.


    "What about¡­" Rian said slowly, "instead of pushing water up the tube, you pull it?" He made a sucking noise.


    Lori blinked as the idea presented itself. "Yes! If one end of the tube was in water, we could use a binding of airwisps to draw it up," she said. "And if that binding were something that can be removed from the end point, than it would be far easier to know when to uncouple it since the reservoir is full."


    Rian was nodding. "And if the tube with the sucking binding was on a weighed arm or something, then it could be designed to uncouple itself from the pipe unless actively moved towards it, so that it will stop if left alone." He tilted his head thoughtfully. "Actually, it would be easy to get something like that to move automatically when the reservoir is low¡­"


    "One thing at a time," Lori said firmly. "Water first so people can take baths."


    "Right, right. Water first, figuring out how to make work do itself later," Rian agreed. He frowned. "Wait. If it''s going to be some kind of tube where air keeps getting sucked through, you need some way to keep people''s hands from being sucked into it." He curled one hand as if holding a cup, then slapped his other hand over it. "This is an easy way to get painfully stuck."


    Lori made a nauseated expression as she imagined what he was implying. "Good point. Perhaps some sort of grate or cage to prevent hands from going on top of it."


    "Maybe some kind of ball around it?" Rian suggested. "Or put it in some kind of sheath that keeps people from being able to put their hand somewhere dangerous. Like¡­ argh, I really should have something to draw with!"


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Lori turned over her stone tablet, slightly softening the still-flat stone on the other side. "Use this."


    Rian blinked at it, but once Lori scored a line using her fingernail he understood.


    "Right," he said, beginning to draw. "All right, let''s say you put the suction binding in a tube¡­"


    "Lord Rian," Mikon interrupted. Rian blinked and looked at the weaver in surprise. So did Lori, for that matter. The pink-haired weaver as sitting on the outside tonight, with Riz between her and Rian. "While I realize this is very important, perhaps you should finish your food first?"


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    Rian ate under Umu''s almost-parental gaze. As her Lord was too busy eating quickly to speak, Lori decided to go back to her dinner as well. That was the only reason. Mikon''s occasional sideways glances at her didn''t factor into it at all!


    After they finished eating, Rian picked up from where he left off, narrating as he drew with the nail of his forefinger. "Right, so the tube with the suction binding should be wide. Wider than a hand or a head, because you just know some idiot will try to stick his head in. A wooden panel down the middle so that even if someone did try to reach in, they don''t block the whole tube and get stuck. You also need these protrusions so they don''t accidentally get pushed against a wall and get stuck because of suction."


    Lori nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, I see what you mean. But how to you propose for it to work?"


    "Well, the mouth of the pipe where the water will be coming from needs to be smaller than the mouth of the suction tube," Rian said, beginning another sketch. "And the pipe needs to be beveled, like this, so that the two halves can form a seal even without being perfectly fitted together. This also keeps the tube from getting stuck. You just need to pull it sideways to break the seal so the suction isn''t keeping the tube stuck to the pipe."


    Lori nodded. "Yes, I can see how this could work¡­ I might even be able to build it myself, though I''ll need wood to act as reinforcement and for the central partition." She frowned. "This might be better if it was on some sort of roller, so it can only be move back and forth."


    Rian tilted his head, looked at the sketch. "You''re right. If it was on some sort of recessed groove with rollers beneath it, and maybe stone walls to keep it on track¡­ they push it towards the pipe, the beveled lip acts as a decent seal, the binding sucks up the water, and then to shut it off we have¡­ " he drew, "some kind of lever here to push the suction tube away from the lip and some sort of block that acts to keep them separate, so that the suction can''t pull it back towards the pipe unless they want it to."


    Lori looked down at it contemplatively. If she hadn''t been narrated at, the resulting drawing would have made no sense to her. "It might work," she allowed. "And if it doesn''t, we can still use the baths by using waterwisps to push the water up the pipe." She hummed thoughtfully. "I can finish the reservoir and fuse the basins into one to simplifying things. That means making the reservoir bigger, since it needs to have enough to fill both basins twice over¡­"


    "Is the reservoir covered?" Rian asked. "To keep dust and flying bugs out?"


    Lori scowled. "It will be now," she said, then sighed. "I''ll need more stone¡­"


    "Not necessarily," Rian said thoughtfully. "There''s something I think you can try. Something you can use besides stone. Or at least, something to use until you can get enough stone."


    She frowned at him. "What?"


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    The next day, Lori built the water hub shed, for lack of a better term. She raised a stone wall out of the river''s bedrock to isolate an area, then raised pillars of stone to act to bar entry to any seels that might be curious. It had yet to happen¡ªthey usually didn''t loiter at the area of the river directly fronting the town¡ªbut better to be safe. In this mildly segregated portion, she opened up the end of the pipe, with a binding that circulated the water in the vicinity of the opening to discourage small animals and plants from making a home there.


    That done, Lori fused the basins running down the center of each side into one so that each bath had a long basin of water running down the middle. The basins touched the back wall of the bath house, which had a small opening though which water could splash down into the basin to fill it. The opening was meant to be closed by a simple wooden sluice, which one of the carpenters was asked to fit in so that it would both move smoothly and be reasonably water tight.


    The carpenter who did so was neither Tackir or Deil, but he looked vaguely familiar, so Lori gave him a nod of acknowledgement before going back to work.


    That done, she expanded the water reservoir for the baths. The problem of stone for the reservoir was solved by sinking it into the ground, letting her use the displaced bedrock for more building material. When the reservoir was filled, a binding would draw water up a tube to a smaller basin directly behind the sluices. If the sluices were closed, the basin would overflow back into the reservoir, meaning no water was wasted and the water was kept moving to prevent it from going stagnant.


    After that Lori decided to try Rian''s suggestion out of morbid curiosity.


    She built low stone walls using the bedrock stone as an extension of the bath house''s basis structure to start with, but they only came up to about her waist. Then she bound waterwisps at the river end of the pipe and began to draw water to the reservoir. She actually had to wait a bit before the water reached her, but when it did she had to make another binding to curve it down into the reservoir instead of continuing forward and blasting the opposite wall. The reservoir filled very quickly, and soon she had a lot of water to do as had Rian suggested.


    First, she made sure the water in the reservoir was free of impurities, which meant all the earthwisps were pushed together into a small rock that she threw over her shoulder, and all the airwisps were all pulled out so that there would be no air dissolved into the water. Then she carefully bound the water, and compressed its substance together to form ice. There was a sudden wave of warmth as all the heat was pushed out of the water as it solidified, parts of it bulging upwards as it expanded in the confines of the reservoir. The ice was completely clear, with no bubbles to mar its transparency.


    Carefully, reshaping the ice so that it flowed while at the same time making sure it remained a solid, Lori began making a high, arching roof over the reservoir, using it the way she had used stone. The ice needed to be bound to stay ice and heavily imbued to last a long time, but those things were utter simplicity now compared to imbuing the water wheel in another demesne.


    She had to admit, when she was done, the effect of being under a glass-clear roof was quite striking.


    Then she went to find a big stick to hit it with and test to see if it broke.

 105 - Waterworks and Ice… Actually Works?

    The ice actually didn''t break. With the binding in place, it was hard as stone, and seemingly as difficult to damage, especially with the binding reinforcing its physical properties beyond what it was normally capable of naturally. Still, for her own peace of mind, she built stone pillars at the corners of the reservoir pool to hold the ceiling up, and repaired the gouge in the process. The material seemed to be holding, at least. The reservoir and basins had been filled after the sluices had been fitted in, so the bath house had been softly opened for use.


    "Yes, it worked, you were right," she told Rian as she and Mikon set up the board for their game. "Wipe that smug look off your face. It will still need to be constantly imbued with magic so it doesn''t melt or collapse."


    "Well, obviously," Rian said, nodding. "So it''s not exactly something that can be used for everything. But is it working right now?"


    "Yes," she said, with a sigh. "I still have to make the¡­ suction tube, for lack of a better term. Did you manage to get the roller form lathed?"


    In answer, Rian put a cylinder of wood on the table. It was about as thick as one of their wooden cups, but three times as long, and not hollow. "This what you needed?"


    Lori nodded. Now she''d have something to make a mold for the stone rollers to go under the suction tube. "What about the lever?"


    "They''ll need to see what they''re working with, and for that you need at least a semi-complete suction tube," Rian said. "It might have to be bigger than what I drew to overcome the force of the suction. The tube will be drawing in a lot of water and air, after all, so it''ll be exerting a lot of force."


    "In the meantime, find people who can be assigned to maintain the third bath house," Lori said. "At the very least, someone to be in charge of operating the sluices, cleaning the baths so that no pools of stagnant water are left at the end of the day, and to operate the suction tube once I''ve finished it."


    "I''ve already asked around, they''ll get started tomorrow," Rian said. "Also, I have a plank you can use to partition the suction tube, but I left it next to the door to your room because it was pretty big. You might need to trim it yourself or something. "


    Lori nodded as Mikon made her opening move. "How is progress on your ice boat?"


    "Ah, about that," Rian said hesitantly. "Since the roof worked, I have an idea for a proof-of-concept test we can do that will also help us get a bigger boat for getting the next batch of miners to River''s Fork in one trip. But I want to get the design and the dimensions finished first before showing you anything final."


    Lori reached to make her own move. "What''s the concept, then?"


    "We replicate the dimensions of the boat¡ª"


    "Lori''s Boat."


    Rian sighed for some reason as Riz, sitting next to Mikon, made a small cough. "Yes, the only boat we currently own. We replicate it at double its current dimensions. Double the length, width and height will be big enough to carry all the people who have volunteered in one trip. The hull will need to be much thicker, of course, for structural integrity, and reinforcement, but beyond that, something of those dimensions should be stable and a good test to see if the ice will hold. And if we weight the keel with rocks¡ª"


    "The what?" Lori interrupted.


    "The keel. It''s the line in the center that runs along the bottom of the boat," Rian explained. "You put extra weight there to keep the things from rolling over. We can''t put one on¡­ on Lori''s Boat, but we can put one on the ice boat when we build it so that it will be more stable and not tilt from side to side as much." He paused. "I''ll admit, I''m sort of afraid it will still start dipping too low if too many people are on one side, so I''m trying to figure out how to put an outrigger on it."


    "And you intend for all that to be made with ice?" Lori said blandly.


    "No, of course not, that would be insane," Rian said. "It''ll need wooden internal supports for added strength. Ideally, the whole thing would be made of wood, with the ice serving as a coating of waterproofing and added displacement for it to float better, since we don''t have enough resources to properly waterproof a conventionally made boat."


    "Food," Lori said.


    Rian blinked in confusion. "I don''t think we can use food as waterproofing."


    Lori sighed. "Get our food, Rian"


    "Oh! Right, right, food, getting it, getting it¡­"


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    Lori left Rian to building his boat while she worked on the mechanism that could be manually operated to fill the reservoir with water. Adding a protrusion to the end of the pipe leading to the river was simple enough, and beveling it so the suction tube would fit over it needed only a little work. She used all the stone that she had on hand from making the ceiling out of ice to make a wide groove with high sides to keep the suction tube from moving to either side, with a lip at the end of the slot to keep the tube from falling into the reservoir. She also added a slight curve to the end of the suction tube so that the water would go straight into the reservoir. Stone rollers, made in a mold of ice, using the wooden roller as a basis to make the mold, were put under the suction tube so it could be moved easily.


    When she tested it, she found that while the binding of airwisps was sufficient for the task of drawing up water, once the water reached the suction tube, the tube would get pushed out of the lip by the water. It took her several very messy, very wet tries to realize that once the water reached the tube, the airwisps had no more air to drawn on, meaning there was no more force being exerted to keep it adhered to the pipe. She had to spend some time figuring out how to add a binding of waterwisps to draw the water once it reached the tube. Thankfully, the fact that there was a divider in the tube helped give her more area to place a binding, so she was able to put a binding of airwisps in one half and a binding of waterwisps in the other.


    The result was the water being drawn up from the river far slower than if she had put a dedicated binding of waterwisps in the pipe, but that was fine. There was no hurry to fill up the reservoir, after all.


    The end of the first month of their agreement with River''s Fork came and went, and she had to be there to provide the ice that had been agreed upon, and to check on the state of the water wheel and fan. It was tempting to add more blood, in case time was degrading her connection, but there was currently no need as she didn''t feel any added difficulty in imbuing, and if it was possible for the connection to degrade over time, it was best she had a baseline measurement.


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    After that came general demesne work. Heating the kiln to begin the glaze firing, building some more packed earth curing sheds for lumber, curing lumber, maintaining all the bindings running her demesne, and converting the plumbing in the old bath houses to be more like the new one, meaning she had to dig reservoirs for them, and build their own suction tubes. She also roofed the reservoir area with ice, purely so that the water level would always be visible so people would know when it was time to renew it. Fortunately, since they were closer to the river, that was less of a problem, though she had to get Rian to find more people to handle refilling the reservoir on top of maintaining the bath houses.


    Hmm¡­ actually, had someone been maintaining the bath houses already? Eh, Rian would deal with it.


    The waste water for all three she decided to bring to the cistern for water to be used on their fields, though that cistern needed some expansion. Two days later, when it turned out that was far more water than their field¡ªwhich had gotten bigger since she''d last noticed, more trees at the edges cut down, leaving their original stand of crops looking like a small lost patch of greenery¡ªcould currently use, she just gave up, created a lower cistern the water could overflow into, and made a binding that turned the water that overflowed into that cistern into steam. It left behind detritus from the water that had been evaporated, but that was something that could be dealt with later. Much later. And since it had essentially been boiled and didn''t reek like waste, it was fairly safe to leave alone.


    "That somehow feels wasteful," Rian said later that night.


    Lori stared at him. "How is that wasteful?" she said.


    "Well, if the water is vaporized, the steam is clean, right?" Rian said. "Can''t you gather all that steam and add it to the reservoir again? It''s not like the irrigation water needs it, it''s already overflow water. "


    Lori tilted her head thoughtfully.


    The next day, she converted the overflow tank into a sealed tank, with a small access door for when the particulates gathering in the bottom of the tank would need to be shoveled out. The steam from all the water being boiled off into vapor was channeled back into the third bath house reservoir and condensed as hot water to help feed it. Lori diverted the waste water used in the laundry area to the irrigation cistern as well. Not all of the water ended up being evaporated and reused, since the field did still need to be watered, but that wasn''t the point. It allowed them to minimize the possibility of tainting their own water, since it was hard for taint to survive being boiled into steam.


    With the new bath houses established, thankfully people no longer needed to bathe in the laundry area, for which she was grateful. That practice had always been nerve-wracking for her to hear about. All it needed were a few insistent idiots to make trouble¡­


    Also, since she finally had time, she told the carpenters to start work on a waterwheel-powered lathe that would fit into the second level, and she would provide the water power to turn it.


    "That''s made them happy," Rian said during dinner, their food between them. "They''re really getting into designing and building it. They should be finished by tomorrow. The day after at the latest. Though the blacksmiths have been quietly¡­ not complaining, but more like asking for as much as support as the carpenters."


    Lori nodded as she finished chewing her food, her game with Mikon put on hold for the moment. The woman was talking quietly with Riz about something, and the way the two were speaking in low tones, the two were clearly gossiping. Umu, on the other side of Rian, struggled to hear them, looking left out. "I''ll find a suitably protected spot. It just can''t be in the second level since it would make ventilation troublesome."


    "I think they understand that," Rian said as he diligently tried to ignore the two women next to him, leaning forward towards her to try and put himself slightly out of hearing range, "but they''ll need a permanent smithy soon. The saws are going to need sharpening or even replacement eventually, everyone''s going to need more tools made of more than just wood and rocks, and they''ll need a better-prepared place to work to do that. And¡­"


    The two women to his left let out shocked gossip gasps as Umu literally leaned over his back to listen in.


    "And the hunter and tanners¡ªthe ones treating our skins and leather, anyway¡ª would like to ask for a better building than a shack to store and smoke our supply of skins, furs and hides," Rian sighed.


    Lori blinked. "There''s a shack?" she said as she took another spoonful. The meat had been fried, from the taste of it, and the stew tasted of stewed mushrooms more than meat stock or vegetables.


    "Yes, they built it themselves once the children started catching seels and beasts started getting skinned," Rian said. "They really need salt. They''ve been making due with seel and beast brains, but that''s not a lot. Most they''ve been drying and stretching, but I''m told that''s not the best way to cure an animal hide."


    Lori swallowed, sighed. "I''ll¡­ see to it. Have you finished the boat prototype?"


    "I''ve worked out the dimensions. I just¡­ need your help?" Rian gave her a sheepish smile as he tried to ignore how Umu was now leaning sideways on his back. "The best way to shape ice to make a mold and fill it with water so you don''t need to try shaping it manually."


    "So¡­ you want me to make the mold AND use it to make ice," Lori said blandly.


    "In my defense, we''ve both always known that you''d have to do everything related to working with ice," Rian pointed out. "And this is basically a test to make sure that the shape of the ice is stable. Or at least, stable enough to use as a boat. It''ll let me figure out how much to weigh the keel too."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori tilted her head and made a show of resting her elbow on the table and her cheek on the back of her hand.


    Silence broken only by gossiping stretched on.


    "All right, I have to ask," Rian said. "What are the three of you talking about?"


    Umu looked down as if only just realizing she was leaning on Rian and blushed as Mikon and Riz started. "Ah, sorry, Lord Rian," she said.


    "Umu, you''ve been washing my laundry and just used me as an arm rest," Rian tiredly. He gave her an equally tired smile. "I think we''re beyond the point of formality. Just call me Rian, all right?"


    Umu made a sound as if someone had gotten trapped in her throat.


    "Now, what have you three been talking about interesting enough to warrant using my back as an arm rest?" he asked again.


    Riz looked panicked but Mikon smoothly leaned around her so Rian could see her. "Riz was merely telling me who has been using the Um, Lord Rian," she said. "Some of the people going in together¡­" She coughed. "Was I not supposed to ask her, your lordship?"


    "Please drop the ''lordship'' Mikon," Rian said. "It''s not like her Bindership insists I get any respect, and I wouldn''t know what to do with it if I got any." Really, his shows of false modesty bordered on the satirical and delusional sometimes. "Just Rian is fine. You too, Riz. I mean, we''re eating at the same food at the same table, rank clearly isn''t much of a separator¡­ except for her Bindership of course." He glanced sideways as if just remembering she was there. "Though please don''t gossip about that in future? People have little privacy to preserve as it is. Let''s let them have their dignity, please."


    "Yes, Lord Rian," Riz said meekly.


    "One would think people are forfeiting their dignity already, using that place," Lori commented.


    "It is as dignified or not as everyone treats it as," Rian said insistently. "It can be crude and sordid, or it can be dignified and intimate and private. And I for one am not going to demean the people going there. I might be one of them someday." He didn''t notice the three women next to him stiffen. "Probably not any day soon, but someday, once I''m the last man in the demesne and someone has to settle for having no standards¡­"


    Lori couldn''t help it. She laughed.


    "Yes, yes, laugh at my pain," he sighed dramatically. "So, are you going to help me with the boat prototype or not?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine," she said. "Tomorrow, and only briefly. I have all those workshops to build. At least tell me your proposed prototype has dimensions?"


    "Yes, I measured it out," he said. "Not as flat as your boat, since a weighted keel works better if it''s lower than everything else."


    Lori nodded. "Good then. It shouldn''t take all morning to make, hopefully." She had another spoonful of stew, chewed, swallowed. "Anything else?"


    Rian leaned back thoughtfully. "No, I think that''s everything immediate for now. I''ll let you and Mikon play your game. You seem to enjoy playing against her more than against me."


    "You''re clearly bored when you play," Lori said. "It''s annoying, especially when you still beat me."


    Rian shrugged shamelessly. "Sorry?"


    "You will be. One day, I will defeat you utterly," Lori declared.


    "I''m¡­ not really sure how I''m supposed to respond to that, so I''ll just eat," Rian said, suiting actions to words.


    Lori nodded sharply as she and Mikon began to set up their game, the weaver looking pleasantly eager to play even as Riz seemed regretful for the end of their conversation.


    "So," Rian asked the northerner woman, "who have been going into the Um together?"

 106 - The Ice Boat Prototype

    Building the ice boat prototype did not, in fact, take all morning.


    They needed a place they could use to assemble the ice and form the boat, and for ease Lori opted to use the area directly in front of the dungeon. It was in front of the river anyway, it was relatively flat, and it needed to be compacted anyway.


    "Your units of measurement are atrocious," Lori said, as she peered down at the piece of wood Rian had handed her with a sketch and large scrawled dimensions on it. The drawing was clearly not to scale. "Why are you using stri? No one uses stri, it''s just something that pads out the scale between a pace and yustri. "


    "It exists, I''m going to use it," Rian said.


    "So do measuring things in half-paces," Lori said, shaking her head. "Well, come on. This is your idea, you help me measure out the mold." She glared again at the numbers. "And turn this into paces, will you?"


    Rian sighed, but took back the wood, drew out a burnt wooden stick from somewhere¡ªhe kept that in a pocket? Poor Umu¡ª and began to convert the measurements while muttering to himself.


    Once that was done, they began to measure out the dimensions for what was essentially an oversized block of ice. Lori had considered making a hole and pouring water into that, but that was stupid. That was the sort of method you would use for mass producing a specific shape. As this was only a prototype, they could afford to form it by hand. The lines they were measuring on the ground were so they''d have an easy reference for the dimensions. Once the lines were in place, Lori depressed the ground and compacted the material so that the lines would remain clear, especially the lengthwise center line.


    "We''ll need clear ice," Rian said as she gathered water from the river, waterwisps giving the fluid unnatural cohesion and viscosity. "It''s the most structurally sound, since it won''t have bubbles weakening it, and we''ll need a benchmark test to see how well it holds without reinforcement."


    "Do you actually know what you''re doing?" Lori asked dryly even as she began binding the airwisps out of the water. This was unusual enough from her usual work that some people, especially the people waiting in line at the Um¡ªthankfully only three pairs or so, instead of the comically long lines when it had been first established¡ªstopped to watch curiously. Well, as long as they didn''t interfere with anything.


    "A little? I mean, it makes sense that impurities would weaken a substance," Rian said. "And, well¡­ air means bubbles in ice, which means gaps, like rotten wood. And rotten wood is weaker than whole wood. So the logic follows."


    "And your idea to put wooden planks in the ice? How are those not impurities?"


    "Because the wood itself will also be structurally intact," Rian said. "The wood will act as structurally reinforcement against lateral stresses, something to keep the ice together instead of just snapping. It''s bone inside muscle or¡­ ah, fibers inside baked bricks. Even if something managed to crack the ice, the wood beneath should help it keep its shape. I''m not sure if we can build it to be self-repairing, I don''t know enough about magic, but pouring water over the crack so it will freeze solid to repair the damage is a nice image."


    Lori considered that. The binding for such a self-repair function¡­ no, it would be unfeasible. The water being added to the cracks would need to be claimed somehow, or else it would never properly solidify into ice. Though perhaps she could do a test to detect gaps in the bound wisps¡­


    "Magic doesn''t work that way," she said instead. Then she began making ice. "Do not touch the ice unless I tell you to, or your flesh will freeze to it and probably become frostbitten."


    Rian whistled, raising his eyebrows. "It''s that cold?"


    Height wasn''t a problem, since they could just trim it down. So she made the whole thing out of a whole block of ice, three paces wide, five paces long and nearly two paces high. It was solid and completely clear with a bluish tinge, the only thing keeping it from slipping along the hardpacked ground the little bumps of packed earth sticking out at the edges to keep it hemmed in, and how it had frozen onto the ground it was on.


    It stayed clear, if blue, as she kept it bound, not really acting like ice. Ice, unbound ice, interacted with the firewisps in the world, drawing them in and leaving the area around it cold as a result. Ice created by taking waterwisps to solidify water did not. While it was technically cold, it did not spread that cold into the world. With the binding removed carefully, it remained solid, but now exchange of heat could happen, and the surface began to frost over as stray waterwisps in the air settled and solidified because of the cold.


    "I can feel that," Rian said, sounding astonished. "That''s cold."


    "Still thinking you can build a boat out of this?" Lori said dryly.


    "If we can keep it solid, we can keep it solid in the presence of heat," Rian said. "That means that cold will be survivable."


    "We?" Lori said pointedly.


    "Sorry, I mean you, most powerful, intelligent and hardworking Binder."


    Rian needed new words of flattery.


    The center of the ice¡ªthe keel, as Rian kept referring to it¡ªwas supposed to come to a point and be three-quarters of a pace higher¡ªor as the case would be once it was turned around and in the water, lower¡ªthan the sides of the boat. Lori used a stone knife blade pulled from the ground, firewisps, a length of cord and Rian to score lines from the keel to the side of the boat, then made the ice part along those parameters, making what was essentially a squat triangle on top of a block. Another pass, and there was a gradual slope on one end that would be the front. Even to her inexperienced eye, it was something barely boat-shaped.


    This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    "Okay¡­" Rian said when that was done. "That looks good. Now how do we flip it¡­?"


    "It''s supposed to float, isn''t it?" Lori said as she directed her awareness away from where they were.


    "It should¡ªoh, that was a rhetorical question," Rian said, stepping back from the crude ice boat as if afraid of getting wet. The water that had risen up from the river enfolded the block of ice as Lori bound it once more to solidity so that it would stop drawing in heat again. For a moment, it stayed stuck on the ground until Lori tweaked the binding a little, and a thin layer of ice turned back to water, which immediately turned to slush again but it released the block.


    The block of ice meant to be a boat heaved, rising in the malformed, rounded water Lori had surrounded it with, slowly rising but not bobbing to the ''surface''. Ah, right. Cohesion and viscosity combined into powerful surface tension.


    "Let''s take this to the river, shall we?" Lori said as if she''d always meant to do that.


    They nearly lost the boat. Lori barely remembered to raise stone bars in its path from the river bed when the current took it, and she and Rian both winced hard at the sound of impact.


    "Please don''t be broken, please don''t be broken, please don''t be broken," Rian said repeatedly as Lori pulled the boat back towards them using the stone bars to push it into place.


    "It''s fine," she said. Well, she assumed. It was¡­ really hard to tell for sure since it was completely transparent. It was still whole, and her binding had been keeping it solid. "It''s fine. And it''s floating."


    It was¡­ technically. A long strip of transparent, glass-like ice bobbed out of the water in a line, with an unnaturally sharp edge. Water lapped over it, not freezing because of her binding.


    "That does not look sufficiently buoyant for our needs," Lori said flatly.


    "That''s because we need to do phase two first," Rian said. "Hollowing it out." A beat. "Well, turning it over and THEN hollowing it out." Another beat. "Um, can you turn it over and put it back where we started? Please? Your most patient and scholarly Bindership?"


    That was not what she meant about new flattery, but she''d take what she could get.


    The boat¡ªwell, block of ice, it wasn''t a boat yet¡ªwas turned the right way up and brought back to shore, where it was rested on some stone she raised out of the ground to keep it in place and even. Then Rian¡ªusing the cord, his writing plank as a relative straight edge and Lori''s stone knife¡ªbegan to score lines along the relatively flat top of the boat, defining a space where the ice needed to be removed. The space ended well back from the angled front¡ª"Let''s not risk poking a hole in it just yet"¡ª but did encompass most of the boat.


    He then scored a line on the side showing how deep the ice to be removed should be.


    "Um, will that be a problem?" he asked as if finally realizing how much of the ice needed to be removed. "Can I help with anything?"


    "Yes," Lori said as she made a block of stone rise up out of the ground next to her so she''d had somewhere to stand on that would let her see all the scored lines. "Watch the level."


    Hollowing out ice was nothing like working with stone. For one thing, water, unlike stone, will settle down to a perfectly flat, even level. That meant she didn''t need to smooth anything out when she hit bottom, just turn it back to ice again.


    She was in the middle of making section of ice in the middle of the block turn into water and move over the side and onto the ground when Rian suddenly started laughing.


    "What?" she asked. She wasn''t wondering whether it was a joke at her expense. Not at all.


    "R-remember when we first started talking about making a boat and sending it to Covehold?" he said, still snickering.


    "Yes, this plan has been greatly delayed, hasn''t it?" she said.


    Rian ignored that. "Remember my first idea for making a boat?"


    His first idea? Yes, he''d had an idea. What had it been¡­


    "You wanted to hollow out a tree¡­?" she said, the bizarre detail coming to mind.


    Rian started chuckling again. "I mean, it''s not a tree, but¡­" He gestured at the block of ice. That she was hollowing out.


    Lori rolled her eyes and continued following the scored lines as her only lord snickered to himself.


    She really needed to find someone to appoint as another one. He might be losing his sanity.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori managed to finish hollowing out the ice a little past mid-morning. By then it actually looked like a boat.


    "It actually looks like a boat now," she said as she looked over the hollowed out piece of ice now actually riding above the water.


    "A barge, anyway," Rian said.


    "A barge is clearly a sort of boat."


    Rian didn''t press the issue. He was giving the new boat a look of¡­ dissatisfaction. "You know, I just realized this might be ill-advised," he said.


    "Really? Making a boat out of ice is ill-advised?" Her sarcasm should been a thick sludge that covered the ground.


    "We should have put some wooden boards on it," Rian said. "Otherwise we''d slip trying to get on and off. If we plan to use it as a boat, we need to test what happens when we use it as a boat. That means getting on it." He frowned. "Why are you looking at me like that?"


    "You truly want to go through with this?" she said.


    "It''s the best we can do, unless you want to try building a boat out of stone," he said softly. "So far, nothing has come up to say this is a completely bad idea. A risky idea? Sure. Very risky. The boat we use will need to be built with care and planning and you''ll have to keep it full of magic constantly over a long distance so it doesn''t fail, but that just makes it difficult and desperate, not actually bad. We need a boat, and ice is a material we can use thanks to you. Even if the boats we used aren''t made completely of only ice, ice will definitely be a component. It lets us seal gaps in the wood that we have no other way of waterproofing, at the very least."


    Rian gestured at the ice boat. "Look at it. It''s stupid, it looks cold, but it works. It''s clearly floating, after all. If the carpenters build a wooden box to those dimensions, and then we put it inside this, we''d had a functional boat for as long as the ice lasted! And if you do the blood thing, it''ll last for as long as you want it to last. I mean, we''d have to be careful of it bumping into things hard, but that would be true of any boat we make!"


    "We''ve been beaching Lori''s Boat," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, and you have no idea how terrifying I find that, which is why I''m trying to find a way for us to make our own boat," Rian said.


    For a moment, Lori stood in silence, staring at the boat.


    "We need to do this, Lori," Rian said quietly. "We can only put it off for so long. One way or another, we need to go back." A beat. "After all, it''s part of your agreement with River''s Fork."


    Lori twitched. That last comment stung, colors consume him.


    She took a deep breath, let it out in a sigh.


    "Fine," she said. It wasn''t a tired word. It wasn''t particularly resigned. Just¡­ said. "Fine. But we do one last thing first."


    "Which is?"


    "We need to test to see what happens to bound ice outside of the demesne for several days," Lori said.


    Rian winced. "Ah¡­ good point. Yes, let''s definitely do that first. Thinking about it, I really want to know if Iridescence can grow on this¡­ "


    They both looked at the boat, made of solidified water.


    "Yes, let''s definitely test that," Rian repeated vehemently.


    Slowly, Lori nodded, still looking down at the ice boat. "I''ll get some stone. If I put a thin layer on the bottom, that should give you some footing, right?"


    Rian blinked at the abrupt change in subject. "Uh, maybe. Yes, it should as long as it''s rough enough, it think," Rian said. "And thick. Wouldn''t want it to crack under me, after all."


    Lori nodded, still thoughtful. "Let''s get some stone, then¡­"

 107 - Prepare As You Did The Last Time

    The ice boat was¡­ successful. For a given value of success, at any rate. It floated and, despite appearances, it wasn''t actually that cold to the touch, and it didn''t make your skin adhere to it on contact like some really cold ice did. It did become extremely slippery, almost frictionless, when wet, hence why it needed a layer of something to let people maintain their footing.


    They didn''t keep it as a block of ice, of course. Some things had to be added. Struts of bone protruding down to act as stabilizers so it went straight. A mount for a tiller, one bigger and more robust than the one Lori''s Boat had that could be lifted out of the water. A plank had been inserted into the ice to have something to properly secure the tiller to, and more had been put along the top and sides to protect the ice from damage and to give people something to step on for traction.


    They tested the second boat, which Rian had facetiously named ''Lori''s Ice Boat'', several times, using both weights¡ªblocks of stone¡ªand volunteers and then going up and down the river with it a few times, testing the balance and stability. The added weight to the keel seemed to help with the latter, though by observation, the weight needed to be greater and located lower to truly be effective. Still, it allowed them to carry over twenty people at a time, not counting Rian, who operated the tiller. That already made it useful for cutting the number of trips down to River''s Fork in half.


    And Lori did test to see how Iridescence affected the ice boat. Or at least, how Iridescence affected the primary material of the ice boat. She left a block of ice¡ªall dissolved air and as many impurities as she could manipulate removed from it¡ªwith a binding to keep it solid for an extended period of time outside at the border of her demesne. Since she wasn''t doing anything beyond leaving it there, she had left a corner of the block partially inside so she could keep imbuing it as needed. There was a piece of rock, bone, and an offcut of wood sticking out of the sides as well to use as points of comparison, and because those were the most likely materials they would be using in boat building.


    Days later, she was examining that block. While the wood, bone and rock had grown a very unnerving layer of Iridescence, glittering in poisonous colors, the ice was¡­ mostly clear. The top part had a light dusting of iridescence growth, but that looked to be bits that had fallen from trees and was just continuing to crystalize on its own, or possibly around dust particles. It wasn''t growing on the ice so much as on top of it. There also wasn''t any of the sense of thickness that needed to be imbued out on the waterwisps on her binding, confirming there was no penetrative growth.


    Lori carefully picked up the sides and winced as her hand slipped on the smooth surface, bringing her fingers up to brush on the Iridescence crystals growing on the non-ice parts. She drew her hand back instantly, but the damage was done: small, fine bits of color were now sticking on her skin, and while she couldn''t feel the sensation of the Iridescence slowly trapping her body''s wisps, she could recall it fairly clearly from long days when they''d only been allowed to try and wash themselves off twice a day. Fortunately, she only had to step back into the demesne to clear that feeling away.


    "The ice seems normal," she said for Rian to record. "And intact. No Iridescence penetration. Only the non-water solids seem to have been iridiated."


    "Really makes you wonder why humans and animals get iridiated," Rian mused as he wrote. "After all, isn''t meat technically ''mostly dirty water''? Even dead meat seems to ooze a lot."


    "That sort of experimentation was deemed unethical, cruel, dangerous, unsafe and pointless a long time ago," Lori as she once more carefully examined the chunk of ice and material. "Mostly because no matter how Deadspoken the animals and people were to include increasing amounts of water in their bodies, they were still iridiated, and the research was considered a dead end."


    "¡­of course it is," Rian sighed. "So no one ever found out ''why''?"


    "Focus on our own results, Rian," she said. "Ice seems to be viable for long-term use outside of the demesne. Stone and bone, the same." Lori tapped her lips thoughtfully. "Wood might be problematic."


    "Only if it''s exposed to air," Rian said. "If it''s in the ice and the ice isn''t melting, it''s not going to absorb water, and shouldn''t rot because there''s no air."


    "An excellent point," Lori agreed.


    "So will you authorize building the ice boat now? Even if we finish it in a week, which I doubt, we don''t know how long we''ll need to travel to get to Covehold and back, and I''d rather not travel in winter."


    "Yes, yes, I suppose," Lori said. With a touch, the block of ice melted into water, washing out the Iridescence on the samples that had been embedded into it. Lori collected the bone. It was a resource, after all. "Do you have design drafts for one ready?"


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    "I have drawings, but I''ll need them to be looked at by people who actually know how to build things to be sure," Rian said. "And, uh, you''ll need to be there too, since you''re the only one who can make ice."


    "Give me a final design, one we can build," Lori said. "Now come on, I still have more work to do."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori''s Ice Boat did, indeed, manage to get all the miners to River''s Fork and back in only one trip, though unlike Lori''s Boat, they couldn''t beach it because it was deemed too potentially dangerous to the structure, even with planks of wood added the outside as protection and more added inside the ice as reinforcement. Between that and more stone in the keel, it rode lower in the water, but was much more stable. However, its large size and relatively larger displacement meant that the water jet attached to it couldn''t accelerate it to go as fast, since its greater mass meant it would be more difficult to stop.


    But it worked.


    "It''s getting people really excited," Rian reported over dinner the night of the miner shift change. "There''s talk we''ll be building the boat soon, and people are already talking about what they want brought back from Covehold."


    Lori snorted as Umu made her move. "We don''t even have a boat yet."


    Rian shrugged. "They''re excited. Besides, having them think about what the demesne needs is good for us. It means we don''t need to compile the list ourselves, and this way, we have more people doing the thinking, so they''re more likely to think of something that we might overlook."


    "One wonders how they expect us to have the beads for such things," Lori said. While she didn''t intend to buy anything, since the first trip would be for dropping off the exiles and researching market prices and what sold well, she did want Rian to look into the price of raw glass.


    "Let them dream," Rian said. "It''s good to have goals. It''ll encourage people to find and produce trade goods to sell."


    "Ten percent tax if sold," Lori said immediately.


    "I''ll let them know," was the dry reply. "We''ll need to keep meticulous records anyway¡­ but that''s for later, after we come back, possibly not until after winter. By the way, when you''re done eating, I have that design draft you wanted. Want to look it over before I set up a meeting with everyone we''ll need to help build it tomorrow?"


    Lori held out her hand for it. Rian slid the plank in front of him around the end of the sunk board, and she examined it. Good, he''d used paces this time¡­


    It was a long vessel, more than twice as long as Lori''s Ice Boat by the scale, at about twelve paces long and almost half that high. The draft was a bit rough, but Rian had included what parts had to be ice, what parts were wood reinforcement and cladding, and what needed to be primarily wood internal structures. Lori frowned down at something along the bottom of the boat. Were those¡­ pipes?


    "We don''t know how deep the river is, so it needs to be as shallow as possible while still being able to carry some cargo," Rian explained as she continued to look over the design while putting her recent knowledge of ice buoyancy to use to imagine what he meant. "As well as being able to carry at least eight people."


    Lori blinked at that number. "Why eight people?" she asked.


    "Three for our agreement with River''s Fork, four to be able to overpower them, and at least one person to handle the tiller," Rian counted off. He frowned. "Maybe ten would be better, four doesn''t sound like enough. That many people will need food, so that adds to the weight. We''ll need to over-prepare with food, since we don''t know how many days the trip will take, but once we know we can adjust the amount. Still, those eight-to-ten people will need sleeping quarters, a place to wash off Iridescence, a place to heat food, space to pack away things like changes of clothes, and cargo space for everything. That last is important, because it means everything will be a little cramped since space will be valuable. Even with things like beds that fold out of the walls at night so that people can put them away in the morning, we''ll need even more careful planning and placement. And that kind of carpentry will likely be more time consuming."


    Huh. Put that way, that did seem like a lot.


    "I''m sure you and the carpenters can arrange this together," Lori said. "It seems a logical design, but I''m hardly familiar with ship-making beyond my recent experience with your idea. Though I see you designed this with outriggers."


    "Best not to take chances," Rian said. "We know outriggers work and have good stability. They''re also much easier to make than a weighted keel, and don''t actively reduce buoyancy. It''ll make boat wider, but from the look of it that''s not a problem with the river so far, and according to people I''ve talked to, it doesn''t narrow enough downstream to present an issue. "


    "I see you''ve also decided not to make everything out of ice," Lori observed.


    "The most important use of the ice is as a material that''s both waterproof and buoyant," Rian said. "The reason we couldn''t properly make a boat on this scale was a lack of materials to waterproof it. Ice solves that problem, but in retrospect, there''s no reason to skimp out on at least  having a well-constructed wooden frame to act as both impact protection and to anchor all the internal structures. Besides, we can always add more ice on the outside for buoyancy, where it''s less likely to be dead weight than internal structural ice."


    "Then set up the meeting, let''s see what the carpenters think." Lori pushed the plank back towards him. "This is your project, after all. Have you considered who will go on the boat once it''s finished?"


    "We''ll¡­ have to talk about that as well," Rian said, looking aside evasively.


    Lori gave him a level look. "Fine," she said. "Inform the carpenters, smiths, and whoever else you think we''ll need. And prepare as you did the last time." she tapped the plank significantly.


    Rian chuckled at that. "Yes, your Bindership."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Lori woke up next, it was by snapping violently awake knowing a dragon was coming.


    "Oh, rainbows."

 108 - Yes, There Are Still Dragons

    Lori changed quickly, pulling on her clothes and rushing down the stairs from her room, barely remembering to seal the way behind her. It was still dark outside the dungeon, and Lori wondered how long she''d managed to sleep¡­ no, no time for that. She hurried towards the one shelter left, noting that the Um no longer had a line in front of it. Was anyone inside¡­?


    Shaking her head, she reached out and altered the bindings on all her lightwisps, diminishing their glow and leaving only the light of the moons, partially obscured by clouds. She scanned the horizon¡ªwhat she could see of it¡ª trying to find¡­


    She felt it again, that distant sense of a wave being pushed in front of something, and she turned towards it. The horizon was dark¡­ too dark. It seemed a yawning void, deeper than any black she had ever seen¡­


    Lori carefully bound the lightwisps in her eyes, slowly increasing the intensity of what passed through, and the night began to brighten. The clouds almost seemed to glow with colors of moonlight. But not that horizon. It remained dark and terrible and¡­


    Lori felt a shiver run through her as the dark moved, and she was reminded of nothing so much as a hungry tongue licking lips.


    She undid the binding on her eyes and ran for the shelter.


    The shelter had a door, but it was more to keep the heat in than people out, so there was a latch on the outside as well. she fumbled with it for a moment before flipping it up and opening the door. The inside was dark, and she reached her hand out into the moonlight to catch some lightwisps to bind, slapping the binding on her forehead so that the glow would light her way.


    Rian was sleeping closest to the door, on¡­ what appeared to be her old bed. She recognized the marks on the headboard. Did that mean before she''d given up her bed, he''d been sleeping on the floor¡­? No, focus!


    "Rian," she said, not bothering to lower her voice or whisper. "Rian, wake up!"


    Rian groaned. "Go away," he¡­ probably said. He seemed to be using only his throat to communicate, as if enunciating was too much effort.


    "Rian, wake up, we have an emergency," she said sternly.


    "Unless it''s a dragon, go away."


    "It''s a dragon," Lori said.


    Silence.


    The silence continued as Rian sat up, one hand up to block out the light shining from her forehead to look him in the eye. "Really?" he said, actually enunciating this time.


    "Yes." She let him have the time to embrace the implications.


    Matter-of-factly, Rian turned, grabbed his pillow, pressed it against his face, and screamed.


    He did this twice more as Lori began to get impatient.


    "All right," he eventually said. "I''ll get everyone inside, you¡­ I think we don''t have water?"


    Lori nodded. "Get everything that can be moved to the Dungeon moved," she said. "And fix your bedroll."


    "Really? My bedroll?"


    "Do you want to sleep on rock after this? We have a little time."


    "Getting my bedroll!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori claimed and imbued the darkwisps of the night sky of her demesne before she shined the lights again so people could navigate. She tore open the front of the Dungeon to let people get through easily, moving the stone aside so she could rebuild the bulwark later.


    The old reservoir pit was still there, and Lori softened a thin layer of the exposed surface and drew up the stone to revel a new layer of it, to remove anything that had been growing down there. She bound firewisps to heat and sterilize its surfaces, just in case. There was no charred scent of anything getting cooked, so hopefully nothing had grown inside and fallen off when she drew out the stone. Still, perhaps¡­


    No, no time to worry about that. Lori rushed to the river, binding the water to move back to the reservoir.


    Around her, the demesne was waking up. Thankfully, no one panicked, not even the young children. One learned not to panic and just do what you were told when a dragon was coming. People were packing up their belongings and getting it ready to be brought to the Dungeon. An orderly line had formed as they waited for Lori to finish moving water to the reservoir.


    With every passing moment, Lori could feel the dragon''s coming. Every immaterial wave sent a shiver up her back despite her best efforts, made her hairs stand on end. The sky was an impenetrable black dome above, her claimed darkwisps forming a thick shroud, leaving her unable to tell the time.


    With the reservoir filled and the way obstructed to keep people away from contaminating it, she allowed people into the Dungeon.


    They hadn''t practiced, hadn''t drilled, and so many people simply set down their things in the dining hall like last time.


    "No, not up here!" Lori yelled. "Downstairs, all that stuff goes downstairs! One alcove per family, keep all your things down there! Rian!" People winced as she used airwisps to let her voice be heard. She needed Rian to deal with this, she still needed to alter the latrines so that they''d have capacity and build some baths where there was still time and space¡­


    "Your Bindership?"


    She turned and saw¡­ what was his name? Beard¡­ ah, right, Deil! "What?" she demanded.


    "Lord Rian sent me your Bindership, he''s making sure all the blacksmithing tools don''t get left behind," the carpenter said.


    Lori grimaced but¡­ "You''ve set up shop below, correct?" Lori said. At his nod, Lori pointed to the people who just dropped their things at the dining hall. "Get them down there and make sure they put their things in alcoves and not just on the ground. One alcove per family, we need to fit as many people down there as possible. Then stay up here and keep people from just setting up wherever and getting in my way."


    The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    The man nodded. "Yes, your Bindership," he said. He started chivying people. "You heard her Bindership! Downstairs, all of you, one alcove per family. Bring your things, we all eat up here and we can''t do that if you leave them all over the tables! Move, move!"


    Lori turned away, waiting impatiently for some children carrying bedrolls, pillows and blankets to make way so she could head towards the latrines. They''d been altered so that they could be cleaned manually, but from the smell, no one had cleaned them yet. The contents had festered, leaving a¡­. rich aroma. Face set, Lori formed the hole under the latrine into a pit three paces deep, displacing the stone to the side so it would rise somewhere else, which she set aside for later to reverse the alteration. She also set a binding of firewisps inside the receptacle to try and kill the smell and reduce the volume of what was left.


    She left the latrines sizzling, a binding carrying the bad air outside while they still could. Right, now she needed to make a bath¡­


    Waste water, she needed to deal with waste water¡­ she''d been feeding her bath''s waste water into the ground under the farm fields, but she wasn''t sure that would work in this instance¡­ well, no choice. She didn''t have stone to spare, so she picked one of the back corners of the dining hall and began to excavate the ground to about a pace down, using the stone from that to raise walls and form a basin for water. This also meant she didn''t have to worry about water spilling out everywhere. It was small, so people would have to bathe in shifts near constantly, but hopefully it would help people from getting sick. A wall divided the new bath into sides for men and women. And if she had to deal with peeking, she''d just toss them out into the dragon¡­


    All right, that was water, baths and latrines¡­ was there anything else¡­? Lori headed towards the front of the Dungeon, looking around. People were still coming inside, but there were still some milling about outside. She felt at her connection to the wisps, felt voids moving back and forth between buildings¡­


    "Rian!" she called again, her voice amplified by airwisps and making some people standing near her jump.


    A shadow outline near the second dining hall turned and headed towards her. She began moving towards him, not having time to wait, and they met halfway up the slope. "Yes?" he said with what seemed like strained patience.


    "Do you have someone keeping track of all the people coming into the Dungeon?"


    "I have Cassan and Doctor Ganan doing that, and they should have told off the other medics to check too," he said. "The new houses have been emptied and locked down and we''re about finished with the old houses. Everyone in the shelter have moved their things down into the dungeon already and I''ve asked people to go around making sure no one left any fires burning. I''m having the tables and chairs from the second dining hall carried in too, but only after everyone else has gotten inside." He hesitated. "We also need help with the hunters and tanners. Our demesne''s entire store of raw and curing skins are with them, and the brine pots too. The brine pots are important, because it took them weeks to gather them up from seel and beast brains¡­"


    "Change priorities to the skins and brine, then," Lori said. "We can always make more tables." She felt the dragon, coming closer and closer. The air was still, without a breath of wind to it at all, but there was a smell in the air, like charred sweetness¡­ "Put them in front of the metal vaults so no one has to navigate the stairs."


    "That''s where we put the blacksmith stuff, but I think there''s still room," Rian nodded. "What about the wood curing sheds? Do we try to get some down to the Dungeon?"


    "I''ll handle that," Lori said. She hesitated, then raised up a hand, gathering lightwisps to make a binding. "Hold still."


    "What are you¡ª" Rian managed to get out before she reached up and slapped her hand on his head. He might had felt the air thicken strangely before she took her hand away. "Did you just put a light on my head?"


    "Makes you easier to find," she said. Technically, it wasn''t on his head, it was on the airwisps around his head, which she''d bound to stay near his vicinity. Hopefully it wouldn''t come off, she''d bound the air around his temples and down his chin. "Get moving!"


    Lori hiked up towards the curing sheds before pausing a moment. She reached upwards, towards the darkwisps she''d bound and willed them to part to the east.


    No light. It was still night.


    Binding the new darkwisps that had rushed in, she continued on her way.


    The sawpits were clear, and the tool sheds were empty of anything but dust and small offcuts of wood. Thankfully, the curing sheds were in a line all the better for when she had to sit down and maintain her binding to dry the wood for use. For a moment, Lori stared at them, already reconsidering what she wanted to do¡­ then shook her head. If they lost the wood, they lost the wood. This way, at least, they''d have a chance of keeping them.


    The sheds were made of packed earth using her Whispering, the doors made of wood so that the humidity and heat could be controlled while curing. Nothing too hard to replace, given enough time. Out of habit, Lori knelt down, touching her fingers to the earth as she breathed in magic, passing it through her bones, through her nails and into the earth, even as she bound the earthwisp directly under the sheds. She began to displace the earth and stone sideways.


    In front of her, the sheds and their stored wood began to sink into the ground. She did it carefully so that the sheds would stay level, even as she made a heap rise using the displaced earth, formed behind the sinking sheds. She sank them down, deeper and deeper, until they were a pace below the surface. The heap flowed forward, covering the trench the sheds has sunk into, and Lori used it to mark where the sheds were buried.


    The smell of burned sweetness had gotten stronger, making Lori feel strangely hungry as she moved on to the next thing she had to do, passing men and women carrying tables and chairs down from the second dining hall. She sealed the cave where they kept the mushrooms¡ªthey''d already been harvested, so only immature ones were growing, but it was full spore-laden wood, and it would have been annoying to replace¡ªleaving only a small air hole the width of her finger. The bone pile was also sunk beneath the ground and covered. An experiment, she told herself, to see if it helped.


    Rian found her as she was heading back towards the Dungeon, the light on top of his head letting her know he was coming. "There you are! We''re moving the tables and benches from the second dining room, and we''ve already brought down the pots, bowls and utensils. Also, the curing sheds seem to have collapsed. Was that you?"


    "I buried them," Lori said succinctly. "We can try to recover the wood later."


    "Smart. You need to go to sleep."


    Lori blinked at him. "What?"


    "The dragon isn''t here yet, so you need to sleep while you can," Rian said.


    Lori hesitated, staring up at the dark sky, then towards the Dungeon. A waved washed over her, seeming to emphasize the smell of charred sweetness. Reluctantly, she parted it in the direction of the dragon.


    It had crept over the horizon, looking terribly close. The darkness deeper than black made patterns now, not by the light of the moons or lighting, but of deep gradients of nothingness, tracing flickering forks of branching lightning¡­


    "Can you see it?" she said, and found her voice sounded small.


    "I can see it," Rian said, and Lori realized he was staring up as well, his shoulders shaking. "Even though I''m pretty sure it should be physically impossible¡­"


    As they watched, the multitudes of branches seemed to uncurl, reaching out in all directions¡­


    Rian violently shook his head. "I''ll keep an eye on it," he said, a quaver in his voice. "Go to sleep. I''ll wake you up, just keep your door open."


    "I don''t think I''ll be able to¡­" Lori said, swallowing. Why did she feel like it could see her even without eyes¡­


    "Well, you have to try," Rian said, and his voice had a forced harshness in it. "You''ve done everything you can already. Until that gets here, you need to rest to protect us from it. So go and rest."


    Lori closed her eyes¡ªwhy was it burned into her eyelids, even though it hadn''t been bright?¡ªnodded sharply, and stumbled towards her room. Rest¡­ she needed to rest¡­


    She stumbled up her stairs, moving the stone out of the way and sat down on her nice, soft bed. Her hands shook as she took off her boots. The charred sweetness was weaker up in her room, for which she was glad as she lay back onto her pillow.


    She could feel it out there, still coming¡­


    Lori didn''t know how, but she managed to fall asleep. Her dreams were filled with darkness that writhed¡­

 109 - From The Core

    It seemed like Lori had barely closed her eyes before Rian was gently shaking her awake, the light on top of his head shining down on her. "It''s here," he said, even as she felt it, the wave-like feeling practically on top of them¡­


    She sat up, and he handed Lori her boots, which she quickly put on. "Everyone inside?" she asked.


    "Checked four times," Rian said. "We''re all in here. The houses are all empty. Not just people, everything. I had people go back to sleep to cut back on trouble, but they might be waking up soon."


    Lori nodded, got to her feet and grabbed her staff. The familiar feeling of the smooth wood with the length of wire running down it was reassuring. She felt more tired than when she''d laid down, but she supposed that was a sign that she''d actually fallen asleep, if she wanted to go back to bed. "Go ahead, there''s something I need to do."


    Rian nodded tiredly. "Got it. Be quick, all right? The Dungeon''s still wide open, it''s making everyone nervous."


    As he left, Lori concentrated on a spot on the floor of her room, binding the earthwisps there. The ground sank, and she carefully stepped down, planning her feet on the top of the pillar of stone. She tossed her staff down ahead of her, wincing at the clattering sound it made. Slowly, gently, keeping her hands on both sides of the opening for stability, the stone sank further.


    Beneath Lori''s bedroom lay her Dungeon''s core, glowing brightly, filled with wisps and magic. She ignored it, orienting herself. Where was¡­


    She shook her head and picked up her staff, then bound the earthwisps directly under the core. A pillar of stone began to rise, reaching up beneath the core. She touched the core with the metal cap at the end of her staff, and carefully wedged it in place with the pillar, wrapping stone around the end of the pillar to hold it in place. The wire running along the staff''s length felt¡­ warm under her hands. Warm in a way only a wizard could know, warm like a bound tool with a wisp bead¡­


    She really hoped this worked.


    Then she went to the wall closest to the other end of the staff and bound the earthwisps there, making a small hole.


    That done, she went back upstairs to her room, sealing the way behind her.


    She hurried down the stairs, where the strange charred sweet smell still lingered, and slowed as she saw the dining hall. It was full of people holding spears. Not the stone and tooth-tipped spears she''d made before, but spears that gleamed with steel points. Many were holding them level to the ground, the point towards the entrance. Someone had also carried Lori''s Boat inside and had laid it on top of a table. The other one¡­ she checked. It was still in the water, probably too slippery to get a grip on. Well, she could always make a new one¡­


    "Rian, why are people armed?" she asked flatly.


    "In case of abominations," Rian said.


    "It''s not over the demesne yet," Lori said.


    "Well, we can''t know that, can we?" Rian shrugged.


    An excellent point, which she would ignore. "Step back from the entrance," she said, her awareness reaching out and beginning to bind earthwisps in the stone. She began to seal off the dungeon, rebuilding the walls she had opened and adding in stone from the pile outside the entrance. She even drew stone from the area in front of the dungeon to add to the thickness, making a bulwark against the dragon''s rage. Then she carefully opened slits for air to come in and circulate, making sure they curved as they entered the Dungeon so that it would be more difficult for dragonborn abominations to come inside. She also remembered to seal off the kitchen''s exhaust vents, closing them off completely. No point risking a point of entry.


    People visibly relaxed as the Dungeon closed off, spears rising up. One of the spearwomen was Riz, Lori recognized.


    "Rian, arrange for shifts to keep dragonborn abominations from getting into the Dungeon," Lori said as she began binding airwisps in the air slits, having them pull air in. Between that and the already existing ventilation of the dungeon, they shouldn''t have trouble breathing. "As long as we need air, they have a way in. I need to prepare the defenses against the dragon¡ª" She felt a wave, and it was right there. "It''s here."


    Lori closed her eyes, letting her consciousness out into the dome of darkwisps outside, the black of the night that she''d captured. Already, magic from the dragon was starting to wear it away. Distantly, there were sounds of people talking, but she tuned them out, focusing on what was important. She began imbuing the darkwisps even as she pulled them, presenting a dark dome almost the size of her whole demesne, claimed for this very purpose.


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    While she wouldn''t be able to perceive as much of the dragon''s manipulations early on, it would hopefully keep her demesne from being devastated by much more than falling rocks and strange substances. Ugh, she hoped it didn''t start dumping acid or poison gas on them. It rarely happened, but the charred sweet smell¡­ it seemed vaguely familiar, but she couldn''t place it¡­


    She stood there, imbuing the dark outside the Dungeon even as the dragon wore away at her dome. Thoughts and vistas tried to claw and twist, but they affected only empty air thanks to her dome. Lori pushed power into her darkness, kept on pushing despite the relentless forces upon it and bit by bit, she managed to fill it to give herself some time.


    Lori opened her eyes, finally hearing what was going on around her. The shifts were being divided, and Rian was trying to figure out how to cook food with their limited air. Lori walked past a surprised Riz, heading towards the wall that hid her core. Where was the hole, where was the hole¡­


    Ah, there it was. She put one finger next to it as she closed her eyes again, sending her awareness back to the darkwisps she''d bound above. She imbued even as she reshaped the darkwisps, pulling a tendril towards and into the Dungeon. Lori stood there, tapping her finger next to the hole to remind herself where it was as she her eyes hovered between closed and open, seeing though a wavering slit between her eyelids. The pure black of the darkwisps¡ªwhich still seemed far brighter than the dragon had been¡ªstreamed through some of the air slits, and she raised one hand lazily as if trying to wave the darkwisps into the hole.


    She really hoped this worked.


    "Uh, Binder Lori?" a voice tried to distract her, but she ignored it, focusing on what she was doing. "What''s happening?"


    "Quiet," she said, trying not to get distracted. The darkwisps streamed through the hole and into the core. She needed them to touch the metal on her staff¡­ one would think it would work to touch the core itself, but no, apparently it didn''t work that way¡­


    There. Was that it? Needing to divide her attention so many ways made her wish she''d learned how to do Mentalism already. Well, at least she could stop tapping her finger¡­ She kept imbuing the darkwisps above in the way she''d already become used to as a Dungeon Binder, as she tried to do it in a way she''d only done twice to see if it could actually work¡­


    She hadn''t had enough wire, after all.


    The Dungeon Core contained power, all the magic that she had available to her as the Dungeon Binder. Just as the core of her self acted as the center of her body, where the magic she breathed in flowed only to course through her and out into the world, so did the Dungeon Core act as the center of the demesne, letting the magic it held flow through the wisps within its borders. She had learned to draw power from the core through her, and through the very demesne itself.


    At its heart however, the core was magic. Solidified magic attuned to wisps, smooth as glass, hard and nigh unbreakable¡­ Just like a bead. One that didn''t run out.


    All she had to do was pull/push¡­


    There!


    Lori opened her eyes and sighed in relief as she felt power from the core filling the darkwisps as if she''d allowed another Whisperer to override her claim¡­ only she still claimed and controlled it¡­ No, no, no time to waste trying to describe new and strange feelings. She''d managed to finally use a wire with her core on one end and a binding shoved into the other to create a pseudo-bound tool that would never run out of magic! It something she''d been trying to build¡ªand lazily (and now guiltily) putting off¡ªsince the first time she''d had to defend her demesne from a dragon. It had been a thought lurking in the back of her mind as she tried to get her hands on wire.


    It had been a way for her to sleep next time a dragon tried to ravage her demesne.


    Her spine wanted to soften and her limbs to collapse like a piece of underwear with its tie strings cut, and for a moment she was tempted to let it¡­


    No. There were still things to do. No one had eaten yet, and the water in the reservoir was inaccessible for drinking or washing. She had to fix that. It was good that this had worked, or else she''d have needed to try to attend to those things in bursts while keeping track of the darkwisps above¡­


    The thickness of the wire seemed to be allowing a decent rate of draw from the core, despite it being untarnishing steel instead of gold. It was at least managing to maintain the level of imbuement on the darkwisps despite the dragon''s depredations. She could fill imbue it faster¡­ but she''d need to pay attention to it¡­


    "Rian!" she called out.


    "No need to shout, I''m right here," he said from directly behind her.


    She did not jump, no matter what anyone said. She came to attention and turned in a commanding fashion. "We''ll need food and water. The pipes I once used probably aren''t clean enough to use now, but I''ll take care of that later. I need some people to get started on breakfast so we can all eat."


    "That would be very nice, yes," Rian nodded. He nodded towards Riz, standing nearby. "Riz, stay with her Bindership and help her find people for what she needs, which in this case is starting breakfast, so after that go down and get the kitchen crew. I''ll stay here and take charge of making sure nothing gets in through our airholes." He was wearing his sword, she realized. It was, she supposed, a mark of the seriousness of the situation.


    "Yes, Lord Rian," she said, nodding sharply.


    "I thought we''d talked about that?"


    Lori resisted the urge to roll her eyes at this childishness as Riz looked like she was trying to keep from blushing. "Ah, sorry L¨C Rian."


    "Find me those people," Lori said blandly.


    "Yes, Great Binder!" she scuttled off, still carrying her spear.


    Lori turned to Rian. "Try not to get the air slits clogged, we need them."


    "No promises. It''ll depend on how small and aggressive they are."


    Outside the dungeon, there was a throaty sound like something was trying to breathe and not doing it very well. Then another. And another.


    "I leave that to you," Lori said blandly. "Yell if you can''t deal with it. Try to do it before they break in."


    She headed for the reservoir at the back to get water as Riz headed down to the second level where people were staying.


    Outside, the dragon remained silent even as she heard the strange cries getting too close to their air slits.

 110 - Timekeeping

    The Dungeon was different from the last time a dragon had passed. For one thing, it was lit now.


    In the meantime, while that was being done, Lori filled one of the pots with water for the morning stew¡ªif it wasn''t morning already, it would be soon¡ªand set down bindings to radiate heat, Riz following her as ordered and going off to look for people if Lori needed it. It was a simple combination of lightwisps, to define the area you most definitely shouldn''t stick your hand in, and firewisps to heat whatever was put in it. She really hoped no one burned themselves to the bone, since this dragon was probably going to kill Shanalorre¡ªand Lori''s miners with her¡ªbut, well¡­


    She chose to look on the profiting column of the ledger: she''d now be able to claim River''s Fork''s core, assuming she could find wherever it was buried, which would greatly ease extraction of metals once she''d bound it to her and she could use Whispering freely there. To do that, however, she and her demesne had to survive as well.


    Lori had boiled the water in the reservoir before she''d sent it to the kitchen, so it should be clean enough to drink, and as breakfast was being prepared she redirected the pipes of the kitchen spigots to lead to the reservoir, while sealing off the old pipes in case anything tried to crawl through there. She also filled the trough in the new baths and heated the water. While she still needed to make a better reservoir, these baths she was inclined to keep this time, even if she would only open them for emergencies.


    By the time breakfast was ready, the Dungeon was under siege.


    A group of former militia armed with spears stood in front of the air vents under Rian''s direction, their spears half inserted into the slits as they killed and pushed out dragonborn abominations trying to get inside. There were noticeably a lot more dragonborn abominations trying to get into the Dungeon this time than there had been before. The charred, sweet smell became intensely nauseating, and Lori was finally able to place what it was: dragonborn blood, exploding into heat and boiling as it left their bodies. Not all had it but some with bodies that seemed to run more on magic than life, the most twisted and strange, were filled with the stuff. The bottoms of the air slits and the floor in front of it was becoming caked in the substance, a thick, syrupy liquid the color of burned gold that still bubbled with inner heat.


    The spearheads were equally coated in the golden dragonborn blood. Fortunately, it didn''t seem to overly impair their use.


    "Rian, breakfast," Lori said.


    "I''ll eat later!" he said, not looking back at her.


    "You have been awake even longer than I have been," Lori said. "And I''m hungry. You will eat now so you can arrange for a change in shifts and so we can plan long-term. Now get over here."


    Rian finally glanced towards her, a frustrated look on his face, but nodded. He turned to a nearby man. "Take over, Kolinh," he said. "I''ll be back."


    "Take your time, Lord Rian," the man said, looking almost bored. Wasn''t he an engineer? "We''ll be here when you get back."


    "I really, really hope so," Rian said fervently. He stepped away and, to Lori''s amusement, rested the spear on the makeshift rack the children put their seeling rods, which had been moved aside when the Dungeon had been opened up. Rian fell in next to her as they began heading for their table. "Please tell me you didn''t just call me to get your food for you."


    Lori frowned at him. "Of course not," she said. "But yes, go get the food. No, we need to schedule. At least one of us needs to be up at any given time, meaning the other needs to be sleeping while that happens. I''ve had my sleep, so after breakfast I want you to lie down so you can take over when it''s my turn to rest. "


    "I''m still good for a while longer," Rian said, looking stubborn.


    Lori gave him a level look. "I am not asking you to sleep, I am ordering you to sleep. You already told some of them to go and rest, didn''t you?" There had been much fewer people in front of the air slits than there had been when she''d come down after Rian had woken her up. "I had Riz find one of the waterclocks from the Um that were moved in here. I''m filling that with water after breakfast, and when it goes empty, Riz has orders to find you and get you to go to sleep. I suggest you set up your bedroll somewhere quiet before then."


    Rian frowned, opened his mouth¡­ then sighed. "All right, fine, fine, I get it." He rubbed at his eyes, then winced, staring down at them. "No need to send Riz at me, that would be a waste of a spear. Do we have any wash water?"


    "Use a wet cloth," Lori said. "Even if our water isn''t limited, the waste water disposal is very rudimentary." She titled her head thoughtfully. "I should probably make an evaporation chamber after this, so we can reuse the water¡­"


    Rian sighed. "I suppose I should probably find my towel then."


    He headed off, presumably to find his towel to wash his hands with. Lori headed for their usual table, already pondering their problems even as she compulsively checked on the darkwisps outside over the demesne. Still holding and filling with magic from the core, she was relieved to find. All around her, the tables were sparsely populated for now. While the food was ready, a lot of people were still asleep, and Lori had given orders, via Riz, to those awake that everyone who were still asleep were to not be disturbed so as to limit the number of people moving around and making a fuss. The ones who were up were all already eating, possibly to beat the inevitable rush. Lori sat down and waited for Rian to come back, probably with his hands washed and hopefully with food. The little waterclock was already there where she''d left it.


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    So, they had wash water, they had drinking water¡ªas soon as she boiled it again to make sure¡ªthey had latrines that she''d have to clean out herself because they were so deep¡­ ah, she''d have to put a binding of airwisps to keep the smell inside. Not on the seat itself, but halfway down, or else the rising pressure from the slow increase of matter would be¡­ explosive. She''d also have to clear out the air slits of the things that couldn''t just be pushed out. Having to breathe air that passed over dead, decaying things¡­ no, not safe. They might get sick. She''d do it after breakfast, they had time. What else? What else¡­ what else¡­ what else¡­?


    Oh, she should probably seal off the reservoir again, so that no one could contaminate it. In fact¡­


    Lori close her eyes and, after ascertaining there were no voids in the passage leading up to it¡ªor in the water itself, she was glad to note¡ªdid just that, binding the stone on either side to pinch the passage shut. Then she sent her awareness through the pipes, checking for conspicuous voids of wisps that would indicate life that shouldn''t be there, like moss or bugs. Thankfully, there was nothing, but she should have remembered she could do this sooner.


    All right, water: protected.


    She paused, then closed her eyes and added a little hump at ground level across the entire passage, so that no fluids spilled along the passage would be able to just continue to the reservoir. There. Now it was completely protected.


    When she opened them again, Rian was across from her, sitting down with two bowls of stew in his hands.


    "I wasn''t sleepy," Lori informed him. "I was using Whispering."


    "I didn''t say anything," Rian said, putting the bowls down. Lori picked one and started to eat. It was nice and warm and flavorful, and tasted strongly of mushrooms today. And no blue gourd, which Rian was probably glad for.


    They both settled down to eat in silence. Lori, for her part, was hungry, and Rian seemed the same. He''d been awake longer than her, after all. Unless he''d managed to find a fruit to snack on, the hunger must have gnawed at him for longer than it had her.


    "All right," Lori said, her bowl half empty. "Long term plans. I have the water clock we use in the Um to count how long people can use the rooms for. It''s marked for an eighth of a day and as close as we can calibrate to an hour. We''ll have three shifts of militia at the air slits, each to run for five-eighths of a day and a bit each. That way people have time to eat, rest and sleep. The entrance isn''t very wide, so it doesn''t need a lot of people at a time. You and I, meanwhile, will both be awake for at least a day each, with some overlap to discuss, so that someone will always be in charge at the time."


    "Why are we measuring things in eighths of a day instead of hours? That''s what you say when you''re trying to tell time with the sun."


    "Because it''s a water clock Rian, it''s not some sort of precision time piece running on springs and gears." Her tone and gaze were flat as she explained this obvious fact. "The hour calibration is just a guess, while we can be pretty sure about how long an eighth of a day is on average, and is thus closer to being accurate. And is the exactness of our timekeeping really an issue?"


    "Right, sorry. Who''ll be watching the time?"


    "I had Riz go find someone," Lori said. "It will be their only job. We can find someone else once they have to go to sleep."


    Rian nodded. "Okay, we can''t keep people running for all that time. Better if we have a shift change every eighth of a day, with every change a fresh group, as well as an emergency reserve of everyone else who''s awake. Five-eighths of a day is about six and a quarter hours, and no one can keep fighting for that long non-stop."


    Lori swallowed her mouthful. She''d been eating while he was talking. "They''re just standing there and poking with sticks," Lori pointed out.


    "And if you keep doing that while in a state of focus, concentration and controlled panic, you''d be exhausted in a hour too," Rian retorted. "Trust me, we need shorter shifts, and more of them. No, what''s important is we have a day group and a night group. The day group can sit next to the active shift and be an emergency reserve if something really bad happens, the night group can sleep in¡ª"


    "Like you''re going to," Lori emphasized by pointing with her spoon.


    Rian nodded. "¡ªlike I''m going to so I can lead them when you go to sleep. Same setup, active shift and emergency reserve. We use the hour marker and people take turns, but no one does two shifts in a row, and they take three shifts to rest before they cycle in again."


    Lori nodded. "Write that down and set it up before going to sleep. I''ll give you an eighth of a day."


    "You''re giving me paperwork before I go to sleep so I''m nice and sleepy?" Rian said, a sardonic smile playing on his lips.


    Sure, she''ll go with that.


    "Sure, let''s go with that," she said, a small smile on her lips.


    "Um, Great Binder? Is this who you''re looking for?"


    Lori turned. Riz was there, standing respectfully at attention. Next to her was the brat. "Excellent. Go and get the other two, and then come back so you can have breakfast while you can."


    Riz blinked. "The other two, Great Binder?"


    Lori rolled her eyes then pointed to either side of Rian. "Yes, the other two. They should be awake by now. If not, then just come back and eat."


    Riz stared at her for a moment, looking surprised, but she recovered herself. "Yes, Great Binder," she said crisply, then turned and headed back down to the second level with a resigned look on her face. The woman had been going up and down those stairs all morning. It wasn''t Lori''s fault people were still asleep!


    "They have names, you know," Rian said dryly. "They''ve been sitting in front of you for weeks, you should know their names by now." Lori resisted the urge to retort that she already knew them better than he did. It was difficult, but she managed to keep it unvocalized.


    Ignoring him, Lori turned towards the brat. "Karina," she said, "I have a job for you." She gestured towards the water clock. "I need you to keep time for me."


    "You don''t have to accept," Rian interjected, "but it would be very helpful if you did."


    Lori glared at him, but nodded to confirm she accepted the amendment.


    The brat looked between her and Rian. "What do you need me to do, Wiz Lori?"

 111 - Day Shift

    The brat had been given a bucket of water and admonished not to drink from it, another bucket to catch the water that dripped out, some stones to count how many times the waterclock had gone empty, and orders to yell out the time before refilling the water clock. Lori had her sit where the people guarding the air slits could hear her but not be close enough to distract her. The brat had sat down, head bowed to stare at the fired pot, a binding of lightwisps at the bottom shining to help her make out the level of the water and the flowing stream easier.


    "She''d probably going to sit like that all day if you hadn''t told her she could take latrine breaks," Rian commented.


    "Good," Lori said bluntly. "I don''t want her getting distracted and losing track of time."


    "For someone who''s so concerned about their wellbeing, you sure give the children a lot of work."


    "I''ll compensate her," Lori said irritably. "Don''t you have scheduling to do?"


    "Don''t you have someone to talk to?" he retorted.


    "Do your work and go to sleep."


    When she returned to the table, she found Riz eating there, with two sleepy-looking weavers sitting next to her. That was a good sign. The two blinked at her, hesitantly making to stand before Lori waved them to sit back down.


    "All right," she said without preamble. "Do you have enough materials to weave?"


    "W-what?" Umu said, rubbing her eyes.


    "Weaving," Lori repeated impatiently. "You brought in the ropeweed fibers, did you not? Are there enough dry fibers for you to work?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," Mikon said, managing to compose herself. "We have enough dry retted fiber for spinning, at the very least."


    Lori nodded. "People need to be occupied so they don''t get into trouble. Everyone else is to get their alcoves properly organized. Things neatly stacked, nothing in anyone''s way. Then organize as many people as possible to start spinning, play board games, and keep the ones keeping dragonborn abominations out of the Dungeon fed and watered." She checked the dome. Still complete, still whole, still being imbued. Good. "Everyone needs to be occupied so they don''t do something stupid, like make trouble or play music."


    "W-what''s wrong with music?" Umu managed to ask.


    "It''s loud, pointless, annoying, and it keeps me from sleeping," Lori said flatly. Dragon shelter parties were the worst. "No music."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Umu said meekly.


    "It will take time to set up, your Bindership," Mikon said. "We can get the other weavers and the spinners working, but I''m not sure everyone else will listen to us."


    Ah. Right.


    "Fine, I''ll have Rian tell them before he goes to sleep and you can just keep them going," Lori said. "Riz, when you finish eating, find Rian and tell him, then come find me again."


    Riz swallowed the spoonful she was eating. "Yes, Great Binder." She started eating faster.


    Lori glanced towards the air slits, frowning as she concentrated on her awareness of wisps. "You two have breakfast," Lori told them. "I''ll be back."


    She stood, heading for the Dungeon''s entrance.


    The air slits had clogged. Now that the abominations were dead, they weren''t complete voids anymore, but since all that was supposed to be in the air slits was, well, air, the dragonborn''s corpses were obvious. Still, she couldn''t clear them while people had spears stuck inside them. They might lose the spearheads.


    "Back away," she said as she approached the air slits, binding the earthwisps making up the stone. The thick, syrupy golden blood was thick on the ground and dripping from the openings. "I''ll clear it so we can get more air."


    "You heard the Great Binder," the man Rian had spoken to¡ª Kolinh?¡ªsaid. "Back away, back away, let her work!"


    It wasn''t smooth, but it was vaguely coordinated as the two ranks of militia stepped back, pulling their spears out of the slits, each dripping with blood. Lori immediately had the earth slide and flow. The surface of the stone roiled and slid, moving towards the outside as fresh new stone that had filled the inside of the slits flowed out, showing a new, clean face. The movement was vaguely organic, like an undulating tongue, but it dumped corpses and blood outside. Those that became lodged inside were pushed out by little fingers of stone that protruded from the surface of the rock and interlocked to sweep them out, sometimes accompanied by a wet, bony snap.


    Outside, strange cries called through the strange silence that still lingered, broken only by occasional too-brief gusts of wind, of loud crashing sounds as of falling rock, and the sounds of things falling from the air slits. Soon, the air slits became clear, and Lori rebuilt them, the stone slits forming into shape once more, slightly less bloody, and now with more air flowing through them again. She made the slits narrow even as she added more of them, hoping to make it too small for the abominations to enter. "Done," she announced as she added little fingers of stone in places to act as obstructions for beasts trying to get in. The curve she''d given it, she realized, had prevented the spearmen from pushing the dragonborn abominations all the way out.


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    "You heard the Great Binder, back into position!" Again, their movements weren''t smooth, but there was no jostling or getting in anyone''s way as the ranks of spearmen stepped back into place, spearhead just slightly outside of the openings as Lori double-checked the bindings of airwisps pulling fresh air in, and the stream of darkwisps that connected the dome outside to the core. Both were intact, though the opening was now too narrow for the spears to poke into.


    "Someone go and find the shovels," Lori ordered as she added glowing lightwisps inside the slits to outline anything trying to make its way inside. "Anything getting in through that will be too small to be dealt with using spears. Hopefully this means fewer things get in, though."


    "Tovvy, you heard the Great Binder, go! The shovels should be downstairs somewhere," Kolinh said. One of the men fell out of line, handing his spear, useless as it was, to another man standing nearby, who took it and his place in line


    "Next time, call me if the air slits become significantly obstructed," Lori said. "Getting air in is slightly more important than keeping abominations out."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Kolinh said.


    "As soon as Rian gets back organizing the rest you should be changing shifts so you can eat and get some rest as well."


    "Looking forward to it, Great Binder. We''ll yell if the air gets blocked again."


    Lori nodded. She suspected she''d be responding to a lot of yelling the rest of the day. She''d have to think of a better configuration for the air slits before it was her turn to sleep.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Rian finally came back after declaring the shift schedule had been organized and would start as soon as the brat called out the first eighth of a day, he''d looked mildly exasperated when told he also had to organize everyone to start tidying up their alcoves¡ª"At least let it wait until after they''ve had breakfast!"¡ªand then get them to do something so they''d be out of the way and out of trouble.


    "Don''t you think they can work out that they''re supposed to do that by themselves?" Rian said tiredly. He was sitting next to Umu since the three had already been sitting down together. It was the farthest he''d ever sat from Lori while sharing the same table.


    "No," Lori said bluntly. "It''s far more likely some idiots start playing music and all this becomes a dragon shelter party."


    "I''m pretty sure it''s not sundown yet¡ª"


    "There will be no music. Arrange it."


    "Is this your cunning plan to get me so tired I actually do fall asleep?"


    Lori gave him a flat look, then ignored him. "Riz, take a nap," she said. "I''ll wake you if I need anyone and you can properly go to sleep when I do."


    "I¡­ can?" Riz said.


    "Yes. You''re my temporary Rian right now."


    Both Riz and Rian got a strange look on their face.


    "You mean temporary Lady, right?" Rian said.


    "I said what I meant. Get to work before the eighth of the day is up, Rian. Riz, nap while I don''t need you. That''s an order."


    "Yes, Great Binder¡­?" Riz said, looking very confused. She looked down at the table and hesitantly began folding her arms in front of her to lay her head down.


    "You can lay your head on my lap if you want," Mikon offered as she ate her breakfast. "I''m more comfortable than the table. Just let me finish."


    "You''re supposed to be doing something," Lori said.


    "Most people are still asleep, your Bindership," Mikon said. "Surely it''s best to wait until after breakfast, so they''ve fed and watered and are more amiable?"


    Lori gave her a flat look. "Fine. After breakfast."


    "That''s very kind of you to offer, Mikon," Rian said.


    Lori couldn''t help herself. "If she''d made you the offer, you''d have just said she didn''t have to, gotten embarrassed and acted awkward and ungrateful."


    "Well, I can''t stay here, I have to go and get the awake people organized to start tidying their alcoves after breakfast," Rian said hastily. He slid off the bench and headed down towards the second level. There was a rising murmur of conversation there, as of people trying to be quiet but the acoustics were against them and all the talking was building up to a din.


    Lori wished she had something more to eat, but alas she was full. Sighing, she got to her feet as well. "Riz, nap. Mikon, Umu, after breakfast."


    "Yes, your Bindership/Great Binder," the three said, not at all like a chorus. They overlapped quite dissonantly, really. As she walked away, Mikon moved down the bench a little, looking at Riz and patting her lap with a smile.


    Slowly, the day, such as it was, began.


    The brat eventually called the first eighth of the day, and Rian barely managed to get his last-moment assignment finished in time. Despite everyone being told to put their things downstairs, Rian had stashed his things at the entrance to the vault corridor. Rather than waste time trying to get him into one of the alcoves downstairs¡ªLori suspected none were left unoccupied¡ªLori just had him sleep in the hallway leading to her room¡ªafter she sealed off the room itself, of course. She even dispelled the lightwisps illuminating the hall so it wouldn''t be bright.


    While the kitchen had spigots to control the water coming from the reservoir, the bath had no such control, and so Lori had to go between the baths to refill the water¡ªpeople were being annoyingly wasteful with it, in her opinion¡ªclearing the air slits, and building better defenses outside the Dungeon. Clearly this dragon was creating more and more aggressive abominations, so she had to make it harder for them to reach the air slits. When she concentrated on her awareness of the wisps, there was a disturbing amount of voids falling on her demesne.


    She had to build the new defenses unseen, but that was almost commonplace now, considering the amount of pipes she''d made up to this point. Creating a basic moat in front of the dungeon, especially a pit beneath the air slits, was simple in comparison. She displaced the stone onto the bulwark in front of the Dungeon to make it thicker, and in the process raising the air slits three paces above the bottom of the moat. That helped keep abominations away significantly as they avoided the deep pit there.


    Just in case this eventually proved insufficient, she also put a binding of airwisps over the pit to keep the air in and set a binding of firewisps at the bottom to cook anything that fell in there should the abominations become more aggressive again. Hidden under the dome of darkwisps over her demesne¡ªwhich was still holding, she was glad to see¡ªLori didn''t have to worry about the bindings being worn away or affected by the dragon.


    As the day progressed¡ªthe brat called the second and third eighth of the day¡ªit seemed the pit was sufficient, which meant she didn''t have to clean the air slits after the fourth time, and they were able to keep getting fresh air, albeit air that smelled of charred sweetness. Given how the smell was from the blood of the abominations boiling once it left their bodies, they probably didn''t have to worry about dustlife riding in the air. Unless it was twisted, unnatural dragonborn dustlife, in which case they were dead already because she didn''t know enough¡ªor any at all, really¡ªDeadspeaking to deal with the things.


    Lori had lunch as the brat called the fourth eighth of the day. She certainly felt hungry enough for it to have been half a day.


    Another half a day to go. She could do this. She''d done it before.


    ¡­


    Perhaps she should plunge the Dungeon into darkness again, she didn''t remember people being this loud last time¡­

 112 - Into the Night Shift

    Lori managed to resist the urge to plunge the Dungeon into darkness again. She didn''t need any more darkwisps, after all.


    The militia and assorted people Rian had scheduled kept watch over the air slits, occasionally killing the few dragonborn abominations that now managed to make their way in. They seemed to be flying bug-derivatives of some sort, and hot golden dragonborn blood and greenish bug blood intermixed before Lori pushed them out.


    With defenses and necessities secured and handled, Lori made sure people were staying out of trouble. She wasn''t Rian, able to get people to settle down with that stupid smile and a few words. She settled for walking around with a glare of disapproval and Riz at her back. Fortunately, people seemed to be staying put. Many people had been drafted to spin thread for the weavers, but they all seemed to be enthusiastic or at least relaxed about it, seeming almost idle except for their fingers, which were moving deftly as they used distaff and spindle to turn the ropeweed into something usable.


    The second level was also tidy, save around the carpenters, who were busy working with some of the few piece of wood they''d brought in the day before. To keep themselves occupied, they were building the waterwheel for the lathe that she''d promised them. There was an almost relaxed air to the work as they worked with more care. To her eye, however, they were moving only slightly slower than they had been when building the other waterwheel.


    "A bigger lathe is nice," one said to the other carpenters nearby as he carefully chiseled out joints where the wood was going to slide together, "but we already have one. Do you think we can try building a saw of some kind instead, to make cutting easier? A waterwheel can power one too, if we make the gears right."


    "We''d have to get the saw made first, you know that," another said. He was carefully chiseling out holes in a round piece of wood. "Unless you have some of those stashed away?"


    "Maybe this dragon will drop so much iron that her Bindership will let us have one made?" another said wistfully. He was gently marking pieces of wood with a small chisel, making shapes that would be carved out later.


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said as she passed, ignoring how they jerked in surprise. Fortunately, no one was injured. Really, they should be more aware of their surroundings, they were working with sharp objects!


    She checked the corner where the stone pots where the seeds were planted under constantly shining lightwisps. The hairy blueball seeds had budded, little shoots of green poking out of the mix of dirt, sawdust and rotten leaves. The pink ladies, however, were still just lying there. Argh, what had Rian done wrong? This had been his idea, right? Next to the pots was a pile of what looked like uprooted crops from the field, dirt still caking the roots. It was a small fraction of what had been planted, but she was glad someone had thought to try and save it. While it wouldn''t be enough to feed anyone, it might be enough to start a proper crop again. She was fairly confident that with the darkness, their crops wouldn''t be twisted by the dragon, but if scales fell on them¡­ or if dragonborn abominations demolished them¡­


    She might have to start that underground planting area after all.


    "They need cold, Great Binder."


    Lori blinked, realized someone was talking to her. She looked sideways at Riz. "What?"


    Riz swallowed. "The pink ladies," she pointed. "They need cold before they can bud."


    Lori frowned. She''d stored them in her private cold room. "How cold?"


    "They need to be buried and cold for at least two months, Great Binder, though three months is better," Riz explained. "They need to think they were buried in the ground over the winter to finally bud and grow."


    Ah. So Rian HAD been doing it wrong!


    Distantly, she heard the brat call the time. That would be the¡­ seventh, right? Dinner would be soon, then.


    "How cold does it need to be?" she asked.


    "It''s winter, Great Binder," Riz said as if explaining something obvious. "Cold enough for ice and snow."


    She might have to build a cold room for this¡­ well, later. Being in a pot probably wasn''t hurting it right now.


    Lori continued her rounds. Fortunately, no one was bathing anymore, so she was able to clear away the stagnant pools of water into the drain and try to level the floor a little to keep it from happening again. At least the floor of the bath was lower than the rest of the floor, so she didn''t have to worry about too much about the water spilling out. Then she emptied the water basin¡ª"Riz, tell people to be more careful while bathing so they don''t get soap in the water everyone is using!"¡ªbefore refilling it again from the reservoir and heating it to a suitable temperature.


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    The water they had stored in the reservoir was holding. At the current rate, they might be able to last for a week. Hopefully it wouldn''t take that long. They had enough food, right? They could access the winter stores if needed, since that cold room was in the Dungeon, but hopefully that wouldn''t be needed, the kitchen stores should be enough.


    Perhaps it would be best to gather more food after the dragon passed. They needed more surplus and a buffer against dragons and other emergencies¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was in the middle of dinner when the brat called the final eighth of the day.


    "Riz, would you go and wake up Rian, presuming he hasn''t been disobeying orders and awake already?" Lori said. "He should have been sleeping in the hallway leading to my room, up the stairs. "


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said across from her, picking up her bowl and spoon and eating as she walked away. The woman looked a bit less tired than Lori, since she''d been having little naps through the day while Lori had been changing the bath water and checking the dome. Still, she was clearly sleepy.


    This was a sharp contrast to all the other militia who had collected near the air slits, which despite a lack of music and booze, and only having the same food as everyone else, had the air of a party to them. A lot of board games had found their way there, and while they didn''t talk too loudly, the sound seemed to carry, making them feel loud, even if Lori could just barely hear them over the background hum of a subdued dinner crowd.


    Across from her, Umu and Mikon slowed their eating, Mikon actually stopping entirely. Why were they¡­? Were they waiting for Rian so he could eat with them? Lori rolled her eyes and went back to eating.


    The day''s sleep had apparently restored Rian to his usual mood, because he immediately tried to be funny.


    "You''re eating?" he said. "Did you finally learn how to get your own food?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Don''t be silly. My temporary Rian got it for me."


    "You''re still using my name as a noun?-!" He blinked, then frowned. "Or is it a title?"


    "It''s a temporary posting for the duration of the emergency. Go get food so I can tell you what needs to be done so I can go to sleep."


    "Ah, working immediately. Fine, fine, I''ll get on it your Bindership¡­"


    Lori finished her food by the time Rian got back, and she immediately got to business as he ate. "All right. Before I go to sleep, I''ll refill the water at the baths. Hopefully not many people will need to bathe tonight, so that should last you the night. The new defenses in front of the Dungeon have reduced the amount of abominations trying to get in, but if there''s a sudden surge that suddenly blocks the air slits, wake me. I''ll leave making arrangements for who''s going to do the cooking through the night up to you, since the kitchen staff have been up all day, and if you want them to make any food for midnight, you should do so before they go to sleep. Also, Karina will need to sleep soon, so you''ll need to find someone to take over time-keeping duties. Do you understand?"


    "Don''t take too many baths, call you if we can''t breathe, deal with midnight lunch, find someone to keep time," Rian repeated.


    "Also, you''ve been planting the pink ladies wrong," Lori added.


    Rian blinked. "I have?"


    "Apparently they need to be kept cold to bud. Riz can give you further details," she shrugged. Was there anything else¡­? "Don''t forget to make sure everyone is sleeping properly so they''re not causing trouble."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he nodded. For a moment, he was quiet. "So, we''re not in danger?"


    "Of course we''re in danger, there''s a rainbows colored dragon above us," Lori said flatly, pointing upwards. She checked the dome of darkness again. Good, still being imbued, still subtly ahead of the wear the dragon was inflicting upon it. "At best, no one in here is doing anything that will get the rest of us killed."


    Rian sighed. "Well, it''s still an improvement over trying to keep you up so you can work your magic."


    "A great improvement," Lori agreed.


    "I suppose you found a trick to let you protect us even when you''re sleeping?"


    "I''m going to sleep," Lori announced, getting up. "Riz, I suggest you do the same soon, I''ll need you tomorrow."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said, much more relaxed than she had been at the start of the day.


    "And there will be no more naps for you tomorrow."


    A disappointed sigh. "Understood, Great Binder."


    "You can sleep on my lap again, if you want?" Mikon offered.


    She couldn''t help it. "Don''t you need to sleep?" Lori asked flatly.


    "I''m not sleeping on a schedule, your Bindership," Mikon said. "Besides, I can sleep with someone on my lap."


    Riz gave her a tired, exasperated look. "Sure, why not. Don''t complain to me if your legs go numb. Where are you sleeping?"


    "Wherever you¡ª"


    Lori walked away, shaking her head. Fickle.


    The brat was still sitting near where the militia were gathered, watching the water dripping from the water clock into the bucket beneath it intently.


    "Karina," Lori said, and the brat blinked, looking up. "You can stop now, it''s night time. Go eat and get some sleep, I''ll need you to do this again for me tomorrow."


    "I can keep working, Wiz Lori," the brat said.


    "No," she said firmly. "You''ve already done a full day''s work. Rest and come back to see me in the morning. You did well."


    The brat blinked, then nodded reluctantly. "Yes, Wiz Lori."


    "Rian will find someone do to this for him tonight. Wait here."


    Lori walked past her, and headed up the stairs to her room. She altered the bindings of lightwisps she had there, making them glow again and just barely managing to not kick over Rian''s bedroll, which along with the rest of his things had been lined up neatly along the wall so that it didn''t block the way. She removed the stone blocking off her room from the hallway and stepped inside.


    The brat was still there when Lori came back down. "Hold out your hands," she ordered.


    The brat dutifully did so, and Lori put three golden buds, three micans, and two pink ladies into her hands. The fruits were still cold and beginning to be covered with condensation. "For your work today," she told the brat. Awkwardly, she patted the brat on the head. "Good night."


    Lori went back to her room and sealed off the hallways behind her.


    Lying down on her soft, wonderfully comfortable bed, she closed her eyes, feeling the dome above her. She began to imbue the dome, filling it faster than it could draw from her core through the wire of her staff¡­


    Lori fell asleep as she imbued the dome, her mind buffeted by the presence of the dragon above.


    She had no dreams, for which she was grateful.

 113 - Just Barely Not A Dragon Shelter Party

    When Lori woke up from a dreamless sleep, she discovered that in her bed she had not been turned into a dragonborn bug abomination.


    Instinctively, she checked the dome above and sighed as she found it still holding. Unfortunately, the dragon was also still there. She could feel its oppressive presence over the demesne, a pressure on all her wisps like a strong wind, even though the air itself seemed dead and still as a hot summer.


    ¡­


    Lori turned to go back to sleep, as no one had woken her up, so it wasn''t her shift yet. Best get as much rest as she could.


    ¡­


    She got up and went to her private bath to relieve herself. Then she went back to bed, curling up on her nice, soft bedroll and closing her eyes.


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    Sometime later, Lori woke up to someone knocking on her door.


    This was concerning, because she didn''t have a door, just a hallway she sealed with magic, and she''d definitely remembered to seal it the night¡ªday?¡ªbefore¡­


    Groaning, Lori sat up, somehow feeling more tired and sleepy than when she''d last woken up despite probably having slept for longer, got up, and stumbled out to her hallway to see what was going on. She found the way, as intended, still barred with stone growing from the walls, and through what gaps they were, she saw Rian standing there¡­ holding his writing plank of wood against a gap in the stone and knocking on it with his knuckles.


    "Oh good, you''re up," he said with annoying early morning cheerfulness. How did someone who was so difficult to wake up manage to be such a morning person? "Breakfast is ready, the baths need more water, and the air slits are slightly clogged but air''s still getting in, so no rush."


    Lori nodded tiredly. "Did anyone die?"


    "No, everyone managed to stay safe and¡ªoh, you''re probably not talking about the militia. No, no one killed someone in the night either," Rian assured her. "No one''s been reported as sick with anything either, which is good. And most people got a good night''s sleep. Come on down to eat, we can talk about it at the table."


    Lori nodded, grumbling. "I''ll just take a bath," she told him.


    She headed for her room, undressed, and went to her private bath to do just that.


    ¡­


    Then she had to connect the pipes leading to her bath to the reservoir and check all the pipes for voids of wisps before finally managing to take a bath.


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    Unable to see the sun and moons, time maintained only by the brat during the designated ''day'' and whoever Rian had to replace her at night¡ªwhom Lori suspected wasn''t as diligent at it as the brat was¡ªlife took on a strange monotony. Lori took to brightening the lightwisps at the start of her shift and added a few firewisps to them to simulate sunlight. At the end of her shift, she removed the radiant heat and dimmed the light in the dining hall, and even further in the second level, while making the lightwisps change between red, blue, and pale white to simulate the moons. It was something they did in the dragon shelters when people had to stay there for more than a day, and it was only now that Lori realized how important they were, marking the cycles of day and night so people knew when to sleep, lest the unchanging walls drive them to be constantly awake.


    Despite this, there was an increasing restlessness during the ''daytime'' hours, when Lori was active and when most people were awake, save for the night shift who would deal with cooking and guarding the air slits. After weeks and weeks of work for nearly everyone, every day, this sudden lack of things to do, while initially welcome, emphasized there was little else to do but work.


    Some people had things to keep themselves busy. Besides the carpenters and weavers, whose work areas were already moved to the Dungeon, the farmers worked to keep their uprooted crops alive and watered and well using what little dirt they had, and Rian had given them permission to get the soil from the pots of fruit seedlings provided they kept the seedlings alive too. The hunters and tanners checked that the skins, hides and furs they had brought in were curing properly, and an alcove needed to be cleared to give them a temporary place to work, since the skins had to be spread out. The sweetbugkeepers had brought their large, boxy hives into the Dungeon covered in old tent cloth to keep the things from getting loose, and checked hourly to make sure it was still secured. Even one of the immature workers getting out would be disruptive, never mind one of the mature ones, big enough to fit in Lori''s fist. The chandler was also finding time to do some work, even if it was just taking the rendered fat from the kitchen and letting it settle and congeal.


    Most of the rest had no seels to kill, no hidden food to gather, no ropeweed to cut, no trees to fell, no Um to use¡­


    "Maybe you should let them play music and start dancing?" Rian suggested brightly one dinner between shift changes. With Riz, Umu and Mikon beside him being completely ignored, things almost seemed normal. "It''ll let them burn off energy, give them something to concentrate on, we have the space for it¡ª"


    "No!" Lori declared as she made her move, taking the stones from a bowl and beginning her turn. "That''s practically a party! It''ll be loud! Annoying! I won''t be able to sleep!"


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    "If we hold it during the day shift, you wouldn''t need to sleep," Rian pointed out. "Actually, you''re not supposed to sleep, that''s my time to sleep. So it will actually help!" He sounded so proud, as if he''d actually thought of a good idea she''d approve of.


    "No," she said flatly as she finished her turn and Umu began peering at the bowls, obviously counting.


    "It''s the same principle as the competitions," Rian pressed. "People need something to do, and unless you''re going to give them digging tools to expand the Dungeon¡­" He blinked suddenly. "Wait, are you actually thinking of giving them digging tools to expand the Dungeon?"


    "Please don''t," Umu said to no one in particular.


    "It''s better than the alternative," Lori said flatly.


    As the days passed, however, Lori was reminded of Rian''s insidiousness. A day later, she woke up to find someone had moved around the tables in the front half of the dining area. The tables had been pushed to the edges, except for the side where the militia were stationed in front of the air slits. In the cleared area people were dancing as people clapped and sang, feet pounding on the floor in an almost synchronized fashion as people did the steps together to the beat of the song. There was no music, but from how noisy it was one could be forgiven for thinking there was.


    Only the table with Lori''s Boat remained where it had been, serving as some sort of bizarre, off-center centerpiece to it all.


    Lori felt her eyebrow twitching as she came down, finally realizing what the loud noise that had woken her up had been. She''d have shouted for Rian, but he was standing in front of her stairway.


    "No music!" he said defensively as soon as he saw her. "They''re just dancing and singing, but there''s no music!"


    "I was sleeping," she said grimly.


    "It''s about an hour past the start of your shift," Rian said, "so you actually slept longer than before. But don''t worry, I''ll still start my shift at the same time later tonight."


    Lolilyuri was silent for a long time, just glaring at him. Finally she ground out, "Breakfast had better be ready."


    "At the usual place, your Bindership," Rian said.


    The dancing was actually quite tolerable without the music, but she wasn''t going to admit that. But it kept people occupied, and for some reason less people were using the bathroom and latrines. Still, it meant less people were working on spinning thread or making the waterwheel. She was initially surprised to find Umu and Mikon working on the spinning wheel, but after some thought, it made sense. After all, Rian was asleep (in her hallway still, and why didn''t he at least try to get an alcove, there were some still free that people weren''t crowding anymore because they were dancing), and if they couldn''t try for him¡­


    Or maybe they just didn''t know how to dance. Lori didn''t, after all.


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    Six days after the dragon had arrived, with the water at less than half their reserve, the demesne several new game boards richer, and several days of musicless dancing, Lori woke up to finally feel the dragon starting to move away from the demesne. As it did, howling winds and pouring rain¡ªwhich might not even have been water, but some other liquid, given dragons¡ªcould be heard through the air slits. It seemed to keep the dragonborn abominations away from the slits though. There were also sounds of things dropping. It might have been anything from normal hail to dragon scales.


    Lori supposed they''d find out when the dragon had finally passed and the abominations and wisplings had finally settled down enough to open the Dungeon safely.


    "I suppose that now is a good a time as any for planning what we should do once it''s left completely," Rian said tiredly over breakfast. He winced a little at the echoing dance steps and Lori took a moment''s malicious glee at seeing him so obviously annoyed by his own idea. "What should our priorities be?"


    "Going to River''s Fork to claim its core if it''s still there," Lori said immediately.


    "And¡­ checking to see if our miners are all right, right?" Rian ventured.


    "No, they''re probably horribly dead," Lori said bluntly. "Shanalorre''s a healing savant, she''d be completely ignorant of how to do anything that would even vaguely protect them from a dragon. Only the extremely lucky are probably still alive, and if the ferocity of the dragonborn abominations here is any indication, those still alive will have probably been swarmed and eaten."


    Rian winced, and even the women next to him were looking uncomfortable. "Maybe people were able to get to the mine and barricade it," Rian said. "It''s a possibility, right?"


    "I wouldn''t bet on it," Lori said. "No, they''re probably all dead, best we just pick up the pieces while we still can." She titled her head. "Speaking of pieces, if we''re lucky we''d be able to recover at least some of their grain. That should make a wonderful seed crop, with some left over for bread¡­"


    It was a cheerful thought. Bread would have been nice. Surely with this many people, someone would know how to make bread, right?


    Rian was taking deep breaths with his head bowed. "Well," he said, voice shaking slightly. "Beyond that, what else do we need to do?"


    "Send out armed people to find abominations and kill them," Lori listed out. "Mark out any new plants on suspicion of being abominations and set them on fire. Mark out moving plants as abominations and set them on fire. Make sure the water is drinkable. See if the cured wood I buried can be retrieved. Repair all the roofs. Hope there are still seels and beasts left to hunt."


    "We might actually have to use the dragon scales right away to make nails," Rian mused. "They''ll be there already, and with nails it will be easier to repair the roofs."


    "That will mean heavy lifting to move the dragon scales and getting the smiths ready and able to start forging," Lori said thoughtfully. "No more dancing tomorrow, people need to be well rested for all the work that needs to be done."


    "I''ll tell them," Rian said. "People have probably tired themselves out by now anyway."


    "Do it before you go to sleep, I''d rather have a peaceful day today."


    Rian rolled his eyes, and then yawned. "Yes, your Bindership, I''ll do more work so I''m good and sleepy."


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    They cautiously opened the Dungeon again two days later, a day after the dragon had finally left the area of the demesne, just to give the abominations time to spread out and hopefully start dying. It was in the middle of Lori''s ''day'' shift, and she''d finally been able to release the dome of darkwisps from above them, as well as retrieving her staff from the core.


    There were rows of militia in front of her, all with spears pointed towards where the entrance would be as she bound the earthwisps that made up the front of the dungeon. Lori had checked to make sure there were no voids of wisps that might have been a living thing or any mobile wisplings before she parted the stone. There was no change in smell or temperature, since all their air had been coming from outside in any case, but the sound of falling rain¡ªand it was rain rather than acid, or golden abomination blood or liquefied air (oh, liquefied air! She was so stupid, she should have thought of that sooner¡­)¡ªincreased in volume.


    Everyone stared at the darkness beyond, the rain blocking out even the faintest tint of colored moonlight..


    Lori took one look, and then closed the Dungeon again, rebuilding the air slits back into place. "I''m going to wake up Rian and then going to sleep," she declared in general. "Night shift is his job. Someone wake me up when the sun rises again."


    Grumbling, Lori went upstairs to do just that.

 114 - A Mess To Deal With, Again

    The next day, once Rian had rested to correct for the night shift and Lori had gotten back the sleep that had been interrupted, they prepared to move out in force out of the Dungeon. The former militia who had volunteered¡ªRiz among them¡ªwere armed with spears, and there were a substantial number of volunteers as well, armed with the tooth spearheads. Others carried clubs and axes, in case of beasts too small or too close to use the spears on.


    This time, Lori remembered to check for undead, concentrations of wisps that moved without being wisplings or any other influence, and found a disturbing number of them. Since the dome had been up, they probably didn''t need to worry about thought-shades and twisted vistas. Even if they had, the wait had most likely drained them of any magic imbued by the dragon. So, only abominations to worry about, and hopefully the dome had been be able to keep any of them from being plants.


    Distressingly, there seemed to be a lot more of the abominations wandering around, and large ones at that considering the voids they generated. It might have been several smaller abominations huddled together, but that was deeply concerning in its own way. They were not physically equipped for large swarms of small abominations.


    While some of the militia stayed behind at the dungeon, guarding the now-open entrance¡ªLori made a note to have a permanent door put on it before winter, to keep the heat in¡ªthe rest moved out in a large, almost comical group bristling with sharp, pointy ends. Rian, as was predictable, was near the front, carrying both a spear and his sword. He spoke with an air of quiet competence that seemed to endear him more to the former militia than any overt friendliness or casualness had before, assigning work to people and then leaving them to it. Lori didn''t know how he picked the people he spoke to, but then, that''s why she had Rian to do these sorts of things.


    Lori, unfortunately, stood near the front, just behind Rian, so she could see in case she had to use Whispering to deal with¡­ well, literally anything. She had her staff in one hand, a fresh coal in the coalcharm for easy access to a firewisp, her hip bag of firewood, and Riz next to her. The woman had been told she had one job: keep Lori alive. It was assumed everyone was to help with that, but it felt better to have someone specifically in charge of it. Near Lori, four burly men carried a half-finished door between them. Their job was to hold the door and give her a place to stand where she could see over the group if she needed to use Whispering in a direction besides the one she was on. Riz was to make sure she didn''t fall and break her neck if it came to that.


    At a casual glance, the demesne was looking to be in much better repair than the first time it had endured a dragon. Most of the roofs still seemed to be intact, with only a plank or two broken. Some even had large rocks or dragon scales resting on them, with the roof only slightly collapsed beneath them. At least one roof had a hole in it, but all in all, the houses had fared very well. The backs of the bathhouses were exposed and missing their roofs, but that was to be expected since she had made them from ice and hadn''t bothered to keep them imbued. The aqueducts were also still there, and the shelters and baths were dark. What looked like a dragon scale had fallen on the clay pit, crushing the kiln and the little shack the potter used to dry the shaped clay before loading them into the kiln.


    Between some of the houses, things moved. They were long, dark and thicker than barrels, looking like wet seels. Instead of fur, they glistened strangely, as if covered in oil. There were also strange creatures with rough, cracked-looking pale skin with dark spots that dragged themselves around on flippers that ended with short, almost stubby claws. Their long, triangular jaws were filled with wicked curving teeth, and the danger they represented was not detracted from at all by the fact many of them had their stomachs torn open and their innards trailing out, releasing a vile scent and probably all sorts of noxious dustlife. She''d have to burn those, or at least boil them very, very thoroughly.


    "Are those slugs?" someone exclaimed.


    "Good eating on those," someone else commented.


    Lori tried to keep her stomach from roiling at the thought.


    "Save your appetite until we see what color its blood is," one of the older militiamen snapped.


    "Ignore the slugs," Lori said, "it''s the undead things we have to worry about."


    "Dillians," Rian supplied.


    She paused. "I thought those were bigger and dark blue? Bigger than a full-grown seal. These are barely longer than my leg, and a third of that is tail."


    "Those are shallow water dillians. They eat smaller prey, so they''re smaller," Rian shrugged.


    Lori stared at him for a moment. "Regardless, they''re undead and their guts are spilling out everywhere. If we''re close enough to smell the rot, we''re close enough to get sick, so stay away. But they''re not our biggest problem."


    "They''re not?" someone in the crowd asked nervously.


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    "Something out here ate a lot of the bug abominations," Rian said, raising his voice to carry. "It wasn''t the dillians, they''re not agile enough. It''s not the slugs, because no matter how big they are a bug is still faster than a slug. So what ate them?"


    Even the abominations at the bottom of the moat in front of the Dungeon''s entrance had been eaten when they''d come out. Lori became very aware of the feeling of voids of wisps in her demesne. While her dome had kept out most of the dragon''s hostile magic, the abominations it spawned were alive and solid enough¡ªor in the undead''s case, just solid¡ªto be able to push through. And in her head, she could feel a lot of large voids moving around, many of them with what felt like far too many limbs¡­


    "So everyone, keep an eye out!" Rian continued. "We''re not going to get them all today. Our task is to assess and clear what we can of the town, then let Binder Lori get more water for the Dungeon so we don''t die of thirst." There was a beat. "We''ll kill them all tomorrow, after we''ve had a good night''s sleep."


    Predictable.


    Still, people laughed, even the militia this time.


    They didn''t range far. There was no need to, when a good number of their problems could be solved by just going back inside the Dungeon and waiting. Still, they needed water for that, and to replenish the water safely, Lori needed to see the water to make sure nothing was going in with it that shouldn''t be, like strangely colored fluids, beast blood, and such. They moved close enough to the nearest houses for Lori to raise earthen walls to keep the dillians and oversized slugs back, allowing her to define a safe area.


    A few people wanted to go to the Um and clear it out of any possible abominations, but both Lori and Rian stepped on that idea hard. The Um had too many rooms and a narrow corridor. If there WAS an abomination there, then the new design was practically a deathtrap guaranteeing that anyone in front would die. Horribly injured at best. And there WAS something in there according to Lori''s awareness. Several somethings, in fact. Lori threw in a burning length of wood and sealed off the Um with another earthen wall, making sure it was airtight. Why fight when you could asphyxiate?


    She did the same with the shelter and the baths, sealing off the openings with earth and, once she remembered the river was an option, ice heavily imbued to stay solid for a day. Then it was the burning wood and sealing it all up. The chittering, scrambling and strange animal cries coming from inside once the smoke spread sent a chill up her spine, and Lori and everyone else hurriedly moved away, ignoring what shadows of movement were visible through the smoke-shrouded ice.


    The clay pit was pronounced cleared, and several men proceeded to carefully drag the dragon scales to one side. It probably crushed what little dried clay pottery was left, but it was no loss. The clay could be shaped again.


    There was a scream as a dillian suddenly burst out of one of the water basins in the laundry area, clumsily launching itself at the nearest person. Fortunately, it missed, seemingly not used to launching itself like that, and several spears were stabbed into it to keep it in one place long enough for Lori to sink it into the ground and trap it. She raised a wall to block off the laundry area and set the water in the basins to boil. The water would still need to be replaced, but it made her feel better.


    With that warning, however, she had to check the river, and found it also full of disgusting dead but moving dillians. In the water, they moved with terrifying agility, and after several more instances of the things launching themselves out of the water, Lori had to raise another low wall and rethink their water replenishing strategy.


    Drinking the water as it was clearly wasn''t doable, and waiting for the river to flow enough to send the tainted water downstream was equally impossible. She''d have to distill the water¡­


    Lori sighed and got to work putting together a distillery.


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    She managed to get the distillery running before dinner.


    "Not a perfect solution, but we''re getting clean water that dead things haven''t been swimming in and spilling their dead guts everywhere," Lori commented over dinner. The build had been simple enough, a long stone trough that was filled with water, enclosed in earthwisp reinforced stone to keep it from being an explosive pressure vessel, where water was forcefully heated into steam by water- and firewisps, with the steam being pulled into another tank to condense, before the condensed water was boiled again and finally added to the Dungeon''s reservoir. It was tuning the various bindings to prevent the tank from exploding that had been problematic, but she had managed it.


    "It buys us time," Rian agreed with a nod, blowing on the stew he''d scooped up on his spoon. "How long do you think before the dillians are properly dead and you can just force the dirty water downsteam?"


    "I can force the water downstream now, it''s how many undead are still in the water upstream that worries me," Lori said. "I''ll see about distilling more water tomorrow." She ate her stew, not worried about heat. Her firewisps took care of it.


    Rian finished chewing his mouthful and swallowed. "Please be careful so you don''t explode yourself."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "I''ll be careful. It''s basically just a kettle, after all."


    "Have you ever had boiling water splashed on you? It''s not fun. Please be careful," Rian insisted.


    She''d have rolled her eyes again, but that would have been repetitive. "Shouldn''t you be worrying about exterminating the abominations?"


    "My job is worrying about you, remember? Everything else is basically something I do while I''m doing that."


    "That''s not why I made you lord and you know it¡­"


    The Dungeon''s dining halls echoed with dinner and, thankfully, no dancing as everyone relaxed and got used to a proper cycle of day and night again. The brat no longer had to call out the eighths of the day. The entrance had been sealed shut again and air slits had been put back in, and a guard was kept, but this was mostly in case something managed to fall down from the top of the hill and land in front of the Dungeon, or something pulled itself out of the water. After all, there were still abominations out there, even if they were all bigger than the air slits now.


    Tomorrow¡­ tomorrow the serious, bloody work of clearing out their demesne would start. But that night, they had water, they had food, they had a safe place to sleep, and Lori wasn''t brutally exhausted from having to stay up for most of the days the dragon had lingered over her demesne.


    Tonight, they were safe.

 115 - Improving Defensive Measures

    They didn''t find whatever had eaten the bug abominations. Rian suspected that perhaps they had killed or eaten each other, while the dillians had swallowed the evidence. Certainly at least one of the dead things with a still-intact stomach was full of bug parts. Despite being awkwardly shaped to move on land, even worse than the seels, the undead dillians were aggressive as the islandshell had been, and unlike the islandshell could right themselves when turned on their backs.


    Clearing out all the buildings took the better part of two days. The militia and Rian had to handle it all themselves most of the time, save for the occasional pit-making and wall raising, because Lori was busy keeping her population from drinking corpse-tainted water. While most Deadspeakers took the time to maintain their undead so that they weren''t rotting and spreading disease, Lori doubted that dragon was as responsible. The distillation wasn''t producing enough water quickly enough when merely left alone, so Lori had to actively control the bindings boiling the water to steam and condensing it into pure, if vile-tasting, water without any of the lingering rot from the dillians. Lori could have turned the reservoir into a well, since it already reached well below the water level¡­ but in all honesty she didn''t know how to do that, and it seemed unlikely to happen on its own, since she had left it untouched for months and water hadn''t filled it at all. So forcefully purifying river water with heat¡ªseveral times¡ªwas the best she could do.


    Once the buildings were cleared, along with the hill over the Dungeon, they were finally able to allow people to come out and start rebuilding, with firm admonitions not to drink or bathe in the water yet, and to stay out of the woods. Groups of militia and volunteers went into the woods, patrolling to, if not exterminate everything there, then to at least keep them out of the town. People gathered the fallen dragon scales, clearing them out of the way so work could begin.


    Thankfully, her gambit with sinking the curing sheds worked. When she shifted the ground to open a tunnel down into them to check, the wood was still intact and dry, with no rot or fungus growing on them. Getting them out was a bit harder, since while she''d been able to sink the sheds, raising them back up whole was harder. However, the sheds had only been packed dirt, so it was easier to write the sheds off and just lift up the wood. She could always build new curing sheds later, and they needed to get to work on repairing the roofs as soon as possible.


    There had been several injuries, but they had honey from the hives the sweetbugkeepers hadn''t managed to bring into the Dungeon. The hives outside had mostly survived damage, though their bugs had seemingly all been eaten, and one of the hives had been opened by a slug and the contents¡ªbugwax, honey and hive binder¡ªall consumed. Still, some of the hives still had their hive binders, and the sweetbugkeepers were hopeful they could rebuild.


    The honey was used to treat what wounds they could, which were mostly work injuries and burns from being splashed by slugs full of sticky, boiling abomination blood. The facial burns were the worst: the patients kept trying to lick off the honey, never mind it was the only thing keeping them from getting infected.


    The carpenters worked day and night, repairing the roofs that had broken and replacing planks. They didn''t need to, but at night it seemed they were putting the finishing touches on their waterwheel for the workshop on the second level, since they were rigging it to be able to power more than just a lathe.


    "I have a petition from the carpenters asking for a saw they can attach to the waterwheel," Rian said as they both sat down waiting for the kitchen to be ready for dinner. He looked tired from a day of patrolling in the woods. "And a recommendation from myself that you allow a wheel and a saw for the sawyers as well. One that''s much bigger, of course, since they''ll be cutting up tree trunks into planks instead of just planks into something else."


    "Oh?" Lori said, raising an eyebrow at him. She had finally finished getting the water hub working again, adding a binding of firewisps into the receptacle tank to boil the water while another binding of waterwisps kept the water from turning into steam. It was water hotter than water actually physically should be capable of, and if she removed the binding it would explode¡ªliterally¡ª into steam in an instant, but it gave her a way to kill any rot in the water while keeping it liquid, which made it much more efficient to move. It required a step to cool it, since adding more-than-boiling water to the reservoir and baths was a terrible idea, but fortunately cooling was simple since Lori had been reminded of liquefied air. "Did they find so many iron dragon scales?"


    "A lot," Rian confirmed. "Most of it is iron, but we also have copper, gold, tin, a blue one that I think is salt that we should give some of to the tanners, and a disturbing one I''m pretty sure is bone." Lori raised an eyebrow at that. Bone wasn¡¯t unheard of as a dragon scale, but it was certainly a little strange. "I think it''s gotten to the point it''s more practical to use it rather than stockpile it for emergencies. Given the wear and tear on our tools, it''s about time we started making replacements for them, especially the saws, and come next year, we''re going to need proper harvesting tools for what our farmers make. Enough of the vigas crop survived that even with what we''ll be setting aside as seed we''ll be able to eat some, so that would be a good mid-winter reserve."


    "I''ll have to set up a more permanent smithy for the smiths, then," Lori mused. "They can''t be downstairs, it will be too hot and noisy for everyone else, but it should be someplace I can seal off in the event of a dragon¡­"


    "Why not just have them right outside the Dungeon?" Rian said. "I mean, that''s the obvious solution. You''d have to redesign the front anyway."


    Lori blinked. "Why would I need to do that?"


    "Because keeping the air slits maintained during a dragon required your personal attention," Rian pointed out. "You could do it during the day, but unless you''re willing to trust another Whisperer to be in your demesne¡ªyes, that''s what I thought." He nodded as Lori made a face. He drew out his plank and began to draw. "If we design a sort of kill room in the front of the dungeon to help keep abominations out while making sure killing them doesn''t interfere with our access to air¡­"


    Lori tilted her head, frowning. "What sort of floor plan is that?"


    "It''s a side view, that line there is the floor, that''s the entrance to the Dungeon."


    "Oh. Well, make that clear!"


    "Right, it''s my fault, right¡­ all right, so the problem with the previous two air slits has been that they''ve been at ground level. You putting a pit in front of them drastically reduced the number of things trying to get in. So we do that, but better, and permanently. We put a¡­ um, call it an entryway room into the dungeon." He drew, adding a measure to the side of one line to show how tall it was.


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    "You want me to make the entrance taller?"


    "Well, we''ve found height works at keeping things away from the air slits. So, the fresh air comes in up here, and the entrance is down here, and during normal times both are open and let air in. But when a dragon happens, you seal up the door and raise a low wall here to keep casual stragglers out, and turn here into a pit for if they decide to come over the wall. With this opening, we''ll get a lot of air coming in, and it''ll enter the dungeon from up here. This overhang acts as a roof to keep rain off AND things that climb down from getting at the air slits, which you can make into actual air shafts, and if we make the pit like this," Rian turned the plank and started drawing on another part as Lori tried to keep up with his descriptions, "then abominations will have a way out and so they don''t just die there and start rotting and tainting our air."


    Lori frowned down at the drawing, which showed a tall chamber that according to the scribbled dimension was at least seven or eight paces tall, and practically level with her bedroom, with a large air shaft placed above a thick door that sealed the dungeon at ground level. It¡­ made a kind of sense, she supposed. Get the air from high up, where abominations can''t seem to reach, and it would be more defensible, allow through a greater volume of air, and require less direct maintenance on her part. . He hadn''t accounted for things like wisplings, thought-shades or twisted vistas, but if she filled the intermediate space with darkwisps and wired the binding to her core, it would be able to keep them out¡­


    "Or if things get bigger or can climb somehow," Rian continued as the dining hall filled up with more people, turning over his plank and starting a third drawing, "then we could make it a double sealed design. See, a door here to close off the dungeon, then a defensible position for people, and then a door to the outside proper, with a side passage and stairs that leads over the room and in front of the air shaft so that if something tries to climb up here, we can put people in front of it¡ª"


    "It can''t stick out that far," Lori protested over the rising sound of the dinner conversation. "Abominations aren''t the only threat during a dragon, there''s also the actual dragon. We need a mass of stone between it and us, to protect us from dragon scales falling out of the sky at the very least. It''s dropped at least one immature island shell at us, and if that had landed on this," she tapped the drawing, "there''s a good chance your overhang would collapse. It would need to be recessed deeper into the dungeon, which would mean either extensively redesigning the interior or adding more stone to the outside, which means I have to get that stone from somewhere. Either way, the kitchens will have to be reorganized, because they were placed near the entrance so they could vent out smoke while cooking. And they can''t vent out near where we get our air, because then the smoke would be pulled back in again."


    "What if outgoing air comes out of a different place than incoming air?" Rian suggested.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "What deep insight into the blindingly obvious. Rian, having a second outlet for air to come out from, while convenient, means another point we have to guard against something trying to get in."


    "Not if it''s underwater," Rian said, and Lori actually to pause as she parsed the bizarre statement.


    "The outlet for smoke and other used up air only needs to go out, not in," Rian said, starting yet another drawing, only to realize there was no place left to draw. He pulled the plank under the table and moved a little, and when it came up one side was smeared and reasonable usable again.


    "Did you wipe that plank on your shirt?" Lori said.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Don''t be silly. It was on my pants. Now look," he started drawing again, "if you use a binding to force air out under pressure, you can vent it out through an underwater pipe. If it''s vertical like this and you can use¡­ something, pressure or waterwisps or whatever, to keep air out, then you don''t need a lot of force to expel the air, and the water will keep most things out."


    Lori nodded thoughtfully. "And if it doesn''t even need to be at the river," she mused. "It can be to a pool outside the dungeon''s entrance. If I make the water boil, nothing¡ª" she paused, then amended that statement, "¡ªfew things will be inclined to dive into boiling water, and since the air is all moving outward, the heat won''t matter."


    "Now, there''s an idea," Rian said thoughtfully, tilting his head. "What if you put a pool of boiling water in front of the dungeon''s entrance to discourage abominations. Though I''m not sure how that will discourage the ones whose blood is already boiling, though."


    "The dead ones will also be unlikely to be discouraged," Lori agreed. "But it will likely keep away almost nearly all living abominations."


    "So, seal off the entrance, put in a pool of boiling water, and three, four paces above that, we have our air shaft," Rian mused.


    "No, we need the mass of stone to protect any structures from falling dragon scales, remember? Here, give me that stick¡­ So instead we make an entry tunnel into the dungeon with a door three paces in that we can seal and block off. And between the entrance and the door, we have the pool of boiling water. Instead of a wide of a space, the ceiling slants up like this, and we have the air slits up there, pulling in air. We can''t have the outlet in the boiling pool, since that would cause the air to cycle back in, but just outside¡ª"


    There was a thump that made both of them glance up in surprise as Riz and Umu each put two bowls of food down on the table, followed by Mikon putting down one bowl, one of the new glazed pottery pitchers that sounded like it was full of water, and five wooden cups stacked on a plate on top of the pitcher, all very carefully balanced. As Mikon removed the plate and began to set down the cups, filling them with water, Riz and Umu pushed all five bowls together in the middle of the table, each with a spoon sticking out, slightly nudging the plank Lori was still drawing on.


    "Dinner," Riz said to no one in particular, not even looking at Rian as she said it. "You seemed distracted, Lord Rian, so we got it for you."


    Umu, meanwhile, was looking down. Lori thought it was very blatant and even lewd that she was staring at his crotch so intently, until the blonde weaver said, "Rian, what happened to your trousers? Is that soot? Why do you have so much soot on your lap?"


    Rian suddenly looked very guilty as he inched forward on the bench to futilely hide the stained lap of his trousers.


    Umu sighed as she sat down next to him. "Really Rian, please take better care of your clothes. Stains like that are very hard to wash off, I''ll need to use soap, and I only get as much as anyone else."


    "¡­sorry¡­" Rian said in a small voice, looking away guiltily.


    Umu sighed again. "Well, there''s nothing to be done about it now. But be more mindful in the future, all right?"


    "¡­yes¡­"


    "What was that?" Umu said, raising her voice slightly.


    "¡­Yes, Umu¡­" Rian said, louder and even more sheepishly.


    Umu nodded, then patiently folded her hands on the table as if she was waiting for something, staring past Lori intently.


    Mikon was sitting on Rian''s other side, with Riz next to her. They also sat patiently, staring at something behind Lori. Lori turned to look, but there didn''t seem to be anything there, just the brat and her family enjoying their own dinner¡­


    Rian coughed. "Uh, Lori, are you going to pick a bowl any time soon?"


    Lori blinked, then looked down. Five bowls, all seemingly identical. Five cups of water too¡­


    Oh!


    "You didn''t have to¡ª" Lori found herself starting to say.


    "Your Rian wasn''t doing it, so as your temporary Rian, it was my duty to do so, Great Binder," Riz said. "They helped. Can we eat now?"


    Hesitantly, reached over and picked the one nearest to Rian, sliding it around the rest of the bowl and towards herself. After a moment, she did the same with the wooden cup of water too.


    The other three women quickly helped themselves to a cup and a bowl each, leaving Rian to stare at the bowl left in front of him and slightly to the left. He and Lori exchanged bemused looks across the table


    "Eat up, Rian, it''ll get cold," Mikon said with a smile as she started eating.

 116 - Responsible For Fourteen

    Improved defenses needed more stone than they had right then, but Lori was at least able to rebuild the kitchen exhaust vents and build the ''water valve'', as Rian put it. There was no need to make the water at the end of the pipe boil, not when it wasn''t needed right then, but all the air bubbling out certainly made it look like it was boiling.


    Naturally, the first thing they had to do was to have someone check the water every day because people would throw things in it, even when told not to. Especially when told not to.


    She also asked the carpenters¡ªwell, told Rian to ask the carpenters¡ªto start making a door for the dungeon proper. In hindsight, Lori really should have done that a long time ago. It was her Dungeon, the center of her power, not some kind of cave open to the world where people can take shelter (except, all right, it kind of was¡­), and really, just having the door open like that was uncivilized.


    Obviously, it would be open during the day, since people would be using the Dungeon, but at night¡­ well, it would still need to be a little open to permit fresh air to come in so she didn''t suffocate in her sleep. Or any of the people still living in the second level, really. Those who had relatively undamaged houses moved out right away, but there were a few whose roofs had a large hole in it, and there was no reason to make them move to the shelter with the unmarried, family-less people¡­


    Well, they should still have a door to close!


    After the buildings were cleared of abominations, the work on repairs could finally begin. Unlike the last time, they had a ready supply of cured wood, which Lori had to make sheds for again to keep off any rain or spores. The carpenters worked quickly despite their talk of needing a rotating saw thanks to the ready supply on hand. It helped that the damage was less intense this time, with only a few individual panels needed replacement rather than the whole roof.


    It reminded Lori she still had that black¡­ material¡­ that one of the roofs had been turned into in the dragon scale vault somewhere.


    Once Lori was certain the water could be left alone to purify itself, she was finally able to concentrate on important matters.


    "We''re going to River''s Fork tomorrow to claim its core and see if we can salvage anything," Lori told Rian over dinner the day after the buildings had been cleared.


    Rian sighed, actually putting down the spoon he''d been raising to his mouth. Always with the dramatic effects, Rian. "Couldn''t you have told me this over lunch? Now I have to stay up getting people together to come with us¡­"


    "I can go, Rian," Riz said immediately.


    "There, you have someone you can delegate to so she can do it for you," Lori pointed out, making Riz blink. She gave the other two women at the table a flat look. "Anyone else want to volunteer to face potential danger while not knowing how to use a spear?"


    Umu and Mikon both shook their heads, though the latter was looking sideways at Rian in concern. Or possibly Riz, they were both to her left after all.


    Very sensible.


    "Very sensible," Lori nodded in approval. "Just three other people should do, none of them Landoor. With the ice boat gone, we won''t be able to bring as many people, so keep it those who don''t weigh a lot."


    "Is this your way of telling Riz you''re making her a lady?" Rian said. "Just start giving her work to do?"


    There was a slight pause in the conversation in the tables around them as all three women on the opposite side of the table straightened, thought likely for different reasons.


    "Of course not," Lori said. "Why would you think I''d consider making her a lady?"


    "You know her name, can match her name to her face, and can actually talk to her," Rian said promptly. Mikon actually nodded at that.


    "By that standard, Karina has a higher chance of being a lady," Lori said.


    "That''s not a ''no''."


    "I''m not considering appointing anyone a lady," Lori said, no matter how correct they were being. "I''d simply rather the one who will likely be steering the boat not be sleep deprived."


    "Ah, you''re thinking of the safety of all who are going to be traveling with you," Rian said, nodding. It was a mocking nod, she could tell. "How very kind of you. Well, she has a point Riz. If you want to come, can you handle rounding out the security while I take care of the supplies, and bringing our smallest wheelbarrow?"


    Lori frowned. "Why would we need a wheelbarrow?"


    "Aren''t we going to scavenger for metal tools and things? We''ll need some way of bringing anything we find back on the boat, unless you want to try carrying it all by hand," Rian said innocently.


    Lori frowned. The wheelbarrow would be a tight fit with six people on the boat, especially since it would need to be upside down. "There won''t be much room for it anyway if we have a wheelbarrow aboard. Leave it, I''ll build something if moving is needed."


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    Rian hesitated, then sighed. "How are we going to move the corpses?"


    Lori blinked. "What corpses?"


    "The corpses we''ll be likely to find when we go there," Rian said quietly. "How are we going to cremate them properly if we don''t move them all to one spot?"


    Around them, dinner continued unabated, but a small demesne of uncomfortable silence settled over the table. The three other women looked away or stared down intently at their food, Riz actually leaning away from Rian a little and up against Mikon.


    Was that what Rian was worried about? Funerary rights? "Do we need to? After a week, the abominations would surely have eaten them, and the beasts scavenged the rest," Lori frowned. "Is that what you want the wheelbarrow for?"


    "The people there need a decent cremation," Rian said. "We''re the only ones alive to give it to them."


    "Given it''s been a week, I find it unlikely there''ll be anything left to burn. Besides, they''re not our responsibility."


    "Fourteen of those people were," Rian shot back quietly. "So yes, we do have a responsibility."


    Oh, right. The miners.


    ¡­


    "Fine, we''ll cremate the miners," Lori said. "But that''s it. Claiming the core comes first."


    Rian nodded curtly, then paused. At the same time a thought occurred to Lori.


    Slowly they both turned and looked towards the table that Lori''s Boat was still resting on.


    "You''ll also need to get some people to put that back in the water," Lori said.


    "Can''t be me, I''m already gathering volunteers," Riz said quickly.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori wasn''t sure when it happened, but Lori''s Boat was in the water the next morning. The water jet''s blood hadn''t been imbued either¡ªit had slipped her mind over the past week¡ªso she had to make the binding again. She drew some blood in her room and added it to water so she didn''t have to bring her syringe along or have to put up with Rian''s irrational reactions to her syringe. With the way the new water jet was installed on the tiller, she couldn''t just touch an imbedded wire to imbue it. And this way she could sit more comfortably.


    They didn''t bring a wheelbarrow, thankfully, so there was plenty of room for everyone and the supplies, with room to spare for anything they scavenged. In addition to Riz, there were three others accompanying them. They thoughtfully didn''t bother to introduce themselves, since Lori didn''t care and couldn''t be bothered to remember.


    The journey downriver was taken a bit more slowly than usual, as they had to watch for any unexpected changes to the river caused by the dragon like blockages, new rocks under the water, or hidden undead that had lasted longer than the dillians. Along the way, they dislodged some corpses of beasts, seels and formerly undead dillians that had gotten lodge on banks or rocks, so that they wouldn''t fester there.


    Lori shivered as they passed the edge of the demesne, and now her only connection to the binding of the water jet was her blood. She lay back and closed her eyes, pulling her hat over her face to block out the bright, hot sun, the drawstring pulled tight to keep it from being blown off. After a dragon passed, the sky was always too clear.


    Methodically, she reached through to her blood and continued to imbue the binding. She breathed in, falling into the familiar rhythm of taking in magic, even though the power she was using to imbue was coming from the core. It was long-practiced habit after all, and it was comforting.


    Occasionally, she cut off from imbuing the jet and switched her attention to the other bindings in her demesne. The lights in the various buildings and over the pots of seedlings, the ventilation for both the Dungeon and the Um, the water purifier and the various bindings that circulated the water in the various baths, the coverings of ice over the reservoir, the corpses she was storing¡­


    One by one, she repeated her daily check of the demesne''s bindings and imbued them, making sure they were all in working order.


    The journey was mostly silent, save for the occasional call from Riz or one of her friends who were keeping an eye out, calling out possible obstructions in front of them. In the colored woods and riverbanks around them, the subdued roar of the water jet pushing them forward, the sounds of bugs, beasts, probably abominations and the winds in the trees dominated. Rian, who''d normally be singing softly or at least humming to himself, was quiet, and what conversation the other four people had was left low and murmuring, an almost indistinct blur that Lori didn''t care enough to try and hear.


    In the quiet, Lori tried to get her thoughts in order. The core¡­ yes, the core. The logical place for it was under or inside the big tree in the middle of River''s Fork''s dome, if only because it was the only Deadspeaking-made structure that might have been big enough to hide it in. Unless the first Binder of River''s Fork was much, much, much better than her, he had likely also been limited to only his Deadspeaking, so he couldn''t have hidden the core behind solid seamless rock or a within a vista that could have made any access opening to it too small for a person to traverse.


    The question was whether the core was at the top or the bottom¡­ not, it couldn''t be at the top, that would have involved growing that absurd tree first, then establishing the demesne. It would have taken too long with a single person''s limited magic, unless he''d wasted a lot of beads to give himself the magic to do it


    Which, given the man who thought it was funny to call something ''hairy blueballs'', was within the realm of possibility.


    Rainbows. Colors and rainbows. Colors, rainbows and endless glittering dust in the wind¡­


    Lori was trying to remember the curvature of the Iridescence on the edges of River''s Fork''s demesne when Rian''s voice interrupted her thoughts. "Um, hey Lori?"


    "What?" she said irritably, her eyes still closed as she leaned back, trying to recall. Come on, remember, remember¡­


    "In the stories, when a Dungeon Binder dies, the demesne vanishes and Iridescence starts growing back, right? That''s a real thing and not one of your ''that''s not how Dungeon''s work'' complaints?"


    Lori sighed. "Yes Rian, the Iridescence grows back." Really, why was he bothering her with childish questions?


    "And there''d be Iridescence all over after a week without their Dungeon Binder, right?"


    "Right again Rian," Lori said, trying to be patient. He was probably just bored from having no one to talk to.


    "¡­ would you start taking a hint and open your eyes please your Bindership?"


    What?


    "What?" Lori said, blinking as she took her hat off her face and opened her eyes¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Greetings, Binder Lolilyuri. You are extremely late, but given the previous circumstances, I suppose it cannot be helped. Did you bring this month''s ice?"


    Lori stared. She couldn''t help it. She''d been staring as soon as they''d reached the clear, uncolored edge of River''s Fork Demesne. "You''re alive¡­"


    "Yes, I am. Happily, you will not be claiming my core this day," Binder Shanalorre said.


    "You''re alive."


    "Yes, I believe we''ve established that," Shanalorre said patiently.


    "You''re alive."


    Shanalorre paused. "Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "You''re alive."


    "I think you broke her," Rian said. "Can she sit down for a bit to recover?"

 117 - No One Died

    After Lori had sat down for a little while to recover from her completely understandable and appropriate surprise, and then resigned herself to not getting River''s Fork''s core this time, things had to be arranged. Their people, whose tenure at River''s Fork had become almost double what they had expected, were all taken to be taken home by Rian, the most qualified at controlling Lori''s Boat at high speed, while Riz and the others stayed with Lori to free up room on the boat and to watch her back.


    The buildings of Deadspoken wood had fared surprisingly well under the dragon''s onslaught, though there were more holes in the branches of the dome. The dome was no longer perfectly dome-like, but had random branches growing out of it now, reaching up into the sun and providing more complete shade. Left unchecked, the town might need to start burning lights during the day just to be able to function in their own homes.


    Shanalorre''s office was one of the places that had managed to survive relatively intact and undamaged, though there were signs someone was sleeping there. Had Shanalorre''s house been damaged, or was it simply too difficult to keep making the trek up to¡­ whatever level of the central tree she apparently lived in?


    "Have you recovered, Binder Lolilyuri?" Shanalorre asked rhetorically from behind her desk, that lord of hers next to her. His name was just on the tip of Lori''s tongue¡­


    "Quite, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. Riz stood at her side, once more doing duty as her temporary Rian while her lord was occupied. The woman wore a face of professional calm, and Lori hoped she was truly as ready to protect Lori as she had claimed when she had, predictably, volunteered herself for the position when Rian had asked. "Though in light of your survival, it seems there are matters to discuss."


    "I would offer my condolences that you are not in a position to claim my demesne''s core, but they''d be insincere," Shanalorre said. "There is little reason to live, but what little that is there is sufficient for now."


    "May I ask how you and the people of your demesne managed to survive?" Lori asked. "Clearly it is possible, even with your limited resources, and I wonder if a similar measure could be implemented in my demesne."


    "It wasn''t anything complicated," Shanalorre said. "I had my people move supplies to the mine and we all barricaded ourselves there. We would not have dared do such a thing if it weren''t for the air circulation device you provided, which managed to survive and operate for long enough that we did not fear for lack of air in the mine. Thanks to the device, as well as the weeks of work by the miners you provided, we were able to excavate fairly deeply, so there was room for everyone."


    "Everyone?" Lori repeated, raising an eyebrow. "Even the criminals?"


    "Everyone," Shanalorre said with finality. Her impassive expression shaded towards grim. "I chose not to kill them, and they will not be killed."


    "It seems a waste of resources, keeping them alive."


    "Your opinion is noted. However, you lost your chance to execute Grem when you remanded him to my judgement and custody. Besides, it is my decision and my demesne''s resources. Until you can complete your portion of our agreement, they are provided with work so they can remain productive."


    Lori nodded to acknowledge the point. Much as the thought of such wastefulness grated on her, it wasn''t she who was losing anything from this. "On to the next matter, then. What restitution do you require for housing and feeding our people over the length of their unexpected stay?"


    "There''s no need for that. While they were not mining, they assisted with preparations for the dragon and have since been helping us rebuild," Shanalorre said. "I am willing to see it as falling under the same provisions as providing labor for mining, and had them fed and housed as such, once the resources became available again. Except for the matter of this month''s ice, I see no need to negotiate anything beyond the continued fulfillment of our agreement."


    Lori nodded slowly, considering. "The matter of this month''s ice?" she repeated.


    "Unfortunately, our meat stores was one of the casualties of the dragon," Shanalorre explained. "The door to the smoke house was forced open by a beast or abomination, and they consumed what we''d left behind. In addition, the cold storage room we''d been maintaining since you have begun providing our demesne with ice had the ice melt and the meat went bad in the interim. We now need to replenish our stores, and in addition to the ice for this month, would like to request half of next month''s ice in advance."


    Lori considered that. "I''m willing to double this month''s ice to serve as interest for the delay," she said. "With the understanding this doesn''t set any sort of precedent."


    "That¡­ would be very helpful, thank you."


    "How is your water situation?"


    "We''ve managed to sink a well low enough water is filling it, and we''ve been boiling it to prevent any diseases. However, we shouldn''t need to for much longer. The river is almost clear."


    Lori frowned. "It is?"


    A nod. "Yes. While I only know healing, any living thing is a viable recipient for healing. I''ve learned how to tell if there''s anything living in the water."


    Oh! Lori hadn''t realized that. Yes, that made sense. A savant might only be able to heal, but with the awareness a demesne granted¡­


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    "We have wounded. Would you have time to handle them according to our agreement?"


    Shanalorre nodded. "Everyone that could be healed here has been healed already."


    "I''ll arrange for them to be brought, then."


    The waterwheel had thankfully not been damaged, merely lightly nibbled on by bug abominations, and had stopped working when the imbuement had run out. Lori supposed that River''s Fork had been very, very lucky there. She didn''t have her syringe with her and was reluctant to borrow one, so she supposed she''d have to use some of the bloody water in the water jet to imbue the waterwheel when Rian came back for them.


    After that, Shanalorre excused herself to deal with matters since her demesne was also still rebuilding, and Lori stepped out to wait for Rian to come back.


    She and Riz walked through the disheveled dome, what little sunlight coming down filtered through the thick leaves far above. As with the last time a dragon had struck this place, there were holes in the dome, allowing for the occasional lone shaft of sunlight to shine through, but this time the holes were clearly smaller and half-obscured by growth. Lori kept a wary eye out for anyone colorbrained enough to attack her, and she was glad to see Riz was following her example, looking around as well.


    "They''re actually surviving," Riz murmured to herself. She probably wasn''t talking to Lori, since she''d know better by now.


    Still, Lori acknowledged the inherent fact in her statement. These people were surviving, that much was obvious. Quite comfortably, almost, barring dragons. Their small numbers was almost an advantage, since they''d been able to hide in the mine.


    "You''re free to leave and come live back here, if you want," Lori said.


    "No, I don''t think I will, Great Binder," Riz said. "I''ll admit, I enjoy having hot baths, and we didn''t have those even back when Binder Koshay was in charge."


    Lori considered that and shrugged, then went to the river to make ice, with interest.


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    It took three trips for Rian to bring them all back home. Lori spent that time imbuing the water jet so when she removed the blood to put it in the waterwheel, they''d still have enough imbued in it to make it back home.


    When they finally made it back to Lori''s Demesne around mid-afternoon, there was a celebratory air in the town that she hadn''t expected.


    "Well, it''s to be expected, right?" Rian said when she''d inquired. "After all, people expected the miners to be dead from the dragon. To find out they actually survived¡­ why wouldn''t people think that was something worth celebrating?"


    Lori stared at him, then sighed. "Well, I suppose it means more people to do work," she said. "We''ll need a new ice boat for the next batch who are going tomorrow¡ªif you can find anyone still willing to go¡ªand I''ll have some blood ready for you to add to the waterwheel there, just in case. I suppose people will be trying to roast beast or seels for dinner?"


    "Probably beasts, it''s a bit dark to go after seel," Rian commented. He shaded his eyes. "Looks like we''ve got people coming back with some now. I''ll just go and make the celebration official in your name, shall I?"


    "No. Music," Lori emphasized.


    "I think they''ve gotten used to dancing accompanied only with singing," Rian said with a bright, innocent smile.


    "You realize I know you''re mocking me, right?"


    "I would of course not argue with you, your Bindership."


    "Is that an admission of guilt?"


    "It''s an admission of not arguing."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Well, let him have his sick fun. Given his complete and utter obliviousness to the blatantly obvious and his bizarre and unnatural lack of enjoyment at constantly being able to win at a board game, it was probably his only source of entertainment. "Get to work, Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


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    As the afternoon wore on, the celebratory air increased. Lori sighed as she saw work getting neglected in favor of dragging out tables and benches again, lighting up cooking fires to cook the cuts of meat from the beast that was being slaughtered, and people dancing to clapping and singing and hands being drummed on the tabletops, which were rhythmic but she was hesitant to call it music, so she let it pass.


    Lori found herself sitting at her usual table in an almost empty dining hall. The few other people in it were taking advantage of the clear light to play board games, and they mostly crowded around the tables near the entrance. In front of her was her square stone plate, which was loaded with roasted beast¡ªtail and thigh meat, for preference, and sizzling with fat¡ªmushrooms fried in collected beast fat, and sliced vegetables cooked in same. There were some micans, golden buds and pink ladies to one side, trapped inside a cube of bound ice so they''d stay nice and cool for her dessert.


    She was popping a mushroom into her mouth and chewing slowly, enjoying the taste and texture when Rian sat down opposite her. She glanced at him, but he only gave her a tired smile before starting on his own food.


    For a moment, they ate in silence.


    "I''d have thought you''d be out there," she commented, waving vaguely in the direction of the Dungeon''s entrance.


    "I wouldn''t add anything to their enjoyment," Rian said. "This is about the fact people we thought were dead, aren''t. About us managing to survive the dragon in general and without any casualties specifically. Telling them how to enjoy themselves¡ªlike saying they can''t play music¡ªwould just take the fun out of it. Besides, I thought I''d keep you company and watch to tell you no one''s sneaking up behind your back."


    Lori paused ever so slightly. "You realize I can feel people coming up behind me, don''t you? It''s something Binders can do."


    "Sounds like a lot of concentrating," Rian said. "Isn''t my way easier?"


    Well, Lori supposed she had to give him that. So she made a sound of acknowledgement and continued eating, even as she started counting her heartbeats.


    She''d reached 372 when Umu casually put a plate of roasted meats, vegetables and fungus down on the table and sat down next to Rian. The latter turned to stare at her. She nodded casually at him. "Rian," she said, and began to eat.


    About 22 heartbeats later, Mikon and Riz also put down plates on Rian''s other side, sitting down together and prompting another stare from him. They didn''t even say anything, just nodded at him and then turned to their meals.


    After a moment, Lori frowned. "Wait," she said, making everyone paused. She looked towards Riz. "If you''re here, who''s at the Um?"


    "It''s not my shift tonight, Great Binder," the northerner woman explained.


    Lori tilted her head. "All right, fair enough." She went back to her meal.


    Rian looked around one last time, shrugged, and decided to follow their example.


    Dinner was spent in quiet appreciation of food as the sounds of clapping, singing and dancing came from outside the Dungeon. And the food was delicious. When her plate was empty, Lori altered the binding on the block of ice, letting the fruits rise up the surface. She took the cold fruits off the now empty block of ice and hesitated. Then she deliberately put them in the center of the table, got a pink lady, and started to eat.


    Hesitantly, hands reached for the fruit in the center and joined her.


    Well, it wasn''t like she could finish all the fruit she still had upstairs by herself.

 118 - Making A Better Water Jet

    The delivery of the next batch of miners, which was a bit larger than usual and required four trips, went without incident. Lori suspected they would not be put to much mining, since a lot of them were northerners who had originally settled in River''s Fork, but as long as Shanalorre was willing to pay the cost of housing and feeding them, she was willing to look the other way. Many were people who had been injured hunting the abominations, who were otherwise in perfectly good health. They weren''t dead, after all.


    More and more abominations were hunted down as repairs were done to homes. Some people who were owed renovations due to the ruling at the last community meeting took this opportunity to call in the request. Lori allowed it under the condition that their homes would be worked on last, to discourage people from doing it when there was still more urgent work to be handled.


    Lori had spent the day securing the now-finished waterwheel and stone flywheel for the carpenters and onto the lathe they''d build for it. Since it had to be able to stop, unlike the waterwheel in River''s Fork, instead of moving the water in a trough under the wheel, she had made a binding that raised up water above the wheel and the carpenters could open a sluice to make it fall down over the wheel''s paddles using an overflow arrangement similar to what she''d made for the baths. It had worked quite well, and the carpenters seemed to be looking forward to using their new lathe. The saw to go with it was already being designed¡­


    "A lot of people don''t actually want fancy rooftop decks and such, they want the folding beds and the overhead lofts for storage and more sleeping area," Rian said after he got back from a day of ferrying people to the other demesne. "May I suggest having the carpenters build those instead of regular beds when possible? It''s a lot more work, but it''s the furniture we need. "


    "Don''t you have a bed?" she said as she set down her sunk board and began putting the little stones into bowls. It was the first time in days she''d actually felt relaxed enough for a game. "I distinctly remember that."


    "Some people have beds," Rian admitted. "Most of the houses have one. A lot of people still sleep on the floor though, since there''s no room for more. Hence the folding beds and things."


    Lori frowned thoughtfully. She remembered her experiences sleeping on rock. Back then, sleeping on a hard layer of wood was a vast improvement on her circumstances. "Assign one of them to start working on beds once the repairs are finished, and tell them to recruit as much unskilled labor as possible. We will have to divide our attention between beds and finally building the boat we will use to go to Covehold."


    Rian blinked. "We will?"


    "Yes. We have just endured a dragon. Now is the best time for travel since we are unlikely to experience a dragon any time soon," Lori said. "Dragons tend to avoid one another, so we have a respite before another one potentially comes. Leaving and returning within the month is the safest time."


    Rian nodded slowly. "Yeah, you''re right. And we have enough wood to get started and still have enough to spare for anything the demesne needs built. "


    "Please tell me you have a design," Lori said.


    "Ah¡­" Rian hesitated timidly. "Tomorrow?"


    "Rian! You''ve had months! You said you already had drawings!"


    "I did! Then I erased them because I only had the one piece of wood! Don''t worry! Last moment panic is a wonderful motivator!"


    Lori sighed as she put the last stone down. Preparations complete, game ready. Well, he had a point, she certainly passed enough exams studying on sheer panic¡­


    "Just to be certain," Lori said, "so that we''re envisioning the same sort of boat, in addition to all the people, it will need to have storage for cargo, supplies, a water jet, water storage, latrines, and at least three prisons."


    Rian paused. "Oh right. Though isn''t specialized prison rooms a bit too much?"


    "No," Lori said flatly. "Prisons. See that they are accounted for in the design."


    "In a water-going vessel, I''m pretty sure the term is a ''brig'', not a prison," Rian said.


    Lori stared at him blankly. "Why?" Why have a different word for the same thing just because it was on a boat? "Why have a different word for the same thing just because it''s on a boat?"


    "Well, a brig is temporary, it''s only for while they''re on the boat and the intention is to unload them as soon as possible. A prison is a more permanent arrangement."


    Ah. That made a little more sense¡­


    "Well, get that design down and don''t erase it this time," Lori said. "You have until the day after tomorrow."


    "No, let''s make it tomorrow at dinner. If you put it away any further I''ll never get anything done¡­"


    He cut off as Umu, Riz and Mikon arrived with food and water, sitting down on either side of him. Lori reached over and took one of the five bowls. Everyone else started to eat.


    For a moment, Rian just sat there. "Couldn''t you have just told me the food was ready?" he said. "I could have gotten our food myself."


    "This was faster, Rian," Umu said, smiling brightly. "You and her Bindership were talking about important matters."


    The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    "Focus, Rian," Lori said as Mikon made her first move. The woman was getting better, but Lori still beat her last time they''d played. "In addition to making the boat design, I need you to train at least three ferrymen."


    Rian opened his mouth, paused. "Can you please explain the last word you just used, just to be certain we''re thinking of the same thing?"


    Lori rolled her eyes as she replied to Mikon''s move. "Ferrymen. People who can convey miners to River''s Fork using the boat in place of you. Using a tiller isn''t complicated, but you''ll need to train them to not be afraid of moving fast and knowing the best time to lift the water jet out of the water to slow down."


    "Ah, I actually have an idea for that," Rian said. "I just¡­ fuck, where''s my plank¡­?"


    Umu reached down to her other side and held up Rian''s plank and burnt stick.


    "Thanks," he said, moving his untouched food to the side.


    Mikon, who was sitting next to him today with Riz on her other side, pushed it back without looking up from the game.


    Rian stared down at it. "Or maybe I should eat a little first."


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    "All right!" Rian declared after he''d eaten a little. "So, my idea. I thought of a way we can stop the water jet flowing without needing to pull the whole thing out of the water." He started drawing then paused. "Uh, give me a moment, I need to set this on fire¡ª"


    Lori sighed. "Give it here," she said, holding out a hand for the stick he was holding. It was Mikon''s turn, she had time. Rian handed it over, and Lori reached out to bind the water in her cup. She increased viscosity and coherence, then dumped the water onto the table, where it lay quivering like a ball of clear, frozen honey, except it wasn''t green. Then she bound it into ice. Heat puffed out, and she bound the firewisps as they leaked out, sticking the end of the stick into the binding. The top of the stick began to glow, and she carefully shaped the heat to char the tip of the wood. Wordlessly, she handed the stick back as she made the frozen water flow back into empty bowl before putting the firewisps back into it. She reached towards the pitcher the other women had brought and poured herself another drink.


    "Show-off," Rian said. "All right, here''s my idea." He began drawing.


    As soon as Lori saw the first circle, she said, "You want to make a ball valve. A disc-type ball valve."


    Rian stopped. "Well, now I just feel silly," he said, letting the burn stick fall on the table pettily.


    "I''ve worked in shops, I know what a ball valve is," Lori said blandly. "The problem is building it to the fine tolerances needed to be completely water tight. This isn''t the sort of thing you just build by hand with rocks. You need molds, precise measurements, precise tools."


    "But it doesn''t need to be completely watertight except where it pivots," Rian said.


    Lori sighed. "Rian, if the ball valve sealing one end of the waterjet is in anyway weak, the negative pressure built up by the void created by removing all the water will cause structural damage to the valve''s structure, and might even cause it to implode."


    "But as long as the water is just churning, it shouldn''t cause any changes in pressure," Rian said. "The ball should be able take the pressure of the water just moving around inside, it''s not like it''s going anywhere."


    The two stared at each other.


    "You know, I think the two of us are having different ideas about what we could use a ball valve for," Rian said slowly. "How about you start first, since you don''t think yours will work? Because I''m pretty sure it''s not my idea."


    Lori didn''t show any embarrassment. She wasn''t embarrassed. At all. There had simply been a simple miscommunication, and since Rian was her lord in charge of that, it was clearly his fault. "Using a ball valve to seal the end of the water jet so that water can''t get in or out. The problem is putting a ball valve on the entry end would potentially cause a void, and putting it on the egress would cause a catastrophic build-up of pressure. Neither is an insurmountable problem to a properly made ball valve, however the problem is I doubt we have the tools and materials to make such a thing."


    Rian listened intently, nodding as if he understood¡ªat this point, it was a one in two chance whether he actually understood or was just making a show of understanding¡ªand waited for her to finish. "Yes, I thought of that, and decided against it for the same reasons you did. No, this is something different. It''s still a ball valve, but it was inspired by the suction tubes you made for the baths."


    Lori blinked. "How do you know about those?"


    "I looked while the carpenters were measuring for the levers that disconnected them." Rian shrugged. "It seemed interesting. But putting a ball valve on the end wasn''t my idea. No, my idea was to put the ball valve in the middle." He picked up the pen again as Mikon finished her turn. The other women were finished eating and were just sitting around, looking awkward. At least Mikon had their game.


    Rian finished drawing and pushed the plank towards her. "See, instead of sealing off the water jet with a ball valve, you put the magic here, in the middle, on the flap. When it''s closed, it''ll just make the water swirl around in the ball. Or at least, I think it should. And if that doesn''t work, we could poke an air hole on top like this so that air can go in to prevent imploding. If we put it in the right place and design it right, the air hole can be covered when the valve is turned and aligned to be a water jet."


    Lori stared at the drawing.


    "Bad idea?" Rian asked.


    "It''s¡­ an idea," Lori said slowly. "It might be difficult to implement on the smaller boat where the water jet is mounted on the tiller, but in a large boat like the one we''re planning to build¡­ Building the ball valve might be problematic, though."


    Rian shrugged. "It doesn''t have to be a ball," he said. "A ball is best for efficiency, but with what we have, a box shape is more exact. It''s easier for us to measure and cut precisely if we make it with squares." He began to draw a cube with a square flap in the middle. "If there''s one thing I know our carpenters can do, it''s make exactly measured boards."


    "We can''t make it out of wood," Lori pointed out. "It needs to be stone or bone so I can bind the wisps to it." Though admittedly with precisely cut boards to base her dimensions on, she could a mold using stone¡­ or better yet, ice¡­


    The flap, she realized. Put the binding on the flat, not the interior of the tube or ball valve¡­


    She stared at the drawing, not really seeing it as her mind thought of alternate configurations for the idea. Bindings on the flap, which moved and rotated¡­


    "You can have until the day after tomorrow for the boat design," Lori said absently.


    "That''s too much time for last moment panic¡ª"


    "Then procrastinate," Lori snapped. "Do something else. I have something I need to test."


    "Oh, can I help? Perfect way to procrastinate."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine, you can help. Maybe you''ll think of something."


    A flap that rotated out of the way, with bindings on only one side¡­ if it could turn to a loop so that it could expend the force of the binding safely¡­ or not just flaps, but tubes that pivoted¡­ or slid along a recess¡­


    Lori would need help with this. This needed straight lines and precise edges, and that meant tools.


    Well, she''d already made the waterwheel for the carpenters and needed to build a permanent smithy for the smiths anyway. They might as well use them for her benefit. And what was for her benefit was to the benefit of the demesne. So everyone benefited.


    Mikon nudged the sunk board slightly.


    Oh, right, it was her turn. Lori reached for the board absently, her mind still thinking about moving parts with bindings on them.

 119 - Modeling

    Lori wasn''t able to start her tests right after breakfast. There was needful maintenance she needed to do after she ate, making sure everything in the demesne (and one thing out of it) that needed to be imbued was imbued. She''d started keeping a list on the wall of her room, which she checked over every morning, even if she did the actual imbuing every other day or so. She could have done it while she was playing a morning game of sunk with Mikon, but the one and only time she''d done that, the other woman had won.


    No, never again!


    Really, how did other Dungeon Binders do this? She supposed using Mentalism they wouldn''t have any problem trying to remember it all, but when did anyone even find the time to do the things she read about if they were doing maintenance work all the time?


    But after far too much time sitting at the table with her eyes closed to help her concentrate, Lori found herself sitting in a near-empty dining hall. Rian still sat opposite her, looking bored. Why was her lord just sitting there?


    "Why are you just sitting there?" she asked. He was usually much more productive, unless it was part of playing to the crowd.


    "I made sure no one snuck up on you and stabbed you to death," he said innocently. "You really shouldn''t do that in public you know, it''s pretty dangerous."


    Lori grunted. "Well, I have to get to work."


    "I thought you were going to test water jet ideas?"


    "Yes, exactly."


    She went upstairs to get her tablet. The slab of rock was flat, reinforced by earthwisps to be stronger and therefore less likely to break should she accidentally drop it or pressed down on it too hard. She also had a stylus made from a slim branch with a pointed piece of rock on the end. It had been naturally pointy when she''d found it, and she''d only had to put it on the end of the stick.


    "So, what are we going to do?" Rian asked.


    "You will stay silent and I will contemplate my ideas and set them down to rock," Lori said. "Perhaps you can draw the boat you''re supposed to while I''m doing it."


    Rian wilted slightly, and sighed. "All this focus is doing horrible things to my procrastination. I''ll never get anything done¡­"


    "I don''t care, stop talking and distracting me." Ah, she''d always wanted to say that!


    She looked down at her tablet, flattened down and smoothed out using a piece of leather. She altered the binding of earthwisps on a thin layer of the surface on one side, just enough to take a mark, and used her stylus to draw two roughly parallel lines. With a slightly out of practice hand, she drew the notational symbol for waterwisp, anchoring binding, directional binding, and then an elongated triangle with a line inside one point to indicate direction. Lori stared at it, then remembered and added a grouping indicator. Yes, she was definitely out of practice in notation.


    Then she began to carefully draw a box around the simple drawing of a tube and put it in a box, and more lines¡­


    She didn''t know why Rian was taking so long at this, drawing was easy! And the only notations he had to specify was measures of dimensions, and none of them had to be for vista interactions either!


    Working carefully so she wouldn''t have to try to erase anything, Lori drew the tube with the water jet binding inside a solid block, inside a larger, partially hollow block. She was already thinking of making one or both blocks with ice, or at least using bound ice so there wouldn''t be any friction. There were inlets and outlets in the larger block to let water through from the ends of the block, but the inner block with the bindings could be slid aside to block the holes and have the water jet tube align with a different channel in the larger block. The secondary channel was shaped like a closed loop, which would allow the water to continue circulating while preventing the buildup of pressure¡­


    "You put in a bend there, you can also make the water go in reverse."


    Lori just managed not to jerk up in surprise as the voice interrupted her contemplation. "What?" she said.


    Rian pointed at her tablet. "If you put in a bend that goes all the way around instead of a loop, you can give it a reverse setting. That would be useful for maneuvering and slowing down to keep from hitting rocks and whatnot. Which given how much more mass the large iceboat has, it would need something to actively slow it down to prevent collisions."


    "Shouldn''t you work on your own design?"


    "I''m procrastinating!" Rian chirped.


    "That is not something to proudly declare." Lori looked down at her design. She could see it. Drawing some lines to block off her initial design as a reference, she began drawing another square. Or rather, a series of squares, all cross sections of the same cube from different angles. Rian leaned forward to get a better look.


    "Make your own design drawing Rian," she sighed. He leaned back and clearly forced himself to look down at his own plank and burnt sick, occasionally shooting glances at her and her tablet. It was like being back in school all over again!


    She ignored him, continuing her drawing. Yes, he was right, the block with the tube through it that held the bind could reasonably be moved to more than one position. Add a hole, say here, and run a pole through it connecting to the inner block and it would move just fine, even without a frictionless ice coating. Which she''ll add anyway, because why not, adding in the notation for waterwisps less one tick to denote it was ice and an anchoring binding¡­


    She frowned, then started a new drawing. There was no reason to the make the tube cylindrical. It could be any shape as long as it was structurally stable. In fact, better if it was an elongated slot than a round tube. That way, the inner block could have thick internal walls for structural stability¡­ actually, there was no reason if it couldn''t have a few reinforcing parts in the tube as well. That would keep it from deforming under the pressure of the water passing through and getting stuck inside the outer block¡­


    Yes, and with the tube with the binding slightly elongated, it can transition between the various tubes in the outer block that let water pass through, again preventing excessive pressure from building up. The tube in the inner block and the various pathways in the outer block didn''t all have to completely align, after all.


    The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    Now, how to orient this? Vertically or horizontally? Vertically was much smoother, and if she put the circulating pathway on the bottom, it would default to not moving so if whatever was being used to move the inner block and hold it in place broke, the waterjet would just stay where it was and they wouldn''t have to chase it around. On the other hand, horizontal would be easier to operate¡­ theoretically, at least. Hmm¡­ wait, there was no reason the intake and outflow had to be at the same level as the two blocks, right? The outer block could have external pipes leading into the water to both draw it in and send it out to propel the vehicle it was attached to. That would make a horizontally sliding block much easier to manipulate¡­


    Of course, there was the question of how to seal such a system so that none of the contents leaked out¡­ or not too much of it, anyway. This would need tight tolerances¡­ though unlike with the theoretical ball valve, it could easily be done with straight lines. Very straight lines.


    Still, the idea was simple enough that she could probably make some models to test how it would work before building it full-sized¡­


    "Rian¡ª"


    "How can I help?" Rian said, far too quickly, brightly and loudly.


    Lori gave him a flat look. Then she looked down at his plank. While there were drawings on it, none of them looked like a boat. "Did you get anything done at all?"


    "I was procrastinating!"


    "Still not something to proudly declare," she sighed. "I will be expecting it from you tomorrow."


    "Who needs sleep anyway?" he said, still cheerful. "Can I see now?" He was actually pleading.


    Lori gave him a flat look, then sighed and carefully pushed the tablet towards him.


    He reached over enthusiastically, taking the tablet and turning it around. Then turned it around again. Tilted his head.


    "Okay, what am I looking at again?"


    Lori sighed and began to explain, pointing out the features.


    "Huh. I''m surprised you considered how this had to be operated by someone else," Rian said. "I know it was my idea, but I do NOT like having to lift the whole water jet out of the water just to get the boat to stop. If this works as intended, it would be much easier. Even one of the children would be able to operate it." He paused. "When we make these, we''ll have to secure whatever boats they''re on better. Even the children would be able to operate these! That''s just asking for trouble!"


    "While it would work, making them would be difficult, even for me," Lori said.


    Rian frowned, clearly not understanding. "Why do you think that?"


    Lori stared at him, then pointed towards the loop. "They''re shapes inside solid objects. What sort of tool could even be used to make that with if not Whispering?"


    Rian looked at it. "Take a solid block. Cut it in half. Hollow it out, put the two halves back together, then glue or secure them in a frame somehow." He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.


    Lori opened her mouth to retort, but nothing came out. Because yes, now that he''d said it out loud, it WAS the most obvious thing in the world. She glared at him instead, but he even had the good grace not to look smug. She let out a huff. "Well, all right, I supposed it can be done¡­"


    "Not something you''ve seen done?" Ah, there was the smugness. Teasing, at any rate.


    It made Lori feel better. Annoyed, but better. "I''m not a carpenter, I just worked in their shops," she retorted.


    Rian hummed. "So, are we building this?"


    "In the small scale at first," Lori nodded. "A test model to see if the concepts actually work out of the drawing tablet."


    "Rocks, then?"


    Lori nodded. "Rocks."


    Rian started to nod too, then paused. Then he grinned. "Wait, I just had a better idea."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Somehow I doubt that."


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    Lori hated being wrong. And while it was certainly better than trying to hollow out a block of stone or bone blind, why did all of Rian''s ideas involve her doing most of the work?


    "This is very strange," Lori said instead. "Who thinks of something like this?"


    "People who need to make molds," Rian said. "Anything I can do to help?"


    "Hold this," she ordered. He complied, and Lori wrapped the cord she had around where she wanted to cut and slowly softened the stones so that it sliced through the stone. It was as close to the line she''d scored as possible, though of course it wasn''t perfect. She used the flattened, smooth offcut of wood that Rian had gotten from the carpenters to level the face that she''d cut, scraping off what protruding bits she could.


    Lori looked at it, then shrugged. Well, this was her first time trying this, so she couldn''t expect it to be perfect. She reminded herself of this firmly, lest her impulses get the better of her and she wasted time on this. "I think this is ready," she said.


    The table was¡­ slightly messy. There was a thin layer of softened rock that had been scraped off their modeling material and had run out of imbuement on top of the table now, so thin that it was crumbling to shards that was slowly turning into dust. In the midst of that was a large bowl of water and their model. Or rather, models.


    Both were built around little bricks of stone roughly the size of a fist. They had both started exactly the same size, made from the same mold. One had been hollowed out with a hole in it, and a long protruding cylinder on the long perpendicular face. The other¡­


    Well, the other had protrusions coming from it. The protrusions were rounded tubes in shape. At one end, a protrusion stuck out one side, bent upwards to face back the way it came, then curving down again, into the block, like a strange handle. In the middle were cylindrical protrusions at roughly the middle, like someone impaled the block on a long shaft. At the other end was another protrusion that curve upward and back the other way, then kept on going.


    "You know, in hindsight, we should have made this out of ice," Rian said thoughtfully.


    "We?" Lori said pointedly.


    "Sorry, I meant you, your Bindership, you did all the hard and very technical work."


    That didn''t make her feel any better. Especially since Rian had a point¡­


    "Let''s get this over with," Lori said. She picked up the model with more protrusions and lowered it into the stone bowl of water next to them, submerging it but being careful to make sure the mass was centered in the water and wasn''t close to any of the sides or the surface.


    Then she bound the water into ice.


    They slid the resulting mass out of the bowl and put it on the table upside down for stability. Then Lori softened the stone and carefully began pulling it out of the ice, leaving behind hollows in the shape of what had been there before.


    For a moment, they both stared.


    "So¡­ how do we cut it in half?" Rian asked.


    "This was your idea," she reminded him. "You think of something."


    "I suppose that''s fair," Rian nodded. He thought for a moment. "I''ll be right back." He hurried off.


    He came back with a confused Deil holding a hand saw, and the carpenter proceeded to saw through the ice while Lori maintained the structural integrity despite the parts being sawed off, and Rian held the ice in place, especially when it had to protrude a little over the edge of the table so Deil could saw all the way through it.


    "Thanks Deil!" Rian said as Lori carefully pulled the two halves apart, reinforcing the ice so that it wouldn''t break. "You can go back to work, sorry for bothering you!"


    Lori carefully placed the other model inside the hollow. It fit in perfectly. Nodding, Lori placed the two haves back together.


    Rian and Lori stared at it.


    "It occurs the me the block that moves around inside should be smaller than the space it''s sliding through," Rian said slowly.


    "You were in charge of making it," Lori said pointedly.


    Rian sighed. "Yeah, this is definitely my fault¡­"


    It took two more tries, but eventually they got it right. The inner block moved, it lined up with the tubes inside, and the tubes worked as they wanted, allowing water to circulate in place, reverse or pass through the block.


    "Well, it works," Rian said tiredly.


    "It works," Lori nodded, equally tired.


    They stared at the block.


    "We''re going to have to make this bigger, aren''t we?"


    "What do you mean ''we''?"


    "Sorry, your Bindership."


    Lori sighed. "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "You thought of this. Find a way to make it easier to do."


    "Yes, your Bindership."

 120 - Rians Problem

    At breakfast the next day, Rian sat himself down heavily, the last to arrive. He looked terrible. He had that slightly unfocused look of a man on too little sleep, each blink slow and deliberate as if he was fighting the urge to close his eyes and just keep them closed. With a caution that made the act seem climactic but was probably just him trying not to drop it, Rian set his plank on the table.


    "Done," Rian said. "I have a boat design."


    Lori glanced at it. "Good. I''ll look it over later. After breakfast, go talk to the blacksmiths to find out if they need anything specific for their smithy, I already have a location for them. Ask the¡­ tanners? Ask the ones treating the seel and beast skins the same thing, I never worked in the industry and have no idea what it entails." She''d heard about the smell and decided not to have that in her life.


    Rian twitched. "Can I do that in the afternoon? I barely slept last night."


    "I told you to not procrastinate."


    "You did," Rian nodded. "But I still managed it!"


    "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Get some sleep before you go decide to go hunting beasts."


    "Yes, your Bindership! Don''t ride on any rocks until I get back."


    He didn''t even look at the bowl of food in front of him as he stood and left, moving with a distinct leftward tilt as he walked back to the door.


    There was silence for a moment.


    "Someone should probably go after him to make sure he doesn''t fall into the river," Lori commented to no one in general.


    Umu was up and almost running instantly. Riz blinked a moment before following.


    Mikon shook her head, picked up the four other bowls on the table and began to expertly balance all four bowls in her hands. She must have worked at some kind of eating establishment at some point.


    Shaking her head, Lori continued eating.


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    The design was a bit smudged and some of the lines weren''t as straight as they could be, as if perhaps last moment panic combined with sleep deprivation was taking its toll on the person drawing. Still, it was mostly legible.


    The shape was basically a larger version of their prototype, the late and unlamented Lori''s Ice Boat. Five paces wide, three times that long, and three paces high¡­ and that was just the block of ice that was supposed to be hollowed out for buoyancy. There were outriggers to the sides for stability, and they also seemed to be for increasing the area of the deck? There was practically a little house on top of the block.


    Lori couldn''t help but feel it was a design that should have gotten to her hands a lot sooner than now.


    There were thick black bars in some places, and Lori assumed that was wooden reinforcement, an internal framework for her to anchor the ice to. From what he''d said before, Rian probably also intended to have wooden cladding on the outside of the boat to protect against impacts.


    Try as she might, she still couldn''t think of a better way to do this than with ice. While bone might be viable, she doubted they''d be able to gather enough of the material before winter, and while stone might work, it¡­ well, it had no buoyancy. Any stone boat would need to be very large to displace enough mass to float, and if she riddled it with bubbles to mimic pumice, it would probably be structurally compromised. Also, she didn''t know how to do it. And while they had a lot of dragon scales¡­ it wasn''t anywhere near enough to actually make a boat of any structural integrity. They were a mix of materials, and some would need to be alloyed or refined to be usable. Even with her generating heat, that would take a long time.


    So, ice. Perhaps next year they could try other options.


    While she waited for Rian to regain consciousness, Lori got to work and began working on making a permanent smithy. Or at least prepare the location for one, Rian still had to get specifics for her.


    Unlike her initial thoughts, she couldn''t put it right outside the entrance. The core was too close on one side, the kitchen was too close on the other, but that didn''t mean there wasn''t any space. After some walking, measuring and checking, Lori found a space behind the excavated rock pile that she could use. It was close enough to the entrance to safely enclose without digging into the cold storage room next to the kitchen. There was enough space for her to excavate a decently high space so it could have good ventilation even without her putting in bindings. Two of the walls could be open most of the time, and then when a dragon happened she could enclose it.


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    She had to move her excavated stone stockpile, otherwise the area would be blocked off, but that wasn''t too big of a problem. Lori just had to put the pile a little past the smithy area, which wasn''t that far and still convenient. However, beyond carving out the space, she wasn''t really sure what they needed. When she''d worked at blacksmiths and other metalworking shops, she''d been there as a heat source, not as someone who made the shop. She''d told Rian handle that aspect of it, that was what he was there for.


    Provided he remembered to. She''d have to remind him when he woke up.


    When Rian woke up and showed up at lunch, the first thing he did was check the plank. He sighed. "Oh good, I didn''t draw anything weird or wrong."


    "Will this even float?" Lori said.


    "Oh, it''ll float," Rian said. "It''s ice and intended to be hollow. The only question is how well it will float. We''ll have to use lightweight wood. The ice will also need to be as cold and dense as possible for the most strength. Then there''s the question of how we actually build the thing. Do we make a wooden internal frame and have you wrap it in ice? Do we make the ice first, hollow it out and add the wood in later? Do we make it all in one piece, or as sections that we piece together?"


    "Yes, very hard questions," Lori nodded. "I look forward to what you come up with. This is your project, after all." She waved a negligent hand. "Tell me when you need the ice and I''ll see if I can find time for you."


    Rian winced. "I don''t know anything about making boats!"


    Lori glanced down at his design. "Well, you''ve had a good start to learning," she said dryly.


    "I should have just hollowed out a tree," he muttered.


    "I couldn''t possibly comment," Lori commented. "Please build the boat in a more timely manner than it took you to create the design. This journey must be completed before winter, after all."


    Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Now eat your lunch, you missed breakfast. And don''t forget to talk to the tanners and blacksmiths."


    Rian sighed. "This is a lot more than what you usually have me do first thing in the day."


    "That''s what happens when you procrastinate, work until late into the night and sleep until noon."


    "Yeah, I''m starting to remember why doing it is a bad idea¡­"


    "Riz. Since he''ll be busy, I''ll need another temporary Rian."


    Riz nodded almost as if she''d been expecting it. "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Good. You can start by finding out for me what the blacksmiths and tanners need for a place of work."


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    Days passed. Work was done.


    The seels, who had made themselves scarce during the dragon, eventually returned, meaning the children were able to start catching them again. Not as many of the children did so anymore. Many had begun working as spinners, making thread and cord so that the weavers could make fabric and eventually clothes. Lori suspected it wasn''t entirely of their own free will, but no one complained, and children seemed willing. More people learned to play board games with their feet. Not sunk, because picking up all the stones with only one''s toe was apparently too difficult, but the other games, where pieces were put down one at a time, managed it.


    The smithy was made in the area that Lori had excavated out near the Dungeon''s entrance. The forge had to be made with clay bricks, as stone alone had a likelihood of cracking, and mortared with more clay that Lori baked solid with firewisps so that it actually turned into brick itself. To hold in the intense heat, she wrapped the assembled oven in water that she then bound into ice, trapping the heat inside since the ice was unable to absorb heat. There were some cracking sounds as the heat transferred to the ground, bereft of anywhere else to go, but when it was finished, there was a new furnace for the forge.


    Lori took out a dragon scale that was mostly iron from the vault and gave it to the smiths for raw material. Soon the smithy was hot and ringing as repairs were made to tools.


    The tannery was easier. She raised up stone walls and the hunters put the roof over it themselves, using branches instead of planks. It was a bit of a fire hazard, but what wasn''t? She also used packed earth to make vats for them to soak the skins and furs in, then excavated a cave nearby where they could move the skins and their materials in case of a dragon. She''d been inclined to excavate a shallow pit and have them set up there, so she could just bury and cover the entire thing in case of a dragon, but apparently they needed the open sun and air circulation, else the noxious and nauseating fumes would build up. Well, it would be easier to bury just the storage cave anyway, and since the roof was made only of branches, it would be easy to repair.


    Now that he had a design and most of the repairs to the demesne were done, Rian finally had the optimum opportunity to build the boat that they would use to go to Covehold. That meant calling another meeting of the carpenters, woodworkers, and smiths to inform them of what needed to be built.


    As could be expected, Rian got a lot of weird looks when he got to the part about making it partially out of ice.


    "I know it sounds insane, but it works," Rian said. "I mean, you all saw the ice boat make the trip to River''s Fork a few times before, you know, the dragon happened. And it won''t be all ice. The idea is to have a wooden frame for the ice to freeze around to give it strength, and wooden cladding on the outside to protect it from impacts. Binder Lori will¡­" He made a vague gesture. "¡­do magic things to keep the ice from melting, so it can serve as a building material and waterproofing."


    He smiled confidently.


    Everyone glanced blankly at him. Then they all stared at Lori, as if even Rian''s charisma wasn''t going to win this argument for him.


    "Yes, he''s serious," she said blandly. "But we tested it, and the idea looks like it will actually work. If it''s any consolation, none of you ever need to ride the boat."


    Everyone looked at each other, and there was a consensus that was best described as a shrug.


    It was, as things went, not a very optimistic start.


    But it was Rian''s project, so Lori didn''t care. It was all his problem.

 121 - The Better Water Jet

    Slowly, things returned back to normal, the dragonborn abominations either being hunted down or dying from running out of magic to sustain their impossible physiologies. People were injured, but they''d been told to prioritize staying alive, so anyone who was hurt was just sent to River''s Fork to be healed.


    Lori chose not to comment on the strange meat in the stew they had for a few days. While it wasn''t completely objectionable¡ªit was actually very soft and tender, and was absolutely wonderful to chew on¡ªit was far too sweet, like it had been filled with honey! Who had ever heard of literally sweet meat?


    Work also finally started on the boat. Lori had to set up a location¡ªRian said it was called a dry dock, to which she just nodded along to, as did everyone else, because what did they know about building boats?¡ªa little downriver from the laundry area, packing down the dirt on the riverbank so it would be able to support weight and not sink, as well as leveling it for stability. It was a bit far from the saw pit¡­ and the smithy¡­ and the carpenters¡­ but as Rian said, they could build near those, then have to drag a completed boat next to the river, or they could build next to the river and just carry the relatively lighter building materials to the location.


    Despite this, it took some convincing for people to understand that, no, the smart thing to do was build the boat near the river.


    The boat¡­ didn''t look very boat-like. As construction on it began, it looked like a shack with strange fencing around it. Granted, it was a very well-built shack, the fence-like long beams surrounding it made of cunningly slotted together lengths of wood. The lack of experience was being substituted with manpower and enthusiasm, and Lori redoubled on her desire to never leave her demesne again. Now that they were actually building one, the idea of a boat made of ice and wood didn''t sound very safe to her. Better that other people use it, not her.


    In addition to the construction of the new boat, Rian also had to find time to train other people on how to operate Lori''s Boat, so that he wouldn''t have to be the one to keep doing it.


    "Finding someone to take over ferrying people might be a while," Rian sighed over dinner. It had been a five days since construction began, and he''d taken the opportunity presented by having to ferry a new batch of miners-but-probably-construction-workers to River''s Fork to try training some random person on how to operate the boat''s water jet. "They understand having to lift the jet out of the water to get the boat to slow down, and turning the tiller simple enough, but Vov can''t seem to handle the speed."


    "Perhaps if you procrastinate, you''ll be able to find a solution to the problem," Lori said blandly.


    "No, procrastinating is a specific solution to a specific situation," Rian said. He sounded completely serious. "In a better world, procrastinating would be the solution to every problem, but unfortunately we live in an imperfect world, where procrastinating isn''t as useful as we''d want it to be."


    "Oh, you saw that play too?" Lori said. She had liked that comedy about the lazy nobleman who believed happiness was measured in slothfulness, and ended up working very hard all through the play to stay slothful.


    "What play?" Rian said, face completely blank but eyes sparkling.


    Lori rolled her eyes. Useless thespian. "Back on topic," she said.


    "You started it," he shot back. "But all right. I think I''ll be able to train someone to handle ferrying, that''s the relatively easy part. The problem is finding someone who will be able to handle moving at those speeds. Unless you''d be willing to slow down the waterjet to a slow rowing speed, but that would mean someone being stuck ferrying all day, maybe even two days. There aren''t any rapids, but a slow rowing speed isn''t going to be able to fight against the downward current very well."


    "Perhaps you should train one of the miners, or someone who''s ridden under the water jet''s power already?"


    "The miners are used to how fast it is, but there''s that, and there''s being used to it and feeling capable of controlling it," Rian said. "They''re among the first people I asked if they wanted to learn. They¡­ uh, refused."


    Lori started counting in her head. One¡­ two¡­ three¡­


    "I can learn, Rian," Riz said. Umu, Lori saw, was frantically trying to swallow a mouthful of food, since she seemed to think it to disgusting to spit it out, while Mikon¡­ huh, she didn''t bother to volunteer. Well, Lori supposed the woman knew her limits. "Teach me!"


    Umu tried to say something but it came out like¡­ well, like she had a mouthful of food in her mouth she didn''t want to spit out because it would be wasteful.


    "Won''t you be busy being Lori''s temporary lady?"


    "Temporary Rian," Lori corrected.


    "Why do you keep using my name like that?"


    "Because it''s accurate. And he''s right. Find someone else."


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    Riz slumped. Umu did so as well, looking relieved. Mikon reached around Rian and handed the blonde a cup of water to help her swallow.


    "Well, besides that, how is progress on the new boat?" Lori asked


    "You can see how it''s progressing."


    "Yes, I can see it. I still have no idea how much it has progressed, which is why I''m asking you."


    "Ah. Well, we need more wood. Fresh wood. The carpenters say the boat needs thicker support beams, and a lot of our wood has already been cut into planks. Which is good for cladding, flooring, walls, furniture and things, but not very good for being load bearing. And the trees near the building site aren''t straight enough for it, so we need to do more cutting, which means you''ll have to do more curing soon. So that''s slowed it down right now, but we''re cutting planks to form secondary reinforcement for the ice."


    "I''ll take your word for it," Lori nodded. "How much longer?"


    Rian hesitated. "Two, three weeks? I''m still not sure how we''re going to put in the water jet, or how we''ll steer. It''s not like we can put in chains to control the ship with a wheel. That might not be efficient with our level of inexperience. But that''ll make steering complicated, since whoever''s in control will have to control it from the back and take direction from someone sitting ahead who can see what''s coming up."


    "How problematic," Lori said blandly. "You''d better hope you can devise a way to solve the problem."


    "Your faith in my competence is really, really annoying. Can''t you be controlling and tell me what to do?"


    "Solve this problem."


    Rian sighed. "I was hoping for more specifics."


    "Solve this problem quickly."


    Rian slumped. Umu, Mikon and Riz and reached over to pat him on the back, looking a bit amused.


    While Rian built the boat, Lori worked on the dungeon. She excavated around the reservoir, raising a waist-high wall over it as she resigned herself to making it permanent. She bound lightwisps to the bottom of the reservoir and along the sides, illuminating the water. Not at regular intervals, because it was hard to judge after a certain depth, but it let her see into the water. She''d been prepared to drain everything out and replace it if she saw anything floating, but fortunately it was clear, and a lot deeper than she thought.


    Creating a pipe from the central water hub, she set it to fill the reservoir, then began to rework the piping she''d laid out recently for the baths to get their water from it. It was time-consuming, but it was needed to keep the water in the reservoir circulating and clean. She made sure to route the pipes close together so that she could easily seal them off in the event of a dragon.


    Hopefully they''d have several more months again before they needed to use it.


    Though given the depth of the reservoir, Lori would have to be careful excavating here, in case she accidentally dug into their water reserve or it started to leak.


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    Lori raised an eyebrow as Rian dropped blocks of wood on the table at dinner.


    "Ta dah!" Rian said cheerfully, gesturing at the blocks of wood.


    "That explains nothing," Lori said. "You''ll have to do better."


    "I got the carpenters to make a better water jet!" Rian said. He gestured at the wood again.


    "Slightly more understandable, but still without context."


    Rian sighed, then picked up the wood. Or rather, the top of the wood. What seemed like a large, solid block of wood came apart, revealing hollows carved into the wood.


    "Circulating loop," Rian said, pointing to three sets of rounded hollows. "Reversed flow, for¡­ well, going in reverse. And a straightaway, for going forward." He lifted up a block, showing how it had three tubes going through it side by side, as well as a long rod at one end. "And this time there''s room for this block to slide past all of them."


    "Why three holes?" Lori had to ask.


    "So it can go faster," Rian said. "Fast, faster, fastest." He put the block down. "When you slide it this way, the first tube comes unaligned from the circulating loop and lines up with the propulsion channel. Slide it further, and then two tubes align, theoretically making you go twice as fast. Then three tubes." Rian looked down at the smooth rod. "It, uh, might need some kind of markings or notches and a ratchet to latch it into place to indicate what is aligned with what."


    Lori frowned, touching the blocks, pulling out another piece. "You realize this will leak, right?"


    "Nothing that you can''t fix," Rian said. "The carpenters have a box waiting that these can go into. We put them in the box so that they''re snug, you line all the insides with bone or stone to act as waterproofing, a little ice or lard to lubricate the block, and then the box holds it all in place, and we mount it to a tiller so it can point left or right." He looked smug and proud. "And before you ask, we have inlet and outlet pipes leading down into the water so that the waterjet will have something to propel. Or just have it fixed on the bottom of the boat and have a separate tiller. I think the latter works better for the large boat, but the former is the best way to do it for a small one like Lori''s Boat."


    Lori stared at him, then at the blocks. Experimentally, she slid the block. "Well¡­ I''m glad to see you made it easier to do. Very well. Though we won''t put it on Lori''s Boat just yet. We need to test it by itself."


    Rian nodded.


    "Also, I need to fix your oversight."


    Rian stopped nodding. "Oversight?"


    Oh good, he really hadn''t realized. "Since this rod controls the movement of the block, it will need to be high up and accessible to the ferryman, correct?"


    "Yes¡­?" Rian said slowly, clearly knowing it was a leading question. One that led into a trap.


    "How is the waterjet going to draw water if it''s above the water?"


    Riant blinked. He looked at the blocks of wood, all with hollows carved through them. He opened his mouth. He closed his mouth. He groaned.


    "Yes, an oversight," Lori nodded smugly. "But don''t worry, I can fix it."


    The wood might need a little shaving to make room for ice to lubricate the block so it would move smoother. She''d have to see how it worked with water inside it first.


    "You say a larger version of this could propel the new boat?" Lori prompted.


    Rian looked like he was still mentally castigating himself but nodded. "Yes. And that CAN be underwater, since it would be simpler to make the tubes where water is drawn in to be through the ice, so there aren''t any protrusions to potentially catch on something and break. Still working on turning. I had an idea for that though¡­ "


    He was interrupted as five bowls of food were put on the table.


    "But I''ll tell you later," he said. "Thank you for the food Umu, Mikon, Riz. Please stop and let me get it myself?"


    "We''ll think about it," Mikon said, smiling a bright, sweet smile, one amusingly mirrored by the other two.


    Lori shook her head and picked a bowl.

 122 - The Ice Boat Floateth

    Fixing Rian''s adjustable water jet was easy enough. The mount for it had a thick wooden rudder that had hollow tubes in it to draw water up and thrust it down. The tubes were more wood that had been hollowed out¡ªthe carpenters were getting a lot of use from their new lathe¡ªand she was able line the insides with bone to act as waterproofing and sealant. Correcting the problem was simple enough. Lori had a small hole drilled in the intake pipes just before the sliding block, and put in a small binding of airwisps to constantly siphon out air. When put into the river, this drew water into the tube and allowed it to reach the binding of waterwisps in the moving block, and the suction by the waterwisps would do the rest. While she was able to put blood in the binding of waterwisps, the binding of airwisps couldn''t be connected to her like that, but fortunately, it was a small binding that didn''t expend much magic that she could imbue the usual way.


    Instead of lining the moving block with ice, they just carved out a recess on the block, lined the recess with stone and put some ball bearings on it to help it roll. Much simpler.


    The resulting block of wood was far too big to be installed into Lori''s Boat, but they needed a new boat for conveying miners to River''s Fork anyway. So the carpenters made a wooden frame, some floor planks so that people wouldn''t slip and some simple benches, and the new prototype water jet was installed into the new small ice boat. Adjustments had to be made, and an outrigger was added for stability.


    They also finally found someone to learn to be a ferryman. Or ferrywoman, as the case may be. Lori didn''t know her name¡ªnot important¡ªbut she apparently wasn''t bothered by speed and could remember how to operate the new water jet. They''d added notches to the bar and a latch to lock the rod in place so it would stay in position and not move.


    "Otherwise it''s too easy to bump the rod and then you might suddenly be going in reverse," Rian explained. "We''ll be able to do it better for the large boat, which is shaping up well. You''ll be able to put ice on it soon."


    "I can''t wait," Lori said blandly. "Do we have anything to bring to trade?"


    "Absolutely nothing!" Rian said cheerfully. "Well, we can try bringing some of the beast and seel skins to see what they''re worth, but the scales are¡­ probably not worthless but most likely a little devalued and the market slightly saturated if as many dropped on the other demesne as it did on us. Even River''s Fork has a stockpile, they just don''t have the manpower to get everything. But the prices will probably go back to normal soon, and metal products will always have worth. At the least, we can sell some knives. We probably can''t spare more, since we need the fabrics we''re producing for clothes and most of the leather for shoes." He sighed, looking down at his feet. "I''m really going to miss having thick soles when these eventually wear out. Hopefully we''ll have access to some kind of trade by then, or at least some Deadspeakers willing to fuse together a bunch of leather into something thicker."


    "I''m working on it," Lori said irritably, just keeping herself from glancing at the women next to him.


    "Well, maybe we can see what the going price for it in Covehold is," Rian said. He titled his head. "Do you want us to recruit more settlers while we''re there, or would you rather wait on that until we''re more established to your satisfaction?"


    Lori''s satisfaction would have been a demesne with a diameter of a hundred taums, a manifestation chamber that let her make any substance she wanted, a vault full of beads so deep she could swim in it, a functional theater district, a library, and possibly a stone giant to make war with.


    "I doubt recruitment will be much of a problem at any time," Lori said, "so hold off for now."


    "I promise not to recruit any wizards?"


    "Hold. Off. For. Now."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    Lori nodded sharply,


    "Something else occurred to me," Rian said, "but can you make a binding that evaporates water if we put water into it?"


    "Easily, but why?"


    "We''ll be sailing over the ocean for part of this, and I figure we might as well get some salt while we''re at it," he said. "The tanners need it, and it will help in preserving food. In fact, I''m thinking that having it go down the river to collect salt wouldn''t be a bad use for the boat once we come back from Covehold. You can never have too much salt."


    Lori frowned. Salt was a seasoning to her, something you added to food to make it taste a certain way, and had interesting interactions with earthwisps, waterwisps and lightningwisps¡­ "If you say so," she said. Well, evaporation was simple, though she''d need wire so she wouldn''t have to add blood to water. She might need to use steam or vapor instead of liquid water anyway¡­ "I''ll see what I can build."


    "You''re the best Binder ever," Rian declared with a grin.


    "You set the bar very low," Lori said.


    "You are the best Binder ever," Rian repeated, still grinning.


    She wasn''t sure if this was new flattery, but she''d take it.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Construction on the boat continued. Planks were laid on the bottom to mark the underside and bottom of the boat, meant to protect the ice from damage. It seemed slow to Lori, who had watched wood be worked quickly with shop equipment, but there was always more wood on it every day. It was like the wood was materializing around some invisible material that formed the bulk of the hull. Carpenters worked with hand tools, the progress deceptively slow but their movements quick, skilled and precise, creating parts that would slot together and be held in place with more wood. Some children would just sit near them and watch as the carpenters made the boat like they''d been making things like it their whole professional career.


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    With most of the demesne''s physical needs met, Lori allowed herself to fall into a daily routine, imbuing everything that needed imbuing, keeping the water hot and flowing, the reservoir roofs solid ice instead of water, the water wheels turning. There was more wood curing in her days than before since they needed more of it because of the boat construction, and the thicker wood needed for the beams needed more effort to cure.


    The day when she had finally had to make the ice that would seal and waterproof the boat seemed to come abruptly, even though it had been nearly three weeks in the making.


    "It won''t be final," Rian said told her as he finished pointing out the beams that the ice should wrap around as the carpenters did one last check to make sure all the planks were secure. "Portions of it will definitely need to be hollowed out for the water jet''s tubes and things. But better we know now how well it floats." His voice dropped down slightly, for her ears only. "Besides¡­ everyone needs to see the idea work. They''ve been doing it so far because¡­ well, there''s a little bit of humoring me, but some probably think it''s a waste of time, even with the original ice boat prototype. They need to see that it could work."


    "They should have seen that with the ice boat," Lori said.


    Rian shrugged. "These men are builders. They know better than anyone that some things don''t scale up in size very well." He paused. "Also, I''ll be honest, I really need to see if the idea still works at this scale."


    Lori gave him a glare. "This was your idea."


    "I know!" He sighed. "I know. Better to be sure sooner than later."


    Lori kept on glaring at him. But she supposed he had a point. And she felt like she needed to see it work too.


    She reached her awareness towards the river and bound the waterwisps there, drawing it up onto the shore once the carpenters stepped back out of the way. The dirt, small rocks, sand and earthwisps, she compressed and pulled out of the water, followed by the bubbles, dissolved air and airwisps, leaving only water. Then she contracted the water together, and there was a puff of heat as the water went from liquid to solid. The air around it began to get hotter as she compressed the water more and more, until it was a cold as it was physically possible for water to be.


    Then she slowly, carefully made the ice flow around the beams of the ice boat.


    She had to admit, it was nice more-or-less having a mold to mark out the confines of what she was binding. The bottom and side of the hull began to be filled with ice between layers of wood, and she was careful to make sure the ice didn''t ripple and fold and accidentally trap bubbles of air inside it. She had to draw on more water from the river twice more before she finally filled in all the areas Rian indicated with ice.


    There was surprisingly less ice than she thought there would be. For some reason, in her mind all the internal walls and surfaces were made of ice¡­ which was, in hindsight, idiotic. Instead only the hull was made of ice, with thick beams for the ice to wrap around, wooden planks cladding it on the outside, and some more planks on top of the ice as a surface to walk on. Everything else above that, like the internal walls, was composed of wooden planks and beams.


    And then Lori was raising pillars of stone out of the river to act as a sort of cage and using water to lift the boat from where it rested and into the river and¡­


    "Huh," Rian said as he stared at the boat of wood and ice floating in the water, tilting a bit to the right. "It actually worked." There was a momentary beat as he visibly and theatrically caught himself, then ''hurriedly'' said, "Ah, I mean, see everyone, I told you it would work! It''s floating." He waved at the boat bobbing in the water, being kept from drifting downriver by the stone pillars, then seemed compelled to comment on the tilt. "I mean, it''s tilting, but we expected that. That''s what the outrigger will be for. I think we can consider it a success."


    Lori had to admit, there did seem to be a general air of ''huh, I can''t believe that actually worked like it was supposed to'' from the carpenters, who had gathered around on the shore nearest to the ice boat and looking at it like they expected the ice to start melting. It wouldn''t¡ªthe binding was keeping it solid and Lori was heavily imbuing it at that very moment¡ªbut they were clearly expecting it to.


    "Well, congratulations everyone," Rian announced. "We''ve actually managed to make a boat that floats! I''d say this calls for a celebration, but we''d be the only ones celebrating, so why don''t you all take the day off to rest? We still need to install the fittings like beds and tables and things tomorrow, but you''ve all earned a break."


    There was a sort of relieved and relaxed cheer from the carpenters, who all began to pick up their tools and putting them away. Lori had to acknowledge their professionalism, they were cleaning up properly instead of just walking away from their work site. She continued to stand where she was, staring at the boat¡ªand it was properly a boat now, since it was floating in the river and everything¡ªwhile the carpenters slowly trickled away and Rian went among them, congratulating them individually and talking to them. From the sound of it, he was also inquiring about the larger-sized blocks that were being hollowed out for this boat''s water jet.


    Eventually, there was only Lori, the muted sounds of the river and the boat bumping up against the stone pillars, and Rian. He stood next to her, also staring at the boat.


    "We''re actually doing it," he said quietly. "We''ve actually got a boat to send back."


    "You''re not going," Lori said sharply.


    "I have to," Rian protested. "You saw them. Seeing it float barely managed to convince them it works."


    "Your absurd theatrics might have had something to do with that."


    "You''d be surprised how much more effective levity can be," Rian said. "If I''d just said ''see, I told you so'', they''d have likely remained contrary because no one wants to be proven wrong. By playing it up like that, I made it all right to show that they''d changed their mind. Now, at least, the carpenters will look confident about the boat that they built, and that confidence in it will spread among other people. Meaning we might actually be able to find volunteers to travel on this with me."


    "You''re not going," Lori repeated.


    "Lori, do you really trust anyone but me to come back with the boat?"


    Lori wanted to snap that she didn''t trust him¡­ but even to herself the impulse seemed silly and childish. "What am I supposed to do without you around?" she said instead.


    "You have Erzebed to talk to people for you," he said.


    "Who?"


    "Riz. You''ll be fine. And I''ll have us come back as quickly as I can. At the very least, we might not be able to afford the berthing fees for very long."


    Lori blinked. "Berthing fees?"


    "You don''t think boats can just pull up to Covehold''s docks for free, do you?"


    She''d honestly never thought of it.


    "I''ve honestly never thought of it," Lori said.


    "Yes, there''s a good chance we might even lose an absurd amount of our money just to be able to dock."


    Lori could see it. Now that she knew it was a possibility, she would not be surprised if they charged by the hour.


    "Relax, we probably won''t need to leave for a week or two," Rian said. "There''s still putting in the beds and storage spaces, the cells for the exiles, the food supplies, a cooking area, finding the volunteers to go on the boat with me, preparing the cargo¡­ you''ll have plenty of time to adjust to me being gone."


    For a moment, Lori had a wild, insane urge. It filled her, completely irrational, pointless, stupid and unsafe.


    She quashed it ruthlessly. After all those times vowing never to leave her demesne again, there was absolutely no reason for her to leave it just to go to Covehold, especially when she''d need to travel with two people who''d already tried to assault her.


    Besides, she was used to feeling lonely. It was her entire childhood, school life and early adulthood. She''d be fine.


    She''d be fine¡­

 123 - A Favor

    The work on the boat continued, the finishing touches that would make it livable for any length of time. A latrine. Beds, which would fold up for space. A large rudder, to be able to shift its course. And of course the large water jet to propel it.


    "I''m an idiot," Rian sighed over dinner. He''d managed to get ahead of the women this time, and had presented Lori with two bowls of stew. She''d picked one.


    "Yes, you are," Lori agreed, eating in a leisurely manner.


    "You don''t have to agree so quickly. That''s just mean."


    "I was merely supporting you." There seemed to be fried or grilled mushroom in the stew tonight. It chewed quite nicely.


    Rian sighed again, absently stirring his bowl before taking a small spoonful, chewing and swallowing. "Anyway, on a related note, the boat needs to be slightly rebuilt. When the carpenters were carving out the blocks that would become the boat''s water jet, I realized it needed to be mounted on a support beam since if we tried putting it straight on the ice, there''s a good chance the ice might crack from the strain. Actually, since it''s meant to reverse, the water jet block needs to have support beams on both sides to secure it to."


    Lori nodded. "Sensible thinking for a self-declared idiot."


    "Yes. A pity I didn''t think of it when we were initially placing the beams. So, uh, can you melt the ice without letting water soak into the wood? I hear that''s bad for them. We''ll need to put in more beams to brace the water jet against, and distribute its thrust through the whole structure." He closed his eyes, rubbing his eyelids. "I suppose it''s too much to expect that we built it right the first time. This is my fault, they were only building what I told to."


    "Yes, it is."


    "Your idea of what supporting me entails needs some work."


    Lori shrugged.


    "It was a perfectly understandable oversight, Rian," Mikon said reassuringly. She was sitting next to him tonight, with Riz on her other side. "You''ve never done anything like this before. Since you realized before something broke or anyone was hurt, I think you''re doing very well."


    "I suppose," Rian said. He shook his head, getting his next mouthful ready on his spoon. "Well, no use dwelling on it. Anything in particular you want me to get you from Covehold, your Bindership?"


    "Tool glass," Lori said instantly. "New boots. A book. ANY book. I need something to read."


    Rian swallowed "What, even a¡­" he frowned, trailing off as he thought. "I''m trying to think of the most boring subject possible, but everything I''m thinking of seems like something you''d find interesting or possibly be too horrifying to give you."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Such as what?"


    "Like a book on tax law," Rian said. The three seated next to him twitched. "I''ll see what I can do about the book. I remember them not lasting well on the way here."


    "That was over the ocean," Lori said. "This is a much shorter journey." She frowned, then clucked her tongue. "I''ve just realized that the boat needs a binding to drain water out of it. It will need to be washed at least twice a day to keep down Iridescence growth, and to ensure that water doesn''t pool inside. Having water filling the insides of you boat is probably detrimental to it."


    Rian slumped, and his forehead hit the table. "Ugh, I forgot all about that." He sighed. "You''re right, I have to account for that. Will it make the ice more likely to melt?"


    Lori shook her head. "No, it shouldn''t affect the behavior of the ice, besides making it slippery¡ª"


    Rian suddenly groaned again. "Ugh, the water''s going to drip through all the floors, isn''t it? We''re only making it from wooden planks, and we don''t have much in the way of sealant for it. Keeping things dry is going to be hard¡­" He glanced at her. "But you don''t care, because you have no intention of ever needing to travel for that far or that long, do you?"


    Lori nodded. Not cheerfully, even if it was a cheerful thought. "Why risk my death? I need to protect the demesne."


    "Well, all the more reason for me to go," Rian said. "Otherwise no one will want to volunteer to go on it."


    "Which reminds me, be the one to ferry miners to River''s Fork next week," Lori said thoughtfully. "Find out how many guards Binder Shanalorre intends to send to accompany the prisoners. They''re her prisoners, after all."


    "By which you mean pointedly hint that she should send her own guards, lest you just have their throats slit and toss them into the river?" Rian said.


    That¡­ hadn''t occurred to her.


    It should have.


    "That would be helpful to imply, yes. They will need to bring their own supplies for themselves and their prisoners, and we''ll need an estimate of how much that will be so we can prepare the storage area." Lori finished her bowl, scraping it clean with her spoon. She resisted the urge to get another serving, letting her stomach settle and reminding her she still had fruit in her room.


    "Not to sound lazy, but that sounds like something Riz should do," Rian said.


    Riz blinked. "It is?" she said, surprised.


    Rian nodded. "I''ll come along, but I might be best if you do this. It''ll allow you to start getting used to doing this sort of thing for her Bindership, even if it''s only on a temporary basis. We can do this together and if you make any major mistakes I can step in and take over."


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    "Don''t make the same mistake he does and just call her ''Shana''," Lori said, pushing her empty bowl aside. "She''s Dungeon Binder Shanalorre. You will be representing myself when you speak to her, and as such you will show her proper respect, lest she take offense and decide to go to war with us."


    "She won''t," Rian told Riz, shaking her head. "She''s a very reasonable person. Disturbingly reasonable."


    Lori rolled her eyes. There was nothing disturbing about Shanalorre, she was a very calm, mature and reasonable person. Lori wished more people were like her.


    "Actually, did you know her, when you lived there?" Rian asked.


    Riz shook her head. "No. I vaguely remember Binder Koshay''s daughter, but¡­ no, I don''t know her personally. I don''t think we''ve ever exchanged words. She was always with her parents."


    "Then I''ll introduce you, and you can get used to talking to her in case Lori thinks of more things to extort but is too lazy to try to get personally."


    Riz''s eyes went wide, and she glanced at Lori.


    "It''s called political negotiation," Lori said blandly. "Well within Rian''s duties. And as my temporary Rian when he leaves, you''ll need to learn to conduct them."


    A vaguely horrified look came over Riz''s face. "Glittering blood," she said, and Lori noted the words, which sounded like invective, "I''m an officer."


    "A temporary officer," Rian said, seeming to understand what Riz was talking about. "Temporary commanding officer, but still a temporary one. But the key word is ''temporary''. When I come back, you get demoted and go back to Um duty."


    "Really?" Riz said, sounding desperate.


    "Yes," Rian said. "Just don''t perform exceptionally well, and you should be fine."


    "Don''t do well, got it," Riz nodded, clearly holding tightly to the words.


    "I won''t tolerate uselessness," Lori said. "I know how well you''ve performed until now. I expect at least that level of competence."


    "See? Just be as competent as you''ve been until now, and you''ll be fine," Rian said cheerfully.


    "If there is any drop in competence, you will be punished."


    Rian frowned at her.


    Lori shrugged. "There have to be consequences. While her position is a temporary one, I expect her to maintain the standard she has previously set. Should your performance be unacceptable, you will be barred from this table."


    Riz stiffened. So did Mikon. Umu, for her part, grinned for a moment, then had the presence of mind to suppress her expression. She continued eating dinner with a cheerful air, though.


    "Are you¡­ turning eating here into a privilege?" Rian said, sounding confused.


    "I understand, Great Binder," Riz said, voice suddenly determined. "I won''t fail you, provided this position is only temporary."


    Lori tilted her head. "I will hold you to that."


    She suddenly pointed at Umu, who paused in her eating. "Don''t interfere," she said sternly.


    The woman sighed, but said, "Yes, your Bindership."


    Riz glared at the blonde, while Umu began patting her on the shoulder, seemingly trying to calm her down, even as the pink-haired weaver sighed tiredly.


    Rian sighed. "I''m missing something again, aren''t I? Is this some kind of secret woman thing?"


    "No, there''s nothing secret about it, you''re just ignorant," Lori said blandly.


    "If I don''t know, you''re not going to tell me?"


    Lori nodded.


    "But what if I need to know?"


    "Then you should get better at noticing," Lori said, her tone unchanged.


    Rian sighed. "Fine, don''t tell me. I don''t care. But if it turns out I needed to know, you''ll only have yourself to blame."


    "No, I won''t."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Anyway, I have a favor to ask."


    "Is this going to be another thing I have to build for you with Whispering?"


    Rian shook his head. "No, this is a normal favor."


    Lori glared at him. "And the reason you can''t ask someone else¡­?"


    "They don''t have much room at their house," Rian said succinctly. "You have the entire demesne."


    "I''m not going to give you land."


    "I''m not asking for any! Just a small favor! You won''t even have to do anything, just drop something in a corner and forget about it until I bring it up again."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "I''m listening¡­"


    "Can you store the things that I can''t bring along with me to Covehold somewhere? Just throw it in a corner of one of the vaults and don''t drop any scales on it. I don''t want to leave it in the shelter, since someone might trip over it or something, or it might get lost," Rian asked.


    "Can''t you just bring it with you? You can''t have brought much," Lori said irritably.


    "I won''t be the only one on the boat, and storage space will be precious," Rian said. "Between the choice of bringing along some of my other clothes and some more food, the food is a better choice. Please? If I don''t come back in half a year, you can have it all."


    Lori stood just enough to be able to reach out across the table and grab the front of his shirt. She twisted her fist just enough for the fabric to tighten around his neck.


    "You are not going to be gone for half a year," she said through gritted teeth, her voice low and determined. "You will be back well before winter, with time to spare, healthy, safe and mentally sound, because I am not dealing with these idiots by myself, is that clear?"


    "I hear you, but this is sort of sending me mixed messages¡­" Rian said, his throat vibrating against her knuckles, words slightly strained.


    Scowling, Lori released him, and Rian patted at his shirt as if afraid she''d torn it or something. "I will store your possessions on the condition you come back for them," she said sternly.


    "I''m completely willing to agree to that," Rian said.


    "And you''re leaving your sword here."


    He blinked. "My sword?" he repeated, sounding confused.


    "Yes. That''s something you''re certainly going to come back for."


    "What if I need it to defend myself?"


    She stared at him. "Don''t put yourself in a situation where you need to defend yourself," she said.


    "You say that like it''s my choice," he muttered. "Fine, fine, I''ll leave it here. Maybe I can find a nice, solid stick or something."


    "Good. You''ll have something to come back to."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "Are you worried I won''t come back?"


    "I am not dealing with these idiots by myself," Lori repeated. "And do not forget that we have an agreement." She nodded in the general direction of the list of laws and rights on the wall that hid the core, which most people seemed to ignore nowadays.


    "Please tell me you''re not going to repeal our agreement while I''m gone," he said.


    "If you''re not back by winter, I will."


    Rian sighed. "It''s always something with you¡­ fine, yes, I''ll come back. I promise. Otherwise I''m terrified of what you''ll come up with when you finally get around to implementing money and taxes."


    Lori glared at him, then nodded sharply. "Fine. I''ll prepare a place to store anything you can''t bring along."


    "Thank you, your Bindership," Rian said. He sighed. "That''s one less thing I have to worry about. I''m not afraid of anyone stealing from me, but treating my things carelessly because I''m not around is another thing entirely. I''d put it under the bed, but I expect someone else will start sleeping on that. After all, it''s not like I''ll be using it, someone else should get to¡­"


    "You will come back, won''t you, Rian?" Umu said, voice quavering only a little.


    "Of course I''ll come back. Why wouldn''t I?" He shrugged. "It''s not like I have anywhere else to go. This place is home now. I''ve done a lot of paperwork on behalf of this demesne, I''m not letting all that work go to waste."


    Umu sighed quietly. Behind Rian, Mikon reached out and patted her shoulder reassuringly.


    Lori stood up without a word, and headed to her room to retire.


    "Good night!" Rian called after her. "See you tomorrow!"


    Lori waved a negligent hand in acknowledgement, her thoughts spinning but not binding together.


    He said he''d come back. He''d promised, repeatedly.


    He meant it¡­ right?

 124 - Something To Come Back To

    Rian continued working on getting the boat built properly, adding in new beams and now carefully examining where else might need reinforcement. Lori felt he should have done that before, but what did she know? She wasn''t a boat builder. Perhaps making blatant errors in common sense and thorough thinking were proper and traditional parts of the boat-building process.


    Well, not her problem.


    Still, the boat was taking up a lot of wood. Above the ice hull reinforced by wooden beams, plank walls were going up. The boat was meant to have a ''below'' deck in the ice hull itself, a smaller enclosed ''above'' deck that was pretty much a little house with a very low ceiling, and a roof deck above that, which was basically just standing on the roof. There was also a simple latrine, which was basically just a seat with a hole in it positioned over the side of the boat so everything fell into the river, with some low plank walls for a semblance of privacy, or at least telling people it was occupied. Considering how many people were expected to be on the boat, there were two on each side.


    As the boat was being built, Rian poured over everything, trying to decide the optimum placement of storage, sleeping areas, open space¡ª"We need somewhere to move around, or else we''ll get cramped,"¡ªand where exactly it would be best to put the kitchen so there was the least risk of fire. Something about avoiding the embarrassing ironic death of dying by heat while on an ice boat. Lori would have thought that avoiding any sort of death at all would have been the point.


    Well, not her problem. It was Rian''s.


    In between maintaining her demesne and curing wood¡ªthey''d cleared a decently large swath around the dungeon already, which would probably provide a lot of farming land next year¡ªshe was excavating. They had sufficient room in the Dungeon right now, but she was thinking of the future. After all, there was a reason Dungeons were underground.


    ¡­well, mostly underground. Skykeep Demesne was an annoying exception to most general statements about demesne that a certain sort of person liked to bring up during discussion to disrupt the flow of the conversation.


    But annoying exceptions to general statements aside, Dungeons were underground to be able to best take advantage of the fact that the area of a Demesne was spherical. And unless the core of the demesne had been placed at the top of a mountain or along the coast, that meant most of the area of the demesne was underground. The old continent was full of tunnels from generations and generations of demesnes, mining, the occasional war, and the rare act of cooperation, such as the Dragon Road.


    There was none of that here. The earth and stone beneath her feet seemed solid all the way until the edge of the sphere she controlled, and she could dig through all of it.


    Not that she was going to. She just needed to excavate a new level.


    The second level was to the side and beneath the depth of the first level. The beginnings of the third level would be even lower down and at a right angle to the line of the other two levels, digging in the direction away from the river and making the beginnings of a downward spiral. Since it was away from the river, she could expand the level as large as she wanted. That was a good freedom to have when you were planning to make an underground farm.


    That would take time though since she''d need soil, so for now she simply excavated. They''d have time to cart in dirt, soil and compost later.


    Moving large lumps of fluidly flowing rock out of the dungeon was familiar, although passing through a surprisingly loud and lively second level, full of spinners making threads, yarns and cords, ropers making rope, weavers making fabric, and carpenters cutting, planning, chiseling, and doing all sorts of things to wood was slightly disorienting. Still, she had years of experience ignoring annoying people, and it stood her in good stead as she took the stone outside to the new stone pile, though she had to move several tables out of her path.


    Lori began by excavating the slope down deeper, giving it a gentle slope and long, shallow steps. Given the purpose she intended to use this for, she''d probably have to make the tunnel wide and make a ramp as well as stairs, but for now this was enough. She''d have to come back to make the stairs level, but that was for later. Perhaps she''d make this stair the ramp and the expansion the stairs¡­ Yes, that sounded appealing¡­


    "Lori? You down there?"


    The words echoed in the enclosed space, and Lori looked back. "What?" she demanded.


    Rian carefully came down the stairs. There were no lights along the walls, the only glow coming from the lightwisps on the end of her staff. "It''s dinner time," he said.


    Already? She could have sworn she''d just had lunch. But no, she was sweaty, her feet ached from walking back and forth from her excavation to the stone pile, and if she strained her ears, she could make out that the sounds coming from the level above her had changed. Lori sighed, then nodded. "All right, I''ll come up." A thought came to her. "Will you be getting the food yourself tonight, or leaving it to the women?"


    "That''s rich coming from the woman who never gets her own food."


    "Yes, but I have no issues with that, unlike you."


    Rian''s face twisted, but he couldn''t find a reply to that. "Well, I''ve done my duty in telling you it''s time to eat. See you at dinner."


    Lori nodded with a grunt and started making the last batch of stone flow to bring to the pile. Fortunately people stepped out of her way when they saw her walking with a big ball of undulating rock in tow. A few children tried to reach out and touch it, but fortunately they were stopped before they managed to do so. While it didn''t look heavy, since it was flowing with the seeming consistency of a very thick dough, it was still solid rock, and weighed as much. Anyone who was accidentally run over by it would probably be crushed.


    Lori managed to get the stone to the pile without incident, then turned to look around. The smithy area was nearby, the coals banked and furnace door closed, tools put away. The houses which had once backed into the trees now had cleared land behind them, tree stumps studding the ground. There had used to be small plants growing there, taking advantage of the larger trees being gone, but a lot of them had been savaged by the dragonborn abominations. Still, a few were stubborn clinging on, and new shoots were already growing. It was a bit too uneven to turn into field, but it would be ideal to put in new houses should they need it, maybe be the start of a new street leading to where the seels were being caught and where the hunters and tanners worked.


    She''d have to move her corpses before that day came. It was a good thing she''d buried them deep. The dragon hadn''t reached them at all.


    Lori glanced at the pile of stone from her day''s excavating. It was sizeable, and months of building had given her a good eye for estimating how much she could build with it. She nodded in satisfaction.


    Then she turned and headed back to her rooms to take a quick bath before heading for dinner.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, Lori was busy getting tree stumps out of the ground.


    "All right, drag that out of there," Riz directed. "This will make for good firewood if the sawyers can cut it up."


    "If there''s anything too hard they don''t want to risk their saws on, tell them to set it aside and I''ll cut it myself later," Lori said, not looking at her as she concentrated on binding earthwisps to soften the ground around the next tree stump so it could be pulled out. This was good soil, and thus had too much mulch and things for her to be able to bind the whole of it completely, so softening it was the best she could do.


    Her temporary Rian was learning her duties well, at least. "You heard the Great Binder," Riz said. "Tell the sawyers to set aside the roots that are too hard, she''ll deal with it. Are you ready on those ropes?"


    "Riz, we know what to do, you don''t need to direct us for every little thing." One of the men at the ropes said.


    "Well, I don''t know any other way to do this!"


    "They can pull now," Lori said.


    "You can pull now!"


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    "Yes, we heard her!"


    One by one, the tree stumps were pulled out, and there was only one accident with someone walking on where she''d softened the earth, sinking down to their knees when the ground suddenly displaced under them. Fortunately, they had ropes to pull her out.


    They finished that day, since they only had to clear a small area. Riz wasn''t Rian, but as a temporary Rian she was¡­ just barely serviceable. Hopefully she''d learn to get better at it. At least she didn''t have Rian''s insistence on being funny.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, she began construction.


    The structure she built using part of the excavated stone was essentially a small segment of the shelter and the Um. The soil and dirt she had Riz find people to shovel to the side. Perhaps it could go into the third level. There was no packed dirt here, just stone to the bedrock. Because of the small size, she finished it fairly quickly. Lori attributed that to her accumulated building experience. The little house had an arching stone roof that came down to the ground and stone wall at the end at either end to cap it off, making it a complete building. One side had an opening for a door and windows to either side, while the other end had a fireplace and a chimney.


    The curving walls and ceiling also had some windows made in them, composed of curving arcs to continue supporting the roof. The floor inside was below the ground level outside, the earth excavated and replaced with a layer of stone, to provide sufficient headroom given the ceiling in question, so the entrance had to be slightly elevated from ground level to prevent water from getting in when it rained, as it had when they had first arrived in the area.


    The step down was slightly awkward when the bed was being brought in.


    "All right, put it there in the corner and you can go," Riz directed the people she''d found. Lori didn''t know who they were, she left that sort of thing to Rian, and now her temporary Rian. All that mattered was that they were able to carry the bed. Theoretically she could have knocked the wall with the door down and they could have brought the bed in that way, but¡­ well, the bed got in, and that was what mattered. "Thanks, everyone."


    "Riz, if you''re going to do Lord Rian''s job, can you find other people to ask help from?" One of the people said. "Being your friend is turning into a lot of hard work."


    Riz chuckled nervously. "Sorry guys. Once we have a bar and drinks, drinks are on me."


    "We''ll hold you to that!" another one said.


    As Lori used some stone to begin work on a table, Riz went on the next errand Lori had told her to do. Soon, Tackir and Deil came carrying a door, one of the doors that had been made for the Um and repairs on the houses that hadn''t been used. Or it could have even been a door that had been made for the ice boat that Rian had declared to be too big or something. With efficient, practiced movements, Lori and the two carpenters attached the wooden hinges into the stone wall mounted the door and latch to it, Lori adjusting the stone around the door to best fit it so there was a minimum of drafts while she sent Riz out to get some firewood for the fireplace. Then the two carpenters measured the floor, taking notes on a plank with a burnt stick and made their way out.


    It was nearing late afternoon when they finished and Umu and Mikon finally arrived, one of them holding a sturdy canvas pack, the other carrying blanket being used as a makeshift sack. Good, it looked like they hadn''t had any problems. Anyone there was probably used to Umu going in and taking things, and Mikon had used to do the same thing before the blonde had cornered the market.


    "Just put it on the bed," Lori directed, pointing.


    They did as ordered, laying the things out with care and a strange and very particular way as Lori looked around, trying to think of what else was needed. Shutters for the windows would have to come later and wooden planking for the floor to keep back chill, but it had a roof, sturdy walls and a place for heat, and while the step up then steps down at the entrance was surprising it wasn''t all the inconvenient¡­


    Out the corner of her eye, she saw Umu nervously open her mouth, pause, look momentarily frustrated, then sighed and turned to Riz reluctantly. The blonde weaver said a few quiet words to her temporary Rian as Mikon walked around, giving the table Lori had a strange look. Well, Lori supposed a wooden one would have been more efficient and easier to move¡ªshe''d have to tell her temporary Rian to have one made¡ªbut stone was what she had to work with at the moment.


    ¡­Maybe she should make a chair? Or some kind of bench along the wall that could be used as a shelf? The walls were fairly thick, she should be able to hollow out a little shelf without affecting the structural integrity too much¡­ No, wait, planks stuck to the wall would be easier¡­


    "Riz, would you please remember to tell the carpenters to bring in some planks here, planed smooth?" she said absently. "One a pace long and two hands wide would suffice."


    Her temporary Rian hesitated, glanced at Umu¡ªwho was giving her a pointed look¡ªand pursed her lips. "Um, Great Binder, why are you doing this?"


    Well, the question wasn''t unreasonable, it was a bit sudden. "I''ll need it for a shelf," she said. "This place needs somewhere to stack things on out of the ground. Hmm, perhaps make it three planks, and three hands wide, two might be a bit narrow¡­"


    The woman hesitated. "I meant, why are you doing all this, Great Binder," she said, waving a hand to gesture at the walls, the ceiling, the fireplace, the table, and everything in around them general.


    "Because I needed a house built quickly and didn''t want to wait the week it would take to build a wooden roof," Lori said.


    Mikon coughed. "Er, if I may?" she said, not speaking to anyone in particular.


    Lori gave her a sideways looks. "What is it?" she asked.


    "Your Bindership, why did you have all this built so quickly?" the pink-haired weaver said. "Why did you ask us to bring Lord Rian''s bed and possessions here while he was occupied? Are you¡­ interested in him?" Around her, Riz and Umu both looked shocked, terrified, scandalized and in disbelief, all at once.


    Lori snorted at the absurdity, though she approved at the directness of the question. And a direct question deserved a direct answer. "No, I''m not interested in Rian the way the three of you seem to be," she declared. If anything, the expression on Riz and Umu''s faces all escalated, now mixed with embarrassment and mortification, as well as taking on a deep tinge while making small noises. Even Mikon was blushing slightly. "Questions of your lack of taste aside, I don''t care if you all decide to become his lovers and get married as a group, so long as it doesn''t interfere with his ability to do what I need him to do."


    Mikon coughed slightly, but didn''t avert her gaze. "And¡­ you built all this so that¡­?"


    "So that Rian has something to come back to instead of leaving when he reaches Covehold," Lori said.


    The three fell silent at that.


    "He has no family here, nothing to tie him down. After all, it''s not like he has a wife or lover waiting for him."


    There was some shuffling, Riz and Umu looking away, while Mikon¡­ was nodding thoughtfully.


    A knock came on the door.


    "Come in," Lori called out. She supposed the shelves would have to be put in later.


    The door opened, and the brat came in leading a frowning Rian. "Wiz Lori," the brat said. "Lord Rian''s here! I brought him, just like you asked."


    Lori nodded. "Thank you, Karina. Go and wash up for dinner."


    The brat nodded, nodded at Rian and stepped out.


    "So, that''s where my bed went. And everything else, for that matter," Rian said, sighing in relief as he saw the bed and the things on it. Then he looked around. "This house is new. Or has it always been here and I just didn''t notice?"


    "No, it''s new," Lori said. "And it''s yours."


    Rian blinked. "Mine?" he said, looking surprised.


    "You asked for someplace to store your things while you were gone, didn''t you?"


    "I¡­ thought you were just going to toss it into the vault until I got back¡­"


    "Well, you can do it yourself," Lori gestured vaguely. "You might have to get something made to put it in¡­"


    Rian looked around, noting the fireplace, which had wood in it with some more to the side, the three tall and narrow windows on either side on the arcing walls, the table¡­ "You¡­ made me a house?"


    Lori shrugged. "Not just me. Other people helped too. Riz was very helpful in finding people to do the work."


    Rian glanced towards Riz, who was still blushing a little. He turned around to glance at the door. "This is house is¡­ mine?"


    "I said that already," Lori said. "I have decided that as a lord you needed your own residence, for privacy, and so you have a space to work and keep more organized notes."


    "And the sacrificial altar?"


    Lori gave him an annoyed look. "It''s a table. And a temporary one. You can arrange to have a wooden one built, and I''ll remove this one when you''re done."


    "I''ll¡­ do that."


    Lori nodded. "Well, go take a bath, I''ll meet you for dinner," she said. She made a gesture.


    Rian blinked then realized he was standing in her path to the door and stepped aside. She nodded and left.


    Then she stood outside and leaned with her back against the wall, listening.


    "Well, we''ll leave you to get ready for your bath, Rian," Mikon said. "Come on girls, I''m sure Rian won''t appreciate us gawking at him while he gets undressed."


    There were shuffling sounds, and Umu stepped out moving quickly, head bowed, face still red. She didn''t even notice Lori as she ran past. Riz followed after, moving at a more dignified pace but clearly just as distracted.


    Mikon stepped out last, pulling the door shut behind her and calling out, "See you at dinner, Rian," over her shoulder, catching sight of Lori as she did so. She only paused for a moment, but finished closing the door.


    Lori pushed off from the wall and began to walk back to the Dungeon and her private bath. A pity. Such a frustrating combination of obliviousness and reticence.


    It wasn''t her problem, but it was mildly annoying. If they had the bad taste to be interested in Rian, couldn''t they at least have the courtesy to do it in a way that was convenient for her, such as giving him another reason to come back?


    To her surprise, Mikon fell into step beside her, and Lori gave the woman a curious glance. The weaver was looking straight ahead. "If I may¡­?" she said, seemingly speaking to the air.


    "You said that already," Lori said. "What?"


    "What are the requirements to get married in your demesne, your Bindership?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "At least two consenting people," she said. "They tell me, I make a record of the agreement, and then they''re married."


    Mikon blinked. "So simple?"''


    "A marriage is merely an agreement made official by the public record," Lori said. "Don''t mistake it for a wedding, which is a separate event entirely, though it is traditional to conduct them simultaneously to save time." She shrugged. "Personally, having just a marriage and skipping the wedding has always seemed cheaper to me, with fewer organizational annoyances."


    Mikon made a sound of realization. "I see. At least two?" There was a tone in her voice¡­


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Yes, at least two." Then, a slightly vindictive thought made her say, "Inform all interested parties they are to submit applications to either Rian or my temporary Rian."


    Mikon merely nodded, looking thoughtful. "I see. Thank you, your Bindership."


    They walked on in silence.

 125 - A Lonely House

    Lori raised an eyebrow at Rian as he collapsed heavily onto the bench opposite her, eyes drooping almost shut. It''s opposite rose as well as Rian folded his arms over the table and laid his head down. "Rian, did you stay up late last night?"


    There was a muffled sound that might have vaguely been affirmatory.


    "Did the private celebrations in honor of having your own house go on for too long?"


    There was a very long muffled string of words in response.


    "I didn''t catch that," Lori said. Behind Rian, Mikon took one look, shook her head, and diverted to head straight for the kitchen area.


    Rian finally raised his head. "I said, ''whichever of any number of implications you''re making, they''re not any of them''."


    "Ah. Perhaps it would have been easier to understand you had you been clearer the first time."


    "Your concern and understanding are a standard everyone should strive to meet," Rian said flatly.


    Lori nodded in agreement. "Yes, it is."


    They stared at each other for a moment as Riz and Umu arrived, both looking much fresher than Rian, and sat down next to him. Both looked around curiously for a moment, as if wondering where Mikon was, until they saw her near the kitchen.


    "I literally can''t tell if you''re joking or serious," Rian said.


    "I''m Lori."


    Rian blinked, paused, blinked again. "And now you''re stealing my jokes."


    "No, they are being requisitioned by the government. Can you work?"


    "I''m going to choose to interpret that as your way of expressing concern. Yes, I can work, yes, I''m fine, I just had trouble sleeping last night."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"


    "Again, whatever implication you''re making, it''s not any of them." Rian yawned. "I just had trouble sleeping last night because I was in a new place, that''s all."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "You had no trouble sleeping in River''s Fork."


    "I wasn''t alone in the room there. I was either in a house with everyone else or I was keeping watch over you."


    Lori didn''t understand his problem. She''d never had trouble sleeping alone. She''d slept alone all her life.


    Rian blinked, then shook his head. "Not that I don''t like the house, I just need to get used to it. It''s a bit too dark and quiet after months of sleeping in what is essentially a communal barracks." He sighed. "I ended up walking around the demesne to try and get sleepy, which worked¡­ eventually." A yawn ripped itself out of his mouth. "Ugh¡­ I don''t want to go to work today¡­"


    "I thought you said you could work?"


    "I said I could. I just don''t want to, because I feel terrible."


    Mikon walked up behind him, putting down a wooden cup and a ceramic jar of water in front of Rian. "Here you go Rian. I''ll get your breakfast too."


    Rian blinked, looking up her blearily. "Thanks," he said, almost sighing the word.


    He really was tired, if he was just letting her get his food without any actual protest. Mikon tapped Umu on the shoulder. The other weaver glanced at her, but after a moment''s hesitation and a glance towards Lori, she stood and went with Umu to get food.


    Lori sighed. "Riz, you''re taking over Rian''s duties for today. Don''t change anything, just see that things that are supposed to be done are getting done. If anyone has any questions, bring them to me."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said with a nod. She gave Rian a sympathetic look and patted his shoulder. "Go get some sleep, Rian. I''ll take over for today. Anything I need to know?"


    "You don''t have to¡­" Rian trailed off, his head slumping slightly, before abruptly straightening blinking rapidly and rubbing his eyes. "Uh, on second thought, thank you very much. I guess I owe you one. You too, Lori."


    "Don''t worry about it, Rian," Riz said. "Get some rest."


    "I''ll try to be up by noon and take over for the rest of the day," Rian said weakly. "Actually, maybe I can just take a bath to wake up¡ª"


    "Rian."


    "Is this the part where you order me to go to sleep?"


    "It is."


    "Going to sleep after breakfast then, your Bindership. Sorry for being useless today. I swear I love the house, it''s just¡­ lonely." That last was almost a sigh.


    "I can only build it," Lori said. "Isn''t it on you to make it less lonely?"


    "I suppose¡­" Rian hummed. "Maybe I can draw on the walls or something..."


    Riz reached up and awkwardly patted Rian on the shoulder.


    "Thanks¡­" he said, shaking his head. "Well, just have to get used to it. And hey, I''m a homeowner now! I actually own my own house. According to my parents, I''m now an adult. And no property taxes¡ª" He paused and looked at Lori cautiously, some of the sleepiness being pushed out of his eyes "¡ªright?"


    She waved a hand. "Yes, yes, no taxes yet. Mostly because you have nothing to pay them with." The brat had found a way, but not everyone was as diligent.


    "No property taxes!" Rian cheered, then swayed and slumped. "Ugh, so tired¡­"


    Umu and Mikon came back with food, one of the bowls only half full, and after Lori picked a bowl, the three of them took turns coaxing Rian to eat a little food. Lori didn''t have anyone to play sunk with that morning but then she''d been a bit too busy to play much for the past few weeks.


    Eventually, Rian finished the half bowl and staggered off to sleep, Umu and Mikon helping him get back home since he was a bit unsteady. Riz watched them go, but could clearly feel Lori''s gaze on her, so she sighed and got up, heading down to the carpenters to tell them of the change of plans.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The blocks that would form the large water jet for the ice boat had been finished yesterday, the pieces finally hollowed out, but the supporting beams to lay them on were still being added to the boat''s frame.


    While that was being put in by the carpenters, Lori finally stopped putting it off since she finally had an immediate use for it, grabbed a dragon scale made of gold, and loomed over the blacksmiths to draw it out into wire. Well, wire and a little container the size of her little finger, since she needed something to hold her blood. Gold was ideal for this, since it could be as thin and small as needed, as long as it was reinforced by something else. She had to make a form of the appropriate size to wrap the gold around to get the size and shape she wanted for the container.


    As the blacksmiths worked on that, Lori took a moment to glance into the window of Rian''s nearby house. She nodded in satisfaction when she saw he seemed to be properly sleeping. He was snoring, at least, and one leg was twitching as if he was stomping on something in his dreams. The thought occurred to her that the woman¡ªor man¡ªwho finally managed to get into Rian''s bed was in for a possibly painful surprise.


    Actually, that made her wonder if he actually had managed to get any sleep that time she''d ordered him to during that holiday. None of the women had ever brought up if he''d kicked them in his sleep¡­


    Lori looked into the window again suspiciously, wondering if he was really sleeping instead of just lying there with his eyes closed. She was tempted to call out to see if he would move, but she remembered sleepless nights and her vengeful anger when her mothers had woken her up in the middle of a day''s well-deserved sleep to do something they wanted¡­


    ¡­


    She supposed she''d let him sleep.


    Lori spent the rest of the day maintaining the bindings on the demesne, checking the baths to make sure the water was the right temperature, and that the cold rooms were cold. Since the dragon, she''d been experimenting with using liquefied and hardened air to keep their storage rooms cold instead of ice, with variable results. She was still perfecting the process, since unlike ice, she couldn''t just use airwisps to compress it solid. Once it became a liquid, it stopped being air, and airwisps could no longer be used to bind it. Waterwisps only controlled water in all its forms and mixtures with water in it, and while she could use bound solid waterwisps to contain and insulate the liquefied air, turning it into solid blocks of air was detailed work, since she had to let the ice start taking in heat and use it to cool the air all the way until it became solid. This was made complicated because it needed to be under high pressure at all times, or else it would turn back to gas before it turned solid.


    There was probably an easier way to do it, but for now she didn''t know.


    Hmm, she might have to get Rian to ask around at Covehold to see if he could find the process for her. Surely someone there would know? She''d only ever made liquefied air in class, and that had very quickly changed back to air, but she knew it was an industrial process. Unfortunately, it had required more formal qualifications than she''d had at the time, and so she''d never worked where she could have learned the process.


    Still, her way was¡­ mostly working. Currently she was getting small amounts of solidified and liquefied air, which was good for massively cooling the food storage rooms and using bound ice to maintain the chill. It was complicated, but she was getting more proficient at the process, and expected to be able to mass produce it any day now. She was getting tired of all the water in the cold rooms from the ice melting, and solidified air didn''t drip. And at the end of the day, the cold rooms were beyond freezing cold again, preserving their food supplies.


    The cold rooms were almost full again. She might have to dig out another storage room¡­ or possibly expand the cold rooms they had now. After all, there was plenty of unused space if she dug down¡­


    Rian was looking more refreshed when he showed up again at dinner. He still yawned and looked tired, but that might have been because he''d just woken up¡­ or he hadn''t really slept at all.


    "Did you sleep?" Lori asked him.


    "Yeah," he said with tired cheer. "Still a little tired, but that means I''ll be able to sleep again tonight."


    "What about the problem that kept you from sleeping last night?"


    Rian shrugged. "I''ll get used to it. I''ve slept alone in a room before, I just need to remember what it''s like. Though the fact the latrines are so far away makes waking up in the middle of the night awkward. One thing about the shelter, there was a latrine right outside. Well, not right outside, but you understand what I mean."


    "If I add a latrine to your house, you''ll have to clean it yourself," she said flatly. "And you''ll probably have people constantly going into your house to use it during the day."


    "Hmm, you have a point¡­" Rian said, nodding in agreement. It was all theatricality: he had his eyes closed as he nodded. "Maybe when winter comes, if the offer is still open?"


    Well, she did implicitly offer to do it¡­ "If I feel like it," she said.


    "That wasn''t a straight ''no''," Rian said.


    "If I feel like it," Lori repeated.


    Rian''s hand rose momentarily, before he seemed to firmly place his hand on the table. "Thank you," he said quietly. "For the house. I think I forgot to say that last time¡ª" He had, "¡ªbut I''m really, really grateful that you made a house for me. It''s not every day you get a surprise house. Thank you, Lori. I promise, I''ll come back to live in it."


    Rainbows. He saw through her strategy!


    "Though I have to ask¡­"


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "What?"


    "Can you¡­ put a light in my house? It doesn''t need to be very bright, just a little glow on the inside for when night falls."


    She gave him a flat stare. "Rian, you''re a grown man. Are you actually telling me you''re afraid of the dark?"


    "I''m not afraid of the dark, I just¡­ got used to going to sleep with a little light leaking out from around the covers on the lights, that''s all."


    "That sounds like being afraid of the dark."


    "It''s not being afraid, it''s having a preferred light level, like having a preferred temperature!"


    "You''re afraid of the dark."


    "I''m not afraid of the dark, I''d just rather not hit anything if I have to go out to the latrine in the middle of the night!"


    Lori rolled her eyes indulgently. "Fine, I''ll make you a night light."


    "I''m not asking for a night light, I''m not a child! I have my own house now and everything! But thank you."


    He might have insisted on the issue, but the women finally arrived, and he fell silent on his little embarrassment.


    Riz sighed in relief as she saw him. "Lord Rian," she exhaled. "You''re¡­ looking more rested. Does that mean you can go back to work tomorrow?"


    Rian glanced at Lori for some reason, before shaking his head, looking amused. "The day wasn''t that bad, was it?"


    "I have no idea what we we''re supposed to be building," Riz groaned, raising her leg to step over the bench before sitting down next to him. "I know it''s an ice boat, but what I know about ice boats is to watch them sink as they stop working. I just told people to keep doing what they''ve been doing and told them to find something else to do when they told me they were done. I don''t know anything about building boats!"


    "Oh, Riz¡­" Rian said, and to Lori''s surprise and likely Riz''s as well, he patted the northerner woman on the shoulder. "What makes you think I do? We''re all making it up as we go along. You probably did just fine." There was a small, squeak-like sound. Umu was staring at the hand in almost comical shock, while Mikon restrained herself to raised eyebrows.


    Then the pink-haired weaver shrugged and sat on Riz''s other side. "Good evening, Rian," she said. "I''m glad to see you''re looking better. Will you be able to sleep well tonight now?"


    "Hopefully," he said as Umu sat down next to him a little stiffly. "Her Bindership is giving me something to help."


    Mikon nodded. "Would you like me to stay with you until you fall asleep?" she offered. She patted her thigh. "You can lie down with your head on my lap, if you want. I''m told it''s very comfortable." Since Rian was focused on the woman speaking, he didn''t notice Umu''s head snap around in shock beside him.


    "It actually is," Riz admitted almost reluctantly.


    Lori watched with some amusement as Rian actually started blushing. "T-that''s all right Mikon, my pillow is just fine¡­"


    "Aw¡­" Mikon pouted, then shrugged. As a child of two mothers who liked to flirt with each other even when their poor daughter was present, Lori identified it as a deliberate ''bosom-jiggling-to-get-you-to-look-there'' shrug. "Well, if you''re sure. I''m still willing to keep you company though." A smile that deliberately ignored the fact Rian''s eyes had involuntarily flicked down. "You can teach me more about sunk. I''m still not very good at it. Maybe we can play a practice game so you can tell me what I''m doing wrong?"


    "I want to learn how to play sunk too, Rian!" Umu declared with no subtlety whatsoever.


    "Me too," Riz said quickly. "Or at least know why the stones are getting dropped into the bowls, anyway."


    "Uh¡­" Rian said, looking overwhelmed. "Sure? I guess we can¡­ do that¡­?"


    "Well," Lori said, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. "It seems you''ll have company to help you fall asleep tonight, Rian. How fortunate for you. Now go and get my food, I''m hungry."


    Did any of them realize Rian didn''t have a sunk board in his house? Probably not. They just seemed to be saying the first thing that came to mind¡­


    Well, that was their problem.

 126 - Cheerful, Unreadable

    Contrary to her expectation, the three women didn''t try to get Rian alone in his house so they could have their way with him, though they probably wanted to. Instead, what happened was that other people started coming over to Rian''s house to talk and relax, in the same way they sat around in front of the baths or lingered in the dining halls. She suspected Riz had something to do with that. Her temporary Rian knew a lot of people. The front of Rian''s house gained some benches and convenient rocks to sit on. Lori would have found this extremely disruptive and annoying, but Rian was a twisted, twisted person, and thus he was soon coming to breakfast as well-rested and cheerful as usual.


    She vaguely wondered if he''d taken up Mikon''s offer to lie down with his head on her lap. Probably not.


    Lori, for her part, just gave him a rock with lightwisps bound to it. It was another thing she would have to remember to imbue, and was added to the list on her wall. Her wire was still being made, but when it was finished, she resolved to try and wire as many bindings as possible directly to her core so that they would be self-sustaining. She also put in the shelves into the walls of Rian''s house like she said she would, so that Rian wouldn''t have to put his things on the table or under the bed where they''d get dusty.


    The large water jet for the ice boat had been hollowed out from wooden blocks, which when put together created the hollow tubes that the water jet needed to direct water. The blocks all had slots that allowed them to be locked in placed by sliding in a specially shaped length of wood, which could be locked in place with a wooden peg. Put together, the whole water jet block was about a pace and a half long and half that wide. It was heavy enough that Rian thought it would suffice in place of putting weight on the keel to help keep the boat level. It also needed reinforcing beams underneath to support its weight, which were still not finished.


    The smiths finished drawing wire and the container for her blood from the gold Lori provided them. She now had¡­ well, a very, very long length of wire of the smallest diameter the smiths had on their draw plate. It was thicker than a hair, but not by much, and very flexible besides. She had to wrap the whole thing around a branch, and even as tightly wrapped as possible, it was still a fairly sizable roll slightly smaller than a head.


    While the support beams were being completed, Lori worked on preparing the water jet. She lined the tubes with stone to waterproof the block, and prevent leakage as much as possible. Then she prepared the central block. Or rather, had the central block prepared. One of the carpenters took a chisel to it to make a space for her little gold container where it could easily be accessed, and she placed it into the recess with wire leading from it to the inside tube of the central block, sealing the recess with stone. She''d put her blood in it later.


    She had the water jets blocks put together so she could test how well the central block slid, and how well it worked with a binding of waterwisps inside it. Or at least how well water flowed through it, especially the holding loop. It seemed to be working¡­


    When the support beams were finished, Lori was there to watch as the blocks for the water jet was installed. A holding box was built to hold the blocks and Lori sealed all the gaps with bone to waterproof it.


    "I think we might have to open it up and shave a little off the central block once it''s been in the water for a while," Rian commented as she was sealing it all up. "Wood expands when it gets wet, right?"


    "Let''s see if we can solve that before we move on to shaving," Lori said. "Otherwise there''s no going back."


    "True¡­" Rian said. "Are you going to line the tubes through the ice with anything or are you just going to leave them as ice?"


    "Probably best to line them, in case something gets drawn in through the waterjet."


    "What about where the water goes in?"


    "Lined, but there''s no reason to make them as long as you designed. After all, why get water from the front of the boat when you can just draw in the water from slightly in front of the water jet? After all, the propulsion come from the water going out, not getting pulled in."


    "Oh, right¡­ I guess I was just thinking in straight lines. We''ll know for sure how well this works when we test this in the water."


    "I heard the rudder''s pivot broke."


    "It turns out it was a bit too small for the whole rudder assembly, so it''s being remade thicker. Hopefully that will be enough, since if it breaks while we''re out there, it will be really hard to fix. I''m thinking of asking two of the carpenters to come along for repairs."


    "What''s your plan for repairing the boat if the ice breaks?"


    "Hope it doesn''t happen?"


    She gave him a flat look.


    Rian shrugged. "Well, you said I''m not allowed to recruit anyone, especially wizards¡­"


    Lori couldn''t fault his reasoning.


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    With the block of the water jet in place, Lori bound ice into a hull again once the rudder was repaired, this time with a thicker, more robust pivot, so they can test how well it worked. The intakes for the water jet as well as the reverse thrust outlet were positioned between two planks, the ice reinforced with a thick bone tube, just in case.


    "I really wish we had a better way to steer," Rian sighed, holding the tiller as the ice boat bobbed and swayed in the water. Every so often it would jerk as it reached the end of the rope that tied it to the shore and rebound back until the current pushed them back again.


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    "As the one in charge of having this boat built, isn''t that on you?" Lori said absently as she bound water to flow into the water jet so she would have enough water to bind for the water jet binding. "Can you move the central block to align with the loop?"


    "Setting the waterjet on neutral," Rian said, sliding the central block using a lever. "It wasn''t like I didn''t try, it''s just that we didn''t have enough materials for what I wanted to do. Trying to control it with a wheel would have taken a thicker rope than we had the materials to make, given we need rope for other things. So we''re going to control it with the tiller and just someone at the top deck to call directions. That''s part of what we have to test now. If you''d be the one to give directions, since you tell me what to do anyway¡­"


    Lori looked up towards the highest point of the ice boat, which didn''t look all that safe. "No," she said bluntly.


    Rian followed her gaze. "Fair enough, I suppose. All right, not from there, but we still need to test steering. Is the water jet ready?"


    Lori finished binding the water in the three tubes in the block. The water started flowing, looping around in the circular tubes as intended. She nodded. "All right, it''s ready. Try the thrust." She had made the thrust fairly powerful, since the ice boat was so big. She doubted the small amount of thrust that Lori''s Boat could manage would be enough to move this much mass.


    "Setting the water jet to one-third thrust," Rian said, moving the lever. The boat began to move forward, if slowly, but they were pointed at the shore, and Rian hastily moved the lever again. "Setting the water jet back to neutral!"


    "Are you going to do that every time?"


    "Do what?"


    "Announce it whenever you do something with the water jet?"


    "Isn''t that what they do on boats to acknowledge that you heard the captain''s orders?"


    "So it''s not just you being theatrical?"


    Rian had the gall to look affronted. "I''m never theatrical!"


    Lori gave him a flat look and decided to just drop the subject. "Are we going to test this with the boat tied up?"


    "No, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. He called out to those on the bank. "Untie the rope!"


    "Yes, Lord Rian!" someone answered.


    The rope was untied, and the boat began to drift free on the river''s current.


    "Well, let''s go," Rian said. "Tell me which way to go so we don''t hit anything, your Bindership!"


    Lori sighed and moved as far forward on the boat as she could until she could see ahead. The boat was already moving as Rian called out, "Setting the water jet to reverse!" The boat slowly began to move away from shore as Rian moved the tiller all the way to one side. The boat began to turn.


    Well, she supposed it was a little useful¡­


    Lori frowned, as she looked forward, then turned back to Rian. "Rian, why are we going upriver?"


    "I figured it would be best if we find out if this can go against the river''s current, otherwise getting home is going to be very problematic." They became parallel to the shore and Rian hastily straightened the tiller, then moved the lever. "Setting the water jet to one-third thrust!"


    Lori frowned, but she couldn''t fault that reasoning. She shrugged and looked ahead. "A bit to the right. We''re still close to the shore."


    "Yes, captain! Turning right!"


    Lori blinked. "Captain?"


    "The one who gives orders on a ship is always the captain," Rian said cheerfully.


    Lori frowned. "I''m the Dungeon Binder. That surpasses any other rank."


    "Traditionally, a captain on his own ship is considered above a Dungeon Binder who''s a passenger."


    Lori stared at him. "You''re making that up," she accused.


    "Would I lie to you?" Rian said, smiling brightly.


    Ugh, she hated it when he smiled like that. It was only now that she realized it was completely unreadable. "More to the right, unless you want to test how well this thing does at hitting seels."


    "Yes, captain! More to the right!"


    Slowly, the boat moved upriver.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Well, I think that went well," Rian said later at dinner, his bright, unreadable smile still in place as they waited for the food to be ready. "Though we might need to have two people handling the tiller at a time. It gets really tiring after a while."


    "Your problem," Lori said, setting up her sunk board. Her mood felt lighter today. "You''ll be bringing a lot of people, might as well make them useful."


    Rian nodded. "Yeah, I suppose. Now we just have to figure out storage and sleeping arrangements. Even if it''s a lot bigger than the boat we''re using to carry miners, it''s still pretty cramped for ten to twelve people to live in for I don''t know how many weeks."


    "Your problem," Lori repeated. "Unless you think you can assign someone to go in your stead now?"


    Rian sighed. "No, I have to go. We''ll need the medicines when the babies start getting born."


    Lori blinked. "What?"


    "Well, Lori, when a man and a woman love each other very much, they go to the Um¡­"


    "We have pregnancies?" Lori interrupted, still surprised.


    "Why wouldn''t we? People literally have nothing else fun to do."


    "I would have thought people would know better than to get pregnant in our situation!"


    Rian stared at her blandly. "Clearly you were wrong," he said. "What did you think we needed the medicines for, cuts and scrapes? Shana¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    Rian sighed and looked up at the ceiling for a moment. Eventually he looked back down. "Binder Shanalorre can handle those, but childbirth is¡­ more delicate, or so I''m told. Women can die in childbirth very easily, you know."


    "Yes, it comes up a lot in plays and novels as to why the main character is an only child with no mother."


    "There you go, then. Unless we get the medicines the doctors and medics say we need, either a lot of children of the next generation are going to have that backstory, or a lot of men are going to be less their wives and a hypothetical child. But that won''t be until the second trip, once we find out how much things cost, what sells and whether we have any of it¡­"


    Rian glanced up as Riz arrived at the table, nodding towards her, who nodded back. "Enjoyed your break from being temporary Rian?" he asked. "And I hate I managed to say that seriously, ugh."


    "It was a good rest," Riz said. "But I''m getting used to doing as the Great Binder needs. Though I might need to start a still, with all the favors I''ve been asking."


    "We don''t have enough food to use for that," Lori said.


    "I know, Great Binder," Riz sighed as she sat down. "Something for the future, just like with everything else."


    Umu and Mikon arrived shortly thereafter. The blonde instantly went to sit in the open spot next to Rian, not seeming to notice how the other weaver deliberately stayed back to let her. Riz glanced at the other pink-haired woman for a moment, then to Lori''s¡­ well, not surprise, but it definitely merited a raised eyebrow, shuffled a little to the side to make room between her and Rian. "You probably want to be close to play with the Great Binder," Riz muttered.


    Mikon smiled brightly. "Thank you, Riz. That''s very thoughtful of you." She leaned forward and¡ª


    All right, Lori was surprised as Mikon gave Riz a quick, almost thoughtless peck on the cheek. Certainly Riz was surprised, eyes going wide as she put a hand on the cheek in question, as if protecting it from another approach. Umu and Rian were both staring with identical raised eyebrows.


    Ignoring all this, Mikon sat down on the space next to Rian, a cheerful, unreadable smile on her face.

 127 - Playing with Water

    With the successful test of the ice boat¡ª


    "I''m honestly surprised you haven''t named it yet," Rian said during breakfast. "You''d usually start calling it ''Lori''s Something Something'' by now."


    "I would rather not have my name on it," Lori replied as Mikon sat alone on one side of Rian, Riz sitting on the opposite side next to Umu, who seemed to feel that her temporary Rian was a bit too free with her elbows.


    "Why? Are you embarrassed by this artistic work of carpentry and engineering?"


    "Yes." Mikon seemed completely unperturbed at being all alone on her side. Novels and plays had inclined Lori to think that the weaver would put out by the implied rejection. Speaking of which, did this mean that she was no longer interested in Rian? Lori supposed the woman shifting her focus would make sense given Rian''s continued obliviousness, but she hadn''t gotten that impression lately¡­


    But then, Lori did need a Rian who specialized in people, since she wasn''t very good at it herself, so there was a good chance her suppositions were wrong on this subject. Well, she didn''t care, anyway.


    "So, does that mean I can name it?" Rian said, grinning. It was a surprisingly honest, more genuine expression than any of his cheerful smiles.


    "Don''t you want to have people submit stupid suggestions for names and then have them vote on it?"


    Rian froze, and Lori could actually see his fetish for voting warring with his desire to get to name the boat himself.


    "Y-you''re right, as the physical representation of¡ª" Rian began, looking like someone was pulling his teeth out.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "No, too much trouble. You name it yourself, Rian. Try not to name it something silly." Yes, that grin was so much more honest than his usual smiles.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian chirped. "I''ll think of a good name for her!"


    Lori frowned. "Her?"


    "Oh, in my demesne, the tradition is that vehicles and significant inanimate objects are referred to with feminine pronouns like ''her'' and ''she''."


    "The demesne you''re from is very strange, Rian."


    "Rude. You''re not supposed to tell people that! Even if it, you know, might be true. And wait, this is my demesne now. So you''re basically insulting yourself."


    With the successful test of the Coldhold¡ªwhich Lori had to admit was an amusing bit of wordplay on Rian''s part¡ªthe boat was tentatively declared properly usable, though it would still need Lori''s blood so it could be imbued outside of Lori''s Demesne. Lori felt it didn''t need the outriggers that were still being finished, since the boat balanced well enough, but Rian insisted they were necessary for the part of the trip that would traverse the ocean. Something about waves and keels and things¡­


    Well, Rian''s problem.


    The carpenters continued to add fittings to the boat, mounting on the folding beds and storage bins. Rian had said they couldn''t just use cabinets, since no flat space would stay level for long, and anything that was just laid down would eventually roll off, so all their storage had to be chests that could be sealed at all sides and secured to the floor so that even if things shifted, they wouldn''t roll off. Lori didn''t know how they would deal with washing everything of iridescence, but that was Rian''s problem.


    Lori had her own contribution to make. With the Coldhold once more standing on land, the ice removed from it, Lori painstakingly began to lay out the gold wire around the beams that would support the ice. The water jet block already had blood in it, and it shouldn''t degrade while it was inside her demesne. At worst, she''d add more blood before they had to leave.


    She also had to fashion a binding for gathering salt, since they apparently needed it. Or rather, a container with a binding. Actually, in the most technical sense, she''d be making a bound tool, wouldn''t she? And she didn''t even need to use any glass.


    ¡­


    She still wanted the glass.


    The binding was simple enough, waterwisps in the form of vapor bound so that any water that passed through it was converted into more vapor. Not steam, that would be too hot, and pointless. They just wanted the salt dissolved into the water. But given the fact that they wouldn''t even reach the ocean until about halfway through the journey, this would have to include her blood for the binding to last that long. But then they''d have a binding that would be unused most of the time, and be a useless waste of magic. True, it wouldn''t be using beads, but still, it was wasteful¡ª


    Wait.


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    "So¡­ it''s for draining the boat of water?" Rian said as she held up the tube of bone. One end seemed to be full of mist.


    "You asked for a way to gather salt from the ocean," Lori said. "I decided that it needed to have more than one purpose. With this in addition to buckets, you can keep the Coldhold from filling with water during daily Iridescence washings."


    "Oh¡­ Oh!" Rian said, as if comprehension was blooming. "Oh, right! If you''re getting rid of water anyway¡­ I should have thought of that."


    "You were possibly distracted by worrying about beds and boxes."


    Rian nodded. "True. I''m told there''s no way to add a storage space to the folding beds. I figured as much, but I hoped at experienced carpenters would have a trick or idea I hadn''t been able to think of. But this is great! But where does the salt go? You said you first made this for gathering salt?"


    "I can make it fit on the end of a large jar," Lori said. "They just pour salt water into the tube and it will separate into water and salt." She paused, then added. "Well, technically it will be water and everything that was in the water, so I suggest the water be relatively clean."


    Rian nodded. "And if there''s water in the boat, especially below decks because of daily washing, instead of needing to go up to toss the water over the side, we can just pour it into the tube."


    Lori gave him a blank stare. "Or you can just take the tube and put it on the floor where there''s water," she said.


    Rian stared at her. Eventually, he said, "All right, two things: First, I''m an idiot, I should have thought of that, that sounds far easier to do. Secondly, are you serious?" He said that last in the tone of someone exclaiming ''are you insane''.


    "Watch your tone," she warned him.


    "Sorry. Respectfully speaking your Bindership, did you bother to think that decision through?" It wasn''t much of an improvement, since he still said it in the tone of someone asking ''are you insane'', but he did begin it with ''respectfully speaking''. "What if someone drops it over the side? Or just drops it and it hits the ice?"


    Oh. Ah, ah¡­ "Don''t be silly Rian," she said, as her mind raced for a response. "The binding is set deep within the tube to prevent exactly that sort of contact. Besides, this is just the prototype. The finished version will be fitted on top of a container to conveniently gather the salt." Yes, that sounded sensible and plausible.


    "Oh. Yeah, I suppose it makes sense that this is a proof of concept device. Sorry, I was just worried about having something on my boat that could destroy it or make a hole in it."


    Lori nodded, accepting his apology, then paused. "Your boat?" she said, raising an eyebrow.


    "Well, it''s most definitely not Lori''s Boat in any way, shape or form, and you''re always telling me it''s my problem, therefore it''s my boat," Rian said in a tone of smug assurance.


    "Impeccable reasoning," Lori said, nodding. "I look forward to your paying the taxes on it. Please include the receipts for what you paid to the loggers, sawyers and carpenters."


    "Of course, as a responsible citizen of this demesne, I''m donating my boat for the use of the government," Rian said hastily. "Please don''t make me have to remember how money works!"


    "The fact you imply that you''ve forgotten is concerning."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    With the reminder that the evaporator could be dropped by idiots, Lori set out to try and make it idiot-proof, which involved making it either too heavy or too inconvenient to move. She had the potter make a large vessel with a specially shaped lid for the salt and after firing that with firewisps in the kiln¡ªshould she make a kiln made from bound water? It would be wonderful at retaining heat¡­¡ªshe lined the lid with bone for some reinforcement. She wasn''t sure it would work¡ªLori wasn''t familiar with the relative strength of ceramic compared to bone¡ªbut it made her feel better about it.


    The lid had a large funnel-shaped opening to pour the saltwater into, as well as a side spout to release the vapor from, since it would be inconvenient for the person pouring water in to receive a face full of vapor. It wasn''t as quick and convenient as putting the evaporator on the floor to turn the water into mist, but it was less likely to be lost over the side.


    "Oh, that''s nice," Rian said as she demonstrated. "But¡­ um¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "What more work have you thought of to make me do?" she said.


    "Well, since you brought it up yourself and asked me¡­ If you could get this vapor to condense into another container, that would really help for drinking water when we reach the sea."


    Lori stared at him.


    "You asked! And we really do need it now that I realized. I was worrying about how we''d be able to store enough fresh water for the sea-going portion of the tried and keep them from getting contaminated with salt water, but once you showed me that¡­ and you asked!"


    Lori sighed.


    "You asked!"


    "I did," she grudgingly admitted.


    "You don''t have to do it¡­"


    "No, no, you make a good point. I''d forgotten that you couldn''t drink sea water."


    "Maybe I should recruit some Whisperers so that¡ª"


    "Don''t you dare!"


    "All right, all right, you command, I obey. Just remember that you told me not to recruit anyone when you complain you have to do everything around here because you''re our only wizard."


    "Yes, well, I have to make a vessel to condense vapor in so that you have something to drink," Lori said. "So try not to think of anything more I need to do in the meantime."


    Rian, who''d been opening his mouth, abruptly closed it again so hard his teeth clicked together. He smiled blandly.


    Lori looked at him suspiciously. "What?" she demanded.


    "You told me not to think of anything, so I won''t," Rian said innocently.


    Lori glared at him. "Out with it," she said.


    "Well, I was just thinking, there might be a use for the evaporator here in the demesne itself, and was wondering if you were willing to make more¡­"


    Lori sighed. "What use?"


    "Well, you see, the tanners, in addition to brain and salt, can use something else for tanning and softening furs and skins, but making it is a painstaking process because it has to be reduced and concentrated¡­"


    Rian explained, and Lori was reminded why she had never, ever, ever worked in the textiles industry back when she was a student. It was absolutely disgusting.


    Then she sighed and made an evaporator for people, mostly men for ease of use, to piss into so it could be concentrated into a caustic substance for making their animal skins nice and soft and was that something that had been done to her boots¡­?!


    As Lori reminded herself that her boots had probably been clean for a long time, the Coldhold continued coming together¡­

 128 - Golden Sweetwood Company

    Even without the ice in its hull, the boat was actually looking like a boat. The boards that defined the area of ice for the hull certainly gave it that impression. And once the upper deck was mostly completed, including a rail at the very top to keep people from falling off, Lori had to admit that the outriggers were probably necessary.


    The outriggers for the Coldhold were a line of wooden barrels to either side, the insides to be lined with bone for further waterproofing so that water wouldn''t seep in. Given the amount of water they would be displacing, the outriggers would actually be extremely buoyant, which Rian said was the point, as they needed a lot of force to help keep the rest of the boat stable on choppy waters of the sea. He had wanted to extend the deck across the support beams leading to the outriggers, but had apparently decided they didn''t have enough time and materials for that.


    "Maybe we can add it in when we come back," Rian said over dinner. The stew tasted of mushroom stock, so she supposed that they''d had a fresh harvest from the cave. She might need to expand it soon, or start a second one. "Best to be cautious, since we don''t know how well this will handle in waves yet. But at least we''ll have plenty of room for cargo and salt. Thanks for adding in the water tank to the evaporator."


    "Thank me by ceasing to think of new things for me to build," she told him as she waited for Mikon to finish her move. "I''m busy enough as it is."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "We should be getting that stove installed soon, we just need to put the pipe were it won''t burn anyone. Hey, what do you think will happen if we stuck fresh wood into the evaporator?"


    Lori gave him an incredulous look. "It would explode violently as all the water in it gets turned to vapor," she said. "What did I tell you about giving me more work to do?"


    "But I didn''t say anything!"


    "Now I have to change the input so people can''t just stick anything into the evaporator," Lori sighed, saw Mikon had finished, and made her move to give herself time to calm down before replying. "What, were you thinking you could quickly dry fresh wood for the stove by sticking it in?"


    "Er, well¡­"


    "Don''t," Lori said bluntly. "It will explode."


    "Yes, you said that already."


    "It''s important, so I''m repeating it. Don''t put wood in the evaporator, it will explode."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Though¡­"


    A sigh. "What now?"


    "Could you maybe use a piece of wood to make an evaporator explode in front of everyone who might need to handle one so that they''ll understand that?"


    A beat. "Sure, we can do it tomorrow." After all, it had been¡­ well, months since she''d made something explode.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After an explosion that wasn''t as violent as she''d wanted¡ªwell, to be expected, it was vapor, not steam, there wasn''t as much heat and energy involved¡ªsacrificing a stone urn she''d fashioned since destroying one of their pottery ones would have been wasteful, the tanners and all those who''d be adding to their supply of leather-tanning substances were sufficiently educated as to why they shouldn''t put wood or anything else but liquid material into the evaporator. Lori added a grill into their evaporators anyway, just to make it harder to shove objects into them.


    The tanners were apparently asking the men of the demesne to use their evaporator as much as possible. The stockpiling of the goldwater had begun to cause a smell that compelled Lori to make a binding of airwisps over the tannery area to funnel the air upward and away, which mostly worked. With the increased amounts of the concentrated caustic liquid for them to work with, they were apparently processing stockpiled skins that had only gotten minimal tanning so that Rian could have a reasonable cargo to bring with him to Covehold, since they were the lightest and most compact plentiful resource they didn''t actually use much of.


    Though Lori had to wonder how Rian intended to put together the beads for the medicines they intended to acquire. She supposed it wasn''t unreasonable to think that other people might have beads hidden away somewhere, but how Rian was going to convince people to part with them for no gain¡ª


    Oh, who was she kidding. It was Rian, he''d manage to bilk them of their money somehow.


    Well, Rian''s problem.


    "We have a problem," Rian said as he walked up to her while she sat next to the curing sheds, curing the wood inside them so they''d be usable tomorrow. "I''m in the middle of dealing with it, but I felt that you needed to be informed."


    Lori sighed. "What problem?"


    "It''s¡­ complicated." Rian leaned against the wall of the curing shed in front of her. "But as you know, but probably need some help remembering, River''s Fork was settled by the Golden Sweetwood Company. They are, in practice, a group of former and retired militia and their families who pooled together their resources to try settling their own demesne on this continent."


    "Yes, of course I knew that," Lori said, nodding. Obviously, she hadn''t known at all.


    Rian nodded, not seeing through her lie. "Well, the late Binder Koshay was the director of the company for this continent, with another director on the old continent to prepare sending across the next wave. But when he died, Grem became acting director. I told you that when I introduced him to you, remember?"


    He might have. "Of course," Lori said. "How is this a problem?"


    "We''re exiling him to Covehold, the one place on this continent that has regular correspondence with the old continent, relatively unsupervised," Rian said. "And as acting director, he knows who to contact on the old continent to direct the resources of the rest of the Golden Sweetwood Company, which is essentially a whole militia and their personal savings. What is stopping him from lying to them and telling them you killed Binder Koshay or something, and directing all of their resources to kill you?"


    For a moment, Lori sat very, very still. Eventually, she nodded. "Yes, that is a problem. We might need to kill Grem."


    "In the spirit of our agreement with River''s Fork, I''ve been trying to find out who''s next in the chain of succession so they can take over the director position of the Golden Sweetwood Company," Rian said. "I''ll let you know what Riz finds. She''s not an investor in the company, just family, even if she was militia. Her uncle is, so she doesn''t really know the full hierarchy. Hopefully the next time I bring this up I''ll know more. But right now, the plan to deal with the problem is to have the next in line write to the old continent that Grem is an attempted child murderer and have them agree to stop recognizing his authority. At the very least, that way they won''t be under his control."


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    Lori frowned. "Why didn''t you tell me about this problem earlier?"


    Rian shrugged. "Because I didn''t have a solution for it earlier. Also, it sort of slipped my mind. I literally remembered the fact he was acting director last night while a bunch of us were talking in my house. Someone mentioned the Golden Sweetwood Company and¡­ well, it reminded me. I''ll probably be able to tell you more later."


    Lori nodded slowly. "All right. I''ll leave this to you."


    "Got it. If we''re lucky, we can resolve this neatly, although it''ll be a few months before we know for sure, since we''d have to send a letter. At best, the reply won''t come until spring, or at least we wouldn''t be able to retrieve the reply before spring. Hopefully the Golden Sweetwood Company will look favorably on us."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Why wouldn''t they? I''m their Binder."


    "Yes, but you''re not a member of the Company," Rian said hesitantly. "That might matter, to them¡­"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "This sounds like a ''dealing with people'' problem. Solve it."


    Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership," he said.


    Lori watched him walk away as she concentrated back on the shed and adjusted the heat produced by the bindings a little so the wood wouldn''t char. That was¡­ probably a bit harsh on Rian. A bit. Just a little. The possibility that someone who had a reason to be disgruntled with her demesne would be able to access resources that could be used against her and her demesne was certainly concerning. Perhaps it would be best to have him killed¡­


    But no, River''s Fork was sending guards along to prevent exactly that sort of thing¡­ because she''d had Rian imply they should to prevent such a possibility¡­


    Well, that was inconvenient.


    Still, Rian seemed to be working on some kind of solution. It probably was the simplest way, just sending a message to the rest of this ''Golden Sweetwood Company'' and informing them of what Grem had done so that they would revoke his authority. If they cared, that is¡­


    Lori tried not to worry. This wasn''t a problem she was equipped to solve¡ªit required talking to people¡ªbut she had Rian and her temporary Rian, and they were quite able at it. Surely they could solve the problem, right?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At dinner the next day, Lori looked across the table at Rian and her temporary Rian-in-progress, sitting next to each other. "So, what have you learned?"


    "Well, we have good news," Rian said. "Riz, you want to tell her? You found out about it, after all."


    Riz pursed her lips, glancing sideways at her Rian, but he smiled at her encouragingly.


    "I''m waiting," Lori said, making her impatience known.


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said. "So, I spoke to my uncle, and he directed me to¡­" Riz paused, as if just noticing the further impatience on Lori''s face, "well, that''s not important. Suffice to say, I was able to find out who was supposed to be next to succeed Captain Grem in the company. Unfortunately, he was one of the men who died in the dragon that killed Great Binder Koshay, so I had to keep looking."


    "Be briefer," Lori said flatly.


    Riz flinched, but Rian patted her reassuringly on the shoulder. "I found that the next person in the chain of succession is Captain Yllian."


    Lori stared blankly at her. "Who?"


    Rian, why are you holding your face like that?


    "Captain Yllian," Rian said slowly, "is Shana''s¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    Rian, you shouldn''t rub your eyes, it aggravates the soft tissues. Did you even wash your hands before you did that? Your fingers might be dirty.


    "Captain Yllian," Rian repeated, sounding tired for some reason, "is Binder Shanalorre''s lord."


    "Oh, is that his name?" Lori said. "I wouldn''t know, I''ve never met the man."


    Rian stared up at the ceiling. "Well, in any case, as the one in the succession, he''s now the Acting Director of the Golden Sweetwood Company. I talked to him earlier today, and he is aware of the situation. I''m told he''ll have a letter ready to send with one of the people he''ll be sending to guard the prisoners. So that should deal with the problem. Grem''s not getting revenge that way. Though this probably means that the Golden Sweetwood Company will be settling in River''s Fork."


    "As long as they don''t start setting up demesne near us," Lori said.


    "No," Riz said, shaking her head. "The plan was that we would found a demesne that would serve as a central base. No building multiple demesne when we could consolidate in a single one supported by multiple wizards."


    "I doubt that everyone is just going to blindly follow such a plan, especially not the wizards who now have a chance to become Dungeon Binders," Lori said dismissively. "Still, better they surround and constrain the growth of River''s Fork than here." This made trying to expand the demesne more important. She''d have to do that soon, but she''d just been so busy, and it hadn''t seemed urgent. The principle wasn''t that much different from creating the core¡­


    "Well," Rian said as Riz fell silent. "I suppose if they don''t start building their own demesne, we can be pleasantly surprised at their restraint¡­?"


    "I wouldn''t bet on it," Lori said. "Who would come to this continent if they didn''t intend to found their own demesne to become a Dungeon Binder?"


    "Binder Koshay''s wife?" Rian said. "After all, she didn''t have her own demesne."


    Lori hesitated as Riz raised her eyebrows and smirked. "All right, I suppose I must acknowledge that¡­ but I would not rely on the phenomenon repeating."


    Umu and Mikon arrived before they could respond, carrying food cups and water. Rian sighed tiredly, but didn''t bother protesting as the five bowls were pushed to the middle of the table. Lori selected one and began to eat.


    Riz reached for one once it was clear Lori had picked. "Thank you," she said, not looking at Mikon.


    "You''re welcome," Mikon said cheerfully. "Rian, are you going to eat?"


    Rian reluctantly got a bowl. "Thanks," he said. "To both of you."


    "You''re welcome, Rian," Umu said. "Let''s eat."


    The four of them did so, Riz casting sideways looks at Mikon, who''d once more sat down next to her.


    "Something wrong?" Mikon asked pleasantly, pausing in her eating.


    "N-no, of course not," Riz said, looking away. "Just worried about elbow room, that''s all."


    "Oh, sorry, am I crowding you?" Mikon shuffled a little bit away from Riz. "There, is that better?" She smiled, cheerfully and completely unreadable.


    Riz flushed, but shuffled towards her to take advantage of the offered space, and Rian relaxed where he''d been sitting, acting a little more free with his elbow.


    The meal finished in silence as the rest of the dining hall buzzed around them. It was so pleasant.


    "By the way Rian, temporary-Rian," Lori said, "have you had people asking you about marriage requirements?" Umu''s head didn''t snap up, but she''d gone very still, and was clearly listening attentively.


    "I''ve had a few people ask me casually about it, so they were probably in a real hurry to get married without letting their parents know," Rian said. "Or at least someone''s parent''s, at any rate. So, what are the requirements, so I can finally tell people."


    Lori waved a negligent hand. "I can''t be bothered to remember exactly right now. Ask Mikon, she knows."


    Rian and temporary-Rian blinked and looked sideways at the weaver, who smiled cheerfully at them. Temporary-Rian''s eyes narrowed.


    "Wait, you told Mikon before you told me?" Rian-Rian said, a strange expression on his face. "How did that even happen?"


    Lori shrugged. "We were talking, she asked, I told her." Really, how else could it have happened.


    Was Rian crying? And crying theatrically at that, with exaggerated sniffs and¡ª "It finally happened," Rian said, wiping tears from his eyes as he let out one such exaggerated sniff. "Our Binder finally made another friend! I''m so proud!"


    He sounded disgustingly like one of her mothers had when Lori had mentioned the name of someone she''d talked to at school, ugh.


    "I dared to hope when you started playing board games with someone other than me, but to see it actually happen¡­" Another sniff. "To think I''d live to see this day¡­"


    Lori kicked him under the table. "We''re not friends," she said, annoyed. "She''s just an acquaintance."


    "As that''s a prerequisite for friends, I''ll take it as the next best thing," Rian said cheerfully.


    Lori rolled her eyes and kicked him again before she went back to her dinner, shaking her head. Why did she sometimes feel like she''d gotten a third mother?

 129 - Finishing Touches

    The ice boat was nearly finished.


    Lori was skeptical, but after a day of Rian not having anything more added, of her not having to remove the ice so that more wood beams or planks could be installed, she was actually beginning to believe it. Granted, he''d asked her to build a dock, which had involved excavating a part of the river slightly so that the bottom wasn''t resting on the riverbed, but she''d taken the opportunity to dig out the river near the water hub shed.


    A part of her had the thought she should turn the water hub into a hardened bunker so that they could continue drawing water during a dragon, but given the sort of things that could fall into the river, that probably wasn''t advisable. Still, making it harder to damage so she wouldn''t need to repair it as much after a dragon passes seemed like a good investment to make¡­


    Regardless, the Coldhold now floated in its new dock, ostensibly complete. It was wide because of the outriggers on either side, and you actually had to walk on a ramp between the outrigger and the boat proper to get on board. Rian offered to give her a tour, as if she hadn''t been there yesterday to put the ice in the hull.


    "You can point out design flaws I missed," Rian said.


    Well, she supposed she should just look at it and see what he did wrong¡­


    First was the level¡ªthe deck, Rian said it was called, which was silly¡ªin the hull itself. Lori bound lightwisps to her head so she''d have light to see. While the ice was clear as glass, the wooden beams within them as well as the planks cladding them kept much light from passing through the hull. At the part of the level near the front of the boat there was a room just barely big enough for three people, with a sturdy door and sturdy walls.


    "It''s where we''ll keep the prisoners on this trip," he sighed. "In future, it can be a secure cargo hold or something. Per your instructions, that door has a little hatch were we send in their food and their slop bucket. I fully expect them to pour it out the hatch just to inconvenience us¡ªMissus Naineb might do it¡ªso I had the carpenters make a special bucket that goes into the hatch and locks in place so it can''t be pulled out from their side. That way, if they make a mess, it''s stuck in there with them."


    "Vindictive," Lori nodded. "I approve."


    "Your approval of this fills me with shame." He didn''t looked very ashamed though.


    Before the room for the prisoners¡ªit was probably a prison or brig, but given how it was just a sealed room without bars, Lori had trouble thinking of it as such¡ªthere was another, larger room meant to house the crew. Or at least sleep the crew. The walls of were covered in beds that folded up, six on each side. They were packed three high, with the lowest one practically at floor level, save for a gap a hand long.


    "It''s so that anyone sleeping there doesn''t get too soaked if water gets in down here, which it probably will," Rian said. "The storage for personal effects is up top, where they''ll be easier to wash. Honestly, I''m worried about fungus, given how everything will always be a little wet at all times. I wish I knew more about how actual ships at sea dealt with this problem¡­"


    "Something for you to look into, then," Lori said ruthlessly. After all, she had no idea herself.


    In addition to all the beds, there were also food stores. While they''d have jars of stew in case of emergency, the plan was for the expedition to catch food on the go and prepare it on board the ship. "We''ve got beds, so we can just anchor in the middle of the river and avoid beasts that way," he said. "And this way we don''t have to worry about beasts being attracted to the blood. Though I want us to do a practice run before we leave. You know, catch a seel and try gutting it on the ship itself so we know it''s possible." He sighed. "We might have to just cut out portions of meat and leave the rest behind, if it''s too unwieldy. It''s inefficient, but it''s better than nothing. Most of us already know how to butcher beasts, but I''m going to have everyone who will be on the expedition learn how to properly butcher seels, myself included, so that we all know how to feed ourselves."


    "Wouldn''t it be better to have them all learn how to catch seels first?"


    "It can''t be that hard. The children and you do it. I mean, you cheat with magic, but that''s you being you."


    Lori gave him a long, level look that could have been used as a road. "Rian?"


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Learn how to catch seels first. That''s an order."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    Seeling was not easy, and she wanted him to know that!


    Really, this was for his own good, he might have starved from not being able to catch any seels, after all.


    The water jet was in its own little space right under the tiller. In fact, there was a hatch leading down to it, since there would need to be someone there to take directions and adjust the speed as needed, since Rian''s idea of a really long lever that poked through a slot on the deck had been too unwieldy and kept tripping him whenever he moved to adjust the tiller.


    "We''ll be storing the food and other cargo in here on top of the water jet, since it doesn''t really get hot or anything like a steam driver," Rian said. "Though I had a table built on top, just in case. I was afraid putting things directly on it would make it come apart."


    Lori gave him an incredulous look. "Rian, it''s inside a wooden box that''s sealed shut, and the parts have their own rods locking them together into place." She considered it. "Good idea to put a table on top of it to keep people from touching it directly." One should never underestimate how easily an idiot could break something.


    "I wanted to have shelves around it too, since people might accidentally kick it, but that would take too long to build," Rian said.


    "Chests," Lori said. "Surround it with chests."


    Rian nodded. "That could work, and they''d be faster to build. Basically a box with a lid. Doesn''t even need a hinge. Well, we''d need someplace to put the food anyway¡­"


    They both nodded in agreement.


    The evaporator was in the corner, with a large, obvious funnel on top of it to put water in. There was another intake funnel in the level above so people could pour water in directly from the river or sea without having to bring it down. The container underneath for the salt could be slid out when it was full so it could be stored in some other container, and next to it was the spout where water would drip into a barrel from the evaporator.


    Lori had added an intake in the bottom to get any water that flooded the level as well, mostly to keep people from wrenching off the funnel and putting it on the ground. She had made sure to add bends in the pipe to the actual evaporation chamber with the binding in it to keep people from trying to stick wood into it. They shouldn''t, especially after her demonstration, but¡­ well, the fact they shouldn''t has never stopped people from doing things, especially if the thing was stupid. Next to it was a rack to secure the barrels the boat would be carrying for water. It had a little space so that people could switch around the barrels and place them next to the evaporator if it went empty.


    "It occurs to me there is a serious design flaw," Lori commented.


    "I know," Rian sighed. "I honestly thought it would be brighter."


    The entire lower deck was dark and gloomy, what little light filtering in through the ice more of an accent than any sort of actual illumination. The only light proper light came from the lightwisps on Lori''s head.


    "In my defense, I didn''t miss this design flaw, I just can''t think of how to fix it," Rian said. "If we''d spaced out the planks to provide more light, it would also let water flow down here when we washed out the upper deck, which would be inconvenient." He sighed. "I remember when our problem was not having enough water. Now our problem is if we have too much."


    This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    "Your problem," Lori said.


    "So you keep reminding me."


    She shrugged. "You could just not go. Stay here, send someone else."


    "Missing me already?"


    "I find you much more reliable for taking care of problems than my temporary Rian."


    "Riz. Her name is Riz. She has a name that you know, use it. Please."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at the sharpness in Rian''s voice, then shrugged. "Fine, fine. Though you''ve never seemed to care before."


    "Yes, well, she''s going to be doing my job. I know firsthand how hard that is, so I''m not going to let you make it any harder for her. Besides, do you really care who''s taking care of your problems as long as it''s taken care of and you didn''t have to talk to anyone to do it?"


    Lori actually had to take a moment to think of that. "You''re better at it," she said.


    "Well¡­ it''s nice to be appreciated, I guess."


    For a moment, there was only the movement of the boat as it bobbed and swayed in the water.


    "I might be able to amend your design flaw," Lori said. "But I''m only putting one binding of lightwisps into place. And even then, I can''t be certain that it can be renewed as easily or as efficiently as the waterwisps claimed by my blood."


    Rian sighed. "I can ask the sweetbugkeepers for some wax to make candles, but that almost seems wasteful. And it likely won''t last long."


    "Do it," Lori said. "It''s an available resource, so use it. It''s not as if you intend to keep them lit the whole night."


    "I suppose¡­" Rian said. "And it''s not like we don''t already have a fire hazard¡­"


    They both looked towards the level above.


    "Come on, let''s continue finding things you can tell me I did wrong."


    They climbed up the steep, almost ladder-like stairs and up onto the level above, what Rian insisted on calling the main deck. The wooden planks were almost flush with the top of the ice forming the hull, and wooden rails formed a boundary on all sides to keep people from falling into the water. Wooden beams on either side connected the outriggers to the hull of the Coldhold, and there were breaks in the railing to allow people to enter via the ramps on the beams.


    Half of the level was open with only railings to bar the way, since whoever was operating the almost comically long tiller would need the free space to move the rudder. The two latrines on either side of the boat were merely seats with a hole in them which let things fall into the river, which¡­ probably worked, but seemed absolutely disgusting to her. In the middle of the boat was an enclosed, shack-like structure with wooden walls, though not a lot of them. On either side and in front, it seemed to mostly be wide window, and the entire back was missing in lieu of a door. The roof seemed the sturdiest and substantial part of it, along with the vertical support columns, a sturdiness that was explained by the ladder built into its side and the railings on the roof.


    Inside the little shack sat a stove. It was made of bound ice, with a metal grill and flat metal panel for cooking food on top. There was a stone-covered wooden door that could be closed in front of the firebox, and one could see the golden wire that carried magic into the bound ice. A tube made of ice and reinforced with bone led outside to act as a chimney. Next to the bound ice stove were a pair of table-height surfaces, and on either side of the shack were long wooden benches that doubled as storage chests.


    "It''s not a fire hazard, not really," Lori said, though even she eyed her creation dubiously.


    "There''s wood directly above it," Rian said. "You just know someone''s going to manage to find a way to get the fire that high."


    "You said you needed a stove, I built a stove."


    "I know, I know, and I can''t think of any way it could be better. But I guess I''ve been around you too long, because all I can see is someone using it to set our ship on fire. I can just see someone making a fire in there, then leaving the door down for light and heat, and then the boat gets jostled and coals go everywhere, and the top deck catches fire¡­ " Rian sighed. "I could be the only one to operate the stove, but that means leaving someone else to operate the tiller, and then I keep seeing us crashing into rocks in the water and getting caught on banks... Please don''t suggest I just stay at home."


    Lori closed her mouth. "Well, if it''s a matter of convincing people to do something¡ªor not do something, as the case may be¡ªthen I''m sure you can manage."


    "That''s a lot of faith in me. Aren''t you afraid I''ll fail?


    "Rian, I consider you to be full of failings. Being unable to convince people to do what you want is not among them."


    "Thank.. you¡­? Um, also, I was talking to some people, and I think that we have a partial solution to the food preservation problem."


    "Oh?"


    Rian nodded. "When ice isn''t available, people smoke food to keep it from going bad."


    Lori frowned. "Smoke¡­ food¡­?"


    "Put it in a container full of mostly smoke," Rian clarified. "It stops things from rotting, and if you do it right it can impart an extra flavor to the meat." He pointed at the stove''s chimney. "I figure if you have that lead into an air-tight box, we can store raw food there and keep it from going bad for¡­ oh, about a day or so, since we''ll hopefully be catching more food to replace it. You won''t even need to put in any sort of binding, just one of those one-way water valves so the smoke won''t go back to stove."


    Lori raised an eyebrow but¡­ well, it vaguely sounded like it would work. Dustlife, which was what made food go bad, needed breathable air to survive after all, and smoke definitely wasn''t breathable. "I''ll need a box."


    "Already being made," Rian said.


    "How industrious of you," she said dryly.


    She hesitated, then turned and began climbing the ladder, absently extinguishing the lightwisps on her head.


    At the highest point of the boat, every little sway caused by the river seemed magnified hugely, and Lori grabbed the nearest railing to keep herself steady. Thankfully, if felt very solid under her hands. High balcony allowed for a wide view all around the boat, but especially ahead, though all that was ahead was the town around her Dungeon. Still, she saw over the curve of the roof of the shelter and baths, and was about level with the roofs of many of the houses. Lori stood carefully, holding the rail, and was mildly annoyed that Rian moved so easily after following her up.


    "I should probably put some benches up here," Rian commented, "otherwise people are going to sit on the rail and fall on their heads."


    Lori nodded. Yes, that sounded exactly like the sort of idiotic thing people would do. "Not completely finished then, is it?"


    "Well, close enough that I want to test how it handles by using it to bring the next batch of miners to River''s Fork tomorrow," Rian said. "All the parts that let it boat are pretty much done, it''s just a few quality of life things left to add. After that¡­ we can leave."


    "You can leave," Lori said quietly.


    "If it helps, I''m only picking people with family here," Rian said dryly. "Happy families. That way, no one will be tempted to stay in Covehold. I asked some of the single people in the shelter if they wanted to come with us and try their luck at another demesne¡ª" Lori''s head snapped towards him, glaring, "¡ªbut they all said to their knowledge no other demesne offered free hot baths. Though a lot of people have a long list of things they want to know the prices of."


    "Consolidate the list for me, and I''ll transcribe it into stone for you to carry," Lori said.


    "That would be great, I''m running out of space on the walls of my house. People want a lot of things." He sighed. "I don''t think they realize this is just the start. When we come back from Covehold, we''ll have to figure out what we can sell to get the money for everything."


    "We''ll have all winter to think of it," Lori said.


    "That''s¡­ what, two, three months away?" Rian said. "Might be sooner. It''s starting to get colder." It was? Lori hadn''t noticed¡­


    For a moment, the two of them just stood there, listening to the wind and looking out over her demesne.


    Eventually, Rian sighed. "Well, best get back to work. The sooner everything is finished, the sooner we can go, and the sooner we can come back and not get caught by winter while traveling."


    "Yes, I suppose," Lori nodded. "Rian?"


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Do you want to get married?"


    Rian spun around so fast he nearly fell off the roof, and only a quick grab at the railing saved him from a painful descent. "Ah, Lori, you''re a wonderful woman, but¡ª"


    She rolled her eyes. "Not with me, you idiot. But in general, do you want to get married?"


    "I''m¡­ not against it?" He looked like it was the first time he''d ever thought of it. "No, I''m not against it." He shrugged. "But it''s not like I have any prospects. I mean, most of the women I know are either married, like other women or¡­ well, are you."


    "But if you did," she asked. "Would you?"


    For a while, Rian just stared into the distance, seeing something on the inside of his eyes, face wistful. "That would be¡­ nice," he said quietly. He frowned. "Why do you ask?"


    Lori shrugged. "If you had family here, you wouldn''t be tempted to stay in Covehold."


    "You''re still on that?" It was Rian''s turn to roll his eyes. "I''m not leaving you."


    "Why? Given your reaction just now, it can''t be because you''re secretly in love with me and are trying to gain my attention by being a steadfast and reliable presence in my life," Lori said.


    Rian frowned. "Play?"


    "Novel. Of course, it doesn''t work, and she married the girl who actually had the nerve to confess."


    "I wouldn''t have thought you''d like a story like that."


    "It was a subplot, the rest of the novel was about industrial espionage." Lori shrugged. "To be honest, the only reason I remember it is because the protagonist used the attempts at romantic encounters as cover to infiltrate various places."


    "Now that sounds more like you," Rian smiled.


    "You didn''t answer my question."


    Rian nodded. "Well, if I''m going to be honest¡­ you remind me of my sister."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at him. "Younger?"


    "Twin, actually," he said, looking sad and wistful.


    "I''m¡­ sorry for your loss," she said. That was what you said, right?


    "Hmm? Oh no, she''s probably still alive. I just¡­ likely won''t ever see her again." He smiled tiredly. "Being separated by an ocean, you know?"


    Ah. She nodded. "And I remind you of her?"


    "Yeah," he said. "You have no idea how many times I have to resist the urge to pat you on the head sometimes."


    "Noted," she said dryly, looking out over the river.


    They stood in silence for a moment.


    "I always wanted a sibling," she eventually said quietly.


    She heard the sound of wood shifting. "What happened?"


    "Two mothers."


    "Ah. Yes, I can see how that would be¡­ difficult."


    She turned, eyed him up and down. Then she turned and started to climb down the ladder. "Come on. Enough slothfulness. Back to work."


    A chuckle. "Yes, your Bindership. Hopefully, we''ll be done by tomorrow, the next day at the latest."


    They got back to work.

 130 - Trying To Convince Himself

    The ice boat was finally finished that afternoon.


    Lori didn''t believe a word of it.


    "Latrines?"


    "Made and tested," Rian said promptly.


    "Structural reinforcements?"


    "All in place for the top deck, the water jet, we double checked all the railings to make sure they can take the weight of people walking on them because of course, and we had four of the biggest, strongest people we had try to break out of the brig," Rian said. "They, uh, broke out the first two times, so we reinforced it a lot, which is why there''s that room lined with stone. We''re a bit front-heavy as a result, but not enough to be unstable, and it helps act as ballast."


    "The bucket for the prison?"


    "It¡­ works, and seals shut, so it doesn''t make the lower decks smell. And I had a second backup bucket made in case something happens to the first one. I know you said to let them wallow in their own filth if they broke it, but if we accidentally lose it over the side¡­ well, that just seems unfair."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "The beds work?"


    "The volunteers going with me and I slept on the beds the last two nights, just get a feel for them, and we also practiced washing the iridescence off so we can work on how to keep our stuff mostly dry."


    Lori didn''t really care about that, but she nodded. "Lights?"


    "We checked them yesterday, they''re still glowing outside the demesne. Do you want me to go seel them out of the river now?"


    Lori nodded. "Yes, best do it now." She frowned. "Are you sure doing that doesn''t hurt you? It seems really unnatural."


    "It''s just diving underwater," Rian said, shrugging. "I''m more worried about one of the seels or one of the smaller fursh attacking me while I''m down there." He shuddered. "Those little fursh are biters."


    It was good to know that she could imbue lightwisps from her eye outside the demesne. Firewisps were still a problem, since she''d have to draw it from her insides, but maybe lightningwisps¡­ Still, for now, the ice boat had two kinds of wisps she could imbue from a distance in it. The lightwisps were simple, just to keep it from being dark inside, and the waterwisps in various forms were being imbued by her blood in their little golden containers. There was a little of her blood mixed into the ice, just in case, even the evaporator, though one could not really call it blood anymore, since it was vapor.


    "Supplies?"


    "We have some stew for the first couple of days while we work on catching things from the ship, and the people from River''s Fork will be bringing some supplies as well," Rian said. She raised an eyebrow at him, and he sighed. "You were right, catching seels is harder than I thought, it was a good idea to learn first."


    Lori smiled smugly. "Good. The smoke box?"


    "It, uh, works," Rian said. "I talked to some people, and they think it won''t be able to help that much, but it''s better than nothing."


    "I can''t make ice at a distance," Lori said. "Not cold ice, at least."


    "I know, I know," Rian said. "Wrong kind of wisps, bound ice doesn''t take in heat, I listened. It''s a pity, but we''ll make do. Fresh food will be good for us."


    Lori looked at the boat, with its hull of ice with planks partially covering it on the outside, the shack-like structure in the middle, the latrines on either side. It was resting in its own dock, next to the new dock for the smaller Lori''s Boat and the second Lori''s Ice Boat. The wood was bare, unpainted and only minimally treated with seel fat to waterproof them. "Are we forgetting anything?"


    Rian shrugged. "If we are, I don''t remember it."


    ¡­Lori couldn''t really fault his logic there.


    "So, I suppose you''re leaving then?" Lori said.


    Rian nodded, and started counting on his fingers. "We''ll leave the day after the holiday tomorrow."


    "¡­ what?"


    "Oh, right, that''s what I was forgetting!" Rian said, snapping his fingers. "Can we declare tomorrow a holiday? Or at least a half-holiday in the afternoon? After all the effort we put into building the boat, we need to celebrate it being finished. We can go and hunt the seels for the food ourselves!"


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "They should have been doing that anyway."


    "¡­ yeah, we should have¡­"


    Lori kept giving him a level, stare before sighing. "Fine, tomorrow. Set it up, no music, and in the afternoon only. AND I''ll hold you to you and those going with you hunting the seels yourselves."


    "We can make it an event!" Rian said. "They can watch us make fools of ourselves hunting the seels, people can eat what we catch, the children can point and laugh at us at how we''re doing everything wrong and not as good as they did it¡­"


    Lori had to admit, that sounded mildly entertaining. "You could try capturing an amount and I''ll bind it in ice and keep it bound with blood on the outside," Lori said.


    "Huh, that''s an idea. Long-term emergency food storage," Rian mused. "I suppose if we cut off the part with the blood, and, I don''t know, drop it in the evaporator, it will be your signal to stop imbuing it."


    That was a thought. "Be careful," Lori warned. "Once the ice is no longer bound, it will be so cold the air will start solidifying."


    Rian perked up. "Ooh, I just had an idea. Make some of those ice blocks with no meat in them, and when we need to freeze food we take one, cut off the part with blood and throw it into the smoke box with the food."


    "We''d have to remove or at least block off the smoke," Lori pointed out. "And surround the smoke box in ice to hold in the cold."


    She knew she was right not to believe the boat was finished!


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    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Fortunately, it didn''t take long to make the changes. The container for the food had been made sizable, since they had been hopeful they''d be able to fill it, and it was a simple matter to line the insides and lid with bound ice to hold in the intended cold. She put in a drop of her blood discreetly in the corner and made it part of the water so she could keep it imbued. If needed, Rian could chip off that blood and the ice would come unbound and start acting cold. A knife would be enough, though it would take some dedicated chipping¡­


    Still, she made the modifications while Rian found someplace to store the ice she''d be making, so she''d know how much she could make¡­


    In the end, Rian decided the ice would go inside the chest they were meant to cool so that it wouldn''t have to be moved very far, taking up almost all of the space with a little hollow space on one side for food, with that hollow getting bigger the more of the bound ice they removed the blood from and used. The hollow, by her estimation, would be able to hold at least two, maybe three meals worth of meat for all the people on the boat if they had small servings. As long as they only opened the chest briefly and didn''t do anything stupid like try to grab the unbound ice, which would be extremely cold, it should last for a long time.


    Lori waited, but Rian didn''t suddenly have a bright idea for more work for her to do that day, and she tentatively allowed that maybe the boat was finally finished.


    Maybe.


    She wouldn''t believe it until it was sailing away beyond her demesne and not returned for three days.


    Lori drew blood with her syringe and used little drops of it to make large chunks of ice to store in the chest, which took up the rest of the day, if only because she had to make sure that there was enough space to pull out at least one block of ice from the chest. The air outflow water valve she made for when the chest was going to be a smoke box was repurposed into drainage for when the block inevitably melted to water.


    It wouldn''t be for a while, since the blocks were so cold they had no firewisps in them at all, compressed into the coldest, hardest form of ice possible, but it would happen eventually, and when it did, it would be best the food wasn''t drowning, though they might need to poke the drainage hole with a stick to clear any ice in it from water freezing again. It could be sealed with a stopper in the meantime, and she had Rian get some cord so that the stopper could be tied to the chest and not get lost.


    All told, making the hopefully final-final-final modifications and partially filling it with blood-bound ice took up the rest of the afternoon. She''d do the rest tomorrow, once she''d recovered and made more blood.


    As Lori sat down at their usual table for dinner, Rian waved to the room to get their attention. "So, it''s taken¡­" he made an exaggerated show of counting on his fingers, "uh, a lot longer than I thought it would, but we''ve finally managed the ship that will let us go to Covehold. Hopefully we''ll make it there and back before winter sets in, or else it''s going to be a very interesting trip." There was a polite murmur of interest and what sounded more like relief than celebration.


    "So, in celebration of this, her Bindership has graciously allowed me to announce that tomorrow we''ll be having a little holiday in celebration." There was an immediate increase of interest. "She says we can have tomorrow afternoon off. So after lunch, people who are interested can come down and see the ship, while the crew of volunteers and myself try our hands at catching seels for food. Just us." Rian chuckled. "I can already hear all the children telling us we''re doing everything wrong."


    There was a small laugh at this.


    "The day after that, we''ll leave for Covehold. Everyone going, make sure you''re packed and ready to go. Okay, that''s everything. Enjoy your dinner everyone!"


    Rian actually managed to get their food for them this time, putting the two bowls on the table and letting Lori pick one.


    "You''ll have to do this for her while I''m gone," Rian told Riz, who was sitting between him and Umu this time. The blonde seemed annoyed by this. "Otherwise she''s liable to starve to death. Make sure she gets to pick which bowl she wants, don''t just give her one."


    "Rian, I''ve been sitting with you for months, I know how it''s done," Riz said dryly.


    "Just making sure. She might not eat it if you do it the wrong way. It''ll be the first time I''ve left her alone for so long, I think it would be easier for her to adjust if we keep her routine the same as much as possible."


    "That would be appreciated, yes," Lori nodded.


    "Don''t worry, she takes care of everything else, food and water is all you need to take care of," Rian said. "You just need to get her food, make sure no one gets to talk to her, and talk to people for her if she needs something done. Assume she doesn''t know anyone''s names or who anyone is or what they do or¡­ anything. Pretty much the only people she can recognize are the people at this table, Karina and maybe some of the carpenters. Oh, and Landoor, but only because he annoys her. Keep him away from her. You should be fine, it''s all easy to remember."


    "Do you really have to go, Rian?" Umu said. "Can''t someone else be the one to go instead?"


    "Are you volunteering?" Lori said, making Umu start. Did they think she couldn''t hear them? She was sharing a table with them, why wouldn''t she hear them? "This is usually when you try to volunteer for whatever Rian needs done."


    "N-no, not me, but¡­" Umu shuffled on the bench, looking awkward.


    "Please don''t tease her, your Bindership," Rian said.


    Lori shrugged and went back to eating.


    "I agree with Umu," Mikon said. "I wish you didn''t have to go." She sighed. "But you''re a lord, so I suppose you have to go represent her Bindership and things."


    "Basically," Rian said. "Besides, if I don''t go, no one will feel safe going either. Then we''d never get anything done. Besides, it should only be for a few weeks. That''s much shorter than it took us to get here by going overland. We''ll be fine."


    He looked so confident, Lori almost believed he really meant it.


    Almost.


    "You still have to organize tomorrow''s holiday," Lori said. "Your idea, your problem."


    "Yeah¡­" Rian sighed. "Well, that''s what the morning is going to be for, I guess." He tilted his head. "Huh, I wonder¡­ hey, your Bindership, can I declare that the members of the expedition get priority use of the Um?"


    "Rian, if you want to take a woman to the Um, just go and do it."


    "It''s not for me!" Rian said hastily as the women next to him turned to look at him. "Some of the people going with me are married, I figured they should get the opportunity to¡­ you know."


    Lori couldn''t help smirking. "Including yourself?"


    Rian rolled his eyes. "You know I''m not," he said.


    Lori nodded. "True, you already have your house, I suppose you don''t need to use the Um¡­"


    "Lori, you put nice, big, open windows on my house that I have no way of closing," Rian said. "Which I still need to get fixed before winter, otherwise I''ll freeze to death. Not that I''m not grateful for the house as a whole, but I think anyone will agree it''s completely unusable for that, not that I have any reason to use it for that in the first place. I''m lucky there aren''t that many bugs I need to keep out."


    "I''m sure Umu can help me keep an eye on it for you while you''re gone, Rian," Mikon said.


    Umu, who''d opened her mouth to volunteer as usual, nearly stumbled over her words. "Y-yes, I can keep an eye on it for you Rian."


    "There, see. No, don''t bother saying we don''t have to, we were the ones who offered, and besides, you won''t be here to do it yourself," Mikon continued relentlessly.


    Rian sighed. "Well, put it that way¡­ thank you for the offer Umu, Mikon. I''d appreciate it if you could check my house every so often to make sure something else doesn''t start living in it and eating the clothes and things I left behind."


    Mikon raised a hand and patted him on the shoulder. "You are very welcome Rian. Don''t worry, we''ll take care of your house while you''re gone, right Umu?"


    The blonde weaver looked completely torn, but managed to reply, "Yes, leave it to us Rian. We''ll take care of it."


    "Well¡­ all right then. Thank you both very much."


    Mikon gave him another pat on the shoulder, then leaned in and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. "No problem Rian. We''re happy to help." She turned back to her stew.


    For a moment, Rian just sat there as if he wasn''t sure what had happened. He blinked, then his head jerked to stare at Mikon, who was passively eating. "Did you just¡­?" he said, confused.


    Mikon turned towards him, looking completely innocent and befuddled. "Did I what?" she said.


    Rian opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again, then shook his head. One finger rose to his cheek. "I guess I must have misunderstood¡­" he said as if trying to convince himself. On his other side, Riz and Umu were looking at Mikon suspiciously.


    Lori, sitting across from them, just kept on eating, wondering if Mikon would do the same with Umu at some point¡­

 131 - Come Back Safe, Well Be Waiting

    It was the first holiday that wasn''t being done in a rush. Lori suspected Rian had already made arrangements before asking for her permission, because there was no sudden frenzy of activity, none of the rush of the previous two times. Or maybe having half a day to prepare really did make that much of a difference. People were still cutting trees and sawing them in the sawpit, spinning thread and cord, but some were taking tables and benches from the dining halls and taking them outside.


    Instead of bringing them out to the clear ground in front of the dungeon, however, people were carrying them past the smithy and Rian''s house¡ªwhich had a couple of benches and a fire pit in front of it now¡ªtowards the area the seels frequented. It wasn''t right next to it, but just in view. The people, adults and children alike, who were usually seeling had gone lightly that morning, and there were plenty of the long, sinuous fursh left to sun themselves on the shores and rocks. The pups swam and played in the water, occasionally finding a slug or squid to gnaw on.


    Lori spent most of the morning making more blood-bound ice cubes for the boat''s food storage box. She made them slightly cylindrical to make them slightly easier to grip. She''d have to remember to warn Rian not to touch them with bare flesh, since they would become very cold once the ice was removed. The blood was only a little dot so that it would be easy to remove, and she was able to manipulate the ice to concentrate the blood to a corner to make it easy to chip off.


    Then she double-checked all the bindings she had installed on the boat, making sure that there were all connected to wire or blood so she could imbue them. Her connection to her blood didn''t give her a sense of distance beyond ''outside her demesne'', so she''d have to continue imbuing everything until she felt the wisps back in the area of the demesne.


    It had better come back¡­


    After that, she went to cure the wood in the curing sheds. The focus had changed on the wood being treated. While they still had a shed full of cured planks that was sealed off to prevent rot, most of what was being cut and cured now was meant to be used for firewood. Lori was seriously considering building a bridge or tunnel to the other shore to get at the trees and maybe the ropeweed there. The tunnel was more likely due to numerous factors, chiefly that it would be easier to build and would actually result in her having more materials to work with by the end of it¡­


    The holiday began early, a little bit before lunch was normally served. Rian and the volunteers going on the boat with him, all shirtless with ropes and spears, tried to catch seels while the nearby tables and benches slowly filled with spectators cheering and jeering at them. Small cooking fires burned, and beast meat cooked in pans for people to snack on while they waited for the seel meat that was promised to come.


    True to Rian''s prediction, the children had opinions on the effectiveness of their seeling technique. The brat, for her part, insisted on giving a critique and trying to tell them how to do it properly. Fortunately, while they were apparently not good enough to satisfy the children''s high standards, they did manage to catch two seels before lunch. Someone slipped and nearly drowned, but Rian was able to use his unnatural ability to swim to get them out of the water, and the medics were able to get the water out of his lungs. He was told to sit out the rest of the day, making Lori wonder if he''d planned it that way. He certainly didn''t seem all that disappointed to not have to go seeling.


    With the first two seels caught, lunch was officially served, with the smell of fat-rich seel meat being cooked filling the air. After Rian and the other volunteers caught a fifth seel, people started joining in to catch seels, the brat at the forefront, letting them rest as other people helped in catching seels.


    Since the tables and benches had all been full and very noisy, Lori had made her own, using earthwisps to sculpt stone into the appropriate shapes. A simple stone cube for her to sit on, a stone table to put her stone plate of roasted, grilled and fried meat, and mushrooms. She was starting to think of it as her holiday plate, since those were the only times she ever brought it out.


    She ate with enjoyment as Rian dragged a bench towards her, putting it on the other side her little table.


    "So, you can make a table that doesn''t look like a sacrificial altar," Rian commented as he sat down.


    "Not getting your own food?"


    "It''s a holiday, I''m tired, and I just realized the children deserve far more respect for all the seeling they''ve been doing," Rian said. "I think I''ll get my own food later. And if someone kindly and generously decides to bring me food in the meantime, well, it can''t be helped, and I''ll just return the favor some other time."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "You must be really tired."


    "I think it''s mostly because we were rushing to do it quickly and making a show of it," Rian said. "Most of the things Karina was yelling at us was that we should to stop hurrying and be patient, but that''s not really fun to watch, is it?" He waved towards the people who were seeling now. They were obviously being much more relaxed and methodical in their approach. "Though now that we have food, it''s a little bit more acceptable. We''ll have to butcher and clean the ones that are caught next too, just to make sure everyone on the crew know how to do it."


    "Didn''t you already make sure everyone already knew how to do all that?" Lori said.


    "Consider this their chance to show off those skills. Or maybe a final test."


    Lori nodded. "Well, at least you''ll be able to feed yourselves."


    "Yeah, it is¡­" Rian said. He sighed. "I think we''re ready."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "I would think you had better be, since you''re leaving tomorrow."


    "I know, I know, but¡­ I keep wondering if I forgot something we need, you know? You said it was my problem. Well, I keep worrying I didn''t solve every part of the problem."


    Lori nodded. "Do you want to stay and send someone else?"


    He glanced at her sideways. "You keep asking me that."


    Shrug. "You deserve a chance to change your mind."


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    "You just want me to stay."


    Shrug. "That as well."


    Rian took a deep breath, let it out slowly. "No, I''ll go. Work to do, and all that. Besides, it would be unfair to stay behind because I''m worried I didn''t do a good job, but still send people with the preparations I made."


    A third shrug. "If you''re sure, then stop tinting the air about it and just do what you said you''d do."


    Rian blinked in surprise, then barked a short laugh. "I guess you''re right." A sigh, this one more relaxed, as if liberated from a great weight. "I suppose I should get some food after all¡­"


    Umu sat down next to Rian on the bench, holding a small plate of meat, mushrooms and a few remaining wild vegetables towards him. "Here you go, Rian! I got you some food!"


    Rian blinked, opened his mouth, and visibly changed his mind. "Thank you Umu. I appreciate it." He took the plate from her hands. "Thanks for everything you do for me."


    Umu beamed. "You''re welcome," she said. She wavered for a moment indecisively, even as Rian started eating with clear enjoyment. "Rian, I¡ª"


    "Oh look, space to sit!" Riz declared, sitting on Rian''s other side with theatrically comical haste. Lori was surprised no one''s food spilled. Riz moved to put her plate down on Lori''s table, then paused and seemed to think better of it. "That was amazing, how you risked your life to save Ransa when he fell into the water. I don''t think I''d have had the nerve to do that, not for anyone."


    Rian blushed. "It wasn''t anything special. I''m sure someone else would have done the same. Her Bindership was probably getting ready to use her magic to save him."


    "No, I didn''t even notice," Lori said.


    Rian sighed, then turned to Riz. "So, yeah, it''ll also be your job to notice anyone in need of saving, then somehow manage to convince her Bindership to actually save them."


    Riz nodded. "Understood. One more thing I have to remember to do."


    "How are you getting used to the idea of actually talking to her Bindership?" Rian asked as Mikon smoothly sat down next to Umu, a plate held in one hand. The blonde eyed her suspiciously, but the pink-haired weaver appeared completely focused on her meal.


    Riz glanced at Lori, who only stared blandly back. "Uh¡­ I can talk to her¡­"


    "Can you?" Lori said flatly.


    Riz winced. Then she visibly gathered herself and turned back to look at Lori. "Yes I can, Great Binder," she said, looking Lori in the eye.


    Lori nodded. "Good. I don''t want to have to find you and ask you if there are any problems. It''s your job to find me and tell me, not the other way around."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    The holiday continued on. Umu kept glancing at Rian, obviously trying to convince herself to do something, but not being able to just yet. Several people approached Rian, wishing him good luck and that he come back safe. Lori supposed they were probably saying the same thing to the other people who would be going with him on the Coldhold. The buzz of pleasant conversation and enjoyment was only occasionally broken by the distressed and dying screams of the seels being caught and butchered, which were easy to ignore since they cut off relatively quickly. And the food they became was delicious.


    Rian ate lightly and sparingly, even though he ate with apparent enjoyment of the food.


    "Should I get you another bowl, Rian," Umu asked as he finished the plate she''d give him.


    Rian shook his head. "No, I don''t want my stomach too full." There was a warbling seel scream that cut off wetly. "I still have to help with the butchering¡­" Rian made a face. "I''ll eat more later."


    Mikon nodded. "Yes, you don''t want to be too full when you''re helping with butchering."


    Umu looked chagrined. "Oh, I forgot. Sorry, Rian."


    "Don''t worry about it, I''m thankful for the offer," Rian said. "Well, gotta go help!" He headed for where the seels were being butchered some distance from the river so that the smell wouldn''t linger and drive the other seels away.


    For a moment, the four women just sat there.


    "Riz," Lori said, holding out her plate to her temporary Rian.


    Riz stared at the stone plate, uncomprehending.


    Lori rolled her eyes. Did she have to explain? "You''re my temporary Rian, since Rian isn''t here. Go get me more food."


    She blinked. "Oh. Oh! Right, right, at once, Great Binder!" She took the stone plate and headed towards the fires where food was being cooked.


    Lori licked her lips, wondering if she felt thirsty enough to pull water out of the air, then decided dealing with the taste wasn''t worth it.


    Seeing Rian assist in the butchering was entertaining, in its own way. She didn''t know if he meant to have blood spurt in his face, but it garnered a laugh, especially when he started sputtering and spitting it out, making a show of gagging. Lori had to look away when he got to the internal organs. She didn''t need to be reminded of all the other substances that had very recently been too close for comfort to the meat she was eating now. At least her temporary Rian didn''t make the mistake of putting any of the internal organ meat on her plate¡­


    It was a languid, relaxed holiday, all things told. People set up board games, and many people left, presumably to their houses or the Um. Lori ate her fill, then not wanting to work when no one else was, went to get her sunk board from her room.


    "Rian!" she declared, putting the long wooden board with its bowl on the stone table. "Face me!"


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "You sure about that?"


    "I will beat you," she declared.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Fine, let''s play."


    Lori nodded and made the first move.


    She won twice. She lost several times, but she won twice, and that''s what mattered! In the background, the children played a game that involved a lot of running around stopping at seeming arbitrary places, touching each other and running back to place hands on trees far away from each other. A few of the men also formed an impromptu circle and started wrestling, seemingly using the same ''down or out'' rules that had been used in the last competition. Despite that, everything seemed¡­ peaceful.


    "Something to come home to?" she said suddenly, looking around at the people of her demesne around her, all seemingly enjoying themselves.


    The women near her blinked, not seeming to understand, but Rian smiled slightly, following her gaze as it swept around. "Yeah¡­" he said quietly. "Friends, family, good food, good company¡­ why wouldn''t they want to come home to that?" He glanced at her. "Thanks for giving me the idea."


    Lori nodded, finding something inside her, a knot she hadn''t realized had wrapped tightly around her heart, seemingly relaxing its grip.


    Umu suddenly took a deep breath. Then, as if that breath held all her courage, she said, "Rian?"


    Rian blinked and turned to look at her. "Yes, Umu?"


    She put her hands on his shoulders and quickly placed a quick kiss on his cheek. "Please come back safe," Umu said, her words so quick they were running into each other, face burning red. Behind Umu, Mikon was nodding and smiling, her hands clapping together in quiet applause.


    On his other side, Riz''s mouth dropped open, then snapped shut as her face firmed. While Rian was still blinking in surprise, she leaned forward, her chest pressing against his arm¡ªLori rolled her eyes at that, then had to wonder if the move had been an accident or intentional¡ªand touched his face to make him look at her. "Y-yes, please be safe, Rian."


    As a confused but slowly reddening Rian turned, Riz leaned forward and kissed on the opposite cheek.


    Next to Umu, Mikon rose from the bench. "Yes, Rian," she said, moving to stand behind Rian and putting both one hands on his shoulder on top of Umu''s, and another one of top of Riz''s hand on his cheek. "Please come back home. We''ll be waiting." She leaned forward and lightly kissed the back of his neck.


    This time a full-body shiver ran down Rian''s back at the contact.


    From somewhere in the crowd, there was a loud laugh, followed by several hoots and cheers. Someone cried, "About time!", to more laughter.


    An increasingly red and confused Rian looked towards Lori. "W-wha¡ª?" he barely enunciated, as if she''d help him make sense of this.


    She merely raised an eyebrow. "What? I''m not kissing you." To her surprise, Mikon laughed at the words.


    Smoothly, Lori stood up, and looked at the three women. "Resolve this civilly, or you are no longer invited to my table. Riz, I expect this to not interfere with your duties. Rian¡­" She gave her lord an exasperated look. "You''re an idiot. Deal with this."


    Taking her board, she went out to look for the brat. Lori had beaten Rian, she''d beat the brat too¡­

 132 - Finally, To Covehold

    "You knew!" Rian accused Lori at breakfast the next day.


    She rolled her eyes. "Rian, everyone knew," Lori said. "People in the next table knew, why wouldn''t I know when it was happening right in front of me?"


    "We knew!" someone in the next table over confirmed, followed by a chorus of laughter. "And so did the table next to us!"


    Rian groaned. "Why didn''t you tell me?"


    "If you recall, I distinctly said that if you didn''t know¡ª"


    "¡ªyou wouldn''t tell me," Rian finished with a sigh. "Ugh, I knew that phrase was something terrible to dread."


    "Oh? You think this situation is dreadful?" Lori said as she let her eyes drift over his shoulder. She had to admit, she was enjoying this. "Shouldn''t you tell them their intentions are unwanted, then? Preferably before they further embarrass themselves publicly?"


    Rian immediately looked conflicted. "Well¡­ it''s not that it''s unwanted, really¡­ I''ve just never been in this situation before! I didn''t think it was humanly possible to be in this situation! I mean, I''m not particularly good looking¡ª"


    "I wouldn''t know," Lori said.


    "¡ªso I don''t really understand what not one but three beautiful women would possibly see in me."


    "I don''t either, unless they wanted a useful subordinate for getting people to do things for them," Lori agreed.


    "¡­ all right, I''m pretty sure that''s not my only good point," Rian said, finally finding enough pride to try and defend himself. "I''m now also an accomplished ship builder."


    "Literally every part of the boat was made by someone else, you just drew some lines on a piece of wood while sleep deprived," Lori said blandly.


    "I am an accomplished boat designer," Rian smoothly corrected. "And construction manager!"


    "And do you think that''s something women are interested in?"


    Rian paused, then deflated. "No, probably not¡­ which isn''t helping!"


    "Perhaps you should stop trying to analyze the situation?" Lori said. "Just accept the fact that they are, for unknown reasons, interested in you?"


    "But why?" Rian said, sounding genuinely confused. "I mean, they''re all smart, skilled, accomplished, beautiful women who are really nice and thoughtful and generous with their time when someone needs help. Riz seems to be everybody''s friend and knows people who are a lot better looking than me, Umu is hard working and Mikon is really friendly and¡­ all right, I''ll be honest, I thought she liked Riz, what with that kiss and all. But the three of them are perfect! Why would they¡­" He trailed off, frowning. "You''re smiling. Why are you smiling? Why¡ª?"


    Abruptly he groaned, his head falling into his hands. "They''re right behind me, aren''t they?"


    "If you don''t know, I''m not going to tell you," Lori said, smirking.


    "If I hadn''t already decided I was never going to leave this demesne, I''d leave this demesne," Rian said, voice muffled by his hands. "I didn''t know you were into these sick pleasures when I agreed to work for you¡­ "


    "I didn''t know they were so enjoyable before you agreed to work for me."


    Rian sighed. "So again, it''s somehow my fault."


    Mikon, who was indeed behind him with the other two, patted him on the shoulder. "We think you''re wonderful too, Rian," she said, kissing the back of his neck again, making Rian jerk upright, face reddening. "Now, no need to be embarrassed, you sit here and talk with her Bindership about last minute things while I go get your food."


    "I¡­ don''t think there''s anything to talk about¡­" Rian mumbled, staring fixedly past Lori.


    "Don''t handle the ice cubes with bare hands," Lori said. "At least not after the blood has been removed. They''ll become so cold they''ll stick to someone''s hand and the cold will be intense enough to cause injury on contact." She tilted her head as she realized something. "Not right away though, removing the blood from the ice will only keep me from imbuing them, but they won''t actually run out of imbuement until about a day later. So make sure you remove the blood a day before you need to use it."


    "We''ll leave you to talk to her Bindership," Mikon said, giving Rian another pat on the shoulder, which made him twitch again. "Go on you two, greet him good morning and let''s get the food."


    Umu wore the face of someone mildly rebellious and clearly wondering why Mikon was telling them what to do, but nevertheless leaned forward and kissed Rian''s cheek. Riz, equally bemused, did so as well on his other side, even as she glanced at Mikon, clearly having heard Rian''s comment. She and Umu both glared at each other over Rian''s head as laughter and whoops sounded out around them.


    Mikon sighed and grabbed their hands. "Come on you two, or her Bindership might decide we''re not being civil enough."


    The two switched the glares at her, suspicion rising again, but glanced towards Lori. Lori made a motion to wave them away. "Riz, you have your duties," she reminded her.


    The three moved off, Mikon in the lead.


    "There''s something going on there¡­" Rian said, finally looking up from his intense scrutiny at the table.


    "How would you know? You''re clearly impaired when it comes to noticing these things," Lori said.


    "Yes, well, now that I know there might be something to see, I''m looking," he said.


    "Hmm¡­ well, stop staring at their behinds and face me, we still have more last moment things to discuss."


    "I wasn''t¡ª! All right, technically I was, but not specifically!"


    "Rian, focus. Stop thinking about their behinds."


    "You were literally the one who brought it up!" Rian sighed. "All right, all right, business. So, there''s a very good chance the harvest will be while I''m away."


    Lori blinked. "The what?"


    "The harvest? You know, when we take the grain off the plants we''ve been growing to store for later?" Rian said. "When that happens, everyone will have to drop what they''re doing to help get the vigas in." He frowned. "At least, that''s how I heard these things go, but those are generally talking about larger fields than the ones we have. When that happens, I strongly suggest you have a holiday to congratulate the farmers for all they did for planting and taking care of the fields."


    "That sounds like something you should tell Riz, I''m not going to remember that."


    Rian paused, then nodded. "You''re right, I should tell her. Please listen to her, all right?"


    "I will listen to her about as much as I listen to you."


    "That little, huh? Well, I suppose that''s the best she can hope for. And I''ll admit, I''d be a little annoyed if you listened to her more than you listen to me¡­"


    Silence fell, as Rian clearly tried to remember anything else to he needed to tell her.


    "I¡­ think that''s all?" Rian said tentatively. "Nothing else comes to mind¡­"


    "Nor to my mind either," Lori mused.


    They sat in silence.


    "So¡­ I asked one of the carpenters to make a game board and pieces for you," Rian said, "but he hasn''t finished making it yet. Might be done later today or tomorrow. You''ll be able to play, chatrang, pincer and lima with it. Well, mainly chatrang, the carpenters have too much work on thier hands to have time to make that many pieces."


    "I hate those games," Lori said. She''d always lost when she played them, with defeat often being snatched from victory at the last moment.


    "I have no idea how to play them. When I come back, I''ll be a complete beginner."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Well¡­ thank you then."


    "Somehow, I knew you''d say that¡­" Rian said dryly.


    The women came back, Umu and Riz sitting on either side of Rian as they put the bowls of food they were holding on the table. He seemed much more aware they were there as Lori reached over and picked one of the bowls, sitting with his elbows tucked in close to his body, focusing on his food and twitching every so often as either of the women casually made contact with him as they ate. Mikon, sitting on Riz''s other side, seemed completely serene as the other occasionally leaned against Rian in innocuous ways that were clearly deliberate.


    Breakfast continued in silence amidst the sounds of the dining hall around them.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, the volunteers¡ªthe ''crew'', as Rian said the people who operated a boat were called, and again Lori had wonder why everything had to have a different name just because it was on a boat¡ªgoing to Covehold all brought the last of their things to the Coldhold, putting their bedrolls, pillows, blankets and personal belongings into the storage set aside for them. For some reason, people only just seemed to realize they were actually leaving. Lori had to sigh exasperatedly as the crew and their families cried, hugging each other and taking far too long.


    "Don''t," Rian said next to her as they stood at the dock for the boats. "Don''t. Let them have this moment."


    She glared at him. "There was a holiday yesterday because this was going to happen!" she said, exasperated. "Why are people acting like they''re surprised?" Really, she already had to leave her demesne again¡ªmost definitely for the last time!¡ªwhy did people have to delay her? The sooner she left, the sooner she could come back and never leave again¡­


    He sighed. "I understand your frustration, but¡­ look, just let them do this. Please? Otherwise people will likely be annoyed at you until we come back, and do you really think Riz is ready to deal with that?" He looked up at the sun. "If they haven''t stopped by midmorning, I''ll go and tell them to get on the ship. Then they''ll be annoyed at me instead."


    Lori watched the children hugging men in the midsection, crying women hugging them higher and exchanging tearful words¡­


    "No, no, let them do this, it''s not like we''re on any kind schedule," Rian repeated.


    "We are on a schedule, you''re supposed to leave today!"


    "After lunch counts as today¡­"


    Lori gave him the withering look such a stupid statement deserved, but sighed and crossed her arms, her staff sticking through the crook of one elbow as a result. She continued to glare at the procrastinators, making her displeasure and impatience known but not saying anything. Nearby, the ferrywoman who took the miners to River''s Fork every week¡ªRian had called her Clowee, but Lori was never going to remember that¡ªsat patiently, waiting to convey Lori. Technically, she wouldn''t need to until later, since the smaller boat would be pulled behind the Coldhold by a rope, but the ferrywoman was apparently taking her responsibility of the boat she operated very seriously.


    So far no one had tried to make off with Lori''s Ice Boat yet, but Lori figured it was only a matter of time. It would most likely be a pair of idiots too impatient to wait their turn to use the Um¡­


    Lori had done a last moment check of all the bindings on the Coldhold, making sure that the ones that needed blood had blood, and that the cold box, still mostly full of bound ice, was airtight so that the cold keeping the supply of fresh meat in it preserved. That would be able to last the crew a few days once they cooked it, hopefully. After having seen it, Lori had begun to think that all the ice packed into it and bound might have been a little too much, but Rian had said they didn''t know how long the trip would be and it was better to be over-prepared than deficient.


    More and more people were crowding around the crew who would be leaving, and a few were even diverting and approaching Rian to give their own goodbyes. Lori had stepped to the edge of the dock to avoid the crowd as Rian talked to random people who wished him well and bade him to be careful. Really, if he wasn''t going to be careful already, being told to do so was unlikely to change anything.


    There were also people who seemed to be reminding Rian of favors they''d asked him to do when he was in Covehold. Judging from the length of the notes of stone tablets Lori had transcribed for him, all with lists of things to do or check on that she didn''t remember telling him to do. It seemed Rian had taken on a significant amount of things to investigate when they arrived¡­


    Finally, the crowd began to thin, and Rian finally began calling the ''crew'' to come aboard the boat. Lori was already there, sitting on one of the benches near the ice stove as the volunteers boarded. At the docks, people crowded, arms waving goodbye and crying, as if they hadn''t already been doing that just a while ago¡­


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    "All right, just like we practiced," Rian said, giving orders. "Liggs, up front, tell me which way we''re going! Cottsy, down below at the water jet driver." Water jet driver? Well, she supposed it was a driver, if one wanted to be technical¡­ "Everyone else, go down and double check everything is stowed away and won''t roll, you all remember the mess that happened with the wood."


    There were affirmative responses, and one of the men climbed up the ladder to the roof deck.


    "All right, did we forget anything? Now''s the time to say so while we''re still here and can turn around!" Rian called out. "No? All right Lom, untie the rope, let''s get moving!"


    Lori was fairly sure that was all just theatrics, since there hadn''t nearly been enough time to for anyone to check if they were missing anything. Besides, Rian had already checked when she''d been going over the boat''s bindings. One of the men undid the rope tying the boat the dock, and leapt onto the outrigger, only to be reminded to get the rope out of the water and gather it up properly, does he want the rope to rot, doesn''t he know how hard it was to make rope?


    "All right Cottsy, put the water jet driver in reverse!" Rian called down to the open hatch at the tiller''s base.


    "Understood Lord Rian!" someone, probably the aforementioned Cottsy, called up from below.


    There was a soft shudder through the boat, and it suddenly began to move out of the dock, moving out into the river rear-first. On the dock, the noise redoubled as if the people leaving weren''t only four paces away, and had been talking to them recently.


    Lori watched as Rian moved the tiller¡ªwhich seemed needlessly long, almost as long as he was tall¡ªand the boat slowly began to turn so it faced down river, the thrust barely enough to overcome the current of the river.


    The smaller ice boat, moving noticeably faster, moved along side and another rope was tossed over, tying the smaller boat to one of the outriggers.


    "All right Cottsy, shift to first notch forward!"


    The Coldhold began to move downriver almost ponderously, seemingly only at the speed of the current. Behind them, the dock slowly moved away. Along the shore, some people mostly children, began running after the boat, seemingly trying to keep up. Still, the boat, powered by the water jets Lori had bound, continued to accelerate, and thankfully they weren''t followed very far past the dry dock where the boat had been built.


    "Lord Rian, we''ve got a straight path ahead!" the person on the roof cried down.


    "Cottsy, shift to third notch forward! Let''s get up to speed!"


    There was another shudder, and the Coldhold began accelerating faster, moving towards River''s Fork, the second Lori''s Ice Boat trailing behind it like a toy.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    River''s Fork had a dock now. It wasn''t as good as the one she had built, of course, but as the demesne didn''t have a Whisperer, or even a wizard who actually knew what they were doing, it was probably the best they could manage. Someone, probably her own miners, had dug into the beach and made an area deep enough for Lori''s Ice Boat to float in. This had then seemingly been lined with rocks to keep it from collapsing. Lori wasn''t sure how well built it was, but eh¡­ It wasn''t her work, or her demesne''s facilities, so she didn''t care.


    The dock was clearly sized for Lori''s Ice Boat, meaning the Coldhold was far too big for it. Fortunately, they had the smaller boat with them, and it was able to slip into the dock and pick up their prisoners. Lori would have expected the three they were taking to exile to be more disheveled, perhaps thin like many people had been when they''d finally stopped next to the river and decided to establish their demesne there where they had a constant supply of fresh water. But no, they seemed as healthy as ever, even if their hair seemed a little more oily.


    There was a small crowd with them, and Lori was too far to easily tell if they were there in support or condemnation of the three. A group of children standing next to a green-haired man were crying, reaching for the woman¡ªwhat was her name again? Eh, it wasn''t important¡ªwho was about to kneel down to hug them when she saw Lori, standing on the rooftop balcony of the Coldhold, as far as she could be from the prisoners and still be on the boat.


    Even from where she was standing, Lori clearly heard the woman''s exclamation that started with ''glitter-eating'' and became more obscene and slightly incoherent from there as the woman yelled at Lori. Two men had to subdue her and tie her hands behind her back as she continued to rant and rave, accusing Lori of somehow robbing her of her land and what she deserved and apparently Lori was responsible for all the things wrong with her life¡­


    Lori had to shake her head. Really, a woman her age should be capable of taking responsibility for her own actions.


    Still, Lori stayed up on the roof as the three prisoners were escorted below decks. The woman''s husband¡ªLori at least remembered they were married¡ªfollowed in sullen silence after he''d been pulled from the children the woman had ignored in favor of Lori. Grem¡ªshe was unlikely to forget his name¡ªhad come last, moving under his own power and seemingly only lightly guarded. His gaze had risen to meet Lori''s own as he had approached, his face more inscrutable than usual, and he continued saying nothing until he was down below decks, where the green-haired woman''s cries and invective were still audible.


    Afterwards came four people from River''s Fork to assist in escorting the prisoners to Covehold, and then their supplies. Lori tried to keep the covetous expression off her face as sealed containers of grain were brought into the boat. It looked like River''s Fork had its own potter, though their clay pit wasn''t visible from where Lori was standing. One of the men was probably also carrying a small mill to render the grain into flour.


    Once they finished transferring the food, Rian climbed up the ladder towards her. "We''re loaded up and ready to go, your Bindership," he said. "Time for you to leave for home. Though Binder Shanalorre asks if you could talk to her a moment. I''ll have the ship wait here until you''re finished with that, so we''ll know you''re all right."


    Lori nodded in acknowledgement. "Did you manage to tell them about the bucket?" she asked as Rian got off the ladder and she started climbing down.


    "They couldn''t hear me over Missus Naineb''s ranting," he said as she climbed down. "I''ll try to tell them later. I think she might be in serious need of help. She didn''t even say goodbye to her children¡­ "


    "They''re better off away from such a maladjusted influence," Lori said dismissively.


    "In a play or novel, this is usually the part in the plot where they resolve to get vengeance on you for destroying their family. The children or Naineb, either or. Or even both," Rian said, and Lori paused a rung from the floor for a moment.


    Then she shrugged, stepping down the whole way. "Well, that will be up to you to watch out for when you come back," she said. "Something for you to do when you''re not busy deciding between three women."


    Rian winced, looking away. "I really wish you''d told me sooner. I could have stopped it from getting this far."


    Lori considered that. "If you really find their attentions so undesirable, perhaps I should tell them so when I get back."


    Rian looked as if he was seriously considering the idea, then sighed. "No, no, that wouldn''t be fair to them. Whatever I decide, they at least deserve to hear it from me."


    "This implies you don''t intend to refuse them out of hand," Lori said.


    Rian looked out across the water, to the domed town of River''s Fork. The leaves were thick on the ground, and there were large mounds between some houses. He shook his head. "I¡­" He sighed. "I''ll think about it. It''s still a lot to take in. And hey, maybe they''ll change their mind while I''m gone."


    "Unlikely," Lori said instantly.


    "You don''t know that!"


    Lori thought of three women who sat one table over, staring at Rian''s back over every meal, for months.


    "I do know that," Lori said firmly. "Consider the significance when I say that I am well acquainted with these women''s idiosyncrasies enough to say that with confidence. This will not go away while you procrastinate over it."


    She began to head towards the outrigger, where Clowee the ferrywoman waited for her on Lori''s Ice Boat.


    "Do you think they really like me?" Rian said.


    Lori was tempted to respond that if he didn''t know, she wasn''t going to tell him. Instead, she rested a hand on the railing to steady herself and gave him an annoyed look over her shoulder "You should be able to tell. It''s for things like this I made you lord, after all."


    Rian shrugged, looking¡­ lost. "I''ve never had anyone like me before," he said, looking aside as he blushed childishly. "I don''t know what it''s like."


    "Well, it''s like this," she said impatiently. "The persons in question care for your wellbeing more than you do yourself, offer assistance whenever you need it, are willing to do difficult and distasteful things for you even if you ask them not to, enjoy bestowing you with physical affection, and like to be in your company whenever possible." She tried not to think of her mothers, tried to remember her anger. "Unless you do something truly distasteful to them personally, that is unlikely to change, so I suggest you be prepared to deal with it when you come back."


    "You realize you just described my relationship with you, right?" Rian said. "No wonder there are weird rumors about us."


    What? How could he possibly think she was describing their interactions? "Rian, now is not the time for bad jokes."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he smiling slightly.


    "You have already failed to deal with the situation when I told you to. Do not fail when you return."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Thank you for your concern. I''ll¡­ figure something out."


    Lori nodded, stepping past the railing and onto the boards to the outrigger, and from there to Lori''s Ice Boat. She put her staff in first before trying to board. The smaller boat moved as she got on it, and Lori really wished the boat was properly beached instead of floating in the water like this, but she managed not to fall as she got into the boat, sitting down on one of the benches. "To shore," she told Clowee. "I need to speak to Binder Shanalorre."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Clowee said promptly, confidently moving the little lever that controlled the boat''s water jet driver¡ªLori supposed it was a driver, after all¡ªcausing them to start reversing away from the Coldhold.


    Binder Shanalorre was waiting for her as they moved into the dock, and Lori again had to carefully step from the unstable vessel and onto the dock, made of planks on posts. "Binder Shanalorre," she greeted with a nod, deciding to leave her staff in the boat.


    "Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre nodded. "You''ve kept your word. Though I must say the form of that fulfillment is¡­ surprising. You were informed that ice boats melt, correct?"


    "That deficiency has been accounted for," Lori said.


    "I trusted as much, which is why I chose to send my people aboard it. They have orders to ensure that the prisoners reach their exile. Beyond that, however, they have been told to obey Lord Rian''s orders."


    "Does that include assisting in providing payment for any berthing fees for the ship?"


    "Lord Rian mentioned the possibility. Rest assured that we have prepared a contribution should they be necessary."


    Many things were left unsaid, such as the possibility of Lori having ordered Rian to rob her people and slit the prisoner''s throats anyway. Lori merely nodded. "And that matter of the Golden Sweetwood Company''s directorship?"


    "That is an internal matter of the company," Shanalorre said. "However, rest assured, we have taken steps to excise the prisoner''s control over the company. With luck, the company should send the second wave of people and supplies late the following year, or the year after that at the latest."


    "I¡­ see," Lori said quietly.


    "Before that happens, I believe it would be prudent if our two demesnes and the various stockholders of the company between them discuss the best approach of the distribution," Shanalorre continued. "Though that will probably be reliant on the response that we will receive in the spring or later. It would be best to avoid the situation that resulted in the crowding of far too many demesne near Covehold that is currently hindering their growth and development."


    For a moment, Lori stared down at the younger Binder. "Yes, that situation is to be avoided, I agree," she said quietly. "However, I cannot possibly make an informed decision at this time."


    Binder Shanalorre nodded. "Of course. I understand completely. Well, that is all I have to say, Binder Lolilyuri. Unless you have anything else to discuss¡­?"


    Lori considered. "I believe our business is concluded."


    "Then I wish you a good day and safe journey, Binder Lolilyuri," Binder Shanalorre said. "And a safe journey for your ship."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The Coldhold began to move downriver once Lori was far enough upstream from River''s Fork. Lori watched as the large wood-clad vessel drove with the current, heading towards the distant sea it connected to. Then there was a bend and both boat and the dome of River''s Fork were out of sight, and there were only hills and trees and the sounds of water and bugs around them.


    The ferrywoman occasionally glanced at Lori, but Lori ignored her, sitting at her bench and idly fingering her staff as her mind wandered to the blood-bound wisps that made up the boat. They weren''t feeling any more distant or, after doing so, any more difficult to imbue. Unless there was an unknown range limit measured beyond the distance between River''s Fork and Lori''s Demesne, the connection would continue to feel no different.


    The reminders to imbue all the bound components of the boat were already on the list of reminders on the wall of her room, but Lori checked on them again anyway, just to be sure: the water jet driver, the hull and oven and insulated cold box, the lightwisps, the evaporators, the blocks of ice¡­


    "Your Bindership?" a hesitant voice interrupted her rumination. "W-we''re back now."


    Lori blinked, looking up in surprise to see the familiar view of the entrance of her Dungeon. She had been so occupied she hadn''t even noticed them entering her demesne¡­ "Thank you, Clowee," she said distractedly as she stood up, then nearly fell down again as the boat shifted underneath her. Ugh, why couldn''t they beach this boat instead?


    Lori almost tried to step on the dock with the boat still shifting beneath her before she remembered that they were in her demesne. She reached down into the water below, sending power from her core, and the water beneath her stilled as it became unnaturally thick and viscous, steadying the boat and allowing her to stand up on the now much more stable surface. She managed to get her feet on the dock and sighed in relief as she felt the solidness under her feet.


    For a moment, she just stood there in the mid-afternoon light, looking around. After all the crying that morning, she would have thought there''d be some kind of sign. Perhaps a woman or child still staring mournfully downriver. Instead, everything seemed to have fallen back into routine. There were women using the laundry area, clothes were hanging on the drying lines, someone was over at the retting pool turning over the ropeweed so they would rett evenly¡­


    Shaking her head, Lori headed to the curing sheds to cure firewood.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At dinner that night, Lori sat at her usual bench at her usual table and stared at the empty spot in front of her. She could smell the food being cooked, hear the usual sounds of conversation from the tables around her, but couldn''t find it in herself to be comforted or annoyed.


    In the back of her mind, she was aware of the Coldhold''s bindings.


    A large pair of breasts moved into her view, and Lori blinked before she adjusted her gaze, looking up to meet Mikon''s amber eyes. The woman wore a sympathetic look on her face as she sat there, where Rian was supposed to be.


    "I wondered if you three would bother to come back here, with him gone," Lori said. She hadn''t wondered any such thing, but it was something witty to say, and if was exactly the sort of thought she''d have had if she hadn''t been¡­ distracted.


    "Riz would, of course," Mikon said. She didn''t seem surprised, as if she''d expected Lori to talk to her. "After all, she''s your temporary Rian."


    Lori nodded. Yes, of course, of course, she had a temporary Rian, didn''t she?


    The person in question appeared, hesitating as she saw the pink-haired weaver sitting at the bench in front of Lori. Mikon turned, following Lori''s gaze, and gave a brief smile, then helpfully slid aside so the spot directly in front of Lori was empty. Still looking at Mikon suspiciously, Riz gingerly sat down in front of Lori, then slid a little away from Mikon, leaving a space between them.


    The three of them sat in silence as the dining hall buzzed around them.


    Lori regarded her temporary Rian. "Rian spoke to you about the harvest?" she said.


    "Yes, Great Binder," she said. There was only a little hesitation in her words.


    "Good. Deal with it." Lori said.


    Now she hesitated. "How should I deal with it, Great Binder?"


    "I don''t care. Just deal with it," Lori said.


    Riz looked uncertain. "Yes, Great Binder¡­"


    Mikon reached over and patted Riz on the shoulder, instantly making the woman turn to look at her warily. "Don''t worry," Mikon said, smiling cheerfully, unreadably. "I''ll help you."


    The woman still looked wary. "Why?"


    "Why what?"


    "Why are you offering to help me? For that matter, why did you kiss me that time?"


    Mikon''s expression didn''t change as she tilted her head. "Don''t you need help?"


    Riz scowled. "That doesn''t explain anything."


    "Haven''t you heard? I''m generous with my time. But if you don''t want my help, just say so." Mikon stood up. "Dinner is ready," she said. "I''ll go get it while you continue speaking to her Bindership, shall I?" Not waiting for a reply, she walked away. Riz continued to stare after her, her expression conflicted and bemused.


    When Mikon returned, she came with three bowls of food, three cups and a pitcher. "I don''t think Umu will be joining us," she said as she placed them on the table. "She''s eating with her family."


    Riz grunted. "So?"


    Mikon merely sighed.


    Lori regarded the three bowls, then chose one and pulled it towards herself.


    The three of them ate quietly as the dining hall buzzed around them.

 133 - Cant Bring Herself To Care

    Lolilyuri woke up to a familiar stony ceiling, an old list of names right in her line of sight, written into the stone. She really should get around to erasing that one of these days, the names were no longer relevant, and she''d forgotten who they were¡­


    She lay on her nice and comfortable bed and bedroll¡ªit still hadn''t begun to feel uncomfortable, unlike her old wooden bed!¡ªand contemplated just staying there for the rest of the day. Her supply of reparation fruit from River''s Fork was long gone, but like yesterday morning, she didn''t really feel all that hungry. Really, it was tempting to just close her eyes and sleep¡­


    Groaning, Lori forced herself upright, years of practice at getting up to meet the unfortunate demands of reality pushing her forward. Well, at least her back didn''t ache anymore when she got up. Still fighting the desire to keep her eyes closed, she went to her private bathroom and poured some water from the reserve jug she kept there to wash her face. The cold woke her up enough that opening her eyes no longer felt distasteful and annoying, but merely inconvenient.


    Sighing, Lori began to strip down for a morning bath. She¡¯d have to do laundry soon, her trousers were getting stained and her shirts were getting uncomfortable. Leaning against the cold stone wall so she didn¡¯t have to stand, Lori reached through her connection to her dungeon¡¯s core and through that to the rest of the demesne around her. She bound the waterwisps in the deep pit that acted as her Dungeon¡¯s emergency water reservoir and central water repository, forming a binding that made them go up into the pipe that led to her bathroom, heating it on its way up with firewisps¡­


    After a nice warm bath and a change of new clothes, Lori came down to her Dungeon¡¯s dining hall to find breakfast in progress. It was far harder to navigate between the tables with them full, but she managed it, skirting around the edges of the room so that there were only be a few tables in her way.


    Her usual table seemed out of place with only two people sitting there in the midst of so many other, more occupied tables. Riz, currently acting as her temporary Rian, and Mikon were sitting at least an arm''s length apart on the bench. Both were drinking from cups, as if trying to hold back their hunger with water. At the sight of her, Mikon stood up and headed for the kitchen.


    Lori stepped over the bench on her side of the table and sat down, eyeing the remaining cup, which was empty. And dry, so it probably hadn¡¯t been spat on. She reached for the cup and poured herself some water, tilting her head back as she drank it all down in one pull.


    ¡°Good morning, Great Binder,¡± Riz said. Even Lori could tell the pink-haired former militiawoman was barely restraining annoyance. ¡°Did you sleep well?¡±


    ¡°I slept,¡± Lori responded. She hadn¡¯t bought down her sunk board this morning. She hadn¡¯t felt like playing. ¡°Report. What happened that I need to know about, and how did you deal with it?¡± She shouldn¡¯t have to say that, but her temporary Rian need to be prompted.


    Riz sat up straight. "Well¡­ we need more storage for the firewood¡­ and more space in the mushroom farm¡­ and the mushroom farmers say they need your help for the next crop. Something about lightning¡­?"


    "What about lightning?" Lori said blandly.


    Riz pursed her lips and sighed. "I''ll go and find out what they want exactly, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Good." She made sure her tone implied that it could be far better. "Anything else?"


    "N-no, that''s all, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Riz," Lori said sharply, and Riz straightened again. "If there are any problems in my demesne, it''s your job to find them in and take care of it. If there are no problems, try harder. Just because Rian never tells me everything because he deals with it doesn''t mean he didn''t know everything."


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    Riz sighed. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori suppressed the urge to sigh herself, even as Mikon came back with three bowls of stew. She placed them on the table in front of Lori, who looked them over and picked the one with the most meat she could see. It was a bit lukewarm, but she simply bound the firewisps in the food, binding them to slightly increase the food''s temperature. Most beginners tended to bind the firewisps to produce too much heat, boiling their water to steam. It took experience to bind firewisps delicately enough to make lukewarm into merely warm instead of explosively boiling.


    When Lori put first spoonful in her mouth, it was as warm as if freshly cooked. Even if having it far hotter wouldn''t have hurt her¡ªat least not her own demesne, as the firewisps in her body regulated her temperature and by extension the temperature of anything she touched that could be bound¡ªit was nice to have the food just right. At least something was¡­


    Mikon let Riz pick a bowl next. Her temporary Rian''s suspicion towards the other woman was still there, but it was more like a habit that she just couldn''t let go of instead of anything she actively pursued. Mikon, for her part, didn''t seem to mind her bowl had the least meat on it, eating the food with usual efficiency of someone with a day''s work ahead of them. The three of them ate in silence.


    "Are you doing anything later this afternoon, Riz?" Mikon said, deliberately not paying attention to Lori. Lori could almost like the weaver for that. She seemed to be the only one who''d realized Lori wanted completely and total non-involvement with everything and everyone around her unless Lori felt like it, and acted accordingly, completely ignoring Lori unless informed otherwise.


    Her temporary Rian grunted. "I''m always busy," she said, and Lori idly wondered how much of that was a blatant lie. "Why are you asking?"


    "Umu and I are sweeping Rian''s house later, and we could use a third to help pick up the bed so someone can sweep under it." Mikon''s face was completely innocent as she asked, "Would you happen to know anyone who''d be willing to help us with that? We were hoping to get it done before dinner, while there was still enough light to see."


    The face Riz leveled at her was vaguely accusatory. "¡­fine, I''ll help," she said.


    "Oh, you will? Wonderful! We''ll see you then, shall we?" Mikon said brightly.


    "You said Umu will be there. If it''s just you, I''m walking away," Riz said.


    Mikon tilted her head. "Of course she''ll be there. I did say we needed a third to lift the bed, didn''t I? Even if you were strong enough to lift the bed yourself while I sweep underneath, it would be cruel to make you."


    Riz still looked deeply suspicious, but grunted. "Fine, I''ll help you two clean house."


    "Wonderful!" Mikon said. "It''ll also help me see how well ropeweed fabric does with wiping up."


    Lori listened to all this with what she knew was even more disinterest than she usually did. Mikon''s even more blatant flirting¡ªcompared to when she''d flirted with Rian¡ªand Riz''s even more determined¡­ not obliviousness. She was clearly aware, but either she was deliberately misinterpreting or not interested but for some reason just didn''t bother to directly tell the pink-haired weaver¡ªwasn''t eliciting the mild amusement or slowly escalating annoyance it should have. She knew this and just couldn''t bring herself to care.


    She should have been worried. Complete and total apathy about the people around her was one thing, completely normal and how she liked to live her life. Apathy about herself, however¡­ she should have been concerned.


    Lori couldn''t bring herself to care.


    She lingered over her meal, eating slowly, such that her food actually cooled. When Lori was finished, the dining room was quiet and sparse, and people were already cleaning the tables and floors. Mikon was gone, probably already downstairs in the second level with the other weavers, leaving only Riz sitting across from her. Wordlessly, Lori pushed her now-empty bowl away and stood, her heavy wooden staff banging on the table a little as she pulled it back from where it was leaning. Lori winced at the impact. It had been a while since she''d last been so careless as to let her staff hit anything.


    Sighing, Lori headed outside. What was it she needed to do again? Firewood storage and¡­ oh yes, expand the mushroom farm. She''d have to dig down, since she couldn''t really dig deeper¡­ that meant stairs¡­ some pipes and waterwisp bindings to prevent flooding¡­ a small obstruction at the entrance to keep water out in the first place¡­


    The lethargic apathy was pushed back as Lori''s thoughts turned to the work she needed to do.


    Seven days, a part of her thought, keeping count. Seven day already, and still not back¡­


    And it would be longer still¡­


    Lori worked. When she worked, she almost stopped thinking about it.

 134 - A Small Hole

    Lori trudged to work, each step heavy as she walked up the slope towards the sawpit area. The sawpit itself was at rest, since no large logs were being cut up into planks. Instead, dead wood, branches, and roots such as the strange growth that had sprouted from the old latrines, pieces too small to be used for building material that had been gathered over the months and left to naturally cure were being cut down to size. Now they were being cut down into smaller pieces for firewood, and a stockpile was being built up for winter. Or at least, the early parts of winter.


    The cut firewood was being put into orderly piles on cleared ground next to the curing sheds that held their stockpile of cut planks and large, squared-off blocks of wood in case they needed planks cut to a different size, for some reason. The piles were low, and as she had told Riz to tell them, the wood was inside lines she had marked on the ground yesterday. Off to the side was the pile of rock she had excavated from the third level-in-progress yesterday, ready for her to use. There was another pile in progress, made of cut log segments each a half-pace long, being stacked up to cure naturally over the time.


    Both piles would need a storage shed built around them, but for now she was going to build the one for the firewood first. Lori sighed and got to work. A part of her wanted to just sit down and do all the work with her Whispering, but she knew that was a terrible idea. She need to see what she was doing if she was going to be making load-bearing structures, so she knew it was properly shaped. Lori began taking deep, even breaths, taking in magic from the air even if she didn''t really need it. She reached out through her dungeon''s core, and from there to all the wisps in her demesne, binding the earthwisps of the pile of excavated stone and imbuing them with magic from the core.


    The stone flowed, things like layering and natural cleavage lines melding together as the rock moved under her direction towards one end of the marked off area. Lori had the stone follow the lines she had made, fusing with the bedrock stone she had drawn up and exposed as she began to build the walls of the structure. The work was familiar and she was able to lose herself in the familiar actions of making sure the walls were properly vertical so that the weight of the stone went straight down so it would be stable. She had to make an internal wall, temporarily cutting the structure in half as she added the curving, half-cylinder stone roof.


    It took her all day to finish the structure, with a break for lunch, despite the fact she didn''t have to make any windows or add any support for openings in the walls, and both ends of the structure opened out so that firewood could easily be stored in and retrieved. Slow work, when she was usually able to make it much faster. At the very least, Lori would usually have been at able to make both storage sheds by the end of the day. She made an effort to start the walls for the other shed, but she could already tell she''d need more stone. It was already late afternoon, and Lori just wanted the day to be over already so she could have her dinner and go to bed¡­


    Sighing, Lori stopped working as she ran out of stone, the walls barely ankle high, and probably a dangerous tripping hazard. She began to trudge down back to the Dungeon. Tomorrow, she''d have to excavate the third level again, get more stone, then finish storage shed¡­ then she''d need to expand the mushroom farm¡­ Actually, she might need to do that first, since that would give her stone for the shed¡­ She should have thought of that sooner¡­


    Lori let herself be pulled down the slope to the Dungeon''s entrance, then turned as she reached the wide, flat area directly in front of it. She passed the smithy, where the smiths were putting away their tools for the day, the forge''s coals banked and the door and chimney closed to hold in the heat. And standing across from the smithy was a house. There was a circle of stones in front of it and to one side so it didn''t block the way to the door, the ground in the middle of the circle darkened with old ash from old fires. Around the circle were a couple of benches and other places to sit.


    Inside the house, she could hear people¡ªprobably three people¡ªhurriedly cleaning, despite the fact they didn''t live there. Even as she watched, there was a brief exclamation, then a panicked sound as of a cloth being snapped around. A moment later, a large bug flew from the door. Only the size of her thumb, the wings on its back buzzed as it was routed out of the house. Absently, Lori bound some airwisps, producing a sharp jet that pushed the bug in the general direction of away from her. After several months, the bug population of the demesne seemed to finally be recovering. She supposed it was only a matter of time before bug meat started appeared in the stew. She hoped they tasted decent. They didn''t have much in the way of spices to flavor the food. If they were lucky, some of them would be like chlyp and would only need to be boiled until they turned yellow¡­


    No, wait, chlyp tasted best with salted lard. And they didn''t have salt. Lori sighed.


    A blonde woman stepped up to the door, sweeping dust out with a feather-bristle broom. She looked up and paused for a moment as she saw Lori, but Lori was already turning away and heading for the Dungeon.


    A bath. She needed a bath. Why is it that despite the fact she didn''t lift anything heavier than her staff and mostly stood around and walked so she could see the walls she was working on better, she still became sweaty? It couldn''t have been from heat, the firewisps in her body took care of that¡­


    And she still needed to do her laundry.


    Sighing again, Lori headed for her table through the mostly empty dining hall and sat down, folding her arms on the tabletop and laying her head down. She''d just close her eyes for a moment¡­ just a little moment¡­ After all, it wasn''t like she had anything better to do¡­


    Someone was poking her in the side. They were annoyingly insistent about it, and Lori grudgingly lifted her head, looking sideways to glare at whoever was foolish enough to not just annoy her, but physically touched her to do it.


    The brat stopped poking her. "Wiz Lori, it''s dinner time," she said. "You need to eat before you go to sleep, or else your tummy will hurt."


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    For a moment, Lori just lay there and glared at her one taxpayer. Then she sighed and pushed herself to sit up, wincing at the twinge on her back. "I''m up, I''m up," she said. "Now go back to your family and eat."


    The brat nodded, turned and nodded at the woman sitting across from Lori then headed back to¡­ wherever it was she sat for her meals. Lori thought it was somewhere in the back corner next to the stairs, where there was a slight breeze from the air being circulated up from the second level.


    Lori couldn''t bring herself to care all that much.


    Still, she leveled an annoyed glare at the two women sitting across from her, her temporary Rian most especially. "Really?" she said, her tone distinctly disgruntled. "You got a child to wake me up? What, you didn''t have the nerve to do it yourself?"


    "It was my idea, your Bindership," Mikon said before Riz could reply. "We weren''t sure if you''d be angry if¡ª"


    "Mikon, shut up," Lori said. Mikon''s teeth clicked together as her mouth snapped shut. She gave Riz a flat look. "You. If you need to wake me up, wake me up. Talking to me is explicitly part of your job, so do it."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said. At least she was no longer stuttering nervously.


    "You used to be more competent. Inexperienced, but competent. Was that only because you were trying to impress Rian?"


    "No, Great Binder," Riz said.


    Lori stared at her for a moment, expression completely flat. It might just be that she had woken up in a bad mood. She pointed with her spoon. "Start eating." She followed her own order, stirring her stew with her spoon¡ªit had been getting increasingly more bland¡ªbefore starting to eat.


    Riz made to do just that, but hesitated as she reached for the bowl. "You pick first," she said to Mikon.


    "Oh? Well, if you''re sure," Mikon said¡­ and picked the bowl that had noticeably less meat floating in it. She began eating the same cheerful, unreadable smile on her face.


    Riz looked down at the bowl left, then at Mikon. Face bemused, she began to eat.


    Relative silence descended on the table once more, while around them the dining hall buzzed with annoying cheer.


    "Well?" Lori demanded after several spoonfuls had gone into her stomach. She didn''t feel like eating, not really, but she knew she needed to.


    Riz paused. "Uh, well what, Great Binder?"


    "Did you clarify about the lightning?"


    Riz jerked to attention. "Ah, yes! Nazu said that they''d just put in some fresh spores, so they needed you to use lightning on it to help increase the yield." A look of barely veiled annoyance came over her temporary Rian''s face. "He said you knew what it was, since you''d done it before."


    "Yes," Lori said. "I knew what he meant. But you didn''t and you didn''t ask. Next time, I might not know what they need, so you need to get into the habit of finding out everything before getting it to me. Unless you like having to go do it twice?" She hadn''t needed to tell Rian this. Rian had always been thorough and diligent in his work. she''d just told him what she''d needed done and made clear all the details were up to him, and he did it, only informing her when it was finished or there was a problem he felt she needed to know about, either because it needed a decision on her part or Whispering work.


    "No, Great Binder," Riz said, barely holding in a sigh. Next to her, Mikon kept her eyes on her bowl, but she reached up and patted Riz on the shoulder. Riz barely twitched, just accepting the gesture.


    "Good. See that you remember it. What else?" Lori went back to eating as her temporary Rian visibly wracked her mind, trying to remember.


    "Ah, we have bugs trying to nest in the back rooms of the baths," Riz said. "The bath workers have been reporting there are a lot of bugs crowding around the seams of the doors when they go to refill the reservoirs there. Some have gotten in and nested or laid eggs in the water. They think it''s because of the season. They''ve been dealing with it, but¡­ ah, well, it''s something you should know about, Great Binder?"


    "Better," Lori said. "You''re right, I haven''t foreseen that. I''ll see what I can come up with, you go ask the smiths if they have what they need to make fine mesh." She glanced at Mikon. "If they can''t, which is likely, we''ll need to use fabric."


    "Use fabric for what, Great Binder?" Riz asked.


    "As a barrier to keep the bugs getting into a heat outlet," Lori said.


    "Ah¡­ I see," Riz said.


    "No, you don''t," Lori said. "Don''t pretend you understand if you don''t. It makes you look both ignorant and foolish. Saying you don''t know just makes you look ignorant, but at least you''re admitting to it so you can change it."


    Riz flinched again. "Yes, Great Binder," she said.


    Mikon reached over and patted her on the shoulder again.


    Lori nodded curtly. "Good." She turned back to her meal. "Is there more?"


    Riz had taken her hands off her bowl. "The farmers said we''ll need to harvest soon, Great Binder. They say they need a place to store the grain so the bugs can''t get at it, and they''ll need a people to help them harvest."


    "Did you ask how much storage they need?"


    "No, Great Binder."


    "I trust you will correct that?"


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Good. Make the arrangements for the people you need for the harvest."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    Riz had taken her hands off the table, and they were now out of sight.


    "Riz, do I look like your mother?"


    The strangeness of the question made her temporary Rian blink. "Uh, no, Great Binder."


    "Then don''t treat me like it," Lori said. "I know the ''yes, mother'', ''no mother'' routine. I am not asking you to do something unreasonable, simply what I know you can do. Is that unreasonable?"


    Riz opened her mouth¡ª


    "If you say, ''no, Great Binder'', I will be even more annoyed than I am now."


    Riz''s mouth clicked shut. "That is not unreasonable, Great Binder," she eventually said.


    "So why are you making fists under the table?"


    Riz said nothing.


    Lori stared at her. "Are there any issues you know of that cannot wait until tomorrow morning?"


    "No, Gr¡ªThere are no issues I am aware of, Great Binder."


    "Then tell me in the morning." Lori bent down over her food and went back to eating.


    Eventually, Riz lifted her hands from under the table and continued eating as well.


    Around them, the silence persisted.


    Lori finished eating, pushed her bowl away, got up and headed for her room.


    Once she''d sealed the door and hallway behind her, Lori sat down on her stone stool and started undressing. She pulled off her boots, examining it for wear. It was still in good repair, although she noticed a few subtle cracks here and there, and the soles were getting more worn. She set them aside, pulling off her socks, and paused.


    One of her socks had a small hole in it, a hole that hadn''t been there that morning.


    For a moment, Lori just sat there, her eyes staring but not seeing. Then she pulled off her socks and set them aside. She stripped down naked, then went over to the niche in the wall were she kept her unwashed clothes, and began to bring them all to her bathroom.


    That night, she stayed up doing laundry, and only managed to get half of them washed.


    Eventually, she just surrendered and went to sleep, the remaining clothes left soaking in the water.


    Lori couldn''t bring herself to care.

 135 - Hungry After All

    In the morning, the hole in the sock and the laundry were still there.


    More work she had to do, needed to do.


    She''d get to it later.


    Before she left her room, she went down the list of bindings she had to imbue and maintain. As she sat on her bed, Lori stared at the wall next to her where she had written the list. She kept meaning to arrange it by order of importance, but as with many things, she just never got around to it. So it was still written in the order of when she''d gotten around to writing them down.


    At the bottom of the list was the list of bindings that maintained the Coldhold. She always did that part of the list first. It was the only thing she could do to make sure the ice boat could return. The hull, the water jet driver, all the parts of the ice boat¡­ she kept them all imbued and functioning. At least she didn''t seem have to worry about her affinity with her blood fading and the connection being lost. Even her lightwisps remained connected to her¡­


    She was finished. Lori sighed and headed down for breakfast. In the dining hall, breakfast was again in progress, though it seemed she''d managed to wake up earlier today. Many of the tables were still unoccupied, so she was able to go directly to hers. It was appealingly empty, and she slipped onto her bench, leaning her staff next to her. She looked around, but Riz wasn''t here yet, and neither was Mikon.


    Sighing, Lori folded her hands on the table and laid down her head, closing her eyes.


    She woke up when she felt someone nudging her shoulder. Lori made a sound in her throat as she opened her eye¡ªshe''d barely put her head down!¡ªto find Mikon standing next to her. The weaver began to pull her arm back as she saw Lori was awake. "She''s awake!" she said to the person across the table.


    Well, it was a little better than calling a child to wake her up, but not much better.


    Lori pushed herself up straight, wondered why there was salt in her eyes even if she hadn''t actually fallen asleep. Ugh. Still, the three bowls in front of her were still warm and fresh from the kitchen, and there looked to be dried mushroom and likely mushroom stock in this batch.


    "Good morning, Great Binder," Riz said. "Did you sleep well?"


    Lori grunted with feeling as she got the salt out of her eyes. A part of her wondered if she should save it to give the tanners. They needed salt, right? Idly, she tried to bind it. Some waterwisps, some earthwisps¡­ Probably not enough salt, salt had more earthwisps to bind. Ugh, stupid back ache. She twisted back and forth on her bench, and felt her spine pop, then rolled her shoulders because there was still a twinge on her back¡­


    Shaking her head one last time, Lori rested her elbows on the table, one hand resting on top of the other, one wrist pressing back into her mouth as she contemplated her temporary Rian. In hindsight, she''d acted¡­ exactly like what she''d been trying not to be. She should probably apologize¡­


    Well, she wasn''t good at this anyway.


    "Good morning, Erzebed," Lori replied. Her temporary Rian seemed surprised to be addressed by her proper name. "I did. Are there any issues I should be aware of?" She glanced at the bowls, and picked one, pulling it towards herself.


    Riz still seemed confused, even as Mikon pushed one of the bowls in front of the northerner and took the last one for herself. "Uh¡­ well, there are bugs trying to nest in the baths."


    "So you said. Anything else?" There was a new spice to the stew, and it wasn''t just because of the mushroom broth. Lori couldn''t quite place it, but it was new and not unpleasant. It made her want to drink water though.


    A strange expression came over Riz''s face. "We''ve started to have small beasts in the fields. We''ve been able to keep them away from the crops, but they might start going into other places."


    "Find out what those places are and make the arrangements," Lori said. "Like doors."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori gave her a flat look, then winced internally as she guiltily realized what she was doing and looked down into her food. "Good," she said. She was NOT going to act like her mothers! "I''ll leave that to you, then. What else?"


    "Those should be it, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Very well," Lori said. "Eat then. You can''t work on an empty stomach."


    Mikon pushed the still-untouched bowl of stew toward Riz significantly. The movement made Riz glance down and she reached for the spoon for the first time. She began to eat hesitantly, occasionally glancing at Lori as if she expected a subtle, pointed comment in her direction. At least, Lori assumed so. It was what she used to think in that position¡­


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    The worst was always when her mothers sighed and started telling her that they loved her. Lori was never sure who they were trying to convince, her or themselves¡­


    Grimly, Lori pushed away such pointless thoughts and focused on the taste of the food, determinedly eating her breakfast.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, Lori set out to begin the day''s work. There was some trudging involved, but it wasn''t as uphill as yesterday''s trudge, which was nice.


    Lori wasn''t sure if it helped, but she wrapped a cloth around her mouth and nose before she entered the cave with the mushroom farm. There was a woody smell inside, and she only took few steps in before she turned around and went out again. The sun shone down brightly, so there were plenty of lightwisps for her to claim, imbue and bind. She put them onto the end of her staff and went back into the cave. Maybe she should put a few lights in there, it was pretty dark¡­


    The cave was mostly clear, and there were only a few crumbling bits of wood on the floor, save for a neatly stacked row along one wall, glowing slightly blue from small growths of mushroom already on them, waiting to mature. She supposed they didn''t plant the mushrooms into the wood in the cave, or whatever it was they did to grow them. This left her plenty of room to work, which was good.


    She started with excavating the floor next to the long wall of the cave, making a ramp that sloped downward. While it would take up more room, a ramp down was easier to build than stairs, and¡­ uh, it would probably made it easier to bring down the wood that the mushrooms grew on to the next floor down. Yes, exactly, that was why.


    Lori built a low wall around the hole for the ramp so they could lean wood for mushroom growing against it, before continuing the excavation. This would be a first for her, she realized. This would be the first level she''d build that would be directly under another. Still, it wasn''t like she had no experience with this. Her room was built over her core, after all, and the space around the core was hollow. Her bedroom floor hadn''t collapsed on her yet¡­


    ¡­


    Maybe she should fill in her core room when there wasn''t a dragon around, give her floor more structural integrity.


    She built the ramp, then built it again when it was obvious it was too shallow and would end up being longer than the cave currently was. Once she thought the bottom of the ramp was deep enough, she began excavating the next level. By now putting up load-bearing pillars and arches when excavating was familiar enough she didn''t need to measure to make sure the arches were the right configuration, though she did anyway. She also bound lightwisps to the corners of the ceiling of the cave, both in the original portion and new one she was excavating, a dim light that wouldn''t impede the growth of the mushrooms.


    She was so occupied she almost missed lunch, and only realized it was time to eat when she went out with a batch of excavated stone and saw that the smiths weren''t at the smithy.


    Lori sighed. Rian usually came to get her when she was too busy to notice it was time to eat.


    For a moment, she was tempted to just go back and continue working¡ªshe didn''t really feel like eating¡ªbut experience had taught her not to skip meals, or else her mind would be too fatigued to concentrate. She headed back to her Dungeon''s dining hall.


    Fortunately, it seemed like it was still early in the meal. She arrived at the table at the same time that Riz and Mikon did, one carrying food, the other carrying the cups and pitcher of water.


    "Erzebed," Lori said as she sat down, "Rian might have forgotten to mention, but if I''m not at the table at lunch or dinner, look for me. It''s hard for me to tell the time when I''m busy digging under the ground."


    Riz winced. "Ah, sorry Great Binder. I''ll remember next time."


    Lori nodded. "Good." She reached for one of the bowls. "So, did anything come up this morning?"


    Mikon very deliberately pushed a bowl towards Riz, who hesitated a moment and accepted it. "The smiths say they need a grinding wheel. All the hand tools are getting dull because of the cutting and while we can make do with whetstones, sharpening them all individually takes too long."


    Lori nodded. "Noted. I''ll make one."


    "They, uh, say that the stone needs to be shaped as quarried," Riz said. "The texture is important for the sharpening, and too much Whispering can ruin it."


    "Tell them that I''ve made grindstones before, but their awareness of how not everyone has is noted," Lori said. "Well done getting more complete information, Erzebed. Very competent."


    The two women across from her looked at her strangely.


    "What?" Lori said.


    "How are you feeling, your Bindership?" Mikon asked. Well, Lori supposed she hadn''t specified who she was addressing.


    Still, it as a strange question to ask. Lori shrugged. "I''m fine," she said disinterestedly. "Was there anything else from this morning?"


    Riz glanced at Mikon, then sighed. "Well, there was one other thing. The weavers want to know how they should prepare for winter. So far, they''ve been weaving a lot of sheets, which are making good blankets, but if they have to make that into anything else, like shirts or winter house blankets, it''ll take time, and they''d like to know what the priority is."


    Lori paused in her eating, frowning. "Winter house blankets? What are those? If they were just like regular blankets, you''d probably say so."


    "They''re thick blankets with sleeves, your Bindership," Mikon said explained. "You use it as a blanket at night, then wear them over your regular clothes to keep you warm in winter."


    "Oh, you want to make robes?" Lori said. She frowned. "Do we have enough material to make those?"


    "No," Mikon said. "But we might have enough to make them for the children, if we start now."


    Lori considered that. "Make sure we have enough for extra blankets first."


    Mikon nodded. "Yes, your Bindership. We''re running out of ropeweed though, and as the season grows colder, retting them becomes less effective."


    Lori grunted and turned to Riz. "Have people start gathering ropeweed from the other side of the river. Clowee can take them, it''s not like the boat is used much the rest of the week."


    "I''ll tell her, Great Binder," Riz said. "I think that''s all that for now."


    Lori nodded, then bent down to focus on her food. She was hungry after all, she realized.


    They ate surrounded by the familiar murmur of the dining hall during meal time. As they ate, Lori became aware of Mikon staring at her intently.


    "What?" she demanded.


    Mikon smiled. "Would you like to play a game later, your Bindership?" she asked.


    Lori considered it, then shrugged. "Sure, why not. At dinner."


    Mikon nodded, and they went back to their meal.

 136 - Even When Hes Not Around

    Lori was able to quickly finish excavating the mushroom farm''s expansion after lunch. It wasn''t all that difficult, after all. It was basically just moving rock, and making pillars and arches so that the ceiling wouldn''t collapse. She even had Riz jump up and down on the first level to prove it wouldn''t collapse.


    "I can''t do it myself," Lori said at the look she got. "If it collapsed and something happened to me, who''d repair it? What if I died and the demesne disappeared?"


    "Tell me that first, Great Binder," Riz said. "This is clearly a job I should delegate to someone else. After all, if anything happened to me, you''d have to talk to people."


    Lori conceded that was a good point.


    "A good point," she nodded. "You''re right, we''ll do that next time. All right, you may go."


    The look on Riz''s face said she was still annoyed and planned to at least pass that annoyance on to someone else as she left to inform the mushroom farmers they could start moving things to the new level. Lori made sure to double check the floor below, adjusting the bound lightwisps to provide optimum light, and had enough time to drag the excavated stone up to near the sawpit. She''d use lightningwisps on the spores once they''d been moved in, and hopefully they''d have a decent crop when winter came.


    Then it was late afternoon and it was time to get ready for dinner. Lori had a quick wash, then took a moment to separate the clothes she still needed to launder.


    She was running out of soap. She made a note to remind her temporary Rian to get her some more.


    Washed and cool again, Lori was about to head down to the dining hall when she paused, remembering. Then she turned and picked up the long wooden sunk board and the sack of stones to play it with and headed downstairs. There were few people yet in the dining hall, though the smells of dinner were starting to emanate from the kitchen. Lori lay down the board on the table with practiced, familiar movements, putting the right number of stones into each bowl.


    She thought about folding her arms and taking a nap, but the wait wouldn''t be that long, so she took the time to double check on the bindings she was maintaining. Waterwisps to move water from the river, firewisps to heat the water to bathing temperature and for the distillers cleaning the water from the river in case there was still a corpse rotting somewhere and tainting it, airwisps to circulate the air through the Dungeon, lightwisps in the first and second level of the Dungeon as well as the shelter¡ªor possibly just he dormitory now¡ªas well as the Um and the baths. She''d stopped using earthwisps to reinforce stone structures in favor of making them self-reinforcing, so there were none of those to maintain, and she had no lightningwisp bindings at all. The material storage vaults acted as her darkroom for now, which didn''t need any actively bound darkwisps¡­


    Lori would have to make some solidified air again soon, the ones in the cold room were almost depleted.


    Which reminded her, she had to check on the pink ladies there so they didn''t freeze completely. Rian had made a mistake when trying to grow them, so they''d just been buried in the ground not growing¡­


    The dining hall began to fill up with the murmur of conversation as Lori stared down at the game board in front of her, fingers suddenly listless. Then she sighed and finished putting the stones in the bowls.


    Riz came to the table, looking tired and sat down heavily on the bench. "Please tell me again that this is a temporary position," she said, her voice more sigh than anything else. "Please, I need I hear it."


    Lori raised an eyebrow from the lack of a title, but said, "This is a temporary position, you will only be here until Rian comes back from Covehold."


    What came out next was a relieved sigh. "Really?"


    Lori gave her a flat stare. "It''s a bit late to be doubting my word, don''t you think?"


    There was a wince. "Ah, good point, Great Binder."


    For a moment, they just sat there. Lori drummed her fingers on the table as she waited for the kitchen to start handing out the food. "Anything to report?" she prompted.


    Riz jerked upright on her bench. "The farmers are saying it''s time to harvest soon, Great Binder. Not this week, but maybe next week. Uh, the smiths say they still need that grindstone."


    "Noted. I''ll get to it either tomorrow or the day after. Though perhaps they can use the stone wheel on the carpenter''s water wheel for the grindstone."


    "I''ll tell them that, Great Binder," Riz said. "I''ve had Clowee bringing people to the other side of the river to gather the ropeweed there, and Mikon says there should be time to rett a lot of it in the tank before winter. Apparently, retting isn''t as effective in the cold."


    Lori waved a hand. "If need be, I can make a heated tank for the winter. Are they leaving seeds behind so the ropeweed can grow back?"


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    Riz was silent. "I''ll find out, Great Binder," she sighed. "And tell them to do it if they''re not."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Now that I think of it, perhaps there''s still food we can gather on the other side."


    "I''m already having people on it, Great Binder," Riz said. "Though there might not be much. It''s well after season, and the bugs will likely have eaten them already."


    Lori nodded. "How is our food supply?"


    "We''re still bringing in seel and beast meat, but it''s only a matter of time before that stops as they migrate or get harder to find. Some people are¡­ ah, trying the local bugs to see if any are good to eat."


    "And are they?"


    "Only if we get really desperate. Though some people actually like eating larvae, even if it tastes like mud."


    "One less mouth to feed, then," Lori said blandly. "Hopefully it doesn''t come to that, thought it would be nice if we found something like chlyp."


    Riz nodded. "Yes, chlyp would be nice. Though making a hatchery for them would be¡­ complicated."


    "Just in case, find someone who knows how to raise chlyp and learn what is needed," Lori ordered.


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    For a moment, Lori tilted her head and considered here. "Good. You have returned to being competent, Erzebed. Keep it up."


    "Er, thank you, Great Binder."


    Lori glanced up towards the kitchen. "The food is ready."


    Riz blinked. "Uh, what?"


    Lori pointed. "Food. Get it."


    "Oh. Oh! Yes, Great Binder." Still, Riz looked around a moment, clearly looking for Mikon. Not seeing the weaver, she sighed and stood up, heading for the kitchen.


    Lori wondered herself where Mikon was. They were supposed to play a game, weren''t they?


    When Riz came back, however, she was carrying three bowls rather than two. Lori chose to refrain from commenting as she picked one of the bowls and pulled it towards herself. Stirring with her spoon, she began to eat, filling her stomach after a hard day''s work and wishing they had some spices to add flavor. Or just salt. Salt would have been nice. Riz, for her part, looked around one last time before shrugging and taking a bowl herself.


    The two were already eating when Mikon finally arrived, carrying a tray in her hands, on which was a wooden box. "Hello Riz," she said cheerfully, completely ignoring Lori beyond a brief glance at the sunk board. "I have that thing you asked me to get from the carpenters, since they finally finished with it."


    Riz stared blankly at her for a moment. "Oh, yes, yes, the uh¡­thing I asked you to get."


    Mikon nodded. "Shall I present it to her Bindership now?"


    Riz looked towards Lori, who wore a blank face. "Fine," Lori said, waving a negligent hand in assent.


    The weaver put down the tray on the table. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a game board. The surface had a dark gloss as if burned, with recessed lines of paler wood. On one side was a grid of fifteen by fifteen squares, the size of a standard lima board. There were other boards, of course. Children and beginners liked to play on a thirteen or nine square grid, since it needed fewer pieces and the game went faster. Seventeen by seventeen square grids were used by people who wanted to show off how good they were. There were also nineteen by nineteen square boards, though in her experience those were usually used by old people who had a lot of time on their hands or young masochists.


    The box was made of a similar wood, its surface also darkened. Lori peered into it as Mikon removed the lid on the box. It was made with interlocking wooden panels that would probably come apart if it was hit too hard, and divided into two halves. One side was large and empty. In the other were round wooden playing pieces, one group dark, the other pale. Lori picked up one piece. Inscribed on it was a simple carving depicting a chatrang Horotract piece, an hourglass inside a cube.


    "Rian said you''d have to make the lima pieces yourself, because there were too many pieces to ask the carpenter to make them," Mikon said. "At least, that''s what the carpenters told me. But there''s a complete set of chatrang pieces. Two sets of a Binder, a core, a lord and lady, a Whisperer, Deadspeaker, Mentalist and Horotract, and eight militia."


    Lori sighed. "That man¡­ Even when he''s not around, he finds a way to make work for me to do." She glanced at the empty space in the box. It might probably be big enough to fit in all the pieces one would need to play on a fifteen by fifteen board, as long as Lori didn''t make them too thick.


    Well, she''d need to make all the pieces if she intended to beat Rian when he got back.


    Sighing, Lori pushed the new game board and the box aside for now and went back to her dinner. Mikon sat down next to Riz, looking pleasantly surprised there''d been a bowl waiting for her as Lori moved the sunk board to the middle of the table. The weaver had lost last time, Lori remembered that much, so the first move was hers. Mikon glanced at the board thoughtfully as she ate her first spoonful, before reaching over and making her move. Then she stared at Lori intently.


    Lori studied the board, eating as she did so, and made her own move before finally fixing her gaze on the weaver. "What?"


    "Could we try playing chatrang after this game?" Mikon said.


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Do you even know how to play?"


    "A little? I''ve watched people play it before¡­"


    "So you don''t actually know how to play."


    "¡­no¡­" Mikon said with an easy smile and a shrug.


    A thought occurred to Lori, and she frowned. "Did Rian put you up to this?"


    Mikon shook her head. "No, your Bindership. I just thought you''d like someone to practice against before Rian got back."


    Loi considered that. "Learn how to play and we''ll see," Lori said. "For now, it''s your turn."


    Mikon nodded, eating a little as she looked at the board and then made her moved, scooping up the stones from one of the bowls on the game board and dropping them spinwise one at a time into the other bowls. She finished her moved, before nodding in satisfaction. Then she turned and looked imploringly at Riz.


    Riz, who had been minding her own business, took a while to realize she was being stared at. She paused and glanced sideways at the other woman. "What?"


    "Riz, can you teach me how to play chatrang?" Mikon said.


    Lori had to wonder if Mikon actually wanted to learn how to play or she was just reusing the same method of flirting she''d used on Rian. But then, the woman did seem to actually enjoy their games¡­ and Lori was sure the other woman wasn''t doing it to flirt with her.


    Mostly sure.


    Fairly sure.


    Reasonably sure.


    ¡­


    Lori decided that it wasn''t her problem.


    Continuing to eat her dinner, Lori made her move, falling to the familiar rhythm of eating and playing as Mikon tried to convince Riz to teach her how to play chatrang.


    Sadly, Lori had to retire after the one game. She still had laundry to do, after all.

 137 - Its Just Not The Same

    Lori woke with the satisfaction of knowing all her laundry was done, her clothes all washed and folded away save for the sock that had a hole in it and its pair. People said it didn''t matter, but socks came in pairs, and the rainbowed pairs mattered!


    "Do you know how to sew a sock?" Lori asked over breakfast as they ate, finishing her move on the sunk board.


    For some reason, Riz glanced sideways at Mikon. "Do you mean making a whole sock or just fixing holes?" her temporary Rian said.


    "The first, but if you can do the second that would be nice too," Lori said.


    Mikon turned to look directly at Riz. "Unfortunately, knitting a sock isn''t that easy," she said. "You can make it out of fabric too, but it doesn''t fit as well, and isn''t as comfortable."


    "What she said," Riz said without preamble. She frowned and sighed. "Rian used to sew the holes in your socks, didn''t he?"


    "One of his duties, yes," Lori nodded.


    Riz made a face that even Lori had no trouble interpreting, clearly trying to think of a way to get out of it.


    Mikon rolled her eyes. "If you can''t do it, I could do it for you¡ª"


    "Please?" Riz said, not even giving her time to finish her sentence.


    "Fine, fine," Mikon said. "If her Bindership trusts me with her socks?"


    Lori pulled the socks out of the inside pocket of her coat. The leather raincoat would need to be treated soon, and she''d need have Riz get the materials she''d need for it. "Here," she said, putting them down on the table.


    "Both socks have holes?" Mikon said, picking them up and inspecting them. Lori had of course washed them first.


    "One of them does," Lori said. "The other is just so they stay together."


    Mikon at least had the sense to not to try and give the other sock back. "I''ll check them both, just in case. The other one might be wearing out too."


    Lori nodded. "That would be appreciated." She went back to eating as she waited for Mikon to set aside the socks and make her move.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The days wore on, and Lori got used to dealing with the demesne through her temporary Rian. So far, nothing had caught fire, there had been no violent altercations that Lori noticed, no one had died or gotten severely injured enough to need to go down to River''s Fork to ask Binder Shanalorre there for healing, and every few days the Um was closed down so that the people who''d used it that week assisted in cleaning it and airing out the rooms, lest it start to smell. Lori didn''t know how thorough the cleaning was, but since it was the people who were going to use the rooms who would be cleaning them, she supposed it was fairly self-regulating. If they didn''t like how the rooms smelled, this was their chance to do something about it. If they did a poor job, they had only themselves to blame, and others would probably be willing to help them in the blaming.


    She managed to finish the storage shed for the logs that would be curing over time, and once the wood they were using to grow the mushrooms were moved into the caves, she was able to use lightningwisps on them to increase the potential harvest. It was a skill she was still developing, since she had never worked in a mushroom farm before, but thankfully the ones in charge of the cave knew how to explain the procedure to a Whisperer, and were experienced enough to be able to judge if she was producing the proper output simply from the way the lightningwisps raised the hair on their arms. It was always good to be working with people who knew what they were doing.


    After the construction, she had to make a grinding wheel. Or at least, a stone wheel that could be used for grinding. The actual construction of the fittings to make it a wheel instead of a wheel-shaped rock would be up to someone else. Fortunately, they were next to a river, so there was some of the right kind of rock to be found¡­ eventually. The rock she was excavating in her Dungeon was too solid and uniform to be a proper grind stone, but she found some near where the seels were hunted that was the right kind, and she had to carefully shape it into a wheel-like shape and knock a hole through the middle. After that it was up to¡­ she wasn''t sure if the smiths or the carpenters did the next steps. No, wait, they had people with stonemason skills to get it properly round and centered, right¡­?


    Well, it was out of her hands, she''d already done most of the needed work on the rock itself. Someone else could worry about turning it into an actual tool for sharpening cutting implements. Lori went back to excavating what she intended to be the third level of her Dungeon. Mostly she was trying to get enough stone to make the alterations to the entryway of the Dungeon that would let them continue to breathe when a dragon came by without having to worry about abominations clogging the vents their air was entering through.


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    She intended the new level to be their in-Dungeon farm. Some place they could continue to grow food all year round, in controlled conditions and protected from dragons, voracious bugs and possibly sieges from invading rival demesne. Lori had even worked in some. Not in the Dungeon of Taniar Demesne itself, but in some of the commercial farms in the city. Mostly she had maintained the bindings of lightwisps to mimic sunlight, humidity, temperature and air circulation, since the spaces were completely enclosed.


    It had been one of the few jobs she''d taken on where she''d worked with other students who weren''t Whisperers. Horotracts had maintained the vista to allow the expanded space to allow for growing a large field''s worth of food in a three by three pace room inside a warehouse, and the alterations of gravity that allowed them to plant on the walls and ceiling as well, as well as the flow compression to allow for harvesting in less time. Deadspeakers had carefully accelerated the growth of the grains, monitored their condition and watched for disease, while more trained professionals had tended to increasing the yield.


    She hadn''t liked working in the commercial city farms. Even the ones who were supposedly accredited and inspected liked to cheat them by using creative record keeping to make them unofficially work more hours thanks to the Horotracts maintaining the vista.


    Now that she was a Dungeon Binder, she''d be able to leverage her experience to try and build her own. She still couldn''t use Horotracting or Deadspeaking, but for getting a farm started, Whispering would be more than enough.


    Lori looked down at the bare, cold stone floor of the third level, which looked like it could grow nothing but moss, and only if there happened to be a flood.


    Well, Whispering and lots and lots of dirt and soil. That would need to be carried manually, or on carts. Trying to move dirt with Whispering tended to leave you with rock.


    She''d have to speak to her temporary Rian about this, have her inform the farmers so they could prepare to do their part.


    ¡­


    Or wait until she got her actual Rian back and have him do it, he could probably do it better. Riz was becoming competent, but Lori didn''t feel all that confident about having the woman take on a large project on her own.


    Until then, Lori continued her excavation. There would always be a use for more space in a Dungeon. At the very least, all the industries in the level above¡ªthe carpenters, the ropers, the weavers and spinners¡ªcould be relocated down so that the second level could be dedicated to being an emergency shelter and public space. Or she could dedicate an area of the third level to more extensive cold food storage. She was running out of space in the first level for expanding the cold storage, unless she began to dig down as she did with the mushroom farm.


    Which wasn''t a bad idea, actually. After all, there was nothing underneath the cold rooms, and even if she kept to the same dimensions, she''d still be able to double their storage capacity¡­


    Still, despite the familiar work she was doing, it just wasn''t the same¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Great Binder? It''s time for dinner."


    Lori looked up from where she was¡­ well, basically staring at the walls to get them to become fluid and viscous as she bound them with earthwisps. Thankfully, Riz had only needed to be told to go look for Lori once. She''d made good progress on the third level-to-be, and already had a decent-sized space cleared. Unlike the second level, she was excavating more space between floor and ceiling. When she finally managed to learn how to make vistas with Horotracting, the dimensions wouldn''t really matter, since she''d be able to just change them, but for now, she wanted there to be enough space for full-grown crops while still having enough of a gap to bind light sources and room for air to circulate. As a result, the ceiling was five paces up, and the pillars and arches had to be thicker to carry the load properly. Or at least give her piece of mind as the person building them.


    At least she was getting a lot of stone out of it.


    "Understood," Lori said. She sighed, rotating her neck. She''d been looking everywhere but straight ahead all day, and her neck muscles ached as a result. "Any problems?"


    Riz paused, clearly thinking. That¡­ wasn''t a good sign. It meant there might be something, but she hadn''t thought of it until asked. "I¡­ don''t think so?"


    Lori gave her a piercing look. "Anything that might become problems?"


    "I''m¡­ trying to keep them from doing so?"


    Lori let her look go on a little longer, than grunted. "Well, I''ll leave you to deal with it." She glanced at the stone she''d excavated since the last she''d gone up, and decided to leave it for tomorrow. "Come on, let''s eat."


    The two of them walked up the stairs to the second level, which was mostly empty, the tools all put away. The only ones there were a pair of carpenters, who were talking about something in their alcove. From the gestures, they were talking about technique. Probably involving chisels. Lori ignored them, and after a glance they ignored her.


    Mikon was carrying three bowls to the table by the time the two of them got there. "Ah, there you are," the weaver said, smiling cheerfully. "Sit, eat, I''ll go get the water."


    Lori slid easily into her bench and looked between the bowls before picking one as Riz walked around the table to her side, watching after Mikon as she moved away. She began to eat as Riz sat down and slowly pulled one of the bowls towards her.


    The two ate in silence.


    "You realize she''s flirting with you, right?" Lori said, not looking up from her bowl. "It''s hardly subtle. In fact, she''s being much more blatant with you than she was with Rian."


    Riz''s voice stuttered slightly as she said, "I-I¡­ she¡­I-it''s not like I''m encouraging her!"


    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "Good, you know. I''ve already seen it happen the first time, involving much of the same people. It was funny then, to an extent, especially with Rian''s obliviousness. Seeing it happen again is just repetitive, annoying and hardly as entertaining. Just don''t let this interfere with your duties."


    She settled down to enjoy her meal as Riz stared at her.

 138 - Needing More Light And Heat

    Lori eventually remembered she had to make a storage room for the grain that would be harvested. It didn''t need to be a cold room, but it had to be some distance from the mushroom farm to prevent growths, and relatively dry. The latter, she could do with a binding, and with properly made containers, they''d be able to keep out bugs and the small beasts that Riz said were showing up more and more. Some of the children had taken to hunting the things with clubs and sticks, though they had to be careful since even small beasts could be ferocious when cornered. Thankfully, none of these small beasts seemed to be the sort that spat venom, and they made for surprisingly good eating, even if there was only enough meat on their bones to feed one person, maybe two if they ate lightly.


    Lori had also started finding a small, plucked and gutted beast at her door in the morning in place of a small seel, presumably because it was getting harder to find small seels. They were presumably fresh, since they only showed up after she went into her room to wash up before dinner. She quickly froze them in ice that she started keeping nearby for just that purpose.


    The smaller beasts were roasted separately, cut up, and added on top of a bowl of stew as a sort of accompaniment, since simply stewing them made them too dry and tough. Cooked right, however, they tasted delicious, and the stew was a good sauce to dip them in. If nothing else, it was a good supplement to their food supplies, thought Lori hoped they didn''t get much bigger. She didn''t feel comfortable walking around outside her Dungeon if there were large beasts walking around inside her demesne.


    "The hunters have caught a few and are trying to raise them for eggs," Riz reported. "Should I tell them to stop?"


    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "How are they keeping the beasts confined?"


    "They have a rope tied around the beasts'' neck," Riz said. "Well, not really a rope, it''s braided leather. They also clipped the beasts'' claws so they couldn''t use them to cut their way out, and they were planning to build a pen when I talked to them. They''ve only got three for now, but that might change soon."


    "Tell them those beasts are their responsibility," Lori said. "If the things become more trouble than they''re worth or grow taller than waist high, kill them for meat." At the moment, the small beasts barely reached up to an adult''s knees. Bigger than that was bigger than anything Lori wanted to be alive in her general vicinity.


    Riz nodded. "I''ll tell them. If it helps, they''re not sure they can do it on a first attempt, but figure getting eggs will be worth it."


    Lori nodded. "Good. How are the jars for the harvest?"


    "They''ve been made, and are waiting," Riz said. "We have fourteen jars with lids ready, but I''m having more made. Better too many than not enough, and we can always find a use for jars." She frowned. "Actually, my worry right now is keeping people from taking them to use for something else."


    "If that''s the case, increase the production of jars," Lori said. "Have the potter inform you of when the kiln will need to be fired and I''ll find time for it."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said. "I think that''s everything for now."


    Wordlessly, Mikon pushed three bowls of food in front of them. Lori reached over and picked the one with a piece of roasted beast thigh on top. Riz glanced at Mikon, and looked like she was about to say something when she shook her head and got a bowl for herself, leaving the last for the weaver. Lori almost rolled her eyes. Despite her claims of not encouraging the other woman, Riz seemed to have no trouble with taking advantage of Mikon''s willingness to do things without being asked. At least Lori had thanked her for sewing Lori''s sock. Mikon had done good work on the sock, and had even reinforced a patch on the other sock that had, in hindsight, seemed a bit thin.


    They ate as Lori moved the sunk board into place between her and the weaver, who made the first move. There was a tranquil silence as they enjoyed the meal and the game. Riz had visibly relaxed after she finished reporting to Lori, and was focusing completely on her food. Though Lori noticed she hadn''t put any more distance between her and Mikon than had been there before, unlike when Mikon had actually kissed her.


    When they finished the game¡ªMikon lost, but only by one stone this time, very close¡ªthe weaver looked at Lori intently, then nudged Riz with her elbow.


    Riz glanced sideways and sighed. "Mikon has something she''d like to ask you, Great Binder."


    Next to her, the pink-haired weaver smiled.


    Lori hummed in consideration, then turned to face Mikon directly. "Yes?"


    "Could we play chatrang later tonight, your Bindership?" she said. "I''ve been learning how to play from Riz, and I think I''m ready now."


    Lori hummed again, then turned to face her temporary Rian. "You''ve been teaching her?"


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    Riz shrugged. "I know how to play, I just don''t have a taste for it. Needs too much thinking and planning. I prefer pincer."


    Lori kept her opinion about adults who preferred to play pincer to herself. "Has she been losing?"


    "Nothing but. But she knows the rules and she no longer mixes up the Deadspeaker and the Whisperer."


    That got Mikon an incredulous look. "How do you confuse the Deadspeaker and the Whisperer?"


    "Well, they do things within three squares," Mikon said. "But I know them now. I don''t make mistakes about the moves anymore. "


    Lori considered. "All right, we''ll play later." Well, she supposed if she was going to play chatrang, it might as well be with a complete beginner.


    She was also mildly surprised that Riz was still teaching Mikon how to play, given how she''d had to admit that the weaver was, in fact, flirting with her. Or perhaps she just didn''t realize it was part of the flirting? Or was she just trying to deliberately ignore it¡ªas opposed to Rian only accidentally ignoring it out of obliviousness¡ªin an attempt to make Mikon lose interest, and perhaps take advantage of her attention with free favors? Rian at least made a point of asking them all not to do things for him that he could do himself. She was fairly sure the way Riz had begun taking the fact Mikon was bringing her food for granted counted as encouragement.


    Well, not that Lori cared, as long as it didn''t interfere with her temporary Rian''s duties.


    And she supposed this was a good opportunity to use the game board Rian had asked to be made for her. It was a very nice board, in terms of craftsmanship. She knew enough about the difficulties of using heat in carpentry to appreciate the skill and technique that had gone into the seemingly simple board and the storage box for the pieces. Her demesne''s carpenters were very skilled.


    But then, she supposed they''d have to be to make Rian''s ice boat idea a reality.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, Lori went to the hunter''s shed to see the captured beasts for herself. They were tied by their necks to a wooden pole that had been buried in the ground and seemed secure enough, but it still made her uneasy. Especially since she knew the children came by here to have the seels they caught gutted and skinned, when they still managed to catch one.


    The little beasts were a dark blue, or possibly green, with streaks of bright orange plumage around their neck and shoulders. They had red faces and a crest on their heads that faded to a sort of magenta partway up. Their tails were relatively short but thick and heavy, and covered with a thick brush of dark feathers. As she''d been told, the long curving blades on their feet and foreclaws had been clipped, and it looked like the remaining edges had been dulled in some way. That seemed both needful and terrifyingly dangerous to actually do.


    Lori had to resist the urge to kill them on sight. Months of having to be watchful for their large, predatory ilk had given her a healthy ingrained reaction to things of their general shape. The abrupt movements, the way they''d suddenly just stand still for seemingly no reason, the way they looked at you like they wanted to strip the flesh off your legs by jumping on you¡­


    ¡­and the things were staring at her. Lori backed away, keeping them in her sight, not trusting the braided leather cords around their necks to keep them bound. They still had their teeth, didn''t they? What was keeping them from chewing through the leather? It was just made of dried skin after all, it was practically made of food¡­


    She lost sight of them, and Lori let out a sigh of relief. Yes, those things seemed¡­ not nearly secure enough. If people insisted on keeping those things alive and not killing them for roasted tail meat, she''d have to talk to her temporary Rian about making sure they were put somewhere really secure, like a pit in the ground. She was even willing to dig the pit herself.


    Lori went back to the demesne to continue excavating the third level. She almost had enough to make the alterations to the front entryway of the Dungeon, but she wanted some more, just in case there was an emergency or if she needed more stone than she had estimated. The latter was very likely, projects always needed more resources than they initially seemed to.


    She had added a good amount to the stockpile by later afternoon, at which point she decided to stop early. For a moment, she just stood there, looking around her demesne. The houses, the buildings, the fields, the aqueducts bringing water down to the laundry area¡ªshe had altered them so that they drew their water from the water hub, with its distilled water, though the old arches remained since people had set up several benches in their shadow, and there was no harm leaving them up¡ªthe smoke coming up from the building that had been the old dining hall, the line into the Um¡­


    It was all very dark, she realized. All the houses were dark, and the lights came from the doors of the old shelter, the Um, the bath houses, the dining hall and the entrance to the Dungeon. Already, bonfires were being prepared in front of the baths, amidst the benches, sitting rocks and¡­ huh, there was a table there now, of a different style from the one in the dining hall. Where would they put that if it rained? Really, had they thought that one through?


    Still, Lori had to admit it was a bit too dark, especially between the houses. It was probably hard to navigate between, when people had to go back to their homes at night after dinner. Candles were limited, since they were a far lower priority than soap, and people couldn''t just leave fires burning in their house despite them being made of stone¡­


    Actually, she hadn''t really put any chimneys in the houses when she''d built them, had she? She''d put one in the shelter and one in the hospital, but not in the houses. She should¡­ probably fix that before winter. At least she had a lot of stone to do it with now.


    Well, she had time to fix one of those, at least. Sighing, Lori reached out, binding what few lightwisps were still in the sky and gathered them into her hands, imbuing them to glow. Their glow created more lightwisps, which she bound and gathered too, adding to the binding in her hands.


    Lori walked towards the houses, and began binding lightwisps to the corners of the stone structures. It was another thing she''d have to remember to maintain, at least until she got more wire made, but lit streets was a mark of civilization. And her demesne was going to be civilized, no matter how long it took.

 139 - Chatrang And A Petition

    "Erzebed, announce to everyone that I will be adding chimneys and fireplaces to everyone''s houses in preparation for winter," Lori said as she set up the chatrang board for her game with Mikon.


    "You will?" Riz exclaimed, clearly surprised.


    "Of course I will. Why wouldn''t I?"


    "You didn''t before?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow at her. "Was it needed before?"


    "It would have been nice," Mikon muttered into her bowl.


    "It would be nice to have Rian back, but we have to make do given the circumstances," Lori said. "They weren''t needed then, but they will be needed soon. Hence, I''m making them. Tell everyone that I will be adding chimneys to the houses in order of those closest to the Dungeon, moving away from the main road, on the wall of the house opposite the front door. It is recommend they move anything they don''t want disturbed away from that end and have someone waiting in the house to move anything else that needs to be moved. I''ll start after lunch tomorrow so they have time to prepare. And anyone who complains will have to build their own chimney."


    "I¡­ will tell them, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Good. Now, after breakfast tomorrow, take me to your house."


    Riz blinked. "Great Binder?"


    "You''re my temporary Rian right now, you get to have your chimney put in first. Rian''s house already has one."


    Riz continued to stare at her as Lori finished setting up the board. She considered the pieces. One set was made of pale wood, the other was heat-blackened wood. She turned around the board so that the black pieces were in front of Mikon. "You take the first move, Mikon," Lori said. After all, the woman was a beginner, and she did lose their last game, even if that game wasn''t chatrang.


    Chatrang, in her opinion, was a stupid game whose players had an overinflated sense of how smart one had to be to be good at it. She was always getting told that you had to think twenty moves ahead, which was something only a Mentalist was reasonably capable of. Still, if Mikon, a complete and utter beginner, wanted to play it, then who was Lori to deny her the feeling of losing at the game?


    Lori kept her hands on her bowl of food as Mikon looked over the pieces. Eight militia, two lords (or two ladies, or a lord and a lady, depending on preference), four wizards, a Binder, and a core. Victory was achieved by killing the enemy binder and getting your own Binder or one of your wizards to the enemy core. There was a version children played where you won by simply getting any piece to the core, but that was for children for a reason. For one, it was even more unrealistic that most stories about complete nobodies getting their hands on a buried core and somehow becoming a Dungeon Binder despite not being a wizard. At least those stories acknowledged that getting to a dungeon''s core was meaningless if its binder was still alive.


    Lori had once wondered why there was only one of every kind of wizard but two lords. Now she understood.


    Mikon began by moving her Horotract piece, moving it over and past the first line of militia. Besides the Binder, all other pieces couldn''t move past another piece blocking them. Most people usually moved one of the militia. Lori definitely did, preferring to keep her pieces close to her Binder and core, and moving your Horotract was supposed to be an aggressive opening. Personally, Lori thought if one wanted to be aggressive, moving the militia blocking the way of your Mentalist (even though a real Mentalist would just go over them) so they could attack head on was a better option. You''d lose your Mentalist immediately, but that was what your Deadspeaker was for¡­


    Lori moved a militia forward so she could get her Whisperer in front of her core sooner. A defensive Whisperer was simple and vulnerable to attack by a Mentalist or a Binder moving like a Mentalist, but it let her protect her core while freeing up her Binder to attack¡­


    She and Mikon played three games of chatrang, and thankfully the weaver didn''t confuse the Whisperer and the Deadspeaker. Riz stayed for all three games, sitting next to her student, watching and visibly resisting the urge to point at what piece Mikon should move. Thankfully, she didn''t actually interfere, but she clearly wanted to, especially when Mikon left her pieces open to attack.


    Lori won all the three games she played with Mikon that night, but each one was closer than she''d have liked. Each game also took far longer than a sunk game, and by the end of it Lori was sleepy and very much wanted to go to bed. Still, as she put the pieces back in the box and carried the game board and box back to her room while a sleepy Mikon begged an exasperated Riz for help to get back to her house, Lori had to admit that winning at a different game was just as enjoyable as winning at sunk.


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    She was climbing up to her room, her board game in her hands, when she paused as a thought occurred to her. She turned around and headed for the front of the Dungeon, and then had to take a moment as she realized that she had to open the door. Huh. She''d never seen the door closed before¡­


    Lori shook her head and opened the door, looking out. The bindings of lightwisps she''d put earlier illuminated the night, and the main street, the fronts of the houses, and some of the alleys between houses were now lit, if dimly. So she didn''t need to bind the lightwisps in her eyes to see Mikon and Riz walking together, the former walking with almost but not quite exaggerated sleepiness, holding the latter''s hand as if she needed to be guided. Either her temporary Rian wasn''t as resistant to the idea of having Mikon''s attention as she acted, or she wasn''t very experienced at flirting. All of Lori''s flirting experience was theoretical from watching her mothers flirting with each other regardless of whether she was present, and the times that they directly lectured her about it like the time they tried to teach her the best way to casually hold a girl''s hand, but it didn''t seem like Riz had even that much.


    Actually, from what Lori could recall, Riz hadn''t ever flirted with Rian the way Mikon had. No physical actions to draw his attention, like breathing in to emphasize her chest, no pressing against him suggestively¡­


    Lori clearly needed to sleep, she was thinking of stupid things. Yawning, she pulled the door closed again and headed up to her room to sleep.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Riz didn''t stand up to make a loud announcement like Rian would have. Instead, she arrived late to breakfast.


    "It''s done, Great Binder," Riz said as she finally sat down for breakfast. Lori and Mikon had already started with their food, and their first game of sunk had finished, with the second being set up. "People will be expecting you after lunch."


    Lori blinked. "They will?" she said. "How? You haven''t told them yet."


    "I told some people, and told them to tell other people," Riz said. "I started with my mother so that she could get the house ready, then moved on to the families who lived closest to the Dungeon." She sighed. "I''ll¡­ have to double check to make sure people got the message after I take you to our house, to make sure that people are ready for you, but they should know, so they only have themselves to blame for not listening to what they''re told."


    Lori nodded. On the one hand, she could recognize how her temporary Rian was making any difficulties someone else''s fault for not listening to what they were told. On the other hand¡­ Lori could respect that. "Excellent reasoning and priorities. I''ll have to see how long it takes me to finish adding a chimney to a house, but hopefully I will be finished within a week."


    She probably wouldn''t be finished within a week.


    "So, we''ll probably get a chimney in a few days," Mikon muttered.


    "If you''re cold, you could sleep in Rian''s house," Lori said as she reached out to make her move, scooping up stones and beginning to drop them spinwise. "You''re helping take care of it after all, and it''s not like he''s using it right now. I''m sure he wouldn''t mind if you got his fireplace a little dirty."


    Mikon sighed. "It''s just not the same. Besides, I wouldn''t feel safe sleeping alone."


    "A pity," Lori said blandly. "Perhaps you''ll get lucky and someone will offer to let you sleep with your head on their lap."


    The weaver paused a moment, giving Lori a look, but dropped the subject, making her move on the board.


    Lori turned back to Riz. "You''ll be coming with me as I make the chimneys."


    Riz paused in her eating. "I will?"


    "Of course. I need someone to make sure people don''t bother me with inanities and demands they have no right to make," Lori said.


    "Ah. Of course. I forgot. Very well, Great Binder," Riz said, nodding in understanding.


    "Good. Anything I should know about?"


    Riz hesitated. "I¡­ have a petition being raised to you that I doubt you will like."


    "It''s not for land again, is it?" Lori said with a scowl.


    "Uh¡­ technically?" Riz said. "People are asking for houses."


    "People already have houses," Lori pointed out.


    "Not¡­ everyone..." Riz said. "Every family has a house. However, the unmarried people and the three married couples who don''t have children or extended family are still living in the shelter. Ever since you made a house for Rian, they''ve been¡­ petitioning to have their own as well."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Has the shelter become more cramped somehow since every family in the demesne moved out? Do we have a Horotract in our midst making mischief?" There had better not be¡­


    "Not that I know of, Great Binder," Riz said. "But some people feel that if Rian has a house to himself, then they should get one too."


    Lori gave her a blank look. "They may have a house if they can build it themselves," Lori said.


    For some reason, Mikon and Riz glanced at each other. "That''s it?"


    "And the moment they decide to build it, they have to move out of the shelter."


    Riz and Mikon both nodded. "Ah."


    "And if I don''t like where they put their house or anything else about it, I''ll demolish it."


    Riz nodded again. "Ah. I will tell them that, Great Binder."


    "If they persist, add that they have to buy the land before they will be allowed to build their house."


    "I think all the rest before that will be enough to discourage them, Great Binder," Riz said, a small smirk on her lips.


    Lori tilted her head, considering. "Alternately, a minimum of six people can petition for a house as a group, on the understanding they will have to live together in that house."


    Riz tilted her head. "Can I wait until next week to tell them that, Great Binder?"


    "Take as long as you see fit," Lori agreed.


    Mikon chuckled quietly. "You''re getting better at this, Riz," she said. "That sounds like something Rian would have said."


    Lori would have to agree. Despite how coddling Rian could be, he could be surprisingly vindictive sometimes. "Don''t worry," Lori assured her. "While your competence has increased, this is still a temporary position."


    Riz sighed in relief. "Thank you, Great Binder!"


    The three of them focused on their breakfasts, and Lori and Mikon continued their game as the sounds of another morning in progress rang around them.

 140 - Rizs Chimney

    After breakfast and another quick game of sunk with Mikon, Lori set off towards the housing at the top of the rise where the people who were previously from River''s Fork lived, Riz in tow. In front of them, a mass of stone from the pile of excavated rock flowed, the binding of earthwisps Lori was actively controlling making it all move like a viscous, fluid mass. At this point, she didn''t even have to think of it beyond whether she would hit anything in front of her as they headed for her temporary Rian''s house to put in their first chimney.


    Around them, people were out and about, doing laundry, irrigating the crops, emptying the latrines, going outside of the demesne into the Iridescence to hunt some beasts for food or towards the river for seels, gathering wood, going across the river on Lori''s Ice Boat to harvest ropeweed and firewood, turning over the stems breaking down in the retting tank, spinning fibers into thread on distaffs in the shade of the aqueducts and generally being productive. One of the first generation houses Lori had built was having its roof worked on, some people carefully removing the roofing planks, while others cut and assembled a beam outside. A few went against the trend and were standing in line at the Um without shame, but that wasn''t Lori''s problem, distasteful as it was. And perhaps they had already finished their work for the day and had free time, in which case Lori reluctantly had to applaud their efficiency. Hopefully, some of the people whose homes she could visit after lunch to put in their chimney were preparing, otherwise she was inclined to just skip them.


    "This way, Great Binder," Riz said, leading her towards one of the segments about a third of the way along the row of houses. "Everything should be moved away from the back wall by now, and if it isn''t I can move it for you. I should let you know, we have a loft above the back wall. Um, if that will affect your building plans?"


    "It shouldn''t," Lori said. "I''ll be knocking a hole in the back for the chimney, so unless there''s anything behind your house, there should be no problems."


    Riz nodded, hastily moving forward to open the door for Lori. She stepped inside, leaving the pile of rock outside. The house inside was familiar in a general way, since she had built it. Six paces long and over four paces wide, with high walls to allow for a high ceiling, there was a wooden platform at the back on which various bedrolls, pillows blankets, and a few other things had been stored, leaving most of the floor clear. There was no kitchen or food preparation area, since everyone ate at the dining halls, and along the walls there were beds that could fold down, similar to what Rian had had installed in the Coldhold. The middle beds were high enough they could either be used as tables or, more likely, so that someone else sleeping beneath them could sit up without hitting their head. Possibly both.


    There were bags along one wall similar to what Lori had used to carry her own belongings when she had been traveling, and from the slightly disturbed way they were arranged, they were probably usually along the back wall, which was currently blank save for a bed folded against the wall.


    Riz glanced at her, the cause of her concern clear, but Lori waved her off. From that she could see, while the bed was slightly secured to the wall¡ªshe vaguely remembered softening the stone so the wood recessed into the wall¡ªbut from what she could see a chimney was unlikely to affect the stability of the bed. It would probably be too hot to sleep in comfortably with a fire in the fireplace, though.


    As Riz watched, Lori began her work, touching the wall where her hands curled in such a way the actual point of contact with the stone were her fingernails. She didn''t really need to anymore¡ªas a Dungeon Binder, the entire demesne acted as her body, letting her lay claim to all the wisps within it not within a living body¡ªbut she liked to keep in practice, in case she was forced to have to leave to do business in River''s Fork or something. She took a deep breath, her lungs filling with air and her being with magic, a familiar sensation from before she had become a Dungeon Binder. Then she channeled that magic through her bones and the earthwisps there, up her arms and then out through her nails into the stone they were touching. She bound the earthwisps at the point of contact, imbuing them with magic. Lori reinforced the stone, strengthening it so it''s more capable of supporting its own weight.


    Then she made a hole in the middle of the back wall under the folded bed. The stone flowed like a viscous liquid, leaving an opening about a pace wide and three-fourths of a pace high in the middle. Carefully, Lori shaped the upper part of the hole into an arch so that it could support the weight of the rest of the wall. It probably wasn''t necessary, since even without the reinforcement from the binding the wall was thick and strong, but she liked a stable structure.


    Humming as she fell into the familiar mindset of working, Lori knelt down in front of the hole and used the excess mass of stone to create a surface for the fireplace, making sure to recess it a little below the floor level of the house and depressing the surface slightly to create a lower point. She made sure the stone there was solid, with no bubbles of air so that nothing would explode if heated. Once she was satisfied with the surface, Lori pushed herself up to her feet. For a moment, she wished she knew enough Horotracting to allow her to walk through the hole in the wall to the other side, or perhaps Mentalism so she could just lift herself over the building for the same result.


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    Unfortunately, both still evaded her despite the fact that being a Dungeon Binder should have given her access to all forms of magic. Her attempts to teach herself at night were¡­ completely unsuccessful. She had done her best, performing basic breathing exercises to fill herself with magic and try to make herself aware of the vistas, thoughts and life that the other forms of magic manipulated, but she still only managed to perceive wisps.


    Lori put that out of her mind as she walked down the length of the row of houses so she could go around the end of it and gain access to the back, bringing the stone rolling along with her. There, she found the hole she had made and the little surface where the fire would burn while the fireplace was in use. Humming, Lori pulled stone from the pile with her and began building the back of the fireplace.


    She enclosed the back of the fireplace with stone, making sure the stone had no bubbles of air, then built the chimney vent upwards, a simple half circle curve that fused directly to the wall and narrowed above the opening inside the house. At the peak of the wall, she gave it a sharp, right angle turn to one side, and then opened a vent on the underside of the horizontal tube. She figured that would allow the smoke to vent out without any risk of water or snow getting in, though it probably wouldn''t stop bugs.


    Still, that wasn''t her problem.


    It was only as Lori finished that Riz was standing nearby, apparently having continued watching to see if Lori needed anything. Well, might as well have her be useful. "Erzebed, get some firewood, will you? We need to test the chimney."


    "Yes, Great Binder!"


    Riz went to the storage shed Lori had recently made to do just that, while Lori considered bringing the excess stone back down before shaking her head and deciding to just leave the stone there for when she had to do the rest of the houses. Though she did move it to one side so that it wasn''t completely blocking the way. She walked back around to the front of the row of houses to wait for Riz to come back with the wood, though she had to peek through the windows until she saw the fireplace since she hadn''t really been paying attention to which house they''d entered.


    Riz came back with a small armful of wood, which was a bit too much in Lori''s opinion. "That''s a bit too much," Lori commented. "We only need to see if the smoke goes up properly."


    "We can use the rest tonight," Riz said cheerfully.


    Lori tilted her head. "It''s not that cold."


    "You can never be too warm," Riz declared, still cheerful.


    Lori shook her head, then shrugged. "Well, put the wood in the fireplace, let''s see how well it works."


    Riz nodded happily, and led the way to the new fireplace, kneeling down in front of it and putting in some of the smaller piece of wood, stacking the rest next to the fireplace. Then Riz reached towards her belt, and Lori instinctively stepped back as Riz drew a belt knife and a small piece of rock¡ª


    "Erzebed, I''m a Dungeon Binder, I can start the fire myself," Lori said blandly.


    Riz paused. "Ah, right, of course Great Binder," she said, sounding slightly embarrassed at having forgotten. She got back to her feet, stepping to one side as if afraid of being set on fire herself.


    Lori rolled her eyes, then reached out through her core and bound the firewisps in the wood. There were always firewisps in everything, though there tended to be perceivably more in objects that were hotter than the Whisperer''s body. The wood was just hot enough from contact with Riz and from their brief exposure to sunlight for Lori to bind the firewisps in the wood, then gathered them together to one spot on the surface of one of the smaller pieces of wood in the pile, at the bottom, and imbued them to do the simplest thing one could do with firewisps, which was to make something hotter.


    At first, there was no change. That was perfectly understandable. Wood could take a surprising amount of heat without really showing any sign of it, but eventually, a stream of smoke began to rise, and then the point where Lori had gathered the firewisps burst into flame as enough of it reached the wood''s ignition temperature. After that it was just a matter of maintaining the heat and making sure the flame had air, but they quickly had a small fire, the flames full of firewisps and generating lightwisps in all directions.


    Lori hummed thoughtfully as the fire burned. "Does it seem like the smoke is all going up the chimney?" she asked her temporary Rian.


    Riz, who had been pacing back and forth in front of the fire, as well as moving in front and behind Lori, waved a hand negligently. "If you don''t start coughing immediately, then it''s a good chimney," she said. "What''s more important is how well it warms the room."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "It''s a fire, of course it''ll warm the room."


    "Yes, but it''s a question of how much of the room it warms," Riz said absently. She gestured. "How widely the heat spreads."


    "I''ll take your word for it," Lori said. "Well, come on."


    Riz blinked. "Great Binder?"


    "It not yet lunch, but you need to make sure that people have cleared the wall of their house I''ll be working on," Lori said. "And that they cleared the right wall. I wouldn''t put it past these idiots to try to get me to put the chimney in some other wall for their own inane reasons."


    "Ah¡­" Riz made a face. "Yes, I understand, Great Binder."


    "I''ll also need you with me when I''m making the chimneys," Lori continued.


    Riz opened her mouth. Paused. Visibly changed what she was about to say. "To keep people from talking to you, Great Binder?"


    "Yes," Lori said, filling the word with all the loathing at the thought she could muster.


    Riz nodded. "Ah. I see, Great Binder."


    "I doubt it, but you don''t have to as long as you do it," Lori said. "I''ll be in the third level excavating more stone. Come get me for lunch after you make sure people who need to be ready are ready."


    She went off to dig more stone.


    Behind her, she just barely heard Riz sigh. "Do this, we won''t tell you why, just do it," she heard her temporary Rian muttered. "I''m supposed to be an officer right now, why do I still feel like a glitter crawler?"

 141 - More Chimneys

    As Lori dug for stone in what would become the third level, she wondered if there would be time to convert it into a farm like she wanted before winter. Farming, from what she could tell, was mainly throwing seeds at the dirt, making sure they were watered, and keeping verminous little beasts from eating them. The farm being in the Dungeon protected the crops from the latter, and people would have plenty of time to tend to them over the winter. Not that tending to them ever seemed to take a lot of time.


    It would probably involve a lot of talking to people, though. Best to wait until Rian got back so he could deal with it. Competent as she was becoming, Riz was unlikely to be able to handle all the organization involved.


    Lori had to wonder what a glitter crawler was. Was it some kind of vulgarity? Hmm, she''d have to hear it used in more contexts, she didn''t want to get it wrong.


    She continued excavating, waiting for Riz come down and tell her it was time for lunch. By then, Lori had excavated a decent pile of stone, and the cleared space was just barely large enough for it to fit. Because of the height of the ceiling she was excavating, she was getting a lot of stone. Even with the chimneys she was planning to build, she should still have enough stone in the pile to make the changes to the front entryway of the Dungeon. Actually, if she didn''t build something that needed a lot of stone soon, she was going to have to stop digging in here, since she would have a significant surplus with nothing to use it on.


    ¡­


    Maybe she should make more homes¡­ ah, but only if those who wanted it applied as a group like she had told Riz. Having a single person having a house to themselves was far too excessive. Rian didn''t count. He was her lord, they were expected to be excessive. Perhaps some expansions though? Another floor could be easily done, and it was probably faster to disassemble a roof and reassemble it than it is to cut everything into shape in the first place¡­


    "Great Binder? Time to eat."


    Lori looked up to find Riz coming down the stairs. At least she still hadn''t begun asking Mikon to do this in her stead. "Understood." She glanced at the stone pile, but there was no need to bring it up now. She could just take it up after lunch. She walked toward her temporary Rian and began to climb up the stairs. "Are the houses ready for me to begin construction?"


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said, waiting for her to walk past before following. "And they''ve been told not to talk to you. I''ve checked myself, and the walls opposite the front door have been cleared of anything that would get in your way."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Hopefully, I can do three, maybe four before dinner. Five, if I''m lucky."


    "If I may ask, Great Binder¡­" Riz said hesitantly. "Why build it yourself? We have stonemasons."


    "Oh? Do we have a store of mortar somewhere I wasn''t aware of?"


    "The clay from the clay pit would do, Great Binder. Even mud would do. It will start hardening enough once people start lighting fires in them."


    "And how long will that take? A day? Two? For every house? No, much faster if I do it myself. It will let people to focus on gathering food for winter." Lori waved a dismissive hand. "If people want to work, have them do something about all the windows. Are the carpenters beginning to make shutters for all the houses to keep the warmth in, or are they waiting for me to tell them to start doing it?"


    "They''re already working on it, Great Binder." Riz coughed. "Rian told them to get started on it before he left."


    "And you didn''t mention it to me?"


    "It wasn''t a problem, Great Binder, and it didn''t need any decisions on your part yet. Rian specified they should find a way to affix the shutters without you needing to use magic, so you wouldn''t need to intervene."


    Lori considered that. "Fine, as long as they can manage it. I can always seal the windows later if needed."


    "If you say so, Great Binder."


    "Go get lunch, I''m going to my room."


    This time, Riz just nodded, heading for the kitchen while Lori went up to her room to get the sunk board. Routine, that was what she needed. Repetitive, mind-numbing routine so that she wouldn''t have to think, just perform the same actions over and over again. And building several chimneys was sure to let her do just that¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She won against Mikon again. If nothing else, she could tell she wasn''t winning the same way every time, or was being allowed to win. Mikon always made the best moves available to her when it was her turn, it was just that Lori was better at making moves that also benefited her not just on her next turn, but also on the turn after that, something that Mikon hadn''t seemed to grasp yet. She was, at best, only looking one turn ahead.


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    After lunch, Lori went to work, Riz in tow. The first house was standing with its door open, some woman standing there looking nervous, but Lori ignored her, just going in. Thankfully, the woman didn''t try to slow her down by greeting her or any such nonsense, just stepping out of her way with a jerky bow. The back wall was, as ordered, bare so Lori didn''t have to be distracted by anything. Lori knelt down and began construction, knocking a hole though the wall¡­


    As expected, with no one talking to her, building the chimneys was simple and repetitive. All the houses were built by her to the same dimensions, so there was no variation for her to adjust for. There was a lot of standing up and kneeling, which was a glittering pain on her knees. By the third house, she''d made a little stone stool that she had Riz carry around for her (since she''d gotten the shape exactly the way she wanted it, and making the stone flow to follow her would ruin it), which helped.


    She managed to make four chimneys that afternoon. Lori told Riz to have people light a fire in it that night, but to stay back in case any of the stones exploded. It shouldn''t, since she''d altered the stone so that there were no bubbles or cracks, but if it happened, she''d have to repair it. Oh, and possibly send anyone who''d been hurt to River''s Fork, provided they didn''t bleed to death on the spot.


    "Put that with the rock pile," Lori directed Riz as they approached the Dungeon. "I''ll be using it tomorrow."


    Riz sighed. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded, then paused. The door to Rian''s house was open, and she could see the outlines of two people inside, clearly cleaning hurriedly. Riz followed her gaze, putting down the stone stool.


    Inside the house, a dark outline looked up, paused. They raised a hand and waved at them. Riz waved back awkwardly. It was probably Mikon, since it was the taller of the two outlines in the house.


    "I, uh¡­ better help them," Riz said. "So the house is clean faster¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "It''s not like Rian is going to ask who''s been cleaning his house while he was gone. Honestly, given the history of how effective it was, you''re better off just kissing him as soon as you see him if you want his attention instead of volunteering. It''s never worked for Umu."


    Shaking her head, not bothering to listen to whatever reply or excuse Riz made, Lori went up to her room to take a quick bath before dinner.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Days passed, and Lori made new chimneys. She got better at it, going from being able to finish eight a day to twelve a day. Thankfully, Riz was able to ensure that no one tried to talk to her. It was a pleasant surprise, not having to deal with deviations of her plans from people not being ready or following the directions she''d provided. She''d almost expected at least one idiot not following orders and needing to be made an example of, but no such thing happened.


    She did see Umu though. Unfortunately, the blonde weaver had made enough of an impression that even after two weeks of not sitting in the same table as Lori, she still remembered the woman''s name, and seemed unlikely to forget any time soon. Umu was there waiting for them when Lori had to build the chimney for what was probably her family''s house. The weaver didn''t speak, didn''t make eye-contact with Lori, just bowed and stepped aside to let them in. She did stay in the house while they worked, but that wasn''t unusual.


    The woman hadn''t been back to the table since Rian left, which was understandable, since without Rian the weaver had no reason to be there. Lori fully expected her to come back when Rian did.


    The Dungeon Binder put the encounter out of her mind, and continued making chimneys.


    Slowly, more and more houses got chimneys. She never saw them in use during the day, but then, no one cooked at home. All the food was cooked in the kitchens of the dining halls. Still, she saw some people beginning to carry firewood out of the storage shed as the days passed. At night, when she passed the entrance of the Dungeon, she faintly saw smoke rising from the chimneys of some of the houses, the flickering firelight through some of the windows.


    Well, she supposed it was good that people were making sure their chimneys were working, but honestly, it wasn''t that cold. The night air, while cool, was still perfectly temperate.


    "People are taking a lot of firewood from storage now that they have chimneys," Riz said at dinner when Lori was halfway finished with putting in the chimneys. Next to her, Mikon was glaring thoughtfully at the chatrang board. "I don''t think they''re using them, it''s more likely people are getting a stockpile at home, but I''m having people concentrate on gathering more firewood for now."


    "Good," Lori said, nodding in approval. She''d also started to notice people were stockpiling firewood in their homes when she''d gone to put in the chimneys. "I''ll set up more storage once I finish with the chimneys."


    "May I suggest not putting the new firewood storage near the sawpit, Great Binder?" Riz said. "Put them near the houses. That way, come winter, people won''t have to walk as far. I''ll find people to keep the storage full of wood at all times."


    "I''ll leave that to you, then. Include firewood among the things for people to gather on the other shore, in addition to food and ropeweed."


    Riz pursed her lips, then said hesitantly, "I¡­ don''t think that''s the best use of time, Great Binder. We''re barely managing to get the ropeweed collected in a day across the river as it is."


    "Then just have them gather the wood in one spot and we''ll collect it later. It''s wood, it''s not like it''s going to fly away."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    Slowly, Mikon took one of her militia that Lori had taken out of play and placed it next to her Deadspeaker, reviving it and using it to block Lori''s Mentalist. The weaver leaned back, looking satisfied.


    Lori tapped her Whisperer, then took the militia out of play again since it was within her Whisperer''s range. Mikon groaned, muttering recriminations about how she should have seen that. She glared at the board as she was back in the same position as before.


    Humming pleasantly to herself, Lori ate her dinner, listening to the pleasant hum of the dining hall around her.

 142 - The Dock On The Other Side

    It took several days to put fireplaces and chimneys on every house in her demesne. At some point, Riz started carrying around a little wooden stool instead of a stone one, probably freshly made by the carpenters. Lori had to admit, it was more comfortable to sit on since the seat was wider. Eventually though, all the chimneys were complete, even with Lori needing to go back and make some of the early chimneys taller.


    When Lori finished the last chimney, she just stood back and looked over it all. No smoke rose from any of the chimneys save the ones she had just completed that day, to test if the chimney worked. She had made clear¡ªwell, had her temporary Rian make clear for her, but it was the same thing¡ªthat even if everyone had fireplaces now, meals would still be communal in the dining rooms, since that was more efficient all around, and it would hopefully prevent people from hoarding food and food going to waste from subpar storage facilities.


    To her surprise, most people seemed to not be testing her on this. At least, people were putting food into the stores, and only the kitchen workers were taking any out. And Lori turned a blind eye to the occasional small verminous beast¡ªwhat people had taken to calling chokers, from the sounds they made when hunted¡ªroasting in the bonfires outside of the bath houses and even in front of Rian''s house. The little things barely counted as a snack, especially when shared among so many, and it wasn''t like that they had found any more happyfruit.


    Ugh, she wanted a happyfruit. She wanted something sweet¡­


    "You and everyone else, Great Binder," Riz said over dinner, looking like she meant it. She''d taken to carrying around a plank of wood and a burnt stick, just like Rian had. Did. He was probably still carrying it around right then¡­ "The only sweet stuff left in the demesne that''s edible is honey, and that''s being stockpiled in case of injuries or midwinter, whichever comes first."


    Lori blinked at that, looking up from the chatrang board. "Why would¡­" She sighed as she realized. "Rian?"


    Riz nodded, a small, fond smile on her lips. "Rian. He said by the middle of winter, we''d all need it to feel better, and if we ate it before then, we''d regret it. And related to that¡­ the sweetbugkeepers say they need to move the sweetbugs somewhere indoors for winter soon, for safety''s sake, and so that if we have a winter dragon, they won''t have to try dragging the sweetbug''s hive through however much snow or mud we get."


    Lori considered that and nodded, glancing back toward the board, then moving her Horotract to block Mikon''s Mentalist. On the opposite side of the table, Mikon made a frustrated sound in her throat. Ah, the pleasure of knowing you''d made the move someone was hoping you wouldn''t. Had she gotten better at this game, or was Mikon just that bad? It was probably the latter, but it felt like the former¡­


    "I''ll build something," Lori said. "How big does it need to be?"


    "They didn''t say¡ª" Lori translated that to ''she didn''t ask'', "¡ªjust that it needed to be indoors and safe from dragons." Lori looked at her. Riz sighed. "I''ll ask for more details, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. Good. "Good. What else?"


    Riz checked her plank. "Uh¡­ oh, Clowee¡ªuh, the ferrywoman who operates the boat¡ª" Riz suddenly cut off, glancing at Lori. Mikon, who''d been about to make her move on the board, also paused, hand outstretched.


    "Yes? Go on. What about her?" Lori said.


    Riz and Mikon glanced at each other, confused. "Ah¡­ she''s asking if it''s possible for you to build a dock on the other side of the river, since it would make loading the boat¡­" Riz trailed off for a moment, eyeing Lori, before continuing, "¡­so that¡­ loading the ropeweed will be easier."


    Lori considered that, then nodded again. "Yes, I see her point. I''ll build it tomorrow. Tell her to expect me so she can bring me across." Lori hummed in thought. "After breakfast should do. Tell her."


    "Uh¡­ yes, Great Binder¡­"


    Lori nodded, then turned to Mikon. "You were going to move?"


    Mikon blinked. "I was¡­ Oh!" Mikon moved one of her lords. Unlike the militia, it could move two spaces instead of one. With her Mentalist blocked, the weaver seemed to be trying to either bait Lori or threaten her.


    Lori resisted the urge to shake her head. Mikon was too focused on a particular area of the board. She responded by moving her own Mentalist diagonally to threaten both Mikon''s Deadspeaker and her Whisperer.


    Mikon made another frustrated sound in her throat.


    Riz glanced sideways at her, then sighed and reached out to pat the weaver on the shoulder. "You can do it. Just¡­ remember to look at the whole board, all right?"


    Mikon turned to look at Riz imploringly.


    "No hints," Lori said flatly.


    "No hints, no hints," the temporary Rian said hastily. "Just¡­ giving general advice!"


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    Lori gave her a suspicious look.


    "I''ll just eat," Riz muttered, pulling her hand back and focusing on her bowl of food.


    Lori kept looking at her, then nodded and focused back on her game and her food. Mikon sighed but did the same as well. Or at least focused on the game again instead of flirting with Riz. Lori couldn''t be sure that was the weaver''s intention, but Riz had touched her, so it had probably been intended flirting¡­


    Well, not her problem. Lori just had to keep her Binder alive and keep other wizards away from her core to win.


    Which was exactly like her life right now, actually.


    Perhaps she hadn''t given chatrang enthusiasts enough credit. Now that she was a Dungeon Binder, a lot of its mechanics were making more sense¡­


    ¡­


    No, no, it was still overrated. Even ignoring the fact that players took turns and knew exactly where everyone''s pieces were, the fact that you couldn''t bribe any of your opponents'' pieces over to your side, use your Deadspeaker to secretly control one of your opponent''s pieces as an undead, or have to worry about one of your other wizards trying to kill you themselves and take your core as their own made the game extremely unrealistic. That wasn''t even getting into the fact that with a Horotract on both sides, the battlefield should be far more malleable¡­


    Still, it was fun to play, especially when she was winning.


    Well, only when she was winning¡­


    But she was winning right now, so she was going to enjoy it as long as she could!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, after breakfast, Lori went to build the dock on the other side of the river. In hindsight, she probably should have done that sooner. The river cut her demesne¡­ well, not exactly in half. From what she could tell through what she perceived of the wisps in her demesne, because of the river''s bends and curves the half of the demesne on the other side of the river was actually bigger, in terms of land area.


    There was a cleared space on the other side of the river, almost directly opposite her Dungeon, where the ropeweed and most anything else had been cut down, though there were browning stalks sticking out of the dirt. It was as good a place to put the dock as any.


    Lori started by compacting and leveling that path of dirt so that she''d have someplace to stand on and stack her stone. It didn''t need to be perfectly level, it just needed to be stable. Then she got to work excavating the river.


    This side of the river was about the same as the other side. There was a layer of cold silt with a few rocks mixed in, held down by a mix of roots and having been shaped by the river to provide the least resistance for the water after the silt settled. Lori ignored that, focusing on what was beneath, more solid. The bedrock.


    It wasn''t that deep, but it would certainly be time-consuming and difficult to reach if anyone tried to get at it without some kind of preparation. Still, as Dungeon Binder, it was simple for her to bind the earthwisps of the stone through her core and deform it to pull it up to the surface. She bound the bedrock over a long, wide area, sinking several spots so that the stone there could flow towards the spot she was raising up above the water.


    In stories, when Whisperers or Dungeon Binders made stone rise out of the ground to form walls or whole buildings, the stories never mentioned where they got the stone from. You couldn''t use Whispering to create stone, after all. At least, not in the same way that Whispering could create light, darkness, lightning and heat. The stone had to come from somewhere. Whenever Lori heard those stories¡ªat least, after she started learning how to Whisper¡ªshe always wondered if there was now an airless void underground just waiting to collapse into a pit. At least most history books would mention where the stone came from when Whisperers made walls. Usually, there was suddenly a dry moat on the other side, which made good tactical sense.


    The spot next to the riverbank that she''d compacted sank, the soft silt moving down with it as Lori excavated the new dock. It was, in her opinion, quite elegant. After all, the water next to the dock needed to be fairly deep so that the ice boat wouldn''t scrape along the bottom, and given the length and width of Lori''s Ice Boat (the second), that meant a reasonably large area had to be sunk, which just mean more rock for her to build the dock with.


    The dock itself couldn''t be a solid wall of rock blocking the river, or else the interruption of the current would cause an eddy where silt would quickly build up. She''d learned that the last time she''d made one. Instead, under the wide stone platform were wide openings under the surface that allowed the river to pass through, with stone arches to support the weight of the platform and send it down into the bedrock.


    It was a relatively simple but time consuming thing to build, since Lori couldn''t actually see what she was building. She had to rely on using her perceptions of waterwisps and earthwisps, comparing the shapes she felt to her perception of the shapes of the other structures she''d already built.


    This was so much harder without Rian. When they''d last built the dock, she had Rian to dive down into the water for her and even measure the exact curve of the arches under the water¡­


    Still, the dock was still sturdy for all that the understructure wasn''t as exact as she''d have wanted. It was solid under her feet when she stomped on it, with no concerning shifts or vibrations. She reluctantly declared the dock complete, and had to resist the urge to put a binding on the stone''s earthwisps to reinforce its structure as she made a hole for a wooden post that the boat could be tied to so it wouldn''t drift off.


    It took her all of that day to complete, stopping for lunch along the way, and she rode with everyone else on the Lori''s Ice Boat when it was time to eat, sitting alone in the rear corner of the boat opposite the ferrywoman operating the tiller and water jet built into it. No one sat next to her or tried to talk to her beyond bowing when they passed her.


    The ferrywoman took her back to the other side once she''d declared the dock finished at about midafternoon, along with a partial load of ropeweed and firewood. Lori acknowledged the bows of the people coming to unload the boat with a negligent wave, and was glad they knew better than to offer their hands when she stood to get off the boat.


    She found her footsteps taking her to Rian''s house. It stood empty, the door closed, the little binding of lightwisps glowing on the outside wall. The fire pit in front of it was clear of ashes, and someone had already stacked a few pieces of wood there for later that night.


    For a while, she stared at the empty house. Then she sighed, shook her head, and went to off to find something else to do until dinner. There was always something that needed to be done, at least¡­

 143 - Beginning Improved Defensive Measures

    "Erzebed," Lori said at dinner, "I will be making improvements to my Dungeon''s front entrance tomorrow. Inform everyone that after breakfast, no one is to pass through my Dungeon''s entrance, as I will be building and do not intend to be inconvenienced."


    Riz had the look of someone who wanted to groan and was trying very hard to hold it inside. "Tomorrow, Great Binder?"


    "I just said that, didn''t I?"


    Riz looked around and sighed, but didn''t argue. "Yes, Great Binder. I''ll let people know¡­"


    Mikon reached over to pat her shoulder. "Don''t worry, I''ll help you. If we work together, we can get the word out quickly."


    The temporary Rian sighed in relief. "Thanks," she said. "That would be a big help."


    The hand on the shoulder gave a brief, comforting squeeze. "Don''t worry about it," Mikon said, smiling gently. "Relax, finish your dinner. Why don''t you take a bath, that way you can relax and tell the women there. I''ll just finish my game with her Bindership. Unless there was anything else you needed to tell her Bindership, or something she needs you for?"


    Riz glanced at Lori, who waved a negligent hand in dismissal. "I''ll need you close by tomorrow to run errands or tell off people thinking they should be allowed to pass through, so make your arrangements." Lori tilted her head as a thought occurred to her. "Do you still manage the Um?"


    "Only when I have nothing else to do," Riz said. "So, not tonight."


    Lori nodded. "All right. Well, do as you''ve been told and finish your dinner. I have a game to win."


    Riz glanced down at the board. It wasn''t quite all of Lori''s pieces surrounding Mikon''s lone Binder and core¡ªthat was a product of satirical drawings and adults humiliating children¡ªbut Mikon was clearly going to lose soon. "Uh¡­"


    "No hints," Lori said sharply.


    Riz glanced at Mikon and gave a defeated shrug. "Good luck then," she said, giving the hand on her shoulder an awkward pat of consolation. She stood up, taking her bowl and eating quickly as she walked, moving to talk to various people.


    Lori ate her dinner at a more leisurely pace as she waited for Mikon to admit defeat. To her credit and Lori''s own enjoyment, Mikon kept at it, but it mainly resulted in Lori simply taking one of Mikon''s pieces almost every turn until the weaver finally had to admit defeat.


    "You seem to be progressing well with Erzebed," Lori said idly as the other woman symbolically handed her their core piece in surrender, her voice soft so as not to be heard among the other tables. "Try not to distract her too much. She''s competent, but she''s still not as good as Rian."


    "She''s trying," Mikon said mildly, voice equally soft.


    "Yes, she is," Lori nodded. "And just barely succeeding. I wonder how much of that is because of you?"


    A cheerful, unreadable smile answered her. "I''m just helping, your Bindership."


    Ugh. She and Rian were made for each other. "Hmm¡­" Lori fixed Mikon with an intent gaze. "Do not try any of that with me, understood?"


    The smile didn''t waver at all. "I understand, your Bindership."


    Lori gaze didn''t waver. "I mean it. Whatever nonsense you get up to, keep me out of it, understood?"


    The weaver blinked at the vehemence, then slowly nodded. "Understood, your Bindership."


    Lori eyed her suspiciously, but nodded. "Good." She began to put away the board and its pieces.


    Mikon continued to watch her. "Well¡­ good night, your Bindership. Shall we play again tomorrow?"


    "Tomorrow," Lori said absently, waving her off as she continued to put away the game board. She paused, staring down at the board, then up at Mikon suspiciously.


    "I''m not flirting with you," she said hastily. "It''s just¡­ it''s fun to play."


    "You keep losing," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, that''s frustrating¡­" Mikon sighed. "But until then, it''s fun. If you must find an ulterior motive, Rian likes it when he sees you playing with me."


    Lori sighed. "I will never understand that man."


    "I''m sure the feeling is mutual, your Bindership."


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    The next day, after breakfast, Lori got to work. Fortunately, Riz and Mikon had managed to notify everyone as she had ordered, and after a rush to go out the door¡ªor in the case of the weavers, ropers, carpenters and kitchen workers, go in¡ªpeople avoided the entrance to her Dungeon, leaving only Lori and Riz, who was standing with the little wooden stool next to her, not that Lori felt like she''d need it.


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    She and Rian had spoken about modifications that would allow fresh air to continue to circulate through her Dungeon even during a dragon while keeping dragonborn abominations out. It had been just after the last dragon had visited, and while not enough time had passed for another dragon to be due, it was enough time to start thinking of the next arrival.


    Lori hoped it didn''t come any time soon. She didn''t want to think of what could happen to the Coldhold if it encountered a dragon out in the open. She didn''t want to, but the thought stalked insidiously on the edges of her thoughts, like a beast waiting for fallen prey to bleed out.


    ¡­


    Lori began to work.


    Unfortunately, she couldn''t just start excavating the stone above the door to raise the height of the ceiling there to make room for an air vent to let more air into her Dungeon. For one thing, it was dangerously close to her room and her bathroom. And she was fairly sure she had a pipe passing through there, so she would have to build outwards to construct the modifications she wanted. No, despite what she wanted, she would have to build outward from the current entrance of her Dungeon, which was why she''d been excavating so much stone from what would become the third level. Right now she didn''t have nearly all the stone she needed, but she had enough for the basic structures, with the rest simply being protective mass against impacts from things falling from the sky.


    Lori started by marking the ground with lines to map out what she wanted to build, using darkwisps for the purpose so that the lines wouldn''t be disrupted. A hallway here, about as wide as the door they currently had so that they could reuse the door¡­ no, wait, wider, that was better¡­ a little side area here so she could build some stairs to reach the upper area with the opening where their air would be coming in through¡­ the door would be reinstalled here, so the opening to let in fresh air would be above it, one level up¡­ Walls along here, which would support a roof so that dragonborn abominations couldn''t come down from the top of the cliff and climb into the air intake¡­ and opening would be over here, no door, just an opening¡­ stone would fill the hallway to either side so that there would be a bulwark between the Dungeon and the dragon¡­


    The last line of darkwisps was laid out on the ground and she looked up to see the final dimensions she had come up with. The tube-like lines of darkness along the ground cast no shadows as she began to properly measure with her staff. All in all, the current front door would need to move three paces, though she could probably cut that down to two¡­ ah, and if she moved the alcove with the stairs to the other side of the entryway¡­ the intention had always been that the smithy would be inside the Dungeon, with an opening to vent out heat and smoke, so she could make a passageway towards the smithy past the stairs¡­


    She finished adding in the new lines and releasing the darkwisps on the ones that were no longer relevant and looked at the arrangement she''d made again as Riz sat down on the wooden stool in the shadow of the Dungeon, looking bored. All in all, it would extend the entrance of her Dungeon out by about five, six paces, which would cut into the open area they had in front of the Dungeon. She could cut it short, but if she did, the pit meant to deal with dragonborn abominations might not be as effective at deterring the things. Such a small pit would hardly inconvenience a beast, much less an abomination. Still, there would still be plenty of room, so they wouldn''t lose the open area entirely. And there was no reason why she couldn''t extend the pit past the opening¡­


    Lori paused and looked down, then groaned. If she did that, she''d be cutting through various pipes that carried water from the water hub shed to the baths. She''d have to sink to pipes down deeper, or at least divert them around where she planned to dig the pit¡­


    She sighed. Well, one thing at a time. For now, she''d build the walls, just to start getting some work done. Fortunately, the thickness of the walls wouldn''t matter because she wasn''t going to have space on both side, so they could be as thick as she felt like making. Lori walked toward the pile of excavated stone and bound the earthwisps there, pulling a third of the current mass out of the pile. The stone flowed like a thick paste as her binding made the stone more viscous and fluid, and she pulled the stone towards the line she had marked out for a wall.


    Lori soon lost herself in the familiar work of raising up a stone wall: clearing away the dirt, bonding it to the bedrock, making sure it rose up straight so all the weight was supported, and making sure the wall itself was properly vertical. She should probably make the ground stone too and not just packed dirt, so that it would be easier to make a defensive pit later, and so she could give it better drainage for when it started raining. Their experiences when they arrived showed them that this area experienced a lot of rain early in the year.


    Lori had managed almost the whole length of wall when Riz approached her. "Er, Great Binder? Can we start letting people into the Dungeon now? It''s coming on noon."


    It was? Surely not, it wasn''t that hot yet, and Lori had been standing out in the sun all morning. But when she looked, the sun was high up and the shadows were short. Huh¡­ "Fine, let everyone in," she said. "I''ll meet you at the table."


    Riz nodded, walking quickly towards her Dungeon''s door and swinging it open, gesturing for people to come in. Now that she was paying attention, Lori found she was a little sweaty. She should probably get her hat after lunch to protect her head from heatstroke¡­


    Shaking her head, Lori stepped back and inspected her wall. It stretched out the whole length of the line she had made, and rose to about chest height. She might be able to get it up to six or seven paces high by this afternoon, though it would need more mass behind it. And she supposed it would be shadier when she worked on it after lunch¡­


    For now though, it probably just looked like a strange wall in front of her Dungeon.


    Lori stood there, examining her wall but mostly waiting for people to stop crowding around the front of her dungeon. She wondered if she should make it smoother, make it harder for abominations to climb¡­ No, she could just coat it with wet ice when the time came, that should be enough¡­


    "Great Binder?"


    Lori glanced sideways at her temporary Rian, who was looking curiously at the wall. "What is it, Erzebed?"


    "What exactly are you building? N-not that I''m questioning you, it''s just I don''t know what it is¡­ "


    Lori hummed. "Rian and I once discussed improvements that could be made to let the Dungeon better survive against dragons." She patted the wall. "This is one of them."


    Riz frowned. "I¡­ see?"


    Lori sighed. "I''ll explain it to you at dinner. Perhaps you''ll be able to provide insight." She hadn''t the last time, but then Rian had been distracting her, and it hadn''t been her job to provide insight then.

 144 - To Keep Busy

    "¡ªand the smithy will be enclosed in the event of a dragon. Those are the improvements I''m making to the front of the Dungeon," Lori finished explaining. "Did you understand all that or do I have to repeat myself?" Riz had better be listening. Lori did not want to repeat herself, especially since she had explained so thoroughly.


    Riz¡ªand Mikon beside her, since Lori had been too busy explaining for them to have their usual game of sunk over lunch¡ªboth stared at the little stone model on the table. It wasn''t to scale, but it sufficed to show what she was building. There was the passage to the dungeon, the wall of which she had been building that morning; the door and the level above it, where the air would come in through; the side passage that would contain the stairs to the level above the door and a passage towards the smithy area; and the bit in front of the door to keep abominations out.


    "Ah¡­ I understand, Great Binder," Riz said slowly.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. "I will be building the rest of the passage this afternoon, and we will hopefully be able to move the doors after that."


    "If you say so, Great Binder. And¡­ this is the final design?"


    "Why wouldn''t it be?" Lori said as she bent over to finally put all her attention on her food.


    "Ah¡­ well, if you say so, Great Binder."


    Well, yes, Lori did say so.


    She heard Mikon sigh. "Riz," she heard the weaver say as she scooped some soft, fatty tail meat into her spoon, "if you have something to say, tell her Bindership. You''re supposed to be doing Rian''s job. Rian would say something."


    "He would," Lori confirmed, not looking up.


    "Come on, her Bindership won''t do anything to you," Mikon pressed. "Otherwise, who''d do things for her?"


    "You," Lori said, glancing up.


    The hand that had been patting¡ªno, squeezing and stroking, not just patting¡ªRiz''s shoulder paused. "Er, me, your Bindership?"


    "Yes."


    "Ah¡­ thank you for warning me, your Bindership¡­"


    Lori shrugged. "You already know how to do it anyway." She fixed Riz with a look. "What are you not saying? You don''t like the plan?"


    "No, no, it''s an excellent plan, Great Binder," Riz said hastily. "It''s just¡­ Do we really need to move the door? I mean¡­" Riz pointed at the model, "You could just keep the door where it is, and simply seal this opening when a dragon arrives, when you make the pit. Besides, if you move the door, chokers might get into the dungeon, since this part is open to the smithy."


    Lori blinked, then frowned. Oh. Her temporary Rian was right, wasn''t she? The little beasts hadn''t been a consideration when she made this plan. Still¡­


    "You''re right," she allowed. "Yes, best to leave the doors where they are." Well, she supposed she wouldn''t need to move it.


    "And if you''re going to be enclosing the smithy," Riz continued, "the smithy itself will need to be bigger. As it is now, if the smithy is enclosed, the smiths won''t have any room to work safely, even if you managed to pull out the bad air from the coals."


    Lori frowned. "Why would the smiths need to work? The smithy will only be enclosed in the event of a dragon."


    "I don''t know, Great Binder. But if you need them to make anything, it will be very difficult for them to."


    Lori stared at her. "I suppose that''s a point¡­" She shook her head. "I''ll consider it. Make sure to remind everyone that I''m still working on the entrance and need them to keep staying away from the doors."


    Riz nodded as Mikon sighed next to her. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori went back to her food, her mind already on the changes she''d have to make. Well, it was no problem, she hadn''t been looking forward to moving the doors anyway¡­


    "There, see?" she heard Mikon say. Some movement in her peripheral vision allowed her to imagine the hand on Riz''s shoulder. "She didn''t do anything to you."


    A sigh as Lori chewed. "No, she didn''t¡­" she heard. "¡­thanks¡­"


    She heard patting. "Any time."


    They ate in silence for a moment. Then another sigh.


    "Great Binder¡­" Lori glanced up, wondering what her temporary Rian wanted now. "Do the doors really need to be closed?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori continued building after lunch. The doors were open, and Riz had the duty of keeping people away from Lori and what she was building. Well, at least her temporary Rian wasn''t just sitting around and doing nothing. That had been mildly annoying to see while Lori had been working.


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    She continued work on the wall, raising it up higher and higher using stone from the pile. The higher parts weren''t very flat and vertical, but it wasn''t enough to structurally compromise the wall, and the walls would be arch-supported before it became load bearing, so it wasn''t a risk. The wall rose over the afternoon, and it was more or less completed by the time she stopped for dinner. She considered it a day well spent as she stood back and viewed the wall from the side. Well, straight and flat enough, and it was fused to the bedrock, so the minor imperfections wouldn''t be enough to make it fall over.


    It had taken a lot of stone, but not so much that Lori would need to resume excavating the third level for more stone before she finished. Tomorrow she''d be able to make the opposite wall, then she''d construct the raised level for the air intake. It wouldn''t be needed now, so at best it would just look like a strange balcony over the demesne''s front entrance, but she''d be able to start adding stone to the outside for a more permanent protective bulwark against dragons.


    All in all, she''d done a good day''s work, and tomorrow she''d have another day''s work ahead of her, and the day after that as well. Plenty of time for her to find more work to do, or for Riz to bring new work to her attention. If she was lucky, she wouldn''t have to think about Rian being gone at all beyond the part of the morning she spent imbuing the bindings on the Coldhold¡­


    For a moment, she panicked as she wondered whether she''d remembered do that today, closing her eyes and going over the distant-feeling bindings of her blood that existed outside of the demesne, before she sighed in relief as she realized they were properly imbued. She imbued them more anyway, even the blocks of ice for preserving food. There¡­ seemed to be one less of those than she could remember from last time, so Rian had properly chipped off the blood and passed it through the evaporator. They''d still had a lot left¡­


    "Great Binder?"


    Lori''s eyes blinked open, and realized she''d started leaning on the wall at some point. She focused her gaze on her tem¡ªon Riz. "What?" she said sharply.


    Riz winced, but held her ground. "It''s time to eat," she said. "You still have some time to refresh yourself."


    Lori stared blankly at the woman, then looked around. The sun was low and orange, the lightwisps she''d bound to the outside of buildings starting to visibly glow as the area slowly darkened in twilight. "Yes. Fine." She stood up straight, running her hands through her hair. It was getting a little long again. She''d have to borrow the scissors from the doctors¡­ "Thank you," she said curtly, turning and heading towards the Dungeon.


    Her temporary¡­ assistant fell into step beside her. "Great Binder¡­" Riz said hesitantly, then lowered her voice. "Are you all right?"


    Lori didn''t bother to look at her. "I''m fine," she said flatly, stepping into her Dungeon and turning to climb the stairs to her rooms. She was halfway up and binding the stones that barred to way up so she could pass through before she realized Riz was following her. She turned and frowned down at her. "What?"


    "It''s just¡­ you were standing there with your eyes closed for a while, but you didn''t look like you were sleeping," Riz said. "Rian never mentioned anything about that. I was wondering if it was something I should be concerned about."


    "There''s no cause for concern. I''m fine," Lori repeated. "Now stop following me, I''m about to seal off the stairs."


    Riz stayed where she was as Lori moved the stone back into place, climbing back up to her room alone.


    Once she was inside, Lori sat down heavily on her bed, her posterior coming to rest on the wooden frame rather than the spun cords that wove through the otherwise empty space in the middle. Her head drooped down and fell into her hands. For a long time, she just sat there, staring at the stone floor and concentrating on her breathing. Eventually, she slipped into the familiar breathing exercise for taking in magic that every wizard is taught, and she let the almost instinctive movements calm her.


    "Stupid Rian," she muttered. "Get back here already¡­"


    She sighed, then pushed herself back up to her feet. Dinner. She just had to eat dinner. She''d already been here for some time, so she''d take a bath later¡­


    Lori went down to her Dungeon''s dining hall to find dinner about to start, with people lining up to get food. It was far harder to navigate between the tables with them so occupied with people, but she managed it, skirting around the edges of the room so that there were only a few tables in her way.


    Her table had the expected two people sitting there. Riz and Mikon were just sitting down next to each other on the bench, the former carrying three bowls of food, the latter three cups and a pitcher of water. Lori sat down on her bench quietly and pulled one of the bowls towards her. She started to eat, focusing on her food.


    "Great Binder, the farmers say we need to harvest soon. In the next three to five days, they say. The grains are almost ready, they said," Riz said.


    With an effort, Lori tore herself away from the obscured depths of her bowl. "What?"


    Riz hesitated. "Ah, I said that we need to harvest soon, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded in acknowledgement, then shook her head to clear it. Right, work. She had work to do. Responsibilities. Something to keep her occupied. "Have you made the arrangements?"


    "Yes, Great Binder, people are ready to help with the harvest as soon as we know what it is," Riz said. "The sickles have been sharpened and are ready to use, though I''m told we''ll need more next year if we''re going to bring in a bigger harvest in a timely manner."


    Another nod. "Good. Then take care of it. I''ll have things to do, and there doesn''t seem to be anything I''m needed for." She''d already made the storage for it some days ago, after all. Lori bent back down towards her food. "Anything else?"


    Quiet, murmurs, and then a sigh. "Uh, will you be playing chatrang tonight?" Riz sounded embarrassed as she said that.


    Lori paused again, then glanced up. Riz looked like she''d just sighed, while next to her, Mikon was studiously pouring herself a cup of water. The weaver raised the cup to her lips and drank.


    "Not tonight," Lori said. "I don''t feel like it."


    Riz blinked, and she and Mikon exchanged looks.


    Lori was suddenly struck very strongly by the memories of her mothers doing that far too many times during dinner. That same confused, unsure look, one that usually firmed before one of them suggested a terrible idea and Lori was forced to go along with it because they insisted¡­


    Riz opened her mouth, and Lori already felt herself getting ready to stop, a remembered anger building up in her chest¡­


    "All right, Great Binder," she said, and Lori''s anger suddenly stumbled, tripping in confusion. Riz continued, no longer looking at her, but at the woman next to her. "Just asking." Her gaze was more¡­ emphatic.


    Mikon sighed, and Lori''s remembered, imagined anger disappeared, and she wasn''t in front of two women raising her, just two women who sat across from her at meal times. Riz was focusing on her food, apparently having nothing more to say, and Mikon looked¡­ disappointed? Like¡­ she''d actually been looking forward to playing¡­


    "Just one game," Lori found herself saying. "After dinner."


    Both women looked up, one confused, the other hopeful.


    But Lori was going back to eating. Eating was something to do¡­ and after eating, going up to get her board was something to do¡­ and after that, setting up a game and beating Mikon was something to do¡­


    Around her, the sounds of the dining hall blending together were a familiar murmur. If she didn''t look at who was in front of her, everything almost seemed normal¡­

 2022 Anniversary Special: Riz And Mikon In Bed

    It was well after dinner and even the line of hopefuls at the Um had long dispersed, deciding they''d rather have sleep than sex. Riz had checked every room, having grown inured to the musky smells the people who used them left behind, to make sure no one was sleeping there overnight and leaving the doors open to air out. Tomorrow was cleaning day at least, and already she had a list of people to go press into carrying the beds out into the sun and scrubbing the floors so that it didn''t stink. Everyone knew the Great Binder''s conditions, but everyone always complained, as if she or the others who managed the Um didn''t all take note of who went in for exactly this purpose.


    Riz was putting away the waterclocks and catch jars for them into the shelf under the front table, throwing the water outside and trying not to think about what state people''s hands might have been in when they''d touched the things when Mikon knocked on the front doors, looking freshly bathed, her hair a little damp and holding the small bucket that contained her soap, her scrubbing rock and her towel. "Tah," Mikon greeted her. "I saw the lights on. Are you done?"


    "Almost," Riz grunted, putting the last of the catch jars under the table. Thankfully, none of the jars or clocks were cracked that day. Every day she thought of asking Gunvi to make one or two spares, and every day she just didn¡¯t seem to have the time. There simply weren''t enough hours for all the things she had to do. "There, all done."


    They stepped outside and Riz closed the doors and shut it with a simple bar. Light shone from under the door, the Um''s lights continuing to burn at all hours of day or night thanks to the Great Binder''s power. The bar on the door wasn''t really meant to keep people out, only to mark that the Um was closed, and to perhaps keep out bugs and chokers from nesting.


    "You sure you don''t want to take a bath?" Mikon asked as Riz slid the bar in place. "I can keep you company."


    Riz tried to ignore how her sides itched. "I''ll take a bath tomorrow," she said tiredly. "It''ll wake me up. Now come on before you start complaining about how cold it is." Really, it was a perfectly warm for fall, but Mikon wasn''t the only one who acted like it was the core of winter. The woman was always taking late baths, then asking Riz to walk her home because she was afraid of running into a choker in the dark. Tonight was another one of them. Really, the woman could be so helpless sometimes¡­


    "You sound grumpy," Mikon said, holding her bucket in one hand as she wrapped her other arm over Riz''s shoulders, sighing as she pressed herself again Riz''s side. "Ah, so warm¡­ another long day?"


    Riz sighed, which was answer enough. Some days working for the Great Binder were worse than others, and today had been one of the more frustrating ones. There were people asking her to ask the Binder for land, for lights inside their houses, for magic to warm their houses, probably for beds stuffed full of beads if they thought they could get away with it. Well, probably not that last, they had more sense than that, but it seemed like it sometimes. As if this wasn''t already more than what they had left behind in their old lives. "Maybe the Great Binder has a point," she said tiredly. "I don''t want to talk to people anymore! They''re idiots!"


    "Is this about what I heard Etwart was saying about how the harvest should belong only to the farmers who''ve been tending to the crops?" Mikon said.


    Riz let out a frustrated groan in reply.


    "Ah¡­" the weaver said in sympathy, nodding and giving her a reassuring squeeze on her shoulder. She leaned towards Riz. "Tell you what. It''s late and everyone''s probably already asleep. Why don''t we go to Rian''s house and use his bed¡­?"


    Riz flushed, both at the thought and the feeling of breath on her ear from Mikon''s whisper. "I thought you wanted to get home?"


    "Consider this me paying you back for walking me home," the breath tickled Riz''s ear again. "Come on, just a little while. You know it makes you feel better¡­"


    Riz was suddenly very aware of how much she itched. "No, no, it''s fine. You just took a bath, after all, and I haven''t. I wouldn''t want to get my sweat and dirt on you¡­ "


    "I can take getting a little dirty," that breath tickled. "Besides, I can''t leave you like this. You''ll probably stay up too annoyed to sleep and not get enough rest. Let me get you to relax. It''s the least I can do¡­ "


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    Riz shuddered. "Well¡­ all right¡­ but just a quick one¡­"


    Mikon smiled. "We can be as quick as you want¡­ "


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They didn''t have a bedroll, so the bed was hard and stiff on her back and legs. Yet her head rested on a soft, warm cushion of guilty pleasures as Mikon''s hand stroked her gently, and Riz released her frustrations.


    Quietly. It was still the middle of the night, after all, and they didn''t want to be caught¡­


    "¡ªso the fool was suggesting that they divide the harvest among themselves, then sell it to the demesne at the price they choose," Riz just barely managed not to rant. "As if they weren''t going to ask everyone for help to reap the harvest for them, or be storing the vigas in a shed Binder Lori made, in jars that belong to the demesne! No, just because they put the stupid things on the ground and kept watering them¡ªusing water Binder Lori put there for the purpose!¡ªhe thinks that they¡ª!"


    "Calm, calm," Mikon urged her, gently stroking Riz''s hair back from her face. Riz strangled the rant that wanted to get out, closing her eyes and focusing on the warmth of the weaver''s thigh under her head. "Let it out gently."


    Riz took a deep breath, sighed it out. "It''s just¡­ so frustrating. How did Rian deal with these idiots?"


    "Very well, I think," Mikon said, and Riz had to think a moment before figuring out what the woman meant. She focused her eyes to give the weaver a flat look. After months of sitting opposite Binder Lori, she''d learned how to make her looks very flat. Mikon shrugged shamelessly. "Well, he did deal with it very well. What happened next?"


    Riz grunted, closing her eyes as Mikon continued stroking her hair, her other hand on Riz''s shoulder. "Well, he started talking about trading his grain to the demesne for land, and having the Binder make him a bigger house that he owned and not his daughter. I told him if he felt like that, then he should tell the Great Binder himself. The little slug started insisting that I do it, because that was I was here for. Too much of a coward to make his stupid demands to Binder Lori''s face himself."


    "So not only did he have a stupid idea, he knew it was stupid enough that he didn''t want to be in front of Binder Lori when she found out?" Mikon said. "So you punched him?"


    Riz sighed, closing her eyes as she recalled. "Oooh, yes¡­" Mikon''s hand that was on her shoulder moved down and gently picked up her wrist, fingers gently stroking her knuckles. "Other hand." Her right hand fell on her chest as Mikon picked up her left.


    "Did it hurt?" Mikon asked.


    "Eh, his face was soft, it was like punching a pillow," Riz said, closing her eyes. That was a lie. Punching the man''s face had hurt, mostly because she''d done it wrong. She was glad none of her friends had seen her throw that punch. It was embarrassing. "But aside from him, the other farmers were far more reasonable. So the demesne''s harvest isn''t going to be held hostage to try and blackmail Binder Lori." Riz snorted, closing her eyes and enjoying the feeling of the fingers stroking her hair. "Idiotic idea anyway¡­ but I still had to deal with it¡­" The bed was still hard and stiff under her, but the night air was pleasantly cool, and the fingers stroking her were relaxing. She could feel herself growing comfortably drowsy.


    "Feeling better?" Mikon said softly, rousing Riz before she crossed the line into sleep.


    "Hmm?"


    "You''re feeling better. Come on, get up so you can sleep in your own home."


    Riz groaned as she realized she had to move¡ªit was so comfortable! "Just a little longer¡­" she muttered, turning to lie down on her side. The hard planks of the bed pressed against her arm, waking her up just as she realized her face was now buried in Mikon''s stomach. Her nose was filled with the smell clinging to Mikon''s clothes, a thick, musky scent¡­


    She turned the other way, settling onto her back before Riz pushed herself upright, one hand on the wooden boards under her. The fingers stroking her retreated as she sat up, rolling her shoulders and straightening her back. In the dark of the house, with the only light coming from outside, she hoped Mikon didn''t see her blush.


    "What, do I still stink or something?" Mikon huffed.


    "No, no, you smell fine," Riz said hastily. "I just¡­ well, you''re right, we should go home now¡­"


    She hastily go to her feet, twisting her spine to soften it again after lying down on those boards. How had their Binder managed it? She''d been sleeping on that bed for months without a proper bedroll¡­


    Mikon held up her hands. "Pull me up," she demanded. "My legs are asleep."


    Riz sighed, and took hold of her hands, pulling her up. Mikon''s hands were warm and firm, with calluses on her fingers from her weaving. She got to her feet, then stumbled as the leg Riz had been lying on folded, and Riz had to catch her before she fell.


    "Oh¡­ thank you," Mikon said, her breath blowing on Riz''s ear as the weight of her arms settled on Riz''s shoulders. "I guess my leg is still asleep. Hold me a moment."


    "S-sure¡­" Riz said. She felt Mikon shifting in her arms as the weaver tested putting weight on her leg. This¡­ this was flirting, wasn''t it? Or did she really need help standing up? If their Binder could tell, shouldn''t Riz be able to?


    Eventually, Mikon gently pulled back, and Riz let her go as she turned and bent down to pick up her bucket from where she''d left it. "All right, I''m ready," the weaver said. "Take me home?"


    "R-right," Riz said. They stepped out of Rian''s house, Mikon closing the door behind them. The weaver put an arm around her shoulders once more, pulling her close for warmth again as they walked away from the empty house.

 145 - The Harvest

    The next day, the opposite wall went up. It was slightly faster since it was just slightly shorter than the first wall, since she''d need to make the side passage towards the smithy and stairs to the¡­ all right, it was basically a balcony. Since the opening of it didn''t lead directly to her Dungeon, it was currently a bit useless, but once a dragon arrived and she made some reconfigurations¡­


    Well, hopefully it would work.


    Admittedly, having two freestanding walls on either side of her Dungeon''s entrance did look a little strange. Thankfully, it didn''t change the amount of air being pulled into her Dungeon, though she had to move the kitchen''s exhaust outflow vent, since when she was finished, the current vent would be inside her Dungeon''s air circulation, which defeated the purpose of having an outflow vent.


    Building the balcony was a bit nerve-wracking. For one thing, she had to build it over the current entrance of the Dungeon, so this time she was very definite about there being no entry allowed in and out of her Dungeon while she was building. At first, she was concerned about supporting the balcony properly since, now that she looked at it, she wouldn''t be able to make supportive arches since the side passage meant there was a gap in the wall. She had to move the balcony two paces further down so that she had solid wall on their side to make supportive arches to bear the load of the balcony''s floor. After that, building the stairs to reach it was simple, though she had to remove a portion of wall she''d build already.


    The day after that was the harvest.


    There was an excitement in the air when she came down for breakfast. People seemed to be up much earlier than usual, and she''d almost have thought today had been declared a holiday¡­


    "No, I haven''t declared today a holiday, Great Binder," Riz said. In comparison to everyone else, she looked tired, as if she''d gotten up earlier and hadn''t wanted to. Mikon was off getting food for them. "Rian said not to have that until after the harvest was brought in and stored."


    He had? Oh right, Lori vaguely remembered telling him to tell Riz that¡­


    She sat down heavily, her mood heavier than it had been when she woke up. "What do I need to do?"


    Riz frowned, tilting her head to think about it. "I¡­ honestly can''t think of what might need your help, Great Binder. Maybe the drying, but¡ª" Riz suddenly groaned. "Glittering rainbows¡­ the chokers. The colors-tainted chokers¡­ I just realized. Great Binder, we will need your help. Normally, we''d leave in the vigas in the fields to dry in the sun, but with the chokers, and how it''s getting colder¡­ We''ll need your help to dry them. I''m not sure, I''ll have to talk to the farmers first, but it looks likely."


    "So thoughtful of you to give me time to prepare," Lori said blandly.


    "Ah, we don''t need you now, Great Binder," Riz said. "That step happens after we actually harvest the stalks. You''ll have time. Some of the vigas lodged, so we''ll have to do those by hand¡­ we''ll have to stick all the stems in the storage shed so they''ll dry without getting eaten by chokers or bugs¡­ " She exhaled heavily and stood up. "Excuse me Great Binder, I need to find a farmer and talk to them¡­ hopefully the winter crop will do better."


    Lori blinked in surprise. "Winter crop? We''re planting in winter? I thought it was too cold for that?"


    "It''s¡­ I''ll explain later, Great Binder," Riz said, sounding exasperated. "Why don''t you ask Mikon, she should know." She walked away, muttering to herself.


    Lori stared after her, then shook her head, sighing. Rian would have done it sooner¡­


    She sat back waiting. Eventually, Mikon appeared, carrying the bowls of food. She put down the bowls, looking around. "Riz?" she called, even if the woman in question was clearly not around. She didn''t look towards Lori.


    Sighing again, Lori reached for one of the bowls. Without looking at her, Mikon moved it away from her hand.


    Lori stared, then frowned and reached for another bowl.


    Mikon moved that away too.


    Lori''s frown deepened. "Mikon¡­" she ground out.


    "Oh, your Bindership! Do you know where Riz went off to?" Mikon said, finally looking at her with a cheerful, unreadable, and now very annoying smile.


    "She went to talk to some farmers," Lori said flatly. "She also said you could explain to me why we''d plant crops in winter. I thought it snowed in winter. Don''t the crops get buried?"


    "Yes, but that doesn''t really hurt it," Mikon said. "They just grow slowly under the snow until spring. And it makes them less likely to get eaten by bugs, beasts and slugs."


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    "How informative. Can I eat now?"


    "Of course, your Bindership. The kitchen is over there."


    Lori gave her a look that said she was not amused.


    Mikon smiled, then pushed all three bowls closer to her. Lori reached for one, and it wasn''t moved away from her. She still pulled it close before eating.


    The weaver looked around one more time and sighed, finally deciding to sit down. She pulled one of the other bowls toward her, took hold of the spoon and paused.


    Lori let her take a moment to take in the frozen bowl of stew that had been perfectly warm when it had been grabbed.


    They sat like that for a moment, Lori eating her nice, warm stew.


    "I''m¡­ sorry for teasing you, your Bindership?" Mikon said hesitantly. "Please forgive me?"


    Lori kept eating for a few moments more, then let the firewisps spread back across the weaver''s stew, bringing it up to as hot as her own meal.


    Mikon sighed in relief, but stirred her stew for a moment and tentatively tested it before she started eating.


    Lori, for her part, had always wanted to do that. Well, something like that. If she was being honest, what she''d always actually wanted was to make someone explode or at least set them on fire and hear their screams of pain as they burned to death¡­ but now that she actually had the personal power to actually do it, that seemed¡­ excessive. Besides, Mikon was¡­ she was¡­ well, not as annoying as other people.


    And more importantly, Lori was able to beat her at board games. That merited keeping her around.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori had never seen a harvest before. She had grown up in the central city of Taniar Demesne, right outside the Dungeon. While there had been work available to a student Whisperer in one of the city''s many farms, the work had been imbuing and maintaining bindings that allowed for farming indoors, not actually picking the food off the plants. She actually didn''t know who picked the food. For all she knew, it was done by some specially modified undead with multiple arms, or some sort of mechanism powered by bound tools.


    In her demesne, right after breakfast, it was done by a lot of people.


    It wasn''t everyone. The doctors and medics weren''t involved beyond a few of them standing nearby in case of injuries. The kitchen staff weren''t there, busy washing the detritus of breakfast and preparing for lunch. There were also those going outside the demesne to hunt beast, or catching seels at the river. And Lori, of course. After all, she was the Dungeon Binder. She didn''t have to do anything she didn''t want to.


    Also, she didn''t know how to do it.


    But most everyone else¡ªthe smiths, the carpenters, the loggers and sawyers and those who usually crossed the river to cut ropeweed¡ªwere at the fields behind the houses. The planted fields had grown slowly over the year, planted with wild vegetables they''d found and tubers and other plants and, eventually, grain. The grain had been partially-grown plants from River''s Fork that had survived the first dragon that had passed over it, and had been transported by the people who''d left that demesne and finally found their way to her own. There had been a lot of those plants, and while they had lost some when the second dragon of that year had passed over her demesne, it hadn''t been a significant fraction.


    Now, all those plants had matured enough to be harvested. They were low, thick-stemmed plants, visually significantly different from the crops Lori had seen in her student days, but that didn''t really mean much. Deadspeaking could be used to cause significant physical changes to organisms while they remained, technically speaking, the same plant. And she''d already seen that the late Binder Koshay had been quite ready, willing, able and experienced in using Deadspeaking to alter plants.


    Given these had initially been planted when he''d still been alive, she would not be surprised if he had Deadspoken these plants. It probably explained how they had been so hardy and survived such harsh treatment. If the seeds from this plant were planted, the resulting plant was unlikely to have the same appearance as its parent unless Binder Koshay had been very thorough in his Deadspeaking, but something like that took several successive generations of testing to ensure that the changes had stuck.


    Lori stood next to the third bath house as she watched people getting to work. Some people were using strangely-curved blades to cut bundles of grain near the base, but most were using more familiar belt knives to cut much smaller groupings of grain. The harvesters were moving in a way that seemed practiced. The stems were cut and then left behind, and other people would follow after to gather them into larger bundles, securing them what seemed to be cords made from ropeweed.


    She frowned as she saw children among those working in the fields, but they mostly seemed to be among those gathering or tying up the bundles. Those few she saw among those cutting were among the older ones, who even she was willing to admit were not quite children anymore. At the very least, none of them seemed to be complaining. On the contrary, they were among the most enthusiastic workers. The few whose expressions she could see worked with an almost exaggeratedly intent expression, taking the work before them very seriously. The brat was one of those, and she was also one who was using one of those curiously curved, hook-like blades.


    Lori found it¡­ something¡ªshe didn''t know if it was ironic or not¡ªthat the brat had not been allowed to use a knife to gut seels but had been given a substantially bigger blade for harvesting.


    The rate of the work was surprisingly intense. She''d have thought that people would move at the same pace they''d moved when she''d seen them cutting and gathering ropeweed, a methodical pace that had seemed like they were working fairly hard to her.


    The pace she saw now made that seem almost relaxed. People moved like they intended to harvest the whole field that day, or possibly even before lunch. The field wasn''t very big¡ªit had been originally the area that they had cut the trees from when they''d been making planks for the roofs of houses, benches and dining tables¡ªbut it was still substantial, and since it had been planted, the field had grown from more trees being cut down, with only isolated happyfruit trees that hadn''t been cut down because of their fruit.


    Honestly, it was tiring to simply look at, and Lori was just sitting and watching them go about it. And that was just their original field. It would probably be even more tiring to look at in the future, since they had more cleared land now.


    Still, it was a satisfying sight. And if all went well, she might finally get some more bread in the near future.


    Hmm, bread¡­


    Lori sat back on the stone block she''d raised up and watched, already thinking happy thoughts of basic baked foods.

 146 - The Best Kind Of Advice

    The harvest took two days. Despite the rapid, almost unreasonable pace, they didn''t finish on the first day. Lori had almost thought that Riz would ask her to bind lightwisps in the air so they could continue working in the dark, but that hadn''t happened. Instead, people started carrying the bundles off towards the storage shed she''d built, a stone structure in the same vein as the curing sheds that she had built against the side of the cliff face since she couldn''t safely build inside it. Looking at it now, she thought perhaps they''d need more space¡­


    Honestly, Lori felt tired just watching everyone work. They didn''t really stop for lunch. The hunting parties had come in with beast parts, and people started setting up fires to roast them. People would stop to get some food, and then quickly go back to the field to work. Fortunately, Riz remembered to bring her food, carrying a bowl of roasted meat to her¡­ and not giving her a spoon or fork to eat it with. At least eating it with her fingers wasn''t too difficult, using firewisps to keep from burning herself, though it did leave her hand oily. But the bath house was right there, and a little wood ash mixed into the oils on her fingers washed it out nicely.


    At dinner, the dining hall was subdued, with the sort of quiet Lori associated with the time just before the last exam of the week, before it was finally over and everyone could relax, as everyone resigned themselves to their fate. It wasn''t a perfect comparison, since there was no panicked studying or anyone coming down with hysterical screaming fits before a Deadspeaker either forcefully calmed them down or some Mentalist picked them up and tossed them away, hopefully on something soft, but it was close.


    The stew they had for dinner had a lot of roasted meat in it, likely what was left of the beasts from earlier, and Lori had to wonder if anything had made it into the cold rooms for long-term storage. Across the table from her, Mikon looked tired. Lori vaguely remembered seeing her on the field, tying up bundles of stalks. Next to her, Riz looked absolutely exhausted, barely opening her eyes and chewing with great effort, as if it was almost too much of a bother to move her jaw.


    "So," Lori said with only partially forced cheer. A part of her was taking perverse enjoyment in being the one to force herself on someone who obviously wanted to be left alone and just rest. "What happens next?"


    Riz slumped at her words, and she clearly forced herself to look up at Lori. Next to her, Mikon sighed and patted on the shoulder, giving her what was probably meant to be a reassuring squeeze. Lori had never really found those reassuring, herself. "What, Great Binder?" she said, her tone clearly wishing Lori would leave her alone.


    The perverse enjoyment was there however. It probably wasn''t fair to Riz, taking out on her all the times in her life Lori had just wanted to be left alone, except one of her mothers, some teacher, one of her mothers, some random busybody, one of her mothers, some classmate, one of her mothers, or both of her mothers had intruded on her to inflict some pointless nonsense, like ''are you all right'' or ''did something happen in school'' or ''stop sitting there'' or whatever it was¡­ but honestly, Lori didn''t care. "What happens next, after everything''s been cut up?"


    Ah, that resigned look as Riz came to terms with the fact that Lori was, in fact, talking to her and not likely to leave her alone. So enjoyable! She knew those people were just deliberately annoying her! ''Important to socialize'', ''want to be friends'', ''blocking the way''¡­ hah!


    "Um, well, the stalks need to be dried so that the vigas can be threshed," Riz muttered in a ''why is this happening to me'' tone of resignation. "Then it''s winnowed¡­ then after that it can be stored."


    "And all of that will be done tomorrow?"


    Riz shuddered. "No, no, only the harvesting will be done tomorrow. The vigas has to be dried first."


    "Ah¡­ and how will it be dried?"


    Riz sighed. "Well, usually it''s left out in the fields to dry in the sun, but with the chokers and the coming winter, and how the farmers want to make a winter crop and need to ready the field quickly, they can''t do that¡­ so¡­"


    "So?" Lori prompted.


    Riz sighed again. "Uh, Great Binder¡­ can you do something to help dry the grain? You... didn''t actually say, yesterday..."


    "I probably can¡­" Lori said, humming in casual thoughtfulness. "How dry does it need to be?"


    Riz stared at her. "W-what?"


    "I''ve never dried grain before, so I don''t know how dry it needs to be," Lori said. "Find out, will you?"


    Riz closed her eyes, head drooping. "Yes, Great Binder," she said in resigned exhaustion.


    "But that can wait until the day after tomorrow," Lori said with almost Rian-like brightness. "Remember to take a bath before you go to sleep." Despite the air circulation she''d engineered to make sure that the air in her Dungeon never went bad, tonight there was a distinctly sweaty pungency to the atmosphere. Lori glanced at Mikon. "Go with her. She looks like she might fall asleep and drown if she''s not watched."


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    Mikon, who''d been frowning slightly, blinked. There was a brief pause. "Yes, your Bindership," the weaver said, nodding to Lori. " Don''t worry. I''ll make sure your temporary Rian doesn''t just fall asleep in the water. I''ll even make sure she gets home."


    Lori nodded. "See that you do." She glanced at Riz. "Erzebed, tomorrow don''t tire yourself out so much. You''re an officer, not a glitter crawler. Temporarily, at least."


    "Ugh¡­ Yes, Great Binder¡­" Riz said tiredly. "Can I eat now?"


    "Yes, go ahead." Lori said, waving a negligent hand. Her sick fun over, she focused on her own food. The beast meat was a little tough, but very juicy. Today was probably the least work she''d ever done in favor of watching people do work. Across the table, Riz looked relieved to finally be left alone, while Mikon hummed as she ate her dinner, a cheerful, unreadable smile on her face.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day was more of the same, for everyone else at any rate. Lori, however, went back to building the new addition to her Dungeon. In hindsight, she should probably have worked on it yesterday as well, but¡­ well, she''d never seen a harvest before.


    But now she''d seen one, so it was back to work. With the balcony-like air intake in place, she put in the ceiling and roof over that. That meant more arches, since it would have a lot of stone above it to be able to withstand dragon scales and islandshells falling on it during dragons. Well, small islandshells, anyway. If a full-grown islandshell fell on it, it was probably rubble. But that was a problem for when an islandshell actually fell on her Dungeon''s entrance. For now, her problem was it not falling by itself.


    She was careful not to stand under the ceiling supports as she built them, making an arch so she could extend the upper part of the incomplete wall over the side passage, letting her enclose the back of the balcony with more arches until she was able to meld the stone with the cliff face itself. The arches and structures were solid, but she couldn''t help but worry¡­


    After that, it was all a matter of making arches to support the rest of the roof between the two walls. She almost ran out of stone, since she had to make raised pillars to stand on so she could get up high enough to properly build the arches. It was only as she almost finished did she think to find out if the demesne had any ladders. The remaining stone from the pile, she used to add bulwarks to the outsides of the walls so that they pressed inward and helped support the arch on top, keeping it from pushing the walls outward.


    Riz brought her lunch again, another bowl of roasted meat. She was clearly feeling much better, since she remembered to bring Lori a spoon this time. By the time Lori finished with the walls and had reduced the stone pile to something barely taller than she was, it seemed the harvest had finished, the fields cleared and stalks bundled together.


    The dining hall was still subdued at dinner, but it was filled with an undercurrent of relief. The exam was over, and everyone could just pass out and stay in bed sleeping all day, unless they were unfortunate enough to have some sort of assignment still due.


    Even Riz was looking much better. She still looked tired, but she at least had no difficulty keeping her eyes open this time.


    "Erzebed," Lori said as they waited for dinner to be ready.


    Riz sighed resignedly. "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "Tell everyone to rest tomorrow," she said. "No working unless they feel like it. Tell them they should just stay in bed and sleep, or go swimming, or just rest."


    Riz blinked. "Everyone, Great Binder?"


    "Everyone," Lori said. "That probably means no one will be cooking breakfast, lunch and dinner, emptying the latrines, or cleaning the baths, but if they''re tired, they should rest. They can just complain about all those things not getting done the day after."


    Riz chuckled. "I''ll¡­ tell everyone, Great Binder. They''ll be glad to hear it."


    "I''ll help," Mikon volunteered. "Then we can go to the baths afterwards."


    Riz sighed in relief. "Thanks. I appreciate it."


    Mikon reached over to squeeze her shoulder as Lori rolled her eyes. The weaver glanced up towards the kitchen, where people were starting to line up to get their food. "I''ll go get it. You sit down and rest."


    Riz didn''t argue, doing just that as Mikon rose to get their food.


    "You''re being quite competent, Erzebed," Lori commented. "You''re not Rian, but you''re being as competent as you were when he was around."


    "Uh, thank you, Great Binder?"


    "And I''m glad to see you haven''t let the flirting between you and Mikon get in the way of your duties."


    Riz blinked at her. Slowly, her eyes widened, her mouth opening slightly. She glanced down at her shoulder as if seeing it for the first time. "Wait, that was¡­ no, that wasn''t¡­" Her eyes opened wider. She groaned, and let her hands fall down into her face.


    Lori stared blankly at her. "Did you¡­ stop paying attention, or something? It wasn''t like she got any more subtle."


    "I was busy," Riz said, her voice muffled through her hands. "Oh, Great Binder¡­"


    "Yes?"


    Riz twitched. "Er, not you Great Binder. I was¡­ uh¡­ "


    Oh. Lori thought about it, and decided she didn''t care one way or another. "Well, be careful when you use it as an expletive," she said. "I''m right here, after all. It might get confusing"


    Riz nodded, looking embarrassed.


    Briefly, Lori debated giving her advice. Her own mothers had given a lot of advice when she was growing up, theoretically for exactly this sort of situation.


    She decided against it. All the advice had seemed bad then, and just thinking of them, they didn''t seem any better now. How was ''showing an interest'' or ''being encouraging'' supposed to help, anyway?


    Still, she did have something practical to say. "Mikon''s help¡­ has been invaluable to you, hasn''t it?" she said.


    "She''s the reason I''m managing to get everything done," Riz groaned, sighing. "I don''t know how Rian did it¡­"


    "If you need her assistance, then you''ll simply need to resign yourself to the fact that you''re going to have to accept the flirting," Lori said. See, this was advice: a workable, practical solution to a problem¡­ such as it was. "You''ve managed to so far."


    Riz groaned again.


    "It''s only until Rian comes back," Lori reminded her. "Then you can reject her advances and focus on obsessing over Rian."


    Riz groaned a third time.


    Yes, a workable, practical solution, the best kind of advice.

 147 - Drying To Thresh

    In the storage shed she had made to store the harvest, Lori examined the tops of the thick bundles of stalks from which hung the heads of vigas grain. The individual stalks were thick, just a little thinner than her little finger, and covered with long leaves that Riz had warned her not to touch, since the edges of the leaves were sharp, and the undersides were full of minute, needle-like fuzz that could easily pierce skin without being noticed. The bundles had been stacked high on top of each other all the way up to the curved ceiling, and filled up every bit of free space in the long shed. In fact, the shed itself had turned out to be insufficient to store all the bundles, as she had found out when she had followed her nose that morning and found some of the alcoves of the second level of her Dungeon had been stuffed with them


    "Erzebed," she said, "I thought you said the dimensions for the storage shed would be more than enough to store the harvest? That''s clearly not the case. And it doesn''t look like we actually need those storage vessels the potters made at all." The large clay pots of barrel-like proportions had all been lined up outside the storage shed, empty.


    "It''s usually not stored like this, Great Binder," Riz said defensively. "Usually the bundles are left out in the field to dry, but because of all the chokers that might eat it, we decided we''d store them here first while the chokers were dealt with or a pen could be built that they can''t get into. Once they''ve dried and we''ve threshed the grain from the stalks, it should all fit. "


    Lori examined the heads of the grain again. They already looked fairly dry to her. "They already look fairly dry to me," she said.


    Riz shook her head, then reached towards the heads and carefully pulled out a single vigas grain. Wide as Lori''s thumbnail, it was about the size of a medium-sized bead, the kind used for middling denominations that were spent often and commonly used to power bound tools. Riz pressed her nail against the vigas for a moment, puncturing it, then squeezed it between her fingers, making it split. The outer shell was surprisingly stiff, and from inside, a sort of paste leaked out onto Riz''s fingers.


    Her dark-pink hair swayed as the northerner woman held up her fingers to Lori. "Here, Great Binder," she said. "All the vigas looks like this inside right now. They need to be dried in the sun until the hulls grow brittle enough that the grain falls off easily. At that point, they can be threshed from the stalks and winnowed. Until then, they''re stuck too securely to the stalks."


    Lori nodded. The explanation seemed simple logical enough, but¡­ "Won''t drying them kill the seed? I thought some of these would be planted for the next crop?"


    "Oh no, they can still be planted after being dried, Great Binder. That''s not the part that actually takes root, it''s this part here," Riz used a nail to point at a bit of not-poweder that seemed indistinguishable from any other part of the burst vigas to Lori, "so drying doesn''t affect its ability to be planted."


    That sounded strange to Lori, but what did she know? She was a wizard, not a farmer.


    "So, how dry do they need to be?" Lori asked.


    Riz looked hesitantly at the mess on her fingers, the shrugged. "I don''t know, Great Binder. I know how they look like when they''re ready, but I don''t know how dry that is."


    Lori hummed thoughtfully, looking at the bundles and bundles of stalks. She narrowed her eyes slightly, concentrating on her awareness of her demesne''s wisps, feeling for the wisps around her, inside the storage shed. Earthwisps and firewisps in the stone structure, airwisps all around, lightwisps in the air, streaming in through the shed''s entrance, darkwisps between the tightly packed bundles and in voids inside the stalks themselves, lightningwisps concentrated on certain conductive materials¡­


    And waterwisps. Lots of waterwisps. They were in the leaves, the stalks, the vigas, in the air and on surfaces. Minute amounts individually , but taken altogether, it was actually very substantial, even with the unremarkable humidity.


    If Lori had been an ordinary Whisperer and not a Dungeon Binder, she wouldn''t have been able to feel any of that. She''d only be able to perceive wisps in objects she was in contact with, it would have required slow claiming and deliberation, and even that would have been ineffective if there weren''t any perceivable wisps at the point of contact to propagate her claim, which occasionally happened when it came to plant matter. Even if she was still unable to utilize Deadspeaking, Horotracting or Mentalism, simply the awareness of the wisps within her demesne gave her options beyond what she originally had.


    "Go and find me a farmer and come back here," Lori said as she thought of a sack in her room. "Someone who isn''t a fool or stupid. I need to go get something, and then I''ll speak to them."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said promptly. Lori nodded, leaving them to it as she headed back to her Dungeon.


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    Her private cold room was more of a box now since she''d run out of fruits. All it contained was a small lumpy sack sealed with a leather cord. The pink lady seeds were in more common cold storage, waiting to be planted to grown new plants. Lori wasn''t quite sure if the cold was actually needed to preserve the contents of the sack, but it was a foodstuff, and keeping food cold and dry probably helped it last longer. She took it out of where it lay, making a binding around it to keep back waterwisps so that water wouldn''t condense on the cold vigas and cause some kind of degradation. Hefting the bag of grain, she undid the cord securing it closed and looking inside. Save for being cold to the touch, they still looked and felt as they had when she''d first discovered them mixed in with the fruits.


    Lori took a moment to warm the grains so that water wouldn''t condense on them anymore before heading back to the storage shed, the sack of grain in hand. When she got there, Riz had someone with her, most likely the farmer that Lori had requested¡­


    She frowned, peering at the man''s face.


    "Um, is¡ª" the man began, before Riz coughed suddenly, and the man stopped speaking at the reminder.


    The man looked vaguely familiar somehow¡­ well, that wasn''t surprising, Lori kept seeing the same people in the dining hall every day, of course they''d eventually start looking familiar from repetition. She shook her head, moving the flow of her thoughts back to business.


    "How dry can the vigas be before they can''t be planted anymore?" Lori asked.


    The man opened his mouth, paused, and looked towards Riz, who nodded. The man sighed in relief. "Very dry, your Bindership," he said. "As long as it only dried from being left to stand and not cooked on a fire or something. "


    Lori nodded, holding up the small sack of grain. "Yes, yes, but for the grain itself, is this dry enough, or can it be dryer?" She held up one of the grains as an example.


    Hesitantly, the farmer¡ªhe hadn''t made the mistake of trying to introduce himself, which was wonderful¡ªtook the grain, rolling it around in his fingers. "Uh, can I break it open, your Bindership?"


    "Yes, yes, go ahead," Lori said. Well, at least he asked for permission.


    He cracked the vigas between his fingers, examining what was inside. Lori could see it was a drier powder than what Riz had shown her earlier. The farmer nodded. "Yes, this is dry enough, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "Get me one of the stalks that isn''t dry enough yet, please."


    The farmer hesitated, bemused, but did as she asked, going to the nearest bundle of vigas and pulling one out. He presented it to Lori awkwardly, as if unsure about simply handing it to her as he normally would.


    Lori took the stalk in her hands, mindful of the supposedly sharp leaves. She concentrated on it, feeling the waterwisps integrated into its structure¡ªstem, leaves, stray fibers, husk and grain seeds¡ªand comparing the concentration to the waterwisps she felt in the vigas she had in her little bag. Staring at the head, with its long and orderly arrangement of vigas, she focused, binding the waterwisps in the little bits connecting the grains to the rest of the stalk, and then drawing them out and into the air.


    There were small streamers of vapor, as if she had just snuffed out a candle, immediately followed by a few pops, and several grains fell off.


    "Huh," Lori said, reaching for the few grains still hanging on and pulling them off. They came off easily, still surrounded by a fibrous husk. She looked at her hand, then held it out to Riz and the farmer to show them. "Is that dry enough to thresh?"


    The farmer held out his hand, and Lori poured the grains into it. he poked at them with his finger, then shook his head. "The hulls still aren''t dry enough, your Bindership. It''s better, but still won''t thresh properly."


    Lori nodded, considering the stalk still in her hands. So she couldn''t just bind all the waterwisps and pull the water out with it, even if she excluded the vigas from such a binding. Perhaps use the binding she used for curing wood to dry the stalks? She shook her head, rejecting that idea, at least without extensive experimentation and modification of the output of the binding. The stalk had too little mass to pass lightningwisps through it without simply setting it on fire, which was probably bad for the grain¡­


    Lori would have to dry it less directly¡­


    "You''re dismissed," Lori said absently. "Enjoy your rest."


    The man glanced at Riz and bowed, tentatively leaving the storage shed as Lori considered the stacks of bundles of grain stalks¡­


    "Erzebed, come with me," Lori said, turning to head out. "I need to find the best way to dry a lot of stalks quickly, and you''re going to help me."


    "I am, Great Binder?" Riz said, sounding nervous as she followed.


    "Yes, I need someone to lift things."


    Riz relaxed slightly. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori pointed back at the bundles behind them. "Get me some bundles to experiment on. Four should do."


    Riz hesitated, glancing at the bundles in the storage shed. "Uh, Great Binder, why don''t we use the stacks in the Dungeon instead? Less likely to fall and easier to clean up afterwards."


    Lori considered that. A good point, and as she thought about it, the Dungeon offered more stable and reliable experimental conditions than the field outside. "Fine," she allowed, turning and leading the way back, the little sack of grain still in her hand for reference. She handed Riz the stalk though. "Here. Get an early start on the threshing."


    Best not to waste anything, after all.


    "Um, Great Binder," Riz said as they walked. "Do you really need to dry the stacks yourself? Wouldn''t it be simpler for you to just build a pen we can put the stacks to dry so that the chokers can''t get at them? Maybe we can just take them out to dry in the sun after all."


    "Beasts can climb. You know that. Besides, that''s a waste of a week," Lori said. "If I use a binding to dry the stalks sooner, you can start threshing tomorrow, and we can replant the field."


    "I don''t think we can plant the field right away," Riz said skeptically. "It usually has to rest for a few days, and then the farmers have to prepare and fertilize it."


    "Well, they can do that sooner as well," Lori said dismissively.


    Riz sighed and nodded. "As you say, Great Binder."


    She sounded a lot like Rian when she said that.

 148 - Experimenting With Riz

    The stalk was gone by the time they got down to the second level, leaving Riz holding a handful of grains that were put in her belt pouch as she grabbed four bundles and moved them to the empty space between the ceiling''s support pillars Lori had indicated. To one side, the weavers sat, spinning ropeweed fibers into thread at a leisurely, almost lazy pace, something to do as they played board games, gossiped, or just sat back with half-lidded eyes. The carpenters were similarly relaxed, and looked to be simply checking over their tools, oiling and occasionally taking a file to sharpen something, or possibly to remove a burr or some other damage. One seemed to be whittling game pieces out of off-cuts of wood. The waterwheel was still, simply rocking slightly as the water was pulled up by bindings of waterwisps only to fall back into the lower basin through the overflow.


    People naturally glanced up as they saw her and Riz, especially since the latter was moving around bundles of stalks as Lori paced back and forth, glaring at the bundles intently as she tried to figure out the best way to approach the problem. She needed to dry the hulls and the point where the vigas were connected to the stalk. Direct manipulation of the waterwisps had already been shown to not be viable, so she''d need something else.


    Direct heat? No, no, that wouldn''t work, increasing the temperature from the inside would likely just cook the grains, even if she didn''t make it hot enough to steam off the water. Indirect heat then? The standard procedure was to let it dry in the sun. However, unless she increased the temperature, that was unlikely to cause the stalks to dry faster, and after a point, that would lead to the same problem as direct heat, which was the grains would cook¡­


    "Uh, Great Binder? What now?" Riz asked.


    "Quiet, I''m thinking," Lori said, distractedly, continuing to pace.


    Where was she? So, direct heat and indirect heat alone was both not enough and too much¡­ and they weren''t the point anyway. The point was getting the stalks to dry without damaging the grain. But how was she supposed to get water out of something if she couldn''t resort to binding the waterwisps or heat it up significantly?


    ¡­


    Oh!


    She turned and headed for the third level. Her temporary assistant hurriedly followed after her, falling into step next to her. Lori glanced towards the woman. "Erzebed, go upstairs and bring back a bucket of water and wait for me by the bundles. Don''t let them get wet."


    "Yes, Great Binder!" Riz said, promptly turning to obey the order.


    Lori quickly excavated some stone from the walls since her stone pile had been depleted by her recent building, then brought it back up to the second level. Her bucket of water was waiting for her.


    "Good," Lori said absently. She pointed to one side. "Sit there until I need you."


    Water. She was trying to get water out of the stalks, and water had its own idiosyncrasies. Taking some of her excavated stone, Lori formed a box. It was a crude box, since she was more concerned with it being air- and watertight, but that was all she needed. With the box finished, Lori used her connection to her demesne''s core and bound all the waterwisps in the air inside the box. It wasn''t something she''d have been able to do before, when she''d just been a Whisperer. If she''d tried to bind waterwisps in the air, she''d have needed a specially prepared binding with water, since trying to claim waterwisps by waving her hands in the air would have only bound the waterwisps if they actually made contact with her. With her connection to the core, however, she was able to treat every wisp in the demesne as if it were part of her body, allowing her to claim wisps a Whisperer would normally not be able to.


    Lori claimed those wisps and formed them into a binding. She claimed airwisps, and with the waterwisps¡ªand in this state, the water in the air could also be claimed by airwisps¡ªbound together a barrier over the opening of the box, trapping and keeping other waterwisps in the air from entering the box, keeping the air inside the box arid. Nodding to herself, Lori took one of the stalks and put it inside the box, pushing it through the immaterial binding.


    The stalk and grains hanging from it didn''t immediately explode from the moisture in it being turned to vapor, which was a good sign. It lay inside the box as Lori concentrated on her awareness. The binding was doing as it was supposed to, keeping all waterwisps and humidity out of the box. Then she waited.


    The stalk just sat there, and if Lori hadn''t had her awareness, she''d have thought absolutely nothing was happening. But through her connection to the demesne''s core and the awareness of all the wisps within the demesne that came with it, Lori knew that¡­ mostly nothing was happening.


    Lori sighed and reminded herself to be patient.


    Eventually, moisture began to seep out of the stalk. The amounts were miniscule and completely undetectable to even a Whisperer, but there was a change. Lori nodded in satisfaction, then added a binding to the air inside the box, a simple arrangement of airwisps to circulate the air.


    She waited again.


    In her eyes, more nothing seemed to happen.


    Lori sat on the rest of the stone she''d excavated and watched the stalk intently.


    After what seemed like forever, in which she''d taken a short nap sitting on a bench in one of the alcoves because why not, everything was imbued anyway, Lori checked the state of the inside of the box. More moisture had seeped out of the stalk, and since the air was circulating and moving the moisture around, the water hadn''t settled on the outside of the stalk. Carefully, Lori reached into the box and carefully felt the surface of one of the stem''s leaves. It was noticeably stiffer and dryer now¡­


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    "Erzebed," she called out, pulling the stalk out of the box. The barrier keeping out humidity didn''t affect it coming out the other way, for which she was glad. It shouldn''t have, since the binding had no directionality built in, but in those cases there was always a chance a directionality would naturally emerge in an untested binding. Not that this binding was completely untested, it was a modification of the binding she''d used to collect water from the air when they had been traveling¡­


    Lori waited, then frowned as her temporary assistant failed to appear. She looked up irritably.


    Riz was sitting on a bench in one of the alcoves, her arms crossed and head back against the stone, eyes closed. Her mouth was slightly open as she slept, practically inviting a bug to crawl in. Being afraid that a bug would crawl into your head while you were asleep was a completely legitimate fear!


    Sighing, Lori wound airwisps into a long tube from her mouth to the sleeping woman''s ear. "Erzebed," she repeated, and the woman jerked upright as the sound was conveyed as if Lori was right next to her. "Come here."


    "Y-yes, Great Binder!" Riz said as Lori let the binding collapse, her temporary assistant hurrying towards the Dungeon Binder.


    Lori held up the stalk. "Is this dry enough to thresh now?"


    Riz blinked at her, but took the stalk in her hands. She felt at the grains, rolling them around in her fingers until they popped. "It''s¡­ still a little tough, Great Binder, but¡­ I suppose, if we had to?" The look she gave Lori was clearly one of someone who didn''t want to. Even Lori could tell that, she''d used to make that face a lot.


    Lori grunted, dissatisfied. "Go find out if it''s lunch yet then come back here," she said, taking the stalk and setting it aside as a result sample. She realized she should have used a water clock to time how long it had been drying for, but¡­ "Wait. Get me a water clock from the Um, and then come back. And have another bucket to go with it."


    "Yes, Great Binder!"


    Riz hurried to do just that, seemingly not bothered at having her sleep interrupted as Lori took another of the stalks and, after binding the contents of the box again to draw out the humidity leaked from the previous stalk, put it in the stone box. This time, in addition to having the air be arid and circulating gently, she rubbed her hands together until they grew warm, then carefully bound the firewisps on the surface of her skin as she stuck her hand into the box. Delicately, she separated the firewisps she''d generated from friction from her skin and into the space inside the box, imbuing them to slowly radiate warmth and using the airwisps to spread that warmth around evenly as Riz returned with one of the water clock and another bucket.


    Once the air around the stalk was warm and seemed to be maintaining the temperature, Lori placed the water clock over the bucket and filled it with water up to the line that measured about an hour''s time. "So, is it lunch yet?"


    "We''re not having stew for lunch, Great Binder," Riz said. "Some people went out to hunt beasts, so we''re having roast."


    "Roast¡­ but it''s just a rest day, not a holiday."


    "Yes, so the kitchen staff are resting," Riz said. Lori couldn''t fault that reasoning. "Besides, who doesn''t like a good roast? Don''t worry, I told them that some of the meat needs to make it into the storage room."


    Lori nodded. "Good." She should bring down her stone plate, then¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The water clock ran out. Lori, who had simply been sitting there staring at the water clock impatiently, immediately reached into the stone box and drew out the stalk. It was hot, but not enough to make her drop it, even before the firewisps in her fingers cooled the parts her fingertips were on. "Erzebed," she called.


    "Um, a moment Great Binder!" Riz called back.


    Frowning, Lori looked towards her. Riz was putting down a pitcher and a stack of cups on a bench next to¡­ yes, there was Mikon, sitting with a group of other women, some of whom looked amused as Riz hurried away. Lori rolled her eyes, but she but waited as her temporary assistant hurried towards her. She held out the stalk, and Riz took it, this time not even needing to be prompted as she rolled the vigas around between her fingers. Little pieces of something fluttered down to the floor and Riz was holding some grains in her hands. Riz frowned down at the vigas, then pierced one with her thumbnail, breaking it open. She rubbed the powdery insides between her fingers¡­


    "That¡­ that feels like we can thresh it, Great Binder," Riz said slowly. "And the insides don''t feel strange¡­"


    "Go find a farmer and make sure," Lori said. "Bring them here, if you run off with the stalk it might break apart."


    "Yes, Great Binder!" Riz said, going off to presumably find a farmer as ordered.


    Lori, meanwhile, took several more of the stalks and, after removing the humidity from it again, put the stalks inside the box until it was half full. Very belatedly, she wondered if it might have been easier to make some sort of lid, if only to keep the heat inside. She did just that, taking some stone from the pile, making a knife and using that to slice off a slab of rock from the pile that she formed into a lid. She had to put it on and remove it a few times to make sure it was air tight and not fusing to the stone of the box itself.


    With the lid closed, she filled the water clock again, reducing the output of the firewisps so that it wouldn''t get so hot since heat was no longer escaping from it. She placed her hand on the lid, concentrating to keep the lid from being cooled so she could judge how hot it was, reducing the output of the firewisps a bit more as Riz came back with the same farmer as before. Riz handed him the stalk, and the farmer felt it himself, rolling the grains between his fingers as well. More flakes of something fluttered down to the floor.


    "Well?" Lori said. "Is that dry enough to thresh?"


    "It''s¡­ close enough, your Bindership," the man said frowning. He continued to feel the stalk.


    "So, if all the harvest was that consistency, you could¡­ what was it you said Erzebed?"


    "Threshing, Great Binder," Riz supplied.


    "Yes, could you start threshing?"


    "We¡­ could, your Bindership," the farmer said hesitantly.


    Lori nodded. "Excellent. Go back to resting."


    The farmer blinked in confusion, glancing towards Riz, who shrugged. "All right¡­ glad I could help, your Bindership¡­"


    Lori was no longer listening, staring at the water clock.


    "You can go, Rafel. Sorry for bothering you. Great Binder, it''s lunch time," Riz said.


    It is? Already?


    "It is? Already?" Lori said, instinctively looking up. Of course, since she was in her dungeon, there was only stone above her. She shook her head. "Right, right¡­ I''ll get my plate, you know what I like."


    "Yes, Great Binder, the soft, fatty bits everyone likes," Riz said. She glanced towards the stalks. "Do you really think we can start threshing tomorrow?"


    Lori shook her head. "No. The day after at best, and only if I can successfully scale up the binding to work on a lot of stalks at once, which isn''t always as simple as making everything bigger. Still, at the very least we can take a couple of days off the process."


    Riz nodded slowly. "But not today or tomorrow? Because I think people need more rest."


    "No, not tomorrow," Lori confirmed. "Tomorrow I will be attempting mass drying, so no threshing will need to be done."


    Riz sighed in relief.


    "You will, of course, be assisting me by carrying all the bundles I need dried."


    Riz sighed again. "Can I at least draft other people to help?"


    "Of course. You''re an officer, not a glitter crawler. Temporarily, at least."


    Riz tilted her head thoughtfully. "Huh¡­ Well, put that way¡­" A small smile grew on Riz''s face.


    Lori started walking. "Follow me so I can get you my plate."


    "Yes, Great Binder!"


    She was no Rian¡­ But Lori had to admit, Riz had her own competencies.

 149 - Final Desiccation Test

    Normally, Lori ate outside when they were having roasted beast. It made it easier to get second, third or fourth servings. However, today, instead of finding a nice, shady spot to set up a rock to sit on, she ate in her dungeon, in her usual table. Outside, the rhythmic, odious sounds of, ugh, music trickled through her Dungeon''s entrance. It made her wish she could just put up a binding to block out¡ª


    Oh.


    Lori made a binding of airwisps at her Dungeon''s entrance, blocking off the annoying sound and letting her eat in peace. She''d always wanted to do that whenever she had to sit in a dragon shelter and endure the party people inevitably held. When she''d grown older and learned enough Whispering to do it, she''d had to be satisfied with binding the airwisps over her ears. It helped but only up to a point, since the music could grow so loud she could feel it vibrating through her jaw.


    Fortunately, Riz has gotten her a lot of meat on her plate, and when she finished it, she felt full enough to not want to go out and make her way through the annoying music that was probably still there. After washing her plate in her room, she went back down to the second level to see how the stalks in her drying box were doing. The water clock still had a lot of water in it, but Lori was able to use her awareness of the demesne''s wisps to judge how much water remained in the stalks. They still retained a lot of moisture, but that seemed to be because the warm, dry air wasn''t able to circulate as thoroughly among the stalks. The stalks near the top of the box were significantly more desiccated than the ones at the bottom, or so she was able to deduce from her awareness. Lori almost reached for the lid to see the condition of the stalks, but restrained herself. Instead, she sat and stared at the water clock again, waiting for it to empty.


    ¡­


    It occurred to her that she might have been doing something else while she waited for this¡­


    ¡­


    Well, there was still about a quarter of an hour left in the waterclock, maybe she could do something¡­


    Lori went upstairs to get her chatrang board and the box that had come with it.


    By the time the water clock finally ran out of water, Lori¡­ well, she had become distracted trying to roll out pieces to use for lima and pincer for the board on the reverse side. She only realized the water clock had finished when she finished rolling out some dark stone and checked the water level. Putting aside the stone roll¡ªit wasn''t a proper cylinder, since it was just some softened rock that she''d rolled on the flat surface of the bench she was sitting on, meaning it wasn''t perfectly rounded¡ªLori checked the contents of the box, focusing on the distribution of waterwisps.


    There was more moisture in the air inside the box, and the stalks were more desiccated than they had gone in, though there was a clear pattern of the stalks at the top being dryer than the ones at the bottom. Lori frowned, and focused on the stalk from the last test, comparing it to the ones in the box. While some of the topmost stalks were close to being as dry as the singular stalk that had been dried before them, it was only some. Many were only as dry as the sample from her second test, and the ones at the very bottom were still fairly full of water. Why¡­


    Oh. Stupid of her, she''d forgotten than the more stalks she put in, the less air there was, meaning the air that was in the box reached its saturation point more quickly. And the stalks seemed to provide some degree of insulation for the ones at the bottom of the box, and certainly kept air from circulating through them properly¡­


    Lori considered what she''d built. That result did not bode well for trying to think of a way to scale up drying the stalks so that they would dry faster than a week. It meant nothing if she made a process to dry the stalks if it still took a week to dry it all. Then she''d have just made a more labor-intensive process that achieved the same result in the same amount of time, which meant she had failed¡­


    She felt the stalks. They were warm, verging on hot, but at least she''d been correct about the heat output. Of course, they were cooler the further down the pile the stalk had been, but even the ones that had been at the very bottom were a little warm. All right, it wasn''t a complete failure. Clearly, it just needed a larger volume of warm air to extract to moisture¡­ and if she positioned the stalks with all the grains on top, then the insulating nature of the stalks didn''t matter, since it was the grains and the stems holding them that needed to be dried. Since the stalks were already in bundles that had the grains on one end, to be efficient she just needed to make the container big enough to fit a whole bundle¡­ and lot of space for the air, so a relatively tall vessel¡­


    No, wait, a tall vessel wasn''t needed. She just needed to remove the moisture in the air, so that it could keep drawing out moisture from the stalks. And since she was circulating the air anyway¡­


    Lori disassembled the box, softening the stone that had composed it to the consistency of wet clay (without the wetness). Then she began building a new one, using the size of the largest of the bundles Riz had moved for her as a reference, then adding a little space so that the bundle could easily be put in and removed. Lori also made a stone lid, which she would not be putting on top herself because it would be too heavy. She made two holes, one near the top of the new vessel and one at the bottom, and used a binding to keep out humidity while letting in air. It was currently useless because the lid wasn''t on yet, but that was fine.


    "Erzebed!" she called out.


    There was silence save for the sound of the air circulating in her Dungeon.


    She waited, but no temporary assistant made herself known. Annoyed, she looked around, but Riz wasn''t sleeping on one of the benches. Where was¡­?


    Oh, right. People were eating roast outside. She was probably there somewhere, probably being flirted at by Mikon and either enduring it to retain the woman''s aid or unaware she was being flirted with.


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    Sighing, Lori climbed the steps up to the dining hall and walked towards her Dungeon''s entrance, suspending the binding there that kept out sound and reconfiguring it into one that amplified sound. She stepped into the binding, and she could hear the sounds of the music outside, mostly percussion, though there where some wind instruments as well, probably carved from wood. She made a pair of quick bindings to protect her ears. "Erzebed!" she called, the binding vibrating around her, and she heard her words shaking her bones.


    Lori removed the bindings over her ears, nodding in satisfaction as she heard the music stutter. Good, Riz had probably heard her. She headed back to the second level, configuring the binding behind her back into one that blocked off sound.


    After an irritatingly long time¡ªRiz''s arms were wet, so she had probably washed her hands¡ªRiz came down to the second level, wearing the face of someone reminding herself she shouldn''t be annoyed and had to be patient. Lori had never made that face herself, but she''d seen it a lot on her mothers, usually just before she explained her side of something and they became unreasonably angry at her perfectly logical reasoning.


    "Yes, Great Binder?" Riz was even using the same tone.


    Lori sighed and reminded herself to be patient. Riz wasn''t her mothers, she wouldn''t ask pointed and leading questions to demoralize her temporary assistant and she missed Rian. "Put the largest bundle into that," Lori said, pointing at the stone vessel she had made. "Then put the lid on it."


    Riz stared at the big stone lid, wide enough to seal the vessel Lori had made and closed her eyes, before letting out a sigh.


    "As you need reminding, you are an officer, not a glitter crawler," Lori said. "You do not actually need to do the lifting yourself."


    Riz blinked, then smiled the smile of someone who was going to make someone else do something, because she could. "Yes, Great Binder," she said, sounding more cheerful than before. She went over the bundles, picking up the largest one and putting it inside the vessel. Thankfully, she put it grain-end up without needing to be told. There was a half a hand''s-length worth of between the bundle and the wall of vessel.


    "Before you go," Lori said as Riz started to turn away, "try to get the bundle out of there. Is there enough space?"


    Riz frowned, but did as she was asked. The bundle was about the thickness of a torso, and while Riz had some trouble gaining a grip, she was eventually able to pull the bundle out. "Might need a hook to get it out easier, Great Binder," Riz commented, putting the bundle back in. "I''ll go and get some people for the lid. Do you want me to get you more meat as well?"


    Lori considered that. "Yes," she said. "I''ll get my plate."


    When Riz came back, she had Lori''s plate with her and five strong-looking men. To her credit, she helped the five of them pick up the stone lid, though Lori had to wonder how much assistance she actually provided. Still, the lid was put on top of the vessel, and the walls of the vessel didn''t collapse.


    Lori nodded in approval. "Come back in an hour to take the lid off," she told Riz.


    Riz didn''t sigh this time. She had the tranquil look of someone who''d been expecting to hear that. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori dismissed Riz from her mind, binding firewisps to warm the air in front of the hole at the top of the vessel¡ª


    She paused and stared at what she was making then sighed.


    Making a hole in the center of the lid without letting any stone fall onto the bundle was aggravating but doable, and she had only herself to blame on that one. She sealed the other hole in the vessel, leaving only the hole at the bottom, and put the binding to keep out moisture onto the hole of the lid. Then she modified the airwisps on both bindings, and the binding on the lid started pushing dry arid air into the vessel as the hole in the bottom pulled it out, the moisture in the air being trapped in the binding.


    She was even able to use firewisps to take heat from the air passing through the hole at bottom and move it to the air entering from the top, which was usually just a needlessly complicated binding used by people who liked to show off their efficiency, but in this instance allowed her to maintain the temperature in the vessel with little additional heat and little chance of accidentally overheating the stalks. It also kept the second level from becoming hot, since she was passing a lot of air through the vessel.


    Then she filled the water clock with an hour''s worth of water and went back to rolling pieces for her game board.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Riz came back a little after the hour was done, which was all right since Lori had become preoccupied making little stone discs for her game board. They were only one color, but later she''d put some beast teeth on them so they''d have a pale side. Her temporary assistant also came with more strong-looking men¡ªLori would be the first to admit she was terrible when it came to remembering people''s faces, but she could remember enough to tell these were different people¡ªas well as the same farmer as the last two times. Lori was impressed. Riz had actually anticipated her needs.


    After Lori had cooled the lid by using the firewisps to move the heat into the floor of the level, the men and Riz¡ªLori had to wonder again if the woman was actually helpful¡ªpicked up the lid and laid it down on top of the stone pile next to the vessel. Riz reached inside with a piece of branch that had a hook-like protrusion, pulling the bundle up enough to get a grip on it. The woman winced, probably at the heat, and hastily pulled it out of the vessel and onto the ground.


    The farmer knelt down and pulled a stalk from the bundle, examining the head where the grains were. He rolled some of the vigas in his fingers, then set the stalk aside and pulled out another one. Lori waited patiently as he examined more stalks from the bundle, talking from different parts in the middle of it.


    "It''s dry, your Bindership," he said eventually. "Dry enough to thresh." The look he gave the vessel Lori had made was dubious though.


    "Good," was all Lori said. "You may go back to¡­ resting." Honestly, why did people call it a rest day, then tire themselves out? That was the complete opposite of what rest involved!


    The farmer gave the vessel another dubious look, but bowed to Lori and left, and after a gesture to Riz, so did the men who had lifted the lid. Riz glanced after them, then sighed and waited as Lori regarded what she had made.


    "You said that the grain will be left out to dry in the sun, correct, Erzebed?" Lori said.


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said promptly.


    "When will that be? Tomorrow?"


    "Probably, Great Binder," Riz said. "Even if the chokers will try to get at it, the vigas needs to be dried."


    Lori nodded slowly, staring at the dried bundle of stalks Then she shook her head. "Noted. Please put away the other bundles and then you may go, Erzebed."


    "Yes, Great Binder." Riz picked up one of the unused bundles and began to put it back in the alcove the other were stored in, stacking them on their side. When she finished, she glanced towards Lori, but Lori waved her away. It was only when Riz was gone did she think to wonder if her temporary Rian will remember to come bring her dinner.


    Lori sighed. Well, she''d deal with it when she started to get hungry.


    She dismantled the vessel and dragged the stone outside, ignoring the din of music as she added the stone to the stockpile, then went around to the bone pile and picked up some of the beast teeth drying there, putting them in a skull as an impromptu bowl. She''ll have to wash her hands and heat the bone to clean it of dustlife¡­


    Lori went back to the now-clear second level of her Dungeon. All that was left was the water clock and the buckets. She sat on a bench in one of the alcoves, considering the alcoves filled with stacked bundles of stalks¡­

 150 - Threshing and Storage

    The next day after breakfast, Lori watched as people began laying out the bundles of stalks under the sun. There was probably a farming technical name for them, but she didn''t care. The bundles were laid out on the fields they''d been harvested from, stacked together in long rows out in the sun. People formed a long line, passing the bundles from person to person, which Lori had to admit was very efficient. No getting bottle-necked by the door to the storage shed, no having to walk back and forth while carrying a heavy thing¡­


    Lori mildly increased her assessment of the intelligence of her people.


    While a line of efficient people did that, forming a line to get the bundles onto the field, another line laid out the bundles so that no bundles were casting any shadows on the one''s beside them, ensuring efficient drying in the sunlight. The children were out in force with sticks and clubs and little slings of the sort her mothers never let her have when she was younger because they said it wasn''t a toy, it was dangerous, and that if she wanted to have one she''d have to play with it outside the apartment¡­


    She finally saw what they meant when she saw one boy use the sling to scare a choker away from the bundles being lined up. The stone flew in a curving arc, but it struck the choker in the back of the neck, and while in novels such a strike would have killed the little beast instantly, the ruff of feathers around its neck seemed to cushion the impact. Still, it did cause it to divert away from the stacks of grains and towards the irrigation cistern, where more children ambushed it with sticks and the sort of enthusiastic violence only a child could muster.


    Other people were taking planks from their stockpile and trying to fashion some sort of temporary barricade with stones and the outdoor tables and benches they currently had, perhaps in the hope that it would be too tall for the chokers to jump over. Or at least, too tall for them to jump over before someone managed to scare them off. It wasn''t the near-manic, purposeful work of the harvest, but rather a more subdued atmosphere. Moving the bundles was repetitive, thoughtless work, and people didn''t seem to have settled on an idea for how to keep the chokers away yet. Lori saw a few of the people talking point towards her, sitting next to the third bathhouse, but someone shook their head at the idea, pointing not at her but the ground. Oh good, someone who knew how earthwisp manipulation was bad for healthy soil.


    Riz was down there, just another blob of dark pink hair. While Lori was familiar enough with her temporary assistant''s face to be able to identify her, she was far enough that Riz was indistinguishable from every other dark pink-haired head on the field.


    Eventually, it seemed to be decided that they''d just set up the benches and tables on the side of the field that faced the woods, where the chokers were most likely to come from, and just loiter there to discourage the things from going at the bundles. That didn''t seem sustainable for the whole week needed to dry all the bundles. Perhaps they were only planning to set a precedent to scare the little beasts off? That seemed unlikely to work. Despite how many the children had already killed, there always seemed to be more of them, if the one hanging at her door was anything to go by.


    Before this harvest, Lori hadn''t thought beasts would bother with eating vigas. In her head, her image of the smaller beasts had them eating bugs, small slugs, larvae, and other smaller beasts like foot-sized scavengers. But no, it turned out that beasts also ate seeds and grains, and their harvest would be a tempting target while it dried. It was vulnerable to bugs as well, which was why some people walked around the bundles with brooms, the wide heads ideal for swatting.


    Lori watched all this as she sat there, body relaxed as she worked on forming some bindings. It took most of the morning to finish getting the bundles out of the storage shed. When the storage shed had been emptied, all the bundles out in the field in the sun, people had headed over to her Dungeon to get the rest of the bundles stored in the second level''s alcoves.


    In the corners of the field, people were preparing small bonfires. Were they planning to have another roast? No, the fires were too small for that. Besides, with her awareness, she could feel the concentrations of firewisps in the kitchens, which meant that stew was being made. Perhaps those were for a night watch, to scare off the beasts at night? They''d done something similar when traveling, but those had involved bigger fires, with much bigger beasts.


    Lori had hated the night watch, and the other Whisperer who had been with the group had as well. They''d needed to provide the heat and light for those times they hadn''t been able to scavenge enough firewood, or it had been too grassy to risk a fire, which meant they''d been up half the night just trying to imbue the binding enough to make it last the other half of the night, and they would still need to wake up early to purify the water they needed for washing off the iridescence, drinking and cooking, and there''d been more than one night attack¡­


    Really, just thinking of those nights made Lori want to go back to her room, curl up in bed and go to sleep.


    Lori was staring at the bundles in the field when Riz came up to her. "Great Binder," the woman said in a tone of voice Lori had never heard her use before. Well, didn''t remember her using before. Really, she had better things to do than try to remember every tone of voice the woman had ever used. Even if she could use Mentalism to remember it, she wouldn''t.


    "Erzebed," Lori said, not turning to look at her.


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    "All the sheaves of vigas in the Dungeon are dry, your Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Yes, they are." Lori wished she had some water. Despite the day not being very hot, she was still sweating a little, and could use a drink. "Dry enough to thresh, I believe."


    "¡­yes, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Perhaps you should get started, then?" It had taken all night to get it all dried. She''d needed to seal all the alcoves and remove the moisture from the air to encourage desiccation, and had needed to double check the walls and ceiling for moisture seeping in. The heat had needed to be kept low so that the second level wouldn''t turn into an oven, and she''d needed to make a very extensive binding of airwisps so that she could force the dry air through all the stalks, even those up against the wall under other bundles.


    Fortunately, she''d had all night, and with only minimal heat and using firewisps to recycle the heat already in the alcoves, the circulating dry air and the bindings to keep the air arid had dried the wood far slower than her experiments, but it had allowed her to be able to affect all the alcoves at once. The few holes she''d made for air to pass through all the alcoves so she could make one large binding instead of several smaller ones for each alcove had been easily fixed.


    "Um¡­ we''ll need to use the second level, Great Binder," Riz said.


    That made Lori blink, and she almost turned to look at Riz before going back to staring at the field. "Why?"


    "We need a solid hard surface to put the stalks on so that we can thresh them," Riz said. "And it helps that the second level doesn''t have sand. It''s even windy, so we might even be able to winnow there."


    "Well, make the arrangements with the weavers, ropers and carpenters and clean up after yourselves," Lori said. "Then get back up here. You might need to bring me lunch." Lori frowned and considered that. "You might need to bring lunch for both of us."


    "Er, why Great Binder?"


    Lori pointed at the field she was looking at. "I still need to dry the rest of that."


    Riz blinked and followed her finger out to the field.


    "I might need to surround the vigas with ice," Lori said, keeping her eyes on the field and the bindings she was placing. Having her eyes to supplement her awareness helped her get it done faster, even if the wisps were actually invisible from her eyes. Without her connection to her Dungeon''s core, she wouldn''t have been able to perceive the bindings unless she ran right into them. "It will make the process more efficient. Happily, that also means that the chokers won''t be able to get at the grain, which is also useful. Unfortunately, it means no one will be able to approach the grain until I bring down the wall, so we might suffer some loss to bugs."


    "You''re¡­ going to dry all the vigas," Riz said slowly.


    "We are not wasting a week," Lori said. "If people want to keep dealing with beasts for that long, it might as well be large beasts that give more food. This way the harvest gets finished faster, we don''t waste firewood¡ª" whatever people were going to use those bonfires in the corners for, it was clearly only because of the bundles of stalks drying in the field, "¡ªand people can do other things."


    Riz looked between her, the field and back again. "If you say so, Great Binder."


    "I do, in fact, say so," Lori confirmed. "Go, see that people are threshing, and tell them to stay away from the bundles when I bring the water up."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said, voice still sounding strange. She looked down at the field one last time before she started walking towards her Dungeon again.


    Lori watched Riz go down and talk to the people around the field, occasionally pointing towards her and the Dungeon. They glanced her way, but she ignored them, focusing on the field. Fortunately, the bundles were laid out in a straight line¡ªmore or less¡ªso she could be efficient with the airflow, though it looked like she would need to make walls with ice to enclose the bundles as they dried¡­


    Hopefully it would only take a day or two to dry everything¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    In the end, it took three days for the grain in the field to dry with her binding to accelerate the process. While most of that delay was because the moisture from the whole stalk slowed the process down, since she couldn''t just dry only the head where the grain vigas was, she had also forgotten that there was moisture in the ground to account for and didn''t realize where all the additional moisture in the air that was slowing down the desiccation was coming from. It didn''t help that she only remembered to check well into the second day, so the binding was extracting moisture from more than just the stalks for all that time.


    Fortunately, no one seemed to have figured it out. They only saw that she was able to cut the time it took to less than half of what it would have normally been, so Lori''s dignity remained intact. The farmers who had cracked open some of the vigas to check the state of the grain also said it hadn''t been hot enough to kill the seed, which¡­ was something that Lori had definitely remembered could happen, so she had made sure not to heat the grain too much! Yes, that was definitely what had happened¡­


    Over the next week, most of the demesne was involved in processing the stalks to get out all the grain and store them into the jars that had been made for them, which was much more efficient for storage. There was some grumbling at the short, fat stalks the vigas was on. According to Riz, the long, thin stalks that Lori was familiar with were usually used to make brooms, which helped with sweeping up the threshing floor to recover every bit of grain, as well as cleaning after the mess threshing made. Beast-feather brooms were apparently too stiff for the job. The blacksmiths had used their hammers to break the modified stalks into fibers pliant enough for sweeping so they''d gotten some new brooms out of it.


    Lori having done her part, stayed out of the way since what was being done was brute force manual labor, which didn''t really need her since there were enough bodies to throw at the problem. She went back to her routine of drying wood, excavating the third level for more stone to continue the construction of her Dungeon''s entrance, making ice for their arrangement with River''s Fork and solidified air for their own cold room, and beating Mikon in sunk and chatrang as she made more pieces to play lima with. By the end of the week, much of the vigas had been stored in jars in the storage shed.


    The next day, a week after the threshing began, in the middle of the afternoon, Lori felt bindings enter her demesne.


    Bindings she had made.


    After several weeks away, the Coldhold had finally returned.

 151 - Everything Back To Normal

    "Erzebed!"


    The name echoed in the air, and Lori winced. She''d forgotten to bind airwisps over her ears this time, and as a result they rang from the volume of the binding of airwisps she had just used to call for her temporary assistant. Lori go up from where she''d been sitting while curing wood and methodically deactivated and unbound the wisps she''d been maintaining. Best not to risk a fire by leaving it unattended. Lori grabbed her staff and started walking downhill to the river.


    Her temporary and hopefully soon-to-no-longer-be assistant met her partway down, again trying to conceal her annoyance. "Yes, Great Binder?" she said. Again, sounding like she was trying to be patient, and only sounding like she wasn''t patient.


    "Do we have anyone outside the demesne hunting beasts?"


    "No one went out today, Great Binder," Riz said. "We needed to get the last of the threshing done."


    Lori nodded. "Send a hunting party out. Let''s have roast for dinner."


    Riz blinked. "Now? I think they''ve already started the stew for dinner."


    "Then we''ll have both," Lori said dismissively. "See to it, Erzebed."


    Riz sighed loudly. "Yes, Great Binder," she said reluctantly. "I''ll see to it¡­ I suppose there''s still time to go out and catch something¡­"


    Lori nodded. "Good. I believe we''ll make tomorrow a rest day as well."


    Riz blinked, frowning a little. "Well¡­ I suppose we''re almost done¡­ but realistically Great Binder, we''ll still have to work tomorrow and maybe the next day to get everything done properly."


    "Tomorrow," Lori said. "That will be all, Erzebed."


    Riz closed her eyes for a moment and sighed again, but hurried off, her head turning from side to side as if looking for someone as she did so. She started calling out names as Lori continued walking downhill, heading for the river.


    It was a fine day, or so Lori thought to herself. She walked to the end of the stone dock on the Dungeon-side of the river and sat down on the edge, playing her staff next to her. The dock was empty, all the boats on the other side of the river on the other dock as people there cut up cut down ropeweed, planted the seeds that were on the stalks, and gathered up firewood to bring back over to this side. She let her feet dangle over the water, the soles just barely not touching the surface as she watched the dark shapes of small, fist-sized fursh too small to be worth catching to eat even compared to immature seels. They rummaged among the plants that had managed to take root in the mud that had started to build up after she''d built the dock, digging for slugs and little graspers and squids. Yes, so relaxing to just sit there and just watch the water go downriver, letting her gaze linger on the water as far as her eyes could see¡­


    Lori kicked her feet, most definitely not impatient. She was also most definitely not tempted to most definitely not increase the outputs on any of her bindings made of water. No, not at all.


    When the shape that she most definitely hadn''t been watching for appeared downriver, Lori didn''t stand up excitedly and therefore didn''t almost fall into the water, drown and die. After all, she was the Dungeon Binder. She obviously wouldn''t do something so foolish, and any pointed comments about rocks were about an isolated incident. No, she stood up with slow dignity, mildly surprised since she hadn''t been expecting anything to come up the river. No, not at all, she definitely hadn''t been expecting anything!


    Still, now that she saw something coming up the river, it behooved her to see what it was, lest it be something unwanted, like a raiding party from another demesne! After all, it was coming from downriver, and there was another demesne down there. You can''t trust another demesne. They weren''t you, after all.


    Lori heard a shout behind her, a cry that was taken up and started to spread, and soon her demesne was in an uproar as the Coldhold, the boat they had sent to the demesne of Covehold, became visible to people who didn''t happen to coincidentally be standing on the stone dock. Fortunately, there were few people outside, since most of them were in the second level threshing the vigas, but from the way some people ran into her Dungeon, that would change soon.


    Lori decided she''d rather not be on the dock when that happened, lest she get accidentally pushed off into the water. She stepped off the dock just as some excitable children rushed towards it for a better view. She glared at them, and they slowed down to let her pass before moving past her once the way was clear. She formed a seat next to one of the new walls creating the entryway to her Dungeon, careful not to destabilize the structure. She still hadn''t gotten around to adding bulwarks to the outside, but maybe she should soon¡­


    People started cheering when Coldhold was close enough to distinguish people, and the men on board started waving to those on shore. On the other side of the river, the few people who were visible had stopped in what they were doing and were cheering and waving at the boat as well. It was quite noisy, and Lori was glad she''d moved back from the dock, otherwise the amount of noise would have been extremely annoying. People started streaming out of the Dungeon, letting out exclamations as they saw the boat and joining the crowd in front of the dock. The boat started to slow, getting ready to move into the dock, which was becoming full of people¡­


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    "All right everyone, get back!" she heard a voice call out clearly from the boat. There was no binding of airwisps involved. The person speaking just knew how to make themselves be heard. "We need to use the dock, and everyone is crowding too much, someone might fall off. Please get back on shore, and we''ll come to you." A pause. "That means everyone, please. Come on, the longer this takes, the longer it will be before we can get off the ship!"


    People began to move off the dock, and people on the shore had to move back as a consequence. It wasn''t everyone in the demesne. She could feel some people, likely the smiths, loitering near the smithy by the voids of wisps they presented in her awareness of the demesne. There were also still people in the kitchens, likely still cooking the dinner stew, and a few people were washing clothes in the laundry area. Still, the space in front of the dungeon seemed full of people.


    The Coldhold finally maneuvered and slid into the dock, and someone moved across the walkway between the boat and one of its outriggers to step onto the dock and start tying up the boat so it didn''t drift away. Once that was done, people started getting off the boat, moving off the dock and heading towards the crowd. Then there were loud, tearful reunions and¡­ people recoiling? All right, she was pretty sure that there was something wrong when a man and a woman started embracing only for the woman to jump back holding her nose.


    "Oh, right. All right, clear a path everyone, clear a path! We ran out of soap a while back and have been washing with only cold water! To the baths everyone, even if they love you, no one is going to touch you the way we all smell now! Go, go, go! And can someone get us all some soap please?"


    Apparently the smell was very intense, because people not only parted, they gave the men disembarking from the Coldhold a lot of space. Some people actually did fall into the river, and it was only the fact it was still shallow there that prevented people from drowning. Still, the smell apparently wasn''t enough to discourage everyone, and some lucky people found themselves getting hugged, even if the person doing the hugging was clearly holding their breath. Someone presumably ran off to get them some soap. And, since the men all rushed into the baths not carrying anything, probably new clothes and toweling as well.


    Lori paused, frowning thoughtfully at that. Actually, where was all the demesne''s soap being made? She didn''t remember building a structure for them, and they weren''t in the second level¡­


    Well, something she could have Riz¡­ no, something she could have Rian find out for her!


    He was back. He was finally back. Her competent, useful, capable lord was back and now she could get things done again!


    Now that it was back inside her demesne, she could finally feel the relative positions of all the bindings that came together to make up the Coldhold. It took only a few moments to sort through, identify and deactivate the binding that powered the water jet driver that propelled it. Best not to leave it in a state it could be moved. A few of the children were already looking at the boat with interest. For that matter, so were some adults.


    Sighing, Lori looked around and was relieved to spot someone she recognized, walking over to them. "Umu," she said.


    The blonde weaver started in surprise, turning around stiffly to face Lori. "Y-your Bindership," she said.


    Lori pointed at the boat. "Keep anyone from getting onto that boat until Rian and the others are finished with their bath, all right? If they brought back anything for the demesne, I''d rather not have it mysteriously disappear all of a sudden."


    For a moment, Umu looked like she was going to refuse. Then she glanced towards the men''s bath and sighed. "Yes, your Bindership," she said, moving to stand on the dock


    Lori nodded in satisfaction, then walked away to go back to curing wood. After all, there was still an afternoon to work in, and it wasn''t like the people Riz had sent to get more meat had come back yet¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was sitting next to the curing shed maintaining the binding inside it when the brat suddenly walked up to her.


    "Wiz Lori," the girl said, "itay told me to tell you that Lord Rian had told tito Ralii to tell him to tell me that he needed clothes and you have all of his clean ones."


    That¡­ what?


    "What?" Lori said.


    "Itay told me to tell you that Lord Rian told tito Ralii to tell him to tell me that he needed clothes and that you had all his clean ones," the brat repeated dutifully.


    No¡­ it still made no sense.


    "Who needs clothes?" Lori said, trying to clarify some of the pronouns.


    "Lord Rian," the brat said. "He told tito Ralii, who told itay, who told me, and now I''m telling you."


    Ah¡­ well, that was helpful. "And¡­ why are you telling me this?"


    "Lord Rian told tito Ralii to tell itay to tell me that if you asked, he said it''s because he doesn''t have any clean clothes, and putting on the ones he had¡­ de-feats the pur-pose of taking a bath," the brat said with such painstaking care that it was probably a direct quote.


    Lori nodded, standing up as she deactivated the binding in the curing shed again. "All right. Follow me and I''ll give you what Rian needs. Then you can take it to him."


    "I''m supposed to give it to itay so he can give it to Lord Rian," the brat said. "Since Lord Rian is in the boys'' bath."


    "Ah. Well then, let''s do that."


    The brat nodded and followed Lori as she headed to her Dungeon where she''d been storing the things Rian had left behind in her care. Not even back a day and her lord was somehow finding work for her to do¡­ it would have been annoying if she wasn''t so relieved. Maybe she could finally get the third level turned into a farm over the winter¡­


    Rian was back, and everything was back to normal.

 152 - I Missed You Too

    Rian was the first out of the bathhouse, wearing a new set of clothes and holding a bundle of cloth that looked distinctly like a used set under one arm, the pack that he''d given Lori before he''d left over his shoulder. He headed to his house, putting the clothes and the pack on the table, sighing in relief. He looked around, seeming to note how clean everything was, sighed in what seemed to be relief, turned and then recoiled.


    Lori blinked at him. "What?" she said.


    "You were there?" he exclaimed, voice slightly high-pitched as if he just seen her drawing blood.


    Yes¡­? Obviously. "Yes, obviously," she said. Lori had most definitely not been loitering around the bath.


    Rian stared at her. "Did you follow me?"


    Of course she had. How else had she gotten here? "Of course I did," Lori said. "How else would I have gotten here? I saw you were done, so now we can talk."


    "We still need to unpack the Coldhold," Rian said. "Is this urgent?" He frowned. "Wait, did someone get murdered while we were gone? Is that it?"


    "No, of course not. Don''t be silly," Lori said. "If someone had gotten murdered, I''d be in my room with all the food as I waited for the murderer to die."


    Rian opened his mouth, paused, looked thoughtful, then opened his mouth again. "All the food?" he said.


    "How else is the murderer going to die?"


    "So, your plan for if a murder happens was to literally starve everyone else to death?" Rian said, sounding very much like her mothers.


    "What else can I do? It''s not like I can find out who did it," Lori pointed out reasonably.


    Rian stared at her. "Because finding out would require talking to people, which you don''t want to do, and you don''t trust anyone else to find out for you because they might be the murderer?"


    Lori nodded. "Exactly."


    "What, even Riz?"


    "Especially not Erzebed, if the person murdered was Umu."


    Rian sighed. For some reason, he started smiling a small, pained smile. "Yup, I''m definitely back." The smile widened slightly. "So, did you miss me?"


    "Yes, your competence was definitely missed." It had been, after all. "Now, I need you to get to work."


    Rian sighed again. "Can I have the day off to recover from the trip?" he asked.


    "No," Lori said. "You can do that some other time." Tomorrow was going to be a rest day, after all.


    "Ah, nothing like coming home to make you wish you were somewhere else wishing you were home." Rian had a look of resignation on his face, despite the fact he was still smiling a little. "All right, what do you need me to do?"


    "I had Erzebed go out and hunt some beasts to roast," Lori said. "She can handle the food. I need you to organize the celebration of the safe arrival of the Covehold expedition."


    Rian blinked. Slowly. It was just fast enough to not simply be him closing his eyes for a moment. "You¡­ want me to organize the celebration for our safe arrival¡­"


    "Yes," Lori said. "Upon consideration, Erzebed isn''t very good at it, so it will have to be you. You have until the hunting party comes back with meat to properly organize it, otherwise it will likely start regardless, and then it will be a chaotic mess."


    Rian looked towards the ceiling. "All right. Can I unpack the boat while I think it over?"


    She gave him an unamused look. "Rian, I am not letting you procrastinate to solve the problem."


    "I''m not procrastinating! I need to think about it, and I might as well be productive while I''m doing it."


    Lori stared at him, then nodded. "Fine. Yes, be productive." She tried to think of anything else she needed to inform him about. There were several, but getting to them now would take too long. "Actually, did you bring back anything?" Her eyes narrowed. "How much did it cost? Are there any beads left?"


    "Yes, we have beads left," Rian said. "And yes, I got you new boots, new underwear and new socks. I hope you appreciate how embarrassing it was for me to buy women''s underwear for you."


    "I appreciate it," Lori acknowledged.


    "I''ll organize what I found into a report and get it to you," Rian said. "But tomorrow."


    "Yes, yes," Lori said, "but what did you bring back?"


    Rian grinned. "I got you a nice book I''m sure you''ll like."


    She gave him an unamused look. "Rian, you had better not have wasted our beads on lewd illustrations."


    "Wha¡­ NO! I got you a little almanac that was being published locally. It has notes on local species, edible foods, things like that, but the reason I got it for you is because there''s a section on magic that the Dungeon Binders and wizards around Covehold and the demesnes around have been finding useful. I skimmed it, and a lot of them seemed very useful and fun to use. There were also some illustrations and things I didn''t understand which I''m hoping you did, since it seemed to be a description of how to actually make the magic in question. To be honest, I have no idea what any of it means, since it''s all in weird notations, but I figure you''d know. I even got it packaged in glass to bring it to you so that it wouldn''t get iridiated and damaged, which was expensive¡­ but you wanted glass too, right?"


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    "Those were probably flow diagrams," Lori said, but her eyes were wide with excitement. If it was public knowledge, there was probably nothing truly amazing in the almanac, since anyone who had managed to innovate something like that would keep it to themselves, but if they were useful¡­ besides, she''d been starved of reading material that wasn''t something Rian had written even before she''d founded her demesne! At this point she''d have read anything, even those obviously made up stories included in lewd illustrations!


    Well, only one or two, they were boring and repetitive and she''d never seen the point of them, but they''d be words in a narrative order and she was desperate.


    "I''ll give it to you later, it''s buried under all the medicines and medical supplies and seed crops," Rian said. "Don''t give me that look, I need to supervise unloading a boat while trying to plan a celebration. I''m already doing a lot."


    Lori huffed. "Fine. Be quick."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said cheerfully. It was that obfuscating cheer that she suspected was occasionally false.


    Lori nodded, hesitated, then turned to go. "Well, welcome back," she said, dismissing him with a wave.


    "Hey, Lori?"


    She stopped and looked back towards Rian. "Yes?"


    "I missed you too."


    She frowned at him. "Too?"


    For some reason, Rian rolled his eyes. "Well, I have things to do and you''re distracting me."


    "You''re the one who called me back!"


    "Yes, yes, this is my fault, I''m aware."


    Lori nodded curtly, turning and leaving the house. She turned and headed for the bone pit to get some teeth. Rian was back, and she had to finish making lima pieces so she could utterly defeat him with her new game board¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian went straight to the Coldhold, only barely slowed down from waving at everyone he passed and saying a few words to them. By the end of it, there was a small group of men with him, who followed him to the boat as Lori sat on the seat she''d made next to the addition at her Dungeon''s entrance. He slowed down a little when he saw Umu on the dock. Lori couldn''t hear what they said, since she was minding her own business and extracting the enamel from the teeth and separating it from the bone, but they talked briefly, and there was a lot of nodding on both sides. Then Rian waved at Umu for some reason, even though he was standing right in front of her, and stepped around her, moving hurriedly towards the boat. Lori got the sense that the men around him were amused. That sense was greatly helped by the big smiles and audible laughter as Umu walked away, heading hurriedly back to Lori''s Dungeon.


    "Umu," she said as the woman was about to pass her.


    The weaver jerked to a stop. "Yes, your Bindership?" she said.


    "I assume you kept anyone from trying to get on board the boat."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "Good work. I assume you''ll be returning to the table now that Rian is back?"


    The weaver''s face reddened some more. "Yes, your Bindership," she said almost defiantly.


    Another nod. "Well, I''ll tell you the same thing I told the other two." Though, come to think of it, she hadn''t really told Mikon, had she? She''d have to remedy that, that woman was the most actually capable of flirting of the three, and therefore was the one most likely to be distracting. "Whatever you have in mind, don''t let it get in the way of Rian''s duties, understood? Your desires are far less important than the continued survival of the demesne. Am I clear?"


    A stiff nod. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "Good luck, then." She dismissed the woman with a wave as she continued.


    Umu stood there for a moment before wandering off. Lori wasn''t sure if she was weaving or helping with the threshing or something else. Well, not her problem.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The hunting party came back before sunset, with their own handcart of meat that, given it had been out in the open air and was probably full of dustlife, would probably all be roasted, lest it go bad. The cookfire and bonfires were already lit and ready, and some tables and benches had been carried out of the dining halls. The lightwisps she''d bound to the corners of homes were just starting to become visible, and the Coldhold had been unpacked, the contents stored in one of the alcoves of the second level. Lori had needed to raise a wall in front of it to close it off so that things wouldn''t be ''misplaced''. Rian had actually asked her to do it, a notable departure from his usual almost naively trusting nature.


    "I''m not taking any chances," Rian said with overblown grimness as she built the wall with stone, building a little doorway that she would block off with a boulder, mostly because it would keep her from forgetting where it was. "The boys and I sailed a long way over dillian-infested waters to get those things, I''m not letting any of it get lost." The shudder that came next seemed more genuine. "One followed us around for a day and kept bumping into the hull. At that point we pushed the ship as fast as it would go".


    That¡­ actually did seem fairly terrifying. Lori remembered seeing dillians sunning themselves on the surface of the ocean on the crossing, and they had looked intimidating from the safety of the large, fast-moving boat. She didn''t'' want to think of what it would have been like to encounter them on the much smaller Coldhold.


    Riz had gone with the hunting party, which explained why she hadn''t immediately presented herself to Lori asking if her tenure as temporary assistant was over. Because when the hunting party arrived and Riz saw the Coldhold being unloaded, she immediately sought out Lori.


    "Great Binder!" she declared, skidding to a stop in front of Lori.


    "Don''t run down the stairs, it''s dangerous," Lori said reflexively.


    "Great Binder, you said this was a temporary position. Rian''s back, so that means I''m done, right?"


    "Not yet," Lori said, pausing in her construction. "You''re not done until you report everything that''s happened to Rian and inform him of everything he''s missed."


    "But then I''m finished, right?"


    "Yes, yes, then you''re done."


    Riz sighed happily, then turned with a bright smile towards Rian, who''d been standing nearby and completely ignored. She opened her mouth.


    "Later," Lori interrupted. "Rian is busy."


    "EH?-! But¡­ But¡­"


    "You''re still working for me Erzebed," Lori said. "Go and make sure dinner gets done."


    "Come on," Rian said. "We can help make sure all the plates are ready and you can start telling me what I missed, how about that?"


    Riz blinked, looking torn, but sighed and started to smile. "Sure."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Don''t waste time flirting," she said, going back to finishing the wall.


    "I wasn''t flirting!"


    Lori gave Rian a flat look. "I wasn''t talking to you."


    "I''m pretty sure she wasn''t flirting either."


    Her look didn''t change, but she glanced at her temporary-and-soon-to-cease-to-be assistant. Then she shook her head. "Just get to work, you two. I don''t want a repetition of the No-Plate Crisis of Eventually."


    "Yes, your Bindership!" Rian said brightly. "Go up without me Riz, I''ll catch up."


    Riz nodded, turned and headed up.


    There was silence for a moment.


    "So¡­ you''re avoiding the issue?" Lori said as she finished building the wall, and started to make a boulder to block the hole with.


    "I''m¡­ procrastinating?" Rian said, looking embarrassed.


    "That turned out terribly last time. Find a different solution."


    A sigh. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "And don''t let this interfere with your duties, understood?"


    "Very clearly, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "If you need advice on how to prevent it from interfering with your duties, ask Riz. She managed to get her duties done while being constantly flirted at."


    "I''ll remember¡ªwait, what?"


    "What I said. Now stop procrastinating and get to work, or the dinner celebrating your arrival will turn out terribly. Go, get moving."


    "What happened while I was gone?" Rian said, sounding incredulous, but he did as he was ordered, muttering to himself.


    Lori hummed to herself as she finished the boulder, securing the spoils from Covehold. Then she went upstairs to clean her stone plate in preparation for the meat to come.

 153 - Were Home

    "We''re home!" Rian declared from the bench he was on standing where everyone in the space in front of her Dungeon could see him, raising a wooden cup in the air. This banal statement was followed by cheers. "We''ve finally had a hot bath!" This time the cheers were mainly from the men who''d left with him, but they cheered very loudly. "With soap!" More cheers of agreement. "Now let''s eat and just stay in bed tomorrow! No having to go get up and get wet just to keep those stupid glittering colors from getting into our brains!"


    The sudden unexpected vulgarities earned a laugh, and then Rian was getting down from the bench and sitting down on it properly, sighing, then drinking the cold water from his cup like it was something stronger. He leaned against the stone wall next to Lori, his eyes closed, looking like he intended to just fall asleep. "Ah," he sighed in a more normal volume. "That''s the stuff. Cold, clean, not-distilled water¡­"


    Lori nodded in agreement. Heat distilled water tasted horrible.


    There probably hadn''t been a lot of organizing to do, but there was something about knowing that Rian was taking care of it that made the circumstances¡­ better. At least, Lori thought so, and hers was the only opinion that mattered in her demesne. There was a festive, happy mood to everything that she didn''t think would have been possible if Riz had handled things. People were actually dancing, but since it was getting dark, there was no music. Instead, people clapped to keep rhythm and sang together, which was still loud but at least didn''t bring back horrible recollections of dragon shelter parties. Usually the confines had been too tight for that, so music had been the irritant of choice, and had mostly drowned out the singing. If anyone had danced to it, it hadn''t been scarred into Lori''s mind.


    Riz came, bearing Lori''s stone plate in one hand and a pair of wooden plates in the other, both of which contained cuts of roasted beast meat. The stone plate clearly had cuts of tail meat, as well as smaller cuts that Lori identified as choker tails. Lori took her plate and started eating as Riz sat down next to Rian, putting him between her and Lori.


    "Hmm?" Rian ''hmm''-ed, opening his eyes and blinking as he saw the plate Riz was holding out to him. "You didn''t have to do that¡­"


    "I have been doing your duties for weeks," Riz said. "Take the plate, you deserve to not have to go and get it."


    "That still means you had to go and get it," Rian pointed out, but accepted the plate.


    "Yes, but the Great Binder promised this was a temporary position," Riz said. "You, however, are lord for life."


    "Then¡­ thank you," Rian said. He gave her a thankful smile, then started to eat.


    The three of them ate quietly to the sounds of singing and dancing and absolutely no music.


    "So¡­ anything you want to say to me, your Bindership?" Rian said. "Anything you want to tell me to do?"


    Lori finished chewing a succulently soft, fatty and absolutely delicious bite and swallowed. "Be quiet and let me eat."


    "Aaand that''s my due diligence done," Rian said cheerfully, turning towards Riz. "Anything interesting happen while I was gone?"


    "We had the harvest," Riz said. "And the Great Binder found a way to dry the stalks so we could thresh everything after only a day."


    "Of course she did," Rian nodded. "And here I was thinking the part of the almanac I brought explaining how a Whisperer can do just that would have been important information to get here as soon as possible."


    Lori looked up from her food. "That''s in the almanac?"


    "Maybe," Rian said, drawing out the word in an annoying way that reminded Lori of one of her mothers and crushing disappointment. The answer was never ''yes''. "I don''t want to spoil the experience of reading the book and making amazing discoveries for you."


    "Your almanac is probably useless and you got scammed," Lori predicted darkly.


    "No, I kept asking random wizards if the book was legitimate and showing them the insides," Rian said. "So it''s the real thing and you''ll probably like it, so I''m not spoiling it for you. And what happened to ''be quiet and let me eat''?"


    Lori considered it and agreed eating was more important right then. She focused back on her food.


    "And that''s us being ignored again¡­" Rian said dryly. "So, harvest¡­ not enough to feed everyone?"


    "Not even close, even if we don''t take any seed vigas for the winter crop," Riz said. "We have tubers, and some wild roots that seem to be growing regardless of the season, but¡­ well, we''ll mostly be eating meat this winter."


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    Lori made a happy sound


    "That is apparently not an unpleasant fate," Rian said dryly. "Well, if worse comes to worse, we can find a way to negotiate for vigas from River''s Fork, unless people are willing to part with the grain they secretly have hidden."


    "No," Lori said, wondering how he knew about the little bag of grain.


    "You know about that?" Riz said, sounding surprised and guilty.


    "This is the part where I''d say something like ''you just told me'', but practically there was no way people would have left all the grain in River''s Fork," Rian said easily.


    Lori blinked as she realized what Rian was saying, and leveled a glare at Riz.


    "Oh, don''t blame her, you''re the one who didn''t think of what should have been really obvious," Rian said. "As if they''d leave all the food behind while they didn''t know how far away our demesne was upriver."


    "My demesne," Lori corrected. "There''s more vigas?"


    "It can only last for so long," Rian said. "Eventually they''ll either have to plant it or eat it, especially since preparing food with it is pretty hard."


    "Every house in the demesne has a fireplace now," Lori pointed out.


    Rian blinked and looked around in the fading light. "Huh? Where?"


    "In the back."


    Rian stared at the houses, but all the doors were pointed towards them, so the chimneys weren''t obvious, and none of them had smoke rising from them. "Huh¡­ all right, that admittedly makes it easier¡­"


    "Erzebed," Lori said flatly.


    "Yes, Great Binder?" Riz said, audibly cringing.


    "Your people. Deal with this."


    "Yes, Great Binder¡­ uh, how?"


    Lori stared at her.


    "Right, my job to figure it out¡­" She glanced sideways at Rian next to her.


    "You''re learning," Rian said brightly. "I''d offer to help¡­ but if they didn''t tell me before, they probably won''t tell me now."


    Riz sighed. "Are we going to be forced to give it to the demesne?"


    "That''s not the question," Rian said.


    "It''s not?"


    "The question is¡­ how will people react to finding out you''ve been holding back food that could have helped everyone¡­ compared to how they will react when they find out because you bring it up yourselves. While it''s your private property and definitely falls under the protections of our laws and rights¡­ will people resent you for it when they find out?"


    "You''re here. This was supposed to be a temporary position until you got back¡­" Riz sighed.


    "I could," Rian said, making Lori look up with a frown, as did Riz. "After you catch me up on how the demesne''s been doing, you can stop. That probably falls under the definitely of ''figuring out how''. But do you trust me to do it right?"


    Riz stared at him then sighed. "I''ll talk to people¡­"


    Rian smiled for some reason and turned towards Lori. "You know, you''re very good at choosing lords. Certainly better than I am."


    Lori raised her eyebrow. "Of course I am," she said.


    "Any chance of making her permanent?" Rian said with a toothy grin as Riz suddenly went wide-eyed..


    "No," Lori said instantly, making the pink-haired woman sigh in relief and glare at Rian for a moment. "This is a temporary arrangement for the duration of you not being here."


    "What about the next time I have to leave?"


    "I''m locking you up in your house," Lori said.


    "I''ll help," Riz added.


    "I''m not leaving until at least spring," Rian said. "I like the hot water bathing and cold water drinking far too much."


    Lori nodded. "Then we''re all agreed, you''re not leaving. I''m sure Erzebed, Mikon and Umu will be quite happy with that."


    Riz coughed and looked away.


    "So, I see you finally put outdoor lighting everywhere!" Rian said loudly. "That''s great! Everything''s starting to look civilized, plus it''s probably safer at night! People can see where they''re going and without the cover of night, there are less likely to be inclined towards minor mischiefs that might turn into crimes. There''s a reason lit streets are a mark of civilization, after all. It makes people stay civil."


    Lori blinked. That¡­ hadn''t occurred to her. "Of course. That''s why I did it," she said.


    "Though I have to ask¡­ what''s this thing?" Rian said, knocking on the wall they were all leaning against.


    "It''s the defensible air intake we discussed after the last dragon," Lori said, mildly annoyed he didn''t remember, especially since it had mostly been his idea.


    Rian blinked, craning his head back to look up at the wall. "Oh¡­ Okay, now I can see it." He looked around. "We might have to make a new space for these big public gatherings, especially when we get more people. Maybe across the river? You could build a bridge¡­ or maybe a tunnel, that might be easier. Just go under the river¡­"


    "We''ll see," Lori said flatly.


    "Oh look, space to sit," and Mikon sat down next to Riz. She was holding a plank of wood that had five bowls of stew on it. "Stew, everyone? Also, Riz, you left your plank lying around."


    "Did you erase anything?" Riz asked urgently.


    "No, the bowls are on the side without writing, and I''ve been holding it all up," Mikon said.


    Lori leaned towards the bowls. "Move," she said, and Riz and Rian leaned back, letting her reach past them and grab one of the bowls. She placed the stew next to her, got one of the drier-looking slices of roast meat¡ªwhich wasn''t really all that dry¡ªand dipped it into the stew, getting it nice and covered before popping it into her mouth, the fatty juices mixed with the mushroom broth base to add new taste.


    Riz and Rian also accepted bowls for themselves¡ª"Thanks, Mikon. You didn''t have to¡­"¡ªand there was a moment''s confusion as they all tried to juggle having a plate and a bowl before Riz just cleared a space on her plate and put the bowl there. Rian looked amused at that for some reason, but imitated her.


    "Welcome back, Rian," Mikon said before she started eating her stew. "We missed you."


    "I missed being home too," Rian said. "But I''m back now, so Riz can stop needing to do my job soon."


    "It¡­ wasn''t just me," Riz admitted. "Mikon helped me a lot. I don''t know how you manage to do it by yourself."


    "I had some free time to be generous with," Mikon said modestly. She reached up and put a hand on Riz''s shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. "I was glad to help."


    Rian eyed the hand for a moment, a bemused look on his face.


    "Rian," Lori said. "Water."


    Her lord blinked, glancing at her, then at his own cup. "Right, right. Hold on, I''ll get you some¡­" He stood up and headed for a nearby table where the wooden cups and the jars of water were laid out.


    "I''ll reiterate, and Mikon, I''m officially warning you," Lori said. "I don''t care what nonsense you get up to as long as it doesn''t impede Rian from performing his duties properly."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said with a nod.


    "Of course, your Bindership," Mikon said. "I would never have assumed otherwise."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Carry on."


    She went back to eating.

 154 - Leaving The Silliness To Rian

    "Thank you for the kind words," Mikon told Riz as Lori ate, ignoring them. "That wasn''t necessary, but it was nice. But you really need to be more forward if you want to flirt with Rian properly. He''s a bit dense."


    Riz turned to give the other woman an incredulous look. "Are you actually giving me advice?"


    Mikon shrugged. "I''ve been helping you so far, I see no reason to change that now."


    "Does this mean you''ve given up on him?" Riz said hopefully.


    "Why would I?" Mikon said with a cheerful smile.


    Riz was making a very strange face. "I suppose this means we''re rivals again," she said, sounding reluctant.


    "Well, no need to start now," Mikon said. "So, about being more forward¡ª"


    "You''re still giving me advice?"


    "Do you not want it?"


    Riz looked torn, then sighed. "Fine, I''m listening¡­"


    "Now, my advice is to touch him as often as you can," Mikon said. "Appropriately, of course. Give him a pat on the back, on the shoulder, things like that. Get him used to you touching him casually."


    Riz frowned. "How is that being more forward?"


    "Well, you can skip ahead to holding hands, but do you feel confident enough to go straight there?"


    "¡­ all right, I get your point¡­ " Riz said, then paused. She glanced at her shoulder with the hand on it.


    Mikon gave her shoulder another squeeze.


    Riz rolled her eyes. "Oh, very funny, I see the joke now." She sighed. "I almost believed you for a moment there."


    Mikon leaned forward and gave her a quick peck on the cheek. "Believe what you will, Riz," she said, taking off her hand and going back to eat.


    Riz stared at her, one hand snapping up her face, which was slowly reddening. "Okay, I''ve been ignoring it, but I think we need to talk about¡ª"


    She cut off abruptly as Rian came back with four cups of water and Umu in tow. "Water, anyone?" he offered as Lori grabbed one of the cups and started drinking. Ah, cold, clean water¡­


    "Thank you, Rian," Mikon said, taking a cup herself and drinking from it. "Hello, Umu. Sit with us?" She patted the bench next to her.


    Umu watched as Rian sat back down on the bench between Riz and Lori and seemingly tried to gauge if she would fit in the space next to Rian, before Lori put her cup there. The blonde hesitated another moment before sighing and accepting Mikon''s offer, sitting next to the other weaver. Umu had her own cup of water and a bowl that seemed to be filled with both stew and cut pieces of roast meat.


    People started eating again as the singing and clapping continued, the voices changing as those who''d been singing before grew tired. Lori finished the food in her plate and her bowl and debated whether to get more helpings¡­ Or at least, make Rian do it. Or Riz, she was there too¡­


    "So¡­ about tomorrow, your Bindership" Rian began.


    Lori blinked, startled out of her contemplation. "What?"


    "Tomorrow," Rian said. "Riz said you suddenly declared tomorrow a rest day? Even though the threshing isn''t finished yet?"


    Lori shrugged. "Anyone who wants to continue threshing or doing any sort of work tomorrow may. For everyone else, it''s optional."


    "Officially optional," Rian said, nodding. "Ah."


    Riz sighed. "I''ll have to tell everyone that, won''t i?"


    It should really be obvious with how everything isn''t finished yet. "It should really be obvious with how everything isn''t finished yet," Lori said. She decided to let her stomach settle a little before getting more food and turned to Rian. "Besides, I''d have thought you''d want to have a day without work interfering to be able to talk to Erzebed about what you need to know."


    "Ah. And what will you be doing?"


    "Going through the things that you brought back," Lori said.


    "I feel compelled to point out that some of that stuff was bought with beads provided by other people in the demesne, at their request and for their use," Rian pointed out.


    "Noted. So I will decide if they will be requisitioned by the government."


    Rian sighed. "As your lord that you put in charge of ''dealing with people things'', I feel it''s my duty to point out that''s a terrible idea, sets a horrible precedent¡ªand yes, I know how you feel about precedent but I''m mentioning it anyway¡ªand would be bad for morale. Also, you have nothing they''d accept as restitution, except maybe land, and you''ve made your opinion on that clear."


    "Also noted. I''m still going through them. Consider it a customs inspection."


    Rian gave her a sideways look, literally and figuratively. "So¡­ you''re not requisitioning, you''re taking customs duties."


    Oh! What an excellent idea! Lori was glad she''d thought of it. "An excellent idea. I''m glad I thought of it."


    Rian rolled his eyes for some reason. "You realize that means whatever item you take duties for, some more than half of it needs to reach the person who asked me to buy it, right? There''s no customs duty that costs more than the actual product in question, after all. It''s usually a percentage of the listed or assessed value. Also, I need a filter."


    Lori blinked, then frowned in confusion at the unrelated sentence. "What?"


    "I need a filter," Rian repeated patiently. "Maybe a very fine cloth or something. We need it to act as a filter for passing water through the evaporator, so that only water gets into the storage tank. Having Iridescence start growing in the tank was expected, and passing through the demesne took care of that, but all sorts of little bits that had been floating in the water also fell in. Sorting it out by hand will be a mess. Much better to try to keep them from getting in in the first place."


    "If it''s a cloth, you have a pair of weavers right there. They would know better than I would," Lori pointed out. "What does that have to do with anything?"


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    "Well, the ocean''s not that far away¡­" Rian said. "All right, it''s still pretty far, but in comparison, to Covehold, not that far. We had to go around a long peninsula first, and coming in from the water the mouth of the bay is kind of hard to see, which probably explains why no one else is around here except for River''s Fork. But a day or two¡­ three at most if the water jet driver isn''t going on all holes, a day spent just filling up containers with salt, and we''d have enough for eating, tanning and selling to Covehold. Granted, it doesn''t sell for much, but it''s enough to make the trip worth it, especially since Covehold can''t make it themselves. The water around them is too dirty. They dumped too much stuff into the water."


    "Fascinating," Lori said blandly. "Tell me the rest in your report the day after tomorrow."


    "Why then? Why not tomorrow?"


    "Do you feel prepared to give me a concise report tomorrow?"


    "The day after it is, then!"


    Lori nodded. She was, she decided, no longer hungry. She finished the water in her cup and stood up. "Best use tonight to best advantage," she said. "I''m going to sleep. Heed what I said."


    Rian blinked. "Wait, you''re going to sleep?" He looked up at the sky, where three of the four moons were already rising. "Already? It''s not even that late yet."


    "Yes, well, I see no point in staying awake, or watching you deal with the silliness that follows," Lori said.


    Rian frowned. "What silliness?"


    Lori gave him a look at his revealing he hadn''t stopped being any more of an idiot while he was gone, then turned her gaze towards the three women next to him. "Be civil," she reminded them again, leaving her stew bowl on the bench, and began heading towards her Dungeon.


    After she passed, Umu promptly stood up and moved towards the suddenly free space next to Rian, taking hold of his arm and pressing it firmly against her front that she leaned towards him. "Welcome back, Rian," she said, kissing him on the cheek.


    Riz, seeing this, pressed closer to Rian and then nervously placed a hand on his shoulder. She didn''t say anything, simply kissed his other cheek determinedly, as if she could push Umu away by putting effort from her side. Behind her, Mikon rolled her eyes and reached over to correct the positioning of Riz''s hand, placing her own hand atop it for good measure. She also leaned forward, pushing Riz up against Rian even more, while the weaver''s other hand came to rest on the still-temporary-assistant''s knee. That was all Lori managed to see as she rounded the edge of the new entryway and headed inside of her Dungeon to her room.


    "So, Rian," Lori heard Mikon say breathily, though in practice the weaver was probably blowing into Riz''s ear as she said it, "have you been thinking of us while you were gone?"


    There was a surprised yelp from Riz. "That was my neck!"


    "Oh, sorry, I missed," Mikon said cheerfully. "Move a little, please?"


    Rian should be fine. He was a grown man. And if he was afraid of them ravishing him, well, he could jump into the river and avoid them with his strange ability to swim.


    "M-maybe we should all sit down and t-talk about this like adults first? In private?" she heard Rian say, voice slightly muffled. "Please?


    "I agree, we should talk about this!" Riz said before Lori was too far to hear anything over the sounds of singing, dancing, and now the laughter and encouragement that was coming from the rest of the crowd as they saw Rian''s situation.


    Humming to herself, Lori went up to her room, ignoring the people sitting around the dining hall and either doing their own rendition of what was happening to Rian or just playing board games. She took a moment to check with her awareness, but there was no one in the second or third levels, or anyone hiding in the cold rooms, or in the hallway with the treasure rooms. Good, there didn''t seem to be any trouble going on. Anyone who were doing more seemed to be in the Um, their own home, or at least out of her sight. She''d¡­ well, she wouldn''t allow it, but she wouldn''t bother to patrol for it right now.


    She wondered if she should go and ask for that almanac Rian had mentioned. It would be nice to have something new to read before bed. Or anything to read before bed at all, save for that list on the ceiling for something or other. But it had been a long day, and she was tired. Sealing the hallway behind her, she closed her door, put aside her stone plate to wash later, and got ready for bed.


    A thought occurred to her, and she considered putting it off¡­ but no, if she didn''t she might be forced to sit around waiting tomorrow¡­


    Sighing, Lori put her clothes back on, pulled on her boots¡ªwhich now felt uncomfortable since she''d just managed to get her feet out of them¡ªand headed downstairs, again sealing the hallways behind her.


    No one had suddenly started playing music just because she''d left, which¡­ was slightly unexpected. She''d assumed they''d do just that, had left so she had an excuse not to hear it¡­ but if they didn''t, they didn''t. She felt glad about that, for some reason.


    The bench up against the outside of the entryway wall was empty. She frowned, looking around, then chided herself and looked towards Rian''s house. Sure enough there was a light there, a bright, even light that stayed still and looked to be coming from the vicinity of the table in the house. Rian still had the stone she''d bound lightwisps to. Trudging towards it, she heard someone saying, "¡ªnever even kissed a girl before, much less held hands! Mothers and sisters don''t count¡ª"


    She pushed open the door. "Rian," she said.


    Rian cut off what he was staying, and everyone turned to look at Lori.


    "Er, yes, your Bindership?" he said from where he was standing in a corner of the house, Riz and Umu arrayed in front of him, the three forming the points of a triangle as Mikon bustled about, retrieving Rian''s bedroll.


    "Just to be clear, I expect you at breakfast tomorrow," she said as Mikon put down the bedroll on the bed behind the three and began to unroll it. "Even if it is a rest day."


    "Noted, your Bindership," he said as the two women in front of him exchanged exasperated looks, then quickly tore their gazes from each other.


    She nodded, turned to leave, then paused. "Also, thank you for the board," she added. "It has been very enjoyable."


    "Also noted, your Bindership." Riz was making a face that said she was trying to be patient, and was only managing to make face, while Umu was scowling with her arms crossed under her breasts.


    Lori contemplated the tableau and shrugged. "Remember, you have no shutters and there are children about."


    "W-we''re just talking, your Bindership!"


    "So there would be no need for me to obscure the windows so no one can see inside?"


    Everyone blinked, Mikon looking up from where she was laying out the bedroll on the bed.


    "Don''t look surprised. It''s in my interest to ensure Rian has reasons to not leave the demesne," she said.


    "Please your Bindership," Mikon said with a cheerful smile as she finished rolling out the bedroll.


    "Wait, what do you mean plea¡ªwhy did you make the bed?-!"


    "So we have somewhere to sit, of course," Mikon said cheerfully. "Standing for a long, serious talk is so uncomfortable." She made a show of sitting at one of the corners of the bed, arranging her skirts modestly. She gestured towards the other corners. "Come on, let''s all sit and talk about this after her Bindership leaves."


    Lori finished binding darkwisps over the windows, preventing people from seeing inside but allowing sound to exit. She turned to leave.


    "Wait, you''re leaving?-!" Rian exclaimed.


    "I''d rather not be around for this nonsense," she said. "It''s the sort of thing that makes me dislike dealing with people. Physical attraction and the things people do because of it¡­" She shook her head. "It''s all so absurd and pointless. I leave those things to you, Rian. Tell me in the morning how it goes."


    "But¡­"


    "And if any of you three touch him without Rian''s express approval after this, I will consider that assault upon my lord''s person and execute you all in the most violent manners I can imagine," Lori continued, her tone not changing. "I allowed you to express yourselves so that Rian would finally understand. He does. Now, you will convince him with words, because this is a civilized demesne. Is that understood?"


    Silence.


    "I said, is that understood?" Lori repeated calmly.


    "Yes, your Bindership/Great Binder!" three women hurriedly exclaimed as Rian looked at her with an expression she couldn''t identify.


    Lori directed her gaze towards the pink-haired weaver. "Mikon, is this understood?" she said, face utterly serious.


    Mikon nodded stiffly. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded, then raised a hand and touched her thumb to the lowest joint on of her first finger significantly. One. "Good. Rian, I''ll deal with your hypocrisy about this in the morning. In the meantime, I believe you had something to discuss?"


    She left and headed back to her room.


    She''d probably done something people thought was wrong. Rian would know. Her mothers would know. If she bothered to think about it, she''d probably know.


    She didn''t care. This was her demesne¡ªLori''s Demesne¡ªand she could finally tell people what to do, so she would. What she knew was right would prevail now, not the nonsense that other people told her was what was right.


    Still, as she lay in bed and dimmed the lightwisps after washing her plate, she found herself starring at her chatrang/lima/pincer game board and wishing she''d had one last game before Mikon started hating and avoiding her.

 155 - First Morning Back

    The next morning, Lori expected to be eating alone with only, at best, Rian for company.


    Not that she cared. She was used to eating alone. There were no inane expectations of conversation that way.


    The dining hall of her Dungeon was quiet that morning. There were the usual smells of food, but from what she could see not all the kitchen staff were there cooking, and there were only a few people sitting at the tables.


    Lori walked to her table, stepping over the bench on her side so she could sit down. Not for the first time, she considered getting rid of the bench and getting a proper chair, with a proper back for her to lean on and a side-rack for her staff¡­ but it was a lot of effort for something she only used for meals. So the bench it was¡­


    She was in the middle of doing basic breathing exercises to pass the time and simply feel magic filling and flowing through her when Rian slipped into the bench opposite her. Lori focused her gaze on him, noting the slightly wet hair, and the same clothes from last night. "Rian," she nodded, letting the magic fill the breath in her lungs, bound to the airwisps there, expelled on her breath.


    "Lori," he replied.


    For a moment, they sat in silence.


    "Can we both just go back to sleep?" Rian suggested. "Because I really want to go back to bed to sleep in for my first day back."


    "You can go back to sleep after breakfast," Lori said. "Though how you think you can go to sleep after taking a bath, I don''t know."


    "It''s the principle of the thing," Rian insisted. "After coming back from somewhere, the next day is for recovering."


    "Today is a rest day," she pointed out.


    "Yes, well, it sort of defeats the point of resting when you wake up this early. You should be allowed to sleep in until noon. Midmorning, at the very least."


    "You had all of last night to sleep," Lori said. She raised an eyebrow. "Unless you stayed up late and therefore did not get as much sleep as you could have?"


    Rian didn''t respond. The silence lingered.


    "There''s a lot of things I want to say to you," Rian finally said, staring down at the table''s surface. "Some things I probably shouldn''t. Some I probably should. I want to say you overreacted last night¡­" He sighed. "But when you walked in¡­ I was literally backed into a corner."


    "I saw. It was why I did it. Were you really so frightened of two women?"


    "I¡­ don''t know anymore," Rian said quietly. "I wasn''t really scared, more like I was¡­ overwhelmed? Overwhelmed and trying to get away so I finally could think about it¡­"


    "So, the whole time you were away, you didn''t think about it?"


    Rian blushed and looked away.


    "You. Idiot." Lori declared.


    "I was¡­ no, nothing I say can make that look good," Rian admitted. "Yes, I was an idiot. I have no excuse. I just¡­ I''d get my hopes up, then I''d think what I was thinking was stupid, I''d make excuses, and¡­ well, it was easier on my mind to not think about it."


    "You. Idiot."


    "Yes, I am," Rian nodded. "But last night I finally thought about it and we talked about it and¡­" He blushed slightly, looking aside. "All right, first off, I want you to know officially that those three have my express approval to touch me. And so does everyone else in the whole world, from the beginning of time to the end, so please don''t threaten to kill anyone like that on my behalf again. Please. It''s the sort of thing that makes people terrified of shaking hands or helping me up if I fall or think that they''ll be killed if they accidentally trip and nudge me. I can do my duty a lot easier when people don''t have to be afraid of making physical contact with me, which translates as being more convenient for you."


    Lori tilted her head, then nodded. "Noted then. I will not summarily execute people who touch you."


    "I''m sure they''ll appreciate that." Rian paused. "Thank you for speaking on my behalf. It was overkill, but that''s how you do things. Still, thank you."


    "Of course. You''re my lord. I still have a use for you."


    "I''ll add I have no expectation of you not doing it to anyone who touches you," Rian said, "but as your lord in charge of talking to people, I strongly recommend that people you plan to kill at least get a ''get your hands off me'' so they can save themselves. Maybe a ''get your hands off me or else I''ll kill you'' so they know you mean it. And make an exception for genuine accidents?"


    "I''d have thought all that should be obvious," Lori said.


    "Yes, well, after your declaration last night, I thought that it probably wouldn''t be safe to assume," Rian said.


    Lori considered that. "No need. Everyone is acting as they should. There''s no reason to correct anything."


    "Wow. That actually sounds like you don''t think everyone around you are idiots anymore."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Of course not everyone around me are idiots. Some of them are skilled craftsmen and craftswomen. And those who are idiots have been acting less idiotic."


    "That''s probably won''t last," Rian said dryly.


    "No, probably not," Lori agreed.


    Rian smiled at that for some reason. "You know, sometimes I think you don''t need me. You seem to do well with people when you need to."


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    Lori snorted derisively. "You''re sounding like my mothers again. I''m the Dungeon Binder. If I don''t want to, I don''t need to, and I don''t want to. That''s your job!" That last might have been a little more vehement than she intended.


    "Understood, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully.


    They sat in silence for a moment.


    "Ah, I missed this¡­" Rian sighed. "You know, I made a horrible design decision when making the Coldhold. You need to be standing up to use the tiller, and since I was the one handling the steering¡­"


    "Ah. That''s a terrible oversight," Lori agreed. "How long before you decided to teach someone else to do it so you could sit down?"


    "¡­I''ll admit it was an embarrassingly long time and leave it at that," Rian said. "I''m having the carpenters put in a way to lock the rudder for times we''re just going straight. And extend the overhead cover all the way to the back, because that stupid ball of fire in the sky is hot."


    "Yes, it''s known for that," Lori said dryly.


    "But those are probably modifications we can do over the winter, because right now it''s enough for going down to the ocean and getting salt and food."


    Lori blinked. "Food?"


    "Yup. There''s a lot of¡­ well, things that swim at the mouth of the river. We''ll need to think of more efficient ways to catch them, but there''s a lot to catch, and winter probably won''t affect them too much."


    Lori considered that. "I see¡­ well, I haven''t been there, so I''ll leave it to you."


    "Actually, I want to assign it to some of the men who went with me," Rian said. "If they''re interested, I think they can be our dedicated rivermen, sailing up and down the river to the sea. And from what I learned, fresh food will definitely sell in Covehold, as will salt."


    Lori frowned. "I''d have thought Covehold wouldn''t have to worry about salt."


    "Not Covehold, no," Rian said cheerfully. "But the demesnes further inland¡­ well. Even with the salt tax Covehold imposes on independent salt harvesters selling at their markets, we''d still make a decent profit, and if we can come to an agreement with one of the demesne to sell directly to them, bypassing Covehold entirely, we''d be able to avoid that. And we might also be able to trade salt for vigas with River''s Fork, to help supplement our food over the winter."


    That¡­ sounded very promising. "That sounds very promising," Lori said, nodding. "Tell me the rest in your report tomorrow."


    Rian nodded. "Unfortunately, I might need to be the one to go to negotiate it."


    Lori stopped and glared at him.


    He shrugged. "Well, someone has to do it. It won''t be now, but we''re already planning another trip after winter to sell things and get the reply from the Golden Sweetwood Company, remember? Unless you trust someone else to do the negotiations on our demesne''s behalf, it has to be me."


    Lori closed her eyes. "Find me someone who can do it in your stead," she said evenly. "You have until spring."


    "Already looking, but successful people like that are unlikely to be desperate enough to be all the way out here," Rian said.


    "You''re here," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, which shows just how successful I was."


    She couldn''t really dispute that.


    Rian looked over towards the kitchen and stood up, heading for where the food was starting to be served. He came back with two bowls and two cups of water, and Lori picked one of each. He took the other one, and they both started eating.


    "Have you considered adding a roasting area to the kitchen?" Rian suggested. "Then we can have roast in addition to stew even on normal days. Or at least, they can roast the meat before adding it to the stew."


    "Is it really necessary?" Lori said dubiously.


    "A roasting area can easily be converted to baking bread."


    Lori paused. She gave Rian a suspicious look.


    "Unless you''d prefer to eat vigas as a kind of boiled porridge?" Rian continued, smiling brightly.


    Lori sighed and looked towards the kitchen. "I''ll¡­ find time," she relented.


    "May I suggest practicing on the old dining hall?" Rian suggested. "Working there would be less disruptive."


    Lori waved dismissively. "Fine, fine," she said, going back to eating.


    There was a thump, and Lori looked up in surprise to see Mikon sitting down next to Rian, her hair damp as she smiled brightly. "Good morning, Rian," she said in an equally sunny tone. She leaned forward, her lips lightly brushing his cheek. Mikon turned to Lori with a smile and nodded at her, then started eating.


    Rian avoided Lori''s gaze as he focused on his own food, eating intently. Lori directed her gaze towards Mikon, who smiled brightly again.


    "I suppose you finally stopped being an idiot, then?" Lori said dryly.


    "¡­yes¡­" Rian mumbled, not looking up at her.


    "And you picked¡­ Mikon?"


    "¡­ not exactly¡­" he kept on mumbling.


    Lori raised an eyebrow and looked back at Mikon, whose smile no longer showed her teeth and had started humming. "Ah. Is this the scandalously extravagant hedonism of lords that I''ve heard of?"


    "It''s not like that!" Rian yelped, reaching a pitch he usually reserved for seeing her drawing blood with her syringe. "It''s¡­ we''re¡­"


    "I don''t care," Lori said, waving his words aside dismissively. "As long as you can do your duty unimpeded. Will Riz be joining us? She had still not been relieved."


    She looked at Mikon when she said that, and the latter grinned again. "I believe she''ll be here soon, your Bindership. We were up quite late last night, so she''s taking a bath to wake herself."


    "It''s not what you think!" Rian interjected.


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "You didn''t stay up discussing your situation like adults and coming to a reasonable arrangement?"


    "¡­ uh, then yes, it is what you think¡­" Rian corrected himself. He bent down to stare into his bowl again, eating slowly as if each and every movement of his spoon required his full attention.


    Umu and Riz approached the table, both carrying their own bowls and keeping a full pace between each other. They hesitated when they saw Lori, but she ignored them, going back to eating her breakfast. Mikon looked up and waved towards them, then slid a little away from Rian, making a space between the two of them on the bench, patting it invitingly.


    Umu didn''t hesitate, sitting next to Rian on the side away from Mikon. Riz sighed, but sat down between the two as Umu deliberately ignored Lori and kissed Rian on the cheek. It was stiff, awkward, probably wetter than it needed to be, and Rian looked like he had to physically keep himself from wiping it off from how wet it was as Umu sat right up against him and began eating, blushing furiously. Riz looked like she was about to do the same, but hesitated, then reached up and patted Rian on the shoulder. "Good morning, Rian," she said. "When do you want to meet for that report?"


    Rian looked surprised, glancing at the hand. "Um, probably after her Bindership finishes with her ''customs inspection'' so I can get the things people asked for to them."


    "Do you want me to help you with that?" Riz offered.


    Umu''s head snapped up. "I''ll help you with that Rian!"


    Lori, Mikon and Riz mouthed the words along with Umu, the other weaver looking fondly amused as Lori and Riz both rolled their eyes.


    Lori was ready to mouth ''You don''t have to do that'' along with Rian, but to her surprise her lord hesitated. "If you want¡­" he said hesitantly. "Mikon, do you want to join us?"


    Mikon made a show of thinking about it. "I believe I''ll pass," she said. "I want to try weaving that fine filter cloth you asked about. But if I finish early, I''ll go and find you all."


    Rian blinked, while Umu looked around him and gave Mikon a suspicious look. Riz also stared at her. "Oh¡­ that''s¡­ thank you."


    Mikon smiled. "I might need to spin a finer thread for it, but for now I''ll try with the yarn I already have. If it''s only a small cloth, I shouldn''t need much."


    Rian hesitated. "Do¡­ you need help with that?"


    "If you want¡­" Mikon said with a coy smile as Lori shook her head and went back to eating. "Do you know how to spin thread?"


    "Completely and absolutely ignorant," Rian said promptly.


    "Ah. Well, I''m sure Umu and I can teach you everything you need to know¡­" Mikon said cheerfully. "Right, Umu?"


    "Yes¡­" Umu said, still looking at Mikon suspiciously.


    Lori tried not to sigh. Well, she supposed it was a rest day, and she and Rian couldn''t really talk about her demesne''s issues before he was properly caught up by Riz¡­


    Shaking her head, Lori focused on her meal, wondering what she''d find that was worth tak¡ªer, imposing customs duties on¡­

 156 - Lori Reads An Almanac

    After breakfast, Lori went to the sealed off alcoves where the cargo from the Coldhold was being kept. Rian had ordered it all be brought there rather than let people start carting away what they had asked for, supposedly because it had been mixed in with everything else and he didn''t want accusations of things getting lost.


    "We might as well do this at the same time," he said. "While you do your customs inspection, we can do inventory to make sure we didn''t lose anything."


    "How would you lose anything?" Lori said as she bound the earthwisps of the rock she''d used to block off the opening and began to move it aside.


    "Well, I took inventory getting them on to the ship, then did inventory again just before we left to make sure we didn''t lose anything," Rian said. "But now that it''s been moved again, I need to do inventory to make sure nothing disappeared between the boat and here. It''s unlikely to have happened, but if it did, I can at least know what I need to track down, and this way, I can at least tell people we did have it. And it lets me calculate how much I need to reimburse anyone. "


    Lori nodded. That all made sense. Proper record keeping was important, after all. "All right, you do that," she said as the rock was moved aside. She''d have to fix the floor here later, it was a bit uneven because of her alterations.


    The inside of the alcove was dark, but she simply collected some lightwisps streaming through the opening and imbued them. sticking them on the ceiling. The once-alcove was full of parcels wrapped in cheap paper, showing water stains and ragged from Iridescence damage. Rian followed in after her, then nudged a ragged block right next to the door secured by a leather cord with his foot. "Your almanac and glass," he said. It didn''t move at all when he nudged it, clearly heavy. "Getting it packed for transport outside of the demesne was expensive. Most people store things they''re transporting in water, but that clearly wouldn''t work for a book. With everything else you asked me to buy, you''re out of beads."


    Lori grimaced. "Summarize the expenses for me in your report," she said, glancing at the block¡­ but no, she didn''t want to be distracted by a shiny new book. Instead, she looked at the packages, a several jars, and other containers. "Now, let''s see what we have¡­"


    She did not smile greedily. It was a perfectly ordinary smile, with nothing greedy about it.


    "Wait, we have to check the list first," Rian said. "It''ll be harder to do inventory if you start opening everything. Riz, can you find some strong people who can help carry this out, and then have them grab some benches from upstairs so we can block off a space to put it all. I doubt her Bindership will want to go over customs in this tight, cramped room while we''re all getting in her way doing inventory."


    Lori paused, but that did sound unpleasant. "Very well," she said. She pointed at the block with the almanac Rian had pointed out. "Bring that out first so that I can inspect it, then do your inventory so I can proceed with the customs inspection."


    Rian and Riz picked up the block themselves¡ªit turned out to be very heavy for its size¡ªand brought it outside before the latter ran off to find people to do all future lifting. The next alcove down was unoccupied save for some scrap leaves and loose fibers from threshing. More threshing was going on at the other end of the second level, which Rian glanced at curiously for a moment before he focused on unwrapping the block.


    The paper came off, and Lori frowned. The glass block, unlike what she was expecting, wasn''t perfectly clear and uniform, but was cloudy, almost opaque, and contained spots of discoloration where it looked like it had somehow burned, as well as sharp borders where it seemed like two different kinds of glass had been softened and pressed together. Resting on top of that was what looked like a thick pottery box covered with a thick, equally cloudy glaze. Covering it and acting as a lid was a flat plane of very thin glass, still cloudy, that seemed secured only with wire wrapping. Small pieces of padding¡ªshe wasn''t sure what, some kind of fibrous substance¡ªseparated the wire and the glass at the edges of the box


    Barely visible inside, she could just see what had to be the almanac Rian had brought, as well as what seemed like a block of some kind on top of it on which the plane of glass rested, probably to keep it from breaking under pressure. "This seems insufficient," she said.


    "Well, it got here safely, so it clearly is," Rian said easily. "It was really interesting, the Whisperer who packed it made a partial vacuum inside the box and kept filing the edges until the glass held on tight. Then they just glued it on the edges and wrapped it tight so it wouldn''t pop off. Very simple and elegant, I was expecting shaping molten glass and stuff. Most of the expense was the glass itself, which is understandable, but this was cheapest glass I could buy a lot of. I hope it''s worth it. You yourself officially no longer have any physical money, at least until we get some trade goods sold."


    Lori closed her eyes, feeling the pain and loss deep inside at the last of her beads. She was officially no longer granular. All her granular capital was gone. The little girl inside her who''d grown up with Taniar standards of fiscal responsibility wanted to a curl up in a ball and scream. "My lack of granularity is noted."


    Rian nodded. "Do you want to release your frustrations by borrowing a hammer and cracking that glass open to get your almanac? I''m told that''s the only way to open it, since there aren''t any edges to pry. The box can be reused once you have another flat piece of glass to put on it. There''s actually a deposit on that box, so technically you still have about two small think beads to your name if we ever go back and return that box."


    Lori glanced at it. "We''ll set that aside then. Where''s my hammer?"


    "Off to get it, your Bindership," Rian said. "Don''t get impatient and try to break it any other way, we wouldn''t want you to injure yourself. I''ll get clippers for the wire too."


    Lori rolled her eyes and waved him off dismissively, most definitely not at all having thought of just taking a rock and cracking it open with that.


    Rian brought back a maul rather than a hammer, a large rounded block of wood with a long wooden handle. He covered the glass with the paper it had been wrapped with to prevent shards and held out the maul to Lori theatrically, as he did all things. Lori hefted it. She''d seen similar tools before when she''d been employed in carpentry workshops, and it was heavier than she had thought. Still she''d seen how it was meant to be used, and gripped it low on the haft with both hands. Then she aimed carefully and swung it down.


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    The almost musical crack of glass breaking was entirely too short and entirely too satisfying, but left a hollowness of wanting to hear it again.


    "Did you like that?" Rian said with a smirk.


    "It was enjoyable, I suppose," Lori said, handing him the maul. Rian let it rest against the alcove wall as men started coming down the stairs carrying benches and laying them out according to Riz''s direction. He squatted down and took off the paper¡ªit had torn where she had struck the maul¡ªthen carefully clipped the wire where it had been twisted shut¡ª"We can still use this for something, right?"¡ªfolded the paper over and picked up the almanac, carefully waving it to get any glass shards out.


    "Your tome of secret knowledge, your Bindership," he said. "May it be another stepping stone in your rise to power and glory and glorious power."


    Lori rolled her eyes as she took the book. "Put the items you''ve finished checking on the inventory in front of me," she said, sitting down on a nearby bench that someone had put down against the wall next to the opening.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "All right, everyone, let''s go through all this¡­"


    Lori opened the almanac and then, upon feeling the quality of the pages, began to turn them carefully. They didn''t feel as tough and durable as the paper she''d gotten used to growing up, and the edges were a little ragged, like it had been cut by a blade that hadn''t been sharp enough. The cover was only a little thicker than the interior pages, and the words The Settler''s Almanac was printed on the front of the slightly off-white paper. She flipped through the pages, glancing over printed words and simple line drawings of plants, animals, seeds and diagrams of tools and machines before she reached the part that she''d been looking forward to since Rian had mentioned it.


    The almanac did, indeed, contain flow diagrams for not just Whispering, but also Deadspeaking, Horotracting, and even Mentalism. She hadn''t thought Mentalism even needed flow diagrams, since it was mostly internal, but there they were. The book had different sections for all four forms, and she flipped over to the section on Whispering, which according to the rather austere page listings behind the cover was the thickest of the sections relating to magic. She carefully turned the pages, and was glad to find another page listing that detailed flow diagrams included in the section. She read through the list, taking in the rather minimal descriptions.


    Lori twitched slightly at an entry that read ''Fast Dehydration. She opened to the page in question, and took in the flow diagram of airwisps, waterwisps, firewisps, scowling as she read. Yes, it was all there¡­ heat, air circulation, removing all the humidity in the air to draw out the moisture in the vigas stacks¡­She kept reading, and raised an eyebrow at reading it was good for making dried fruits, dried mushrooms and dried vegetables. There was also a note that said a large binding could be safely entered by people, though the book recommended they didn''t stay long, meaning such a thing could be set up by a Binder and left to be used by other people. That¡­ actually sounded useful. She''d have to think of building something like that.


    She flicked through the pages, the uneven edges of the paper reminding her to be careful. There were other flow diagrams, all very useful, many of which made her frustrated that she hadn''t thought of it herself, and some more that impressed her at how elegant they were. There was a binding that made solidified air completely without outside input. It required several different bindings and containers strong enough to resist pressure, but once all was in place, air went in one end and solidified air for preserving food went out the other, and there was a note at the bottom of another binding it could be paired with to take advantage of the heat and firewisps being removed from the air. There was a note recommending a heatscale so that one knew what kind of air one was solidifying, as well as reminders to be careful about using solidified exhalation in an enclosed room, not letting solidified inhalation get too close to fire, and not leaving any sort of solidified air in a sealed container, lest it explode.


    Really, all of them reading and planning to use this should be experienced Whisperers. Anyone who didn''t know to do all of that already deserved the gruesome death coming to them for not paying attention to the properties of common air.


    Out of curiosity, she also looked at the other sections. The part on Deadspeaking immediately confused her when she tried to read beyond the title, speaking of ''recessives'' and ''expression'' and ''spirals'' and ''dead sinks'' and other terms she barely remembered from her very first class on introductory magic, before she and her classmates were all separated to learn about the forms of magic they could actually learn to do. Still, the parts that were simple summaries of what the flow diagrams did were interesting. One flow diagram was for making trees produce thick resin¡ªshe assumed it was meant for trees that didn''t already produce resin, or perhaps didn''t produce a lot of resin¡ªwhile another was for altering grain plants to produce sugar instead of flour, and several were ways to make flowers larger and produce more nectar for honey¡­


    The flow diagrams for Horotracting were interesting. She''d always assumed that Horotracting was¡­ well, Horotracting. Simply making rooms and spaces bigger and smaller. However, one diagram showed how to make what it called a ''Gravity Pump''. And it wasn''t by inverting the direction of the flow of gravity like she thought would have been obvious, but by altering distance so falling water could be pushed up a short distance and end up higher than from where it had started, while at the same time increasing its pressure using slight adjustments to the rate in which time passed.


    The diagrams were simple enough, and in some cases obvious enough, for her to understand what it meant. She could probably do something similar by binding waterwisps to force water forward, but this was meant for a Horotract, and she could see how such a seemingly obvious solution might need to be taught. After all, she had needed a lot of experimentation to develop a binding and methodology for drying the vigas stalks quickly, and she was willing to admit, in the privacy of her own mind at least, that the method in the book was far more simple and efficient, and could easily be adjusted and scaled up or down.


    The fact there were three different flow diagrams for such water pumps, one reliant on altering the measures of dimensions, another on altering the passage rate of time, and a third using the obvious solution she had thought of regarding gravity implied that Horotracts found some aspects of their magic easier than others.


    The section on Mentalism flow diagrams had been the most obtuse, with a lot of explanation and terminology removed. Which made sense, since a Mentalist was the one wizard you could rely on to never forget ANYTHING about how their magic worked. It was frustrating to read about though, and the more Lori read, the more it looked like a list of reminders, as if the people who never forgot anything might have actually forgotten what they could do.


    It was really easy to dislike Mentalists. They never had to spend time reviewing for tests! One read was all they needed, and they barely had to pay attention!


    "Enjoying your book, your Bindership?" a voice interrupted her annoyed reminiscences, and Lori blinked and looked up. Rian was smiling at her, but he was always doing that.


    "What?" she demanded.


    Rian pointed to the side. "We''ve finished the inventory, so I thought you''d want to do the customs inspection so we can release all this."


    Already? Lori turned to follow his finger and saw things had been laid out on the floor and on the benches. They rested on what had probably been the paper wrappings, each separate and with space for her to walk between them all. There were also a line of familiar jars, a mix of the large storage jars and smaller jars that they used to store cooked food.


    Lori frowned as she examined the things arrayed before her, closing her book with her fingers in among the pages and getting to her feet. It was¡­ It was all¡­ "What is all this junk?"

 157 - Customs Inspection

    "What were you expecting, exactly?" Rian asked, looking amused.


    Lori wasn''t sure, but she had imagined that there would be things she would covet. At least, she had thought so¡­ "All right, go down the list for me, what do we have?" Lori said.


    Rian''s smile became genuine for a moment, though no less amused. "All right. Well, over here we have some medicines. Some bottles of antiseptic in case of major injury again, refined osiel extract and osiel nuts to plant and grow more, baler roots, a few dried quefo roots as well as a little sapling we can start growing to eventually make our own¡­ we have these winter tubers, which will still grow in the cold, and our farmers tell me they know how to keep it from dying out. We have these little saplings we can grow for spices. This is green nigrum, these little stalks here are from a vauang bulb that started sprouting on the way back so we put them in these pots to grow, and these are blue sharrods. This little jar here is some vinegar that actually has some vinegar paste in it, so as soon as we have fruits again we might be able to use that to start making more, and we can also use that for antiseptic. It''ll be excruciating, but it''ll work if we really need it. We also have these grains here. We''ve got valri, glits and I was lucky enough to get some of this mais¡­ it''s not a lot, but if we plant it over the winter in the Dungeon, we should have enough to plant with in summer. At worst, we just plant it next year and eat it the year after."


    The words were definitely food words, even if Lori barely recognized some of them. Her mothers had done the cooking at home, and if they couldn''t be home for one reason or another she bought something to eat. "Why is so much of it food?" she said.


    "Because we don''t want to starve?" Rian said, as if that was supposed to be obvious. "We also brought back the seeds from some fruits we ate while we were there, and hopefully we''ll be able to grow those, we need them if we don''t want to come down with scurvy, and we''ll need it for the vinegar. Don''t get me wrong, I think mushroom stock is delicious, but a little variety would be nice."


    Lori couldn''t argue with that.


    "Anyway, we''ve also got pirri nuts that we can try to¡ª"


    "All right, you can skip any plants, food plants and medicines," Lori interrupted. "For now, no duties on them. What else? "


    Rian looked aside and gave a signal, and Riz and Umu started moving the plants and various wooden things¡ªthey looked like wood, so she called them wood¡ªto another part of the area marked off by benches. "All right then. So these jars are for the carpenters. It''s wood glue, resin, and tressflower oil. Until we start producing enough bugwax and figure out which trees to tap for what¡ªyour almanac should contain that information, your Bindership¡ªwe needed to buy all that."


    "Why the tressflower oil? I thought that was for cooking?"


    "Not this kind. This is for treating wood against damage like decay and rot, better than just scorching it like they''ve been doing so far. We also have a few tressflower seeds, but I''m not sure if it germinated properly¡­" Rian sighed. "They might not even be viable, I got them from a bag of cooking ingredients. Anyway, this jar contains flux for the blacksmiths¡ª"


    "What''s flux?" It sounded vaguely familiar, but not something she''d actually handled or dealt with...


    "As I understand it, it''s something they use to get the metal malleable at a lower temperature. It''s probably for the anatass dragon scale, I hear anatass needs absurd amounts of heat to be worked."


    Lori waved dismissively. "A waste of money. If they need heat, I can bind it for them."


    "They probably didn''t want to waste your time, your Bindership, and it probably has other uses for them so it''s most likely still useful. I think they use it for welding metal together too? We have these wire brushes, which were cheaper to buy there, and we also bought these mesh screens, since it was a pretty good deal and you can always find a use for mesh. Uh, no need to charge duties on that, it''s meant for general demesne use. Hopefully by the time they wear out the smiths will be able to make more."


    Lori looked at the coppery screens made of thin wires stretch taught on a wooden frame. "I can''t imagine what we''d use it for," she said.


    "Well, off the top of my head," Rian said, "papermaking."


    She blinked and stared at him.


    "What? How did you think they made paper? Magic?"


    "How do you know how paper is made?" she shot back.


    "I used to be neighbors with a papermaker," Rian said with a shrug. "We talked, and I visited the workshop where he worked. I''ve seen it done. Can''t do it myself, but I understand what''s involved. It can also be used for sifting flour so there aren''t little rocks and husks in it or something."


    Stolen novel; please report.


    That¡­ was a point, she supposed. "That''s a point, I suppose," she said. "What else?"


    "Well, those big jars are the salt we collected." Rian said. "On the way back, we spent a day filling all the water jars with salt since we knew we''d last getting home and just filled some of the used food jars with water. We can get more easily, we just need more containers¡­ and that filter I mentioned, in case there''s something floating in the water." He paused. "Also, we might have to process this salt again before we cook with it, something green''s mixed in with the salt. I think that was something in the water, some kind of plant or something. You know how seawater can look green."


    Lori felt her covetousness fading with every word, replaced by impatience and a slight amount of self-recrimination. Really, she should have expected this. Who would waste their beads buying absurd luxuries? It definitely made more sense that people had been doing as she had been, and buying resources they needed for what they were doing. She listened much more perfunctorily as Rian read out what else they had bought. There wasn''t all that much. After all, not many people had any beads left. There was thick leather, made of sheets of leather Deadspoken together, that Rian said was meant to make soles for new boots for the men and women who regularly went out to hunt for beasts who might need better footwear than just a thin sheet of leather over some stuffing. They had pooled their beads together in anticipation for the future need. More glues, this time for the leather. More tressflower oil, of a different composition than the one for the carpenters, meant for waterproofing what fabric they had for rain cloaks when the rains came again so people could continue working¡­


    Eventually, they got to the end of the list, and nothing jumped out at Lori as being worth havi¡ªer, taking customs duties on.


    "All right," she said, absolutely bored and just wanting to get back to reading the book she had in her hands. "You may distribute that to¡­ whoever. Tomorrow I expect a report on Covehold. Riz, finish your report to Rian this afternoon so you can finally go back to being a glitter crawler like you want."


    "Yes, Great Binder!" Riz said, actually sounding happy at the prospect.


    Rian picked up a pair of packages and held it out to Lori. "The other things you asked for, your Bindership," he said. "I''ll carry the glass and the box to the treasure room once you get it open, shall I?"


    Lori grimaced at one more thing keeping her from just reading her day away, but accepted the paper-wrapped packages that she realized hadn''t been laid out on the ground with the others. One of the packages was bigger than she expected. How many socks and underwear had Rian purchased? She had made it clear he was to use the majority of the beads she had given him for glass. "Make sure to include the glass shards and the wire," Lori reminded him. She could use that wire.


    Rian lifted the glass block himself, following her as she went ahead to open up the treasure room. The block and box were placed in a discreet little corner away from the piles of metal before she closed it off again, then parted ways with Rian so she could continue reading. The packages she took upstairs, and she carefully put her new book on her table. Then she opened the first, more obvious of her packages. Inside was a new pair of boots. The leather was fresh and clean and did not smell of piss, the soles thick and made of Deadspeaking-layered leathers that seemed very tough. She''d bought her old boots in Taniar and it had an inner layer of cushioning that her new boots didn''t seem to, but it would be a simple matter to take them out of her old boots and into her new ones when she started using them¡­


    Her old boots were probably still good for a few more months, but the soles were getting worn and there were clearly cracks growing where the leather folded and wrinkled with her stride. When she''d noticed she''d tried to walk while keeping her toes straight, but she very quickly reverted back to her normal walk.


    She took the boots and hollowed out a small alcove in the wall, storing the boots there and drawing out as much air and all the moisture that she could before sealing it. Hopefully the partial vacuum would keep the new boots from getting damaged while she wore out her old ones.


    The other package held, as she had hoped, new socks and underwear. The larger size of the package was soon explained by how thick they were. She pulled at the socks gently, testing the elasticity of the knitting, and found herself comparing them to the rather thin strands of the socks she was currently wearing and had folded in her clothes alcove. The chest wraps were equally thick and looked rather warm, as did the loin cloths. The cloths ties were actually very thick, almost like belts.


    Lori began folding up the new clothes, reflecting on the irony that she had bought socks and underwear with the last of her money. She had always been annoyed when her mother had given her those for her birthday, and now here she was, buying them for herself. Or at least sent someone to buy them for her.


    Once they were folded up, she debated just curling up on her bed and reading her new almanac to find ideas for more new bindings to make, but she knew it was close to midday. She reluctantly admitted that she might miss lunch if she did that. So Lori picked up her new book and headed downstairs, sitting down at her usual table to read.


    Lori was tempted to just go from flow diagram to flow diagram, but she restrained herself. Instead, she went back to the beginning of the Whispering flow diagrams and began systematically reading them. It began with what it claimed were efficient ways to gather water out of the air, and she was slightly annoyed to find some of them actually were more efficient than the method she had used. She had made a large cloud of airwisps and waterwisps that funneled water vapor in the air down into the containers they had stored their water, staying up so that she could imbue the binding enough to last for the whole night.


    She took comfort in knowing that her method had still been more efficient that how whatever-her-name-had-been-who-was-dead-now had been doing it. Lori had always made more water than the other Whisperer.


    Lori lost herself to reading for what was left of the morning as she devoured through the flow diagrams, tracing the notations with her fingers as she read and resisting the urge to form the bindings then and there. The dining hall wasn''t the place to start experimenting on bindings! She needed to do it outside or at the third level¡­


    But after she finished reading!

 158 - All Was Right

    During lunch, Lori had to all but sit down on her new almanac to keep from reading it while she ate so she didn''t accidentally drip any of her food on it. Despite her excitement and enjoyment, she had glanced at the page listings, affirming for herself what other information was in it besides flow diagrams. The almanac contained illustrations of plants and labeled whether it was edible or whether it had any use as a resource, or if it caused itching on contact and many other things.


    She had a feeling she might need to¡ªugh¡ªshare this almanac, with Rian if no one else. The illustrations were so good she actually recognized some of the plants as those that they''d been cutting down and clearing to make space in the demesne, and some of them had actually had edible parts, like the roots, or leaves that could be used to spice their meals. Personally she thought the stews tasted well enough, but if they had more food, different kinds of food¡­


    Well, they might need spices and flavors then.


    "So, you''re not playing sunk anymore?" Rian was saying to Mikon as Lori ate a bit faster than she normally would have, eager to get back to the almanac.


    "Oh, we are," the weaver said. "I''m getting better at it. The games are very close now!"


    "She still hasn''t won," Riz, sitting between the two of them, said.


    "I will! Eventually! It''s just that her Bindership is really good!"


    "You''re still playing that?" Rian said incredulously.


    Both Lori and Mikon frowned at him. "Why wouldn''t we be?" Mikon said.


    "You¡­ don''t find it boring?"


    Lori and Mikon looked at each other, as if trying to confirm they''d heard the same thing. "Why would we be bored?" Lori said.


    "It''s fun," Mikon¡­ probably agreed. What was fun about constantly losing? Did she just enjoy being crushed and shown her inadequacy? Her mothers had warned her about women like that¡­


    "If you like it, you like it," Rian said hastily. "I don''t, but that''s just me."


    "It''s not just you," Riz said in a low voice.


    Mikon reached around Riz and patted Rian on the shoulder. "Don''t worry, I still like you anyway," she said cheerfully.


    Rian''s lips pressed together and his face didn''t redden, but he was clearly embarrassed as he avoided anyone''s gaze and focused on his food. On Rian''s other side, Umu leaned back and gave the other weaver an annoyed look as Riz sat there looking awkwardly indecisive.


    Lori shook her head and ignored this silliness as she continued eating her own lunch.


    When she finished, she picked up her book and headed back to her room. She''d have the whole afternoon to read, and she was going to use it!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Rian," she said as she started setting up the chatrang board. She''d come down to find a lot of benches gone from the dining hall again, and so had deduced everyone was eating roast outside. The board was being set up on a block of stone she''d pulled from the stockpile for this purpose, in front of the bench that she had claimed against the stone wall flanking the Dungeon''s new entryway. Her stone plate lay next to her on the bench, waiting to be filled with food as dinner was prepared, the air once more filling with the smell of woodsmoke and roasting beast. She hadn''t tired of the taste of it yet, and from the looks of things neither had everyone else. "I need you to find someone who can draw."


    For some reason, Rian smirked. "Let me guess. To copy parts of the almanac? The illustrations, perhaps?"


    "Yes," Lori said, frowning slightly at the tone. What was there to be smug and triumphant about?


    "Well, I don''t think we''ll need it," Rian said confidently. "Have you looked at all the magic parts in the book yet? All the ones about Whispering, at least?"


    "I''ve glanced through them, and I''ve been reading the ones I thought immediately relevant to our situation," Lori said. It was immediately obvious that some of the flow diagrams had two versions for their bindings: a small, relatively simple one that needed only a small amount of imbuement, and one that worked better when scaled up for economy and efficiency and incidentally required great amounts of imbuement that would either need to come from beads, several people working in shifts¡­ or a Dungeon Binder''s raw power.


    "Ah, that explains it. So, you haven''t been reading the section that talks about unusual but useful applications of basic bindings?"


    Lori frowned as she continued putting the pieces on the board. "I saw it but haven''t perused it yet." She remembered that section, and honestly, it had seemed interesting, but the flow diagrams of things she didn''t already know how to make had seemed more immediately important. Tomorrow she intended to use the binding it depicted in one diagram to more efficiently make solidified air for their cold rooms, though she''d have to modify the rooms with better ventilation so that no one asphyxiated to death. The suggestion given in the almanac to line the room with metal to draw out the heat and keep the solidified air in another location also had some merit, and they certainly had a lot of dragon scales that weren''t doing anything except perhaps rusting¡­ "Tell me what about it you mean without being dramatic."


    If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    Rian sighed. "Sure, ruin one of the few things I can do for fun, why don''t you¡­ Fine. Do you know how to lock lightwisps to create a still image?"


    "Of course," Lori said. It was one of the more delicate bindings of lightwisps, binding the lightwisps in the air such that they captured an image, though it wasn''t as simple as that. In essence, the binding locked the lightwisps in the claim to continue emanating the light passing through it at the moment the binding was made. It saw more use in theater and novels, usually used by ''cunning'' characters to trick people into thinking someone was still asleep in a room or making them think an open door was still closed, never mind it wouldn''t work like that because it was just a flat image hanging in the air. "And no, that binding doesn''t work that way. I can''t just bind lightwisps to make a copy of the page because the binding would also lock the light coming in all other directions, so the only way to read the page would be from almost exactly where my eyes were when I made the binding."


    Rian nodded. "Exactly," he said. "At least, that''s what the almanac said. But! Someone worked out a way to copy an image by making the copy radiate its own light so that it can been visible from any angle it can be viewed from. "


    "Yes, you paint the air with lightwisps," Lori said dryly. "I don''t have that kind of skill, Rian."


    "Neither do most Whisperers in Covehold and the demesnes around it," Rian said. "So someone worked out a way to make copies of things by using locked lightwisps of the first type and turning them into lightwisps of the second type bound to things people can carry around. It''s all there in the almanac. So if you use it, not only can you make copies of the illustrations in the book, you can actually make the illustration bigger than the original."


    Lori gave him a skeptical look. "If you say it will be useful, then I''ll investigate it after dinner," she said, finishing putting all the pieces on the board.


    "Please. It''ll mean you don''t have to lend the book to anyone, so no need to worry about people getting their grubby hands on it."


    Oh. Well, that certainly increased the priority of her reading the section he meant. "I already said I''ll investigate it, didn''t I? Worry about your own report. You haven''t been procrastinating, have you?"


    "Only in the sense I''ve been doing other work in the meantime. Oh, by the way, Riz finally got me up to date on what happened while I was gone."


    "Good. Then inform her that her temporary position is no longer extant and she had been demoted back to a glitter crawler."


    "What, you''re not even going to tell her yourself?"


    "Talking to people is your job, remember?"


    "Ah, right, so it was. How foolish of me to think you''d be comfortable talking to the woman after working with her all these weeks." He reached out and moved a black militia.


    Lori frowned and put the piece back. "What are you doing?" she said, annoyed.


    Rian blinked at her in confusion. "Er, aren''t we going to play?"


    "Why do you assume that? If you want, I''ll be perfectly content to crush you utterly tomorrow, but I already have an opponent for tonight."


    If this were a story or a play, that would have been Mikon''s cue to appear. As it was, Rian gave her a skeptical look, then shrugged. "So, back to work tomorrow, I suppose?"


    "The threshing will continue, and probably finish," Lori nodded. "And then preparations will be made to plant the winter crop."


    "Wait, winter crop? We''re planting in winter? Isn''t it too cold for that?"


    "Of course not," Lori said authoritatively. "The crop simply grows slowly under the snow until spring. It makes it less likely the crop will be consumed by beasts, bugs and slugs."


    "Huh. You learn something new every day."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Well, you need to know these things when you''re a Dungeon Binder, so I learned. That being said, I also need you to begin construction of a Dungeon farm in the third level," Lori informed him. "As we have neither the equipment nor the right technical knowledge to grow crops in trays and fluids, soil will need to be carried in to line the floor to a sufficient depth. I leave the logistics of it to you."


    Rian stared at her. "A¡­ farm. A full farm? Not just a few plants we''re keeping indoors? Is there even enough space? I haven''t really looked down there yet¡­"


    "There will be," Lori said. One way or another, there would be. "Once I learn how to perform Horotracting, having all the space we need in my Dungeon will be trivial. For now, however, we will simply have to take best advantage of the space I have managed to excavate. That means planting what will give us the greatest yield for the least space."


    "So, we''re having a lot of boxes and racks made, filling them with soil, and planting tubers in them?"


    Lori paused. "What?"


    "I mean, obviously we''ll be planting vigas and other things too, but tubers are very efficient when it comes to space, and you can fertilize them with waste straight from the latrine," Rian said. "Add in all the meat in cold storage and we''d get through the winter pretty well. And we''d get a new crop every six to nine weeks, which is a pretty good rate. If we planted some now, we''d have some ready to harvest by early, mid-early winter. And since it''ll be in boxes, every family can have two or three in their house, or outside their house, that they can just bring out to the Dungeon come dragon time." He paused. "The ones near people''s houses probably shouldn''t be fertilized with fresh latrine stuff."


    Lori stared at him a moment. "As I said, I leave the logistics of the matter to you. I will be busy ensuring proper growing temperature, light and maintaining a suitable irrigation reservoir." Maybe she could repurpose their old reservoir for irrigation and simply make a new one for their drinking water? Then she wouldn''t have to worry so much of people pissing and dropping shit into the reservoir pit, since it would all be growing towards their crops anyway. Though she''d have to make sure all the pipes that lead from it were properly redirected, especially the ones leading to her bath¡­


    "I don''t suppose I can ask you to appoint a new lord or lady?" Rian said. "Or let me get some official assistants I can give some authority too? Because even just organizing the Dungeon farm thing will be a full time job unless I have someone doing it for me, and then who''d deal with all the other things for you? Unless you''ve become comfortable dealing with people in my absence¡ª"


    "I''ll consider it," she interrupted him to kill that odious line of thought on the spot. "But I suppose you have a point. Before you left, you were beginning to rely on assistance from Riz, and when she was replacing you, she relied on Mikon. It seems clear to me an official full time assistant will be necessary for you from now on."


    The smile on Rian''s face looked disturbingly like the one Riz had when Lori had said she only needed to report the demesne''s events to Rian before she would be relieved of her position.


    She shoved her stone plate at him. "Now, get me dinner."


    Rian rolled his eyes, but took the plate. "One dinner, coming up."


    When he came back, he wasn''t alone, of course. But Lori had been expecting that.


    Still, it was an enjoyable dinner as Lori played chatrang with Mikon, the two of them eating as they played while Riz and Umu took turns trying to teach Rian how to dance as people sang and clapped and ate.


    It was a perfectly ordinary night, and all was right in her demesne.

 159 - Report On A Journey To Covehold

    "All right," Lori said in Rian''s house after breakfast. She sat on the little wooden stool, her new almanac on her lap. "You''ve had time. Report."


    "Are you sure you don''t want us to do this somewhere else?" Rian said. "The benches in the alcoves in the second level would be a lot more comfortable. Sitting on that stool is probably going to hurt after a while." He was seated on his bed, his bedroll folded under him as a cushion.


    She rolled her eyes. "They''re still threshing there. It''s loud." It really was. The sound of the wooden threshing tools striking the stalks and the stone floor beneath was surprisingly resonant. Rian''s house was much quieter, and thankfully didn''t have the smell that sometimes wafted out of her mothers'' room after a night when she struggled to go to sleep before the imbuement on the binding blocking off her hearing ran out. She supposed the flirting hadn''t gone that far yet. "Now, report."


    Rian shrugged, but made himself more comfortable on his bedroll cushion. "All right. Before I start, what do you want me to skip? I doubt the details of what we had for dinner and the hunting situation is anything you care about¡­"


    "It isn''t," Lori confirmed.


    "Day to day morale?"


    "I don''t care."


    "Problems with the prisoners?"


    "Unless you tell me you had to kill them before reaching Covehold¡ª"


    "¡ªyou don''t care. Okay¡­ potential resources and ways to make money we identified on the way?"


    "Of course. Get started."


    He rolled his eyes for some reason. "Right¡­ all right¡­ well, first I''m here to report that Grem, Naineb, and Rann were all successfully exiled to Covehold. We also didn''t lose any buckets along the way, and the letter to the Golden Sweetwood Company was sent and we didn''t have to pay for it. No one was hurt, no one was robbed, we were able to sell all the cargo we brought for that purpose, and all in all, I''d call the trip a success."


    Lori frowned. "Who?"


    "The people we exiled for attacking you," Rian said.


    "Oh. Next time, don''t bother with the names, you know I don''t care."


    "Noted. All right, removing the bits that happened during the trip, it takes about two, three days to reach the ocean at the Coldhold''s maximum speed with the amount of people and cargo we had at the time, though it takes longer to get back since we''re fighting against the current. So regularly sending people to get salt for the demesne is easily viable. Most of the land on either side of the river below River''s Fork is hills and rocks, which explains why they settled where they did, but I think it''s worth it to cut and bring back the ropeweed growing on the banks if we can be sure there aren''t any beasts around."


    Lori nodded. "I''ll leave that to you. Continue."


    Rian nodded. "The river opens out to a protected bay, it''s actually a pretty good location. A lot of seels and fursh in the water, as well as lots of different sea weed, which might be good for something. Maybe there''s something in your almanac, but they''re a potential resource. The bay though¡­" Rian shook his head. "I''m kind of surprised the Golden Sweetwood people didn''t settle there instead. It''s a good location, and it would let them control the mouth of the river. The next batch of them might set up a demesne there next year."


    "Rian, no one would want to build a demesne next to the ocean," Lori said dismissively. "You only get half the surface land area when the demesne expands. Covehold is necessary, but now that it''s there, no one needs to do the same thing again."


    Rian stared at her. "Lori¡­ all the goods from the old world, all the beads, all the people pass through Covehold, and they charge customs duties, taxes and fees for everything. That alone makes them richer than any five demesnes on this continent, but they''re the main supplier of salt on the continent because they''re on the ocean. Salt can be used to preserve meat without any additional magic, meaning that EVERYONE who can''t access the ocean to make their own salt, or use Whispering to preserve their food with cold like we have, will need to buy from them to preserve their food long-term. That alone gives them a hold over every other demesne around them, even without everything else they control. Maybe what you said is true in the old continent, but this is the new continent. The next person who decides to set up a demesne on the shore is going to become as powerful as Covehold."


    Lori stared at him.


    "In the old world, where everyone was moving outward to the sea," Rian continued, "but here, everyone is moving from the sea inwards. And as long as advanced, processed goods need to come from the old continent, and as long as Covehold is the only demesne next to the sea, they have an economic advantage. The only reason that no one has set up another spot is because most of the coastline near Covehold is rocky cliff that isn''t immediately accessible from ocean or land. The bay at the mouth of the river is different, and the person who sets up a demesne there can directly compete with Covehold. At the very least, they''ll restrict our access to the sea, even if it''s just a fee to pass through."


    Lori kept staring at him. Eventually, she took a deep breath. "A matter for later," she eventually said. "Continue your report."


    Rian frowned at her, but nodded. "From the bay, once we got out to the ocean, it took us most of a week to get from there to Covehold, though we were slowed down from not knowing exactly how far the demesne was and how we needed to be careful to keep the Coldhold from capsizing from the waves. The outriggers were a good design idea, but we need a deeper keel and more weight on the keel. Though maybe that was just because it''s close to winter, maybe the water will be milder when it''s warm. "


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    "So, we''ll need to redesign the boat again." Lori managed not to groan. She thought they were done altering that boat!


    Rian sighed. "Yeah¡­ but if it''s just from here to the ocean for salt, what we have now is fine. Though we might need to think about where we put the Coldhold when a dragon comes. We can''t just leave it out, and it''s been a significant enough investment of time and work that we need to protect it. "


    "I''ll work on it tomorrow," Lori said. "Even if I feel a dragon coming right now, we have time."


    Rian nodded. "Good, that''s good¡­ all right, so in addition to being able to travel to Covehold safer, a more seaworthy ship will also let us take advantage of our access to the ocean beyond salt. While there''s a lot of potential food in the bay, there''s a lot more outside. Bigger fursh, small dillians, sea bugs, larger graspers and squid¡­ it''s food everywhere, and what we don''t eat, we can sell to Covehold or just trade to River''s Fork. But food really sells in Covehold and, a lot of it gets resold to the other demesne around it."


    Next to him was the plank of wood he wrote notes on. Rian held it out to Lori. "Here''s a list of all our expenses, and there''s a legend of how much beads were worth. But there was a daily docking fee for Covehold''s docks. Just cheap enough to be affordable but expensive enough for you to need a steady income to afford it."


    Lori took the plank and blinked. Instead of being written in charcoal, Rian had carved the list of expenses into the wood. She supposed he had worried the information might be lost. The handwriting was¡­ well, it was terrible, but she supposed he couldn''t safely hold a knife or whatever he''d used to write this the way he would normally hold a writing implement.


    She still frowned as she read though the numbers, and winced as she saw how much her boots and glass had cost. The rest of all the other items they''d brought back were also listed¡ªRian had used a strange shorthand, but she supposed that made sense to reduce how much carving he needed to do to list all this down¡ªas well as how much they''d been able to sell their cargo for.


    "You sold salt?" she said. It was on the top of the list of sold things.


    Rian shrugged. "It''s not like we couldn''t just make more on the way back. Though the deep-sea water might be why it came out a little green, the batch we sold didn''t look like that. It really helped pay for the berthing fees, and let me buy more of what we needed. With the whole river and ocean for us to get from, with a little work we could start turning a profit next year. "


    "So, we''ll have people regularly leaving the demesne and spending large amounts of time out in the Iridescence," Lori said.


    "They''ll pass through River''s Fork before they get here, and if we managed to keep a good relationship with Shana¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected. Honestly, he was supposed to be the one who remembered names, why did he keep forgetting this one?


    "Right, her. If we can maintain a good agreement, she can heal them of any injuries and damage they might accrue out there. We might be able to pay for healing with salt, they''ll want it to preserve their meat and for tanning their own skins and furs."


    Lori considered it, then sighed. "We already have an agreement she''d heal us in exchange for hiring mine workers."


    "True. Maybe we can negotiate an addendum that they''ll heal us over the winter in exchange for salt to preserve their food?" Rian suggested. "Winter means people might get sick, and since we don''t have much in the way of medicines¡­ well, we know where a Deadspeaker is, we might as well stay on her good side."


    Lori frowned, considering that, then reluctantly nodded. "All right, arrange it. I suppose it''s a good contingency until I can learn Deadspeaking."


    Rian paused. "Yes, exactly," he said. "Anyway, the list also has how much things were selling for when we were there, though I think that might shift depending on the season."


    Lori looked at the plank again. "I can barely understand what any of this means."


    Rian sighed. "Yeah, I know, I''ll write it out properly later. But right now, our best means of income is probably food we catch from the ocean, skins, salt, and ropeweed fabric. With the whole river to get resources from, we can harvest far more ropeweed than we need for ourselves." Another pause. "They also don''t call it ropeweed, but I figure you don''t care what their term for it is when we have our own that you use already?"


    "You figure correctly," she acknowledged.


    "So, if we''re going to trade with Covehold for what we can''t make for ourselves, we''ll need to establish production facilities, storage facilities, processing facilities¡­" Rian began to list. "Of course, these are secondary to the demesne''s needs to survive, but if we plan to have a lot of surplus for something we''re going to be making for ourselves anyway¡­"


    "The salt will be simple," Lori said. "We simply need an efficient means of pouring seawater into an evaporator and storing the resulting salt. The fabric though¡­ " Lori shrugged. "I''ll leave the details of scaling up production of that to you¡­ after you set up the Dungeon farm."


    "Yeah, that''s probably a good set of priorities," Rian said. "With how little we actually managed to harvest, any additional food will be important." He sighed. "We might have to find a way to buy grain from River''s Fork. They lost some during the dragon that killed their old Binder, but they still have a lot since they originally needed to feed a much larger population. They have surplus and we''ll need that surplus."


    Lori scowled.


    "I can literally feel your dislike of the idea from here," Rian said. "Think about it as practice for trading with Covehold. If we don''t have enough surplus to trade for food from River''s Fork, then we don''t have enough surplus to trade for resources in Covehold, where the value of our goods will be relatively lower because we won''t be the only one providing it."


    "I''m familiar with supply and demand," Lori retorted. "I grew up in Taniar. I just don''t like it."


    "Given that I''ll be doing all the talking to other people to set this up and get it going, I''m inclined not to like it either," Rian said dryly. "But if we want to thrive, it''s necessary. We''re relatively isolated and have room to expand out here, but what about next year? The year after that? When the Golden Sweetwood Company comes, people will know about this place, simply from watching where they''re going. I think you''ll want to be in a dominant position when that happens and not have to worry about being hemmed in by other demesne. And if we continue with your stance about not recruiting other wizards¡ª"


    "No wizards," she snapped.


    "¡ªyes, that, well, it means we''ll be working with a significant handicap. Even one Deadspeaker would let us increase grain yields and not have to worry about disease and injury."


    "Only until I learn how to use Deadspeaking," Lori said, to which Rian had no reply, clearly knowing she was right. "Is that all?"


    Rian sighed. "Well, while I didn''t recruit, I kept an ear out for people who were amenable to moving to a different demesne, and it looks like there are a lot. There''s also talk about Covehold actively encouraging people to move to other demesnes. So when you do decide to start recruiting, I don''t think we''ll have trouble finding skilled workers who have their own tools, though if we''re doing it on the Coldhold we''ll only be able to bring in people in small batches."


    Lori nodded. "Noted. What else?"


    Rian hesitated, frowning. "I¡­ think that''s everything immediate. I mean, you probably don''t want to hear about every rumor and thing I heard about while I was there¡­"


    "No, I don''t," Lori nodded. "Very well, then that will be all. Inform me immediately about anything that might have slipped your mind."


    "Yes, your Bindership¡­" Rian said. "Ah, have you read the section I told you about yet?"


    Lori sighed at his impatience. "Yes, yes, I''ll read it now," she said, holding up her almanac to show him.


    Really, he could be so impatient sometimes¡­

 160 - Images Bound In Light

    "Lori, it''s lunch time."


    Lori jerked up from the page she was reading, staring at Rian standing at the doorway to her room. "How did you get up here?" she demanded.


    He pointed back the way he''d come. "You forgot to seal the hallway," he said. "I think you shouldn''t read that during the day, it''s very distracting. I mean, I understand, it''s probably full of interesting and useful things, but¡­ uh, I''ll shut up now." Ah, he finally noticed her glare.


    "I''ll be down momentarily," she said.


    "Lori, I know what it''s like to read new books too, I know that means you''re skipping lunch and not coming down for dinner," Rian said.


    She glared at him.


    "If you''re not going to eat lunch, just tell me so I can eat? I have a farm to get organized for you, and I''d rather not do it on an empty stomach."


    Lori exhaled loudly¡ªit wasn''t a sigh, those let out exasperation, not make more¡ªand would have slapped the book shut until she remembered it was her only book. "Ugh, fine. I''ll eat."


    "Thank you for doing me this great favor," Rian said, voice flat. "Your Bindership''s generosity is boundless. Shall we?"


    This time she sighed, but closed the almanac around her finger and got off the bed. "Move," she said irritably, and Rian moved back from the door, leading the way down to the dining hall. Lori followed after him still annoyed but reluctantly conceding that she was hungry after all.


    There were only two bowls waiting at the table. The three were already eating, and Riz made room for Rian to sit down between her and Umu. Lori just put down her book next to her on the bench and grabbed one of the bowls and started to eat. It was a bit lukewarm for her, but a quick binding of firewisps fixed that. Rian seemed to have no problem eating it as it was.


    Lori found she was very hungry, and she concentrated on eating until her bowl was half-empty. At that point, the food had become mostly tasteless from over saturation, and she had to take a moment''s break to drink. There were two cups on the table, and she grabbed one and filled it with water from the jug.


    "Oh good, I can drink now," Rian muttered, grabbing the other cup.


    Lori felt a strange, vague twinge at that which reminded her vividly of her mothers. She ignored it. "Rian, I need paper," she said.


    "For the pinhole?" he said.


    "For the pinhole," she confirmed.


    "I''ll have the carpenters shave off a sheet of wood from a plank," he said. "That should be thin enough to work, and less light will leak through compared to paper."


    Lori blinked. That¡­ was actually a good idea. "Good," Lori said.


    "We can probably hang a piece of wood on a rope to have something to bind the image to," Rian continued. "And you can use magic to block out the light around it so only the light from the pinhole passes through. Someone should be in there to make sure that the page we want to copy is properly centered and we''ll need a really bright light so that the image is clear¡ª"


    "All right, all right, you''ve clearly put a lot of thought into this," Lori interrupted irritably.


    "I strive to anticipate your needs," Rian said, smiling cheerfully.


    "Just how much of this book did you read?"


    "I only looked over it," Rian admitted. "I needed to get it packed for travel, after all. No, I asked a couple of Whisperers in a drinking hole about it and about what parts they recommended. One of them even had his own copy and showed me."


    "¡­ were you recruiting them?" Lori said, glaring at him.


    "You said not to, so I didn''t," Rian said. "But I figured they''d know some good tricks we could try, and they did."


    Lori kept glaring at him. The annoying thing was, he was probably telling the truth. And if he wasn''t¡­


    If he wasn''t¡­


    Well, she''d deal with killing him when it came to it.


    Lori broke off her glare and continued eating. "Get the carpenters on that shaving. We''ll use the walls of the Dungeon."


    Rian glanced at the walls. "I''ll find a spot no one is using to keep score of their lima games."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The shaving of wood was ready soon after lunch. It was ready so fast Lori suspected Rian had already had it made and had simply been waiting for her to ask for something like it. The shaving was small, about the size of her open hand, and almost literally paper thin. It felt strangely delicate in her hands, and when Rian suggested she make a frame around the edges so they''d have something more secure to hold it by, she immediately had him go and retrieve some bone to do just that.


    He came back with a bucket of several long bones that, from their wet look, had recently been washed by being thrown into the river, one end on each broken open, revealing the marrow was gone. Thankfully, they were clean of any rot or remains.


    "I just realized that we''ll need something to hold the frame and the sheet steady," Rian said. "Otherwise someone is going to have to hold it up, and I don''t want that to be me, especially since I don''t know how long this might take. Besides, having some kind of stand or something to hold it in place would be more reliable."


    ¡­


    Riz wouldn''t have thought of that.


    "Excellent," Lori nodded. "Now go wash your hands while I heat the rot off the bones so I don''t get sick while handling it."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said, putting down the bucket.


    By the time he came back¡ªagain wiping his hands on his trousers¡ªLori had heated the bones enough to be reasonably sure it wasn''t going to make her sick, and the lack of smell after she was done indicated Rian had picked well and there was no more hidden meat or marrow to decay. She reduced the bones back to body temperature and picked up one of them, a shoulder blade that was nice and thick, and began to bind the earthwisps in the bone so she could shape it.


    She built the frame, placing the shaving between two bone squares and fusing the squares together where they touched. The resulting frame was¡­ well, it worked, it was light and rigid, and it didn''t deform the shaved wood sheet, which was all they needed¡­


    The frame was mounted on a stand, also made from earthwisp-shaped bone, a simple tripod that she could fuse the bone frame to. The hole on the frame was made using the finest, narrowest needle from her sewing kit, pierced through with Rian''s confident, steady hand. That done, they mounted it onto the tripod, and Rian adjusted the frame so that it was parallel to the wall they would be using to test this. The wall wasn''t perfectly flat, but it was flat enough, and this was just a test to see if they could make what was described in the almanac work.


    "All right, what now?" Rian asked.


    Lori referred again to the almanac in her hands just to be sure, then nodded. "Now one side of the pinhole needs to be completely dark and contain the surface I''ll be binding the lightwisps on, while the other side needs to contain what I''ll be copying, and has to be brightly lit. It''s advised that the former be at least large enough for me to be in, so I can see what I''m binding. There''s a warning that what I will be copying with be upside-down and inverted, so this should only be used for images where the orientation doesn''t matter."


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    "The Whisperer I spoke said that darkwisps are enough and that you don''t need an actual room," Rian said. "They also use this for surveying, apparently."


    Lori blinked, frowning. "Surveying? What''s the point of using this for surveying?" Confirmation she could just use darkwisps to block out light was helpful, and she reached out across her Dungeon to start binding the darkwisps available.


    "To make images of the terrain that they can bring back," Rian said. "He said they also tried this as a way of making records of contracts, but it didn''t work since the binding needed to be regularly renewed, and making bound tools to preserve the image like they do in the old continent was expensive."


    "That''s probably an understatement," Lori said as she began moving the darkwisps towards her location. They moved instantly, not bound by limits of mass, moving where there was nothing opaque blocking the way. "Having bound tool images made in the old continent was expensive. Here, it must be exorbitant."


    "Probably," Rian said as what seemed like a cloud of darkness began streaming from the side corridor with the treasure rooms, the water reservoir and, once she had extinguished the lightwisps there, the third level. Her lord stared at the moving darkness in fascination. He reached towards it curiously, then hesitated. "Um, is it all right that I touch it? I just¡­ want to see what it''s like?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow at her lord, a small, amused smile on her face. "Go ahead," she said. "You won''t feel anything, though. Darkwisps and darkness have no mass or substance, only volume. It is space absent light."


    "Huh¡­" Rian said, waving a hand into the blackness. He spun his hand around, and seemed fascinated when it didn''t alter or deform. "You''re right. It just feels like normal air. If I closed my eyes, I wouldn''t even know it was there. I''d have thought it would be a little colder¡­"


    "Only in intense sunlight where lightwisps and firewisps are mixed," Lori said. "Even then, it''s of little help. The substance occupying its volume would be the air already present, and that air would still be hot."


    Rian shook his head. Why was he smiling like that? "That''s so¡­ strange. I mean, why is there a wisp for the absence of light? It''s not because of some kind of symmetry. I mean, there aren''t any coldwisps or vacuumwisps for places where there aren''t any firewisps or things with solid mass, right?"


    Lori shrugged. "That''s just how Whispering works. Trying to find reasons ''why'' is a task for philosophers: a waste of time and beads, and only done by people who are not qualified to do anything else. However, it is not true that darkwisps are defined only by the absence of light. They have other properties. Like glass, they act as an insulator against magic, though an ablative and temporary one that needs to be imbued. No Whispering, Horotracting, Deadspeaking and especially Mentalism can pass through a volume of darkwisps without expending imbuement to overcome the darkwisp''s own imbuement, unless they had a dedicated channel through the darkwisps like a wire or some other substance that their wisps, life, thoughts or vistas can move through. It''s what I use to protect my Dungeon against dragons."


    Rian frowned. "Wait, it acts like glass?" he said, eyes suddenly intent. "Like, can it do everything glass can do? Can it protect against the Iridescence?"


    Lori was ready for this. Everyone always asked this. "To a limited degree," she said. She held up her arm, wrapping some darkwisps around it. "If I cover my arm like this when I leave the demesne, the darkwisps will insulate me against the colors. However, this covering is irrelevant, as my arm is still not completely covered. The colors would come in from the wrists and the elbow." Lori pulled the Darkwisps all around herself, shrouding herself completely. "To completely protect myself, I would need to completely cover myself. However, I''m sure you can see the problem with this approach."


    Rian frowned, looking up and down at her. "I don''t see¡ª" He blinked. "Ah. You can''t cover your eyes, or else you can''t see where you''re going. That''s a way for the Iridescence to get in."


    Lori nodded, releasing the darkwisps around her. "That can be mitigated by glass, but even then, such a binding requires constant imbuement, for the Iridescence would be constantly bearing upon it from all directions. A Whisperer would only be able to keep imbuing it for so long, and would be unable to form any sort of binding as they did so. The darkwisps would insulate them from all other wisps in their environment, and if they used a wire as a channel, it would be a way for the Iridescence to circumvent the darkwisps, rendering all this effort moot."


    Lori braced herself for some sort of bright idea, some ''what about?'', ''did you think about?'', ''have you considered?'', as if Whisperers haven''t been thinking of the uses, applications and limitations of their own magic for centuries.


    "Well, that''s unfortunate," Rian sighed. "But at least I learned something new. And it sounds like this could really help us with our cargo!"


    Lori blinked. What? "What?"


    "Our cargo!" Rian said cheerfully. "If we pack our cargo with darkwisps, then Iridescence can''t grow on it, right? At least, as long as its all completely covered. Even if it won''t last for the whole trip, it''ll mean we don''t have to expose our cargo to water damage or wear from the holes the Iridescence pokes into things. That means we''ll have, say, skins with fewer holes poked through that need to be repaired by Deadspeaking, which means we can sell it for a bit more."


    Lori stared at him. "That¡­ wouldn''t work," she said. "Even if I fill, say, a jar with darkwisps, the contents will still be making contact with the sides of the jar, which will channel the Iridescence through. It will be admittedly slower transmission than if it were out in the open air, but it will still happen." Which¡­ actually would be enough to at least lessen the degradation of their product to some degree, wouldn''t it?


    "Ah," Rian said, suddenly grinning widely. "But what if you cover the WHOLE jar, inside and out?"


    "Then there would still be where the jar was in contact with the ground," Lori said.


    "But what if the jar was resting on was something that insulated against Iridescence?" Rian said. "Like glass? Or ice?"


    Lori blinked and suddenly stopped, staring at nothing.


    "Could it work?" Rian said excitedly.


    It could work. It could actually work¡­ If it did, it meant¡­ it meant¡­


    It meant they could transport water and Iridescence perishable goods. Books. Paper. Food that was something other than stew in a jar.


    "We will need to experiment," Lori said calmly. "Later. For now, we are already in the middle of something."


    Rian blinked, then looked at the frame of bone as if he''d forgotten it was there. He actually looked embarrassed. "You''re right, you''re right. Sorry for getting distracted. We need to get this done first." He shook his head. "What do you need me to do now¡­?"


    Once they were both focused again, creating the pinhole imager, as the almanac had called it, was relatively simple and quick. Lori bound the darkwisps to define a ''room'', with the frame and the pinhole along one ''wall. The ''room'' had only darkwisps for walls, allowing light to pass through within the ''room''s'' confines, but not letting any in or out except through the little pinhole. At that point, the imager was basically done, with only a few adjustments to be made for a better image.


    Rian stood in front of lit side of the pinhole, holding up the almanac to the hole. His eyes were closed because all around the frame of the pinhole was a ring-shaped binding of lightwisps that cast a brilliant radiance on him and what he was holding. This, according to the almanac, was useful for a brighter image, though it also warned that adjustments needed to be made, lest the image be too bright and rendered useless. Lori, standing inside the dark side of the pinhole imager, observed the spray of light the pinhole was casting on the wall and willed the ring of light to slowly grow dimmer. The image on the wall slowly began to resolve, forming shapes and colors¡­


    Eventually, a slightly warped image was on the wall. The cover of the book, upside-down and inverted as if it was a reflection in a mirror. It was moving, shifting as Rian adjusted his grip or moved a little to maintain his balance as he stood there patiently. The image was faint, as Lori had needed to reduce the amount of light the binding emitted so she could make out the fine details. Slowly, carefully, she bound the lightwisps streaming through the pinhole and carefully applied a variant of the binding she used to see better in the dark, as recommended by the almanac. The image on the wall grew brighter, more defined despite the contours of the wall preventing it from being perfect.


    "Hand me the tablet and turn to the first image we need to copy," Lori said, her voice passing though the darkwisps to Rian. It was, as she had said, only empty air after all.


    The image of the book''s cover disappeared, and Lori found herself staring at her Dungeon''s dining hall, if all the tables and benches hung from the ceiling. The image was clear enough, if a bit fuzzy at the edges, and things that were farther were dark, as if in deep shadow. Then the image shifted again to upside-down parts of Rian. "Here!" he said, and she stuck out her hand, feeling a flat tablet made from bone carefully placed on it. The image shifted again as Rian carefully opened the book to the first image, then held it up.


    "Turn it upside down," Lori ordered. "Now closer. Closer. Closer! Wait, not that close!" The image resolved, and she adjusted both bindings of lightwisps again. She held up the bone tablet, putting it in the path of the light from the pinhole. She positioned it so that the image took up most of the board and adjusted the bindings again until the image was to her satisfaction. Well, almost. "Stop moving!" she told Rian. "You''re off center, move back¡ª that''s too much! Good, stay there and move it up¡ªno, the other way! There! Stay there!"


    "My arms are starting to ache," Rian sighed.


    "Hold a little longer!" Honestly, it was only holding up a book. It wasn''t even that heavy. She was the one doing all the work. She held up the tablet again, held perfectly still, then claimed and bound the lightwisps in immediate contact with the tablet''s surface. Carefully, she moved the tablet as she imbued the binding, making it glow brighter. She nodded in satisfaction as she stared at the image of the line drawing from the almanac, reproduced larger on the glowing surface of the tablet. "Done. You can relax now."


    A loud sigh, almost a moan of relief followed, the image projected on the wall changing as Rian lowered his arms. Really, it wasn''t that long or that heavy. "Did it work?" he asked.


    "It worked," Lori said, carefully parting the darkwisps so they wouldn''t abrade on the lightwisps on the tablet. "The image has been reproduced."


    Rian looked at the image on the tablet with relief. Then he blinked and his eyes widened. He stared down at the almanac in his hands. With a tone of mounting dread, he asked, "How many images are we copying?"


    "All of the ones about edible food and useful plants, of course," Lori said.


    Rian groaned.


    Why was he complaining so much? He only had to hold up the book. She was the one who was doing the real work.

 161 - The Importance Of Milling

    Lori allowed herself to be swayed by Rian''s argument to not make copies of every illustration in the book right then. He argued that they should focus on the illustrations of edible plants that were still in season, as otherwise it was just a waste of time because the plants wouldn''t be available. She supposed he had a point about that. And she''d need to be the one making the tablets for it, since the lightwisps would need to be bound to something else with wisps, and trying to bind it to airwisps wrapped around an object was inefficient when it came to imbuement. So perhaps he had a point in not doing all the illustrations.


    He also suggested just putting the images on the walls of her Dungeon, or at least on the walls of the outside entryway, as both a decoration and a way for people to be able to quickly refer to them. They spent the next day doing that, moving the tripod with the frame on it and the darkwisps along the entryway corridor, binding the images to the stone walls. They weren''t her flattest walls, but they were even enough, so the illustrations weren''t so warped they couldn''t be used for identification.


    "Be sure to explain what those are for to people, all right?" Lori said, inspecting the almanac for damage as Rian put away the frame for later. The pages were surprisingly thick and sturdy, and the glue on the spine didn''t seem like it would come off any time soon. She wondered how long it would last.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said.


    "Now that we''re done, go and get the farm on the third level started," Lori said.


    "I can start talking to people and begin organizing it, but we''ll have to wait for the threshing to be finished, which should be soon," Rian said. "Probably in a day or two. Then we can start on it after we have the holiday celebrating the end of the harvest."


    Lori gave him a displeased look. "Another one? We''ll never get anything done at this rate."


    "I''ll point out those rest days were your idea," Rian said. "Yes, Riz told me about those rest days you declared while I was gone. So you can''t blame those on me, I wasn''t even here. You have no one to blame but yourself for those. And anyway, celebrating the end of the harvest is traditional. You''ve seen how much work goes into it compared to the normal day-to-day work. People deserve a nice holiday after all that."


    "Maybe it''s traditional in other demesne, but in mine¡ª" Lori began.


    "Besides, we need to test that the grain is good to eat," Rian interrupted. "That''s usually done by grinding it up into flour and making bread."


    Lori paused.


    "And since we have salt now, and know about plants that can be used to add flavor, the bread is going to be much tastier than what we had in River''s Fork. And I''m sure we can do some things with the meat and fat we have to make the bread even better¡­"


    Lori turned and gave him a level look.


    "Or we could just act like it''s a normal day like any other and just work and work and work," Rian sighed. "Yes, we should save all that bread for later, when we''re too hungry and cold to enjoy it¡ª"


    "All right, all right, you can have a holiday," Lori interrupted. "But the bread better be good!"


    "Your generosity is boundless, your Bindership," Rian said. "Truly, you''re too good to us."


    "Only because we don''t have taxes yet," Lori said.


    "Your thinly veiled threat of economic suffering is duly noted. May we actually have the beads for you to think it''s a good idea to do it."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The threshing was finished a day later. Lori spent that time assisting the stonemasons in making mill stones so they could make flour, when Rian had rather embarrassedly informed her at breakfast that they didn''t have anything to make flour with.


    "The grist mill to make flour was left at River''s Fork because it was too heavy to move easily," Riz explained for Rian. "We were planning to go back for it once we found¡­ well, here, but with everything that''s happened¡­" She sighed. "Technically, it''s commonly owned by the Golden Sweetwood Company, so we have as much right to it as the people still living there, but¡­" She looked away, seemingly embarrassed.


    "But last time it was brought up, it got unpleasant and messy," Rian continued for her. "And people were getting heated on the subject, so I had them set the matter aside. We didn''t have any grain yet then, and I always thought the plan was for us to make out own grist mill, since we came here without one¡­"


    This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    "I think that was less of a plan and simple the circumstances we left Covehold with," Lori said. "I was certainly never informed we needed such a thing." She paused. "You want me to make one, don''t you?"


    "If we don''t have one, it''ll take forever to mill down enough flour to make bread," Rian said. "We could use a mortar and pestle, but that takes longer, doesn''t grind as much, and is much more work intensive. A mill stone is the better option."


    She gave him a very flat look. "Rian, you seem to be under the misapprehension that I''ll do anything for bread."


    Rian shrugged. "It''s a very necessary piece of equipment for the demesne. Vigas needs to be ground down into flour before we can really eat it. Otherwise the only other option is to boil it into a kind of tasteless porridge. Having once made the terrible mistake of trying such a porridge, I can confidently tell you there''s a reason why humanity invented bread."


    "It''s not that bad with honey." Riz said. Rian turned and stared at her. "It''s a lightweight food that you just add water to, and having the colors grow into it a little actually makes it softer and easier to eat once you boil it."


    Rian turned to Lori. "See? It''s so bad getting iridiated is actually an improvement." Riz shrugged but nodded in agreement.


    "And how exactly am I supposed to build one of these mills?" Lori said.


    Rian gave her a look. "While I appreciate that you like building all the things made of stone yourself, maybe this is something we should leave to our stonemasons? I mean, it would probably be faster if you shaped the stone yourself, but they''ve made these things before and would know the best way to make them."


    Lori blinked. "I thought stonemasons built buildings and things?"


    "They also shaped stone," Rian explained patiently. "And while having them do it by hand would be time consuming, if the stone they were working on was somehow softer than¡­ well, solid rock¡­"


    Lori began to scowl at him.


    "It''ll be just like assisting the potter with the kiln or the smiths with the forge," Rian said. "You just sit there and glare at what they''re working on while you make your magic. You don''t even have to talk to them."


    Well¡­ that sounded¡­ tolerable. But still! "Why was one of these not made earlier?" Lori demanded. "If it was known how vital it was and that we didn''t have one, then why was no effort to make one happen sooner? Why wasn''t I informed of the need?"


    Rian winced, looking guilty. "That¡­ was an oversight on my part. I accept responsibility for this mistake. There were¡­ a variety of factors involved, but as lord, it was something I should have dealt with sooner."


    Lori leveled her glare at him. "See that such an oversight doesn''t happen again," she said. "After all this clamoring for a holiday, and now you tell me that we''re lacking something that should have been made much earlier¡­?"


    "I know, your Bindership," Rian said. "As I said, it''s an oversight on my part. I forgot to mention it before I left. I''ll do my best to set it up today so that all you need to bother yourself with is softening the stone so that it can be shaped. You don''t even need to pick out the stone in question. Just make it soft and then harden it when they finish."


    Lori continued to glare at him. "You wouldn''t have made a mistake like this before," she said, letting her gaze sweep over the women on either side of him. Umu stiffened, while Mikon paused in the middle of considering which bowl on the sunk board she should move stone from next. "Are you letting yourself get distracted?"


    "I just got back, and this is an oversight that''s been going on for a long time."


    Lori considered that. "Fine, I will hold you responsible for this." Rian nodded. "But don''t think I''m ignorant of the fact that Erzebed is equally culpable, since she should have known to tell me we needed one of these mill stones, especially since she obviously knew the demesne didn''t have one."


    Next to Rian, Riz flinched and Mikon reached up and draped an arm around her, squeezing her shoulder.


    "Or the culpability of the one who was distracting Erzebed," Lori continued.


    Mikon''s hand twitched, but didn''t move, simply continuing to stare at the sunk board intently.


    "Your Bindership, you''ve already officially made this my fault," Rian said. "Can we move on to the logistics of getting one built, please?"


    Lori swept her glare one more time, then nodded curtly. "Very well. Make the arrangements with the stonemasons, and I''ll see if the almanac has anything I can use. And your holiday will be delayed until this is finished, for however long that might be. And it will be the last holiday we hold, understood? From then until winter, we will be concentrating on storing as much food as possible, preparing the winter crop and Dungeon farm, and all the other work to prepare for winter."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "I won''t let it happen again."


    "See that you don''t," Lori said, then glanced at Mikon. "Well? Are you going to make a move or not?"


    The pink-haired weaver hastily reached out to make her move, continuing the game she and Lori were playing.


    The almanac did, in fact, include how to make a mill stone for flour. Specifically, it had a simply diagram for such a mill in one of its sections, though it was less an exact design than some general directions for making one''s own. Naturally, it was easiest with Whispering, but there were also some notes on how to do it with Mentalism, such as recommending holding the stone in place with thoughts while shaping it by hand, since stability is more important when making the mill stone. Well, that wouldn''t be relevant to her, but it was a useful note to remember when she finally learned how to use Mentalism.


    The section in question was relatively short, and she managed to finish it with her breakfast. The writings also made it clear that, yes, this was one of the things best made by a stonemason who knew what they were doing, but this section of the almanac had apparently been written for those who didn''t have such skilled laborers nearby, since it still included enough diagrams for Lori to try building one herself. It wasn''t unlikely. Perhaps some foolish group had set up a demesne and hadn''t had a mill stone or a stonemason to make one for them?


    Well, they had stonemasons, and so were fortunately not in the same terrible situation as those hypothetical idiots.

 Ryan Is An Isekai Zeo! - April Fools 2022!

    Ryan had few things from before he''d gotten isekai''d. The clothes on his back were long gone, worn out and replaced by things he''d bought. He''d had his phone, but that had quickly run out of power and had basically become a strange black mirror, and he''d needed to sell it for the glass and aluminum content at one point when he''d needed money. If he''d been a half-way decent OP isekai protagonist, maybe he could have found a mad-scientist type scholar who could take one look at his phone, realized the value of the solid state electronics, battery, capacitors and microchips inside, and started some kind of electronics revolution.


    Hell, he could have sold the screen protector to some glassmaker and become partners on the world''s first ceramic glass, if he could find a glassmaker willing to talk to him. And knew enough chemistry to realize what was different about his glass. And was honest and wouldn''t just steal the glass and have goons kick him out¡­


    If he''d been a quarter-way decent isekai protagonist, he''d have remembered to bring his solar charger with him that day, and he''d probably still have his phone, though most of the time it would be charging, and he''d at least still have a bunch of ebooks, manga, movies, and old porn to entertain himself. He might have even been able to get some sort of business started, since one of the books had been on candymaking that he''d never gotten around to reading.


    But no, he sucked, and so nothing of the sort had happened. At least he''d somehow been given the ability to understand and speak the local language, but had spent two years functionally illiterate since that hadn''t extended to the writing and numbers. Whatever had happened to him didn''t also helpfully make him see all the text in English, which was annoyingly arbitrary in his opinion. Ryan had needed to learn that through immersion, which had been hellish. But he''d learned the numbers, so he could actually keep track how much things were worth and whether he was getting the right change. Beads. Whatever. Whose stupid idea had it been to use magic marbles as the medium of exchange? Couldn''t it at least have been cubes, or little cylinders? Marbles resulted in a lot of empty air in his money pouch, and it needed to be a pouch because having marbles in your pockets made weird bulges. Some banks offered something like a credit card system where you stored your money with them and showed places a token, and the bank would pay them later from your account, but Ryan hadn''t been born yesterday! He knew all about service fees and percentages and stuff like that!


    Still, there were some things he''d managed to keep hold of over the past six now going on seven years on this planet. He kept them wrapped in the remnants of the vest he''d been wearing, more out of nostalgia than practicality, but what else was there? Ryan usually slept with the bundle under his pillow. Not out of any particular sentimentality, but because his pillow was really thin and meant to be used with a sizable rock or block of wood under it to support his head, and he''d never gotten used to either of those.


    "Rian? What''s this?" Mikon asked.


    After six going on seven years, he''d learned to stop wincing when people mangled his name. Really, how could a culture that came up with a tongue twister of a name like ''Lolilyuri'' manage to consistently mispronounce his name right after he''d just said it? So Ryan just looked up from where he was tending the fireplace¡ªRiz had offered to do it, but if he couldn''t indulge his minor pyromania in his own home, where could he? So she sat on his bed giving him the patient look of someone very loudly not telling you what you were doing was wrong¡ªand towards where Mikon was pulling the bundle, along with his pillow, out from under her admittedly very shapely ass.


    "Ah, please be careful with that!" He just barely managed to keep from sounding panicky. It would have been just his luck that telling her to be careful actually made her drop the thing.


    Thankfully, nothing of the sort happened, and Mikon handled it with the kind of obvious, ostentatious care that said she was humoring him to make him feel better, which¡­ actually did make him feel better as she carefully set it to the side. "There. What is it?"


    Ryan hesitated, wondering what exactly to tell his¡­ well, girlfriend. Kind of his girlfriend? One of the candidates to be his girlfriend? No, not the issue! Normally he''d have told the truth with enough strategically omitted information for it to function as a lie, but doing that to one of the women who was sincerely trying to build a relationship with him seemed¡­ not just wrong. Disrespectful. Still, what else was he supposed to say? "They''re mementos," he said, turning away to face the fireplace so she wouldn''t see his face. To not get caught in a lie, even one of omission, it was best to reduce the number of micro-expressions that signaled it. "What''s left of what I had with me when I left home."


    "Oh," Mikon replied, her voice quiet and¡­ sympathetic. It was things like that, her saying those things, that made Ryan wonder about her background. "I''m sorry for moving them, then."


    Ryan waved a hand, still looking at the fire and poking it with a stick. He could practically feel Riz''s exasperation as he moved around the firewood, probably lessening their duration, but he liked seeing them glow bright orange! "It''s fine. It''s not tragic or anything¡ª" For him. His family most likely thought he was dead instead of just being blasted through the void beneath existence, only to pop out here like a summoned hero from a cash grab lightnovel. "¡ªit''s just¡­ I haven''t seen my family in a long time. I''ve traveled too far, and¡­ well, I''m here. Even if I wanted to, it''s not like there''s a regular riverboat service I can take to go see them."


    "Sure there is," Riz said. "Once a week from here to River''s Fork, twice a day."


    Ryan chuckled. "Well, my family lives a bit farther away than River''s Fork, Riz." All right, his face was feeling a bit too hot now. Time to stop playing with fire and¡­ well, work on his love life. He reached to the side and got a fresh piece of firewood and put it on top of the currently burning coals, then threw in the stick he''d been poking with. It had grown short already, so he''d have to get a new one tomorrow. That done and resisting the urge for more pyromania, Ryan stood, and nervously headed for the bed where his¡­ uh¡­ girlfriends?... sat.


    In his humble and unbiased opinion, they were, all of them, way out of his league. Not ''perfect skin jade beauty movie star'' out of his league, just ''hot girl with huge tracts of land'' out of his league. Just being near them, really looking at them in a way that still made him feel like a creep, was to feel both inadequate and aroused and like he was still fourteen looking up at his brother''s really tall, hot gyaru friend. The fact they all had anime-colored hair just added to it, quite frankly.


    "What sort of mementos are they?" Riz asked. Unlike Mikon and Umu, who were in skirts, the militia woman and all-but-officially-his-assistant wore trousers, her legs folded in a carelessly casual way as she ran a hand through her short magenta hair (it was far too dark and didn''t have enough yellow in it to be pink, so it was definitely magenta!). Her shirt showed off her muscular, small-tracts-of-land build, and she usually moved with the self-assurance of someone who knows they could kick your ass if they needed to, except when Mikon got really skinshippy.


    "If it wouldn''t be intruding¡­" Mikon said, sounding more hesitant and solemn than she usually did. She gestured towards the bundle before reaching up to undo the twintails her pink hair had been pulled into and oh God, had she realized he liked the smell of her hair, oh God he wanted to die¡­ Her usual flirty smile was tempered as she looked at him with sympathy.


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    "Uh, sure," he said, forcing himself not to think about it. He looked around the bed for a place to sit, and Umu immediately patted the spot next to her, smiling widely at him. A hair shorter than him, she was pretty, blonde, possessed bountiful real estate, and acted like they''d been dating for years, always casually pressing up against him every time she got close. In fact, as soon as he sat down she moved so they were hip to hip, casually leaning against him and very clearly pressing herself against his arm.


    He felt so plain and inadequate in the face of all this, he really did.


    Ryan sat there between Umu and Riz, glad to get his bare feet off the cold stone floor and wishing they had such a thing as flip-flops here. Maybe he could convince Dormin to make him a pair come summer. For now, he settled for sitting with his legs crossed. In the middle of the bed, providing the only other source of light inside his house, the glowing rock that Lolilyuri had given him lay, still glowing weeks after he had expected her to forget about it. She really did remind him of his sister, surprisingly kind in the most unexpected ways.


    Carefully, he unwrapped the bundle. The vest still seemed in good repair if you didn''t know about the places in the cloth where abrasion had worn the fibers down to nothing and the holes that his skill at sewing hadn''t been able to repair. Maybe he could try repairing it again. Any patches would easily fit into the faded pale khaki¡­


    Inside the bundle was a two-inch wide cylinder of stained wood about a foot long, a distinctively red Swiss-made pocket knife, and a pair of plain butterfly knives, the only thing that had been in his pockets at the time he''d gotten isekai-d. Like his phone, his wallet had been lost at some point, though it had been no big loss, mostly containing receipts and expired insurance cards. There had been no little pictures of his family in there. He''d been born a generation too late for the practice¡­


    The only other thing from home he had that wasn''t in the bundle was the braided paracord bracelet wrapped around his wrist, locked in place with a magenta-colored metal buckle, though the compass had gotten lost at some point, its cheap plastic breaking off without him noticing. Ryan had woven it himself, though his brother had helped with the materials, and had given them out as gifts, back when home had started getting nightmarishly dangerous.


    Such small things, to be all he had left of another life.


    The three looked at the things curiously, though Umu used the opportunity as an excuse to cuddle up against him as he picked up the glowing rock and held it up to properly illuminate his little treasure hoard.


    "What are these?" Mikon asked, leaning down to get a better look, one hand raised to keep the light out of her eyes. Ryan moved the rock to one side, and she gave him a grateful smile.


    "Well, these three," he said, pointing, "are knives."


    "What, really?" Riz said, looking interested.


    Ryan nodded, picking up one of the butterfly knives. It had been a long time since he''d handled one, but his thumb flipped up the locking tab as if he''d last done it yesterday. Moving carefully, since Umu was on his arm, he flicked his wrist, and the butterfly knife snapped open, the other half of the handle snapping into his hand. Riz let out an impressed whistle as Umu tried to lean back without letting go of Ryan.


    "Nice," Riz said, looking admiringly at the knives. "Where''d you get knives like these? I''ve never seen anything like these before." She spoke in the tones of someone who''d just seen a really cool thing that she wanted to have herself.


    "Oh, there''s a little town back home near where I was born where the smiths are locally famous for making these," Ryan said. "My sister got me these to protect myself. I used to have four, but I left the other two when I¡­ left." If he''d been a better boyfriend, he probably should have offered one of them to her. He had two, after all. However, selfishness won. Sighing, he carefully folded the butterfly knife closed, making sure the tab was locked in place. He put the knife down, then got the pocket knife. "This, on the other hand, was a gift from my father," he said. He began to unfold everything, starting with the big knife. Big knife, small knife, scissors, can opener¡­ "He gave it to me when he thought I was old enough to be responsible."


    "Binder protect us," Mikon said, staring at all the tools he flipped out. "Your father just gave you something like that? It must have cost a lot of beads¡­"


    "No, I''m not secretly a lord or son of a lord who ran away from home," Ryan said. "I only got within spitting distance of lordship when her Bindership decided to draft me. My father used to be in the militia, and he knew someone who knew someone who did good work. It wasn''t cheap, but it was an important gift. He had his own, and he never left home without it." He held up the fully opened pocket knife, showing all the tools on it. The plastic toothpick had gotten lost even before he ended up here, but he still had the tweezers.


    "What about this?" Riz asked excitedly, nudging the wooden rod. "Is it another knife?"


    Ryan forced himself to chuckle as he went from omission to outright lying. He felt like shit. "Actually, it''s just a weighed rod. My brother made it for me when I was younger and was just starting to learn how to use a sword. Hollowed it out, filled it with weights, got someone to fuse the two halves together again." He picked it up and hefted it, carefully avoiding the little switch recessed on one side. That would have been hard to explain, leading to awkward questions. "It was to let me practice swings without having to worry about hitting anything, and get me used to the weight. Now it''s¡­ well, it''s just a surprisingly heavy club. I know it''s silly, but it''s the only thing of my brother''s I have." He swung it down onto his opposite palm, and there was a meaty sound of impact.


    "Sure, that''s how you learn how to use a sword," Riz said, looking amused at the idea.


    Ryan shrugged. "My brother worried about me. Didn''t want me to be at risk of getting hurt, the hypocrite." He smiled sadly in remembrance.


    "Do you miss them?" Mikon said quietly.


    "Every day," Ryan said, sighing. Carefully, he began to wrap them all up again, setting the bundle to the side so he could put it back under his pillow to add more padding to it later. "Sorry if I ruined the mood. I just¡­ I haven''t been home in a long time. I miss them, that''s all." At his side, Umu cuddled against him again now that he wasn''t handling knives anymore. On his other side, Riz did the same, though she was more awkward about it, as if she wasn''t sure what she was doing, and eventually settled on holding his hand.


    The three left soon afterward, and the goodbye kiss they each gave was relatively chaste. Ryan supposed after his little recollection, they realized he''d feel a little melancholy. And yes, while usually the nightly making out as each tried to, ah, convince him to choose them as a more permanent partner was¡­ enjoyable¡­ right now he just wanted to lie down, stare at the ceiling, and wonder how everyone was doing back on Earth and where Yellow had ended up, since she didn''t seem to be on this planet with him. He''d never found any indicator of it, at least, and he''d listened to rumors for the sort of strangeness she''d cause for years. He still did.


    Tomorrow, they''d probably redouble the enthusiasm, and he''d feel really amenable to that¡­ but that was tomorrow.


    "Not tonight honey, I''m have a headache of nostalgic longing for home," he muttered as he got ready for bed, moving the bundle back under his pillow. As he did, the wooden rod fell out of the end and Ryan sighed, annoyed at himself for not folding up the end better so that wouldn''t happen. He picked it up, turning it over and checking for damage, but aside from a little scuff on the stain on the wood, there didn''t seemed to be anything wrong¡­


    Ryan turned around, but the shutters of the house were all closed, and the door was latched. Hesitantly, he held the rod away from him, gripped it tight, and pressed the switch firmly.


    The wooden handle jerked in his hand as a three-foot long blade suddenly shot out of the slot on the end, dull magenta and gleaming like cloudy glass in the light from the glowing stone on his bed. Carefully, Ryan flourished the sword, but the blade felt as secure as ever. Out of new habit, he checked the blade for rust and damage, but there were no such imperfections, and the edge was still as sharp as ever. His brother''s work still held up, even after all these years without maintenance on the more exotic parts.


    Satisfied that it was still in good working order, Ryan pressed the switch again, and the grip jerked once more as the blade retracted back into the slot. He wrapped the sword back with the rest of his mementos, put the bundle back under his pillow and lay down, staring at the ceiling and thinking of where he had come from.


    Sleep was a long time coming, and when he dreamed, he dreamed of nightmares, eldritch, chaotic and unknowable¡­

 162 - The Mill Stone

    After breakfast, and reluctantly putting away the almanac in her room so that it wouldn''t be damaged by the rigors of a day''s work, Lori met with the pair of stonemasons who would be needing her assistance in making the mill stone so it would be done sooner as the rest of the threshing was being finished. Rian did the talking, introducing them to her¡ªwhy did he do that? He knew she didn''t care nor would she remember¡ªin one of the alcoves on the second level of the Dungeon as she inspected the stone they had apparently chosen for this. From what the almanac said, the stone for something like this needed to be one that was sufficiently hard so that she wouldn''t end up eating sand with her bread, which was something the almanac warned of for demesnes that didn''t have a Deadspeaker who knew how to fix teeth.


    There has also been a note reminding Whisperers that, no, you shouldn''t use earthwisps and mass from the teeth of dead beasts to repair your own teeth without proper training and experience. It was followed by a list of very painful-sounding complications from attempting to do so, ending with ''and you''d still need to see a Deadspeaker anyway''. As Lori didn''t want to have to deal with a Deadspeaker, and she wasn''t sure if Shanalorre''s savant-healing extended to teeth and repairs thereof, she decided to do her best to make sure it wasn''t necessary.


    They began once Lori had satisfied herself as to the suitability of the rock. She softened the stone and reduced its viscosity as she could, making sure to keep it solid so that there weren''t any bubbles to weaken their structure, then reshaped them to be reasonably round and thick. Round was much easier to make than flat. All she had to do was reshape the stone to be taller than it was wide, alter the viscosity, and then released her hold of the structure without releasing the binding. This made the stone ooze out more or less evenly in all direction on the flat ground. She did this twice, and ended up with two round stones a little over half a pace wide and half a hand thick at the edges, and somewhat thicker in the middle.


    After that, the stonemasons took over as she sat nearby, keeping the stone soft by reducing its cohesion, at least near the surface of the material. It wasn''t a binding she had a lot of practice in, as she had never worked anywhere there was any call for it, but she knew the theory, and more importantly she knew the practice thanks to the flow diagram in the almanac refreshing her memory. Lori had to maintain the binding, adjusting it as needed to account for what the stonemasons were doing and having the binding''s effect extend deeper into the stone as they removed material from it.


    If she had merely bound the entire material and then walked away¡ªwhich was the kind of lazy thinking a Whisperer who''d never done this sort of work would conceive¡ªthen the entire stone would have reduced structural integrity. This method allowed for a softer, more malleable outer surface that could be worked while having the rest of the material retained the structural integrity to not be damaged. She had read about the process in an old biography about how the walls of Dungeon Binder Lamses'' Dungeon, Dendilys, had been decorated with finely detailed artistic works using this method. The flow diagram included in the almanac was much better than what she would have come up with to do it. In the privacy of her own head, she had to admit her initially conceived method of forming the binding would probably have resulted in a hard rock with a coating of stony sludge.


    Thankfully, she wasn''t bored. Watching the two stone masons work was fascinating. The two used an assortment of three different chisels and a wooden, round-headed hammer to shape the stone with a speed that Lori would have called rushed had she not been used to how fast a skilled worker at their craft could get something done. Well, after the first few hammer strokes revealed the altered consistency of the stone and they managed to adjust, anyway. As the men who had picked the stone, they had known and expected it to be much harder, but once they had adjusted to its altered properties from Lori''s binding, they worked quickly.


    Lori was almost jealous at how fast they flattened the respective stones they were working on, using only changing angles of their chisels and a straight-edged metal rule to measure. She knew better than trying to replicate it with her Whispering. It seemed almost easy and casual the way they did it, so it was probably a skill the two masons had worked for years to master. Soon, the two stones were level except for a fist-wide, thumb-thick upraised area in the middle of one that was matched by an almost equal depression in the middle of the other, and Lori adjusted her binding as the two men stacked the stone on top of each other. The two pieces almost stacked perfectly, and after a little readjustment they soon fit smoothly.


    While the exterior was a bit rough¡ªfrom her experience with carpentry, perfectly smooth surfaces were the very last thing you applied to a work, literally why it was called a ''finish''¡ªthe stones were beginning to look like they were a single piece cut in half. It was hard to tell if it was a purely aesthetic step¡ªit certainly made the whole thing look more pleasing¡ªor something that needed to be done to make a later step or a function of the tool more efficient. Lori had seen a lot of that in carpentry, things that had been done that had seemed excessive or pointless that were later shown to be very necessary, and would have been inefficient or inconvenient to add at that later point. Well, they were the stonemasons. Until she''d observed them enough to at least be able to reasonably internalize their construction logic, she''d keep her mouth shut and focus on the Whispering aspects of the project.


    The two worked so fast that Lori had to shift her seat several times already to keep both stones in view, so that she could see where they were working and anticipate where she had to alter the binding. One was carving out a channel inside the rim of their stone, while the other was making his stone a bit smaller, removing material from the edges. Thankfully, they soon learned to be mindful of not positioning themselves to block her line of sight, though she still had to move in any case when the work in question needed their complete focus or could only be accessed from such a position. Well, she was used to that too. At least the situation was far better than it would have been had she merely been a Whisperer and not a Dungeon Binder, or else she''d need to keep touching both stones to be constantly in contact with the binding. At best she''d have been touching metal contact points connected to whatever work surface the stones were on. At least this way she could move anywhere she needed to without having to worry about someone getting entangled with her contact wire, or worse, she wouldn''t have had a mobile contact wire, and been stuck in one spot, trying to see¡­.


    None of them spoke, all of them concentrating on their work, and Lori was personally proud she was able to keep up with the two craftsmen. Neither had to obviously change their pace to adapt to her not being able to adjust her binding quickly enough, and the stone didn''t break or fracture in any way that wasn''t intended. Speaking would have been difficult anyway, since between the hammers, the threshing going on elsewhere in the second level, and the work being done by the carpenters¡ªthey seemed to be in the midst of producing a lot of shutters for the windows of the houses above¡ªthe alcove was full of the sounds of productive activity. While the individual sounds were different, the din they caused was, if not exactly comforting¡ªher times employed in workshops had been full of labor, exacting requirements, the need for speed without losing exactness, and she always felt like she wasn''t paid enough beads for her work¡ªat least familiar.


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    When the call for lunch came in the form of Rian, she waited for the two craftsmen to finish what they were doing and pull back their tools before reaching out with her will to deactivate the binding. It was standard workshop procedure that the wizard was always the last to take their hands off whatever was being worked on, though it was a bit more literal in the workshops. After all, a binding being removed before it was safe could be disastrous, while it was usually always safe to stop using your tools on something. Unless that tool happened to be tongs holding hot metal, but that was just being facetious.


    Lori rose and headed up to the dining hall as they began putting away their tools, both to get out of their way and because she was hungry. But then, she always was after she came from the workshop. Ignorant people joked that all wizards did was breathe deeply and touch things, but that was like saying all accountants did was sit and write numbers down. Concentrating was tiring work, which was something those uneducated jokesters never seemed to understand, and concentrating to respond to the actions of other people was wearying. Compared to that, just willing stone walls to get runny and moving them out of the third level was simple. The only moves she had to account for were her own, and she could fall into an efficient rhythm. It would take many, many more millstones before she could reach that state, and so she was tired.


    So when Lori sat down at her usual bench, it was to a heavy, tired sigh despite the fact that technically she''d been sitting for most of the morning, closing her eyes as she leaned forward on her elbows.


    "Difficult morning?" Rian said.


    "It was a difficult morning fixing your glaring oversight, yes," Lori said, maintaining her pose.


    "Wow, you went straight for that. You''re really tired."


    "Such great skill at observation. How long did it take to you realize the women sitting next to you have been flirting with you?"


    "Do you want me to get you two bowls of stew for lunch instead of just one?"


    That question finally made Lori open her eyes and stare blearily at her lord across the table from her. "What?"


    "A second bowl," he said. "You obviously need the energy if you''re this tired. You went straight to the table instead of going up to get your sunk board." Next to Riz, Mikon looked disappointed. "Or the almanac, for that matter. If you''re too tired for either, you''re too tired, end of sentence."


    Lori waved a dismissive hand. "Fine, fine. Go ahead." A second bowl of stew sounded¡­ tempting right now, actually.


    "Take a rest while you wait, then," Rian said, and what had he thought she''d been doing. "There''s nothing to report anyway, and the most urgent stuff, how far along the millstone is, is something you''d know better than I would."


    Lori frowned. Did she know that? The stones had changed substantially over the morning, but she couldn''t exactly say how complete it was¡­ "Find out how complete the millstone actually is," Lori said. "It seems to be progressing well, but I want to know how much progress was actually made, and if it can be finished by tonight."


    Rian, thankfully, just nodded instead of making some quip. "Yes, your Bindership," he said. "I''ll be back with the report and your food. In the meantime, just rest."


    Lori gave him an annoyed look, but leaned on her elbows again and closed her eyes. Just closed her eyes and let the sounds of the dining hall wash over her¡­


    Having two bowls of stew did, in fact, help her mood and her tiredness. The report that the millstone would probably be done by tomorrow morning was slightly less helpful for her state of mind.


    "Pellee and Markes say that''s already very good time, thanks to you," Rian answered her impatient scowl. "A lot of time would otherwise have gone to shaping the stone and getting rid of excess, but you saved them a lot of time with that, and what you''re doing to the stone is letting them go even faster. They say they can do it by today, but the millstone would be very crude, and aggravating to operate, and would cost us later in wasted flour."


    "Fine, fine," Lori said, eating quickly. She swallowed. "Tell them to make the best millstone they can so we only have to do this once."


    "No changes to what they''re doing, then," Rian said cheerfully. "Apparently some of the things they''ll be making carving into the stones are a catch rim and a built-in hopper to make grinding a lot of flour easier." Oh, was that what that thing was? Now that Rian said it, she could see it in the work that had been done. "The carpenters have already finished the wooden rods for the dowel and the handle, I''ll bring it to you after lunch so you three can start fitting it in. They say it might be better if you fit it with Whispering."


    "Rods?"


    "The things have to turn around something, and the person doing the turning needs something to hold," Rian shrugged.


    Lori nodded, tucking that away for later.


    "I should probably tell you this is unlikely to be the only millstone you might need to make," Rian continued. Her gaze on him sharpened. "When the demesne gets bigger, or at least when we have a bigger harvest, we might need to make a millstone that''s connected to a waterwheel, for proper mass production."


    "Why can''t we simply connect the one we''re making now to the one powering the lathe?" Lori demanded.


    "We could¡­ but it''s frankly not necessary yet." Rian shrugged. "Someone would need to operate it, but with the right setup they''d be able to do it by themselves all day, and while connecting the millstone to a water wheel is relatively simple, we''d need to keep spray from the water part of the wheel from getting on the floor, which in the case of the downstairs water wheel means either raising up a wall between the wheel and the millstone to prevent spray, or using a really long axle. Both would take a lot of time to build. At this point though, there''s nothing bad about a manually-operated millstone. And you did say we couldn''t have the harvest celebration until the millstone was done¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes and went back to eating.


    When she finished her lunch, she didn''t linger, heading back down to the temporary stonemason alcove after using the latrine. The two stonemasons were already back, and she almost felt like she was late¡­ but pushed that thought away. Instead, she sat back on her bench as she checked the bindings on the stones, then activated them, softening the surface layers again. "You may begin," she said, sitting down for the next shift of work.


    The millstone took shape over the afternoon, and by the time they stopped for dinner, both halves were looking more distinct and different. The stone that would serve as the base had a channel all around it now, as well as a spout, presumably for the flour to flow down to a container. The other half had a large bowl-shaped indentation on one side, with a hole at the bottom, which by the illustration in the almanac was where the vigas or any other grain would be loaded for milling. There was also a central hole through both stones, into which the rod that Rian had mentioned rested, acting as the pivot point for the stones.


    It was nice working with professional craftsmen who knew what they were doing. It looked like they actually would finish tomorrow. It seemed Rian would have his holiday soon after all.


    She''d still have to make sure he didn''t find any further excuses to ask her for more holidays. They still had a Dungeon farm to get started on building.

 163 - The Milling Process

    The mill was completed by mid-morning of the following day.


    It was¡­ well, most people probably wouldn''t call it beautiful. It was two round hunks of rock on top of each other, held together by a thick wooden rod, with a bowl-like hopper for grain on the top stone, and a wide channel all around the bottom stone for flour to spill out onto, or so Lori gathered. The finish was rough instead of smooth and shiny, even after being washed to remove all the stone dust that had been knocked off in the process of making it, and the wooden handle was the same. A little bit of the central pivot rod was sticking out of the top of the mill for some reason.


    "It''s for the long lever," one of the stonemasons explained to Rian. "Someone can turn this by hand easily enough, but the arm starts aching after a while. With a long lever, all they have to do is push, and one person can keep doing all the work all day, even if their arm gets tired.


    Rian nodded. "Makes sense. Did you run into any problems while making it?"


    "No, Lord Rian. Fastest work I''ve done, really. Her Bindership knows what she''s doing." He bowed to Lori at this, and the other stonemason did as well. Lori waved a dismissive hand in acknowledgement.


    Rian, why do you look so annoyingly happy?


    "Have you used it yet?" Rian asked.


    "Not yet, Lord Rian," the other stonemason said. "It''s cleaned and ready though, so all we need is some vigas and someone to start turning." He hesitated, and then added, "And something to stand it on. We can move it up to one of the tables upstairs and¡ª"


    "No," Lori said, and the man stopped talking. She pointed to one of the walls. "Put it in one of the alcoves. We''ll make a permanent space for it down here. I don''t want us to have to risk trying to move it when a dragon comes, and if we removed the benches, there''s enough room to use your walking lever."


    The three men started nodding. "Makes sense," Rian said cheerfully. "That way we only have to move it once. And you can probably take care of where to stand it on?"


    "Yes, yes," Lori said, waving dismissively. She turned away. "I''ll create a pedestal, go get some vigas to test this with." A thought occurred to her. "Make sure it''s enough vigas to make a batch of bread."


    "Is this a good time to point out we don''t have an oven for food?" Rian said brightly. "We could make spiral bread on skewers or flatbreads on pans, but that''s it."


    Lori gave him a level look.


    "I''d have mentioned it sooner, but it hadn''t been relevant before now," Rian smiled.


    "Noted," Lori said. "Go get the vigas and inform the kitchen staff they need to prepare to turn flour into some kind of bread."


    "Of course, your Bindership," Rian said. "And I will be sure to take testing whether the bread is edible very seriously, as I cannot in good conscience ask anyone else to do it, certainly not you, who might suffer if the bread were somehow unfit for human consumption¡ª"


    That was as far as Rian got before the stone beneath his feet liquefied completely, and he let out a cry of surprise as he sank into the floor, the two stonemasons moving back hastily, bumping into the walls of the alcove. Unlike with¡­ someone, she forgot who, no one important¡­ who Lori had sunk into the floor, she didn''t keep directing the stone to pull down Rian into itself like water, merely greatly reduced the viscosity and cohesion. Lori expected Rian to sink to about his stomach and panic, though she had made sure that Rian''s feet would touch stone without his head submerging. She was emphasizing her displeasure, not trying to kill him.


    That was certainly her intention¡­


    Instead, her Lord just sat there, moving his arms in circular motions as he bobbed up and down calmly after that cry. "Your lack of amusement is noted, your Bindership," he said blandly, though it was clear it was trying to repress a smile for some reason. "Consider myself chastised. May I get out of this now? The stone''s oozing up my legs and I don''t want to have to try to clean this off my underwear. Or the area around it, for that matter."


    How was he¡­? Oh. His strange ability to swim. Lori had forgotten about that. She supposed it gave him the experience to not panic when suddenly submerged in fluid.


    "Don''t do it again," she said sternly. He would, eventually. She knew he would. But as long as it wasn''t anytime soon¡­


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said. "Can I pull myself out of this now?"


    "Can you?" Lori was genuinely curious if he could.


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    "Yeah, I''ve had my back against solid stone for a while now," Rian said. "Just need to pull my arm out¡­"


    Lori watched, fascinated as her lord calmly pulled himself out of the liquefied stone, putting his hand on the stone floor behind him and pushing his body up as calmly as¡­ well, as calmly as he''d pulled himself out of the river onto the end of the stone dock after he''d volunteered to look underneath the dock for her to check the support arches. Though this time he was wearing more clothes.


    "Well, don''t just stand there," Lori said after Rian had pulled himself out. "Get the vigas."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said as one of the stonemasons nervously prodded the area of stone floor Rian had come out of with a foot. It held solidly, though Lori would have to come back later and fix it, since now there was a depression in the ground surrounded by rippling bumps of stone. More stone was sticking to Rian and his clothes. "Come on Pellee, Markes, let''s get moving before her Bindership gets annoyed at me again. If we hurry, I can take a bath before lunch."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The actual testing, once Lori had placed a stone cube to rest the grist mill on in the alcove and contoured the top of the cube so that the mill rested in its own little outline so it wouldn''t move from side to side, was slightly anticlimactic. Rian, still wearing stone-encrusted clothes¡ªthe stone was slowly breaking up into shards and dust¡ªcame down with a wooden bowl full of vigas and a man who looked vaguely familiar. Had he gotten another admirer?


    "You remember Tamas," Rian introduced. No, she didn''t, though now that he said it, the name did tickle something¡­ Eh, probably not important if she couldn''t remember it. "He''s a miller by trade, and actually the one who reminded me we need a gristmill. He''s volunteered to be in charge of this milling, in addition to any other work he might need to do." The man in question nodded, then hastily converted the movement into a bow. "All right, let''s see how it works. I assume it works, since Pellee and Markes know what they''re doing, but always best to make sure."


    The miller lifted up the top millstone to inspect the inner surface of the grist mill, running a finger over the pattern that had been chiseled into both halves before nodding in acknowledgment at the two stonemasons, who nodded back, seemingly satisfied that the craftsman who''d be using the tool they made confirmed it was of quality. The miller set the top millstone back into place before grabbing the wooden handle and giving the whole thing a few turns to see how well it moved. In Lori''s opinion, it needed a few ball bearings to make it turn smoother, but the stonemasons had seemed satisfied with how it had moved when they had tested it, so perhaps it was supposed to be like that?


    Lori watched as the miller poured some of the vigas into the bowl-like hopper on the top millstone, then grasped the handle and began to turn. There was a sound like two rocks rubbing pebbles between them¡ªwhich, given how the gristmill seemed to work, was probably exactly what was happening¡ªand the vigas in the hopper shifted and sank down to the bottom of the indentation.


    Eventually, a pale, sandy powder started to emerge from between the two millstones, settling on the bottom of the channel around the edge. It was pale brown, and looked coarser than the flour that Lori had seen in River''s Fork, when she had been drafted by Binder Shanalorre''s aunt to help with preparing breakfast. This looked lumpy, and there were little shards of what she realized were vigas shell mixed in.


    "Is it supposed to be that consistency?" she asked Rian.


    "I¡­ think so?" he said, looking towards the miller, who was adding more vigas to the hopper. "Tamas?"


    "It''s just the first grind, Lord Rian," the man said, not stopping in turning the handle. "That''s perfectly normal. You can get it finer by passing it through more times, but it''s not really needed unless you were going to use the flour for something other than bread. A time or two is all you need to get all the lumps out, and then you can use it for baking."


    Lori stared at the flour that was continuing to steadily accrue on the millstone''s channel. "How long would it take to make enough flour so that everyone in the demesne could have a serving of bread?"


    "The whole day, your Bindership," the miller said immediately. "With a millstone this size, and maybe someone to take turns with, we can grind about thirty sengrains a day. Forty on a good day."


    Only forty sengrains a day? No, thirty¡­ "Doesn''t that mean we need more gristmills?" How many people could you feed with that much, exactly?


    "You can feed four people with just one sengrain of flour, your Bindership," the miller said. His arm still hadn''t stopped turning the handle, and the wooden bowl now lay empty, the contents of the mill''s hopper steadily depleting.


    Lori did the conversion in her head. A sengrain of water was one chiyudrop¡­ so a quarter of that¡­


    She nodded to herself. Put in that context, a sengrain feeding four people seemed about right, and milling forty sengrains a day¡­


    "Is there any way to increase the output?" Lori asked.


    The miller glanced at Lori, then shrugged. "If I pushed it, I can perhaps make fifty, but I''d need two people to change shifts with so we can keep up the pace. Though your Bindership, a quarter sengrain per person a day is the calculation for if they''re eating nothing but bread. If we just add it as part of the meals we have now, we''d need only half a much, maybe a little less. But the easier way to make more flour is to have a bigger millstone, though it will take more people to operate it."


    Lori considered that. "As a miller, do you think you can supply all the flour the demesne needs with what we have now?"


    "As long as bread''s not the only thing we''re eating, very easily your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "Rian, start arranging for your little harvest celebration. You may hold it when we have enough flour to let everyone have¡­ oh, four servings of bread. The rest will be prioritized for planting the winter crop and the Dungeon Farm, with any left over to be eaten over the winter."


    "Yes, your Bindership!" Rian said with a wide smile that was probably only half-feigned for theatrics


    Lori managed to maintain her dignity and not walk with a happy bounce in her step. Bread! She could finally eat bread in her own demesne! Ah, bread with stew¡­ bread with roasted tail meat¡­! And it was going to be a holiday, so there WOULD be roasted tail meat!

 164 - Warm and Cold

    The day after the harvest celebration, the taste of bread that had been salted with what Rian and those who had gone with him had managed to gather from the ocean, soaked in roasted tail meat fat, and dipped in stew still lingered on Lori''s tongue. She was bemusedly surprised to find that breakfast included little chunks of stale bread floating in her stew, growing soggy and mushy.


    "Why do we have stale bread?" she asked.


    "It happens," Rian said. "Some people were too full to eat their portion, or just didn''t feel like it. Although I think this is more a case of the kitchen crew making some extra in case some people wanted more, and there being not as many of that as they had thought there would be. It''s not like the bread went to waste. We''re eating it right now."


    Lori grunted, acknowledging the point. "The fact there''s any waste at all of a limited resource¡ª"


    "Again, we''re eating it, so it hasn''t been wasted," Rian interrupted. "It''s merely been¡­ delayed, so as to achieve a new form of delicious."


    "It''s soggy bread disintegrating in my stew," Lori said.


    "Well, they''re working with what they have," Rian shrugged. "And it serves a purpose. It thickens the stew into a saucy consistency, so it''s different from how we usually have it, and is basically the best way to use it right now. We haven''t gotten any eggs from the chokers we''re keeping yet, and if you want to reuse old bread properly, you need egg."


    Umu and Mikon looked at him sideways as Lori wondered how he knew that. "How do you know that?"


    "Why wouldn''t I know that? It''s hardly a secret."


    "You know about cooking but you don''t know how to do your own laundry?" Lori said blandly as Mikon and Umu nodded, agreeing with the question.


    "I like knowing how to make the things I like to eat," Rian shrugged, then glanced sideways at Umu. "And I''ve been asking you to teach me how to do my own laundry."


    "I''m busy," Umu said, looking like she was trying one of Mikon''s smiles and¡­ well, clearly only trying. "How did you even manage to get stone on the inside of your trousers?"


    "I displeased her Bindership with one joke too many, and she made her displeasure known," Rian said.


    The three women glanced at her.


    "Oh, don''t look so afraid, he''s more useful alive than dead," she said. "So I''m not replacing him with Mikon any time soon."


    Rian blinked. "Wait, Mikon''s my replacement?"


    "Only if I have no other choice," Lori said offhandedly. She tilted her head thoughtfully. "Or you leave again. Or you die. Or if I just need a lady for some reason."


    Rian looked between Lori and Mikon. "Are you¡­ threatening her with becoming a lady? Or me? It could go either way."


    Lori had another spoonful of stew. He was right, it was a little thicker, and the traces of soggy bread wasn''t as distracting as she had initially thought. "Rian, stop being silly and eat. You''re making a farm for me today, remember?"


    "I''ll point out that I have no idea how to build a farm inside a dungeon," Rian said. "I don''t even know how to build one outside of one."


    "It''s not that hard," Lori said. "The biggest issue is providing drainage so that the roots of any crops don''t get waterlogged and start rotting. Beyond that, it''s a matter of maintaining a proper temperature and providing the right kind of light so that the crops will grow, both of which I have extensive experience with."


    "That¡­ sounds about right, but how do you know?"


    Lori held up the almanac.


    "Oh right, silly me."


    "Yes, but you''re still useful anyway," Lori agreed. "The almanac was helpful in informing me as to the importance of drainage, so the third level''s floor will have to be prepared by men with tools to break apart the rock while I soften it for them to make it easier." That hadn''t been in the book, but it included an illustration of the increasingly fine layers of rock that needed to be under the topsoil so that the water could drain properly. Lori already had the idea to have all that water drain into a cistern so it could be used to water the plants again, since all that water had to go somewhere, and she needed it to not flood her Dungeon. "Once the matter of preparing the ground so that it won''t flood and therefore rot has been dealt with, it can be treated like any other crop, except we don''t have to worry about dragons destroying it, or chokers and bugs devouring it, provided we manage to keep the latter out of my Dungeon."


    "There¡­ isn''t a lot of space in the Dungeon just yet," Rian said skeptically. "At best, the grain we harvest will make for a decent seed crop, but we won''t be feeding everyone in the demesne with it any time soon. And that''s if we manage to get it to grow properly at all."


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    "We can continue to expand," Lori said, waving her hand dismissively. "There is more potential space underground than there is across the entire surface of my demesne. It will take time, but it should be doable, and it will all be constantly protected from the coming of a dragon."


    "Until we get three islandshells dropped on us at the same spot," Rian said.


    Lori waved her hand again. "Yes, but you can say that about anything."


    "I suppose so¡­" He sighed. "Well, I still want to prioritize surface planting. Right now, we have more cleared space above ground than in the dungeon, and if we can plant it all with a winter crop, we''ll actually be able to eat bread regularly when we harvest it. And we''ll need to find more soil to bring down to the dungeon anyway, and I''d rather we do that after we''ve planted above ground. The compost pit isn''t ready to be used for fertilizer yet, but we need to get started on a new one¡­" By the end, Rian seemed to be talking to himself more than her, frowning down and moving his fingers in the air as if he were drawing or writing something only he could see. "We still have the tools we used to dig out the dungeon originally¡­ somewhere¡­ and if not that we''re at the point the smiths can make new ones¡­"


    "As I said, I leave organizing it to you," Lori said. "I will be digging."


    Rian trailed off, frowning thoughtfully. "It''s not a lot of time," he said. "I don''t know how much of the above-ground planting we''ll be able to finish before winter, so there''s a good chance we''ll have to delay work on the Dungeon''s farm until the cold starts." He hesitated. "Uh, are you planning to heat the Dungeon with magic over the winter, or are we going to have to start setting up braziers and stuff inside? Because otherwise keeping any crops in the Dungeon alive will be difficult."


    Lori gave him a flat look. "Of course, I''ll be heating the Dungeon. I live here, after all, why would I want to be cold?"


    For some reason, Rian, Umu and Mikon all gave her the same look. "Why haven''t you started yet?" Rian said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Because it''s not cold yet."


    "Lori, it is freezing out there in the morning," Rian said. "I mean, it''s not winter cold, but it''s certainly a message that it''s coming."


    "It''s not that bad," Riz said. "It''s a nice, average summer, and it warms up more when the sun is out." She paused to think a moment. "So, yes, I suppose it''s probably a little cold for you southerners."


    Lori frowned. "What are you all talking about? It''s not cold."


    "No, it''s definitely cold," Rian said. "I have a fire on every night now, though that''s mostly because I don''t have shutters on my windows yet. In fact, today I''m going to the plank shed and getting a few to block out my windows to keep the warm air in until the carpenters get around to making shutters for me."


    "You''re a lord, just tell them to make your shutters first!" Lori said, exasperated.


    "No! I''m just one man. There are houses with children in them. I can wait."


    Lori gave him a flat stare and sighed. "Erzebed, go and tell the carpenters to fit shutters over Rian''s windows first."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said promptly.


    Rian looked between the two of them. "Wait, you call her ''Erzebed''?"


    "Of course. Why wouldn''t I call her Erzebed? That''s her name."


    Rian blinked, tilted his head and shrugged. "All right, fair enough." He turned to Riz. "I thought your stint being her temporary-me was over?"


    "Yes, but you need shutters on your windows," Riz said. "Families with children can sleep together and keep each other warm. You live alone."


    "And you don''t let us stay over at night," Mikon muttered. Umu sighed heavily.


    "She didn''t need to know that," Rian muttered back.


    "I certainly didn''t," Lori agreed. "But at least you don''t need all that advice my mothers gave for convincing women to sleep with me. Now, eat and get started on my farms."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "So, you''re going to start heating the Dungeon now?"


    "It''s warm, it doesn''t need to be heated yet," Lori said, rolling her eyes.


    Rian sighed and held out his left hand towards her. "Lori¡­ how cold is my hand?"


    She rolled her eyes again and reached out to indulge him. She grasped his hand and blinked at how cold it was. It remained cold in her grasp, not warming or adjusting to be more comfortable to her. "You''re cold. Why are you cold?"


    "Because it''s cold, Lori," Rian said. "And it''s not just me. How have you not been able to tell?"


    Lori frowned, letting go of Rian, and turned towards Erzebed. "Hand," she demanded. Her former temporary assistant dutifully held out her hand, and Lori grasped it. Cold. "Mikon." The weaver held out her hand as well. Lori took it. Cold.


    She stared at her hand. Why¡­ Oh!


    Lori leaned back, twisted and reached down to touch the floor. It was cool under her touch for a moment before becoming pleasantly warm. She focused on the stone under her hand and felt firewisps. They were directly under her hand and there were fading traces of imbuement on them. She remembered hot food cooling to a pleasant temperature, her fingers not getting burned¡­


    "Well, consider this one of your duties now," Lori said smoothly as she sat up straight again. "You''ll need to point out to me how hot or cold it is if it seems like I might not be able to tell."


    "How are you not able to tell?" Rian asked. "That kind of lack of sensitivity is concerning."


    "It''s part of being a Dungeon Binder," Lori said, her mind racing as she tried to find an explanation. "The temperature of the air around me is always warm." The demesne was like a part of her body since she had made her core. And as with her core replenishing her lightningwisps when she drew it from her nerves, the demesne''s firewisps warmed nearly anything she came into contact with to keep her warm, including the very air around her. Other living people, however, were voids to her awareness of wisps, and even now she couldn''t bind or imbue the wisps in their bodies¡­ which was why their hands remained cold. "Unless I leave my demesne, in which case I''ll probably feel as cold as anyone else. So I''m never leaving my demesne again, ever."


    "That¡­ makes sense¡­?" Rian said. "Well, as your lord in charge of telling you how cold it is, I''m telling you it''s cold."


    "Yes, yes, I''ll heat my Dungeon," Lori said, waving a hand. "Cold will not be the reason why my Dungeon''s farm fails."


    "Then my work is now done," Rian said cheerfully.


    Well, she supposed it would be a good opportunity to make some new bindings. There might even be something relevant she could try out in her new almanac! That was a cheerful thought.


    Lori went back to eating her breakfast, ignoring the way Umu and Mikon were enthusiastically showering Rian in affection, the latter while pressing against an awkward-looking Riz, completely heedless of who were watching. Ugh, Rian was acting more and more like one of her mothers every day. Sighing, Lori focused on her food, already going over possible arrangements of bindings in her head.

 165 - Salt, Fees, Anchorage, Heat

    After breakfast, Lori set about heating her Dungeon, even if the cold didn''t bother her. Clearly she didn''t need it, but it was the principle of the thing. A Dungeon was at the heart of the demesne, fortress and seat of a Dungeon Binder''s power, first and last bastion against dragons. It was rare but not unknown for a demesne to be ravaged by a dragon so thoroughly that those who had taken shelter in the Dungeon needed to repopulate the entire demesne... and the only reason they managed to do so was that the dragon had managed to kill the demesnes around them, so they hadn''t needed to worry about being invaded.


    Hopefully she didn''t need to worry about that. Dying by finding the entire demesne suddenly had a mountain on top of it, or finding it suddenly at the bottom of a frozen sea was¡­ not survivable.


    Even if she didn''t need the warmth, her Dungeon needed to be warm and comfortable, not just because she lived there, but because the second level was an industrial area, and as someone who had worked in industries, it had always irritated her when the people she had worked for had been too cheap to pay for any sort of heating. ''You''ll be sweating in no time, you''ll be warm then'', ''just warm yourself''¡­ ugh. Horrid people. And they always paid the lowest rates, too.


    Tempting as it would have been to not provide heating to save on expenses¡­ she wouldn''t actually be spending anything, whether beads or materials, so why not?


    At Rian''s suggestion, she had also placed bindings of firewisps in the old dining hall and the hospital to warm those locations, as well as indoor lightwisps in the latter''s case, which¡­ well, she had actually forgotten about. Still, he''d had a point. While both building had received shutters at some point, eating would be torturous in this new cold¡ªor so Rian said¡ªand should there be any injuries, the doctors and medics would need light to operate, and due to the new shutters, the building couldn''t rely on natural light for it anymore. It was an oversight Lori was annoyed to have made.


    She had to start with feeling the cold. That had been¡­ unpleasant, but needful. After all, she couldn''t properly heat her Dungeon if she couldn''t tell how cold it was before, and how hot it was when she was finished. It had been surprisingly simple, deactivating all the firewisps around her. The cold had been like a bucket of water thrown over her, the change in temperature not exactly abrupt, but the end result had been sharp. Her firewisps had half-accidentally, half-instinctively come out of her grasp, like her lungs after she''d held her breath for too long, and she had immediately warmed to a comfortable temperature, the occasional breeze from her Dungeon''s air circulation a cool breeze rather than a freezing bite.


    Bracing herself, she did it again, and with her braced for it, the cold wasn''t so surprising. It was, she was willing to admit, annoyingly chill, the kind of cold that made one want to curl up in bed with a good book and wait for a reasonable hour like noon, when the world had finally sufficiently warmed enough.


    Lori grit her teeth and set about banishing that feeling from the confines of her dungeon.


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    "Ah, so warm¡­" Rian sighed at dinner. Lori had spent the whole day trying to balance the temperature of her Dungeon, starting with putting heat-generating firewisps among the airwisps that circulated air in her demesne¡ªheat needed a medium over which to spread¡ªand then adjusting the output of the firewisps, making sure it would only generate up to a point and not grow hotter than that. Heat built up, after all. "Well, warmer, in any case."


    "Additional heating isn''t necessary right now," Lori said as she set up the chatrang board. "It will grow warmer as the heat builds up."


    "And you can just make it hotter if it gets colder, right?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "If needed," she said. "I''ll need to implement a more extensive system to take advantage of the heat we''re excluding from the cold rooms, but for now this solution works." It worked but it wasn''t¡­ elegant, and a bit wasteful, even if it was the simplest solution to implement right now. She was coming to loathe those. "What is the progress on the farm?"


    "It''s¡­ happening," Rian said unhelpfully. "We have a lot more open area to plant in now, which is both good and bad. That means more ground needs to be prepared, and since you can''t assist with that, it has to be done the hard way. At least being out in the sun keeps us from getting cold, though I could do without the smell from the latrine soil. But the farmers say that once they have it all planted, when we harvest it we''ll be able to regularly have bread."


    "Something to look forward to," Lori nodded.


    "Well, before then we have to make sure the chokers don''t eat any of the grain we cast," Rian said. "Or at least too much of the grain we cast, since everyone seems a bit resigned to losing some. Even with our most optimistic estimates, it will be a while before we can get started on the Dungeon''s farm, and it will eat heavily into the amount of grain we can eat. We might have to trade salt for grain at River''s Fork, at least if we want to eat bread and make the Dungeon''s farm."


    "Make sure our needs are fulfilled first before we trade away any of the salt," Lori said.


    "They might ask us to pay a toll fee," Rian said. "At least, we''ll have to be prepared if or when Shana¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre."


    "Binder Shanalorre starts charging us for the privilege of passing through their length of the river," Rian said, voice suddenly sounding tired for some reason. "Hopefully it won''t come to that, but at the very least do I have your permission to preemptively start giving them salt?"


    Lori stared at him. "Why would we want to do that?"


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    "So we can essentially set the price," Rian said. "If we wait for them to start charging a toll fee, they can set the price, and it might be a percentage of our cargo, or it can be a weight that becomes a new minimum we have to gather. If we voluntarily start giving them salt, we essentially set the price, and it can be a much smaller fraction. It will also cause fewer delays, since if they demand a set percentage, we might be delayed while they inspect our cargo and count it all up."


    Lori stared at him. "That makes absolutely no sense!" That¡­ wasn''t how economics worked! "That''s not how economics works! We can''t just give them things! Why¡­ why¡­"


    "Ah," Rian said, smiling smugly. "But it''s not economics. It''s interpersonal relations. Or rather, inter-demesne relations. People are far less inclined to be horrible to people who have been nothing but nice, helpful, generous and friendly to them. By giving them the salt when they don''t ask for it, they''ll seem greedy and churlish by imposing a higher toll fee or customs duty or both. And if they do so anyway¡­ well, we tried, and you were right."


    That¡­ that¡­ that¡­


    "Ugh, fine, do it if you think it will work," Lori groaned.


    "If it helps, it also performs the practical function of showing them the quality and desirability of our salt, likely making them more inclined to trade with us for it," Rian said.


    "Well, why didn''t you just say that in the first place!"


    "Because it''s only the secondary purpose of doing so. Conditioning River''s Fork to allow us to pass without some sort of onerous fee is the main reason to do it. I''m having the Coldhold set off downriver tomorrow towards the ocean. With plenty of water to wash with, they should be able to last until they fill the holds with salt¡­" Rian hesitated, then sighed. "Ugh, maybe not tomorrow. I''ll have to set up something so they can stay warm. Maybe some kind of brazier¡­ well, they''ll be going within the week, anyway. Will you be able to maintain the Coldhold for that long?"


    Lori thought of her list of bindings to imbue. "That shouldn''t be a problem."


    "If it helps, you won''t need to make any more ice blocks to keep food cold," Rian said. "We have salt now, we can make salted meat. It''ll preserve well, having it get iridiated will basically just tenderize it, and since we can cook it in water, that won''t be a problem."


    "I''ll take your word for it." Preserving food with salt wasn''t something she was knowledgeable about.


    Rian nodded. "Now if you''ll excuse me, I have to go get our food before they beat me to it." He stood, just as Riz, Mikon, and Umu arrived and started putting down bowls of food and cups of water.


    "Too late, it seems," Lori said blandly, grabbing one of the bowls and cups.


    "Hello Rian," Mikon said cheerfully. "Sit, sit, we brought dinner. And I finished the filter cloth you asked for, and made a few spares as well."


    "The carpenters said they''ll have the shutters ready soon," Riz said as she sat down to one side of Rian, Umu settling down on Rian''s opposite side. The northerner woman blinked when she saw Mikon decide to sit down next to the other weaver. "M-maybe as soon as tomorrow, they said."


    Rian stood there, looking up at the ceiling for a moment before sighing and sitting back down. "Thank you for bringing the food," he said, sounding sincere but tired. "Though if you''re all going to be doing this from now on, I insist I get a turn getting food too¡­"


    Lori tuned out what was likely to be ''relationship things''. Her mothers had also had a lot to say on the subject, as if her getting into some kind of intimate relationship was a given. Really, they got ahead of themselves on a lot of subjects like that, ugh. She focused on enjoying her food and playing chatrang with Mikon, who finally seemed to be developing some sort of proper caution. She no longer sent her pieces into attack range so recklessly, at any rate.


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    Lori had checked the temperature of her Dungeon again the next morning, disabling the firewisps around her. While it had been a little cool, it was certainly far warmer than it had been the day before. Lori resisted the temptation to increase the output of the firewisps she''d set. She had to let it run for a few days to let the heat grow, otherwise she might overheat her Dungeon¡­


    With the temperature of her Dungeon resolved, she set about going over the next thing she had to personally see to, which was proper storage for their boats in the event of a dragon. Lori''s Boat could easily be picked up and carried into her Dungeon, so it wasn''t a problem, but due to the size of Lori''s Ice Boat and the Coldhold, that wasn''t an option for them. The boats would need some kind of secured structure she could seal in the event of a dragon, and it would need to be along the river so it would be relatively simple to move the two vehicles there.


    She toyed with the notion of just building an enclosure around the dock to which the boats were secured, but the dock had been built close to the water hub, and building a proper protective enclosure that would encompass the Coldhold alone would mean intruding into the water hub''s structure. That would mean either rebuilding the water hub or making a too-tight enclosure, which the Coldhold would have difficulty maneuvering into and out of. The alternative was moving the dock a little farther, but that would put it too close to the clay pits, which was vital industry with established infrastructure she didn''t want to have to move or rebuild.


    With the docks as they were currently positioned not an option, and building the docks farther upriver would put it too close to the seels, disrupting their food supply, the only option was putting the enclosure downriver, past the laundry area and the aqueduct that carried up drinking water to the demesne''s basins. Well past, as she didn''t want to potentially affect their drinking water''s quality.


    She¡­ should probably alter that system so that the drinking water reaching the basins also came from the water hub, which had been heated to kill dustlife in the water without actually resulting in distillation. It would certainly be far safer than water from the river itself, no matter how well she had planned their waste water disposal so that it wouldn''t contaminate their drinking water¡­


    Ugh, she''d have to do that next!


    One thing at a time, one thing at a time¡­


    She walked past the laundry area, ignoring the people there doing laundry and avoiding the clothes drying on the long lines strung up on poles stuck into the ground. Some of those poles were visibly wobbling a little, piles of rocks at their base to try and stabilize them. Absently, Lori reached out through her core to bind the earthwisps on those rocks, fusing them together and wrapping them around the poles they were around, before forming a wide base to properly stabilize the structure.


    Once she was past all that, Lori reached a part of the riverbank where all the ropeweed had already been harvested, the stalks cut and long trampled, the dirt hard-packed. A few of the ropeweed at the edge of the river was already starting to regrow though, small shoots rising out of the ground. It was the site where they had constructed the Coldhold.


    Sighing, Lori began to mark out a space for the shelter where the boats would be kept, drawing it out with lines of darkwisps she pulled out of her clothes so that the marks would be visible in the daylight. After all, if it was big enough to build the Coldhold at, it should be big enough to store it, right?

 166 - Ship Sinking

    "Uh, Lori¡­" Rian said hesitantly. "I''m not trying to question your decision making, which I''m sure is backed up by things that I''m simply ignorant of¡ª"


    "Spit it out, Rian."


    "This seems a terrible place to store our boats in the event of a dragon," Rian said bluntly. "At least, in my admittedly ignorant opinion. We''d basically be putting them in a shed, and none of our sheds have fared particularly well to dragons. Well, except the ones you buried, but even then, recovering it after the fact was a pain."


    Lori looked over the plot of land on the river''s bank, black lines drawn on the ground and in the air, and finally had to reluctantly admit the same thing to herself. Even when she''d been choosing it, it was obvious that the spot probably wasn''t the best place to shelter their boats, simply the closest and most convenient. Her plan for it had mostly consisted of using excavated stone to make an oversized shelter similar to the Um and the long shelter that now contained so few people the ones living in it were fairly comfortable and not crowded. Well, there had also been the option of making the boat shelter immediately across the river, but then they''d need the boats to get to the boats, and it would still have been the same stone shelter design. Perhaps if she finally made the tunnel going under the river she could move the boat storage to the other side, but for now¡­


    She shook her head to clear it of tangential thought. "Well, what do you suggest?" she said, trying to make her tone scathingly sarcastic and even to her ears simply sounding tired at all this effort she''d just wasted.


    Rian shrugged. "Nothing comes to mind," he admitted. "I just know that trying to do this by sticking our boats in a stone shed probably isn''t the best idea, but I don''t really have anything better." Another shrug. "Admittedly, I only came here to tell you that lunch was ready. I wasn''t actually planning to get into a discussion of boat protection logistics."


    A part of Lori wanted to skip lunch, to continue working on this problem until it was finished, but that part was quashed by long practice and experience. Depriving herself of food just to try to get in an hour''s more work wouldn''t lead to anything productive. There wasn''t an immediate deadline like a test or exam or submission date, after all. She was a Dungeon Binder now. The only deadlines she had to meet were ones she set for herself.


    She still hesitated before finally nodding. "Well, let''s go eat then."


    Rian nodded, taking one last look at all the lines drawn in darkwisps. "How about we talk about this over lunch? Maybe I can help you come up with something."


    Lori shrugged tiredly. Why was she so tired when all she''d really done was walk around essentially drawing lines and taking measurements of boats? She''d needed to get her staff after an embarrassingly long time trying to properly approximate paces with¡­ well, paces. More and more often she''d been leaving her staff in her room, as she no longer really needed the coalcharms, quartz, and wire wrapping for her to use Whispering. All she actually needed it for nowadays was the length markings she''d put on it for measuring, and even that would be unnecessary once she finally learned to utilize Horotracting.


    It was quite an annoying tool, come to think of it, and she always had to be aware of it lest she hit anything, and it kept falling over whenever she leaned it on something to free her hands¡­


    Sighing, Lori sat down at her bench, carefully leaning her staff against a notch she''d hacked out with her knife so it wouldn''t roll sideways towards her while she was eating. Riz was already there, a cloth wrapped around her head to keep her hair out of her eyes as she used a towel to wipe sweat from her face. She looked like she had been working, given the smell coming from her. Had she been helping with the field preparations? Next to her, Mikon was sitting just a little bit farther away from the other woman than usual. Rian wasn''t there, but a quick look around showed he was at the line for food with Umu. Lori rolled her eyes at the sight, but couldn''t help but be amused in any case. Apparently he''d finally managed to come to a compromise about them letting him get his own food. Idiot.


    For a moment, Lori contemplated going upstairs to get her almanac, or her sunk board, but had to decide against it. She just wasn''t in the mood, not with the frustrating problem of the boat storage in front of her. While the grain storage shed was outside the Dungeon, she had placed and design it so she could easily bury the thing in stone so it could be protected from dragons. There was the risk of it becoming something else, like metal or wood or¡­ well, anything else, but that was true of anything and everything, and was why she covered as much of the demesne as she could with darkwisps, so that most of the danger could be reduced down to physical impacts from falling objects or random lightning.


    Rian and Umu came back with food, and Lori grabbed one of the bowls and started eating.


    "So!" Rian said brightly once the bowls had been distributed, "you''re working on where we can put the boats? Anything I can do to help?"


    "Get ready to have the area I marked dug out with shovels," Lori said. "We can use the soil in the Dungeon''s farm."


    Rian nodded, while next to him Riz sighed. "Let''s call that the backup plan," Rian said. "You don''t seem happy with it."


    "Yes, well, I have no other alternatives do I?," Lori said irritably. "After all, what else can be done about them?"


    "With the smaller ice boat¡ª"


    "Lori''s Ice Boat."


    Rian stopped speaking for a moment, closed his eyes and let out a breath. "Right, that¡­ you could just let the ice turn back to water, and we can carry the frame inside and just rebuild it afterwards. Even with how big it is, without the ice it''s easy to carry and turned sideways. It''ll still fit into the Dungeon''s front door."


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Oh. Right. Lori had forgotten about that. "That''s one solution, but we can hardly do the same to the Coldhold," Lori said. "Not easily, in any case."


    "It''s still easier to try to figure out how to protect one ship than two. Maybe you can bury it too, like you did with the wood storage sheds?"


    Lori blinked at the odd idea. But¡­ well, was it really that odd? Certainly, with Whispering it could certainly be done. Only¡­ "There''s no appropriate location to do such a thing," Lori said. "At least, not near the town." Which¡­ huh. It was still technically nameless, wasn''t it? The demesne had a name, but they had never really named the town outside of her Dungeon¡­ No, focus, not important!


    "We have that space in front of the Dungeon¡­" Rian began.


    "No," Lori said sharply. "All of the pipes bringing water to the baths pass through there. I would need to reroute all the pipes around where we would put the Coldhold just to be able to utilize it, and I don''t want to."


    Rian nodded. "Fair enough, fair enough¡­" he said, and ate for a moment, face thoughtful. "All right, so we need to store the Coldhold at the very least, and it needs to be protected from heavy things falling out of the sky hitting it¡­ what else?"


    "Dragon born abominations," Lori listed. "Undead things. Possibly wisplings, twisted vistas, and thought-shades, though only if I''m not able to raise enough darkwisps to protect it along with the Dungeon. Though in which case it would also be vulnerable to being turned into a dragon scale."


    "What are the chances the dragon will do us a favor and turn it into wood?" Rian said, sounding half-serious.


    "Small, and not to be relied upon. It''s far more likely to be turned into some kind of metal, salt, stone, or even air."


    "Ah, well, there''s goes that idea." A sigh. "So, it most likely needs to be protected from things hitting it really hard or trying to eat it, then? There''s really nothing we can do if the dragon wants to try to change its substance."


    "True, though sufficient mass around it will act as ablative protection to make it more likely to survive, " Lori said.


    "Why don''t we just bury it, then?" Rian said thoughtfully. "We make a big hole, you move the Coldhold into it with water, drain the water out, and then we bury it until the dragon goes away? It would certainly give it more mass to protect it than a shed."


    "There''s still the question of where it would be buried," Lori said, stating the obvious since it seemed to have slipped by her lord''s thought processes. "We can''t simply bury it now, since it would still be in use, but it would need to be a location where the Coldhold could quickly be moved to from the river once I became aware that a dragon was coming." A thought occurred to her. "Unless it was away when a dragon arrived, in which case it would be a lost cause and those on it would be horribly dead."


    Rian winced at her words. "Yeah¡­ that''s a separate problem. Though if the Coldhold were fast enough¡­" He shook his head, then slapped his own cheeks. "No, focus, no tangents!" He shook his head again, then gave Lori an intense stare. "All right, what if we bury it in the river? When a dragon comes, we cover all the wood with ice, then you sink it under the water and cover it with more ice, and maybe anchor it to the ground so it doesn''t move. If we give it maybe¡­ uh¡­ say five paces of water above it, the water would blunt the impact of most things falling out of the sky enough that the ice shell would be able to take the rest of the impact."


    Lori stared at him.


    "No, no, that''s a stupid idea," Rian dismissed.


    "It is," Lori agreed.


    "How about¡ª"


    "Instead of using ice, we should go straight to stone," Lori interrupted him. "That way it wouldn''t have the buoyancy issues of trying to cover it in ice, and I won''t have to essentially rebuild the ice of the hull because trying to separate the waterwisps that the boat needs structurally with the waterwisps of the ice we buried it in would be even more laborious. Stone is also heavy enough that we can simply cover the outside while leaving the inside hollow and it would still sink, so it''s unlikely to be swept away." She tilted her head thoughtfully. "The same can also be done with Lori''s Ice Boat, so we won''t have to struggle to bring it inside."


    Rian blinked, and stared at her. "Wait, are you serious?"


    "No, I''m Lori."


    The chuckle that came out of Rian seemed to be involuntary. "I mean, it''s actually a viable solution?"


    "For now," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively. "In the long term, some sort of means to shelter all the boats would be more efficient and cost-effective, but for now, as the plan in the event of a dragon, it''s certainly a more effective suggestion than building a riverside shelter for them. However, it gives me the freedom to find a better site for such a shelter, as well as not requiring any immediate action on my part beyond having enough stone set aside for both an emergency bulwark and to envelope the boats."


    "So¡­ you''re procrastinating?" Rian said with a wide grin.


    Lori kicked him under the table.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori spent the rest of the day excavating more stone from the third level. It was already half the current size of the second level, but with a ceiling clearance twice as high, so she had technically already excavated the same amount of stone. She was getting better at efficiently excavating the level. On two of the walls that led away from the river were rows of hallways with support arches to hold up the ceiling, each of them running parallel to each other. All she had to do was keep digging deeper into each hallway while maintaining the shape of the ceiling so it wouldn''t collapse. When she needed to make it properly part of a large open space, she simply needed to knock down the walls between the hallways and leave behind support pillars.


    With her newly excavated stone, she tested the dragon contingency plan the next day, wrapping the Coldhold in a shell of stone while Rian stood nearby with a water clock to time how quickly she managed to do it. After three tries that had Rian wincing, she found the best approach was to create a platform of thick stone underneath the Coldhold, then build up walls around the boat, encasing it in a cube that she then began to collapse inwards to force out the air and water though holes. Once covered and the stone fused airtight, she simply added more and more stone until it grew thick enough for her own piece of mind, at which point it was heavy enough to sink. Then she simply had to move the whole thing closer to the river''s center so that the water above it would be thick enough to absorb impacts, as Rian had suggested.


    By their tests, her best time was two hours, but they were able to cut it down closer to one by having the stone base and much of the stone mass prepared in advance and sunk under the water of the dock, greatly reducing its depth. She would probably need to adjust it when the Coldhold came back from the ocean with a full load so that it wouldn''t scrape against the stone, but that was simple to attend to. Lori''s Ice Boat could be encased even faster, and both she and Rian concluded they would probably have plenty of time to secure the two boats in the event of a dragon. Probably. Maybe. Hopefully. If they remembered to.


    That night, Lori wrote the reminder on her wall, just in case. Her walls were becoming very crowded with reminders, but with her memory, there was no helping it.


    Ugh, she really wished she''d figured out how to access Mentalism already!

 167 - Better Farming Through Explosions

    Lori began preparing the third level for farming. Her biggest concern had originally been preparing the ground. After all, they couldn''t just throw down dirt and call it a day. Well, they could, but according to the book without proper drainage their crops would fail and die from variety of reasons like root rot, loss of minerals, or simply collapsing as the ground lost the solidity to support the plant. The almanac had provided a small example illustration and a brief passage about how different-sized rocks arranged in a certain order were needed for the water to drain properly, but such rocks would need to be gathered or broken down from larger rocks.


    She had tried to devise a binding to let her do it herself, to turn their stockpile of stone¡ªor better yet, the very floor of the third level itself, since it was already where it needed to be¡ª into smaller stone. All her ideas, however, seemed as labor intensive as simply taking heavy hammers and breaking apart big rocks into small rocks. Turning the stone into a softer consistency would let them cut out or even scoop out the stone they needed¡ªdepending on how soft she made it¡ªbut it would require her to remove the binding from the extracted piece as soon as it was extracted so that it wouldn''t fuse with any other pieces. By herself, it would be tediously long and take forever, but if she had Rian find laborers to do it for her while she focused only on managing the bindings, it would be overwhelming as she''d need to concentrate on what each individual was doing, and they might need to break the rocks apart with hammers anyway if she didn''t remove the binding on the individual pieces and they fused to each other.


    She could also just use earthwisps to extrude slabs or rods of rocks and have people with hammers break off the extrusion, but that seemed extremely unsafe, since no matter how she thought of it the piece that broke off could only fall onto someone''s toes. It was a process she could theoretically do herself, using one binding to extrude and another binding to have a large stone slab press down to break off the extrusions. No risk of heavy rocks on her toes, and she could do it herself.


    Then she remembered she had an almanac, chided herself for trying to think of a solution by herself when she had a reference work, and searched through it to find any entry that was applicable to her own situation.


    She found it, perhaps not surprisingly, in the section about mining and quarrying stone. Upon reading it, she found herself both vindicated in thinking of checking the book and exasperated that she hadn''t come to the simpler, obvious solution mentioned.


    Lori read the section in question three times, especially the part about safety measures and reminders, and set off to work.


    Despite how much she had excavated already, according to the almanac Lori would need to dig even deeper, so she could lay out the drainage for her farm. Normal above-ground farms seldom had a problem with drainage, since the land was already naturally inclined to drain water down to rivers, lakes and aquifers¡ªor so her classes on the subject at school had said¡ªbut underground, in a Dungeon, it was a different matter. Part of constructing a dungeon involved sealing up the small, almost negligible seeming cracks and fractures in the stone. If one didn''t do so, one did not have a Dungeon so much as ''someplace for water to drain down to''. Above ground, these same cracks were part of the mechanism that drained water from soil, and to establish her farm, Lori would need to partially recreate this natural draining, lest her farm become waterlogged.


    The process of preparing the Dungeon''s floor for farming was simple. First, a layer of large rocks, which would have large opening between them. Then a layer of smaller rocks, just large enough to not fit between the gaps of the first layer. Then a third, even finer layer, and as many more layers of increasingly finer rocks, though according to the almanac three was a good minimum for most crops. Then a thick layer of mulch, woodchips or composted vegetation, though according to the almanac stone slabs would do, so long as they did not fit together perfectly, so as to allow the water to flow between the seams. Then after that, a thick layer of soil, prepared according to the needs of whatever crop.


    To the side of all this was supposed to be a drainage tank where the excess water was meant to finally drain down to, positioned at the lowest possible point and regularly drained and reused for irrigation before any other water, as it would contained dissolved¡­ things¡­ that the soil would need. Lori wasn''t exactly sure what those things were¡ªshe wasn''t a farmer, alchemist or Deadspeaker after all, though she was trying to correct that last¡ªbut that wasn''t her problem.


    It was one of the most basic ways to set up a permanent farm in a Dungeon, suitable for anything from grain fields to orchards of fruit trees with some adjustments, as she had learned in one of her jobs during her schooling days. Other permutations involved box planters of varying sizes or dimensions, trays on tall shelves, or growing everything from the ceiling using Horotracting to invert gravity, but it all came down to drainage in the end. Drainage, efficiency, and dealing with water so that any lower levels of the Dungeon wouldn''t find itself flooded. Most demesnes had long since set up their Dungeon farms according to their own designs, and were thriving, vital sources of food and resources for their economies.


    Lori had never worked in Taniar Demesne''s own Dungeon farm, since the demesne could afford to maintain a more experienced¡ªand probably better paid¡ªmaintenance and work staff of laborers, wizards, undead and skilled worked to raise, prepare and distribute the food grown there, but she had worked in the city farms, the privately owned commercial equivalents in the Dungeon Capital''s septants, which had been built in warehouses on the surface or, for the better funded ones, in one of the chambers in the underground district. The agricultural towns that the majority of a demesne''s food came from were said to be even more extensive, enormous underground complexes of tunnels and chambers that far surpassed the Dungeon''s own production in terms of scale and economy.


    As she had neither the need, the population, the space, or the resources to found an agricultural town, a Dungeon farm would have to do.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    Using the advice and idea from the almanac, she set about preparing to render down the stone floor into the rocks she needed. A test, she needed to test the almanac''s advised binding. She marked out a plot of floor with darkwisps, leaving three paces of space between the markings, the wall closest to the river and the wall with the stairs from the second level, and started binding the stone floor. She used earthwisps to pull up stone, leaving her with a wide, shallow depression that was two paces square that came up to her knees. Not as deep as she needed right then, but this was still just a test, after all.


    Then she went upstairs and debated whether to get water from the reservoir¡ªshe needed to remember to check it in case the water had gone bad¡ªor the river, before deciding on the reservoir because it was closer. She passed through the dining hall, which was mostly empty except for some people quickly and methodically sweeping the floor. They glanced up at her, but she ignored them, heading towards the back where the sealed hallway with the reservoir was. She passed the newer cold storage rooms, filled with blocks of solidified air so that there would no longer be any melted water among the cold meat, the doors sealed tight. Could she make more cold storage? She could try digging out the floor under the ones they had now¡­


    Lori bound the earthwisps of the barrier blocking the reservoir and moved it aside, collecting some lightwisps to illuminate her way. Well, there was no smells of byproducts of the human body, at least. She moved the lightwisps ahead of her, revealing the pit that was their emergency water reservoir. A wary look inside found no corpses floating in the water, or anything else. Well, that was good at least.


    Soon, Lori had a viscous orb of ice flowing at her side as she headed back to their third level. She had to be careful not to have the ice move too fast, since it didn''t take all that much for it to start slipping and sliding, but soon she had it back into the hole she had dug. The ice flowed in, coating the bottom of the depression. Lori set the rest of the water aside¡ªthere''d be time for it later¡ª and then poured in the rest of the stone after it. She rubbed her hands together, then claimed the firewisps the friction had created, and bound it onto the stone, moving the firewisps until they were among the ice, the binding on the firewisps deactivated.


    Lori looked at the bump in the stone floor she had made and nodded. Then she turned around and climbed back to the third level again as she deactivated the binding on the ice. Immediately, the ice began drawing in heat, and the stone around it began to chill. She reached the second level and ducked into one of the alcoves near the stairs, still focusing on the binding of waterwisps she had placed. She focused on the firewisps and the waterwisps at the same time and began imbuing them with magic from her Dungeon''s core.


    She checked the stairs. No voids of wisps, only the little binding of airwisps she had made to properly circulate air down into the third level for her so she could breathe. At the other end of the second level, far from her, weavers spun thread and wove, carpenters made shutters for windows, and ropers made rope. All of them were far away from the staircase leading down.


    Lori took a deep breath and then, before she could doubt herself, she willed the binding of firewisps to turn all the magic she had imbued into heat. At the same time, the binding of waterwisps turned all of the layer of ice into steam.


    For a moment, nothing happened and she frowned.


    Then there was an explosive crack that she felt through the floor. A few moments later, steam began rushing up the stairs from the third level, and Lori was barely able to bind it and force it to congeal into water as she bound all the firewisps in them and reduced their heat. She claimed the waterwisps that were now lying on the ground, gathering them all back into a rolling, viscous mass again as Lori went downstairs to see the results of her work.


    There was a hole in the floor again, but this time it was surrounded by debris. Shattered rock of various sizes lay scattered all around the hole, in addition to puddles of water and more water dripping from the ceiling.


    Lori sighed, and shook her head. Well, it had worked but the results¡­ it looked like she would have to try again. She gathered together the water and fused it into ice again as she started making another depression on the ground, careful not to get any of the shattered rock get entangled in the stone she was removing from the floor. When the depression was made, Lori filled it partway with ice and poured the rest of the stone on top. Then she turned around and headed back upstairs, already wishing she had an easier way to go up. Her legs were starting to ache.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At midmorning, Rian came running towards the alcove Lori had taken to sitting to during explosions, which Lori didn''t hear because of the bindings over her ears. On the stairway leading down, the binding of waterwisps and firewisps she had placed forced the steam from the latest explosion to condense back into water and the firewisps gathered the heat released by the water together so Lori could move it back to the next explosion.


    "Your Bindership," Rian said, panting slightly. "It''s come to my attention that things have been exploding. Is everything¡­ well?"


    "Of course, Rian. Why wouldn''t it be?"


    "So¡­ this is like the trees exploding right after you made the demesne and is just you¡­ enjoying yourself?" Rian said hesitantly.


    Lori brow wrinkled. "What?"


    "You made trees explode after you made the Dungeon''s core, remember?"


    "I can''t be expected to remember every detail from that far back," Lori said dismissively, though it did tickle something in her mind¡­ Ah, she remembered now! Ugh, that was so wasteful, she could have cured it for lumber! "I''m simply preparing the Dungeon''s farm."


    Rian stared at her. "You''re preparing the farm¡­ with explosions?"


    "How else am I supposed to prepare all the rocks that we need for drainage?" Lori said.


    Rian blinked. Stared. Frowned thoughtfully. Looked towards the third level. "Um¡­ have you been checking that all the support pillars are still structurally stable?"


    "Of course," Lori said dismissively. "What do you take me for?"


    Rian nodded. "Well¡­ as long as you know what you''re doing¡­ Though could I ask you to maybe block off the sound? People are getting disturbed and worried. It might make lunch late, since it''s distracting the kitchen crew."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine. If it will ensure lunch is on time."


    "Thank you, your Bindership. I''ll come back to tell you when lunch is ready."


    Lori waved him off, and as Rian went away, she set about adding in a third binding to block off the noise and the resultant vibrations through the stone. She didn''t want to miss lunch, after all.


    Then, when she was sure Rian was far enough away, Lori hastily began checking over the pillars of the third level and began repairing the small cracks she found. She might have to set a wide scale binding to reinforce the stone she didn''t want to break before she set off any more explosions¡­

 168 - Tired Of Stairs

    While Lori did not develop a rhythm, since with every explosion she made slight adjustments to the configuration of the ice, stone and temperature, trying to create better rocks with each explosion of steam, she did become better at dealing with the aftermath. Earthwisps reinforcing the stone structure of everything she didn''t want to explode, which was everything else in the third level; gathering all the steam and condensing it back to water and then ice so she could prepare of the next attempt; using a binding to use a large mass as a sort of shovel to push all the rocks she had exploded in the depression off to one side; and resetting for the next attempt.


    The next attempt was always different, since she was never satisfied. She changed the shape of the ice that she would convert into steam, to see if it would exert force better. She altered the shape of the stone she softened and poured over the ice, to see if it would fracture better. Whether she should use thin or thick layers, slabs or rows, just a single layer of ice under rock or multiples¡­


    By the time Rian came to retrieve her for lunch as she was setting up for another attempt, the third level was¡­ messy. While the area of floor that she was methodically blasting apart was relatively neat, the same could not be said for the rest. Rocks with sharp and angular shapes and edges littered the whole level seemingly at random, with a few smaller pieces having somehow reached all the way to the far wall.


    "You know, I think this is the most cluttered and disorganized I''ve ever seen one of your projects," Rian said, looking around and moving carefully as he nudged and kicked rocks out of his way. "Do you want me to have some people come down here to gather all the rocks and put them all in one place?"


    Lori hesitated, looking around. It¡­ was looking cluttered. "Yes, it is looking cluttered," she agreed. "Very well, arrange it after lunch. I''ll delineate an area for them to dump all the rocks into."


    Rian nodded. "You will, of course, not be doing any exploding while they''re down here, will you? People are much easier to break into little pieces than rocks."


    "Yes, I am familiar with the damaging effects of explosions on the human body," Lori said tersely. She began making her way up the stairs. She was getting really tired of those stairs. Maybe she should try and build some kind of pulley lift system so she wouldn''t actually have to climb¡­ ?


    Her lord hesitated. "Uh, how do you know?" Rian asked, looking disturbed. "Have you actually¡ª?"


    "No, of course not!" Lori snapped. "There was a demonstration at school. They used a fresh corpse operated by a Deadspeaker, and the professor showed us the effects for our benefit. Afterwards, the Deadspeakers went to observe how to make repairs on a damaged corpus and we Whisperers learned about explosions. How do you know the effects of an explosion?"


    "I used to work at a lumber yard with its own sawmill for cutting the wood down to size," Rian shrugged. "We had lots of sawdust, and were always being told horror stories about old fires that lumberyard workers apparently pass around as a morbid form of teaching fresh meat."


    "Ah," Lori nodded, trying to ignore the burning in her legs from having climbed up and down all morning because it had been too dangerous to stay on the third level during explosions. "We had those in carpentry workshops too. There''s always a candle or a lamp and a windy day¡ª"


    "¡ªor some first day Whisperer student who tries to use wind to sweep up instead of a broom¡ª"


    Lori made a face. "Ugh, I hate that story. I wasn''t even allowed to have a cool breeze on my face because of it. That was actually a specific clause in my employment contracts!"


    "Speaking of which, you know those kinds of explosions happen with flour too, right?" Rian said.


    Blink. "They do?"


    "Apparently, it''s even worse than sawdust explosions. Uh, the miller actually asked me if anything can be done in the gristmill alcove to block off the wind from the air circulation? If nothing else, we need to block it otherwise we''d lose a lot of flour to being blown away. He was fine up to now, but earlier today the wind suddenly started blowing into the alcove for some reason, and he had to suspend the day''s milling because of it."


    Lori sighed. "I''ll fix it after I mark off a place for the rocks," she said as they finally reached the dining hall. "Get people started on that after lunch." Now that she wasn''t setting off explosions any more, it occurred to her she should probably see how much rock she''d managed to break apart, so as to get some kind of idea of her rate of production, and compare how much more stone she had to make.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "Do you also want me to assign a group to you to take care of clearing the rocks after every explosion so that you can do it more efficiently? I can ask Riz to be in charge of them so you don''t need to remember anyone else''s names."


    "That''s your job," Lori said as they both sat down at the usual table. Usually, she''d have gone up to her room to wash her hands¡­ but at that moment, she couldn''t stand the thought of climbing another flight of stairs. She''d just have to be careful not to touch her food. Riz was already there, and she leaned against Rian with a sigh, not even glancing Lori''s way as she sat with her hands under her armpits. Was it that cold? Lori braced herself and deactivated the firewisps around her, but while it was a little cool, it wasn''t cold¡­


    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    "I could do it if you want," Rian said, "they don''t really need me to supervise getting the winter crop ready, but given this is just picking rocks off the ground, I figured you didn''t need me specifically. Between the minor changes to the Coldhold to make it easier to handle for long periods of time, keeping people from brawling, getting winter clothes made for everyone¡ª"


    "Fine, fine, Erzebed can be in charge of the rock collectors," Lori sighed. Winter clothes. Yes, the children would need winter clothes, wouldn''t they?


    Next to Rian, Riz blinked and straightened up slightly. "Wait, I''m doing what?"


    Rian suddenly looked very awkward. "Uh, yes¡­ Riz, could I, um, ask you for a small favor¡­? Please?"


    Riz sighed. "What do you need me to do?"


    As Rian explained, Lori wondered if she could overcome her reluctance to go upstairs to get her almanac while she waited for lunch to be ready. It wasn''t that far up¡­ no, no, no stairs right now. She''d just stay here and sit. It would be more comfortable if she had something to lean back against so she could really relax, but at least she was off her feet now¡­


    "All right, I can do that. Just picking up rocks, I can find some crawlers to help with that," Riz said, looking relieved.


    "If any decisions have to be made, her Bindership will probably be making them," Rian assured her.


    Riz nodded, then sighed and reluctantly got up. "I''ll see who''s up to a little rock hauling. Just hauling right, no need to actually break the things?"


    "Her Bindership has already done all the breaking needed. You all just need to gather them up and put them where she says. You, uh, might need to do it every day from now on, since we''ll need a lot of rocks for the Dungeon farm."


    "But we won''t need to break it apart ourselves, right?" Riz said.


    Rian glanced at Lori, who waved a dismissal. "Just clean up," she said. "And only do so when I tell you to."


    "She''s not kidding," Rian said. "She''s been making explosions all day."


    Riz nodded. "What can we requisition?"


    "I''d suggest one of the carts," Rian said, "but use your own judgement. Who knows, maybe everyone you find will be a masochist who likes picking up rocks one at a time in their bare hands and walking back and forth for each one." Lori twitched as her legs started to ache just thinking of it.


    "I''ll ask Raradina if she''s free, then," Riz said.


    Rian blinked, and Lori found herself doing the same. "Wait, there''s actually someone in the demesne who fits that description?" her lord said, sounding incredulous.


    Riz coughed, looking aside. "I said nothing of the sort. To imply such about anyone would be wrong. And very silly."


    Rian looked up at the ceiling. "Fine, fine. I''m hardly in any position to judge the sorts of things people might be into in their private time."


    "As a lord, you actually are," Lori pointed out.


    "I meant morally."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Silly thing to worry about. "Do you have any updates for me?"


    "Well, we''ve finally installed Mikon''s filter cloth onto the Coldhold''s evaporator and have been testing it on the greenish salt," Rian said. "We dumped a little of it in water as a test, got it all dissolved, then ran it through again, and the cloth managed to catch all the green stuff. Though at that point it was starting to turn a little grayish-brown, so it was probably dead. Definitely something that had been floating in deep water. I''m having all the salt run through the evaporator again, and when it''s done we can send the Coldhold out to collect more salt. Soon we''ll have salt for food, industrial needs and for trade. Also, just in case you forgot, the monthly ice block to River''s Fork is due in the next shift change."


    Lori nodded. "Noted," she said. It had been written on her list of reminders, but given how there was really no pressing need to keep track of what day it was, she was glad of the reminder. She hadn''t missed a scheduled exchange yet, though she had more than once made the ice in the time between the two batches of miners being ferried to the other demesne.


    "Also, I think the seels are getting ready to migrate away," Rian said. "Karina told me there are fewer seels this week compared to last week, and more and more are swimming downriver. On that note¡­"


    Lori sighed. "What now, Rian?"


    "I was wondering if you''d consider heating a portion of the river near the seels as a sort of experiment," Rian said. "About whether or not that can entice them to stay. We''ve got a lot of meat stored up now, but if and when we lose the seels we''ll finally need to start digging into our cold storage reserves, since that''s probably about the time trying to hunt for beasts will become harder, assuming they don''t migrate away as well. Besides, knowing if we can get a few to stay would be good to know, and would get us just that little bit more meat, furs and skins that we might need."


    "Rian, that''s not how rivers work," Lori said, annoyed. "Water flows downriver. Any water I heat wouldn''t stay where it was, requiring me to heat all water that passed through." True, she could set up a binding of firewisps that cycled and moved heat only in a given area, so that water warmed when passing through its boundaries and grew cold again when it had passed, letting the overall heat remain the same while at the same place...


    Rian shrugged. "It was just a thought. Well, it''s probably best if people start staying away from the river unless they absolutely have to. It''s getting so cold that even a person who can swim might not be able to save themselves."


    "Don''t talk about yourself in the third person Rian, it''s an irritating affectation."


    Whatever response Rian might have given was interrupted as Mikon and Umu finally arrived with lunch. Rian looked like he had to physically stop himself from taking some sort of action to help as the two women put the five bowls and cups of water in front of him¡ªMikon took the opportunity to snare a quick peck on the cheek¡ªsince he seemed to realize anything he did would only disrupt what they two were already doing. "Thank you Umu, Mikon," Rian said as Lori took one of the five bowls and cups and started eating.


    The others quickly took their own bowls¡ªRian somehow managed to choose last, which was probably intentional on his part¡ªand started eating as Lori let her mind wander, trying to think of arrangements of stone and ice she hadn''t tried yet that would result in rocks the size she wanted. Maybe Riz and her rock gatherers would finish quickly enough she''d have time to try again¡­


    In the meantime, she''d have to do something else. Something that, hopefully, wouldn''t require her to climb any more stairs until it was time to go to sleep for the day¡­

 169 - The Dungeon Farm

    Lori soon developed a rhythm to breaking rocks. Taking a bit more time between explosions to allow Riz and the people with her¡ªone of whom, to Lori''s disgust, was Landoor and ARGH, why did she have to remember that idiot''s name so clearly?¡ªto gather the fragments and put them into a pile wasn''t difficult, and with hands besides her own, she was soon able to come to a method of breaking apart stone into rocks that was faster, resulted in the size of rocks she wanted and, most importantly, still allowed her to use explosions.


    First, the area she was using for explosions¡ªthree paces long and wide, and a pace deep¡ªwas cleared, all the rocks in and around it gathered in buckets or picked up by hand and put on the cart that thankfully hadn''t been one previously used to move latrine waste. Once that was cleared, they went to pick up the rocks that had been launched some distance away while Lori reset for the next explosion.


    A layer of ice was spread on the bottom of the explosion box. A layer of stone directly on top of the ice, on which Riz used a stone blade on a stick that Lori had made for the purpose of carving out lines on the softened stone, making a rough grid where each square was approximately the size of the rocks they wanted to produce. The woman used the crude tool with deft, experienced movements, as if essentially writing with a big stick was something she was used to, though her face occasionally had a vaguely amused, disbelieving look to it. The lines weren''t perfect, as much as Lori would have wanted them to be, but they were relatively wide and fairly deep, even if they didn''t reach down to the ice below. Speed was more important.


    Once the lines had been made, the binding softening the stone was removed, and Lori poured in more water, letting them fill in the cracks and form a layer over the stone before solidifying the water into ice. Then another layer of stone, Riz drawing lines on them, then more water, repeating the process until all the stones from the previous explosion had been gathered, which was usually enough to let Lori and Riz make three layers. In each layer of stone was a binding of firewisps, deactivated but imbued, to provide the heat for the reaction.


    Then everyone¡ªand the cart¡ªevacuated to the third level, at which point Lori activated the bound firewisps to heat the stone while binding the waterwisps to not change their state. Once she felt enough heat had been made, she altered the binding on the waterwisps, turning them all into steam.


    At which point, there was a happy little explosion.


    After that Lori condensed all the steam, gathered back all the firewisps and reduced them down to her body''s temperature so that the level wasn''t scalding hot, and the rocks were gathered while Lori repaired any unwanted damage¡ªno matter how she reinforced the stone, there was always some¡ªand reset for the next explosion.


    Three paces by three paces was admittedly a small area, but Lori couldn''t make the area wider without becoming nervous as to the number of support pillars she''d need to remove and increasing the risk of a collapse. It also let her control the size and location of the explosion, letting her keep the eruption manageable.


    "Uh, Great Binder?" Riz asked tentatively after the first day.


    "What, Erzebed?" Lori said, focusing on getting the ice back in place. Every few explosions she had to send for more water, since try as she might, she wasn''t able to recover all the water after an explosion.


    "Um, Great Binder, I''m not complaining, but can''t you put up some walls so that the rocks don''t fly so far?" Riz said. "We''d be done a lot faster if that was the case."


    Lori gave her current temporary assistant a fat look. "Erzebed, do you know how explosions work?"


    "They go ''bang'' and things break?" Erzebed shrugged. "I never had much to do with militia alchemists except for buying their booze."


    "That''s a ''no''," Lori said. "Erzebed, you never want to put a wall around an explosion. All you will do is make a bigger explosion. One that could damage the pillars and make the ceiling come down. And you''d still have to get all the rocks that went far anyway."


    "Oh," Riz said in a small voice.


    "Not having a big explosion is also why we only blast this much at a time," Lori said. "If we were in the open air, then it would be safe to risk blasting long rows open. In here, however, the force of something that big could break the walls, cause the ceiling to collapse and make me have to excavate the whole level all over again."


    "Understood, Great Binder," Riz said meekly as she hefted the stone-tipped spear. "I''ll be quiet and work now."


    All right, some of that might have been exaggerations, but not by much, and the risks and possibilities were real.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The explosions eventually became part of her schedule, and after a point stopped being a daily occurrence. After all, she had other things to do, like curing the wood that was still being cut¡ªthough she could mostly just leave that alone since what was being cured was for firewood, so there was no need to worry about warping¡ªassisting the smiths and the potter with providing heat to repair tools and fire the kiln¡ªno reason to waste fuel that could be better used for heating in winter, and when she was providing heat the smiths didn''t need to use flux, or so she was told¡ªand preparing the third level for farming.


    When she had initially conceived of ''farming'' in her Dungeon, Lori had imagined the city farms she was so familiar with. Long rows of grain stalks, bound lightwisps in place of sunlight, all inside a vista for space¡­ while she hadn''t worked out Horotracting yet¡ªshe was working on it!¡ªshe was working towards the other two, and had thought that was when she could say that the third level had become a farm.


    She hadn''t been expecting stone boxes filled with mixed dirt and latrine waste.


    But¡­ well, as it was, it was far easier to set up than the vigas and other grains, which would need more drainage. Just a box filled with soil that the tubers could be buried in. The ''rows of hallways'' arrangement she had made as a way of excavating the third level was easy to fill with planter boxes that the tubers and other small food-plants could be planted in. Rian had organized it, just as she had told him to, finding out the details and what was needed before finally telling her. Making the long rows of planter boxes had taken only two days, and with light watering, the boxes didn''t even need any drainage built in save for a small hole in the side.


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    The planter boxes were all wide and low to the ground, rising only up to her knees, and would probably cause backache for anyone tending them¡­ which was fine with Lori, since she wouldn''t be doing it. They also had a smell, but fortunately it didn''t spread far, and she was seldom close enough to smell it. And while she didn''t exactly approve of finding many of the children in the third level tending to the planters, she had to admit that it was probably safer than them continuing to hunt the few remaining seels in the river, especially given how it was apparently getting colder and colder. And it wasn''t exactly strenuous work¡­


    Well, the children seemed enthusiastic about it in any case. The brat seemed to have taken charge, or as well as anyone could be said to be in charge of children. And they heeded her when Lori told the brat they needed to leave because she was going to blast, which would brutally and violently kill them all if they stayed, yes, all of them, no exceptions, no they couldn''t stay and watch.


    Slowly, the third level took shape. A drainage cistern was dug out to one side where all the water could drain to, and then the rocks Lori had blasted were laid out in plots, the largest ones at the bottom, then finer layers¡ªthe smallest ones had needed to be smashed with hammers¡ªthen the slabs, and finally half a pace of soil, ready to be planted. Each plot had to be planned out in advance, since they couldn''t be expanded without one end basically collapsing and all the layers getting mixed together. That had been annoyingly difficult to salvage.


    However, once plots had been laid out, the farmers finally had the time to start planting them with grain. Blasting was moved to a distant, isolated hallway so that the steam and debris wouldn''t ruin the crops, and proving Lori right when one blasting managed to break down the wall between hallways, causing her to hurriedly condense all the steam that had leaked out past her condensation binding before they reached the crops.


    The third level was slowly planted, one plot at a time. Most of the plots contained vigas, though others were planted with mais, glits, and the other things Rian had brought back from Covehold, which no one had been willing to risk outside where the chokers were. Every few days, another plot was excavated, filled with rocks, set up and planted, so that all the plots eventually contained plants of different heights.


    "This is going to take forever," Rian groaned one night during dinner, some weeks after Lori had started blasting stone into smaller rocks, Umu leaning against him and hugging his arm with her cheek against his shoulder. "I''m glad you didn''t put some sort of mandated deadline for this."


    Lori tilted her hear thoughtfully.


    "Oh, PLEASE don''t put a mandated deadline for this!" Rian protested. "You of all people should know how long it takes to set up each plot before it can be planted! Even if you make the third level as wide as all the above ground fields we have put together, it''ll take us four, maybe five times as long to plant. Up at ground level, we have soil already. Down there, even that has to be installed, and we''re sort of running out. If we dig up all the soil available, it''s going to bite us when it comes to future ropeweed production, as well as other plants that would have grown there naturally."


    Lori huffed. They actually had a lot of rocks now, and all the plots were ready to be dug up, with two plots already filled with stone so they''d be somewhere convenient and out of the way. "So now the production bottle neck is soil?"


    "Pretty much," Rian said, shrugging. "Right now, the only way to fix that is to start making a large compost pit and scouring the woods for leaves, branches and things to compost with the latrine stuff, but with how cold it''s getting, any compost pit we put outside isn''t going to start composting until spring."


    "It''s that cold already?" She''d mostly been staying in the Dungeon.


    "I''ve been putting a little water in a bowl out on the entry way above the Dungeon," Rian said. "This morning, there was a little skim of ice in it."


    Lori nodded. "Ah, definitely that cold already."


    "Oh, yes. Why do you think all the children are in the third level, where it''s nice and warm?"


    Lori blinked at that. Huh. That¡­ actually made sense. "Huh. That actually makes sense. Well¡­ that aside, is there any other way to get the soil we need?"


    "If we''d set up a big pile beforehand and it had already started composting, I think its own internal heat would have let it last through the winter, but even then, it wouldn''t be ready for us to use until spring," Rian said. "The compost pile we already have is mostly depleted from all the other plots we''ve already set up, and it hasn''t been replenished since most of the waste that would have gone into it instead when straight to the tuber planters. And since we''re still making more tuber planters, that replenishing isn''t likely to happen any time soon." Next to him, Umu made a face.


    With a sigh, Lori ran a hand over her face, trying and failing to somehow squeeze out the frustration. "I thought I told you to organize this."


    "This is organized," Rian said dryly. "Right now, we can''t do much more because of a lack of materials. If we''d been badly organized, we wouldn''t be having this conversation until three weeks from now, when we''d overextended ourselves, and our above-ground farms were failing from not having enough soil and fertilizer." He sighed himself. "At best, we could set up a compost pit in the third level¡ª"


    "No," Lori snapped as Umu straightened, releasing her grip on Rian slightly.


    "¡ªand I figured you''d say that. I''m not fond of the idea either. It''ll stink, bringing almost-fresh human waste through two floors of important things, especially the kitchen where our food is prepared, is practically asking to spread sickness around, and it wouldn''t be ready any sooner than spring in any case." Rian shrugged. "At this point, I think its best we switch from trying to make more plots in the third level and focus on properly maintaining the ones already planted."


    Lori frowned at him, but sighed. "Very well. Start setting up compost pits¡ªwait. Couldn''t we use the soil from digging up the compost pits?"


    "Where do you think the soil from the last three plots came from?" Rian said dryly. "I''m having more pits dug, so we might be able to make some more, but as it is the holes need to be dug manually, and need to be filled in with compost before it starts getting really cold. We needed some place to dump latrine waste over the winter in any case." He shrugged. "The farmers tell me we could probably get the waste to compost a little over the winter if we keep it warm, but¡­ how do you feel about using magic to keep holes full of excrement warm and drained of melted snow?"


    Lori made a face.


    "Yes, that''s what I thought."


    "Um, Rian?" Umu said, looking nauseous. "I don''t want to interrupt or tell anyone to do anything¡­ but is there any way to stop talking about this when Riz and Mikon come back with the stew?"


    Rian sighed. "Was really trying not to think about it, Umu." He reached across his chest to pat her arm awkwardly. "Sorry. Uh, anyway your Bindership, I''ll have the holes dug, and you can decide whether you want to do any¡­ maintenance on them. Shouldn''t be too much of a problem. When we expand the fields we can just fill them up and plant over them."


    "If we have enough soil," Lori noted blandly. She idly moved one of the pieces on the chatrang board in front of her, ready to be moved to whichever side Mikon decided to sit this time. It occurred to her she hadn''t challenged Rian to a game yet. She should really get around to that¡­ "All right. We will proceed with maintaining the plots starting tomorrow, though I expect the soil from the compost pits to be brought down to the third level. As to the last plots, see if they can be used to grow the happyfruit and hairy blueball seeds."


    She was going to have fruit trees in her Dungeon and nothing was going to stop her!

 170 - Winter Is Co—Oh Wait, Its Already Here

    The coming of winter was somehow still a surprise.


    Lolilyuri had simply woken up one morning thinking that everything seemed comfortably cool, and had gone about her morning ablutions, washing herself and changing her clothes¡ªas a bit of an indulgence, she''d put on a pair of the new socks, chest wraps and loin cloth and oh they had felt so thick and fluffy!¡ªonly to come down to the dining table carrying the sunk board to find Rian sitting at the table wrapped up in his blanket.


    "Rian" Lori sighed, "what are you doing?"


    "Currently, freezing," Rian said. "All right, I admit, I''m not actually freezing, but I AM cold."


    Lori frowned. "Why?"


    Rian stared at her, then blinked and¡­ leaned down to lightly knock his head on the table. What? "Sorry, forgot you slept in the dungeon. I think we can officially say that it''s winter." He jerked his head sideways in the general direction of her Dungeon''s entrance. "You probably didn''t notice, being in here and all, but shortly after dinner, it rained. And this morning, all that rain was frozen. Given the clear shift in weather, I think it''s safe to say winter''s here. We might start seeing snow in the coming week."


    Lori nodded thoughtfully. "Very well. How long before the miners would have changed shifts?"


    Rian made a face, and from the movements of his blanket he seemed to be counting on his fingers. "Maybe half a week? I sort of stopped really keeping track once I wasn''t the one doing the ferrying anymore. I''ll ask Clowee, but shouldn''t be much more than that, probably less."


    She hummed. "And the status of the Coldhold?" She checked and found it was currently outside of the demesne.


    "Should be on its way back today," Rian said. "Especially if they felt the cold earlier than us. We''ll have to think of a faster way to load water into the evaporator than manually using buckets, it''s inefficient."


    Lori tried not to be impatient. Her lord was raising a good point after all, and she herself was still thinking¡­ "You said you were going to bribe River''s Fork with salt. How is that coming along?"


    "Well enough. They haven''t slapped any toll fees on us, and according to the miners it''s been very welcome in the demesne. The bread''s gotten tastier and they''ve been using all the rest to salt-cure the meat they have. There''s also been the not-subtle indications that they want more. I think we should sell it to them, before they actually do decide to charge us a toll or a customs duty just to get more salt."


    Lori nodded. "And how have we been doing, in terms of salt requirements?"


    Rian shifted, trying to pull his blanket tighter around himself. "Saturated, mostly. Most of our food''s frozen, which already works pretty well, but some of the recently acquired meat was salted at my request, mostly to see how well it turns out and how it affects the flavor of the meat. At the very least it''s a good preservation method that doesn''t need your support, and it will probably be our primary food supply on the Coldhold and any other ships that will be away from the demesne for a long time. More compact and we don''t need to worry about Iridescence damage. Uh, the tanners have all they need and a decent surplus besides, so at this point most of it is surplus and can be sold, though we''ll need dedicated storage for it if we''re going to stockpile it here before taking it to Covehold. Someplace that doesn''t get wet. Though if we had a more efficient means of putting water through the evaporator, the Coldhold could leave here with an empty hold, sail straight to Covehold, and arrive there with a hold full of salt that they just have to unload. It''s practically money for no work whatsoever, so it''s nearly all profit!"


    By the end of the assessment, Rian was grinning widely, and it was the first time Lori could actually call his expression ''avaricious''. Well, she could understand. Given the logistics of his plan, it was money for practically nothing.


    Lori nodded again. "Very well. With the coming of winter our mining agreement with River''s Fork has reached its conclusion. This will be the last batch of miners. When the Coldhold comes back, and you''ve taken measures against the cold, we''ll take the Coldhold to River''s Fork and make arrangements for transferring our share of the mined metal once I refine it, unless we choose to renew the agreement come spring. While you''re there, I also authorize you to arrange to purchase their surplus grain and any still edible fruits in exchange for our salt."


    Rian¡­ groaned.


    "What was that?" Lori said, a bit surprised at her lord''s reaction. Usually he capped his complaints off at a sigh.


    Rian dutifully repeated the groan, though seemingly with a bit more emphasis. "Oh, don''t worry, I''ll do it. I just¡­ well, need to see if the tanners have any furs for me to keep from freezing to death on the way there. They and the weavers have been preparing winter clothes for everyone, but¡­ " Rian groaned again. "I now fully sympathize with your stance of never wanting to leave the demesne again. You''re right, it''s a terrible idea, let''s not do it."


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    "So you finally understand. You''re still going to River''s Fork."


    Rian groaned a third time as Mikon slipped onto the bench next to him, nodding to Lori and not speaking to her as Lori placed the board between them. The weaver seemed to be wearing two skirts, and there was a thick shawl around her shoulders, while a scarf was wrapped around the lower part of her face and neck. "Good morning, Rian," Mikon said as she unwrapped the scarf. "I''ll bring you the winter robe Umu and I made for you once I finish the last of the sewing. I''m sorry it''s taking so long, but you did say we make the children and the pregnant women our priority."


    Lori blinked. "We have pregnant women?"


    Rian gave her a disbelieving look. "What did you think people were doing in the Um?" he said. "Some didn''t even wait that long, I''m pretty sure we have a few women who conceived on the way here, or at least when we''d already picked this area to set up the demesne." For some reason, Mikon sighed, looking¡­ wistful? "And yes, we should have enough supplies to have a good chance of not losing anyone to childbirth. It would be far, far better if we had an experienced Deadspeaker, but I knew your views on such things and rigorously complied with them. If babies die, they die, not your problem."


    Lori almost flinched at the words. Almost. Mikon was not as controlled with her expressions, and looked at Rian with shock on her face.


    "Well, make sure they have sufficient firewood, or whatever else they need," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively. "And have the doctors and medics compile a list of things they''ll need in the event of a birth that we can build or provide in the demesne. If there''s something there I need to do, I''d rather know sooner than later."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said dryly.


    "Also, while you''re in River''s Fork, you are to prioritize continued access to Binder Shanalorre''s healing over the grain and fruit," Lori said. "If necessary, narrow it down to healing for pregnant women and newborns."


    Rian hesitated. "Respectfully speaking your Bindership, even if she agrees, that''s going to be a logistical nightmare. The Coldhold will need far better internal heating if we want to keep those women, never mind babies, from getting sicker from the journey. And that''s just if we we''re bringing pregnant mothers over. Bringing a sick baby to River''s Fork with the resources we have right now might as well be a death sentence. Even if we get them to River''s Fork to be healed, given conditions it''s very likely they''ll just get sick again on the way back." Next to him, Mikon was nodding fervently.


    "What do you suggest, then?"


    Rian hesitated. "A simple solution comes to mind¡­ but you''re not going to like it. And will probably think it''s some kind of disaster waiting to happen."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Then why suggest it?"


    "Because it''s simple, viable, and you''d basically be the biggest obstruction to it getting done," Rian said simply. "You yourself personally."


    Lori frowned. "What sort of insane solution have you come up with?"


    "As I said, a simple one," Rian said. "If we need to have pregnant women and babies healed, then we invite Shana¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected irritably. "Really Rian, stop making this mistake."


    "She''s not actually here to hear me say it, you know."


    "It''s a bad habit to get into!" Then she realized the rest of what he had been saying. "Wait, what do you mean ''invite''?-!"


    Rian sighed. "Well, we invite Binder Shanalorre over to perform the healing here as needed in the event of pregnancy complications or a baby getting sick."


    "Impossible," Lori said immediately. "She would never leave her demesne."


    "We haven''t asked her yet. There''s a chance she''ll say ''yes''," Rian shrugged.


    "She''d never agree to something so personally dangerous."


    "Uh, respectfully your Bindership, while many of the people who didn''t like how you''re running Lorian decided to leave for River''s Fork, the people here don''t actually have any animosity towards Binder Shanalorre. Closer to apathy, really. There''s actually a lot of people here who know her and feel sorry for her, given all she''s been through. She''s actually far safer visiting here than you would be visiting River''s Fork, and you already know not to walk around alone when you go there. Literally the only person who could have a reason to be a danger to her is you." Rian hesitated. "And possibly Landoor. He still thinks he''s somehow your successor and will somehow gain magical ability if he claims a Dungeon''s core. Or something. But if we take him to the other side of the river, he shouldn''t be a problem. Well, unless the river freezes over and he tries walking on it."


    Lori glared at him.


    Rian shrugged. "As I said, it''s simple, viable and you''d be the biggest obstruction to it. And remember, this is only in the event of complications during childbirth. There are other ways we can mitigate the risk for it. For example, we make arrangement with River''s Fork to bring expecting mothers there when they''re close to term. The trip is short, it''s easier to keep the mother warm when she''s not in labor, and there''s no risk to them to go there because they''re not you, and it''s far easier and safer to make arrangements for the mother and child to stay there over the winter than it is to bring the child back. At that point, the relative logistics to keeping our own people fed and warmed for the duration is its own separate problem, but I''ll leave it up to you to decide how the costs and difficulties to keep some of our people fed and warm in River''s Fork while they wait for winter to be over, versus trying to convince Binder Shanalorre to just visit long enough to heal the baby and have a warm meal compare to each other."


    Lori kept glaring at him. Her lord merely pulled his blanket tighter over himself.


    Finally, Lori said, "If you somehow manage to convince Binder Shanalorre to agree to such a request, then you may inform her that I will guarantee her safety while she is in my demesne. I find it unlikely she will, but I suppose if someone can convince a child to leave the safety of her home it would be you."


    "Please don''t phrase it like that, you make me sound like a terrible person," Rian said blandly.


    Mikon leaned against him, reaching across his back to give him a reassuring pat before giving his shoulder a squeeze.


    Lori raised an eyebrow as Rian suddenly leaned into Mikon with a sigh, closing his eyes. "Ah¡­ so warm¡­"


    "R-rian?" Mikon stammered, surprised.


    "Ahh, that''s so nice¡­" The blanket wrapped around Rian shifted, and Lori saw his arm reach out and wrap around Mikon''s waist, pulling the weaver to him. "So warm¡­!"


    "Please don''t do anything inappropriate at the table, I eat here," Lori said flatly.

 171 - Loris Demesne In Winter

    Lori was surprised at how day to day life seemed to remain largely the same, even when it finally started snowing.


    Oh, there were changes. Their meals became more of a soup than a stew, becoming a bit more watery but warmer, and the addition of the salt was obvious. There also seemed to be a bit less meat and a bit more tubers, which wasn''t an unpleasant change in Lori''s opinion, and hers was the only opinion that mattered. She supposed it was in response to the cold, a more warming dish that was just as or even more filling than before, with their bowls now usually filled to the brim.


    The children spent more time in the second level, helping with the spinning, tending the planter boxes full of tubers or playing games in the third level when they thought they could get away with it, despite them clearly being audible. The seels had also disappeared from the river, having migrated away as Rian had predicted, with the few that had remained being quickly caught, skinned, gutted and butchered into food. Smoke rose from all chimneys seemingly constantly, and all the houses now had shutters that were secured and shut, probably rendering them very dark¡­


    Beyond that, however, people still worked as hard as ever. Lori had thought it was only people in the city who were up and about in winter because of all the sources of heating and the inexorable needs of finances and industry leading to year-round work, and that a small place like this in the middle of nowhere would be idle and lazy as people slept or played in the snow, waiting for winter to end. Apparently not. There was firewood to be gathered and cured, ropeweed to go in the retting tank and removed when they were done, latrines to be emptied out, soap to be made, the fields tended and patrolled to make sure the chokers didn''t dig up the seed crop and eat them. She''d have thought that with the cold the chokers would¡­ well, die or something. Surely beasts weren''t meant to survive in this sort of weather? It was barely fit for humans! Supposedly the chokers would be less of a problem when enough snow had fallen that the little beasts wouldn''t be able to dig through it to reach the planted seeds.


    At least she assumed so, as Lori didn''t really feel it. Even when it actually started to snow, indicating that the temperature was definitely cold enough to turn water into ice, all she felt was a moderate cool, as if it were a pleasant night. The only indicator of the cold for her was the cloud formed by her breath as the moisture in it condensed. But Rian said it was ''cold enough to keep the Coldhold from melting'', while shuddering almost comically until the heat in her Dungeon finally managed to warm him, and as the one in charge of telling her how cold it was, he would know.


    Lori received a lot of sideways looks from when she walked around to cure the wood in only her usual clothes, though she wore her raincoat to keep the snow off lest it melt and get her clothes wet, as well as her hat to keep the snow out of her hair. If anything, she found conditions to be more irritatingly wet than cold. She left slush in her wake as snow she stepped on warmed, and if she stood still long enough she could find herself in a puddle of mud. It was extremely unpleasant, and the only way to counter it was actively controlling the firewisps around her to not impart heat into her environment, which needed her concentration, or willing the firewisps to deactivate, which left her suddenly freezing. Lori got very good at moving quickly, stepping carefully, and only standing where there was solid footing.


    She had more work to do. The smithing area needed to be enclosed, bindings of lightwisps placed so the smiths could see what they were doing, airwisps to circulate the air to keep it from being too hot or letting suffocating air linger, and the outflow of the furnace needed to be siphoned out and vented elsewhere. Lori ended up combining the outflow of the smith''s furnace and the kitchen and venting it out through the small water reservoir in the water hub shed. She added more lightwisps to her Dungeon''s entryway so it wouldn''t be so dark, and bound firewisps to start warming the air passing through there so that it would be a comfortable temperature once it entered her Dungeon.


    Lori also assisted the potter in firing an array of strange pots, which she later learned was for heating water inside people''s homes. Now that it was winter, it seemed people wanted to drink their water warm, and they had apparently managed to find a weed that grew quickly enough that people had kept a small pot of it in their home for the purpose of adding the leaves to boiling water to make a sort of tea, as well as using other leaves they had found, gathered and dried over the warmer months. So far, no one seemed to have gotten sick, delirious, or poisoned from all this, and some had actually been mentioned in the almanac as being suitable for exactly that purpose, though Lori didn''t think that would last. Sooner or later someone was going to find a weird leaf¡­


    What people were wearing also changed. First children, then some women who Lori had thought had simply gotten fat but in hindsight had probably been pregnant, began wearing what Lori assumed were the ''winter robes'', long-sleeved, encompassing robes that were worm over regular clothes, and held closed in front with a belt, sash or ties of some sort, finally explaining where all the fabric she''d seen being woven for months had gone. They seemed padded with some sort of stuffing, mostly likely consisting of the down fibers and feathers from beasts that had been collected thus far, making the winter robes thicker and likely more insulating. The sleeves were sometimes wrapped closed by cord or cloths along the forearms, just below the elbow, though that seemed to be a matter of preference. Most walked with their hands folded in front of them, stuck into the opposite sleeve, especially the children. There were also hoods made from furs, or on occasion furry hats with flaps that came down the back and sides, and might as well have been hoods in practice.


    Even Lori received such a winter robe, given to her by way of Rian¡­ and notably after everyone else in the demesne was already wearing one, which was¡­ annoying but logical. When she finally opened it up and examined it, she found it to be a largely square garment, as if someone had taken a large padded square, folded two of the edges together to meet in the middle, stitched along one end so it wouldn''t fall off your shoulders, and added sleeves. There was a wide sash included, which was apparently meant to hold the robe shut. It was long enough to be comfortably used as a blanket, which was apparently exactly what it was used for at night. She had to admire the ingenuity of the garment, intended to keep one warm at all hours of the day. Together with her blanket, it made for a comfortably cozy cover, even if the firewisps around her rendered it largely irrelevant. Still, there was a difference between comfortably cool and comfortably warm, and with her winter robe and blanket, at night she was the latter.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    Though she had to wonder how people kept warm while their winter robes were being washed¡­ not that they seemed to be doing much laundry anymore, since the laundry area was always empty¡­


    "¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Umu," she said flatly, staring the blonde weaver straight in the eye over her bowl of soup, "answer me: are people doing their laundry in the bath house?"


    Instead of being nervous, Umu just looked awkward. It might have had something to do with the fact that Rian had both arms wrapped around her waist and was pressing up against her back, which was an awkward pose when they were sitting next to each other, forcing Umu to lean forward slightly with her elbows on the table. While most people opened their winter robe or even took them off in the dungeon, Rian not only kept wearing his at all times, but often supplemented it with his blanket. "Uh, yes, your Bindership," she said, blushing.


    Lori nodded. "And has it made the bath house more crowded, and harder to take a bath in?"


    "Uh, a little," Umu admitted. On Rian''s other side, Riz was partaking of her soup with great enjoyment, glad to finally be able to eat, as Rian had only just let go of her. For someone who had seemed so uncomfortable for weeks when the three had started becoming openly physically affectionate with him, he seemed to have shed all such inhibitions once he realized that such affection was very warm. Literally. "The laundry area is just¡­ well, too cold to use right now, so we''ve all been washing clothes in the morning and just bathe at night, uh, your Bindership."


    "How do you dry the clothes?" Lori asked intently.


    Umu glanced over her shoulder at Rian, who simply had his eyes closed. Then, almost reluctantly, she looked towards her fellow weaver, looking at her pleadingly.


    Mikon smiled at her, then reached out towards Rian and nudged. "Rian, your food is getting cold," she said. "Let Umu talk to her Bindership and eat so you can get to work."


    "Awwww¡­" Rian sighed, but reluctantly let go of Umu. He looked at his bowl, then at his hands, and Lori literally saw the moment when he wondered whether he could stick his hands into his bowl¡­


    "If you stick your hands in the bowl, you''ll need to wash them." Evidently, Mikon had seen the same thing. "They''ll just be cold again."


    Rian sighed again. "So cold," he pouted, but began to eat, blowing on his spoon before swallowing, though he soon stopped with that, sipping the warm food straight.


    Umu sighed in relief and sat up straight. She still looked embarrassed as she answered, "We hang them in front of the fireplace at home, your Bindership," she said. "Some we hang in front of the windows to block out the cold and the occasional draft when we''re sleeping."


    Lori considered that. "Not the second level?"


    Umu shook her head. "Too windy, your Bindership. While it''s warm now, if we put up washing lines, it would block the air and clothes would likely fall off, so we''d need to wash them again, and the wetness on the clothes will cool the breeze."


    Lori sighed and made a note to enclose and heat the laundry area. Or at least enclose it and leave people to handle the heating themselves. "Noted, Umu. Rian, why didn''t you bring this to my attention?"


    Rian gulped down his current mouthful of soup. "Because I don''t do my own laundry and didn''t know?" he said. "I''ve never seen anyone doing laundry in the men''s bath beyond a stained shirt, and usually only when it''s a stubborn stain they know their wife will be annoyed about."


    Lori pursed her lips, but nodded, accepting the reasoning. She glanced sideways at Riz, but dismissed her. While she assisted Rian, it wasn''t in an official capacity that Lori recognized, and as she recalled the woman didn''t have the sort of initiative to report such a thing. That glance shifted to Mikon, at the end of the line opposite her¡­ but telling Lori such things wasn''t the woman''s job, was it?


    There was something disconcerting about finding out something by herself when she should have reasonably have heard it from other sources first, only those sources had good reason not to inform her until she brought it up. Perhaps this was something that Rian would have found out later that day and informed her about?


    "I''ll see what I can do about making the laundry area usable again, given current conditions," Lori said, "though given those same conditions, it will probably still be necessary for the laundry to be dried in your homes. Rian, remind me when we¡ª" Lori shuddered "¡ªget back from River''s Fork."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. He had a towel over his shoulders, which had been wrapped around his neck and mouth in place of a scarf. To be fair, he wasn''t the only one who did that, and not just with towels. Lori actually felt sympathy for the person she''d seen with what was clearly a sock wrapped around their mouth.


    Lori didn''t want to leave her demesne. She very, very much didn''t want to. In her demesne she controlled all the wisps, she had her awareness of them. Outside of her demesne, the only benefit she had from her connection with her Dungeon core was that it afforded her boundless magic without having to draw it in with her breath. Which¡­ admittedly, was still a significant advantage¡­ but it wasn''t an overwhelming advantage.


    Still, she had no choice. Part of the deal with River''s Fork was dividing the mined copper between them, and¡­ well, River''s Fork hardly had the resources to extract the metal from the ore. Not in any sensible timeframe, anyway. Trying to transport their share of the metal in the form the raw ore was nonviable, even with the Coldhold. So the ore needed to be smelted and refined, and one of the terms of her contract with Binder Shanalorre was that she would assist in doing so by providing the heat. It was either that or load the ore into the Coldhold, and not only would that be inefficient, they would also need to hope that the unrefined metal in the ore had been properly divided evenly.


    True, Rian had asked some of the miners to keep track of how much ore had been extracted so they had their own count, but the numbers were inconsistent and often didn''t agree, which Rian said probably owed to the miners being busy with¡­ well, mining. Still, putting the miners'' counts together gave them an average of seven thousand sengrains of raw ore. Which was¡­ not inconsiderable, but not nearly as much as the total amount of metal they had collected in dragon scales. However, the miners were all certain that this was a rich vein, and with more men and better equipment far more could be extracted¡­


    Lori sighed and focused on eat her breakfast, hoping this wouldn''t take long but already not very confident. Hopefully she''d at least get some bread out of this.

 172 - Traveling In Winter

    "Aren''t you going to put on your winter robe?" Rian asked as he put the carefully wrapped bundle of Lori''s bed roll into the special cargo box in the hold of the Coldhold. The bedroll had been wrapped up and secured by a pair of cords that Umu and Mikon had hurriedly stitched to the bedroll itself at Rian''s suggestion, ''to keep them from being misplaced when they''re needed''. Since it was on the nominal underside of the bed roll, Lori had just shrugged and left them to it. The bedroll was followed by her blanket and her pillow.


    Lori frowned at him. "Why?" she said, handing him the winter robe in question, which had been secured with the sash that came with it so it wouldn''t get loose and unfold. She''d gotten used to using the garment as a second blanket, but beyond that¡­


    Rian shrugged, sniffed, and disgustingly wiped the drip from his nose with the towel near his face and argh! "All right, as you please," he said, putting the winter robe on top of her bedroll in one of the cargo boxes. They were new, simple boxes whose corners were covered in blocks of bound ice that were inserted into recesses between the planks of the floor to keep them from sliding around that they were using as a test. After all, while glass was impervious to darkwisps, ice was not. Inside the boxes were Rian''s own bedroll, blanket, pillow and a change of clothes, as well as the bedrolls of those accompanying them: one of the blacksmiths, three other people to help carry the hopefully to be refined metals that they would be bringing back, and the men who had become the regular crew of the Coldhold and took it down to the ocean to collect salt. Most of the hold was empty for exactly that purpose, save for a store of firewood that would be burned on the new, very carefully secured braziers to keep them warm, not that Lori needed it.


    It was unlikely that Lori would actually need to stay overnight at River''s Fork, but Rian had advised her to bring her sleeping equipment ''just in case''¡­ and Rian readily admitted that ''just in case'' was to avoid her taking his bedroll, pillow and blanket, which he had also packed ''just in case''. While Lori had learned that refined metal was left to cool overnight, possibly over several days if it was very hot, she had no desire to stay for that, which was why they were bringing people that they could leave behind to watch the metal so that River''s Fork wouldn''t be tempted to abscond or be creative with the recordkeeping of the metal.


    "All right," Rian declared as he straightened. "Food''s on board, lots of space for cargo, we all have room to sleep, I''ve had what used to be the brig refurbished into a private room for you so you can have privacy, and the latrine seats have been cleaned. You''ll need to put in a light yourself since there aren''t any windows, though. We''re ready to go. Are you sure you don''t want to put on the winter robe?"


    Lori waved dismissively. "I don''t need it."


    Rian shrugged. "All right then. Well, all the cargo''s in. We can start the experiment now." He said it eagerly, and Lori had to wonder if he followed the Mysteries of Alknowledge. Rian never said it, but she wouldn''t be surprised, and it would certainly explain why he was knowledgeable about so many disparate things.


    Lori deactivated the bindings of lightwisps that supplemented the illumination in the space inside the Coldhold before she reached out to the small room at the front of the boat and bound the darkwisps that lingered there. They streamed out of the small space, darkening the hold as she carefully began to bind them around the boxes. It was trickier than it would have normally have been. The containers were made of wood, and treated to keep out water, so she had no earthwisps to bind the darkwisps to. So she had to bind the darkwisps to the blocks of water beneath to anchor them to the containers. After that, she covered the side of the containers and made the darkwisps close over the top, doing so for each container. When Lori was finished, each of the experimental containers had the appearance of a square of night-like, opaque blackness that were laid out in an orderly line along one wall.


    "We''ll have to remember to check it before we enter River''s Fork''s demesne," Rian mused as Lori opened her mouth to allow darkwisps from within her lungs to emerge, combining them with each box''s binding so that she could imbue them at a distance once they were out of her demesne.


    "Yes Rian," Lori said in withering tones as she applied the darkwisps and made sure they were fully imbued before she reactivated the lightwisps, raising the illumination back to reasonable levels. "As I was the one who formulated the parameters of the test, I remember this."


    "I''m simply reminding myself, your Bindership," Rian said, switching to a cheerful tone. "After all, I wouldn''t want to forget and have to do this experiment all over again. Best to do it all right the first time."


    Well¡­ she couldn''t fault that kind of thinking. It kept them from wasting time, after all. "I can''t fault your reasoning. Best not to waste time. Tell them we can begin to move."


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    "Yes, your Bindership!" Rian said, his cheerfulness seeming to change, becoming¡­ well, more cheerful, somehow. "You heard her, everyone! Cottsy, get the driver ready! Multaw, get ready to back us out! Everyone else, sit down and hold on so you don''t fall off!" Rian looked back towards Lori. "You might want to sit down in your room, your Bindership. All the swaying takes some getting used to, and you usually sit when we travel, right?"


    Lori glanced towards the foremost room of the boat as Rian made his way up. While the original plan had been to demolish the walls after it was no longer needed to contain anyone, letting them expand the rest of the space in the hull of the boat, they''d never really gotten around to it. Doing so would have required them to remove the ice of the internal wall, then the carpenters would have needed to carefully remove the wooden beams. Rian had mentioned the men were using it to store their sleeping paraphernalia, food and supplies so that they''d be away from the salt, and that was probably the best use for it so they wouldn''t have to rebuild the boat again. Now, however, it was her own personal room, in case they had to stay overnight in River''s Fork for some reason. Lori hadn''t suggested it, hadn''t even thought of it until Rian had informed her so.


    She recalled the cramped, crowded conditions of the boat she had taken to travel across the ocean, shuddered and headed for her room, her staff beating a familiar rhythm on the floor panels and ice as she walked. Entering the little room, Lori looked around. On the wall opposite the door were three beds that folded into the wall, the middle one already folded down as a sort of bench. Lori sat down, making herself comfortable as she claimed and bound what few lightwisps were streaming in through the open door and imbued them, anchoring them to some ice between some planks to illuminate her new temporary quarters. It was very cramped, and was more an oversized closet than an actual bedroom. The beds ran down the whole width of the room, and with the bed down it seemed three fifths of the available floor space was occupied.


    Really, it was all wonderfully comfortable and cozy. She felt sorry for Rian, needing to sleep crowded outside while the three prisoners had enjoyed such wonderful accommodations.


    The movement of the boat changed. It was slightly disorienting, feeling the shifts in balance when her eyes told her she was standing perfectly still in a room where nothing moved, but she supposed she''d get used to it. Sighing, Lori set down her staff on the bench against the wall and lay down next to it, stretching out as she closed her eyes and began running through the bindings she had to maintain, checking her connections to all of them and imbuing them¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was in the middle of a light doze when her eyes suddenly snapped open and she let out a scream.


    COLD! Cold, cold, cold, COLD¡­ WHY WAS IT SO COLD?-!


    She tried to get up, and nearly fell off the bed¡ªbench, whatever!¡ªas the boat swayed. Lori fumbled at the door, managing to turn the latch, wrenching it open¡ª


    Rian stood on the other side, holding her winter robe in his arms out to her. "This what you''re looking for? I knew you forgot about how you''d be cold when you left the demesne."


    Lori grabbed it from his hand, snapped it in the air to unfold it open, and hastily tried to get her arms through the sleeves.


    "I''ll go and tell Cottsy to put the driver in reverse so we go back into the demesne, shall I?" Rian said, sounding so cheerful Lori wanted to punch him in the face.


    "Do it," she managed to growl out through gritted teeth as she finally managed to get an arm into one sleeve, only to nearly stumble and fall as she stepped on her own hem.


    "Careful, those things are long!" Rian said, still annoyingly cheerful as he walked to the back of the boat.


    When he finally came back, he found Lori holding the robe closed with her hands, only one arm through a sleeve as the other one pulled at one of the robe''s flaps from the inside, binding the firewisps at her fingers to very slowly, carefully warm those extremities without raising her temperature so high that she did herself an injury.


    "When the ship gets back inside the demesne and you''re feeling warm again," Rian said, "Do you want me to help you put that on properly? You need to use a sash to pull up the hem and double it up around your belly so it doesn''t trail along the floor." He reached into the sash around his waist and drew out the sash in question.


    "You¡­ you¡­" Lori was barely able to articulate, never mind the thought she was trying to accuse him of. "You¡­!"


    "Hey, I did try to warn you to put on your winter robe," Rian said, shrugging. "You were the one who kept saying she didn''t need to. I mean, I sort of suspected you might not be as warm outside of your demesne, but you were so insistent I figured you knew something I didn''t."


    Lori glared at him until she suddenly found herself ''moderately cool'' instead of ''freezing from the very air around her'' and let out a sigh of relief as her jaw stopped wanting to clench and fingers stopped wanting to be set on fire.


    "Feeling better?" Rian said.


    "Much," Lori said curtly, finally letting the flap of the robe go and having it hang open. She knew the irritation at Rian was irrational but¡­ well, it was irrational, but she didn''t care. "Did you find that amusing, listening at my door and waiting for me to start freezing?" she ground out.


    "A little," Rian admitted easily. "But don''t worry, no one else did. Everyone else except Cottsy is outside around the brazier, and the driver makes so much noise I doubt Cottsy heard you. So your dignity is safe."


    Very irritated. But¡­ "Thank you," she muttered sullenly.


    "No problem. What are lords for, if not to keep people away from you, tell you how cold it is, bring you food, make farms in your name¡­" Rian shrugged. "Now, raise your arms for a moment so I can get this on your shoulders properly, then I''m going to need you to hold the front so you can adjust the length¡­ "

 173 - Rivers Fork in Winter

    Putting on the winter robe was of immense help in staying warm. Worn over her normal clothes and with her rain coat underneath as well, it was quite comfortable¡­ save for the fact her face and hands were freezing. However, unlike other people, Lolilyuri was a Dungeon Binder! And more important, she was a Whisperer. Her soul could touch the world to alter it to her will beyond just the reach of her physical body! As such, she spent most of the trip from the border of her demesne to River''s Fork making a binding of airwisps and firewisps to wrap around her head and extremities to regulate her temperature, so that said physical body would stop shivering and being very inconvenient to be in.


    By the time they arrived at their destination¡ªfar sooner than she remembered the trip taking previously¡ªLori felt suitably warm. True, the way the winter robe wrapped around her legs was a bit limiting, but if she tried to force it the robe would part open and let in the cold, so she had to walk with measured, dignified steps.


    At least some good had already come of this trip. When they had checked the cargo boxes just before entering River''s Fork''s demesne, Lori pulling the darkwisps aside so they could see, they had found the contents of the boxes had lacked the light dusting of Iridescence that had been present on everything else on the boat.


    "Well, that''s something," Rian said, looking into the box, then at the sleeve of his robe. The Iridescence on the garment was far less than there would usually be since cold had the effect of retarding the crystallization of the colors, but it was still present. Even Lori''s own clothes, skin and hair had a light dusting, and she could feel it slightly degrading the binding of warmth she had made around herself, but the objects inside the cargo box had none at all. "This will certainly expand the range of things we can buy, since we won''t have to glass-box any of it. We''d be able to buy paper so that people can cover their windows next year without blocking out all light from getting into their houses."


    Lori blinked. "What?" Did she hear that correctly? "Did I hear that correctly? You want to use paper to cover windows?"


    Rian shrugged. "It''s not my idea, it''s how people who are too poor for glass cover their windows so they can block out drafts but still let in light. Pretty sensible actually. Lightweight, decent illumination, easy to replace, and if properly made and waxed getting a little wet isn''t really a problem. Right now a lot of houses are dark because they can''t open their windows to let in light, and unlike me, they don''t have a glowing rock. People who need light to work or play board games go to the Dungeon, since it''s warmer than the old dining hall."


    She tilted her head, then shrugged. "Well, if it works, it works," she said. Lori had gone back to the small room to imbue her bindings some more as the Coldhold crossed the border into the other demesne.


    River''s Fork looked different as Lori held on to one of the wooden columns holding up the boat''s roof deck, her other hand holding her staff securely so she wouldn''t drop it. The overhanging dome of living wood was covered in white snow, and it looked like much of its leaves had fallen off. Beneath the dome, the streets and wooden houses that had been shaped by Deadspeaking looked dark and shadowed, and she saw more than one flickering light that might have been bonfires or braziers. Beyond the dome, the areas that Lori remembered contained the demesne''s agricultural fields were flat and covered in snow. There were few people walking, and the few who were out seemed to be chopping wood.


    Only a small group of people were waiting for them at River''s Fork''s dock. There were five who were probably of the demesne''s militia, all wearing thick, heavy leather coats that Lori instantly coveted, with thick hats that covered their ears and scarves over their mouths. It was practically a uniform, despite the lack of colors or insignia. In their midst was the small figure of Binder Shanalorre, who looked absolutely swaddled. What looked like furs secured by cords were wrapped around her boots, she was wearing thick mittens secured by more cords that made Lori absolutely envious, a leather mantle that had fur peeking from the hems wrapped around her shoulders, and a long and surprisingly colorful scarf was wrapped around her neck, the end trailing down her chest. On her head was a large furry hat, the flaps so large they rested on her shoulders, too long to tie under her chin.


    Lori felt Rian''s hand on her shoulder, heard his voice speak gently into her ear. "The hat and scarf look too big to have been made for her, so they probably belonged to her parents. I wouldn''t draw any attention to them if I were you. It might be a¡­ sensitive subject."


    She glanced sideways at her lord, wondering why he had decided that was something relevant to this. "Why is this relevant?" she said, keeping her voice low as well.


    "Because you might bring it up, and I thought it would be a really bad idea if you did," Rian said. "Don''t remind the child her parents are dead by pointing them out, all right?"


    "She is literally wearing the very things on her person, I think she already knows."


    "Look, just¡­ trust me, all right? Just be aware of what they might be and don''t allude to them in any way, shape or form, and even if she brings them up, just say they seem warm. As your official ''lord for talking to people'', that''s my considered advice, and if you decide to ignore it, don''t say I didn''t warn you."


    Lori rolled her eyes. This was almost exactly like having her mothers with her as they forced her to attend some neighbor''s funeral. Really, she hadn''t even known the man, why had she needed to go with them just to see the vial containing the ashes of his heart? She hadn''t even been allowed to bring one of her books with her¡­


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    The Coldhold slid into place alongside the pier, and Lori waited patiently for the boatmen to tie ropes and things, and for Rian to stop holding on to the back of her robe, before she stepped onto the little wooden bridge that connected the boat to one of its outriggers, from which she could step onto the pier. For a moment she looked down, regarding the young girl who was Dungeon Binder of this place at a mere¡­ what? She could be anywhere from eight to thirteen for all Lori knew. And that didn''t matter, did it?


    "Dungeon Binder Shanalorre," she greeted.


    The other Dungeon Binder, who had been looking up at her and probably thinking her own considering thoughts in turn, inclined her head slightly in acknowledgement. "Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri." Barring the accent, her name was barely mutilated at all.


    "As per our standing agreement, I am here to refine and collect our share of all metals extracted from the mine," Lori said. "Forty-five parts out of a hundred. I would hear from you the estimate of how much material was extracted."


    Binder Shanalorre was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Of course. I anticipated that you would wish to immediately proceed to the extraction process and have had an area prepared, with the ores stored nearby. Shall we, then?" The shorter Binder gestured and began walking. "We can speak of other matters on the way."


    "What matters do you have in mind?" Lori asked, her longer legs allowing her to quickly catch up as Rian fell into step beside her and the other men with them fell in behind him as Shanalorre''s own militia fell in behind her lord.


    "After some consideration, we have decided that we will not have some of the raw ore refined," Binder Shanalorre said.


    "Oh?" Lori said. "This would throw off the division calculations, will it not?"


    "We are willing to use the raw weight of the ore in our share of the division to be calculated," Binder Shanalorre said. "I point out that such a conversion favors you, as you will be recipient of a greater weight of refined metal."


    Ah. Well, that was certainly a reason for her to agree to it, wasn''t it? Lori was just about to nod to this she felt a sudden impact to her left forearm. Her head snapped around to find Rian looking at her, and he quickly and sharply jerked his head in the negative. What¡­?


    "What is it, Rian?" she demanded. This had better be good, interrupting a conversation between two Binders.


    Rian looked like he wanted to sigh, but instead he leaned towards her and, whispering awkwardly because they were still walking, said, "Blue copper ore is used as a basis for blue dye. Green copper can be used for dye as well. Refined copper can''t be used for either."


    For a few moments, Lori just kept walking, staring straight ahead. Slowly, she turned to look down at the other Dungeon Binder, whose face remained¡­ impassive.


    "I would be amenable to not refining some of the raw ore," Lori said flatly, "provided we received an amount of the ore in question in proportion to our agreed upon division of materials."


    Binder Shanalorre considered. "Very well. I suppose it was too much to hope for. Division will proceed unaltered."


    Lori kept glaring at the smaller binder, annoyed at how she had almost agreed to the change. While she didn''t know the exact value of dye, or if her demesne had the resources to produce dye, she did remember how much blue and green ink cost, back when she had to buy writing supplies for school submissions. She had never bought it because why, but the shock of seeing the price and how far more it cost compared to black ink was something she remembered.


    "In future," Lori finally said, "any premeditated changes to an established contract is usually proposed and discussed well in advance, to give both parties the opportunity to analyze the costs and benefits of doing so. I will excuse this oversight for now, due to your relative inexperience with such matters. Should you have any similar changes to be made to future contracts, inform Rian and I will consider it at my leisure. Of course, the inverse is also true, but I have been satisfied with our contract until now. If you had not been, you should have said so."


    "Noted, Binder Lolilyuri," Binder Shanalorre said.


    The rest of the walk proceeded in relative silence, save for Rian''s occasional sniff. A path had been kicked open for them leading to the dome, and while it was darker underneath the dome, there was also less snow. They crossed the covered space, walking at the edges to avoid the homes clustered together with seemingly no sensible order of streets, and Lori soon found herself at the other side of the settlement, near the side of the hill where the mine lay. She could see activity there, could see the water wheel still turning. The miners shift would be ending tomorrow, but it looked like they were still working hard despite the cold.


    On the side of the hill was¡­ well, piles of rocks. The only thing to distinguish them was that they were in shades of green and blue, though the former was more plentiful than the latter.


    "These are the ores?" Lori said. Well, the colorful material certainly seemed like something that would be used to make dyes. They looked like they would stain. "How much raw ore is there?"


    "An exact measurement wasn''t possible due to lack of proper measuring equipment," Binder Shanalorre said, "but we estimate that we have four thousand sengrains of blue copper ore and somewhere between seven to nine thousand sengrains of green copper ore."


    That was¡­ significantly above their miners'' estimates. Lori glanced at Rian, who shrugged.


    "Better higher then lower, I suppose?" he said. He turned towards the man beside him, who Lori recognized as one of the blacksmiths. "Lanwei? What do you think?"


    The blacksmith examined the piles. "Seems about right, Lord Rian. They''ve probably already powdered some of the blue copper, though."


    Lori glanced down at Shanalorre. "Have you?"


    "An amount of ore was ground down to powder to test its viability," Binder Shanalorre admitted. "And I cannot speak of how many rocks the children chose to keep for their interesting appearance. However, if you wish, we have been keeping a record of the daily output of the mine. The standard measurement is how many carts worth of stone where transported to the piles."


    Lori nodded. "Please show me those records. Rian, retrieve the cart in question and begin loading it to simulate the accepted measure of one cart''s worth of stone so we can get some idea of the standard of measurement. With your permission, of course, Binder Shanalorre?"


    The smaller Dungeon Binder inclined her head slightly. "Of course, Binder Lolilyuri. I am sure you will find everything in order."


    Lori wasn''t, but then, that was why you always checked the product before buying it, didn''t you? There was no getting around the fact their miner''s estimates had been far lower than the number they were being told, but perhaps the miners had been inconsistent in their measurement. Or maybe they simply couldn''t count. That seemed a distinct possibility.

 174 - Punitive Measures

    "Well?" Lori asked Rian later that day as she sat in her small room on the Coldhold, imbuing the light there as her lord leaned against the door frame. It was just past the afternoon, and lunch sat heavy in Lori''s stomach..


    "Well, on the one hand," Rian began, "They have records at least, with entries that at least seem regular and consistent, and counting all the entries and factoring for the productivity lost because of the dragon and the delay in our checking if they were still alive, all the days when the miners were working are accounted for. So they have a basis for saying they have between eleven and thirteen thousand sengrains. Though it''s not much of a basis."


    "Why the discrepancy? Two thousand sengrains is a lot."


    "I did say it''s not much of a basis," Rian said. "Given how heavy rock is, two thousand sengrains worth of probable error is actually pretty easy to reach. As for why our numbers were so low, well, our men are miners, not accountants. Sometimes they forgot. It was nothing more than a possible minimum, anyway." He hesitated, then sighed. "On the other hand¡­ the daily counts is measured in full loads of a cart, and it doesn''t seem to make any distinction about how full the cart is, or whether it''s the same cart each time. They don''t even give a daily estimate on how many sengrains each cart is. As far as I can tell, their claim of eleven to thirteen thousand sengrains is just an estimate someone made by counting the number of cartfuls, so it''s perfectly possible even they don''t know exactly how much ore there is. I couldn''t really tell if the amount of raw ore they showed us corresponded properly to the amount they said they excavated, not short of measuring it all, since the piles aren''t a specific weight or volume or anything. The best we could do is interview our miners, who said that the amount of ore in the piles has remained consistent."


    For the first time, Rian actually looked frustrated. "So if they''re cheating us and are hiding an amount of the ore somewhere else, it''s not so much that our miners could notice. Given how much ore has been excavated, that might amount to a cart or three, five at the most. That''s still less than one in a hundred of the overall numbers they''re claiming. They''ve probably lost about that much from ores falling off the cart in transit and getting kicked around for the whole life to the mine."


    Lori nodded. "In your opinion, are we being cheated?"


    Rian looked down, actually frowning in thought. "I''m inclined to say ''no'', if only from how clumsy everything has been. I don''t know if the ploy was all her idea, but I''m willing to bet she didn''t know that the ore could be used to make dye when she originally made the agreement. I certainly didn''t know the ore could be used for that until a few days ago, when I was asking the smiths which of them were willing to come with us to help supervise the refining and they brought it up. Given she''s been straightforward with us before, there''s a good chance she was convinced to try it like that, and she went along with it not realizing the consequences. If they had secreted any amount of ore, it would have been in their best interest to not bring any attention to any possible abnormalities and just get you to start smelting everything. Instead, Shana brings up the ore question. Technically, that wasn''t them cheating us, it was simply not telling us how much more valuable the ore could be as a dye component than as a metal. They were still perfectly willing to abide by the ratio set by the agreement. They even implicitly offered to increase our share of the refined metal."


    Lori frowned. "So you feel we should go forward with the refining."


    "No." Lori blinked at Rian''s blunt declaration. "Even if they might not be cheating us, they certainly tried, even if only by trying to be coy about wanting to keep some of their share of the ore in an unrefined state. It''s a slippery slope from little games like that to secretly hiding substantial amounts of the ore so they get more than the share we agreed upon. It''s a betrayal of trust, minor as it was."


    "What trust?" Lori said. "They''re another demesne. We don''t trust them."


    "We trusted them enough before to leave our people''s lives in their hands, provide them with the water wheel ventilation fan, trade with them, supply them with ice, and essentially look the other way while they no doubt asked our miners to help in the post-dragon reconstruction and repairs," Rian said. "I know you knew about that, even if you didn''t say anything."


    She glared at him. "What does this have to do with anything?"


    "I think someone might have come to the erroneous conclusion that just because we''ve trusted them before means we''re idiots," Rian said. "That thing with the ore might be something they just thought to throw in at the last second in all innocence, or it might be them testing how far we can be pushed. While you obviously still trust them, either way we''ve reached the point we need to push back a little."


    "I don''t trust them," Lori insisted.


    "Lori, we''ve stayed so late trying to confirm the amount of ore that we''ll likely have to sleep over and you don''t seem to be worrying they''ll attack you in your sleep."


    Lori blinked, then her eyes widened as she realized what Rian was saying. "Do you have any reason to suspect such a danger?"


    "No, I don''t, but shouldn''t you have?"


    Lori waved a dismissive hand. "If you think it''s not a possibility, then there''s no need to worry about it."


    Rian, who''d been in the middle of saying something, blinked, his mouth hanging open. He looked at Lori strangely, tilting his head sideways. Then he shook his head. "W-well, regardless, we need to show them our trust has limits, and I feel they''ve just pushed it. I suggest we force them to deal with the consequences of damaging that trust. It acts as a punitive measure to express your displeasure, while disincentivizing doing any action to damage that trust again in future."


    Lori tilted her head slightly. "My displeasure, you say?"


    "Well, it''s not like you''re pleased, right?"


    "Are you suggesting I sink Binder Shanalorre into the ground?"


    "No, of course not. Mostly because I think her people will kill us all, but partly because that can''t be as easy for you outside your demesne. No, I''m suggesting doing something really unpleasant."


    Stolen story; please report.


    "Such as?" Lori asked.


    Rian smiled, or at least showed his teeth. "We show her how much harder it is to do business with someone who doesn''t trust you."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Later that afternoon, Lori met with Shanalorre in the latter''s office. The small space was surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, warm, and the windows were covered with what appeared to be oiled or waxed cloth, which let in some amount of light. Given the dome above and how much snow was on it, that amount wasn''t much, and so the majority of the light was emanating from the binding on the end of Lori''s staff, because while other people might have to tolerate the choice of darkness or flickering hot flame-light, she didn''t have to.


    "You wish to change our contract?" Shanalorre said.


    "An addendum," Lori said, "in light of recent matters. Due to how much of the ore being removed for rendering to powder was not recorded, we are left uncertain with how much of the ore is, in fact, still left." She struggled to maintain the wide smile on her face. Honestly, how did Rian keep doing this for so long? It felt so strange on her face, and the muscles she needed to contort for it ached. "And while your records were thorough, your storage practices are sadly not of an equal standard. We cannot be certain, for example, of how much ore is in every freestanding pile. "


    "The total amount of the ore is specified in our records."


    "Unfortunately, due to your storage practices, that can''t be confirmed," Lori said. "The amount in each pile is unspecified. Thus, we wish to extend the contract slightly, and ask you to continue to house, feed and warm our miners, as well as ourselves, as they go over each pile to measure how many carts of ore in total are present. Fortunately, today''s total isn''t in doubt. I''m sure it will take no time at all to have all the piles be measured to see how many carts of ore they contain to ensure that the total corresponds to the amount in your records." Lori could feel one of her cheeks starting to twitch as she forced herself to keep smiling.


    "Could you not simply rely on the records we''ve kept?"


    Ah, good. There was one of the cues that Rian said meant she could stop smiling. She did so, her face settling back to her usual tranquil expression. "We could¡­ but that is currently not prudent. After all, you''ve recently acted duplicitously with regards to the ore. It would be best to independently confirm the amount of ore in question."


    "You think we''ve stockpiled ore in secret," Shanalorre said flatly.


    Shanalorre''s lord and the two militia to either side of her stirred slightly, realizing along with their Binder what was being implicated. Standing next to her, Rian made an exaggerated show of relaxation in response, as did the other two men of theirs with him.


    Lori ignored them, staying with the line of discussion Rian had suggested. "Not at all. However, we note that nowhere in your records is it mentioned exactly how much ore you¡­ tested for viability."


    "The amount was negligible."


    "And I''m sure a thorough accounting of how much ore is in the piles will confirm that," Lori said. "Unless¡­ there''s some reason you don''t want your records confirmed?"


    For a moment, Shanalorre sat there silently. "And if I refuse to accommodate this¡­ addendum?"


    "Why would you wish to refuse such a perfectly reasonable request? Besides, this ensures a more exact division of the metal and ore."


    "That does not explain why I should not refuse to accommodate this addendum," Shanalorre said.


    "Ah, so you will have your own people perform the labor necessary properly account for the amount of ore in the piles? Well, I have no problem with that. I simply assumed you did not have the labor force necessary for it, since you needed to hire workers from our demesne to perform the mining."


    "I do not see why such an accounting is necessary. We kept careful track, and the amount is in the records we showed you."


    "Which cannot be verified," Lori said flatly. "Due to your storage practices. And so it becomes necessary to go over the ore once more to account for the amount present. Unless you were excessively zealous in your testing for the viability of converting the ore into dyes?"


    For a long moment, they both stared at each other, the lord and militia on Shanalorre''s side of the room looking tense, in stark contrast to Rian''s relaxed pose. Truthfully, Lori could have done with Rian being a little tense himself. Her grip on her staff was tight, and the chunk of ice hiding inside the light at the end of her staff, surrounded by the illumination provided by the binding of lightwisps so as not to be seen, was ready to explode into steam.


    Finally, Shanalorre said, "I will need time to consider your proposal."


    "You have until tomorrow morning," Lori said. "At which point, we shall simply take our share of the ore and leave. Of course, without an exact accounting, we might find ourselves unknowingly excessive in our zeal to transfer what belongs to us onto our boat. But don''t worry. I''m sure the discrepancy will be negligible."


    "I find that doubtful."


    "Oh? Do you have some sort of reason to doubt my word, when I say that the discrepancy will be negligible?" Lori said. "Have I recently tried to trick you in some capacity, to make this distrust warranted?"


    Shanalorre did not reply.


    "I shall leave you to your considerations, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said, rising smoothly from her seat. At least it wasn''t a short stool this time. "Please have your answer ready by tomorrow morning. If you wish to inform me sooner, or have a different matter you wish to raise, I will be on the Coldhold."


    "You are staying?"


    "Yes. We wish to be in a position to confirm none of the ore was¡­ accidentally misplaced in the night, so that none of the amount is in doubt." Lori gave her opposite a nod. "Good day to you."


    Rian''s solution was simple enough: make River''s Fork literally pay for their breach of trust by forcing them to continue to provide housing for their miners, as well as Lori and her group, which essentially doubled the number of people to feed, as the miners sorted and measured the mined ore.


    Since River''s Fork''s records had merely counted the number of carts of ore, the process of accounting was, essentially, having them stack the ore in the biggest cart River''s Fork had¡ªbecause, as Rian had pointed out, the records had also not specified which cart was used¡ªto more or less count how many carts worth of ore had been stockpiled.


    Such a task was unlikely to be finished in a single day, or even two, and while River''s Fork likely had the grain reserves to continue feeding that many people, having to feed so many people for what was, essentially, an extended inventory with no direct benefit to the demesne would be punishing¡­ as intended.


    For while Lori might have been willing to accept such lax records from someone of who could be relied upon¡­ Shanalorre''s ploy that morning had cast doubt on that reliability. Thus, this punitive measure, which consumed both their time and their resources, and in the end would only grant them exactly what they had agreed to already. The general outline of her words had been planned by Rian to emphasize this, and while she was loathe to just repeat what she had been told, Lori had to admit that Rian was better than she at using words to manipulate others, to emphasize that this was a direct response to what Shanalorre herself had acknowledged had been ''too much to hope for''. That the hope had not only failed, but had added piss to what had once been an impeccably clean reservoir.


    Of course, if Shanalorre refused, then they would do as she had said: pack the ore into the Coldhold and leave. This would, of course, take multiple trips. But surely River''s Fork could not deny them their due, after already denying them their reasonable request for a proper accounting¡­


    At that point, both Rian and herself foresaw only violence in one form or another. Both had come to the conclusion that it would be a costly but assured victory. After all, they had more people, and they had Lori, whose magic would be far better disposed towards violence than Shanalorre''s savantism. And Shana would know that.


    As she left her counterpart''s office, Lori hoped, very quietly and very strongly, that the other Dungeon Binder would take the logical course of action.


    Having everything break out into violence would be so tiring, after all.

 175 - An Accord

    The following morning, after a breakfast of stew that tasted very salty, with the tubers being hard and almost underdone¡ªeh, she had eaten worse¡ªLori met with Shanalorre, in her office once more. Unlike yesterday, when they had both had militia with them, this morning it was just them and their lords. Shana''s lord, whatever his name was, looked stern and impassive next to the smaller Dungeon Binder as he watched Rian and Lori, while Rian stood at her side, leaning against the wall to keep her and the door in his view.


    "I am willing to consider the addendum," Shanalorre said, "But I must request a reduction in numbers. If it is merely an accounting of the ore, then it isn''t necessary to retain all of the miners. Half of the current number should be sufficient to the task, would it not?"


    "While that would normally be the case," Lori said smoothly, "it is winter. Unlike mining, my people will be exposed to the elements. Thus, they will need to work in shifts to prevent sickness and injury from the cold. While half of the number of the miners currently present would be sufficient to the task, under these conditions it would be cruel to expect them to do so outdoors for the whole day. Shifts will be necessary. This will need to be done in a rush as it is, before truly heavy snowfall begins. Only after the accounting can we begin the smelting of the ore into refined metal that we can divide between ourselves."


    Shanalorre frowned minutely. "What about the crew aboard the Coldhold? Surely some of them can return to Lorian Demesne, due to their presence being surplus to requirements?"


    "Such as myself and my lord?" Lori said. "No, we will be staying to supervise the accounting to be sure it is performed correctly, and in order to prepare for the smelting. The Coldhold needs to stay as well, so that I have a place of rest, and all aboard it are essential to its operation."


    The younger Dungeon Binder let out a small sigh. "I see¡­"


    "Pardon me, Great Binder," Rian interrupted, "but are your concerns perhaps logistical? Does your demesne lack the supplies needed to feed a few more mouths for a few days more?"


    Shanalorre tilted her head thoughtfully for a moment.


    "As a matter of fact," Shanalorre''s lord said, "our supplies are¡ª"


    "Stop."


    The word was a firm, sudden command, and Lori''s eyebrow rose as the older man stopped speaking immediately. "Our supplies," Shanalorre said, continuing the statement, "are more than sufficient to the task, as we have grain to spare. Though, in the interest of disclosure, we are running a bit low on salt. I''m afraid that with the coming of winter, most has been used in preserving food for a winter dragon, and the rest is being used for bread."


    Lori glanced over her shoulder. "Rian?" she prompted.


    "We have some salt on the Coldhold, your Bindership," Rian said with easy cheer. "I''m sure we can part with some for our beleaguered neighbors here."


    "Arrange it, then," Lori said. She turned her gaze back to Shanalorre. "I''m sure you can have more salt when we make another journey to the ocean, once this matter has been dealt with and the Coldhold can go about its usual activities."


    Shanalorre tilted her head and nodded. "Very well. Then I must ask that this accounting be done in reasonable haste. After all, should the cold grow in intensity, such a thing becomes less vital than being properly home."


    "Of course, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. "When has our work been anything but thorough?"


    Another nod. "Then we have reached an accord. Lord Yllian, please pass and confirm the order. Our hardworking guests will be staying a little longer. Lunch will be ready for you and yours, Binder Lolilyuri. Should we both be available, shall we have a meal together?"


    Lori tilted her head and nodded. "That would be acceptable, Binder Shanalorre. I shall look forward to it."


    "Then our business is concluded. I will not delay you any longer."


    Lori nodded again and rose, heading out the door, activating her bindings of firewisps as she did so. Rian followed after her. Bereft of firewisps bindings, he simply wrapped his towel around his face again, and Lori tried not to imagine the parts he had wiped his nose on being the same parts touching his mouth.


    Outside, her volunteers¡ªnot proper militia, just big, strong men Rian had asked to accompany them¡ªwere standing with Shanalorre''s two militia, the two groups standing in silence. Rian could probably tell what the mood was but she had no idea. Instead, she just walked past, Rian at her side between her and the militia as their two volunteers fell into step with him.


    They''d gone some distance before Rian made a sound, a hum. It was one of those ''pay attention to me without me having to tell you to'' sounds, pitched just low enough to sound like thoughtfulness, and Lori had to surpress a shudder as memories of pointed, leading questions from her mothers over dinner came to mind. "What?" she snapped.


    "Yllian''s not leaving the office yet," Rian said quietly.


    "So?"


    "Despite Shana giving him an order to pass and confirm that should really have him going somewhere else."


    Lori blinked and finally deigned to look back. The two militiamen were standing in front of the repurposed house they had just left, looking straight back at them, but she ignored them. She couldn''t see anything through the paper-covered windows, no dramatically cast moving shadows¡­


    "I understand Shana not leaving yet, if she''s tidying her desk so nothing gets lost, or putting out the brazier so it doesn''t burn the place down," Rian said quietly, "but Yllian should be going to convey her message, right?"


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    "Perhaps they are discussing us," Lori said dismissively.


    Rian kept staring towards the office. "Awfully long discussion when he already has something he''s supposed to be doing."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Then what do you think they''re doing?"


    "Arguing?" Rian suggested. "Maybe? A man that age can''t be completely comfortable just taking orders from someone that young, Dungeon Binder or not."


    Why not? "Why not?" Lori asked, disbelieving.


    "His age making him think he knows better just because he''s old?"


    Hmm¡­ yes, that would do it.


    "Idiot. He should know better than to argue with his Dungeon Binder," Lori said.


    "He probably thinks Shana can''t really do anything to him," Rian said. "It''s like he''s forgotten how petty and vicious children can be."


    Lori shook her head. "Come. We have things to do. Get the miners organized while I prepare the heat and smelting vessels."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Apparently all the miners had been provided with heavy work coats and furs to wrap around their legs at some point. She supposed that given the lack of heating in the mine, only ventilation, such clothing had been necessary when it had started getting cold, even before the onset of proper winter. As Rian began to divide the miners into two groups¡ªthere were ten in this shift¡ªLori began to make bindings to warm the air in the work area.


    She was annoyed to find herself slightly out of practice when it came to using her staff to form bindings, finding herself trying to default to reaching through her connection with her core to bind the wisps¡­ only to be abruptly reminded this wasn''t her demesne, which resulted in an internal screaming fit and reminding herself that she''d used a staff for years and knew how to use one, so USE IT.


    Fortunately, it was firewisps she was binding, so she could have magic flow from any warm point of her body to align it to the wisps in question. What snow there was on the ground also worked to her advantage since she could anchor the binding of firewisps to waterwisps instead of earthwisps. That meant the magic could also flow from any point in her skin. Getting some firewisps was as simple as rubbing her hands together to create some through friction, even if she didn''t already have some bound around her body to keep her hands, face and feet warm.


    By the time Rian had managed to divide the miners into two groups, Lori had managed to get a binding that emanated warm air running. She''d needed to use darkwisps to define the area where the firewisps were instead of lightwisps¡ªdealing with lightwisps was always annoying given how close things had to be to one''s eyes¡ªto keep people from simply walking into the invisible binding and harming themselves, but an area of darkness in midair was usually disquieting enough that it probably worked better than lightwisps to discourage people from walking through it. Firewisps were not bonded to a material the way earthwisps, waterwisps and airwisps were, and just because she couldn''t actively reach into someone''s body to bind and imbue the wisps there did not mean those wisps couldn''t be imbued or affected by other wisps. Walking through active and imbued firewisps was dangerous and potentially fatal, especially when it was generating heat well above her core body temperature.


    People should probably know this already even if just from stories, but she had told Rian to mention it to people anyway, emphasizing the ''horrible death from your insides catching fire''¡ªthough not really, since the heat the firewisps were bound to generate was well below a body''s ignition temperature¡ªand to not walk through the hot darkness, or even touch it. She expected someone to at least try to stick their finger in though, and get horrible scalding that would perhaps discourage people from doing it again, but they had snow around them, and they still¡ªadmittedly tentatively¡ªstill had their agreement with Shanalore to provide healing if someone were so foolish.


    Rian directed their miners to perform the rudimentary audit of the ore. The larger of the carts that had been used to transport the ore from the mine to the location they''d been stored was retrieved, and the miners used shovels to pile the cart with ore. Once it was full, as the miners reckoned such things, the cart was pushed a little under the dome to where Lori was and dumped onto the ground, accounted for and ready to be smelted.


    Off to the side, a woman she vaguely remembered¡ªsome relation of Shanalorre''s? The woman made Lori think of bread for some reason¡ªwas keeping track of the number of loads on River''s Fork''s behalf, just as Rian was doing for Lori. If the amount of carts of ore matched the record the demesne had kept, then wonderful! All was as it should be, and the demesne had learned a valuable lesson in properly attributing and measuring things in storage. If it exceeded it¡­ well, then surely the original count was somehow wrong or inaccurate, and everyone had come upon an unexpected scalefall from which they could benefit.


    If it was significantly below the amount recorded by the demesne¡­


    Well, then surely they had been a touch overzealous in testing for viability, and the lack would be deducted from their share of the ore. After all, any inconsistency couldn''t possibly be anyone''s fault but their own. The miners had been busy working, trusting in their hosts to properly account for the ore, and Lori hadn''t entered the demesne in months. Any discrepancy would clearly have their hosts at fault, since the accounting was being done with the demesne''s own tools.


    Rian had said that he believed that no such significant lack would exist, and that any discrepancy could be accounted for by some days having recorded carts as full when they were comparatively less as a convenience, but one aspect of the punitive measure was to make River''s Fork worry that the ore would be found lacking. It was a frustrating social interaction that Lori was willing to have her lord handle the minutia of, even as she understood the broad flow diagram of it.


    But that was all for later. Now that the heat source had been placed to keep her miners¡ªsimply workers now, since they weren''t mining anymore¡ªwarm, her part was preparing to smelt the ore. Smelting wasn''t as simple as providing heat until the metal melted into a liquid. As she had learned from one particularly talkative blacksmith during a job when she had been close to finishing her education, smelting ore sometimes also involved having the substance comprising the ore alchemically reacting with other substances so as to isolate the metal itself. Even though this still required an intensive amount of heat, certain kinds of ores also needed the correct additives for the ore to react properly, or at least efficiently.


    It was a bother, since it meant she couldn''t simply have an open vessel that they could just keep adding ore to at the top while the refined copper flowed out the bottom. Annoyingly, the almanac had been lacking in any information about smelting when she had looked it up, which made an annoying amount of sense. Most of the information in it either had to do with processing commonly available material resources, or ways to more easily survive while constructing a new settlement. Information about smelting, however, would provide an industrial advantage to everyone who had access to metals, which was NOT a commonly available material resource. The closest thing it had to helpful advice on the matter had been the section on quarrying advising using explosions to break up rock, and that was general advise useable for all rock.


    The book was similarly bereft on information about papermaking, glassmaking, dye making, the refinement of vitriolic fluids, and other such subjects. It DID contain a page-long recipe and procedure for making soap, but once Lori had read that, she had to agree that the materials for it were hardly uncommon, and it was probably a survival necessity.


    Fortunately, Lori had her experience, and she had a Rian to extract any pertinent information she didn''t have from their blacksmiths, who had experience in smelting copper, even if it was more common to use metal stock. With those two, she had devised a method of smelting.


    As the workers from her demesne made an accounting of the ore, Lori went down to the river, staff in hand, the case containing her syringe in her pocket.

 176 - Things Left Unattended

    "Lori, lunch time."


    Lori blinked, looking up from the ice she had been working on. She immediately became aware of an ache in her neck, and winced, slipping her hand beneath her collar to rub at her nape. Ugh, she hadn''t realized she''d been bent over that long¡­ ack, and there was her back. Straightening, Lori put one hand on the small of her back and bent backwards, wincing more as she did so.


    "Do you want some ice for that?" Rian said with a grin.


    Lori flicked her other hand, and the butt of her staff slapped solidly against the side of his leg. Between his winter robe and the fur wrappings around his boots, most of the impact was blunted, but Rian still made a blatantly theatrical show of wincing and briefly hopping on one foot as if the strike had pained him.


    "No ice, noted," he said, before looking down at what Lori had been working on, then around at all the others like it.


    It was a tube of ice, a bit wider at the base than at the peak, meant for stability and to reduce the possibility of it falling over. No one wanted a container meant for molten metal to tip over and spill, after all. A half a pace high, the hollow inside was just big enough to fit someone''s head, its thick sides irregular in a way that annoyed her greatly but which she couldn''t afford to correct without wasting time, the whole thing made of bound ice that had been solidified. A small drop of her blood could barely be discerned somewhere on the glass-like, perfectly transparent cone.


    The tube was one of a handful she''d managed to make that morning, barely uniform in height and base width, each one bearing a shameful lack of symmetry save for the dimensions of the hollow within the tube. That she had made by using a form made from a piece of wood with a handle she''d had her carpenters make¡ªwell, she''d told Rian to tell the carpenters, who''d probably passed the order down to Riz¡ªon their lathe. It hadn''t been the only tool she''d had made in preparation for this smelting work. Some of the rest were still on the boat, not currently needed. The smith had bought his own tools as well, and would probably be doing most of the work when it came time, but she wanted to be ready.


    Each tube was imbued, the solidified water maintaining their shape without exchanging heat with their surroundings. As she had every time she''d finished working on a tube, Lori checked their levels of imbuement through the drops of her blood she''d mixed into the ice. Each was reduced from the last time she''d checked, of course, and she sighed, switching to imbuing them again. She breathed in out of habit, and for the now relatively miniscule magic she drew in from the air, even as the magic contained in her core filled her through her connection to her demesne. She pushed this magic to the waterwisps contained in her blood through her affinity, reinforcing that affinity even as imbued the bindings¡ª


    "Lori? Lori?"


    Lori just managed to stop herself from halting the imbuement as her lord drew her attention. "What?" she snapped irritably, trying to pay attention to him and what she was doing at the same time.


    "Lunch, remember?" he said. "The bread is here, and the salted meat stew is done."


    Oh. Food. Right, right¡­ Lori tried to decide if she could walk while imbuing or whether she should stop until she reached the food, then continue to imbue as she ate. Rainbows, both sounded like bad ideas for different reasons.


    She compromised by imbuing only one of the least-imbued of the tubes as she followed Rian towards where they were eating, and nearly lost that bit of her concentration as she saw what was there. Her workers sitting around the binding of heat and darkness was completely expected as Rian led her towards a small wooden stool¡ªhe must have gotten it from Riz¡ªsitting on the far side of the binding from most of the men. The crowd of children at their edges throwing balls of snow into the binding and laughing when water came out the other side were not. Nor were the adults with the buckets and shovels.


    As she watched, two people carrying a pole from which a large wooden bucket filled with snow hung between them walked towards her binding, walking on either side of it as the bucket between them passed through the darkwisps. When they walked out the other side, the bucket was filled with water, which was hurriedly carried over to a barrel and poured in as people put in more snow after it to melt.


    Lori sighed. Why was the world filled with idiots?


    "Rian, please tell our people to keep those idiots away from our heat source," Lori said irritably. "The imbuement I filled it with was supposed to last all day, but if these fools have been using it to melt water and warm their buckets¡ª"


    Even as she spoke, the darkness suddenly disappeared, leaving a pair who had just been about to pass their bucket through where the binding had been to pause, standing awkwardly.


    "¡ªthen," she continued, suddenly feeling very tired, "the imbuement will have been expended far more rapidly due to the difference in the amount of energy it takes to imbue air with heat as opposed to the amount of energy it takes to imbue frozen water, wooden buckets, rope and poles with heat!" By the end of the sentence, she was just short of screaming, and the children had vacated the area, apparently knowing better than to be in her presence.


    "Oh¡­" Rian said, voice small. "That¡­ uh¡­ makes sense. You should have told me that."


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    "I would have thought it wouldn''t be needed, given how I specifically warned you of the hazards of this particular binding," Lori said through grinding teeth. "What, after telling everyone how dangerous it was to stick any part of their body into it, everyone decided it was safe to stick literally anything else in?"


    "Um¡­ pretty much?" Rian said.


    Lori took a deep breath¡­ then sighed. She closed her eyes, and used her fingers to massage her forehead, squeezing from her temples inward. She bent down and picked up the stool. "I," she told Rian, "am going back to my crucibles lest some colorwit decide they would be a good place to piss in, or some children think it would be fun to carry them somewhere, or just fill them with snow. Bring me food."


    "Probably a very good idea, your Bindership," Rian said tiredly. "People aren''t really used to you here. And the people who do know you will probably not be very respectful. They left, after all."


    Lori nodded and irritably began to walk back towards her furnaces.


    "Um¡­ about the heat¡­"


    "As you all let it run out of imbuement early, I''m sure you can find your own solution, as you all clearly know better."


    "Punishment, got it. All right boys, lunch is interrupted! Go find some wood so we can start a fire!"


    Lori did, in fact, have to keep children away from her furnaces, as well as have to deal with a furnace that had somehow been half-filled with snow in the time she''d been gone. At least it hadn''t been piss.


    She was muttering about all the things she wanted to do to those children''s parents for failing utterly in teaching them proper behavior as she finally finished turning the last of the snow into steam when Rian finally came with a platter of bread and two bowls of stew. The bowls were only half filled, and most of it was a watery soup that still wafted up heat in her face as she took one of the bowls.


    "It''s a dipping soup. You''re supposed to put the bread into it and let it soak a little for warmth and flavor," Rian said.


    "Obviously," Lori said, who had suspected as much. She sat down on her stool, grabbing one of the flat disks of bread from the platter. Rian stood to one side, holding his own bowl and taking from the platter as well. "If you''re going to stand, do it over there so you can block the wind."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said with a small sigh as he moved to the indicated spot. "Do you want a report or can I eat first?"


    "Eat," Lori ground out. "I don''t think I can bear to hear anything more right now. Stupid, idiotic, rainbow-brained¡­" she bit savagely into the bread chewing. The outside had already cooled a little, but the insides were still pleasantly warm, and Lori let out a sigh as she ate. The bread was thick and heavy, but it was bread and tasted so good!


    Lori sat in silence, dipping bread into the stew, biting, chewing, using folded bread edges to scoop up bits of meat and popping both bread and meat into her mouth. Her simmering annoyance slowly abated as she ate, so that when she finished all that was left was a vindictive irritation that had already been sated by her previous declaration. When she finished, she took a deep breath, adding the meager magic that filled her lungs to the binding around her hands and face, then let it out, nodding to herself. She held out her bowl to Rian.


    "You want me to see if there''s any more bread?" Rian asked.


    Loi blinked, then looked towards the empty plate. For a moment, she glanced towards her furnaces.


    "I''ll get them and come back, and you can listen to my report while you''re eating," Rian suggested.


    "Do it," Lori said.


    The bread he bought back wasn''t very warm anymore, but that was fine. She altered the binding around her head to warm the bread slightly as it passed through on the way into her mouth, so it wasn''t cold when she chewed. Unlike with the heat source earlier, she could adjust for the additional imbuement this consumed, so she didn''t suddenly have a cold face.


    "All right," Rian said, glancing towards her workers, who were now crowded around a fire. The people with the buckets and shovels were gone, off to take advantage of their stolen heat no doubt. "We''ve got three piles of exactly twenty five carts of ore and are halfway through a fourth, so you and Lanwei can probably get started on smelting. We''ll start the afternoon''s work once Shana''s aunt comes back to keep track. We should hopefully have eight, maybe even nine before we have to stop for tonight, and I''m going to have to find someone willing to keep watch so we can all say no one tampered with the piles while we slept. I don''t think anyone is going to, but we need to do it anyway, unfortunately."


    Lori nodded. "Then we will begin smelting. Hopefully after three or four tests I can learn enough that tomorrow I can start mass production, perhaps even start using bigger furnaces."


    Rian glanced at furnaces she had made, then up towards the dome. "Should we have a roof put up or something?" he said. "Just to maybe avoid potential steam explosions if snow should drop down into the things when they''re full of molten metal?"


    Lori blinked, then looked upwards herself, towards the dark, snow-covered dome above. Had this been some sort of play or novel, that would have been the moment some snow dislodged and dropped down onto her face. No such thing happened, but Lori could well imagine the possibility.


    "I will find some stone to make a roof," Lori said, then took another bite of her bread and swallowed. "But later."


    Rian nodded, taking some more bread for himself as well. "We''re going to be here a while," Rian said, his tone more casual. "How do you feel?"


    She frowned at him. "Cold. Sore. In need of a taller chair." This stool was definitely not comfortable for eating on. Her knees were too curled up, and the legs rocked a little on the uneven ground.


    "Oh? No urges to declare you''re never leaving your demesne again?"


    "I always never want to leave my demesne again. However, I have obligations and agreements to fulfill."


    "You don''t have to start smelting today, you know?" Rian said quietly. "Why don''t you take the Coldhold back home, sleep on your own bed, and come back in two days? We should have most of the ore audited then. You don''t have to sleep here."


    Lori snorted, waving her hand dismissively. "I would still need to be here. I''ve never smelted ore before, and I need the experience so I can understand the process and begin to make more appropriate bindings for it."


    Rian tilted his head, then shrugged. "Fair enough, I suppose."


    They finished the bread, and Lori stood up. "Watch over the furnaces," she said, hefting her staff. The wire that ran up its length was cold in her grip, the binding of firewisps around her hands not heating it. "Make sure the children don''t come back to play with it. I''m going to go find some stone."


    "Try near the mine," Rian suggested, pointing to one side of the location in question. "A lot of what gets excavated is just rock without any ore we can use. They dump that over there."


    Lori nodded in acknowledgement, heading in the direction he was pointing to get some stone so she could keep snow and water off her furnaces. Lunch was over, and there was more work to do.

 177- Preparing To Smelt

    Building a roof over her furnaces took Lori an annoyingly long time. Outside of her demesne, she no longer had the control over wisps that she had become used to, and so things she had taken for granted, like turning stone into a fluid, viscous consistency and having it flow to move the mass, were far, far more difficult in River''s Fork. If it weren''t for her connection to her demesne still giving her limitless power, she''d never have tried to move so much stone so far, as the amount of magic necessary would have been beyond her short of hyperventilating or consuming a wisp bead.


    Still, she managed to raise the roof, a simple curving stone arch not unlike the baths, shelter and some of the storage sheds back home. It was low, but that was all right. She didn''t care about the soil of River''s Fork, so once the roof was up, she bound the earthwisps of the ground beneath it, compressing it into walls to support the arch, hardening it into a proper floor, and the excess was pushed aside so that the furnaces could be moved under the roof''s protection. It was open at both ends so that the wind would be able to keep the air circulating and any air that resulted from the smelting wouldn''t be able to just gather.


    It also meant the little improvised smithy wouldn''t become outrageously hot or filled with air released from the ore, something she had been warned was dangerous. While it would probably be more efficient to give the firewisps a directionality so that all the heat would remain inside the furnace, given the freezing cold around them excess heat was preferred, they just didn''t want it to be so hot they couldn''t approach the furnaces. The furnaces were made of water after all. If they ran out of imbuement while they were filled with molten metal, ''steam explosion'' would be an understatement.


    With everything in place, they were ready.


    Lori had assisted in melting metal before, back when she had been a student earning beads for school supplies or, in her later years at school, for magic to digest for extended exercises that required a lot of binding. She had melted scraps of copper, bronze, brass, lead, tin, pewter, jasada, magan, iron and steel back into stocks and ingots, ready to be reused and made into new things. The latter had been difficult, given how hot it had needed to get, and she had actually taken turns with another Whisperer to maintain that binding, the two of them switching out imbuing it and keeping the contact wire they were using from getting too hot to touch by making ice to cool it.


    However, those had been refined metals, already purified by previous processes and only needing heat to melt. Ore, by definition, was unrefined, alchemically impure metal, which significantly changed the temperature it would melt, as well as affecting its structural integrity and durability. Lori didn''t know how to purify those. She was a Whisperer and Dungeon Binder, not an alchemist¡­ or a blacksmith.


    Fortunately, they had those in her demesne.


    The smith she''d be working with was introduced to her by Rian as Lanwei. He was clean shaven, balding in front, muscular from repeatedly carrying heavy things for most of his professional life, he had worked with Whisperers before, he knew how to smelt raw ore into usable metal, and, most importantly, he wasn''t the talkative sort. They had already worked together before, refining one of the ferrous dragon scales into some of the tools they''d be using for this. She also didn''t need to explain the particulars of the furnaces made of ice to him. While furnaces were normally made out of special clays, quartz, or other minerals that were durable in the face of extreme heat, she''d used bound ice as a perfect insulator before with the blacksmiths. As long as it didn''t run out of imbuement to keep the binding active, and no one decided to trying using a hammer on the furnace while it was in use, it was perfectly safe. Or at least, as safe as any other furnace could be.


    They had other tools as well, brought over on from the Coldhold. A mortar and pestle, the wood still light and new from having been freshly formed on the carpenters lathe. Buckets, which she knew there were never enough of. Ceramic ingot molds, which she''d hopefully be able to fuse back together if and when they cracked from the heat. A ceramic crucible, which like the mold had been made by the potter earlier that week with her help. Tongs for the crucible. A metal rod with a wide spoon at the end. The wand that Lori had commissioned the smiths to make for this occasion, with her assistance. Personally, Lori didn''t think they''d need all that just yet, but then she wasn''t a blacksmith. Perhaps he felt more comfortable with all the tools nearby.


    Lori watched as the blacksmith poured large pieces of charcoal into the furnace, part of her concentration on the binding of the furnace they were using, sending more magic to imbue it. Unlike the binding of firewisps, the binding of waterwisps keeping the furnace solid was a static thing, the imbuement draining at a steady, predictable rate, so no external force on it would consume its reserves any faster, but Lori still worried. The others she also imbued so that they would continue to keep their shape and not start melting if her mind were absent for too long. She could fully imbue them later so that they''d last through the night, but for now she just had to have them last through the afternoon¡­


    A cart load of ore lay outside the little smelting hut, already recorded in the accounting. The pile lay on a trough made of solidified dirt, so that none of it could get lost or go to waste. It was a bright, vibrant green, and Lori could understand why it would be used for dyes. She''d seen that shade of green before. Next to it were four of the buckets, all filled with ore that the smith had ground in the pestle. He hadn''t been idle while she had been working, preparing the materials for when she was ready. The buckets of ground ore went into the furnace on top of the charcoal, and the smith stepped back, nodding to Lori. It was her turn.


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    Lori gripped her staff, sighing and wishing she''d remembered to put a coal in her coalcharm. She''d let a lot of habits she''d used to maintain slip ever since she''d become a Dungeon Binder. The bits of quartz embedded into her staff were still, not buzzing with lightningwisps held ready as they would have a year ago. Well, she had other options. Lori reached inside the furnace, picking up the largest piece of ore she could reach, about the size of a finger joint. Carefully, she altered the binding of firewisps around her hands, imbuing it as she did so. The cold piece of ore in her hands began to grow warm as the firewisps began to affect it, and soon it was as warm as the air around Lori''s hands, filled with firewisps of its own.


    Reverting the binding in her hands, she claimed and bound the firewisps in the ore as she put it back inside the furnace. Her hands still inside the tube, she began to form the binding. Firewisps, anchored to but not¡ªand this was very important¡ªpart of the binding of waterwisps that solidified the material of the furnace. She moved her hands, the firewisps trailing after her as she made a rising spiral inside the tube, the firewisps anchoring to the sides of it in her wake. Carefully she imbued the firewisps, and the air inside the tube began to grow warm.


    Lori extricated her arm from the furnace slowly, then stuck her staff inside. Careful not to let the steel-shod butt of the staff touch the ore piled at the bottom, she smoothly switched from binding the firewisps with one hand to binding the firewisps through the metal wire running down her staff which pressed into her other hand. Taking, deep, regular breaths even though she didn''t really need to because of her connection to her core, she imbued the firewisps, binding them to slowly radiate heat.


    The heat spread through the tube, warming the ore beneath the firewisps she had anchored and bound. Contiguous with her binding, she claimed the firewisps in the ore, making them part of her binding as the heat slowly progressed downward. Eventually, the heat reached the charcoal and the air around it, and then finally the bottom of the tube, and Lori anchored the firewisps into place. With the firewisps now completely filling the interior of the furnace, she arranged them into a lattice.


    There were gaps, of course. The charcoal''s internals changed temperature slowly, but that was fine. She didn''t need to change their internal temperature, she only needed the charcoal to get hot enough to start partial combusting, and for that the outside was fine. She imbued the firewisps through her staff wire as the firewisps maintained their temperature. While she couldn''t feel it through her clothes and the binding that warmed her hands, there was probably a mild updraft coming from the opening of the furnace as the air in the furnace grew warmer than the air above it.


    Finally, once she thought the firewisps were sufficiently imbued, she carefully deactivated them, then drew out her staff. The wire under her hands was warm as she looked around, shrugged, then stuck the staff into one of the nearby, unused furnaces for lack of anywhere else to put it where it wouldn''t fall. While she could use her staff for what she was going to do next, it was mostly made of wood. Sticking it into a vessel intended to be heated such that metal would melt was inadvisable, at least not without a binding to protect it from the heat. Given how busy they were likely to be, maintaining such a binding was likely to be forgotten.


    Which was why she had commissioned a wand.


    A pace long, made from part of the anatass dragon scale they had found¡ªbecause why not, when they had no other use for it¡ªthe metal rod was as thick as her finger, and blue from end to end, a deliberate aesthetic choice after it had been forged. A wooden grip long enough for both her hands was at one end, a metal strip running down the length of the grip to give her a contact point to conduct magic through. At the other end was a blunted, rounded point. The whole thing had a noticeable weight that was still lighter than her staff, and more importantly it was a metal conductor that was very unlikely to catch fire, quite unlike her staff, the grip easily replaced.


    Lori pick up the wand from where she had placed it next to the wooden tube-form and other tools she''d prepared for herself, placing her thumb on the contact strip just to be sure. It had been a while since she''d used a wand¡ªshe''d used them in some of her jobs where using a staff wasn''t practical¡ªand so she handled it carefully as she placed the tip inside the furnace''s opening. The wand made contact with the binding of firewisps, and she activated it, imbuing the binding as she did so.


    She increased the heat slowly, giving time for the heat to spread within, letting any moisture warm and evaporate to avoid the possibility of a steam explosion. Despite the lack of directionality to the binding, between the open nature of the temporary smithy, and the breeze, the air didn''t become all that hot yet. Eventually, Lori drew out her new wand and, as a test, stepped outside the smithy and tapped the tip that had been just inside the furnace onto some snow that had fallen from the dome. The snow melted, sizzling into steam, and Lori nodded in satisfaction.


    The materials were preheated. It was time to truly begin.


    Thrusting the tip of the wand back inside the furnace, she altered the binding slightly, and activated the firewisps at the bottom of the furnace, imbuing them as she caused the heat they were generating to spike up sharply.


    Through the transparent side of the bound ice furnace, one of the coals began to glow with heat.


    Nodding, Lori reverted back the binding of firewisps to what it had been before, continuing to imbue as she began increasing the temperature.


    Inside the glass-like tube, more and more coals began to glow, and smoke began to rise.

 178 - Smelting Copper

    In retrospect, while using a perfect insulator as the material for a furnace was greatly advantageous, having a completely transparent material proved to be slightly problematic when the ore inside started to glow with heat. She''d needed to integrate a binding of lightwisps to the structure of the furnace to blunt the amount of light passing through, so that they could still see the progress of the smelting process, but without going blind.


    It would have been the most annoying thing she''d have had to do all day, as binding lightwisps was normally done by channeling magic through one''s eyes, which¡­ was seldom safe. Fortunately, the radiance from the furnace reached a point that its glow could penetrate her skin, reminding her of something Rian had pointed out once. It was¡­ a new sensation, passing magic through her eyes to align them with lightwisps, and then instead of using that magic to claim and bind lightwisps, channeling that magic just under the surface of her skin to her hand, where she claimed the lightwisps that were passing through the edges of her extremity. It was far more convenient than bringing things close to her eye.


    The binding of lightwisps was simple, a mere reduction in intensity so they could still see what was happening inside, though in muter orange tones. Once that was done, and all the heat from the furnace was stabilized, Lori took a step back and allowed the blacksmith to step back in. All she was there for, really, was to maintain the heat and the furnace. The smith had to do most of the real work.


    As she watched, the smith slowly added in more and more crushed ore, using a poker to stir the conglomerating mix of charcoal, ore and what was probably slag. She deactivated the binding when he did this so that the poker wouldn''t be forcibly heated to the temperature of everything else inside the furnace, ruining the temper. The smith covered and uncovered the top of the furnace with a thick metal plate¡ªso that Lori could still imbue and adjust the furnace''s bindings as needed¡ªto control the flow of air, keeping the charcoal from properly burning. Normally, this would have been to affect the temperature of the furnace, but as the heat wasn''t being generated by combustion, in this instance it was to keep the air away from the coals so they would produce the alchemical gas needed to separate the copper from the slag. Most of what he was doing seemed to be agitating the contents of the furnace to encourage the copper to sink down, adding more charcoal and ore as needed.


    After what seemed far too soon, all the crushed ore had been poured into the furnace, and through the transparent walls, Lori could see shapes distorting, saw them break apart from the heat, exploding and striking the metal plate on top of the furnace. Each impact made her flinch, and she was glad the pieces were so small. That had probably been intentional.


    It was a surprise to Lori when she looked outside and saw how dark it had gotten. At first she thought that they had worked until night, but as she stepped out of the little smithy to check, she realized the gloom had been caused by the dome and the angle of the sun. It seemed her estimate of ''three or four'' tests had been overly optimistic. Outside the dome, snow had begun to fall, the clouds obscuring the sky further contributing to the twilight.


    The workers seemed to have finished carting the ore into new piles and were cleaning up, the fire they''d been using for warmth burning low as Rian spoke to the woman who was keeping track of the progress on behalf of Binder Shanalorre, gesturing at the eight piles of ore. There was still some ore left in the trough of solidified dirt. She''d have to cover that, just to make sure none of it got misplaced or covered in snow¡­


    "Will you need me to adjust anything else¡­" Lori faltered briefly, looking around wildly and finally spotting the note to herself she''d written on the ceiling, "¡­Master Lanwei?"


    The blacksmith paused, possibly thinking it over, more probably surprised she''d remembered his name. "I''ll need you to let the furnace rest, your Bindership," he said.


    "Will that be soon?" she said.


    The blacksmith looked at the contents of the furnace, stirring it slightly with his poker. "A little bit more, your Bindership."


    "Then I''ll leave you to it while I deal with this," she said, stepping out.


    She stepped back in to leave her wand behind and grab her staff, grabbing some lightwisps from the furnace, binding part of them to the head of her staff for light. The rest, she imbued and hung in the air to illuminate the piles, because it was too colors dark. The snowfall that was one of the reasons for that darkness had left a nearby dusting of snow. It wasn''t particularly thick or dense¡ªthe snow had just fallen, after all¡ªbut it was better than nothing. By the time she was done gathering all the nearby snow into one cold ball of slush that glowed after over the cold, hard mud, the sun was barely a suggestion behind the hills to the east, and Lori had the lightwisps on her staff as bright as she could endure, the sphere of radiance blocked in a little wedge towards her face so she wouldn''t be blinded.


    Lori just threw the slush on top of the pile of ore and solidified the water. Slowly, since unlike back home she couldn''t just mitigate the sudden burst of firewisps squeezed out of the water by the process. She looked over the pile and nodded. No ore would be misplaced, and when the imbuement ran out, the cold of the ice itself would keep it solid through the night. Lori turned to head back to the covered smithy and jerked to a halt as her staff remained embedded in the ice shell. Oh. Right.


    She sighed.


    After managing to detach her staff from the ice, she returned to the smithy to find the smith in the middle of holding a metal spoon over the open top of the furnace, preheating it to get rid of any moisture on the surface. On the ground next to the furnace was a bucket-like ceramic pot, it''s open mouth wider than its base, with two long ''ears'' for lifting, one of the tools they''d been carrying along on the Coldhold. It was never good to rely on someone else for buckets, after all.


    "Your Bindership," he said, nodding to her. "Can you deactivate the heat so I can scoop out the slag? Then we can work on getting the copper out."


    Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    Lori nodded, and after anchoring the binding of lightwisps to the ceiling, she slipped her staff back inside one of the furnaces and grabbed her wand, touching the tip to the brim of the furnace to do just that. The contents of the furnace continued to glow, but that was merely from its own heat. "Firewisps deactivated," she called out.


    The smith nodded in acknowledgement, and began using the heated spoon to scoop things out of the furnace. The familiar debris of slag was drawn out from the furnace and tapped into the bucket-like ceramic pot, where it quickly cooled down enough to stop glowing. This was deceptive, as they''d still be more than hot enough to cause droplets of water to flash into steam on contact, and the blacksmith was very careful to keep everything but the end of his spoon away from the inside of the bucket. Smoke and a strange, alchemical smell were rising from the bucket, though thankfully the slight breeze passing through the smithy kept it from lingering. The bucket had clearly been heated beforehand, as it wasn''t making any distressing cracking and snapping noises. The glowing coals soon followed, what were left of them, tapped out on the ground to glow for longer than the slag.


    "How are you two doing?"


    Lori blinked, turning to see Rian stick his head into the smithy, one hand up to keep the light out of his eyes. "Progressing. The metal is cooling now, I think."


    Rian nodded. "How are you doing, Lanwei?"


    "Just getting the copper now, Lord Rian," the smith said. "There''s not a lot of it. Only a third of the ore I put in seems to be copper. Maybe only a quarter."


    "That¡­ doesn''t sound good?" Rian said, exchanging looks with Lori, who frowned.


    "I''ll know more when I can weigh it, my lord," the smith said. "And perhaps it was just a bad batch. Quality can vary. Your Bindership, is there any way to let more light back into the furnace? I can''t see what''s inside."


    Lori nodded, tapping the outside of the furnace and deactivating the binding of lightwisps around it, the new, strange feeling of channeling magic over her outer skin making her tentative as she did so. Yes, she definitely needed to try this more. It was much more convenient than putting things close to her eye. Some of the things she hadn''t understood in class at the time finally made sense now, and explained why so many of her classmates had been faster than her at forming bindings of lightwisps¡­


    She shook her head, clearing it of such petty details as the blacksmith put aside his poker¡ªalso putting it into the tube of an unused furnace¡ªbefore taking his tongs and carefully reaching inside the still-hot furnace. What he drew out was a large, slightly smoking mass that looked barely distinguishable from the slag he''d been removing save the fact it was large and solid. It even had a glowing coal stuck to one side.


    "Is that it?" Rian asked.


    "Once you get the slag off, Lord Rian," the smith said. He carefully put down the mass and reached into the furnace again, pulling out another similar mass. That was set down next to the other one too, then the tongs were set aside and he grabbed one of the buckets. The smith stepped out for a moment and returned with the bucket full of snow. Taking the tongs in hand again, he set the smaller of the masses in the bucket. Sizzling sounds immediately began to come from the bucket, the mass starting to sink down as its heat melted the snow into water, then flashed it into steam.


    While this was happening, the smith placed one of the demesne''s few copper-mesh screens over the slag bucket, then set all other tools aside as he readied the mortar and pestle. Lori, for her part, deactivated all the binding on the furnace save for the one keeping the ice solidified, conserving most of the imbuement for tomorrow. A little would be consumed just to keep the binding together, but at least this way she wouldn''t need to rebuild the binding.


    The smith moved the large mass to the mortar, then grabbed the pestle. "You might want to back away Lord Rian, your Bindership, pieces sometimes go flying and could hit you in the face."


    Rian immediately took two steps back, while Lori stepped sideways to put the smith between the mortar and her as he began to pound away. From the sound of it, the mass was much softer and more brittle than the ore, and after a seemingly brief time, both chunks had been smashed. Setting aside the pestle, the smith picked up the whole mortar in a show of strength that made Lori''s arms and legs ache just watching him and carefully tipped the contents of the pestle onto the copper mesh.


    Dust and debris poured out, the former slipping through the screen into the bucket full of slag, the latter bouncing on top. Every so often the smith put down the mortar and sorted through the debris, tossing some aside and pouring the rest into another bucket. Eventually, the mortar was empty.


    Lori stared into the bucket that was perhaps a three-quarters full of nuggets and spiky debris. Maybe two-thirds. "This is all the copper we were able to extract?" she said. Next to her, Rian tilted his head for a better look.


    "I''m afraid so, your Bindership," the smith said. "It''s still not completely pure either. There''s slag there that we''ll need another melt to get out, and the bucket has a lot of air. That batch didn''t have a lot of copper in it. Sometimes it''s like that. Maybe it was ore from the edges of the seam."


    Lori frowned harder, then turned to Rian. "Is all the ore like that?"


    Rian sighed. "I really couldn''t tell. I''m not an ore expert. But going from what''s left of the pile of ore you had to work with¡­" He shrugged. "Some of the other ore is greener, some less so. I''ll have to take a close look tomorrow." He looked around, then sighed. "Do you two mind if we use this place as a guard post for the one who''ll be staying up to watch over the ore? They''ll also be able to watch the tools, since it''s a bit late to bring them all back to the Coldhold." He sounded frustrated and annoyed, a very rare state of affairs for Rian.


    The smith glanced towards her. "I don''t mind, Lord Rian, though it''s going to be a little cold for them."


    "For me, you mean," Rian sighed. "I didn''t really do much, so the others need sleep more than I do."


    "No," Lori said instantly. "You keep the tally. I won''t have us needing to repeat because you''re too tired to confirm the count. Pick someone else." A thought occurred to her. "Perhaps someone who stayed on the Coldhold. They didn''t do anything."


    Rian hesitated, then nodded reluctantly. It was a mark of how tired he probably was¡ªrecord keeping was tiring, no matter what anyone said¡ªthat he didn''t really try to press his idea. "Well¡­ if you insist, your Bindership." He glanced around. "Though it might be cold for them¡­ "


    Lori waved a dismissive hand. "I''ll make a binding for them. As long as they don''t stick anything into it, it should last until morning." She''d need to put something over the opening to hold in the heat. "The two of you clean up while I do that, so we can all get to dinner."


    "Yes, your Bindership," the both chorused. Both sounded tired, probably for different reasons, but there was no helping it. The work wasn''t over until everything had been cleaned and put away.


    Ignoring her hunger¡ªshe did not feel a gnawing in her stomach, she''d eaten at lunch¡ªLori set about doing just that.


    She really wished she was in her demesne. Her nice, warm, brightly lit, comfortable demesne, with her bed, her almanac, her game boards, and someone to crush utterly¡­


    Lori shook her head, glaring at the open back wall of the smithy and started to rub her hands together to create enough firewisps to start a new binding. She''d made an agreement, and she was keeping it!


    But next time¡­ next time¡­ any agreement was going to include she could do everything from the comfort of her own demesne!

 179 - Time To Sit Down

    "I''m never leaving my demesne again," Lori said tiredly.


    She sat in her room on the Coldhold, curled up in the bed with her feet folded under her as the boat swayed, finally making its way up the river back to her demesne, its storage spaces full of the ingots of copper she had smelted. After having slept in it for the past seven days, the room felt thick and muggy, with an odor that seemed to hide from her most of the time but suddenly puffed unexpected if she sat down or moved. The room would probably need airing once she left.


    Lori half-expected Rian to make a comment about how she said that every time she left as he sat on her stool just outside of the door, leaning back on the wall. Her lord sat slumped, his head lolling tiredly. Despite her orders, after all the ore had been audited¡ªthe total had come up to seven carts under the total River''s Fork had claimed, which Lori had magnanimously excused as being the result of inconsistent cart loads¡ªhe''d taken the duty of staying up and watching the piles at night. He hadn''t been alone, as River''s Fork had begun doing the same, but her lord had been staying up late for days and despite having slept normally the night before, he didn''t seem to have recovered yet.


    "Good idea," he sighed. "In fact, let''s not just never leave the demesne, let''s never leave our beds at all. Just stay curled up where it''s nice and warm."


    Lori stared at him. Eventually, she said, "What about food?"


    He waved a dismissive hand. "Eh, if we just stay there and sleep, then we don''t need to eat as much because we''re not doing anything that makes us hungry, right? Who needs to eat more than three times a week? And it will let us cut back on food stores until spring! No downsides to this whatsoever!" His head slumped lower as he cradled his face in his hands.


    Lori nodded. His idea sounded very tempting¡­ "Well, you wouldn''t deserve any food then anyway," she said.


    "I''ve just stayed up all week watching piles of rocks in the cold with some surly people who kept making snide remarks about how warm and spring-like the weather was because we were annoyed a little girl tried to be cute with us," Rian retorted. "I definitely deserve all that food, I''m just not going to eat any because it would be too much of a hassle." He sighed and finally looked up. His eyes were half-lidded, obviously tired in a way sleep hadn''t rid him of. "Next time you make an agreement like this again, let''s have the accounting built into it already so we don''t have to do this again."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Next time?"


    "She''s still the only one nearby who can provide healing, unless you learned Deadspeaking without bringing it up," Rian said. "So one way or another we''ll have to do business with her when the babies start getting born."


    Lori''s teeth clicked shut at the reminder. "Fine. But she comes to us this time!"


    "No argument there," Rian said. "It''s probably not safe to bring any newborns to her." He closed his eyes and slumped forward again, and Lori couldn''t stop the urge to do the same.


    It had been a long week, and the week hadn''t even finished yet. Rian had needed to organize a change in workers a day in, as they''d already been tired from mining and hadn''t expected having to stay longer, much less working outside. It was apparently much warmer inside the mine somehow. They had sorted the ore, while others assisted her, the blacksmith Lanwei¡ªthe name was still with her after actually having to use it for the past several days¡ªand River''s Fork''s own smith by crushing the ore with the mortar, pestles and whatever blunt objects and buckets they could use while the three of them used her furnaces first to separate the copper from the ore, and then cast the copper into ingots.


    Lori wasn''t sure how the ingots had been divided, because try as the three of them might they couldn''t make the metal bricks completely uniform, but Rian had taken care of that somehow. She''d seen him conferring with that woman who''d been keeping track of the accounting for Shanalorre, and¡­ well, she trusted that he''d gotten them their share of the copper. He was the one in charge of talking to people after all, that sounded like his area of responsibility¡­


    She knew when they finally crossed the border back into her demesne, even without the light dusting of Iridescence on her vanishing. The air suddenly became completely comfortable instead of being too hot and too cold in patches, which actually made Lori sit up straight with relief, even if it didn''t really overcome her general tiredness and apathy. She didn''t move from her bed, but she did push her raincoat, winter robe and blanket off her legs and shoulders as she released the bindings around her hands and face. The firewisps from the bindings, she was amused to notice, simply began keeping her warm like all the other firewisps around her.


    Sighing, she stood up and began to roll up her bedroll so she could transfer it to her room when they arrived back home. She folded her blanket, put her pillow aside and put her boots back on, wincing as she noticed more cracks on them. She''d been maintaining it with a mixture of beast fat and bugwax that Rian said was what everyone else in the demesne used on leather, but either she hadn''t been doing it right or it wasn''t enough. Hopefully it would last a bit longer¡­


    She was the last person to step off the Coldhold after it docked, carrying her pack with the few changes of clothes she''d bought, now filled with used garments, as well as her staff and new wand. She wore her rain coat¡ªthankfully its leather seemed to be faring better than her boots¡ª with the hood up, the better to keep in her warmth. Her hat had been left in her room in the demesne. Snow was falling and she didn''t want wet hair from the snow melting because of the warmth around her. Behind her, Rian followed, carrying a large sack made from her winter robe, filled with her bedroll, pillow, and blanket, the padded garment making for a large and slightly unwieldy container as they walked over the planks to the outriggers of the boat, and from there onto the stone dock. Despite how long she''d waited, there was still a crowd in front dock, though thankfully it was in the process of dispersing. Wives and children, parents and siblings were helping husbands and sons bring their packs back home.


    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    Someone was still waiting, of course, though it wasn''t for her. Riz quickly took the sack from Rian, who let her take it gratefully as he embraced the northerner woman, shamelessly using her for warmth as she kept her balance, apparently enjoying the contact. Lori glared at the two, daring Riz to let the winter robe touch the ground. "Rian, don''t linger," she said, turning and heading towards her dungeon.


    "Yes, your Bindership," she heard him sigh behind her. "Sorry Riz, duty calls."


    "I''ll walk with you. You look like something a Deadspeaker woke up."


    She heard footsteps behind her as she walked.


    "I''ve been doing night watch the last few days."


    Snow had built up on the ground, though a few paths had been shoveled clear between the main road, the baths and her Dungeon.


    "Huh¡­ not very tough, are you?"


    There wasn''t such a path between the dock and her Dungeon, just some disrupted snow where people had stomped through.


    "I''m softer than bread dough when it comes to the cold."


    Gleefully, she claimed and bound the waterwisps in the snow, taking delight in just being able to will it so and not have to use the staff or wand she was carrying.


    "Cold bread dough is pretty hard though."


    Lori made the snow fuse together, and from there made the ice flow to either side of where she was walking, opening a path to her Dungeon.


    "Softer, then."


    The ground was mud and she didn''t want to ruin the soil in case they grew desperate enough to dig it up or wanted to grow ropeweed or something on it when it became warm again, so she just froze the mud to make it for all intents and purposes dry.


    She didn''t almost slip. Not at all.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, the copper was unloaded and transferred to the dragonscale vault. They were piled more or less neatly next to the storage jars full of finely ground blue and green copper ore. Rian was to find someone who knew how to turn it into dye, and if there wasn''t anyone, then they''d either sell it in Covehold when it was warmer, have it made into dye or ink, or just melt it into more copper. They''d didn''t really have a need for pigment right then, but it was the cause of the extended suffering in River''s Fork, so they had it.


    Rian suspected that River''s Fork did have a dyer who could turn it into pigment, otherwise there''d be little reason to want to retain any and no reason to test it for viability. Despite everything, it seemed the other demesne was still getting the better end of the deal.


    Thankfully, Lori hadn''t forgotten any of the bindings she''d needed to imbue while she was gone. Having to force herself to check each and every single binding in her demesne without the benefit of her reminders had been greatly exhausting, and upon checking her list she had sighed in relief at not having forgotten anything. The rest of the afternoon had been spent curled up in bed, reading her almanac in a tired fugue with none of it being retained in her memory.


    Both her and Rian had still been tired even during dinner. She didn''t bring down any of her game boards, not feeling in the mood, and while Rian stood up and said something loud and pointless that had people¡­ not so much cheering as being just loud and affirmative, it didn''t feel like one of Rian''s usual speeches, just empty and false. No one seemed to notice, the dining hall descending once more to the usual murmur of dinner conversation, but the women around Rian clearly did.


    "Are you well, Rian?" Umu asked, looking at him with concern.


    "Just tired, Umu," he said. "And cold." Then he groaned.


    "What is it?" Mikon asked, looking past Umu towards him.


    "I don''t know if I have any firewood," Rian sighed. "I have to go get some after dinner¡­"


    Above his head, Mikon and Riz exchanged a look, and the latter nodded.


    Ignorant of this, Rian shook his head. "Uh¡­ anyway. Um, your Bindership?"


    "What?" she said bluntly, not looking up from her food.


    "Now that we have so much copper¡­ could you perhaps authorize it to be used to make new pots for the kitchens? Since its winter now, having metal pots instead of what we have now will let the kitchen staff cook meals much faster and using less fuel."


    Lori blinked and stared at him. "What?"


    "Now that we have so much copper¡­ could you perhaps authorize it to be used to make new pots for the kitchens? Since its winter now, having metal pots instead of what we have now will let the kitchen staff cook meals much faster and using less fuel," Rian repeated.


    Lori frowned, looking towards the kitchen. "What have they been using, then?"


    "Stone pots," Rian said. "You know, the ones you made on the way here? They take forever to heat up, so sometimes they still need to use the cooking ingots to heat the water."


    Lori stared at him. "Tell me again tomorrow," she said. "I don''t want to deal with this right now." She could already feel her legs aching as she sat down next to the forge, providing heat as the smiths shaped the metal into the pots in question¡­


    Rian sighed. "Fine."


    Next to him, Umu, Riz and Mikon all leaned back and exchanged looks behind him.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    In her room, Lori lay on her bed and stared up at the ceiling. Ah, so comfortable, so nothing at all like a hard plank of wood under her bedroll. All these months, and her bed still felt so comfortable¡­


    She really needed to get rid of those names on the ceiling, it would give her more space for reminders.


    Really, she wouldn''t need all those reminders if she was capable of Mentalism.


    ¡­


    Lori sighed. It was finally winter. Her demesne was sustaining itself and, more importantly, herself, and they were no longer constantly on the edge of starvation, thirst or other forms of resource-deficient impending death. Sure, it was cold, but a lot of time had been spent cutting and curing wood for fires. People could handle that without her.


    Save for, it seemed, authorizing Rian to use their new copper to make cooking pots, there was nothing that actually needed her attention. It was time to do what she''d been putting off.


    It was time to sit down and begin expanding the demesne''s borders.


    It was time to sit down and force herself to try and learn the other forms of magic by herself, with no teacher, no texts, and no assistance.


    ¡­


    Rian was to never know how much she''d been procrastinating. She''d never hear the end of it.

 180 - Most Definitely Not Procrastinating

    After a night of finally getting to sleep in her own bed, Lori woke feeling only the usual degree of wanting to curl back and sleep. As she finished putting on a new, clean set of clothes, she eyed her bedroll and the clothes in her pack, and debated whether she should keep putting off doing her laundry. And whether she could wash her bedroll in her room or if she''d have to carry it out to the laundry area¡­


    "So, as I was saying last night," Rian said brightly, "would you be willing to authorize using some of the copper to make new cooking pots for the kitchens?" He seemed to be feeling much better that morning, sitting up straight with that annoying smile on his face.


    "Find out how many pots are needed and how much copper the smiths will require," Lori said. After all the smelting, removing the slag that wasn''t copper and pouring everything into ingots, they had returned with over three thousand, eight hundred sengrains of copper, but there was no need to be wasteful. They would probably need to sell some of it in Covehold for things they couldn''t make themselves yet.


    "I''ll ask and get you the details by lunch," Rian nodded. "Also, as your lord in charge of telling whether it''s hot or cold, I should tell you it''s gotten a bit colder, so you should probably make it a bit warmer."


    "Noted," Lori said. "Is that all?"


    "In addition to the pots, when we got back people reported there was a strange taste in the bathwater," Rian reported, making Lori sit up straight. "It only became pronounced while we were gone, and seems to be in all the water coming through the pipes."


    "Is anyone sick?" Lori demanded, leaning forward.


    "No, everyone''s fine so far," Rian assured her. "We''re not having a crisis or anything, and no one''s gotten sick but it does have people concerned. The problem doesn''t seem to be coming from the river, since drinking water from the aqueducts is still fine, though that''s been having its own problems, since it''s gotten so cold it''s sometimes slush. It hasn''t gotten to the point where people need to start melting snow, since scooping up slush from the drinking water basins is still easier, but it might become an issue as winter progresses."


    Lori frowned. "I''ll investigate it." The river was fine but the water in the baths had a strange taste? That meant the problem was in between, and the only thing between the two was¡­


    Lori groaned, remembering the exhaust valve she''d put in the water hub for her Dungeon''s and the smithy''s exhaust. "I think I know what the problem is. I''ll fix it."


    Rian nodded. "We might need more storage for more firewood. I''ve been informed that as winter gets colder, people work less, eat less, and just stay in bed as a family to stay warm, only getting up to tend to the fire." He glanced at Riz as he said it. "I''m¡­ not sure if it''ll get that cold, but best to prepare for it. Maybe move some of the firewood down to the unused hallways in the third level so they''re not just out there if a dragon comes."


    "I''ll leave that to you," Lori said.


    Rian nodded, then seemed to remember something. "Ah, you asked me to remind you that you were going to make the laundry area usable again when we got back from River''s Fork." Next to him, Umu, Mikon and Riz all nodded in enthusiastic agreement.


    What was he¡­ oh, right, Lori remembered now. "I will deal with the laundry area issue after I deal with the water."


    It wasn''t procrastinating, it was necessary immediate creation of infrastructure for her demesne!


    After breakfast, and adjusting the bindings of firewisps keeping her Dungeon warm, Lori went out to the water hub. In the middle of the boiling tank, where the water was boiled hot enough to turn into steam while at the same time prevented from turning into steam by another binding, the end of the exhaust vent for the smith and Dungeon''s air protruded. She''d put it there because the temperature of the water would discourage anything¡­ would discourage most things from entering it, much less trying to crawl into the vent to enter the dungeon, but apparently there had been a side effect she hadn''t anticipated.


    Sighing, she made an isolated pool for the vent exhaust, where the water that covered the vent wouldn''t mix with the rest of their water, and moved the output of the vent there, forming a new vent through the bedrock and using the displaced stone to seal the old output vent. The water became black with what Lori recognized was soot as she did this, and Lori hastily blocked off the pipe leading towards the reservoir in the dungeon to prevent the sooty water from being pulled up. She deactivated the binding that fed the boiling pool so that no more would be added in, then drew the heat out of the water in the pool before binding the water and moving it out of the pool to dump all of it into the river.


    Lori waited a few moments, then activated the binding that filled the pool again, tasting the water as she did so. There was no discernible taste, only a pleasant coolness, and it seemed like she''d managed to get all the soot in the pool with the old water. She reactivated all the bindings again and watched the water start to boil. Hopefully that would solve the problem.


    Though¡­ the vent had been adding smoke and waste air all week. How much of the affected water was in the reservoir?


    Lori sighed, rubbing her head. Well, it was only bath water. It should be cycled through soon¡­ though if a dragon were to suddenly appear¡­


    She sighed again.


    Next she went out to the laundry area. The place was deserted, the hot water in the long basins rippling in the breeze, snow melting on the stone and the areas immediately around the basins. Lori didn''t even need to force herself to feel the cold. This area was obviously too cold to be used properly¡ªwait, not completely, several people seemed to have hung shirts to dry on the mostly empty washing lines.


    Lori walked back and forth, wearing her rain coat and her pointed leather rain hat to keep meltwater out of her hair, trying to judge how best to do this. Pillars supported a wooden roof that was meant more for shade than protection from the rain and snow, a mix of warped and cracked planks that had gaps between them for light, and panels made of branches laid out in parallel, secured by ropeweeds, what looked like shavings of bark, and leather scraps. Snow was piled on many of the latter, blocking off the light, and a few had icicles growing down from them


    A part of her just wanted to take water from the snow and the river, turn it into ice and use that to make walls to keep the wind out so she could put in bindings just under the roof panels to warm the area. It was very tempting¡­ no, that would just be another thing she''d need to keep imbued¡ª


    "Hey. Want some company?"


    She blinked and turned to see Rian standing next to her. "No," she said. Why would she want company? "Aren''t you cold?"


    "Very much so," Rian said. "But with so few people outside, if you had some kind of accident and fell into the river, or slipped, fell and broke something, there would be no one to see, so as Lord I''ve decided to keep an eye on you to keep that from happening."


    "And if something happens to you because you''re out here?" Lori asked.


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    He shrugged. "My death wouldn''t make the demesne collapse. I''ll risk it. After all, you already have my potential replacement lined up, so it''s not a problem for you."


    Lori gave him a flat look. "Well then, make yourself useful," she said, pointing towards the laundry. "I need to raise walls and trap in heat so that the laundry area can be usable again. How can you see this being done?"


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    Lori was almost not surprised that Rian actually proved useful. For one, he pointed out the walls didn''t need to be load bearing, only strong enough to not collapse under its own weight and sideways pressure from wind and snow building up against it. She had forgotten about snow building up. While Taniar Demesne was far enough north that they had snow during winter, actual snow on the ground had been rare for her. Between the street sweepers, the mountain that the demesne''s Dungeon had been built inside acting as a wind break for the city, and the fact that she generally stayed indoors, she wasn''t used to thinking of snow in those terms.


    So the walls made from stone previously excavated from the third level were relatively thin compared to her previous constructions, and tilted slightly outward so that it would actually be resting on any snow banks that built up around it, supporting the wall rather than being a load. It had required some stone support buttresses at intervals, but that wasn''t too difficult. Lori had even bound snow and ice and packed them against the outside of the walls to give the process a start.


    A wall on the side of the laundry area facing the river was obvious¡ªwith openings for the used water to flow out through, of course¡ªbut deciding where the entrances into the laundry area should be on the other walls had required discussion. Lori had been all for making the openings in the middle of walls on either end of the laundry¡ªto get in from the baths and to get out to where the drying lines were¡ªbut Rian had pointed out that meant that cold air coming from the river or parallel to it could potentially get into the laundry area and be trapped inside, likely making one side noticeably colder than the other. And while his suggestion of using a curtain of warm air in front of the entrance to actively push any cold air out seemed workable, it would be another binding she''d have to make on top of a binding to warm the air in the first place.


    In the end, Lori made an opening in the middle of the wall opposite the one facing the river, with short, stubby stone walls on either side of it to disrupt the flow of air and minimize the wind that could potentially get inside. Another wall slightly inside the opening forced people entering to go sideways, but also blunted any wind coming directly through the opening. Since there was a natural rise on that side of the laundry area, any such wind would be minimal.


    "It''s already getting pretty warm," Rian commented, unwrapping the sock he had wrapped around his face as Lori held up a hand, trying to judge how much of the wind from outside was getting in. She had to admit, her hand didn''t feel as chilly as she thought it would. "I don''t think you need to add anything more to make this place usable. Just let it get warm overnight from the hot water and by tomorrow people should be able to start washing their clothes here again."


    Slush fell through one of the gaps and landed on his hair with impeccable comic timing. Huh. She thought that sort of thing only happened in novels.


    They both looked up towards the ceiling, and Lori had to step aside to avoid water that was starting to drip. She didn''t know if it was melt water or condensation. "Perhaps not completely usable yet," she said flatly.


    Through her pointed hat, she felt slush drip down onto her head.


    The binding of firewisps she eventually placed just under the patchwork roof prevented heat from passing through to the snow and slush above, greatly minimizing the melt and dripping. Instead the heat was made to flow down the walls and finally be released from the ground in front of the entrance. It wasn''t Rian''s suggested curtain of air, but the added heat there helped mitigate the cold air coming in from outside, even if the heat did make it a little muddy from the snowmelt. She also bound lightwisps to the corners of the laundry area, since between the overcast sky, the snow on the roof and the new walls, it was just a bit too dark to work in comfortably.


    It took her all day to finish building the walls, taking a break for lunch. Rian stayed with her, using a beast-jaw shovel to clear what snow he could from where she was working so that she mostly didn''t need to divert her attention to using waterwisps. The two of them worked in relative silence, save for when Rian intercepted people coming to them and sent them on their way, or when she wanted him to shovel or prioritize one pile of snow over another.


    Compared to the hurried, almost frantic pace of the past few days as she mass-smelted copper ore, this slow, thoughtful construction was positively relaxing.


    "All right, everyone!" Rian announced as people gathered and waited for dinner, standing on his bench while Lori set up her chatrang board across from him. "I''m happy to announce that her Bindership has finished enclosing the laundry area, and by tomorrow morning it should be warm enough to use." There was actually a round of applause and some cheers at that, which was new and quite surprising. "Sadly, the drying lines are not similarly enclosed, but at least you don''t have to try and do your laundry while taking a bath anymore." For some reason this was followed by laughter. "I caution everyone that it''s probably still a bad idea to use the laundry area for baths, as well as the outside showers, but at least we all have more time in the day to take baths now." More laughter for some reason. "That''s all for now. Please be reminded of the new woodcutting assignments, and remember to control your fires so as not to waste wood. If you want to get warm, just come by the Dungeon, there''s plenty of heat."


    Lori paused at that, but¡­ it was true, wasn''t it? Well, she didn''t see any reason to make an issue of it. It wasn''t like people had started sleeping there¡­


    After one more laugh, Rian sat down with a sigh as Lori finished setting up the board. "Ugh, what a day¡­ "


    "What are you complaining about?" Lori said, waiting for Mikon to get back with the food so that she and the other woman could start playing. "I did all the actual work."


    "When has that ever stopped anyone?" Rian said.


    Lori tilted her head in acknowledgement of his point. "I''ll be in my room studying the almanac and conducting research I''ve been putting off," she said instead. "Call me down for meals there tomorrow, all right."


    Rian seemed to perk up at this. "Oh, research? More tests? Anything I can help with?"


    Lori was about to open her mouth to tell him ''no'' when she paused as she realized something. "Yes, actually," she said. "I need you to operate one of the smaller boats for me. I have to set something up at the edge of the demesne. It will be a quick trip. "


    Rian nodded. "I''ll ready Lori''s Boat. It''s been a while since the two of us have ridden on the old girl. After breakfast, or will you need more time?"


    "That will be acceptable," she agreed.


    Rian nodded. "Ah, by the way, I forgot to tell you earlier. The smiths say they won''t need much copper, only about three or four ingots, but they also need tin. They need to line the pots with tin or else it will turn green and food will literally rot through it as its being cooked."


    Lori blinked. "Oh¡­ yes, that sounds familiar." She considered it. "How much tin?"


    "Not a lot," Rian said. "Just enough to coat the inside of the cook pot, and only the inside. It will wear away, but that''s supposed to take years, and by that time we should have more tin, or gold."


    Lori blinked. "Gold?"


    Rian nodded. "Gold is better than tin for this sort of coating, since it looks nicer, conducts heat better, lasts longer and doesn''t corrode, but since you''ve had the gold drawn into wire, they didn''t bring it up, since you might be planning to use it for something."


    Lori titled her head, then nodded. "We still have some dragon scale. Tell them to use gold. Tin is better off used for more useful things. Best to make the useless metal actually good for something. I still have all the wire I need."


    "I''ll tell them, then."


    Riz slid into the bench next to Rian, who greeted her with a smile and an enthusiastic hug that was still a blatant attempt at using her for warmth. The woman endured it with a fond smile. "Rian," she said, "why is there so much firewood in our house now?"


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    After dinner, Lori returned to her room, staring at the new reminder for the laundry area''s heat displacement binding and lightwisp bindings.


    There was no putting it off any more, and until she put down a marker to signify the current edge of her demesne, trying to expand would be¡­ well, not useless, but definitely not verifiable. So, this first for tonight¡­


    "All right, all right, all right¡­" she muttered to herself, opening the almanac to the section on Mentalism flow diagrams and strange reminders. She had absolutely no idea what they were supposed mean, but it looked like a textbook, it made her feel better, and maybe it would inspire something. "Mentalism, Mentalism¡­ what do I remember? Come on, come on¡­ Mentalism uses thoughts, which can only be found inside the body¡­." She frowned. No, wait, that wasn''t right¡­ "¡­can only be naturally found in the body¡­" Did that mean it can be found unnaturally outside it? No, wait, of course, there was thought force, that was outside the body¡­


    Lori muttered to herself into the night, staring unseeing at the open book on her lap.


    Her last thought before she fell asleep was that she should probably write this all down¡­

 181 - Borders

    Lori ate breakfast feeling half asleep. She had a feeling she''d been awake for far longer than had been advisable, but without some kind of clock in her room, she didn''t exactly know how long she''d stayed up beyond her usual bedtime. All she knew was that she''d spent that time dragging up what general knowledge about Mentalism she''d learned in passing, repeating them to herself and trying to use them in any way to begin gaining sufficient understanding of the subject to perhaps figure out how to start. In at least three separate instances she remembered feeling like she''d actually forgotten something she should know about the subject, only to not remember what she didn''t remember, and sat there trying to decide to force herself to try to remember or just move on and try to remember something else.


    It had felt excruciatingly like trying to remember answers to a surprise test when she had comfortably not thought of the material for weeks because she''d thought they wouldn''t be bringing it up until the exams. Only somehow worse because it was all self-inflicted¡­


    "Are you feeling all right?" Rian asked over breakfast that morning as he and Riz came with the food. "Do you feel sick? Should we see if we can still get Shana to heal you?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "I just didn''t get much sleep last night," she said as she took one of the bowls. "I''ll be fine."


    "Shouldn''t you be old enough to know when it''s time to stop reading and go to sleep?" Rian said as he handed out the rest of the bowls to Umu and Mikon, while Riz set down the cups of water and Lori took one.


    "Rian, shut up so I don''t have to kick you," Lori said, and began to eat.


    "Shutting up about it, your Bindership," he said brightly as he sat down. Mikon moved to make space as he did, but Riz sat down on her other side. The pink-haired weaver looked bemused for a moment, then shrugged and patted Riz''s hand before getting started on her own breakfast. "But moving on to other matters, are we still on for this morning?"


    "Yes, yes," Lori said. "Get the boat ready after breakfast, we''re going as soon as possible."


    "How far are we going?" Rian asked.


    "I told you yesterday, weren''t you listening? We''re heading for the edge of the demesne."


    "Do we need to go in any particular direction?" Rian asked. "Because I don''t think you''ve been upriver yet, and neither have I. It''s probably a good idea to see what''s up there for ourselves."


    Lori waved her hand again. "I have no preference, I simply need to get to the edge. Either direction is fine with me."


    "Upriver it is, then," Rian said cheerfully. "Riz, do you mind coming along and bringing a spear? I''d like a second set of eyes to watch for beasts, just in case."


    "Hmm?" Riz said, turning to look at him, then needing to lean forward slightly to look around Mikon. "Oh, sure Rian. Should I get a second person too?"


    Rian looked towards Lori inquisitively, but she just waved her hand again. "If you think we need it. I''ll be operating the tiller, so I can''t really do much while we''re moving."


    Lori simply concentrated on her food as she let Rian take care of matters, trying to shed the ''stayed up late studying'' feeling from her mind.


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    "So¡­ that''s it?" Rian said as she finished setting up the little stone markers. One stood on the edge of her demesne, while the other was three paces outside of it. Both markers were hollow, to maximize the volume of the stones she''d been able to gather, standing on patches of riverbank that she had cleared of snow by the simple expedient of moving that snow into the river. Most would probably have turned it into steam, but that was just asking for the steam to condense almost immediately into snow again.


    Lori nodded. "That''s it," she said. "Tomorrow or the day after, we might need to come back so I can check on them, but we can return now."


    "What, that quickly?" Rian said, surprised. "I thought you were going to do some kind of test?"


    "The test will take time," she said. "Hence returning later."


    Rian looked towards the two markers, standing on open ground surrounded by fallen snow. Above, leafless trees stood, looking dead. Shimmering color marked the difference between trees inside and outside of her demesne, the snow on the ground a blank whiteness free of color. The iridescence on the trees were occasionally patchy, as if they''d been rubbed off. She supposed that was snow falling on them. "All right then¡­ I guess we go home now, before some beast decides to pop up."


    Lori frowned, looking back out onto the stark, even whiteness. It had felt so strange to not be able to see the border between her demesne and the Iridescence until she''d walked through it. "Are there any beasts out there?"


    "They''d have to be," Rian said. "Maybe sleeping in dens or huddled up together to stay warm. Those feathers of theirs are good for that. Why do you think we use it for blanket stuffing? A few of the small ones are probably awake and looking for food, and we might count."


    Distantly, Lori saw movement between trees, glittering rainbow colors moving where they hadn''t been before, then disappeared. Lori shivered, and carefully backed up towards the boat, keeping her eyes on where she had seen the movement. Off to one side, Riz and the one she''d brought along lowered their spears. They must have seen it too. "Let''s get back," Lori said. "I have more work to do."


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    Thankfully, the blacksmiths didn''t need her help to make the copper pots. Copper was soft enough to be worked when it was solid, it just took time and a lot of hammering, and any softening needed from the metal being compacted too much could be done with the forge. After she went to check that the laundry area was working as intended, keeping most of the warmth from the hot water in, Lori retired to her room after a quick detour to the rock pile. The pile of excavated stone had grown so much she''d started a second pile on the other side of the entry way, the better to quickly construct a bulwark in the event of a dragon.


    In her room, she sealed the hallway behind her before she took that stone, softened it, and used a stone blade and some leather to make some stone tablets so that she''d have something to write on for notes. Best to do it now before she forgot¡­


    And she was procrastinating again.


    Still, Lori finished the tablet she was working on before she pushed it aside and rose. She glanced back and forth between her bed and the floor, considering, before shaking her head and concentrating on a particular area of the floor, an area that had nothing on it and nothing nearby. She reached through her connection to her core and bound the earthwisps there. Slowly, carefully so that nothing would fall down, she made the stone flow back in a circle. The stone parted, revealing a space underneath her room.


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    Lori carefully looked over the edge of the hole and sighed in frustration. Then she reached down with her will and moved the stone pillar that she had made to step down into the hidden space so that it was directly under the hole she had made instead of a pace to the side. Walking to her bed, she took her bedroll and tossed it into the hole, and there was a soft sound as it struck the floor at the bottom. Carefully, Lori sat at the edge of the hole and lowered herself down until her foot made contact with the pillar. Still holding on to the edges of the hole she carefully made the stone comprising the pillar flow without turning viscous, compressing down and making it bulge outward to slowly lower her down.


    Once the pillar was low enough that she was about to lose her grip on the edges of the hole, Lori stopped the binding and dismounted from the pillar onto the floor below next to her bedroll. She opened her bedroll and arrange it on the floor folded over on itself for cushioning. Then she sat down and faced her Dungeon''s core.


    Her core hung in the air in the exact, geometric center of her demesne, a glowing solid sphere. Its radiance wasn''t intense, certainly not blinding, but back when her Dungeon had been a small cave that consisted of her core, bathroom and a space for her bed, she had needed to throw her raincoat over it at night for her to be able to sleep. A thin thread of gold still hung from it, melted from the process of claiming that had created her core in the first place.


    The thought occurred to her that she should really get around to wiring her core to be able to provide power to some of her more permanent bindings. She had the wire now, and there were a lot of bindings that ran constantly enough it was worth the time to do it¡­


    Lori shook her head sharply, rejecting the thought. No, no getting distracted¡ªeven by, admittedly, essential infrastructure that needed to be built¡ªshe needed to do this! Last night she hadn''t made any progress on Mentalism beyond making her head ache at trying to remember things from years before that she hadn''t really bothered to learn. Today, at least, she was at least going to work on expanding her demesne. She had put it off for months because it hadn''t felt necessary, then because she didn''t think she had time. After all, how necessary was it? They were barely using more than a fraction of the resources on one side of the river, much less the entire demesne¡­


    But the Golden Sweetwood Company would potentially arrive next year, sending a new group of settlers, settlers with their own wizards, settlers that some of her people could potentially leave her for. After all, they had come under the auspices of the Golden Sweetwood Company themselves, and even though they had abandoned the demesne they had established in favor of hers¡­ what was stopping them from doing so again?


    She could imagine it easily. Her demesne hemmed in at all sides by other demesne, restricting her growth. Their own expansion blocking off gaps between them, until she was trapped completely, unable to grow anywhere but up and down¡­ unless she took the initiative and attacked first, killing the Dungeon Binders around her and claiming the core of at least one such entrapping demesne, allowing her to expand in that direction¡­


    Or she could start now and be too big to contain. Be the one that hemmed in anyone foolish enough to rise near her, stifle their growth herself. Now was the time. Her demesne was stable, secured, provisioned. For the next season, there was little she absolutely had to do, and no reason to do so. The population of her entire demesne could fit into her dungeon; they had protected stockpiles of essential resources. They had a dungeon farm begun, and while the plots they had currently built were too shallow for growing trees, they were just enough for shallow-rooted grain plants, already sprouting and growing. Rian could handle any problems that arose, and even if some crisis did arise, they had enough resources to make time to find a solution.


    Unless by some bizarre turn of events a large group of people suddenly arrived and necessitated her quickly building emergency shelters for them to sleep in as well as the necessary expansion of current infrastructure that would need to follow to cope with the sudden population boom, Lori wasn''t needed by her demesne beyond keeping the currently active bindings imbued. Any work she could do wasn''t something that was desperately needed.


    No more excuses. No more delaying. It was time she did this. She had all she needed, now.


    Basic principles. Anyone who could create a demesne could expand it. The process was the same. All she had to do was¡­ do it.


    Lori sat on her folded bedroll and let herself¡­ relax. Let herself become aware of the wisps around her. All of the wisps around her. The darkwisps under her clothes, in her shadow, in the folds of her bedroll, in the minute cracks in the stone. The lightwisps emanating from the core itself, filling the air, burrowing just slightly under the surface of her skin. Lightningwisps flowing inside her head, down her spine, though her extremities, going back and forth. Everywhere, airwisps, filling every open seemingly empty space. Waterwisps floating as vapor, churning in her mouth as fluid, spread all across her demesne''s surface as a solid. Firewisps floated all around her, inside her, clung to the edges of the voids of wisps that were people. Earthwisps under her, all around her, filling one half of her demesne just as air filled the other half.


    It had been a long time since she''d allowed herself to simply¡­ revel¡­ in this feeling, of everything around her already bearing her affinity, the lightest claim of her will, waiting only for her to bind and imbue. For months, almost every day, she had ignored it, focusing on the bindings she had to form, the problems she had to solve with them. The chores she had to do.


    For a long moment, Lolilyuri just sat there, letting herself feel everything. In the darkness behind her eyes, she let the feeling fill her, of every wisp in her demesne, from the air and light and water vapor at its greatest height to the earth and stone and water in its depths far, far beneath her. She felt her demesne''s boundaries, of dirt covered in snow, felt the river passing through it all, flowing and twisting with the land''s contours. Felt the water in the trees.


    Then she took a deep breath and let the moment pass. She had bindings to form. Problems to solve. Chores to do.


    She drifted on her awareness, focusing on the edges of her demesne. Where it seemed like she simply¡­ stopped. Where her demesne ended, and she knew the Iridescence began. Beyond that point, the wisps weren''t hers.


    So she had to claim them and change that.


    There was power in the core, power that could reach any wisp in her demesne when she needed it, imbue any wisp as she needed it. She let the power course from the core, letting it flow through the land, the water, the air, through the light and darkness, let the magic flow through her to pass through heat and lightning.


    Lori didn''t know how long she sat there, channeling the power in her core, aligning them to all seven wisps, gathering the aligned magic on the edge of her demesne. She kept her eyes closed, trying to minimize distractions as she spread that magic all across her demesne''s border. It was a familiar sensation spread to a scale she hadn''t realized was possible, even if she should have. After all, ever since she had formed the core, the demesne had acted as an extension of her body. It was why she could control the wisps inside it.


    Long before she had become a Dungeon Binder, she had already been controlling wisps outside her body.


    She could feel them, beyond the boundaries of her demesne, touching its surface. Wisps. Unclaimed, but not free.


    All across the surface of the sphere defined by her demesne, her magic bound the wisps just within her borders. Then she reached out and claimed. In all directions at once, wisps of earth, of air, of fire, of water, of light and dark and lightning surged out from her demesne, out into the world of tainted Iridescence. Her wisps and magic met the colors that grew beyond the edge of safety, and she began to lose control. The Iridescence greedily trapped her wisps, drawing the imbuement from them, and Lori knew that beyond her sight, on the edge of her demesne, the colors were growing as they used her very magic as fuel to crystallize.


    She didn''t stop. She drew more power from her core, pushing it out beyond her demesne''s borders as the Iridescence devoured more and more power, greedily trapped more and more of her wisps. And in the moment, as the bane of all life fed on her magic, as it was overwhelmed by more wisps and more power than it could use to grow more of itself, Lori reached through her awareness, through all the wisps she had claimed and bound on the edges of her demesne, through the claim and the binding they were part of to the wisps that the Iridescence had trapped in its structure, still imbued, still hers, still a part of her even as they were being trapped and drained¡­


    Lori reached out¡­ and bound the Iridescence to her will.


    Her wisps became part of the Iridescence and the Iridescence became part of her wisps before melting away. In front of her eyes, her core seemed to ripple.


    Eyes still closed, Lori barely managed keep from hitting her head on the cold stone ground as she collapsed.

 182 - Expansion

    For a time, Lori just lay there, half on and half off her bedroll, the stone cool on her face. Her head¡­ she''d had headaches before. Studying too long, staying up too late, not drinking enough water, trying to keep her patience with her mothers as they kept lecturing her about nonsense¡­


    What she felt was similar to studying, throbbing in part along her neck and in a band above her eyes. She kept her eyes closed, feeling utterly exhausted despite not having moved. It was a familiar feeling, like she''d spent a whole day at a job just imbuing from the start of her shift to the end. She hadn''t been concentrating that long, had she? She tried to gauge the time by how hungry she was but her body refused to cooperate, her stomach silent as if she was in the middle of reading.


    So tired¡­


    She hadn''t felt like this when she had first made her core¡­ but that had happened quickly. This had taken¡­ well, far longer. She''d had to imbue wisps across the whole surface area of the sphere of her demesne after all, to a depth of¡­ well, she didn''t know. There must have been a depth, likely far deeper than ''one wisp wide'', a ludicrous measure that was more an intellectual concept than anything you could use as a distinct unit¡­


    And her mind was wandering again.


    She needed to get up, needed to get back to work, needed¡­ But the stone floor, still cool but only relative to her body, was strangely comfortable now. A part of her knew she''d ache for it afterwards, that blood was being restricted, muscles growing numb, but for now¡­


    Distantly, she heard her name.


    At first, she thought nothing of it. Her mothers were always calling her name for the silliest little things, like asking her to open jars when they were perfectly capable of doing so themselves, or making her ''clean'' and ''organize'' her room when it was already just the way she liked and needed it. If it was really important, they''d actually come to her and bother her face to face¡­


    She heard her name called, louder than before. There was something strange about it. It didn''t sound like one of her mothers, despite the nagging motherly tone¡ª


    Then Lori blinked, and she remembered where she was as she emerged out of her half-sleeping daze, and Rian''s distant voice called her a third time. Shaking her head¡ªugh, headache¡ªshe pushed herself to her feet, limping as one leg seemed to have gone asleep and could only be moved awkward as a burning sensation of pins and needles spread over it. Warily, she bound some airwisps around her mouth, and was relieved when it didn''t make her headache pound harder. "Rian?" she called, the binding amplifying her voice, and she winced as her voice echoed inside the hidden chamber. Ugh, hopefully no one heard it through the wall and suspect this was here¡­


    "Your Bindership?" she heard distantly. She''d sealed the hallway up, so Rian was at best at the top of the stairs, in the hallway leading to her room. "It''s lunch time!"


    Lori opened her mouth to tell him to start without her, and that was when her stomach made its hunger known. She sighed, rubbing her head, still feeling tired. She picked up her bedroll, bundled it up awkwardly, and tossed up towards the hole in the ceiling. It unfurled in midair, fluttered, half landed on the lip of the hole and fell back down. Lori sighed again, and this time her binding caught the noise, and she winced as the sound echoed.


    "I''ll be down," she called out, then dissolved the binding so it wouldn''t catch any more sounds as she walked over to her bedroll and picked it up again. This time she rolled it carefully, securing the cords that had been stitched on it so that it wouldn''t unfurl.


    Then she picked it up and threw it towards the hole in the ceiling so it would land in her room. It didn''t unfurl, moving as a single, solid object. The bedroll bounced off the lip of the hole, fell, caught the pillar of rock on the way down, crumpled to the floor and rolled to her feet.


    Lori stared at it, scowling. Grumbling to herself, she picked the bedroll up a third time, wishing she knew Mentalism already so she could just use her mind to throw the bedroll up through the hole.


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    "Ah, you''re here," Rian said brightly as Lori sat down heavily onto her bench. "Did you decide to have a nap or something? Well, I supposed if you can''t just stay in bed all day, then no one can."


    The notion was both very tempting and mildly repulsive in equal measure. "I was doing magic," Lori snapped at him. She''d eventually managed to climb back up from her core. While her body wasn''t exactly tired, simply awkward from lying down so long in such a position, she had still moved slowly and carefully, her mind filled with the fatigue her body didn''t feel. Even now it weighed on her as she took one of the two bowls of soup remaining with slow care. Even if her hands didn''t feel weak, she felt like they should be.


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    Rian took the other, and sighed in relief it was still warm. "What kind of magic?" he asked, dipping his spoon into and blowing on it experimentally.


    Lori didn''t bother, just putting the spoon straight into her mouth from the bowl. She ate, swallowing three times before answering. "Necessary work for the demesne," she said.


    "Ah?" Rian said, sounding unsure. "Uh, is this necessary work why you''re so tired in the middle of the day?"


    Was it that obvious? "Yes."


    Rian nodded. "Um, are you liable to be like this all day, or would you be rested enough to play some board games over dinner?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow at him. "Why do you care?"


    "I don''t, personally, but a man in my position has certain responsibilities."


    Lori stared at him blankly. "None of that made sense, but if you must know, no, I might be tired later as well."


    Next to Umu, Mikon slumped slightly.


    "I see," Rian nodded. "Uh, will this tiredness last long, or is it likely to end sometime soon?"


    Lori paused and glared at him.


    "Oh, don''t glare at me like that," Rian said. "What if your demesne needs you? Like a dragon happens to show up tonight. Will you be rested by then?"


    Lori continued to glare at him, but acknowledged he had a point. "I''ll hopefully be fine after some rest," she said. "And sleep."


    Rian eyed her and nodded. "Anything you want me to take care of in the mean time?"


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Just keep everyone from killing each other."


    "Noted. Well, while I have you, I should tell you some issues were brought to my attention while you were in your room."


    Of course there were. Why wouldn''t there be? "What is it?" she asked, feeling tired all over again as she ate.


    "Well, first off, there''s the issue of water for the Dungeon Farm," Rian said. "There''s no source of water for it on the third level, meaning it all has to be brought down, and I''ve been getting complaints from the ones in charge of cleaning the dining hall that those passing through with water have been leaving spills. There are also spills on the second level, which are becoming a hazard because no one is cleaning them. Everyone cleans their own areas on the second, but since these spills aren''t their fault¡­" Rian shrugged. "So, we need a more convenient, dedicated source of water for the third level to reduce the spills on the floor, and possibly someone dedicated to cleaning the second level. We should still enforce having everyone clean their own areas, but this way there''s someone to clean the things that the rest of it. And perhaps the third level as well. The farmers and children clean the messes they make, but unless there''s someone dedicated to cleaning, it''s eventually going to be assumed the children have to clean it, and I know you hate that sort of thing."


    "Do it," Lori said. "I''ll leave the arrangements to you."


    "I assume you''re talking about organizing the cleaning," Rian said dryly.


    "Yes, yes, I''ll find a way to get water down there." She really should have done so sooner, she realized. Well, she supposed the water reservoir was long overdue proper permanent infrastructure and improvement¡­ "However, for now, tell them that instead of bringing down water, bring down snow and dump it into the drainage cistern. Tell them to fill¡ª" she made a quick assessment "¡ªhalf of the cistern so that the water will last. I''ll put a binding to melt it down for them to use while I work on the issue of water. And tell them to clean up their own mess in the meantime."


    Rian nodded. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori knew what she was doing. It was tempting, so tempting, to just fall back into the flow of building things for her demesne, putting off the expansion ''until she had more time''. The headache, the tiredness, the difficulty of what she had done this morning¡­ if it was like that for everyone, no wonder all the demesne near Covehold Demesne were so small. And it made Covehold''s size much more impressive. She tried to recall when Covehold had been established, but the knowledge evaded her. Lori knew the continent had been discovered within her lifetime, and she''d already been learning magic when she''d heard of its existence, so¡­ ten years or so? She tried to think of how hard it must have been to grow Covehold to its current size and shuddered inside.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, she went down to the third level to put down the binding. Fortunately, there was some water at the bottom of the drainage cistern, and it was a simple matter to put down a binding of firewisps that would raise the temperature of the water to her body''s temperature. It would be well above melting, but not so extreme that it would be dangerous for anyone that stuck their extremities in. Allowing for individual differences in body temperature, it was as close to harmless as she could make such a binding. Of course, if something hotter that that came into contact with the binding, then it''s temperature would be lowered drastically, but since people would be dumping snow into the cistern that was unlikely¡­ hopefully.


    Once that was done, Lori retired to her room again. She still felt fatigued from that morning''s attempt at expansion, and it occurred to her that she didn''t really know if it had worked or not. There had been a sensation that she had only ever felt when she had created her dungeon''s core¡­ she had seen¡ªthought she had seen?¡ªher core ripple¡­


    Lori considered doing it again, and shuddered at the thought. No, not right now. No matter how easily binding still came to her, no matter how her body felt, she felt tired, felt like she could just curl up and sleep the afternoon away. The thought was¡­ very appealing, actually.


    ¡­


    With a sigh, Lori reluctantly got up and walked out of her room, only just remembering to seal it shut in her wake, as she headed to her Dungeon''s water reservoir to begin planning how to finally improve it. she wouldn''t do any building today, but¡­ well, she needed to see what she was working with, that was all.


    Tired as her mind felt, it was still awake and functioning. That meant it could still think, so it should think about how she''d go about doing this chore in the future.


    She''d rest later tonight, while she slept. Then tomorrow¡­


    Tomorrow she''d go see if her demesne had expanded after all.

 183 - The Rest Of Her Life

    Rian stared at her. "Uh, forgive me if I sound stupid, but didn''t we already go to the edge of the demesne yesterday?"


    "Yes," Lori said. "Now I''m saying we''re doing it again. I need to see the results of my test."


    "What, already? Why didn''t you tell me yesterday, then?" Rian said, then sighed. "Fine, fine, I''ll have your boat¡ª"


    "Lori''s Boat."


    "That''s what I said. Your boat," Rian said, voice and face flat. "I don''t see why you have to talk in the third person."


    For a moment, the two stared at each other.


    "As your jokes go, it''s even less funny than they usually are," she finally said.


    "You''re a very tough audience, your Bindership," Rian said. "Anyway, I''ll have your boat ready after breakfast." He looked to the side. "Riz, are you busy?"


    "I''ll go see who else is free to grab a spear," Riz said.


    "You''re the best," Rian sighed, turning back to Lori and missing the expression on the northerner woman''s face, as well as the expressions of the two weavers. "The new cookpots are progressing well, and it''s not putting too much of a dent into our fuel reserves. Fortunately the forge is only needed for the gold and if the copper gets too hard. In fact, we should have the first pot ready soon. I suggest issuing it to the outside dining hall. It''ll reduce the amount of fuel they need, since it''s also using braziers to keep the inside warm enough to eat in comfortably."


    Lori considered that. "How much fuel is that using? Is it significant?"


    "I think it''s manageable," Rian said. "Even with the outdoor lights, walking up the rise through the snow at night is a bit dangerous, especially for pregnant women. Getting to the outside dining hall is still a bit of a walk, but it''s shorter, so many of them have been eating there, especially for dinner." Rian shrugged. "In hindsight, it''s probably something we should have thought of before it got cold, maybe given it more efficient heating. At least the lights you installed mean they can keep the windows shuttered all the time."


    Lori nodded. "Very well. Inform me when it becomes unmanageable."


    Rian stared at her for a moment. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Anything else?"


    Rian actually seemed to think about it. "If you''d be willing, the Coldhold needs better heating before I want to risk sending people out on it to get salt in this season. And maybe a way to signal them to come back because a dragon is coming? Like, make the lights change color? At the very least, it''ll give them a slightly better chance of surviving if they know to try to head back home."


    Lori titled her head, considering that. "Perhaps tomorrow, if we have time. It''s not all that urgent, after all. Bound ice should insulate the majority of the insides of the Coldhold. In those circumstances, a brazier would be sufficient, if you had a means of expelling the smoke."


    "Yes, but people have to work outside to pour sea water into the evaporator," Rian said. "And using buckets in those circumstances invariably means spilled buckets."


    Lori nodded. "Ah. A point. Though it seems to me the solution is not better heating but better means of getting water into the evaporator." She hums and tilts her head in thought for a moment. "Devise such a solution and get back to me." She continued eating her breakfast.


    Across from her, Rian continued staring for a moment. "Yes, your Bindership," he said eventually. "Um, that''s all I guess. Unless you want to hear about disciplinary issues?"


    "Has anyone been hurting the children?" Lori asked, not looking up.


    "No."


    "Then I don''t care. You seem to have it in hand, keep doing so."


    Really, Rian should know better by now.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori knelt down, examining the stone marker that she had placed on the very edge of her demesne the day before. Cautiously, even though she could see the difference, she carefully extended her bare hand over the marker towards the second marker she had placed yesterday. The tip of her extended hand didn''t start feeling cold until her elbow had gone past the edge-marker. Former edge-marker. The edge of her demesne had moved.


    It had worked. Expanding her demesne had WORKED!


    ¡­


    Er, not that she ever doubted it, of course. But still, it was good she had some kind of baseline to compare this with. She took her staff with its rule marks and measured out the new gap. It¡­ wasn''t very far, admittedly. It was a bit difficult to make out exactly how large the growth was, since trying to measure her forearm and hand using her staff was a bit awkward, but¡­ forty-three, forty-four yustri? Best be a bit on the generous side, call it forty-four. Not quite half a pace.


    It was¡­ well, it was growth. On the face of it, her demesne growing half a pace¡ªnot quite a full pace in overall diameter¡ªwas only a small fraction of its overall size. However, it was also an expansion of tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands¡ªshe couldn''t be bothered to try to do the exact math at the moment¡ªof cubic paces in volume. Measuring the growth in three dimensions instead of just one¡­


    Lori shook her head. She could calculate the numbers on the way back. She bound the earthwisps in her old marker, making the bottom where it touched the ground flow, and moved it to the new edge of her demesne, moving it until its outward face was was once more on the very edge just short of the taint of the Iridescence. The other marker she had made still stood outside her demesne, two and a half paces or so away.


    "All right," she said. "We''re done here. Let''s head back."


    As she sat down on Lori''s Boat, taking care to prop her staff on her shoulder and keep one hand on it, Lori began to run the numbers. They weren''t promising. She generally needed a slate and soapstone if she wanted to do large math, and a counting rack was highly preferred, but the numbers she was looking at were simple enough she didn''t need them. Her demesne had grown by less than half a pace yesterday¡­ half a pace in radius, less than a pace in diameter. Her demesne was¡ªhad been¡ªfour taums wide. Covehold was ten taums wide. If she wanted to reach that size, then at her current rate¡­


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    She''d need to expand the demesne every day by at least the same rate for somewhere between ten and twenty years. Trying to narrow down that number didn''t matter, because the fact that she''d even need to calculate beyond ''ten years'' was¡­ was¡­


    Ten years was just slightly under half of her life. Well over half of the part she could clearly remember. The thought that she''d have to¡­ every day¡­ for longer than that¡­


    To expand her demesne to even just equal Covehold Demesne in size, she would need to commit every day of the rest of her life.


    The rest of her life.


    For a long time, Lori just stared at nothing, not really seeing anything. Her gaze was pointed straight ahead, past Riz and the random person she''d brought along, both sitting with spears at the front of the boat. No particular feature of the landscape really drew her eye, it was just that her head was pointed that way because of how she was sitting.


    The rest of her life.


    While she had gone to school, both the basic education that taught her to read, write and count, and the more advanced education where she had learned to wield her Whispering, it hadn''t really been... voluntary. She could vividly remember her logical, reasoned and¡­ and¡­ and bratty tantrum as she refused to go to basic, her sullen attitude as she had been removed from the familiarity of basic to be placed in a different institution after the standard breathing exercise had revealed her affinity for magic, if not exactly what kind yet. It had taken¡­ time¡­ for her to learn to appreciate her ability, to seize it for the great and wonderful power it was, to embrace and actively seek out what her school was teaching her. It had taken more time to finish this education, to be acknowledged, certified, and registered as a Whisperer, one of the powerful, who shaped the very world with their breath and their soul, binding it to their will.


    The rest of her life.


    And all that time, all that forced education, all that learning she had eventually sought out¡­ was still far less than the time she would need to devote, freely and of her own will for there was no power in her demesne but herself that could force her to do so, to expanding her demesne every day for¡­ for¡­ for¡­


    ¡­the rest of her life.


    Lori closed her eyes at the enormity, the utter finality of that statement.


    All around her, she felt the wisps.


    All of them.


    She just sat there with her eyes closed, feeling the rocking, swaying movements of the boat she rode. She felt the water beneath then, felt what moisture had managed to seep into the immensely dense substance of the boat she was sitting on. The wind in the air, filling a massive half-sphere full of light and heat and little sparks of lightning. The earth beneath it all, another half sphere, pierced through with water and darkness. And inside her, that well of endless power through her connection to her core, as much power as her she needed¡­


    ¡­ until the day she died.


    Lori took a deep breath, feeling the magic fill her lungs, a drop compared to the deep, bottomless well within her. She opened her eyes, and found they were just moving past the cliff face of the hill her Dungeon was built beneath. Her Dungeon, inside of which lay her core, the physical thing that was her connection to her demesne, that thing that would someday connect the core to her¡­. her¡­


    She closed her eyes again, took another deep breath, let it out.


    Lori''s Boat began to slide into place next to the stone dock. She sat, waiting for the boat to settle as Riz leapt onto the dock, taking the rope and tying it around the wooden post on the dock that it was supposed to go around. She waited until the other militia followed suit, until Rian adjusted the water jet and set the stream of water to loop so that the boat would stay in place. Only when Rian was off the boat did she stand, a little uncertainly, and stepped over the side as Rian knelt down to hold the sides of the boat so that it wouldn''t drift away from the dock when she moved.


    "Did you get what you need?" Rian asked as he stood up, letting go of the boat.


    Lori blinked and glanced at him, then nodded. "Yes," she said simply.


    "You¡­ don''t seem happy. Were the results bad?"


    Lori fell silent again, pressing her lips tightly together. Eventually, she said, "Yes. They were substandard. Improvements and efficiencies need to be made and implemented."


    Rian chuckled. "Don''t they always. What do you need me to do?"


    Lori frowned and turned to Rian. "Tomorrow," she said, "I need to go back to the edge of the demesne."


    Rian tilted his head and nodded. "I''ll make arrangements. Will this be a regular thing from now on?"


    "We''ll see."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll make a lot of arrangements then."


    Lori nodded. Then she turned and headed towards her dungeon.


    She had a demesne to expand again, and she needed to do so more efficiently than she did yesterday. Had her biographies and histories mentioned anything about demesne growth rates? She tried to recall, but nothing came to mind, no vague half-remembered numbers of how many taums an ancient demesne grew over how long. That was¡­ somewhat mixed. With nothing to compare her growth to, she had no idea how optimally her demesne was growing. On the other hand, with no other demesne to really compete against, only the possible demesne of the future¡­ any growth at all was only beneficial.


    After all, to be a Dungeon Binder was to be one for life. There was no way to remove a person from the role without killing them, and some well-prepared Binders who dabbled in self-Deadspeaking had managed to go beyond that. If she was going to be like this for all of her days from now on¡­ then what was another thing she had to do for the same length of time because of it? She had to eat for the rest of her life, breathe for the rest of her life, and now expand her demesne for the rest of her life.


    She had chosen this for herself. She would do it. And once she learned to do it better¡­


    Lori walked towards her room, plowing through the snow before she entered the entryway leading into her dungeon. To either side, the illustrations copied from the almanac shone on the walls, and would have provided subtle illumination if she hadn''t bound more lightwisps to the ceiling. Past the illustrations, past the side corridor leading to the smithy, past the open doors that could be barricaded in the event of a dragon. She rounded past the stone wall that separated her core from the rest of the dungeon, and walked up the stairs, moving aside the rock that barred the way to her room and putting it back behind.


    Entering her chambers, she closed the door behind her and sat down heavily on her bed, staring at the floor. Then she took a deep breath and spread out her bedroll. Lori put her pillow at her back so she could lean back against the wall her bed abutted against, and tested if she could comfortably just collapse back against it if she suddenly collapsed. Fairly comfortable, but her pillow was too short to support her back and her head at the same time, else she''d strike her head on the stone, and keeping the pillow pressed to the stone with her head without some kind of back support was¡­ uncomfortable.


    Actually¡­ there was no reason to do this sitting up, was there? Lori tried lying down, then shook her head. No, no, if she lay down, especially with her eyes closed to concentrate and block off sensory distractions, there was a good chance she might accidentally fall asleep in the middle of what she was doing. As long as the wisps she was handling didn''t have a binding that had to be actively controlled to be safe, like having rock roll and flow, there was no danger, but it would be annoying if she fell asleep in the middle of this¡­


    In the end, Lori wedged herself into the corner where two walls met, her bedroll folded under her, her blanket and winter robe stuffed in to the space behind her back for support and her pillow behind her head. She leaned back, letting her legs splay gracelessly in front of her so that they were less likely to go numb from being bent, and closed her eyes.


    For the second time, Lori began expanding her demesne.

 184 - When It Rians It Floods

    Her second time expanding her demesne went much like her first. In fact, it went as exactly like her first as she could manage it. After all, if she was going to experiment with ways to improve on the methods of expanding her demesne, then she had to be sure that consistent methods yielded consistent results.


    Yes, that was absolutely why she did it that way, pushing herself for who-knows-how-long until she was mentally exhausted and collapsed on her bedroll. Perfectly planned to confirm a consistent, repeatable baseline.


    Doing so predictably left her in the strange state of being mentally fatigued and exhausted while still being physically well-rested. She was much better prepared for it this time, knowing what to expect, and so she was able to force herself to move. That seemed to help, at least, her body rousing her mind. Her eyes wanted to droop and felt sleepy, and she splashed water over her face to try to wake herself up.


    By the time Rian came up to call her for lunch, Lori was¡­ well, not exactly back to normal, but at least functional. Mostly functional. Reasonably functional. She forced herself to eat lunch, concentrating on getting food and soup into her mouth, chewing and swallowing. Thankfully, there didn''t seem to be anything of import that needed her attention, and so she was able to just focus on eating her food in peace.


    After eating, Lori very much wanted to go up to her room and sleep the afternoon away. However, she still had work to do, and so forced herself to her feet and trudged towards the reservoir. She moved the stone blocking the way to it, looking at the thing with annoyance. Despite having resigned herself to it being permanent, she couldn''t make herself come to like it. Even with the waist-high stone wall all around it to keep things from falling in, she still half-expected to find something inside the reservoir when she looked, but no, the watery pit was clean as far as she could see. Though admittedly, she wouldn''t be able to visually tell if something had been mixed into it unless it was a corpse, or was something easy to identify like floating excrement.


    Lori walked up to the stone wall around the reservoir and looked inside. The interior of the reservoir was brightly lit by lightwisps studded along its sides, illuminating the churning water that flowed in from the water hub, keeping it constantly filled. Pipes leading to the baths also drew their water from it, though Lori was alarmed to see how high the water was. It was still four paces below the top of the wall, but it was far higher that it had been the last time she''d come here to get water for blasting apart the stone for the Dungeon farm! Lori groaned and hastily reached towards the water hub shed, deactivating the bindings there.


    Idiot! She was an idiot! She''d left water running without checking on it to keep it from overflowing! The bindings she''d placed had kept pushing water into the reservoir even when the water level had risen above the discharge pipe, and if she hadn''t checked up on it, it would have flooded. The only thing keeping her from screaming in frustration at the fact was that she''d actually manage to catch it before it had started flooding her Dungeon.


    She''d¡­ have to devise some kind of system to stop the water from overflowing, wouldn''t she? Either stop the flow of water into the reservoir, or build some sort of runoff pipe that would send water somewhere else once it reached a certain level. Ugh¡­ well, she was here to modify the reservoir to provide water for the Dungeon farm anyway¡­ what was one more thing she needed to make?


    Come to think of it, she needed to be ready to use this reservoir to provide drinking water again in the event of a dragon, so she might as well prepare for that too. That meant pipes and basins to put the water, and more dealing with overflows and runoffs¡­ and people will probably still get water from there even if there wasn''t a dragon passing, wouldn''t they? It would be just like them¡­ though she supposed with winter having arrived, people would naturally want to get in out of the cold. She''d have to add drinking water basins to the bath houses, so it would be closer than her Dungeon¡­


    She didn''t want to. Even though her tiredness didn''t really affect her ability to bind wisps¡­ she didn''t want to. All that work, feeling the way she did¡­ but she''d have to, wouldn''t she? After all, it wasn''t like there was anyone else who could do it. And it was needed. If she didn''t do it, people would keep spilling water inside her Dungeon¡­ and her Dungeon would flood, of course. And the flooding would negatively impact their farm, which was at the Dungeon''s lowest point¡­


    "Lori?"


    It took her a moment to realize someone was calling her. She shook her head, turning around to find Rian standing at the mouth of the passageway leading to the reservoir. "Rian?" she said, sighing. What now? "What now?"


    "Are you all right?" Rian asked. "You seem¡­ not yourself."


    "I''m perfectly well," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively.


    "Probably¡­ but that perfectly well self doesn''t seem to be your usual perfectly well self. Have you been having trouble sleeping lately? I''m your lord, if there''s something you need me to do for you¡ª"


    "Then I''d tell you," Lori snapped.


    Rian nodded. "You''d tell me. I''m more worried about what you wouldn''t tell me. Because you don''t tell me, so I don''t know whether I should worry about it, so I default to worrying." He spread out his hands. "At lunch today and the day before, you looked like you''d been up all night and hadn''t slept. Except I saw you at breakfast, and you were your usual, well-rested perfectly fine self. So you clearly did something between the time we got back from the edge of the demesne and lunch." Rian leaned back against the passageway. "Maybe you should go rest today? You''ve been working hard all year, a rest won''t hurt."


    Lori glared at him. "I thought you said we needed water for the dungeon farm?"


    "We do, but not at the expense of our Dungeon Binder''s health." He gestured towards her. "This isn''t a per-day student work contract where you''ll be summarily dismissed without pay if you don''t do every little thing you''re told to do instantly." He paused. "Can we make so those kinds of practices are illegal here? At least force them to have to pay for time already worked?"


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    "It''s far too early to be considering such things. We don''t even have beads yet." Ugh, they didn''t even have beads! How was she supposed to find time to make those when expanding her demesne already let her so exhausted?


    "So you''re not doing it?"


    "Of course I''m doing it, I hate those people." She''d been working for almost the whole contract, and all of a sudden just because she told the man she wasn''t properly certified to lightning-weld metal suddenly she was dismissed without pay? ARGH! He knew she wasn''t certified, she''d had to specify it in her application, which he''d been holding, the cheap, cheating¡ª


    "Uh, I''m not saying we have them executed for it¡­"


    She glared at him again. "Did I say it would be an execution offence?"


    "It was implied by your clenched fists, enraged eyes, gritted teeth and borderline animalistic growls of fury," Rian said. "How about just flogging? It would make the people they cheat feel so much better, especially if we have them do it."


    Lori thought about flogging the man who had dismissed AND forcing him to pay her for the work she had already done. "I''ll consider it."


    Rian nodded. "So¡­ do you want to tell me why you''ve been so tired in the afternoons?"


    "It''s none of your concern," Lori said.


    "Given that it seems like something I''ll need to schedule around for both your sake and mine, I think it falls under my concern," Rian said. "It seems to occupy your mornings and makes you all but dead on your feet for the afternoons. Not impossible to compensate for, but I need to know about it." He shrugged. "If it goes on for three more days, I was planning to call the doctors to examine you. I''d already set aside a whole bunch of salt to have you treated in River''s Fork if it was necessary. This kind of sudden onset exhaustion isn''t something you used to go through, after all. As lord, it''s my job to keep you alive, and I''m doing it."


    Lori glared a third time, but this time her heart wasn''t in it. Scheduling. Resource allocation. Keeping her alive. Those weren''t concerns she could really dismiss and tell him to stop doing. Keeping her alive was vitally important. The most important thing in the world, really. Sighing with bad grace, she crossed her arms over her chest, not looking at him. "I''m fine. The tiredness is just a side effect of my ongoing efforts to expand the borders of my demesne."


    "Ah. I figured it was something like that when you started measuring this morning." Her eyes snapped up towards him, and he was just finishing nodding, looking self-satisfied. "What? I need to be a little smart to be able to keep up with you, and there aren''t many reasons you''d suddenly be using the measuring stick function of your staff." He nodded again. "Ah, that''s why you want to go out again tomorrow and for the foreseeable future. I assume that marker you put down is currently on the demesne''s current edge, so you''re measuring the demesne''s growth every time you expand? Trying to figure out a baseline so you can optimize the procedure?"


    "¡­ yes," she managed to get out.


    Rian nodded. "Would it be more efficient if I went out and measured the growth in the mornings? That way we don''t have to worry about exposing our very important Dungeon Binder to potentially being attacked by a hungry beast at the border of the demesne, and you don''t have to waste your time doing it."


    "How would you be able to identify the new border?" Lori said. "The snow is hiding the Iridescence."


    "If I go out there now and leave some bowls or something in a line, they should be coated by enough Iridescence tomorrow I can make it out, even if they get buried in more snow," Rian said, waving a hand dismissively. "Or some kind of board propped up with rocks, in case I''m incorrect about where I think the edge is from the marker. I could get one now, leave it out there, go back in the morning, reset for the new border, and keep doing that every day. That way you don''t have to go."


    The suggestion was¡­ very tempting actually, especially for her tired mind. She tried to think of a way to justify why she needed to be the one to do it and found none. After all, she''d only gone because she''d felt she was the only one who could discern the demesne''s border, but Rian''s suggestion had merit.


    "Do you want to keep this secret for some reason?" Rian said. "Because Riz''s friends talked and people know you''ve been doing something up there."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "You deal with it."


    Rian nodded. "So, will you be expanding the demesne again this afternoon¡­?"


    She gave him a withering look. "Do I look like I''m in any condition to do that?" she said.


    "I wouldn''t know, I can''t do magic," Rian shrugged.


    "No, I won''t," Lori said. "I''ll be working on expanding the capabilities of our reservoir. I''ll expand the demesne tomorrow."


    "Of course," Rian nodded. "Well, I''ll leave you to it. I''m sure you have many things you need to plan first before you actually start building, so that your new improvement don''t cause any unintended flooding problems. You probably need to plan the layout, figure out how to prevent flooding from too much water, how to keep the reservoir from running out of water too fast, things like that which have to be planned out before you even start building."


    "¡­obviously," Lori said. "After all, it would be foolish to start building without some kind of plan." Yes, she should probably plan this out first, shouldn''t she? After all, she had to make irrigation water accessible to the third level, add drinking water access to the baths for the winter, and add a means of stopping the water''s flow to prevent the reservoir from overflowing, which was the most important part¡­


    And actually, she should probably have a way to make irrigation water shut off by itself, shouldn''t she? She could easily imagine some lazy idiot leaving the water running, not realizing that the water wouldn''t just drain into the earth if it overflowed, and resulting in the third level flooding¡­


    And she''d need the same for the drinking water access, wouldn''t see? Else the water would just keep overflowing, possibly overwhelming the drains and causing the bath houses to flood¡­


    "Well, I''ll leave you to that then," Rian nodded. "Tell me if you need anything commissioned from the smiths and carpenters, like more spigots and things."


    Spigots would be helpful actually, especially if they could have some sort of mechanism to automatically close them¡­


    "Huh?" Lori shook her head, looking up at Rian. "Ah, yes, yes, I''ll tell you if I need anything. "


    Rian nodded, and turned to leave, then paused. He turned back towards her. "Um, I have to ask, is there any particular reason why you have to expand the demesne in the mornings? Couldn''t you do it in the afternoons instead? That way you could have dinner and just go straight to bed and not force yourself to work when you''re clearly tired."


    Lori stared at him.


    Rian just stared right back.


    "Get to work, Rian," Lori finally said.


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said, turning away obediently. "I''ll see you at dinner, then."


    After Rian left, Lori just stood, there, feeling¡­ tired. Then she shook her head, looked around the reservoir one last time, and headed down the passage back towards her room, barely remembering to close the way behind her to block access to the reservoir. Without anywhere else to work, she headed towards her room to plan out her approach to improving the reservoir.


    Lori sat down on her bed with its nicely stuffed bedroll because there was nowhere else more comfortable to sit, one of the stone tablets she kept prepared in hand, a stylus made from a beast tooth on a stick in the other for writing, and began to plan out how she was going to improve the reservoir.


    She most definitely didn''t fall asleep in the middle of planning. That would be wrong.

 185 - Schedule Optimization

    After her carefully considered and needful afternoon''s mental recuperation session¡ªshe most definitely didn''t fall asleep!¡ªLori was feeling refreshed enough to go down to dinner and eat instead of just trying to force food down her throat in defiance of her lethargy so that she wouldn''t be weak from hunger and become even MORE lethargic. Down that way was a vicious cycle after all.


    "You''re looking better," Rian commented, sniffling. Lori hoped he didn''t come down with anything. Replacing him would be difficult. "Back to eating normally, I see."


    "And you look sick," Lori said, resisting the urge to lean back as they ate. On either side of him, Umu and Mikon both had the closest to looks of disgust she''d ever seen on their faces as Rian wiped his nose with the towel around his shoulders. Lori had to wonder if he had washed that towel this morning, since¡ªno, he probably hadn''t washed it had he? And he was still using it as a scarf AND using it to wipe his nose, oh gross, gross, gross, GROSS!


    "I''m fine," Rian said as Lori tried not to stare at the abominable towel. "It''s perfectly normal for a nose to start dripping uncontrollably when it gets cold. It''s your body telling you it hates you and will be trying to kill you by drowning until the situation improves. It''ll be gone as soon as I warm up."


    Lori stared at Rian, trying to figure out if he actually genuinely believed that, then averted her gaze because even that brought her eyes too close to the towel.


    "Anyway, I''ve talked to the carpenters, who are making a spigot for you," he said. "For the third level. I figured people accidentally leaving it open and flooding the third level was a concern, so I asked the carpenters to make a spigot that would by default be shut if left alone."


    That¡­ would actually be useful. "If there''s time, tell them to make a bulge at the intake end so I can more securely anchor it to the stone wall. If it''s too late, threads of some sort of the surface that will let me anchor it will do."


    "I''ll tell them. Hopefully it won''t be too late."


    It was probably too late. "Also, tell them I need four more," Lori said. "I will be installing spigots for drinking water in the baths for ease of access. The water will have passed through the same purification process as the bath water. I assume the taste is gone?" Why had people been tasting bath water in the first place? "Why had people been tasting bath water in the first place?"


    "Yes, it''s faded. And I think it''s because they were trying to see if they could drink it, because the drinking water in the basin was turning to slush and ice? Water''s still flowing down to the laundry area, but in the basins it''s been kind of freezing solid."


    Lori nodded tiredly. "Well, either way, people will have a new source of drinking water that they can get somewhere warm."


    "And the people, myself included, appreciate it," Rian said, nodding. "Shall I tell people to not go into a particular bath house tomorrow so you''re not bothered?"


    "After the spigots are ready," Lori said. "Tomorrow I''ll continue working on the reservoir. Take the measurement as you said you would."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Umu."


    The weaver jerked up in surprise at being addressed. "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "You have a choice: either teach Rian how to launder that towel around his face so he can do so every day, or do it for him. Either way, that towel is getting cleaned."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    "What''s wrong with my towel?" Rian actually had the gall to say.


    "It''s disgusting," Lori said. Around him, Mikon and Umu both nodded. "How you can endure using that to dry yourself after a bath when you''ve dripped all over it, I have no idea."


    "Well, it''s not like I have anything else to use," Rian said, exasperated. "Would you rather I wipe my nose on my sleeve?"


    "Yes. You don''t have your sleeve wrapped around your face and breathe in through it."


    "You know, when I started this job, you wouldn''t have cared."


    "Yes, well, you''re too useful to lose now, and I refuse to let it be from easily avoidable sickness."


    Really, he should take better care of himself. Didn''t he realize how inconvenient it would be for her if anything happened to him?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, after breakfast and being assured by Umu that she''d brought Rian to the laundry area and taught him how to wash his own towel, Lori got to work. A part of her felt mildly uncomfortable at delaying expanding her demesne, but Rian had a point. If she was going to be useless for the rest of the day after doing so, best to make it the last thing she did before going to sleep. It would allow her to optimize her schedule by still managing to do substantive work before being rendered all but useless when she expanded her demesne.


    The spigot presented to her by the carpenters had been surprisingly large. The thick wooden tube had clearly been shaped in the lathe, and unlike most spigots Lori was familiar with, it had no lever to turn, though it did have a hole on one side of the tube for the water to exit through. As Lori examined it, she realized its function. Inside the tube there was a round plug connected to a rod. When the rod was pushed, the plug would move, allowing water to flow around it and out through the hole of the spigot. When released, the pressure of the water would push the plug back into place, blocking off the water. A wide knob prevented the rod from being depressed too far, as well as giving a convenient surface to press on.


    With the spigot in hand, Lori was able to get to work on providing water to the Dungeon farm. First she restored the bindings she deactivated the day before, allowing water to flow once more into the reservoir, where the water level had lowered noticeably. For her peace of mind, she would definitely need some kind of overflow control system for this if she wanted to leave the water running.


    ¡­


    She''ll have to remember to tell Rian to have the carpenters¡ªand probably the smiths as well, in case this required parts better made by metal work¡ªto make one for her.


    Now, where was she? Ah, yes, water for the third level. It was relatively easy to form a pipe from the reservoir heading down to the Dungeon farm. Despite how deep the pit looked, when she used her awareness of her demesne''s wisps to try to gain a better understanding of where its bottom lay in comparison to the third level, she found that the reservoir''s bottom was, by her estimate, about a pace or two above the floor of the third level. She hadn''t really realized how deep she''d been digging. The floor of the second level was seven paces lower than the floor of the first level, and the floor of the third level was a further ten paces below that, or so she estimated.


    No wonder her legs had started to ache from climbing the stairs.


    Still, that wasn''t a detriment. On the contrary, that depth meant there would be sufficient water pressure to force the water down without her having to make any bindings. All that was needed was for her to form the pipes. That was barely an effort. The process of using earthwisps to compact the stone and seal any gaps while forming a hollow tube through which water could flow was simple. The only real difficulty was the choice of starting the pipe from the reservoir and making its way down to the third level or the inverse. One couldn''t simply make the pipes inside the stone without an opening to somewhere.


    The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Lori decided to start at the third level so she could start with installing the new spigot and making sure the diameter of the pipe she made was about equal to the spigot''s opening. Too small, and there wouldn''t be enough water, too big and the spigot would under a lot of pressure when closed, leading to leaks or even the spigot itself being pushed out of its mounting, which would lead to flooding as the reservoir drained into the third level.


    ¡­


    On second thought, perhaps she should position the pipe''s intake a little higher in the reservoir than she had initially planned, so that even in the event of such a failure, she wouldn''t end up with a flooded farm.


    Even with this modification to her intentions, the installation went off with no problems. Lori positioned the spigot in the wall next to the drainage cistern for the plots¡ªshe had, of course, been planning installing something like this from the very start! Of course. Of course¡­¡ªand made a deep catch basin under it so that the runoff would be collected. One end of the basin was positioned so that the overflow would be deposited into the drainage cistern.


    She''d need to have Rian inform everyone that the spigot was NOT to be used to fill the drainage cistern. It was for drainage, after all. It probably should have been obvious, but unless it was made explicit some idiot would probably feel safe making excuses for whatever stupidity they did.


    That done, she spent the rest of the morning making another boiling station, digging an alcove next to the reservoir, and forming the piping and bindings that would let the water be heated to above the temperature water boiled, yet be prevented for actually turning into steam. That way, the water didn''t become distilled and develop a terrible base taste. A binding of firewisps would draw the heat out of the water as it was moved to another tank, and from there the water flowed to the bathhouses. There was no reason to separate the drinking water and the bath water, after all, and this way she didn''t have to create a new set of piping to carry the drinking water.


    It was the second tank that made the difference, since the water all already boiled in the water hub before being sent to the reservoir. Within that second tank, she bound lightwisps that were meant to shine brightly with unseen light.


    While there were several kinds of unseen light in existence, not all of them had been taught with any relevancy in her classes, and thus she only learned of some of the most basic, the kinds emitted by the sun in addition to visible light. This unseen light was part of why her demesne''s drink water was delivered by aqueduct instead of through pipes, allowing it to be exposed to the sun to cleanse it of dustlife contaminating it. However, with water from the reservoir, she had to provide that light herself with a binding.


    Lori did so carefully, first binding the lightwisps in her eyes to allow her to see the unseen light, then carefully binding the lightwisps she had bound in the second tank to alter the light that shone from them, not looking directly at the lightwisps in question but on the stone around her, watching the reflections. To her eyes, the unseen she sought to produce shone light in an impossible shade of purple. Once she thought she had achieved the correct color, she briefly deactivated the bindings on her eyes. The world in her view flickered for a moment as it returned to being in only the colors she knew.


    Satisfied, Lori immediately deactivated the binding of lightwisps. Exposure to unseen light could be dangerous on a body, causing abnormal and dangerous growths that only Deadspeaking could reliably deal with. Lori sealed the second tank first, and the first tank for that matter, before she activated the binding of lightwisps again, filling the inside of the tank with the invisible radiance. She activated the binding on her eyes once more, this time altering it to emphasize the dark unseen light in favor of the more normally visible light. Her vision darkened, and she carefully walked around the tank she had made, looking for any unseen light leaking out.


    She patched a few spots where the material was apparently too thin, until there was no more to be seen. Only then did Lori breathe a sigh of relief and undo the binding on her eyes, letting her see clearly again. Ugh, she''d forgotten how nerve wracking and eye-watering working with unseen light could be. Human eyes weren''t meant to see unseen light, unless one had allowed a particularly adventurous Deadspeaker to have their way with you, and altering the lightwisps in her eyes to allow her to do so, instead of just amplifying visible light or magnifying it¡­ well, it made her eyes itch. There was also the distinct possibility that unseen light could damage her eyes, which was why she hadn''t looked directly at it and had kept the binding''s intensity low until she had sealed it off from her.


    Lori wondered what time it was. That was the problem with working inside her dungeon, she couldn''t tell what time it was. She walked towards the dining hall, closing the passageway to the reservoir behind her.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Here''s the measurement you wanted, Binder Lori," Rian said as he arrived at her table, handing her his plank of wood. It looked recently washed. "I''ll report the rest to you later, it''s my turn to get the food." He sounded far too cheerful for a man off to do a menial chore as he walked towards where they were handing out the bowls of food with Umu.


    "That man is far too cheerful for someone off to do a menial chore," Lori muttered as she read over the measurement, ignoring the way Mikon was flirting with Riz and the latter seemed to be playing coy and hard to get. She frowned when she saw the plank read ''thirty-nine yustri''. Wait, thirty-nine? That couldn''t be right! Had he measured that properly?


    Grumbling, Lori decided to accept that for now, though she''d have to arrange a more accurate means of measuring the edge to Rian, in case the method he used was flawed. Shaking her head, Lori set the plank aside. She should probably write this all down, so she''d have a daily record. And maybe write down how she approached expanding the demesne that got those results. Ugh, that means either isolating a new stretch of wall to write on or trying to keep track of stone tablets. Maybe she should start writing on the floor, that was free space¡­


    "Rian," Lori said when he finally appeared with the food, taking her bowl of soup from him, "I need a mechanism."


    "You''ll have to be more specific, that covers a lot of things," he said as he made the sure the women had their own bowls first before he started eating. "What do you want it to do in particular? I''m assuming it''s something that you can''t magic for yourself? Or at least, don''t want to magic for yourself?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "I need a mechanism to block the pipe that brings in water from the river once water reaches a certain point so that the reservoir doesn''t overflow."


    "Ah. That does sound serious," Rian nodded, taking a sip of soup. "How much water are we talking about here? Or did you just build it and don''t know because you didn''t feel like that sort of detail was important?"


    "That detail wasn''t important," Lori said. She supped her soup as well. Ah, nice and warm and tasty¡­


    Rian sighed. "Well, no matter how much water it is, it will have to be some kind of float system. And it should be relatively easy for you to adjust the output after the fact, right?"


    "Of course."


    Rian nodded. "Can we use some of the copper and dragon scale, or would you prefer it be made of wood to preserve materials?"


    "I''d prefer it be mostly made from wood, but if there is a component that is best made with metal, do so," Lori said.


    "For the hinges maybe, since it means we can make it smaller," Rian muttered, then shook his head. "I''ll tell them, though it won''t be done as quickly as the spigots. We''ll have to think about this one."


    Lori nodded. "It''s not completely pressing, but given how long we leave the reservoir unsupervised, I want something in place to prevent potential flooding. The alternative is an overflow runoff that that takes the excess water away, and I''d prefer not to add another pipe just for that."


    "Yeah, the more pipes there are, the more likely they''ll get forgotten in the event of a dragon," Rian agreed. "Don''t worry, we''ll get it done. Are you still on going through with your plans for the afternoon?"


    Lori nodded. Given how paltry yesterday''s growth had been, she needed to expand today. "I will begin after lunch." Once her stomach settled and she emptied herself, so that she wouldn''t be distracted in the midst of expansion¡­


    Rian nodded. "Can you¡­ leave the hallway open, even if you lock the door? That way I don''t have to worry that you can''t hear me when I come get you for dinner?


    Lori considered that, then sighed. "Fine," she said. Hearing him had been problematic, especially since she wasn''t sure if he could hear her in turn.


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    When she had finished with lunch, Lori went up to her room and, after writing down how much the demesne had grown the last two times she expanded it, preparing herself, and setting up her corner again so she could nestle there, Lori began expanding her demesne a third time. It was as tiring as it had been before, but this time she could look forward to just going straight to sleep after dinner, which helped her persist in channeling, aligning and gathering wisps on the borders of her demesne for much longer as she sat with her eyes fixed on the palm of her hands, since closing her eyes soon became too tempting as her mind slowly tired.


    After reaching to claim and expand her demesne, Lori barely managed to stay awake during dinner to force food down her throat, eating slowly in what she was able to recognize as a tired haze. When she was finished eating, she almost stumbled getting up and had to be assisted to get up to her room where she collapsed onto her bed and fell asleep.


    When she woke up in the middle of the night, gagging as she almost vomited from the food in her stomach, Rian barely managed to help her sit up and get everything to flow back down to her stomach again. As she fell asleep sitting up with her pillow at her back while she leaned against her corner, a cup of water having cleansed her mouth of the burning acid taste of her stomach, Lori felt there was something strange about her room. Watching Rian sit on the floor on top of his bedroll, back against a wall and reading her almanac, she tried to figure out what it was.


    She was still trying to understand what was so strange as sleep took her again.

 186 - Lori and Rian Wake Up Together

    When Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri woke up from restless dreams, she found that in her sleep she had not become a monstrous, verminous bug. This meant that a dragon hadn''t descended upon her demesne in the night, which was always to be hoped for.


    She did wonder why she had woken slumped upright, as if she had fallen asleep sitting up. Her neck ached from the position, familiar from years of sleeping in crowded dragon shelters where the only space to rest had been up against a wall. Lori straightened up, wincing as the movement brought more aches and pains caused by the position to her attention. Posterior, utterly numb; legs, stiff; back, aching. She had to shuffle a little before she could lean back and stretch, feeling her back popping into position again, then had to stop as the sudden change in position made heat rush to her posterior, and she lay back down on her side while she waited for it to start feeling better.


    Ugh, she bet Deadspeakers didn''t have to deal with this in the morning! They probably used their magic to fix it first thing when they woke up¡­


    Lori lay there, staring sightlessly at the floor, and it took a while for her to realize she was looking at Rian curled up in his bedroll on the floor next to her table, his blanket half off, his hands inserted into the sleeves of his winter robe for some reason. It lay draped over him like he was wearing it backwards. On the table next to him were two wooden cups and a pitcher.


    ¡­


    ¡­what?


    She looked towards her door, which was shut. Had she forgotten to seal it last night? She must have¡­


    There was a thump, and the hem end of Rian''s winter robe leapt up as he started kicking in his sleep. Ah. She''d forgotten that detail about his sleeping habits. She wondered how annoying the three found that habit. Then again, perhaps they all snored, and thus had no grounds to complain¡­


    ¡­


    Wait. Rian wasn''t supposed to be in her room.


    That realization seemed to finally kick her mind properly awake, and she finally pushed herself up. Her posterior still tingled, but that faded as she began to move. Lori looked down at what she was wearing, and found herself still dressed in yesterday''s clothes. The ties of her trousers were still knotted tight, so she probably hadn''t been molested last night¡­


    And honestly, why would Rian need to when he was hardly starved for more voluntary choice?


    Though that still didn''t explain what he was doing in her room.


    Lori forced herself to get up, her body slowly righting itself as she moved, and grabbed her staff from where it stood beside her bed. She leaned on it a little as she made her way next to Rian''s bedroll, where his leg was just starting to kick again. One bare toe nudged against his side. "Rian," she said. Her voice came out a bit too soft, and she tried again louder. "Rian." Much better. "Wake up."


    Rian muttered incoherently, spouting off random syllables.


    She nudged him again. "Rian! Wake up and tell me what you''re doing in my room."


    He turned over, moving away from her nudging toe.


    Lori took a moment to consider if sinking him into the ground would work¡­ no, she was above her core room, there was no ground to sink him into. She settled on poking his back with the butt of her staff. "Rian! Wake up!"


    "Ouch¡­" he muttered, raising his head. Finally! Coherence! "Please stop poking me¡­ also, your room is kinda cold¡­ "


    "What are you doing in my room?" she demanded again.


    "Sleeping," he said, turning over and curling up his legs.


    Lori poked him again. "Why are you sleeping in my room?"


    "Because you insisted on eating dinner and then going straight to bed," he muttered, in the tones of someone who knew sleep was a doomed endeavor but was still going to try anyway. "Worried you''d throw up in your sleep and didn''t want you to choke on your own vomit."


    Oh. Well, that''s¡­


    Lori remembered a burning sensation in her throat.


    "Ah. Well, good. Now get up, I need to take a bath and get changed, and so do you."


    Rian groaned again, but rose to his feet. He moved with a lingering petulance like a child, but he didn''t say anything. Despite it, he quickly rolled up his bedroll and wrapped his blanket around himself. He did hesitate about the cups and pitcher though.


    "Leave those," Lori said, "I''ll bring them down."


    "Right, right," Rian said. "We''ll talk over breakfast then?"


    "Yes, yes," Lori said dismissively as she pointed towards her door. "Go."


    "Going." Rian managed a sleepy smile before letting out a huge yawn, and thus walked straight into the passageway wall opposite her door. "Ow¡­ "


    He shuffled off and Lori shut her door behind him, sealing it with stone to bar the way. Finally alone, she grabbed the pitcher of water and drank, washing the lingering taste of stomach fluids from her mouth. Ugh, she wanted something sweet to chew on¡­


    Sighing, she got ready to face the day.


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    Despite a start that was less than auspicious, Lori''s new modified routine of conducting all necessary work and construction in the morning, and expanding the demesne in the afternoon was moderately successful, in her opinion. As it was the only opinion that mattered, that meant it was successful.


    In the mornings, she worked, reshaping her demesne and installing bindings and infrastructure to improve it. Spigots for drinking water in all the baths, which were warm and close to where people lived. Installing the mechanism that the smiths and carpenters devised to prevent overfilling of the reservoir, a simple nozzle that would be sealed shut when a hollow float was raised up too high by the reservoir''s water level. It was the sort of mechanism Lori would have been hard-pressed to devise with her Whispering alone, and once installed¡ªby turning the reservoir''s water to ice, then laying planks on top of it so she''d have something to stand on without slipping, with the rest of the water removed from the reservoir temporarily¡ªit allowed her to keep her Dungeon''s water running unattended without worry.


    Lori also took this opportunity to finally lay gold wire along her demesne so that certain bindings would be powered by the core directly into perpetuity, or at least until she died of boredom dozens of decades in the future and her core went dormant as a result. It was good that gold could be drawn very fine, because she barely had enough wire to go from her core to the reservoir. She''d ordered Rian to tell the smiths to turn the rest of the gold dragon scale into wire, but even then, she''d probably only be able to directly wire some parts of her Dungeon.


    Still, it meant that by altering the lightwisps that lit the various levels of the dungeon and combining them into a single massive binding, she was able to keep it imbued with a single metal contact point along the wire. That way she didn''t have to run wire down to the other levels to power the bindings of lightwisps there. Adding in the bindings that lit the Dungeon farm had been a bit difficult, since those bindings had been specially tuned to emit light that replicated sunlight, meaning it emitted unseen light as well as visible light, but Lori eventually managed it.


    That was the limit of what she could do. She only had a few yustri of wire left after all that, which she decided to save for when she started experimenting with making bound tools. She would need to wait for the new wire from the smiths before she could wire anything else.


    There were also other chores, such as regulating the temperature and humidity in the Dungeon farm, to keep the plants thriving and to prevent sudden condensing of water that would be dangerous to those walking around. Distributing the excavated stone around her Dungeon''s entryway to better insulate against the cold and to be ready in the event of a dragon. Setting bindings in the kitchen which would do the work of heating the new metal pots, so as to help conserve firewood for people''s houses. Making solidified air for their cold rooms to keep the food preserved. Keeping the lights on outside at night.


    Then, after a morning''s work and a warm lunch, she''d get to work expanding her demesne.


    When Lori had initially done this procedure to create her core and founded her demesne, at the end of the process she''d¡­ well, she''d started laughing manically in triumph. The process, while time-consuming, hadn''t been exhausting, and she had been able to start work on the shelters almost immediately.


    The process of expanding her demesne, she was coming to realize, wasn''t anywhere nearly as pleasant. The first week of expansion left her extremely tired, and according to Rian''s measurements the following morning resulted in the demesne growing an average of forty-two yustri. There was a correlation between how long she was channeling magic and affinity to the wisps at the edges of her demesne before she finally pushed outwards to expand, but¡­ well, she needed to find a way to make the process more efficient.


    The correlation came about after Rian insisted she set some water clocks to count down how much time it took between the moment she started channeling magic and the moment when¡­ well, she claimed more territory beyond her demesne and she collapsed as a result.


    "You need information," Rian told her over breakfast after the fourth time she''d expanded her demesne and he''d noticed the number of yustri had increased. "At the very least, you need to know how long you spent concentrating so you could compare it to how much the edge expanded. You need numbers to compare if you want to know how well you''re improving. As a preliminary goal, we need to make the number of how long you spent concentrating to go down and make the number of how much the demesne grew go up!"


    "Rian, have you been sitting outside my room in the passageway again?" she said. While she had grudgingly agreed she might require assistance getting up to her room now after dinner, depending on how tired she was, she had also told him he was not to sleep in her room again¡­ So he''d started sleeping in the hall outside of it.


    "I was there to make sure you didn''t vomit in your sleep. Tonight, how about you only drink a little soup and we''ll save the rest in a jar that you can eat if you wake up hungry in the middle of the night?"


    That¡­ did sound a bit more palatable¡ªno, back on topic! "Rian, stop sleeping in my hallway! You have a perfectly good house with a perfectly¡­ well, with a bed! Sleep there!" Mikon, Umu and Riz all nodded in agreement.


    She did allow him to set up the water clocks though, putting up a series of shelves on her wall where they could be placed to flow down into each other. Rather than a single one, they used a series of them so that refilling the clocks didn''t become a factor in how long they ran. Then, when it all went to waste because she was too tired to read the time, reluctantly allowed Rian to monitor the clocks and her, provided he didn''t read her almanac as he waited to do so. He sighed and pouted about it but complied, and so they were able to compile more information. Rian wrote on stone tablets she prepared, writing down the time and growth. He seemed to obsess over them, and actually seemed to be far more invested in the growth of the demesne than she was. While she knew full well how important the growth of the demesne was, even she was mildly bewildered at how focused Rian was on watching a number go up!


    After a week of this, Rian all but demanded she explain to him what she was doing.


    "You need to identify what you''re doing so you can break it down into elements that we can individually test the effectiveness of," Rian said as he began preparing the water clocks for that afternoon''s expansion. "That way you can test how much each matters so you can focus on the elements that produce the most results. If you can find the right combination, we might be looking at a growth rate of a pace of expansion for half an afternoon''s work!"


    "You have no idea what you''re talking about," Lori pointed out as she got her corner ready. The corner had been altered to better facilitate sitting with one''s back against it, and with half of her bedroll as padding, it made for a comfortable semi-reclined seat. "You don''t know a thing about Whispering."


    "I know, which is why I''m asking you to tell me!" Rian had practically whined plaintively. "Or at least list them down for yourself and then isolate each variable and test what happens if you modify each of them in isolation! Think about it! A pace in half an afternoon! That means you''ll have more time to rest! You can get more reading done!"


    The idea was very appealing¡­


    "Be quiet, I''m about to begin," Lori said instead, settling into her corner and reclining back.


    Rian sighed and got ready to pull out the wads of wax that sealed the spouts of the water clocks. "Ready," he said.


    Lori closed her eyes and began channeling the power of her core. "Begin."


    She heard the water start to flow, finally ending down in the catch bucket. The sound gave her something to occupy her senses without being distracting as she began expanding her demesne.


    Two days later, a reluctant Lori sat down and began to list what she could identify as the individual variables that were part of the process of expanding her demesne.


    Stupid Rian and his stupid good advice¡­

 187 - Experimenting With Expansion Variables

    "Rian, what is this?"


    ''This'' was a plank on her table, held up at an angle by smooth river rocks like some kind of signboard. Numbers were written on it in char.


    "This is a little something I had made up to help you keep track of your progress and encourage you," Rian said brightly as he prepared the water clocks.


    "My progress?" Lori said warily. There was something very motherly about how he was saying it¡­


    Rian stepped away from the water clocks after stoppering them and went over to the board. "You see, these numbers are, in order," he pointed, "how much the demesne expanded yesterday; the highest amount you''ve caused the demesne to expand to date; the rate of expansion that''s the goal we''re striving for; and the dream of how much we wish we could have per expansion that''s just big enough to be unreasonable but just close enough to be possibly attainable."


    Lori looked at the numbers. Forty-one, forty-seven, one hundred, and one thousand. If they were all in yustri¡­


    She glared at her lord. "What do you mean ''we''? I''m doing all the expanding."


    "I like to think everyone helps with that too by making sure you don''t have to worry about food," Rian said. "And I measure every day, so I''m a little involved. With yesterday, the growth average has gone up to forty two and three-fourths!"


    "Your strange obsession with seeing a number go up is very strange," Lori said.


    "Your lack of enthusiasm of seeing the literal growth your demesne is what''s strange here!"


    Yes, this obsession with rising numbers was doing very strange things with Rian''s attitude. Rates of growth went up and went down. One learned to stop being excited about it. What was important was that her demesne was growing. It had already grown by eleven paces since she''d started expanding it. She considered that good, reasonable progress. Really, a hundred yustri of expansion to the demesne''s radius every day¡­


    ¡­


    All right that would be nice, but she hadn''t even managed to consistently go over forty-four yustri of expansion, a hundred was definitely unreasonable right now.


    Lori shook her head and ignored her lord''s foolishness. "Stop distracting me, I need to devise what changes can be made to the process," she said, sitting at her table and looking down at the list she had written. She ignored the plank with the numbers.


    The process was simple enough, and taught to every Whisperer while at the same time informing them that actually going out beyond the demesne to try it out will result in their death for treason. One used wisps and materials extracted from one''s body, where applicable, so that they would still have an affinity to it. Using that affinity, because it would be difficult to use conducting wires, imbue the wisps with a large amount of magic. Have the wisps and materials make contact with wisps and materials from the area in question one was trying to form a Dungeon at, and from there, with Iridescence. The Iridescence would begin to encapsulate and trap wisps while feeding on the imbuement, but it wouldn''t do so instantly. And in that time was an opening for a Whisperer to claim and bind the Iridescence itself, creating a dungeon''s core and founding a demesne.


    Lori¡­ wasn''t quite sure what she had reached out to claim in the Iridescence when she had made her core and in the recent days that she had used a modification of this procedure to expand her demesne. It wasn''t wisps. The Iridescence didn''t have wisps, didn''t correspond to any wisps. It wasn''t the wisps that were being trapped in the Iridescence, those were still under her control, contested and slowly degrading as that was¡­


    She shook he head. Not important right then. What mattered was that it worked, and as long as she kept doing it, if not the same way then the right way, kept working. However, that didn''t mean that there wasn''t any room for changes.


    In her hands were a list of variables that she had identified with the procedure for expanding her demesne¡­ once she actually bothered to try an identify them. Originally, she had viewed the whole thing as one complete, distinct process, with no possible variable she could reasonably change except for how long she kept doing it¡­ but as she had sat down to consider it¡­ that wasn''t exactly true, was it?


    "Affinity¡­ alignment¡­ distribution¡­ concentration¡­ Iridescence?"


    Lori blinked, then looked over her shoulder in annoyance. "Stop that. It''s annoying."


    Rian shrugged and stepped back. "Is that the list of variables?" he said, sounding excited.


    She turned in her seat and kicked him in the shin.


    "Ow!" he cried, hopping back and starting to rub his abused leg.


    "I mean it," she said. "It''s annoying."


    "All right, I get it, no more reading over your shoulder," Rian said, wincing and hopping as he tried to rub the pain away. "I''m sorry, it won''t happen again."


    Lori nodded curtly, satisfied. "Yes, these are the variables I''ve identified. I''m trying to decide which of them I''d test and how, to see how it affects the expansion rate."


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    "Ah," Rian nodded, putting down his foot, even as he still winced, and limped over to grab his tablet, which he''d left next to the water clocks. "Do you currently have a preference? Whichever you decide, I need to write down exactly what¡ª"


    "Yes Rian, I am aware of how you''re supposed to properly conduct an experiment," Lori snapped, still annoyed, though not enough to kick him again.


    "Right, sorry," Rian said. "I''m just excited. It''s been a while since we''ve done experiments together, and I''ll admit, it''s a nice change of pace from what I usually do."


    Lori frowned. "What is it you do?"


    "Keep you from having to talk to other people, tell you how cold or hot is it, feed you during meals, measure how much the demesne has grown, talk to people to follow up on the things you asked me to ask them to make, resolve disputes between people, keep morale up, keep parents from killing horny teenagers who''ve been euphemisming with their horny teenager¡ª"


    "Euphemisming?" Was that actually a word? "Is that actually a word?"


    "I''m using ''euphemism'' as a verb."


    "I have no idea what a verb is." Some kind of¡­ grammar thing?


    "Probably not considered very important for wizards," Rian said. He held up his plank and the latest charred stick he used to write. Where did he keep finding those? Lori would have thought that every small twig within walking range of the dungeon would have been picked up for firewood by now. "So, what are the differences between the variables? I assume we''re going to be using the past week''s results as the control group. Though as time goes on, you''re probably going to have to do ''control'' expansions every so often to recalibrate for your increasing familiarity with the process."


    That¡­ hadn''t occurred to her, but then, she''d only been doing this for a little over a week. "Of course, of course. But it''s still a bit too early to need to do that."


    Rian nodded. "Yes, I suppose¡­ but we''re getting off topic. What variable will you be experimenting with?" He frowned. "Actually, what variables have you narrowed down, anyway? I didn''t really understand what I was reading."


    "Of course not. You''re not a wizard."


    "That, I am not. But I still need you to explain it to me, otherwise I won''t be able to record it properly."


    "I don''t feel like explaining."


    "All right then. So, which one are you planning to test?"


    Lori sighed. Still, she looked at the list


    Affinity. Alignment. Distribution. Concentration. Iridescence. Wisp preparation. For the moment, she''d narrowed down the variables to those six, mostly because they were the most simple to isolate, even if not all of them could reasonably be tested. Testing if affinity had an effect on demesne expansion, for example would necessitate using wisps from her body, which¡­ well, she doubted that she could extract enough for it to make an appreciable difference.


    Alignment was normally a factor in binding wisps for Whisperers, since the magic one drew in needed to be aligned to the kind of wisp one was going to claim and bind before it could do so, but while she had done it as a step in expanding her demesne, she wasn''t quite sure if it was actually needed, as such. She''d never needed to align her magic when binding wisps inside her demesne¡­ but on the other hand, she also knew firsthand that trying to claim and bind wisps outside your body without first aligning your magic to the wisps just didn''t work. Still, if she could eliminate the need for that stage¡­ well, it would at least make things simpler for her.


    Distribution and concentration were two inter-related factors she had identified. Distribution was where the aligned wisps she would use to expand the demesne were positioned, while concentration was how heavily the aligned wisps were¡­ concentrated. While the concentration naturally rose the longer she gathered wisps on the borders of her demesne, it occurred to her to wonder if it would make a difference if she, instead of spreading and claiming evenly from all across the borders of her demesne at once, instead claimed outwards from a singular point. While the demesne would always be spherical in shape, perhaps concentrating her wisps¡ªand her attention¡ªat a single point would make things easier for her?


    The Iridescence and whether the wisps being claimed had been prepared ahead of time had occurred to her late as she was trying to think of any more variables that could be tested, when she had ruled out other factors as being too circumstantial, like whether the weather had an effect on the expansion rate. But those two¡­


    When she''d been getting her core ready, she had added a container of Iridescence she''d gathered. After all, it was what she had found in her own independent research, as while the official lessons about it in class had been vague, the information she''d been able to pull together from several different biographies, books on historical Whispering, and older textbooks that had been removed from the syllabus but were still in the library specified a seed amount was necessary. But there was Iridescence everywhere, wasn''t there? Her sources couldn''t have known they''d been washing the cave they''d been expanding so it could be safely excavated. Yet different sources that she''d read had still specified the inclusion of an amount of Iridescence, even if they didn''t all agree on the amount. Shouldn''t the text have simply assumed that Iridescence would be present?


    And of course, there was preparing the wisps.


    Lori hadn''t founded her demesne right away. They had spent days preparing the cave, using her Whispering to soften the stone so that it could be more easily removed with the tools they had. At the same time, she had spent that time building a waterbreak around their encampment as a deterrent against beasts, which had involved claiming, binding and regularly imbuing the water she had poured into it. She had also performed other bindings in the area, mostly on earthwisps, as well as hunting beasts for food with narrow cutting streams of waterwisps. While that had clearly had some sort of beneficial effect in defining the area that would later become her demesne, would outward expansion also benefit from a similar effect with similar preparation? Or would the time preparing be better spent in actual expansion?


    She didn''t know. It would need to be tested.


    Isolate each variable. Test what happens if you modify each. Record the results. Apply the acquired data¡ª


    "Lori? Lori?"


    Lori blinked, looking up from her list. "What?" she snapped.


    Rian pointed at the waterclocks. "While those aren''t actually running yet, you are kind of running out of time if you still want to expand this afternoon."


    Oh. Right.


    Lori shook her head, then glared down at her list one last time. Then she raised her hand and, in the fine tradition of all students trying to find the right answer among several options when they didn''t actually have any idea which one it was and no preference, closed her eyes and poked her finger down at random. She opened her eyes, and, since she''d landed between two options, picked the one her finger was physically closest to. "Rian, take notes," she said. "I will be testing whether concentration is a factor in the demesne''s expansion."


    Rian nodded, writing it down. "Understood." There was a pause. "Can you define what you mean by ''concentration''? Are you talking about how hard you concentrate on the task or something else? Because we''re going to need a clear definition of terms, otherwise this record is going to be extremely vague and unhelpful to future generations otherwise."


    Lori sighed. "Just write it down, Rian."


    "Fine, fine. But you''re going to have to explain this later!"

 188 - And Bloody War Followed

    After her experiment, Lori didn''t feel any worse off than she usually did after expanding her demesne, which¡­ wasn''t bad, but neither was it good. Purely from the perspective of efficiency, it meant altering the concentration didn''t affect the difficulty of the expansion process, but that wouldn''t matter if there wasn''t any sort of substantial positive effect on the rate of her demesne''s expansion.


    To her, the demesne was a massive half sphere of earthwisps at the bottom, another half-sphere of airwisps at the top, a layer of waterwisps in between, and a moving stream of waterwisps passing through it. For her experiment, Lori had increased the concentration of wisps in a single area along her demesne''s borders, specifically at the river near where she had placed her markers, where water flowed into her demesne. In a roughly circular area at the mouth of the river, she had positioned a substantially greater amount of wisps than she had anywhere else. She''d chosen the area purely because it was the easiest to identify with her awareness of wisps, at least without placing bindings there to mark it out for her. This way, it would be easy to repeat the procedure to minimize the variable of placement.


    Without actually having her eyes there, she couldn''t really tell how many she placed¡ªwhile she could theoretically count the number of wisps in her control, in practice it was a laughable idea¡ªbut she could still tell by comparison that she had placed at least seven times as many wisps for claiming in that one spot. It was relatively miniscule compared to the full expanse of her demesne, but this was an experiment. Depending on what results Rian brought back after breakfast, she could considering increasing the concentration.


    And she''d have to do this for a week at least so that she''d have a sufficient sample size to draw conclusions from. If she was being strict, she should do this for thirteen days, as she did with the control, without changing the altered variable, to have an equal amount of samples. If she were doing this properly, she''d have far larger sample sizes, at least a red month''s worth, before she started drawing any sort of conclusions. However, she didn''t have the convenience of unlimited time. She had a limited amount of time, and even though it was still early winter, that wouldn''t last. Soon it would be mid-winter, then late winter, then it would be spring and raining again.


    So Lori needed to find the variables that produced usable results. If drastically changing the concentration didn''t offer any substantial difference from how she did it normally in the next four days, she''d need to drop it and move on¡ª


    "So, you said you''d explain?"


    Lori was knocked out of her musings by cheerful voice of her lord. For a man who clearly hated having to wake up in the mornings, he was surprisingly energetic once he was. "Explain what?"


    "Concentration!" he said. "Exactly what sort of concentration did you change? Does it have to do with how hard you''re focusing on what you''re doing? Trying to see if you can be less tired at the end of it, or maybe keep working for longer?" He had his plank with him, poised to write. Next to him, Mikon seemed gladdened that Lori had brought down the chatrang board instead of the sunk board, and was cheerfully putting the pieces into position for a game. Lori didn''t know how someone could enjoy always losing, thought admittedly the weaver was getting better. She was able to take down a lot of Lori''s militia in their games, and Lori needed to be watchful lest she lose any of her wizards that she didn''t intend to lose.


    Lori sighed. "Fine, fine." She didn''t remember promising any such explanation to Rian, but on the other hand, the full hypothesis needed to be recorded. And perhaps he had some ideas she could try. Quickly and concisely, she exposited to him the variables she identified, and what she believed to be the possible effects of increasing concentration¡ªboth of wisps and her attention¡ªon a singular point. With more wisps gathered, could she perhaps claim more and thereby expand the demesne more?


    "I suspect," Lori said as Rian wrote while Riz and Umu arrived with food and water, "that while my demesne might expand more at that point, any gains will be flattened and averaged across the whole of the demesne''s borders." Mikon made to move aside so one of them could sit down next to Rian, but Riz just sat down on Mikon''s other side. The weaver gave her a bright smile and a quick peck on the cheek,


    "So¡­ the demesne''s borders are elastic?" Rian said, tilting his head thoughtfully.


    "Of course. We have an abundance of historical evidence of the borders of demesnes warping and flattening when pressed against another demesne. Bloody war would usually follow, of course, but sometimes the demesne and Dungeon Binders involved would briefly continue expanding their demesnes against each other. It''s been recorded that in such instances, the borders of demesne would flatten like two round bladders pressing against each other. In some truly rare instances, one demesne''s size remained stagnant while its neighbor continued to grow. To continue the allegory of bladders, it acted like a finger pushing the bladder inward. When the lesser demesne tried to expand, it wasn''t able to push back the greater demesne''s borders, and the lesser demesne was only able to expand directly away from the greater, all the while hemmed in by the greater demesne''s continued expansion."


    "And then bloody war followed?" Rian said dryly.


    "And then bloody war followed. Though such incidents are, as I said, truly rare. It''s not considered desirable for one demesne to enfold another demesne so completely before the two join in conflict for each other''s core."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "Why? I''d have thought it would assure the enfolding one a tactical advantage. It gives them more directions to attack from, wouldn''t it?"


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    "The lesser demesne would be equally capable of raising defensive fortifications to defend against such," Lori said as she reached out and picked a bowl of food and a cup. "No, it is undesirable because if one demesne were sufficiently larger than the other, when the Dungeon Binder of the lesser demesne fell, the greater demesne would expand and in so doing destroy the lesser core."


    Rian paused. "That''s a thing that happens?"


    Lori nodded. "It''s rare and undesirable, hence why demesne tend not to continue expanding their demesne in that manner. Even if the greater demesne would technically be subsuming the territory of the lesser demesne, having multiple cores is desirable because it means multiple points of growth. It makes for more efficient expansion."


    "That part I understand, but¡­ so, a demesne expanding over a dungeon''s core¡­ destroys the core?"


    "Expanding over an unclaimed core, yes," Lori confirmed. She''d never really questioned why when she read about it, but now that she had a core of her own¡­ well, it made sense, didn''t it? "Why do you think all those nonsense, stupid stories about random nobodies finding cores and accidentally claiming them happen outside a demesne, deep in the Iridescence? An unclaimed core can''t exist in the bounds of another demesne. It would cease to be."


    "Huh. You learn something new every day," Rian said thoughtfully. "But back to what you were telling me¡ª"


    "Eat," Lori said, pointing.


    Rian stared. "What?"


    "Eat breakfast, Rian," Lori repeated as she moved one of her militia on the chatrang board, determined to get as much enjoyment as she could over breakfast.


    "Oh! Right! Thank you Umu, Riz," Rian said, turning to either side of him to thank the two women and leaning forward to look around Mikon.


    "I''m glad to do this for you, Rian," Umu said, leaning against him briefly.


    Riz, for her part, just reached around Mikon and patted him on the shoulder. "Eat up, you''ll need the warmth for when we go out to the edge later."


    Rian sighed. "So cold¡­" he muttered.


    There was relative silence for a moment as they ate, Lori and Mikon playing chatrang as they did so. She really had to get around to challenging Rian to a game soon¡­


    Around them, the dining hall seemed louder than usual as people talked, played their own board games, and ate. Thankfully no one seemed to be arguing. She supposed people were managing to keep themselves constructively occupied instead of stewing in their own (idiotic) thoughts and getting into trouble as a result¡­


    "All right," Rian eventually said, setting aside his spoon for a moment and picking up his plank again. "So, you decided to concentrate your efforts at a single spot. Do you have any idea how far out you were able to reach by concentrating there? If we assume that your reach in previous efforts corresponded to the amount that the demesne expanded, how much farther were you able to reach out by concentrating on that spot? Could you tell?"


    Lori frowned, but¡­ "No," she said. "I can''t give an exact measure. I know I reached out farther in that spot, but how much that is, I cannot quantify."


    Rian nodded, writing something on his plank. He frowned, cupped his hand around something on the plank and blew lightly. "All right. Not exactly the kind of hard data we''d want, but we can do better next time. It might not amount to much but that just means we need to reach farther out."


    "''We''?"


    "Sorry, ''you''." Rian picked up his bowl with his left hand and raised it to his lips, sipping directly from the thing. Lori thought it was a bit early for that, but he was clearly trying to eat and work at the same time. "What would happen if you tried to expand from only one spot? Just keeping pushing out at one point and simply have the rest of the demesne catch up? It''s probably a lot easier to concentrate on a distinct point than it is to try and push outwards in all directions at once. Though I don''t know how far out over how large a point you''d need to be able to equal our current expansion."


    Lori had considered that. "I had considered that," she said. "However, I decided that retaining the assured expansion of the demesne was more important. The current methodology works. Experimenting with other variables must not come at its expense. While altering them might lead to producing a superior method of expansion¡­ it also might not. If we dedicate our time to only experiments, that will be time the demesne is not properly growing at the optimum rate it currently can. "


    Rian frowned, considering that as Lori turned and countered Mikon''s Whisperer with her Mentalist. It was a calculated risk, since Mikon might attack with her Horotract, but there were some militia in the way, and Mikon sometimes forgot her Horotract didn''t need to go through the occupied spaces.


    Eventually Rian nodded. "All right¡­ I suppose that''s the priority. Still, we might not get any discernible results like this."


    "So I suspect," Lori said. "However, that means that any variable sufficiently capable of affecting the growth rate would also be more obvious."


    "Somehow I doubt the world contains such a convenient solution," Rian said dryly, and Lori had to agree. "However, I think trying to test this variable to the extreme in isolation would at least reveal a less taxing method."


    "If expanding a demesne quickly were easy," Lori said, equally dryly, "the demesnes around Covehold would have managed to grow much greater."


    "True¡­ but that implies you did something significantly different from what they did, to have our demesne come out so large," Rian mused. "It''s not like any of them are touching each other, so that isn''t what''s constraining their growth. Though it could be something as simple as all of them being too busy with everyday life to have much time to expand, especially with so much active competition around them for resources like water, wood, agricultural land¡­ "


    "Yes," Lori said flatly. "It''s almost like the dead ones and myself actually put thought into the idea of traveling so far away before setting up a demesne."


    "I never said you didn''t," Rian said quickly. "Though you''d think that at some point someone there would have tried to focus on expansion first to the exclusion of all else."


    "Given how much effort was needed to establish the support infrastructure of this place, anyone so foolishly shortsighted probably starved to death or was killed when they were weak," she pointed out. "Many of them did not have the convenience of having a steady source of fresh water as we do, and given how many people must be using it, the underground water must be drained dry at some points of the year."


    "Not to mention food, shelter, warmth, and trying to get even a local economy started," Rian contemplated. "Even one of those failing would be devastating."


    Lori tried not to think of the fact that for all intents and purposes, her demesne didn''t even HAVE an economy worth mentioning.

 189 - Matters of Marriage

    When Rian got back from the edge of the demesne at about mid-morning, he informed her that her demesne had grown by 44 yustri.


    "That''s barely anything!" he said, glaring at his plank as if it had insulted him as he walked next to her. They were on the third level while she checked the bindings of lightwisps, waterwisps and firewisps that controlled her Dungeon farm''s light, temperature and humidity. It was something she had to do once in a while, to make sure it wasn''t too hot, too cold, too moist or too dry. Theoretically the farm should settle into some ideal equilibrium, but they clearly hadn''t reached that stage yet. "It''s not even statistically significant!"


    It was only the fact that Rian''s ire seemed to be directed at the number itself that kept Lori from being annoyed at his attitude. As it was, she was mostly exasperated. "Rian, it''s a first attempt. At the very least, this is a new sample for a whole new average," Lori pointed out as she deactivated the firewisps around her and let her feel the actual temperature of the level. "Should it continue, it will mean changing this variable has resulted in an improved average by one yustri and twenty-five chiyustri."


    Rian brightened immediately at the implication that his precious number had gone up. "Ah, you''re right! And this also means an improved expansion-to-time ratio!"


    "Yes, yes, the numbers are rising," Lori said, rolling her eyes as she decided the temperature at that spot didn''t need to be adjusted yet. She kept walking between the plots of little seedlings, of vigas and the seeds that had been brought back from Covehold, making sure there weren''t any significantly warm or cold spots she had to adjust. While the farmers were theoretically supposed to report this to Rian so she could deal with it, some mornings she didn''t really have a lot to do, so why not check it herself?


    "I saw that."


    "I did it in front of you, of course you did."


    "Hmph. You realize if I weren''t doing this, you would have to keep track of all the numbers and do the calculations."


    "No, I wouldn''t. I just wouldn''t do them. All I need to know is by how much my demesne is expanding to confirm my efforts are working."


    "You''re making me cry, you really are, you know that?"


    "I''m sure Mikon would be more than happy to give you a lap to cry on."


    That was sufficient to embarrass him enough to make Rian change the subject. "So, there''s a matter I need to bring to your attention that I''ve been putting off."


    Lori turned and gave him a sharp look. "What is it?" she demanded. Was this something that had become an emergency because of his procrastination? "Was this something that became an emergency because of your procrastination?"


    Rian actually looked vaguely offended. "Do you think I''d be spending time on math if we had something that urgent? No, this is just something I''ve set up so that it wouldn''t waste your time. Remember a few months ago when you laid down the procedure for getting married?"


    Ah. She understood. "Ah. I understand. So I suppose Mikon finally asked you to marry her? Or was it Umu?"


    "Neither," Rian said. "And no, before you mention Riz, no one asked me to marry them! No, when I spread the word, I told the people who came to me that I''d like to wait until there were ten marriage requests before bringing it to your attention to keep you from being bothered over the next few days." He shrugged. "To be honest, I thought we''d get ten requests a lot sooner, but some seemed to have rethought the matter during the wait and eventually retracted the request. Or at least succumbed to pressure from their parents. However, before breakfast someone spoke to me in the baths about it, and on the way here I got two requests, so I thought it was about time the matter was brought to you attention."


    Ah. No wonder she hadn''t received any requests. She''d honestly been expecting them to come to her for a long time, had even prepared some wood-backed, stone tablets for them so that there would be a functionally long-lasting record she could issue. She''d water cut them herself to get them just the right thickness. "Tell them I''ll see to them tomorrow after breakfast," Lori said.


    "Is that all I can tell them?" Rian said. "I mean, what should they expect? Will you be interviewing them on their assets for tax purposes? Making up a whole new section of marriage law, like who has custody of the children in the event of a divorce? Telling them the requirements for a divorce in this demesne? Will the people who object to them getting married have the opportunity to air their objections?"


    "Why would people who want to get married want people who object to their getting married have the opportunity to say so?" Lori knew she didn''t want to bother dealing with people, but she understood enough to think that idea was very strange.


    Rian shrugged. "In case they do actually have a point? Like what if one was only marrying the other for their money? I know we''re not exactly in a position for that to be the case¡ª"


    "Yes, as the man who owns a boat you have other people operate for you, you''re technically the richest person in the demesne who''s not me."


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    Rian stopped talking for a moment, a strange look coming over his face. Had he never thought of it that way before? "Uh, anyway, at the very least, they should still be heard. If they''re stupid objections, you''ll be able to call them out as such, but if it''s something with actual merit, then you''ll know so you can consider whether or not it''s grounds to deny the request to be married. I know there''s at least one request that was made because the boy got the girl pregnant and are being pressured by the parents. Such an opportunity might be the only chance they have to keep themselves from getting pressured into marriage against their will."


    Lori stopped walking, staring at him.


    "What?"


    "I thought I made it clear that you are my lord in charge of dealing with people!" Lori said. "Those sound like ''dealing with people'' matters!"


    "Yes, but since you''ll be the one registering them as married, you might need to know pertinent information that qualifies or disqualifies applicants. Also, establishing the laws involved with marriage is solely up to you," Rian said. "Does this automatically mean all future property is jointly owned or not? Does it have any consequences to how much tax they''ll pay eventually? If they get married, what do they need to do to file for divorce? Can they file for divorce? Who gets what if they get divorced? What happens to any children they have?"


    "Rian, why are you already thinking of divorce for people who haven''t even gotten married yet?"


    Rian shrugged. "All you said that to get married in your demesne, there had to be two consenting people who apply to you, and you record it."


    "Yes, exactly. Marriage is merely an agreement made official by the public record."


    "Yes, but what are people agreeing to?"


    "All the romantic nonsense they''re expecting, obviously?"


    "Yes, but what are the legal ramifications of such an agreement? Marriage carries with it the implication of certain legal obligations, which is established by the laws of the demesne where the marriage is recorded, though there''s usually the implicit and unofficial agreement that each demesne will respect marriages performed in other demesnes, even if they''ll impose their own legal standards of marriage on the people in question should the need arise."


    Lori gave her lord a look. "I would have thought you''d say that marriage is about people loving each other."


    "Yes, well, life has compelled me to put more thought into the matter," Rian said, looking aside. "I still think that love, liking each other, the desire to be together, and actively wanting to work out the difficulties living together will entail are the most important parts of marriage, but that''s in ideal situations. Life tends not to be ideal, and while you might not want to have to bother with preemptively mediating in any disagreements by legislating it, what about how this will affect any children that results from this? What if there''s been infidelity, and the parentage of the child is in question? What if the father decides the child isn''t his because of that and neglects them?"


    For a moment, Lori said nothing as, from one of the adjacent tunnels full of tuber planters, the sounds of children playing could be heard while they were supposedly tending to the plants in question. Rian opened his mouth to keep talking but she raised up a hand, and his teeth clicked together as he shut his mouth. Eventually, she nodded her head.


    "All right," she said after some thought. "Tomorrow morning, I will draft some guidelines regarding marriage. It will retroactively apply to all married people in my demesne. The day after that, I will meet with the people requesting to be married, you will explain these laws to them, and they will be registered as married. See that everyone relevant is informed, Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Rian, why are you smiling?"


    "Well, it occurs to me that the first group of people getting married in the demesne is something worth some celebration," Rian said brightly. "So¡­ maybe I should have some of the grain milled into flour so we can have an special celebratory meal for lunch at least? After all, despite the objections, people are generally going to be in a celebratory mood, so perhaps a little something special is in order? It''s also a good time to release some of the honey, so we''d have sweet cakes instead of just bread¡ª"


    "Rian," Lori said, voice completely flat and unamused, "has all this been a setup for a holiday?"


    "Look me in the eye and tell me that you won''t enjoy some bread sweetened with honey to eat after all the work you''ve been putting into expanding the demesne, all the tiredness, all the cold you''ve had to put up with while smelting metal in River''s Fork, and I''ll drop the subject," Rian said.


    "Whether or not I''ll enjoy it is not the point!"


    "What is the point, then?"


    Lori glared at him but found she couldn''t find an answer to that. And¡­ honey. Nice, tasty, sweet green honey¡­


    Why was she arguing against this again?


    "You will use only a small amount of honey," Lori said sternly. "We might still need it for¡ª" No, wait, they''d come back with alchemical antiseptics when they''d come back from Covehold, hadn''t they? "¡ªfor emergency antiseptic. And other emergency things!"


    "We''ll be frugal, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. If he dared be smug about the fact he had essentially won¡­ "Well, I better get to work. Tell people they''ll be getting married in two days, then see if we can risk organizing a hunting party for fresh meat¡­ see if anyone knows a good recipe for honeyed pan bread, since we don''t have an oven yet¡ª"


    "I''ll make an oven," Lori ground out. "Happy?"


    "Binder Lori, you''re the best Dungeon Binder ever, everyone who left for River''s Fork left too soon," Rian said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. It was very hard to tell when he was being sincere or just flattering. "Well? What are you waiting for? Get moving! You still need to watch the waterclocks this afternoon and you have averages to calculate and things! And you still have to get the expansion data in two days."


    "Yes, your Bindership! Going, your Bindership!"


    Rian actually seemed to be skipping as he hurried back to the stairs. Ugh, her lord could be such a child sometimes.


    Shaking her head, Lori turned and hurried to make her rounds so she could get to work on the oven in the kitchen. It would need a new and more direct exhaust vent, since it would need to function with burning wood, as the cooks would need to adjust the heat and they couldn''t do that if she heated it with a binding¡­ and she couldn''t do that because she''d be far too busy¡­


    And then there were the laws she had to make. Rian was right, annoyingly, though she thought he was a overthinking things a bit given the current state of things. Still, it would probably be best if she officially established what she expected of married people in her demesne¡­


    Try as she might though, she kept getting distracted by thoughts of sweet, honeyed bread.

 190 - Theatricality In The Presentation

    Making an oven was relatively simple. The stone used needed to have bubbles squeezed out of it so that no sections suddenly exploded due to trapped gasses expanding, but her awareness of wisps made that simpler for her than it would have been for an ordinary Whisperer. Really, the greatest difficulty was not getting in anyone''s way¡ªor having anyone get in her way¡ªin the kitchen, since she had to build it while people were in the middle of cleaning up and preparing the food for lunch. She had to navigate around them, which was simple enough since the best place to put in the new oven was in its own little section off to the side, thereby expanding the kitchen.


    And while many respected her position enough to not bother her, some of the older women, about her mothers'' age or older, for some reason felt the need to comment on what she was doing, saying the oven was too small, no it''s too low they''ll hurt their back, it should be wider and deeper so they could fit more bread in, are you really going to be marrying people in two days, some of those people are far too young, is that really such a good idea, maybe you shouldn''t¡ª


    At which point someone finally seemed to remember who they were talking to, because the sounds of talking abruptly stopped. Lori studiously didn''t look behind her as there were sounds of a scuffle, focusing on making the oven, which now had a lower section to put in firewood, and an upper section for the actual baking. The stone partition between the two had to be carefully shaped to be load bearing, and she had to poke careful holes to let hot air come up from below. The carpenters would have to make doors for the two halves, and likely in a hurry¡­


    She linked the oven to the exhaust pipe and stepped back, examining the oven for any flaws. Now that it was completed, it seemed a bit too small to make enough bread for the entire demesne, but then, the small bakeries that she had bought warm bread from on the way to school when she was younger couldn''t have had facilities bigger than this, so perhaps it was enough? She''d have prepared to put in firewisps to heat it, but she wasn''t really sure how hot bread needed to be to bake properly, and this way the people cooking could control the heat in the way they were familiar with.


    Lori shrugged and took her excess stone with her as she continued to studiously not look towards where the kitchen staff were now being very quiet. She didn''t want to know. if there was one thing she remembered about all the biographies about Dungeon Binder''s she''d read¡ªbesides the potential danger they were all in from every side¡ªit was that one should never antagonize the people making your food, at least if you couldn''t have them replaced with anyone just as good and trustworthy.


    Lunch was slightly delayed, but when it arrived it seemed to be the same quality it usually was, so whatever it was that Lori had studiously ignored didn¡¯t seem to have been too much of a problem.


    "Rian, have the carpenters make a door for the oven," she said as she ate, waiting for Mikon to make her move. The weaver was a bit distracted, however, glancing sideways at Rian, Umu and Riz every so often. "Something that they can finish before the day after tomorrow. The oven needs something to keep the heat in."


    "I''ll tell them," her lord assured her. Around them, the dining hall was filled with a liveliness and excitement that usually came when a holiday was announced well in advance. Which, considering the food they were preparing, might as well be the case. "The miller has already started on making the flour, and we''ve got plenty of firewood."


    "How is our firewood supply holding?"


    "Pretty good," Rian said. "It''s still not so cold that we can''t go out to gather wood, and the snow''s been manageable, so not much time has to be spent opening paths through the snow. The shovels we currently have aren''t really suited for it, but they''re doing the job. Though¡ª"


    "You want to ask me to make some sort of special shovel, aren''t you?"


    "Please?" Rian begged. "Your bone shovels are lighter than wood, and you can shape them without loss of material, as opposed if the carpenters make it."


    Lori sighed and waved a hand dismissively. "I''ll find the time. Probably not tomorrow, since I have to draft those laws, or the day after. Expansion takes priority. Mikon, make a move already."


    "Oh! S-sorry, your Bindership!" the weaver moved her Deadspeaker, no doubt getting it ready to bring back any militia Lori managed to take out.


    "Anything else, Rian?" Lori said as she moved her Horotract.


    "It''s been bought to my attention that the Um is freezing cold, your Bindership," Rian said.


    Lori blinked. Come to think of it¡­ Huh. She was surprised it had taken this long for the matter to be raised. "I''m surprised it took this long for the matter to be raised."


    "So am I, really," Rian said. "But since snow started to fall, most people have been staying at home when they could and huddling up for warmth when they haven''t been here in the Dungeon or working. After announcing you''d be doing marriages soon, however, apparently some people wanted to¡­ ah, ''celebrate'', and found they couldn''t. In retrospect, I should have realized because the water clocks weren''t in use."


    "Yes, you should have," Riz said flatly. "We''ve stopped watching the place. Anyone who wants to have a tumble in there is welcome to it until spring arrives."


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    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "I''ll get to it eventually. If people have been able to wait this long, then it''s clearly not a priority."


    "Uh¡­" Riz began, before stopping herself and glancing at Rian.


    "What is it Riz?" he prompted.


    "Um, I don''t know how to put this¡­ but in winter, with the whole family in the house to stay warm, everyone under the blankets together¡­" Riz said awkwardly, "men and women still have needs¡­ and sometimes it can''t wait until the little ones are asleep¡­ or sometimes it wakes up the little ones but you can''t actually stop¡­ most just think it''s Tyatya and Tota hugging, until they get older¡­ and at that point they ignore you while you ignore them and pass the time by yourself¡­ and you have to keep it down so the little ones don''t catch on¡­ Ah, but everyone is all covered up and under blankets, of course! It''s too cold not to be¡­"


    Lori stared. Rian stared.


    Rian looked sideways at Umu and Mikon, whose faces said they had absolutely nothing to do with this conversation, their gazes averted and not looking at anything or anyone in particular.


    Lori sighed. Idiots! At least from the sound of it they were being aware and circumspect, but¡­ idiots! "Fine, fine, I''ll put heating in the Um! There, happy?"


    "Thank you!" someone at a different table called out.


    "You''re all still cleaning it if you use it!" Lori shot back, not looking at whoever it was.


    "That''s fair!" someone at another table said.


    "Maybe we should think about expanding the houses come the spring," Rian muttered. "So that there''s more than one bedroom in each house, maybe?"


    Lori sighed and focused on eating her food.


    <hr>


    After lunch, she went up to her room to continue expanding the demesne. The wall next to her bed had a special recess now where she could sit slightly reclined with her bed roll padding her legs and back. She made herself comfortable as Rian finished readying the water clocks.


    "I still have some more things to do to set things up, so I''m going to have to run out," Rian said as Lori put her pillow under her head, reclining and holding it in place. "I''ll be back before you finish so I can record time, though. In the meantime, I''ll just close the door behind me. Do you want me to station someone on the stairs to make sure no one comes up and knifes you while you''re busy? Riz, maybe?"


    She stared at him blankly for a moment, then shook her head. "No, just hurry back. With the door closed, most people will probably assume it''s locked."


    Rian frowned. "Tell you what, why don''t I put your boots in front of the door, so you''ll at least hear it being opened if someone tries.


    Lori rolled her eyes, but nodded. "All right. You do that. But I''m going to start now, so get ready to open the clocks."


    Rian got into position as Lori leaned back, relaxed and concentrated on her awareness of her demesne''s wisps.


    "Begin" she said, closing her eyes as that day''s expansion attempt began, deciding to increase the concentration of wisps in the one spot even further.


    <hr>


    The next day, while waiting for Rian to come back from measuring the demesne''s expansion, Lori went to install heat in the Um. She bound firewisps to the ceilings of each room and the main passageway to radiate heat. The binding itself was hot enough at the source that people were unlikely to try and stick their hand into it, but after what had happened in River''s Fork with the warmth binding she had made there, she wouldn''t be surprised if some idiot tried to touch the source of the heat anyway.


    When she stepped out of the Um, she gave the line of people standing in the snow in pairs and carrying bedrolls and blankets a flat look. Then she sighed and walked away.


    When Rian got back¡ª "Forty-five and a half! It went up!"¡ªLori had him sit down to help her draft what exactly the legal terms of marriage in her demesne would be. Unlike the laws she had written before, of which she had felt were obvious, these laws were¡­ well, she was mostly apathetic to them. Marriage wasn''t something that had ever crossed her mind except in annoyance whenever her parents had brought it up, advising her how to get a girl or a boy and wasting time with them.


    Fortunately, despite his initial protests¡ª"I don''t know a thing about marriage law!"¡ªRian once more proved himself to be useful. While he might not have had any knowledge of the legalities of marriage¡ªor so he claimed¡ªhe apparently had strong opinions about what an ideal marriage should be, and once you removed the parts that were clearly sentimentality, some of them were surprisingly practical.


    "Obviously, in a marriage the participants should be working together to support themselves and their children materially and financially. At the very least, that should be a recognized obligation on both their parts. And it has to be both. One can''t just live off the work of the other and not contribute anything. That''s not a marriage, that''s a parasite. Of course, this doesn''t mean they have to both contribute the same way, but ideally this is something they have to talk about and decide between themselves."


    "¡­ generally, the trend is to give married people a deduction when it comes to taxes¡­ because they''re actively making MORE tax payers. It doesn''t matter if you get a small slice of a pie if the pie is one that keeps getting bigger and bigger. Two people paying full taxes nets overall less revenue than two parents and five children paying slightly reduced taxes¡­ well obviously after a certain age the children have to start paying their own taxes¡­"


    "Look, as much as I want to, I don''t think it''s practical that we make people take a test before they can start having children. They''ll have the children regardless. I understand where you''re coming from, believe me, I love my parents, but there were times¡­best I can suggest is they take a sort of mandatory apprenticeship or something with someone who''s already had children. How to properly hold the baby, how to clean them up, that sort of thing¡­ grandparents are usually inclined to help that way anyway, the amusement of watching someone flail around ignorantly like that only lasts so long¡­"


    Lori wondered with some amusement if these were opinions Rian had held for a long time, or ones he had formed recently due to¡­ being a man in his circumstances.


    Still, at the end of the morning she''d put together a short, functional list of legally binding obligations associated with marriage, as well as included some simple grounds for applying for divorce. They were all general since, as Rian had pointed out, if something actually came up, she''d be the one deciding it directly anyway, and she could make up a law to cover some overly-specific situation after the fact.


    When she was finished, Rian had tentatively asked if he could ''rephrase them to be more presentable and romantic''.


    "After all, if you''re going to be telling them these things at their marriage ceremony, it would probably be nicer if it didn''t read like legal code."


    "It IS legal code."


    "Yes, which is why I want to dress it up and make it look pretty. It''s a ''dealing with people'' matter, trust me!"


    Lori rolled her eyes but left him to it. She supposed that some theatricality in the presentation wouldn''t be amiss.

 191 - Seasonal Hazards

    The day started normally enough for Lori. Get up, wash her face to wake herself all the way, sit down on her bed and go down her list of reminders to imbue everything there¡ªthere was a mark on the water wheel in River''s Fork since it didn''t need to be run at the moment¡ªgo through the list again to make sure she didn''t miss anything, take a bath, contemplate whether her clothes were good for another day or whether she should change¡ªthey were still good¡ªand then head down for breakfast.


    She was halfway down the stairs when she paused and frowned. The dining hall below sounded¡­ strangely quiet, save for the sound of the bindings of airwisps circulating air and wind from outside the Dungeon. There was no din of conversations, no sounds of footsteps, no echoes of sounds running together and bouncing off the walls. In fact, it was it was so quiet her ears started to ring. Lori hesitated, the turned and hurried upstairs to get her staff, her footsteps suddenly sounding strangely loud.


    Armed with her staff, a stone spearhead added to its butt using rock she''d pulled from the walls, Lori cautiously crept down to the first level of her Dungeon, keeping her back to the walls. The dining hall was empty, the bindings of lightwisps shining down on neatly arranged tables and benches that had no occupants. There were no people sitting, talking, playing games or napping. The kitchen was equally devoid of life. The long rows of stoves were bare, the stones where the heat rose up to the pots sealed up with wooden covers to keep the heat of the firewisps in the firebox contained. The new copper pots and the old stone pots had been put away, the taps with water for drinking and cooking closed up. The only sound was air blowing through the dungeon.


    Lori stared. What was going on? She''d never seen her Dungeon like this. Had she woken up too early? Was it still the middle of the night? Frowning, Lori turned and pushed one of the front doors of the Dungeon open, intent on going outside and finding out what time it was.


    As soon as she managed to open a gap in the door, a blast of howling, utter cold blasted through the crack, slamming into her face like a bucket of freezing water. The cold was so intense it actually momentarily overwhelmed the passive warmth of the firewisps around her, and Lori jerked back in surprise, the doors closing shut again.


    Lori stared at the doors for a moment, then looked up to the vent slots in the stone above the door that pulled fresh air into the dungeon. She raised one hand, and felt the freezing cold air blasting through the slots, cold that she could feel even though the warmth around her. It wasn''t comfortably cool, as it usually was, but chilling and uncomfortable.


    She leaned her staff onto the rack next to the door, placed both hands back onto the closed portal and pushed. The doors swung easily once she managed to get it open and give the wind another avenue to go around the door instead of pushing against it. The sound of the wind suddenly rose in intensity as she pushed to door all the way open until it struck the rock behind it. Beyond the door, the narrow stone passage was full of snow almost to the doors, rising up to about chest high at the open mouth of the passage. Cold wind slammed into her face, sending her hair flying and reminding her she needed to borrow scissors to cut it. Her shirt rippled under the onslaught as she forced herself to step forward, crunching over the snow that had spilled into the passageway as she tried to see out into her demesne.


    Lori forced herself through the snow, then realized how stupid that was and bound the waterwisps in them, making the snow flow out of her way and compress into ice on either side of her. Fortunately, the snow at the mouth of the passageway was so packed it didn''t collapse as she approached it, and she was able to bind the whole thing in one piece as her breath fogged the air. She reached out, claiming and binding more and more of the snow, before fusing them all together. Bracing the fused mass against the stone at the mouth of the passageway, she made the whole mass push itself outwards, clearing the entrance.


    Beyond the passageway, a blinding white curtain of snow fell. The Um, the shelter and the baths were just mounds in the snow storm, their outlines barely visible. Past that, the houses where just white shapes with some glowing bindings of lightwisps at the corners. The snow was piled alarmingly high¡­


    For a moment, Lori thought of going back in and getting her raincoat and winter robe. She was actually starting to feel the cold, like a mask growing on her face and climbing up her arms. Then she shook her head, reached out and bound the airwisps around her, binding them with the firewisps that would normally keep her warm and imbuing both, shrouding herself in a sheath of warm air. Water immediately started to condense on her face and arms, and she wiped it off in irritation as she stepped out into the snow, imbuing the warmth around her just enough to last her some time before she focused on the snow.


    It would have been so convenient to just turn all the water into steam, but that would be problematic. The heat from the state change would have to come from somewhere, so as she turned more and more water into steam, the area surrounding the water she had converted would grow colder and colder as the heat was sapped from them by the evaporating liquid. As the temperature was already well below the point water would freeze, there already wasn''t much heat to begin with. She could clear the way but create a path so utterly cold no one could safely pass through. And with the snow still falling, it would only be a temporary measure at best, unless she found a way to keep the snow from falling¡­


    Oh!


    Well, at least building material was plentiful.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It took her a while to realize she could check on whether people were alive by focusing on her awareness of the wisps in the demesne and checking for voids. After all, it would probably be a waste of time trying to get to people who were already dead from cold or asphyxiation or something. Fortunately, when she concentrated, there were many such voids nearby, surrounded by airwisps surrounded by earthwisps surrounded by waterwisps, meaning they were probably inside the houses, so people were still alive and this wasn''t a pointless effort.


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    With all her practice with making pipes, making arches and excavating tunnels in the third level while she was expanding it, binding the snow out in front of her dungeon''s entrance passageway, and compressing it outwards to form a tube of ice through the snow was relatively easy. It helped that they didn''t have to support thousands of sengrains of weight above them. She worked quickly enough that she was able to walk forward as her tunnel through the snow formed in front of her. It was a slowly, almost leisurely walk, but it was a walk.


    If she didn''t have to actively concentrate to shape and form icy walls around her to keep out the rest of the snow, Lori might have gotten impatient at the rate the tunnel formed. As it was, she was just annoyed at how slowly she was working as she tunneled towards the shelter next to the Um, where she could feel several voids of wisps and a large concentration of firewisps what was probably the shelter''s fireplace. It seemed like they''d only lit one and had huddled around it, perhaps to use the other as an air intake.


    Eventually she found herself facing the shelters thick wooden door, which glistened a bit wetly from the lightwisps she''d bound to the top of her head. She tried the latch, sliding it sideways to pull the bolt and pushing the door open. "Is anyone dead in here?" she called out as she stepped inside. The lightwisps inside still glowed brightly, the wooden covers that normally covered them at night when people slept pulled back as the group of people all huddled in front of the fireplace looked up in surprise. They were all covered in their winter robes, blankets and even bedrolls, all sitting together in groups of at least two to share warmth.


    "Y-your Bindership?" someone said.


    "Yes, yes, it''s me," she said, waving a hand dismissively. "Did anyone die?" She looked around, but there were no body-sized lumps pushed to the corners, which was probably a good sign. Belatedly she realized people couldn''t look at her properly with the binding of lightwisps over her head. She decided to keep it there. "No dead, then?"


    Annoyingly, no one answered her questions. Instead, they all started making a din about how ''they were saved'' and ''her Bindership saved us''. Lori rolled her eyes. Ugh, people. Couldn''t they just respond properly to a simple question?


    "Put out that fire and get to the dungeon," she said. "It''s warm there. If you have any tools we can use to dig, bring them, we still need to get to everyone else first¡ªI said put out that fire! Do you want to waste fuel?"


    Sighing, Lori stomped back outside to her tunnel, grimacing to herself. Ugh, obviously she couldn''t delay this anymore.


    Orienting on the stone she had given Rian that had a binding of lightwisps on it, Lori began digging another tunnel straight towards his house. She''d need him to keep people away from her and to direct everyone during this emergency. Ugh, stupid storm! Why couldn''t it have come in the middle of the day, when it was convenient?-! Really, the only thing worse would have been a dragon suddenly appearing!


    Lori froze, but despite what her novels and the narrative convention of theater plays would have her believe, thinking that didn''t somehow immediately make her aware of an approaching dragon. Letting out a sigh of relief, she went back to compacting the snow into ice and tunneling through it, trying to move as fast as possible¡­ just in case.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After a brief detour to grab her staff, seal off her room, and yell at the people in the dungeon to NOT get any food from the cold rooms since they weren''t authorized, Lori was finally able to tunnel to the front of Rian''s house. The doors and shutters were all shut, of course, but there was a void inside and a concentration of firewisps, which probably meant her lord was alive.


    She opened the door and frowned. There was only a small fire in the fireplace, and Rian had dragged his bed dangerously close to it. Like the others, he was wrapped up in his winter robe, blanket and bedroll, facing the fire with his eyes closed.


    "Rian, why is your fire so small?" she demanded.


    The clump of fabric and padding jerked, and Rian''s eyes snapped open. . "L-Lori?" he said weakly through chattering teeth.


    "Yes, I''m here, I''m here," she said. "Get up, it''s warmer in the Dungeon. I need you to take charge of the idiots I just pulled out of the shelter while I try to get everyone else out of their houses."


    He blinked at her, looking uncomprehending for a moment, then shook his head as if trying to clear it. "Right¡­" he muttered. "Right. Emergency¡­ What''s the situation?" By the end of the sentence he almost sounded like his normal self.


    "There''s a snow storm burying the demesne, so I woke up to find breakfast isn''t ready yet," she told him. "I''m hungry, but unfortunately I don''t know where the people who cook live, so I need to get to everyone to find them."


    For a moment, Rian stared at her. "Ah. I see. And you didn''t just grab some meat from the coldrooms and feed yourself because¡­?"


    "I don''t know where they keep the kitchen knives." She certainly wasn''t going to use her own knife to cut up meat like that! She knew what she''d used that knife on!


    Rian nodded, shoulders shaking a little. "Right¡­ right. I''ll get up and join you as soon as I pack up my bedroll. I think it might be safer to sleep in the Dungeon tonight¡­"


    Lori scowled as he confirmed what she feared. "Only for the duration of the storm," she said. "I''m not letting everyone else just live in my Dungeon."


    "I''m sure that''s well understood," Rian said as he hurriedly began folding up his bedroll and blanket.


    "Good," she nodded curtly. She frowned, looking around. "Why are you alone in here?"


    That made Rian pause in his packing as he looked up at her. "Why wouldn''t I be alone? It''s my house and I don''t have any other family around here."


    "Huh. I''d have thought that given how forward you''ve been, you''d have invited the three of them to keep you warm at night."


    Rian gave her a flat look, then went back to folding up his things. "Well, I didn''t. It wouldn''t be appropriate."


    She glanced down. "And the four of you probably wouldn''t fit on the bed, I suppose." The bed she''d used to sleep in was narrow, meant for a single person, or two if they were being disgustingly intimate. Three people would already press it beyond its limits.


    "I''ll have you know that even when they do visit, they always go back home afterwards. In fact, I walk them home to make sure they get there safely. Can we drop the subject now? I thought there was an emergency on." He hefted the bundle containing his bedroll and pillow.


    "Come on, then," Lori said, waving at him to follow her.


    They had a long day ahead of them.

 192 - Fortunately, No One Asphyxiated

    Rian was far too useful. Lori hoped other demesnes only had lords less than a tenth as useful as Rian, because if they were even half as useful, killing their binders would be far too difficult when she finally had to.


    Once he had finally managed to get warm in the dungeon¡ªafter she''d agreed to raise the heat some more¡ªand put on his winter robe and fur wraps properly, Rian got to work, sending people down to the third level to get firewood.


    "All the shovels are in the tool shed," he explained as he laid out the firewood on the table. They were all about a pace long or longer, slim and rounded, with no sharp edges. "So we need new ones. Tunneling through the snow instead of clearing or melting it was a good idea, but from here we have more people we need to get to."


    Lori looked down at the firewood. "And this is for¡­?"


    "Shovels," Rian said. "Shovel handles, specifically. You''d have to make it with stone, but we''re in a hurry, and it''s not like we''re going to keep them for long. It''s a bit too cold to be digging with our bare hands, and we don''t really have any better shaped tools. Also, I''m fairly certain the carpenters will murder us for using their tools improperly."


    Lori nodded. "They would." Most important rule in any profession, never use someone else''s tools without permission. "And I''d let them."


    Rian gave her an indecipherable look. "Anyway¡­" he continued. "We need tools, and then we can split up into teams. First you tunnel us close to the houses close by. Once we''re there, you open a hole outside, and the shovel team will dig through the snow to all the houses close by, while you and I tunnel up to the houses on the rise. The old houses are pretty close together with little alleys between them, so they don''t really need to dig that far, but it would be time consuming for you to do it, so we''ll just throw people at the problem. They should be able to get to all the houses and the hospital. The houses on the rise are farther away, but their doors all face the same way in a line, so once we actually get up there, it''ll be easier to dig them out. Once they''re out, they can help get food ready and dig out the rest."


    Lori frowned, pursing her lips. "How will the diggers deal with the snow that they''ll displace without me?"


    "Ideally, they should pile the snow up to either side to make walls," Rian said, "but if the snow gets too high for that and they actually have to start digging tunnels themselves, we can throw the snow into the cookpots and dump them in the baths. The baths'' drains should take care of it, if they haven''t frozen shut." He frowned. "Wait, no, not the cookpots. Too heavy when full, too small, the kitchen staff will murder us and you''ll let them. A blanket or maybe a bedroll. We can lay it out on the ground and people can drag it by the corners to the baths." He glanced at her. "Uh, they haven''t, right? Would you know?"


    Lori frowned, checking on the demesne''s water systems. The water hub had run dry, since the storm had probably dumped enough snow into the river to freeze the non-moving parts of it, and the water around the hub was sedentary enough to be vulnerable. The reservoir in the dungeon was still full though, and not quite up to capacity. The pipes through the bedrock were all clear, however, and they were already well-imbued from this morning. The minor alteration to the waterwisp bindings that pushed the water through the pipes towards the waste water cistern to keep water from freezing despite how cold it got would consume the imbuement faster, but that was a minor problem overall.


    "The pipes will function as intended," she said as she added more imbuement to the firewisps that heated the water in the baths, also altering the binding there. That was the most logical place to dump the water. "I''m altering the basins in the baths to produce more heat to melt the snow. Keep people from sticking their limbs into the water until I change them back." The firewisps were bound to waterwisps, so only the water should grow warm, but that would still be dangerous for her idiots. "And there''s no need to waste a perfectly good blanket. We should still have some tent canvas somewhere, perhaps in someone''s pack in the shelter. Use those instead."


    Rian nodded, looking relieved. The idiot had been planning to have them use his blanket, hadn''t he? Despite the fact that he seemed to be the person most sensitive to the cold. Idiot. A most useful idiot, but still an idiot. "Right, better idea. That will keep everyone working and out of mischief." He sighed. "I suppose we''ll have to push the marriages back a little. Good thing the flour keeps well." He made a face. "We might have to use that flour to make some quick bread. Easier and faster to make than our normal food, and we''ll need it since no one''s eaten yet."


    "Do it. That''s what emergency supplies are meant for."


    They both went to work, Lori heading down to the third level to get stone for the shovels, and Rian to get everyone organized and in a state to work. Fortunately, the Dungeon''s latrines were clean, and while they didn''t have ready food, they had drinkable water. That would have to be enough for now.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The stone shovel heads weren''t her best work, needing to be actively reinforced by a binding of earthwisps just to be sure they wouldn''t break under the stress of being used as tools, but it was enough. Rian had advised that they be flat and wide, almost like tablets, tapering down to narrow edges since it was just as important to cut through the snow as to dig it out. The shape of it had compelled her to go and get her stone-shaping tool, which was a shaft with a flat board at the end. The tool was added to their list of usable assets.


    Rian had informed the idiots they had on hand of the plan while Lori opened up the Dungeon''s emergency baths so it was ready to use, directing the drainage of the baths towards the Dungeon''s farm''s cistern. She also adjusted the basins in the emergency baths to reduce the amount of water in them, creating an artificial scarcity that would hopefully discourage people from being wasteful with it. Ugh, would she need to create a distillation facility to recover that water and put it back in the reservoir. She might have to, when they had more people, if only to make the water last longer¡­


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    Once someone managed to retrieve some tent canvas from the shelter¡ªpeople had been using them as a simple partition, providing the illusion of rooms and privacy¡ªeveryone was ready to start digging. In addition to shovels and her stone-shaping tool, others were carrying some of the planks Rian used to write notes on. The flat boards weren''t much, but Rian had said they needed every tool they could get, especially once they had more people to help dig. Lori had also laid down a binding to circulate air into the snow tunnels, pulling it in from the passageway to the dungeon. Some people had been left there to keep clear the passageway and the gap over the tunnel clear so they wouldn''t run out of air.


    They started in the middle of the tunnel to Rian''s house. Orienting herself using the bindings of lightwisps on the outsides of the corners of the houses, Lori began to bind and move the snow towards her destination, leading the way at her slow walking pace. The snow just opened up in front of her, flowing up to make walls. Since she wasn''t bothering to make the ice perfectly transparent, it was streaked and full of bubbles, but it was enough to occasionally allow them glimpses at the storm outside.


    Through the ice, the sounds of the storm were muted, but it clearly still raged. The tunnels behind them were already being covered over in snow, and she could feel that the snow ahead of her was now about the height of her sternum, though it was a bit hard to judge accurately given the amount of waterwisps in the air. As she walked, she tried to keep an eye on which way the wind was blowing. Fortunately the direction seemed to be consistent.


    Soon enough, tunnel ahead exposed the corner of a house. "We''re here," she said, turning the tunnel. A little walking soon had them at the house''s front door.


    As Rian knocked on the door to let the people inside know they had arrive, Lori walked a little farther, eventually coming to the gap between the house and the one next to it. As planned, she proceeded to open a hole in the tunnel into the little alley, careful not to turn the snow into ice as she pulled back the tunnel wall. Immediately there was a howling wind and a moderately cool wind on her face. Others without such bindings raised hands to their faces, but grimly stepped out into the snow, tools in hand. Armed with the heavy stone shovels, her stone-shaping tool and Rian''s planks, they quickly began dig through the snow as the door of the house behind them finally opened.


    "L-lord Rian?" she heard someone say as she continued tunneling to the front door of the next house.


    "Good morning," she heard Rian say. "Sorry to get you out of bed like this, but because of the storm we''re moving everyone to the dungeon. Have everyone get their blankets, bedrolls and pillows and head down to the second level, all right? Just bring those, don''t bother with anything else for now. You can get anything else you need later once everyone''s settled in."


    "Y-yes, Lord Rian! Thank you, thank you!"


    "Don''t thank me, Her Bindership did all the hard work. Oh, and can we borrow your house? We''ve got people digging to get to the other houses, but they need someplace to warm up."


    "Y-yes, of course, Lord Rian! A-as soon as I get everyone to the Dungeon, I''ll come and help too."


    A laugh. "Get warmed up first and use the latrine. And maybe get something to drink. You''ll need it."


    Another laugh in return. "Yes, Lord Rian!"


    Lori rolled her eyes as she reached the door of the next house. Reaching up, she thumped her fist on the door. "Open up!" she ordered.


    She waited impatiently, tapping her foot and considering knocking again before the door finally opened, and a man in a winter robe peeked out. "Y-your Bindership?" he said.


    "Is anyone in there dead?" she demanded.


    "N-no, your Bindership! No one''s dead."


    Lori nodded curtly. "Good. Put out the fire so it doesn''t burn the house down, take all your sleeping things and get to the Dungeon where it''s warm. Do it fast."


    She glanced towards where Rian was, but people seemed to be taking their sweet time leaving the first house, so she couldn''t put the binding in it yet. Honestly, didn''t they realize they needed to hurry? Shaking her head, Lori turned and continued tunneling. Only one house more, then she could start going up the rise toward the houses there.


    Hopefully by the time she finished someone would have started cooking breakfast in the kitchen!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once they got to the houses on the rise, the experienced northerners were able to take charge of digging everyone else out. Fortunately, no one had asphyxiated.


    "The gaps in the roof planks and under the eaves are designed to let enough air into the house in case of exactly this sort of situation," Rian explained to her later as they sat at their table. To one side, Umu was wrapped around his arm, while on the other, Riz merely leaned against him, while Mikon leaned against her. All four seemed to be enjoying each other''s warmth. Around them, the dining hall was loud with its usual sounds of life, with perhaps overtones of relief. "Sure, it would be blocked off if the house was completely buried, but that takes a lot of snow, and until then there''s some leeway. If need be, people could climb up and move the planks on the ceiling. They''re made so people could pop them out on the inside in exactly this sort of situation."


    "Ah. How convenient," Lori said.


    "Not convenient. Exactly what it was designed for," Rian corrected. He had a cup in front of him and was drinking small sips every so often, a familiar placebo for curbing one''s hunger. Lori had been doing the same thing. While her lord seemed to be concentrating exclusively on their conversation, Lori kept glancing towards the kitchen were food was hurriedly being cooked. She could distinctly smell bread cooking in their new ovens. The emergency food was being cooked far too slowly! "Though if the snow had piled up higher than the houses, then we''d probably have had cases of people asphyxiating."


    "Most people would have risked opening a window and poking the broom out until they hit wind or daylight," Riz said, Mikon wrapped around her arm as if mirroring Rian. "We''ve had worse up north."


    "Good to know," Rian said, nodding to her. He turned back to Lori. "Still, as the government, we should probably prepare to do something about this now that it''s already happened, maybe have a stash of shovels and carts here in the Dungeon. And maybe make an official plan for what to do in the event of a storm, the way we do for if a dragon arrives. Or in the event of a storm and a dragon arriving at the same time."


    Even Lori shuddered at that idea. "After breakfast," she said.


    "Don''t you mean lunch?"


    "No one''s eaten yet, this meal is breakfast."


    Rian tilted his head slightly and nodded, conceding the point. "I suppose¡­ well, at least we''re in a good position. The baths are still usable, at least, and we have water."


    "Only what''s in the reservoir," Lori corrected. "The intake from the river is frozen."


    "Ah. Well, fortunately, there''s a lot of frozen water falling from the sky right now that''s easy to pick up and move. Would there be any problems with dumping it straight into the reservoir?"


    Lori grimaced. She really didn''t want to just have people going back and forth to the Dungeon''s reservoir, and she liked the idea of people throwing things into it even less, snow or otherwise. "I''ll build an intake they can dump the snow into," she said reluctantly. It only needed to be a temporary thing, something like the evaporator on the Coldhold to keep solids from getting into the reservoir. She could connect it to the pipe from the water hub shed, and place it at the entryway so the snow wouldn''t have to be dragged into the Dungeon¡­ "After breakfast."


    She wasn''t going to be able to expand her demesne at all today, was she?

 193 - Taking A Rest

    After the very late breakfast that some people kept mistakenly referring to as lunch¡ªand the wonderfully warm, chewy, hot, succulent bread that annoyingly had to be rationed and didn''t have any honey on it because it was emergency rations that were for energy instead of a celebratory sweet treat¡ªLori went to build something people could dump snow in to melt for water. She put it in the passageway, near the opening of the tunnel into the snow and right under where snow blew in through the gap above the tunnel''s entrance and beneath the passageway''s ceiling.


    It was simple enough to set up, consisting of a long stone basin that rose to waist height. The basin was divided into three separate chambers. In the first chamber, the only one that that was open at the top, was a layer of hot water with a binding of waterwisps and firewisps to keep it hot. Slightly above that layer was an opening into the otherwise sealed middle chamber, where the water would overflow into. Within was a binding of waterwisps that turned water into steam, ensuring that anything that wasn''t water was left behind to accumulate in the middle chamber. The steam rose within the sealed compartment into a hole at the top that led into the third chamber, where the steam was sucked in by airwisps and condensed back into water by more waterwisps and firewisps before flowing down into the pipe that led to the reservoir in the dungeon to fill it.


    It was, Lori thought, a rather elegant closed loop, if she did say so herself. The firewisps looped through all three chambers, moving the heat from the condenser back into the evaporator so that no new heat was created, meaning it used imbuement more efficiently and the water that fed into the reservoir did so at a reasonable temperature. She''d still need to decrease the heat later when she finally deactivated the thing, and she''d need to remember to keep it imbued as the storm continued, but all anyone had to do was to keep dumping snow into it, and it would melt the snow, cleanse it, and add it to their reservoir. She was finished by mid-afternoon, which included making a pipe from the Dungeon''s emergency baths to dump the waste water from the drains into the second chamber so that they no longer drained into the drainage cistern in the third level.


    "Be sure to check the reservoir and stop putting in snow once the reservoir is full," Lori ordered Rian sternly once she was finished building it and she had shown him how it was to be used so he could explain it to other people. "Otherwise the pipes will back up with water and overflow, the passageway will be flooded with boiling hot water, and I''ll throw everyone involved out into the snow without winter robes to think about what they''ve done. Is that clear?"


    "Stop when the reservoir is full, or else you''ll do horrible things to punish us for our own stupidity," Rian said. "Got it."


    Lori glared at him to emphasize how serious she was, then nodded. "Have any more problems come up? What stupid things have they done?"


    "Unfortunately, people have gotten bored and started playing music," Rian said, and Lori twitched. "I''ll have them stop when it gets dark. Well, dark-er." He glanced up towards the gap above the tunnel, where the overcast sky was visible. "Everyone else, I''m keeping occupied."


    "Occupied how?"


    "The latrines have been emptied out and the stuff sent down to the farm, the inevitable drip on the floor from that''s been cleaned¡ªdon''t worry, I had them use boiling water and soap¡ªas many people as possible are checking over every plant we have in the farm, what little ropeweed fiber we still have are being spun into thread, and the carpenters are making more shovels, buckets, cargo litters since wheels won''t do well on the dungeon''s stairs, and more covered buckets in case the latrines have to be cleaned again and for when we have to dig out the snow after all this is over. Those who have no work to do have been encouraged to sit still and not cause trouble, hence the aforementioned music."


    Lori grunted. "Good," she grudgingly allowed. "Except for baths in the bath houses, everyone is to stay in Dungeon tonight. Have them set up in the second level alcoves. We''ll see about letting them go home if the storm''s passed by then."


    "They went straight there after we got them out of their houses," Rian said. "With your permission, I''m going to have people start moving their things from their houses to their alcoves as if this is a dragon. You know, just in case a dragon does show up in the middle of all this. And it will give people something to do to keep them occupied."


    "Do it," Lori said. "I''ll be in my room expanding the demesne."


    Rian''s eyes widened. "Wait, I''ll go set up the clocks!"


    Lori waved a hand. "Don''t bother," she said. "You weren''t able to measure this morning, so there''s no telling how much of the expansion you''ll measure is today''s or yesterday''s."


    "Are you sure you''re up to it? You''ve been working hard all day. Why don''t you just take a rest and read your almanac or something?"


    Lori waved her hand again. "I''ll be fine. Come knock on my door when it''s time to eat." She paused a moment, and then added, "And don''t set up your bedroll in the hall outside my room! Go downstairs and claim an alcove like everyone else!"


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    "Wasn''t going to," he said. "That would just start weird rumors again." He paused. "More weird rumors."


    "I don''t want to know."


    "Yes, that''s probably wise."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Despite herself, Lori had to stop trying to expand the demesne prematurely. The morning''s work had left her tired in both mind and body, and she found herself unable to devote sufficient concentration to the task. Grudgingly, she ceased that day''s effort, putting her bedroll back in order as she wondered what to do with herself.


    She eyed the chatrang board on her table, next to the plank with the numbers, then let her gaze drift towards the sealed, airless alcove where she stored her used clothes. She supposed she could do her laundry. That had been piling up recently and¡­ Lori turned and checked the alcove she kept her clean clothes. Yes, she was down to one last shirt and trousers, though she was still good on socks, loin cloths and chest wraps. She still had to wash her bedroll and blanket as well. She''d been putting that chore off for a while, since the last time she''d done it had been so frustrating. And speaking of chores, she still needed to cut her hair¡­


    On the other hand, she was tired, it had been a long and irregular day, and all those were still work.


    She eyed the chatrang board again, gave up, and decided to indulge herself.


    The board and its pieces in hand, Lori headed downstairs. She was met with the sounds of singing, dancing and music, and almost turned around again. The dining room seemed more crowded than usual, but she supposed any crowd at all after lunch was strange. Rian had apparently neglected to mention exactly how many people lacked something productive to do. While she saw people sewing holes in clothes, most were sitting around tables talking, playing board games, and¡­


    Lori watched in some bemusement as someone sat at a table with a blanket wrapped around them while someone else stood behind them and worked on their head with scissors. She supposed she wasn''t the only one who''d decided they needed a haircut, then. Actually, given that there seemed to be a line of people sitting nearby waiting their turn¡­


    Shaking her head, Lori reminded herself it wasn''t sundown yet¡ªshe paused, turned and checked out the passageway, and yes, it wasn''t sundown yet¡ªso they were still allowed to play music. At least it wasn''t everyone contributing to the din, as if competing to see who could make her go deaf. She headed down to the second level, where it was somehow less noisy. Oh, there were still the sounds of the carpenters working, cutting and shaping wood, using the lathe and moving wood around, but it was a familiar, productive sound, not the loud, pointless din of music.


    Others seemed to find it equally comforting. Many of the alcoves were occupied to some degree, and people had laid out their bedrolls in the niches and benches and were napping. A few were spinning thread in a leisurely fashion, rolling the threads into balls, or wrapping the thread around spools. The looms and the spinning wheels were untouched, however, as if none of the weavers really wanted to work¡­


    Lori found Rian in an alcove at the far end of the second level by following the binding of lightwisps on the stone she''d given him. The alcove was one near the stairs leading down to the dungeon farm, and stood relatively isolated, the nearest occupied alcove five spots away. Huh. She''d have thought he''d have chosen an alcove near where everyone else was.


    "I''d have thought you''d choose an alcove near where everyone else was," she said.


    He looked up from the plank he was balancing on his lap, a piece of charcoal in hand. Umu and Mikon sat to either side of him on the wide bench, both spinning thread as they leaned on him, while Riz napped with her head on the pink-haired weaver''s lap, her booted feet extending over the edge of the bench. "Oh, hey. Done with work?"


    "Not in any fit state to work, after today," she clarified. "What are you doing?"


    He held up his plank as if she could actually see what he''d written from where she was standing. "Doing the math on your expansion-to-time average."


    Lori sighed. Another number he''d obsess about seeing go up. Lori could, intellectually, understand how important it was, but Rian seemed to expect day-by-day massive improvements! She had barely begun experimenting on what factors affected the growth rate, an experiment this storm had interrupted. "Well, do it quickly. I''ve come to challenge you to chatrang. Or lima, if that''s your preference." Next to him, Mikon brightened at the mention of chatrang.


    "Me?" Rian said, sounding bemused.


    "It''s the board you had made. It''s about time you got to play on it. Now stop doing math and pick a game."


    Rian glanced at his board. "As you command, your Bindership," he said cheerfully, tucking the plank under the bench and leaving the charcoal next to it. "Though I''m not really very good at chatrang."


    Lori smiled. "Wonderful. That''s the best kind of opponent." She glanced at the weavers to either side of him, and Riz still snoring softly on the bench, then shrugged. She bound the earthwisps in the stone in front of Rian, pulling a block up out of the ground as she made an equal volume next to it sink down. Putting the chatrang board on top of the block, Lori raised a seat for herself to sit down on, pulling the stone from under the bench behind her.


    "What, an opponent that''s not any good? Where''s the challenge in that?"


    "I''m not looking for challenge, I''m looking for enjoyment. And the most enjoyable part of any game is winning. Thus, facing someone who is easy to beat is the most enjoyable sort of game."


    "I¡­ can''t really think of how to refute that. Huh. Do you want to go first or should I?"


    "You go first," Lori generously allowed as they began putting down the pieces on the board.


    Rian nodded. "Mikon, which pieces do what again? I remember that Dungeon Binders do everything and the Horotracts can skip over spaces, but the rest¡­"


    "No helping hi¡ª" Lori paused, glancing at Mikon. "On second thought, feel free to help, it probably won''t make much difference."


    "Confident, aren''t you?" Rian said. "We''ll see if you still feel that way after Mikon and I defeat you!"


    "Not so loud, Riz is still taking a nap," Mikon said reproachfully.


    "Oh, right. Sorry Riz."


    Riz just mumbled something and covered her eyes with her forearm.


    Rian reached down for the militia and hesitated, then glanced at the pink-haired weaver next to him. "How many spaces can the militia move again?"


    "You can do it Rian," Umu encouraged him. She didn''t sound very confident


    Ah, Lori was going to enjoy this¡­

 194 - Lori Officiates Marriages

    "Rian, tell everyone we''re doing the marriages after breakfast," Lori told him as she sat down for breakfast.


    Outside, the snowstorm still howled, burying her demesne even more. From what she could discern from the wisps outside her Dungeon, the surface of the river had frozen, trapping the Coldhold, and the snow had gotten even deeper. Fortunately, the entryway into her Dungeon had been kept clear in the night, no doubt from Rian assigning people to the job, so air continued to circulate.


    Rian stared at her, paused halfway in the act of getting seated. He looked like he hadn''t taken a bath yet, which was probably where the three were. "What, now?"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "Are people perhaps busy for some reason?"


    "Well, no¡­ It''s just that¡­" Rian said hesitantly, before frowning.


    "Just what? And sit down."


    He sat. "Wait, I''m thinking¡­" His fingers tapped rapidly on the table, every extremity tapping seemingly at random, or at least to no tune Lori could recognize. Who taps their fingers like that? Well, Rian obviously but why? "Actually, this could be good," he said thoughtfully. "If we make it properly celebratory after you finish conducting the marriages¡ªnot a full holiday, but if we make honey-sweetened bread and stick some meat in the ovens so they cook differently than normal¡ªthen it would be a nice boost of morale from the storm and make it less likely for people to get into trouble."


    "I thought I said no more holidays," Lori said sternly.


    "It''s not a holiday! We''d still be working, those of us who have something to work on. And speaking of work, I should tell you this before we have food in front of us."


    That¡­ was never a good sign. "What is it?"


    "The latrines aren''t full yet, but they might need to be desiccated," Rian said. "That should let it last longer. We''ve been dumping the latrine stuff into a pit, but given the storm outside, even if it stops right now we''d have to dig through a lot of snow before we hit dirt, and the dirt is likely frozen, so digging it to make a new waste pit might take two days, maybe more. The alternative is taking the desiccated waste down to the dungeon farm and using it as fertilizer directly, or start making new tuber planters and adding more to the ones that aren''t very full."


    Lori made a face at the subject matter, but sighed at the necessity. "I''ll desiccate the latrines after breakfast, while you''re getting the applicants organized."


    "How do you want to do it?"


    "Just have the applicants come up to me and sit there," she said, gesturing at Rian''s side of the table. "You''ll be next to me to explain anything they don''t understand. I will explain to them their obligations and benefits under a marriage agreement, they sign on the tablet, I give them one as a receipt and keep one for the demesnes records."


    "The demesne has records?"


    "It will soon."


    "If we have records, I should probably put together a proper list of everyone''s names, ages, relations and professions¡ª"


    "That sounds like a waste of time¡ª"


    "¡ªfor tax reasons. You know, so we can do the calculations for taxes properly when you get around to implementing it."


    "¡­ fine. Put it together." Didn''t they used to have such a list? Written on the wall or something?


    "Yes, your Bindership. Now, if you''ll excuse me, I need to go and get everything ready for you after breakfast while I can, get the honey opened up so we can use it¡­"


    Lori glared at him, but sighed and decided to allow it. It wasn''t like she wouldn''t enjoy having some meat cooked a different way. "Fine, fine¡­" she said, then frowned as she remembered something. "Rian, where are the sweetbugs?"


    "In the second level," Rian said. "I talked to the sweetbugkeepers weeks ago, apparently Riz asked them for the dimensions of where the sweetbugs needed to be kept but I think one of you forgot because it never got built, so when it started getting cold I just had them move the things into some of the alcoves. They''re there now, covered with tent cloths. We''ll bring them out again when it gets warm, since we can''t really keep them in the dungeon all year long. We don''t have enough plants in the dungeon farm for them to feed on."


    Lori felt the sudden panicked clenching in her chest relax. Stupid memory! Why hadn''t it reminded her about the sweetbugs weeks ago, instead of now when there could have been nothing she could do about it? "I see," she said. "Excellent, then."


    "You''re welcome," Rian said dryly.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, Lori did as she said and desiccated the contents of the latrines, separating the waterwisps from¡­ well, everything else, and using firewisps to heat what was left until she was reasonably certain it was dry. Then she bathed the waste and the latrine itself in unseen light for good measure. The latrines in the dungeons were regularly cleaned, the seats and floors scrubbed as well as emptied, but a childish part of her couldn''t help but feel she needed to be sure.


    By the time she finished, there was a nervous-looking couple sitting on Rian''s side of her usual table. More people were seated at the table behind them, and Rian was speaking to them in a low voice, the couple on the table looking back at him to listen. Other people were seated in groups in nearby tables. While some were playing board games or talking in low voices, they looked like they were spectating, and Lori saw at least two older women who had an air of ''meddling parent'' about them speaking sternly to different waiting pairs.


    Lori didn''t go straight the table, instead heading to her room. When she came back down, she was carrying a stack of thin wooden sheets about the size of her palm and fingers, a stylus made from a beast tooth and a slim branch, a bone from a beast that she''d retrieved from the bone pile before the storm had begun, and a more ordinary stone tablet on which she had written some notes for reference. Lori had water-cut the sheets into squares herself, though she had asked the carpenters to smooth the edges on the grinding wheel. One side of each wooden sheet had been covered with a layer of dark stone she had found, making a small tablet.


    Ignoring the applicants, Lori sat down at her usual place and neatly stacked up the little tablets in front of her into two piles. Each had the words ''Certificate of Marriage'' written on it, but one pile had the words ''recipient''s copy'' in one corner and the other pile ''records copy'' on it. The shallow, careful lines she''d written had been filled in with bone to make stark white lines on the background of the dark stone.


    "All right," she said, and the people all seated in front of her all stiffened and sat up straight, looking nervous. The onlookers¡ªfor that''s what they were¡ªquieted down. "Before we begin, how many of the applicants can write their own name? Raise your hand." She waited a moment. "Raise your hand over your head," Lori clarified. The hands rose higher tentatively, and she did a quick count. Huh, that was better than she had expected. More than half could write their own name. "Very well, put those down. For those who can''t write, would you be able to read your name written down if you saw it? Raise your hand if you can."


    Lori watched as more hands were raised. To her relief, the numbers made up the difference. "Good. Those who can''t write their name, your spouse-to-be will assist you." Two people in the back looked alarmed. "If they can''t, Rian will."


    At some point, Rian had moved to stand off to the side of her, and he gave them his theatrically big smile and waved at them for some reason. "Don''t worry, I''ll be right here if you need any help," he said. People actually did look relieved when he said that.


    "Before we begin, I shall clarify some points of what marriage will entail in my demesne," she said. "You probably have some idea from where you came from. I don''t care. This is my demesne. If what you think you know does not go against anything I am about to tell you now, then it doesn''t matter. If it does, cast it aside. If you wanted to be married according to however it''s done in the demesne you came from, you should have stayed there." People began to look nervous again.


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    "On that note, I will recognize any marriages that were conducted outside of this demesne, provided the people involved follow the laws regarding marriage that I am going to set forth. All that is needed is for the people involved to proclaim that they are already married, and to bring out proofs of this marriage. I will accept the presence of existing children and the testimony of relatives and the children in question as proofs. Present and proclaim yourselves to Rian and he will make note of you for when we implement the collection of taxes."


    There were more nervous looks.


    "Which will not be implemented right now, but we will eventually. I did say that land distribution would only occur after taxation was implemented." Lori swept her gaze around, wondering if anyone was going to try and force the issue of land again. Surprisingly, people stayed silent. "Very well. Applicants." She directed her gaze towards the people sitting opposite her, huddled together and from their stance were holding hands under the table. Her gaze passed them, going on towards the people behind them. "All of you. Before I register your marriages, I will require you to listen to the terms and conditions of marriage as defined in this demesne. If you have any complaints, direct then towards Rian, they were all his ideas."


    Next to her, Rian''s head snapped in her direction, a comically betrayed look on his face. "Me?" he protested. "They''re your laws!"


    "I asked for ideas, you gave them to me. Therefore, they''re your ideas."


    The look became betrayed and resigned. "I take no responsibility for how my ideas were interpreted and codified into law," he said to everyone in general. "Everyone knows you make up your own mind."


    "Of course. I''m the Dungeon Binder." She turned back to the applicants. "Before we begin, I will inform you all that of the obligations you will be required to uphold once you are married, providing sexual gratification to your spouse is not one of them." There was a sound like Rian''s hand had just forcefully slapped into his face. Lori didn''t bother to look. "Under the terms of marriage in my demesne, being married does not require you to commit any such acts, nor does your spouse have the right to demand or force those acts upon you. If you say no and they persist, any subsequent actions will be legally interpreted as rape and will be dealt with accordingly. It can also be used as grounds for a divorce."


    "How are they supposed to have children if they don''t tumble?" someone at the very back called out.


    "Rian, find out who that was and see if she is married, and whether they are in violation of the law," Lori said.


    "No need your Bindership, that''s just Reeona," Rian said. "She''s unmarried and unattached, for obvious reasons."


    "She''s ugly?" For some reason, people laughed at the perfectly reasonable question.


    "No, she''s crass, pushy and hard to live with for long periods of time. Which is a shame, because she''s a pretty good hunter."


    "Ah. Well, to answer the crass question, one would think the applicants would do so because they both want to do such things to each other," Lori said. "In relative privacy, if they know what''s good for them."


    "Just nod, all of you," Rian said, and the applicants all nodded hurriedly.


    "To continue," Lori said, "marriage also does not immediately or obligatorily require that all current and future possessions and assets be jointly owned by both spouses. You may if you wish to, but it is not assumed or required."


    "''Possessions and assets'' means ''stuff you own''," Rian informed the applicants, who nodded in comprehension. "Why would that be something you bring up? I''m asking for both myself and for the benefit of everyone present, who are probably as confused as I am." There were a few more nods at this.


    "In case of divorce, to reduce the ambiguity when it comes to division of assets."


    "While I''m sure everyone''s glad to have such a hardworking and thorough Binder, I don''t think talk about divorce is what people really want to hear on their wedding day," Rian said, sounding tired for some reason.


    "Marriage, not wedding."


    "Given the circumstances, it''s currently the same thing."


    "A marriage is an agreement, a wedding is the pointlessly expensive festivities leading up to and after the officiation of that agreement."


    "Again, given the current circumstances, it''s the same thing."


    Lori frowned, tilting her head thoughtfully. Huh. He was right. Well, regardless. "Well, regardless. One final point before we proceed, I am announcing the requirement of a mandatory apprenticeship for all applicants here, as well as those already married but do not yet have any children, and those pregnant and unmarried." She saw people exchanging confused looks and murmuring to each other. "The people in question are required to apprentice themselves to married individuals who already have children above five years of age, for the purpose of learning how to tend, raise, discipline, and properly care for children." The volume of the murmurs rose, though she heard one or two laughs for some reason. "This is mandatory and required. I can''t stop you from breeding, but I don''t have to tolerate people being stupid about it. You will learn, and you will do it sooner rather than later so you don''t raise your children incorrectly."


    There were actually nods and more laughs at that.


    "If you have any objections to any of these requirements, you know where to go," Lori finished.


    "Not me," Rian said. "I''m for when you have complaints. If you have objections, she means leave and try your luck at River''s Fork. Just to be clear."


    A hand was raised. "Uh, Lord Rian¡­" A young man Lori vaguely recognized for some reason. "What about for those that can''t have children?" He waved to the other young man next to him.


    Rian turned to her. "Your Bindership?"


    "It''s still required," Lori said sternly. "No exceptions. If you can''t take this seriously, withdraw your application and stop wasting my time. Failure to comply will render your marriage null and void."


    Surprisingly, that was met with an exchange of looks and a nod. Huh. A reasonable person. How rare.


    "Anything else? No? Then we proceed. Rian, take note. First applicants." She directed her gaze towards the two in front to her, who straightened up on their bench again. "I will speak to you, you will answer. Understood?"


    "Y-yes, your Bindership," they both said eventually.


    Lori nodded. "Now, do either of you have a profession? A trade, a craft? Training in anything?"


    They looked at each other in confusion, then glanced at Rian.


    "It''s all right, just answer her," he said, and she could hear his reassuring smile.


    Nonetheless, it seemed to work as the applicant on the left, a young man with pale blue hair said, "Um, I was a beastherder, your Bindership," he said. "Was pretty good at it."


    "What kinds of beasts?" Lori pressed.


    "Short-tailed tsokows, your Bindership." While she''d never seen one personally, she was vaguely familiar with the creature from theater, novels and the occasional illustration, bringing to mind images of a short, stubby-legged, fat, and docile kind of beast, bred for food, eggs, leather, possibly other things that weren''t coming to mind. "We bred long-tails too, but not very many." Why not? Tail meat was delicious.


    "We don''t have many beasts here," Lori said. "What have you been doing?"


    "I''ve been trying to raise the chokers we have, your Bindership, if they managed to survive the snow." For a moment he looked worried, the face of a man concerned for his livelihood, such as it was. "And I''ve been helping at the tannery, getting the skins of what''s caught plucked and tanned. And I do my time on the cutting rota, of course."


    Lori nodded, then turned to the one beside him. "And you?"


    The woman with the long pink hair held in a braid running down her back swallowed and said, "I''m a weaver, y-your Bindership," she said, glancing sideways between the man next to her and Rian. "And I knit as well."


    "Noted. And you want to marry?"


    The two glanced at each other. "Yes, your Bindership," they both said eventually, though not at the same time.


    "Is there anyone present who objects or has any reason to object?" Lori said in a loud, carrying voice. "Someone already married to one of them and was not consulted on this marriage, perhaps?" She looked around. "There seem to be no objections. Very well then. Your application is approved."


    Lori reached for two of the small wood and stone tablets, one from each pile, and carefully bound the stone on top of both. Not too soft, the consistency of hard wax, and only on a thin layer¡­ "You, sign your name here and here, and then you, sign your name here and here. Use this and don''t press down too hard. Use your full name, this is a legal document." She handed them the stylus.


    The two wrote their names where indicated, albeit a little clumsily in the beastherder''s case. Still, it was legible. Lori put down both tablets in front of her, removing the binding. To her relief, the names were both legible. She nodded and consulted her tablet of notes, reading the theatrically worded thing Rian had given back to her. "Very well. Do you, Leiyanami, wish to marry this woman with you? To love her, to protect and succor her, to honor and adore her, to support her and her children with your love, your time and your efforts, until time and death parts you?"


    For some reason, the man glanced towards Rian. "I do," he said.


    Lori nodded, countersigning the man''s signatures. She turned to the woman. "And do you, Astolp Weaver, wish to marry this man with you? To love him, to protect and succor him, to honor and adore him, to support him and his children with your love, your time and your efforts, until time and death parts you?"


    The response was more immediate, the woman nodding decisively as she said, "I do."


    Lori nodded, countersigned on the woman''s signature, removed the bindings on the stone, then took the bone and, binding it soft, lightly rubbed it over the signatures. The pale white bone, soft as wax, scraped off and accumulated on the grooves left by the stylus, contrasting them against the dark stone. She set aside her copy and handed them theirs. "Your marriage has been recognized and recorded. Here is your copy of the record. Please find someone to apprentice yourselves to as soon as possible and check the list for the exact laws covering marriage obligations beyond those already discussed. If you find you cannot or do not wish to comply with any of them, inform Rian within the next week so that your marriage may be annulled. NEXT!"


    As the pair hurriedly vacated Rian''s bench and the next applicants moved to take their place, Lori hoped that this all finished before lunch so that she''d be able to expand her demesne in the afternoon. One set of applicants down, eleven more to go¡­

 195 - Application Complications

    Some applicants were rejected, which annoyed Lori, because it took more time to establish they were being coerced by their parents because one had gotten the other pregnant.


    "Your application is denied," Lori said. "Come back when you actually want to do this and not just because your parents say you should. You¡ª" this to the nervous-looking young woman, "¡ªare required to apprentice yourself in preparation for the birth of your child. Next!"


    Not everyone took her decisions well. However, Rian was there and by implication so was Riz, and Riz had friends that were willing to help her. In this instance, it was to keep back some angry parents.


    "So he just gets her pregnant and that''s it?-!" one such parent demanded angrily. "He has to do right by her!"


    "If he wanted to do right by her, then he would have asked to marry her without any of you forcing him," Lori said irritably. She glanced at the young man in question. He looked lost and overwhelmed, meaning he was feeling very lost and overwhelmed if Lori could tell. "If they want to get married, they can re-apply provided they can prove no coercion on anyone''s parts."


    "He should at least have to help take care of the child!" another parent said.


    "If he were inclined to do so, he would probably volunteer to do that anyway," Lori said. "If he wasn''t, would you really want such a useless, bloodsucking slug married to your daughter? If you just want to satisfy your own anger, just drag him into a corner and beat him. As long as you don''t kill him, it''s fine. However, I will regard that as grounds for coercion should he be party to another application in future. And what are you two still doing sitting there? I said ''next''!"


    Eventually the combative older people were made to sit down and the applicants moved on, though Lori noticed Rian seated them away from their still-irate parents.


    Then there were the two applicants who were clearly too young. The two children looked about the brat''s age, and clearly infatuated with each other, holding hands earnestly in a way that Lori would have thought overdone if they didn''t seem absolutely genuine about it. Thankfully it didn''t seem like the issue of pregnancy or anything of the sort. They had simply spotted the lack of any sort of listed age restriction in Lori''s marriage laws¡ªsomething she was now actually reconsidering¡ª and had applied to Rian.


    They actually did reasonably well in their interview, with the young boy proudly informing her he was a seel hunter, a farmer, a woodcutter and a sweeper. The girl was the same, but had exchanged woodcutter and sweeper for spinster and apprentice weaver and knitter.


    That had thankfully given Lori an excuse. "I''m afraid that as you are still on your apprenticeship, I cannot yet grant your application," Lori said, and actually winced at their crestfallen looks. "However, I am willing to keep your application prepared and ready to be officially granted. You can sign it here and now, and in¡ª that is, when you''re both sixteen or one of you have officially finished your apprenticeship in your trade, whichever comes first, you can come back to me and I will officially declare you married. And if you change your mind before then, then that''s fine."


    The two children brightened at that. "Do we say the marriage oath too?" the girl asked excitedly.


    "You can say it, but it doesn''t mean you''re married," Lori said. "If you want, we can make it a promise that you''ll one day be married."


    "Really, Wiz Lori?" the boy asked, equally excited.


    "Yes, really."


    Only one of them knew how to write, and not very well, so some time was taken up with the girl helping the boy write his name in awkward, jagged script that barely fit on the tablet, the girl standing behind the boy and holding the stylus with him as they both tried to remember how his name was spelled. Then Lori asked them if they ''someday wish to marry'' and so on and so forth, with both children answering earnestly, making them probably the third most excited applicants of that day when Lori told them that their promise to get married had been recorded and would be revisited in the future when it was due.


    The two happily walked away hand in hand, their peers teasing and congratulating them equally, pronouncing them ''almost married''.


    "If they don''t grow out of it, they are going to be a very happy couple," Rian muttered.


    Lori had to agree as she set the paired tablets aside to be stored for the future. If it was not simply childish infatuation that would fade away as they go older¡­ well, it was official agreement, after all. "I wish them luck. Next!"


    It was very fortunate that they had started almost immediately after breakfast, save for the brief time it took her to desiccate the latrines. Still, with only twelve sets of applicants, even with the people who had difficulty writing their names, they managed to finish before lunch. Thankfully, the parents who had been pressuring their children to marry kept their dissatisfaction to themselves. By the time Lori came back from putting her copies of the records aside¡ªand wondering where she would be putting them and any like them in the future¡ªthe food was ready, and her usual table seated only those it usually did.


    The dining hall had a celebratory air, which Lori supposed was only natural since the kitchen had made roasted meat and honey bread. The honey bread had a light green tinge to it, and was sticky to the touch, but absolutely delicious. Lori wished there was more honey, but she sternly reminded herself it was being saved as an emergency supply.


    "Don''t you know you''re supposed to eat that last?" Rian said, sounding amused as she devoured the three sticks of honey bread that was her ration.


    "I know I''m ''supposed'' to," she said disdainfully, "I just don''t care."


    Rian nodded. "Fair enough," he said, holding his utensils in one hand and¡­ Lori blinked and watched with some bemusement as he somehow used the utensils like tongs and picked up one of his own honey bread, biting into it. "No, no too sweet, it''s going to stick on my tongue if I eat it all before my soup." He put down the bread and drank from his cup, rinsing his mouth before swallowing.


    Lori rolled her eyes at him as she picked up her own cup. "You could have just done that after you finished eating."


    "Lori, the point of sweet stuff is to be eaten last so the sweetness lingers in your mouth afterwards. You can enjoy the lingering. If you eat it first, everything else you eat afterwards washes it out. Unless you prefer the lingering taste of the soup, in which case I withdraw what I just said."


    Why would she want the aftertaste when she could have the taste? "Why would I want the aftertaste when I could have the taste?" she said as she started eating her soup, stirring in some of her small cuts of roasted meat.


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    "That makes sense, I suppose," Rian said, getting started on his own soup.


    Next to him, Umu, Mikon and Riz were doing the same, though for some bizarre reason the northerner woman had taken one of her sticks of honeybread and was using it to stir her soup, the green coating of honey melting away as the bread became soaked. Before it became soggy and limp, however, Riz drew it out and bit into the soup-soaked bread enthusiastically. Lori vaguely recalled her doing the same with her bread yesterday, but why with the honey bread?


    "Did you just add honey to your soup?" Umu said, seemingly sharing Lori''s disbelief.


    "Putting honey in your soup is something you do in winter," Riz replied, looking past Rian at the weaver. "The honey gives you more energy to stay warm."


    "I thought you said that''s for children too young for mead?" Mikon said.


    "So? No reason why they''re the only ones who get to enjoy it. Besides, we don''t have any mead. Not enough honey to spare to make it," Riz sighed.


    "And it had better stay that way," Lori said, staring at Rian.


    "It probably won''t last," Rian said, "but right now everyone''s morale is high enough that we shouldn''t have anyone inclined to try stealing some of the grain to ferment into booze."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Rian, come see me after lunch, I need you to set the water clocks."


    Rian straightened, smiling. "Yes, your Bindership," he said. "I''ll just have to average out the growth when the storm ends. That is, if you''re going to continue with the variable?"


    "Yes, though I will be increasing the intensity of the variable to see if it substantially affects the result."


    "That''s¡­ not exactly correct experimental protocol."


    "I''m aware, but as it is I don''t have time to establish a consistent average. I need results."


    "That''s what they say, and then something horrible happens and someone ends up dead or disfigured or some sort of abomination from experimental and untested random Deadspeaking."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "You''ve seen too many plays," she said, uncomfortably aware that, yes, ''I need results'' was usually when the horrible things started happening. "No Deadspeaking is involved."


    "No, just Whispering, which can make things explode." Rian sighed. "At least wait for the storm to finish before you start increasing the variable. Until I can measure exactly how much altering the variable increases the result, this won''t result in any experimental data. The previous results were a good increase, so why not stick to it, at least for the duration? Instead of growth, try for consistency? Before the variable, the results could be relatively far from the calculated average in either direction, even if the average tended to keep growing. If this variable shows consistent results, that is already a marked improvement from how you were doing it before."


    Lori considered that. Well, she supposed he had a point about altering the experimental variable again being useless if they couldn''t immediately measure the changes that resulted from it. "Fine, fine," she said, waving her hand. "I suppose you have a point. Though I''m surprised. I thought you would want your precious numbers to get bigger."


    "Consistent growth is guaranteed gain," Rian said. "No matter what, the numbers are going up!"


    Ah. Of course. Somehow, it was still a number getting bigger.


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    When Lori left her room for dinner, she was tired, though thankfully this time her head didn''t throb. As per her discussion with Rian, she had claimed outward, and the concentration of wisps she had placed where the river entered her demesne had remained as it had the previous time she had done so. As for the lack of a headache, she hoped it was a sign she was getting better at expanding her demesne, developing a rhythm that let her work more efficiently. Even with the variable of strongly concentrating the wisps in a particular spot, the rest wasn''t any different. She supposed it had only been a matter of time before it became sufficiently routine.


    In fact, she even decided to bring down the chatrang board, which made Mikon happy at least.


    "So¡­" Rian said in a low voice as the weaver put the pieces on the board and the other two got dinner, "while you were in your room, a matter came to my attention. You remember the two who were being pressured into getting married by their parents?"


    "It hasn''t been a day yet, I don''t forget that fast," Lori said. "And why are you talking like that?"


    "I don''t want people to hear," he said. Lori looked significantly at Mikon. "She doesn''t count."


    "Mikon doesn''t count as people?" Lori smirked.


    "You know what I mean!"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "What about them?" she said, lowering his voice slightly. She was not going to lean towards Rian like this was a ''conspiring in a pub'' scene in a play.


    "Salenhalt spoke to me earlier this afternoon¡ª"


    "Who?"


    Rian rolled his eyes. "The boy we''re discussing."


    Well, he should have just said that. "You should have just said that."


    Sigh. "Anyway, he spoke to me and asked if the two of them could still apply. They talked about it and they''ve decided they still want to get married, even with their parents pressuring them. Apparently being called a useless, bloodsucking slug by his own Dungeon Binder is the sort of thing that makes a man think." Rian hesitated. "They also asked if they could move back into the shelter after the storm has passed, so they don''t have to live with either of their parents. Since we don''t really have any official rules about that, I took the liberty of authorizing that particular request."


    Lori''s eyebrow rose at the requests. "And what is your assessment? Do you think they''re being coerced still?"


    Rian shook his head. "Despite your stance on people beating other people as long as it wasn''t to death, that sort of thing leads to disciplinary problems. I asked some of the boys to stay with him to keep that from happening, and they''ve been mostly celebrating the fact their other friends got married. At worse, he''s being coerced by exposure to what happy newly married people look like." Rian shrugged. "Maybe he just decided he wants that for himself."


    "And the other applicant?"


    "Arranging her apprenticeship with her mother," Rian said, "who at least agrees with you that Bliss should be trained to take care of a child before she actually has one."


    "So she could still be coerced," Lori pointed out.


    "As I understand it, the pressure was coming from her father. Her mother agreed by not opposing it, but doesn''t exactly seem to be an aggressive proponent, merely an agreeable one. She actually seems to like the boy. She let the two of them talk, after all."


    Lori frowned, then sighed. Well, a quick interview and countersigning wouldn''t hurt. "Very well. But only this. Any other applicants are to wait until convenient for me in the spring, or we have another ten applications, whichever comes first. Tell them to come here after dinner."


    "Ah, about that," Rian said. "I''d suggest a more private venue. If nothing else, if their parents see them together with you, they might get coercive again and go against the spirit of this decision. And I think it would be better for them. They''re both shy and quiet people."


    "The girl is with child," Lori pointed out.


    Rian shrugged. "They were shy and quiet together. The tunnel''s still open, so how about my house? I think I still have some wood for the fire¡­"


    Lori considered it and nodded. "Your house will do. And don''t bother. I''ll provide the heat." There was a good chance the end of his chimney was under snow by now.


    Rian sighed in relief. "Thanks. My chimney''s probably buried in snow at this point. Okay, that''s it. Enjoy your game."


    Mikon, who had been waiting patiently as they talked, smiled brightly and kissed Rian on the cheek before turning to Lori and pushing the game board between the two of them. The weaver made the first move¡­


    In hindsight, perhaps Lori had still been too tired after expanding her demesne to play such a mentally intensive game. Mikon actually managed to beat her.


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    Still, she didn''t consider herself too tired to conduct the marriage application interview again, though she did splash cold water on her face to chase off what little drowsiness was there. In Rian''s room, sitting on his only chair while the two applicants sat on his bed, Lori spoke to them again as Rian stood behind them. She was forced to conclude that Rian had been right. They were shy, quiet people, and absent the crowds of the dining hall and their parents no doubt glaring a hole into the back of their heads, they were much more relaxed and willing to answer her questions with some degree of confidence.


    They also held hands, which they had been too nervous to do earlier. Lori did not consider that conclusive to the sincerity of their application, but it was a point nonetheless.


    Eventually she came to a conclusion, and the application was accepted. When they indicated of their acceptance to the conditions for marriage, what other people had erroneously begun referring to as the ''marriage oath'', for some reason Lori was reminded of the two children earlier that day who had promised themselves to each other.


    Though that could just have been the tiredness. Mikon did beat her, after all.


    Then Lori went back to her room to sleep, waiting for tomorrow to come.

 196 - Smarter, Not Harder

    The storm continued into the next day. Lori could feel her demesne getting buried in more and more water, solidified as it was. She had thought she would need to be the one to clear the entryway of snow so that they''d continue to get air into the Dungeon, and was pleasantly surprised that wasn''t the case. With literally nothing else for them to do, Rian had organized people into a clearing detail, keeping the entryway open with ladders, newly made snow shovels that bore some resemblance to her stone shaping tool¡ªwhich she managed to get back¡ªand lots of people.


    "We''ve got this under control," Rian said to her. "Plenty of people willing to work, we''ve finally got the tools, and we don''t even need to worry about the reservoir overfilling, since right after this I think most of us are going to the baths to warm up. Go stay inside where it''s warm and relax. Or maybe do what you were planning to do this afternoon."


    All Lori had to do was to create a source of warmth in the entryway the morning after all the marriages so that no one would be tempted to start a fire, something easily done by adding firewisps to the lightwisps on the entryway ceiling. She set it to replicate sunlight, the unseen light more efficiently carrying the warmth. Beyond desiccating the latrines again after breakfast, her mornings were mostly free, with little in the way of further work for her to do.


    She spent the morning rethinking how she was expanding her demesne.


    Normally, she would have just gone straight to her room and begun expanding her demesne as she had been doing before, while continuing her experiments on the effects of the variables she had isolated. With the coming of the snow, however, and with literally everyone in her demesne who wasn''t doing some work¡ªwhich was a lot of them¡ªjust sitting around playing, talking, singing, relaxing or sleeping, she couldn''t help but be influenced. Because she was not going to work her hardest when everyone else in her demesne decided they were on a rest break! That was just backwards! If she was working, everyone else should be working as well! And if she wasn''t working, they should still be working!


    She wanted to be just as lazy and unproductive! After all, there really wasn''t much work to do and she had already done them. The farm was well within the parameters of a good growing environment, there was water if they needed to be watered and the drainage ensured the roots didn''t get sodden and rotted. Rian had keeping the entryway clear well in hand, and there was really nothing left for her to do inside the dungeon. Even the cold rooms didn''t need more solidified air.


    But her demesne had to expand, and she was the only one who could do it. So she told Rian she''d be in her room and didn''t need the clocks set, went up, closed the door but didn''t seal it so he could come up and get her, and readied her bedroll in her little corner. It was as she was sitting down and getting ready to expand while thinking mournfully about how no one else needed to work as hard as this when the thought came to her.


    Why did she need to hurry?


    The question made her stop and think. During the past two weeks since she''d started expanding her demesne, she had been doing so with a certain haste, trying to get as much growth as possible as quickly as possible. This was mostly because her attention was a limited resource, and magic needed to be directed to circulate and imbue. If she stopped paying attention, the flow of magic would stop. And if she needed to pay attention anyway, then she might as well cause the magic to flow as quickly as possible. The problem was she needed to pay attention to the entire border of her demesne, a massive sphere four taums wide, since that was what she needed to imbue to expand.


    Well, four taums and about twenty-two paces more now, she wasn''t sure, she left obsessing over the exact numbers to Rian.


    Most of her difficulty, and subsequently the cause of her headaches and tiredness, had been in adapting to the change in methodology needed when it came to where the magic needed to be directed. She had been taught to move magic in terms of flows, moving it from where it was gathered in her lungs and through the parts of her body filled with the relevant wisps that aligned it, before it progressed out to where the aligned magic could be channeled to the wisps she was going to claim and bind, usually through the wire on her staff.


    She did not disperse magic to every square yustri of her skin at once, in equal measure, and she did not use all that skin to claim and bind simultaneously. Since that was almost exactly what she needed to do to expand her, it was understandably causing her difficulties. It was an entirely different concept of magic direction, since there was no one point to send all the magic. All points possible had to be imbued equally.


    Now however, with the relaxed, lazy atmosphere of the demesne filling her with an envy and desire to be lazy as well, her mind stepped back to examine what she had been doing. Yes, obviously she had to grow her demesne as quickly as possible, but she didn''t need to hurry the process, did she? The more of her magic she aligned and imbued to the wisps at her border, the more she could claim beyond it, and the more time she had to expand before the Iridescence consumed all the imbuement in the wisps in question. That part undoubtedly had to be done as quickly as possible. But the rest¡­


    Theoretically, magic moved at the speed of thought¡­ which was part of what made Mentalists so dangerous, because they could make their speed of thought, already so fast it couldn''t reasonably be measured, even faster. In practice however, this speed didn''t matter if the amount of magic being transferred was limited to small amounts, which was primarily restricted by how much magic a wizard could draw in when they breathed. Deeper breaths drew in more magic, but also had to be done slower, lest one start panting and hyperventilating.


    Taking in a bead could mitigate this, but not completely, since it simply altered the problem into how to efficiently utilize all the power the bead provided, since beads had to be swallowed to extract their magic for use. While you could theoretically retrieve the bead¡­ no. Just¡­ no. Besides, such beads are no longer considered legal tender since being partially used reduced their size from what it was supposed to be, as well scoured off the markings on it, so the only other use for them was to put them in a bound tool or swallowing them again¡­


    No. Just¡­ no.


    One learned to either take controlled breaths while channeling magic at a very slow and even rate, or drew in several rapid breaths over a period before imbuing in a single, massive burst. The latter technique resulted in a net loss from inefficiency, as an amount of magic also exited with one''s breath unless one was actively channeling, ultimately resulting in more effort for less gain, or at least that''s how Lori''s teachers had taught.


    Her own research, and some of her favorite novels, had taught her that such bursts were useful if one needed a large imbuement of magic quickly, such as if one got caught in a violent altercation and needed a sudden work of magic to dramatically turn the tide in your favor. Perhaps this was something officially taught to wizards who became part of the militia. Regardless, it wasn''t what Lori had learned, though she knew of it.


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    It was also considered wasteful, since magic, once imbued into wisps (or vertices, or thoughts, or life), could not be retrieved. Better not quite enough than too much, they had been taught, because the former could be corrected, the latter could not. While it didn''t really affect the end result, since a binding (or a vista, or a formation, or a meaning) could be altered and utilized for something else, or simply dissolved even when it still retained imbuement, such over-imbuement was considered sloppy work unless you were binding (or defining, or arranging, or taming) something that was meant to last for a long time and therefore be constantly imbued.


    With her core, however, she had no such restriction. And while the steps leading to expansion needed her attention, the consequences of her attention lapsing, now that she considered it, weren''t actually serious. The flow of magic would stop, but most of what she had prepared would still be in place. The wisps would remain claimed, bound and imbued, but with no binding in place to consume magic, and with the wisps still being within her demesne, imbuement loss from dissipation would be slow, provided she didn''t decide to go off to have a lunch and a nap. Loss would be even further reduced if the wisps were organized into a deactivated binding, the imposed order rendering loss from dissipation almost negligible.


    But¡­ she hadn''t done any of that. She simply had taken the procedure she had used to create her core and scaled it upwards while directing it outward in all directions. And it had worked¡­ but that had been all she had done to change it.


    Part of the reason why she''d been wasting so much time and effort with quickly imbuing was because, now that she thought about it, she had never properly anchored the airwisps and waterwisps so that they wouldn''t be blown away by the weather, holding on to them by active concentration as she had done when she had originally formed her core. This had resulted in more of her attention being taken up with holding the wisps in place while imbuing them. As they were being imbued, she had felt the effort was necessary, but now¡­


    As Lori lay there, she realized she had made the most stupid beginner mistake possible when it came to an extended undertaking: she had worked harder instead of smarter. She had taken what she had known and had simply done more of it, expending greater effort in expectation of greater results. She had used a massive, inefficient burst when she should have acted in a slow, steady and methodical fashion. Lori had, because of her own efforts, been utterly mentally spent once she had expanded her entire demesne in one large burst, pushing back the awareness of her wisps soon afterwards as she lay back and let exhaustion take her.


    How much imbuement had been left in the wisps she had used that had simply dissipated naturally overnight since they hadn''t been formed into an organized binding? How much of her efforts had she simply wasted?


    Lori felt a self-directed rage rising as she realized how much less work she could have been putting into expanding at the rate she had been¡­ and how much more growth she could have had for the same effort. Even something as simple as binding the wisps she had used to expand such that their imbuement wouldn''t deteriorate completely overnight would have let her realize she''d been doing something wrong, would have given her wisps that were already heavily imbued. She could have skipped the intermediate step of directing magic towards them before she could expand. She could have imbued and expanded one day, then immediately expanded again the following day after a night''s rest with the remaining imbuement before sitting down and channeling magic to the edge again for another attempt! She could have been twice as efficient!


    She spent that morning carefully creating a massive binding over the skyward half of her demesne. The binding was not meant to do anything but be a means of correcting her mistake of inefficiency when imbued, reducing imbuement dissipation so that any remaining could be utilized the next day. While she had technically already done this before, had done this every time she had expanded her demesne by having all of her wisps reach beyond her demesne''s border, that had been freeform control, actively controlling the wisps with her will. It had been the same way she made stone flow to move it around or made water move uphill when she needed to carry it up from the river, requiring active attention, thought and control on her part.


    This sort of binding, holding wisps in place and having them do a single, specific thing was more akin to filling a water clock. It would do what it was supposed to as long as it had imbuement, and since what it was supposed to do was nothing but keep its shape and therefore not lose any imbuement¡­


    It was almost annoyingly easy. She picked a spot to start at¡ªwhere the river entered her demesne, and she had experimented on whether increasing the concentration of wisps affected expansion, and did those results actually mean what she thought they did now?¡ªand simply bound the wisps there, from the border of the demesne to perhaps a pace inwards. She couldn''t be sure about the exact volume without being there. Then she had simply¡­ continued. Her attention had moved turnwise along her border, continually extending that one binding, until her attention was right back where she had started. It had taken¡­ how long?


    Lori opened her eyes and grabbed one of the water clocks, filling it with water from her bathroom. Putting it back on its shelf with the catch bucket underneath it, she let it flow, then closed her eyes and repeated her previous exercise. The area she was binding was about¡­ well, it was smaller than the width of the river, and the river wasn''t any narrower here than in front of her dungeon¡­ call the width of what she was binding perhaps twenty paces wide? She started at the same place, and then proceeded turnwise as she had before, binding the wisps directly above her previous binding, imbuing with just enough magic to keep the binding from collapsing.


    When she completed the second revolution along her demesne''s border, the contents of the water clock had only dropped a miniscule amount. Less than three minutes had passed, probably. The water clock didn''t have markings that fine, so she had to estimate, and refraction might have made her estimate incorrect.


    Lori stared as the waterclock again, then closed her eyes for a third time, leaned back, and continued forming a binding that would encompass the border of the entire skyward half of her demesne. When she had opened her eyes again, the water clocks was just dripping itself empty, the last of the drops falling into the catch bucket below. Possibly a little over an hour to finish the whole procedure.


    It only occurred to her afterwards that besides protecting her demesne from dragons, this was probably the largest, most Dungeon Binder-worthy accomplishment she had ever done. Nearly everything else she had built so far, she could have done with sufficient beads. But this? Almost literally claiming the sky above? It was truly something only a Dungeon Binder could have accomplished. For a single person to equal it would have taken a truly absurd number of beads just to provide the magic needed to keep the whole binding sufficiently imbued to prevent it from collapsing naturally, never mind having to actually form the binding in question.


    Repeating the exercise underground didn''t take much longer. If anything, it actually went faster, because earthwisps weren''t inclined to move, and what little water there remained relatively still. At the end of a little under an hour, probably, she had managed to place a binding that encompassed the entire border of her demesne, from sky to depths.


    Lori lay back against her bedroll, satisfied. That had gone much faster than she had thought. She supposed it had been concentrating her attention at a relatively single spot instead of trying to reach all points of her demesne''s border at once. The massive binding was imbued but inactive, and would last long enough for her to take a short rest so she could relax her mind and not get a headache. Then she would just have to sit down and put herself through the headache-inducing experience of imbuing every spot on the border of her demesne simultaneously and¡­


    ¡­and¡­


    ¡­


    In her mind''s eye, Lori stared at the massive, spherical binding she had created. Slowly, with the air of someone who''d realized something that should have been extremely obvious, she picked the same spot as before, where the river entered her demesne, and began imbuing the wisps there with magic from her core.


    Through the binding, the magic spread out to every wisp upon the borders of her demesne at once.


    ¡­


    Like Skykeep Demesne tearing itself out of the ground in story and legend, the hateful, rage-filled scream of utterly furious, incandescently burning frustration ripped itself out of her chest and kept on rising.

 197 - Planning For Recovery

    "So¡­" Rian said casually at lunch as they started to eat, "was that scream we all heard coming from your room something that I should worry about, or¡­?"


    Lori glowered at him as she put down the last of her stones into the bowls of the sunk board and finished her turn. She''d decided to bring it down today, something that Mikon seemed happy about. For herself, after what had happened this morning, she needed the satisfaction of an easy victory against the weaver. "Everything is fine. There is nothing to be concerned about."


    "Ah. So you didn''t break your leg or something?"


    "Rian, I walked down here, how could I do that on a broken leg?"


    "I don''t pretend to know what a Dungeon Binder could be fully capable of," Rian said. "Most of what I know that didn''t come from you comes from stories, which I have been told are not how Dungeons work. Loudly. Repeatedly. Several times."


    Lori gave him a flat look. "I had a realization. It was an irritating realization."


    "Ah. That kind of scream." Rian nodded as if he actually understood. "Well, it could be worse. Think of what it would be like if you hadn''t made the irritating realization."


    "Don''t give me trite and hollow platitudes, Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership," he chirped. "Anything you want to tell me so I can provide you with accurate and specific platitudes instead?" Next to him, Riz covered her mouth and started coughing. Ugh, be careful woman! That was how diseases got spread!


    Lori glared at him. "No," she said.


    "Well, if you change your mind, you know where to find me," he said, as annoyingly cheerful as ever. "Now, on to other business: I''d like to discuss our recovery plan for after the storm blows over."


    Ah. Yes, that was probably something they had to plan for properly, wasn''t it? "What do you have in mind?"


    "We''ll probably need more of your tunnels," Rian said. "Because while we have more tools now, the bulk of our tools are outside in the toolshed. In future, they''ll probably have to be moved closer to the dungeon to prevent exactly this sort from happening, but that''s for future Rian and future Lori to talk about. For now, our first step after the storm breaks is to get there so we have more tools to clear with. All of our shovels, some of our buckets, and all of our wheeled carts are there."


    Lori frowned. "Why aren''t those things stored in the dungeon?"


    "Shovels and carts mostly get used for latrine clearing."


    Ah. No wonder. "Ah. No wonder. Yes, getting to those tools is a priority."


    "After that, we clear the houses," Rian said. "Get the snow off their roofs and chimneys, and then clear out the latrines so they can be used. Even with what you''re doing, the latrines are slowly getting full." He looked down at his food. "Though we can talk more about that after we finish eating."


    Lori looked down at her meaty soup as well. "Agreed."


    On either side of Rian, Riz, Umu and Mikon all sighed in relief.


    "If this is the sort of weather we can expect for winter here, we might need to maintain the tunnels, even after the snow ends and people go back to living in their homes," Rian continued. "At the very least, keeping the tunnels will give us a measure of safety and mobility, especially if another unexpected storm hits."


    "As long as no one tries to hit the walls with hammers, the ice should hold as long as it''s cold enough for ice," Lori said.


    Riz glanced at Rian and began to nudge him with her elbow.


    "Yes, Riz? Do you have something to add?" Rian said.


    "Packed snow would support the tunnels almost as well and would hold in heat better than ice, meaning the tunnels would be warmer," Riz told him. "The ice is probably packed enough by now that the tunnels wouldn''t collapse if the ice is removed."


    "Huh. That sounds useful¡­" Rian turned to Lori. "If we''re going to be having people using the tunnels to get around, it would be nice if they were warmer. " He frowned. "And you don''t really need to get rid of the ice. Just line the inside of the tunnels with snow as best as we can for insulation. If it starts melting, well, we''re unlikely to run out of snow any time soon."


    Lori waved dismissively. "I''ll leave that to you."


    "Uh, there''s also a matter only you can take care of," Rian said. "The chimneys. Clearly no one expected the snow around here to be this deep. As soon as it''s viable, the chimneys will have to be raised up higher so that they''re less likely to be buried in snow."


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    Lori frowned, but reluctantly nodded in agreement. "And some sort of ventilation tube, I suppose," she said reluctantly. "So that no one suffocates if the snow overtops the roof before they can get out."


    "We should probably rebuild the roofs come spring so that snow slides off better," Rian added. "Make them steeper, like the roofs of the houses on the rise. It will use up more wood, but that way they''re less likely to be buried. And speaking of wood, we should get the rest of the wood out of the curing sheds and bring them to the Dungeon. Just in case."


    "I suppose we''ll have to subsist on the food in the cold rooms from now on," Lori said. "Hunting is no longer likely to be as viable."


    "Given how deep the snow is outside, it''s probably just a form of suicide at this point," Rian agreed. "I''ll do an inventory of the cold rooms and see how much food we have. Between all the meat in there, the tubers we''re growing, and the grain not being saved for planting, we should be good to last."


    "Do that," she said. "If people have been taking from the cold rooms, I''d rather know sooner rather than later. Eat."


    "Eat?" Rian said.


    Lori pointed at his bowl, untouched since he''d started speaking, in stark contrast to her now-empty bowl. "Eat."


    "Oh! Right, right¡­ " He went back to eating his lunch. After a couple of spoonfuls, he said, "We should probably send someone to check on River''s Fork after the storm, see how they''re doing?"


    "Eat," Lori said sternly.


    Rian went back to eating.


    He was probably right. There was always a chance that this sudden storm had resulted in such difficulty and hardship that the demesne had collapsed such that Shanalorre had died. Lori doubted it, though. Their protective tree dome was far better suited to keeping snow off, and they had enough supplies. Still, it was best to check. Who knows, maybe they were all dead and Lori could just step in and claim their demesne''s core like she had wanted.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, once the bowls and utensils had been put away, Lori and Rian continued their discussion since they no longer had food to be turned off from.


    "Dealing with latrine waste will be more problematic now," Rian said. "We had that pit dug up to dump all the waste in, but that''s probably full and buried under snow by now. Heating and desiccating it will help, but eventually we''re still going to need to deal with the solid waste that''s left."


    "Rian, just skip the exposition," Lori said irritably. "We both know what the problem is, stop wasting my time and get to the solution you want to propose."


    "You sound even more like my sister than usual," Rian said, and what did that mean? "But fine, fine. I suggest we turn the waste into charcoal, or close enough."


    Lori stared at him. "Perhaps a little exposition," she allowed.


    "I talked to Riz, Riz''s friends, the smiths, the farmers and the charcoal burners," Rian said. "There are only a limited number of ways we can deal with our latrine problem since we don''t really have any place to dump it, what with the pit we were using covered in snow and the ground frozen solid so we can''t really dig another one unless you use magic, which would ruin the soil. So our choices are limited."


    He held up one finger. "We can just desiccate it as you''ve been doing and take it down to the Dungeon farm for fertilizer and for mixing new soil in the tuber planters. We can just throw it out in the snow, but that''s going to thaw in the spring, so we''re basically just delaying the problem in a very disgusting way. Or we can use it as fuel."


    "Fuel," Lori said skeptically.


    Rian nodded. "In the north, it''s prepared like charcoal, put into a kiln and heated with sawdust to create fuel. Since we already put sawdust in the latrines to sop up the waste, after you desiccate it all we have to do is put it into a kiln to cook it."


    "A¡­ kiln," Lori said slowly. "You realize you''re saying we need to spend fuel to produce fuel."


    "No, I''m saying we spend fuel to get rid of waste. The fact we get rid of it by turning it into fuel is simply a bonus. We can try the others as well, but eventually the farm is going to reach the point where we don''t really need all that fertilizer because it would unbalance the mix of the soil or something, and the same for the tuber planters. "


    Lori gave him a flat look. "You want me to build a kiln for the waste, don''t you?"


    Rian shrugged. "It''s either that, or we build some sort of elaborate furnace where we use the fuel we have now to cook the waste into fuel, while also providing warmth to several houses." He frowned. "Or maybe you can just make a desiccating box, like the snow melt box. Just make something that will desiccate anything we put inside it, and I''ll handle organizing people to get the waste there so you don''t have to do it manually. Once it gets full of completely dried waste, we can decide on the next step. We can actually do it all in stages, using it for fertilizer, and then when that''s no longer viable, turning it into fuel. I''m told that some amount of equipment will be needed to start making the waste into fuel, and¡­ well, it''s probably not something we want being done in the second level, since that''s where people will sleep in an emergency. Maybe we can do it in the wood curing sheds after we move all the wood into the Dungeon?"


    "Put together a plan and get back to me," Lori told him. She sighed. "I will consider building a dedicated desiccator for the waste." She''ll probably have to soon. Even with her desiccating the waste, she could see the amount in the latrines building up.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "I''ll let you get back to your afternoon plans then¡­ Ugh."


    Lori sighed again. "What now?"


    "It just occurred to me. How are we going to measure the growth after this? The river''s probably frozen, so we can''t take any of the boats upriver, and with the snow so thick, the markers I used are probably buried so deep I won''t find them until the spring thaw."


    Ah. That would be something of a problem, wouldn''t it? Just because she didn''t obsess about the numbers and rates didn''t mean she didn''t need to know how much her demesne was growing with her expansion attempts. "I trust your ingenuity to devise a means of travel for us," she said.


    It was Rian''s turn to sigh. "Yes, your Bindership. I''ll get to it after I put together a plan for dealing with our increasing amounts of latrine waste."


    She nodded, picking up her sunk board, all the stones in the bowls. "Good. We''ll talk again at dinner. I have work to do. No need to set the clocks."


    "Well, good luck."


    Lori headed upstairs, carrying her game board. After this morning''s preparation and frustration, she still had a demesne she needed to expand. Hopefully, her altered methods would work. Because if it didn''t¡­


    Well, she could easily imagine the next scream that would rip itself from her lungs if that were the case.


    Within her awareness, the spherical binding surrounding her demesne remained inactive, heavily imbued and waiting to be used¡­

 198 - Unexpected Unexpected

    Lori was not one of those foolish people who refused to admit she was wrong. She was very willing to admit she was wrong, once presented with sufficient empirical evidence. She wouldn''t admit it out loud, because that would be pointless and silly and unnecessary, but she would admit it to herself, and that was really the only person such an admission mattered.


    It was still incredibly irritating, those wasted days, but she had a superior method now. At least, it should be superior. With all the wisps at her demesnes border now all part of being a prepared binding instead of simply being bound and willed, she''d been able to heavily align and imbue it. The alignment phase was still important, since she was going to technically be claiming something outside of her ''body''.


    And if the idea didn''t work, she had a binding so wide and heavily imbued that she might actually be able to substantially divert the weather. That would actually be fun to try, she''d never done it before. Weather tended to be a little higher than what she could affect with the size of her demesne.


    Still, Lori prepared her corner nook, lined it with her bedroll and put her pillow behind her head. She made herself comfortable, leaning back and clasping her hands together. Then she closed her eyes and focused on her awareness of her wisps.


    She could feel it, the massive binding across her demesne''s entire border, heavily imbued from this morning. Carefully, she made sure the bindings weren''t anchored to anything material. She did not want the stone at her borders to suddenly convulse outwards. For one thing, that would needlessly consume a lot of imbuement. And it would probably also be very messy.


    Well, there was no use delaying. Lori reached out and took control of the binding and all the wisps that were part of it. A part of her winced as she did so. The binding was a disorganized mess, wisps of all kind bound together without any sort of organization, purpose or division, all of them merely claimed and bound as they had passed. Lightwisps, darkwisps, a preponderance of waterwisps and earthwisps, lightningwisps, airwisps. There were probably even firewisps there she couldn''t perceive because they were too cold.


    She took a deep breath and braced herself, despite the effort being completely of the will. Then she reached outside of her demesne and claimed. Doing so in all directions at once hadn''t become any easier, but she managed to make her wisps surge out, into cold, snow covered lands beyond. Beneath the snow, in the ground away from the water, in the little pockets of air in the snow, delicate crystals of Iridescence grew, carefully growing with the chains of ice. They trapped her wisps, and drew out the imbuement from them, growing and crystallizing. She could perceive some delicate interplay as the Iridescence grew, bonding to each other, displacing the small flakes of snow and ice¡­


    Lori could feel the Iridescence beginning to draw more and more imbuement, trapping more and more wisps¡­ but something was different. She could feel it distinctly. Carefully, the Dungeon Binder released her direct control of the binding, letting it revert to an inactive state as she took a moment so sit back and make sense of what she was perceiving.


    It took several moments to be sure of what she was feeling, moments where she had to open her eyes half way to metaphorically rub her eyes to clear them and look again. However, what she was perceiving didn''t change.


    The Iridescence was trapping wisps and drawing imbuement at a greatly reduced rate. It was, in fact, the same rate of decay her bindings experienced normally when she created them outside of her demesne. It was a feeling she wasn''t going to ever forget. It was also far less than the seemingly voracious rate of consumption she had perceived over the past two weeks when she had been expanding her demesne. What?


    She looked closer, and realized that wasn''t exactly true. There was almost no such consumption above the ground, out in the open sky¡­ which made sense. No Iridescence there. The storm was too cold and blowing too energetically for there to probably be much in the way of small Iridescence crystals on the wind. And as she had perceived, there was some Iridescence in the snow, nestled in the gaps of the frozen water. And underground¡­


    Lori observed her earthwisps on the underground part of her demesne. There, at least, imbuement was being drawn and consumed. But while it was at a greater rate than the above-ground decay, it wasn''t exactly the voracious consumption she''d become used to when she''d expanded¡­


    Slowly, carefully, Lori made a hole in her spherical binding at the river''s entry point that she was beginning to think of as her reference. She aligned and channeled magic, then made it flow to that spot, binding wisps and heavily imbuing them. Through the hole in her demesne-sized binding, she reached outside of her demesne as she had done before, and used the wisps she had just bound and imbued to claim wisps outside of her demesne¡­


    Nothing. Well, no difference from how her binding was currently being consumed. What¡­?


    Oh, right. She was claiming outwards on the river. The ice and water wouldn''t have any Iridescence, after all.


    Lori opened another hole, this time underground amidst solid stone and trapped water, and repeated what she had done¡ª


    Ah, there was the voraciousness with which she had become familiar! Her wisps becoming trapped, the consumption slowly escalating, as if the more imbuement the Iridescence devoured, the more they could devour. Lori observed the process with interested detachment, imbuing more and more magic to the wisps she had claimed as they became trapped but still hers. She watched and waited, like a child throwing things into the fire to watch them burn in the flames. Without the distraction and strain of trying to reach out and claim in all directions at once, Lori calmly watched as more and more of the wisps she had reached out beyond the borders of her demesne with were entrapped.


    As the last of the wisps she had reached out with were about to be consumed, Lori calmly bound the Iridescence to her will. Her wisps became part of the Iridescence, and the Iridescence became part of her wisps, their increasingly familiar sensation seeming to melt away.


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    Lori opened her eyes and sat up straight, frowning down at her floor. Had it been open so she could see into the room where her core was, would she have seen its surface ripple? Probably. The increase to her demesne''s size was likely infinitesimal, though. It had required claiming outwards from every part of the border of her demesne to expand forty-four and a half yustri. One probably needed to be a Horotract with a parvusight to be able to tell how much her demesne had expanded from that little exercise.


    She sat back again and considered what she had discovered. So, in addition to greatly reducing imbuement loss, forming her wisps into an active binding also reduced the rate that the colors devoured imbuement¡­ which made sense. She''d made bindings outside of her demesne before, after all. It''s just she hadn''t realized the full repercussions of the effect on the steps needed to expand her demesne.


    Did this affect expansion? Lori closed her eyes and regarded the binding around her demesne, which now had two holes in it. It was still heavily imbued, even as the underground portion was having that imbuement drawn on by Iridescence. She tried to judge how long it would take for the binding to collapse from the draw rate. So far, it looked like it would last all through the afternoon and a short ways into the evening, but that didn''t account for the slow increase in the rate at of consumption¡­


    So she had plenty of time¡­ if this method worked. She still hadn''t successfully expanded with it, after all.


    Lori nodded to herself. All right, test that first, worry about the repercussions later. The repercussions would only be worth worrying about if this actually worked. Taking several deep, even breaths to steady herself out of habit, Lori reached out and took direct control of the binding around her demesne once more, then began the process of binding the iridescence to her will¡ª


    It started going wrong immediately.


    As soon as she reached through her binding and bound the first of the Iridescence, she felt her binding, her entire sky-wide binding, suddenly heave violently as the wisps trapped in colors became part of each other¡­ and then began dragging the entire binding with it, drawing the whole binding towards the first point that she had claimed the Iridescence in like water into a drain.


    The shock caused her simultaneous other attempts to collapse, which in hindsight was probably for the best as she instinctively tried to reassert control of the binding. It was nothing like trying to fight someone who was trying to claim wisps already under her control. Her claim was still in place, it was just that the entire binding was moving anyway!


    Frantically, Lori reached out and severed the wisps fused with the Iridescence from the rest of the binding, forcibly dissipating the wisps closest to the voracious amalgamation as she cried out in a frantic panic. She nearly collapsed in relief as this worked, the binding suddenly falling still again as the amalgamation was severed from it, the latter vanishing from her awareness as soon as it was no longer part of the binding.


    Lori stared at the stone ceiling above her, panting as if she had actually physically exerted herself. That¡­ that had never happened before. Nothing like it had ever happened before! That was¡­ that was¡­! Well, she would have said it was impossible, but it had clearly just happened and¡ª


    There was a frantic knocking on her door. "Lori!" Rian''s voice cried though the wood. "Are you all right?-! Are you hurt?-! Lori! Say something!"


    Lori blinked in surprised, sitting up. "Rian?" she said. What¡­? Oh. She had cried out involuntarily, and someone must have heard her. "I''m fine! Just¡­ I''m fine."


    The knocking had ceased as soon as she''d spoken, for which she was glad. It had been quite strident. "Can I come in?" her lord called through the door?


    Lori hesitated, then nodded. Then realized he couldn''t see the nod. "Fine, come in," she said.


    The door opened, and while she''d been expecting Rian, she was surprised to see other people crowding around him in her hallway. Thankfully, none of them tried to come inside as Rian stepped in and closed the door behind him. "Are you all right?" he said immediately, as if she hadn''t already answered his question.


    "I already told you, I''m fine," she said, irritation coming forward.


    "People who scream like that are seldom fine," Rian retorted. He turned and open the door, stick his head outside. "She''s all right! Nothing to worry about, she''s not dying! Everyone relax, I''ll take care of whatever it is!" Lori glared at the back of Rian''s head as he made people stop crowding outside in her hallway. Eventually, he pulled his head back in, closing the door behind him once again. "What happened, then? You went ''Ta-wa-wa-wa-wa'' so loudly I heard you from the bottom of the stairs." He looked around. "Nothing seems damaged, so¡­ did something happen while you were trying to expand the demesne?"


    "I¡­" Ugh, why did he have to be so perceptive? She let out an annoyed huff. "Something unexpected happened," she finally admitted.


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "Good unexpected or bad unexpected?"


    "Unexpected unexpected," she flatly. "Something completely outside of my experience or education."


    Rian frowned, looking around again as if he expected to see something. "Is it dangerous?" he asked. "Do we need to get everyone inside and seal up the dungeon? Or get everyone out of the dungeon?"


    Lori shook her head. "No, no, nothing like that. The unexpected occurrence occurred just outside the demesne. I managed to stop it before¡­ well, I managed to stop it."


    "You paused. I heard that pause. That sounds like a very disturbing pause I should be very concerned about."


    She glared at him, but her heart wasn''t in it.


    For some reason, Rian walked towards her and knelt down meeting her eyes. "Lori¡­" he said. "If there''s been some sort of unexpected magical accident or something, maybe you should tell me what it was? Because this is sounding disturbingly like the part in a story where one character doesn''t tell the other characters what they know, and vital information that should have been passed isn''t, and the whole story ends tragically with everyone dead."


    Lori snorted. "You read far too many stories," she said.


    "Play, actually. It''s a surprisingly common bit of plot-mandated stupidity in tragedies." Rian shrugged, spreading his hands. "Come on Lori, tell me. The worst that could happen is I don''t understand a thing because I''m not a wizard. Who knows, maybe if you explain it, hearing what you''re saying out loud will lead to some sudden epiphany enlightening you to what happened."


    That¡­ was something that happened in stories, wasn''t it? "You realize that''s just a plot contrivance to exposit to the audience so they can be fed all the relevant information leading to the sudden twist, don''t you?" she said flatly.


    Another shrug. "It might work," Rian said. "I know it''s sometimes happened to me."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine," she said. She supposed she did need to figure out what had happened. Absently, she checked the large binding around her demesne. It was still intact and imbued, although it had a third hole in it now at ground level, and the binding had grown thin at the opposite end of the demesne from whatever that amalgamation had done. "Sit, I''ll only explain this once." Rian sat at the foot of her bed, looking expectant as she was forced to organize her thoughts. How to relate what had happened¡­ "To begin with, as I was making preparations for expanding the demesne this morning, I came to a realization¡­ "

 199 - A Success By Any Standard

    "We''ll have to go to the spot at the edge of the demesne where it happened," Rian said thoughtfully after she finished relating matters to him. "If nothing else, if this somehow deformed the terrain, it might be a good idea to see how."


    "Unlikely," Lori said. "The wisps weren''t anchored to anything except to hold them in place, otherwise I would be distending the ground at the borders of the demesne at every expansion."


    "I should probably go check, just in case," Rian insisted. "Dismissing something and not going to check it out is also a form of plot-contrivance that leads to horrible consequences."


    Lori rolled her eyes. All right, even if she hated the obvious utter stupidity of that particular plot contrivance herself¡­ Ugh. "Fine. We''ll go check it out as soon as it''s feasible."


    "Absolutely not!" Rian said. "''We'' are not going anywhere! I''m checking it out, you stay here in case it''s something horrible and deadly!"


    "Rian, it wasn''t Deadspeaking, you''re unlikely to find some twisted abomination that cannot survive without magic."


    "And that''s exactly the sort of dismissive attitude that gets the annoying scholar or lord or so-called expert killed early in the story as comeuppance for their arrogance," he pointed out. "No, no, we don''t send the vitally irreplaceable person into this strange, potentially dangerous situation. You''ve injured yourself and gotten assaulted going to the latrine, let''s not add a third thing. I''ll go, you can lead me from here."


    "And how am I supposed to lead you from here?" Lori snapped irritably. While he made several good points, especially about her safety¡­ Ugh. She hated it when Rian was right.


    "You can track me with my glow rock, so when I''m close, just put some kind of glowing signal over where I''m supposed to go," Rian said. "It''ll be another thing we''ll have to remember to do once the storm is over. I''ll have to remember to write it down. Now, about your new expansion technique¡­"


    "It''s not a new technique. Using it resulted in an unforeseen effect. I have no idea what the result was, but it clearly wasn''t expansion," Lori said.


    "Not necessarily," Rian said. "You said yourself that having the big binding made putting magic into everything easier, and it was faster and less tiring than what you had to do before. If nothing else, integrating it into at least the preparatory step of your expansion procedure will save you on time, effort and literal headaches."


    Obviously. "Obviously," Lori said. "That much is blatantly obvious. I was already planning to do that." Really, her biggest regret was the utter waste of imbuement that would result from it. If she should lose her control of the wisps after expansion as she had done previously, all that imbuement would once more go to waste. "I''ll have to experiment on how quickly I can bind everything again after the expansion stage to keep the imbuement from dissipating¡­" If she worked quickly and systematically¡ªand if her head didn''t hurt too much when she did it¡ªshe should be able to claim a significant portion of the wisps into a binding again before the imbuement substantially dissipated.


    "If there''s any imbuement to dissipate," Rian pointed out.


    Lori paused, frowning. Ugh! "You''re right," she hissed in frustration. "It was right in front of my face! I even did a standard expansion before the phenomenon and saw it happen." There had been no leftover imbued wisps when she had bound the Iridescence as everything came together. "Stupid! I could have realized how unnecessary this was earlier!"


    Rian''s voice was annoyingly reasonable. "Well, like you said, a better preparatory step that doesn''t wear you out is already a significant improvement, and it means you still don''t have to worry about a post-expansion clean and reset stage. That''s all improvement as far as I can understand."


    Lori grimaced but had to reluctantly agree. "Yes, yes, I suppose. Still, I was hoping that the procedure would allow me to immediately reset to the pre-expansion phase with already imbued wisps so I could perform multiple expansions per day."


    Rian tilted his head thoughtfully. "Maybe you still can?"


    "Oh, undoubtedly," Lori said. "With the improved preparatory phase I might be able to perform two, perhaps three expansions a day." She allowed herself a chuckle. "That would triple your precious numbers."


    "Why stop at three?" Rian said, still sounding more thoughtful than excited, the fingers of one hand moving, either counting something or drawing a sketch only he could see.


    Lori considered the question. Actually¡­ "I could perhaps experiment to see how far I can push it," Lori said, voice becoming equally thoughtful. "With sufficient practice and habit, I could become faster at the preparatory stage." She''d never seemed to get better at it with the method she''d previously used, but with what she had done to set up the binding today¡­ well, such a simple, rote procedure''s only possible problems was her mind wandering from boredom. She could easily start increasing the relative area she claimed as she spiraled around her demesne, over time. In a few months, she might even be able to claim the entire border of her demesne in one move out of sheer habit¡­ "I''d need a brief rest after every expansion before setting it up again, but since the new method isn''t as strenuous¡­ "


    "What if you ready several preparatory stages at once?" Rian said.


    Lori blinked, staring at her lord. "What?"


    "You said the big binding for the preparation stage is like a shell around the demesne, right?" he said. "What if after you set it up, you put up another shell just inside it instead of waiting until after you''ve expanded to make a new one? Several separate, already prepared stages that you can use immediately after your first expansion of the day. Well, after you let your head rest, anyway. Expand the demesne, rest for a bit, grab the next prepared shell and expand again. Or is there some reason why that won''t work?"


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    Lori paused, thinking about. Multiple prepared bindings, all layered one within another¡­ "I see no reason why not," she said mused. "As long as each successive layer isn''t anchored or bound to the next..." She could already see it. Multiple nested layers of bindings¡­ Ah, and running though all of them, a single point of connection that she could easily dissolve, but while it was in place, she could imbue all the layers simultaneous!


    Actually¡­ if the layers would need to be connected to be imbued¡­


    "I might not even need multiple bindings¡­" Lori mused to herself


    Rian blinked. "You don''t?"


    Lori nodded slowly, still thoughtful. "Another possibility is I simply create one binding that I divide into multiple layers¡­" It was¡­ theoretically possible, though already her mind cringed at trying to conceptualize how she would do it. Impulsively, she claimed some airwisps, and then formed them into a ball around some other airwisps that she didn''t claim. Then she tried to separate the ball into two layers, but forming the proper mental image was difficult¡­


    Rian was completely unaware about any of this. "Like a spiral!" he said. "Instead of making ends meet into a sphere, you make one end go under the other and loop it around as many times as you need! Then you break it up and fuse pieces together to form layers!"


    Lori paused, blinking as the description translated itself into her mind. A spiral¡­ "Yes, I suppose that''s one way to do it," she said thoughtfully. She''d been thinking in terms of height, length and width, but Rian rendering it in terms of a spiral let her let her simplify the concepts involved. "A spiral with height, length and width¡­"


    "Like a slug shell," Rian suggested.


    Oh. That was an easy image to remember. While not perfect spheres, the image of the spiraling shell some kinds of slugs had was far simpler to visualize!


    "I shall have to test the idea," Lori said, mostly to remind herself. "While theoretically possible, it might be difficult to actually form the binding in the shape in question. While time consuming, forming individual shells is simpler and does not require esoteric visualizations." And given how her mind already flinched from expected pain from just thinking of how to form a binding in a massive spiraling shell¡­


    "Hmm¡­ very true, very true," Rian mused. "Actually, this is a multi-step process, right? Then it''s probably best to keep the steps as simple as possible. The fewer details to worry about going wrong, the better."


    Oh. Yes, he was correct. Even though a waterjet cutter was capable of complex shapes and cuts, most of the time the cuts done were straight lines, or at best circles that could be achieved by slowly and carefully spinning a piece of wood on a secured axis point. Complex curves were the domain of hand saws, and were slow, taxing work.


    Lori glanced up and through her awareness of wisps, she saw her shell around her demesne, slightly distended and with holes in it. "Of course, these improvements rely on the fact that the preparatory binding can be used for the expansion process."


    "Easy enough to test, right?" Rian said. "Just get rid of the binding and expand as you normally would."


    "Yes," Lori agreed, then sat back, making herself comfortable. "Easy enough to test¡­"


    "Wait, you''re doing it now?"


    "Quiet."


    "Shutting up, your Bindership."


    Leaning back and closing her eyes, Lori took control of the massive binding once more¡­


    ¡­


    The result was almost anticlimactic. After making the binding expand beyond the borders of the demesne to claim the wisps immediately adjacent to them, she dissolved the massive binding, bracing herself for the sudden voracious increase in the rate that imbuement was being devoured by the Iridescence. Once she was actively controlling all the imbued wisps with her will alone, she simply expanded as she normally did, binding the glittering rainbows beyond the edge of her demesne to her will.


    And that was that. Her dimensions of her demesne expanded, and now that she was properly paying attention, she saw how none of the imbued wisps remained from her expansion. A part of her felt strange, expecting the usual headache and tiredness, but there was none of the extreme mental fatigue she had come to expect after the process. Far from it, in fact¡­


    Lori opened her eyes. "The expansion was successful," she told her lord succinctly.


    Rian nodded and¡ªwhere had he gotten that wooden tablet? Oh, it was the one on her table with his ''encouraging numbers'' on it¡ªwrote something on the tablet he held with his charred wooden stick. "Wonderful," he said. "Do you feel like you''re capable of performing the steps again? Preparation binding, imbuement, expansion? I wouldn''t suggest doing it right this second, but if you had a short rest, do you think you could do it again today?"


    Lori considered the question. She felt a minor throb in her head, but beyond that¡­ "I might need a nap," she assessed, "but that was because I had pushed myself earlier to counter the phenomenon, and I''ve just finished claiming. With a nap, I''m certain I can do it again at least once more today."


    Rian nodded, writing this down. "If you had a binding for another expansion you''d prepared earlier, do you think you''d need the nap?"


    Lori titled her head. "A nap would be nice, but I think I can manage another expansion at this moment, provided the binding had already been imbued," she mused.


    More writing. "How about I set the water clock for an hour and you take a nap. Once you''re done, I''ll time how long it takes you from the start of preparation until you finish expansion. We can work out an improved schedule for you then."


    Lori''s head throbbed. "Make it an hour and a half," she said.


    After all, she''d already expanded he demesne twice today, even if the first instance had been negligible. A third instance could wait.


    Rian nodded. "Do you want anything for your head? I can probably get you a spoonful of honey, tell them it''s for emergency medical reasons."


    The thought of the thick, green, sweet syrup was terribly tempting¡­ "Just get me something to drink," Lori said as she arranged her bedding bad pillow for a nap. "And be sure to wake up on time."


    Later that day, the third expansion of her demesne was, if anything, even more anti-climactic. There were no more unplanned surprises, no supreme efforts of will or quick reactions. To an outside observer, she simply lay back with her eyes closed as Rian watched the both her and the water clocks. A close observer would have seen her head moving side to side in small motions, seen her eyes tracking beneath her eyelids.


    After a little over an hour and a half, just as dinner was being served, Lori opened her eyes. "Done," she said. "Expansion complete."


    Rian hummed. "You said making the preparatory binding took you an hour this morning, not counting fully imbuing it. Do you think you managed it faster this time?"


    "I do not know," Lori said thoughtfully.


    "Hmm¡­ We might need to time that as a separate step," Rian said. "It seems like it''s the step in the process that will take up the most time."


    "I''ll be able to shorten it," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively.


    "Hm¡­ well, if you say so. How are you feeling? Tired? Headache? Need more sleep? Spoon of honey?"


    The honey was tempting¡­


    "I''m well," Lori said as she pushed herself up from her reclining position, moving her back to to bring feeling back to the parts that had gone a little numb.


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Are you at least feeling better than how you usually would after the old expansion process?"


    Well, that was easy to answer. "Far better," she admitted.


    Nod, note. "All right, excellent! You did it twice and it didn''t exhaust you. A success by any standard. You''d never have even tried doing it twice in one day with the old one."


    "We still need to see how much the demesne expanded," she pointed out.


    "Until this storm blows over, I don''t think we should worry about those numbers too much," Rian said, though he looked frustrated as he said it. "Better to think about the results we can measure, for now."


    She supposed he was right. "I suppose you''re right," she allowed. "Now help me up, I''m hungry."

 200 - Past The Storm

    The storm continued for two more days, finally blowing itself out and going still after five days of intense wind and snow. Technically it stopped midday of the fifth day, but Rian had suggested giving it time, in case it had simply been a lull and not the end.


    During those two days, Lori had continued expanding her demesne using her new methodology. The creation of the massive spherical binding, while still greatly intimidating in scale, had been made and remade again and again. Despite how annoyed she''d been at Rian for wanting to time how long each binding took to create, it had become clear that each iteration was finished incrementally faster than the one before.


    Rian, predictably, had gone strange again now that he had a new number that was going up¡­ or down, as the case had been. It wasn''t even something that he''d had anything to do with!


    Still, Lori couldn''t deny that there was a certain satisfaction in being able to do multiple times a day with relative ease what had once been possible only daily, and with great suffering. Between the relatively more sedentary pace enforced on them by the storm and how little else she had to do, she had the time to expand her demesne nine more times. Three expansions per day had turned out to be insufficiently optimistic.


    On the sixth day after the storm began, with the sun shining weakly through the hole left open in the entryway to the dungeon to assure them this wasn''t some temporary lull, her whole demesne set out to dig out their homes from the snow. Nearly everything had been buried in the frozen water, snow piled so high on the roofs of houses the structures were essentially entombed.


    As they had planned, the first order of business had been for Lori to create a tunnel through the snow to the tool shed, a house-sized stone building at the edge of their agricultural fields notable for its low ceiling and wide double door to accommodate the carts stored within. It was also deeply buried, but the roof was well-cured wood and had been put together by carpenters who knew what they were doing. The floor was covered in bugs, dead from either the cold or running out of air in the half week the storm had persisted.


    The next building she tunneled to were the curing sheds, full of a mix of firewood, logs that were being stored in preparation for being cut into planks, beams and anything else they needed, and a supply of charcoal, made by the demesne''s charcoal burners. There wasn''t a lot of it, not enough to supply every house in the demesne¡ªthe supply had been meant to supply the smiths¡ªbut it was a fuel. She also passed by the second bath house on the way, because they needed the facilities.


    The whole first day was busy, with only a brief stop for lunch, as Lori tunneled to connect to other disparate buildings of the demesne, and the successive days didn''t get much easier. She was so busy she barely found the time to expand the demesne once a day. Thankfully, her new process was much more forgiving than her old one, affording her more recovery time, usually when she was just imbuing the binding in preparation for expansion.


    Everyone else worked hard on getting the buildings with wooden roofs unburied, standing on top of the planks from the curing shed to distribute their weight on the snow so they wouldn''t sink. There was a lot of digging, and Rian had needed to ask Lori to mark out with lightwisps the areas where there wasn''t anything buried in the snow after there had been altercation''s from people flinging their snow on top of other houses.


    The laundry area''s rather flimsy roof of branches had collapsed at one corner, which explained why Lori had woken up to find the binding keeping the area warm had dissipated, all the imbuement used up from melting the snow. The mushroom farm had been cold, far too cold, but while all the growing mushrooms seemed to have wilted, this apparently meant the mushrooms had simply gone into winter hibernation, and could be continued once it became warm enough to thaw and fruit again. The tannery, it was initially decided, was a lost cause until the snow melted, but eventually Lori had been convinced to tunnel there to save what skins and leathers had been left behind.


    She also tunneled towards where the rest of the vigas had been stored, and in hindsight storing such an essential resource outside the Dungeon had clearly been a stupid idea. Fortunately the Dungeon had room. Even if there weren''t many alcoves still standing empty, there was room in the side tunnels of the third level, at least until Lori continued with expanding it. Digging the houses out was put on hold the next day until all the storage jars of the precious grain had been properly moved to her Dungeon, every jar accounted for, their clay seals checked to make sure they were all still intact.


    The second to last structure Lori had tunneled to had been the irrigation cistern, where all the waste water from the bath houses was delivered by the pipes, to find that it had predictably flooded recently, since the ground had become waterlogged and then frozen. The snow around it had darkened from the things in the water, soap and dirt that had been washed off, and the binding that had evaporated the water and fed it back to be used again in the second bath house had also been overwhelmed and dissipated. Thankfully, the pipes hadn''t filled with frozen water, but she had needed to quickly devise a different means of dealing with their waste water.


    Using the snow as building material, she''d made pipes of ice and a binding of air-, water-, and firewisps to turn waste water into snow and blast it out over the buried agricultural fields, while the heat that was removed from the water by the process kept the underground pipes warm to prevent the waste water from freezing solid and blocking them. Lori would have to check it ever so often and invert the firewisps to destroy excess heat if it became too much and started to make the snow around it boil¡ªit took the same amount of magic to increase heat as it did to decrease it¡ªbut she''d need to keep it imbued anyway.


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    The very last structures she tunneled to were the dock for the Coldhold, which had fused to the frozen ice of the river, and the nearby water hub shed. She''d deactivated the latter once the river froze and no more new water was being pulled into the reservoir. So far, the snow melter was doing adequately for their water needs, even if it needed to be loaded with clean snow daily, but that was hardly a resource currently in short supply.


    Even when all the tunnels connecting everything had been finished, the ice walls lined with a layer of packed snow, there was always more for her to do. The sudden increase in usable latrines meant she had to put the plan Rian had proposed into action. It was a viscerally disgusting plan, even if she intellectually understood that all the things that rendered the material disgusting would have long since ceased to be relevant.


    A part of her wanted to use bound ice as the building material in questions, simply because water was currently so plentiful, but eventually decided to use stone. Choosing where to put it was slightly more complicated, but she eventually decided to set it up just past Rian''s house, just outside the mushroom farm. This required extending the tunnel slightly, creating an open space under the snow held back by ice walls. It was actually not that different from excavating her dungeon. She even made sure to place supporting pillars.


    After the small space was made, she used stone to build a large stone tank that rose up to chest height, with a ramp leading above it so that the waste could be dumped inside. The size of the tank was to help prevent any misuse by putting the active biding well beyond arms reach. Why anyone would want to stick their arm in tank full of waste, she had no idea, but it wouldn''t surprise her if someone did so just because she thought no one would actually be stupid enough to do so. The size would also allow it to be filled for a long time before it had to be opened and the contents removed so that the next step could be done.


    A part of her hoped it would last all through the winter, but she was resigned to the unlikelihood of that. The waste of more than two hundred people, desiccated or not, would very quickly pile up.


    When it inevitably did so, according to Rian''s plan the box could be turned into a kiln, the insides lined with bound ice to act as an insulator, to bake the waste. This would simultaneously reduce the weight further and alchemically render the now-cooked waste of similar substance to charcoal. The resulting substance would be pressed into chunks and used as fuel to heat homes, or so the plan went. She had spoken to the charcoal burners Rian had spoken to, who assured her this was how it was done in small, cold villages in winter, and had confidently claimed they could do it. They even had the molds for pressing the¡­ substance¡­ into solid chunks. All she''d need to do was provide heat when the time came, and they''d do the rest.


    The idea still made her shudder. But it was a solution to the latrine waste issue, and she didn''t have to touch a thing, so she really had no good reason to refuse the plan, and Lori had tried very, very hard to find one.


    Sometimes, not very often but sometimes, she really hated her own practical nature.


    That same practical nature resigned her to the fact that people were unlikely to leave her Dungeon and go back to their homes until spring, or at least until they cleared the snow enough to be able to gather more firewood. Though at the rate progress was being made, that would also not be until spring. That didn''t mean she had to like it.


    "Well, can you blame us?" Rian said over dinner almost a week after the storm had ended as he put down the bowls of soup he was helping Riz carry. "It''s still freezing out there, and the snow''s still too thick for us to cut any new firewood. It''s warmer in here."


    "My Dungeon is for emergencies," Lori said as she took one of the bowls and a cup of water.


    "A shortage of an essential resource is an emergency," Rian said as the three other women took their own bowls. "Until we can clear enough snow to be able to reach the tree line and start gathering more firewood, we''ll have a wood shortage. And we''re barely keeping ahead of the snow fall from burying everyone''s houses again as it is, never mind making progress towards the treeline."


    "Why are people doing that if they''re not living in them?" Lori said irritably.


    "For space to hang laundry," Rian said.


    Lori stared at him. Then she glanced at Umu and Mikon, just to be sure. They both nodded in confirmation.


    She sighed heavily. The sad thing was she really couldn''t find any fault with that argument. People still needed to wash their clothes, and while the laundry area''s roof covering had been repaired, there was otherwise nowhere else to hang the clothes out to dry except her dungeon.


    "Look, it can''t be helped," Rian said as he stirred his soup with his spoon a few times. "Either this was a really bad storm or this area just naturally gets a lot of snow at this time of year. And you were the one who decided to make clearing a path towards the forest your last priority. Not that I disagree that the desiccator was more important." He raised a spoonful, blew on it and ate.


    "I know, I know," Lori said irritably. "I''ll get to it tomorrow." Simply moving all the snow by binding all the waterwisps had been an option for her, of course, but the tunnels were secured against further snowfall. Also, a part of her was of the opinion that people should be kept busy lest they have the time to do something stupid. Clearing a path towards the treeline was just the sort of thing to aid people in keeping busy.


    "That would be wonderful, thank you. Warm as it is in here, I''m starting to miss my bed." Given that she had previously slept on that bed, Lori doubted it was the bed itself he missed as she glanced at the women seated to either side of him. "We''ll have to keep a watch kept after you do," Rian mused. "Wouldn''t want chokers getting into the tunnels, after all. Maybe some kind of temporary door."


    Lori snorted derisively. "I highly doubt any chokers survived the storm. Even if they did, they''d be buried in paces of snow."


    "Life always finds a way," Rian said. "Those things had been living and surviving on this continent for who knows how long. This can''t be the first time a storm like this had come around. They''re out there somewhere. When spring comes, we''ll probably up to our necks dealing with them, because they''ll be hungry."


    That¡­ sounded annoyingly plausible. "Well, I''ll leave that to you," Lori said. "Their meat will do us good."


    "Every little bite helps," Rian¡­ probably agreed.

 201 - Oh

    Lori had planned to clear the way to the tree line by creating another tunnel through the snow until they hit a tree, and then having people with shovels deal with the rest. It was, in her opinion, the simplest way to deal with a lot of frozen water unless they wanted a lot of ice lying around, and she didn''t. Snow wasn''t a contiguous solid, after all, so she''d need to compact it first before she could properly manipulate it. In many ways it shared the same problems as using earthwisps to move soil.


    Then Rian had one of his strange ideas over breakfast.


    "Using wind on the snow?" Lori said skeptically over breakfast.


    Rian nodded. "Yes. At this point, most of the snow we''re clearing up is new stuff. It hasn''t had time to compact, get hard and stick together. We can shovel it, but if we had a strong enough wind, it would blow right off the roofs."


    "Rian, stop procrastinating and waiting for the wind to do the work for you."


    Next to Rian, Riz actually snickered.


    "That''s not what I''m doing," Rian said with theatrical injured dignity. "Though admittedly I can understand why you would think that. No, I was thinking that¡­ uh, well¡­"


    "You''ve thought of more work for me again, haven''t you," Lori said blandly.


    "In my defense, it''s only work for you if you decide to do it. You''re the Dungeon Binder, you don''t have to do anything you don''t want to."


    "That''s right, I don''t," Lori said.


    "Even if what I have in mind might be fun to play with, your authority is above and beyond all others in the demesne. You have no peers or equals, so no matter how enjoyable my idea might be, you don''t have to do a thing."


    "Now you''re just being childish," Lori noted.


    "It could still be fun," Rian said cheerfully. "And it might even help with gathering firewood. Maybe. Possibly."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "You sound like a child begging for a new toy. Don''t you have any more critical business to speak of?"


    "Well, we could talk about the food supply," Rian said.


    "Then do that and stop wasting my time with your silliness," Lori said.


    "Fine, fine. We have enough food to last the winter."


    Lori waited. Eventually she said, "That''s it?"


    "That''s it." Rian had on one of his annoying smiles now. "All critical business, spoken about." He paused. "Well, there is one other thing¡­"


    "Then it''s not all critical business after all. What else?"


    "Should we check on River''s Fork to see if they''re still alive?"


    "So, this silly idea of yours, using wind to clean off the snow?"


    "Yes! It''s an idea that came to me last night, though only you can do it," Rian said, smiling brightly. "The snow we get every morning is pretty light since it hadn''t gotten back down yet. With a strong enough wind, you could just blow it off the roofs."


    "And I should do so¡­ why? Shovels and feather brooms have been doing well so far."


    "That would be nice, but no. My point is snow is airy. If you can create a strong, focused wind, you might be able to simply blast the snow out of your way instead of having to slowly tunnel through it." He blew on his hand, presumably pretending to blow away snow.


    Lori tilted her head. She considered the snow over her demesne, the feeling of all the waterwisps covering its surface. The other wisps intermixed into it¡ªlightwisps, airwisps, darkwisps, earthwisps¡ªshe had all but ignored. After all, there was always something dissolved or mixed into water. It was nothing unusual, and only really something to pay attention to when she was trying to make ice that was perfectly transparent, with no bubbles from the dissolved air or particulates from dust¡­


    She shrugged. "I suppose I can give it a try when I clear the path to the tree line later."


    It worked surprisingly well, once she had the technique down. The air had to strike the snow at an angle, essentially shaving off the surface, but a constant flow of wind quickly broke up any amount of snow. Even snow that seemed hard packed turned out to not be as solid as it appeared, unless it had become ice somehow.


    "See, you''re having fun," Rian said as he followed behind her, using the spear he held in his other hand as a walking stick. He poked the ground in front of him with the butt of the spear before taking a step. Lori did the same thing with her staff, the wire cool under her hand, which meant it was probably freezing. Their clothes fluttered energetically around them as the binding Lori maintaining sent air blasting in front of them at a slightly upwards angle and another one that blew at a downward angle.


    "I suppose," Lori said, trying to sound detached. All right, yes, this was fun. It was a binding that would have required her to swallow a bead before she had become a Dungeon Binder, since the amount of imbuement needed for the wind to be constant while moving this volume of air through a binding this wide was¡­ well, she would just barely not be able to maintain it unless she was willing to hyperventilate, which was unsafe. It was jarring sometimes, to realize that she was doing something that would have taken at least two Whisperers to maintain, and doing it as a matter of course.


    Rian nodded. "I don''t suppose you can stick this binding in a tube that someone else can carry around? Let other people share in the fun and maybe make getting snow off roofs easier?"


    Lori turned and gave him a flat look.


    "It''s just a thought," he said guilelessly. "The snow''s been filling up the paths to the houses we dug up. If you want people to move out of the Dungeon and back to their houses, we need either an easier way to clear snow or just turn all the alleys between the houses into tunnels so all we have to worry about is keeping snow of the roofs and chimneys."


    Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    Ah, right, she still had to make the chimneys taller, didn''t she?


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori, in her generosity¡ªand because it was fun to use her binding to blast snow away¡ªcleared space around several trees once they reached the tree line. Once she had cleared a path, people finally stopped simply loitering in her dungeon and actually began working again. Trees were cut for wood, and then snow had to be cleared to reach other trees.


    Most of the tree would become firewood, but a few parts that were particularly straight and thick were set aside and taken to the curing sheds, to dry in the cold over time so they could be properly cut in the spring. The sawpit they''d been using before was buried in snow, and no one wanted to try digging down that deep. The rest of the wood was cut with saw and axes and taken down to the third level for storage, while the sawdust was gathered for the latrines. Lori was amused to see Rian going around gathering up thin branches and twigs into a bucket.


    Now that they had a regular source of firewood again, people finally started going back to their houses. Lori gave in and spent two days building up a network of ice tunnels in the alleys and paths between the houses near her Dungeon. There were also breaks in the tunnels that opened out into the sky, through which people could access their roofs with a ladder. Well, once the snow was cleared, anyway, because of course snow would drop down and block the way.


    Try as she might, Lori couldn''t find a safe way to anchor the air jet binding to something solid without whatever she bound it to becoming extremely dangerous. Any material that the airwisps could be anchored that was light enough to be easily carried¡ªthe best one had been made from bone¡ªwould also be light enough to be propelled by the expulsion of air the binding caused. This meant that once the binding was made and anchored to an object, there was no way to safely put it down. Putting the object down resulted in a randomly moving, dangerous projectile moving around at high speed, at least until it ran out of imbuement. And unlike the water jet, they couldn''t just remove it from the air so the binding would have nothing to propel, because air was everywhere.


    Attempts to block airflow with wooden various plugs had some success, but the intensity of the suction meant it was very, very difficult to pull the plug out again. Rian had proposed a complex mechanism of sliding boxes, similar to the adjustable water jet driver in the Coldhold, to let the binding keep circulating air so that it could be put down safely, but even he seemed to agree that building such a thing wasn''t reasonable.


    That didn''t mean the idea was completely abandoned, but it required Lori to personally hand out the bone tubes with the bindings and activate and deactivate the binding herself, which was¡­ annoying. Still, it worked to a degree, letting one person clear the snow from several houses if they stood on the right roof and were very careful with their footing, at least until the imbuement ran out. And the imbuement did run out, since she only put a relatively small amount of imbuement into the binding. Better not enough than too much. If the work still wasn''t finished, well, they had brooms and shovels.


    After that, Lori spent most of the next week making the chimneys taller. It wasn''t much, only about a pace or so above the highest point of the roof, but it was enough to let the fireplaces vent out smoke even if the house was still partially buried. For the first time, however, she wasn''t doing it alone.


    "Rian," Lori said, regarding him and the mix of men and women with him, "what is this about?"


    "So, a ''dealing with people'' matter has come to my attention," Rian said, "in regards to you putting up extensions to the chimneys."


    Lori gave him and those with him a blank look. "If they want me to work on their houses first¡­"


    "No, no, actually it''s something sensible this time. We know how you are with names so we''ll skip that part, but these good folk are our demesne''s stone masons, carpenters¡ª" ah, that''s why they looked familiar, "¡ªstone workers and thatchers."


    Lori frowned. "What''s a thatcher?"


    Rian glanced at a pair of people. "She''s from the city, they don''t do thatch roofs there," he said. "Ahem, a thatcher is basically a craftsman who makes roofs using plant fibers. Not something you''ve probably run into in the city, but they''re very important in the edges and in places that don''t have ready access to other roofing materials. They''re mostly here because they have a good head for heights and standing on roofs. Which is about what we¡ªand by which I mean me¡ªwant to talk to you about."


    "Well, go on. I have work I still need to do," Lori said irritably.


    "Yes, about that. It''s been discussed, and brought to my attention, that the good people of your demesne don''t want you to work on the chimneys."


    Lori blinked in surprise. "I thought the extensions were needed?"


    "Let me rephrase," Rian said. "The chimneys still need to be extended slightly, but it has been agreed that while it needs to be done, no one wants you to be the one to do it."


    For a moment, a surge of indignation surged though Lori. How dare they! She was the Dungeon Binder, no one had any right to tell her what to do, they¡ª "Is there something wrong with the quality of my work that¡ª"


    "No, you¡ª!" Rian sputtered, his vocabulary finally either failing him or realizing who he was talking to. "No one wants you getting hurt!"


    Oh. "Oh," Lori said blandly.


    "Yes, ''oh''. You''re the Dungeon Binder, remember? No one wants you risking your life in a slippery roof just to make chimneys."


    "I thought you said only I could deal with extending the chimneys," Lori said.


    "That''s because I was stupid," Rian said, not seeming to notice the way people looked at him in askance. "And because I was thinking that we didn''t have any mortar to anchor things to the stone with. But Pellee and Markes pointed out that you didn''t actually have to be on the roof to work your magic on the stone, and they very rightly informed me that the extensions to the chimneys could be formed on the ground where it''s safe for you. They could handle the dangerous part of actual climbing up to the roof to put the extension on the chimneys and make any holes that need to be made. They''ve done it before, they have more experience than you at it." Some of the people with Rian nodded. "As to mortar, if you know where it is you can use your magic on it from the ground, right?"


    Lori blinked. That¡­ hadn''t occurred to her. She''d resigned herself to trying to navigate up a ladder and having to find a way to bring stone up there herself. The idea to have someone else do it hadn''t been something to consider. Why would she? The chimneys had been her work, after all¡­


    "I see," Lori simply said. "Well¡­ all right then." A thought occurred to her. "What tools do you have?"


    Lori spent her time making the chimney extensions using their stone stockpile while other people took care of climbing up to roofs to knock holes into the existing chimneys¡ªshe softened the stone so that their tools wouldn''t get worn and marked where it was with a few weak lightwisps¡ªand carrying her finished stone tubes up to put them over the chimney to extend it. At first she fused the extension to the rest of the chimney herself, until the stonemasons started using the softened stone they''d removed to act as a mortar, using it to seal up any holes where the chimney and extension met and anchoring it as best as they could. Then she just sent them up with some softened stone so they could do the work themselves.


    She very quickly saw that they meant about injuries. Even with the roof swept clear of snow, sometimes patches of ice developed, and the boots they had to wear didn''t have very good grip on the wooden planks. Lori saw at least three instances of someone slipping and sliding down the roof to land on the snow below. Thankfully, the thick snow cushioned their falls, so no one was grievously hurt, but one person injured their knee on the roof from slipping, and another one clipped their head on the eaves on the way down and they had been taken to the hospital for observation in case of brain swelling.


    It had been terrifying to watch, hearing the crack as the man''s head struck the wood, the blood on the snow from the scalp injury, how he had been carried to the hospital by four people while they all talked to him to keep him from falling asleep¡­


    That night, Lori lay in bed, one hand on her head and staring unseeing at the ceiling over her as she shuddered at the images of her falling and striking her head on a roof.

 202 - The Sled

    "Can I borrow your boat?" Rian asked her that morning as they waited for Riz and Umu to come with breakfast.


    "My boat?" Lori frowned as she finished setting up the sunk board and moving it towards Mikon so the weaver could make the first move. Ah, winning was fun.


    "Yes, your boat."


    "Do you mean Lori''s Boat?" Lori made her move as Mikon finished with hers. The weaver was trying all sorts of opening gambits other than the most optimal one, simply because she wasn''t winning. She still wasn''t winning, but now she seemed to actively be trying all possible combinations of not winning.


    "Yes, that''s what I said."


    Lori gave her lord a flat, unamused look as she finished dropping the stones in her hand into the bowls and ended her turn. Rian, for his part, just wore a bright, cheerful smile. "Why?"


    "I had an idea about how to get upriver to that thing we talked about checking on," he said. "I''m going to need your boat to start with."


    The look became more unamused. "You''re going to try and talk me into putting air jets on it, aren''t you." It wasn''t a question.


    Rian made a show of crying with happiness, pretending to wipe away a tear from his eye. "Why do you still need me? You can tell what people are thinking just fine, my position is superfluous. Also, yes."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Not people. Just you."


    "I don''t count as people?"


    "You''re a lord," Lori pointed out.


    "Fair enough, I suppose. Though in my defense, it''s just a job for me. It''s not like it''s everything I am and for some reason I''ve wrapped my entire identity around it to an unhealthy degree."


    She rolled her eyes again at that, then frowned. "Where is my¡ªI mean, Lori''s Boat?"


    "You''d know better than I would, if you''ve been keeping the water jet running, but presumably still in the docks, buried under all the snow," Rian said. "That is, if it wasn''t blown somewhere else by the storm. Ugh, I hope it didn''t slide into the river and float downstream, otherwise we''d never get it back. But presuming it''s still there, it should still be fine. The snow''s likely not melting, and the carpenters have already checked it over recently, so the wood''s been treated with what oil we have."


    Ah. Right. Lori concentrated, sorting through the bindings in her demesne. Yes, there was one that way¡­ yes, it was the water jet¡­ "It''s still at the docks."


    Rian brightened. "If you lend me the air jet and open a hole in the ice tunnel, I should be able to dig it out."


    "Very probably," Lori nodded dryly. "What do you need it for? Besides the silly idea of putting air jets on it."


    "Why is it a silly idea? Riz has been telling me about how they use sleds up north in the winter to get around, since it''s more efficient that trying to walk or anything with wheels. Your boat''s underside is just the right shape to be used as a big sled, once we take off the stabilizer fins. There''s enough area to distribute its weight pretty evenly on snow so it won''t sink much and with the right runners should go pretty straight. As long as we don''t pile on too much weight, it should be able to skim over snow without much friction, and a sufficiently strong air jet can give it enough thrust to take advantage of that lack of friction."


    Lori stared at him. "What''s a sled?"


    Rian stared right back as Riz and Mikon arrived with breakfast, putting the bowls of soup and cups of water down on the table. Lori took one. "You¡­ don''t know what a sled is?"


    Obviously, or else she wouldn''t ask. "Obviously, or else I wouldn''t ask," she said, dipping a spoon into the soup to stir it a little before proceeding to eat.


    "Huh. Well, if you don''t know, you don''t know." Rian shrugged and took the last bowl of soup as Riz sat down next to Mikon. "A sled is a kind of board that children sit on to slide down snowy slopes."


    "It sounds very dangerous. I treasure my ignorance."


    "The adult version is a practical vehicle for getting people or cargo around in the snow."


    "¡­ By distributing weight over a large area and using the relatively low friction of snow to make something that''s easy to propel, if I recall your exposition correctly."


    "Yes, exactly!"


    "Presumably to reach the edge of the demesne to investigate that matter I spoke to you about."


    Rian just nodded. He dipped his spoon into his bowl and blew on it before putting it into his mouth.


    "Would not the trees get in the way? As I understand it, there are a lot of trees between here and the edge of the demesne."


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    "Not on top of the river," Rian declared, with the air of one making a dramatic reveal.


    "Ah. That makes sense." Yes, the river was currently frozen and under a layer of snow, wasn''t it? It would make for flat, even ground with no obstructions. And if the ice should happen to break beneath him, so what? It was a boat. "And propelling it with the air jet?"


    "It would probably take more force than the air jets you let us use to clear snow, but in principle it''s not that different from the water jet, right? And the ice would have a lot less friction and resistance to push against than water."


    "It''s also supposed to have a metal bottom, Rian," Riz said. "To get it at its most slippery, it needs to melt the snow a little so it''s wet under the sled. It''s not necessary, but it helps."


    "I don''t think we''ll be able to put one of those, Riz."


    "And if I refuse to humor this silly idea?"


    "Well, we should probably still bring your boat in from under the snow, and then I''m going to find a way to tie a pair of planks on my feet, tie a shovel to my back, and start walking up the river to check it out. It''s only a little walk, what''s the harm?"


    "Rian, you hate the cold. You''re weak to the cold. Your nose starts dripping and threatening to drown you if so much as a chill breeze blows in your face." She''d had him see their doctors and medics about it, but they all said he wasn''t really sick, just dripping disgustingly.


    "It''s fine. My nose only drips one side at a time, so I can still breathe at half capacity."


    And he was probably completely serious about that.


    Lori sighed, and turned towards Riz, sitting on the other side of Mikon. "Go with him when he investigates and keep him alive."


    The woman nodded. "Of course, Great Binder."


    Rian grinned. "Does that mean you''re lending it to me?"


    "Why? You can walk perfectly well."


    "Ah¡­ well, there''s another reason why I''ve been thinking of how we might be able to quickly traverse the snow," Rian said.


    Of course there was. "Of course there is," Lori said blandly.


    "You see, the first births are likely to happen in a two months at the most. If we want to give them the best chance of both the mother and the child surviving, I think it would be best to find a way to restore contact with River''s Fork and beg Shana to come here so she can heal either if there are any complications. Doing the experimentation this early gives us more time to find a reliable method, and the sooner we make contact with them, the more time we have to negotiate a deal they''ll accept."


    ¡­


    Lori gave her lord a look pronouncing exactly how much she disliked this idea. "Is this really necessary?"


    "Your Bindership, ''mother died in childbirth'' comes up a lot in novels and plays for a reason."


    ¡­


    Lori sighed. "Fine, fine. Get it out of the snow and see what state it''s in first."


    "Wait, you''re already agreeing? I usually have to do a lot more convincing."


    "You can still walk. I''m sure Binder Shanalorre could be comfortably conveyed on your back."


    "Thank you for your benevolence and generosity, your Bindership!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was a relatively simple matter to dig out to the docks with two air jets and several people with shovels. It helped Lori had already made a tunnel to the water hub shed, which was next to the docks. She just had to open a hole in the wall of the ice tunnel and, admittedly, put down some lightwisps for them to follow so they wouldn''t get lost.


    She could have just made a tunnel, but she needed to imbue the bindings she''d be using to expand the demesne later. Besides, it was best to give people something to do. Lori had seen a few pacing restlessly, unable to settle down, so best to give them something physical to let them spend their imbuement on before they did something idiotic.


    Once dug out of the snow, Lori''s Boat was taken to the second level and raised up on wooden stands to be examined by the carpenters and other woodworkers, just in case there was any damage. Thankfully, being buried in snow for two week hadn''t seemed to cause it any more harm. The fittings that had been added to it¡ªthe outriggers, the water jet, the stabilizer fins¡ªwere removed carefully, and the places they had been mounted on were checked for weakness or damage.


    Then Rian had gleefully declared they should ''test it to see how it handled the snow''.


    Lori had then been treated to the sight of grown men pushing Lori''s Boat around in the snow, trying to get it moving as fast as they could, before trying to jump aboard to ride it for however far it managed to travel on the force that had been imparted on it. The grown men acting like children had then been joined by actual children, who then rode on Lori''s Boat while the adults pushed them around. At that point, she had retreated to her room so she wouldn''t actually have to see if they somehow broke the boat, and spent the rest of her afternoon expanding her demesne like a responsible person.


    "Well, your boat is already a wonderful sled," Rian reported at dinner. "Now we just need a way to get it moving." He gave Lori a hopeful look.


    "So you didn''t break it from jumping on it?"


    "No, we didn''t break it. It''s pretty durable Deadspoken wood. Some of us have bruises on our shins, though I don''t expect you have any sympathy for us."


    "It was your own silly idea," Lori nodded. She waved a hand. "Very well, I''ll see about putting together a larger air jet to propel it for you."


    Well, she supposed she wasn''t too annoyed at Rian for thinking of more work for her to do. With the desiccator for the latrine waste running, other people taking care of supplying water to the reservoir with snow, and the snow limiting what work could be done, Lori had most of her day free, and even she was starting to get bored at efficiently expanding her demesne, playing board games at meals and reading her almanac. Being aggravated at Rian for thinking up some foolish project was a nice change of pace.


    Obviously, the larger air jet to propel the boat-turned-sled would need a way of stopping, else it would be¡­ well, a very inconvenient conveyance. However, unlike the smaller air jets, a vehicle-mounted air jet would be relatively stationary, so the air could be pointed in a particular direction and she wouldn''t have to worry about it moving to point somewhere else. Obviously, it would need some kind of mechanical element, just like the water jet, but it would have to be fairly simple so it could be built with what they had.


    To that end, she went down to the second level and examined the boat again, taking measurements to refresh her knowledge of its dimensions. Then she went back to her room and sketched out some ideas on a stone tablet. The air jet would need a large volume of air being thrust at great intensity to propel the sled. Enough to counter the weight of the materials and¡­ say, three, no, four passengers as minimum. That would be¡­ what, four hundred sengrains of weight? Well, she could calibrate the thrust later. What she needed was something to anchor the air wisps providing the thrust to, which would in turn need to be physically connected to the sled¡­


    Ugh, why did she let her lord keep talking her into going along with his silly ideas?

 203 - The Sled Air Jet

    After a night''s thoughtful deliberation, the mechanism Lori came up with for the carpenters to make was a box. The shape had to be simple so it could be efficiently made from planks with a minimum of wood. While they could theoretically leave her Dungeon now to fell trees for wood again, in practice the snow made that difficult. Best to work within the resources they had stockpiled that required a minimum of processing. Technically she could have designed something that could be made with the metal from their dragon scales, or even just their copper, but that wasn''t as easily replaced as wood.


    The box was an elongated square tube, with accelerated air meant to pass though one end and out the other. On one of the faces was a hinged flap that could drop down and block the tube at an angle, diverting the accelerated air out through the new opening that had just been uncovered. A lever mechanism would keep the flap pushed up and shut, as well as give the operator the leverage to overcome the force of the accelerated air to push the flap back up once it had dropped.


    "I don''t see a locking mechanism," Rian said as he perused her diagram. "How to we keep the flap from falling down?"


    "The intention is that someone is holding the lever to keep the flap closed at all times," Lori said. "Otherwise the flap will drop down and the accelerated air will divert upwards, removing the sled''s source of thrust and causing it to slow. This way, if there is no one on the sled to apply force to the lever, it will just stop."


    "Ooh, clever!" Rian said. "I wish I''d thought of that! This is so simple! And here I was trying to think of how we''d put together sliding wooden blocks."


    "Far too heavy and big," Lori said dismissively. "A simple design is a lighter design, and is more likely to be something an air jet can actually push to any appreciable speed. Give this to the smiths and carpenters and tell them to start planning on how to build it but not to begin construction yet."


    "Eh? Why not?"


    "We need to find out how much thrust is needed to move the sled," Lori said. "That will depend on how much air is being accelerated, and that will depend on how wide the tube anchoring the bindings accelerating them will be."


    "Not necessarily," Rian said. "If you put something like a funnel at the end of the tube, you can collect more air, especially if the tube is already moving forward and meeting the oncoming air head-on."


    Lori tilted her head thoughtfully. "Hmm¡­ an interesting idea¡­ yes, I can see how it could work."


    "Might work for the water jet too," Rian said. "Something to consider in future."


    Lori waved her hand, wiping the thought away. "Well, remember to bring it up when we''re talking about water jets. We''re discussing air jets at the moment."


    "Right, sorry. So¡­ does that mean you''re going to try to ride the sled? It''s really fun!"


    "No, Landoor is going to ride the sled. I will be building the tube that will be mounted to the sled and the binding to accelerate it."


    Rian blinked. "Why Landoor?"


    "I don''t care if anything happens to him in the course of testing the air jet."


    "Wow. What a terribly harsh and very Lori thing to say. You know nobody actually needs to be riding it, right? It doesn''t have a steering mechanism, it''ll just go straight. We can just put snow or rocks on it to simulate the weight of a person."


    "Ah. Then do that instead."


    "¡­ You know, Landoor is a very nice person once you get to know him."


    "That sounds like a ''dealing with people'' matter. I leave that nonsense to you."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine, I''ll drop it. Though try not to get the man killed, all right? He''s a hard worker and has a naturally cheerful and pleasant disposition. Infinitely preferable to the inverse of either, don''t you think?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Eh, I suppose," she said.


    Rian suddenly frowned. "Huh. Something just occurred to me. The mechanism will only redirect the air and stop the acceleration, right? It won''t actually slow the sled down?"


    "Yes¡­?"


    "So¡­ how do we actually slow it down if we want to stop?"


    Lori gave him a bland look, and pointed significantly to one side. "I suggest consulting an expert."


    Rian brightened. "Oh, right! Silly me." He turned to Riz, sitting next to him. "Hey Riz, do you know how to get a moving sled to slow down?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    For building the sled''s air jet, she needed building material, and her options were very limited. Wood was in limited supply and would need the carpenters to shape. Stone was too heavy and while ice was plentiful, it was still weighty and unless reinforced would be easily damaged. While she knew that with reinforcement it would be adequate to the task, as the Coldhold had proven, reinforcing it would add more weight.


    So, bone it was. Lori had already tunneled and excavated the snow from the bone pit before today, since she had needed it for material for making the original air jets. Getting the material was merely a matter of going there and picking it out, and months of eating seels and beasts had given them a healthy supply. Some of the bone was, according to Rian, ground down and used as fertilizer for the fields, but she still had her pick.


    Few of the bones were still whole. Some had been broken open to access the marrow, which was added to their stew. Others had come apart, and a few looked like they had been gnawed on by chokers. Still, some here set aside because they made for good material for her, such as skulls and jaws. Lori had long since stopped collecting all the teeth and claws, since she had a healthy stockpile, but that just meant other people got them to make buttons, small blades, arrowheads¡­


    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    And just because the bones were broken didn''t mean they weren''t useful. After all, she could just make them whole again. It increased the overall weight, since some of the porousness was lost, but the material was still decently strong.


    To shape it into a tube, however, she had to do so in several steps. First she got a plank from the carpenters that seemed the right dimensions for what she wanted. Then she went outside and gathered snow to create a block of ice, which she bound solid. The smithy was empty, so she took the block there and pressed her plank down into the ice, deforming it through the binding of waterwisps as she went. When she managed to pry out the plank, on the ice was left a plank-shaped mold.


    After that, it was a simple matter of putting bones into the shape, then carefully filling in the gaps using bone made fluid by a binding of earthwisps to fill the mold. This allowed her to retain some of the porousness of the bone, allowing it to be both relatively strong and lightweight, until she had several planks of bone to use. They weren''t completely uniform, but that was fine.


    The material preparation took her most of the morning, and she had no intention of not expanding her demesne, so actually putting the tubes together had to wait until the following day. Putting the bone planks together was a simple matter, since they were all made of the same substance. Lori had considered making them in the shape of square tubes, after her design, but decided against it, opting for a triangular tube shape instead. It would make fitting in the mechanism a bit more difficult, but having it be a triangle made the structure more resistant to deformation. Given the planks were all as wide as her hand was long, there would be plenty of space in the tube for air. She made two, both a pace and a half long.


    Once that was finished, the two tubes for the air jet needed to be secured to Lori''s Boat. They needed to be mounted on the arms that usually connected to the boat''s outriggers, where she used more softened bone to bond it to the wooden spars.


    "Don''t step on it or lift with it," Lori told Rian sternly as he directed the men who would be carrying the boat back out into the snow for her to test whether it could even be propelled by air. She stood on a plank that had been placed in the snow, mostly to keep herself from sinking in, because she wasn''t sure her boots weren''t leaking and she didn''t want to have wet socks. "It''s not made to be load bearing like that."


    "Will it be able to provide thrust without breaking, then?" Rian asked as the boat was gently set down on the snow and slid back and forth a few time to make sure it would move.


    "We shall see," Lori said. She stayed where she was as she bound airwisps, anchoring them to the earthwisps on the bone. That would transfer the force of the thrust to the bone tubes, and from there to the boat-turned-sled.


    "Should we weigh it down?" Rian said as a rope was tied to one of the arms, with several men holding the other end, standing to one side. It would be their job to slow the sled down if it moved.


    Lori shook her. "Not yet. We''re still trying to find out how much force is needed to move the boat. We''ll start with that as a minimum, and work upwards from there."


    "Huh. Given the utter lack of testing the water jet underwent, I was afraid you''d just slap these things one the boat and then tell me to get going and figure it out as I went."


    "I''d made a water jet before when I was a student," Lori shrugged. "I knew it would work."


    "But not an air jet, presumably." Rian said.


    "Not for the purposes of propelling something, in any case," Lori said. "It''s known but considered impractically dangerous. To have enough expanding air for decent thrust, one usually needs to rely on some sort of alchemical combustible or steam, which leave residue that is burning hot, cloying, harmful, and the combustible itself is usually costly to make."


    "Unless you happen to have the raw power of a bored Dungeon Binder, presumably," Rian said.


    "Unless that," Lori agreed.


    "You''re really bored with nothing to really do, aren''t you?"


    Lori ignored him and his stupid smile as she began to properly assemble the binding, giving it directionality to propel the air down the tube. She made sure that both bindings were formed the same way so that they would have the same output. It wouldn''t do for one side to have greater output than the other and make it list to one side, after all. Then she simply had to heavily imbue both sides.


    Once both sides were imbued, she activated both bindings simultaneously.


    Snow was blasted into the air behind the sled as the tubes suddenly began to thrust air through them. It was surprisingly loud, something that Lori should have expected from the smaller air jet tubes they used for snow clearing, but hadn''t really been prepared for. The tubes shook in their mountings as the bindings began to consume their imbuement.


    The sled, annoyingly, didn''t move.


    Lori frowned. "Annoying, but not unexpected," she said, mostly to herself. She got ready to increase the air jets'' output.


    "Wait a moment," Rian said thoughtfully.


    Lori glanced at him as more snow was blown. Her lord had a thoughtful look on his face. "What?" she said.


    "Let me try something first," he said.


    She watched, curious and bemused as Rian moved behind the sled, raising one hand over his face to, probably futilely, keep the snow out of his face until he was standing directly behind the sled. Then he put two hands on the back of the sled and pushed. One step, two steps, and suddenly the sled was moving on its own, leaving Rian behind. It was moving barely faster than walking pace, but it was moving.


    Rian was nodding in satisfaction as he walked back towards her, his nose not so much running as streaming and¡ªugh, yes, RIAN, STOP USING THE TOWEL OVER YOUR MOUTH TO WIPE YOUR NOSE, IT''S DISGUSTING! "Friction," he said in a self-satisfied tone. "We had to overcome the friction of the snow first before it would start moving. The snow''s not wet, so the friction isn''t reduced yet."


    "So I see," Lori said, watching the sled slowly progressing away from them. Obvious, in hindsight. "Still, it would still need to be faster than this. This is without people weighing it down. As it is, when it is occupied it will move even slower."


    "Can you get it going that fast?"


    "Oh, undoubtedly," Lori said. "The question is whether a reasonable speed will be achieved with a reasonable amount of imbuement consumption. Air is a far less efficient propellant than water because of its lack of density¡­"


    Lori paused, then looked down.


    When she looked up again, she saw Rian had also been staring down at the snow.


    Their eyes met.


    "Water is denser than air," he said, a slow smile growing on his mouth. It was a new smile, one of mounting delight and realization.


    "It does not even need to be water," she said. "Snow in any state is far denser than air."


    "We''ll have to mount the tubes lower down so that they''re closer to the snow," Rian mused. "And need some sort of scoop to scrape up the snow¡­ "


    "That would add needless friction," Lori said, her tone also musing. "Besides, if there was a receptacle, that could just be filled up with snow and the receptacle opened to drop snow down into the binding¡­"


    "Snow to water to steam¡­ that would result in air far denser than just sucking it up¡­"


    "Only one end would need to be opened, and since it''s reliant on water, the air jet can technically be deactivated by cutting off the flow¡­ and if I use vaporous waterwisps instead of airwisps, the binding wouldn''t activate completely to common air, simplifying the control mechanism¡­"


    The two of them stared at the sled, which was being pulled to a stop by its rope. Lori absently deactivated the bindings.


    "I need to design a different mechanism and tube structure," she muttered. "And a new means of mounting it to the boat."


    "I''ll see if I can find something lightweight for the snow receptacle," Rian said. "Maybe some kind of sack, that will be lighter than a wooden box or anything like that."


    Lori nodded absently, and they both looked towards the boat.


    "We should probably figure out how to steer," Rian added. "Otherwise our magic-powered sled is going to be steered by someone in front with a stick pushing it left and right. Which is probably stupidly dangerous."


    Yes, a method of steering would be needed¡­


    ¡­


    But after this afternoon''s demesne expansion!

 204 - The Sled, Completed

    "So, suggestion for a new plan," Rian said as they sat down to breakfast the next day. "On consideration, maybe using your boat is too much. We don''t really need all the space on it, after all. What if we just put the air jets you made on a couple of boards? They''ll be light enough for the air jets to move without any further modification, a smaller profile would reduce friction, and they can be steered by leaning left or right, which we couldn''t do with the boat unless we built some sort of mechanism for it."


    Lori gave Rian an exasperated look. "So after all that work, your idea is just do something else?"


    He shrugged. "We''ve identified problems with the initial design before we devoted too much time or irrecoverable resources to it. Now is actually the best time to consider changing ideas, since nothing has been wasted. The air jets clearly work, it''s just the boat was too heavy for them to work efficiently without further changes that would require more building time. I''m simply suggesting we take the only part that works, your contribution, and put it on something lighter. And the rest of the work on it wasn''t wasted, since now your boat''s safe inside the dungeon."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori mused. She sighed. "Ugh, fine. Don''t be wasteful."


    "Of course, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. "The point is to make something that doesn''t weigh much, after all."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After removing the air jets from the boat, and recovering the bone she''d used to attach it with, Lori took a walk around her dungeon to see how everything was doing. There were people scattered about the dining tables, talking, playing board games, sewing clothes, cleaning tools, sweeping the floor, and coming and going from outside the dungeon. She quickly physically checked the reservoir and found nothing floating on it. It was also reasonably full, and she knew people had been assigned to put snow in the melting box, so it would be renewed soon.


    In the second level, the weavers were weaving but there were no spinners spinning, so they''d probably run out of rope weed. She also found many alcoves occupied, with some people napping in the sleeping spaces. At one of the corners of the level, far from the work, some children played some kind of game that seemed to involved standing in seemingly arbitrary spots, holding their arms out to either side, and either trying to tag one another or running from each other. Lori wasn''t familiar with the game. It seemed like the sort of thing she''d avoided when she was younger. Among the carpenters, something was being made, while Rian sat on the floor nearby, watching with interest. Ugh, her lord could be so childish sometimes.


    Lori glanced at her lord in passing, and he looked up at her, getting ready to stand, but she moved on down to the third level. A quick inspection showed there were no temperatures to correct and everything seemed to be tended and watered. The plots of vigas had sprouted long, bright blades of grass, and the planters of tubers all had green stalks sprouting from the only slightly odoriferous soil. Hopefully in spring they''d be able to fill more plots with vigas so they could have a good crop in the dungeon itself¡­


    After that, she went out and checked that all the ice tunnels were both holding as well as properly ventilated, and that the ladder access holes to reach the roofs so they could be cleaned wasn''t clogged with snow. She also made sure that the opening in the tunnel that led out to the trees so that people could gather firewood hadn''t gathered any snow. Lori didn''t go beyond the tunnel, but she saw that the path leading to the trees had been shoveled clear. Good.


    Her inspection done, she went to her room to make preparations to expand her demesne later that afternoon.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Two days later, after breakfast, Lori looked down at the sled lying on the snow. The main body of the sled was around two paces long and perhaps three-fourths of a pace wide, and looked more gaps than wood. It lay on three pairs of wooden boards that Rian said were called runners, two pairs at the back and a pair at the front. One of the rear pair of runners was directly under the main body of the sled, while the other pair were on extensions spaced apart very widely, giving the sled a vaguely triangular shape. They reminded Lori of the outriggers on their boats. Supported above the runners beneath the main body was a ladder-like wooden frame, where parallel planks were arranged like rungs, and had gaps between them. At one end was an upright frame that made the whole thing seem like a bed with a head board. Raised planks on the sides added to the impression of a box.


    "Why are there so many gaps?"


    "It''s to reduce weight," Rian said. "After all, it doesn''t need to be a solid platform when you''re sitting on it. Besides, it makes it easier to mount the air jets."


    "Mount the air jets where?"


    "Anywhere," Rian said, pointing. "You could mount both on either side of the frame, underneath the frame, on the stabilizing arms for the outer runners, on top of the main frame ¡­ though that last will be a bit awkward to ride. The front runners turn on this pivot here¡ª" he demonstrated the pivot "¡ªletting you steer. It will fit¡­ maybe four or five people if they''re all friendly and one stands at the back here." He demonstrated what he meant, putting his feet on the ends of the runners under the box-like frame and holding on to handles built into the head board. "The stabilizing arms aren''t really made to bear much weight."


    "The turning mechanism seems inconvenient," Lori pointed out. While it could turn, there didn''t seem to be any actual way to control it.


    "We''re putting a rope on it, the ropers are just looking for a short length that they''ve already made so that we don''t have to cut any of the long coils," Rian said. He put a hand one the head board-like frame and began to push the sled back and forth. "As you can see, it''s far lighter than the boat was, meaning it will definitely be easier for the air jet to push."


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    Lori shrugged. "We''ll see."


    Mounting the triangular bone tubes onto the planks on the sides was simple enough, though Rian suggested lashing them on with ropes as well for added security. The steering rope arrived, and was secured to the runners, with Rian testing if they would turn as intended. Lori allowed herself to be talked into sitting on the sled and grabbing hold of the steering rope while Rian pushed the sled, and she tested pulling at the ends of the ropes to make the sled turn left and right.


    ¡­


    All right, it was a little fun.


    Once more a long rope was tied to the sled so they could slow it down, and Lori again anchored airwisps inside the bone tube into a binding. For now, they''d test it with air again instead of snow converted to vapor. When the bindings were imbued and activated, the air jets began to move the sled immediately. They pushed it slowly at first, but it began to accelerate, building up speed. It soon exceeded the slow walking pace the boat had attained the day before, reaching a fast walking pace before Lori deactivated the bindings and the sled was pulled to a stop by the men holding the rope.


    "Were the air jets set at the fastest they would go?" Rian asked as the men went to retrieve the sled and start pushing it back towards them.


    "No."


    "Huh. And I''m pretty sure that slow start was because it was at a dead stop. If we''d pushed it, it would have started accelerating a lot faster."


    "Undoubtedly." Really, did he have to state the obvious?


    "I wonder how fast it can go?" Rian mused.


    "You are not finding out," she said sternly. "While I will concede it''s a viable vehicle, it does not have nearly as stable a seat as a boat. Turns are likely to result in you falling off."


    "Probably not, the pivot doesn''t turn very far by design," Rian said.


    "Well, you''re still not going fast on it. You''re too useful to risk."


    "It''s nice to be appreciated. Well then, mother, how fast am I allowed to go?"


    Lori glared at him for the uncalled for remark.


    "Oh, don''t look at me like that. I like my mother, so it''s a compliment."


    She rolled her eyes. "It''s still uncalled for. I''m far too sensible to be a mother."


    "If you say so, your Bindership¡­ Huh. I just thought of something."


    Lori sighed. "What now?"


    "That mechanism you designed, the one for redirecting the air jet to make it stop accelerating¡­ How are we going to operate it like this? I mean, didn''t you say it''s meant to be held open at all times so that it would stop by itself if it didn''t have any passengers?"


    She considered that. "Rian?"


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Solve that problem."


    A sigh. "Yes, your Bindership."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It took a day to make the flap mechanism and secure it to the ends of the air jet tubes. Rian''s solution was simple, and surprisingly didn''t require her initial design be altered greatly. Instead of controlling the flaps with levers, a rope was tied to the end of each flap. Pulling the rope served the same purpose as the lever, closing the flap and letting air pass straight through the tube, which would provide propulsion. Slack on the rope would cause the flap to drop, diverting the air upwards. The ropes were then tied together to a bar at the front of the sled, where they were supposed to be pushed forward by the feet of the person steering the sled.


    It was actually much simpler to build than her lever mechanism, and Lori was annoyed she hadn''t thought of it.


    Still, after fitting the flap mechanism to the air jet tubes and calibrating what she considered a safe, stable speed, the sled was finally functional. While it blasted a long cloud of snow behind it, it moved far faster than a person trying to wade through the snow. However, its limitations in practice required it to be a vehicle that always had two people on it at all times. One person to steer and operate the flaps¡­ and another person to throw out the bundle of wooden hooks on a rope that acted to slow the sled down.


    Which was fine, since someone would need to accompany Rian when he went out on it anyway.


    "It''s going to need to be a lot faster if we''re going to use it to get to River''s Fork," Rian told her over dinner that night. "Fast like the boats were, or else we won''t be able to make the trip to there and back in a day."


    Lori grunted in unwanted acknowledgement of a practical problem as she waited for Mikon to make her move on the chatrang board. "I''ll consider it after Riz tells me her impression of the conveyance tomorrow."


    The woman in question paused in her eating. "Uh, me, Great Binder?"


    "Yes, you," Lori said. "Or are you really going to let someone else go with Rian when he goes out to the edge of the demesne?" Technically, the location wasn''t the edge any more. She supposed it was good Rian was going to investigate it now, since she barely remembered where it had been. Thankfully, the river was a decent landmark, and she''d marked the general area with some deactivated wisps so it would stand out to her awareness.


    "I wouldn''t mind bringing someone along to help, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Well, go and see if they''ll fit on the sled,"


    "We''ll need to pack spears and shovels too, in case we need to move the snow around," Rian muttered. "By the way, where exactly on the edge am I investigating?"


    "I''ll mark the location for you," Lori said as she scooped up some meat with her soup and popped it into her mouth.


    "Uh, mark how?"


    "Lightwisps and darkwisps. I''ll make it tall so you can see it over the trees."


    "So, tomorrow we''re going out on a magic-propelled sled to look for a tall pillar of light and darkness on a quest for our Dungeon Binder," Rian said blandly. "Sounds like a bad fantasy story."


    "If it were a bad fantasy story, you''d find a dungeon''s core buried in the snow, accidentally bleed on it and somehow become a Dungeon Binder," Lori pointed out.


    "True, true¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian, Riz and one of Riz''s friends set off on the sled after breakfast the next day. Lori wondered if it had been intentional on Rian''s part that any passengers on the sled had to sit behind the operator, pressed against their back, arms around their waist. Riz certainly seemed to be enjoying the position. Her friend, sitting behind her, just seemed exasperated.


    Lori had nothing in the way of expectations about what Rian would find at the place that used to be the edge of her demesne. The wisps of the binding hadn''t been anchored to anything, after all, so there shouldn''t be any sort of physical deformation to anything. From the times she had visited the edge after expanding her demesne, the expansion also didn''t alter the ground or even seem to move the snow.


    So having someone pound on her door late in the morning while she was imbuing the binding for expanding her demesne later was unexpected. Despite her annoyance, she quickly rose to see what it was about, because if they dared disturb her like this, it had to be important.


    And if it wasn''t, she''d bury them in the snow over lunch.


    "What?" Lori said as she opened the door to find Rian. He had a strange expression on his face, and the towel he wrapped around his head like a scarf to keep him warm was in his hands, held like a sack. The improvised sack clearly contained something large and heavy.


    "We found something," Rian said, his voice odd. He opened the towel and showed her.

 205 - Not a Dungeon Core

    Lori stared. "Where did you get that?" she demanded, voice starting to tremble.


    "We found it buried in the snow," Rian said, voice low and glancing over his shoulder as if he expected someone there to be trying to listen. "It was near the marker you put down. Had to dig up the snow to find it, since I figured anything interesting would have gotten covered up since then. Dragged the sled, pointed the air jets towards the marker, had everyone stand in front of the sled to keep it from moving and pulled up the flaps."


    "Bring it in here," Lori hissed, stepping back to give him room to come in. "Put it on the table."


    Rian did as ordered, shuffling in and hurrying to the table. The sound of the towel striking the stone surface made her wince as she shut the door, sealed it, then sealed the rest of the passageway in for good measure. The urge to chastise him fell away with the towel, however, as the fabric pooled around the object it had been carrying.


    "At first I thought it was an unclaimed dungeon core," Rian said, sounding a bit breathless. "Obviously it''s not, because you''ve made it perfectly clear enough times that''s not how dungeons work, and this was inside our demesne, so if it was a core, it couldn''t exist. That left the obvious answer, which is also insane. Completely, utterly insane."


    Lori found herself nodding in agreement, staring at the object on her table. Entire surface perfectly smooth, with a sheen to it like clean glass, it was about the size of the beast skulls Lori had turned into shovels, about forty-one yustri. It was a familiar cloudy white, as if it should be transparent if not for impurities suspended upon it. "Yes. The obvious answer is completely, utterly insane."


    "Just to be clear, we''re both coming to the same completely, utterly insane answer, right?" Rian said. "Because I can''t think of anything else it could be except glass, making it a stupidly expensive prank by persons unknown who actually took the time to make a ball of solid glass this big!"


    "It''s not glass," Lori confirmed, still staring. "It''s a bead. A large wisp bead."


    For a moment, they both stared at it. Beads, as a rule, were small, lest they not fit in one''s bead pouch. The smallest, regardless of what type, was about ten chiyustri in diameter, with the next one five chiyustri bigger, all the way to the largest denominations at twenty-five chiyustri. If one needed to carry more money than that, one just resorted to a monetary certificate.


    "Are we¡­ rich?" Rian asked tentatively, clearly trying to put this find into a context he could understand.


    "No," Lori said, her mouth seeming to speak on its own as she tried to claim and bind the very concept of the thing in front of her. "The intrinsic material value of a bead comes from how much magic it provides, either to a wizard or a bound tool. It has financial value because of a collective agreement to let it stand as a placeholder for the value of other goods and services. Unless it can be used to power a bound tool, provide a Whisperer with magic, or someone agrees to exchange goods and services to possess it, it''s literally worthless."


    "You can say the same about literally anything," Rian argued, distractedly. "Beast teeth, shiny rocks, bits of glass."


    "Yes." she agreed. "However, those things you mentioned are raw resources with immediate use. Beast teeth and bits of glass are simply a cutting implement usable for making more complex tools to produce more refined resources. Shiny rocks like copper are easier to work than dull rock, with desirable material properties. They have worth independently of the structures of civilization. Beads require those structures to be valuable."


    "So¡­ we''re not rich."


    "No, we are not rich. As it currently is, it''s useless to me. We have no bound tools to consume it, and even if I were so inclined for some reason, I wouldn''t be able to fit it in my mouth."


    "So it''s essentially worthless."


    "Yes. Utterly worthless."


    They both nodded, as if coming to an agreement, letting out a mutual sigh.


    "Where in the glittering rainbowed shadow of colored Skykeep did you find this?-!" Lori all but cried.


    "I told you, it was buried under the snow where you said!" Rian replied in the same tone and volume. "Just there! We thought it was a rock or a piece of ice at first!"


    "How could you find it?-! Beads don''t just fall out of the sky!"


    "Like I''d know that! No one''s ever given me a straight answer on how beads are made except ''the Dungeon Binder makes them''! What did you do!-?"


    "Me?-!"


    "You''re the Dungeon Binder! Dungeon Binders make beads, right?-! So it must have been something you did!"


    "If I knew how to make beads, I would have already!"


    "Then¡­ then maybe it''s not a bead!" Rian suggested. "Maybe¡­ maybe it''s something else that''s not made of glass that just looks like a ridiculously large bead, but isn''t."


    "Like what?"


    "I have no idea! Maybe it''s just something that happens naturally in winter around here, and when spring comes we''ll find big balls of stuff that look like beads but aren''t! Is there any way to test if it is a bead?"


    "W-well, if it were a bead, if we touched it to metal that was also touching a binding, the binding would become imbued."


    "What, that simple?"


    "Of course. Why do you think beads are never put into metal containers?"


    "Huh¡­ I thought that was so they don''t get scratched and have their denominations rubbed off¡­"


    "Well, it isn''t, it''s so that no magic seeps from the beads," Lori said, feeling herself calming slightly as she corrected Rian''s ignorance. Having his question answered also seemed to settle him down. Lori forced herself to look at this objectively. It was a question to be answered, a problem to be solved.


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    "Well, can we test it, then?" Rian suggested. "Maybe it''s not a bead and we''re getting excited over nothing."


    "Yes," she agreed, turning away. "Yes, we should test it properly."


    She reached into a storage niche near her table, where she put some of her more recently collected materials. On a pile of beast teeth and claws was a small coil of her drawn gold wire, next to a larger and still secured coil of the same that the smiths had made for her using the rest of their gold that hadn''t been used to line the pots. If she needed any more wire, they''d need to make it from copper or one of their other metals.


    Walking back to the large allegedly-a-bead, she claimed some of the lightwisps streaming down from the bindings she used to illuminate her room, binding them but not imbuing. Taking one end of her coil of wire, she stuck it through the air where she knew that her binding was. "All right," she said, mostly to keep Rian from bothering her with obvious questions. "If this is really a bead, then contact with this wire will cause magic to seep out and be drawn to the binding at the other end." She set the binding to make it glow, but still held it together with her will rather than imbue it.


    "And if it isn''t a bead, presumably nothing happens," Rian said.


    She nodded. "Yes. Nothing happens. The binding of lightwisps will not start producing light when I touch the other end of this wire to the supposed bead." She slapped down the coiled other end of the wire onto the large sphere.


    The binding of lightwisps immediately started producing light when she touch the other end of the wire to the supposed bead, shining on them with a pure white radiance.


    For a moment, the two of them stared at it. But only a moment, as it was a bright light. Lori dropped her coil of wire as if burned, and it hit the stone floor with an anti-climactic lack of distinctive noise as the binding stopped shining.


    "Um¡­" Rian said hesitantly as he blinked and rubbed at his eyes. "So¡­ it lit up. That¡­ that means it''s a bead, right? Really a bead."


    "Yes¡­" Lori said quietly.


    They both stared at the confirmed bead.


    "We have a bead," Rian said, sounding strangely numb. "We have a bead bigger than a human head."


    "Mine," Lori said reflexively.


    For some reason, Rian rolled his eyes. "Yes, your Bindership," he said. "Well, we found it near your marker, so this could be the result of whatever it was that you did three weeks ago."


    "That¡­ would appear to be the case, yes," Lori said, still staring at the large sphere. Three weeks ago. When she''d had something unexpected unexpectedly happen¡­ "We need to test this," Lori said decisively. "We need to see if it can be replicated. Or at least, confirm that the suspected cause is in fact the cause."


    Rian began to nod. "Yeah, I¡­ I suppose you''re right."


    A thought occurred to Lori. "Who else knows about this?" she demanded.


    Rian winced. "Um, well, there''s you and me, of course. There''s Riz, who was with me. And there''s her friend Navia, who was also there. I asked them not to tell anyone and guard the stairs up so no one can listen in."


    "You did?" Lori said, feeling hopeful.


    "I did," Rian said. "So either only they know or everyone knows by now."


    Lori stared at him. "Well, no matter. We need to go to the edge and test this. Come on, and tell the two to come along as well." She grabbed her staff and headed for the door.


    "If we''re going outside the demesne, you''ll need your winter robe," Rian reminded her.


    Lori spun around. "I know that," she said, grabbing her winter robe from where it was folded among her other clothes.


    "Of course, your Bindership."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Riding the sled had been annoyingly cramped. Rian had insisted that she hold on to Riz from behind. Lori had been disinclined, simply sitting back with her legs crossed and leaning on the headboard at the back. Riz''s friend stood on the runners and held on to the headboard''s handles, a large bundle on her back and a hook handing from her belt.


    After the second time Lori had almost fallen off because of an unexpected change in elevation¡ªthe snow was not as flat as it seemed¡ªshe''d reluctantly laid hands on the woman in front of her, glaring at the dark pink hair so close to her face. The spears, bow, quiver, and her staff that had been laid and lashed securely to the bed of the sled underneath them were uncomfortable bumps on her posterior.


    They followed the path of the river, whose surface had frozen over and been covered by more than a pace of snow. It reminded Lori of going down one of the wide main roads of Taniar, except it was completely bereft of people, wagons, steam drivers, and riding beasts¡­


    Actually, that meant it was absolutely nothing like going down the wide roads of Taniar.


    They moved quickly, especially after Lori found their pace too slow and greatly increased the output of the air jets. The trees on either side of the river whipped past them at speed, many of them leafless, although there were occasional stretches of tall pointy trees that still seemed to have their foliage.


    When they neared the edge of the demesne, Riz let go of Rian with one hand and pointedly poked at Rian''s back with two fingers. "Slow down, we''re almost there," she said. The sounds of the air jets had long been muffled by a binding Lori had placed on them, since she was not going to endure that din when it was occurring within arms-length of her.


    "Got it!" Rian acknowledged. He did something, and the muffled sounds of the air jet grew noticeably louder as Lori suddenly felt a strong, almost physical wind blowing up on her side. She glanced sideways and saw that the air jet flaps had dropped, all the air now directed upwards. At first, nothing seemed to happen, but it eventually became apparent that the sled was slowing down.


    "Stop the sled!" Lori ordered as they approached where she could feel her awareness of the wisps ending. "We''re here!"


    "Navia, drop the anchor!" Rian called.


    "Yes, Lord Rian!" the woman standing behind Lori said. A few moments later, the sled shuddered and began to slow greatly. Thankfully, they didn''t actually go over the edge of the demesne, coming to a stop a few steps away from it.


    "Careful," Rian warned her as Lori let go of Riz and shuffled back so she''d have enough space to get off the sled. "The snow''s pretty deep here. We''ll need the snow pads if we''re going to be walking on it."


    Lori frowned at him. "Snow pads?" she said as she swung one leg out over the side of the sled. It started to skink down into the snow and kept sinking. Lori pulled it back out.


    "Yes, the snow pads," Rian said patiently. "I take it you don''t have snow where you used to live?"


    "We had snow," Lori said, "It was just never this deep."


    "Then please believe me, you''re going to need the snow pads."


    After a struggle putting on the snow pads¡ªlarge hoops covered in leather with thongs to secure them to your feet¡ªLori awkwardly walked out to the edge of the demesne, already forming the binding of firewisps and airwisps to keep her warm when she went beyond the borders. Her staff dragged over the snow next to her, since it was too deep for the butt to make contact with solid ground as she carried a wooden bowl taken from the kitchens in her other hand. There was a burning coal in the coalcharm, and the quartz embedded in the staff vibrated slightly from the lightningwisps bound and stored within them.


    Ahead of her on either side walked Riz and her friend, both holding spears ready in case of beasts. The two scanned the trees watchfully. Behind them, just in front of Lori, Rian followed after them holding the bow and looking like he actually knew how to use it.


    Crossing the threshold was a terrible surprise, as it was far, far colder than it had been before when she''d gone down to River''s Fork, even through the binding meant to keep her warm. She increased the output until she was comfortable, as she stood outside of her demesne. The snow shimmered in the noonday sun, almost like¡­


    "Stop," Lori called as she frowned and crouched awkwardly on the snow pads to get a better look at the snow. No, it hadn''t been her imagination. The snow outside her demesne had the multicolored tinge of Iridescence, like a fine powder that had been mixed in with the snow.


    Well, at least she wouldn''t have to look for any¡­


    She carefully scooped up some of the colorful snow into bowl as the other three maintained their positions. Rian''s head was twitching like he wanted to watch what she was doing, only to stop himself and go back to watching out for beasts for a few moments before being tempted to look again. Carefully, Lori walked back until she was once more mostly inside her demesne, careful to keep the bowl from crossing the unseen border. Standing inside her demesne, Lori began to claim, bind and imbue wisps¡­

 206 - Bead Economic Theory

    When they returned back to her dungeon on the late side of mid-afternoon, they did so with five beads of various sizes sitting heavily in Lori''s hand, since she forgot to wear her belt pouch. She had lost track of the time during experimentation, so when they''d gotten back she''d resigned herself to being hungry and therefore irritable, only to learn that Rian had asked the kitchen to set some food aside for them.


    Thankfully, Riz''s friend had not needed to be told she wasn''t invited, and sat eating at a different table where others were gathered. Occasionally, some people would send looks towards Lori. She ignored them, staring down at the five beads sitting in a wooden bowl in front of her.


    Beads. She''d made beads. All it had taken was a freakish, random accident and¡ª


    "Lori? Your Bindership?" Rian prompted as she continued to stare down at the beads. "Should I be worried? Getting ready for more work?"


    What had been a secret procedure only Dungeon Binders knew and could perform had been surprisingly easy. All she had needed to do was create a binding of wisps of all kinds¡ªsubsequent tests using only waterwisps, lightwisps and darkwisps had all failed, and it was only when at least five different kinds of wisps, which had to include darkwisps, had been part of the binding had a bead formed¡ªheavily imbue the binding, and use the binding to try to claim Iridescence.


    She stared at the five beads again. While close, none of them were any of the standard sizes. Lori could tell that much even without precise measuring equipment. They didn''t feel right in her fingers, which had years of practice at being able to tell the size of the beads in her pouch. There had been six, but she''d swallowed one to see what happened, and it had acted like a bead, dissolving in her stomach to allow her to access the magic locked within it¡­ though now that she knew what it was made from, she just had more questions¡­


    It was so easy. Anyone could do it. Why hadn''t they? If she''d known it was this simple to make her own beads, she''d have run off to the edge for a day or two and just made some. Or a lot. They wouldn''t have been legal tender, since they didn''t have denomination markings, but it would have been useful in her classes and in some of her more difficult jobs where they hadn''t provided her with any beads despite the work needing it.


    Or perhaps it wasn''t that simple. Perhaps she did need to be a Dungeon Binder to make it. And¡­ the procedure for it was very similar to creating a dungeon core, and could only be done outside the demesne, in the presence of Iridescence. The location and the laws and treaties about how creating a demesne is considered treason would probably be sufficient to discourage the sort of experimentation that would lead to this discovery. And given how she herself had been staying within her demesne as much as possible and not experimenting with bindings when outside its borders¡­


    That made anyone else in the continent replicating the steps she took to discover the process unlikely. First, she had been expanding her demesne. Then she had experimented with using a massive binding for easier imbuement before expansion. Then tried to expand while all of the wisps she planned to use to expand were still part of a binding. Given how only Covehold itself seemed to have expanded at all, and they had imposed a restriction that only beads from the old continent could be used for transactions¡­


    "Your Bindership, aren''t you going to eat?" Rian said, interrupting her flow of thought.


    Lori blinked, shook her head to clear it and focused on her food. It had grown a little cold but that was easily fixed, and soon she was eating warm food as she filled her empty stomach. Her eyes wandered over to the beads, and across from her, she knew that Rian and Riz were doing the same.


    "So¡­ Rian, does this mean we''re all going to get paid now?" Riz asked.


    "Probably not," Rian said.


    Lori swallowed the mouthful she was in the middle of. "No," she said firmly.


    Riz raised an eyebrow. "Not that I''m implying anything, Great Binder, but everyone knows that not paying a militia is the fastest way to get that militia to quit or revolt. Or anyone else, for that matter."


    "You''re not militia, you volunteered to come along because Rian," Lori pointed out.


    "We can''t pay anyone yet, Riz, because of two very important reasons," Rian said. "It took her Bindership¡­ what, half a day to make five beads? There are over two hundred people in the demesne, counting the children. If we pay everyone a daily wage, that means her Bindership will need to make at around a thousand beads a day, assuming a daily wage of four beads, which¡­ is unlikely to happen for practical reasons. Secondly, if you, at this very moment, had any beads¡­ what would you spend it on? You don''t need to pay for food, firewood, use of the baths, use of the tools, or anything else. So what do you need money for? It''s only useful if you have something you need to spend it on."


    "Rian, even in the militia, we had food, firewood and baths," Riz said. "Admittedly not as good, but we still had them, and we were still paid."


    Rian nodded. Both seemed to have forgotten Lori was there. "A good point. All right then. Let''s say everyone here is paid for their work. You and your friends are paid for your turns administering the Um, everyone who works in the kitchen is paid for cooking our meals and cleaning up the dishes and things afterwards, people on woodcutting rota are paid for cutting wood, those who go out to hunt beasts for meat¡­ would you say that''s fair?"


    "Well, of course," Riz said suspiciously. Lori recognized the inherent distrust of someone in a conversation with leading questions.


    Rian nodded. "Now, in this situation where you''re all getting paid, should use of the baths, getting firewood from storage, and food still be free?"


    "We can all provide for ourselves, Rian," Riz said dryly. "Cut our own wood, hunt for our own food, even take baths in our own house."


    The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Rian nodded. "So the woodcutting rota, the kitchen staff, the hunting parties, and the ones who look after the baths are all out of work and don''t need to be paid then, is what you''re saying?"


    Riz paused. At the other tables, people were listening intently. Lori continued eating, wondering what point her lord was rambling towards. He always had one, he just needed time to get there so her idiots could catch up¡­


    "By the same logic, people don''t need to use the Um," Rian continued. "They can do that at home. If no one is using the Um, no one has to be paid to administer it. So those people aren''t being paid either. Since no one is getting paid, no one needs money."


    Riz made a face, as if she thought this was wrong but couldn''t think of how to argue how¡­


    "Of course," Rian continued, "it''s possible that eventually, people realize they really don''t want to have to cut their own firewood, so they pay someone else to do it. That''s the woodcutters getting paid again. And the woodcutters could be too tired after a day of getting firewood to cook for themselves, so they pay someone to cook for them. That''s the kitchen staff being paid again. And the kitchen staff need material to cook with, so someone pays hunters to go out and hunt beasts for meat, since they might be busy in the kitchen or gathering firewood."


    "Stop right there," Riz said. "I can already hear the ending. ''It''s basically what we have already, except we''re passing beads around'', right?"


    Rian shrugged, smiling innocently. "You said it, not me. Though I point out not everyone reaps the same benefits. Those being paid to cook will only cook for the ones paying them, those cutting firewood will only cut for those paying them, and so on."


    "It sounds simple when you say it like that, Lord Rian!" someone at another table called out. "But what about the farmers? Shouldn''t we get paid for our work?"


    "I''m pretty sure the farmers all got to use the baths, the Um, the laundry area, and got food to eat along with everyone else, Etwart," Rian called out, glancing over his shoulder at someone as Lori finished the soup in her bowl. "In that sense, they''re paid just like everyone else."


    "But the grain we all worked to raise isn''t ours to keep," the person protested. There was something familiar about it¡­ a feeling of¡­ annoyance¡­


    "Etwart, are you really trying to build up to saying how you''re taken advantage of and that the harvest raised from the sweat of your brow was stolen from you by someone who''s just getting fat on the work of others?" Rian said. "Are you really trying to build up towards that, when you''re sitting in a room literally built by one woman who doesn''t even need it? Who''d probably have done the tables and benches too if we hadn''t gotten ahead of her? Come on man, we''ve talked about this! You''ve even agreed it''s for the best! Stop complaining about settled matters."


    "We brought a lot of that grain with us from River''s Fork, Etwart," someone at another table said. "So don''t be a slug. You don''t hear us glittering complaining about people who want a share of grain that they just helped with and didn''t actually own!"


    That got another laugh, mocking and pointed.


    Rian turned back to Riz. "Now, it''s not that we don''t want everyone to be fairly paid for the work they do, but right now, paying them with beads brings complications we''re not ready for, and without really improving everyone''s overall lot. In fact, it''ll just make it more complicated. I''m sure you can imagine the troubles we''ll get with people losing beads, accusing people of stealing their beads, and so on." Rian paused and said, "But mainly, does Binder Lori look like she''s willing to make that many beads when she''s already making that annoyed face when we''re just talking about the subject?" Rian gestured towards Lori. "Besides, you want to talk about people getting paid, consider this: who is paying Binder Lori to make all those beads?"


    Riz blinked. So did Lori as she considered the question.


    "You bring up good points, and I agree with them," Rian said. "But if you''re going to ask about people who aren''t paid, what about our Dungeon Binder? Shouldn''t she be paid for her work? If you want to talk about people who''re being taken advantage of by someone who''s just getting fat on the work of others¡­" He didn''t finish the sentence and just shrugged.


    Eventually, Lori found her voice. "Rian, don''t be absurd," she said. "I don''t need to be paid. If I want something in the demesne, I''ll just take it."


    "Of course, your Bindership. Do you want me to tell the kitchen to make honeyed bread and roast tail meat tomorrow?"


    "Rian, what have I told you about holding holidays?"


    "As you say, your Bindership. Still, it''s not all bad. Even if it''ll take time to move on to a bead-based economy again, there''s already a wonderful upside to you being able to make beads."


    "There is?" Riz said.


    Rian nodded, smiling broadly. "We can sell them in Covehold," he said cheerfully.


    Lori stared at him. "Explain."


    "I don''t think Covehold or the other demesne near it have worked out how to make beads on their own yet," Rian said. "Otherwise they''d be making their own and not insisting all goods and services be paid for with Taniar-certified beads. However, that means the only source of new beads is from ships coming in with people and supplies to buy relatively cheap furs."


    Lori nodded in understanding. The furs were about the only thing she had heard of being exported by Covehold Demesne when she had still been a student, which had become expensive status pieces from those with more beads than sense who valued that kind of thing. From what she had seen when she had been passing through on her way to here, the demesnes around Covehold simply didn''t produce enough surplus of grain or other resources to be worth exporting over the ocean in amounts that made it economical.


    "However!" Rian said triumphantly. "That means beads that wizards and bound tools can use are ultimately a limited resource, since to use them for either will deplete the overall bead reserves of this continent as a whole. This is on top of the beads already being removed from the local economy to buy products from the old continent. "


    Riz looked like she was barely able to follow, though Lori nodded at her lord''s reasoning. Some people in other tables were nodding as well.


    "Now, though, our demesne, and you specifically," he grinned at her, "has just become a new source of beads. Not for using as money, because if Covehold allowed that we''d literally end up owning them, but for use in bound tools and for their wizards. Until someone else comes forward with a Dungeon Binder who knows how to do it, we¡ªI mean, you¡ªare literally the only ones in the whole continent that can provide a steady supply of this resource."


    Lori stared at him. She looked down at the beads on her bowl. "I see¡­" she said slowly. She began to grin herself. "As a resource for sale, they become subject to market forces of supply and demand."


    "And there is currently little supply and a lot of demand, so we can set out own price! Though it probably can''t be that simple," Rian calmed down and cautioned. "There''s a good chance Covehold put a law or something in place in preparation for someone finding out how to do this before they did, like some outrageous fifty-percent tax. I''ll have to go back and find out more before trying to sell beads. "


    "You''re not going," Lori said reflexively.


    "You''re not going!" Riz cried. "I don''t want to be temporary-Rian again!"


    "I don''t want her being temporary-Rian again," Lori agreed. "She is only barely adequate at it."


    "See, this is why you need another lord or lady," Rian sighed. "We''ll talk about this later. But right now, you might want to consider becoming this continent''s one and only exporter of beads for wizards and bound tools. Until someone else figures out how to do it themselves¡­ you''d have an absolute monopoly."


    Absolute monopoly¡­ absolute monopoly¡­ absolute monopoly¡­


    Oh¡­ to think she might be able to make two childhood dreams come true in one lifetime.

 207 - Bead Experiments

    Naturally, Rian had to destroy her beautiful dreams.


    "It won''t last forever. Given the incentives to find out how you did it, I wouldn''t be surprised if other demesne stumble upon how to make their own beads within a year of us showing up in Covehold selling beads to workshops so they can power their bound tools," Rian said later when it was just the two of them playing chatrang in an alcove in the second level. Well, the two of them and the other three. Riz was once more napping on the bench with her head in Mikon''s lap while the weaver watched the two of them play and held a ball of thread for Umu as the latter knitted something.


    "I know that," Lori almost snapped in annoyance. Everyone wanted to have a monopoly and to break one if they didn''t have it. "That''s why it''s best to maximize our profits while we do have the monopoly."


    "That''s going to hurt us later," Rian said. "Even if it''s only one or two other competitors, we suffer a distinct disadvantage when it comes to location, since we''re the demesne furthest away from Covehold. That means it will take longer and cost us more to bring our beads over to where the market for it is. I feel that instead of focusing on maximizing our profits, we need to maximize our reputation and customers. Even if there are others who are closer, if we have a reputation of being reliable and good to deal with, it will help offset problem of not being as immediate. People will seek us out to buy what we have, and having limited stocks will drive up the price by itself. It''s how people work. And besides, having your customers practically run up to you and scream ''take my beads'' is just good economics."


    "Now you''re just being facetious," Lori said, moving her Mentalist.


    Rian peered down at her piece. "Mentalist, right¡­" he muttered. "Thought it was a Horotract for a moment there. Yes, yes, I know, the marks are different, that''s why I looked. So, are we going to experiment with making more beads tomorrow?"


    "''We''?"


    "Of course I''m coming along, you''re going to the edge of the demesne. Besides, you need someone to write notes for you, and I can operate the sled."


    "Coming with you," Riz muttered, not opening her eyes.


    "Thank you Riz, your company is greatly appreciated," Rian said as he moved his core behind his Whisperer.


    "Remember, you volunteered," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, Great Binder, not being paid," Riz muttered. "Even if you have beads now."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "I have five beads. If I paid you with one, what would you even do with it?"


    "Use it to pay you to make our house warm for a week," Riz muttered as Mikon smiled fondly down at her. "Napping now."


    "Huh. That''s one way to set the bead standard¡­" Rian said thoughtfully. "One bead keeps a house warm with magic for a week, so a bead can buy a little under a week''s worth of firewood¡­"


    "We are not using that to set the standard."


    "Well, we''ll have to think about it eventually," Rian said. "So far, people understand that the copper is a resource held in trust for the entire demesne, but that''s only because I worked really hard to get as many people from every family to agree to work at the mine at least once, so everyone feels they have a stake in it. But we''re going to need to start using it eventually, one way or another. If we don''t and it just sits there, people are going to be tempted to start stealing what they consider their share."


    Lori grunted. "We''ll sell half in the spring for more materials for the demesne," she said.


    "Like window paper?" Rian asked hopefully.


    "I still don''t think that''s really how it''s done. Won''t it get wet when it rains?"


    "Not when it''s oiled to repel water," Rian said. "Besides, they''re meant to be behind shutters when weather happens¡ª Oh. I just had a thought."


    Lori sighed. "What now?"


    "Now that you can make beads, could we set up the Coldhold so that it''s maintained by a bead instead of you directly?" Rian said. "Like what you did to check if the bead we brought back really was a bead?"


    Lori blinked as she considered that. It¡­ was actually very viable. Most of the Coldhold''s structure was merely bound to be solid, and therefore not conduct heat. Such a binding wouldn''t need much imbuement. With enough beads¡­ "It should be possible, but doing the same thing to the water jet driver would be wasteful," Lori said.


    Rian looked thoughtful. "You know¡­ you have beads. You have wire. You have glass. Isn''t that what you need to make a bound tool?"


    "Probably."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "''Probably''?"


    "Bound tools such as drivers require more components, obviously. Metal for the drive shafts, gears, the casings¡­ it will depend on what sort of bound tool I will try to make¡­"


    "¡­you''ve never actually made a bound tool, have you?"


    "It''s made with Whispering. I am a trained Whisperer."


    "Just not trained in bound tools, though?"


    "I''m sure I can learn. Bound tool artificing was only a three year post-graduate course, and I''ve seen, used and examined several industrial bound tools when I was working."


    "¡­it can''t be that easy, otherwise making bound tools wouldn''t need that long to be taught."


    The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    "¡­well, regardless, I''m sure I can figure it out."


    Rian sighed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Over the next few days, Lori and Rian went out to the moving edge of the demesne to conduct more experiments with beads. And of course, make more beads. With Rian taking notes¡ªbecause otherwise it was just them doing wasteful and strange things, not proper scholarly research¡ªand Riz and one of her friends keeping watch for beasts, Lori was able to confirm some of her initial suppositions about the process. The final size of the bead relied on how heavily imbued the binding used to claim the Iridescence was, and while it wasn''t possible to make a bead with darkwisps alone, tests with all possible combinations of wisps showed that bead formation would definitely not occur if darkwisps weren''t present.


    Given what she knew now about how they were made, it made her wonder why beads were as unreactive as glass. It was literally made of wisps, magic, and Iridescence, yet like every bead type she had ever used, she couldn''t anchor wisps to it. In fact, given it didn''t dissolve in water, beads acted frustratingly nothing like the materials they were made of!


    She also couldn''t bind or even claim the beads in question. Not by touching it, not with a wire¡ªall that did was imbue the wisps in her skin and in the binding around her¡ªnot with her demesne, not with a binding of wisps like the one used to make a bead¡­ the beads didn''t even identify as wisps in her awareness while within her demesne, simply another void like glass, or people. And even glass would probably appear in her awareness once it was heated to a molten state! So would people, for that matter.


    "That probably means there''s some kind of interaction that''s going on that we don''t understand yet," Rian suggested as he wrote down notes on the results of her trying to anchor various wisps and combinations of wisps. Even darkwisps had done nothing, not even being displaced from its position when Lori had waved the bead she was holding through it. "And our understanding of the interaction is limited by our inability to perceive it because we lack instruments. If we had a parvusight, for example, a closer look at its structure might be answer some questions and bring up new ones."


    "I could try to make one," Lori mused. "It''s all just concentrating light, after all¡­"


    They made one in one of the alcoves in the second floor, putting a bead on a stone-molded stand to hold it in place while she''d spent time creating bindings of lightwisps to magnify and focus the image of the bead, and then doing it again with darkwisps to block out ambient light, and then doing it a third time while directing an intense light at the bead so that the magnified image wouldn''t be so dark¡­


    The resulting image, while clear and even aesthetic if you were of a mind for it, was utterly useless in providing any sort of answers, and Lori had dissolved the binding in frustration as she went to her room to calm down and expand the demesne.


    Fortunately, other tests and experiments yielded more quantifiable answers, while creating even more questions in the process. One who followed the Mysteries of Alknowledge¡ªor Rian, since she wasn''t sure if it was the same thing¡ªwould say that was the natural state of the pursuit of knowledge. Lori, who was not a follower of the mysteries or Rian, found it annoying and time-consuming.


    Lori found the process resulted in some measure of energy lost. She had taken the largest bead she had managed to make, one close to twenty chiyustri, and had dropped it into a small container of water to measure its volume. After dumping the water into a bowl to get the bead out with no water loss, she had swallowed the bead and had used only the magic stored within it to imbue the binding used to make the next bead.


    The bead that had resulted was visibly smaller, and some imprecise calculations she and Rian had hastily done led them to conclude it had lost around a quarter of the total energy from the original bead.


    "Maybe the amount goes into stabilizing the bead itself?" Rian suggested. "After all, given the materials involved, beads should dissolve in water but don''t."


    "A possibility, but unprovable, since there''s no way to make softer beads," Lori said.


    "No way that you know of," Rian pointed out. "For all we know, softer bead are some sort of secret material known only to Dungeon Binders that they use as mattress stuffing or something."


    "It annoys me I can''t actually refute that."


    Rian smiled that smile he did when he was trying to look innocent while being annoying. Until she had met Rian, Lori had not realized it was actually possible to do that with one''s face.


    He also noticed something that Lori had never really considered or noticed: Iridescence did not react to beads. They didn''t grow on beads, and putting beads down on Iridescence dust didn''t suddenly cause them to start visibly crystallizing, as opposed to when an imbued binding occupied the same space as the colors. They only got a reaction when a metal wire in contact with a bead made contact with Iridescence.


    Then the tainted rainbows started visibly crystallizing on the surface of the wire, spreading over the surface of the bead and the piece of ice Lori had used to press the wire between the two. They hadn''t grown into either surface, but rather the crystal''s growth simply covered over them. The growth stopped when she removed the wire, leaving the bead visibly reduced and the wire covered in a mostly symmetrical Iridescence growth blooming outwards from the wire at its core.


    The experiment had put added context for why beads should never be placed in a metal container.


    It was Rian who''d suggested they try to break apart the large bead.


    "It''s too big to use, and besides, seeing what the cross-section looks like might be helpful," he said as they''d been packing up the sled to go back to the Dungeon.


    "You just want to hit it until it breaks," Riz accused fondly as she secured the spears.


    "All right, I''ll admit to that, but think about it. Have you ever seen a bead break?"


    "No, because people are careful with their money and any changes to a bead that removes the denomination markings renders it not acceptable as legal tender," Lori pointed out. "Admittedly, the only way to significantly alter the shape of a bead is to put it into the bead receptacle of a bound tool, where it will start to get smaller as it''s used."


    "This isn''t legal tender, it''s a big rock that won''t even fit in your mouth," Rian pointed out. "Which reminds me, we need to experiment to see how to put our own denomination markings for when we eventually start using it as money¡­ But setting that aside, beads can''t actually be unbreakable, or else it would have far more uses besides power and money. It would be used as ball bearings, when you need bearings that will never ground down."


    "Rian, don''t be absurd. If you use beads as bearings, the material it rests on can''t be metal, or else there will be the possibility of seepage. And any device that can wear down bearings like that can''t be made of anything but metal, or else other parts will start to fail."


    "Hmm, good point. But I think we should at least try to break it. It will give us a lot of useful information about its material structure, if we manage it, and given its size, it will be a much more visible cross section than one of the small ones."


    Lori considered the large bead now lying in its own stone shelf, on top of a piece of leather so that it didn''t start seeping from possible metals in the stone. The only possible use she could currently think of for it was using it to power the wired bindings in her dungeon in place of the core, but if she did that, she''d have to remake all her bindings all over again when the bead ran out, and then she''d put the wire back on the core anyway¡­


    And now that Rian had proposed the idea, she had to admit she was a curious about what would happen. If it was unbreakable¡­ well, that would expand the things they could use it for¡­


    "Sure, why not? It''s not like it''s currently useful for anything."


    She could always make another one, after all.

 208 - Breaking Bead

    "So¡­ the only hammers we have are made of metal. Will that be a problem? Seepage and whatnot?" Rian asked


    Lori shook her head. "It shouldn''t be as long as the metal isn''t also in contact with a binding. Metal is a conduit, not a receptacle."


    Rian frowned. "Why is seepage such an issue, then? Shouldn''t it only be a problem if a bead is around bindings?"


    "Can you see bindings to avoid them?"


    "Ah. Good point."


    After she had given Rian authorization, he had arranged for assistance with breaking apart the large bead. He''d also informed her that for some silly reason, the rumor was going around that the bead wasn''t actually a bead but a dungeon''s core. Therefore they had to be careful of idiots ''accidentally'' spilling their blood on it.


    The bead was being broken outside, near the mouth of the tunnel leading out to the woods, in case there was some sort of unfortunate explosion. Lori didn''t think there would be, but the cold should keep most people away, though she had to undo the binding of airwisps keeping the front of the tunnel clear so that they wouldn''t seep from the bead. They were trying to break it, not drain it.


    First she set down a surface of stone, with contours and a low wall in place to keep the bead from moving around and rolling. When that was done, Rian put the bead in place, and she altered the shape of the stone base to hold the bead more securely. Pieces of scrap wood were then wedged in to place to hold the bead tight.


    They had immediate scrap wood because the assistance Rian had arranged involved calling the biggest and most muscular of the blacksmiths, carpenters, sawyers, woodcutters and the stone masons. The blacksmiths had brought along a selection of their hammers, long-hafted things with steel heads, while the stone masons had blunt-looking metal chisels with wooden grips.


    After getting rid of Landoor, Rian turned to the assembled men. "All right," Rian said while Lori put together a binding to emit warmth. They were working outside, after all. "As many of you may have heard, her Bindership has worked out how to make beads. We''re still in the starting parts of that, so no one is going to have to remember how to pay taxes any time soon¡ª" everyone''s eyes widened at that, "¡ªbut that''s not why we''re here. We''re here because her Bindership gave me permission to try breaking this bead open."


    "So it''s not a dungeon''s core?" one of the blacksmiths, red-haired man with work-darkened skin, asked, sounding disappointed as Lori used darkwisps to mark the binding''s location, putting it far above the bead so that it would warm everyone efficiently.


    "No, that''s not how dungeons work," Rian said as Lori checked to make sure there were no bindings were near the bead. The earthwisps that had been used to shape the stone was inert and unbound, and there was nothing in the air above it. "If this were really a dungeon''s core, we wouldn''t be able to move it and it would vanish as soon as it was inside the demesne. No, it''s a really big bead. If we had any sort of bound tool, we could probably run it for an absurdly long time. As we don''t¡­ we get to break it open and see what''s inside."


    Everyone looked at the bead.


    "Can we even break a bead?" someone Lori vaguely recognized as one of the carpenters asked. "I''ve never heard of a bead breaking."


    "They can''t be unbreakable," Rian said. "Otherwise someone would make a big bead like this and use it as the head of a drop hammer or an anvil or something. It would be really expensive, but then they''d have a perfectly round, smooth, unbreakable hammer head. It''s not as if there''s some reason beads can''t be big. We have a big one right here."


    The men, craftsmen all who had probably seen a drop hammer at some point, all looked thoughtful.


    "If we can''t break it, can we use it as an anvil?" one of the men holding a blacksmith''s hammer¡ªso he was probably a blacksmith¡ªasked.


    "Or a round form?" added one of the carpenters.


    Rian turned to Lori. She rolled her eyes. "Schedule it among yourselves, at least until we have a bound tool to wire it to," she said, waving her hand dismissively.


    "Though that doesn''t mean you shouldn''t try to break it," Rian said dryly. "So let''s put our backs into it, all right?"


    The other men gave him dubious looks. While Rian could hardly be called lean, some of the men looked like they weighed twice what he did in muscle. Well, that was probably an exaggeration, but one smith had arms thicker than Rian''s legs.


    "Maybe you should just sit and watch, Lord Rian," one man said kindly.


    "Eh? I''m not that weak, am I?"


    All the other men looked away.


    "You''re that weak," Lori said.


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    Rian sighed. "You didn''t have to say it out loud for everyone. Can I at least hold one of the hammers that''s not being used so I can feel useful?"


    The men gave him a hammer to hold. Rian promptly fell over backwards into the snow. "I can''t move¡­ all right, take the hammer back, I''m too weak!"


    Lori sighed as the men laughed and helped him back up. Rian and his stupid theatrics¡­


    After covering the bead with some tent canvas so that if it broke the pieces couldn''t go flying and holding the canvas in place by using some rocks to tuck it against sides of the stone platform, the men began trying to break the bead. First, the largest-looking blacksmith picked up the heaviest-looking hammer, held it in both hands, and just swung down at the top of the rounded mound that was the bead. The head of the hammer rebounded with a dull sound, but with a smooth and practiced motion the blacksmith had the hammer ready again and was swinging down a second time.


    Each successive swing came down with just a little bit more force. After five increasingly heavy swings, the blacksmith stepped back, and the tent canvas was pulled aside so they could examine its surface. Rain crouched down next to the bead to get a closer look


    "I think it''s cracking. It didn''t have those cracks before, did it?" Rian said, pointing to something on the surface of the bead.


    Everyone crowded around him to peer at what he was pointing at, though they made way for Lori when she leaned over. At first, there didn''t seem to be anything on the cloudy white surface of the bead, but a closer look revealed stark white lines. They seemed to be just under the surface of the bead, following a wiggling path like lightning. Lori ran her fingers over the smooth, glass-like surface, but she didn''t feel any breaks or imperfections along where the cracks were, only perfect smoothness.


    Still, it was a good sign, since it meant that hitting it repeatedly was doing some good. Putting the tent canvas back on to cover around the bead, the men stood in a circle around it and, wielding their own hammers, began taking turns hitting the bead. Rian had to relinquish the hammer he was holding, but he was put in charge of keeping counting out the rhythm of the work.


    Soon an almost constant series of hammer blows were falling down on the bead as Rian kept time. With nothing better to do than watch, Lori sat down on a block of bound ice pulled from the snow and started preparing for expanding her demesne later. Despite herself, she found her knee bouncing to the rhythm of the hammers as the men worked. It made her strangely nostalgic, remembering the days she used to be a student and worked in the small metal workshops to earn beads.


    The dull echoes faded into the background as she did her work while they did theirs in the cold winter air. Every so often they''d stop and pull back the tent canvas, examining the surface of the over-sized bead. From the sound of it, more and more cracks were developing, but from where she was sitting away from them so she wouldn''t get hit by the swinging hammers, the bead was still unmarred, so the cracks were likely very small and subtle. Still, the number of cracks were apparently growing, because after every check, the circle of men went back into place and resumed hammering with vigor.


    It was about half an hour before there was a result that wasn''t just the hammers rebounding dully. Lori glanced up, pausing in her imbuing as she heard a sudden crack. She rose to her feet, then had a moment to look down in annoyance as she realized her boots were resting on mud from the passive heat around her. It took her a few moments to dry the mud sufficiently so that her boots wouldn''t sink into it. By the time she managed to make her way to the bead, the tent canvas had been carefully pulled back.


    The surface of the bead was shattered, its glassy surface and cloudy white interior marred, and a curving shard lay lopsidedly on top of the outline that matched it, along with many smaller, less distinct pieces. Small, fine shards were scattered around the cracks, the wind causing some of them to slide down the sides of the bead to the stone stand below. She''d have to be careful to collect everything from the base later.


    "See, we broke it," Rian said excitedly.


    "Well, there goes using it as an anvil," one of the blacksmiths sighed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once the outermost glass-like shell was broken¡ªand hadn''t resulted in any sort of violent explosion or reaction¡ªthe tests began.


    Well, after moving the bead, of course. Now that it had shown breaking it wouldn''t cause it to explode¡ªnot that there had ever been any reason to think it would, since neither Iridescence or bindings were known for just exploding¡ªLori ordered the bead moved down to an alcove in the second level, where she could test it under more controlled conditions.


    The bead, stone stand and all, was carefully picked up and moved, the tent canvas thrown over it again so that the wind couldn''t blow away the loose shards. Once the stand was placed in an alcove, Lori got more stone and blocked off the alcove from the breezes caused by the air circulation. It was only when the air inside the alcove she had requisitioned was completely still did she carefully remove the tent canvas off the bead, absently handing it off to Rian.


    The first thing she inadvertently learned was that while beads didn''t react to water, the contents of beads definitely did. She found this out when she reshaped the stone stand to get at the bits and fragments of the bead that slid down beneath it and found, among the powdery remains and shards, small drops of cloudy white translucent water that almost, but not quite, looked like flour had been dissolved in it.


    It was, she noted, not unlike the appearance water took after it had been used to dissolve and wash away Iridescence, a multicolored sheen like a layer of oil refracting light. However, unlike water that had dissolved the colors, the drops of water under the stone stand didn''t gradually become clear water again. Instead, the drops remained a cloudy white.


    "Huh," Rian said, writing notes down on his plank. "Is it¡­ supposed to be doing that?"


    "It shou¡ª" Lori caught herself, shook her head. "I don''t know. It''s doing it, however, so it probably is supposed to do that."


    "Maybe we should take samples?" he suggested. "Can you gather them up with your syringe?"


    Lori thought of all the stairs and rolled her eyes. "Or I could just do this instead," she said, reaching out to binding the waterwisps in the few droplets.


    The second thing she inadvertently learned was that while beads were as nonreactive to magic as glass, the contents of beads were not. She had just claimed and bound the waterwisps when the cloudy water suddenly became clear and the binding became imbued.


    "Wait, you cleared it?" Rian said. "How?"


    Lori stared down at the now-clear droplets. "Rian," she said, "write this down¡­"

 209 - White Iridescence

    They only managed to do basic experiments on the substance inside the beads, since Lori''s tools, equipment and instruments were limited. The substance inside the bead felt disconcertingly like Iridescence to the touch, and Lori had to resist the urge to wash her hands to clean of it every time she made contact. Thankfully, unlike the colors, it didn''t seem to be crystallizing, and she felt none of the telltale prickling on her skin of crystal growths embedding into her flesh.


    The mostly transparent outer shell of the bead, which was about half a yustri thick and felt like glass but didn''t produce the same sharp edges, seemed like a completely different substance from the cloudy white insides, but when Rian had suggested dropping some of the shards into water, the shards had also dissolved, resulting in the same cloudy white water. Subsequent tests of more shards had showed that while the bead''s shell didn''t react to water when applied to its ''outside'', when applied from the ''inside'' the whole shell dissolved¡­ which made no sense, since that implied the whole thing was made of the same material, and so should be equally reactive to water. Try as they might, they couldn''t recover any sort of remains that could have comprised an outer-most water-protective layer.


    "It''s too early to try and look for explanations," Rian reminded her as she glared at the cloudy white water at the bottom of the small sample bottle. "Let''s just note down cause and effect for now."


    Lori grunted in acknowledgement. "But it makes no sense!" she immediately said. "How can it be made of the same substance? How does it not react with water from one side, and dissolve instantly from the other?-!"


    "Don''t obsess over it," Rian said patiently. "Just list it down as a physical property of the substance and move on."


    Lori huffed in frustration, and went back to trying to note down the bead''s properties.


    Once the outer, glass-like shell was broken through, the material inside was very soft. While it didn''t exactly crumble at a touch, since the bead was completely solid and without hollows or bubbles, Lori could scratch it with her fingernail. They used a beast tooth as a cutting and scrapping tool, since metal tools would likely cause seepage, and she didn''t want to have to keep actively suppressing the wisps around her keeping her warm.


    Trying to measure its density was¡­ interesting. Cutting off a substantial amount of the substance, they dropped it into a glass bowl of water to dissolve it so they could try to weight it using some simple scales¡ªreally a plank balanced on a narrow block, so they could approximate how much weight in water the sample they dropped in would amount to by slowly adding more water to an equal-sized bowl on the other end¡ªand correlate the amount of water displaced, but when the sample dissolved and rendered the water cloudy white¡­ the water''s volume and weight didn''t increase.


    At all.


    The water rose slightly as the sample was added, but once it had been completely dissolved, the water level was the same as before they had added in the sample from the bead. They both stared. Lori started shaking as Rian duly wrote it down on his plank and suggested they heat the water to test the effects of heating and evaporation.


    A small metal tripod was taken from Lori''s equipment box and assembled, and the glass bowl was exchanged for a carefully made one of earthwisps with all the bubbles removed to prevent cracking and explosion. The stone bowl of cloudy white water was placed on the tripod while Lori made a binding of firewisps beneath it to heat the water indirectly, and thus slowly. They had to move to another alcove so that the water wouldn''t accidentally condense and fall on the bead that had been broken open, which Lori also covered with stone just in case.


    Then they sealed off the second alcove and watched from around a corner using a binding of lightwisps to reflect light so they could see what was happening to the bowl. Rian duly noted that it slowly started to boil as opposed to exploding, catching fire, or suddenly dissolving the stone bowl. Only when the water had all boiled away¡ªthere was no more bubbling¡ªdid they feel safe in returning to the alcove. On the bottom of the stone bowl were clumps of cloudy white residue.


    Once gathered, and accounting for the altered shape, there appeared to be less of the sample than had been dissolved.


    "But that makes no sense!" Lori cried as Rian noted it down.


    "Actually, it''s the first of its behaviors that make any kind of sense at all," Rian argued. "It''s water soluble, and we were able to extract it again by evaporating the water."


    "But it added no mass to the water! There should have been nothing to extract via evaporation! Water used to dissolve Iridescence doesn''t leave Iridescence behind when it''s been evaporated!"


    "I know!" Rian said cheerfully. "I wonder if it''s possible to dissolve in a volume of white Iridescence greater than the volume of water? Would you suddenly have a big mass of the stuff once all the water evaporated, or would it be concentrated and condensed?"


    Lori blinked. "White Iridescence?"


    "Well, it''s like Iridescence, but it''s white. And as far as I know, ''white'' is one of the few colors Iridescence doesn''t do. Iridescence isn''t silver either, but that''s understandable, since that''s more of a measure of how reflective a metal is¡­" Rian tilted his head. "Huh. I wonder how many of these properties other kinds of beads share?"


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    "We won''t be breaking any open until I learn how to make them myself," Lori said sternly.


    "I know, I''m just wondering¡­ do you think it would be safe to try the fire test? See what happens if we heat it directly, with no water?"


    "Not in an enclosed space," Lori said sternly. Warm and hot Iridescence crystallized at an accelerated rate, growing fast enough to be visible. Burning Iridescence did so energetically, randomly, violently, and tended to spread hot particulates of the colors in the air that could be inhaled, which burned on the way down and cause it to start crystallizing. Lori wasn''t sure if that last was something that actually happened or just a scary story, but it was one of those things no one wanted to actually try to find out.


    "Of course," Rian nodded absently, covering his nose and mouth with the towel around his neck as he lifted up the glass bowl the residue had been transferred to for a closer look. He frowned and moved the bowl away from his face. "Huh¡­ could you shine a light on this, I can''t make out details very well."


    Lori split an annoyed look between her lord and the glass bowl he was holding, but raised up a finger, binding and anchoring lightwisps to the end of it as she made it glow with visible light, holding it up behind Rian''s line of sight.


    "Thank you," he said absently, frowning intently at the clumps on the bowl. "Is it just me, or are the ones in the bowl a different shape than the ones we took straight from the bead?"


    They left the second alcove, and went back to the alcove with the bead. Lori pulled back the stone cover, then pried up a small chunk of the¡­ white Iridescence¡­ from inside the bead, before placing the new sample into another glass bowl. Even to the naked eye, there was some difference...


    "These," Lori mused, pointing towards the samples that had been evaporated from water, "all seemed to be have formed natural right angles." Perfect right angles, at that, or at least as far as she could see. Each clump looked like several cubes fused together by their faces.


    "And these seemed to naturally curve," Rian said in the same tone as he regarded the fresher sample. "See the underside, where you pried it up? It''s curved there, like it''s following the spherical shape of the bead. And look here¡­ doesn''t that look like separate layers?" He had to use the tip of the beast tooth to point.


    They looked between the two samples, as if doing that would somehow reveal their secrets, even as Rian made another note on his plank. From the intent look he was giving the bowls and the movements of his hand, he seemed to be trying to sketch the two samples. Lori wished him luck.


    Lori also replicated her initial accident in deliberately controlled conditions. Mixing a little bit of the white Iridescence into water and then claiming and binding that water led to the binding being imbued and the water becoming clear. However, dissolving white Iridescence into water in a stone bowl, and then claiming and binding the bowl again while it still held the water and white Iridescence solution did not cause the earthwisps to be imbued. Attempts to replicate similar results with other kinds of wisps, except for firewisps, also lead to a lack of reaction with the water.


    "So does it react because it''s the water you''re claiming, then?" Rian mused. "Would the other kinds of wisps react if the white Iriescence were properly dissolved into the corresponding substance?"


    "How would one even go about doing that?" Lori asked.


    She had meant it to be rhetorical, but Rian had gotten a thoughtful look on his face. "Turn stone molten and then add it in?" he suggested. "Liquefy air and then add the white Iridescence? I''ll admit, I can''t think of how you''d do it for the others. "


    "Just because there wasn''t some sort of energetic reaction to being boiled doesn''t mean the same will hold true for being exposed to temperature that would lead to molten stone," she pointed out.


    "Something to carefully plan for before trying then," Rian said brightly.


    Lori glared at her lord, but she couldn''t really rebuke him. She''d been thinking the same thing.


    However, there was something else all these experiments of trying to draw the¡­ she supposed there was no other word to use but imbuement¡­ from the water showed her.


    Her wisps could anchor to white Iridescence. That¡­ was bizarre, but almost, almost understandable. Usually, wisps would anchor to two things: other wisps and the substance they corresponded with. Thus, waterwisps could only anchor to water, firewisps to heat, airwisps to air, and so on, or they could anchor to other wisps, in which case waterwisps could anchor to earthwisps. This was why she needed to use certain substances when intending to anchor bindings. She couldn''t anchor waterwisps or earthwisps to wood, for example. At least, not if the wood was dry. While wood could get wet and absorb moisture, the moisture could evaporate or seep out, or the water being anchored to could move unless she made it part of the binding, and then she would have to make it an exception to the binding she was making¡­


    But her wisps could anchor to white Iridescence. Any wisp could do so¡­ despite white Iridescence not being made of water, air, light, darkness, lightning or heat, and it was very doubtful whether it could be considered earth, stone or mineral. Yet they anchored. Almost, she felt she could explain it. After all, beads were formed by using a binding of wisps to claim Iridescence, and having that binding be amalgamated into the colors. So, technically, white Iridescence was also composed of wisps, and wisps could anchor to wisps¡­


    Except for the fact that the white Iridescence was a void in her senses. If her awareness was to be believed, the substance had no wisps of any sort whatsoever¡­ even the ones that had been heated to boiling point to evaporate the water it had been dissolved into, which should have at least made it full of firewisps. But there was nothing, as if the white Iridescence were a living creature, or glass.


    And yet, her wisps could anchor to it!


    AND IT MADE NO SENSE!


    "Do I include that last exclamation in the notes, or was that just for your own benefit?" Rian asked as he duly wrote down her findings.


    "Don''t include them," Lori said irritably.


    "For your own benefit, got it," Rian nodded. "What next?"


    Outside what had once been an alcove and was now an isolated room with only one entrance, there came a cough. "Rian? Your Bindership?" Umu''s voice called. "It''s, um, time for lunch. The food is already waiting at the table."


    "Now," Lori said. "We stop and eat lunch. And then I go to my room and expand the demesne."

 210 - Routine Set In

    It was very tempting to stop expanding the demesne.


    It was very tempting to stop going out to the edge of the demesne to practice and study forming beads


    It was very tempting to just stay in her newly¡ªand probably permanently¡ªclaimed alcove in the second level and devote her time to studying the now-opened bead. The substance inside, the white Iridescence as Rian had dubbed it, was fascinating, and defied her expectations of what it should act like, given what she knew had come together in the creation of it. How had it become like this? Was it like this for all kinds of beads, or simply wisp beads? How could she use this?


    The questions and frustrations posed by the white Iridescence in the bead was a need she wanted, wanted intensely, to satisfy with answers.


    She pushed back the temptation with experience. Admittedly, it was harder than pushing back the temptation to spend her money on honey bread or sweet rolls or new books, but she managed it.


    While the bead was interesting, and the material information from it would probably be potentially useful, it was only potentially. Forming beads, and developing a method to mass produce beads, would definitely be useful. Likewise, expanding her demesne was a long-term investment that only she could grow.


    So, tempting as it was, studying the material of the bead could not be her priority. Also, when she calmed down and the excitement wore away, Lori was able to realize that none of what she was likely to learn would be new information, frustratingly strange and counter-intuitive as they were. Someone would have decided to break open a bead at some point, and there was no one more likely to do so than the people who could make them: the Dungeon Binders of old.


    That still made it information she needed to know, as a Dungeon Binder, but the realities of her situation meant that it was not her primary need. That didn''t mean she wouldn''t do it, just that she had to do it in moderation. Bead forming and expansion was a greater priority. And now that she had the resources, she also needed to learn how to make bound tools¡ªat least, Whispering-based bound tools¡ªso that she could take advantage of her ability to make beads¡­


    Besides, it was lunch time. They needed to eat, and afterwards she needed to go to her room and expand the demesne as she was scheduled to, because that was certain and sure and needful. It was the responsible, mature thing to do.


    "Yes¡­ yes, that sounds like a sensible set of priorities," Rian said as they finished putting away all of her instruments and glassware into the padded box and covered the large bead full of white Iridescence with a protective stone cover to keep out moisture and prevent accidents


    Lori gave him a flat look. "You want to do more experiments on the bead, don''t you?"


    "¡­so much¡­ but I understand. You''re a Dungeon Binder, I''m a lord, we have responsibilities¡­ even if it would be really nice to just spend time trying to understand more about the white Iridescence inside the bead¡­" Rian sighed. "So¡­ we''re going to prioritize trying to mass produce beads¡­ that means we''re going out to the edge every day?"


    "Until I know more, yes."


    "The edge that will keep moving slightly every day, so we can''t even build a little hut to stay warm in." Rian sighed. "Ugh, I''m going to freeze."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "You don''t have to come, you delicate flower."


    "Of course I do. What if you need notes taken? Besides, you''d have to talk to people without me."


    She supposed she would. "I''ll need a jar."


    Rian blinked at the sudden declaration, then followed after her as she left the alcove. "A jar?" he said as he stepped out of the alcove, and Lori sealed it behind him, the stone flowing to seal the opening. It wasn''t very thick, and someone stomping on the wall would be able to crack it eventually, but it was a sufficient deterrent for casual investigation of her bead.


    "Yes," she said, not elaborating. Having some sort of sealed, relatively watertight container for Iridescence to crystallize and grow in would help her in growing more beads. So far she''d been relying on the little that had been mixed in among the gaps of air in the snow, but that needed careful handling lest the snow melt to water and take the colors with it. The thought of deliberately trying to grow Iridescence made her shudder, but it was needed. As she''d slowly been finding out, the substance clearly had more uses and interactions with magic than she''d been led to believe.


    It was probably deliberate. The inherent danger of being in Iridescence, the increased difficulty and rate of degradation of any sort of magic performed in it, and the possibility of instantly being executed for treason would have probably been enough to deter people from experimenting with the substance normally. Lori had certainly never considered doing so when she''d been in school. This probably allowed Dungeon Binders to reasonably restrict the information.


    She was starting to suspect there were probably more uses than simply creating dungeon cores and beads¡­


    "A jar," Rian said, nodding as she led the way her usual table. "Right. Got it. I''ll see what I can find. What do you need it for?"


    "Making beads, of course," Lori said.


    "Oh, tomorrow you expect to make so many beads you need a better container to bring them back in so they doesn''t accidentally fall off the sled?"


    Lori paused. "Make it two."


    So useful.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Routine set in, despite the cold. The next morning, Rian took Lori to the edge, where she left one of the jars some distance away from the edge of her demesne, well outside even her most optimistic estimate of her current rate of expansion. Then she made beads.


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    From the previous several days of doing so, the basic components had become obvious. A bit of Iridescence was claimed by a heavily imbued binding, and the two would amalgamate, forming a bead. The size of the bead was mostly dependent on how heavily imbued the binding was, though the absolute minimum size seemed to be set by the volume of the Iridescence that was claimed. Water had to be kept away from the process, but that was just to keep the colors from being washed away. Once the beads were formed, there was no longer any need to worry about them, beyond them getting dropped into the snow.


    The one time that had happened it had been a rainbowed pain to find the bead again, since it had been cloudy white on white snow.


    Leaving the jar outside of the demesne to allow Iridescence to crystallize inside it overnight allowed her access to more substantial amounts of Iridescence than what was currently available from the environment, especially after she started leaving a binding of firewisps inside it. The Iridescence quickly crystallized from the heat and from trapping the imbued wisps.


    She didn''t even need to extract the Iridescence from the jar to start binding. All Lori had to do was create bindings of wisps, heavily imbue them, anchor them to the frost on her belt knife, and stick her knife inside the jar so the bindings reached the Iridescence. The metal of the blade acted as a conduit for her, letting her initiate claiming the Iridescence. It soon became a process of finding what level of imbuement created a bead of what size. Even so, the finished products contained small but noticeable variations in size, even when she used bindings that were of equal levels of imbuement. Presumably, the size of the Iridescence ''seed'' was what affected the end result.


    Lori tried claiming, binding and imbuing the beads after they had been formed to increase their size, but it was a futile endeavor. The beads were devoid of wisps to her, just as beads had been all her life, and felt like glass under her fingers touch, even when she finally got back to her demesne where it was warm. She tried it anyway, both inside and outside her demesne, in case that made a different, but other than appearing as a void in her awareness of wisps, it made no difference.


    She''d even tried pouring her blood on it and, when that had resulted in no effect, using waterwisps from her blood in the binding to make a bead. Their affinity allowed her to imbue the binding outside the demesne, confirming the connection, and she was still imbuing when she had the binding claim Iridescence, but as soon as the bead fully formed, it was like someone had overridden her claim, the wisps just coming out of her control, and there was only a bead, devoid and glassy.


    Despite those failed experiments, she managed to increase her bead production. She was now coming back from the edge of the demesne with a jar that, if not exactly full, usually contained at least five to ten beads of a size close to the largest denomination, give or take a few chiyustri. It was a decent improvement over coming back with three small beads that barely reached the smallest standard diameter, or a single large bead just a little bit past the largest size.


    Lori supposed she would likely have to go to some effort to make them closer to the standard diameters, if only so that they''d fit into the bead receptacles of bound tools without modification. Beads came in four standard sizes, starting at ten chiyustri in diameter at its thickest points¡ªdenomination marks would be a fraction of a chiyustri less¡ªand increasing in increments of five. While modifying the bead receptacle would be easy¡ªshe''d seen it done once, with a metal lockbox wired to a bound tool¡ªmost owners of bound tools would probably be wary of such modifications. She''d never worked for a bound tool maker, but she''d heard enough stories to know they did not look well on those tool owners who made such modifications. Few actually refused to repair the bound tool in question, but steep surcharges were not unheard of.


    Several new containers in her room slowly but steadily began to fill with cloudy white beads, each container filling with beads more or less the same size, or at least within two chiyustri of a standard diameter. It was another number for Rian to track, but Lori wasn''t exasperated by this. These were potential saleable goods after all, and keeping track of inventory for sale was important!


    Eventually, she started experimenting with trying to use molds and forms to try to get beads of the same size. Rian suggested to make them bigger than they needed to be and then just use seepage to reduce their size. The wastefulness of the idea made Lori shudder, but unfortunately it was the most efficient and effective idea she had to work with.


    The distaste made her put the idea aside for a while, as she decided to focus on ways to increase her rate of production. There had to be a more efficient way to mass produce beads. At the rate she was making them, she would never be able to produce enough to make up for the amount of beads a demesne managed to consume with its bound tools in a day, which older demesne clearly had to be able to do to keep their economies running while still using bound tools! Lori reminded herself to not make the same mistake twice, to find a way to produce beads smarter, not harder¡­


    This became part of her morning routine after breakfast. Fortunately for her delicate flower of a lord, it didn''t take very long. Simply going out to the constantly moving edge of the demesne, retrieving the jar that had been filled with Iridescence overnight, making beads, and anchoring a binding of firewisps inside the jar, before securing it somewhere she''d be able to find it later. A pair of branches crossed together over the jar helped when there''d been a night''s snowfall.


    The rest of the morning she was able to use to maintain her demesne. The waste desiccator had slowly grown full, and the noxious air within it had to be vented, but the remaining powdery substance thankfully looked and smelled nothing like what had originally gone in. Not exactly pleasant, but given what it had stared as¡­ Well, definitely an improvement.


    The desiccated waste was temporarily stored in one of the curing sheds where the planks that had been moved into the dungeon had been stored, where it would be kept until spring to be used for fertilizer, or turned into fuel far earlier. As long as it wasn''t spreading noxiousness and disease in her demesne, Lori didn''t really care what happened to it. This also allowed more waste to be put in the desiccator, meaning their latrines could still be used.


    She also performed maintenance on the other bindings maintaining the demesne. Not imbuing their bindings, but making sure they functioned as intended. In the case of bindings with firewisps, she had to make sure the temperatures were stable, and to destroy any excess heat, especially when it was heat that had been generated by firewisps. All she had to do was invert the firewisps. When she could, she simply moved the heat elsewhere, since it was winter.


    In the afternoons after lunch, Lori expanded her demesne at least three times. Sometimes, when she felt capable of it, she did so four, or rarely five times. Once, when she managed to reach a particularly comfortable rhythm, she managed to do seven, but that led to her being sleepy and distracted at dinner, and passing out immediately when she got to bed. She didn''t manage to find time to perform any experiments on the broken bead and its white Iridescence then.


    Most days, she managed to at least find some time to open the alcove and pull back the protective stone cover over the broken bead. Rian was always there, taking notes, which she''d later transcribe into stone tablets that joined the rest of the other notes she''d transcribed over the months. It also took her an embarrassingly long time to try and claim the white Iridescence in an attempt to use it to make beads, but the attempt resulted in failure. While her wisps could anchor to it, she couldn''t claim and bind them like she could the colors.


    It took her an even more embarrassingly long time to notice that, half a week later, the binding of wisps was still anchored to the white Iridescence she had tried to claim even after the imbuement had long run out.

 211 - A Gap In Understanding

    "Um, I''m not sure I understand the significance," Rian said, looking up from what she''d just told him to write. "I didn''t go to wizard school, after all. I can barely read and write. Why is something still being ''anchored'' significant?"


    Lori glared at him, but he had a point. While her lord seemed able to understand concepts with relative ease, even esoteric ones about Whispering¡ªmost people had trouble with firewisps not actually making fire, since fire needed fuel¡ªshe supposed he didn''t have the foundation to realize the significance of this. "Because only imbued wisps can be anchored," she said, stating it as simply as she could. "These wisps are anchored, but they''re not imbued."


    Rian blinked. Tilted his head. Wrote something down on his tablet. "So¡­ a very basic, almost foundational aspect of magic isn''t being followed. Should I be worried?"


    "No, you should prepare for experimenting, because I want to find out why."


    Rian took a very big step back. "Uh, by experimenting you don''t mean doing experiments on me do you? Because I know this plot, and¡ª"


    "Rian, stop thinking about the theater and get over here to take notes!"


    Despite how useful he was, Rian was still one of her idiots, and unfortunately acted like it. At least it seldom persisted for very long.


    It wasn''t just that the wisps were anchored, of course. It was that, as far as she could tell though her awareness, the binding was also still holding in place despite the lack of imbuement or anyone¡ªsuch as herself, the only one capable of Whispering in the demesne¡ªactively claiming the binding in question. She''d have said that such a thing was impossible, since both her education and experience told her that when a binding ran out of imbuement the binding collapsed and the wisps comprising it dispersed, but it was clearly happening, so it clearly wasn''t impossible.


    The first part was confirming the wisps were, in fact, anchored. That was simple enough to test, with Lori using a pair of wooden tweezers to pick up the largest intact piece of white Iridescence¡ªa chunk about half the width of her smallest fingernail¡ªand then¡­ moving it back and forth, gingerly shaking it, and shining a bright light on it. It was, admittedly, a crude way of trying to dislodge the wisps, but they remained anchored to the piece.


    At least, the wisps of the binding that had been directly anchored on the piece in her tweezers. The other wisps of the binding had remained anchored to other fragments, and when she had removed the fragment the binding had warped and distended alarmingly before fragmenting, leaving a hole in the binding in the bowl. The wisps on the piece she had removed managed to largely retain their positions relative to each other, and the wisps still in the bowl all snapped back into place more or less where they had previously been.


    It was a strange thing to perceive, a binding literally being torn to pieces¡­ which was just another thing to add to the notes, along with the binding retaining existence despite having no imbuement.


    "Could the binding be siphoning off imbuement from the white Iridescence?" Rian suggested. "I mean, they clearly contain magic that the binding can use, since that''s what beads are. Like what happened with the water with white Iridescence dissolved into it, except not all at once."


    Lori frowned. "It''s a distinct possibility," she admitted, wishing she had thought of it, "but to all my senses the binding doesn''t have any imbuement." She carefully ran her finger over the surface of the piece she''d been manipulating and observing, shaking her head. "Nothing. Imbuement can''t be hidden. You can''t mistake an imbued wisp for one that isn''t imbued." Even if an imbued wisp that wasn''t claimed and wasn''t part of a binding started leaking imbuement like water out of a cracked jar.


    "If we had a more precise way to measure something''s weight, we could test that," Rian mused. He pointed down at the glass bowl. "Take a piece, weigh it, anchor a lot of wisps to it and let it sit for a few days and weeks in a sealed container, then weight it again. If it''s lost weight, theoretically that should mean that the wisps have been drawing imbuement from it."


    "That would actually be a good experiment to perform," Lori agreed, "if we had a scale that precise. We don''t even have a scale that''s imprecise!"


    Throwing one of the fragments with wisps anchored to it into a few drops of water, to see what would happen, had it dissolve and turn the water a cloudy white, but notably did not imbue the wisps that had been anchored to it. The wisps and piecemeal binding in question also didn''t immediately disperse, as she had thought would happen when what they had been anchored to physically disappeared. However, as Lori continued to observe the binding fragment with her awareness of wisps¡ªan observation she''s have been hard-pressed to replicate with merely her abilities in Whispering, as sticking in her finger or a piece of metal to conduct through would likely have greatly altered conditions in the sample¡ªshe saw that the wisps were all slowly drifting apart. It wasn''t dispersal as she knew it, but rather like¡­ like¡­


    ¡ªLori glanced towards the glass bowl with the rest of the white Iridescence and anchored wisps¡ª


    ¡­like each wisp was slowly being pulled apart while still connected by the same binding.


    "Maybe they''re still somehow anchored, even if what they''re anchored to is dissolved into the water?" Rian said, stating the obvious.


    "Obviously," Lori said dryly. It was obvious, after all. "The question is whether the water is having a destructive influence and slowly dissolving the anchors, or if whatever the wisps are anchored to is merely spreading because of the water and is physically pulling the binding apart as a result."


    "Or both," Rian chirped. "Don''t look at me like that, we always have to consider the possibility of more than just one factor being at play here. I really don''t understand people who insist the answer to something must be one or the other absolutely. The world is seldom that neat. It''s far more likely there are multiple things causing this reaction. Is the dispersal dependent on water temperature, for example?" Rian suddenly frowned. "And if we boil the water to recover the white Iridescence, would the wisps still be anchored to them?"


    It was a good question. "A good question," Lori acknowledged as she saw a feminine shadow hovering at the doorway. "Note it down for next time. It appears that it is time to eat."


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    Rian glanced at the doorway as well. "We''ll be right out Umu," he called. "Remember, it''s my turn to get the food, so don''t start without me." Lori rolled her eyes. Her lord could be so strange. Still, at least he hadn''t tried to press his voting fetish in a long time¡­


    They put away the instruments, Lori sealing up the glassware that still had samples contained within under stone, packing the rest in her padded box to return to her room. As they did, Lori mused on the strange properties of the white Iridescence. She could already think of some strange uses for them, like dissolving several beads contents into water to provide an extremely concentrated source of magic¡ªthey had found that seepage on contact with metal still occurred with cloudy water¡ªprovided there was no point of saturation. If there was¡­ well, as long as they could dissolve a number of beads that into water that was less than the bead''s overall volume, it would be a far more concentrated form of storage than beads¡­


    Of course, that begged the question of why such weren''t in active use¡­ but perhaps they were, and she had simply never been near them, or realized what they were. After all, she''d never worked anywhere that would need such greatly concentrated amounts of imbuement in a small space.


    As Lori took one of the bowls of food offered by Rian, her mind turned to her previous experiments. She had hoped to use white Iridescence as a substitute for actual Iridescence for making beads, but while that had failed, there were other avenues to pursue. Perhaps using some of the white in the normal bead-making process outside of the demesne would have some kind of effect. At the worse, the white would simply be consumed by the colors to fuel the latter''s crystallization¡­ which wouldn''t be all bad, as it would give her more seed material.


    Really, the most disappointing result of such an experiment would be no interaction at all, which would be counterintuitive¡ªand make no sense!¡ªand reveal little useful data. Hopefully it wouldn''t be like that.


    She ate her soup like one of the undead, her hand moving from bowl to mouth with smooth, thoughtless movement as Lori considered her other planned experiments in bead-making. Using the jar and heat to promote more Iridescence growth for use as seed has been successful, increasing her yield, and she''d been by mass producing relatively well the past few week, but now she wanted to see if she could enact standardization and perhaps even imprinting with denomination markings. So far she had been making beads using the methodology she had initially discovered, using imbued bindings, but as she had learned, her first method might not be the best method, only the easiest to discover, which was what had prompted trying to grow beads with white Iridescence.


    She had wanted to try standardizing with molds, but Rian had correctly pointed out beads naturally formed spheres anyway, and his other suggestions for trying to control the size of the beads were, in hindsight, easier to do, though a part of her twitched at the wastefulness of intentionally trying to seep beads to get them down to a standard size, even if the imbuement to be seeped was to be used somewhere else. That didn''t solve her problem of how to put in denomination markings, though. A part of her was sure the secret to getting denomination marks on beads was to have them form inside a mold stamped with the appropriate markings, but as Rian had pointed out, that could burst the mold, unless there were metal contact points to initiate seepage and therefor curtail growth.


    In addition, there was a possibility there were other methods to create beads. Or at least, possible permutations to the basic procedure she had already discovered. In fact, she had planned one such experiment tomorrow, involving Iridescence placed on metal to act as a conduit, and imbuing the binding that would claim the colors while the two were in the process of amalgamating. Theoretically, it would mean that she could control the size the bead grew to by supplying the forming amalgamation with imbuement until it reached the size she wanted. It would all depend on whether she could imbue the binding fast enough to match the process of amalgamation¡­


    Lori sighed. She wondered how many days of winter were still left? Once spring arrived, with its inevitable and intense rains, she''d probably be busy with the demesne again. Constructing more buildings, probably making a more permanent waste repository to both keep it away from their water supply and be more accessible in winter, probably building new houses, new storage buildings¡­


    She wouldn''t have as much time for this study and research, such as it was. This winter was her best opportunity to find efficient solutions to these problems, because when the rains came she''d have to use her mind to solve more practical problems. She''d probably find out the hard way if this area was prone to floods. The banks of the river hadn''t been flooded when they''d arrived, but that hadn''t been directly after the winter thaw¡­


    Her spoon came up empty when she put in in her mouth, and Lori blink as she realized she''d finished eating all her food. Shaking her head at her distraction, she turned to her lord opposite her. "Rian, the notes?" she asked.


    "Here, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully, handing her the plank. Lori skimmed through it, making sure the words were all legible so that she wouldn''t have to find him and get clarification. It was a sad fact that Rian couldn''t write very finely with the instruments he had on hand, so the notes tended to be oversized. Part of why she had to transcribe them into stone tablets, where she could use her sharp-tipped stylus to write much finer lines¡ª


    Lori paused as she read some of the random words Rian had scribbled in. Not all of the things written on the plank were what she had dictated. Rian sometimes wrote down questions he had. Usually it was from his relative ignorance of matters pertaining to magic, but in this instance¡­


    "What do you mean, ''bound tools''?" Lori demanded.


    "Oh, just wondering if the white Iridescence has any use in making bound tools," Rian said. "I was thinking that instead of using beads, we could use tubes of some sort full of the compressed powder, since spheres are a very inefficient shape when you''re trying to store things. You end up with lots of gaps of air. This would result in a higher density of material that more efficiently distributes to take up space. Sorry I didn''t bring it up sooner, but it seemed a bit too soon to be worrying about efficiency in that area."


    "Ah¡­" Lori said, nodding. "Yes, it is a bit too soon. But thank you for the reminder. I should start thinking of if there are any applications of the material in making bound tools."


    "The bound tools you still haven''t started working on?" Rian said dryly.


    "As you are well aware, I haven''t exactly had time to start working on learning how to handle molten glass," Lori said flatly.


    Her lord twitched. "All right, fair enough. We wouldn''t want you to burn yourself or something," he said. "Tell me ahead of time, all right? This is probably the sort of thing that will need specialized tools to handle safely, which I''ll need to ask the smiths to make."


    Lori hesitated. She''d been thinking she''d just use earthwisps to shape the glass, since glass, like metal, was malleable and claimable by earthwisps in its molten state¡­ but on consideration, it was likely the glass would reach a state it was no longer molten¡ªand thus claimable by earthwisps¡ªwhile still being extremely hot. "Yes, you had best inquire with the smiths if they are familiar with the making of glass-handling tools," Lori said. "And what materials they will need."


    "Off the top of my head, probably iron," Rian said dryly.


    "Probably," Lori agreed, glancing at the plank again.


    In all honesty, she still had no idea how to make bound tools. But then, she''d also had no idea how to make beads, and she''d managed it just fine. At least she had the components now. Beads, as sources of magic to fuel the bound tools. Metal wire, for conduits along which the magic will travel. Glass, for¡­ uh¡­ for¡­ uh, something about binding wisps to the tool?


    ¡­


    It was at that moment that Lori realized there was perhaps a crucial gap in her understanding of how bound tools worked, because what had seemed like a reasonable explanation she remembered from her early years in school in hindsight made absolutely no sense!

 212 - In Case of Pregnancy

    At breakfast the next day, Lori was trying to find the connection between bound tools, glass and how bound tools function¡ªall the bound tools she''d ever encountered had glass parts with wires from the bead receptacle leading into them¡ªwhen Rian sat down in front of her and immediately said, "We have a slight emergency."


    Lori sighed, her flow of thought interrupted. "Who died and who did it?"


    "No one''s died yet, but potential for death is very high."


    "What is it then?"


    "I talked to our doctors and medics, and they tell me that one of the pregnant women is likely to give birth soon. Sometime this week, at the very least. A week and a half, at most."


    Lori considered that. "You want to try and re-establish contact with River''s Fork," she said.


    "I don''t want to lose one of our people and her baby," Rian said as Mikon sat down next to him, greeting him with a smile and wrapping her arms around his waist as she leaned against him. Rian absently shifted his balance to lean back against her as well. "Re-establishing contact with River''s Fork and finding a way to ask Shana to come here and assist with the birth and any healing needed is the simplest way of doing so." He sighed. "I wish we''d been able to do this sooner, but the storm happened. I was hoping to try and buy our way back to her good graces after that little audit. As it is, if we do manage to manage to reach River''s Fork, I might have to do some begging and giving them some resources for them to agree."


    "Oh? You made all those decisions about our resources so freely, did you?"


    "Nothing without your approval, of course, but let''s be realistic. The last time we saw each other it was over an audit. Even if it was justified and a lesson, it was still an audit," Rian shrugged the shoulder away from the weaver. "And it wouldn''t have been much. Just some of the salt we''ve stockpiled to sell come spring and maybe a little of the honey. The salt is relatively easy to get more of once the river melts and we can get to the ocean again, and given how much River''s Fork needs it, it''s a good trade for them. I don''t know if they have any sweetbugs, so if we give the jar to her directly, it might be sufficient apology and¡­ well, hiring fee? To get Shana to come back with us to help during the childbirth."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at him. "You intend to offer a young girl sweets so you can convince her to return home with you?"


    "Please don''t phrase it like that, you''re making me sound like a terrible person again."


    Lori shrugged. "Do we really need her for this?"


    "Again, death at childbirth is a common theme for a reason," Rian said. "So yes, we need her. So please let me try and convince her to come? Otherwise the alternative is trying to bring a pregnant woman to them, and then having to support that woman and her child in River''s Fork for a few weeks or even months until the infant is well enough to travel. Since we have more than one woman due to give birth this winter¡­"


    Lori frowned, but had to admit that she had already made a decision on this matter a long time ago. "There is still the issue of transport," she said. "While transferring Binder Shanalorre with the air jet sled is doable, provided it is only herself and maybe one other, the sled as it presently exists will not be sufficient for transporting the goods that will be used to pay her fee. And given it is unlikely she will agree to be transported without sufficient escort, which the current incarnation of the sled cannot carry¡­"


    "Maybe they''ll have their own sled?" Rian suggested as Riz and Umu finally arrived, the other weaver sitting on Rian''s free side, while Riz sat down next to Mikon. The pink-haired pulled back from her lord for a moment to peck Riz''s cheek in greeting, which was accepted with an almost resigned air. "We''ll have to see what she''s willing to agree to. Regardless though, the first step is taking the sled, going back there, and asking her if she''s at least willing to heal for us. If she is, then we''ll have the problem of either finding a way to bring her here or bringing someone to her. Hopefully she''s willing to come to us. Bringing someone to her will be a nightmare, and might just kill them if we do it too late and they''re already in the middle of childbirth when we do it."


    Lori sighed. "Very well. We shall go down to River''s Fork after breakfast with a jar of honey and as much salt as we can carry. Hopefully she will be amenable."


    Rian paused. "''We''? You''re going?"


    "As much as I''d rather leave such matters to you, if we are going to be trying to convince her to leave her demesne, then I should handle the negotiations," Lori said. "This should probably be a conversation between equals, and I will need to be present to offer her my guarantee of her safety."


    "I don''t think she needs it?" Rian said. "After all, we''ve already dealt with the one man in our demesne who wanted to kill her."


    "I meant the safety of the sled she might have to ride if she agrees."


    "Oh¡­ right¡­" Rian nodded. "Yes, I suppose when she sees it''s good enough for you, it might be good enough for her. If we can get her to agree, we''ll have until Keyyara starts going into labor to find a solution to the problem of transport."


    "Who?"


    Rian sighed. "That''s the name of the woman who''s closest to giving birth, but don''t worry, you don''t have to remember her name."


    "I never worry about silly things like that."


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    <hr>


    Thankfully, there was nothing that needed her attention, so after breakfast, Rian made preparations for the trip, which involved finding a way to transport salt on the sled without it spilling everywhere should they have some sort of bump. A sack was found, and after being checked scrupulously for tears, was carefully filled with salt, after which it was secured and then put into another sack, which hadn''t passed the scrupulous inspection for tears but was still fairly sturdy. The honey was put in a wooden jar about a third the size of the jars they used to carry rations of stew. It had apparently been shaped a long time ago on the carpenter''s lathe, because it was already polished and seasoned, with a well-fitted wooden stopper to seal it shut.


    "Why do we have a wooden jar of this quality?" Lori said, glaring accusingly at Rian.


    "I''ve been planning this months, of course I had this prepared in advance. Besides, it looks much nicer than the jars we use to carry rations while, and this is very important, holding far less."


    Lori blinked and gave the little wooden jar a second look. Honey had enough water in it that she was able to get a sense of how much was inside the sealed vessel which¡­ wasn''t very much. The sides of the vessel were innocuously thick. In addition, there was some amount of air between the honey and the stopper¡­


    "Ah. It looks pretty, but doesn''t contain very much," Lori said, nodding in approval.


    "The small size will also hopefully encourage her to keep it for herself instead of adding it to their communal food stores," Rian said. "If she actually enjoyed it for herself, she''s more likely to think well of us."


    Rian''s ability to manipulate people was a truly disturbing thing. He explained it so casually and simply, and the way he said it made Lori almost think people could actually be understood, rather than being the illogical, self-destructive idiots that she knew they actually were.


    Lori, for her part, did her own preparations, making sure that the bone tubes connected to the sled were intact and double checking the structural integrity of the surfaces. After that, she imbued the binding of airwisps anchored inside the tubes.


    She also had to choose her clothes with care. While she''d gotten better at dressing herself for the winter since she went outside of her demesne''s borders to make beads in the morning after breakfast, she had no illusions that travelling to River''s Fork wouldn''t be worse. Far, far worse. The last time she went there, it was on the Coldhold. She''d had her own room in the Coldhold, which, among other things, blocked out the wind and was a perfect insulator, so a little binding for warmth as all she needed.


    The sled wouldn''t have that. She''d be exposed to the wind and the cold, and it would be for at least an hour, possibly two¡­ twice. She''d be freezing, and sitting in a pose that was already uncomfortable for the brief amount of time she needed to get from her Dungeon to the edge of her demesne. She wouldn''t be able to wear her hat, since it would be blown off, and the hood of her raincoat would as well, unless it acted as a scoop to gather the cold air around her head to freeze her ears.


    And so, measures had to be taken. She wore three shirts, because she needed insulation. She wore two sets of trousers, one over the other, and while it felt a bit constricting, she would be able to sit on the sled and it would be warmer than just one set of trousers. She carefully put on her winter robe, and used some cord¡ªthat she had to ask Rian to get from the ropemakers¡ªto secure the sleeves shut so they would hold in her body heat better.


    There was nothing to be done with her hands, since she had no gloves or knitted mittens. Those had to be wrapped in bindings of airwisps and firewisps to stay warm. The same with her head, especially her face and ears.


    The rest of her was kept warm with firewisps anchored to wide, flat, rounded stones that she had to make and then hurriedly smooth so it wouldn''t tear people''s clothes¡­ most importantly, her own. The warm rocks fit between her layers, though she needed to be careful lest they fall off, since clothes weren''t really meant to be used as pockets for rocks shaped like already-used soap. she had to secure them in place with some of her chest binders so they wouldn''t slip off, making her glad she''d had time to do her laundry recently.


    She didn''t know how Riz and Rian secured the rocks she gave them, but given how stupidly happy Rian looked, he found a way.


    With all the preparations, it wasn''t until well past mid-morning before they were ready to go¡ªor at least, try to go¡ªto River''s Fork.


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    Lori stared at the sled. She''d expected the big sack with all the salt, which was tied to both the bed and the headboard of the sled, but the bed of the sled also contained what were recognizably folded tent canvas, some spears, a bow with no string and some arrows, rope, snow pads, and another pack. "Rian, what is all this?"


    "In case of emergencies," Rian said as he and Riz checked the ropes tying things in place. "Or if we have to stay overnight in River''s Fork for some reason, like a sudden storm. You, uh, might want to grab your bedroll and blanket, so we can pack it all in and distribute the load properly."


    Lori sighed. "Is this truly necessary?"


    "It''s for emergencies, which we hope don''t happen but need to be ready for in case they do. And I really don''t want to have to sleep without a bedroll and blanket."


    "I would have thought you''d be sharing with Riz if that were the case?"


    Rian twitched as Riz smirked.


    "If you think that, do you really want to be using my bedroll?"


    It was Lori''s turn to twitch. She turned and headed back to her room to get her bedroll and blanket.


    Once her bedroll, blanket and staff had been packed along with everything else¡ªand she tried not to think of it being in the same pack as Rian''s bedroll¡ªit was time to get on board the sled. This time Lori had to sit directly behind Rian, her arms around his waist as she leaned back against the sack of salt and their bedrolls. "Why do I have to sit here?" she sighed. "Can''t I stand in the back?"


    "Do you know how to throw the braking anchor properly?" Rian said as they both tried to be comfortable¡­ or at least, secure enough not to fall off. "Are you used to standing on a sled and holding on for dear life for hours on end?" He tested the rope that raised and lowered the flaps of the air jets.


    Lori had to concede that.


    The sled started to move, people wearing snow pads pushing them to get them moving. They picked up speed, and Lori activated the air jets on either side of the sled. There was a roar of wind and a blast of snow as they started accelerating, the people who''d been pushing them falling behind as Rian turned the sled to follow the river. Once they were properly on course, Lori increased the force of the air jets, and they proceeded to accelerate further.


    Lori continued to imbue the air jets all the way until they reached the edge of her demesne. In a wave of biting cold, they had moved beyond, into the mostly white, vaguely glittering winter snows, following the path of the river towards River''s Fork.


    She hated all this already. Argh, why did she keep thinking it was a good idea to leave her demesne? The only consolation was that if they were successful, at least it would be Shanalorre coming to them. Lori didn''t know what they''d have to negotiate to get the other Dungeon Binder to agree to leave the safety of her demesne, but it would probably be more than simply some salt and honey.

 213 - Interest

    Because of her preparations, riding the sled to River''s Fork wasn''t as bad as she feared. While Lori would have liked to be holding on to Riz''s waist instead of Rian''s¡ªbecause if she were holding onto Riz, it would mean her hand would be between the militiawoman''s front and Rian''s back, protected from the wind¡ªthe stone with the bindings of firewisps was some help keeping her back and legs warm.


    Thankfully, there were no attempts at conversation, despite the bindings of air wisps she used to muffle the sound of the air jets. Rian was concentrating on steering the sled, and Riz should have been keeping an eye out for any beasts around them, in case one decided they were some sort of edible prey.


    It was still a long, chillingly cold journey, and for once she actually wished she''d done what Rian had done and wrapped her towel around her face to keep warm. Or had gloves of some sort to wear on her hands. Riz had gloves, and while Lori didn''t know the insulating value of old, worn leather, they looked like they at least kept the wind off.


    Was there anyone in her demesne who could make gloves for her? She''d seen people with gloves, but she wasn''t exactly a judge at being able to tell how old leather was¡­


    These and other thoughts occupied Lori as they rode on the sled, following the curves of the river. On either side of them, trees flashed by, Iridescence growing in the shadows under the branches where the snow didn''t gather. The snow beneath the trees seemed to glitter more than other places. Iridescence fallen on the snow, perhaps, dislodged by the wind? It was all strangely desolate compared to the riverbanks she remembered when she''d passed this way before by boat, the snow a deceptive blanket veiling the deadly colors almost, but not quite, completely.


    Lori spent her time during the journey imbuing what bindings in her demesne needed imbuing, including the trapped Coldhold, since she didn''t want the binding to dissolve and require having to be rebuilt later. After all, she didn''t need to be physically in her demesne to have an awareness of the wisps in it, and since she had time, she did so. When she finished with that, she moved on to making a binding around her demesne so that she had something to expand with later.


    Her concentration was occasionally interrupted as Rian turned the sled to avoid obstacles like trees and thick piles of snow, and she had to hold on and maintain her balance so as not to fall off the sled. Fortunately, there was usually enough space for their small sled to maneuver, thanks to the width of the river combined with the fact that unlike with a boat they didn''t have to worry about running the bottom into hidden rocks or shallow water.


    Lori was almost done with the binding around her demesne she was making when she noticed the quality of the snow change, becoming pure white instead of subtly glittering, and realized they had finally reached River''s Fork. At that point, she set her claiming aside and simply imbued the binding so that it would retain its form until she could attend to it later.


    Not long after, she stared at the white, seemingly perfect dome of snow rising above the trees in front of them.


    As they got closer, the dome became less perfect. The snow hadn''t been distributed evenly, and it seemed more had piled up at the base of one side than the other. There were also holes in the dome''s surface that had been hard to see at a distance, since all the snow seemed to blend together. Up close, the little breaks of the surface were more noticeable. Smoke was rising up from several of them, and Lori wondered for a moment how much of the abandoned homes and smaller trees inside that dome had been cut for firewood.


    Eh, not her problem.


    As they drew close to the dome, the flaps on the air jets dropped, redirecting the stream of air upwards, leaving the sled moving only with its own momentum. Rian made a gesture, and few moments later the sled jerked, slowing down as the braking anchor Riz had dropped started to pull them to a stop.


    Lori waited impatiently for Rian to stand up¡ªthey''d established that trying to disembark in any order but front to back was impractical, as much as Lori disliked the fact she always had to get up last¡ªbefore she was finally able to stand. The air jet continued to roar as Rian hurriedly untied the sack with the salt and their emergency supplies so she could get her staff. Staff finally in hand, she carefully stuck the butt into the lowered flaps of the air jet and, holding her mouth close to the her staff such that her breath was striking the wire running down its length, deactivated the binding of airwisps.


    Relative quiet followed.


    "Well, they seem like they survived¡­" Rian finally said. "I wonder how warm it is under there, with the snow to hold everything in?"


    Lori gave him a flat look. The cold was not helping her mood. "Rian, stop talking about nonsense and get moving so we can get indoors where it''s warmer."


    Rian sighed. "Right, right¡­" he muttered. "Well¡­ thank you for the hot rocks, they''re very warm right now."


    "Of course they are, that''s the whole point of them." Really, did he have to state the obvious?


    Rian sighed again for some reason. "So, what approach do you want us to take to try and convince Shana to give us her help? Do you want me to open with abject begging on my own cognizance and absolutely not on your behalf?"


    Lori frowned as she sat back down on the now-quiet sled, accepted the snow pads that Riz handed her and began securing them onto her own boots. "No, no, do that on your own time, when it''s officially not officially on my behalf," Lori said as she began doing up the ties. Despite her binding, her hands were alternating from just a bit too warm to biting cold with every breeze, making securing the snow pads a bit difficult. "We shall have to adapt to her reaction, but I expect we will need to offer her more resources than just salt and honey to get her to agree. After all, Binder Shanalorre is unlikely to provide the only resource her demesne currently uniquely has access to for nothing."


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    "Of course, I would be perfectly willing to visit your demesne to assist in making sure no one dies in childbirth," Binder Shanalorre said as they sat in her office.


    Lori blinked. "What?" she said, not sure if she''d heard correctly. "You will?"


    "Of course. Why wouldn''t I?"


    "You would be in my demesne. I could kill you easily there."


    "You could kill me easily now, Binder Lolilyuri," Binder Shanalorre said as the man standing beside her¡ªher lord, Lori thought, though she was fairly certain this was the first time she''d ever met the man¡ªgave Lori a narrow-eyed look, "as you could have previously many times. I do not find it any more likely in this case, as it had not happened in any of the previous cases before. Besides, I will admit to curiosity. I had heard often of your demesne''s warm baths, which are available for anyone to use. I was hoping to see them myself."


    "I''m sure that can be arranged," Rian said cheerfully from slightly behind and to one side of Lori. Riz was outside with the sled. "Though you''ll unfortunately have to bring your own towel to dry off with. I''m afraid we don''t have any to spare. Though we might be able to provide you with a little soap. We can spare that much, I think."


    "Of course," Binder Shanalorre nodded in acknowledgment.


    Lori was still trying to comprehend the abruptly strange direction this negotiation had taken. All she''d had time to do was to present the situation they found themselves expecting soon. They hadn''t even had to present the salt and honey! Speaking of which¡­ "What do you wish in exchange?" she demanded, trying to get the discussion back to more sensible negotiations.


    "Well, given how long childbirth is said to sometimes take, I would wish a hot bath and a place to rest should it take several hours," Binder Shanalorre said. "And meals, of course."


    "Yes, yes, of course," Lori said dismissively. That was a given. "But what do you want? What will this cost my demesne?"


    "Well, since you ask, some more salt would be appreciated," Binder Shanalorre said. "One can never have too much salt when it comes to preserving our food supplies, or so I am told."


    "Ah, if that''s all, we can pay upfront," Rian said. "How does a large sack sound?"


    "Could you perhaps provide a specific weight?"


    "One sack, large, full."


    "That is very imprecise. How do I know it is as you specify? Perhaps we should measure it with our own sacks, to see if it is properly full."


    "Well, we only have the one sack right now, and you''d be able to tell how full it is. Our sled didn''t have room to carry much else. Though if you want, I can have our tanners sew up some standardized sacks."


    "We can pay one sack now, and another sack of the same size¡ªthe same sack, in fact¡ªfor you to bring back for every instance of pregnancy in which you agree to intervene," Lori intervened.


    Binder Shanalorre tilted her head sideways in an almost parodic gesture of thoughtfulness. She stayed like that for some time. Finally she straightened and turned to her lord. "Well, Lord Yllian? Your thoughts on this negotiation?"


    "I think it''s unsafe for you to travel, Great Binder, especially in these conditions," he said. "Besides, you''re not really needed. Women give birth all the time, and they have more doctors in their demesne than we do. It''s an unnecessary risk for, too little gain."


    "Hmm¡­" Binder Shanalorre turned back towards them. "Who is giving birth?"


    "Does it matter?" Rian said with a smile. "After all¡­ at least a quarter of those living in our demesne came from here. There''s a one in four, perhaps a one in three chance it''s someone you know."


    Binder Shanalorre''s lord frowned, redirecting his annoyed look at Rian.


    "I will need an escort," Binder Shanalorre said. "Lord Yllian, for example. Or perhaps my aunt."


    "Our sled currently has a capacity of four people at the moment, five if we push it, but that might be unsafe or slow," Rian said. "However, it''s always been our intention to build a sled with a greater capacity. That being said, we cannot guarantee it will be ready by the time of the birth. If all we have is the sled we came in just now, you''ll have to pack light, and we''ll only be able to bring one other person with you, provided they''re not too big. However, if you''re willing to come as early as the moment that the water breaks¡ª" Wait, what? Lori had thought they were talking about pregnancy? "¡ªwe should have the time to bring two of your militia ahead of you so that they''re ready to protect you when we come on the second trip. We will of course provide accommodation should this require you stay overnight. Though I must ask that any militia you send not be someone who had previously left our demesne to move here. Given such a history, I''m sure they wouldn''t appreciate being back."


    "Is that to your satisfaction, Lord Yllian?" Binder Shanalorre said.


    "It still leaves you greatly vulnerable, Great Binder," Lord whatever-the-man''s-name-was said. "I wouldn''t feel confident in being able to protect you with only two other people."


    "Really? I do it for my Dungeon Binder all the time," Rian said cheerfully. "If you need help, why don''t you ask your friends living in our demesne to assist you? I''m sure they have plenty of time. It''s not like there''s farming going on or anything."


    Binder Shanalorre nodded. "Yes, you do. I believe those will be adequate preparations for such a trip, Lord Rian. While I am sure Lord Yllian would be more comfortable with being able to bring more people to accompany me, I am willing to trust in Binder Lolilyuri that such will not be necessary."


    She was? "You are?" Lori said.


    "Of course. You have often placed your safety in my trust, even after I failed in adequately seeing to your protection. It is only fair that I return the gesture."


    "Fair warning, you might need to sleep in the Dungeon if you need to stay overnight," Rian said. "But honestly, it''s much warmer there anyway, so you might actually prefer it."


    "I''m sure the accommodations will be more than sufficient," Binder Shanalorre said. "I look forward to your demesne''s hospitality."


    "Ah, that''s wonderful," Rian said. "We look forward to having you visit. With adequate escorts for your protection, of course."


    "Of course."


    Despite herself, Lori found herself exchanging mildly confused, frustrated looks with Binder Shanalorre''s lord whatever-his-name-was. Why was Binder Shanalorre agreeing to this so easily? Shouldn''t be asking for more? A sack of salt as a down payment and another sack each time she was called upon was¡­ well, it was actually still a lot, since they didn''t exactly have rooms full of salt in her demesne, but they had been able to accumulate a stockpile that¡­ actually, where had they stored their stockpile of salt? It wasn''t in the second or third levels¡­


    "Admittedly, some of the later payments might have to be deferred if we run out of salt," Rian said. "At least until the river thaws so we can get back to the ocean."


    "Completely understandable," Binder Shanalorre said. "I''m perfectly willing to wait for late payment. For a suitable interest fee, of course."


    Ah, there it was. It wasn''t the payment, it was the interest. That made more sense. Behind her, lord whatever-his-name-was had regained his composure, and while he seemed not completely satisfied, he appeared be considering the situation.


    Rian turned to Lori. "Will that be acceptable, your Bindership?" he said. "After all, we do still need salt for our own use."


    Lori considered that. "One-twentieth interest per red moon," she said.


    "Outrageous," lord whatever-his-name-was said. "A tenth on the storm moon."


    Lori narrowed her eyes. Oh? Did this northern bumpkin think he could match interests rates with her? A Taniar Demesne woman? One of her mothers had worked for the Banking Authority, she had literally learned interest rates on her mothers'' knees!


    The haggling began¡­

 214 - Expecting

    The resulting interest rate that was agreed upon left Lori dissatisfied, but since it also left Binder Shanalorre''s lord whatever-his-name-was just as dissatisfied, Rian had cheerfully declared it a perfect compromise. Lori would have pushed, but Binder Shanalorre had finally overridden her lord and declared she was prepared to accept the last one, and since Lori had been the one to propose that rate, she had acquiesced. After all, it was considered poor manners to persist when your rate had already been accepted.


    The sack of salt had been presented as a down payment, while the jar of honey had, at Rian''s quietly muttered suggestion since she had already agreed, been presented as a gift of a sweet treat for the winter season. Binder Shanalorre had actually smiled widely when it had been presented to her and the jar opened, making her look like the child she was before she had hastily sealed it shut and tried to offer solemn thanks. Tried, because her lips had kept twitching.


    It had been early enough that they hadn''t been invited to lunch, and so they had returned home after Lori had managed to reactivated the bindings of airwisps in the air jet. The whole time, she was troubled as she contemplated the meeting. Why had Binder Shanalorre agreed so quickly, even before they had managed to present their incentives? While she was the only¡­ Lori supposed that as Dungeon Binder Shanalorre should be referred to as a wizard¡­ that Lori was willing to have in her demesne because the little girl was so inexperienced she would not be a threat, it was still troubling that they had agreed to visit so quickly¡­


    A thought occurred to Lori, and she frowned. Was Shanalorre simply using this as an excuse to finally accept Lori''s offer? To abandon her demesne and live in Lori''s? If so, Lori would have to make it clear that while the younger Dungeon Binder was welcome, it would come with conditions. She would have to cede control and authority of River''s Fork to Lori, as well as revealing the location of the demesne''s core¡­


    It would be an unorthodox arrangement, but it would only last until Shanalorre was old enough to¡­ well. Old enough for the situation to change. A few years of such an arrangement was no problem¡­


    And until then, they''d have a healing savant to assist the doctors and medics, and Lori would finally have control over the mine. Of course, the Golden Sweetwood Company might contest that and claim it belonged to them exclusively, but she''d be their Dungeon Binder, so who cared?


    Lori shook her head at the thought, and it wasn''t just because snow had been building up on her eyelashes. No, no, don''t suppose and stop fantasizing! Whenever she looked forward to something like this, it ended up never happening! She''d so looked forward to having all four forms of magic when she made her core and became a Dungeon Binder, fantasizing extensively of flying like a Mentalist or using Horotracting to have as much room as she wanted, and look how things had turned out!


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    They arrived in her Dungeon in the middle of lunch. Fortunately, there was still some food left, even after they had to remove all the supplies that had ended up not being used from the sled first. Lori wasn''t just going to leave her bedroll outside, and she wasn''t going to let someone else handle it. She slept on that thing, and slept really well!


    "So," Rian said as he came back with three bowls of soup. Lori took one. "Are we going to try to develop a better means of traversing the snow, or are you content with the sled as it is?"


    Lori swallowed the mouthful of soup in her mouth as she waved her hand dismissively. "I see no reason why we should expend more resources on the matter. If the only reason it will be done is to provide Binder Shanalorre with a large militia force, taking two trips will suffice. Extended research into the matter will not benefit us. It''s not as if we have cargo we need transported over long distances across the snow."


    "We might next year," Rian pointed out as Riz started eating her soup next to him, Mikon pressed against her in the same pose she did to warm Rian.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Then we shall find a means of solving the problem next year," she said.


    "Are you sure?" Rian pressed. "If we find a way to propel your boat to proper sled speeds, it would be much more convenient for you when we go to the edge."


    "The use of Lori''s Boat as a sled was unfeasible, remember. You were the one to propose a lighter sled."


    "Yes, because the clock was dripping and we needed a faster mode of transportation as soon as possible. Now that we have that, trying to turn your boat into a properly functional sled isn''t as urgent, but would still be useful."


    Lori stared at him. "''The clock was dripping''?" she repeated.


    Rian shrugged, smiling brightly. "Well, water clocks are what we have around here, not nice ones with springs, gears, weights or flowing sand."


    "That''s absurdly specific even for you," she said blandly.


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    "Well, you understood what the words are meant to convey, so there''s no problem."


    Lori sighed, shaking her head at her Rian''s¡­ Rian-ness. Merely calling it an idiosyncrasy seemed lacking. She focused on her soup for a few moments to clear her head. "What possible use would turning Lori''s Boat into a sled have?"


    "Well, besides transporting Shana, which you don''t care about, it might be more convenient for going to the edge for you," Rian said. "We could put a tent on it, and you''d have someplace warm to sit at when doing what you do beyond the edge. So would the rest of us, for that matter."


    "Oh Great Binder, yes," Riz sighed.


    "''Yes'' what, Erzebed?"


    There was a moment''s confusion. "Oh, I was just swearing, Great Binder!" Riz said. Beside her, Mikon giggled, and even Umu looked amused.


    Lori sighed. "What have I told you about swearing like that around me?"


    "Sorry, Great Binder."


    She let her flat look linger for a moment before turning back to Rian. "While the idea appeals¡ª" just because Rian was the most sensitive to cold in her demesne didn''t mean she particularly liked it herself, "¡ªI thought we''d established that using Lori''s Boat as a sled was unfeasible?"


    "It was unfeasible at the time," Rian said, emphasizing the last three words, "but we''d come up with an idea to mitigate it, remember? At the time though, trying to solve the logistics and mechanics of it would take far longer than simply trying with a lighter sled. Now that we have a lighter sled, we at least have the option of trying to turn your boat into a sled at a more leisurely pace. Come on, think about it. A tent on a sled, with a nice warm¡­ uh, whatever source of heat inside, the walls blocking off the wind as you sit there doing what you do. And if we build it right, you could stay inside there the whole ride to the edge¡­"


    It was, admittedly, a tempting thought¡­


    "Besides, when you mounted the air jets onto your boat, it wasn''t at the level of output we''re using on the sled now, right?" Rian said. "And it was only the two. If we put on more than two air jets and had them blowing at the strength of the ones propelling the sled, I''m sure your boat would move at a reasonable pace. Admittedly, we''d need to figure out how to steer it and a better method for controlling those flaps you designed, but that should be doable."


    Lori considered that. "Then provide me a design for those two things," she said. "If I think them sufficient, you can try converting the boat into a sled."


    Rian nodded. "That''s fair. What about the air jets?"


    "When you have met my conditions," Lori said. The air jets were relatively easy, after all.


    He nodded again. "Will you need me after lunch then? I need to get to work on it."


    Lori almost said no, he was free, but paused. She shook her head. "Mark out an alcove for Binder Shanalorre''s use and have it prepared on the assumption she''ll need to use it tomorrow," Lori said. "Unless you''re relatively certain no one is about to give birth in the immediate future?"


    "Yeah, I should do that first. With our luck, Keyyara will suddenly go into labor before dinner," Rian sighed. "I''ll get right on it after lunch, your Bindership. We might have to set up another alcove aside for anyone giving birth as well. The hospital has fireplaces, but it might be a bit too cold for newborns. The Dungeon is much warmer, especially at the second level, once the drafts have been blocked off."


    Lori frowned, then reluctantly nodded. "Prioritize that, then Binder Shanalorre''s accommodations," she amended.


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian nodded. "Should I put her militia in the same alcove, or put them in a separate one?"


    "It would defeat the purpose of their presence to keep them apart, wouldn''t it?" Lori said blandly.


    "Have them sleep on the floor in front of the alcove it is," Rian said cheerfully. "Speaking of her being here, we should probably provide her with a guide. After all, we wouldn''t want her to go into the wrong baths and embarrass herself, or something like that. "


    Lori narrowed her eyes. "I didn''t get a guide," she said pointedly.


    "Technically, we had a guide, he just tried to kill Shana before we could ask him to take us anywhere specific," Rian said. "Besides, we know where to go now, and why do you think I always make sure at least one of the people who come with us when you go there used to live there? We''ve had guides with us, we just haven''t really needed their directions yet. If and when Shana comes, it''ll be for the first time. And it''s not like we have signs up or anything. At least, none that aren''t covered up by snow."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine, give her a guide. One that knows not to let Binder Shanalorre enter the Um."


    "¡­yeah¡­ that''s probably a good idea," Rian said. Of course it was, it was one of hers. "Well, I''ll get to all that after lunch."


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    Thankfully, no one decided to give birth that day, giving Rian time to make his preparations. Beds were moved from the hospital to the second level, since no one was getting injured badly enough to require sleeping in the hospital. One of the beds was moved to an alcove for Binder Shanalorre, and Lori used some stone to partially close off the alcove so that there''d be some privacy and no one would be able to just stare at her when she slept. The opening was closed off with some tent canvas to act as a curtain.


    Two other beds were put in the alcove set aside for giving birth, which was also walled off to give privacy. Lori also added in some firewisps to the lightwisps that illuminated those areas, just to make them a little bit warmer. It was¡­ well, actually about on par with her own accommodations at River''s Fork when she had needed to sleep over. Probably warmer as well.


    Lori also built another air jet, of the same dimensions as the ones she had built before and mounted to the sled. The binding of airwisps within it was set to the same output as the air jets on the sled as well. The only difference was that a piece of copper ingot was partially fused to the side of one bone panel, on top of which a bowl-like shape had been made.


    She took this air jet outside her Dungeon one morning and secured it to a large block of ice so that it would remain in place. The binding of the air jet was lightly imbued. As it began to roar to life, Lori placed one of the beads she had made inside the bowl-shaped container, making sure the wisp bead was in contact with the ingot¡­


    Eight days after their trip to River''s Fork, just after the tubers in the third level had been harvested and replanted, someone started giving birth.


    Or went into labor. Whatever the term was.

 215 - Expecting Visitors

    When Lori woke up from empty dreams, she found that in her sleep someone had started banging loudly on her door to wake her up. After lying in bed trying to ignore it and go back to sleep, then debating whether to bury them in the snow for their impertinence, she finally sighed¡ªthough it probably came out more as a growl¡ªarose from her bedroll in a terrible temper and angrily activated the lightwisps on the ceiling. The only thing keeping her from stomping as she made her way to the door was the fact that her feet were bare and the floor was stone.


    She unlatched her door as she muttered darkly about going back to sealing off the passage to her room, then all but flung the door open. "Who died?" she ground out, glaring at, of course, Rian.


    "No one died, Keyyara just went into labor," Rian said. He looked half asleep, and his hair was tousled. He was already wrapped up in his winter robe.


    "Who?"


    "A pregnant woman!" Rian snapped. "Sorry, I''m not fully awake yet. Riz and I are going to get Shana, we need you to start the air jets."


    Lori looked at him blearily. "Can''t it wait until morning?"


    "It is morning. The sun just isn''t up yet."


    "That''s not morning," Lori grumbled but sighed. "Fine, fine, come on." She pushed past him, stomping down the stairs. Then she winced, turned around, and went to put on her boots.


    "At least you can go back to sleep," Rian said as she sat down on her bed and put on her socks and footwear. "I have to stay awake, and not have any breakfast."


    "This was all your idea. You have no right to complain anyway."


    "Everyone always has the right to complain. Whether something happens to them for doing so is another matter."


    Her socks and boots on, Lori got up to stomp outside. Rian followed after her, yawning and muttering to himself. She was halfway down the stairs when she paused, turned around again, and started stomping back up, her lord barely getting out of her way. Going back to her room, she headed towards the containers where the beads were stored.


    Reaching inside one, where the largest ones were kept, Lori pulled out a handful of beads. Since they were on average two and a half yustri wide, some even as wide as three, it was awkward, so she dropped them into the jar she used to bring back beads from the edge of the demesne. She also grabbed the flattened rocks that she''d bound firewisps too, then proceeded to drop them because they were too big and wide for her to pick up properly


    "Rian, pick these up and carry them," she said as he got to her door. "Now!"


    "What fo¡ª oh! Warm rocks! Yes, please!" he said, suddenly sounding more awake and enthusiastic as he recognized them. He pulled off the towel wrapped around his face and quickly fashioned it into a small, improvised sack. Really, why hadn''t Rian asked her to prepared any of this in advance? He of all people should have been aware of how cold it was out there!


    Between the two of them, they managed to bring down the flattened rocks and the jar of beads downstairs, even though Lori sometimes swayed, still sleepy and really awake only because of a burning, molten annoyance as she rubbed sleep sand from her eyes. Downstairs, she heard sounds of activity in her Dungeon as she came down the stairs. People were awake in the second level, and at the kitchen someone was boiling water, the lone pot looking absurdly small by itself where the larger stew pots were normally used. Beyond that, the kitchen was still empty.


    In the passageway leading to the Dungeon, they found Riz waiting next to the sled, which was already packed next to the snow melter. Lori didn''t know if it was kept packed specifically for this situation or if Riz had simply moved quickly. She was holding a pair of gloves and smiling triumphantly.


    "Here," she said holding the gloves out to Rian. "I finally managed to borrow a pair from¡ª"


    The detail of whoever she had borrowed them from was lost as Rian started kissing her all over her face in a mildly nauseating manner. "Thank you! Thank you, thank you, thank you¡­!"


    Lori ignored the giggling and byplay as she knelt next to the sled. On the top of each of the air jets, recently added, was a cup-like structure fused to the bone and sealed with a wooden stopper. Pulling off the stoppers revealed¡­ well, a cup-like recess, at the bottom of which was a wide disk of copper. Lori dropped three beads into each recess before stoppering them closed, pushing the wooden stoppers down tightly so they wouldn''t come off. While the binding was still heavily imbued, she didn''t know how long they might be made to wait in River''s Fork as the people there would likely also be surprised by the timing of the pregnancy. That didn''t even include how long it would take to climb up to where Binder Shanalorre probably lived and wake her up, explaining the situation, and them waiting for her to rouse herself and get dressed. The beads would ensure that the bindings would have all the imbuement it needed, and she could give Rian more when he came back. It wasn''t a true bound tool, but it would suffice for this.


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    The air jets loaded with beads, she turned to Rian and Riz, and grimaced at what she saw. "Stop doing that, you two," she snapped.


    The two separated to infantile giggles. "Sorry, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully, not sounding particularly sorry at all. "Just, ah, rousing ourselves awake, that''s all."


    "Rian, I know enough to know wakefulness is not what is aroused by that," she said irritably. "Get those stones secured under your clothes so I can bind some firewisps to them, and be quick about it. It''s bound to be colder out there at night, and you''ll need to stay warm!" Really, why hadn''t Rian prepared any of this in advance? He of all people should have been aware of how cold it was out there!


    "Uh¡­ we should probably get inside for this," Rian said, trying to keep from dropping any of the rocks, which were probably starting to grow warm. "And have something to secure these with." He glanced towards the Dungeon.


    "Back home. We can use chest wraps to tie them into place again," Riz suggested.


    Rian nodded, swaying slightly, though he glanced at Lori for a moment.


    "What are you looking at me for? Get moving! You''re in a hurry, aren''t you?"


    "Yes, your Bindership, " Rian said, pulling Riz and heading past Lori down the tunnel in front of the Dungeon''s entrance, presumably towards his house.


    Naturally, Lori followed, stomping on the cold ground, and remembering to bring the jar with only a couple of beads left inside it with her. After all, she had no intention of just standing around here, and someone had to stop her two idiots from getting distracted by their lusts.


    Rian''s house was brightly lit when she opened the door, the glowing rock she''d given him resting on his table¡ªoh yes, she''d need to give the sled lights, wouldn''t she? With the snow, there was no guarantee any of the moons would be visible to provide light. On Rian''s bed were Mikon and Umu, the latter sleeping deeply¡ªmaking Lori twitch with jealousy at other people getting to sleep¡ªwhile being held in the former''s arms under a thick pile of blankets. The pink-haired weaver cracked an eye open slightly as Lori entered before closing it again and going back to sleep, or at least feigning it to be comfortable. She was surprised both were clothed, or at least wearing blouses.


    Rian and Riz were in the middle of undoing their winter robe and coat as quietly as possible, and both glanced up when she entered. "Lori?" Rian hissed.


    "Don''t mind me," Lori said blandly, picking up on of the stones and reaching for the firewisps among the smoldering coals of the fireplace. "I''m just here to warm these stones. Carry on." She imbued the firewisps into a binding, making heat emanate from the fireplace so she''d have more firewisps to work with. As the air in the house began to warm, she began claiming firewisps out of the air and binding them to the stones systematically, imbuing them slightly but leaving them deactivate for now.


    With a slightly awkward and aggrieved air, Rian and Riz continued what they were doing, loosening their clothes enough so they could take the warming stones and secure them to arms, legs, and around their torsos under their clothes. The stones were secured in place with chest wraps, and Lori briefly wondered if there''d be any left for the sleeping pair when they woke up.


    Once the last stone had a binding on it, Lori started imbuing them all, which was a bit difficult to do consistently because she was still sleepy. Still, once she set it properly the binding wouldn''t take much imbuement. She resisted the urge to chide them to hurry, aware there were sleeping people nearby. Well, one sleeping person at least. She was annoyed at losing sleep, but not annoyed enough to start inflicting it on others. She might have become so if Rian and Riz had taken their time and continued flirting, but fortunately with her in the room they moved quickly and methodically even if it was obvious both were still trying to wake up. Rian was excitedly pulling on the gloves he''d just been given and somehow not managing to do so successfully in his hurry. Riz had to help him put the gloves on, showing him how to secure their cuffs shut to keep the air out.


    Once they were dressed again, Lori had to take a moment to activate one of the warming stones and adjust it until it was a comfortable temperature, then applied those adjustments to all the warming stones they were carrying on their persons. "All right, you''re both ready," she said irritably. "Last chance to say it''s too warm. No? Then come on and get to the sled so I can go back to sleep."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said in a voice that made it obvious he was being patient. "Thank you for bothering to wake up at all."


    She glared at him and stomped off.


    Riz and Rian pushed the sled outside of the tunnel, pointing it downriver as Lori added bindings of lightwisps to the sled. She had to anchor them to the bone of the air jets, since the front of the sled was made of wood, binding the lightwisps to cast their light forward instead of in all directions. It created a stark white path in front of the sled, even as everything around it remained dark. The two got into place, Rian sitting in front with Riz holding on to his waist behind him as Lori activated the air jets.


    There was a blast of air that actually made Lori feel cold as snow was blown away from the back of the sled. The sled began to slowly move forward, accelerating as it became a moving speck of light in the dark.


    Lori was already walking back to her Dungeon, sleepily trying to imbue air jets, lightwisps and warming stones as she stumbled her way back to her room, closing the door shut behind her. She barely remembered to take her boots off as she as she lay back in bed and deactivated the lightwisps above her.


    Angrily fluffing up her pillow in place under her head, Lori went back to sleep.

 216 - A Guest

    When Lori woke up, it seemed like an ordinary day like any other. She had a quick wash, breaking in the new bar of soap and setting aside what was left of the old one for her laundry. She should probably do her laundry soon.


    Her boots were wet in a small puddle of water, and she took a moment to get them dry and put some oil on them from the small supply she had managed to get Rian to procure for her. Hopefully her boots would keep lasting a little longer.


    Once properly dressed, with new dry socks, Lori headed downstairs for breakfast. She still felt tired, like she hadn''t gotten enough sleep¡ª


    There was someone on her bench.


    Lori paused as she saw two people sitting on her bench. Not on her spot, but a little farther down, at one end.


    With the sort of serenity borne of boiling rage, of the sort that melted glass and metal, Lori stalked towards her table. Sinking them into the floor? A bit problematic, her bench might sink with them. Lightning? Tempting, tempting¡­ Steam? Steam in your lungs was agonizing, or so she''d heard, a protracted death as your lungs burned from the inside, filling with your own blood, and even with a Deadspeaker, recovery was painful¡­


    The shorter of the two on the bench turned and Lori almost stumbled as she found Binder Shanalorre looking towards her. The pale-haired young girl¡ªno¡ªthe younger Dungeon Binder turned and swung her legs over the bench''s seat to stand and face her. "Good morning, Binder Lolilyuri," she said. "I have come as agreed upon. Missus Keyyara is still not ready to give birth, so at your Lord Rian''s suggestion, we are taking breakfast." The other one at the bench also stood, the older man moving to stand behind the girl.


    Last night''s events¡ªor possibly very early this morning''s¡ªfinally returned to Lori''s memory as she turned a flat look towards her lord. "He did?" Lori said mildly.


    "In my defense," he said, sitting slumped with his elbows on the table, Riz actually sleeping with her head on the table next to him, "I tried."


    Lori looked significantly at the other person who had been on the bench.


    "I said I tried, I didn''t say I actually managed it," he said, stifling a yawn. "I leave these things to more awake minds."


    Lori glared at him for a moment more before turning back to Binder Shanalorre. "Welcome to my demesne, Binder Shanalorre," she said. "I apologize for not greeting you sooner, but I was asleep."


    Binder Shanalorre nodded. "I apologize for not presenting myself to you as soon as I arrived," the younger Dungeon Binder said, "but I fell asleep soon after I entered your Dungeon."


    "Ah. Perfectly understandable. Shall we sit and wait for breakfast, then?"


    Binder Shanalorre nodded, and Lori walked over to sit at her usual spot in front of Rian. The other Dungeon Binder sat down about a pace away, adjusting her seat on the bench to get comfortable. The older man pursed his lips for some reason, glancing at Lori, and found she was giving him an intense glare. Frowning, he moved to sit back down.


    "Not you," Lori snapped. She pointed at the opposite side. "Sit over there."


    "What?" the man said.


    "You''re not to sit here. Sit over there." Really, Lori was pointing to where he should sit and everything, why didn''t he understand?


    Rian gave out a tired sigh. "As I tried to delicately tell you Lord Yllian, that''s the Dungeon Binder-only side of the table. Everyone else sits over here. Please sit down before my Dungeon Binder loses her temper. If you''re not sure where to sit, just sit in front of your Dungeon Binder, like I''m doing?"


    After frowning, looking around, and glaring for far too long, lord whatever-his-name-was pursed his lips and did as Rian said, sitting on the opposite side of the table from his Dungeon Binder. Lori gave him one last glare for good measure, then turned towards her lord.


    "You look terrible," she said.


    "I''ve been awake all night, sledding in the dark and cold," Rian said flatly. "I think we might have to skip our usual morning trip. I''m in no more condition to operate a sled. In fact, there''s a good chance I''ll pass out asleep right after breakfast."


    Lori frowned, then sighed. "Fine, fine. Go to sleep after this. At least tell me you''ve arranged a guide for Binder Shanalorre?"


    "Yes, we have a guide lined up," Rian said. "Talked to her days ago, she''ll probably come by after breakfast." He looked over his shoulder and sighed. "Speaking of which¡­" With clear reluctance, Rian stood up, stepping over the stool and walking towards the kitchen. Riz made a muted sound of complaint, but otherwise didn''t move.


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    "Were you planning to do something, Binder Lolilyuri?" Shanalorre said.


    "A minor project," Lori said dismissively. "Your presence will necessitate putting it on hold, for the moment. Are your accommodations to your liking?"


    "They are adequate," Shanalorre said. "Their warmth is greatly appreciated. I''ve been sleeping in my office for the past red month because of the difficulty of getting myself up to my usual residence."


    "How inconvenient. I hope you overcome the problem in time."


    "The matter will hopefully resolve itself in the thaw."


    "Ah. Procrastination. A problem-solving method my lord is fond of. I suppose there aren''t many possible alternatives, given the resources available to you."


    Shanalorre tilted her head. "I admit, I had not thought of it like that. Incidentally, Binder Lolilyuri, may I compliment you on the extent of your Dungeon? It must have required extensive work to accomplish."


    "Yes, it did. It is still not yet complete, however. The third level will still be expanded to house our Dungeon farm, once the ground thaws and we have access to more soil. I take it your own Dungeon is not as extensive?"


    "I don''t have one," Binder Shanalorre said.


    Lori waited for elaboration. None came. "Should it not have been a priority during the demesne''s initial construction?"


    "It should have been," Shanalorre said.


    Nothing further was said, so Lori shrugged and regarded her duties as host done. After all, her guest no longer wished to speak, she certainly wasn''t going to press her. Lori preferred not talking, after all.


    On the opposite side, Riz continued sleeping, while lord whatever-his-name-was kept glancing back and forth, occasionally turning to look directly behind him. Around them, the dining hall filled with people waking up and talking. There was a mildly excited air to the words, probably because they had visitors, or because someone was giving birth. This would be¡­ huh, the first birth in her demesne, wouldn''t it? She''d have to find out what the date was and make a record of it or something. That was the sort of thing that needed to be recorded, right?


    Rian, Umu, and Mikon eventually arrived carrying food. Rian put the two bowls he was carrying down in front of Shanalorre and lord whatever-his-name-was, while Lori reached for one of the bowls Mikon put down, grabbing a cup of water as well. Soup, with thin cuts of stewed meat and boiled tubers. The same as usual. She stirred it with the spoon for a moment before taking a sip. Ah, delicious. Across from her, Riz was being roused awake so she could eat.


    "Rian," she said after she''d had a few spoonfuls to warm her stomach. "Find out what the date is today, if you can. This is the first birth in our demesne, so I''ll probably need to record it or something."


    "34<sup>th</sup>of first storm," Shanalorre said, interrupting her rather enthusiastic consumption of the soup in front of her.


    There was a beat, then Lori turned to stare at the other Dungeon Binder. "What was that?" she asked.


    "It''s 34<sup>th</sup>of first storm," Shanalorre said. "Or first red, if you prefer."


    "Ah¡­ are you sure, Binder Shanalorre?" Lori said hesitantly. After all, a lot of people had forgotten what the date was.


    Shanalorre nodded. "I''m sure," she said.


    Well¡­ all right, then. "Thank you," Lori said simply. "I will note it later. Rian, remember it for me."


    "Gonna sleep after breakfast¡­"


    "I''ll remember it for you, Lord Rian!" Umu said as she sat next to him.


    "Thank you, Umu," Rian sighed.


    "Are you at least awake enough to remember how many visitors we have?" Lori sand blandly.


    "Six," he said. "Four militia, and our guests here. They''re¡­ uh, around here somewhere." He made a vague circling gesture with his finger, then yawned, covering his mouth with one hand. "I''ve arranged for them to get some soap so they can use the baths if they want, though I''m not sure if they brought towels¡­"


    "I brought mine, Lord Rian, as you recommended I should," Shanalorre said. "Lord Yllian, did all of you pack your towels and spare clothes as well?"


    "Yes, Great Binder," her lord said.


    "Good. I probably won''t need you while I''m assisting with the birth, so you have my leave to use the bathing facilities we''ve heard so much of. With Binder Lolilyuri''s permission, of course?"


    Lori waved her hand. "Of course, of course. Feel free to use any of the baths, as well as the laundry area should you need it, though you might need to make other arrangements to dry your clothes afterwards."


    "Thank you. I look forward to it."


    They all went back to eating, since there wasn''t much else to discuss. Rian was tired and his mind wandering, and anyway, Lori didn''t wish to discuss any of their current projects with their guests present. They''d find out about the beads sooner or later, but Lori would rather it be later rather than sooner. Lori also sent Rian to get a second bowl of soup for their guest when she finished, since she still seemed hungry. She''d been staring at her bowl, at least, so Lori supposed as much.


    Well, two bowls. After all, if they were going to feed their guest, she was going to eat some more too! A pity there was no bread¡­


    After breakfast, Rian''s guide arrived.


    "Hello, I''m Karina," the brat said. "Lord Rian asked me to show you around, help you get to places, and answer any questions you might have. Are you Binder Shanalorre?"


    Lori gave her lord a flat look. He simply shrugged in response. She supposed there were worse choices¡ªfar worse. The thought of Landoor being Shanalorre''s guide¡­¡ªbut why a child?


    "Yes, I am Binder Shanalorre. It''s a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for agreeing to act as my guide."


    The brat tilted her head. "You sound funny. Are you all right?"


    "I am well. Possibly I sound strange because I am sleepy."


    "You don''t sound sleepy¡­"


    "I am sleepy. I was woken up last night and had to travel here on a sled."


    "Well¡­ I suppose¡­ Where do you want me to show you around?"


    Lori took this as her cue to rise. "Well, I''ll leave you with Karina, Binder Shanalorre. Be welcome in my demesne, and should anyone attack you, I''ll drown them out in the snow. Riz, please make sure everyone knows this so nothing unfortunate happens."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said, still sounding sleepy. "Drowned in the snow, got it."


    Lori nodded. "If you''ll excuse me, Binder Shanalorre, I have things to attend to. Rian, see me after you''ve had a chance to sleep."


    "Yes, your Bindership! Will sleep as ordered!"


    After all, she had bindings to imbue, expansion to perform, and once Rian was awake again she was having him take her out to the edge of the demesne so she could make beads. The former two, she could do from the safety and isolation of her sealed off room, where Shanalorre''s militia¡ªwhose faces she wouldn''t be able to tell apart from everyone else¡ªwouldn''t be able to ambush and kill her.

 217 - Due Diligence

    After recording the day''s date on a stone tablet, Lori set about doing what chores she could from the safety and security of her own room. As she imbued the bindings around her demesne¡ªshe was still considering whether she should wire some more to her core using the copper they now had available¡ªshe examined the thing she had made that she had been planning to use in making beads today. It was a copper ingot set into stone, with the stone shaped to form a sort of rectangular bowl such that the ingot made up the base. It reminded her of the mold they''d used to pour the ingots into shape. Forming the thing had taken some time, mostly because she had to get around to it, but she''d finally finished it yesterday.


    It was probably silly to just use whole copper ingots in her experiments with beads, but it was far less time consuming than trying to have the smiths heat and hammer the copper into shape, and besides, this minimized material loss. Really, all she needed was a metal to conduct magic with, the shape was irrelevant. In addition, it made it easier to recover the metal afterwards.


    The plan had been to place Iridescence in the bowl, and then used the metal as a conduit to start forming the binding that would amalgamate with the colors to form a bead. She had hoped to test if the binding could be imbued while the bead was being formed, and she had needed a more conveniently shaped tool to do it in than simply her hand or the end of her staff.


    If it worked, then she''d be able to use the principle to make beads of a specific size, or close enough. Since beads naturally formed spheres, growing outward from the seed of Iridescence, if she could make a receptacle that would lift forming beads away from the metal contact point once it reached a certain diameter, that would result in a self-sizing mechanism. Of course, it would need to be light and easily portable on the sled, since they''d need to keep moving it out towards the edge¡­


    If it worked. Otherwise¡­ well, she didn''t want to do Rian''s idea of forcibly seeping beads to reduce them down to size! It was so wasteful!


    Sighing, Lori put the bowl aside and double-checked the list of things she needed to imbue, just to make sure she''d completed it for the day. Until Rian woke up, she wouldn''t be going to the edge to make beads, and she wasn''t leaving her room lest she be assassinated. With nothing else to do, Lori began expanding her demesne, letting her mind wander during the imbuing stages. There were further experiments to be done on the white Iridescence, like heating it far beyond boiling and burning it under direct flame, but that had to wait until the winter ended and she could do it outside¡­


    Wait, had she told Rian to tell everyone to keep the existence of the new beads secret from Shanalorre and her militia? Lori groaned as she realized she hadn''t. Well, that was¡­ undesirable. Still, they couldn''t really do anything about it besides try to extort their boats for it as a ''toll fee'' when they resumed going back to the ocean for salt¡­


    Shaking her head to dislodge the annoying¡ªand distracting¡ªthought, Lori went back to expanding her demesne. Ever since she had altered her approach, it was no longer so fatiguing, so the schedule of expanding in the afternoons so she could go straight to sleep was no longer really necessary, and with her stuck¡ªer, that is, defensively secure in her room, she could probably expand seven, maybe more times today as she lay back on her bedroll to get comfortable¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori jerked awake. What¡­?


    There was a knocking sound and she sat up as she realized she was sleeping on her bedroll. Why were they disturbing her? It was the middle of the night!


    Grumbling, she rubbed her eyes of sleep sand and arose from her bedroll. The only thing keeping her from stomping as she made her way to the door was the fact that her feet wore only socks and the floor was stone.


    She unlatched her door as she muttered darkly about going back to sealing off the passage to her room, then all but flung the door open. "Who died?" she ground out, glaring at, of course, Rian.


    "No one died," he said cheerfully. "The baby was born healthy and Missus Keyyara is fine as well."


    Lori stared at him blearily. "What?" Why had he woken her up in the middle of the night to talk nonsense?


    He sighed for some reason. "The baby? You know, the reason we both woke up last night to get Shana from River''s Fork?"


    She stared at him, then shook her head as memory finally returned. "Oh, yes, yes, the baby¡­"


    "Anyway, I''m up now and came to get you for lunch since you didn''t come down on your own and were ignoring me calling you." Rian tilted his head, as if realizing something. "Were you sleeping?"


    "I was until you knocked on my door," she said. It was lunch? "It''s lunch time?"


    Rian nodded. "Yes. are you coming down to eat or do you want to keep sleeping?"


    Going back to sleep sounded very tempting, but Lori pushed the thought away. If she went to sleep she''d just keep sleeping and never get anything done. "I''m coming, I''m coming," she said. "I''ll just put on my boots."


    Rian nodded. "Can I talk to you while you do? There''s something I wanted to discuss without our guests hearing."


    Their guests? Who were¡ªoh, right. "Fine, fine," Lori grumbled. "Close the door after you." She headed to her bed to put her boots back on.


    Rian stepped in after her, closing the door behind him. "The doctors have talked to me and asked if we could negotiate for Shana to stay one more day, maybe two."


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    Lori sat down heavily, glaring at him. "What?" she demanded.


    "They said that if either the mother or the child got sick or infected, it would take them at least that long to start showing symptoms," Rian said. "Since Shana''s expertise is healing and not, say, getting rid of the causes of disease, she can''t really do anything until after someone gets sick or injured. At least, that''s what the doctors who have experience working with Deadspeakers said, and I can understand their reasoning. As the mother and child are now, according to Shana there''s nothing ''wrong'' that needs to be healed, but the doctors are worried that she might not be able to provide a proper diagnosis of a more subtle ailment."


    "She wouldn''t," Lori nodded, disgruntled by the logic of it. "She''s just a savant, after all, not a fully taught wizard." She sighed. "We''ll bring it up during lunch. Have any of them asked to be returned to River''s Fork yet?"


    "Not yet," Rian said. He chuckled. "According to the people I asked, Shana and her party spent all morning soaking in the pools in the baths. Until the doctors asked for Shana''s help when Missus Keyyara started giving birth, anyway. Don''t worry, they were well-behaved and there weren''t any complaints. More like people are amused."


    "I didn''t ask for the exposition and don''t care," Lori said, finishing getting her boots on. "Come on, let''s eat."


    Rian nodded falling into step behind her as she opened the door to her room and headed down. "Will we be going to the border this afternoon, or are you putting that off until tomorrow?"


    "We''re going," Lori said. "There''s a test I want to run that will hopefully improve efficiency."


    "Oh good, more notes to take," Rian said, sounding far more cheerful now. "I hope the efficiency improvement is as good as the improvement of the expansion procedure."


    "Rian, how would you even be able to compare them? They share no relevant parameters at all."


    "Qualitatively. Either you start producing three times as much as before because you find an easier method, or you manage to make as much but in less time. Not actually needing to physically be on the edge would be nice too. "


    "Unlikely."


    "Please don''t destroy my wonderful dream with cold, terrible facts," Rian begged as they made their way down the stairs.


    Lori found herself glaring as she made her way to her table and saw some idiot was sitting on her bench. Oh, and Binder Shanalorre was there too, but that was fine, she was a Dungeon Binder. Before she could make her displeasure known, she heard Rian sigh and dart ahead of her. She slowed her pace slightly as she watched him get to the table ahead of her and start whispering frantically to the impertinent fool who apparently hadn''t learned from this morning.


    The man got up reluctantly, and moving around to the other side of the table and sitting in front of Binder Shanalorre. Probably one of the people that came with the younger Binder to keep her safe. Lori gave him a displeased look as she sat down at her usual place in the middle of the bench, turning to acknowledge the other Dungeon Binder sitting a pace away from her. "Binder Shanalorre. I am told the birth had occurred and was successful."


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said, nodding to her in acknowledgement. "Both of them are well and currently in excellent health. However, I''m not sure as to how long that will last."


    Lori gave her an intent look. Was this a threat of some sort? "Oh?"


    "Yes. You are aware that I am a savant, are you not."


    "Of course."


    "As a savant, I can only perform healing. Or at least, that is how I can most easily describe what I can do. However, to heal, there must be something to be healed. Torn skin, broken bones, parts of the body that are too hot or are not functioning properly. Do you understand?"


    "I follow the reasoning, yes."


    "Currently, there is apparently nothing wrong with my two recent patients. However, I cannot be definitely sure, not the way I would be if they were in my demesne. In my demesne, I can perceive, to a degree, people''s bodies. They are exceedingly complex and I do not understand them, however, I have noticed that sick people have¡­ an increased concentration of¡­ something that responds to my magic."


    "Life," Lori said helpfully. "That is what Deadspeakers manipulate."


    "Thank you. Life, then. However, I am not in my demesne, and my ability to perceive this¡­ life¡­ is extremely limited."


    "I am familiar with the limitation," Lori said blandly. "In my own way."


    "Of course. While my two patients are currently both well and do not require healing anymore from their experience, this current limitation means that I cannot declare with any degree of certainty that my patients have not contracted some form of illness, despite the preparations of the doctors and medics whose directions I followed. Therefore, in due diligence, I would like to request that I be allowed to remain in your demesne for one, perhaps two more days to monitor the situation of my patients. That length of time is more than enough for them to begin displaying symptoms should they have become infected or otherwise contracted some illness."


    For a moment, Lori stared down at the shorter Dungeon Binder. Then she turned to look at Rian. Rian''s eyebrows were up, and he gave a shrug when he met her gaze. "I''m¡­ sure we can continue to support our guests for that long without significant foreseeable problems, though of course it''s the unforeseeable ones that will bite us. Especially with the recent tuber harvest, that''s added a little more to our food situation."


    Not really what she had been demanding answers about, but good answers nonetheless. "I see no problem granting this request," Lori said. "Two days, was it?"


    "At most," Binder Shanalorre nodded. "Then I will need to return to my demesne and deal with the situations that have doubtlessly arisen there."


    Ah, yes. Lori could sympathize. She didn''t think she could leave her idiots alone that long without them doing something stupid either. "Then you are welcome to stay in my demesne for that long, Binder Shanalorre. Will that be all? Do you need a message sent to your demesne to inform them of this change of plans, lest they assume we are holding you against your will?"


    "If you would be so kind, Binder Lolilyuri. I will have one of my men sent with such a message."


    "Rian, arrange it," Lori said.


    "Yes, your Bindership. Before or after that inspection we have to conduct?"


    "After, obviously. We''ll go once we are done with lunch."


    "Lord Yllian, please coordinate with Lord Rian as to who will be sent," Binder Shanalorre said.


    The man on the other side of the table from Shanalorre nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. Is there anything in particular you want sent?"


    "Perhaps ask your aunt to send you additional clothes or something?" Rian suggested. "For the trip back."


    Yllian eyed Rian sideways, but nodded at his Dungeon Binder.


    "I suppose I was cold, even with the warming stone Lord Rian lent me," Binder Shanalorre said. "Very well, please send a message to my aunt requesting additional clothes."


    Lori made a mental note to remember to make more warming stones for Shanalorre to put on her person for the trip back. It wouldn''t do to waste all those negotiations and preparations only to lose their only healing-capable Deadspeaker to the cold, after all.


    How fortunate Shanalorre had brought up the matter herself. Now they didn''t need to trade away or lose anything by having to request it of her. The matter had been outside of the terms they had negotiated, after all. If Lori had been the one to bring it up, Shanalorre would have had an opportunity to demand more resources as recompense¡­

 218 - A Clear Hazard

    After lunch, and binding the warming stones for Rian, Riz and whichever friend Riz had invited to join them for protection to put on, Lori went out to the edge, her test bowl in hand. She''d started carrying a kit with her whenever she went to make beads at the edge. The jar for carrying beads, a wooden spoon, her belt knife, and a new pair of copper tweezers. The smiths hadn''t needed her assistance, but she''d found herself watching anyway as they tempered it to be able to snap back into shape. Seemingly so simple to do, yet she knew if she tried doing it, all she''d end up with was a waste of good copper¡­


    By now, everyone knew the routine. Even Riz''s friend, despite the fact it was seldom the same one twice in a row. They reached the edge, and two would keep an eye out for beasts while Lori retrieved the jar she had left well beyond the edge of the demesne, its location marked by a stick. Inside, the binding of firewisps she''d left the day before would be gone, the wisps entrapped by the Iridescence that had crystallized inside, fueled by imbuement and heat.


    Being so close to the Iridescence, much less actively breaking off pieces¡ªwhich wasn''t that hard¡ªto use to amalgamate beads still made Lori''s spine shiver, and she made full use of her authority as Dungeon Binder to have Rian do it most of the time. If he felt the same reticence and disgust, he hid it well, acting like he was simply getting salt from the jar. The only potential sign of discomfort he showed was washing his hand on the snow every so often.


    "If you want to get rid of it, just go back to the demesne and step back out again," Lori said as she nudged a small, glittering measure of Iridescence into a packed mass in the upper part of her new bowl, holding it such that any potential moisture rolled downward, away from the colors. At least it wasn''t actively snowing today. Less chance of some snow melting and dissolving the Iridescence, and she''d never thought that would actually be a problem.


    "I''m fine," Rian said as he stood over her, holding his note plank as an impromptu roof in case anything did fall into the bowl. "We''re never out here long enough for it to be a problem, anyway. Come on, I want to see if this works!"


    Lori rolled her eyes, and she distinctly heard Riz and her friend chuckling.


    "What? There''s not a lot to do when we''re all cooped up in the Dungeon. Seeing how this works out is the most interesting thing to happen today!"


    "Sleeping with me isn''t interesting?" Riz said as Lori reached her hand into her demesne and started gathering wisps there. She didn''t need everything, which was good since there were no convenient source of earthwisps about.


    "We shouldn''t talk about that at work," Rian said hastily as Lori carefully anchored the binding to the stone on the edge of the bowl, making sure it intersected the Iridescence. All right, first test, imbue the biding through the metal contact¡­


    "Oh? Riz, are you so boring the other two are more interesting?" All right, imbuing through the contact was successful. Now, to imbue the binding enough so that it wouldn''t be completely amalgamated immediately and make a bead the size of a pebble. Well, not that small. She had a good volume of iridescence on the bowl. Normally she did this inside the crystallizing jar, but... well.


    "Move those eyes, we don''t want the Great Binder getting eaten by some beast! Save the chatter for later, you know how the Great Binder feels about noise!" Oh, now Riz remembered. Grumbling to herself, Lori continued imbuing the binding, drawing power from her connection to her core and sending it out through her limbs, down her fingers, into the ingot of metal at the bottom of the bowl and to its final destination.


    Lori imbued until the binding contained enough to form at least a low-denomination bead. Even in the event of failure¡ªwhich was likely if she got the timing wrong, since this was her first attempt¡ªat least some kind of useful bead would result. Once more, she wished she could do this in some kind of permanent structure, but with how she expanded the demesne every day, unless she built very far beyond the edge, anything she built would be within her demesne in a week. At least she got to sit on the sled while she did this.


    Breathing in and out, calming herself with the familiar ritual even if she didn''t really need it to do magic anymore, Lori took control of the binding she had imbued, detaching it from the earthwisps it had been anchored to. The Iridescence had started to crystallize again, trapping wisps and drawing imbuement from the binding, and Lori carefully observed it until she was sure the spoonful of glittering powder had come together into a single mass. Carefully holding the rectangular bowl, adjusting her grip to something more comfortable and making sure her fingers were touching metal, she began the familiar process of making a bead.


    She failed immediately.


    Well, technically, the process was a success, as the Iridescence and the binding amalgamated into a wisp bead¡ªit immediately went into the jar so she wouldn''t lose it¡ªbut the test she was running failed. Her fault. She had thought she''d have time to resume imbuing once the amalgamation began, but no sooner had she started when there had been a bead rolling around in her bowl and no binding for her to imbue. Stupid. She should have remembered how fast the process was, and she should have realized that initiating it might move the binding such that she could no longer imbue it!


    After getting Rian to put more Iridescence into her bowl and packing the powdered rainbow tightly once more, she tried again. Bind wisps, move to bowl, imbue¡­


    When she began the test again, this time she made sure she was actively imbuing the binding before she began amalgamating it into a bead. For a moment, she thought it had failed as a bead quickly formed, only to realize that no, she was continuing to imbue, even as the bead rattled around in the bowl and¡ª


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    The connection cut off abruptly. "Rainbows," Lori snapped.


    "What?" Rian asked.


    "It bounced when it rolled down the bowl and lost contact with the copper," Lori muttered as she took out the second bead and put it in the jar with the first. .


    "Ah. Guess you need to be careful then. Why not put it in the bottom? No snow''s falling right now, take the risk."


    Lori nodded irritably, holding the bowl out to him. "Put more on."


    Rian obliged, sticking the wooden spoon into the crystallization jar and coming out with a slightly bigger spoon of Iridescence than before. "In case it snows," he said cheerfully. Lori rolled her eyes as he carefully dumping the glittering colors into the bowl for the third attempt. If this didn''t work, she was going to cut her losses, push back the test until tomorrow, and just make beads normally.


    This time Lori packed the Iridescence in the bottom corner of the bowl as she held it tilted. That way it would be nestled and not roll around. Bind wisps, move to bowl, imbue¡­


    This time the bead didn''t roll or bounce and break contact with the copper. The bead formed quickly, as it would, but didn''t form all the way. Or at least, whatever¡­ curing? It was called curing in workshops when they waited for alchemical coatings to dry and set¡­ whatever curing needed to occur so that she could no longer imbue that bead hadn''t happened yet. It was strange, as if her claim on the wisps had been challenged and she was almost, but not quite, overwhelmed, as if she was just on the edge of the binding falling out of her control.


    "Ooh, is it working now?" Rian said eagerly.


    "Yes", Lori said tersely, "It''s formed but I''m still imbuing it."


    "Success, then," came the cheerful reply. "Alright, notes then. Would you say you''re imbuing it at your maximum possible rate?"


    "No," Lori said. "Definitely not." The rate she was imbuing it was a slow, steady pace, one she had defaulted to because it was what she had used for years when she had been working as a student.


    Rian nodded, writing that down, then peering down at the bead. "Its width is¡­ call it sixteen, seventeen chiyustri wide or so?" He glanced at his smallest finger, holding it up as if comparing. "I can''t say I can tell if it''s growing."


    Neither could Lori. "I''ll increase the rate of imbuement," she said. "Perhaps that will cause a change."


    "You just don''t want to wait in the snow for it to get bigger."


    "Of course."


    "Yeah, me neither. All this impatience on our parts is bad scholarship."


    "I''d rather be a bad scholar than a cold one. If we have suspect results, we can repeat the tests when it''s warmer."


    Lori increased the rate at which she drew magic from her Dungeon''s core and passed it through the metal contact of the ingot. Immediately, the bead began to grow. It was still slow, but readily visible to the naked eye now.


    "Well, that''s a result, then," Rian said. "Shall we call the test successful, then?"


    "It was already successful when I was still able to provide imbuement to the bead despite it having amalgamated," Lori said.


    "True, I suppose." Rian hesitated. "Uh, before you stop imbuing the bead¡ªare you still imbuing the bead?"


    "Yes," Lori said, frowning slightly as she tried to reduce the imbuement rate.


    "Ah, good. Well, before you stop, there''s one thing I want to try doing, with your permission?"


    If Lori wasn''t worried taking her eyes off the bead would impact her concentration, she''d have given her lord a look. "What now?"


    "This is purely for the sake of knowledge, I swear," Rian said. "Can I touch it?"


    Lori couldn''t help it. She looked up and gave her Lord a confused look. Thankfully, she managed to keep imbuing. "What."


    "The bead. Can I touch it?"


    "Rian, you''ve touched beads before."


    "Not when it''s in the middle of being formed I haven''t! Come on, please?"


    Ugh, fine. "Ugh, fine. Press down only so it doesn''t stop making contact with the metal."


    "Yes, your Bindership!" Rian said cheerfully. Carefully, he reached out and touched his finger to the bead, pressing down on it. Lori felt the pressure in her hands as he did.


    Rian frowned. "Did you feel that?"


    "Feel what? You pressing down? Yes, obviously, I did."


    "No, not that! The bead! It deformed when I pressed down on it!"


    Lori blinked, looking down at the bead, which had increased in width past twenty chiyustri. It looked perfectly spherical. "It looks perfectly spherical."


    "I know what I felt! You press down on it, see what happens!"


    Lori gave her lord a flat look, but carefully adjusted her grip on the bowl such that she held it in one hand, then pressed down on the bead with the other.


    It was firm and solid under her finger, but ever so slightly it gave, as if she was pressing down on her thumbnail, only firmer. Eyes widening, Lori pressed down firmly, and she was rewarded with the sight of the bead squashing, deforming as if it was trying to maintain its round shape even as it was crushed down, matching the contours of the corner of the bowl¡­


    Lori stopped imbuing the bead in progress.


    The feeling under her pressing finger suddenly hardened, becoming as stiff as stone or glass. Cautiously, Lori removed her finger, and both she and Rian peered at the bead.


    Or at least, what should have been a bead.


    It remained pressed into the corner of the bowl. Carefully, Lori tilted the bowl the other way, and the bead came off easily. It had a three-sided triangular corner, two of them textured like stone, as if someone had taken a ball of warm wax and¡­ well, pressed it into the corner of the bowl. Rian gently picked it up and ran his thumb over the surface. "I can feel the marks your finger probably made when you were pressing down on it," he noted. "Well, I think we know how they get denomination marks onto beads now. They must use some variant of what you just did and have the beads grow in molds with the markings. Though it makes me wonder why they let it be spherical. If they can press it into a shape, why not a cube? You know, so it doesn''t roll around on a table. Literally any shape with a flat surface would be an improvement! Make little discs or something."


    "Wide shapes and shapes with edges would probably be difficult and dangerous to swallow," Lori pointed out.


    Rian stared at her for a moment before an expression of realization came on his face. "Oh! Right, I forgot, you swallow these too. I suppose that''s an important consideration, and round spheres make it easy. Do it for long enough, it becomes a tradition, and you don''t just change tradition, not matter how sensible it would be."


    "You''ve never needed to swallow three beads a day. You don''t get an opinion on their shape." Looking at the non-spherical bead they had made, Lori winced at the thought of putting it in her mouth, much less swallowing it. That three-sided point was a clear hazard. Still, she dropped it into the jar with the other two.

 219 - An Outrageous Offer

    Lori repeated the test, just to confirm it had worked as intended. That included pressing down on the amalgamating bead with her finger to deform it. After that, she used the rest of the Iridescence in the jar as normal, forming beads of various sizes. It was at that point Lori realized that she could prepare the bindings in advance inside her demesne and imbue them completely before taking them out and amalgamating them to the colors.


    Stupid. She should have done that sooner! It would have increased the number of beads she could make, even with small shards of Iridescence to work with! Well, she knew it now, so she could start doing it that way tomorrow¡­


    By the time they returned to her Dungeon, Binder Shanalorre''s message was ready and one of the militia who had accompanied her was waiting to be taken back to River''s Fork. Lori had to imbue the sled''s bindings again, and even dropped some beads into the new receptacles on top of the tubes, just in case it wasn''t enough.


    "Well, get going," she told Rian as she pushed the wooden stoppers back into place.


    "How much longer are these warming stones you gave us going to last?" Rian asked.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Yes, they''ll last until you get back. Get going already." Lori started imbuing the warming stones, which were running a bit low on imbuement¡­


    Once Rian was on his way, Lori barricaded herself back in her room once more, putting the bowl with the ingot on the bottom on her table and dropping the beads she''d made into the receptacles for them, sorting them by size as she imbued the warming stones Rian, Riz and Riz''s friend were wearing, up until the point they left her demesne.


    When that was finished, Lori could finally spare her attention to considering the results of her experiment. Rian''s impromptu test had revealed surprising information, one she''d have to test later. Still, it was nice to know how it could be possible to add denomination markings to her beads. More importantly, however, her test of forming beads through a conductive metal meant that with the right mold and sufficient Iridescence, she could greatly scale up bead production. So far the most time consuming aspect had been how each binding that amalgamated with the colors needed to be made and imbued individually, given she''d need to be outside of her demesne and she only had so many hands. If she could imbue through metal, however¡­


    Lori pictured it, a grid-shaped mold where each square had a bit of Iridescence and a binding, and the bottom of the mold was made of metal that she could conduct magic through. Even if she had to activate each binding individually, if she could imbue it while the bead was forming instead of beforehand, she''d be able to save time on the preparations for the beads. And¡­ actually, if she was imbuing the bindings through conduits, then she didn''t actually have to be the one to imbue it, right? After all, she had beads now¡­


    For a moment, she allowed her mind to wander, imagining herself creating a binding that she imbued greatly to create an extremely large bead, then connecting that bead to the metal contact point of the mold, so that all she''d need to do was start the amalgamating process and the forming beads would initially draw imbuement from the large bead until she could take over the imbuing directly. Or she could draw a wire from her core all the way to the edge and use that instead¡­


    It was a silly fancy. They didn''t have anywhere near enough metal for a wire that long. Well, something to work towards in ten years or so¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Unfortunately, she wouldn''t be able to talk to Rian about their findings over dinner because of the presence of their guest and her militia. Even if it was very unlikely that Shanalorre would understand what they were talking about and be able to replicate their findings, simply revealing such information to another Dungeon Binder would be foolish in the extreme.


    However, since they couldn''t talk about sensitive matters, that meant Lori was free to focus on playing chatrang with Mikon!


    She nodded to Shanalorre, already sitting at the bench¡ªthankfully this time it looked like the people who had come with her had finally recognized the pattern of events and hadn''t tried to sit on her bench as well¡ªas Lori put down the board and the box with the pieces and started laying them down. Across the table, Rian was speaking with the interloper. From the sound of it, he was inquiring about their accommodations and if they needed anything more. Lori tuned it out. Nothing she cared about.


    "Good evening, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said.


    Lori blinked, turning to look at the other Binder. "Good evening, Binder Shanalorre. Is something the matter?"


    "Everything is well, for now. My compliments, Binder Lolilyuri. You have a wonderful demesne and an extensive Dungeon. I must admit to a degree of envy."


    Ah¡­ well, Lori could find some time to listen to compliments. "Thank you for saying so, Binder Shanalorre."


    "All this construction must have taken some time."


    "I have been working since we established the Dungeon''s core," Lori admitted as the other three joined them, Riz immediately putting her head down on the table and settled in for a quick nap as Mikon awkwardly found herself sitting between Rian and the interloper as they talked. "And it''s still not finished. Several parts are very lacking."


    "Lacking? I cannot see how, though is probably my ignorance talking."


    "Oh, we are still very much lacking. The third level has barely been prepared for proper farming due to a lack of resources and time, and we always need more food and food storage. And unlike your own demesne, we are dependent on random dragon scales for metal, which is unwise to rely upon." They''d been lucky the first few times, but given all the possible alchemical substances, it was only a matter of time before something deadly dropped on top of them. At least it was unlikely to be blightstone. So far, there has been no historical record of a blightstone dragon scale, and Lori hoped that trend continued.


    "Ah. If that is the case, have you considered renewing our mining agreement when spring arrives?" Shanalorre said, and Lori immediately focused on her, the two men opposite hesitating in their conversation. "While it will not be for some time, as I am here I thought I should take the opportunity to discuss it with you."


    Lori glanced mournfully at her game board. On the one hand, she could understand the other Dungeon Binder''s reasoning. On the other hand¡­ "Given such an extensive subject, could it not wait until tomorrow morning?"


    "Tomorrow would suffice," Shanalorre said. "You''ve doubtlessly been working hard all day, and I would not interfere with your rightful rest. Will after breakfast tomorrow do?"


    "I suppose," Lori said. "I will have you informed when I am available, as I have duties in the morning I cannot put off. Is that the only matter you wish to discuss?" The unspoken hope was that it was. The unstated expectation was it would only be the start.


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    Expectations triumphed over hope. "Unfortunately not. In addition to the matter of renewing our mining agreement, there is also the matter of my demesne''s Dungeon."


    Lori blinked. "I thought your demesne didn''t have one?"


    "Yes. That is, in fact, the matter. We need a Dungeon, one that can act as a proper protection in the event of any future dragons, and an emergency store for our supplies. I would like to inquire as to your price for assisting us in rectifying this lack."


    "Given your summary, it is hardly in my interests to¡ª"


    "I am willing," Shanalorre interrupted, "to make an opening bid of healing for all in your demesne for the rest of my natural life, as well as afterwards should I become able to extend it. That will include my coming here in winter, or any other time, to assist in childbirths and severe injuries where the patient cannot be safely brought to my demesne for treatment."


    Lori stilled. Everyone on the other side of the table turned to stare.


    "Is it in your interests now, Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "Well¡­ you have my attention, at least," Lori admitted. "Shall we discuss this tomorrow?"


    Shanalorre nodded. "Unless my patients'' health turns, my schedule tomorrow should be clear. I look forward to continuing to discuss this and other matters with you, Binder Lolilyuri."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori had not been able to play chatrang over dinner. Indeed, everyone but Shanalorre¡ªand Riz since she''d been napping for it¡ªhad seemed preoccupied after the announcement. When they had finished eating, Shanalorre had risen and left sedately after a polite "Good night, Binder Lolilyuri," her lord walking next to her slightly bent over and whispering furiously.


    Since, unlike Shanalorre, Lori didn''t have an office, she had followed Rian to his house for a quick discussion.


    "There is something very wrong with that little girl," Rian muttered as Mikon cheerfully placed four sets of bed rolls on his bed and readied four blankets atop it. Umu was hastily removing the clothes that had been hung to dry in front of the fireplace, and Riz was absent, having gone to take a bath.


    "Binder Shanalorre seems like a perfectly reasonable and rational person to me," Lori said as she sat on the only chair next to the stone table


    "Yes, that''s what I mean about there being something very wrong with her. Children are many things, but reasonable and rational aren''t usually on the list. She actually reminds me of someone I used to know, and we never let her go off alone without her cousin to mother her. "


    "You make Binder Shanalorre sound addled," Lori said. "How does someone acting reasonable and rational disturb you?"


    "When it''s because they''re clearly acting like you."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Now Rian was just being wrong-headed and silly. "Now you''re just being wrong-headed and silly," she said. "What do you think of her offer?"


    "I think we''re going to need to semi-permanently station someone in River''s Fork to let us keep our own records of how much ore is being extracted from the mine, and come up with some sort of standardized way of measuring the ore so we have something to record," Rian said. "And that you should agree to her offer for the construction of a Dungeon, or something Dungeon-like, anyway. The offer is just too good to turn down, especially when so many people heard her make it. Though I bet Yllian it trying to talk her into changing her mind, or at least narrowing the terms."


    "So you think we should accept?" Lori said.


    Rin shrugged as Mikon started laying out the pillows. "This opportunity won''t last forever. Once the Golden Sweetwood Company starts sending more supplies and people, they won''t need us to work the mines or help them build a Dungeon anymore. I suggest we take it while we can. Even if we''re not using it now, we''ll need that metal. Once our food production is sufficiently secured that we have a surplus of vigas, we''ll need that metal to make pipes, cooking implements and fittings for things to refine that surplus into a more high-value product."


    "Rian, I know where booze comes from, and I''m not having it in my demesne."


    Rian shrugged. "If you ban it, they''ll make it anyway. And if it''s banned, you can''t tax it, which is just lost revenue for you once we have taxes again. Besides, once distilled enough, it has its uses, like antiseptic for wounds and cleaning surgical tools. More importantly, we need the healing she''s offering. It will let people operate with more peace of mind, knowing they have a Deadspeaker willing to heal them if they get injured, and not just until the end of the year."


    "I dislike being dependent on another demesne for such an important matter," Lori said as Mikon started helping Umu roll up and put away the laundry.


    "Well, that''s your own fault, since you wouldn''t let me recruit any wizards when I was in Covehold," Rian said bluntly. "Honestly, do you have any idea how easy it would have been? The standard of living in Covehold is expensive enough that I could have gotten us any number of reasonably educated wizards just with the offer of a rent-free residence and warm baths. It would not have been that hard to find a Deadspeaker who was willing to work and had no ambitions of having a demesne of their own. Or any other sort of wizard, for that matter."


    Lori flinched, then glared at Rian for making her flinch. "They''d have been a threat to my safety," she said. "What sort of wizard would come to this continent if they didn''t have ambitions of being a Dungeon Binder?"


    "The kind who came because they wanted to be with their family and keep them safe in a possibly dangerous place?" Rian said. "The kind who just needed an ocean between them and any troubles they were leaving behind? The kind who understands the economics of having a seller''s market due to high demand and low supply?" He shook his head. "Well, you''ve made your decision, and now we have to make the most of it. Though I should point out that there is no possible way Shanalorre is the sort of wizard you''re afraid of."


    "Of course she isn''t," Lori said. "She''s not actually a wizard, just a savant."


    "True, but not the point I was making. She didn''t come to this continent because she had ambitions of being a Dungeon Binder, she came here with her parents," Rian pointed out. "Remember, her uncle had to maneuver her into somehow taking control of their Dungeon''s core." Rian frowned for a moment. "Actually, is it still a Dungeon''s core if by her own admission they don''t actually have a Dungeon? Shouldn''t it be a demesne''s core instead?"


    "A Dungeon''s core is a Dungeon''s core, Rian," Lori said. "It doesn''t matter if it''s inside a proper defensible Dungeon complex or in a wooden box, it''s a Dungeon''s core. Still, I suppose you have a point about Shanalorre¡­" Not that she would relax her guard around the other Dungeon Binder. That would be foolish. "But it''s still a terrible idea to be so dependent on another demesne for something so important. History is rife with such examples, followed by market collapses and war when the other demesne used their position to betray the one depending on them."


    "I''m willing to bet those happened after a Dungeon Binder was replaced," Rian said. "Probably violently. Established governments, as a rule, prefer stability, and market collapse and war aren''t exactly stable."


    All right, Lori had to give him that. "I still don''t like it."


    "Then add some sort of escape clause," Rian said. "One that lets you back out of the agreements at any time. We''re the ones with the really fast boats and are the ones who will actually be providing transport. They can''t exactly force us to come to them if we don''t want to. Remember, healing was just her opening bid. That means we can negotiate for more."


    "Such as what?" Lori asked.


    "Well, off the top of my head, don''t they have more kinds of fruit trees than we do? That will greatly help vary our diet and will be good for morale."


    Lori blinked, tilting her head thoughtfully.


    The door opened and Riz came in, her towel wrapped around her head and her coat held closed with one hand, bucket in the other. She saw Lori and froze. "G-great Binder? W-what are you doing here?" For some reason, the northerner turned to glare at Mikon, who looked amused for some reason.


    "Speaking to my lord," Lori said. "Don''t worry, I won''t be staying. You can progress to your group fornication once I leave."


    Umu suddenly straightened where she was putting clothes on shelves, Mikon grinned widely, and Rian''s hand slapped into his face.


    "That''s not what we do!" Riz protested.


    Lori raised an eyebrow, giving Rian a sideways look. "Ah. Rian, do you want me to tell you the advice my mothers gave me about what to do in be¡ª"


    "Is there any other business we need to talk about, your Bindership?" Rian interrupted loudly.


    Lori chuckled. "No, I suppose we''re done for now. I''ll see myself off." She headed towards the door, a red-faced Riz stepping out of her way. Truthfully, she''d forgotten most of her mothers'' advice, besides remembering they sounded disgusting and unenjoyable, but if Rian really needed it she could perhaps force out one or two¡­


    The door closed firmly behind her, and Lori headed back to her room, thoughts centering on the possible discussion tomorrow and remembering how delicious the fruits from River''s Fork had been¡­

 220 - Project Negotiations

    This was a terrible position from which to negotiate.


    When negotiating, one must never let the enemy know you intended to say yes to their demand. Even if they were the only source available, and had an absolute monopoly (sigh¡­!-!-!-!-!) on a valuable commodity, the position of being willing to not accept their deal and maintain your current position regarding resources, implying you didn''t need what they had, gave you bargaining capital of a sort. She''d learned this from her mothers, back when she had been younger. They were lessons that every Taniar Demesne girl learned. After all, Taniar was the financial capital of the continent, and maintaining the exchange rates of nearly all the civilized demesne of the known world made them a convenient trading hub.


    However, the opening bid Shanalorre offered was strategically too enticing for Lori to pretend they didn''t want it. Even worse, given how publicly she had made the offer, everyone else in her demesne knew about it.


    The fact she had made such a bid, however, also showed how desperately Binder Shanalorre wanted this. She had set no minimum requirement beyond a Dungeon¡ªor rather, because it wouldn''t have the core inside it, it was correctly a shelter¡ªthat could protect against dragons in the future¡ªwhich would not be certain, because dragons were unpredictable and had many different ways to make the places they were traveling over unlivable¡ªand an emergency store of supplies. While that would be corrected during negotiations, had Lori agreed on the spot it would have left her open for lazy, low-effort work.


    This was also a transparent bid to keep Lori invested in her survival, since she had cited that the agreement would only last for her life. Not that River''s Fork had anyone to replace her, but still! And even if she died, they would still have the shelter!


    Granted, if she died, Lori would by their agreement take River''s Fork''s core, so it would be her shelter, but¡­


    Argh!


    Fortunately, when Lori came to her table for breakfast, Shanalorre didn''t bring up the subject, simply greeting her with a simple, ''''Good morning, Binder Lolilyuri." Thankfully, her¡­ lord? Yes, Shanalorre''s lord had learned his lesson and was seated on the other side of the table.


    "Good morning, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said. "How have your accommodations been?"


    "Very well, thank you," Shanalorre said. "You have been an excellent host, and your demesne has been quite hospitable towards us. I''m very glad to see that those who chose to leave River''s Fork have found a better place to settle."


    "How kind of you to say," Lori said. The empty platitude was the sort of thing one said in this situation, right? "I hope those who chose to leave my demesne in favor of yours have found things to their satisfaction."


    "I cannot say for sure. They are very vocal in their complaints, though strangely they blame you for their difficulties."


    "I have no idea what they''re talking about, but then their complaints are no longer my concern. They chose to leave, after all."


    "Yes. Given what I have seen of your demesne, I have to wonder why they would."


    Rian started coughing for some reason.


    "Rian, if you''re sick, stop spreading it around."


    "Sorry, your Bindership. Some spit went down the wrong tube while I was breathing," he said, voice sounding a little rough.


    Lori glared at him.


    "If you wish, I could try to heal him, just in case?"


    "That would be appreciated."


    "Uh, that''s all right, I''m fine, really¡ª"


    "Rian, shut up and be healed."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    Shannalorre stood and walked to the other side of the table, moving to stand behind Rian. She was breathing in with deep, even breaths, though Lori was fairly certain that was just to get her in the proper frame of mind to heal. It wasn''t like the other Dungeon Binder needed it. Lori was always connected to her core when outside her demesne, even in River''s Fork, and she assumed that the same was the case with Shanalorre.


    Seen from the outside, being healed by a Deadspeaker wasn''t particularly impressive. Well, unless there were large, gaping wounds on your person, or wide swathes of obvious burns on your skin. Then it was probably impressive. When you were watching someone with some unspecified and possibly absent illness that was completely internal with no dramatic symptoms, there was really nothing interesting to see. Shanalorre pressed the back of one of her hands on the bare skin on the nape of Rian''s neck, most likely to claim the life in his body, and they stood like that for a few moments.


    Then the younger Dungeon Binder let go. "There," she said. "Are you feeling better now, Lord Rian?"


    "Uh¡­" he said, voice still sounding a little hoarse, "not significantly more than before, I think? I really can''t think of what you''d need to heal from coughing." He moved slightly, then tilted his head. "Huh. I think that did help. That ache I had on my back is gone. Thank you."


    "You are welcome, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said, moving back to her side of the table.


    Fortunately, after this Shanalorre no longer seemed to want to converse, letting her discuss the demesne''s matters with Rian. The wood storage shed was filling up, so she''d need to give it a quick cure to make sure the wood was properly dried and could be used for fire wood. The waste desiccator seemed like it needed to be opened and emptied again. The weavers were inquiring whether they could grow some ropeweed in the Dungeon farm when the thaw came, as a steady supply of material and as a seed crop if the plants didn''t start regrowing naturally.


    This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    "Also, I think we need to have another community meeting before winter ends, while we have the convenience of time," Rian finished. "So we can discuss the broad plans for the demesne''s development in the coming year."


    "What broad plans for the demesne''s development?"


    "Yes, exactly."


    The two stared at each other.


    "All right, I see your point," Lori said blandly. "I know you already have a list of things planned, so prepare to hold the meeting in a few days."


    "As you command, your Bindership."


    "You WILL tell me what those things are before then," she said.


    "Of course, your Bindership."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Eventually, breakfast was finished.


    "I am now amenable to discussing the subject you broached last night, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said, gesturing across the table from her. Rian, very quick to understand, immediately vacated the position. "If you will please take a seat, we can begin the discussion."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Should we not be discussing this in your office?"


    "I don''t have an office," Lori said. "I don''t really need one." Technically, her room was her office, but she didn''t really want to bring Shanalorre in there.


    Shanalorre looked at her in surprise, but rose and walked around the table to sit where Rian had been as Rian moved to stand next to Lori. He was holding his plank and burnt stick.


    "I suppose we must begin with your outrageous offer," Lori said. "The rest of your natural life, was it?"


    "There will be conditions to be met first, of course," Shanalorre said. "A required minimum size and depth for the Dungeon to be constructed, for example." Ah. So she had thought of that, or her lord had suggested it to her. "In truth, after seeing your own demesne, it is not the only structure I wish built in my demesne as well, but it is the most needful that I and mine cannot build in a timely manner."


    "You have had months and haven''t built anything like it at all," Lori pointed out. "At least, not that I know of."


    "As you may have suspected, the mine was supposed to serve that purpose, which is part of why we resumed its operation," Shanalorre said, "but because of the nature of mining, it is not very well organized or spacious, and was highly problematic to occupy in a sudden emergency. In speaking with several of your people, however, they informed me of your impressive rate of construction."


    "I am a Dungeon Binder, not a day-laborer," Lori said, unable to keep herself from mentally adding, ''anymore'', if only in her own mind. "Why should I?" It was bravado, since she had resigned herself to agreeing already¡ªthe person who might need healing might be her!¡ªbut she couldn''t just let herself agree.


    "It will greatly simplify future interactions, and you will no longer have to keep negotiating healing from me," Shanalorre said. "I am willing to sacrifice future income to increase the likelihood of my demesne''s survival in the event of a dragon. Besides, I have a personal investment in keeping a not-inconsiderable portion of your demesne''s population alive. Just because they left my demesne before it became my demesne does not mean I do not wish them well. This will ensure that I do not simply violate our agreement when you finish your part in it."


    Next to her, Rian was nodding thoughtfully for some reason.


    "Additionally," Shanalorre continued, "as I said, this was merely my opening bid. I am prepared to negotiate any other payment you require for this task should you decide to go through with it, within reason." As if she didn''t know Lori would need to accept in any case.


    "If I agree, you will need to shoulder the expense of housing and feeding myself and anyone I deem necessary for such a project," Lori said. "This is non-negotiable. After all, it is not as if you will have anyone left to spare to assist me."


    "Very well. Though I hope you will be understanding when the accommodations do not match what you have provided here," Shanalorre said.


    "Well, it must have, at minimum, be indoors, clean, with adequate warmth and hot food."


    Binder Shanalorre nodded. "That, I think we can reasonably provide."


    "Secondly, you will be the one to provide all raw materials," Lori said. "Whether that''s wood, stone, metal fittings¡­ the materials will be sourced by your demesne."


    "Of course."


    "Thirdly, myself and my labor force will each be paid to the amount of two sengrains per day of fresh and good quality grains or fruits, outside of the provided food."


    Shanalorre blinked. "What?"


    "You likely do not have beads, so we will accept tangible goods as payment," Lori said.


    "Two sengrains is far more than what any one person will need per day, especially if they''re already being fed," Lord whatever-his-name-was protested.


    "Of course. The food will be to feed their families. You don''t expect men and women to work to feed simply themselves, do you? If you do not have the scales to measure the amount exactly, I''m sure I could build something."


    "Agreed, provided the shelter is constructed in two weeks or less, according to the specifications I will provide," Shanalorre said.


    "And those specifications are?"


    "A minimum of a hundred and twenty square paces of living space, food storage space of fifty square paces, fifty square paces for a bathing area, and storage for twenty square paces of emergency water. Beyond that point, food payments will cease, and meals will only be twice a day instead of three."


    "Three weeks," Lori countered. "With construction to begin only after we have finished all the spring cleaning and preparations for the coming year."


    "I''m pretty sure the river''s going to flood when it thaws, so we have to ready our Dungeon for that at the very least," Rian said.


    Lori¡­ had forgotten all about that. "As my lord has said, such preparations must take priority, if I agree to this."


    "And if a dragon passes by before you can begin construction?" Lord whatever-his-name-was said.


    "Then you''ll either be dead, and I won''t have to care, or you''ll continue to live and we''ll continue as agreed upon," Lori shrugged. "The situation resolves itself for me either way."


    "You can''t really expect us to worry about our commitments to you over our own Dungeon possibly getting flooded, do you?" Rian asked, most likely rhetorically.


    Lord whatever-his-name-was frowned but didn''t answer.


    "Two and a half weeks, after you have finished your own preparations," Shanalorre said. "With my offer of healing only becoming active after construction begins, save for our already standing agreement to assist with any pregnancies."


    Lori considered that and nodded. "Fourth, guaranteed passage through the section of river you control."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Aren''t you supposed to stop at three points of negotiation?"


    Lori gave her a flat look. "Why?"


    "I¡­ cannot rebut that. However, I would like to set aside the issue of river traffic as its own separate discussion."


    Lori considered that. She''d thrown in the issue to see if she could get away with it, but¡­ "Very well," Lori said. Well, she had negotiated the issue of labor pay, materials, lodging and feeding¡­ ah, yes. "Fourthly then, I will have the right to claim all materials I excavate in the course of this construction, such as ore."


    Shanalorre frowned. "I¡­ will agree to that," she said slowly. "Though you will have to set aside and store the material yourself, if you want to take it home."


    Lori nodded. That took care of any lucky finds she might run into. "Finally, there will be a flat down payment of five barrels of grain, well preserved and adequate to use as seed crop."


    "Aren''t we already paying you food?" Lord whatever-his-name-was said.


    "This is the fee for designing the shelter in question," Lori said. "Unless you already have a design you know for sure can be built in two and a half weeks? I will not begin construction without a finalized design, lest constant changes drag out the length of construction to my detriment."


    Why was Rian looking at her like that?


    "That is¡­ reasonable," Shanalorre allowed. "Very well. However, I will have input on the design."


    "Naturally. I can begin once the site for construction has been chosen."


    "Does that mean you accept, then?"


    Lori made a show of thinking about it. "That," she said, "will depend on the resolution of the river traffic issue."

 221 - Finalizing Agreements

    "While my demesne is ideally positioned to control your access to the ocean, and therefore to Covehold Demesne," Shanalorre said bluntly, "I have not done so, because it would not benefit us to bar your way. Purely for practical reasons, we have no way of enforcing such a toll save your voluntary participation without an extensive building project that we currently have neither the manpower, materials nor ability to do. Additionally, unless we are able to construct boats of our own, you are also our only access to Covehold Demesne, and more importantly, a reliable supply of salt. Therefore, I propose simply making this arrangement official."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "What do you have in mind?"


    "I will officially guarantee free passage for you through our portions of the river," Shanalorre said, "in exchange for two services."


    Lori''s eyes narrowed. "What services?"


    "Firstly, we would like to ask for salt every time you go to the ocean to gather it. Not a percentage, just a flat fee. We need it for food preservation, and salt is less ephemeral than ice and keeps better. As toll fees go, it is hardly onerous."


    "How much salt?"


    Shanalorre inclined her head towards Rian. "The amount that Lord Rian has previously gifted to us in prior times would be sufficient."


    "Hmm¡­ and the second service?"


    "Passage," Shanalorre said. "Specifically, passage on your vessels when you go down to Covehold with your goods and back, should we need to send someone there. Two people and enough cargo space for a box of goods."


    "One person, and anything they can personally carry aboard the ship in one trip, unassisted," Lori said flatly. "If they have more, we will be willing to rent out cargo space for the purpose."


    "We will need at least two people to accomplish what is needed in a timely manner. Two people and what they can carry."


    "Two people and what they can each carry in a single container," Lori said. "Any more cargo space beyond that must be paid for. Every bit of space we''re not using for our own goods is profit lost."


    Shanalorre paused to consider. "What are you asking for in terms of cargo space?"


    "One twentieth of the gross sales of whatever it is we will be transporting. I assume whatever cargo will be for sale, otherwise it would be a waste of both of our time and effort." While the profit was nice, it wasn''t the most important part. The intention was to make the other Binder consider if it was worth it to bring the cargo along. "This is assuming there is any space left for your cargo. We will be prioritizing moving our own goods. If you need more than that, you need to arrange it in advance, as part of planning for the expedition."


    "If you''re going there to buy something there and bringing it back, I would suggest making arrangements on a case by case basis," Rian said. "Loading the cargo can''t be done carelessly, after all. If the ship is unbalanced by the weight of the cargo, it could tip over and everyone on board will drown as the ship sinks."


    Shanalorre considered that. "Two people and what they can carry, and any further cargo arranged depending on the situation."


    Lori considered that. "Agreeable," she said. "Very well, then. I agree to this and I am willing to accept your request to construct a dragon shelter for your demesne."


    Shanalorre let out a small breath. It wasn''t quite loud enough to be a sigh. "Shall we draft the agreement?"


    "Rian, please tell me you wrote that all down?"


    "I wrote it down," he assured her. "Though anymore and I''ll have to start writing on the table. I''m out of space on this plank."


    "We still have the mine to discuss."


    "Writing on the table it is, then."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They discussed renewing the mining agreement next. Lori deferred renewing it until later in the year, since she didn''t want to commit any of her demesne''s workforce when everyone might be needed. After all, at the very least they would need to perform maintenance and repairs, as well as set up more farmland, both inside and outside her Dungeon. While Shanalorre looked reluctant, she accepted that reasoning.


    Then came the request to build a bath house.


    "I had thought you were managing your hygiene situation adequately," Lori said.


    "My experiences in your demesne has me shown the value of centralizing such a facility into a specialized building," Shanalorre said. "Unfortunately, as with the dragon shelter, we simply do not have enough people to devote to such a project without impacting essential work. And my guide mentioned you were able to build your bath house in a day¡­"


    "As I''m sure you are aware, a Dungeon Binder has certain advantages in their own demesne," Lori understated. "Even if I should be inclined to do so, I doubt constructing a bath in your demesne would be as simple. Besides, have you not already specified a bathing area in your dragon shelter?"


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    "That is an emergency bath. I speak of a bath house for daily, regular usage."


    "You realize that it takes a lot of magic to make our bath house actually work the way it does, right?" Rian spoke up. "Magic to move the water, magic to heat the water, magic to drain the used water so it doesn''t accumulate and the water stays clean, magic to provide light and ventilation to an enclosed building¡­ if you try to build a bath house like ours in your demesne without a Whisperer to keep it running, you''d end up with a dark, cold shed that quickly gets flooded."


    The look of disappointment on Shanalorre''s face was almost humorous despite how subdued it was. For that matter, the fact her lord looked equally disappointed¡ªif equally subdued¡ªwas humorous.


    She wondered how long before they noticed the agreement to build a dragon shelter didn''t include providing light, heat or ventilation?


    The discussions concluded, and using Rian''s notes, the specific terms of the agreements were written down. Since they didn''t have any paper¡ªat least, paper and ink that wasn''t her almanac and Lori was not using that!¡ªBinder Shanalorre allowed the agreement to be written into a pair of stone tablets. It was almost na?ve, really, since Lori could easily change either copy if she happened to get her hands on them. Not that she would, since she intended to honor her part of the deal¡ªto the letter¡ªbut it was still careless on the other Dungeon Binder''s part. Lori supposed the next time they went to Covehold she''d need to get Rian to buy her some paper and ink for any further agreements. They were planning to buy paper anyway.


    It was late morning by the time they finished discussion, and Lori had to work until lunch to finish making both tablets, so she didn''t have time to go out to the edge to make more beads. She still sent Rian anyway so he could move the jar further from the edge, before retiring to her room to expand the demesne. It probably wasn''t necessary, but given how relatively refreshed she was, she knew she''d be able to expand the demesne more than three times this afternoon, so Lori decided to err on the side of caution. After all, she didn''t want to go to the edge tomorrow only to find not Iridescence to work with since the jar was inside her demesne.


    Besides, Shanalorre''s militia were still about¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Nothing noteworthy happened during dinner. Lori was again unable to play chatrang, but that was because Shanalorre ensnared her in a conversation asking her where the ideal place to put the dragon shelter would be.


    "For the sake of convenience, I would want it within the dome for easier access for everyone," Shanalorre said as Lori nodded absently, "but Lord Rian''s reminder about flooding has me concerned."


    "I would recommend against building it there, purely for practical reasons," Lori said. "Given what I have observed of many of the Deadspoken structures in your demesne, would it be safe to presume there were originally living trees planted in those positions?" At Shanalorre''s nod, she continued. "Then there would be extensive root systems beneath the surface, which will both complicate excavation and might compromise the structural integrity of any structures I build. In addition, the proximity of the river does make flooding both during construction and afterwards a real danger." Lori gestured around the dining hall. "I needed to perform extensive work to seal the stone so as to prevent water from the river and groundwater penetrating inside. Outside of my demesne, I am not confident I can repeat it."


    "Where do you recommend, then?"


    "I would suggest excavating a hill," Lori said. "One well above the river. We will not have to worry about flood after construction, and it is easier to drain in the event water gets in because of rain or seepage of ground water. Additionally, having to simply excavate solid stone simplifies matters greatly, as the building material is already present. "


    "You just want the opportunity to claim free ore," Lord whatever-his-name-was muttered.


    Lori shrugged. "I have no particular preference as to which hill is used, but given this is a dragon shelter, one would want it to be nearby, would you not? Besides, I''m sure you have enough experience to know that there''s always something that needs to be carried into the Dungeon that wasn''t carried in earlier. In that regard, Binder Shanalorre''s desire to place the shelter under the dome would be best, but would require far more work than is practical or timely."


    "Because of the presence of roots and the risk of the excavation flooding."


    Lori nodded. "Exactly. And even if we find an ideal location with no roots that we manage to sufficiently waterproof, the dome itself would threaten it, since over time the dome''s growing root systems will probably start to damage the shelter''s structures."


    "That would take years, surely," Lord whatever-his-name-was said. "We''d have stopped using it and built a better shelter by then."


    "How many of the essential things you rely on in your demesne now were originally built with the intention of them being temporary until you built a better, more permanent one?" Rian asked.


    "Well, if I remember right, the houses were supposed to be temporary because we were going to build better ones with stone foundations and fireplaces," Riz said.


    "You remember correctly," Shanalorre said.


    "If you really want to try building the shelter in the middle of the dome, it would be doable if the shelter was built above ground," Lori said. "Unfortunately, that would mean transporting all the building materials there, and unless the entrance were above ground level, would still put you at risk of the shelter flooding. And without sufficient mass between yourself and the dragon, you are vulnerable to things falling from a great height and being surrounded by abominations. Worse yet, if the dragon were somehow to turn your dome into an abomination¡­" She shrugged. "The more I consider it, the more I come to conclude that situating the shelter under the dome is actually the more dangerous option."


    "Unfortunately, I must agree," Shanalorre said. "I shall take Binder Lolilyuri''s suggestion of excavating a hill into consideration. We might have to seriously consider integrating the shelter into the copper mine."


    Lori shrugged. "If you wish for me to have no opportunity to claim ore, we can try excavating at a point higher than the current expanse of the mine. However, that will add its own difficulties when it comes to evacuation. It is difficult to carry things uphill, leading to the possibility of the shelter being undersupplied when the time comes."


    "So noted, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said.


    "Inform me when you have settled on a location. I cannot prepare a plan for construction until I see what I have to work with."


    Rian made a strange face. Was he constipated or something? Rian, don''t make faces like that over dinner.

 222 - Flood Preparations

    "Good morning, Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Good morning, Binder Shanalorre."


    The two of them stared at each other for a moment. Then they both turned away and Lori took her usual seat in the middle of the table, Rian opposite her. Said lord was glancing between her and Shanalorre with another strange look on his face. Umu sat next to him, with the other two absent, so they were probably getting the food.


    "Now, what''s this about flooding?" Lori said.


    Rian blinked at her for a moment, looking confused, before shaking his head. "Ah. Well, like I said the day before, from the looks of things we''re definitely going to get flooded, and we should probably prepare the demesne while we can."


    "Yes, but why are you so certain?"


    Rian gave her a look that she was better able to recognize. "Your Bindership, how much of the demesne right now is literally covered with more than a pace of water? What happens to all that water when it starts getting warmer?"


    ¡­


    Ah. When he put it that way¡­


    Lori glanced towards the entrance of her Dungeon. Then she glanced towards the stairs leading down to the lower levels.


    "Yes, exactly," Rian said. "Now, because of how you''ve been building, we shouldn''t have too many leaks, but what leaks there will be only you will be able to seal up. If I''m right in my guess of how high the water could potentially rise, you might need to be ready to seal off all water pipes into the Dungeon."


    Lori almost swore, and barely remembered there was a child a pace away from her. "Ah," she said instead, frowning. "Yes, I can see that. The current arrangement of the water hub shed is based on the normal water level of the river. If it exceeded that level¡­" Yes, she''d have to seal off their water reservoir. "How high do you guess the water will rise?"


    "The riverbank gives a fairly good indicator as to how high the flood waters are likely to rise. I''m willing to bet the entire river bank is underwater when the snow thaws. Conservatively, I''d say that it might rise up about a pace above the average level of the river bank. Off the top of my head, our permanent structures that are likely to be affected by flooding are the old baths, the remaining shelter, the Um, the clay pit, the laundry area, the docks¡ªalthough that''s only a worry if they take damage¡ªthe mushroom farm, the bone pit, maybe the tannery, and some of the houses near the Dungeon. Oh, and my house, of course. If the other side of the river weren''t more flat, I''d be more worried, but it''s likely most of the water will spill over that way."


    "You''re¡­ probably correct," Lori said as she remembered what little she recalled of how natural water tables worked.


    "So¡­ can I move into the Dungeon until spring?" Rian said brightly.


    Lori paused and glared at her lord.


    "What? The alternative is trying to build a new house on higher ground in the middle of winter. Given its more important to focus on flood proofing the Dungeon, I clearly have to be prepared to move."


    Lori continued glaring at her lord. People were just going to keep living in her Dungeon, weren''t they?


    "And of course, there''s making sure our vigas fields are protected from flooding, to make sure the grain that''s been growing over the winter under the snow doesn''t just get washed away," Rian continued. "I''m told that given how much snow is on top of them, we need to clear out the snow once it starts to thaw so the vigas doesn''t get flooded and start rotting in the ground."


    Lori sighed. "Well, I''ll leave that to you then, you already seem to know what needs to be done."


    Rian nodded. "We''ll have to prepare to move everyone still living in the shelter into the Dungeon, just in case. And the furnishings of the Um, I suppose, though I think I can reasonably be sure in saying that people would probably want to leave that for last."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Of course they will."


    "At best, you can probably seal up both and just open them again when the water recedes, but I''m not too sure how well anything left inside will fare. And given the back half of the bath house is made of ice, that will probably take a little of work."


    Lori tapped the tabletop thoughtfully. "Rian, have a watch kept on the river outside to warn us of any possible flooding."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    That should at least give them some warning, although by the time there were visible signs it would probably be too late to do anything substantial. Still, better than nothing¡­


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    Lori fell into routine as she considered of how to deal with her demesne flooding. The clay pit getting flooded wasn''t too much of a problem. At worse they''d have to rebuild the kiln if something carried on the flood water struck it hard enough to break it, which was relatively trivial. The baths, Um and shelter had wooden fittings however, and while they''d been treated to withstand humidity, they probably wouldn''t fare well to being underwater for hours, or possibly even days depending on the severity of the flooding.


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    Rian''s suggestion to just completely seal up the buildings was looking like an easy, simple, viable solution, though it would mean the second bath house would soon find itself very crowded. The laundry area getting flooded would be problematic, though. Unwashed clothes would soon start being malodourous and eventually cause people to be ill, and people would likely start washing their clothes in the bath house all over again.


    Either way, she might have to raise up flood barriers of some sort to divert water away from the area around the Dungeon. She''d have to go outside and move a lot of snow, but it was just water, that would be simple. At least what she''d have to build wouldn''t be complicated.


    As to people living in her Dungeon should the flooding reach the shelter and some of the houses¡­ well, she''d resigned herself to it already. After all, it was only a few people, as opposed to the entire population of her demesne. And Rian would be there to keep them in line. She''d just have to¡­ not just wander down into the third level without making a lot of noise, because with the Um either flooded or sealed to protect against flooding, that''s where people will likely go to slake their lusts upon one another¡­


    These thoughts and more occupied her as she rode with Rian and those two accompanying them out to the edge of the demesne. She could feel the wisps in the river below them, water flowing under the ice. Had that ice grown thinner? Should she be worried? No, no, it still seemed solid, and if need be she could bind it solid again. She might actually need to do that to control the river''s flow. She''d never considered it before, but¡­ well, she was a Dungeon Binder, wasn''t she?


    After she made the day''s beads and left a binding of firewisps in the jar to grow more Iridescence, she made sure to bury it near a tree, well away from where she could feel the river bank under the snow. Just in case.


    Once she returned and stored the beads in her room, she went out again to walk outside and evaluate what had to be done. She had to put on snow pads since she would be walking on snow, which made for an awkward gait, but it was the best way to not sink. Some people were lashing whole planks to their feet, but that made turning in the tunnels awkward, and putting it on by yourself difficult unless you did it on one of the benches in the dining hall.


    The wind was only mildly cool on her face as she walked, Rian and Riz following her, though if she stood in one place too long the snow under her would start melting to slush and she''d sink, so Lori kept moving. She actually went out and walked over the river to get around to the other side of the hill her Dungeon was built into, since the overland path was still buried in ice and only reached up to the mushroom farm. That would probably be easier to seal up completely, then just open when the water receded¡­


    On the other side, she recognized the area the children used to hunt seels at in warmer days. The snow might have covered the terrain and the trees were bare of leaves, but she could recognize the location well enough. It wasn''t like it was a face after all, full of minute, insignificant differences that people expected you to be able to recognize at a distance after one glance, much less remember.


    If she raised a low wall to divert water from here back into the river, that should hopefully be able to divert any floodwater away from the tannery. While the building was still mostly buried in snow¡ªincluding the chokers that had been housed near there and were probably dead at this point¡ªif a flood came the alchemical substances they had stored there would mix into the water and would both be a great loss to their ability to prepare hides, as well as possibility tainting the water downstream for some time. And since the Dungeon was downstream¡­.


    In addition, she was a bit uncertain how high the terrain of the usual path people took to get to this point was. There was a very real possibility that a small trickle of water might be able to trickle in on the path and be trapped behind any flood barriers they made, flooding them anyway, if much slower. So she had to raise some sort of wall here as well, just in case¡­


    With another wall in front of her Dungeon, maybe one extending all the way past the laundry area, she might be able to keep water back entirely, so that they''d be able to keep things functional.


    Of course, it''s completely possible she''d underestimate how much floodwater there would be and the water would overtop her walls, so that the water would be trapped behind them once the water receded. Well, if that happened, at least she''d be able to completely seal off the passage into her Dungeon and open up a higher entrance. That should be easy enough. The outlet vent was already under water and shouldn''t be bothered by having more water on top of it as well¡­


    It would be easier to judge for sure if there wasn''t so much snow in the way, though¡­


    ¡­


    Well, she was out here already so¡­


    Lori began to make a binding of airwisps¡­


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    "Thank you for your hospitality, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said at lunch later. "My stay here has been very pleasant. When you next come to stay in my demesne, I shall see about making your stay equally enjoyable." After two days and no indications that either mother or child had gotten infected or were becoming ill, Shanalorre and her militia were finally returning to their own demesne¡­ at least until the next pregnant woman gave birth, which was apparently due in a few weeks, although with the human body it was uncertain and the birth could occur earlier and ugh.


    "I''m glad to hear you regard my demesne so highly," Lori said. After a whole morning of being outside and using bindings of air to blow away snow into large piles so she could see the terrain and the ice of the river, even she was a little chilled and enjoying the warmth of her Dungeon. While it was possible the other Binder would be able to make good on her boast, Lori found it unlikely. "We shall keep the alcove prepared for you." No reason to move the bed, after all. And if the alcove was needed¡­ well, some lucky family had a bed. She''d tear down the wall though, as it wasn''t needed anymore.


    "If there''s any change in my patient, please call for me immediately."


    "Of course, Binder Shanalorre," Rian said brightly, causing Lori to give her lord a look. Oddly, she noticed Lord whatever-his-name-was doing the same. "I''m sure Missus Keyyara and her daughter will be glad of the visit. Hopefully we won''t need to, but you never know how things will turn out. Also, thank you for agreeing to check on all those people yesterday."


    "It was the least I could do as a guest."


    "What is this?" Lori asked.


    "Ah, you were busy working in your room yesterday afternoon, you didn''t see. Binder Shanalorre offered to heal some people who weren''t feeling well." Rian''s tone turned wry. "Mostly it was dripping noses and such."


    "You were first in line, weren''t you." It wasn''t a question.


    "I can''t help the fact I''m sensitive to the cold!"

 223 - Infrastructure Assessment

    The day after Binder Shanalorre had finally left to go back to her demesne¡ªthough probably not for very long, since there were more pregnancies due¡ªLori woke up with the firm intention of assessing the ability of the riverside infrastructure of her demesne to deal with the possibility of flooding. She''d left several bindings of airwisps anchored in place the night before to blow away snow in the areas she intended to work¡ªfinding places to anchor them that hadn''t been snow had taken a while¡ªso hopefully there wouldn''t be much for her to clear herself. Or at least, not as much, anyway.


    Then she could get to work on the exposed ground, using the surplus stone in the pile next to the entrance¡ªwhich was¡­ still covered by snow, but no matter¡ªto try and make barriers against possible flooding. The question was whether the measure would only be temporary, or if they would become permanent structures¡­


    Oh, who was she kidding, of course they''d be permanent. She could already hear future generations complaining about why the area around her Dungeon''s entrance kept getting flooded¡­


    "I need your authorization to change our food," Rian said as soon as she sat down at the table.


    She stared at him for a moment. "Repeat that, with context."


    Rian nodded agreeably as Riz sat down next to him, closed her eyes, and immediately went to sleep with her head on the table. "Our reserves of meat in the cold rooms are running low. I need to authorize opening the vigas reserve to add to our food. Eating a reduced meat ration is better with bread to pad it out, so our morale isn''t affected. Also, given the month¡ªif Shana''s correct about it¡ªwe need to start building up everyone''s reserves of energy to get them ready to work, and that means feeding them more filling foods like the vigas to supplement the tubers that''s already there."


    Lori straightened in alarm. "How much meat is still in the cold rooms?" she asked.


    "About a third of what was there when we started the season," Rian said. "It''s best to make it last until after the start of spring, when we can start hunting again and replenish out meat supply, though. Besides, it''s about time we had a change in what we''re eating. Even without honey, it''s an easy way to keep up morale."


    Lori frowned and looked around. She might not be any good with faces, or understanding how her idiots think most of the time, but in her cursory inspection it didn''t seem like anyone needed their morale raised. "No one seems to need their morale raised."


    "When people look like they need their morale raised, it''s already too late," Rian said. "Besides, even if you do manage to raise their morale at that point, the increase is less than what it could have been if you''d raised it earlier¡­ Look, trust me, all right? It''s a ''dealing with people'' matter. Just something to break the monotony of winter while preparing for spring."


    Lori sighed. "Fine, fine, do it."


    Rian nodded, then grinned. "If you want, you can also authorize a little bit of honey, and we can have sweet honey bread for dinner," he said in a low voice that people in other table''s probably didn''t hear. "After all, Shana''s probably eating some of what we gave her, so you should too. You know, for the morale."


    "Do I look like I need my morale raised?" Lori said flatly.


    "Honestly, it''s always hard to tell with you, so I just err on the side of caution and try to raise it at every opportunity. But you do look like you''d appreciate having some honey bread for dinner. Come on, it''s not like I''m asking for a holiday¡­ though I point out the time on that ban has already long expired."


    Lori glared at him a little longer, but¡­ well, she didn''t really disagree with the logic. There was probably a lot of work to be done in the spring, so it was best to start bulking up for it, and everyone knew grains and tubers were good for that. And she was hardly going to say they wait for all the meat to be gone before they touch the grain. As long as they had enough for planting and a little bit for emergencies¡­ "Fine. But the honey is only for tonight. Will there be enough flour ground by tonight?"


    "We have a lot of people with big, muscular arms with very little to do, I don''t think that''s going to be a problem," Rian said.


    Lori nodded. "You and Riz are free this morning. We''re not going out to the edge. I have work to do closer to the Dungeon."


    "The flood preparations, right?" Rian said. "If you start work in the immediate area around the Dungeon''s entrance, I can accompany you to the rest after I finish organizing the milling. Don''t look at me like that. You''re the most likely to accidentally slip and fall in the snow out of all of us, since you start to melt it if you stand still long enough."


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point. "I''ll be careful," she ground out as Umu and Mikon arrived with food and water.


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    "You always are, but things happen regardless." He sounded resigned.


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    After breakfast, Lori grabbed her stone-shaping tool¡ªin case she felt like making any immediate changes¡ª and, after some consideration, her hat, and headed out of her Dungeon towards the water hub shed.


    Unfortunately, the binding of airwisps she''d left overnight to blow the offending snow away wasn''t as successful as she''d hoped. Of course, she''d hoped that it would be able to clear the snow all the way down to the dirt. Enough of the way was clear that she was able to make her way to the stone shed.


    If there was going to be flooding, then she needed to make sure that this particular conduit to her Dungeon wasn''t going to be the reason it was flooded. The pool where water was usually boiled to clean it before being sent to the reservoir and other places was still and cold, barely being kept liquid by the binding that kept the water around the output vent for her Dungeon''s air near boiling to discourage bugs and abominations from using it as a way in. She found all sorts of larvae in the pool, taking advantage of the heat, and shuddered in disgust.


    Shaking her head at herself, Lori restructured the binding to contain heat around the water of the vent instead of merely generating it. That would eventually cause the water in the rest of the pool to freeze, hopefully killing the bugs. She''d have to clear out the pool before she restored the bindings that provided them with water, but flooding would probably do that anyway¡­


    Lori also checked the vent itself, hidden under the water. It still seemed secure, so even in the event of a flood it shouldn''t let any water into her Dungeon. The air pressure from the vent should be more than enough to keep any water out, and while she could add a binding of waterwisps¡­ it really didn''t need it just yet.


    Ironically, a flood would be a greater danger to their water supply than the river freezing, since such an event would cause the river to rise up and fill the boiling pool where the water was heated to kill dustlife before it was drawn in to the reservoir, and from there redistributed to all the bath houses. She''d have to shut down the hub before the reservoir was filled with contaminated water. Even if it didn''t have dustlife, flood water would have a lot of suspended particulates and possibly debris, which the bindings she had in place weren''t meant to deal with.


    In the event that happened, she''d have to build something to specifically deal with particulate-heavy water, but that was best done when she knew what the flood''s water level was¡­


    She was starting to see why Rian thought procrastinating might be a solution to problems¡­


    No, no, not a good idea! Back to work, back to work!


    Lori looked towards the docks next to the water hub shed. The Coldhold was covered in snow, making it look like a half-buried hut. On the other side of the stone dock, Lori''s Ice Boat was completely buried under snow. She hoped there would be time to recover it before flooding started¡­


    Well, back to inspecting.


    She wasn''t sure if the clay pits need to be protected from flooding or not. On the one hand, it was just dirt¡­ but on the other hand, flooding might alter the composition or add impurities or something. She''d have to get Rian to find out for sure. However, it looked like the issue was likely not to matter, since the bedrock might be too deep for her to properly anchor a flood barrier in front of the clay pit without adversely affecting it.


    The laundry area¡­ probably didn''t need to be protected. The infrastructure was stone and well-anchored, and none of it was likely to be ruined or irreparably damaged by flooding. If she raised a wall, they might be able to use it during a flood¡­ no, that wouldn''t work. The laundry area was designed to drain down to the river. If they used it from behind a floodwall, she''d have to add new infrastructure and bindings to drain out the wash water so they could continue to use the laundry area from then on. She''d have to think about that¡­


    Raising a flood wall to protect the bath house, shelter and Um would be simpler, though as she looked at it, she almost didn''t think it was necessary. From this angle, she was reminded that they were a bit higher up the slope than her Dungeon''s entrance, making them slightly less likely to be flooded. They were still low enough that flooding was definitely a risk, but as things stood they were in a safer position than her Dungeon.


    Lori considered her option. Of course, she could just make more a permanent barrier along the river bank¡­ but that would mean demolishing the water hub shed, the clay pit, the laundry area and possibly even the docks, or at least finding a way to integrate them into such a wall. Such would be more time and material intensive, and she wasn''t sure she could do it in the time they had left, especially given the weather.


    The easiest thing to do would be to just seal up all affected buildings, create a flood barrier to keep water out of her Dungeon, and then just wait it out¡­ except that would mean having people in her Dungeon, reduced necessary infrastructure while the bath house and laundry area were flooded¡ªand the Um too, she supposed¡ªand there was no knowing how long the flooding would be. Judging from the fact that the area hadn''t been flooded when they''d arrive during the rainy season, it probably wasn''t that long¡­ or the previous year had been uncharacteristically mild, and this year could be worse.


    There was also the option of not building anything and just setting waterwisps to divert floodwater from the town when flooding occurred, but in her opinion that seemed extremely dangerous. Such a binding would require a lot of imbuement, not to mention need to be anchored in place, so she would still need to prepare solid structures for it. Of course, she could set the binding to instead turn potential floodwater to steam or ice, but that would be so irresponsibly dangerous she might as well kill her idiots herself, and further bindings needed to make such a thing ''safe'' was an added expenditure of energy. So, no.


    ¡­


    Well, one step at a time. First, build something to keep floods from getting into her Dungeon. Hopefully building such a barrier would put her in a proper frame of mind to consider the problem properly. All these months of not properly building something seemed to have taken their toll¡­


    Humming to herself, still shouldering her stone-shaping tool, Lori went to get her stone stockpile unburied of the snow that had fallen on it since they''d added the additions to the chimneys.

 224 - One More Day

    It soon became clear that trying to build a flood barrier in front of the passageway into her Dungeon would not be practical. The entrance, while wide enough to deal with the daily traffic of everyone in her demesne walking through it every day, would be hard pressed to continue to function if there was a pace-high barrier in the way. The only way to navigate such a thing would be to build in ramps¡ªwhich would be unreasonably steep or unreasonably long¡ªor some kind of stairs. The length of such stairs would make them as problematic as the ramps, while creating a wall and then adding stairs to the faces of each side would drastically limit the traffic in the passageway. That wasn''t even getting into how dangerous such stairs would be in the snow, or how the snow melter would be in the way.


    Another option that she considered was clearing the whole area in front of her Dungeon of snow, and then building the flood barrier outside the passage. While that would still have the problem of also obstructing entry in and out of her Dungeon, she''d have more space to build a solution, such as different stairs for those coming in and going out. The problem was a flood barrier that took up that much space would be right in front of the other structures in front of her Dungeon''s, creating a narrow avenue of traffic that was sure to limit access to them¡­


    ¡­


    Lori wished she didn''t have to be the one to do this. She wished that there was someone she could just order to construct such a thing, to have to deal with all the considerations and needing to second guess and having to consider and reconsider options. Someone she could just leave this to while she did something else.


    But there was no one. She was the only wizard her demesne had, and it was too dangerous to allow anyone more experienced than Shanalorre into her demesne¡­


    ¡­


    For a moment, Lori just stood there, leaning against the stone wall of the passage to her Dungeon, ignoring everyone passing by as they ignored her in turn. Next to her was the pile of stone she''d been using to start building the flood barrier, which she''d torn down when people had started crowding around he as they had tried to go in and out of her Dungeon. Then she took a deep breath, turned, and got back to work.


    She reached out and claimed all the waterwisps in the snow outside of the entrance to her Dungeon. After all, she''d need a clear space to work¡­


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    Lori was sitting in quiet frustration at her usual table, glaring at the tabletop as she waited for lunch, when Rian sat down opposite her.


    "All right, we should be good for bread for dinner, and a little less bread in all subsequent meals, with slightly more tubers and water," he said.


    Lori looked up. "What?" she asked tiredly. Most of the morning had been a waste, from her perspective. She hadn''t really managed to build anything, and all she''d done was clear some snow that would likely start being replaced that evening.


    Rian sighed. "The flour is being milled, so we''ll have bread for dinner. We''ll have smaller servings of bread in subsequent meals that will have less meat and a little bit more water in the soup to draw out the meat we have. We''re also increasing the amount of tubers a little bit because we can afford to. That should let us have meals with a little less meat that are just as filling."


    Oh, right, the food thing.


    "As long as we have enough to eat," Lori said, once more wishing her bench had a back so she could lean on it and get comfortable. Instead she went back to resting her elbows on the table and closed her eyes again.


    "Um, are you all right? You seem tired."


    "I''m fine," Lori said, not opening her eyes.


    For a moment, there was only the usual din of the dining hall.


    "You know, if you''re tired, maybe you should just rest this afternoon?" Rian suggested. "Take a nap instead of expanding the demesne to¡ª"


    He cut off as Lori let out a groan of frustration. Yes, she had to expand the demesne this afternoon, didn''t she? She''d forgotten about that! She''d been thinking of going back to work this afternoon for the flood barriers, but¡­


    Her forehead met the tabletop, and she just leaned on it as she shook in frustration.


    "Lori," Rian said, and she opened one eye to glare at him, "you''re making me worried. What''s the matter?"


    "Nothing is the matter," she snapped. "I just have a flood barrier I need to build that I haven''t managed to start yet, and which I won''t be able to start today since I have to expand my demesne this afternoon, so everything I did this morning has just been a waste of time!"


    Rian nodded, even as Umu¡ªwhen had she gotten there?¡ªleaned away and tried not to be noticed. "If it''s so important, why not skip the expansion for today and get to work then?"


    "Because I need to expand the demesne," Lori said. "It''s not like I can leave that to anyone else!"


    "Then why don''t you do that and leave building the flood barrier to someone else?" Rian said.


    Oh, how she wished. "Oh, how I wish." Her tone was bitter.


    "All right then, it''s settled. You take care of expanding the demesne, and I''ll see about getting a start on the flood barrier," Rian said.


    Lori stared at him. "What?"


    "I don''t think we''ll actually be able to build much, but I can have the stonemasons and anyone else who feels they can help survey the area that needs to be protected from flood and we can at least submit a proposal to you," he said. "We can do that this afternoon while you''re expanding and tomorrow you can decide if what we come up with is feasible or to your taste. Tomorrow we might be able to dig out the dirt and clear it to the bedrock for you too, depending on how hard the ground is. Would be faster if we could melt the ground a little, but we can light some fires for that¡­ well, it will depend on what you want us to do."


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    Lori continued to stare at him.


    "What?"


    "Can you actually do all that?" she said.


    "I don''t know," Rian said. "I''ll have to ask. Maybe people will have experience at this, or at least have some ideas. Maybe they''ll be completely ignorant and the best we can do is grab shovels and keep the area clear for you so you don''t have to waste your time keeping the snow off where you''re working. All I know is we have a lot more men and women with no work they really need to do, and our Dungeon Binder looks like she''s about to cry from how tired she is."


    "I am not about to cry!" she snapped.


    "Noted. Are you tired though?"


    Loir did not dignify that with a response, sitting straighter on her bench. Ugh, she wished she had a backrest!


    "I''ve been keeping track," Rian said quietly. It was just quiet enough that people in other tables probably couldn''t hear, but she had to lean forward to make it out. "There''s maybe four days I can maybe say you didn''t work all day this winter: the three days Shana was here, and that one day you had me play chatrang with you. No holidays either, so you didn''t even have any excuses to stop for a day. Of course you''re tired."


    "I''m fine," Lori said irritably.


    Rian nodded. "You''re fine, yes. But you''re also tired. So why don''t you rest? Just this afternoon. After lunch, go up to your room, lie down and take a nap. I''ll call you for dinner, or have some food set aside for you when you wake up. You can go back to working tomorrow, and maybe we''ll have gotten something done that can help you by then."


    The suggestion was tempting¡­ so, so tempting¡­


    "Fine, do this survey you want to do," Lori said brusquely. "We''ll discuss it tomorrow. But I''m not resting. I have a demesne to expand while I can."


    Rian sighed, but nodded. "Then if you''ll excuse me, your Bindership, I have people I need to talk to." He rose and left, walking quickly. Lori didn''t bother to see where he went. Instead, she just leaned her elbows onto the table again, rested her head in her hands, and closed her eyes. The food wasn''t ready yet, so she had a few moments to rest¡­


    Lori didn''t fall asleep at the table, though it did take her a few moments to open her eyes when Mikon hesitantly said, "Your Bindership? The food is ready?"


    She blearily opened one eye, then straightened and grabbed one of the bowls of food. No bread yet. It still wasn''t ready. Lori ate quickly and methodically, waiting for Rian to come back.


    He didn''t.


    When she finally finished the contents of her bowl¡ªit didn''t take long, with no Rian distracting her with his reports¡ªLori stood up, looking around. She saw Rian standing several tables away, seemingly talking to someone there. He didn''t look up as she turned away and headed for her room.


    It was routine by then. Laying out her bedroll into the corner next to her bed where she could sit upright, then getting into position, closing her eyes, and creating the binding that she''d use to expand her demesne. Ignoring how heavy she felt, she leaned back and began expanding her demesne¡­


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    Lori jerked awake. What¡­?


    There was another knock on her door and she tried to sit up, only to find she was already sitting up and her neck was annoyed with her because her head had been lolling to one side. Wincing, she blearily stumbled over her bed, her bedroll sliding out from under her, and made for her door. Her feet shuffled unsteadily on the cold floor as she rubbed her eyes of sleep sand.


    She unlatched her door as she muttered darkly about going back to sealing off the passage to her room, then tiredly opened the door. "Who died?" she muttered in annoyance at, of course, Rian.


    He smiled for some reason. "Oh good, you managed to get some rest," he said with annoying cheerfulness. "It''s dinner time. Though if you want I can bring the food up to you and you can have it as a middle of the night snack?"


    Lori stared at him. Then she groaned as she remembered.


    "This is probably a very good indicator you need a lot more rest," Rian said, still annoyingly cheerful. "Why don''t you sleep tomorrow, too? We have enough wood that if we set some bonfire fires in the right spots, we can dig up the ground to get at the bedrock and get it ready for you to build. If we mix the soil with some of the desiccated latrine waste, we should be able to make more tuber planters, since we''d need you for setting up the plots in the Dungeon farm."


    She''d fallen asleep! Exactly what she''d said she wouldn''t do! Had she even¡ªyes, she remembered expanding the demesne once, and¡­ Lori checked. There was a binding around her demesne, filled with some imbuement. She must have fallen asleep while imbuing it¡­


    "This doesn''t mean I''m tired," Lori snapped.


    "It does, actually," Rian said, still annoyingly cheerful. "Fortunately, it''s easy to fix. You just have to spend tomorrow resting."


    "I don''t need to rest!"


    "It does, actually. That''s what being tired means. Look, you''ve made me go to sleep plenty of times when I''ve been tired. Now it''s your turn to rest. For the good of the demesne."


    Lori gave him a flat look that was immediately ruined when the urge to yawn filled her. She managed to keep her teeth clenched together and her lips shut, but there was nothing to be done about the obvious deep breath.


    Rian, color him, didn''t say anything, just looked at her cheerfully.


    "I don''t need to rest," Lori said again once she was sure another yawn wasn''t going to happen in the middle of her words.


    "Everyone needs to rest eventually," Rian said. "Now is the absolute best time for it."


    "How is this the best time?"


    "There isn''t a dragon coming after us, everything is running smoothly, and we have a lot of people with not much to do and plenty of energy they need to use. We can help you. Please, let us help you."


    "I don''t need help. It''s just a simple building project. I was merely overwhelmed and frustrated this morning, so I wasn''t able to make much progress on it, but I''m fine now. I can get started on it tomorrow."


    With each word, the annoying cheerfulness on Rian''s face became visibly strained. "Well, at least rest one more day! Just do nothing but eat and play board games with Mikon or something! One more day, that''s all I ask! Just one day where you don''t go out to the edge or expand the demesne before you start building things to keep floods out. Please, just one day!"


    Lori stepped back as Rian leaned towards her. He paused, then deliberately took two steps back, his hands that had been wringing the air as his fingers kept flexing open and closed both moving to his back as he started leaning on the wall. "Please," he repeated, sounding more calm. "Just¡­ rest one more day. That''s all I ask. One day where you rest and relax and do nothing but eat and play games. Please?"


    Her eyelids wanted to droop, but Lori stoically forced them open, and disguised the yawn that wanted to come out of her by taking a deep, deliberate breath as if she was trying to calm herself. "Fine," she said, a strange relief filling her as she waved a hand dismissively. "Fine, I''ll ''rest''. Though I still think it''s a waste of time."


    Rian blinked "Really? You''ll really rest?"


    "I said I would, didn''t I?" she snapped.


    "You''ll stay in the Dungeon all day? No expanding?"


    "Yes, yes, fine!" The thought of not having to leave her demesne to brave the cold to make beads, of not having to claim the earth and sky and then wrestle it with her will alone to push beyond her demesne''s borders¡­ something in her back seemed to come loose at the very thought of it. "I''ll rest tomorrow, all right?"


    Rian sighed, sounding relieved. "All right¡­ okay, then. Thank you."


    "Why are you thanking me? It''s just resting. It''s not as if I''ll be doing something difficult."


    "Well, that''s true," Rian said, sighing again. "So¡­ will you be having dinner, then?"


    "Of course I''ll be having dinner. Why wouldn''t I be having dinner?" She stomped past him, heading down to the dining hall.


    Then she stomped back, because she wasn''t wearing her shoes, and stomping in only her socks had hurt.


    The honey bread was delicious.

 225 - Loris Rest Day

    Lori almost forgot that she agreed to rest today.


    Almost.


    She remembered partway through imbuing the bindings on the list she maintained, and for a moment felt both relieved and guilty. Relieved, treacherously relieved, that she had agreed not to work today, and irrationally guilty that what she was doing was ''not resting''. Ridiculous. This was necessary maintenance, and besides, what could Rian do to her exactly? Make her rest for another day?


    ¡­


    Anyway!


    After completing the list, Lori took a quick bath to refresh herself¡ªshe needed to cut her hair, it was starting to get long again¡ªand got dressed before heading downstairs for breakfast. Once she reached the level of the dining hall, she paused, frowning slightly.


    There was something different about the room. For one thing, there was something¡­ energetic about the buzz of conversation that she heard. The subdued and relaxed air of the past few months had been replaced by something that sounded more active, something that reminded her of the seasons when everyone was going out and actually doing a lot of work¡­


    And then the smell hit her, and she took a deep breath, letting it out as a happy sigh.


    The smell of freshly made flatbread filled the air, and it was almost like eating the bread itself, except somehow worse, because it didn''t sooth the sudden pang of her stomach, didn''t quench the need in her suddenly salivating mouth. What had been a subtle suggestion in the air the night before had strengthened into a rich fragrance that filled her with need¡­


    Shuddering, Lori took another deep breath to calm herself¡ªwhich was almost for nothing as another lungful of somehow warm bready aroma filled her¡ªthen headed for her table like usual.


    Partway there, she paused. Then she turned around and headed back to her room to retrieve her long-neglected sunk board.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I can''t believe I let you talk me into this," Lori muttered as she waited for Mikon to finish her turn. The weaver was happily dropping little stones into the bowls of the sunk board, all but ignoring Riz next to her, who looked amused.


    "And I can''t believe I have to practically beg you to rest, but that happened too," Rian said dryly. "What kind of person actually has to be made to rest?"


    "You," Lori said. It was her turn, so she reached into a bowl and picked up the stones there, then began dropping them one at a time into subsequent bowls.


    "Me?-!" Rian said, looking indignant.


    "Oh, you don''t recall trying to go hunting for beast meat while you were practically asleep on your feet? You must have been more tired than I thought," Lori said pointedly.


    "That happened once!"


    "And yet I''ve had to order you to rest¡­ I think three more times since then?"


    "While working for you, so whose fault was that?"


    Lori didn''t dignify that silliness with a reply as she finished her turn. After a good night''s sleep, she felt perfectly fine, but she had agreed, so now she just had to endure it. One should only break one''s agreements when it was of great advantage, allow one to net a greater profit, and when she could¡ªand this was the most important¡ªkill all witnesses who would spread word of the betrayal and render the method far more difficult to use in future. While she was losing some time, she had to reluctantly agree that the loss wasn''t so great that she''d wouldn''t be able to finish building a flood barrier before the thaw set in if she started building tomorrow. Or the next day. Or even the day after that¡­


    No, no, don''t fall into the trap! There was work to be done! She could rest later, if she felt like it!


    Rian took her silence as an opportunity to change the subject. "So, we surveyed the area yesterday, and everyone thinks a flood barrier is doable, though the clay pit is unfortunately going to be flooded. However, Gunvi says that that shouldn''t be much of a problem once we drain the water. Though next year we should probably be more prepared so our claypit doesn''t flood." Rian took his plank and set it down on the table between them.


    Lori turned to look. There was a not-all-that-crude drawing of the part of the riverbank in front of the dungeon. The dock and the water hub shed was easily recognizable, and using that as reference she was able to identify the claypit. The kiln and small hut where the potter worked and held the pieces as they dried before firing weren''t depicted, but those didn''t matter. Lori swiftly identified the other buildings on the plank. "What are these lines?" she said, pointing to some lines with numbers next to them.


    "Measurements. That''s not to scale, but it was what I could prepare to show you. This line here¡­" Rian pointed at a line that seemed to parallel the river, "is the length of where we think we should build the flood barrier. It can be part of the cliff wall that faces the river, but if we need to make it shorter because of materials, we can make it part of the outside of the Dungeon''s defensive face here." He tapped what she recognized to be the thick stone protective layer to one side of the passageway into the dungeon. "Two straight walls here and here¡ª" he moved his finger from the first line and pointed to another line that ran between the laundry area and the remaining shelter, "¡ªshould be sufficient to protect the front of the Dungeon from flooding."


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    On the map, two lines met at a right angle where Rian had been gesturing. The shorter line went from next to the shelter, where it was implied to fuse with the rising ground behind the structure, and straight towards the river. The other line more or less paralleled the river, starting from the hill inside which her Dungeon was located and moving to intersect with the shorter line. It was a simple shape, and one Lori had considered herself, before she had momentarily set it aside to think of raising a barrier into her Dungeon first to give her time to think, which had led to her getting frustrated¡­


    She shook her head. "There''s still the area near the tannery, where the children go seeling," Lori said mildly. Mikon had finished her turn, so Lori reached for another bowl filled with stones.


    "Is there? Well, one thing at a time. This is closer and on assessment, there''s actually something we can do for you that you''d otherwise have trouble with."


    "Oh?" To say that one syllable was laden with skepticism was to call Rian''s Rian-ness mere idiosyncrasies.


    "We can dig," Rian said. "The soil''s been packed by foot traffic and you occasionally roll flowing stone over it, but it''s still good soil. Granted, it''s cold and a little frozen right now, but nothing a little fire can''t fix¡­ hopefully." He shrugged. "We can use the soil to make more tuber planters."


    "I could just warm the ground, if it''s been frozen."


    "After you rest, please. You said you''d rest."


    Lori rolled her eyes as Mikon began her turn. Where were Riz and Umu? Wasn''t the food ready yet?


    "Even if we don''t manage to dig out the soil, we can mark out where the flood barrier will be for you so you can put them up later. Though I have reason to think that the regular flooding isn''t as high as all that."


    Lori straightened. "Oh? How do you know this?"


    "The cliff face," Rian said. "Especially the part closest to the river. The discoloration as well as the shape of the stone because of erosion gives us some indicator of what the highest point the river can reach is. The highest point that regularly gets flooded isn''t that high. It''s below the snow line right now."


    "Given how high the snow is, that is not as encouraging as you might think," Lori said flatly.


    "I know. But after we found it and took some measurements, we''re fairly certain that even if it floods, it should only come up to about the door of the shelter and the Um¡­ Which I realize isn''t exactly good, but at least means it won''t hit the lowest of the houses, so that''s fewer people who have to take shelter in your Dungeon when it happens. Isn''t that good news?"


    All right, it was a little¡­


    "Even if you identified the correct discoloration, it''s best not to rely on that," Lori said dismissively as she began her turn. There were fewer bowls full of stones now¡­


    "Oh, agreed. Still, it''s a good, hopeful sign. With any luck, all either building will need is a knee-high wall to keep water out. "


    "You realize a knee-high wall for those buildings is a chest-high wall for the Dungeon''s own entrance, right?"


    Rian sighed. "I''m aware, but as your lord in charge of dealing with people, I have to see the bright side so I can tell people about it and keep their morale up. Have you considered just closing that door and making a new entrance that''s higher up that flooding can''t reach? Even if it''s just temporarily for the thaw?"


    "I''d have to make a new defensive passageway to protect against dragonborn abominations all over again."


    "I¡­ was going to argue that you don''t need to build one, but we can''t really tell when a dragon will pass over us, can we?" Rian sighed. "And given the time frames we''ve had between you warning of dragons and dragons arriving¡­" He didn''t complete the thought as he started muttering to himself, then shook her head. "Well, not something I can do anything about except suggest it to you, so I''ll stick with getting some work done on the flood barrier."


    It sounded needless to Lori. What did it matter if they dug up the soil? "It sounds needless to me. Why does it matter if you dig up the soil?" She finished her turn and leaned back.


    "If we leave the soil in place and just pile rocks on top of it¡ªor in your case move and solidify stone on top¡ªthen it becomes a weak point that can be eroded by moving floodwater," Rian said. "That will leave a void under the flood barrier, making it vulnerable to collapsing and breaking."


    "Colors," Lori muttered with snarl, closing her eyes. Argh, how had she forgotten about that? Now that Rian said it, how had she not remembered that flowing water would have a destructive effect? It was basically the same principle as her water cutter binding at a lower hydraulic pressure.


    "Technically we can mitigate it by just packing down the soil very tightly, but it''s not guaranteed to stay in place, and with it frozen the way it is now, it''s as hard to pack down as it is to dig up because there''s ice mixed in among the dirt. If both are going to be equally hard to do, best to dig it up and use the soil somewhere else."


    "I''ll warm the soil," Lori said.


    "You''re supposed to be resting. No working!"


    "It''s magic, not working. I don''t even have to actually move."


    "Thinking really hard and bending reality to change to your will isn''t resting, it''s work! It''s like trying to do accounting. Just because you don''t move doesn''t mean you''re not making yourself tired. Just rest. I told you, we can just light some fires or something."


    Lori winced at the comparison, remembering how tired her mother always looked after she came home from a day working at the Banking Authority. "Then I''ll rest tomorrow to make up for it."


    "Lori, I know this kind of bargaining when I see it." What bargaining? "First you''ll ask to warm the ground, then it''ll be setting up bindings to keep everyone warm because why not you''re already there, and before mid-morning you''ve managed to get yourself in the middle of doing some kind of work that no one else can do and your day of rest has been stabbed in the chest, bled to death, skinned, gutted, butchered for parts and its tail meat is being roasted to be eaten by some hard-working Dungeon Binder who likes tail meat."


    Lori stared at him. Even Mikon turned to look at him, a strange expression on her face.


    "All right, I admit that last sentence got away from me, but you know what I mean!"


    Disturbingly, she did. "Disturbingly, I do."


    "So, you can understand why I can''t let you do that," Rian said. "Look, back in the old days when you were employed at workshops and such, was there anyone who ever demanded you work longer than what you were scheduled for because ''the work isn''t finished'', but they didn''t pay you anything more for going over time? Threatened not to pay you at all if you left when it was agreed you could leave?"


    Lori''s teeth clench at remembered anger and rage and barely restrained urges for violence. "Yes," she said.


    "If you had your own business, would you be that kind of employer?"


    The young student who had been pushed beyond what she had agreed to and not compensated felt offended at the suggestion. The part of her who wanted to be the exploiter nodded enthusiastically. "Of course not,¡± Lori lied.


    "Then why are you insisting on having a worker who is obviously overworked, insufficiently compensated, and in need of time off to rest keep on working?" Rian said, pointing at her.


    Lori stared at her lord.


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    Before she could respond however, someone placed a plate of bread on the table, filling Lori''s nose with the wonderful scent and drawing her attention entirely. Bowls of soup followed. Wasn''t the amount of meat in them supposed to be reduced? They looked like they still had the same amount¡­ or did it just seem that way because of the sliced tubers?


    Wordlessly, Lori took a bowl of soup and one of the flat circles of bread and began to eat as Rian thanked Riz and Umu for bringing the food.


    There was no honey, but the bread was warm and soft and delicious¡­

 226 - Sewing and Board Games

    Resting, Lori soon found, was boring.


    How was that actually possible? She''d used to love her rest days, the times when she''d been too sick to go to school or work but not sick enough to need to be taken to a Deadspeaker or doctor! Just staying at home alone, the window open and a binding in place to keep air circulating, lying back on her bed with a nice book and¡ª


    Oh.


    Rainbows.


    To be fair, it wasn''t like she was bereft of books. There was the almanac up in her room, after all. While it was a nice book, and very informative, there wasn''t much of a plot. Or characters. Or much excitement, unless you counted the passages with warnings about how it would cause explosions or make poisons or to check the structural integrity of materials first in case of collapse.


    Should she find the lack of such warnings in the entries devoted to Mentalism concerning? The only thing like a warning the Mentalism sections had was ''beware endless recursion loops''. She had no idea what that meant.


    Rian had left after breakfast, heading out of her Dungeon. A number of people had gone with him, including Riz. From the distant sounds and the feeling of voids in her awareness when she concentrated, he was probably organizing the effort to dig up the soil along the river bank.


    Umu had left as well, but to Lori''s surprise the blonde weaver had come back carrying a sack full of clothes, and had started sewing after pointedly putting a roll of thread and a needle next to Mikon. The other weaver had taken the items with a smile and had begun sewing a shirt with a hole in the shoulder seam while waiting for Lori to finish with her move on the sunk board.


    With nothing else to do, Lori had wordlessly cleaned up the board after that game finished and taken it back upstairs to her room. She had come back down with her other game board to find Umu and Mikon still at the table, the latter just finishing with the shirt. After cutting off the thread with her belt knife, Mikon had grabbed another garment to sew¡ªa mitten¡ªwhile Lori had sat back down opposite her and wordlessly begun setting up the board for lima instead of chatrang.


    It had been some time since she''d last played lima. Not because she actively derided it the way she did pincer, but because she preferred the relatively faster pace of chatrang. One could attack at any time in chatrang as long as you had an opposing piece in range. She remembered games where pieces were lost at every turn until the board was wiped clear.


    Lima was different. It wasn''t about attacking pieces, it was about entrapping them and controlling areas of the board. As a game wore on, it took longer and longer to be able to set up such traps, especially if you were playing on one of the larger boards. Lori considered herself good enough at the game, but she was willing to admit the slower pace didn''t provide her with as much enjoyment. Still, once she got into the game, she liked it well enough, as long as she managed to win.


    There wasn''t really much else to do, really. She could go back to her room and sleep or read the almanac again, but neither really appealed right then, and unlike some people, she didn''t consider just sitting around naked in the baths an enjoyable waste of time. She could have gone down to the alcove where the large broken bead was kept and done more experiments, but without Rian to take notes and occasionally say something actually useful¡­


    Playing board games it was, then.


    ¡­


    Lori really wished her bench had a back rest.


    Mikon brightened when she saw the lima configuration of the board, even as her fingers continued her sewing. Lori made the first move, playing as black, setting down a stone halfway between the center and the edge of the board. Supposedly, the board was the world, and the stones represented Dungeon Cores or demesnes, showing how the world was civilized.


    One place at a time.


    The pink-haired weaver responded almost immediately, putting down her own stone on the other side of the board, but closer to a corner. She didn''t even stop sewing, pushing the needle with one hand for the time it took to put the stone down before seamlessly going back to using both hands. Silently, Lori responded.


    Ah, this was nice. With the meals finished, the dining hall was quiet, with only the sound of those cleaning up, low conversation and other games being played to interrupt. From the second level, Lori could hear the sounds of the children playing. Or possibly getting into a violent brawl. It was hard to tell.


    Lori had expected the two weavers to start talking to each other as they sewed, and was surprised they didn''t. Instead, Umu seemed intent on her sewing, fingers moving with deft practice and familiarity, and while Mikon had her attention split between her work and the game, her fingers moved no less deftly. The way they moved was familiar to Lori. She''d seen it in the craftsmen she''d once worked with and for, the ones who''d been good at their work and had been doing it for so long that every movement was like breathing for them. It reminded her of some of her teachers in school, who could make a binding while in the middle of lecturing without missing a beat, binding airwisps while speaking without even a pause for breath. Even now, she''d have been hard-pressed to do the same outside of her demesne.


    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    The relative silence continued as the two women worked and the game progressed. Lori soon found herself trying to entrap Mikon''s pieces, only to have the woman seemingly abandon them and start putting pieces down on another part of the board. What followed was¡­ familiar to Lori. Her mothers always told her she concentrated on trapping her opponent''s stones too much, but it was the way she liked to play.


    Partway through the game, Lori had left to go upstairs and returned with some of her own clothes that needed sewing. One of her trousers had a worn hem on one leg near the heel from where it sometimes rubbed across the ground, and another pair had unfortunately worn areas high in the inseam where the fabric rubbed together when she walked. Other than that, the trousers were still good. The cloudbloom fabric was tough and hard wearing¡ªexcept, it seemed, when it was the hem scraping across the ground at every step or between her legs¡ªso unless there were any unfortunate tearing accidents, they should still last her another year or two, enough time to find a way to buy new ones.


    Her hands were not so quick, confident or skilled as the two women sitting across from her, but Lori knew how to sew her own clothes. Er, that is, knew how to sew to repair her clothes. She had material to patch it with, from a roll of fabric that used to be the leg of another pair of trousers she had outgrown years ago she had brought with her for this purpose¡ªthe other leg was her cleaning rag¡ªand so she got to work, keeping an eye on the board.


    It probably wasn''t Rian''s notion of getting some rest, but she had to find time to do these repairs, and unfortunately trying to do it while she expanded the demesne hadn''t worked, even when she was only imbuing.


    The game, already slow because her lima board was so large, slowed even further as she took more time studying the board so she could sew. A part of her couldn''t help but feel envious at how quickly the other two were getting through their own pile.


    When the smell of bread started to fill the dining hall and people began coming back inside in anticipation of lunch, Lori decided to end the game, signaling by putting down a piece to one side of the board. Mikon did the same, and they momentarily put down their sewing to tally up the board. Lori had thought she was sufficiently ahead, but after she counted the spaces she controlled and the number of Mikon''s stones she had trapped, it came out the weaver was ahead by five stones. Even though Lori had been half-expecting to lose¡ªafter all, she could only win or lose in this game, even odds of either result¡ªshe still glared at the board in annoyance.


    Well, clearly Mikon would be better than her at this, after all she''d see the other woman playing lima with her feet while weaving, so obviously she had a marginal advantage over Lori. And it had been some time since Lori had played this, after all, so it was to be expected she was a little out of practice! After a few games, she would be able to continue her streak of beating Mikon when they played.


    Setting aside the board for the moment, Lori picked up the clothes she''d managed to sew¡ªthe trousers had been repaired, even if she''d needed to fold up the hem slightly into a thick roll that had been hard to sew into¡ªand took them back to her room, rolling them up and setting them aside in their niche. When she came back down, the dining hall was full of the smell of sweat, humidity, wood smoke and people.


    At the table, Riz and Rian were both very aromatic, such that Umu actually put some distance between her and the lord. The towel that for the past few months had been wrapped around the lower part of Rian''s head was on his shoulders, and it looked like it had been used for its intended purpose of wiping himself off.


    "You seem like you''ve been busy," Lori noted dryly as she sat back down on her bench.


    "Well, there''s a lot of soil to dig up," Rian said. "Before you start building the flood barrier, you might have to dig up more farm plots in the Dungeon Farm. Even if we''re just going to use the dirt for tuber planters, we need somewhere to put it all so it''s out of the way."


    "There''s that much soil?" she said.


    "There''s enough," Rian said. "Even after we had to make a detour because we hit clay. I had them cover it up and pack down the dirt on top of it as best as we could. I''m not sure how good clay is for farming, but we need it for pottery, so might as well keep it from being washed away in the flood. It''s actually not that bad. Means there''s overall less flood barrier to build." He sighed, then glanced at the game board, then at Lori. "So, how was your day? Restful so far, I hope?"


    "I played lima and did some sewing," Lori said challengingly. "Probably more sewing in the afternoon."


    "Well, I hope you''re having fun."


    Lori shrugged. "It''s been some time since I''ve played lima. I am out of practice."


    "Is that Lori-speak for ''lost the game''?"


    "I am out of practice!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch¡ªwhere the bread was delicious, especially when dipped into the soup¡ªLori went to the hospital to borrow scissors to cut her hair, which had grown long enough to fall down her neck. It was becoming annoying, having hair tickle her cheeks when she lay down. So, time to cut it again.


    The hospital was warm and bright, bindings of lightwisps illuminating the interior as a fire burned in the fireplace. The doctor whose face she recognized¡ªnot that she knew their name¡ªdidn''t even bother to ask why she was here. They just went retrieved their medical bag, opened it, drew out scissors from inside and handed them to Lori.


    "Thank you," she said, because she hadn''t been inconvenienced or had to say anything else, which was something to be thankful for.


    She stepped outside and after making sure Landoor wasn''t around to try and gather up her hair¡ªshe didn''t know what he thought he could do with it, but it probably had to do with some story that he thought was how reality worked¡ªLori reached back to grip the excess hair in her fist and started to cut with the scissors


    Soon, dark purple hair began to fall.


    Really, she didn''t know why other people wasted so much time sitting still and having someone else do this. It was so easy to cut your hair yourself.


    Once the hair on the back of her head had been shortened, she cut off the excess on the side, making sure to get at the hairs behind her ears. The last thing she cut were the ones that fell down her face. That was the most time consuming since she had to ruffle her hair several times to get it to fall so she could identify which ones to cut. Eventually, however, she managed to get rid off all the hair long enough to fall over her eyes.


    Nodding in satisfaction, Lori headed back to the hospital to return the scissors.


    There was still plenty of day left. Maybe she''d do her laundry¡­

 227 - Back to Work

    "Well, you''re in a good mood," Rian said as she arrived to breakfast the next day.


    "Rest is over. Time to get back to work," Lori said as she sat down.


    Rian nodded with a smile as Umu sat next to him, pressed up against his side. Lori analyzed the smile, but it wasn''t any of the permutations she knew¡­ not that she could really remember them very well unless they were right in front of her. But if they weren''t coming to mind, then it wasn''t any of them! Ugh, how do people do this?


    "Wonderful!" he said. "Well, if you''re willing, I''d like to discuss with you how you can most efficiently contribute to constructing this flood barrier your Bindership."


    "Rian, it''s a flood barrier. I just need to make a stone wall that doesn''t leak."


    Rian''s smile grew a little bigger, and now it was the smile he made when he was being deliberately annoying. "That sounds time consuming. When are you going to have the time for going to the edge and expanding the demesne like you usually do?"


    Lori shrugged. "It will have to be delayed until I finish this project," she said. She knew how long it took her to build something. Oh sure, she could use earthwisps to move stone, but she couldn''t just dump it into place and then walk away. She had to anchor it, make sure it didn''t leak, shape it properly... everything took time.


    "Ah. If only you had a reliable lord who could come up with plans and schedules and organize things for you to help you make the best use of the skills of the people whose names and skills you don''t know."


    Lori gave him a flat look. "Well, instead I have you."


    "Ouch. That actually hurt. Come on, just hear me out."


    Of course she would. Didn''t she always? No matter how stupid the ideas were¡­


    "All right, fine. What is your idea to let me continue with expansion and bead production while still building the flood barrier?"


    "First, I should point out you really can''t build the flood barrier yet," Rian said. "Since we didn''t actually have anywhere to take it to after we dug it up, there''s still piles of dirt on the site next to trenches that go down to the bedrock. All that soil needs to be removed from there, and you can''t move that soil yourself because you''ll ruin it for planting. So my first recommendation is for you to designate and excavate a large new plot in the dungeon farm. We can carry down the soil into the dungeon farm so it doesn''t go to waste while at the same time clearing the area for you to be able to work."


    He was unfortunately right about what would happen if she moved the soil. And it would be useful for the farm¡­ "Fine," Lori said, nodding in agreement. "I''ll excavate a new plot in the third level for the soil to go into. We can''t actually plant in it, since that will require more preparation for the drainage, but it can store the soil for the time being, and we can just prepare it into a plot later. "


    Rian nodded. "Of course, you won''t actually be able to build while that''s happening, since there will be a lot of people carrying the soil on carts and buckets back and forth, and it would just slow them down if you made them keep stopping to let you through with stone to make the flood barrier, so best to let them finish first before you begin. So you have plenty of time to go to the edge and make some beads, and maybe even expand the demesne." He smiled widely.


    Lori sighed but she had to admit that he had a point. Moving anything with that much mass was dangerous, and doing so through traffic was just asking for someone to get injured. "I see your point," she said grudgingly. "I''ll excavate the third level after breakfast. Prepare the sled so we can leave as soon as I''m done. How much soil is there to move?"


    "Well, I''m not an expert, but¡­ a lot?" At her glare, he shrugged. "It''s not like we kept count of how many buckets. There''s just a big pile of dirt where the snow''s been cleared. You''d be better at estimating how much storage it needs."


    Lori rolled her eyes and stood. The kitchen was only just starting to get ready to start serving breakfast, and she could already see Riz and Mikon in waiting in line for food. "I''ll go look at it now, then."


    "I''ll go with you," Rian said, rising himself.


    Lori waved dismissively, and Rian fell into step behind her as she headed for her Dungeon''s entrance. "What else have you come up with?"


    "Remember when we added the extensions to the chimneys?" Rian said. "When we couldn''t risk you climbing up to the roof?"


    "Yes¡­"


    "Remember how you made softened stone that the stonemasons could work using their tools?"


    "Yes?"


    Rian nodded. "If you could see your way to softening some stone for us, we could help you with building the flood barrier. We can move a lot of stone with the shovels and carts."


    Lori snorted as they passed through her Dungeon''s open doors, ignoring the people coming in who stepped out of her way. Rian smiled and nodded at them. "Rian, while I appreciate that manpower is the most efficient way to move soil, it''s not the same for stone. It''s much more efficient for me to bind the stone and move it myself. I can move all the stone I need to flood barrier in one morning."


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    "I think you''re underestimating how much weight we can move and carry."


    "No, I am correctly estimating how strong the shovels we have are. Its beast bone bound around wooden sticks, not metal. The shovels are likely to break from the weight," Lori said as they entered the ice tunnel and turned towards the opening towards the river bank. She could see that the floor of the tunnel was covered with dirt and globs of mud. "And even if they didn''t, how are they supposed to get the stone up the stairs in any sort of timely manner? In buckets? That would take far too long, and we can''t use carts because it will need to go up, not down. Focus on digging and moving the soil."


    Rian sighed but nodded as they walked past the snow melter. "Yes, your Bindership."


    When they exited the tunnel, Lori finally saw what Rian had been having people do yesterday. There was a light coating of snow on everything, but most of the ground was relatively clear. Well, save for the mud and piles of dirt that were only partly mud. Lori walked confidently, solidifying the waterwisps in the few patches of wet mud under her feet to make them firmer and keep mud off her feet as she walked around to get a better sense of how much dirt there was.


    A trench had been dug in a line leading from the cliff face of the hill her dungeon''s first level was inside. The trench was a pace or so wide, and more or less paralleled the river. She could see that the trench grew deeper and deeper as it moved away from the hill as the bedrock kept sloping downward, and there was still soil in it in some places. The trench was not yet complete, as there was still no trench between the laundry area and the shelter, just some markers made of bone stuck into the ground.


    Her awareness of the wisps was just good enough to be able to differentiate between the bedrock and the soil¡ªsoil had more waterwisps and airwisps interspersed among them¡ªso she was able to judge how much more soil there was still to dig. Most of those waterwisps was cold ice, though they melted into water the deeper underground it was. Still, it made the topmost layer very solid.


    "Well?" Rian asked, shivering in place and standing with his hands in his armpits. His nose had already started to drip and ugh! "What do you think?"


    "I think I''ll have to dig up a long plot in the Dungeon farm," Lori said. "Possibly three."


    "Three?"


    "Two for storing the soil, and the third that needs to be prepared for becoming a farm plot so the soil has somewhere to go," she said. Preparing that farm plot wouldn''t be easy. While she could theoretically still set off explosions of steam in the third level to reduce stone down into rocks of the right size for setting up the drainage for the farm plots, it would require a lot of preparation. However, the steam, even brief moments of it, would almost certainly be harmful to their crops. She would have to find another way to turn the stone she had on hand into appropriately sized rocks¡­ "Is this all?"


    "No, there''s still a lot of soil to dig up," Rian said. "We''ve marked it out, but the serious digging is starting from the hill and making its way down. And there isn''t really anywhere to put the soil except in piles next to the trench."


    Lori nodded absently. "I''ll soften the soil," she said. "And put up some bindings for warmth. I''m done resting."


    "We, your freezing cold subjects whose sweat has turned into ice on their skin, kneel at your magnificence and worship at your feet at your benevolence."


    "You''re standing, not kneeling."


    "I''ll kneel as soon as I''m not so freezing cold the stuff dripping from my nose is no longer turning solid on my chin."


    Oh, that was disgusting!


    He did kneel when they got back to her Dungeon, though.


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    After breakfast, Lori got to work. Setting a binding to provide warmth was simple, and she was able to serve two purposes at once by anchoring the binding of firewisps to the very soil that was going to be dug up. That warmed the ground enough for the water to melt so it could be excavated more easily, put the heat near the people who needed it, and ensured that no one accidentally stood inside a binding of firewisps and killed themselves by elevating the internal temperature of their bodies, since the binding would move with the soil.


    She was aware that this meant that the Dungeon farm would start to get hotter as soil was brought into it, but she could deal with that at the end of the day. After that, she went down to the third level to excavate the plot where the soil would be stored. Making the stone flow out of the ground was a familiar exercise, and soon there was a deep, rectangular trench in the ground. She left the excavated stone in the third level for the time being, sticking it in one of the unfinished excavation corridors that didn''t really have anything in it. After all, it wasn''t like she needed the material right then.


    Once the excavated plot was ready, people began bringing the soil down to the third level, carrying it in buckets being supported on poles to carry multiple ones at a time, and litters like the ones they used for carting latrine out of the dungeon. From the lack of smell, it probably wasn''t the same ones.


    While this was going on, Lori was able to go to the edge of the demesne to make beads. The plans for making Lori''s Boat into a sled had yet to materialize, and she was fairly sure it was unlikely to any time soon. Rian either hadn''t been able to come up with anything, or he was just too busy to work on the design.


    The cold that slammed into her was as brutally uncomfortable as it always was, but fortunately the jar full of Iridescence was easy to find, and the longer time since she''d been out here had meant there was a little more of the nauseatingly colorful crystals inside the container than usual. This time she had remembered to make the bindings for the beads inside her demesne and imbued them while she was on the sled, so that by the time she got to the edge, all she had to do was take the imbued binding outside and claim the colors with it. Prepared like that, the process was much faster, and she was able to make several beads in rapid succession, not even needing to wait for beads to finish forming to make more.


    It allowed her to see how two beads forming too close to one another behaved. In hindsight, it was a test she should have conducted sooner, or at least thought of it at all, but it was only while seeing all those beads growing inside the jar did she realize that she had not had the opportunity to note such behavior before. The beads seemed to repel each other when they formed. Lori had watched as two beads amalgamating next to each other while pressed on all sides actually managed to push on each other enough to pop into the air once there was room for the pressure to release.


    She''ll have to remember not to put more than one amalgamating bead into an enclosed mold or anything of the sort¡­ as well as test how much pressure two beads repelling each other could generate. Could the pressure of beads repelling each other actually be used to exert enough pressure on the beads to crack their outer shells?


    Something to think about¡­

 228 - Rolling Stones

    "Rian," Lori said as she deactivated the bindings on the air jet, "I need workers for a project."


    Rian blinked, pausing in the middle of wiping his nose with his towel and ugh, that was disgusting, and he was going to wrap that thing back around his face too! "Er, sure. I''ll ask around."


    Riz''s friend immediately made herself scarce, just barely evading the hand Riz reached out to try and grab her.


    Lori nodded. "I''ll need two or three people, no particular skills beyond being able to follow orders and use their hands. They will need to have their own leather gloves in relatively good condition, and good arm strength." If not, she''d have to provide either heating or cooling, which could be¡­ well, it might require her to set up more bindings. "Not Landoor."


    "That should be easy," Rian said as Riz looked conflicted. "When do you need them?"


    "Now. Tell them to meet me near the laundry area, I just need to go retrieve something."


    Riz seemed to settle whatever internal conflict she had, because she turned and immediately made herself scarce.


    "I''ll see what I can do," Rian said, turning. "Riz, could you¡ª huh. I could have sworn she was just there." He looked perplexed for a moment, then shrugged. "Guess she had something to do¡­ oh, well. I''ll see who I can find, your Bindership, though it would help if I can tell them what you need them for."


    "I need them to roll rocks," Lori said.


    "Ah. How suitably vague of you."


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    "Oh. You literally meant roll rocks," Rian said.


    Lori stood outside the laundry area, on the stretch of ground that in warmer days would have been full of poles and washing lines full of clothes drying. Now, however, it was merely a relatively flat, snow-covered area, her snow pads letting her stand without sinking¡­ much. The snow beneath her was slowly melting from the subtle warmth around her body. She''d have to move soon before she sank.


    In front of her was a block of bound ice, of a height and smoothness to use as a table. The top was mostly level, because she''d turned it into water for a moment before freezing and binding it again. Next to the table was a pile of softened stone she''d gotten from the stone stockpile. The pile lay next to the ice block table, on which Lori was rolling a mass of softened stone.


    "Yes. I said so, didn''t I?" Lori said. The rock she was handling like bread dough was about the size of two fists put together, and was cool on her hands. She let the vaguely rounded mass of stone slip out over the edge of the block away from the mass of softened stone, dissipating the binding on it as she did so. "Or at the very least, assist me in figuring out the most efficient way of turning¡ªwhat is she doing here?"


    The brat stood next to Rian, along with two young men she didn''t recognize, which was everyone. One had blue hair, while the other had dark green hair. Lori pegged them as Blue and Green.


    "I asked for volunteers, they volunteered," Rian said with a shrug. "Karina was insistent about volunteering."


    Karina waved. "Hello, Wiz Lori."


    Lori grunted, looking at the brat intently. "Do they all have gloves?"


    "Uh, no. Most of those with gloves suited for work are currently working and wearing them," Rian said. He raised his own hands. "Even I don''t have gloves, I just borrow a pair sometimes from one of Riz''s friends, and not very often at that."


    Lori scowled, looking down at the block of ice she''d prepared.


    "What exactly were you going to make them do?" Rian asked.


    "I was going to have them roll the stone into rocks so we''d have a supply of properly sized rocks for the drainage of the new plots in the Dungeon farm," Lori said, "but if they don''t have gloves, then it would be too cold for them to handle the stone in this weather." It would be far more time-consuming than using explosions to blast sheets of rocks into smaller rocks, but it wasn''t like they didn''t have time and many people not doing anything.


    "Couldn''t you just¡­ warm the stones?" Rian said as the three looked back and forth between the two of them. "I mean, you could, right?"


    "Yes, but if the stones are warm, they''d melt the snow."


    "Why is it important they not melt the snow?"


    Lori gestured at the snow at her feet impatiently. "After the stones are rolled, they need to be put on the snow so they don''t stick and clump together before I can undo the binding that makes them malleable. If they''re warm, they''ll melt through the snow."


    "Ah, so the stone is softened stone, got it. You forgot to mention that."


    ¡­oh. She had, hadn''t she?


    "Well, the stone has been softened," she said, poking the pile of softened stone next to her. Her finger sank easily as if it were dough, if particularly hard dough. "The plan was to have them pull off stone from the pile like this." She sank her hand into the softened stone, pulling out a chunk. It was cool in her hands, which probably meant it was freezing. "Then they roll it with their hands like this¡ª" she rolled it around in her hands, then put it down on the surface of the ice block and used the surface to help shape the softened stone into a roughly round shape, creating a sort of dome, "¡ªand when it''s shaped, they were supposed to put it on the ground until I can get around to removing the binding that softens it."


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    "And this is important, because¡­?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Because otherwise the stones would stick to each other since I can''t keep watching all the time to remove the binding from every individual stone as soon as they''re done. They''ll need the room to lay them out," she said, taking two more handfuls of softened stone and demonstrating. The stone did, in fact, fuse on contact because of the binding they both shared.


    Rian nodded. "All right, I understand. Just one question, then."


    Lori sighed. She''d explained the process as simply and clearly as she could. "What?"


    "Can''t you just bind the snow to not melt?"


    Lori stared at Rian. Then she looked down at the stone at her feet, full of waterwisps.


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


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    Rian''s suggestion, annoyingly correct as it was, required some more infrastructure to set up. Snow had to be gathered in sufficient amounts¡ªthough that wasn''t exactly hard¡ªbound to not melt, imbued, then compressed by walking all over them to tamp them down. The surface needed to be malleable and textured enough so the stones wouldn''t slid around after they were laid out, or else she''d have just used ice. Fortunately, she didn''t have to do the first and last parts, though the brat had to be cautioned not to be so energetic about it lest she slip.


    Once bound, the snow, like the ice, was actually not at all cold to the touch, since the binding kept them from exchanging heat with the environment around them. Combined with the firewisps she added to the binding of earthwisps that softened the stone, and the volunteer''s hands were actually very warm as they worked. Lori showed them how to shape the softened stone on the block of ice to the dimensions and shape needed, which was also not cold because of the binding on it. Still, the minute heat from the stones was enough to melt the occasional bits of snow that got blown onto the block, the surface of which soon had a layer of water that rendered it frictionless.


    With the three volunteers, Rian, and Lori herself, they went through the pile of stone she''d taken from the stockpile surprisingly quickly. Once everyone knew what they had to do, it only took them a few moments and gestures to get the stone to size and then down on the bed of bound snow before they were ripping of more softened stone from the pile.


    Lori soon found herself too occupied to form the rocks herself. She was too busy removing the bindings on the finished rocks and going back to get more softened stone from the stockpile. It was only possible to move small amounts since she had to take it through the tunnels in the little windows of time when no one was bringing soil down to the Dungeon farm, and she also had to squeeze it past the back laundry area. Fortunately, there weren''t many people doing their laundry.


    The four moved quickly. So quickly, in fact, that Rian had to stop helping make rocks and find more people to move the finished rocks away so the three could have more space to put down any further rocks they made. Soon they had more volunteers whose job was to remove the rocks¡ªafter Lori had removed the bindings softening them¡ªoff the beds of bound snow and eventually just start carrying down to the third level to store them.


    When noon and lunch came, they had a surprisingly large pile of rocks in the third level, a total of five volunteers making rocks, and as many more moving the finished stones out of the way and carrying them to the third level. It was not yet enough for a plot¡ªthey''d need smaller and smaller rocks¡ªbut it was surprising progress for half a morning. If they continued on into the afternoon, and maybe got more workers¡­ well, they''d have enough large rocks for the bottom layer of a plot''s drainage.


    "This¡­ was surprisingly more labor intensive and efficient than I thought it would be," Lori said, sitting down heavily on her bench.


    "You want to make it faster, just form the stone out into a long roll and have someone go from one end to the other cutting it to size with a shovel," Rian groaned. Next to him, Mikon put an arm across his shoulders as she patted him comfortingly. Normally Lori would have chided him for exaggerating his tiredness, since all he did was run around looking for people to do the real work. However, as Lori had spent her time running around getting stone, removing bindings from stone, then turning seemingly immediately as the stone she''d gotten turned out not to be enough and she had to get more, she instead could only sympathize.


    It was a truly bizarre sensation. Usually people were too idiotic to sympathize with.


    Lori actually took a moment to consider the method Rian proposed. "It would sink into the snow," she said, closing her eyes tiredly.


    "So turn the snow into ice and make some kind of channel or rest in the middle for the stone to go into."


    "Too imprecise," she countered. "No quality control for the rock''s size. No real way to make sure the pieces don''t stick together while the person cutting moves on."


    Rian grunted. "The shape doesn''t have to be perfect," he said, "but I suppose I can understand how it would be hard to keep the pieces from sticking after they''ve been cut." He sighed. "Pour snow over the stone before cutting to act as a separator coating?"


    Lori considered that. It sounded annoyingly doable. "I''ll consider it." She barely strangled the urge to sigh herself. "Tell everyone we''re done for the day and to take all the finished rocks to the third level. We''ll start again tomorrow. I''ll see if I can make the process more efficient." A scowl came over her face as she realized something. "It might be simpler to set up the work down in the third level. We''ll have ready access to more stone, and the rocks can immediately go into a storage plot. The volunteers moving the rocks won''t have to go as far¡­ " Moving snow bound to not melt would be simple enough, and if they needed more¡­ well, it was downhill, they could bring down a whole cart of snow.


    "I''m sure they''ll enjoy being completely warm," Rian said. "You might actually get more volunteers than you''ll be able to use. Will you be doing those preparations today or tomorrow? You still haven''t expanded the demesne today, right?"


    "Maybe later today. Or tomorrow," Lori sighed. "Something to do while the soil is being dug up¡­ How much longer will that be?"


    "It should be done tomorrow or the day after," Rian said. "We''re going to have to leave a stretch undone so that people can reach the laundry area."


    "No, dig it out anyway," Lori said. "I''ll start there and dump stone for people to walk on. Less disruption that way."


    "I''ll tell people this afternoon. Hopefully, I can get people to get all their laundry done before then so we don''t have a bunch of people trying to jump over or go back and forth while we''re digging."


    Lori grunted. "Find more volunteers as well. If we''re lucky, we''ll be able to prepare a surplus of rocks for farming plots before the thaw happens. Ugh, we should have been doing this before now!" So many days of winter, wasted!


    "It''s not like we''d have had the soil before now," Rian said. "We live, we learn, we''ll be ready for next winter and all the other winters to come. Relax, Lori. We''re here for the rest of our lives. Let''s not cut those lives short by working too hard."


    "You just want to procrastinate," she accused.


    "Only a little," he admitted cheerfully.


    Lori sighed. Rian might be the least idiotic of her idiots¡­ but he was still one of her idiots.

 229 - Building The Flood Barrier

    The next day, production of the rocks for making the farm plot drainage continued, this time in the third level. Lori began preparing it after breakfast. Snow had to be bound to not melt and brought down, to act as a protective coating on the rocks to keep them from sticking to each other. In fact, they had enough volunteers that they could have people whose job was to keep the rocks from sticking to each other, and signal her when there were enough rocks that needed their binding removed.


    A disquieting number of the volunteers were the children and after having the brat talk to them, the ones whose parents had made them volunteer were removed, causing several others who were there because they thought their participation was required to leave as well. In the end, only the brat and a few others remained. While the brat still insisted she chose to volunteer, the others were staying because they liked handling the softened stone, regarding it as playing for some reason. Children were very strange.


    Halfway through the morning, Lori had the volunteers forming smaller rocks the size of a fist, since the bottom of the pit that would be a farm plot had gotten full. She herself was busy keeping everyone supplied with softened stone and removing the bindings on the rocks the volunteers had already formed.


    While this was happening, the excavation of the soil continued. Lori would glance up every time a group came down to the third level with buckets and carts and cargo litters of soil, which was dumped into a separate pit that she had excavated of stone. She eventually need to dig more pits for the soil, since the first one had gotten full and there seemed to still be more being carried down.


    Between the rocks that were being made and the soil, they had enough material for more farm plots. While it was far too late to plant more vigas this season, according to Rian, who''d talked to farmers, they''d be ready in time for the next season''s vigas crop. The bulk of their vigas would still be grown and harvest outside, but apparently the Dungeon farm would be enough by itself to supply the starting seed for those crops by itself now, with perhaps a bit left over.


    Speaking of which, the vigas in the farm would need to be harvested soon¡­


    Where had all this work that she hadn''t realized needed to be done been hiding before now?


    At lunch, she went up and out to see the progress on the excavation, and reposition the bindings. While there were fewer piles of dirt around, and the ground where the work was being done was being kept clear of snow, there was still soil that needed to be dug up. The bindings that provided heat to the ground and people needed to be moved though, since the progression of the work meant that where people were had shifted places. Fortunately, that was simple enough.


    "How much longer before you''re done?" Lori asked Rian as they ate. Ah, bread, so nice and warm and delicious¡­


    "We should be done by tomorrow, Rian said. "I''ll have to ask people who know better than me to be sure, but if it''s just digging, then yeah, tomorrow or the day after at the rate we''re going, if we don''t suffer another collapse. We''ve had to slow down to pack in the sides so they don''t collapse into the trench. Normally the correct thing to do is to build supports to hold the walls of the trench in place, but that would take up planks and we simply can''t waste them for something like this."


    "If it will get you done faster, I can bind the ground to keep it from collapsing."


    "Uh, wouldn''t that ruin the soil? Isn''t that the reason the soil needs to be dug up manually?"


    "It would if I bound the earthwisps. Binding the waterwisps won''t be as problematic. The ground is already frozen, after all, it just needs to stay that way. Isn''t that why you need to warm it before you can dig?"


    Rian groaned and sighed at the same time. "Ugh, right¡­ I forgot about that. If you please, your Bindership? It would be very helpful¡­ "


    "I''ll inspect the area after lunch, before I expand the demesne," Lori said dismissively.


    "I''ll tell your rock rollers they''re done for the day, then?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Rian, even I can do that much." It was easy to talk to people when you just stated things in a loud voice and didn''t look at anyone.


    "Aw¡­ some day you won''t even need me anymore¡­" Rian sniffed theatrically¡ªbecause nothing was dripping down his nose, so he had to just be acting¡ªrubbing at his eyes like he was crying. "You''ll be able to talk to people all by yourself and remember their names¡­"


    "That''s never going to happen," Lori said flatly.


    "It will once you get Mentalism. Then you''ll always be able to remember everyone''s names and faces. Forever."


    Lori twitched. On the one hand, an occasionally problematic shortcoming of hers would finally stop complicating her interactions. On the other hand¡­ people were annoying.


    Mentalists could always remember. She wondered if they had a way to forget¡­?


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    As Rian said, it took two days to finish excavating all the soil, although this included getting the soil that had been dug up out of the building site and down to the third level.


    In that time, Lori had her volunteers reduce the size of the rocks they were making once more. By the time soil¡ªalthough it was more mud, most of the time¡ªwas no longer being carried down to the third level, they had managed to finish preparing the drainage for a farming plot. Large rocks at the bottom, smaller rocks on top, then even smaller rocks on top of that, then some stone slabs spaced to let water through but keep the soil separate from the rocks until it could all pack down enough to not fill up the gaps between the rocks. Finally there was the topmost layer of soil and desiccated latrine waste mix. Lori had opened a hole in the side of the plot to connect it with the other plots so that excess water could drain out to the drainage cistern.


    It was probably what she''d be doing once she finished with the flood barrier, getting more rocks for the farm plot drainage produced. The soil would still have to be dealt with, after all.


    After all the delays from the digging, and her own frustrations with the project that she was able to admit might have been more a result of tiredness rather than actual difficulties, raising up a flood barrier was almost¡­ comfortable. The familiar activity of building a structure with stone and earthwisps allowed her to relax, even if the barrier she would be building would be radically different from what she had built previously.


    Her flood barrier could not simply be a stone wall of the sort she had made before, a raised vertical plane of stone like the walls she had built for houses and the entryway of her Dungeon. The problem with trying to wall off water was that your wall didn''t just have to be strong enough to hold back the water in contact with it. Any single point of such a wall had to hold back the weight of not just the water on the same level as it, but the weight of all the water above that point as well, which was pressing its weight down on the water below it as well as against the wall.


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    This meant that there would be more force being exerted at the bottom of any barrier holding back water than at the top. Logically, that meant the bottom part of the wall had to be thicker to hold back the greater weight.


    So instead of a wall with a rectangular cross section, Lori had to build a wall with a triangular one. Well, technically a trapezoidal one. And it couldn''t be a tall, narrow trapezoid either, but a trapezoid with a broad base and a wide angle at its peak. It would also result in a wall that would be at least as wide at that base than it was tall, meaning there was a limit to how high she could make the barrier.


    Thankfully, the discolorations and other marks on the cliff wall facing the river gave them an indicator of the historical average height of the river''s flooding, and it was¡­ well, it was well below her Dungeon''s current entrance, but that was only the average. There could be brief periods that were much, much higher, and she had to build accordingly.


    Fortunately, making a wall twice as high as the average indicated on the cliff wall wasn''t too much of a problem. The height indicated was a pace above the river''s usual water level for most of the year, a wall two and a bit paces tall was simple enough to make.


    Lori started construction by filling in the excavated trench with stone excavated from the plots in the third level. After all, the volume of the trench should be similar to the volume of the stone, even with all the stone that had been used to make rocks for drainage, because the stone had come from the plots that she had made to hold all the soil from the trench. Probably more. They hadn''t exactly wasted time tamping down the mud and soil that had been dumped into the plots, after all.


    Even so, she still had to draw some stone from her stockpile next to the passageway into her dungeon. Technically, it was no longer so much an actual pile as a permanent stone bulwark over the front of her dungeon, but it was still where she dumped all the stone she''d excavated until she needed to use it for something, because that way it was ready in case of a dragon. She''d have liked to think that much mass wasn''t really needed to protect her Dungeon anymore, since they''d already survived twice with a defensive bulwark of far less, but someday a dragon might drop a full grown islandshell on them¡­


    Yes, best to have a lot of stone between them and outside, just in case.


    Filling in the stone foundation that had formerly been a trench took two days of work. Lori had to do it one batch at a time so that there wasn''t so much mass moving as to be dangerously uncontrollable, and had to remove all air and water bubbles inside the stone before setting it into place to ensure there were no structural weak points. By the end of the second day of work, however, the foundation had been set, a solid extension of the underground bedrock that would be able to securely anchor any stone structure she build on top of it.


    During this time, Lori had forgone making any more beads, as she wanted to get this finished as soon as possible for her own peace of mind. Expanding the demesne was also curtailed, as she was simply too tired to be able to stay awake to perform the steps. She told herself the sooner the flood barrier was finished, the sooner she could go back to doing both.


    Once the stone foundation was in place, she started building the wall atop it, starting from the cliff face closest to the river, where the weathering of the stone and slight discolorations helped indicate how high the water could normally rise. Beyond the shape of the wall she was making, it was the same familiar exercise. Binding earthwisps to soften stone, then moving the stone to where it needed to be by making it ripple and undulate like a soft tube filled with fluid, before fusing it with the stone-filled trench so that it was one contiguous stone structure.


    Unlike her usual method of construction, where she just raised up the wall in a line, she had to construct the wall while moving from her starting point down the length of the stone foundation to help her build to a more-or-less consistent shape with her stone-shaping tool and Whispering. Every so often she had to measure the height of the wall, measure the width of the base, grimace, and then get more stone to widen the base and by extension add more mass to the slopes of the walls. It was slow work, since the material she had to move amounted to less overall wall length than it normally did.


    Usually, this sort of pace wouldn''t bother her. Her projects were finished when they were finished. However, with every passing day, the time grew closer and closer to a sudden shift in temperature that would result in the river turning back to water. And while she could use her Whispering to keep the river frozen¡ªshe had to stop for a moment as she realized that, yes, actually keeping a river frozen was something she could just do now¡ªit would only be the portion of the river within her demesne. They would still be flooded as water came down from upstream, and without the well-worn path of the river to guide it, the water would go everywhere, spreading out from its usual path, likely leading to a worse flood if it just simply flowed over the frozen river¡­


    On the afternoon of the second day after she finished the foundation and started building the wall proper, with what looked like less than a tenth of the wall done, Lori had to admit this project was probably going to take longer than she was comfortable with. The greater mass needed for the wall, the necessity of shaping to have the proper cross-section so that it could withstand the weight of flood waters, it was all slowing her down far more than she thought it would. She could probably move faster if she was less careful but¡­


    No. She was not going to let her Dungeon flood. If she wasn''t careful, she was going to end up with a break and the wall and all the work would have been for nothing. Their vigas was stored in the lower levels of her Dungeon now, as were all the carpentry tools. No. No, she couldn''t let it flood.


    Yet, she couldn''t just leisurely build it at her own pace, either. Shanalorre had said the child had been born on the 34<sup>th</sup>of first storm. The 34<sup>th</sup>day of the new year. That meant winter was going to end in about 30 days or so. That was the problem. For all she knew, it would suddenly start getting warm enough for everything to begin thawing next week. Or three days from now. Or five weeks from now. She didn''t really know when winter really started to end in this region, and neither did anyone else. So the flood barrier had to be finished as soon as possible


    Lori sighed. While there was probably a way to build this wall while maintaining the necessary building standard¡­ she couldn''t think of how. And there were too many things that needed her attention for her to be stuck building this for a week and half, even if she could risk taking that long.


    She was going to have to ask for help¡ª


    "Lori, it''s lunch time."


    She turned to find Rian, bundled up in his winter robe with his towel wrapped around his face. Just looking at him, it was hard to tell if the season was getting any warmer, since he''d been wearing the same thing at the first fall of snow.


    "Rian," she said, nodding at him, "I need help building the flood wall."


    She was going to kick him in the shins if any of the annoying smiles made an appearance.


    He tilted his head to an exaggerated degree, which was probably a deliberate choice since the towel kept most of his face hidden. "What, really? You seem to be doing fine to me. Though¡­ well, I suppose the surface of the wall isn''t as even as it usually is, for you¡­?"


    "It looks like a child tried to make a sweetened egg foam treat." The surface of the stone was uneven, and surfaces she''d thought had been flat¡­ weren''t.


    "I''m going to guess that child was you," Rian said. "Well, appearance aside, did it at least taste good?"


    "It tasted like egg with sugar," Lori said, frowning at the memory.


    "You didn''t fold it enough, did you? You''re supposed to fold in air until the texture changes, that''s why it''s foam and not just egg."


    "Enough about sweetened egg foam treats!" Lori wondered if there was anyone in the demesne who knew how to make it with honey if they could get their hands on some eggs¡­ "I need to get all this done faster without compromising the flood barrier''s effectiveness. As it is, it''s going to take far longer than I am comfortable with to build it by myself."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "You¡­ actually want us to help you build something? Not just have us come in after your done, actually help you build it?"


    "Yes," Lori said. Why was he focusing on that? "You always have ideas. Figure out how we can get it done faster with all the idle people in the demesne. Also, see if you can come up with some sort of idea for how I could build the flood wall more efficiently."


    Rian smiled. She couldn''t see it, but she could tell he smiled. Lori got ready to kick him, depending on what he said next. "You worked in a lot of different places, right? Did you ever work with masons?"


    Lori gave him a wary look. "No¡­"


    "Ah. That explains it. If you had, you wouldn''t have to ask me this. Well, the answer''s simple enough, at least."


    Lori blinked. "It is?"


    Rian nodded. "You just have to start thinking in stacks¡­ "

 230 - Basic Bricklaying

    "Stacks?" Lori said skeptically.


    "I''ll explain over lunch," Rian said. "Since, you know, I came out here to tell you it was lunch time and all?"


    Lori grunted, taking one last look at her unfinished wall. The segment she was working on was basically just a pile of softened stone that she''d plopped down and looked like melted candle wax. It annoyed her just to look at it. "Fine. Come on."


    She shouldered her stone shaping tool, trudging back towards the Dungeon.


    "So," she said once she was seated at her table. "Explain yourself."


    "You need to start building the wall from the bottom up," Rian said as Umu shuffled closer to him, ignoring their conversation to wrap her arms around his.


    "Rian, I know all about how you need a secure foundation to build on," Lori said. "I might not remember who any of them were, but I remember the meeting with the masons and engineers."


    "You''re going to make them cry, you know that?" Rian said, sighing as he said it. "But no, not that. You''re forgetting your basic wall building, your Bindership. Which is regrettable, because back when you were making ordinary walls for houses, you did it right without having to be told how."


    "Rian¡­" Lori growled.


    "Your Bindership, instead of building the wall by trying to grow it sideways, you need to grow it from the bottom upwards," Rian said. He said it simply, like it was something blatantly obvious. "Before, when you''ve made walls, you didn''t try to raise up a pillar, then added material to the side of the pillar and grow it sideways." He mimed holding up his arm, and then pulling at something imaginary from it with his other hand, moving carefully so as not to dislodge the weaver holding it. "You put stone down on the ground and pulled it upwards to make walls."


    "This wall can''t be shaped like that, Rian," Lori said. "It will be under different stresses, horizontal instead of vertical."


    "So? It''s still a wall. You build it the same way. From the bottom upwards. Look, from what I could see, you''re trying to shape the wall so that''s it wider at that base so that it can withstand the water pressure, right?"


    "Obviously."


    "And I just bet that what''s slowing you down is you''re trying to build it so that it has perfectly sloped sides, right?"


    "Rian, is this going somewhere relevant?"


    Rian sighed, an annoyingly fond expression on his face. "Perfectionists," he said, sounding exasperated. "Your Bindership, if you want this thing build quickly, forget about the having perfectly sloped sides and focus on having the wide base. I know in your head you see the wall as having sloped sides, but on a practical level it doesn''t need them. What matters is the base is wide and gradually narrows as the wall gets higher."


    "Which is why it has sloped sides," Lori explained patiently. Rian wasn''t usually this idiotic.


    Rian had the gall to put on a patient expression that had Lori gritting her teeth at the very sight of it, anger starting to smolder inside her, hands clenching into fists as¡ª


    "I''ll be right back," Rian said, extricating himself from Umu¡ªwho pouted¡ªand leaving.


    Lori glared at him as he left, breathing in deeply and gathering magic to calm herself. No, no, don''t be angry just because he made that face. That annoying, condescending, ''I''m doing you a favor by explaining this nonsense to you, why are you so stupid that you don''t understand this'' face.


    When Rian came back, he still had on that face, but he was also carrying an armful of the wooden cups everyone drank from. He put them down on the table. Why did he have so many?


    "All right," Rian said. He took three of the cups and arranged them in a line. Then he placed cups on top of those cups. "Here we have a wall, a good presentation of, say, the walls of the houses you''ve built." He made a show of pressing down on them. "As you can see, they''re very good at bearing vertical forces, but not horizontal ones." At this he poked sideways at one of the cups at the bottom, pushing it far enough that it tumbled over and the cup on top of it fell off.


    "Get to the point, Rian," Lori said through gritted teeth. The only reason she hadn''t kicked him yet was because he was standing behind his bench.


    "However, the wall you''re trying to make is wide at the base, to be able to better bear those horizontal forces," Rian said. "Like this." He placed three cups in a line like a wall. Than he placed two cups on top of those, over the point where the bottom cups touched their neighbor. Finally, he placed a single cup at the very top. "This is the outline of the wall you''re trying to build, right?"


    Well, it was exaggerated, but¡­ "Essentially," Lori said, annoyed.


    Rian nodded. "This is how you build the flood wall faster. You build it like this."


    "I''m already building it like that!"


    "No," Rian said. "You''re building it like this." He put down to cups next to each other in a line towards her, then put a cup on top of where they met. Then he put down to cups next to the previous two, and put a cup on top of those. He did this three more times, and Lori found herself staring bemusedly at a five-cup wide wall.


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    Rian pushed that wall aside. "You need to build it like this." He put down five pairs of cups in a line five cups wide. Then he put a cup on top of each pair. The same wall of cups as before faced her.


    Lori stared at the wall of wooden cups.


    "It''s basic brick laying," Rian said with a sigh. "Basic stacking, really. Have a wide base, than have the next layer on top be slightly less wide, and so one and so forth until you reach the top. So start building the base first. Please tell me you understand it now?"


    ¡­


    Argh! So simple! So obvious! How could she have missed it!


    Well, she knew the answer to that. She''d been concerned about making sure the cross-section of the wall was the right shape she hadn''t really thought of the most efficient way to build the wall that way! Instead, she''d been trying to personally hand-shape everything! Working harder instead of smarter like an idiot!


    "Ah, I take it by that emphatic fist slam onto the table that you do," Rian said as the wall of cups came tumbling down. He and Umu frantically tried to keep the cups from rolling off the table. "So, does this help?"


    "Yes," Lori ground out.


    Rian nodded, looking relieved. "If you really want the walls looking neat with smooth slopes, I know some people who are excellent masons with the tools right to shape mortar and plaster into exactly those kinds of smooth slopes. You know, so you can get done faster?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian''s idea for how she could build the flood wall faster was annoying in its simplicity. It was the sort of simple idea that in hindsight should have been obvious, but for some reason hadn''t been. Not until Rian had told her. After he had¡­


    Well. She put it into practice after lunch.


    Stacks, Rian had said.


    Lori stared down at the¡­ well. It was rock she''d taken from the stockpile, extending in a line over the stone foundation. It hadn''t been shaped, simply¡­ moved and dumped there, running parallel to the river. At its highest point, the long, extrusion-looking pile of stone rose up to a quarter of the way up her thigh, and Lori was not a short woman.


    It had taken¡­ well, about an hour or so to get all the stone from the stockpile and in place, and most of that was from being careful while she was moving the stone. The whole time, she had to resist the urge to make everything neat and flat and level and consistently shaped. A part of her, the same part that almost physically hurt when she had to listen to amateurish dragon shelter party music, was feeling something of the usual pain, but she pressed it down. It was just for now, she told herself. It was just for now¡­


    The low, mound-like wall of stone extended in a line all the way until the point the stone foundation turned inwards and stopped paralleling the river, and was not quite a pace and a half wide at its widest point, its surface uneven. By its very nature, the stone was imperfect and riddled with structural flaws in the form of folds of trapped air and water, since she''d just basically moved stone there and dumped it into place. However, it was far, far greater in overall volume than that pitiful length of wall she''d been working on for the past days and a half. If one were using that as a benchmark, then she had, technically, already greatly increased her rate of construction.


    Lori then spent the next two hours or so fixing all the mistakes. Removing the bubbles of air trapped in the stone that weakened the structure, making sure the stone lay flat on the ground so that it distributed its weight evenly, and fusing it to the stone foundation that fused to the bedrock.


    Then, once that was done, she got more stone and did it again, using Whispering to pile¡ªor according to Rian, stack¡ªthe softened stone atop the first mound wall. This was a bit harder, since she needed to push the stone upwards, even if she could fuse the stone to the mound and shift and shape the stone to rise. She had to do it carefully, lest the angle and the weight of the stone cause something to crack, leading to the whole thing falling over. Still, she managed it, having the stone roll up slowly from one end of the forming wall to the other.


    Once the second layer of stone was in place, she had to fix mistakes all over again. Try as she might, air somehow still got trapped as stone flowed up and over, and she had to go back and forth along the wall twice to be able to get rid of the air and water pockets. There was no further attempts to make it smooth or clean it up to appease the part of her that cringed on looking at it. Just get rid of the weak points between the two layers of stone she''d just basically dragged into place and threw over each other.


    By the end of the day, however, she had a long, wide wall that rose just above her stomach to just under her sternum in spots¡ªtry as she might, she couldn''t get the heights evened out without spending time hand-shaping the stone¡ªthat was mostly free of structural defects. Simply from volume of the stone in the wall alone, she estimated that she''d finished building somewhere between a third and half of the overall flood barrier.


    True, it was ugly, uneven, and looked like giant lines of beast excrement that had been extruded across the ground, but it was technically a wall, technically made of solid stone, and technically the right, wide-bottomed shape for resisting the pressures of flooding. And¡­ she could just fix it later, right? Make the slopes smooth and even¡­


    "This is going to be a permanent fixture of my demesne, isn''t it?" Lori muttered disgustedly. A temporary measure that became permanent¡­


    Lori was frantically using her stone-shaping tool to try and flatten out the slopes of the sides when Rian came to call her for dinner.


    "Nice! It''s coming up faster now," Rian said cheerfully, so he was probably smiling widely under that towel. "At this rate, you''ll be done in four or five days!"


    "Yes, yes, it worked," Lori irritably She sighed, knowing she''d have to go back inside soon. There was no way she was going to work out here at night, even if she could simply by binding lightwisps in the air. They got most of their snow at night, and trying to build like she had been while it was snowing¡­


    No. There''d be too much trapped snow. She''d be spending an inordinate amount of time trying to get the pockets of water out of the stone. Best to just wait until people have shoveled and swept out all the snow tomorrow.


    "Oh, cheer up," Rian said. "I spoke to the masons, they''re ready to help you touch it up tomorrow. Just have a little warmth and softened stone ready for them, and they''ll take care of making the outside the smooth, even slopes that you want."


    Lori grimaced. On the one hand, she didn''t want other people nearby, getting in the way of her work and interfering because they thought they had an opinion she cared about. On the other hand¡­ "They''d better," she said.


    "Look, come inside for dinner, and I''ll tell you the plan we came up with for tomorrow," Rian said.


    Sighing, Lori pulled back her stone-shaping tool. "Fine, fine, let''s go eat."


    Looking at the wall she had made one last time, she cringed once more. Rian had better be right about the masons being able to do something about this. Even if it could act as an effective flood barrier, making something that looked so slapdash¡­ it almost physically hurt, it really did.


    Sighing one last time, Lori turned away and followed Rian inside for dinner.

 231 - Stone Finishing

    In the days that followed, the work continued on. Despite how¡­ unsightly¡­ the results were, Lori couldn''t deny that simply piling the stone like that from the bottom up was getting the wall built a lot faster. Normally, simply piling up stone like that wasn''t productive for her, since it would get unstable the higher she piled it up¡­ unless she let it settle out naturally. Which made a pile that was wide at the base, too thick for the kinds of walls she usually needed to build. Except now that was exactly the kind of wall she was trying to make¡­


    ¡­


    It was still unsightly. Even so, it was built, and it was better than nothing.


    Fortunately, the masons that Rian had enlisted to assist her and organized were taking care of that unsightliness.


    Lori kept glancing sideways at the stonemasons working on the wall, using long cords, weights, what looked like spikes driven into the dirt to hold the cords steady, and ladders. She had left them a sizable amount of softened stone at the beginning of each day, the binding heavily imbued to last all day. They used shovels to move relatively large batches of stone and slapped them down onto the surface of the flood barrier, to fill in spots that were too low under the guidelines of cord that they had set into place. Where her attempts to make a smooth slope were too high, they used heavy metal chisels and wooden mallets to trying and level it down, or at least mark it for her to get at later.


    For trying to smooth the surface of the walls, they alternated between using the wide, flat shovels modeled after her stone-shaping tool and metal hand tools that seemed a bit too small and delicate for working with softened stone, but the masons handled them deftly, and despite the fact that they could only lift small amounts of the softened stone because of the weight, their quick, experienced movements meant they were making steady progress.


    Part of their speed was because of what Lori had done to provide warmth. Rather than leave a binding hanging in the air¡ªwhich would have been dangerous if someone walked into it¡ªLori had added a binding of firewisps to the completed portions of the wall, combined with a binding of airwisps that kept a steady, hot breeze flowing parallel to the wall''s length. It wasn''t perfect, but it was sufficient for keeping the areas where work was actually being done warm.


    This allowed the masons, plasterers, volunteers and Rian¡ªbecause of course he was there¡ªto work without gloves, and some actually removed their winter robes and shirts. After the past few months of winter cold, it was very strange to see men with bare arms covered in sweat as they worked outside. Their discarded clothes were all piled off to the side, marking a sort of border where the warm air didn''t reach. The lack of heavy clothing allowed them to move quickly and deftly, and the flowing warm air was able to mostly keep snow from melting on the stone they were working on, preventing water from being trapped.


    As for Rian, he was helping by moving stone around with a shovel and placing it where the masons indicated. He was down to just a shirt, and he looked so happy to be warm. Sometimes one of the masons would give him their tools and he''d¡ªvery slowly¡ªdo what they had been doing while the mason put on their winter robe and went off, presumably to the latrine.


    While Rian moved much, much slower than the masons and plasterers did, he actually seemed to know what he was doing when using their tools. Admittedly, the results were visibly inferior, but that seemed to be more from a lack of skill and experience rather than incompetence, and when the mason returned they very quickly corrected any defects, while Rian watched intently before going back to moving stone.


    They usually managed to use most of the stone she provided them by the time it was time to stop working and go inside for dinner. There were surprisingly few bubbles of air that needed to be removed when she checked over their work before removing the binding on the stone at the end of the day.


    It was fascinating to see them work as they put the finish on the stone flood barrier, but Lori knew better than to take more than glances. She still had more wall to build, taking stone from her stockpile and pushing it up the wall to pile it on top until it settled into place. It was a bit too high in places, going over the height she was trying to reach, but that was fine. Getting rid of stone from the top was easier than trying to push it up¡ªsince when doing the former, gravity was in one''s favor¡ªso she left it for now, focusing on getting the rest of the wall the correct height and width.


    Getting the length of wall that paralleled the river completed took only another day and a half, and most of that time was getting the air and water out from between the layers of stone after she placed them, and then properly fusing the stone together. She erred on the side of making the stone spread out a bit too wide, since as the wall progressed getting stone around to the other side to add mass to any flaws on the river-facing side became more and more annoying. There was more wall to skirt around, after all.


    Never mind trying to get the stone to go over the top of the wall to get it to the other side. It was still stone, after all, and essentially pushing a large mass over a wall and trying to get it to drop down onto the other side¡­ no. Too dangerous, too much mass. It would be far too easy for something to go wrong, some weak point breaking and then the mass would fall over the edge. Given that the dock and the water hub shed was on the other side of the flood barrier¡­


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    Yes, deliberately having excess stone on the wall so she could just trim it down later was the better option.


    The result was an utter, unsightly mess of piles of stone on top of piles of stone fused together, but it was the right height, about the right width where it mattered, anchored solidly to the stone foundation fused to the bedrock, and had no folds, hollows, bubbles or pockets of air, water, mud, snow, or anything else that threatened its structural integrity.


    When it was done, Lori was actually torn between working on smoothing out the wall''s slope so that it would look flat and even, and continuing to build the rest of the wall, before reminding herself of the issue of time.


    She also had to leave gaps in the wall while she built. After all, she couldn''t block off the laundry area yet, since people still needed to do their laundry, so she was leaving that for last so she could build some stairs into it. Stairs that she wasn''t quite sure how to make with stone without it ending up becoming slippery. She also had to leave a gap in the wall to let them easily access the river for the sled.


    In case a sudden and abrupt thaw did happen, she intended to pack both gaps full of stone and hope for the best.


    All in all, it took her six days of work to get the stone piled up into proper walls, even with the necessary gaps. That was far, far faster than she would probably have been able to finish if she had persisted trying to build the wall when she had begun. It took another three days of working with the masons and plasterers to smooth and level and surfaces of the walls. Lori started from one end and systematically fixed the bumps that the masons hadn''t been able to chisel away, before assisting the masons by being the one to move softened stone onto the surface of the walls for them to shape and level, helping with her own stone-shaping tool as needed.


    The only words exchanged to her were directions on where the craftsmen needed her to place stone. With their assistance and expertise, the surface of the flood barrier finally managed to achieve a neat, flat slope in appearance, with a squared-off flat top that might not have been strictly necessary, but was far from unsightly and uneven and looking like piles of rolled wet clay stacked on top of each other.


    Then, one final day and a half of work finishing the portion of the flood barrier near the laundry area. On the advice of the stonemasons, the stairs that she integrated on either side of the flood barrier there were inscribed with patterns. They weren''t any particular shape, simply lines and whorls and in one instance the pattern a broom''s quills made when it was brushed over the softened stone. The idea was to give the stairs a rough texture that would give feet traction on the wet stone, as well as providing depressions on the surface for water to sink to so that it wouldn''t create a slippery layer.


    And¡­ it was done. The flood barrier that protected her Dungeon, and the buildings near it were complete. Well, not completely. She''d have to make a secondary water hub shed to let them draw water from the river when there was a flood¡­ but from what she recalled of some of the waterways she''d passed in the city of her birth after a heavy rain or storm, the floodwater was usually murky and filled with debris, so the quality of the water would not be the best. Lori would have to see when the flood actually came. Should something similar also be the case¡­ well, that''s why they had a reservoir in her Dungeon.


    "Ah," Rian sighed happily as they sat down for dinner that evening. Now that they were back inside the dining hall, he was back to being wrapped up in his winter robe, which had some stains on it from all the work. There was still a sheen of sweat on his face, which combined with his sensitivity to cold was probably why he was shivering slightly. Next to him, Mikon sighed and shook her head in exasperation, taking his towel from around his shoulders and wiping his face. "Finally, we''re done! Now we no longer have to worry about the Dungeon getting flooded."


    Lori frowned at him. "How did you get that idea?"


    Rian blinked and stared at her with a comically horrified expression, one made more comical by how Mikon was in the middle of wiping the sweat from his cheek. "But¡­ but¡­ we''re done! We made the wall and the stairs and everything! I was there! You were there!"


    "We finished raising the flood barrier near the Dungeon''s entrance, yes," Lori said. "Now I have to raise up another flood barrier near the tannery, to keep water away from it." It shouldn''t take long, and since the ground was a little higher there, the barrier wouldn''t have to be as high.


    "Ugh, I forgot about that. Is there any chance you can be more relaxed about that flood barrier''s appearance since you probably won''t have to look at it ever again?"


    Lori gave him a flat look.


    He sighed as Mikon started wiping the back of his neck. "Yeah, I didn''t think so. I''ll organize people to dig up the soil there once you point out where the wall has to go and set up some bindings to keep us warm, I guess¡­"


    Lori nodded. There was also having to build a binding to drain water from inside the area of the flood barrier, since a wall that can keep water out could also keep it in, and given how it was still snowing, that meant water was getting in. If she wasn''t careful, her Dungeon might end up being flooded anyway¡­


    She would also have to partially demolish the wall once the flooding was over and the rains began, but that was a concern for the future¡­


    Through the sounds of the dining hall getting ready to eat, Lori heard someone cry out, and a shift in the tone of the dinner conversation. She turned her head in the direction of the first sound, frowning. "What is it?"


    Rian had stood up, and when that wasn''t enough to let him see over the crowd, stood on top of his bench as well. He peered over people, then sighed. "Unless I miss my guess, that''s the sound of another woman''s water breaking. Again."


    Lori considered that, and sighed. She got up and headed for her room to get the warming stones so she could start binding firewisps into them while she ate¡­

 232 - Diagnose Shanalorre

    Finishing the second flood barrier meant to protect their developed areas from being flooded from the back¡ªor upriver, as it were¡ªtook another four days of work. Snow had to be removed, dirt dug up, a stone foundation fused to the bedrock laid, the actual flood barrier built by piling up stone, and then finally finishing the wall to make it stop being unsightly so that Lori wouldn''t feel disgusted with the quality of its construction every time she had to look at it.


    For all of that time, Shanalorre was once more in her demesne assisting with a birth, and then staying over to continue to monitor the health of her patients, as well as following up on her previous patients. Lori fretted, but decided to take the calculated risk to continuing work on the rear flood barrier while the other Dungeon Binder was present. The same volunteers¡ªand Rian¡ªwere also working on building this wall, and while she could remember the volunteers only vaguely¡ªthe masons and plasterers currently stood out in her recollection, even if she didn''t know their names¡ªeven she should be able to identify if someone isn''t supposed to be there, and with Rian present, he should be able to identify someone who didn''t belong even if she was too busy to do so.


    Of course, the other Dungeon Binder noticed the flood barrier. It would have been difficult for her not to, given she had to climb over it at the laundry area stairs to get inside. She was full of amazement, curiosity and praise for the quality and speed of the construction, and Lori found herself being drawn into describing the process by which the wall was made. There was no harm in it, and it made Binder Shanalorre give more and more compliments.


    Outside of meal times, the two of them didn''t interact much. Lori had work to do, and technically, so did Shanalorre. When the younger Dungeon Binder wasn''t spending an absurd amount of time in the baths, accompanied by her guide the brat, she was speaking to the demesne''s doctors and medics. Given the conversation that Lori managed to overhear at a distance with airwisps, Shanalorre seemed to be trying to learn what she could about caring for patients and how to identify symptoms of illness at a distance.


    "Why would she need to know that?" she demanded of Rian later that night after dinner, pacing back and forth. She had relayed the context of the conversation to him, which had been difficult because it meant she''d had to remember it for most of the day. Lori was very aware of how much of the specifics of the conversation she had forgotten and had needed to convey in vague generalities in summary.


    "Isn''t it obvious?" Rian said as he sat at the foot of his bed while Mikon hummed as she prepared the rest of it. Umu and Riz sat away from her at the bed''s head and tried to pretend they weren''t there.


    "No," Lori said bluntly. "Which is what I have you for. To explain when people do things that are not obvious to me."


    "Sometimes I wonder how much you really don''t understand and how much you''re just too lazy to think about," Rian sighed.


    Lori glared at him. "You''re calling me lazy?"


    Rian shrugged. "You have to be lazy about something," he said. Over his shoulder, Lori saw Riz and Umu cast horrified looks at the back of his head, while Mikon just looked concerned. "Given how hard you work most of the time, it only makes sense that you''re pulling resources away from something else so that you can sustain your work ethic. Actively not actually thinking at all about people''s motivations fits the requirements." He waved his hand in a gesture she knew well. "Fine, fine. Obviously, Shanalorre is trying to educate herself in diagnosis. Basic and rudimentary diagnosis, at that, something even she can do without specialized and technical training."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Yes, but why?"


    "To make the most of her limited ability to heal, most probably," Rian said. "That''s my guess, anyway."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "To my knowledge, she can heal broken bones, infection, cuts upon flesh, and those are merely the injuries that I had that she managed to heal me of. From context, she can also heal disease and illness, regardless of symptoms or cause, and the only reason we do not know if she has an effect on poisons and venoms is that no one yet has been poisoned or envenomed. That is hardly limited." Rainbowed savants, making everyone else who actually had to learn how to do things look bad¡­


    "Yes, by itself, her ability to heal is comprehensive. However, it''s reliant on knowing people need to be healed," Rian said. "Things like broken bones, bleeding, and coughing up blood are pretty obvious signs that there''s something wrong with your body, but what about symptoms that aren''t obvious or ones that people actively try to hide?"


    Lori frowned. "Try to hide¡­? Why would anyone try to hide symptoms of illness?"


    "Well, it could be that they don''t want to worry their family," Rian said. "Or that they genuinely think it''s not a big deal and it will go away on its own. Or because they don''t want to seem weak in front of other people. Or maybe it''s cultural. Hey, Riz, how likely are militia to hide the fact that they''re sick?"


    "Rian, we''re militia," Riz said, sounding indignant. "We are the first line of defense of the demesne''s people. We stand out in the Iridescence and protect the farms and people forced to live beyond the edge from beasts and bandits. When disaster strikes, we are the first ones sent to relieve the people''s suffering and begin rebuilding. When war calls, we answer. We are sinews of the Dungeon Binder, the strength of their arms that lift up their burdens. The militia never fail, never falter, through deadly colors and the might of the enemy."


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    "So, all the time?"


    "Unless we''re actually healthy and think we can get away with it because nothing important is happening," Riz said shamelessly. "Outside of that, militia don''t stop."


    Rian nodded, turning back to face Lori. "The people left in Shanalorre''s demesne are her direct relatives, militia and their families who decided to stay in the face of what seemed like utter disaster at the time and thus probably people she feels grateful to for helping keep her alive, people who had been too injured to be moved whom she healed and thus feel grateful to her, and people from our demesne who left to be away from¡­ well, you."


    "Idiots," Lori rolled her eyes.


    "To put it another way," Rian said. "They''re the only family she has left whom she is probably desperate to not lose after already losing her parents, militia who have both experience hiding their ills and are predisposed to hide them because ''militia never falter'', people who have faith in her whom she probably doesn''t want to fail, and¡­" Rian shrugged. "Well, the cynic in me wonders how many people try to get out of work by pretending to be sick but claiming they don''t feel sick enough to need healing, they just need a few days of rest doing nothing."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "There''s cynicism in you? I find that hard to believe. You''re¡­ you."


    "I''ll have you know I have a deeply cynical side. How else do you think I understand you so well?"


    "I am not a cynic, I am a realist. Cynics are delusional people who always think only the worst will happen when there is no reason to suppose it will."


    "Ah, my mistake. Nothing like you at all, then."


    Lori nodded. Good, he understood.


    For some reason, Mikon started coughing, and she hurried over to the jar of melting snow next to the fire to pour herself a drink.


    "But to get to back your question," Rian said, "that mix of people are all very good reasons for her to try to learn how to better diagnose people at a distance, or at while she''s talking to them. For one reason or another, some people might not come to her to be healed if they''re sick, so she has to be able to identify them if need be. Without any way to learn Deadspeaking, short of requiring everyone in her demesne to come to her every morning to be pre-emptively checked if they need to be healed, this is the best and quickest way for her to make what skill she has more useful. I wouldn''t be surprised if she''s learned to identify and prioritize the severity of injuries."


    Lori frowned. "Severity of injuries?"


    "You know, identifying which kinds of injuries are more immediately life-threatening and which ones can be made to wait because they won''t kill immediately. Head injuries are prioritized over broken bones, and injuries that bleed a lot are prioritized over those that don''t because of the risk of blood loss."


    Ah. Yes, head injuries did need to be prioritized. Damage to one''s brain would impact one''s ability to use magic after all. For all that wizards were taught that magic was how the soul interacted with the world directly without having to utilize the intermediary that was the body, that intermediary was still very important.


    Still, Lori frowned. "I recall her saying that she can identify people who are ill by a general increase in the concentration of life within their bodies through her awareness of them. Wouldn''t it be simpler if she used that as a basis for diagnosis?"


    Rian blinked, staring at her. "People around you every day in your own demesne and who''ve helped you in your building projects multiple times, you can''t even recall the name of, but that you remember?"


    Lori frowned at him. "Why wouldn''t I remember it?"


    For some reason, Rian made a sound like he was trying to clear his throat, cough and scream at the same time.


    "Are you sick?" she asked, leaning back slightly


    "I''m fine, I''m fine," Rian eventually sighed, getting up and pouring himself from the jar of melting snow, before tilting his head back to drink. "Just¡­ I''m fine."


    "Why would she need to learn from our doctors and medics though?" Lori asked. "I''m almost certain they have their own." Fairly certain. Reasonably certain.


    Rian shrugged. "Well, they do, but one of them is the uncle that tricked her into becoming a Dungeon Binder and seemed to be trying to use her as a figurehead to place himself in power for her own good, and one other whose name you probably don''t remember. Given the fact that they might be too busy to teacher her or she might normally be too busy to ask them to, she''s probably using this opportunity to have some many doctors and medics to learn from to¡­ well, learn."


    Ah. Well, she supposed that would make finding an opportunity to learn difficult. "Ah. Well, I suppose that would make finding an opportunity to learn difficult."


    "Speaking of opportunities to learn¡­ are you sure you want to continue with holding the community meeting tomorrow? It won''t be difficult to cancel it for until after Shana leaves, even if I just told everyone tomorrow morning."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "The sooner it''s done, the sooner I can go do something actually useful than hearing people complaining about wanting to own land."


    "Are you sure?" Rian, why are you repeating yourself? "You have absolutely no problem with Shana and her lord seeing being present, hearing and seeing what happens, maybe see you sink someone into the ground to drown again¡­"


    "Wait, she what?" Riz said just barely loud enough for Lori to hear. In response, Umu started saying something quietly to her, speaking directly into her ear.


    "You were the one who wanted this, remember," Lori pointed out, responding to Rian. "We were going to hold it tomorrow, we''re holding it tomorrow."


    "All right then¡­" Rian said. "Though you realize that if the issue of land comes up again, Shana could get a lot of people to move to her demesne just by telling people she''ll give them land like they want, right?"


    Lori could help it, letting out a brief laugh. "Extremely unlikely," Lori said. "Binder Shanalorre has made it quite clear she has no intention to simply give people land."


    Rian''s eyebrows rose. "And¡­ you believed her?"


    Lori''s laughter cut off like a piece of wood sliced on a water cutter.

 233 - The Winter Community Meeting

    With her third¡ªor was it fourth?¡ªso-called community meeting, Lori was resigned to the fact that she would have to attend. Unfortunately, she just couldn''t see how she could reasonably get out of it. If she just left and told Rian to handle any decision-making that came up in the course of the meeting, he would no doubt indulge his strange fetish and put it to a vote. So, despite the fact that Rian already knew what he was supposed to inform people of, she still had to be there.


    Her presence felt like a waste of the time she''d spent talking to Rian, listening to him telling her of what people apparently considered vital issues and making her decisions about them. They''d spent some time looking over her map, made by ex-militia scouts so many months ago, still marked by the locations of dragon scales even though they''d collected most of them already. Well, the ones on this side of the river, anyway. They''d only gotten the ones closest to the demesne on the other side of the river, since there were more vital things to collect. Besides, it wasn''t like the dragon scales were going anywhere.


    With everyone informed that the community meeting would be happening far in advance, people had taken the opportunity to prepare. To that end, people had apparently been randomly accosting Umu, Mikon and Riz and trying to get them to convince Rian of one thing or another, or even Lori directly. While it was relatively normal for people to just walk up to Rian with issues or just childish complaints that they expected him to do something about, and it seemed like Riz had experienced something similar during her time as Lori''s temporary-Rian, the two weavers were not prepared for it. Umu, especially, had become irritable as a result, and Lori had actually heard her yelling for someone to stop bothering her, though she hadn''t seen the incident itself. The three had started walking together, and spending their time in Rian''s house between meals to avoid people, or so he said.


    Shanalorre''s presence had not been intended. She had been just about to return to her demesne when two more women had gone into labor, causing her to extend her stay. That stay had happened to coincide with the planned community meeting. Lori had been considering postponing the meeting until after the other Dungeon Binder had gone, but none of the topics to be discussed were anything that actually had to be kept secret. What did it matter if Shanalorre knew how they planned to expand their agricultural fields?


    Then Shanalorrre had approached her and asked if she could stay to observe the community meeting¡­


    "I wish to see how such a meeting is conducted," the other Dungeon Binder had said. "I have been considering conducting something like it, and this is an opportunity for me to observe the format in action."


    ¡­


    Well, nothing they would discuss really needed to be kept secret anyway.


    After breakfast, the dining hall was reorganized for the meeting, with a table and bench being moved to one end of the dining hall opposite her Dungeon''s entrance and everyone sitting on their benches to face that way. To her surprise, Shanalorre had moved to a different seat. However, instead of sitting at a table close to Lori, as she had expected, the younger Dungeon Binder had moved to a table to the side near one wall, where she seemed to be observing both Lori and the crowd.


    "All right, is everyone ready?" Rian said, his voice pitched to carry, tone insufferably cheerful. "Has everyone gone to the latrines? If you decide to leave in the middle of the meeting to take care of that, we''re not repeating everything for you."


    There was a brief laugh. Several people did, in fact, stand and headed for the latrines.


    "Well, while we wait for people to get back, I''d like to welcome Binder Shanalorre and her people, who have joined us in today''s meeting. She has asked to observe how we do this, so everyone please help us show her. Also, on behalf of everyone in the demesne, but especially our newest members and their parents, I''d like to thank Binder Shanalorre for her assisting our doctors and medics, and all her help in keeping people healthy this year." Rian stood and bowed to Shanalorre. Surprisingly, other people did so as well, standing up and turning to bow in acknowledgement towards Shanalorre.


    Why was she getting bows? Lori didn''t get bows like that. Actually, when was the last time she''d actually gotten people bow down to her¡­?


    The younger Dungeon Binder actually looked bewildered by the sudden shows of respect, but nodded to people in acknowledgement.


    "Ah, but don''t worry Binder Lori, we all still like you more. You''re the best Dungeon Binder we''ve ever had, right everyone?" Still standing, Rian bowed again, this time towards Lori. His bow was clearly much deeper than the one he offered Shanalorre.


    As Lori stared at him, seemingly everyone else in the dining hall rose as well, all bowing to varying degrees.


    Finally, Lori managed to roll her eyes. "Rian, s-stop wasting time and conduct this meeting already."


    "As you command, your Bindership," Rian said, straightening up with a smile and turning to face everyone else before sitting down. Everyone followed his example, sitting back down on their benches as well. "All right, looks like everyone is back from the latrines, let''s start with something minor. I''m sure you''ve all seen our nice new flood barrier outside? Well, right now, we''re looking for a volunteer or volunteers to stand on a flood watch. It''s technically an easy job, just standing on the wall and keeping an eye on the river so we''ll have some warning when it starts melting¡­"


    Lori wished she had a chair. A proper chair, with a back. You just couldn''t fall asleep properly while sitting upright on a bench¡­


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    "Now, over the past week or so, I''ve received a lot of petitions. However, I would like to open this discussion with one of my own. Yes, I''m shameless setting everyone''s concerns aside to push forward something that I want done. I''m a lord, you all know we do things like that." For some reason, that garnered a laugh. "Ahem. Now, as to my petition¡­ could everyone please stop bothering Umu, Mikon and Erzebed with petitions and issues? Especially in the baths? None of them work for Binder Lori or myself in any sort of capacity, and anyone harassing them are simply wasting their time. I officially did not hear a single word about any issue that was pressed on them and wasn''t brought to my attention, so if your matter doesn''t come up in this meeting, that''s why. Umu and Mikon aren''t even the main representative for the weavers, so please stop bothering them."


    "If they''re being bothered, they should just punch the annoyances in the face," Lori pointed out.


    Rian turned and gave her a flat look. "You want two skilled craftswomen whose trade relies on the dexterity of their hand movements to punch people in the face?"


    Ah, good point. "Ah, good point," Lori conceded. "Just kick them, then."


    "I don''t know how long it''s been since you''ve last worn as skirt, but kicking with them on is far more difficult than if you''re wearing trousers."


    "And just what do you know about kicking someone while wearing a skirt, Rian?"


    "Moving on!" Rian said loudly, to more laughter. "Speaking of the weavers, there was a petition from them to plant ropeweed in the Dungeon''s farm on the third level to be harvested for fibers and to act as a seed crop for planting more ropeweed. They have also requested that ropeweed become one of our main crops to provide material for thread and fabric. They actually had the ropers'' support on this, and everyone knows how rare that is." People laughed while Rian made a show of looking down at his sleeve. "Well, I''m sure no one will object to that last. It''s very nice and warm. However, her Bindership has decided it will not be planted in the Dungeon farm for the time being."


    There were murmurs at this, though they sounded more confused than angry.


    "Her Bindership had concerns that we currently don''t know how the plant will react to being planted in the sort of controlled conditions of the Dungeon," Rian said. "So far, it''s most grown along the river bank, or close to it. The growing conditions for it are different enough from the growing conditions of vigas and most of the farm crops we have down there that growing it might be too difficult. So, for the moment, ropeweed will not be grown as a crop in the Dungeon."


    "However, her Bindership will allow potted samples and one of the growing planters near the tubers for trying to grow the plant in the Dungeon, and she has also authorized cultivating the plant above ground. Once we have a better idea of what kind of conditions the plant needs to grow to best affect, then she has agreed including it in the dungeon as a permanent crop there."


    A few hands rose, and Rian pointed. "Weaver Amokat."


    Lori followed his gaze and blinked. A woman who looked like Mikon¡ªlight pink hair, same features¡ªhad stood up. Unless that was Mikon? Lori looked around, and found another woman who looked like Mikon sitting somewhere else with Umu and Erzebed while she sewed the hem of a pair of trousers.


    The woman, who from context was a weaver named Amokat, said, "Where will it be planted then, Lord Rian?" She even sounded almost, but not quite, like Mikon!


    "We''ll get to that," Rian said. "Planting the ropeweed will be part of the overall expansion we will be conducting of the demesne''s above-ground agricultural land in the coming year. We didn''t have a lot of opportunity to really plan it earlier this year, since we were busy with trying to gather enough food to not starve, get roofs on houses, clearing enough trees for us to actually start building¡­ all that stuff. However, this year we have all that sorted now, so we can plan how we''re going to expand now."


    The Mikon-faced woman looked unsure, but nodded and sat down.


    "Now, before we get to that, we''d like to discuss a matter that will probably impact a lot of people first," Rian said. "As this winter has shown, despite our best efforts everyone''s houses were not entirely prepared for winter, and specifically winter storms." There were mutters and nods about this. "Now, I''d just like to be clear, I''m not blaming anyone. We were all caught by surprise by the storm, and if it hadn''t been for Binder Lori, we''d probably have had a much harder time digging ourselves out of our homes.


    "However, over the coming year I''d like everyone to keep the aftermath of the storm in mind and share ideas for improvements that can be made to everyone''s homes. We''ve already raised the chimneys, but if you have better ideas¡ªI personally would be very grateful for any further ways I can keep my house warm¡ªplease tell me and everyone else you know. All I ask is that you keep in mind that our houses might have something unnatural happen to them next time a dragon passes by, so as much as possible it should be something that''s easy to rebuild."


    There was what seemed like a collective resigned sigh at the reminder, but people still nodded.


    "But, uh, don''t make those changes any time soon," Rian said, suddenly looking awkward. Theatrically awkward. He was making a big production of rubbing the back of his head and deliberately looking awkward. "There is a possibility that we might have to abandon some of the houses closer to the river, as well as the shelter, Um and the old bath houses."


    This caused an outcry, which were probably from people who think they lived in the affected houses.


    "I know, I know!" Rian said. "But depending on how high the flooding gets, it might be too dangerous for people to continue living there! We''ll have to see what the case is when the river floods after winter. The flood barrier should protect us, but when the rain starts, that wall is going to keep water in and might start its own flood. And if that happens you know Binder Lori isn''t going to lift a finger to help us until she''s made sure the Dungeon isn''t going to flood."


    "I wouldn''t," Lori nodded. "My Dungeon is more important."


    "To be fair, getting water out of the Dungeon would be a lot harder than getting water out of any of our houses. Anyway, it''s not certain, and I''m sure if it became necessary her Bindership will take action. I wouldn''t presume to guess what that action is, but I''m sure she''ll do something. She always has before, and she hasn''t let us down yet. Well, except for that time she sat on a moving rock¡­"


    "You tried to go hunting beasts while you were dead on your feet from lack of sleep," she retorted.


    "I hadn''t gotten enough sleep, so of course I had a bad idea. What''s your excuse?"


    "Moving on! What is the next topic, Rian? Come on, we don''t have all day!" Really, why was he being distracted by pointless tangents? "Really, why are you being distracted by pointless tangents?"


    "You started it," he muttered. "All right then. Next, I''m told that the vigas in the Dungeon farm is ready to be harvested¡­"

 234 - Land, Again

    "¡­ as seed crop for the next harvest, then," Rian concluded. "Speaking of which, now that she''s done with the flood barriers, Binder Lori will probably need more people to roll rocks for her again so she can build more farm plots."


    Lori nodded. Yes, all the soil in the third level had to be dealt with, after all.


    "And speaking of farming¡­" Rian paused, as he set aside the stone tablets he''d previous been referring to for different ones, "we will also be expanding the current fields once winter is over." There were excited murmurs at those words. "I realize this much has been obvious, since with all the trees we''ve been felling we have much more new space. I''m told we have more than enough hands to handle such an expansion come harvest time. Growing ropeweed will be part of the expansion, as well as other crops whose seed crop have been growing in the Dungeon farm over the winter. The tentative allocation of space for crops will be put up in the passageway once it is finished."


    "Her Bindership has also agreed for the need to establish a new, much more permanent tannery. After examination of its location, she has decided it''s much too close to the river in the event of a flood. We ask the tanners and hunters who have been treating and processing the hides and skins so far to help choose a better site that''s further inland and away from the river."


    People made faces at that for some reason. Fortunately, Rian seemed to understand. "Yes, yes, we''re aware there will be a smell, but would you rather the tanning alchemicals get into the air or into the water you drink? By now all the men have used the evaporator enough to know how much of it the tanners have on hand. Do you really want all that gold water to get into what you drink?"


    The meeting continued on and on. Unlike previous meetings, where people aired whatever they were (allegedly) thinking, to which Rian either responded or she made a ruling, most of it was announcements of her decisions, as well as reminders. There was the planned next trading expedition to Covehold, which Rian would be joining again so he could see if he could find buyers for the beads she''d made.


    The beads themselves weren''t mentioned, but Rian had informed her there was a good chance Shanalorre knew already from gossip and rumors. Since it was early in the year, they didn''t have much of a stockpile of leather and furs yet to trade, but after a few weeks, they will have gathered more than enough of a surplus of salt to sell. Rian also put out the reminder that they would be resuming going back to the ocean to harvest salt, and asked for volunteers who might take it up as their¡­ well, not exactly trade¡­ occupation? Yes, their mostly permanent occupation.


    Speaking of occupations, there had been the request from the waste haulers that the binding she had used to desiccate the Dungeon''s latrines before they''d been able to dig out the others be added to all latrines permanently. The petitioners had been very straightforward about the fact this was from a wish to reduce the smell, with making the waste far lighter and easier to move around being a secondary consideration. Lori had been mildly inclined to deny the request, but Rian had pointed out how it could reduce the likelihood of people getting sick, as well as making her demesne more sanitary, and she had finally agreed. It would mean making modifications to the latrines to better vent the water that would be extracted from the waste, but that was a relatively minor change.


    Lori had debated using their copper to draw out wire to help make such bindings permanent¡ªshe didn''t know off the top of her head how many latrines they had in the demesne, but that just meant there would be exactly that many binding for her to perpetually renew. The alternative was to use beads to maintain such bindings, but that would still need wire, even if in lesser amounts.


    Those considerations weren''t mentioned in Rian''s announcement, however. Only the fact that she''d opted to provisionally install such a binding on the Dungeon''s latrines¡ªonce she had time to make the changes needed to vent out the steam that would be produced¡ªwhile the matter of doing so with the rest as still ''under consideration''. Said consideration would involve measuring how much wire it would take to connecting all the latrines to the core, and what she could also connect the wire to in the meantime¡­


    "Now, I''ve received some petitions from people who wish to move out of the shelter, and have confirmed their willingness to live together," Rian continued. "To that end, we will be building two new houses¡ª"


    "We?" Lori interjected flatly.


    "¡ªher generous Bindership who is far too good for us has agreed to build two new houses once the snow melts and the ground is clear enough for her to begin work," Rian said smoothly without even changing expression. "It will most likely be built at the top of the rise, near the row of houses there. There is also the possibility that it will be the start of a second row of houses, but her Bindership has still made no definite decision on that." Rian glanced sideways at her but said nothing more. He had wanted her to make a second row of houses and move everyone there, then use the old houses as workshops, storage, or temporary housing for any immigrants. His reasoning was that it would cut down on people comparing each other''s homes, as well as moving them a bit further up and away from the river.


    "Since this will drastically reduce the number of people living in the shelter," Rian continued, "once arrangements for the remaining residents are made, the shelter will be reallocated, though at this time we''re not sure what it will be. Though it probably won''t be made into storage, given how vulnerable it was to a dragon the first time. If you have any suggestions as to what the shelter can be turned into, please inform me as to your ideas¡ªnot right now!¡ªand I''ll propose them to her Bindership."


    Rian looked down and set aside the tablets in front of him, pulling the last, which was just his wooden plank. "Now, we''re almost done. Her Bindership and I have spoken and she has declared we will be building more support buildings this year. We will probably be able to build a dedicated sawmill, once an appropriate site has been chosen¡ª" there were a burst of happy sounds at that, probably from the sawyers and carpenters, "¡ªand it shouldn''t be too much trouble to add a gristmill to that, as we will hopefully have more vigas this year."


    That produced a general increasing in happy sounds in general, and Lori added her own happy sound to that. Just the thought of having more bread on a regular basis¡­


    "Finally, we will be expanding to better take advantage of the land on the other side of the river. I know that will be difficult since we have to cross over by boat, but now that we have things properly set up on this side, we have a bit more leeway to go exploring there and think about how we can use what''s there." Rian shrugged. "Off the top of my head, I think we should move all attempts to tame and domesticate chokers and any other small beasts we discover to that side of the river, where we can keep them away from the crops we already have¡­ and, you know, people they might attack?" There were people nodding in the crowd. "Though I ask everyone to be careful when they do so. We''ve left that side mostly untamed ever since we established¡ª"


    "We?"


    "¡ªever since then-Whisperer Lori established the demesne. Any beasts there have had all that time to adapt, and they probably haven''t learned to be wary of people, so¡ª and some of you are giving me that ''stop telling us about what we already know'' look, so I''ll shut up now." There was laughter, both from Rian and some people in the crowd. "All right then. Now, for the moment we will not be trying to expand the agricultural fields to that side, since between the river and lack of infrastructure any grain we plant is just going to get eaten by beasts and bugs, but it should be all right to try and plant what saplings we can coax to sprout, and if anyone can manage to get a whole field of ropeweed going, that would be absolutely wonderful. I''m sure we''d all want a new set of trousers and shirts this year."


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    There were sounds of agreement at that, and Rian sighed, setting aside. "Well, that''s all the matters prepared in advance. Now we come to the difficult part of the meeting. All right everyone, does anyone have any issues they want to bring up¡ªthat doesn''t involve land!" he finished hastily.


    "When are we going to get land?" someone said before Rian had even managed to finish talking.


    "What did I just say?-!" Rian just barely managed say in a reasonable volume, clearly exasperated. "I just said it! And I said it this morning before breakfast too! And yesterday after dinner! And in the baths every day before!"


    "Easy for you to say!" someone in the crowd said, hiding in anonymity. "You''re already a lord. What about the rest of us?"


    "So you want my job where you have to talk to Binder Lori every day for the rest of your life and do everything she tells you?" Rian said.


    There was silence.


    "That''s what I thought¡­" Rian said, looking sideways at Lori. "So do you want to skip this question?"


    Lori considered it. "I will answer," she said eventually, "if the idiot who brought the question has the nerve to stand up and show me his face to hear it."


    There was another brief silence. Then there was a wave of movement from the crowd A nervous-looking man suddenly found himself sitting exposed while everyone who had been around him finished stepping away, some raising their hands to point.


    Lori nodded. "You, stand up. Everyone else, you may sit down again." After a moment, she added, "And thank you."


    The man looked nervously insistent on sitting until someone pulled him up to his feet on their way back to their bench. Then he stood, and went from just being nervous to looking nauseous.


    "I am not going to remember your name, so spare me any pointless introductions," Lori said, a binding of airwisps amplifying the sound of her voice. "In a way, you''re all very lucky. No matter how annoyed I become of any of you, most of you can always go back to hiding into faceless anonymity to annoy me again. Most of you. And even when you have the misfortune of my remembering you, Rian will do his best to protect you. Unless you annoy him." Lori glanced sideways at her lord. "I''m sure you''ve noticed he''s looking very annoyed right now."


    The lone standing man suddenly looked even more nauseous. Rian, for his part, made a show of leaning back with his arms crossed, mouth set in a very straight line. He didn''t say a word.


    "Now, I could take this moment to lecture you on the various histories of land ownership," Lori said. "I could point out that in nearly all demesne, the land is considered owned by the Dungeon Binder, and any who ''own'' land are technically maintaining a hereditary, transferable lease, which they have to pay rent on in the form of land taxes. And I suspect that some of you actually know this. Most of you, probably."


    "Actually, that''s news to me, but it would make so much sense," Rian said. He didn''t smile, his face remaining set, his mouth returning to a line.


    Lori nodded. "If I had to guess, some of you are here because of explicit promises from¡­" Lori hesitated and frowned. "Uh, the dead ones."


    "I''m going to assume you forgot their names after they died because you had to stop using them," Rian sighed. "Whisperer Elceena and Deadspeaker Ahnree."


    "I''ll take your word for it," Lori said, shrugging. They were dead, after all. No point remembering. The soul is well known for disappearing after death. It was why claims didn''t survive past it, after all. "I might not remember names very well, but I can remember what I overhear. That woman was entirely too free with promising land to everyone." She shrugged again. "Perhaps if she had actually lived, she''d have carried through with her promises. Perhaps they were all just the lies she knew you wanted to hear, to make you follow her. However, she''s dead, and her promises with her. I''m the Dungeon Binder of this demesne. And I didn''t promise any of you a thing."


    Lori didn''t see anyone actually wince, but it felt like they should.


    "You, nameless annoyance," Lori said, making it clear she was talking to the man who was standing. "You asked a question. You will be answered." Lori didn''t even bother to not glare. "Previously, I said that the matter of land allocation will come up a week after I think of a way to charge taxes, did I not?" She ignored his frantic nod. "Between then and now, I came to several conclusions. Firstly, I''ve concluded that the most important use of land we currently have is growing food. Does anyone dispute this? Does anyone feel that there might be a better use for the land than planting food that will keep us from starving?"


    No one replied, which was almost surprising. No one let out a forceful ''yes'' of dispute either, which she thought might actually have been within the realm of possibility.


    "Good. The second most important use for the land within the demesne is growing needful materials that isn''t food, like wood or ropeweed. Would anyone care to dispute this?" Again, there was a lack of replies. A few were actually nodding. "The third most important use is for erecting infrastructure, whether that be homes or needful facilities like the clay pit, the tannery, and the baths." More nods. "I will give the people who keep pestering for land a chance. One chance. Here and now, you may make the case that you need land for any of these things. That you can and will, develop that land to grow food for the demesne, or use it to erect infrastructure that we need such as the tannery and the clay pit."


    Lori saw people straighten in their benches. Next to her, Rian''s head snapped to look at her in surprise.


    "There will be conditions, of course," Lori said. "If you claim you need that land to grow food or cash crops, then you will have to prove you can use it to grow the item in question. By yourself, without assistance from any of the other farmers, or anyone else. You cannot use any of the demesne''s tools like its shovels, hoes or whatever to prepare your fields. You can''t use any of the demesne''s buckets and pots to get water. You can''t take water from the irrigation cistern, or use any of the desiccated waste as fertilizer. And of course, you''ll have to source your own seeds."


    There was an exclamation at this, but for some reason a few people started laughing.


    "However, I am not unreasonable. Should you remove it from the latrines yourself, you can have all the nightsoil you can carry. You''ll have to make your own shovel and bucket, lest you carry it in your bare hands, but I think that''s only reasonable. The same goes for if you wish to use it to grow needful material cash crops. And if you wish to set up a facility, then you will have to prove you can do so yourself." Lori tilted her head. "However, in that particular instance, I will not deprive you of material assistance. I am aware that while many craftsmen know how to use the tools of their trade well, actually building the tool is usually best left to other people. Therefore, in that instance, you may try to convince the smiths and carpenters to build you what you need for your facility. How you will compensate them for their time is up to you, but you will need to provide the materials they will require."


    "This is outrageous!" another person hiding in anonymity declared. "It''s unfair!"


    "It''s what the potter, the tanners and hunters who operate the tannery, the ones who operate the kitchen, the weavers, the ones who operate the mushroom farm, the sweetbugkeepers, the ropers, and the sawyers do," Lori said calmly. "It would be disrespectful of their skills and efforts to not hold others to the same standard. Incidentally, I am hereby awarding the ownership of the claypit, the kiln and the attached drying shed to Gunvi the potter, and the land that the tannery currently stands on will be in the joint ownership of the people who operate it, at least until the newer, relocated tannery is built, at which point the lease will transfer. Oh, and the same to whoever has been making charcoal as well. Though I shall inspect the extent of the land you have been using before making a final declaration." She knew someone had been making charcoal in her demesne for some time now, she''d just never needed to meet them.


    Lori was half-expecting stunned silence, but instead she got an uproar.


    Still, the airwisps amplifying her voice managed to cut through the noise. "We will discuss taxes at a later date. Now, who would like to step forward and justify why they should have land?"

 235 - Denied. Next!

    Unsurprisingly, there were a few who had the nerve¡ªor possibly complete lack of sense¡ªto step forward and try to justify themselves to her. Also unsurprisingly, many were selfish idiots.


    "You''ll be able to farm a thousand square paces of farmland by yourself? With the restrictions I''ve placed?" Lori said flatly.


    "It will be difficult, but with the assistance of my family¡ª"


    "Denied. Only you yourself are applying for land, not your family. If they will be working on the land with you, they will be part of the joint ownership of the land in question."


    "As head of the family, I''m of course representing them."


    "Given you visibly did not discuss this with any of the people next to you prior to coming forward, I doubt anyone gave you the authority to speak on their behalf. Again, denied. Next!"


    Persistent selfish idiots.


    "So, you intend to use the land you''re asking for to grow ropeweed."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Do you even know how to grow ropeweed?"


    "I''ll be learning as I go, of course, but it''s a plant with seeds, so it can''t be that difficult."


    "And you base this on your prior experience as¡­ what?"


    "I''ve had ample time to study the growth of weeds."


    "Doing what?"


    "¡­I was a beastherd."


    "Denied. Next!"


    Bizarrely confident selfish idiots.


    "You want two hundred square paces of riverside property to start domesticating seels for meat and fur¡­"


    "Yes, your Bindership. I understand it''s a lot to ask for, but the fursh clearly need the space to feed themselves, since if they were penned in a smaller space they would likely starve. Given that the coming spring is their breeding season, I intend to trap and pen the juveniles so that I can begin domesticating them, and so that I can begin learning how to best care for them long term."


    "I see¡­ and your experience with seels?"


    "Well, in truth, I don''t have much, but if children can deal with them it''s probably not that hard¡ª"


    "Denied. Next!"


    On and on it went. Some she denied regardless of their argument, because she had no need to justify her decisions, but mostly because they were clearly just trying their luck to grab something. Some actually had good proposals, but either asked for far too much land than they reasonably needed¡ªwhich meant it was probably just trying to grab land¡ªor clearly had no experience with what they were proposing.


    While there weren''t that many idiots, some of them were very long-winded, going on and on about why they deserved to be given land, more so than anyone else. They actually had lunch in the middle of it, with the kitchen workers getting up to get the food ready, and people coming from their tables to get their bowls and bread while idiots continued to be idiotic. Rian had slid her a note on his plank that people were less likely to pay attention to someone talking when they were eating unless that person was talking to them, so this way there was less chance the idiots¡ªnot that he used that word¡ª would be able to sway people with their arguments.


    Lori didn''t know why that mattered, or whether it was even true, but she put the trivia aside for future consideration.


    However, between the selfish idiots, there were actually a few who made a sensible argument.


    "A waterwheel and drophammer?"


    Lori vaguely recognized the man as one of their blacksmiths. "Yes, Great Binder," he said. "It will make forming sheets far more efficient, as well as blades for tools. And¡­ with a water wheel, we should be able to build a rig that can more efficiently draw wire."


    Lori had raised an eyebrow at the blatant hinting. "I see," she said flatly. "Have you identified a suitable location for such a thing?"


    "Not yet, Great Binder. It will have to be far from the proposed sawmill and gristmill, however, for safety reasons. "


    Lori nodded. "Identify a suitable location and inform Rian, and we will resume discussion on this subject."


    "Thank you, Great Binder."


    "Next!"


    Rian kept notes next to her, seemingly keeping track of people, the amount of land they were asking for, and why.


    "We already have a mushroom farm. De¡ª"


    "Wait, your Bindership! Please, just hear out the rest!"


    "What else could there be?"


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    "I know we already have a mushroom farm, but a mushroom farm outside would be easier to expand, letting us grow more, and the spores would be less dangerous to anyone working in it. We need the land because we can make it bigger than it currently is."


    "¡­" Lori gave the woman a level look. "You may begin with a plot twice the overall size of the current mushroom farm," Lori finally said. "Same restrictions as everyone else. If you achieve some sort of success, you may continue, and we will discuss this further. If it is unsuccessful, I''m taking the land back. You have until next winter to bring about some kind of quantifiable result. Next!"


    Admittedly, some ideas were more likely than others, but Lori had decided to give anyone who placed an emphasis on arguing for the feasibility of their idea over how much land they needed a chance. Were her conditions predisposed to make things difficult for anyone who wanted to try farming on their own? Very much so, since it deprived them of tools, resources and assistance when it came to labor. She was already prepared to say no.


    "A curing shed?"


    "Yes, your Bindership. W-while the cold rooms allow for storing food nearly indefinitely, properly cured with smoke and salt, meat is lighter, takes up less space, and easier to store. I-it would be easier to carry smoked or cured meat as provisions when going out to sea to collect salt, and we''d be able to carry more food. Trying to catch and butcher fursh on the Coldhold takes up time, and the blood draws beasts on land and dillians and other toothy things in the water, which make it difficult to gather salt. "


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Hmm¡­ while that does sound advantageous, it seems a lot to go for provisioning just one boat. Is there anything else?"


    "Cured and salted food tastes differently from food that''s been frozen to preserve it," Rian said, one of the few interjections he''s made since people started coming forward. "So it will also add a little variety to our meals. The hunters did a little smoking early on, but then they became busy treating the furs and hides, so all our meat has been frozen since then. Properly cured meat doesn''t need to be kept cold, however, so storing them would probably be a lot easier and require less work on your part."


    Lori considered that. "Are you certain you can build all you need for this?"


    "Yes, your Bindership! Once a suitable shed''s been made, all you really need is fresh meat, salt and firewood."


    Lori tilted her head. "Do you have any objection to putting your ''curing shed'' on the other side of the river?"


    The man hesitated. "The only problems I can really see with that is the chokers there possibly getting into the shed and eating the meat, and perhaps the shed catching fire in the night without anyone being able to put it out."


    "Hmm¡­ is there any strong reason you would not be willing to live on the other side of the river, should a house be available there."


    The mans'' eyes widened. "Um, well¡­ no bath house?"


    People laughed.


    Lori considered that, and nodded. "A thought for later, then. Very well, provisionally prepare what you need, and we shall test the capabilities of your ''curing shed'' once fresh meat is once more available. Speak with Rian about where it may be located, we wouldn''t want it to be in the middle of the vigasfield. Next!"


    The proposals she didn''t outright refuse weren''t so much her saying yes as her tentatively saying maybe. If the idea was viable, and if it did need the land being asked for to be done effectively¡­ then she''d be a fool to say no. But just giving land to people, even if it would technically be a long-term hereditary lease that would be paid for with land taxes, just because people asked?


    That would just be idiotic.


    Eventually, there were no more people coming forward. Well, untrue, there were some people she had denied earlier who thought that they could still argue their case, but while Lori had no memory for silly things like people''s faces, she had a lord who did.


    "Is that it, then?" Lori said, ignoring the ones Rian assured her had already spoken. "Very well. Now, are there any other matters that need to be brought up?"


    "¡ªease, you Bindership, just hear me out¡ª"


    "¡ªtalked to my family, they''ve agreed that¡ª"


    "¡ªwas promised! I gave up everything to come here, I deserve¡ª"


    "Sit down and shut up, you idiots!"


    Lori didn''t know who yelled that last, but she nodded when they did. "Thank you," she said over the sounds of people being made to sit down and shut up, most likely by the hands of other people rather than their own will. "Any other matters? Raise your hand and be acknowledged if you do. "A few hands rose. After Rian pointed out the hands of the ones who had were still trying to justify why they should have land, Lori picked at random. "You," she pointed.


    An older woman stood up, her dull purple hair just beginning to be streaked with white. "Your Bindership, since you''ve begun awarding land to some people¡ª" Lori almost, almost said ''next!'', "¡ªdoes this mean you''ll begin taking taxes soon?"


    Silence fell.


    "Not at this time, though I am certainly closer to it than the last time the subject came up," Lori said. "Rest assured that as much as you all dislike the thought of having to pay taxes, I dislike the thought of having to calculate how much you all owe me. That being said¡­ All the proud new land owners¡ªor rather, the new owners of a hereditary, transferable lease¡ªwill be required to pay taxes on that land." Lori shrugged. "We will come to an arrangement."


    "I feel I should point out we don''t really have any money in the demesne, as such¡­?" Rian said from next to her.


    "Yes, Rian, I am very aware. However, it''s not the amount of beads they possess that is of value. It''s their skills, and the ability of those skills to make things gain even more worth. As I said, we will come to an arrangement. Does this answer your question?" Lori addressed that last to the woman who had raised her hand to ask.


    The woman looked uncertain, but nodded hesitantly.


    "Sit, then." She sat. "Next¡­ you."


    A man with long bright green hair and a beard stood. "Your Bindership," he said, voice, surprisingly soft but firm, "there''s been talk of another expedition to Covehold, but what exactly will that mean?"


    Lori glanced sideways at Rian, and found him looking right back at her. She pointed at him, and he nodded.


    "The next expedition to Covehold will be to trade salt and, and try to find a market for the demesne''s other available goods," Rian said. "Her Bindership and I have discussed it, and have decided that, for the moment, salt gathered by the Coldhold will be counted as a communally owned commodity, though of course those who volunteer to help gather it will be given some consideration for their assistance. But basically, the surplus salt that we will be taking to Covehold will be used to buy things the demesne needs that we currently can''t make on our own, or at least not make easily. On the list of things to buy next time is paper for everyone''s windows, more medicines, and more seeds, though that last will be hard because everyone keeps a tight hold of the seeds only they have. So unless we rob someone, we probably aren''t getting hold of cloudbloom or white blood saplings any time soon."


    "Don''t get caught," Lori said immediately.


    "I''m not going to rob some demesne to get cloudblooms," Rian said. "Just like how I didn''t rob a bank!"


    "I can order you."


    "Your Bindership, how exactly are you planning to enforce that order from all the way over here? If anyone has any other trade goods they want to add, inform me. It''s not required that it be a communal contribution, but her Bindership probably won''t let us carry it without a cargo fee. If you need something however, tell me and we might be able to work something out that will satisfy her Bindership, even if she''ll want to slap duties on it."


    The green-haired man nodded and sat down.


    "Next!"

 236 - Not Her Problem

    "All right, I think that about covers everything," Rian said, visibly sighing in relief. "Unless anyone remembered something at the last moment?"


    In the crowd, someone tried to stand up. The man behind him grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled him down, and the woman next to him¡ªpresumably his wife, or at least a close relation¡ªswatted him on the head. Another woman rose, stopped at a sort of half-crouch, then sat back down again.


    "No one? All right, then, I officially declare the community meeting over, just in time for dinner to get started," Rian said. "Thank you for your contributions everyone, even if you were denied. If you feel dissatisfied with the demesne, Binder Shanalorre is right there and will probably be more than willing to allow you to live in River''s Fork¡­ um, once she wakes up from what seems like a very comfortable nap. Thank you to whoever lent her what she''s using as a pillow, that was very nice of you."


    And just like that, the community meeting was over again. Lori sighed in relief, even though she was in the middle of imbuing the binding that she''d be using to expand her demesne for the fourth time that day. Thankfully, most of the matters brought up after the idiots were things Rian knew how to deal with¡ªwithout resorting to his voting fetish¡ªthough she had to rouse herself every so often. Still, she was able to make good time. She hadn''t been able to expand the demesne when she''d been busy building the flood barriers, except for the days when the soil was being dug up to clear the way to the bedrock.


    "Ah, the feeling of sitting around all day and calling it work¡­" Rian muttered as he stood up next her, then winced slightly. "It feels like your hips falling asleep, doesn''t it?" Indeed, most people seemed to be getting up and walking¡ªthe children were running and were being yelled at to stop running¡ªand even Lori felt an urge to stand up and walk around before she sat back down onto another bench for dinner. Already there was activity in the kitchen, but it would be some time before all of that would result in food. "So, what now?"


    "Now, you tell everyone that was told I would discuss matters with them later that I meant some day after tomorrow," Lori said. "We do have someone making charcoal, right?"


    "Yes, a few people," Rian said. "At least, they were before winter. They have a place somewhere in the woods where they gather the deadfall and make the mounds they need."


    "Show me where it is so I can make the boundaries official," Lori said.


    Rian started gathering up all the stone tablets with notes on them to take back to her room so that they could be made into blank tablets again. "I have to ask, why not the sawyers?"


    "It''s a hole in the ground. They don''t qualify."


    "If you wrote down what your standards were, I''m sure it would be easier to meet them."


    "If I wrote them down, I''d have idiots claiming they had already met them."


    "Ah. Yes, I suppose that is what would happen."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time dinner had come, Lori had managed to stretch her legs and stop her posterior from aching from the hours of sitting at a seat with no back as she once more inspected the flood barriers she had built. Thanks to the masons and plasterers, the surface of the barriers were as smooth and even as she would want. Indeed, they were much smoother than her own work. She tried not to be annoyed with that. After all, they were craftsmen with specialized tools and skills meant for such a thing, while she''d had a plank on a stick. A difference in quality was to be expected.


    Still, the work wasn''t done. On consideration, she decided she needed to make a small flood barrier in front of the passageway into the Dungeon after all. Not because she thought that the flooding from the river could reach it¡ªshe was very confident about the flood barriers she''d made¡ªbut because she''d just realized that all the ice and snow all over the village would also melt, and she needed to keep that water out of her Dungeon too.


    But not today, since it was so late. Tomorrow, she could make it, a little knee-high thing that she''d even add steps to. And it would need something to texture it so that people wouldn''t slip on it when wet. Then after that she could build the pipes to work with the binding that would drain water from their side of the flood barrier so that the melting snow wouldn''t be trapped behind it and be the cause of the very flooding they were trying to avoid¡­


    Lori already had a full plan of the next day''s work to be done as she sat down on her bench for dinner, her game board in hand. Then she frowned, got up, and pushed the bench back into position, since it had been a bit too far from the table. Only when she was satisfied did she sit down again with a sigh, leaning on her elbows as she closed her eyes.


    She felt the bench shift under her. It was a familiar movement by now, even though their guest usually got to the seat before she did. Lori opened her eyes, inclining her head to the one sharing her bench.


    "Binder Shanalorre," she said.


    "Binder Lolilyuri," came the reply.


    "How did you find the community meeting?" For some reason, the thought entered her head of Rian answering ''easily'' with a stupid smile on his face.


    "You have my sympathies," the younger Dungeon Binder said as her lord sat down opposite her on the other bench. "And while I would of course be willing to accept anyone who wished to live in my demesne¡­ I''d rather not."


    "Oh?" Lori said.


    "They will find that my policies on simply giving people land just because they want it comparable to your own."


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    "Why would anyone think otherwise?"


    "I suspect my youth plays a factor."


    Lori frowned in puzzlement. "Why would you being young cause them to equate to you being willing to just give them land?"


    "I believe they thought me foolish or easily convinced. I already have many such people in my demesne. I''d rather not have more. Still, it was¡­ informative and interesting. You''ve given me much to think on and perhaps adapt to my own circumstances."


    Oh? "Oh? Well, best of luck there, then."


    Rian finally slipped into the bench opposite her, Umu sitting next to him and leaning against his side. "All right, finally have someone who''s volunteered for flood watch duty," he said cheerfully. "Now he''ll just need someplace along the wall to watch out for floods from. On top of the stairs over the wall heading towards the laundry area doesn''t exactly command a good view of the river."


    Lori sighed, but added it to the things she needed to make. Maybe she could widen the shorter floodwall to make a walkway? No, wait¡­ "They''ll need access to one of the ladders."


    "I''ll see what I can do," Rian said. He turned to their guest. "Binder Shanalorre. Lord Yllian. What did you think of the community meeting?"


    "It was interesting, Lord Rian, though I''m not sure if I can make use of it," Shanalorre said. "Many in my demesne are prone to complaining already."


    "It wasn''t all complaining," Rian said. "That part didn''t matter much anyway. People are always doing that. Besides, even if they''re complaining, it might be about a legitimate problem that needs to be fixed. You won''t know unless you listen to them."


    "Unfortunately," Lori sighed as Mikon and Riz finally arrived. While Riz sat next to Rian as usual, the pink-haired weaver sat next to Umu, something that seemed to surprise the northerner woman. Lori began setting up the board for a game of chatrang, putting the pieces down.


    Lord whatever-his-name-was looked sideways at Rian. "I think there are people in my demesne who would use such an opportunity to do nothing but complain, Lord Rian," he said pointedly


    "Then let them." Lord whatever-his-name-was looked surprised at his reply. "They have to get tired of it eventually. And if it''s in a public venue like this, then if other people besides you have to listen to it, they''ll get very tired of it much more quickly. Even people who want to complain can only listen to so much of other people complaining."


    "Hmm¡­ an interesting premise¡­" Shanalorre mused as Lori moved the board between herself and Mikon. Mikon, as the one who lost their last game, moved first, propelling one of her militia pieces forward.


    Rian shrugged. "You won''t know if it work until you try it though. Maybe you''ll be unlucky and people in your demesne like listening to other people complain as long as it''s about complaints they would have complained about too. But what we really use it for is making sure everyone is aware of our situation, and any plans we have for the future that will either affect everyone or need everyone''s participation¡ªOh, wait, food''s ready. Excuse me."


    Rian stood, Umu rising with him, and the two headed for the kitchen to get the food. Lord whatever-his-name-was hesitated, glanced towards Shanalorre, then reluctantly rose and went with them.


    "How much longer will you be staying with us, Binder Shanalorre?" Lori asked as she moved her Mentalist to threaten Mikon''s militia.


    "Barring another woman going into labor before I leave, we will be returning to River''s Fork tomorrow afternoon," the younger Binder said, looking at the game board curiously. "I will need to continue overseeing the construction of our own protections against flooding."


    "I see. Is it likely to be necessary?" Lori tried to recall if there were any markings on the rocks that indicated how high the water could reach, and couldn''t remember any. Did that mean there was no flooding, or that all the rocks became completely submerged.


    "Given the topography of the hills on either side of the river, as well as the relative flatness of the ground on which the dome stands, any flooding on either branch on the river is likely to converge at our fork," Shanalore said as Mikon moved a different militia. "In truth, we are uncertain as to how bad it is likely to be. Given the elevation of our buildings above the usual level of the river, it is hoped that any flooding will not reach us. However, with the hills lining the rivers on either side, the floodwater has nowhere to disperse as it does here."


    Lori nodded, understanding the dilemma as she recalled the hills that rose on the opposite sides of the two rivers that met near the Deadspoken dome that was at the center of the demesne. "Do you have sufficient material?" She moved her Horotract.


    "We have the tailings from the mine, as well as rocks along the river," the Deadspeaker savant said. "However, as we are without a Whisperer such as yourself, all the rocks need to be moved manually, and given the season that has proven¡­ difficult. Should the area beneath the dome flood badly, the only safe places would be the homes built into the central tree, which are finite in number, and the mine."


    Lori nodded. It sounded like a lot of very difficult work, especially since they''d be doing it in the cold and snow. "It sounds like a lot of very difficult work, especially since you''d be doing it in the cold and snow. My sympathies."


    "Thank you," Shanalorre said as Mikon moved her own Mentalist. "It is difficult, but it has to be done."


    "I am familiar with the difficulties. I myself also still have things I need to build before the probable spring floods arrive. Will your projects be done in time?"


    "It should be," Shanalorre said. "We are simply dumping the mining tailings and any other debris we can move into a crude wall. The problem will be properly waterproofing the barrier. We are covering the surface of the barrier with mud and attempting to bake it by lighting fires on top of it."


    Lori considered that. "That might work, but the quality is likely to be very poor and brittle."


    "So we have found," Shanalorre said. "But we''ve been gathering a large supply of wood over the year, and one of the first things my¡­. father¡­"


    Shanalorre trailed off, staring blankly at nothing. As Lori looked on in bemusement, the younger Binder twitched, and her left arm rose and slapped herself on the cheek. She blinked, then shook her head. "Apologies. My predecessor used a taming to cause a stand of wood outside of the dome to continuously grow branches, which I have been able to maintain. Unfortunately, the dragons damaged several over the past year, and the current cold has reduced the growth of the few that remain. We have been regularly pruning their branches and gathering firewood over the past year, as well as refining it into charcoal, which helps supplement the deadfall gathered from the hills around the dome. Even with the losses, we should have sufficient fuel for this project, as long as people are careful."


    Meaning the demesne was probably on the edge of running out of fuel. Though it made their sabotage of her warming binding earlier that winter when she was refining the ore even more idiotic. Or possibly lazy. Or simply deliberate malice¡­


    "I see¡­" Lori said. "How convenient."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Yes, the stand makes for a convenient place to dump waste to keep the trees constantly fertilized as well. Though people have to be careful where they step when they''re pruning, and we''ve had to punish a few who nearly damaged the trees."


    "There are idiots everywhere," Lori nodded as Rian and Umu came back, Lord whatever-his-name-was following after, all of them carrying bowls of soup and platters of round flatbread, as well as a few pieces of slightly greenish honey bread. Well, it had been the community meeting, so Lori had allowed herself to be talked into letting them use some of the honey.


    As Lori picked one of the bowls of soup and her share of the bread¡ªthough there seemed to be one more piece of honey bread than there should have been¡ªshe thought of how difficult it had been to make her own demesne''s flood barrier, even when it only covered such a small area. She considered how truly difficult it must be with only hand tools, rocks, mud and a limited number of people.


    Then she shrugged as she tore a piece off her bread and dipped it into her soup. Not her problem.

 237 - Raining And Still Freezing

    Over the next few days, Lori continued with the things she had to build to prepare for the thaw, whenever it came. A stone pipe was added to the corner where the two segments of flood barrier met, with an opening at the bottom of a small recess on the landward side of the wall where water could gather, and the other opening at the top of the wall on the river side. She placed a binding of waterwisps at the base of the pipe¡ªanother thing she had to remember to imbue¡ªwhich would only draw in liquid water so that it could be siphoned up and then dumped into the river.


    Once that was done, Lori proceeded to make¡­ it wasn''t really flood barrier, was it? More like a slight lip to keep loose water out. She added one to the entry of the passageway into the dungeon, a short step made of stone a little past ankle height, instead of the knee-high one she had originally thought she needed. After all, the water would mostly be flowing downhill past her the passageway, and would be siphoned out into the river, so the water was unlikely to reach knee high.


    After far too many reports of people tripping on it¡ªeven though most people saw her building it¡ªshe added some lightwisps to illuminate it so people couldn''t possibly miss it. This, strangely, caused even more people to trip, as now they claimed they couldn''t see it because of the light, so they didn''t know to step over it. Normally, she would have just ignored all this complaining but¡­


    She tripped over it. Twice.


    Finally, she decided that instead of making a little wall that people had to step over, she''d make a sort of landing that people stepped up to, and then down again as they walked into the passage. It required far, far more stone but people finally seemed to see and step over it now. For texture, she took a broom, and passed it back and forth over the stone while it was softened so that lines would form, giving water somewhere to drain if people stepped on it with wet feet.


    She had to include a similar step to the baths, blocking the doorway to prevent any melting snow or possibly rain from getting in,


    Once that was done, she found time to add an observation platform to the flood barrier, so that the volunteer Rian had found could keep an eye on the river to see if it was melting. She''d need the warning so she could properly secure their boats when the time came. Building the platform was simple enough, and involved adding more stone to the upper corner where the walls of the barrier met until she could shape a relatively flat area. The intake for the siphon pipe was directly underneath it, but that was fine. The platform would need a ladder to reach, and there were no rails or barriers to keep people from falling off, but the drop wasn''t so far that such were needed.


    Then, with all the preparations finished, Lori went back down to the third level and continued preparing farm plots. After all, there was still a lot of soil and mud down there, and it needed to be dealt with. Fortunately, Rian was able to find her more workers. She didn''t like how so many of them were children, but apparently they''d heard of about how the previous volunteers had been able to shape the softened stone, and some had volunteered simply to try it out themselves.


    Lori had been worried one of the children would try to throw the handfuls of softened stone they were working with, most likely at someone else, but thankfully that hadn''t happened. Perhaps they had thought the handfuls too heavy. Perhaps it was the way the brat had glared at anyone who looked like they might try. Eventually, most of the children who had only volunteered out of curiosity stopped, and Lori was left with people who were actually willing to work. That still included the brat and two other children, but they seemed to be taking the matter seriously, and didn''t seem to be there because their parents wanted them kept ''out of trouble''.


    There were enough volunteers that Lori was able to divide them into three groups, one for each size of rock to be shaped for the farm plots'' drainage. Snow was brought down, the waterwisps bound to keep them solid, so that the volunteers would have a surface to lay their finished rocks on and keep them from sticking to the stone floor.


    To give herself something to do while the volunteers did this, Lori also tried an idea Rian had proposed, laying a long log of softened stone on top of a long block of bound ice. The ice had a curved depression in the middle to hold the stone in place, and she used her stone-shaping tool to divide the stone into smaller pieces. It worked¡­ to a degree. Because of the depression in the bound ice, her stone-shaping tool couldn''t cut through all the way. However, by dividing the stone log like that, she could separate the rocks by putting a little weight on them and breaking the little extrusions of stone connecting the pieces she divided.


    Well, it worked well enough, so she got some of the bigger volunteers, made more blocks of ice, and had them start dividing tubes of stone, and then breaking them apart after she''d solidified them.


    Rian, for his part, worked on taking the finished stones and putting together new farm plots. Biggest rocks at the bottom, then smaller ones, and so on, while she made stone slabs to put on top of them before the soil¡ªmixed with some desiccated latrine waste¡ªwas shoveled on top.


    The work was interrupted after a week while they harvested the vigas they had planted in the farm plots. The vigas had been allowed to dry on the stalks, with Lori doing her best to control the humidity of the third level. Harvesting the vigas took less than a day, as despite their best efforts, the dungeon''s farm wasn''t that big. It actually took longer to clear the plots of the remains of the vigas and get them ready for another planting.


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    In the middle of that, Lori was surprised to hear that things were starting to thaw.


    "It is?" she said to Rian at breakfast a week and a half after Shanalorre had last left.


    "I honestly can''t tell," Rian said with a shrug. "It''s all painfully freezing cold to me. But apparently we''re starting to get rain instead of snow, and the sun''s warmer now when its clear and sunny."


    Lori frowned. Like Rian, she couldn''t really tell herself, since inside her demesne she felt either pleasantly cool or simply just the right degree of warm. "How does the river look?"


    "Honestly, it looks the same as usual, but I hear that''s normal for frozen rivers. Personally, I wouldn''t be sure that things have started to thaw until I looked outside and see the snow turning into slush. Though if we are starting to thaw, maybe you should reinforce the ice tunnels? We wouldn''t want the tunnels to collapse on anyone."


    Lori frowned, closing her eyes for a moment and focusing on her awareness of the wisps in her demesne. The river felt solid for the moment, but that meant little. It would be solid right up to the point it melted, and she wouldn''t really be able to tell what temperature it was. She opened her eyes and nodded. "I suppose that''s a reasonable precaution," she said. Another thing she needed to imbue. A thought occurred to her, and she frowned. "How many more pregnant women are left?"


    "Only three more about to give birth soon, which is what I think you''re asking about," Rian said. "Not that I''m trying to rush them, but I hope they go into labor soon, while the snow between here and River''s Fork is still reliable. The closer we get to things thawing, the less confident I am about trying to use the sled to bring Shana here and them taking her back home."


    Rian''s concern turned out to be justified. When the next woman started giving birth a few days later, Rian went to fetch Shanalorre¡ªand her escort of militia¡ªand brought them to Lori''s demesne. In the middle of her usual three day wait to see if the mother or the child would get sick¡ªit had happened one time, causing Shanalorre to stay two more days afterwards to make sure they wouldn''t get sick again¡ªthe river started to flow.


    It wasn''t much, just a seeming trickle of water flowing along the middle of the river, cutting a path through the accumulated snow, but it meant that temperatures were warm enough that water was more likely than ice. Through her awareness of wisps, Lori found that while the river was still mostly ice, it was starting to melt in the middle¡ªor at least stay liquid¡ªthough the areas near the banks were staying solid.


    "Great Binder, we should head back," Lord whatever-his-name-was said as he stood next to his Dungeon Binder outside, standing on the now-cramped platform that overlooked the river. "With water in the river, it''s only a matter of time before it all starts to crack."


    "I agree," Rian said. He was standing on the narrow level band on top of the flood barrier near Lori as he looked out onto the river with a frown on his face. "We don''t know how long before it starts melting, and I''m not confident in our sled''s ability to travel over wet slush." He had never gotten around to giving her any plans to turn Lori''s Boat into a proper sled.


    Lori and Shanalorre both stood on the observation platform, its usual occupant displaced to the ground below to hold the ladder on the muddy ground. Occasionally, water trickled out from the output of the pipe on the river-facing side of the wall, sending water flowing down the wall''s side. Water that actually reached the snow at the bottom instead of freezing, and was starting to turn the snow into slush.


    "I have no objections to you leaving now," Lori said. "We don''t know the weather patterns of the area, so it''s best to err on the side of caution. The river might stay like this, slowly melting, for another week, or it could break apart at any moment."


    Shanalorre looked out over the river impassively, before shaking her head. "I understand your concern," Shanalorre said, "but it''s just one more day to make sure mother and child don''t fall ill. We can wait that long, can we not?"


    "If we knew that for sure, we wouldn''t be suggesting you leave earlier," Rian said dryly.


    With this indicator that things were finally starting to thaw, Lori double-checked her flood barriers and other measures. She had to alter the binding on the siphon to be able to deal with mud, altering the binding so that it rotated the water in a vortex to prevent the mud from accumulating and blocking the pipe. At Rian''s suggestion, Lori also made holes along the bottom of the ice tunnels through the snow, to keep water from being trapped by the tunnel when the snow melted.


    It was during this that she was surprised to realize that the tunnels weren''t completely buried in snow anymore. With the inside of the tunnels being lined with snow for better insulation, the view through the ice had been blocked, but it was soon clear that portions of the tunnels were now well above the snow line.


    It was at that point that Lori decided to bring down the ice tunnels. It kept her occupied for the rest of the day as she bound the waterwisps in the ice and carefully made the tunnel sag down in segments, removing the arching roofs and adding the ice to the walls on either side, making them thicker. By the time she stopped for dinner, most of the ice tunnels had been brought down, and the paths and streets of her demesne''s village was open to the sky which was clear and cold and already being tinged with the light of the red moon.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I don''t suppose you could be convinced to put the ice tunnels back up?" Rian said at breakfast the next morning. His winter robe was damp, his hair was wet, and even with Riz and Umu wrapping their arms around him from either side¡ªand lightly glaring at each other across his back¡ªhe was still shivering slightly.


    "I spent all of yesterday bringing them down, so no," Lori said. "Why are you even asking?"


    "Because it''s raining actual, wet rain right now, and it''s still freezing," Rian said, actually looking miserable. He glanced sideways at Shanalorre. "Sorry, your Bindership. I don''t think it''s safe to try and take you back home today."


    "No need for apology, Lord Rian. You did advise me to leave when I could," the smaller Dungeon Binder said. "Would you like me to heal you so you don''t get sick?"


    "Please¡ªachoo!"


    "Rian, cover your mouth when you do that, that''s how diseases get spread."


    Lori made sure she was healed too, just in case.

 238 - The Coming Of Spring

    With the state of the river being what it was, and more and more snow turning into slush and mud every day, Binder Shanalorre and her militia had to stay over for an indefinite period of time, at least until the river became navigable by one of their boats. Fortunately, the laundry area hadn''t started to flood yet, and thus they were able to wash the limited clothes they had available. According to Rian, their friends among her idiots also lent the visitors clothes.


    One of Shanalorre''s militia had volunteered to try and go back to River''s Fork overland to inform them that she was all right and not, to give a random example, being held against her will by Lori. Lord whatever-his-name-was had been willing to allow it, and Shanalorre, after some consideration, had reluctantly given the man permission, but only after Rian had suggested one of the demesne''s hunters accompany the man. Lori had been against the suggestion, but had also reluctantly agreed once Rian pointed out they needed to find out the disposition of the beasts outside of the demesne''s borders so that they could assess when it was safe to go out hunting again.


    In the end, three people had gone out. One of Shanalorre''s militia, one of the demesne''s hunters, and one of the men who, according to Rian, had scouted the demesne to make the map of it that Lori had tucked away. They headed out, armed with spears, dressed lightly but with warming stones on their persons, and enough food to go to River''s Fork and back.


    They came back the next day, all of them injured and carrying the scout, who''d been incapacitated when a pack of beasts had surrounded them. The only reason he wasn''t dead was because the beast''s talon that would have ripped his leg open had deflected off one of the warming stones he was wearing, and only tore the back of his leg. They''d barely made it back into the border of the demesne, and even then they''d had to make their way in and climb a tree because some of the beasts had followed them back inside. According to the three, the beasts had stayed inside the demesne even as they started bleeding heavily from the thousands of wounds covering their body that no longer had Iridescence sealing them shut, either too disoriented by hunger and pain or too drawn to the possibility of prey. The scent of blood and screaming had drawn even more beasts into the demesne, who had also started bleeding and screaming, and a few had started attacking other beasts out of hunger or perhaps panic¡­


    As the three men had been taken to the doctors and medics, Shanalorre offering her assistance to heal them, Rian had ordered everyone to arm themselves, and get the children into the Dungeon. Once a large enough group of people had heavily armed themselves¡ªRian had put on his sword even though he was wielding a spear¡ªeveryone else had also gone into the Dungeon and the door had been sealed while the group investigated.


    They had come back lightly injured, having encountered some of the beasts when they''d been maddened with pain. It had been dangerous putting them down, but the group had been equipped with enough spears to keep the beasts at bay until someone could find an opportunity to spear them somewhere vital.


    The group hadn''t brought back much meat since they hadn''t wanted to risk lingering too long or getting the scent of more blood in air, but once they managed to ascertain that the interior of the demesne was properly clear of beasts¡ªLori had assisted by identifying voids of wisps in her awareness¡ªthey were at least able to partially recover teeth, bones, hides and feathers.


    That had ended any more attempts to try to contact River''s Fork overland while the local beasts were still hungry from their winter fast. Fortunately, the injuries had been repairable, and while some might have been debilitating or even crippling in normal circumstances, Shanalorre was present. Thankfully, the other Dungeon Binder was more than willing to heal everyone''s injuries.


    Even before the three attempted messengers had gotten injured, Shanalorre had already made it known that she would still be available to everyone who were feeling ill or otherwise unwell for the duration of her unexpected stay. Naturally, this led to a stream of children being sent to her with runny noses, as well as anyone else in the demesne with some kind of ache or pain. She sat outside of the alcove in the second level that had become her room, poised patiently on a stool, and handled all the people who came to her.


    The recently pregnant women and their newborns had taken to keeping her company, along with the older women¡ªusually mothers or aunts, sometimes an older sister¡ªwho they were apprenticed to, as Lori had decreed. The spouses sometimes joined them as well, being taught how to hold the babes properly, how the head should always be supported, and of course how to clean and change the child''s diapers when they inevitably soiled themselves.


    Lori had needed to alter the way air circulated in the area so it wouldn''t be so drafty, as well as making it a bit warmer for the sake of the children. This, of course, led to more people lingering in the area, men and women sewing clothes, sharpening and maintaining tools, cobblers repairing shoes and boots¡­


    Not that everyone was just lingering in her dungeon. With the coming thaw, the fields that had been covered in snow were being cleared and aerated, the vigas that had been buried over the winter were checked on, and Lori was able to start reactivating the plumbing she''d needed to shut down over the winter. All waste water was once more directed towards the irrigation cistern after she''d checked the stone and pipes for cracks and other possible expansion damage from the cold. The pit they''d been dumping waste into before the winter was cleared of snow, and started seeing use again. The mushroom farm, no longer buried in snow or freezing cold, was also being tended to.


    While the injured messengers and the need to make sure there weren''t any pain-maddened, injured beasts in the demesne had forced a sudden halt on these activities, once they were sure all the beasts that had entered were dead and gutted¡ªthe trails of blood had been easy enough to follow by the other scouts and hunters¡ªwork quickly resumed. A few of the former militia had been selected to stand guard with spears, just in case, and some spears were left stacked where people could quickly run to them.


    Shanalorre had also ordered her own militia to assist with the lookout and deployed to keep watch as well, with only Lord whatever-his-name-was staying at her side. Lori had been glad for the offered assistance. It annoyed her to have to put the other demesne''s militia up for several more days, especially since none of them had been actually doing anything productive. Oh, they guarded Shanalorre, but it was in shifts of two at a time, meaning that for the rest of the day, the other four could probably be found in the baths, or at least just lazing around. Unfortunately, they weren''t hers to command. They were Shanalorre''s people, and if she was willing to let them sit around doing nothing¡­


    Now, at least, they were earning their keep.


    Lori had her own work to do. The new farm plots on the third level were finished, four new rows of bare soil with drainage beneath it. The small amount of soil left was added to the tuber planters. Now that the farm plots were ready, the Dungeon Farm was prepared for planting. Desiccated waste, ground bone, and some sawdust was added to the soil by the farmers and other workers, and all the mud being tracked into her dungeon was dumped into the third level to add to the soil there.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    With the snow gone, the old dining hall was finally unburied. Lori used airwisps to air it out, and the benches and tables that had been stored inside had been checked for rot and mold. The tannery was also uncovered, the roof inspected and repaired, and the containers full of alchemical substances had been checked for leaks as the place was put in order for the coming year. The chokers that were being kept there were dead from being buried and exposure, and their skins were the first to be tanned that year.


    She also did her part to try and deal with the mud by solidifying the dirt on top of the major walkways of the village outside her Dungeon. Ruining the soil for planting wasn''t a concern there, as given they were thoroughfares nothing was supposed to grow there in any case. She''d done this before earlier in the year, but the dirt had come apart over time, no doubt from wear and water soaking in and expanding during the winter. Lori made a note to get around to having the road, such as it was, properly paved this year. They hadn''t had time before because of all the work, and because the rest of the year had been dry enough that the footing hadn''t been a concern that had been brought up.


    Since they were no longer really needed, the waste desiccator and the snow melter were dismantled, the stone used to build them added back to the stockpile. Since it wasn''t flooding yet, Lori cleaned out the water hub shed of bugs by filling it with steam to kill anything in there, followed by a brief burst of lightning wisps, before having Rian send people inside to clean it out. Once it was clean, Lori reconnected all the pipes in the stone and rebuilt the bindings. She also added in a distilling stage to the water, since the river wasn''t as clear as it usually was. While she already had a distillation stage after the reservoir, she wanted to lessen the amount of silt and sediment that got into it.


    Despite the flood watch being kept on the river, Lori made sure to come out and check it at least once a day. The smooth, white expanse she had seen and traveled over for months was gone, replaced by flowing dark water that frothed white with turbulence. The water level was clearly far more elevated than usual, the dock wet from waves that occasionally lapped up and over the stone surface. Every day, the water seemed to rise higher and higher, and the stone dock was constantly wet and for all practical purposes under water. It at least confirmed that she hadn''t made the flood barrier for nothing and that the river was going to overflow its banks.


    Rian and Lord whatever-his-name-was both agreed that it was far too turbulent to navigate safely with the boats the demesne had. While it was certainly possible, even survivable, neither of them wanted to try it with Binder Shanalorre as a passenger, even on the Coldhold, where she could theoretically be secure inside. Additionally, while they could probably travel downstream, Rian was unsure as to how well any of the boats would be able to travel back upstream. With the further danger of debris in the form of driftwood in the water threatening to damage the ice of the boats'' hulls, both lords strongly recommended they not try until the river was more settled.


    Well, Rian strongly recommended. Lord whatever-his-name-was bluntly told his Dungeon Binder that he wasn''t letting her on board such a deathtrap in the current conditions. Lori felt her fists clench at the blatant disrespect, and imagined repeatedly striking the man''s head with her staff¡­


    Still, she kept her peace. The man wasn''t her lord after all, and if Shanalorre was willing to let him speak to her like that¡­ well, that was her problem. Though something inside Lori cringed as she watched the younger Dungeon Binder simply nod and take it.


    Really, if Rian spoke to her like that, she would be reaching for her staff.


    ¡­


    Well, she would hold back if he had a very good reason since she wasn''t unreasonable, but if he didn''t, then the staff it was!


    Since neither was going to be used any time soon, and to prevent damage from the aforementioned debris, both Lori''s Ice Boat and the Coldhold had been stored away to avoid risking losing them. The former''s ice had been removed, the wooden frame, fittings and driver stored down in the third level in one of the incomplete excavation corridors, where the carpenters had checked all the parts for swelling and damage. Some woman had volunteered to make sure all the components were stored properly and in good order.


    The larger of the two boats had been encased in stone and sunk under the water, fused to the ground so it wouldn''t budge. When Lori had formulated the measure to protect the boat for when a dragon came, she hadn''t expected that she''d need to use it for something more mundane. Given how many different parts and bindings comprised the Coldhold, however, simply keeping them imbued and just encasing the thing was easier to do than removing the ice.


    With so much to do, so many structures that had been covered in snow needing to be inspected, so much piping that had lain dormant that had the be checked, Lori barely had time to try and expand her demesne. She barely managed to squeeze in a single expansion in the time before dinner most days, and she certainly didn''t have the energy for games afterwards.


    Thank goodness there was bread to look forward to.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori greeted as she sat down for dinner. After almost a week of eating together again¡ªtomorrow would mark ten days exactly¡ªin addition to all the previous times over the winter, having the other Dungeon Binder sharing her bench had become routine, even if Lori did wonder how much longer she''d be staying.


    Shanalorre nodded right back. "Binder Lolilyuri," she said. "You look tired again. Are you well?"


    Lore waved a hand dismissively. "I''m fine, I''m fine. It''s just been another long day." Opposite them, Lord whatever-his-name-was watched the kitchen, ready to stand once food was being served. Lately, Rian and the other three had been coming to meal times later and later. The presence of the man seemed to stifle their willingness to flirt, which was strange because they never seemed to have a problem doing it in front of her. The delay wasn''t for very long, but it meant that she was lacking her pre-meal reports from Rian. "And you? Any problems today?"


    "None. I am pleased to report that all the recently born infants are progressing well and are continuing in good health without my intervention."


    Lori nodded. It was the same report for the past several days, but that was good. It meant there were no problems in regards to the health of her most delicate subjects. Said subjects would probably grow up to also be idiots, but given their parents, that couldn''t be helped, unfortunately. "I see. Again, thank you for your assistance, Binder Shanalorre."


    "Of course, Binder Lolilyuri. It''s the least I can do while we enjoy your extended hospitality."


    At this point, Rian finally arrived with a cheerful, "Hello, everyone," sliding down onto his spot on the bench opposite Lori. Despite his appearance, he was clearly tired, sitting down with the sort of heaviness that only really, really wanting to take your own weight off your feet could bring. "Ah, that feels so good¡­" He sighed, then shook his head. "All right, enough of that. Your Bindership, I''m told we''ll be ready to plant the Dungeon farm with vigas soon, possibly tomorrow."


    Lori nodded. "That shouldn''t take long then. What else?"


    "Well, it''s not exactly a flood, but the person I have watching the river told me just now that he thinks he spotted seels in the water."


    Lori blinked, then straightened. "Seels?"


    "He''s not sure," Rian cautioned as Riz walked up and sat next to Rian¡­ on the side away from Lord whatever-his-name-was. "Thinks it might just have been his eyes playing tricks on him. But he says he saw something dark in the water that was moving upriver. I think we should have people scout along the river tomorrow, see if they can spot more, and maybe tell us if the seels have decided to avoid our little spot of river from all the seeling we did last year."


    "Do it," Lori said. She could already taste the meat¡­ "Tell them not to venture too close to the edge."


    "No chance of that," Rian said as he unconsciously started leaning towards Riz. "With the snow gone, the colors beyond the edge are visible again."


    Ah. Right. She must have become too used to the nearly undifferentiated white when she''d been making beads beyond the edge. "Warn them regardless. I don''t want anyone becoming beast food."


    "I''m sure they''ll be touched that you care so much," Rian said with a bright smile. "Speaking of the river, we''ve started seeing some new growth of ropeweed along the banks¡­ "

 239 - (Re)Securing Water

    Work continued on as the water level of the river rose. Lori was informed when the river began to exceed its banks, and so she went out to see it for herself. The dock was properly underwater now, and the relevant working parts of the water hub shed were just barely above water. She hastily deactivated the building when she saw this, and began sealing the pipes leading from it again.


    After checking to make sure that the exhaust vent leading from her Dungeon wasn''t being overwhelmed and filling with water¡ªit wasn''t¡ªLori considered what she should do. They needed water, and unfortunately, all their water was provided by the water drawn from the shed. It was why it was the hub, after all. The water for the baths, the water for the kitchens, the drinking water, the water in her Dungeon''s reservoir¡­ all of it was drawn through the bindings in this building, which drew it from the river¡­


    Oh, right!


    Lori turned, looking past the laundry area and towards the stone pillars, troughs and arches of the aqueduct. It had stopped working during the winter because it had gotten too cold, and so she hadn''t been keeping the bindings on it imbued, letting them dissolve. Now, however, with the temperature warm enough for water to be liquid¡ªeven if Rian still insisted it was freezing cold¡ªshe could put the bindings back in place and get it working again.


    At the very least, it would ensure the demesne wasn''t lacking for drinking water, though she''d have to tell Rian to have the basins where the water would flow down cleaned. They''d still need water for the baths, at the very least, which was their most significant expenditure. She might be able to reroute all the pipes so that the used bathwater would be evaporated so it could be reused again, but¡­


    No, no, better to just build another water hub shed. Even when it''s been thoroughly treated, people objected to bathing and potentially drinking water they''d sullied. Even she objected to it, and she knew how thorough the process was!


    She had considered it some weeks earlier, but really, the best way to do this was to move the water hub shed such at it could still functioned even if the river was flooded. That meant raising it up such that the area where water was boiled to clean it was well above the level the flood water could reach. And it just so happened she''d build a nice, high stone structure recently¡­


    ¡­


    Yes, this flood barrier was probably going to be an annoyingly permanent feature of her demesne, wasn''t it?


    "Rian," Lori told her lord later at lunch that day, "I need you to have the water basins under the aqueducts cleaned. I''m going to be reactivating the aqueducts tomorrow, and I don''t want anyone getting sick because something has accumulated in the basins."


    "Ah, I was wondering if we''d still be using those this year," Rian said. "Though shouldn''t we clean the aqueducts themselves as well? There''s no point in cleaning the basins if the water is passing over dried bug droppings on the way there."


    The women on either side of him made expressions of distaste. So did the one in front of him for that matter, though for a slightly different reason. "Ugh, you''re right," Lori said. "Can it be done safely?"


    "I think so¡­" Rian said thoughtfully. "Our ladders should just barely let us get to the top, and as long as there''s no water running, it should be relatively safe. I''ll ask Arak if he has a rope long enough that we can use as a safety line. A little soap and some scrubbing¡­ though it would probably take a day or two before it''s finished, since we''d have to be careful¡­"


    Lori sighed. She''d been to check her Dungeon''s reservoir earlier, and while it was still full, without the snow melter or more water from the river adding to it, that wouldn''t last. "Get it done in a timely manner," Lori said. "I''ll work on moving the water hub shed so it can still function with the flood this afternoon." She thought of it, then added, "Until that''s done, no one is to use the pools in the baths."


    "That''s going to be a hit to morale," Rian sighed, "but I suppose it''s understandable. I''ll tell the bath house managers to stop refilling them after lunch."


    Lori ignored the disappointed groans from the nearby tables, as well as the sigh from next to her.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, Lori got to work on building the new water hub shed. While she knew that Rian would do exactly as he said and have the soaking pools in the baths not be filled with water¡­ it was likely that her idiots would ignore that order and do so anyway. So she had to move quickly to get something built that would replenish the water.


    Even though the old water hub shed was right there, she didn''t disassemble it for building material to make the new one. It might function as a good backup. Also, it was currently surrounded by calf-high rushing water, and while she could probably dismantle it at a distance without getting her boots wet, that would leave her Dungeon''s exhaust vent without physical protection, so best leave the old water hub shed where it was for now.


    The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    Building the newer water hub shed into the structure of the flood barrier was actually relatively easy. She didn''t build any pipes inside the wall¡ªthat might have resulted in some kind of structural weakness¡ªbut raising some stone walls allowed her to build a small water tank on the inside incline of the wall. They were simple vertical walls, since they weren''t expected to have to hold back much water¡ªat least, not compared to the flood barrier¡ªbut Lori made them a bit thicker in the bottom, just in case.


    The next day, some stairs were added to the incline so she could more easily reach the top of the wall, a job she was able to give to the masons and plasterers with their tools and some softened stone. While the stairs were being put in place, Lori laid down a stone tube on the outside of the flood barrier that reached down into the river, which she then formed a pipe inside for the water to pass through. She made sure the stone tube was thick so that it was unlikely to be damaged. The end of the pipe actually connected with the old water hub shed, using its mass for further protection, before opening up into an intake tube within the river.


    Lori wanted to keep the weight of the new water hub structure to a minimum, so as to put less stress on the flood barrier it was built on top of, but that wasn''t really possible. The new water hub shed needed to be durable enough to survive a dragon, or at least dragonborn abominations. Still, the extra-thick walls such reinforcement needed would serve just as well to strengthen the flood wall from breaking under the pressure of a flood, so it was probably a net advantage in the end.


    The walls she had already added to the flood barrier needed a little extension so she could properly build a shed she could stand up in, while the roof was a simple stone half-cylinder roof. She had to reinforce it with ice acting as a solid support while she was building it, but by the time she finished, the arching half-cylinder was a sturdy, solid thing that¡­ well, would probably crack if a dragon scale fell on it, but it would be enough to keep the weather out.


    After having the carpenters measure out a door for the one opening in the new water hub shed, Lori got to work on actually building the necessary components within it. The new water hub shed didn''t really have a floor, as such, only a triangular, sloping tank for the water that would be pulled from the river. First she placed a binding in the pipe extending into the river, to draw up water and dump it into the water tank, but didn''t activate it yet. Then she placed a slatted frame made of bone she''d made in front of the pipe output, securing it in place to the stone and anchoring a binding to it that would attract the mineral sediments to the bone to filter out large particulates.


    Only then did she activate the first binding, drawing water from the river, and examined the resulting quality.


    ¡­


    Lori sighed and anchored a binding of lightwisps inside the water hub shed, since not a lot of light was really passing through the opening into the shed, and she was blocking most of it. With the better illumination, she was able to give the water a closer look. It looked far clearer than the water flowing outside in the river did, so it did seem like particulates were being removed. Still, the water was no doubt filled with dustlife, some of which could cause illness¡­


    After that, all she had to do was build an intake about halfway up the holding tank that led down to the pipe from the old water hub shed to the reservoir, placing a binding on it to draw in water. Then she began drawing water from the river and filling the holding tank. Once the holding tank was partly full, Lori added in the binding of firewisps and waterwisps that would simultaneously heat the water to boiling while preventing the water from becoming steam.


    More bindings of firewisps on the inner surfaces of the new water hub shed prevented the heat generated from leaking outward, keeping the heat contained within the shed and in the water. The binding also functioned to pull heat out of the water being drawn through the pipes towards her Dungeon''s reservoir so that she wouldn''t be filling it with superheated water. After a certain point, the binding would stop generating heat and simply keep it within the binding.


    At that point, the most pressing concern would be to keep people from entering the water hub shed and killing themselves by accidentally falling into superheated water.


    "What about bugs?" Rian asked later at dinner when she told him why she was waiting on the door the carpenters were still in the process of building before activating the new water hub shed.


    Lori frowned. "What?"


    "Bugs. You know, hard shells, more than four limbs, occasionally wings¡ª"


    "I know what bugs are, Rian. What about them?"


    "Well, the door keeps people out, right? What''s keeping bugs out so they don''t fall into the water and get boiled alive? For that matter, what''s keeping bugs and slugs in the water from being pulled up the intake tube in the river?"


    Lori stared at him. Then she sighed. "I¡­ think there was a binding in the almanac that mentioned an efficient means of keeping bugs away from a location using lightningwisps," Lori said. "I''ll read up on it tonight, and see if it can be adapted to work in water."


    Rian sighed. "I suppose I should ask around and see if anyone has some clean cloth scraps you can just secure onto the end of the tube to act as a filter or something."


    "That¡­ will probably work too," Lori conceded.


    Sighing, Rian reached for his cup of water and was about to raise it to his lips for a drink when he paused. Slowly, he looked down at his cup. "You know, I just realized¡­ the way you''re saying it, you never built any way to keep bugs and things out of the old water hub shed, right?"


    "Yes¡­?"


    "And¡­ when you opened the shed earlier this winter, you found a lot of dead bugs in there¡­"


    Lori stared at him. Then she twitched and looked down at her own cup of water.


    "When was the last time you actually checked inside the water hub shed before you opened it this winter?" Rian asked, still staring down at his cup.


    "I''m sure it''s fine," Lori said, also still looking down at her own cup. "The water is boiled beyond the capacity of life to survive, evaporated, and shone with unseen light that actively kills all life exposed to it. The phase where it is evaporated alone ensures that only clean water could possibly come from the Dungeon''s reservoir."


    "So it''s not rotting bug water, it''s well-cooked bug broth?"


    They both continued to stare at the water in their cups¡­

 240 - Forward Planning

    The next day, after installing the cloth that Rian had managed to acquire over the opening of the intake pipe leading into her Dungeon''s reservoir, Lori resolved to not think about the water issue once she finished installing the door of the new elevated water hub shed. After all, it had been boiled, evaporated, and then shone with unseen light to kill dustlife! Even just the evaporation meant the water coming from her reservoir could not have any hypothetical essence of dead bugs in it!


    The aqueducts, in the meantime, were still in the middle of being cleaned. Volunteers with experience at climbing where scouring the channels atop the stone structure, removing leaves, dead bugs, and other detritus. Rian was supervising, because Lori had told him under no circumstances was he to actually climb up and do the work himself, lest he fall, crack his head open, and leave her without a functional lord. Riz, next to him, had taken it upon herself to make sure he stayed on the ground.


    Technically, with the water hub shed functioning again, there was no reason to bring the aqueducts back into service. People could just get their water from the bath houses like they''d been doing all winter. However, that would no doubt cause congestion in the baths since people were starting to work again. While she''d keep the drinking water accessible in the baths, bringing the aqueducts back into service would keep people from congregating in the baths, especially since filling water containers probably wasn''t instantaneous.


    Besides, with the laundry area likely to flood soon¡ªat the moment it was still high enough to remain dry, but the level of the river continued to rise¡ªpeople were probably going to start washing their clothes in the baths again. She wasn''t going to make another laundry area¡ªthey could just wait it out¡ªbut giving her idiots somewhere else to get water from would alleviate the inevitable crowding.


    "How much longer before the aqueducts are cleaned?" Lori asked her lord during lunch later that day, before dipping a piece of bread into her soup to eat.


    "Optimistically, maybe this afternoon," Rian said, still stirring his own bowl to cool it down. "Realistically, perhaps tomorrow morning. You didn''t exactly build the aqueducts with cleaning them in mind." He chuckled for some reason. "That might actually be what you need to build next: convenient access to the aqueduct''s channels, so it''s easier to do it next time. We really shouldn''t clean them only once a year, after all."


    Lori twitched and vey determinedly did not think of all the cups of water she''d drank over the year. "That would be a waste of time," she said. "Have the carpenters build some sort of reusable scaffold. Given future construction projects, such would be a more worthwhile investment of time and materials."


    "Usually, it''s safer to have such things be made of metal," Rian said. "For the sturdiness. Wood that keeps getting assembled and dismantled like that will get worn down eventually."


    "It doesn''t need to last forever. Just for the year''s needs. Perhaps two years, if we''re lucky."


    "Another permanent temporary solution?"


    Lori twitched.


    "I know, I know," Rian said, his voice strange. "It makes me cringe inside too."


    "Then why bring it up?" Lori ground out.


    "To remind us both that it is temporary, and that someday we''ll get around to putting in something better and permanent," Rian said with a bright smile. "Eventually."


    Lori twitched again. "What else?"


    "The door for the water hub shed should be done this afternoon, so you can put it in place then," Rian said. "Work on the farms, both above and below ground as well as mushroom, are progressing well. And I felt I should remind you, but I can take you to see where the coal burners have set up their mounds at your convenience."


    Ah. Right, that. "Tomorrow, once I''ve reactivated the aqueduct," Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "We''ve also started seeing seels coming back up the river again. I''ve taken the liberty of telling everyone, especially Karina, that no seeling is to be done while the river''s still flooded. The current''s too dangerous, and even if it wasn''t, the added silt makes it hard to be sure of your footing."


    "Good. We can afford to wait a few more weeks for fresh seel." Lori paused. "We can, right?"


    "Yes, we can," Rian assured. "We still have meat in the cold room. Though in anticipation of needing to refill it, I''ve had the hunters scouting out the edges of the demesne and keeping an eye out on the beasts out there. It looks like the beasts are starting to calm down, so it should be safe to try and hunt them soon. We might even be able to send someone to River''s Fork soon and tell them we didn''t try to kidnap their Dungeon Binder."


    Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.


    "While such a message would be appreciated, since my aunt is no doubt worrying, I would rather no one be put at risk for such a thing," Shanalorre said from a little bit away from Lori on the bench.


    "Noted, Great Binder," Rian said, nodding towards her. "It''s unlikely to happen any time soon. We''ll probably be able to take you downriver by boat sooner than we can send a message."


    "''Great Binder''?" Lori said, raising an eyebrow.


    "I thought I''d give it a shot," Rian said, shrugging. "Don''t worry, you''re still greater, your Bindership."


    Next to Rian, Riz coughed, covering her mouth. At least she knew how to keep disease from spreading.


    "Rian, stop being silly and get back to reporting."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Speaking of food stores, we might need to make them just a little bit bigger. They were able to last us the winter and then some, but I think it would be better we had more food storage capacity. We should probably make separate storage for the smoked and cured meat in any case."


    Lori looked towards the where the cold rooms were. "I''ll see about expanding current storage," she said. "Now would be the best time to expand them, while most of them are empty." She''d have to do this carefully. Her idea had been to expand the cold room downward, which could be dangerous since they used solidified air to cool the food now instead of ice. While the former didn''t melt into water, it was unbreathable. If she wasn''t careful, the concentration of unbreathable air could become dangerous.


    Hmm¡­ perhaps she could build upwards, instead? That way any unbreathable air would be level with the door and be circulated out. Technically, building upwards wouldn''t be any different than building downwards, in regards to structural stability¡­ after construction was finished. During construction, however, she''d need to add pillars and arches to the current cold room so that it would be able to support the floor of the expansion above¡­


    Something to consider later. "Is there anything else?"


    "Nothing important, though I feel I should remind you that we''ll need two new houses built," Rian said. "For the petitioners."


    Ah, yes, that had slipped her mind. "I remember," Lori lied. "I''ll build it after the cold room expansion. I''ll have the material for it by then."


    Rian hummed. "Well, that should be everything for now¡­ though as your lord, I think you should take a break this afternoon and plan the order you''re going to build things, maybe reread your almanac as well to remind you of what resources you have there."


    Lori frowned, but nodded. Well, she did need to think about her approach to expanding the cold rooms. "Fine. Inform me when the door is finished so I can install it."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian chirped.


    Lori pointed at his still half-full bowl. "Now eat before that goes all the way cold." Her own bowl of soup was conspicuously empty.


    "I point out that I can''t really eat when I''m doing most of the talking."


    "Less talking, more eating."


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    Installing the door to the new water hub shed was simple enough. With the carpenters having measured the doorway, all Lori really needed to do was sink the hinges into the stone and anchor them in place. After that, the water hub shed was complete, and she could finally activate all the bindings to bring it into operation. She watched it for a while, making sure everything was functioning as intended before closing the door and locking it with stone to prevent it from swinging open, sealing the edges as best as she could to keep out any inquisitive bugs


    That done, Lori got back to planning how she was going to approach the cold room expansion. While it would be easier to expand underground, she ultimately decided it would be safer in the long term to expand upwards. She had enough experience with excavating to be reasonably certain she could do so safely, and building upwards was safer in the event of a potential flood, since it meant their food would hopefully be above water level. And while they no longer used ice to keep the cold room chill, this would also allow any condensation to flow down to ground level and be dealt with relatively easily instead of gather in an underground pit and potentially making a pool.


    ¡­


    Lori made a note to have wooden steps on any stairs so that it wouldn''t become slippery with condensation or ice. Well, less slippery than just stone, at least¡­


    The first cold room would probably take some time as she took care and did it slowly for safety''s sake, but expansion of subsequent cold rooms should be faster once she had more experience.


    She also reread her almanac, as Rian had suggested. The binding for making a steady supply of solidified air was tempting to add to the cold rooms as an integrated feature, but without the sort of pressure vessels it specified, it was still a bit unfeasible. Still, it was something she could try and have the smiths make later. They still had some anatass, after all.


    Perhaps she could experiment using very, very thick stone and see how viable that was? As long as it produced enough solidified air to break even, it should be more than enough to maintain the temperature of the cold rooms. Well, she''d try it later when she had time to experiment.


    A dehydration shed to accelerate the drying of vigas, fruits, mushrooms and anything else that might be feasibly dried, however, was well within her current resources. It would be far slower than the dedicated desiccator she''d made for the vigas during the first harvest, but it would require far less oversight on her part beyond imbuement. Given that it would probably start raining soon, it would also be useful for the drying of any gathered deadfall.


    Her reread of the almanac didn''t bring anything immediately useful to her attention, though she did find and make note of the binding for using lightningwisps to keep away bugs. After the water hub shed, she should put that on the entryway to her dungeon, once she''d properly read through it and was certain it wasn''t harmful to her idiots. And the baths. And the shelter. And around the open channels of the aqueduct¡­


    Oh, welding metal together with lightningwisps would probably be useful at some point¡ªit talked about welding broken tools together¡ªbut she was unlikely to need to do her own welding any time soon. Though¡­ would this process work with glass? The problem with metal was that it couldn''t be shaped by earthwisps unless it had reached an almost molten state, and glass was similar. Could she use this process to selectively heat parts of glass enough to make it malleable without needing to melt the entire mass?


    It would be something for her to test once she had a free moment¡­ and when Shanalorre was no longer in the demesne to potentially see it.

 241 - Bug Repellent

    Almanac in hand, Lori carefully followed the flow diagram for the binding to repel bugs from an area. She made it small for now, since it was just a test binding in her room, making a binding about the size of a door. After all, that was how big the binding needed to be for the water hub shed.


    According to the flow diagram notes, the lightningwisps would charge the air in such a way as to irritate the delicate sensory organs of bugs, discouraging them from passing through the binding, while at the same time causing no harm to people beyond a slight tingling sensation of the hairs. At least, if she followed the flow diagram properly¡­ and if the person who''d written the flow diagram was writing it down properly. Granted, the diagram looked right, but it would be best if it were tested, just in case.


    Warily, she imbued the binding. There were no sparks of light, no crackling in the air, no peals of thunder. The ignorant always assumed lightningwisps looked like¡­ well, lightning. In truth, lightning was too impractical for most of the uses one usually wanted lightningwisps for, unless you wanted to kill someone, make something explode, or¡­ well, pretty much those two things.


    This binding''s output was well below what was needed to harm, much less kill, but Lori was careful nonetheless as she warily passed her hand through where the binding was. Because of the way the binding was put together¡ªlightningwisps and airwisps anchored and chained together¡ªthe imbued lightningwisps went around her body instead of passing through, which was what kept it from being instantly fatal, or at least extremely painful.


    The other lightningwisps emanating from the binding, not imbued but simply free in the environment, did pass through her, but there was no tingle as the binding said there would be. Lori frowned, wondering if she''d done something wrong. She should have been feeling something at the concentration of lightningwisps in the air. A small spark, or at least the sensation of her hairs straightening, but there was nothing. Why¡­?


    Oh. She should have realized. It was like the way the firewisps around her changed without her direct control, modulating the temperature around her so she wasn''t too cold or too warm. The lightningwisps seemed to do that same, such that she couldn''t actually experience the usual indicators of their presence.


    Colors.


    That meant she''d need outside input to inform her how well the binding was working.


    "Rian," Lori said at dinner as they waited for the food to be ready, "where''s Landoor?"


    Rian raised an eyebrow, narrowing his eyes slightly. Next to him, Umu moved away a little. "That depends. What do you want him for?"


    "I just need him to test the binding I made to keep bugs out."


    "And you need Landoor for that, because¡­?"


    "I need to see if it''s harmful to humans."


    "Please don''t use our people to do that," Rian sighed as Shanalorre turned, staring at Lori. "Really, no one in our demesne has done anything deserving of being a subject for destructive human testing. As your lord in charge of dealing with people, it''s literally my job to tell you to not do this!"


    "Well, I still need to test the binding," Lori said, ignoring the stare, "to make sure it''s tuned to repel bugs but not kill humans."


    "Just test it on bugs! If it doesn''t kill them, it probably won''t kill a human."


    "I would, if I could catch a bug to test it on," Lori said. She¡­ actually hadn''t thought of doing it that way, but she supposed she could do it that way as well.


    "Is it really important to test it?" Rian asked, sounding exasperated. "Can''t you just set it up and leave it, then then come back in a week to see if bugs got in?"


    "I need to test the binding''s safety and effectiveness now, before all the bugs start breeding in earnest so I know it''s safe to put the binding around other locations. If I wait, there will already be bugs inside whatever I put the binding around."


    "Oh, come on, you barely notice the bugs in the Dungeon. And the all the food is well sealed, so that''s not an issue."


    Lori blinked. "There are bugs in my Dungeon?"


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "For several weeks, the front door of your Dungeon was a boulder with a gap around the edges to keep you from asphyxiating, and even now, we leave the door open during the day. Why are you surprised there are bugs in the Dungeon?"


    Lori stared at him in horror. The reservoir¡­ the reservoir was just there, at the end of a sealed hallway¡­ a seal that had gaps to let air in¡­


    "Is my Dungeon infested?" Lori said, voice faint.


    "It has a far less than normal amount of bugs," Rian said. "They''re not getting into the vigas, the flour, or the meat, because the cold rooms are freezing. Mostly they''ve just been buzzing around, staying warm. The regular latrine cleanings and sweepings mean they have nothing to eat if they stay here, and the farmers worked to keep them from eating the vigas while it was growing. So relax, your Dungeon isn''t horribly infested by bugs. It just has a few here and there." Rian hummed. "Though if we start growing fruit trees, that might change. More places to hide, softer things to eat, harder to keep bugs off because fruit trees are taller¡­"


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    Lori twitched.


    Rian sighed. "Look, if it''s really important to you, I''ll test the binding for you. Even if you made a mistake, as long as it''s not instantly lethal, Binder Shanalorre can most likely fix me. Probably. Maybe. Hopefully." He glanced sideways at the visiting Dungeon Binder. "Uh, that is, if you''re willing?"


    "Of course," Binder Shanalorre said. "I''m perfectly willing to assist in ensuring no one comes to lasting harm."


    "You sound increasingly less hopeful," Lori said.


    "I''m just remembering that you asked for Landoor to test this, meaning it''s potential lethal."


    "Potentially harmful, not lethal. The lightningwisps are not set to be powerful enough to be lethal."


    "Then why are you testing it?"


    "To make sure it''s functioning as intended."


    "How diligent of you," Rian sighed. "Well, come on, let''s get this over with before Mikon and Riz get here with the food."


    Lori blinked. "Now?"


    "Yeah. This shouldn''t take long, right? I mean, you just need to know if it''ll be harmful if someone passes through it. Just make one, I''ll walk through it a few times, and if I end up on the ground shaking in pain and agony Binder Shanalorre can put me back together so I can have dinner and sleep it off." Rian stood up, stepping over his bench and looking at Lori expectantly.


    ¡­


    Well, she hadn''t expected to test this at the dinner table, but it wasn''t really a complicated test. Lori stood as well, binding darkwisps from under her clothes. It flowed out from around her like her soul leaving her body as she anchored the darkwisps to the ground and used it to define the area she''d be putting the bug repellent binding on.


    People sitting at the other tables watch curiously as she raised the door-shaped patch of darkness, then anchored the binding of lightningwisps and airwisps to it, drawing some of the lightningwisps from her body, her finger growing numb for a moment, to make the binding.


    "All right, it''s done," Lori said, the feeling returning to her finger as she finished. "The binding is set, so just walk through it to see if it will harm you."


    "Right¡­" Rian said. "So, just to be clear, this is supposed to be safe for people and you''re just being sure, right?"


    "Yes, of course," Lori said. "If I wanted to harm someone with lightningwisps, I''d just do everything my teachers told me never to do with lightningwisps."


    "Was one of them ''don''t work with lightningwisps when you''re taking a bath''?"


    "¡­yes."


    "I''m fairly certain the only one that would harm would be you. So, uh¡­ please don''t do it? For all our sakes?"


    Lori didn''t deign to answer. "Rian, just get on with it."


    "Right, right¡­" Rian muttered, looking at the doorway-shaped square of darkness. He took a deep breath and stepped through.


    Then he frowned, turned around, and stepped back.


    "That¡­ feels strange," Rian declared, rolling his shoulders strangely. "But I don''t actually feel like I''ve been harmed. Are you sure this thing is working right?" He stepped through again, still frowning. "This feel very anticlimactic, really. Why did you think this could possibly harm someone? Wait, did you at least try it yourself before looking for other people to do this?"


    "Of course I did," Lori said. "However, I couldn''t tell if it was harmful or not because the lightningwisps changed when they touched me. I wouldn''t have even felt them if I hadn''t known they were there. Hence why I needed to test it on someone else." She tilted her head. "I suppose this means the binding is safe to put in front of the door of my Dungeon to keep bugs out, then."


    "Do you think you can put it on the fields to keep the bugs off?" Rian said thoughtfully. "It would mean far less worrying about whether bugs are eating the crops."


    Lori shrugged. "I don''t see why not. Though I''ll have to test it to see if it has any adverse affects on plants." Hopefully it wouldn''t. Any excess lightningwisps should just be pulled down to the ground.


    "We can find some poor, blameless stalk of vigas just minding its own business for you to test on," Rian said, stepping through the binding one more time. "Anyone else want to try this before Binder Lori puts it on the front door?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was raining the next day as Lori put the binding across the entrance of her Dungeon. The location was close enough that with a little creativity she was able to connect the bug repellent binding to the lightwisps that illuminated the inside of her dungeon, allowing the binding to be imbued directly by her core with no intervention on her part.


    People were wary as they crossed the threshold of the binding into her dungeon, but other than a shudder or patting at the hairs on their arms, the binding truly had no effect on people, and it wasn''t long before people were passing through the binding without hesitation. Well, except for the children, who kept walking back and forth through the binding and giggling at the way it made their hair tingle.


    Her inspection of the charcoal burning site had already been postponed because of the rain. Despite the temperature immediately around her body adjusting to her comfort while she was in her demesne, walking through mud and rain would still have been a miserable experience. In addition, the cleaning of the aqueduct had to be postponed because it was too dangerous to work on, so reactivating it was put aside for the moment.


    Once the binding in front of her Dungeon''s entrance was finished, she went to install the binding in the water hub shed. The rain dripped down from the brim of her hat as she stood outside the door of the shed, placing the binding on the four walls of the shed, as well as on the ceiling and atop the boiling water. Then she slowly pulled the bindings towards the entrance.


    No bugs were dislodged by the bindings, but did that mean none managed to get in through her seal on the door or the binding wasn''t enough to irritate them into motion? She supposed she''d have to check in a week or so. Securing the binding behind the doorway on the inside of the shed, Lori closed the door again, this time only making the stone extrude enough to prevent the door from opening.


    Once that was done, Lori moved on. She placed the same binding on the entrances of the shelter, the Um, and the baths. If there were any bugs trapped within¡­ well, people could deal with the things on their own. However, she repeated the procedure she had done at the water hub shed when she came to the mushroom farm, this time focusing on her awareness of the demesne''s wisps to look for small, mobile voids. This finally allowed her to find a few, distributed among several static mostly-voids¡ªthere were spots of darkwisps, lightningwisps, airwisps and waterwisps¡ªthat were probably the frames holding up the logs on which the mushrooms were grown.


    As the bug repellent binding became active, Lori was glad to see the voids immediately move. She kept the door of the mushroom farm open as she pulled the bindings from the walls, herding the bugs in the farm towards the opening. The bugs flew or skittered past, and she lost track of them in the rain as she pulled the bindings towards the door and collapsed them into a smaller, properly fitted size for the entrance, anchoring the binding in place.


    Idly, Lori wondered if the outdoor mushroom farm was being built yet and made a note to herself to have Rian show her where it was. Had it even been started or were they waiting for her to assign a specific plot of land first? Uh, she should probably assign the land herself.


    With the binding over the mushroom farm''s entrance in place, Lori headed back towards her dungeon. As she began to pass Rian''s house again, she paused, then shrugged. All the shutters were closed against the rain, but through her awareness of wisps she could feel no people inside it. There were a few small voids though, probably bugs that had gotten under the door or in through the chimney. As the rain fell, Lori began placing bindings on the walls, floor and ceilings¡­

 242 - Cold Room Improvements

    The river continued to rise, becoming more turbulent as it did, rising a third of the way up the flood barrier. This probably wasn''t solely because of the rain, since the river had been low when they''d arrived the year before, and it had still been raining then.


    Rian and Lord whatever-his-name-was checked the river every morning, debating whether it was safe enough to take Shanalorre back to River''s Fork before reluctantly admitting it was still too dangerous. However, enough time had passed that the beasts had managed to find something to eat, and so a volunteer accompanied by the hunters again tried to reach the other demesne overland. Lori had personally had given them up for dead.


    Well, less mouths to feed, and since there were other hunters who knew how to cure hides, skins and furs, it wasn''t a total loss to her demesne, though it would slow the tannery down a little.


    Lori began expanding their cold rooms upwards. She carefully excavated stone from their ceilings, using that to make a support pillar in the center of the room to help support the weight of the stone. The room might be small enough that she could just keep digging upward, but she wanted to be sure the ceiling wouldn''t collapse under the weight of the stone above. Still, a single support pillar would do. With that in place, she excavated upward, doubling the height of the cold room.


    She had to be careful to work around the empty wooden shelves filling the cold room, at least until she gave up and found Rian to tell him to get her people to move all the shelves to on side so she could excavate the room properly.


    "So, you want the carpenters to put on a wooden floor above this?" Rian said once the shelves had all been moved to one side.


    "Yes. I''ll take care of building the stairs. Make sure to tell them that the floor needs to be able to support more shelves."


    "May I ask why you didn''t just make a second level out of stone?"


    "Air needs to pass through the floor so that cold air can circulate and make the cold room cold. Also, this was faster."


    "Faster for you maybe, but it''ll take some time for the carpenters to build a second floor," Rian said, looking up where the ceiling was partially excavated. "Especially if it''s supposed to be able to hold up shelves of meat. Can''t you just dig shelves out of the wall?"


    "I could, and intend to do that once the floor is in place, but that would be a waste of space. At least have them build some shelves for the middle of the room, around the support pillar."


    Rian sighed. "Well, we''ll have time. Once you finish digging we can move the shelves back in place and use it as we have been while we build the next floor and shelves. I''ll go and have people move the shelves in the other empty cold rooms for you. Call me when you''re done so we can put the shelves back."


    Lori nodded absently, getting back to work excavation the ceiling. She had to be careful so that stone wouldn''t fall down and damage the shelves, so she had to move the stone over the shelves first¡ª


    Rian came back into the cold room. "Lori, did you add these lights after you started working in the cold room?"


    Lori gave him a strange look. "Of course. Why would I work in the dark?"


    Rian nodded. "That''s what I thought. Could you come and put some lights in the other cold rooms so we don''t have to work in the dark while we''re moving around heavy furniture?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After putting in lights in the cold rooms and connecting them to her Dungeon''s lightwisp binding, Lori finally finished excavating the first cold room. She used the excavated stone to add some stairs just to the right of the door, so that the carpenters would know how high the floor needed to be. That way they wouldn''t just build at random, and it was convenient for storing meat on both floors.


    She spent the next two days working on the empty cold rooms, excavating the ceilings and putting stairs to the side of the door. Only the cold room that still had food in it was left untouched for now, but she''d already given orders that, once she''d filled the expanded cold room with solidified air, that all new food be put in those and the remaining cold room be allowed to empty so she could expand it. The carpenters had begun measuring the first cold room for the floor, which would mean they''d need wood for beams and floor planks, which she''d need to cure once it was cut¡­ ah, and she''d need to make more solidified air for all the cold rooms once they started filling up¡­


    "Binder Lori, can we have a holiday?" Rian asked brightly at dinner that night. Next to him, Riz perked up with interest.


    Lori blinked, disturbed out of her musings. "What?"


    "A holiday," Rian repeated, still smiling. "We probably should have had one sooner, but now''s a good time as ever. None of the buildings are in need or urgent repair and I''m told the crops are doing well and just need to grow. Now is the best time for a holiday."


    Lori gave him a flat look. "We''ve just spent the past two days excavating our very empty cold rooms."


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    "The one cold room that still has food in it is still mostly full," Rian said. "Come on, the food won''t last forever even if it''s frozen. We managed to survive the winter, no one died of anything, and all the births turned out well. If that''s not a reason to have a holiday and celebrate, what is?"


    "There''s work to be done," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, but it''s all work we can still put off for a day, as opposed to being very urgent and immediate because survival is at stake. All the urgent work has already been done. Come on, please? We haven''t had one this winter yet. Consider this an ''end of winter'' holiday." Next to him, Riz nodded enthusiastically, looking at Lori with pleading eyes. Lori ignored her


    "I''m fairly certain winter ended when the river melted," she pointed out. "Besides, it''s still raining outside. We can hardly hold a holiday out in the rain."


    "As it happens, we have a nice, spacious floor that everyone in the demesne can fit in with plenty of space to spare¡ª"


    "We are not having a dragon shelter party!" Lori snapped.


    "It''s not a dragon shelter party if there''s no dragon to shelter from," Rian said brightly. "And I''ll have everyone stop making music by sundown."


    "I''m not having people light fires down there to roast meat! That will fill my Dungeon with smoke! It will stain the ceilings with soot!"


    "And people will suffocate," Rian said.


    "If they light a fire in my Dungeon, and stain my ceilings, I''ll let them!"


    "I see¡­ yes, that''s a valid objection, I guess."


    What?


    "If only we had someone who could create a heat source intense enough to cook meat that doesn''t produce smoke¡­" Rian said with a wide smile. "Then we could have a holiday indoors complete with roasted meat¡­"


    Lori gave him an unamused looked.


    "Come on¡­ we can open up more of the honey and make honey bread¡­ or hey, we could try cooking the meat with a sweet honey glaze, maybe? Plants will be flowering soon, so the sweetbugs can go out and collect more of the sweet green stuff¡­"


    "That sounds absolutely disgusting," Lori said.


    "All right, admittedly we might be lacking a few ingredients to make the glaze properly, but we have honey, we have salt, a little jar of vinegar, some vauang, we have all those other spices we''ve been growing in the Dungeon farm, why not give it a try? Someone must know how to make a good honey glaze from those things."


    Oh, right. They did have spices now, didn''t they? "Do we even have enough of those?" Lori asked.


    "We have enough to give our holiday food a little kick," Rian smile became a grin. It showed teeth and everything.


    Lori twitched. "Fine," she conceded, and ignored the cheers that came from all the other tables around them. "However! Before you can have a holiday, you need to go out and see if you can hunt more beast meat to start replenishing our stores. If you bring in some new meat, you can use an equal amount of the frozen, stored meat for holiday food the day after."


    "Aw, you''re just worried we''ll all starve to death, aren''t you?"


    "No, I''m worried I''ll starve to death if you manage to use up all the food in storage."


    "Well, nice to know you don''t see us as emergency food."


    Lori made a face at the terrible joke, as did Riz. "Rian, don''t be disgusting. This is a civilized demesne, not the Armada."


    "I''m fairly certain the Armada doesn''t actually eat their dead, just use them as fertilizer."


    "You''re the one talking about people as emergency food," Lori pointed out.


    "Yes, I regretted it as soon as I said it. Please still let us have a holiday?"


    "For your tastelessness, you are only allowed to use half as much frozen meat for all the fresh meat you bring back."


    Rian sighed, but nodded. "Understood, your Bindership. Bring back twice as much meat."


    Lori nodded sharply. Emergency food¡­ really, sometimes he just wasn''t funny.


    "You''re really going to have a holiday?"


    Lori turned towards Shanalorre sitting with her on the bench. The other Dungeon Binder politely stayed quiet whenever she spoke to Rian about the demesne''s matters, but she supposed they were done speaking now. "Yes," Lori said. "I''m told its occasionally necessary for people to rest. Personally, I don''t see how it counts as rest when they seem to be even louder and rowdier than they usually are."


    "What do you do on holidays?" Shanalorre asked, wide-eyed and curious.


    Lori shrug. "Eat roasted meat instead of stewed meat¡­ or soup, in this case. Make a lot of noise. Sing loudly. A few people dance. People play boards games, and sometimes do so in tournament format. The children play games all day. "


    "Please don''t make our holidays sound boring and no fun, your Bindership," Rian said. He looked sideways at both Shanalorre and Lord whatever-his-name-was. "It''s not as boring as she makes it sound, I promise."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Then I''ll look forward to it, Lord Rian, provided we''re still here when it occurs."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Half a week after they left, the militia that Shanalorre had sent to River''s Fork with a message and the hunters who had accompanied them returned, still alive, looking worn but relatively uninjured. The party that had gone out to hunt beasts to replenish their cold room encountered them making their way back, the hunt was put on hold as they escorted the group back to the demesne.


    "They managed to make it to River''s Fork, where some people had apparently managed to convince themselves that we''ve taken their people hostage, and the remaining militia should arm up to try and get them back," Rian explained to Lori. "When our people and Shanalorre''s volunteer showed up, those same people accused them of more of the same and that our message that everyone was all right and would be returning once the river had settle enough to make travel safe was a trick while we murdered their Dungeon Binder."


    "Idiots," Lori said. If she wanted Shanalorre dead, she''d have been dead already. There''d be no need for messages or anything like that.


    "From the sound of it, either Shanalorre or Yllian foresaw the possibility of this happening and prepared confirmation codes with the militia that remained behind before they left," Rian said. "Thankfully, it was just a few people making trouble. Everyone was too tired to bother listening to them. They''ve been busy making their own flood barrier with rocks and baked mud, and making sure it didn''t leak, tending their own vigas fields, and doing their own spring work. Though Shanalorre''s aunt sent them some fruit to bring back here."


    Lori frowned. "Fruit? Why?"


    "Probably because it was the only well-preserved, portable food they could give our hunters, and maybe as thanks for taking care of their Dungeon Binder?" Rian shrugged. "Maybe they''re just being kind to travelers."


    "The first one sounds more likely."


    Rian shrugged again, then grinned. "Well, in any case, the fruits should be a good addition for trying to make that honey glaze sauce!"


    "Why are you so focused on that honey glaze sauce?"


    "Because plain roasted meat is getting just a little repetitive, all right! This will be great for morale!"

 243 - Cold Room And Holiday Preparation

    In preparation for new food that would be stored in the cold rooms, Lori had been making more solidified and liquefied air.


    Normally, making solidified air was quick, something she usually did every few days to replenish their cold rooms. She''d go into their cold rooms and check how many blocks of solidified air they still had, and that the walls and floor was kept free of ice condensing out of the air. When the number of blocks was sufficiently depleted, she made more.


    She was vaguely aware of how much food they had because of this, but it wasn''t something she really thought about. The meat was just¡­ there, pale and frost-covered chunks on the shelves or hanging from the hooks built into some of the shelves. As long as there was stuff in the cold rooms, there was food, so she didn''t need to worry, even as she had to stop putting blocks of solidified air in some of the cold rooms because they were empty¡­


    Over the months, she had refined her methodology. Nowadays she used a large block of ice that had been carefully solidified to be cold enough to form flakes of solidified exhalation without also condensing inhalation into blue liquefied air, which she would usually set up in the cold room that most needed replenishment. The block would have a hole at the top that led down into a hollow space within the block where the air would liquefy and solidify. When it was time to make solidified air, Lori would deactivate the bindings that kept the ice solidified except for a thin layer over the outside faces of the block. This meant that while the ice would begin to exchange temperature, it would only do so within the hollow inside it.


    Lori would then use airwisps to push air through the opening of the block and into the hollow within, where the temperature would begin to solidify the air, as well as some water vapor. Flakes of solidified air would start to gather at the bottom of the hollow, which she''d tamp down and compress with a tool to force it into a convenient block. Excess air that wouldn''t solidify would leak out of another hole in the side, to help lower the temperature of the cold room. Every so often she''d have to poke that outlet hole with a stick as flakes of solidified air and normal water ice formed around it from the cold.


    The blocks of solidified air would be placed high up on a shelf, atop a tray of bone that she had made to for the purpose of catching any water ice that remained when the solidified air was gone. Lori was careful whenever she handled the solidified air. Under normal circumstances, contact with it was dangerous to human flesh, and even with the firewisps around her altering temperature so that she was always comfortable, she did not want to test the substance''s effects on her. Her touching it would also be wasteful, as the firewisps around her would add heat and cause the block to sublimate back into air.


    With the expansion of the cold rooms, however, Lori decided she needed a bit more cooling to bring the expanded room down to a temperature that could safely preserve food and keep it from harboring dustlife. While they still had one functioning cold room, she wanted the expanded cold room ready to accept new meat.


    The day after she agreed to let Rian have his holiday once he met her conditions, she set up for mass production of solidified air in one of the expanded cold rooms, telling everyone to not disturb her. Instead of just a single hollow block of ice, she set up several, with the blocks of ice solidified completely, making them as cold as possible. This caused liquefied air to form, but that was intentional. The liquefied air that would normally have been bothersome for her¡ªthere was a reason her blocks of ice was prepared to be just above the temperature that inhalation liquefied¡ªdripped out of a spout she had placed on the sides of the blocks and into a long open trough made of bound ice. The cold room she was in quickly became very cold, such that mist wafted from the floor, and even she had to actively bind the firewisps around herself to stay comfortably warm.


    As both solidified and liquefied air started to form, Lori went over to her Dungeon''s reservoir¡ªmaking sure to seal the entrance to the cold room she was using to prevent accidents¡ªand drew out a mass of water that she also solidified into a block of ice about half a pace wide on each face. Then she simply moved the block into the cold room she wanted to cool and released the bindings on it. As the block of ice started to exchange heat with its surroundings again, frost that could be congealing water vapor or more solidified air forming on its surface, Lori bound the air in the room to circulate so that the block of ice would begin cooling the now-warm cold room.


    When that was done, she sealed the door of the cold room with stone to prevent people from getting in and potentially hurting themselves, and placed a stone bar across the doorway to make it obvious.


    The amount of both solidified and liquefied air slowly increased. Once there was enough blue liquefied air in the spill trough, Lori carefully scooped it up into the small jars usually filled with travel ration stew. She held the jars with tongs she borrowed from the blacksmiths because she couldn''t let the liquefied air make contact with the firewisps around her body, lest the liquid start turning back into vapor from the added heat. While the substance was a bit too dangerous to use for regularly cooling the cold rooms with the resources and materials she currently had at her disposal, it would suffice for helping cool the now-warm cold rooms in preparation for long-term storage as long as she sealed up the rooms so that no one could get inside and into trouble while that was happening.


    It was a simple matter to reshape the block of ice Lori had put in the cold room to have a hollow space inside. She carefully poured the jars of blue liquid into it. The blue liquid lay there, more mist wafting up around it. Then she went back to the room where she was making liquefied and solidified air and continued the process over. Solidified air was tamped down into blocks, liquefied air was moved to the cold room to add to the hollow in the ice block. The flakes of solidified air that formed in the bottom of the basin, under the layer of blue liquefied air, she left in place.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The next day, after a day of the room cooling with liquefied air, Lori carefully moved all the blocks of solidified air she had made into the cold room, which was now freezing and ready to store food. Most of the blue liquid from the day before had evaporated back into gas, and she carefully evaporated away what was left. With the cold room once more properly a cold room, it was now ready to be used, though she''d have to remove the block of water ice eventually. It took up a lot of space on the floor and blocked some shelves, but for now it was useful for keeping the room cool.


    Once the expanded cold room was properly cooled down, Lori had Rian tell people to move all the food and any remaining blocks of solidified air into the expanded cold room so she could start expanding the only cold room that hadn''t been expanded yet.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The day after the hunting party found the group coming back to the demesne from River''s Fork, enough fresh meat had finally been brought in to comply with the conditions Lori had set for the holiday.


    "So we can have a holiday tomorrow?" Rian said, leaning forward excitedly during lunch.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Yes, you can have a holiday tomorrow."


    "And you''ll provide the heat so we can roast in the dungeon?"


    Sigh. "Fine, fine, I''ll put some firewisps near the wall. You be the one to tell people not to stick their hands into them unless they want to cook those hands."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Remember, no music after sun down."


    "Of course, your Bindership. You''ll be joining us and enjoying the holiday too, right?"


    "I''ll be there and eating the food," Lori said. "If you try to get me to dance, I will kick you."


    Rian nodded. "That''s fair. Tell me what you think of the glaze we''ve come up with, will you?"


    "I''ll try one sample. Don''t give me more unless I ask for it."


    "Right. Understood. Hope you like it, then. We''ve tried the recipe on small pieces as a test, and it''s turned out good, but if it''s successful, we might be able to have our first traditional winter holiday recipe."


    Lori frowned. "First traditional winter holiday recipe?"


    "Well, we start having the recipe during enough holidays, it''ll become a tradition," Rian said brightly. "I love roasted meat, but a little variety would be nice."


    Lori sighed again, wondering what was taking the food so long.


    She listened distractedly as Rian reported the status of the demesne. The binding of waterwisps to pump water from behind their side of the flood barrier towards the river was keeping up with the sporadic downpours of rain, which came down every other day or so, but had clearly been increasing in frequency as time went on. The trees were starting to sprout buds and leaves again, and stalks of ropeweed were starting to grow along the parts of the riverbanks not currently under water. More seels had been spotted, but not yet in the numbers they had been at originally.


    "I suspected these are just the early arrivals," Rian said. "The rest will probably all arrive by the time the river settles down. We should wait until the seels give birth before we let people start seeling them, though. Make sure the next generation at least has a chance to exist before we start eating them. And if we wait, they''ll be bigger and have more meat on their bones."


    "I wouldn''t know," Lori shrugged. "Do what you think best¡­ without it involving voting of any sort whatsoever!" she added hastily.


    "So we can''t have people vote on which honey glaze variant is best?" Rian said.


    "No. You try all of them and decide for yourself, then make that decision known and stand by it."


    "I''m kind of hoping to get a little rest too, you know¡­"


    "No voting."


    Rian sighed. "Fine¡­ ah, by the way, I''ve noticed slugs crawling along the outside slope of the flood barrier. You might want to check the pipes leading into the river for them every so often. I don''t think that was a problem previously, but I think this is their breeding season, so there might be more of them to get stuck in the pipes."


    Lori frowned, closing her eyes to focus on her awareness of her demesne''s wisps and concentrated on the intake from the river to the water hub shed. She winced at the voids she felt. "Noted. I''ll look into it."


    Rian nodded. "All right, I''ll stop bothering you, you look like you''re dangerously close to completely ignoring what I say. I''ll tell you the rest later."


    Lori waved her hand dismissively, focused on her food, her mouth chewing though the admittedly excellent and delicious bread like an undead set on a task.


    "You don''t approve of the holiday?"


    It took a moment for the voice to register, and another moment as she started to ignore it only to finally recognize the voice¡ªor at least, the direction the voice was coming from. Lori turned to glance at Shanalorre, who was looking at her solemnly, a towel wrapped around her pale hair. "I think it''s unnecessary," Lori said after she finally managed to swallow the mouthful she was on. "There''s still work to be done to get the demesne properly civilized, and none of it gets done while we''re wasting time having a holiday. However, Rian insists they''re necessary for morale, and one should listen to an advisor when they speak about their area of expertise."


    Shanalorre blinked. "What is Lord Rian''s area of expertise?"


    "Manipulating people to do what he says," Lori said.


    Shanalorre''s head snapped to look at Rian, clearly alarmed.


    "Please don''t make me sound like some kind of evil, treacherous villain, your Bindership," Rian sighed. "My job is to speak to the people of the demesne, organize them if they need it, find out what they need, resolve disputes, bring their concerns to Binder Lori''s attention, and see to the well-being of the people of the demesne. In short, I do a lot of talking to people so that Binder Lori doesn''t have to, allowing her to concentrate on other matters. She just likes to reductively summarize that as ''manipulating people''. It''s technically correct, but makes me look really bad."


    "Yes, manipulating people, that''s what I said." Really, why did Rian have to repeat what she said but with more words?


    For some reason, Rian slumped down and let out a groan. Umu, Mikon and Riz all reach out to pat him reassuringly.

 244 - Binder V Binder

    On the day of the holiday, Lori woke up to the sound of a louder than usual din coming from outside of her room, immediately reminding her of the planned occasion. Sighing, she considered just staying in bed, imbuing bindings and expanding the demesne. It would keep her away from all her loud, annoying idiots and spare her poor ears from the noise that would probably be echoing across her Dungeon from having everyone holding a holiday in it.


    Her stomach disabused her of that notion, however. Once she finished going down her list of bindings, Lori had a quick wash¡ªreminding herself to change the bone filter in the water hub shed and find a way to keep slugs clear of the intake¡ªput on some fresh clothes, and headed downstairs. It was louder in the dining hall, and even with a casual glance, it was clear many tables and benches had been moved aside to make a space. No one was dancing, and there were no terrible attempts at music yet, but Lori knew it was only a matter of time. Most of the tables already had game boards laid out on them, with people of all ages already playing.


    Along the walls were little blocks of darkness, where she had anchored darkwisps and firewisps the night before. People had set up rocks and tripods around the blocks, placing wide pans and preparing grills made of peeled branches over them. A few were glancing towards her and back at the blocks, some putting their hands close but not quite into the bindings of darkwisps. She wouldn''t have put it past a few to actually put their hands inside despite what she had told Rian to tell them, though. Some of the tables and benches near them had what looked like wooden plates and bowls full of meat, many of which were still covered in frost from the cold room.


    The smell of bread in the air was tinged with sweetness, making Lori''s mouth water at the thought of honey bread as she sat down on a bench that had been placed near the stairway up to her room. She sighed in relief as she leaned back on the wall behind her, letting her put her weight on it and slouch a little. Eyes closed, she just enjoyed the feeling of being able to lean back on something while sitting.


    The bench she was sitting on shifted, and there was a dull thud as something was set down to her left. Opening her eyes, Lori saw Rian sitting down on the bench with her, a plate of honey bread between them, along with a cup of water. "Good morning, your Bindership," he said cheerfully, sliding the plate a little closer towards her.


    Lori grunted, reaching for the honey bread. She closed her eyes again as she bit. Ah, warm, sweet, soft, sticky¡­


    "That''s all that the kitchen''s preparing for breakfast, by the way," Rian said. "If you want to eat anything more, we kind of need heat for roasting¡­?"


    "Yes, yes¡­" Lori said, waving a hand dismissively before bringing it to her mouth to lick the honey on her fingertips. "Tell them to get back from the bindings before I activate them. I''m going to assume there''s no water or anything dropped into the binding that could explode."


    Rian nodded and rose, stepping forward a little and raising his hands to call people''s attention. "All right, everyone, get back from the black things her Bindership made. If anyone dropped something into them, now is a good time to say so before it explodes!" People backed away from the bindings as ordered, and if they had dropped in anything, they weren''t saying so. The buzz in the air took on a tone of excitement and expectation as Rian looked at Lori and nodded. "They''re all clear, your Bindership."


    With a thought, Lori activated all the bindings she''d made and placed the night before, and she heard the exclamations as those closest to the bindings felt the heat wash over them. She''d done her best to replicate the heat of a cook fire with Rian''s assistance, with firewisps emanating heat from within the darkwisps that marked the boundary of the binding. Most of the heat had been set to radiate upwards, towards any food that needed to be cooked, while a small amount of heat bloomed outward to inform people of the presence of the binding.


    "All right!" Rian said loudly as it became obvious that the bindings had been activated and people began milling around them. "The very belated winter holiday has officially begun! I hope everyone enjoys themselves, and please remember that the lima tournament will be starting soon!"


    There were some sporadic cheers at the announcement as Rian moved back towards her bench and sat back down with a relieved sigh.


    "Lima tournament?" Lori asked as the first, rhythmic sounds that probably tried to be music began to rise.


    "We have lima this morning, chatrang this afternoon, and pincer for the children at about midday," Rian said. "Prizes are hard, since we don''t really have much of anything we can hand out as a treat, so unfortunately all the winners get today are bragging rights and the titles of ''winner of the winter holiday board game tournament'' in their game. Hopefully next year we''ll have something better. Maybe we could buy fruits from River''s Fork in advance and make the winners a little fruit pastry next time. "


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    Lori grunted, reaching for another stick of honey bread.


    "Fine, fine, I''ll go and leave you alone," he said with a smile as he stood up. "Want me to get you some more honey bread? I''ll be back later to bring you a plate of good cuts and tail meat once the meat is ready."


    Lori took the last stick of honey bread and nudged the now-empty plate towards him.


    "Right, more bread it is," Rian said, picking up the plate. He turned and seemed to vanish into the crowd.


    She focused on eating the remaining bread slowly, trying to make it last as Lori savored the taste, the flavor, the sweetness and the feel of the bread in her mouth, but all too soon she was swallowing the last bite, and there was nothing but an aftertaste and sticky fingers.


    Lori was about to start licking her fingers again to get the taste and stickiness off of them when her bench creaked again. She glanced sideways to find Shanalorre had sat down on the bench with her, seated at her customary distance of a pace away. Lord whatever-his-name was some distance away on another bench, his gaze intent on the two of them.


    "Good morning, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre greeted.


    Lori nonchalantly lowered her fingers from her mouth. "Good morning, Binder Shanalorre," she answered as she picked up the cup of water and subtly dipped her fingers in, rubbing her fingertips together to get the stickiness off. "I apologize if the holiday isn''t enjoyable just yet. We''ve only just begun to cook the meat."


    "I accept your apology, and look forward to the meat," Shanalorre said. "I''ve quite enjoyed the food you''ve provided me during my visits to your demesne, and I''m sure your holiday fare will be no different." She paused a moment, before adding, "What do you usually do during these holidays?"


    Lori shrugged. "Eat my fill of food. Sit around all day. Remind myself that I agreed to let people play music during the day to keep myself from making them stop. Wait for the day to end so I can go to sleep."


    Shanalorre blinked. "That''s¡­ it?"


    "That''s it," Lori confirmed.


    "Don''t you do anything to enjoy yourself?"


    "That is what I do to enjoy myself." Was that not clear? "Was that not clear?"


    Shanalorre gained a strange expression on her face. "But¡­ why not go dancing? Singing? Spend time with your friends? Play games?"


    Lori twitched with every mentioned suggestion, but she maintained her patience. "I do not find dancing or singing enjoyable. I have no friends, and even if I did, I would not find spending time with them enjoyable. As to playing games¡­" Lori looked around, then shrugged. "Those I would normally play chatrang or lima with are usually too occupied enjoying themselves during holidays." Mikon would most likely be busy flirting with Rian or Riz, and the brat would be off doing brat things. Rian¡­ he''d probably be busy making sure things ran smoothly, and likely frustrating Mikon, Riz and Umu as he made flirting with him difficult.


    "Oh. I see¡­" Binder Shanalorre trailed off. "Well, if you have no one to play with, I could play with you."


    Lori glanced at her, then shrugged. "If that''s what you want. I suppose we can play a game or two." She frowned at a realization, then looked around. "Where''s your guide?"


    "She''s eating with her family right now," Shanalore said. "We will be meeting later, and she offered to show me what was fun to do during a holiday. Until then, I''m free to play with you."


    "Ah. I see." Lori glanced at her for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, I''ll get my game board, then. Do you have a preferred game you wish to play?"


    Shanalorre shook her head. "We can play whatever you want," she said.


    When she went up to her room to get her game board, which had been lying on her table for weeks, Lori was very tempted to just get back in bed and sleep. After all, she had no work to do today, and sleep was the best form of rest, after all. Still, she picked up her game board and the box that contained all the game pieces, laying the second atop the first and carrying the board with both hands as she returned to the bench.


    The board was big enough to rest between them on the bench. Lori sat with her back to the wall, her head turned as she started putting the chatrang pieces on the board. Shanalorre, in contrast, straddled the bench, her legs on either side of the plank as she leaned forward, her hands on her knees.


    "Which side do you want to play?" Lori offered.


    "Can I play white?" Shanalorre asked.


    "Are you sure? If you play as black, you get the first turn."


    Shanalorre shook her head. "White, if you please."


    Lori shrugged. "Very well, then," she said, reaching down to move one of her militia. "Your turn."


    Shanalorre picked up her Horotract and moved it over the line of militia in front of it. Ah. Well, at least she knew what the pieces did properly.


    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "Where did you learn how to play?" she asked as she moved another militia to open a path for her Whisperer.


    Shanalorre moved one of her militia as well. "I¡­ learned from my mother," she said, her voice trailing off, as she stared blankly at nothing. The younger Binder twitched, and her left arm rose and slapped herself on the cheek. She blinked, then shook her head.


    "Ah. I see." Lori moved her Whisperer. "Do you play much?"


    Shanalorre paused, then shook her head. "No. I simply know how to play. You will be my first opponent."


    Lori couldn''t help but raise an eyebrow at that. Had Shanalorre simply watched her mother play? Lori herself had learned over a game when she had asked one of her mothers to teach her while they had been taking shelter during a dragon''s passing. It had been her first loss among many, a memory that made Lori twitch still, indistinct as it was from time and age.


    When Rian returned, he was carrying another plate of honey bread, a pitcher of water, a cup and a wooden stool. Humming, he placed the stool down, then placed the plate, the pitcher and the cup on top of the seat. "The meat''s cooking, and the first batch should be done soon," he said cheerfully. "Do you have a preferred cut, Great Binder?"


    Shanalorre glanced towards him, then towards Lori. Lori waved her hand dismissively. "Something soft and tasty?" the younger Dungeon Binder asked. "Please?"


    "Got it," Rian said. "How about you, your Bindership? Need anything else?"


    Lori waved her hand again, focusing on the game board as she tapped her Whisperer, then took one of Shanalorre''s militia within the piece''s range out of play¡­

 245 - Holiday Excitement

    Shanalorre, Lori found, played very conservatively. She kept her pieces close to her core and mostly used them to keep Lori''s own forces at bay, and deny her Horotract and Mentalist the ability to move freely. She was also very adverse to risk, opting to withdraw pieces that were threatened instead of attacking, and only attacking when there was no way for Lori to immediately retaliate.


    Lori was far more forward, and would relentlessly chip away at targets of opportunity among Shanalorre''s militia, forcing the other Binder to expend a turn using her Deadspeaker or her Dungeon Binder to bring the piece back. They weren''t playing under official tournament rules, so there was no limit on how many times the militia could be brought back, but Lori was fairly certain this was the first game she had ever played where someone had brought their militia back more than ten times.


    Occasionally, however, Shanalorre would move to take one of her pieces, forcing Lori to back off or otherwise temper her aggression. This led to a relatively slow game, as Shanalorre took her time considering what move she could make with the least risk to her pieces, while Lori had to consider how she could keep chipping away at Shanalorre''s defenses. It wasn''t exactly boring, but the much slower pace compared to her games with Mikon¡ªshe really should start bringing her board down to dinner again¡ªgave her mind time to wander.


    Still, there was no need to rush. Nothing urgent was going on, after all.


    Every so often, Rian would come by to bring them more water, honey bread, or freshly roasted meat while looking increasingly sweaty. Given that Lori saw him awkwardly dancing with Umu, Mikon or Riz¡­ or more likely, from the way they''d occasionally stop, move aside, and the woman in question would demonstrate something, learning to dance. He seemed enthusiastic, if nothing else, and clearly getting better as time passed. His movements were smoother, in any case.


    "Binder Lolilyuri?" Shanalorre asked quietly.


    Lori looked up from the board. "Yes, Binder Shanalorre?"


    "I wish to thank you for continuing to accommodate us, despite our lack of contribution to your demesne," Shanalorre said as she reached out and moved one of her lords, occupying a space that Lori''s Horotract could have moved to, though she hadn''t been considering doing so. "We have stayed far in excess of our intended duration."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "The fault is ours. After all, it''s not as if you have the capability to return yourselves to your demesne. Your continuing to be here is because we are currently incapable of fulfilling our part of our agreement to return you safely to your demesne." Lori shrugged. "Besides, having your people spending their time in our baths is hardly a strain on our resources."


    "Yes, that is quite clear," the younger Dungeon Binder quietly. "Your demesne is quite prosperous."


    "Thank you," Lori said, accepting the compliment as she reached out and moved her Dungeon Binder, moving it like a Horotract to position it to take Shanalorre''s Mentalist on her next turn.


    "What would we need to do to share in that prosperity?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "I do not see how you could. It is our prosperity, after all. I have no intention of sharing."


    "And if our demesne became subservient to you? Could we do so then? "


    "I am not going to kill you, Binder Shanalorre. If I intended to, I would have done so well before now."


    "I do not doubt it, Binder Lolilyuri."


    "So you need not fear my taking your life, core and demesne any time soon."


    For a moment, Shanalorre''s gaze rose up, a strange expression on her face. For some reason, she sighed. "And if I were to give my demesne to you to rule over as your own? If I surrendered my demesne to you and all my authority over it, and swore to become one of your subjects?"


    ¡­


    What?


    "What?" Lori said, staring at the other Dungeon Binder.


    "Was my wording unclear?" Shanalorre said.


    "Quite possibly," Lori said. "I''m sorry, I must not have been paying enough attention and misunderstood. Could you please repeat you words?"


    Shanalorre nodded gravely. "What if I were to give my demesne to you to rule over as your own? What if I surrendered my demesne to you and all my authority over it, and swore to become one of your subjects?"


    ¡­


    "You''re lying," Lori said, even as she stared. "Or making some joke I don''t understand."


    "I am doing neither. I am asking if my demesne could share in your prosperity if I surrender control of it to you, and surrendered myself to become one of your subjects."


    ¡­


    "Why would you do such a thing?" Lori asked. It made no sense. It wasn''t something a Dungeon Binder did. No one just surrendered their demesne without a fight, not when it meant death so that their conqueror could claim their core and subordinate it.


    "You said I need not fear my life being taken from me, and you have shown that you are a woman of your word" Shanalorre said calmly. "And so I surrender myself to you, and hereby place myself and my demesne under your authority."


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    ¡­


    This was a ''talking to people'' matter, wasn''t it? Why was she dealing with this by herself?


    In a daze, she claimed and bound airwisps. "Rian!" she called out as she rose to her feet, her voice echoing across the first level of her Dungeon as the binding increased the volume of her voice to cut through the noise and sounds people were making. "Get over here!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian, to his credit, came running to her side, or at least moved as quickly as he could through all the people between them. He wasn''t able to beat Lord whatever-his-name-was though, since the other man had been nearby keeping watch over his Dungeon Binder. Lori ignored him as he loomed behind his Dungeon Binder, waiting for her own lord to finally arrive. He did so by skidding across the stone floor, and had to slow down by catching himself on the wall behind her.


    "All right, I''m here," he said, covered in sweat and sounding like he was fighting the urge to cough. "What''s the matter? Are you hurt?" He glanced at Shanalorre and whatever-his-name-was, scanning over the other Dungeon Binder as if looking for injuries.


    Lori faced Shanalorre, resisting the urge to put more space between them. "Repeat¡ª" she began, and winced at the loudness of the word. Ah, right. She dissolved the binding or airwisps before repeating herself. "Repeat what you just said."


    Shanalorre''s face was smooth, almost serene as she said, "I surrender myself to Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri, and hereby place myself and my demesne under her authority."


    Had this been a story, all noise would have stopped. Everyone would have ceased dancing and turned to bear witness, turning a scene of frivolous merriment into one of quiet import. Nothing of the sort happened, because only those closest to them could hear the words Shanalorre said, but those who did paused and turned to stare, even as those trying to make music hesitantly began playing again after cutting off abruptly from her summons.


    Rian stared at the smaller Dungeon Binder, who was still seated straddling the bench. "Huh," he said, as if that was all the reply he was capable of. He turned towards Lori. "And you needed me here because¡­?"


    Lori waved in Shanalorre''s general direction. "Deal with this!"


    He was silent for a moment as the people around them whispered and murmured and quite audibly began telling each other what had previously transpired. Distantly, she heard the attempts at music cease. Rian looked up at the ceiling for some reason, before sighing. "All right, all right, fine. Your Bindership, look at Binder Shanalorre and repeat after me: ''Why are you doing this?''."


    Lori stared at him for a moment. He stared right back with a blank, if sweaty, expression on his face.


    Eventually, Lori turned back towards Shanalorre. "Why are you doing this?" she said.


    "Because I need to save the people of my demesne," Shanalorre said calmly. She stood, awkwardly swinging her leg over the bench so that she could get on her feet properly as she continued. "When we first settled the demesne, we were able to grow several accelerated harvests of vigas. Even at the time, the intention was for that amount to feed the full population of the demesne for only four pale months at the most, supplemented by the accelerated fruits. During this time, the demesne was intending to establish its infrastructure, including greatly expanded vigas fields and fruit orchards, without having to worry about growing food. Because of the dragon, this expansion did not occur.


    "Due to the greatly reduced population of the demesne, we have been able to subsist on those initial harvests, supplemented by hunting and the fruits that continue to be accelerated. However, it will not last. We only managed one harvest before winter began, at which point our supply of fruits and meats ceased, and our grain reserves began dwindling. Unless we secure alternative sources of food, we will not survive to harvest later in the year, especially since my aunt sent that the division caused by my absence has led to delays in the spring planting.


    "We need the assistance of Lorian Demesne if we are to continue to live. And so I surrender and place my demesne under your authority and rule. River''s Fork is yours. I give you our mine, what little tools and resources we have that you do not. I give you myself, and all that I am capable of, as one of your subjects. I swear to obey you as my Dungeon Binder. In return, all I ask is that you treat the people in my demesne as you have treated your own."


    Facing Lori, Shanalorre knelt, her head bowed deeply.


    Lori stared at her. They were managing to maintain the accelerated growth of their fruits?


    "Huh¡­" she heard Rian say next to her. "And you, Yllian? You''re awfully quiet right now."


    The lord''s lips pressed together, his face otherwise blank as he looked down at the kneeling form of his Dungeon Binder. Then he stepped forward and knelt down as well. "I¡­ agree with the Great Binder in this," he said, and his voice was of a tired man. "While it might be possible to survive until the harvest with care and rationing, our current circumstances make that difficult to enforce. And that is not taking into consideration the coming of storms and dragons. We beg you, your Bindership. Rule us."


    People began to mutter. They sounded excited.


    "Well¡­ so there, I guess¡­" Rian said. He glanced towards Lori. "You heard them, your Bindership. What do you say?"


    Lori took a deep breath, then another and another, until she was breathing in a steady, familiar rhythm to calm herself down. "No."


    The muttering all stopped. Lord whatever-his-name-was''s head snapped up to stare at her. Next to him, Shanalorre let out an exhalation.


    "Wait, ''no''? What do you mean, ''no''?" Rian sounded the most shocked he''d ever heard her.


    "No," she repeated, stepping back from Shanalorre, then doing so again, until she judged she was out of the range of any sudden lunges from the smaller Dungeon Binder. "I will not be fooled. This is clearly some kind of trick. No Dungeon Binder would simply subordinate themselves to another!"


    "I never wanted to be a Dungeon Binder," Shanalorre said, head still bowed. "I do not wish to usurp your position, Binder Lolilyuri. You are safe from me, I swear."


    "Of course you''d say that," Lori snapped. "No one would actually admit to wanting to usurp the Dungeon Binder! That''s exactly what someone who wanted to usurp me would say!"


    For some reason, Rian had both hands over his face and was groaning.


    "I believed you when you said I did not need to fear you taking my life, Binder Lolilyuri. Why will you not do the same?"


    "Then you''re a fool," Lori snapped. "I could have been lying! Lying about not doing something is the easiest way to do it! Everyone knows that."


    "Uh, your Bindership," Rian began, "maybe we should take a moment to calm down and¡ª"


    "Is that what you doubt?" Shanalorre said, rising to her feet and stepping towards Lori. "My sincerity? Is that all that stands between you and saving the people in my care?"


    Lori took a step back as Shanalorre''s hand reached towards her waist. The taller Dungeon Binder''s eyes followed the movement, and they widen as the hand reached a belt knife that hung there. She hadn''t noticed it at all during their game. Had Shanalorre been wearing it this whole time?


    With a practice drawing movement, Shanalore held a naked blade in her hand. It was a small blade, barely the length of Lori''s middle finger, but the point looked sharp and threatening and¡ª


    Raising her left arm, Shanalorre held the blade to her wrist. "If you doubt my sincerity, then let us remove it from the negotiations," she said.


    The blade cut and blood began to flow.

 246 - Worth More Than Anything

    As Lori stared in shock, people started yelling and moving.


    Lord whatever-his-name-was, the closest to Shanalorre, moved first, knocking the belt knife out of her hands. The sound of it hitting the ground and bouncing under the bench they''d been sitting on was strangely loud to Lori''s ears .


    "Medics! Doctors!" Rian cried as he leapt towards the other Dungeon Binder, taking hold of her forearm. Already blood was trickling down, painting her skin dark, almost brownish red. "We need bandages, there''s bleeding from the wrist! Does anyone have a cloth that''s not sweaty?"


    "Shana, heal yourself!" Lord whatever-his-name-was said, digging through his belt pouch and pulling out a small roll of bandages, followed by some cord.


    "No," Shanalorre said, turning and somehow twisting her bleeding arm out of Rian''s grip, leaving his hands slick with blood. She held that arm to her chest, griping it with the hand of her undamaged limb and crouching down as blood began to stain her clothes. Despite all this, her gaze was still intent on Lori. "I offer you a sign of my sincerity, Binder Lolilyuri. If you do not trust me, then you need not trust me. You need not break your word. Simply allow me to die as you''ve waited for, and claim my demesne."


    "Stop being so dramatic," Rian snapped as he tried to regain hold of the bleeding arm, but Shanalorre kept twisting out of the way. "Someone grab her and make her stop moving! If all this agitation keeps up, she''s going to bleed out even faster!"


    People were start to crowd around them now as if trying to get a better look at the bleeding. Others recoiled, moving away and grabbing nearby children to pull them back. Shanalorre''s blood was beginning to stain her shirt, the dark fluid creeping downwards as she surprised Rian with an aggressive and well-aimed punch to the face that had him recoiling in surprise and clutching at one eye. Lord whatever-his-name-was tried to take advantage by grabbing the outstretched limb, but she managed to parry him on the backswing, twisting out of his way and somehow moving closer towards Lori.


    So much blood¡­ how was there already so much blood? It had been only a few short moments, but already Shanalorre''s arm was wet, and drops of blood were smearing across the floor, from Shanalorre trying to avoid the two men. Rian had thrown himself bodily at Shanalorre, trying to tackle her while Lord whatever-his-name-was kept her hemmed in, but she somehow managed to avoid him, jumping over him as he slammed into the ground where she''d been. The younger lord let out a pained groan, then a cry of complaint as Lord whatever-his-name-was'' foot struck him in the shoulder. In the struggle, the stool holding the now-empty plate of food fell over, the wooden cups bouncing and splashing water everywhere as the pitcher hit the ground and broke, sending more water everywhere.


    It¡­ it was convenient, really. Yes, this would perfectly deal with her objections to this suspicious proposal! After all, Shanalorre could not betray and usurp Lori if the other Dungeon Binder was dead. Hadn''t she just been waiting for Shanalorre to die all this time? To the dragons, to the winter, to random chance? And here she was, bleeding to death. A death from cut wrists was far slower than opening the veins on the neck, but Rian was correct. All this movement and agitation, the quickened heartbeat that would result from it, was no doubt pumping more and more blood from the young girl''s body, hastening her death.


    All Lori had to do was sit back and wait. Yes, she simply had to sit back down onto the bench next to her and wait¡­ not all that long, really! Perhaps a tenth of an hour or so. As long as the wound was not properly bandaged and treated¡ª


    Lori blinked as she realized someone was calling her name, and had been doing so repeatedly. "What?" she said distractedly, focusing on Rian. Shanalorre''s arm looked painted, trickles of fresh blood keeping the color from darkening as it would normally have the way the blouse she was wearing was doing. So much blood¡­


    "A little help here?-!" he cried as he was getting to his feet, his feet sliding a little on the wet floor and nearly falling over again. His teeth gritted and one hand rubbing at his shoulder, trying to quickly alleviate the pain. "Tell her to stand down and stop moving so we can treat her!"


    Lori''s mouth parted open in a tangle of instincts. Words chastising Rian for speaking to her in such a way tangled with the words to tell Shanalorre to stop and to stand down, words accepting her surrender, words telling Rian to not fall for whatever trickery this was to manipulate them, words telling him to leave her alone and deal with this¡­


    Really, this was a simple choice. She could accept this suspiciously generous surrender of a still-living Dungeon Binder''s demesne, ostensibly to save its residents because they were supposedly running out of food and wouldn''t last to produce more on their own, and no doubt inevitably be betrayed. Or she could simply do nothing and simply wait for Shanalorre to die of blood loss, succumbing to her wounds, and then taking the demesne''s core, claiming power and authority over the territory in the traditional, established method.


    Obviously, she would do the latter. It was the intelligent, sensible, rational thing to do. There would be no possibility of betrayal or usurpation, and she would not have to worry about any unexpected attacks from people in Shanalorre''s employ if she was dead.


    She would not be breaking her word. She would not be taking Shanalorre''s life, simply letting it slip away. Indeed, she really had no power to prevent it. After all, despite her efforts and study, she still had no skill with Deadspeaking, and therefore no ability to heal, so really the only one with the ability to save Shanalorre was herse¡ª


    Lori''s flow of thought stopped at that realization as if slamming into a wall. And as with slamming into a wall, the force of her thoughts was redirected sideways at a reversed angle.


    Shanalorre was capable of healing. Shanalorre was the only one capable of healing. Certainly, they had doctors and medics, but those there only, when you go down to it, specialized scholars with knowledge of how to tear the body open and put it back together. They couldn''t actually heal, not the way a Deadspeaker could, simply put the piece back into place and wait for the body to heal itself.


    And while Lori would have liked to say that as a Dungeon Binder, she was the only one they needed to perform healing¡­ she was willing to admit that even up to now, Deadspeaking eluded her as surely as Horotracting and Mentalism. While her demesne could function without healing, incidents serious enough to need healing would have a small but undeniable impact on her demesne''s productivity. The impact would increase drastically if the affected party was someone with an uncommon but highly useful skill, like the potter, the roper, Rian or¡­ herself¡­


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    Shanalorre, as a healer, was an important resource. As a Dungeon Binder and a potential threat and danger to her, however¡­


    But then, any wizard would always be a danger to her, wouldn''t they? That''s why she had given Rian orders not to recruit any wizards to join their demesne during the expedition to Covehold. Any of them would have had the ability and motivation to kill her and usurp her position as Dungeon Binder if they couldn''t find a location that appealed to them for setting up their own demesne. Or even if they did find a location that appealed. After all, why have only one demesne when you can have two?


    Shanalorre, however¡­.


    She was savant. She knew how to heal and only how to heal¡­ and, admittedly, how to claim a dungeon''s core. However, beyond that, she would know nothing. Not how to affect the life in Lori''s body to make her ill, not how to cause growths to swell in her organs, or how to stop her heart from beating. On consideration, she would be the safest wizard in all the continent for Lori, as any danger to she posed would have to be through commanding her subordinates to do Lori harm¡­ something Lori could mitigate with more subordinates or simply not coming out of her room¡­


    Lori looked down, really looked down, into the eyes of the smaller Dungeon Binder who, even though her attempts to evade Rian, her own lord, and others who were beginning to become involved, would turn her gaze at Lori, awaiting some kind of response. Her movements were starting to slow, but whether from tiredness or blood loss, Lori wasn''t sure.


    She opened her mouth. "Tell me¡ª" Lori began, then frowned as her words were swallowed up by the sounds of people yelling, of Rian and Lord whatever-his-name-was both trying to convince Shanalorre to stop moving so the bleeding in her wrist could be staunched and bandaged, of people trying to replicate Rian''s attempt at bodily throwing themselves to catch the savant and instead replicating his crash onto the floor as she continued to evade them. Lori bound airwisps.


    "All of you, enough!" she snapped, the deafening sound of her voice sweeping over everyone, her words just barely not blending together into unintelligibility. Rian and the others paused in mid-movement as they tried to surround Shanalorre, giving her the opportunity to duck under their arms and stand smoothly to face Lori, still cradling her bleeding arm to her chest protectively. Only Lord whatever-his-name-was still moved as he tried to get around the hesitant men and women and towards her Binder, only to trip on some blood on the floor, falling painfully on his face.


    In the short lull that followed, Lori faced Shanalorre. Irrationally, she wished she had her staff in her hands. It would have been useless, but she wanted it anyway. "I believe you have sufficiently shown your willingness to die."


    "Have you reconsidered your position, then?" Shanalorre said calmly even as her blood continued to flow, droplets falling from her elbow.


    "That your death would be useless to me if I were unable to claim your demesne," Lori said. "If you are truly intend to die as a demonstration of your sincerity, then tell me: where is your core and how do I reach it?"


    "That''s what you''re asking her?" Rian exclaimed incredulously.


    Lori ignored him.


    "The core is located under the central tree," Shanalorre said immediately. "The entrance is an opening among the roots underneath the stairs, currently buried by dirt and rocks to obscure the signs of an underground cavity. You can access it easily."


    Lori stared at her for a moment. She stared back just as impassively.


    "Fine. I will accept authority of you and your demesne under two conditions," Lori said.


    "Which are?"


    "First, confirmation that your core is, in fact, where you say it is."


    Shanalorre nodded. "And the second condition?"


    Lori pointed. "Heal yourself. Your value as a healing savant is worth more than anything else your demesne contains. You will live and be useful."


    Shanalorre hesitated for a moment. Her arm was drooping, growing weak as she lost more and more blood. "Understood," she said eventually. "I will comply." There was a beat. "It is done."


    "Finally!" Rian exclaimed, his face twisted in a pained expression.


    "Show me," Lori ordered.


    For a moment, Shanalorre looked around, and only then seemed to spot the spilled and broken pitcher, the pottery vessel lying on the ground next to the upturned stool. With solemn dignity, Shanalorre raised her wrist to her mouth and spat on it, then used her other hand to wipe the fluid on the blood staining her limb. She presented her wrist to Lori, revealing smooth, unblemished skin surrounded with red-stained flesh.


    Lori grunted, continuing to stare down at the Dungeon Binder. "You place yourself and your demesne under my authority?"


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said. "All those who previously obeyed me, I shall order to now obey you, and only you, as their Dungeon Binder." A brief pause. "Those who did not obey me, I have no authority over."


    ¡­ technically true and correct. Lori suddenly very strongly reminded that a portion of the current population of River''s Fork had originally been from her demesne, and had left to no longer be under her authority. How problematic for them.


    "Does this mean you''re also going to help keep the people who live in River''s Fork from starving now?" Rian said, sighing heavily as he sat down on the bench next to them. Lori noticed that the game board that had somehow managed to remain in place, though the pieces were slightly disarrayed.


    Ah, yes. There had been that situation, hadn''t there? Authority in exchange for implicitly sustaining Shanalorre''s subjects¡ªthose who had formerly been Shanalorre''s subjects¡ªthrough their oncoming difficulty. "The problem will be dealt with," Lori said. "However, we have more immediate matters." Lori turned to look at whatever-his-name-was and frowned. "Rian, what''s his name?"


    Rian sighed as he put a hand on his face for some reason. "Yllian, your Bindership. His name is Yllian."


    Lori nodded, facing the man. Except for how his shoulders moved as be breathed in from his exertions, stains from the water and blood on his clothes and hands, the man looked calm and composed as he stood with his hands loose at his sides. His eyes, however, kept looking between Lori and Shanalorre. "Yllian," Lori said. "You heard Shanalorre. Do you obey?"


    The man looked between her and Shanalorre one more time. Slowly, he bowed his head. "Yes, Great Binder," he said, voice flat.


    "Excellent," Lori said. "From now on, you are assigned to guard and monitor Shanalorre at all times, with an emphasis on ensuring that blades of any sort are to be kept out of her reach. Is this understood?"


    "Perfectly, Great Binder," he said, straightening.


    "Make your own arrangements as to how she is to be monitored in the baths," she said. "Rian, see to it my new subjects here are moved to more permanent quarters at the shelter. As they are now under my authority and are therefore no longer guests, have their alcove put back in order and start assigning duties to the men who came with her."


    "Uh¡­ shouldn''t that wait until we can get them back home to their families in River''s Fork?" Rian said.


    "No," Lori said. "Those who don''t work don''t eat. Tomorrow, they start earning their keep in the demesne." She looked down at Shanalorre. "Including you. No more all-day baths."


    "I understand¡­ Great Binder," Shanalorre said, bowing her head in submission.


    Lori reminded herself it was hardly the best time to luxuriate in the feeling of having a Dungeon Binder bow down to her as a superior. No, not the time, not the time. "Shanalorre¡­ you made this mess," she said, gesturing at the mix of blood and water staining the floor. "Clean it up. And gather the shards for repair." There were only a few pieces. While broken pottery was usually given to the potter to render down into material for future pottery, the pieces were large and whole enough she could easily fuse them back together with earthwisps.


    "Yes, Great Binder," Shanalorre nodded, then paused, looking around uncertainly.


    Lori ignored her, moving to sit at the end of the bench, which was just out of range of the mess of blood and spilled water. She leaned back, resting against the stone wall behind her, and waited for her heartbeat to calm down.

 247 - The Horrified Light Of Realization

    "You need an office," Rian said as Lori paced back and forth. "You know, a dedicated room for discussing matters about the demesne''s well-being in private, maybe with chairs for both of us, shelves to put all the notes and records on, maybe speak with people in it, that sort of thing."


    "I don''t need an office," Lori said dismissively. Step, step, turn, step, step, step, step, turn, step, step¡ª


    "If you keep pacing like that, you''ll wear out the soles of your boots, and we can''t replace those."


    Lori paused mid-step, but eventually remembered to put her foot down. She looked down at her boots. Agh, were those cracks? How long had it been since she had oiled her boots? No, no no no no¡­ she had a spare pair, but she had only the one! What would she do if she needed new boots again?-!


    She shook her head to clear it, and deliberately turned around to sit on the stool in front of Rian''s table, taking care to take long, careful steps to minimize wear.


    "So¡­" Rian said, tucking his feet under him as he sat on his bed. He was no longer wearing the bloodstained clothes from earlier that day, and had on a clean shirt and a pair of loose trousers of the sort that Lori usually saw worn by Mentalists, both on the theater stage and in day to day life. "You wanted to talk about something? Otherwise I was going to go to sleep."


    Lori grunted. "Do we have enough resources to sustain¡­ however many more people there are in River''s Fork?"


    "We should," Rian said, "We''re planning to expand our agricultural fields here, and once we harvest the winter vigas, we''ll have refilled our stores. With some hunting, the fruits that their own demesne produces, as well as their own reserves, they should be able to last that long, even if food might be a little lean." He sighed. "Of course if it were as simple as tightening belts, Shana probably wouldn''t be so desperate she was willing to kill herself to get your help."


    She frowned. "How do you know that?"


    "I spoke to Yllian and the other people with her when we were moving their stuff to the shelter, how else?" Rian said. "You of all people should know that the Binder doesn''t necessarily know everything going on in her demesne. That''s the lord''s job."


    Well, that was true. "What did you find out, then?" Lori asked.


    "That you might be looking at civil unrest," Rian said, then frowned. "Wait, that''s misleading. You''re looking at uncivil unrest. The violent kind of incivility, where they don''t know when to stop being uncivil."


    "Rian, stop with the wordplay and get to the point."


    Rian sighed. "Fine, fine. Right now, there are two kinds of people who live in River''s Fork. The first kind are either members of the Golden Sweetwood Company and their families who think the place can be revived when the company sends more people and resources, Shana''s family, or friends of her family who feel that she needs their assistance. The second kind are people who originally lived in our demesne and managed to survive traveling to River''s Fork when they, for one reason or another, decided they didn''t want to live here anymore."


    At the other end of the bed, Riz snorted. "Civilians," she said, her tone heavily derogatory. She, Umu, and Mikon were all sitting near the head of the bed, and only the latter looked comfortable.


    "Everyone in this room but you is a civilian, Riz," Rian said, and the woman reddened at the realization. "But if you change the word, I''d agree with the sentiment." He sighed. "So, I''m not sure if you noticed, but despite their size compared to us, River''s Fork doesn''t do centralized communal meals. Shanalorre tried implementing it, but many people kept cooking at home, so people stopped attending. Because of this, they continued using a system of rationing where a central quartermaster gave people a rationed weekly amount of raw ingredients, originally instituted back when the demesne was first founded and were capable of growing more resources. Now, however, it''s resulted in hoarding, and Shanalorre was unable to curb people getting more than their share of the supplies."


    Lori frowned. "Wait¡­ so this is all because people have been hoarding supplies?"


    "Partially," Rian sighed again. "From the impression I''ve gotten, some people have also not been sticking to the rationing, using up the supply they were given early and demanding more, which they were given to help sustain them until the next time they were supposed to be supplied. However, this led to people complaining about other getting more than everyone else. The first time, Shanalorre issued the same amount to everyone else as additional supplies, but it happened again and kept happening because some people figured out that if they claimed they''d used up all their rations, they''d be given more. This resulted in them going through reserves faster than expected, which led to people hoarding food while at the same time demanding larger rations because they were afraid the supply would be depleted faster from people demanding larger rations¡ª"


    "I understand the circular illogic," Lori groaned, rubbing her head.


    Rian nodded. "When Shana tried to instill discipline by refusing repeat offenders, it resulted in them trying to obtain food from other people, which if they''d been following the rationing meant they didn''t have enough food, which just meant who needed to ask for food was getting passed around. So little irregularities like that kept perpetuating itself over the winter, since people assumed that they had enough supplies to sustain the behavior."


    "Didn''t you just say that people were demanding more rations because they thought the supply would be depleted?"


    "Yes. Amazing how people can think two completely opposite things at the same time, isn''t it?" Rian said dryly. "And they did have enough stored supplies¡­ over the winter. However, if that behavior continues into this spring, and there''s no reason to think it won''t¡ª"


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    "They will soon deplete their own stores and be effectively in a famine situation, while some people will be sitting on a hoard of food that they selfishly acquired," Lori nodded. "And while the situation could be resolved by releasing the hoarded food to everyone, you mentioned people consuming more than the amount that was rationed to them."


    Rian nodded. "According to their calculations, they should have had food for three more months or so after winter, but when they last did an inventory check, food had gone missing from the stores, which they suspect happened while River''s Fork''s flood barriers were being built and most strong able bodies had to be on hand to help with the work. Given how little was taken, they suspect someone sent their children to steal from the stores. With how long Shanalorre has been away, and how busy the place must be if they''re working to get ready for spring¡­" he shrugged. "Their stores could be half empty, or they might be in the middle of starving to death as we speak because some idiot tried to turn all their grain into booze or something."


    "And as a savant, Shanalorre didn''t have the necessary knowledge of punitive measures to just force people to comply," Lori mused.


    "She had her militia for that kind of thing," Rian pointed out. "It''s just that they couldn''t be everywhere, and as some of her most able-bodied people, they''d usually be more busy working than doing guard duty. And that''s not even counting the fact that she couldn''t exactly sustain having a quarter of her population constantly monitoring and disciplining another quarter."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori mused. "Well, unlike Shanalorre, I have no problem with instilling discipline."


    "What do you mean ''I''? I''m the one who takes care of discipline around here. And speaking of discipline, there''s still the second problem we now have to deal with."


    Lori frowned. What second problem? "What second problem?"


    "Is Shanalorre still a Dungeon Binder? Officially, I mean, even though she''s subordinated herself to you."


    What kind of stupid question was that? "What kind of stupid question is that? Of course she''s still a Dungeon Binder."


    Rian nodded. "Ah, good to know. Because when you had her get on her knees to clean blood off the floor earlier today, in full view of everyone else in the demesne, after she''d already publically begged you to basically conquer her¡­ well, if you weren''t planning to utterly humiliate her as if she was no longer a Dungeon Binder and just some random little girl, then you couldn''t have managed it better if you''d actually tried."


    Lori stared at him.


    "Of course, I''m sure you already knew all of that when you did it, but continued anyway because of some cunning plan on your part I''m not privy to¡ª"


    "No, I didn''t," Lori said, still staring at him. "I didn''t realize at the time."


    He blinked. "Wait, you''re¡­ you''re actually admitting¡­" Rian shook his head. "So why did you do it?"


    "She made a mess! I made her clean it up in order to discipline her into not making such a mess in the future!"


    "Absolutely no mention of how she gave herself a life-threatening injury that severely drained her off blood, such that she''s going to need bed rest for the next few days to recover?"


    "The source of the mess didn''t matter!"


    "Of course it doesn''t," Rian groaned. "Not to you, I see¡­ well, regardless, in the eyes of everyone in the demesne, you completely humiliated her, and now they''re probably wondering how they''re supposed to treat her. Do they go as they have before, being respectful? Is she just another random girl they ignore? Because given how you treated her, the latter seems to be the precedent."


    "Well, we don''t care about things like precedent in this demesne, remember?" Lori snapped. "Tomorrow, announce that Shanalorre is still a Dungeon Binder and is to be treated with the respect she deserves."


    Rian nodded. "And now she''s a part of this demesne, right? I mean, she''s bent knee to you and literally shed blood to be under your authority, so¡­"


    "Yes, we''ve established that. What are you getting at, Rian?"


    "Can Shana give me orders now, then?"


    Lori blinked. "What?"


    "She''s a Dungeon Binder, an exalted position far above a mere lord such as myself," Rian stated the obvious. "And now that she''s under your authority, she''s obviously no longer an outsider. Does that mean she has authority over me now? Does she have authority over everyone else?"


    "Of course not! You''re my lord!"


    "So despite being a Dungeon Binder, she has no authority over me. Does she have authority over anyone else?"


    Lori opened her mouth to snap the first answer that came to her mind and paused as the second answer arrived. Her eyes widened again.


    "Ah, there we go, the horrified light of realization. Let''s continue seeing how big this problem is, then. Is Lord Yllian still counted as a lord? Does he have authority over other people? Are he and I equals? Is he actually trusted to make and implement any decisions? Is he no longer a lord because you very publically essentially made him Shana''s jailer and suicide watch?" Rian leaned forward slightly. "Do they still sit to eat at your table?"


    Lori twitched at that last question.


    "It''s pretty fortunate that both of our demesne have fairly simply hierarchies," Rian said, "but nevertheless, we¡ªand by ''we'' I mean you, because these aren''t things I can decide¡ªhave to decide how we''re integrating the established authorities of their demesne. Are you completely dismantling their organization? Integrating it fully? What authority will they have?" He shrugged. "In my opinion, it''s a far, far more immediate concern for you than the one Shana nearly killed herself to ask us to solve, and one will have to be answered soon, before something unfortunate happens."


    Lori groaned, clenching her fist in frustration. After taking a few deep, calming breaths, she looked up to give Rian an annoyed look. "And you have a solution, I presume?" Lori said. "You usually do."


    At her words, Rian smiled brightly. This smile had some sincerity to it, but she was fairly sure it was mostly to be annoying. "Well¡­ this situation counts as a mess, doesn''t it?"


    "You know it does." Lori knew only Shanalorre''s lord, but given he was here with her, she likely had more people with some kind of authority back in her demesne. The person in charge of those food stores, for one thing¡­


    The smile became a grin. "Didn''t you just say that the person who made the mess should clean it up?"


    It took her a moment to understand what he meant. When she did, Lori blinked, staring at him. "You can''t be serious."


    "Yes, I can''t. I''m Rian," he said with annoying cheer. "Look, with how drained of blood she is, you can''t really assign her any demanding work, and anyway, she technically counts as a child. So you might as well talk to her and have her explain how her demesne is organized so you know how much of the structure to keep and how much to get rid of." Rian coughed. "Personally, I''d recommend keeping Yllian on as a lord on a probationary basis. I''ve been waiting months for you to assign another lord, and we have someone who has experience at the job and dealing with the people of River''s Fork. In fact, with the influx of new people, you can even use it as a pretext to finally raise someone else up to be a lord or lady to help with all the work."


    Behind him, Riz jumped up to her feet, startling Mikon who''d been partially leaning against her. In seemingly the blink of an eye, she''d run to the door and swung it open, running out into the dark, fortunately not rainy, night.


    Everyone stared at the door as it swung partway shut.


    "I think that was Riz''s way of politely asking she not be considered for such a position," Rian said.

 248 - Subordinates

    The next day, the mood of the dining hall at breakfast was strangely subdued. Usually, people were quite loud and energetic the day after a holiday, filled with enthusiasm and making a lot of noise. Today, however, many sat quietly and spoke in low murmurs. Some of them sounded confused.


    "Rian, are people sick or something?" Lori said as she checked her notes for her announcement, which were inscribed into a stone tablet. "The Dungeon doesn''t sound right."


    "That might have something to do with what happened yesterday," Rian said, voice flat.


    Lori frowned. "What happened yesterday?" She didn''t recall any other incident after she''d dealt with Shanalorre''s¡­ surrender? She really couldn''t think of a good word to describe it. But after that, the rest of the day had been quiet and peaceful, with no one making noise or dancing, just sitting around gossiping and actually resting. "The rest of the day was quiet and peaceful."


    Rian groaned for some reason. "That wasn''t quiet and peaceful, that was everyone being shocked and horrified and not sure what had happened!"


    "You still haven''t said what that was."


    Instead of replying, Rian turned and glanced past Umu at Lord something-something-ian and Shanalorre. "See this? This is what you have to look forward to for possibly the rest of your lives. You have only yourselves to blame. At least we knew what we were getting into from traveling with her."


    "Noted, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said.


    Rian sighed and turned towards Lori. "What happened was a little girl almost committed suicide, which doesn''t usually happen and is intrinsically shocking and horrifying, especially to parents of children of a similar age, of which the demesne has many. However, not everyone saw it, and those that didn''t don''t believe those who did, because it''s too disturbing for them to want it to be real. Some think it wasn''t as bad as people are saying, because Shana is well now, so maybe she was just being dramatic."


    Lori blinked. "Why are they perturbed, then? She''s not their child. And she didn''t even manage to succeed. Besides, that disturbance was over in a few moments, and it''s not like many actually managed to see it."


    "Point of order," Shanalorre said. "I was not committing suicide. Had my intention been to die, it would have been more expeditious to apply the blade to the arteries on my neck. I was showing Binder Lolilyuri my sincerity and giving her the option of how to approach the problem."


    "See Rian? She wasn''t trying to commit suicide, it was merely a bargaining technique."


    Rian stared at them both, looking tired for some reason. Then he turned to Lord Ily-something-something. "Please tell me her aunt still yells at her for doing stupid, childish things. Lie to me if necessary."


    "Vyshke still scolds her when she does something wrong," Lord some-three-part-name said.


    Rian nodded. "Right, we can leave that part to her then. Back on topic though, just trust me, your Bindership. As your lord in charge of dealing with people, everyone in the demesne is torn between finding what happened yesterday disturbing, horrifying, off-putting, and something that will haunt their nightmares for weeks, possibly years. It completely ruined the holiday for everyone."


    "Rian, if this is a pretext to declare another holiday¡ª"


    "It''s not," Rian interrupted her, voice flat. "In fact, no one''s probably going to want to hold holidays inside the Dungeon for a long time because of this." He sighed again. "Just¡­ go into this with that in mind, all right? Either people are shocked and horrified, in denial about the thing that has others shocked and horrified, or worst of all, consider it all gossip fodder."


    Lori blinked. "What is there to gossip about? The incident was perfectly simple and straightforward."


    "People will find a way." Lori had not thought it was possible for Rian''s voice to get any flatter, but apparently it was. "Look, I''ll handle it, all right? That''s what I''m for, after all."


    Lori frowned. "Then why bring it up?"


    "You asked at the start of this conversation, remember?"


    Oh, right, she had, hadn''t she? "Ah, yes. Well, could you draw everyone''s attention now? I''m ready to make my announcement."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said, before standing up. "Excuse me? Everyone? May I have your attention please? Hey!"


    Slowly, people stopped what they were doing and turned towards him. It seemed to take longer than usual to Lori. Didn''t people usually respond faster when Rian was calling for them? Maybe they were disturbed, if they were less amiable to Rian''s manipulations. Eventually, however, they settled down and focused on him.


    "Thank you," Rian said, his voice still raised to carry. "Now, before we move on to breakfast, Binder Lori has a few announcements to make. I''m almost entirely certain none of it is about land, so don''t ask." The resulting laughter was even weaker than usual. "As to yesterday''s events, I think her Bindership will have something to say about that as well. Your Bindership?"


    Rian nodded towards her, and Lori stood up, turning where she sat and swinging her legs over the bench since there really wasn''t much room to stand between the bench and the table. "All right," she said through a binding of airwisps that raised the volume of her voice. "As we established yesterday, Binder Shanalorre has surrendered herself and her demesne to my authority. Normally, this is when I execute her so I can claim her core, but as the only Deadspeaker capable of healing, I have decided to spare her until she is no longer needed."


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    Across the table, Rian''s hand slapped up into his face.


    "However, until this happens, Binder Shanalorre is still a Dungeon Binder, and will be treated with the respect she deserves," Lori continued, ignoring her lord''s theatrics. "She does not, however, have the authority to issue orders. She is also not to be given any sharp objects of any sort. That means knives, scissors, saws, razors, needles, beast teeth and claws, shards of bone, sharp sticks, and similar. If Binder Shanalorre needs something cut, I expect everyone to offer their assistance¡ªah, but she has no authority to order you to do it, so it''s purely voluntary!"


    For some reason, everyone looked confused. Idiots. She''d made everything perfectly clear!


    "Starting today, Binder Shanalorre will be stationed at the hospital, where she will be available to consult for healing. If you have any ailments, consult with her there. Because of the integration of River''s Fork Demesne into my possession, we will need to increase the expansion of the agricultural land as far as reasonably feasible, as we will need to provide more food for more people." That caused a reaction as people began to mutter. It was understandable, really. They would essentially need to begin supplying food to another demesne.


    "Also, if there is anyone here seeking to move to River''s Fork Demesne, as its new Dungeon Binder, I hereby accept your transfer," Lori said blandly.


    For some reason, Rian started laughing.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Rian. Shanalorre." Lori checked her notes. "Yllian. Stay. I need to speak with you all." Breakfast had finished, and while the tables around them were slowly emptying as people left to go do whatever tasks they had ahead of them, Lori had stayed in place.


    Shanalorre promptly stood up and walked around the table to sit opposite her, Rian moving out of the way and getting up to go around the table as well.


    "No Rian, you stay there," Lori said, pointing to the spot next to Shanalorre.


    Rian blinked, and looked at the indicated spot. "Did¡­ I do something to make you mad?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "The situation has changed. Go sit there."


    "All right¡­ oh. Oh, I get it. This is the subordinates side of the table now, huh? I guess this means you can finally sit down, Yllian."


    "Yes, yes, hurry up, we have much to discuss," Lori said impatiently. Once they were seated, she fixed her gaze upon Shanalorre, who stared back evenly. "I am very annoyed with you. Your antics have pressed me into a position I was not yet prepared to take, at a time where we could ill afford to divide our efforts."


    "I would apologize, Binder Lolilyuri, but I do not regret my actions," Shanalorre said evenly. "Had I approached you later, or had circumstances resulted in my death at a later date, my¡­" She paused, visibly remembering and amending her statement. "River''s Fork Demesne''s food crisis would have been far more advanced, and there would have been far less supplies at hand to act as a buffer while a solution was sought."


    Lori was unamused by her reasoning. "I am unamused by your reasoning," she said. "If you had not made saving the population of your demesne from such a crisis a condition of your submission, I am inclined to just leave them all to die." After all, they would not have been her subjects unless they submitted to her, and many of them were idiots that had chosen to leave to avoid exactly that.


    "So I presumed, which is why I could not leave your conquest of River''s Fork demesne to the chance of my death," Shanalorre said. "While I am a poor Dungeon Binder, lacking as I am in skill and ability, I am not so poor as to shirk my duty to keep those under my care alive by any means possible."


    "How commendable," Lori said flatly. "However, do not think that this stratagem of yours has spared you from future work. As my subordinate, you have merely added the people of my demesne in addition to your own in your responsibilities."


    Shanalorre inclined her head in acknowledgement. "I understand, Binder Lolilyuri. In that case, may I make a proposal?"


    "We are currently in the middle of dealing with the repercussions of your last proposal. If this aggravates me, you''re losing hot water bathing privileges."


    Her subordinate Dungeon Binder titled her head, clearly considering. "Very well. I propose that instead of being stationed at the hospital, I should instead accompany those sent to fell trees. That group has a higher likelihood of dangerous injury requiring immediate healing lest death by blood loss occur. Should I accompany them, I can react immediately to any such injuries."


    It¡­ was actually a reasonably good idea. "I will consider your request," Lori said. "Either way, you will remain in the hospital until the doctors there all agree you have sufficiently recovered from your little misadventure. For now, we will discuss your demesne''s organization so I can consider if and how to integrate structures you''ve already established." Lori read her notes again. "Yllian. I have decided to allow you to retain your position as Shanalorre''s lord in addition to the duties I have already assigned you. In addition to Shanalorre and of course myself, you will also answer to Rian as his subordinate."


    "Oh, finally! Thank you!" Rian sighed.


    "Given that the last person from your demesne that I made a lord tried to kill a Dungeon Binder, know that any similar insubordination will result in your immediate death by asphyxiation," Lori continued. "For the moment, you are on probation. Rian will assign you work in addition to the duties I have already assigned you. You will not have authority over anyone without Rian''s authorization, and should it come to light that you falsely claim such authorization, I will consider that grounds for your death. Should you refuse these terms, then you will be stripped of your position."


    "Say yes. Please, say yes!" Rian pleaded, staring at the other man imploringly over Shanalorre''s head. "You''ll be fine, this is just her Bindership being herself. Please, I need help, and she still hasn''t appointed any other lords or ladies. Even if I have to arrange things ahead of time and account for you needing to stay close to Shanalorre, every job I don''t have to do myself will be a big help! Please accept, I''m begging you!"


    Yllian gave Rian a look that seemed both disdainful and vaguely sympathetic. Then he glanced down at Shanalorre. She seemed to sense his gaze, because she turned and nodded. He turned towards Lori and bowed his head. "Very well, Great Binder. I accept your terms."


    Rian sighed in relief, looking theatrically happy.


    Lori ignored him, instead nodding at¡ªshe checked her note again¡ªYllian. Ugh, she was going to have to spend weeks learning his name and face¡­ "I will ratify and retain the rest of your demesne''s organizational structure on a case by case basis," she said, turning back to face Shanalorre, "provided they are necessary. Rian, go get your plank so you can take notes."


    "I suppose this means I''m telling the coal burners the inspection is postponed again¡­ " Rian muttered as he got up to do just that.

 249 - You Just Want To Eat Our Food

    Lori tried to listen as Shanalorre, Rian and¡­ uh¡­ the one whose name she was trying to learn and it was written on her notes, so it was fine if she couldn''t really recall it now¡­ discussed River''s Fork''s organization. With only between fifty and sixty residents¡ªcloser to fifty now since Shanalorre and her escorts were in her demesne¡ªthey apparently needed less organization than her demesne did, and had less specialization. Unfortunately, when they started mentioning names¡ªas if those were more important for identifying people than, say, what they actually did¡ªher eyes started to glaze, and started ignoring the irrelevant details.


    Still, she was able to discern that in addition to Lord Iri-something, River''s Fork had a quartermaster in charge of keeping track of their resources¡ªand was apparently unable to keep those resources from being stolen¡ªas well as help assign people to go gathering resources such as wood, fruits, and trying to hunt beasts for meat. They had a few farmers who tended to their fields with the assistance of any able bodies, who were under the authority of an overseer who was himself a farmer.


    While they only had two carpenters, many men had experience working with wood from their time in the militia, and so could be assigned to work with the two as needed. The same for the demesne''s single blacksmith, who had apparently been working all winter to repair their damaged tools and turn the demesne''s refined metal into more tools. Hunting was done on a volunteer basis with no central authority to organize it, only requiring hunters to provide their catch to the quartermaster for cold storage, and while the demesne''s inhabitants had also tried to catch seels, it had not been as successfully implemented.


    Shanalorre''s aunt also held an unofficial position, being the one many of the adults spoke to with their concerns in the belief that she had influence over her niece. From the sound of it, the woman had an almost Rian-like position, though it was clear that Shanalorre only took her words under advisement.


    Lori didn''t think she''d let the woman keep that position.


    From the sound of it, some people had also been hoarding food for far longer than this winter, collecting fruits from the dome''s trees and keeping most of it in their homes instead of surrendering it to the quartermaster for drying and storage. They had tried to keep back meat as well, but the lack of salt early on had led to some families falling ill from improperly preserved meat, and so most of the meat usually reached the demesne''s cold room that Lori''s payments of ice had managed to make feasible. When River''s Fork had gotten access to salt, Shanalorre had managed to prevent a reversion of events by keeping the salt closely guarded, which had mostly prevented people from stealing it and using it to preserve food only for themselves.


    The more Lori heard, the more she just wanted to leave those idiots to their own devices so they''d die out on their own. It was only a small fraction of the people in River''s Fork, usually those who had left her demesne, but they were clearly having a deleterious effect on morale and discipline, as they couldn''t be harshly punished without severely affecting the demesne''s available manpower¡ª


    "You''re a healer. Why not just break their bones, allow them to experience agony, and then heal them?" Lori interrupted.


    "Because the doctors refused to be complicit in such a thing," Shanalorre said, turning to face her to explain, "and while the one meaning I am capable of is able to mend broken bones, it does not align bones together. Without properly aligning broken limbs, healing in such a state would result in permanent disfigurement."


    "So beat them until they''re bruised, don''t break any bones, let them suffer, and then heal them," Lori pointed out.


    "It was suggested," Shanalorre said, "but failed because no one was willing to be the demesne''s designated torturer."


    "Disciplinarian," Lori corrected. "If it''s for your own good, it''s not torture, it''s discipline, not matter how terrible and seemingly unreasonable it is."


    Rian gave her a flat look. "Something your parents said?"


    "I don''t want to talk about it."


    Shanalorre stared at Lori for a moment. "Regardless, at the time I decided that such measures were not necessary. By late summer we had managed to impose an acceptable level of discipline on the rebelliously insubordinate, curbing their behavior. However, during the winter the relative isolation people experienced due to having to remain indoors, aside from their going to the quartermaster for supplies and gathering wood for the use of themselves and the blacksmith, allowed enforcement of discipline to lapse. And unfortunately, militia with too much time on their hands are known to allow such lapses, beginning the slow misappropriation of food supplies."


    Lord something-iyan actually looked uncomfortable. "I had intended to deal with the matter before spring properly began, and had been taking measures to curb it," he said hurriedly, "but because circumstances led to our being detained here, the situation has no doubt managed to progress."


    Lori frowned. "So you don''t actually know if your demesne is going to be lacking in food supplies?"


    "According to the last inspection and audit by our quartermaster, the supplies we had at the time would just barely allow us to last until the harvest," Shanalorre said. "However, that was at the time we were last in our¡­ in River''s Fork demesne. Before we left, one of the children confided to me that he saw someone sneaking into the supply depot. If that behavior had continued unchecked up to now, the supplies would obviously be more depleted."


    Lori nodded. She already knew that from Rian. "Should I deem it necessary," she said, giving Shanalorre a flat stare. "I will be breaking some bones and you will be healing them. Such short-sightedness in the face of survival cannot continue. If those idiots are going to be my responsibility, they will learn proper behavior. Our agreement was that I will keep your people from starving to death. There were no specifications as to their well-being beyond that."


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    "As your lord in charge of dealing with people, it''s my job to tell you that arbitrary corporal punishment like that is a bad idea," Rian interrupted whatever reply Shanalorre would have made. "Terrible for morale, not as good for discipline as you think, and will probably just make things worse."


    Lori turned and glared at her lord. Her first lord? She technically had a second¡ªtechnically her third¡ªright now. "Taking from supplies like that is clearly theft, and a punishable offense. Beating them until their bones break clearly falls under the established punishment of public humiliation and flogging. And how can teaching them that actions have consequences not instill discipline?"


    "Because this sort of violent response on your part is exactly the sort of thing they were afraid of enough to move to another demesne for. If these people were the sort to let themselves just be browbeaten into compliance by authority, they wouldn''t have left their old demesnes to come to this continent, or left our demesne to move to Shanalorre''s when they had the chance. While I agree that they need to be straightened out, that''s also my job. Whatever offenses they might have committed, it was under Shanalorre''s reign, not yours." He glanced at the other Dungeon Binder, looking almost apologetic. "Given that they have not been punished by her, nor has any action really been taken against them, their actions are, by implication, not a punishable offense."


    Shanalorre tilted her head thoughtfully. "I¡­ cannot deny that logic. While River''s Fork''s legal framework is based on militia law, it is true that their actions contrary to it have not been prosecuted as assiduously as should have been the case, to the demesne''s detriment. By allowing them to continue their actions while I prioritized other matters, I have likely led to this very breakdown of discipline."


    Next to her, Lord something-something¡ªLori checked her notes again. Yllian¡ªdidn''t say a thing, but he wore a very parental ''I-told-you-so'' expression. Lori probably wouldn''t have wanted to hit him more if she didn''t find herself agreeing with the sentiment. "That''s as may be, but River''s Fork is under my authority now."


    "They don''t know that yet," Rian pointed out. "If they knew they were doing something to make you mad, they¡­ well, they might still do it, but they''d be doing it with that in mind."


    "Ignorance of my law is no excuse."


    "But surely a short transition period to let people be aware of the change in authority so they know to adjust their behavior is only reasonable, right? After all, they should be given the time to find out what laws they''re operating under now and adjust their behavior accordingly. Sure, those who used to live here know what those are, but what about the rest? And even for the former, how would they know if you''ve added any new laws after they left? You didn''t but they don''t know that yet either."


    Lori glared at him, but she supposed he had a point about River''s Fork''s original residents not being familiar with her laws. "Fine. I''ll give the demesne two days to become familiar with my laws and adjust their behavior accordingly. But no more than that."


    "I''m sure that should be enough," Rian said. "Though speaking of which, we need to discuss how we''re going to break this news to those in River''s Fork without, you know, everything breaking out into open violence. Off the top of my head, the people who thought we''d captured Shanalorre will all think we actually have and this is all under duress, general malcontents will be generally malcontent, and people like Shanalorre''s uncle will¡ªnot unreasonably¡ªthink we''ve been influencing her and question the legitimacy of the news."


    "I have confided in my aunt and some of the senior militia that I might surrender the demesne to Binder Lolilyuri for the sake of our survival," Shanalorre said. "Over the winter, it has become an increasingly more palatable option to those I have discussed it with in light of Binder Lolilyuri''s capabilities, as opposed to the slow degradation and sudden death of the demesne''s residents through increasing public disorder."


    "I think you need actual violence in the streets for it to be considered public disorder," Rian said. He glanced at Lori. "Remember what I was telling you about how we can attract people to live in our demesne because we had hot water? This, right here? This is basically recruiting people to live in our demesne because we have hot water."


    "It can''t be just that," Lori said.


    "The stable infrastructure, secure buildings, general morale and secured food supplies were also a factor," Shanalorre admitted.


    "So you just want to eat our food," Lori said blandly.


    "Yes," Shanalorre said in the same tone. "And live in easier to repair and more convenient buildings like yours. And have a Dungeon that can shelter us against dragons like yours. And be as prosperous as you are. You already rule over most of those who survived the first dragon to pass over River''s Fork. This is simply adding the rest. As to announcing the change in authority, I will simply inform them. As I said, all those who previously obeyed me, I shall order to now obey you as their Dungeon Binder, which should suffice. I have had the militia who accompanied me on my trips to assist in childbirth relay their experiences in this place to as many others as possible to help make the idea of being under your authority more desirable. After all, in the same amount of time as River''s Fork has existed, you have managed to create a far more stable and comfortable demesne. By any comparison, your rule has been far superior."


    Lori smiled smugly at the compliments. They were all true, after all.


    "Somehow, I don''t think it''ll be that easy," Rian said. "If people were reasonable, then yeah, that''s probably what would happen. But if they were reasonable, you wouldn''t have this food crisis in the first place."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Ah. I¡­ cannot refute the logic of that."


    Rian turned to¡­ Lori checked her notes¡­ Yllian. "In your opinion, how many people are liable to react violently to this change in leadership?"


    "Lasponin, for sure," Yllian said immediately. "About a dozen people as well, mostly from the new immigrants. The likely disciplinary cases and thieves, and their families whom they lead or cannot refuse them."


    "Who''s Lasponin?" Rian asked. Wait, there was a name Rian didn''t know?


    "My uncle," Shanalorre sighed. "He has been sharply critical of my leadership, sometimes with good reason. However, his arguments are undermined by his insistence that he would make a better leader. I leave disciplining him to my aunt."


    "Ah. My condolences on your difficult family situation."


    "Thank you."


    Lori twitched upon hearing this. Still, it wasn''t her prob¡ªwait, yes it was! Now, at least. "Such disrespect will not be allowed to continue," she said. "He will be included in the disciplinary action."


    "It''s not against the law to criticize you," Rian said. "If it was, you''d have written it down."


    "No, but undermining her authority is surely treason."


    "You didn''t write that law down either."


    She hadn''t? No, surely she had! Hadn''t she?


    Lori frowned, got up, and went to check the list of laws and rights near the door.


    She stared at the list inscribed into the stone for a moment.


    Then she turned and headed back to the table.


    "It''s there," she declared as she sat back down. "It falls under ''theft of property'' and ''murder'', as attempting to take away the Dungeon Binder''s demesne is clearly theft and clearly an attempt to murder her."


    "Ah. Well, at least wait for him to do it again before you punish him," Rian said. "Shana didn''t punish him, so during her reign, by implication¡­ you know."


    Lori turned to Shanalorre. "If your uncle attempts to undermine your authority, and by extension mine, he will be punished."


    The younger Dungeon Binder nodded. "I will see to it he is warned, Great Binder."

 250 - To Deal With Malcontents

    The discussion went on as Rian asked for specifics on the known malcontents. Their names (what did that matter?), their families, their positions and skills, and the things they were known to have done.


    "I think I remember some of these people," he mused, looking down at the list he''d made while Lori contemplated between laying her head on the table to nap or simply lying back across the whole bench. She was the only one sitting on her side, after all. "I honestly didn''t think they were the type to steal food like that. Senn is Naineb''s brother whose family has been taking care of her children since she and her husband were exiled, right?"


    "Yes," Shanalorre said as Lori once more wished she had a chair with a back she could lean on. "I initially excused their breaches of rationing in light of that fact. However, they abused the consideration."


    "Probably for petty revenge. And this one¡­" Rian sighed. "I remember him. Is he still going on about how people don''t need the Binderarchy?"


    "Yes. His rhetoric is that while a Dungeon Binder must exist to create the demesne, there is no reason they must possess supreme authority, and that all should be free to govern themselves. He uses the current state of the demesne as support for his argument that a demesne does not require a supreme authority."


    "And these people wanted land when they were here¡­ though unlike some people, they didn''t really make as much of a fuss about it¡­" Rian muttered as Lori tried lying down on the bench, only to find it just narrow enough to be uncomfortable. "And they were pretty well behaved when they lived here. A bit afraid of Lori, but not exactly a problem¡­ what changed?"


    "I suspect they are among those who think the demesne won''t survive under my leadership and are indulging recklessly as they count down the days," Shanalorre said. She glanced at Lori. "A belief that is not uncommon."


    Lori shrugged unapologetically.


    "If they do it''s sort of unconscionable that they''re planning to get their children killed with them instead of just trying to come back here. I''ve been coming by all winter, and they didn''t even so much as try to talk to me about it." Rian sighed. "Well, I''ll have to consider all this later. Binder Lori, do you have any thoughts as to what will happen to River''s Fork once you''ve officially taken over there?"


    She straightened up from leaning backwards to try and relieve the muscles on her back. "Since this is all conditional on the demesne''s core being where I''m told it is, I will be checking that first," Lori said. "Then I''m properly securing it with stone. Afterwards, we will be moving as many of the population here as possible. I am inclined to leave the malcontents there to their own devices and simply come back when they''re dead."


    "Please don''t," Rian and Shanalorre said in chorus. The two looked at each other, and Rian made a gesture of acquiescence.


    "We cannot depopulate River''s Fork," Shanalorre said. "The trees with meanings to accelerate aspects of their growth need regular maintenance, otherwise they will consume all nourishment available to them and die. While I can imbue the meanings my father made, I cannot replicate them. Well maintained, they will provide a rapid, additional source of food and wood."


    "If you just leave people there to their own devices, they''ll ruin the place trying to survive," Rian said. "Accelerated or not, River''s Fork has reliable access to more fruit trees than we do, which will be a great addition to our diet. In addition, there''s the mine. We''ll be the ones operating it now, so it''s in our interest to have people in River''s Fork to work it. While I agree we should move the current population away from there and bring them here to better integrate them with the society we''re forming as well as properly impose discipline, River''s Fork needs to continue to be populated and functional. It''s¡­ uh, I don''t know exactly how big it is, but it''s an entire area with no Iridescence. Hilly or not, we can use that space."


    Ugh, yes. Ruining perfectly good resources because they were unsupervised idiots was exactly the sort of thing people would do, wouldn''t they? It was why she put some many protective measures around her reservoir! "Fine," Lori said begrudgingly. "We will keep River''s Fork populated. However, there cannot be a repeat of these circumstances. At the very least, food will no longer be individually rationed out to families and will instead be served on a communal basis. That will at least limit the food expenditures to a sustainable amount. Rian, see to it."


    "We''ll need to organize people to cook for the entire demesne on a regular basis, the way we do here," Rian said thoughtfully. "It should be easier, since there aren''t as much people, but that will still be a big job. At the very least though, it should be able to keep people out of mischief while they adjust to the new order." His fingers tapped on the table at seemingly random. At least, the tapping didn''t sound like a tune. "Actually, if we just want a quick and dirty solution to the food problem, all we need to do is reduce the number of people in River''s Fork. Uh, without killing anyone, let''s be clear. If we move a family or two here, depending on how much food is left in River''s Fork they just might be able to make it until harvest. Not a full relocation, but just enough to reduce the strain on the demesne''s resources until we have the proper infrastructure set up to accommodate more."


    "That would certainly help," Shanalorre said.


    "Though, the most logical people to remove from River''s Fork would be the malcontents," Rian said as he turned to look towards Shanalorre and Lord¡­ uh, her lord. "They are, after all, the ones whose actions have been most ruinously affecting the food supply''s longevity. So I have to ask¡­ has all this been some kind of ruse to foist them off on us, and then declare your independence from her Bindership''s authority?"


    Lori blinked, then straightened as she realized what Rian was saying.


    "No," Shanalorre said as Lori directed a flat stare at her. "That is not the case. I am a woman of my word. I have submitted to Binder Lolilyuri and am content to remain so until she, for whatever reason, chooses to release me or kill me so she can claim my core once my usefulness expires. Though I cannot fault your reasoning regarding the malcontents, as I also came to such a conclusion."


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    "Removing the malcontents would certainly help improve morale," Lord someone-or-other said. "We''ve considered getting rid of them ourselves. However, their families, especially those with children, are of varying degrees of innocent. And even if we wanted to rid ourselves of them, we didn''t have the means."


    "You could have just killed them," Lori pointed out. Militia killed people all the time, after all.


    "Under militia law, while they were certainly guilty of theft, it was not a to a degree worthy of execution," Lord something-something said. "And unless I misread, it is the same by this demesne''s laws as well."


    "We''re getting off topic," Rian interjected. "All right, so you''re not just foisting them off on us. I had to ask. It was in my Dungeon Binder''s best interest that I at least bring up the possibility."


    Lori gave him a flat look, then huffed in annoyance. "Do it sooner," she said.


    "I will attempt to increase my paranoia to Binder-approved levels from now on." Good. He knew how important her safety was.


    "We understand that you don''t completely trust us yet," Shanalorre said. "That is only logical. However, please believe me when I say that we have more to gain from surrender than from deceiving you. Deceiving you merely creates enmity where there is no need, and which we have no capability to stand against. I have no intention of being audited again. Consider me disciplined."


    Hah. Like Lori would just believe that. Still, Lori acknowledged that lingering on the point would serve no purpose now. Best to pretend she believed it. "Rian, organize the shelter to be ready to house those that will be moved from River''s Fork. Tomorrow, I will begin construction of the houses for the petitioners, so that the shelter will be mostly empty by the time we resume contact with my other demesne. The malcontents can be placed there." Her other demesne¡­ it felt nice to say out loud. "In addition to the malcontents, Binder Shanalorre''s relations will also be moved here." Her uncle was a known malcontent, and so removing him from the place would probably be useful for instilling discipline.


    "Um, while I agree with the idea in principle, her uncle is also one of the only two doctors the place has," Rian said.


    "You say that like it will be easy," he muttered.


    "I¡­ must raise a possible issue. My aunt is one of the authorities of the demesne, charged with maintaining organization, finding and solving possible problems, and maintaining morale. If she is removed, who will be her replacement?"


    Lori stared at her. "This despite her husband''s incitement?"


    "Keeping my uncle reasonably restrained was within the purview of her duties."


    Lori considered this. On the one hand, the woman was already a part of an organizational structure in place¡­ on the other, the structure was obviously an incompetent one given the demesne had reached the point that it had. "The state of the demesne shows she was incapable in her position. I see no reason to retain her. They will all be deported here to remove their influence from the area, your uncle especially."


    Shanalorre frowned slightly. "What will become of him?"


    "That will depend on his actions," Lori said.


    Rian coughed loudly for some reason. "Well, I suppose we''ll have to move more people there anyway so there''s enough to farm the land and work the mine after we move out the malcontents, but people probably won''t be willing to go back on a permanent basis until we can significantly improve the available infrastructure. A proper shelter that they''ll be safe in should a dragon pass overhead that has water, air, lights and food for one thing. I know River''s Fork survived without any casualties last time, but that was probably as much luck as preparation."


    "Definitely luck," Lord something¡ªLori checked her note¡ªYllian said, actually shuddering. "I could hear those abominations even through the rocks we piled up to block the entrance of the mine, and they could surely hear us. If they had started digging¡­ or if the vent that was letting air into the mine had been blocked, or worse, entered¡­ we''d have all died."


    "But you didn''t," Lori sighed regretfully.


    Rian sighed as well, clearly understanding her annoyance. "We have a resident healer now and that''s a good thing," he reminded her. "Now you can ride on as many rocks as you want."


    "Please don''t," Shanalorre said. "The possibility of you predeceasing me fills me with terror. But to return to our discussion, a proper shelter is the one thing the demesne needs above everything else, Binder Lolilyuri. That is why I was willing to give up so much for you to build one for us. It is still a necessary priority if the demesne is to be maintained."


    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "Can we move everyone to this demesne until the construction of the shelter is completed?" That would simplify matters in the event of a dragon, since she doubted they''d have enough time to evacuate people once a dragon had become perceptible to her¡­


    "The people can be moved with no issue," Shanalorre said. "But as I said before, with no one to maintain the plants with meanings that accelerate their growth, they will exhaust the available nourishment in the soil and die."


    "What sort of maintenance are we talking about?" Rian said.


    "Regular watering and fertilization with latrine waste."


    "Ah. The kind of job we wish we can give the malcontents but can''t because they wouldn''t do it."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Unfortunately, it requires reliable and disciplined people, else the maintenance will likely lapse."


    "This just makes finding people willing to move there harder," Rian sighed. "Well, either way, it seems to me our first step when we can finally go back there, once we''ve sufficiently secured her Bindership''s authority, is to move the malcontents to this demesne and begin construction on a proper shelter there. One that we can somehow adequately protect from whatever a dragon may throw at it. Unless you think there''s something I''m missing, your Bindership?"


    Lori grimaced but¡­ well, that was indeed the only actionable plan, wasn''t it? "I''ll inform you if something occurs to me. In the meantime, start finding people to move there. Ones that can be trusted to remain disciplined with minimal supervision."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori pushed back her bench and rose. "You two, go to the hospital. Rian, get to work." She had to go get started on building those houses. And then there was the dehydration shed as well, which would have to come after that. Then there were still the inspections¡­


    As Shanalorre and Lord whoever rose to do as she had ordered them, Rian said, "Hold it, Yllian. Now that I have you, I''m putting you to work."


    Yllian looked at Rian, face even. "The Great Binder ordered me to remain by the Gr¡ª¡­ uh."


    "Keep calling her ''her Bindership'' so you don''t get the two confused," Rian said. "And I wouldn''t dream of stopping you from doing as she ordered you. However, if you''re just going to sit around all day in the same room as our little Dungeon Binder, then you might as well be useful. Come with me, we''re passing by my house before you go to the hospital. I have the demesne''s latest inventory list and I want you to compile it all together to see how much of what we have and how long it''s likely to last at the rate we''re going through it."


    Yllian stiffened, and he turned to Lori. His eyes didn''t go wide, and his face was still even, but his stare at her was¡­ emphatic, somehow.


    Rian, too, looked at her. "Is that all right, your Bindership?" he said brightly.


    Lori waved her hand dismissively. From the light coming through her Dungeon''s door, most of the morning was already gone. She''d barely have enough time choosing a building site. "Yes, yes, as long as it doesn''t interfere with the duty I set him."


    "Wonderful!" Rian grinned. "Come on Yllian. I have a nice, big plank you can write everything down on. Don''t get anything smudged, or you''ll be writing it all down all over again."


    Leaving her lords to their duties, Lori went outside, Rian''s theatrically slightly unhinged laughter trailing behind her.

 251 - Spring Construction

    There was, really, not much adjustment needed for the integration of Shanalorre and the new residents into her demesne, beyond Shanalorre stationing herself at the hospital while she recovered from her blood loss. The militia who had accompanied her had been integrated into the workforce, assisting with the logging, sawing, farming, the rising need to keep chokers out of their farms while fences were being raised, and the clearing operations to prepare for expanding the agricultural fields. Since there were only a handful of them, it wasn''t particularly significant assistance, but at least they were properly earning their keep now!


    Rian in particular seemed happier as he set Yllian to compiling and keeping track of the resources the demesne had at hand. Lori was surprised to learn¡ªthough she probably shouldn''t have been, given Rian''s obsession with numbers going up and down¡ªthat her lord had taken it upon himself to keep track of the amount of meat, vigas, vigas ground into flour, tubers, planks, bundles of firewood, buckets of coal, logs growing mushrooms in the mushroom farm, amount of mushrooms harvested per log, salt, distilled gold water, soap, chiyudrops of honey, furs, skins, hides¡­


    She stopped listening well before he finished he completely enumerating the list, but it was lengthy. Rian had been having some people keep track of each thing and report to him how much of each had been used or produced at the end of the day. He compiled that together in his house every night, keeping track of it all on a plank. Every week, he recalculated how much the demesne had made or used of each resource, which he apparently used to project how long the resource would last¡­


    "That does not have to recalculated every week!" Lori declared when he had told her what he was having Yllian do, horrified at the repeated calculations that would require.


    "I beg to differ," Rian said. "Depending on the time of year, we would be using more of, say, coal and wood, or producing more soap and hides. With this I''ll know what we need a ready supply of at what time of year and when we''re likely to have a surplus of something so we know when we have to allocate labor to what. It''ll basically be our demesne''s own little almanac." He actually seemed proud of it.


    "Which you have now delegated to¡­" Lori checked the rock she''d taken to carrying around with the name inscribed on it. Much less likely to break than a stone tablet, "¡­Yllian." She glanced at her new lord, whose sooty hands and too-tired state on arriving had prompted her to ask Rian what he''d been making the man do.


    "Only putting together the numbers. I do the final calculations and records myself, so it all fits onto the plank."


    A thought occurred to Lori. "If you''re recording these in planks, where are you keeping them?"


    "Under the bed, where else? Uh, while we''re on the subject, can I start storing them in the vault? It''s getting hard to clean under the bed because of the planks."


    Lori sighed. "Is it really necessary, Rian?"


    "Maybe, maybe not," Rian said, shrugging his shoulders. "This is a long term project whose benefits likely won''t be obvious for a few years. But currently, it''s letting me keep track of our food supplies, better predict how long they''ll last, and let me plan for the trip to Covehold."


    Ugh, fine. That was just barely beneficial enough to allow him to do it for now. "Ugh, fine. That''s just barely beneficial enough for me to allow this for now."


    "May I assist in that as well, Lord Rian?" Shanalorre said from where she was sitting. "I know my numbers. I can help Lord Yllian."


    Rian stared at the other Dungeon Binder, then turned to Lori. "Can she? It''ll give her something to do when there''s no one to heal, which is most of the time."


    Lori hesitated, glancing at sideways at Shanalorre. The girl stared back at her blankly. "Fine. She can assist you while she continues to recover her blood." Ever since she had surrendered to Lori, the other Dungeon Binder had been having her meals supplemented with beast liver and marrow, the traditional remedy for blood loss. Well, the one they had available. They could have filled her veins with the blood of others, but no one knew what flavor her blood was, and the few people with smooth thin blood couldn''t give her too much since they had to work as well. Still, Shanalorre was in no danger, merely lethargic as she slowly recovered.


    Work also began on the new houses, both for the petitioners and those who would be moved from River''s Fork. While she wanted to just continue to extend the original row of houses, latrines had been set up at the end, and she didn''t want to move those. Actually, the area might actually need a few more for convenience. There had actually been a small line when she had been there looking for a building site.


    After examining the area available, she decided to put the new houses opposite the old row, just past the basin that was filled with drinking water by the aqueduct. The ground was stable enough for her needs despite the rain, the undergrowth keeping the dirt together, though she''d need secure the slope against collapse too. The site was well away from the direction their farmlands were going to expand while still being close enough to be convenient.


    The first thing she needed to do was to move the stone there to build up a foundation. She still had a large amount in the stockpile, but given they hadn''t had a dragon in some time, she opted to keep them in place to protect her Dungeon. While she had Rian dig up the site to get the soil out of the way¡ªthey could move the soil down to the Dungeon farm to expand the plots¡ªshe worked on excavating more stone.


    The third level wasn''t even a tenth of their above-ground farmland and barely a third the size of the second level, and while she had stopped excavation because of other matters, it was far from completed. Lori spent a relaxing few days expanding the third level, furthering the expansion tunnels and knocking down the walls between them to make pillars with arching supports to hold up the ceiling. She intended the third level to be a massive and able to provide food for at least the town around her Dungeon, but that would be a work of months, possibly years.


    For now, expansion was limited by the fact she was the only one capable of excavating, and the fact the stone had to go through the rest of her dungeon to be removed. Still, it was a useful ready source of building material, and there were always more things that needed to be built. After excavating out the expansion tunnels and a few plots on the ground to be filled with rocks and dirt to farm in for a few days while she waited for the dirt to be removed from her chosen building site, Lori estimated she had enough stone to start construction.


    It was almost familiar, moving stone from the pile she''d been making near the building site and laying out a foundation. She measured out the same dimensions she''d used for the row of houses, this time remembering to add a little more to account for the walls between buildings. Once the initial foundation was in place, she drew out lines to denote the individual houses and began making the floors level. She was building eight homes to start with, though she intended to be able to continue extending this row for the foreseeable future, or at least until the row became unreasonably long.


    Wearing her hat and rain coat, she worked through the weather. In a way, the water was actually useful for letting her know whether her work was level or not, since it would pool in any depressions and any significant bumps would stand out, assisted by the stone masons. Unfortunately, it meant her socks getting wet in her boots as water seeped in from some seam. That was something she hadn''t missed, but unfortunately she had to live with it. Rian insisted that Shanalorre heal her at the end of the day to make sure she didn''t get sick¡ªwell, stay sick, anyway, since her nose sometimes dripped¡ªand Lori really couldn''t find it in her to object.


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    In fact, Shanalorre was very busy before and after dinner as people asked her to heal them. Lori eventually had to impose that she only heal people after they''d been examined by a doctor or medic and the person was confirmed to be actually sick of something


    "Thank you, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said as people reluctantly walked away, and no longer crowded Lori''s table.


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Be sure to inform the doctors what I said. They should be examining people already, but you are not to heal anyone unless they have been examined."


    "Does that apply to the infants as well, Binder Lolilyuri?"


    Lori considered that. "Fine, you can deal with the children immediately. Make sure anyone claiming to be sick stay away from them."


    "Of course, Binder Lolilyuri."


    Lori waited, but Shanalorre didn''t seem to have anything more to say, so she shrugged and turned to Rian, who was as usual looking back and forth between the two of them. "Rian, what do you have?"


    "The new pit traps are working," Rian said, smiling as he reported the good news while Riz and Umu went to get the food with Yllian. "Not getting us as much meat as bringing down one of the big plodders, but it''s meat. And Aska got lucky and found a clutch of choker eggs. The hunters want to try raising some again, this time from the beginning."


    "Again? After what happened last time?"


    "They say trying to grow chokers from the egg is mostly safer, since they can train the things not to attack, and they can clip and dull their claws and teeth from birth," Rian said. "And this time they''ll be able to make a proper coop for them to stay in."


    Lori grunted. "Speaking of chokers, how is the fence coming along?"


    "Slowly," Rian said. "But the rain is actually helping, making it easier to stick branches into the ground. It will still take weeks to complete though. On a related note, I think we should use some of our stockpiled hides to make new shoes. Despite repairs some people''s shoes are starting to wear out, and some of the children''s don''t fit them anymore. We can''t afford stepping on something and injuring themselves. With Binder Shanalorre here it probably won''t result in a fatal infection, but better to prevent it in the first place."


    "Authorize it," Lori nodded. "I''ll leave deciding the order of priority to you. What else?"


    "While you''re building, I ask that you consider building another bath, especially since we''ll be taking in more people from River''s Fork. Possibly with its own laundry area attached, what with the laundry area unusable right now."


    Lori scowled, reminded she had to do her own laundry. "I''d have thought the rains would have helped with the laundry."


    "Just getting clothes wet doesn''t count as washing it. The rains are making it difficult because more clothes need to dry in front of the fireplaces. Actually, someone suggested that we set up drying lines for clothes in the third level. Not washing, just string up some poles next to the plots of vigas there and have the clothes drip on them. The stalks don''t need much light, and if we place the drying lines right they shouldn''t be in danger of people stepping on them."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at the actually good idea. "That''s actually a good idea. See to it, but priority is on not ruining our crops. And it will be drying only. There will be no laundry done in the third level. I will go there myself to check the temperature and humidity and adjust it accordingly, and I had best like what I see."


    "I''ll tell them, your Bindership. Now, on to the next matter, I''ve taken the liberty of asking the carpenters to start building some new beds for the shelter that we can move to the new houses once the latter are ready. We don''t want people sleeping on the floor after all."


    Lori frowned. "Have they already begun work on the beds?"


    "Uh, they were starting to work on two earlier. Should I tell them to stop?"


    Lori considered it, then grunted. "How big are the beds?"


    "Wide," Rian said as Riz and Umu arrived, putting the bowls of soup, plate of bread and cups of water on the table. "You know, for the family to sleep in. If they need more beds, we can add it in later, but I figured one per family would be enough to start."


    "Continue those beds, but don''t make any more for the moment," Lori said as she reached for a bowl and a cup, then helped herself to a disk of bread. "We will discuss why later in your house."


    "What, not here? Are we keeping secrets from our loyal subjects?"


    "Yes," Lori said bluntly as she dipped her bread into her soup and took a bite.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "You¡­ want me to find the four families with the worst houses in the demesne?" Rian said, looking confused at the request as he sat at the foot of his bed. "Ones who don''t live in the row of houses you made."


    "Rian, why are you repeating what I''m saying?" Lori said as she kept out of the way of Umu and Mikon hanging clothes to dry in front of the fire.


    "To make sure I heard it right and understand what you said. I''ve got the first, not sure about the second. Why the worst houses? Do you mean the ones in most disrepair?"


    "No, I mean the ones who are most uncomfortable living in their house."


    "That would be the big families with more members than they can really fit in," Rian said promptly. "Unfortunately, when you made the original generation of homes, you didn''t really account for how many people would be living in them. A few had older sons and unmarried uncles moves into the shelter, and it''s actually a bunch of them who lodged a petition to make a sort of bachelor''s house. But some couldn''t do that because they wanted to stay together."


    Lori nodded. "They will do. While the dimensions of the row houses aren''t much bigger than the original houses, they have more overhead space, and with some creativity can more comfortably fit more people. I intend to move the families you choose into the new houses."


    At the fireplace, Mikon glanced towards Lori.


    "That¡­ would be nice for them, but¡­ why?"


    "I have no intention of giving the malcontents we''ll be bringing here new, comfortable houses to live in," Lori said flatly. "They abandoned my demesne, and the only reason they''re coming back is to prevent starvation in the area they infested, which has now become my responsibility."


    "Ah, petty revenge," Rian nodded. "Why didn''t you say so? I''ll see who I can find. It will take some days, however, since I don''t think you want this to spread, or everyone will want to argue they should get the slot?"


    Lori nodded. "That''s fine, as long as it''s ready when the structures are to be roofed and made habitable, yes, what do you want Mikon?"


    The weaver, who''d stopped hanging up the laundry to stare at Lori, jumped slightly at being acknowledged. She hesitated a moment, then took a deep breath. "Um, your Bindership, may I nominate my family?" she said timidly. "I have an uncle, two aunts, and seven cousins. All my cousins are women, so Aunt Kasco wouldn''t let them move back to the shelter to make space. If¡­ if you would consider¡­"


    Lori stared at her, then shrugged. "Fine. I make no promises they''ll be more comfortable, but they should be able to try."


    Mikon bowed low towards her. "Thank you, your Bindership."


    "Does this count as nepotism or compassion¡­?" Rian muttered to himself, rubbing his chin.


    Lori turned back towards Rian. "This is also why I want you to delay building the beds until you''ve picked who the families are. They might have their own beds already, or will have beds built into the wall. Also, I want the malcontents to be forced to sleep on the floor for a while."


    "Understood, your Bindership, though I should point out they''ll have their children with them, and it''s a bit cruel to punish the children for what is likely their parent''s doing."


    Ah. Right. She''d forgotten. "Fine, have the carpenters make six wide beds. They can all share and be uncomfortable in close quarters together." The children will probably be light enough to sleep on top of their parents, right?


    "I''ll inform them tomorrow, your Bindership."


    "Have one of the beds moved in here when it''s finished and get rid of this one. Move it to the shelter, or maybe the hospital. You four can''t possibly be comfortable sleeping on a bed that narrow."


    Rian blinked, and in the light of the glowing rock she''d given him that he''d placed next to him on the bed, Lori saw his face redden. He started to speak but Riz, who''d been sitting at the other end of the bed, suddenly lunged towards him over the bedrolls and blankets and slapped a hand over his mouth. "Rian, please thank the Great Binder for her thoughtfulness and generosity," Riz said into Rian''s ear.


    "Yes, Rian, please tell her Bindership how thankful we are and how we will greatly appreciate the space to actually lie down instead of being on our sides all night," Mikon added, already bowing to Lori again.


    "Rian, please tell her Bindership how grateful we are and would of course not even think of refusing her gift," Umu said, also bowing to Lori, a damp shirt that she had been about to hang in her hands.


    Rian looked between the three of them, Riz''s hand still over his mouth. Then his visibly sighed and tapped the northerner woman lightly on the forearm. She released him. "What they said. Thank you for the thoughtful gesture, your Bindership. Though for the record, I did offer to sleep on the floor so you three would have more room."


    "Rian, even I can tell that would defeat the point," Lori said.


    "I¡­" Rian swallowed. "Is that all, your Bindership?"


    Lori waved in dismissal. "Yes, yes, that''s all. I''ll leave you four to your business."


    She stepped out into the night, adjusting her hat against the wind and rain as she followed the lightwisps illuminating the outside of people''s houses back to her nice, warm, dry dungeon.

 SS1 – "What If Lori Was A Generic Charismatic Main Character?"

    Lori woke up, as she usually did, to someone knocking¡ªvery loudly¡ªon the door of her house.


    "Lori! Wake up!" an irate, female voice called from outside. The words were barely audible though the single piece of Deadspoken wood artistically fused from several branches. The loud yelling was also usual.


    Groaning, Lori pushed herself up from her bed. Not for the first time, she was thankful for the ingenious net of woven cords in place of slats. It was far more comfortable than lying on top of planks, and made her cushioned bedroll go from being adequate padding to absolutely luxurious¡­ well, by the standards of luxury out here in the frontier.


    Someone knocked irately on the door again. "Lori, get up! It''s morning already! Get your glittering feet on the ground!"


    "I''m awake, I''m awake," Lori said, or tried to. She was in the middle of a yawn as she did it, so it came out¡­ well, a yawn.


    "There, see? She''s awake already. Stop yelling¡­" another voice outside her door said as Lori got to her feet, eyes still closed as she tried to use her awareness of the demesne''s wisps and get a few more moments of sleep at the same time. It¡­ wasn''t very effective, since it made her more awake, but one of these days she was sure to figure out how to get used to this so she wouldn''t have to wake up completely to answer her door!


    Navigating through the airwisps surrounding her and avoiding any concentrations of water wisps, voids or earthwisps¡ªnot that there were any in her path¡ªLori made it to the door and fumbled for the wooden latch. She managed to get her hands on it on the fourth try and slide it back on the second. "Good morning, Elcee," Lori said, even as she winced and hissed at the morning sunlight on her eyelids. "Ahnree."


    "Elceena," came the correction. There was the sound of an impatient sniff, followed by an annoyed huff. "Open your eyes already, idiot," the other Whisperer said, sounding her usual self. "There''s work to be done."


    "Good morning, Lori," a soft-spoken male voice said. "Do you want me to wake you up?"


    "Please, no," she mumbled, stepping back to get the sun out of her eyes. The glare through her eyelids lessened as she stepped back into the shadow of her house, turning away from the sun to crawl back onto her bedroll. "Going back to sleep now¡­ "


    She felt a hand grab the back of her shirt. "Oh, wake up already," Elceena said impatiently.


    "Shouldn''t you be more respectful? I am the Dungeon Binder, after all."


    "And every day I wish I hadn''t agreed to Rian''s suggestion to have everyone vote on which of the three of us would make the core," Elceena muttered. "Come on, you can wake up in the baths before we head to breakfast."


    "No¡­ sleep¡­" Lori moaned. "More sleep¡­"


    "Good morning!" The aggressively, almost falsely cheerful greeting from the familiar voice of her next-door neighbor was also expected. "Whisperer Elceena. Deadspeaker Ahnree. Your Bindership."


    At the words, Lori could almost see Elceena''s face composing itself to a picture of poise and dignity. "Good morning, Rian. Off to the baths?"


    "The best way to start the morning, especially with this cold weather," Rian''s voice said, the big, bright smile that accompanied them clear in the words. "Do you need help pointing her Bindership the right direction?"


    "No, we can manage," Elceena said, and Lori felt the hand on the back of her shirt sliding up to become an arm around her shoulders. "We appreciate the offer, however."


    Rian probably shrugged. It was always what he did when he faced Elceena''s thinly veiled mild antagonism, if he wasn''t just blatantly amused. Lori really didn''t understand why, and she considered herself quite good at getting along with and understanding people, her little, ah, difficulties with remembering people''s names aside. "Well, if you need anything else, then just tell me. See you all at breakfast."


    There were footsteps walking away, and Lori could hear Rian greeting other people he passed by. Reluctantly, Lori forced her eyes open as she watched her loneliest lord heading for the men''s bath. For all his talk about coming to the frontier in search of adventure, he was a surprisingly stabilizing influence, and always full of ideas to add just that little bit more touch of civilization.


    Lori glanced towards Elceena, finally really looking at the pale-haired Whisperer. As expected, even this early in the morning the other woman''s hair was already pulled into a tight, neat braid over one shoulder. She was glaring after Rian as he walked away. "You know, if you''re interested in him, just say so," Lori ventured. "This playing at being belligerent is just counter-productive."


    Elceena groaned as Ahnree chuckled, the dark-haired Deadspeaker''s slightly oily falling back over his eyes at the movement. "I''m not interested in Rian," the Whisperer said, giving Lori an intent look. "I have better taste than that."


    "What''s wrong with Rian?" Lori asked, blinking. "He''s nice. Kind of a loner, but he''s hard working, really helpful, and fun to talk to."


    "She''s still convinced he''s some kind of spy for some lord or other," Ahnree said.


    "He''s too smart and knows too much about things a lumberyard worker shouldn''t have any reason to know about," Elceena insisted.


    "Personally, I just think his family was deep in the Mysteries of Alknowledge, and he came out here to find more things to a learn."


    "Nothing wrong with that," Lori nodded in agreement. Those deep in the Mysteries, the ones who devoted their lives to it as its administrators, librarians, reviewers and curators could be a little strange. While everyone knew its followers were trying to learn and bring together all that could be known about all existence, those deep in it acted like it was actually possible instead of simply an ideal to strive towards. "Maybe he''ll build a school. Or better yet, a library."


    "Can we stop talking about Rian?" Elceena grumbled. "It''s too early in the morning to put up with him."


    Lori sighed. She really didn''t understand why her friend was like this with Rian. Sure, she hadn''t known the woman long, having only met when Lori had joined the group of settlers when she''d heard they were planning to found a new demesne far from Covehold last spring, but the two seemed to have gotten along well enough on the journey here. It would have been nice to know about this enmity back when she''d just formed their demesne''s core, and had asked Rian to help the three of them run the new settlement as its first lord. "Fine, fine," she said, waving her hand to dismiss the subject. "Come on then, let''s have that bath you were going to drag me to."


    The seemed to improve Elceena''s mood immediately. "W-well, good! Finally we can get started on the day!"


    "You never tell me I need to take a bath," Ahnree said, amused for some reason.


    "You''re a Deadspeaker. If you can''t get rid of the dustlife on your person, nothing I say could possibly help."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The three of them took turns getting food from the kitchen at meal times, and breakfast was Lori''s turn, on the grounds that if she was allowed to sit down so soon after her morning bath, she''d just fall asleep at the table, which¡­ all right, she was willing to admit that was a possibility. And so she spent her early mornings in the line waiting for the food to be served. At first, people had hastily made way for her to get to the had of the time, but after all these months, people seemed to have finally understood she didn''t want that sort of special treatment.


    While she waited, Lori talked to the people waiting with her.


    "Ahnree''s about to finish putting meanings on all the crops so he can work on getting some ropeweed to grow soon, mistress weaver," Lori said, smiling reassuringly even as she panicked inside, trying to remember this woman''s name. The bright pink hair and large breasts helped narrow it down, but not by much. Wait, she had a beauty mark on her left cheekbone, so she was either Mikon''s mother or her aunt. So that made her¡­ uh¡­ okay, flattery, flattery, flattery! "So you and your sisters will have more skeins to spin by next week, at the soonest."


    The weaver laughed at her. "Oh, your Bindership, we''ve been over this," she said, smiling pleasantly despite Lori''s semi-deliberate mistake. "But I''m flattered you think I look young enough to be one of my nieces."


    Lori could barely tell her apart from the eight younger women in question, but if she was Mikon''s aunt, then she was¡­ "Oh, I''m sorry Miss Taji," she said, giving the same embarrassed, apologetic smile that she had unfortunately become all too familiar with in her life. Most people tended to forgive her when she made mistakes like this, which just somehow made it feel worse¡­ "I guess I must still be sleepy¡­"


    People were simply too polite to call her out on always confusing their name for other people''s, especially since she was their Dungeon Binder. Young, na?ve Lori had once thought that becoming a Dungeon Binder would be the end of her embarrassing little inability, that having the memory of a Mentalist would finally let her remember the names of all the people around her without getting them mixed up with the names of other, similar-looking people. It was silly, wanting to become a Dungeon Binder for such a childish reason, but it had been a dream she''d had for years¡­


    Thankfully, Lori''s embarrassment was short-lived, as the kitchen started serving food afterwards. Like many, Taji was carrying something flat and convenient to carry multiple bowls of food on, in this case a washboard to put as many bowls of food on as possible. A little further down the line, one of her nieces¡ªdefinitely one of her nieces¡­ most likely one of her nieces¡­ probably one of her nieces, pink was a common hair color¡­¡ªstood waiting with another plank to help bring food for the large family


    For Lori, carrying three plates of meaty soup so thick it was practically a stew, three cups of water, and a plate stacked with disks of flatbread was nothing for someone who''d worked as a waitress in one of Taniar demesne''s many worker eateries. It had been a stressful experience that she''d quit after four days, but she''d learned some skills from it, and the fine art of balancing bowls of hot food while forming a binding of firewisps to keep from burning herself had proven surprisingly valuable many times. Most mornings when it was her turn to get their food, for instance.


    If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    Still, she was thankful when Elceena took hold of some of the more awkwardly positioned bowls, setting them down on their table. The table that was¡­ a little embarrassing, really. While all the other tables in the dining hall had simple benches, and perhaps a shorter bench so people could sit on the ends, this table had benches with backrests made from scrap wood that Ahnree had Deadspoken together with some beast leather. Embarrassing not because of the craftsmanship¡ªit was actually wonderfully made, and the differently-colored scraps looked like a mosaic¡ªbut because none of the other tables hand anything similar.


    Though, Lori had to admit it was nice to be able to lean back and rest her weight as she ate.


    "Excuse me, your Bindership, Deadspeaker Ahnree, Whisperer Elceena." The three of them looked up to find Rian standing next to the table holding his breakfast. "Do you mind if I sit with you?"


    Lori smiled welcoming, gesturing at her bench. "Of course, Rian. We have a lot of space."


    They really did. Most of the demesne''s other lords and ladies usually ate with their families, unless there was a project they needed to cooperate on, like building their trading ship or planning where the agricultural fields and infrastructure buildings would be. Then they ate together so no one would be absent for the arguing. Rian, however, was one of the few people in the demesne who didn''t have any blood kin, and so usually ate with a fellow lord or lady he needed to talk to, or here in with them, the others without blood kin.


    There used to be more people at the table with the three of them, those without families to support them banding together as companions, and then as friends. There was Cas-something the astrologer, Mik-something the sculptor (definitely a sculptor and not a stonemason, and Lori still hadn''t gotten the story of how he''d ended up here from him), and Aly-something who Lori suspected had used to be a bell-girl but for some reason had decided to join the settlers, and others who had come with them to seek, if not their fortune, then a different life, but over the past few months many of them had found other people they preferred to spend their mealtimes with. Lori had even signed off on the marriages of some of them, and now they ate with their new in-laws, leaving the table fairly empty.


    Ahnree stood up for a moment so Rian could slide the bench slightly and step in, putting his food on the table so the two of them could pull the bench forward again to sit down. The lord muttered an apology that the easygoing Deadspeaker dismissed with a wave, before the two of them started talking about¡­ experiments on the ropeweed? Something about breeding them to be thicker and softer?


    She wished she knew enough about Deadspeaking to be able to follow the conversation, but beyond some utterly basic principles she''d picked up from novels about Deadspeakers, she was still fairly ignorant on the subject. They had been all so busy trying to build infrastructure for the demesne Ahnree really hadn''t had time to try to tutor her on the basics of Deadspeaking. Colors, she''d barely had time to learn the advanced lightningwisp manipulation that Elceena knew, and that would have been a straightforward discussion between two Whisperers. Or at least, a Whisperer and a Dungeon Binder who was very familiar with Whispering.


    "G-good morning, y-your Bindership."


    Lori looked up from her nearly empty soup bowl, her fingers breaking apart her last half-disk of bread to wipe up all what was left. "Oh, hello Umu," Lori said, glad it was one of the people whose name she knew. Well, was reasonably confident in. "What can I do for you?"


    "Ah, I''ve finished sewing your shirts, y-your Bindership," the blonde weaver said, her face as usual lightly tinged with red at her nervousness with speaking to Lori. She couldn''t even meet Lori''s eyes, instead keeping her gaze down below Lori''s face. "And your t-trousers as well."


    "Oh, thank you, Umu," Lori said with a bright smile. When she''d found such a long tear in one of her shirts, and a few smaller holes in other places, she''d been resigned to trying to sew the things up herself¡ªor possibly have Ahnree simply fuse the fibers of dead plants together¡ªuntil the weaver had volunteered to do it for her. Given how shy the weaver seemed to be¡ªshe never looked Lori in the eye, always keeping her head bowed¡ªand how much it must have cost to volunteer her help, Lori hadn''t been able to protest that she could do it¡ªbadly¡ªherself.


    The shirts and trouser in question were in the weaver''s hands, hesitantly held out towards Lori. Hastily, Lori washed her hands with the water left in her cup and evaporating away the water before she reached for the clothing. Her hands brushed against Umu''s forearms, and she could feel the woman shiver slightly at being touched, but clearly pushing through her shy nature to not cringe back. Lori pretended not to notice, not wanting to embarrass the woman as she put the clothes down on the bench next to her, and flipped through them to find the shirt with the long tear.


    "Oh, this is very good work!" While the weaver would hardly have been able to make the tear disappear, the stitching over the damage was small, even and strong, and didn''t pull much on the rest of the shirt. If Lori had tried to do this repair, she knew the garment would have ended up noticeably tighter, perhaps uncomfortably so. As it was, she was sure she wouldn''t even notice any change. "This is great, Umu. I don''t think anyone could have done it any better."


    "I-it was my pleasure, y-your Bi¡ªLori," the weaver said, pushing the last out with an effort.


    Lori brightened, turning to grin at her. "There, see. You can say my name after all." Ha ha, one more person who was no longer calling her ''your Bindership''. She reached out and patted Umu on the shoulder, giving her an encouraging smile. "Feel free to say my name any time, Umu." Soon, she''d properly be friends with everyone in the demesne!


    "Oh, hello Umu."


    The weaver stiffened, and Lori turned her gaze a little to the left towards the sound of the voice. She found the familiar smiling face of Mikon, who she saw more often than her sisters, so she was able to almost tell her apart from them. The other weaver was holding a larger stack of clothes in her arms as she turned her attention to Lori. "Lori, I have your clothes here. They might still be a little damp, but you said that was fine, right?"


    "Yes, I can deal with making them properly dry, Mikon," Lori said, giving the woman a grateful smile. With so much to do around the demesne, she had naturally fallen behind on some of her chores, such as doing her laundry. It had been a guilty relief when the pink-haired woman had generously volunteered to do Lori''s laundry for her. Lori had almost wanted to refuse, not wanting to take advantage, but she had insisted, and Lori had given in.


    Lori accepted the folded laundry, still damp as she had been told. There were her trousers, shirts, socks, but¡­


    Mikon leaned in, discreetly speaking directly into Lori''s ear. "Your chest wraps and loin cloths are tucked in between your shirts and trousers," she said in a breathy voice that could almost be called sultry if Lori hadn''t known that was just how she sounded like when whispering. The warm breath almost tickled as she felt the weaver''s hand on her shoulder. "Don''t worry, I made sure to handle those very, very gently¡­"


    Oh, good. Lori was still a bit uncertain as to how comfortable fabric made from ropeweed would be as undergarments, and the longer hers lasted, the better. "I see," Lori nodded as the weaver drew back. "Thank you, Mikon."


    "You''re welcome, Lori," Mikon said, winking as she drew back the hand she''d used to steady herself. Lori supposed the backrest of the bench was just a bit too high to be comfortable. "If you''d like me to do anything else for you, just ask." She turned to Rian across the table. "Rian, your laundry isn''t done yet. I thought you''d rather they were completely dry before I handed them to you."


    "Thank you Mikon, but you really don''t have to do this," Rian said, smiling ignorantly.


    "Nonsense," Mikon said, leaning forward a little. Next to Rian, Ahnree politely averted his eyes as Mikon''s breasts probably came into view. "It''s no bother Rian. If you want me to do anything, all you have to do is ask. Don''t worry, all your clothes will be properly folded up before I get them to you."


    It was all Lori could do to keep from sighing. Really, how oblivious could the man be to such blatant flirting? Did he think women just willingly handled someone else''s undergarments because they were casually acquainted? But no, he just sat there smiling politely, not understanding. It made her want to cry, it really did. Mikon was practically throwing herself at him, all but wearing a bell on a ribbon and ringing it next to his ear to signal her willingness to be ravished, and he just didn''t¡­ argh!


    Next to Lori and Mikon, Umu was shaking slightly, no doubt mortified at such brazen forwardness. The shy woman, as usual, was seemingly aghast that someone would be so forward. Lori knew the blonde also had an interest in Rian, one that she naturally had difficulty expressing, save through small, helpful gestures like offering to sweep his house for him or mending his clothes. The Dungeon Binder wish her the best of luck, but unless she was a bit more obvious¡ªperhaps by actually using spoken words¡ªshe was unlikely to have any more success than Mikon in flirting with Rian.


    She could probably clear it up with a few blunt, direct words, but that would no doubt have been absolutely mortifying for the three¡ªwell, perhaps. It was hard to tell with Mikon¡ªso she refrained from interfering. Besides, she was a Dungeon Binder, not some neighborhood busybody sticking her staff into everyone''s bindings. No, Lori would just keep her hands off this mess and simply watch in mortified fascination at the empirical demonstration of the limits of human obliviousness.


    That wasn''t even getting into how Mikon sometimes seemed to flirt with Umu, although the woman was so shy she probably didn''t notice. No, she wasn''t touching any of that¡­


    "Ah, well, if you would please excuse me, I need to get these back home and dry them," Lori said, picking up her laundry and putting her mended clothes on top of them.


    "Here, go out this side," Elceena said, starting to slide away, sounding disgruntled for some reason. Really, for someone who insisted on waking up early, the Whisperer could be so cranky in the morning. "I was done anyway."


    "Oh, thank you," Lori said, picking up her laundry and following after the Whisperer as Mikon and Umu continued to try to flirt with Rian.


    Lori headed to her house, and Elceena fell into stop beside her. "Honestly, those two," she muttered, flicking her braid over her shoulder in irritation. "Shameless, simply shameless."


    Ah. That must be it. Elceena could be a bit unrelenting about propriety. "Oh, give over," Lori chided her friend. "So they flirted with Rian in front of us. Given how busy he likes to make himself during the day, it''s not like they''d have any other chance outside of meal times."


    Elceena gave her a look that conveyed negative opinions about Lori''s worldliness. "Isn''t Rian seeing that militiawoman down in River''s Fork?"


    "No, she''s trying to see him, and he doesn''t understand what she''s implying, so he thinks they''re just sparring with spears," Lori said, shaking her head. Three women. She was completely bereft of any romantic prospects of any sort, men or women, and he had three women interested in him¡­ and he couldn''t even perceive it! Made her want to cry in exasperation sometimes, it really did.


    They reached her house, and before Lori could ask for help, Elceena had already opened the door to let her in. The interior was lit by the morning sunlight coming in diagonally through the door, enough that Lori didn''t have to activate the lightwisps to make her way inside. She put her laundry on the wooden table she''d resignedly asked Ahnree and the carpenters to make for her after everyone had kept teasing that her previous, perfectly serviceable stone table looked like some sort of sacrificial altar, separating the dry mended clothes from the damp laundry.


    "Here, let me help you with that," Elceena said after Lori bound the waterwisps in the clothes and made a binding to slowly sublimate them into vapor. "We''ll get done faster if two of us are folding them."


    Lori smiled. "Are you sure? You don''t have to."


    "Well, I''m already doing it. Come on, I''m not going to fold all your clothes for you."


    Such a proud, prickly woman. Lori shook her head, pulling the top half of the pile towards her, only to notice too late that meant Elceena was left with the undergarments. "Ah, wait, let''s switch, I''ll take care of that."


    A dismissive wave. "I''ll do it. You''ll probably just wad these up into balls."


    Lori mockingly pouted at her, even as she shrugged internally and began properly folding and rolling one of the shirts to put away. "How dare you accuse me of such accurate things!"


    A derisive sniff. "Not even going to pretend you don''t do it," the Whisperer said as she folded up one of the loincloths.


    The two worked with measured haste. They had a full day ahead of them, after all. Bindings to imbue, kilns and furnaces to heat up, the dungeon farm to maintain, then a planned visit to River''s Fork in the afternoon to assist Binder Shanalorre with repairs to her demesne¡­


    Lori found herself humming as she looked forward to another day with her friends. All was right with the world.


    ¡­


    Ah, she should probably make sure it was clean under the bed. Umu was coming to sweep later while she was gone, and she didn''t want the house to be messy¡­

 252 - Land Inspection

    Days passed. Work continued. The walls for the new row of houses started going up, and eventual placements of doors, windows and fireplaces were marked. They were intentionally taller than Lori thought was needed for structures that size, almost five and a half paces high, so that the large families that Rian was choosing could find a way to fit their members somehow, even if it was only when they were sleeping.


    Shanalorre, having recovered from her blood loss, was assigned to accompany the loggers with¡­ uh¡­ Lord something-ian. Mostly this meant she was to stay out of their way and kept away from all the sharp objects they were carrying. Lori also saw her passing by the building site to get water from the basin and bring back to the logger to drink, which was probably a useful way to pass the time. For some reason, the brat accompanied her. Lori wondered about that, but simply shrugged it off. It wasn''t like the children were assigned any work, and as long as she wasn''t trying to go seeling with the river as deep as it was. she was free to do what she wanted. Yllian, it turned out, was helping with the logging, which Lori doubted was really conducive to keeping sharp objects away from Shanalorre, but at least he was being useful. Well, people knew to keep sharp objects away from their healer.


    When the walls¡ªcomplete with fireplaces and chimneys this time¡ªof the new row of houses were finally raised and marked with the locations for the doors and shutters, Lori decided it was finally time to get around to inspecting the charcoal burners.


    "Huh. I''ll be honest, I thought this was just something you''d never get around to, like actually learning how to do other magic," Rian said as they walked in the general direction of downstream, through the untouched trees above the submerged river bank. The undergrowth was covered with scatted patches of sunlight. The air somehow managed to be hot, annoyingly humid, and randomly cool at the same time, depending on the direction of the wind.


    Lori turned to glare at him. "I''m working on it," she said through gritted teeth. It wasn''t that she hadn''t been trying¡ªunlike him, she had few things to occupy her nights beyond expanding the demesne when she felt she had the patience to make the binding across the border and rereading her almanac.


    Rian nodded. "Well, as long as you keep trying. Anyway, while we''re alone, there''s something I''ve been meaning to tell you."


    She frowned. "You couldn''t tell me all those time we were in your house?"


    Shrug. "I didn''t think you''d want the three of them to know. Or at least, know without you explicitly deciding to let them know. I had some of the scouts do another survey of the demesne, with a special emphasis on any possible resources near the edges."


    What? Why? "What? Why?"


    "So that they''d go to the edge, obviously," Rian said. "You never really said if you wanted the fact that you''ve been expanding the demesne to be a secret. We''ve certainly talked about it at meals enough that anyone paying attention could eventually realize, and certainly Riz and her friends have all they need to put it together. But to be safe, I asked the scouts to keep their findings secret for now. Although that also won''t last. The hunters would certainly have realized by now it takes a little longer to get to the edge than it used to."


    Oh. He was talking about the demesne''s expansion. "Oh. You''re talking about the demesne''s expansion."


    Nod. "Unless you''ve significantly expanded the demesne in the last week¡ª" she hadn''t, she''d just made about half an expansion binding that''s she''d sort of left to start dispersing, "¡ªthen according to the estimates of the scouts, the demesne has grown about three hundred and fifteen paces in radius, give or take a few paces. They can''t really be precise, but they figure it''s in that range. So congratulations. Our demesne grew well over half a taum this winter."


    Half a taum?-! That was¡­ that was¡­ "How much land area is that?"


    Rian chuckled. "Normally this would be where I tell you an obscenely huge number, but I''ll be honest, that was more calculating than I wanted to do. I think ''six hundred paces more diameter'' is about the most comprehensible number for both of us." The grin his face broke into seemed filled with his strange love of large numbers getting larger, but for once Lori could almost understand. Six hundred paces of growth for her demesne was a significant increase.


    She tried to remember how many days of working to expand the demesne that had taken, but annoyingly all the days simply blurred together like faces in her memory. Still, it had been most of the winter¡­


    "So¡­ do you want this growth kept secret?" Rian said. "I mean, it might make the people who want land bother you for land more since you''d have more to give away now, but anything on the subject would make them do that."


    That sounded annoyingly true¡­ "We will not make an announcement of it, but I see no reason to actively restrict the information," Lori said. "As to those who would make a nuisance of themselves because of the fact¡­ I leave them to you."


    Rian sighed in resignation. "Well, if I''m expecting it, then at least I''m emotionally ready for the work," he said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "How much farther?"


    "Close. Krezz won''t be there, since he''s probably collecting more wood or helping with the logging, but I can show you. "


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    Indeed, they soon came to a clearing among the trees. From the half-rotten stump near the middle, the clearing had probably been made by a large tree falling, though there was no sign of that trunk now. Lengths of fallen branches that had been cut into forearm-long pieces and arrange neatly in an unfamiliar, circular manner. Not far from it was a pile of earth, it''s texture different from what was underfoot. Off to one side was what Lori thought was another mound of dirt at first, but on closer inspection turned out to be a small, one-person shack made of fallen branches and packed mud.


    "Is¡­ this it?" Lori said, looking around. She had¡­ well, she had honestly expected something bigger.


    "It''s all Krezz needs," Rian said. "Before you ask, the shack is necessary infrastructure. When making charcoal, the burner needs to be nearby at all times to make adjustments, so Krezz¡ªer, the charcoal burner¡ªhas to sleep nearby to keep the burn from going out of control."


    "Still¡­" Lori mused, looking around the clearing as if that would let her find more. It wasn''t even all that big, an irregular ovoid about six paces long and four to five with in the middle. "I thought there would be more infrastructure."


    Rian shrugged. "Well, we don''t really have much in the way of resources to make them. At least, not for someone in his profession. I''m told that a kiln would usually be used to make the charcoal, but it''s not like we have any baked bricks to make one with right now. Though it would actually be a good idea. It''s more efficient and cuts down on the work of making the charcoal, or so I''m told."


    Lori completed her circuit of the clearing. All told, it was a minuscule little patch of land that wasn''t near anywhere¡­ including their own village. "Why here?"


    Rian pointed in the direction of where she could hear the river''s waters flowing. "There''s a little bit of clay that way," he said, "which is what Krezz uses to cover up the charcoal pile and make it airtight. Also, we generally haven''t expanded much in this direction beyond harvesting the nearby ropeweed, so it''s unlikely he''d have needed to move any time soon from logging or other resource gathering. And of course, it''s an easy walk, which is important when he has to carry the charcoal back."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori hummed thoughtfully. "I''ll have to define the area more solidly than just this clearing." Maybe stone markers marking out the corners of the area that had been leased. "Find out the specifics of the kiln that needs to be built."


    "Ah, I have that already," Rian said. "Not very big, but it needs to be lined with clay to retain heat. And of course the stone needs to be carefully chosen so it doesn''t have any cracks, because any air pockets would cause it to explode. Not too different from the pottery kiln and the furnace, really, but it''s not shaped the same. The wood needs to reach a high temperature, but with insufficient air to burn."


    "Can he build it himself? Or have a stone mason do it?"


    "I think so. It''s sourcing the stone that''s likely to be the problem. Stone''s heavy, after all, and most people are busy with other things."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "I''ll move the stone here, and leave it softened to make working on it easier. I''ll have to bring stone here to mark out the boundaries of the lease in any case. Remind him it is a lease, and that it was bestowed for the purpose of him developing facilities to make charcoal, not build a house or pass the lease on for beads." Which they don''t have anyway.


    "He understands, your Bindership. May I suggest you make the area big enough for him to be able to make a small storage building for the coal so that chokers and the weather doesn''t get at it?"


    After marking the boundaries of the lease with lightwisps¡ªshe''d get to making it out of stone later¡ªRian took her to the proposed site of the outdoor mushroom farm. It was far more developed than the charcoal burners. There were strange, chimney-shaped stacks of alternating logs arranged in rows under the shade of the trees, and there were square plots of smaller twigs and leaves demarcated by rocks.


    Unlike the charcoal burners, there were actually people here. One was using some kind of tool to gouge holes into a log, while another was in the process of stripping a dead branch of leaves and other outgrowths with a knife. A third was in the process of using rocks to make another plot around a pile of crushed twigs, leaves and random scraps of wood. A fourth was taking mushrooms from a basket and cutting off the base, separating the two. This last person had a cloth tied around her mouth and nose, and Lori remembered something about spores from mushrooms being harmful when exposed¡­


    "As you can see, your Bindership, these good people are hard at work at making a productive mushroom farm," Rian said loudly, making the four look up in surprise. They stopped what they were doing uncertainly, standing at attention to face her.


    "Is all this space really necessary, though?" Lori said, looking around.


    "More space means more means to grow things," Rian said. He gestured around. "The open space means it''s easier to stack more of the logs to grow the mushrooms on." He chuckled. "And even if the land you''ll be leasing them will only be twice the area of the cave farm, there''s really no reason why they can''t put more logs outside of that beyond their ability to keep maintaining them."


    Lori gave him a flat look.


    He shrugged. "I''m just saying, production could easily be increased. Granted, it''s not exactly going to be able to produce enough to keep everyone in the whole demesne fed by itself, but it''s a useful and easy source of food that can be easily dried to preserve it and it keeps for a long period of time if necessary. Very good food to bring on the Coldhold so we don''t have to bring along jars of stew, meaning there''s more room for other things."


    "It''s always about food with you."


    "You say that like it''s not what''s keeping us alive. Every little bit of food helps."


    All right, that was fair. "All right, that''s fair," Lori admitted. She turned to the four in front of her. "And you are the ones who are working to earn the right to lease this land, I presume?"


    A woman stepped forward, "Y-yes, your Bindership. We''re the ones who set up the mushroom farm near the Dungeon. There''s two more, but they''re out collecting more mushrooms to bring back and try to grow."


    Lori raised an eyebrow, looking around. "So the lease of this land is being divided among the six of you?"


    "Y-yes, your Bindership."


    Lori hummed thoughtfully, looking around. She nodded. "I''ll be back later to demarcate the boundaries of the lease. Carry on. Come, Rian." She turned and headed back towards the Dungeon. Rian fell into step behind her as Lori heard quiet sighs.


    Once they were some distance away, Rian said, "You don''t know how big the area of the mushroom cave is, do you."


    "Find out, and then tell me what double of it is,¡± Lori ground it out annoyance. "I''ll go get stone to make the markers."


    "Do I just go by the area of the first floor, or is the second floor''s area part of the measurement?" Rian asked brightly.

 253 - The Dehydration Shed

    The day after Lori had set the markers for the charcoal burner and the outdoor mushroom farm''s leases, Lori decided to make the dehydration shed while she waited for the carpenters to finish the preparation for roofing the new row of houses. The sawyers and carpenters were hard at work at it, taking measurements and cutting planks and beams. She had been told it would take a week, perhaps longer, to get the material prepared, and until them she could only wait for them to finish before she needed to be present to alter the walls to accept and secure beams and other fittings.


    Since she still had some stone left¡ªprobably not enough, but it wasn''t like she was in a hurry¡ªthe dehydration shed became next on her list. While it wasn''t urgent, Lori viewed it as a long-term investment for when the winter vigas was harvested. It would also be useful in drying anything from wood to mushrooms, and while it wouldn''t be as fast as her actively doing it, the intention was the dehydration shed could be used without her input.


    It would also be very useful right now because of the regular rains. While they could build with green, unseasoned wood¡ªdespite it causing Lori to twitch inside as she thought of the potential warping¡ªit was a bit harder to burn it for warmth. And while the demesne had a supply of deadfall and scraps in the storage sheds, they needed to be dried to use. The rains also meant that the mushrooms couldn''t be dried as efficiently.


    The first step was building a shed, which she placed near the entrance of the mushroom farm, not far from Rian''s house. It had been a while since Lori had built one of the stone half cylinder structures, so she was a little slow in getting it up. Still, she soon managed to get back into the rhythm of constructing it arch by arch, using her stone shaping tool to see if each new arch was in line with the one''s she''d already raised. She could probably have forgone this step and used the now mostly empty vigas storage shed¡ªsince most of the vigas was now in the third level next to the gristmill¡ªbut they''d need that to store the harvest when it was finally ready, and at the moment it was being used to store some wet firewood.


    After a day of building and having the carpenters come in to measure the shed for a door, Lori then had to put in the bindings according to the flow diagram in her almanac. Based on the diagram, she needed to have warm, dry air circulate through the building from one end and be vented out the other. That the air was dry was key. It was strongly recommended that water in any form was prevented from entering the dehydrator, as that was exactly what they were trying to remove. That meant she needed to put a binding on the entrance and wherever the air intake for the structure was to keep out humidity.


    First she made a small hole in the far wall of the shed¡ªthe wall that didn''t have a hole for a door in it¡ªto serve as an output vent for the air. Then she placed a binding for airwisps, firewisps and waterwisps across the doorway. When the shed had a door, she''d put the binding on an intake vent, but for now the open doorway was convenient.


    Her binding generated a hot, dry wind, which was drawn in and accelerated by the airwisps and injected with heat by the firewisps. She''d made sure that the temperature only reached a certain degree below the boiling point of water, since the point was for the shed to dehydrate, not bake. Any moisture in the air was drawn by the waterwisps in the binding to the edges of the door, where they congealed into liquid that flowed downwards and became ice on the ground, a substantial amount of the heat that the water had contained removed and infused into the air.


    The result was a swift, hot wind that, while not exactly comfortable to be in, would draw out the moisture from anything that was left inside the shed over a matter of hours. Though she had to adjust the airwisps when it became clear that the wind generated was too strong and would send small objects¡ªlike mushrooms¡ªflying. It became clear that she''d overcompensated for putting the binding on an opening the size of the doorway. After adjustment, the wind became much milder.


    That step done, she put another binding over the small hole in the far wall, this one also consisting of airwisps, firewisps and waterwisps, then connected the two bindings with firewisps. The airwisps would pull out the warm and now-humid air in the dehydrator shed and send it outside, which would allow more dry air to be brought in. The firewisps would act to draw the heat out of the air¡ªwhich would actually cause the humidity to congeal into fog once it had passed through the binding¡ªand move that heat towards the intake to be injected into the dry air coming in. The waterwisps were there to make sure that no moisture could enter though the opening against the air pressure pushing outwards, such as condensation or water droplets, by rendering any such into vapor that would be carried out by the airflow.


    At least, that''s how it was supposed to work. It would need to be tested to make sure it functioned as intended, and then tested again once the door was in place because obviously when the door was there she''d have to draw air in through a different opening, and she''d need to make sure enough air would be able to pass through.


    The door would be a problem, since people would need to use it to enter and bring the things to be dried, but that would also be a large point of entry for moisture. While she could put a binding of waterwisps across it to keep out moisture, that would be dangerous. While it was unlikely to effect the water in her idiots'' bodies, having their eyes, nostrils, and other exposed orifices suddenly bereft of moisture, or at least filled with water vapor, would¡­ well, probably be bad for them.


    After consideration, Lori decided the best way to mitigate the problem would be to put the binding to keep out moisture on the door rather than simply across the open doorway. It would mean that moisture in the air would get in when the door was open, but that should be quickly mitigated by the binding that would circulate the air out. As long as the door was closed¡­


    ¡­


    Her idiots would probably forget to close the door, wouldn''t they?


    "A door that closes on its own?" Rian said, looking both amused and bemused by the notion after she finished telling him what was needed.


    "Yes," she said as she led the way to the shed. At this point, she was resigned to needing a second opinion to point out the things she had missed that probably should have been obvious. Though, if they were obvious, then she wouldn''t have missed them, so Rian probably just thought strangely. "The door needs to be closed so that the whole thing will work properly."


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    "You could just tell people to close the door," Rian said.


    "If I trusted that to work, I wouldn''t need a door that closes on its own, would I?"


    "I suppose that''s true," Rian nodded. "Well, I can think of how it could be done with cleverly spiraled hinges on the door, but that will probably wear out quickly. We could do it with a metal hinge, but it would be complicated to make¡­ Actually, the simplest thing I can think of is to just have a rope and a weight from the door to the door frame to pull it closed."


    That¡­ sounded doable. "That sounds doable. Have the carpenters build that in."


    "Ah, as your lord in charge of dealing with people, I wouldn''t recommend it."


    Lori blinked. "Why not?"


    "Well, if you had a door that was mechanically built to close on its own, on a building that people had to keep bringing things in and out of, then to get things in, people would either find a way to jam the door open so it wouldn''t close on them as they were going in and out, or ''accidentally'' cut the rope so it would stop closing," Rian said. "After all, no one''s going to just stand there and hold the door open when we need all hands to be working."


    Lori stared at him, and this nearly stumbled because she wasn''t watching where she was going. "Colors!" she snapped. Ugh, that''s exactly what her idiots would do, wouldn''t they?-! "Argh!"


    Rian nodded as she vocalized her frustration. "Yeah. So¡­ taking people''s most likely actions into account, maybe just tell people to close the door so that all that added work and infrastructure doesn''t just go to waste."


    "Then how do we keep the door closed?-!"


    "Just tell everyone the door needs to be closed for the thing to work. If they''ve spent all that time moving things in to dry, it''s not like they''ll let all that effort go to waste by leaving the door open. Even if someone does leave it open, someone passing by will know to close it."


    Lori let out an annoyed sigh. "Is that really the best we can hope for?"


    "Well, we could assign someone there to make sure the door is closed, but that would be a waste of manpower. We could ask the children to do it, since it''s easy work they can do, but you don''t like the children being made to do things. Though if it''s near the mushroom farm cave, we could tell the mushroom farmers. They''re likely to be using it, and they of all people would know the importance of keeping the door closed."


    That¡­ was slightly more palatable. "Fine. Make sure the right people are made aware once the dehydration shed is operational."


    Rian nodded, then pointed ahead of them. "Is that the shed?"


    Lori nodded curtly.


    "How does it work?"


    As Lori explained how the bindings on the shed were intended to function, Rian listened attentively, nodding every so often. He followed her inside as Lori activated the binding to demonstrate it, holding up his hand as if trying to catch the wind, but hurriedly went outside well before Lori.


    "This is distressingly warm," he said once Lori had realized he wasn''t in the shed anymore and followed him outside in annoyance. "I''m not sure it''s actually safe for people to go in there when it''s that hot. We might have to put some sort of hatch over the warm air intake that people can close so they don''t get cooked while they''re carrying things in there."


    Lori frowned. "It''s not that hot," she said. "Pleasantly warm at best."


    Rian gave her a bland look. "You forgot that thing around you that keeps you cool, didn''t you."


    ¡­


    Oh, right!


    Lori concentrated for a moment, deactivating the firewisps around her that adjusted the temperatures she experienced. Instantly the air around her cooled, becoming sharp and chill, if not exactly cold. She shivered as she felt a breeze on her face, and her hands grabbed the front of her rain coat to keep it closed. Resisting the urge to let go and have the firewisps around her do as they would again, she turned and headed back to the dehydration shed, sticking her hand in¡ª


    "Ah!" she exclaimed as the hot air surrounded her extremity, and she let go. Instantly the firewisps around her moderated the temperature, and the extremes of heat and cold faded away, becoming pleasantly warm and unremarkable, respectively.


    Rian nodded. "Yeah, I''m going to call the carpenters and have them make a hatch for that." A thought seemed to come to him and made him smile. "We can connect it to the door so the hatch covers the intake when the door is open. Then you''d really have to close to door for the dehydrator shed to work."


    "See it done then," Lori said waving her hand to dispel remembered heat. "Anything else?"


    Rian titled his head thoughtfully. "I think you might need to make some kind of overhang in front of the door and over the intake and output vents," he said. "Keep rainwater from getting in. I know your binding might be able to take care of it, but I remember what happened to that heat binding you made when too much snow was passed through it. Best to physically keep off as much water as possibly to keep the thing from being overtaxed."


    Lori sighed, managing to push down the familiar annoyance of missing the obvious. Well, at least it was something she could do easily with a little stone shaping. "I''ll make a note of it. What else?"


    "You should probably put lights inside," Rian said. "Wouldn''t want people fumbling around in the dark, after all. Given you''d probably need a wall to have an air intake in, leaving the door open probably won''t let in as much light as it would in the wood curing shed." He blinked and snapped his fingers. "Unless you can build the air intake into the door? That would take care of the ''people needing to close it'' and the ''too hot for people to be inside when the binding is working, problem."


    Lori blinked, tilting her head as she considered the idea. "That¡­ might actually be a workable solution," she said. She''d have to make some changes to the binding, especially regarding where the water extracted from the air went, but that would be a simple alteration. "Go get the carpenters so they can measure the door again. I''ll have my own specifications to add."


    "Yes, your Bindership, " Rian chirped, turning to do just that. Then he paused, and turned back to her. "By the way, what is this going to be dehydrating? Wood or food?"


    Lori frowned at him. "Both, of course. If need be, I can easily make it bigger if we need more capacity."


    Rian nodded in understanding. "You realize we''re going to need two of these, right?" he said.


    Lori blinked and looked at him. "What?" she said flatly.


    Her lord shrugged. "Obviously we can''t dry firewood with the food. The vigas might be all right, but food needs to be clean or it will rot or go bad and make you sick. Do you see anyone going to the trouble of cleaning dead wood they just picked up off the ground, covered in dirt and rotting leaves, the same stuff that caused you to get infected when you tried to ride that rock, just so it can be put next to food that''s going to be dried?"


    Lori stared at him. "Surely the moving air will keep that from being a problem?"


    "And when it''s all being loaded in? Imagine loads of dirty wood going by food that we''re going to be eating, shedding bits all over them¡ª " He stopped as he saw Lori shudder. "Well, at the very least have two distinct and separate rooms for the two things? Or, you know, make this a food dehydrator and turn one of the wood storage sheds into a firewood dehydrator?"


    "I''ll take it into consideration," Lori said, still twitching slightly at the thought of dried food and¡ªno, no, stop thinking about it! "Now go get those carpenters before they get started building a door to the previous dimensions."


    "Yes, your Bindership!" He turned away again, and this time he kept walking, heading towards her Dungeon where the carpenters worked.


    Sighing, Lori turned towards where she still had some stone piled up, softening a handful so she could get started on building some overhangs to keep rainwater off.

 254 - Further Adjustments

    "I thought of a way to deal with the problem of moisture getting in through the door when it''s open," Rian said before breakfast the next day.


    "Oh?" Lori said idly as she waited for Umu and Mikon to arrive with the food. Off to the side, Shanalorre listened curiously.


    Rian nodded enthusiastically. "Instead of putting the door on the same wall as the air intake, why not put it opposite the air intake. That way, the intake is always pushing air, and when the door is open any air will be pushed out instead of being pulled in. That way you don''t need to do anything strange to the door either. Well, except treating it against humidity."


    "Hmm¡­" she nodded disinterestedly.


    "And as to the issue of the air being too hot for people, why not separate the source of heat from the air intake?" Rian continued. "Or at least, have an intake that only circulates air, and another intake that actually generates hot air. That way, the air pressure can keep out humidity while the door is open and people are bringing things in or taking them out, but the shed won''t be so hot as to be harmful to people. We can make some kind of hatch to go over the hot intake that can be opened and closed from outside before people go in." He smiled, looking proud of himself.


    "Very good thinking, Rian," Lori said. "That is almost exactly like the idea I had yesterday when I was putting the overhangs on the intake hole to keep rainwater out. Well done."


    Her lord blinked. "Oh."


    She nodded.


    "Well, that''s good, then! Uh, so I should probably go back to the carpenters and tell them not to put a hole in the door, then?"


    "Yes, you should get to that after breakfast. While you''re there you can also ask about the progress on your bed."


    "So, the water in the river is getting lower!" Rian said loudly. "We should be able to go down to River''s Fork soon!"


    "You don''t have to yell it out, Rian," Lori said. "I''m right in front of you."


    "Ah, sorry."


    At that moment, Umu, Mikon, and¡ªLori checked the rock she was carrying¡ªYllian arrived with the food. The latter was carrying food for himself and Shanalorre, who accepted her bowl and bread with a soft, "Thank you, Uncle Yllian." Lori took one of the five bowls the weavers put down on the table, nodding her head in acknowledgement as she started to eat.


    Uncharacteristically, Rian focused on his food instead of reporting to her. Lori was content to let him.


    She made a note to go back to the dehydrator shed and put in a second intake vent for warm air before she anchored the bindings of airwisps that would help circulate the air inside the shed. After all, she had only said it was almost exactly like her idea. That had been a good suggestion on Rian''s part¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, Lori went to make a second hole in the shed like Rian had suggested and anchored a binding of only airwisps and waterwisps on it draw air into the dehydration shed. The other hole would be drawing in the actual hot air, which would be blocked off with a panel of some sort. Reluctantly, she deactivated the firewisps around her so she could assess how hot to resulting stream of air was. She had to add a binding of airwisps after the two intakes to combine the two streams of air together, but once that was done, the resulting stream of hot air was as hot as the original binding.


    Combined with the binding of airwisps to softly distribute air within the shed, Lori felt that the shed was ready to, if not actually start dehydrating whatever needed to be dehydrated, then at least be tested to see if it worked. Well, as soon as the doors were in place. Though if it was just a test, all she needed to do was seal the doorway. So she didn''t even need to wait for the door to test it.


    ¡­


    Did she have anything to test it with?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She found Rian by the simply expedient of using her awareness of the wisps in her demesne to find the rock with the binding of lightwisps she''d given him. He carried the rock with him in his belt pouch all the time for some reason. She supposed it was useful when he was going inside buildings like the storage shed and the mushroom farm, but it wasn''t like he went into those places every day¡­


    Lori realized she didn''t really know if her lord did that. For all she knew, he inspected every structure in the demesne every day, which¡­ would actually explain what he did for most of the day, really. Probably not every day, since he¡­ probably had other things to do¡­


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    ¡­


    Well, he was easy to find because he had the rock with the binding of lightwisps on it, so Lori was able to go to where he was helping dig tree stumps out of the ground where they had cut down trees the season before. Lori was amused to see that despite the rare bright sun shining down¡ªthough she could see thick, dark clouds on the horizon that threatened rain later¡ªthat had many of the other men working with him removing their shirts from the heat, Rian both still had his shirt on, and seemed to be shivering. Did he actually feel cold?


    "Rian!" Lori called, and he looked up from where he''d been digging in the ground. Realizing who was calling for him, he handed his shovel to another man, who took his place in digging out the stump, and headed towards her.


    "Yes, your Bindership?" he said, wiping sweat from his brow.


    "I need to test the dehydrator shed. What food do we have to test it with?"


    Rian blinked, clearly adjusting the flow of his thoughts, but after a moment''s consideration, he said, "Mushrooms. Right now, we''re storing them in the cold room to keep them fresh since we can''t really sun-dry them. Actually, they''d just harvested some when we went to inspect the mushroom farm. We can ask them for some and try it in the dehydrator shed."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Go get some mushrooms to dry while I make sure the dehydrator is ready."


    "Ah, do we have anywhere to put things to dry on?"


    She blinked at him. "There''s plenty of floor."


    "You want to put food on the floor? I mean, it might work for vigas, but mushrooms don''t have skins to peel off, so¡­"


    ¡­


    "Do you want me to get one or two of the benches or something so we''ve got someplace to put the mushrooms on that''s off the ground?"


    "Yes, you should probably go do that."


    Rian nodded. "One bench should be fine, since this is only a test. We can''t use too many mushrooms, after all. Maybe just a plate''s worth. Or at least, it will all fit in a plate. Will the airflow be mild enough to not send mushrooms flying?"


    "I''ll adjust it to make sure," Lori said as they both started walking to go about their tasks.


    "Did you remember to put the binding to keep bugs out on the dehydrator shed?"


    Lori blinked, turning to look at him. "What?"


    "The binding to keep out bugs. I mean, it''s a nice, warm place where we''ll be leaving food unattended for long periods of time."


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    "I''ll put it on all the openings," she sighed. The two intake vents and the exhaust vent¡­ the door when it had one¡­


    "We''ll need to have some kind of shelves made for it when it''s ready," Rian said. "Not just a table. That way we can dry more things at the same time."


    Lori frowned at the thought. "I''ll need to adjust the how the airwisps circulate the air inside if we do¡­"


    "Well, that''s for after the test. Right now, we''re just going to see if it works, right?"


    "Yes¡­ right now, it''s just a test." A thought occurred to her. "Do you know how long it takes to dry mushrooms?"


    "The farmers will probably know," Rian said. "Hopefully they''ll say the shed will be comparable or faster. Actually, it should be faster, it won''t be dependent on daylight to dry the mushrooms. We can just leave them in there all day and night, and it won''t be interrupted by clouds or rain¡­"


    "Obviously, Rian. That''s the whole point of the exercise. Are you done saying the blatantly obvious like a theater narrator?"


    "In defense of theater narrators, it''s not always obvious. Sometimes they''re introducing the state of the setting at the beginning of the story."


    Lori snorted. "It''s bad writing! A competently written narrative would show it from the interaction between the characters rather than just having some non-character say it out loud."


    "Yeah, you have a point there," Rian nodded. "But some things have to be said, such as a character being rich or handsome or beautiful or skilled, because the limits of the production can''t afford the costumes or actors good-looking enough to be noticeably handsome, or actually be skilled enough at something to be able to fake it on stage. So really, it''s not on the writing competence, it''s on the resources of those interpreting the script."


    "All right, perhaps there''s some allowance for that. But that doesn''t excuse the narration of character interactions!"


    "Well, bad writing exists. It might not even be because of the writer''s skill. They might just not have enough time, or have requirements they can''t write around, like one of the actor''s parts being expanded for some reason or another¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    A small amount of mushrooms were chosen and placed on a plate. Some of the smaller ones were kept whole, while some larger pieces were cut to expose more surface area.


    While that was being prepared, Lori anchored the bindings to keep out bugs over the openings of the dehydration shed. Fortunately, none had made their way inside, but it had been a good reminder.


    Instead of using a bench, Lori just used some stone to make a small pillar to keep the plate off the floor. After all, there was no need to occupy a good bench. After adjusting the airwisps so the wind they generated didn''t blow the mushrooms off the plate, Lori activated the bindings¡ªall of them¡ªand sealed the doorway, leaving only a small opening for the exhaust vent.


    "The farmers said that it would usually take a week of continuous sunlight for mushrooms to dry completely," Rian said as she finished closing up the shed. She could hear a strange almost-whistling as the hot air blew out of the narrow exhaust vent. "But we should probably check up on it every day. Need to take notes on every stage of the experiment, after all."


    Lori frowned at him. "Test," she corrected.


    "No, it''s an experiment," he retorted. "Normal drying under sunlit conditions is the control, so testing the effects of using the dehydrator shed in place of sunlight has a changed variable. That makes it a proper experiment."


    Lori blinked. He was right. "Colors," she swore. "Are you taking notes?"


    "I don''t have my plank on me, but¡ª" he looked up. Some clouds had moved across the sky, making it lightly overcast, although on examination, it would likely keep getting darker until it rained again. "Well, we can record the relative time of the start of the experiment so we can note how long the test sample was in the dehydrator. Will that be enough for now?"


    "It had better," she sighed. "Remember next time."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian chirped.


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Get back to what you were doing. I have go and convert one of the wood storage sheds into a dehydrator."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    She turned to walk away.


    "Uh, your Bindership?"


    Lori glanced back at him. "What?"


    "Do you know if that binding to repel bugs works on chokers and small beasts too?" Rian said. He was looking at the dehydrator shed.


    "Not that I am aware¡­" Lori said warily. "Why do you ask?"


    "Well¡­" Rian pointed. "Aren''t those vents kind of low and big enough for chokers to climb into?"

 255 - Preparing For Rivers Fork

    The river, which had risen up to so high that waves always seemed in danger of reaching the top of the flood barriers, was starting to recede. It had been interesting, occasionally climbing up to the watch platform and looking out over the water. The riverbank on the other side had disappeared, replaced by more water that extended under the trees on the shore beyond. It made the river seem like it went on forever, even if her awareness of wisps let her know that the water didn''t go that far.


    Today though, the water barely lapped at the base of the flood barrier, and the outline of the dock was bright under the surface.


    "We can bring the Coldhold out soon and start going over it to make sure it''s seaworthy. Or river-worthy, in this case. The sea can wait a while," Rian said over breakfast a few days after the dehydration sheds had been finished. The firewood shed was already full of the gathered wet deadfall, drying up so it could be used as fuel and regularly filled and emptied, while the food shed was beginning to dry their first large batch of mushrooms after the success of the test batch.


    Lori fixed a flat look on her senior lord as she reached for one of the bowls of soup. They had always contained pieces of mushrooms, but for some reason they stood out to her now. "Are you implying my boat storage method is faulty?"


    "Oh, don''t be like that. Checking over the ship after it''s been left unattended for so long is only good sense. It''s a vital, life-preserving piece of equipment, not checking it over would be dangerously negligent. Especially since both you and Shana will probably be riding on it at the same time. That is, unless you''re planning to send her back to River''s Fork alone?"


    Of course she wasn''t. "Of course I''m not," Lori said as Lord Yl-something slid a bowl of food and a plate of bread across the table towards Shanalorre. "I have to be there to assess the situation myself, as well as confirm the position of the core."


    "And make sure everyone knows who''s in charge?" Rian said dryly as Mikon and Umu spoke to each other in low tones. Probably weaver matters, since the blonde wasn''t actively glaring at the other woman.


    "Of course."


    Rian nodded as Riz ate her breakfast in a leisurely manner next to him, all her attention on her food due to her lack of conversation. "Then the check will be even more necessary, since of course you''ll want some of our own people to accompany you for protection, and we''ll need to make sure the ship will be stable with all those people onboard. And we''ll need to bring our own food too. After all, they''re having food issues. Best to not make things worse by putting more strain on their reserves."


    Lori waved dismissively with a piece of bread. "Fine. Make preparations you feel you need to, then." She started to tear the bread into pieces for dipping.


    "So, same thing as usual, got it," Rian nodded, simply stirring his soup as if waiting for it to be cooler. "It should take us a day, maybe two after you get the Coldhold out of the water for us to check it over and sail it around to make sure everything is functioning as intended. Hopefully by then we''ll have some dried mushrooms, and I''ll see about having some meat salted and smoked."


    Lori tilted her head. "I thought smoking meat needed some kind of facility?" She took a piece of bread, dipped it in her soup, and put it in her mouth, chewing.


    "It does if one intends to make a lot on a regular basis, but even without we should be able to make some smoked meat by using one of the large storage jars as a smoking chamber. Honestly, salting it is probably enough, but trying to smoke it can''t hurt. We''ll be able to carry food with us as raw ingredients, which takes up less space than jars of stew, and it''s less likely to go bad. I don''t know how long we might need to be in River''s Fork to assert your claim and deal with any problems, but a few days worth of food for everyone wouldn''t hurt." He looked sideways. "Yllian, can I rely on you to deal with making sure that''s packed and ready while I get the ship working?"


    Yllian¡ªthank goodness Rian had said his name before Lori needed to check her rock¡ªhastily swallowed the mouthful he was eating. "As long as there are no problems with production," he said.


    Rian nodded. "After that, what happens depends on you, your Bindership. I can''t make more definite arrangements and plans if you don''t tell me what you intend to do."


    "Implying that you''ve already made indefinite plans and arrangements?" she said dryly.


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    Rian shrugged. "I can make pessimistic estimates of what we''ll find when we get there, and make general plans to deal with things. But I can''t really plan further than that unless you tell me what to plan for, as a practical matter. So¡­ what do you intend after we get there, your Bindership? You said that we''ll be removing the malcontents, but then what?"


    Lori didn''t answer, instead scooping up a spoonful of soup and sipping to giver herself time to think. She¡­ really hadn''t been thinking about what she would do once they managed to make contact with the demesne that was technically newly hers. In all her imaginings, she had thought it would be¡­ well, years before she''d find herself the conqueror of another demesne. Even in her imaginings, she''d never really thought of how she would subjugate the people of her imaginary conquest. The few times she had thought about it, it had been to imagine them resisting her futilely as she used her powers as a Dungeon Binder to snuff out their resistance and lives, which even she knew were just childish daydreams.


    "Once we have secured the demesne, we will proceed with the relocation of inconvenient parties," Lori said after some thought. "Four of five families have been identified as having members who are malcontents. They will be moved here where we will have sufficient numbers to discipline them. After that has been arranged, we will need people to replace them on a permanent basis. Rian, Yllian, I need you two to find people willing to move to River''s Fork. In addition to farmers, we''ll need at least three doctors and medics."


    Rian finished chewing his bread. "Three?"


    "Yes. Since Shanalorre will no longer be residing there, they''ll need more medical personnel to make up the difference. Four of them should be sufficient to keep a population alive for long enough to ferry Shanalorre there when needed."


    Shanalore looked up as she was mentioned. "I will be residing here permanently?" she said.


    "Yes. The bulk of my population is here, so you will be as well to keep them alive. Unless you have a pressing reason to be in River''s Fork?" Like plotting against her. "If you have been maintaining meanings, then with your connection to the core you can do so here as well as there."


    "I can. I have been doing so during my stay here."


    "Well, then you can continue doing so indefinitely."


    Shanalorre nodded, accepting her fate.


    Rian, meanwhile, was frowning. "Uh, don''t you mean five doctors and medics?"


    Shanalorre, realizing she no longer needed to participate, turned back to her food.


    "No. As I recall, Shanalorre''s idiot uncle is also a doctor, correct?"


    Yllian coughed for some reason. Fortunately, he remembered to turn his face away and cover his mouth. "Yes, he is, your Bindership," he said once his throat was clear.


    Lori nodded. "As an inconvenient party, he will also be deported, remember? We discussed this last time," she said, stirring her soup and drawing up another spoonful. "Shanalorre saw fit to allow him to continue undermining her rule. I will be showing no such leniency." The spoonful went into her mouth, pleasantly warm and flavorful.


    "So you''ll make him live next door where you can hear him starting something and kick his shin as needed?"


    She swallowed "Obviously." The best way to deal with dissent was immediately, and this would be the most immediate. "The best way to deal with dissent is immediately, and this would be the most immediate."


    Shanalorre looked up from her food again, her expression strange.


    There was a very loud cough, and Lori looked towards Rian disapprovingly. He smiled brightly at her as he lowered the hand over his mouth. "So! A thought occurs to me! Can Shanalorre heal people in her demesne from here? I mean, she''s connected to it, and all that¡­"


    She stared at him, then turned towards Shanalorre. "Can you?"


    "I¡­ could," Shanalorre said slowly. "I did it when I was there. However, I would not know who would need healing. While I''m aware of all life in my demesne, I cannot differentiate between everyone''s physical states of health."


    Rian hummed thoughtfully, then opened his mouth.


    "Do not suggest that she just heals everyone once a day," Lori told Rian bluntly.


    "Yes, please do not suggest that."


    "I wasn''t! I was going to ask if she can tell where the people are in the demesne through her connection to the core. Like if they''re in a specific building, or even a specific bed."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "You''re suggesting placing injured people within a specific designated building, and Shanalorre simply heals anyone in that building."


    Rian shrugged as Umu and Mikon finished their breakfast next to him. On his other side, Riz had been done for some time, and was taking a moment to nap with her head on the table. "It''s a thought. If there''s more people than can be healed that way because of some accident, something happened that will probably need us to go there anyway. If we arrange it so you check the building at scheduled times, that should let us deal with any injuries that happen in the other demesne without Shanalorre actually having to be there. Will that be enough to deal with the average amount of injuries?"


    Shanalorre tilted her head thoughtfully. "It should be, especially with the doctors present. Though I will need to see if I can identify the building consistently. I will have to see. Perhaps I can use the meanings on the fruit trees as landmarks¡­"


    Lori considered that herself. She supposed that without the ability to make any sort of meaning but healing, those would be the only actively imbued things Shanalorre would perceive through the dungeon''s core. "Perhaps a building close to one of the meanings can be designated."


    "We will have to find one still in good repair."


    Lori nodded, then turned towards her lord. "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Shut up for a moment and eat."


    Rian blinked, then looked around. Shanalorre''s bowl was almost empty, and she had returned to eating, while Yllian was just finishing. Lori''s own bowl was still half-full, but she intended to correct that soon. Rian''s bowl, however, was still mostly untouched save for a piece of bread he''d left in it and was now soggy and falling apart. "Uh, yes your Bindership."


    He ate.

 256 - Getting The Boat Ready

    When the water level of the river finally receded to close to normal levels a few days later, Lori decided it was safe to retrieve the Coldhold from where it was stored inside a stone cube next to the dock where it usually floated.


    "There has to be an easier way to do this," Rian muttered as he watched her carefully open the stone container, then slowly fill it with water to allow the boat float up the level of the river. As the water within the container rose, the boat of ice and wood began to shift as it began to displace water and started to float. "Maybe we can excavate the river here so it''s deep all the way to the flood barrier, then build a covered stone shelter for all our boats? That way we can keep it maintained all year long."


    "''We''?"


    "Well, yes, mostly you, but I''m perfectly willing to help, and so are other people."


    Lori rolled her eyes and focused on raising the Coldhold up to the river''s level, one hand keeping her hat in place against the wind out of habit. When the level of water in the container was on par with the river, she lowered the sides of the container some more, until one a hand''s length of stone remained above the water, keeping the boat isolated from the river''s current. She turned and nodded at Rian. "All right, it''s ready."


    Rian nodded, grabbing the plank next to him on the stairs that she''d build on the riverward side of the flood barrier. She could probably open a hole in the barrier, but the thought of undoing all the work that had gone with it didn''t sit well with her. This meant she didn''t have to rebuild it next year¡­ and that¡ªsigh¡ªit was probably permanent. Rian was able to maneuver the plank so that one end rested on the dock and the other rested on the lip of the remaining stone container that had been around the boat, creating an impromptu bridge. That done, he turned to retrieve a coil of rope that he''d left next to the flood barrier, and tied one end to the stone post that they usually used to secure the boats. Letting out some rope from the coil, he slipped the rest of the coil through one arm. Wearing the coil of rope, he carefully began crossing over the plank.


    Lori couldn''t help but wince as she saw the plank flex slightly with his every movement, but Rian didn''t seem to care, instead moving slowly over the plank until he reached the walls of the container. Resting one foot on the stone, he carefully stepped from there to the outrigger of the boat. Visibly sighing, Rian moved quickly, slipping off the coil of rope and tying it around a thick wooden post on the boat.


    "All right, we''re secured," Rian called out. "You can drop the rest of it now."


    Lori nodded, and moved the rest of the stone downwards to join the stockpile under the dock, ready to encase the boat again in the event of a dragon. No longer isolated from the river''s current, the boat would have begun to drift away from the dock, but Rian began pulling on the rope, tugging the boat closer to the dock before the current could properly take hold. He loosened the knot around the post, then tied it again with the rope shorter. The boat was just close enough that one could take a long step onto the walkways on the outriggers from the dock.


    The boat drifted with the current slightly until rope grew taut, keeping it in place. To her eyes, the boat looked completely fine. "The boat looks completely fine."


    "Yes, but we probably have to replace all the containers of your blood. It''s been a while, they might have gone bad or something."


    Lori blinked and frowned as she realized it had been some time since she imbued the bindings of the Coldhold though her blood rather than through her connection to her core. Ugh. She hated it when he had a point. "Ugh, I hate it when you have a point. Yes, I suppose it would be best to replace the blood."


    "We have to check the insides of the water jet driver too," Rian said. "It might have deformed from moisture, or there might be cracks. It''s technically a pressure vessel, so any cracks¡ª"


    "I know how pressure vessels work, Rian!"


    "Hence why we need to check over everything, like I said."


    "Fine¡­" Lori grumbled. "Get on it then."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll have someone tell you when we''re opening the driver. Maybe we can seal any gaps or cracks with bone or something."


    "When you get around to sailing it¡ª" was it still called sailing when the boat didn''t have a sail? "¡ªtake it outside the demesne for a moment. It will let me know if I really do need to replace the blood."


    Rian nodded. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori turned away, leaving Rian to his own devices. Near them, the laundry area was full of people washing clothes, and had been ever since the water had receded enough for people to walk around barefoot with trousers legs and skirts pulled up. It reminded Lori she needed to do the rest of her laundry. Her pillow, blanket, her bedroll¡­


    Shaking her head, she headed up to where the second row of houses were under construction. Beams had been placed to support the roofs, and workers were in the middle of putting together other beams to give the roof its shape. Already one of the houses had been roofed with planks, and a second house was a quarter of the way covered. The roofs in question were angled to let snow slide off in the winter and dump them behind the house so that people were less likely to be trapped in their house by snow.


    The high angle of the roof also meant that Lori had needed to raise the walls between houses more to be able to support the roof beams, which she had done over the past few days. It was annoying, having to redo work she''d considered finished, but she hadn''t realized what having roofs at such angles had meant.


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    She spent the rest of the morning making holes in the walls for windows and fitting in the few doors that the carpenters had managed to make, sinking their hinges into the stone and adjusting the stone to form a proper doorframe, and helping fit and secure wooden beams into the stone walls by reshaping them with earthwisps. It was all minute adjustments that took up more time than they seemed as she went from place to place, adjusting the stone, then climbing to the next place where the stone needed adjusting. The stonemasons could probably have done the same, but it would have taken more time, and people had been needed to help move beams and planks, and so they were working there in the meantime.


    They worked until lunch, prioritizing placing the beams so that most of the construction could be continued without her. Once the beams were placed, all she''d need to be involved with would be placing the doors and the frames for the window shutters. After that, she''d be mostly able to step away from the project, allowing her to deal with River''s Fork. Any other things that needed her intervention could probably be done after she came back. By that point it would mostly be installing the rest of the doors and window frames.


    At lunch, Rian was slightly sweaty as he sat down across from her, putting down a plank full of writing in black char on the table in front of him. Riz seemed equally sweaty, but that was normal, since Lori had seen her assisting the carpenters with carrying the beams and planks. Her new lord¡ªLori checked her rock: Yllian¡ªwas the same, since he would have been working with the wood cutters. Lori wasn''t as sweaty, since she hadn''t needed to carry anything heavy today, but climbing up to the beams so she could properly see the stone she needed to reshape had still been an exertion. Umu and Mikon, for their part, were equally disheveled. She''d seen the two of them in the laundry area earlier, doing laundry together.


    Shanalorre seemed the freshest among them, sitting quietly with her fingers laced together and her back straight in a way that made Lori remember her mothers chiding her about her posture and once more made her wish for a backrest. Lori herself was mildly sweat-stained from climbing up and down ladders to be able to get to where the beams met stone walls. While firewisps changed the temperature of the air around her, that didn''t actually change the uncomfortable feeling of humidity on her skin as moisture was trapped in her sleeves and her body sweated from exertion.


    The feeling of the air on her skin was wonderfully refreshing as Lori laid out her raincoat and hat on the bench next to her before she sat down. "So, is the boat usable?" she asked Rian.


    He blinked at her, glanced at the plank, then turned to look towards the kitchen. "Uh, could that wait for a moment? It''s my turn to get the food."


    Lori stared at him blankly for a moment. Then she sighed. "Fine. Go get it and come back."


    Rian nodded, getting up to make his way towards the line where food would be distributed, followed by Riz.


    Yllian glanced after them and grimaced, making to stand up.


    "Stop," Shanalorre said. "Stay here and rest, Uncle Yllian. I''ll go and get the food for us."


    Yllian, who had paused immediately, let his weight settle back on the bench as Shanalorre rose and followed the other two as Lori frowned after her.


    "Something the matter, your Bindership?" Yllian said blandly.


    Lori moved her gaze towards him, her frown deepening for a moment, but¡­ well, he was one of her lords, after all. She supposed this was a reminder that he was still loyal to Shanalorre, and that her authority over him was because the younger Dungeon Binder had ordered it of him. Best she remember it.


    Rian, Riz and Shanalorre soon came back with food, Lori taking a bowl from the five presented. Shanalorre placed one of the bowls she was carrying in front of Yllian before walking around the table to put down her own bowl and the plate of bread, only then seating herself.


    As Lori began eating, Rian glanced at his plank again for a moment, frowning thoughtfully as he visibly weighed and summarized his findings in front of her. Finally, he nodded as he came to some conclusion. "Regarding the usability of the boat, we''re still checking over everything, but so far it looks good. Some of the planks that are supposed to protect the ice from impacts had things growing on them, and a few had mold, but so far none of that seems to have spread to the structural parts of the ship. However, it means it will take a bit longer than we thought since we''ll need to thoroughly examine everything."


    Lori frowned, swallowing what was in her mouth. "How long?"


    He shrugged. "I don''t know. If we focus on checking all the major structural beams for damage, we should be able to make it to River''s Fork in a few days, but I don''t feel comfortable going out to sea and going to Covehold until we do the more thorough check."


    Next to her, Shanalorre was roused from her meal, her head coming up. "If I may interrupt, Lord Rian?"


    Her lord blinked in confusion and glanced towards Lori. She shrugged, allowing the interruption as she started eating her soup. "Uh, go ahead, Great Binder."


    "Because of the nature of our housing, mold and other causes of wood decay has been a concern for us as well," the other Dungeon Binder said. "While I cannot do anything about the matter, as I do not have the adequate training or knowledge, I have been able to discern the difference between wood that has been infested with mold and wood that is untouched. The life between the two contrasts enough for me to be able to distinguish between them. I can also identify subsurface rot to a degree by the voids left behind. Once the Coldhold is within the boundaries of River''s Fork, I believe that I can assist in identifying any structural defects in the wood of the structure."


    Tearing some bread to dip in the soup, Lori found herself staring at Shanalorre. That was¡­ She hadn''t thought about it, but on consideration, that would be something the other Dungeon Binder could do with her connection to River''s Fork''s core. Even if she didn''t know how to do anything with the life in her awareness besides heal, there would be a difference between the life of something alive and the life of something that wasn''t anymore. Lori remembered that much, even if it was from some novels she had read years ago¡­


    "Uh¡­ huh," Rian said as he seemed to take a moment to comprehend her words. He turned towards Lori. "Ah, is that all right with you, your Bindership? After all, she''s volunteering, so it doesn''t go against your views of making children work¡­ And she and the Coldhold will both be in River''s Fork at the same time in any case, so¡­"


    Lori frowned, pausing in dipping the bread in her hands. "Fine. She may assist in identifying potential points of failure. However, the whole boat is still to be manually inspected, in case there are defects she is unable to identify. What else?" She dipped the bread in her soup.


    Rian looked awkward for a moment. "We, uh, also need your help airing out the inside of the boat. There''s a bit of a smell down there that¡­ well, honestly I was sort of hoping it would go away over the winter, but that didn''t happen. Thank you for keeping the light imbued, by the way. It was really helpful."


    Lori grimaced, but¡­ well, an airing would probably be good, since she''d be traveling inside the Coldhold herself. Best that it be tolerable to do so. As to the smell, well, time and airwisps could deal with that¡ªwait a moment¡­


    "I might be able to assist with that," Lori said thoughtfully. "There was something in the almanac for removing smells¡­ I''ll look it up later."


    "That would be helpful, if there is such a thing. All in all¡­ call it half a week at most?"


    "Hmm¡­" She pointed. "Rian."


    "Eating, your Bindership."

 257 - Necessary Maintenance

    She found the article in the almanac that she had recalled, a way of removing scents by exposing an area to unseen light. It had taken a while to find it because it was an article on the uses of unseen light, not a flow diagram. While it had many suggestions for utilizing the various forms of the phenomenon, it also had a lengthy list of reminders of its deleterious effects on the human body, which presumably extended to other bodies as well, such as beasts, bugs and fursh. Some of them, like blindness and growths of the skin similar to mild forms of blight, could be mitigated by a capable Deadspeaker¡­ but they didn''t have one of those.


    Some of the things there she already knew, like how it killed dustlife¡ªwhich was the same phenomenon that caused the illnesses from long exposure¡ªbut according to the article, it also killed mold with enough exposure. While removing mold would probably be beneficial, Shanalorre''s suggestion for finding possible structural defects in the wood relied on the contrast between living mold and dead wood.


    "Unless you can tell the different anyway?" Lori asked the following day after she had checked the almanac.


    Shanalorre tilted her head thoughtfully, clearly considering. Finally, she shook her head. "No, I do not think I can. While it might be possible to differentiate between the two, it would probably take a more experienced and knowledgeable Deadspeaker than I to do so."


    "You might still be able to use it," Rian mused. "Mold on the surface would die, but the damaging kind of mold is the kind that''s gotten under the surface of the wood. That would probably still survive even when the surface mold dies." He shrugged. "And killing surface mold would probably be a good idea in any case. That can make a person sick, especially in an enclosed space."


    Lori considered this.


    Work on the interior of the Coldhold paused for the day as all the hatches were opened and Lori placed a binding of airwisps to create a turbulent flow of air within the boat, in addition to a binding of lightwisps to fill it with unseen light of the right variant. Yes, the place definitely needed airing, smelling of old food and old sweat, and since she''d be traveling in it soon, it was in her best interest to make the place more livable. To prevent possible blighting, Lori concealed the boat with darkwisps, blocking out the emanations of unseen light that might leak through the ice and any openings.


    When all the bindings were deactivated after lunch, Lori herself checked the insides of the boat, and was gladdened at reduction of the odors. Some of the sweat would probably be introduced back in from all the people working inside it, but there was no helping that.


    As the inspection of the boat continued, so did the construction of the new houses. The first of the new houses were finished while the Coldhold was in the middle of being inspected. It wasn''t much. There was the door, the two windows on either side of it, cold stone walls, and the beams and planks of the roof several paces up. The fireplace was empty, the chimney built covered to prevent rain from entering.


    "Tell those who petitioned for group housing that their groups can move in once two of the houses have been finished," Lori told Rian over dinner. "And that if they assisted with the construction, it will be done even faster. "


    "Two so that there''s no fighting over who gets to move in first, I take it?" Rian said. His bowl was conspicuously half empty of soup, and he was just getting started on dipping his bread into it.


    Lori nodded. "And it motivates them to assist in getting construction done sooner¡ªare you crying?"


    "Oh, don''t mind me," her lord said as she realized too late that those were theatrical tears. "I''m just seeing the day you don''t need me anymore looming closer and closer as you learn how to deal with people. You''ll be able to understand how people feel yourself¡ª"


    "Even if I can, I refuse," Lori said flatly.


    "Well, at least I''ll always have work," Rian mused. "Now, if only it came with some kind of wage."


    "You have a house, a boat, and soap, food and medical care are provided for. Stop being greedy. Next you''ll be demanding land."


    "Fair point, fair point¡­ speaking of which, some people have been expressing resentment that the malcontents we intend to move here will be getting to live in the nice, new homes instead of people who''ve stood by you and have been loyal and hard-working subjects."


    Lori frowned. "Why would¡­?" Oh, right, she had discussed this with him in her house. And given the timing, it made sense for them to come to that conclusion. "Please make it clear to them that the new houses are not for the malcontents. The malcontents will be residing in the shelter until such a time as residences can be found for them."


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    "Hear that?" Rian said loudly, glaring around at the tables around them. "Those houses aren''t for the ones who left the demesne to live somewhere else! She said it, not me! Now will you all stop bringing it up and go back to complaining about other things that we can deal with?"


    Somewhere in one of the tables, someone said, "But who are all those houses for, then?"


    "People of this demesne who need them," Rian said in exasperation. "Go back to eating, Enso. You''ll find out soon enough, anyway."


    A grumbling voice faded away into the usual murmur of the dining hall as her lord sighed. "I''m going to have to check the houses to make sure the unfinished ones don''t happen to have leaky roofs or something, won''t I?"


    "None of our people are that shoddy with their work, Rian," Lori reminded him. "To my knowledge, none of the houses built so far had been prone to leaks."


    "People don''t report things like that to you, they tell me," he pointed out. "And we''ve definitely had some leaks, which have been sealed with creative woodcraft, wax, and tree sap. Or possibly resin. I''m not sure what the difference is."


    He probably had a point there.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori had to be there to inspect the water jet driver as it was opened up¡ªshe''d deactivated the bindings beforehand¡ªand the blocks of wood constituting its parts inspected for any damage or deformity. While there were no cracks, some of the bone that she had coated the interior of the driver''s tubes with had become worn from the water that had constantly been flowing through the driver.


    In some places, the bone had been eroded down almost to the wood beneath. Had the bone actually been penetrated, the wood underneath would probably have swollen from absorbing the water, deforming and pushing at the bone coating from underneath, which would have resulted in damage that would expose more wood to water, which would also absorb water and swell¡­


    Lori recoated the tube with bone twice as thick as what she had originally used, making sure to add even more bone to the spots where it had been very worn, hardening the bone as much as she could without actually needing to keep it strengthened with a binding of earthwisps. She''d probably still put a binding of earthwisps on it when she remembered, but the bone had lasted up until now, so it should be enough to keep the boat functioning until next winter.


    She''d have to remember, or have Rian remember, to inspect the driver every two seasons for wear on the bone coating. Especially with the changes to the water jets she planned to make¡­


    With the river now stable, Lori''s Boat and the wooden frame and components for Lori''s Ice Boat were also inspected for any damage, with Lori personally checking their water jet drivers. Their bone tubes were also worn and had to be repaired. The wear wasn''t as severe as with the water jet driver on the Coldhold, but it was concerning nonetheless, especially considering how much the boats had been used in the previous year. If they had seen continued use during the winter, they might have failed¡­


    The thought made Lori shudder. Such an equipment failure would have been an ironic death sentence, with whoever had been riding on them becoming trapped in the water until they had drifted to shore. Potentially safe from the Iridescence indefinitely, but trapped where they were, unable to return to the demesne unless they risked leaving the water and trekking back over land. And if that had happed to the Coldhold while it was out at sea, collecting salt¡­


    She shuddered again. Maybe she should make Rian put sails on the thing, in case the driver failed. Or perhaps oars¡­


    In addition to the wear on the water jet drivers, the Coldhold also had some components that had become loose with wear, such as some of the planking, rails, and a few of the wooden components that regularly got wet when they were gathering salt. Those were tightened, refitted, and replaced as needed. Once everything had been checked and the water jet driver rebuilt and resealed, Rian and those who had previously regularly used the boat to gather salt tested its functionality.


    The crowd seeing them off was small, since many people had to work and the novelty of seeing a boat made of ice and wood moving seemingly without impetus had clearly faded. Still, there were some people watching. Some children were there, and Lori was aware that if the test was successful Rian would probably allow them to ride on the boat for a lap or two. She''d sometimes seen the children riding on the smaller boats when they crossed the river, though that could also have been because they had volunteered to help load and unload gathered materials.


    Lori was there to watch the boat go as well, but it wasn''t because she was concerned or anything like that! It was merely out of professional interest! She watched to see if she needed to adjust the output of the water jet to overcome the river''s current, since the water still seemed to be moving swifter than it usually would. Her concerns were empty, however. The Coldhold proved itself capable of fighting against the current and progressing upriver as planned, although from the foam that appeared behind the boat, and a quick check using her awareness of the demesne''s wisps, it had to move all the tubes of the waterjet driver into position and use its maximum capable thrust to do so.


    Hmm, she might need to adjust the output of the water jets after all. While it was making its way upriver, it was quite slow in doing so, and that was just with the weight of its normal amount of passengers. If they loaded more people onto it to act as guards for herself, as well as Shanalorre and the people who had come with her¡­


    Perhaps now would be the time to try the idea she had considered for the sled when she had been considering fueling its propulsion with snow, before discarding the idea as currently impractical¡­


    That would require tests, though. Such expansion would turn the water jet tubes into a pressure vessel, so they''d need to be better reinforced¡­


    She''ll have to think about this.


    But later. She still had to pay attention to the Coldhold so she''ll know for sure if she needed to renew the vials of her blood on the boat.

 258 - Water Jet Improvement Test

    "Oh, grow up, Rian," Lori said as she finished using her syringe to extract blood. Some distance away, Rian was twitching, averting his eyes and shuddering far too energetically to be simple theatrics, especially since it was just the two of them. He really didn''t like the sight of her syringe being used.


    "You grow up," he returned rather childishly.


    "Surely you can conceive of a wittier reply," she said as she reversed the flow of the syringe, filling the hastily-cleaned metal vial with fresh blood. She had been lazy over the winter, neglecting to imbue the bindings she''d placed on the boat through the blood she had left in the vials. It had been easier, after all, to simply imbue it through her connection to her core, and she''d been so busy all winter¡­ so of course the blood had lost its affinity with her¡ªor was it her affinity with the blood?¡ªrequiring she put in new blood. They''d probably have to make this sort of maintenance a regular occurrence.


    "We probably have to make this sort of maintenance a regular occurrence," she said distractedly as she sealed the vial close before putting the piece of plank back into place in front of it and moving the ice around it to bury the vial again.


    "If it were me, I''d suggest doing it once a blue month, but we probably can''t afford to spend that much time on it," Rian sort of agreed. "Do you think it would survive two red moons without something breaking?"


    "It lasted three seasons, even if it was inactive through one of them," Lori said as she stood up. That was the last vial, so she wouldn''t have to put up with Rian''s childishness anymore. She''d still need to make the lightwisp bindings, but that could wait until after they came back and the Coldhold started going downriver to the sea for salt. Losing sight in her eye, even if it was only briefly now, was a disorienting experience she''d rather avoid. "So that should probably be a reasonable maintenance schedule. Inform all parties that need to know that we will be heading for River''s Fork tomorrow. You have the rest of today to arrange matters and get the necessary supplies loaded onto the Coldhold."


    "Can we push it back to the day after?" Rian asked. "The supplies are one thing, but volunteers for possibly fighting in River''s Fork are another matter."


    "You''ve had five days."


    "I was busy making sure our ride wouldn''t sink and take us with it. I''ll need at least a day to dedicate to finding people willing and able to potentially fight without being worse than useless," he countered. "The only people we have with any sort of proper fighting experience are from River''s Fork, and might be a bit reluctant to engage in violence. At best, I might be able to find people willing to come along provided we''re not the aggressors and are just there to help the local militia deal with any unrest from the announcement. And even then, they''ll be reluctant."


    "They''re militia. Fighting is what they do."


    For some reason, Rian winced. "Please never say that in front of any of them. That''s part of the thoughtlessness they left their demesne to get way from. Militia are people too, and people generally don''t want to fight. Sometimes they need to, but they don''t like it. And no one wants to have to fight people they know, which is who the people in Rivers'' Fork are." He sighed. "Consider it a ''dealing with people'' matter and let me handle it. Please?"


    Lori scowled, but¡­ well, explained that way, she supposed he had a point. "Fine then. I needed to do a test to see if I can enhance the water jet''s effectiveness anyway."


    Rian perked up, looking cheered. "I''ll go grab my pla¡ª"


    "No."


    He stiffened in the middle of turning around, one foot dangling in the air. "N-no?" he said.


    "No," she repeated. "You said you needed a day to convince volunteers. So you will obviously not have any time to take notes for me. Go do that instead and have our contingent ready."


    "C-can''t I do both?" Rian asked pitiably, finally remembering to put his foot down.


    "If you could, you would obviously have been able to both inspect the Coldhold and find suitable volunteers," Lori said, and he winced. "I gave you the time you asked for, so put it to use. Get moving."


    He sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After Lori had cleaned her syringe, made sure the needle was clear¡ªit wouldn''t do to have some sort of obstruction inside it, especially one that may rot¡ªand put the instrument away in her room, she began building the components she needed for her test. New bones were showing up in the bone pit now since they''d started hunting again, and she made sure to pick the ones that already looked like they''d been boiled for bone glue by the carpenters.


    She was amused to note all the skulls had been set aside, possibly to make sure they weren''t used for anything else, and made a note to check the state of the demesne''s shovels, as well as to collect the teeth and claws later.


    Lori formed the bone she had collected into a tube, making it as solid as possible for structural integrity. While the water jets were technically already pressure vessels, she was worried that what she intended to do would drastically increase that pressure catastrophically. Lacking in measuring instruments to determine if the materials she was using could withstand the increase of such pressure¡ªand admittedly the training to use such instruments in any case¡ªLori would simply need to take a ''do it and see'' approach to the matter.


    Of course, for it to be a proper test, she needed to take notes¡­ or at least, needed someone to take notes for her.


    Her options for that were limited. She could take the notes herself, but that would be awkward while actively experimenting, and anyway, she was a Dungeon Binder! What was the point if she couldn''t have someone else take her notes for her?


    However, she didn''t actually know who in her demesne could write. It was probably safe to assume the astrologer¡ªshe was sure they had an astrologer somewhere, unless he had stayed behind in Covehold when Rian had gone there¡ªcould write, but¡­ well, Lori didn''t actually know where he was. She assumed he worked somewhere, but as to what that work was¡­


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    That left her only one other alternative. Returning to her room to grab her own plank¡ªit probably wasn''t safe to assume he''d have his own, and besides, she''d need the notes for later anyway¡ªshe then headed out to the woods. Fortunately, she didn''t have to wander around for long, since the group cutting down trees were easily visible.


    A large trunk was being dragged along the ground towards the sawyers with ropes and rollers, men moving back and forth from back to front to place the rollers on the ground. Other men were digging up stumps and pulling them out of the ground to clear it for planting. A few trees stood isolated and left alone by the loggers, and Lori recognized the profile of happyfruit trees. Just the sight of them made her mouth water. She hoped they managed to harvest a lot of them this year. A small, pale-haired figure standing off to the side was identifiable as Shanalorre, a jar that was probably filled with water next to her. Lori twitched as she saw only a single wood cup¡­


    In hindsight, she probably needed a way to be able to quickly determine Shanalorre''s location. Perhaps Lori could give her a rock with a binding of lightwisps on it as well¡­


    The other Dungeon Binder caught sight of her first, turning and giving a small bow. "Binder Lolilyuri," she acknowledged.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori greeted. She reached into her belt pouch, moving aside some beast teeth and quarts before she found her rock. She checked it. "Where''s Yllian?"


    Shanalorre turned and pointed. Yllian was one of several men wielding a large saw¡ªthough not as large as the one the sawyers used to cut beams and planks¡ªas they moved together to cut down one of the large trees that loomed up. She debated calling out to them, but they were already moving in rhythm, and she knew better than to interrupt work in progress. Best to wait for the tree to fall.


    However, while she was here¡­


    "Rian tells me you want to apprentice under the doctors and medics," Lori said.


    "Yes," Shanalorre said. "I believe I should augment my healing meaning with useful support skills in addition to diagnosis, such as bone setting, and perhaps suturing in preparation for reattachment of limbs."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Is that even within the ability of your meaning?"


    "I do not know," Shanalorre said. "However, learning the skill is still useful."


    Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Are you making yourself too skilled and useful to conveniently kill?"


    Shana tilted her head, seemingly surprised. "I had not considered that. I was merely trying to optimize the uses of my ability to heal. Within the confines of this demesne, my ability is hampered without my awareness of others'' life."


    "Now you know how difficult it was for me to be in your demesne," was her very flat reply.


    "I apologize in retrospect for the inconvenience, and thank you for the quality of your work despite it."


    The men trying to fell the tree stopped sawing, and Yllian stepped back, wiping his brow as the saw was repositioned. He turned towards Shanalorre and stopped, the smile that had been on his face vanishing as she saw Lori there, his posture straightening as his back stiffened. Lori gestured for him to come towards her, and walked towards her.


    "I have need of you," she said, handing him the plank. "Rian is occupied, so you''ll be taking notes for me instead."


    He blinked. "Notes, Gr¡ªyour Bindership?"


    "Yes, notes. Just write down what I tell you to write down and you''ll be fine."


    The man¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªYllian looked confused, but followed Lori as she headed back down to the river.


    She''d considered doing these tests at the retting tank, which was currently unused as they waited for more ropeweed to grow, but that had only a limited amount of not very clean water. If she needed to do multiple iterations of her test, she''d need more.


    It wasn''t until she got to the river that she realized that Shanalorre had come with them.


    "You ordered Lord Yllian to remain near me at all times," she said. "If you require him, that means that I must move to stay near him."


    Ah. Right. Silly of her to not realize. "Very well. Stay back and out of the way."


    Lori grabbed some of the stockpiled stone under the dock for protecting the Coldhold in the event of a dragon and used that to create a mount for her bone pipe at the end of the stone dock. One end of the pipe was submerged in the water, while the other stuck up diagonally, pointed further away from shore towards the middle of the river. Using a binding of waterwisps to pull some water up the length of the pipe, Lori anchored waterwisps to the inside of the bone pipe and bound them into a water jet binding.


    "All right," she said absently as she stepped back from the water jet so she''d have a better view of what happened. "First control experiment, using a water jet binding that will remain unchanged through all subsequent experiments. Angle of inclination, force of output, and volume of water utilized will all remain unchanged in all tests."


    "What was that, your Bindership?"


    Lori blinked, remembering she had someone else who wasn''t Rian writing for her. She huffed in annoyance, but repeated herself. "Write this down: first control experiment, using a water jet binding that will remain unchanged through all subsequent experiments. Angle of inclination, force of output, and volume of water utilized will all remain unchanged in all tests. Did you get all that?"


    "I''ll need you to char the end of this stick for me, your Bindership."


    Lori let out a sigh and briefly wondered if she should have gotten Rian to take notes for her after all. "Give it here," she said irritably.


    She waited impatiently as¡ªshe checked her rock¡ªYllian wrote with the freshly charred stick. "Done?" she said when he stopped writing.


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said.


    "Read back what you just wrote."


    Yllian did so. It¡­ sounded like what she''d said¡­ right? Ugh, Rian would have realized he needed to write it all down!


    "Commencing control experiment," she said out of habit as she activated the water jet binding. A stream of water erupted from the elevated end of the tube, which arched out over the river. Annoyingly, the wind was blowing towards them, sending spray into Lori''s face for a moment before she sighed and bound the airwisps to block the wind from interfering with her test and affecting her experiments.


    "Did the notes get wet?" she said, glancing at Yllian.


    "No, your Bindership, your notes are unharmed."


    She nodded in satisfaction. "Write this down. At current angle of inclination, the stream of water reached a height of¡­" she gave him her estimate of the height of the apex of the arching water, as well as her estimate of how many paces out it reached. She had him repeat the numbers to her, just to make sure. Rian would be able to review the numbers later. Maybe he''d still enjoy the numbers changing even if he didn''t write them down himself.


    Once she was certain the notes had been recorded accurately, she turned back towards the tube and deactivated the water jet binding, then added a new binding of waterwisps to the ones already in the tube. She placed it just inside the submerged portion of the tube, anchoring it in place by connecting it to the other waterwisp bindings, which wouldn''t affect their function unless she made them too intertwined. Those waterwisps, she bound to turn water into steam.


    "Beginning first experiment," she said after she''d stepped back from the bone tube, again out of habit, then shook her head a she remembered. She turned towards¡ªshe checked her rock¡ªYllian. "Write this down. Second test, additional variable, binding to convert water into steam to increase volume. Hypothesis, increased volume will result in increased force and therefore thrust. Read that back to me."


    She waited until he finished writing and repeated what she had just said. Nodding in satisfaction, she first activated the binding that converted water into steam, then activated the water jet binding.


    A plume of steam shot out of the upraised end of the bone tube, and Lori briefly realized that she hadn''t actually thought this experiment through very well. Steam didn''t arch down, after all.


    However, the plume began to sputter as if it wasn''t getting enough water. As she watched, frowning in consternation, the plume eventually disappeared soon after. What?


    Cautiously, since she didn''t want to have a face full of steam, Lori deactivated the bindings before approaching the bone tube. As she approached, she saw why the steam had vanished.


    The end of the bone tube that had been submerged under the water was blocked by ice.


    Huh.


    ¡­


    Oh right, that would have happened, wouldn''t it? She hadn''t added firewisps, and the water wasn''t all that warm to begin with¡­


    "Yllian, write this down," she said. "First experiment failed due to unforeseen and unaccounted for variable."


    This¡­ would be a problem¡­

 259 - Uncovered Results

    It was, indeed, a problem.


    Normally, dealing with something like this was easily amended by adding in some firewisps to generate heat for the water to draw in when it changed state. And sure enough, when Lori added firewisps to her binding the next experiment worked as intended, with the area surrounding the binding no longer losing so much heat the water outside the tube started congealing into ice.


    The resulting plume of steam was hot, long, consistent and forceful¡­ but honestly, Lori really couldn''t tell if the steam resulted in more force than simply the water jet. All she''d learned said it should. The expansion from water to steam should impart more force from the expansion than simply having the waterwisps move the water, which should theoretically move any boat it was attached to faster than simply water alone.


    Should. Empirically proving it, however, much less making it practical for the boats they had¡­


    She tried to put a rock on the end of the tube and see which version of the jet''s output launched it farther¡ªa very good way of measuring which configuration generated more force¡ªbut putting one on the end of the tube proved annoyingly difficult. The initial force from the tube wasn''t the most powerful, so those initial results were useless¡­ and slightly counter intuitive. The rock propelled by the water jet went further than the one pushed by the steam jet, but she attributed that to the water having more mass than the steam. The rocks also weren''t the same size, making the results invalid.


    Rather than giving in to the temptation of trying to redesign the bone tube to be able to slot a rock into the path of the tube in either configuration¡ªthe thought of getting wet or getting a steam-scalded hand also helped block that flow of thought¡ªLori decided to simply change the configuration of the experiment. The bone tube was secured completely under the water line of the stone dock, and she activated the water jet binding, then sat there for some time trying to visually assess how fast the water was moving, both with her eyes and by how fast the waterwisps were flowing in her awareness. Then she activated the additional binding that turned water into steam, first without firewisps, and then with.


    The results were interesting. With the tube fully submerged, the surrounding flowing water moved too fast to freeze into ice without the added firewisps, although the surrounding bone quickly became very cold. The steam jet, as she surmised, seemed to displace far more water from its path, at least on initial inspection, and even more when she tested it with the binding of firewisps activated to inject heat into the water so that it wouldn''t need to draw heat from its surroundings.


    By all indications, a steam jet would in fact propel their boats far faster than simply using a water jet. And from the fact that the bone tube hadn''t cracked and started spewing bubbles of steam, the pressure within it hadn''t increased so greatly that the tube had ruptured. While the wide openings on both ends probably prevented the tube from becoming true pressure vessels, it had been a concern for her.


    Unfortunately, the results made it clear altering the bindings of the Coldhold''s water jet driver into a steam driver would me more than she could reasonable do in a day. While the smaller boats might be converted into steam jets, since their configuration mean they''d be able to draw sufficient heat from their surroundings so that ice wouldn''t form¡ªor at least, not form and block the intake¡ªthe same couldn''t be done with the larger boat.


    Between the large driver being in the inside the boat and being fed water through pipes, and the fact she didn''t want to risk killing herself by extracting some of her body''s, converting the Coldhold''s water jet driver into a steam jet driver that had firewisps to add heat to the water to assist in converting it into steam wouldn''t be feasible. The only other possibly configuration would be to move the binding that turned the water into steam at some point after the water jet driver before the stream exited the pipes to provide thrust and that was just as unfeasible. The bound ice would be useless for providing heat, meaning the water would probably freeze into ice and block the pipes. And of course, there was the possibility that the increased pressure would damage the surrounding ice.


    "So I''ll have to simply increase the rate in which the water flows through the water jet driver of the Coldhold," Lori finished explaining to Shanalorre, who nodded earnestly, a fascinated look on her face as she watched Lori pull the bone tube up from where it had been secured. The other Dungeon Binder had asked what the point of her experiments and notes were, and she felt there was no harm in explaining. "Otherwise the boat might not be able to return upstream in a timely manner, and it would be disconcerting that to have to camp out in the Iridescence if we don''t have to." The stone that had been holding the tube in place was returned to the stockpile under the dock.


    "Would not adding more water jet tubes also work?" Shanalorre asked.


    "It would, but they cannot simply be attached at any point of the boat," Lori said. "The Coldhold''s water jet driver is designed to be controllable and allow the boat to stop when needed without interrupting the bindings providing it with propulsion. Adding further external water jet tubes, while allowing the boat to move faster and be better able to travel against the current of the river, would also not be connected with these control mechanisms. The boat would not stop until the imbuement on the external tubes were depleted, which would be inconvenient when one wishes to stop because they have reached their destination."


    "I see¡­" Shanalorre said, glancing towards the Coldhold next to them. "Will you be building a new boat that will take advantage of the results you have uncovered?"


    "Eventually," Lori said. She bound the waterwisps of the water clinging to the bone tube, binding them to turn into vapor. The air around her hands holding the tube became very cool, though the feeling quickly dissipated. "However, such a boat will require a different arrangement of components. Providing heat to assist in the conversion of water to steam will be the primary necessity." That would probably require metal components. Well, more metal components. Tubes instead of wires, perhaps even pressure vessels¡­


    She paused, then looked sideways at Shanalorre. "Does River''s Fork contain possible deposits of iron?"


    "There were traces found in some of the nearby hills," Shanalorre said promptly. Nearby, her new note writer looked up from his plank. "Indeed, traces of possible deposits in several nearby hills was the reason that location was chosen to found the demesne. To prevent possible taint of the local water from vitriolic or caustic substances, it was previously decided that the extraction of most of the seams would be delayed until the demesne had more equipment, alchemists and Whisperers to safely facilitate the process."


    A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Lori nodded. Concern about the release of such substances into the local water was why mining was conducted with care. While the copper ore that they had mined only needed smelting to be extracted, not all metals were as convenient or safe to handle. She vaguely remembered that there were metal ores that existed as amalgams of metal and crystalline vitriol, though it had only been mentioned in passing when they had been shown how to separate water and oil of vitriol in one of her classes a long time ago.


    Huh. She was surprised she''d remembered that little detail. Perhaps she was starting to utilize Mentalism? She remembered that some aspects of it became usable without need for conscious thought as simply breathing in magic enabled it¡­


    ¡­


    No, no, best not to get her hopes up. Remembering random trivia more memorable than someone''s name wasn''t unusual. There was no reason to think she''d done some unconscious Mentalism or anything like that¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "So, how did the tests go?" Rian asked immediately as he sat down across from her at dinner.


    "They went well," Lori said. She''d taken the time to leave her rain coat and hat in her room after drying them, and the air flowing over her previously humid arms was a welcome relief. Thankfully it hadn''t rained until after her experiments were completed. The notes hadn''t been ruined, thankfully, but the handwriting wasn''t as legible.


    "Define ''well'', please? Did you find out something useful? Are we going to have to delay a few days to put some new thing on the Coldhold?"


    "Yes. No. Did you manage to get enough volunteers? Will we be able to go tomorrow or do you still need a day?"


    Rian hesitated, then sighed. "Yes, but not enough. Unless you feel safe with only six other people coming with us, not counting Shanalorre''s original party?"


    Six would put them at parity with Shanalorre''s contingent. She didn''t want parity, she wanted to outnumber them, and have enough people to put between her and any violent malcontents in River''s Fork so she could use her Whispering for violence! "Of course not. Get more tomorrow."


    "That was the idea," he said dryly. "So¡­ besides Yllian, have you considered appointing more lords? Or ladies?"


    "No."


    "No, you haven''t considered it yet, or no, you''re not going to?"


    "Yes."


    He slumped, then sighed. "You realize you''re going to need to appoint at least one more, right?"


    "Oh? I need to, do I?" Lori said flatly.


    Rian pointed across his body towards¡­ Yllian¡­ sitting some distance past Umu on his other side. "Unless you change his orders, he''ll have to stay here with Shana to keep an eye on her. So you won''t have an authority to represent you in River''s Fork. Of course, given he has family there, he might just resign his lordship so he doesn''t have to stay here away from them. In which case, you''d need to appoint a new lord anyway to replace him, because I can''t run two demesne at the same time!"


    That last sounded nearly strangled as Rian leaned towards her emphatically.


    Lori tilted her head. "I suppose you have a point," she said. "I''d rather you stayed nearby to deal with things here, so someone else will have to deal with River''s Fork¡­" Admittedly, she hadn''t really thought that far ahead, concentrating on more immediate events. Getting the boat ready to go to River''s Fork and assert her authority over it¡ªafter ensuring the core was where she had been told it was¡ªsuppress any dissent, move the malcontents away and then begin moving people in to best exploit the demesne''s resources¡­


    Ah, wait, she''d need to build infrastructure first. Shelters, baths, a better communal kitchen, better food storage¡­


    Just thinking about it made her heart feel like it was being clenched in her chest, which was why she hadn''t really thought about it. It was like trying to found a demesne all over again, except with less people, and she''d have to do it without the convenience of her core¡­


    Perhaps she could still change her mind. Just bring Shanalorre to River''s Fork and leave her there¡­ but no, then she''d have to go back to fulfill their agreement to build a shelter for the demesne, among other things. Unless she didn''t¡­


    But she had given her word. And while she one day intended to break her word¡­ it would be for far greater gains than simply avoiding an inconvenience. A very annoying inconvenience. A very annoying, stressful inconvenience.


    ¡­


    Well, ruling two demesnes was never going to be easy. All the biographies and histories she''d read agreed on that.


    Hopefully, she could avoid the common failure of overly focusing on the well-being of one at the expense of the other. It was almost always the same point of failure as well, where the Dungeon Binder was just too distrustful and didn''t do the sensible thing and place a subordinate in charge of one of the demesne so that the Dungeon Binder¡­ wouldn''t have to¡­ keep dividing their focus and resources¡­ between the two¡­


    ¡­


    She hated it when Rian had a point.


    Lori glanced at her rock. "Yllian," she said. "If the malcontents were removed, could you manage River''s Fork''s day to day affairs and not starve yourselves to death?"


    "That would be doable, your Bindership," Yllian said.


    "Maintaining the trees that need to be maintained? Switching everyone to communal meals and enforcing it? Preventing theft from supplies? Farming?"


    "Not all of it," he said immediately. "We won''t have enough manpower. The work, at least. We should be able to switch to communal meals."


    Lori stared at him. "Fine. Once we travel to River''s Fork, I''m leaving you there as lord. You''ll be reporting to Rian, who will come at random so that you can''t simply present a convincing farce in his presence. Your goal is to implement communal meals to control and regulate food expenditures while maintaining the plants that have meanings on them, and whatever else can be done with the manpower you have. Once I am satisfied with implementation¡­ we shall see."


    She turned towards Shanalorre. "I will assign someone else to watch you."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Of course, Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Your Bindership¡­ A request," Yllian said suddenly.


    Lori stared at him, but gestured for him to continue.


    "I would like to ask that you move all the children in River''s Fork to Lorian before you transfer the malcontents."


    Across from her, Rian suddenly straightened in surprise.


    "I am not taking hostages," Lori said flatly. History was a bit mixed as to the results of that¡ªsometimes it ended with better diplomatic relations, sometimes it resulted in one demesne knowing exactly how to destroy another¡ªand so she didn''t want to risk it. "If this is your idea of trying to advise me¡ª"


    "Uh, your Bindership?" Rian interrupted, and she turned to glare at him. "Perhaps ask him why?"


    She stared at him flatly, then turned back to Yllian. "Why?"


    "So that we''ll know they''ll be safe in the event of a dragon," Yllian said. "Take them, let them live here, and we will do anything you ask of us with gratitude."


    "Join us, we have hot water," Rian murmured. "It would work. It removes a similar amount of people from the demesne as removing the malcontents, but without the loss of any able bodies¡­"


    Next to her, Shanalorre twitched. A strange look came over her face. "I¡­ should have thought of that¡­" she said quietly.


    Lori glanced between the three of them. Yllian''s face was unreadable, which¡­ well, wasn''t unusual for him, or for her. Rian nodded at her, likely seeing this as a useful means of manipulation. The strange look on Shanalorre''s face became clearly distressed.


    She took a deep breath. "Fine. But if I feel that River''s Fork is not properly under control¡ª" or rebellious, "¡ªthen they shall be returned to you. Understood?"


    "Yes, your Bindership. With luck, we might even be able to impose some discipline on the malcontents before they''re transferred."


    "If you could, you''d have done so already," Lori said.


    For the first time, Yllian smiled. It was a grim smile, but a smile nonetheless. "Yes, but this time¡­ we won''t have to worry about the children."

 260 - To Rivers Fork Once More

    More of the row of houses came closer to completion over the day Rian had asked for. There would probably be more work done on it as the new residents asked for help to modify it to suit them. Most would probably want to add a second floor, or at least an elevated platform to take advantage of the height. A few of the previous row of houses had such things, but they''d been limited by the height of the ceiling.


    During this time, Lori made plans. Well, not just made plans. Since she''d be sitting in one spot and thinking, she decided it was a good day to run the curing shed and dry all the wood that had been filling it. So far they''d been drawing on the stockpile of cured wood that they''d had stored in the second level, but that was rapidly dwindling with the construction of the second row of houses. So she sat there on a stone seat, an additional stone overhand to keep most of the rain of her, adjusting the balance of firewisps and lightningwisps as they cured the wood inside the shed, and thought.


    She hadn''t really thought of the further practicalities of having two demesnes, but Rian''s point last night, as it often was, had been annoyingly undeniable. And while¡­ uh, Y-something¡­ might be able to tend to River''s Fork¡ªshe found it highly doubtful, since he hadn''t been able to before¡ªthe fact that they were distant from her meant that they''d have a worrying amount of independence. Historically, that much independence led by one not completely loyal to the Dungeon Binder resulted in rebellion as they took advantage of their relative disconnection from the center of power.


    In the immediate future, she could mitigate that personally, reminding them of her authority with her very presence as she conducted infrastructure construction projects, but that couldn''t continue indefinitely. For one thing, it would involve her having to leave her demesne often, which¡­ no. Just¡­ no. It would have been all right if she had claimed River''s Fork''s core, allowing her to feel more secure in the demesne, but until then¡­


    Since she''d rather not go herself, a representative of hers would have to do it. Unfortunately, the only one she had was Rian, and while she''d like to think that he''d be able to manage both her demesne and her new demesne, even Rian probably had his limits. Perhaps if he were a Mentalist he''d be able to do it, moving under his own power between the two demesne, his memory allowing him to remember all essential details about both. There was a reason Mentalist becoming bureaucrats was a common stereotype, equal only to the stereotype of them becoming academics.


    But if he were a Mentalist, she wouldn''t want him anywhere near her.


    Fortunately he wasn''t a Mentalist, but that still meant that while he was her best choice to send to keep River''s Fork under her control at a distance, it would mean limiting the time he had to handle her demesne. So she would have to assign a new lord or lady after all, as he had said.


    Her first thought was Riz, as she''d already acted as a temporary Rian, but she had made her refusal clear often enough. There was possibly Mikon, but while she might be capable, Lori hadn''t really seen any indicator she was capable of working at the same scale Rian and even Riz had managed. Or at the same pace. She seemed content with her very, very slow progress. Perhaps if Riz were present to assist Mikon, the two of them might be able to make almost a functional Rian, but as Riz had made her refusal known¡­


    Unfortunately, that left Lori unable to think of anyone else even vaguely capable of taking the position. And she had to be able to think of them, even if she didn''t know their names, otherwise they clearly didn''t leave enough of an impression of any sort of competence to stand out among her idiots.


    Well¡­ that wasn''t quite true. There was the brat, who clearly had some sort of influence on the other children. And she paid her taxes, at least, when she was physically capable of procuring payment. But¡­ she was a child, and making her a lady would essentially be putting her to work. It didn''t sit well with Lori to do that. Children shouldn''t have adults forcing them to work just because they were conveniently present¡­


    She adjusted one of the stream of lightningwisps running through the wood being cured to keep the distribution of heat even, and the firewisps that had been generating around it became less concentrated. There would be no spontaneous combustion on her watch! She hadn''t caused a curing shed fire before, and she wasn''t going to start now.


    Lori settled back into the flow of her thoughts. She supposed Rian could recommend someone, but¡­ no. The last time she''d taken such a recommendation from him, he''d suggested a child murderer. She didn''t want a repeat of that. While he had suggested Y-something remain a lord, he had technically been Shanalorre''s choice¡­


    Hmm¡­ Shanalorre. Well, as a Dungeon Binder she should be familiar with the administration of a demesne. Clearly she wasn''t very good at it, given the state she reported her demesne being, but it was probably a good start. And Rian would mostly be present to oversee her when he wasn''t traveling to River''s Fork to oversee them. She only really needed to be present to deal with things while he was gone. In addition, Lori herself would be there to mitigate Shanalorre''s influence, preventing subversion of her own demesne while Rian was absent to deal with people for her.


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    She''d have to bring it up with Shanalorre later, once she''d checked River''s Fork''s core was where it was supposed to be and transferred River''s Fork''s children to her demesne. They''d have to live in the shelter, at least until Rian made some sort of arrangements for them, probably asking friends of their family to take them in. The rest¡­ well, she''ll tell Rian to make sure they didn''t have to stay in the shelter long.


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    When the appointed day came, Rian had gathered several volunteers, many of whom Lori vaguely recognized as friends of Riz''s. Riz was of course there, bringing their number up to eight. In addition to the people operating the Coldhold and two of the medics, they outnumbered Shanalorre''s numbers three to one, which should keep Lori reasonably safe while on the boat.


    It had been relatively quiet during breakfast, the mood in the dining hall subdued as Lori had eaten and listened to Rian''s inventory of the supplies that the Coldhold was carrying. Salted and smoked meat, tied and hung up since they didn''t have paper to wrap them with. Lori intended to shine unseen light on the meat before they ate it to kill any dustlife it might pick up, and let Rian know. Dried mushrooms, for stock and flavor. Flour, sealed into containers that were tightly stoppered, for bread. Salt, for both cooking and other uses. A small bottle of the antiseptic they''d purchased in Covehold, which would hopefully not be necessary.


    After breakfast, it was time to get ready to leave. Rian had already made arrangements beforehand, and after breakfast people started to pack the Coldhold with their personal effects, since it was unsure how long they might have to stay in River''s Fork, though hopefully it wouldn''t be long. The packs were brought to the docks, and the men who operated the Coldhold carried it all aboard and packed while people waited outside for their own turn to board.


    Lori herself had packed her pillow, blanket, a change of clothes and socks, and her bedroll, the latter of which made for a decently big bundle by itself. Her side bag was full of lengths of firewood, and for the first time in a long while, she had lightningwisps stored in the quartz imbedded into her staff, as well as coals in her coalcharms. It had been a while since she''d worn a coalcharm on her wrist, and the once-familiar weight felt strangely intrusive.


    She waited impatiently, carrying her own pack and bedroll. She wasn''t letting anyone else pack those. There was no big crowd seeing them off, no speech from Rian. People were too busy, trying to get as much work as possible done before it inevitably rained. Still, there a few people lingering, watching the others waiting to board. Some of the latter carried spears, as well as a club-like lengths of branches. Mikon and Umu of course were there, speaking to Rian and Riz. She paused as she saw the brat was also there, talking to Shanalorre. She watched the two curiously, then shrugged. Well, as her guide, Shanalorre probably made friends with the brat or something.


    Eventually, the packing was finished, and one of the men on the boat signaled down to Rian. It took a few tries to get his attention, because Umu had leaned in very close to him and was being very distracting. Once Riz had interrupted their conversation¡ªbut not before Umu had grabbed Rian and kissed him very enthusiastically, if sloppily¡ªRian had taken his leave a bit unsteadily and began directing people aboard.


    "You first your Bindership, your room is waiting for you," he said, gesturing for her to board first.


    Lori nodded curtly, allowing him to take her pack and bedroll for a moment so her hands would be free to step onto the walkway attached to the outriggers on the side facing her and climbing onto the boat. Rian handed her pack and bedroll back to her once she was in. "Tell Shanalorre she will be traveling with me in my room," she said. She supposed the other Dungeon Binder deserved to not be crowded by having to travel with the others.


    Rian tilted his head. "Is that an order or optional?" he asked. "I think she might like to stand on the top deck and watch the view as we move away down the river."


    Lori gave him a bemused look. "Why would she want to do that?"


    "It''s a suspicion I have based on my ability to understand people," Rian said brightly.


    Her look continued to be bemused. "Fine. If she changes her mind, tell her she can join me."


    "I''ll tell her if she seems like she''s had her fill of the top deck," he nodded.


    Nodding, she turned away to climb down below.


    Downstairs, lightwisps shone from where they were anchored to the hull''s ice as she walked along the length of the boat, such as it was, to the small private room in the front. She made herself comfortable, removing her side bag for a moment to relieve herself of the weight and pushing her pack and bedroll into a corner of the bench that also served as the bed. Then she turned just sat and waited.


    Soon, they''d be in River''s Fork again. River''s Fork, and her first¡­ conquest. Somehow, she had expected more armies of militia when she first conquered another demesne, with herself floating at their head with Mentalism, laying waste to the forces that opposed her while protecting her own forces from harm. Not simply floating up on an admittedly absurd boat made of ice and wood with their still living Dungeon Binder and telling the demesne''s population that they were under Lori''s authority now because the one that ruled them had surrendered to her.


    Lori found she wasn''t actually looking forward to the conquest all that much. Instead, her thoughts were of her nice, cozy room, and her bed with its ingenious woven cords in place of wooden slats. She thought of getting this¡­ this chore over and done with. Probably not the kinds of thoughts a conquering Dungeon Binder should be having. Lori knew she should probably be looking forward to the expansion of her demesne, the increase in safe usable land, plan how she would extract and utilize the new resources available to her, and think of how she would pacify and subjugate those who resisted her rule.


    Despite knowing all this, all she could think of was how she just wanted to go back home.

 261 - Arrival

    The trip to River''s Fork was uneventful, save that Lori suddenly became cold when she passed through the border of her demesne and into the world outside. Argh, why did she keep forgetting about that? She hastily claimed some firewisps from her coalcharm and made a binding to keep herself warm. Fortunately, the little room retained heat very well since the bound ice around it was a pefect insulator, so it grew warm quickly, but it was still annoying to forget.


    She spent part of the trip idly looking for a good way to anchor the firewisps to herself, and settled for putting on her raincoat and anchoring the binding to the darkwisps that came to be underneath. Her arms and back were pleasantly warm as a result, and she was working on adding some airwisps to the binding so she''d have some warm air around her legs when the door opened slightly and a hand reached in to wave at her.


    For a moment, she was annoyed at the interruption, until she remembered she''d put up a binding of airwisps to muffle the sounds of people talking in the next room. Out of habit, she willed the binding of airwisps to deactivate before remembering she couldn''t do that anymore and awkwardly reaching for her staff. It took her a moment to remember how to reach through the wire wrapped around her staff and deactivate the binding of airwisps. Immediately there rose an annoying din of conversation from outside. "What?" she demanded, wincing as a sudden rush of sensation from her posterior told her she''d been sitting on it for too long.


    The door opened the rest of the way. "Ah, I thought it was something like that," Rian said as he stepped inside and closing the door behind him. The din wasn''t all that muffled by the gesture, hence why Lori had put down the binding. "When you weren''t responding to people knocking on your door¡­ well, anyway, we''re here. Or at least, we''ve entered the boundaries of River''s Fork''s demesne and will be reaching our destination soon."


    Already? Well, she supposed that from the feeling of her posterior enough time had passed. "Very well. And Shanalorre? She hasn''t come down yet."


    "She''s been enjoying the view from the top deck," Rian said, smiling absently. "Was almost acting like a child again, the way she was just looking at everything, even if it was the Iridescence. I guess she''s been stuck under that dome for a long time, and there''s not really much to see when you''re sledding in winter the way she was¡­ "


    "¡­she''s safe, then?" Lori said, shaking her head as a strange sensation seemed to crawl up her spine. "She didn''t fall off the boat in her foolishness?"


    "Yes, she''s still alive. No children were harmed on this trip, they simply enjoyed themselves."


    Lori rolled her shoulders, trying to ease a strange tightness on her back. "Good, good," she said absently. "Well, tell everyone to get ready." She reached for her side bag of firewood and began to tie it back onto her waist.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The skies threatened rain as Lori climbed up from inside the Coldhold and the thought idly occurred to her that if it rained, there would be no way of keeping water from getting into the interior of the boat. They''d probably have to fix that when they got back¡­


    Her first view of the center of River''s Fork was a miserable sight. The foliage on the dome of woven branches was uneven and seemingly random, with some parts covered with new growth while other parts were still bare and dead. The leafless branches seemed even more of a pointless decoration than usual. Directing her gaze lower, she found a pile of rubble. It took a moment of staring before she realized this was River''s Fork''s attempt at a flood barrier. It¡­ well, it looked like a pile of rubble laid out to make a crude wall. Rounded river rocks, debris from the mine, what looked like mud and attempts at packed dirt, even buried and muddy hides¡­


    Lori had to wonder how successful that had been, since it currently looked like¡­ well, a pile of rubble. She vaguely remembered some mention of them covering it with clay and lighting fires atop it to try and bake the clay solid. That would explain some of the less identifiable debris that didn''t look like rocks.


    It hardly looked like a prize worth conquering. Indeed, it hardly looked like it was worth anything at all.


    For once, their arrival was slow to be noticed. Only now were people stopping what they were doing to look towards them, a few moving in their general direction. Already, the militia who had accompanied Shanalorre had disembarked, walking towards some of the people heading towards them. From the enthusiastic way one of the departing militia had started to hug the group he''d approached, they were probably family.


    Shanalorre was standing there next to¡ªLori fumbled under her rain coat for her belt pouch, eventually pulling out the rock¡ªYllian, looking out over the dome with a slight frown. Next to them, Rian waited with a relaxed air, looking like he had nothing better to do but stand there all day. His sword was on his belt, but for some reason he had a pace-long length of wood¡ªthe curves and dimensions made her think it was a formerly a tree branch¡ªin hand, one end resting on the ground like a cane. Riz stood next to him, also frowning out at the dome.


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    "Rian, why do you have a cane?" Lori said.


    "Technically, it''s a baton. Though if you think it''s too long to qualify, a club will do," Rian said cheerfully.


    "Noted," Lori said flatly. "Again, why?"


    "In case there''s trouble," he said. "These are our people now, and historically, only the really bad rulers turned their swords on their own people. This way if something happens, I can get involved without having to use a sword." He tilted his head. "Didn''t you notice we were carrying staffs down in the hold instead of spears?"


    She hadn''t, actually. "I left that sort of planning to you," she said. Lori turned towards Shanaloore. "We''re wasting daylight, and I''d rather we not be caught in the rain. Show me the core so we can get started."


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said. She glanced sideways at¡­ at Yll¡­ Yllian? Probably Yllian. "Lord Yllian"¡ª ah, Yllian, she was right! "¡ªI regret interfering with your reunion with Auntie Erisha, but may I ask you to accompany us a little longer, please?"


    "Of course, Great Binder¡­ your Bindership," he said, nodding first to Shanlorre, and then a bit belatedly to Lori herself. She met the almost lapse with a flat, unamused look.


    "Into the dome, then, I suppose?" Rian said. He glanced up towards Riz. "Riz, could you ask everyone to come up and get ready to escort everyone ashore?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian," she said, and Rian winced for some reason, even as she looked amused. Still, she moved around Lori with alacrity, heading down the ladder into the lower floor of the boat and calling out that everyone was to get ready to move, get moving you glitter crawlers, has civilian life made you fat and slow?


    As Lori waited for their escort to come up, a man and a woman approached the boat. Shanalorre glanced towards them, then turned towards Lori. "May I disembark, Binder Lolilyuri?" she asked. "I need to greet my Aunt and Uncle."


    Lori frowned. "Why?"


    "Because she probably actually likes her relatives and missed them while they were separated?" Rian said.


    She directed her frown at Rian. "Her uncle, by her own admission, has worked to undermine and usurp her."


    Her first lord gave her a bland look. "What does that have to do with anything?"


    The two stared at each other for a moment. Lori waited for Rian to smile or make some indication he was joke, but he simply returned her stare. Was he actually serious?


    ¡­


    Well, there was really no reason to keep Shanalorre safe aboard¡­ "Fine, you may go down," Lori said, waving her hand dismissively. "Be ready to accompany me to the core when the escort is ready."


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said, bowing briefly to her before she moved with alacrity over the walkway to the oat''s outrigger, and from there to the dock. Lori checked her rock as¡­ Yllian, glanced at her, but she waved him off, and he also disembarked from the boat, moving towards one of the women who''d approached the boat.


    Lori watched the other Dungeon Binder idly as she moved lightly over the broken ground on her way to meet the pair of people who were probably her aunt and uncle. The woman moved to hug the Dungeon Binder, which supported her supposition, but to her surprise the man did the same. What?


    Her confusion abated slightly as, after the affectionate greeting, the man started scolding Shanalorre. She couldn''t hear what was being said, but it was definitely a scolding. That seemed more in line with the man she vaguely remembered. She watched, but unfortunately Shanalorre didn''t move to beat him for his insolence. Well, it was to be expected. Shanalorre wasn''t as strict with discipline as she should be, after all.


    By the time their escort of volunteers was ready, all armed with long staffs not unlike the ones they''d used in the quarterstaff competition during the holiday months ago¡ªand why did that memory come so easily to her when she hadn''t thought of it in literal months?¡ªa small crowd had finally gathered. The ones among them carrying spears had relaxed when¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªYllian had gestured for them to stand down, grounding the butts of the spears, and standing more relaxed and simply curious.


    Others in the crowd, however, were not as disciplined. While some had only come and were looking curiously, a few were making displeased faces. They did nothing, didn''t approach, but simply stood there and glared. Lori noted they seemed to be glaring at both her and Shanalorre equally. Some of the malcontents then, though their lack of action implied they were using Lori and Shanalorre''s arrival more as an excuse to shirk work than anything else.


    Lori disembarked from the Coldhold, the escorts moving to surround her as Rian conferred with Riz, and then gestured towards¡­ Yllian? Probably Yllian. Probably Yllian seemed to sigh and excused himself from his probably-wife with visible reluctance, moving towards Shanalorre. He interrupted the scolding her probably-uncle was delivering¡ªshe had been quietly unmoved, putting up with the nonsense with stoic patience from what Lori could see¡ªand there was a brief exchange of words with the probably-aunt. For some reason, the probably-uncle looked up to glare at Lori, then reached down to grasp Shanalorre''s shoulder.


    Shanalorre glanced at the hand on her shoulder, then then said something. Her probably-uncle responded with a scowl as the probably-aunt gave him a disapproving glare, and then Shanalorre was grasping the thumb of his hand and twisting it outward, removing the appendage from her shoulder as she stepped away, walking towards Lori. Yllian fell into step beside her, glancing towards the probably-uncle, who the probably-aunt had grabbed and was starting to scold. The two started arguing where they stood as Shanalorre and the lord approached Lori.


    "Shall we go see the core then, Binder Lolilyuri?" Shanalorre said, gesturing behind her towards the dome.


    Lori nodded impatiently. "Yes. The quicker this is finished, the quicker we can start getting to work on my new demesne."

 262 - The Core Of Rivers Fork

    The core was where Shanalorre said it was.


    Or rather, the pile of rocks and dirt that supposedly blocked the way to the core was where Shanalorre said it was, under the first steps of the spiraling stairs shaped into the trunk of the dome''s central tree.


    "I have to ask," Rian said as Lori slowly claimed the earthwisps of the obstructing rubble with her staff, breathing in evenly out of habit as she began to fuse all the rock into one mass so she could move it all out of the way, "why exactly are cores hidden? I mean, if the Dungeon Binder dies suddenly, wouldn''t that be a hindrance to someone claiming it right away and continuing the demesne?"


    They stood surrounded by their escort of volunteers, who were supposed to be keeping watch but were occasionally glancing at what she was doing. Shanalorre and whatever his name was since Lori was too busy to check her rock were standing nearby, speaking to the some of the local people, probably those who were part of the demesne''s previous organizational structure. Lori as vaguely aware of people watching them curiously, a few pointing at her specifically.


    "If the Dungeon Binder dies a natural death," Lori said, only a small part of her concentration on the conversation as she had to focus on the Whispering she was doing, "then there would have been preparations made in advance for the successor. The way would have probably been opened by the Dungeon Binder themselves, and there would have been some sort of arrangements made. I recall reading years ago of a Dungeon Binder, Dungeon Binder Molrijo of Tyuray Demesne, who arranged a grand ceremony where he chose his successor, held a hedonistic celebration that lasted for half a week, and culminated with his trapping himself and his successor in the chamber with the dungeon''s core, where in front of witnesses watching through glass he took his own life."


    "How could you possibly remember that name and still not know the names of people you''ve been dealing with for almost a year?" Rian said, sounding incredulous.


    "If they trap themselves in a room and kill themselves in front of their trusted friends and all their political allies, then maybe I''ll remember their names."


    "No, you won''t."


    Lori shrugged as she softened some of the stone whose earthwisps she''d already claimed, making them flow so that their surface area would come into contact with other earthwisps she hadn''t claimed yet, accelerating the process. It was one of those tricks one learned over the years that were never officially taught. "No, I probably won''t. I remember it because I could never understand why a Dungeon Binder would wish to kill themselves. What kind of twisted person would simply end their own life and actually choose to lose all of that power?"


    "Someone who doesn''t want it and finds it extremely inconvenient to live with?"


    Lori rolled her eyes at Rian''s silliness. "Continuing on, if a Dungeon Binder were somehow murdered, rare as that is, then making access to the core difficult serves as a deterrent to prevent their murderer from gaining the core, as they no doubt intended to, as well as punishing the demesne for allowing their Dungeon Binder to die and not doing more to prevent it."


    Rian looked back from where he''d briefly been looking at Shanalorre. "I''m a bit doubtful as to that last, but I can see why some would interpret it that way."


    Several references to the Dungeon Binder explicitly arranging matters so that the demesne would suffer from their death should it come about suddenly came to mind, but trying to arrange them in some sort of comprehensible order to tell Rian took too much concentration from claiming earthwisps, and she let it go. "Thirdly, in older demesne much infrastructure equipment is built around the core, such as wire connections to bound tools to power them in perpetuity. Such infrastructure needs to be isolated from sabotage, misuse, and even just idiots who might cause accidental damage." Left unsaid was how wire connections themselves were kept equally well-isolated, to prevent the limitless power of a core from being used to power some idiot''s binding, or whatever it was they were making.


    "Ah, that makes more sense," Rian said, nodding. "You don''t want just anyone to be able to access a dangerous industrial power source, after all. Imagine if some idiot made a heat binding that just kept getting hotter and hotter, and connected it to a wire to the dungeon core." He tilted his head. "Do you know of any pits made of molten rock that might suggest someone did that in the distant past?"


    "Thankfully, no," Lori said absently as she claimed more and more earthwisps. "Heat would be trivial for a Dungeon Binder to destroy, though it would kill anyone else. The fourth reason to protect a Dungeon Core is to make it inaccessible to dragons. Dragons have some sort of capability to destroy the cores of dungeons, and in so doing kill their Dungeon Binder."


    "I think I remember stories about that," Rian mused. "How, though? I mean¡­ aren''t cores supposedly made of pure magic in solid form or something?" He tilted his head. "Not unlike beads, really, but obviously there has to be something different, what with the floating in the air and the glowing and all that¡­"


    "No one knows." Lori gestured with her staff like she was trying to sweep a broom through thick mud as she moved all the earthwisps she had managed to claim and bind. The softened stone began to flow, anchoring to surrounding rocks and dirt for leverage as she rearranged the shape of the stone to push it up from one end to get the stone out of the way. "Historically, whatever it is manages to kill anyone close enough to see. The event is relatively rare, even in ancient history, and is suspected to be self-inflicted. Some Dungeon Binders of the demesne that were destroyed are noted to have developed an interest in dragons, with some making arrangements to try to experiment on them. Hence why any gathering of data from dragons is restricted to passive observation only. In most demesnes, an accusation of trying to experiment on dragons is a very serious charge, since it could potentially end the demesne it occurs in."


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    In the one recorded instance someone was known to have planned to use rousing the attention of a dragon as a weapon of war, their own subordinates had turned on them. When that rebellion had almost been suppressed, the rebels had managed to get word of the plans to neighboring demesnes, which had resulted in all their neighbors allying together against them. That had been the end of Ertalann Demesne, its name only remembered as an object lesson.


    Rian hummed. "I notice you don''t have that law written down either."


    "I don''t have a law telling people to not set themselves on fire either. Like drinking molten lead, some things are simply no longer contemplated by any sane wizard."


    "That doesn''t rule out the insane ones."


    And what was there to say to that? Obviously? "Obviously," Lori said sarcastically. "But you can say that about any profession."


    Rian nodded. "True, true¡­ "


    "And of course, the fifth reason is that some Dungeon Binders know how to destroy the cores of dungeon''s not their own."


    Rian stared at her for a moment. "That should surprise me, but it doesn''t because there''s no depth of horribleness people won''t eventually sink to given enough time," he said. It was a shockingly pessimistic thought to hear, especially from Rian. "Of course people would find a way to destroy the only thing keeping people safe. Why wouldn''t they? I don''t suppose anyone knows how?"


    Lori shook her head as more and more of the stone moved out of the way. Steps downward shaped from tree roots were revealed, and she shifted her efforts towards exposing them. A path slowly formed. "No. At best, all that is known is that way exists, and is suspected to be possessed by Frado Demesne, Elisdoder Demesne, and Relren Demesne, among others. Suspected, but not confirmed. No one knows what they really used as the only survivors of the destruction, which usually collapses a sizable portion of the Dungeon the core is housed within, were the Dungeon Binders who caused it¡­ and sometimes not even them."


    "That sounds utterly terrifying," Rian said, his voice flat. "Thank you for giving me problems sleeping tonight." He frowned. "Unless you''re going to tell me those are simply scary stories that get passed around and dungeons don''t actually work like that?"


    From the bottom of the path Lori had made, there was a glow.


    "Enough talk," Lori said, pushing the stone to the side and deactivating the binding. "I need to investigate the core." She put her staff down on the steps, and was just able to claim the waterwisps of the moisture so she could turn them into mist. She wasn''t going to fall on slippery steps.


    "Do you want me to come with you?" Rian asked.


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "That won''t be necessary. I simply need to visually confirm the core. Binder Shanalorre, prepare to make the announcement of your surrender and subjugation. We will commence once I have finished my inspection."


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said, bowing slightly. "I have already begun informing people to congregate for an announcement."


    She had? Well, that explained the people she''d been talking to. Good. "Good," Lori said. "I will be back momentarily." She descended the steps, moving carefully. The steps felt solid under her feet, but there was something disconcerting about how they felt through her boots. Too many bumps and contours, where she was used to professionally planed flatness. Many of the steps were growing small roots, and even though she couldn''t feel them, it felt like she should be able to, half-expecting the sensation of hairy tendrils under her feet.


    And then she had reached the bottom of the steps, and there was a familiar light in front of her, a light she had last seen months ago. It filled a room that was similar to the cave she had initially lived in with her core, except the ground was made of flattened roots that looked like they had been merged and flattened with Deadspeaking. The walls might have once been smooth wood, but now they had the darkened, textured look of tree bark. Floating in the center of the small chamber, about the leng of two hands from the ceiling, was undoubtedly the core of the demesne.


    The core looked similar to the one she was already connected to, and seemed of a like size, though her pride wanted to say hers was bigger. Everyone knew that size was what mattered, after all. The core floated in the air, glowing softly. Not a brilliant, radiant light, but a soft, diffuse light that emanated from its cloudy-looking surface, which had a luster like a wet tooth and lines like the grains on pale wood. From the bottom of the core, there were short growth that looked like¡­ was that bone? It had been wrapped in with that looked like gold wire, which was secured by a band of some sort of substance that she couldn''t identify but looked distressingly familiar¡­


    Lori stared.


    ¡­


    It¡­ made sense, she supposed. When she had made her core, she had been a Whisperer. She formed it using wisps from her body, anchored to materials from her and the surrounding area that she had collected. That had included lightwisps and firewisps. The heat from the lightwisps had melted her gold and lead, leading to the appearance of melted strands in her own core, while the lightwisps had shown brightly¡­


    River''s Fork''s core, however, had been made by a Deadspeaker. The life that they tamed into meanings were inherently part of materials that had, at one point, been alive. Wood, teeth, leather, bone and¡­


    Hesitantly, Lori stepped forward, claiming some of the lightwisps in the air and binding them. She reached up to her left eye with one hand and anchored the binding to the waterwisps on her fingers, and the binding glowed with light, brightening the space. Transferring the binding of lightwisps to one of the vibrating pieces of quartz on her staff, she shined her light on the jutting pieces of bone at the bottom of the core. Hesitantly, she reached towards the strange band holding the gold wire in place, and recoiled at the smooth sensation that finally let her place what the material was.


    Fingernails.


    A part of her mind said quietly that blood had probably been used at some point, perhaps hair. Maybe even muscle or some other flesh¡­


    The rest of her shivered at the thought, and firmly resolved to not think about what parts of himself the late Deadspeaker had used to form his core. Yet it was with morbid curiosity that she raised up her hand and gingerly touched its surface. Despite the pattern that looked like wood grain, that wasn''t the familiar sensation she felt under her palm. Instead, the surface was smooth as glass and cool to the touch. Almost, she had thought it would be warm and alive and disturbingly fleshy¡ª


    Repressing another shudder at that thought, Lori pushed at the core experimentally. It didn''t move so much as a fraction of a chiyustri, remaining absolutely stationary despite¡ª


    Lori paused and, still keeping her hand on the core, began to walk around it.


    ¡ªyes, it was completely unsupported from all sides, simply hanging in the air in defiance of the weight that its size and solidity would suggest. It did not shift under her hand, neither rotating or dislodging.


    She wondered how Shanalorre had managed to touch the core to claim it. Had she used a stool?


    ¡­


    Probably.


    ¡­


    The core was exactly where she had been told it was. She had confirmed it. By the terms of their agreement, she was now the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork.


    Turning, she left the core behind, knowing it would be there waiting for her when Shanalorre was dead.

 SS2 – "What If Mikon Was Lady Instead Of Rian?"

    Lori sometimes wished that Rian had agreed to be her lord when she had first asked him. It would have made things so much easier in the long run, but he had been firm in his refusal¡­ and then had started running away from her whenever he''d seen her coming in his direction when she''d kept trying to get him to agree. While it had been tempting to sink him into the ground to get him to stop, that would likely have broken his ankles if he''d been moving with sufficient acceleration, and he''d have been little use with broken ankles.


    So she''d gone with her second option.


    At least her mothers would be happy. They''d always wanted her to find a nice girl to settle down and spend the rest of her life with, and as lady and Dungeon Binder, they were most certainly doing that.


    "Good morning, Binder Lori," Mikon said cheerfully as she sat down opposite Lori on their table. "How are you this morning? Did you get enough sleep?"


    Lori watched the woman warily for any sign of flirtatiousness. She had long since told her subordinate that the sometimes-weaver''s preference were of course her own so long as she kept Lori out of them, but the pink-haired woman seemed to occasionally ''forget''. Then she''d put her hands on Lori''s shoulder, or her arm over Lori''s shoulder, or her face would move too close to Lori''s face, or sometimes her foot would touch Lori''s¡ª


    She paused, then leaned down sideways and looked suspiciously under the table, but Mikon''s feet were primly folded back under the bench she was sitting on. When Lori rose back up, Mikon''s smile was cheerfully innocent, which meant she was probably guilty of something. "Is something the matter, Binder Lori?" her lady said.


    Lori eyed her suspiciously. "Are you flirting with me again?" she finally voiced.


    "Now, Binder Lori, why would I do that?" Mikon said, even as her smile somehow grew wider. "You''ve made it perfectly clear that you don''t want such attentions directed at you. Why would I disobey your orders?" She winked.


    "There!" Lori exclaimed, pointing at the offending eye. "That right there, that was flirting!"


    "It most certainly was not," Mikon said pleasantly. "I simply had something in my eye." She winked once more. "See, there it was again."


    "If that''s so, then go and wash your face first so it stops happening," Lori said, her tone completely flat and unamused. "You obviously missed doing so during your morning bath."


    "Well, if you insist, Binder Lori," Mikon said, and Lori rolled her eyes as the woman deliberately leaned forward to emphasize her chest in Lori''s direction as she rose. "I''ll be right back so we can discuss matters." Then she walked away with a deliberate sway in her step that made her posterior swing sideways as she walked, and Lori sighed, closing her eyes and putting a hand over them so she could squeeze inwards to her nose.


    Lords and ladies used their positions of power for their benefit, and for the benefit of those related to them, that was just a fact. When she''d offered Mikon the position, Lori had done so with the understanding, indeed the certainty, that she would use her implicit power and influence derived from speaking in the Dungeon Binder''s name to her own advantage. She had thought that the woman would use that to defeat that other blonde weaver in their rivalry over Rian. It was the sort of small, petty abuse of power she had been expecting.


    And, there had certainly been some of that. She had gotten her family a house that was twice the size of most people''s houses¡­ but given she had an uncle, two aunts, and seven cousins¡­ Well, Lori had been inclined to let it go, because even she was forced to agree that trying to cram that many people into the standard houses she''d first built was far more cramped than having them live in the shelter. The few other similarly large families had, under Mikon''s supervision, also received such living quarters, showing that her lady at least knew to give their indulgences publicly defensible justifications.


    The rest, however¡­


    Well, Lori had honestly thought the woman''s affections were for Rian.


    She had been wrong. And not even in the way she would normally have been wrong about such a thing.


    Mikon came back, and she actually looked like she''d washed her face. There was moisture on it, at any rate, little droplets of water on her cheeks. "There, Binder Lori. I''ve washed my face, so there shouldn''t be anything more getting into my eyes." Not that there ever had been.


    Was it lying if both parties knew the statement was untrue? That was either politics or flirting¡­


    Lori sighed, reminding herself that Rian still refused to be her lord and that there were no other candidates. The suggestion of¡­ whatever his name was¡­ that man who tried to kill Shanalorre had been a horrible mistake she didn''t want to repeat again, and was one of the few blemishes on Mikon''s otherwise perfectly capable record. "Fine, fine¡­" she muttered. She was fairly certain dealing with your subordinates shouldn''t feel like this. It probably shouldn''t feel like anything at all. "What do you have to report?"


    Mikon unrolled her scroll of beast hide leather. It was something of an indulgence, to use a perfectly good roll of leather so in their current circumstances, but she had said that carrying around a piece of plank was uncomfortable. "Ah, Rian tells me that the large ice boat''s frame is almost complete," the pink-haired woman said as she check the slightly smudged writing, "and that they''ll soon need you to put ice around the frame to see if it stays balanced. He estimates that they should be able to make the trip to Covehold in a few weeks and be back before winter arrives." She sighed dramatically, and Lori rolled her eyes.


    The weaver had been her second choice because¡­ well, she was one of the few people whose name Lori could remember. The situation between Rian, Umu and Mikon had been something she had noticed soon after they had left Covehold, and had watched in morbid fascination out of a lack of any other entertainment. Like most romances, it had been something like an irritating subplot, the kind that should have been resolved easily if at least two of the parties involved had bothered talking coherently at each other. Exasperation and morbid curiosity as to whether the situation would lead to some kind of sudden murder has been strong enough to anchor their names in her mind, though just barely.


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    Nowadays, the subplot had become even more ridiculous, and Lori was trying to stay well away from it. Sometimes she wondered how well she was succeeding.


    "Stop swooning about a man who hasn''t even left yet and get on with it," Lori said. She meant it to be sharp and reproving, but it came out as simply exasperated and tired. "What about the harvest?"


    A sigh, and Mikon visibly roused herself. "Master Rafel said that the grain''s in good shape, and should be ready to harvest in a few more weeks," she said, not bothering to consult her leather scroll. "Though he''s worried that there won''t been enough sun to dry the grain properly for threshing and winnowing."


    Lori frowned. "What?"


    Mikon paused as well, staring at Lori, and then suddenly shaking her head. "Right, right, you were from a city¡­" she muttered, "Uh, threshing and winnowing is how the vigas grains are removed from the stalks. It''s best done when the stalks have been dried in the sun for a week or so after behind harvested, but with how cold the days are getting, it might take longer for the vigas to dry, and we can''t just leave them out where the chokers could get them."


    She hesitated for a moment, and then said, "Rian wondered if maybe there was something your magic could do? He said that the heat wasn''t the important thing, it''s how the heat dries out the stalks?" It was her turn to speak with tired exasperation. Mikon knew that she''d been chosen to be Lori''s lady not because of any great talent on her part¡ªthough Lori was willing to admit the other woman possessed talents that had proven themselves useful in her role¡ªbut to serve as an intermediary so Lori wouldn''t have to talk to anyone else in the demesne. Specifically, she was to be an intermediary for Rian, who despite his protestations of not wishing for any responsibility, was perfectly willing to organize and direct everyone provided it was because he had been asked for his help in doing so.


    It was... well, it was inefficient. Lori told Mikon what she needed done, and while Mikon, to her credit, enacted what she could, for much of it she sought out Rian and asked for his help in getting it done. And he did. Lori wasn''t privy to the exact details, and she didn''t really care. The things Lori wanted done had been done, and things that needed to be done were brought to her attention by way of Mikon, who was the only one she needed to talk to.


    "I''ll see what I can do," Lori said, and Mikon nodded.


    As her lady checked her scroll for further matters she needed to bring to Lori''s attention¡ªor possibly just having difficulty reading smudged writing¡ªUmu finally arrived, carefully balancing three bowls of food in her arms. With her was Rian, carrying a jug of water and four cups. Another bowl of food was on the mouth of the jug, where it remained balanced quite well as long as the jug managed to remain upright.


    Mikon quickly got up and helped Umu put the bowls down on the table. With their hands now clear, she gave her wife a quick kiss on the cheek, as if they hadn''t spent the night together and woken up in the same bed. It reminded Lori far too much of her mothers, bringing to mind memories of sighing tiredly in the morning as they flirted over breakfast before she managed to finish her food and beat a hasty escape to school. In fact, she felt a strong urge to shovel her food into her mouth as quickly as possible so Lori could make her scarce.


    Sometimes a part of her worried she''d forget what her mothers'' faces looked like, since she no longer saw them. However, it seemed her grievance against them was so strong it prevented that from happening.


    "Stop that," Lori said, not looking up from her bowl as Rian helpfully put down the cups and jug, taking his bowl off the top of the jug. Lori grabbed one of the cups and started filling it with water as Rian nodded amiably and walked away to try to claim a spot to eat his breakfast. The two women watched him go, making Lori want to sigh.


    She didn''t know how Mikon managed to seduce Umu after she had become a lady. She didn''t know why, because she clearly remembered the two exchanging glares behind Rian''s back where he couldn''t see as the two had tried to get his attention and failed miserably. She didn''t want to know, because it was strange enough to be aware of that fact that marriage had apparently done nothing about their interest in Rian.


    It made sense, to some degree. After all, given the lack of available orphans for adoption, if they wanted to have children they''d need a man to assist them. As Dungeon Binder, that was none of her business outside of establishing inheritance laws, laws on parental responsibility, and possibly taxation laws if people started charging money for the service. However, Lori was fairly certain that wasn''t just their intention, mostly because while Mikon had asked her what the limitations on marriage were, whether marriages can subsequently add more people, and whether there was an upper limit¡­


    Lori had reluctantly admitted¡ªto herself if no one else, but she was the only person who mattered, so that was fine¡ªthat perhaps she should support her lady in this pursuit. After all, if Mikon¡ªand her wife¡ªwas married to Rian, then it would secure Lori''s hold¡ªhowever indirect that hold was¡ªon him, reducing the possibility he''d move to, say, River''s Fork, or simply leave when the planned trading trip arrived at Covehold. The only way to more securely tie him to the demesne would be¡­


    ¡­


    No. No, that sort of thing was what lords and ladies were for!


    "Ah, by the way, Binder Lori," Mikon said as she finally looked away from Rian, "It''s been two weeks now. Do you need help with your laundry again?"


    Lori blinked. Oh, yes, she was running low on clean clothes, wasn''t she? "I''ll have them ready for you after breakfast," she said.


    Umu immediately turned an unamused stare at her wife. "I''m not washing that batch," she said flatly. "I draw the line at touching your loincloths."


    "Of course not, moonlight," Mikon said, smiling and leaning her face toward Umu again. Their foreheads touched. "I''d never ask you to do such a thing¡­" One hand rose¡­


    "Again, stop that," Lori sighed. The two reluctantly parted, Mikon again pouting at her. "That too. I told you to stop flirting at me."


    "I''m not flirting. Do you think me the sort of woman to do such a thing in front of my beautiful wife?"


    "Yes," both Lori and Umu said flatly.


    For some reason, Mikon smiled widely at this. "You two have so much in common¡­ "


    "Sunlight, stop reminding me why you annoyed me for weeks," Umu said in honey sharp tones.


    "Yes, my moonlight."


    Lori pointed at her lady. "And eat. We still have more to discuss. You can flirt with your wife later."


    "Yes, Binder Lori." She finally started eating, and Umu and Lori exchanged a glance of commiseration for a moment, before the other weaver started eating as well.


    Lori reminded herself how useful and capable Mikon was despite her¡­ tendencies. Reminded herself that there was no one else in the demesne¡ªwhose name she knew, at least¡ªwho was capable of performing the same duties to Lori''s satisfaction, save possibly Rian, who was the one who did most of the actual work anyway¡­


    ¡­


    Perhaps she should start looking for a replacement. Not an actual replacement, since Mikon was still a satisfactory lady, but what would Lori do if she was incapacitated for some reason? Surely it was only prudent planning to find someone to take her place in the event of an emergency, and perhaps act as her assistant the rest of the time?


    Hmm¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Erzebed, Riz to most people, looked at Lori nervously as the Dungeon Binder eyed her. "Are you Riz?" Lori said, just to be sure.


    "Y-yes, Great Binder," the pink-haired woman said, straightening in what Lori recognized¡ªmostly from plays¡ª as ''at attention''. One arm rose, only to falter abortively. Probably a salute.


    Lori nodded, then looked sideways at the brat. "Thank you Karina. You may go."


    The young girl nodded, turning away to leave and do¡­ young girl things.


    Lori turned back to the other woman, whose name she''d been able to get from Umu when her wife wasn''t about. "You''re Riz," she said, mostly to remind herself. It was embarrassing to forget someone''s name in the middle of talking to them, after all. "I believe you''re interested in Rian?"


    The woman''s eyes narrowed slightly. "Yes?"


    "How would you like a reason to speak to him more?"

 263 - What Have You Done

    "I would like to begin," Shanalorre began, "with an apology for my absence. I was not here to act as your Dungeon Binder and lead you over the past several weeks as winter ended. For that, I apologize." She stood on one of the higher steps on the spiraling stairs built into the central tree of River''s Fork''s dome to allow herself to be seen. Despite her size and the open space, she was able to make her voice carry.


    The group that had gathered once Shanalorre had given the word looked small to Lori. From the numbers, she knew that River''s Fork had only about a quarter of the people in her deme¡ªin her primary demesne, but looking at them, there seemed to be even less. They also looked more disheveled than the ones in her primary demesne, with many people standing on the muddy ground without shoes. Others only had leather wrapped around their feet.


    Lori herself stood among the volunteers from her demesne, standing off to one side next to the wooden house that she remembered Shanalorre using as her office. Their position allowed her to keep both Shanalorre and the crowd in sight. Some in the crowd were glancing in their direction, probably curious as to why they were there, but most of their attention was on the Dungeon Binder. Or at least, the one they thought was their Dungeon Binder.


    "However, you will all be glad to know that during this time, I was able to make an arrangement with Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre continued. "In light of our¡­ deficient dragon shelter measures, Lorian Demesne has agreed to allow the children of our demesne to reside with them, to keep them safe in the event of a dragon." That caused a murmur of interest among those present. "I understand that many of you might be reluctant to allow you children to be away from you, so you need not decide immediately. However, know that it is an option. I am assured that any children sent to Lorian will be well taken care of while they are there. In addition, after some consideration I have decided to implement measures to curtail the rampant theft of our food that¡ª"


    "We need that food, you brat!" someone in the crowd yelled out. Lori followed the sound of the voice towards, predictably, somewhere in the middle of the crowd.


    "I am aware people need food, which is why each family unit is provided with specifically measured¡ª" Shanalorre began, and a stone flew out from the same general area of the crowd. Shanalorre stepped out of its way, and it struck the steps behind her,"¡ªamounts that are enough to sustain everyone in the household."


    "Ah¡­" Rian said tiredly. He rotated his wrist, spinning the baton in his hand. "Here we go. The unrest has once more stopped being civil." He glanced at Lori then shook her shoulder for some reason. "Look alive. I can''t have you freezing on us."


    She glared at him indignantly. "When have I ever frozen?" she snapped.


    "Two times that something violent has involved Shanalorre," Rian said.


    That¡­ that¡­ That was absolutely¡­


    Lori turned away angrily. "Be ready to deal with this, unless you want me to set them on fire."


    "Ah, yes, ''dealing with people''," he muttered as the uproar rose. Lori saw another stone flung, but instead of stepping out of its way, Shanalorre swept her hand, deftly sweeping it out of the air, then nonchalantly began bouncing the stone up and down in her hand. Huh. Impressive. It also must have hurt, even with the force partially mitigated by coming at it sideways, but it would be relatively trivial, and might also be something she could just heal away.


    ¡­


    She hated it when he had a point.


    Fortunately, there was something else she needed to deal with right now. While people were making exclamations, and many looked angry or disapproving, the people immediately near the source of the thrown stones were conspicuously not responding to whoever was throwing the rocks. In fact, some people on the outer edges of the crowd were being pushed back from getting to the middle of the crowd.


    A third rock went flying, but now lord someone-someone was in front of her, and the rock struck his chest, to which he grimaced. Thankfully, the ground around the central tree didn''t seem to have any very large stones.


    Shanalorre took these attacks on her person with calm dignity that Lori was willing to admit she wouldn''t have been able to equal if she had been in that position. "Are you quite done setting a terrible example for children, Master Sahil?"


    "Rainbowed bellringer!" the same voice as before swore, and parts of the crowd seemed to ripple in outrage at the vile obscenity. "You think you can just come back after abandoning us? Where were you when we had to deal with the floods?"


    "I was absent, but I never abandoned you," Shanalorre said, much more reasonably than Lori thought she should have been. On the one hand, she was being very calm about all this. On the other hand, if this was her usual response to people challenging her, no wonder her demesne had deteriorated to this state. "And as to the floods, I had already directed for the construction of flood barriers to begin. While the schedule was tight, it should have been finished in time provided all were assisting in construction as they should."


    Stolen novel; please report.


    "You abandoned us! We''ve had to walk through floods for weeks, and where were you?-!" Some of Shanalorre''s militia were wading into the crowd, trying to find the man talking, but were having difficulty getting through the crowd. "Run off again, leaving everyone else to¡ª"


    Shanalorre''s arm blurred, the rock flew, and there was a sharp crack of impact. Lord someone-someone winced, one hand coming up to his throat. Lori''s eyebrows rose at the implication of her target as cries of shock and surprise sounded from the crowd.


    "As I was saying before I was interrupted, I have decided to implement measures to curtail the rampant theft of our food supplies that will lead to food shortages in the near future," Shanalorre said, as she began climbing down the stairs. "This is part of why I encourage, but do not require, that children be sent to Lorian Demesne to help reduce the strain on those supplies, along with a few upstanding individuals who are well-regarded by all to act as chaperones to ensure the children''s well-being, for those who do not believe our mutual friends living there will be sufficient at doing so. Now, I must ask everyone to please make way. If Master Sahil''s throat is not healed, he might choke to death."


    The crowd parted, and Lord¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªYllian led the way, while other militia fell in behind and beside Shanalorre. When they reached the part of the crowd in the middle that had previously difficult to pass through, it parted with clear reluctance.


    "Ah, Master Sahil," she heard Shanalorre say, her voice a bit muffled now but still audible. "I will not ask you to apologize, foul as your words were. Such an apology would have no meaning, in the face of what I see in your eyes. I will heal you, and then you will cease interrupting my announcements. We have delayed much because of your foolishness."


    There was a pause. Presumably that pause was so that Shanalorre could heal the injury, because there followed an angry roar of "YOU BELLRINGING LITTLE¡ª!" Then there was the meaty sound of an impact, and the words cut off.


    "That was rude and ungrateful of you," Shanalorre said. "Lord Yllian, please have Master Sahil detained so that he may be disciplined. He will be kept in confinement until the morning of the day after tomorrow. In that time, he will be provided with water but nothing else. I am reasonably sure he will survive the experience."


    There was a high-pitched cry, and Lori heard orders being given. She couldn''t see Shanalorre, but she could see Yllian as he walked out of the crowd, most likely at her side. The other Dungeon Binder stepped out of the crowd, and climbed back up to where she had been before. Lori glanced at her, but turned her attention back towards the crowd. She saw some militia seemingly dragging someone while others kept the way clear for them¡­


    "I think she''s trying to impress you," Rian said softly.


    Lori turned to look at him. His eyes had narrowed, and he seemed¡­ displeased. "What do you mean?"


    "You''ve commented that you disapprove of the way she runs River''s Fork," Rian said. "Not enough discipline. So I think she''s trying to act the way you think she should have acted to try and impress you. Or at least utilize your ideas to see how effective they are."


    Lori grunted. "Don''t be foolish, Rian. She''s a Dungeon Binder. She doesn''t need anyone''s approval."


    Shaking her head, she turned back towards Shanalorre.


    "Unfortunate as it was, Master Sahil has given me an appropriate example," the other Dungeon Binder was saying. "It has become apparent to me that despite my best efforts, I have failed as your Dungeon Binder. People are no longer safe from violence in my demesne, theft is rampant, our infrastructure cannot be maintained, and given how our food stores are being depleted, we are likely to starve to death before we can harvest our crops." She glanced to the side, narrowing her eyes for a moment. "Which I cannot even say has been properly planted and growing in my absence."


    The crowd quieted, and Lori imagined them looking down at the ground in embarrassment.


    "These failings are ultimately my failings," Shanalorre continued. "I was unable to properly enforce discipline and social order. I was unable to properly organize everyone to preserve our infrastructure. I was unable to properly instill the urgency of how much we needed food. In this and more, I have clearly failed in my responsibilities as a Dungeon Binder, and in so doing have failed you all. After much consideration, I have decided to surrender my position of Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork to someone more capable and more worthy of leading you." That finally caught everyone''s attention as the crowd, and in fact the militia, broke out into exclamations of surprise.


    Next to her, Rian suddenly started to chuckle quietly. As she looked at him, frowning at his reaction, he met her eyes and snickered. "Look at Shana''s uncle." Then, remembering that she didn''t know what he looked like, he added, "The pale-haired man over there in front."


    Lori gave him a bemused look, but looked, trying to understand what her lord found so amusing¡ª


    Ah. Now she realized. Shanalorre''s uncle was standing straight and proud, a condescending smile on his face.


    "He thinks she''s talking about him," Rian said, then started chuckling quietly again.


    "Idiot," Lori said, rolling her eyes.


    "For once, I''m in full agreement. Ah, I think she''s signaling that you need to step forward and show yourself soon."


    Lori glanced back to Shanalorre, who was looking in their general direction and making a small, subtle beckoning gesture with her finger. "Follow me, then," she said, moving towards Shanalorre.


    Shanalorre nodded, then continued speaking to the crowd. "In my place, River''s Fork will have someone who is capable, knowledgeable and able to provide the leadership and care that we so desperately need."


    At the front of the crowd, Shanalorre''s uncle stepped forward¡­ and his foot slid as he set it down on the muddy ground. He flailed his arms to keep from falling, and was barely able to catch himself as Lori walked past him. As she reached the foot of the stairs, Shanalorre began to step down. Once she reached ground level, she bowed to Lori. Lori inclined her head slightly in acknowledgement.


    Had this been a theater production, everyone would have fallen silent at that gesture and, and then the musicians would have started playing a dramatic score, probably with a lot of wind instruments. Then she would have made a dramatic speech that would close the scene, and the curtains would fall, and then it was over except for getting through the crowd trying to exit the theater.


    Here, no such thing happened. The exclamations of surprise grew louder, as Lori and Shanalorre faced them. The loudest exclamation of all came from Shanalorre''s uncle.


    "What have you done?-!"

 264 - A Poll, Not A Vote

    "What have you done?-!"


    Shanalorre turned towards him as Lori gave him a disapproving glare. "I have surrendered and submitted to the authority of Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri," the other Dungeon Binder said, her voice still pitched to carry her words to the crowd. "It is she who now rules River''s Fork Demesne. She has generously allowed me to continue to live rather than simply killing me so that she could claim my core."


    "You¡­! You had no right to do that!" her uncle insisted, his face growing redder as blood rushed into it from the strength of his emotions.


    "On the contrary, as this demesne''s Dungeon Binder, I was the only one with the right to do this. If you believe otherwise, then you are incorrect." Shanalorre turned and climbed back up the stairs so she was once more visible to most of the crowd. Lori followed her, making sure to plant herself one step higher than Shanalorre, the exclamations of the crowd changing as they saw her in turn.


    Shanalorre''s was perfectly calm as she continued speaking, now facing the crowd again instead of just her uncle. A crowd that was murmuring to itself, the combined whisperers slowly growing louder. "It cannot be denied that Lorian Demesne exceeds us. They are more prosperous. They are safer. Their food stores are greater and more reliable, and they have more resources and facilities. All of which the people of this demesne need, and which as Dungeon Binder I must provide. And so I have in the only way I could. You''ve all heard what Lorian Demesne is like. Some of you are from there. You know how no one died there when the dragons came, how they were protected within their Dungeon. That is a security I cannot provide for you, try as I might. But Binder Lolilyuri can. And with our arrangement, she has agreed to do so. She will build us a shelter against dragons, provide us with food from their stores, and help us build the infrastructure we need to not simply survive, but thrive."


    She gestured towards Lori as Rian and some of the volunteers took up positions between the base of the stairs and the crowd, her lord standing in front of Shanalorre''s uncle. Lord something-something stood next to him. "I have sworn myself to Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri as one of her subjects. If you hold any trust in me, if you accept me as your Dungeon Binder and are willing to follow my will, then by our agreement, she will consider you her subjects as well, and with her power build up this demesne as she has built up her own."


    "And if you choose not to obey, and hereby reject my authority," Lori said, one hand on a length of wood in her side bag, ready to quickly place a well-practice binding of firewisps on it and throw if needed, "then you are free to leave for a different demesne. Or die. It matters little to me what happens to those I hold no responsibility over."


    "You did something to her!" Shanalorre''s uncle said, pointing at Lori in what he probably thought was a dramatic manner, but was really just rude. Well, her mothers would have said it was rude. She herself couldn''t see why simply pointing was considered a rude gesture. It did make her want to break his finger, though. "You forced her to say all this, just so you could take over our home!"


    "If I wanted to take this place, I''d have simply killed her and claimed the core under the tree," Lori said disdainfully. Next to her, Shanalorre nodded in agreement.


    Shanalorre''s uncle opened his mouth to continue his rant, but next to him his wife sighed and slapped him up the back of the head. He whirled around on her angrily. "Oh, be quiet Las," she said tiredly. "You''re making a fool of yourself again. Shana told me before she started leaving to help with the pregnancies that she was going to try to find a way to try to get Lorian''s help with everything, and that she''d surrender if she had to. Well, it looks like she had to, so she did."


    "You knew?-! And you didn''t do anything to stop her?"


    "She''s the Dungeon Binder, Las," she said, in the much the same tones as Lori''s mothers trying to explain something that made no rational sense, like sharing or making friends. It was¡­ slightly strange to be hearing those tones and not have the pointless lecture be directed at her. "You should know, you''re the fool who talked her into it. Why would we stop her? It''s her decision."


    "It''s a foolish, childish decision!"


    At every word from the man''s mouth, Lori felt the pressure inside herself build. Every expression of foolishness, every idiotic word from his idiotic mouth, practically demanded to be struck down, and she felt her hands tightening on the staff that could, would do it. The disrespect! Was he forgetting whose demesne this was? It certainly wasn''t his! He was just one of the ungrateful parasites who lived in it! She opened her mouth¡ª


    "That''s your opinion," Rian interjected, drawing the man''s attention towards himself, and giving Lori pause. Rian''s voice changed, becoming strong and carrying the way Shanalorre''s had. "Does everyone else agree?"


    "Stay out of this, outsider," the man snapped.


    "No," Rian said, and the blatant cheerfulness in his voice, as well as the smile on his face, was definitely just to be annoying. Hah! She knew it! He turned sideways to look up at Lori. "Your Bindership¡­ Great Binder¡­ If I may advise? For dealing with the matter of this¡­ person?"


    ¡­


    Right. right, this was a ''dealing with people'' matter. That was Rian''s duty. She didn''t actually need to talk to this idiot, and satisfying as it would be to inflict agonizing bodily damage upon him, he was a doctor¡ªeven if she was finding the possibility he was any good at it doubtful¡ªand even with Shanalorre''s healing on hand, a doctor would still be useful. Theoretically. "What do you have in mind now, Rian?"


    Strangely, people seemed to quiet, as if they were actually listening. "The doctor has made his opinion known, your Bindership. He''s against River''s Fork Demesne subordinating itself to you. I propose we hear from everyone else."


    ¡­


    Lori gave him a flat look as she realized his intent. "You want to put this to a vote?-!" she said, and only reason that her voice wasn''t filled with disgust was because incredulity had gotten there first, managing to push back the outrage she''d been feeling.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    "A vote implies the result will dictate policy for the demesne," Rian said, smiling widely. "No, I simply wish to hear how many of those who live here believes as the doctor does. A¡­ poll, on whether others share the doctor''s opinions. That their Dungeon Binder had no right to make this sort of arrangement with your Bindership. That Missus Vyshke, and possibly any others that Binder Shanalorre had made her intentions known to, should have stopped her. That this arrangement was foolish and childish. That they don''t need a shelter from dragons, or food to keep from starving, or a place they can have hot baths, or all the things you can provide them."


    "We don¡ª!"


    "Then I''m sure you have nothing to worry about and that we''ll see that everyone else in the demesne will agree with you," Rian cheerfully interrupted.


    "What do you propose, Lord Rian?" Shanalorre said.


    "It''s simple, really. If people agree with the doctor''s opinions, then they simply need to stand next to him. And if they disagree¡­" he made a sweeping gesture towards Shanalorre, and by extension Lori herself, "then just stand next to the tree, away from him. You know, to make it easier to count. After all, there''s no need to complicate matters."


    He turned back with a smile. "Shall we begin?"


    The glare on Shanalorre''s uncle''s face turned into shock as Shanalorre''s aunt walked past him. Lori watched as she approached the stairs, looking up to Shanalorre and Lori. Then she dipped her head in a small, almost perfunctory bow, and turned back around to give her husband a disapproving glare.


    "Ah, good, our first vote," Rian said, still sounding annoyingly cheerful. "Next?"


    There was a moment of confusion and indecision. Then, slowly, the crowd began to move.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Fools! You''re all fools! Can''t you see she''s just using you! She doesn''t care about us! "


    "Yes, call everyone you want to agree with you fools, that will change their minds," Rian muttered quietly next to Lori. "Excellent bedside manner doctor, I''m sure your patients all feel very safe in your care."


    Surprisingly, Lord whoev¡ªLori remembered she had his name on a rock in her belt pouch and pulled it out to check it¡ªYllian chuckled quietly at Rian''s words. She supposed he agreed with the sentiment, or at least found it amusing.


    The number of people who had chosen to stand with Shanalorre''s uncle was small, and seemed to consist mostly of non-northerners. They looked increasingly embarrassed as the man continued to harangue those standing near the tree. Two people had simply walked away from the man, finding a practical third option, while a few were clearly having second thoughts.


    His most recent rant had been born from one of those who had initially sided with him choosing to walk over to the tree, why Rian had greeted the new arrival with a big smile and genial pats on the back. A couple of others had followed.


    Normally, Lori would have been angered at his disrespectful words. Accurate, in many respects, but disrespectful. However, given how ineffectual he was, and how increasingly pathetic he looked as he became increasingly alone¡ªthe three left of those who had joined him were backing away behind his back¡ªshe couldn''t help but be amused instead.


    "Well, that seems to be everybody," Rian said cheerfully. "It looks like many people have chosen to put their trust in Binder Shanalorre and Binder Lori, doctor. Ah, but it was very close. Clearly your opinions, while not reflecting the majority, have their own merit."


    Huh. That was probably the cruelest thing the she''d ever heard Rian say.


    She half expected the man to explode into rant, or possibly into hysterics as he trembled where he stood. Instead, he sent a hateful glare at Lori, but visibly gathered himself as he finally shut his mouth. With an attempt at dignity, he deliberately turned away from them¡ªthen paused, clearly confused as he realized there was no one behind him. He didn''t let that surprise stop him, however, as he stalked away from them, his feet sinking angrily into the mud with every emphatic step.


    "Where''s he going?" Lori heard someone say. "His house is up there!"


    The observation amused the crowd, and Lori found herself surrounded by chuckles.


    Next to her, Shanalorre glanced up at Lori. "Shall I continue, or do you wish to make your will known yourself?"


    Lori glanced back at her, then waved a hand dismissively. "Finish what you were going to say," she said.


    Shanalorre nodded, then drew herself up. "Thank you, everyone, for your trust and understanding in this matter," she said, her voice once more carrying. "If you would all please return to your previous positions, we still have a few other announcements."


    Slowly, the crowd trickled back into position. The mood had changed, becoming more relaxed, and when the crowd finally settled down, they seemed more willing to listen.


    "Now then," Shanalorre said. "In addition to agreeing to allow the children of the demesne to shelter in Lorian, where they will have access to the safety of Lorian''s Dungeon in the event of¡­ anything that makes it necessary, as well as assisting us in the various problems we''ve been having with food, as part of her taking charge of River''s Fork, Binder Lolilyuri has agreed to allow some families to move to Lorian to helped reduce the load on our supplies. In addition, we will be enacting some changes that have proven successful in Lorian, such as communal meals."


    Murmurs arose at those words.


    "Yes, I am aware that our first attempt at doing so did not prove very successful, or last very long. However, given the pressing certainty of death by starvation as our food supplies run out, I am sure the second attempt will be more successful, as otherwise we shall starve to death," Shanalorre said flatly. "Except, of course, for the children sent to live in Lorian, who will probably have no such worries. This means distribution of food rations will be stopped, as no one will need to cook their own food anymore because they will be receiving communally prepared food. If any persons wish to apply for the position of cooking for the demesne, please speak to Lord Yllian. This also means that all food rations currently possessed will need to be returned. Please bring all rations remaining in your homes to the site of the communal dining area so that it may be included in the coming meals today."


    Lori gave the crowd a bland look. "In this instance, we will not be counting of how much rations are brought forward by each household. But only in this instance. Any subsequent theft of food supplies, or any other supplies, will be subject to discipline. And it will be discipline by my standards, not whatever soft measures Binder Shanalorre has been using on you all."


    There were a few mutters at that, but not as much as there had previously been, and no one threw rocks or complained they needed the food this time, which was a marked improvement.


    "I am told that the communal dining area has been in some disrepair," Lori continued. "So the first order of business shall be to make it usable. Binder Shanalorre, Lord Rian¡ª" Lori checked her rock, "Lord Yllian, organize everyone for the project. I want the place usable by dinner at the soonest, because we are all eating there tonight, or not at all. And if I see any smoke rising from any houses because someone went home to cook, I am setting the house on fire as an example."


    That caused more murmurs to rise, but before anything could come of it, Rian hastily said, "And what will you be doing, your Bindership? Do I need to assign anyone to help you?"


    "I," Lori said, "will be constructing permanent cooking facilities. Unless whoever is going to be cooking actually wants to have to kneel down next to a fire to do it?"

 265 - New Minions Require New Facilities

    It rained just long enough to be wet and annoying, but not long enough to justify not working.


    Lori was reminded of the year before, when they''d just arrived at the location they had settled, and it had rained as they had worked. At the time, they had been glad for the rain, which had washed the Iridescence off them and kept beasts in whatever dens they hid in, letting the settlers work on the Dungeon and the water break around them to keep beasts away at night or when it wasn''t raining.


    Now though, the rain was just irritating.


    It was more so under the scraggly, half-grown dome over River''s Fork. The branches and leaves above seemed to concentrate the rain, in some spots causing a steady trickle of water. Even wearing her hat and rain coat, the random streams of water were distracting. The fact the sun came out and shone down after the rain was added insult to injury, since the dome also blocked enough of the sunlight that the mud was unable to dry.


    Thankfully, River''s Fork''s dining hall was covered.


    While the ground was just bare dirt and therefore a bit soggy, it wasn''t completely wet mud, and already people were sweeping out fallen leaves and other detritus from the area using brooms with heads made from bundles of vigas stems. The roof of the dining hall at least looked mostly structurally intact, though Lori noticed Shanalorre was pointing out spots of the structure to some people. Ah, right. Now that they were in River''s Fork, Shanalorre could use her connection to the core to find locations infected by mold or voids in wood where it was rotten.


    Lori checked her rock. Yllian was directing people to move various benches and tables out of some houses where they had apparently been stored for the winter, and which were also being inspected for damage or mold. A few people tried to just sit around or not properly carry their end of a table, and was immediately spotted by the lord and chastised to work properly. Lori supposed he was capable, after all. Once all the tables and benches were brought out, they were given brooms¡ªthe demesne seemed to have a lot of brooms¡ªand told to help sweep. Soon the swept area had extended around the dining hall.


    Before she''d begun with the cooking facilities Lori had, upon Rian''s suggestion, made a few tools that were essentially rocks wrapped around one end of a long branch, with the end opposite the branch flattened into an even, broad striking surface. Those tools were now being used to pound down the dirt floor of the dining hall, flattening and compacting it to make it less likely to turn into mud in subsequent rains. This was what the people who''d tried to sit down and not work one too many times had found themselves being assigned, on the sound logic that since they were so well-rested, they had a surplus of imbuement for picking up the heavy tool and pounding it down on the ground to flatten it.


    Rian was directing people to bring rocks to her to use for building the cooking facilities. The dining hall used to have one, but now there was only a bare space, with only a few black traces of soot and ash to hint it had ever been there. Lori suspected it had been gutted for parts for the flood barrier.


    "How much stone do you need?" Rian asked as buckets of the loose rocks that had been removed from the dining hall''s floor and two carts worth of tailings from the mine¡ªones without any signs of blue or green ore¡ªwere dumped where she had indicated.


    "I''ll tell you when to stop," Lori said. "Dump the next batch over there, I''ll be working on this pile." She pointed at a spot two paces away.


    Rian nodded, exchanged nods with Riz who was standing with Lori, and went to supervise getting more rocks for her. The other volunteers were nearby, sweeping or pounding the ground, but Riz was specifically watching Lori, and conspicuously the only one not doing any sort of work. A few were actually directing looks at her about that, but Lori was not going to have her protector occupied by anything else.


    The pile of rocks from the two carts, several buckets, and one litter was sizable, and while it wouldn''t be enough for any serious building, it would do for a foundation. After all, she couldn''t build straight on the mud. That would just be asking for trouble.


    Out of habit, she tried to claim the pile of rocks through her core, but this wasn''t her demesne. Fortunately, no one seemed to notice the little moment of inattention as she raised up her staff and put the metal-capped butt on top of the pile of rocks. One fingernail rested on the wire that ran the length of her staff as she drew power from her core and made it flow outwards, passing it through her bones and out through her nails, channeled the magic through the metal of the wire and through that claimed the earthwisps in the pile.


    An outside observer would have said that the rock her staff rested on began to distort like hot wax, flowing downwards as it touched more and more of the rocks beneath it. Lori was patient, however, as she methodically claimed the earthwisps in the rocks. Slowly, she made the stone flow as she altered their shape, and began laying out a foundation on top of the wet ground. Unlike in her own demesne, she couldn''t just fuse the stone to the bedrock to stabilize the foundation.


    The second batch of stone was placed where she had indicated, but the third she had dumped onto the foundation she was building to add mass to it. She had to move her staff so she could claim the waterwisps in the mud beneath the stone and draw the water out of the mud, allowing the dirt to compact properly. Once that was done, she claimed the dirt and stone and anchored them together, creating a foundation that ran deep enough it should remain stable through the subsequent rains.


    That done, she took a moment to plan out the shape of what she was going to build, using her staff and Whispering to draw some lines on the foundation she had made. Since she didn''t have the convenience of her core to make Whispering easier, she''d need to be methodical and plan the steps she would do. She''d already had a general idea of how she''d build this¡ªall they really needed was a stove that could fit one of the old stone cooking pots on¡ªbut now that she could see what she had to work with, she could better visualize what she was trying to build.


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    The foundation Lori had built was three paces long and four paces wide, which probably seemed excessive. However, she wasn''t just building a cooking surface, but also a roof to keep rain and other things off the food. She could probably set it up under the roof of the dining hall, but that would take up space for people, and she didn''t know if there was already enough space for all the people of the demesne. Besides, if she set it up under the dining hall''s roof, it would be in the way of the inspection and repairs of the structure, which would cause and delay and she''d have to be away from her demesne for even longer!


    No, no, best she build this and have one less thing to do!


    As a Whisperer, the best kind of roof covering she could make was what she''d already been doing, arching half-cylinder stone roofs whose own shape supported its weight. That required a wide structure if one wanted to be able to stand in it however, and since she didn''t have the option of digging down to get more head-height that way¡ªtoo much mud and probably roots¡ªshe had to make the arch wide to give it more height.


    However, that was for later. For now, she had to make a stove that could support the stone pot they had brought. With the copper pots that they had made during the winter, the stone pots hadn''t really been needed anymore and had been relegated to storing unmilled vigas grain because they had been convenient containers. Bringing the pot had been Rian''s suggestion, since it was big enough to cook just enough food for everyone in River''s Fork¡ªespecially when the children were moved to her demesne¡ªmaking cooking communal meals easier. And it wasn''t likely they really needed it. Lori could have made one in River''s Fork when she arrived, but that would have taken more time, and they''d already had one on hand, so why bother?


    Lori marked out a circle on the stone, using a cord and the markings on her staff to measure it out. That would be the size of the actual fire pit, where the fuel would be and where the pot would sit on top off. The dimension had been based on the size of the pot they had, so that it would both sit securely and be adequately supported. To that circle, Lori drew two parallel lines some distance apart representing where the firewood would be inserted from. She then added a large square that encompassed the other markings, to demarcate the overall dimensions of the firepit.


    Once she was satisfied, she got to work. She had Riz help her move some of the rocks from the pile to the foundation, and when the next load of rocks arrived, she had them dump two of the buckets of rocks on the lines she had drawn, and then had them start dumping subsequent loads on the edge of the stone foundation.


    For a moment, she debated trying to keep working with her staff, or perhaps her wand¡ªshe''d brought it along, but had left it in the Coldhold¡ªbut eventually had to admit that doing so would be inefficient. Sighing, she knelt down¡ªwincing as her knees came to rest on the hard stone foundation¡ªand put her hands on the stone piled on her lines, curling her fingers so that it was her fingernails making contact instead of her fingertips. Belatedly, she wished she hadn''t trimmed her fingernails a few days ago, but what was done was done.


    Claiming earthwisps like this always seemed faster than using her staff. There was none of the detachment of working through metal as she felt the stone under her hands being bound to her will. It was just so undignified, kneeling like a child playing in the mud and rolling balls of it around. Still, it couldn''t be helped. It would be awkward, simply in a different way, to remain standing and try to build this by holding her staff in her hands and poking at the rocks on the ground until they changed shape. Faced with these two options, she chose the one that let her get work done faster.


    Still, Lori couldn''t help feeling childish as she grabbed rocks with her hands and added it to the softened stone she had claimed and bound, then shaped and placed on the ground according to the lines she had made. She used her belt knife both as a leveling tool and a conduit to conduct magic as she methodically began raising up stone walls along the lines she had made. Admittedly, shaping the stone both by hand and using Whispering was faster than simply Whispering alone, and once she got used to working with her hands like this again, she was able to work fairly quickly. It helped that she could solidify the rock again once she was satisfied with it


    She soon managed to fall into a rhythm that almost let her forget the ache of her knees as she knelt, raising up the shape of a stone cylinder along the lines she had down on the foundation. It wasn''t a complete circle, since it needed a way to add in more firewood while something was cooking, but close enough. It got faster once she realized she could soften large stones taken from the nearby pile and roll them out into cylinders, then place the solidified rolls upright along the lines.


    Once she realized she could do that, then she just had to make a lot of stone rolls to place all along the lines she had made, fusing them in place on the foundation to make walls. They weren''t complete walls, since that would be too time consuming, but simply a form that she would then fill with rocks to fill in the spaces, softening some to fill in the gaps in the walls of the forms as necessary.


    "Rian," she called once she had finished putting rolls along the outline of the stove.


    "Yes, your Bindership?" Rian said promptly, a cheerful smile on his face. It was one of his fake smiles, since the rest of his face looked tired. He was also sweaty, and from the shovel he was holding, he''d probably also been helping load the carts with stone to bring her. Idiot.


    "I need branches," Lori said. She made a circle with her thumb and first finger. "About this thick or thicker, and at least a pace long, relatively straight, no protruding branches."


    Rian nodded at the specific dimensions. "How many?"


    Lori looked towards the outer outline of the stove she was making. "Enough to make a pace-long wall," she said.


    "Ah, of course," he said. "Do they need to be dry? Peeled of bark? From a specific tree?"


    That last was probably just him being facetious. Lori waved a hand dismissively. "No, my previous specifications are enough. I just need it as a support for the stove." It would certainly be faster than trying to make a small arching passage to the firebox of the stove.


    "I''ll ask Yllian, maybe they have some in their firewood stores that haven''t been cut down to size yet," Rian said. "But can it wait until after lunch?"


    Lori blinked, then looked up. Through the dome, what was visible of the sky was unhelpfully overcast. "It''s lunch?" she said.


    "About to be," Rian said. "They''ve been cooking up lunch for the demesne in the pot¡ª" he nodded in a direction, and following his gaze across the dining hall, Lori saw the large stone pot over a fire, being held up by a triangular arrangement of large stones, "¡ªand I''ve had some of the men cooking our own lunch from our supplies."


    Lori considered it, then nodded. "Fine, after lunch will do." Her mouth was dry, she realized. Ugh, how long had it been since she''d had water? "Riz, with me. Rian, find me some water."


    She still had a lot of work to do today, but hopefully she could get it done quickly. The faster she got this done, the sooner she''d be back home.


    First, however, she was going to the latrine, and this time she had no intention of being attacked afterwards.

 266 - They Know Where You Sleep

    Lori was able to finish the stove and the roof over it by late afternoon. The lip of the roof was just under the roof of the dining hall, and with a raised lip on the outside curve of the roof, any rainwater shouldn''t fall on the food as it was taken out. That night, the demesne was called out to the dining hall and told to bring bowls and utensils. The meal was stew, because that was simple and easy to make enough for over fifty people. There was some meat that had been packed in snow to preserve it, some vigas grains that were boiled in the broth, a few dried fruits and wild vegetables.


    There was some grumbling as people had to line up to fill their bowls, but between the hot food, the lightwisps Lori had anchored¡ªwith difficulty, since she had to reach up with her staff while standing on a table¡ªto illuminate the dining hall, and the little fires they''d put down around the perimeter of the dining hall that she''d bound and imbued the firewisps of to throw out increased heat, people seemed willing to stay and eat there rather than trying to take the food back to their homes.


    "It''s the light and warmth," Rian commented as he finished reporting what had transpired. "It''s probably pretty dark in their homes, since they can''t really build up their fires too high. The dining hall will look far more welcoming and inviting, even if it will be a bit drafty without walls. And having Shana there helping serve the food seemed to make an impression, though I hesitate to speculate exactly what. At the very least, it certainly made people show up to eat there. Now they just have to make it a habit."


    Lori nodded. "And you''ll handle tomorrow''s part?" She still thought it would have been easier to send militia to go into people''s houses while they were eating and seize any stored food, but according to Rian, who had heard from¡­ Lori sighed and checked her rock, ignoring her lord''s amused look¡­ Yllian that not everyone had turned in the supplies as they were supposed to, with people claiming they''d already cooked it all in a big breakfast. Which was just another reason why her new idiots couldn''t be trusted with food.


    Rian said they couldn''t just send their people to check the houses for food while everyone was eating, because that would result in broken trust or something. Didn''t the fact people were stealing food from the stores mean that trust was already broken? Hence this plan that Lori though was needlessly overcomplicated. It wasn''t that Lori couldn''t understand the reasoning behind it¡ªit was very simple reasoning, as befitting something that needed to be easily understood by her new idiots¡ªit just seemed needlessly pretentious. The systemic failings of River Fork''s lack of proper discipline were well known and needed to be fixed, and this would fix it. It needed to be done, had needed to be done for some time, so why would they need an ''excuse'' to implement it?


    But Rian claimed doing it this way would act to curtail potential violence, while also implementing discipline. Yllian had reluctantly agreed, as had Shanalorre.


    "Yes, the food stores will be audited, and when it inevitably comes up short, we''ll have an excuse to inspect everyone''s houses for food they technically shouldn''t have," Rian said. He sighed. "Hopefully this doesn''t get too ugly. At this point I suspect everyone has a little bit in their house to try and stave off the inevitable, so we''ll only be punishing people with egregiously big caches of food. The rest will be allowed their little emergency supply¡ªit''s a good idea anyway, in case something happens that keeps people trapped inside like a storm or something¡ªwhile being informed they shouldn''t get more."


    "Telling them so directly would be far more efficient," Lori said, "and taking the food from them equally efficient."


    Rian waved his hands sideways in a strange sweeping gesture that managed to be ambivalent instead of dismissive. "Some people don''t learn by being told. A more practical, tactile approach is sometimes necessary. Besides, one should never give an order one knows will be disobeyed, unless one actually wants it disobeyed. Doing so only weakens your authority. And while you''re the technically the supreme authority here¡ª"


    "I am the supreme authority here." Her tone was flat, final and unamused.


    "While you are the supreme authority here," Rian amended smoothly, "that authority isn''t being backed up by the full destructive power and monopoly on force of a Dungeon Binder as it usually would. In practical terms, as an authoritarian you''re facing the same limitations as a lord or lady who just happens to be a Whisperer: your subjects outnumber you in practical terms, you have limited militia that you can''t really ask to do anything extreme because these people are their friends and neighbors¡ªannoying as some of them might be for being troublemakers¡ªand if you push them too far, they know where you sleep and everyone has to sleep eventually."


    A shudder vibrated up Lori''s spine at the way Rian emphasized that last item. She remembered the days when she''d slept alone in her room, separated from everyone else in the demesne by cracks just barely wide enough to provide her with air. Colors, had that only been¡­ just a little under a year, at this point. Why had she stopped?


    "Which is why I''ll be sleeping in front of your door, just in case," he continued. "So please don''t block out sound through the door again, because my dying screams might be the only warning you get. In which case, take that as my tacit admission that all my plans are wrong about everything and we should have used direct violence at the start. Granted, I don''t think it''ll come to that, since from what I''ve seen everyone''s only self-centered and slightly uncaring of the people around them instead of actively malicious and hostile, but everyone thinks that until they''re proven wrong."


    Lori twitched. "You could have led with that," she said.


    "I know, but keeping it last is well-respected oratorical tradition," he said cheerfully.


    She glared at him, even as she grudgingly acknowledged his point. Somehow, that sort of expository structure always sounded more fun in the theater, or in a novel. In real life, it was just annoying.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next few days were extremely irritating for Lori, though as the alternative was Rian''s hypothetical scenario of someone trying to kill her in her sleep, she supposed it could be far worse. She had to spend that time outside her demesne. After the first two nights sleeping in her room in the Coldhold, she began setting a binding of airwisps to air it while she was gone since it was becoming stuffy. Doing so was a bit difficult because there was only one entrance, but she was able to make the airwisps flow through a twisting loop such that air was pulled in from the top of the door and pushed out from the bottom.


    During those days, she built. An addition was added to the dining hall''s cooking facilities in the form of a bread oven that would let them bake discs and coils of bread. While bread was quick to make, having a single facility cooking it for over fifty people was time consuming, and so it needed to be fairly sizable, as well as able to potentially roast meat and other foodstuffs in future.


    After that, she worked on the rest of the infrastructure that in her opinion the demesne desperately needed. Even before a dragon shelter, the place needed secure food storage. She''d finally seen what River''s Fork used for food storage, and it had been a literal root cellar. That is, an underground chamber that had been created by Deadspeaking, the wooden walls constructed from Deadspoken living roots that had been fused into solid panels, then lined with straw from the multiple harvests of vigas from the year before to act as insulation before wall panels of none-living, Deadspoken wood were put in place to complete the structure, as well as pillars to hold up the ceiling.


    The structure was actually fairly spacious, and a fool might have thought it would have sufficed as a dragon shelter if they ignored the fact less than a third of a pace of dirt covered the structure; that the door to the food storage was a light, almost hollow-feeling door that hung on its frame by leather hinges fused to both by more Deadspeaking; that the door was loose in its frame as the leather had already taken a beating and as a result didn''t lock properly; or the fact the door had claw marks from dragonborn abominations, one of which had broken through the door and left a hole that still hadn''t been patched up. Granted, it was too small for bugs to get into, but still!


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    Lori considered it almost pure chance that the structure had been in an area high enough that flooding hadn''t reached it, given that it seemed to have been made with a fanciful aesthetic rather than pragmatic utility in mind. It would certainly have fit what other examples of Shanalorre''s late predecessor''s work she''d seen. While the storage room was mostly still functional, they were using it to store their meat supplies on ice, and the water had already started degrading the wood, and would inevitably lead to fungus and rot, possibly infecting any further food stored there. Thus she needed to build properly sturdy food storage, one that could be used to store food more securely, especially through a dragon. The fact the demesne hadn''t lost all their food to abominations, or simply exposure and damage, was quite frankly absurd in her eyes, and not an absurdity that would probably happen again.


    And that was just the start of the infrastructure she needed to build. In addition to the food storage that would hopefully keep out thieves in future, she''d also need to build supply storage for things like wood, firewood, leather, and other raw materials; a dragon shelter, which for the sake of convenience and survival should be connected to the food and supply storage; a water storage cistern; and houses more secure and longer-lasting than the ones the demesne was currently inhabiting.


    That last, she knew, would by necessity would have to be temporary. While she was still working on Deadspeaking, it didn''t take one to see that the dome was clearly suffering from its unnatural construction and lack of maintenance by a proper Deadspeaker. In addition to the tree whose trunk had shattered and which she''d secured with stone in one of her earlier arrangements with Shanalorre¡ªhad that been more than half a year ago already?¡ªsome of the other trees that had been integrated and interwoven into the dome seemed to be dead, or at least dying. Rian had shared his suspicion that some of the trees comprising the dome were parasitizing others, or at least drawing on more than their fair share of nutrients, behavior which would probably have been curtailed by a Deadspeaker who was sufficiently familiar with botany and plant behavior.


    It was, in Lori''s opinion, something of an indictment of the demesne''s founder. While her demesne utilized a lot of Wisps that she had to constantly keep imbued, none of it was structural or, strictly speaking, necessary. It was part of why she built using pillar and arch structures, so that none of her buildings, and none of her Dungeon''s levels, needed earthwisps to reinforce their structure. The lights, the heat, the running water? Convenient, of course, but should all the imbuments run out one day, nothing in her demesne would become unusable. Cisterns and the water reservoir would still hold water, they''d just need to manually pour and lift it out with buckets. People would need fire for light and heat, but structures would still be solid. Her doors would stay in place, because they had been mounted with carpentry, even if she''d used earthwisps to set them into stone.


    River''s Fork, however¡­ everything in it needed active maintenance by a Deadspeaker, Dungeon Binder or not. They used to have elevated houses on stilts, until those fell down from the dragons. While the buildings were solid wood, it was untreated solid wood, with no charring applied or oil brushed on to inhibit rot and decay. The central tree had homes built into it, but during nights, Lori saw very few of those homes with burning lights to indicate occupancy. She identified only four on the entire tree, and the two near the top she was fairly sure was Shanalorre and her remaining in-laws. For that matter, few of the houses at ground level had lights either. Was that from a lack of occupation or a lack of light?


    While she was, of course, not going to die any time in the following century, because she would take command of her body''s aging with Deadspeaking¡ªonce she figured out how to do it¡ªif she happened to forget to maintain anything in her demesne, it would continue for function for as long as the stone stands, and given she used strong, solid stone as building material, that would likely be a long time.


    It was almost¡­ sad, really. All this construction, now going to waste because it hadn''t been designed to be maintained by anyone but the one who had built it. No wonder Shanalorre had failed. She had been trying to lead people who lived in a place slowly dying around them. Of course everything had degraded. People had literally seen the signs of it on the walls.


    Well, Lori was here now.


    After the cooking facilities, the food storage was next. She was building it in the copper mine, simply softening and excavating the stone from the walls near the entrance to clear open a large space. The stone she excavated was dragged outside to make a stockpile and to thicken the outside of the mine. Fortunately, there wasn''t any signs of green and blue copper ore in the stone she excavated¡­ mostly. The miners had followed a vein, and while there was more of the vein deeper in, right near the entrance of the mine they had extracted all that they could, leaving uneven wall supported by frames of wooden beams. The little patches of color she saw were too small and insignificant for her to expend the effort to try and separate it from the rest of the stone, so there was nothing to distract her from simply digging outward from the main shaft of the mine.


    Riz and another two volunteers¡ªshe didn''t know who they were beyond ''not Deil and Tackir''¡ªstayed with her to protect her, guarding the entrance of the mine and the water wheel mechanism keeping the air circulating for her. She had been surprised it was still intact, and could only be smugly proud of the craftsmanship of her demesne''s woodworkers as she claimed and bound the water in the trough to flow and turn the wheel once more.


    While she had worked on the food storage, the inventory of the food storage was being conducted. The food was actually meticulously counted, both because they needed to know how much was there and to remove any doubt of a miscount. She heard the uproar as the results of the inventory came out and it was announced that people''s homes would be inspected to search for the ''missing stores''. Lori wouldn''t have literally heard it if she hadn''t been coming out of the mine with a load of stone, which was seemingly being ''pushed'' ahead of her with her staff so she could maintain direct control of the earthwisps causing it to flow and deform to move it across the ground. There had been angry shouts and assertions as to the supremacy of the sovereignty of a person''s home, which was complete and utter nonsense.


    She had lingered worriedly for a moment, hearing the distant, unintelligible voices of Shanalorre, Rian and¡ªa quick check of her rock¡ªYllian speaking, and occasionally shouting to the crowd. Eventually, she had gone back to work, but only after ordering Riz to unleash violence on anyone suspicious who so much as approached the mine. Riz and two other people probably wouldn''t be able to hold back an angry crowd long, but their dying screams would be her cue to bind the tunnel into a death trap as only a Whisperer could.


    It didn''t come to that, thankfully, even though she''d been wary as she worked for the rest of the day. She had heard the rest of what had transpired afterwards. Rian had offered to let anyone who could beat him or Yllian in a fist fight a pass on the inspection, and had even let them choose who they wanted to face. Most had chosen him.


    Foolishly, it seemed.


    "What were you thinking?-!" Lori had demanded once she had heard and managed to get Rian in front of her. "Offering to let people not be searched? By fist fighting you?"


    "A lot of things," Rian said. "You weren''t there¡ªfor which I was glad, because that meant you were safe¡ªand you wouldn''t have been able to recognize them by name or face if you had been, but nearly all those most against the search were known malcontents¡ª"


    "Yes Rian, that would have been blindingly obvious from context alone!"


    "Uh, yes. So I figured I''m offer them an illusion of a chance to get away with what they''d done, all fair and in front of witnesses. If they win, they could get away with their theft." Rian''s smiled gained an edge she''d never seen on him before. "Simple terms that everyone understood. We''d go to their house, and they could choose to let us in to look or fight me. If they won, we wouldn''t inspect and move on to the next house. If I won, we go in." He shrugged. "When faced with the choice, most reasonable people chose to let us in, and we had random people in the crowd, as well as residents, come in to see that we only took the food and not anything else. Showed them we were being honest with our intentions. Those with only a little food we simply commended for having an emergency store to show were weren''t being unreasonable."


    "Most."


    Rian shrugged. "Those that accepted were known malcontents, so them doing so wasn''t unexpected. But it served to show that they were feeling guilty and had something to hide, especially when we did find food afterwards, and far more than they should have had."


    "And you beat them. All of them."


    Rian smiled widely. He hadn''t lost any teeth, Lori noticed. "You''re not the only one who''s been feeling frustrated by selfish idiots," he said. "Yllian is older than I am, but also bigger, and everyone knows he used to be militia. I, however, am smaller and kind of scrawny looking." That¡­ well, perhaps compared to Yllian. "So of course they chose to fight me instead."


    "And you beat them."


    "There''s something about having an idiot who''s making your life harder in front of you that lets you concentrate a lot of power into a punch to the face," Rian said. "And the gut. And the kidneys. And into the kicks to the side of their leg. Though Shana had to heal me up later. I''m good, but I''m not that good."


    "I''m heard that you threw a man to the ground."


    "He mostly threw himself down. I just helped. Enthusiastically."

 267 - A Belated Realization

    It took Lori several more days to sufficiently excavate the mine and shape the excavated area such that it was fit for storing food. While she couldn''t control earthwisps at a distance anymore as she could in her demesne, she had been a skilled Whisperer even before becoming a Dungeon Binder. It was all about knowing how the work would flow, and with her nigh-limitless magic due to her connection from her core, the pace of her work was no longer constrained by the rate in which she could breathe in magic to imbue her wisps.


    The resulting space was rather plain, but it was well insulated because of all the stone, and copied the dimensions of the food storage facility the demesne currently had, meaning there was plenty of room to store food. She''d carved out little channels on the ground to divert the meltwater from any ice towards a little pool tucked away in the back corner that she''d dug out for the purpose of drainage. Once the space had been excavated, she made walls to partition off the space from the original mine shaft tunnel so that the only way to access the storage space was through a doorway... or, well, an opening in the wall, at any rate. A door would need to be installed later.


    After that, she finally began construction of the dragon shelter.


    While it had been proven that the mine could shelter everyone in River''s Fork even without any expansion, the conditions in which it did so were terrible. She shuddered to think of what people had done to relieve themselves while they had sheltered here, though it seemed like the mine had at least been cleaned since that time, if only for the benefit of the miners who would have continued excavating afterwards.


    The very thought of it made her want to build latrines on the spot, but no. She needed to excavate a space for the shelter first. That was done a little deeper into the mine. Originally she was going to start a pace past the edge of the wall of the food storage area, but after some consideration, she decided to conduct some measurements first, to be sure of where she was digging. Because of her lack of connection to the core, she couldn''t just know how far away the surface was or whether there was space for her to dig. This wasn''t her demesne¡ªyet¡ªafter all, and so she was forced to be more meticulous.


    After some measurement to ascertain that she wasn''t going to break out the other side of the hill, Lori cautiously began excavating upwards. She was deep enough inside the hill that she had some leeway in every direction but back towards the entrance of the mine. While excavating sideways or downwards would be easier, it would be more difficult to remove the excavated stone that way, especially since she was doing it by herself. Besides, she didn''t want to be too far away from fresh air.


    She started with an upward oriented ramp, settling on one that was three paces wide to allow sufficient space for two-way traffic. It took her some time, since the initial angle was far too steep, but it was easier to build than stairs, even if it technically required more excavation of stone. However, making stairs would force her to do it almost by hand, since she''d need to get down on her hands and knees to properly for the steps, and she didn''t have the stonemasons to do it for her. So¡­ ramp it was.


    It was on her second trip to bring stone outside that she realized she could use the stone to reinforce the ceiling of the mine shaft tunnel with arches rather than simply dragging it out.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Sooo¡­ Riz tells me she heard you screaming in frustration in the mine today," Rian said when he came to bring her lunch.


    "I had a belated realization," Lori said stiffly as she picked one of the five bowls and one of the cups on the plank he was carrying. She sat on a little stone seat jutting out from the wall as Rian offered the other bowls to Riz and the two volunteers who''d been standing guard at the mines entrance while she worked. The latter two immediately moved farther down the tunnel, beginning to chat quietly once they were some distance away.


    Riz glanced briefly towards then, then towards Rian, cradling her bowl. Sighing, she got up and went after them.


    Lori raised an eyebrow at that as Rian took the last bowl for himself. There was no bread, since that would have been too difficult. Instead, little shelled and boiled grains of vigas floated in the stew. While hardly the most appetizing way to eat it, with the stew it wasn''t intolerable. "Why isn''t Erzebed eating with you? Did you do something to offend her? Compare her to one of the other two?"


    Rian paused. "Did¡­ you actually just say that? Did you actually just take an interest in my personal affairs?"


    "Erzebed is currently guarding me," Lori said, stirring her bowl and assessing the firmness of the vigas. They were softer, but not yet waterlogged and mushy. Perfect. "I''d rather she wasn''t distracted by¡ªstop that or I''ll give you something to really cry about!"


    She glared at him as he theatrically wiped a nonexistent tear from his eye. "I''m just so happy your own ''dealing with people'' skills keep developing."


    "Noticing that Erzebed isn''t eating with you when she usually would doesn''t need skill to deal with people, simply functional eyes, a working memory, and basic pattern recognition," she said flatly, spooning some stew and putting it in her mouth. It was hot, but not burning, and the vigas had a nice firm texture amidst the meat, soup and bits of tubers. Delicious.


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    "No, but your being concerned that I had offended her does, and suggesting a possible reason why shows understanding of what offends people."


    "It''s not understanding, it''s simply remembering common and stupid reasons why characters argue in pointless romantic subplots."


    "Still counts, since you managed to apply it to real people," Rian said cheerfully. "But to answer your question, no, I think she''s simply reinforcing her militia-ness by commiserating with the other glitter crawlers instead of eating with us officers. And also no, I didn''t compare her to someone else. How suicidally stupid do you think I am?"


    "My allegedly expanding skill with people cannot understand that, so I''ll take your word for it."


    "Ah, job security," Rian said dryly. He stirred his own bowl, but seemed to find it still too hot. "So, what was the belated realization?"


    Lori stared at him. "What belated realization?"


    "The one that made you scream earlier."


    Ah. Lori recalled the beginning of this conversation. "Just that I should have been using the excavated stone as reinforcement instead of bringing them outside."


    "Yes, the piles outside are getting a bit big. Though personally I don''t think the ceiling needs reinforcing. The beams seem to be doing a good job as is."


    "You''re not the one working here, you don''t get an opinion."


    Rian shrugged. "Fair enough, I suppose. Do you need help? We''re running low on supplies on the Coldhold since we''re only eating our own food, so I was thinking we needed to send it back for a supply run. We can get the stone masons and maybe some of the carpenters here to help you build what you need, since the locals are all busy finally getting their fields ready and doing all that maintenance Shanalorre said they needed to do."


    Lori considered that. She glanced sideways at the partially complete ramp, which at the moment still lead to nowhere. "I suppose some assistance would be helpful¡­" she admitted. Then she blinked. "Wait, you''re sending the Coldhold back?"


    "Yes, I just said that. I figured tomorrow would do¡ª"


    "When were you planning on telling me you were sending our only means of getting home away?-!"


    "I¡­ just did? A little while ago?"


    Lori twitched. "Why are you sending our only means of getting home away?"


    "I¡­ also just said. We need more food, since we''re not taking from River''s Fork''s supplies. It''ll just be a quick hop back a forth, the ship will be back this afternoon."


    Lori gave him a long, unblinking stare. "Then I will accompany it," she said. "I''m going back home."


    Rian frowned, opened his mouth, paused, and looked around. Eventually, he nodded. "Yes, I think that''s a good idea. You''ve been working nonstop for days, and you haven''t even had a bath since. Maybe you should spend the night there and come back in the morning."


    Lori was torn between arguing that there''s work to be done and the idea of going back to her demesne, where she wasn''t constantly cold and had a wonderfully soft bed to sleep on. It had been¡­ colors, how long had it been already? The monotony of the mines and the work had sort of blended together.


    "How long has it been since we left home?" she said, voice soft as she realized she''d actually lost track.


    "Uh, a week and a half? Also why we''re running low on supplies, we were supposed to go home sooner, but you just kept on working here, so¡­"


    A week and half. Half of three of the months, and more than a third of a red one¡­


    "I''m heading back this afternoon," Lori declared. "After lunch. Get the boat ready. I want to be home as soon as possible."


    Rian blinked at her in surprise, mouth opening as if to argue. However, before she could start glaring at him for questioning her, he closed it, humming thoughtfully. "Are we bringing everyone back with us, or just you?"


    Lori opened her mouth, but then it was her turn to pause. She closed her mouth to hum thoughtfully. "What are the rest of our volunteers doing?"


    "I have a couple guarding the old food storage from theft while allegedly everyone else is working on the fields. They''ve noted a few people, some of them the known malcontents, walking past far too often for it to be anything but them thinking to try their luck and aborting when they saw the place was now guarded. A couple are on the ship to make sure our supplies don''t get stolen. And the rest are protecting your privacy."


    Lori considered that. "Leave a few here under Yllian''s command to keep guarding the food. We''ll go home, you find people to relieve them, bring their replacements in, and have them back home by tonight. Tomorrow, we''ll bring more volunteers, as well as the stone masons and some more carpenters to make the door for the food storage so we can finally get around to moving the food that''s left." She frowned. "What''s taking that door so long, anyway?"


    "Well, they''re still cutting all the wood for the door since they don''t have a stock of pre-cut planks," Rian said. "So, yeah, it might be faster to have a door made at home and just bring it here. Hinges, too."


    Lori nodded. "Tell them so once we arrive. I''ll measure the opening for the dimensions of the door we need." She considered it a moment. "Inform Binder Shanalorre she''ll be coming with us."


    "What about her family? You said you intended that they move to Lorian with Shanalorre. Are we doing that now?"


    She thought about that, then shook her head. "No. Not while I still have to come back here to continue work on the shelter. I''m not leaving her idiot uncle alone in my demesne unsupervised."


    "And by unsupervised you mean you."


    Obviously. "Obviously," she said.


    "Can I at least finish eating first before I start doing all the running around this will entail?"


    She impatiently waved a hand dismissively, and he started eating. She did as well.


    The two ate in silence for a moment.


    "I''m surprised you didn''t want to go home sooner," Rian said quietly between mouthfuls.


    She shrugged. "There was work to be done, and I lost track of time."


    Rian''s spoon paused for a moment. "Uh, have you been remembering to keep things back home imbued? You know, hot water, lights, that sort of thing?"


    Lori gave him a withering look. "Of course I have." She had it written down on a list that she checked every morning. "What kind of fool do you take me for?"


    "Ah." He sounded relieved. "Because I remember the first time we came here, and how everything had stopped working by the time we got back home¡­"


    "Just eat, Rian."


    "Eating, your Bindership."


    Lori ate as well, her mind filled with thoughts of home as her hands moved the spoon on their own. Her bed. Her table. Her private bath. The perfect, ideal warmth around her that told her she was in her demesne¡­


    She looked towards the incomplete ramp and sighed.

 268 - One Nights Rest

    Leaving should have been simple. Rian should have only needed to tell some people they were going, everyone would have gotten on the boat in an orderly fashion, and she''d have been on her way back to her demesne. Even if she''d be leaving again the following day to get back to work on her new other demesne''s dragon shelter, the rest would do her good.


    It should have been, but it wasn''t.


    "There''s no reason for you to leave with them," the woman Lori vaguely recalled was Shanalorre''s aunt was saying to the other Dungeon Binder. She was using that annoying voice that people thought sounded like they were being reasonable but was clearly only condescending. "You''re finally back home, and as I understand it there are no births you needs to assist with."


    "The Great Binder ordered I accompany her," Shanalorre stated the obvious. "So I will. I''m under her authority now, mushka. We all are. That was the agreement."


    "That''s no reason for you to leave," the interfering woman repeated as Lori gave her a flat look, force of habit from years of living in a demesne she didn''t rule keeping her fist from striking the woman''s face. The woman was holding Shanalorre''s shoulders possessively, in a way that was probably starting to hurt. "You''re¡­ this is your demesne. You outrank her here."


    "No, I do not. This is her demesne now," Shanalorre said, and apart of Lori was viscerally satisfied at hearing the other Dungeon Binder using the ''being reasonable but really just condescending'' tone. "The only reason I am not dead so Binder Lori can take the core is because she finds me more useful alive than dead. I''ll be perfectly safe, mushka. If the Great Binder wanted me dead, I would be already."


    For some reason, this perfectly reasonable argument didn''t immediately convince the woman with the incorrectness of her assumptions, because her hands visibly tightened on Shanalorre''s shoulders.


    "Mushka, that''s almost painful," Shanalorre said. "Please let me go now, I do not think the Great Binder wants to be delayed any further. We will likely return tomorrow, or the next day at worst."


    "You don''t need to go," the woman insisted.


    Before Lori finally stepped in and acted on the impulse to end her meddling with a swift fist to the face, whatsis-ian¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªYllian intervened. "That''s enough, Vyshke," he said, voice quiet but sharp. "The Gre¡ª Binder Shanalorre made an agreement with the Great Binder. We won''t have you breaking it just because it''s inconvenient for your mothering."


    The woman turned to glare at him, and in that moment of inattention, Shanalorre was able to bend down, out of the woman''s grip and with some dignity turned away to move towards Lori. The Vyshke woman tried to go after her, but Yllian stepped in to physically bar her way.


    "Take care for things while we''re gone, Yllian," Rian said as Lori began heading for the boat once Shanalorre had presented herself. "Someone''s probably going to go try and steal some food tonight, so watch out for that, all right?"


    "Your warning is noted, Lord Rian," Yllian said in a dry, flat voice, and Lori could hear the ''don''t tell me something I already know'' in the tone, even as he continued to bar the Vyshke woman''s way.


    Lori let the nonsense fall behind her as she started walking towards the Coldhold, a spring in her step at the thought of going back home. It was raining again, but she''d replaced the blood in the evaporator and imbued it, so any water that got into the boat could be taken care of. Water dripped onto her hat from the branches of the dome above, and she adjusted her collar to make sure none of the water went down her neck.


    Shanalorre was wearing no such protection from the falling water, but she seemed unbothered, simply keeping pace with Lori as they continued heading down to the boat. "I apologize for my aunt," Shanalorre said quietly. "She is only concerned for my well-being." A pause. "Though I must ask, why am I accompanying you back? I have no objections to doing so, but I am simply curious."


    Because she didn''t want Shanalorre out of her sight, because she didn''t want Shanalorre to potentially plot rebellion with the people still loyal to her, because she thought this demesne was still likely to break out into violent uncivil unrest and she didn''t want to lose her healer to that¡­


    "Because I think this demesne is still likely to break out into violent civil unrest and I don''t want to lose my only healer to that," Lori said bluntly. "I might not care to understand people, but I know enough to understand that resentment, selfishness, thoughtlessness, contrariness and spite don''t just disappear in a week. The idiots who are more idiotic than everyone else will probably try something, and once we leave is a possibility."


    "But if that''s so, shouldn''t we stay to mitigate it?"


    "No," Lori said bluntly. "I have another demesne to take care of, one I like more because it actually has self-discipline and doesn''t try to destroy itself as soon as my back is turned." Not actively destroy, anyway. "Besides, should anything come up, Yllian can deal with it better using violence, and if I¡ªand you, I suppose¡ªwere here he''d have to divert militia towards protecting us rather than dealing with any foolishness."


    "Our deal was that you treat the people in my demesne as you have treated your own," Shanalorre said quietly.


    "And if any of them had reached this level of criminality, I would have treated them this way." She tilted her head thoughtfully. "Well, I''d have had Rian treat them that way, but Yllian is a fitting substitute. Do you assess that he is a needlessly cruel man?"


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    "No, of course not."


    "Then no one should die unless they prove themselves to be an active, unreasonable danger to someone else," Lori said with finality. "At worst, you''ll have a few broken bones to take care of tomorrow. Or do you feel that the people here will act significantly more malevolent just to steal food?"


    "I¡­ understand your reasoning," Shanalorre said slowly, "but it still seems like we''re abandoning the demesne."


    "How is it abandoning them if we''re back by tomorrow? A more logical case for abandonment would be my absence from my primary demesne for over a week, or your own absence during the early spring had that absence been deliberate. Compared to that, this is nothing. You are overestimating the importance of this place."


    Shanalorre nodded slowly. "I¡­ understand, Great Binder. Thank you for correcting my perspective."


    Lori nodded. Truthfully, she wanted to stay more than a night in her demesne. She wanted, as always, to never leave. That wasn''t possible, of course. There was work to be done, and she had responsibilities as this place''s Dungeon Binder¡­ miserable and soggy as this place was.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was past mid-afternoon when they got back, and while Lori didn''t have to participate in the far too lengthy reunions that were occurring, the way they filled up the docks and the stairs going over the flood barrier kept her essentially trapped on the boat until enough people had managed to get out of the way. She spent the rest of the time until dinner luxuriating in her private bath and doing her laundry, since she''d been wearing the same clothes for far too long.


    When she went down to eat, it was finally wearing clean clothes, carrying her sunk board for the first time in a while. At her table, she found Shanalorre waiting for her, the other Dungeon Binder''s hair still wet from what was obviously her own soak in the baths.


    "Lord Rian asked me to inform you that he won''t be joining us for dinner tonight," Shanalorre said. "He returned to River''s Fork with the new volunteers to relieve the people that were left there, and he said it was highly likely that the ship would not return until well after dark. He also said that as you were not answering knocks on your door, that he was accompanying the boat to use the illumination you gave him to help light the way, as you have both once more forgotten to put external lights on the Coldhold."


    Lori paused as she took a moment to comprehend what her subordinate had just told her, then sighed as she realized that, yes, she had forgotten to put exterior lights on the Coldhold for navigating in the dark. Though to be fair, they didn''t really travel on it at night¡­ except in this instance¡­ and actually, wouldn''t they have needed to do so back when she had been injured and infected?


    "Remind me to correct that tomorrow," Lori said with a sigh as she finally sat down and put the sunk board down on the table in front of her. She opened the container of stones she used to play and began to set the board. "Did Rian leave any other messages?"


    "No," Shanalorre said, "though he did ask me to speak to people on your behalf in his absence. I''m unsure of what he meant."


    The hand that was placing down stones stilled slightly. Oh, yes. She''d forgotten about that. Lori eyed Shanalorre, who looked back at her with tranquil inquisitiveness, clearly expecting, or at least hoping, for an explanation.


    Finally, she said, "It shouldn''t come up, but with Rian absent, I need you to be the one to speak to people and either tell them what I need them to do or find out what they need. Rian usually does it, but he''s not here, and¡­" She frowned and looked around the dining hall. There were several flashes of pink hair, but many of them were over features of Mikon-faced women, and there was no sign of anyone whose face she could make out. "Do you know where Ezebed is?"


    "Erzebed¡­ Oh, you mean Riz," Shanalorre said. "I believe she accompanied Lord Rian and the new volunteers. I gather she will be remaining in River''s Fork tonight to act as a squad leader for the volunteers on Lord Rian''s behalf."


    Ah. Well, the woman didn''t want to be considered for the post anyway, but Lori had been hoping she could tell Shanalorre what she needed to do. "A pity." Lori put the rest of the stones onto the bowls of the sunk board and hoped Shanalorre wouldn''t ask her for further clarification. She''d never actually had to teach someone to take Rian''s place, since Riz had been nearby for long enough that she had a good idea of what the position entailed.


    From the crowd, Mikon and Umu suddenly appeared. The former was using what looked like Rian''s plank of wood to carry four bowls of food and some cups, while the latter was carrying a jug of water and a plate stacked with disks of bread. "Your Bindership," Mikon said with a warm smile as she carefully put down the plank. "I''m sorry for talking to you, but Rian asked me to bring you food while he was gone. Oh!" Her smile widened as she saw the sunk board. "Are we playing tonight, your Bindership?"


    Lori simply moved the board between them in lieu of answering, taking one of the four bowls and a cup for herself, and her share of the bread when Umu put down her load.


    "Here," the blonde weaver said with a gentleness that Lori had never heard before as she handed Shanalorre one of the bowls. "Rian asked us to get food for you too, Lady Binder."


    Lori''s eyebrows rose at the strange address. "Lady Binder?" she said. Her tone demanded explanation.


    The gentleness vanished as Umu found herself the focus of Lori''s attention. "Ah, w-well, people aren''t quite sure what to call Binder Shanalorre, y-your Bindership," Umu said. "Calling her ''her B-bindership'' too would be confusing when you two are together, and since she''s a Binder but also sort of your lady, some people have been calling her that."


    That¡­ was almost sensible reasoning for her idiots. So much so that she was immediately suspicious. "Did Rian come up with that?" she said.


    The two women opposite her looked at each other, clearly considering how they should answer and all but confirming it. "Yes," Mikon admitted.


    "I do not mind being called such," Shanalorre said. "I suspect the alternative is being referred to as the Little Binder. And as a female subordinate of Binder Lolilyuri with standing at least equal to, and in the case of Uncle Yllian exceeding that of a lord but no longer equal to the Great Binder, I suppose it would be accurate for me to be a considered a lady."


    Lori grunted. She eyed Shanalorre for a moment, but¡­ well, the suggested nomenclature certainly helped with properly stratifying the hierarchy, and contextualizing Shanalorre''s rather unorthodox position. "I''ll consider it," Lori said. "Your move, Mikon."


    As the pink-haired weaver enthusiastically opened the game, Lori started eating her food. One night''s rest, and then¡­ and then it was back to work. She''d need to finish the dragon shelter, make sure they had latrines that would keep waste properly isolated, make sure they had a water supply that wouldn''t be tainted by those latrines, make sure they had reliable air circulation and lights, make sure they had a sturdy door to bar dragonborn abominations from getting into the mine¡­


    Tomorrow, she''d do all that. Tonight though, she''d sleep in her own bed, in her own room, and rest.

 269 - A Restless Walk

    After dinner, Lori should have been sleeping. Her bedroll was on her bed, and her pillow and blanket atop it, ready to give her a good night''s rest. The only one she''d have for some time, given where she''d be going the next day.


    Instead, she was restless.


    Try as she might, Lori couldn''t sleep. Despite not being hungry, all she could do was lie in bed, staring up at the names on the ceiling that she never seemed to get around to removing, even though she couldn''t remember why it was there. The names themselves were stuck in her memory now, though except for Umu, Mikon, and possibly Deil and Tackir she wouldn''t be able to tell them by face. And the last two she might get mixed up.


    She tried reading her almanac, but Lori found she couldn''t properly concentrate on the words. The book sat open on her lap, and she found she''d been reading the same opening paragraph over and over without remembering what it said. When she tried to switch to something else, a flow diagram for a controlled burn of forest undergrowth¡ªshe''d chosen it because it had been the only thing that had piqued her curiosity¡ªshe had ended up simply tracing the diagram with her fingers.


    Eventually she put away the almanac, lest it be damaged by her carelessness. She got to her feet, thinking to walk about to, if not exactly clear her head, then at least expend some of the energy that seemed to be imbuing her. The dining hall below was quiet when she stepped down. The lights were as bright as they always were since they had been connected to the core, but the kitchen was oddly empty and still without any people bustling about there. She was so used to that area being occupied, full of people cooking or preparing to cook, that the lack was simply strange.


    The doors of her Dungeon were closed, and she stared at them for a moment, before shaking her head. Pulling them open wasn''t difficult¡ªthey weren''t barred, though the wooden beam that would secure it lay to one side, ready in case of a dragon¡ªand she would have left them open behind her when a thought occurred to her. She turned and pulled the doors shut. Even with the binding to keep bugs out of her Dungeon, there was the possibility of chokers or something smaller skulking about.


    She took a moment to look at the illustrations made from lightwisps that she''d anchored to the walls of the entryway to her Dungeon, then sighed. While they had looked suitable when she and Rian had originally made them, now some of them were clearly blurry and slightly lopsided. The lines of the illustrations they''d copied were sharp enough that what they were depicting was easily identifiable, but still¡­


    Lori shook her head, lest she start staring again, and continued walking. The air around her was pleasantly cool, a coolness that didn''t change as she felt a breeze on her face, so it was probably colder. She could see a bonfire had been lit near the baths, next to the collections of benches to the side. There were people huddled there, talking among themselves. Huh. She''d have thought if people would be staying up late, they''d be doing it in her Dungeon.


    She shrugged as she let herself wander, turning right past the entryway. To her left, the corners of the houses of her demesne glowed with lightwisps anchored to the stone walls. A little ways ahead of her, a lone house that was smaller than the others and looking like a child''s drawing¡ªit had a door in the middle of the wall facing the path, with two square windows to either side¡ªwas the last beacon of light. Beyond that house was darkness and moonlight, the red moon bathing the land in its colors. Past Rian''s house, she could barely make out the shape of the food dehydration shed, though she could hear it faintly as it continued to circulate air even now. She wondered what was being dried in there. Mushrooms? Or had people decided to convert it to drying laundry while they were gone?


    ¡­


    It occurred to Lori she hadn''t really left anyone in charge of the idiots in her demesne while she was gone. Rian was with her, so clearly he wasn''t keeping them in line, so who¡­?


    ¡­


    She was just going to assume that Rian, who had always shown he was very capable, had thought to put someone in some sort of charge. For some reason, Umu came to mind. Lori could even imagine it: Rian would be wondering who he could leave in charge of the demesne while they were gone, to keep people from doing something stupid, and Umu would be right there saying, "I can do that for you, Lord Rian!" and of course Mikon would use the opportunity to try and ring Umu''s bell by assisting her¡­


    ¡­


    Yes, Lori was just going to assume that was how it had all played out, because she didn''t want to think of the alternative and¡ªshe was going to have to inspect everything in the morning to make sure her idiots hadn''t done something excessively idiotic while they''d been out of her sight, wouldn''t she?


    ¡­


    Well, she probably should anyway. Make sure nothing had broken unexpectedly or needed repairs, see to it no one was pissing in the unfinished excavations on the third level, that no one had turned the dehydrator into a clothes dryer¡­


    Lori stood there for a moment, staring out into the dark past the shape of the food dehydrator shed. Even if this was her demesne¡­ she wasn''t going out into that. Not alone, in any case. She had far too many vivid recollections of that kind of darkness and moonlight hiding beasts. She turned around and began walking back, even as the sudden itching on her neck kept making her glance behind her. Silly, she knew. Her awareness of wisps told her there weren''t any voids nearby that could be a beast, even a small one like a choker, but¡­


    Her step quickened, and she didn''t slow until she was back near the entryway of her Dungeon.


    ¡­


    Why were so many people still awake?


    It wasn''t just the people sitting around the bonfire in front of the baths. Someone had also lit a fire near the short wall of the flood barrier, between the stairs to the laundry area and the stairs to the docks. Benches had been moved there, and people were sitting around waiting. Some of them were children, who seemed to have fallen asleep where they sat, the warmth of the fires letting rest comfortably.


    A few seemed to be talking quietly to each other, probably in deference to those sleeping, but most simply sat there. One, a young man by his build, was pacing back and forth, occasionally turning to walk up the steps that led towards the dock, and then simply stood there as if looking out over the river before turning away to walk down and resume their pacing.


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    At the top of the stairs over the flood barrier, two women were standing.


    Lori should not have been able to tell who they were. From where they stood, their hair colors were unclear, and the skirts and shawls they were had nothing distinctive about them. She had nothing to use for reference to their height, and they were both standing still, not interacting with each other. The only movement about them was the way the night breeze played with their hair and clothes, blowing it back and forth. When one tucked a stray lock back behind an ear, there was nothing distinctive about the movement.


    Despite that, Lori was almost completely certain that the pair was Umu and Mikon.


    ¡­


    Were the two of them waiting for Rian to come back? That¡­ seemed the most likely. Lori glanced at the other people waiting around the bonfires, especially the one who kept pacing and occasionally climbed up the stairs. Did that mean that these were the family of those they''d left behind this afternoon, the ones Rian should be returning with? All of them just waiting for the Coldhold to come with Rian and their families aboard?


    ¡­


    That was probably what they were doing, wasn''t it? They were all just out here, waiting for the boat to finish making the round trip back from River''s Fork. A round trip that, Lori realized, would probably take a portion of the night to finish, since the Coldhold didn''t have any light to navigate by except for the glowing rock she''d given Rian. They''d have to travel slower so that they didn''t accidentally run into anything. And the rock wasn''t exactly easy to hold out in front of you without fingers getting in the way of its light, so it was distinctly likely that Rian could drop the rock into the water.


    Then the boat would be adrift in the dark, and they''d either have to stop for the night and continue on when there was light out, or try to continue with the moonlight, and hope the clouds didn''t come in for a midnight drizzle.


    ¡­


    It all sounded worryingly plausible in Lori''s head. Had these people thought the same? Or were they simply waiting, impatient for someone in their family to come home?


    ¡­


    Well, not her problem. That was a ''dealing with people'' matter, and Rian wasn''t here. Shanalorre was, but Lori didn''t know where she was. Sleeping in the shelter, most likely, but it seemed pointless to wake her up for a matter that didn''t actually need to be solved immediately. One way or another, it would be resolved with time. Either the boat would arrive later tonight, or it would arrive the following day since they had to stop and sleep.


    ¡­


    Lori found a dark corner next to the entry way of her Dungeon and bound some earthwisps from the stone, pulling out a small ledge she could sit on. Closing her eyes, she reached through her affinity with her blood and the light from her eyes. Light¡­ the Coldhold needed light. Exterior lights, at that. Unfortunately, all the lights she had given it had been interior, to illuminate the space within the hull. Why had she never considered they''d need lights outside? How had they managed during those weeks they''d been traveling to Covehold?


    She found her connections, and became aware of the bindings of lightwisps and waterwisps she was distantly connected to. She began to imbue them as she considered her options. The bindings moving water through the water jet driver, she dismissed from consideration, though she still kept imbuing them. The ice that made the hull¡­ she couldn''t really affect that, not without being able to see what she was doing. The evaporator¡­ no, nothing she could do to that which would be useful.


    Could she make the interior lights brighter? Bright enough to glow through the hull, between the gaps of the planks? Perhaps that would help? Though¡­ no, that was more likely to simply blind those inside, and it was even likely they''d covered up the lightwisps so they could sleep. She could try moving the lightwisps¡­ but in what direction? Relative to what?


    Lori rose and started to pace around in a circle, her restlessness moving her. She really should stop worrying about this. Rian would be back when he came back, and there wasn''t really anything she could do to accelerate the process. She should just deal with her restlessness and then go back to sleep, and when she woke up, he''d probably be back, and she''d have skipped all the waiting. Being preoccupied about all this was simply pointless.


    She had stopped pacing, thought the restlessness within her hadn''t changed. Lori found herself staring up at the pale moon and its stark white surface. Even with only a wide crescent visible at this time of month, it was still bright, even if the light it cast seemed weak compared to the bloody illumination of the red moon¡ª


    ¡­


    Lori''s eyes widened slightly as an idea came to her. Perhaps¡­ perhaps there was a way to give the Coldhold some light after all?


    With the moons out and shining, the air was filled with lightwisps, even if it didn''t seem like it. But they could see, so of course there was light. Through her connection to her core, through her demesne, Lori claimed those lighwisps, and began to gather them at the highest point of her demesne. Two and a third taums directly above her Dungeon, she bound those lightwisps together, gathering more and more lightwisps from the light of the moons and stars. There was nothing to anchor them to save airwisps, and that would simply blow them about, so Lori consciously held them in place with her mind as she imbued the simple binding.


    Then she made the lightwisps shine.


    High up above, a soft light suddenly came into being, glowing like a fifth moon. As people, those paying attention anyway, looked up in confusion, Lori altered the binding, making the light grow stronger. The illumination intensified, the fifth moon turning into a twilight sun, the darkness around her washing away.


    Lori claimed and bound a second group of lightwisps next to the light above her Dungeon, shaping them into a wide disk and giving them directionality that caused them to reflect the light being generated. She wrapped that disk around the shining binding, limiting the direction the light could go. Not up and not down. The direction of upriver was also blocked off, as was the direction of both the river''s shores.


    Finally, all the light shone only downriver. The light was actually visible in the air, reflecting off minute dust and vapor, revealing a wide cone. Pulling it down to an altitude of merely two taums above her core, she was able to get a better sense of the direction the light was going as it created more lightwisps in its path. Carefully, she began to angle it downward, until the bottom edge of the cone of unclaimed lightwisps reached the edge of the surface of her demesne.


    She wondered how bright that light was, to anyone looking towards it. It was only visible light, bright white and carefully stripped of any unseen light lest it become warm or harmful. Directed away from her, she only had a small sense of its intensity, but given it was lighting up the very air¡­


    That should be able to give the Coldhold enough light to navigate their way faster¡­ right?


    Lori sat back down on her ledge, her limbs suddenly no longer as restless as they''d been before. She leaned back and closed her eyes, her mind focusing on keeping the binding of lightwisps imbued as she ignored the stares of the people sitting around the fires, and the gazes of Mikon and Umu¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Lori?" a gentle voice said. "Lori, wake up. Your neck is going to ache if you keep sleeping like that."


    Lori jerked awake. What¡­?


    She tried to sit up, only to find she was already sitting up and her neck was annoyed with her because her head had been lolling to one side. Wincing, she blearily moved her head as she tried to relieve the aching muscles, as she rubbed her eyes of sleep sand.


    Rian was crouched in front of her, one side slightly illuminated by a glow coming from his open belt pouch, smiling.


    "Who died," she muttered in annoyance at being woken up, "and what are you doing in my room?"

 270 - Ah, A Sound Idea

    The next day started as a perfectly ordinary morning for Lori. Specifically, it started with her in her demesne. When she finally came down, it was to a full dining hall, as she had come to expect on mornings, and which she found she had actually missed in the last week and half. Everything was as it should be, everything was as she expected it to be¡­


    She was home.


    The only thing to mar the occasion was the fact that when Rian came carrying breakfast to her, Umu, Mikon and Shanalorre, there was no one at his side. Lori found her gaze lingering slightly on the empty space next to the pink haired weaver, where Riz would usually be. Then she shook her head, putting her foolish sentiments to rest.


    "Have you made the arrangements for the stone masons to come with us?" Lori said. Talking about demesne matters in the morning over breakfast was also wonderfully familiar, and she''d even brought down the sunk board. As she made a move in response to Mikon''s opening, she could almost pretend it was the year before¡­


    "I told them we needed them to come with us before I left yesterday," Rian said as Shanalorre quietly ate next to Lori, "and we managed to talk again in the baths this morning. They''re willing to come and can get all they need together right after breakfast, but they''re not comfortable with the idea of being gone as long as we were."


    "That shouldn''t be a problem," Lori said as Mikon made her move. "Staying so long was a mistake. From now on, we will be doing four day shifts, with a day in between to arrange any new things we need as well as dealing with demesne matters here. Perhaps two if something urgent comes up."


    Rian sighed in relief. "That would be wonderful. I''ll tell them after breakfast. I haven''t told the carpenters about needing a new door yet, so I have to take care of that before we leave. Are they still going to come with us, or will they build the door here?"


    "At least one of them needs to come along to take measurements for the door, and to find out what work, if any, the carpenters in River''s Fork have already done."


    "It''ll need to be one of the carpenters from there, then," Rian said thoughtfully.


    "We also need at least one of the hunters to come along," Lori said as she reached over to the sunk board, her hand hesitating a moment before she picked up all the stones in one bowl.


    Her lord paused at that. "To help get more food for River''s Fork, right? They''ll need some of the people from our regular hunting parties then, people who know how to get as much of the meat off the bone and packed up before the blood draws more predators¡ª wait, maybe not¡­"


    "What is it?"


    "If you''re willing, we can send the Coldhold and its crew to help with gathering food. All of us learned how to butcher meat quickly, and in the confines of the surface deck, if need be. It will limit the area they can hunt to along the river, but beasts have to drink eventually. If we add some extra people to help with dragging the carcass close to the boat, they should be able to manage it."


    Lori frowned as she finished her move. The idea of the Coldhold not being there in case she needed a quick escape should uncivil unrest and violence erupt¡­ "Are any of the other boats ready?"


    Rian shook his head. "Not yet. Lori''s Boat is still in storage, as far as I know, and Lori''s Ice Boat is notably lacking in ice. And I don''t think you''ve checked on their water jets lately, so those probably haven''t been imbued." Shanalorre looked up at the names, her face confused for some reason.


    Ah. Right. "We''ll do that in four days," Lori declared as Mikon took a moment to consider her response. "Make arrangements for the wood to be inspected in the meantime, and have the carpenters prepare to make any replacements if necessary." She hummed in thought for a moment, then sighed. "Have one of the hunters come with us anyway, to see how viable the idea is. Also, have the potter begin production on large water vessels."


    Rian blinked. "Large water vessels?"


    "If there''s a more specific name, I don''t know what it is," Lori said flatly. "Regardless, we need something that can ideally be carried by one strong person that can hold a lot of water for the dragon shelter in River''s Fork. While I can fill any reservoir I build in the shelter with water from the river, that water will need to be used and replaced, lest it become undrinkable. I know they probably have buckets and at least one barrel there, but that demesne will need a means of filling the reservoir with enough water for fifty people for at least three days in the few hours they might have before a dragon arrives. That requires vessels."


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    Rian sighed for some reason. "The barrel, you remember." He shook his head, then nodded. "I''ll see what we can do. Though I think we''ve reach the point where we can actually make our own barrels now, which would be lighter and easier to move than clay pots, even when filled. I''ll need you to authorize the use of the copper for it, though."


    Lori considered that. "Shanalorre," she said as Mikon made her move, fingers dropping the stones into bowls one at a time as she went around the board. The other Dungeon Binder looked up from her meal, which was almost finished. "Since this project will be going to be for your demesne, we''ll be taking the copper from its stores."


    "Understood, Great Binder. How much will be needed?"


    Lori turned back to Rian. "Find out how much copper will be needed to make five barrels to start with, then get it back to Shanalorre."


    Rian hesitated, glancing at the other Dungeon Binder. "Uh¡­"


    "If I may, Great Binder?" Lori turned back to her bench companion. "If Lord Rian can direct me to the person to ask, I can find out the details myself, as well as any others I might need to learn."


    "What she said," Rian said hastily. "Not that I''m not willing, but I''m sure there are other things I''m going to need to be doing, and this will help familiarize her with the people of the demesne that she''ll need to remember when it comes to these kinds of matters in the future."


    Lori frowned. "Fine. Umu, take Shanalorre to meet the people in question after breakfast."


    The blonde weaver gave a start of surprise from where she''d been leaning against Rian''s side. "M-me, your Bindership?"


    "If you don''t want to," Lori said, her voice dry, "then I''m sure Rian can find a volunteer. Rian, you find someone to¡ª"


    "I-I''ll do it, Rian!" Umu said immediately. "I never said I wouldn''t!"


    Lori''s gaze happened to meet Mikon''s. The other woman was smiling fondly. Lori simply rolled her eyes. Shaking her head, she made her move. "Well, with that dealt with, are there any other matters that need to be brought up?"


    "Well, there was nothing immediately urgent," Rian said thoughtfully. "No one felt they had something they needed me to know right away, after all. But I''ll probably find out some minor matters after breakfast, so I''ll get back to you on that later. Ah! Five of the houses are finished now though, and the other three are almost complete. Does that mean those who petitioned for it can move in now?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Fine, fine. I''m sure I can leave handling that matter to you. Do they have enough beds, or are they going to ask for having beds that fold into the wall?"


    "The latter, I think, and maybe a loft floor to give them some more space to spread out and not crowd each other," Rian said.


    "Fine, have the carpenters prioritize that for the moment. In the meantime, have the petitioners move in so we can clear some space in the shelter."


    Rian chuckled. "At this point, the people in the shelter have more space than anyone else in the demesne, including you."


    "Not for long. Over the next four days, we will be moving in the children from River''s Fork."


    "Ah. That¡­ might be problematic. We might need to arrange for chaperones. At the very least, it would be very irresponsible for us to just stuff all those children in a building without any adult supervision to make sure they''ll be all right."


    "Won''t the ones they''ll be sharing the shelter with be enough supervision, if it''s actually needed?"


    "Spoken like someone''s who''s never had to keep more than one child out of trouble, or go to bed on time, or¡­" Rian shook his head. "If you''d be willing to have it be part of their apprenticeship, I''ll ask some of the newlyweds to do it. It will be good for them to have experience dealing with children."


    Ah, a sound idea. "Ah, a sound idea," Lori agreed. "Arrange it, and tell them to expect the children to arrive with us in four days or so."


    "Ah, if I may, Rian?" Rian, and Lori both turned their attention towards Mikon. "If it''s for watching over children, my aunt may allow some of my cousins to move into the shelter for that reason, especially if there are going to be fewer people there now." The weaver gave them a bright smile. "I''m sure she''ll be eager for an acceptable reason to get them out of the house."


    "We''ll see," Rian said noncommittally. That seemed to satisfy the woman though, who gave one last smile and went back to her food.


    "You''re a lord now, you know. Nepotism is expected," Lori said, reaching for the sunk board to take her turn.


    "I''m trying to start a tradition of ethical and non-nepotistic lordship. Granted, I know it''s probably not going to catch on, but I need to at least make the effort."


    "It''s what people expect of their lords."


    "Well, your expectations would be difficult to meet if I acted like that. A lord like that would be trying to manipulate you for his own convenience. I''d rather not be a dead man."


    "Yes, you''d be hard to replace," Lori agreed. "Is there anything else?"


    Rian tilted his head thoughtfully. "No¡­ no, I think that''s everything right now. It''s been a year, people know what to do now, and you''ve pretty much built everything they really need. Anything after this is just to make things easier or to make money. You can probably rest up while we''re getting things ready."


    "In that case, I''ll be at the docks. The Coldhold needs exterior lights."


    Rian smiled for some reason. "Have I told you recently you''re the best Dungeon Binder ever?"


    Lori stared at him. "Not lately, no."


    "You''re the best Dungeon Binder ever."


    "Yes, that''s obvious. If there''s nothing else, then finish eating, Rian. You have a lot of work to do."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"

 271 - A Little Girl And A House

    As Rian made the arrangements, Lori put lightwisps on the outside of the Coldhold. She had to use lightwisps from her eyes so she could keep them imbued even when the boat was outside of the demesne, but when she was done, she was reasonably sure that the Coldhold would have enough light to navigate by. She also anchored some on the waterwisps making up some of the external structure of the boat, so that it would have some external lighting at night so they could see around the boat.


    Thankfully, they were able to get underway a little past midmorning, with some of the stonemasons aboard. In the next four days, Lori was able to progress excavating the dragon shelter, while they dealt with the fine details that she didn''t have the time or skill to try to do herself, such as straightening the doorway to the food storage, and making sure that the channels she had carved on the floor all led properly to the pool for the meltwater, and that the water wouldn''t start to gather anywhere else in the room.


    On the third day of her excavating¡ªthe ramp had been finished, and she could now start excavating the shelter itself¡ªshe took a break from the excavation to reinforce the mine tunnel and lessen the likelihood of collapse. All that stone that she had excavated and had simply dragged out into the mine had piled up, narrowing the tunnel''s width by more than half. The stone masons had looked increasingly worried as she had kept simply dragging stone into the tunnel and leaving it there, all but burying the tunnel''s support beams.


    Fortunately, this was her intention.


    Starting from the part of the tunnel closest to her ramp, she claimed and bound the excavated stone, causing it to flow and seal off the tunnel. Then, once a complete barrier from one wall to the other had been made, Lori simply removed the middle part of the stone obstruction, reopening the tunnel¡­ with a new, stone arch ceiling and stone pillars to either side of it that would help channel the ceilings weight to the ground.


    It was, in a way, a recreation of the way she was excavating the third level of her dungeon. While she needed to move a lot of stone for this since she had to make a complete wall, the way that her excavated stone had built up in the tunnel meant she only had to move enough stone to block out the remaining gaps. That was easy enough since she had a lot of excavated stone around to claim and move, and in the process of moving the stone she was able to clear space in which to work.


    In some ways, the process was a bit repetitive, since she essentially filled in the tunnel, excavated it open again, then moved the re-excavated stone back out to fill in more of the tunnel so she could excavate it out once more, only to use the stone to seal more sections of the tunnel all over again. However, from her attempts the previous week, and with the amount of stone she''d managed to fill the mine tunnel with while she''d been excavating the ramp, doing it this way was the fastest and most efficient method available to her. It only involved a relatively simple binding that simply softened and moved stone to fill in gaps, and then softened it again and excavated it to make a cleared space. She didn''t have to move stone upwards against its own weight, didn''t have to try to shape it into an arch while it hung above her, and didn''t have to push stone up to fill in gaps while nothing but air and having its earthwisps anchored to the ceiling supported the stone''s its own weight.


    Working in this way, she managed to both clear most of the stone that had accrued almost to the mine''s entrance and reinforce the ceiling by the end of the day. The next day, she was able to do more excavation on the dragon shelter while the stone masons were adjusting the walls and arches she had made to be more plumb and even.


    When they returned to her demesne after the fourth day, the boat contained some of River''s Fork''s children.


    Not all of them were there. She hadn''t been expecting the malcontents to let their children stay in her demesne, and had been surprised and confused when one of the families had. All in all, seven children had come with them from River''s Fork, each carrying what clothes they had in an assortment of packs.


    Shanalorre took the initiative of leading them, taking them not to the shelter or the baths, but rather to the row of houses at the top of the rise where nearly all the people who had come from River''s Fork lived.


    "Ah, good idea," Rian said approvingly as he saw where she was taking the children. "Take them to meet people they know so they''ll be more comfortable, maybe meet some of their friends who moved here. It will help them adjust to living here."


    Lori frowned. "I''d have thought they''d want to put their packs away first."


    "You mean the packs that hold all their worldly possessions? You want them to leave those unattended in a building they don''t know, when they''ve just come from a demesne where people have been stealing?"


    Ah. When he put it that way¡­ "Ah. When you put it that way¡­still, they''ll need to move in there eventually."


    "I think it would be better if we arrange for them to live with the families they know," Rian said thoughtfully. "I know we talked about how we''d have them in the shelter with Mikon''s cousins as chaperones, but on consideration, that might be a bit too uncomfortable for them, at least for the first few days."


    "Well, you handle that," Lori said, waving her hand dismissively.


    "Do you mind if I handle that by asking Shana to do it?" Rian said. "She seems to be taking care of it already, and I need to make sure your boats have been inspected and are ready to be used again this season."


    Ah, right. They were going to do that, weren''t they?


    The wood of the smaller boats had been inspected, thankfully, and they hadn''t found any mold or any other damage. Lori remounted the first generation, simple water jet driver onto the wooden frame of Lori''s Boat. Then after lunch she rebuilt the ice hull of Lori''s Ice Boat, burying bindings of lightwisps in the ice for illumination at night, just in case. She did the same for Lori''s Boat. Since older boat was made of wood, she had to wrap little pieces of bone along the front so she''d have something for her lightwisps to anchor to. They probably wouldn''t need to use the boats at night, but that''s what they had thought about the Coldhold.


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    Lori inspected the levels of her dungeon, checking that the temperature and humidity were corrected, and that the soil of the Dungeon farm was draining properly. She also checked all her unfinished excavation tunnels on the third level for suspicious smells. She found one suspicious smell, but it turned out to be a pile of the dried waste being stored nearby to fertilize the tubers that had somehow gotten wet. It was just as bad, but at least it had been incompetence rather than stupidity. She drew the waterwisps from it as she tried not to gag and told Rian to tell people to not store that sort of thing in the third level, especially where it might get wet.


    Besides that, the rest of the dungeon farm seemed to be doing well. The plots that had been made in time for planting was full of thick, green growth, and the seeds of the pink ladies, golden buds and micans at least seemed to be sprouting, though they were still in pots instead of a proper plot.


    She also checked the water hub shed, and was glad to find no bug corpses floating in the water, or settled in the bottom of the tank. The binding she''d placed seemed to be working, which was good to know. Though¡­ should she experiment to see if she could develop something similar for beasts? Well, it wasn''t like she had time to really do her own experiments, since she was still building needed infrastructure for her new demesne.


    It was one of many things she had to get around to when she had time and the things she needed to do were no longer so urgent. It was probably less of a priority than putting together a bound tool, but definitely more urgent than making more beads. Though given she was a bit too busy to expand right now, she might be able to make bead production more efficient, since she could set up semi-permanent infrastructure for it¡­


    "So," Rian said brightly at dinner as Lori stared at the little interloper on her bench, her hair pale with a light green tinge. The interloper stared back, looking at her curiously. "How are the other children doing, Shana? Settling down all right? More importantly, do you think they feel safe and comfortable enough to actually go to sleep?"


    "I have had them accommodated, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said.


    "You should probably just call me Rian," he said. "As a Dungeon Binder, you outrank a mere lord such as me."


    "Noted, Lord Rian." Rian winced for some reason. "Tonight, I have arranged for them to stay with families they know, in lieu of sleeping in the unfamiliar confines of the shelter. Warm and comfortable as it is, I do not think they would sleep very well there, with them unused to it as of yet. The only ones who will be staying in the shelter will be myself and my cousin."


    "Your cousin?" Lori said blandly.


    Shanalorre nodded, then gestured at the interloper sitting next to her. "Yes. May I re-introduce my cousin, Yoshka. You met once when my aunt invited you to breakfast with them. My aunt tasked me with watching over her."


    Lori''s voice was still bland. "Did she, now?"


    "Yes. I, of course, accepted the familial responsibility. Yoshka, what did I tell you about staring at Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "But she''s looking at me¡­" the girl said. Still, she looked away, looking across the table towards Rian, who smiled and waved at her. Tentatively, she smiled and waved back.


    "Why is she eating here?" Lori asked.


    "Because I''m supposed to be watching over her, and I cannot do that when she''s at another table."


    Lori stared at her. "Fine. She can stay, as long as she remains quiet while we discuss matters. But no one else!"


    "Of course, Great Binder," Shanalorre said.


    "I thought you were Great Binder, Shasha?"


    "Not anymore."


    "Oh, good!"


    Lori blinked in surprise, staring at the little girl. What?


    "You never liked being Great Binder. Does that mean you''re going to stop talking funny now?"


    "I do not talk funny."


    "Yes, you do!"


    She did not.


    "I do not."


    "You do! It''s weird!"


    "This is a perfectly normal way to talk."


    "You used to talk faster!"


    "Oh, look! Food''s here!" Rian announced, and indeed, a returned Riz and Mikon were back, carrying between them six bowls of food, a plate with bread for six people, cups, and a pitcher of water.


    Yoshka reached out for the food, but Shanalorre intercepted her. "No, Yoshka, Binder Lolilyuri picks first," she said gently. The little girl pouted, but put her hands down as Lori picked one of the bowls, a cup and some bread. "Now you may get food. Blow on it first, it''s hot."


    "That one! I want that one!" the little girl declared, pointing towards one of the bowls of hearty soup, and Shanalorre patiently took the bowl and moved it in front of her cousin. "And that one!" She pointed towards one of the pieces of bread near the bottom of the stack. Shanalorre carefully pried up the rest of the bread and pulled that piece out, handing it to her cousin. "Thank you!"


    "You''re welcome," Riz said, smiling at the child.


    "Very welcome," Mikon said, doing the same.


    "Yoshka, no. Don''t dip the whole thing into your soup," Shanalorre said as she prevented her cousin from doing exactly that. "Tear it into pieces like this." She took a piece of bread and a bowl for herself¡ªleaving the last of both for Rian¡ªand demonstrated, tearing off small bits of the flat bread and dipping it into the soup. "There, see? No, no, not like that, your pieces are too small. Tear off the bread, don''t pull it out so hard. Here, let me do it for you."


    As Shanalorre patiently showed her cousin how to eat, Lori saw Rian looking at the two with a strange look on his face.


    "Rian, eat," she pointedly reminded him.


    He blinked, glancing towards her, then back towards his food. "Right, right. Eating, your Bindership." He ate, but his eyes remained fixed on the two next to Lori.


    Lori shook her head, focusing on her own food, even as she glanced sideways, watching Shanalorre gently, patiently, and seemingly happily teach her cousin about the intricacies of eating soup with bread. "Rian, how many more of the houses have been finished?"


    Rian blinked, then visibly had to make himself turn his attention to her. "Well, work has sort of stopped on the last three, but if we ask them to divert some work into it, the roofs should be finished with another day or two of work. Though I should mention that we''ve exhausted nearly all our store of cured wood."


    "Nearly all?"


    "I had them set aside a reserve for repairing the door of the dungeon in the event of something unexpectedly damaging happening to it, just in case something happened while you were asleep during one and we had to build something to defend ourselves in the time it would take to wake you up. And it might be useful for other things."


    Lori stared at him for a moment, but that made just enough sense that she eventually nodded. "Fine. I''ll cure what wood I can tomorrow, and again when we get back home next time. In the meantime, have one of the empty beds in the shelter moved to one of the finished houses. The one currently most fit for habitation."


    "That would be the one the petitioners didn''t pick. It''s got doors and shutters on its windows, but it''s pretty bare, and it doesn''t have much in the way of anything inside."


    "See that the bed is transferred first thing tomorrow," Lori said. "Shanalorre will need her new house to be livable."


    Rian blinked and next to Lori, Shanalorre suddenly turned away from her cousin. "What?" he and Shana managed to say at the same time, even if not with the same inflection.


    "I''m assigning you a new permanent residence," Lori said. "You are still a Dungeon Binder. I will not have you sleeping in emergency housing, now that you will be permanently residing in my demesne."


    Shanlorre stared at her. "May I invite some other people to stay with me?"

 272 - Shanalorres House

    "This is your house now," Lori told Shanalorre the next morning after breakfast. The bed Shanalorre had been using in the shelter up to now was being carried inside by four burly men and Rian. He¡­ honestly didn''t seem to be of any help whatsoever. "Once the bed is inside, I''ll build you a table. Do you know where you can get wood for your fireplace?"


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said, standing next to Lori.


    "Once they finish moving in your bed, and I''ve finished with your table, the carpenters can start to work on installing some shelving for you, so you can put your things there. Tell them where you want the shelves installed." She''d have to assist so that the wood can be secured to the stone walls. "Remember to keep the shutters and doors closed, lest bugs and chokers get in. If there are leaks or any other problems, inform Rian, and it will probably be repaired eventually."


    "I understand, Great Binder."


    Next to Shanalorre, her cousin was looking at the stone house curiously, glancing at the identical houses on either side. "This big house is all Shana''s now?"


    "No, Yoshka, just the one in the middle," Shanalorre said patiently. "It''s many houses built next to each other, so it looks big. Our new house is that one." She pointed. "Do you want to see inside?"


    The little girl nodded, and without waiting for her cousin headed towards the door, where the men carrying the bed¡ªand Rian¡ªhad managed to get it inside.


    Lori glanced at the other Dungeon Binder. "Are you sure about this? Speaking from experience, having so many people in your home every day can be greatly irritating."


    "They''re my friends," Shanalorre said, as if that actually explained something. "And besides, while I am admittedly a terrible Dungeon Binder, it should be within my capabilities to provide at least these few under my care shelter and comfort." A pause. "Well, comfort, at the very least, as I had no direct hand at the shelter. But the opportunity presented itself, so I should take advantage of it. My original intention was to slowly have everyone move to the shelter when they''ve become used to the demesne so as not to exhaust the welcome of our friends, but this is better. It allows the other children to be relatively near the people they know, it''s more private than the shelter, and it won''t impugn on the few people still residing in the shelter, so they will not have to worry about the presence of children."


    Well¡­ Lori supposed she could understand that reasoning. "You should probably enter and direct how the bed should be oriented," she instead advised. "Otherwise you might have to move it yourself."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Ah, yes. Thank you for the suggestion, Great Binder. I should do that." She hurried inside after her cousin as Lori patiently waited outside with the pile of stone and her stone-shaping tool that she was going to use to build Shanalorre''s table.


    When the men finally left, giving her a nod or bow in passing, Lori finally entered the now less-crowded house.


    Her immediate impression was that it was a bit dark. Even with the door and window shutters open, the inside of the house had a certain gloom to it, which she didn''t think had been present in any of the previous houses. Both the individual ones, and the row across the road had both seemed far brighter inside with the doors and windows open. Shanalorre''s cousin was looking around curiously, but from expression she was clearly disappointed. The bed had been placed parallel to one of the long walls, but some distance away from the fireplace, presumably so that it would be within the cone of heat the fireplace would be radiating. Shanalorre was also looking around, but her gaze seemed more assessing, and she was looking down at the ground for some reason.


    "Yeah, it''s a bit dark," Rian said, standing off the one side and looking around and up. Lori followed his gaze, starring up the beams and rafters of the roof above. Thankfully, there were no obvious points of light on the roof signifying some sort of leak. "It''s the angle, the fronts of the houses are facing the wrong way for the sunlight to really get in here for most of the day. If I''d known, I''d have suggested putting windows in the back on either side of the fireplace." He nodded towards the wall in question.


    "Does it really matter?"


    "Well, it makes it harder to keep the house properly swept if they can''t really see the floor. And while most people work outside or in the Dungeon, there are some people who have work that can''t be done there. The chandler''s been making soap around his house for months now since he doesn''t have anywhere else." He snapped his fingers. "Which reminds me, a few people have been making inquiries as to where it might be possible for them to have workspaces separate from their homes. Some, like the chandler in question, needs to boil ashes, which¡­ well, that''s dangerous."


    Lori frowned. Another thing she had to build. "I''ll consider the matter. Regardless, it will have to wait until we return on the next shift. Has Shanalorre said where she wants the shelves to be?"


    Shanalorre looked up from her contemplations. "Yes, Great Binder," she said, gesturing towards the wall opposite the bed. "As to the table, could it please be installed over there, in that corner near the window? If I need to use it, the window will best provide light there. Even at night, I believe the lights you placed outside will be sufficient for me to see the writing on the planks."


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    Lori stared at her. Then she turned towards Rian.


    "She volunteered to help me, and has actually been able to," Rian said, shrugging. "Which is a great relief. Yllian''s not around to help collate the inventory numbers for me, and it gives her something to do that''s useful to the demesne but isn''t too taxing. And I must repeat, she volunteered."


    "You said that already."


    "I felt it was important, so I repeated it."


    Lori shook her head, then turned back to Shanalorre. "Do you have a bath bucket?"


    "Not yet, Great Binder."


    "Go to the carpenters and correct that. Do so for the other children as well, and see to it that they''re issued soap, as well as stress to them that the soap should be conserved."


    "The children should also be shown the laundry area," Rian interjected. "And either they''ll need to learn to wash their own clothes, or have someone wash their clothes for them, which seems a bit much to ask from the parents who already have children. Unless you want to ask the apprentice newlyweds to do it? Make it part of their training?"


    "Do it," Lori agreed.


    "Make the newlyweds regret the idea of children, got it," Rian said. "Shanalorre, why don''t I help you and Yoshka go and get your things from the shelter so we''re get out of Binder Lori''s way while she makes you a nice new table? She probably won''t be done by the time we get back, but at the very least she can get started. Then you can go show the other children the baths."


    "The help would be appreciated, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said. "Come Yoshka, let''s get your things from the shelter an bring it back here. We''ll be sleeping here with the others from now on."


    He started following after them. "You don''t need to call me ''lord'', Shana. Just ''Rian'' will do. You too, Yoshka."


    "Yes, Lord Rian."


    "Shana, I feel like you''re mocking me."


    "Not at all, Lord Rian."


    "There''s that feeling again¡­"


    Their voices faded with distance. Lori took a moment to prepare a weak binding that will start warming the wood in the curing shed. It wouldn''t be close to a proper cure, but it would prepare the conditions inside the shed, and she could fairly safely leave it unattended so she could make the table, then start curing things properly when she was done. With the binding in place, she went outside to retrieve the stone she''d taken from the stockpile and move it into Shanalorre''s new house.


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    It took two trips to retrieve all of Shanalorre and her cousin''s things from the shelter. They first brought along the bedrolls and blankets, and furs that Shanalorre had used to stay warm the previous winter, then went back for the clothes and other personal effects, such as the bucket.


    Lori had managed to finish the basic shape of the table, though after Shanalorre had come back the first time she''d lowered it slightly so it would be of a size with the other Dungeon Binder. For Lori it would have been just short enough to be mildly irritating.


    "Oh no," Rian said the second time they''d come back, with the clothes and smaller effects, "she''s making another sacrificial altar." At the words, Shanalorre''s cousin looked at what Lori was making curiously.


    "It''s not an altar, it''s a table," Lori snapped at her lord. She gestured towards the stone she was slowly pulling outwards from the central portion, so that it would have enough of an overhang for legs to fit under it when a person was seated on some sort of chair and strong enough to support their weight if they sat on it. Also, she realized Shanalorre would need some kind of chair. Or at least a stool of some sort. "How is this an altar? There are no grooves for blood and other fluids to drain down, no drain holes that let those fluids be caught in a bucket, no hole for setting the fire to burn the sacrifices¡­ it''s not that my tables look like altars, it''s that altars look like tables!"


    "You say that, but the fact it looks like an altar and can only be found in my house, and now Shana''s house, is going to set people talking and making up rumors. Again," Rian said. "Thankfully most everyone can count, so they don''t think we''re sacrificing people, but still."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "We don''t have nearly enough condemned criminals to make that viable." Then she frowned. "Wait, are there people expecting that sort of thing?"


    "No, most people are from edge communities. If they did sacrifices, it was a few symbolic handfuls of grain and a cup of booze, maybe a small beast when they were having a particularly prosperous time. I think sacrifices like that are a more central practice. If there are any Dungeon worshippers, no one seems to feel strongly enough to make a spectacle of it, or ask to make an official event."


    "I know a few people who moved here do praise the Dungeons for their blessings," Shanalorre said. "However, as militia they have a less fervent view of the practice."


    "So¡­ is it an altar or a table?" Shanalorre''s cousin asked, sounding confused.


    "It''s a table," Lori insisted. "Rian, make sure Shanalorre has a stool she can use with this."


    "I''ll put that on the list of things I wished you''d told me before you gave Shanalorre a house," Rian said dryly. "Don''t worry, we''ll take care of it."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Now, I have to finish this so I can get on to curing wood¡­"


    "And that''s the sound of you being kicked out of your own home, Shana. Come on, let''s go and not bother her Bindership. Why don''t you show everyone where they can get soap?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian. Come, Yoshka."


    Lori nodded in approval, already going back to working on the table. Ah, being back in her demesne was so great! She didn''t have to touch the stone at all, so her hands were free to use her stone-shaping tool.


    Humming happily to herself, she eventually managed to finish with the table, taking the rest of the unused stone outside with her. For a moment, she was tempted to just leave it outside, but she sighed and took it back to the stone stockpile outside of her Dungeon. This was her demesne, she couldn''t let it be slovenly, after all.


    Then she headed towards the wood curing shed, and sat outside it as she cured wood for the rest of the day, listening to the familiar sounds of the saw pit as they cut logs into beams and planks, and watched the sky turn gray, once more about to rain.


    It did rain, but she had on her hat and rain coat, which she buttoned closed. The falling water dulled the sounds of the sawpit, but they didn''t cease working. Fortunately, the rain wasn''t so thick that the glow of the lightwisps she''d anchored around her demesne''s building became visible, and the downpour soon ceased, though the sky remained overcast.


    Outside of the wood curing shed, Lori continued to sit, the water that her raincoat and hat hadn''t repelled pleasantly warm on her skin, and simply smiled, thinking of the future.

 273 - Shanalorres Rock

    The rest of the day was unremarkable as Lori cured the wood in the shed. Nearby, people were moving in and out of the firewood dehydrator shed¡ªthough in practice it was a wood drying shed¡ªputting in cut but wet branches and deadfall, and taking out dry pieces to bring back to their homes. When it was time for dinner, Lori took a moment to take a detour, walking briefly along the riverbank on the other side of the flood barrier. The water level had gone back to the way it had been when they''d arrived the year before, revealing small stones, plants, and short stalks of new ropeweed that were already growing quickly.


    Lori found what she was looking for and finally headed back to her room to take a bath and dry her clothes.


    When she came back down, she was bemused to find that the table next to hers was full of children. The brat was there, as was Shanalorre and her cousin, so Lori assumed that the others were the ones they had brought from River''s Fork yesterday. However, there were too many children at the table for that. She might have difficulty remembering people''s faces, but she could count, and there hadn''t nearly been this many children yesterday. Some of them were probably local children, then.


    "Rian, what''s going on?" she said, the din at her back slightly irritating as she put down her game board and started setting up for a game of chatrang. Next to Riz, Mikon smiled when she saw the board.


    "Shanalorre gathered the new children together, then went around asking if the other children could eat with them," Rian said, leaning on one elbow, knuckles resting on his jaw as he watched over Lori''s shoulder, head slightly tilted. Next to him, Umu also seemed to be watching the children. "I think this is her way of helping them adjust, making sure they''re around people they know and helping them make friends." How would forcing them through the terrible ordeal of ''making friends'' possibly help? "I think she also plans to invite some more to sleep over at her house tonight, so that sleeping at her house seems more like a fun gathering than a refugee camp."


    Lori glanced over her shoulder. There were some game boards on the tables, and the children seemed more intent on those than getting food. No one seemed to be getting food. "No one seems to be getting food."


    "Well, it''s the first night, some flaws in the process are to be expected." He glanced towards the kitchen. "Speaking of which, it''s my turn tonight to get food tonight. Excuse me¡­"


    Rian stood up to fetch the food, accompanied by Umu. Lori wasn''t exactly sure what arrangement they had to decide whose turn it was, since it was never the same pair all the time, so there was probably some sort of rotation involved, but she''d never really paid enough attention to figure it out. Given the din behind her, it sounded like Shanalorre was gathering everyone to have them get food as well.


    She and Mikon had begun a game by the time Rian and Umu came back with the food. Lori took one of the bowls and some bread. "So, what do you have to report?"


    "The carpenters have started working on Shanalorre''s shelves. They said they can do the mounts for shelves tomorrow, if you''ll be there to soften the stone," Rian said, letting the other three get their own bowls first before he took the last one. "Do you think you have time to before we leave?"


    Lori frowned, then sighed. "Fine. After breakfast, we''ll bury the mount in the walls. Is the boat ready to go again?" She reached out and moved her Mentalist into a defensive position.


    "Everything''s been resupplied, and Dormin was willing to come back to try to hunt more food for the demesne. Although with the seels finally coming back, it''s been suggested it might be safer to have people seeling for meat instead, since they can do it from inside the demesne''s borders."


    "Does anyone there know how to seel?"


    "The children from the families who used to live here? Though I wouldn''t suggest having them do it. Or at least, not just them, since their parents will probably try to hide the meat and keep it for themselves, or worse."


    Lori grunted as Mikon moved one of her militia. "Who''s available to learn seeling so that they can do it, then?"


    "Unfortunately, there''s not a lot of people to spare in River''s Fork to do that," Rian said. "They still need to finish planting the fields¡ªthankfully there''s still enough grain for that¡ªas well as clearing more land to plant more crops, since the land they currently have is just barely more than what they originally had when their old Binder was alive. And the only reason that was enough was because he used Deadspeaking to accelerate the harvest."


    "Wouldn''t that deplete their supplies of grain even further?"


    "With the fruits, the seels, the hunting, and what grain is left after planting, they should survive until harvest provided we can stop the stealing¡­ admittedly, that''s a very optimistic prediction. If we can spare some tubers for them to plant, that''s another source of food for the demesne¡­ provided that no one tries to steal or hoard it."


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    "You know, since we started tending to River''s Fork, you have increasingly assumed the worst in the people there," Lori noted. She also moved one of her militia. It would be threatened soon, but in her next move she''d put her Whisperer near it.


    "Yes, I know. Depressingly, people stealing and hoarding things is something I''m familiar with." Rian sighed heavily. "Hopefully when they''re eating regularly and have a secure supply of food, they''ll stop this behavior."


    "How likely is that?"


    "Please don''t ask, I don''t want to think about it."


    "So¡­ you''re procrastinating."


    "I can only deal with so many problems at once. I''ll leave these hypothetical future problems for when they become more definite nearly-today problems."


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    Lori was almost finished with dinner when Shanalorre approached her, standing respectfully to the side as she waited to be acknowledged.


    "What is it?" Lori said as she tapped her Deadspeaker to revive one of her fallen militia, placing the revived piece where it could act defensively.


    "Great Binder, I have a request," Shanalorre said.


    "Hmm?" Lori ''hmm''-ed, glancing sideways at her subordinate. "What request?"


    "If possible, I wish to remain here instead of returning to River''s Fork tomorrow. The children have not yet properly adjusted to the living conditions here, and I believe it would be best if I were to remain to help them acclimate. In addition, I also do not wish to leave Yoshka unattended in a new place."


    Lori nodded, still waiting for Mikon to make her counter move. "Yes, I agree. You should stay here to take care of the children. What resources will you need?"


    Shanalorre hesitated. "I shouldn''t need any resources. The intent is to get them acclimated to living in the demesne, as well as helping them deal with being separated from their families and sleeping in an unfamiliar environment."


    Lori nodded, then reached down into her belt pouch. She felt around, and pulled out a rock. "Here, take¡ª" She glanced at the rock. "¡ªno, wait, this is my rock with Yllian''s name." Putting the rock down at the table, where Rian was giving the rock an exasperated look, Lori searched through her belt pouch again. "Ah, here it is." She drew out a rounded river rock, one end a smooth ovoid, the other consisting of ridges that have had their edges smoothed by water over an unknown period of time. "I''ve been meaning to give this to you."


    "A¡­ rock, Great Binder?"


    Lori held up the rock, anchoring passing lightwisps to it, which she then began to imbue. She reached out through her connection to the core towards the other bindings of lightwisps in the demesne, checking them for reference, before configuring the binding on lightwisps anchored to the rock. It began to glow as she imbued it, and she held out the rock towards Shanalorre. "Here."


    With the dining hall already brightly lit by lightwisps, the glow from the rock wasn''t really all that blinding, and was simply a slightly brighter glow in the air. Shanalorre hesitantly took the rock. "Thank you, Great Binder."


    "It''s for your house," Lori explained. "To help illuminate it should you need to work on Rian''s numbers. When you plan to go to sleep, simply put your bucket over it to obscure the light."


    "Ah¡­ I understand then, Great Binder. I''m sure it will be very useful. Thank you again."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "I will be coming by later to attach lights to the outside of the house, since I had neglected to do so while they were being constructed. In the meantime, sit. I still need to speak to you."


    Shanalorre nodded, turning to someone behind Lori. "I will just speak to Binder Lolilyuri for a moment, everyone. Why don''t you all go to the baths? I will meet with you all there when I am finished. Karina, could you please help Yoshka until then?"


    "Sure. Come on, Yoshka, let''s go and do as Shana says," Lori heard the brat say as there was an outburst of excitement from the other new children at the idea of taking another warm bath again. Mikon finally made her move, using her Mentalist to remove Lori''s Horotract. Lori winced, but had resigned herself to that happening.


    She heard the din the children were making recede as they all started moving away towards the entrance of her Dungeon. Shanalorre started to take a seat next to Lori, hesitated, then walked around the table to sit on Umu''s other side.


    "What did you wish to speak of, Great Binder?" she said, holding the glowing rock that Lori was still imbuing so that it was covered by her hands.


    "In addition to the inventory matters that Rian has you doing," Lori said, "I am making you directly responsible for the wellbeing of the new children. That means making arrangements for bath buckets to be built for them, and to have some of our leather stores be used to make them proper footwear. Rian, see to it that the carpenters and¡­ uh, whoever else know that I''m authorizing Shanalorre to make these arrangements."


    "Got it, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. "If she needs help, I''m sure Karina can tell her who to find for what she needs."


    Lori nodded, still focused on Shanalorre. "In addition, I want you to supervise having more tubers planted where there''s space, in preparation for transferring them to be grown to River''s Fork for additional food."


    "I¡­ see."


    "It shouldn''t be difficult to find time to plant some things in the ground. Just do as much as you can while we''re gone. Use your own judgement as to how to proceed, and limit yourself to a reasonable expenditure of resources."


    "Ah¡­"


    "By supervise, you mean not actually do it herself, right?" Rian said. "Who can she ask for help?"


    "I''ll leave that to her discretion, provided it''s for this planting," Lori said.


    "I¡­ will do what I can, Great Binder."


    "Excellent." Lori turned towards the game she was still playing with Mikon. "That will be all, then. You are dismissed. I''ll be out to anchor lightwisps outside your house when I finish here."


    It had been some time since she''d played chatrang, and she was going to enjoy herself.


    "Well¡­ congratulations, I suppose?" Rian said to Shanalorre, sounding unsure. "You finally got your own glowing rock too. How long before Yllians gets one, do you think?"


    Lori paused. Then she sighed. She supposed she''d have to find a rock tomorrow¡­

 274 - Suffering Marriage Problems

    After installing the mounts for Shanalorre''s shelves for when the carpenters finished building them, it was back to River''s Fork after breakfast. Handing Yllian his rock¡ªshe''d carved his name on it so he''d know it was his, although it probably wasn''t visible to him because of the glow¡ªLori then went back to the mine to continue excavating the dragon shelter. The stone masons were absent at the moment, since right now they would only get in the way as she excavated, and they had already finished with the food storage area.


    Lori was moving a batch of stone outside when she heard the disturbance from the mine entrance. Riz''s voice was being calm but firm, and an annoyingly familiar voice was being loud and angry.


    "¡ªwill know what has happened to my niece!" the angry voice said as Lori approached the mine, the softened stone rolling and undulating in ahead of her and slightly to the side, the staff pressed against it so she could maintain her connection. "Where is she?"


    "I''ve been telling you, she''d back in Lorian," Riz said. "Where else would she be? Now you know, so stop trying to bother the Great Binder."


    Lori finally finished pushing the stone out of the mine, pushing it outside to the new stockpile she had started outside the mine''s entrance.


    "And I''m supposed to believe that?"


    Setting the stone in place, she turned to head back into the mine and return to work.


    "Well, if you''re not going to believe anything I say, then there''s no point talking to you further, is there?"


    Before she left to go back home in a few days, she''d probably need to reform the stone to be properly thick and defensive¡ª no, wait, she should probably enclose the water wheel so that nothing could fall on it. Perhaps find a way to keep dragonborn abominations from getting into the mine through the vent¡­


    "I''m not here to talk to you, I''m here to talk to her! You! Where is my niece, woman?"


    She continued on with her work, fantasizing about how easy this would be if she had a connection to the demesne''s core¡ª


    "Don''t ignore me, you glittering¡ª!"


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    Lori hated eating in River''s Fork''s dining hall. The tables and benches were all slightly unstable, and she couldn''t tell if it was because of the way they were made or because the ground was uneven. It was nothing like her nice solid table back home and her nice solid bench. The dining hall was cold and drafty, and if she didn''t have a binding of firewisps around her it would have been far more irritating. In addition, the bread was slightly charred and smaller than the one they served at home, and the soup was a bit bland.


    "There you are!"


    This was not the end of the annoyances.


    Lori turned to look from her food at the exclamation approaching her from behind her as Riz and Rian stood up from the bench across from her. She heard the bench at the table behind her scrape slightly before it sudden fell over, likely having caught something on the ground. One hand wrapped around her staff as she stood up, remembering how random attacks on Dungeon Binders were dangerously common in this demesne and why had she agreed to this again, ah, right, she had needed a healer.


    It was annoying that she could finally recognize Shanalorre''s uncle''s face. Still, he clearly wasn''t as annoying as Landoor, because she only knew his face and not his name. The volunteers who had accompanied them from her demesne stepped into his path, keeping him from getting any closer to Lori as people looked up from their meals.


    "Where''s my niece?-!" he demanded. He raised his hand and pointed dramatically, but Lori just stepped forward and wrapped her fist around his finger, clenching tightly to trap it in place. Using the leverage to twist his wrist palm up, she pulled his finger back so that it pointed down. "Argh!"


    "I feel that a reminder is in order that I am not Binder Shanalorre," Lori said, her grip on his extremity forcing him to keep his arm outstretched. "I am not weak and inexperienced and lax with discipline. I will not suffer being addressed in that manner. Or at all, for that matter. If you have something to say, say it to Rian or¡ª" she wanted to reach for her belt pouch and check her rock, but the one she did that with was currently holding a finger, and trying to reach with her other hand would be awkward, "¡ªYllian, and if it''s in any way relevant they will inform me." Oh, she hoped she''d gotten that name right. People could be so unreasonable about their names being remembered correctly.


    She shifted her grip, pulling his finger back even further as he let out a pained cry and tried to twist his arm sideways to a more comfortable position, and failed. "Now, you have my attention. Think very carefully about what you wish to say now that you have it, or I will break your knee, and it will be several days before Shanalorre returns to be able to heal it." She did not release his finger. "Well? What do you have to say?"


    He glared at her, his teeth bared and gritted together as his other hand kept opening and clenching into a fist, though that was probably because of her grip on his finger. "Where is my niece?" he finally managed to say.


    "In my demesne, obviously. Where else would she be?"


    "And why is she there? Before, she always accompanied you, but now she suddenly decides to stay away from her home?"


    "...she decided it was important that she see to the comfort and well-being of the children whose parents sent them to live there for their safety, and so requested to stay so that she could see to it that they adjust to their new circumstances," Lori said flatly. "The children from here who would now be living away from their parents and might need reassurance? I believe she also didn''t want to leave her cousin unattended."


    He continued to make angry faces at her. "What assurance do we have that our Binder will remain safe in your demesne, then?"


    Lori stared at him, something she''d only felt once before filling her. "What''s your name?"


    The man actually looked offended she had asked. "You know who I am, woma¡ªARGH!"


    Lori turned towards Rian as she bent the finger back even further. "Rian, what is this absolute idiot''s name?"


    "His name''s Lasponin, your Bindership," Rian said with a cheerful smile. Lori vaguely recognized it as the one for when he was being deliberately annoying.


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    The feeling attached to the name. Lori nodded, turning back to her captive, who''d tried to kick her in her moment''s inattention and found his legs were coming up short. He''d continue to unless he was willing to endure more pain by bending his arm to get closer. "Congratulations, Lasponin. You''ve just declared yourself so stupid I need to remember your name to keep you away from anything vital and important." The man managed to sputter indignantly while still pained by the pressure on his finger. "To answer your question, since you are obviously not smart enough to deduce the answer yourself, there is no assurance that Shanalorre will be safe. The only reason she still lives is because she can heal. Once I have managed to deduce how to utilize Deadspeaking and do the same, I will have no further need of her, and will be able to finalize her submission and surrender by taking this demesne''s core."


    He gaped at her, then yelled out, "Did you fools all hear that?-! She said it herself! She intends to kill her! She''s no different from Grem!"


    Lori stared at him again. "Yllian," she said over her shoulder.


    "Yes, Great Binder." Oh good, she had gotten his name right.


    "Have you told Shanalorre''s aunt how she made the proposal to surrender this demesne to me?"


    "¡­yes, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded, then turned back towards the absolute idiot. "I think your marriage is suffering problems, Lasponin," she said, "if your wife neglected to inform you of that relevant detail. However, for your edification, Binder Shanalorre slit her wrist with a knife as part of her offer to surrender this demesne to me." Lori shook her head. "I still don''t understand why she did that. Her life is worth more than all of yours, so why be willing to lose it?"


    "Perhaps," Rian said blandly, his voice stripped of the annoying cheer of before, "she was following the precedent set by her predecessors?"


    Lori snorted disdainfully. "Precedent," she said, the word dripping with scorn. She took a deep breath, then shrugged. "Well, regardless of the reason, she was already willing to lose her life simply to have her core vacant for me to claim, simply so that I would have a reason to take care of all of you people. She lives only because I need a healer. When I have no need of her in that capacity anymore, I will take her up on her original offer." She tilted her head. "Well, perhaps that counts as some sort of assurance, after all."


    "Probably not, your Bindership," Rian said. "He doesn''t look very assured."


    "Yes, well, he''s an idiot. Obviously, these matters are above his capabilities to comprehend."


    "Liar! That¡­ she wouldn''t¡ª"


    Lori had no problem with bending her arm without losing her grip on his finger so she could get close enough to give him a resounding kick in the shin. "Never doubt my word again," she snapped as he cried out in pain from his leg, then cried out again as his change in posture to take pressure off his legs caused him to put more pressure on the finger in her grip. "An idiot like you isn''t worth lying to. Why bother, when the truth is clearly enough to baffle your limited faculties?"


    A thought occurred to her, and she frowned. "How did you ever manage to become a doctor? I know it''s not Deadspeaking, but doesn''t it at least require functional thought?" Shaking her head, Lori shoved him away¡ªby his finger, for one last burst of pain¡ªand picked up her staff as he recovered himself, hefting it in her hands.


    "Your Bindership, if you don''t finish your food soon, it will grow cold and congeal," Rian said. "And you still have more digging to do on the dragon shelter, remember?"


    Lori considered his words as she eyed the idiotic malcontent. Finally, she said, "Get out of my sight so I can eat and get back to work, or I will beat you to instill the discipline that Shanalorre clearly failed to."


    "And we won''t tell Yoshka you asked about if her cousin was safe before you even bothered to find out if she was alive," Rian said with that cheerfulness that was specifically for being annoying. "Though you should really do something about this blatant favoritism of yours. You''re going to make your daughter sad if she ever finds out you clearly like Shana more than you do her."


    There were some chuckles at Rian''s words as Lasponin somehow still managed an indignant glare at Lori. "I''ll have you know that I was a doctor in the militia."


    "Lord Yllian, would this level of discipline pass muster in the militia?" Rian said loudly, his voice still filled with that annoying cheerfulness. "Especially for a doctor?"


    "It would not, Lord Rian."


    "Ah, I see. Hypothetically speaking, if the doctor were still in the militia, how would such a glaring lapse be corrected?"


    "Well, officially, his superior officer would call him up and tell him exactly how much of an embarrassment to the militia he is. Normally, an officer would be expected to avoid colorful language, but in such an instance, colorful language would be inevitable to illustrate exactly how deep in the shit pit he is. After this reprimand, he''d receive his punishment, which could start from typical labor so he stays out of trouble, but could go all the way up to beatings, lashings, canings, crucifixion¡­"


    "Isn''t that last one execution by a slow death from asphyxiation?"


    "Not if you get him down before he dies."


    "Ah. Good point. And unofficially?"


    "That''s only if he survives the beatings from everyone who takes offense at his behavior and don''t want the officers to think they just stood by and did nothing."


    "Ah. Well, fortunately, for the doctor, he''s a civilian now and doesn''t have a superior officer¡­ well, save for his wife, anyway. Still, by that reasoning, I suppose everyone should just get back to their food and let her deal with him." There was a pause. Lori hadn''t taken her eyes of Lasponin. "Out of curiosity, was she ever in the militia?"


    "Oh, course. They met there."


    "Ah. Well, I''m sure she''ll remember that the standards of militia discipline shouldn''t apply here."


    "¡­if you say so, Lord Rian."


    Had this been a story, Lori would have contemptuously turned her back on Lasponin and gone on with her meal, confident he was cowed as he stared ineffectually at her back to show how weak he was. That even if he clearly desired to attack her from behind, he was too much of a coward to go through with it without complete surprise on his side, and he''d scurry away before there was a scene transition or something.


    Lori, because she wasn''t a fool, didn''t do this. Instead, she reversed her staff so that the thick metal butt was pointed up, one hand holding the staff near the middle and the other gripping the staff lower down, near what would usually be its head. In this configuration, it was nothing so much as a very long, mace-headed club.


    Still glaring at her, he hastily fled, abandoning the dining hall entirely to retreat out among the houses.


    "Las, that''s not the way back to your house!" someone in the crowd yelled out, and there was some more scattered laughter.


    Lori lowered her staff, orienting it the right way around. In the table next to her, the volunteers all finally sat down. Glancing around at the scant few other tables, many of whom were still staring at her, she finally spotted Shanalorre''s aunt, whose frown smoothed as she saw Lori looking at her. The Dungeon Binder turned to look over everyone again. Many were also still watching her, their expressions harder to make out, but none were smiling.


    She claimed some airwisps, binding them to raise the volume of her voice slightly so that she would be heard. "In case you missed the specifics," she said, "Binder Shanalorre did not remain in my primary demesne because of some nefarious plot on my part to kill her, because I wouldn''t need such a thing if that were my intention. She stayed behind to make sure your children are safe, properly supplied, and could adjust to living and sleeping in a place without you." She snorted. If their roles were reversed, she wouldn''t have wasted her time doing such things on the behalf of these ingrates. Shanalorre is a far better Dungeon Binder than they deserved.


    Not that she''d say that out loud.


    Rian clapped his hands twice, cupping them so they made deeper sound. "All right, everyone, show''s over," he said. "Let''s all get back to our food and try not to think of the fact that your little Dungeon Binder nearly committed suicide to keep you all from dying of starvation because some of you were stealing your own food like greedy bugs. Don''t think about it and just eat. Sahil, why don''t you complain this isn''t enough food, that will liven everything up."


    Lori sat down, picked up her spoon, and went back to eating. She grimaced as the food entered her mouth. It had gotten cold, and already the feeling was gritty as things congealed. Sighing, she rubbed her hands together until they felt intensely warm, and claimed the firewisps that the friction had generated to reheat her bowl.

 SS3.1 – "What If (nearly) EVERYONE In Lorian But Lori And Rian Was An Isekai?" Part 1

    "You¡­ want me to be your lord?" Rian asked.


    "Yes, that''s what I just said."


    "Uh¡­ why me? I mean, there are other people¡­"


    "I need a leader. Someone people listen to and can convince them to work."


    "Again, there are other people," Rian argued. He seemed well aware that many of those people were likely listening in as they spoke. "There''s Mary Sue over there¡ª"


    "It''s Marissa!"


    Rian ignored the interruption, though it made Lori twitch. "¡ªSeraphine and her friends, Katherine over there is clearly the leader of her group, Mara is clearly respected¡­ even Hatarine would be a good choice."


    "Eh? Did someone say my name?"


    "Go back to eating, Hatarine," Rian called out.


    "Okay!"


    "While that may be true," Lori said, "they are all clearly leaders of their particular group. That will skew their priorities." While she knew nepotism and factionalism were inevitable in any hierarchy, since there was a way to avoid such problems at the outset of her demesne, she''d intended to take it. "While I know nepotism and factionalism are inevitable in any hierarchy, since I have a way to avoid such problems at the outset of my demesne, I intend to take it."


    "And that way is¡­?"


    "Having you as my lord," Lori said. "You are clearly unaffiliated with the multiple groups that make up the settlement party, but have good relations with them¡­ even that group who all speak that strange regional dialect that seems to have no relation at all to proper speech." She heard some isolated areas were like that, where the residents'' colloquial idiosyncrasies had gone uncorrected for so long that what they spoke was nigh-unintelligible. Fortunately, education was wiping out such deviations, though clearly these edge-dwellers hadn''t had that benefit.


    "I''m sure they''re all perfectly eloquent in their own dialect," Rian said. "But if you needed someone like that, why not ask Lee Fei?"


    "Besides the fact she''s clearly a Mentalist pretending not to be, and doing very badly at it?"


    "Yes, besides that."


    "She''s a Mentalist," Lori said. "I can''t trust her to not kill me and take my core to make this her own demesne."


    "Why?"


    Lori stared at him. "Why what?"


    "Why can''t you trust her to not kill you?" Rian said. "I mean, she hasn''t struck me as particularly violent, hateful, or envious, so why would you think she''d want to kill you just to take this demesne away from you? I mean," he waved in his arm out in an arc, as if trying to gesture at the world, "it''s not that far of a walk to find unclaimed land. If she wanted to, all she''d need to do is walk for maybe half a day and she could have her own demesne. And if she really wanted to take this place from you, it would be smarter of her to do that first, so she could at least match you at an almost equal level. The fact she hasn''t and has mostly been helping out dig pits for latrines and helped with excavating the dungeon should be a good indicator she''s not out to murder you."


    Those¡­ were all very fair and reasonable arguments, and Lori didn''t care. This was her life. "No. Be that as it may, I would feel safer if she wasn''t constantly close to me."


    "You realize she''s sitting right there," Rian said, pointing diagonally over his left shoulder and towards where a young woman whose short hair straddled the line between light brown and pale red sat. "And can probably hear you."


    Lori stared at him. "So?"


    He stared back at her, then eventually sighed for some reason. "All right¡­ say I agree to be your lord¡­ what will the position entail?"


    "You''re capable and can get people to work. People listen to you. Your job will be to keep all of us from dying because we''re out of food or out of wood or someone''s son has slept with someone''s daughter because there''s nothing else to do around here and people are taking wood axes to heads."


    "¡­yes, that last is looking disturbingly likely," he said, glancing towards the table where many of the black-haired young men who all spoke the same unintelligible dialect all sat, making faces at the food as they ate. One of them saw him and shouted something in a tone that was probably supposed to be dramatic, pointing at him with a frown.


    "You are also not affiliated with any of the established groups, but seem to get along with them, and you were the one who organized excavating the cave for the Dungeon."


    "Well, it needed to be done," he said. "The sooner we had a Dungeon protecting us, the safer everyone would have been. And if we helped, you''d be able to keep us safe with the water break while we worked."


    "And the patrols keeping watch for wild beasts?"


    "That''s just common sense. There are dangerous beasts out there and we didn''t have a Dungeon to protect us yet. Besides, it gave some of the hotheads something to focus on and kept us in meat."


    "And the woodcutting parties?"


    "Well, we needed wood, didn''t we? Someone had to do it, and those guys weren''t doing anything and didn''t mind being asked."


    "Well, Rian, I need more of that," Lori said. "I need to get people to work while I keep everyone safe. Everyone keeps looking at me like I''m going to set them on fire."


    "Well, you do glare at people a lot," he said. "Especially when you''re muttering about drowning people or setting them on fire."


    Oh dear. Had she said those things out loud?


    "Don''t worry, I told them you were just cranky because you had wet socks," Rian said. "You''re always cranky when your socks get wet."


    The words were pulled out of her with rusty hooks. "Thank you," she managed to push out.


    "You''re welcome," he said cheerfully. "We''re all in this together, after all."


    "Which simply proves my point about why I chose you to be my lord," Lori said.


    "Are you sure about this? I mean, for all you know, I might go mad with power and start declaring that all the women belong to me or something."


    "Then I''m sure there''s no shortage of people who would be willing to correct you by beating you soundly."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori had felt so optimistic when she''d first made her core. In hindsight, she might have to admit the heady sensation of power had gone to her head. And she was willing to admit to herself¡ªthe only person such an admission mattered¡ªthat she might have assumed too much of the other settlers she''d joined with. She had thought that there would be some people who would know how to farm.


    "Would you repeat that?" Lori said, trying to deny the evidence of her senses. Her ears, in particular.


    "The number of people in the demesne who know how to farm are precisely two," Rian said. If he was troubled by the words coming out of his mouth, it wasn''t obvious. "One if you discount purely theoretical knowledge."


    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    Lori nodded. Yes, that was what she''d thought he''d said. A pity she''d been correct. "And these people are¡­?"


    "The person with only theoretical knowledge is Lee Fei."


    Of course the Mentalist would know. And depending on where she had learned, it might actually be purely theoretical. "And the other one, who I gather must have practical knowledge as well?"


    "Hatarine Weise."


    Lori twitched. "The one who introduces herself ''hello, I''m Hatarine. I''m a perfectly ordinary girl and definitely not some kind of lady. That would be wrong. And very silly''? The addled idiot who''s clearly some kind of lady in disguise, has a woman who is clearly some sort of servant with her, and accompanied by a whole group of clearly infatuated idiots who are also clearly lords and ladies of some sort, and are only slightly more successful at pretending?"


    "Yup, that''s the one," Rian said brightly. "I took the liberty of asking her to organize our farming, because she''s literally the most qualified. She actually had farm tools with her. Well, she had a watering can and a hoe, but that''s literally all the farm tools in this entire demesne."


    Lori groaned. "We''re going to starve to death."


    "Not at the rate everyone''s bringing in meat, no. If Hatarine proves to be even partly capable, then we''ll hopefully have something to show for it later in the year, when we''re all sick and tired of meat. Although some people are already sick and tired of meat. They''ve started experimenting with some of the local plants, trying to find something that can be used as a spice of flavoring." He sighed. "I''m afraid they also managed to get their hands on many of the eggs beasts that had been found in the territory of the demesne."


    Lori grimaced. "Is that why I''ve been seeing so much yolkoil?"


    "They call it mayonnaise."


    "It''s yolkoil, whatever it''s called in that dialect of theirs."


    "You don''t like it?"


    "It''s a disgusting substance that shouldn''t exist."


    "What did she say?-!" someone at another table exclaimed.


    "Go back to eating, Arashi! Not everyone likes mayo, don''t antagonize her Bindership by insisting she like it!" Rian called out. He turned back to her. "Anyway, I''ve told them that if they find anything usable, they need to preserve it first so we can grow more."


    "So they''re probably going to strip every plant of it they find in the demesne bare and kill them."


    "Most likely," Rian nodded.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Despite everything, the farming was actually going well.


    "Heave-ho! Heigh-ho! Heave-ho! Heigh-ho!"


    Though she seemed to have the mind of someone half her age, Hatarine¡ªher name was burned into Lori''s mind, both because of her atrocious introduction and horror she had felt at learning the woman was their only farmer¡ªactually seemed to be a capable farmer. And despite clearly being a bunch of lords¡ªor at least their children¡ªher entourage were actually a respectable labor force under her direction.


    "Heave-ho! Heigh-ho! Heave-ho! Heigh-ho!"


    Even now, they were laboring in the newly cleared ground that Hatarine had been working on. Said work had apparently included sowing the waste from the latrines onto the soil to fertilize it¡ªLori had assisted in that, desiccating the waste by removing all the waterwisps¡ªafter the area had been cleared of trees.


    "Heave-ho! Heigh-ho! Heave-ho! Heigh-ho!"


    Lori was still wondering how it had been cleared. She''d been in her dungeon when it had happened, excavating stone for building material and to expand the dungeon into a proper shelter in the event of a dragon, so she hadn''t actually seen it, but the trunks had clearly been cut by a water cutter, or perhaps a Mentalist''s thought force had been used as a cutting edge. The trees¡ªand their stumps¡ªhad also been stacked haphazardly next to the hill her core was in¡ªright over the corpses she had on ice for when she had Deadspeaking, as it happened¡ª without even being stripped of branches and leaves. The rocks and other obstructions that had littered the ground had been put in a much smaller pile, a convenient building material for Lori or anyone else. People had already started using it to make firepits for semi-permanent bonfires.


    "Heave-ho! Heigh-ho! Heave-ho! Heigh-ho!"


    Getting the tree trunks from the pile, stripping them of branches and leaves, and then cutting them into logs had become the punishment duty for those who had kept bothering her about insisting on the features they wanted on the houses she''d been building. Everyone was getting a single large room with a stone floor and sun-facing doors and windows and liking it! She wasn''t going to hear about packed dirt floors in front of the door or raised wooden floors, and if they wanted sliding paper doors, then they could figure out how to make paper themselves! Perhaps all the work they''ll be doing with the branches, leaves and trunks will inspire them. Not everyone doing it was on punishment duty, of course, but it was conveniently endless, needful work that would keep such bugs occupied.


    "Heave-ho! Heigh-ho! Heave-ho! Heigh-ho!"


    As Lori watched Hatarine leading her besotted idiots and a few volunteers in turning over the earth, she finally realized what had been disturbing her about the scene she was watching.


    "Rian," she called out, and he looked up from where was speaking with one of the demesne''s few medics. "I need to talk to you."


    He sighed, then turned back to the medic. "We''ll talk later, all right Anna? Keep up the good work though. Hopefully we can keep people from getting sick."


    The woman nodded cheerfully. "Sure, Rian! Later!" She walked away, a literal bounce in her step as Rian turned towards Lori.


    "Yes?" he asked, and Lori twitched a little at the patient look on his face.


    She let some of her irritation enter her voice as she pointed out at the scene sight before her. "Rian, where did all those farm tools come from?" Now that she was looking, in addition to the hoe Hatarina had, there were also several shovels, some people at the edges of the fields were using picks to soften the soil in preparation for further expansion, and there appeared to be several metal buckets being used to carry desiccated waste. "You said Hatarine had literally all the farm tools in the demesne on her, and they amount to a hoe and a watering can!"


    "Oh, those tools!" Rian said brightly. "Some people made them."


    "With what?"


    He blinked. "Uh, pardon?"


    "Some people made them, you said. Made them with what? The sound of metalworking is quite distinctive and carries, and I heard none of it. There was no smoke to signify attempts at forging using all this wet green wood, and I don''t remember assisting in any forging by creating firewisps of sufficient heat to make iron workable. I saw no one with proper forging tools, and I definitely saw no anvils among the carts on the way here. And judging from what I can see of the tools even from this distance, they appear to be made of steel, which requires even higher temperatures to achieve. Untarnishing steel, at that, which requires not just iron and coal, but croco as well."


    Rian was silent for a moment.


    She rounded on him angrily. "Where did it come from, Rian?"


    "I told you, it was made in the demesne," he said, then sighed. "The maker just¡­ didn''t want you to know they were making it in case you might be inclined to over-react. It was their condition for making the tools in the first place."


    Lori''s hands shook, and she clutched at her staff tightly. "Rian," she said, and she didn''t know if she was angry or afraid, "is there another Whisperer in the demesne, hiding in all those groups?"


    "No¡­ I can definitely say that there isn''t another Whisperer in the demesne," Rian said. "I should probably just show you. Just¡­ please be reasonable? They don''t want to hurt anyone, they just want to be left alone. You of all people can appreciate that, right?"


    "Rian, explain this to me properly. Now!"


    "A bunch of people have set up a little facility on the edge of the demesne," Rian said quickly. "It''s where beasts and such get taken to be butchered now before they''re carted here for you to put on ice. That''s where some people have set up¡­ shall we say premises¡­ to do some things where they''re less likely to be bothered. And not by you. You''re not the one they''re trying to keep things secret from, though they did it anyway because it was convenient."


    "And who, exactly, are these people trying to hide from?" she asked, her voice filled with vitriol.


    "The Japanese."


    Lori stared at him. "Who?"


    "Ah, right. The ones with the unintelligible dialect who keep making yolkoil and¡ª"


    "Oh. Them," Lori said flatly. A bit of the tension inside her eased. "Well, I can almost understand that." Their obsession with yolkoil was enough for her to not want to be near many of them. "But what does this have to do with farm tools?"


    "The person who made the tools are afraid that if it gets out who''s making them, that they''ll start pestering her to make them swords and armor and crossbows and a table with a brazier on the underside¡­"


    The tension lessened even more. Yes, that certainly sounded like some of them. Not all, probably, but as Lori couldn''t tell them apart because they all looked alike from having the same hair color¡­


    "Anyway, they don''t go out there, since they don''t participate in hunting anymore and most are a bit squeamish at the butchering part. Once the other groups figured that out, some of them started setting up there so they wouldn''t be bothered while they worked."


    "Which includes this smith."


    Rian nodded.


    Lori nodded. That all sounded¡­ almost reasonable. However, her gaze was still piercing as she glared at Rian. "Why didn''t you tell me we actually had a smith in the demesne?"


    "You hadn''t asked, and weren''t working on anything that might need one."


    "And the fact they have the resources to make untarnishing steel?"


    "Uh¡­ that''s something I think you need to discuss with them, since I don''t know the specifics myself."


    "Take me to them, then," Lori said. "I want to meet this smith."


    Rian might have hoped she hadn''t noticed it, but he had made no mention of what the person in question was using for heat in their smithing. Even if she was inclined to believe Rian¡ªwhich she wasn''t at the moment¡ªabout there not being another Whisperer in the demesne, there was clearly some sort of resource being hidden from her. One that could provide enough heat to work steel.


    She was not going to let something like that be hidden from her!

 275 - A Standard Sales Technique

    The continuing work excavating the dragon shelter was repetitive, the sort of repetition where time lost meaning as a result of the monotony. Lori had finally managed to dig the ramp upwards to the dragon shelter, as well as start clearing a space. Steps on the ramp to make them proper stairs would, unfortunately, need to be the last thing to be made, as the ramp made it easier to roll down her excavated stone.


    While she had a general goal of ''excavating enough space'', this time she also had a specific goal. Namely, to excavate enough space so she could make some latrines. She already had a spot in mind for them. They''d be against the wall the shelter would share with the mine shaft, so that next to the ramp there would be hatches that could be opened to shovel out the waste after the dragon had left, to make cleaning easier. No doubt when mining resumed, some lazy miners would use those latrines, but then it would also be on them to carry the waste out.


    Building it was easy enough, she simply had to excavate a pace in from the wall of the mine¡ªbeing careful around the support beams¡ªso she''d have a trench, then just rebuild the stone wall again, this time with holes¡ªwith arch supports, of course¡ªfor getting the waste out later. Dividing the latrine site into separate stalls required raising stone walls as partitions, but that was easy enough. The rest would need to be done by the carpenters putting down benches with holes in them, and doors that shut both for privacy and to keep the smell in.


    Once that was done, she went back to excavating in general, using the tunneling method she had used in building the third level to make sure the ceiling had proper supporting arches as she worked. The bindings of lightwisps that she had to remake every day and anchor onto the stone walls cast a bright, cold light around her. For much of the day the only sounds were her breathing, the ones the rocks made as she excavated them, and the quiet susurrus of the air being circulated by airwisps she also had to remake and anchor to stone every day. She was alone for hours, with only the times Rian came in to tell her it was time to eat marking when she had any human contact.


    If it weren''t for the fact she wasn''t in her demesne, Lori would have called the working conditions ideal.


    Meal times were¡­ less than ideal. There was none of the pleasant murmur she''d gotten used to in her Dungeon''s dining hall. Oh, a murmur existed, but it was either the quiet murmur of people tired from work, or the angry buzz of the malcontents being loud.


    "¡ªgets to be in the dry while we work outside all day¡ª"


    "¡ªhave to walk through mud and¡ª"


    "¡ªgetting rained on¡ª"


    "¡ªhoarding all the good fruit for themselves¡ª"


    "If you all want to talk about something, then just sit at the same table!" Rian called out. "Don''t try to have a conversation from across the dining hall. What are you all, children?"


    "No, the children are all well behaved and eating," Yllian said.


    "Ah, you''re right, Yllian. I apologize to all the children, your manners aren''t anywhere that bad!"


    There was a small smattering of laughter, and the overly loud complaints of the malcontents quieted to sullen mutters.


    Lori gave Rian an approving nod, and he nodded right back. "So, how''s your work coming along?" Rian said at a more reasonable volume. "Can the mine be used as a dragon shelter yet?"


    "It''s already been used as one. Twice, in fact. So, yes," Lori said.


    "All right, that was a bad phrased question on my part. Let me ask again. How long before it''s up to your standards?"


    Lori shrugged. "I still need to excavate more space, or else everyone will be crowded again. The ventilation to let out stale air hasn''t been planned yet, and right now there''s no water reservoir."


    "I thought we were using barrels for water storage?"


    "That will be for the drinking water. The reservoir will be for washing so that no one gets sick while crowded together in the dragon shelter."


    "That implies the dragon shelter will have a washing area."


    "Where else will people wash the dishes between meals?"


    Rian smiled slightly. "Isn''t that a bit¡­ much?"


    "This is my demesne now. If people wanted to shelter in a cesspit before, that''s their business. But now that I run this demesne, we will do things properly."


    "To be fair to Shana, she couldn''t exactly build like you could, what with having no idea how to do anything but healing and no way to learn. "


    "Rian, why are you talking like a theater narrator and saying the blatantly obvious? You''re not in a play and there''s no audience for you to remind of what had previously happened in the story."


    Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    "No particular reason," Rian said with that annoying cheerfulness of his as Yllian started to cough. Thankfully, he covered his mouth when he did so. Hopefully he wasn''t catching something because of all the rain.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At the end of the four days, Lori had managed to excavate a space that¡­ well, everyone in the demesne would be able to line up to use the latrines, but not much more than that. Technically, she wouldn''t need to clear so much space since there was still more of the mine shaft for people to occupy, but if she was going to build a dragon shelter, then she would do so properly. Besides, given how wet the part of the mine near the entrance got, the lowest point of the mine was likely starting to flood, which would reduce the available space and start causing other problems as well.


    ¡­


    She''d probably have to make something to keep the water out when she came back. Maybe a little rise to act as a flood barrier, or some kind of drainage channel near the entrance¡­


    "Maybe you can ask the stone masons to do it?" Rian suggested as they rode back home. Lori didn''t want to have to do any more work when she arrived back in her primary demesne, and as they had time during the journey, she was meeting with Rian now to make the most efficient use of the time. "It sounds like the sort of thing they might have experience doing, redirecting water out of areas. At the very least they can assess it and plan out the most efficient spot to deal with the problem."


    "I suppose¡­" Lori muttered. "Very well, ask them to come with us when we return and inform them of what to expect."


    Rian nodded, writing it down on his plank, where the carpentry work she needed for the latrines had already been listed down. "Do you mind if I get them started on planning a structure to protect the ventilation equipment? Even if you have to do the actual building, some kind of preparation might be helpful."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Yes, yes, get them on that as well." She was willing to admit¡ªonly to herself, of course, since that was the only person that mattered¡ªthat she hadn''t really thought of the matter, but the dragon shelter would been a way to do that, wouldn''t it? Though since this was her demesne now, perhaps she could improve the current equipment? She already used bindings of airwisps to improve the circulation of air for her when she was excavating in the mine. Perhaps if she integrated a bone pipe to the ventilation tube to increase the airflow¡­? "Anything else?"


    "Nothing significant to report so far, which I''m very happy about. Right now most people are still in the ''societal guilt'' stage from hearing about Shana nearly killing herself for them. We''ll see if this will motivate them to improve or whether they''ll just bury this along with the rest of the guilt. Even the malcontents have quieted a little, relative to when we first took over. Pains in the neck they might be, but they all have children. We''ll just have to see which part of human nature wins out."


    "Those are all ''dealing with people'' things, so I leave that up to you." A thought occurred to her. "Does Yllian¡ª" she checked her rock. Yes, Yllian, "¡ªknow about this?"


    "We''ve discussed it, and while he disagrees with me, he''s agreed to go a little easier on them to encourage them to ruminate on the consequences of the act and what sort of people they are that they forced someone to such an extreme," Rian said.


    "Again, I leave the ''dealing with people'' things to you," Lori said, waving her hand again. "The food?"


    "We''re¡­ holding," Rian said, frowning. "Grain''s being used up in meals, of course, but I''ve already ordered an emergency seed crop be set aside in case of crop failure or damage. As to the meat¡­ right now we look like we''re breaking even, bringing in as much meat as we''re using up, but I''d feel better if we had a buffer. With your permission, I''ll ask another of the hunters to join us, see if we can maybe increase the amount of game we''re catching, even if we don''t manage to double the current intake"


    "Why wouldn''t it? It sounds simple to me. Two hunters, twice as much meat."


    "Because if a second hunter went and hunted separately, they''d need their own volunteer crew to help them actually get the meat back from outside the demesne," Rian said. "And right now we don''t have the people for that. Still, having a second hunter to help should present some improvement. However, it will cost us some of our own ability to provide food for ourselves." He started tapping his chin.


    "But you have already had a thought about that, haven''t you?"


    "It''s just a thought, but¡­ why don''t we move all hunting operations to River''s Fork, and then use the Coldhold to transfer the meat back to Lorian? Not counting the meat that will be to feed River''s Fork, of course. The beasts around Lorian might have gotten wary about being hunted, or at least need an opportunity to replenish their numbers. Near River''s Fork, even with some of the hunting they did last year, there should still be more beasts. And we were planning to transfer people there in any case. This will help start integrating the two populations together."


    "Won''t that be problematic? I thought hunting parties needed a lot of people to be able to bring what they catch back?"


    Rian nodded, but he still looked thoughtful. "I know. But it''s an idea worth considering. Though it will mean we''ll lose the Coldhold as a salt gatherer and trading vessel, since it will have to remain nearby."


    "Given current circumstances, it''s already not doing that."


    Her lord nodded again. "I''ll keep thinking about it and get back to you. We might be able to do it in a few weeks when the situation in River''s Fork is more stable. Maybe it''ll be more doable when the fields have been planted and we can assign people to do something else. Speaking of which, when do you want to transfer the malcontents to Lorian?"


    "I don''t want to," Lori said. "However, it needs to be done. We''ll transfer them over when the rest of the houses are finished."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "Let them think the new houses are for them, then stick them in the ones that were just vacated? As your lord in charge of dealing with people, I feel I should tell you that''s a nasty manipulation of their expectations." He sniffed theatrically. "You''re learning so much. Granted, I''d prefer you learn how to be nicer to people, but this is still progress."


    Lori shrugged. "It''s standard sales technique. Raise the customer''s expectations with a superior product, then say none more are in stock and have them settle for an inferior one."


    "Please tell me you eventually stopped going to buy things in those kinds of places, that''s a terrible business practice."

 276 - Seeling Again

    There were, as expected, people waiting for them at the docks.


    Lori didn''t know why people did it. It had only been four days! Surely not seeing someone for that long was no cause for this kind of commotion. And all the hugging! Yes, she understood that it was nice to be held, she''d enjoyed receiving hugs from her mothers provided they were brief, but they did it for far too long with a lot of pointless swaying back and forth, and people held on far too tight, such that it looked uncomfortable.


    She wasn''t even going to get started on all the kissing.


    "Rian!"


    Umu met Rian at the docks, wrapping her arms around in him a tight hug. Her lord had almost been surprised, but his arms had come up to return the hug, even if he looked a bit embarrassed at doing so in public. Next to him, Riz was giving Umu a flat look that the blonde weaver ignored, sparing the militiawoman only the briefest of glares before turning her attention back to Rian. Kissing then commenced, and Lori had already resolved she wasn''t going to get started on that. Though it looked very awkward and¡ªno, she wasn''t getting started on that!


    Sitting on one of the benches at the top of the Coldhold while she waited for enough people to get done so she could finally pass through, Lori took a moment to appreciate just doing nothing. She wasn''t claiming anything, not binding anything, not imbuing anything¡­ she was just sitting there. After the previous days of repetitive stone excavation, and the journey spent discussing matters with Rian¡ªmatters she hadn''t been able to discuss with him during meals because she hadn''t wanted her new idiots and the malcontents among them to hear¡ªthe rest was a nice break. Not far from her, two children sat huddled together on one of the other benches, clutching their own packs and glancing at her nervously, when they weren''t looking out over the town around her Dungeon.


    Riz was letting out a huff and in the middle of shrugging when¡ª


    "Erzebed!"


    The militiawoman stumbled in surprise as she suddenly found herself being wrapped in her own embrace courtesy of Mikon, who had come up behind Umu but hadn''t been noticed because¡­ well, she hadn''t gone for Rian first. Riz swayed, momentarily losing her balance, and her hands came up to grab Mikon to stay upright. Thus, she was unprepared¡ªthough she really should have been, Lori thought¡ªwhen Mikon punctuated her greeting with a kiss on the cheek. Then another. And another. And¡ª


    "S-stop that!" Riz stammered, drawing back slightly as Mikon started moving down from her cheek to the side of her neck. "W-what are you doing?"


    "What?" Mikon said, fluttering her eyelashes in theatric innocence that no one believed. "You were missed too, Erzebed." She sighed. "We only had two blankets, and Umu didn''t want to sleep close together, so it was so cold¡­" She lay her head on Riz''s shoulder. "I''m looking forward to sleeping with you next to me tonight. It will be so warm¡­"


    "Oh. So you only want me for my body heat," Riz said, sounding irritable.


    Mikon smiled at Riz before giving her another quick kiss on the cheek again. "Not just that," she said cheerfully. "Besides, I''m waiting my turn to welcome Rian back, and didn''t want you to feel unappreciated." One hand rose to stroke Riz''s cheek, making the woman redden with further irritation. "Welcome home, Erzebed," Mikon said in a softer voice. She said something else in a softer tone that Lori didn''t catch, not that she was eavesdropping or anything.


    Whatever was said made Riz let out a huff¡ªit was too fast to be a sigh¡ªand pat Mikon on the shoulder. "Well, I''m back. Can you let me go now?"


    In response, Mikon kissed her cheek again. "Is Umu done yet?"


    "Umu, hurry up and let Mikon have a turn already!"


    Some of the other people on the docks laughed for some reason as Lori started tapping her foot. While she was thankful for the rest, other parts of her were feeling restless. Well, let them. She was resting! When everyone had settled down and she''d be able to pass through, then she''d have to inspect that the Dungeon farm was the right temperature and humidity, check the far corners of her unfinished excavation to see if people were being unsanitary, see if she had to cure more wood¡­ Lori sat back and enjoyed the brief respite.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After Mikon finally got her turn at Rian and enough people had vacated the dock, Lori was finally able to disembark, her tightly bound bedroll and pack in hand. They''d left right after breakfast once Rian had finished relaying instructions to Yllian¡ªLori checked her rock just to be sure¡ªand the two new children whose parents were sending to the relative safety of her primary demesne had finally stopped crying and clinging to their mother''s skirts,, so despite the overcast sky, it was probably only late morning.


    To her surprise, Shanalorre was there seemingly waiting for her. Her hair was dry, which meant she hadn''t just gotten out of the baths, though the skirt she was wearing was wrinkled in a way that suggested she''d girded it recently.


    "Great Binder," she greeted Lori, bowing in acknowledgement.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori nodded back.


    "I see that more children have joined us," the other Dungeon Binder said, nodding towards were Rian was gently trying to get the two children on their feet. "With your permission, I shall take charge of these two and get them settled in my house."


    Lori nodded in assent, then paused. She eyed Shanalorre. "How did you know about the children?"


    "When you all left my former demesne this morning, I noticed that you had more passengers than you left with. Given how much smaller they were in comparison to everyone else, I deduced they were children."


    Ah. Yes, Shanalorre had her own awareness from her connection to River''s Fork''s core, didn''t she? "Very well, then. I''ll leave this to you, Binder Shanalorre. We shall speak at dinner. You will join me."


    The other Dungeon Binder nodded, then headed for the Coldhold, where the two children were looking nervously at the walkways to the boat''s outriggers. "Nera," she called out. "Ardlia. Welcome to Lorian."


    "S-shana!" one of the two children exclaimed, sounding relieved.


    "Let me help you with that, it''s easier to get off the boat when you''re not carrying anything¡­ "


    Lori left her to it. She headed back to her room to put to down her things, then have a proper bath. After four days of excavating underground, sweating because trying to control the temperature with more than just anchoring strategically placed airwisps to blow air on her took up too much time to do, her bath practically called to her. Her clothes were so permeated she''d have to give them a preliminary soak and wash, lest they ferment in her laundry pile.


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    As she headed for the stairs leading up to her room, she noticed something hanging next to the door. It was a small seel, impaled though the neck by a hook carved from a branch. The branch was hanging from a little hole in the stone next to her door.


    Huh. It looked like the brat was seeling again. She was improving as well since the seel''s tail, with its fan-like webbed fin at the end, was trailing down to the floor. Thankfully, it wasn''t dripping.


    Shaking her head, Lori hurried past it so that she could take her things to her room. The seel was far too big for her to carry just then, and she didn''t want whatever fluids were on the seel to get on her bedroll. Upstairs, Lori put down her things on the wonderfully elastic weave of her bad, then went back down to get the seel. It might be a bit too late to add it to lunch, but it would be more meat for dinner.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori didn''t speak to Shanalorre at lunch. The latter sat at the table with the other children from River''s Fork, as well as some of the other children, seemingly welcoming the two new children to their number. The normal murmur of the dining hall was punctuated by the happy, high-pitched commotion coming from that table, almost but not quite grating on Lori''s ears. Normally, she''d be speaking with Rian about demesne matters to distract her, but they''d already discussed everything relevant on the boat ride home. Rian was also rather distracted, since Umu and Mikon were both making up for lost time. Riz had let the pink-haired weaver sit next to him to avoid Mikon''s attentions, and was focusing on her food as the other two paid more attention to Rian than eating.


    ¡­


    They should probably make Riz''s position as some sort of militia leader official at some point. Despite her protestations about not being an officer, she was the one who spent the most time organizing people to do militia-like things. Even though all their ''militia'' were volunteers, Riz was always present and willing, even if it was because of Rian. She''d have to discuss this with Rian later. It sounded like a ''dealing with people'' matter.


    The rest of the day went as Lori had foreseen. She checked the Dungeon farm''s humidity, light and temperature, making a few adjustments to equalize and disparity, and altering the airflow caused by some airwisps. Inspected the unfinished expansion tunnels to see if there had been any more storage accidents with dried waste, or if someone had started using them as latrines. Thankfully, the former hadn''t repeated and the latter didn''t seem to have happened, but Lori made a note to see about putting a latrine near the stairs up to the second level. She''d have to make bindings to ensure that the waste was desiccated on the spot so that emptying out wouldn''t involve dragging waste through the rest of her Dungeon¡­


    A check of the curing shed showed a lot of the wood had already been used. However, this meant that the remaining houses were almost done, with only a single house left to finish, and to her eye it would be done some time tomorrow. She supposed this meant they needed to announce the housing assignments soon so that the families who would be moving into them could make the arrangements for the internal additions to fit them. A second raised floor or loft would probably be enough, though they need more wood for that.


    Once those inspections were done, she took a moment to make adjustments to the water jet drivers of Lori''s Boat and Lori''s Ice Boat, converting them into steam drivers. The former has a relatively simple mechanism, simply a bone tube at the end of a piece of wood that was raised out of the water when not in use or the boat was being allowed to drift. Making the alteration that would add heat to the water so that converting the propelling liquid into steam without encasing the tube in ice was simple enough, and on the test run, the boat actually seemed to accelerate faster.


    The latter was a bit harder, since she couldn''t add the alterations to the where the water was accelerated by the binding. In the end, she attached the binding of firewisps and waterwisps near the output of the driver, well past the moving block that accelerated the water. When tested, the increased acceleration wasn''t as noticeable as with Lori''s Boat, but Lori''s Ice Boat had far more mass to move. Lori decided to do more tests on it tomorrow if she had time.


    At dinner, Shanalorre sat with Lori as she had been instructed. Lori looked in askance at Shanalorre''s cousin sitting next to her, but thankfully the young girl didn''t make a nuisance of herself. Instead, she seemed to be eagerly looking forward to the food, looking out towards the kitchen expectantly. Well, as long as the girl behaved¡­


    "Report," Lori said as they waited for the food to arrive.


    "A third of the children have bath buckets," Shanalorre began. "I have made arrangements, but the woodworkers couldn''t make enough quickly. Between roofing the remaining houses, and the construction of the water barrels for River''s Fork, the buckets were not a top priority. I decided not to press on the matter, and have utilized the available buckets to best effect. One bucket contains everyone''s soap, and the other buckets hold clothes and towels. I am told more buckets will be available in the next few days. "


    Ah, right. She should have realized. Yes, the new barrels¡ªmade using River''s Fork''s supply of copper for the barrel hoops¡ªwere to supply them with water in the dragon shelter, and as such were being prioritized. "The delay is acceptable. What else?"


    "The shoes are being made, but it is also slow. The cobbler isn''t used to making new shoes, and we have no cordwainer, but he is the only one with the tools and experience to do so. Some of the adults with leather tools volunteered to help in stitching the shoes together. Thanks to them, about half of the children have shoes, and I am told the rest will have their shoes finished tomorrow or the day after. Unfortunately, they are not waterproof, so the shoes have been made slightly overlarge to allow for growth and shrinkage. The weavers were all kind enough to sew some foot wraps to help cushion feet within the shoes in lieu of proper socks."


    Ah. She hadn''t considered the matter of socks. "Good," she acknowledged. "The matter of proper socks will have to be dealt with, but at the moment I gather we do not have sufficient materials?" As she recalled, all the fabric the weavers had made over the last year had been used to give everyone winter robes.


    Shanalorre nodded. "The ropeweed is still growing. However, I believe River''s Fork should still have a plentiful supply of the plant, especially up along the other river. I believe it will be in our interest to begin collection of the plant there as soon as possible."


    Lori considered that. "Good idea. We shall discuss it with Rian when he returns. What of the tubers I assigned you?"


    "We have begun trying to plant behind our house," Shanalorre said, "however, we were only able to use sticks and branches collected from the woods due to the proper tools being needed elsewhere, and it was what Karina was familiar with. I was able to secure a shovel for myself, but the size was awkward for me, and I am doubtful as to how helpful it was. Still, we managed to begin a small patch. With Karina''s help, and the authorization Lord Rian arranged, we were able to acquire some tubers for planting. It was decided it would be best to start with a small batch to see if we could grow it in the conditions available to use before planting more, so as not to risk wasting the tubers. Karina was of great assistance in this."


    Lori nodded. "I see. Do you think this is the best way to conduct this assignment I gave you?"


    "Yes," Shanalorre said. "While Karina was confident the tubers would grow, I wasn''t certain, and I decided it would be more prudent to test the growing conditions before risking more supplies in potentially unfavorable ground. Once we have confirmed growth, we will begin planting more tubers."


    Lori regarded her a moment before nodding. It was a cautious approach, but she was clearly prioritizing conserving resources. Lori could respect that. "Very well. In that case, prepare other sites for planting in the meantime."


    "Yes, Great Binder. On the topic of food, however, I have been asked to bring a matter to your attention."


    Lori almost groaned. Instead, she just hung her head in exasperation. Ah, she should have realized her idiots would try to use Shanalorre to try and bring up the matter of land again. "What is it now?"


    "Karina would like to volunteer to join you when you return to Rivers Fork," Shanalorre said, and Lori''s head snapped up. "She wishes to assist the demesne with its food difficulties by hunting seels for them to augment their food supply."


    ¡­


    What.

 SS3.2 – "What If (nearly) EVERYONE In Lorian But Lori And Rian Was An Isekai?" Part 2

    Lori had a specific image of what life on the edges of a demesne was like. It involved flimsy buildings in some degree of disrepair, uneducated masses, poverty, and lords or ladies who were either lazy, corrupt, or incompetent. There''d be a militia base nearby, to give the edgeward settlement a reason to exist, as they''d provide the militia with goods or the services of bell-ringers. Beyond the edge, among the colors itself, would grow fields of crops that were technically illegal as they''d be against international treaty, though people were reportedly lax about that. Most people worked outside the demesne, tending to crops beyond the edge, hunting beasts and possibly making things without official oversight of the local lord or lady.


    For good reason, she didn''t want such a place in her demesne. After all, a properly run demesne wouldn''t have such a place¡ªexcept perhaps the militia to defend against external attack or banditry¡ªand she intended hers to be properly run. However, it seemed that without her knowledge¡ªbut with her lord''s tacit approval, since he knew about it¡ªsuch a place had manifested in her demesne. She''d probably have to deal with that, once she was clear as to what exactly was going on and whether or not they had a Whisperer hidden among them.


    After a long walk¡ªmore than two taums through the woods, with its changes in elevation, uneven ground, and obstructing undergrowth were not easy to traverse, or quick¡ªthey reached their destination. It was, strangely, not unlike the rising settlement near her core, with its two shelters, two bath houses¡ªthat were not hot springs despite some people pestering Rian, and even her, to make it so¡ªand a growing number of box-like stone walls that just needed doors and roofs to become houses. Thankfully, there had been some people among them who were familiar enough with wood working to make doors, and simple tables and benches, even if the quality was a little crude.


    The buildings at the edge appeared to be simple mounds, their outsides covered with dirt, possibly as insulation. While they seemed cruder than her own stone buildings, she was immediately disabused once she got a closer look at all the doors and windows. What she had thought was well-crafted wood¡ªbetter, even, than the doors their shelters currently had¡ªon closer examination turned out to be dark-brown metal, with perfectly flat surfaces, sharp lines, and perfect corners, as if they''d been built by a professional metal workshop at a demesne''s capital, with their heavy metal rollers and experienced Whisperers.


    Instead of merely being simple shutters, the windows themselves had transparent planes of glass on them, letting in what light there was. Or rather, letting light out, since several of the mound-like buildings seemed illuminated from within. Lori twitched when she saw those, and grudgingly reminded herself to put some kind of light in the houses¡­ eventually.


    The plain, dull colors of the buildings stood in sharp contrast to the ever-shifting, almost twinkling colors of the Iridescence, though they blended in the ground inside the demesne at a distance. The discrepancy between the crude-looking structures and the clearly valuable materials used to make them gave the buildings a strange set of unreality, like the backdrop sets of a play, but in reverse.


    The air was filled with the smell of blood and offal, which seemed to be coming from a tall, lean-to-like structure also covered with dirt, but was almost five paces high at its tallest point. Lori couldn''t see what was going on there from where she stood, but she could see that one of the thick vertical posts holding up the high roof also seemed to be made of the same brown-colored metal, and it sounded like there was a lot of activity there. No one was visible, though from the movement she could see in the windows, there seemed to be people in the mound-like buidlings.


    "Yes, I know it''s a lot of metal," Rian said as she turned to him with a frown. "No, we haven''t been keeping a mine secret from you. It''s¡­ look, it''s better if you find out from the source, all right? Vanessa''s workshop is over there." He pointed at one of the mound-like structures. "And yes, I know you don''t like remembering names, but you''ll probably want to remember this one."


    "Don''t tell me what to do," Lori said, her grip tight on her staff. Belated, she focused on her awareness of the demesne''s wisps, trying to watch behind her, and stiffened as she suddenly became aware of more about the area she was approaching. Each of the mound-like building was filled with lightwisps to a degree that implied they were brightly lit, but that simply confirmed what her eyes could already see. What had her paying attention was how the triangular, lean-to structure was surrounded by lightningwisps, all of them flowing as if bound and imbued¡­ except they were neither. To her senses, the lightningwisps had not been filled with magic or organized into some kind of binding, even as they acted like they were both, flowing through the air around the structure, likely making the hairs of anyone who passed through them rise up and tingle.


    That¡­ that was wrong. What was¡­ that shouldn''t¡­


    She realized she''d continued to follow Rian as he approached one of the mounds. While it had looked like a solid structure that had lacked the windows of the other mounds when they''d approached from behind, from the other side Lori saw that it was open on the end that faced the Iridescence.


    Inside the open structure, a young woman was standing next to a pace-high table that seemed to be made from a single piece of metal, the legs and tabletop all one fused piece. A shovel lay on the table, its shaft clearly a tree branch¡ªit was still covered in bark, though someone had made the effort to trim it¡ªwith a metal shovelhead. As they entered, Lori saw the woman adjusting the shape of the shovel with her bare hands as she muttered to herself. The seemingly-metal shovelhead moved like it was made of something far softer as the woman used both hands to make the sides of the shovel curl up.


    Rian stopped and seemed content to wait as the woman continued on with her work, and out of habit learned working in several metal workshops Lori did the same. The woman was wearing very clean clothes, Lori noted. A pair of trousers of what looked like blue-dyed cloudbloom, and a dark red shirt that didn''t seem to have any buttons at the neck, implying it was a knitted fabric instead of a woven one. What was someone wearing such an expensive shirt doing¡ª?


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    And then all such thoughts vanished from Lori''s mind as the woman put one hand on the butt end of the shovel''s shaft and, with a shimmering in the air like a heat haze, metal suddenly wrapped around the end of the wood, flowing down the shaft for a hand''s length even as a crossbar suddenly formed under the woman''s hand, forming a handle for the shovel. As Lori stared, speechless, the woman put the shovel back on the metal tabletop¡ªwhich looked to be made of the same metal as the handle, a small part of her noted¡ªand tapped three points on the metal handle, causing the metal to recede and reveal the wood underneath.


    In another shimmer, a shining steel nail suddenly appeared gripped in the woman''s left hand, which she casually placed point-first over one of the holes, adjusting it so it would go straight through the shaft. She leaned down, raising up her empty right hand as if she was lifting a hammer, and suddenly there was a hammer there, seemingly growing from under her fingers, the shaft end of the shaft shimmering as it extended up and formed a striking head. Lori watched as she hammered in the nail until it was deep into the shaft, then ran a finger over the remainder that protruded up. The nail shortened, seemingly¡ªno, clearly fusing with the rest of the metal of the handle. The young woman moved with a practiced casualness and confidence that spoke of experience and familiarity.


    Rian coughed. "Hey, Vanessa."


    The woman raised a hand. "Hold on Rian, just let me finish this." Moving with slightly more haste¡ªan experienced apprentice or early journeywoman, then. No master would rush even a little because of an interruption¡ªshe hammered two more nails into the holes of the handle, securing it to the shaft. "Ah, done." She picked up the shovel. "I''ve got another shovel done for Hatari¡ªoh shit."


    "Vanessa, you know Binder Lori," Rian said bright cheerfulness. "She had some very intelligent questions about the tools people have been using, and I decided she deserved answers. Can you help her out?"


    The woman''s eyes flicked between Rian and Lori as her grip shifted on the shovel in her hands. Noticing the change, Lori deliberately raised up her staff, holding it metal-capped butt-end up¡ª


    And then Rian was standing between them. "Now, now, no need for that," he said hastily. "There are no enemies here. We''re all in this together if we want to survive in the middle of nowhere. Vanessa, put that down. Please?"


    The woman glared at him, but sighed and lowered the shovel, grounding the tip down on the ground that, now that Lori glanced at him, seemed to be a sort of sturdy metal mesh raised over bare dirt. "Well, I suppose this was going to happen eventually. Um, hi¡­ Lori, right? I mean, your Bindership." She said the title awkwardly, as if she didn''t quite believe it. "I come in peace?"


    "I was told that I would be given explanations as to where the tools being used to farm were coming from. I thought I would be learning of a previously unknown Whisperer providing heat for whatever forge was smithing them." Lori gave the woman a flat look. "Explain. Now."


    The woman twitched, her face changing into a frown, but she glanced at Rian, and altered her expression with clear reluctance. "I can¡­ make metal."


    "Clearly. How?" Such creation of matter¡­ it was impossible. Matter could be altered, changed in state, but not simply just created. At least, not by anything known to humanity. Such things were, perhaps, the domain of dragons, who did strange things to magic and¡­ and¡­


    And wouldn''t have Dungeon Binders had the opportunity to observe them when within their demes¡ª?


    No, no, focus!


    "It''s¡­ just something I can do," the woman said, her eyes darting between Lori, Rian, and the opening leading out to the Iridescence. "I convert magic into steel "


    "Rainbows," Lori snapped.


    The woman shrugged, seemingly unphased by Lori''s disbelief. "Believe me or not, that''s what''s happening." She held out one hand, palm up and slightly cupped, and as Lori watched a small metal bearing appeared in another heat haze-like shimmer, visibly growing larger until it was the size of a bead. "See? It clearly happened, so it''s not impossible." She raised her hand and dropped the metal bead onto the tabletop, where it made a resonant sound of impact.


    "As you can see, this isn''t just something I can tell you to explain where the tools came from," Rian said. He''d moved aside once he thought they weren''t going to attack one another, forming a triangle with each of them as a point. "I mean, you saw it happen, and you''re still questioning it."


    Lori stared at the metal bead, which had begun to roll along the table until the woman''s hand scooped it up again.


    "I know what you''re thinking," the woman said. "You can''t use me to corner the metal market. The steel is temporary." She held up the bead between two finger, and as Lori watched, the metal shimmered again and disappeared. "That''s the quick way. The other way is that it slowly turns to dust once it runs out of¡­ imbuement? Imbuement. Once it runs out, the metal will cease to exist. Useful for a quick scam, but not something that can be sold ethically. The only reason our tools are lasting is because I keep them imbued."


    ¡­


    Well, there went that idea.


    "And is that all you can do?" Lori said, focusing on the woman again.


    The woman licked her lips, then coughed, covering her mouth. "S-sorry," she ground out. "Spit went down the wrong way."


    "Just tell her the truth, Vanessa," Rian sighed. "She''s smart, she''s educated, and do you really want her to have a reason to be perpetually suspicious of you? My life is going to be hard enough after this, and this was basically just omission. If you straight up tell her an untruth, she might actually set you on fire like she keeps muttering about."


    "She can try," the woman said, voice confident, even as she looked at Lori contemplatively. She sighed. "What the hell. There''s not much point in lying anyway. I can do fibers and fabrics too, for a given value of ''fabric''." She touched the thumbs and forefingers of her hands together as if pinching something with all of them, and then pulled her two hands apart. A string appeared as she did, each end seemingly held between her pinched fingers, growing longer as her hands grew further apart. Then she flicked her hands downward, and from the single thread fell a white square of thin fabric. "I''m not very good at it though. The clothes I''m wearing took a while to make, and since it''s not my efficiency my fabric dissolves a lot faster than my metal. And I can control temperature."


    "Temperature," Lori said blandly. "Only temperature?"


    "Hot and cold," the woman nodded.


    "So you aren''t the one who caused the lightningwisps around the structure over there," Lori said, pointing in the direction of the large lean-to-like building.


    Rian made a strange gesture towards her with both hands, raising his eyebrows at the woman.


    "No¡­" the woman said, suddenly slow and reluctant again.


    "So there''s someone else," Lori said, turning her glare at Rian. "Would they be the Whisperer?"


    Rian sighed. He looked at the woman. "Perhaps it''s time we got the others for this?" he said.


    The woman sighed. "Yeah, probably for the best. This is above my paygrade."


    "Others?" Lori said sharply. "What others?"


    Rian smiled. It was a sickly thing. "Remember when you said you picked me to be your lord because the other candidates were clearly leaders of their own groups?"

 277 - Indecisions And Responsibility

    "If she''s volunteering, it would be a good idea to take her up on the offer," Rian said after Lori had finished choosing bowls and Shanalorre had related the matter to him. "I didn''t want to bring it up, but people didn''t really enjoy trying to go seeling late in the year. From what I gathered¡ªmostly from Karina, admittedly¡ªit took too many people too long to catch a single seel, though those were adult seels they caught. While she probably won''t be singlehandedly feeding the whole demesne, more food is more food. That is, if you''re willing to take her up on her offer."


    It wasn''t often that Lori found herself torn by indecision. Usually, when faced with two things she wanted to do¡ªlike going to see two different plays she had heard good things of, buying two novels, or getting two different jam rolls¡ªher choice was ''both''¡­ even if afterwards she''d have to work hard to restore her budget back to what it should have been for the month. This, however, as a rare situation, where her choices were truly mutually incompatible.


    A part of her wanted to accept the brat''s offer. She was willing and able¡ªher tax payments had been consistent, when she could acquire them¡ªit would help relieve the situation in River''s Fork, and she might even be able to teach the children there how to do it themselves. If the terrain of the area had been what had made people cease trying to seel for food, then as someone experienced and enthusiastic about seeling, the brat could probably figure out how to adapt to the situation.


    On the other hand¡­ she had meant it when she said she didn''t want the children to work. At least, not because they were made to. There was, admittedly, some ambiguity in situations like how the children were the ones who took care of the tuber plots, but as far as she could discern¡ªshe had asked Rian, and lurked in the third level, listening for complaining¡ªthat initiative had been on the brat''s prerogative as she had gotten her younger siblings to help her with it, and she had managed to talk other children into helping them. However, as long as it was self-organized and no adults had been involved, then it was their own business.


    For her to accept the brat''s offer, however¡­ it felt uncomfortably like putting her to work, especially since the brat wouldn''t be paid. Well, no one was getting paid really, but there was something about how she wasn''t going to be able to pay the brat that made the skin between her shoulder blades tighten uncomfortably¡­ "I''ll take it under advisement," she said as she took her bread and tore off a piece, dipping it in her bread. When it reached her mouth, it became the ideal, warm temperature.


    "Well, don''t be too long taking it under advisement," Rian said, tearing off his own piece of bread and dipping it. "I doubt her parents know, so if you take her offer, she''ll have to tell her parents, and you know how parents can be. One of us, most likely me, will have to talk to assure them we can keep their little girl safe, and she''ll probably have to sleep with you in your little room because it''s probably not a good idea to have her sleep with the rest of us in the main cabin of the ship."


    He put the bread in his mouth, chewing a bit before taking a quick drink of water. He began to stir the bowl, obviously trying to get it to cool. "That''s a whole day gone, and Karina will still need to make her own preparations, whatever those are. Unless you want to delay us leaving to wait for her?"


    Lori twitched. Ugh, she hated it when Rian had a point. Though¡­ surely so many factors made it a ''dealing with people'' matter? "Do you think we need to accept her offer?"


    "Yes," Rian said promptly. "It won''t interfere with any other work in both demesne and it will allow us to take advantage of an additional food source. Karina is known to the children of the people who moved there and thus might be able to re-establish her friendships with them and begin their adjustment and reintegration into society. It also sets a good example for others. We might need to have someone to accompany her, but we''d need to have someone do that anyway to help her with gutting and cleaning the seels she catches. At worse, I''d simply advise that we accept her offer, but bring her with us one shift later."


    Lori blinked. "Why delay that far?"


    Rian nodded towards Shanalorre. "Hopefully by that time the other children will be used to this demesne enough that Shanalorre will be able to accompany us back. I don''t doubt that parents will want to know how their children are doing, and she can accompany Karina in her work. Even if she doesn''t rule the demesne anymore, she''d be able to keep Karina out of trouble."


    "I would be more than willing to return Karina''s assistance in being my guide when I first came to this demesne," Shanalorre said. "however, if I were to do so, I would need someone to stay with the children, and especially my cousin, to chaperone them."


    Lori looked towards Umu with a blank, flat stare, waiting for her to volunteer. The weaver was concentrating on eating her food¡ªand leaning against Rian''s side without obstructing his own ability to eat¡ªlooking very intent upon her meal. After a moment, Lori said, "Perhaps you can find someone willing to do that, Rian?"


    "I''ll ask around, since if anyone will be willing." Next to him, Umu began to open her mouth¡ª


    "There''s no need for that, Rian," Mikon said. "My cousins Koyan and Kayas expressed their willingness the last time I asked, before the Lady Binder decided that all the children could live in her house. They''ll still be willing since it gets them out of the house, even if it''s only for a few days, and my aunt Kasco already gave them permission if it was for looking after the children. Though they might try to claim the bed, Lady Binder."


    "The bed is for Yoshka and the other young girls," Shanalorre said. "However, if there is still room, then perhaps they can fit in. If your cousins are willing Ateh Mikon, perhaps they can stay tonight while I am present so that I may assess their interaction with the children."


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    "I''ll ask them. Excuse me, Riz¡­"


    Riz muttered, but slid aside to let Mikon swing her legs over the bench they were sitting on and get to her feet. She took a moment to orient herself, looking around¡ªpresumably for a table mostly filled with pink-haired women¡ªbefore heading purposely towards Lori''s left.


    "Setting aside the matter of Karina''s volunteerism for the moment," Lori said, scooping up some soup in her spoon, "what other matters occurred?"


    There was a pause.


    "Uh, are you talking to me now, or are you still talking to her?" Rian asked.


    Lori put the spoonful in her mouth, swallowed. "Yes."


    Rian and Shanalorre exchanged glances. Then he waved towards her.


    "During your absence, there were no injuries that required my presence," Shanalorre said. "Though I believe that might change in the future. After we finished planting the tubers, and she instructed me that they needed to be regularly watered, Karina began seeling at the river."


    "So I discerned."


    "Some of the other children have joined her. I declined her invitation to learn at the moment, but some of those in my care accepted." Shanalorre paused for a moment, and a concerned expression came over her usually composed face. "I fear that she might soon do herself an injury. While the other children are seeling ones that they appear to be able to easily handle, Karina appears to be working towards catching larger prey. At the very least, her seels are always bigger than everyone else''s."


    "That''s¡­ concerning," Rian commented.


    She nodded, seemingly in agreement. "I have been cautioning her, and to her credit, she seems to be perfecting her technique for catching adolescents so that she may seel them consistently. However, once that happens, I fear she will attempt to move on to much larger prey."


    "I''ll be careful!"


    Shanalorre looked over her shoulder. "It is still worrying. I do not wish you to come to harm. I don''t want anyone else to come to harm again." That last was spoken with surprising vehemence, even if the other Dungeon Binder did not raise her voice. She blinked, swaying slightly, then closed her eyes and began to take deep breaths in a way Lori was deeply familiar with. Eventually, her breathing returned to normal. "Beyond that, I have nothing more that I think needs to be reported, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Very well. Continue as you have been. Rian?"


    "I''ve talked to the carpenters, and the last house should be done by tomorrow morning," Rian said. "It could have been done today, but there was no sense of urgency, especially with the other projects. Do you want me to make the announcement about them tomorrow?"


    She nodded again. "Do it during breakfast. I want you to be present to coordinate the inevitable disruption that will result."


    "I thought it would be something like that. Some of the barrels are also finished. I''m going to have them packed with food so that they''re not just full of empty space when we take them to River''s Fork." He sighed. "My biggest concern is someone decides to try fermenting booze inside them. I''m almost certain that part of the stolen food was being used to do that. Speaking of which though, I realized an oversight on our part. And I say ''our part'' because both of us didn''t think about it."


    "Oh?" Lori said, her voice flat.


    For some reason, Rian looked up at the ceiling. "Despite our proclamation of you now being in charge of River''s Fork, it''s only recently occurred to me that we¡ªand by we of course I mean you¡ªdid not publicly update the demesne''s legal code to reflect this." He pointed in the general direction of the list of laws near the door. "I mean, I know it''s based on militia law, but I don''t really know what that is. The specifics, I mean. From context, it''s what the militia operate under, but I don''t know it."


    Riz grabbed her bowl and remaining bread, and stood up hastily.


    Without looking, Rian reached out and managed to snag her sleeve. "It''s okay Riz, I''m not going to ask you to tell us about it. Should we assume it basically covers the usual spirit of ''don''t be horrible to each other'' that most laws do?"


    Riz glanced at him, then eyed Lori for a moment, before slowly sitting back down. "Basically," she admitted. "It''s got specific punishments for things that are a bit more forgiving than civilian law, but it''s kind of understood that if you break any of it, you''re getting a lot of dangerous glitter-work where you''ll be taking your chances more than usual. And your officer can also decide to hand you over to be punished under civie law. Depends on how he feels and how badly you''ve rainbowed."


    "Hey, watch the language! There''s children in the next table!" someone at another table said.


    "We''ve glittering heard rainbowed swearing before!" a high-pitched, girlish voice said from the table full of children.


    "Irla, don''t speak that way. You know how delicate adults can be," Shanalorre said blandly. "And wipe your mouth."


    "Sorry, Lady Binder!"


    "Ah, the wild frontier, where the children swear like militia," Rian sighed, sounding theatrically nostalgic. "Anyway, I believe it would be in¡­ well, your interest to at least integrate your code of law with the one that River''s fork is familiar with. While I''m sure it would be easier to just replace it entirely with your laws, they might have more specific, situational clauses since it sounds more extensive. Of course, your laws take precedence, but it doesn''t really cover something like, say, accusing someone of something they didn''t do. Under your laws, that''s technically not illegal, though the accusation will likely reach you or me, and you''ll probably set some terrible punishment for wasting your time once we''ve settled the matter."


    "If I may, Great Binder?" Shanalorre said. "I familiarized myself with our laws as a part of my duties as Dungeon Binder. With your permission, I can organize which parts of the legal code can logically be subclauses of the laws that you established, and present it to you for your decision as to which parts to retain or leave off? It will reduce the amount of decision making that need be done if examples of punishments for specific ranges of wrongdoing are already prepared in advance."


    Lori and Rian both blinked and stared at her. She stared back.


    "Shanalorre, no offense to you," Rian said, "but that''s the saddest thing I''ve heard this year. The only reason anyone your age should be completely familiar with a demesne''s laws is if Lori came up with it, resulting in a short list."


    "It was my responsibility. What sort of Dungeon Binder would I be if I were not familiar with the laws we''ve established?"


    Lori found herself nodding in approval. Despite her many, many, many failings, Shanalorre''s dedication to her former position was undoubtable. "Very well. Do so. When you finish, give me the plank and I will peruse it for consideration. Rian, see to it she has a plank. A personal plank, since she will likely need to do more writing in future."


    For some reason, Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."

 278 - Under Serious Consideration

    "Now, some of you have been understandably concerned about the new houses that her Bindership started building some weeks ago," Rian said. It was before breakfast, the kitchen almost ready to start distributing food. "Especially in conjunction with the news that certain families in River''s Fork¡ªthe blameless children of one such are currently in Binder Shanalorre''s care because their parents wished them to be safe here where we have a functional dungeon to shelter them¡ª"


    "Rian, cease with the narration of things everyone already knows and get to the point," Lori interrupted.


    "Your Bindership, important as our discussions are, not everyone bothers to eavesdrop on us when we''re talking. They need the context."


    "No, they don''t. Just tell them what I told you to tell them."


    Rian stared up at the ceiling again. When he looked down, his face was¡­ strange. It was an expression she''d never seen before. If they used it in theater, it was probably too subtle for her to really make out, even with the help of lightwisps to let her see the stage better. "Ah, you''ve learned so much, your Bindership." Huh? "Why, you''ve gotten so good a dealing with people, you''re even telling me how to do it. Would you like to show me how it''s done, as you have clearly surpassed me in ability in this field?"


    Ah. His face was different, but she''d heard those words from her mothers¡ªor something like them¡ªbefore. B-but NO! She was a Dungeon Binder now! She wasn''t going to be intimidated into silence! She was going to¡­ she was going to¡­uh¡­ what did she fantasize yelling at her mothers when they had done this to her? No, no, setting him on fire wouldn''t solve anything! Ah, right, she''d fantasized about getting up and proving them wrong by doing exactly what they''d dared her to do!


    ¡­


    No. No, she was not talking to people when she had someone to do it for her!


    "Rian, stop wasting everyone''s time and get on with it!" she snapped.


    "Are you sure, your Bindership? Perhaps you should tell me how to¡ª"


    "Get on with it!"


    "Well, if you insist, your Bindership. As I was saying, we have some more new houses up now. While people probably thought they''d be going to new people moving in from River''s Fork, they''re actually going to people who live right here, whose families are a bit too big for the house they currently live in. While that was probably an advantage last winter, since they would all have someone nice and warm to share blankets with, it''s going to be a nightmare when summer comes back around, so we''re fixing it early!"


    There were almost but not quite cheers, and the usual murmur of people talking in her dining hall rose in volume as people became more interested.


    "No, unfortunately, people can''t apply for the new houses," Rian continued. "It was decided beforehand that they would go to the families with the most members, to give them more space. Granted, there isn''t a lot more space right now, but it should be possible to build in a loft space, or even a small second floor, provided everyone is fine with a relatively low ceiling. And there will be more room for everyone to have a bed, and even little places that''s just for them¡­ but as I said, it has already been decided these will be for families with many members. I''m sure we can all count and figure out who those families are."


    There was a brief pause. Then Lori heard a distinct rise in excited talking some distance away by disturbingly Mikon-like voices.


    "That means us, right?"


    "We''re getting a bigger house?"


    "Does that mean we can actually sleep on beds now?"


    "Do you think if we also slept with¡ª"


    "This decision was made purely based on which families were biggest and not affected at all by ANYTHING ELSE!" Rian said loudly, though not loudly enough to drown out what was being said, or the laughs, teasing and everything else that ensued.


    "No one believes that, Rian," Lori said. "And if that''s obvious to me, it should be even more clear to everyone else."


    "Now, that''s just not fair," Rian sighed woefully, very clearly being theatrical. "What have I done to make people doubt my honesty? Do I seem like the sort of person to be dishonest about that sort of thing? Also, why would I lie about that?" He waved in Mikon''s general direction. "Does it seem like the sort of thing I''d feel any need to lie about?"


    Lori stared at him. "Rian, if you only prefer men, perhaps you should have said so far earlier¡ª"


    "No, I don''t. What does that have to do with anything?"


    She imitated his wave in Mikon''s general direction.


    "What does that have to do with¡ª No, no, we''ve digressed a long way from the point of this announcement! Back to work, back to work." There were disappoint groans, along with a cry of ''No, keep talking!". "Back to the announcement so our Binder can get on with her breakfast! You all know how she gets when she''s annoyed. No one wants her muttering about setting people on fire."


    If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    Lori rolled her eyes at the blatant distraction, but she was getting a bit hungry. "Then get on with it, Rian."


    "I''ve been trying! Anyway, just to be clear for those trying to count, the four houses are going to the families of¡ª" Rian rattled off some names, all presumably those with large families, and at least one set belonging to Mikon''s own relatives. "Now, this means we have four empty houses, slightly used. Also, people will notice that there''s one new house that hasn''t been assigned to anyone. It will remain unassigned so far, as Binder Lori has plans for it." He glanced at her for a moment. "However, I don''t think she''d object to it being used to store firewood or something until then?"


    Lori considered it, then waved a hand dismissively.


    "She doesn''t mind! So, we have one more temporary storage space! Be careful, since it''ll be used by people in future, but we can probably store dry things there. More firewood, maybe ropeweed when we have it¡­ maybe people can use it as a rest spot when it rains, though you''ll need to bring benches in. Just remember it''s temporary."


    "Now, once the families have moved into new houses, the houses they used to live in will be empty. While Binder Lori also has intentions for them, at the moment we''ve decided that they''ll be used as workshops while they''re available. One will be for the use of our chandler, Bonn, to hopefully make his life easier as¡­ well, as thanks for supporting this demesne''s bathing." Surprisingly, there was a round of approving-sounding voices and even a smattering of applause. "You''ll, ah, need to open the windows, and we''ll have to ask her Bindership to put in something to help vent out the fumes, but for now, you''ll have your own little space to make soap. Another will be set aside for our cobbler and those making shoes for the children, perhaps leather work in general. I''m willing to listen to suggestions for the other two houses¡ªlater! Later, people."


    The loud surge of people yelling out suggestions quieted down.


    "Now, this is only temporary, but I''ve been told our Binder, who is the very best and very good to us¡ª" there was another surge of noise that almost sounded like cheering, "¡ªintends to make more permanent workshops for those whose work are¡­ well, a bit too smelly for her to want it in the dungeon, where any smells will get everywhere."


    There were reluctant mutters of agreement.


    "All right, that should be it for now everyone! Please don''t rush the families to move out just because you want their house. If you want them to move faster, help them with whatever still needs to be built with the house they''ll move into. The heads of the families in question, meet with me after breakfast and we can get around to you picking which house you''ll move into. They''re all pretty much the same, but you might have a preference¡­ somehow. Enjoy your breakfasts everyone, and have a good day!"


    With a sigh, Rian sat down. He gave Lori a flat look for some reason.


    Next to him, Mikon leaned against his side. "Don''t worry, Rian. I believe you."


    "Thank you!" Rian sighed, then looked at Lori. "So, a thought occurred to me for the next time we went to Covehold. I was wondering if we could recruit a wizard."


    "No."


    "Ah, but things have changed," Rian said. He looked self-satisfied for some reason. "Your objection has been that you didn''t want another wizard in the same demesne as you, exempting Shanalorre because she''s only a savant, correct? What if the wizard was in another demesne? What if we recruit a wizard, but they stayed in River''s Fork? With you and Shana here, they wouldn''t be able to take River''s Fork''s core."


    Lori paused. Her head began to tilt sideways in thought.


    "With you here, there''s probably no point in recruiting a Whisperer, and there''s nothing we really need a Mentalist for," Rian continued. "However, if we get a Deadspeaker¡­ then we''d have someone to both maintain the demesne and, most especially, help accelerate the growth rates of our crops. Since Shanalorre can maintain Deadspeaking after it''s been made, they can provide the magic for any sort of extended¡­ uh what do you call Deadspeaking things again?"


    "Meanings," Lori said absently, heads still tilted as she hummed.


    "Yes, those. What do you think?"


    For a moment, Lori sat there silently. "I will put it under consideration."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, Shanalorre approached Lori to inform her that the younger Dungeon Binder was going to begin the integration of the two demesnes legal codes for Lori''s approval. Lori was a bit dubious about the prospect, but since she wasn''t the one doing the work it was no trouble to let Shanalorre do so. Besides, if there were parts she didn''t like or didn''t understand, then she could simply strike them out.


    Before Lori went to the wood storage sheds to cure the wood there, she took a look around her demesne. Since she had made the smaller boats operational again earlier that week, they were being used to get to the other side of the river. From what Lori could see, people were gathering some ropeweed from the other side, and there was already a batch in the retting tank. The spinners and weavers would have work soon, and hopefully people would have new clothes. Rian had suggested they make leather and hide trousers for everyone, but she wasn''t sure how serious he was about that.


    Some of the ropeweed was also being used for its namesake, the children beating the stalks and braiding it into simple cord to make retrieving their seeling rods easier. The brat and a few of the other older children were at the river despite the cold water, trousers rolled up and skirts girded around their loins, spread out and looking for suitable seels. The long, sinuous fursh were numerous and loud, though many seemed to be on the opposite shore. Lori supposed they were either starting to learn, or the children were a bit out of practice and had scared them off for the moment.


    Lori found herself staring at the brat for some time. Her offer¡­ shaking her head, Lori turned away to get to work.


    Being back in her demesne was such a stark difference from River''s Fork. The sky was open, and even when cloudy or overcast, everything was just so much brighter compared to River''s Fork, with its self-imposed gloom from the dome over the core. Her demesne was also filled with sounds of industry and activity. As she walked, she could hear the wood being cut at the saw pit, the splashing from clothes being washed, the ringing of copper being hammered into shape, all rising and lowering with proximity. Even the slightly nauseating smell of the hides and skins being tanned and processed into leather, interspersed with those working yelling to each other, was a sign of productivity.


    As she prepared her seat next to the shed to start curing the wood, Lori began to plan out where she would be putting the buildings that would function as workshops, and gave Rian''s proposal the serious consideration she had said she would¡­

 SS3.3 – "What If (nearly) EVERYONE In Lorian But Lori And Rian Was An Isekai?" Part 3

    The woman¡ªLori checked her hand, where she''d written a name in lightwisps¡ªVanessa had been amenable, at Rian''s prompting, to enclose her¡­ well, it was technically a smithy, since it was used for working and shaping metal, but the lack of furnace and forge made Lori not want to call it that. Workshop, perhaps? Whatever it was called, she was amenable to raising up metal panels in front of the open wall to enclose the room, using that strangely thin fabric as a curtain to cover the remaining opening as a door.


    "After all, we wouldn''t want the others to see Lori here and panic," Rian said, "or worse, talk to her."


    "Yeah, that¡­ would probably be bad," Vanessa agreed.


    Lori said nothing, merely standing up against the far wall¡ªthe one covered by dirt on the outside¡ªto protect her back and absently binding some lightwisps to illuminate the now darker room. The metal walls provided nothing to anchor the wisps to, so she warmed a spot with firewisps, and anchored the lightwisps there. She and Vanessa were left alone in silence as Rian went out to collect the ones he thought Lori needed to speak with. Fortunately, she didn''t bother making small talk. Instead, after one last glance at Lori, the woman had gone back to making shovels. Naturally, Lori had watched.


    The woman had started with a sheet of metal, which had appeared after she had traced her fingers over the metal table. Lori had been amused to see her take a stencil made of leather and use a metal stylus to trace out an outline on the metal. She had run her finger over the outline, and the metal had simply separated at the outline. Vanessa had then simply tossed the excess metal to the side, letting it clatter to the floor in a way that made Lori wince. She was about to pick up the metal¡ªif the woman didn''t want it, she was taking it¡ªonly to see that it was starting to dissolve. The solid-seeming metal was breaking apart, reducing into a silvery dust that eventually started to shimmer and fade away. In moment, the cast-off metal was gone, leaving nothing behind.


    ¡­


    Ah. That was what was meant by the metal ceasing to exist. Yes, not really something they could sell without it being a fraudulent product.


    The woman¡ªLori checked her hand¡ªVanessa began to shape the shovel-head-to-be, working it in her hands. It acted like stiff paper, flexing in her hands, yet holding its shape when she let go. Every change was accompanied by that strange heat haze shimmer, which was probably a result of her actively using whatever strange, deviated magic she possessed. Lori remembered the old aphorism, of how magic was the means through which the soul affected the world beyond without the intervention of the body. Of course, by that criteria there were people who argued that meant art, music, and discourse was a form of magic, which was simply absurd¡­


    The shovelhead was being attached to a branch¡ªthere some lengths stacked next to one wall¡ªwhen Rian entered the workshop. He had regained his usual annoying cheerfulness, because he announced himself with a jovial "We''re here!" as people followed behind him.


    "Oh, shit," the first person entering after Rian said upon seeing Lori.


    Vanessa nodded, her smile a bit sickly. "Yup, that''s what I said."


    The dark-haired newcomer¡ªshe had the same dark hair as the metal-creating woman, face as sun-tanned but arms slightly paler¡ªfrowned, glancing towards Lori. She mouth opened slightly, visibly changing what she was planning to say. Finally, she turned towards Rian, and her frown deepened. "I thought we had an agreement, Rian?"


    "I agreed not to tell her about you, and I didn''t," Rian said. "But I never agreed to lie for you, Katherine. Keeping yourselves secret was on you, and unfortunately for you, Binder Lori asked where all the tools were coming from. If it helps, she didn''t try to kill Vanessa on sight, but she''d like answers now."


    The next person to come stepped inside, took one look at Lori, then abruptly turned on his heel and started to walk out again.


    "No, you get back here," the new woman said, raising her hand towards him, her fist clenched as if she was holding something. There was a shimmer, and for the first time Lori saw the shimmer had a slight tinge of a vivid yellowish green before it formed into a long metal rod with a hooked end. The hook caught his bicep, there was another green-tinged shimmer, and now there was a loop on the end of the rod, shackling the arm loosely. Slipping out of the loop would have been easy, but the way the new woman was holding the rod, it would be difficult for them do that. "If we have to deal with this, so do you."


    "I didn''t agree to that," the man said dourly. Still, he turned away from the door, leaning against one of the metal walls with his arms crossed, pointedly looking at the metal ring around his arm. Ring and rod shimmered and vanished as the new woman turned to face Lori again, her arms also crossed over her chest.


    "The others should be here soon," Rian said. "Yoctoha is helping with the butchering, so Seraphine has agreed to attend on their group''s behalf."


    Even as they spoke, the fabric sheet that functioned as the door was pushed aside, and Lori tensed. She claimed the darkwisps within her clothes, under everyone''s clothes, under the table, and hidden in the spaces among the little pile of branches, imbuing them and getting ready to put them between her and the Mentalist who had just entered. Though Lori didn''t move save to tighten her hold on her staff, Lee Fei¡ªof course she''d remember the name of a potential threat!¡ªslowed, looking wary. "I have no quarrel with you, Binder Lori, nor do I seek your power. You need not fear me." She directed an annoyed and accusing look towards Rian, however, one that Lori found herself mirroring.


    "Rian, why is she here?" She''d already known about the Mentalist.


    Instead of answering, Rian turned to Lee Fei as some more people entered the workshop, pausing slightly as they saw Lori was there. "It''s now or never. Well, now or later, but I don''t think choosing later will make her any better disposed towards you."


    The Mentalist''s face remained completely impassive, but she became unnaturally still, in that way only Mentalists¡ªand, Lori supposed, Dungeon Binders using Mentalism¡ªcould achieve. Eventually, she said, "To cultivate knowledge, let us be rid of lies." It had the sound of a quote.


    "Wonderful," Rian said. "Then let''s just wait for the others."


    Lori didn''t relax, even as Lee Fei visibly made a point of moving to stand at the point of the room farthest from Lori, and closed her eyes, her hands folded over her stomach. However, she didn''t have the luxury of concentrating only on one person. Lori claimed the airwisps within the room, the earthwisp beneath and around the metal, the loose lightwisps in the air, and the firewisps around¡ª


    "Are you well?" Lori found herself saying, glaring intently at the man leaning against the wall.


    The man raised a single eyebrow. "I''m fine. Why do you ask?"


    "The air around you is far too hot. You must be feverish."


    "Huh, you can tell that from all the way there? No, I''m fine. This is a normal body temperature for me. I naturally run a little hot."


    "That sounds dangerously unhealthy. Have yourself examined by a medic as soon as possible. We cannot afford anyone being sick." They had medics, she distinctly remembered that¡­


    He rolled his eyes at her. "As one of those medics, I examine myself and declare I''m in good health. Thank you for your concern."


    "Get a second examination from someone else," Lori said flatly.


    "See? I told you she was nice," Rian said cheerfully.


    "You have low standards of nice, Rian," the new woman said. "Vanessa, it looks like we''ll be meeting in your space, so¡­"


    "Chairs coming up, boss," Vanessa said, setting her unfinished shovel aside for a moment. Lori watched with interest as she began producing metal chairs out of thin air in a shimmer of¡ªLori saw now¡ªred heat haze. Unlike the shovel, she didn''t need to bend and shape these. Instead, they seemed to grow from her hand instantly, tubes of metal seemed to grow from her hand to form the familiar shape of a chair''s legs, back, backrest, and seat. Instead of being flat metal panels, the seat and back had a slight curve, and for some reason were perforated with little decorative holes. Vanessa made the new chairs quickly, clearly having far more practice with these than with the shovel heads. Soon, there were chairs all around the metal table, which also received extensions to make it a bit larger.


    As she finished, four other people arrived, prompting one more exclamation of ''Oh, shit''. One immediately drew Lori''s attention.


    "What is he doing here?" she said, pointing at the dark-haired young man who she recognized as one of the annoying ones who primarily spoke the same unintelligible dialect.


    "He''s been invaluable in keeping his fellows from finding out about this place," Rian said, nodding towards the other man, who nodded back, even though he looked uncomfortable and out of place. "How about everyone sit down so I can facilitate introductions?"


    "Why bother?" the feverish man said as he pushed off from the wall and grabbed one of the chairs. It scraped across the strange metal floor in a way that made Lori wince and had some people glaring at him. He ignored it, sitting down on the hair and slouching so far the back of his head was resting on the backrest of the chair, and it was not a high back. "She''ll just forget all of them."


    "Well, we can write your names down on the table in front of you so she''ll be able to tell you apart," Rian said, rolling his eyes.


    "Vanessa, if you''d make us some name plates, please?" the other metal-creating woman that¡ªLori checked her hand¡ªVanessa had acknowledged as her boss said.


    Vanessa sighed, even as she started making lengths of triangular tube. "Vanessa do this, Vanessa do that¡­" she started to mutter.


    "Vanessa, stop complaining," was the response as the tubes were set down on the table in front of the chairs.


    "Hostile work environment! I''m complaining to HR."


    Rian pulled back the chair that had been placed at one end of the table. "Binder Lori?" he said, a clear invitation.


    Lori gave him one last annoyed glare¡ªshe would definitely be having words with him after all this was done, but for the moment she still needed him¡ªbefore she took the seat at implied the head of the table. Tellingly there was no other seat at the opposite end of her, even though there were nine other people. She gave Rian another look and pointed at seats to her left. He took the hint, sitting where indicated. A still-muttering Vanessa deliberately took one of the triangular tubes, scribbling on it with the metal stylus.


    The tip of the stylus shaved off metal like it was soft wax¡ªdidn''t she say the metal was supposed to be steel?¡ªand when the triangular tube was set down, it had Rian''s name in all capitals, lopsided handwriting like that of a child just learning. Or an adult who couldn''t be bothered to do better, which was in fact the case. Fortunately, it was still perfectly readable, though a part of Lori twitched to look at the sloppy writing.


    One by one, everyone sat down. Lee Fei sat furthest from Lori at the right of the table, an empty space opposite her, her hands flat on the tabletop. The feverish one sat down next to her, still slouched. Next to him was yet another dark-haired woman, her hair showing brown at the edges where light managed to pass through it, who''s smile was wide and reminded Lori far too much of Rian''s. The next seat closer to Lori was occupied by the second metal-creating woman, whose face was smooth and composed, her hands on the table with the fingers interlaced together. Between her and Lori sat a dark-haired young man who looked suspiciously like one of those idiots with the unintelligible dialect.


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    On the other side of the table, opposite the feverish man, sat a woman about Lori''s height, with pale blonde hair that had been pulled back in a tail with a strip of leather cord. Lori vaguely recognized her as one of three people close to Hatarine who didn''t obviously obsess about her. Disturbingly, she had a curved sword hanging from a belt at her waist. Next to the blonde was either a child or a very small woman. Notably, unlike the others who were wearing simple shirts or blouses, and cloudbloom trousers, this woman was wearing a dress. It was a well-made, hardy dress, but clearly a dress, of the sort worn by more well-off women when they were being idle in public at cafes. Her impractically long, more brilliantly bright blonde hair was held in place away from her face with metal hair clips, and Lori suspected that, seated as she was, her hair was touching the floor. On the table in front of her, her hands resting on it possessively, was a thick book that had actual metal hinges and fittings, with what looked like a locking mechanism of all things keeping the book shut. Vanessa and Rian sat in the remaining places, the table in front of the former full of metal shavings that were slowly dissolving into non-existence.


    "All right, then," Rian began. "You''ve already met Vanessa, and you actually remember Lee Fei. Next to Lee Fei is Stephen, one of our technically-medics, cooks, and alchemist. He''s keeping himself secret because if they knew about him, some people would pester him to make black powder for them. He only really represents himself and his friend Anna, but since they''re the most experienced medics we have, I thought you should meet."


    "Damned eehsecays," he sighed.


    "You''re a ''damned eehsecay'' too, Steve," the woman next to him said cheerfully as Vanessa moved one of the triangular tubes in front of him, angled so that the crudely written name on it face Lori.


    She was met with an annoyed elbow for her trouble. "Don''t call me ''Steve'', Mary Sue."


    "And on that convenient transition, the woman next to him is Marissa," Rian said smoothly as the two started to elbow at each other like children. "She''s one of our hunters who goes out to kill beasts and bring them back for butchering. She''s here to represent the simbohls." The what?


    "Hi!" The woman waved at Lori for some reason as Vanessa push one of the name triangles towards them.


    "Vanessa''s boss there is Katherine dela Rosa, Katherine for short. She''s the leader of the gising." He said the last word strangely, stressing the two separate syllables. It was either some dialect term, or a completely made up word.


    "Which means what, exactly?" Lori demanded.


    "I am told it means something like ''Awake''," Lee Fei said from the end of the table. "Fascinating word. Meaning and usage is completely contextual, with no change in form or structure to denote alteration of meaning¡­"


    "Oh, the stories I can tell you¡­" Marissa said.


    "Moving on," Rian interrupted. "This is Senou Kaede-san¡ª"


    "Hai hai, Kaede desu."


    "¡ªwho, yes, is one of the Japanese eehsecay. He''s one of the more level-headed of them. Well, there are a lot who are pretty level-headed and just want to get along, get by and survive, but unfortunately the loud, disruptive idiots are the ones who stand out. He''s been a big help in helping us keep the Industry Complex secret from his fellows."


    "Don''t want baka get sword," he said, shaking his head fiercely. "Worse, gun."


    "We won''t give them any anyway, but having them bothering us about it will be a pain in the ass," Katherine said.


    "Also, Kaede-san got lucky and saw someone doing magic that they shouldn''t have been able to," Rian said.


    Kaede¡ªKaede-san? His name triangle read ''Seno Kaideh''¡ª shrug. "Luck stat, es-es-ar-eeh-ecks."


    "Back at the end, we have Mara Clara, or simply Mara. She''s also one of our medics, and is the one who accompanies hunters out into the Iridescence in case anyone gets injured."


    "Not that it is often need," Mara said. "Those who venture forth have learned to git gud and are not unskilled."


    Lori frowned. "What was that?"


    "Git gud," Lee Fei said. "It is difficult but the meaning can be roughly translated as ''attain excellence''. It denotes one who has honed their skills to sharpness, cultivating their technique to ascend to the heavens."


    For some reason, the feverish one¡ªLori checked his name plate¡ªStephen started coughing.


    "Are you sure you''re not sick?" she said sharply.


    "Sorry," he said, his voice deep and strained for a moment. "Spit went down the wrong way. I''m fine."


    "While Mara isn''t the leader of her group¡ªthat''s pretty much Hatarine, at least in essence¡ªshe''s the most level-headed person among them, and they trust her to represent them properly."


    "And they don''t trust any of the others to use their absence to not get some sort of advantage with Hatarine," Stephen said dryly.


    "That as well," Mara confirmed, even though the statement made no sense to Lori.


    "Haremu skeellu es-es-ar-eeh-ecks," Kaede said, whatever that meant.


    "And finally, we have Seraphine," Rian said, which by the process of elimination was likely the hopefully small woman with the impractical hair. The alternative was that she was a child. "She represents the other shardessi, who can''t be here because they''re busy butchering our meat for storage or are still out on the hunt."


    "Binder Lori," the small woman nodded, her voice too deep to be a child''s, confirming Lori supposition as Vanessa put the last name triangle in front of her. "I give you my word that none in our group wishes you any harm, or desire any sort of position or influence in your government. If we could live out¡­ there¡ª" she waved in the direction of the Iridescence, "¡ªwithout being in any danger of Iridiation, we would do so. None of us wish to usurp your position of power and leadership. We just want to live quietly and do our research. "


    "Join the club," Stephen said just loudly enough to be audible.


    "Your words are noted," Lori said, glancing one last time at Rian. "We shall see the truth of them. Answer me this: who is the Whisperer in hiding?"


    Whatever they were all expecting, it wasn''t that. There were confused expressions, and some exchanged looks.


    "To my knowledge, there are no other Whisperers in the¡­ the demesne," Katherine said slowly.


    "Then explain the lightningwisps around the long building," Lori said, pointing towards one of the walls, on the other side of which would have been the large lean-to-like building.


    "Lightni¡ªoh!" Katherine said, snapping her fingers for some reason. "The bug repellant field." Was that what that was? "That''s Trini''s work. She set it up to keep away bugs being drawn in from all the smells. She''s not a Whisperer. She''s a gising, like Vanessa and me."


    Lori suppressed the, admittedly facetious, urge to correct her grammar. "Not a Whisperer," she said flatly. "She controls lightningwisps, but she''s somehow not a Whisperer. Do you take me for a fool?"


    "She''s not a Whisperer because she''s like us," Vanessa interrupted. "Because she''s gising. I told you I can control temperature, right? Well, Trini can control ele¡ªlightning. Like me, her magic has nothing to do with Whispering."


    "Your magic," Lori said, voice still flat. "Your magic that involves creating metal and fabric, and controlling temperature."


    "Or lightning," Katherine said, and Lori turned to face her. "Or weight. Or light and sound. Or time. Or force. Or magic itself."


    "Huh. That explains a lot," the woman next to her¡ªLori couldn''t be bothered to check the name¡ªsaid, sounding thoughtful. She seemed to be counting on her fingers. "Just those?"


    Katherine glanced sideways at her. "Yes, just those. As I understand it, Whispering controls heat, light, shadows, mineral solids, water, and air. And you can''t make metal. Not out of the air, at least. The very fact that we can create dreamsteel should already be a big sign we''re not Whisperers, even if there''s some overlap. From what I have heard, both Whispering and Deadspeaking can change the shape of teeth and bones, and Mentalists can perceive lightningwisps to a degree."


    That¡­ was true¡­


    ¡­


    There was a logical conclusion to be reached from this. One that Lori had been avoiding. One that was the obvious conclusion to reach when she first saw Vanessa making metal out of nothing.


    "You possess a new type of magic," Lori said slowly. "One that is neither Whispering, Deadspeaking, Mentalism, nor Horotracting." Or an old one. One that predated memory. "How?"


    "We don''t know," Vanessa said. "We just¡­ woke up able to do this."


    "We had to teach ourselves," Katherine said. "We didn''t trust the government not to just lock us up for study. Or use us. Or try to breed us."


    "Yup, that sounds like the government, all right," Stephen said, nodding amiably. "Assholes."


    "Present company exempted, I''m sure," Rian said cheerfully.


    "Oh, like being set on fire is any better for most people." He looked at Lori as he said that.


    "I currently lack the facilities to contain anyone for study," Lori said. "And you have made yourself of use of your own volition. And breeding is disgusting." Slowly, she looked towards the others. "I know why the¡­ the gising¡ª" for some reason, people winced. Ugh, well, it was her first time trying to pronounce it! "¡ªare in hiding. The draw of unlimited metal tools¡­ unlimited metal and fabric¡­ However, by the fact you identify as separate groups, you are not all gising." Was that closer? Ugh, she hated pronouncing terms wrong! It made her look uneducated! "Why do you hide?" She looked at Stephen. "Surely it can''t be simply to hide your skill with alchemy."


    He nodded towards her. "To clarify, even though you call it firewisps, you can''t actually control fire, right? Not the actual, burning fire."


    A pointedly leading question, so Lori simply nodded, even as she concentrated on her connection to her core, her awareness of her demesne''s wisps¡­


    He raised his finger, and suddenly there was a flame dancing there. It was a clear, yellow flame like a candle flame, but¡­


    "Wait, what are you burning?" Vanessa exclaimed. "An open flame needs fuel! You can''t be burning the air, it''s the wrong color!"


    "Oh, right, you haven''t seen this before," Katherine muttered.


    "Is it your finger? Are you burning fat from your pores? That''s it, isn''t it!"


    "You know the answer is ''magic'', right," Stephen said with a smirk.


    "Bullshit!" What? "There are rules! For there to be flame, something needs to be burning, even if it''s just the molecules in the air!"


    "Magic. It''s burning my magic as fuel."


    "So, what, you can convert your magic into a flammable substance?"


    "Magic is fire. Fire is magic." The feverish man shrugged, and the flame disappeared. "The magic itself is what''s burning, with no need for intermediaries like fuel. Although I''ll admit, they do help."


    Firewisps. Lightwisps. Heat and light, as would have been natural for an open flame¡­ and yet, it was like the wisps had simply spontaneously appeared. No source. No bindings.


    Slowly, Lori turned her attention to Lee Fei.


    "I am not a Mentalist," the woman said immediately, "though it was a convenient, if dangerous, ruse and obfuscation for this one to allow you to believe so. While there are curious commonalities that I wish to study further should I ever meet a true Mentalist and risk revealing myself in this manner, in mechanism we differ greatly and our similarities are superficial. I am in truth a zian, one who seeks the ascend on the path of immortality by cultivating my mind and skill through effort and study. To that end, I study and learn from the world to be better study and learn myself."


    Oh. Someone from the Mysteries of alknowledge. Well, she supposed a particularly driven one could be mistaken for a Mentalist. In fact, this one had been. She supposed zian was some kind of rank or position within the Mysteries, probably from some distant demesne she''d never heard of.


    Lori simply nodded, and turned towards¡ªshe checked the name on the triangular tube¡ªMarissa. "And you? You represent the¡­ simbohls, correct? What are you, exactly?"


    Marissa grinned. "Simbohls are the pretty guardians, the warriors of truth, love and justice! With the powers love, hope, faith, righteousness, fear, anger, and despair, we¡ª"


    "They''re Magical Girls," Stephen said blandly.


    "Hey! Did I interrupt your little show? And that''s reductive! We''ve got guys too!"


    "Oh. Faceless. That explains much," Lee Fei said.


    "You have despair powers?" Vanessa said, sounding incredulous. "Did anyone happen to make a contract with¡ª"


    "Enough!" Lori snapped. Fortunately, everyone quieted. That didn''t always works with her. "Spare me the theatrics and give me the explanation."


    "Simbohls can use powerful magic, but only when they''re in a state of emotional extreme," someone said. "Those emotions are love, hope, intense belief in an external force, intense personal certainty, fear, anger or despair. Each person has a specific emotion they must feel intensely to manifest their power. In practice, many potential simbohls never realize their power, as the probability of attaining the correct emotional extreme is highly improbable. This is not helped by the fact that until they simbohlays, usually by facing possible death while in the correct emotional extreme, there is no way to know for certain if someone is a sihmbol or not."


    Slowly, everyone turned to look at the diminutive¡ªLori checked her name¡ªSeraphine. The book in front of her was open, and she was perusing a page near the front of the book. At their looks, she shrugged, closing her tome. There was a click as the lock sealed shut again. "Simbohls are not unknown to us. Neither are payrotergists." What?


    For some reason, the dark-hair¡ªLori checked. Seno Kaideh¡ªsighed. "Riajuu¡­" He sounded both bitter and exasperated.

 279 - Consequences Of (More) Theft

    Lori hated it when Rian had a point.


    However, as she thought about his proposal while she ran the curing shed, she found that she couldn''t really refute his points. And if she was being honest with herself¡ªand that was the only person to whom honesty mattered¡ªthe thought of having another wizard about to do things she couldn''t, things she had taken for granted as being done back when she had lived with her mothers¡­ it appealed.


    She couldn''t even really argue his suggestion to recruit a Deadspeaker. Shanalorre could do little with her connection to her demesne''s core¡ªalready as surprise, because Lori had thought she could do nothing¡ªbut one of the things she had confirmed she could do was to imbue meanings that had already been created by someone else. If they had a Deadspeaker¡­ well, River''s Fork''s impending food crisis, while probably not solved, would certainly be greatly alleviated. Accelerating the growth rate of the crops, turning the need for weeks into mere days¡­


    They''d actually have a significant surplus. Even with the proposed limitation of restricting the recruit to River''s Fork, with the proper infrastructure, allocation of workers, and possibly pointed and painful public examples should the malcontents be¡­ well, malcontent, they might be able to start being able to use the vigas for more than bread. They''d have a large emergency supply in the event of a dragon. They''d be able to replant and recover their crops faster in the event of a dragon.


    Of course, this would require sending the Coldhold to Covehold. It would be several weeks, and to make the voyage worth the effort, they''d need materials to trade for goods they needed. While they had salt, it was unlikely that others weren''t also operating in that market. Most likely, they had managed some kind of profit because they had arrived before the winter, when people had been busy trying to preserve food, and there had been high demand. This early in the year, while there would still be a demand, the prices might not be as high. More people might have also moved into the market as well. Even if people had somehow not thought of building a boat out of ice before, the idea would almost certainly have been introduced by the Coldhold''s visit.


    Rian would also need some days to try and see if her unmarked beads could be sold to those who wished to imbue their bound tools, or at least those made by Whisperers. That added perhaps a week to the expedition. Given how the Coldhold was currently occupied transferring herself and other things to River''s Fork, it was unlikely they would be able to mount a return trip any time soon. Possibly not until summer. So she''d have plenty of time to give the idea more consideration, then.


    Lori was most definitely not procrastinating! She wasn''t Rian, after all.


    Unfortunately, the matter of the brat''s proposal was, according to Rian, not something she could put off. She tapped away at the thought all day, her flow of thought going around in circles. Ultimately, however, she reluctantly decided to take the brat''s offer. Despite being a child, she had knowingly volunteered¡ªLori didn''t understand why, but that was perfectly normal for her when it came to most people''s motivations¡ªwithout being prompted, indicating a willingness to do so for her own reasons. In doing so, she alleviated a difficulty Lori was having, and could potentially train others to take over for her.


    Despite the logic of her decision, it still made her neck itch in what might almost have been guilt.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, they were slightly delayed as the new door meant for River''s Fork''s food storage area was loaded onto the Coldhold. Unfortunately, its dimensions were just a bit too wide to fit through the hatch that went down to the boat''s main storage area.


    "Yeah¡­ that was a bad oversight of our parts," Rian said as they considered the problem. Below, the barrels were still being secured. "We might need to have the carry the door behind us on your ice boat. It will be more stable laid down on. Our other alternative would be to lay it out on its side on the deck, and to be honest that would be far too disruptive, along with a risk of it falling overboard."


    "Lori''s Ice Boat," Lori corrected.


    "That''s what I said, your ice boat."


    "¡­fine, get it done."


    Rian nodded. She''d told him she was taking the brat''s offer at dinner last night, and ordered him to see to any preparations needed for it: talk to her parents, talk to her, inquire what the brat needed, whether the parents were willing to come to River''s Fork and assist with the farming there, all those things. "Right. Come on, men, let''s get this door off so we don''t need to worry about it falling off our boat and make it Clowee''s problem. Also, someone get Clowee, we need her to bring this down to the Fork with us."


    People laughed at that for some reason, even as Rian and some of the men picked up the door to carefully try to get it off the boat and back on the dock. Clowee, it turned out, was the ferrywoman who operated Lori''s Ice Boat on a regular basis. They stayed long enough to watch the door be carefully placed on the ice boat before the Covehold finally got underway.


    Once they arrived, the door had to be carefully removed from the smaller boat and taken to the mine, where Lori was finally able to mount it to the stone walls. It took some adjusting to make sure it didn''t scrape against the ground, or any other part of the stone frame around the door, but fortunately a year of mounting doors like this gave Lori enough experience to adjust the door herself without any of her demesne''s carpenters.


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    With the food storage now secured by a door that could be barred¡ªthey were still working on a lock, since that was a bit delicate, and Lori wanted one that couldn''t just be opened by someone with a carved stick¡ªLori''s peace and quiet in the mine was broken as people started transferring food from the root cellar. Fortunately, Lori had to be outside anyway to make ice for the meat that had recently been brought in by the hunters with them. It gave her something to do while people labored to move the food, while Riz, Rian and other people had kept an eye out for people trying to steal said food.


    The most common excuse, not all of them from simply the malcontents, seemed to be that they''d had to eat their house''s emergency food cache because they hadn''t been satisfied after a meal. People honestly seemed to think this would get Rian and Yllian¡ªLori checked her rock. Yes, his name was Yllian¡ªto let them keep the food they were blatantly stealing. Perhaps it would have, had Shanalorre still be in charge of River''s Fork.


    "Twenty lashes each for theft." Yllian had a darkly satisfied look on his face.


    "If any children are willing to step forward and admit to any such wrongdoing because their parents goaded them to, they''ll be let off with a warning," Rian said. "I know how hard it is to tell your parents no, even when what they''re asking you to do is something you know is wrong."


    Five adults had their hands secured to posts and punished while the work paused a moment for people to watch. Lori didn''t know if it was mercy, or Rian''s own form of cruelty, but instead of a knotted rope, leather belt, or supple branch, they were lashed by what looked like a soaking wet towel that was twisted before each lash. It left interesting wet spots on their clothes, but from the sounds it was no less impactful.


    Once they were done, Rian smiled at their pained or glowering faces. "Now, we''re not unreasonable. If you ate your emergency supply, then of course we''ll allow you to replenish it. We wouldn''t want you all to starve in an emergency, after all. Dormin, you and the boys are going hunting this afternoon, right?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian."


    Rian nodded, and exchanged looks with Yllian. The two of them nodded at each other for some reason, and Rian''s smile actually widened. "Well, the five of you are excused from work to help Dormin, Aska, and some of the other men go hunting outside of the demesne," he said brightly. He spoke loudly over their exclamations. "No, no, no need to thank me. I''m sure you''re all eager for the chance to get as much food as you want with your bare hands and replenish your home''s emergency stores. Going out there and having to kill beasts yourself will let you do just that! Don''t worry, it''ll be easy! If it wasn''t easy, I''m sure you five would have had far more qualms simply taking food from the stores like you were doing, so of course it must be so simple anyone could do it! Right?"


    He stopped and made a show of listening to their exclamations for a moment. "All right, all right, I''m not unreasonable," Rian said. "if you truly think don''t have what it takes to go out there and help our brave hunters and ferrymen risk their lives to bring back some fresh meet, then you don''t have to¡­ provided you can beat Yllian or myself in a fist fight. Yes, even you Missus Asil. Everyone is equal under Binder Lori''s laws. You have as much right to punch someone in the face as the men do."


    Rian spread his arms invitingly as Yllian moved to stand with his fellow lord. "So, who wants to try? Which one of us do you want to face? We''ll even give you a chance. Circle rules. Manage to force us out of the circle, and you win."


    After that, transferring the food to the new food storage went much more smoothly. It would mean that her mine wouldn''t be as peaceful anymore, since there''d be people coming in to get food for lunch and dinner, but Lori was resigned to that. In fact, people were coming and going the whole day as they filled the barrels with fresh water from the river.


    When one was filled, Riz would indicate it to Lori, and she put a binding of lightwisps to fill the container with unseen light before it was sealed shut. It wasn''t a perfect measure¡ªa part of her wanted to boil the water, but they didn''t have the time or the equipment beyond just using bindings¡ªbut given the circumstances it was the quickest and most efficient way of making sure the water was pure enough to drink when it was needed, for now. Other methods could be worked out in the future, when the water was replaced to keep it fresh.


    It took the rest of the day to move all the remaining food supplies once the thieves had been sent off with the hunters. The next day, Lori was able to get back to excavating. The change in arrangements allowed them to free up people from having to protect the food, since Riz and those with her would effectively be doing the same as they watched over Lori.


    On the last day, with more space excavated, Lori used the stone to build a protective stone building around the water wheel and ventilation fan. Making an arching roof would normally have been difficult, especially since she didn''t have her connection to her core to be able to control the earthwisps at a distance, which was why she''d been leaving the stone she''d been excavating around the water wheel, letting the piles build up. On the last day, she had enough mass to make the stone piles rise up, and then, very slowly and carefully¡ªusing both her staff and her wand in either hand so she could control the earthwisps of both at the same time¡ªmeet in the middle. After that, it was all a matter of trimming the excess stone away, leaving an arching roof over the structure that supported its own weight over the water wheel shaft, and fan.


    Unfortunately, she had to leave it at that, since without her connection to her core, she had needed to move slowly, such that it was dark by the time she''d finished. Rian had even come over to check up on her and remind her it was dinner time, then had left to bring food for her, Riz, and the others with Riz who hadn''t gone to the dining hall because Lori had still been busy.


    By the time Lori had finished, everyone else''s bowls were empty, and the last remaining bowl that Lori had chosen when he''d first arrived was cold in his hands. Fortunately, it wasn''t anything she couldn''t rectify with some firewisps. By the time they''d walked back to the dining hall¡ªwhich only had a few people left¡ªthe bowl had cooled down enough for her to eat it as Rian moved some of the brazers that had no one near them and still had some fuel over to where she sat.


    Yllian was one of the people still there, and he joined Rian sitting opposite her as she ate. Neither of her lords said anything as she ate several mouthfuls, chewing on the boiled vigas. Finally, she swallowed and said, "All right. What do you have to report?"

 280 - Making Farmable Land

    The air started to get a little bit warmer as the days passed.


    The next time they went to River''s Fork, the brat and Shanalorre accompanied them, the former carrying three sharpened sticks as seeling rods along with her bedroll, blanket, and a small pack with a change of clothes. The children who now resided in Shanalorre''s house, most especially her cousin, had been left in the care of two of Mikon''s cousins, who had also started sitting at the table with the children during meals.


    Neither of the brat''s parents had come to accompany her, though they had spoken a lot to Rian. At least, Lori assumed that''s who the man and woman with the four children who had accompanied the brat up to the dock were. Rian had spoken to them for some time while Shanalorre had spoken to her cousin, then the two Mikon-cousins, then all the children who had come to see her off. Lori distinctly saw the rock she''d given to Shanalorre solemnly being passed to the younger girl, who gripped the rock tightly and nodding several times as the children all tried to get a look at it.


    Lori had invited the brat to spend the trip with her in her little private room, but for some reason the girl declined, deciding to spend the journey outside. Perhaps she wanted to get an idea of the concentration of seels outside Lori''s demesne? That was likely it.


    Once they were at River''s Fork, she didn''t see the brat much. The most she saw was during meals, and a little bit after breakfast near the river, while she was making ice for the food storage. Lori would sometimes see the brat, accompanied by Shanalorre and someone she didn''t recognize except as someone she might have seen with them on the Coldhold, walking along the river with a seeling rod and a spare in hand. As the days passed, the brat started to be accompanied by some of the children who still lived in River''s Fork, who also started carrying crudely sharpened seeling rods.


    While Lori didn''t actually see her seeling, the results soon became visible. Wooden frames made from branches started to appear, on which were secured seel hides laid out to dry in the sun when it was out. The addition of what she recognized as seel meat in the food. A seel waiting for her with an amused Riz, which was taken to be added to the next morning''s pot.


    It took five more shifts for the dragon shelter in River''s Fork to be ready to Lori''s standards. The dragon shelter was mostly a large space interrupted only by stone pillars that supported the ceiling. There was a line of latrines near the ramp that could be accessed from the mine tunnel to be cleaned. Without her connection to her core, it was useless to put any bindings on it, and she desperately wanted to. Airwisps to keep the smell inside, waterwisps and firewisps to desiccate and dry the waste for easier cleaning, lightwisps so that she could add full doors in front of the latrines for privacy¡­


    Well, perhaps it wasn''t quite up to Lori''s standards, but until she claimed the core, there was no practical way to maintain the bindings she wanted to anchor there. At best, she could place some lightwisps from her eyes for illumination, but the rest¡­ she''d need some kind of container to place blood from her veins if she wanted to put in a binding of waterwisps she could maintain from outside. In the end, since the dragon shelter was meant to be used only in the event of a dragon¡ªor at worst, a powerful storm¡ªit was probably best not to put in any bindings¡ªsave for the lightwisps¡ªthat would encourage people to occupy the dragon shelter when there wasn''t a dragon passing over.


    After that, they then had to bring in the carpenters and stone masons to add the things she couldn''t. The stone masons added steps to make the ramp into stairs, helped her even out the floors, walls and pillars, and pointed out places that might need more stone for support. The carpenters measured and made the wooden doors to seal off access to the latrine''s contents to mostly keep the smell of the latrine out of the mine tunnel, bench seats with a hole in the center for people to sit on while using the latrines, the doors to give privacy in the latrine, and even wooden lids to cover up the hole in the latrine bench to try and keep the smell in when people weren''t using it.


    The lids didn''t seal in perfectly, but the carpenters were confident the lids would work to try to limit the smell. Apparently most latrines would have these, but because of the bindings she put on the ones in her demesne to trap the air and desiccate the waste, it wasn''t needed. The carpenters also built fittings for a cold room for the meat and ice that Lori fitted into a corner of the cold room. The idea, apparently, was to put the ice in a separate chamber over where the meat is actually stored, to prevent contact with the melt water.


    This involved using some of River''s Fork''s copper to make metal sheets to lay the ice on that would better transfer heat from the meat to the ice. It stored a much smaller amount of meat than Lori thought would be sufficient for River''s Fork, but according to Rian and Yllian, this would be better for the demesne''s circumstances, since there wouldn''t be so much meat that some going missing would be unnoticed.


    "That sounds dangerous," Lori said when they explained it for her. "Shouldn''t we be working to store a surplus for winter?"


    "That''s what the harvest is for," Rian said. "Besides, if there''s a surplus, people are going to start trying to steal it. Or eating too much. Or both. Or start trying to ferment it to make booze."


    The low, only mildly indignant mutter that had risen had indicated reluctant agreement, though Lasponin¡ªand it almost physically hurt Lori that she managed to remember his name¡ªstarted loudly saying that it was all a means of trying to control the good people of River''s Fork¡ª


    "Yes, because some of them are unruly, selfish, prone to theft and violence, and selfish!" Rian yelled back. "So they can''t be trusted when there''s food lying around! They tried to steal food from Karina! What sort of adult does that? The kind that clearly need some controlling to keep them from doing something selfish, stupid and selfish!"


    "You said selfish four times," Shanalorre noted from next to Lori.


    "It needed emphasis, so I repeated it. Repeatedly."


    Despite some people not learning even as they were repeatedly sent out to hunt beasts, the demesne was actually doing pretty well when it came to food. With the beast meat bring brought in, the seel meat the brat and some of the other children were bringing in, the fruit that was still growing quickly on some of the trees of the dome, what they''d been able to gather in the hills around the demesne, and the remaining vigas from the previous year''s harvest, Yllian calculated that they''d be able to now last until harvest, and a little beyond¡­ provided that the influx of meats continued.


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    The hunters, the people being punished for theft, and the men who operated the Coldhold continued to hunt beasts for the demesne. While the arrangement worked¡ªeven the thieves had stopped complaining about the danger and just complained about how much the work smelled¡ªit wasn''t something that could go on indefinitely, given the plans they had. The Coldhold was needed for collecting salt and eventually heading for Covehold to trade.


    "We might have to ask Clowee to move here with your ice boat to help the hunters get around and transport the game from the edge back to the center," Rian suggested during one discussion. "That one has enough space for the hunters, their assistants, and the game they bring back. It won''t have as much capacity as the Coldhold, but Clowee can make multiple trips while the others are out hunting."


    "While that might be workable, will it not impact the work to be done on the other side of the river in Lorian?" Shanalorre inquired.


    "We have another boat, but yeah, it probably will," Rian nodded. "At this point, we might have to make a fourth boat."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "''We''?"


    "Yes, because the carpenters will be needed to make the frame and driver components. Unless you want to try to make the frame out of bone? Then it''ll be all you."


    Lori thought back to the bones of the island shell she had buried.


    When the crops were finally planted, people were directed towards clearing more land and readying it for planting. This was difficult, both because of the position of River Fork''s settlement¡ªbetween where two rivers met and merged into one¡ªand because of the rather hilly and rocky terrain. What soil there was didn''t go very deep before hitting solid rock, and Yllian said that during the more intense rains the water that came down from the hills around them tended to make temporary streams that would wash away any crops that were planted in the wrong place.


    While there was a moderately flat stretch of ground that could have been used for planting¡­ unfortunately, some idiot had planted a giant dome made of trees in the center of it, and then put houses all over it to keep it from being usable. The ground was a bit more workable on the other shores on either side of the dome, but unfortunately, there was no easy way to cross them for the sort of regular work setting up a new field would need. There was a rocky part of the river that didn''t lead back to Lori''s demesne that could be traversed over if people were careful, but that was almost a taum upriver.


    And so, they had to make do.


    It was Rian who suggested that, since there was no nearby flat level ground that wouldn''t be awash in flooding water when it rained, they should make their own.


    "No, I don''t mean make it with Whispering," he said before Lori was able to progress from her flat, unamused look to saying what she thought of such a stupid idea. He started sketching on his plank. "I meant make something like the tuber planters we have on the third level, but bigger. We have a lot of rocks and some mud, and there are some spots on the slopes of the hills that don''t become waterfalls. If we use the rocks to make some kind of¡­ of terrace that we can fill with decent soil, we could plant there. With some proper drainage, even if water gets redirected into it, it shouldn''t be a problem."


    He turned the plank around to show Lori as Yllian and Shanalorre¡ªshe was visiting this shift, alternating between staying with the children and reminding the people of her demesne she was still alive¡ªboth peered at it as well.


    "Is this supposed to be the hill?" Yllian said, pointing.


    "No, that''s the edge of the terrace, which we''ll have to build up with rocks, but it''s not like we don''t have a lot of that lying around. We build it one the side of the hill, and now we have level ground to plant on."


    "I don''t see how this is any different from simply using soil to create an area that can be farmed in already level ground, Rian," Lori said.


    "A lot of that level ground tends to get very runny when it rains, remember? If it were possible for plants to grow there, they''d already be growing there. If it''s bare, it''s because the soil tends to get washed away. If we do it like this, while it might still get flooded with water, this will actually trap soil, at least until it fills to the brim."


    Lori considered that, even as she peered at the drawing.


    Then she shook her head. "No, I still don''t understand."


    It took Rian building a little model using mud and river rocks to finally properly convey the idea he had. Once he did, however¡­


    "That would actually be a workable idea," Yllian mused as he looked at the little model that Rian had built up against the side of one of the Deadspoken houses, which acted as the hill. Little rocks had been stuck into the ground in a curve, the open end towards the ''hill'', and then the space inside the curve had been filled with mud, which had been flattened to make Rian''s ''terrace''. "If we choose the right location, it could actually be made fairly large."


    "I see what he meant about drainage as well," Shanalorre said. "Properly made, this shouldn''t flood. The water would just pass through the rocks and towards lower ground, taking relatively little of the soil with it. I remember my mother¡ª" Shanalorre trailed off, staring blankly at nothing. Then she twitched, and her left arm rose and slapped herself on the cheek. She blinked, then shook her head. "Apologies. My direct predecessor told me they used such structures for farming in mountainous regions such as Open Hand Demesne, when the ground isn''t secure enough for a large vista."


    Lori examined the structure as Rian and Yllian looked at each other for some reason. Eventually, she said, "Do we have enough people to construct this?"


    "Moving all the rocks shouldn''t be a problem," Rian said, looking like he was resisting the urge to wipe his muddy hands on the front of his trousers. "There''s still plenty of rocks along the river. If needed, we still have the mining tools, so if you designate one for us to use as raw material, we can break up one of the piles of stone you excavated from the mine. The biggest difficult will be to build this in such a way that it can support weight, especially when there''s soil behind it."


    "Consult with the stone masons about this. Though you probably already considered that."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll talk to Kolinh about it too. He or someone he knows might know how to build something like this."


    Lori frowned at him. "Who?"


    "Captain Kolinh, retired, formerly of Lomabuyar Demesne''s militia engineering banner," Shanalorre said.


    "Engineer Kolinh," Rian said. "He''s the one who led the work on the first and second row of houses after you go done putting up the walls."


    Lori titled her head. "I''ll take your word for it," she said, shaking her head. "How long will this take?"


    "A storm month, at the very least," Yllian said thoughtfully.


    "Possibly longer, since I wouldn''t be surprised if it collapsed on us a few times as we try to figure out what we''re doing," Rian nodded. "Then we''d need to fill it with soil and plant it. Best to see this as a long term project. Something for people to do over the next few years to increase the usable farmland."


    Lori nodded. "All right," she said. "Find a spot and build one." No doubt Rian already had a location in mind. "Once the stone has been placed, I will consider securing it to the ground. And let''s see about building one of these back home, as well."


    The dragon shelter was done. And it had only taken¡­ a pale month and a half? There were probably a few more days there somewhere she wasn''t counting. The days had blended together while she was underground after all, and she hadn''t really bothered to keep count. Still, as far as she concerned, a major part of her responsibility to her new demesne had been fulfilled. She was going home and staying there for a week. Let Rian take care of going back and forth between demesnes for a while. She wanted her rest and she was going to have it!

 SS3.4 – "What If (nearly) EVERYONE In Lorian But Lori And Rian Was An Isekai?" Part 4

    Lori''s hand made a satisfying impact as she slammed it palm-down onto the metal table, which reverberated after the initial strike. The one sitting next to her, opposite Rian, actually jumped in surprise at the sound. It certainly made everyone turn to look back towards her, cutting off the budding comments from the others arrayed around the table.


    "I find it very doubtful that," Lori began, "that my demesne is populated by those with deviant magics simply by chance."


    "Deviant?" the feverish one¡ªLori checked¡ªStephen said indignantly.


    "It''s not Whispering, Mentalism, Deadspeaking or Horotracting. Hence, it deviates from the known magics. Though given that it seems at least one group managed to research and quantify it, perhaps it''s simply rare." Lori looked towards the small blonde¡ªSeraphine, according the name in front of her¡ªwondering what else was written in her book. Given the fittings on it, it was probably a personal notebook of some sort. Most books did not usually come with metal hinges and a built-in locking mechanism.


    "It wasn''t," Katherine nodded. "The plan was to try and set up a little settlement of our own, some place where we¡­" She chuckled for some reason, "where we wouldn''t have to hide what we could do, were we could conduct our studies without having to worry about being seen as test subjects and confined, or worse forced to use our abilities in ways we objected to."


    "Unfortunately," Lee Fei said, "we found that none of our abilities could create a protective field against the Iridescence. Despite much experimentation, none of our¡­ deviant magics could protect against it. At best, we were only able to slow its growth in the experiments conducted, but in comparison, cleansing with water proved to be far safer and more efficacious, and so the methodology was deemed inefficient and impractical."


    Next to him, Stephen made an inarticulate sound of complaint, disagreeing for some reason.


    "So we decided to try and join a small settlement, hopefully with a wizard who might be understanding of our plight," Seraphine said, her fingers stroking the cover of the book under her hands.


    "But things happened, the two nice ones had that terrible accident, and instead we got you," Stephen said dryly.


    "They died, I didn''t," Lori said. "Any promises they made with you died with them."


    "Oh, don''t worry, we never got around to approaching them," the feverish man said, before closing his eyes and yawning. "They just made the same promises to us as they did everyone else: owning our own land, making our own future, being part of a glorious new beginning as we make a great new demesne that will last forever¡­ that Elceena was really full of herself."


    Lori frowned. "Who?"


    "The dead Whisperer."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Oh, her." Well, she was dead, so she didn''t matter now.


    "If I may ask, Binder Lori," Rian said. "What happens now?"


    And that was the question, wasn''t it? Her concern had been if there had been a Whisperer hiding among her population, a secret threat to her life that she needed to deal with. Instead, she had found¡­


    ¡­


    Huh.


    "This has to end," she found herself saying. "This arrangement is inefficient, adversely impacts productivity, and in the long run is detrimental to my demesne as a whole. While the butchering can remain here, provided it doesn''t adversely affect the quality of the meat, all the other operations are best transferred back to the center of the demesne, near my Dungeon."


    Everyone stared at her.


    "Could you please say that again, Binder Lori?" Rian said. "I''m not sure we understood."


    Lori sighed, but repeated herself. "This arrangement is inefficient, adversely impacts productivity, and in the long run is detrimental to my demesne as a whole. While the butchering can remain here, provided it doesn''t adversely affect the quality of the meat, all the other operations are best transferred back to the center of the demesne, near my Dungeon."


    "She literally repeated herself," Lee Fei said. She seemed bemused.


    "You¡­ want us to set up near the core? In front of everyone?"


    "What part of ''hiding from the annoying eehsecays'' wasn''t clear? No offense, Kaede-san," Vanessa said.


    "Offense, but understand."


    "So?" Lori said. "You have fists, don''t you? If they annoy you, make your displeasure known."


    They stared at her.


    "Are you telling us," one of the woman who could create metal¡ªLori checked her name. Katherine¡ªsaid slowly, "that you''re fine with us attacking other people?" For some reason, her tone was disapproving.


    "If they make a nuisance of themselves, I see no reason why you shouldn''t strike them to inform them of this fact. Of course, they might choose to strike you in return, not comprehending how annoying they are, but that will be for you to deal with." She paused as a thought for a moment. "Just don''t kill anyone. Until I learn Deadspeaking, our labor force is limited."


    For some reason, the feverish one¡ªLori checked his name: Stephen¡ªlaughed. "That''s where you draw the line? Don''t kill anyone, we need them to do things?"


    "Of course. Usefulness to the Dungeon Binder is why all demesne have laws against murder. The dead cannot pay taxes or perform skilled labor. It is also why criminals are executed. The useless cannot be allowed to continue to impair the demesne."


    "Oh, I like this one¡­"


    "You would," the woman next to him¡ªLori checked her name: Marissa¡ªsighed.


    "I disagree," Lee Fei said. She had straightened in her chair, her hands flat on the table, and was looking disapproving. "While violence has its place, using it simply because one is¡­ irritated at another is not conducive to peace, order, and the greater good. It merely creates oppressors and oppressed, violence breeding violence. As a zian of the Singing Steel Academy, it is my duty to oppose this."


    "Doesn''t that make you an oppressor by definition?" Stephen said with a smirk.


    "I am aware of the hypocrisy, but my path is clear. Admittedly, this dichotomy is something I must meditate upon later¡­"


    "For someone who claims not to be a Mentalist, you certainly behave like one," Lori noted. She began to bind the firewisps around the feverish man next to the supposedly-not-a-Mentalist in preparation for violence, bound airwisps to erupt in sound to disorient her, bound lightwisps and darkwisps to rid her of sight. Had they not been standing on metal, she''d have bound the earthwisps in the ground to sink the woman down, but alas, she would have to make do. Lori claimed what lightningwisps were still stored in the quarts embedded in her staff, preparing to conduct them down her staff''s wire and across the metal floor towards the woman''s feet as she stood, her chair being pushed back and skidding along the floor. "Do you intend to challenge me? Despite claiming you have no quarrel with me nor seek my power over this demesne?"


    "What worth are ideas that cannot withstand challenge?" Lee Fei said, standing as well, and Lori prepared to unleash her bindings. "Binder Lori, face me in reasoned argument! I will show you your reasoning is flawed!"


    ¡­


    Lori stared at the woman.


    "Huh," Rian said. "That certainly didn''t go where I thought it would. However, I feel compelled to point out that as the Dungeon Binder, Binder Lori has the literal and figurative power to make such a declaration, as the traditionally accepted government and hence the sole lawmaker of this demesne. And personally, while I like the thought of just being able to punch someone who annoys me in the face, I feel there should be some sort of restriction to prevent someone just, say, punching some random person simply because they feel like it."


    "The random person would be well within their rights to strike back," Lori said, not looking away from Lee Fei, though she did risk sitting down again.


    "And if the odds are two to one against them? Or five to one? What if five people just decided to start beating the next person that walks by because they happen to be bored? I believe that is the scenario that Lee Fei wishes to avoid."


    "Lord Rian is broadly correct," Lee Fei said, sitting down as well. She leaned forward, elbows on the table and hands folded. "While such a rule benefits the strong, the weak will suffer. In a place were all are equals, perhaps such a rule, to strike one who offends you, and thus inviting them to strike back, may take the form of some justice." By her expressions, she was merely being rhetorical. "But where the weak and strong mingle, is it not more just to stay the hand of all, that the weak need not fear, and the strong not abuse their might?"


    Lori tilted her head. "Is this the ''reasoned argument'' you wish to have?"


    "It is, Binder Lori."


    "Then I will say that your reasoning is flawed, for you are concerning yourself with hypotheticals, while I must face reality," Lori said. "And the reality is that because there is a group in my demesne considered so annoying that several skilled workers with irreplaceable skills have prioritized hiding from them for their own comfort over productivity, efficiency and contributing to the work that needs to be done, the demesne has been severely and negatively impacted as a whole. Because they need to hide, they have not contributed to the work of making houses for the other citizens of the demesne. They have allowed the¡­ the¡­" She paused. "Rian, what are they called, again?"


    "The Japanese, Binder Lori."


    Lori nodded. "All those in hiding here have allowed the Japanese to dictate their movements, causing suffering for those that could have otherwise benefited from their overt presence." She gestured angrily at the building around them. "Since the founding of the demesne, they have managed to raise several of these buildings. Setting aside the issue of quality, in the same amount of time, the houses I have been building do not even have roofs yet."


    "Ano, not fair blamed for this," the sole Japanese at the table¡ªLori reflexively checked in front of him for his name. Seno Kaideh¡ªsaid, looking indignant as he spoke brokenly. "Accurate, not fair! Hai, some annoying. but more contributing people, work hard. Discrimination! Racist! Shame you!"


    "None of us are muricans, Kaede," Stephen said. "That''s their weird societal psychological hang-up, not ours."


    The indignation deflated in a tired-sounding sigh. "Shit."


    "No, you make a good point, Kaede-san," Rian said, giving the younger man across from him a smile that was probably meant to be reassuring. "All eccentricities aside, you and your fellows are valuable contributing members of the demesne, and should be treated as such. So I ask you: if everyone here were to come out of hiding and start utilizing their abilities to more publically contribute to the demesne, how would your fellows react?"


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    The young man winced at the question, but sighed and said, "Many¡­ will be annoying. But¡­ after many days¡­" he sighed. "Will asking be taught magic."


    "And that''s not happening," Katherine said. "Being gising is rare and restricted to people from a certain area."


    "Simbohlisim is pretty rare too, and needs specific conditions to unlock," Marissa said. "Even if they have it, getting to unlock it is, as the phrase goes, ''courting death''."


    "Even if they could learn¡­ No. Just¡­ no," Stephen grimaced emphatically.


    "I''m not a teacher," Seraphine said. "I can barely teach someone who already knows how to do magic. And as Katherine said, they are unlikely to have the gift."


    "I would be willing to teach them what I know, if they are open to receiving instruction," Lee Fei said.


    Everyone blinked, including Lori, and turned to stare at the woman.


    "Honto ni?" Kaede said, sounding breathless. "R-really?"


    "Of course. I would welcome more companions along the path of cultivation. Let us defy the heavens together."


    "I have to ask," Rian said, "why didn''t you say so sooner?"


    "The subject did not arise."


    "If I may interrupt your reasoned argument, I have a proposal."


    It took Lori a moment to place the voice. The woman had been sitting so still and so quietly she had completely slipped Lori''s mind¡­ and, it seemed, the others as well. Everyone turned in surprise to the pale-haired woman at one end of the table, who had simply sat there after she had been introduced.


    "Of course, Mara," Rian said. His bright smile implied he hadn''t forgotten about her at all. "What do you have in mind?"


    "Merely that the matter of abuse of force between citizens has a long-established solution," the pale-haired woman said. "Binder Lori need only empower a small group of trusted individuals to act as peacekeepers. They would then use their judgement to determine whether any altercation is an oppressive abuse of power, or an exchange of violence between equals both willing and able to face the consequences of their actions. If it is the former, they can intercede, and administer chastisement as needed. If the latter, then they can ensure the duel reaches its end, and is not interrupted by griefers."


    "Sorry, what was that last?" Rian said. For some reason, Stephen had started snickering.


    "Griefers. It is an ancient word that does not translate well. Considered more heinous than those who spread misfortune through the ancient practice of gravelording, griefers are vile miscreants who inflict pain and hardship on others, disrupting the proper order of society not for personal gain, but simply because it gives them pleasure to do so. They are twisted souls, known to be willing give away great sums freely as long as doing so causes others misery and unhappiness."


    "Ah. They sound like terrible people."


    "H-how would that even work?" Vanessa asked, confused.


    "Tax laws," Mara said.


    Lori and many of the others nodded in understanding, clearly familiar with the twisted logic of taxation.


    "Ah. Like relative leaves you house, but also fifty years taxes?" Apparently, so was Kaede, in his own fashion.


    Mara nodded solemnly. "Would this be an acceptable compromise, Binder Lori?"


    Lori considered it. "I will have to write down some laws first."


    Lee Fei frowned. "The idea itself has merit, but it can still be implemented without the allowance for violence upon others."


    "Violence is inevitable," Mara said, her voice firm and certain. "Given so, it might as well be bound by conventions that work for most involved. When two or more people mutually wish to inflict violence upon each other, inflicting your own belief that they shouldn''t is arrogant in the extreme, and merely allows grudges to fester into hatred."


    "Violence for the sake of violence is barbaric," Lee Fei said, looking very disapproving. "Still, I acknowledge that the proposed compromise has merit and addresses my most urgent concern. I withdraw my argument for now, Binder Lori, and wait to see how this unfolds."


    Lori didn''t actually care. "I don''t actually care," she said. "The notion of deputized peacekeepers shall be taken under advisement, once I have laws for them to enforce. However, you all must stop limiting yourself purely to hide from these annoying people. With only a single farmer directing what needs to be done, food production has slowed and requires considerable labor to compensate, which has limited our ability to put roofs on houses. Something that created metal will be able to do quickly."


    The metal creator Vanessa winced, looking guilty.


    Lori pushed on. "At the moment, my demesne is also lacking in the proper infrastructure to protect against dragons. Something I cannot focus on building because my attention is divided between making homes and infrastructure. Infrastructure of the sort that require buildings such as what you have already constructed."


    "You wish us to work for you," Seraphine said.


    "You are already working. I wish you to do so with your full ability instead of a limited fraction that keeps you from being discovered and harassed. Or do you actually like making this trek every day?"


    "What is so difficult about it?" Lee Fei said. "A short, pleasant walk is quite refreshing."


    "Not all of us have unlimited stamina like you, Fei," Stephen said. "Personally, I''d be quite happy to work out of my house like a civilized person."


    "In that case, speaking only for myself and the people under me, we will be more willing to work openly once we have seen those laws and judged that they align with our interests," Katherine said. "And while I agree in spirit that people shouldn''t just be able to be violent on each other for no reason¡­ being able to punch some annoying asshole in the face to make him stop bothering me is an appealing thought."


    "I''m fine to come out right now so long as you guarantee I can punch anyone who keeps annoying me and doesn''t go away when I tell them to," Stephen said with a bright, almost Rian-like smile. "Also, I''ll need an indoor workshop. Not good to do alchemy out in the rain, after all. Bad for the quality of the finished product."


    "Can you make soap in large quantities?" Lori asked.


    "As long as I have some kind of oil or fat. I''ll need to have dibs on all the fat being removed by the butchering. No promises about how good it smells, though."


    Lori nodded. "You will have your workshop."


    "I''ll have to discuss this with the others," Seraphine said. "I''m a representative, so I can''t make a definite decision on something like this."


    "Most of us are private by nature," Marissa said thoughtfully. "But if we''re allowed to hide what we are during the day, we''re willing to make full use of our abilities working at night."


    Lori had to blink at that one. "Why?"


    "We work better when there''s no one to judge us. Shy boys and girls are we," Marissa said, also smiling brightly. "It''s how we cleared the fields for planting."


    The urge to stare at the woman''s claim arose, but Lori pushed it down.


    "I do not feel that my friends and I need to change anything in how we currently comport ourselves," Mara said. "We already work to better the demesne. However, I''m sure they will enjoy such a change. Hatarine has made comments about wishing for better tools. A seed drill and plow, I believe were what she wanted, to increase her efficiency in planting more fields."


    "I''ll get the design from her," Rian said. "Vanessa, would you be willing?"


    "Sure. I think I have a rough idea of what a plow looks like, but I''ve never heard of a seed drill¡­"


    "Want no one punch no reason," Kaede said. "Punch with reason, fine."


    Lori nodded. "Those are acceptable terms. I will take them under advisement." She rose to her feet, adjusting her grip on her staff.


    "Wait, you''re leaving already?" Marissa said.


    "Yes. I have more things to build, and now laws to write down," Lori said. "Including a workshop. I expect you to get to work on that soap." That last was to the feverish man.


    "How much am I going to be paid per batch?"


    "Consider it a requirement of your residency in my demesne. Unless you wish to leave?"


    For some reason, he smirked. "Your house, your rules?"


    "My everything, my rules."


    "Fine. I was getting bored of making charcoal anyway."


    "Please continue making charcoal, we need the heat," Rian sighed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "I''m surprised," Rian said as they walked away from the converted workshop and back to the center of the demesne. "I thought you''d be more¡­ well, less compromising."


    "They have magic," Lori stated the obvious. "Self-taught magic, but functional nonetheless. Given that I am trying to accomplish what they have, that they were able to teach themselves to use their own deviant magic without having any point of reference of what could be done is a notable achievement."


    She also wasn''t stupid. Given the depth of their capabilities were unknown, it would be foolish to rouse their ire. Though at least she''d been able to learn Lee Fei was merely an academic and not a Mentalist. With that confirmation, she might be able to recruit the woman. Even with only theoretical knowledge and an imperfect memory, it was likely she knew something useful. Academics, especially of the mysteries of alknowledge, tended to know all sort so disconnected things, even if they usually had a specific field of interest.


    As to the others¡­


    Dungeon Binders could do all four kinds of magic. The only reason she was currently incapable of anything beyond Whispering was because she had no one to teach her Deadspeaking, Horotracting and Mentalism.


    What if the abilities of a Dungeon Binder wasn''t limited to simply these four magics? If no one knew these deviant magics were possible¡­


    Lori imagined herself being able to create metal out of nothing using magic, and smiled.


    Though now she was going to have to come up with a list of laws¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Epilogue


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Fei stayed seated with the others after Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri had left. As always, the Xian took the opportunity to circulate the essence in her core. It was familiar at this point, like casually pushing an already-spinning wheel. The weeks in the Iridescence had slowly degraded her core''s circulation, and she had found that the corrupted spirit crystals grew even faster upon her person than it did for anyone else. While her core''s circulation had not slowed so much that she had been sent back to the core acceleration stage, it had seemed like a real possibility as thoughts had slowed, her reflexes had dulled, and her body had weakened.


    Finally, something struck the metal panel next to the opening that served as a door, followed quickly by another.


    "All right, she''s gone," Katherine declared, and everyone sighed in relief.


    Stephen immediately ruined the mood. "See?" he said with a smirk, "no one had to say the words ''we come from another world'' at all."


    "Well, it might have been necessary," Marissa said, an exaggerated pout on her face. "She could have asked how we have the abilities we do that have never been seen on her world, and we''d¡ª"


    "Be able to use at least a dozen other misleading lies of omission before we even had to consider being in the same ballpark as the truth," he interrupted the Symbol as a flame appeared, dancing over the Pyroturgist''s finger. "But the point is moot, because we didn''t have to tell, which means I was right, so there."


    "As obnoxiously as he puts it, Stephen is right," Katherine said. The Awakened was in what Marissa had told Fei was called the Pose of Gendo, a stance that in their world was apparently meant to be powerful and intimidating. From her body language, however, she had done so simply because she found it comfortable. "As long as she doesn''t start asking personal questions¡ª"


    "And she won''t, because she literally doesn''t care," Vanessa said across from her.


    "¡ªyes, that; then we should pretty much be in the clear. At least with her. I''m still not crazy about the idea of coming out to all the normies. Again."


    "Oh no, getting to be able to use your magical cheat powers in public in front of everyone. Woe is you," Senou Kaede said, and Fei had to deliberately ignore the dissonance between what he actually said and what she thought she heard. Her ears heard and remembered both, and it was a disquieting experience, for all that it was convenient in allowing them to speak to the mortal. Even without the strange understanding granted by Stephen''s deceptively small flame, the sarcasm in his voice was clear, though. "I''m sure you''ll adjust somehow."


    "It still won''t be fun. Though at least this time the government is less obnoxious about getting us to work for them. Maybe we won''t have to revolt and set up our own government again."


    "You do that, I''ll be outside where she can''t kill us all from her bedroom," Seraphine said.


    Mara rose smoothly. "If you''ll excuse me," the knight demurred, "I must go and inform the others as to what transpired here." Bowing towards them in a gesture from her homeland, she exited the workshop.


    Stephen sighed as he pushed himself up. The heat that Fei had felt radiating from him all this time finally moved. "Well, I''ve got to go to. Busy day, got to get rid of the bacteria from the meat, then have to start figuring out a recipe of soap that stays solid¡­"


    "I would be glad to assist you in your endeavor," Fei volunteered as other began to get to their feet as well. "I have such a recipe memorized, thought it will probably need to be adapted to the materials we have available on hand."


    "Thanks WikiFei, that will be a help. I''ll let you know when I''m about to get started."


    They all began to move their separate ways, each returning to whatever had been interrupted by the call that Binder Lori had discovered them, that Rian had given them up¡­


    As Fei headed back to continue gathering wild plants for food, glad that it wasn''t her turn to go out into the cursed, ravenous spirit crystals of this world to hunt the beasts that roamed the wilds, she found her thoughts turning to consider the man. She remembered how he had acted when he had discovered how the Gising could create metal, because he had seen Vanessa creating utensils to eat her food. He had simply stared as the fork and knife had appeared in a shimmer of color and a sense of essence being displaced¡­ and then shrugged and turned away as he continued eating.


    Not for the first time, she wondered¡­ could Rian be like them? Could he be someone had who also washed upon the shores of another world?


    As always, Fei shook her head. No, he acted nothing at all like the Nihonjin, who had not hesitated to proclaim themselves once they had met others from their land¡ªor at least, lands similar to theirs¡ªdeclaring their were ''isekai'' loudly, almost proudly. Rian had never acted anything other than one who was from this world. Open-minded and thoughtful to be sure¡­ but one did not need to be from another world to be such.


    No, to assume he was like them simply because he was accepting of them was to belittle his character. It was wrong¡­ and a little bit silly.


    Dismissing the thought, Lee Fei went back to work. The mortals and faceless from other worlds all needed to eat, after all, and the meat by itself was horribly bland. Meditating to circulate her core as she walked, Fei went back to her search for plants they could use as spices.


    She was getting very tired of mayonnaise.

 281 - This Probably Wouldnt Last

    Lori knew this probably wouldn''t last.


    At some point, she''d have to go back to River''s Fork again. Perhaps to build something, perhaps to fix something. Perhaps someone would do something so monumentally stupid that she''d need to become involved, like trying to attack the brat for her seel meat. However, it probably wouldn''t be for some days yet. For now, she was back home and she was going to enjoy it.


    "Your Bindership, remember the plan to move the malcontents here?" Rian began in lieu of any reports.


    "Yes¡­?" There was¡­ something wrong with this face. She couldn''t quite place it¡­


    "Going over what we have from River''s Fork over the past month, they should be able to survive given the current population and the rate we''ve been bringing in meat," Rian said. "Granted, we need to maintain that rate at the very least, and hopefully increase it so the demesne will have a bigger reserve, but moving any more people here besides the children should be unnecessary. If the planting terraces work, that should be achievable. "


    Lori considered that as she waited for Riz and Mikon to bring breakfast. Next to her, Shanalorre was acting as a post for her cousin to lean against as the young girl dozed. She obviously hadn''t taken a bath yet, or else she''d be more awake. "Are they making themselves useful and taking to the new discipline being imposed?"


    "Well, they''re still malcontents, but they''ve been stealing less now," Rian said. "Admittedly, that''s because we''ve been making things harder to steal more than any discipline on their parts. Though if they''re not going to improve their behavior in River''s Fork, they''re not likely to do it here." He sighed. "And our demesne isn''t as secured against theft as River''s Fork. All the food is basically stored in unsecured buildings. The vigas, the mushrooms, the meat, the tubers, the little wild vegetables¡ª"


    Lori blinked. "We have wild vegetables?"


    "What do you think is keeping our meals from being bland?"


    "Salt?"


    "That too. Besides, this way, you don''t have to make any workshop buildings. The empty houses will be sufficient for now. Unless we need more storage for something, you probably don''t have to build any more buildings until we begin construction on the sawmill, gristmill, and drophammer."


    Ah. Yes, they were building those, weren''t they? "Have they found sites for them yet?" During the winter, the river had been frozen over, so it hadn''t been possible to find a good place along to build the waterwheels that the facilities needed. With the floods over, however¡­


    "They''ve found some good spots," Rian said. "Though I''m having them build it downriver. That way our own water won''t be full of sawdust floating down." He sighed. "I don''t know how well they''ll survive dragons, to be honest. A part of me wants to build them mostly underground and have the waterwheels be the only thing above ground, but that''s just wishful thinking. The engineering would be a nightmare, and you''d definitely hate all the excavation involved."


    Lori tilted her head. Yes, he was right, she would hate the amount of earthwisps she''d have to move to make a completely underground building¡­ but she could also understand the appeal of protecting something from dragons in that manner. "Have them find a rocky area to make raising walls easier," Lori said. "I will confer with them about what sort of building will be needed once all other construction is finished."


    "Are you counting the meat-smoking shed in that?" Rian said as Riz and Mikon finally arrived with food. He stood up to help them to put down the bowls, cups and platter of breads as Lori had first pick of everything. Shanalorre''s cousin went next, awakened by the other Dungeon Binder. The others seemed inclined to indulge the girl, handing her the bowl of food filled with pieces of meat, tubers, some vegetables, and a few pieces of mushroom. The pieces were mostly tasteless, all their flavor drawn out in the creation of the broth that was the watery stew''s base, but they chewed nicely.


    Tearing her bread to pieces for a moment to give her some time to consider, Lori eventually said, "Yes, we might as well do that one first. Will it be possible to make the whole shed out of wood?"


    "Hmm¡­" Rian ''hmm''-ed thoughtfully, stirring his bowl to try to get it to cool. "I''m concerned it might catch fire if it''s all wood, but I''ll admit I don''t really know how to build a building for smoking. Though it might need a stone floor, or at least a packed dirt one, if only because there are more chokers running around on the other side than here, and they might be able to dig under any wooden walls to get at the meat."


    Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    Lori blinked. "Can chokers dig like that?"


    "I don''t see why they can''t. They''ve got the limbs for it." He held his arms up, hands drooping down to mimic the common pose of many beasts, and scraped his fingers over the table in a movement that could be construed as digging. Shanalorre''s cousin giggled at the sight, making Rian smile, which widened as she imitated him.


    She rolled her eyes at the byplay as she took one of her pieces of bread and dipped it into her bowl. "Yes, I see your point. Something beneath the walls of the structure, at least. For the rest, dirt will keep from burning as well as stone, and less likely to crack." She put the bread in her mouth. For a brief moment, it was a bit too hot, before the food merely became pleasantly very warm. Ah, delicious. Though she might have to wait a little.


    "It will probably flood next spring, but that''s a next year problem," Rian said. "We''ll have all winter to empty it out, anyway. All right, I''ll inform everyone involved of the order we''ll do things. You''ll probably need to cure more beams and planks for it in any case." He scooped up a spoonful from his bowl and blew on it before putting it in his mouth. He immediately reached for water.


    Lori grunted. Yes, she would, wouldn''t she? "The first one we''ll build will be the sawmill," she said flatly.


    Rian let out a little laugh, and the wrongness of his face finally vanished. "What a coincidence. I was hoping you''d say that. So is everyone else. No one likes working in the sawpit when it''s full of mud. At least there''s a ladder now, unlike last year." He shook his head, still smiling. "So¡­ except for curing the wood, what are your plans?"


    Loir shrugged, reaching for her spoon. "I need to make more solidified air for the cold rooms." She frowned. "And I suppose it''s time to do maintenance on the reservoir." She could excavate the third level, or at least dig out more farm plots¡­ but she didn''t want to think of moving around and earthwisps for a little while. Maybe in a few days.


    Rian nodded as she ate. Ah, she missed never having to worry about burning her mouth! "So¡­ you have time to make a few beads? I don''t know how many we have stockpiled already, but the more we can sell¡­"


    Lori blinked, and her eyes widened in understanding as she swallow. "Colors," she swore at herself. Argh! She''d stopped after winter had ended, since there had been work to be done, and the whole thing had completely slipped her mind.


    Her lord nodded again, smiling in amusement. "Yeah¡­ I thought it was something like that. When you''re done with curing the wood that''s been stocked in the curing shed, do you want to take your boat and go out to the edge to look for a good spot for a shed for you to work from? Unless you plan to expand the demesne too, in which case¡­ uh, I don''t know exactly."


    She twitched. While she knew she it was probably well-advised for her to go back to growing her demesne properly, she didn''t want to be laid out in bed for half the day. Perhaps in a week or so, but not now. "I''ll think about it while I''m curing." She always had time to think while she was curing. "I''ll need to plan the steps."


    "By the way, have you checked the large bead lately?" Rian said. "It''s been in that alcove for a while."


    Lori stared at him. Then she swung her legs over the bench and ran down to the second level.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The large bead they''d broken open was unchanged from when she''d left it months ago. Lori had to resist the urge to start rearranging things in the alcove, instead sealing it shut again and going back upstairs to finish breakfast.


    "So¡­" Rian said, glancing sideways at Shanalorre, "will you be continuing your experiments where you left off last time? Our last discovery was¡­ well, I honestly thought you''d be revisiting it sooner, given its likely application in¡­ well."


    Lori also looked sideways at Shanalorre, who sat there looking blankly at them. Then she shrugged. "It''s not like she can make beads, Rian. And even if she could, what could she do?"


    "It always sounds so rude when you put it that way," Rian said.


    "So? We will resume experiments when I feel like it. I have to review our notes."


    "Uh, will you lend me those notes too? I don''t remember them very well."


    "¡­ fine. I''ll give them to you when I''m done."


    "Ah, finally," Rian sighed happily, "reading material."


    "Should I make myself scarce?" Shanalorre said. "This appears to be a matter I am not to be privy to."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Not at this time. I''ll tell you when you need to be absent."


    "Ah, I see. Very well, Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Shana, please don''t encourage this sort of behavior, it''s going to set a bad example for Yoshka."


    Shanalorre seemed to consider this, then turned to her cousin. "Yoshka, don''t act like Binder Lolilyuri. Her behavior is not suitable for anyone who is not a Dungeon Binder, understood."


    "But you don''t act like that, Shasha."


    For some reason, Shanalorre stared at her cousin. "As long as you don''t act like that," she said eventually. "Now, clean your bowl."


    "I don''t have any more bread¡­"


    "Use some of my bread."


    "Yah! Thank you, Shasha!"


    "I really hope this doesn''t mean she''s going to start more acting like you," Rian sighed. His own bowl was empty and clean. Good.


    "And what would be so terrible about that?" Lori challenged.


    "She''d be more likely to break her word, ruthlessly do everything she can to strengthen herself, and try to kill you when you''re most vulnerable?"


    Lori stared. Then she turned to Shanalorre. "Shanalorre, don''t act like me. That''s an order."


    Shanalorre gave her a flat look. "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri. How should I act, then?"


    "Continue acting as you have been."


    The flat stare continued. "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri. I shall endeavor to follow your command to the best of my ability."


    Lori nodded in satisfaction, then turned back to Rian. "The matter has been dealt with."


    For some reason, Rian lowered his head and sighed.

 282 - Questionable Assistance

    After breakfast, Lori inspected her Dungeon''s water reservoir. She needed to deactivate the bindings of unseen light so she wouldn''t hurt or blind herself. The thought of being blinded made her shudder, even if Shanalorre''s healing would probably be able to restore her eyes from any damage caused by unseen light. She needed her eyes.


    The bottom of the evaporation chamber was coated with debris, and Lori had to make a scraping tool with bone to fit onto the end of her stone-shaping tool to get it all off. Cleaning it probably wasn''t necessary, but simply leaving the debris there did not sit well with her. Once the debris had been scraped off and gathered in a bucket to be dropped off into one of the tuber planters¡ªit had to be good for something¡ªshe was able to seal up the evaporator and activated the wisps inside it again.


    Once that was done, she went off to start curing wood. Thankfully, it wasn''t raining this morning, so her seat outside the curing shed was dry as she sat down and put the bindings of airwisps, firewisps, lightningwisps and waterwisps in place inside the shed. Still, she wore her rain coat and hat to keep any rain off. When the curing was well underway, Lori settled down to consider her future priorities.


    She should probably resume making beads again. While expanding her demesne was better for the long term, having beads for Rian to try and sell to power bound tools was better for the immediate future, at least if he managed to find a way to do so. If he could¡­ we''ll, they''d need stock to sell, then. Optimistically, they''d be able to sell the beads for wispbeads of similar size, which¡­ meant that she''d have to make the beads about those size for ease of transaction.


    On the subject of bound tools, though¡­. She would need to continue her research on the subject. Or, more accurately, start her research on the subject. While she still had no idea how to make glass, she believed she had an idea of what it was for now. It¡­ probably wasn''t as simple as she thought, but it was her only line of inquiry at this point.


    It would no doubt be intermixed with experiments with the white Iridescence. There were several experiments that they had noted but not performed because of concerns about them being too dangerous to do in the little alcove within her Dungeon. Which¡­ probably meant she''d need to make a location suitable for conducting experiments outside her dungeon. Probably not a full shed, but at least a roof to keep the rain off.


    As to the rest¡­ well, she was leaving those to Rian to inform her of when her intervention was needed. So¡­ not her problem!


    She was debating whether to prepare some bindings when Shanalorre approached her.


    "Binder Lolilyuri, may we speak for a moment?" she said after stopping some distance away and giving Lori a bow. "A matter has arisen of which has given me cause for concern."


    Lori eyed her for a moment. "Is something the matter with the children?" Shanalorre''s previous reports were that the children were adjusting. Mikon''s cousins had moved to live in her house, helping tend to the children. From reports, the change had been a lateral move rather than an improvement of their circumstances¡ªthere were even more people in the house than the one they had left¡ªbut a second floor was in the process of being added to Shanalorre''s house, which would give them more room, even if only Shanalorre and her cousin had a bed at the moment.


    Shanalorre shook her head. "The other children are adapting admirably, especially since we have arranged for me to relay messages from them to their parents and back." Is that what she''d been doing? Well, Lori supposed it made sense. "I will need to accompany Lord Rian next time he¡ª"


    "No," Lori interrupted. Shanalorre blinked. "You will be remaining here from now on. Any messages from the children, Rian can convey. We can give him a plank written with all the messages he needs to relay."


    Shanalorre hesitated. "If that is the case, it is Lord Rian that I wish to speak of."


    Lori frowned. "Rian? What about him?"


    "I am concerned about his well-being. He appears to be tired and at the edge of his patience."


    ¡­ What? "What?" Lori said, straightening up in her seat.


    "I am concerned about his well-being. He appears to be tired and at the edge of his patience," Shanalorre repeated.


    "Yes, I heard you the first time. Explain what you mean."


    "I¡­ believe that Lord Rian is exhausted from dealing with the malcontent elements of m¡ª of River''s Fork Demesne. Over the past two weeks, he has been increasingly sarcastic, confrontational, and has moved to initiate conflict by challenging people to fight him."


    That¡­ huh. "That sounds like a completely understandable response, given the individuals he has been dealing with in River''s Fork."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Yes, it is. However, Lord Rian does not usually respond in such a manner. His usual tendency is to encourage, aid, and counsel people, even those who act in an unpleasant or confrontational manner. The fact that he acts in this understandable manner is concerning. His cheerfulness has been more feigned than is normal, and there have been moments where he does not even bother to do so. In my previous interactions with him, he was very unlikely to be confrontational, and his sarcasm was better concealed and rhetorical."


    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    ¡­


    The beginnings of concern began stir. That¡­ put that way, it was very unlike Rian.


    Shanalorre continued. "Lord Rian has been recovering and returning to his usual disposition slower and slower with every shift in River''s Fork. Today, he has clearly not yet recovered his equilibrium. I am concerned he will not recover himself before he has to leave and return to River''s Fork, which will likely exacerbate his condition. Lord Rian is currently not in optimum condition. I believe it will impair his ability to work and deal with the matters you have assigned to him."


    "I see," Lori said, her voice even. "What do you recommend, then?"


    The other Dungeon Binder paused. For a moment, she just stood there, not saying anything, her head tilted to one side as she visibly considered how to reply. Eventually, she said, "I believe Lord Rian needs more time to rest and recover. I do not think that the performance of his usual duties will impair his recovering, but it is likely that the duties will not performed to his usual standard. Therefore, I would respectfully suggest that he be allowed more time to recover here in Lorian before he has to return to oversee matters in River''s Fork. An additional day or two of recovery perhaps. Alternately, it might also help to shorten his time in River''s Fork. He does not seem to enjoy being there."


    Lori nodded. "I see. Go find Rian and tell him all that."


    Shanalorre blinked in surprise. "Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "This sounds like a ''dealing with people'' matter. Rian is in charge of those. Tell him and he can decide to deal with it himself or bring it to my attention."


    Shanalorre stood there for a moment, staring at her as if she couldn''t understand the simple instructions. "I¡­ see. Are you¡­ sure, Great Binder?"


    Lori nodded. "Yes. Rian would best know how to deal with something like this."


    "¡­ It is Lord Rian who is experiencing this difficulty."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "It wouldn''t be the first time Rian has neglected to take care of himself. Ask him about the time he tried to go hunting while deprived of sleep. If you need assistance getting him to rest, Umu, Mikon and Erzebed would be quite willing to give you aid."


    A small breath escaped the other Dungeon Binder. "¡­ very well, Great Binder." Shanalorre bowed once more before she turned and left.


    Lori wasn''t sure if what Shanalorre had described could really be regarded as problems, but if Rian was losing his cheerful disposition that was his main means of manipulating people¡­ well, that was concerning. While it wouldn''t make him useless¡ªat the very least, he was still quite capable of tending the demesnes'' affairs¡ªit would certainly impact his utility and ability.


    Hopefully, being informed of his current state will prompt him to correct it.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was in the middle of preparing and imbuing some bindings that she could use to make beads¡ªshe''d decided that tomorrow she''d go out and at least test how the change of seasons affected bead making¡ªwhen Shanalorre approached her again.


    "Binder Lolilyuri," she said after giving Lori a quick bow. "I''ve spoken with Lord Rian. While he listened to my observations, he dismissed them and claimed he was ''fine''. When I pressed, he said he would deal with it later when he had time. I decided to cease pressing, but I followed him on his rounds and assessed that he would be too busy for the rest of the day to do so."


    "Did you include your recommendations on how to correct his condition?" Lori asked.


    "Yes. He informed me that because you are the one who set the current schedule of shifts, he cannot override it without consulting you and you authorizing it." Shanalorre hesitated. "I think he is also mildly jealous that you will be remaining here for the foreseeable future while he will continue to administer River''s Fork."


    He was? "He is?"


    "That is the conclusion I reached upon interacting with and speaking with him. However, it is possible that I am incorrect. You would know better than I would, since you have known him longer."


    ¡­ no, she wouldn''t. She really, really wouldn''t. That was why she had Rian in the first place.


    Well, she''d take care of it when she met with him at lunch, which should be pretty soon. The cloud cover was thin enough she could tell the angle of the sun even though their obstruction, and it was almost directly overhead. "I''ll take care of it when I meet him at lunch."


    "¡­ if I may ask, Great Binder, what do you intend to do?"


    Lori shrugged. "If he needs rest, he will be made to rest." She supposed suspending the shift schedule for a few days wouldn''t do any harm. "I suppose suspending the shift schedule for a few days wouldn''t do any harm."


    "Actually, it would. The Coldhold and its complement are needed for the current hunting arrangement that support''s River''s Fork. Karina also adds her own substantial contribution. While she has taught¡ªor re-taught, in some cases¡ªsome of the other children how to catch seels, they''re not as good as she is."


    ¡­


    "We will discuss the matter with Rian."


    Shanalorre tilted her head sideways. She let out a small sigh. "I¡­ see. Very well, Great Binder. I am glad to have been of assistance."


    Lori supposed she had been, though a part of her wondered if it really counted as assistance if the actions resulted in MORE work, not less. "Concerning the matter of food for River''s Fork, how are the tubers progressing?"


    "The initial batch has sprouted, and we have further buried them to try to increase the yield. We have also begun a second plot. I must add, however, that according to Karina before it will be at least two more months before the ones we first planted are ready to be harvested. Hopefully by the time we will have been able to prepare an area in River''s Fork to plant them."


    "I''ll leave that to you," Lori said. "Is there anything else?"


    The other Dungeon Binder hesitated. "If I may be so bold, Lord Rian once said that there needed to be more lords and ladies to assist him in managing both demesne¡ª"


    "That is my decision," Lori said firmly. "If that is all, you may go, Binder Shanalorre."


    Shanalorre bowed. "Thank you for your time, Great Binder." She turned and wandered off, presumably to do something productive, or check on her cousin to see if she was still alive.


    Lori was finally able to relax again, leaning back against the stone wall behind her and took a moment to check on the bindings inside the curing shed to make sure everything was progressing properly. She''d need to deactivate the bindings to head inside for lunch soon. Once she was certain everything was to her satisfaction, she closed her eyes, pulling down the brim of her hat to give herself some more shade.


    If Rian actually was tired¡­ well, while she didn''t want to resort to it, but there was a measure that she could implement that might be able to deal with that. The thought made her sigh, but it couldn''t be denied that it seemed to work. As with many things regarding other people, she didn''t understand why, but it did. She could work with that, exasperating as it was.


    Though there was no way she would be doing it by herself.

 283 - Lori Needs Her Note-Taker

    "Rian, I believe Shanalorre has informed you of her findings and conclusions."


    Rian sighed. Now that Lori was actually looking, he did seem tired. He also wasn''t smiling or any form of cheerful, whether genuine or annoying. In fact he¡­ actually, he reminded her of herself after a long day working one of her more unpleasant jobs. "As I told Shana," he directed a flat look towards the other Dungeon Binder, "I''m fine. I appreciate the concern, but this is nothing I can''t deal with."


    "So, you don''t think that you need more time to rest and recover, need shorter shifts at River''s Fork, and are jealous of the fact I won''t need to go there any time in the immediate future?"


    Rian''s expression changed, and it wasn''t to form a smile. "I''m fine," he insisted, even as Riz, Mikon and Umu all gave him concerned looks.


    Lori stared at him, then nodded. "Well, if you say so."


    Across the table, Umu, Mikon and Riz all turned to frown at her. Rian simply nodded tiredly, letting out a sigh and slumping slightly. Given he''d already been a little slumped, it was more of a forward slouch. Next to her, she heard Shanalorre sigh for some reason.


    "If you are fine as you say, then you will be able to assist me with my upcoming experiments."


    Rian''s head rose up. "Experiments?"


    Lori nodded. "I will need someone to take notes for me. My previous experiments while utilizing a replacement note taker were unsatisfactory." She sighed, remembering the experience. "I had to repeat myself constantly, and he wrote very slowly."


    "Ah, yes, that. Yllian told me about that." Rian chuckled quietly, a small smile on his face. "Are we doing it this afternoon?"


    "No, I still have wood to cure. We will proceed tomorrow. When did you think I intended to perform my experiments?"


    Rian frowned again. "Can you wait a few days? I have to be back in River''s Fork by then."


    "This takes precedence. The Coldhold will go without you. Find someone capable and put them in charge in your stead."


    "If I could do that, I''d have already done it. Most capable people are already in charge of something else, and those who aren''t are working on something that needs their specific skill set. And you promised Riz you wouldn''t make her an officer ever again." Rian sighed. "Is this some kind of ploy to make me stay and rest?"


    Lori gave him a flat look. Then she turned towards Mikon. "Has he been sleeping well at night?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," the pink-haired weaver said immediately.


    "A full night''s sleep? He doesn''t get up and stay awake restlessly in the middle of the night?"


    "Despite our best efforts, no."


    For some reason, the other tables sounded amused as Rian raised a hand over his eyes.


    Lori nodded, turning back to Rian, who was looking at her from between two fingers. "It doesn''t seem like you need any rest. However, just to be sure, I''m sure these three will be more than willing to make sure you''re well rested for tomorrow."


    "Of course, Great Binder."


    "You can rely on us, your Bindership."


    "We''ll make sure he sleeps well, your Bindership!"


    Rian sighed. "I''d accuse you of mothering me, except my mother would never do anything like this."


    Lori couldn''t help the twist of envy that coiled her insides. "How fortunate for you. Every time I so much as mentioned someone I talked to, my mothers would start telling me to get to know them better, that I should become friends with them, asking me if they were nice, when would I meet them again, how I should ask them to have lunch with me, advising me on how I could lure them into my bed¡­" Lori shuddered. "They were the ones who kept telling me I should study and learn, then they''d spend so much time telling me to waste my time doing pointless things¡­" She shook her head.


    "That¡­ listening to you talk about that is causing me almost literal pain," Rian said.


    Lori waved a hand dismissively, though she was heartened by Rian''s sympathy of her suffering. "Well, it doesn''t matter. They were wrong anyway. Because I didn''t waste any of my time on any of that nonsense, I''m a Dungeon Binder now. So clearly they were wrong."


    "I¡­ can''t refute that, since you are, in fact, a Dungeon Binder now, and also just as clearly never listened to any of their advice. Even though it might have helped, since you''d have more experience remembering names¡­"


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    Lori rolled her eyes. What did names matter? If a name was important, she''d remember it. Or at least remember to write it down. "If a name was important, I''d remember it. Or at least remember to write it down." Wait, did that mean the names on her ceiling were important? "But we are getting off-topic. Tonight, have a good night''s rest so that you can take good notes tomorrow. I''ll take the notes with me to the curing shed this afternoon to read over them, and give them to you after dinner."


    Rian looked amused. "You want to give me interesting reading material¡­ just before you want me to get a good night''s rest? You¡­ remember what reading is like, don''t you?"


    "I''m sure that these three will find a way to keep you from rereading everything more than once."


    "What exactly do you think they''re going to do?"


    "It would not be appropriate to say in front of a child."


    Rian rolled his eyes. "In that case, may I say you have a very dirty mind, your Bindership."


    "I blame my mothers. I would elaborate, but I don''t want to, and there''s a child present."


    "Almost literal pain¡­"


    "Food."


    Rian paused. "What?"


    Lori pointed towards the kitchen. "Food. Get some."


    Rian opened his mouth. Rian closed his mouth. "Right, right. Getting food, your Bindership." He got up, Umu getting up with him as the two went to get lunch.


    When he''d left, Lori finally let herself sigh in relief. Good, it seemed like she wouldn''t need to declare a holiday after all as she had originally thought she would need to. Rian had regained some of his cheerfulness when she''d mentioned notes and experiments. Hopefully, that would be enough to deal with the problem.


    And if not¡­ well, then she might have to declare a holiday after all. She needed her note taker!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    During lunch, Lori observed Rian, which admittedly amounted to her staring straight ahead as she ate instead of sitting with her eyes on her food. Fortunately, he noticed nothing amiss as he reported on the day''s matters, and probably thought she was simply being attentive as she usually was.


    "The crops are doing well, and we''ve been managing to keep the chokers away from them," he said, now actually smiling at little as he reported. How had she missed that he hadn''t been smiling earlier? It wasn''t like trying to remember facial features, after all! "Fortunately, no one''s really gotten hurt from doing that, and we''ve added a little choker meat to our food, though it''s not really a lot compared to other beasts. A choker barely feeds three people, four if they don''t mind the meal''s a little lean. However, we have a decent surplus stored up, so that''s not a problem."


    "I''m concerned they''ll try to dig up our tubers when they are nearly grown," Shanalorre said. "Thankfully, at the moment they seem to hold no interest. There had been no choker-related injuries brought to my attention so far."


    "The mushroom farm, thankfully, hasn''t been molested by them," Rian continued, "but that''s more of a supplement to our food rather than a staple. Our production hasn''t yet reached the point we can live off the stuff if need be. The local varieties are delicious and gives the stew more flavor, but they''re not as nutritious as the strains that have been made specifically to sustain populations." He sighed. "We¡­ might have to send some to River''s Fork so they''ll stop complaining about the food being so bland. On the subject of food, however, I think we should exchange some of our stored meat with some of River''s Fork''s fruits. While we didn''t have any such problems from our diet last year, best to broaden our range of foods in any case."


    "Do it," Lori said instantly. Her mouth was already watering at the thought of pink ladies, micans, hairy blueballs and golden buds.


    After lunch, Lori took a detour to her room to find the stone tablets that had the notes she needed. There¡­ were a lot of stone tablets that had to be sorted through to find the tablets she was looking for. Had she really made these many tablets over the past year? She was pretty sure she''d given some to Rian, so why was there so many here in her room?


    Thankfully, she found the notes she needed all grouped together, so she was able to remove them and put them on her plank to carry. The tablets wobbled slightly, some of the displaced stone from creating the inscriptions creating bumps that meant the tablets didn''t lie flat on top of each other. Lifting them carefully, she watched her footing as she took the notes to her seat at the curing shed.


    Her detour had taken her a bit longer than she had thought it would, so she hastily activated the bindings of the curing shed and checked the conditions inside. Ugh, she might have to stay here a little longer than usual, just to be sure the wood buried in the middle of the stacks were properly cured.


    It started raining as she finally sat down, and she scowled up at the sky, only to hastily stop because it let raindrops fall on her face. Adjusting her hat and making sure her rain coat was closed, she carefully picked up one of the stone tablets¡ªbinding the waterwisps off the tablet and her fingers so nothing would be slippery¡ªand held it up to read.


    These weren''t the original notes, of course. Rian had written those on his plank in black char, the writing oversized because of the size of his writing implement. Despite this, his notes managed to be decently readable, and his own thoughts that he wrote on the side of the margins were isolated from what she had dictated to him. When she''d transcribed them to stone, she''d done so with smaller, clearer writing, and had set his own contributions off to one side, since they were usually relevant.


    That meant each stone tablet had maybe two planks worth of notes on it, but given each was a direct transcription, the notes, findings, and conclusion weren''t organized very well. She''d probably have to take a day to organize everything into something properly concise, but today wasn''t that day.


    It was another thing on the list of things she''d ''do when she had time''.


    Most of the notes, as was proper, were records of their experimental procedures. It was very tempting to just skip over this and look at the conclusions, but that was poor scholarship. Besides, some of the experiments she had genuinely forgotten about, so she needed to read them to put the results and conclusions into context.


    The pile of notes grew smaller as she stacked the tablets she''d read on her other side so they wouldn''t get mixed up. One of the notes nearly fell when it slipped from her wet hands, but fortunately it landed on her lap, which absorbed the blow enough that it didn''t visibly crack. She still claimed and bound the earthwisps on it to reinforce its structure, since it seemed like it had caused internal cracks, and she didn''t want to have to recreate the notes another time.


    ¡­perhaps she should try using bone for these notes? Even with the bones regularly being used for glue and fertilizer, they always had a surplus of the stuff, and it was far lighter and more durable than rock.

 284 - Decreed Perpetual Non-Officer

    "So, did you manage to read all the notes I left you?" Lori asked at breakfast the next day. She carefully watched Rian''s face.


    "I tried, but no," Rian said. For some reason, he was giving her a very flat look. "It was made very clear that I needed my rest, and that staying up to read wasn''t considered resting."


    Lori sighed. "Well, read it later when we get back. For now eat, we might not come back for lunch."


    "Should I have the kitchens set aside some food to bring with us, then?"


    Lori considered the question. "I suppose. Tell them to ready about¡­ six jars." The watery stew¡ªit wasn''t quite the soup they''d had during the winter¡ªwouldn''t be at its best without some bread, but if Rian could fix that, he would.


    "Are we taking that many people with us?"


    "There might be ropeweed to be harvested in the area," Lori said. "If there is, someone should, and it certainly isn''t going to be you, me, or whoever Riz is going to bring along."


    "Wait, I''m coming along?" To her credit, she directed the question at Rian.


    He reached out and patted her hand, giving her a gentle smile. "You don''t have to if you don''t want to."


    That made her nod. "All right then, I''ll see who can come along."


    "Then I better go and talk to the kitchen while there might still be some food to put away." Rian stood up, and headed for were breakfast was still being served.


    For a moment, the table was filled only with the sounds of eating as Lori and the other women focused on her food. Lori felt like she was forgetting something, though. She''d done something¡­ and now she was supposed to do something else¡­?


    It was only when Rian came back, carefully stepping over the bench between Umu and Mikon and reporting that the kitchen would set aside the food¡ªLori wondered what happened to the surplus of each batch of meals. Did it just get added to the next batch to be eaten?¡ªthat she finally remembered. Reaching down, she felt around inside her belt pouch, and felt the thin, hard shape there.


    Lori took the piece of bone she''d made the night before and set it down on the table next to her food. A rectangle a little smaller than her flat open hand, its thickness was about half the width of her smallest finger. As she had surmised it was both lighter and more robust than stone. The little rectangle had survived getting dropped from multiple heights, and she even tried flexing the thing to see if she could break it. The sheet of bone had survived the experience. "Erzebed. This is for you." She pushed it across the table.


    The four on the other side of the table blinked and peered at the little square. Rian was obviously the fastest reader, because he started snickering first, clearly trying to keep from progressing into open laughter.


    "Seriously?" he managed to get out as Shanalorre turned her head sideways to try and better see the writing on the card, the other Dungeon Binder''s cousin leaning forward over the table to try and see what the fuss was about..


    Lori shrugged. "Given how often she has led, I wanted to affirm that I am honoring our agreement."


    "It''s an agreement now?"


    "She asked, and I agreed. Hence, an agreement."


    Shanalorre''s cousin finally reached across the table for the little rectangle of bone, which Riz pushed towards her with an amused smile. The little girl picked it up, turning it over in her hands and looking at it intently. Then she let out something between a sigh and a whine. "Shasha, what does this say?" she asked, holding the little bone plaque towards her cousin.


    Shanalorre took the proffered rectangle. "Erzebed, Decreed Perpetual Non-Officer," she read.


    Rian started snickering again as Riz gained a strange expression on her face, and the murmuring of the dining hall took on a tone between amused and confused.


    "What does that mean, Shasha?"


    "It means Binder Lolilyuri promises that Riz will never be an officer, Yoshka. Since it''s in writing, it is an official document," Shanalorre said.


    "Glittering officers!" Yoshka cried.


    "Glittering officers!" many of the children seated in the table behind Lori echoed.


    "I could not possibly comment," Shanalorre said. "Many of the officers I know are fine people. Also, if mushka asks, I refuse to take responsibility for your language. It is the unfortunate result of growing up surrounded by militia."


    Lori took the plaque back from Shanalorre and once more slid it towards Riz, who finally took it hesitantly. "As promised Riz, you are not, are not eligible to be, and will never be an officer."


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    "How wonderful!" Mikon said brightly, taking the opportunity to give the militiawoman a hug that the weaver probably not have normally gotten away with. "Congratulations, Riz! It''s what you''ve always wanted. Not being an officer."


    "Congratulations, Riz¡­?" Umu echoed, looking a little confused.


    "This feels very strange¡­" Riz said, still looking at the plaque.


    Rian finally got his snickering under control. "Well, at least you never have to worry about being promoted up to officer, Riz," Rian said. "Do you want someone else to come with us so you can enjoy your never-promotion?"


    That seemed to rouse Riz from her strange melancholy. "No, no, I''ll go with you," she said, putting the plaque down in front of her on the table. "Have to make sure nothing eats you out there, after all."


    Rian smiled, and Lori decided to stop watching his face. He seemed to be back to properly smiling and being cheerful, so it looked like she wouldn''t have to be forced to declare a holiday after all!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It had been some time since she had ridden Lori''s Boat. The demesne''s only wooden boat had once belonged to River''s Fork, one of the many things created by the Deadspeaking of its first Dungeon Binder. It had come to her demesne along with most of River''s fork''s population after the first dragon that they had weathered, and she''d had it ever since.


    Originally, it had only had a simple water jet driver that she had to activate and deactivate manually, as well as imbue near-constantly. Over the past year, there had been other improvements. Stabilizer fins made of bone, outrigger floats to keep it from sinking too far on one side or another, a small extension was added to the back to be better able to hold the improved water jet, now-steam jet driver¡­


    Still, it had been some time since she''d last sat on this particular one of their boats, and Lori remembered why. There were no benches, so they had to sit down on the floor of the boat, which was far too close to the water for Lori''s liking. Rian had taken charge of the steam jet driver, slipping into the role as if he''d never stopped operating one. Riz sat next to him, but rather than doing so for intimacy, she was actually watching the shore. They actually saw some chokers drinking from the river, their surprisingly pale plumage stark against the dark browns and vibrant greens of the plants around them. Somehow they still managed to fade into the grasses and growing ropeweed.


    Seated at the front of the boat to keep it counterbalanced was the friend of Riz''s who was coming along and two other people with baskets and sickles. The latter two were there to gather what ropeweed they could, if there was any that could be harvested. Since they were heading for the edge¡ªthe new edge¡ªit was likely that there were plants there that hadn''t been harvested. While it wouldn''t be a lot, they were going there anyway and the boat had the room for it, so why not?


    The sun was shining, the skies clear of clouds, which meant they weren''t sitting in slowly-rising water as Lori used waterwisps to make the water flow over the side back to the river. Hopefully it lasted until they went back.


    It wasn''t long before they reached the edge. The sharp, curving line was as stark as it always was. On one side, the trees were dark, with trunks in different shades of brown, their leaves a rich green. The ground beneath the trees was dark with wet dirt, decaying leaves and other detritus. On the riverbanks, a mix of grass, ropeweed and other small plants grew, lush, verdant and vibrant.


    On the other side, everything was covered by the same glittering, many-colored Iridescence. The growths covered trees from roots to crown. Only the leaves, which were soft enough to ripple in the wind, were not completely covered, the Iridescence a light, perpetually growing dusting thin enough to let the natural green show through. Everything caught the light and shimmered in rainbow hues as they moved, the endless facets constantly changing with every slight shift in angle. Only right at the edge of the river, where spray and flowing water lapped at rocks, was anything free of the Iridescence.


    Not far beyond the edge, Lori actually saw a large beast drinking at the river, Iridescence washing away from its skinless, hard bill as it lapped at the water. If it weren''t for the fact that it stood in bright sunlight with dark forest behind it, the beast would have faded into the background of the rest of the Iridescence. The reminder made the squirming inside her almost become shudders as she remembered the nights and days keeping watch as they had traveled, a binding of waterwisps ready to become a water-cutter at the slightest sign of beast-like movement.


    It never failed to make Lori''s insides feel like they were alive and squirming inside her. Even Riz, who presumably had been out in the colors many times when she''d been in the militia, had an expression of resigned distaste on her face, a feeling Lori was very familiar with. For that matter, so did the two with the sickles and baskets.


    Rian''s voice was incongruously cheerful as he said, "Riz, could you get ready to tie up the boat to a tree? We don''t want to stop right at the edge, since who knows what beasts are hiding out there that we can''t see."


    Riz tore her gaze away, reaching down for the wooden anchor made from hook-shaped branch segments as Rian carefully maneuvered them closer to shore. Once they were close, Riz leapt out, and secured the anchor around a small tree, wrapping the hook with the rope. Only then did the others get off the boat, carrying their tools with them. Riz''s friend handed her one of the spears they had brought along as the other two looked around, inspecting the plants growing around them before beginning to cut down and harvest the growing stems of ropeweed.


    Lori was the last one down after she handed Rian the box containing her glassware and tools. She didn''t want to risk slipping as she stepped off and breaking them. The water was high enough that it managed to get into her boots, to her annoyance. She had to sit down a moment and take her boots off so she could remove her socks and dry her feet. She was not going to be doing experiments with wet feet.


    Once her feet, shoes, and socks were dry the latter had been put back onto the former, she picked up her staff and the box, and walked towards the edge. Riz, her friend, and Rian fell in behind her, leaving the two harvesting ropeweed behind.


    "So," Rian asked brightly, clutching his plank and charred stick eagerly, "what are we going to do first?"


    "Now," Lori said as she bound waterwisps in the river, "we''re going to clear a workspace."


    The river surged onto the shore, flowing upriver into the riverbank beyond her demesne''s borders.

 285 - Warm Weather Bead Experiments

    "It''s always fun seeing you do that," Rian said, a wide smile on his face as he watched the river water wash over the Iridescence beyond her demesne''s borders. "A pity you don''t have much reason to do it more often."


    Lori allowed herself a smug smile at the compliment. The binding had been simple, a basic redirection of the force of the flowing river using waterwisps. The scale wasn''t even all that big, something she could have done back when she''s simply been a Whisperer, if a bit more time-consuming to imbue then. And it had resulted in a substantial amount of water seemingly throwing itself out of the river and dousing the area beyond the edge of her demesne.


    The colors were all washed away, revealing the true colors of the surfaces beneath them as the water receded. A lingering layer of shimmering colors, like a thin scum of oil, glinted briefly on the water before fading away. Sooner if the water somehow flowed back across the border to her demesne.


    It also made the ground muddy, but she could deal with that, claiming the waterwisps in the ground and forcing the water to turn the vapor. The ground turned very chill as a result, but it wasn''t anything the sunny day couldn''t quickly fix. Thankfully, the sudden flood didn''t disturb a beast hiding near the edge. The one that had been drinking had wandered off, and while Lori would have really liked to know where it was, they simply didn''t have enough people.


    "So¡­ shouldn''t we be setting up something?" Rian said.


    Lori hesitated. A part of her said that with the ground cleared, it was safe to go out. There weren''t any beasts hiding nearby, so she was free to start experimenting.


    A part of her that still screamed at the thought of being alone in the dark near high grass told her to douse everything with water just to be sure.


    Unfortunately, as much as she wanted to listen to the latter, she couldn''t. Not in this instance. They needed Iridescence crystals for making beads, and if she doused everything, they''d need to walk out to where the Iridescence was still growing to scrape some off, which might put them near any hiding beasts anyway.


    Taking a deep breath, Lori help up the box with her tools and glassware. "Hold this so I can get something."


    Rian held up his plank to serve as a tray, and Lori set the box down. She undid the clasps, half-ready to grab hold of the box in case Rian''s hands faltered in their hold. From the box, she pulled out a clear glass specimen bowl, and some metal tweezers. A rectangular bowl made from bone, with a bottom made from an ingot of copper.


    Lori looked around, then held out the bowls to Riz, who let go of her spear, letting it drop down to be cradled in the crook of one arm with a practiced movement. The militiawoman carefully took the bowls in hand, and Lori put the tweezers in the bone bowl. Then she closed the box and clasped it shut again, then carefully put the box back in the boat next to her wand. She wasn''t sure if she''d need her wand for anything, but if they did anything with open flame, she would be more comfortable sticking that into the fire than her staff.


    She took the bowls from Riz and handed them to Rian. "All right," Lori said, pointing to where the colors still clung on past the area she had washed. "Go out there and check for beasts for about five paces. I''ll be right here to kill it if you find any. "


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said. Then she bent over, picked up some rocks off the ground, and stared throwing them into the still-glittering brush.


    ¡­ well, that was a way to do it, she supposed.


    Still, Lori gathered the water she needed for a water cutter. It occurred to her that while she''d used water cutters after she''d made her core, she hadn''t really practiced putting the power of a Dungeon Binder behind them. Normally, water cutters were constrained by factors like air resistance and gravity. It was a projectile on a predictable parabolic arc, after all. Waterwisps were used to keep the stream from coming apart into spray so it would be a cohesive stream on impact but there were always tradeoffs, especially if one was doing it quickly. Put too much imbuement into the waterwisps that would squeeze and send the stream flying, and there wouldn''t be enough to keep the stream coherent, causing it to break apart into uselessness mid-flight. Make it too coherent, and range could suffer. But as a Dungeon Binder, she had the power for both¡­


    Well, something to experiment with later. Right now, she used the water cutter she was familiar with, since it was a binding she knew was reliable.


    She held her staff up to aim, an unnaturally viscous glob of water on one end ready to send out and cut as Riz and her friend threw rocks. They listened as they did so, and Lori realized it was to hear what their rocks landed on. She tried to listen as well, but it was hard for her to distinguish anything with the river flowing nearby. Riz and her friend seemed to not have that problem, however. When they stopped throwing rocks, they walked boldly into the grass, their spears before them as they double checked.


    "It''s clear, Great Binder!" Riz called out. "You can come out now."


    Lori didn''t lower her staff as she hesitantly stepped up to where she knew the edge to be, even though the line had been washed away. Taking a deep breath, she stepped through. Cold slammed into her, and Lori shivered as the pleasant, comfortable warmth that had been surrounding her was pushed away by the cool spring weather. It took her a few moments to adjust. It wasn''t really that cold, but the sudden change was uncomfortable. Why did she keep forgetting this happened?


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    "You forgot it would be cold again, didn''t you?" Rian said, his face innocent.


    "Of course not," Lori said. "Come on, we have work to do." She handed him the glass bowl. "Go collect Iridescence."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Going to get the disturbing colorful substance!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It didn''t take long for Rian to find some large growths of Iridescence growing not far away. As long as they were undisturbed, the colors would keep growing indefinitely, and Rian had apparently found some places sufficiently sheltered from wind and rain for that to happen. There were several shards on the bowl, each about half the size of her smallest finger.


    "Iridescence specimen is two and a half yustri long, and about a yustri wide," she dictated to Rian. "Exact dimensions are difficult to quantify due to nature of Iridescence growth. Moving sample to container to begin process."


    Lori carefully picked up one specimen and placed it on the bone bowl with the copper bottom. After today, she''d probably finally get around to making something specifically designed for bead making. For now¡­


    Keeping the bowl well away from the border of her demesne, and telling herself she was only imaging the feeling of Iridescence starting to grow all over her, Lori reached into her demesne with her other hand. The heavily imbued binding composed of multiple types of wisps that she''d prepared beforehand anchored to the earthwisps in her nails, and she reached through her bones to claim the binding properly, not simply though her connection to her core. Only then did she pull the binding out, and carefully moved it towards the bone bowl.


    Tilting the bowl to cause the Iridescence to slide down to one end, she anchored the binding to the bone at the opposite end. Then she took the metal tweezers and used that as a conduit to keep in contact with the binding. Taking a deep breath, Lori tilted the bowl the other way, causing the Iridescence to slide down and touch the binding. Well, touch it after Lori budged it into place with the tweezers.


    She claimed the binding again¡ªthe contact with the Iridescence was already slowly pulling the wisps and imbuement towards the shard¡ªtaking direct control of it and bound the shard of Iridesence. As she expected, her whole binding was violently drawn into the shard, which began to grow. In a few moments, there was a cloudy white bead rattling in the bowl.


    "Growth rate is noticeably faster," Lori dictated. "Likely from the increase in temperature. Iridescence growth known to accelerate with heat. Phenomenon is likely related."


    "We can test that," Rian said. "You can make a block of ice, chill one of the Iridescence crystals, then do¡­ whatever the thing you do is. Possibly do it in cold air too, to remove environmental temperature as a factor. "


    Lori tilted her head, then nodded. She put the bead into her belt pouch, then reached through her connection to her core. Next to the boat, a block of ice formed as she used waterwisps to solidify water, decreasing the heat from the expunged firewisps so there weren''t any unfortunate explosions.


    Rian looked towards the block of ice. "You''ll have to reshape that," he said. "And I''ll find some branches we can use as handles. If it''s as cold as you like to make your ice, our fingertips are going to peel off."


    "¡­yes, go do that."


    Lori shaped the block of ice while Rian went to find some suitable branches. She''d need space to stick her hand in, after all. When her lord came with some long branches, she directed him to put it to the sides of the block, altering the solidified water''s shape to surround the branches so they could be used to lift the block up. Which they did, lifting the block of ice beyond her demesne''s borders. She got another glass bowl from her box and placed several Iridescence crystals in it to chill.


    The glass bowl was being placed in the space she had made to chill it when Rian suddenly said, "Wait! Is there water in that?"


    Lori looked up at him. "Of course there''s no water, Rian. If there was the colors would be dissolving."


    "No, not that," Rian said, waving a hand dismissively. "I mean inside that space. When it gets cold, the water vapor in the air is going to congeal, and that might dissolve the crystals if a puff of warm air blows over it."


    Rainbows.


    The experiment was delayed as she made sure to isolate the experimental space, which involved carrying the block of solidified water back into her demesne so she could put a binding of waterwisps in place to block off vaporous water from entering the cooling space. Then she had to remove the Iridescence from the bowl so she could bring that back into her demesne too so she could surround that with the same binding, which she had to anchor to a rock that she put in the bowl since she couldn''t anchor wisps onto the glass.


    The binding in question started deteriorating since the Iridescence had to go right up against the rock that was the anchor, but that was fine. She''d be removing the crystal she''d use in her test anyway, so a little miniscule growth shouldn''t be a problem. They''d probably have to make a note of it though.


    While they waited for the iridescence to cool, they made more beads with warm Iridescence. This time they actually counted how long it took. They didn''t have a time piece, but Rian put fingers to his wrist and counted his heartbeat. It wasn''t a perfect replacement, but he took several deep breaths to calm down to keep his heartbeat from increasing erratically in the middle of the process. For Lori, it still seemed like the beads grew faster than they had in winter.


    This was confirmed when they pulled out the Iridescence they had cooled¡ªLori had to use the wire tongs in her box¡ªand used those to make beads. According to Rian''s measurement, it took a four times as many more heartbeats for the beads to form to a similar size, which was far longer than it had taken during the winter.


    "So temperature definitely has an effect," Rian said, writing it down. "Interesting. Should we try warming the Iridescence and seeing how quickly it forms, then?"


    Lori twitched. While it was a perfectly logical suggestion¡­ she couldn''t think of a way of doing it that wouldn''t result in disaster. Usually the method of warming something slowly was to immerse it in water and start warming that water. That wasn''t possible with the colors, and putting it to open flame¡­ No. At best, they could lay it on a metal pan over a small flame, but that still felt extremely dangerous.


    "Let us set that aside for later," she said. "For now, go and gather more Iridescence. Let''s make beads¡­"

 286 - To be Pleasantly Surprised

    They did manage to try using warm Iridescence to make beads by laying it out in the sun and using lightwisps to concentrate the heat of the sunlight to warm the sample. This meant they didn''t need to risk moving it close to open flame or putting imbued firewisps near it that could potentially be drawn to the Iridescence. She was able to set it up some distance away, and when it didn''t explode violently, she sent Rian to retrieve it. When he returned with the sample held in a glass bowl, there were new growths visible on its surface, as if someone had sprinkled salt on it that had stuck. It was warm enough that she could feel it by putting her hand near it.


    Using it to make a bead was faster than the other crystals, taking only three-quarters as many heartbeats.


    "So, by the results so far, it would form even faster if we got it hotter," Rian said as he noted the results. "Should we try?"


    Lori shook her head. "No. Perhaps when we initiate mass production, but at the moment, the growth rate of the initial environmental temperature is sufficient for my purposes."


    Rian nodded. "So¡­ did you bring any of the white stuff?" he said, grinning widely. "Because all the way out here is probably the safest place for doing the fire tests."


    "No," she said, and Rian visibly slumped, a theatrically comical expression of disappointment on his face. He straightened silently, eyeing the beads that had been made. "No, I''m not breaking one open."


    "Why not?" He actually whined and pouted. "Surely it''s an important experiment that needs to be conducted? W-what if it results in more of the white crystals growing?"


    "Doubtful. The white does not show any auto-crystallization tendencies."


    "We should confirm and make sure¡­?"


    "Rian, this is bordering on actually pathetic instead of merely theatrically pathetic."


    "Dignity is for people not secure enough in being themselves to be themselves!"


    "Rian?"


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Be quiet about the fire experiments and go back to taking notes."


    He sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    They didn''t have to stay through lunch, as the day grew very hot even with Lori''s hat, so she decided to cut their stay short. She had managed to make a sizable number of beads anyway, such that she had to make a container from a rock since she had forgotten to bring along something to carry the beads in, and there was too much metal in her box to put them there without potential seepage. She should have remembered to bring one properly, ugh!


    The trip back was more crowded, since cut ropeweed was stacked on the boat. Fortunately, they were heading downriver, so the added mass wasn''t that much of a problem, but their speed was still reduced. Lori also had to use bindings of waterwisps to slow down the boat, lest they drift past the docks because Rian had been unused to steering Lori''s Boat when it was loaded so heavily.


    Once they were docked, Rian saw to the boat being unloaded, and spoke to¡­ whoever operated Lori''s Ice Boat to start bringing people upriver to gather more of the ropeweed near the edge, while Lori put away the beads in the container she stored them in. She''d need to make far more soon, possibly begin true mass production. That meant it was time for her to finally have the smiths make her tools specifically for bead making.


    She''d need to tell Rian to do that once she figured out the best shape of the tools she needed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "So, do you need me to take notes for anything this afternoon?" Rian asked as they ate lunch.


    Lori considered that. She will admit, if only to herself¡ªthe only one to whom such an admission mattered¡ªthat she hadn''t really thought this through very extensively. On consideration, however, she might as well continue on with experimenting with white Iridescence and have Rian take notes. Though they''d have to find a sufficiently isolated location for seeing what happened when the substance was thrown directly into fire.


    And so she nodded decisively. "Yes, we''ll be doing experiments in the alcove after lunch."


    "And¡ª?"


    "Yes, we''ll set some on fire." The words were supposed to come out irritated but became a tired sigh instead. "Outside, on the river, where it''s safe."


    Rian grinned widely. "So¡­ I think you need a shed for you to work in at the edge," he said. "That way, you''d be safer from beasts, and you can keep working if it rains, which it still will."


    Lori frowned. She had no real objection to that¡ªit was for her safety after all¡ªbut given the location, building such a shed would be difficult. "I have no real objection to that, but given the location, building such a shed would be difficult. Bringing the wood upriver will be difficult, and building it will take time."


    "Not if you build it," Rian said.


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    "It''s outside my demesne. Building there will be like building in River''s Fork." She paused. "Admittedly, perhaps slightly less agonizing, since I can literally step back into my demesne at any time¡­"


    "Actually, I was thinking that maybe you can building the shed inside the demesne, and we can push it out over the edge. That way, you can build it with the convenience of your full capabilities."


    Lori blinked, then tilted her head thoughtfully. "That¡­ I suppose I could do that. But building material will still need to be moved there, unless I draw from the bedrock."


    "Not if you make it out of ice," Rian said brightly.


    Lori stared at him. She shouldn''t have been surprised he''d think of something like that, but she was. "I shouldn''t be surprised you''d think of something like that, but I am," she said.


    "I point out you thought of using ice to roof the back of the bathhouses all by yourself. This will be the same, and like the back of the bathhouse, it won''t need reinforcement like the boats do because no one will be putting any weight on the outside. And since it will be clear, you''ll have plenty of light to work with."


    "It will have to be constantly imbued, though" Lori said. "Which I''d have to do personally, since it would be outside my demesne."


    "Ah, but it''s a building," Rian said. "There''s no reason a little bit of it can''t be inside the demesne so you can imbue it, right?"


    That¡­ well¡­ "I''d still rather not have one more thing I have to add to the list of things I need to imbue."


    "Ah. Well, I can understand that. If only we have a way to keep things imbued without you having to really bother with it. Perhaps something that will be produced in large quantities¡­"


    "¡­"


    Lori considered that. "Tomorrow," she said finally. "I don''t want to go back there today."


    "Completely understandable. Hopefully it won''t be raining."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, Lori got her box of equipment: a long-unused wooden mold from her room, the leather sheet she used to make stone tablets, and one of the bone tablets she had started making, and took them down to the alcove she had claimed and sealed off in the second level. Then she went outside to gather some bones from the bone pit. Claiming and binding the earthwisps in the bones, she made a large jar by fusing together the bones and flattening them out into a sheet, using the leather to smooth the surface and get rid of any bumps.


    She then wrapped the bone sheet around the mold for the ice furnaces she had used to smelt the copper last winter. It didn''t go as smoothly as with the furnace, since bone was not completely frictionless, but she managed to get the mold out. The resulting vessel was a little small, so she stacked two such bone cylinders on top of each other and fused them together, making a taller vessel that she was satisfied with¡­ that she had to cut in half again when Rian came back from his errand and pointed out its height made it more likely to fall over on the boat ride back, potentially spilling beads everywhere.


    "Maybe you can have Gunvi make it for you?" Rian said as an annoyed Lori finished separating the bone vessel again. Well, two little bone buckets were good containers, she''d just have to add on some handles. "Give him some softened¡­ bone¡­ that he can slap down on his potter''s wheel to shape and when he''s done you can harden it? It probably won''t turn like wet clay would, but he''d still have more experience than you do on the matter."


    Lori considered that and sighed. "Fine. Speak to him about it later. In the meantime, use this to write. I don''t have time to transcribe your plank right now."


    Rian blinked, hastily putting down his blank and charred stick so he could take the tablet made from bone that she handed him. "Wait, won''t this bre¡ªhey, this is really light!" He hefted it in his hands. "Feels familiar, though. Like¡­ wait, is this bone too?" A strange expression came on his face as he hefted it again. "Huh, I wonder why you didn''t think of doing this sooner. Well, I''m not really one to talk, I didn''t think of this either¡­"


    "Does it write?" Lori asked, opening the box with her tool and taking out a glass bowl and a little ceramic spoon.


    Rian hummed, and picked up his charred stick. Holding it, he carefully rubbed the blackened end on one corner. "Yeah, it writes. Ready to take what notes you need taking, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded as she began spooning some of the white iridescence from within the broken open large bead. "All right then," she said. Best to get this out of the way so he''d stop bothering her about it. A part of Lori was morbidly curious as to what would result, anyway. "Do we have anything we can heat this in? I''m not risking one of my glass bowls."


    "I thought the experiment was putting it into direct flame?" Rian said. "It''s probably been exposed to enough extreme heat when we did the evaporation tests, and that didn''t do anything."


    Lori frowned. "We can''t just make a fire and throw it in. At the very least, the fire needs to be in a vessel so we can easily recover the sample."


    "I''ll be honest, I''m sort of expecting the white Iridescence to act like a concentrated fuel, and doubt we''ll recover anything, but I see your point. Maybe you can make a bowl out of ice?"


    "Is ''made out of ice'' the only solution you can come up with anymore?"


    "No, but it''s a surprisingly versatile answer when you use it."


    "No. I don''t want a nearby binding that might potentially skew the results."


    Rian hummed thoughtfully. "Well¡­ we can take one of the clay ration jars and you can reshape it with Whispering. The baked clay should be resilient enough to not crack from the heat of a fire, and it won''t need magic to hold its shape. I''ll just tell Gunvi to make one to replace it."


    Lori considered that as she slid the white crystals into an empty glass bottle carefully, taking care to not let any fall. "Do that, then," she said as she stoppered the bottle. So many things she needed made, and she wasn''t if she''d be using them more than once.


    Rian nodded, but didn''t go to retrieve the jar just yet. "What else will we need?" he said, picking up his new tablet and starting to write down what seemed like a list.


    She eyed him, but she supposed doing a full inventory of what they needed before he left was only prudent. "Firewood," she said. "For the open flames you want."


    He was nodding before he stopped mid-gesture. "Correct me if I''m wrong, but we didn''t check if the white Iridescence is affected by steam, right? I don''t think we did, but I haven''t finished going back through the notes yet."


    Lori shook her head slowly. "No¡­ we did no experiments involving exposing the white Iridescence to steam, but given how it interacted with evaporating water, I doubt will be affected by steam. Why?"


    "Well¡­ firewood contains a minute amount of moisture, so its smoke contains a little steam. If we want to remove that factor, we should use some of the charcoal. The production process removes the moisture out of them, so¡­"


    Lori frowned. "Where do we keep the charcoal?"


    "Back of the firewood shed, though it''s mostly the smiths who''ve been using it. Mostly people mix it in with their firewood so that they''ll have something to banked in the ashes," Rian said promptly.


    She grunted. "Get both then. We''ll do the experiment twice."


    Rian grinned. "Really?"


    "Don''t make me repeat myself. Anything else?"


    "Uh, vessel, fuel, ignition will probably be you¡­ that should be everything, I think. Though we should probably mention what you expect to happen for the sake of completeness, and why."


    "I expect it to explode," Lori said. "After all, that''s what happens with Iridescence."


    "This isn''t Iridescence, though¡­"


    "Then perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised."

 287 - Pleasantly Surprised, But Slightly Disappointed

    Lori ruined a perfectly serviceable jar by softening the earthwisps comprising its sides, and then slowly spreading out the material to make a vaguely bowl-shaped¡­ thing. It was lopsided, but serviceable, and when stood on the base¡ªthe only part she hadn''t touched¡ªit was stable and didn''t wobble¡­ much.


    Rian, for his part, went to gather fuel, returning with a basket filled with both firewood and some charcoal. "So, where are we doing this?" he asked cheerfully. To Lori''s ear, it sounded like a perfectly natural cheer, rather than an annoying cheer, and therefore far less irritating.


    "You''ve obviously been eager to do this," Lori said flatly. "I''m sure you have some ideas."


    "Other side of the river," Rian said immediately. "Well away from anything important, and if it does explode, the river is nearby to douse any fires. Probably best if we do it in a shallow pit, so that any explosion is directed upward, and less chance that any debris flies towards us." He thought for a moment. "I should probably get a shovel, so I can clear out any soil we don''t want to turn into rock."


    With everything in hand, they loaded all the equipment aboard Lori''s Boat. Riz still followed after them, mostly to make sure they weren''t bothered by chokers or anything else growing wild on the other side. Lori thought she''d probably have heard if there was a large beast roaming the other side¡ªat the very least Rian would probably have told her¡ªso another guard probably wouldn''t be necessary. There were still no clouds threatening rain, which was fortunate


    On the other side of the river from the docks, a pile of cut ropeweed was stacked, waiting to be taken across. Since they''d begun harvesting this side late in the year, there was still plenty of ropeweed to harvest. Rian waved at those who looked at them, but fortunately he didn''t stop to talk. Instead, he led the way towards a rocky part of the shore. "Here should be good," he said. "If you reshape the rocks a little, I don''t have to dig, we''d have a decent recess to set the fire in, and we can be well back once the fire''s lit and we''ve added in the white stuff."


    Lori didn''t really have a preference¡ªshe was mainly doing this experiment out of morbid curiosity¡ªso she simply shrugged and waved a hand dismissively. "Fine, then," she said. "Get me more rocks."


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    As it turned out, white Iridescence thrown into open flame didn''t explode. It didn''t even burn.


    "Are we doing something wrong?" Rian asked. He looked almost betrayed as he glared at the latest fire, this one fueled by pieces of charcoal that had been ignited by wood shavings and tinder. "The color of the flame isn''t even changing! Are we sure that it''s in the fire?"


    "You were the one who carved out the piece of charcoal and put the white Iridescence in it," Lori said. "Unless you were careless with placing the charcoal, it should still be there. After this many iterations, I can only conclude that white Iridescence neither ignites nor reacts to direct heat."


    "Or the temperatures needed for it to react are far higher," Rian mused.


    "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "You''re not taking note. Take notes."


    "Ah, right, sorry, sorry." He began to write. "So¡­ what does this mean, exactly?"


    "White Iridescence is clearly an inert substance," Lori mused as a Riz paced back and forth behind the two of them, either watchful and vigilant for chokers or bored out of her mind and restless.


    "Inert to heat," Rian corrected, "and only up to¡­ well, however hot our fire is. We haven''t put it in a vitriolic substance that''s doesn''t contain water." He paused, his writing pausing for a moment. "Though I''ll admit, off the top of my head I can''t think of a vitriolic substance that does not, in fact, contain water."


    Lori tilted her head as she tried to remember. It had been so long¡­ "I think a substance only becomes vitriolic or caustic after interaction with water."


    Rian sighed. "So, absolutely no point doing those tests, since it will just dissolve into the water¡­?" He frowned. "Or would the white Iridescence be mixed into whatever the dissolved substance was when all the water is evaporated?"


    "I see no reason to test that at the moment," Lori said. She had reached the edge here, and wasn''t willing to go beyond into the colors. "And unless you can think of a good reason to try, you will leave the subject alone."


    Rian began to stroke his chin, looking thoughtful. Eventually, he said, "All right, maybe there''s no reason to try to find out if White Iridescence is inert to a vitriolic substance with no water in it, but just because we can''t think of anything doesn''t mean some can''t. But yes, I suppose in this instance we don''t have to go that far. And hey, we found out we don''t have to worry about fire damaging our product! That''s something, right?"


    Lori supposed that as one way of looking at the results.


    They''d placed the white Iridescence in firewood that smoked and, according to Rian, was releasing some still from residual moisture, and in nearly-smokeless charcoal fire. They''d put the substance right next to open flame, and on portions that were actively on fire, and in all instances, the white Iridescence had simply lain there. The shards had gotten hot, which Rian had found out when he''d touched one of the samples after pulling it out of the fire. but beyond that the samples hadn''t reacted. No change in color¡ªafter they''d gotten the ashes off¡ªno noticeable change in shape that implied deformation, no strange smells coming up with the smoke, and contrary to Rian''s hopes, no energetic combustion or violent explosion. There hadn''t even been a little pop or sizzle.


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    It was honestly an anti-climactic result. "Honestly, it''s an anti-climactic result," she said. "While I did not wish it to explode the way you did, such an outcome would have been understandable and usable in a conventional way. This lack of result, while intellectually interesting, does not bring to mind any further avenues of experimentation and inquiry."


    "I was not wishing it would explode," Rian said with theatrical offended innocence. "I simply thought it would because that seemed like the logical result. Iridescence explodes, after all, so it''s only logical to assume this does too."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Well, come on, get the bowl and the last sample so we can get back to working in the alcove."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    In the alcove on the third level, Lori set aside the samples that had been fire-exposed. While they had no visible differences, it would probably be best to set them aside for any further experiments, in case something had still changed that wouldn''t be obvious unless they were used for something else. She couldn''t conceive what that could be, but best not to risk it¡­


    For a moment, she just sat on one of the benches on one side of the alcove and stared at what was laid out before her. At the large bead that had its semi-transparent shell with its bizarrely directional properties cracked open, revealing the cloudy white insides; the small collection of stone containers in one of the niches, filled with the white Iridescence they''d previously extracted for experimentation, set aside so they wouldn''t get mixed in with the source sample; and the box with her glassware and equipment. To one side, Rian sat quietly, the bone tablet balanced on his knees, charred stick in hand and ready to write. Lori half-expected him to pester her with suggestions for things they could test, but he remained silent.


    Eventually, Lori stood up and reached for the stone container on which had been inscribed the words ''anchor sample 1'', and checked if there were any wisps still anchored to it through her connection to her core. Carefully, she shook the contained white Iridescence, simply watching as the pieces moved. They didn''t clump, since clumping was a reaction with moisture, but the different sizes of the pieces meant they didn''t all move the same way.


    Lori reached into her equipment box, and drew out her metal tweezers. Instead of using them to pick up a piece, she hung it from the side of the container so that one tine was touching the samples. Drawing lightwisps out of the air, she made a simple binding that emitted light and anchored it to the white Iridescence in the container, making sure the binding was contacting the tweezers.


    A glow began to emanate from the container.


    "Um, is that something I should take a note of?" Rian asked.


    Yes, she supposed she should¡­ "Affirming previous findings," Lori said. "Wisps anchor onto white Iridescence, and remain anchored after the imbuement is consumed, as well as retaining the binding." She hadn''t put a lot of imbuement in it, but it would still be a few moments before the binding stopped glowing. Lori got to her feet. "I have to go get something. Stay here and make sure no one enters to alcove. Do not disturb the sample."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    By the time Lori came back from her room with a handful of the beads she had made this morning, the lightwisps were no longer imbued, and the container of samples appeared empty. She nodded. "Note: the imbuement has run out, but as per previous results, the lightwisps remain anchored, and the binding remains intact. This despite the lack of imbuement." Reaching back into the equipment box, she drew out a pair of springy metal tongs with curved grippers meant for lifting certain kinds of hot glassware. Pushing the tongs open, she reached down to clamp one of the beads she had with her¡ª


    Lori paused, then looked at the tongs in her hands. At distinctive copper sheen, darkening slightly in some spots with patina. "Side note," she said. "Inquire with the smiths if they know how to make springs using copper, and what other metals and equipment they might need to do so."


    Rian blinked, and also stared at the tongs in her hand. "Huh. I should have thought of that. Making a note of it, your Bindership. The smiths probably know, they just haven''t brought it up because it wasn''t relevant or needed for anything."


    He was probably correct about that. Lori couldn''t think of a use for springs made from copper off the top of her head at the moment, but knowing it was a possibility would be useful for the future. "Continue the notes. The test setup is arranged as follows: a stone container filled with white Iridescence. Anchored to the white Iridescence are lightwisps in a binding that is meant to radiate light. The binding contains no imbuement but persists because of being anchored to the white Iridescence. A pair of metal tweezers hangs on the side of the container. One tine is intersecting the binding of lightwisps.


    Lori paused a moment to allow Rian to finish writing, then continued when he nodded. "Further equipment is as follows: a pair of copper spring glassware tongs and a wispbead, undenominated. The bead is gripped in the tongs, directly contacting the metal to allow for seepage." She opened the tongs and clasped the bead in the curved grippers as she spoke.


    "Observational note," Rian interrupted, still writing. "Seepage is probably currently happening, because you''re holding the tongs and you''re surrounded by some kind of warmth binding you keep forgetting about."


    Lori blinked, then blinked again as she realized Rian was right. She hastily put down the tongs that gripped the bead. She glared at her lord, who gave her an innocent look of the borderline-annoying kind. "Get over here and pick these up," she said. "Give me that tablet."


    Rian put the charred stick on the tablet and held it out to her. Lori took it carefully, but the charred stick still rolled off. Sighing, she put the tablet on her lap as Rian bent down and handed her the stick. Taking it in hand, she ignored the way it smudged her fingers as she held it like a pen or stylus, ready to write. "All right," she said, "pick up the tongs¡ªdon''t let the bead fall out!¡ªand carefully touch the metal of the tongs to the tweezers hanging on the side of the container."


    Her lord nodded, picking the tongs up by the grippers and the bead¡ªwhich was actually a good idea. Lori wished she''d thought of it¡ªand carefully moving it until the coiling spring at the fulcrum of the tongs made contact with the tine of the tweezers that hung from the outside of the container.


    Light suddenly glowed from the container of white Iridescence.


    Lori nodded, making a note of it. "Remove the tongs from the tweezers."


    Rian complied. The light vanished immediately.


    "Contact them again."


    Light.


    Lori nodded. "Rudimentary bound tool constructed."

 288 - Rudimentary Bound Tools

    "Huh," Rian said. "Look at that." He sounded merely like he''d seen something he''d been expecting rather than impressed or excited. Which, given he''d done the initial white Iridescence experiments with her, was fair.


    "You''re not surprised," Lori said as she finished noting the results of the test.


    "Honestly, my most immediate thought is ''ah, of course bound tools that create heat are safe, white Iridescence doesn''t react to heat''," he said, pulling back the tongs. The binding of lightwisps stopped glowing. He moved the tongs again. The air directly above the white Iridescence glowed.


    "Stop that," Lori said, and Rian pulled back the tongs. He paused, then looked down at them with a frown.


    "We forgot to record the size of the bead at the start of the experiment," he said, sounding annoyed. "We should have done a before and after measurement."


    Ah. "We''ll do that next time," Lori agreed. She had some calipers in her box that could measure the beads.


    Rian nodded. "So, does this mean you''ll be making bound tools now?"


    Lori waved a hand, not so much dismissive as negligent. "We still need glass. Without glass, we can make nothing but laboratory demonstration projects."


    "I don''t see how. Beads, metal, white Iridescence, bindings you make¡­" He pointed at the container with the white Iridescence in it. "Make a few of these and we''ll have lamps for people to carry around."


    "And how will we keep the white Iridescence dry without glass?" Lori said. "And for that matter¡­"


    She reached down to pick up the container, and shook it back and forth like she was trying to sift the samples before putting it down again. "Touch the tongs to the tweezers again."


    Rian glanced at her and shrugged, then did as ordered.


    There was¡­ some glow, but it was a small, weak glow compared to what had come before, and wavered slightly like a candle flame in high wind about to go out.


    "Ah," Rian said. "Yes, that looks problematic and inconvenient. What happened?"


    "Bindings need to be anchored for a reason. Wisps interact with each other, and similar to how water can dislodge water, waterwisps can dislodge waterwisps."


    Rian tilted his head. "All right, that makes sense. If waterwisps can push on water, then of course the other way is possible too, otherwise the waterjet wouldn''t work because there''d be no transfer of force between the water and the tubes with the bindings on them. And¡­ huh. Darkwisps. All right, I think I understand¡­"


    It was always convenient how intelligent Rian was. She seldom had to explain things more than once, and never had to try to explain using awkward metaphors involving throwing rocks or sticks or strings. "The lightwisps were anchored to the white Iridescence. When I shook the container, the wisps all moved with the sample they were anchored to, which did not stay in the same positions relative to each other. This resulted in the binding dissolving." She paused, then added. "The latter is not usual. Normally, a binding will retain its arrangement no matter what other wisps encounter it, especially when anchored so that it maintains its relative position."


    Rian titled his head. "Perhaps it''s because the binding wasn''t imbued when you shook the white? After all, being imbued is what normally keeps a binding from falling apart. Here, give me that tablet and we can try again."


    It turned out to not be as simple as that. Making a binding of lightwisps, anchoring it to the white Iridescence, imbuing it to theoretically have the binding maintain its shape, and then shaking the container led to a strange result. They actually did the experiment twice, first with the binding imbued and active so that it shone with light, then another experiment when the binding was imbued and anchored, but deactivated so that it didn''t glow.


    To Lori''s senses, the imbuement was clearly acting to hold the binding together even as the white Iridescence that the wisps were anchored to was randomly displaced. Even so, there was a limit, and just as if she''d anchored a binding to something solid and then broke that solid in half right were the binding was, a sufficient extreme change from the initial starting position broke the binding. The latter, at least, was within what she knew, even if the nature of the position change was unusual.


    It proved to Rian, however, that the lamps he''d envisioned wasn''t as simple as he thought.


    "I guess the glass is necessary after all," he sighed as he finished writing down the day''s notes. "It probably holds the white Iridescence and wisps in place so that¡­ well, that doesn''t happen. Are you sure there''s nothing we can use as a substitute? Something that can hold the white Iridescence in place so that the binding doesn''t get moved around?"


    "Rian, this is a rudimentary bound tool," Lori said flatly. "Barely better than a classroom demonstration of metal causing seepage in beads. In fact, save for the white Iridescence, it''s exactly that. It will require experimentation and iteration on my part to create even a simple bound tool to make light that won''t be ruined by being left out in the rain or shaken. Experimentation I''ve only barely begun."


    "What sort of experimentation will you need to do? Besides figuring out how to make glass, that is."


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    It was a question Lori had been considering, but hadn''t really made solid plans about. Faced with Rian''s direct question, however, she drew together her half-formed notions to come up with an answer. "Besides the glass," Lori said slowly, "I will need to find the ideal sort of binding for the bound tools and the ideal configuration of the bound tools."


    "Ideal configuration? Shouldn''t it just be kept simple? Beads go on end, light or whatever comes out the other end. Using only a bound tool that makes light as an example, keeping it as simple as this¡ª" Rian gestured to the container with the tweezers, "¡ªat least, in essence, makes it idiot-proof for the users and simple to build for¡­ well, you."


    "That might work for simple bound tools such as lamps, but a bound tool for a water jet driver or an evaporator for salt extraction will not be able to function on such simple principles." Normally, this would be the point that she''d stop explaining. Rian wasn''t a wizard, after all. He wouldn''t understand, and his thinking of magic would be formed from silly stories¡­


    Except he was looking thoughtful. "Ah, I think I see. In the waterjets, the binding itself is in the water, and for the evaporator the salt water passes through the binding to change state." He was nodding. "Yes, that''s a level of sophistication above ''light up on contact with beads''. Possibly two, or even three. You''d know better than I do. Off the top of my head, you''d need to at least keep the white Iridescence isolated from water while still having anchored waterwisps that can affect the water coming in¡­" He was nodding to himself now, his fingers tapping in a seemingly random pattern on his forearm. "Yeah, bound tools would be the best way for you to reduce the number of things you need to keep track of."


    Lori was¡­ impressed, despite herself. Had she ever related the technical details of how the water jets worked to Rian? "Essentially," she said. "I have some thoughts on how it might be possible, but I''ll still need a means of isolating the white Iridescence, which will require glass."


    Rian was still nodding. "Yes, yes¡­ you know, we should probably leave some white Iridescence outside of the demesne to see what happens," he said thoughtfully. "At the very least, it might give us more information about exactly why they might use glass in making bound tools¡­ unless bound tools meant to be used only inside a demesne differ from bound tools that can be used outside of a demesne''s borders¡­" He straightened up suddenly. "Wait. Can you actually use a bound tool outside of a demesne?"


    That¡­ Lori had never considered that before. Could bound tools actually be used outside of a demesne, where Iridescence was a factor? All the bound tools she was familiar with were those used inside of a workshop of some kind. But¡­ there was some inter-demesne trade, mostly along waterways, as well as travelers. She herself had ridden one as part of leaving Taniar Demesne, heading towards the ports where she''d eventually gotten on a larger boat to this new continent. The boats that travelled the waterways were probably powered by bound tools, since she didn''t remember the boat she had taken passage in possessing smoke-spewing chimneys that indicated they were propelled by a steam driver.


    Rian snapped his fingers. "I know. We can ask Riz, or maybe Kolinh, if the militia had bound tools that they used outside of a demesne. They''d know, wouldn''t they?"


    Lori supposed they would. "I suppose they would," she mused. "Very well, find out. Hopefully you will learn something definitive."


    "In the meantime, why not practice making bound tools that will only be used inside the demesne?" Rian suggested. He wasn''t even trying to look innocent.


    "I''ll still need glass," Lori said. "That''s what bound tools use."


    "Yes, well, we don''t have glassworkers. We do, however, have smiths. Why not see if metal¡ªlike, say the copper we have a lot of¡ªcan be used to substitute?"


    She gave him a flat look. "You realize that metal is opaque, and will not allow light to pass through, and therefore are useless for making any sort of lamp bound tool?"


    "Yes, I recall that," he said. "No, I was thinking¡­ off the top of my head, the reason to use glass is to either keep Iridescence out, or to keep whisperers from altering the binding anchored to the white iridescence after it had been¡­ bound?" Lori nodded, confirming he was using the word correctly. "If it''s the latter, well¡­ you''re the only Whisperer we have¡­you know, unless Shanalorre has somehow managed to learn Whispering simply from living in the same demesne as you, and since you haven''t spontaneously learned Deadspeaking healing, that''s unlikely. So you can afford to at least try it out."


    Lori hummed thoughtfully. "I''ll consider it," she finally said. "Though I still don''t see what kind of bound tool could be made from that."


    "A heater," Rian said. "Firewisps, anchored to white iridescence, held in place with metal¡­ we can use it to heat the bath water so you don''t have to imbue it anymore. It would also be helpful in keeping everyone warm. That way, we can divert people away from having to gather and prepare firewood. If we make it hot enough, we can use it for cooking too, and as a general purpose evaporator heat source."


    She blinked at that, her head tilting sideways thoughtfully. Yes, a binding of purely firewisps would work for that. The intensity of heat wouldn''t change¡ªwell, unless she changed it, because as Rian said, she was the only Whisperer in the demesne¡ªbut it could be deactivated, and if would run on beads without her oversight¡­


    Wait. Firewisps.


    While firewisps could create heat, they could also destroy it. And while she''d stop being able to perceive and claim firewisps when they became colder than her body temperature¡­ they would still be there. Firewisps, bound to destroy heat, and keep destroying heat, as long as they had a bead to power them¡­


    She could stop manually making solidified air and solidified water to cool their cold rooms.


    ¡­


    She could stop manually making solidified air and solidified water to cool their cold rooms!


    Not only that, the bound tool could be taken to River''s Fork for their cold room as well, removing one more reason she might possibly need to leave her demesne to go there!


    And¡­ if she could create bound tools for ventilation¡­ if she could create a bound tool that could make a shroud of darkwisps to help blunt the effects of the passage of dragons¡­ then she might never have to set foot there ever again!


    ¡­


    Well, no, she would probably still have to go there to build new things and install further bound tools, but still! Her need to go there would be GREATLY minimized!


    ¡­and¡­ well¡­ the shroud of darkwisps was unlikely to be effective, or else she''d have heard of them being used to protect towns and such¡­ but maybe that was because it was just more efficient for the Dungeon Binder to cover the entire demesne with darkwisps? The experienced ones probably knew better than her how best to go about it¡­


    ¡­


    No, no, she wasn''t letting cold, terrible, sensible reality ruin this for her!


    "All right, we''ll try your idea," Lori said. "Find out if the smiths have the time and the right equipment to melt some copper for us."


    Rian grinned widely.

 289 - Its A Euphemism

    It turned out the smiths were currently busy doing maintenance on the metal tools the demesne had. Lori decided it was best not to interrupt them, but she had Rian arrange for them to be free to assist her the following day.


    That prompted Lori to go check that the treasure room was in order. Fortunately, all the dragon scales were still there. The anatass scale had a chunk of it removed, but that was from her wand. The pile of copper ingots was piled neatly on the ground next to the scales, arranged in a aesthetically pleasing alternating pattern. In one corner, a pile of planks that contained months of inventory records lay. Lori might have to tell Rian to transfer those onto bone tablets to make a smaller stack and so they could get the planks back. She used¡ªhad used¡ªthin stone tablets on which she wrote with a beast-tooth stylus after softening a thin layer of the stone, but even she had to be careful with that lest she drop the tablets and break them.


    With the bone tablets proving more durable and lighter¡ªif a far more limited resource than rock¡ªher permanent record keeping could switch to that, although¡­ well, her time would be bound up in making the tablets and softening a bit of the surface of the bone so it can be written on. Thankfully, the writing wouldn''t be all her. Rian could write, and Shanalorre had shown she could as well. The other Dungeon Binder''s handwriting was actually better than his. And she remembered¡­ ah, yes, they had an astrologer, right? She remembered something about Rian having him write things out. So that was three people to do the writing for her right there!


    It was late enough in the day that she had dismissed Rian so he could¡­ well, do Rian things. The bone tablet, she took back and inscribed the notes more permanently onto another bone tablet using a stylus, then spend the rest of the afternoon making blank bone tablets to transfer their old notes onto. It was mostly something to keep her hands occupied as she thought about what she had learned and how it might be applied to practical bound tool making.


    While she''d realized that white Iridescence was most likely a component¡ªadmittedly sometime after she''d decided to put experiments on hold in favor of bead production¡ªtoday had been the first time she''d had the opportunity to confirm it. It was nice to be able to confirm things and not simply have only thought experiments to base her plans on.


    Her mind was already thinking of further experiments for tomorrow. Rian had proposed that they basically suspend white iridescence with a binding of firewisps anchored to it in molten copper to try to prevent the white iridescence from moving so that the binding won''t become disarranged. Of course, in hindsight, it was an extreme step when they could do a similar step using earthwisps and white Iridescence being suspended in stone, or bone. It wouldn''t be possible with water, unfortunately, unless one did it with dry solidified water. Done that way it would probably work, but as soon as the imbuement keeping the water solidified ran out¡­ well, it would turn into ice that would start melting¡­


    Which¡­ wouldn''t actually be water the white Iridescence could dissolve in at that point. Would that work? Bury some white iridescence in the ice hull of the Coldhold, anchor the binding to it, and when the imbuement ran out, theoretically the binding would be maintained long enough for someone to put a bead to some kind of metal contact and wire to imbue the binding and solidify the hull again.


    They should probably test that. As long as they got all the water, they could recover the dissolved white Iridescence.


    ¡­ she probably wouldn''t use it on the Coldhold, though. Too easy for another Whisperer to claim the binding through the ice or the metal contact for the bead, and alter it. At least with her blood, her claim to the waterwisps through her affinity would allow her to perceive and fight such a thing. Hmm¡­ would wisps anchored to both white Iridescence and another point that wasn''t white iridescence maintain the anchor after the imbuement was used up?


    The thoughts occupied her mind as she softened bone and then flattened it out on a sheet of leather on her table, then started to cut up the thin slab into smaller tablets. She only managed to do two slabs when Rian knocked on her door to announce it was time for dinner. He was smiling, and¡­ well, it didn''t make her annoyed to look at it.


    The seel hanging outside her door was removed, and she handed it to Rian so that it would be added to tomorrow''s breakfast. She wondered if she should start putting some sort of rack next to her door instead of a hole to hang the hooks on. Recently all the seels the brat had been leaving her had been long enough to touch the floor.


    The three were already at the table, and for some reason they were all huddled together and speaking quietly, their tones urgent. Lori didn''t bother to listen as she took her own seat on the bench opposite them. At least, that was the intention as she waited for Rian to come back, but the way the three kept glancing at her as she began to set up the chatrang board¡­


    "What?" she demanded flatly as she finished putting the last pieces into place.


    Riz and Umu immediately looked away, one looking over at another table, the other looking down at the grain of the wood. Mikon, however, met her eyes. "Thank you for lifting Rian''s mood," she smiling in a Rian-like way.


    The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    Lori shrugged. "He''s much more competent and efficient when he''s smiling. Smiling for real," she amended. "That said, his enthusiasm for such things is nearly disturbing. Useful but disturbing." Still far better than his strange voting fetish, though.


    "Do you think if we asked him to write things for us, it would lift his mood too?" Mikon asked. On either side of her, the other two leaned towards Lori.


    "No," she said bluntly. "It''s not that he''s writing things down, it''s what he''s writing down. He''s writing answers to questions he thinks are interesting to answer, as well as recording the process of attaining those answers." She titled her head. "Though I don''t see why you''d need to do such a thing to lift his mood. Aren''t the three of you sleeping with him?"


    The three stared at her. Umu was reddening for some reason, while Riz was¡­ well, it looked like she was trying to glare and not doing it very well. Mikon sighed as Lori heard snickering coming from the other tables around them save from behind her.


    ¡­


    Wait¡­


    She should probably have left this alone. After all, whatever they got up to had nothing to do with her. That said, the possibility of some sort of misunderstanding on their part out of ignorance¡­ "You¡­ know sleeping with someone is a euphemism, right?" she said as she claimed and bound the airwisps behind her to keep her words from being audible to the children. It was¡­ well, probably futile, but she felt she had to make the attempt. "You don''t actually sleep, you¡­" She touched the tips of her thumbs and forefingers together, making an elongated hole shape with either hand, then began to rub them together.


    "Of course we know that!" Riz hissed, glaring around her as if trying to deter listeners. "What do you think we''ve been trying to do?"


    "Glare at Umu until she goes away and willfully ignore how Mikon wants to¡ª" Lori made circles with her fingers again and repeated rubbing them together, "the both of you."


    Riz and Umu glanced at Mikon sitting between them. The other weaver shuffled away slightly, staring at the table again, while the perpetual non-officer sighed.


    "Her Bindership doesn''t want to know, Riz," Mikon said, still smiling and looking unperturbed.


    "I don''t. I really don''t," Lori confirmed. Still, an almost morbid curiosity filled her. They haven''t? At all? It had been two, almost three seasons! And the few times she''d visited at night to talk to Rian in private, all four had clearly intended to sleep in the same bed! Granted, the house had lacked that smell that came after her mothers¡­ but¡­ Had they never bothered to even suggest it?


    This flow of thought was interrupted as Rian came back, now without the seel. "Hey, I''m back," he said, and the three women opposite Lori seemed to jump in place. Umu moved one way and the other two moved another, making a place in front of Lori for Rian to sit in. She let the binding of airwisps behind her disperse, and the sound changed slightly as the sounds from the children''s direction finally reached her. "Ah, did I interrupt something? Were the four of you talking?"


    "No, you weren''t interrupting at all, Rian!"


    "It wasn''t anything!"


    Mikon simply smiled at him. "Did you have fun today, Rian?" she said as she made the first move on the chatrang board.


    He blinked at the direct question, then his smile widened. "Yeah, it was fun. Just what I needed after the past few weeks."


    "I thought that was what finding reasons to fistfight people was for?" Lori said blandly as she responded to Mikon''s opening.


    "No, that was to tell them they''re annoying. At best it''s cathartic, but not actually fun. While there are people who find physical violence fun for its own sake, I''m not one of them. The aches afterward remind why it''s such a bad idea."


    "You''ve done it several times."


    "Yes, but in my defense, it''s usually after I stop aching and therefore need a reminder." Rian shrugged as Mikon made her next move, moving another militia to be able to open the way for her wizards. "So I talked to the smiths again before I called you down, and they''re ready to help with the experiments tomorrow. Hopefully, it will work."


    Lori nodded. "Rian, we had an astrologer around here somewhere, right?"


    "Yes, Cassan," Rian said promptly. "What about him?"


    "Can he write?"


    "Oh, yes. He''s one of the people I''ve asked to help me keep track of our inventory. Why do you need something wri¡ªwait, are you planning to have experiments without me again?"


    Lori gave him a flat look as he suddenly leaned towards her from across the table. "No, I need people to transcribe some things for me. And for you, for that matter." She moved her Horotract, moving it over her militia.


    He blinked. "Huh?"


    "I want him to transcribe the records on the planks being stored onto some tablets," Lori said. "It will let us stop using the wood for record keeping. The same for some other materials that I don''t want to keep recorded onto stone anymore."


    "Oh! I''ll talk to him, he should be willing to do it. But I thought you had to do it because the stone tablets broke easily?"


    "I will still need to be present, since it will involve softening earthwisps, but he should be able to mostly do it himself. I will need you to write too."


    "Oh?"


    "Yes. I need you to transcribe our research notes."


    Rian raised an eyebrow as Mikon mimicked her move, lifting her Horotract over the militia as well. "Don''t trust anyone else to know what it says?"


    "No. You already know, so you copy it."


    A small sigh. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori pointed at him. "See? It''s not just being asked to write something."


    "Uh¡­ what?"


    "You still have the notes in your house?"


    "Uh, yes. I was planning to read them tonight¡ª"


    "No. We''ll be taking them back to my room. You can peruse them when you''re transcribing."


    "Can you leave just one¡­?"


    "No. If you want to entertain yourself tonight, find something else to do."


    Next to him, three women stared at Lori. She ignored them.


    Rain didn''t notice. "Well, I suppose I can think up more experiments¡­"


    "I already have my own experiments I want to run," Lori interrupted. "Stop trying to think of ways of staying up late. My orders about you getting rest still stand. I want you at your best for tomorrow''s experiments so you can take proper notes.


    Her lord pouted¡ªwhat was he, a child?¡ª but sighed in a resigned sort of way. "Yeah, I suppose you''re right."


    "I''m always right."


    He gave her a flat look. "Didn''t you decide to ride a moving rock?"


    "You decided to go hunting while sleep deprived."

 290 - Another of Rians Fetishes

    After dinner¡ªand beating Mikon in chatrang again¡ªLori took her chatrang board back to her room, then accompanied Rian¡ªand the other three¡ªback to his house to get the notes. The lightwisps she''d anchored to the outside of the house illuminated the area around it, but the insides were completely dark with the shutters closed, save for the weak glow of coals peeking out under banked ashes in the fireplace.


    Rian was in the middle of pulling out the rock she had given him with the lightwisps anchored to it when Lori had simply made a binding of lightwisps in the air. She anchored the binding to the frame just inside the door as she looked around and spotted the stack of stone tablets on the stone table. It was in two large piles on opposite ends of the table, with a single stone tablet between them.


    "Can''t you leave just one?" Rian pleaded. "I haven''t finished that one yet! Just let me go through it so I won''t lose my place!"


    Lori sighed. Well, she wasn''t cruel. "Fine, you can keep that one tonight. Get it back to me tomorrow."


    Rian sighed in relief. Fortunately, he wisely chose not to push it. "Your generosity and munificence is boundless, your Bindership."


    "I''m fairly certain both those words mean the same thing."


    "It was important, so I repeated it."


    Lori rolled her eyes, but her attention wasn''t really on him. Instead, she subtly sniffed the air. There was a mild trace of woodsmoke, but the chimney was doing its job and channeling most of that out of the house. There was none of the thick stuffiness of a confined space that a human had been living and sweating in, and there was none of that smell¡­


    She made a note to air out her room sometime soon, it was smelling a bit stuffy and lived-in lately.


    Lori carefully stacked up the tablets, making sure not to pile it up too high lest the tablets crack under their own weight, as Umu and Mikon entered the room. Wait, did Riz no longer live here? No, those were four sets of bedrolls on the bed, which Mikon had started laying out to make the bed¡­


    "Where''s Riz?" Lori asked Rian, who had gotten his plank and stacked the tablets on in. He was moving slowly, and clearly trying to read the notes as he did so.


    Rian blinked as he looked up, his reading interrupted. "Riz¡­? Oh, she''s probably doing a shift at the Um, to make up for the time she''s been in River''s Fork. She''ll be in later."


    Ah, yes. Riz was one of those who managed to Um and made sure the people who used it also cleaned it once a week, wasn''t she? Lori shrugged. "Well, come on, help me bring these back so you can get to bed."


    Rian sighed.


    "Oh, stop complaining. You can keep them all night once they''re on bone and less likely to break when dropped."


    "Promise?"


    "Rian, this childishness is starting to be disturbing. Did you take too many hits to the head during all those fistfights?"


    He snorted derisively. Lori hadn''t known he was actually capable of that. "What kind of amateur do you think I am? Does this look like the nose of someone who can''t protect his head?"


    "It looks a little squashed in and pushed up."


    "All right, bad example. But no, I haven''t taken hits to the head. A bit too late to worry about that, don''t you think?"


    She supposed it was. "I suppose it is. Come, we need to get these back."


    "You know, you''re going to have me transcribe these anyway, why not just leave these here?"


    Lori paused, and gave him a bland look. "Well, if you insist. So you''re willing to spend all of tomorrow transcribing these notes into bone instead of assisting me with trying to use copper as a glass substitute, rather than waiting a few days?"


    "¡­let''s get these up to your room."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Shanalorre," Lori said the next morning at breakfast.


    "Yes, Binder Lolilyuri?"


    "Could you please get Karina for me? I need to speak to her."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Yoshka, stay here and behave, all right? Don''t make trouble for Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Muruburgrebu¡­" Yoshka managed to vocalize from where she lay with her arms folded on the surface of the table to cradle her head.


    The younger Dungeon Binder nodded in approval before rising from her seat and walking off to find the brat. The brat sat at the table behind Lori often enough that Lori had expected to find her there this morning, but the brat had been absent.


    Lori stared at the still-empty bench in front of her, ignoring the sounds of Shanalorre''s cousin trying to go back to sleep. It was still early, but Rian, at the very least, was usually there by this time in the morning. Had something, perhaps, caused him to stay up later than usual?


    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡­


    She was both mildly nauseated and self-satisfied at the thought.


    "Wiz Lori?"


    Shaking her head to clear her flow of thoughts, Lori turned on the bench to better look at the brat, folding on to do so. "Karina," she said. "I notice you''re still paying your taxes with seels."


    The brat blinked, before nodding uncertainly.


    "Given the work you''re doing in River''s Fork, you don''t have to provide any further taxes while you''re doing that," Lori said. "What you''re doing is more than sufficient."


    Karina blinked. "Huh?"


    "Binder Lolilyuri is saying that as long as you''re catching food for River''s Fork, you don''t have to give her any seels," Shanalorre said. Yes, that was what Lori had said. Why did she need to repeat it?


    "Oh!" the brat said. She frowned. "Don''t you like seel? I can try getting you some chokers¡­"


    "No, that will not be necessary," Lori said. "I like seel just fine. This is simply so that you will not be distracted from your work by other concerns. River''s Fork needs all the food it can get, since they''re not very good with it. Understood?"


    The brat nodded slowly, still frowning. While she could understand what she was being told, she clearly didn''t understand why. Well, as long as she obeyed.


    "Very good, then," Lori said. "You may go back to your breakfast."


    Giving Lori a quick bow, the brat walked away, still frowning.


    Shanalorre looked after her, her expression shifting slightly from her usual smooth calm, before turning to deal with the table full of children¡ªand two Mikon-faced women¡ªbehind Lori. She usually sat with them during lunch, since that was when the table had the most people because of all the other children that joined them, but made sure they were well at all times. Only when she found nothing amiss did she turn to sit between her cousin and Lori again.


    Rian finally arrived then. "Good morning your Bindership, Binder Shanalorre," he said cheerfully.


    "Rian. Did you enjoy reading last night?"


    "Yes, actually. Could I¡­?"


    "You''ll give it back to me tonight. You can have it back in a few days when you start transcribing."


    "Well, it was worth a try. So, looking forward to later?"


    Lori eyed him, but he didn''t seem any different. But then, she wasn''t exactly sure how he''d look different after the three had finally gotten their way. Though she supposed the lack of obvious difference might, in itself, be an indicator, since she could always tell with her mothers, to her regret. "Yes, I suppose. Though after giving the matter some thought, it occurs to me we might need to perform multiple iterations."


    "That''s a given," Rian said, shrugging. "After all, we''re basically trying to make a replacement component from scratch since the necessary material is¡­ well, not unavailable, but not currently workable. It''s only natural it won''t go right the first time. This is more like attempted application than research and study. Or rather, attempted application that doubles as research and study, since we haven''t seen how the white stuff reacts to hot metal."


    Lori tilted her head. She supposed that was a point, though she couldn''t think of what sort of reaction that might be. But then, that was why thought experiments were a terrible, terrible research method whose delusional adherents had been removed from the face of the world.


    She hated it when he had a point, ugh.


    Still, the reminder was necessary. She''d been thinking that they''d simply have the smiths somehow imbed the white Iridescence in copper, which¡­ well, showed a distinct lack of thought on her part. She''d worked in metal workshops and smithies, she knew, generally, what they were capable of, had a decent idea of how copper was worked¡­


    "What, exactly, are we going to ask the smiths to be making?" Lori found herself saying.


    "We''re trying to replace glass with metal, copper, as a means of¡ª"


    "Yes, yes, I know that," she said, waving a hand. "I mean what exactly what are we going to have them make? As in, physically manufacture."


    Rian opened his mouth.


    Rian paused.


    Rian closed his mouth slowly.


    ¡­


    "You know what I find helps in these situations?" he said eventually.


    Lori gave him a flat look.


    "Something to draw with. Much easier to develop something that way."


    Lori kept giving him a flat look.


    "I''ll go get my plank."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "¡ªthen we hammer it tight to hold everything in place."


    "That¡­ might work, but I don''t think we''ll be able to use glue, at least at the moment. The only adhesives we have that we might be able to use as glue are flour paste, dried honey, boiled tree sap and the bone glue the carpenters boil. And I don''t think any of them can take such a beating. Might be best if we layer it between two sheets, crimp the edges, and then slowly work our way inward." Rian drew a visual representation of the ideas as he spoke, though Lori could grasp what he meant. "We''ll probably have a few samples gets misplaced, but most will probably be where we put them."


    Lori considered the alteration, then nodded. "It seems doable. Add it to the list at a higher priority."


    It¡­ wasn''t a very long list. At the bottom had been Rian suggestion that they take molten copper, sprinkle white Iridescence on it¡ªwhich he theorized would float because its mass was far less than that of copper and wouldn''t dissolve because it wasn''t going into water¡ªand then press a sheet of copper down onto the sample and copper so that the metal would fuse together with the white Iridescence trapped between them.


    That had gone on the list because Lori couldn''t actually think of points where the idea was unsound, or any instances were they would lack the tools to try it. Much higher up the list was the permutation where they put the white Iridescence into the molten copper, allow it to embed as the copper cooled, and then put the other sheet of copper on top of it. That should really have removed the item at the bottom of the list, but Rian had pointed out, in that too-cheerful way he had when he was being annoying on purpose, that they might need a more secure and watertight seal to prevent the white Iridescence from getting wet.


    As Lori reluctantly let the item stay, she noted to herself that Rian clearly had a fetish about substances at very high, dangerous temperatures.


    ¡­


    Still better than his voting fetish.


    As Rian noted down the idea on one side of the plank, a bowl was shoved in front of him by an exasperated Mikon.


    "I know better than to interfere with you writing down what her Bindership has you write," the weaver said, "but as soon as you''re done with that, you''re eating, Rian." Riz and Umu both nodded in agreement.


    He blinked at the interruption, then stared at the bowl as if he''d completely forgotten what it was. He glanced up, blinking again when he saw the half-empty bowl in front of Lori and the spoon in her hand.


    "Honestly Rian, this is a bad habit of yours," Lori said, dipping her spoon into her bowl as she spoke.

 Ryan Is An Isekai Turbo! - April Fools 2023

    Whenever Ryan visited RF nowadays, he had to ignore the memory of a confident, feminine voice cheerfully suggesting he just kill the people causing him problems, and get on with his day. Some days, when they were very frustrating, the voice of memory would gleefully suggest killing and eating them to solve two problems at once.


    When he''d been younger, he''d thought it had all be part of a very morbid and darkly utilitarian sense of humor, a way of coping with a nightmarish scenario and the stresses of they''d been facing. Now, however, Ryan had to wonder if she''d been completely serious, and if the sighing and whining afterwards when her suggestion had been flatly refused had actually been real.


    He currently had the unenviable position of both thinking of those ideas and needing to be the one to refuse them. That sort of casual monstrosity¡­ no. He was frustrated with them, but he didn''t actually want them dead.


    The memory of a smirking voice noted that he wouldn''t exactly be all that sad if they didn''t happen to wake up one morning¡­


    He shook his head, banishing that old voice full of deliberately terrible advice from his head. Nope, not doing that. If nothing else, such casually murderous behavior was the mark of trash isekai, and while he''d been isekai''d, he''d was not going to be trash. Admittedly, being isekai''d would have been easier if he''d gotten some kind of cheat power, like being able to multi-task doing a hundred things at once¡ªin his experience the most OP cheat power ever, because plasma beams had limited use case, but multi-tasking was good for everything¡ªbut alas, reality was a brutal and vindictive bitch.


    Yes, truly brutal and vindictive. Why, it had even taken away the usual ''superior modern knowledge'' cheat away from him! Gunpowder? Already invented and highly regulated as an extremely dangerous substance, given the population density of urban areas in demesnes and their propensity for underground structures. Guns? Already invented and really expensive to make, and only safely usable inside demesne because Iridescence growing in the propellant makes it really, really dangerous to set off. Mayonnaise? Ancient and common, though they called it yolkoil, and he hated the stuff anyway. Soy sauce and tofu? People had been fermenting and trying to find a way to make new foods of everything since forever, because safe growing space was limited and markets were competitive, so they had something like that too.


    Radio? Well¡­ uh, he''d made a simple crystal radio with his brother when he was younger, but it wasn''t like he knew how to make a receiver. And the radio had come from a kit.


    It was why he was always so happy when he and Lori experimented, despite how fast she expected him to write down notes. Thank goodness he had experience with highschool teachers who couldn''t seem to grasp how to use a blackboard during lessons. There was just something about redrawing the boundaries of what he knew of reality in a repeatable, quantitative manner that tickled the kid in him who''d watched all those educational shows about how the phone had been invented, how the Wright brothers had built their plane, and of course that show about those two guys in San Francisco who kept running remote-controlled cars into the same fence. It made him want to grin and cackle like a mad scientist.


    Research like this¡­ it was the closest he could get to doing magic. Perhaps if they learned enough, he''d¡­ well, he wouldn''t be able to make it, but he''d be able to design something that would let him use magic. Bound tools were a thing, after all, and humanity, whether here or on Earth, was a tool-using species. The end goal would be, of course, finding a way to fly, but right now that seemed a long way away. Not even Lori could really manage it at the moment, even with infinite MP¡­


    Well, life goals! Lori wanted her monopolies¡ªwhich was a noble and honorable goal, especially when you were the one who had it¡ªand he wanted to fly: the dream of everyone who''d ever been stuck for at least two hours in traffic!


    Well, flying and riding a dinosaur.


    This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    Though he''d admit, it wasn''t exactly the two days of doing experiments that had him humming pleasantly as he did his job as a tool of the colonial overlady.


    "Good morning, Yllian," he said, taking care to pronounce the man''s name properly. The key was trying to say it with the same accent the northerner had. "Did you have a good time while we were gone, or were the children misbehaving again?"


    The man smiled. It was a small, grim smile, but given he didn''t used to smile at Ryan because he thought Ryan was some sort of evil manipulator, best to take it as a win. "They''re quiet but surly. None of them needed to be spanked."


    "Oh? They''re learning? Do you think they''re responsible enough to be left at home without burning the house down?"


    "Let''s not be silly."


    Ryan sighed theatrically. "Well, we''ve got food in the hold, and ice-like things for the cold box. Let''s get those unpacked and we can talk about whether or not I need to worry about anything. Same as before, no one''s to touch any of it with bare skin."


    They didn''t have gloves, but they did have rags. They used the rags to keep from making direct contact with the frozen meat, lest the cold make their fingers stick to it and give them freezer burn or worse. Lori kept the food in the cold room very, very cold so she''d have a long time between topping up the liquid nitrogen, liquid oxygen, dry ice, and whatever state-changed atmospheric gasses she was using as coolant.


    It worked, but Ryan couldn''t help but think things would be so much easier if she just made a tub to put absolute zero ice in if she was worried about it melting. She already had little tubs for the liquefied gasses¡­ Ah well, he''d deal with that when she got around to changing her mind.


    Once the food had been safely stowed¡ªthey had to leave out some to warm up so that they''d be able to eat it tomorrow, or possibly the next day¡ªand the Coldhold was off with its crew of cheerful sailors, hunters, and conscripted hunters¡ªnowadays they seemed more resigned than surly¡ªRyan and Yllian made their rounds. It mostly involved walking around the demesne, checking out the crops and the terraces being made, and then checking out the mine-slash-shelter-slash-pantry-slash-freezer as they talked.


    The inspection was something Yllian had to do anyway, and let Ryan get a general sense of the demesne''s state¡­ usually from how swept the ground was. The fact the dome was a living thing¡ªeven the tree whose trunk had been shattered during a dragon and had needed Lori to basically put a stone cast on it to keep it aligned with its own stump¡ªmeant that deadfall from branches tended to fall inside the dome.


    Looking up, Ryan saw branches that needed to be cut. Shana usually took care of that, to his horror, taking a hammer¡ªshe still wasn''t allowed sharp objects¡ªup to the branches to prune the dead wood and any that threatened to block out too much sunlight by smashing them. She was the only one who was both light enough and good enough at climbing the tree to do the needed work. River''s Fork technically-former Dungeon Binder didn''t just spend all her time waiting for people to injure themselves or hanging out with Karina.


    Yllian followed his gaze and grimaced as well. Ryan heard him muttering "Colors, Koshay," undoubtedly complaining about his late friend''s design choices.


    "Nothing to be done about those right now," Ryan said. "Hopefully she''ll be coming with us next time and can take care of it then."


    "Why isn''t she?" Yllian asked mildly.


    "Lori wanted her to stay, for some reason. I think she''s going to try having Shanalorre do some of my duties while I''m gone so she doesn''t have to raise another lord or lady to do that job." At Yllian''s look, he shrugged. "I told you, Lori doesn''t see Shanalorre as a child. A Dungeon Binder is a Dungeon Binder is a Dungeon Binder, and everything else doesn''t matter." The idea should have been morally outrageous to him but¡­ honestly, he''d seen more messed up. And it was a form of utmost respect, in Lori''s own particular way. "Speaking of which, how are the children. The actual children, not the ones who act like children¡­"


    Ryan supposed that, if one looked at it from a certain point of view, he was living the dream. He was senior management at a company¡ª no, better still, he was the second-highest official in the government! He owned his own house (built and paid for by the government, literally), the government paid for all his expenses, he got to travel for work, the government had given him a fancy state of the art personal vehicle, he had not just one, but three girlfriends who he was sleeping with, now no longer simply literally¡­


    It''s just that except for that last, it all¡­ well, didn''t seem all that isekai-y. Maybe not even that last, he had known someone who had a lot of live-in fuckbuddies with benefits¡ª


    Oh God, that''s where he was now, wasn''t he? Argh, now he wished he''d paid more attention to how the man had done it!


    ¡­


    Okay, just relax, just relax. He¡­ well, he probably had a very delicate conversation to have when he went back home in a few days, but that was a few days from now! So don''t worry about it until then!


    No matter what Lori said, procrastination worked!

 291 - Prototyping

    The smithy was¡­ probably warm, but Lori couldn''t tell. It had lightwisps in the ceiling to brightly illuminate the workshop, with sliding covers should the smith need relative darkness to be able to properly judge the color of the metal they were working on. Bindings of airwisps circulated air, both to cool down anyone working there and to prevent deadly gasses from the furnace from gathering or worse, being pulled into her Dungeon. Like the lightwisps and airwips in the rest of her Dungeon, all these bindings were wired directly to her core, since it was close enough to do conveniently.


    Despite all their discussion during breakfast, both Lori and Rian had been forced to agree that it would probably be best if they tell the smiths their intended result and let them figure out how to make it, though the list of possible approaches would still be brought up. Lori had a glass bowl full of samples, as well as the mortar and pestle to grind the samples down if needed, which it probably would be.


    Several men waited for them in the smithy area, looking very professional, though some wore more shirt than she was used to with blacksmiths. Tools had been laid out, such as the ceramic crucible that had been used to cast the copper ingots back during winter, hammers, tongs, chisels¡­


    "Your Bindership, these are the metalworkers of our fine demesne," Rian said. "These five are our blacksmiths, these three fellows are redsmiths, and this good sir is a tinsmith, though they''ve all been helping each other with projects in the demesne." He sighed. "I''d introduce everyone, but they suggested I not bother since it would only get in the way of whatever work you wanted done."


    Lori blinked. That¡­ that was very thoughtful, actually. "I see. Thank you for your consideration," she said gratefully.


    For some reason, Rian sighed before shaking his head. "Well, on to work, then. Her Bindership thinks she can make bound tools. Unfortunately, we don''t have a glassworker in the demesne that I know of, and the closest we have is Jeordoj and Artelego knowing how to make tools for them." Ah! Well, that was useful to know. "So for now, we''re going to try to do it with copper, since that will be easier to work than iron or steel, and easier to rework. Whatever we come up with will probably make someone who makes bound tools for a living cry at the amateurs getting above themselves¡ª" there were some chuckles at that, though the tinsmith winced as well, "¡ªbut we don''t care about them because they''re not here. If we''re successful, then it will be a good start to reducing our need for firewood, and will let Binder Lori have to keep track of fewer things. Personally, I''m hope it gets to the point we can all have bound tool lamps or warmers in our houses in the winter."


    Lori shrugged noncommittally as everyone looked interested. The idea of a bound tool for such things was probably beyond what they had thought possible for themselves in their old lives, even ones for something as simple as heat or light.


    Rian glanced at her, then at the sample bowl. She gave him a brief nod.


    "All right. What we need help with is a way to keep some of this," he gestured at the glass bowl of white samples, "in place and not moving or rolling around in the bound tool we''re trying to make. Binder Lori has deduced that they use glass to hold it in place in bound tools, but¡­" he shrugged. "Whatever we come up with, it can''t use water, and by extension any glue with water because that would ruin this white stuff. Binder Lori and I have discussed the possibility of pressing it between two sheets of copper and hammering that copper flat, but you would know what you can do better than I do."


    The smiths crowded around at a gesture from Rian, peering down at the sample bowl.


    "Is this salt?" one of them¡ªLori though it was one of the redsmiths¡ªasked.


    Rian titled his head. "No, but it looks, feels and acts like it. Some of you might remember this from the cracking we did last winter." That caused some looks, and everyone examined the samples again, recognition in some of their eyes. "Whatever method we come up with, it can''t get wet at any point. No, don''t try to taste it, we don''t know what it does but best to assume it might be poisonous."


    The one who''d picked up some between two fingers quickly put the samples back on the bowl.


    "So, we need to put this¡­ bead stuff¡­ onto a setting?" one of the other redsmiths asked.


    Rian frowned, then seemed to come to a realization. "Ah, no¡­ although¡­ huh, would that work, your Bindership? Just set one of the big shards like some kind of gem?"


    Lori blinked, then looked down at the sample bowl with fresh eyes. The samples of white Iridescence were a variety of sizes, but the ones closer to powder had settled to the bottom, so most of what the smiths could see looked like pebbles and larger, though no piece was bigger than half a grain of vigas. "It might work mounted like jewelry¡­" Lori said contemplatively, "But even so, it would still need to be completely enclosed in some kind of capsule to keep water out. I''d prefer a solution that would work with the smaller pieces, though, the ones like ground sand. It gives me more to work with while potentially using less material. Still, we should test the idea for viability."


    "We could make a cup," the tinsmith suggested. He was the scrawniest of the smiths since tin was mostly worked cold, or cast in molds. "A shallow cup, say, just an indent on a sheet. Fill that with the finer pieces, the ones most like salt or sand, then use a stamp to press it down flat and crimp the stamp in place."


    "That''s far better than our best idea," Rian said. He glanced at Lori. "Shall we try both, then?"


    Lori nodded.


    "Very well then," Rian said. "What do you all need to be able to do both of these in the least time?"


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    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    They all had to start with copper sheets and wire.


    Lori still had coils of gold wire, and they didn''t need all that much to try to wrap some of the larger samples in a setting that would hold it in place no matter the orientation or amount of shaking that it would be facing. ''Some of¡ä because Lori had to give the tinsmith and one of the redsmiths a few pieces so they could test the material''s tolerances to being worked. It wasn''t a hard rock after all, and it was the first time they''d be working on it. Fortunately, they had a well-worn leather work sheet to lay out and catch any fragments that fell off for recovery¡ªeven small amounts of tin and copper couldn''t be wasted, not in relatively poor edge communities¡ªso they were able to recover the little bits of white Iridescence that they unfortunately removed from the samples they were practicing on.


    Meanwhile, the copper sheets were being made. An ingot was slowly being hammered flat at one end, occasionally being heated on the furnace to relieve the work hardening that resulted. Once it was thin enough, it would be cut so that the smiths would have less material to have to hammer. The other smiths returned to work maintaining the metal tools of the demesne. Fortunately, none of it required the use of the forge, merely files to remove little nicks and other damage.


    According to Rian, normally the owners of the tools could have done that sort of maintenance themselves, and some did, but not everyone had a file or a good enough whetstone to deal with such things. The smiths did, and so they were taking care of these little bits of maintenance. Fortunately, it was the kind of work that they didn''t actually need to be in the smithy for, so those who weren''t currently working on Lori''s prototypes had dispersed to more refreshing places.


    Lori, for her part, was also working. Using stone, she was making a die form that the copper sheet would hammered on to make the cup that would contain the Iridescence. It was shallow, only five chiyustri high for now, but the stone needed to be dense and hard enough to not crack under subsequent hammering¡­ and she also wanted it to be as flat and even as possible. Once the die form had been made in the copper, she''d be able to make a stamp that would press down on the white Iridescence to keep it in place. The stamp wouldn''t be completely copper¡ªit would be copper wrapped stone for mass and solidity¡ªbut it needed to fit snuggly in the cup full of white Iridescence to tamp it down.


    Still, both projects felt like they had promise. Putting a relatively large fragment onto a metal setting was a relatively quick and simple solution, though on consideration, it probably wasn''t something they could do with glass. In this instance though, such a mounting, sufficiently covered by a metal shell to protect it against water, would probably suffice for use in her demesne, provided it was secured to a solid base. The binding for such a thing wouldn''t be something she''d have been able to easily make with Whispering alone¡­ but she was a Dungeon Binder now, so that wasn''t a problem.


    The more involved procedure involving the container and stamp, however, seemed like it would be easier to integrate with glass, and having the white Iridescence as a powder meant they didn''t need to be as careful with handling the samples beyond keeping water away from them. The maximized surface area and contact with metal might also be a boon. She wasn''t sure yet.


    Rian came to check in on progress every so often as he went about his usual chores around the demesne. He seemed to have assumed the smiths would be done far sooner, and that they''d be testing the resulting prototype that morning. Truthfully, a part of Lori had thought so as well, but the more work-experienced had understood that wouldn''t be the case. The attempt to try and put some of the white Iridescence in a wire setting was unlikely to be finished before lunch at the earliest. Not when the two smiths involved had to fabricate something from wire using material they weren''t all that familiar with. It wasn''t anything as simple as drawing metal though a plate, after all.


    Listening to the sounds echoing through the smithy, of metal being filed and hammered, of the occasional pump of the bellows to the furnace, of the indistinct voice just loud enough to reach the person they were meant for, had a soothing familiarity to Lori. While she had never done this sort of work in those places, the atmosphere gave her a rhythm as she worked, shaping the stone die form, measuring the lengths and angles with straight-edged metal rulers she retrieved from her own box of equipment, cutting and scraping out excess with her belt knife. It was¡­ well, crude, but it was the best tool for the job since it was long, straight and sharp, and she was careful not to damage the edge while shaping the stone.


    Once the shape was done, after one last measurement with the rulers Lori deliberately put her tools aside to resist the temptation to make it just a little bit straighter and flatter. This was just a quick and dirty die form for the prototype, after all. If she wanted or needed better, she could have the stone masons chisel it out and flatten it properly, or have the smiths make it out of all metal so it could be used repeatedly for a long time.


    Instead, she claimed the earthwisps of the stone of the die form she had just made and did something she hadn''t needed to do in months: form them into a binding that reinforced the physical structure of the stone. After all, she didn''t want anything to break in the process of the copper being formed. She then tested the resulting durability of the reinforcement by picking up the die form, turning it so that the shape she has made was pointed downwards, and then slammed it into the ground three times.


    Fortunately, the impact was a dull instead of loud, though it still prompted the smiths to glance towards her. She ignored the sudden flush of self-consciousness at being under the scrutiny of master craftsmen¡ªand one probably journeyman in the tinsmith, since he had neither the age or self-assurance to be a master, in Lori''s experience¡ªjudging her crude method, and reminded herself she was a Dungeon Binder and a very experienced wizard. The reminder just barely helped, so she just ignored them and focused on her work. Focusing on your work made you look professional and capable, right?


    The floor didn''t crack, and neither did the die form, though the former ended up with three little white marks caused by the die form''s corners striking the ground. Turning the latter the correct side up, Lori examined it for damage, laying it back down gently and using her fingers to feel at the die form''s edges. She found no unevenness that implied anything had broken off, and all the edges and points felt as sharply defined as when she''d put away her tools.


    Satisfied, Lori set the little die form aside for the moment, as she waited for the copper sheets to be finished. She was certainly not going to pick it up and show it to the smiths who would be using it like a child trying to get her mothers to praise her, and while the smithy had a wooden workbench along one wall, she wasn''t going to put anything on it until the men who actually used it told her to. She was a Dungeon Binder, not delusional.


    Resisting the urge to get her tools and flatten out everything again, Lori simply picked up the die form and continued to imbue the binding of earthwisps for when it would finally be used, and used her fingers to continue double-checking for any damage from her little impact test. Now it was only a matter of waiting to see what happened first: the tin- and redsmith finishing with setting a sample of white Iridecence on gold wire, the copper finally being beaten thin enough sheets or the call to lunch.


    Staying in the little space of the smithy she''d claimed to work in, Lori leaned back against the wall and waited, her fingers still checking the stone die form for damage.

 292 - The First Prototype

    When it was time for lunch everyone put aside their tools, and the forge was banked to save on fuel. Lori wordlessly gave the die form she''d made to the coppersmiths, who wordlessly accepted it and, after examining it briefly and hitting it a few times with a hammer, nodded in satisfaction and acknowledgement. It was¡­ probably just them humoring her, but at the moment it wasn''t like there was any other way they could get a proper die form for something like this.


    Lunch was unremarkable, save for Rian practically vibrating. He kept glancing towards the doors of the Dungeon, just beyond which was the smithy, as he gave his report on the demesne''s condition.


    "¡ªnever handled bound tools outside of the demesne," he said, even as his gaze was towards the door. Lori was very tempted to use the distraction to take his bread for herself. "Not even simple ones for making light or heat. They used oil lamps for that. Though he tells me he''s heard of bound tools being used outside of the demesne, but it was always the equivalent of rumor story. Someone heard from someone who heard from someone. No confirmed primary sources, that sort of thing."


    "I see¡­" Lori muttered. Well, at least that told her it was¡­ well, not exactly possible, but probable. Though if the only source was stories¡­ "Are there any stories of people using bound tools outside of a demesne? I don''t mean confirmable, factual stories, I mean the nonsensical ones."


    Rian actually looked at her as he visibly considered this. "Not off the top of my head, no¡­" he said slowly. "It''s always finding cores buried somewhere and somehow becoming the most powerful and competent Dungeon Binder in the world, with a demesne so big they''re clearly compensating for something, amazing magic they just made up that apparently no one has ever thought of doing like that before, and killing everyone who''s so much as looked at them funny. We''re all very glad you''re not like that, by the way."


    "You don''t think the magic I''ve done is amazing?"


    "I refuse to answer that. That''s clearly the wizard equivalent of ''does this dress make me look fat''."


    "My mother told me the response to that is ''take it all off, I need to compare''."


    "Please tell me they waited until after your growth spurt to tell you that. Lie to me, if necessary."


    "She waited until after my growth spurt to tell me that. You don''t think the magic I''ve done is amazing?"


    "No, that dress doesn''t make you look fat."


    Lori gave Rian a flat look that was returned in kind.


    "¡­ anything else?"


    "Karina has been seeling. A lot. Seeling enough for it to be notable."


    "I believe she wishes to bring some of what she caught here to River''s Fork to make up for her time away, hence why she is trying to acquire a greater bounty than is usual for her," Shanalorre said from beside Lori. "At least, that is the conclusion I came to. She has not actually said so."


    "Yeah, it is! Can I, Lord Rian? We always have room on the boat when we go there, and people always need more food!"


    "She has said so," Shanalorre said blandly.


    Rian glanced at Lori. She waved a hand dismissively. "Binder Lori says she doesn''t care, so we can try, Karina."


    There was a pleased exclamation from behind Lori.


    All in all, there wasn''t much change from how the demesne had been earlier that morning. The crops were well, the chokers were under control, the choker eggs had apparently hatched and the juvenile chokers were carefully being raised to try and domesticate them. The young beasts didn''t need a Deadspeaker to make them lethargic and less aggressive, and the ones tending to them were hoping to train them to accept only food from them and to be better behaved as they got older.


    "Though they might need a secured dragon shelter pen for when dragons pass overhead," Rian finished.


    Lori stared at that last. "What?"


    "A dragon shelter pen. You know, someplace we can secure the chokers when it''s dragon time. I don''t think you''d want them in the dungeon with everyone else, especially since they might get violent surrounded by people they''re not used to, but we can''t just leave them outside. It would be a waste of the time and effort invested into them, and they are food, after all."


    Lori groaned, letting her head slump down.


    "You don''t need to do it now," Rian said. "If something happened to pass by tomorrow, we can just stick the chokers in one of the incomplete tunnels on the third level. Or better, just make a pit in the third level and throw them down there. We can worry about cleaning it out when everything''s down. I''m just saying, when we finally do have a decent number of domesticated beasts, they''ll need somewhere to be safe."


    "Noted," Lori sighed. "All right, when we have something bigger than a few chokers, I''m building one. For the moment, however, they''re going into a pit."


    With her luck, a dragon would arrive tomorrow, requiring her to, in fact, excavate a pit in the third level.


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


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    Fortunately, her luck held enough that a dragon didn''t make its coming known during lunch. When she returned to the smithy, she found the tinsmith and coppersmith already at work putting a large piece of white Iridescence into a gold wire setting. The wire appeared to have been hardened by the expedient of gently hammering the wire, taking pains to not get it so flat that they couldn''t turn it on its side to continue hammering. Even so hardened, the gold was still soft enough to be shaped by their tools.


    The capsule-like copper protective shell that was meant to go around the setting to protect the white iridescence from water and contact was still in the process of being made, but it was almost finished. The smiths had even taken the time to shape the other end of the gold wire on which the sample was mounted into a spiral that formed the shape of a little saucer to better hold the bead. Rian must have been the cause of that.


    A part of Lori wanted to take the setting as soon as it was completed to start anchoring bindings on it, but she repressed such childishness. Without the shell, it was basically just another demonstration of bead seepage. No, any subsequent experiments would need the copper shell around the setting.


    Belated, Lori realize they hadn''t specified some sort of support rod for the thing, meaning the gold wire would be bearing the weight of the setting and shell. She considered having a copper rod fabricated, before dismissing the idea. She''d just do something with bone or stone. The setting would be used in controlled conditions¡ªor at least, conditions she controlled, which was much the same thing, in this instance¡ªand as Rian had said, as the only Whisperer in the demesne, she was the only one who could make any bindings that might interact or intersect with the experimental prototypes anyway.


    While she waited for the shell to be finished and mounted, Lori positioned herself near the two coppersmiths working on the rest of the sheet metal copper. They were using her die form to shape the sheet they had, which they had first bent and folded in a close approximation of the intended dimensions, before beginning to hammer down the other two sides. It was awkward work, as they didn''t have a clamp to hold the sheet in place, meaning one of them had to press down on the sheet while the other hammered. Still, they seemed to be making progress. Lori didn''t interfere except to make sure the stone die form was imbued and reinforced as strongly as possible.


    When the first prototype was finished, Lori had Rian called. It wasn''t out of sentimentality or anything of the sort. She merely had need of a capable note-taker! When he arrived holding his tablet and burnt stick, she handed him one of the bone tablets she had made and a new stylus, a beast tooth mounted on a rod of bone. "Write on this," she said. "The side of the tablet facing you has been softened so you can write on it directly."


    Rian took the stylus and tablet, and thankfully didn''t turn it around so as to potentially lose track of which side was which. Instead, he used the stylus to make a few test lines on one of the tablet''s corners, presumably to get used to the feeling of writing on it. "So, I ask you to erase any writing errors I have or do I just strike it through and live with our notes having indelible corrections on it?"


    Lori twitched at that. "Don''t make any mistakes," she said sternly.


    "You realize that means I''ll have to write slowly and carefully? I''m still getting used to this, after all."


    She frowned, but¡­ well, she supposed that was only reasonable. "Fine, fine. I''ll try to speak slowly." She cleared her throat, preparing herself to dictate as the smiths who had made the prototype watched, waiting to hear what she''d say of their work. She hadn''t really examined it yet, not wanting to have any thoughts on it before Rian arrived to record them.


    Only now did she look at the completed prototype. Well, almost completed. It would have to be put on a base and there was still the bone rod to give it support, but for all intents and purposes, it was complete. "The first prototype consists of a white sample, measurements approximately three yustri long, one yustri thick in all its other dimensions, secured in a setting consisting of hardened gold wire. The sample and setting were then covered with a copper shell that completely encases the sample but does not make contact with it. The only point of contact is along the length of gold wire connected to the setting, which has been reinforced with copper sheets that have been folded and pressed to provide reinforcement."


    Lori glanced at the two smiths, who nodded in confirmation. Rian was still writing, so she waited for him to finished before continuing. "The whole prototype is approximately thirty yustri long. Original length of gold wire used was approximately forty-five yustri, but some length was lost as a result of hardening for the portion that could make the setting. The remainder has been shaped into a spiral saucer¡­" Lori described the receptacle for containing beads. It currently wasn''t ideal, but that wire wasn''t hardened and could conceivably be reshaped, so that was fine. "Gold wire is not perfectly straight, but has been straightened for the purposes of presentation. Wire has not been hardened. Quench hardening was not possible while sample was not yet encased." She looked at the two smiths, gesturing to Rian to let him know not to dictate what followed. "As it is, do you think you can quench harden the wire without damaging the casing or letting any water inside?"


    The redsmith frowned. "It might be possible, your bindership, but since you specified that the shell be air- and water-tight, heat might cause the air inside to expand."


    Lori nodded. "Very well. It might be necessary to harden the length of the wire at some point. If it can''t be reasonably work hardened, we might need to quench it. At worst, removing the shell and setting might be needed. Do you think you can rebuild it if needed?"


    The two exchanged looks, then nodded.


    "Very well. I shall have Rian inform you should it be needed. Thank you for your efforts. This is fine work. I will provide compensation as soon as I am able. You may return to you normal work."


    Gently, she picked up the prototype. While it didn''t matter if the wire was bent, that seemed¡­ unseemly. "Come Rian. We need to test the prototype."


    "Your Bindership?"


    Lori paused, then turned towards the tinsmith who had spoken. Well, she supposed she had been talking to them. "Yes? Was there anything else?"


    The man hesitated, glancing towards Rian. The latter, for his part, had smiled and nodded, which seemed to encourage the man. "Could you¡­ could you tell us how well it works, when you''re done doing¡­ what you''re going to do?"


    Lori blinked at the request, but¡­ well, she supposed it was only natural for two craftsmen to want to know the quality of their work was. "You will be informed," she said, then couldn''t help adding, "I might have notes for improvements of the next iteration of the prototype."


    Thankfully, the two had nodded, seemingly accepting that the prototype was unlikely to be perfect the first time. At the very least, even if Lori''s experiments were successful, changes would have to be made to use fewer resources and make production easier.


    Lori waited, but smiths said nothing more. She turned away. "Are you done, Rian? We have experiments to do."


    "Ready, your Bindership," he said cheerfully. "Uh, could you remove this correction? And, uh, this one? And¡­?"

 293 - Testing the First Prototype

    Lori''s first instinct was to build a stand to put the prototype on to satisfy her aesthetic impulses. However, in practical terms all she really needed was the prototype to conduct her tests and experiments. She weighed pragmatism and perfectionism, but eventually decided to build a stand for it after all, if only so she wouldn''t have to keep holding it while experimenting.


    The resulting stand was just a rock she had grabbed from the third level¡ªpulled from the walls of one of the unfinished excavation tunnels¡ªand stuck gold wire into, with a bone molded to keep up the end with the copper-sheathed sample.


    "Rian, stop laughing," Lori sighed as she finished adjust they little spiral wire receptacle to her satisfaction. "Yes, I know it looks like a male pelvic organ. What exactly is so amusing about that?"


    Rian didn''t respond with anything more intelligent than slapping a hand over his mouth to try to stifle his laughter, turning away so he wasn''t looking directly at the first prototype. Eventually, he got his laughter under control, though he still had on the stupidest smile on his face.


    "Are you done acting juvenile?" Lori asked, her flat tone more unamused than usual.


    "No, but I''ve stopped laughing and can still take notes," Rian said cheerfully, and there was the annoying tone that said he was doing it deliberately! "Go on, your Bindership. What are you doing now?"


    Lori huffed impatiently. "Don''t make so many mistakes this time."


    "I can''t promise that, sorry."


    Shaking her head in annoyance, Lori pulled out a bead she had gotten on the way to the alcove, as well as a pair of metal calipers. "Take note, then. Beginning first experiments on first prototype. We will be using a wispbead that is¡ª"


    "Wait, let me do that," Rian interrupted. "You have that warming thing around you, remember?"


    What¡­ oh. Right. "Fine, you measure it," Lori said, handing him the metal calipers.


    Rian measured the wispbead, doing it several times to be sure that the calipers were measuring the widest point of the bead. Finally, he set down the bead and calipers. "Bead is three yustri, three chiyustri wide," he said as he wrote down his measurements. "Finer than that, I can''t really make out."


    "Sufficient," Lori said. She reached out and laid a hand on the copper shell of the prototype, ignoring Rian''s snickering at the gesture. Why did her lord act like a child about the strangest things? "Stifle it, Rian."


    "Y-yes, your Bindership."


    Shaking her head, Lori focused on her awareness of the wisps in her demesne. The metal shell was no impediment to it, and she could feel the airwisps and darkwisps around the white Iridescence and its setting. For a moment, she considered using them in her experiment¡­ but no. Best to go on as she had planned.


    She rubbed her hands until they grew hot, and claimed the firewisps that resulted from it, which she formed into a binding. "First experiment," Lori dictated, and Rian started writing. "Using a binding of firewisps to warm the external shell of the copper casing, and by extension the air within, to reveal the firewisps inside the casing. Firewisps in the space within the copper casing revealed. Proceeding to claim and bind the firewisps inside the casing. Anchoring binding inside the casing to the white iridescence sample mounted on the setting within the casing, taking time to ensure the binding is contacting the wire of the setting. Internal binding of firewisps currently generating a mild amount of heat." She hesitated. "Rian, hold out your hand and confirm that the binding of firewisps is active. "


    Rian dutifully held out his hand, slowly moving it towards the copper shell, and stopped just short of touching it. "Yes, it''s hot, though I''m not sure if that''s a result of the firewisps you used first, or the firewisps inside it."


    Ah. "I''m increasing the output," Lori said, during just that.


    Rian hastily withdrew his hand. "Yup, it got hotter. What now?"


    "Now, we wait for the imbuement to be consumed completely," Lori said. "In the meantime¡­ continuing first experiment. Wisps are currently anchored to the white Iridescence. White Iridescence is secured onto a wire setting. First experiment, testing whether this configuration is more resistant to the effects of violent physical agitation."


    Lori picked up the first prototype by the weighty stone base and then, after considering the prototype, took hold of it in both hands and began to shake it up and down.


    "Rian, if you somehow manage to choke yourself on your own spit, I''m not having Shanalorre heal you," Lori lied to threaten as her lord apparently found this gesture uproariously funny for some reason.


    "S-sorry¡­" he managed to say, as he slowly took proper hold of himself, the childish laughter¡­ well, he was trying to keep his lips squeezed shut, even as a too-wide smile stretched across his face and his shoulders continued to shake. "Just¡­ keeping talking, I''ll write¡­" He squeezed his lips shut once more, cutting off his words as more shaking came over his shoulders.


    If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    Lori considered kicking him, but given the way he was holding the bone tablet with their notes, she didn''t want to risk it. Sighing, she continued dictating. "Experiment successful. Compared to the control, the mounted sample of white Iridescence was not displaced, and the wisps anchored to it remain in place. The setting seems to have sufficiently secured the sample such that the sample did not fragment because of the agitation. At the very least, the prototype has proven to be an effective design to prevent the anchored wisps from being displaced."


    "That''s what we were trying to go for, right?" Rian said.


    "Yes, but it doesn''t matter if it will limit us to only one kind of binding," Lori said. "The uses of firewisps in this demesne is limited."


    "As someone who can feel the cold, I''m perfectly fine with if all the prototypes can do is use firewisps, but I can see your point," Rian said.


    "The experiments aren''t finished yet," Lori said. "Once the imbuement is fully consumed, we need to conduct the physical displacement test agai¡ªRian, stop laughing!"


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    Once the wisps were no longer imbued, Lori repeated violently shaking the prototype after she made Rian stand outside of the alcove to listen to her dictation. The result was the same, thankfully. With the sample of white Iridescence being all one piece and secured in its setting, and the copper shell as added protection, any binding of wisps anchored to the sample wouldn''t be disturbed. While Lori still wanted to use glass, and suspected there was probably a very good reason for it, at the moment it would do for her purposes.


    "Test three," she said from where she sat next to the door so Rian could hear her. "With the imbuement expended, I am placing a wispbead on the bead receptacle to test the effectiveness of the prototype as a bound tool. Rian, if you can stop yourself from laughing, you may come inside to assess the current temperature of the bound tool."


    "I''ll be good¡­" Rian''s voice floated in.


    She doubted that would last long.


    Still, except for a small, annoying smile, he didn''t react as he held out his hand to the copper shell on the end of the bound tool. "A bit warm," he said, "but not as hot as when it was imbued previously."


    Lori nodded. "All right, out with you, then."


    "But I''ll be good¡­!"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "The next time you laugh childishly, I''m kicking you."


    "¡­fine, that''s fair."


    She placed the bead on the receptacle of spiraling wire as she dictated what she was doing to Rian. Even though she wasn''t touching the metal, through her awareness of the demesne''s wisps, she was able to perceive the metal seeping magic from the beads, and imbuing it to the binding anchored to the sample of white Iridescence. Rian was able to confirm the heat after a few moments, then again confirmed that heat was no longer being produced a few moments after she removed the bead from the receptacle.


    "No visible reduction to the dimensions of the bead as yet," Rian reported as he measured the bead again with calipers.


    Lori nodded, and handed him the tablet and stylus again. "Beginning test four, then. Reconfiguring the binding of firewisps to include firewisps both inside the copper casing and firewisps in the metal of the casing." She already knew the result of this, but she needed to be methodical about the testing procedure. It was how this worked, after all. "Firewisps in the metal casing have been successfully integrated into the binding. Placing bead in receptacle to imbue binding." A pause. "Seepage has been initiated. Binding is being imbued and functioning. Rian, confirm that heat is being generated."


    "Binding is hot, your Bindership."


    The bead is removed from the receptable.


    "Beginning test five. Reconfiguring the binding of firewisps to include firewisps inside the copper casing, firewisps in the metal of the casing, and firewisps in the air outside of the metal casing." A pause. "Firewisps in the air around the metal casing have been successfully integrated into the binding. Placing bead in receptacle to imbue binding." Another pause. "Seepage has been initiated. Binding is being imbued and functioning. Rian, confirm that heat is being generated."


    "Binding is hot, your Bindership."


    Lori removed the bead from the receptable.


    "Beginning test six. Reconfiguring the binding of firewisps to include firewisps inside the copper casing, firewisps in the metal of the casing, and lightwisps in the air outside of the metal casing."


    Rian looked up from the bone tablet, the annoying smile finally wiped off his face. "Wait, you can do that?"


    Rolled her eyes at the interruption. "Yes, otherwise I wouldn''t be doing it." Then she conscientiously added, "We are confirming that current prototype can imbue the binding in this arrangement. If successful, it will increase my options when constructing bound tools."


    "You have a glorious gift for understatement, your Bindership."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Lightwisps in the air around the metal casing have been successfully integrated into the binding. Placing bead in receptacle to imbue binding."


    The air around the copper case began to glow with a pale white light.


    "Seepage has been initiated. Binding is being imbued and functioning."


    "And we have light¡­" Rian said, voice hushed as if reverent. It was a tone that clashed with the wide grin on his face.


    "Rian, confirm that heat is being generated."


    "Huh? Ah, right, right. Um, binding is hot, your Bindership. Uh, is it supposed to be?"


    "Of course, Rian. There are still firewisps anchored to the white Iridescence, as well as in the copper shell, and those are also being imbued." Lori reached out and removed the bead. The light around the copper shell of the prototype vanished.


    "Beginning test seven. Reconfiguring the binding to reduce the heat output of the firewisps inside the copper casing, and the firewisps in the metal of the casing. Lightwisps that have been incorporated into the binding will remain unaltered." A pause. "Placing bead in receptacle to imbue binding. Output of lightwisps remains unchanged. Rian, confirm whether or not heat is being generated "


    "Uh¡­ it doesn''t feel as warm as it did last time, your Bindership."


    Lori removed the bead from the receptable.


    "Beginning test eight. Reconfiguring the binding of firewisps to include firewisps inside the copper casing, firewisps in the metal of the casing, and airwisps in the air outside of the metal casing¡­"


    "Wait, wait, I''m running out of room to write!"

 294 - Unpaid Gainful Employment

    After they got Rian a new bone tablet, they spent the afternoon conducting several permutations of the initial successful binding. Lori experimented with replacing the firewisps anchored to the sample of white Iridescence with airwisps, with darkwisps, and with airwisps and darkwisps. While the other internal arrangements worked, if inefficient, the firewisps in the copper shell around the sample were absolutely necessary as they were one of only two kinds of wisps could be in the metal shell.


    They also experimented on the wisps they could anchor to the outside of the copper shell. Lightwisps, of course, provided illumination, and some airwisps resulted in an underwhelming breeze, since the shape of the shell wasn''t exactly conducive to air flow, and she couldn''t have the airwisps extend out too far. Darkwisps anchored well and were easy to make fairly large, but she didn''t really see a good use for a little cloud of darkness.


    Waterwisps also anchored, and it was possible to have them either solidify water or evaporate it on contact, which was useful. Lori could already see how she might possibly use the prototype as it was to make some of the waterwisp¨Cbased bindings she had made. The evaporators they used to distill gold water for the tannery, the flowing water that powered the water wheel for the carpenters¡­


    Lightningwisps were a bit problematic, since they wanted to occupy the copper instead of the air around it, but that was solved by letting them take the place of the firewisps in the metal. Unfortunately, there wasn''t anything they could do with it. Her only uses for lightningwisps were the bindings to keep bugs away from certain buildings, and the binding she used for the curing shed. Possibly it might have some use in welding metal, but she didn''t really know how to do that very well, so she couldn''t really translate that into something they could use the prototype for.


    Earthwisps required her to put some stone on the shell, and they integrated well with the binding anchored to the white Iridescence, but there wasn''t really anything she could use it for either. Perhaps if she used earthwisps to reinforce stone structures, but she didn''t. And off the top of her head, she didn''t really know any bound tools that actually used earthwisps¡­


    "Could you use some other material for the shell?" Rian asked as they finished with the thirteenth experiment. "Bone and rock seem to be doing well."


    "No. Even if it''s a substitute, metal has a property bone and rock do not: it has no wisps of its own."


    "What really? I''d have thought it would have earthwisps¡­"


    "Only when it''s near-molten."


    "I''ll¡­ take your word for it. But why is that important? Wouldn''t the shell having its own wisps be an advantage in this instance? You can skip the step of putting firewisps into the shell."


    "Because having wisps that don''t do anything in a binding reduces the overall efficiency of the binding," Lori said. "There''s a reduction in the amount of magic transferred between wisps of unlike type when using metal seepage. When the binding was all firewisps, there was no loss, but in the configuration with the lightwisps, the lightwisps had less magic imbued into it from the firewisps¡­ or at least they would have, if it weren''t for the fact they were also being imbued directly from the copper shell. Which they could only anchor onto because of the firewisps in the shell, which were anchored into the firewisps anchored around the white Iridescence."


    "Ah¡­ so it''s an optimization problem¡­" Rian mused. "The wisps anchored to the white Iridescence is what lets the binding stay together, but the shell is what imbues the part that''s actually doing the work we want it to do, like make light or move air around." He tilted his head. "Can''t we still use bone or stone to act to connect external wisps to the wisps anchored to the white Iridescence, then just use some other metal to imbue the wisps anchored to the bone or stone? That should take care of the imbuement inefficiency, right? Or¡­ what if we used a raw metallic ore? Would it be metallic enough to allow magic to flow and imbue through it, while letting you anchor onto its earthwisps?"


    "Do you have any raw ore to test this with?" Admittedly, it sounded like a good idea if it worked¡­ but if it worked, bound tools would likely already be using metal ore in that way.


    "Well, no¡­ ah, but I think River''s Fork might still have some of the raw ore they were trying to sell or make dye with?"


    "No, just get some from the mine. We''ll test it when you get back. "


    "And¡­ using a bone or stone shell?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "We''ll have them make another prototype setting to test it." A part of her didn''t want to¡ªthese prototypes were all supposed to be a stopgap measure for her inability to work with glass, which was how a proper bound tool was made¡ªbut she supposed that having different possible stopgap measures couldn''t hurt. "Still, remember that the goal is of these experiments is not to make these little classroom demonstrations of metals seeping beads, it''s for me to learn to make proper bound tools. Ones we can use reliably and are simple enough I don''t need to be the one to operate it. Perhaps eventually create bound tools for sale to Covehold. For the latter we will need to have mastered the proper way to make it with glass."


    "So that other people can''t modify it or study it to learn how to make one themselves?"


    "Exactly!"


    After all, why have only one absolutely monopoly when you can have two?


    Rian sighed for some reason, but he was smiling as he did so.


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    They put away everything to get ready for dinner, sealing up the alcove again. The tablets had several spots that needed correction near the beginning as Rian continued to get used to the new writing medium, but beyond those, it was all well-written and neatly organized, though a word here and there were missing, likely omitted to let him write faster. Lori read the two tablets, just to make sure that none of the omissions resulted in any wrong connotations, but Rian knew what words he could afford to omit. At worst, it read like someone in a hurry.


    She''d still need to remove the corrections, because they looked terrible, but the notes themselves were perfectly understandable and concise.


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    "Are you ready to go to River''s Fork tomorrow?" Lori asked as Rian sat opposite her. His hair was wet from the baths, but he was still wearing the same clothes.


    "I suppose. We''ll have to wait until tomorrow to pack the meat, but beyond that, everyone''s ready to go." Rian sighed, but the sigh sounded different from the ones he''d been making when they first arrived from River''s Fork a few days ago. It was less deep, for one thing. "We''ll bring back some fruit when we come back. It''s part of why we''re trying to keep the place alive, right? Might as well get our share of it." He gave Lori a twisted smile. "Do you have a preference of which fruit we should bring more of?"


    Lori seriously considered that. Which one, which one¡­? The micans? The golden buds? The pink ladies? The hairy blueballs? Eventually though, she had to sigh. "I find I have no exact preference at the moment," she said. "Bring home equal amounts of each."


    Rian nodded. "On a related note, you''ll probably have to promote two people to lord or lady in the near future."


    "Oh? I will, will I?"


    "We''re still planning to take the Coldhold to Covehold, right? That means you''re going to need someone to manage Lorian, and someone else to keep visiting River''s Fork while I''m gone. Unless you don''t want me heading that trip and think someone else can handle trying to sell the beads?"


    Lori flinched inside. Ah, yes, that. It was something she hadn''t really thought of since she''d been so busy. She should have, but she hadn''t. "We''ll discuss it when you return. So far, I do not have any promising candidates."


    "I can suggest some¡­"


    "I remember how the last candidate you suggested turned out."


    "All right, to be fair, any other candidates I have now I will have known for far longer!"


    She gave him a flat look as Shanalorre helped her cousin step over the bench and sit down. "Do you even have candidates?"


    "¡­ I don''t see what that has to do with anything¡­"


    "Well, only bother me about it when you do."


    "¡­yes, your Bindership." Rian looked around for a moment, as if searching for something. "Ah, right, do you intend to go to keep going to the edge to do¡­ things." He glanced at Shanalorre.


    "Should I make myself scarce for a moment?" the other younger Dungeon Binder said.


    Lori waved a hand dismissively at her to stay. "Of course. I need to make more for the trip to Covehold."


    "Then I''ll ask Riz to stay behind to accompany you. Since you''ll be staying here, we don''t need to bring as many people, since we don''t need to assign anyone to protect you. She can accompany you to the edge." Rian tilted his head. "Unless you''re fine with someone else doing it?"


    Ah. She hadn''t considered that. "Don''t you need her to accompany you?"


    "We''ll be fine. Keep her with you, it''s more important to keep you alive, remember?"


    And what was she to say to that? Lori simply nodded. "Very well. Don''t come back early because you were stabbed in the back by someone who couldn''t stand you. The people there have a distressing tendency to suddenly attack people for no reason."


    "That only happened once," Shanalorre said as Umu and Riz sat down on either side of Rian, with Mikon sitting down next to perpetual non-officer, "and the ones responsible have already been dealt with."


    "So? It still happens significantly far more than it does here."


    "I¡­ do not know how to respond to that¡­ Ah, Riz," Rian said, turning towards the non-officer. On his other side, Umu gave the other woman an annoyed look as she was ignored for the moment. "Could you stay here and go with her Bindership when she goes back to the edge?"


    Riz blinked. "Ah, right, she''s not going to the Fork with us." She pressed her lips together, even as Mikon''s expression brightened, and the weaver smiled at Lori for some reason. "Sure, I''ll stay. If, uh, that''s fine with her Bindership?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "The same arrangement as last time should suffice, Erzebed."


    Riz nodded, then stiffened. "I don''t have to take notes for you, do I?"


    "No, you do not."


    A sigh of relief. "Thank you, your Bindership."


    "If you need any notes taken, Binder Lolilyuri, I volunteer," Shanalorre said. "Provided you feel it safe to allow me to learn the contents of the notes."


    "That will not be necessary, Binder Shanalorre. I will not need any notes taken." Beyond putting up the ice structure to work in as Rian had suggested, and leaving some samples of white Iridescence beyond the edge to see what happened to them, all she intended to do was make more beads. "Rian, are there any matters in the demesne that need to be dealt with while you''re gone?"


    Rian blinked. "Wait, are suggesting you''ll¡ª"


    "I''m sure Erzebed can attend to it when she''s done accompanying me to the edge."


    "¡­ of course you do¡­"


    "Wait, wait, I''m not an officer!" Riz said hastily. "You gave me an official plaque about it and everything!"


    "Yes? I''m not promoting you into an officer, Erzebed, or making you my temporary Rian again¡ª"


    "Oh, you''re back to using my name as a job designation."


    "¡ªand if you don''t want to provide any assistance to Rian, I''m sure he''ll understand."


    "Wow. Seriously? You''re doing that? You realize Riz is an adult woman and not a child, right? And even most children wouldn''t fall for that plot." There was a pause. "But, um, if you''re willing Riz, there are a few things¡­ "


    "Well¡­ so long as if doesn''t mean I''m an officer."


    "No, of course not!" Rian hastily assured Riz. "At worse, you''re a sergeant, getting things done for an officer who clearly needs help. And I definitely need help¡­"


    Riz looked relieved. "Ah. Huh. Well, that''s fine. I can do that."


    "Oh, thank you! It''s not much, just talk to all the task overseers and ask them if they anything. If they do, decide if it needs to be mentioned to Binder Lori or if you can handle it yourself. If you''re not sure if it''s something to tell Binder Lori, or it doesn''t seem urgent enough to do so, just wait and tell me when I get back."


    "It will only be two days, so you won''t have to do it for long," Lori said.


    Rian nodded at Lori''s words, then paused. "No, it''s four days, right?"


    "Two days," she said with finality as Umu and Mikon stood up to join the line at the kitchen to get their dinner.


    A strange expression came over Rian''s face, before it settled onto something that might actually have been distaste. "It needs to be at least three days," he said eventually, sounding like was barely keeping himself from sighing. "I''m not going to be able to get anything done in just two days. I''ll need the whole working day in the middle."


    Lori gave him a flat look, which he returned with one that wasn''t quite as flat. It looked very reluctant, in fact. "Are you sure?"


    "No, but I need to do it anyway. I''m a gainfully employed adult. I have to do the distasteful things that are part of my responsibilities."


    "You''re not being paid," Lori pointed out. "I''m not sure it counts as gainful employment."


    "That''s simply an unfortunate artifact of the current state of our economy. Everyone is equally unpaid. Now let''s stop talking about this before you start getting ideas for how to tax people."


    Lori smirked at the implication. She supposed she did have the basis to switch her demesne to a capital-based economy now, what with being able to produce beads. It¡­ well, was probably something she should finally get around to thinking about¡­ but she didn''t want to. Not yet. "All right. Three days."


    "Would it be too much to hope that you''ll wait for me to get back before testing the second prototype?"


    "Yes."


    "I hate being a responsible adult¡­ have more experiments to do by the time I get back?"


    "I''m sure you''ll bother me with proposals for them yourself."


    "I wouldn''t dare presume."


    "Yes, you would. You would definitely dare presume."


    Rian shrugged, not even looking a little chagrined.


    Lori rolled her eyes as Umu and Mikon arrived with the food. She took one of the bowls and a piece of bread for herself. "Well, besides all that, did anything come up this afternoon?"


    "Well, the smiths said the second prototype will be ready tomorrow, and we''ve set aside some of the older frozen meat and a few jars of dried and fresh mushrooms to take to River''s Fork tomorrow, so hopefully that will take care of some of the complaints about the food¡­"

 295 - Congratulations

    It was a perfectly ordinary morning in Lolilyuri''s demesne. The sun was shining, the bugs were singing, breakfast was cooking, people were getting ready to clean the Um for the week after breakfast, the storm and red moons hung in the sky to give it some variety, and Lori was already thinking of what sort of tool she''d need to help in the mass production of beads. She still had her emergency wispbead¡ªa denominated one of the largest size, but she could probably replace that with one she''d made herself at this point¡ªand while she could use that a size guide, it was probably best to use one of the blank ones she had made. One of those would be perfectly smooth¡­


    She was thinking of going back up to her room to get a tablet and stylus so she could try sketching out what she wanted made to better explain it where Rian finally arrived, sitting down on the bench opposite her. "Good morning, your Bindership," he said cheerfully. It was a bright, happy cheer more intense than anything she''d seen from him before. "Did you sleep well?"


    She gave him a flat look. "Rian, is this your way of telling me we have booze in the demesne and you had some before breakfast?"


    "No, as far as I know we don''t have any booze in the demesne, and no, I''m not drunk," he said, still smiling cheerfully.


    "Then why are you acting strange?"


    "Hmm? I have no idea what you mean, your Bindership. I''m always like this." For a moment, his cheerfulness briefly shifted to ''deliberately annoying'', but it quickly shifted back.


    Lori stared at him, then shrugged. Well, if Rian was in a good mood, then that had nothing to do with her. At least he wasn''t sighing over having to go to River''s Fork. "At least you''re no longer sighing over having to go to River''s Fork," she said.


    Rian blinked as if he''d just realized it himself. For a moment, Lori thought he was going to start sighing again.


    He did, in fact, sigh, but he managed to smile as he did so. "Well, it''s something we need to do to help keep the people there alive," he said. "Once we''ve got more infrastructure invested there, optimized the collection of resources, and gotten them some working prototypes to make up for you not being able to maintain bindings there, they should settle down and behave."


    "Are you sure you''re not drunk? Because all that sounds like you''re delirious."


    "I''m not drunk! I''m just looking at the problem through fresh eyes. For better or worse, everyone there are our people now, and we need to think of them as such. How about we invite everyone over next time we have a holiday? We can plan it in advance, spend the whole day before bringing everyone over, they can stay in the shelter or the Dungeon, we lock down everything we don''t want stolen, and they can spend the holiday with us enjoying themselves so they feel like they''re part of the community."


    "I was wondering whether you''d gone insane until the point you mentioned taking measures against theft," Lori said.


    "I have a new perspective on the situation, I didn''t become stupid." His smile didn''t change at all.


    There were sounds of footsteps, and Lori looked over her shoulder to see Shanalorre approaching. "Good morning Binder Lolilyuri, Lord Rian," she said, bowing to Lori and nodding towards the latter as she carried her dozing cousin on her back. "Do you require my presence this morning?"


    Rian glanced at Lori. She considered the matter, then waved a hand dismissively. "I don''t think so, Shana," Rian said. "You can go have breakfast with the other children."


    "I see. Very well, then. May I speak with you at lunch, Binder Lolilyuri? I have a request on behalf of the children, but it can wait."


    Lori nodded. "Fine. We will speak then."


    "See you later, Shana," Rian said, making a show of waving goodbye.


    Lori was in the middle of rolling her eyes¡ªShanalorre was literally sitting at a nearby table, and Rian would probably be able to see her all through breakfast¡ªwhen a slight shift in the air brought a scent to her face. An unfortunately familiar scent. Her nostrils flared, as she tried to figure out where it came from. Who could¡ª?


    Her eyes fell on Rian. The person sitting closest to her¡­ and the direction the air had come from.


    "Rian," she said flatly. "Have you taken a bath yet?"


    "Not yet. I overslept a little, so I decided to come straight here so that there would be someone to get you your fo¡ª"


    "Go take a bath."


    Rian blinked. "What?"


    "Go take a bath," Lori repeated, voice just low enough to be heard over the din of the dining hall. "And make sure to wash your hands thoroughly before you handle any food I might be eating."


    "That''s a bit rude to say, don''t you th¡ª"


    "Rian, I recognize that smell from my mothers." That gave Rian pause. Lori saw his eyes widen in realization, his lips pressing together as he began to blush. "Congratulations. Now take a bath and tell them to do the same."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said, sounding subdued and mildly embarrassed. He made to stand.


    "Rian." He paused. "Was it voluntary on your part?"


    His blush deepened, but he nodded with nearly defiant firmness.


    "Then again, congratulations. Don''t be like my mothers and bring it to the breakfast table."


    "Ah¡­ my condolences."


    "Bath."


    "Right, right. Going, your Bindership!"


    Once he was gone, Lori eyed the table, trying to remember where Rian''s hands had touched it. She was going to have to blast that with steam and unseen light later¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Breakfast had already started by the time Rian returned carrying three bowls of food and a plate filled with bread for five people, his hair damp from his bath. "The girls are just finishing up," he said.


    "They would certainly be women now, wouldn''t they?" Lori said blandly.


    His hand rose up to cover his face. "Can you please leave the subject? Please?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine. But bathe afterwards from now on. You handle food for Shana and her cousin too."


    Rian winced. "All right, that''s¡­ fair. Now can we leave the subject?"


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    "What subject?"


    Rian opened his mouth, then paused. He closed his mouth, and nodded. "I''ll get the rest of the food, then."


    "Don''t you have some sort of rotation?"


    He smiled mischievously. "Well, they''re not here, so I have to do it." He winked.


    Lori rolled her eyes at him. She had no idea why he was so insistent on fetching the food rather than letting the three do it. It wasn''t because they''d been sleeping with him, he''d been like that for a long time. Shaking her head, she picked one of the bowls, helped herself to bread, and started eating.


    While Rian was gone, Umu, Mikon and Riz finally arrived. Lori eyed them warily, but judging from the moisture on Riz''s short pink hair, they had bathed. Mikon was wearing a wide, brilliant smile that bore a strong relation to the expression Rian had worn earlier, while Umu was wide-eyed and flushed as she tried to make herself as small and unobtrusive as possible, and doing very badly at it. Riz had a serene expression on her face and a slight bounce in her step.


    The three sat down opposite her, Umu a greater distance than usual from the other two than having a space open for Rian justified. The blonde stared down at the table, while Riz slouched and leaned her elbows down on the tabletop, Mikon leaning against her side as the weaver sometimes did. The pink-haired weaver took the two bowls remaining on the table and passed them to the other women. "Eat up you two, or it will get cold," she said, her smile looking almost painful it was so wide.


    "You sure?" Riz said, even as she took some bread and dipped it into the bowl.


    "Go ahead, I''ll wait for Rian to come back."


    Umu twitched, but accepted the bowl, not meeting the other weavers face. She began to eat


    When Rian came back with more bowls of food, a jug of water and some cups, the three women turned towards him immediately. Riz''s serene expression turned into a smile, while Umu''s face reddened further as Rian sat down between the two of them.


    "Thank you, Rian," Mikon said brightly as she accepted a bowl from him.


    Lori braced herself, but fortunately it seemed that the rather sickening displays of blatant flirting her mothers had indulged in on the mornings after wasn''t practiced by everyone¡­ or perhaps these four hadn''t reached that point yet. Instead, they all settled down to a quiet breakfast¡­ with all hands above the table and accounted for.


    Rian had managed to start eating¡ªhe was eating quite enthusiastically, actually¡ªand was a quarter of the way through his food before he finally slowed down. "So, I''ve been thinking¡­"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "How much extra work is this going to cause me?"


    "Not that kind of thinking¡­ though admittedly, I was wondering if we can just mix ground white stuff with molten copper so they''re suspended in the metal when it cools¡­ but I digress. I think we should be making more long-term plans."


    "That is a very vague subject. Be more specific."


    "I think we need to start a school for the children," Rian said.


    That¡­ hadn''t been what Lori had been expecting him to say. Honestly, she''d thought he''d say something about her needing to get around to building more workshops, or expanding some of their current infrastructure. "What?"


    "We need to stop thinking only in terms of what we need to do this season or our next one." Rian leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table to do so as he entwined his fingers together and rested his chin on his thumbs. "Our goals need to be longer term, assuming our continued survival and growth over the next decade."


    "And you think a school for the children is the most urgent thing to start on?"


    "Lori," Rian''s said, and she blinked in surprise at the use of her name. Her lord''s voice was completely serious. "If you get the monopoly you want, this demesne is going to become rich and very, very busy. To best take advantage of a monopoly, we will need to scale up production to be able to meet the demand for our product, or we''ll incentivize people breaking the monopoly due to insufficient supply. To meet that demand, we''ll need raw and refined materials in sufficient quantities. To get those materials, we''ll need to send people to get them. To get those materials on a regular basis, we will need established contracts with suppliers to provide things we can''t produce ourselves. Those contracts will need negotiation, they''ll need to be read to make sure what''s written is what was agreed upon. And unless you want those negotiations to take forever, I can''t be the only one doing them. We need people who can do these things, who can read contracts to make sure there aren''t any unfavorable clauses hidden in the agreement, who can write our own contracts and know how to hide clauses in our favor. We need people who can do calculations and negotiate prices. Since we have neither the time or the leeway to train any of the people of the demesne who are currently working, we need to train those who aren''t working. So we need a school."


    Lori found herself leaning back slightly as Rian spoke. The three on either side of him were looking at him too. He didn''t raise his voice, but as he spoke his speech gradually picked up speed. His gaze never left her, his eyes intense. When he finished, she had to take a moment to realize that he had actually stopped speaking. "That¡­" That had been a far more coherent and detailed argument than she usually got from him. Very detailed, in fact. "How long have you been thinking about this?"


    "Technically, since last night," he said promptly. "If you mean useful thinking however, then only during my bath."


    She raised her eyebrows. "Last night?" The gazes of the three next to Rian also became intent.


    His lips pressed together for a moment before he said, very evenly, "Yes, last night."


    The urge to comment on the timing was very strong. Several had already come to mind, all along the lines of asking him how bored he''d been, or whether he''d had nothing better to do, but she restrained herself. They had left the subject, after all, and given how motherly he sometimes was¡­ No. She had abandoned the subject as soon as possible with her mothers before, and she saw no reason to change that now¡­ no matter how many sarcastic comments she was managing to think of. "I see," she said instead. "Didn''t I tell you to rest?"


    "You''ve said many things, some of which had contradictory implications," Rian said flatly. Mikon nodded, snickering to herself slightly.


    Lori shrugged. "I have no objections to the proposal. It sounds like a ''dealing with people'' matter, so I''ll leave it to you."


    Instead of sighing or rolling his eyes, Rian nodded. "I''ll see if I can set one up by this summer. The sooner we can get this started, the more time they''ll have to learn. We can set up a school room somewhere, and I can find people who can teach them. I can do it, and maybe Cassan might be willing, maybe some of the doctors and medics¡­"


    There was a cough from behind Lori and about a pace to one side. "Excuse me, Lord Rian, Binder Lolilyuri," Shanalorre said as Lori quickly turned to face her. "I couldn''t help overhearing Lord Rian''s impassioned proposal. If I may, I am willing to volunteer to assist in this endeavor. I was taught how to read, write and how to interpret and calculate numbers. As I am responsible for the well-being of a number of the children already, I volunteer to teach them the necessary skills. It will also free Lord Rian to continue to perform his duties for the demesne."


    A conflicted look came over Rian''s face. "Thank you for offering, Shana, but¡ª"


    "Lord Rian, I understand you see me as a child." Lori blinked at that, looking at her lord incredulously. Really? He actually thought that? "However, I am a Dungeon Binder. More importantly, I can read, write, do calculations, am not needed for any other duties save for emergencies, and I already have charge of the children that need to be taught. Taking on this duty justifies the continued expenditure of resources to sustain me."


    For some reason, Rian twitched.


    "A sound argument," Lori agreed. It would certainly be useful if Shanalorre had more to do than healing. While healing was important if Lori got sick or injured¡ªand her idiots too, she supposed¡ªthey didn''t exactly need it every day. "You can discuss matters further with Rian when he gets back. Is there anything else, Binder Shanalorre?" She pointedly emphasized the title for Rian''s benefit.


    "Nothing at the moment, Binder Lolilyuri, though I still wish to speak with you later."


    "Get back to eating, then."


    Shanalorre bowed, and turned back to her meal as Lori shifted to sit on her bench properly again.


    "We''ll discuss the matter further after you return, Rian," Lori said. "Hopefully you''ll have a more concrete plan by then. And be more respectful of Binder Shanalorre. She''s still a Dungeon Binder, after all. Is there anything else?"


    "Nothing that can''t wait at the moment. We''ll still have to discuss the next expedition to Covehold and such, now that you''re not busy digging."


    Lori nodded. "When you return then. I''ll try your proposal of suspending the samples in copper in the meantime." The white Iridescence had shown it wouldn''t react to heat of combustion, but she''d test that first by exposing it to copper-melting temperatures. If it still didn''t react¡­well, trying to suspend it in molten copper should be fine.


    Rian twitched. "Oh, come on! At least let me be there when you do that! It was my idea!"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine, I''ll wait. I''ll need to test the second prototype in any case." Shaking her head, she went back to her food.


    He sighed relief, then bent down and did the same.


    Riz turned towards him. "Since last night? Were you bored or something?" Umu''s head snapped sideways to look at him, looking aghast.


    Rian flushed, glancing towards Lori, who met him with an utterly bored expression. "I didn''t fall asleep right away, you know," he said. "Just¡­ thinking of the future¡­ raising children and¡­ things like that¡­" His words faded into muttering.


    "¡­oh¡­" Riz said, face no longer as serene and looking a little flushed.


    Mikon just kept on smiling, humming to herself as she ate.

 296 - Prototyping for Mass Production

    Half the morning was spent packing the Coldhold with meat from the cold rooms, frozen solid and hard as rock. People had to handle the food carefully so the cold meat wouldn''t stick to anyone''s skin. Lori filled one of the cargo boxes in the Coldhold with blocks of solidified water, carefully giving the blocks just enough imbuement to last until lunch, at which point they''d start being extremely cold. She had filled the small cold storage in River''s Fork with ice before she''d left, but here was no harm in having more, and by this point it would no doubt have room for it.


    And then the boat was moving away from the dock and sailing downriver, to be gone for another three days. Some people lingered at the docks, and a few of the children ran along the river bank to parallel the boat for as long as they could. Lori didn''t bother watching it go as she headed to her room to sketch with her stylus and bone tablet. Before he''d left, Rian had relayed to her that the second prototype would be ready to fill with white Iridescence after lunch and would likely be finished by the end of the day, so Lori had time on her hands. Rather than going straight to the edge of the demesne and making beads, she decided to take the time to properly design the mass production aid she''d been conceiving. She''d already learned that she could continue to imbue the binding that was amalgamating into a bead as long as the flow of magic wasn''t interrupted. With that in mind, the sort of tool she needed for mass production was obvious.


    She needed a tray and a grid.


    No, wait. First, she needed a test prototype as a proof of concept before she had a larger tool made, so that she could fine-tune the concept on the small scale.


    Her stylus traced along the softened surface of the bone tablet, trying to draw and solidify the concept in her mind. A tray covered by a grid, and within each grid, a layer of metal at the bottom to channel magic. Inside each grid, a concave slope that would allow a growing bead to remain centered and resting on the metal contact point as it grew, until it reached a certain size and the bead''s own growth would cause it to rest on the raised walls of the grid and lift it up off the metal contact, causing it to stop growing.


    It was a simple, elegant concept. That meant that there was no doubt implementation would a glittering rainbow. Hence why she needed to start with a prototype, to test out several different iterations of the concave slope and see which ones worked and, if there were any, which ones would be easiest to make. She could just simply take a bead of the size she wanted to replicate, and press it into softened stone or bone to make concave the wanted, and if needed she was resigned to having to do that for the mass production tray, but she''d rather not if the craftsmen of her demesne could make something that sufficed.


    Lori went out to the bone pit to get bone for raw material, checking on the progress of the second prototype on the way. The cup that would be filled with the finely ground white Iridescence was still being worked on. From the looks of it, they were shaping the top of the cup so that a copper cover¡ªwhich also seemed to be in the middle of being made¡ªcould be slid over the cup containing the white iridescence before it''s presumably hammered tight. She''d have to come back to it later.


    The bone pit was bigger these days, and actually consisted of two pits now. One was a bug-ridden pit where fresh bones were picked at for the minute bits of meat that the cooks hadn''t been able to extract. Another pit was full of bones that had been picked clean and drying in the sun when they weren''t being washed by the rain. When she got there, one of the men she vaguely recognized as one of the demesne''s carpenters was collecting bones, no doubt to boil into glue.


    He looked at her warily as she approached the pit, bowing cautiously. She nodded in acknowledgement, but crouched down and began picking out bones for herself. Lori picked out the ones that had been opened for marrow, checking that there weren''t any concentrations of waterwisps that might signify remaining meat or marrow still attached to the bone. She didn''t want any unfortunate surprises after all. Claiming the earthwisps in the bones she''d chosen, she fused them together into a mass to make them easier to carry back.


    Once she had a large enough mass, she took the bone over to docks and claimed waterwisps from the river. She doused the bones with water, altering the viscosity of the waterwisps so that instead of washing away, the bones were slowly encased in a thick blob of water. When she had enough water, she made a little ice inside the blob to squeeze out some firewisps, and claimed those firewisps, adding them to the binding.


    Then she made the water boil.


    It was a quick boil to get rid of any dustlife or anything else disgusting on the bones, lest she get anything on her hands. She was bringing this to her room, after all. Once it was sufficiently boiled, she drew away the waterwisps and water to dry the bones, which she carried back to her room, making a detour to get an ingot of copper from the treasure room.


    Lori spent the rest of the morning making a series of mold prototypes, with the bone as building material. First she flattened out the bone as if she was making tablets, and then used her belt knife to cut the flattened bone into strips. The strips she then layered together to make thicker panels that she then used to make a little tray with¡­ well, it was only a single row of little square compartments, so it wasn''t exactly a grid. She used what tools she had¡ªher belt knife, the various teeth and claws she''d collected, beads of the sizes she wanted to replicate¡ªto make the various indentations, and put the ingot on the bottom to act as a contact point for magic to flow.


    She was in the middle of making the last of the prototype mold shapes¡ªa shallow ring that the growing bead could rise up on¡ªwhen there was a gentle knock on her door. Lori blinked, wondering if it had been her imagination or some sound that had come up from downstairs that had nothing to do with her, when the knock came again. Sighing, she put down the little strip of bone she''d been shaping, got up and opened the door, wondering why Rian was being so quiet.


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    The fact that Rian was in River''s Fork returned to her at about the same time she opened the door and saw a nervous Riz. The non-officer bowed. "I apologize for disturbing you, Great Binder , but Rian asked me to remind you when it was time to eat."


    Ah. It did feel like midday, she supposed. "I''ll be right down," Lori said.


    "Uh, the smiths also asked me to tell you that the thing you asked them to make is almost finished, and they just needed you to give them what''s supposed to go in it so they can seal it shut."


    "Tell them I''ll meet with them after lunch. Is that all?"


    Riz nodded.


    "Then I''ll be down once I put away my work."


    Once she''d neatly put away everything she''d been using, especially the beads so they wouldn''t roll off and get lost under her bed like beads tend to do, Lori went down for lunch.


    When Shanalorre approached the table, Lori pointed at the spot opposite her where Rian usually sat. There was plenty of room since Mikon and Umu were getting up to get the food. The other Dungeon Binder sat there, her cousin sitting next to her.


    "What did you wish to talk about?" Lori said as the dining hall''s familiar murmuring rang around them as they waited for the food to arrive.


    "I was wondering if it would be possible for some of the children could go to River''s Fork to visit their parents," Shanalorre said.


    Lori frowned. "Are they failing to properly adjust to living in this demesne?"


    "They are adjusting. However, I believe it would be beneficial for them to meet with their parents again. I am often asked when they will be ''going back home'' every other day. Allowing them a visit will help curb this, and seeing that the children are safe might prompt the parents who have still not sent their children here for their safety and well-being to do so. And at the very least, the parents would appreciate being able to see for themselves that their children are doing well. It will also empirically disprove those who are claiming that the children are being held hostage or are otherwise not being cared for properly, further lowering their credibility."


    That last did sound nice. "We''ll see what Rian thinks. This sounds like a ''dealing with people'' matter."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Thank you, Great Binder."


    "If this idea is implemented, you will be in charge of arranging and organizing it, as this falls under your purvey."


    ''"I¡­ understand, Great Binder."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lunch was unremarkable. Without Rian about, Lori was able to focus on eating.


    His absence was more pronounced across the table. Without Rian, there was none of the usual physical flirting of Umu and¡ªusually¡ªRiz pressing against his side, and Mikon doing the same with Riz. The serenity from this morning had faded from the non-officer''s face, and Umu was no longer red-faced, but the two of them now kept glancing sideways at each other and Mikon when they thought the others weren''t looking. Only Mikon seemed unperturbed, still smiling widely. She was often smiling, really.


    For the first time, Lori wondered how much of that was fake.


    Well, she didn''t care, so not her problem.


    After lunch, she went up to her room to get the bowl of ground white Iridescence and the wooden spoon for scooping up the samples. It was a very rough grind, not unlike the salt they''d had stored that¡­ was probably slowly running out, they need to send the Coldhold to the ocean soon, wouldn''t they?


    One thing at a time.


    The square copper container that was the second prototype was about four yustri long and wide, and half a yustri thick. The gold wire that would connect to the bead hadn''t been attached yet, but one edge had excess metal that was no doubt meant to secure the wire. Out of a paranoid but not unreasonable fear that a sudden movement would send the little prototype flying, spilling the white iridescence everywhere, Lori made an impromptu clamp with some stone she pulled from the walls to secure the thing to the smithy''s workbench. The smiths had clamps, but none were small enough for the prototype, at least not without ruining it.


    The smiths actually nodded in amused approval when they saw her do that, which meant they''d no doubt been thinking of how to secure it themselves.


    With the second prototype-in-progress secured, Lori carefully began spooning the white Iridescence into the little container. She used the spoon to spread it out evenly, and even pressed the samples down flat with another stone she pulled from the walls and shaped to conform to the container. She didn''t press it down too hard, merely tamping down the white Iridescence as much as she could.


    Once the container neared full, the smiths started sliding in the little copper cover plate to test the fit. With every fitting, Lori put in a little bit more white Iridescence and pressed it down, until finally the cover plate was scraping along the samples. Once that was done, Lori carefully shook the container, trying to feel for any shifting into the contents.


    Only when Lori was satisfied that the white Iridescence was packed too tight to move did she hand the prototype back to the smiths for final sealing. They would be sealing the cover plate tight, and then tightening all the seals and work hardening them for that final bit of security, as well as fastening the gold wire.


    "When will it be ready?" Lori asked before they started getting to work.


    The two exchanged glances. "Probably tomorrow, your Bindership," the older-looking one said. "We''ll have to work slowly so that it doesn''t rupture."


    Lori nodded in understanding. "Take all the time you need to get it done properly," she said. "The day after or later will be fine, if that''s what you need." A thought occurred to her. "If it''s suited for my needs, I will require to you make more like it. Please think of changes that need to be made that will make producing this easier. Change anything you need to. All it needs to do it to be able to hold the white powder packed tightly enough that they will not be able to move as long as it''s intact."


    The two frowned, but it was the professional frown of craftsmen considering a problem. They both nodded. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "I won''t keep you, then. Inform Erzebed if you need my assistance for anything." She turned away, then paused. "Where are the two who made the first prototype?"


    With an amused smile, one of the smiths pointed behind her.


    Lori turned, following the indicating finger, to find two men standing some distance away. One looked a bit young, so he was probably the tinsmith. She turned back and nodded gratefully. "Thank you," she said, and walked towards the two indicated. The two straightened as she approached them, looking expectant. "The prototype you two produced has functioned with no problems, and done everything I have demanded of it. I do not doubt that it will continue to function through my further tests and experiments. While it is possible that it will not meet my future needs, it will be because I did not know what I needed, not because your work was insufficient."


    Giving the two one last nod, Lori turned and headed back to her room to continue her own prototyping.

 297 - Its Not The Same, Again

    Lori finished with the mold prototypes that afternoon. There was one made from pressing a bead down on softened bone, one made by a ring of bone, and various other arrangements of shapes, each with the copper ingot as a contact point on the bottom. The bindings would be imbued as long as they were in contact with the metal while they amalgamated into beads, and when the beads reached the right size, their own growth would lift them up off the metal contact point, ceasing the amalgamation.


    Once she had exhausted the variety of shapes she could think off that would lift up the bead once it was properly grown, Lori deliberately set aside the mold as she centered the first prototype on her table and began doing new experiments. She''d let her mind wander slightly as she had shaped the mold prototype, and had come up with some new ideas she wanted to try out. Taking some bone, she made a rudimentary hoop, about the size of the circle made by putting her thumbs and forefingers together. She carefully secured that hoop to the supporting rod of bone that held up the copper shell with the setting of white Iridescence inside, moving the ring so that the copper shell was at its center.


    When Lori was satisfied that the equipment was set up to her satisfaction, she took a moment to write down her experimental notes. A part of her wanted to just speak them out loud, but she stepped on the urge and continued writing carefully.


    ¡­


    Why did this feel like it was taking much longer than it should?


    ¡­


    Had she been talking too fast when she asked Rian to write down notes?


    ¡­


    Finally she finished writing, and proceeded with the next step. Claiming and binding the airwisps inside the ring, she anchored them both to the bone ring and the firewisps embedded into the copper shell. She gave the binding directionality and intensity, then sighed and studiously wrote the details down on her bone tablet. Lori took the bead she''d been using previously for testing the first prototype, and quickly measured it so that the wisps around her wouldn''t cause much seepage with the metal calipers. She took note of the dimensions again, and only then placed the bead onto the little spiraling wire bowl.


    Immediately, the binding she had made was imbued, and a strong breeze began blowing over her face from the bound tool prototype. Lori nodded in satisfaction. Well, that was the unsuitability of the prototype''s shape for moving air¡ªand presumably water¡ªsolved. The configuration wouldn''t be much use for circulating air through her Dungeon, because of the wires that powered many of the bindings essential to the livability of her Dungeon¡ªbut it would be useful for the desiccator sheds, and for the air circulation vents in River''s Fork. They''d have to find a way to keep idiots from trying to take out the beads, or stuffing things in the bead receptacle, but that was a separate problem.


    Following success¡ªand taking off the bead, deactivating the prototype¡ªwas a brief break to write down the results, and then she moved on to the next thought she''d had while working.


    First, she had to make sure that the little airborne water that was in the air trapped within the copper shell was dealt with so that it wouldn''t suddenly condense on the sample and dissolve it. Thankfully, the copper didn''t prevent her from perceiving and claiming the wisps inside through her connection to the core. There were waterwisps inside¡ªnot much, but still present¡ªand she claimed those, using them and the airwisps inside to try and move water vapor down below the void of wisps that was the sample of white Iridescence, before she made the waterwisps solidify. There was a sudden burst of firewisps, which she mitigated lest the copper shell rupture.


    It was the best she could do at the moment when it came to keeping the white iridescence from getting wet. In future, she''d have to make special preparations to keep moisture from the space inside the shell. For now, having what moisture there was be ice at the bottom of the shell should do.


    The firewisps inside the shell were still in place, but she integrated the released firewisps into the binding. Then she modified the so-far idle binding, inverting it to destroy heat. The binding wouldn''t do much, just enough so it would be obvious there was a decrease in temperature. This was simply a test, after all. Combined with the binding of airwisps anchored to the bone ring, it should produce a simple cool wind.


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    Once she was done writing down all the notes and had put in the bead however, the end result was disappointing. While the breeze was as strong as it had been before, the firewisps didn''t seem to be as effective as she would have liked. The flow of moving air was only a little cool against her face. Was she doing something wrong?


    Taking off the bead¡ªshe didn''t want to waste it for adjustments¡ªLori imbued the binding herself as she adjusted the firewisps to destroy more heat. The resulting breeze, however, was only slightly cooler than before. Frustrated, she adjusted the firewisps one more time, then activated it. The breeze on her face was still only just cool, and barely at that¡ª


    Wait. Why was there white condensation on the copper shell? If it was that cold, then why couldn''t she feel¡ª


    ¡­


    Oh.


    Lori sighed, and then reached out and consciously deactivated the firewisps around her. Immediately the cold hit her, confirming that the firewisps had indeed been working properly.


    ¡­


    She missed Rian. He''d have remembered to remind her about this had he been around.


    Sighing, Lori began writing down the results of the experiment.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    This time Lori was mostly expecting it when Riz knocked on her door. She put away her tools, set the bead she''d been using aside, and grabbed her chatrang board to bring it down to the dining hall.


    Lori was in the middle of setting up the pieces when Shanalorre and her cousin arrived, leading the other children from River''s Fork. The former gave Lori a nod as the younger girl sat down on the bench some distance from Lori, her legs swinging freely, as the Dungeon Binder and the two Mikon-faced women with her had the other children sit and settle down to wait for the food to be ready.


    By the time the children were settled, the actual Mikon had arrived, now with a more normal, if still pleasant expression on her face. Though the weaver did smile again when she saw the chatrang board laid out on the table. She sat down opposite Lori, where Rian usually would be, next to Riz, whose squirming implied she''d moved away a little even if she seemed to remain in the same place. Hesitantly, she reached for one of the white pieces, then paused, glancing back up towards Lori.


    Lori waved a hand negligently, and Mikon made her move, having her Horotract go around the militia in front of it. They played chatrang silently as they waited for dinner to be ready. Umu was the last to arrive, sitting down some distance away from the pair of pink-haired women, almost as if she expected Rian to sit down between them.


    "Erzebed," Lori said, and the woman raised her head from where she''d been trying to nap on the table. "I''ll be going to the edge tomorrow. Make the arrangements."


    "Uh. yes, Great Binder," Riz said. "Do¡­ do I arrange for a couple of people to coming along and harvest ropeweed?"


    "I leave that to your discretion," Lori said. "Also, inquire with the smiths when the second prototype will be finished and inform me when it is." She''d probably need the reminder to collect it.


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    "That should be all, Erzebed. I''ll inform you if I need anything else."


    "Yes, Great Binder. Uh¡­ how long do you think you''ll be out there?"


    Lori considered that. Prototype testing, perhaps putting up the ice shed Rian had suggested, maybe leaving a sample of white Iridescence to test what happens¡­ "We might be some time. I''m going to be building something, but it shouldn''t take the whole day. "


    "Should I ready food, then?"


    "¡­no¡­ no, we shouldn''t be staying that long. At worst, we''ll return for lunch and then head back."


    "Understood, Great Binder. I''ll¡­ see who are willing to come along."


    Surprisingly, Mikon reached over and put a hand on Riz''s shoulder. "Don''t worry," she said. "Rian will be back in two days, remember? This isn''t like last time."


    Riz blinked, and suddenly started laughing. "R-right! It''s only three days! Two, now. I can make it that long." She sighed. "Thanks for reminding me."


    Mikon''s hand patted the shoulder reassuringly as the smiled at the militiawoman. "Of course, Riz. I''m always here when you need me."


    Lori twitched, but the weaver drew her hand back, so that seemed to be the extent of the flirting. Ugh, it was bad enough that Rian sometimes acted like one of her mothers, she didn''t need these two flirting like her mothers too!


    Eventually, Umu and Mikon got up to get the food, and dinner proceeded largely as lunch had. There wasn''t any conversation save between Shanalore and her cousin. Despite the reminder that Rian would only be gone two more days¡ªand not even a full two days at that¡ªRiz once more slipped to quietude, and Umu said nothing at all. Mikon, of course, didn''t make conversation as she and Lori played chatrang, but beyond her one shoulder touch she made no other flirtatious movements towards the women on either side of her.


    ¡­


    Well, not her problem. This was a ''dealing with people matter'', so she''d leave it to Rian when he got back.


    When Mikon lost the game after they had finished eating, she simply nodded at Lori with a smile, rose and left.


    Lori put away the game pieces, and retired to her room. Tomorrow was another day of work, and she needed her rest.

 298 - Ignorance of Something

    The next morning, Lori realized she was down to her last set of clean clothes. That¡­ probably explained the smell in her room. She''d have to do laundry soon, and also air things out. Hmm, the latter she could probably do while she was out today, she just had to seal off the corridor to her room before she set the airwisps¡­


    Perhaps she should put a window in her room? It would require having to make a hole through the stone face of her Dungeon, but it would make it much easier to air out, as well as drying her laundry once they were washed. Clothes always felt too dry and scratchy when she dried them by pulling out all the water, and while doing it by evaporating the water with firewisps was better¡­ well, it made the room too humid and impatience had led to some burnt clothes when she was younger. And she didn''t have any way of replacing her clothes at the moment, so she wasn''t risking that.


    Though if she opened a window¡­ well, the problem of rain getting in could be solved with judicious use of airwisps and waterwisps, and she had enough wire left to connect it to the core situated under her room. And that binding of lightningwisps would keep the bugs out. But it would also be another entrance to her room that people could reach with a ladder, not to mention it would be another thing she''d need to secure when a dragon came¡­


    Sighing, Lori put those thoughts away and got dressed in yesterday''s clothes. If she was going to be mucking around along the river and beyond the edge, best it be in clothes that were already dirty. She picked up the prototype with its variously shaped compartments so she wouldn''t have to come up and get it and headed downstairs.


    Then she turned around and headed upstairs again, because she remembered one of the experiments she''d be conducting was leaving some white Iridescence outside the demesne to see what happened, and she needed a container of that. Lori used some of the unused bone strips to make a container for some of the rough-ground white Iridescence, slapping them together into a simple cube and sealing it shut by fusing the edges and corners together with earthwisps so that water couldn''t get in while they were on the boat. After some consideration she made another container as well, to carry a shard of white Iridescence that she''d need to break off from the large bead in the alcove. The sample size and mass might be a factor in¡­ whatever would happen.


    She was just finishing up the second container when there was a knock on her door. "Uh, your Bindership?" she heard Riz say. "It''s breakfast time¡­"


    "I''ll be right down, Erzebed," she called out, finishing the last seams of the second container. She tested it by filling it with water from her private bath and checking for leaks. Once she was satisfied there were none, she washed her hands, and then picked up the three objects and headed downstairs.


    Lori blinked in surprise as she saw Riz still waiting for her on the other side of the door. Well, she supposed she hadn''t exactly told them woman to go downstairs without her. "Is there anything I need to know?" she said as she led the way downstairs.


    "Uh¡­ no? I don''t think so. Uh, no one died, nothing was stolen, none of the children have been hurt or are crying¡­ "


    Lori nodded. "Check with the smiths whether the second prototype has been completed yet, and if it isn''t, inform me how long they say it will be before it is. Then we''re going to the edge."


    "Uh, now or after breakfast, Great Binder?"


    "After breakfast. Eat first, then make the inquiries and arrangements. I want us moving by midmorning at the latest. Earlier, if possible."


    "Got it, Great Binder."


    Riz had shown that she wasn''t really suited to taking on Rian''s full duties, as revealed by her difficulties in being a temporary Rian, but Lori had noticed that she was quite capable when given specific tasks where she didn''t really have to think about what she needed to do. The woman could even meet more vague orders where she needed to use her initiative. Not that she didn''t have any, but Riz seemed to have difficulty in using that initiative on things of a large scale, unlike Rian.


    Lori could work with that. She just had to remember what needed to be done and explicitly order Riz to do it, one at a time.


    ¡­


    If she could have Rian write down everything he did or that needed to be done, could she possibly keep her demesne running by going down that list and ordering Riz to take care of things? Something to think about. thought she suspected she''d actually need to do as Rian had been saying and promote two people to become lords or ladies.


    She hated it when he was right.


    Downstairs, people were already eating. When she reached her usual table, she took one of the four bowls there¡ªit looked like Shanalorre was eating with the children this morning¡ªand started to eat. The other three sitting across from her did the same. Mikon and Umu ate silently, while Riz was frowning thoughtfully and occasionally muttering to herself between spoonfuls. The rest of the dining hall more than made up for them, and Lori let the buzzing talk and occasional childish cry from behind her wash over her. It helped make up for the lack of her usual morning discussion¡ª


    "Mikon," Lori said, "Rian hasn''t mentioned any issues, but do the weavers have enough fiber to work?"


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    It took a moment for the weaver to register the question, and when she did Mikon was clearly startled at the attention. Still, she was able to answer coherently. "We''re starting to, your Bindership," she said . "We''ve been collecting ropeweed from the other side of the river, since we weren''t able to collect it all last year, and we''ve been retting enough to start spinning thread again."


    Lori nodded. "In your estimation, how long will it take to weave enough fabric to make everyone in the demesne a new set of clothes? Shirts and trousers. Or¡­ well, I suppose skirts, in some cases."


    "Ah¡­ that will be some time, your Bindership. Two seasons, or so? Possibly faster, since we won''t need to try and make everyone winter clothes"


    That¡­ sounded promising. "Will you be able to make new clothes for the babes and the children before mid-summer, at least?"


    "That''s what we''re concentrating on now, especially the babes," Mikon sounding more relaxed and certain as they continued to talk about weaving. "We have enough looms, we just need enough thread, and for that we need more ropeweed."


    Lori nodded. "Would it help if we suspended logging for a time and have anyone who can be spared focusde on finding and gathering ropeweed?"


    Mikon hesitated, eating for a few moments as she considered. "It might¡­ but¡­ most of the ropeweed we''re getting right now is coming from across the river. Even if we had a lot of people to cut and gather the ropeweed, unless the¡­ the Coldhold is here, we''d only have Clowee and her boat to get it all on this side."


    Ah. That would be a bottleneck, yes. And that would be the same boat being used to get people across the river.


    "But, that shouldn''t be needed, your Bindership," Mikon said. "The ropeweed grows fast, and the ones growing on this side should be ready to cut down soon." She hesitated again. "If¡­ if we wanted to increase the amount of fabric we can weave, more retting tanks would be helpful. We can only put so much in the one we have now¡­"


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm¡­''-ed thoughtfully. "Would a deeper tank help?"


    "I''m¡­ not sure. We''ve always done it in shallow waters."


    Lori nodded. "If you can think of¡ª" A thought occurred to her. "Actually, never mind. I might have somewhere that can work. If we can increase the number of retting tanks, do you think we can get everyone a new set of clothes within the year?"


    "Oh, easily, your Bindership, even without more retting tanks, though it would certainly help. We did it last year, after all, and winter clothes take up more fabric than a normal set of clothes. Rian is hoping we''ll have enough fabric to make each family a new mattress too, so that they can sleep easier."


    "Oh? Why didn''t he tell me about that?"


    "Ah¡­ I suppose¡­ perhaps he felt it wasn''t something you needed to be bothered with, your Bindership?"


    No¡­ it probably wasn''t. She''d didn''t know enough about the textiles industry to really give an informed opinion, and from what Mikon had said, Rian had merely discussed scheduling and priority issues. And she already had a nice new mattress, so it wasn''t like she needed a new one.


    Lori finished the last of her food and pushed away her plate with her utensils before draining the last of the water in her cup. "I have something to retrieve, Erzebed. Inform me as soon as we''re ready to leave, I''ll be in my room."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz, said, looking lightly confused for some reason. She actually glanced at Mikon, and the weaver shrugged, conveying her ignorance of something, before smiling suddenly and waggling her fingers at the non-officer. Riz hastily looked away.


    Lori ignored the usual flirting¡ªstill not as bad as her mothers¡ªand got up to retrieve one of the sample containers she''d made to put one of the larger sample chunks from the broken bead into it. And¡­ well, she still had some bone. Best to make a container for Iridescence to grow in again between trips so they wouldn''t have to keep looking for usable samples from the environment¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    There was a knock on her door. "Great Binder? We''re ready to go."


    "Coming," Lori called, gathering her materials. There was her prototype, the two sample containers, a large cube made from bone panels for growing iridescence in, as well as her pocket knife and staff. She''d ended up throwing everything in one of the tubular bone containers she had made for transporting finished beads for lack of anything to conveniently carry it all in. There was no way she was carrying her entire equipment box just to bring along a few things. All her glassware was in that!


    That done, she checked herself. Hat, raincoat¡­ Lori nodded to herself in satisfaction and opened the door. For the second time that day, Riz was there, and Lori gave her a nod of acknowledgement. "The smiths?" she prompted as she opened her door wide and wedged it in place by making the floor rise up slightly to bracket the door.


    "They said it would be ready soon, Great Binder. It will probably be done when we get back." The woman glanced at the open door in confusion, but fell into step with Lori as the started climbing down. Behind them, Lori made spikes start growing sideways from the wall, physically barring people but leaving most of the corridor clear.


    When they got to the ground floor, Lori took a moment to bar the stairway as well, and even physically tried to squeeze through. She didn''t fit.


    She was just about to nod to herself in satisfaction when Riz coughed. "Um, your Bindership, will any of the children fit through there?"


    Lori blinked and looked at the stone growths barring the way to her room again, then sighed as she saw what Riz had. Rainbows.


    After modifying the placement to keep the children from being able to pass through, Lori put bindings of airwisps all along the corridor, anchored to the stone floor and ceiling, and imbued them heavily. When she activated the bindings, she felt a breeze around her head as air was drawn to the top of the corridor, even as air began to blow out from along the floor, making the leather of her raincoat sway slightly. "All right, let''s go."


    "Ah, airing day," Riz said as she nodded in comprehension.


    Lori''s Ice Boat was ready, the woman who Lori vaguely recognized as the one who operated it nowadays already at the controls. Riz had apparently decided to bring along some people to take advantage of the trip, because two people with sickles were already sitting on the boat, along with someone Lori recognized as one of Riz''s friends and who commonly accompanied them on trips like this.


    Lori settled down on one of the shallow benches, laying her staff on the floor so she had one hand free to grab hold of her hat and another to keep her bone container from falling over and spilling everything as Riz followed in after her and took her own seat. "All right. Take us out, Clowee," the non-officer said.


    With a familiar lurch, the boat slid out of the dock as the steam in the steam jet driver pushed against the water, the front turning to point upstream and towards the edge.


    The sky already threatened rain.

 299 - The Shed On The Edge

    The rain began to fall about halfway to the edge. Lori had to adjust her grip on her hat and tried to divert the falling rain with a binding of airwisps. It was inconsistent cover, since while the direction the rain fell from was mostly consistent, occasional crosswinds blew water around her binding, which had to be quite high to sufficiently divert the raindrops. A binding of waterwisps to turn any oncoming raindrops into vapor would have worked better, but such a binding wouldn''t have been able to move with the boat quickly enough to do any good.


    She also had to get the water that fell into the boat out. While there was little danger of sinking, the rain water on the bound ice of Lori''s Ice Boat rendered them dangerously slippery. Lori had to draw them together with waterwisps into a viscous glob, and then throw the water over the side into the river.


    The sound came slowly and insidiously, or at least that''s how it felt like to Lori. She had just finished throwing another viscous ball of water, the binding of waterwisps holding it together anchored to her hands, when she realized she was hearing it, even if she didn''t know what it was. The sound was high-pitched and intermittent, cutting off briefly before resuming. The noise sounded distant, but if she was hearing it from the river, and over the sound of the rain¡­


    Lori took an embarrassingly long time to place that the sound was.


    It was beasts screaming in pain as the Iridescence was washed off their bodies by the rain.


    The screams weren''t as intense as they could be, not like the ones she''d heard when there''d been a powerful downpour. In this light rain, while the surface Iridescence on the beasts'' feathers and on the few stretches of their bodies not covered would have been washed off, the water was unlikely to be plentiful enough to wash off the iridescence growing deep within their bodies. Feathers were very good for repelling water, after all. Still, there were parts of beasts not so thoroughly covered, such as around their eyes. No matter how they turned their head, at least one eye would have the Iridescence around it washed away, the flesh around the sensitive region becoming raw and irritated painfully as the iridescence under the skin was slowly drawn up and washed off the by rainwater.


    It was a disturbing sound, one that multiplied as they drew closer to the edge, growing louder as they neared the border of her demesne. Lori felt like the cries were making her heart vibrate in her chest.


    The edge looked different than it usually did. The rain had begun to wash off the growing iridescence from the trees. While the trees still glittered, enough had spots and streaks of dark color showing through, muted shades of green and brown. The rocks and ground on the riverbanks were almost bare, but little spots of glittering colors still shone, somehow untouched by the rain so far.


    "Prepare to land here," Lori pointed where the ropeweed was a bit shorter than anywhere else along the bank. The rain had made the exact location of the edge a bit uncertain, and she didn''t want to accidentally ride out of her demesne.


    "Yes, your Bindership!" the woman operating the steam jet driver said, the boat beginning to turn. There was the sound of something heavy sliding, and she actually felt the boat slow a little as they maneuvered.


    Once they landed, and everyone had gotten out of the boat, Lori was able to put together and anchor a binding that turned any water that would fall into the boat to vapor, so that it wouldn''t fill up with water. So when she finally finished the binding and anchored it in place, the rain stopped, because of course it did! From the dirty looks being directed at the clouds above, she wasn''t the only one who thought so.


    "Erzebed," Lori said, trying to keep her annoyance reined in, "check for any beasts we can''t hear. The rest of you, start cutting ropeweed and loading the boat. If there''s too much, come back for it later."


    There were acknowledgements, but Lori had already turned away, gathering her container of effects from the boat so it wouldn''t get buried by ropeweed. The ground was soft underneath, her boots sinking slightly into the mud, but not enough for her to be inclined to try and use a binding on it. Holding her container in her arms¡ªand then turning it on its side to drain it once she realized it was full of water¡ªLori began to claim waterwisps, forming a binding that drew a thick, viscous mass of water out of the river. As Riz and her friend threw rocks to check for beasts, the two with the sickles began cutting ropeweed, and the one who''d been operating the boat began to gather the cut ropeweed into bundles, Lori began pulling torso-size globs of water from the river and binding them solid so they would flow.


    "It''s clear, Great Binder," Riz eventually reported, eyeing the solidified water around Lori. At some point, Lori had started solidifying the water in the river and then moving them out, so she had begun to make bigger and bigger boulder-like globs of ice, all still bound to stay solid.


    "Thank you Riz," Lori said. "Keep watch while I work."


    First, she started combining the globs of solidified water together, until they all formed a large, irregular mass. Flattening out the bottom and anchoring the waterwisps to the earthwisps on the ground, Lori slowly moved the large mass towards the edge, making sure to stand uphill from the mass should it start to slide along the ground from its own weight. Fortunately, that didn''t happen and she was eventually able to get the mass to the edge.


    A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Cautiously, Lori moved the mass a bit further inland, following the curve of the edge, until she reached a tree. The trunk was thick but bare near the ground, and part of the tree extended out into the colors. She carefully moved the mass of solidified water to press up against the tree and, moving slowly and carefully, began to enfold the lower part of the tree''s trunk.


    Once a part of the solidified water was enfolded around the trunk, securing the mass¡ªtheoretically¡ªLori was finally able to start shaping it. A part of her was still exasperated that she was actually going with Rian''s idea to build this structure with ice, but¡­ well, it actually did work, and it meant she didn''t have to try and excavate rocks out of the ground to build her shed. She anchored the mass of solidified water to the ground, moving the ice so that the shed had a thick, heavy base to distribute the weight. When it became clear she didn''t have enough mass, she just drew more water from the river and now would have been a good time to have water falling out of the sky!


    Still, it wasn''t too dissimilar from working with stone and earthwisps, and she''d built enough things with using that material that she was able to build her shed with a decent amount of confidence, skill and speed. It took time, but well before noon she had a dome-like structure of ice that was half-inside, half-outside of her demesne. The walls weren''t perfectly clear, since there was river sediment suspended in it, but she could still see through the walls of the building and out the other side.


    As buildings went, it was the most fragile one she''d made¡ªthe top of the dome was a mere three yustri or so thick, though the dome got thicker the lower down it went¡ªbut it kept the rain off, and she had some small confidence that if a beast tried charging at the walls, it would last long enough for her to run deeper into her demesne¡­provided that the beast was about her height and not one of the big, heavy, slow moving ones¡­


    Well, she could add more water to the walls to make it thicker next time, maybe add rocks to the base to make it more secure¡­


    For now, noon was nearing, so she had Riz gather some rocks and stepped inside the cover of her new shed¡ªshe was just barely able to stand inside it¡ªand set about getting her experiments ready. First, she extracted the two sealed bone containers full of white iridescence from her container and, after checking above her in case some water had appeared to drip down into the samples¡ªnone had¡ªshe opened each container one at a time to check the state of the contents. The samples appeared unchanged, even when she bound some lightwisps to shine more light on them.


    She sealed the containers again, then took the rocks Riz had gathered and reshaped them to make two small, hollow containers. Each little bone container was put into a stone to protect it in case chokers or bugs made their way into her ice shed. Then she stepped over the border of her demense¡ªthere was a sudden change of temperature as the air became a bit cooler for her¡ªto place the shaped stone container containers up against the wall of the shed that was deepest into the colors. Taking her belt knife, she softened the tops of the hollowed stones and wrote which one contained which sample.


    Then she set about testing the production molds.


    Finding Iridescence that she could use was a bit difficult because of the rain, but Lori was able to scrape some off the dry, overhanging parts of the trees with her belt knife, and used her hat as a shade to keep water off the samples. Riz and her friend followed her, keeping watch for danger. When she turned around to go back to the shed to get to work, however, Lori realized the shed had only one door.


    And it was on the side of the shed that was inside her demesne.


    A mildly amused Riz held Lori''s hat over the little prototype tray full of Iridescence as Lori went back inside the demesne and entered the shed, then opened a small hole in the shed wall which Riz was able to pass the prototype tray through. Unfortunately, a little water dripped into the tray, dissolving the Iridescence in two of the cells, but she had enough to samples to redistribute after she''d gotten rid of the water.


    Once Riz had walked around the shed and given Lori her hat back, Lori began to test the prototype. Instead of using heavily imbued bindings to amalgamate into beads, she only imbued then with a small amount of magic, just enough for them to start amalgamating with the iridescence to form a bead, then actively imbued them using the copper ingot as a contact point to channel magic.


    All the beads began to form properly, though their growth was slower than normal because she was imbuing them. She held the tray carefully at a slight angle, not wanting to have the amalgamating beads roll around such that they lost contact with the ingot and stop forming.


    The one formed from pressing down a bead of the size she wanted onto bone to leave an impression was the first of the prototypes to fail. It probably would have worked if she''d laid the tray on a completely flat and level surface, but she had clearly made the area where the bead would contact the ingot too small. She debated trying it again later once this batch was finished, but had to decide against it. If it would only work in ideal conditions¡­ well, it would probably be a long time before she''d have anything approaching ideal conditions during production.


    Other failures soon followed. These were the molds similar to the imprint one, with concave bowl-like sides where she''d also made the contact area too small to account for the bead rolling around too far to the side. Disappointing, but at least she didn''t have to worry about trying to figure out why the molds failed.


    In the end of the first production run, only four molds worked as intended all the way to the end, creating beads of the size she wanted. They were the shallow ring-shaped one, one shaped like an angled trench, the shallow square one with inclined sides which had been an angular take on the concave molds, and a mold that had a simple incline in it. In each, the bead had been lifted up from the metal contact point by its own growth, though the resulting beads weren''t all the same size. Well, she''d done her best by using an actual bead to try and calibrate the molds, but at least the results were all pretty close.


    She marked the outside of the molds that had worked so she wouldn''t forget. Now, all she had to do was simply to show them to her carpenters, and possibly her smiths, and have them build a tray for bead mass production using the shape that was the easiest for them to mass produce. Once she had that, she could begin true mass production of beads.


    Lori could hardly wait. She would have her monopoly!

 300 - The Production Mold And The Second Prototype

    Of course, despite the previous failures, Lori tried all the molds again, just to be sure. She even made a little level table using ice to give the curved molds the best chance of working. Some of them actually did work then, but unfortunately they still didn''t make it all the way to the end. The failures weren''t even consistent about what size they failed at, so she couldn''t even use them to make smaller denomination beads.


    By the time they had to return for lunch, she had several undersized beads and twenty of the size she''d been aiming for. It was a moderately good haul, but she''d need to make it more efficient. If she didn''t care about size, she could simply heavily imbue the binding she''d be amalgamating with and then have several start growing at once. Given she was going to be limited by the amount of magic she could channel to the binding through the metal contact, she''d need to make each production run of a fairly large scale to make it efficient¡­


    Once Lori had removed all the water that had gathered at the bottom of the boat so that people wouldn''t slip on the ice¡ªputting down some of the cut ropeweed as something to step on helped¡ªthey all got back aboard to head back down to her Dungeon. Lori held her prototype and container of beads carefully, noting that she needed a bigger container again. The trip back was slow as, again, the boat was full of cut ropeweed. She took the time to imbue her new shed, since she didn''t have anything else to do, and made a note to herself to add the shed to her list of things to imbue in the morning. The shed would probably need to be replaced with something actually solid at some point, but for now options were limited, and required either gathering stone or a very large number of bones.


    After delicately maneuvering Lori''s Ice Boat to the dock and waiting to be able to get off, Lori found that lunch had already started. Rainbows. She hoped that didn''t mean only the dregs of food were left: mostly water, lukewarm, cold gummy bread, and disintegrating tubers. Ugh, maybe they should have brought food this time.


    She went up to her room to dump the beads in with the others she''d already made. Perhaps she could make a basket made of bone or something, with a handle for easier carrying? That might work better for transporting beads from the edge. She definitely needed something with a wider base so there''s risk of it falling over when full¡­


    Her prototype mold in hand, Lori went down to her table, where Mikon and Umu were already eating. As Lori sat, wishing her bench had a backrest to lean on, Riz arrived with two bowls of food. To her surprise, the bowls Riz came back with were¡­ not full of dregs. In fact, there seemed to be more meat and tubers in the stew than usual! There was even an extra disk of bread! Wait, was that because they were the last to get food, so since no one else was going to get food they got more of everything? Does that mean she should start waiting for everyone else to get food first¡­?


    No, no, she couldn''t wait that long. Though in future, maybe she''d consider sending Rian for a second serving if she was still hungry.


    "Riz," Lori said, and the woman in question paused¡­ well, paused as much as she could while still using her spoon to bring food in her mouth and eat. Rian should learn from her. "Inform the carpenters and the coppersmiths I need to meet with them after lunch. I need them to build something for me."


    "Uh¡­ now, Great Binder?"


    "No, it can wait until after lunch. But I need to talk to them today. After that meeting, you''re dismissed for the day."


    "Understood, Great Binder. I''ll get to it after lunch, then."


    Lori nodded absently, staring at the little prototype mold as she continued to eat.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Unlike Rian, Riz didn''t prepare a list of the carpenters name arranged according to where they were sitting. Well, she wouldn''t be addressing any single one of them anyway, so that was fine.


    Lori placed her prototype on top of the table the carpenters and coppersmiths were seated around. "You probably have things to get back to, so I shall make this brief," Lori said. "I need a new tool based upon this prototype. It must be a tray at least a pace long and half a pace wide, divided into a grid of cells such as these. Each cell must contain¡­ well, whichever of these four designs would be easiest for you to replicate for each cell."


    She indicated the cells of the prototype that had functioned until the beads had grown to the size she wanted. Lori supposed it was a good thing the cells with the concave-shaped molds had all failed early and been removed from consideration, since they would have been difficult to reproduce in a timely manner with the equipment they had now. Not impossible¡ªcraftsmen could be amazing with hand tools¡ªbut it certainly wouldn''t be quick, since it would likely require hand-carving each cell.


    The prototype was passed around as the carpenters all examined the cells she had indicated, though many turned it over to look at the ingot of copper embedded into the tray.


    "In addition to the tray, cells and whichever shape you all decide will be easiest to put into the cells, there also needs to be metal at the bottom of each cell as a contact point," Lori continued. "Sheet metal will do, but it will need to be completely flat and level, and either all one piece or connected together by wire. It will also need to have removable and adjustable legs, since I will need to be able to move it back and forth from where I need to use it."


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    "Does¡­ this have to do with making beads, your Bindership?" one of the carpenters asked.


    "Did I say that?" Lori said blandly.


    "Um¡­ well, everyone knows you come back with new beads on mornings that you go to the edge, your Bindership."


    "Oh? And does this ''everyone'' include Shanalorre?" she said, turning to look at Riz intently.


    Riz flinched. "I¡­ don''t know? I don''t think so¡­"


    "See to it that it doesn''t," Lori said, turning back to the craftsmen. "Are you asking to be compensated with beads for this work?"


    The carpenters looked at each other, then all pointedly looked at the one who''d first spoken. He, for his part, looked towards Riz, who looked away with a theatrical air of innocence¡ªRian''s was better¡ªpretending not notice. Lori, for her part, never looked away from him. Eventually, he turned to face Lori again. "No, your Bindership. After all, what will we spend it on? But¡­"


    "Rest assured, you will be compensated," Lori said. "And¡­" The next words made her want to sigh. "¡­when you finish with this project, and I''ve used it successfully, I''ll have Rian declare a¡­ a holiday."


    The carpenters all looked at each other as they considered that.


    "A five day holiday," the one she was talking to rebutted.


    "I''m not going to haggle this," Lori said flatly. "I will agree to a minimum of one day of holiday. You can negotiate with Rian for the other four when he comes back."


    The man paused, but nodded, obviously thinking that Rian would be easier to convince.


    "Good. Now, tell me which of the cells would be easiest for you to build¡­"


    The carpenters got down to business, asking her which parts of the prototype were necessary and which could be removed or modified. No, the walls of each cell didn''t really need to go all the way down to the base, they were just there to separate the different cells. Yes, the rows and columns did need to be spaced that far apart. Would the angled trench design still work without the panels that separated the rows of cells? She¡­ wasn''t sure, but maybe? She''d have to test it. No, just wires are unlikely to work, it will need to be sheets, though relatively thin sheets will do.


    Someone got a plank and sketched out a diagram for a design. It¡­ well, stripped of the parts she had said they could strip out, the resulting tray looked like a laundry board. The rows of the angled-trench design ran parallel to each other, implied to have strips of copper on their bottoms and there was no grid of cells.


    Lori imagined using the proposed tray, and¡­ thought it would actually work, and work very well. The separate growing beads didn''t fuse together in any case, meaning it didn''t matter if they touched while amalgamating and growing. She''d need something to anchor the bindings to start with, but if she put firewisps or lightningwisps in the metal she could anchor the bindings to those. At worse¡­


    "Cut the edge short on one side of each trench," Lori directed. "While it should work, I might need to make a modification if I experience problems. Best to put the space for me to install the modification now." She could put a small strip of bone or stone to anchor the bindings too if needed. "If it''s not needed, then the change shouldn''t affect the functionality of the tray."


    "Can we trim both sides?"


    "If you feel it best."


    Eventually, the design of the tray was tentatively finalized, but Lori had them start working on the base of the tray first while she tested the long-trench configuration tomorrow. While she believed it should work, best to test it while they still had time to modify the design. She gave the redsmiths the ingots they needed to begin making the copper sheets needed. Lori hoped they could make the sheets as flat as she needed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The second prototype bound tool had been completed and was presented to Lori when the two smiths making it saw she was done speaking to the carpenters. It had, admittedly, slipped her mind that morning, but with it now in her hands, she decided to begin testing how well it worked¡­ after she also made a base for it so it wasn''t just flopping around like some sort of dismembered extremity.


    The second prototype¡­ didn''t look all that different from the first bound tool prototype. Oh yes, one was round with wire coming out from it, and the other one was a compact, hard square that had been sealed¡ªforge welded, unless she missed her guess¡ªwith a wire secured to its side, but beyond that aesthetic difference, they were very similar in principle. In her hand though, the second prototype was clearly more solid, and had a greater sense of weight. The shell of the first prototype, despite being work-hardened, felt a bit delicate to her touch. The second prototype also had a shorter length of gold wire, and instead of a saucer made from a spiral of gold wire, it had one made from a sheet of copper.


    A part of her already expected the second prototype to behave in a similar way, which was probably bad scholarship on her part, but she couldn''t really help it. As a prototype, the first had been fairly successful, so she wanted the second to at least meet the same baselines. Physically, she could already tell that the second prototype would probably be more solid than the first.


    With Rian absent, she had to write her own notes again. Unlike the first prototype, which had a binding of wisps anchored to the white Iridescence and then again to the copper shell, this prototype had the samples of white iridescence tightly packed and pressed right up against the layer of copper containing them, so the firewisps or lightningwisps within the copper shell could be anchored to the white Iridescence directly. Aesthetically, it was an improvement for her, but in practical terms, it wasn''t all that different from the first prototype. But then, that was to be expected.


    Repeating all the various bindings of wisps that she tried on the first prototype, they all worked in the same way, even the binding of airwisps for circulating air was as ineffectual until she mounted a bone ring to the prototype to extend the area of the binding.


    The difference, however, was that the second prototype felt much more physically robust. Lori was more willing to use the second prototype as a base to make a water jet bound tool than the first bound tool, which made her feel like a knock could deform the copper shell, tear it open, and either chip the sample in the setting to tear at the binding or let water in and allow the sample to dissolve away.


    As difficult and time consuming as the second prototype was to make, if she was going to be handing out bound tools to her idiots, she''d rather use it as a base since it seemed more likely to survive idiotic behavior.


    Maybe that''s why they used glass in bound tools? Glass was known to be a relatively fragile material, and any damage to it fairly obvious. When people saw the glass of a bound tool, they might be more inclined to handle it carefully.


    ¡­


    She really hoped that wasn''t the case. If one simply wanted to keep a bound tool from being easily damaged, making parts of it out of large blocks of metal would be far more effective than relying on people''s tendency to be careful with glass.


    Well, she''d find out herself once she started trying to melt the glass they did have into something she could try to use.


    For now, she¡ª


    There was a knock on the door. "Great Binder? It''s time for dinner."


    ¡ªwould go down and eat dinner, then tell Riz to prepare to go out to the edge again tomorrow.

 301 - Rians Considered Advice

    After breakfast the next day, the trip to the edge of the demesne was quick, and this time they didn''t bring any people to gather ropeweed with them. When they arrived at the edge, Lori was glad to see the shed still standing, its surface unmarred. She''d been worried a beast would grow curious about the structure and try to break in or otherwise damage it, something that might still happen. The ground around it was already glittering with growing Iridescence.


    She was tempted to flood the area to wash away the colors, but it was only an instinctive impulse. Lori needed the Iridescence as seeds to amalgamate beads, and with it growing in the part of the shed outside of her demesne, she''d finally have a consistent, reliable source of Iridescence crystals¡­ since she kept forgetting to bring a sealed jar out here to grow them in. Now she didn''t have to remember anymore!


    ¡­


    If Rian ever asked, that had been her plan all along.


    Riz and her friend went to check the area beyond the edge for beasts as Lori went into the shed. Up above, the sun was bright and there were few clouds, but Lori didn''t trust that. As Lori crouched down, carefully removing pieces of Iridescence¡ªas large as she could extract¡ªputting them it in the prototype mold that she had modified the night before to be one long trench shape, she reflected that the shed was going to need some kind of chair. And a table. And a shelf to hold things if she wanted to keep the table clear. And maybe a window to help with air circulation¡­


    What would have been the first batch was utterly ruined as she accidentally pulled it into her demesne when she moved without thinking. Strangling her scream of frustration, she got more iridescence, and then carefully stood up on the far outer-side of her shed¡ªtelling herself she was imagining the feeling of the colors already burrowing into her flesh¡ªbefore she began anchoring bindings to the bone, anchoring the ones she had imbued inside her demesne onto her finger and from there to the bone. Lori had to carefully hold the mold level so that the iridescence wouldn''t all just gather into a clump, and she carefully nudged the pieces of Iridescence into where she knew where the binding wer¡ª


    She should have anchored the bindings to the mold before she took the mold out of her demesne and started putting iridescence into the mold, shouldn''t she?


    ¡­


    ARGH!


    ¡­


    Well, she''ll remember to do that next time!


    With the bindings imbued and anchored, and a piece of iridescence touching each one, she started the experiment. Still holding the new mold level¡ªthe shape actually reminded her of the brick-like molds used for large ingots, or at least ingots as depicted in plays¡ªshe detached each binding from where it was anchored and had it start amalgamating with the piece of Iridescence in contact with it at the same time.


    One by one, each binding started amalgamating into a bead. The long strip of metal at the bottom of the mold was a good contact point for her to imbue the growing beads through, and the trench-like sides kept the beads on it. Lori carefully angled one end of the mold down and the small growing beads, some still a bit lopsided since they hadn''t yet formed a proper spherical shape, rolled down to one end. She tensed as one looked like it would roll up and off the metal, but the trench sides stopped it.


    The beads grew until their shapes pushed up against the angled walls of the trench, pushing the beads up off the strip of metal and ceasing their imbuement. One by one, they stopped growing. Lori took two at random and held them up, comparing their sizes. They looked about the same size, though one felt a hair larger than the other. She closed one eye and adjusted her grip, making sure they were both the same distance from her open eye. They seemed¡­ close enough. She''d need to check with her calipers for sure.


    Still, it was a successful proof of concept test. She could tell the carpenters to build the tray as planned.


    "Erzebed," she called as she stepped out of the shed, "we''re going."


    "Eh? Already, Great Binder?"


    "Yes. I didn''t need long. Also, remind me that the shed needs a chair. And a table. And a shelf. And a window to let the air in¡­"


    The woman who operated the boat, Lori was surprised to see, had been loading cut ropeweed that they hadn''t been able to bring back with them yesterday. It wasn''t as much as what they''d brought back yesterday, but Lori supposed she was only one woman. Once Lori and the other two were settled onto Lori''s Ice Boat, they set off again. Since it wasn''t raining, Lori used her hat as a bag to carry the beads, and used a binding of darkwisps over her face to shield her from the glare of the sunlight.


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Once they had managed to maneuver back onto the dock in front of her Dungeon, Lori dispelled the darkwisps and stepped off the boat, careful not to drop her mold or the hat with the beads. Yes, she definitely needed to make a basket out of bone or something.


    She went off to inform the carpenters to continue construction with the trench-covered tray.


    Then she went to get some bones to make a basket.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was finishing her new bone basket when there was a knock on the door to her room. "Your Bindership!" Rian''s cheerful voice called through her door. "Lunch time!"


    She gave the voice a suspicious look¡ªwell, technically she gave her door a suspicious look, since it was in the way¡ªas she stood up from her table. When she opened the door, Rian was standing there, smiling brightly.


    "Hi! I''m back!" He waved at her for some reason.


    Despite herself, Lori took a deep inhalation through her nose, sniffing the air.


    "Wow, is that really what you think of me? I just got back home."


    "I wouldn''t know, I''ve been busy in my room."


    "Well, I just got back home, so there''s no call for you to sniff me suspiciously like that. Come on, let''s eat. What experiments are we going to do next? You said you''d wait for me before trying to embed white Iridescence into copper, right?"


    Lori rolled her eyes as she closed and locked her door behind her, then headed downstairs. "Well, then you can take care of arranging it with the smiths tomorrow."


    His smile became a grin. "Yes, your Bindership!"


    On the other side of the table Umu, Mikon and Riz were all looking far more lively. When Rian sat down on the bench Umu and Riz were all over him, while Mikon used the distraction to press up against Umu from behind. Oh, it was probably also to get at Rian, but Lori recognized the maneuver from when her mothers flirted. All that was missing was Umu laughing and ineffectually swatting at the other weaver. For once, however, instead of being bashful and hesitant, Rian was merely being bashful but had a big smile on his face as¡­ he was actually flirting back!


    As Lori stared at them in exasperation, and some mild nausea, Rian glanced at her and gave her an apologetic smile. "Ah, we should stop for now everyone. Binder Lori is making the same face she does when she talks about her mothers." She was? Wait, she made a face when she talked about her mothers?


    "Yes, stop," Lori said. "I need to talk to Rian, and he won''t pay attention properly when you three are distracting him." She paused, then amended, "Distracting him more than usual."


    "Eeeeeh?"


    "Aaaaaaaw!"


    Mikon merely sighed loudly, pouting at Lori for some reason, but at least didn''t whine noisily like the other two. She was also forced to remove her arms from around Umu''s shoulders, who had finally noticed.


    "Well?" Lori said to Rian as Umu glared at Mikon, who was making an innocent face. "What is the situation in River''s Fork?"


    "Doing well," Rian said. "The terrace is coming together, but I''d like to bring some people better suited to building things with me next time. Some people who used to be militia engineers, just to make sure we don''t make any silly mistakes. Between the meat we brought, the seels Karina and the other children have been seeling, and the beast meat we''ve been hunting, they should be good for a while. Well, provided no one starts stealing, overeating, or anything else stupid."


    "So, they''re still doomed to starve."


    "Now, it''s not that bad. The few people who tend to make trouble are being kept busy and are actually behaving themselves. I think that changing our approach, focusing on making them feel welcome again, and reintegrating them into the community would be more effective in making them change their ways and have them cease their behavior."


    Lori gave him an unamused look. "Rian, whatever booze you drank while you were there this morning, confiscate it next time you go. We need something to distill it for medical antiseptic."


    "What do you¡ªI''m not drunk!" He actually looked offended at the accusation. "It''s the middle of the day! Do I really seem like the sort of person who''d be drunk at noon?"


    She tilted her head, then leaned forward to peer at him.


    "I''m not the sort of person who''d be drunk at noon!"


    "I wouldn''t know, I have no idea what sort of person that is."


    "Then why did you look at me like that?"


    "As I said, I have no idea what sort of person that is, so I was making observations to learn."


    Rian sighed. "Of course you were. Well, I''m not someone like that, so consider all those observations useless."


    "No. You were sighing and complaining about how frustrating those malcontents were before you left. What happened that you¡ª?" Lori paused. She shifted her gaze and eyed the three.


    "Not that!" Rian said, but he was blushing as he said it. "And I wasn''t drunk, I just realized that being angry with them accomplished nothing and would actually encourage them to continue to acting like the way they have been. Since that''s not working, we need to change what we''re doing."


    "And you think that... what, welcoming them and integrating them would be more effective?"


    Rian shrugged. "What are the alternatives that you''re willing to do to them and their children?" He smiled. It was surprisingly toothy. "Besides, this way we don''t lose people who can work. Given we can''t exactly spare anyone here to move to River''s Fork, and there aren''t many who''d be willing to at the moment since they probably feel safer here in the event of a dragon. That''s my considered advice on this ''dealing with people'' matter."


    Lori gave him a long, flat look. "I''ll leave that to you, then. Deal with it."


    Rian shrugged. "So what else is new?"


    "Shanalorre wants to take some of the children who live with her to see their parent''s in River''s Fork."


    "Oh, that''s a great idea! It would help with some people who are griping and moaning about us taking their children hostage, and I''m sure their parents would be happy to see them."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "Binder Shanalorre''s uncle?"


    A sigh and a nod. "Binder Shanalorre''s uncle."


    From the table behind Lori, there was a tired, embarrassed sigh. "Uncle¡­"

 302 - Speaking of Tax Evasion

    Over lunch, Lori and Rian discussed matters. River''s Fork was progressing and remaining relatively stable, and people were all regularly eating in the dining hall now, even if they did so far earlier because of the lack of resources for lights. As she had ordered, he brought back a large amount of the fruit. Fresh pink ladies and hairy blueballs, and some of the older micans and golden buds they had in storage.


    "Excellent," Lori said. "Put half of that in with the general food supply for distribution and set the rest aside for me."


    Rian raised an eyebrow. "We filled all the cargo containers in the ship with them."


    "I know what I said."


    "Ah. I should have realized that it was all too good to be true. You''re planning to keep all the good fruits for yourself so that you can have sweet snacks any time you want, aren''t you? Figures¡­"


    Lori blinked. Then her head slowly began to tilt sideways.


    "Oh. Uh, I might have just made a horrible mistake¡­"


    "Yes, you did," Riz sighed.


    Eventually, Lori shook her head. "Regardless. There''s something I need the fruits for. You may distribute the rest with the current meals."


    Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "That being said, I''m not to be disturbed for the rest of the day."


    Her lord blinked, surprise. "That''s¡­ rare. What about emergencies?"


    "Define ''emergency''?"


    "Uh¡­ sudden arrival of new people, significant infrastructure damage, dragons, fires, floods, and any of the children getting injured¡­"


    Lori considered that. "Fine, you may disturb me for any of those emergencies."


    "All right, then. You know, in stories you''d say some sort of hyperbole you''re not to be disturbed for, and then that thing would happen and we wouldn''t disturb you about it."


    "Well, I expect you to be smarter than those kinds of badly written comedy characters."


    "They''re usually written for dramatic irony and to mock the shortsightedness of the arrogant. Does that mean I can interrupt you even for an emergency that''s not on the list?"


    "¡­ all right, fine. But don''t interrupt me for anything else! I have things to do."


    Rian glanced down at her shirt. "Laundry day?"


    "I have things to do."


    "Of course. Please wash your socks before you ask me to sew them."


    "What sort of person do you think I am?"


    "Not the sort of person to get drunk before noon?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, Lori locked herself in her room and did something she''d been putting off.


    She did her laundry.


    Loin cloths, chest wraps, shirts¡ªshe liked the fit better than blouses¡ªtrousers, and most importantly her socks, they all had to be washed. Unlike Rian, it wasn''t like some woman was going to conveniently volunteer to do it for her, so she had to do it herself. At least she had enough soap for it.


    Doing the laundry wasn''t exactly an unpleasant chore. Over the months of doing it, she''d built her infrastructure. A little stone stool for her to sit on so she didn''t have to squat, a flat washing surface covered with the ridged pattern of a washboard, flowing water¡­ mostly it was all time-consuming. First she inspected all of her clothes for holes and worn seams, which were fortunately not that common, all the while once more chiding herself for not having done this before she''d worn the clothes and given them some ripeness. The socks she would sort later after washing, so she could give Rian the ones that needed to be darned.


    Once all the repairs had been made, she set about washing them. She anchored lightwisps on the ceiling above her and made them shine brightly with a cool white light so she could see her clothes clearly. Her chest wraps, loin cloths and socks first, because they were smallest and easiest to wash. Shirts next, because they were soft and white. Then her trousers for last, since the heavy cloudbloom weave needed a bit of effort to clean. Also, she used the trousers she wasn''t washing yet to cushion the stool she was sitting on, so that the cold hard stone wouldn''t make her bare posterior go numb.


    When all her clothes had been washed and wrung of as much water as she could squeeze out with her hands, she careful dried them the rest of the way by binding the waterwisps still in the clothes. She took care not to remove all of the water¡ªthat would damage the threads¡ªleaving her clothes just dry enough.


    For a moment, she considered washing her bedroll and blanket as well, but¡­ well, it was a bit too late for that. She''d need to sleep soon, after all, and washing those two was very time consuming.


    When all the clothes had been sufficiently dried and removed from her bath room, the last thing she washed was herself. Splash, soap, scrub, and she was able to refresh herself. Even if she couldn''t get hot or cold, washing so many clothes was always sweaty work, which was why she''d long since taken to washing her clothes naked. It was more comfortable and practical that way.


    Wearing her last set of clothes, Lori headed downstairs to get some stone from the stockpile near her dungeon''s entrance. There had been¡­ two on the first prototype, and¡­ two more on the second?


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "No socks?" Rian said as Lori sat down on her bench, wearing her last fresh set of clothes. Already sitting on the bench, Shanalorre gave Lori a nod that was returned, while the other Dungeon Binder''s cousin played with what looked like a beast and a sweetbug that had both been carved from wood. Who had made that?


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    "They''re still drying," Lori said, looking away from the two toys. "Rian, do we have any of the large containers we used to store vigas that are empty?"


    "Uh, you''re not planning to alter it or anything are you? Those big jars take a long time to make."


    "No, I''m not planning to alter it, I just need one. An empty one that''s clean and dry inside."


    "How clean? Is a little dusty on the inside fine?"


    Lori titled her head. "That should work."


    "I''ll get one cleaned up for you tomorrow, then."


    "Good. Have you and Shanalorre discussed the logistics of her suggestion?"


    "Does that mean you''re allowing it, Great Binder?"


    She waved a hand dismissively. "I leave the logistics to the two of you. How long will this visit last?"


    "At least two days," Shanalorre said. "The children will stay overnight."


    "That''s just long enough for them all to appreciate getting to see each other," Rian said. "And we don''t need to bring any additional food for the children. Though we should anyway, give the demesne more of a buffer."


    Lori grunted. "How is our food holding out?"


    "Hunting''s still going well. The problem is still being able to recover enough meat during a hunt before other beasts smell the blood and come to eat their fill, but they''ve started getting wary of us, and the hunters have been getting better at luring the beasts near the demesne before putting them down, so we''ve been able to bring more and more of the beasts home." Rian shrugged. "We still have to be careful though. The beasts are wary, but they still consider us more food than threat."


    "What about seels?"


    "The children are in charge of that, but they''re still regularly bringing in a good catch. The children left in River''s Fork are doing the same, though of course it''s far less." Rian looked over Lori''s shoulder with a smile. "Karina actually manages to catch a significant portion of the seels each day when she''s there. I mean, she''s not feeding the demesne by herself, but the food stores would certainly feel it when she''s not around."


    Lori nodded. Yes, the brat very clearly needed to be compensated. She added them to the list.


    "Uh, on a slightly related note¡­ when are you going to do more work on their dragon shelter?"


    She hummed thoughtfully. "When I feel like it."


    Shanalorre turned to stare at her.


    "And when will that be, your Bindership?"


    "When I can stand to leave here to work there again. I have research in progress here that I have been delaying. Once that research is finished, I''ll have time to get around to it."


    "And if a dragon arrives before then?" Shanalorre said quietly.


    "Didn''t you manage to survive a dragon by sheltering in the mine?"


    Shanalorre''s voice was completely flat. "We were lucky. It is ill-advised to rely on that luck repeating."


    "Well, what do you expect me to do?" Lori said, matching her tone as she turned to meet the other Dungeon Binder''s gaze. "I can hardly protect them by raising darkwisps around the mine. I have no connection to the demesne''s core. I cannot give the dragon shelter the same sort of protection as I can this place, and those protections that I can, I am in the midst of developing. Development takes time. I''ve done what I can."


    The two of them stared at each other.


    Rian coughed. "Uh, we could¡­ add thick doors to the entrance? You know, something that can keep out dragonborn abominations? Since, uh, the mines don''t have those yet. Sort of a glaring oversight on everyone''s parts, when you think about it¡­"


    Lori frowned. "Doesn''t the mine already have doors? I remember mounting doors in the mine."


    "No, those doors were to keep thieves out of the food stores."


    Huh. "Well, do it then. Make three layers of doors, just to be sure they can keep things out." Redundancy was never unnecessary when it came to dragons.


    "Before or after they finish with your tray?"


    Lori turned away from Shanalorre to turn her flat look at him.


    "Right, right, afterwards. We''ll need you to mount the doors into the stone, though. "


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Yes, yes." She turned her look back on Shanalorre. "There, the dragon shelter will have permanent doors. Happy now?"


    Shanalorre nodded. "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Good. Rian, see to it."


    "I''ll add it to the list of things we need built," Rian said. "And speaking of which¡­ don''t you already have a stool? Why do you need a new one for your shed?"


    "I''m not going to be working while squatting on the ground, so I need a higher seat."


    "All right, fine, but why have the carpenters do it? Can''t you just put together one from bone? Probably not the table, that''s too big, but a chair-like thing is in your skill range, right?"


    ¡­


    "Fine, tell them to stop making the chair. And the table can be replaced with removable, mobile supports for the tray."


    "I''ll tell them. I think they were planning to do something like that anyway. I''ve spoken with the coppersmiths, by the way. They say they can help do the experiment tomorrow. And they recommend you provide the heat so that we don''t have to spend all day trying to melt the copper."


    Lori nodded. "Do they have a mold for the metal?"


    "They had Gunvi¡ªer, the potter¡ªmake them one a while back, but it hasn''t been used yet. Should I tell them it won''t be needed?"


    "No¡­ best we not use any more bindings than needed. Having a crucible or mold made of bound ice might cause a reaction."


    "You could test it? Make a container from bound ice and see what happens?"


    "Perhaps later. Right now, it would be best to simply remove as many variables as possible."


    "Ah. Good idea. Maybe¡ª" Rian cut off as Mikon, Riz and Umu put seven bowls of soup, a plate of as many round disks of bread, cups, a pitcher of water, and several fruits on the table. He turned towards the three, a vaguely betrayed expression on his face. "Hey, it was my turn to go get the food!"


    "You were busy speaking to her Bindership," Mikon said a cheerful smile as Lori took a bowl, one of the bread, counted up the various fruits, and took a pink lady and a golden bud for herself. "We didn''t want to interrupt you."


    "I''m sure you can find some way to make it up to them later, Rian," Lori said as Yoshka cheerfully pointed at the fruits, and Shanalorre grabbed a mican and a pink lady for the little girl.


    "Your Bindership, with all due respect, please don''t help."


    "Now Rian, her Bindership gives wonderful advice that''s worth heeding," Mikon said.


    "She does?-!"


    She did? "Of course, I do," Lori said. "Why do you sound so surprised?"


    "I''m trying to imagine Mikon of all people actually coming to you for advice and you actually giving anything useful, and failing utterly."


    Mikon pouted at him in a way Lori knew was flirtatious. "What do you mean, ''me of all people''?"


    "I can''t imagine any subject you''d actually need her Bindership''s advice, except perhaps accounting or tax evasion."


    Lori snorted. "Rian, don''t be silly. As if I''d give anyone advice on tax evasion when I''ll be the one taxing them."


    "You''re not actually denying having tax evasion advice."


    Lori shrugged.


    "Your Bindership¡­ did you leave the old continent to escape criminal charges for tax evasion?"


    She pointed with her spoon. "Eat your food, Rian."


    He rolled his eyes but bent down and started eating. Yoshka, to no one''s surprise, had eaten the fruits first, so Shalanorre was now using a piece of bread to wipe fruit juice from the girl''s face.


    There was a brief silence filled with only the sounds of the dining hall around them and Shanalorre gently scolding her cousin to be neater when eating as everyone just ate.


    "So¡­ what did you ask her Bindership for advice on?" Rian finally asked.


    "Marriage laws," Mikon said brightly.


    Umu and Riz turned to stare at her as Rian started to redden. "You, uh, could have asked me?"


    "Perhaps later. When we''re ready." She winked at him. Rian couldn''t redden further, so he hastily turned to focus on his food as Riz reddened beside him.


    "Please stop flirting," Shanalorre said, "the Great Binder is starting to look nauseous."


    Lori reached across the table, took one of the fruits that Mikon had picked for herself, and gave it to Shanalorre.


    Shanalorre nodded, but reached back across the table and put it back close to Mikon, since her arms couldn''t reach that far. Lori shrugged. Well, it had been Shanalorre''s fruit, so she could do whatever she wanted¡­


    "Oh no¡­" Rian muttered. "We''re going to have a fruit-based economy, aren''t we?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Of course not, Rian. That would be very silly."

 303 - Making The Third Prototype

    The following day, Lori found herself sitting alone at her table, staring at an empty bench opposite her. A part of her had expected this happening, and that part was nodding in satisfaction at being right. The rest wondered if she''d have to get her own food, which¡­ uh, actually, where would she get her food? Except for holidays, she''d never really gotten her own food, so she wasn''t sure how it was done¡­


    Her bench shifted, and she glanced sideways to find Shanalorre helping her cousin sit down. Once she was properly seated, the little girl promptly folded her arms on the table, lay down her head, and went back to sleep.


    "Is something wrong with your cousin?" Lori said.


    "She''s just hard to wake up in the morning sometimes," Shanalorre said as she glanced towards the other table. Lori didn''t know what she was looking at, but whatever it was, it seemed to satisfy the other Dungeon Binder. She sat down next to her cousin instead of joining the children. "Thank you for allowing the children to visit their parents, Great Binder. I''m sure everyone will appreciate it."


    "I don''t see why," Lori said, "but I leave that matter to you and Rian."


    Shanalorre nodded solemnly. "Should Lord Rian not arrive in a timely manner, do you wish me to get the food for us?"


    "¡­"


    "I''ll take that as a yes, just in case."


    Thankfully, Rian arrived before breakfast started, his plank in hand, but from the way some people were standing up and heading towards the kitchen it seemed about to. He seemed to be more cheerful than usual, his gait more energetic, his smile wider as he sat down on the bench in front of Lori. "Mornin'', your Bindership. Looks like a nice day today."


    Lori leaned forward and sniffed the air suspiciously.


    "I took a bath! And washed my hands. From now on, can we assume I''ve done both when necessary?"


    "In my experience¡­ no."


    "Well, how long before your experiences change?"


    "We''ll see."


    Rian sighed. "Here''s hoping it''s sometime soon." He shook his head, then glanced towards the kitchen. "I''ll get breakfast then. What fruits do you want?"


    "Pink lady and golden bud," Lori said.


    "Mican and hairy blueball," Shanalorre said. "And Yoshka will have the same."


    "Got it, your Binderships."


    By the time he came back, the three women had arrived, their hair still mildly damp from the baths. Umu sat down gingerly, her faced tinged pink, a smile on her face. Riz''s smile was somewhere between serene and self-satisfied, while Mikon was humming happily to herself as she sat next to Umu and put an arm around the other weaver''s shoulders. The blonde tried to shrug off the arm, but Mikon put it back, and Umu seemed to just give up and let it stay there.


    The three of them seemed satisfied to just sit there, the quiet punctuated by a little girl''s not-quite snoring as Rian came back with four bowls of food, a platter of bread, and another bowl full of fruits. "Good morning Umu, Mikon, Riz," he greeted as Lori picked a bowl of stew, took some bread for herself, and got her fruit. "You three stay here, I''ll get your breakfast."


    "Rian¡­ wait, isn''t it¡­" Umu began as Shanalorre started waking her cousin for breakfast.


    "No, no, let him go," Mikon said quietly. "He obviously wants to. Auntie says sometimes you just have to let your man have his way with silly little things."


    The blonde''s interjection died as Rian hurried off to get more food for them. As Shanalorre grabbed two of the bowls and some bread for herself and her cousin, who was rubbing her eyes and starting to smile blearily, Riz casually took the last bowl of stew, bread and fruit and started eating. Umu didn''t seem to notice, but Mikon looked amused at the boldness.


    Lori was halfway done with her bowl of stew when Rian came back with food for himself and the other two women. He also looked amused at seeing Riz eating but said nothing, simply putting down the second batch of food down with a cheerful, "Breakfast is here."


    He sat down between Riz and Umu¡ªwho had moved apart when he''d arrived¡ªand took the last bowl, remaining bread and fruit for himself with a smile. There was a rather pleasant lull¡ªnot silence, not with the rest of the dining hall around them¡ªas they all ate.


    "So," Rian said, "ready to go to the smithy after breakfast?"


    "I don''t see if it''s really needed anymore," Lori said. "The first two prototypes have been quite satisfactory."


    "I''ll take your word for it on the second prototype, but shouldn''t we at least explore an option that''s easier to mass produce? The two prototypes needed skilled workers to make, and took two, three days to make. Sure, the process of making them will likely go faster with proper tools and experience, but if this works, it''ll be as simple as melting the metal and sprinkling the samples on it to embed them until the metal cools solid. That could potentially let us make several at a time with minimal skill, and mass production reduces costs through economies of scale."


    This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    "You don''t even know if it will work yet," Lori pointed out as she started peeling the yellow skin off her golden bud.


    Rian shrugged, chewing and swallow his mouthful of food before replaying. "I''m optimistic, and what data we''ve gathered says it should work. Besides, that''s why we''re testing it first. If it doesn''t work¡­ well, back to the drawing plank." He dipped a piece of bread into his stew and put that in his mouth.


    Lori sighed. "Well, I suppose a method that''s easier to mass produce has merit¡­ but I don''t intend to continue on with this line of inquiry beyond this testing phase. Once I finish my experiments with glass¡ª"


    "Don''t you mean start your experiments with glass?"


    "Once I finish my experiments with glass, I''ll be discontinuing the current line of inquiry utilizing metal."


    "Given we don''t know how long that will take, and given we''ll need a way to keep warm next winter, I still think this will be worth pursuing. Besides, the information might still be useful, even if not immediately."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Yes, yes. We''re doing it, aren''t we?" She frowned at him.


    "What?"


    "I''m surprised that you''re actually managing to keep eating."


    Rian glanced down at his food, then shrugged. "Don''t tell Yllian, but conversation with him isn''t exactly interesting enough to distract me from my food."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After breakfast, they met with the smiths.


    Well, they met with the smiths after Lori went to get a glass bowl of white Iridescence samples. She needed fresh samples that weren''t too finely ground, so that they''d be a little visible against the copper. The samples she came back with were about the dimensions of the rough grains of salt they had in storage, with a few larger pieces, just in case. Then they had met with the smiths.


    Normally, the crucible with the copper to be melted would be placed in a small, sealed furnace designed to hold in heat. While the furnace in the forge could get very hot, it was meant to get metal red-hot so it could be worked and shaped, not to melt metal on a regular basis.


    Fortunately, Lori was there. The ingot of copper that they would be melting only needed to be warmed in the furnace before being placed in the crucible. Normally, a Whisperer would need a wand to claim and bind the firewisps in the hot metal, but Lori had her connection to her core for such things.


    Despite this, she had to increase the heat of the ingot slowly. The crucible was ceramic and the ingot was already very hot, and while the crucible had survived being used to hold molten copper before, a sudden increase in temperature might cause it to break from the sudden extreme temperature change. A gradual rise in heat for the ingot was needed. As the ingot''s temperature rose higher and higher, Lori felt a change in the copper''s wisps. Among the firewisps, earthwisps began to appear. From what she''d read, that meant that the metal was close to liquefying.


    The earthwisps disappeared as the ingot of copper melted into molten metal. It wasn''t something she''d been able to observe when she had first smelted the ore into copper back in River''s Fork. Here in her own demesne however, she''d been able to perceive the moment when the metal could be manipulated by earthwisps because of her connection to the core. Supposedly, the same would happen with glass once an appropriately high temperature was reached.


    The crucible now contained molten copper with some slag floating on the liquid''s surface. The presence of slag always offended her sensibilities. The ingot had been pure copper, the crucible had been cleaned, so why was there slag?


    Unfortunately, it was an unavoidable part of the process. The smith who was handling the crucible used tools like a large metal spoon¡ªit might very well have been just a spoon¡ªto scoop up the slag from the surface of the molten copper, dumping them to the side. Slag contained substances that could be recovered, and with enough slag they''d be able to recover some of the copper that had gotten scooped up. There was already a little jar labeled ''copper slag'' waiting for the slag to cool down enough to be moved into it.


    For all his enthusiasm, Rian was standing well back, perhaps from a healthy respect of the delicacy of dealing with molten metal, but more likely because he found it extremely hot. His face was certainly sweating. Lori wasn''t as far back as he was, but she stayed out of the blacksmith''s way, keeping the copper molten at a distance as the smith picked up the crucible with a long-handled pair of tongs. Carefully, the smith poured some of the molten copper into a ceramic mold, which had been warmed on the forge to ensure there was no moisture in it that could cause a steam explosion, no matter how small. No one wanted molten metal droplets in the air.


    Lori watched as a thin layer of molten copper spread across the bottom of the mold, making a second binding of firewisps to keep the copper in the mold hot as the smith set aside the crucible and put it back inside the furnace, sealing it back with a stone wheel as a lid. It was less to keep the copper warm and more to keep it out of the way. Despite the radiance from the bindings anchored to the ceiling, which gave the smithy a bright illumination, the molten copper clearly glowed a bright orange.


    "Samples," Rian said quietly, handing her the glass bowl of white Iridescence and a wooden spoon.


    Lori nodded in acknowledgement as she took the bowl from him. Using the wooden spoon, she scooped up the white Iridescence, careful to take pieces that weren''t too large. The copper in the mold wasn''t all that thick¡ªabout two chiyustri or so, from whatshe could tell through her awareness of wisps¡ªso the samples should be much thicker. The idea was to have them float slightly on the molten metal, after all.


    She dissolved the binding of firewisps so they wouldn''t accidentally interact with the samples. Carefully, Lori gently tapped the white Iridescence onto the metal, watching as the grains¡ª


    ¡ªsank beneath the surface of the metal and disappeared?


    "Huh?" Rian said, squinting down at the glowing liquid. "What happened? I can''t see very well."


    Lori frowned as well. "Perhaps the samples were too small. Let me try again." She carefully scooped up some bigger pieces of white Iridescence, aware that the copper was slowly cooling. Moving slowly, she sprinkled the sample onto the molten copper.


    She, Rian and now the smith looked down into the mold with its thin layer of molten copper. The surface was bright glowing orange and unmarred with anything floating on top of it like slag.


    "Lori," Rian said slowly. "Do you have a really big piece in the bowl?"


    Wordlessly, Lori used her fingers to pluck a particularly piece of white Iridescence that she had included because she had thought the copper pour would be thicker. It was a triangular fragment at least a yustri thick and half that wide.


    "Could you drop that in?"


    Lori put the sample on the spoon and carefully used the spoon to drop the sample into the still-molten metal.


    The sample sank beneath the surface and disappeared.


    "Well¡­ shit," Rian said blandly. "There goes that idea."

 304 - A New Line Of Inquiry

    Lori wanted to stare at the results of their experiment, to sit down and start seriously considering the implications of what had just happened. However, they had molten metal in a container, and more molten metal that was cooling in a mold. Both were significant safety hazards and needed to be dealt with appropriately first.


    The mold with the thin layer of no-longer-molten but still very hot and glowing copper¡ªfilled with earthwisps and firewisps in her awareness¡ªwas set aside to slowly cool in the part of the forge the smiths had designated for the purpose. Lori made a note to herself to set up something more enclosing that could be covered for added safety, but for now it would do.


    The remaining molten copper was poured into a wide, tray-like mold made of bound ice to make a copper sheet for her mass production tray. Between the mold''s insulating nature and another binding of firewisps to keep the copper molten, they were able to spread out the copper to cover the whole tray. Rian looked amused as she used the spoon the smith had used to scoop out the slag to scrape at the molten copper and check how thick the layer of copper was without having to bend down and see through the ice.


    The redsmiths could probably have made the sheet by simply hammering the copper¡ªit was soft and convenient like that¡ªbut since they were already melting some for this experiment, Rian had arranged they do this step to make sheet copper for her mass production tray. The resulting sheet of copper should be perfectly flat and even, but given this was her first time trying this, it probably wouldn''t be. Lori took some satisfaction in being able to use earthwisps to extract the hot copper remaining in the crucible and adding it to the molten copper. Thankfully, it wasn''t all that different from manipulating stone or bone.


    By the time they finished with the second pour, the first pour that was to have been the third bound tool prototype base had solidified. The copper lay at the bottom of its mold, radiating a dull heat¡ªor so Lori would assume¡ªand glowing a dull red through a layer of soot. At least, until they pried it up from mold and threw it into a bucket of water, where it sank to the bottom, steam bubbling up to the surface.


    All that activity allowed Lori to calm down and put away her confusion at the result. It let her keep calm as they picked up the whole bucket to take back with them¡ªshe wasn''t sure why but she was willing to allow that Rian probably had a good reason for doing so¡ªto the alcove in the third level that stored the broken bead, where her equipment box remained after she''d collected samples for this morning''s experiments. She remained calm as the copper was extracted from the bucket and put in one of Lori''s glass beakers from the equipment box. She stared at the sample, watching a small puddle of water gather around the foot of the sample as Rian left for a moment, trying to put her thoughts in order now that she didn''t have procedure to distract her. She watched blankly as Rian came back some time later, holding a large metal pot, and let herself be diverted watching him pour the water from the bucket into it.


    "Can you boil this without putting any bindings in the water?" Rian said, holding up the metal pot.


    Lori looked up from staring at the sample and trying to get her thoughts in order. "What?"


    "I said, can you boil this without putting any bindings in the water?" he repeated.


    She stared at her lord. "Why?"


    "In case it''s full of dissolved white Iridescence leached out from the copper," Rian said. "The copper strip went from the mold to this bucket. If there''s no white Iridescence in this, then that means it''s still in the copper. Please?"


    ¡­


    Huh. "Why do you think that the water might have leached out the white Iridescence from the copper?" she found herself asking. "It''s not cloudy."


    "Because I want to be sure about where the white Iridescence might be, and given how normal Iridescence is conducted through metal, and leached out through water, we need to check if the same happened to the sample we added to the copper."


    ¡­


    "We''ll need a tripod," Lori said. "Get the one in the box."


    The metal tripod, meant to support her laboratory glassware, just barely managed to support the pot, and Lori placed a binding of firewisps under the pot, sending heat upwards to bring the water to a boil to evaporate the water.


    They set the pot in one of the alcoves along the far wall, away from the cracked open bead so that the moisture from it wouldn''t reach the insides of the bead and cause her complications. A binding of airwisps and waterwisps channeled the steam back into the now-empty bucket next to the pot, where it congealed back into water.


    The water in the pot bubbled gently as the two sat and stared at the strip of copper. The submersion in water had removed some of the dark soot that had formed around the cooling metal, revealing the dull colors of the metal. A bone tablet Lori had prepared was pulled out from under the equipment box and handed to Rian, as well as the stylus.


    "Oh! This is new," her lord commented, looking at the stylus. On the opposite end from the beast tooth, she''d added a small spatula. It had been an annoyance to shape to her satisfaction. "Uh, what is it?"


    "Use it to smooth out anything that needs correction," Lori said.


    "Oh! Nice. Now if you''ll just talk a little slower so I actually have time to make corrections¡­"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Just take notes."


    "Yes, your Bindership." He settled the tablet and readied the stylus. "Right. So, unless I didn''t see it properly¡­the white Iridescence dissolved into the copper. That''s what happened, right? I wasn''t seeing things."


    "Yes Rian, that''s what happened."


    Rian nodded. "So¡­ assuming that the white Iridescence is in the copper and not the water¡ª" They both glanced at the pot, slowly boiling away. "¡ªthen would it be safe to say that this is a copper and white Iridescence alloy?"


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    "That implies that the properties of the copper have been altered by the white Iridescence," Lori pointed out.


    They both glanced at the little strip of copper. In the illumination of the lightwisps Lori had anchored to the ceiling of the alcove, parts of the strip not too covered in soot shone with the familiar and distinctive reddish shade of the metal. Hesitantly, Rian reached for the strip pulling it from the beaker it had been dripping in. He looked around, shrugged, and wiped the remaining droplets on the copper strip on his trousers, then rubbed it some more to remove the soot from it.


    Lori found it in her to sigh. Really, didn''t he realize how difficult that would be for Umu to launder?


    "It doesn''t look all that different," he muttered, slowly rotating it in his hands as he tried to see it from different angles. Rian held it out to her to examine.


    Lori took it carefully. The surface of the strip had a strange texture, but there were no edges or sharp points. She frowned at it, but in her hands it looked no different from the unpolished copper ingots they had stored. Holding it between thumb and finger, her nails pressing on the metal, she tapped the strip against the stone of the alcove. She easily claimed and bound the earthwisps in the stone using the metal as a contact, without using her connection to her core. There was nothing unusual about the metal in that sense, no strange feeling of resistance or ease or anything else.


    If she didn''t know there was anything unusual about it, she''d have thought it was a perfectly ordinary piece of copper.


    "There''s nothing unusual about this strip in the context of using it to channel magic," Lori said. "If I didn''t know there was anything unusual about it, I would have thought it was a perfectly ordinary piece of copper."


    Rian nodded and wrote something on his tablet. "Can you anchor wisps to it? Or¡­ can you do that thing where you make a binding inside it and the white Iridescence inside it imbues the binding?"


    Lori tilted her head. Good questions. "Good questions. Let me see¡­" Claiming and binding some airwisps, she tried to anchor the binding to the metal the way she would anchor onto the white Iridescence, but the attempt, and subsequent ones with lightwisps and darkwisps, failed. She rubbed her hands for friction, claiming and binding the firewisps that resulted but not imbuing them, then passed the binding through the metal. There was no sudden imbuing from this action. She bound the firewisps she had made, letting it radiate out heat and warming the metal slightly, then claimed the firewisps already in the metal in case that made a different. Nothing.


    "Nothing," Lori said. "I can''t anchor to the metal as is, and passing a binding through it does not result in the binding being imbued, nor does binding firewisps that appear in the metal after heating it. I could, I suppose, heat the metal until I can bind and claim its earthwisps¡­"


    "Please no," Rian said. "At least, not in here. Let''s save it for next time that we try this again."


    Lori nodded absently. "Yes, we need to see if it''s consistent and repeatable, whatever it is. Your idea of embedding white Iridescence into metal has been shown to be unusable, but it''s given us a new line of inquiry."


    "Lori¡­" Rian said thoughtfully, "it occurs to me that we can''t be the first people to do this."


    Lori''s glanced towards him. "Oh?"


    "We''ve already found out that white Iridescence is a very likely, probably even vital, component in Whispering-based bound tools," he said slowly. "Bound tools have been around for a very, very long time, which means that white Iridescence as a component has been around for that long. Dungeon Binders¡ªor at least their research staff¡ªhave had that long to try and mix white Iridescence with metal together. Or with anything else, for that matter. How much of the metal used¡­ well, anywhere¡­ are some kind of white Iridescence alloy?" He gestured towards the broken open bead. "I mean¡­ it''s unlikely that copper is the only metal that it mixes with."


    Lori tilted her head thoughtfully. "That depends on what properties the alloys have."


    "And¡­ well, that''s just white Iridescence, from wisp beads. What about alloys made from the contents of other bead types? What about alloys made from combinations and ratios of different bead types?"


    She stilled, her eyes widening slightly in realization. Yes, that was right. She''d been so focused on the wisp beads she could produce, and the white Iridescence she had access to, that this had slipped her mind.


    Rian was still speaking, seemingly lost in his own thoughts and conclusions. "This also makes me wonder: how much of the metal used in bound tools might be bead Iridescence alloys? Are they necessary?"


    "Hopefully not," Lori said fervently, more wish than observation. "If nothing else, my tests so far with the two prototypes have allowed me to recreate some basic bound tool functions. Combined with the proper mechanical parts, I can see how we can make some of the bound tools I''m familiar with."


    "Does that mean you won''t have time to research white Iridescence alloys?"


    "We have still not ascertained that it is an alloy of copper and white Iridescence," she pointed out. "As I said, it does not function any differently from any other piece of metal when it comes to channeling magic."


    "Can you hand it here?" Rian asked, and Lori passed the sample towards him. She glanced towards the pot, which was still boiling away, while the bucket next to it continued to slowly fill. "Right, so¡­ if it''s an alloy, then the easiest way to tell would be if its physical properties are different from normal copper. So¡­"


    Lori watched as Rian took the strip of metal in both hands, placing his thumbs together underneath it. He took and deep breath, and suddenly the copper strip began to bend in his hands. The short strip curved as he pushed upwards with his thumbs, only to straighten as Rian released the pressure.


    The two of them stared at the innocuous-seeming strip of metal.


    "Pure copper doesn''t do that, does it?" Lori said. She''s seen the redsmiths working copper, and the metal had folded under the pressure of their tools. There had been no snapping back, and very little¡ªrelatively¡ªin the way of resistance.


    Rian shook his head. "No. Spring copper is an alloy of copper mixed with¡­ uh, I forget what the smiths said, but it''s something we don''t have. And even then, I think it has to be hardened to get that kind of elasticity normally. "


    Lori frowned at the strip. "We''ll have to see if it can be shaped," she said. "The alloying has made it no longer possible to work it cold the way copper can normally be."


    "I think that''s what smithing is for? Other metals are generally heated in the forge to soften it enough to work, remember. We''ll just have to treat this alloy like a harder metal." Rian suddenly grinned. "Look at it this way. If we can do this consistently, we might be able to use the copper we have stored to make tools that would normally need harder metals like iron. We could have more saws, more scissors¡­ We might even be able to put plates of copper on the front door of the Dungeon to secure it better against dragonborn things."


    Lori blinked, her head tilting thoughtfully. They could, couldn''t they? So far, the copper had been mostly unused because there was little they could use it for like the pots, which was why it was available for Lori to use in her experiments.


    "We need to make more," she said. "What is the ratio needed for an optimal alloy? Would different ratios result in different physical properties?"


    "Can we use it to make an alloy without melting?" Rian added thoughtfully. "Because steel isn''t really made by melting iron and adding charcoal, it''s made by letting it sit in the coals of the furnace to absorb the charcoal. If we can include white Iridescence into steel to make it an alloy¡­ "


    "Rian!" Mikon''s voice called from outside the alcove. "Could you please tell her Bindership it''s time for lunch?"


    In the niche on the far wall, the pot stopped boiling, the water inside it completely gone, leaving nothing behind.

 305 - Needing More

    "We''ll need to work closer with the smiths," Rian said as they ate lunch. "Unless we learn more that says otherwise, after it''s alloyed working it will probably be more normal metalwork than anything else."


    Lori frowned, but nodded as she had a spoonful of stew. She chewed and swallowed thoughtfully. "How long before my tray is finished? If we''re going to be utilizing it like this, we''ll need to produce more."


    "A few more days? The carpenters are doing their best, but it''s involving a lot of precisely shaped parts, not to mention they have to integrate the copper sheet, which you only made today. I''ll ask them for a more exact timeline after lunch, but you would know better than me that trying to hurry skilled workers never ends well. If you actually do manage to get them to work faster, what you get is never as good as if you''d given them the time to do it properly."


    "Yes, Rian, and the sky is blue."


    "What about at sunset? It''s more like a purple pink, when it''s not a nice¡ª"


    She pulled back her foot to kick him under the table, paused, looked underneath, adjusted so she wouldn''t accidentally hit Umu, and kicked.


    "¡ªorange with tones of yellow, and¡ª OW."


    "Don''t be annoying, Rian," Lori said. "I might kick Umu by accident."


    "Noted, your unamused Bindership."


    Umu blinked and glanced down under the table, looking concerned. She visibly debated moving away from Rian. She didn''t, but the thought clearly entered her mind.


    "So," Rian said as Lori ate, "what next?"


    She swallowed. "We need to test what the rest of the capabilities of the alloy are. While its new elasticity is useful, the full extent of its properties needs to be recorded."


    "Just give it to the smiths. They''d know better than us what properties pure copper is supposed to have, so they''ll be better suited to comparing the two." Then Rian blinked. "Huh. I just had a thought."


    "And the sky is still blue. What now?"


    "Does it only work with metal, or can you use it to alloy stone?"


    Lori gave him a bemused looked. "Why would you think that?"


    "Because if we could alloy it with stone¡­ well, we''d end up with rock that would have increased elasticity, and maybe less prone to shattering on impact. That might let us make boats with stone hulls. Less maintenance heavy than ice boats."


    An urge to sigh rose up within her, and Lori gave in to it, letting a tired breath leave her. "Rian¡­ why do you keep trying to make boats out of anything but wood?"


    "Because we still don''t have enough material to waterproof the hull of a wooden boat bigger than a rowboat for crossing the river," Rian said. "Just something to think about."


    "Noted." Internally, she signed and shook her head at her lord''s strange thoughts, then resigned herself to doing that later. Ugh, would the crucible they had even manage to hold something that hot?


    "Where''s your curiosity? Anyway, consider this: can we make alloyed glass?"


    Lori blinked, tilting her head.


    "Oh, now you''re interested. See, if we can make alloyed glass, it might make the bound tools you want to make more sturdy."


    "We need to test it," Lori said firmly, her eyes slightly unfocused as she considered the image Rian had given her. All this time, she''d had an image of white Iridescence embedded, suspended in glass, with a metal wire touching it to channel magic from a bead, a binding anchored to the white iridescence somehow. Now¡­


    Lori closed her eyes. There was so much she still didn''t know. She''d made progress, made prototypes that were almost passable bound tools, but¡­ for all the sophistication of their components, what she''d made were still barely more than classroom demonstrations. Any Whisperer could alter the bindings she''d made anchored to the white Iridescence of each prototype. That, really, was part of why she really couldn''t consider what she''d made proper bound tools. In all the bound tools she''d ever used¡ªwhen she''d been hired to imbue one because someone didn''t want to use a bead for one reason or another¡ªall she could do was imbue and operate it. The wisps, the binding on the other end of the contact, had always felt like they''d been claimed by someone else, unalterable.


    She needed more information. She needed to do more research.


    She finished her food, and started peeling the golden bud next to her bowl. So much she needed to do. Not expansion, no matter how much she wanted to. Expanding would require her to keep moving her shed and workspace for mass producing beads after each one, which would make bead mass production more difficult. She needed to make some bound tools to install in River''s Fork''s dragon shelter, to make them more likely to survive. As convenient as it would be for her for all of them to simply die, she was responsible for them now¡­ unfortunately¡­


    "Lori?"


    Lori blinked, realizing her hands had stilled in the middle of peeling. Fingers moved as she continued pulling the rind off the fruit. "Yes?"


    "Are you all right?"


    She waved a juice-covered hand dismissively. "A momentary distraction. What is it?"


    "Will you be needing me for more notes this afternoon? I didn''t think this morning would be so interesting, so I had planned to go around the demesne to check up on everything, but if you still need me¡­"


    Lori opened her mouth. Paused. Closed her mouth. Frowned thoughtfully. Shook her head. "No, you can go," she said. Keeping her demesne functioning should be her priority. "But give the smiths the sample and tell them to test it."


    Rian looked around. "Huh, none of them are close enough to hear. After lunch, then. Is that all?"


    She waved a hand dismissively, then went back to separating her golden bud into wedges. "Yes, I probably won''t need you for the rest of the day."


    Her lord nodded, then suddenly slapped a hand onto his forehead. "Oh, I forgot! I got that piece of copper ore you asked me to get. Well, not on me right now, but I can get it to you later."


    Lori frowned, trying to remember¡­ Ah, yes, Rian had suggested surrounding a setting like the first prototype with unrefined metal ore that could be manipulated by earthwisps. She''d have to test that¡­ but she''d need a piece of white iridescence on a setting without a shell first.


    And then there was still the thing she had to do.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, Lori retreated to her room and began transcribing the notes on all their white Iridescence experiments to bone. It was a way of refreshing herself about what they had learned, some of which had slipped her mind. All right, many of which had slipped her mind, but that was what notes were for! Like the detail that bindings anchored to white Iridescence somehow remained bound even when the sample they were anchored to had been dissolved in water.


    Lori wondered if that would work when the white Iridescence was used to alloy metal or glass. Could that be a way of permanently anchoring a binding inside metal, anchoring a binding to white Iridescence before using it to alloy metal? She''d have to explore it when she tried alloying white Iridescence and copper again¡­


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    As she worked, rereading their notes and transcribing them from the stone tablets to bone, she took notes of other ideas like that. They were few and far between, but she didn''t want to forget them, even if she was unlikely to be able to test them any time soon.


    The stone tablets whose contents had been transcribed, she set aside. They were no longer important.


    By the time she finished with all the notes about their white iridescence experiments, her hand was aching from having to carve so many words onto bone. Lori flapped her hand back and forth in a futile attempt to deal with the pain, wincing as she did so. While it would stop hurting in a little while, the pain would come back once she started using her arm again. She wished she could have a Deadspeaker just heal the pain away, but those were expensi¡ª


    ¡­


    Oh, right.


    Lori left her room to find it was mid-afternoon outside, hoping Shanalorre had kept her rock with the binding of lightwisps on it on her person. Fortunately, she had, and Lori found the other Dungeon Binder working among some tuber plants in a large plot behind her house. She wore a hat on her head that seemed woven from strips of ropeweed, shading her from the sun above that was still bright and probably hot. With a stick in hand, Shanalorre was poking at the soil at the bases of the plants. Occasionally, doing so would disturb a bug, and by a criteria Lori didn''t know, the other Dungeon Binder left some of the bugs unmolested after that and ruthlessly crushed and killed others with the stick she was holding.


    The other Dungeon Binder glanced towards her and bowed shallowly. "Great Binder," Shanalorre said. "May I help you with something?"


    Lori glanced over her, but there was no knife hanging from the other Dungeon Binder''s belt. The stick had been shaved smooth, and the ended had been given blunt, curling ends, lacking the ragged edges of a cut. It didn''t look like it could be used for self-harm. "I need you to heal me," she said holding out her writing hand.


    "Ah, certainly, Great Binder." Shanalorre hurried towards Lori has as much as she could while stepping carefully between the tuber plants. "How were you injured?"


    "Transcribing notes."


    Shanalorre paused, looking at Lori curiously. "Ah. Your hand aches from writing too much."


    "Yes."


    A strange expression came over the other Dungeon Binder''s face. "And¡­ you want that healed."


    "Yes. I still have more things to do, and putting up with it would be inconvenient."


    The strange expression persisted. "¡­ At this point, I would usually tell someone to go to the doctors and medics so it can be assessed whether healing is actually warranted."


    "Shanalorre."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Heal my aching hand. Now."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    When Shanalorre was done, Lori mimed holding a stylus and writing a few words. The muscle aches that had built up from those movements were gone, and she nodded in satisfaction. "Thank you. You should get inside. It''s far too hot to be watering the plants at this time of day."


    "I¡­ should make sure there are no more bugs molesting my crops¡­"


    Lori gave her a flat look. "Fine. But don''t get yourself sun-addled by staying in this heat. Come with me and drink something."


    Shanalorre hesitated, but nodded. "Yes, Great Binder."


    The two walked away from the farm plot, and Shanalorre turned to where water poured down from the aqueduct onto a stone basin, washing her hands first under the basin''s overflow before scooping water up to her mouth to drink.


    Lori turned and headed back to her Dungeon. Shanalorre might die, but it wouldn''t be now. They needed her healing.


    At her table, Lori took the stone tablets whose contents she had transcribed to bone. The tablets were unnecessary now, simply raw materials that could finally be used again.


    She used them for just that, fusing tablets together to form sheets, and then shaping those sheets to form bowls¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was almost dinner time when she came down stairs, carrying her basket made from bone. It was¡­ well, it was four beast skulls fused together and thinned out to make a larger¡ªand relatively lighter¡ªcontainer, with a curving handle also made from bone. She hadn''t had an opportunity to use it yet for its intended purpose, but hanging from the crook of her arm, it was relatively comfortable to carry, though on consideration, it was more like a bucket than a basket, since it was whole and without openings.


    The basket also banged against the side of her leg, but try as she might, no matter what the configuration of the handle, that just kept happening.


    The fruits had been stored in the cold rooms that contained the food they would be eating soon, which was kept at a relatively warmer temperature than the winter storage cold rooms. They were right in front of the doors, technically the warmest spot in cold room. Fruits had already been brought out to warm so they could be eaten with dinner, but Lori ignored those. Instead, she went to the ones still in the cold room, ignoring the looks of the men and women cooking at the kitchen. Carefully, she began filling her bone basket with fruits, making sure there was an even mix of all of the ones available. The fruits were chilly in her hands,but not uncomfortable, the frost on them melting into water at her touch. Once her basket was full, she headed back to her room.


    She had to come down and get more fruits since the amount in her basket wasn''t enough, and by then people were coming in to sit at the tables and wait for dinner.


    When Lori came back down again her table was full. Shanalorre and her younger cousin sat at her bench, the latter talking excitedly to the former about¡­ something, who listened attentively and nodded every so often. Umu, Mikon and Riz sat to either side of Rian, looking eager and impatient and trying to control it, which just made Lori sigh. Well, she supposed some self-control was laudable.


    The din of the dining hall around her was the noise of the familiar as she passed through it, walked between the tables to her customary place. At the table behind where she sat, the children Shanalorre was in charge of gathered, talking to each other in excited tones as two Mikon-faced women sat with them, both looking tired for some reason.


    As Lori stood behind her customary positon at the table, Rian glanced at her and nodded, but he continued listening attentively to Shanalorre''s cousin, who seemed to be talking about how she had seen a choker catch and eat a bug earlier that day.


    "¡ªand then it swallowed the whole thing, but a little piece of wing got caught in its mouth, so it was standing there with the little wing sticking out," the younger girl narrated, using her hands to mime where the wing had been hanging from. "And then it started panting, and its mouth was hanging open, and you could see its tongue get fat and red! But then it ran away."


    "It''s good that you weren''t hurt," Shanalorre said. "You were far too close to be safe."


    "Don''t worry Shasha, I wouldn''t have gotten hurt. I know not to eat big bugs!"


    Rian let out a small chortle, seemingly amused at the reasoning.


    Lori just sighed. "Rian."


    "Ah, I have that ore, your Bindership. Do you want me to give it to you now or after dinner?"


    "Later. I need you to gather the four smiths who worked on the first two prototypes, as well as the smith we worked with this morning."


    "Oh, sure. When?"


    "Now."


    Rian blinked. "Uh, all right. Where?"


    "Here."


    He stared at her for a moment and sighed as he got to his feet. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. "Erzebed, come with me."


    The woman glanced at Lori at the mention of her name but nodded, standing up as well. She followed behind Lori as they headed back to Lori''s room.


    At her table were five stone bowls. They were plain-looking and uneven, no two of the same exact size or dimensions despite Lori''s best efforts. Each of them was filled with fruits.


    Lori put one of them in her bone basket and held that out to Riz. "Carry this and two other bowls, and bring it back to the table."


    "Yes, Great Binder," was the ready reply. The basket on the crook of one arm and a bowl in each hand, Riz made carrying them look easy.


    Lori, for her part, struggled to get a hand under each bowl to be able to support them, holding them against her body to have something to stabilize them with. She walked cautiously as she traversed the stairs so that none of the fruits would fall off the bowls, something that Riz didn''t even seem to need to bother with. By the time Lori managed to reach her table, Riz had already divested herself of her load and was sitting down again.


    Around the table, five vaguely familiar men stood, and Lori was glad to recognize the smith from this morning. She didn''t know his name, but at least she knew his face.


    "Ah, the smiths you asked for, your Bindership," Rian said by way of confirmation.


    Lori nodded, then put down the stone bowls she was holding next to the other three on the table, removing one from her bone basket. A mican and a pink lady had fallen into the bottom of the basket, which she ignored for the moment. "Good." she said. "Each of you, please pick a bowl, with my compliments. Your work was very fine, even if some things were unplanned. Not a word, Rian."


    Rian closed his mouth, probably about to say something about a fruit-based economy again.


    Mildly bemused, each of the smiths picked up a bowl and the fruits therein.


    "I realize it''s strange compensation for your work," Lori said, "but at the moment, paying you in beads would be a worthless gesture. Better something you can enjoy. Keep the bowls. I''m sure they''ll be of some use." Perhaps they''ll need someplace to put more slag in the future.


    "Thank you, Great Binder."/"Thank you, your Bindership," the men said in a staggered chorus, bowing towards her with the bowls in their hands. The bemusement had turned to smiles and considering looks at the bowls in their hands.


    Lori nodded. "Now, go and eat dinner."


    As the men left, making their way back to wherever they''d previously been seated, Lori finally sat down on her bench. She reached into her basket, pulling out one of the two fruits that had fallen there, the pink lady, and held it out past Shanalorre to the other Dungeon Binder''s cousin.


    "What do you say?" Shanalorre said as the fruit was snatched from Lori''s hand.


    "Thank you very much, Great Binder!"


    As Lori put the basket on the bench next to her, pulling out the mican that was had been left in it and starting to peel it open with her fingers, she saw Rian smile.


    "You know, someday soon you''re not going to need me anymore," he said. "Even if you don''t think so, you actually handle ''dealing with people'' matters pretty well."


    Lori snorted. "I don''t want to. You''re still doing it."


    Rian just kept smiling. "Yes, your Bindership."


    Why was she annoyed even when it wasn''t his ''to be annoying'' smile?


    Shaking her head, Lori continued peeling her mican as they waited for dinner.


    Around her, her demesne lived on.

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    A Mentalist''s Morning


    Emdeng awoke, as he usually did, to the sounds of the bells of Open Hand Demesne chiming the time. Despite advancements in timekeeping technology over the centuries, the bells were still rung at sunrise rather than at fourth bell, which according to his own clock wasn''t for another few chimes yet.


    For a moment, he just lay there on his cot, his brain fuzzy from having just been kicked out of sleep. Then he took a deep breath and cleared his mind. Magic filled him as air filled his lungs, and he began the cyclical breathing technique he''d practiced every day since coming here. He took magic in and flowed along his nerves, energizing the thoughts flowing along them from his brain.


    Emdeng sat up, feeling lighter, less heavy, less awkward, his casual breaths of air enough to give his body the magic it needed to move with grace and precision. He put on his shoes against the cold stone floor, and got dressed, pulling on the tough linen trousers and tunic over his underwear, securing them in place with a cloth belt from which hung his day pouch. Pushing aside the curtain that served as the door to his bedroom, Emdeng stepped into his office.


    It was a small room, only twice as big as his bedroom, and was the usual perpetual mess it always was. There were shelves built into the walls full of books, papers, journals published by the other sects in Open Hand, and a few foreign journals from other demesnes. Loose papers were held down by reference books from the library he needed to return¡ªhis memory helpfully recalled five books that were due that day and two that were overdue¡ªwhich he''d have to do by midmorning''s sixth bell, or else the librarians would come for him.


    He didn''t want the librarians coming for him. That route lay valuable time lost to punishment detail he could be using for something more productive, like drawing flowers!


    Gathering the books to be returned, Emdeng wrapped them in a carry cloth, pulling the corners tight so it wouldn''t shift in his grip as he knotted the cloth together to secure it and make a handle for him to grip. He did one last check in the room''s gloom, patting himself down to make sure he was presentable, and then finally opened the door.


    Daylight and the driving, near-constant mountain wind of Open Hand Demesne entered his room as Emdeng stepped out into the hall of his sect''s bachelors'' dorm rooms. Outside, other bachelors of the Life Sciences sect were busy doing morning chores. Some were pounding out their mattresses, airing their rooms, taking their clothes and sheets to wash at the laundry, walking to the baths carrying their bathing things, sweeping out dust from their rooms and into the wind¡­ the usual things scholars had to do to keep their rooms and offices from being a compost pit.


    Others were doing stretches, calisthenics, drills, thought exercises, and other ways of passive-aggressively rubbing in the fact their rooms were clean and their studies were on track. Or just keeping their bodies as fit as their mind, one or the other. A group of the more senior bachelors¡ªthey would likely be raised to Masters in a few months¡ªchatted in a knot in front of one room, partially blocking the hallway. Another bachelor, hurrying and preoccupied, wasn''t able to dodge around them sufficiently, clipping his shoulder on one of them and falling to the floor, his papers going everywhere. He let out a cry of despair as the papers were caught by the wind.


    "Good morning, Emd," his neighbor to his right, Aando, said cheerfully as the knot of seniors leapt into action, grabbing the papers, launching themselves from each other''s shoulder to catch ones lifted high into the air, or simply using thought force to grab the errant sheets like boring people. "Heading to the library?"


    "Aando," Emdeng said, nodding in acknowledgement even as he felt a prickle behind him and he stepped out of the way of another bachelor who''d obviously been doing nocturnal studies, carrying an unlit lamp and a notebook and walking with eyes closed to his room. Emdeng doubted he was using his thought for anything but the muscle memory to get there blind. "Where are you off to?" he asked as the seniors plucked the rest of the papers from the wind. One of them helped the fallen bachelor up, obviously chiding him to be more aware. Another lent him a carry cloth.


    "The Dean of Bachelors asked me to help some fresh students get oriented," Aando said as he did some simple morning stretches to wake up his muscles. Even after all these centuries, kinesiologists still argued about whether stretches had any effects or where just physical placeboes. "You know, show them where the libraries are, mention the rules, best places to hide from the librarians if they''re overdue, tell them to hide from the librarians if they''re overdue, that sort of thing. You?"


    "Library," Emdeng said as the bachelor bowed in thanks to his seniors, who sent him off with a laugh as they continued their conversation. "I should be fine as long as I get there before cutoff. Then I''ll go down to the fields for work credit. Need to get out of the office, you know?"


    The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    "Well, be careful," Aando said. "I hear the Young Scholar is in a foul mood."


    "Did she lose at something?" Emdeng said with a frown. The Young Scholar of the Life Sciences sect was usually such a pleasant young woman. Much more sensible than the Young Scholar of the Art Studies sect. Art was barely a proper science!


    "One of the young male fursh got into the tanks where she kept her control and experimental groups for that heredity study she''s doing, you know, trying to breed longer fursh? The buck impregnated who knows how many of the females, it''s a whole mess," Aando said. "She''s going to have a Deadspeaker fursh specialist double check, but from what her interns say, nearly the whole batch got impregnated. It''s going to set her research back by a whole season."


    Emdeng whistled, shifting his books. "Colors, that''s hard to hear. Was it anyone''s fault?"


    "Apparently the male was just that determined to stick it in something and made it out of this pen by following the mating calls," Aando said. "So yeah, she''s in a bad mood. Don''t make eye contact unless you want a rant about lesser creatures that only think with their genitals or a sudden peer review."


    "Rant against the random chaos of the universe, got it," Emdeng said. "Thanks for the warning."


    It was a painful lesson, if it could be a lesson at all, but one every Mentalist at Open Hand Demesne¡ªevery Mentalist who was part of a sect, at any rate¡ªhad to learn: you can''t predict the universe perfectly. Whether that was in precautions, experimental variables, setup, or just having the reference book you needed not being available, you needed to learn to roll with the impact so you didn''t break something.


    Of course, that was the purpose of the Mysteries of Alknowledge, which many people in Open Hand Demesne followed: to study and quantify the world, to eventually make a working predictive model of all of existence. The reasons for why varied: some wanted to know the future so they could control their own fate, or avert catastrophe. Some wanted to know how the world worked so they could build a new world (those who believed this never specified how they''d do it, but always claimed they''d know how once they actually knew enough to build a new world). Some believed it could someday be done, others thought that it was an impossibly infinite pursuit that was worthy by itself.


    The morning air was cold, and the wind near-constant given their altitude and the intentionally low roofline of the architecture. Emdeng walked with casual balance, fluidity and efficiency that came naturally to any Mentalist who honed their body as assiduously as they did their mind, nodding to people he knew, his weak casual sense of the thoughts around him letting him know when he had to step out of the way in amusement as people with books even more overdue than his rushed past him at a dead run, clutching their books to their chests as they tried to reach the library before the librarians got them.


    He passed people doing stretches in the hall talking about biology, kinesiology, botany, toxicology, nutrition, and whether old Sanmig''s beer was still as good as it used to be, or if one of the younger brewers had managed to make up something with a more interesting flavor profile. He passed Master Sanni, who was overseeing mental acceleration practice. The man was calling out corrections even as the wooden balls seemed to simply launch themselves at the group, telling one to make his breathing more cyclical, for another to bend his knees more and relax his shoulders, chiding another to step out of line and do some more stretching exercises first, they clearly weren''t limber enough. Currents of lightning flowed along the walls, carried by copper wires wrapped in thick plant latex for insulation.


    Emdeng reached the stairs, the wind changing direction and strength as he made his way down from the slope to where the main buildings were. In front of him, the five fingerlike pillars of stone that gave Open Hand Demesne its name rose over the rest of the Demesne, the fortified bulwark with its massive doors leading into the Dungeon built beneath it like some sort of charm on a bracelet. As he descended, he could see the rest of Open Hand. Over there were the Mathematics and Engineering sect, smoke and steam already rising from their chimneys, their buildings always looking new and orderly, placed in a precise grid despite the fact they were on a mountainside, the work of generations of neurotic engineers and architects that liked their right angles and triangles. There was the, ugh, Art Studies sect, a terrible waste of space and funding though obviously not everyone thought so. Well, they were entitled to their wrong opinion.


    The Physical Sciences sect was the largest of the sects, sprawling so much they almost reached the woods of the low foothills and many of their buildings went deep into the mountain itself. In the distance, at ground level, next to the towns that provided Open Hand with meat and other foods that were too difficult of them to grow efficiently because of the altitude, was the Political Sciences sect, guarding the wide, ancient approach up to the rest of the sects, its mechanical and bound tool lifts powered by the core itself, with their entry fees, tariffs, immigration offices, embassies and the standing army of militia.


    In the center of all this were the libraries. General libraries for most introductory and elementary level subjects, sect-specialized libraries for more intermediate subjects, and more specialized subjects according to fields for those doing focused research. The libraries were all run by the Librarian sect, who had split off from the Accounting sect a long time ago.


    There was also the Support Infrastructure sect, who ran the agricultural towns around Open Hand, as well as the on-site fields were Open Hand grew some of its own food, interspersed where there was room. They planted the fruit trees for shade in courtyards, cultivated bushes of vegetables around pathways, ran the cafeterias, directed Mathematics and Engineering in maintaining buildings, kept the water flowing in the pipes and the currents in the wires, performed tri-monthly sanitation inspections of quarters, and generally kept the sects from all starving to death or getting sick from wearing the same dirty clothes for weeks on end.

 Demesne Livestream, Out of Story Episode 13: Top Five Most Requested Stat Blocks!

    Hello Internet friends and welcome back to our campaign! The new season is starting soon, and so as a refresher, I thought I''d give you all a treat and show you the stats of the characters we''ll be playing with. Not the whole spread of course, we don¡¯t have the time to go Adjective by Adjective and go over every piece of equipment and why. See our old videos if you need that kind of refresher! Hopefully, this will be enough to sate you number crunchers out there.


    As for you munchkins in the audience, I¡¯ve said it before, but I am NOT playing Lori as an optimized build! This is a story campaign. We¡¯re role-playing, not roll-playing. That said, don¡¯t stop with the suggestions! I always need builds for villains, mwahaha!


    Now, for all those tuning in for the very first time, or already know but need a reminder, we¡¯re using the Demesne system for our character builds. I know Dungeon is more popular, but honestly, I like what Demesne did to improve on Dungeon 3.5 Edition. Evidently Dungeon thought so to, as they clearly cribbed a lot of stuff from it in Dungeon Fifth Edition. And more importantly for the campaign, Demesne has simplified skills and opposed checks, making it far easier to play on the livestream.


    For those who don¡¯t play Demesne¡­ first, why not? And secondly, I¡¯m going to leave a little note here on the screen to explain what stat does what, but to keep it brief 10 is average, 20 is max possible without magic, all are built from a hundred points each, and Shana has PTSD that have lowered her stats.


    <table width="626">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="38">


    Physical


    </td>


    <td width="122"> </td>


    <td width="42">


    Mental


    </td>


    <td width="134"> </td>


    <td width="42">


    Spiritual


    </td>


    <td width="247"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="38">


    Strength


    </td>


    <td width="122">


    Raw Physical Strength


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Intelligence


    </td>


    <td width="134">


    Analytic Ability and Comprehension


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Charisma


    </td>


    <td width="247">


    External Force of Personality


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="38">


    Vitality


    </td>


    <td width="122">


    Health and Immunity to Sickness


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Memory


    </td>


    <td width="134">


    Recall and Overall General Knowledge


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Resolve


    </td>


    <td width="247">


    Strength of conviction and identity/self


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="38">


    Finesse


    </td>


    <td width="122">


    Dexterity, Coordination and Agility


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Will


    </td>


    <td width="134">


    Force of will and Mental Strength


    </td>


    <td width="42">


    Connection


    </td>


    <td width="247">


    Empathy, Compassion, ability to connect with others and make friends


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    So, without further ado, here are the top five most asked for stats.


    <table width="254">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Lori


    </td>


    <td width="93"> </td>


    <td width="85"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Physical


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Mental


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Personal


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Strength: 10


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Intelligence: 20


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Charisma: 15


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Vitality: 9


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Memory: 5


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Resolve: 12


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Finesse: 9


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Will: 15


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Connection: 5


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Now, as is abundantly clear¡­ Lori has shit memory. If it weren¡¯t for her ¡®Formally Educated¡¯ and ¡¯Voracious Reader¡¯ Adjectives that give her a boost to her knowledge checks and let her use Intelligence instead of Memory when recalling things she learned from books, the infrastructure of her demesne would be far worse off than it is.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    Some of you are no doubt surprised she has such a high charisma score since she¡¯s¡­ well, Lori, but if you recall, Charisma is for force of personality, and she definitely has that. Most of her problems with people is in relating with them, since she has a Connection score as bad as her Memory. Her Bad Cop Adjective also means she can only use her Charisma score on Intimidate checks, not Socialize checks. Yes, I still call it Bad Cop even though they changed the name! I like it!


    Now, people keep telling me I should pick Adjectives that let her use her Intelligence score in place of literally every other score she has to make, but again, this is a story campaign. And yes, I know people are going to suggest she start writing names down so that she can technically use Voracious Reader to remember people¡­ that¡¯s always been part of the plan, but we¡¯re not at that point of the story yet.


    Okay, next up, we have¡­


    <table width="246">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="68">


    Shana


    </td>


    <td width="86"> </td>


    <td width="92"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="68">


    Physical


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Mental


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Personal


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="68">


    Strength: 9


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Intelligence: 14


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Charisma: 12


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="68">


    Vitality: 9


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Memory: 15


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Resolve: 6


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="68">


    Finesse: 11


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Will: 5


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Connection: 18


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    As you can see, her Traumatized and Mentally Scarred Adjectives have done a number on our little woobie. I gotta tell you, most of her Adjectives are giving her serious debuffs, or else stats like her Vitality would be higher. Putting numbers doesn¡¯t really show the full picture, since Shana¡¯s story comes off better in her characterization than her stats.


    And yes, her Connection and Memory are stupidly high because her coping mechanism is taking care of people, so she reaches out and remembers everyone. And obviously with both her low Resolve and Charisma being what it is, she¡¯d never win any opposed checks with Lori in things like Intimidate or, unfortunately, Socialize.


    <table width="254">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Karina


    </td>


    <td width="86"> </td>


    <td width="92"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Physical


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Mental


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Personal


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Strength: 12


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Intelligence: 9


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Charisma: 10


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Vitality: 13


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Memory: 10


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Resolve: 10


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Finesse: 12


    </td>


    <td width="86">


    Will: 11


    </td>


    <td width="92">


    Connection: 11


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Lady Karina, as people have been calling her for a long time, is¡­ not that bad, actually. Her Intelligence is only that low because she¡¯s got Uneducated as an Adjective. Like Shana, she¡¯s not going to overpower Lori with the power of Cute any time soon, but¡­ she actually has a reasonably good chance of wrestling her to the ground. Catching seels makes you swole, apparently. Of course, she¡¯s a child, so she gets a malus when grappling with adults. It¡¯s one of those quirks of Demesne that her numbers are read straight when dealing with anything but an adult of her own species, where it¡¯s adjusted. Too much trouble to house rule it, so I¡¯m just going by the rules as written.


    But seriously, she has those stats because it¡¯s the minimum she needs to be able to consistently take down seels with the Adolescent Template by herself. Admittedly, this is with the bonuses she gets from her Patient Hunter and Seel Hunter Adjectives, which bump up her numbers if she takes a few turns waiting.


    <table width="254">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Mikon


    </td>


    <td width="93"> </td>


    <td width="85"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Physical


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Mental


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Personal


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Strength: 11


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Intelligence: 13


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Charisma: 12


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Vitality: 11


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Memory: 10


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Resolve: 12


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="75">


    Finesse: 12


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Will: 13


    </td>


    <td width="85">


    Connection: 6


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Yes, it¡¯s finally revealed why Mikon sucks at romancing Rian, Umu and Riz: Connection is her dump stat. But more seriously, it¡¯s her dump stat because she doesn¡¯t really need it from a story perspective. Most of those she deals with besides the main cast are casual coworkers, like the other weavers, or members of her family. Not much call to really have much Connection, unlike Riz who always has yet another buddy she knows if she needs help with a skill check or work to do.


    Most of her Adjectives have to do with her livelihood, so she has Skilled: Weaver and Master: Distaff. She actually has a grand total of ONE Adjective related to her romance plot, which is Passionate and is there more for flavor that the boost to Will it gives.


    No, I will not munchkin her to be a harem protagonist who gets everyone. Why would I want to munchkin that?


    And finally, we have¡­


    <table width="181">


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td width="88">


    Rian


    </td>


    <td width="93"> </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="88">


    Vigor: 10


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Dexterity: 18


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="88">


    Mind: 10


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Intelligence: 10


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="88">


    Endurance: 16


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Faith: 10


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td width="88">


    Strength: 18


    </td>


    <td width="93">


    Luck:10


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    As you can see, Rian is only Level 22. For equipment, he doesn¡¯t have much. He¡¯s got a Longsword with no upgrades because we didn¡¯t get any Iron Shard drops, and a Machette, which have Str and Dex scaling, respectively. His equipment is nothing special, just some Commoner¡¯s Pants and Commoner¡¯s Shirt, no gloves or head gear. His End means that he has the Stamina to make power stance swings with both weapons, and they both have pretty much equal stat scaling.


    To be honest, I wish I hadn¡¯t started with a Wretch while making him, since he doesn¡¯t need Int, Faith or Mind because he¡¯s not going to be a spellcasting class, but oh well. No shield, because that just engenders passivity.


    I really don¡¯t see why people keep claiming he¡¯s an isekai, which is wrong and kinda silly. I mean, look at him. He¡¯s not equipped with a Grand Lunarblade or a Bifurcating Crystal Twinblade. Where¡¯s all these weird Rian conspiracy theories coming from?


    And that''s all the time we have for today. See you next week, when we start with the next season of the campaign. If you liked this video, please like, subscribe, ring that notification bell, comment down below, leave a review and don''t forget to support me on Patreon</a>. I am your host and we''ll see you guys next time. Bye!

 306 - The Summer Dragon Comes

    When Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri, Lori to most, awoke that morning, it was by snapping violently awake knowing a dragon was coming.


    "About time," she muttered to herself as she got out of bed. She reached out to the bindings of lightwisps she had anchored to the corners of her room, checking their imbuement out of habit even as she activated them. Light filled her room, making her wince at the sudden illumination, and she closed her eyes out of habit. Doing so immediately made her want to lay back down and sleep, so she forced her eyes open and got to her feet, taking inventory.


    Her pack containing a change of clothes, a small leather bag of wisp beads she had made, a small jar of dried fruit, another small and very tightly secured jar of honey, and a small coil of copper wire was ready and had been ready for some time, but she ignored that for now. Instead she stood up, feeling the pleasantly cool stone floor of her bedroom under her feet, and staggered to her private bath. She had water there, and Lori splashed water on her face to wake herself up all the way.


    The water was also pleasantly cool on her skin, and the sensation was enough to wake her even further.


    For a moment, Lori just stood there, contemplating the utterly unpleasant task she had before her. She didn''t want to do it. Unfortunately, doing so had been part of the conditions that she had agreed to with the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork Demesne for the latter''s submission to Lori''s authority. And at this point, she had invested so many hours of work and resources that to break her word and dissolve the agreement would result in a massive loss for her.


    Lori reminded herself that going forward with it wasn''t a sunk cost fallacy. It wasn''t a matter of putting in good resources after bad. She''d already gained from the exchange. It was just extremely unpleasant for her. Unfortunately, it was an unpleasantness she''d undergone before, and unlike previous times, she couldn''t even tell herself it would be the last time, that she would never do it again.


    Taking a deep breath, she straightened up, wiped the remaining water off her face with her hand and headed back to her room.


    Through her connection with her Dungeon''s core, Lori felt the pressure the dragon''s presence exerted on her demesne''s wisps like a wave lapping on the shores of a river, pushing at the grains of sand. She could already discern the direction it was coming from as she pulled on her leather rain coat, settling the familiar garment over her shoulders. The pack she''d prepared went over one shoulder, and she checked it one last time. In their leather sack, the wispbeads rolled against one another, cloudy white and the size of one of her thumb joints.


    Securing the sack and the pack, she glanced at her hat, with its wide brim and conical point. On the one hand, she shouldn''t need it, since she would be underground. On the other hand, she wouldn''t be underground on the way there¡­


    Lori grabbed her hat and put it on her head, then pre-emptively secured it by tying the cords under her chin. If nothing else, the previous two times dragons had passed over her demesne it had become very windy, so best to keep it on.


    She grabbed her staff from next to her bed, heading for the door. The passageway beyond was narrow for her Dungeon, only a pace wide. Lori turned towards the stairs at the end of it that led down to the main floor of her Dungeon as she bound the earthwisps of the hallways behind her to narrow the passage, keeping people from getting to her room. Normally, that wouldn''t be necessary, but¡­


    To her surprise, the doors of her Dungeon were already open. People were coming in carrying sacks improvised from blankets, rolls of bedrolls and pillows, all heading down to the second level of her demesne. They made way for her as she passed, pressing themselves to either side of the entrance to her Dungeon and stepping out of her way. Beyond the stone defensive entryway into her Dungeon, she could hear Rian''s voice, her lord calling out orders and directions.


    Lori scanned the horizon, but even knowing where the dragon would be coming from, she still saw no physical sign of it. That in itself was a bad sign. The further away she could feel the dragon''s approach, the longer it would take to pass over her demesne and leave them be¡­


    She concentrated on her connection to her core, and through it all the wisps in her demesne, feeling for bound lightwisps, and found two that were moving despite being anchored to earthwisps. One was right outside, just beyond the entryway crowded with people. She went towards it.


    It was dark outside, though the predawn sky was slowly brightening to blue along one distant horizon that was obscured by trees and distance. Lightwisps she had anchored to the corners of buildings provided illumination, however, letting her see people already at work removing things from their homes, running to and fro, carrying things, and pushing what seemed like all of the demesne''s carts and barrows.


    Rian stood there, and despite the fact he wasn''t actually doing anything special, he seemed to stand out even though he wasn''t significantly taller than anyone else. It might have been the rock with the binding of lightwisps at his feet, dramatically illuminating him from below. He was speaking to various people, quick exchanges of words before they were on to do some unknowable thing and he moved to speak to the next person.


    Lori reached out to the darkwisps all over her demesne through her connection to her core, claiming, binding and imbuing them as she always did when there was a dragon. Around them, the gloom seemed to grow just the slightest bit thicker, but she couldn''t have the darkwisps dispersing in the light of day before the dragon arrived. She walked towards Rian, people stepping out of her path as they recognized her.


    He turned toward her as she drew close, giving her a nod. "Your Bindership," he greeted. After the summer heat that had everyone in her demesne¡ªwell, everyone but her¡ªsweating at all hours of the day and some parts of the early night, seeing him without any dripping down his face was almost strange.


    "How are you all already awake?" Lori asked. Despite all the activity, the night¡ªwell, early morning, she supposed¡ªwas calm and cool.


    "Shanalorre," Rian said by way of explanation. "She woke up screaming about the dragon coming and started running around knocking on doors to wake everyone up. Then she¡­ uh, collapsed into a ball of nerves and crying for a little bit¡­" He sighed for some reason. "And then she calmed down and insisted on organizing the children to move down to the second level with everything they owned. I think she''s still down there getting them settled down. "


    Ah. Yes, the former Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork Demesne¡ªtechnically she still was, but only until Lori finally managed to get around to learning enough Deadspeaking do her own healing¡ªwould feel it, wouldn''t she? While the other Dungeon Binder didn''t know how to use any magic beyond the healing meaning that she was able to perform instinctively, she was still perfectly capable of perceiving life with her Deadspeaking.


    Well, at least they were already starting the evacuation into the Dungeon. At the distance the dragon was coming from, they had several hours to get ready, so people should be able to get most of the valuables into her Dungeon¡­


    Unfortunately, she wouldn''t be around to see any of it.


    "Is the boat ready?" Lori said.


    "Clowee''s waiting with your ice boat to take you downriver as fast as she can. She should have enough time to take you there and back before the dragon gets here." Rian grimaced. "We might lose the boat, though. It''ll probably be too wet to pick up out of the water as it is."


    If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    "Beach it," Lori said. "I''ll get rid of all the ice once I feel it on solid ground. You should at least be able to save the frame. If that''s too heavy, just remove the steam jet driver and as much of the wood as you can take. That''s the part that will be difficult to replace."


    Her lord nodded. "River''s Fork probably doesn''t know a dragon is coming. Do you¡­ do you think we can risk Clowee waiting there so she can take the rest of the children back with her?"


    Lori considered that. On the one hand, the children of River''s Fork would be far safer in the shelter of her Dungeon. On the other hand¡­ "The only way any children in River''s Fork will die is if I do. As I am not going to die, then neither will they."


    Rian opened his mouth. Paused. "All right¡­" He sighed. "Well¡­ here''s hoping this works. After all, it''s not like we really practiced this beyond the one time you tried it."


    "The idea is sound," Lori said.


    "The idea relies on you actively paying attention to something that''s not right in front of you," Rian countered. "While you''re presumably also doing something else that needs your attention. And while you''re somewhere you don''t want to be and would be trying to distract yourself from."


    Lori gave her first lord a flat look. "Should I stay here and let everyone there die, then?" She ignored the way some people people standing nearby looked at her at those words.


    Rian shook his head. "No, of course not. It''s the right thing to do, even if a selfish part of me if screaming it''s not the smart thing to do."


    Lori had to agree. Well, partially agree. It didn''t matter if it was the ''right'' thing to do, but a part of was screaming it wasn''t the most intelligent decision she had ever made. Still, she had given her word¡­


    ¡­


    She really should stop giving her word to do stupid things.


    "Well, enough talk. Once everyone is evacuated to my Dungeon¡ª" that she wouldn''t be in, a part of her wailed, "¡ªsignal me, and I''ll start sealing up everything up and altering the entryway. I still need to secure the Coldhold before I leave"


    Rian nodded. "Everyone should be ready to go as soon as you''re done. Talk to me before you go, there might be a few things you can seal up on the way downriver."


    Lori tilted her head, then nodded. "Fine." She turned and headed for the dock.


    The dock lay beyond the stone wall that was meant to hold back the spring floods from the areas that they used near the river. Said wall hadn''t been there when they''d built the dock, but it was there now, and will likely be for the foreseeable future, which was to say, forever. At the docks, two boats waited, one significantly bigger than the other. Both were made of wood and ice


    At the moment, the larger one was her main concern. The Coldhold was too big to try to fit into her Dungeon, but given all the time, effort, materials and engineering they had invested into the boat¡ªnot to mention the plans they had that centered around it¡ªit needed to be protected from any damage the dragon could cause.


    Fortunately, they''d had a contingency plan in place to for just this eventuality. They''d even sort of tested it last winter.


    Lori ignored the other, smaller boat and the people waiting near it for the moment, putting them out of her mind. She reached out to the wisps of her demesne though her core, claiming the earthwisps of the stone she had long ago left stockpiled in the water under the boat. The stone flowed like liquid, and she carefully shaped them to raise up the base she had made long ago.


    During testing, she managed to do this in a little over an hour. However, given how the dragon was still distant and yet on the horizon, Lori chose not to rush. The point was preserving their boat, not damaging it so badly it didn''t matter what the dragon did to it.


    Stone rose out of the water to build walls around the boat. Given the boat was five paces wide, fifteen paces long and eight paces tall from the bottom of the hull to the top of the platform people used to see ahead of the boat for the one steering, that was a lot of stone. The stone flowed around the beams for the outriggers that helped the boat maintain its balance, because she was not going to try to enclose those as well.


    Lori encased the boat in a shell of stone, which she cautiously collapsed inward to force out water and air, while being careful not to damage the boat. Once she''d removed all that she safely could, she had the stone seal itself tight, keeping out water and air, then added more and more stone to both weigh it down and to put solid mass between the boat and the dragon. Then she carefully sank the whole block of stone beneath the water of the river, watching for water trickling into the block. The stone held however, and she began to move the stone block, fused to the river bottom, towards the center of the river to put as much water between it and the dragon that was coming.


    By the time Lori had secured the boat in the middle of the river, the light of morning had arrived, obscured by the darkwisps she had imbued. Those hung in the sky like dark clouds, and lingered near the ground like fog. Her stomach made its presence and emptiness known, but she ignored it. Given how people were still milling about, bringing things to her Dungeon¡ªthe weaver''s families seemed to be carrying inside as much raw ropeweed as they could¡ªit was unlikely that anyone was making breakfast.


    She found Rian not far from where she''d last seen him. He broke off the conversation with a man she vaguely recognized as one of the carpenters, obviously waiting for her. "The Coldhold is secured," she told him.


    He let out a sigh of relief. "Well, that''s one worry out of the way," he said. "You''re going now, then?"


    Lori nodded.


    "All right. You can seal up the mushroom cave. Everyone''s moved their things into the Dungeon, so now we''re just trying to move as many of our supplies in as well. All the vigas is in there already, so now we''re working on the planks and beams."


    Lori frowned, looking in the direction of the wood storage and curing sheds. "Tell them to stop that," she said. "Bring in the benches and tables, and what beds that can fit, especially from the hospital. After that, seal off the Dungeon at your discretion and signal me when the boat gets back, and I''ll start altering the defenses." The wire to her core that would imbue the darkwisps had been in place for a long time now, all she had to do was touch a binding to it. "I''ll sink the wood into the ground again. That seemed to work reasonably well the last time."


    Rian glanced up, then nodded. "All right, you heard her Bindership," he called to the people standing nearby. "Let everyone know."


    "Yes, Lord Rian," they all acknowledged with a complete lack of synchronization and chorus.


    Lori turned away, heading back to the dock and ignoring the overwhelming urge to go inside her Dungeon and just stay there.


    The other boat was still there waiting for her.


    Lori''s Ice Boat was far smaller than the Coldhold at only three paces wide and five paces long. Like the other boat, it was a hull of ice built around a wooden frame for strength. The outside was clad with planks to prevent damage to the ice from impacts, and the inside had planks to prevent slipping on the wet ice as well as somewhere to sit.


    Several people were waiting for her, the ones she''d ignored earlier. There was the ferrywoman who operated the boat¡ªwhose name Lori couldn''t remember¡ªtwo men whose faces were vaguely familiar¡ªnot that she could remember their names right then¡ªa man she vaguely recognized as one of their doctors¡ªagain, no name came to mind¡ªand Erzebed, Riz for short, one of Rian''s lovers and Lori''s temporary Rian when the actual one was unavailable. "We''re going," Lori announced, getting onto the boat made of ice. Ahead of them, darkwisps lay all the way to the bottom of the river. Lori reached out through her core and moved the darkwisps on the river out of their path so that they could see where they were going using the lightwisps anchored to the front of the boat.


    She sat as the others scrambled after her, finally putting down her staff and pack. As soon as everyone was on the boat, the ferrywoman moved the mechanism of the steam jet driver. Water flowed, and Lori''s Ice Boat slowly began to pull away from the dock, moving rear-first into the current of the river.


    "Here, Great Binder," Riz said, handing Lori a leather sack as the boat began to turn, the front pointing downriver. "Rian said this was for you."


    Lori blinked in surprise. She''d been getting settled in to start sealing up the cave with part of their mushroom farm and their water hub shed. "What is it?"


    "I think it''s fruits."


    Lori snatched the sack away with an unseemly haste that seemed to amuse the militia woman from whom it had been plucked. The mouth of the sack was folded instead of tied shut, and when Lori finally managed to get it open, a selection of fruits met her eyes. Happyfruits, pink ladies, micans, golden buds and hairy blueballs were all mixed together, and apparently enough time had passed none of them were wet with condensation from being taken out of the cold room.


    Her stomach conveniently reminded her it was still empty, and had been since she''d woken up at least an hour ago.


    "Erzebed," Lori said, still staring at the fruits, "remind me to seal up the mushroom cave and the water hub as soon as I''m done eating."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    The reminder set, Lori grabbed a golden bud and started peeling it open. Work could wait, she had breakfast to eat!

 307 - An Itch In Her Mind

    Rian had put a lot of fruits in the sack. There was so many, in fact, that Lori couldn''t finish it. She gave the sack to Riz to dispose of the rest of it before settling down to get some work done before they reached her destination. While Riz and the other four ate, they passed through the boundary between her demesne and the rest of the world.


    The summer heat suddenly slammed into Lori like a stifling blanket, and she felt her sweat immediately start to bead all over her everything. Lori groaned at the reminder of one of the reasons she hated leaving her demesne. In her demesne, the temperature around her immediate person, as well as most things she touched, immediately adjusted to being at most pleasantly cool or comfortably warm. While there were exceptions for extreme temperatures like cold intense enough liquefy air or the heat of a pottery kiln, in theory even those would adjust given enough time.


    Outside her demesne, she had no such comforts. Already she felt like she was taking a bath. A small part of her that sounded distressingly like Rian pointed out that with that much water on her person, she at least wouldn''t have to worry so much about Iridescence growth.


    Metaphorically kicking that part in her shins, she took off her hat¡ªinstantly regretting it as the sunlight touched her bare head and face¡ªgrabbed the wooden ladle lying on the floor of the boat, and carefully scooped up some water from the river by lightly passing the dipper through their boat''s wake. The churned water filled the ladle, and she poured the water over her head. She knew the respite of the cool water would be brief, but just then, she didn''t care. While her head was still cool, she put her hat back on.


    She reached out and started claiming every firewisp in her vicinity.


    Outside of her demesne, without the connection her core gave her to every wisp inside it was wasn''t inside a living creature, claiming wisps to form them into a binding had to be done the way she''d first learned it, the way all wizards who were merely Whisperers did it. Thankfully, being connected to her core still gave her some advantage there.


    Even as she began the deep, even breathing that pulled magic into her lungs, Lori drew power from her core. It was a bottomless, inexhaustible well, and it was all hers. She channeled outwards, through the heat and firewisps of her internal organs, through her muscles and now out through her very, very warm skin. She claimed the firewisps immediately around her, anchoring them to other firewisps on her skin to keep them in place and binding them all together. She didn''t need much, only a thin layer all around her.


    Then she very carefully set the binding to draw out heat.


    It was a binding she''d gotten around to using relatively recently because of the summer heat and her new responsibilities, taken from the almanac Rian had gotten from Covehold Demesne. The firewisps drew out heat from her and transferred it to the air around her, and a secondary binding airwisps would weakly circulate that air to disperse the heat. As temperature control went, it wasn''t instantaneous, but it had been in the almanac because it was relatively quick and simple to set up, the low amount of imbuement it consumed over time meant most Whisperers could keep it imbued when they had a spare moment like walking from place to place, and the even if left heavily imbued and unattended for long periods of time it was unlikely to destroy so much heat as to be harmful.


    She could have also destroyed the heat, but that was dangerous to do when one was not paying attention.


    Lori wished she''d known it when she''d been younger. Hot summer days had been hot.


    Comfortable again, she went back to work. It also conveniently gave her a reason to keep her eyes closed, letting her ignore the sight of the Iridescence beyond her demesne''s borders. The crystalline growths covered everything in a many-colored, rapidly growing layer. Trees, rocks, plants, the ground, the feathers of the beasts lazing about in the shadows of the trees¡­ the only things not covered with the glittering Iridescence were the rocks near the river that were regularly sprayed with water.


    No, she didn''t look at it. There was only the darkness of her soul behind her eyes, the heat, and the slight coolness that her binding was creating.


    After over a year of using her Whispering at things she couldn''t see through her connection to her core, Lori had become quite accomplished at it. She still had to close her eyes to do it most of the time, but that was more a matter of being able to concentrate, and not strictly necessary.


    The mushroom farm was easy to seal off. She claimed and bound the earthwisps of the stone at the front of the artificial cave of their Dungeon''s mushroom farm, reshaping the stone to seal up the entrance. The stone was layered thickly to best protect the entrance behind a pace of material. One never knew exactly what would happen when a dragon passed overhead, so Lori simply put the breakable but immovable assets behind a lot of rock to try to mitigate physical damage while her other measures blunted magic as best as it could.


    Stolen novel; please report.


    After that, Lori moved her attention to the wood storage sheds, where they kept the demesne''s supplies of processed wood that hadn''t been moved down to her Dungeon yet. She''d done this before, burying the wood storage sheds underground the last time a dragon had passed. That time, however, she''d had the sheds in front of her as reference.


    Now she was in a rush. Once she reached her destination, she''d be occupied with things she had to do there, at least until Rian gave the signal to seal up her Dungeon. Given the speed the ice boat was going they''d be at River''s Fork Demesne soon.


    ¡­


    Well, the point of this exercise was to preserve the material and not the building, after all.


    Lori began to lower the sheds into the ground, displacing the ground and stone underneath them by having the ground rise up along one side of the row of buildings. The process was slow, because even earth and stone that earthwisps had softened and moving like fluid wasn''t actually a fluid. She had to consciously control them to make them move. It was not unlike pulling out folded shirts from the bottom of the stack to lower the topmost shirt so she could reach it. Fortunately, unlike the shirts, sheds were unlikely to tip over because they still had the surrounding stone Lori wasn''t displacing to keep them centered.


    Once the sheds were down deep enough to Lori''s satisfaction, Lori had the displaced stone that had been rising up flow and cover the arching, half-cylinder roofs of the sheds, burying the sheds under thick stone and packed dirt. One of the roofs cracked and collapsed slightly under the weight, but Lori just let the stone solidify. The wood was what she was trying to preserve, not the buildings. She''d just rebuild them after the dragon passed.


    Or maybe she wouldn''t and just make some wood storage that was already underground and protected so she wouldn''t ever need to do this again¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The dragon still wasn''t visible when they reached the borders of River''s Fork Demesne, which was when Lori finally finished burying the wood. Given the trees in the way, that meant little, but Lori could feel it coming closer. She suspected if she could see the horizon, it would already be tainting the sky.


    The settlement at the center of the demesne was on a large triangle of land where two rivers met and combined into one, hence the name. Planted directly over the core was an unnaturally large tree surrounded by a circle of trees that were only smaller in comparison. Deadspeaking had been used to combine the branches of all the trees, fusing and weaving them together to form a massive dome of interlinked branches.


    Perhaps it had been impressive when its creator had been alive, but in the five seasons that Lori had been coming to River''s Fork, the dome had gotten progressively more and more wild, untended, and depressing. It had become clear that the structure needed active maintenance from a Deadspeaker, something the only living person actively capable of some amount of Deadspeaking that Lori knew of couldn''t provide.


    As they approached the rebuilt dock¡ªthe original had been gutted for materials to try and make a water break against the spring flooding earlier in the year¡ªLori saw people tending to the demesne''s field of crops just outside the dome, as well as seemingly testing the planting terrace that had been built to give them more level ground to plant crops on. A few seemed to be collecting the fast-growing fruits from the fruit trees around the dome, and she saw a wheelbarrow no doubt full of latrine waste being pushed to fertilize the trees and restore what the quick growth had depleted.


    They were seen, of course, but even so, Lori and those with her were in the middle of disembarking from Lori''s Ice Boat before anyone actually approached to speak to them. She both recognized them and knew their name. Given that applied to only two people in this demesne, and one of them was someone she couldn''t stand, it was good they were meeting with the other one.


    Yllian was the lord in charge of the idiots who insisted on still living in the demesne. He had originally been Binder Shanalorre''s lord, back when she ruled this place, but after the latter had submitted to Lori''s authority, he had been retained after proving he was capable, disciplined, could follow orders, and had the intelligence to do things on his own initiative.


    "Yllian," Lori said as soon as he was within hearing range. "There''s a dragon approaching. Get everyone organized and have them transfer anything they want to save in the mine, priority on clothing, bedding and anything else needed to live through the winter. Nothing that takes two people to carry, unless it''s metal and irreplaceable. We don''t have a lot of space in the mine."


    The man stared at her, but to his credit he didn''t waste time on protestations, repeating what she''d just said, or complaining. Instead, he simply nodded. "Any other orders, Great Binder?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "I leave organizing everything to you. Have someone keep watch in that direction¡ª" she pointed in the direction she could still feel the dragon coming from¡ª "so that we have warning when it''s close. I''ll handle preparations at the mine." She paused, then sighed. "Inform the idiots that they have until I send the boat back to change their minds about sending their children to m¡ªLorian Demesne for their safety." Lori considered some more, and nodded. "That will be all."


    Yllian turned and broke into a dead run.


    Picking up her own pack from the boat, her staff in hand and hat on her head, Lori headed towards the mine that served as River''s Fork''s dragon shelter, trying not to think that two Dungeon Binders had previously died trying to protect this place from a dragon. Riz fell in behind her, the woman''s own pack slung over the arm she wasn''t using to hold her spear. The two vaguely familiar men and the doctor fell in behind her, all also carrying their own packs. Against her will, she tried to remember their names, but all she could recall was¡­ something about sweat and sawdust¡­ and scissors?


    No, no, not important. Focus on the task at hand.


    Still, the annoying feeling that she should be able to remember some names nagged at her, an itch in her mind she couldn''t scratch.


    She really hated that feeling.

 308 - The Dragon Shelter

    The uproar seemed to have started in full by the time Lori had cut through the dome and reached the hill that contained the demesne''s only dragon shelter. The technically-still-functional but currently-inactive mine had a well-worn path to it nowadays, and someone had even taken the time to take some of the flattened river rocks and arrange them into steps at some points of the path. The entrance to the mine itself was a pair of thick doors¡ªopen at the moment¡ªthat was the first of three in the corridor leading inside. Each set of doors was meant to be barricaded with the thick wooden beams and the pile of large rocks in the alcove that had been hollowed out next to them.


    A stone grate was set above the outermost door, its panels recessed and arranged so as to not let light out, and would hopefully prevent small, flying dragonborn abominations from realizing the grate was there and entering the dragon shelter. Unlikely, but it was a hope. The second door had nothing of the sort above it. If Lori hadn''t known it was there because she''d been the one to make it, she''d have missed the stone grate set into the ceiling between the first and second doors.


    Lori ignored those for the moment, walking deeper into the mine. It wasn''t long before they reached the demesne''s secure food storage. Two men were there, standing alert and no doubt having heard them coming. Next to them, a rudimentary bound tool¡ªa wisplight¡ªwas glowing, powered by an unmarked wispbead. They relaxed slightly when they saw it was her, both of them making hasty and awkward bows. "Great Binder," they both said as they straightened. There was still some of the hesitance in their calling her that, but they acknowledged her as their Dungeon Binder¡ªdespite Shanalorre still being alive¡ªand obeyed her orders, and that was enough.


    "We have a dragon coming," Lori said without preamble. "Double check the inventory and make sure the water''s been replaced and filled." That''s what they were supposed to do in the event of a dragon, but they might need reminding. "Take the wisplight with you and close the door. I need the mine to be dark."


    The two former militia¡ªor were they properly active militia of the demesne now?¡ªstiffened in alarm, but thankfully, they made no comment about the last order. "Yes, Great Binder," they said. One picked up the bound tool while the other opened the food stores.


    "And be more careful with that!" Lori snapped. "Those are hard to make!"


    The one who''d picked up the bound tool sighed, but moved it with more obvious care, not letting it hit anything.


    "You two, go help them count and close the door behind you," Lori said. "Erzebed, go back to the entrance and give me some warning when people start coming here. Doctor, go with her."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said. "Come on everyone, let''s get out of the Great Binder''s way. Deil, Tackir, once you''re done, take over guarding the food so that Yhac and Vill can help their families with packing everything."


    Oh, those where their names! She remembered now.


    As much as Lori wanted some light to work with, that would be counterproductive. She took a deep breath, drew on the magic from her core, sent it out through her lungs and throat, and claimed the darkwisps around her.


    It didn''t take that long to claim and bind all the darkwisps in the mine. Lori gathered all the darkwisps together, compacting them and anchoring them into the alcove past the third door. She waited a moment, then went back to claim all the darkwisps that had taken the place of those she had bound.


    She repeated this five more times, combining all the darkwisps she''d gathered into a single binding. This wasn''t something she''d had to do in her own demesne¡ªLori took a moment to check her demesne through her connection to her core, and found the darkwisps she''d claimed and bound earlier still in place, Rian not yet giving the signal¡ªbut without a connection to River''s Fork''s core, she needed to claim any wisps she needed herself, and that meant going where they were.


    Once she felt she had enough darkwisps for what she needed, Lori finally collected some lightwisps from outside the mine and anchored them to her staff for light so she could check on the shelter''s bound tools¡­ and the beads meant to imbue them.


    The alcove behind the third door was larger than the other two alcoves that came before it. Those alcoves only contained wood and stone for barricading the doors against dragonborn abominations. The third alcove, however, had been excavated to make space for the things that would be needed to keep the shelter protected. Most important of these was the receptacle for the bead that would imbue the bound tool that would keep them supplied with fresh air, and the similar pair of receptacles that would imbue the shelter''s active defenses¡­ such as they were. All the receptacles were still in place, and thankfully no one had decided to put rocks or any anything else inside them.


    You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    Lori put one hand on the metal contact for the air intake that pulled in fresh air from the ceiling grate. Through the metal contact and the wire connecting it to the very crude bound tool, Lori could feel airwisps anchored to it that comprised the entirety of the air circulation system. They were still in place, still bound despite not being imbued, and she resisted the urge to deactivate the binding and imbue it with a little magic to keep them from dissolving. It wasn''t needed.


    "Great Binder?"


    Lori looked up at the voice. "What is it, Erzebed?"


    "We have people gathered outside to go into the shelter, and Clowee is ready to go with all the rest of the demesne''s children," her temporary Rian reported. "Several people are asking to go with the children."


    "Refuse them and send the boat on its way."


    "They might object."


    "Be emphatic. As to the rest who are behaving, tell them to go to the area that''s designated as a shelter and stay there. No wandering in the mines. The sooner we can seal up the mine, the safer I''ll be. Get back to me as soon as you finish. Leave the emphasis to someone else."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    As her temporary-Rian left, Lori walked over to what at a casual glance might be mistaken for a badly carved stone bench. The stone was uneven, creating six large bumps. A slightly less casual and more imaginative observer would think that it was instead six squat pots covered by a dirty canvas, until they drew close and realized it was stone and not fabric. Lori touched one of the bumps in questions, curling her fingers so her nails touched stone, and claimed the earthwisps there. Her claim spread from the points of contact, and she formed the earthwisps into a binding.


    She softened a segment of the stone, thinning the already thin material even further in various places before dissolving the binding. Taking her staff, she struck the places she had thinned. The stone broke, falling off what it had been covering: a knee-high, cloudy white perfect sphere, sitting in a mild recess to keep it from rolling around.


    Lori carefully rolled the oversized wispbead towards the receptacle that had been made for it, moving it slowly and making sure she had both hands on it at all times. If it got away from her, it would roll all the way down deeper into the mine, and she did not want to have to try and recover it.


    Wishing she already knew how to use Mentalism so she could just pick up the bead with her thoughts, Lori maneuvered it into place onto the metal contact. Immediately, she heard air moving as the bound tool began sucking up air through the ceiling grate between the first and second doors. As ventilation systems went, it wasn''t much. It relied completely on getting fresh air from outside, and in addition to leaving a weakness that dragonborn abominations could enter through, any noxious vapors in the air would be drawn in as well. Still, it was better than the certain death of stuffing more than fifty people in a cave and sealing the doors. The method had worked in her demesne so far¡­


    At least this time she had a means of mitigating the dragonborn abominations trying to get in through their air vents¡­ which she really should have thought of sooner, but she thought of it in time for this, so that was all right!


    With the oversized wisp bead in place, ready to power the crude bound tool for a week at the least¡ªshe hadn''t really tested how long the bead would last but that was mostly because there hadn''t been time¡ªLori slid the wooden panels that would prevent people accidentally kicking it out of position or putting anything on top of it into place. Once that was done, she took a moment to check on her demesne again, searching for Rian''s signal. Nothing yet. Well, Lori''s Ice Boat had probably only just left to go back, so Rian would probably wait for that to return. Still, there were some things she could do until then, and best she get what she could done, since she had little else to do. She hadn''t wanted to risk bringing her almanac with her.


    She waited for Riz to get back before she allowed herself to her get distracted, though she made herself comfortable on the long niche built into one wall of the alcove next to the receptacles. Unfortunately, she didn''t have her bedroll, but her pack had enough clothes to make for a functional pillow, and she could use her rain coat as a blanket. It would be like when she first started living in her Dungeon by herself again.


    That had been a miserable time. The only thing that would make things as bad was if she''d be sleeping on a pile of sand. It had seemed like a good idea at the time and a stupid one since.


    When Riz got back, there were people behind her, being led by someone carrying one of her wisplights. They glanced at Lori sitting in the alcove behind the third door, but continued on deeper into the mine, towards the shelter area next to the food storage.


    Lori ignored them, focusing her attention on her temporary Rian. "I need to arrange some of our defenses back at home," she said. "Stay here and make sure no one bothers me." A pause as she recalled something, then amended her order. "Make sure no one bothers me unless the dragon is starting to pass over us, or everyone is inside the shelter. Can you see it already?"


    "A little, Great Binder," Riz said, moving to lean back against a wall so she could see Lori and the stream of people entering the mine carrying packs and sacks and jars and blankets and other things, her spear on the crook of one arm. "There are dark clouds high, high in the sky behind all the other clouds, flashing with dragon claws. It makes it hard to tell how far away it is in overland distance. Do¡­ do you know if it means anything that the clouds are orange and green?"


    "It means if they mix they''ll turn brown." High in the sky? That¡­ would probably explain why it felt so strangely distant, if there was a greater vertical distance compared to the previous two she had felt¡­ "Keep an eye out while I''m configuring Lorian Demesne''s defenses." Ugh, she hated that name. It will always be Lori''s Demesne in her heart.


    "Understood, Great Binder."


    Lori lay back on the flat surface of the stone niche, again wishing she had a bed roll. Well, it was still better than sand. Adjusting her pack behind her head as a pillow, she closed her eyes and began securing her home against a dragon''s passing.

 309 - The Dungeon And The Dragon

    After the first time a dragon had passed over her demesne and caught her unawares, Lori had steadily started upgrading her Dungeon''s defenses as well as its ability to house the people of her demesne for extended periods of time. More food storage, more water storage, more space for people, more space to bring in the demesne''s resources, better defenses against dragonborn abominations, better air vents¡­ Her Dungeon was hardened, well-defended, safe and comfortable.


    Unfortunately, she wasn''t inside it at the moment.


    However, it was still in her best interest to protect it. Her Dungeon''s core was there after all, and she didn''t want it to be destroyed, which a dragon was well-capable of doing. If anything happened to her Dungeon''s core¡­ well, she didn''t exactly know what would happen. There was a dearth of literature about what happened to a Dungeon Binder in those circumstances. At best, it would mean she would be without a core, and would at minimum lose the endless supply of magic it gave her. At worse, she could lose the ability to use all other forms of magic and leave her a mere Whisperer once more, or even die because of her core being destroyed.


    Lori would rather none of those possibilities happened.


    Also, her stuff was in her Dungeon, and she didn''t want to lose any of the tools and equipment she had, especially her glassware!


    Lying on her back in River''s Fork, Lori reached though her connection to her Dungeon''s core to activate the defenses that were not yet in place that she could without actually blocking off entry into her Dungeon. She began sealing off all other points of entry into her Dungeon, which at this point were the pipes running through the stone between the water hub shed next to the river and the water reservoir in her Dungeon, as well as the pipes from the reservoir to the baths outside of her Dungeon. The exhaust vent for the air was well defended enough, since it was submerged in boiling water, though she checked to make sure the binding that kept the water in that state was well-imbued.


    Once that was done, she proceeded to armor the outside of her Dungeon. The stone stockpile near the front of her dungeon grew and shrank depending on whether she''d built anything or she''d excavated more of her third level¡ªshe really needed to excavate that completely so they''d finally have more secure farmland¡ªbut she always kept enough to create a defensive bulwark for the entrance of her Dungeon. Now she made it flow slowly, anchoring and fusing it to the stone of the entryway and the outside of the smithy. Carefully, she moved the stone to thicken the front of her Dungeon, especially the top of the entryway, where it was most vulnerable to breaking from something dropping on it.


    There wasn''t enough stone to reinforce the entire entryway, but Lori was resigned to having to rebuild parts of her demesne anyway. Perhaps it wouldn''t happen, but she would rather not bet on that.


    Once the stone had been distributed to her satisfaction, Lori claimed the earthwisps of the stone in the front of her Dungeon, and formed them into a binding she hadn''t used in some time. The binding of earthwisps reinforced the stone''s structure, making it more durable. When she had first started building her Dungeon, she had used the binding to keep the ceiling from collapsing on her, before she had started using pillars and arching load-bearing structures. The binding had honestly slipped her mind until she realized she could use it in conjunction with her current designs.


    She used the binding now, reinforcing the front of her Dungeon and a little bit of the ceiling of the first level so that the binding would contact one of the wires that connected to her core. The wire''s direct connection to her core kept the binding imbued, allowing it to persist without her paying attention to it. Really, she wished she''d had wire back when a dragon had first passed over her demesne, when she''d had to manually reinforce the entire hill with earthwisps¡­


    ¡­


    Oh.


    Lori spent the next little while claiming the earthwisps of the hill her Dungeon was under. Well, most of the earthwisps, the ones corresponding to contiguous solid stone, since she didn''t want to ruin the soil. And¡­ well, it was built into the hill anyway, so she claimed the earthwisps of the flood barrier as well. and since the flood barrier was built right into the bedrock, she claimed the bedrock as well, and through the bedrock, claimed the earthwisps of the stone walls and floors of the hospital. And the stones of Rian''s house. And¡­


    Well, it took some time¡ªand she resolved to never, ever tell Rian she only made this realization now¡ªbut she was glad nearly all the buildings she had made in her demesne had foundations that went down to the bedrock. And for those that didn''t¡­ well, the soil directly under a building was unlikely to ever be used for planting anyway.


    With every stone structure in her demesne reinforced¡ªwhich was nearly every structure¡ªLori felt a little better about her demesne''s chances. There would probably still be things in need of repair afterwards¡ªthey always had to replace roof planks¡ªbut at least it would hopefully minimize the things that only Lori could repair.


    After that, there wasn''t much left for Lori to do until Rian gave the signal. She took the binding of lightningwisps that kept bugs from entering her dungeon, and moved it towards the new wire that had been embedded into the stone of the entryway¡ªthe now actively-reinforced stone¡ª anchoring the binding so it touched the contact point. Carefully, she expanded the binding so that it extended across the entire entryway. At the moment it was a bit inefficient, since bugs really only needed to be kept from the front door and the intake vent above it, but once her Dungeon was sealed¡­


    "Great Binder?"


    Lori opened one eye, turning her head slightly until Riz came into view. "What it is, Erzebed?" she said. Distantly, she heard the din of people.


    "Everyone''s inside the shelter, Great Binder," her temporary-Rian reported. "We''ve managed to bring in most of the benches, and we''ve transferred as many of the crops we could fit into buckets in case the dragon hits the fields particularly hard. Uh, Rian told me to remind you to put some light on them so they wouldn''t wilt?"


    The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    Lori quashed the urge to build the demesne a dungeon farm. Her own demesne''s dungeon farm was still incomplete, she wasn''t about to start building for another one. "He specifically mentioned that to you in particular?" she said dubiously.


    Riz nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. Rian¡­" She shrugged. "You know how he is."


    Yes, she did. "Noted. Show me where they are."


    The buckets of crops¡ªvigas, the same grain crops they grew in her demesne¡ªwere indeed stuffed root-first into various buckets, with damp soil with them in an attempt to keep them planted. They''d been left in a line along the main tunnel of the mine, little clumps of dirt flattened into the ground around them.


    Lori took the binding of lightwisps anchored to her staff and anchored them on the stone over the uprooted crops. Manipulating lightwisps outside of her demesne had gotten easier ever since she had realized the light could pass through the edges of her skin and even her fingernails. Admittedly, it needed a very strong light, but that was what actually sticking her hand into the illumination was for. No more having to put her eyes near her staff to manipulate lightwisps!


    Altering the binding of lightwisps so that it would imitate sunlight was easy, since she had plenty of experience with it. If these crops died, it would not be because of improper light.


    She held out a hand, both collecting lightwisps in the air for another binding to anchor onto her staff, and to imbue the binding to make it last for more than a day. "How close is the dragon?" she asked as she anchored the binding of lightwisps in place and began imbuing them to make them last.


    "Hard to say, Great Binder, but we can see more of it over the trees now,"


    Lori pressed her lips together. "All right. I''ll do what''s needed for the outside of the mine, then we can seal up the doors."


    She headed back to the alcove behind the third door where she had lain, and collected the bindings of darkwisps she had anchored to the stone. As she headed out of the mine, she found trios of men and women stationed at the doors, looking nervously outside at the darkening sky. Wait, wasn''t it close to noon?


    Lori stepped outside and in morbid curiosity turned to look towards where she could feel the dragon''s presence. There was what seemed like an undulating pillar that rose in the sky and kept on rising, fading as it grew smaller and smaller at its distant peak. Then her gaze lowered, and she realized it wasn''t so much a pillar as a cone. The cone, covered in orange and green swirling patterns, seemed thicker than the clouds it floated above, and unlike the dragons she had seen before, this one didn''t roil and bubble like boiling water. Instead it seemed to flow like thick honey, light passing and reflecting through it in disquieting ways, even as the core of the cone remained dark as ink, the suggestions of eyes and teeth glinting disquietingly within.


    The patterns spun on the cone''s surface, orange and green spiraling together until the swirls exploded into twisting, two-toned orange and green cloud columns that didn''t look like clouds, too solid and thick like paint smearing across the sky. They erupted in too-straight lines for what seemed great distances before making an abrupt right angle turn and starting to spiral inward back to the cone. The base of the cone was just barely visibly though the trees, a dark tunnel from which fell dragon claws, streaks of many colored lighting that seemed to be sweeping across the ground like the bristles of a broom. As she watched, one of the flickering, too straight lines of lighting began to curl, forming a spiral that began to tighten as the lightning seemed to draw back into the gaping maw of the cone, even as more colored lightning unfurled and started to trail down, seemingly almost to the ground. Instead of thunder, there was a deep rumbling that Lori didn''t so much as hear as feel resonating in her bones,


    Lori wrenched her gaze away as she saw eyes within the base of the cone. Her heart was beating fiercely, she realized, and her breathing had fallen into the deep, even rhythm she used to most efficiently draw in magic¡­ or to calm down. Shaking her head, she resolutely kept her back towards the dragon and started anchoring the darkwisps she had collected to the rock outside the mine, even as her bones continued to vibrate. The darkwisps formed a half-dome over the mine''s entrance, blocking out the light and the sight of the dragon.


    With the dome formed, the only light left came from the lightwisps anchored to her staff. She deactivated the lightwisps on her staff for a moment, plunging her in darkness, and she reached out and claimed the darkwisps that suddenly appeared in the lightless space, binding, imbuing and integrating them to the half-dome she had anchored, anchoring the new additions to the ground and the stone of the mine, making sure she anchored darkwisps around the grate set into the ceiling of the space between the mine''s first and second doors. When she reactivated the lightwisps on her staff again, the darkness remained, and she had to part the darkwisps so she could find her way again.


    The militia stationed at the first door stared at the darkwisps nervously, and they stepped out of Lori''s way as she approached. She ignored them for the moment as Riz stumbled out of the cloud of darkwisps after her. The Dungeon Binder touched one of the pieces of quartz that had been set into her staff, which was vibrating slightly in a steady beat. Laying her finger flat against the quartz, she extracted the lightningwisps she''d stored within, forming them into a binding. When she had extracted all the lightningwisps, the quartz lay still.


    Lori couldn''t reached the ceiling, so she used her staff to anchor the binding of lightingwisps to the stone above the door, and had the binding pass through the stone grate. That done, she stepped through the door, ignoring the way the militia there stepped hastily out of her way, and drew the binding over to the stone grate on the ceiling, anchoring it such that the lightningwisps surrounded the grate opening, then reshaped the rest of the binding so that it would extend out to her satisfaction.


    "Have them close the first door so I can barricade it," she ordered Riz, "then tell them to get ready to do the same for the second door. I need to go check something."


    "You heard the Great Binder," her temporary-Rian said as Lori moved past them to head towards the alcove behind the third door. "Get that door closed and barricaded unless you want us all to get eaten by dragonborn. Uh, can you leave us some light, Great Binder"


    Lori stopped, sighed and turned around. She took the binding of lightwisps from her staff and anchored it to the stone wall opposite the alcove behind the first door, then collected more lightwisps from the air to anchor another binding to her staff as she continued back on her way.


    The second and third receptacles next to the bead that powered the ventilation intake was still empty. Lori knelt and touched one of the metal contact points that a bead was intended to rest on. She used the metal as a channel to reach out to all the wisps the wire that lead from the receptacle was touching. Earthwisps in the stone surrounding the wire, some firewisps from the heat of her hand, airwisps in¡­ well, the air¡­ and darkwisps and lightningwisps from the bindings she''d anchored around the stone grate, which was where the wire led.


    Good, all the bindings were making contact with the wire properly.


    Lori took a moment to imbue both bindings through the wire for a moment. They were unlikely to run out of imbuement any time soon, but habit was habit, and their defensive bindings could never have too much imbuement.


    Then she stood and went to secure the first door.

 310 - Sealing The Dungeon

    Each of the mine''s doors were finally closed, wooden bars slid into place onto brackets to keep them from opening, blocks of stone stacked against the doors for emphasis, and stone pulled from the ground acting as backstops to secure the doors from swinging open at all. The stone around the first door had been reinforced with a binding of earthwisps for a pace in all directions. The reinforcement wasn''t as extensive as the one in her own demesne, but she didn''t have a core to keep it imbued here.


    The multiple layers of barriers seemed to give the militia who had moved the prepared blocks of stone in place peace of mind. No doubt they thought the barriers would be more than sufficient to keep dragonborn abominations away from them.


    In Lori''s experience, this was foolishness as long as the dungeon¡ªor in this instance, the dragon shelter¡ªneeded air vents to draw in fresh air and keep people from asphyxiating. The openings could be entered by small dragonborn abominations, which had been the bane of her defenses.


    At least, they had been the bane of her defenses. Hopefully, her newest addition to her defenses would allow her to stop worrying about them.


    Deil and Tackir settled the second enormous wispbead into place atop one of the two receptacles set in the third alcove, the bead touching the metal contact point at the bottom.


    "All right," Lori said, nodding in satisfaction that she didn''t have to be the one to move the wispbead this time. "That''s enough for now, you two. I''ll take it from here, and then we should be safe until the dragon finally passes." She paused. "Well, at least until the water runs out."


    "We have plenty of water, Great Binder," Riz assured her. "Rian''s been making sure to keep having barrels built and shipped here. The water we have should last us a week, and Lord Yllian has someone watching to make sure the water is being rationed properly."


    Lori nodded absently. "Tell them as soon as I finish here, I''ll come over to provide heat to cook by." She paused. "They did remember to bring the cooking things, didn''t they?"


    "Yes, Great Binder. Right now the ingredients are being prepared for dinner, and water being pulled up from deeper in the mine for washing. Though Lord Yllian is asking what we do with the wash water?"


    "I''ll get to that after I''m done here," Lori said, kneeling down next to the newly-placed bead to touch the metal contact point of the third receptacle next to it. Through it, she could feel the bindings of earthwisps, darkwisps and lightningwisps being imbued by the second bead. "Keep an eye out for interruptions."


    The darkwisps were as well as they could be, and the earthwisps were continuing to reinforce the rock, so she focused on the lightningwisps, finally activating the binding. The lightningwisps began to consume the magic she had imbued into them, and though she heard nothing, Lori imagined the sound of sparks crackling in the air as the activated binding made lightning flow through the area that the lightningwisps covered. She sniffed at one of the vents from which the air drawn in, but there was no smell of burning wood, so she''d positioned the binding properly and the first door wasn''t currently on fire.


    Nodding to herself, she let the wire go, eyeing the large bead that was imbuing all the bindings. With the number of other bindings it was supporting, as well as the larger scale of those bindings compared to the ventilation bound tool, she had no doubt that the second bead would be consumed at a far greater rate than the first one. It was why there were so many spare beads in the alcove. With the bead in place, she took the other wooden panels for the receptacles and slid them into place around and on top of the second bead. The panels were primarily for this receptacle, because if the wispbead was removed from the metal contact for any reason, all the bindings it was imbuing would dissolve. Given that it was imbuing their primary defenses¡­


    Yes, they wouldn''t want that bead to move out of place.


    Lori grabbed her staff, imbuing the binding of lightwisps on it. "All right," she said. "Come on, let''s see about getting ourselves some lunch."


    Riz nodded. "Uh, do you want me to have Deil or Tackir to come here and watch to make sure no one touches your things, Great Binder?"


    ¡­


    "Yes, get them both. I''ll wait here."


    <hr>


    Once the two carpenters arrived and had been told of the importance of not letting anyone touch Lori''s things, the importance of immediately getting her if they smelled smoke, and the importance of screaming loudly if a dragonborn abomination suddenly appeared, Lori went with Riz towards the main area of the shelter. Located next to the food storage, it was where the population of the demesne was intended to reside for the duration of the dragon''s passing.


    Lori was reminded how much this wasn''t her Dungeon as she saw how dark the shelter was. The only light was coming from two of the three wisplights in the demesne, which had been placed in the middle of the space of the shelter to illuminate the space. Everyone was sitting along the walls of the shelter, probably both to keep people behaved and so that no one was blocking the light. The third wisplight was off to one corner of the shelter, illuminating the small food preparation area, next to where someone was cutting up ingredients for what was probably lunch.


    The relative darkness meant that when she entered, the binding of lightwisps on her staff immediately made the room brighter and drew everyone''s attention to her. She ignored the murmur of the conversation around her as she walked directly towards the vicinity of the third light. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw someone stand and start walking purposefully towards her, but a woman next to him grabbed the back of his shirt and several nearby men grabbed his arms, one of them slapping a hand over his mouth.


    The people working on what was presumably their next meal were cutting up hard-looking meat¡ªprobably fresh from the cold box of the food storage and still partly frozen¡ªpealing tubers and cracking grains of vigas glanced up at her. She kept her eyes on the knives they held until Riz interposed herself in front of Lori.


    Satisfied, the Dungeon Binder knelt down in front of the stone stove. Lori held her staff on the crook of one elbow as she rubbed her palms together, moving briskly until the heat of friction arose. Quickly, she claimed and bound the firewisps that resulted, then held up one hand towards the light anchored to her staff, claiming and binding lightwisps in the air. Lori formed the firewisps and lightwisps together into a single binding as she imbued it, drawing on her connection from her core for the magic.


    Once she felt the binding was sufficiently imbued to last long enough to cook something, Lori reached inside the stove and anchored the binding to the bottom of the firebox. Drawing back her hand, she reached down to her belt knife and drew out the blade. With one finger touching the blade, she reached back inside and tapped the tip of the knife until she felt the binding. She activated the binding, then quickly drew back her hand as a bright red light and heat began to emanate from the firebox.


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    "That should be enough to cook with," Lori said as she sheathed her belt knife. Well, tried to. She got it on the fourth try. "Treat it like a real fire and don''t stick your hand inside. If it runs out before you finish cooking, tell¡ª" Lori resisted the urge to reach into her belt pouch and feel around for a rock, "¡ªYllian or Riz, and they''ll bring it to my attention." Had Yllian factored the cooking water into the drinking water ration?


    ¡­


    Lori decided to just assume he had, and hoped they didn''t run out of water as a result.


    She vaguely heard their words of acknowledgement as she looked around, trying to remember what she had to do next. Oh, right, the wash water. Yes, that was a problem, wasn''t it? They might not have enough water to use on washing¡ªand bathing too¡ªbut they did have some water flooding the deeper part of the mine that¡­ well, was probably relatively clean. At the moment, anyway. It certainly wouldn''t stay that way if that was where they would throw away their wash water.


    Which meant Lori had between now and until the kitchen finished cooking to make something to deal with the issue.


    Did they even have anything to draw that water with? Didn''t they just use all the buckets to plant the crops they''d taken from the fields?


    ¡­


    Sighing, Lori absently checked her own demesne, and if Rian had¡ª


    She stopped. There it was. The binding of lightwisps that was anchored to the rock she''d given Rian had been placed atop another binding of lightwisps on a little stone shelf next to the door of her Dungeon. It was signal to seal up her dungeon and activate its defenses.


    Lori straightened up, grabbing her staff. "Erzebed, with me." She began hurrying back towards the alcove where she had left her things, her temporary-Rian following after her.


    She found Deil and Tackir leaning against the wall opposite where the buckets of uprooted crops was¡­ probably because she and Riz had taken the light with them when they had left. Ah¡­ well, at least they were positioned to intercept anyone heading towards her things, though they were unlikely to smell burning wood or hear any dragonborn abominations coming unless they were noisy.


    Yes¡­ she might have to anchor down more lightwisps when she was done.


    Claiming some lightwisps from the air around the illumination on her staff, she anchored it to the wall opposite her alcove before she went over to her niche¡ªher pack was still in place¡ªand lay down. "Don''t let anyone disturb me," Lori told Riz. "Same conditions as before. If that idiot doctor comes here¡ª" distantly, she heard what sounded like a heated exchange, though because of the echoes in the tunnel she couldn''t tell if it was coming closer or not, "¡ªfeel free to use violence to keep him away."


    Riz smirked. "Yes, Great Binder."


    With one last nod, Lori closed her eyes and reached through her connection to her demesne''s core, through the core''s connection to the wisps of her demesne. She altered the binding of lightwisps the rock was resting on, activating and deactivating it to make it pulse, letting Rian know she''d received the signal. The voids of wisps near the binding moved, and eventually one reached out and removed the rock. Rian presumably, unless he''d assigned someone to do it. They knew she would be making alterations now.


    The first thing she did was look for Lori''s Ice Boat. She found it on the riverbank a little ways down from the laundry area, surrounded by voids of wisps that were most likely people. Lori reached out and found the binding of waterwisps that kept the boat''s hull solid, and almost dissolved the binding before realizing that would mean the hull simply became ice. Ice that was the coldest it was possible for ice to be. That¡­ wouldn''t be safe to handle.


    She searched and found some firewisps in the air, claiming that and binding it. Lori  made the binding radiate heat as she moved it down towards the boat, claiming the other firewisps in the air that resulted and integrating them to the binding. As the firewisps reached the boat, she integrated them to the binding of waterwisps.


    Then she slowly altered the binding on the hull make it change state from ice to water.


    The ice tried to draw in heat from its surroundings, which the firewisps provided, otherwise the air would have become dangerously cold, cold enough to liquefy air. From the way the voids of wisps recoiled from the boat, the air still grew chill enough to be startling. Soon however, all of the hull had been reduced to water. There was just enough water on the wooden frame and planks of the boat for her to be able to distinguish it as the voids of wisps all surrounded the remains of the boat again and, after a few moments, raised up the boat and started carrying it towards her Dungeon.


    Lori claimed, bound and anchored lightwisps to the ground to draw a trail towards her Dungeon before she began moving the bindings of darkwisps she had made before leaving her demesne. Because she had claimed them while it had still been dark, the darkwisps covered most of her demesne, with only the areas around her Dungeon where she had lighwisps anchored to buildings, the uppermost reaches of the demesne''s sphere where there had been stronger concentrations of lightwisps, and along the river where she had moved the darkwisps so they could navigate being exceptions. Lori formed the darkwisps into a proper dome over her demesne, obscuring the light from the sun.


    She claimed the darkwisps that appeared beneath the dome, binding them with the dome above and making sure the darkwisps were in contact with the same contact point as the binding of lightningwisps across the entryway at the entrance of her Dungeon. The wire imbued the darkwisps directly from her Dungeon''s core, sustaining it continuously. Now no matter what magic the dragon would throw down at her demesne, the darkwisps would act as an ablative layer, consuming imbuement to blunt and resist whatever wisps, thoughts, vistas or life was thrown at it. And since the dome was wired directly to her core, it would have all the imbuement it could possibly need.


    The dome meant that, at best, all she would need to worry about as sources of damage to her demesne''s infrastructure would be physical objects such as dragon scales and other objects falling from the sky, fierce winds, and violent dragonborn abominations. While damaging, the scale of the damage would be far smaller than whatever the dragon could cause directly. Lori waited for the voids of wisps carrying the frame that had been Lori''s Ice Boat to get inside her Dungeon, double checking that all the pipes and entrances were sealed.


    Finally, the voids of wisps entered her Dungeon, and there was a change in the distribution of airwisps that she recognized as the front door being shut. This was confirmed when the binding of lightwisps on the rock she''d given Rian was again placed on the little shelf, even though they''d only discussed that doing so was the signal for sealing her Dungeon. Lori made the binding of lightwisps on the shelf flicker again in confirmation. She would need to talk to her lord about this later. Using the signal like this hadn''t been in their discussions!


    With her Dungeon finally sealed, she began to make the final alteration for its defenses. The stone floor in the middle of her Dungeon''s entryway began to sink. Some of the stone was displaced upward to further block off the door of the dungeon from the entryway by creating a wall that closed off the part of the entryway under the balcony-like stone platform three paces above the door. Behind the balcony, in the stone above the door, vents drew in fresh air for the Dungeon. This should prevent any dragonborn abominations from being able to reach her Dungeon''s doors, while allowing the doors to still open if people needed to access the balcony to defend the vents.


    The sinking pit made a shear wall under the balcony, even as a gentle slope formed on the end towards the entrance of the entryway. Once the pit had sunk deeply enough, Lori opened a pipe from the water hub shed that she had sealed earlier, and the pit began to fill with water. When the water reached a sufficient depth, she sealed off the pipe again, then configured the binding of lightningwisps, anchoring it to the stone on either side and the water underneath. Finally, Lori altered the binding of lightning wisps from one that merely irritated and repelled bugs to one that produced circulating currents of lightning in the air meant to kill anything that passed through it¡­ just like the binding she had placed on the vent grates at the entrance of the mine.


    If this didn''t keep bugs out¡­ well, then she''d have to see what else she could come up with. Hopefully, Rian and the militia would be able to repel whatever did come through.


    Lori sighed in relief as she opened her eyes and sat up with a wince at the hard stone beneath her. It was finally done. Both her Dungeon and this mine had been secured against dragons to the best of her ability.


    Now all she had to worry about was someone in the shelter with her trying to kill her.

 311 - Between Friends

    Karina stopped humming ''Sleep Without Colors'' as her younger brothers and sisters all finally fell asleep. Cif, Jivoy, Malli and Siithia were lay on the bedrolls they''d put on the floor of the alcove her family had claimed. Normally it would be hard to get them down for a nap. However, they were all tired since they''d woken up when it had still dark and had needed to carry all of their family''s things into the dungeon. Her brothers and sisters hadn''t put up a fight when she''d had them lie down and rest.


    Her mother had been lying down on one of the alcove''s benches, eyes also closed, but she turned to look when the humming stopped. Her mother gave her a smile and nodded, letting out a sigh of relief.


    Karina got to her feet carefully so she wouldn''t disturb her sisters beside her. "Inay, I''m going to go and help Shana get everyone settled down. Is that all right?"


    Her mother hesitated. "Are you sure, Rina? Aren''t you tired?"


    Of course she was tired. And hungry, since everyone had been too busy to make breakfast, and even now people were still bringing in what they could so they wouldn''t have to leave anything out for the dragon. But she was eleven now, and the eldest of her siblings besides. She had to be responsible, like her inay and itay always said she should. "I''m fine, Inay. I''m not sleepy yet, and Shana will probably need help," Karina said.


    "Well¡­ if you''re sure."


    "I''m sure," Karina said. She walked around her siblings and leaned down to give her mother a kiss on the cheek, which made her mother smile. "I''ll be back later."


    She left the alcove, heading towards where she thought Shana''s alcove was. The magic lights on the stone ceiling were bright as noon, the way they always were, making it easy to find her way. It would probably be hard to sleep later, though. She remembered that Wiz Lori had made it darker last time.


    Karina passed by several alcoves, looking inside. Most were empty save for people''s things, since a lot of the grown-ups were outside helping bring in the big heavy things they didn''t want to leave outside, but there were some people. Auntie Johzi was sleeping in one, while her daughter Bharelli was playing lima with Big Yerart. In another, Auntie Astolp was sitting on the bench as she used her distaff to spin thread. Her belly was already big and round from her pregnancy, and would probably get even bigger. A few alcoves down, Yhalta was sitting one of the alcove''s benches, holding hands with Matoy. They''d been doing that all the time ever since Wiz Lori said they could promise that they''ll get married, even when they were fighting. It was weird.


    Shana''s alcove was noisy. Ateh Koyan and Ateh Kayas weren''t there, probably too busy helping carry things to help her take care of the other children who used to live in River''s Fork, so Shana was having to settle the other children down by herself.


    "Everyone, sit down," Shana said, making that face she did when she was trying to act like Wiz Lori. It was the same face Wiz Lori made, but without the scowling as she tried to get them to sit down on the benches and niches to get settled. "I know you''re all hungry, but people are busy right now. If you''ll all settle down, I''ll speak to Lord Rian about getting everyone some fruits, but I won''t do that until you all settle down."


    That quieted them down a little, but not all off them.


    "Tota! I want tota!" Adgwyne cried, calling for her mother.


    "I want to go home!" Riga cried, stomping his feet.


    "I''m hungry!" Loveld cried.


    "Yaaaaaahhh!" Febe cried with a big smile on her face, just enjoying being loud.


    They were making the other children who had settled down fidget. Karina knew that if they weren''t reined in soon, the other young ones would start joining them, and the older ones would start yelling at them to be quiet.


    Karina stepped into the alcove, giving Shana a nod. Shana noticed and nodded back as Karina stepped forward, picked up Adgwyne under her arms and lifted her up. The little girl''s crying cut off briefly in surprised as she was tossed into the air, and Karina let go of her just long enough to wrap her arms around the girl and catch her in a hug. She nimbly spun in place as she rocked from left to right and back again, patting the little girl''s pack gently. Adgwyne always needed comforting, and while anyone she trusted would do, she always called for her mother when she was upset.


    "Riga, you know you can''t go home right now," Shana said, nodding to Karina for taking care of the little girl. "We are taking shelter. If you promise to behave now, I''ll ask if you and anyone else who wants to can go with them the next time the Coldhold goes there. Loveld, I can''t go and ask Lord Rian for food if I''m not sure you''re all going to behave. Febe, if you''re going to yell, yell into a pillow." She bent down and picked up a pillow, presenting it to the younger girl.


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    Febe ignored it. "Yaaaaaahhh!"


    For a moment, Shana stood still, clearly thinking. Then she nodded. "Anyone who doesn''t want to eat breakfast, speak up so I don''t ask Lord Rian for food for you."


    "Yaa¡ª!" Febe cut off immediately, putting both hands on her mouth.


    "No one?" Shana said. "All right then. Riga, you can come with me to help me carry the food, so you can be sure I ask Lord Rian if you can go visit later."


    Riga sullenly got to his feet, but he didn''t argue. He knew Shana would do what she said. She''d been the one taking care of them, after all, even if she was only Karina''s age.


    "Karina, could you make sure everyone behaves while we go?" Shana said.


    Karina nodded and gave her friend a smile, still rocking Adgwyne from side to side. "Sure, I''ll take care of it."


    "Thank you. Come, Riga, let''s hope Lord Rian has time for us."


    She felt a twinge of annoyance as Shana turned away. Still no smile. Even Wiz Lori smiled sometimes, but Shana¡­ she only ever made that face.


    Putting her intention to get her friend to smile out of her mind for a moment, Karina leaned back so she could hold out Adgwyne and look her in the face. "Feeling better?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After a while, Shana and Riga came back, both carrying baskets with fruit in them. The fruits weren¡¯t wet and cold, meaning they hadn''t come straight from the big cold rooms.


    "All right everyone, line up," Shana said, taking both baskets and holding them out. "Riga can get first because he helped me carry. The same rules as during meals, you can get two fruits each as long as they''re not two of the same fruit, or one of any other fruit and three hairyblueballs."


    Everyone lined up as Riga got a happyfruit and a golden bud. They all knew the rules. The littlest one went first, because while they ate they''d be quiet. The tallest one would go last. Karina knew it wouldn''t just be the children that Shana was taking care of who''d be lining up.


    Sure enough, the line got longer and longer as more children saw there was food. Karina worked together to make sure everyone didn''t cause too much of a ruckus. It helped that many of the other children brought their game boards. Soon there were people spread out in front of the alcove, sitting on the ground and playing pincer or that new game Shana had shown everyone, jump. Everyone liked jump. It was a lot quicker than pincer, which meant people got to play more of it, and it needed fewer stones than any other game.


    Once everyone had gotten their fruits, Shana gave Karina the basket, which still had some fruit in it. "Can you go and make sure everyone gets some?" she said.


    "Sure. I''ll be right back," Karina said as she took the basket, giving Shana a smile.


    Shana gave her a nod in return, and Karina almost sighed.


    Ciy, Jivoy, Malli and Siithia were still asleep, and mother was snoring slightly on her bench. Karina decided not to wake them, just leaving them some fruit in the alcove on the other side of mother.


    Then she went looking for any other sleeping children.


    Kanan was just waking up when she got to him, and she left him with a pair of fruit on his lap as he yawned and rubbed at his eyes to wake up some more. A few alcoves down, the sisters Phami and Tazel were sleeping next to each other on a single bedroll, and someone had put a blanket on them. Fortunately, Karina remembered what they liked, leaving the fruits above their head. Walking around, she checked all the rest of the alcoves, but there didn''t seem to be anyone else sleeping. But there were still four fruits in the basket! Who hadn''t eaten, yet?


    ¡­


    Oh, right!


    "Here, Shana," Karina said, holding out the basket to her friend. "Your turn to pick."


    "Thank you Karina," Shana said, taking a golden bud and a happyfruit. Karina took the other happyfruit and the remaining pink lady. Setting the basket aside, the two sat down on the ground¡ªthe benches were occupied¡ªas Shana watched to make sure everyone was staying close to the alcove and no one was sitting on the ground further than the nearest pillars. It was sort of allowed to go that far, but any further and you were getting in other people''s way.


    Karina bit into the pink lady, exposing the flesh underneath. Despite how hungry she was, she took small bites, chewing for as long as possible to get every drop of flavor.


    Next to her, Shana started pealing the golden bud, using a fingernail to make a cut in the rind that she peeled open. With slow, careful movements, she pealed back the rind so it was mostly one big piece, exposing the sweet yellow wedges inside. Putting the rind on her lap, Shana pulled apart the juicy fruit inside into two uneven halves and held out the bigger of the two.


    "Here you go, Yoshka," she said, and Shana''s young cousin took the fruit, pulling off the little wedges and happily stuffing them in her mouth.


    Shana ate her fruit more slowly, but she also put each piece into her mouth whole, closing her eyes as she chewed. Soon, her half of the golden bud was gone. She reached down to start eating the happyfruit


    Karina took one last bite of her pink lady, then held it out what was left to her friend. The other girl frowned, but Karina just moved the fruit closer to her face.


    "Come on, just take it."


    "Well¡­ then, thank you Karina," Shana said, raising it up to her mouth and taking a small bite.


    Karina nodded in satisfaction, and looked down to begin peeling her own happy fruit, but suddenly couldn''t because there was a pink lady in front of her face. She tilted her head to look around it at her friend. "I gave that to you."


    "And now I''m giving it back." Shana was making that Wiz Lori face again. "Come on, just take it."


    She took the pink and made a small bite. Then she held it out to Shana again.


    The two continued eating like that until the pink lady was gone.

 312 - Waiting For The Boat

    Slowly, the alcoves around them began to fill up with people. They were tired, sleepy and hungry, and many went straight to the alcoves their family had claimed to go to sleep and let someone else take care of the rest. Others were still bringing things down, carrying more beds into alcoves or other things down to the third level where they had the dungeon farm. Shana and Karina made sure the children in their alcove didn''t get too rowdy and disturb anyone. A few of the children had gone back to their own alcoves to sleep too, but they''d left their game boards so the others could keep playing. They knew Shana would make sure it got back to them properly.


    Everyone was finally starting to behave, with only a little tending on her and Shana''s parts. Karina was able to let herself doze a little, her back to a pillar so she could see everyone if needed. She wasn''t sleeping, she was just resting her eyes! Her ears could hear everything, and she''d open her eyes if she heard something that she needed to do something about!


    After all, her eyes opened right away when she heard Shana stand up and put on her reed tsinelas. People had started making those again when summer had started and everyone felt too hot to wear boots. They were a bit scratchy but a lot cooler, and it was all right to get your feet wet while wearing them. Only Wiz Lori didn''t wear them, but she was Wiz Lori.


    She supposed Wiz Lori really liked wearing socks.


    "W-where are you going¡­?" Karina asked. That wasn''t a yawn. She wasn''t yawning, she was taking a deep breath.


    "I need to speak to Lord Rian," Shana said. "I believe the boat is returning with more children."


    "Oh," Karina said as she straightened and started getting to her feet, wincing as the feeling of the parts of her that had fallen asleep starting to move again. Wait, when had Ateh Koyan and Ateh Kayas gotten here? "Do you want me to go with you?" Everyone had settled down now, and where either playing board games, watching people playing, or playing with the little carved beasts that Shana had gotten from somewhere. She needed to find out if they were going to have food soon, before anyone got really hungry and started complaining. They''d gotten fruits, but she didn''t think anyone else did¡­


    "I shouldn''t need any help."


    "All right, I''ll come with you so you''re not lonely, then." Karina scrunched up her face to get it ready, then gave Shana a big smile.


    "I¡­ would appreciate that, then." She gave Karina a nod of thanks.


    Another failure. But Karina would keep at it. Shana had to smile eventually¡­


    Shana nodded at Ateh Koyan and Ateh Kayas, who nodded back. Karina gave them a smile, and the two Ateh smiled back too. See, that''s what you were supposed to do!


    The two off them headed upstairs, feeling the breeze on their faces from the air coming down the stairs. There were more people in the alcoves since she had rested her eyes, aunties and uncles she recognized as those who used to be militia. Why were they asleep? There seemed to still be work being done.


    When they reached the dining hall, Karina looked towards the kitchen. She was glad to see that Auntie Johzi, Auntie Connie, Uncle Puti and other uncles and aunties were cutting up food and getting the big stew pots ready to cook. There was already a pot on the stove, but no food smells yet. But there would be. There''d be stew and tubers and flat vigas bread and fruits and everyone would stop being hungry.


    Lord Rian was at one of the tables near the doors of the dungeon, holding the flat tablet made of bone that Wiz Lori had made for him. He had a stick that was charred at one end and was using that to draw on the tablet. No, not draw. Write. He was writing. Lord Rian said he was going to teach all the children how to do that soon so they could learn to be merchants and scribes, but Karina wasn''t sure she could learn.


    Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu were sitting on the same table, spinning ropeweed fibers into thread. The two of them were always near lord Rian when they could. Karina really didn''t understand why some people made fun of them. Ateh Umu always looked lonely, even when she was with Ateh Mikon and Ateh Riz. Ateh Mikon was always trying to make her smile, which was so nice of her. Karina had heard the aunties saying Lord Rian should make them honest women by marrying them, but she didn''t think they were the type to tell lies.


    Shana walked right up to Lord Rian, Karina trailing behind her. "Lord Rian," her friend said, and he looked up from what he was dra¡ªwriting and gave Shana and her a smile, which Karina returned.


    "Shana. What can I do for you?"


    "I believe the Lori''s Ice Boat is on its way back from River''s Fork," Shana said.


    Lord Rian blinked, tilted her head, and nodded. "Ah. You can feel their¡­ it''s called life, right?"


    Shana nodded. "Yes. Several concentrations of life are moving along the path of the river."


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    "Well, that''s good to know. How much longer before the dragon gets here?"


    Shana took a deep, slow breath, and Karina saw her hands started to shake. Karina reached down and took her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. She kept squeezing until the shaking stop. Lord Rian glanced down at her hands, but didn''t say anything, waiting for Shana to start talking again.


    Eventually, Shana said, "I believe we still have half a day, perhaps a little less, though that is purely from the intensity of how the life in my body is reacting to its approach."


    Lord Rian nodded, and let out as small sigh. "Thank you. I know she did it to keep us safe in the long run, but since we can''t actually see it because Lori blacked out the sky, it''s hard to say how much longer we have before it gets here. I t''s good to know we still have some time. In your opinion, do you think Lori''s Ice Boat will be able to arrive here before¡­ it does?"


    Shana''s hands started shaking again, and Karina grabbed both of her friend''s hands. The left hand started to jerk as it tried to move, but Karina didn''t let it. The right hand tried to jerk as well, but she held firm. Finally, Shana said, "I believe so. However, this is an uncertain estimate. It believe it would be safer to signal Binder Lolilyuri to seal the Dungeon as soon as the boat arrives. She should have enough perception to not seal off the Dungeon completely when you do, but she will know to start devoting her attention here." Karina glanced at her then warily let go of one hand.


    Lord Rian nodded. "I think so too. I''ll ask some people to be ready to bring the frame of the boat into the Dungeon when it gets here. At worse, we can remove the steam driver and the cladding, if she doesn''t melt the hull¡­"


    "With your permission, I will wait at the docks to take responsibility of the children the boat is most likely carrying," Shana said.


    "All right, as long as Karina goes with you," Lord Rian said. "Karina, if she accidentally falls into the river, scream for help and then go after her so she doesn''t drown, all right?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian," she nodded, giving him a serious look so he knew she was serious.


    He returned the serious look with a nod, then broke out into a smile. "Thank you Karina. I feel better knowing Shana has a friend like you with her."


    Karina grinned widely to return the smile. See Shana, you can smile after nodding!


    "We will be going then," Shana said. "While it will be some time before they arrive, I would rather not miss them, and the children are currently resting, so it is safe enough to leave them alone."


    "Be safe, you two. Hopefully the food will be ready by the time you get back. If needed, I''ll have fruit brought out again for everyone."


    The two headed for the nearby door of the Dungeon, walking hand in hand. At the long tunnel beyond the iron-covered doors, the two pressed up against the walls to make room for people carrying in more beds, benches, tables, and other wood furniture. The walls of the tunnel glowed with colorful, glowing pictures made of light that Wiz Lori and Lord Rian had made showing edible plants. Karina had already memorized each picture so that she''d know to gather them if she ever saw any.


    Outside, the sky was black, even as Karina and Shana began to sweat from how hot the air was. Above them, there was no sun, no moons, no stars, not even clouds. It was very strange, but Lord Rian said it was something Wiz Lori had done to keep them safe, so she wasn''t worried. Light came from the magic lights Wiz Lori had put on the corners of houses, and outside of the old shelters and the baths.


    The carpenter uncles were at the bath houses, working on something with their tools, as Shana and Karina passed them. She gave them a wave and a smile, but they didn''t seem to see. That was all right. They were busy.


    They climbed up the steps over the stone flood wall that Wiz Lori had made. Even though she was wearing her reed tsinelas, Karina stepped carefully, eyeing the stone steps for moisture. As someone who caught seels nearly every day, she''d learned to be careful of wet rocks underfoot. Once they reached the top of the wall, Karina hesitated. The flood wall blocked the light from behind them, and the stairs beyond were dark. They''d all been told¡ªshe especially, for some reason¡ªto not go seeling when it was too dark to see through the water since it was dangerous.


    Shana, however, reached into her belt pouch and drew out a source of light. The plain smooth rock of the sort easily found along the river banks glowed in her hand. Holding the stone, Shana held it out, shining light on the stairs in front of them and the stone dock beyond. The water on either side glimmered with light, but Karina didn''t feel like risking falling into it.


    "Come on," Shana said, leading the way this time. "Don''t worry, I won''t let you fall."


    "I can swim," Karina reminded her. "Lord Rian''s taught me."


    "I am aware. Still, I do not think you would enjoy a swim right now, no matter how hot it is."


    Well¡­ no, she wouldn''t. She and everyone else had been taking at least one swim a day since summer started, but that was when they could see through the water. Even though she knew how deep the water was¡ªshe''d swam there before¡ªthere was something about doing it when she couldn''t look down and see her feet¡­


    There probably wouldn''t be any swimming in the dungeon while the dragon was passing. Binder Lori had made it very clear that none of the water was for that, not even the cistern in the dungeon farm, which was so dirty?they were all told¡ªthat anyone swimming in it would get sick. Well, it probably wouldn''t be needed. It was always cool enough in the dungeon, especially after Lord Rian had told Wiz Lori.


    The two of them walked to the end of the dock, and Shana put down the glowing rock so it would light up the dock around them. Her friend turned to look downriver and put on a patient face, clearly intending to wait however long it took.


    Karina sighed, took off her tsinelas¡ªbecause it was dark, the stone dock was still cool since the sun hadn''t been shining on it¡ªand sat down with her legs crossed, then took her tsinelas, held them against the back of her head, and carefully flopped down on her back. "Sit down," she chided. "You''re just going to hurt your feet waiting like that."


    Shana glanced down at her, giving her that Wiz Lori look. "Your clothes are going to get dirty," she said.


    Karina shrugged. "Help me dust it off?"


    "Of course."


    Shana looked at her a little more, then smoothly slipped off her tsinelas, and carefully sat down with her back against one of the posts they used to tie the boats to the dock, resting against it so she could continue watching the river.


    Together, the two waited for the boat to come home, ready to greet whoever it would bring.

 313 - The New Girls

    Karina felt someone nudge her shoulder gently but insistently.


    "Karina, time to wake up. I can see the boat."


    She sat up, lifting her head from the tsinelas under her head. The stone of the dock was hard against her back. "¡­wasn''t sleeping," she managed to get out as she stifled a yawn, breathing deeply through her nose as she kept her lips closed, even as her jaw opened as far as it would go. She wiped the sweat off her face with the hem of her dress


    "It''s fine," Shana said. Her face and pale white hair were wet, as if she''d splashed herself with river water to get the sweat off. "You should sleep while you can, since Binder Lolilyuri might not remember to dim the lights on the second level, meaning people will likely be confused about when to sleep. I''ll need help keeping watch over everyone at all hours of the day if that happens."


    "I wasn''t sleeping," Karina insisted. She''d just been resting her eyes again. She got to her feet, trying to slap dust off her clothes from lying on the ground.


    "Here, let me do it," Shana said, Karina held still to let her. The other girl started from Karina''s hair, running her fingers back and forth to dislodge dust, and proceeded to work her way down. Karina felt her moving down the back of her dress, holding out the skirt so she could strike it to knock the dust off. "There, that should be enough. Be ready to grab the rope, Ateh Clowee is almost here."


    They both turned back to the river. A light was moving through the dark, and they could hear the strange splashing of a boat moving against the current. As the sound grew closer, Shana raised up her glowing rock, waving it back and forth. Eventually, the boat floated into place next to the dock, and Ateh Clowee sitting at the back did something to make the boat suddenly come to a stop.


    "Catch!" Ateh Clowee called, tossing a rope towards the two of them. Karina caught the rope, and began to secure it around the post sticking out of the dock, wrapping it around the two pegs near the top the way she''d seen the ferrywoman do.


    In addition to the Ateh Clowee, there were two other children in the boat.


    Karina frowned. "I thought you said there were six children left in River''s Fork?" she asked Shana.


    Shanna sighed, then shook her head. "There''s nothing we can do about it from here. Binder Lori will take care of them. Hello Yrria, Tena. Welcome to Lorian Demesne. While you''re here, I''ll be taking care of you."


    "Ateh Shana?" Yrria said. Karina recognized her from when her family used to live in Lorian Demesne. Yrria was about two years younger than her, and was trying to get to her feet on the boat, only to sway and lose her balance as the boat shifted under her.


    "Be careful," Karina said. Shana raised up the glowing rock so that they''d have more light. "Stay on your knees, it''s easier to move that way. Come over to me, and Shana and I will help you up onto the dock."


    Yrria and Tena both nodded nervously. They both looked scared, and kept glancing at the darkness around them.


    "Don''t worry," Karina assured them with a smile. "The dark is just something Wiz Lori did to protect us from the dragon. Lord Rian says if it can''t see us, the dragon can''t hurt us as badly. So don''t worry, the dark means we''re safe."


    The two relaxed slightly on at hearing that, but it still took some work getting them out of the boat. Ateh Clowee eventually had to pick them up and pass them to Karina on the dock. She was strong from days spent helping Shana with her farming and her own seeling, so she was able to pull the two younger girls to the docks safely.


    Yrria and Tena each had a pack. The packs had seen better days and weren''t very full. Each probably contained clothes, but there was also a small pillow and a bedroll each, probably from River''s Fork. The two children held their packs and pillows and bedrolls fearfully, as if they thought someone would take them, and it was lucky they didn''t drop anything and it fell into the river.


    "Do you want me to help you carry some of that?" Karina offered.


    Yrria shook her head fiercely. "Inay said we should carry our own things so they don''t get lost," the younger girls said. Tena nodded in agreement.


    "All right, then. Did your Inay say anything about helping you pick it up to carry?"


    As Karina helped the two pick up their things and carry them so nothing fell, Shana turned to Ateh Clowee. "Lord Rian said you should beach the boat near the laundry area," she said. "I think he had someone waiting there, so he should know you''re back. Beach it and they''ll work on getting the boat dismantled and brought into the Dungeon."


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    Ateh Clowee nodded. "I thought I saw someone there," she said. "Will you two be fine with the children, Karina?"


    Karina nodded. "Yes, Shana and I will be fine."


    "Then I''ll be going then! If anyone falls into the river, yell, all right?"


    Shana undid the rope around the post, and Ateh Clowee did something to the handle she was holding. The ice boat began to move backwards, away from the docks, the lights glowing at its front showing the way as it turned and headed a little downriver to the shore in front of the laundry area.


    "Are they ready to move?" Shana asked.


    Karina looked at the two girls each had a pack strap over thier shoulders, across their body, and were carrying their pillow and bed roll in their arms. Already the two looked like they thought it was all too heavy, and Tena''s pillow was slipping to the side of her bed roll, threatening to fall. She let out at gasp of alarm as Karina grabbed it, but sighed in relief as it was put back squarely on top of her bedroll.


    Shana sighed. "Here, why don''t we help you with that?" she said. She stepped behind Yrria and used her hands to hold up the bedroll slightly, taking its weight from the younger girl without actually lifting it from her hands. "There, is that better?"


    Yrria tried to see behind her and failed, but hesitantly nodded.


    Shana glanced at Karina, then at Tena, and Karina nodded. Giving the younger girl an encouraging smile, she stepped behind her and did what Shana was doing.


    It was awkward walking back to the Dungeon that way, but Karina didn''t mind, and neither did Shana. The important thing was making the two new girls feel safe, and if that meant letting them carry their own things¡ªwith some help¡ªthen that''s what they did.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The smell of good food was starting to spread through the Dungeon as they led the two younger children down to the alcove Shana had claimed. The girls relaxed when they saw the other children, as well as other people they knew. Yrria and Tena had used to live here, before their parents decided they didn''t like living under Wiz Lori and had moved to River''s Fork instead, walking along the river so they were close to water. Wiz Lori didn''t let anyone use her boats to leave the demesne if they weren''t coming back, no matter how much Lord Rian asked.


    Their families had left last summer, after the first dragon had passed over the demesne, so the two didn''t know about all the changes Wiz Lori had made to her dungeon. Yrria and Tena had stared at how big the dining hall was, with all the tables and benches and latrines close to the door. Karina glanced at a rack just inside the entrance out of habit, but she wasn''t carrying a seeling rod today, and they''d continued walking back to the third level.


    "Everyone, Yrria and Tena are here," Karina announced as they reached Shana''s alcove. She kept her voice down to not disturb the other alcoves, but everyone who was awake looked towards them.


    "Tah! You''re here, you''re here!" Yoshka, Shana''s younger cousin, called happily, putting down the wooden beast she''d been playing with. She got to her feet, the pale white hair she shared with her cousin an unruly mess as she rushed to Shana. The smaller girl gave her cousin a hug, and something that might have been a small smile finally appeared on Shana''s face as she returned the hug before giving Yoshka a pat on the head. "Is it time to eat yet?"


    "Not yet, Yoshka," Shana said as Karina directed Yrria and Tena to put their things in the niche at the far side of the alcove, where everyone''s things were already being stored. "But it should be ready soon. Go wash your hair so that you''re clean by the time we have to eat." Shana paused. "Actually, come with me and I''ll wash your hair. Karina and I have to show Yrria and Tena where everything is."


    The two had glanced at their things for some reason.


    "Don''t worry," Shana said, looking up from her cousin. "I promise, no one is going to steal your things. You have my word. If anything is stolen, I will get it back and if that''s not possible, I will personally replace it."


    Karina had heard that people had been stealing in River''s Fork, but Shana''s promise seemed to be enough to get them to be willing to leave their bags, bedrolls and pillows in the niche along with everyone else''s. Shana had sent a look towards Ateh Koyan¡ªAteh Kayas seemed to have fallen asleep¡ªand the weaver nodded.


    Shana took hold of one of Yoshka''s hands, and lead the way to the stairs at the back of the level. "Now, it has been some time since you left Lorian Demesne," she said as Karina herded Yrria and Tena behind her, making sure the two girls didn''t wander off, "so let us show you where everything is now. Every family has their own alcove, where they stay when there''s a dragon or some other emergency, like a storm. I''m sure everyone will be glad to see you again once they wake up."


    They climbed up the same stairs they gone down, Yoshka laughing as the breeze sent their hair flying back.


    "You have already seen the latrines," Shana said, "and the kitchen, which is where we will be getting our food later. The table we''ll sit at is there in the middle, we''ll show you were it is later." She pointed to one side. "Those are the baths. We can take a bath there later. Right now, men are using it, so we can''t go in. If you need to launder any of your clothes before the dragon leaves, we''ll do it here."


    "You probably don''t have any soap," Karina said, "and it doesn''t seem like you have your bath buckets with you, so we''ll get you some later." Shana nodded at those words, so she''d probably ask the carpenter uncles for the buckets later.


    "We will get you the soap before it''s time to eat so you can wash your hands," Shana said. "Over there are the cold rooms. No matter how hot it gets, do not go inside there. You''ll hurt yourselves, and you might not be able to open the door from the inside. There''s also all the new buildings outside, but we can''t show those to you at the moment. We need to stay inside because of the dragon. Now, do either of you need to use the latrine?"


    Yrria shook her head, but Tena nodded nervously.


    "All right, we''ll show you the short latrine that will probably be easier for you to use¡­"

 314 - The Dragon Arrives During Lunch

    They were in the middle of having lunch when Karina began to hear a faint sound. It sounded vaguely like a distant dry branch being snapped, but it must be loud if they could hear it over the sounds of everyone talking and eating heartily over the long-delayed meal. Karina looked around in confusion, as did the other children around her.


    As she did, she noticed Shana was shaking. Her friend was holding her spoon and fork in clenched fists, and there was a little mess on the table where food seemed to have spilled, which Karina gave a disapproving frown at. She dutifully took her spoon to scoop up the spilled food and ate it, then ran her finger along the tabletop to scoop clean up what was left of the smear. There. No food wasted!


    That done, she put a hand on her friend''s shoulder. Shana was completely tense, all her muscles clenched tight. Tears were starting to well from her eyes, and her chest was starting to heave. Karina could hear air whistling as it went in and out of Shana''s nose far too fast.


    "Shasha? Are you all right?" Yoshka asked from Shana''s other side as Karina heard movement and a bench scraping across the floor behind her,


    Karina reached around and very, gently rested her hand on her friend''s left cheek, then started shaking Shana''s from side to side to get the other girl''s attention. Her eyes, meanwhile, were watching Shana''s hands, especially the way they were both still tightly clutching their wooden utensils. If either hand looked like it was going to move¡­


    She''d seen Shana slap herself in the face before, when she seemed to be having nightfrights in the middle of the day, and right now she was still holding a spoon. So she put her hand on the side of the face Shana hit and shook her to get her out of the nightfrights without any slapping.


    After a while, she felt the tense muscles in Shana''s shoulders relax, no longer as tight as pulled cords. "Karina, could you please stop doing that to my face now?"


    "You''re not going to slap yourself?"


    Karina felt hot breath on her wrist as Shana sighed. "Yes, I won''t slap myself. The panic attack seems to have passed."


    After one last look, Karina drew back her hand. On Shana''s other side, Yoshka grinned and put her hand of Shana''s face, because it had probably looked like fun. The young girl mashed her cousin''s cheek with her palm, giggling as she did so.


    "Please stop that Yoshka, you''ll get food on my face," Shana said. Her cousin giggled one last time, but put down her hand. "Thank you." There was a moment''s pause as Shana glanced down at her utensils, then at the table. "Karina, what happened to the food I spilled?"


    "I ate it. It was going to waste."


    Shana sighed in a way that was actually very like Wiz Lori, usually when she was muttering about people being idiots. "Karina, I keep telling you, you''ll get sick eating food right off the table. Stop doing that! The demesne has plenty of food, there''s no need to get sick eating a spoonful to keep it from going to waste."


    "But it''s wasteful!"


    "It''s even more wasteful if you get sick!" Another sigh. "Come here!"


    Shana put her hand sideways on Karina''s forehead, the way she''d seen the aunties, medics and doctors do to check for fever. Karina stayed still expectantly, but just like the times Shana had done it before, she didn''t feel anything.


    "There," Shana said. "If you still feel pains in your stomach after this, or it feels like your stomach is bubbling, tell me right away, all right?"


    "Yes, Wiz Shanalorre," Karina said, in the same tone she''d say it to Wiz Lori.


    "Binder Shanalorre. I''m not a wizard, just a Dungeon Binder."


    "I thought you needed to be a wizard to be a Dungeon Binder?"


    "I can state confidently that''s not the case. I wasn''t, after all." Sighing, Shana pushed away her food. "Excuse me a moment. I need to find Lord Rian."


    "I think he already knows the dragon is here," Karina said, glancing over her shoulder at the table behind them. The bench directly behind them was empty¡ªeven with her gone, no one sat on Wiz Lori''s bench¡ªwhile across the table from the empty bench, Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu were eating along, a space between them where Lord Rian usually sat. "Finish your food first. Lord Rian is probably busy right now."


    Shana frowned for a moment, but her face smoothed and she nodded. "Yes, you''re right. Lord Rian doesn''t need me to inform him that¡­it¡­" She trailed off, so Karina put her hand on Shana''s face again and shook her.


    "Ah!" Yoshka cried. "Can I do it, Ateh Karina?"


    "All right, Yoshka," Karina relented. "Don''t press too hard."


    Karina took her face off Shana''s face, and Yoshka proceeded to mash her palm on her cousin''s cheek.


    Shana blinked. "¡ªhas arrived over the¡­ Yoshka, would you kindly please stop doing that?"


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Yoshka grinned, but didn''t stop.


    With a patient expression on her face, Shana gently took hold of her cousin''s wrist and pulled it back. Yoshka pouted, but drew back her hand. "Shasha, peel this for me!" she said, holding out the mican she''d pick for her fruit with the meal.


    Shana took the fruit, scoring it with one of her nails until she could get a finger underneath and started peeling, making the rind open like flower.


    From outside, Karina could hear the sounds of whatever the dragon was doing growing louder. It no longer sounded like a branch snapping, or even several branches snapping one after another. Instead, it sounded like someone was striking a thick metal pot like a drum repeatedly. Possibly with a hammer in either hand, from how fast and loudly the sounds were being. There was also a smell like rain in the air and¡­ something else¡­


    Karina glanced towards the door, and it seemed like she wasn''t the only one. She couldn''t actually see the door, of course, since there were other tables in the way, and she didn''t want to try to wiggle out of the bench just to look. "Ateh Koyan, can you see what''s happening?" she asked.


    Ateh Koyan looked very similar to her cousin Ateh Mikon, and had the same pink hair and bright yellow eyes, which she shared with all her sisters. However, unlike Ateh Mikon, unless Ateh Koyan made an effort to smile she always looked like she was glaring, even when she was asleep. Fortunately, she was often smiling when she helped take care of the other children. The woman was also looking towards the door, a concerned expression on her face that, sadly, looked like a glare. She glanced at Karina for a moment, who gave her an encouraging smile, and Ateh Koyan smiled back.


    "Lord Rian has his ear to the door," the weaver said. "He''s gesturing to Master Kolinh¡­ some of the volunteers are moving to sit next to the door, but they''re not getting their spears. Ah, they''re eating. So perhaps Lord Rian doesn''t think it''s anything to worry about right now."


    Indeed, not long after¡ªKarina had finished her own food and was in the middle of eating her fruits¡ªLord Rian made his way back to his table and announced in a loud voice that, "All right everyone, go back to eating. Weird sounds coming from outside when a dragon passes by is normal, and since the door isn''t being battered down, I don''t think it''s any worse than the screams from last time." Karina considered that, and found herself nodding in agreement, and several people seemed to be doing so as well. "We should be safe for now. Binder Lori put in a lot of work to have the Dungeon better protected. So when this is all over, let''s all thank her when she comes back by giving her what she wants most: no one talking to her and pretending she doesn''t exist unless she talks to us first."


    There were laughs at that. Karina thought it was one of the weirder jokes Lord Rian liked to make. It wasn''t what people did, after all. When they saw Wiz Lori, they stepped out of her way and gave her a bow, not ignore her.


    "And on the note of special things we''re doing for our Dungeon Binder¡­ Onezto, how''s that chair coming along?"


    Uncle Onezto called out, "It''ll be ready by the time she gets back, Lord Rian."


    Lord Rian nodded. "Great. As to everyone else¡­ like the bed, don''t tell her we''re making her a new chair, all right?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian," Karina said, her voice mixing with everyone as they said pretty much the same thing.


    Lord Rian nodded. "Good. Hopefully when this is all over, all we have to do is fix a few roofs. From the sound of it, we''ll be losing some crops again¡ª" Karina sighed at that, and she wasn''t the only one, "¡ªbut that''s why Binder Lori has been making more plots in the Dungeon Farm." He clapped his hands together, smiling at everyone. "Now, everyone finish eating so we can wash up, and then start taking turns at the baths. Be sparing with the water, but at least take a bath to wash up after all today''s lifting. And then¡­" Lord Rian began to chuckle. "Well, Binder Lori''s not here, so¡­ I won''t tell her if anyone wants to start playing music."


    There were more laughs at that, but Karina saw some people look happier at the reminder.


    "All right everyone, that''s it! Eat up and remember: Binder Lori is probably going to forget to do anything about the lights downstairs, so have a clean cloth to cover your eyes when you sleep!"


    There was some confusion, followed by groans as people realized that Wiz Lori probably would forget to dim the lights so people could sleep. Karina looked over her shoulder, watching as Lord Rian sat back down and accepted a cup of water from Ateh Umu. He looked tired.


    Next to her, Shana had turned as well. "Karina," her friend said, "I need to ask you a favor."


    "Sure," she said instantly.


    "I need you to take care of the children for me while one of the Ateh and I sleep," Shana said. "Least one of us needs to be up at all times because it''s hard to tell if it''s day or night, so we''ll need to take turns."


    Karina nodded. "All right."


    They didn''t say anything for a moment.


    "Aren''t you going to ask me why I want to go to sleep first?"


    "Not really. But¡­ why do you want to sleep first?"


    "Because this way, I''ll be up when Lord Rian is sleeping, so I can give him a chance to sleep too."


    "Oh! That''s very nice of you."


    "You are very kind to say so." Shana turned back to the table, and Karina did the same, and saw Ateh Koyan and Ateh Kayas playing alistaya, clenched fists pumping up and down twice before revealing an open hand, two fingers, or still a clenched fists. As they watched, Ateh Koyan dropped a fist and Ateh Kayas had an open palm. Ateh Kayas let out a hiss, smirking victoriously as her twin sister sighed.


    "Very well," Shana said. "Ateh Kayas, please get our bed rolls ready after we bring in our dishes for cleaning. I will speak with Lord Rian and join you." She turned to her cousin. "Yoshka, I''m going to sleep after lunch. Do you want to keep playing, or will you join me?"


    "But it''s too early to go to sleep!"


    "Then you can stay up," Shana said. "But when you go to sleep later, I won''t be going to sleep with you, since I have to be awake then."


    "Eh?-! But¡­ can''t you sleep later?"


    "Unfortunately, I need to sleep now."


    Yoshka let out a whine. "Fine¡­! But I''m not sleepy yet!"


    "That''s fine. You can just lie down next to me until you are. Here, have some of my golden bud." Shana gave her cousin a few of the yellow wedges of fruit. The younger girl brightened immediately, happily accepting the fruit as she was distracted from the fact she had an earlier bed time. Yoshka still had trouble sleeping without someone she trusted next to her, so she could only sleep comfortably next to Shana.


    Karina scrapped her spoon over her bowl one last time, to get the last of anything left there¡ªher mother had told her she was too old to lick the bowl clean anymore, so the spoon it was¡ªthen took her bowl, utensils, cup, and the plate for the bread and got up to bring it to where it would be piled up to wash. "All right everyone, clean your bowls and follow me. Don''t leave any food in your bowls and drink all the water in your cups!" There was a sudden rush to drink.


    Shana also stood up, taking her own dishes and Yoshka''s as the younger girl sat there and enjoyed her last wedges of fruit. "Yrria, Tena, are you done eating? Ah, good. Follow me, I''ll show you were we bring the dishes to be washed."

 315 - Sleep and Farming

    Karina led the other children back to Shana''s alcove as her friend went to talk to Lord Rian. Everyone was full and a little sleepy, but that wouldn''t last. She was ready for that, however.


    "All right!" Karina declared cheerfully, the way Lord Rian did. She even put a bit smile on her face. "Now, when everyone''s done resting after lunch, we''re all going downstairs to take care of the tubers and help with watering the farm plots!" There were groans. "Now, don''t be like that! If the dragon hurt the crops outside, then all we''ll have to eat is from the crops downstairs. What would you rather do, a little watering now, or having to try to catch more seels later because that''s the only food we can get?"


    "We just ate!" Riga complained.


    "That''s why it''ll only be when you''re done resting," Karina said. "So rest up! If anyone is all rested and starting to get restless, we''ll go downstairs!"


    There was another groan as everyone sat down on the floor and benches of the alcove. Other children were coming over, bringing their game boards or claiming the ones they''d left behind earlier. A bedroll had been unrolled in one of the niches in the thick stone wall that separated the alcoves, and Ateh Kayas was unrolling another one that Karina recognized as Shana''s in the opposite niche.


    Yoshka pouted when she saw the bedroll. "I''m not sleepy," she insisted.


    "I know," Karina said, and she did. "But Shana needs to go to sleep so she can do Lady Binder things later tonight. If you want, you can just lie down until Shana falls asleep, then go back to playing. You know how Shana likes to sleep."


    The young girl''s stubborn expression faded to a sighing one. "Well¡­ all right. If it will help Ateh Shasha sleep better¡­"


    Ah, nice little sisters were all the same. And Yoshka was a little sister, even if her brother was still in River''s fork with their parents. Yoshka really did need Shana to be comfortable enough to go to sleep, but Shana¡­ well, she could fall asleep, but knowing how Shana had been like last winter when she''d stayed with them because the snow had been too thick for travel, Karina knew she slept¡ªand woke¡ªeasier with her cousin near her.


    Karina smiled and patted Yoshka''s head. "You''re a good little girl, Yoshka. I''m sure Shana is glad she has a cousin like you."


    Yoshka¡­ hesitated. Then, quietly, she said, "Shasha doesn''t smile anymore. She hasn''t smiled since mushka and dyadya went away."


    Karina didn''t correct her. She knew a lot of people who''d¡­ went away, getting here. "I know. But we''ll make her smile. She can''t not smile forever." She made herself smile. "So when she gets back, be sure to smile too so that she knows what she''s supposed to do."


    Yoshka''s sad face became happy as she smiled widely. That got her another headpat. "Good girl. Now, why don''t we wait for Shana to come back from whatever she''s talking about with Lord Rian?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Shana came back, the alcove was full of children again, and Ateh Kayas was already asleep, a folded towel over her eyes and nose to block out the light as best as she could. Ateh Koyan was sitting on a stool, spinning thread on her drop spindle, helping keep an eye on the other children, though everyone was settled down at the moment. Lord Rian had told her that children rarely actually needed an adult to watch over them. It was more that it made adults feel better that children were being watched¡­ by someone that wasn''t them.


    Beyond that¡­ well, everyone knew what not to do so they wouldn''t get in trouble, even if they needed to be reminded sometimes. So Karina was able to focus on getting Yrria and Tena comfortable. First she''d shown them where their packs were, and stayed back to let the two of them go through the packs to make sure nothing had been taken. Now she was getting them to at least relax and play. It had taken a while for the new children from River''s Fork to feel safe, that their things wouldn''t be stolen.


    It was something she knew Shana felt bad about, that River''s Fork had become like that. Even if only a few people had actually done it, it had happened enough that everyone had become afraid it would happen to them. Shana had even said that she''d once gone into her office and found someone had gone through it, even if nothing had been taken.


    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    "Tah," Karina greeted when she saw Shana approaching. "Did you talk to Lord Rian?"


    Shana nodded. "Yes. It was difficult, but I was able to convince him to rest. Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu were very helpful in getting him to agree." At the mention of her cousin, Ateh Koyan looked up briefly, but went back to her spinning. "I should have more than two hours to sleep, by the water clock Lord Rian had filled, but knowing him, I probably have a little more than that."


    "Do you want me to wake you?" Karina asked.


    Shana shook her head. "No, let Lord Rian have his little lapse. At the latest, I should wake up for dinner, at which point we will speak, and he will go to sleep properly."


    Karina nodded approvingly. Since Shana had been the first to wake up and warn them about the dragon coming, it was only fair she get to sleep first.


    <hr>


    Shana''s face was different when she was asleep. When she was awake, she tried to look like Wiz Lori most of the time, so she made that face that was like the face Wiz Lori made. When she slept, however, that went away, and there was only Shana''s real face, which always looked lost. Like she was trying to go somewhere, but didn''t know where it was.


    Lying down with Yoshka on the unrolled bedroll inside the niche in the alcove, the two of them looked more like sisters than cousins. The two were sharing a pillow and a thick blanket was haphazardly covering them, more to block drafts than to keep them warm, as the two slept with Yoshka pressed again her cousin''s side.


    Despite how everyone nearby wasn''t making any effort to be more quiet, the two had fallen asleep quickly enough. Still¡­


    "All right everyone," Karina said, trying to be heard without being too noisy. "Since it sounds like you''re all well rested, it''s time to go downstairs."


    "Aw¡­"


    "No!"


    "We''re still tired!"


    Karina stood there with her arms crossed listening to all the complaints long enough to let them know they were heard but not long enough for the uncles and aunties to get involved, beyond Ateh Koyan sighing and starting to put way her distaff, giving Karina a slightly annoyed look. Then she clapped her hands loudly, like she''d learned from seeing Lord Rian do it. "See? Well rested! Now everyone, come on, let''s all go down and give everything that needs it a watering. The sooner we all go down, the sooner we''ll be done and we can take a bath!"


    There was a stir of interest at the word ''bath''. While Karina could remember a time not even two years ago where she''d bathed at most once a week, more often once every two, nearly everyone bathed every day here in Lorian Demesne. Even with the warm water in the baths, the feeling of being wet was refreshing in the summer. Looking around at everyone''s hair, Karina knew no one had managed to take a bath yet.


    She clapped her hands again. "Come on everyone. Let''s go down so that when we''re done, we can all take a bath."


    No one cheered when she said it, not like how they did when it was Lord Rian talking, but despite the grumbling, all the older children started to push themselves up reluctantly. They knew how this worked, contributing a little work every day, helping with chores, sweeping the house, or in this case, helping take care of the dungeon farm''s crops. They were all growing older, after all. Almost too old to be considered children.


    Even by Wiz Lori.


    Karina led the way downstairs, knowing they were following her. Sure, they would grumble and complain, but in the end¡­ she wasn''t actually making them do this. They chose to do this themselves, probably because, like her, they felt restless and simply running around and yelling would get them scolded. Whenever she felt restless, she did something to catch or grow more food for everyone, and there was always something like that to do.


    They reached the bottom of stairs, and around them, the smell of soil, the stink of fertilizer, and the rank smell of water that had been a little filtered through both filled the air. Despite complaints, they all got to work. Big Yerart went to the arrangement of ropes and levers they used to pull up water from the cistern where the irrigation water drained to from all the farming plots. The number of those had grown since Wiz Lori had first made them, though the heights of all the crops weren''t all the same since they were planted at different times.


    "All right, Yhalta, Bhar, you two come with me to check and water the tubers," she called out since they were closest. "Everyone else, do a lane of crops, and make sure to do all of them, all right? Be careful of the pink lady saplings¡ª"


    "We know Karina, stop nagging!"


    Everyone took from the bucket that held the watering dippers¡ªthe notches on the handle differentiated it from the bathing dippers, and all the other dippers they used in the demesne¡ªand then lined up to get buckets from those Big Yerart was filling from the cistern. The girls in the group, Karina among them, girded their skirts to keep them from getting splashed by the smelly water, while some of the boys rolled up their trouser legs.


    Karina waited her turn to get a bucket, picking it up carefully so it wouldn''t spill and made her way towards the tuber planters. Bharelli was already there, carefully looking at the soil around each tuber plant in the plot in front of her before using her dipper to splash water on the tubers. They exchanged nods as Karina moved past, getting started checking the next tuber planter. The stone box held water very well, not letting it leak out, so they had to be careful not to drown the tubers or else they''d go rotten. So Karina checked the soil, then took the handle of her ladle and pushed it down into the corner of the planter until she hit rock at the bottom, testing how wet the wood was when she drew it out.


    Soon Yhalta arrived, and the three of them began to quickly go down the tuber planters. They''d all done this before in the past year, so they all knew what to do. Karina hummed as she worked, falling into the familiar, satisfied feeling of knowing what she was doing would help ensure people didn''t go hungry.

 316 - Shana Speaks To Rian

    Dungeon Binder Shanalorre, Shana to some and Great Binder or Lady Binder to most, waited patiently as Lord Rian spoke to <del>uncle</del> Kolinh about the organization of the all-but-militia volunteers for the duration of¡­. the duration.


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana found herself blinking, coming back to awareness as the disruptive emotions receded. After Karina and Yoshka had made their dissatisfaction with her means of bringing herself back to full wakefulness clear, she had begun to forego it, relying on them to rouse her from her unaware state, but that meant she tended to stay insensate for periods of time when they were absent.


    It seemed she had not been insensate for too long. Lord Rian was finishing talking to <del>uncle</del> Kolinh as the volunteers were moving to the benches that had been carried in from outside of the Dungeon. While only a few were actively on shift, most of the volunteers were resting nearby so they would be able to respond quickly in the event of an emergency. It wasn''t an arrangement that she had used in River''s Fork when she had ruled there, but she''d hardly had the level of resources and infrastructure that Lorian Demesne always seemed to have on hand.


    That was her fault though. If she were a better Dungeon Binder, she would have found a way to create matching infrastructure and resources.


    When the two finished speaking, Shana stepped forward. "Lord Rian," she greeted.


    "Shana. You know you can just call me Rian, right?" He sounded tired, even with his smile and energetic tone.


    "Noted, Lord Rian. I''d like to speak to you about your condition."


    For some reason, Lord Rian sighed as <del>uncle</del> Kolinh standing nearby turned and gave him an amused look. "Is this about me needing to rest? Because I already got that from Mikon, Umu and Kolinh."


    "It''s about you needing to rest," Shana confirmed.


    "If you must know, I was in fact going to rest for the afternoon, once I''ve made sure everyone''s settled in and people weren''t overcrowding in the baths."


    "Actually, I was going to propose I assist you by taking the night shift so you can rest properly instead of trying to force yourself to function on little naps," Shana said. "When does that begin? Karina told me that last time there was a dragon she¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    She blinked, then shook her head, pushing down the irrelevancies. Perhaps she should go back to slapping herself for the length of this conversation, to reduce delay. Opposite her, Lord Rian waited patiently, badly-concealed pity in his eyes. Shana simply picked up where she''d left off. "¡ªshe was asked to keep time by watching a water clock, so I assume you have begun that as¡­ are you well, Lord Rian?"


    Lord Rian''s head hand bowed, and one hand had risen to grasp his face. "I knew I forgot something¡­" he said from behind his hand. "Thank you for reminding me, Great Binder. I''ll see if I can get someone on that¡­ and for the night shift as well, I suppose."


    "You are welcome, Lord Rian. Will you be accepting my assistance, then?"


    "I''m¡­ not sure I should, Great Binder. You''re the one who''s been up longest of all of us. If there''s anyone who needs sleep, it''s you."


    "I agree. However, I intend to sleep directly after this conversation to rest and prepare. I shall wake up at dinner, and we can exchange information and shifts then."


    "I wouldn''t want to impose on you¡­"


    "There is no imposition. I had already resolved to follow this sleep schedule to ensure someone is supervising the children at all times, especially since there are two new children with us."


    "Yes, I saw¡­ Just two?"


    Shana nodded. "Yes. Just two."


    He sighed. "I''m both surprised and not surprised¡­ Do they need anything?"


    "Physically, Yrria and Tena are well. They already have their ration of soap, they just need their own bath buckets, tsinelas for their feet, and possibly toweling. I am unsure if they have any, but the likelihood is low. Beyond that, they only need to acclimate and unlearn bad habits acquired from my mismanagement."


    "Hmm¡­ Yes, I remember them. They were nice girls."


    "They are," Shana agreed. They''d always been willing to tell her about what their parents had been doing, even after the spate of thefts from their food stores had begun. All the children told her anything they noticed when she had asked. It had been one of the few ways she''d been able to stay informed of the goings on of her demesne, since even Lord Yllian had been reluctant to report some things to her, most likely out of some sense of trying to preserve her childhood innocence.


    She had not been so cruel as to invite him to consider the implications of being aware of the activities of every living thing in her demesne.


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    "I shall go rest now, Lord Rian," Shana said. "We''ll speak again at dinner."


    "I haven''t agreed to this yet!"


    "With all due respect, Lord Rian¡­ you can''t stay awake indefinitely. If no one else, Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu won''t let you," Shana pointed out. "You''re swaying on your feet already."


    Lord Rian stood straighter, stiffening his legs. "I''m fine. I was just¡­ making excuses for the fact I''m really tired¡­ " he sighed. "I really wish it was anyone other than you. This isn''t something someone your age should have to deal with."


    Shana considered all her possible responses and simply stared at him, her face blank.


    "And that''s a face out of my nightmares," he said. "Fine, I accept your offer of you taking the night shift. But if anything happens, if an abomination so much as scratches at the door, you wake me up and have me deal with it, all right? Lori might not like to think about it, but we can''t risk you. If anything happens to her¡­" He fell silent, a pained, ashamed expression on his face.


    "I understand, Lord Rian," she said. And she did. It was why she had been the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork, after all.


    Short of bringing in a stranger from Covehold, if Binder Lolilyuri died from being in River''s Fork, Shana would be the only one capable of claiming the dungeon''s core to re-establish the demesne. She even had experience doing so, having done it before.


    She checked on the concentration of life she knew to be Binder Lolilyuri, ensuring that all the life in her body was functioning as it should, and that she¡ªand anyone else in the demesne¡ªwas not injured. The inert life that made up her clothes and her staff were distinctive in their arrangement, and Shana had long since learned to recognize her. From her pose and the concentrations of inert life being added to her mass, she seemed to be in the midst of eating. Lunch was delayed, though given that River''s Fork had probably been able to have breakfast, it might not have been so pressing for them.


    Fortunately, no one seemed injured, so Binder Lori probably hadn''t needed to enforce her views of public order. At least, Shana thought so. All the life seemed to be as they should, and she''d spent enough time using this one of the few abilities she could utilize she had as a Dungeon Binder to know what even mild bruising looked like in her awareness of life, even if she couldn''t affect it with anything besides the one meaning she knew how to tame.


    Shana realized she''d been standing there quietly enough that Lord Rian would not unreasonably conclude that she was having one of her episodes, and made a show of tilting her head thoughtfully. "Binder Lolilyuri and Ateh Erzebed seem well," she said to assure him, knowing those would be his priorities, "as are everyone else. Whatever defenses Binder Lolilyuri established, they appeared to be secure and holding."


    Everywhere else besides the areas Binder Lolilyuri had secured were being damaged, the life being¡­ there was probably a technical term for it, but she was not aware. From her awareness, however, what she could perceive of the trees and plants and bugs and other living concentrations of life in her demesne was slowly being¡­ disordered was the best she could describe it, the life slowly becoming inert. It was a random change, occurring at different points of different concentrations of life to seemingly no rhythm.


    Lord Rian didn''t sigh this time, but his shoulders relaxed slightly. "That''s¡­ good to know."


    "You shouldn''t worry, Lord Rian. Binder Lolilyuri has more than merely luck to protect her from harm. I''m sure she will keep herself and everyone else safe." The fact that Binder Lolilyuri could somehow make wispbeads of various sizes was a badly kept secret that, in consideration for her sworn Dungeon Binder''s wishes, she pretended not to know of, This was a little absurd since Binder Lori seemed to make no effort to hide the beads themselves from her, but as Lord Rian had asked, it was simply easier to humor her.


    She did not know how this had led to Binder Lolilyuri making strange bound tools, and she had not asked. Those, for some reason, Binder Lolilyuri made no effort to hide from her. The woman''s thinking could be quite inscrutable at times.


    "I hope so." He sighed now, then shook his head. "You should probably get to sleep. I just need to check on something, and then I''ll go find someone to keep a watch on the time and maybe finally sit down." Lord Rian paused, then amended. "Take a bath and then sit down. It''s been a long day."


    Shana nodded. "Very well. I shall inform Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu about our conversation, then I will retire. What do you need to check on?" she asked as she prepared to turn away.


    "I''m just going to check on what''s making the noise," Lord Rian said, beginning to turn away himself.


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana blinked as she realized she was now gripping Lord Rian''s wrist in as tight as grip as she could manage, her lungs panting at the sudden panicked exertion. "That''s dangerous," she said, trying to be calm and instead being forceful as disruptive emotions affected her rational thinking. "You''ll die."


    "Please let go," Lord Rian asked politely, and Shana surrendered her grip, drawing back her hand. It wanted to clench tightly, but she didn''t let it, relaxing and letting her hand fall to her side. "Thank you. I realize it''s dangerous, but this is the first time we don''t have any abominations tapping on our dungeon door asking to be let in, which is already proving the effectiveness of our defenses. I should be safe enough to see how what''s going on."


    Shana shook her head in opposition. "It''s never safe," she said vehemently. "And this is nothing like the previous incidents." She felt the familiar sensation of disruptive emotions rising, about to bring her rational thought to a halt at the mention, but other emotions dominated, and at best it made her words stutter for a moment. "Whatever is falling out there, it has no life, inert or otherwise." She had her uncle to thank for that bit of terminology. "It is not living or once-living, neither beast, fursh, bug or plant."


    "What about mushrooms?"


    Shana blinked at the sudden question. "What?"


    "You mentioned beasts, fursh, bugs and plants, but what about mushrooms? Or slugs? Graspers? Where do dillians and islandshells and their kind come in?"


    "They are not those either," she said flatly.


    "Wow, you said it exactly the way Lori would have. That''s both impressive and very, very disturbing."


    She nodded to herself, pleased a correctly reproducing Binder Lolilyuri''s inflections. "Please do not distract me with humor, Lord Rian. I will not have you die out there. This is clearly a sign of your tiredness."


    He hesitated. Lord Rian visibly had to think about it. "Maybe you''re right¡­" he said hesitantly. Eventually, he sighed. "Fine, not today then. Though I think I should still see what''s out there¡­ but yes, not now. If I need to, I can look tomorrow¡­"


    "No," Shana said firmly. She turned her gaze. "Captain Kolinh, please ensure that Lord Rian does no such thing, and that he adheres to his stated itinerary of finding someone to keep watch over the time and then sitting down to rest after taking a bath."


    "Yes, Lady Binder," <del>uncle</del> Kolinh said in the same tones he used when saying "Yes, Great Binder" to Binder Lolilyuri.


    "It''s a good thing Lori''s not here," Lord Rian muttered. "She''d definitely overreact to hearing you two talk like that."

 317- To Not Shirk Responsibilities

    "Tah," Karina greeted her with a wide, welcoming smile as she arrived at the alcove. "Did you talk to Lord Rian?"


    She returned Karina''s greeting with a nod. "Yes. It was difficult, but I was able to convince him to rest. Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu were very helpful in getting him to agree. I should have more than two hours to sleep, by the water clock Lord Rian had filled, but knowing him, I probably have a little more than that."


    "Do you want me to wake you?"


    "No, let Lord Rian have his little lapse. At the latest, I should wake up for dinner, at which point we will speak, and he will go to sleep properly."


    Karina nodded. "We washed Yoshka''s hands and face and had her gargle to clean her mouth."


    "Thank you. I apologize for asking you to stay up, but it''s necessary."


    "Don''t worry," Karina said. "I know you wouldn''t ask me to do this if it wasn''t important. Now lie down and go to sleep so you can get as much rest as you can."


    Sleeping in one of the alcove''s stone niches was a new experience for her, since in her previous times sleeping in the dungeon, she''d had a bed. While the bed in her house had been moved into the dungeon, like most of the beds that had been brought in, it had been moved down into the third level and stored in one of the many excavation tunnels that Binder Lolilyuri had left unfinished.


    Her bedroll provided cushioning against the hard stone, though it was noticeably harder than the wooden beds she had slept on previously. Shana didn''t complain, though she folded the blanket on top of the bed roll so it would provide Yoshka with additional cushioning. Her cousin lay down next to her with sullen reluctance, but she knew the younger girl would soon be asleep. Yoshka fell asleep quite easily.


    Lying on her back, her pillow cushioning her head, Shana helped her cousin to find a comfortable position. Though she closed her eyes, she waited until Yoshak''s breathing had become even before she relaxed her own hold on wakefulness. The tiredness of the early morning''s waking that she had been holding at bay came rushing forward, and her consciousness was subsumed by darkness as her arms weakly tightened her hold on Yoshka.


    She fell asleep.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Karina woke her up just before dinner as everyone was moving upstairs for the day''s dinner. Even with the rather extended day, they were maintaining the day''s usual schedule, and that included dinner.


    When she had attained full wakefulness, the first thing Shana heard was the distant, fading sounds of music. There were the whistles of flutes and pipes, the twanging of strings, and reverberations of things hitting other things as drums even as they began to cut off and fade away. She could feel the radiance of the lights on the ceiling outside the alcove, and they made her wince involuntarily as she opened her eyes.


    Karina''s smiling face leaning over her was the first thing she saw, her bright orange hair in sharp contrast to the muted and slightly smeared colors of the stone top of the niche. "Tah!" she greeted cheerfully. "Did you have a good rest?"


    "I did," Shana said. "Be careful, you might hit your head on the stone."


    "Don''t worry, I''ll be¡ª" she cut off as she straightened up and the back of her head struck the top of the niche with a resounding impact. "Ow!"


    Shana sighed. "Come here, I''ll make the pain go away¡­"


    Karina meekly knelt down next to her so their heads were on the same level, and Shana raised one of her hands from holding Yoshka and gently placed it on top of Karina''s head.


    Between one breath and the next, Shana became aware of the life in Karina''s body. Even now, she could not truly distinguish between the life beyond ''alive'', ''inert'' and ''disordered'', and could not see how she could even begin making any changes to the life to do¡­ well, anything. She simply did, doing one thing without really know what it was specifically.


    Shana did it now, drawing magic from her distant, buried core and letting it flow down the life in her arm and into the life in Karina''s body, claiming and taming the disordered-looking life at the back of Karina''s head. She hesitated, then tamed all the life in Karina''s head to be safe, in case her friend had given herself a brain injury.


    And with the imbuement of magic, Shana¡­ healed her.


    It was an inadequate way of referring to the process. As a savant, the meaning that Shana did was instinctive, and even with her near-nonexistent understanding of what she did, she could tell that the meaning affected several things seemingly near-instantaneously in all of the tamed life, and all the life in the back of Shana''s head went from ''disordered'' to ''alive''. This included life that she hadn''t tamed in her initial claim. Hopefully this meant that Karina would not develop mental difficulties in future. "There. Is that better?"


    "Yes! It doesn''t hurt anymore! Thanks, Shana!" Karina tried to stand up again, even as Shana kept her hand on her friend''s head, and so it was the back of Shana''s hand that struck the stone edge of the alcove instead of Karina''s head again. "Ah! Sorry!"


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    "It''s all right, Karina," Shana said, shaking her hand to try and diffuse the sting. "I''ll just heal it as well. Can you tell me what happened while I was asleep as I take care of waking Yoshka?" She sat up carefully so that she wouldn''t repeat Karina''s mistake, even though there was enough headroom.


    She listened as Karina described organizing some of the older children to go downstairs and tend to the plots of the dungeon farm while she sat Yoshka upright, gently rocking her sideways. Waking Yoshka abruptly made her very distressed, so she had to be woken up slowly. There was a dull impact and barely cut off colorful language as Ateh Kayas struck her head on the top of the niche she''d been sleeping in. Her bright pink hair disheveled, the weaver cradled her head as she sat in her niche while Karina described how she had taken the older children to take baths after working, so all the older children had gotten washed up and gotten the runoff-water smell from them.


    "After dinner, I''ll take everyone else to the baths to wash up so they can go to sleep refreshed," Shana said.


    "I''ll help," Karina instantly replied.


    "There''s no need, Karina. You''ve been up longer than me, you need your rest."


    "I''m not that tired. Besides, I still need to get my brothers and sisters to take a bath too."


    She was clearly lying, but Shana let it go. She wasn''t going to disrespect her friend''s offer, and besides, the other girl had managed to get some sleep earlier. Even if Shana had needed to wave off flying bugs to keep them from making a den in Karina''s mouth and possibly eating her tongue. "Very well. Thank you."


    It was slightly hypocritical, given her discussions with Lord Rian, but she could do nothing but acknowledge the state of affairs.


    When Yoshka started making incoherent mewling sounds, Shana knew she was¡­ well, ''awake'' was probably an overstatement¡­ ''not-asleep'' enough to stand and walk in an only slightly-uncoordinated fashion. With a practiced movement, Shana picked up Yoshka and hefted her up so that her head and arms were settled on Shana''s shoulder as she slid one arm under her cousin''s hips to support her with the ease and grace of practice. Yoshka''s arms moved, wrapping around Shana out of formed habit to secure herself.


    Carrying her cousin, Shana walked towards Ateh Kayas. "Would you like me to heal you?" she offered.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was strange to sit at Binder Lolilyuri''s bench and table without her. However, she needed to speak to Lord Rian, and there wasn''t room for him to join her at her table. It was already full of children, and the addition of Yrria and Tena pushed the table to the limits of its capacity.


    Shana made a point of avoiding sitting in the middle of the bench, where Binder Lolilyuri sat. Instead, she sat at her usual location to the left of it. Usually, this meant that she would be speaking to Lord Rian at an angle, since he sat opposite Binder Lolilyuri, but today he''d moved sideways to face her. The man looked like he had to force his eyes open, and while Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu sat close to him on either side as usual, today it seemed to be to keep him upright.


    The resemblance to Yoshka, sitting on the bench next to her and asleep with her head rest on her folded arms on the table, was very strong.


    "Should you be eating in your state, Lord Rian?" she asked, concerned.


    "No, which is why I won''t be," he said. He was looking at her with only one eye. The other was shut as if already sleeping, and the eyelid of the open one was fluttering as if threatening to fall as well. "I hope you don''t think me rude if I try to keep this quick? Otherwise I might fall asleep on you." One hand reached up to rub at his closed eye as he visibly forced it to open.


    "You need not make such excuses with me, Lord Rian," Shana said. "Very well. Let us converse quickly. I can get food for myself and Yoshka when we finish."


    Rian nodded, and he sat there still for a moment with his eyes closed before he forced them open again. "Uh, sorry¡­ All right, so, the sounds haven''t gone away all day. They''ve been getting louder and louder though, and the consensus is they''re explosions. We don''t know what''s exploding, but if it''s exploding, then those are our crops probably ruined¡­"


    Shana frowned, her thoughts turning to the exposed crops of her demesne. "That is worrisome for the state of things later¡­" she said. "Have there been any sign of dragonborn abominations of any sort?"


    "None yet," Rian said, sounding relieved. "Hopefully this means there aren''t any or Lori''s lightningwisp killing thing is working. Though since we haven''t smelled any burning lightning smells yet, it might be the former. Beyond that, nothing to report, Lady Binder."


    Shana nodded. "A state of affairs that will hopefully continue. Very well, Lord Rian. I will keep watch for the rest of the night, with your permission."


    "You''ve got it, for whatever good it does¡­" Rian''s voice cut off as he raised a hand to his mouth, sparing the world the sight of it wide open as he yawned hugely. "Sorry. Uh, let''s see, what else¡­? Uh, Cassan is keeping an eye on the clock for me, but he''ll need to rest soon too. Kolinh''s cycled out early, right now Kovla''s in charge of the volunteers, and Yhohim after him in a couple more hours. They''re in charge of defense, but if anything non-urgent comes up, they''ll know to come to you."


    "I understand, Lord Rian. Hopefully it will not be necessary to wake you."


    "You presume I''ll wake up." He paused. "That sounds morbid." He rubbed his eyes again. "Uh, I think that''s it?"


    It probably wasn''t. "That should be it, Lord Rian," Shana agreed. She''ll need to find out the state of the latrines, the rate of water use, and any disciplinary matters, if only so she could report it to Lord Rian for him to decide when he woke up. "Rest well."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll just¡­ sleep here¡­" he said, folding his arms on the table top and getting ready to lay down his head.


    "Oh no," Ateh Mikon said gently but firmly. "You''re going to downstairs. The bedroll''s laid out, and if you fall asleep, we might not be able to wake you up to get you to move." She kissed his cheek. "Now, please get up. Unlike Yoshka, you''re too heavy to carry."


    Lord Rian sighed, but pushed himself to his feet, swaying with his eyes closed. The two weavers next to him helped him up, pushing back the bench instead of stepping over it. He sighed again and forced his eyes open. "I''ll go splash water on my face first before trying to go down the stairs," he said, turning towards the baths in the back of the dining hall.


    Ateh Mikon and Ateh Umu went with him, helping him navigate between the other tables of the dining hall.


    Over at the kitchen, they started serving food.


    Shana swung her legs over the bench, turning to Karina who was sitting at the bench behind her. "Come on Karina, let''s take everyone to get their food."


    She still had this responsibility, after all. Binder Lolilyuri never shirked her responsibilities, so she couldn''t either.

 318 - Sleeping And Waking

    Dinner was without incident, especially after Yoshka fully woke up to eat. Yrria and Tena finally relaxed during the meal, apparently taking comfort in the familiarity of the food. After dinner, she, Karina, Ateh Koyan and Ateh Kayas took the younger ones to the baths.


    The dungeon''s bath was much smaller than the bath houses outside that people regularly used. Most of the time it was unused since Binder Lolilyuri had made it clear it was for emergencies only, and people had more convenient and comfortable facilities at their disposal. Now, however, everyone was staying inside the Dungeon due to the dragon¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana found herself blinking, coming back to her senses as the disruptive emotions receded, and found Yoshka grinning up at her, her cousin''s hand mashing her cheek in circles again. "Please stop that, Yoshka."


    Yoshka giggled, but put her hand down.


    Everyone was staying inside the Dungeon, so using these baths were the only option available to them to use. The bath''s capacity was much smaller than the others outside, so Shana and the children under her care all had to wait as others who had entered the baths before them finished. Fortunately, the arrangement of the dungeon''s baths discouraged lingering. Shana had never used the baths beyond washing her hands before dinner until now.


    Unlike the demesne''s other baths, it had no anteroom for people to get undressed and put away their clothes. There was only a pair of blocking walls that kept people from seeing inside, in keeping from Binder Lolilyuri''s views on propriety. Since the arrangement seemed to keep out most drafts, no one really complained despite how cramped the entrance to the baths could be when many people were trying to get in and out.


    As they waited, other children joined their group, all carrying their bath buckets with towels and a change of clothes. With Binder Lolilyuri''s bath houses, everyone had gotten into the habit of washing off after a sweaty day, and everyone clearly intended that today would be no different.


    Normally, clothes would be worn for as long as people could stand them in the summer¡ªand in other season, really¡ªbut at Lord Rian''s urging, people had taken to changing out their clothes when possible, so as to give soiled clothes time to be given a shallow washing in water to get some of the sweat off. Clothes were usually washed in soap, but with the summer''s heat and everyone sweating so much, it was done in this way to ration out their soap supplies. Shana carried her bucket with her soap, toweling, and a set of shallow-washed clothes. Later, when she had time, she intended to take the set she was wearing and wash them as well to get the smell off so that they would be reasonably wearable for a few more days.


    Eventually, it was their turn.


    Fortunately, most knew how to bathe themselves, and for those young enough to need help, Shana, Karina, the two Ateh, or one of the older children were there to help. Most of what Shana and the others had to do was remind everyone not to use too much water or make a mess by splashing it everywhere on the floor. Some also needed help washing their hair, since the younger ones couldn''t put soap on their head and close their eyes at the same time. With everyone having been restricted to the dungeon though, there were fewer instances of mud and small pebbles falling out of someone''s hair during washing.


    Then everyone had to be toweled and dried, which required a lot of reminding because there were those who would have been perfectly fine with walking out of the baths still dripping wet to try to keep cool in the summer heat.


    "No," Shana said resolutely as she picked up the dripping wet Febe by her underarms and carried her back to be toweled off by Ateh Kayas. "If you go out there dripping, you''ll leave water all over the ground, and people could slip and hurt themselves, you especially. The mess will also make it more difficult for the uncles and aunties who clean the floors of the dining hall. Do you want to give people more work to do?"


    "But it''s hot¡­!" Febe whined.


    "No, it won''t be," Shana said patiently. "We''re sleeping in the dungeon tonight, remember? It won''t be hot."


    "Oh! Yay!"


    Shana placed the girl in front of Ateh Kayas and her toweling, who made the younger girl giggle with pokes at her ticklish spots as she was dried. Shana was glad the two women were learning to be more patient. They had been a bit overwhelmed when they had first started living with her to help tend the children, but in the past months the two had gotten better at it.


    Once everyone was done, Shana led her charges down to her alcove, where all the game boards and a few carved toys were set aside to one corner so that everyone could start laying down their bedrolls together. The bedrolls were layered for added padding, and some blankets were put on top of them, since blankets were easier to wash than bedrolls. Then it was the usual confused tangle as everyone tried to get a comfortable spot without anyone''s feet in their face.


    Shana laid out her and Yoshka''s bedroll next to where Yrria and Tena lay on the edge of the sleep tangle and sat down on it to keep them company.


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    Yoshka sat down next to her without a pout. "I''m not sleepy," she insisted. "I just slept!"


    "I know, Yoshka," Shana said as she sat back. "I''ll just make sure that Yrria and Tena can sleep well, and then I''ll be going up. You can play upstairs while you''re waiting for me if you want." She reached up and grabbed their pillow, then set it down next to her.


    "I''m not going to sleep," Yoshka insisted, but she lay down and put her head on the pillow. "I''m just lying down."


    Shana nodded, one hand drooping down so two of her fingers could gently stroke Yoshka''s hair. "You''re just lying down."


    Yrria and Tena took a while to fall asleep. The two of them were uncomfortable in their new surroundings, and the constant, unchanging light of the Dungeon was probably brighter than they were used to. The other children were sleeping with an arm over their eyes or simply with their back to the opening of the alcove, clearly used to the Dungeon and Binder Lolilyuri''s occasional bouts of thoughtlessness on the matter.


    The second level of the Dungeon suddenly plunged into darkness, making Yrria and Tena cry out and Shana glanced out of the alcove in surprise. Ah. It looked like Binder Lolilyuri had either remembered or had been reminded. She reached into her belt pouch and drew out the rock that emitted light that she had been given, setting it down on the ground next to her. The two young girls shuffled closer to her, their hands grasping. Shana reached down and took their hands in hers.


    "Don''t worry," she said as gently as she could manage. Beyond the alcove, a dim light returned, weak like the light of a single moon. "I''m here. You''re safe."


    "I want to go home," Tena said plaintively. "I want my inay and itay."


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana blinked, coming back to her senses as the disruptive emotions receded. "You''ll go home," she said gently. "You''ll see them again. After this is all over, you can go back home."


    Eventually, the two fell asleep, the long day and the relative gloom of the second level lulling them unconscious. Shana carefully let go of their hands, adjusting their blanket so they wouldn''t get too cold. With the added light of her glowing rock, she checked over the other children. Most were asleep, and those that weren''t were slowly getting there. Yoshka''s snoring quieted as Shana adjusted her cousin''s head, even though she knew her cousin wouldn''t be loud enough to wake anyone.


    Picking up her glowing rock, she placed it on the bench next to Ateh Kayas. "Here. Use this if you''re going to be spinning."


    Ateh Kayas smiled gratefully. "Thank you, Lady Binder," she said. "I''ll watch over them. You can go take care of things."


    Shana nodded. "Thank you. I''m sorry you have to stay up like this."


    "I know how the children need to be watched, Lady Binder," Ateh Kayas said as she flicked her wrist to get her spindle turning. "Go. I''ll be fine here."


    She nodded again and left.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The first matter Shana checked on was whether Lord Rian was in fact sleeping as he''d said he would be.


    Lord Rian''s alcove was the one in the far corner of the second level, next to the sealed off alcove where Binder Lolilyuri stored things she worked on that she didn''t feel like keeping in her room above the dining hall. The alcoves around them hadn''t been properly claimed by families, and were mostly used for storage for things like jars of vigas, or the room where flour was milled.


    Unlike everyone else, there was a bed in the alcove, a large and wide one meant for several people at once. Currently, it''s only occupants was the sleeping Lord Rian, with Ateh Umu cuddled against him on one side and Ateh Mikon on the other. Lord Rian''s leg was twitching slightly, but was being held down by Ateh Mikon''s, meaning all it could do was jerk up slightly.


    The next thing she did was check with the medics and doctors if there were any injuries. While there were probably no serious hurts or possible infections since no one had been referred to her, there might be more minor things that weren''t considered worth interrupting her. Upstairs, the dining hall was still as brightly lit as usual, with some people sitting at the table to play board games. The baths were still in use, not everyone having managed to take a bath yet.


    There was still a congregation of people near the entrance of the Dungeon. In addition to the on-duty volunteers and the currently off-duty volunteers keeping them company, a space had been cleared and several bed rolls had been laid out on the floor, with several people sleeping on them. More volunteers, those too tired to stay awake but wanting to be nearby in case they were needed.


    At a nearby table, <del>aunt</del> Medic Parndal was keeping an eye on a pottery waterclock that was dripping water down into a bucket. A small handful of stones was piled next to the water clock, and a line of three stones stood in front of her, likely a counter of some sort.


    Shana decided to go there first. "Medic Parndal," she greeted as she drew close to the table.


    The woman looked blinked sleepily as she looked up, a few strands of her pale blue hair having escaped from her bun. "Oh, Shasha¡­" she said blearily, before she shook her head, rubbing her eyes. "I mean, Lady Binder. W-what can I do for you?" She was clearly repressing the urge to yawn.


    "I''m inquiring as to injuries," Shana said. "Are there any injuries I should know about?"


    "Oh, nothing to worry about, Lady Binder," <del>aunt</del> Medic Parndal said, standing up and stretching. Her movements weren''t particularly tired, so perhaps she''d been simply bored and lulled by inactivity. "Only some aching fingers. No one dropped anything on themselves, no one got cut on anything."


    That was good to hear. It didn''t mean no one would be injured from this point on¡ªone of the stairs was near the baths, and she could imagine a chain of events involving someone dripping on the ground and someone slipping and falling down the stairs¡ªbut at least nothing of the sort had happened yet. Such would help with morale, she supposed. "Thank you. Would you like me to relieve you for the moment, or find you a replacement?"


    "Oh, I don''t need replacing yet, Sha¡ªLady Binder," <del>aunt</del> Medic Parndal said. "But if you''re offering, I''ll be glad for a chance to stretch my legs a little and get the blood flowing."


    Shana nodded. "Does this mean three hours have passed, or that we are on our third hour?" she said, gesturing to the stones.


    "Three hours passed," <del>aunt</del> Medic Parndal confirmed. "We think sundown was an hour ago, before we had dinner, but we''re not very sure."


    Shana nodded. "Very well. Take a moment to stretch, and if you could, please call Sargent Kovla for me so I can speak to him?"


    She settled down on the bench, checking the level of the water and drawing the ladle from the bucket in preparation for refilling it.


    Hopefully, it would be a long, boring night.

 319 - Illumination and Water Reclamation

    Once the mine was sealed, Lori would have liked to just seal off her alcove and sleep. They were secure behind her defenses, the lightningwisps should be sufficient to keep bugs or bug-like abominations out, they had air, and the mine and its intakes was sufficiently elevated that most deadly gasses that dragons would be likely to produce¡ªegg gas came to mind¡ªwould likely pass them by.


    Unfortunately, besides someone trying to kill her, there were also other things she needed to do.


    Unlike her Dungeon, she hadn''t dug a large reservoir for the shelter as she had at home, partly because she hadn''t wanted to ruin any buried copper ore, and partly because she hadn''t wanted to invest the time away from her Dungeon. However, Rian and¡­uh¡­ what was his¡ªah, Yllian! Rian and Yllian had made sure that the shelter had enough water for fifty people for a week. With most of the demesne''s children in Lori''s Demesne, there were less people than that¡ª


    Lori paused in her flow of thought, then sighed and sat up. "Erzebed," she called.


    Riz stuck her head around the stone wall to look into the alcove. "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "Is everyone accounted for?"


    "Yes, Great Binder. Lord Yllian had everyone counted, then checked twice. Everyone that should be here is. I counted myself as they were coming in, there are as many as there should be."


    Lori nodded. "Good."


    With most of the demesne''s children in Lori''s Demesne, there were less people than that amount needed to sustain, so they should be fine¡­ as long as drinking and eating was all they used that water for. And it likely wouldn''t be. At the very least, they''d need to wash the utensils and cooking implements, because if anyone got sick¡­


    In hindsight, perhaps Lori should have arrange some kind of signal with Shanalorre that would inform the other Dungeon Binder when someone in the shelter needed healing. Though even if anyone did get sick, it was unlikely to be serious enough that the ailment would kill them before the dragon finally left. They had never really managed to implement the idea of having Shanalorre heal anyone in a designated area because people had managed to avoid serious injury so far, and the Coldhold or Lori''s Ice Boat had been in the other demesne often enough that if anyone was that seriously injured they could simply be brought to Shanalorre, or Shanalorre could be brought to them.


    Hopefully this state of affairs would hold, but if anyone did get sick, it would most likely be food poisoning or bowel disease, which would go through their water very quickly. Hence it was better to prevent it from happening at all with a little washing. She was fairly sure that soap was one of the emergency supplies in storage¡ª


    "Erzebed, do we have any soap?"


    "It was stored near the water, Great Binder, as well as some clean sand for helping scour bowls and utensils," Riz said promptly.


    They had soap for washing, and they had water. While that might be enough¡­ she wasn''t going to underestimate how wasteful people could be.


    Grunting in annoyance, Lori got to her feet. "Come with me," she said, picking up her staff, "and have Deil and Tackir go back to watching this alcove." She glanced at the two receptacles, looking through openings in the panels securing the beads letting her see their size. Both were still in place, and still looked the same size at the moment, the bead imbuing their active defenses not yet visibly getting smaller. A Horotract would have been able to tell, but she certainly couldn''t. Not yet, anyway. It should be fine for the next hour or so.


    They walked back to the shelter area, the binding of lightwisps on her staff lighting their way. The shelter area hadn''t been built the same as her Dungeon''s second level. She''d had less space to work with, a reduced ability to do that work, and fraying patience while she had done so. As such, instead of alcoves, she''d simply made a large rectangular room with latrines next to the ramp that led up to it and the food preparation area. As shelters went, it was rather bare, without benches and tables to eat on, but¡ª


    "Did they remember to bring in the bowls and utensils?"


    "Yes, Great Binder, they remembered to do that. We won''t have to try eating with our hands."


    ¡ªthey''d have bowls and utensils, at least.


    And if Lori managed to build what she had in mind before any water was wasted, they''d have the water to wash all that without significantly impacting their water reserves.


    First things first, however: the main shelter area was too dark. She couldn''t work in such conditions.


    Lori held out her hand, slowly moving it back and forth through the air as she claimed lightwisps being given off by her staff and the two wisplights, anchoring them to her skin and imbuing them using Magic she''d drawn from her core. Once she felt it was sufficiently imbued, she anchored the binding to the butt of her staff so she could anchor the binding of lightwisps to the ceiling and activate it.


    There rose a susurrus of low voices at the sudden radiance. The brighter light made it easy for Lori to claim more lightwisps from the air to bind and imbue. The next light she placed on the ceiling over the kitchen area, where food was in the middle of cooking, the pieces of meat being seared to brown them, filling the air with a delicious smell.


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    It also reminded her that she needed to deal with the water issue, so she anchored the last binding of lightwisps onto the ceiling of the unoccupied corner furthest from the ramp up to the shelter area. The stone there was bare, with no shades of green or blue to indicate the presence of copper ore. Lori touched the stone, fingers curled so she was making contact with her fingernails as she channeled her magic outward through her bones and to her fingernails to claim and bind the stone.


    She had to work quickly and efficiently, since she didn''t have much time to build this. It needed to be done before they finished cooking lunch at the very least, because she was not working while other people ate! Lori softened the stone and slowly, carefully drew mass out from the stone wall. As stone moved laterally towards her, she hollowed out the wall above the thick shelf she was drawing out, creating a deeper niche.


    Without any tools or her connection to her core, she had to use her bare hands, which made shaping a waist-high sink a bit difficult. While the stone was softened like wet clay, it still had the mass and density of stone, and so it was heavy in her hands as she gathered excess stone into a ball that she¡ªand thankfully, Riz¡ªhad to pick up with their bare hands to place on the floor. They had to do this several times to be able to excavate enough stone, resulting in a sufficiently deep recessed sink wide enough for two people to use side by side.


    Lori took a hand full of the stone she''d excavated and removed and formed it into a palm-sized blob, then used that to smooth out the surfaces and edges of the sink so that there wouldn''t be any sharp edges that might cut fingers. As she made a hole at the end of the sink¡ªthe end not facing a wall¡ªfor water to drain through, the resulting roughness of the whole thing made her perfectionist soul ache. However, she couldn''t spend much more time on the matter, since she could see that the kitchen seemed to be close to finishing cooking.


    "Erzebed, do you happen to know if we have any buckets that didn''t get used to as planters for crops?" Lori ask as she took some stone she''d set aside and began forming it into a crude tube.


    "I know we have some for carrying water from the barrels, Great Binder. Do you want me to get you one?"


    "No, you stay with me. But I need one of those clean buckets with some water in it¡ªit doesn''t need to be full¡ªand one of the buckets being used for planters. Have someone get them for me. Put the crops in another bucket and have them bring the bucket to me. There''s always at least one that hasn''t been filled as much as the others." She could build a crude container later, but she needed something to catch debris in the meantime.


    Lori continued working on the tube as Riz waved to Yllian and the two spoke for a moment. The pipe was¡­ well, unsightly and heavy. However, it didn''t need to be all that good looking. She made a hole in the tube at a third of the way of its length, then began to fuse the tube horizontally to the hole in the sink. She fused the stone carefully, since it would need to support its own weight for the moment. She might come back to put stone supports on it, but she''d have to do that well after lunch.


    She was tempted to put a bend in the tube, but that might weaken the tube too much. So instead she stuck her finger into the hole on the tube¡ªshe had oriented the hole so that it was on the bottom¡ªand softened the stone slightly so she could form a groove to help guide debris where she wanted it to go.


    "Uh, Great Binder? I have the buckets."


    Lori turned towards the voice, then forced her knees to straightened with a wince. "Ah, good. Give them here." Riz handed her the buckets, and she cringed at the feeling of mud and dirt on the rope of one of the buckets. Well, she had asked for one of the dirty buckets.


    She took the dirty bucket and positioned it under the hole on the tube. Then she dipped one hand into the bucket of water¡ªas requested, it had only a little water in it¡ªand claimed the waterwisps around her handing, binding and imbuing it to unnaturally viscosity. When she drew out her hand, it was covered with a slime-like layer of water. She used her other hand to scrape the water together into a glob in her hands, then knelt down and carefully raised the glob up into the hole in the tube.


    Lori anchored some of the water and waterwisps to the stone. Drawing her belt knife with her free hand, she laid her finger on the blade and used it to act as a channel to the waterwisps so she could remove her other hand. Then she had the water change into vapor.


    The blade went cold under her finger as the waterwisp drew heat from the air around it to change state. She pulled back her blade, putting it back in its sheath as she took the blob in her other hand and raised it to the end of the tube, anchoring the water wisps to the stone opening there. She stuck her finger into the binding of waterwisps, making the whole thing spread to fill the entire tube, anchoring it to the tube''s opening. She then divided it into four distinct bindings: one at the opening at the drain hole of the sink all the way to before the hole in the tube, one over the hole in the tube, one extending through the rest of the tube, and the last at the opening at the end of the tube.


    Lori rubbed her hands together now that she didn''t have water on them¡ªgrimacing at the feeling of grit from handling the dirty bucket¡ªand used the friction of the movement to create firewisps, which she claimed and bound. She added the binding of firewisps to the binding of waterwisps.


    With all the pieces done, she was finally able to properly form the binding to distill water so they could reuse the dirty wash water.


    While all the wisps were interconnected, that was mostly so she only had to imbue one thing. Each binding was simple in purpose. The first binding of waterwisps in the tube, positioned between the tube''s hole and the sink, would move any water¡ªno matter what state it was¡ªfrom the sink down the tube. This was mostly so that there would be no backflow, especially from the second binding over the hole, which would have any water change state to vapor, leaving any debris such as dirt, oil and soap behind. Any debris left in the tube would hopefully be pushed by the water propelled by the first binding so that it would fall out the hole.


    The gritty bucket was placed under the hole to catch debris, which they''d just get rid of by dumping it into one of the latrines to be cleaned out after the dragon left.


    The third binding of water wisps would continue drawing the vapor down the tube, where it would reach the last binding of waterwisps, which would condense the vapor back to water and let it drip down to the clean bucket she''d asked Riz for. The firewisps would act to transfer the heat needed for the water to change state, as well as to keep the tube from getting so cold ice formed in the tube. She''d check later if she needed to modify it to add heat, but for now it was probably all that the system needed for a rough equilibrium.


    Lori tested the new sink by washing her hands and letting the water flow down the sink. The water flowed down into the hole, meaning she''d made the sink properly and there were no spots lower than the drain.


    She sighed as the condensed water flowed out of the tube and onto the floor, because she was still holding the bucket to pour water into the sink.


    "Erzebed¡­"


    "I''ll have someone get another bucket, Great Binder."


    "You do that," Lori said as she grabbed her staff to start gathering the water on the floor into a viscous blob. Water was a limited resource to them, after all.

 320 - Resting to Be Ready For Emergencies

    Once a second bucket was placed to catch water, it was time to eat.


    Lori made a little seat of stone extrude from the wall a little bit away from the sink and sat down, one hand on the tube to continue imbuing the binding. The binding was relatively simple, so she''d be able to form another one if it ran out of imbuement and dissolved, but she''d rather she didn''t have to. She''d have to alter one of the wisplights to provide imbuement for the binding, maybe keep it from dissolving when the imbuement ran out.


    Riz came back with two bowls of stew. Lori took one and started eating quickly, filling her empty stomach. With all the work she''d been doing, she''d been able to distract herself, but now that she had food in front of her, her hunger wouldn''t be ignored anymore. She ate, the familiar taste of beast meat, fat, some sort of leaf that¡­ well, hadn''t poisoned anyone yet, what tasted like faint traces of mican, and meat broth.


    ¡­


    It could use salt.


    She ate the food nonetheless, because she was hungry and it was the only food available.


    When she was done, she left the bowl and utensil on the sink. As much as she''d like to consider the thing done, she knew that they couldn''t wash dishes very efficiently at a bucket of water at a time. She''d have to make come kind of cistern to catch the water with. Something they could scoop the water up from using the buckets.


    Well, she''d already eaten.


    She took a moment to check on the state of her demesne. The dome of darkwisps was losing imbuement as it resisted the magic being thrown at it, only to be replenished by the connection to her core. Though from what she could perceive, very little abrasion seemed to be happening. Oh, there was some, but it seemed to be very light contact on relatively small areas of the dome.


    Actually, most of what was entering her demesne was¡­


    Was that rain?


    Yes, that was rain, if a very warm rain from the amount of firewisps among the waterwisps. And¡­ there was something else falling with the rain. It was hard to judge dimensions, since the things were falling through her demesne quickly, but at a casual comparison, they were bigger than the drops of water, and smaller than a person. Smaller than a child.


    And each and every single one was full of firewisps. Firewisps far hotter than the firewisps on the raindrops, firewisps that got hotter and hotter as they fell. Any raindrops they made contact with in mid-air seemed to change state into steam, but some of the smaller drops simply seemed to vanish as the firewisps simply got hotter and hotter.


    There was a sudden burst of firewisps, and Lori saw what had once been one falling solid became several¡­


    Wait. Were they¡­ exploding?


    The bursts of heat¡­


    Oh.


    Well, that explained the sound she could hear through the air vent. The dragon was raining explosions over them.


    No, wait, whatever it was dropping were solid objects, so technically it was hail. The dragon was hailing exploding dragon scales on them.


    ¡­


    Their crops would be ruined, wouldn''t they?


    ¡­


    Lori let out a sigh as she opened her eyes. One thing at a time. They''d worry about it when the dragon finally left and they could go back outside.


    For now, she just had to make a water cistern before people finished lunch.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    As she was in a rush, she made the cistern the fastest, simplest way: she excavated the floor.


    She used some of the displaced stone to make a little pillar that supported the sink''s tube and doubled as a wall so that the debris that dropped out of the water when it changed state wouldn''t fall into the cleaned water. The rest of the stone, she made a little wall around the cistern to keep people from kicking things in it or stepping in it. With the little walls, cistern was wide enough to allow someone to scoop water out of it using a bucket.


    "All right, it''s done," Lori sighed. "Erzebed, give me the water." No one was bothering her, but Lori could see the stacks of dishes building up over at the kitchen area.


    Riz handed her the bucket of dirty water from the bottom of the mine. It was dark and murky, but it wasn''t particularly rank. Even if it was, distillation should be able to separate the water from everything. Still, she poured the dirty water into the sink slowly, watching the water that came out of the tube and into another bucket so she could see it clearer. Lori let out a sigh of relief as the water came out clear, the dissolved minerals and things falling out of the hole in the tube and into the gritty catch bucket underneath, which already had some dark particulates in it.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. "All right. It finally works. Have someone get more water from the mine and tell them to pour it¡ªslowly¡ªdown into the sink to clean it. Theoretically, the water that comes out should be clean enough to drink, but¡­ don''t."


    "Don''t drink the sink water," Riz said. "Understood, Great Binder. Um¡­ how do you feel, Great Binder?"


    She blinked at the strange question. "What?"


    "How do you feel? You''ve been up all day, and it''s probably been most of a day already. Do you need to rest?"


    She frowned. "I''m fine. I can rest after dinner. "


    Riz hesitated. "Uh, with all due respect, Great Binder¡­ do you need to? Everything seems to be working well, and¡­ well, nothing seems to be trying to get inside. Shouldn''t you conserve your strength in case there''s an emergency only you can do something about?"


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    Lori considered that. "Rian told you to say that, didn''t he?"


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said promptly.


    ¡­


    Ugh. She hated it when he had a point.


    For a moment, Lori considered continuing on. After all, she was the Dungeon Binder. Rian was subservient to her, he didn''t give her orders. Except now that she thought of it¡­ she was tired. It had been a long day, and even though she wasn''t struggling to keep her eyes open, they felt like they''d be quite comfortable being closed.


    A part of her felt like there were still things she needed to do. Surely she needed to make sure that the sink wouldn''t run out of imbuement and dissolve¡­


    ¡­


    Lori shook her head. If it dissolved, it dissolved, but she''d heavily imbued it, so it shouldn''t. "Tell them to use the sink for cleaning and use water only from the cistern." Perhaps she should make something to let them recover water from¡ª "Tell them not to overuse it and use only small amounts of water at a time or else it will be overwhelmed and get clogged." A lie, but the sort of thing that people who don''t know how her binding worked would think was reasonable. "I''m going to sleep. Don''t let anyone near me and only wake me up in an emergency that Yllian can''t deal with, or if someone kills someone else."


    Riz nodded. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori grabbed her staff, making her way back to her alcove. As she walked across the length of the shelter area, she saw some people had started unrolling their bedrolls on the ground, though it looked like a one and a half-pace wide walkway was being left clear for people to walk down. People spoke quietly, heads close together, and it was nothing like the low murmur Lori was familiar with when people were talking in her Dungeon.


    It was an annoying reminder this place wasn''t her home, even if it was technically hers.


    Lori walked to her alcove, where Deil and Tackir were still linger in the mine tunnel outside, leaning on either side of the binding of lightwisps she''d anchored to the wall.


    She paused as she passed them. "Have you two eaten?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," one of them said. She knew their names, she didn''t know whose name was what! "Riz had some food sent for us."


    Lori grunted. "Good." She headed into her alcove.


    Her rain coat and pack were still on the niche in the alcove. She leaned her staff against the stone wall and checked the wispbeads in the panels. The bead supporting the active defenses was now noticeably smaller than the one imbuing the air vent, though not by much. Lori had to stare to be able to say that the former was just a little bit smaller than the latter, as if someone had shaved a thin layer like the skin of a pink lady off the bead. That boded well for the wispbead''s capacity in the long term. It probably wouldn''t be completely consumed while she was sleeping.


    "Erzebed," she called out.


    "Er, she went off to talk to Lord Yllian, your Bindership," Deil or Tackir said. "She said she''d be quick."


    Lori sighed, then gestured towards them. "Come here then, you two. Someone needs to know before I go to sleep. Tell Riz when she gets back."


    The two carpenters walked to her, and she pointed at the bead imbuing their second defenses. "You two see that bead?"


    They both nodded.


    "Whenever you''re here, check on it but don''t touch it. It''s on a contact." They were both carpenters, so if they ever worked with a bound tool like a water cutter or a driver saw, they''d know what that meant. "If you ever see it the size of two fists or smaller, run for me immediately. It''s what''s imbuing what''s keeping us alive. If it runs out, we die. Understood?"


    The two of them stared at the bead.


    "I said, understood?" Lori repeated, annoyed.


    "Yes, your Bindership!" they both said loudly.


    Lori nodded. "Good. If anyone tries to touch it for any reason¡ªactually, any of the beads in this alcove¡ªif it looks like anyone who''s thinking of it gets within two paces of this bead or the one next to it, don''t bother being nice. Drag them away and beat them unconscious if you have to. I''d rather not die because an idiot meddled with something I built, and I doubt you do either."


    "See? Now aren''t you glad we didn''t sit on it?" one said to the other.


    "I never said anything about sitting on it, I just said it was too short for a proper seat!"


    "Don''t ever try to sit on it. We''ll die, and in the time before we do, I''ll personally set the person who does it on fire."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    "Understood your Bindership!"


    Lori nodded. "Good. Tell Riz when she gets back. I''m going to sleep so I''m rested for any emergencies that come up." She waved a hand dismissively. "As you were, then."


    The two went back to their wall, staring at the panels surrounding the bead.


    "Maybe we should make a bench to go over that¡­" Deil or Tackir said, just loudly enough Lori heard them as she straightened out her coat on the stone of the niche. "More secure than those panels."


    "It''s pretty secure. Lord Rian told me those things should be able to take a kick without coming off," Tackir or Deil said as she did her best to fluff up her pack with the clothes inside it. "But you''re right, it needs something better. Maybe some kind of chest, with posts securing it into the ground and wall."


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said as she sat on the stone niche and took off her boots and socks. Laying down, she winced at the familiar but unwelcome feeling of stone through thin leather. Outside, through the doors and the vent, she could hear the rumbling sound the dragon was making. "Could you keep it down? If you want to talk, move further down the tunnel."


    "Sorry, your Binderhip!"


    "We''ll do that, your Bindership!"


    She closed her eyes as they moved away, their already low voices growing more quiet until there was only the sounds of the dragon''s rumbling. How many explosions were going off that she was hearing it as a continuous rumble? Still, the sound wasn''t so loud, and it was actually quite comforting to listen to if she didn''t think of the source.


    ¡­


    Lori sighed, sat up, pulled her boots over her bare feet to keep them somewhat clean against the cold and gritty stone, got up, and walked to her staff. The glowing binding of lightwisps she''d anchored to it went dark as she deactivate the binding, then leaned her staff back against the wall. She glanced at the binding of lightwisps anchored to the wall and with a grumble she walked towards it, altering the binding to give it directionality so that the light was directed down into the mine tunnel instead of just letting the light go everywhere.


    With a satisfied jerking nod of her head, she went back to her niche, took off her boots, and lay down, closing her eyes with a satisfied sigh. With the darkness behind her eyes not being driven back by light on her eyelids, she was ready to sleep.


    ¡­


    "Uh, Great Binder...?"


    Lori''s eyes snapped open in annoyance as she turned her head at an already-wincing Riz, standing at the entrance of her alcove. "What?-!" she demanded.


    "Um¡­ Rian told me to remind you before you went to sleep that you¡­" her temporary-Rian faltered slightly in the face of her unamused face, but swallowed and continued, "that you should dim the lights in the second level when you went to sleep so that it wouldn''t be so bright for peop¡ªchildren also trying to sleep."


    Lori gave her a flat look at the blatant correction. "Fine. Now leave me alone."


    "Yes, Great Binder! Sleep well, Great Binder!" The tail ends of the platitudes were barely audible as Riz very quickly made herself scarce.


    Lori grit her teeth and wanted to drop her head down on her pack in frustration, but remembered just in time it wasn''t all that thick. Instead, she closed her eyes, ignored the urge to pettily go straight to sleep, and reached through her connection to her core to the lightwisps in her Dungeon, took a moment to identify the ones that illuminated her second level, and deactivated them.


    She nodded curtly to herself, kept her eyes closed, and went back to trying to sleep.


    ¡­


    Then she sighed, opened her eyes¡ªa useless gesture, since she was going to be closing them again, but they made her feel like wasn''t trying to sleep¡ªthen closed them again to help her concentrate as she began altering the bindings to provide a dimmer illumination so people wouldn''t walk into any of the pillars or step on someone.


    Finally, she closed her eyes again and tried to go to sleep once more.


    ¡­


    Her last distinct thought was that perhaps she should sleep further from the door so she wouldn''t be the first to die if something did manage to get through the shelter''s defenses¡­

 321 - Uncomfortable, Boring and Annoying

    When Lori woke up, it was on her own cognizance. So unless she''d woken up, done things while half-asleep, and forgotten about them¡ªnot unlikely, given anecdotal evidence from her mothers¡ªthere hadn''t been any emergencies she had needed to take care of during the night. And save for the way her back ached from sleeping on hard stone with only a layer of leather as cushioning, Lori felt refreshed and well-rested. Aching, but well-rested. The feeling was enough to remind her of where she was.


    Normally, she''d have proceeded to go over the bindings she needed to check in her demesne¡ªshe could remember most of them, and even if she forgot some, none of them were part of the defenses, so that was fine¡ªbut her aches prompted her to sit up to start alleviating them. She winced at the muscles that had been resting on stone all night protested at the movement, and wiggled her toes. Lori rolled her shoulders as she tried to massage her body to a state of ''awake and not aching''.


    The air was a little warm, probably from her being in it all night, and black as a soul. Distantly, she could hear the continued rumbling of the dragon and its explosions. In the mine shaft beyond her alcove, the binding of lightwisps she''d anchored to the wall was gone, its imbuement no doubt consumed while she''d been asleep. Her eyes being open or closed seemed no different save to alter the texture of the darkness. Out of habit, she reached through her connection to her core to claim a few lightwisps before she remembered where she was. Grimacing, she shuffled to the end of the niche and gently felt around her where her staff was hopefully still leaning against the wall.


    She let out a sigh of relief as a fingertip touched cold wire, and Lori was able to grab her staff before it unbalanced and fell over. Reaching through the wire, she reactivated the binding of lightwisps she''d anchored to it, which had endured because of the imbuement she''d had placed in it.


    The light showed Riz sleeping in front of the entrance of her alcove, a pile of packs next to her bedroll laid out to block her path should she roll towards the receptacles of beads. Around her were¡­ and¡­ what were their names again¡­ umm D-something and T-something¡­ or was that two D names? Well, the two carpenters were sleeping a little beyond her, as was someone else¡­


    Just how many people were sleeping outside her alcove? Had they had so little confidence in her defenses that they''d decided to keep watch on the entrance themselves? It was annoying, considering any kind of defenses was a definite improvement over the distinct lack of them when they had been under Binder Shanalorre.


    Sighing, Lori imbued the binding of lightwisps on her staff so that it would last longer as she shuffled across niche to put her back up against stone. Leaning on the wall, she made herself comfortable, one hand idly fanning her face. Perhaps it was the excess of bodies that had made everything so warm.


    She reached through her connection to her core to claim a few firewisps before she remembered where she was. Grimacing, she reached out a claimed a few of the firewisps in the air through her hand and made a simple binding to delete heat, imbuing it slightly and anchoring to the stone next to her. A part of her squirmed slightly at leaving such a binding unattended, which went against the work habits she''d been taught about firewisps, but it wasn''t a powerful binding, and if it made her alcove too cold, she''d could just deactivate it.


    Actually¡­


    She pulled on her socks, then her boots so she wouldn''t have to step on the gritty floor. Using her staff, she anchored the binding of firewisps in front of the vent blowing out air from outside. That spared her from making a biding of airwisps to circulate the cooled air to mitigate the warmth.


    Satisfied, she went back to sit at her niche to check on her demesne.


    Her defenses were holding, and if there were any damage to the reinforced stone structures, it was minor enough she couldn''t identify it with her cursory inspection of the earthwisps. The exhaust vent that let out smoke from the kitchen, as well as the air that settled in the third level, seemed to be intact and continuing to send air out to the water hub shed, where it bubbled out. The bindings that controlled the light, temperature and humidity of the Dungeon farm in the third level were working, and from what she could tell nothing needed adjustment.


    Though why were all the lightwisps on the second level¡ª?


    Oh, right.


    After she changed the illumination back to normal levels, she went back to checking her demesne. The water in the reservoir was holding, and the used bath water was going down to the dungeon farm, into the cistern for watering all the crops. The runoff cistern had plenty of space to hold the water, though the crops needed so much watering each day that the cistern getting too full wasn''t really a concern. The bindings keeping the Coldhold solidified were imbued, so that it wasn''t going to melt inside the stone cube keeping it safe. With the rain, she also made sure that the binding of waterwisps built into the lowest point of the floodwall that drew up water that pooled there and sent it out to the other side of the wall was activated and imbued, so that there wouldn''t be any water trapped behind the wall.


    Everything seemed to be in order. Her Dungeon was functioning, protected, and seemingly safe.


    And she was here.


    Opening her eyes, Lori let out a sigh.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It took seven days, as best as Lori could judge since the shelter didn''t have a water clock, for the dragon to pass. She supposed it could be worse. Those seven days could have been exciting and terrifying as dragonborn abominations battered at their door, tried to creep into their air vents, and been filled with long days and tiring nights as the shelter had to be actively defended with spears and bindings and all that heroic nonsense.


    Instead, those seven days were alternately uncomfortable, boring and annoying in various combinations.


    Uncomfortable, because for all the work she had done on the dragon shelter, it had been focused on functional matters. The storage for the food so that those in the shelter wouldn''t starve¡ªand the food wouldn''t be stolen¡ªthe three doors to keep abominations from getting inside, the extensive defenses on the vents so that they''d have air¡­ all these things were made to keep the shelter safe, and clearly they were working, as nothing had gotten inside yet!


    ¡­


    Granted, there was nothing trying to get inside, but Lori was confident that if there was anything trying to get inside, it still wouldn''t be able to!


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    However, the dragon shelter had something of a dearth when it came to comforts, hence ''uncomfortable''. There were no sleeping niches along the walls, no alcoves for privacy, no bath, no tables and benches¡ªthough she''d learned that many people had brought in stools, as those could be carried by one person¡ªand no fixtures for light. As such, she was forced to make a circuit of the shelter every day, anchoring new lightwisps in various places, most especially the kitchen area¡ªwhere she also had to place a binding of firewisps three times a day so that meals could be cooked¡ªand the new sink area.


    Thankfully, the sink was working as intended, although she had to keep it heavily imbued because, try as she might, she couldn''t find a good way of placing one of her new bound tools to maintain the binding when the imbuement ran out. Since she didn''t have the necessary equipment to safely draw her blood, she had to heavily imbue it between the periods of time that the sink was being used.


    She also had to put in bindings of airwisps to help circulate the air. While new air was coming in through the mine''s original air circulation tubes, fed by her bound tool, that was originally meant to bring air into the mining tunnel, not the shelter. As such, she''d needed to anchor bindings to the ramp that blew in air from the tunnel, forcing the air inside the shelter to circulate.


    After four days, they''d needed to put in another large wispbead to power the shelter''s active defenses once the bead she''d put in on the first day had reduced down to half its diameter. It was far slower than she thought, but if the situation in River''s Fork was the same as in her own demesne, nothing was actively trying to get into the mine. If she was correct, most of the imbuement was probably being drawn by the binding of earthwisps reinforcing the stone around the entrance, keeping the stone together in the face of the explosions happening outside.


    Occasionally, a loud explosion would echo through the mine shaft, which had Lori reaching for the contact wire to check if the mine''s first door had been breached the first time it had happened. She''d been relieved to find everything still seemed intact and the door still in place. She wasn''t sure what the state of the door was, but there was no smoke being pulled by the vent, so the copper alloy sheathing on the door had probably held, and the wood hadn''t caught fire.


    After it had happened a few times, Lori theorized it was occurring because whatever was exploding¡ªfrom the lack of distinctive odors, she suspected it was due to caustic metals reacting to the rainwater, which from what she''d learned in school would account for what she had perceived in her demesne¡ªhad managed to land directly in front of the mine entrance, or close enough. The sound of the explosion came in through the vents, which is why it had been louder than the background rumble.


    Lori had still checked the state of the mine entrance through the contact point, but given she hadn''t died from some sort of poisonous gas or otherwise impaired from breathing some kind of odorless air, she''d ultimately decided the explosion''s results were relatively harmless.


    The bead imbuing the bound tool that drew in air hadn''t been needed to be replaced at all, the simple and efficient binding of airwisps requiring relatively little imbuement.


    Boring, because after she''d done all those things¡­ there really wasn''t much else to do besides sit next to the sink and imbue the binding there, or sit in her alcove, doing nothing. Neither were particularly appealing. While others in the shelter had nothing to do either, Yllian was able to keep them from growing restless. The first two days, the doctors left in the demesne¡ªall three of them, which included the one who had come with Lori¡ªchecked over everyone''s physical condition. It kept the doctors busy, especially that idiot uncle of Shanalorre''s, and people were occupied trying to recall recent ailments to see if they needed to be healed by Shanalorre, or some sort of special medicine.


    They most likely didn''t have that medicine, but that wouldn''t change the fact someone might need to know they needed it.


    After that, Yllian found other ways to get people organized. He politely requested that Lori make a little plot for the crops that had been brought in so the buckets could be used for other things, which Lori graciously did because she literally had nothing better to do. Then she put in more lightwisps, since the crops would wilt if they weren''t getting the right kind of light. Then she made a little runoff channel since someone was sure to overwater the crops, and then they''d get waterlogged and get root rot or something. And then she made a little dirt trap so that any dirt that got carried away by the water wouldn''t go far and could be put back onto the crops¡­


    With the buckets available, restless people were put to work going down to the bottom of the mine, drawing some of the murky water that had gathered there from rainwater before the mine had been sealed trickling into the mine tunnel, and bringing it back up to run through the sink to clean it. So Lori had needed to anchor more bindings of lightwisps through the mine so people could see where they were going, and then expanded the cistern next to the sink to be able to hold more water. This resulted in the sink''s binding needing more imbuement, so she had used a little bit of her wire to make a metal contact that she could more easily touch, as well as fashion something that could hold a bead so that could imbue the binding while the sink was being used so she wouldn''t have to crowd in around it.


    People started using the recovered cistern water to wash, taking buckets of clean water back down to the mine to give themselves a standing wash. So Lori had to make a cistern there too for them to put the clean water, but she didn''t make another sink because all the back and forth was a way to keep people occupied. The amount of water in the mine increased again as all the wash water runoff flowed down there, to be scooped up again and run through the sink once more.


    Lori had even taken a bath herself, with Riz keeping watch so she wasn''t interrupted. She distilled water directly from the pond of stagnant and now soapy mine water so she wouldn''t have to carry buckets, and gave herself a wash that felt wonderful after three days of having not done so. She didn''t have a towel, but given she could just claim waterwisps through her skin, it wasn''t really necessary.


    Annoying, because this went on for seven days. Seven days away from her demesne, of her needing to run around to do things, of having to actually come into contact with bindings to imbue them. Seven days of sleeping on rock, eating food that always seemed to need salt, of occasionally being jarred awake as the sound of an explosion came from outside, of being bored and uncomfortable. All she could do was sit silently and long for home.


    To distract herself, she had focused on their plans for after the dragon had passed. She and Rian had agreed that they would send the Coldhold to Covehold Demesne at either midsummer or after a dragon had passed, whichever had come first, and simply hoped that a dragon wouldn''t come after midsummer. The timing had been important, since the dragon''s arrival meant that after it had gone, they''d have a relatively safe period to travel. The midsummer deadline had simply been because they wouldn''t have been able to delay much longer if they still intended to try and make a profit that year.


    They had also needed to check with the docks if there had been any word about when the next group of settlers from the Golden Sweetwood Company would be arriving with their personnel and supplies. Rian and Yllian had been confident that the next group could be convinced to settle in River''s Fork instead of founding a new demesne, but Lori really couldn''t see why. There was no reason for the wizards of the group to not found their own demesnes where they''d all be able to rule as Dungeon Binders. Rian''s explanations of wanting to live with their friends in secured, established demesne''s had been nonsensical. If the Golden Sweetwood Company had wanted that, they''d have simply joined one of the already established demesnes around Covehold.


    Still, Rian was going to try to get their settlers and resources for themselves, even if it was extremely unlikely to actually happen. The best she herself could hope for was for them to found their demesnes far, far away from hers, and most especially not on the same river as her.


    Try as she might to think of the potential profits that their plan of selling wispbeads to workshops to power their bound tools would bring them, her thoughts always came back around to those thoughts, which added to her annoyance.


    On the seventh day after they''d sealed the mine shut, the rumble of things exploding outside of the mine finally fell quiet.

 322 - Stepping Outside Again

    Lori didn''t unseal the mine immediately, even though she could feel the dragon moving away. First, she checked on her demesne through her connection to her core, and was able to ascertain that while it was still raining, no solids of potentially caustic metals were falling any longer, and the falling rain wasn''t filled with firewisps anymore. There were also no mobile voids of wisps that might denote living dragonborn abominations, though that didn''t bar the possibility of undead dragonborn abominations. Still, there also didn''t seem to be any of those either.


    She hoped that the same was true of the demesne outside the mine, but with no ability to perceive outside, there was no way of knowing for sure. Still, she couldn''t just keep people inside. Even with the sink, they had been depleting their drinkable water. She''d had to desiccate the latrines of all that post-water several times. If the dragon had stayed for longer, she might have been forced to try to recover that water for more drinking, which¡­ well, she was glad she didn''t have to. While it was technically no different from her drawing moisture out of the air to drink back when they had first journeyed from Covehold Demesne to where her demesne was now, and she knew that the distillation process would remove all substances besides water¡­ well, she was glad she didn''t have to continue trying to build a water-recovery latrine.


    Of course, opening the mine again wasn''t something she could just do. Plans had to be outlined so she wouldn''t get killed. Preparations had to be made so she wouldn''t get killed. People had to be organized to set out, and people had to be assigned to protect the ones remaining in the shelter. Only the former had to do with her not getting killed, but the latter would make sure no one went through her things while she was outside investigating what had happened to her second demesne.


    Normally, Rian would be the one arranging these things, but he wasn''t here. She did, however, have a temporary-Rian, as well as a lord who, while not Rian, was at least capable.


    "The dragon has passed," Lori told Riz and Yllian after lunch. Technically, it was the second meal since waking up, as they weren''t sure what the time of day was. Even with Yllian having people maintain a distinct schedule of waking up, having three meals and sleeping, that still didn''t mean that they''d been managing to properly approximate the cycle of one day. Even Lori only thought that seven days had passed because she''d had a hearty sleep seven times. Given how long she''d slept, it might have been closer to eight or nine days. "I need you two to start organizing people to venture and see if everything is clear. Once we''ve confirmed that there''s nothing waiting out there to kill us, we can refill our reserves of water once I''ve checked its drinkable."


    Yllian frowned. "Why do you think the water will be a problem, Great Binder?"


    "I suspect that the dragon was making it rain dragonscales of caustic metal," Lori said. "If you don''t know, caustic metals react to water and explode." Not exactly, but that was what they''d understand. "The ashes that result can dissolve into the water, which you don''t want to be drinking. The river water is probably full of the stuff, so I might have to build something to distill water for people until the river is clear."


    "Ah. Yes, that would be helpful, Great Binder," Yllian said. "I''ll start getting people organized to go out. I''ll need a few moments, perhaps an hour to make sure everyone knows what needs to be done."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Inform me when everyone''s ready so I can open the mine. I need to try to inform Rian to do the same."


    Now, she just had to hope he was paying attention.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori and Rian had worked out two signals between the two of them. The first, Rian placing the stone with a binding of lightwisps she had given him on it on top of a shelf with its own binding, was his means of informing her that the Dungeon was to be sealed. The second signal, one that she would send him, was meant to tell him to organize the militia to prepare go out as she opened the mine. His reply¡ªputting the stone back on the shelf¡ªwould tell her his preparations were done, and that she was to start deactivating her demesne''s active defenses to start letting people out.


    More importantly, it meant that Rian had better be getting a boat ready to pick her up and bring her home.


    She signaled him now, making the lightwisps on Rian''s stone blink. Deactivate the binding, wait for a count of three, activate it again, wait for another count of three, deactivate again and continue the repetition. Then, to ensure he got the message, she began to do the same with the lights of her Dungeon''s dining hall. Deactivate, activate, deactivate, activate, deactivate, activate¡­ Lori patiently did this for ten repetitions. Even if Rian was asleep at the moment, someone would go to wake him, and if he managed to miss the signs, there would be people to tell him.


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    In the meantime, Lori deactivated the active defenses. She reconfigured the binding of lightningwisps guarding the entryway of her Dungeon back into a binding to repel bugs, and dissolved the dome of darkwisps, letting the light of the sky shine down on her demesne again. The stone she had displaced to make the moat in her entryway, she slowly moved back, though she kept the stone barrier under the overhead balcony in place for the moment. Just because she couldn''t feel anything roaming her demesne didn''t mean there weren''t any.


    As the moat water being displaced by the returning stone began to rise, Lori double checked the binding of waterwisps at the floodwall to pump water from the lowest point behind the wall to the river, and found it still functioning as intended.


    Once the water was gone, Lori restored the entryway floor as best as she could without actually being there to see it. She''d have to do it properly when she got back home. The final wall of displaced stone, she left in place for until Rian signaled back that they were ready.


    "Great Binder? Lord Yllian says they''re ready."


    Lori opened her eyes at Riz''s words. Her temporary-Rian was standing there with her spear, looking content to wait indefinitely. Unfolding her legs beneath her, Lori got up from her niche and walked over to the receptacles imbuing their active defenses. She carefully touched the contact wire were it sank into the wall, and deactivated the binding of lightningwisps keeping abominations out of the air vent intake. The darkwisps in front of the mine entrance were also deactivated and dissolved.


    Straightening up, Lori grabbed her staff so she wouldn''t have to bend down again and used it to contact the stone she had raised to keep the doors from opening. The stone sank down, actually leaving a little depression on the ground as she displaced the material sideways to the wall. "All right," she said, "Open the doors. But don''t put the stones and bars into my alcove yet! I''m still using it."


    The mine tunnel outside her alcove were full of men who had the look of both northerners¡ªat least, north of Taniar Demesne, the place she grew up¡ªand former militia. Pale skin that easily flushed red with exertion, hair in mostly pale shades of color, general physical fitness, and an air of casual, almost bored readiness. They moved quickly and competently to pick up and move the rather heavy rocks out of the way of the door. The wooden beams were lifted from where they rested to bar the door shut, and the door was opened.


    Nothing was waiting for them beyond the door but more stone, more beams, and another door, which was a good sign.


    The manual labor was repeated twice more, and then the outermost door was being opened.


    "Great Binder, why are you gripping the back of my shirt so firmly?" Riz asked.


    "Don''t be distracted," Lori said firmly as she stood behind her temporary-Rian.


    "Great Binder, if you''re going to use me as a shield, then just stay behind me. I''ll protect you."


    "I have no idea what you''re talking about. Now, continue protecting me."


    "If you keep holding my shirt like that, I won''t be able to use my spear properly, and won''t be able to protect you as well."


    Coincidentally and completely by chance, Lori''s hand, which had been pushing on Riz''s back so that the two of them wouldn''t be crowded so close, fell down to grip her staff. Lightningwisps were making the quartz in her staff vibrate, and she had a few lengths of firewood in a bag at her side, convenient mediums for carrying and throwing firewisps. Whisperers throwing lengths of wood with a binding of firewisps on it was the truth to the popular theater trope of hurling fireballs, since in theater productions they couldn''t use actual wood and had to use brightly painted balls of fabric and ribbon streamers instead.


    The binding of lightwisps still anchored to her staff had been dimmed since it was close to most peoples'' eye-levels, but she was ready to brighten it as soon as it was needed.


    Nothing leapt at the foremost militia when the doors opened, which was another good sign. Actually, a wave of damp coolness washed over them as rain fell outside. The skies were dark, and it was hard to see. Lori couldn''t tell if it was early morning, late afternoon, or midday with really thick cloud cover.


    She stared out at the rain as people grumbled but began to ready themselves to step out into it. "Everyone, back inside," she said.


    There was a moment''s pause in the grumbling.


    "Great Binder?" Riz asked.


    "It''s too dark to see anything, it''s raining so people are going to get sick, and we''re on a rocky hill that''s been blasted apart for most of a week," Lori said. "Which means the grounds is probably littered with rumble and slippery besides. Everyone back inside, we''ll check things when there''s more light to see by. Yllian, have some of the empty water barrels brought out to catch the rain. It should be clean enough, and if it''s not, I can do things to it." There was enough flat ground in front of the mine entrance, though as she had said it was strewn with rumble, mostly rocks that had been blasted apart. "Close and bar the doors again when you''re done."


    "Wouldn''t be the first time we''ve drunk rainwater, Great Binder," Yllian said. "All right, you all heard the Great Binder. Everyone back inside. No one''s to go into that and break their neck ''til it''s brighter out. You three, get some barrels out here. Make sure the only thing dripping on them is rain. The water dripping down from higher up might be tainted with something."


    Despite the order, no one really went back inside, though Lori decided to retreat back to her alcove. The militia stayed crowded around the mine entrance, watching the rain as three barrels were carried out and positioned so they wouldn''t roll down the slope. As Lori waited for them to come back in so they''d close all the doors again, she checked back on her demesne.


    Ah, there, Rian had put the stone on the shelf.


    She reached through the core and began to lower the final stone barrier separating her Dungeon from outside as the doors of the mine were closed again.

 323 - Distillation and Damage Assessment

    The rain had stopped when they opened the mine doors again after breakfast the next day, replaced by the punishing summer heat. It was all made worse by the sudden humidity in the air, which somehow combined to distill the worst parts of being wet and being hot.


    Lori wanted to just stay in the mine with a binding of waterwisps in front of the entrance to keep out the moisture in the air, but unfortunately there was work to be done. While it wasn''t as bad as the puddles of water caught in rocks and the many new craters, the river water had the bitter taste of caustic fluid. She didn''t know how long that would last, so for the foreseeable future River''s Fork would need to distill its water before drinking.


    While everyone went out to assess the damage, start clearing out the debris¡ªshe told Yllian to put all the stone debris together into piles in case she needed building material¡ªLori began working on something to purify the water. The barrels they''d left out in the rain, as well as what remained in the mine, would be able to provide them with drinking water, but those would be expended soon.


    The work was an exercise in suffering, since she had to do it under the bare sun next to the river. The humidity and heat were strong, and even with a binding of waterwisps, airwisps and firewisps anchored to her warm skin to try to keep her comfortable, it wasn''t. Oh, the waterwisps were mostly able to keep the humidity off her, but she couldn''t put them in certain places like her face because of the moisture in her eyes, so her face was feeling a little humid. And while the airwisps gave her a nice private breeze over her skin, even under her shirt and trousers, that didn''t change the fact the sun was hot. Even a binding of firewisp to keep the heat from the sun from reaching her wasn''t very helpful when everything around her was hot.


    Still, the bindings around her made the terrible heat manageable, and her hat kept the sunlight off her eyes as she worked. She kept the device she was building simple, a pace-high stone pillar¡ªwell, pile of rocks fused together with the sides shaved down¡ªthat rose from the ground and connected to the bedrock by means of using earthwisps to solidify everything under it. On opposite sides of the stone pillar were stone spouts and at the top of the pillar was a bowl-like funnel to pour water into. She''d have made it shorter, but the barrels for the water needed to be able to fit under the water spout. One of the spouts was lower and closer to the ground, and would be where the substances dissolved into the water would come out.


    Lori had several of the rock debris carried over to the stone pillar so she could fuse the material together into a stepping stone to stand on top of when pouring water into the funnel.


    The binding she anchored to the internal piping leading from the funnel to the spouts was the same binding she had placed on the sink. She had been tempted to remove the firewisps since given the pillar''s position the sun would be providing a lot of heat, but the thermal conductivity of the stone was uncertain, so in the end she made no alterations. People poured water in, waterwisps turned it into vapor while directing it so that it would backflow up the funnel, anything that had been dissolved into the water would drop down. The dissolved debris would fall out the lower spout, the vapor would be directed out the higher spout where more waterwisp bindings would condense the vapor back into water.


    Thankfully, pouring in a bucket of water into the funnel resulted in water that had only the bitterness of distilled water, and not the more intense bitterness of a more caustic solution. The white powder that came out of the other spout was caught in a little stone container that she shaped, because the wooden bucket that she''d originally been catching the powder with had started getting distressingly hot when a little water accidentally splashed into it.


    Lori was in the middle of attaching a gutted wisplight to the pillar to try and make the water distillation pillar into a bound tool when she heard a sound. It was the sound of fast, rushing water moving so quickly it almost whistled. She looked up, turning her gaze upriver, and there she saw a small, fast-moving boat. It was moving faster than the current, and though she knew it would have oars, none of them were in use. Standing nearby, Riz started waving, and people on the boat waved back.


    Oh good, her way home was finally back.


    She turned away and went back to working on the distillation device. She just had to mount the gutted wisplight, perhaps add a binding of lightwisps to act as an indicator that it was imbued and active, and her responsibilities would be met. Then she could finally leave and go home.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Despite finishing the new water distillation bound tool, Lori didn''t get to go back home right away.


    As much as she glared at Rian, she supposed it was part of her lord''s responsibilities to assess the damage to River''s Fork''s infrastructure. And if he was going to be assessing things, she might as well find out about it herself.


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    Ugh, she''d better get back home today!


    "The damage to people''s houses has been minimal," Yllian reported as the three of them walked through the rain-soaked ground under River Fork''s dome. As usual, there were new holes in the dome of intertwined branches and leaves, and Lori could see a long branch that seemed to be hanging from a thread and ready to fall as someone climbed up the dome with a saw hanging from their belt. "The worst is some window shutters being lost and a little water damage because water got inside. The roof of the dining hall was damaged by a falling branch though, and the dome sustained the usual damage. Fortunately, the trees are managing to hold, so the dome is still structurally sound. Some of us will probably spend the night in the mine, but I already have people moving things back to their homes. Though the ground outside the dome is covered in pockmarks from whatever it was the dragon was doing. The Great Binder mentioned exploding metal."


    Rian nodded. "Caustic metal explodes with contact with water and vitriolic substances," he said. Lori should have been surprised, but wasn''t. Her lord was knowledgeable about the strangest things. "The size of the explosions depend on what kind and how much, but from the looks of it, whatever exploding dragon scales were being dropped weren''t enclosed, which probably limited the damage their blasts caused." He sighed. "Our poor crops, though. A number of them were damaged, and we can confirm that Shana''s¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre''s," Lori corrected, walking between the two of them.


    "¡ªBinder Shanalorre''s healing meaning doesn''t work on plants," Rian continued seamlessly at the correction, "so we couldn''t just patch them up again. We tried, but it wouldn''t work. Not really surprising, but since even she hadn''t ever tried it before, I thought maybe there''d be a chance. The farmers are all working frantically, trying to bind stems together, graft stems to intact roots, or replant the tops of the crops to see if they take root, but it''s not looking likely."


    He turned to Lori, his face grim instead of set in its usual smile. "This is going to be a bigger problem as time goes on and we set up larger fields. We could potentially lose up to a quarter of the crops we had in our fields, though since we expanded our fields this spring, what we''d have left would still enough to sustain us. However, if it had been worse¡­ well, we''d definitely feel it harder."


    Lori glared at him. "You want to recruit more Deadspeakers when you go to Covehold than what we had discussed."


    "If we had someone other than Shanalorre, we''d have avoided most of our food problems," Rian pointed out. "Come on. You know that if I recruited only one they''d end up very overworked. Them having one or two people to help them with work would go a long way towards giving them time to rest and keeping them satisfied."


    "Three. Three more Deadspeakers," she said flatly.


    "One or two," Rian corrected meekly. "It''s not unreasonable. You''ve seen our fields. How long do you think it would take a single person to go over it, just putting damaged crops back together before they died? Without having the advantages of a Dungeon Binder?" Rian made a theatrical sweeping gesture, as if trying to encompass everything around them. "Think of what we could do now if we had one or two experienced Deadspeakers. Repairs to the dome and houses, healing the crops so we don''t lose any food, and without running them ragged since two could work in alternating shifts."


    She gave him a flat, unamused look.


    "And moving on and changing the subject!" Rian said cheerfully. "How are your terrace and crops? The trees with the meanings on them? How many of them survived?"


    "We were lucky there," Yllian said as the direction they were walking changed. "While the kindling trees were damaged, it wasn''t anything they wouldn''t grow back anyway, and the fruit trees lost a little off the top, and the fruits on them went unharvested while we were in the shelter, but they managed to make it through the dragon untouched again."


    Rian blinked. "That''s¡­ very fortunate. So they''re fine? All of them?"


    "Yes, though it''s still not a lot."


    "Every little bit helps," Rian said, sounding distracted as he frowned at the crops outside of the dome. There were some bare patches at the edges were people had dug up some of the crops to bring them to the mine. Some people were already planting the crops back in place, and with the contrast the amount of crops they managed to bring into the mine were rather underwhelming. "Did anything burn down?"


    Yllian shook his head. "No, though we found scorching in several places." That would be from relatively small amounts of caustic metal getting hot and igniting on contact with water rather than exploding. "Compared to previous dragons, this one seems to have caused relatively little damage that can''t be fixed, unlike the ones that came before. There don''t even seem to be any dragonborn abominations."


    "Let''s not get overconfident, but it does seem that way, doesn''t it?" Rian said. "Still, the water''s probably going to be tainted for a while so pass water through the bound tool her Bindership made before drink. I''ll come by tomorrow with more beads for it." He glanced at her when he said this, and Lori nodded. Yllian already had the little sack of beads that she''d brought with her in case of emergencies. "Are there any injuries? Does Binder Shanalorre need to make a visit?"


    "No, no one was injured. The worst that happened are a few stubbed feet and aching bottoms from slipping."


    "Hmm¡­ perhaps Binder Shanalorre should come, just to make sure. Those kinds of falling accidents sometimes results in injuries that go unnoticed. Besides, with the work to come, best to make sure that everyone is as fit as possible. Sometimes back aches don''t just go away, after all. What do you say, your Bindership?"


    "If she needs to heal anyone, she can do it from where she is now," Lori said. "No need to have her go anywhere."


    "I suppose, but she''s petitioned for permission for some of the children to visit their parents. You know how she accompanies them when that happens. If she''s going to be coming here anyway, she might as well see to the healing too, right?"


    Lori grunted. "I''ll consider it."


    Rian and Yllian both looked at each other, the two of them looking amused for some reason.

 324 - Welcome Home

    After making sure that the large wispbeads¡ªreduced and unused¡ªwere secured back in the third alcove, and doing one last check on the water distillation bound tool¡ªit was functioning properly, and there was already a small pile of some sort of white powder in the catch bucket¡ªLori was able to settle down onto Lori''s Boat with Riz, Rian, and the other people who had come with her to River''s Fork. Rian had come by himself, supposedly so that the boat wouldn''t be as crowded with everyone it had to carry.


    It was a bit of a tight fit. Made of deadspoken wood, Lori''s Boat was their first, oldest and smallest boat. They''d mostly stopped using it after they had built the two ice boats, since without a Deadspeaker it couldn''t be effectively repaired, even with their carpenters on hand. While they''d started tapping some trees for resin and boiling bone and hide for glue, none of their carpenters had any true experience with building boats, and specifically experience in making boats waterproof.


    And so Lori''s Boat was placed into storage, only taken out at times like this when the other two boats were unavailable because they were disassembled or currently sunk in the river.


    "So," Rian asked cheerfully as they made their way upriver against the current, the driver pushing on despite the river being slightly swollen from the rains that the dragon had brought with it, "did you all have a good time at River''s Fork?"


    "No," Lori said flatly, glaring at him as she tried to adjust the bindings around her body to cool her better in the face of the summer sunlight. "It was hot, taking a bath was nerve-wracking and uncomfortable, the noise was constant, the food was bland, and there was nothing to do."


    "Isn''t that on you for not building a bath?"


    Lori reached for one of the ladles lying in the bottom of the boat, swept it through the river water they were churning up, and with a flick of her wrist sent the water flying at Rian''s face. Riz, sitting next to him, had moved to avoid the worst of the splash, though a little of it still sprayed her arm.


    "Ah, thank you for the cool, refreshing water, your Bindership," Rian said after he finished sputtering the no-doubt bitter water from his mouth. "Definitely the best way to deal with the summer heat." He gave her a bright smile. "Can you do that again? There''s a spot on my head that didn''t get any water."


    Riz turned her head away and started coughing, for some reason.


    Lori stared at him, then stared at the ladle in her hand.


    Then immediately started scooping up water and pouring it over her head.


    Ah! So cool! So what if it was a little caustic? She just had to make sure none got in her eyes, and maybe have Shanalorre heal her when she got back.


    "Uh, Lori? Please don''t pour so much water on yourself, the boat is going to fill!"


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    Having to gather the water at the bottom of the boat and throw it back over the side was worth the cool, even if sitting on a puddle of water was a bit uncomfortable.


    With nothing better to do, Lori watched the trees pass by. There seemed to be fewer signs of damage on the trees growing along the river, though the growths of ropeweed on the banks had a shredded, mutilated appearance. Occasionally there were small patches that looked burned, and there were occasional gaps among the growths. Here and there were branches that hung broken and limp by a small shred, or had fallen entirely, the freshness of the leaves betraying how recently it had happened.


    Beyond the borders of River''s Fork Demesne, the damage was far more extensive.


    Lori stared at a tree that appeared to have caught on fire, and it wasn''t the only one.


    "Yeah, I saw a lot of those on the way here," Rian said, following her gaze. "I think that whatever caustic metal the dragon was dropping on us managed to ignite in the vicinity of Iridescence that had been covered enough to not be washed off by the rain, or maybe some landed on water that had just dissolved colors, the kind that still glittering like there''s oil on top of it. Caustic metal, water, Iridescence¡­" Rian shrugged. "I almost wish I could have seen what happens when you combine the three together."


    "A more violent eruption, clearly," Lori said. She had to admit, a part of her was curious to see the combination as well¡­ for purely intellectual and academic reasons, of course. Everyone knew combining Iridescence and heat, much less open flame, was a supremely terrible idea. The resulting reactions, while no doubt energetic, were unpredictable, and therefore unreliable and dangerous. So of course it was a common development in novels and plays when events were portrayed beyond the edge of a demesne for any reason. "Was anything like that found near the settlement?"


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    "No, not that I noticed," Rian said. "The damage back home is far less dramatic."


    Lori nodded. "Does it appear that reconstruction will cause a significant delay in the planned Covehold expedition?"


    "No, everything seems to be manageable. Despite the damage the dragon did to our crops and some of our less robust outdoor infrastructure, the lack of any dragonborn abominations actually means we have less to worry about, so reconstruction will probably finish in the next few days. Nearly all the roofs are intact this time, and the one that was damaged was the tannery hut." Oh. That was a pleasant surprise. "Do you think you can get the Coldhold out of the river today so we can do the final test run of the new driver down to the ocean, or do you want to rest and just put it off until tomorrow? Either is good for the crew. Our salt stores are getting low, but we''ll be able to hold out for a few more days."


    Lori considered that. The idea of spending a day just resting after the whole ordeal was tempting. She could have a proper bath, change into clean clothes, use a latrine that had actually been emptied out and wasn''t reeking, lie down on an actual bedroll instead of bare stone¡­


    Well, she could do all that after she brought the Coldhold up. "I can rest after I bring the Coldhold up," she said. "Do we still have water in the reservoir?"


    "I¡­ think so? You blocked off the reservoir, remember?"


    Oh, yes, she had. "Ah. Thank you for reminding me."


    She''d need to reconnect it to the water hub shed so they could refill the reservoir from the river¡­ wait, she''d need put in a new distillation stage first. While the reservoir had a binding for distillation, she had placed it after the reservoir. She needed to put one between the water hub shed and the reservoir, or maybe even before the river and the water hub shed. Lori didn''t want whatever caustic substance was dissolved into the river getting into her reservoir. The white powder of the caustic substance would need to be isolated. It might be useful, and at the very least, best to keep it from just falling back into the river and need to be distilled out of the water again.


    And once that was done, she''d have to reconnect the reservoir to the baths¡­ and then make sure the baths are operational, so that she wouldn''t have people taking baths in her Dungeon anymore¡­ and had she put the lights in second level back to normal¡­?


    A thought occurred to her, and she turned to Rian. "Did you find any dragon scales?"


    For some reason, Rian shuddered. "No, and I think we should be glad for that. Imagine if the dragon had dropped a caustic metal scale of the sizes we''ve found before? Or worse, it had changed something on the ground into caustic metal."


    Ah. There was the reason. Yes, Lori wanted to shudder as well as she imagined that. If such a thing were left in the middle of her infrastructure¡­ caustic metal reacted with water, and with the way everyone was sweating¡­ "Still¡­ nothing at all?"


    "Not even a little," Rian reiterated. "Though to be fair, we haven''t really looked that far. I can definitely say that we found nothing in or around the village, or near any of the outbuildings. We might find something if we go further out, but that''s something we can do after all the repairs."


    Lori nodded thoughtfully. She''d probably need to repair her bead-making shed upriver. Given it was made of ice, the explosions of caustic metal had no doubt damaged it extensively, not to mention it probably collapsed since she hadn''t maintained it all week.


    On either side, trees and hills passed, and every so often, a burned tree stood in the middle of charred ground.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The moment she crossed the border of her demesne, Lori immediately felt better. The pounding, unrelenting heat of the sun above her softened, becoming a pleasant warmth. Her skin stopped feeling overheated, and for the first time in days she actually felt something close to comfortable. She became aware of the wisps around her, connected to her through her core, as if they were a part of her body.


    Through her core, she claimed the waterwisps still on the bottom of the boat, carefully drawing them together into a viscous ball that she threw over the side into the river.


    Now that she knew they had crossed into her demesne, she was glad to see no more burned trees. There were fallen and broken branches, but those didn''t matter. It was merely damage to undeveloped and irrelevant areas, after all.


    Soon they were coming to the docks, and as she looked over her demesne, she saw the roofs were intact. That was a first for them. Many of the wooden roofs had been blackened however, and people were inspecting them, no doubt to assess if they needed to be replaced. More were carrying things out of the dungeon, and¡­


    "Rian, why are people carrying beds and tables from my dungeon?" Lori asked flatly.


    "We had a lot of time after we finished carrying in the essentials, so I had people move in what they could," Rian said. "Didn''t take that long, really. We were even able to get the shelves from the bath houses. Probably didn''t need to, but at the time it was a reasonable precaution."


    "Is that why it took you so long to signal me to seal my Dungeon?"


    "No, that was because I was waiting for the boat to come back. We actually got everything in well before that."


    They approached the dock, where people had begun to gather. Lori recognized Umu and Mikon, and Shanalorre was there for some reason, as well as some other people. As Rian awkwardly maneuvered the boat next to the dock, Riz threw the boat''s rope to one of those on the dock, who tied it to the post there.


    As people nearer to the dock began to climb out, assisted by the people waiting there, Lori exchanged nods with Shanalorre. "Binder Shanalorre."


    "Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Did anyone die?"


    "No. Nothing arose that endangered anyone or required my intervention. Was anyone hurt?"


    "If they were, it was self-inflicted, but no one died. Tend to it later when you escort the children to see their parents."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Understood, Great Binder. When will that be?"


    "Rian will be bringing more wispbeads to Yllian tomorrow. See who wants to go and arrange the matter with Rian."


    "We might have to make more than one trip, I''m not sure all the children can fit in the boat," Rian said. "Uh, can we talk about this later at lunch? It''s hot out here."


    The two Dungeon Binders looked at each other and both nodded. "We''ll speak of this later during lunch," Lori agreed.


    "Understood. Welcome home, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded, finally getting up and stepping off the boat onto the dock.


    Yes. She was home.

 325 - Fixing Home

    Over the next few days, Lori had to work to restore what she could of her demesne back to how it was before the dragon''s passing.


    She started with recovering the Coldhold from where it had been encased. It took up most of the afternoon of the day she arrived, since she had to move the stone container with the boat close to the dock before carefully raising it up, and then opening the block slowly so that the Coldhold would float in the water. At that point, Rian and several other men waiting nearby on Lori''s Boat pulled themselves aboard to keep the larger boat from drifting downriver and maneuver it properly into the dock.


    The next day, Lori worked on restoring her Dungeon''s¡ªand by extension the town''s¡ªwater supply as the Coldhold was checked over and Rian delivered the wispbeads, Shanalorre and children to River''s Fork. This was more complicated than the distillation bindings she''d made for River''s Fork. Her demesne had far greater water requirements, and they would need to distill far more water than a bucket at a time. However, the distillation process required turning water to vapor, and if a large enough amount of water changed state like that, the technical term for it was ''an explosion''. Therefore, she''d need to take care with the bindings she made.


    First, Lori reinforced the stone pipe that drew water from the river and filled the water hub shed with a binding of earthwisps. Then she altered the binding that drew water from the river and propelled it up a pipe to turn water into vapor and added a binding to condense the vapor back into water so that it would fall into the water hub shed''s receptacle. When all three bindings were active, it created the appearance that the pipe was working normally, simply drawing up water from the river.


    Lori then began working on trying to increase the pipe''s flow rate to something approaching what was normal for it, slowly increasing the rate the bindings of waterwisps turned the river water into vapor and condensed it again. She made sure the whole length of stone pipe was reinforced, lest it suddenly explode from the pressure the vapor was exerting on it, even adding more stone to the pipe to make it thicker and thus increasing the total reinforcement provided by the binding of earthwisps. Because of the way the bindings were arranged, with the directionality in the binding that turned water to vapor preventing that vapor from flowing back out to the river, most of the pressure was trying to escape out the end with the binding that condensed vapor to water.


    In the end, she was able to attain a flow rate that she was satisfied with, and the resulting water was sufficiently distilled. Still, Lori decided to pile on more stone around the stone intake pipe to reduce the likelihood of catastrophic rupture, even if the pipe and the store around it would be reinforced by earthwisps. Best to prevent any potential accidents.


    It was only at the last moment, before she was going to start all the bindings that would begin the process of sending distilled water from the water hub shed to her dungeon''s reservoir that she thought to check the water remaining in the shed''s receptacle. She immediately spat out the caustic tasting water.


    Cleaning out the water hub shed of caustic water so that it wouldn''t infect her reservoir took a while. Still, it was a good test of the distiller as she made it provide her with distilled water for cleaning out the surfaces of the water hub shed of caustic residue. Only once she was sure that no more caustic residue remained did she reconnect the pipe between the waterhub shed and the reservoir, and then the pipes between the reservoir and everywhere else.


    Lori was about to reactivate the binding that would bring water from the water hub shed to the reservoir when a thought occurred to her.


    She closed up the water hub shed, making sure the binding of lightningwisps that kept out bugs was in place before she made her way to her Dungeon and towards the reservoir at the back, following the pipe in the stone she''d made a long time ago. The door that blocked the way to it was closed and still secured by the raised stone on the floor that kept looked in place. Lori intercepted the pipe towards the reservoir, pinching it shut and diverting it up towards her as she knelt down and made a bowl-like depression on the floor.


    Reaching through her connection to the water hub shed, she briefly activated the binding that sent water through the pipe to the dungeon''s reservoir. Lori followed the water through her awareness, deactivating the binding as the water reached her diversion and flowed up to the depression she had made.


    Warily, she dipped on finger into the water that filled the depression and tasted it, then sighed in relief as it tasted like the reservoir water normally did, with no bitter aftertaste. Then promptly spat it out, as it was still water she''d found on the floor.


    She gathered the water into a ball of ice, repaired the depression in the ground and reconnected the pipe, then activated the bindings in the water hub shed. Her dungeon''s baths were nearby, so she just threw the ball of ice into the basin of water there¡ªfortunately, it was the women''s turn to bathe¡ªbefore she headed back to the reservoir to check the water flow.


    Even though there was now a waist-high wall around the wide, circular pit of the reservoir, Lori could never stop feeling worried that someone would somehow manage to urinate into their water. Or worse. She knew at this point it was an irrational fear¡ªthere was the railing, and a door that stayed locked nearly all the time¡ªbut why take the chance with the water she was going to be drinking?


    The bindings of lightwisps she''d anchored at intervals down the sides of the reservoir had run out of imbuement and dissipated since she had last been there, so she claimed and bound more lightwisps so she could see down into the water. The reservoir was somewhere between half and a third full, which was vaguely concerning. Should she make the reservoir deeper? Actually¡­ how full had the reservoir been when she''d left?


    ¡­


    Uh, she hadn''t checked, had she?


    ¡­


    Well, uh¡­ something to remember for next time¡­


    Still, the flow of the water seemed to be equal to what it usually was. She could risk reconnecting her demesne''s bath houses to the reservoir¡­ once she remade and anchored the necessary bindings to the bath houses'' components and remade the ice ceilings of the back of the structures.


    She really needed to get around to the putting stone roofs on the back of the bath houses, but for now building it from ice was quicker, even if that ice was slightly caustic. Perhaps she''d use the stone she''d excavate from making the reservoir deeper.


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    Once the supply of water to the reservoir was secured, which included the spigots for the drinking water, building the ice roofs followed. Having even one of the bath houses allowed her to tell people to stop taking baths in her dungeon. Once all of the bath houses had been repaired, Lori double-checked the draw on the reservoir, and was glad to see that the water level seemed to be increasing slowly now.


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    The waste water of the baths was sent to a cistern near the agricultural fields for irrigation, and when that was near full the excess water was sent into a distiller and sent back to the baths. Well, it did once she reformed those bindings, which had run out of imbuement and dissolved. The cistern water was caustic, but it didn''t seem to be causing any adverse effects on their crops, so there seemed no need to distill that. The laundry area also didn''t need distilled water. The caustic water from the river did well enough for washing clothes.


    Once her demesne had water again, she had time to rebuild the Lori''s Ice Boat. This wasn''t the first time she''d had to rebuild the boat after having to dismantle it so that it could be stored in her dungeon. The carpenters had checked over the components and had found no rot, so the frame had been reassembled. Lori had then rebuilt a hull of ice around the frame, with a drop of her blood mixed into the water so that she could imbue it beyond her demesne.


    When they had begun making bound tools like wisplights and drivers for the boats, Rian had wanted her to make the hull a bound tool so that she wouldn''t need to maintain it.


    "If it''s a bound tool, all we need to do to maintain the hull is to put a bead on it," he''d said as they''d eaten dinner. "That''s one less thing you need to pay attention to, and Clowee can just add it to the maintenance she already does to the boat."


    "You realize that if the imbuement on the hull runs out, the ice will become so cold not only will it freeze the river water, but anyone who touches it will likely immediately develop frostbite, if not immediately freeze to the ice," Lori had countered.


    "So? The same thing will happen if you ever forget to imbue it. At least this way they''ll have a way to imbue it again and make the freezing stop."


    "And if it gets stolen?"


    "As opposed to the bound tool steam jet driver you just mounted on it getting stolen? Where are they going to take it? River''s Fork? Besides, if you''re worried about it getting stolen, just put your blood on it and make your hypothetical thieves regret it. All we need to do is restrict access to wispbeads and make the intake too small to fit enough for a potential thief to reach Covehold."


    Lori had grunted. "Fine, I''ll consider it."


    She''d become slightly more amenable to the idea when Rian had reported that the steam jet driver bound tool on Lori''s Ice Boat consumed most of a bead just getting between her demesne and River''s Fork, and needed part of a second to be able to make its way back. It had certainly helped put the amount of imbuement she''d been putting into the binding of the boat''s steam jet driver into context.


    Now, as she shaped the hull and added her blood, she also finally mounted the sealed copper container filled with white Iridescence to the hull, near where the tiller with the steam jet driver bound tool would also be mounted. The container had been ready for some time, and had sat on her desk for a time when she could get around to it, which was now. The sealed copper container was connected by a wire to a bone tube which had a wooden stopper on it, which had been sized to hold a maximum of two beads when sealed. She secured the bone tube by fusing a bone protrusion to its side and wrapping that protrusion around the wooden frame of the boat before covering both wood and bone with ice, leaving the tube to protrude in front of the boat''s driver.


    She''d still be imbuing the boat through her blood, but as Rian had requested, this allowed for a degree of leeway when it came to safety. The test she had done with a block of ice of the same volume as Lori''s Ice Boat had showed that a wispbead with an average diameter of twenty-five chiyustri¡ªthe largest of the standard sizes of beads, as opposed to the far, far larger non-standard wispbeads she had made to imbued River''s Fork''s defenses¡ªimbued the binding of waterwisps that kept the ice solidified for approximately three quarters of a full day, as well as she could judge. She''d been asleep during the end of the first time she''d run the test, and while she''d managed to be awake when the bead was completely consumed the next two times, it had been hard to judge exact times.


    Still, a close-enough estimate sufficed for her purposes. Anyone who stole the boat would need a lot of beads to get it to Covehold¡ªor anywhere else for that matter¡ªand since the only ones she gave wispbeads to were Rian and Yllian¡­ Well, their problem. Even if some thief in River''s Fork stole beads from the wisplights and possibly the distillation pillar, she could just destroy the boat before they got very far. Still, she didn''t like how doing this gave people the illusion that trying to steal the boat to try to go somewhere was an option.


    The thought of it had her still scowling in annoyance at dinner, though the scowl was mitigated as she sat down on her new chair and allowed herself to rest her weight on the backrest. Ah, so wonderful! It was high enough she was even able to rest her head on it, and everything had been shaved smooth and painted with oil. She had worked in enough carpentry workshops to be able to appreciate all the work that had gone into the seemingly simple piece of furniture.


    "Long day?" Rian said, sitting across from her at the table. His hair was damp in a way that said he''d had a bath rather than just being so sweaty even his hair was inundated. The bench was empty on either side of him. As summer had progressed, the three women had been spending longer in the bath.


    "I still think this makes it more likely the boat gets stolen," Lori muttered, closing her eyes with a sigh. Oh, yes¡­ no more having to put up with a bench!


    "Oh, you put on the hull maintenance bound tool? That''s great!"


    She grunted. "I''m still imbuing it. It''s more efficient and still haven''t had time to make new beads." She''d need to do one tomorrow, rebuilding her bead-making shed and spending the day making beads.


    "Of course, Great Binder. Still, a little redundancy never hurt."


    Lori shrugged, opening her eyes. "I''m surprised you didn''t ask for the same of the Coldhold."


    "Given how big it is, we''d need one of the really big beads for it," Rian said. "No, trying to do the same with it probably isn''t viable. We''d be better served trying to find a way for the carpenters to build a waterproof boat hull. If the dragon had left any sort of scale that wouldn''t explode, we might have been able to do it with sheet metal, but¡­" He shrugged.


    "Depending on the beneficence of dragons is na?ve foolishness."


    "I know, but a man can hope."


    Lori rolled her eyes. "How was the test trip to the ocean?" she asked.


    Rian grinned. "The new steam driver bound tool on the Coldhold works great. Forward, reverse, low speed, top speed¡­ and with it replacing the big block underneath, it''s not as crowded down below. Though we had to venture out a little farther from shore than usual to collect salt. I didn''t want to accidentally have whatever caustic substance the dragon dropped on us mixed in with the salt."


    She frowned as Lori realized what he meant. "Were you able to ensure that the salt is untainted?"


    "Reasonably sure. I brought along some rendered seel fat and mixed it in among the salt we extracted. It didn''t turn into soap, so there probably wasn''t enough of the caustic substance in it to be significant."


    Lori blinked. "Oh. Yes, that would work, wouldn''t it?" Caustic ash and oil reacted to make soap, so whatever caustic substance in the water probably would as well. The bitter taste in the river water had been growing weaker over the past week, but it still hadn''t fully gone yet, so she was still distilling their water.


    "Yup. We''re going to make two more trips to get both demesnes full of what salt they need before heading for Covehold, but we''re on schedule to leave by the end of a week at the latest."


    A smile started to curl Lori''s lips in eagerness. Soon, soon, Rian and the Coldhold would be on its way, ready to sell the beads she''d been amalgamating all spring. If he could find just one buyer¡­ her monopoly would begin.


    She chose to focus on that and not that fact Rian would be gone for a least a month, leaving less competent people to deal with matters so she wouldn''t have to.

 326 - Leaving For Covehold, Again

    Ten days passed by faster than she thought. In that time, work had progressed and returned both of her demesnes back to the state they were in before the dragon''s arrival, which was the point that Lori felt everything had recovered and was back to normal. Not everything, of course. While the attempt was made, they lacked the skilled hands to save all the crops that were damaged by the dragon''s passing. Most of the damaged crops died, though some seemed to persist even with broken stalks. Those, the farmers were laboriously identifying and trying to support with sticks so they wouldn''t be overshadowed by the other crops around them as the plants grew.


    It was long, difficult and borderline futile work, but if there was a chance¡­


    Still, Lori had¡ªvery reluctantly¡ªgiven Rian the authorization to recruit two Deadspeakers, one for Lori''s demesne and one for River''s Fork, and their families, provided the families were small. This meant she''d have to actually start building a bath house in the latter demesne, since that was part of the facilities Rian would be promising to the recruits. With her capability to now make rudimentary bound tools, such a facility wouldn''t be as taxing and frustrating to maintain for her as it would have once, but constructing the facility in question would still be something only she could do.


    Lori gloomily considered the work she''d have in front of her as she sat back on her new chair, listening to the louder-than-usual din of the dining hall as people loudly bade farewell to the people who would be accompanying Rian to Covehold Demesne on this trading trip. Really, shouldn''t they have done that last night? They''d had¡­ well, it hadn''t been a holiday. People had done a full day''s work, which had involved fully loading the Coldhold with all the trade goods they could spare. The Coldhold''s cargo containers were filled with seel furs, what beast hides could be spared, bags upon bags of wispbeads in hide sacks that had been stitched together just enough to not have any of the contents fall out, and the very large wispbeads that were meant to imbue the boat''s new massive steam jet driver.


    The boat had also been loaded with provisions. While the plan, as before, was that they''d catch, clean and cook food on the way, the boat was still carrying food in the event of emergencies or scarce hunting. As such, jars of happyfruit and pink lady slices sitting in brine had been carried aboard, along with jars of smoked and cured meat, and little bricks of something called biscuit that looked like a waste of good flour. There''d also been a barrel of mikans and golden buds, which would probably be eaten first since it was the most likely to be bruised and ruined by Iridescence growth.


    After all the work, a holiday-like mood had fallen over the dining hall. Instead of the usual stew and bread for dinner last night, they''d had roasted beast meat, and along with the usual bread, everyone had gotten a little fruit pulp-filled bun that was slightly green from the honey syrup that it had been dipped in. The food had been delicious, and everyone had been the kind of noisy they usually were during a holiday.


    Lori had distinctly remembered Rian eating his fruit bun fastidiously, touching it only with his fingertips, which had been amusing to watch.


    Now was the morning they were supposed to leave. With all the cargo already loaded onto the boat the night before, theoretically that meant that all Rian and the ones going with him¡ªthe boat''s ''crew''¡ªneeded to do would be to get on the Coldhold and sail away¡ªwas it still called sailing if the boat did not, in fact, have a sail?¡ªafter they finished breakfast, what with everything but putting their personal effects onto the boat already done. But no, people were lingering over breakfast, and then afterwards there would no doubt be a crowd saying goodbye¡ªshouldn''t they have done that the night before?¡ª but in practice blocking the way to the docks enough to slow down the men going on board with their things. It would no doubt delay the boat''s leaving to midmorning, possibly even late morning just before lunch. She was recognizing the pattern, even if she didn''t understand why people kept doing it.


    "I know that look," Rian said. He looked a little sleepy, as if he hadn''t had much sleep the night before. He probably hadn''t. "We haven''t even been delayed yet. Don''t aggravate yourself by pre-emptively being annoyed about something that hasn''t happened yet. Perhaps everything will go smoothly and there won''t be any delays."


    Lori snorted loudly.


    "Think of it this way. It''s a sign everyone heading to Covehold has a reason to come back instead of running off with the profits."


    ¡­


    Well, it was still annoying.


    "I realize that''s probably not much comfort, since you have to build a bath house in this heat¡ª" Rian cut off as Lori made a sound in her throat like a prolonged groan. "You don''t have to. Just let them and their families live here, and we''ll bring one over to River''s Fork when work needs to be done."


    The sound from her throat went from a groan to a growl.


    "Well, if you insist on minimizing your risk, then you have no choice but to build the bath house," her lord said with annoying sensibleness. "It''s not just for them, it''s¡ª"


    "Yes, yes, it''s a long-term investment and will make the people who live in River''s Fork materially dependent on us for their luxuries, I know how monopolies work," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively. "I know I need to do it, I just don''t like it."


    "You''ll manage somehow. You always do. And if you can''t, both Deadspeakers can live here in Lorian until you do."


    Lori twitched.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The boat''s departure was delayed.


    One would think that standing under the hot summer sun with no shade would have people cutting things short, but no, people seemed willing to sweat as if they''d just dumped a bucket of water on themselves to have long-delaying goodbyes. Normally Lori wouldn''t have minded, except she''d gone aboard the Coldhold to do a last moment check on the bound tools and bindings, double-checking her list of things she needed to maintain.


    The lightwisps in the interior of the boat, for example, had been replaced with a couple of wisplight bound tools that also served to circulate air, something Rian had begged her for. She''d also made a simple bound tool stove using firewisps to produce heat, to reduce the use of fires aboard the boat for cooking, though Rian had orders that make sure it was used properly. Along with the stove was a bound tool coldbox to let them store meat for longer, and the evaporator for collecting salt and providing drinking water had been replaced with bound tools as well.


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    Then there were the special cargo boxes. Raised up on blocks of ice, the special cargo boxes where shrouded on all sides by darkwisps to keep out Iridescence and kept inside a bigger locked box so that nothing could be put in or taken out of the boxes when between demesnes, lest someone''s errant hand introduce Iridescence to the space within. They had only the one, which contained some of their hides to see if there would be a difference in quality. That one, she''d need to maintain herself, and she made sure it was on her list, along with the hull.


    She really didn''t want to forget to keep the hull imbued.


    One other thing she no longer needed to keep imbued herself was the water jet driver that propelled the boat. Once, the driver had been a large block composed of several different pieces of wood that had been carved out and fitted so that when placed together they formed tubes through which water flowed. This was because there was a simple binding of waterwisps that made water flow anchored to one of the blocks, and it kept flowing at all times because the boat was meant for someone beside her to operate it. Through an arrangement of sliding wooden blocks, the flow of the water was controlled so that the Coldhold could move forward at different speeds, stay in place, or move in reverse.


    However, this meant that the binding of waterwisps that made the water flow and gave propulsion to the boat had to be heavily imbued so that it would never, ever run out, lest the binding dissolve. It was something she had needed to do daily, even when the boat wasn''t being used, because¡­ well, she was more likely to remember to imbue the binding than remember to activate or deactivate it.


    All that had changed when she''d found the means to create a rudimentary but reliable bound tool.


    Using the¡­ cores, for lack of a better term, of white Iridescence tightly packed in a waterproof metal container, she''d been able to make bound tool drivers for all the boats in her demesne.


    The first steam jet driver had been mounted on Lori''s Boat as a proof of concept prototype to test its effectiveness and assess how much imbuement it needed in beads. The corrections learned from that were applied to the bound tool steam jet driver that she built and mounted onto the Lori''s Ice Boat. The corrections and notes for improvements from that were applied to make the far, far larger bound tool driver that was then installed onto the Coldhold.


    Doing so had required moving the Coldhold onto land and first removing the arrangement of wooden blocks they''d been using. Then they had installed the long, thick tube of bone along the center line of the boat, securing it with wooden braces to anchor it to the wooden frame of the boat before putting the ice that served as the boat''s hull back in place.


    The driver bound tool wasn''t complicated. It was actually quite simple. Bindings of waterwisps were anchored to the long tube, which had openings in the front and back of the boat to let water pass through. When the waterwisps were imbued from the large wispbead, they made water move though the tube, and therefore propelled the boat in the opposite direction.


    The complicated part had been the controls for the driver bound tool. It had four cores in total, each controlling a separate bindings of waterwisps, as well as the binding of earthwisps on the tub that acted to reinforce its structure to both prevent wear and as a preventative measure to keep the tube from cracking under the pressure of the water. One of the bindings propelled water so that the boat would go backwards, so that the boat would be better able to maneuver in and out of dock, while the other three propelled it forward, with each additional binding activated increasing the boat''s forward speed.


    The smiths had needed to make a special lever that routed imbuement from the wispbead to all the bindings, but doing so had been well within their skills. It has been simple enough to design, but had required proper metal bearings and springs at the contacts to ensure the flow of imbuement through the metal. It would have been quire unfortunate if the bound tool had stopped working because of a loose connection. Fortunately, white Iridescence-alloyed copper had the durability and elasticity to work in this capacity, at least as far as their tests had shown.


    All in all, she''d finished her inspection with an updated list and feeling satisfied that the boat was as it should be¡­ and now she couldn''t leave as the dock was crowded by people who weren''t moving.


    It was all very irritating.


    Still, at least her inspection hadn''t turned up any problems that had managed to spontaneously manifest since yesterday''s inspection and all the new improvements to the Coldhold functioning as intended.


    She glared over everyone''s heads at Rian, who was being crowded by Umu, Mikon and Riz. Really, they''d had breakfast together! They''d probably spent the night before¡­ well, doing whatever they did in Rian''s house together! They''d known this was coming for a week! Shouldn''t the goodbyes be over already?


    Lori didn''t notice Shanalorre until the younger Dungeon Binder had interspersed herself with the group and was drawing Rian''s attention to¡­ oh. Rian met Lori''s eyes and actually looked embarrassed, as well as mildly exasperated. She, for part, gave Shanalorre a nod of thanks and her lord a flat look to convey her dissatisfaction.


    He visibly sighed as he turned towards the three women, who all turned to look towards where Lori was standing on the boat, her arms crossed impatiently.


    It took a few moments for Rian to get the crowd to part enough for Lori to be able to pass through, and that finally seemed to be the signal for people to stop delaying and end the overly long goodbyes. Slowly, people began separating and getting off the dock as Rian led the way to the Coldhold. People were crying. Why were they crying? The men would come back. Rian was with them, and they''d all already comeback from one such trip like this before.


    "Cottsy, put the driver in reverse!" she heard Rian direct from where he was handing the tiller. "Everyone else, grab an oar, let''s get turned around quicker! The sooner we leave, the faster we can come back home!"


    Lori heard their affirmatives as four of other men on the boat grabbed long wooden oars, each one trailing a rope that secured it to a post. With awkward looking movements of men who''d practiced just enough to know what they were doing but not actually done it enough for the movement to feel comfortable, they started trying to maneuver the boat to turn. She watched from on top of the flood wall, ignoring the people around her as they cried and waved and wasted all sorts of time.


    Once the Coldhold was oriented so that it was pointing downriver, Rian looked towards them and waved. "We''ll be back soon!" he called, his voice carrying audibly over the water. "Hopefully we can bring back something nice. Don''t make trouble for her Bindership while I''m gone, all right?"


    That seemed to make people laugh for some reason, even as they started waving back, and the men who had been at oars hung them from brackets built into the boat to do the same. The boat began to move downriver, clearly having activated the driver again even as all the men stopped working and waved to those on shore.


    It took a while for the boat to move sufficiently downstream for people to finally stop waving back. With the slow awkwardness of a crowd with no more to do, the families who''d congregated at the docks began to drift off, finally wanting to get out of the sun.


    Sighing, Lori turned to Riz, who was still waiting next to her. Mikon and Umu had gone, presumably back down to the second level of the dungeon to their looms. The woman who was most definitely not an officer, and technically not a temporary Rian because she wouldn''t be doing what Rian normally did. "Erzebed," she said.


    "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "We''ll be going down to River''s Fork to begin construction on the new baths there either tomorrow or the day after. Arrange for someone to come with us to help you guard, will you? Then after lunch we''re going upriver"


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    Stupid recruitment promises.


    Still, she supposed it could be worse. At least she wasn''t having to promise land. That was just nonsense.

 327 - Three For One

    Lori spend the rest of the day making wispbeads just beyond the upriver edge of her demesne. It was a familiar tedium that she didn''t have to think too deeply about, and allowed her to get lost in her thoughts and simply wait. Since she spent it sitting inside her shed made of bound ice, she wasn''t uncomfortable even though she was technically sitting outside of her demesne. The binding to circulate cool air inside the shed saw to that.


    The tray she used was a pace long and half that wide, with columns of little wooden trenches arranged in rows atop it. A copper sheet on the tray acted as a contact point for all the trenches, and a copper wire extended from one side of the tray all the way down to another sheet of copper that was secured to a small plank of wood about the side of a large book. One of Lori''s bare feet rested on that copper plate, channeling magic through the metal contact. It had been the best solution to the problem of how to best keep contact with the copper sheet to imbue the amalgamating beads while keeping her hands free, and after all this time of using it, she was forced to admit it was an intelligent solution to the problem.


    It freed her hands to put shards of Iridescence on the trenches of the tray and anchor heavily imbued bindings she plucked from the half of the shed that was within her demesne onto the tray next to the shards. If nothing else, learning how to mass produce beads had done wonders for ability to perform multiple tasks at once. Well, in stages, in any case. Place Iridescence fragment on the tray, removing binding she''d anchored to a convenient rock in arm''s reach, anchor binding onto bone edge of trench where it contacted the fragment, touch both with finger to begin amalgamating the two into a bead. Repeat previous steps to make the next bead, all the while channeling magic through her foot and the copper pad it was contacting to imbue the beads that were already in the middle of forming.


    When she wasn''t making beads, Lori had to wonder how it was actually done in the large, established demesnes of the continent she''d just left. She couldn''t imagine how a bound tool could possibly be used to replicate this process, much less allow it to be done by anyone who wasn''t already a Dungeon Binder. Perhaps imbuing the growing beads could be left to other people, but actually beginning the process itself? That would probably just result in the world''s smallest dungeon¡­


    ¡­ which, come to think of it, might actually be what was occurring in the old continent. Did established demesne have little demesnes bare yustri wide at its edges, their growth forever constrained by the far, far larger demesne they were already abutting? Were there people who had claimed those miniscule cores who worked in perpetuity to create beads?


    It was a disturbing thought that would sometimes arise when she wasn''t forming beads, which had sufficiently distracted her when she had first conceived it that she''d accidentally interrupted the flow of imbuement, ruining some of the batches she''d been working on. The very thought, the sheer plausibility of there being Dungeon Binders in such circumstances¡­ it made her heart want to squirm in discomfort, especially considering what she was doing.


    It had taken her three days to stop thinking about it, and now the thought only came up when she was lying in bed, waiting to fall asleep after a long day''s work.


    Occasionally, she''d stop everything but the imbuing and look up to listen for Riz and her friend, who were outside ostensibly keeping their eyes open so that some beast couldn''t just come up behind her shed and smash the shed while her back was turned. The two were outside, taking advantage of the shade of the tree Lori had built her shed under. It was a little bit less shady from the damage inflicted by the dragon, but more than enough for the two former militia to shelter under and basically relax even as they kept a watch. They were just far enough away from the entrance of her shed that their words were background sounds she had to concentrate on to decipher.


    Fortunately, it was an unremarkable day, and bead production proceeded uninterrupted. The trough next to her filled with wispbeads at a constant pace as the amalgamating beads grew until they were lifted up from the copper contact at the bottom by the angled sides of the trench the cloudy white perfect spheres were forming in.


    She stopped well before late afternoon so that beads could be scooped up into a large leather sack for transport back to her Dungeon. When she had originally started mass bead production, Rian had wanted to count how many beads were produced in total in a day, but that idea had been rejected after the one time they had tried to do that accounting. The way he''d moped at not having a new number to watch grow bigger had been both amusing and exasperating.


    He''d still gotten his wish to eventually count how many beads there were in total¡ªshe''d conceded they needed to know how much stock they had available¡ªand the number he''d reported was¡­ well. She hadn''t quite realized she''d made that many.


    Of course, since they were making use of bound tools now¡ªrudimentary as they were¡ªthere had been beads expended¡­ but production had far exceeded expenses. Granted, she had to maintain production so that they''d have a supply to send to River''s Fork in the winter, but that was no great difficulty.


    Lori headed back downriver to her Dungeon, operating Lori''s Boat herself as they headed down for dinner, the wooden boat weighed down by the three of them, the bead production tray, and three large leather sacks of beads. The sacks weren''t all the way full, and could hardly be said to be bursting¡­ but they were three sacks nonetheless.


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    Dinner was a stark reminder of Rian''s absence.


    The spot on the bench opposite her was empty, and Riz was pointedly refusing to slide into it, as if doing so would be some sort of tacit move of acting as a temporary Rian again. As a result, there was a gap between Umu and the others¡­ or there would have been if Mikon hadn''t pointedly sat down next to the blonde-haired woman and started inquiring about when they should launder the bedrolls and blankets.


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    Lori ignored the mundane, if awkward, conversation as she ate the stew that Riz and Mikon had brought. Despite Rian''s absence, the two still seemed to be bringing food to the table, for which she was glad. Around her, the dining hall''s conversation sounded subdued.


    When she finished eating, Lori remained seated, leaning back on the backrest of her chair as she waited patiently. Ah, she was never going to tire of being able to lean back when she sat!


    "Karina, could you take Yoshka to the baths? I''ll meet with the rest of you there later, I just need to speak with Binder Lolilyuri."


    "Sure, Shana. I''ll take care of things while you do Lady Binder things. Come on everyone, let''s take a bath¡­!"


    As the happily cheering children marched out of her Dungeon, clearly looking forward to the prospect of a bath, Shanalorre walked around to the opposite side of the table from Lori and sat on the bench in front of her next to Riz. "Great Binder," she said as Mikon and Umu rose, vacating the table, presumably to also head for the baths.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori acknowledged. While she was still wary and reasonably suspicious of the younger Dungeon Binder, in her time in Lori''s demesne as a subject Shanalorre had been punctilious in the fulfillment of her responsibilities. These responsibilities had consisted of acting as the caretaker of the children from River''s Fork who had been sent by their parent''s to Lori''s demesne for their safety and comfort, as well as compiling the numbers of what stocks they had in storage every week for Rian.


    She was probably the one who''d had to compile the final count of the wispbeads, poor thing.


    Lori had learned from the last time Rian had left to go to Covehold. Riz had proven¡­ insufficient to the task of doing his duties, even with assistance, but the woman hadn''t been completely useless. She''d done quite well when Lori had told her exactly what to do and what to arrange. Organizing something more complicated on her own initiative, however, had left the woman lost beyond the border, and had shown she lacked the aptitude for overall authority that Rian had.


    There were currently no outstanding projects in the demesne, with the sawmill having been deferred to after Rian returned so that they''d have the assistance of the Deadspeaker he returned with, as well as his own presence. However, there were current endeavors to maintain such as the mushroom farms, the logging for materials, maintaining the fields, gathering ropeweed¡­ even with Lori''s assistance to manage the heat, she had still needed to agree to allow people to stop working from late-morning to mid-afternoon to avoid the worst of the day''s heat.


    However, Lori still needed someone to talk to people so that she wouldn''t have to do it herself, and in that Riz was just barely suitable. She could work with that.


    Once Shanalorre was seated, a man who''d been lingering at a nearby table approached and nervously sat down on Shanalorre''s other side opposite Riz. Lori immediately reached into her belt pouch and pulled out a rather wide rock. Rian had felt she needed far more than simply a name in this instance. On the tablet was written: ''Kolinh. Retired Captain, formerly of Lomabuyar Demesne''s Militia Engineering Banner. In charge of all building projects in the demesne (on my authority)''. It was all carved in what she recognized as Rian''s rather awkward handwriting, though that might have been the material in question. Next to it was a simple caricature of a face that, Lori was amused to see, was actually identifiable as the man across from her.


    "Engineer Kolinh," she acknowledged.


    The man nodded carefully. "Great Binder," he replied, even as he resolutely kept his gaze directed at something just past Lori''s right ear.


    Lori took a moment to consider this arrangement. Riz, to talk to people and have them talk to her, and to be sent to do things for Lori directly. Shanalorre, to keep track of what they had and what they needed. And¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªKolinh, who''d see to organizing what things needed to get done.


    It was slightly disturbing to think that Rian did do so much she needed at least three people to substitute for him, and that was merely a tentative minimum. She knew he was capable¡ªvery much so¡ªbut quantifying it like this¡­


    Lori chose not to think about it.


    "Erzebed, what have people bothered you with since we''ve come back?" Lori said.


    "I''ve gotten complaints that the baths are crowded, Great Binder, but everyone thinks that. It''s why some people have been bathing in the laundry area again. They''re clothed," Riz hastily assured her. "They splash their clothes too so it soaks up the water and maybe gets some of the sweat off. So nothing too serious. The medics haven''t reported anyone fainting from the heat today, so we''re good there too."


    Lori nodded. "Binder Shanalorre, are there any deficiencies we need to be aware of?"


    "Nothing beyond the usual expenditures so far, Great Binder," Shanalorre said. "Intakes of seel meat continue to dip from the effects of the heat on the seels and those who hunt them with Karina, but we are managing to make up for it with increased beast hunting."


    "Will that be sustainable?"


    "I do not know, Great Binder. Unlike with the seels, I am unaware of the particulars of beast hunting. However, Karina has stated her intention to wake up before sunrise while it''s still cool to try and take the seels by surprise."


    "Remind her that she''s not allowed to do so without someone there to get her out of the water if she should fall in. Erzebed, find out if the hunters think if they can make up the difference the lack of seel meat is going to cause."


    Reluctantly, Riz pulled out her new bone tablet, writing something with a burnt stick. "I''ll ask, Great Binder."


    Lori turned back to¡ªshe checked her rock¡ªKolinh. "Engineer Kolinh. Are there currently any deficiencies or problems in any of our ongoing projects that need to be brought to my attention?"


    "Nothing beyond the heat, Great Binder," the man said. "We''ve shifted to waking up before dawn so we can get as much work done before the sun rises properly again, just as we did last summer, and have done what we can to do a little work in the evenings when it''s cooler, but given the lack of true urgency some have elected to simply sleep through the heat." He spoke confidently, likely aware she''d already discussed this matter with Rian. "It helps that the dragon''s passing caused so little damage to buildings."


    Lori nodded. She''d done what she could to ameliorate the heat where people were working, but due to a lack of stationary objects she could anchor them to, bindings of darkwisps to cast shade on work areas wasn''t really viable when she wasn''t actively maintaining them, and she had better uses for her time. The best she''d been able to do was anchor bindings of airwisps and firewisps to make cooling breezes, but even that was of limited utility. She couldn''t put those on their fields, for example, where the farmers were still working to ensure that their crops were continuing to grow. The soil had turned slightly caustic, and they were working to address the imbalance with seel fat lest more of their crops die. "Very well. Tomorrow, I''ll be going to River''s Fork to begin construction there. Erzebed, Shanalorre, the two of you are coming with me¡­"

 328 - A Coldhold Interlude

    I was glad I''d had the roof extended to the back of the Coldhold when we were refitting it for going back to Covehold Demesne. It solved so many problems, not the least of which was how hot it got when someone was operating the tiller. The sun still managed to shine on whoever was steering during the morning, but that was a tolerable heat.


    The trip downriver was routine enough that Yhorj handled the steering while everyone else was cleaning and butchering the seel we''d caught earlier¡­ from the shade cast by the roof. I, being the ''do everything I ask people to do'' leader that I was, wasn''t as lucky, standing at the front of the boat with only a woven reed hat to keep the sun off held in one hand as I acted as the lookout to give Liggs a break from the hot sun.


    It was a necessary post, since despite how wide and deep the river was most of the time, it had submerged rocks in the most awkward places and not all of them had seels conveniently resting on them to mark them out. While I was familiar with most of the rocks between Lorian and River''s Fork, I wasn''t as knowledgeable about the rocks between River''s Fork and the hidden bay that the river let out to. Neither were the rest of the salt crew. While they''d done the trip several times already, it wasn''t yet routine enough that they could navigate it in their sleep¡ªmetaphorically¡ªand so the watch was still kept.


    Also, this way I didn''t have to join in on the cleaning and butchering.


    An abuse of my position? Maybe, but I had to stand out here under the sun with only a hat to keep cool with, so who was really suffering?


    "You all right up there, Lord Rian?"


    Looking directly in front of the ship and not seeing any signs of rocks, I risked turning to look over my shoulder at Hans and gave him a smile. "I''m fine! How about you four? Done yet?" It was very hard to tell when the process of butchering was done by smell alone.


    Hans made a face. "Almost done, Lord Rian. Just washing them up and putting them in the cold box. We''ll have something more to eat besides the slugs Cyuw found under those rocks this morning."


    "More for me, then!" a cheerful voice called.


    Hans and I shuddered. Every time we''d had to eat slug, I told myself it was just like eating tongue, and kept calling myself a liar every time after I was again proven wrong.


    "Well, remember not to wash off with bloody water," I said, going back to facing ahead and keeping a lookout, doing my best to keep covered under the hat. Just because I had slightly darker skin than everyone else didn''t mean I didn''t get sunburned. Also, it was hot. Agonizingly hot. A part of me wondered if all the sweating I was doing was helping wash off Iridescence. It was technically moving water all over me, after all.


    I checked my shadow, but it was still angled. Not yet noon then, which was when we were scheduled to take a dip and wash break, when we jumped into the river and splashed water on things to wash off Iridescence growth. It was particularly important for the stove and cold box bound tools, since unlike the water jet driver bound tool that propelled the Coldhold, those two bound tools weren''t under water and getting constantly washed. Lori had said they should last as long as we washed the bound tools every day to free the wisps from being trapped by Iridescence, and I hoped she was right.


    Still, that was a problem for later. For the moment, all I had to do was keep watch for rocks, keep the sun off me and relax.


    And it was very easy to relax. True, the high-pitched bugsong coming from the Iridescence-covered trees on either side of the river could be annoying when you were trying to sleep, but since I wasn''t, it provided a nice counterpoint to the sound of the water rushing through the bound tool that moved the Coldhold. On either side, trees covered by the colors swayed slightly in a breeze that I didn''t feel. Probably because we were in the middle of the river. Winds caused by temperature differences went in the direction of relative cold to relative warmth. Maybe we''d feel it if the ship we were on wasn''t made of bound ice that didn''t exchange temperature?


    Even without the wind though, the view was pretty, in the way that a raging fire was pretty even as it destroyed. The trees and rocks and the very ground shifted color as we moved past and the angle I saw things changed. The treetops seemed like a shimmering ocean as leaves and branches swayed to the wind, and the glittering fall of Iridescence dust seemed to color the very air. Bugs shone with colors as they flitted back and forth, the Iridescence dusting their bodies refracting the light.


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    The stick in my hand swung, a precise move that slammed into a bug that had gotten too close for my comfort. The stick struck solidly, and the bug went tumbling and splashed into the water. I watched the bug as the water washed away the Iridescence on it, revealing the dull, dark colors beneath that, ironically, blended with the water very well. The bug didn''t struggle for long before a dark, sinuous shape emerged from below. With a splash and a flash of pale teeth, the bug was in a seel''s mouth even as the fursh dove deep once more, it''s long body undulating to propel it through the water.


    It wasn''t the only one. This far down river from the two demesne I had to help keep alive, the fursh didn''t have even the little bit of caution that the seels Karina had hunted so assiduously had for anything people-shaped. If it weren''t for the seel blood and offal that was still occasionally dripping into the river, the seels would have been curiously rubbing up against the hull and following in the Coldhold''s wake. I''d seen it before when we''d gone down to collect salt from the ocean.


    At least they weren''t climbing onto the outriggers.


    I reached down into the bucket next to me and splashed my arms with water to cool them down. "Rock ahead," I called, "twenty paces out! Slow and veer left!"


    "Slowing and left," Yhorj acknowledged. It had taken a while for them to see the necessity of the call and respond to make sure that important instructions were heard, but everyone was following it now. It helped that the sound of the water jet driver was pervasive enough that it could be mistaken for loud, and people instinctively tried to talk over it.


    I reluctantly put the hat on my head as I grabbed the solid oar, watching both the rock I''d identified and the water ahead of us, in case I needed to use to oar to try and assist in pushing the Coldhold to the side of the rock, but it wasn''t necessary. "You''re past it! Straighten up!"


    "Straightening up!"


    With the cold box filling up, we were still on the easy part of this journey. It would get a lot harder once we left the river and the bay at the mouth of it and started crossing the open ocean. Despite what we were using it for, the Coldhold wasn''t really meant to be a deep-water ship. It was too broad, and the draft too shallow. Without the outriggers on either side, extending out on the strongest wooden beams we had, it would have been only a matter of time before the waves capsized the ship. As it was, we had to sail near the shallows so that the waves wouldn''t overwhelm them, which was why the last journey to Covehold had taken so long.


    We''d managed it last time, so I was confident the Coldhold would survive the trip again. Almost certainly. Probably. Maybe. Hopefully?


    It was one of my ulterior motives for getting Lori to agree to recruiting a Deadspeaker. With a Deadspeaker who, no offense to Shana, actually knew what they were doing. I wanted hulls. Solid wooden hulls! The kind could be fused to a keel and weighed down with rocks, the kind that has a draft that will work for proper sea-going water craft!


    Yes, all the stuff I told Lori about food production applies too, but why only try to solve one problem with one solution? And maybe once Lori grows to trust the men or women I recruit, maybe she''ll be amenable to letting them set up an allied demesne near us. With someone to keep trees growing even as they were cut down for wood, and Lori''s skill with Whispering, we''d be able to really raise living standards! No more people sleeping one family to a bed! No more single room houses! No more roof repairs! Well, probably still the roof repairs, but they''d probably be done a lot faster with a Deadspeaker!


    Admittedly, that was unlikely to happen any time soon. Lori had only authorized this to secure their food supply after the recent losses from the dragon, so that was going to be their priority, and if the past year was any indication, that was probably going to take a long time. However, as lord, I had to think of the future between tomorrow and Lori''s far-off dreams of grandeur. I had to think of building more storage buildings, of educating our children, of keeping everyone gainfully employed and occupied, and even of the financial system neither Lori or I really want to try to build but was going to be inevitable so I might as well get ahead of it.


    I knew Lori probably had her own opinions on those subjects¡ªI even knew what some of them were¡ªbut until she actually mentioned a specific thing she wanted done out loud, I had to organize things as best as I could. The plans for teaching the children how to read and write were already in place, ready to be enacted when I got back.


    Hopefully Lori would let me hold classes in the Dungeon. Learning was hard enough without attaching bad memories of being hot and bored to it too.


    Those were all future problems, though. Right now, my problems consisted of washing off Iridescence, not getting heatstroke or sunburn, and keeping us from crashing into any rocks. And in the near future, I¡­ well, I had to figure out how to sell wispbeads in sufficient quantities that we actually made a profit on this trip. I was already partly resigned to the thought that we might have to sell directly to Covehold''s government and let them worry about distributing the wispbeads as a fuel for bound tools. I hoped I didn''t have to do that, but if we became successful and their Dungeon Binder couldn''t reproduce what Lori had done in making beads, it was only a matter of time before they passed laws to get their cut of our potential bead sales.


    ¡­


    Well, that was a future problem as well. For now, I had an easy day in front of me¡ªthe sun not withstanding¡ªafter almost a month of stress and work.


    I reached back down to the bucket next to me and splashed water on my arms again, watching the colors of the Iridescence shift on the wind, and hoped that Umu, Mikon and Riz were getting along without me. And that Lori wasn''t getting too aggravated. And Shana wasn''t working herself to the bone. And¡ª


    Stupid worries. Leave me alone, I''m resting!

 329 - I Want To Shirk My Responsibilities!

    It took Lori several days to build the bath house in River''s Fork. Most of this was the difficulty of moving material to the building site she had chosen¡ªthe rock debris hadn''t nearly been enough to work with¡ªbut the rest was the sheer difficulty of the project. It wasn''t just that she was working outside of her demesne and had to claim wisps like any other Whisperer, or it was so stupidly hot and humid! No, the delay was caused by practical problems.


    To build the bath house in a way similar to the ones she''d made before, she''d need a pipe to be able to draw water from the river, and another pipe for the used bath water so that it wouldn''t go back into the river so close to where the demesne would be getting its drinking water. However, making pipes would be difficult without her awareness of the demesne''s wisps to assist her in forming to pipes and displacing the stone. To properly make the pipes with the resources and capabilities she had available, she''d either need to have the ground dug up so she could lay out pipes manually, or make above-ground pipes from the river to the bath house.


    The former wasn''t practical, whether she did it herself by excavating the ground with earthwisps, or had it dug up by other people. If she did it herself, she''d be taking a lot of time to do it. If she had it dug up, it would require bringing in people from her demesne to do it or having the people of River''s Fork do it, which would disrupt their work. Food was still tightly rationed in the demesne, and a lot of time was spent tending to and growing or catching what food they had. The above-ground pipe was the only practical solution. Building the above ground¡ªor rather, ground-level¡ªpipe all the way to the river required a decent amount of stone, which she needed to excavate herself. Since she''d need to excavate stone to build with in any case, a little bit more for the pipe wasn''t a problem.


    Figuring out where to direct the waste water was her next problem. While she could just let it all flow back into the river¡­ she didn''t want to, not the least of which because there as a chance that the waste water would get drawn into the intake pipe again. That would just be disgusting. Ideally, she''d reroute the waste water towards the fields¡­ but even if the site of the bathhouse was equidistant between the river and the fields, that would still require a lot of piping.


    An open gutter might have worked, conferring the water towards the fields with a minimum of construction on her part, but that was a short step away from having an open sewer, which was just asking for someone to do something disgusting. And on more practical terms, such a gutter would need to be cleaned since rocks and dirt would no doubt fall into it. Covering a gutter makes it all but a pipe anyway, and she''d be back to the annoying amount of work she''d have to do.


    She was tempted to forego the pipes and just have people manually fill the baths with water from the river. It would be time consuming, but doing so would remove a very tedious portion of the work she''d have to do. What stopped her was the very real possibility that the work would be pushed on the few remaining children in the demesne. It was the sort of heartless cruelty parents would think of, making children carry heavy containers of water under the hot sun, and probably scold them for using that water to cool themselves down. And doing it that way still wouldn''t have solved the issue of disposing of the used bath water. If she just made it flow out to a cistern outside the bath house, it would likely start getting malodorous, and someone might try to use it for quick washes and ugh.


    Lori spent a lot of time considering the problem as she excavated stone from the closest source, which was the bedrock of the nearby river itself. After all, it wasn''t like losing a little stone there would matter. It was a time consuming process that had her standing under the sun with water up to her calves in the river as she used her wand to claim the stone, wearing her boots without socks to protect her feet from rocks, graspers, and bloodsucking slugs. Her hat had new clips of bone at the edges of the brim for her to anchor bindings to, which made it easier to keep her head and face cool.


    Once she''d claimed enough earthwisps, Lori gently drew the mass out of the water, leaving a long trench in the river that had slowly grown wider as she removed more and more stone. The stone was carefully moved up the broken ground of the riverbank until Lori was able to pile it up next to the spot where the bath would be. By the time she was finished excavating¡ªwhich took three days¡ªshe had a pile of stone bigger than a house¡ªwell, one of the early-built houses in her demesne¡ªwhich was a decent start.


    First she made a foundation that would also act as a floor, spreading stone on the ground from one side of the pile of excavated stone in a long strip three paces wide. She anchored the stone onto the bare dirt, which she also claimed, bound and then compressed under the stone, making sure the floor was raised higher than ground level to prevent rain and dirt from flowing into the bath house. It probably wouldn''t be any use against the spring floods, but that was a future matter to worry about.


    Once the floor was laid out, Lori started hollowing out the pile of stone next to the foundation.


    After all, it was already of a decent height as to act as a roof, and the sides of the pile could act as walls. All she had to do was hollow out the pile, basically re-excavating the stone as she made a space that formed a cave-like hollow that had a self-supporting, arching curve to it. The stone she slowly extracted was ''pulled'' outwards from the hollow to continue the curve of the walls and ceiling. The whole mass of stone¡ªfoundation, hollowed stockpile and slowly extending walls, essentially everything that she that she wasn''t actively moving¡ªwas all part of a single binding that reinforced the structure of the stone, allowing the stone to support itself when she had not yet finished forming the supportive arches. At intervals, she also raised up stone pillars to support the ceiling,


    She slowly lengthened the stone structure over days. The work had to be done carefully, since the shape of the structure was important, and she had to remember to imbue the binding of earthwisps that reinforced the stone while she worked.


    Twice, she found that the stone she had excavated was insufficient, and so Lori had to go back to the river to excavate some more. The excavated stone was piled around the open end of the tall, arched structure she was making, to make it easier to extend the building to the length she needed it to be. While the overall structure wasn''t all that big¡ªit only needed to be able to serve less than fifty people, and not even all at once¡ªthe walls needed to be thick enough to bear the weight of the roof, and she also needed more stone for the internal fittings, like the basins to hold water, the pipes, and the internal walls to prevent people from seeing inside¡­


    At the end of a day of work, when the sun began to hang low in the sky, Lori, Riz, the friend Riz would bring that day, and the hunting party that helped the demesne hunt for beast meat would get on Lori''s Ice Boat and back home. Without the security of sleeping in her own room aboard the Coldhold, as well as the numbers afforded by having Rian and the operators of the Coldhold present back when she''d been building the dragon shelter in the spring, she didn''t feel safe spending the night in River''s Fork. Oh yes, ostensibly it was because they didn''t want to have to draw on the demesne''s supplies for breakfast and dinner, but Lori just didn''t want to stay. Not with the weather the way it was. Sleeping in Shanalorre''s office was too hot!


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    In the evenings, they''d get back to her demesne as it was getting dark, the sun hidden behind the trees, casting the sky in shades pinks and purples and orange and red. More often than not, dinner would have already begun without them, though there was always still food waiting. The next day, they would proceed back down river after Lori had spoken to Shanalorre and, after checking her rock for his name, Kolinh. Lori would be back to work building the bath house and sweating profusely by mid-morning.


    Slowly, far slower than any of its counterparts, the bath house took shape. Instead of two long, half-cylinder structures parallel to each other¡ªone for men, the other for women¡ªLori simply made one such building, then built a wall in the middle to divide it into two segments. Finishing the building was a relief, since it meant that she''d finally be able to work in the shade without the intense sun shining down on her.


    Of course, the relief was short-lived, because as the day wore on the inside of the bath house got increasingly hot, and so along with lightwisps to let her see, Lori also had to anchor bindings of airwisps to circulate the still and hot air, and bindings of firewisps to destroy heat within the bath house to mitigate the heat. If she hadn''t been a Dungeon Binder, she''d probably have never been able to do all this alone, since she''d have been spending significant amounts of her time simply imbuing the bindings that let her work.


    Sometimes, when Lori was alone and she was sure Riz and whoever else couldn''t see her, she''d simply stop working sit down, and waited for the urge to cry to go away. This¡­ wasn''t anywhere near what she thought being a Dungeon Binder would be like. Building a stone structure by herself in oppressive heat, unpaid¡­


    It wasn''t like she''d ever actually use this building herself. She''d certainly never used any of the bath houses she''d built in her demesne. Did the idiots that lived here really need it? They''d been doing well with¡­ however they''d been bathing so far. Why did she have to work this hard by herself?-! Just her, fingernails scrapped ragged from all contact with stone, making pipes with the stone foundation and stone basins for holding in water¡­


    She never let herself stop working for long, even when the heat and frustration meant she cried as she worked. Or perhaps that was just all the sweat pouring down her face. She went through the little jars of warm water she had Riz get her quickly, drinking to keep from getting dehydrated.


    Many mornings, she just wanted to stay in her demesne and make beads. After all, it''s not like the stone she''d already raised and formed was going to go anywhere. Surely she could put it off for a day¡­ or even put it off completely until Rian came back, and only continue it if he had actually managed to recruit any Deadspeakers lazy and insecure enough to be willing to work for someone else instead of founding their own demesne. After all, no point building something if the intended user never arrived¡­


    For two weeks, Lori left her demesne every morning and took Lori''s Boat downriver to River''s Fork. Each day, every day, she made the journey and worked on the demesne''s bath house bit by bit. The basins were made, running along the center of both halves of the bath house. Pipes were formed to take the used water and pass it though an above-ground pipe to a stone-lined pit near both the fields and the in-progress planting terrace, the pit currently empty since the bath house had no water yet. She''d excavated the pit to be lower than the baths, so that only gravity was needed to get the water there, with stone-line sides to keep it from collapsing.


    Another above-ground pipe of stone was laid between the bath house and the river, and Lori debated wondered if she needed to put in something to repel slugs, squids, graspers and aquatic bugs from getting into the pipe to the bath house before deciding that it was just bath water. There was no need to overdo it. She ran the pipe from the river along the outside of the bath house, and eventually passed the pipe through the wall between the bath house''s halves, where the tube then let out to the basins she''d made.


    Once the building was finished and the pipes were laid, all that was left was to make the bound tool that would draw water from the river and bring it to the bath house''s basins for people to use. That, at least, she could design from the cool and convenience of her room in her Dungeon. A bound tool core mounted to a tube of bone¡ªbecause stone was annoyingly heavy to try to move around on her table¡ªon which a combination of waterwisps and airwisps were anchored. When it was mounted to the pipe she''d stuck into the river, the airwisps would draw air from the pipe, and the suction would pull water up the pipe. Once the water reached the portion of the pipe where the bound tool was located, the water would be propelled the rest of the way by the binding of waterwisps. Given the weather, there was no need to make the water warm at the moment, and adding the binding of firewisps later would be trivial.


    It was a simple binding she''d used before¡ªshe used a variant of it in the bath houses of her demesne¡ªso she was confident it was safe to leave alone with the idiots of River''s Fork.


    And then it was back to River''s Fork to actually install the bound tool onto the pipe where it went into the outside wall of the bath house. She used local stone to make a protective shroud around the contact receptacle of the bound tool, to protect the wispbead from being dislodged by the wind or bugs. Keeping bugs from roosting in the contact receptacle could be Yllian''s problem.


    "It''s simple enough to use," Lori said as she showed Yllian how to operate the bound tool. "Put a bead on it, and it will draw water up from the river to fill the basins. Don''t let the basin overflow, that will be a waste of water, and I don''t suggest drinking the water from the basin. At the very least, it might have silt. You''ll have to clean the basins every so often to get the silt out."


    "Understood, Great Binder," Yllian said solemnly.


    "I''ve already tested it, so the basins inside already have some water in them. Remember, one is for men, the other is for women."


    "I''ll make sure nothing untoward happens in the baths, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "You''ll have to build your own shelves for storing your clothes while you''re bathing. I don''t have the time for that. If anyone vandalizes the bound tool, I will personally break their leg."


    "I will see to it that their leg is reserved exclusively for you, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded absently. "Now, the four new wisplights I gave you are for the bath house only. They''re far brighter than the ones you already have, which is needed because aside from the entrances, there are no openings into the bathouse, otherwise people will get up to nonsense."


    Yllian nodded in agreement. "Understood, Great Binder. May I use my own discretion for designating someone to handle the wispslights in the women''s side of the baths?"


    "Make arrangements you feel you need to," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively. "Make sure to keep an eye on the waste water pit near the fields. Don''t let it get too full or else the baths will probably flood, and you''ll be walking around in your own filthy bath water."


    "Noted, Great Binder," Yllian said. Hesitantly, he added, "If I may ask¡­ why are there no bathing pools?"


    Ah. Right, Yllian had used the baths in her demesne, hadn''t he? "Because they require dedicated full time maintenance and a more robust facility for dealing with used bath water, neither of which the demesne is capable of. Besides, the river is right there,"


    "Understood, Great Binder. But¡­ do you suppose that you could find it in you to add something like it before next winter?"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "You realize you''ll have to walk out of the dome into the cold just to use it, don''t you?"


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    The two stared at each other.


    "I''ll consider it if Rian comes back having recruited a Deadspeaker who knows how to fuse wood and other materials together," Lori finally replied.


    "I see¡­" Yllian said thoughtfully. "I understand, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Good. Now, I need to do some more tests before you can tell everyone they can use the baths. I will inform you when I am finished."


    "Yes, Great Binder. I''ll see to it that everyone is rationed some soap."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively, and Yllian went off. "Erzebed?"


    "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "Did you two pack soap with you like I told you?"


    "Yes, Great Binder!" Riz and her militiawoman friend both chorused.


    Lori nodded, very aware of how drenched with sweat she was, how hot she was, and how her clothes stank of both. "Good. One of you get the packs, the other come with me."


    Her responsibility here had finally been discharged. She supposed now was a good a time as any to use one of the bath houses she''d built.

 330 - Food Supply Problems

    Even after she finished with building the bath house, Lori''s Ice Boat continued to make the trip to the other demesne and back. Beasts and seels had to be hunted for food, after all, and the nearly week-long stay in the shelter while the dragon passed had depleted much of the comfortable margin that they''d managed to build up over the spring.


    Thus, hunting was redoubled, as the still abundant numbers of beasts and fursh were slowly rendered into food. The hunters stayed in four day shifts before coming back to rest for a day¡ªor at least, do a different sort of work while they spent meal times with their families, which Rian said was important¡ªand then went back to River''s Fork to hunt again. They brought back reports on the demesne''s condition from Yllian, which were told to Riz or¡­ uh¡­ Kolinh, which eventually made its way to Lori, updates on River''s Fork''s inventory that went to Shanalorre for collating, and supplies of fruit that went to her demesne''s food storage.


    The construction of the baths has also seemed to have given River''s Fork some initiative. Shanalorre reported they''ve increased their soap production, using the rendered seel and beast fat. They didn''t have an experienced chandler among there number though, and so the soap they produced was runny and carried a strong smell from the fats used, but given the sweatiness that they were using the soap on, the smell probably isn''t too much of an issue.


    She still had Yllian arrange for the necessary supplies to be sent to Lori''s demesne so that they''d make the soap themselves. According to Shanalorre and¡­ ah, what was his name¡­ oh yes, Kolinh, the chandler''s was only limited by a lack of molds and materials when it came to making soap. Increasing production to also meet the needs to River''s Fork presented no great difficulty, especially since he''d taken on an apprentice to assist him, or so Lori had been told.


    Lori had her own work to do, making beads in her shed. They were becoming increasingly necessary, given the number of rudimentary bound tools they were using now. Lori had even made three new large beads, two to replace the ones that had been used during the dragon''s passing and one extra in case it was needed.


    It wasn''t that their usage of the beads was coming close to equaling her production rate, but if Rian was successful in his mission they''d need more beads to trade with. At least, that was her optimistic hope. The alternative was Rian wasn''t able to exchange the beads for anything, or even worse, the beads had been seized by Covehold Demesne''s authorities without restitution. That would be the sort of insult she''d have to answer¡­ eventually, once she''d grown her demesne to be a match for Covehold.


    She hoped the worst didn''t happen. Getting her demesne to a war footing would be quite annoying.


    Still, the days passed quietly, and she had plenty of work to do in that time. So she didn''t think about how long the Coldhold had been gone. She didn''t need to remind herself that with the improved, more efficient driver bound tool propelling it¡ªall the tubes and curves of the previous driver had been reducing its efficiency, as had been made clear when the bound tool driver had propelled the boat much faster with the same binding¡ªthey would be able to return much faster. She was too busy for such things!


    All she had to do was wait. Only a couple more weeks and they''d be back, hopefully with the profits and the new recruits, who would no doubt bring their own problems, but those were matters for later. As long as she didn''t start any more projects, she could just keep on making beads. When Rian came back, she''d have all new difficulties to deal with, so she might as well enjoy the relative rest she was having now.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "There''s a problem in River''s Fork," Shanalorre said at their after-dinner briefing, a week after Lori had finished building the baths.


    "Rainbows," Lori swore in deadpan tones, then sighed. "All right, who died and who did it?"


    "No one died, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "So the malcontents didn''t kill the ones guarding the food stores, stole everything and ran off into the hills?" she said incredulously. Ever since she''d become responsible for River''s Fork, that had been something she''d been waiting to hear had happened.


    "Actually, those people had become much more well-behaved ever since you built the bath house," Shanalorre said. "I am not Lord Rian, so I would not care to speculate as to why, but perhaps he could provide an explanation when he returns. No, the problem is that replenishing the demesne''s food supply has met with serious impediment."


    What? "What?" Lori said.


    "The hunting parties have recently been unable to hunt for beast meat, because beast meat has become scarce in the areas we''ve been hunting in," the younger Dungeon Binder said. "The access to seel meat has been unaffected, and it is likely we might have to switch to focusing on our efforts on them. If it becomes necessary to do so, I must request that Karina be given permission to assist in the endeavor. Her experience will allow us to increase the yields that will perhaps allow us to meet previous rates."


    Lori took a moment to consider all that. For a moment, she wondered why Shanalorre was the one reporting this. Such a report was supposed to be Riz''s purvey, as something that had been relayed by Lori''s subjects, or¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªKolinh''s purvey as someone who organized what work there was to be done. So why was Shanalorre the one reporting this?


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    She was about to open her mouth, the words "Binder Shanalorre, why are you the one reporting this?" ready to leave her mouth when she suddenly became more aware of the first word in that sentence. Ah. Right. Her incompetence at the role side, Shanalorre was technically still the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork, at least until Lori finally got around to claiming the core, and if nothing else she has been earnest in trying to fulfill the responsibilities of the role. Given that this was a matter that was an issue for River''s Fork alone, as well as pertinent to the agreement they ha made when Shanalorre had subordinated herself to Lori¡­


    "Do we know why beast meat has become so scare in our hunting area?" Lori asked.


    "Hunter Ralii believes that the dragon''s passing displaced one of the larger local beasts. They''ve found very large tracks in the areas they''ve been hunting in, as well as damage to trees and Iridescence that indicates a beast of great size," Shanalorre reported. "It was a direct sighting that led them to conclude its presence has been what has been scaring away the local beasts. Hunter Ralii estimates that it was ten to twelve paces in length and somewhere between three and four paces tall at the hips, bulkier and longer than a koncallos. Not the sort of thing we should be trying to poke to death with spears. Hunter Ralii believes it has established a den nearby, likely after its previous den was destroyed by the dragon''s passing. Though he did not risk getting close, he believes that the beast might be suffering from burns received during that period, which is what is making the local beasts vacate the area. The injury is no doubt making the beast more aggressive than normal."


    Reflexively, Lori glanced up at the ceiling as she tried to imagine a beast that tall. Given the usual posture of beasts, that was probably not even the highest point of its body, merely the highest point that was consistently that high without being affected by changes in balance. While she wasn''t some sort of enthusiast or vitalogist, she had some common knowledge of the large kinds of beasts, the ones commonly used in plays to put the characters in peril when they wander out of a demesne, like koncallosi and rahimics. A koncallos, if she remembered correctly¡ªand it wasn''t someone''s name, so she did¡ªwas about that height, and was considered one of the largest land predators alive, hunting chasmoses and thaggomses and¡­ uh, what else¡­ did it hunt rahimics? Well, whatever else was out there in the wilds outside of demesne.


    "Can the hunters deal with it?" she asked.


    "Only if they were insane and suicidal, Great Binder," Kolinh said. "A koncallos is the sort of beast that militia are sent to deal with when it got close to farmlands, and we have either heavy ballistae or wizard support to deal with it, usually both."


    Lori tilted her head. "How would you have dealt with a koncallos, then?"


    "A pit," Kolinh said immediately, "with a Horotract to be sure. Make the pit, then have them put a reductive vista on it so it doesn''t look like a pit, then bait it with blood and meat. Have riders on lakimays bait it to the pit, then when it''s in position invert the vista so the pit is too deep for it to get out of. Have the Whisperers finish it off."


    Lori nodded slowly. "I see. We have almost none of those things, though I can stand in the place of a Whisperer." She''d started as one, after all. "Could we sustain the demesne on seel meat, or move our hunting to other areas?" There was the shore on the other side of the other river, after all, as well as simply the other side of the river itself.


    "Only if we increased the number of people we dedicate to seeling," Kolinh said. "Moving to another area would be possible, but only to the other side of the river. We''ve changed to that, but the beasts there are reportedly more wary. Ralii suspects that they''re smelling the koncallos-like beast and think it''s nearby. Their increased caution is making it more difficult for our hunters. They''ll likely settle down in a few days, but¡­"


    "A few days will mean having to switch to stricter rationing, put us dangerously close to no margin for error at all if we continue at the current rate of consumption, or have to retain all of River''s Fork''s fruit harvests to feed itself, even accounting for us theoretically managing to seel at the rate we''ve been able to so far," Shanalorre interrupted.


    She didn''t like the implication of that. "What would happen if we waited the week, perhaps week and a half, that it would take for Rian to make it back?" she said, the ''make this his problem'' unsaid but obvious.


    The three she was speaking to obviously heard the addendum. While Riz had a moment of looking mildly guilty, Kolinh had a seemed to be seriously considering the option, as did Shanalorre.


    It was the latter who answered the question, shaking her head. "River''s Fork would have to live exclusively on the stockpiled food supplies, which would no longer be enough to last the demesne until the projected harvest date of the demesne''s crops," Shanalorre said, looking down at her tablet to check her numbers. "Once those are exhausted, we would have to actively provide them with supplies from Lorian''s reserves, which will monopolize the time of either the Lori''s Ice Boat or the Coldhold, which will likely curtail our activities on the opposite shore of the river. A construction of a new boat might be needed to be able to return to mitigate this. If Lord Rian has managed to recruit a Deadspeaker capable of fusing materials, they should be able to assist in that, but given previous priorities, it would be more efficient to have then assisting in increasing grain production."


    Lori considered that. on the one hand, each item started at distasteful and escalated from there. On the other hand¡­ "If we deal with the koncallos-like beast now, would the beasts settle down enough for us to continue hunting?"


    "No, Great Binder, it would take a few days for its scent to dissipate," Kolinh said. "However, we''d at least have its meat to add to our stores, and since its presence has made smaller beasts vacate the area, we can probably take our time with butchering and dressing it''s meat."


    She nodded solemnly. "And how do you plan to kill it so we can reach that point?"


    "We¡­ would need your assistance, Great Binder," Kolinh said, sounding both reluctant and embarrassed.


    "Couldn''t we just build a ballista to shoot it with?" Lori said, allowing herself to hope.


    "They are not simple to make, Great Binder. And even if we could, we''d need to transport it to where the beast is, which we would still need to find."


    Lori sighed. Well, it wasn''t like she had never killed beasts before. In fact, she''d killed quite a lot of them when they had been traversing overland from Covehold. She''d just¡­ well, never seriously imagined herself having to kill a beast the size of a koncallos. Oh, she''d imagined a long time ago when she''d been young and silly, killing a koncallos while riding atop a charging lakimay after watching one too many adventurous plays or reading about it in a book, but in real life¡­?


    "How would you suggest we deal with this beast without a Horotract to assist us?" Lori asked.

 331 - Shirking My Responsibilities Is Sounding More And More Tempting

    Kolinh''s suggestion to deal with the beast was to lay a trap. A pit filled with spikes, or simply gather piles of Iridescence ready to be set on fire¡ªan idea that Lori found both horrifying and dangerously pragmatic¡ªwhich would be set alight once the beast was near enough to ignite the Iridescence growing on its own body.


    "Given the situation, we don''t have the days it would normally take to track the beast and learn it''s habits," Kolinh said.


    "But we do have the time it takes to gather that much Iridescence?" Lori said flatly.


    "It won''t take that long, Great Binder. We''d simply need to scrape all the nearby trees and scoop it up off the ground. The summer''s heat has been making them grow to be very thick."


    Lori shuddered at the thought. "You say this will be best for dealing with the beast quickly?"


    Kolinh nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. However, there are still dangers. We will need a way to lure the beast towards the trap, whatever the trap may be, and building the trap will likely be dangerous, as we''d need to build it near enough to the beast''s territory that it might be drawn to us while we do so."


    "Should I just assume that every part of dealing with this beast will be very dangerous so it doesn''t need to be repeated?"


    "That would probably be for the best, Great Binder."


    Lori sighed. "Would we even be able to dig a pit trap deep enough, quickly enough, to be useful without taking so much time that it would be more efficient to simply switch to sending food to River''s Fork?"


    "With sufficient manpower, it should be possible, Great Binder. Either that, or¡­"


    She gave him a flat look as he trailed off. "Or?" she prompted.


    "You could excavate the hole yourself, Great Binder."


    Lori simply stared at him. Eventually, she said, "Moving on. How would we lure it to any trap that we set up?"


    "Blood and fresh meat of some sort would be best, Great Binder. Kill a seel or smaller beast and leave it where it can be found. With the area vacated by other beasts, it should be the only one that will be drawn to the smell." Kolinh paused for a moment, as if remembering something. "Though it would be best to set the trap and the bait near the river, Great Binder. A beast of the size reported would need to drink no matter how much the feeling stings, especially in this heat."


    That¡­ made sense. If the heat was bad for her, it must be terrible for the beast, who wouldn''t have the option of jumping into the river to cool off with burning agony as the Iridescence was washed off its body and the spots where the crystals had pierced through its skin were opened. She remembered reading somewhere that beasts didn''t sweat, instead panting and fluffing their feather to release body heat.


    Shaking her head, Lori focused on the now. "So. We set a trap for it, and lure it in with fresh meat. How do we make sure the trap kills it?"


    Kolinh visibly hesitated as Riz turned her head, seemingly looking at something far to the side.


    In the middle of the two, Shanalorre said, "While igniting a pit of kindling and Iridescence would no doubt be damaging, there is no guarantee that the beast will be fatally caught in the blast, and it would be extremely dangerous for the one who would ignite the fire. Spikes would probably be effective, but making and installing them would take time, and a beast is unlikely to simply fall into an open pit. The most effective trap would likely require your involvement. A sufficiently lethal binding would allow the beast to be killed after being drawn by the lure, and would not require overt physical construction that would put people in danger for extended periods of time as they labored to construct it. And anyone in both demesnes would gladly give their life to keep you safe should the beast appear while you are preparing the trap."


    Lori stared at the other Dungeon Binder, who stared back as the other two with her looked away.


    "I will consider your proposal," Lori said, getting to her feet. "If there''s nothing else, the three of you are dismissed for the evening."


    She lingered for a moment, waiting, but they also said nothing, so she turned and headed back to her room.


    Then turned around to tuck her chair into place at the table so that people wouldn''t run into it. Then she headed back to her room.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    In the privacy of her own room later that night, Lori very, very seriously considered the merits of simply¡­ not doing anything. While they couldn''t make more defined plans to deal with the beast whose very presence had made all other beasts vacate the vicinity of River''s Fork, they had the general outline of one, which was to find it, find a way to contain it to a small area and have Lori set it on fire or hit it with lightning until it died, possibly from the safety of the branches of a tree.


    ¡­


    A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Put like that, it sounded both very simple and extremely dangerous. They didn''t know where they''d be encountering the beast, and the idea of ''containing'' it if it was as big as described was laughable to consider with the equipment they had on hand. A koncallos, according to what she''d read, weighed an average of two taugrain of heavy muscle, could chase down anyone on foot, and tear someone in half in a single bite.


    Oh, bad stories involving random idiots finding Dungeon Cores and somehow becoming the most powerful Dungeon Binder in existence made it seem they were easy to kill with but a wave of the hand and a flash of lightning, but they weren''t. More serious novels whose protagonists had ran and hidden from koncallosi had taught her why these beasts were so dangerous. Their flesh was too thick to cut quickly through with a water cutter, and they moved too quickly for such a stream to be concentrated long enough to go through flesh, much less cut through enough to be debilitating. Their feathers were a covering that would act as an ablative layer against fire and firewisps, even with the Iridescence no doubt growing on them being dangerously volatile. Those same properties also made them difficult to kill with handheld conventional weapons.


    For the first time, Lori seriously began to reconsider the merits of having other wizards in the demesne. If they had some other wizard, any other wizard¡­


    A Horotract would have been able to enact the plan of trapping it in a pit. A Deadspeaker¡ªwell, a Deadspeaker other than Shanalorre¡ªwould probably be able to use the many parts of skeletal remains to make some sort of undead that could occupy the beast''s attention, or alter trees to be able to cage or trap the beast. A Horotract and a Deadspeaker could probably combine their efforts and kill the beast instantly¡­ and while she would normally be very and rightfully concerned about such a capability being used on her, at the moment she couldn''t help thinking it would be a wonderful solution to her current problems. A Mentalist would probably be able to use a formation to hold a beast completely still long enough for them to manually shove a spear into its eye and into the brain. And a Whisperer¡­ well, they wouldn''t be able to do anything Lori couldn''t do herself, but the important point was that they would be doing it instead of Lori!


    She didn''t have to do it. Putting herself in that sort of danger had not been any part of her agreement with Shanalorre, and the discussion had made it clear that while it would cause added difficulties in future¡ªand possibly require her to make a new boat¡ªthey could quite easily ride out this difficulty with the resources they had at their disposal. Also, there was no large beast disrupting hunting around her primary demesne, so they should still be able to continue as they have been, even withdraw the hunter who''d agreed to take up partial residence in River''s Fork to oversee the hunting there and allow him to come back home. Then Rian would arrive and¡­


    ¡­well, they''d probably need to reexamine the decision of focusing their efforts on killing this beast, but she''d have Rian to help plan that now, and she trusted him to make optimum decisions.


    But¡­ the only choices Rian would have to decide between would be continuing to leave the beast be and trying to subsist with their current resources¡­ or try to kill it with those same resources.


    And try as she might, she couldn''t see what Rian could possibly add that would make what they had at hand even more capable of killing a beast large enough to make other beasts avoid it. Yes, by the time Rian returned he''d might be coming back with one, possibly two¡ªthere had better not be three!¡ªDeadspeakers, but that didn''t mean they''d be able to contribute¡­ much less be trustworthy!


    No, if they waited for Rian to come back, all they''d have was Rian and maybe the men who''d gone with him to Covehold Demesne. The newly recruited settlers and any family they had would be of questionable reliability and motivation, and unless Rian secretly had some sort of past experience trying to put down koncallosi out in the colors, they would be relying on the experience of those who''d been militia for the planning and strategy of dealing with it.


    That meant that now was as good a time as any to try to bring it down.


    ¡­


    Lori didn''t have to do this. She didn''t want to do this, hunting down a large, predatory beast that was reportedly injured and therefore in pain and likely more aggressive than usual. She could simply order Kolinh and the militia to try and kill it without her. They''d understand why she wouldn''t want to commit herself to this kind of hunt. It was extremely unsafe. No one would question her if she didn''t include herself in the attempt to try to deal with the beast. After all, she was the Dungeon Binder. If anything happened to her, the demesne would collapse, and the only one capable of claiming her core and restoring the boundaries of the demesne was Shanalorre¡­ who didn''t know where Lori had hidden the core and would have difficulty reaching it if she was told. Rian would have to tell her. She was fairly certain he remembered where it was. He remembered things like that.


    ¡­


    She wanted to tell herself it was too soon to make some kind of decision on this. After all, the hunters wouldn''t be taken down to River''s Fork to find the beast''s tracks and locate its den until tomorrow. She had plenty of time to make her decision.


    But she also knew that no matter how much time passed, her options were unlikely to change. Either she risked her life to deal with this beast decisively¡­ or she had to start building one or two new boats, and commit her demesne to an extended period of delivering food to River''s Fork as they adapted to the displacement of the local beasts, possibly straining both demesnes supplies.


    There was, she supposed, the option of just transferring the population of River''s Fork to her demesne and leaving only a small group of people to tend to and harvest the fruit trees they had an interest in¡­ but since no one in the demesne seems to have so much as inquired about the possibility, it was clear they didn''t want to leave for whatever inane reason. And if she did transfer them, that was an equally distasteful result. She''d have to build more new houses, expand their infrastructure, and it wouldn''t change the fact they''d need to increase their food stocks to accommodate the increased population¡­ a population that had already proven to have elements that were undisciplined, disruptive malcontents among their number, as well as people who continued to allow such behavior to continue.


    So either she''d be spending more of the summer building things and making all the infrastructure she''d already built in River''s Fork go to waste, one way or another¡­ or she could risk her life, and by extension the existence of the demesne, in trying to kill this beast.


    ¡­


    It was a very difficult, aggravating decision.


    And as such, best she made it quickly so she''d have as much time as possible to make the preparations for mitigating the difficulties presented by her options.


    Unfortunately, she knew what she would choose, even if she didn''t want to.


    After all, despite how much she wanted to shirk them¡­ she had her responsibilities.


    She would simply have to keep herself as safe as possible.

 332 - Seeling Is Not Shirking My Responsibilities!

    "I''ll build the trap. Find me a place we can lure the beast so that I can anchor the bindings in place," Lori declared after breakfast the next day.


    "Uh, are you all right, Great Binder?" Riz said, making a vaguely concerned face.


    The non-sequitur made Lori frown. "Of course I am. Why do you ask?"


    "You seem to be breathing heavily. And you''re clenching your hand so hard it''s shaking."


    She looked down at her hand. Ah. So she was. Why was that happening? Lori made her hand relax, entwining her fingers together. Much better. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "As I was saying, I will build the trap. Find me a place we can lure the beast so that I can anchor the bindings in place."


    "What sort of location do you need, Great Binder?"


    Lori considered the question. Given how she aimed to construct her trap¡­"Someplace close to the river would be best, relatively flat, and preferably twice the beast''s length in diameter so its whole body can be caught. I''ll be bringing rocks to anchor the trap to in any case." She''d debated how she would trigger the trap, whether she should be close enough to activate it or use a wire, but had ultimately decided neither was necessary. "I need to be within sight of the area of the trap to be able to activate it, but far enough that the beast can''t reach me. The most reliable way it can''t reach me is if I were in the middle of the river."


    Whatsisname¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªKolinh slowly nodded. "I''ll inform the hunters to look out for a suitable spot. We''ll need to scout the area so we know where the beast likes to drink, and when. It will make it easier to set up the trap."


    "How long will that take?"


    "Ideally, it will be a few days, but¡­ I will ask the hunters."


    "Don''t send them to scout until you get back to me on the matter," Lori said. "In the meantime, send out a party to go seeling in River''s Fork and ONLY seeling." Lori hesitated, then sighed. "Shanalorre, can you please inquire with Karina if she will be amenable to joining them. Emphasize it''s purely voluntary."


    "As it happens, I have a petition from Karina asking if she may be allowed to visit River''s Fork to go seeling there," Shanalorre said blandly. "I was going to raise the matter once we finished this discussion, but as it has become relevant¡­"


    Lori managed not to wince even as she nodded. Her sole taxpayer was very¡­ enthusiastic when it came to seeling and seel meat. Having to ask the young girl to use her talents and enthusiasm to keep River''s Fork from starving¡ªagain¡ªwould have felt far too much like asking her to work, a guilt that was only slightly mitigated by the fact that the girl was apparently volunteering. It felt still felt too much like taking the girl''s time to rest and relax for Lori''s own benefit. "Why is she asking to do that?"


    "She heard that River''s Fork has having problems with food again, and approached me for more details. After I explained, she put forward her petition. Well, she had the idea for it, and I suggested I put it forward as a petition on her behalf, in keeping with established practices."


    The brat had petitioned for it, Lori reminded herself. The brat had petitioned for it¡­ "Very well. Inform her that she may go to River''s Fork to go seeling there. She''ll be traveling with the party we are sending."


    There was an eager exclamation behind her that Lori ignored.


    "Uh, Great Binder, shouldn''t we inform Karina''s parents first?" Riz said. "So they don''t get worried about her not being in the demesne? They probably haven''t given their permission for her to go."


    Lor''s back straightened. "Why? It''s Karina''s petition, and if she wants to travel to another demesne, she has every right to."


    Riz stared back for a moment, then sighed. "Um, please just let me inform them first, Great Binder? I''m sure Karina would want to tell her she''s going anyway."


    "I don''t see why it should matter."


    "I believe it''s what Lord Rian would classify as a ''dealing with people'' matter, Great Binder," Shanalorre interjected.


    "Yes!" Riz exclaimed. "Yes, that''s exactly it! Let me deal with this, Great Binder. I''ll just speak to them the way Rian would, and then there won''t be any problems with Karina going seeling."


    Lori gave her a flat look, but rolled her eyes and waved a hand dismissively. "Fine, fine, take care of it. Shanalorre, I''ll leave informing Karina to you."


    "Yes, Great Binder." She glanced over Lori''s shoulder. "Karina, the Great Binder approved your petition, conditional on your parent''s approval."


    "Thanks, Shasha!"


    Lori ignored that. "Kolinh, I need a wild choker."


    "A¡­ wild choker, Great Binder?"


    "Yes. I need something to test the binding I''ll be using for the trap."


    "I presume you don''t mean the ones we''ve been raising, Great Binder?"


    Huh. She''d forgotten about those. "Wait, did those survive the dragon?"


    "Yes, Great Binder. Lord Rian had them and the sweetbugs moved to the third level, where they were penned in their own tunnels."


    Lori considered that, then sighed. She''d have to remember to make dedicated storage spaces for their domesticated chokers and sweetbugs. "Then yes, I don''t mean them. Mildly injured chokers are fine. I just need them alive enough to kill."


    "I¡­ will see what I can do, Great Binder. "


    This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Lori nodded. "Very well. Are there any other matters?"


    Riz and Kolinh looked at each other.


    "Given the current lack of ready meat due to the hunters being temporarily reassigned, should we suspend or increase the processing of smoked and cure meat, Great Binder?" Shanalorre asked. "I would recommend the latter if we will need to provide meat to River''s Fork for the near-future. They weigh less and pack more heavily compared to frozen meat, as well as require less involvement on your part to bring to River''s Fork, since they won''t need to be kept cold."


    Lori considered that. "I thought the curing shed was already operating at capacity?"


    "I have spoken with¡ª" Shanalorre paused a moment, then shook her head, "¡ªthe individual operating the facility. He says that he might be able to fit in a little more meat into the smoking racks."


    Eventually, Lori shook her head. "Have him continue production at the current rate so far, but start getting what smoked and cured meat we currently have ready for transfer to River''s Fork."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Noted, Great Binder."


    "With the Great Binder''s permission, we can put a temporary halt to logging and sawing activities and have people divert to seeling," Kolinh said. "That should mitigate most of the impact of reassigning our hunters to look for this beast, and the number of people we throw at it should make up for young Karina being in River''s Fork."


    Lori considered that. "No," she said. "No, I''ll handle seeling today. You''ll need time and people to get me my chokers, after all. And it''s been a while since I''ve been seeling. I could use the relaxation."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori knew how to seel. She''d once spent an unproductive day learning to do so, cutting her own seeling rod, sharpening it, learning how to stand in wait, how to account for the water bending the light that passed through it when aiming for her prey¡­


    She wasn''t any good at it, but she knew how.


    That didn''t mean she didn''t know how to catch seels. She just did it her way.


    After all, what was the point of being a Dungeon Binder if you couldn''t indulge yourself every so often?


    The sun was merely pleasantly warm instead of agonizingly hot as it shone down at an angle, not yet mid-morning. The spot that the children usually went to catch seels was as loud and full of prey as usual, but already the children were sweating, and a few had set aside their seeling rods and shirts and had dipped into the river to cool themselves. Given how much they were exposing their backs and arms, Shanalorre would probably have more supplicants asking to be healed of sunburns again.


    While the children were far more experienced at catching seels than they were a year ago, the sinuous fursh had also seemed to have gotten better at avoiding them. They could have caught some of the younger seels easily enough, but many seemed to be avoiding that now. Lori wasn''t sure if it was because they''d realized targeting the juveniles would eventually reduce the seel''s numbers or if it stemmed from competitiveness in getting bigger and bigger seels.


    Off to the side, a young man hiding in the shade of a tree was looking bored as he watched over the children, and Lori vaguely recalled something about how the children weren''t allowed to clean the seels on their own because that work involved knives¡­


    Lori ignored the children looking at her, though she glanced at the ones soaking in the river. Some were propelling themselves with their arms, slowly swimming through the water. One was splashing loudly, seemingly trying to move his arms as quickly as possible. He moved through the water quicker than the others, but it was only by a small margin.


    She found a place to stand where she could look out over the seels. Most were in the water, although some were resting their upper bodies on rocks that broke the surface of the river. It seemed an awkward way to keep their heads above water, though Lori saw that some seemed to be watching the shore. She supposed it was how they kept an eye out for beasts? It made sense. They had to rest at some point, and there were only so many rocks in the middle of the river.


    Narrowing her eyes slightly, she focused on her awareness of the wisps in her demesne. The earthwisps mixed with waterwisps, darkwisps and minute amounts of airwisps that permeated the ground, defining the half-sphere that was the lower part of her demesne. The airwisps mixed with lightwisps, firewisps, small amounts of darkwisps and minute amounts of waterwisps and earthwisps that made up the above-ground sphere of her demesne. The long, flowing length of waterwisps that was the river, and the voids of wisps that were scattered through her sphere of awareness, voids she couldn''t perceive because they were in the body of a living being.


    Those were what she focused on now, the voids in the river that were long and undulating and sinuous¡­ surrounded by waterwisps.


    And differing amounts of all the rest as well, but that wasn''t important at the moment.


    She focused on one in particular, a long and bulky adult seel specimen swimming in a relatively open section of river. Relatively, because there were seels within a pace of it, but above the water, it looked like it was alone, swimming just enough to not be taken downriver by the current and keeping its head up.


    Lori reached through her connection to her core and claimed the waterwisps around the seel. The way it moved though the water would normally have made it hard to keep it surrounded by the wisps she claimed¡­ so she just claimed all the waterwisps in all directions for five paces.


    Then she formed all the waterwisps into a binding to increase the viscosity of the water, trapping the seel within her binding¡­ along with parts of several seels that also intersected the water that she had claimed. The binding made the water thick and almost solid, and was the same one Lori used with the water she gathered from the bottoms of boats so she could throw it over the side. Some of the trapped seels were able to wiggle out of the viscous water, but the target she had aimed for and a couple of others that had been trapped headfirst in her binding, and their forelimbs, body shape and the viscosity were preventing them from extracting themselves. She claimed the waterwisps around them as well, adding them to the binding that made the water viscous.


    She let out a sigh at how easy it was to claim more waterwisps in the river, and using them to impart force on the viscous glob of water and trapped seels to push it towards the riverbank, careful to avoid the children in the water. This¡­ she''d missed this. Not needing to reach out though metal contacts, no slowly having to claim outwards from a point


    because she was limited in what she could do. This¡­ this was the power of having a core! No, more than power! This was the convenience!


    With a surge of force redirected from the river''s current, the large, viscous glob of water was pushed up to a stretch of unoccupied rocky riverbank, oozing like a large blob of slime. Huh. The blob was bigger than the she thought at more than seven paces wide, although that was from getting squashed down by its own weight. The children present immediately noticed, and proved themselves to not be idiots as they immediately darted back out of its way or, even better, realized it wasn''t going to go anywhere near them and stayed put, but looked on curiously.


    Lori anchored the waterwisps at the bottom to the rock as she reshaped the waterwisps, using the momentum of the push to keep it rolling. Some of the children pointed at the seels that had been caught in her viscous blob, which were rolling around inside. Lori carefully moved the three trapped seals apart¡ªtwo of them were adult specimens, while one was slightly smaller, possibly a young adult¡ªbefore she altered the binding of waterwisps she had trapping them to cause the water to solidify into ice, carefully deleting the firewisps this state change expelled out into the air. It was already hot, she didn''t need to make it any hotter.


    Shoving the three seels trapped in ice between some convenient trees so they wouldn''t slide or move around, the binding keeping the water solid and not exchanging heat with the environment, Lori turned back to the river to capture more seels.


    Hopefully the brat would show up as some point. She wasn''t sure where the seels were supposed to go next after they got caught.

 333 - Reading Is Not Shirking My Responsibilities!

    Lori never thought she''d see the brat looking envious. It seemed she hadn''t been able to join the hunters who had gone to River''s Fork to seel for meat there. Well, there was still tomorrow. The girl alternated between directing that envious gaze at Lori and pointing at the seels trapped in ice that Lori had trapped and dragged ashore, visibly counting them even as she kept losing track of which ones she''d already counted and having to start over. The only reason Lori had stopped pulling seels out of the water was because she''d run out of space to put them where they wouldn''t start sliding around because of the ice on them.


    Still, the brat didn''t let her clear envy affect her. "All right everyone, find a club or a rock," the brat called out to the other children. "They''re big, but they''ll still stop moving once you hit their head enough times! Loveld, you go run and get Auntie Armis, tell her we have a lot of big seels. Then find uncle Kolinh and tell him we need help here."


    One of the smaller boy reluctantly put down his rock¡ªa little thing that fit in one hand¡ªand went to do as asked, while the brat turned to Lori. "Wiz Lori, can you take the ice off their heads so we can hit them? Kuya Vov can start gutting them for us when they''re properly dead." Off to the side, the young man who''d been keeping an eye on the children had a resigned look on his face as he sharpened his belt knife with a rock.


    Unfortunately, it wasn''t as simple as that. While the juveniles and adolescents were easily killed by the blows to the head that the children could perform on them, the adults were much more resilient. They were also very loud, making many of the children reticent about approaching them. Try as they might, the children didn''t seem to be very successful at trying to kill the seels whose heads Lori had uncovered from the ice.


    Fortunately, people started to arrive, no doubt called by the boy the brat had sent. There were exclamations at the sight of so many seels trapped in ice, but people quickly got to work. The children were dislodged as adults handled dealing with the seels. After a quick debate, shirts were removed and folded so that people could start pushing and guiding the trapped seels away from that part of the shore.


    "Best we don''t bleed them all here, Great Binder," Kolinh explained. "Otherwise the seels may start avoiding this place because they remember the smell. And it''ll be a mess if we start butchering them here. We don''t want the chokers to have any reason to come around to where the children are."


    "I''ll take your word for it," Lori said blandly. "Get these things turned into food and prepare to send a batch to River''s Fork. If not today when we pick up the hunters there, then tomorrow when they go back." She titled her head for a moment. "Will this be enough to match what the hunting parties would normally been able to gather?"


    "That and a bit more, Great Binder," Kolinh said. "Are you considering taking over seeling for the demesne for the duration?"


    Lori hadn''t been until that point, but now that the idea had been proposed¡­ "Only while the hunters are occupied with tracking down the beast in question," Lori said. "In the long term, there are better uses of my time. See to it they know this and that they don''t take their time with finding this beast."


    "Understood, Great Binder."


    She''d¡­ have to do this again tomorrow, wouldn''t she? Lori eyed the river, but at the moment she was quite spoiled for choice when it came to seels to catch. Well, it wasn''t that bad. She could do it again tomorrow. Still, she couldn''t help thinking that another thing that she had done to exert her power had found its way to possibly becoming a repetitive exercise¡­


    Lori followed the seels, but need not have bothered. Hammers, chisels and knives chipped at the ice around their heads, and blades were thrust through their furry necks until the seels'' aggravating wailing cut off, and they were allowed to bleed out onto the soil around the demesne''s fields. She didn''t know why they were doing that there. Perhaps the blood helped improve the fertility of the soil or something. Benches were used to raise up one end of the trapped seels to facilitate the exsanguination.


    She left them to it. She didn''t want to be around when enough of the blood had been drained that people would start with the butchering in earnest.


    Ah, perhaps that was it. So that it wouldn''t be far to carry the seels'' inedible innards to the soil they''d be fertilizing.


    She let out another sigh as she realized she should have kept one of the seels for herself to test out the lethality of the binding she was planning to use in the trap to kill the beast haunting River''s Fork''s outskirts. For a moment, she considered going back to the river and catching a fresh seel¡­


    Shaking her head, Lori headed back to her room. No, no, she didn''t want to be outside once the smell started. With so many seels being butchered at once, it would be nothing like the more usual daily butchering. No, she was going to lock herself in her room, and¡­uh¡­ ah, she''d check her almanac Maybe there was a binding there whose warnings would tell her how to properly convert it into something lethal. While she had it in mind to use lightningwisps, she was willing to alter her plan if a better binding was brought to her attention.


    This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    And reading in her Dungeon would hopefully be far enough away to keep her from noticing the smell.


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    As much as she enjoyed reading, Lori didn''t really have much time to read her almanac. She had to work most days, and on nights that she had to stay up, it was to think of whatever thing Rian had brought to her attention. As much as she would have wanted to read the book cover to cover, she really couldn''t afford the distraction of immersing herself in its words.


    Oh, when she had first gotten it, she''d skimmed though the pages of its flow diagrams to get ideas for bindings, and she''d read over its listing of edible flora, which she''d copied with lightwisps to the walls of the entryway so that people could identify them as well when they went looking for food in the woods. Beyond that, however, it had become a reference that she checked when there was a matter that her knowledge, Rian''s and those he asked for help from, were lacking in. It was where she''d found the binding that used lightningwisps to repel bugs, for example.


    It wasn''t a well-loved book she''d read through completely several times before and had an idea of where everything was. As such, she still had to check the pages listing the topics the book contained every time she was looking for a topic. Lori had just carefully turned towards the listing of contents and was slowly paging towards the section listing the various flow diagrams in the book when her mind caught up with her eyes, and she turned back a couple of pages to stare at a listing she''d seen before but had never read before now, as she hadn''t been interested in it.


    Beastiary, the heading of the section said.


    Beneath that was a listing of what might have been¡­ names? Someone had fun with them, that was certain. She recognized some as the names from seminal works of fiction, usually of the ''Deadspoken creations turns against its creator'' kind of stories, though others were of the ''young boy-or-girl finds escaped Deadspoken creation and makes friends with it'' genre that her mothers had bought for her when she''d been younger. A few were names from history and folk lore, like ''Iskandaliyalos'', from the Empire Binder''s storied construct that emitted deadly piercing light from its eyes, or Typhon, the mythical progenitor of dragons¡ªthough that latter was usually conflated with the storm moon in those silly superstitions.


    She changed her plans, noting the page listing and opening the book there instead. To her relief, the entries had illustrations, well-detailed line drawings that showed the proportions and profile of the beasts listed, as well as a scale comparing its size to the average person. Entries were organized by average body length, a decision that briefly baffled Lori, before she took a moment to think about it and realized that it was unlikely that someone had studied the local beasts in enough detail to sort them by the long-established classifications vitalogists used. Classifying by length, however, sorted the beasts by an obvious metric.


    Lori paged forward, remembering that the beast in question was between ten and twelve paces in length. She started somewhere in the middle of the entries, but on seeing the length of the beast she opened to being a mere six to seven paces long¡ªit looked like a chasmos, but the two long horns running down its jaw that went far past the four-legged beast''s beak¡ªshe skipped ahead some more.


    Eventually, she found what she was looking for. At least, it was the right range for length, as the almanac listed it as being between ten and eleven paces long. Its illustration showed it in profile with its tail and head outstretched, and a drawing of a koncallos below it in the same pose as a comparison. It was this beast whose name she had noticed in the listing, the one that had been given the grandiose¡ªbut on consideration very worrying¡ªdesignation of a ''Typhon Beast''.


    As she looked at the illustration of it, Lori didn''t see what was so worrying. Typhons were about the same length and height as a koncallos but¡ªthe things weighed how much?-!


    She stared at the estimates of its weight, which on average was four times that of a koncallos at a calculated six to seven taugrains. That was¡­ certainly far, far bulkier. She thought that the larger outline was from a thick coating of feathers, not significantly greater body mass¡­


    She examined the illustration closely now. The Typhon''s head was far larger than the koncallos'' in comparison to its body, with visibly larger teeth. She read the article, then did a double take. Its teeth were how long? That was big enough to be used as a spearhead without needing to be shaped! The more she read, the more intimidating the beast seemed. It apparently like to kill exclusively using its jaws to cause traumatic damage, which given it had teeth longer than many knives was probably a very effective tactic.


    There were more differences between it and a koncallos. The typhon beast''s forelimbs were smaller, proportionately, compared to the other beasts, and they were apparently not used for latching on to its prey. The typhon also had three rows of increasingly larger knife-like growths running along its spine from near the tip of its tail to the back of its head, with the largest growths concentrated at the vicinity of its shoulder blades. The article hypothesized these were some sort of natural defense against other typhon beasts, though it was listed as speculation since no one had yet witnessed two typhon beasts fighting.


    The article was also full of warnings to not try to engage typhon beasts, as they had been known to swallow¡­ people¡­ whole¡­ and that the beasts were¡­ uh, was best engaged by¡­ several wizards working in concert.


    ¡­


    Lori forced herself to keep reading, even as her hands started to shake and she felt herself breaking in a sweat that had nothing to do with exertion. Strangely, the almanac''s article recommended fences as the best means of keeping the beast away, especially from frequented water courses, with thorn fences being the most effective. What? Ah, there was a reference to a flow diagram in the book, illustrating how a Deadspeaker could reshape wood into the aforementioned thorn fence¡­


    There was a distressing lack of detail as to how to get the typhon beast out of an area it had already occupied, though there was a note that the smell of typhon beast urine repelled most beasts¡­ and ending with a declaration that the reader should report all typhon beast sightings to their Dungeon Binder so that¡­ they could ask¡­ other demesne¡­ for assistance¡­


    ¡­


    That sounded very ominous for Lori''s chances of killing this by herself.

 334 - Testing For The Trap

    Lori was surprised to find there were not as many people as usual in the dining hall at lunch. The children were there, hair wet from either bath or a quick dip in the river, but many tables seemed depleted, leaving mostly women present. Even Riz was absent, with only Umu and Mikon sitting across from Lori. Mikon didn''t seem worried, so nothing bad had probably happened to her temporary-Rian, but it was curious.


    "Where''s Erzebed?" she asked Mikon.


    "She''s helping with butchering the seels, your Bindership" Mikon said. "The ice you trapped them in is melting, so before they break out, Riz and the others are going to get them cleaned and gutted. Because of the smells, everyone''s skipping lunch so their stomachs are empty. They''ll eat after they finish and bathe."


    Ah. She supposed she had taken a lot of seels out of the river, which would need a lot of people to process. "I see. Inform Erzebed that I need to speak to her at her earliest convenience," Lori said. Then she paused. "No, I will clarify that I need to speak to her after she''s done eating," she amended.


    "I''ll tell her, your Bindership."


    She nodded, and went back to her food. It had just the right amount of salt.


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    "Great Binder? You wished to speak to me?"


    Lori looked up from the almanac at the knock on the door. She''d been reading the bestiary entries, mostly to have something to do, and had been amused to find that the beasts they called chokers were also in the bestiary¡­ as ''chokers''. "Enter, it''s open." Riz opened the door, stepping in carefully and closing the door behind her. Her temporary-Rian was looking recently bathed, though she still had sweat beading on her brow. All in all, she looked as refreshed as to be expected given how hot it was outside. "Erzebed. We have a hunter who actually saw the beast that''s driving others beasts away from the area around River''s Fork, correct?"


    Riz nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. Ralii was the one who saw it."


    "You know I won''t know who that is," Lori said. "Is he in the demesne right now or is he one of those who went to River''s Fork earlier?"


    "He''s in River''s Fork right now, Great Binder. What do you need him for?"


    "There are illustrations of beasts in this almanac. I need him to point out if the beast he saw is any of the ones here."


    Her temporary-Rian blinked. "I''ll tell him when he gets back, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Tell me how the butchering went. Were you able to process all of the seels?"


    "Yes, Great Binder. We managed to butcher all thirty-one seels, and they''re all in the cold rooms now. The furs are going to be cured once the other hunters get back."


    Lori frowned. "Why do they need to get back?"


    "The hunters are the ones who run the tannery, Great Binder. They''re usually not all out hunting at once, but since they were sent to River''s Fork to add to the foodstores¡ª"


    "I understand. Can you tell me how much food we have, or do I need to ask Shanalorre that?"


    "The Lady Binder would be able to tell you the exact amount, but from what I saw, the cold rooms were full. Completely full. We had to bring in some benches so that the meat wouldn''t just be on the floor when we filled up the some of the walkways between shelves. It''s not going to stay that way for all that long, at the rate we eat, but the cold rooms are the most full that they''ve ever been."


    Lori tilted her head, then nodded as she finally closed the almanac in her hands, sliding the book under her pillow. "Tell¡­" she reached into her pocket and drew out a rock, checking the name on it, "Kolinh that he''s to prioritize meat that''s been in the cold rooms longer for sending to River''s Fork. Tomorrow, send Karina with some volunteers to seel in River''s Fork, while the rest of the hunters scout to find the beast so I can trap and kill it." She began to put on her boots.


    "I''ll tell him, Great Binder. Uh, do you need me for anything else?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "No, you may go."


    From the sound of it, she had more work to do this afternoon. So much still-warm, fresh meat in their cold rooms meant she should check the bindings of firewisps that delete heat could handle the load. She might need to make solidified and liquefied air to help with the heat. And she just knew that people had placed obstructions that blocked the airways that kept temperatures even all across the cold rooms.


    Her boots in place, Lori went to deal with this.


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    She checked over the cold rooms, temporarily anchoring bindings of airwisps and firewisps in places to compensate for the pathways blocked by cooling seel meat. The meat was cooling, but she could feel little concentrations of firewisps deep in the meat. She claimed those firewisps, forming them into a binding that deleted heat so that they''d cool from the inside.


    It probably wasn''t necessary, but between the sheer amount of still-warm meat that had been placed in the cold rooms, the number of people who''d been in and out of the rooms, and the how the doors had no doubt been left open, a lot of heat had entered the room where they kept their food. Best to mitigate that heat so that dustlife didn''t start growing on their food and making them sick.


    Riz found her in her Dungeon''s baths at about late afternoon as she was making ice for River''s Fork''s food storage. She was needing to use water from the reservoir, so that it wouldn''t be caustic and potentially damage or poison the food it was meant to cool. It was a bit early in the week, but she might as well, and it would keep the meat that would be transported there from getting too hot. "Great Binder?"


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    "What is it, Erzebed?"


    "Kolinh is here with the chokers you asked for."


    Lori blinked in confusion before she recalled what she had ordered earlier this morning. "He didn''t bring them inside my Dungeon, did he?" she said.


    "They''re outside, Great Binder," Riz assured her.


    She nodded, relieved. "I''ll be right out, I just need to set these aside in the cold room for tomorrow."


    Riz glanced at the blocks of ice. "Do you need help with that, Great Binder?"


    "I can handle it. Tell him to take the chokers to the dock, I''ll experiment on them there."


    "Do you want me there too, Great Binder?"


    Lori considered that, then nodded. "Yes, that might be needed. Are the chokers injured?"


    "Probably a little bruised, and their jaws have been tied shut, but they''re all there."


    "Good. I''ll be out shortly."


    Lori slid the block of ice she''d made in the baths towards the nearest cold room, the binding on waterwisps on it keeping it solid, and not taking in heat from its surroundings. It didn''t need the cold, but it was a good place to keep the ice for the evening.


    Once she''d anchored the block to the floor so that it wouldn''t move, she went out to see the chokers. The sun was low in the sky, but she could still see it above the trees, so she still had perhaps an hour of natural light to work with. Not that she couldn''t make her own light, but that would mean being somewhere she could anchor the bindings, and she didn''t want to do this inside her Dungeon.


    Outside, she found Riz, and¡­ uh¡ªshe reached into her belt pouch and checked the rock¡ªKolinh were waiting for her, as were a few men. The chokers were there, as promised. Each choker had been tied to stripped branches, hanging by their limbs and tail, which had been bound to the branch with ropeweed cords. Their heads were similarly tied to the branch by the cord muzzling them, holding them in place.


    For a moment, Lori considered how they were secured. She''d thought they''d only have a leash around their necks, but this was much more secure.


    "How dangerous would it be to tie one of them by their neck to the post at the end of the dock?" Lori asked. "I need to test how my trap affects their ability to move."


    Kolinh and the men made reluctant faces, eyeing the chokers. "We should be able to do it, Great Binder," he said, in the tones of a man who would rather not.


    Lori had no sympathy. If she might have to try and kill one of those typhon beasts by herself, he could put up with a little inconvenience. "Do it, then. In the meantime, lay one of the chokers at the foot of the stairs on the other side of the wall. Erzebed, warn off people so that they don''t get close."


    She received different variants of "Yes, Great Binder" as Kolinh and the men with him got to work.


    Unfortunately, they couldn''t just lay down one of the restrained chokers on the ground. When they did, it started flopping around like a landed seel, the branch it was on rattling loudly, and the men picked it up before it could potentially escape. In the end, Lori softened the ground¡ªit was mostly packed dirt at this point, and she might as well solidify it properly¡ªso they could stick one end of the branch into it to hold the branch upright, the beast hanging upside-down to try to disorient it.


    Once it was secured, Lori drew some lightningwisps from her body. The tip of the smallest finger of her left hand became numb and unresponsive for a moment, before feeling returned as the lightningwisps moved back to that part of her body. The lightningwisps she drew out were formed into a simple binding that sent weak, invisible lightning flowing back and forth though the air between her hands. With every passage, lightningwisps were left in the lightning''s wake, which she claimed and added to the binding, making more and more lightningwisps until she had enough for what she needed.


    The choker was struggling on its stick as it tried to turn its head the right way around. Lori ignored it as she formed the lightningwisps into a binding. What she made was the modification of the binding that kept bugs out of her dungeon, the one she had used to try and protect her Dungeon and the dragon shelter she''d been in from dragonborn abominations.


    She''d tested this binding before, on chokers, bugs and seels. While she knew it would kill those things, it didn''t do so immediately. The larger the creature was, the longer it took, though it served wonderfully as a deterrent from the pain it inflicted. Since only bug-sized abominations would have managed to enter through the air vents, the binding had been calibrated to bring quick death to anything of that size.


    Since the possible typhon beast was much, much larger, she needed to refamiliarize herself with how she needed to calibrate the binding. Lori anchored the binding around the choker on the branch, extending the binding upward so that some parts of the bindings passed through the beast. Since she''d already claimed those wisps, she could perceive them even though the wisps were technically inside a living creature, which lets her continue to form the binding.


    "Erzebed, I need a rock," she said. "Something the size of my palm."


    Thankfully, Riz didn''t ask any strange questions, instead quickly heading towards the nearby river bank and coming up with a damp rock. Lori accepted the rock, claiming and binding the earthwisps and making the rocks soften so she could stretch it out into a ring that she slipped over the top of the branch before tightening and solidifying the rock. She then anchored the binding of lightningwisps to that rock, giving the binding of lightningwisps a conical shape.


    Lori began imbuing the still deactivated binding as she calibrated it so that the lightningwisps would create lightning that was on par with what she would use if she were trying to kill something. This would normally be far too inefficient, since such powerful lightning would expend a great amount of imbuement for two to three heartbeats¡ªwhich would be far too much and very inefficient for their defenses¡ªbut as a trap which she would heavily imbue¡­


    Well, they would be trying to kill a very large beast.


    She imbued the binding and kept imbuing it as she nodded to be man who''d been holding on to the top of the branch. "Let go and step back," she ordered. "No, well back. This far back. Erzebed, keep people away." Lori turned and began to walk towards the laundry area, moving to stand behind one of the few remaining stone walls from the renovations she had made during the winter. She didn''t want the glare that would result from the lightning blazing in her eyes.


    The fact that she''d hidden behind a wall seemed to inspire something, because people moved to stand well-back.


    Lori gave the struggling choker tied to the stick one last look before she stepped back and activated the binding of lightningwisps.


    There was a flash of light that briefly painted the ground on either side of the stone wall Lori was standing behind white and a simultaneous explosion that sounded very much like thunder. As her ears rang, she noted that the binding of lightningwisps had dissolved, all its imbuement consumed, and that firewisps had radiated out of where the binding had been. As she quickly began claiming the loose lightningwisps in the air, forming them back into a binding, Lori carefully leaned around the stone wall.


    The stick to which the choker had been secured had been shattered, and a shorter, blackened, smoking stump rose up from the ground where it had been. A crumpled, smoking heap that had formerly been a choker was next to it, very much dead.


    Through the ringing in her ears, she could hear very loud swearing and cries that sounded like something was choking.


    Lori stared at the result of her little experiment.


    She would definitely have to alter the calibration for her final trap. The binding consumed its imbuement far too fast. The lightning would have to be weaker and over a longer period, unless she wanted her trap to explode. And given her trap would need to be at least twelve paces in diameter, and almost certainly far larger to fit all of the beast she meant to trap, and no doubt many trees as well¡­


    She couldn''t have all of that explode, especially since she''d need to be in line of sight to be able to trigger the trap.


    Well, she had two more chokers. She was certain she could narrow it down to something more reasonable.

 335 - Further Testing for the Trap

    Lori had to change the binding of lightningwisps so that all the imbuement wasn''t consumed almost instantly. In hindsight, she should have realized putting that element directly from the offensive lightning binding would have resulted in something like that. Usually, the imbuement was consumed in getting the lightning to traverse the air between herself and the target she was aiming at, but since the binding she had made would have the lightning travelling along the lines of anchored lightningwisps instead of through the air between loose lightningwisps¡­


    Well, if nothing else, she knew about this binding now, so if she ever needed a sudden violent explosion and she had no water nearby to turn into steam, she''d know what to do.


    As the blackened, still smoking corpse of the first choker was removed by¡­. someone¡­ Lori began rebuilding her binding with the lightning she claimed in the air after the explosion. She started with the binding for killing dragonborn abominations, calibrating the lightningwisps to produce lightning of the intensity that according to the flow diagram for the bug repellant binding was the minimum for being instantly lethal to most bugs, then increased it even further towthat she remembered reading in a novel was lethal to people¡­ and doubled that just to be sure so that it would be lethal to beasts. She then limited the output of the binding so that the lightning produced wouldn''t exceed this intensity.


    To try to be more efficient, Lori began going over the reworked binding, designating along which flows of lightningwisps lightning would manifest along as she imbued the binding. There was no need for the lightning to actually touch the ground and then sharply arc, for example. That, however, lead to making more flows of lightningwisps for the lightning to follow, which took some more time.


    When she tested the binding, there was a crackling sound in the air, and brilliant white arcs of lightning appeared, producing lightwisps, firewisps and more lightningwisps as they formed glowing lines above the ground between the points where she had anchored the binding. Lori flinched, looking away so she wasn''t looking directly at the lightning, which was quite bright. Already, its distinctive smell was rising in the air. Keeping the binding imbued, she took the anchor point in the middle of the binding and moved it upwards. The binding changed from a bright flickering web into a cone as one point began to rise up out of the ground


    Satisfied, Lori anchored the point back on the ground and claimed the earthwisps in the middle of the binding to soften the dirt. "All right," she ordered, "stick the choker''s branch into the ground like the other one." Lori looked around, but the stone ring on the first branch seemed to have gone flying. She sighed. "Erzebed, find me another rock!"


    The men carrying the branch that the second choker was secured to between them didn''t comply right away. Instead, both were looking at Riz, making strange wide-eyed faces that she didn''t know how to interpret. Riz also hadn''t immediately gone to the river to get her a new rock.


    "Uh, Great Binder, is this really necessary?" Riz said, sounding strangely reluctant to speak.


    "Yes Erzebed, I need the rock to properly anchor the binding," Lori said. "Get me one."


    "I meant doing¡­ whatever it was you did to that choker," Riz said. "It just¡­" Riz''s hands made expanding movements in lieu of actually speaking.


    "''Exploded'', Erzebed, the word you''re looking for is ''exploded''," Lori informed her. "No, that wasn''t ideal. I was trying to kill it, not explode it. Even if it still died anyway, that wasn''t how I wanted it to die."


    "It¡­ wasn''t?"


    "No. I was trying to kill it while leaving its body intact. I''m not sure how much of what was left could be recovered for meat. Hopefully, the next one would be recoverable, once I have a rock," Lori said pointedly.


    That finally motivated Riz to move. She shrugged a the two men and headed for the river to get another rock.


    Lori directed her gaze at the two in question, who still hadn''t moved. "Stick the branch into the ground," she said, pointing at the spot she''d softened. "I don''t have all day. I want to get this done before dinner. Come on, stop delaying, move!"


    The two men moved reluctantly, which was partly understandable because the choker on the branch between them grew agitated as it was carried closer to where the previous choker had been unfortunately exploded. Nearby, the charred stump of the previous bench was still sticking out of the ground, blackened but no longer smoking. She''d have to remove that later, but right now conducting this experiment was more important.


    Experiment¡­ colors, she hadn''t been taking notes, had she? Ugh¡­ well, too late now. If she slowed down to get a tablet and start on the documentation¡­ no, dinner was more important.


    Kolinh and the men who''d been with him came up from the dock, and from the sounds they''d managed to secure the choker to the post as she''d asked. Some of the men had bleeding injuries on their arms, including Kolinh.


    "The choker has been secured, Great Binder," Kolinh reported, glancing at the two men sinking one end of the branch into the softened ground. "With your permission, I''ll lead the injured to the Lady Binder to get healed. Beast wounds get infected very easily."


    Lori nodded. "Go, deal with it. We can''t afford for anyone to get sick. You two, sink that deeper. You''ll feel it when it hits the¡ªthere, good, you''ve reached it. Now hold the branch steady so I can secure it in place!"


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    She hardened the earthwisps to hold the branch in place and upright as Riz finally returned with another rock. The two men stepped back hastily as Lori took the rock, claiming and softening the earthwisps on it so she could make another ring of stone on the upper end of the branch, the anchored flows of lightningwisps to it from the binding she had laid down previously. As she worked, people began to move away from the beast, probably worried about another explosion. There shouldn''t be this time, however. The previous explosion had been from the intense heat created by the lightningwisps inside the beast, turning the water in its body into steam, and possibly igniting the very air. Admittedly, she wasn''t sure about that last, it had happened too fast for her to perceive.


    Once she was satisfied at how the flows the lightningwisps defined, Lori turned and headed back to the stone wall. Other people were standing well back. While she didn''t expect it to explode again, she didn''t want to deal with the light burning her eyes.


    Keeping the binding imbued, she activated it.


    The lack of an immediate explosion was a promising sign. Instead, there was a bright light coming from around the stone wall. Lori tentatively looked around her obstruction with narrowed eyes, wishing she had some to to¡ª


    Oh.


    Claiming some of the lightwisps in the air, Lori created a binding to lower the intensity of the light passing through it, anchoring the binding to her eyes. She leaned back around the pillar, then calibrated the binding again until she could see the lines of lighting arching up from the ground to the ring of stone and back down again, passing through the beast in between. The beast was thrashing in its bonds, and there was the smell of burning feathers as some of its plumage started to char, but there were no open flames yet.


    Lori observed the beast''s darkened outline through the binding, but it didn''t seem to be dying yet. That wouldn''t do.


    She incrementally increased the intensity of the lightning by half.


    The beast began to thrash more violently, but thankfully the cords holding it in place remained strong¡­ although the rather distressing smell of burning reed told her that the cords were getting da¡ª


    And then she became aware of the wisps inside the beast. The firewisps in its muscles, the waterwisps in its blood, the earthwisps in its bones, teeth and claws, the darkwisps in its internal spaces. Lori deactivated the binding of lightningwisps, as well as the binding of lightwisps over her eyes as she carefully stepped closer to the now-dead beast. It was still twitching slightly, but Lori could see that was just random lightingwisps. Despite the smell, relatively few of its feathers had actually been burned, although most seemed to be smoking at the edges.


    As Lori got closer however, another smell hit her, and she nearly gagged. It seemed that the beast had lost control of its sphincter, and now waste was dribbling from its cloaca, and she hated the fact she managed to remember what that part was called. They could still recover its meat, right? The waste was outside, after all, and they were going to wash off that part anyway.


    "Erzebed, can the beast meat still be recovered?" Lori asked.


    There was no immediate reply. She blinked, looked around for her temporary Rian, who was staring at the dead beast. "Erzebed? Are you listening?"


    Riz gave a start, turning towards her. "S-sorry, Great Binder! What did you say?"


    Lori held back a sigh. "I asked if the meat from that is recoverable," she said, gesturing at the second dead choker.


    Her temporary-Rian''s gaze followed the gesture, and she shuddered slightly. "I¡­ think it''s still edible? But we''d need to cook it right away, and a choker isn''t much meat¡­"


    "Have them cook it separately from the stew and give it to Binder Shanalorre for her table, then," Lori said. The children would appreciate a little extra meat. "If you get it to them now, it should be ready with the rest of dinner." Hopefully.


    Riz nodded weakly. "Uh¡­ Onda, Enso, could the two of you take care of¡­ that?" she said, waving at the choker still mostly secured to the branch. Parts of the branch had been blackened and charred, and a few spots were glowing like embers and smoking, but the branch hadn''t actually caught fire.


    The two men who''d been carrying the choker approached it warily, making faces at the smell.


    "Grasp the branch securely, and I''ll soften the rock so you can put it out," Lori said. "Move quickly, I have one more experiment to do."


    The choker that had been tied at the dock didn''t start making its distinctive choking sounds that had garnered its kind their particular name, but Riz and the two looked in its direction anyway. All three shuddered for some reason.


    The two quickly grasped the branch, and Lori softened the stone beneath it, allowing them to pull up the length of wood to carry the choker on. The tail flopped loose, dragging along the ground since the cord securing it seemed to have burned off, but as the choker was dead that was no great problem.


    "Come back for the other choker, I should be done with it soon," Lori said.


    The three looked in the direction of the docks again. While the wall was blocking their view, they could finally hear the agitated choking sounds the small beast was making.


    As the two men carried the dead choker off, Lori headed towards the dock, collecting the binding of lightningwisps from where she''d anchored it. The calibration seemed workable, but death still hadn''t been instantaneous. She should double it and see if the choker died faster. The typhon beast was far, far larger than the choker, but hopefully this much lightning would at least neutralize it''s limbs so that it would stay still to be struck by more lightning. It was a factor that wasn''t obvious with the two bound chokers, which was why she''d had one unbound and simply tied to the post on the dock.


    Taking the binding of lightningwisps, she climbed the stairs over the floodwall¡ªcareful to step around the malodorous area where the second beast had voided itself¡ªuntil she could see the other choker. It was tied to the end of the dock as she''d instructed, a cord stretching from the post to a sort of harness that had been tied under its arms and around its chest. Its jaws were muzzled with more cord, as were its forelimbs. Despite this, it seemed to be trying to twist itself to reach towards the harness securing it in place, contorting its body to try to reach the cords with its forelimbs and jaws, despite the latter being muzzled.


    Lori began anchoring the lightningwisps on the stone dock, covering the extent of the area the choker seemed able to reach from the end of its cord leash, and then a little more just to be safe. There was no raised point she could anchor the lightningwisps to, so she had to maintain the highest point herself. It was an added effort, but since she would be continuing to imbue the binding as well as making adjustments if necessary. She made sure to have the flows of lightningwisps avoid the wooden post they used to secure their boats. It wouldn''t do to have it damaged.


    Once the binding was in place and imbued, Lori activated the binding of lightwisps still anchored to her eyes, darkening her vision.


    Then she activated the binding of lightningwisps.


    The last choker died much faster than the second.


    It still happened a bit too slowly though. She''d have to increase the intensity even more when she finally used this trap on the typhon beast.


    Well, at least it was done now. Lori turned to head to the dining hall for dinner, leaving the smoking choker corpse behind on the dock.

 336 - Studying The Problem Is Not Procrastinating

    Lori held the almanac in her hands as she kept it open for the hunter that she''d had Riz bring to the discussion after dinner. A new binding of lightwisps directly over the table shone down on the pages, since the man had said it was hard to see from where he was leaning over Shanalorre.


    "That looks like the beast I saw, your Bindership," he said after studying the illustration. "I wondered what the things on its back were, but they might have been spines."


    Colors and rainbows. "I see¡­" Lori said, having to restrain what she had initially wanted to say. "Spread the description among the others who will start looking for it tomorrow, and find me a place where I can trap it. The sooner we deal with this thing, the sooner things can go back to normal."


    "I''ll tell them, your Bindership," the hunter said.


    "Great Binder¡­" what was his name¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªKolinh said hesitantly, "does the almanac have anything else to say about the beast?"


    "The typhon beast," Lori corrected. "That''s apparently what people have decided to call it. As to what it says¡­"


    She outlined every terrifying detail about that had stuck with her. The knife-size teeth, the way it was four times heavier than a koncallos, how it apparently attacked primarily with its jaws, how other beasts avoided it, how they needed several wizards at a time to take one down¡­


    "We''ll have to forget any plans to deal with this using the militia," Lori said. "The information has forced me to conclude it wouldn''t be viable."


    "I concur, Great Binder," Kolinh said, while Riz nodded emphatically. "In fact, I would humbly request that you reconsider the plan to try and trap this beast¡ª"


    "Typhon beast," Lori corrected.


    Kolinh paused for a moment, confused, before realizing what she as talking about. For a brief moment, she missed Rian so, so much. She hadn''t realized just how quickly he managed to recover from her corrections. "Er, yes. I request you reconsider the plan to trap this typhon beast, Great Binder. While the lack of local hunting near River''s Fork will make resupplying their stores difficult, we can adapt."


    Shanalorre nodded as well. "According to our recorded food consumption rates that Lord Rian was tracking, the total of edible meat harvested from the seels you caught today should last for 88 days at our current rate of consumption, even if we are directly supporting River''s Fork. We can comfortably take our time with the situation and wait for Lord Rian to return with other wizards."


    Lori blinked. 88 days¡­? "Can you please explain the disparity between my efforts and our hunters?"


    "Of course, Great Binder," Shanalorre said. "The demesne''s hunting parties do normally not have the time or resources to harvest all the edible meat on the flesh of the beasts that they hunt because of the beasts'' size and how the scent of their blood tends to draw other predatory beasts. The only times they have been able to do so is when the beasts in question are near enough to the borders of the demesne that their corpse can be moved within its borders before cleaning the carcass commences."


    "Additionally, while every part of a seel can be butchered and harvested, it is not often that the seels caught are the size of the ones you seeled out of the river today. According to records and interviews I conducted today, even when the children were displaced from being the ones who did the seeling in the weeks before winter set in, they were not able to land seels of those sizes. The only other times the demesne has caught seels that big were when you yourself caught the seels."


    ¡­


    Huh. She supposed she might have gotten a little overenthusiastic when seeling earlier.


    Lori shook her head to reform her thoughts. Cancelling the attempt to trap and kill the typhon beast was an extremely tempting suggestion. She wouldn''t have to put herself in danger, she wouldn''t have to go outside of her demesne and work in the hot sun, she wouldn''t have to run around trying to set up a binding near where an extremely large and dangerous beast roamed¡­


    And the reason they needed to kill it was because it interfered with the hunting, right? If hunting wasn''t a factor¡­


    Lori frowned, and turned towards the hunter, who hadn''t left yet. "Is a beast that has relocated the way this typhon beast has likely to settle down or relocate again?"


    "I''m not familiar with this beast''s specific habits, your Bindership," the hunter said, "but if other beasts avoid it as you say, then either it is not the sort to settle at a particular range for long, or it claims a territory and simply ranges far beyond it. It''s the only way it would be able to feed itself. I don''t know enough to say for sure, unless your book has it written down somewhere?"


    Lori shook her head. That information hadn''t been included in her almanac, at least in this edition. Either the research was still being compiled, it was research considered too dangerous to do at the moment, or the researcher had been eaten and their notes hadn''t been recovered. All seemed very likely outcomes. "It doesn''t say. However, from what you''re saying, it''s either a permanent problem, or a problem that will last several weeks, perhaps months, and will repeat unexpectedly as different typhon beasts include either of my demesne near their ranges."


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The hunter grimaced, but nodded.


    "Either is unacceptable. Such unexpected disruptions to our hunting will make properly supplying my demesnes difficult." While procrastinating was tempting, and an option in this instance, waiting wouldn''t actually solve the problem. "Even if we could continue to survive if I did all the seeling, I have other things to do." Granted, she didn''t really have anything at the moment, but once Rian returned with new people who would case new problems¡­


    Surprisingly, the four opposite her all nodded with some degree of agreement.


    "However, my little seeling detour has given us some margin for error, if I understand it correctly. So while we will be continuing the plan to trap and kill the typhon beast, unless circumstances change it need not be done immediately. I want the hunters to scout for the typhon beast''s likely range as planned, but this time over the long term. Learn its habits, its behaviors, study it as safely as you can. Find out what you''d need to hunt if as if it were a smaller beast. Then you will report to myself and Rian, and we will find a way to deal with it and any other typhon beasts we might encounter in the future. We might not be killing it this week, but I certainly intend to kill it within the month."


    The hunter frowned, looking thoughtful. "One of us would have to devote all our time to tracking it, your Bindership. No interruptions to hunt elsewhere, since that would cause us to lose sight of it."


    "You can sort it out amongst yourselves," Lori said. "This is your area of expertise. Just tell Erzebed if it can be done or not, and what you need to do it properly, and she''ll pass it on to me."


    "But only until Rian gets back," Riz said.


    Lori nodded. "But only until Rian returns."


    The hunter gave a small smile. "Understood, your Bindership."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "You are dismissed. Discuss this with your fellows and report to Kolinh as to the arrangements. Kolinh, deal with this until Rian gets back."


    "Of course, Great Binder," he said.


    Lori nodded. "Good. While we will be sending some of our older cold food to River''s Fork, we will continue with the efforts to sustain the demesne with local resources. As such, seeling operations will continue as planned."


    Kolinh and Shanalorre nodded, while Riz merely waited for more orders.


    "If I may, Great Binder?" Kolinh began, and continued at Lori''s nod, "with your permission, I will release some of our smoke and cured meat to the hunters. It will allow whoever will be tracking the b¡ª" He hesitated. "¡ªthe typhon beast to carry the least weight while still having provisions."


    Lori considered that, but had to admit she didn''t really know much about such provisions. "If you think it best, then do so. We should have time before we need to provision the Coldhold again, in any case."


    Kolinh nodded. "Beyond that, the meat we will be delivering tomorrow has been prepared, and young Karina''s parents have given her leave to accompany us to River''s Fork for the foreseeable future¡­"


    <hr>


    The days passed. Lori made beads to restore their supplies as the hunting around demesne was temporarily put on hold for a few days until the walkways of the cold room were no longer occupied by meat.


    One of the hunters¡ªLori didn''t know who¡ªhad taken a supply of smoked and cured meat as he began to scout around beyond the borders of River''s Fork Demesne. It was three days before Lori received word the hunter was still alive and was cautiously tracking the typhon beast. He reported that while it was hard to see because of the unfamiliar spines and the layer of Iridescence growing on the beast, the beast seemed to be physically irritable, confirming his initial report that the beast had burn injuries.


    "He says its seems like the Iridescence is growing into the burns, which are aggravating them and causing the typhon beast pain," Riz reported. The hunter had apparently flagged down the day''s boat on its way back to her demesne and had passed what he''d learned to the other hunter who''d been on the boat. "He also has a rough idea of where the beast likes to drink along the riverbank, but he needs a few more days to be sure."


    "Is that safe?" Lori asked skeptically.


    "No, but he probably knows what he''s doing," Riz said. "He''s been leaving markers along the river bank inside the demesne to let us know he''s still alive, and they''ve arranged a signal for them to wait for him if he needs to resupply or to come back home."


    "If I may, Great Binder?" Shanalorre said, and Lori turned her attention towards the subordinate Dungeon Binder. "I''ve been able to partially perceive the hunter in question through my core. At least, I assume it''s him. I can only be sure if I concentrate on trying to perceive someone entering my demesne at the correct time of day. He has been sleeping inside the demesne at night, so he should have no worries about being overly exposed to the Iridescence. So far, I have not been able to discern any injuries beyond the minor irritation that daily exposure to the colors would cause."


    Lori nodded, accepting the explanation. "Heal them if you think it''s needed," she said.


    The reports continued, and enough meat had been transferred to River''s Fork¡ªor smoked and cured¡ªthat it was safe to resume hunting for beast meat. By some unspoken agreement, no one went after the seels near them during that time, perhaps to give the fursh time to relax from the sudden loss of so many adults. A week passed.


    Lori had been in the middle of testing the river water¡ªthe caustic taste was supposedly gone, but she had to be sure before she converted the water hub shed back to normal operation, as well as possibly recover the bound tool components in the distiller in River''s Fork¡ªwhen Riz said, "Uh, Great Binder? The Lady Binder is here. She says she has news."


    She looked up from the glass bowl she''d filled with river after from a ladle. The binding to slowly turn the water into vapor was already finished, waiting to be activated. Carefully, she picked up the bowl and set it to one side so it couldn''t be accidentally kicked or roll into the river, where it would be nearly impossible to get back. "What is the matter?" she said, turning towards the other Dungeon Binder.


    "Several people just entered River''s Fork from downriver," Shanalorre said.


    Lori considered that, and nodded. "Erzebed, get the boat ready," she ordered. "And an escort."


    "Yes, Great Binder!"


    She picked up the bowl and dumped out the water. This could be done later. Right now, she had to see if her lord was back.


    But after she properly stored her glassware back in her room.

 337 - Coming To Covehold Demesne

    The journey to Covehold was hot, nerve-wracking, and mildly terrifying. Even though we had to sail¡ªdrive?¡ªclose to shore so that we wouldn''t have to face the large ocean waves that could fill the ship with water or possibly even roll us over, having so much water in all directions made everyone a little nervous. The occasional sighting we had of large dillians and other things curiously poking at the ship didn''t help.


    I did my best to hide my own nervousness and keep a smile on my face, but it wasn''t easy. Even though I could swim, there was always something disturbing about water that I couldn''t stand in, especially if I couldn''t see my feet. Still, I couldn''t let the men see that. I had to smile and keep up their morale, and not let them realize how well-founded their unspoken fears were. While the Coldhold was a good river boat, it was only good for calm weather in coastal waters.


    No matter what, any Deadspeaker I recruit is going to learn how to help build boats!


    But now, we were finally near our destination! The spot of dark color had been growing since yesterday, but today we finally reached it!


    In the waters in front of the rising coastal town were dark shapes floating on the waves under the late-morning sunlight. As we had steadily gotten closer, the shapes had resolved themselves into boats. Or at least, peoples'' ideas of boats. It wasn''t that they were bad ideas. It was just they looked like someone had asked a Deadspeaker to make a giant bowl, then stretch out the ends of the bowl so that they were long ovals instead of circles. A few looked distinctly like leaves in profile, which probably wasn''t a bad inspiration for a Deadspeaker. None of the boats were very long¡ªby the scale of the people on them, they were about four paces or so on average¡ªbut they were definitely boats, each with one or two outriggers to one side to keep it from tipping over.


    I suppose people haven''t gotten the hang of weighing the bottom of the boat yet? It was probably a bit counter-intuitive to make a boat heavier at the bottom to make it float better, when people probably wanted it to sink less, not more. Then again, that''s probably best done with bigger boats, ones that will remain above the tops of the ocean waves, or else it really was just a bowl waiting to be filled with water.


    Many of the boats were throwing up tall plumes of vapor and sometimes smoke as the men on the boat scooped seawater up with long ladles and deposited them into the containers letting out the vapor. Only a few of the boats had sails. Most only had what seemed like notches on the side, and I could see the shapes of long oars messily left lying on their decks, which the men on the boats sometimes had to step over. The boats were all very small compared to the Coldhold, which naturally drew attention as my ship plowed through the waves with neither sails nor oars.


    "Small things, aren''t they?" Hans commented. The salt barrels were all full from the previous days and as tightly packed as we could get them, so he was helping keep watch from the little cabin''s roof, on the lookout for big waves and dillians. Most of the time he and Liggs were the ones kept the evaporator running smoothly, at least when the ship wasn''t on the move. "Probably takes them all day to get anywhere with those little oars." Yeah¡­ the time we tried to see how fast we could get the Coldhold moving with oars alone would have been funny if we hadn''t been the ones trying to do it.


    "They probably go out with the tide in the morning to make it easier on themselves," I said.


    Hans blinked. "What''s a tide, Lord Rian?"


    Ah, right. Hans came from far inland. Most people in both of Lori''s demesnes did. "It''s when the moons pull the water with them when they move across the sky," I tried to explain as simply as possible. "You know how when we anchor for the night sometimes the water is lower than when we wake up?" Hans nodded uncertainly. "That''s the tides doing that. Don''t worry, we won''t have to bother with it much. We have Binder Lori''s driver bound tool to push us around. Even with the tide, they probably still have a lot of rowing to do."


    "Huh. Why don''t we have that back home?"


    "Oh, we probably do, but since it''s a river the water is moving all the time, so it doesn''t matter," I said.


    Many of the people on the boats stopped and pointed at us as we moved along, either because of the Coldhold''s size¡ªwe were by far the biggest vessel in sight by a wide margin, and could probably fit any of their boats on the deck lengthwise¡ªor the fact we were moving through the water so quickly. I made sure to smile widely enough that it was obvious and wave at the other boats in a manner that I hoped came across as friendly and not taunting. It wouldn''t do to seem like I was making fun of how small their boats were, after all.


    While the lack of a system of exchange beyond the bartering of favors and goodwill¡ªwhich were the kinds of debts people were slightly more willing to let pass¡ªhad made my ability to consider things in terms of bead value a little rusty, between my experiences with Deadspeakers at the lumberyard I once worked at and the rate Lori worked when she was building something at River''s Fork, each of those boats probably represented a couple of days of more of work on the part of both a carpentry workshop and a Deadspeaker. Given they hadn''t been around when we''d first visited this demesne, and judging by the plumes of vapor and sometimes smoke, our visit had probably inspired imitators. Back then, the salt gatherers had all been on the shoreline.


    I looked in that direction, and sure enough they were still there, wooden building in various states of repair and disrepair. Many were unpainted wood or looked to have been Whispered using nearby stone. Some were simply shacks with roofs made from thin canvas or Deadspoken materials, but a few didn''t even have those, looking more like freestanding stones that ranged from simply stone tripods to long troughs. From each arose vapor, or steam and smoke as the salt gatherers used either Whispering or just fire to separate the sea water from the salt and whatever else was in the water that people were collecting from the nearby.


    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    I suppose the boats were people who decided not to get involved in whatever territorial pecking order had already been established on the shoreline and were trying their luck in the relatively unclaimed open sea? The area of the demesne extended well out into the water, but all the boats seemed to be staying well inside the demesne''s boundaries.


    Ahead of us was our destination, a wide opening that led into the round, sheltered cove that gave the demesne its name. The cove was wide enough that I suspected all of River''s Fork Demesne would be able fit in the circular area protected by the curving arms of stone on either side.


    Near the tips of each curling arm were tall stone towers, both looking about five paces high at the least. The slightly swirled pattern to the stone they were made from implied that the tower was built from Whispered rock, but the straight and even shapes of the towers meant that either the person who''d built them was as fanatically obsessed with symmetry as Lori, or that the towers had been further worked on by stonemasons and possibly more Whisperers after the fact. At night the top of each tower glowed to act as a landmark for any incoming ships, a sight I remembered from our last visit. The little house-like structure built into the bottom of each tower implied that each lighthouse was operated by a Whisperer instead of being imbued by the demesne''s Dungeon Binder directly. It was probably good work if you could get it.


    "Any boats in front of us, Liggs?" I called out.


    "No boats in front of us, Lord Rian," was the reply from the lookout. "The way is clear!"


    "Clear, got it!" I said as I handled the tiller. "Uh, about that, everyone. Liggs, you stay in front in case someone slow decides to cross in front of us, but can the rest of you get up here for a moment? I need to talk to you all, and I''d rather not raise my voice."


    To be fair, ''everyone'' wasn''t all that far away, sitting on the benches in the cabin on the deck of the ship to take advantage of the ocean breeze while staying shaded from the sun. Only Liggs, who was up front with the hat to shade his head, and Cottsy, down below operating the bound tool''s lever, wasn''t there, and the latter quickly made his way up after locking the driver controls in place. Everyone else sighed, but were thankfully willing to stand up and get closer, Cottsy climbing up from the driver room below to better hear what I was going to say.


    I looked over the crew of the Coldhold. They''d been on the ship since its first journey to Covehold, and had been the ones taking it downriver and coming back with jars full of salt from the bay that the river¡ªwhich was yet unnamed, but I wouldn''t be surprised if a certain someone privately referred to it as Lori''s River in their head¡ªdrained out to. Despite the ship technically belonging to me, they had more claim to it than I did. They''d spent more hours living in it, sleeping in it, eating in it, and hunting beasts from it than me.


    They were all good men, and chosen for the fact they had families back in Lorian whom they loved, with wives and children and even a few siblings and in-laws. That had been to satisfy Lori. But they were also men with generally even tempers, weren''t excitable when surprised, and all got along well. That had been for my benefit, because if we were going to be spending days sleeping in the same room together, I''d rather it be with people who didn''t make problems.


    A cough bought me a little time to hide the nervousness I always felt when speaking to a crowd, especially one that I felt should know me enough to be able to tell it was just making things up. "Ahem. So, first thing that I really should have told you all sooner, but while we''re here, don''t call me ''lord'', all right? I''m just one of us while we''re here, so just call me by name. Besides, every time someone found out I was a lord, I got the feeling they added a few beads to their prices." That actually hadn''t happened, but it got the laugh I''d hoped for from the men.


    "Now, just to be clear, we''ll be sleeping aboard the ship again this trip." There were sighs at my announcement, though they were resigned rather than protesting. "I know, I know, but it''s cheaper than finding a place to sleep and doesn''t risk getting everything stolen. However, it won''t be as simple as last time. People have boats now, so if someone really wanted to, they could get to us in the middle of the night and rob us in our sleep, or worse." They all looked uneasy at the thought.


    "I don''t think it''s likely but you all remember what this place is like," I continued. "So we''re going to have to sleep in shifts and someone needs to keep a watch while the others rest. I can take the first watch tonight, but someone needs to watch after me until morning. Whoever does gets to sleep until noon once everyone else is awake." The already-tired looks on the men changed to those weighing the difficulties against the benefits of sleeping in versus getting to sleep all day. Everyone surreptitiously glanced towards the front.


    "Don''t just foist it off on poor Liggs just because he''s not here," I said sternly, well familiar with the kind of things people got up to. "You can talk it out while I''m ashore."


    That got everyone''s attention again.


    "You''re going alone, Lord¡ªI mean, Rian?" Yhorj said, concerned.


    "No, of course not. Two of you are coming with me," I said. "I''m going to be bringing samples, and I''ll need two of you to keep me from looking like an easy mark."


    "Is two enough? Maybe all of us should go with you," Multaw suggested.


    I shook my head. "Any more and it''ll be hard to sail the ship." I frowned. "Drive the ship? We don''t have a sail, we have a driver¡­" I shook my head again to banish the random tangent. "Drive. Driving the ship. The ship needs at least three people to drive it safely and a fourth to keep an eye out for waves or other boats who might come up to do who knows what. Two people are the most who can come with me without putting those on the ship in danger."


    Everyone glanced over to the other boats on the water. No one had taken out their oars and started rowing toward us, but we were clearly being watched. A few were standing up, trying to get a better look, and were falling over for their efforts. That probably meant there wasn''t an actual level deck on those boats¡­


    "Then I''ll go with you, Rian," Multaw said, the big man rolling his shoulders like he was loosening them up to start punching. "In case you need anything carried."


    I smiled gratefully and nodded. Multaw was, in fact, my first pick to go with me. Tall, muscular men are the kind of people trouble takes one look at then turns around to find someone smaller to bother, even if trouble had a friend or two with him. I turned towards the rest. "Cyuw, can you come too? You know the inventory as well as I do and maybe better." Cyuw, by contrast, wasn''t as big as Multaw, but he had the stocky build of someone who carried heavy things. Well, all of us carried heavy things, but he looked it, and he did have a better memory of what we had than I did.


    He nodded agreeably. "Got it, Lord Rian," he said. "Ah, I mean, Rian."


    This would probably take a while to sink in.


    Well, we''d work on it.

 338 - The Streets of Covehold

    When I''d first arrived in Covehold, fresh from a very long sea voyage in a tightly packed ship with food I''d rather not try to remember, the ship had come to rest on a solid stone dock that had been built along one of the encircling stone arms around the cove¡ªthe left one from the perspective of the cove entrance, to be more specific. The dock had been made of Whispered stone, something I''d only properly recognized the second time I''d come to the city by the sea, having become familiar with the appearance of the material from Lori''s extensive building projects.


    Wide wooden piers had extended out into the water supported by pillars of stone to accommodate the people and, more importantly, the cargo that would unloaded and loaded to and from the ships that crossed the ocean from the old continent to this one. Facing the docks were rows of solidly built warehouses, at least one of which I knew was used to temporarily house new arrivals for three days after their arrival so they can be checked over by local Deadspeakers to make sure there was no one with a contagious disease.


    Now, however, there seemed to be a second set of docks at the opposite arm of the bay. These docks were not made with Whispered stone, with wood featuring as the primary building material. Even from all the way from the entrance of the bay I could see several of those wooden piers swaying with the waves in a way that was very distressing. I was relieved to realize that some of that seemed to be from how the piers weren''t solid, but rather on floating platforms that probably went up and down with the tides. The wooden docks were far more extensive than the stone one on the opposite side of the bay, seeming to extend some ways up the river that fed into the bay, though it was hard for me to tell for sure given the distance.


    Fronting the new docks, however, were structures¡ªsome made of wood, some that were probably made of rough stone given their colors, and others made from both¡ªthat could be politely described as rough and crude, and impolitely described as ''slum-like''. While Covehold Demesne had seemed to have a minor problem with overcrowding last time I''d been here, their preferred solution had been to push people beyond the town''s walls and subtly encourage them to be the problem of either the farms beyond the walls or the other demesne beyond their borders. The fact that a¡­ uh, let''s call it a ''low-income district''¡­ had arisen implied a new means of making beads¡ªer, earning beads, unless someone had managed to make Lori''s discovery as well¡ªhad been found, enough to let the people who had set up there afford building materials and people skilled enough to turn those building materials into structures.


    I glance behind me at all the boats that hadn''t been out there when I''d last visited.


    Yes¡­ that would do it. Even if the price of salt had been bottomed out due to greater supply¡­ although, perhaps not? There was nothing to say where the people on the boats were from, and there were a lot of demesne that had been raised along the river for the fresh water. If many of those in the boats were from those demesne, they might be harvesting salt for themselves and selling surplus to other demesne that were closer to them than to Covehold. Which would still probably lower the prices of the local salt market, but from slightly reduced demand than greater supply, and maybe to stay competitive against those hypothetical demesne. It would depend on whether Covehold was imposing anything on those passing through their territory, from tariffs to toll fees¡­


    I shook my head. While the situation would likely affect how much we could get for our barrels of salt, I already had a seller in mind, as I did for our skins. Hopefully they remembered me¡­ and that they hadn''t moved since then. The latter was unlikely, but the former¡­


    Well, hopefully they remembered me.


    "All right men, we''ll land the same way we did last time," I said, putting a smile on my face to reassure them. "I''ll signal you when you need to come in a pick us up. Check for us around late afternoon. In the meantime, go wait outside the bay and don''t let any strangers onto the boat, all right? Even if they say they have booze to share." I paused for a moment to set up the line. "Especially if they have booze to share. Someone who brought booze with them when they should have been working, especially on a boat, is probably all sorts of trouble waiting to happen."


    There were nods and barely restrained smiles at the admonition. I knew they weren''t the sort to let that happen¡ªeveryone probably remembered one or two bad experiences from being too trusting or negligent when they''d been in Covehold, heard a story from someone, or seen it happen¡ªbut everyone seemed to like the joke in any case.


    "All right," I said. "Multaw, Cyuw, empty your belt pouches and leave your valuables here. Leave the pouches too if you''re worried about losing them, but grab two micans each for lunch, since we won''t have be able to stop anywhere for food. I need to get changed."


    After all, wearing your belt pouch on the inside of your pants, under your shirt, is the sort of thing you''ve got to do carefully, or else you''ll end up with an obvious bump.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Covehold Demesne probably hadn''t started right up against the water. Its core had been established some distance inland, most likely at some point of what had these days become the grounds of what is now Covehold''s dungeon. The dungeon was far away on foot, through slightly meandering streets. I recognized them as the far future descendent of what the well-worn paths though Lorian and River''s Fork would be in a few decades. A part of me wondered what landmarks the paths had meandered between in the old days, and if anyone still remembered, or if they had not considered such silly things worth remembering?


    ¡­


    Well, anyway! Covehold had obvious grown over the years, and now the town reached all the way to the water''s edge, well beyond the point where a beach would have been naturally. Facing the entrance to the bay was a stone wall, no doubt meant to block the worst of waves and storms and storm waves. Atop it, though set some ways back, was a mid-sized thoroughfare that ran the length of the wall, stretching from the foot of the old dock on one end all the way to the bridge over the river from further inland and the new docks and slovenly area on the other side.


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    At low tide, the top of the stone wall was well above the waterline, looking like a wall in truth. At high tide, the waterline was half a pace below the top at best, and sometimes particularly energetic waves would lap over the top of the stone, spreading across the stone and dripping down into whatever flood controls the town had.


    At the moment, the waterline was a pace and a half below the top, the waters themselves more than deep enough for the Coldhold, letting it come close to the wall.


    From the wooden walkway between one of the side outriggers and the boat, I waited until the distance was just right, then took a running jump, pushing off from the end of the outrigger and managed to grab the lip of the wall. My feet flailed against the stone, my boots sliding on the wall but giving me just enough leverage to let me pull myself up with my arms. Once I had an elbow over the wall, I was able to pull myself up the rest of the way.


    I smiled at the passersby looking at me as they walked along. "Hello!" I said cheerfully. "Wonderful weather we''re having, isn''t it? Wish it wasn''t so hot though."


    Some started walking faster, while others slowed down to watch. Once people realized two other men were going to try to make the jump, they gave us a small open space just to see us fail, and were astonished when Multaw and Cyuw didn''t. Having someone with the leverage to help pull them up really helped when doing this. It was far cheaper than getting a slot at the pier¡­ and given the changes I could see, I wasn''t really sure we''d be allowed onto the pier we''d docked at last time. Or that we''d be able to afford it if we could. I wanted to get a feel for things first before we inevitably had to part with our beads for whatever new berthing fees they''d come up with.


    As soon as the three of us were up the wall, Yhorj, who was acting as steersman again, signaled Cottsy¡ª"Driver to third!" "Driver to third!"¡ªand the Coldhold started moving as the latter activated the driver all the way up. The Coldhold shot forward, a white bubbling wake trailing behind it as it accelerated to a speed that was clearly fast than a boat can be rowed, and then even faster, moving back towards the entrance of the cove.


    "Come on men, we''ve only got a few hours, and I''m not sure if I remember where we''re supposed to be going," I said, turning to smile at the people milling about. "Hope you have a good day, everyone. We have somewhere we need to be. Colors, it''s hot."


    At the reminder of the heat, many seemed to think we weren''t as interesting as we''d been before, and resumed walking towards wherever they''d been heading previously. A few kept glancing back, as if still expecting us to do something more.


    I didn''t wait for them, leading the way towards the street across the way that led deeper into the town, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Multaw and Cyuw were with me. Fortunately, after the few steps the two men fell in behind me, a lifetime of living in what passed for law and order on the edges of demesne easily coming back to them. The two normally pleasant men had expressions that were at best neutral and in a bad light could have looked stern, maybe even challenging. That was all I saw, because not looking where I was going wasn''t a good idea, so I turned my eyes back in front.


    Fortunately, I still remembered where I needed to go, and it seemed like the passing of the recent dragon hadn''t damaged the demesne''s buildings so much that extensive changes had to be made. But then, since our own demesne hadn''t needed to replace roofs again, that made sense.


    People walked purposefully along the road, with none of the idle, meandering pace of someone with nothing to do or someone looking for a mark, though I couldn''t really be sure of that. While many wore undyed trousers, and shirt or blouses, just as many were wearing clothes that had been dyed yellow, red, brown, orange or green. It was probably a sign of relative wealth. After a year of living in a demesne where everyone was basically as poor as everyone else, all wore clothes made of the same material, ate the same food, and lived in all-but-the-same houses¡ªmy house was the only one with a stone roof, at the expense of being the smallest house in the demesne¡ªit had actually taken me a while to recall that such disparity was something that happened.


    It also reminded me that I really needed to ask Lori what the almanac said about plants and bugs that could be used for dyes.


    Still, the three of us stuck together, because even if no one nearby looked like they were planning to rob us, that just meant they were probably good at it. I kept my face forward, looking around with only my eyes as I kept an eye out, and hoped Multaw and Cyuw did the same. I noticed many people doing so as well, and a few gazes even lingered on the three of us. I made sure to establish eye-contact, smile and nod when this happened. Many people looked away, but a few actually smiled back.


    I choose to view that as a positive, with these people simply being friendly to a stranger, and not that they saw me as someone na?ve to rob.


    Many of the buildings in Covehold were wooden, their surfaces dark from exposure to the elements. My eyes could occasionally pick out the shapes that showed were the planks and beams had been secured by pegs and other forms of joinery. Some of the bigger or more prosperous-looking buildings seemed to have been reinforced with Deadspeaking, the wooden parts fused together for added sturdiness. Most windows had shutters of some sort, whether on the inside or the outside, but all had wooden bars placed vertically or as a crosspiece to presumably keep people from using them as entrances.


    There were no stone buildings, although there were stone chimneys, and sometimes the buildings would be on a raised stone foundation. The closest the buildings had to stone walls was having the lower pace of the wall being made of the material, with the rest of the building above being made of wood. From the way some of that stone was cracked and chipping, on a few buildings the stone was simply an external fa?ade.


    The street was about three paces wide on average, and had plenty of room for people walking along it. Occasionally, there would be someone pushing a wheelbarrow, or carrying jars that hung on the ends of a pole balanced between their shoulders. While there weren''t any on the street, I knew that some in the city employed Deadspeakers to operate undead beasts for use in hauling wagons.


    A shadow passed over me, and I looked up to see someone running on the roof of the building we were passing. No, not on the roof. There were running on a beam that was raised up slightly above the roof, resting on the building''s support columns. The running woman stayed on the beam, easily transitioning to the beam on the next building, then leaping up to the beam of the building after that. She didn''t even slow, one hand holding the brim of the hat on her head to keep it from flying off, the other holding a satchel tight against her side.


    I lost sight of the probably-a-Mentalist as they turned to head down another street that intersected with ours. We kept following the road until we came to what was clearly a major intersection, one I remembered. Somewhere between two or three times as wide as the street we''d been following, the width of the road was hard to tell exactly because of all the wagon traffic on it. It was a road I was familiar with from my last trip to Covehold Demesne, as it was one of the major highways that crossed from one side of the town to the other, hence why all the wagons.


    Looking both ways to judge where along the thoroughfare we were, I turned right, making sure Multaw and Cyuw were still with me. The place I knew was nearby. Hopefully I''d be able to make a preliminary deal for our salt and skins today so I can devote my time to the issue of selling Lori''s beads sooner.


    She wasn''t the only one who wanted her to have a monopoly on this!

 339 - Rian’s Adventures In Mercantilism

    The place I was looking for was technically on the thoroughfare, but only their stock gate opened onto it. The actual front door was on a street that extended out from the thoroughfare¡ªI should probably find out what it was called, but honestly I was terrible at remembering street names¡ªthat had probably formed because the place had situated their entrance there.


    Emborin and Sons was a heavily built wooden building two stories high but several paces deep an dozens of paces long. The wide, open windows were at least two paces off the ground on the first floor, and the bars over the windows were made of slim metal rather than thick wood, an understated display of wealth. Heavy wooden shutters that hinged above the windows were propped up by wooden arms, acting as shady awnings. The wide doors were thrown open, possibly to be inviting, or possibly in a futile attempt to keep the building cool in the hot sun. Regardless, it did a lot to counteract the impression of a prison the bars made. On either side of the open door were two men with sticks that had the distinct look of hired guards: bored, hot, and reminding themselves of how much they got paid to justify all this.


    It all made me very nostalgic.


    I walked through the front door with a confident step and a purposeful air, completely ignoring the two guards on either side, and thankfully they didn''t stop me.


    Inside, the place echoed with a mess of voices. To one side of the space, there were several tables spaced apart where people were talking. Sitting at the tables were Emborin and Sons factors, wearing plain shirts and near-identical brown-dyed trousers. Opposite them were people where had trousers dyed different colors, perhaps a spot of embroidery on their own shirts. Usually they''d have a hat on the table next to them, made from either felt or leather. There were no reed hats here.


    No, wait¡­ there was one reed hat over there, next to that woman, decorated with flowers that looked far too lively. To be fair, it was a much nicer hat than the one we used when on lookout duty.


    On the wall just inside the door, there was a board set up, listing the rates they were buying and selling certain commodities. I glance over them. Seels and furs haven''t really changed much since last time, but I was surprised that salt also remained the same. Huh. Does that meant that the salt the boats were collecting hadn''t been significant enough to drive the price down?


    On the other side of the door from the tables, set back slightly so that people rushing down wouldn''t run into people entering, a relatively wide wooded staircase headed up to the second floor, where I could hear more people at work. At the top and bottom of the stairs were more guards with sticks, no doubt to keep unauthorized persons from just walking up. Messengers were running back and forth from the tables towards the back and upstairs, some carrying what looked like tokens made from bone¡ªor possibly sea shells¡ªin their hands on which things were written in blackened char. Other messengers lingered where they could watch the people entering through the door and tables, waiting to be called over.


    Opposite the door we just entered through was another wide open door that led out the back to the rest of the enclosed compound. The parts that could be seen looked a lot like the lumberyard I used to work at: stacks of wood at various stages of greenness, and what looked like a long shed finished with sun-dried mud or clay, which was probably a curing shed. It even had someone who might have been a Whisperer sitting next to it under an inadequate little roof. Somewhere at the back, there were no doubt Deadspeakers putting together sheets and planks of wood from off-cuts and shavings, and maybe even sawdust.


    I kept myself from looking around beyond a curious glance as I waited, and sure enough, one of the waiting messengers approach me. "Could you please inform Master Ravia we''re here to see him about what we had discussed?" I said.


    "Who should I say is here, master¡­?" the messenger said.


    I gave him my name, saying it twice just to see if he''d get it right. As the messenger rushed upstairs, I stepped aside so that I wasn''t blocking the way of other people passing through the front door.


    When we''d come to Covehold a couple of seasons ago to sell our salt, skins and furs for supplies, I hadn''t just taken the things to the first place that would take them off our hands for beads. While that would have been the quick and easy route¡­ it wouldn''t have been optimal. Especially since I later learned that many such places dealt with low volume sales, so they would have expected us to bring what we had to them. Given how much we''d had, us carrying anything from the Coldhold to such a buyer would have mostly likely resulted in us getting robbed in transit. If not the first time we made the trip over, then almost certainly when we were passing with the second batch.


    It had taken lot of asking, following leads that I''d managed to wheedle out of people in seemingly casual conversation, then following up on those leads by talking to various merchants, and going around asking about their reputations in various places round Covehold. It had taken a lot of walking, but it hadn''t been summer then, and I''d needed to do a lot of research anyway about what was considered a fair price for salt, furs... everything, really.


    Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    After a lot of work, during which I''d also scouted out the best places to buy the things we''d needed, I''d been able to narrow down my choices, one of which had been Emborin and Sons. The deciding factor had been the fact that they had been willing to send a cart to pick up the goods we''d been selling when I''d implied that the cart we''d used to bring it to the demesne had broken down.


    That''s the sort of thing that will get me to give you my business, and from the looks of it, it''s not just me.


    Thankfully, the wait wasn''t long. Soon, a man who looked a few years older than me¡ªmaybe? I wasn''t really very good at telling people''s ages¡ªwas coming down the stairs, his gaze falling on me after sweeping over the trading hall. Slightly shorter than me, his skin tanned a little bit darker than I''d last seen him and orange hair darker than Karina''s, Ravia was one of the ''sons'' mentioned in the sign. The brief smile when we made eye contact was a good sign.


    I raised a hand, waving at him casually once I was sure he''d seen me. "Hello, Ravia," I greeted once he was close enough. "Sorry I haven''t been by a while, I''ve had to accrue some stock for you."


    "Master Rian," he replied with a professional smile. It was a good smile. Not eager, and just the right amount of welcoming without making me feel we were close enough for favors, while making me feel he was genuinely glad to see me. I met his smile with my own, though I liked to think I was being more sincere. "It''s good to see you again, though I wish you''d sent word you''d be coming."


    "Well, I didn''t have anyone to send except myself and the men here, and given how the streets can be¡­" I shrugged. "So¡­ this is word that I''m coming? However, if you''re busy, we can come back tomorrow."


    "No, no, it''s fine, Master Rian," Ravia said. "I can accommodate you right now. If you''d follow me?" The merchant began to walk towards the tables, and I followed after him, Multaw and Cyuw falling into step with me. "I take it you came back on your unusual boat?


    "Yes, though we had to leave it at sea. I see people haven''t decided to follow our example, and chose to be boring by making theirs out of wood. Well, at least their suppliers are probably happy."


    "Oh, you were quite influential," Ravia said as they passed by other occupied tables. "All winter we had fools trying to float blocks of ice down the river and into the sea."


    "Well, there''s the problem right there," I said, nodding knowingly. "They should have made boats made of ice, not just blocks. Amateur mistake."


    "I suppose you would know." Ravia sat down at a table near the end of the hall. "So, what do you have for me, Master Rian?"


    I felt the belt pouch under my shirt pressing against my side. "Salt, beast skins and seel furs, mostly," I said. "How much are those going for these days again?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Despite the listed prices, there was always a little room for margins to be negotiated. The fact we had far more salt than most people coming to trade, and definitely far cleaner than what those harvesting from the shore could offer, allowed me to nudge up the price per sengrain of salt a little.


    "I will need to examine a sample of the salt to make sure it''s as clean as you say," Ravia said. "We get a lot of sand from people trying to add weight to their salt."


    "Of course, that''s perfectly fair," I said with a smile. "Though, we might need you to bring an advance for the salt when you come to pick it up so we can pay for the berthing fee for our ship. Getting all the salt out is going to be time-consuming, after all, and I''m sure the harbormaster is going to be annoyed if we don''t pay." I made a show of tilting my head. "Actually, would we still be allowed to dock there? I notice that there''s a new wooden dock across the bay."


    "You''ll be allowed as long as you can pay the fee," Ravia assured me. "The Rickets are there to lure the new boaters on their way back home from their demesne with dinner and quick beads for their salt. I wouldn''t recommend berthing there. I''m informed gangs have claimed that part of the bay."


    Of course they have. Why wouldn''t they?


    "We''ll stay away. Thank you for the warning." I wondered which of the trading houses had taken over the area, with the alleged gangs as their enforcers? After all, Lori wasn''t the only one who liked the thought of having a monopoly, small as it was.


    As a concession for the favorable salt rate that we''d agreed to, I left the prices of the skins and furs alone, letting Ravia have his own margins. Besides, it wasn''t like we had any means of arguing how much better it was compared to someone else''s.


    We''d be back with more salt anyway, so getting a good rate on that during our stay here was a better investment in the long run.


    Even with the added margin to the salt, I was probably only getting as much as I would have gotten at some other merchant house. That wasn''t the point. The point was that part of the agreement was that Ravia was willing to send wagons to pick up the goods from us on the Coldhold, rather than requiring us to bring the goods to their trading house ourselves. Not having to worry about the security of the goods as soon as it was off the boat was worth the potential risks.


    Without the heavy haggling happening at the other tables, Ravia and I finished out business quickly. Two copies of a preliminary contract was drafted, written out in black ink on paper, and it had been so long since I''d seen someone write on something besides a stone tablet. I checked both copies, making sure they both said the same thing, before nodding and writing my name on both copies of the agreed upon terms.


    "Well, it''s been a pleasure dealing with you again, Ravia," I said cheerfully as I waited for the ink to dry fully before I folded it up to slip into my belt pouch. "We''ll see you tomorrow at the docks, then."


    "I''ll be there, Rian," Ravia said, his smile slightly more genuine now that we''d come to an agreement we were both satisfied with. I don''t see why people strive for compromises where both parties were equally miserable. Compromises where both were equally happy were much better. "I must say, I look forward to seeing your ship again. Are you sure you''re still not willing to take a charter?"


    I shook my head. "I''m afraid not. We have other plans for our stay."


    "A pity." Ravia looked towards the windows, checking the shadows. "Well, if there is nothing else, I must see to making arrangements for tomorrow." He made to stand.


    "Actually," I said, and Ravia paused, sitting back down. "I could use some advice. Do you happen to know if there''s anyone nearby with a bound tool who can do fine woodwork?"

 340 - Back On The Streets Of Covehold

    With the preliminary contract dry and secreted into my belt pouch, an address and name from Ravia, and plenty of daylight ahead, I had time to start working on trying to sell Lori''s wispbeads.


    The problem, as I saw it, was deciding what the best way of doing so actually was.


    Ideally, we could sell directly to the workshops that would want the beads, such as carpentry or smithing workshops who had bound tools that have probably become very expensive to run. As long as the cost of the wispbeads was lower than the monetary value of the denominated wispbeads they''d otherwise need to use to run their bound tools, and that we proved to be reliable in providing them with their beads, we''d have steady customers for however long their bound tool was in repair and functional.


    That was probably how Lori would see the problem, but as her lord¡ªand more importantly someone who once worked in a lumberyard¡ªI knew that satisfying demand was only a small part of properly establishing a monopoly. We needed to be able to adequately supply that demand as well, and that was a problem more complicated than Lori spending her time making beads instead of expanding the demesne, ugh! If we sold her wispbeads directly to the owners of bound tools, we''d need to bring the beads from Lorian Demesne all the way back to Covehold Demesne. While each leg of the trip was a little under a week¡ªthough that was only because of the limitations of the Coldhold''s design¡ªthat meant that to keep our customers, we''d need to provide two weeks'' worth of beads for all our customers. Then we''d need someone to stay in Covehold to distribute those wispbeads to customers to fulfill orders. Repeat every week and a half or so to keep up with demand¡­


    The logistics that I''d have to set up made me want to cry. Of course, we could hold back, maybe send a new batch of wispbeads once a month¡­ but that would create scarcity, and if they were driven up enough, the wispbeads would be equal in value to denominated beads, disincentivizing purchasing them¡­ or perhaps the workshops would only use them strategically. But still, I would probably need to find potential customers by myself¡­


    It was a lot of work, and while it could be done¡­ it was very labor and resource intensive, especially on my part since organizing everything would likely fall to me.


    Alternately, we could employ a middleman. We could just sell all the wispbeads to Emborin and Sons through Ravia, and they''d be the ones who''d need to worry about finding customers and selling it to them. Since we''d be their only supplier of beads¡ªas far as I knew, at any rate¡ªwe could name our own price, and as long as we kept it reasonable, the trading house would probably be willing to buy what we had, and I could foist all the headaches of selling the wispbeads to them. They''d be the ones who had to deal with the problem of controlling the price of the beads to keep them cheaper than using actual denominated beads.


    Despite her grumbles, Lori had been amenable to that plan. It minimized work on our parts, we could have more time in between deliveries, and we wouldn''t have to deal with the inevitable problems that would arise when we dumped the wispbeads into the market. The problem was when someone else discovered how to amalgamate their own beads¡ªand someone would outside of Lori, it was inevitable¡ªwe would be subjected to market forces when we were no longer the only option available to our middleman.


    If we directly sold to the workshops, we''d at least have a prior relationship, and even if we had to lower prices, I would bet on Lori''s work ethic against any other Dungeon Binder on the continent. Our supply would be far more stable than anyone else, so in the long run¡ªor until Lori figured out how to properly mass produce beads the way older demesne do¡ªI''m sure we would still be making a great profit.


    Either way, it would only be a matter of time before the government administration of Covehold Demesne¡ªprobably not their Dungeon Binder himself, but most likely someone who answered directly to them¡ªwas going to find out that someone was putting wispbeads into the market. Regulation and taxes would probably be inevitable, but¡­ well, even Lori was resigned to that.


    Of course, if we wanted to try to get around such, we could instead make the government of Covehold Demesne our middleman by trying to sell the wispbeads to them directly. However, such a thing would immediately bring the wispbeads to the administration''s attention, which would mean regulation like customs duties and perhaps special taxation of sales much, much sooner. It also would likely get political. And while Lori seemed comfortable with talking to Dungeon Binders, I knew she''d rather not. So while it was probably inevitable¡­ best to procrastinate it for her sake.


    However, even if I was reasonably sure I wanted to partner with someone to act as a middle man, I needed to do proper research. We had a supply, but even if I was reasonably sure there was demand, I needed to find out how great the demand was. Hence why I was off to talk to a carpentry workshop.


    The carpentry workshop that Ravia had recommended wasn''t far, and as the sun was still getting to noon, I could hopefully catch them when they were having lunch. Otherwise, I''d have to come back later, possibly even tomorrow.


    As we set off, I glanced over my shoulder at Multaw and Cyuw. "How are you doing, you two?" I asked. "Do you still have your micans on you?"


    "Have them here, L¡ªRian," Mutlaw said, holding up a bundle made from a carry cloth. "We got some for you too, don''t worry."


    "Can''t have you getting lightheaded from missing lunch, Rian," Cyuw said, nodding knowingly. "You''re the one doing the talking."


    I opened my mouth to tell them they didn''t need too, and just barely managed to strangle that sentiment before it managed to slip out. "Thanks, you two. Tomorrow, we''re going drinking, how does that sound? Same place as last time, if we can remember where it was. If not, we''ll follow our noses."


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    The two smiled at that. "Looking forward to it, Rian," Multaw said. "It''s been months since I''ve tasted booze."


    "Food," Cyuw sighed. "Some nice doughstrand soup, steamed buns, something fried¡­"


    "Oooh, yes¡­" I groaned. "Fried beast thigh meat with breading, fermented bean sauce, sweet fruit juice¡­"


    The three of us sighed as our stomachs reminded us that while we''d had breakfast, we were coming on to lunch, and all we had to eat until we got back on the Coldhold were micans.


    "The two of you can eat when we get there while I''m talking to them," I said as we walked, turning down one street as we''d been directed. We passed an ice house, likely run by some enterprising Whisperers, a water wagon parked in front providing them with raw material, which was being pumped into a large wooden tank in front of the establishment. A butcher next to them was clearly a customer by the piles of ice in front on which the cuts of meat were laid out, shaded to keep them from melting in the sun. The telltale feeling of hairs rising on my arms told me the butcher had the same sort of binding that kept away bugs anchored in front of it, spotting the stone that had been inlaid into the wooden frame of its frontage.


    "You sure, Rian?" Cyuw said.


    "Sure. I can eat later." I hadn''t really been planning to eat lunch today, but luckily for me the men were taking care of me.


    Thankfully, Ravia had given me actual directions rather than some street name, as well as a name for the place, which allowed me to ask for directions on the way just to be sure I was on the right path. We passed smithing workshops ringing with the sounds of metal being hammered, ground and cut. At another workshop we passed, I saw large mesh trays and piles of what were probably still-wet sheets of paper. A small but prosperous-looking two-story building between two larger workshops shop had the discreet sign of a Deadspeaker¡ªa root and a bone twined together¡ªcapable of some degree of healing. There were several people waiting outside it sitting on a bench, some holding their stomachs, while others had no obvious maladies.


    Finally, the three of us reached the carpentry workshop we''d been directed to. I breathed in the smells of fresh sawdust, the oils, stains and glues the carpenters used, and knew I was in the right place. Men with saws, chisels and sharp stylus for scoring the wood were working, but many had the air of men putting on finishing touches, or at least preparing to stop working. The place was one of several workshops standing next to each other in a row, or at least, that''s that they looked like from the outside. There were no walls between the neighboring shops, which I knew from my days in the lumberyard was so that the shops could share workspace to work on projects. The second floors of the workshops were self-contained and where anything valuable was kept.


    "Hello?" I called. A workshop was not someplace you just stood around and waited to be noticed. People had more important things to do, like carefully shaving off wood with a chisel so they could get the tolerances just right. "I''m looking for master Yhosed?"


    For a moment, there was no reaction, until a carpenter who''d been scoring a board called out, "Yhosed, someone''s here for you!" Then he took a saw and started cutting, not looking towards either the man he''d called or me.


    "Thank you!" I said anyway, even if he didn''t even so much as grunt. His work was important, so of course, he''d focus on it, but it didn''t feel right for me to not acknowledge his help.


    Soon, a man who''d been somewhere at the back approached. The already short sleeves of his shirt had been rolled up, presumably to try to get some air under his shirt, and the lean muscles on his arms were on full display, implying the same of the rest of him. His dark blue hair was tied back in a bun and kept out of his eyes with a cloth, and he had the kind of scraggly beard of someone who cut it to get it out of the way once a week, but didn''t particularly care about how it looked. "I''m Yhosed. What can I do for you?" Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that some of the carpenters had slowed their work and were watching us.


    I took a moment to consider how this looked like. I was fairly young man who''d just walked in off the street followed by two older men who looked like they could handle themselves. Despite it being the middle of the day, we were here instead of whatever job we should probably have, while I could be here to commission something or perhaps even ask for a job¡­


    I turned to Multaw and Cyuw. "Why don''t you to step outside and eat," I said. "We wouldn''t want to get mican peels all over Master Yhosed''s workshop." Hopefully that would dispel the image they were there to loom threateningly for me, and put a little food in their stomachs. I turned back to the carpenter. "Hello, Master Yhosed," I said, doing my best to quash my reflexive desire to smile disarmingly and instead simply focused on sounding sincere as I introduced myself and the men. "We''re from a different demesne, and someone gave us your name when we asked around for a carpenter with a bound tool." I held out my hand, and after a moment we exchanged grips. His was rough, hot, and had a little sawdust on his palm. A working man''s hands.


    Don''t smile, be sincere, don''t smile, be sincere, don''t smile¡­


    Master Yhosed peered at me intently, then grunted and waved back at the other carpenters behind him. They relaxed, and many turned back to work, though those nearby kept glancing at us ever so often. "Is that so? What do you need done that you need a bound tool for? I warn you, even if we can do it, we''d need a wizard to run the tool. Best if you hire your own, the one we know asks for a lot."


    "Can''t we just use a wispbead?" I asked.


    "If you do, you''ll have to use your own too," Yhosed said, shaking his head emphatically. "Since you''re from off, you wouldn''t have heard, but a while back word came down from the lords that we should stop using beads with bound tools because we were running out of beads. It took a while, but after I stopped seeing any small wispbeads I only used my bound tool with a wizard, and so did everyone else I know. Even wizards stopped using them."


    "Ah¡­ I see¡­" I said, nodding. "Did it affect business a lot, not being able to use your bound tool?"


    He shrugged. "We''ve been able to get by. That''s what saws and chisels are for."


    I nodded, frantically thinking of what I could commission that would need a bound tool to make quickly and not just a lathe or a saw¡­


    A thought occurred to me. Well, if we actually needed to buy it, I was pretty sure it was something we could use at home. "I was wondering how quickly you could carve out a water screw?" I said. "We need it in something of a hurry, and no one in our demesne has the skills to make one."


    "A water screw?" Master Yhosed said thoughtfully. "That will take some work. It might be faster to commission one from a smith instead. It would weigh less and last longer. A wooden water screw would work, but¡­" he shrugged. "Well, it''s your beads. If we''re going to make it, it''ll take a lot of work to properly shape a log. You''re right, this would be faster if we could use a bound tool. As I said though, you''d need to provide the beads for it."


    I reached under the hem of my shirt and pulled out the wispbead I''d secreted in a little pocket I''d made with my handkerchief so I wouldn''t have to reach into the belt pouch I had hidden. Holding up the wispbead, I smiled, and did my best to keep it politely pleasant instead of mischievously ''I-know-something-you-don''t-know''. "I only have a couple of the right kind of beads. Can you show me your bound tool, if it''s not too much trouble? If I''m going to be the one providing the bead, I''d like to see how you plan to go about it, so we can manage with what we have."

 341 - Worth The Price

    The bound tool had been covered with a canvas sheet, and a bench was next to it, probably because it kept people from propping things up against it otherwise. Still, while the canvas had acquired the light dusting of sawdust everything does when carpentry is being done, when Master Yhosed pulled off the sheet the bound tool underneath was in good condition.


    Something clattered as the sheet was pulled off.


    Master Yhosed looked down and sighed. "Edjrond, you left your chisel on the bound tool! I told you to check here! Get over here man, and next time I tell you to check somewhere, you colors check there!"


    As Master Yhosed verbally castigated the carpenter who''d apparently left his chisel on the bound tool, I examined the device in question. It was vaguely lathe-shaped, and to my surprise the table that held it up had the look of new wood. Had the bound tool been dismantled so it could be brought aboard the ship that had taken them here? Well, if they could, they probably did. Standing at about stomach height, it was supported by widely spaced legs. The legs had boards on the bottom on which rocks had been placed, weighing down the tool and making it hard to move or tip over.


    A rectangular metal frame was supported on the table, anchored to the wood by bolts. The frame was half a pace wide and two paces long. On either end were the lathe mounts, one of which could be moved by a screw that ran the length of the frame. Along one long side of the rectangle was another track, on which was a vertical track that a round device was mounted. From the pivot and markings, the device could be angled up and down as well as raised and lowered. On one side of the frame was a recognizable bead receptacle, while next to it was a coil of what I recognized as wire sheathed in deadspoken leather. That would be the contact a Whisperer¡ªor whichever sort of wizard was needed to imbue the bound tool but it was often a Whisperer¡ªwould use to imbue the bound tool in lieu of a bead. Just behind the stationary lathe mount on one end was a semi-circular protrusion on a relatively flat, table-like section.


    I was still examining the bound tool when Master Yhosed finished with his little disciplinary matter. "Sorry about that," he said gruffly, making me look away and meet his gaze.


    "It''s fine, I understand," I said. "Can you talk me through what your bound tool can do?"


    Master Yhosed nodded. "This part," he gestured to the semi-circular protrusion, "is a saw, for cutting beams and planks down to size. The rest of it is, at heart, a lathe." He gestured towards the mountings. "We can turn a length of wood up to thirty yustri wide as well as core it out, and with this head," he gestured to the track on the side, "we can also do boring, routing and drilling."


    That¡­was actually pretty good for making a water screw. "What do you usually use it for?" I asked.


    "Cups."


    I blinked. "What, really?"


    Master Yhosed nodded. "About once a month I get young Remia to come over so we can use this, and we do a run of cups for a traveling merchant. It''s fast enough that it''s worth it to pay the wizard for the day. The rest we spend trimming down what we can for the month while she''s still on the clock."


    "Huh¡­ I can see it. You''d think people would be more careful with cups, though." I glanced at the bound tool. "If you had the beads to run it full time, what would you use it for?"


    "What we planned to use it for," Master Yhosed sighed, giving the bound tool a frustrated look. "Turning, drilling, mortising and cutting. We have a treadle lathe that can also be used as a saw, but it ties up two people to use, and the hand drills and saws are slow. With this¡­" he sighed.


    "All that but faster, and not needing as many people," I said, nodding. "Do many other carpenters have a bound tool they can''t use?"


    "Vov a few shops down has one that''s a saw and planer. We all chip in a little so we can hire young Remia or Lastrin to run it once a week for getting everything we need ready. A few streets over, I hear they have a saw too, though I can''t recall the name of who has it at the moment." He let out an annoyed breath. "If I''d known how little use I''d get out of this thing, I''d have sold it for more tools."


    "Last year, I heard that the only beads accepted here were Covehold-issued beads and old continent beads" I said, "but from the sound of it, Covehold really isn''t issuing its own beads, is it?"


    "Oh, that. They''ve been saying that since I came here ten years ago, but so far the only new beads anyone sees come in on the ships from the old lands. I suppose none of the Dungeon Binders there wanted to share how it was done."


    We both shook our heads, probably for different reasons, but the same sentiment.


    "Well, here," I said, handing him the wispbead Lori had made. She was going to be so smug when I confirm that at least the Dungeon Binder of Covehold hadn''t figured out how to make beads. "Let''s see if everything needed for our commission is working."


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    Master Yhosed hesitated. "Are you sure you don''t have anything smaller, Master Rian?"


    "It''s fine. This one doesn''t have any denomination marks anyway, so it''s not good for anything but bound tools and being swallowed," I said.


    The carpenter sighed the sigh of a man who''d done what he could to keep his conscience clear and took the bead from my hands. He slipped it into the bead receptacle, and the bead rolled down to the bottom where the metal contact was. I watched as he moved the switches on the bound tool, activating the driver on one of the lathe mounts, the driver on the track-mounted drill, router and borer, and, once he flipped over the protective cover, the driver on the bound tool''s circular saw, which all began to turn rapidly. Each driver activated only briefly, likely so as not to consume the bead more than necessary,


    I watched as he operated the bound tool, paying particular attention when he turned some knobs which seemed to increase the speed at which the driver on the side track rotated. That¡­ all right, I''ll have to tell Lori about that, because I had no idea how she might possibly replicate that with the bound tools she was making. Though there weren''t any glass components visible on the bound tool, so I had to wonder why she kept insisting that was necessary, but maybe it was an internal component I couldn''t see.


    Master Yhosed moved all the switches the other way, apparently deactivating all the drivers, then tipped back the bead receptacle so that the wispbead would roll back to the wider end and be scooped out.


    "Thank you," I said as I accepted the bead. "I think you have exactly what I''m looking for. Do you have an office where we can discuss details?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Master Yhosed didn''t have a proper office, but there was a room above the shop where, as I had surmised, he, his family, and some of the other carpenters slept. At the moment, it contained his wife and his daughter, who were getting the food ready for everyone''s lunch. The two glanced at us curiously, but apparently this wasn''t an unusual occurrence, because they went right back to cooking. I found myself salivating slightly at the smell of something that wasn''t just stewed beast or seel meat.


    The carpenter led us to a table, where I sat, while he drew out an abacus, a leather sheet, and a charred stick before he joined me.


    "Now, how big do you need the waterscrew to be, Master Rian?" Master Yhosed said.


    "Actually, I have an apology to make, Master Yhosed," I said, laying the bead we''d just tested the bound tool with on the table. "You see, I needed to speak to you in private about something else. As much as I''d like to bring home a water screw¡ª" we could probably used it one the third floor to make it easier to fill up buckets, or eliminate at least one of the bindings Lori had to maintain in the baths, "¡ªwe don''t really have the budget for it." I placed the bead in my hand between us. "Please accept this for your bound tool along with that apology, to make up for your time."


    Master Yhosed as frowning now, but he glanced at the cloudy white wispbead between us, picking it up warily.


    "It''s unmarked, so you can''t buy anything with it, but you''ve seen it''s a real bead and you''ll be able to use it to run your bound tool downstairs," I said.


    "Then what did you come here for?" he asked, looking at the bead critically as if worried I''d switched it when he''d been looking for his implements.


    I took a deep breath. There really wasn''t a way I could get around to this without revealing some measure of the truth. "As far as I know," I said, "that bead has never been in a Whisperer''s stomach, nor has it been used to power a bound tool until we used it downstairs. My Dungeon Binder gave it to me like that."


    Master Yhosed''s frown deepened, and he looked intently at the wispbead. The very smooth wispbead.


    "If I had to guess," I mused allowed, "back when people were still being free with using beads for their bound tools, they probably used the wispbeads that were small and small-mid denomination, because those would be worth the least compared to everything else. Mid-large kinds of beads, no matter the size, might be too valuable to use. So the beads used for the bound tools would have been large small-mids at the most¡­ Does that sound about right, Master Yhosed?"


    The carpenter nodded slowly, his gaze finally coming back to me.


    "That''s a large bead, but since it doesn''t have any denomination markings, I can''t use it to buy anything" I said. "Since I''m not a Whisperer, all I can do with it is find someone to whom it''s worth something." I tilted my head. "How much work can your bound tool do with a large wispbead, Master Yhosed?"


    "A large bead would last the bound tool a day or more, used sparingly," Master Yhosed said in a slow, contemplative voice. "Half that if we kept it working the whole time."


    My head bobbed in a nod. "Would a large small-mid bead be worth the price of running your bound tool for two days, used sparingly?" I asked.


    "It might¡­" he said slowly. "Only two days?"


    "It''s all I have on me," I said. "If you need more¡­ well, we can meet again in a day or so, once you''re more sure the beads are worth the price. Perhaps tell you friends about how sure you are, so they can come with you?"


    Master Yhoed glanced down at the wispbead I''d given him again. "I''ll have to see if they work on the bound tool first," he said. Yes, he was clearly concerned I''d switched the bead for glass.


    For the first time since meeting the man, I let myself smile.


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    A little while later, I stepped out of the carpentry workshop, my belt pouch two more wispbeads lighter and a heavier by a small talkbead. I had been pleasantly surprised when Master Yhesod had insisted on paying more for the two beads once we''d proven on their bound tool that they were the real thing. Multaw and Cyuw were waiting outside, some mican peels kicked to the side as they tried to stay under the shadow of the workshops overhang.


    "You done, Rian?" Multaw asked.


    "Yeah," I said. "Come on, I''ll tell you how it turned out later."


    I needed to find a quiet corner to get more beads out of my pouch and slip them into my handkerchief. The day wasn''t over yet, and there were more workshops around. Not Vov a few shops down, he was too close, but perhaps a few streets over?


    Cyuw handed me a mican. "Why don''t you eat first, Rian?"


    I took the fruit, nodding in agreement. "All right, eat, then I tell you how it turned out."


    Up above, the sun told me how much longer it was before we were to meet with the others on the Coldhold.

 342 - Rian Is Betrayed

    The sun was low in the sky by the time Multaw, Cyuw and I got back to the thoroughfare that faced the bay. It was high tide, and I could see that the cove was full of small boats. Many seemed to be making their way towards the river mouth, some moving surprisingly fast considering they had no sails and only seemed to have oars. Since some of the boats I saw earlier no doubt had a Whisperer aboard, perhaps they were propelling their boats so they could get home faster.


    In their midst, the Coldhold seemed to rise out of the water like an island, significantly larger than the little boats around it. Thankfully, they hadn''t hung any of the wisplights outside¡ªI hadn''t remembered to tell them not to show those off¡ªbut hopefully they were looking this way.


    I held up my rock with the binding of lightwisps on it, the glowing side facing the ship, and waved it back and worth as Multaw and Cyuw watched my back. We''d been fortunate enough to avoid getting into trouble, though I''d caught some folk following us for a little bit. It hadn''t escalated to anything, but I was glad for the reminder before we''d gotten into any real trouble. I''d have to rethink how I wore my belt pouch, since I couldn''t just keep it so inaccessible forever.


    The shadow that was the Coldhold began to move towards us. Fortunately, there weren''t any other boats in the way and the water level was high because of the tide. The ship was able to come in and turn so that the outriggers came close to the thoroughfare. The three of us took a running leap onto the wooden walkway from the outrigger to the rest of the boat, and once we were aboard Yhorj stomped twice on the deck. The was the signal for Cottsy to activate the bound tool driver, and we all reached for the railing as the ship began to move.


    "Where are we going, Lord Rian?" Yhorj asked as he steered the ship out of the bay. Fortunately, there were no other boats coming in, so he was able to aim for the middle of the opening at full speed.


    "We''ll need to find someplace else to anchor for the night," I said. "I don''t want us getting swarmed by boats tomorrow morning. As soon as we''re out of the cove, turn right and keep an eye out for someplace that looks good. Has anyone started on dinner?"


    "Hans is downstairs preparing the meat, and we have some water boiling," Yhorj said, pointing towards the pot on the stove bound tool in the cabin.


    Ugh, I must have been really tired if I''d missed that. It was right there! I nodded, making my way to the enclosed cabin in front and sitting down heavily on one of the benches there. Ugh, my feet! They hurt so much! "So, have you all worked out who''s going to be staying up with me to keep watch?"


    "Lord Rian, I don''t think you should be one of those staying up," Cyuw said. "You''ve been talking to people all day, and you have more things to do tomorrow. You should rest."


    Normally, this was when I''d protest that I was fine and that I could keep going, but¡­ ugh, my feet! However, eventually I found the energy to say, "I''ll think about it and tell you after dinner. Maybe I''ll be feeling better by then. Cottsy, I''m sorry for asking, but can you bring the wisplights up so we can see where we''re going?


    "Coming, Lord Rian!"


    The wisplights came up, already glowing with light. The bead receptacles were sealed with a wooden stopper so that the beads wouldn''t accidentally go flying from a sudden movement. Multaw hung them on the hooks that had been added when the Coldhold had been refurbished, then tied the cord on the wisplight to the hook as well, to be doubly sure they wouldn''t accidentally fall into the water. While both of them were the same shape¡ªa stone base to let it stand, an enclosed copper bead receptacle, the core that made the thing work, a circle of bone, a wooden ring on top to hang it from, and a cord that trailed from the ring¡ªone of the wisplights shed light in all directions, while the other directed its light in a cone in one direction, the better to see what was in front of us in the dark. The wisplight that sent light in all directions also moved air, allowing us to circulate and cool the air below the deck where weslept. It was a bit bright, but nothing they couldn''t sleep through, especially with something over their eyes.


    On either side of the entrance to the bay, the two lighthouses were beginning to shine, light glowing from their peaks. The white, even light was definitely Whispering. I saw someone watching us from one of the towers, outlined in the light and hard to see. I waved to them anyway, and they waved back.


    Beyond the protection of the bay, the ocean was an ominous plain under a darkening sky. Fortunately, the waves were relatively mild, so it was an easy trip as Yhorj guided the Coldhold back the way we''d come that morning. Along the shore, we could see light in the various sheds. Light, and¡­


    "They''re still working?" Yhorj said. Even with the setting sun, dark shapes were walking down the shore towards the water, carrying buckets that they filled and struggled to carry back.


    "Probably getting a start on tomorrow while it''s still cool," I said. "Or maybe there''s a day shift and a night shift. It''s a lot harder for them to get the salt out of the water compared to us, and they need to get all the stuff that''s not salt out of the finished batch too. And then there''s how hard it must be to gather enough salt to make a profit and not just break even."


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    I wondered how hard that life must be, how many people might be using those sheds. Did people even live in them? Or did they have to make their way from wherever they lived to the shed, then have to travel all the way back once their shift was done? How close was the nearest dragon shelter? I¡­ hadn''t actually ever learned if Covehold had dragon shelters¡­


    We should probably ask about that. Yes, we should definitely ask about that.


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    Eventually, the shoreline we were passing became bare of sheds, the rocks taking their place, and we began to search for a good place to anchor.


    The water was clear enough that I could see almost to the bottom once you angled the directed wisplight down into the water. It was a great help in finding good places to anchor.


    Once we were anchored, everyone took turns stripping down and using the ladles to take a bath. Usually they wouldn''t do that so late, but given the time they''d spent in town, it couldn''t be helped. At least no one lost their soap this time.


    By the time we finished scrubbing off the sweat and assessing whether our clothes needed to be washed in salt water again or could stand another day, the food was ready. The meat had been fried in some seel lard and its own juices, which had been quicker than stewing and much more flavorful.


    We all ate in the cabin above, Multaw and Cyuw taking it in turns to tell the others of what they''d seen in Covehold''s streets, while the men who''d stayed on the boat relayed what had happened as they''d waited.


    "We had some of the little boats trying to come up to us," Liggs said as I listened. "But they only got close enough to give us a yell and ask where we were from, and if we were the ''ice boat'' that came around a couple of seasons ago. One kept trying to get close, but Yhorj kept our distance, and eventually they gave up and went back to gathering salt."


    "Did you notice if they had a Whisperer on their boat?" I asked.


    Liggs shook his head. "Sorry, Lord Rian. I couldn''t really tell."


    "Well, keep an eye out next time. If someone was feeling nasty, a Whisperer could destroy the ship with a touch if they could tap any of the ice. I don''t know how well Lori would be able to tell someone was trying to do it, or if she''d be able to respond."


    The men looked alarmed, and I quickly tried to calm them down. "Don''t worry, don''t worry, it takes a special kind of evil to want to do that to men just minding their own business, but¡­ well, be careful, all right? Even if they broke the boat, I''m sure the other little boats would come to rescue you. But if that happened¡­ well, we''d have to look for a way back home overland, and we''d lose all our goods, not to mention the bound tools. And Lori would be really annoyed at me. You''d all be safe though, she doesn''t know who any of you are."


    That¡­ probably wasn''t as reassuring as I''d hoped it was.


    "Anyway, tomorrow we''ll be meeting with Ravia and he''ll be picking up our salt and other trade goods. Once we have beads to spend, we can focus on our other priorities," I said. I held up my hand to illustrate. "First, we need to sell Binder Lori''s beads. I was able to sell a few today, but doing it that way takes too long, so I''ll have to go with my other plan. Secondly, we need to recruit those Deadspeakers Lori said we could finally look for, which will mean doing the rounds on the bars and placement offices. Third, we need to buy the things that the demesne needs. Oiled paper for everyone''s windows, Deadspoken thick leather for boot soles¡­ everything. We can get Ravia''s help putting that order all together, so that''s actually the simplest thing we need to do."


    It wasn''t as daunting as it sounded but it would take time. And while I could theoretically take as long as I needed, or at least as long as we had enough food and beads to make the journey back to Lorian, unless Lori had radically changed her mind there would be no additional projects in the demesne while I was gone, which meant my absence would be delaying the construction of the sawmill. That wasn''t counting any new problems that might come up. While I had faith in Riz, Kolinh and Shana''s capabilities¡ªeven as the thought of someone like Shana actually needing to be competent like this made me want to cry¡ªI had slightly less faith in their ability to understand what Lori meant, or being able to tell Lori ''let''s try something else'' when she might have an idea that would be inadvisable.


    And I honestly not sure where they would fall if Lori decided it was time to kill Shana and claim her core¡ªincluding Shana. She probably wouldn''t, but¡­


    "Will we all be going out into the town and looking for what we need, Lord Rian?" Cottsy asked, pulling me away from my musings.


    "It would be faster," I said, "but I''m not sure how advisable it would be. Now that there are other boats in the water¡­" I sighed, and shook my head. "No, some of us will have to stay here to guard the ship."


    "Then only you and two other people will be able to go out into the town every day," Yhorj said. "Well, that settles it. You can''t stay up tonight to keep watch, Lord Rian. Or any night while we''re here, for that matter."


    I blinked. "Say that again?"


    "Well, you''ll probably be out every day talking to people and handling the buying and selling," Yhorj said, and everyone else nodded in agreement. "So you need your rest to keep your wits about you, and you need to get an early start so that you have as many hours of daylight as you can. Any of us can stay up and keep a watch out, but we''re not as good as you are at talking to people and making deals." More nods all around.


    I opened my mouth to protest¡ª


    "So, all who vote that Lord Rian get as much sleep as he can and not need to keep watch?" Yhorj said. He raised his hand over his head. "I say aye!"


    "Aye!" everyone else chorused, raising their hands as well.


    "The votes are in, Lord Rian," Yhorj said with a grin. "Off to sleep with you after you finish eating."


    ¡­


    Well, if they were so insistent, what else could I say?


    "I''ve been betrayed!" I declared dramatically. "You''re all voting against me? How could you?-! After all I''ve done for all of you, you turn on my like this?" I mimed being stabbed in the heart.


    "You could just do what Binder Lori does and do what you want?" Cottsy said with a grin.


    "Don''t tempt me. Fine, fine, you can all have the night the watch. It can''t be whoever''s going to be coming with me tomorrow, though."


    "We''ll sort it out, Lord Rian," Yhorj assured me.


    I made a big show of sighing and turning back to my dinner, pouting theatrically to hammer home my ''defeat''.


    As the men began discussing who should come with me and who should stay up on watch¡ªthey''d also have to make sure the boat wasn''t drifting towards shore¡ªI wondered how everyone was doing back home.

 343 - A Lorian Interlude: Karina

    In the middle of the day, work ground to a halt, the heat too great for anyone to sweat through except perhaps the uncles and aunties working on the rebuilt outdoor mushroom farm where it was shady. And ever since Wiz Lori had put up a thingy to keep bugs from eating the mushrooms they were growing, they hadn''t needed to keep an eye on them as much, letting them do other things or, in this case take a midday break with everyone, since even the magic winds Wiz Lori had set up weren''t enough to let people overcome the heat. Even the seels thought this time of day was too hot, diving into the water and swimming in the depths of the river to stay cool.


    Most people who usually worked outside stayed in the Dungeon at this time of day, or soaked in the baths¡ªthe water was no longer kept hot¡ªor did laundry, since the water kept people cool, and with so many people sweating there was always laundry to do. The ones who already worked in the Dungeon, the uncle carpenters and auntie weavers, kept working, but they had more people to talk to or help with spinning thread. Well, Wiz Lori was probably working, building a bath in River''s Fork with Ateh Riz and Ateh Mekari, but that was Wiz Lori. She was always working.


    The children of the demesne had other plans.


    Her skirt still girded from the morning''s seeling, her shirt still on to keep her skin from getting burned, Karina''s bare feet pounded on the hot stone of the dock. The burning heat under her soles drove her faster towards the end of the short walk, and then she was jumping through the air and she had a heartbeat to pull her knees up to her chest and brace¡ª


    Splash!


    The heat that had been pounding on her from above vanished, and she was in cold, cold water that engulfed her, replacing the air. Karina let out a small exhale to keep the water from going up her nose as Lord Rian had taught her, felt the hem of her shirt billow up, letting the water flow up the skin on her back.


    Karina felt her feet and posterior touch the bottom, and she opened her eyes. The waters of the river were clear, and ripples of light were dancing across the riverbed as she kicked off, rising up to the surface faster than she had sank. Karina broke through the water, and for a heartbeat she was half in the river and half in the air, her vision blurred from the water in her eyes. She took a greedy gulp of air, her cheeks puffing out, clenching her teeth tight to keep the air in as she fell back down.


    Her feet kicked in an alternating rhythm, just like she''d been taught, as she used her hands to pull her back up to the surface. As her soon as her head was in the air, one hand darted up to push hair out of her eyes as she blinked so she could see again, even as she began to move to the side, knowing it was only a matter of time before someone else jumped down from the dock.


    All around her, the other children in the demesne played in the water. Some were a bit further downriver, sitting on the shallow riverbank in front of the laundry area with water up to their shoulders and occasionally dunking their heads under the surface. Others were running around despite all the pebbles there, splashing through the water and using their hands to throw water at each other. Because of the risk of getting sunburned, everyone had their shirts and blouses on, and a few were still wearing kerchiefs to protect the back of their necks.


    There was another splash as Yhalta and Matoy both jumped into the water, holding hands as they did so. To the side of the dock where the Lori''s Ice Boat was usually tied up, Big Yerart was floating on his back, eyes closed, ignoring the small waves that washed over his head as he kept his nose above the water. Phami, Tazel, Ardlia, Galef and Bharelli were all daring each other to see who could swim out furthest into the river. It wasn''t very far, since as soon as they reached the river''s current, the colder water had them turning back with excited shrieks.


    Only Shana wasn''t in the water. Still wearing her loose trousers and skirt, with her wide-brimmed reed hat to keep the sun from burning her skin, the girl sat to one side of the dock, kicking her feet back and forth as she watched over everyone, but especially her cousin Yoshka, who liked to keep diving down into the water next to the dock to look of smooth rocks. Already there was a small pile of them next to Shana, now dry from being exposed to the sun.


    "You sure you don''t want to join us?" Karina said as she swam close to where her friend was sitting. "It''s already really hot."


    Shana shook her head. "Someone needs to be watching in case there''s trouble," she said. Her eyes flickered back down to her cousin, who was underwater and trying to swim down to the bottom again. It wasn''t all that deep, but Yoshka had an awkward way of diving so sometimes she stopped halfway and came back up for air.


    "You need to have fun too."


    Shana waved a hand in a Wiz Lori-like way. "I''m fine. I can go swimming later."


    Karina sighed, sinking down a little so the sigh came out as bubbles. It was more fun that way. "I''ll hold you to that!" she said.


    She turned and swam away.


    Moving a bit further out into the river, just short of the cold current, Karina turned to face upriver. Then she took a deep breath, and threw herself forward. Her feet kicked, propelling herself as her fully extended arms moved in the circular movements that Lord Rian had taught them was the best way of moving through the water. She held her breath as long as she could, slowly letting her breath bubble out through her nose before turning her face to the side at the right time to take a breath through her mouth.


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    After a count of twenty movements, Karina arched her back, tucked in her knees to her chest, and twisted her body so that she was facing back the way she''d come. Her feet kicking on nothing but cold water, she continued swimming. Lord Rian said swimming was something you needed to practice to get better at, so that was what Karina was doing. She was going to become the best at swimming so she didn''t have to worry about falling into the water anymore! If she became really good, she''d be able to get to the rocks in the river where the big seels slept and catch them when they weren''t ready for her!


    Karina swam back and forth, enjoying the feeling of the water flowing around her as she did so. It was a completely different feeling than when she waded in, the water pressing against her front with every step, slowing her down. There was none of that when she swam. She felt like she belonged in the river when she swam like this, no longer hindered by the water''s weight.


    It didn''t last. Her arms and legs began to ache as she worked them, until eventually she slowed down, letting herself sink into the water for a moment before she kicked up to see where she was.


    She''d drifted out into the river again, but that always happened. Moving with her arms, she turned to face the dock, then kicked with her feet as she began to swim towards¡ª


    Pain stabbed into Karina''s left leg, and her practiced movements faltered as her limb made its desire to lock up become known. Her arms briefly flailed in panic, before she managed to push herself up and out of the water long enough to let out a cry and fill her lungs.


    Then she let herself sink into the water, holding her breath and trying to stay calm as she reached down to try and massage the cramp in her leg muscle. It was the one at the back of her leg, between her ankle and her knee, the muscles pulling into a painful knot that didn''t want to loosen.


    Karina told herself not to panic. She had a full breath and she''d been able to yell. Once she managed to ease the pain in her leg, she could use her arms to pull herself up and get another breath, then just float until the pain went away. Lord Rian had warned about this, and he''d said that they needed to keep calm when it happened, or else they''d injure themselves or even drown. So she needed to stay calm, and remember that despite the pain, she wasn''t bleeding and could use her arms to pull herself up.


    She was just starting to think of doing just that so she could take another breath when she felt someone grab the back of her shirt. With a sudden jerk, she was suddenly being pulled backwards. Her head broke through the surface, and she released one hand from trying to massage her leg to keep herself afloat enough to take another breath. To one side, she saw a pair of legs kicking through the water.


    The cramp was still tight and painful, and she tried to keep her leg outstretched to minimize it, but that was painful in its own way.


    Eventually, her posterior touched the familiar, pebbly ground of the river bank, and she forced herself to sit up, wincing at the pain the shift caused in her leg.


    Splashing through the water, a soaking wet Shana moved in front of her and knelt down to raise up Karina''s cramped leg. Her hat was gone, and her pale hair was clinging tightly to her head and neck.


    "Give me your leg," she said, and with a wince, Karina did so. Instead of the pain suddenly disappearing, as she had expected, Shana''s hands methodically felt at her limb from the knees down until she reached the point that had cramped. "Here?"


    Karina nodded, embarrassed.


    The other girls sighed, sounding exasperated. "Karina, stop swimming so hard. This is the third time this has happened." Her fingers began to massage the leg. "And you wonder why I don''t swim at the same time you do anymore. All is well, everyone. Karina just gave herself another cramp."


    "Sorry," Karina said.


    "Your legs are probably too tense," Shana said, still massaging. "You know Lord Rian said you''re not supposed to do that or this happens."


    "Sorry¡­"


    "If you wish to apologize, rethink the way you swim." Slowly, Shana''s massaging fingers began to loosen the cramp. Karina wanted to shrink on herself in shame, but with Shana doing this, there was no one watching the others now. She kept watch as the muscle slowly relaxed, making sure everyone was in sight. Thankfully, Yoshka was no longer diving next to the dock but was instead sorting through the rocks she had gathered.


    Finally, Karina was able to get to her feet. She did so gingerly, half-expecting her leg to stiffen up again, but except for some tightness, her leg was fine. "Thank you," she said, though she wondered why Shana hadn''t healed her the way she had before.


    "You''re wondering why I didn''t just heal you, aren''t you?" Shana said, getting to her feet. At Karina''s nod, she said, "I didn''t heal you because you were safe and there was no immediate danger. Let the feeling remind you to not push yourself so hard. If I''d gone into the water as you''d suggested, I might have missed your cry. No one else realized you were calling for help."


    "I''ll be more careful," Karina said, chagrined. "Thank you for saving me."


    Shana nodded. "I''m a Dungeon Binder. It''s what I''m supposed to do. Now, since I''m wet already, it''s your turn to keep watch while I swim. You can wear my hat."


    "Eh?-!"


    Her friend gave her a flat stare, then looked pointedly down at her leg.


    A sigh. "Fine. Go swimming."


    "Don''t pout. You''re the one who said she would be holding me to having fun."


    "I''m not pouting!"


    Only grumbling a little, Karina walked with a slight limp towards the dock with a little help from Shana, who let her rest a hand on their shoulder. Taking the hat that had been left on the dock, Shana handed it to her. Once it was on and Karina had sat down on the dock, Shana jumped into the water.


    Karina dripped water onto the stone surface, cooling it enough so she could sit comfortably as she began to sweep her gaze back and forth, glancing every so often at Yoshka to make sure she hadn''t started diving again.


    Well, at least Shana was in the water having fun now. Although¡­


    Shana floated back up, and immediately lay on her back, her eyes closed as her arms and legs splayed out in the water.


    ¡­did her idea of swimming have to be so boring?


    One hand massaging her leg to try to get rid of the remaining stiffness, Karina turned her gaze back to the others playing in the river. Well, she needed a rest anyway.


    She wondered how long it was until lunch¡­

 344 - A Little Wager

    The next day, we were back in Covehold bright and early to see the procession of small boats coming down the river and heading out of the bay towards the sea. While the sun was still on the horizon, individual boats were already coming in a steady stream from the river, most using oars and the current to propel themselves, although I saw a few boats where it looked like a Whisperer¡ªor maybe a Mentalist?¡ªwas doing the work of moving the vessel around.


    There were a few boats docked in the newer docks that Ravia had called the Rickets. From the crowds of people around what looked like carts, they were either there to eat a quick breakfast of whatever was being served or to buy lunch for later.


    The older, stone-built docks were still empty, but there was some activity at the warehouses fronting them. As I had learned last time we were at Covehold, the warehouses were where the trade goods of the ships coming in from the old continent were stored, along with the goods they would be coming to pick up. Yhorj guided the Coldhold towards those docks as I sat on the roof of the cabin, trying to spot Ravia, or at least any sign he was already there. The level of the water was low, but we''d managed last time, so it shouldn''t be all that different now.


    Fortunately, none of the smaller boats approached us. Perhaps they wanted to get as much work done before it got hot, or get as far out while the waves were still relatively calm. Maybe they had favorite spots they wanted to get to.


    At last, I saw movement at the little building that passed for the dockmaster''s office. There were carts coming in, being pulled by pairs of men, with another pair pushing from behind. These carts were full, however, and as I watched they headed towards one of the warehouses near the middle of the line. Early morning was when most of the cart and wagon deliveries around the town were done, because that was when there were the least people on the streets. It was apparently a very small window, because if people were waking up to do deliveries they were waking up to go to work, but those people generally moved in the same direction as the carts, so it all worked out. It was later when people went to market or left their houses to loiter in the relative cool of the streets that they became congested.


    I kept looking towards the dockmaster''s office, but there didn''t seem to be anyone else but more of those carts. The wide front door of a warehouse was opened, and the first cart entered, presumably to start unloading so that their goods would be ready to get picked up when a ship from the old continent arrived. It was hard to tell what the contents were¡ªthe carts had high sides, presumably to keep things from rolling off¡ªbut I knew that the most common product sent back to the old continent for beads were seel furs, because they could be washed regularly enough that they weren''t damage by the transoceanic voyage. The price for the furs was, according to Lori when I had brought it up once, artificially inflated because of its relative rarity of coming from the new continent, which apparently appealed to people with ''more beads than brains'' as she had put it.


    As someone who''d never owned anything with fur on it¡ªdown-stuffed was much easier to clean, in my opinion¡ªI didn''t know whether or not there was enough of a qualitative difference between old continent seel fur and new continent seel fur for there to be some kind of basis on the price. If there wasn''t, could a Deadspeaker just¡­ do something to the old continent seels before skinning to fix it?


    My musings on the seel fur market were interrupted as I saw someone waving to us from the stone docks. His clothes were dyed, which¡ªoh, that was Ravia! "Yhorj, head for the dock," I called down as I waved back to acknowledge I''d seen him. "Take us to that one where they''re waving, he''s the one we''re meeting. "


    "Yes, L¡ªer, Rian! Heading to the dock!"


    "Everyone else, get the things ready to move out, we''re going to be unloading soon." Ravia should have brought his own containers for the salts since we needed our barrels. I''d made sure that was understood in our discussion yesterday, but¡­ well, things happen.


    By the time we were drawing close to the dock Ravi was standing near, he''d been joined by someone wearing a wide-brimmed reed hat with a band of cord wrapped around it. It was a cheap, simple, and in combination with the hat a practical means of denoting position. I wondered if it was something from one of the demesnes in the old continent¡ªdespite the scarcity of oceanic travel, there was river boats and river trade¡ªor just something they''d made up here.


    "Hey, Ravia," I called once we were close enough. "Sorry, I didn''t recognize it was you!"


    "Perfectly fine, Rian," Ravia said. "The dockmaster says you can moor here, though we''ll need to secure your boat."


    "Don''t worry, we remember. Hello, Yhoe! Nice to see you again!"


    The dockmaster blinked in surprise that I''d remembered his name, but looked pleased nonetheless. "Master Rian, was it? I''m afraid you have to pay a berthing fee if you''re going to dock."


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    "Don''t worry, I know," I said. "I remember from last time. Is the price and duration still the same?" At his nod, I called out, "I''ll have the beads ready, though I''ll need you to change a few."


    At his nod, I went down to get some beads from the stash I''d put together from yesterday''s adventure in street-level mercantilism. I''d only had twelve of Lori''s wispbeads on me yesterday so that my belt pouch would still lie relatively flat under my shirt. After I''d figured out how to not have to give a free sample in the later workshops, I''d been able to sell all the beads for a total of four large small-mid denomination beads and a small mid-large denomination bead. I didn''t recognize the name of the demesne the beads were cast¡ªI''d never heard of Iliari Demesne¡ªbut they had a little Taniar Banking Authority mark on their bead, so that meant they were value regulated, and even as I thought that my brain began to ache, so I stopped thinking about it.


    The berthing fee wasn''t very expensive, but it was still a lot when one literally had no beads that were accepted as currency, hence all the jumping and climbing yesterday. The fee was mostly so that when the trading ships came¡ªthey''d probably already had some as soon as summer started, which reminded me I needed to talk to the local factor of the Golden Sweetwood Company¡ªthey wouldn''t just occupy the dock indefinitely. After all, no one built such an extensive and sturdy stone dock to deal with a handful of ships a year. When we''d left, trans-oceanic shipbuilding and shipping was a growing industry. One that had a high mortality rate as centuries of strictly riverine experience was finding that their institutional knowledge couldn''t be completely applied to the ocean.


    Said the man who had gone to sea on a riverboat made of ice.


    The still-low tide meant that the dock we were berthing next to was more level with the roof of the cabin then the main deck. While that would change later, we would lose a lot of daylight if we waited that long, and Ravia no doubt had other things to do. So once the ship was secured properly¡ªnot just with one mooring rope but several so it wouldn''t drift too close or to too far from the dock¡ªthe dock''s gangplank was secured to the roof of our cabin. The heavy wooden support beams would be strong enough to bear the weight of the traffic, but we''d have to secure the gangplank to the deck later when the water rose again.


    The men began bringing up the cargo. Skins and furs were first, passed along in a relay line until they were deposited onto the cart that Ravia had brought along while I paid for the berthing fee. It took most of the beads I''d managed to get yesterday, but that was fine. We would be getting more from our contract with Ravia.


    "Sorry I can''t give you a tour right now," I said as the men emptied the hold of the skins. "But once the hatch is clear we can go and have a look."


    "I look forward to it," Ravia said, looking at the boat with great interest. "How do you propel it? Even for a Whisperer, something of this size would be prohibitively difficult."


    "Our Dungeon Binder had some ideas, which they keep imbued constantly," I said vaguely. "I''m not a wizard, so I don''t really understand, but it works as long as we only do what they told us to."


    Ravia blinked. "Your Dungeon Binder is directly imbuing your boat?"


    "How do you think we keep it from melting?"


    The merchant stared at the boat. "But¡­ how¡­?"


    "They didn''t explain," I said, giving him an apologetic smile. "Sorry, I really can''t tell you anymore. Our Dungeon Binder isn''t really the kind who tells me what they''re doing, they just do it. Do you know the type?"


    Ravia snorted. "I''m familiar with it. Well, I suppose they need to get their amusement somehow."


    I nodded. "By the way, do you have an appointment after this? I wanted to talk to you about something that might be of profit for both of us."


    "Nothing I can''t put off a little, provided I had good reason¡­" Ravia said.


    I took a deep breath. "How would you like to be our partner in being the distributor for a new product that will likely be in high demand?"


    "I''d tell you I''d like to, but every few weeks some demesne or other on our trade route discovers how to make a product they''re sure only they can make, which is invariably reverse engineered within a week of hitting the market," Ravia said with a smile that had the implied undertone of ''that''s so cute''. "Unless you have a mine for croco, magan or anatass in your demesne, it''s hardly worth the bother."


    I blinked, then sighed. "All right, I deserved that." I tilted my head. "What kinds of products?"


    "Oh, people have been tapping all the trees, and one found a sap that makes of a decent substitute to sweetwood sap," Ravia said cheerfully.


    "What, really? There was none of that in the almanac."


    "Oh, they debuted their product when spring broke. Unfortunately, the tree is relatively common in the area. With enough people tapping every tree around, they very quickly narrowed down which it was."


    I sighed. "I have to get a description, it would be nice to have something besides honey for sweetener." I shook my head. "Well, it doesn''t matter. I''d like to ask you to look over our product in any case. Even if someone manages to figure out how to replicate it, here and now, I don''t think anyone has. And it''s still valuable, sellable product despite that."


    "I suppose, though I will be the judge of whether it''s valuable, Master Rian."


    I nodded. "Of course. Still, I think you''ll agree this is will be a good product to sell. Tell you what, if you don''t find it impressive, I''ll give you a mican."


    He gave me a bemused smile. "A mican?"


    I shrugged. "Have you had a mican today?"


    Ravia laughed. "I suppose I haven''t. Very well. And if I am impressed?"


    "Then I''d have won, because you''ll be giving me a lot of beads to buy and sell my product," I said. "That''s far better than a mican."


    "No, no, that won''t do. I insist on proper terms."


    I shrugged. Well, if he insisted¡­ "You recommend a Deadspeaker who''s amenable to be recruited to a demesne."


    Ravia considered that. "Fine. A simple recommendation it is. You will have to recruit them on their own."


    We shook hands in agreement for the little wager.

 345 - The Tour

    Once all the furs and skins were moved out of the hold, the salt came next, which would have been difficult if Ravia hadn''t brought a Mentalist with him. Either he remembered the difficulty we''d had last time or he had something heavy to pick up later. The woman needed to have line of sight to the barrels to be able to lift them up, but I''d had a new large hatch added to the deck. That and the mount for the heavy pulley directly over the hatch had been meant for us to lift up the barrels¡ªwe''d practiced it back home¡ªbut I was glad it wasn''t needed.


    Thankfully, there was no slipping or accidents. The controls for the bound tool driver had been covered up with blankets and bedrolls, meant to look like we were just being very lazy about how we did things¡ªthe exasperated expression on the Mentalist''s face when she''d glanced at it meant we had probably succeeded¡ªbut it would probably be damaged a lot if the barrel had fallen on it, never mind the ice and planks below it. Ice and wood were not meant to resist a falling barrel full of what was essentially, when you thought about it, powdered rock.


    It took far less time to move the salt barrels with the Mentalist''s assistance.


    "So," I said brightly once the last of the salt barrels had been lifted up from the hold, "I promised you a tour, didn''t I? Follow me."


    I led Ravia down the ladder into the deck below. "Sorry for the mess," I said, gesturing towards the pile of bedding over the bound tool controls, "but shelves don''t really work as well when the ship is always swaying. Everything just falls down. Ideally we''d use chests or boxes, but¡­" I shrugged, "we needed the space for trade goods."


    "I see," Ravia said thoughtfully. "Yes, I vaguely remember from the voyage here when I was younger. Would baskets hanging from the ceiling work?"


    I blinked, titling my head thoughtfully. "Huh¡­ you know, it would, though it can''t be anything too heavy. And we''ll need to put them against the walls and where we won''t be walking, or else we''d be smacking our faces on them all the time. Something to remember for when we get home."


    "I''m glad to be of assistance," Ravia said cheerfully. He had a very good ''cheerful''. It felt natural and not forced at all.


    "Well, anyway, there we are," I said, waving at the space below the top deck. "If anyone tries building ice boats again, perhaps you can advise them on how to do it properly. As you can see here¡ª" I indicated at the gap between two wall planks that was filled in with perfectly clear ice, "¡ªsorry, you have to bend down a little¡­ we have beams of wood running though the ice of the hull for reinforcement, giving the hull structural strength."


    "Ah, yes, I see what you mean," Ravia said, bending down as I had indicated. The sun was out now, meaning there was enough light outside that the inside of the ship was lit up from what was passing though the clear ice''s gaps.


    "Ideally, you''d mix sawdust into the ice for more reinforcement, but we couldn''t do that because we needed the sawdust for other things," I exposited. "Here though, there''s so many carpentry workshops that someone would be able to just ask for sawdust for their boat, at least until the carpenters catch on. And probably not even then. The downside is that it would be a lot darker in here, since the ice wouldn''t be so clear."


    "I admit, when I heard of a boat made of ice, I expected the inside to be cold," Ravia said. "It''s actually very warm in here."


    I nodded. "Yes, people keep thinking that. The ice is held together by a binding that keeps it solid, and as a result it doesn''t take in heat. So the ice actually helps maintain the temperature. If you want to keep something hot or cold for a long period of time, putting them in a box of bound ice is a good idea, as long as the ice stays bound."


    "I''ll have to remember that," Ravia said. "And these are?"


    He indicated our cargo boxes, still sheathed by a layer of darkwisps.


    "Ah, that''s something our Dungeon Binder came up with to try and keep Iridescence from damaging our goods without glass. Did you know that Iridescence doesn''t grow in, on or through ice?"


    Ravia blinked. "It doesn''t?"


    I shook my head. "I mean, it makes sense. Ice is basically solid water, after all. But we can''t exactly use a box of ice." I paused. "Well, we can, but it''ll be a bit fragile. However, darkwisps also keep out Iridescence, it''s just not used for the purpose because the enshrouding has to be total, and you can''t see through it, so using it to protect yourself from Iridescence is impractical, especially for someone who''s not a Dungeon Binder."


    Ravia nodded. "I take it then that your Dungeon Binder found a way to combine these two aspects somehow?"


    I nodded. "You can''t see because of the darkwisps but there are wooden boxes in there. The darkwisps keeps the Iridescence out, and our Dungeon Binder keeps it imbued from our demesne. To prevent Iridescence from coming up from underneath, it''s raised up on blocks of ice."


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    "Which doesn''t allow the colors to grow or pass through it," Ravia said, nodding again in understanding. "It sounds simple when put that way."


    "It''s not perfect," I said. "Once we''re out of a demesne, we can''t put anything in the box or take it out, or else Iridescence would get in with our arms. So in practical terms, it''s in essence a sealed glass box."


    "A glass box that can be any size, and made with materials far cheaper than the cost of glass," Ravia pointed out.


    "That''s true," I agreed, "but I''m not sure how well it would work when mounted on a wagon. Most methods of locking the boxes in place would allow a way for the colors to get through the protection of the darkwisps. Speaking of which, do you know who''s publishing the almanac? My Dungeon Binder gave me permission to send the idea to them for submission."


    "They explain the submission procedures at the back of the almanac, I believe."


    "Unfortunately, my Dungeon Binder never lets me read it. Which is fair, because if I had a book to read I''d never get anything done, but still¡­" I shook my head. "Anyway, here are our beds. They fold up against the walls so we have space to eat and other things during the day. It''s something we use back at home since houses are still pretty small."


    "Ah, yes. I''ve encountered the same in some of the demesne I''ve traded at, although it''s not often down here. Many walls are too weak to hold the weight."


    "That''s¡­ unfortunate." It really was. "Well, that''s everything."


    "What about that door there?" Ravia said, nodding to the closed door at the front of the ship.


    "I''m afraid its contents are private," I said. "Sorry. But it''s really just a small room."


    Ravia glanced towards it. "A pity. I was hoping to see how your boat moved as it did."


    "Whispering," I said. "Although I''d afraid I can''t share how it works. Not a wizard. Sorry. However, speaking of negotiation¡­ "


    "Ah, yes, your mysterious product of which you are offering me the chance to be the exclusive distributor," Ravia said, looking amused. "You know, a man in my position might be inclined to be resentful at being denied."


    "Would a mican make you feel better?" I said, reaching into the mican jar¡ªbigger than a sack, smaller than a barrel¡ªand pulling one out to offer it to him.


    Ravia smiled, but took the fruit. "Oh? Are you conceding our wager already?"


    "Not at all. But I figured you''d enjoy a mican," I said, sitting down at one of the folding beds that doubled as benches and gestured for him to sit opposite me.


    "Well, you''re not wrong¡­" Ravia said, but put the mican in his belt pouch. "I hope you don''t mind if I save it for later." He sat down.


    "It''s your mican," I said, reaching into my belt pouch and feeling around for a bead with no markings. "Anyway, I''d like you to take a look at this."


    Ravia held out his hand, and I placed the wispbead on it. He raised an eyebrow for a moment, his smile widening slightly before he blinked and actually looked at the bead, rolling it around in his hand. I sat back, waiting for him to speak first.


    Eventually, he said, "This bead is far too big," he said slowly, finally looking up from the bead to meet my gaze.


    "Is it?" I said, keeping a polite, ''I''m listening'' expression on my face.


    "The only way to smooth a bead like this is to use it to imbue a bound tool or for a Whisperer to swallow and either regurgitate or pass it."


    I twitched. "I did not need that latter part pointed out!"


    Ravia chuckled. "It''s not as if beads can be digested. But as I was saying, this bead is perfectly smooth but it''s too big."


    "Oh? Do tell," I said, my expression going back to ''listening politely''.


    The merchant''s gaze narrowed slightly. "All demesne issue beads that are two and a half yustri in diameter, but that''s at their widest points, which includes the denomination imprints on it. For a bead to become smooth would reduce it to less than that."


    "Fascinating."


    Ravia rolled the bead around in his hand again. "Even if this is real, it wouldn''t be considered legal tender. It''s very unlikely that another demesne would accept it, and Covehold Demesne has made their position on what beads maybe be used as currency clear."


    "Legal tender? Why would you even think of such a thing?" I said brightly. "Didn''t I say this was a product that would be in high demand? I know that the workshops I visited yesterday were ecstatic that they could use their bound tools again."


    The bead stopped rolling around in his hand. "That is presuming these are, in fact, wispbeads and not simply glass."


    I shrugged. "I''m sure you have Whisperers in your employ. You can have them swallow one and let them try to use it for Whispering, but it would be simpler it you let them anchor a binding, touch metal to it, and touch the bead to the metal to imbue the binding. Less regurgitating and passing would be involved. Besides, why would I waste glass on something like this? Glass is expensive. If we had glass, we''d sell it market value."


    Ravia made a gesture that was part shrug and part nod, acknowledging the point. "I will need to have this checked back at the house," he said.


    "I''ll come with you," I said cheerfully. "We can get our salt and skins assessed while we''re at it."


    "Wha¡ªOh! Yes, yes, we can." Ravia shook his head, still staring at the bead in his hands.


    "Could you give that back, by the way?" I said, holding out my hand. "I wouldn''t want that misplaced."


    It was with clear reluctance that Ravia gave me back the wispbead, actually staring as I slipped it back into my pouch.


    "That''s rude, you know," I said as I made sure my belt pouch had been properly shut.


    Ravia flinched, a chagrinned look on his face. "Sorry. I have no excuse."


    "It''s fine," I said, waving a hand as if to wipe the whole thing away. Then I grinned. "So¡­ should I take it to mean you''re impressed?"


    The merchant blinked, then chuckled. "Even if it is fake¡­ the audacity is certainly impressive," he said.


    "No, none of that! No conditional victories. I won''t settle for it. You''re either impressed or I owe you a mican."


    "Then¡­ let us see what Endlew thinks back at the house."


    I nodded. That was presumably one of their Whisperers. "I can wait that long. And to show I''m a good sport about it, I''ll even bring the mican along."


    Ravia laughed.

 346 - Ravia’s Party Trick

    We had a long walk following the carts through the streets later, where I found a much shorter and more direct way to get to Emborin and Sons than the one I''d taken yesterday. I talked to Ravia as we went, asking him his opinions on the local bars, eateries, bakeries, doctors, Deadspeakers, and anything else to fill the time as Multaw and Cyuw once again followed behind me.


    "They have doughstrands?" I said intently as we passed one in particular that seemed both strangely empty and yet strangely wealthy, with a low stone fa?ade, well-made wooden walls, and even a colorful painted sign.


    "Yes. It''s not cheap, but as you can see they get enough business to be doing very well," Ravia said, looking amused at my reaction. "Other places have tried serving it as well, but everyone agrees Engario''s is the best in the demesne. They''ve done very well with using what ingredients are available in their dishes."


    I solemnly swore that I would eat there before we left.


    After a lot of walking that made my feet ache, we were back at the merchant house.


    They offered to let us wait at the bargaining tables¡ªand even brought out some warm buns of bread and water for freshments¡ªbut despite the men''s hungry glances, I had to decline, and instead asked if I could watch as they inventoried the skins and weighed the salt. Thankfully, Ravia didn''t look insulted by the insinuation. I suppose I wasn''t the only one who liked to keep their eyes on their goods until the payment came in.


    I thought that the Mentalist was going to lift the canvas that the salt was on to move it, and was slightly disappointed when workers instead just shoveled all the salt into the merchant house''s own barrels. Thankfully, a cursory examination showed that the barrels were, if not exactly, at least very close to the volume of the ones we''d used, so shortly after arriving the salt was once more packed into five wooden barrels.


    "Each barrel is measured so we know how much it weighs when empty," Ravia explained as we followed the barrels, which were now being pushed on wheelbarrows specially shaped for the purpose. "When we weigh them on the scale, we know how much to subtract to get the correct weight."


    "Clever," I said as I watched one of the barrels be moved onto the short arm of a large scale. Once it was in place, weights were moved along the long arm until the arm the barrel rested on rose and the scales became level. I left unspoken that the thing could be rigged with short weights. That would have been rude. Besides, I came to Emborin and Sons because they had a reputation of being scrupulously fair. While they could, of course, just be very good liars¡­ well, I wasn''t Lori. Reasonable precautions aside, I trusted people until there was reason not to, and they usually repaid my trust¡ªespecially when they saw I wasn''t so trusting that I hadn''t taken precautions.


    Living any other way was just too sad for me.


    The salt came down to 725 sengrains, 726 if rounded up, which Ravia was willing to do since it was in bulk. Since they were buying salt for 14.71 bead-tani per sengrain, and factoring in how much we were getting for the skins and furs which was at 15.25 bead-tani per sengrain¡­


    Well, it was a lot of beads.


    It also showed me that I had perhaps priced the wispbead I''d sold yesterday just right, perhaps even undersold them a little.


    I glanced over the receipt appended to the contract that Ravia had passed me, looking over each item, and comparing it to the other copy. I nodded, signing my name at the bottom of both and keeping one copy for myself. "Thank you, Ravia. Once more, it''s been wonderful dealing with Emborin and Sons. I''m surprised you''re not bigger."


    "We''ve been wanting to expand, but finding a location for a new house has been difficult," Ravia said. "There are considerations we need assurance on."


    "Like proper dragon shelters?" I said knowingly.


    "Among other things, but yes, that is a primary consideration. Even the oldest surviving demesne outside of Covehold don''t really have the resources to protect more than their population in the event of a dragon. Until that changes, we are limited to this location."


    "Well, I hope things get better for you soon," I said, thinking of the measures that Lori had taken for River''s Fork''s dragon shelter. "Now, about our wager¡­" I held up a mican. This time we had a small sack of the things with us. We probably didn''t need it for lunch, but it was delicious, so why not?


    Ravia nodded. "If you''ll follow me upstairs? I believe a private room would be more suited for this discussion."


    "Lead on then," I said, getting to my feet and gesturing Multaw and Cyuw to follow me.


    The merchant said nothing about their presence as we followed him towards the stairs, where he paused a moment to speak to the guard there before gesturing for me and the men to follow him. The guard eyed us as we went up, but it was a professional eyeing so he''d remember who we were. I gave him a smile and a nod, and he nodded back perfunctorily.


    The floor upstairs was a large, open room full of tables serving as desks. Various men and women were working with papers, pens, styluses and other implements, probably doing accounting and inventory things. On three of the desks, the people were just grabbing sheets from one pile, quickly looking over it, then putting the paper into another pile, occasionally taking a break to write something every dozen sheets or so. Mentalists most likely, putting their memory to use as computers for the merchant house, as opposed to working as couriers or lifters. People glanced up as we passed, but apparently it wasn''t too unusual to have people up here, because they quickly went back to work after the brief interruption of the mundanity of their day.


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    From the dimensions I could see, this was only a third of the second floor. On opposite ends of the room were doors, and we headed towards one. There was no guard on it, and from how Ravia just opened it the door wasn''t locked either. Beyond it was a hallway lined with doors, with another door at the end. There were guards here, two at the end of the hallway on either side of the door there and, as I realized when I looked to either side, two on either side of the door we''d come in through. Ravia nodded at them, then led us towards the nearest door to the right.


    Inside was a room with a table that was larger and was more decorated than the one downstairs. The chairs around it were heavier and had a seat cushion this time, which was quite frankly seemed almost indulgent now after months of sitting on benches and stools.


    Huh, would Lori like a cushion for her chair? She probably would, but the question was getting the chair away from her long enough to put a cushion on it¡­


    We''d barely sat down on opposite sides of the table when the door opened again, and an older man walked in. He had the kind of darkened, dry looking skin that came with working out in the sun a lot, and his green hair was sun-bleached to a paler shade. The clothes he wore were sweaty, but no more than mine was. "You called for me, Ravia?" he said, and I blinked at his surprisingly high-pitched voice. Huh. I had honestly expected some variation of gruff, but he sounded like a young singer I''d listened to once.


    "Ah, Endlew," Ravia said warmly. "Come in, please. I need you to verify something for me. Hopefully, it will be quick one way or the other. My friend here has a bead that I need you to confirm is real."


    "Ah, that''s why you said I needed to bring wire," Endlew said, glancing towards me. "Well, I suppose I could use a new bead, but I''m not paying that it used to be worth."


    "We can discuss that later, Endlew," Ravia said. "Rian, the bead please?"


    I reach into my belt pouch and pop it open, pulling out my handkerchief¡ªyes, I''ve never really gotten into the habit of using those¡ªand laying it out on the table. Then I dug inside the pouch again to grab a handful of beads. "Here you go," I said, putting the beads on the handkerchief, which managed to keep them from rolling. "Test whichever you¡ªoh, wait, not that one." I grabbed the last large small-mid bead¡ªit was a thinkbead¡ªand put it back in my pouch. "Sorry, grabbed too many."


    Endlew narrowed his eyes at the large wispbeads on the handkerchief, their lack of denomination markings clearly visible. He glanced at Ravia, who nodded.


    From his pocket, Endlew drew not a wire but slim metal rod¡ªit looked like brass¡ªsomewhere between thirty and forty yustri long. Taking one of the beads at seemingly random with another glance at me, a light began to glow on one of his fingers. He pressed one end of the rod to the light, and touched the other end of the rod to the bead.


    After a short wait, he grunted. "It''s real," he said, sounding surprised. He raised the wispbead up to his face, rough fingers rolling the bead over as he stared at it.


    "Could you test the others as well?" Ravia said, gesturing at the other beads on the handkerchief.


    One by one, the beads were tested. I already knew what they would find, so I simply sat patiently and waited for them to finish. Ravia, for his part, became more and more expressionless with each confirmation. When the last bead had been confirmed, he let out a deep sigh. "Thank you Endlew," he said as he turned back to me. "Could you please inform father about your findings while I continue speaking to Master Rian here? I believe he''d want to hear this from you directly."


    Endlew nodded as he reluctantly put down the last bead. Giving me one last look¡ªI gave him a bright smile and a little wave¡ªhe left the room with noticeably more urgency in his step.


    "While I understand this might be something the head of the house would want to get involved with, I was hoping to continue dealing with you," I told Ravia once the door had closed. "You''re easy to talk to."


    "Why, thank you. It''s nice to be appreciated," Ravia said. "Well, it seems I owe you a recommendation of a Deadspeaker. If you can give me some specifics about what you''re looking for, I''ll see about who I can find. "


    "I''d say to take your time¡­ but we intend to leave in five days, so¡­ "


    "Ah. I shall hurry, then." Ravia took a deep breath. "Your Dungeon Binder has really discovered how to make beads?"


    "They''re there, aren''t they?" I said.


    "Yes¡­ I suppose they are¡­" Ravia mused. "Well. I won''t insult you by asking how these are made. If your Dungeon Binder was willing to part with that information, you would be offering that instead."


    "The idea of having the monopoly of supplying wispbeads to all the owners of bound tools in the continent did appeal to them, yes," I said. "In time, they expect people to figure out how it''s done. But until they do¡­" I shrugged. "Well, the owners of bound tools can either wait for new double-small beads that are wispbeads to come in on the coming boats and burn through them as they have before¡­ or they can use these." I gestured to the beads on the table. "Uh, could you help me put them back on the handkerchief? I don''t want to roll off."


    Ravia obliged, and we both put beads back on the cloth. "How much are you asking for them?"


    "Ten bead-tani per wispbead," I said. A small mid-large bead for two had been the most I''d been able to negotiate for the beads yesterday, but he didn''t know that. Besides, I fully expected to be negotiated down a little.


    "Per bead? Surely per sengrain of beads is a more reasonable measure."


    "You''re assuming we know how many beads it takes to make a sengrain," I said. I''d probably have to find that out for future reference. "Per bead because we know exactly how many beads there are when we conducted our inventory, and this is enough of a high-value product to justify putting a Mentalist on duty to count it. You''d need to do that anyway to verify how much you have available." Still, I relented a little. "Look, how about this. If you can tell me how much the average large wispbead weighs¡ª"


    "Twenty-one grains at most, though depending on denomination marks it might be closer to twenty grains."


    I blinked. "You just know that off the top of your head?"


    Ravia shrugged in that way one does when you finally get to show off a party trick that really isn''t all that impressive.


    I chuckle "All right. Assuming twenty-one grains is in fact what a large bead weighs¡ª" I''ll have to check to be sure, "¡ªgive me a moment¡­"


    "Forty-eight beads rounded up," Ravia said innocently.


    I gave him a flat look and made a show of stubbornly calculating it myself first, then nodded. "Let''s be generous and call it forty-seven and a half, so you''d want two sengrains to get whole numbers of beads. That''s 475 bead-tani per sengrain, provided a wispbead does weigh that much."


    "You''re welcome to borrow our scales to check, Rian," Ravia offered.


    "Why, thank you," I said. There were so many possible layers of deception that even if the scales in question were completely accurate a cheat might still happen down the line, but¡­


    Well, it''s a terrible way to live, thinking like that. Besides, without denomination markings, our beads would no doubt be heavier than the ones used for legal tender. However, more importantly, if Ravia and his family''s trading house were going to be our distributors in this, then they needed to make their own profits too.


    I was never going to get ten bead-tani a wispbead anyway. Both Ravia and I knew that. It was just a nice number to work down from.


    The door opened.

 347 - The Man Whose Name Was On The Sign

    The way Ravia stood up told me the man who entered was important, along with how he just interrupted this negotiation. If the guards at the door, the stairs and the hallway outside let him in¡­


    "Ah, father," Ravia said with a nod. "Endlew spoke to you, I take it? Master Rian, this is my father Emborin, the head of our merchant house."


    Well, that confirmed it.


    I gave Ravia''s father a quick glance up and down. He wasn''t very tall, standing at about his son''s height, but had the stocky build of someone who''d done a lot of heavy lifting for a long time. His muscles were still thick, and I wouldn''t be surprised if he was the type who didn''t care about getting his hands dirty, hauling things himself. His wide waistline was probably as much muscle as fat, but his orange hair was going pale at the temples, the pale pastel orange standing out against the darker hair on the rest of his head. Even if it wasn''t required, I stood up respectfully, giving them a welcoming smile. It was always a good idea to be respectful to someone''s whose beads you were going to take, especially when it was a large amount of beads. "Good day, Master Emborin. To what do I owe the pleasure of your presence?"


    He didn''t smile back, his expression remaining smooth and serious despite all the wrinkles on it. "Master Rian. I hear you''re the one with the ice boat who can keep it from tipping over." His voice was as deep as you''d expect, with a slight grating quality like he had a mouthful of rocks. Not unpleasant, but surprising after dealing with Ravia.


    I shrugged. "It helps to know what you''re doing."


    The man let out a low chuckle as he walked over to the other side of the table. "I suppose it does. Are you going to be teaching everyone how to do it themselves?"


    "Unfortunately, I don''t have the time. Lots of things to take care of at home, you know?"


    Emborin nodded as he sat where Ravia had been, his son sitting next to him as I settled back onto my seat. He picked up one of the wispbeads from the handkerchief with thick but deft fingers, rolling them across his fingertips. "So¡­ these are the wispbeads¡­ yes, they''re far too big to have been swallowed or used before."


    "We were discussing Rian borrowing one of our scales so he can weigh the beads he has and calculate a reasonable price per sengrain," Ravia said. "At the moment, he is asking for ten bead-tani per wispbead."


    The older man''s eyes rose, though I couldn''t tell it was genuine surprise or confusion, or purely for my benefit. "For a large bead?"


    Well, as a conversational prop, it didn''t matter. I shrugged. "Our demesne isn''t Taniar-approved, so even if we put denominations on our bead, that value would only mean anything in our own demesne. Outside of our demesne, its greatest value would be as a fuel for bound tools and for use by Whisperers themselves. We all know how that''s going right now. The only way we''d make a reasonable profit is if it''s cheaper to buy and use than the remaining denominations of large wispbeads. Depending on how the demesne the beads come from organizes it, the remaining large beads left to use probably cost anything from a hundred to two thousand bead-tani." No one was going to be using double-large wispbeads for their bound tools. They''d never make enough to justify it.


    I didn''t lose anything by admitting that. A small mid-large bead was almost always denominated at ten bead-tani, unless it was one of those demesnes where the Dungeon Binder has all the beads there valued at one and prime numbers, or all the beads have denominations that were multiples of seven.


    Everyone hated dealing with beads from those demesnes.


    Theoretically, I could raise the price all the way up to just under the value of a large mid-large bead, but in practice, the cost of the bead was best equal to or much less than the price of hiring a Whisperer to imbue the bound tool themselves. I''d probably putting some Whisperers out of work for a little while, but only as long as the supply of wispbeads locally available lasted, and Whisperers would always be in demand somewhere. They could take up a rewarding new career in salt extraction, for one. I wouldn''t be surprised if some of the boats out at sea were evaporating their water with a hired Whisperer.


    Both Emborin and Ravia nodded in agreement, either realizing this line of thought themselves or simply agree with my reasoning.


    "But," I continued, "to be honest, we don''t have the time, resources or infrastructure to sell the beads ourselves. Even if we were inclined to, we''d immediately lose our profits acquiring some sort of premises, local taxes, paying for security against the gangs I keep hearing about¡ª" while there had always been criminality in Covehold, the carpenters I spoke to yesterday all warned me of the recent rise in gang behavior, "¡ªand all those fun things¡­" I shook my head. "I''d rather sell them to you and have you deal with all that."


    "How honest of you," Ravia said dryly.


    My reply was a shrug and a shameless grin. "You already know who to talk to about all these things. I know how government corruption works. I''d rather not lose all my profits just to be able to pay my taxes in a timely manner."


    "It''s not quite that bad," the younger merchant said, "but I take your point. So you''ll simply sell them to us?"


    "I was thinking more of a partnership," I said. "You''d have the exclusive contract to sell and distribute our wispbeads to the workshops of Covehold and the Whisperers of the surrounding area. In exchange, you''d probably need to be the one to deal with any government interference and eventual regulation, taxation and other issues that will no doubt arise."


    "Exclusive, you say?"


    I nod. "Exclusive. While we might get more if we approach another merchant house, or even pit the houses in a bidding war, that would take too long, cause needless and avoidable ill will, and would surely draw the attention of Covehold Demesne''s lords and perhaps even the Dungeon Binder, no doubt accelerating government interference." I shrugged. "No, what''s important is to start selling these beads to workshops with bound tools and Whisperers who want them as soon as possible. The faster people buy them, the faster we can both make a profit."


    "Interesting. And what would your stake be in this?" Ravia said.


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    I glanced at Emborin, who was watching me intently, letting him know I hadn''t forgotten him. They were actually going easy on me, having Ravia doing all the talking. I had no doubt the father could be more aggressive, pressuring me with supposed urgency and added costs that would sound so reasonable to get me to try and concede larger shares or a lower price. "Why, we provide the product and transport it to you, of course. After all, there''s nothing to sell without product."


    "It doesn''t seem like much, considering what we will have to deal with."


    "You''re welcome to develop the means of producing wispbeads on your own."


    Ravia nodded, conceding the point, then glanced at his father. "I admit, the offer is tempting, but I''d like more information on some details."


    "Such as?" The hard questions would no doubt be coming.


    "How often will you be able to deliver beads to us?"


    "I''m afraid it will not be regularly. Not weekly, certainly, and I doubt we''ll be able to manage monthly. Once every two months, perhaps, outside of winter," I admitted honestly. "Truthfully, we''d have been here sooner, but my Dungeon Binder wanted to wait to see if there would be a dragon this summer, since travelling would be relatively safer during the period after one passed."


    "That does not bode well for having a regular supply," Emborin finally said, tone mildly disapproving.


    "It isn''t," I admitted readily. "However, that''s because we''re limited to the resources we have now. Part of the reason I''m here was to recruit Deadspeakers to allow us to build better boats. As nice as the Coldhold is, it could be better. Faster, certainly."


    Ravia opened his mouth to respond, then paused. "The¡­ Coldhold?"


    "Inaccurate, I know, but it seemed like a good name with all the ice that went into building it."


    "I¡­ see." He shook his head as if to banish the tangent. "Well, regardless, having an unreliable or at least irregular supplier is not desirable. Can''t you commit to more regular times?"


    "Not at this time, no," I said. "As I said, even if I wanted to commit, our resources as they stand make the voyage dangerous. Besides, while having an irregular supplier is inconvenient, I''m sure a merchant can use the reality of a limited supply to raise the price of goods a little, at least until the next delivery."


    "That''s not a practice we approve of," Ravia said with a glance at his father, who was frowning.


    "Then don''t," I said. "You''re experienced at this, I''m sure you can come up with some kind of solution to the problem of low supply and high demand beyond the usual. It''s not like you''re going to have any competition. And if we have competition, it means we no longer have a monopoly and you have another supplier of beads." I shrugged. "But as to regular times, we might be able to improve matters in a few months once we''ve built a better boat. As it is, I can''t really promise a resupply sooner than two, perhaps three months, and none at all in the winter. Perhaps when we have more resources, it can be faster, but until then¡­"


    "I see¡­" Ravia said. "That is unfortunate. Is there anything else we should know?"


    "Nothing that I feel you need to be informed of before you commit yourselves to partnering with us," I said. "You know how it is."


    "Why us?" Emborin said, and Ravia visibly sat back in his chair as I turned to face his father. "Why not some other merchant house? The Valmert Trading Company would have agreed to any price you named, and so would the Covehold Merchant Partnership."


    "Because everything I''ve found out about you, and my own dealings, tells me you''re fair, reliable, and honest," I said. "Your neighbors don''t resent you, your workers respect you, and your customers like you. There are probably worse people to approach about this, but it will take a lot of work on my part to find someone better. And to be perfectly honest, I don''t have that long. Our Dungeon Binder wants us all back home soon."


    "You''ve dealt with us twice," Emborin said. "You''re willing to trust us after that?"


    "No, of course not," was my cheerful reply, which made them blink, though likely it was because of the tone. "There''s no trust in insisting you pay me for the beads on the same day you receive them. Trust is what grows from what happens in between. If you refuse¡­ well, then I''m going to be spending the next few days having to look for another partner in this, on top of all the things I already have to do. I''d bid you good day, take the beads for my salt and skins, and maybe come back later for some things I don''t have time to look for on my own."


    "You''d come back?" Ravia said, clearly both amused and bemused by the statement.


    "Well, yes. You still owe me a recommendation and I have no idea where to get any of the things in my shopping list. I have no idea where to find a good papermaker, for one thing, much less where I might be able to buy cloudbloom seeds or seedlings or whatever."


    Ravia chuckled somewhat self-consciously as his father glanced at him. Ah. No wonder the older man didn''t smile much. That expression was slightly unnerving if you weren''t used to it. Still, I took him having so many laugh lines on his face was a good sign. "Ah. Yes, I do still owe you a recommendation. Sorry, it slipped my mind."


    I waved my hand in the gesture Lori was so fond of. "Happens to my Dungeon Binder all the time. I''d recommend writing a note to yourself on a rock and keeping it in your pocket." My expression became slightly more serious as I looked them both in the eye. "Now, I''m a reasonable man. I understand if you need to speak with some other people before coming to a decision about this. I can give you one¡­no, two days to consider."


    "Why that long?" Ravia asked.


    "Because we''ll be leaving soon after that, and if you decide ''yes'', you''ll need some time to properly inventory all the beads, and maybe another day or two to put together the other things on my shopping list that I''ll be able to afford then. After that, we''ll be leaving. And if you refuse, I''ll need that time to find some other merchant house willing to take this deal."


    "You''re not going to look for another merchant house while we deliberate?"


    I shrugged. "That''s my problem, isn''t it?"


    Ravia shrugged and nodded at the same time, conceding the point, then glanced sideways at the older merchant next to him. "Father?"


    Emborin stared at the bead on the handkerchief. Then he nodded. "Could you come back at noon, Master Rian? We''ll have your answer¡ªand the beads for your salt and other goods¡ªready for you then."


    I nodded, then paused. "I don''t suppose I can get a little advance on that salt money? I promised the men lunch."


    The older merchant glanced at the two men at my back, and nodded. "Of course. Ravia, see that Master is given an advance from the petty beads, will you? Then wait for me in my office."


    "Yes, father," Ravia said as the man rose and gave me one more nod before leaving the room.


    "He seems nice," I commented. "Reminds me of my father."


    Ravia gave me a quick smile. "If you''ll come with me, Rian, I''ll collect your advance, and we can weigh your beads on the office scales."


    Ah, right. It had almost slipped my mind. I wished I had a convenient rock to write it on. "Lead the way," I said as I collected the beads from the table.


    The young merchant smiled when I asked to weigh the large small-mid bead I''d gotten yesterday, which incidentally came up to twenty and eight-tenth grains in weight. The wispbead came up to twenty-one and three-tenths. I said nothing at either number, simply committing them to memory.


    Ravia quickly counted out two hundred bead-tani¡ªthankfully in an assortment of beads and not simply two large mid-large beads¡ªhanding them to me along with a little receipt noting the amount was being deducted from the totals of our contract. This time he pointedly didn''t stare as I put the beads in my belt pouch¡ªwhich would need to go under my shirt again, and the handkerchief and glowing rock had to be used as a separator¡ªas I put them in.


    "Here," I said, putting one of the wispbeads on Ravia''s desk as I stood up. "For demonstration purposes."


    It was, quite frankly, impressive how Ravia seemed to just wave his hand over the bead and it disappeared from the table, tucked into his palm. "Thank you, Rian," he said. "And¡­ thank you."


    I shrugged. "I hope you remember you said that when things get complicated," I said as he led me back towards the stairs, nodding at the guard there to let me though.


    Now, where do we go eat?

 348 - The Final Negotiations

    As much as I wanted to eat at that place with the doughstrands, the men probably wouldn''t enjoy it as much as I would. So once we were back out on the street, we asked the guards at the door if they knew any good places to eat. Fortunately, we were early since it was only late morning, and found seats at a corner table before the early crowds started coming in.


    By unspoken agreement, there was no stew of any sort. Instead, we ordered shredded meat served on long bread buns¡ªactual bread and not just flatbread¡ª meat balls, dumplings, chlyp skewers and mugs of booze for Multaw and Cyuw. I made do with cold tea, which actually had little ice shavings floating on it, as I''d never really managed to developed a taste for booze. My tongue rebelled at the taste.


    I''m told I''m missing something really good, but I don''t like what I don''t like.


    Because of the number of people coming to the eatery, we didn''t have the table to ourselves for long. Fortunately, because of the proximity to Emborin and Sons, it wasn''t unusual to have people from other demesne eating there, and people were friendly enough.


    "Oh, our demesne is a long way inland," I said when asked were we were from. "It''s new, we only started it last year. The first time a dragon came¡­" I didn''t have to play up the shudder that came over me. That had probably been the point the demesne had been closest to death. If Lori hadn''t managed to keep up the protection''s she''d set¡­ if she hadn''t been capable of maintaining what she was doing while she''d been all but asleep, one quivering, partly open eyelid away from true unconsciousness¡­ "It nearly finished us, but thankfully our Dungeon Binder was too stubborn to fall asleep, and the dragon was gone quick." If the first dragon that had passed over us had lingered for a week¡­


    One of the men, Toltar, made a face. "Yeah, you hear stories about that. Everyone knows you don''t bother to remember a new demesne until it''s survived a dragon or two. I heard a whole bunch of the new ones burned down in the last dragon. Not ready for exploding rain, or just fell asleep in the middle of it and their wizards couldn''t keep up what they were doing."


    "I heard someone was killed by one of their own wizards, and then the fool didn''t know how to do anything so the whole demesne died," another one of the men eating with them, Yhoe, whispered conspiratorially.


    "If everyone in the demesne died, how does anyone know they were killed by one of their own wizards?" Multaw asked.


    Toltar rolled his eyes. "Don''t mind him, he just likes to spread that one around."


    Yhoe unashamedly gave a wide grin. "You wouldn''t believe how many people don''t ask that question when I tell them."


    After some chatting, a casual question let me know where the nearest job placement board was. It was as good a place as any to look for Deadspeakers, and one of the men who''d come to eat with us even commented that it wasn''t unusual for a demesne looking to recruit a wizard of some sort to post bills there.


    We''d have stayed longer, but noon was approaching, and while there was the possibility that we might be made to wait in the usual power-play of wasting our time, it''s more likely we''ll be asked to wait because they haven''t come to a decision yet, or were still hashing out all the points of the decision. Fortunately, the guards still remembered us from earlier, so someone was sent to tell Ravia that we were back.


    It wasn''t long before the merchant was coming down the stairs, his usual professional smile on his face. "Ah, there you are Master Rian," he said. "You are very prompt. I trust you enjoyed your meal?"


    "It''s so good to be able to eat something besides stew for a change," I said. "Are you done already? We don''t mind waiting a little if you still need to discuss things."


    "There''s no need. The deliberations are finished. Please follow me so we can finalize matters."


    I let out a small sigh as I climbed up the stairs, my eyes on Ravia''s back. That was a great weight off my mind. While the following negotiations were still important, unless I was completely unreasonable¡ªand I liked to think I wasn''t¡ªthen it was unlikely the merchant house would go back on their decision. They could threaten to, but it wasn''t a threat they could use lightly, and I doubted they would.


    We followed Ravia back to the hallway with the meeting room, but instead of the meeting room from before, the merchant led us towards the door at the end of the hall. Nodding to the guards on either side, he opened the door for me.


    I reminded myself that I was a lord, for all the good that was when our demesne was all but a non-entity, and stepped through with a confident smile and a firm step, Multaw and Cyuw following behind me.


    Directly opposite the door was a wide window that, while only showing a view of the buildings beyond, let in a lot of light and even a slight breeze. In the room was a long table that was parallel to the window, and on one side sat Emborin, three other men that were probably the sons besides Ravia mentioned on the sign as they shared their father''s orange hair in various shades, and the Whisperer from before as well as three other people. One of them seemed to be taking notes, or possibly dictation of the proceedings, but that didn''t necessarily mean they were some kind of menial. Maybe they just had the best handwriting.


    "Master Rian," Emborin greeted me as I sat down, Multaw and Cyuw at my back. "Allow me to introduce everyone. This is¡­"


    I listened attentively as Ravia sat down on an empty chair on their side, getting a handful of names. The one taking notes was a brother-in-law who was in charge of the house''s record keeping, and the other two were the house''s primary lawyer and accountant, which I supposed only made sense. There was a good chance that at least one of the people in the room was a Mentalist, if for no other reason than so that they could have an exact record of the event. Those last three were the mostly likely ones to be it. All three might be, for all I knew. There was no reason to not have more than one.


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    "We''re thankful that you allowed Ravia to keep a sample," Emborin said. "It made our discussion much easier."


    "It''s no problem," I said. "I hope you didn''t have to use up all of it."


    In response, one of Ravia''s brothers placed a wispbead on the table. I reached for it, then paused. "Uh, no one swallowed this, did they."


    "No, I didn''t swallow it," Endlew the Whisperer said, the left side of his mouth pulling back in a half-smirk. "It''s clean."


    "Uh¡­ let''s leave it there for the moment, then," I said. "So¡­ what have you decided? Do I have to try my luck somewhere else?"


    "No. After discussing it, we''re decided to accept your offer. However, we have certain conditions."


    "What a coincidence. So do I."


    Emborin nodded, no doubt having expected it. "And they are?"


    "I''ll bring them up when they become relevant," I said, "however, I''d like to request that Ravia continues to be the one who handles dealings with me as much as possible."


    Everyone turned to look at the merchant in question.


    "Is there any particular reason why?" one of Ravia''s brothers asked.


    I shrugged. "I''ve enjoyed my dealings with him, and see no reason to change to someone else unless he says that he can''t stand talking to me."


    Everyone looked at Ravia again.


    "I have no objection to continuing to handle our dealing with Master Rian," he said, looking amused.


    Emborin nodded. "All right, then. That sounds reasonable enough. Now, Master Rian, you said you can''t commit to regular deliveries, but you must have some idea of how often you can deliver new products."


    "At the moment, with the resources we have available, the most I can promise is making another delivery of beads once, perhaps twice more if we''re lucky, before winter sets in," I said. "If we had a better boat, we could probably be more regular, but at the moment it''s not something I can promise."


    "Hmm¡­" one of Ravia''s brothers hummed thoughtfully. "What if as part of the agreement we commission such a boat for you? We could provide the wood at cost, and arrange the commission with the relevant Deadspeakers and workshops?"


    I blinked. Huh. That¡­ honestly, that actually sounded like a good idea. All this time Lori and I had been thinking of having to build a new boat ourselves, but¡­ well, even if we had a Deadspeaker with the skills we needed, if the rate that Lori could build things in River''s Fork was any indication it would still be months before such a project was completed. And Lori had the advantage of having a Dungeon Binder''s endless supply of magic to assist her. The Deadspeaker would probably be limited to how much magic he could work with.


    Having a boat built here would be much easier. There would be a large workforce, both of Deadspeakers and woodworkers, to call upon so they could probably solve any problems with attrition¡­ but doing it that way would require funding. I doubt Lori would be happy with me deciding to spend all our earnings on a new boat. Then there''d be the issue of bringing that boat back home with us. I''m not sure the Coldhold could tow such a thing behind it.


    "I''m afraid I can''t make that decision alone," I said. "It''s something I would need authorization for, not to mention a plan so we can get an estimate for the amount of wood it would need and labor. Can we put that suggestion on the side for now?"


    "I see. Very well, then. Onto the next matter. How many wispbeads can you deliver per trip?"


    I had to shrug. "It depends on my Dungeon Binder. They''re the ones who produce the wispbeads, and¡­" I sighed. "I''ve asked them to record how much they can make in a day, but you try getting a Dungeon Binder to do anything they don''t want to do."


    "No, I suppose not¡­" Emborin said slowly.


    "The only thing I can guarantee is that I will have beads for you to sell when I come back," I said. "The amount¡­ well, it''ll depend. I can reasonably promise maybe a hundred beads, but I don''t dare go above that. Not without speaking to our Dungeon Binder and finding out how much time they''re willing to devote exclusively to production."


    "Is that why you preferred to price them by bead rather than by weight?" Ravia said.


    I nodded. "Partially. We just didn''t have any scales back home, but we had plenty of time and people to count. So we counted, and some poor girl had to add it all up."


    "How many wispbeads do you have, then?" Ravia asked.


    "Before I tell you that¡­ I''d like us to agreed on the price per bead," I said.


    Emborin narrowed his eyes. "And how much were you thinking?"


    "As I told Ravia, I want ten bead-tani per wispbead," I said. "That''s well below the likely value of any remaining large wispbeads in the demesne, and it''s reasonably low enough that most workshops would still be able to afford it even if you added a profit margin of that much again." They''d probably already discussed what they were willing to pay, so here comes their counter offer¡ª


    "Done," Emborin said, nodding placidly.


    I stared, blinking. "What, really?"


    "Yes. Why, did you think we would refuse?"


    "A little? I fully expected you to give a lower price, and then we''d haggle until we met in the middle¡­"


    "You''ve heard too many stories, Master Rian. Why would we turn down a price that''s already good?"


    I considered that, then considered the possibility I might have underpriced my product. But¡­ "I have no objections¡ªit''s the price I quoted, it would be silly of me to object¡ªbut I have to say this feels very strange." I really hoped Lori didn''t ask me to renegotiate the price next time I came here. I''d do it, but¡­ No, focus! Don''t let yourself be unbalanced. "So be it, then. However, you''ll need to pick up the beads from us at the dock, as you''ve been doing with our salt. We don''t have the resources to get the wispbeads here in a timely manner, never mind safely. I want you to be the ones responsible for transferring and securing the beads from our ship to your inventory."


    "Agreed," Emborin said. "A few beads in your belt pouch is one thing, but¡­" He shook his head. "We''ll have a wagon ready as soon as we finish here. That way we can have guards with it."


    "And my men as well," I said. "So they can keep each other company."


    Emborin glanced at one of his sons¡ªthe eldest of them, as I recalled¡ªand the man nodded slowly. He was probably in charge of security or something.


    "Well, with that settled Master Rian, perhaps you are now willing to tell us how many beads you have to trade?" Ravia said.


    I took a deep breath. "Right now, my ship is carrying eleven thousand large wispbeads."


    There was silence. Even the brother-in-law taking notes had stopped as he realized what I''d just said.


    There was a reason I said that I would bet on Lori''s work ethic against any other Dungeon Binder on the continent.

 349 - Only Just Starting

    ¡°I thought you could reasonably promise only a hundred beads?¡± Ravia said.


    ¡°From your tone, you know eleven thousand is an unreasonable number,¡± I said. ¡°The only reason we have that many is because our Dungeon Binder spent a long time making those beads as we waited for the arrival of the year¡¯s first dragon.¡± I shrugged. ¡°And that was mostly because they were focused on how much we could sell so many for. With the coming year and things like the harvest and the other things they have to maintain, not to mention the projects that they¡¯re waiting on the materials we¡¯ll bring back for, I doubt they¡¯ll have as much free time. You¡¯re looking at a stockpile that arose over a long period.¡±


    ¡°Ah. That explains it. It¡¯s basically winter work,¡± the last of Ravia¡¯s brothers that hadn¡¯t spoken yet said.


    I gave a tired shrug, but didn¡¯t actually confirm it. Lori had actually made most of it this past spring and early summer once she¡¯d gotten her bead-making tray together. The main bottleneck had been getting enough pieces of Iridescence whenever she went out to grow the beads. While grains about the size of sand probably worked, Lori had found it difficult to maneuver them on the tray.


    ¡°I can see why you would want us to be the ones to transport it,¡± Ravia¡¯s eldest brother said thoughtfully. ¡°That many beads¡­ Anyone looking at it probably wouldn¡¯t see the lack of denomination marks. They¡¯d just see an almost absurd number of large beads. And if there¡¯s one thing people would likely be able to identify through a sack, it¡¯s beads. We¡¯ll need a covered wagon, and one of the lakimay to pull it¡­¡±


    With most of the important details finalized, we moved on to drafting the contract. The agreed price of ten bead-tani per bead was accepted, though the terms would defer final payment until everything was inventoried to confirm there were, in fact, as many beads as promised. Some poor Mentalists and maybe even Horotracts were going to have several tedious hours in front of them. If they were my people, I¡¯d have gotten them something nice once they finished with it all.


    There was a clause that we could update the price from per bead to per sengrain once I received confirmation from Lori. Hopefully she¡¯d understand not maximizing our profit margins in favor of maintaining cordial relations with our partner. And if not¡­ well, if she asked me to get more for the beads, at least we''d be renegotiating the price anyway.


    I was already sighing at having to try and figure out how I was supposed to rationalize the reasoning for it to something she could accept.


    There were a lot of such clauses on the contract, such as commitments to regular deliveries and the minimum amount of beads we could promise per delivery that would be renegotiated later. As it stood, we were agreeing to another delivery before winter came, for a minimum of five hundred beads. The later was something Lori could do easily, so hopefully we could finalize at a higher number. If I had my way, we¡¯d deliver monthly, but that would tie up the Coldhold to basically being a dedicated delivery ship. If we did that, we¡¯d need to have another ship for regular salt-harvesting for Lorian and River¡¯s Fork¡¯s own needs, which¡­ was probably going to need to be the next project.


    Well, second-next project. Increasing our harvest yields so we could better sustain our populations and maybe eat something besides stew was more important. The only reason we were able to live like that so far is probably because the local beasts and seels hadn¡¯t yet learned to be wary of us, but that was changing. We needed to switch our staple food from wild meat and forage to domesticated crops as soon as possible. With our staple food secured, we can slowly start recruiting more people, and maybe start having something beyond a favor economy¡­


    One of the smaller concessions I managed to get was an agreement that they would negotiate for our continued use of the docks should the demesne pass some sort of ruling limiting who could use those docks, as well as paying for our docking fee¡ªdeducted from later from our earnings¡ªshould we be lacking in funds. "Which we would be," I said shamelessly, "since I intend to leave here with more goods than beads. Besides, there'' a good chance that the increase in boat traffic in the bay might cause policy changes that might force us to have to use the newer wooden docks at the opposite side of the cove, which¡­ well, I don''t want to. That place looks very unsafe. I''ve heard talk of gangs."


    Ravia''s eldest brother made a snort of amused agreement. "It''s a bit of an exaggeration, but given how valuable your goods are, you''re probably right not wanting to dock there. Though the old docks aren''t all that safe either. Early this spring, a gang set fire to the warehouses and stole a ship that was docked there, then managed to sail it out of the demesne before word could reach Binder Kaures."


    I blinked. "They stole a ship?"


    He nodded. "It was the first ship of the year and already full of provisions and cargo. The poor fools were probably thinking of using it to get back over the ocean. Probably lost and dead now. I hear sails are hard to use. It''s why most boats use oars or wizards to move their boats."


    "No arguments there," I agreed. "Well, I''ll tell the men that if they see a fire to get our ship away from the dock." Those poor souls. Depending on the time of day they''d stolen the ship, they''d probably gotten lucky about using the sails to get out of the cove. Still, I made a note to keep an eye out for a derelict ship on the way back. There was a lot of ocean it could have drifted to, but we might get lucky. Either we can bring the ship back for a reward or we could keep it for ourselves!


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    One of the questions I¡¯d been expecting came up near the end of drafting the contract, when we were finishing up going over all the listed points, most especially the exclusivity clause that promised we would provide beads only to Emborin and Sons for the next five years. It wasn¡¯t very long, but it was very likely that someone else would have figured out how to make beads as well by that point. Dungeon Binders would be very well-motivated to figure out the process, if just to get into the market and break our monopoly. Once the period was reached, we could discuss either renewing the exclusivity clause or transitioning it to them becoming preferred partners, where they would have right to first refusal for our beads before we offered them to someone else.


    ¡°You have wispbeads to offer, but can your Dungeon Binder produce any other kind?¡± the accountant who I suspected was a Mentalist asked.


    I didn¡¯t even bother misdirecting that one. ¡°No,¡± I said. ¡°And for pretty much the reason you probably suspect.¡±


    There were nods at that, and the accountant¡ªwho I reclassified as almost certainly being a Mentalist¡ªsighed, but nodded in resignation.


    It was practically public knowledge that none of the Dungeon Binders who had established demesnes near Covehold¡ªincluding the Dungeon Binder of Covehold Demesne itself¡ªhad shown any ability to use any magic but the ones they been born with. Their efforts to try to fix this lack had eventually been spread by rumor and gossip. Trying to learn by reading basic primers on the other forms of magic, asking other wizards to teach them directly by apprenticeship, swallowing beads that they previously couldn¡¯t utilize to try to align their magic to a different type¡­ none of it had worked.


    I¡¯d kept the information from Lori, even as she''d told me to try and find primers on the other three magic she lacked with the profits from selling the beads. Partly it was because it didn''t really change her situation. While she was utterly confident she would learn how to do other forms of magic, she only made plans based upon her and the demesne''s current capabilities.  It was why I wasn''t too concerned about Shanalorre''s safety most of the time. When Lori said the little girl would be all right until Lori learned Deadspeaking, she meant it.


    The other reason was that as long as Lori still thought it was possible to learn other forms of magic, there was a very good chance she could stubborn her way to doing so. The woman had managed to learn how to both make beads and expand her demesne, a singular feat in this continent. Even the Dungeon Binder of Covehold Demesne had managed only one of those things, and while he seemed to have put it to good use, from what I heard he seldom left his dungeon and had never left his demesne. The chances of him matching Lori are practically non-existent.


    I was still getting her the books, mostly so she''d have something else to read so that she''d finally lend me the almanac, and partly so that we had some way of educating Shanalorre and any of the children who showed the potential. While all the current generation of children were confirmed to not possess magic, we had a new generation of babies now. They were still far too young to be tested, but¡­


    Well. Hopefully Lori would know better than to not educate a population that had proved loyal to her for many years. Otherwise, I had plenty of time to get the right books as reference for pointing out how doing so has historically been a terrible idea economically.


    Finally, the contract was drafted, and both Master Emborin and I read over the copies before we signed our agreement. This time they gave me a nice leather folder embossed with the merchant house''s sigil to keep the contract, which was nice. I was able to unfold the contract I''d gotten from Ravia earlier for the salt, skins and furs and put it in the folder as well. Hopefully the fold marks would flatten out.


    Multaw, Cyuw and I hitched a ride with the wagon that was readied to pick up the beads. The lakimay pulling it stood still instead of shuffling nervously as we, Ravia, Ravia''s eldest brother Royt, and the four guards got onto the back. The beast was undead, of course, the Deadspeaker sitting behind it controlling it with chain-link reins. Its feathers were still bright, vibrant and mostly intact, which meant it was either newly made or well-cared for.


    The streets had cleared again since it was a past noon, so the wagon had few obstructions as the undead beast pulled us along. There was no conversation, since we were all too busy trying to keep from being bounced hard over the streets. The wagon had some springs and suspension, and it was probably enough to keep inanimate objects from breaking too badly, but as animate people, it still hurt.


    When we reached the dock, the Coldhold was lingering several paces away from the dock according to my orders. Even before I''d known about the ship that had gotten stolen, someone forcing their way aboard the Coldhold had been a concern. Fortunately, we were paid for the day, so the dockmaster didn''t charge us again when ship docked once more. The water level had also risen, letting us put the ramp onto a saner spot.


    Ravia and his brother stayed ashore as I went down and directed the others to open the front room and start pulling out the sacks of beads, making sure we only pulled out the beads that were marked for sale and not the ones for all the ship''s bounds tools. The spare oversized beads for the bound tool driver remained where they were, covered in one corner where they couldn''t be seen when the door was open.


    It took a while to get all the sacks of beads out, passing them all in a chain with Ravia and the merchant house''s people taking care of getting them on the wagon. Each of the sacks was securely tied shut, with a number on it that listed how many beads were inside. I''d tallied them twice before we''d left to make sure they added up correctly, because it would have been embarrassing to claim eleven thousand and actually have only a little over nine thousand wispbeads. All in all, it represented nine out of ten of the beads Lori has made before we''d left. Two-thirds of the rest were also on the boat to keep us in creature comforts. In an extreme emergency, we could sell some of the rest for extra funds, but it shouldn''t be necessary.


    "Once we leave, head out and start collecting more salt," I told Yhorj as the last of the sacks were carried out. "I''ll signal you from here at the same time as yesterday. And since we have beads now, we''ll bring food. And yes, we''ll get some booze too if we can."


    "Thank you, L¡ª"


    "Ah?"


    "¡ªuh, Rian," he corrected.


    I nodded, and turned to head towards the wagon. After all, I needed to see the exchange through to the end, which included watching the merchant house confirm how many beads there were. I needed to place the orders for what the demesne needed. And then I needed to recruit Deadspeakers.


    The work was only just starting.

 350 - A Lorian Interlude: Mikon

    After dinner, Mikon and Umu left the table so that Binder Lori could talk to Erzebed, the Lady Binder and Master Kolinh in relative privacy. While the dungeon wasn''t hot, it also wasn''t all that cool. After a day of many people being out in the hot sun, the dungeon felt a little warm and smelled a bit sweaty, making lingering in it after dinner not as comfortable as it usually was.


    And so, everyone in Lorian spent their nights outside, sitting on the outdoor benches and stools and enjoying the breeze from the river that Binder Lori had made with her magic. After the heat of the day, the night was cool and refreshing as long as everyone was outside. Many people opened the doors and windows of their houses to let the interiors cool, setting up stools for them to sit at so they could ward away bugs from making themselves at home while this was happening. People also lit little piles of leaves¡ªboth dried and freshly fallen¡ªthat would smolder and smoke to try and keep the things away while they waited outside.


    Waiting for their stomachs to settle, tired from a day''s work but waiting for the insides of their houses to cool a little, people sat outside as they talked, played board games, took care of small chores, or just sat around to enjoy the cool after a long, hot day. Karina, Koyan and Kayas kept an eye on the children under the Lady Binder''s care while she was still occupied talking to Binder Lori as the children ran about, tiring themselves one last time before they had a bath and got ready to sleep.


    Mikon waved and nodded to people she knew as she and Umu headed for their house to get it ready for the night. Without Rian, no one had gathered around the log benches and fire pit in front of their house. Normally, this was a pleasant turn of events since it meant they could be alone with Rian sooner, but with him gone to Covehold Demesne again¡­


    They didn''t speak as they arrived at the house that was now their home. Mikon opened the back windows, while Umu went to the ashes of the fireplace and the tongs¡ªmade of flexible wood with pieces of bone at the end to keep from burning¡ªto draw out one of the banked coals there, blowing it back to life before using to light the wick of the oil lamp. The oil lamp was new, since Rian needed to bring his glowing rock with him to light the inside of the boat at night, so he''d gotten one for the three of them to use while he was gone.


    Judging from how it was made of stone instead of pottery, he''d asked Binder Lori to make it for him.


    Just another small sign of how special he was, that he could ask the woman to make a stone bowl for him, and she''d grant it.


    Once the lamp was lit and moved to a corner of the house to keep it from being put out, Mikon opened the door and the rest of the windows, letting the evening breeze into the house. Unlike every other house in the village, their house had a stone roof, and while it was strong and sturdy, it became very hot during the day and took some time to cool at night. With the windows and doors open, the breeze cooled the interior, though it would take some time before the room was cool enough that they could sleep comfortably.


    Even with all the doors and windows open, they didn''t have to worry about bugs getting inside, the way other people did. Bugs couldn''t enter house, barred by something Binder Lori had done. At least, Mikon felt the same strange tingling feeling entering the house as she did when entering the dungeon, and they hadn''t had to drive out a bug hiding under the bed in weeks. The only other house so favored in the village was the Lady Binder''s, and that was probably because it had the most children sleeping in it. They even had a bound tool to create a breeze inside the house! Even Rian hadn''t been able to get one of those!


    Mikon supposed one needed to be a child¡ªor probably a group of several children¡ªto be that favored.


    The flame of the little oil lamp burning on top of the table wasn''t as bright as Rian''s glowing rock, but it was enough to see by as she and Umu got the bed ready. First they laid out the bedrolls, then their blankets were laid out on top as the bed surface, to minimize the poking and keep all the layers beneath from moving around. The topmost blanket, the same one they put on every time, was starting to smell.


    Mikon and Umu finished putting together the bed covers with some relief and, after carefully lighting a little sliver of wood and blowing out the lamp wick to conserve the oil, went outside to sit in the cool of the seats at the front of the house. Erzebed still wasn''t back, and wouldn''t be for some time. It was Erzebed''s turn to mind the Um and make sure that everyone who went in were noted so they could help clean the insides at the end of the week. From the times Mikon had kept Erzebed company this summer, the building was also hot from the stone roof and took much longer to cool since there were no windows to help circulate air. That didn''t stop the people who went there for privacy, however.


    It had still been mildly embarrassing when her Aunt Kasco and Uncle Haqunoh had come in when she''d been flirting with Erzebed though. Especially when her uncle had given her an encouraging nod. He''d never judged her, and had always treated her like one of his own daughters, and she loved him for that, but it also meant that he was as embarrassingly affectionate with her as with her cousins.


    Well, it had only been mildly embarrassing.


    They used the burning sliver to light a small pile of dried and newly fallen leaves in the bonfire circle they''d gathered earlier, which began to give off smoke to keep away bugs now that they were outside the house. Mikon sat on one of the crude long benches that could fit three people, making it clear that Umu was welcome to sit beside her. Umu hesitated, glancing towards another seat, but the smoke was drifting directly towards it. The smell of smoke, while delicious on meat, was less desirable on clothes, and if Umu sat there she would have started coughing. With a sigh, Umu sat on the far end of the log bench from Mikon, all but perched on the edge of her seat.


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    It made Mikon want to sigh, but she put an encouraging smile on her face and let the other weaver be.


    They sat there quietly, the two of them just enjoying the cooling breeze and listening to the sounds of people enjoying themselves. Up above, the red and storm moons together cast everything with a pinkish light, pale glimmers of lightning flickering over the latter''s shadowed crescent. When she''d been younger, she''d been told that was a sign that a new dragon had been born on the storm moon and would be coming down soon¡­


    Mikon turned her face away from that thought and pretended it didn''t exist as her mind walked hurriedly away from it like she owed it beads. No such thing was going to happen. Binder Lori and Rian had both given a lot of thought to when he would be setting off for Covehold Demesne, and had agreed that soon after the first dragon of the year would be the best time because no other dragons were likely to appear for at least the next two months afterwards. He would be safe.


    He had to be¡­


    But while he was gone, she had to take care of the house, and everyone who lived in it.


    On the other end of the bench, Umu had her head bowed, staring into the pile of smoking leaves as if it were a fire. The breeze made her bangs and the long locks framing her face fly back and whip about. The rest of her hair was pulled back into a bun so that her neck and shoulders wouldn''t be so warm. If no one roused her or drew her notice, she could stay like that for hours, Mikon knew. She''d seen it when Umu worked, ignoring the gossip and conversations of the other women around her, hands and feet moving as her eyes followed the loom''s shuttle intently.


    "We should probably do the laundry tomorrow," Mikon eventually said, breaking the silence¡ªwell, not really silence, as the dark of night was loud with the cries of bugs and the yelling of children having fun a little ways off¡ªand making Umu glance towards her. "There''s not a lot of clothes piled up yet, but the smell of the top blanket is getting a little strong."


    Umu made a face at that, giving her a sideways look. "And whose fault is that?"


    Mikon shrugged unapologetically. "You do it too," she said, a teasing smile on her face.


    The blonde looked away. The light coming from the corners of the house left her face in shadow, but Mikon was fairly certain she as blushing. "Fine. Let''s do it in the morning before breakfast so we can get it down by noon." That was a bit optimistic, but the clothes would probably be dry enough by then. Umu looked towards the baths, then stood up. "I''m going to take a bath," she declared. "Are you coming? Your cousins are done, so you won''t have to deal with them."


    Mikon glanced that way as well, seeing a group of people coming out of the baths. As Umu had said, she saw several of her cousins among them, as well as her Aunt Taji. Vidts and Gutsi seemed to notice her and waved, which prompted the others to look and wave as well. She raised a hand and waved back. Yes, she did not want to have to bathe with her cousins, at least if Umu or Erzebed were going to be there. There would be far too many waggling eyebrows and teasing comments. It always made Umu uncomfortable and Mikon frustrated at her cousins'' lack of subtlety.


    Yes, it was them being supportive, but it was still frustrating!


    "I''ll put out the leaves," Mikon said.


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    After a refreshing bath, the two of them went back home and got ready for bed. The lamp was lit again so they could see as they closed the doors and windows. With everything closed once more, the two of them undressed again, adding their clothes to the ones they would wash tomorrow. The air was just pleasantly warm on their freshly bathed skin as they got their clothes for the following day ready. Mikon also readied Erzebed''s bucket for her in case the woman came home wanting a proper bath. It wasn''t likely to be needed, but Mikon wanted it ready so that it would be found without lighting the lamp again.


    Umu went to bed ahead of her as a result, lying down on the side of the bed she had claimed. When Rian had left, the three of them had tried going to sleep with nightclothes on again¡ªthe other two because they had felt awkward sleeping as they had without him, Mikon because she hadn''t wanted them to be uncomfortable¡ªbut had quickly reverted back for being too warm. Umu had tried sleeping with a skirt on, but even that hadn''t lasted long as her legs had sweated through the night, making her kick restlessly.


    Once she was done, Mikon blew out the lamp again, plunging the room in darkness as she carefully made her way back to the bed from memory. She sat down on the bed as she heard Umu making herself comfortable, stretching out her legs to do the same as she felt for her pillow to place it under her head.


    Then she lay back, folded her hands over her stomach, and waited.


    She kept her breathing quiet and even as she slowly adjusted to what little light was entering between the seams of the shutters. Mikon ignored the low sounds that Umu eventually began to make on the other side of the bed. Let Umu have her illusion of privacy. Once the other weaver finished, her breathing slowed as she fell asleep, leaving Mikon to her vigil.


    Eventually, the door opened.


    Erzebed came inside with a tired sigh, not closing the door behind her and letting in the pink moonlight.


    Mikon sat up on the bed. "Welcome home, Riz," she greeted quietly.


    The other woman wasn''t surprised. "You know, you don''t have to wait up for me," she said, even as she reluctantly closed the door until only a small sliver of light shone through, keeping it open by extending the latch so it caught on the doorframe.


    The familiar phrase made Mikon smile. "Well, I wanted to," she said, carefully sitting up. Fortunately the bed didn''t creak or shift as she did. "How was your shift?"


    "Hot," Erzebed groaned quietly, mindful that Umu was already asleep. Militia took letting people sleep very seriously, unless they thought it would be funny. "I wish Lori would let us have a bound tool, the breeze isn''t really consistent even when we leave the door open¡­"


    Mikon nodded as she listened while Erzebed undressed. The militiawoman was messy, just dropping her clothes on the ground. With a sigh, Mikon rose from the bed and began picking things up.


    "You don''t need to bother, I''ll take care of it tomorrow."


    "We''re doing the laundry tomorrow. I''m adding this to the pile."


    "Those clothes are still good! I only started wearing them a few days ago."


    "Riz, you''ve been following Lori as she goes downriver to work. Your clothes are full of sweat. They''re getting washed. Stop complaining, it''s not like you''re the one washing them."


    "But they''re still good¡­" Erzebed muttered, even as she sat down heavily on the bed. Mikon winced, but Umu remained asleep.


    Mikon put the clothes in with the others to be washed as the militiawoman made herself as comfortable as she could without actually rubbing shoulders with Umu. It meant there was little space left on the bed, but that was all right. After closing the door properly and latching it shut, Mikon went back to bed. Settling on her felt side, she pressed up against Erzebed''s arm. "Good night, Riz," she whispered.


    Eventually, Erzebed tiredly said, "You too."


    She only sighed as Mikon leaned forward and kissed her cheek.


    Mikon closed her eyes and let herself drift off to sleep, telling herself once again that she''d push her luck tomorrow night¡­

 351 - A Little Bit Evil

    As it turned out, counting the wispbeads happened faster than I had thought.


    We were in a small, nondescript room in the back of the merchant house''s stockyard, next to what looked like barracks for their workers. At a glance, it looked like someone''s office, presumably the manager of the stock yard, or maybe where they kept immediate copies of inventory records. Another of Ravia''s brothers had met us when the wagon had come into the stock yard, directing the sacks of beads here. Presumably it was to minimize the number of people who''d see the sacks of beads before the merchant house was ready. Someone had taken a pair of calipers and measured several of the wispbeads to confirm their diameter. Once they''d gotten an average, someone else had brought out several wooden trays and started dropping the beads into them without counting them.


    "The trays are what we use to count out large beads," Ravia explained as I watched the beads being counted by presumably trusted people. "They''ll hold a hundred beads each when full. Much simpler than counting every bead one by one. Though given the direction matters are going, in future we might have to invest in ways of more efficiently counting large numbers of beads quickly."


    "I''m sure someone can design something," I said. "I can already think of some off the top of my head, but I''m not really much for making things. Though speaking of which¡­ can I borrow something to write with for a moment?"


    Ravia raised an eyebrow, but immediately went to a nearby drawer. From it he drew out a pale slate and a piece of chalk. "Here. You may use these."


    "Thank you," I said, starting to write. "I sold some beads to a few workshops yesterday to test the market. Don''t worry, they were specifically set aside for the purpose, so it won''t affect the count. Could you approach them when you''re ready to start selling the wispbeads? I wouldn''t want them to have to worry about where they''d get further supplies."


    "Ah. Master Yhosed was one of them, I presume?"


    I nodded. "I''m just listing out who they are and what I can remember about the directions to get to their workshops. At the very least, it''s a list of people who won''t doubt that the wispbeads are real. You probably won''t have all that many problems finding customers for the beads, but I''d appreciate it if you can let them know they can buy from you. Call it due diligence on my part. I''ll try to tell them myself if I pass by, but I might not have the time."


    Ravia nodded. "I understand perfectly, Master Rian. A pity you seem to already be employed. I would very much like to hire you to work for us."


    "I take it as a high compliment that people wish I''d work for them instead," I said with smile, then glanced back at the beads being counted. "Wow, they''re working fast. I have to remember this. It would make our own counting much easier."


    "It''s not something most people would need to know about," Ravia said, also watching the counting being done. The beads were measured out and then placed in canvas sacks that were far larger than the sacks we had brought. "Few people are in a position to have so many beads."


    "And most of the ones who do usually have people to count it for them."


    Ravia laughed. "Yes, that too."


    I finished my list, handing it to Ravia, who took it graciously and actually looked it over, then took the chalk and began to mark the names. "I''ll have to ask, but I think we do business with some of these workshops already. Very likely, if they''re nearby. I''ll see about informing them about availability. We''ll need people who can spread word in the right floors, after all."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When the beads were counted¡ªand the number of ''eleven thousand'' was confirmed¡ªI received a receipt confirming the amount, as well as the total I was owed for them. It¡­ was honestly a lot. Well, it probably wouldn''t last very long for someone living in Covehold Demesne, what with the prices of everything, but we''d only be staying a few more days.


    Now that I had a large amount of beads that the merchant house technically haven''t gotten around to giving me yet, I set about on the second phase of this trading trip, which was buying the things that our demesne needed.


    Bolts of sturdy cloudbloom cloth, to make more trousers for everyone. Paper, both the thick, heavy sort that we can use for windows, and the thinner sort for writing on, so we can finally stop writing on pieces of wood. Ink. Pens. Thick leather for soles so that our cobbler could try to make new shoes, or at least repair the ones we already had. Seeds or cuttings¡ªpreferably the latter¡ªof cloudbloom and tressflowers to grow for fibers and oil. Mesh screens, because our smiths didn''t have time for those. Wire, now that we could afford it. Bread riser cultures, brewjelly and vitrioljelly¡­


    It was a long list.


    The first time I''d come to Covehold Demesne, I thought I''d need to run around the town looking for and sourcing what we needed. Thankfully, I found out about the merchant houses before I did, or else I''d have wasted a lot of time. For a relatively small fee or small markup, the merchant houses would source and assemble the materials you were looking for, and depending on the house might even be willing to deliver it to your demesne for you. After all, I wasn''t the only one coming from another demesne who didn''t have the time to go looking for what they needed.


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    While we couldn''t have things delivered to Lorian Demesne¡ªit was too far over land, and not on the same river Covehold was on, so it couldn''t be brought upstream by one of the small boats¡ªthey could gather the materials for us. Their rates and margins were reasonable, which was why I''d also used them to gather the materials we''d been bought last time.


    "It will take a few days to assemble all this, Master Rian," Ravia said.


    "I know," I said. "We were hoping to be able to leave in five days, so if possible see about fulfilling this only with stock that''s already available."


    "That shouldn''t be a problem." Ravia''s smile became slightly smirk-like. "Especially if the workshop in question has a bound tool for drawing wire that they can now use."


    "I leave the matter in your capable hands then," I said cheerfully. "Also, I was wondering if you could inquire about bound tools that people would be willing to sell cheaply since they can''t use them anymore?"


    Ravia''s smile became less ''like'' and more definitely a smirk. "Ah. I believe I understand. As soon as I get these orders arranged, I''ll make the inquiries. There will only be a small window of time before word spreads, so we should move quickly. Are there any sorts of bound tools you''re looking for in particular?"


    "Wisplights and small, hand-held bound tools," I said promptly. "Saws as well, as long as it''s not too big."


    Ravia nodded slowly. "We will probably start purchasing such tools ourselves soon," he said with a slowly growing smile, "but as our partner, I''m sure father wouldn''t mind if we provide the tools to you at cost before the price changes."


    "Why, thank you." Honestly, I''d just realized that people might have started selling off their bound tools because they couldn''t use them anymore. And while Lori''s bound tools were usable, I''m sure she''d like some samples she could examine and study to improve what she could make.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    We got the sacks back, which was nice.


    "All right," I said out loud as we stepped out of the merchant house. It was early afternoon, so there was still a lot of daylight ahead of us. "We need to buy food to bring back for the others later, so keep your noses open for anything that smells great. Booze too if you see anyone selling them in big enough bottles or casks."


    "Right, Rian!"


    "Slug skewers!"


    "No slugs!" Multaw and I cried.


    "Aw¡­"


    "I''ll buy some for you if we find any. Multaw, don''t tell the others and I''ll buy you something too." Ugh, now I have to remember to get the others something for when it was their turn to eat out. I thought I''d left acting like a parent behind with Lori. "But food is for later. We need to recruit those Deadspeakers Lori said we could finally have. So let''s go find some Deadspeakers willing to change demesnes for a free baths, a small house, most of their needs taken care of, and living under Lori."


    The three of us considered that as we started walking, Cyuw carrying the sack full of the sacks.


    "It all sounds good until you actually meet Lori," I said eventually. Multaw and Cyuw nodded. "And then it sounds good again once you realize she''s not that bad, or at least you don''t need to talk to her." Multaw and Cyuw nodded again. "No, no, that won''t work. They''ll be Deadspeakers. She might actually talk to them regularly, if only to give them orders." More nods.


    I considered the problem quietly for several steps. "Well, by the time we get them home, there''ll be no escape!" I concluded cheerfully. They nodded. "Is that evil?"


    "A little bit," Multaw said.


    "Just a little, though," Cyew added.


    I nodded. "Well, I''m sure I can live with myself afterwards. Now, let''s find the poor fools¡ªI mean, lucky people who''ll be our new neighbors!"


    Our search for poor fools¡ªI mean, lucky people led us to walking around looking for a job-placement office. It was a little stall, but the three walls were covered by little bills listing jobs that were looking for people to do them. I was familiar with them. I''d gotten my job at the lumberyard from a job-placement office, and had even placed bills with them to hire other people. The system was familiar to me, and moving to another continent didn''t seem to have changed it much.


    That being said, there had been few changes. Back in the old continent, if you didn''t have a bill that you''d written already, the office had let you have some paper for free, as well as a pen and ink. Granted, it was a small piece of paper, but it was free. The larger sheet that was less likely to be overlooked, they charged a little for. I remembered it was usually 5 bead-yutani per sheet of very cheap paper.


    In the placement office we found, they offered the small sheets for twice that much, and the larger sheets for 25 bead-yutani. The pen and ink, we could borrow for ten bead-yutani for writing on one sheet. If we wanted to write on another sheet, we had to pay again. I''m surprised they didn''t charge for the writing surface, but I kept that thought inside so I didn''t give them ideas. Posting was a single bead-yutani, but by that point they''d already made their profit. Most of the bills posted was on their paper.


    Another change was the postings were divided into three categories. One wall had the job placement bills I was familiar with, where people who were hiring wrote down what sort of people they were looking for. Another wall, bowing to the market pressures of the area, had listings from demesne trying to recruit people, looking for farmers, carpenters, farmers, sawyers, farmers, weavers, farmers¡­ it went on like that for a while. I didn''t know if it was from there not being enough farmers or people making the mistaken assumption that more farmers meant more or faster-growing crops


    The third section was the inverse. People had posted bills about themselves. There were no names, but people described what they could do. Carpenters, smiths of various kinds, a surprising number of Horotracts and Whisperers who were unemployed by implication¡­ presumably, it was in the hope that people looking for skilled workers would hire them.


    I wasn''t sure how effective that was, but it couldn''t be completely useless if people were using it, could it?


    Checking over the listings unfortunately didn''t bring up any Deadspeakers. At least, none that I would hire. The Deadspeakers who''d posted of their services listed prices first thing, as well as used vague language and seemingly random letters that probably meant something to someone. It meant nothing to me, but I got the feeling it was probably something illegal.


    Shrugging, I bought some paper and paid to use the pen as I started writing out our bill recruiting Deadspeakers.

 352 - Going Out Tonight

    The man at the desk of the job-placement office read over my bill before nodding. "All right. Where should I send applicants?" he asked, taking out a book.


    I blinked, suddenly feeling stupid. "Oh¡­ ah, we''ve just arrived, we don''t¡­ uh, can I come back later?"


    The man nodded, sliding the bill back towards me. It seemed this wasn''t an irregular occurrence. "Come back once you find out the address of the inn you''re staying at. Be sure to have someone there to receive applicants." Yes, this definitely happened a lot.


    "I will," I said, taking the bill and adding it to the leather folder so I didn''t lose it. I took out the bead I was going to use to pay for posting the bill. "Thank you for the help."


    He seemed pleasantly surprised as he accepted the little bead. Sure, it wasn''t a lot, but it was a bead and he could probably use it for something. I had to wonder what the prices were in the general stores and such like. We should probably stop at one later to check it out. It would be a good way for us to be more familiar with the local prices.


    I considered what to do. It was clear that for the next five days we needed some kind of base, somewhere to work from. An inn was the simple solution, but if we were going to be spending beads anyway¡­ well, it was only five more days. We could afford paying the docking fee for that long, and it meant we wouldn''t have to go out so far at night or in the morning. And while the story of someone stealing a boat was concerning, security had¡­ probably been improved. Maybe.


    ¡­


    I could, alternately, get a room at an inn for myself and tell the others to stay on the ship, but that was unfair. I didn''t want to be that kind of leader, even if most people expected lords to be like that.


    Sighing, I almost decided to call it an early day, but then a thought struck me.


    Well, it couldn''t hurt to give it a try.


    We weren''t that far away from Emborin and Sons, so after a little walking and navigating and buying Cyuw some slug skewers, with some beast skewers for myself and Multaw, I found myself back at Master Yhosed''s carpentry workshop. The bound tool was uncovered and wood was being cut on its saw. The person moving the wood through was clearly trying to keep from falling into the temptation of moving with unseemly haste and just barely succeeding.


    I spotted Master Yhosed at the back talking to another man and waited until they were parting before I called out, "Master Yhosed!"


    Fortunately he heard me, and I saw his expression change a little as he realized who it was calling him. Instead of walking towards me, however, he got the attention of the man he''d been talking to, said a few words, and the two of them both walked over to me.


    "Master Rian," he said, sounding pleased. "Good to see you again. Just the man I was hoping to see."


    "Master Yhosed," I said. "I see you''re getting good use out of your bound tool."


    "I am," he said, smiling. "I''m hoping to get more use out of it this week. Vov here was just telling me he''d like to get as much use out of his bound tool."


    "It''s nice to meet you, Master Vov," I said, exchanging grips with the man. The man was leaner than Yhosed, his build more wiry, but he had the same strong, working man''s grip. "You have a¡­ saw and planer, I believe?"


    "Yes. Yhosed here tells me you''re the one I have to talk to about that," he said.


    "Well, I do have a couple on me," I said. "If you''re willing, I can offer you some at the same price as what I offered Master Yhosed yesterday?"


    "I was hoping I could get some more as well," Yhosed said.


    "Ah." I leaned towards them a little, which they reciprocated. "Don''t spread it around, but you should be able to buy them from Emborin and Sons in a few days." I winked. "However, until then¡­ as I said, I do have a pair I could offer you. Perhaps somewhere private?"


    I had Multaw and Cyuw wait downstairs, handing Cyuw the folder, then Yhosed led me upstairs while Vov went off, presumably to get his own beads. Two wispbeads came out of my pouch, and Yhosed gave me another small mid-large bead for them.


    "Thank you," he said, making the wispbeads disappear into his own belt pouch. "Now, what can I do for you, Master Rian?"


    "It''s a bit complicated, but to put it simply I''m looking for a Deadspeaker to recruit for our demesne," I explained. "However, they need to be someone with experience in woodworking. I was wondering if you could recommend any Deadspeakers might have the skills but are looking to live in a smaller demesne? Perhaps someone you wished you could hire if you had more beads?"


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    Yhosed crossed his arms, tapping the fingers of one hand on the opposite forearm thoughtfully. "Hmm¡­ well, I know a few people, but I''m not sure they''ll be willing to leave¡­" He lapsed into silence for a moment, then nodded. "Come back in two days, and maybe I''ll have something for you then."


    I nodded. "I''ll bring more beads."


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    Master Vov was quite glad to pay ten bead-tani for two wispbeads as well, and I was able to ask him if he knew any Deadspeakers with a familiarity with woodworking who might be willing to move to another demesne. I briefly considered going back to all the other workshops I''d visited yesterday, then dismissed that idea. It would take too long to check up on them in a timely manner.


    I decided we''d stop early, and the three of us headed for the docks. My feet were aching again, and I wanted to get back to the ship. Along the way, we picked up a paper bag of dumplings, and a leaf-lined paper bag of more meat skewers for the others. I insisted on being the one to carry the food, otherwise if there was trouble the two wouldn''t be able to react as needed. The regret came quickly, as not only did I have to carry so much hot food in my arms, I had to smell it the whole way and it was delicious.


    The things I do to be a good leader.


    Fortunately, we didn''t run into trouble on the way to the docks, which was always nice.


    "Hello Yhoe," I greeted when we got to the dockmaster''s office. "Multaw, could you take the food off my hands for a bit? I need to talk to the dockmaster for a moment. Yhoe, how much for us to dock here for the next five days?"


    It turned out that after the ship that was stolen was¡­ well, stolen, they''d been able to hire more guards to patrol the docks and warehouses at night. I got the sense it was mostly the latter that was being protected, since it contained large amounts of goods to be brought back to the old continent that had not yet been paid for. I wasn''t able to get the dockmaster to lower the price for docking that many days, but an offer of a bag of dumplings for him and all the guards who would be there that night secured us some consideration so that they''d keep an eye on us. Free food was free food, after all.


    I sent Cyuw off to buy another bag of dumplings for the dockworkers as I signaled the Coldhold and had them dock. Once the ship was secured again, I could finally sit down, which I did with a happy groan. Everyone had already opened up the bags and were happily eating. I accepted a dumpling and two skewers and joined them with tired enthusiasm.


    It occurred to me that I might have been a little bit too free with Lori''s beads. Uh¡­ I can probably justify it as necessary expenses for expediting things?


    ¡­


    Ugh, I''m going to have to spend the rest of the afternoon writing down expenses so far. That''s the responsible thing to do.


    After everyone had eaten and were pleasantly full, I sighed and summoned the energy to try to be responsible again. "All right everyone, we need to talk," I said. Everyone was already sitting, so I just had to wait a little bit until everyone was paying attention to me. " First, Multaw, Cyuw, I still need to go out tonight¡­ as soon as my feet don''t ache anymore. So don''t get too comfortable, all right?"


    The two men sighed a little, but nodded.


    "Secondly, we''re sleeping docked here for the rest of our stay, now that we can afford to," I told them all. "So we don''t have to worry about navigating in the dark." Liggs let out a sigh of relief. "That doesn''t mean we shouldn''t keep watch. Ravia told me that someone set fire to one of the warehouses¡ª" I waved at the large buildings on the shore,"¡ªand used that as a distraction to steal a ship. I don''t want that to happen to us. Do you?"


    There were mutters that averaged out to a consensus in the negative.


    "Right! Now, tomorrow morning, I want you all to take the boat out of here and gather more salt, because it never hurts to have more things to sell. It will help pay for our food that''s not the supplies we brought along¡ª" there were fervent nods at this, "¡ªand give you all something to do while keeping the ship safe. And we''ll need drinking water for the trip back anyway."


    "Multaw, Cyuw, we''re going out tonight to the bars and taverns and see if we can recruit there or find people we can recruit. So nap for the rest of the afternoon, as short as that is, then we''re going out again. Have you all decided on who''s going to take Multaw and Cyuw''s place accompanying me tomorrow?"


    "I''m going with you, L¡ªRian, and so is Liggs," Hans said.


    "Then the two of you get as much sleep as you can," I said. "We''re going back to the merchant''s tomorrow, and we still have to visit the lawyer who''s working for the Golden Sweetwood Company to find out if there''s been a reply already." We really should have gotten to that today, but¡­ the lawyer was deeper into the demesne, closer to the Dungeon, and that was a long walk.


    Ugh, I''d need to find that authorization letter from Yllian. The lawyer and I had already met, but it would still require the authorization letter to have him talk to me.


    Sometimes I wished I''d refused to become Lori''s lord. So much work to do, so many matters to attend to¡­ but then, it wasn''t like I would have been good for anything else but carrying things and doing what someone else told me to do. If I was going to just be doing what someone else told me to do, with no expectation of skill on my part, then it might as well be where I could do the most good.


    I glanced out over the water. It was late afternoon, but there was still maybe an hour or so left before nightfall. "I''m going down to get some sleep," I announced. "Could one of you wake me up when the boats all start coming in? I need to take a quick rest. You should too Multaw, Cyuw."


    "Go ahead, Rian," Yhorj said. "We''ll take care of things up here."


    "Thanks," I said. "When they start coming in, all right?"


    I headed downstairs, carefully climbing down¡ªmy feet protesting being used again after their short rest but resigned to their fate¡ªto the hold, heading to the common area. Flipping down one of the beds along the wall, I took off my boots and socks¡ªgroaning in relief as I did so¡ªand laid down, my feat doing over the edge of the bed to keep pressure off them. Adjusting my belt pouch so I didn''t have to remove it, I lay back on the hard wooden surface and closed my eyes.


    Just a short rest. I was just going to have a short rest, and then it was back to work¡­


    The darkness of my soul behind my eyes claimed me, and I¡­

 353 - A Night Out In Covehold

    Covehold Demesne was bright at night.


    Light shone from seemingly random locations high up on walls, just barely out of reach. The last time I was here, I''d learned that the demesne employed Whisperers as streetlighters, who spent all day imbuing a certain number of bindings of lightwisps. At dusk, they anchored the bindings in the areas they were assigned. Many Whisperers also made a side business of selling light to people, where they would imbue lightwisp bindings and people would pay them some beads so they would anchor the binding to a bowl of water or something so that their house would have light for the night. Other people with more beads or less concern about fire had oil lamps or candles, which were brighter and lasted longer and could be put out to keep it from being used up.


    I saw both kinds of light among the streets stalls that seemed to spontaneously appear as night fell. Some were barely more than someone with a stool, a large-mouthed jar full of coals, and a bucket of questionable meat in questionable marinade of questionable cleanliness. Others had wheeled stalls, where skewers of recognizable meat cooked on a wire grill¡­ from a bucket of questionable marinade of questionable cleanliness, but I suppose that was what cooking was for.


    It would probably be a good idea to set aside some beads for if we needed to go see a Deadspeaker for any upset stomachs.


    People thronged the streets, and the air was filled with the cries of street vendors offering food, soap, candles, and whatever else; the subtle ringing of bells as we passed women with their skirts pinned high on one side and blouses cut low or unbuttoned, and men with shirts open to the waist or simply shirtless; the distant screams as someone realized they''d had their pockets picked or their belt pouch cut.


    I sighed happily as I felt the cool night breeze flowing from the bay as Multaw and Cyuw walked with me, heading towards the tavern we''d gone to for information when we''d visited Covehold before last winter. There''d been wizards there last time, as it was near several boarding houses and apartments. I was hoping to find one who I could recruit, and if not perhaps they knew someone that would be amenable. The place was relatively clean and brightly lit with a mix of lamps and little wooden cups of water with a binding of lightwisps floating on top of it, which was a good indicator of the Shady Stand''s relative prosperity. Once, it had been built next to a stand of shady trees, hence the name, but the trees were long gone. I know this because I had shared a table with a nice old man who''d been drinking there since those days, and had been happy to tell the story to me.


    Inside, the Shady Stand smelled of frying meat, other cooking foods, and sweaty bodies. There were several tables, as well as a raised gallery on three sides with more tables, held up by stone pillars¡ªor more likely wooden posts that had been faced with Whispered stone¡ªthat were very solid, as the galleries didn''t shake at all. Several tavernhands were walking around carrying trays of food or drink, or cleaning up tables and plates from vacated tables.


    By the standards of Covehold, the place was slightly pricey but still well within the means of most working people. I''d probably have better luck with a cheaper place, since people down on their luck were more likely to go there, but if I recruited in such a place, I might come off as highly suspicious. Besides, last time I''d managed to hear of several promising recruits just by listening. Hopefully I would do so again this time.


    When we arrived, we ordered a light dinner¡ªwe''d mostly already eaten, after all¡ªas well as drinks. Multaw and Cyuw ordered booze, while I asked for a cup of beast-meat broth. I got some strange looks for that. Broth was an autumn and winter drink, and we were in the middle of summer. Still, I knew they would have it. The broth was the base they used for some of their dishes, and while I wasn''t happy about drinking something hot, being boiled meant it was safe to drink, and it was better than tea. I could only drink tea with a lot of honey in it. I already got enough grief for not drinking booze, I didn''t want to seem childish as well. Broth, while strange, wasn''t childish. The latter would make people think I didn''t know what I was doing and incline them to not take me seriously.


    "You sure you wouldn''t rather have one of these, Rian?" Multaw said in the tone of someone doing his due diligence of being a good drinking companion as he held up his mug.


    I shook my head as I waited my broth to cool. There was a smell not unlike the glue the carpenters used coming from it, which meant it was also a bone broth. The smell wasn''t a problem, as the taste was completely different, and it would fade as the broth cooled. "We''re not getting too drunk, remember?" I reminded them. "Nurse those drinks, we don''t want get in trouble on the way back."


    The two sighed, but nodded. I chose to pretend not to hear that mutter about me acting like everyone''s wife.


    Since there were only three of us, we shared a table with a group that was friendly enough but had to leave as we were waiting for our orders. It wasn''t long after the tavern woman took away their dishes and wiped down their side of the table that a new group joined us.


    "Good evening," I greeted with a smile. Beyond them seemingly being less sweaty¡ªthough that might have just been my imagination¡ªthe new arrivals didn''t smell of anything in particular to help me narrow down their professions, though a casual glance tentatively had me putting them down as friends. Their builds weren''t all that big but healthy enough to handle regular labor, they had no ink stains on their fingertips¡­ still, they smiled back pleasantly enough as they sat down. "Rough day?"


    Of course it was. The day was always rough.


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    It turned out they worked at an ice house, cutting, moving and delivering blocks of ice to the local butchers, eateries, and some of the more well-off homes. I nodded and listened at that, and felt better when two of the five-man group also ordered broth when they saw I was drinking some. Technically a failure, since none of them were Deadspeakers or seemed to know Deadspeakers, but people would know people would know people. All I had to do was talk and listen. Occasionally, I had to move that talking along by offering to buy the booze for our new friends.


    I learned a lot, not all of it relevant, but most of it interesting.


    It turned out the ice houses get bothered by requests to make ice boats so often they had a quote ready for how much it would cost to make one the size of the little boats we saw on the bay, which was very expensive. Most of that expense, however, was because of the wispbeads it would take to let a Whisperer make that much ice in those dimensions and keep it from melting for at least a day.


    However, once I''d established that I was a good listener and genuinely interested in their stories¡ªas did Multaw and Cyuw, who knew how to listen to a tavern after-work story¡ªI''d have the opportunity to point their stories in general directions. For example, a comment like, "Making a living is hard these days, isn''t it?" would have them talking about the difficulties of their job, but an additional prod of "well, it could be worse" would usually be enough to prod them towards talking about people they know who are having a harder time. No job, worst job, terrible job, sick child, dead wife¡­


    "Colors," I sigh at one point. "I wish I was a wizard or something. They probably never have to worry about not finding work."


    It took a while, but I got a lot of stories about wizards who were out of work or were in need of better or more work eventually. Many of them were Horotracts, since it took a lot of magic to maintain their vistas, at least at the dimensions they were usually hired to make them.


    "I heard that one of the room stretchers got desperate and actually became a Dungeon Binder just so they''d have enough magic to make big rooms," one of our new drinking friends said, shaking his head. Alren worked at a lumberyard, and we''d bonded over how hard it was to maneuver long beams through narrow and short streets, ugh. "Made a little demesne somewhere, built a small house, rented some of the land so people could build houses and farms on a small plot of land, but worked in the city to make vissies and keep them together. Died in the last dragon because he left his big ball just standing around."


    "That''s terrible," I said, as everyone else shook their heads with me. I wasn''t sure if the story was true, but it a simple chain of events that sounded disturbingly plausible. "Are there a lot of people who do that? Just¡­ make a demesne just to be a Dungeon Binder so they can work?"


    "Used to happen a lot back in the old days," an older man said. "All the magic, none of the work, you know? They''d work here in the town, and let know-nothings live in their little demesne who think there were safe because there were no colors. Then a dragon would come by and their farm would be gone, the colors would come back, and their core broke because the lazy uhogs didn''t bother to build a decent dungeon around it¡­"


    Deadspeakers were unfortunately among the most well-employed people in the demesne. Even a small talent had a use, even if it was just to imbue a meaning for a more experienced Deadspeaker to manipulate. Those who didn''t know how to do the useful meanings that everyone wanted done were well-motivated to learn.


    However, that didn''t mean there weren''t any Deadspeakers to recruit. After all, just because they were sought after and employed didn''t mean they liked their employment. Some actually wanted to move to another demesne because they didn''t like their circumstances in Covehold. Those people were probably our best bet. They wanted to move out to a different demesne anyway, but from what I was able to learn, the difficulty was finding a demesne that was both decently established, could protect itself against dragons, and offered enough of an improvement over their circumstances in Covehold.


    As much as I was hoping for it, I wasn''t able to find a lead on anyone like that tonight, but I''d ask several of my new friends to keep their ears open and let me know if anyone new came to mind. Most would probably forget in the morning, but hopefully they''d remember if we met again tomorrow night.


    We left when the mood changed. The people coming in were less talkative and more serious drinkers. The talking became subdued. I paid our tab, asked if we could have them fill a jar we brought with booze¡ªthey would, so I resolved to bring one tomorrow¡ªand Multaw, Cyuw and I headed home, my belt pouch a lot lighter, though only because I didn''t put a lot into it.


    Outside, the streets were clearer than before, with several of the food stalls gone now. Bellgirls and bellboys lingered in a few corners and doorways, but they looked tired, the sound of their bells almost perfunctory. After relieving our bladders on a handy wall, we walked towards the docks. None of us spoke, our heads turning back and forth to watch for possible muggers waiting in ambush. I even glanced above, because there was no reason a Mentalist couldn''t have turned to that line of work either.


    "Did you two have fun?" I asked quietly, turning to look at Multaw next to me and using that to cover the quick glance I shot behind us. The group of three men behind us were still there. They looked like they were just walking the same way we were, minding their own business, and there was nothing to mark them as different at all. If I knew the area better, I''d have turned into a side street and see if they''d follow us, but I didn''t.


    "Nothing like a booze after a long day," Multaw said, seeing my glance but thankfully not turning his gaze that way himself. His eyes were eyeing the doorways and alleys ahead of us, also wary.


    "You sure I couldn''t have one more?" Cyuw said in a voice that sounded drunk, even though I know he''d only had the two mugs, which had been watered slightly with ice.


    "Sleep it off, Cyuw," I said as I turned towards him, taking another glance. The three men were turning into another alleyway, finally leaving the street. Well, at least we could potentially run back that way¡­


    Thankfully, our watchfulness was for naught. Besides some tough leaning against a wall who took one look at us but didn''t move, there were no people lingering in any of the side alleys along our way.


    That would probably change in the following nights if how I bought booze for other people was noticed, but tonight, we made it back to the ship safe and sound.


    Tomorrow, I would be meeting with Ravia again, then going see the lawyer that the Golden Sweetwood Company had retained to hear if word had arrived earlier this spring. Since at least one boat had already come to Covehold Demesne from across the ocean, there was a good chance their reply had arrived. The day after that I would see if Master Yhosed had any good news.


    I should probably get a walking stick or something tomorrow.

 354 - The Lawyer And The Letter

    In the end, we still had to wake up early. Even with the bound tool for moving the air around to help cool the hold, we all still woke up sweaty. The water of the bay was not an option for bathing. Even if it didn''t smell, all the demesne''s liquid waste had to go somewhere, and I doubted they had the sort of water cleaning infrastructure the demesnes in the old continent had for fertilizer and drinking water. If they did, it clearly wasn''t cleaning ALL the demesne''s water.


    We didn''t really need to take a bath. After all, it was just us on the ship, and most people in the city probably stank as strongly as we did. More, since they probably worked in indoor places where they marinated in their own sweat. Call us spoiled, but we''d gotten used to having a wash in the morning and the evenings. Last night, everyone had been happily full and had been fine not washing since they hadn''t worked that hard, but after a night brining in our own juices¡­


    Well, we undocked and went out of the way, going out enough distance that we could finish our business before the salt boats arrived. The clean salt water was refreshing to splash over us, and a last wash in some of the distilled water was enough to keep them from getting crusty when they dried. Once we emptied ourselves of our inner darkness, we headed back to the dock. Hans, Liggs and I were dropped off before the others turned around again and went out to refill our water barrels and get more salt, breakfast just starting to be made on the bound tool stove.


    I paid Yhoe for the day''s docking fee, and promised the dockmaster that I''d bring back food that evening. Hans was carrying a pack with three waterskins in it, as well as another pack so that we didn''t need to repeat yesterday''s suffering with the food, and so we didn''t need to stop anywhere to drink since I didn''t trust their water and I''d rather not have to try to drink the booze. Carrying the leather folder I got yesterday, I led Hans and Liggs as we headed for Emborin and Sons. When we arrived, we were told that Ravia was busy with someone else. Rather than interrupt him, I told the runner that we''d be back later in the morning, and were willing to wait until Ravia finished his business.


    After all, I wouldn''t like it if my discussion with him was interrupted for someone else.


    With some time on our hands, I took Hans and Liggs to breakfast, getting us a couple of hot salted bread rolls each and some meat dumplings. The latter had the ratio of dumpling to meat skewed towards the former a bit more than I''d like, but it tasted good and it was still a decent amount of meat.


    After that we checked in with Emborin and Sons again, but Ravia was still occupied. I decided to stop lingering and told him we''d be back much later, probably after noon, and set off to do our other errands.


    Master Yhosed was quite amenable to making three ''walking canes'' on their now usable-lathe. The look he gave me said he knew what I wanted them for, but he said nothing. While swords weren''t banned in Covehold, I wasn''t wearing mine here. Swords got stolen and resold for their metal. Sticks, even lathed ones, weren''t something people would really go out of their way to steal, and I could use one like a sword. Getting it to look like a cane was more for my benefit, in case I needed to take weight off my feet. I had no illusions about how much walking I was going to have to do.


    He told us to come back for them later. I paid him a small deposit for the work, and then we were off to visit the lawyer.


    Unfortunately, getting to the lawyer took more walking. They were located closer to the dungeon in the center of the demesne, at an older part of the demesne on the other side of the thoroughfare. There were more stone-faced buildings there, with many having plaster on their walls, and even old buildings where the walls of the first floor were actually stone instead of just stone and plaster. Many buildings were stained, whitewashed or simply painted with oil to better preserve the wood, and a few buildings had actual colorful paint on them, although those were mostly on the buildings of other merchant houses, or what seemed to be other successful businesses¡­ including an alchemist who made paint. Well, I suppose they wanted to let people know how good their product was¡­


    The lawyer worked from a building that, to my eye, looked like it had started life at least ten years ago as a small warehouse that had been converted. The wide double doors big enough for a cart to fit comfortably through was a big clue. One of the doors had the secured appearance of a permanently closed door, leaving the entrance only half the size and almost uncomfortably narrow. Outside, a large sign was full of names with understated titles next to them, like ''Wylok - Surgeon'', or ''Taluk ¨C Deadspeaker, Dentist'' and such. In the old continent, the insides would have been expanded by a Horotract, but that wasn''t the case here.


    The lawyer wasn''t in his office, which was locked. Helpfully, he''d left a note written on the door in chalk that said, ''I''m in the back''. As a matter of fact, a lot of the doors had the same note on them. Some soul had helpfully drawn an arrow on the floor with the words ''the back'' next to it.


    I had Hans and Liggs and wait outside as I went in, following the arrow. The inside was distressingly hot, even for me, giving me a good idea why the lawyer was away from his office at the moment. I followed the narrow hallway, past other closed doors, turning left twice. Someone had really tried to cram in as many little offices as they could. I applauded their ingenuity and cursed their cheapness. The walls on either side of me rose up to not quite to the ceiling, which probably kept people from suffocating in their offices but meant that people could hear the discussions in the rooms unless you went out of your way to speak softly.


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    At the end of the hallway was another door that stood open, and I could hear people chatting pleasantly beyond it as weak sunlight came through. I exited warily, and found a small space between the building and what looked like the building behind it, which also looked like an old warehouse. The space was open to the sky, and at the moment the sun wasn''t shining down into it directly, but that would change at noon.


    There were benches on the edges of the space, and several men and women sat among them, many fanning their faces with¡­ well, anything they could get their hands on to fan themselves with. There were a few reed hats, a hard piece of leather, a small sheet of wood, things like that. A couple were playing a game of lima on a board that, on examination, had been drawn on a sheet of paper.


    They all glanced at me as I came in, their expressions a mix of annoyance at me intruding and hope that I was looking for them.


    "I''m looking for Master Tend?" I said.


    There were disappointed sighs, but many went back to leaning back and fanning themselves or returned to their game. The only exception was a man sitting on the end of a bench two paces to my right. He got to his feet, taking a moment to fruitlessly wipe the sweat off his face. His face had the sort of roundness that would make you think he was fat if you couldn''t see his thin neck and arms. His red hair was lank on his head, and he looked both eager and dreading what was to come. "That''s me," he said. "What can I do for you?" Then he squinted, frowning. "Have we met?"


    "We spoke last before last winter," I said. "If we can speak in private?"


    He sighed. I could almost literally see him thinking ''please let this be quick'' as he walked towards me. I backed away to give him room and led the way to his office. When we got back to it, he pulled a few keys from his pocket and unlocked the door, leading me inside. In the office was a table that served as a desk, three chairs, and a chest that took up a corner. The desk had a small sheet of leather on it¡ªpresumably a soft writing surface¡ªa bottle of ink, a stoppered jar, a dry seal press, a bowl of sand with a little coal in it, another small bowl with a pile of loose wax, some feather quills, and other odds and ends.


    "It''s too hot for either of us, so I''ll try to be quick," I said, reached into the folder I''d been carrying. "My name is Rian and I''m here on behalf of the Golden Sweetwood Company. I''m here to check if anything has come in from the Company in the old continent?"


    "I''m afraid I''ll need proof of that," he said, sweat beading on his forehead. "I''ve had these beggars coming at me claiming to be from the company asking for a loan in the company''s name."


    Ah. Well, uh¡­ nice to know they were still alive? "I think I know who those are. They''re no longer affiliated with the company. When did you last hear about them?"


    "Back¡­ when the snows started, I think. Haven''t heard from them since." His tone said they were not missed.


    Oh. Well, that was¡­ ominous. "I see." I reach into my folder and pull out the later that Yllian had drafted. "Here''s my identification letter."


    Tend wiped the sweat off his face and hands again before reaching for the letter. He laid it down on the table, weighing it down with an ink bottle, a rock, and a fork that I hoped was clean, before he took a magnifying lens to read the text. Either he had bad eyesight or he was doing this to not get sweat on the paper. "Hmm¡­Just a moment."


    He turned to the chest and unlocked it with another key before opening it. With a grunt, he knelt down and rooted around inside before eventually coming back up with a stiff paper folder. It¡­ wasn''t all that full. Sitting back down, Tend opened it and took out another letter, laying it on the table and also examining it with the magnifying lens. Eventually, he grunted. "All right, everything matches up." Picking up a quill, he tested the tip, then reached for the ink bottle and opened it. After a quick dip, he wrote something on my letter before sliding it back to me.


    I accepted it, mindful of the still-drying ink. He''d written his name, what I presume was the date, and an acknowledgement that the letter had been read and acted upon. Presumably, it was so that someone couldn''t just steal the authorization letter and use it again in the future. I hadn''t even thought of that.


    "Here you go," he said, pulling out an envelope sealed with a band of paper from his folder and handing it to me before putting the folder back in the chest. "It came on the first boat of the spring. The date of receipt is written on the back."


    I flipped it over to check, then nodded. "Thank you, Master Tend. I might be by later this week if I need to send a response."


    He grunted. "Come yourself, and bring the letter to remind me," he said.


    I nodded. "Do you like micans?"


    He blinked at the strange question. "They''re all right¡­? Why?"


    "I''ll bring you some when I come back next," I said, getting to my feet. "Well, I won''t take up anymore of your time, Master Tend. Good day to you."


    He was already getting to his feet. "And to you, Master Rian," he said as unstopped the jar and poured himself a cup of water, which was quickly drunk. Walking around the table, he didn''t quite chivy me towards the door, but I took the hint and exited quickly.


    Outside, it probably wasn''t any cooler, but the open sky and moving air certainly felt better than the cramped confines of the building. Hans and Liggs got to their feet as I came out, and I motioned them to follow me. "Back to Ravia again, men," I said. "Hopefully he''s free by now."


    As we headed back, I was very conscious of the envelope in the folder I was holding. The Golden Sweetwood Company''s reply. Whatever it said, I was fairly sure Lori wasn''t going to like it. The only questions were how much she wasn''t going to like it, and what I would have to do about it.


    Keeping my back straight and a little spring in my step for the benefit of the men¡ªI can''t let them see me worried¡ªwe walked back the way we''d come.

 355 - Installments, Bound Tools And A Deadspeaker

    When I finally got to talk to Ravia, the news was good. The materials we''d asked them to procure were coming in, albeit slowly. Honestly, I wanted to buy more things, but we also needed the space for those we''d be recruiting, especially if they had a family accompanying them. And while what we were buying was a lot, it only used up a significant amount of the beads we made from selling the salt, skins, and furs, not all of it. That wasn''t getting into the profit from the wispbeads.


    "I actually wanted to discuss that with you," he said.


    "You don''t actually have that much in beads on hand," I said.


    The merchant nodded. "Yes. Do not fear, we will honor our agreement, but¡­ well, at the moment it''s physically impossible for us to gather enough double-large beads to do so, at least in the time remaining."


    I nodded. "I realize." Then I chuckled. "You realize this makes you a bank, right? Holding my beads and keeping it safe?"


    "Should we charge for keeping your beads safe then?" Ravia said dryly.


    "Please don''t," I said. "I''m perfectly willing to accept payment in more goods, it''s just we don''t have enough space in our ship for it. Personally, I''m inclined to take all those beads and use it to fund building a boat, but¡­ not my decision. We''ll simply have to put the transaction in abeyance, and slowly transform it into goods as we go."


    "We''ll probably have enough beads for the full amount when you return in a month or two," Ravia said. "If you''re willing to accept a partial amount, we can accomplish that now."


    "Payment in installments?" I said thoughtfully, then nodded. "I believe I''ll take you up on that. It will make explaining the situation to my Dungeon Binder easier." I grinned. "And to save us all headaches, I won''t even bring up interest."


    "How generous of you," Ravia said.


    "It''s the least I can do for being a bank that doesn''t charge to keep my beads safe for me."


    The two of us shared a laugh. While I still only knew Ravia in a professional capacity, I was a getting a better understanding of his personality, and he was probably doing the same. Better, most likely, since he did this for a living. I technically did as well, but these days I already knew all the people I usually had to deal with, and had the implied threat of Lori''s anything if my sweet reason didn''t work. I would have to be careful of Ravia influencing me, but I''d be influencing him too. It was all the usually circle of people talking to people. He and I were just more aware of it and less offended when someone tried to do it to use as a result¡ªwithin reason, of course.


    "Speaking of which," I said, "I know it''s early but how has the bound tool market been?"


    Ravia smiled in the self-satisfied way of someone''s plan coming together. "We''ve managed a respectable early haul. Various pawnshops had bound tools they couldn''t unload in their inventory that they were willing to part with. Most are functional. I believe you''ve expressed an interest in wisplights and hand tools?"


    I felt myself smiling as well. "I don''t suppose you have a list of what''s available?"


    "Well, I could go get you the list¡­" Ravia said, then winked. "But wouldn''t you like to see the bound tools yourself?"


    See, that was manipulation right there!


    The merchant house''s stockyard had a warehouse for the materials that couldn''t just be left outside, or for gathering together orders. In one of the smaller rooms, the bound tools that the merchant house had already bought were already in the middle of being refurbished. Metal was being cleaned, wood elements were being examined for replacement or reinforcement, reflectors were shined and whatever else were needed. Ravia led me to where the ones that were finished and waiting to be examined were set aside.


    The wisplights were obvious. They''d been shaped to resemble oil lamps or candle holders, depending on whether they were meant to stay put or be carried around. They actually weighed only a little bit more than the wisplights Lori had made. Unlike hers, some of the wisplights had mesh or metal-bottomed glass receptacles so that the size of the bead remaining was visible. All had a switch to activate and deactivate them, and a few had a knob to adjust the brightness of the wisplight.


    The hand tools were more varied. There were bound tools that rotated circular saws to cut through wood, like the one on Master Yhosed''s bound tool. Others had rotating cylinders with blades mounted on them which I recognized as planers, cylinders with a rotating mount on the end and a handle on the side that were probably drills, what looked like a water cutter that was either handheld or had been detached from a larger bound tool¡­


    "Any chance you found a bound tool that blows out cold air?" I asked.


    "If we did, we''re keeping it."


    That was fair. "That''s fair," I conceded. "Do they work?"


    Ravia nodded. "Endlew has tested all the ones here and confirmed all their functions work properly."


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    I nodded and picked out two of each bound tool that I recognized the carpenters might want to have, as well as a dozen of the wisplights shaped like lamps. We should be able to find the space for those, and it would let Lori reconfigure some of the wisplights she''d already made into something else. For example, a bound tool that moved air around!


    "Could you deliver these with the rest?" I said to Ravia as he wrote out something on what was presumably their bound tool inventory. "It''d be suspicious if we were walking around with these outside."


    "Of course, Master Rian," he said. "Set them aside here, and I''ll add these to the list."


    Once we were back at the negotiating tables, Ravia updated our order, marking the bound tools as fulfilled, and I sighed off on the changes.


    "By the way," Ravia said as he tucked away the sheet, "I have a recommendation for you, as per our wager."


    I blinked. "That was fast." A thought occurred to me. "You didn''t just post at a job-placement office, did you?"


    "I had the thought, but decided it was against the soul of the wager," Ravia said. "No, this is someone who was recommended to me by one of our lumberyard workers, Firif. They''re friends who came here aboard the same ship. Telref fell sick earlier this season and as a result lost his employment at a carpentry workshop."


    "Wait¡­ he''s a Deadspeaker who fell ill?" I said incredulously.


    Ravia nodded grimly. "From what I''ve heard, the workshop master drives all who work for him a bit too hard. They are well-compensated, hence why Telref stayed for so long, but¡­well, I suppose he put off tending to his own needs for too long and got sick as a result."


    "I get the idea," I sighed. "Pays well but wants his money''s worth, and maybe a little bit more."


    Ravia nodded. "Telref recovered, but he was bedridden for some time as he worked to cure himself and then had to spend some time to make sure his family didn''t become as sick as he had. That time away led to him losing his job. He''s looking for employment again, which is what brought him to my attention. If you wish, you can meet with him beforehand and see if he''s willing to be recruited by you for your demesne? If not, then we can consider offering him a job here instead."


    I tilted my head. It was a silly habit, but the familiar movement was comforting as I thought. "Well, I wouldn''t want to make your hard work go to waste. When is a good time?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The good time turned out to be after lunch.


    That meant we had to go out early and have our own lunch. I let Hans and Liggs pick, though I limited them to one cup of booze. The food was delicious, some sort of meat in a dark sauce that was not, in fact, stew. It had flavor and spice, even if it was just simmered vauang and sharrods. While we had some of both back home, it was still a seed crop. With so many people to feed every day, we''d need a lot before we''d be able to notice the difference, so I''d had the farmers focus on just growing a lot for now and replanting as soon as viable.


    After lunch, Ravia had me wait at one of the merchant house''s negotiating tables. I sat there nervously as I waited for the prospective recruit to arrive. This wasn''t something I''d ever really done before, recruiting someone for the demesne, but as the lord most likely to be sent to Covehold I would probably be doing this more in the future.


    I reminded myself of the positive reception I''d gotten last time when I''d told people what our demesne was like. Sure, some of the people I talked to probably didn''t believe me, but they seemed to like the idea. I just¡­ had to do that again. After all, the worst that could happen was that they turned me down and I had to keep looking. At the very least, I''d get practice on how to recruit.


    Eventually, someone hesitantly approached the table I was sitting at. He was wearing hardy cloudbloom trousers that seemed in good condition, a clean shirt, and leather boots that appeared to be both very well-worn but in good repair. For a Deadspeaker, that probably wasn''t hard. Actually, shouldn''t a Deadspeaker be able to manipulate the threads in clothes as well? They were usually dead plant material, weren''t they? Or was it like using Deadspeaking on paper, where there was a distinct difference in the deadspoken material?


    The man himself looked about my age, but that didn''t mean much. I''d gotten very bad at being able to tell how old people were as I''d gotten older. Of average height, he had dark hair that initially looked black but, on closer observation and by the edges where the light was through it, was a very dark shade of green. For a man who''d gotten so sick he''d been bedridden he seemed healthy enough, even if his limbs weren''t notably muscular or fat. His eyes were a very bright and striking pink.


    "Are you Master Rian?" he asked hesitantly as he reached my table.


    I nodded, smiling briefly to try to put him on his ease. "I am. Wizard Telref, I presume? Please have a seat."


    With visible nervousness in his body language, he sat down as he nodded. "Yes, that''s me."


    "Thank you for meeting with me. May I ask what were you told about me so I know what your expectations are?"


    "Just that you were looking for a Deadspeaker to come back with you to your demesne, and that they would like me to talk to you first," Telref said, licking. He was starting to relax, and I recognized the way he was breathing as the same as what Lori did when she was calming herself down. I suppose it was a wizard thing. Still, he looked tired and not just from a lack of sleep. "They said if I refused you, or if you found me unsuitable, they would still be willing to consider hiring me on as a wood presser."


    I nodded. "That''s correct. We''re looking for a Deadspeaker for our demesne, and if we both like what the other is offering, we''re willing to help move you and your immediate family to our demesne at our own expense."


    "Immediate family?"


    "Your spouse and any children," I clarified. "If you happen to have an unmarried sister-in-law or something¡­ well, we can talk about it."


    "That''s¡­ very generous¡­" he said cautiously.


    "In addition, we will provide you with a house to live in for as long as you choose to be part of our demesne." I said. Then, because I''d seen the quality of the housing in the area, I added, "It will be solid Deadspoken wood, the roof doesn''t leak, and there''s a firepit in place for warmth in the winter. It will be provided rent-free, and you will have assistance when it comes to repairs from storm and dragon damage."


    He blinked and those tired pink eyes glinted. "Rent-free, you say?"


    I had to struggle to keep my smile from getting wider. "Yes. I can personally attest to that, and so can my friends." I nodded to where Hans and Liggs were sitting against the wall. The latter had taken the opportunity to take a nap, his head lolling as he slouched with his arms crossed.


    "What sort of Deadspeaking are you looking for, exactly?" Telref asked hesitantly, and the smile I was still suppressing wanted to widen at his too-casual tone.


    "Why don''t you start with telling me what you think your strongest skills are and we''ll go from there?" I said.


    I was sure my casual tone was much, much better than his.

 356 - The Interview

    Telref, I soon found, was a man barely holding himself together and constantly on the edge of despair. It was in the tired way he sat, the tone of his voice as he spoke, and the air of needing sleep. He seemed a worrier, probably worrying about his work, his wife, his son, whether they could afford the rent on where they lived, whether they could afford food, whether they''d be able to afford heat in the coming winter¡­


    In other words, he was a perfectly normal, responsible adult with a family.


    I liked to think that he''d be happier living in Lorian or River''s Fork as our resident non-Shana Deadspeaker. It would remove a lot of his worries¡­ at least until Lori had to implement putting us on a bead-based economy again, but as a resident Deadspeaker, I was fairly certain Lori would continue to support him, since he''d still be a very valuable worker. I would just need to keep Lori from overworking him.


    ¡­


    Maybe if I had Lori let me take care of assigning what work he had to do¡­


    As to skills, Telref had needed to develop his abilities in Deadspeaking along pragmatic lines to make a living that would support his family, meaning he''d had to learn to do a little of everything over the years. Woodworking, boneworking, leatherworking¡­


    "¡­though I''m not very good at deadcraft," he admitted, letting out a tired breath. Over the course of our conversation, I''d realized he wasn''t actually sighing at the end of every sentence, it just came out that way.


    "Oh? Why not?" I asked, genuinely curious. Deadcraft and healing were what Deadspeakers were best known for, even if it wasn''t the only thing they could do, the way Horotracts where known for making rooms bigger on the inside and Mentalists were known for having perfect memories. "We don''t really have much need for undead, so there''s no call for it¡ª" Lori probably wasn''t going to let anyone else handle the corpses of Elceena and Ahnree, if only because she''d want to do it herself, "¡ªbut is there any particular reason why?"


    "I''ve just never been very good at getting them to do anything complicated. I can make a leg move, and I can even move two, but I can''t get them to walk without the whole corpse falling over¡­"


    "Huh¡­" I tapped my lips thoughtfully. "Could you, say, use a beast leg to¡ª"


    "Make a dead leg driver? Yes, I can do that," Telreth said, "though I wouldn''t recommend it. It needs a lot of imbuement for it to work for a reasonable length of time, or else I''ll need to sit by it and maintain it all day."


    I nodded. "Well, something to keep in mind, but deadcrafting isn''t something we need back home." We ate most parts of beasts and seels, so except for the bones, there wasn''t exactly a lot of material for deadcrafting. "The woodpressing, woodworking and your familiarity with farming meanings are what we''re looking for. What about healing meanings?"


    "I can do the expected things," Telref said. "Knit flesh, mend bone, repair muscle and blood vessels¡­ I can also mitigate symptoms, but I''m not very good at cleansing illness."


    "You can''t do it?" I said. It was hardly necessary, since we had Shana, but¡­


    "No, I can, but¡­ I can''t do it very quickly," he said. "I have to take it slow so that I don''t make any mistakes¡­"


    Ah. "I see¡­" A thought occurred to me. "How much of what you have problems with could be solved if you had beads or someone else to provide more imbuement?"


    He blinked. "Well¡­ it would certainly help¡­"


    That meant Shanalorre would be able to help¡­ maybe? At the very least Telref, or anyone else we recruited, wouldn''t need to do all the imbuing by themselves.


    "Now, do you have any questions of your own?" I asked. I didn''t let my nervousness show, hoping he didn''t ask anything awkward, like ''what is our Dungeon Binder like?''.


    "Actually, yes," he said. "Previously, you said that there would be a house provided that we wouldn''t have to pay rent on¡­"


    "Yes," I said. "Now, you wouldn''t be the first owners, and at one point it was used for storage, but if you choose to accept our offer and move to our demesne, you''re free to stay there for as long as you want."


    "And¡­ that''s it?" he said, looking dubious.


    "Well, it hasn''t been lived in for a while¡ªas I said it was used for storage¡ªso there might be mold," I admitted. "We''ve done what we could, but you might need to remove that, or fuse new wood into some spots. But don''t worry. We have several houses for you to pick from, so you can choose where you want to live."


    He frowned. "Hasn''t the house been maintained?"


    "It''s one of several houses that were originally made by a Deadspeaker who is no longer with the demesne," I said. Technically true. "They made them by hollowing out and reshaping each house from a tree. To be fair, the resulting houses are sizeable and could fit a family, and they''re still in good repair. We''ve done what maintenance we could with our carpenters, but¡­"


    "But they''d need to cut the wood," Telref said, nodding. "And that kind of Deadspoken wood have little in the way of flat surfaces or straight lines, making it hard for them to work without it irrevocably damaging the structure or taking an unbinderly amount of time."


    "It doesn''t help that glue isn''t as plentiful as we''d like," I added. Extracting hide glue unfortunately ruined the skins such that they didn''t make for very good material afterwards, and while we had plenty more bone, Lori always had uses for it, not to mention everyone else. "I''ll be honest, you''ll probably going to become a local repairman when you''re not being asked to help increase and accelerate crop yields."


    He made a face at that last, clearly recalling an unpleasant experience. "That''s not an easy meaning to apply," he said.


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    "I see," I said. The late Binder Koshay had done it, but in hindsight, he''d been working with the advantages of a Dungeon Binder, which if Lori was any example were considerable. "Which aspects in particular make it difficult?"


    "Imbuement," he said immediately. "Unless you''re willing to spend talkbeads like water, any meanings I place to accelerate a crop''s growth or ripening wouldn''t last very long. There are ways, I''ve heard¡­ but I don''t know them."


    I nodded. "Well, it was a hope, but not something we placed all our hopes on. Your woodworking experience is more important." At least, it was for me. I wanted an actual wooden-hulled boat! And with his assistance, we could finally do maintenance on Lori''s Boat, and maybe build some new ones! "If the house isn''t to your liking, you''re free to select any of the other unoccupied houses in the demesne, or try and improve it. As I said, we''ll assist you in any repairs and additions you want to make, provided they''re reasonable. No two-floor mansions with multiple rooms and private dragon shelter."


    "Does it have a kitchen?"


    I paused to consider that. "There''s the firepit I mentioned¡­" I said slowly, "but if you mean a kitchen with a sink and stove¡­ no. However, there''s a communal kitchen and dining hall so everyone can eat and socialize together, which also helps prevent fire hazards. But if having a kitchen is really important to you, I''m sure something can be arranged." Lori could probably put up a low-effort stone addition to the side of one River''s Fork''s houses, and Telref could poke a hole in the wall¡­ Or maybe Lori could use a water cutter. "However, if you''re concerned about food, then our demesne is willing to shoulder the expense of providing food for your and your family, within reason. You''re not going to get grossly fat, but you certainly won''t be living on almost-water soup. It''s closer to meat and mushroom broth stew. Actually, it''s mostly meat and mushroom broth stew."


    Telref looked suspicious, but behind that suspicion was hope. I actually felt almost bad about that. It was the kind of hope that the unscrupulous took advantage of, building it up so that people would stop listening to their good sense before those terrible people struck. I had to remind myself that I was only creatively omitting things because believing how Lori ran her demesnes was hard until you actually saw it for yourself. "Free food as well?" he said.


    "I know it sounds suspicious, but we''re willing to provide free room and board to have a skilled Deadspeaker come to make their home in our demesne," I said. "In addition to that, you and your family will also have free use of the local bath house, as well as receive a soap allowance."


    He blinked at that. "Soap allowance?" he repeated.


    "You don''t want soap for bathing and doing the laundry?"


    "No, no¡­ I mean, yes, we''d want soap¡­" he said.


    "Well, you''ll have it," I said brightly. "It certainly helps keep the number of people who get sick down, so that will be less work for you and the local doctors. Do you have any more questions?"


    "You¡­ mentioned free use of the bath house?"


    I nodded. "Yes. Ah, I''m afraid I might have been accidentally misleading. The bath house is free for anyone to use, at all times of the year. Usually, the bath water is heated, especially during the winter, but because of the summer heat the water isn''t being heated at the moment as the cooler water is more comfortable. However, come the next season the water will no doubt be heated again."


    "Your bath house is free to use for everyone?" Telref said, that mix of hope and suspicion in his eyes again.


    "Yes," I said. "I admit, it''s one of the best parts of living in our demesne. When I left to come here, people were bathing three times a day because it was so hot." I was suddenly very conscious of how sweaty I was, how much my clothes smelled and how itchy I was under it, and had to resist the urge to start scratching. "Do you have any more questions?"


    For a moment, he sat there, his breathing even as he considered thoughfully. "What exactly do you expect me to do, should I join your demesne?" he said slowly.


    I sighed. "Unfortunately, a little of everything," I said. "While we have carpenters, we no longer have a Deadspeaker who can help them, so you''ll be asked to help with woodworking. The farmers will want your help to try and accelerate the growth of the crops so we have mave more harvests per year. The hunters and tanners will want your help fusing skins, furs and leather together so we can have larger sheets¡­ I''m not going to lie, you''ll probably be busy for the first few weeks after you arrive, but you''ll be able to work at your own pace as long as you contribute to the demesne, like assisting at harvest time and things like that. You''ll also be asked to assist our Dungeon Binder if they need anything built with Deadspoken wood, but beyond that, you''re free to do as you please, within reason. Is there anything you particulalrly want to do?"


    The question made him hesitate, before he eventually shook his head. "No¡­" he said, "¡­nothing in particular¡­"


    I nodded. "Do you have any intention of trying to establish your own demesne?"


    That actually made Telref blink before he let out an abrupt snort and shook his head. "No," he said. "I have no intention of establishing my own demesne. Would I have stayed here in Covehold if I did?"


    "Well, I didn''t want to assume," I said. "Though, if I may ask¡­ why did you come all the way out here, then?"


    Talref fell silent for a moment, suddenly looking more tired than before. "I was young and foolish," he said eventually. "I outgrew it."


    Ah. One of those kinds of regrets. "I won''t pry, then," I said. I should probably ask if he''d ever been accused of a crime¡­ but there was really no way for me to confirm or deny his answer. I''d just have to keep an eye on him when we got back, if he decided to join us. "Though in that case, what are you looking for now, that you''re considering joining our demesne?


    This time he actually did sigh. "I''m hoping for a place we don''t have to pay rent," Telref said. "All the rest¡­ as long as we don''t have to pay rent."


    "You won''t have to pay rent," I promised. "Is there anything else you''d like to know?"


    For a moment, Telref almost shook his head, paused, then shook his head harder, as if clearing his head. "I should have asked at the start¡­ which demesne are you with?"


    "Lorian Demesne," I said brightly.


    Telref frowned. "I''ve never heard of it."


    "We''re a year-old demesne a long way upriver, so we''re pretty far from Covehold," I said. "I''m pretty sure we''re the demesne farthest from Covehold right now. That''s probably why you''ve never heard of us. Not surprising, since this is only the second time we''ve come down to this demesne. We haven''t had a chance to make a proper name for ourselves yet. Hopefully that changes soon."


    "Ah¡­ I see¡­"


    "Do you have any further questions?" I asked.


    He paused, then shook his head.


    I nodded. "Now, I realized this is a big decision, so you don''t need to answer me now. Take some time to consider the matter. Go and speak to your wife about it, decide together. When you''ve decided, you can find me having dinner at the Shady Stand. You know where that is?"


    "I''ve heard of it¡­"


    "Great!" I said cheerfully. "Now, I''d just like to say our demesne would be very happy to have a man of your talents joining us, but if you choose another course, then I''ll understand. Good luck to you, Wizard Telref. I hope you find what you need."


    It was an awkward parting as I stood up, prompting him to do the same, and I extended my hand so we could exchange grips. I watched as he walked out to the stockyard, presumably to meet with the manager there to see about the woodpresser job.


    I closed my eyes, bowed my head for a moment and sighed.


    Well¡­ I probably wasn''t seeing that man again. After all, why take a suspicious offer to relocate when one could have a nice, secure job that they knew how to do?


    Still, it was probably good practice, and now Ravia had fulfilled his part of our wager.


    Shaking my head, I stood up to wake Hans and Liggs. Time to go back to looking for Deadspeakers¡­

 357 - Looking For Deadspeakers

    I felt better once we went back to Master Yhosed''s workshop and collected our three walking sticks. There was just something about having a sturdy stick in hand that was reassuring. Very good for poking, swinging, hooking legs and arms¡­ leaning on when my feet started aching¡­


    ¡­


    Why do my feet ache so much? I''m still young and healthy, especially now since Shana''s healed me once or twice and probably fixed things I didn''t know needed fixing! I''m only twenty-two years old! I mean, I don''t join the logging teams every day, but I don''t hold them back when I join them, and I do a lot of walking all the time! Why do my feet ache so much!-?


    ¡­


    Well, my feet aside, I had to get back to work.


    Trying to find other Deadspeakers to recruit was hot work. After all, I couldn''t just walk into any place with a Deadspeaker''s sign and ask them to move to our demesne. Unless I had the luck to find someone sufficiently dissatisfied with their life, or the person in question was having a very terrible week, we weren''t going to get any recruits that way.


    Over the next three days, I asked around some of the carpentry workshops in the area, especially the ones to whom I''d sold beads to, inquiring about the local Deadspeakers while I still had some goodwill. While there were no doubt Deadspeakers who were gainfully employed in one way or another, there were probably still those with the terrible luck of being unemployed because the workshops couldn''t take on any more people as regular employees. Granted, these people might also be unemployable for one reason or another, but not all of them would be.


    Between all this walking and the information I was able to learn about talking to people at the Shady Stand, we were able to meet and try to recruit over twenty people over that time. The key word, unfortunately, was ''try''.


    Some of the Deadspeakers were far too young, still in their mid-teens and either apprenticed to older Deadspeakers for training, or attending one of the local schools that had managed to establish themselves. I wasn''t sure as to the exact particulars of the latter arrangement, but casual inquiry gave me the impression that the schools subsisted on a combination of civic responsibility on the parts of the wizards teaching, tuition fees, support from the demesne, and local good will.


    While the young Deadspeakers had been spoken well of by the carpenters I''d talked to, I''d thought that their references to ''young'' someone was simply in comparison to them, which had been the case a few times. One carpenter had referred to a Deadspeaker as ''young'', and it turned out the wizard in question actually just looked younger than them. No, it turned out some of the woodworkers had been literal. A few looked young enough to for me to think of them as children, and Lori probably would have as well.


    There were older ones in their late-teens, those nearing the end of their apprenticeship or schooling, but many of them were shackled by debts they''d undertaken to pay for their education. The young Deadspeakers also probably needed seasoning in the application of their skills and abilities, which was probably safer for them to have in the controlled conditions of whatever workplace they''d eventually go to.


    I could still have recruited some of the older ones, the ones who were recommended as really good or talented¡­ but unfortunately, there was always a final factor that made me remove them from conservation: the size of their families. More often than not, the very talented, driven ones that I might be inclined to recruit had large families to support¡­ which probably explained why they were so driven and worked so hard. If we''d be recruiting them, it was obvious we''d need to bring their family as well, which¡­ well, often had far too many people for us to safely transport on the Coldhold. Not unless we didn''t take on any cargo, and even then, it would far too overcrowded for safety.


    Recruiting only the older of the young Deadspeakers was an option¡­ but there were still their debts to consider. If we recruited only them, they''d at the very least want to be able to send beads back to their families to pay for their debts. Besides the fact we couldn''t really pay them the way our demesnes were, Lori would be very annoyed at her having to restructure the current economy of her demesnes just to pay one person, and we would have restructure, because as easygoing as everyone has become with Lori''s rule, no one is going to be happy that only a one person in the entire demesne is getting paid.


    Then there were people with difficult attitudes. Fortunately, there weren''t many of them and none of them were belligerent, but I doubted Lori would appreciate a Deadspeaker who took the opportunity to slack off every chance they got. It would also be terrible for general morale. The same for the one who was far too flirtatious. In their defense, from what I heard they did very good carpentry work, but¡­ well, at the very least, I put them at the very bottom of the list of maybes.


    There were those who just refused our offer, though they did so quite politely, even if I did make sure to mention the free baths. That admittedly made some people very thoughtful, but in the end they still refused, and I didn''t press. However, some of them were kind enough to recommend other Deadspeakers who they thought might be more amenable.


    Despite all that, we had some promising candidates.


    Taeclas was a pleasant young woman who''d been recommended by two nearby carpentry workshops and three of the Deadspeakers we''d met with earlier. While a skilled Deadspeaker, she was currently not regularly employed by any workshop because she was considered a bit slow when implementing meanings as well as not very well-verse in manual carpentry, so she was less desirable to employ compared to many of her peers who could work faster and assist in the more manual aspects of the craft beyond carrying wood around.


    While that wasn''t the best when it came to any worker, it also wasn''t the worst, and beyond the speed in which she worked, those who mentioned her said her work was exceptional. It was simply that in the workshops, fast and good was more desirable than not-as-fast and exceptional. It sounded like something that would sort itself out with enough experience and learning manual carpentry, and given the sorts of projects we were likely to ask her to do in Lorian and River''s Fork such thoroughness probably wasn''t a bad thing. She was also very skilled in meanings meant for farming, something we found out when we learned she and her wife were growing pots of vegetables in their house, which supplemented their diet as well as their income.


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    As a recruit she was almost perfect, but Taeclas was a bit reluctant to uproot herself and her wife to move to another demesne now that they''d established themselves in Covehold. They promised to discuss it and I told them I would return in a few days to hear their decision, as well as help them with packing if they decided favorably.


    Sharrod¡ªyes, he had apparently been named after the bulb vegetable¡ªwas another candidate, an even-tempered and supposedly industrious young man who wasn''t regularly employed because in addition to being the bead-winner of his family, he was also the oldest and had to take care of his three younger cousins. It was a recent change, as his aunt and uncle had died over the winter. I hadn''t gotten any specific details as to how and hadn''t pressed, but given he was a Deadspeaker, it probably wasn''t from disease. Hopefully.


    Since then, he''d had to go from being a regular worker to a part time or temporary one, or at least that was what we''d been told. When we met, I got the impression that some of his irregular hours was also because he became anxious when away from his cousins for too long, a fact that he admitted to with some embarrassment. Ah. Employers didn''t like it when you started acting unreliable, after all. They''d no doubt be more than happy hire him again as a regular when he was more reliable again, but¡­ well, that seemed to be unlikely to happen soon. Still, he was able to subsist on small jobs from the workshops for now, but that was probably not sustainable in the long run.


    The Deadspeaker had listened quite politely when we had met in their home, his cousins sitting with us, and had asked me several questions about how safe our demesne was. He seemed interested to hear if there was any violent altercations, and I answered honestly that while there was roughhousing, it was generally usually resolved in a friendly manner. I also confirmed that there were no gangs in our demesne, which was probably a sign of what happened to his aunt and uncle.


    By the end of our discussion, he seemed very interested in accepting, and said he would take some time to think about it.


    There had also been Master Yhosed''s recommendation, Lidzuga, who seemed about my age or at most a year or so older. He was skilled in Deadspeaking, friendly, hardworking, and seemed to be making a decent living, so I was a bit confused as to why he was being recommended, since it seemed very unlikely he would want to accept.


    The answer to that turned out to be very simple: he''d come to the new continent searching for adventure, and now after working to rebuild his savings, he wanted to move out to one of the outer demesnes¡ªas the least-developed demesnes furthest from Covehold were called, which¡­ well, we qualified, so fair enough¡ªto have that adventure. Thankfully, as a devout follower of the Mysteries of Alknowledge, his idea of adventure was being among the first to document the native plants, beasts, bugs and fursh, which was admittedly hard to do around Covehold because the march of progress had driven them out, killed them, eaten them, used them as building material, or some combination thereof. If he wanted to record anything new, a demesne far from Covehold was the best option.


    On the one hand, he seemed a wonderful candidate for his skills, and as a follower of the Mysteries, he probably knew useful things beyond Deadspeaking. On the other hand¡­ I felt very reluctant to recruit a Deadspeaker who wanted to go and be adventurous in his spare time. Especially one that wanted to observe, document and sketch the local beast population, study their habits, sketch them¡­ I mean, I suppose that the hunters could accompany him, but Lori would probably be very annoyed about having a Deadspeaker who''d take long breaks from working to conduct such studies. Still, of the candidates so far, he was the most enthusiastic of about the idea of leaving Covehold and heading out to a distant demesne he''d never heard of once I told him we were from really far away.


    It was vaguely concerning, actually. No wonder Master Yhosed had recommended him to me. I probably looked halfway trustworthy, so I was unlikely¡ªwell, far less likely¡ªto rob Lidzuga and just leave him for dead somewhere.


    Correction, Lidzuga and his sister. Because I learned at the end of our discussion that he also had a sister, but he was sure he could convince her moving was a good idea¡­


    Uh¡­ not my problem. Though I got the feeling the sister was probably the one who was going to decide whether they''d be coming with us or not.


    Crucially, when asked, all of them denied any desire to found their own demesnes. Lidzuga said he had no need for it since he''d be living in a demense anyway, and actually ruling a demesne would be a distraction. Taeclas also said it seemed like hard work, and not something she''d be good at, and Sharrod said it was a position that would take up far too much of his time.


    That was good enough for me. Hopefully Lori would accept it. Well, we''d already be there when she found out, so she really wouldn''t have any choice¡­


    After three days, we had to stop the search. Enough of the goods we had ordered from Emborin and Sons had been assembled that Ravia said they were ready to start delivering them to the Coldhold. That meant that the boat couldn''t set out and gather salt that day, and I needed to be there to supervise and direct the others as they arranged the cargo amid the space available.


    After we sold the salt we''d gathered to Ravia again¡ªwe only had one barrel, since the priority was filling our water barrels again¡ªit was time to move all the cargo into the ship. It took most of that day, since we had to balance and secure everything so that the Coldhold wouldn''t tilt too far to one side or the other. The bound tools and some of the things that didn''t need to be washed¡ªlike metal ingots and bar stocks, coils and coils of wire as well as the containers of ink¡ªwere stored in the front room, while the bundles of paper, bolts of cloth, books and anything else were put in the cargo boxes, sealing the lids shut so that no one could accidentally reach inside. We''d probably have to tell whoever we recruit not to touch them, but the darkness-shrouded appearance of the containers would likely make people careful around them.


    By the time we finished loading the ship with most of the things we''d bought, it was mid-afternoon. To thank Ravia and the workers who''d pushed the carts with all the goods for waiting while we got the ship sorted out, I treated them to lunch when we''d stopped to eat in the middle of the day, which was gladly accepted.


    "It was an education for myself as well," Ravia said as we ate. "I had not realized the importance of properly distributing weight aboard a boat. In hindsight, it seems obvious, but¡­" He shook his head.


    "Thinking of commissioning your own boat so you can sell to the demesnes upriver more easily?" I asked.


    "It''s an idea that''s been bandied about," he admitted, "but it was decided that we should wait until there are more experienced sailors to advise us."


    "Given how your rivals likely have more beads to draw on, you''d likely be outbid. You''d probably do better to get the experience yourself by funding your own boat and crew," I said. I waved my hand at the men. "None of us had any sailoring experience before we built the Coldhold. We learned as we went."


    "That has also been suggested, but the investment¡­"


    I shrugged. "Why don''t you fund a saltboat or two and work your way up from there? As an investment, it''s not bad. Helps you cut out the middle man, so it might even pay for itself by the time you think you have enough experience to move on to larger ships?"


    Ravia blinked, then tilted his head. "A sound proposal¡­ I''ll pass it on to my father."


    "Glad to help," I said. "And since we''re good friends, I won''t charge you a consultation fee."


    Ravia laughed. "That is greatly appreciated."

 358 - The Ship

    That night, after we''d loaded the Coldhold with most of the cargo that we''d bought from Emborin and Sons, I finally decided to indulge myself and went to have an early dinner at Engario''s to have their highly recommended doughstrands.


    It was absolutely delicious. The doughstrands were boiled, and then fried in beast fat with diced vauang and sharrods, fatty pieces of beast meat and mushrooms, with a dash of salt and ground green nigrum to taste. It was all I could do not to cry, it tasted so good.


    Only my caution of the possibility we''d get waylaid on the way back to the docks kept me from eating until I was too full to move.


    Afterwards, I took Cottsy, Yhorj and Multaw to have dinner at the Shady Stand, just leaning back with a meat dumpling as they ate. Tomorrow, I was going to be visiting our recruit candidates to see who needed help with packing and bringing their possessions to the Coldhold, so tonight I didn''t have to work at listening for any possible people to recruit. Instead, I was able to just relax and talk to the people who came to sit with us, some of whom we''d met on previous nights.


    "So, how''s the search going for you, Rian?" Aran asked. He worked at a local papermaker''s, something I''d wished I''d known before I''d placed an order with Ravia, but that was how life was.


    "Pretty good, pretty good," I said cheerfully as I waited for my cup of broth to cool. There was a little skim of oil on top, but I didn''t mind. "We''ve found some good ones, and I''m checking up on them tomorrow. Thanks for the recommendation by the way, but they weren''t interested."


    "Ah, too bad," Aran''s brother Golto said. He also worked at the papermaker''s with his brother. "Still, glad to hear you''ve found someone to take back home with you. Most people wait until the ships come in with fresh blood to go recruiting. If you''d been here earlier in the spring, you might have had an easier time."


    "I''ll remember that for next time," I said, even as I wondered if there was some kind of schedule of boat arrivals. In hindsight, I probably should have asked. "Still, better safe than sorry. Wouldn''t want to be caught by a dragon out at sea, after all."


    The men at the table all nodded at that. Yes, no one wanted to be caught by a dragon at any time.


    We left earlier than we usually did, as I didn''t have to stay to talk to people about recommendations. It was actually a nice change of pace. The streets were still fairly full of people out and about, either heading home or stopping somewhere for dinner, and I felt fairly safe that we wouldn''t be ambushed. Buying drinks for all those people the previous nights had been very obvious, and clearly a large expenditure. While I liked to think that the people I had shared a table and conversation with wouldn''t deliberately spread word about me, the fact I had done the same thing again the next night, and then the night after that, and then the night after that¡­


    Well, it was fairly obvious I had so many beads on me that I was willing to share them.


    And doing so every night, at the same place, for the same length of time¡­ well, it was predictable. It was easy to observe where we went when we left the Shady Stand. It was easy to count how many of us walked together, and therefore how many people it took to outnumber us. Every time we left the tavern, I lived in dread of it finally being the night that our luck ran out, and some toughs coming at us for the beads I was carrying. It was why we stuck to the wider streets, so that it would be harder for us to get hemmed in.


    Fortunately, we didn''t have to deal with that tonight either, though every walk back I feared this would be it. The four of us reached the relative safety of the docks, greeting the dockworkers patrolling the docks that night as we gave them a warm paper bag full of meat dumplings.


    "We''re going to miss this when you leave," Plet, the night dockmaster, said wistfully as the bag of dumplings was passed around. He and the night shift usually sat outside of their office to be take advantage of the breeze coming from the ocean. "Most of the people that dock here give us nothing but trouble."


    "We''ll be back then," I said cheerfully. "Thanks for all the hard work."


    From what I had heard, while the docks had used to get a few gangs trying to get into the warehouses or make trouble for the new arrivals when a ship came in, the miscreants had gotten bolder since the incident when someone had set a warehouse on fire and stolen a ship. I''d been woken up by the men once when they''d heard a commotion at the dock entrance, which had turned out to be a gang trying to climb and get into the docks. The dockworkers had run them off, but one of them¡ªRyloi, if I remember correctly¡ªhad gotten hurt by a knife in the process.


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    The man had been fine two days later, soft pink flesh the only sign of the wound after a Deadspeaker had seen to him¡ªthe docks apparently had an arrangement with a local Deadspeaker for their workers¡ªbut it had certainly made the men more vigilant about keeping watch. They''d actually brought up perhaps taking the boat to sleep out in the open water again, though I''d eventually decided we were reasonably safe if we kept watch, and the time saved in the morning was worth it.


    So when Cyuw woke me up in the middle of the night, I went into a controlled panic to wake myself up in case something was happening that I had to react to immediately, like a gang having set another warehouse on fire. "Wazapenin?" I eloquently managed to get out. The wisplight and air blower was near the back where it wouldn''t shine on our eyes and could circulate air from the hatch, but there was enough illumination to sting my eyes as I opened them. One hand patted around me for either my new walking stick or my belt knife, the big one just barely not suited for chopping wood and undergrowth.


    "Lord Rian, there''s a boat coming towards us," Cyuw said, speaking quietly.


    My hand felt the cane and I pulled it towards me as I blinked and tried to rub the sleep out of my eyes. "A¡­ boat?" I said, trying to wrap around¡­ Oh. I shook my head again and got to my feet. "Right, boat, boat¡­ how close are they?" A boat coming towards us at this time of night¡ª "Is it morning already?"


    Cyuw shook his head. "Still the middle of the night, Lord Rian."


    Right¡­ a boat coming towards us at this time of night was probably some kind of mischief at best. If it was something malicious¡­ "Go back up and get on top," I said, finally looking around for my knife instead of feeling for it. Where was¡­? Oh, right, it''s under my pillow. "Make sure to stand somewhere they can see you and make it obvious you can see them." A paranoid thought occurred to me. "But be ready to get behind something if they have a weapon or¡­" Ugh, I was still sleep-stupid. "Be careful. I''ll be right behind you."


    "Do we wake up the others?" he asked.


    "Be ready to, but not just yet. Let me see what''s going on first." If it was something malicious¡­


    I got to my feet and debated whether or not to put my boots on before deciding I didn''t want to give Umu and Mikon more work to do by poking a hole in my socks. Quickly pulling on my footwear, I grabbed my cane in one hand and my knife in the other, heading towards the ladder and hatch at the back.


    Then I had to leave my knife on top of the driver bound tool since I needed one hand free to climb the ladder up. The cold night air struck my face as I poked my head out of the deck, and I shivered a little, but the sudden shock helped push me a little further towards wakefulness. Once I stood on deck, I looked around. The moons were out in various degrees of fullness, giving me enough light to not worry about my footing as I looked out over the water, looking for¡ª


    Oh.


    "Cyuw," I said, "I think I''ve told you all before, but just to be clear. If it''s our size or bigger, it''s a ship, if it''s smaller, it''s a boat. That''s definitely a ship." I shook my head, rubbing my eyes again. "Uh, you can come down from there, I don''t think they need to see you after¡ªno, wait, put the wisplight where they can see it so they don''t accidentally run into us!"


    Fortunately, Cyuw was more awake than me, so he was able to act sensibly, taking the wisplight from downstairs¡ªeveryone was still asleep, and it was cool enough they didn''t'' really need the breeze it made¡ªand hanging it up at the front of the ship while he took the one that cast light in a cone and hung it from the tiller so it cast its light over the rest of the Coldhold, making it more visible. By the time he was finished, I was awake enough to be able to actually put together analytical thought.


    The ship was heading towards the dock, a vague outline of shadows and moonlight. Its sails hung like listless curtains as it moved slowly though the water, propelled either by a bound tool driver or a wizard. The ship''s dimensions were difficult to ascertain, since it was still in the dark waters between the entrance to the cove and the docks, but I could see that its deck was higher than ours, standing above the roof of our cabin. The height, distance and darkness made it difficult to see what was going on, but I could make out shadows and lanterns moving along the edges of the deck as sailors looked out to make sure their ship didn''t run into anything.


    I watched as the ship came closer, shivering slightly at the wind. "I don''t think we need to wake up the others, Cyuw," I said as the man moved to stand beside me, "but thanks for waking me. We should keep an eye out as they pass us, if only so we can react if it looks like they might get too close." The ship I''d been on had arrived in Covehold during the day, so they''d begun having us get off the ship shortly after we''d arrived, but it was the middle of the night right now. "Hopefully they''ll let people sleep and not start unloading right away, but if they do¡­ well, we''ll have to make sure no one tries to get aboard our ship in the confusion."


    Cyuw made a face as if contemplating something unpleasant. He was probably remembering something that had happened when we''d first gotten off the ship. "Yes, we wouldn''t want any troublemakers getting near us," the man agreed.


    I stifled a yawn. "I''ll stay up with you until the end of your shift," I said, already foreseeing my suffering tomorrow from lack of sleep.


    "No, you go back to sleep, Lord Rian," Cyuw said. "You need your rest for tomorrow. I''ll wake up Yhorj instead. We''d not going out for salt because the new Deadspeaker might be joining us, so we can rest during the day."


    I open my mouth argue, and that''s when a great yawn left it. It went on so long I''m lucky a bug didn''t fly in my mouth. When I was done, Cyuw was giving me a smug look.


    "Fine," I said. It was being woken up that was making me grumpy, not anything else! "But if there''s any trouble¡­"


    "Then I''ll wake everyone up, Lord Rian, not just you," Cyuw assured me.


    Yeah, that was probably smarter than what I was telling him to do.


    Giving him a nod, I climbed back down the ladder and made my way back to my bedroll, laying my cane down beside me. As I put my head down on my pillow and closed my eyes, I heard Cyuw waking Yhorj up¡­


    ¡­


    Wait, did I leave my knife on the driver?

 359 - The Ship In The Morning

    While I woke up early these days, I was not naturally a morning person. It was a learned habit, and I needed to get up immediately and start moving to wake up properly.


    This morning, I woke up miserable because I''d been woken up the night before, interrupting my sleep. The temptation to turn over and go back to sleep was strong, but as the leader I had to set an example. So I got up and started stretching to get my blood flowing and wake me up the rest of the way.


    ¡­


    I said I got up and started stretching to get my blood flowing and wake me up the rest of the way!


    No, I didn''t close my eyes again and go back to sleep when I didn''t hear anyone else awake, I responsibly got up and¡ª


    ¡­


    Somehow feeling even more miserable, I woke up hot and sweaty to the sounds of everyone moving around on the upper deck.


    As I lay there, feeling miserable and now guilty, I took a moment to decry my complete and utter unsuitability for being a leader.


    ¡­


    Sighing, I sat up, rubbing my eyes. Well, that was enough sleeping in. I needed to get up and¡ª


    I paused, sitting still for a moment as I concentrated on feeling how the ship moved. Why were we swaying? And¡­ why did I hear water splashing?


    Groaning, I pushed myself to my feet, still rubbing my eyes. The wisplight that also moved air was back in its usual place, but it was deactivated, the bead receptacle conspicuously empty. The light coming in through the hatch next to it made the wisplight unnecessary, and I was relieved to note it was the soft glow of morning light rather than the harsh illumination of noon. I hadn''t slept in that long, then.


    Sighing and grunting like an old man because it made me feel better, I got to my feet and started rolling up my bedroll and folding my blanket. It only took a moment''s work to put my bedding away as I resolutely forced myself to be awake. Hanging my walking stick next to where my sword was¡ªI''d brought it in case I needed it for anything, even if couldn''t really carry it around Covehold Demesne¡ªand putting away my knife, I climbed up to the deck.


    I blinked at the light, even as the ocean breeze started to blow over my face. The splashing continued, and I turned to find some of the men balancing on one of the outriggers and scooping up water to pour over themselves as they scrubbed at their bodies, those who still had some soap using it.


    Beyond them, the buildings and warehouses of Covehold was gone, and there was only the sea¡­


    I looked the other way, and sighed as I recognized the stretch of shoreline there, which was bereft of glittering prismatic colors. We weren''t far from Covehold Demesne, still well within its sphere of influence, so it wouldn''t take too long to get back.


    "Yhorj," I said as I climbed the rest of the way up, "why are we out here?"


    "The other ship started letting people off early this morning, Lord Rian," Yhorj said from where he was carefully dipping his shirt into the seawater before starting to pound it on one of the wooden beams to crudely wash it. "Some of them were getting too close, and there were troublemakers getting past the dockworkers to the dock. I decided it would be best if we left for a little while until it was safer, since we needed to leave the docks to bathe anyway."


    I blinked. "Oh. Was it that bad?"


    "It was like last time again, Lord Rian. The sailors were just getting people out of the ship, people were trying to hold on to what they''d brought with them, there were arguments breaking out as people accused each other of taking things¡­ it was starting to sound like trouble, I thought we shouldn''t be where they could walk up to us."


    I nodded slowly. "I see¡­" Ugh, I should have been awake for this, but Yhorj was in charge of the Coldhold when I wasn''t on it for a reason. If he thought it was best for us to make ourselves scarce for a moment, then I trusted his judgement.


    Yawning, I took off my shirt. Despite my guts telling me they needed to be emptied, there was an order to this. Take a bath and wash clothes, then release our inner darkness. Wouldn''t want to bathe in that water if we did it the other way around, after all.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    I got my first proper look at the newly arrived ship as we drove back into Covehold Demesne. The ship docked in one of the piers was a fat-looking thing, unlike the boxy riverboats common in the old continent, but then those boats didn''t have to worry about waves battering against their sides. Unlike the salt-collecting boats, which tended towards being wide and shallow bowls, these ships were narrower in profile, looking like a large, inflated bladder, or a kind of elongated seed. A mast rose from it, though at the moment there was no sail, no doubt having been furled to keep from catching the breeze and having the ship pull against the ropes securing it to the dock.


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    At the back of the ship was a pressure-release chimney for a steam driver. It would be heated by Whispering, I knew. There were always some wizards on every ship like these, and they were usually offered reduced passage fees for assisting in the operation of the ship, such as heating the water in the steam driver that was the primary means of propelling the ship and desalinating drinking water, or maintaining the temperature of the occupied parts of the ship to just within livable ranges.


    While we were still too far from the ship for me to see it at the moment, I knew that all the wood above the waterline, as well as on the inside of the hull, would have the strangely textured look of material that had been overly Deadspoken. It wasn''t dissimilar from the effect Whispering had on the ordered layers of natural stone, in which the natural patterns and striations were subtly smeared as magic was used to alter its arrangement. It was far less obvious with wood, since the Deadspeaking was used to collapse the holes created by growing Iridescence and reinforced the structural integrity of the material, but repeated applications led to patterns that didn''t occur naturally in wood.


    I''d noticed a lot of those, since there hadn''t really been all that much to do for entertainment on the ship I''d traveled on to Covehold.


    As I we got closer to the docks, I couldn''t help looking at the larger ship with some resentment. Sure, it probably wasn''t the same ship that had brought me here, but it certainly represented it. The cramped quarters, the noise, the smell, the heat and cold, the bad food¡­


    I noticed I wasn''t the only one giving the boat sour looks. Were the others remembering their time on board the ship that had brought them here too? Probably. Everyone would have needed to go through the same thing, cramped in the hold except for the scheduled times for people to go up on the deck to wash the Iridescence growing on themselves off with seawater¡­


    That had been an experience, learning that people in some demesnes didn''t consider it an issue for women to be shirtless in public, treating it as no different as men being bare-chested¡­


    I shook my head, both to banish the memory of embarrassment and to return my thoughts to the present. My gaze turned from the ship towards the docks and dockyard next to it. The warehouse on the end closest to the dockmaster''s office, the one I knew new arrivals were allowed to stay in for the first three days before being kicked out to make other arrangements, was open, and a chimney at the top was blowing out smoke. A late breakfast was likely being prepared, as being kicked out of the ship had probably meant no food had been prepared for them. The front doors of the warehouse had been thrown wide open, no doubt to allow air to circulate and help deal with the heat that was probably building up inside.


    A few buildings down, another warehouse was open. A wooden crane was lifting things from the ship''s hold and setting them down on the dockyard, and men were busy moving the unloaded cargo from the ship to this new warehouse. I let out a breath that wasn''t quite a sigh as I looked over the activity. I wasn''t sure if I wanted us to be docked near that. At the moment the new arrivals were probably setting up their little mini-camps and getting their bearings, enjoying having more space to themselves, but it was probably only a matter of time before they got curious and stepped out of the warehouse. And while the ship''s sailors were working at the moment, they would probably stop for lunch and maybe take a break at noon when it was hottest. If they approached the Coldhold¡­


    "Yhorj, after we get off at the dock, move the Coldhold out so that you''re in sight of the docks but too far to be bothered," I said. "We should be back around noon and hopefully we''ll have the new recruits with us, or at least get a start on loading their baggage onto the ship."


    "So we don''t go out for salt and water today?" Yhorj asked.


    I considered that. "Come back by noon. I''ll try to bring you all lunch, and if we''re coming back, it will likely be then. If we''re not here by then¡­ well, wait for us. I''ll leave you some beads to buy lunch with."


    Yhorj nodded. "Got it, Lord Rian."


    "No booze, all right? I don''t want to see what happens when someone tries to guide the ship after they''d been drinking."


    I deliberately did not notice Yhorj rolling his eyes at me. "Understood, Lord Rian."


    Look, if I hadn''t made it explicit, someone would have thought to do it! They''re all good men, and I trust them¡­ but I also know what sorts of things people can get up to if you leave them wiggle room!


    Yhoe the dockmaster didn''t come to meet us as the Coldhold approached one of the docks and let me, Multaw, and Liggs off. I caught a glimpse of him keeping watch over proceedings and directing the dayshift dockworkers, looking very busy. He saw me, and I waved and mouthed ''later'' at him, pointing towards the Coldhold, and to my relief he nodded in understanding and waved to tell me to go. Hopefully we both understood that I meant I''d settle the matter of any extant docking fees later. These sorts of gestures weren''t infallible communication, after all.


    Let off the hook, walking sticks in hand, we headed out into the city to check in on our prospective Deadspeaker recruits and see who had decided to accept out offer.


    While it would be difficult if they all decided to refuse, it would also awkward if all of them accepted. Still, I''d rather deal with the latter problem than the former. It was easier to turn someone down than it was to try to convince them to change their mind.


    ¡­


    No, either way it was going to be very awkward for me.


    And after I find out which ones have decided to accept our invitation¡­ well, I was going to have to see Ravia and inquire about renting one of their carts and someone to help push it along for the day.


    We''re not going to carry all their stuff by hand to the Coldhold, after all. That was just asking to get robbed in the street. All it took was someone willing to make a snatch and run¡­


    Yeah, I was definitely going to ask Ravia if I could borrow a cart.


    Already sweating, I headed towards the nearest of our prospective recruits, hoping they were home and that I had remembered the way properly.

 360 - Siblings

    Since we were having a late start, we grabbed a few chlyp skewers for a hasty breakfast from a street stall, and two buns each from a bakery so we''d have energy for all the walking we''d be doing today. Fortunately, the walking helped me shed my sleepiness, but I still felt tired. That would pass later in the morning, I knew, but for the moment I was simply going to be miserable.


    We checked up on Master Yhosed''s recommendation first, since he was nearby. I''d told him, as I had told all our prospective recruits, that I would come back in a couple of days so they''d have time to consider our offer. Wizard Lidzuga and his sister lived in a small room in a boarding house, one of those depressing places that seemed more a place to sleep than it was a place to live, though perhaps that was just my bias after living in Lorian. There were no families, for one thing, and I''d been told during the small talk stage of our discussion that the one married couple had been told to move out when the woman had gotten pregnant.


    Thankfully, my worry that Lidzuga wasn''t going to be in was groundless. I found him sitting on a bench outside of the boarding house, working on what looked like a wobbly-looking chair, a wooden mallet in hand. He was gently tapping at pegs and tenons to firm it up, then seemed to be using Deadspeaking to fuse the pieces together to secure it. At least, it seemed to wobble less and less as Lidzuga worked. Clad in tan-colored cloudbloom trousers and a short-sleeved shirt with the expected sweat stains, his pale red hair was wet with sweat and tied back with a cloth to keep it out of his eyes as he worked. He looked up as I approached, and his face broke into a wide, happy smile.


    "Tah, Rian!" he greeted, swinging the wooden mallet in little arcs in lieu of a wave as he kept one hand on the chair, no doubt to maintain whatever meaning was in progress. "I''ve been waiting for you."


    "I hope that means good news, then?" I said. "Ah, Lidzuga, these are Multaw and Liggs. I brought them along in case any heavy lifting was needed."


    "Tah," he greeted, waving the wooden mallet again. "Well, it depends on what you mean by good news. My sister said she wouldn''t decide to go until after she''d met you." One shoulder went up and down in a shrug, as if to encapsulate the eternal inscrutable mystery that was sisters.


    I nodded in understanding. As a man with a sister¡ªeven if I hadn''t seen her in six, no, seven years¡ªI knew well what he meant. "I see. Is she in at the moment?"


    "She should be coming back from the bakery," he said, looking down the street, the opposite way we''d come. "Actually, there she is now."


    I followed his gaze, trying to figure out who it was by process of elimination. I didn''t have to think to hard about it, as the Deadspeaker''s sister was obvious by how she was looking directly at him. She had a displeased expression on her face that made me want to make myself scarce out of reflex, though that was hopefully from being out in this heat. Her hair was a vibrant red that was tinging towards orange where her brother''s was pale, and she cradled a carry cloth wrapped around a lumpy shape that was probably whatever she''d bought from the bakery.


    "Lidz," she said as soon as she was close, and I relaxed slightly at her easygoing tone, "we''re in luck, the bakery had just finished some meat rolls, so I got us some of those instead."


    "Thanks Kuw!" Lidzuga said. "Rian, this is my sister, Kutago. Kuw, this is Rian."


    "Nice to meet you," I said, going with an inoffensive, easygoing smile that would hopefully put her at ease.


    My efforts slammed face-first into a wall, no doubt squashing its nose and perhaps losing some front teeth as Kutago narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me. "So you''re the one who''s trying to lure my brother to some other demesne," she said.


    "That''s me," I said, giving her a small wave. "He said you wanted to meet me?"


    She nodded curtly even as she handed the carry cloth to her brother, who began to unwrap it. "I had some questions about your offer."


    "I''d be happy to answer them, if I can," I said as Lidzuga drew out what was probably a meat roll. "What are they?"


    Inwardly, I braced myself for a rejection. He didn''t look like he was looking for a reason to refuse, like abruptly saying ''ah, you don''t have a library? Sorry, I have to refuse, I couldn''t possibly live in a demesne without a proper library'' or something like that. The sister though¡­ well, she was actually doing the smart thing, getting more details about important matters, but that was close enough to make little practical difference.


    "My brother tells me that you claim to have survived three dragons so far," Kutago said. "I''d like to hear the details about how you did so."


    ¡­


    Well, this was awkward. On the one hand, it would be a simple matter to outline our preparations. It¡­ might sound a little unbelievable¡ªI honestly don''t know how well it compared to the speed in which infrastructure got built in the demesnes outside of Covehold¡ªbut I could probably explain it as Lori being¡­ well, Lori. ''Our Dungeon Binder puts a lot of importance on infrastructure'' is a reasonable explanation.


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    The problem there was a good chance that Lidzuga and his sister were going to end up living in River''s Fork, which¡­ well, didn''t have Lorian''s extensive infrastructure. It had a dragon shelter now, but¡­


    Wait, perhaps this wasn''t an issue. A Deadspeaker surely counted as important personnel. Surely they''d be moved to Lorian to keep them safe in the event of a dragon¡­ right?


    I was mildly terrifying that while I was mostly certain Lori would do the right thing¡ªor at least the thing that would preserve lives¡ªI wasn''t absolutely sure.


    My thoughts were interrupted as Lidzuga patted the bench next to him. "Well, if we''re going to be talking, the two of you better sit," He said. The meat roll in his other hand already had a bite in it. "You need to eat too, Kuw. You want some, Rian?"


    I shook my head, even as I accepted his invitation and sat down. "We already ate before coming here, but thank you for the offer."


    Kutago rolled her eyes but sat down on her brother''s other side, reaching into the carry cloth to get a meat bun herself.


    I took a deep breath as I sat down, looking like I was organizing my thoughts, and helped by the fact that was exactly what I was doing. "Well, to start with, our Dungeon Binder was particular about where they formed the dungeon''s core for the demesne," I said. "They were very particular about how the core needed to be inside a cave of a moderately large hill¡­"


    The two of them listened as I listed all the particular features of that Lori had made over the past seasons, slowly eating through the baked meat buns. I admitted to the hurried excavation she''d done when she''d felt the original dragon arriving, of the water reservoir she''d dug out and filled, of how she''d stayed up all night to maintain the, in hindsight, very rudimentary defenses she''d made. Of how the Dungeon had become a dining hall, which it basically still was to this day. The cramped and slightly inadequate in-dungeon bath. The second level she''d excavated, which was still bigger than they really needed, so the unused rooms were used for grain storage, the carpenters, the weavers, the ropers and the gristmill. The still-unfinished but still-expanding dungeon farm, all the water systems, the cold rooms, the ventilation¡­


    I also delved into the defenses Lori had set up for when there were dragons. The hot moat, the binding of lightningwisps, the vents that let us draw in fresh air, the darkwisps¡­


    It was actually quite impressive when I listed it all out like that, and Lidzuga seemed to think so too as he listened with rapt attention, occasionally asking how effective the defenses had been. The chair in his hands continued to move as he tapped the pegs and tenons snug into holes and mortises before he fused them whole with Deadspeaking. While that probably wasn''t very complicated and taxing work, it spoke well of both his capabilities and experience that he managed it while listening to me speak. Hopefully his work when something had his full attention was commensurately more capable.


    "That sounds like a fair-sized dungeon," he said as he finally set the chair aside. The chair now stood solidly, no longer loose and wobbling. "A lot of the surviving demesnes have dug out dungeons themselves, or hired Whisperers and Mentalists to dig it for them, but I''ve always heard they get fairly cramped. Yours doesn''t seem to have that problem."


    I shrugged. "Our Dungeon Binder has good motivation to keep expanding the dungeon. The excavated stone is our primary building material because it''s so plentiful and relatively easy to shape."


    "Hmm¡­ yes, I can see that¡­" the Deadspeaker nodded. "And you said any stone that hasn''t been used for building is used to reinforce the front of the dungeon. It all sounds better than the colored dragon shelters around here."


    "That wouldn''t be hard to do," Kutago grumbled. Her suspicion and curtness had softened as I''d explained about our dungeon''s defenses, and she''d asked her own questions as well about practical logistical matter like ''how was the waste in the dungeon dealt with''. Fortunately, that was something I could answer, since it was part of my duties to make sure it was being done. Lori might have a private bathroom, but she didn''t have a private latrine¡ªas far as I knew, anyway¡ªso I had the dungeon''s kept clean, emptied, and as fresh-smelling as we could manage.


    "It can''t be too bad, if you''re still alive to complain about them," I said.


    The two siblings exchanged looks.


    "Well, I suppose it''s enough to keep people alive, but every dragon it seems like the shelters get more and more cramped and uncomfortable," Lidzuga said. "The Horotracts taking shelter with us have to keep taking shifts to give us all enough space to breathe. I think we''ve petitioned for the shelter near us to be expanded twice already, but from what I''ve heard the soonest any expansion work is likely to begin is next red month."


    "Oh."


    Kutago sighed. "It''s not so bad all over. I''ve heard that the population in the area simply grew larger than was planned for, but¡­ well, unfortunately we don''t really have time to go looking for a new boarding house we can afford in a part of the demesne with a nicer shelter."


    I resisted the urge to tell them how our demesne doesn''t have that problem and just nodded. No need to come on too strongly.


    For a moment, the three of us sat in silence.


    "So¡­" I said awkwardly, "while I don''t want to rush you¡­ we plan to leave some time tomorrow. If you''re going to decide to turn down our offer¡­ well, either way I need to know sooner rather than later so I know what to prepare the ship for."


    The siblings looked at each other, and Lidzuga gave his sister an expectant look.


    She sighed. "Fine, fine. You can go have your adventure, exploring strange new lands and seeking out new beasts and bugs to draw and study."


    "What do you mean ''my'' adventure? You''re the one who decided to come to the new continent with me!"


    "Well, someone has to make sure you don''t just go rushing into trouble. You wouldn''t have even asked about their shelter''s conditions if I hadn''t reminded you."


    "I assumed they must have one if they''d survived this long."


    I felt like an intruder as the sibling bickering to place. Really, hadn''t they ever learned they needed to keep disagreements like that private? It was the sort of thing an unscrupulous manipulator could use to drive a wedge between them to separate them and leave one or the other more vulnerable.


    I missed it so much¡­


    Hoping that my own sister was doing well, I waited for the two of them to remember I was still here.

 361 - A Large Cart

    Once the two of them stopped their sisterly bickering, they went inside to start packing, as well as speak with the one they were renting their room from to end their rent. Since the room was cramped, us going inside to help them would be more hindrance than help, so I told them I''d come back to help them move later that afternoon after I checked on our other prospective candidates.


    After much walking, we arrived at the house where Sharrod and his cousins lived. It was actually more like a row of houses, and might actually be worthy of being called houses. While still one-room affairs, they were bigger, and could actually fit a decent-sized family if they all slept on the floor on bedrolls. All the rooms shared a long wooden porch, presumably so people would have a place to take off muddy shoes during rainy days or something like that. A few of them had a small bench in front, or small pots and planters full of small, flowering shrubs and what looked like fast-growing herbs.


    After sternly reminding Multaw and Liggs to not laugh at the man''s name¡ªand patiently waiting for them to get the snickers out now so they wouldn''t come out later¡ªI knocked on the door and waited.


    No one answered.


    I frowned and listened at the door. While it wasn''t some flimsy thing, it wasn''t all that thick, and there were enough gaps around it that I if there was anyone inside the room, I would likely be able to hear them.


    "Are you looking for Sharrod?"


    I blinked and turned to the side to find a motherly-looking woman who was¡­ well, probably at least ten years older than me, maybe more. As I''d said before, I was terrible at being able to tell how old someone was. "Yes, mistress," I said. "I expected him to be here, but¡­" I let my shrug summarize the entire situation.


    "Ah, you must be the one he told me about," she said. "Reen, right?"


    "¡­" I ''¡­''-ed. "Most likely."


    She nodded. "He told me to tell you he was turning down your offer."


    Oh. "Oh," I said. "That''s too bad. Did he say why?"


    Instead of shrugging, the woman said, "He didn''t say it, but he managed to get a job in old Tunhem''s workshop, and the old softie lets him brings his cousins along. Tunhem''s wife watches them, I think. After her own children moved out, she''s been feeling lonely¡­"


    I nodded amiably as the woman proceeded to go on about the workshop master''s wife, and how what a nice thing she was doing taking care of those children, they''d lost their mother and father last winter when some gang toughs had robbed them for the bread they''d just bought and their beads, it had been so sad but thank goodness the ones responsible had been caught and hung up by their necks by the rest of the neighborhood, and it was a good thing that the neighborhood mayor hadn''t interfered when he was so lazy that they had to do his job of dealing with the gangs for him¡­


    Eventually we were able to extricate ourselves from the admittedly nice woman, and began walking towards our last prospective recruit.


    "I''d just like to say, I''d very much appreciate it if people leave the ''hang by the neck'' decisions to me," I told Multaw and Liggs as we walked. "Or better yet, to Lori. "


    "Don''t worry, L¡ªRian," Multaw said. "We know to keep it to a good beating if someone needs to get the colors washed off them. Though for something like that¡­"


    "Oh, if someone did something like that back home, Lori would probably have them put to death," I said. "She''d probably just want to do it in some terrible Whisperer way that she''d been warned of to not do, and that would be her chance to find out why." Tellingly, most of Lori''s laws that sentenced death on being broken had her acting as her own executioner.


    I hoped she never actually had to do it.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It was almost mid-afternoon by the time we reached the boarding house where Deadspeaker Taeclas and her wife lived. It was similar to the previous row of town houses, though the individual rooms were much smaller. Instead of being laid out in a line, the town houses were arranged in a square, with a small inner courtyard that served as a shared, semi-private space for the residents. It was one of several square-arranged boarding houses in the neighborhood, hinting at some kind of previous mass-housing project. As I had learned when I had visited the Deadspeaker last time, their particular block used the inner courtyard as a vegetable garden, with pots full of tubers and vegetables like sharrod, nigrum, clapper roots and other vegetables that I couldn''t easily identify.


    Unlike the previous places we had visited, Taeclas'' room was a center of activity. Multaw, Liggs and I watched in bemusement for a moment, standing a little distance back where we wouldn''t get in anyone''s way. Women of various ages were coming and going from other rooms in the town house block and nearby blocks, while some men were carrying out wrapped bundles secured by cord and standing guard over it in case of opportunists. For some reason, there was a line of people holding various different planters containing some kinds of vegetables, herbs or spices.


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    At the head of the line was Taeclas, her long light-brown hair tied back in a tail to keep it out of her pale green eyes as she examined such a potted plant sitting on a stool. She was holding a pair of scissors, but from the way she handled it the Deadspeaker was most likely using it as a conduit to pass magic through, probably so she didn''t get pricked by bristles and thorns or those really annoying fine needles you almost couldn''t see. I hated those.


    For someone who was described as being a slow but exceptional worker, Taeclas was finished with the little plant very quickly and handed it back to its owner with a smile and a few words. They chatted briefly, but the man quickly made way for the next person in line, who placed their planter on the stool, and Taeclas went to work with her scissors.


    It was a few more plants before the Deadspeaker finally saw us waiting there. She excused herself to the person who''s plant she was working on¡ªfrom the leaves, it was a tuber plant¡ªbefore hurrying towards us with a big smile on her face. "Rian!" she called. "I was wondering where you were!"


    "Sorry, we¡ª" was all I managed to say before in found myself being enfolded by a quick but friendly hug.


    "Hmm??" Taeclas said as she stepped back. "What was that? You just trailed off suddenly."


    I shook my head. Right, right, Taeclas was one of those very physical people. Considering she was a Deadspeaker, Lori was probably going to grab my shirt and use me as a literal shield more often, wasn''t she? "Just surprised. Sorry, we had to meet with the other Deadspeaker we recruited. What''s going on here, though?"


    "Oh, our friends in the neighborhood are helping us pack," Taeclas said. "Rybelle is inside making sure everything is put away and cleaning the room so that it will be ready for someone else to live in." She sighed. "I hope whoever lives there next is as happy as we were."


    "So should I take this to mean that you''ve decided to accept our offer?" I said.


    "Oh, yes! Did I forget to say?"


    "You did."


    "Then yes, we decided to accept your offer," she said brightly.


    I nodded. "May I ask why? While I''m glad you decided to accept, I didn''t think it was likely you would. You seem¡­ happy here."


    Taeclas sighed. "We are, but¡­ well, Master Cralk has been really kind, but we can barely pay the rent since I don''t have regular work, and Rybelle''s job as a weaver working for Mistress Alanya and working at the greengrocer''s in the morning just isn''t enough. We discussed it for a long time, and¡­ well, we both agreed that doing this was for the best."


    For a moment, I wondered how the sudden return of relatively cheap, usable wispbeads would affect the carpentry workshops of Covehold Demesne. It would very likely increase their productivity, but would that lead to them being able to hire more people? Would it result in Taeclas being able to find a more regular job?


    "Are you sure about this?" I found myself asking. "It''s not that we don''t want you, but¡­ "


    Taeclas shook her head. "It''s fine. Rybelle and I have been discussing moving out to one of the farming communities on the edges, or one of the other demesne that raises a lot of crops like Jinan Demesne. The fact you''re actually recruiting us¡­ well, you promised there''s no rent on the house, right?"


    I nodded. "No rent. And the people are very friendly once you get to know them." Even the malcontents were nice to talk to once they stopped complaining and began to appreciate how good their life actually was.


    The Deadspeaker smiled. "Well, it sounds like we have that to look forward to as well."


    I nodded, then gestured towards the pile of wrapped things. It had gotten bigger in the time I''d looked away. One large, lumpy bundle bore the unmistakable outlines of pots and pans. Next to it was what looked suspiciously like a dismantled table. "Is this everything you''re bringing?" I asked.


    "Oh no, Rybelle is still wrapping up the rest, and there''s still my little darlings in the garden. And a few we''ll be giving back to friends who let us borrow them or giving them away to those who need them."


    I breathed a small sigh of relief at that, but even so, the pile was intimidating. "Why don''t I go and see if I can borrow a cart to help carry all this?" I gave the pile another look. "A large cart."


    "Oh, would you?" Taeclas said, a relieved smile on her face.


    "Sure. We''ll need it for the things our other recruit will be carrying anyway. Though¡­ we won''t be leaving until tomorrow. Will you be fine sleeping here with so many things packed up?"


    "Oh! I''ll tell Rybelle so she won''t pack the bedrolls and pillows."


    "And I''ll go see about that cart," I said.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Fortunately, Ravia was quite understanding about letting me borrow a cart. I offered to rent it, especially since he was having three of their men come with us to help push it through the streets, but he insisted on the assistance. They apparently had few deliveries due this late in the day, so there were a few carts free. In the end, I talked him down to letting me pay for the three men''s dinner, as well as giving them a little extra¡­ and discreetly asking how much was a good amount.


    Then I had to ask for a few more beads from the amount they owed us, to pay for it all.


    "By the way," I said as a cart was readied. "Did Deadspeaker Telref choose to take a job with you? He hasn''t shown up at our appointed meeting spot yet."


    "Ah, I believe he has," Ravia said after a moment''s thought. "Would you like to check the scrap room?"


    It turned out that Telref had accepted the job with them. He was apologetic about not meeting with me, but had thought that him not showing up would have made his decision clear. Honestly, it was an understandable sentiment, but I was a bit annoyed he hadn''t thought I deserved the courtesy of refusing me to my face. Still, it was a small matter, and as I wouldn''t have to work with him ever again, I could afford to part ways with an understanding nod and an amiable handshake as I wished him well.


    Hopefully the man would be able to get more sleep now. He looked exhausted.

 362 - Loaded And Ready To Go

    With the new cart, we needed to find a route that wasn''t so full of people as we headed back to Taeclas'' house. Fortunately, the three men accompanying us¡ªLerri, Aran, and Malbin¡ªknew Covehold''s streets well, and had a good sense of what the roadways of the city were like at any particular time of day. With their help, we were able to get back to Taeclas'' neighborhood in a reasonable amount of time, though it still seemed to take a little longer than walking would have.


    The three men were pleasant enough company , but they tended to get engrossed in their own conversation when they weren''t telling each other of conditions ahead that they needed to push the cart through. Still, they were willing to talk when I asked them about what their jobs were usually like, when was the best time to push a cart through the streets, complaints that the streets were getting more and more crowded again, and their very loud and colorful complaints about those who used living lakimay to pull their wagons instead of dead ones, as was only polite and sensible.


    I could understand their point of view. Even the most affectionate, well-behaved lakimay was big enough to knock a man down, and no matter how well-trimmed and sheathed their claws were, a swipe by either foreclaw or hindlimb could be very damaging and liable to break someone''s bones. And just because most had their heads muzzled didn''t mean that there was no threat of injury there, just that it was less likely to be from the teeth and more from the blunt impact of the head on one''s poor, defenseless body.


    And of course, living lakimay relieved themselves wherever they wanted.


    It was always that last which got people annoyed.


    We actually walked past several such gifts to the roadway, which wasn''t pleasant. Even with Deadspeakers and breeders altering them in different ways since people had started using them as war mounts, wagon pullers and undead, they still had to eat some amount of meat, which made their waste smell particularly vile. And while there were herbivorous beasts, they tended to be big, slow, heavy, and eat significantly more, and relieve themselves an equal amount, which¡­ well, was worse for other road-users.


    By the time we got back to Taeclas'' house, the pile of wrapped bundles in front of their house was a bit smaller, though the dismantled table was still there, and the pile was now surrounded by several potted plants being fussed over by the Deadspeaker. She was tying cloths around their pots, presumably to keep the soil from spilling out if the pots fell over. Her wife Rybelle stood next to her, the blue-haired, yellow-eyed woman holding several other cloths and wearing the mildly exasperated expression of someone indulging their spouse about something they didn''t think was necessary.


    "Hey!" I called as I walked ahead of the cart. "Sorry we took a while, but we have the cart."


    Taeclas looked up with a smile. "Oh, there you are! Uh, will we be able to bring some of our vegetables along? They''re all newly planted, so they shouldn''t take up much room."


    I looked at the pots, which numbered about a dozen. About half were small pots easily held in one hand and contained a small, well-maintained leafy shrubs, which were presumably some kind of herbs or spices. The others, however, were bucket-sized pots, full of heavy dirt and holding everything from larger but still well-maintained shrubs, vines and climbing plants supported on trellises, a short and squat sapling-like tree with small flower buds, and what looked like a stump from which grew long pointy leaves so thickly clustered together they looked like solid branches.


    "We can probably bring the small ones," I said, "but bigger ones¡­ well, they''d need to be secured on the outside of the ship, and I''m not sure how well they''d survive the trip." The rest of their belongings we''d be able to carry, even the table, though they''d probably need to be placed carefully.


    The two women were making mildly nauseous faces. "Does it really need to be a ship¡­?" Taeclas said.


    In hindsight, I should have realized that most of the people who''d come here to the new continent probably remembered only unpleasant experiences with ships. Being enclosed in a mostly dark hold, the nauseating swaying that never ceased, the smell from all the people crammed together, only rarely being allowed up on the deck for fresh and a chance to stretch one''s legs, shivering in cold from the bi-weekly washings to get rid of any iridescence growth, the lack of privacy, the occasional incidents of vomiting when someone couldn''t get using to the swaying¡­


    Months ago, it had taken me some time to realize the reason for the reticence the men seemed to have when we''d first been learning how to operate the Coldhold. I wasn''t sure if it explained why all the salt boats we''ve been seeing have all been open-topped affairs though. That was probably as much the cost of all the wood that went into it, but most people were probably disincentivized to be on a boat large enough that it had an enclosed lower deck.


    I''d already reassured the two women about this before, but I repeated it again to assuage their discomfort. "Don''t worry, our ship is completely different. It won''t be anything as crowded as the ocean-crossing ships, and you can go up and walk around as much as you want."


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    "Well, that would be nice¡­" Taeclas said. "But Rybelle was really sick on the ship¡­


    "Walking around helps with that," I assured them. "I''ve heard it helps to look at the horizon as you get used to the ship, but since we weren''t allowed up often, we couldn''t do that on the ocean ships. And unlike the ships, if you''re feeling really bad we can slow down and let you walk on land for a bit."


    It was that last that had made them agree they were willing to risk the ship again when I had been recruiting them, and it seemed to work again now. Hopefully they''d come to realize that not all ships were terrible, claustrophobic boxes of suffering.


    ¡­


    It''s only just occurred to me that Lori actually liked being in the small room in the front of the ship, which admittedly still smelled a little ripe since¡­ well, Lori slept there when she had to go to River''s Fork and stay overnight. I had to wonder what she''d gone through when she''d traveled on the ship she''d been on.


    With everyone''s help, we were able to quickly pack up all of Taeclas and Rybelle''s things onto the cart, securing the potted plants with some rope that Lerri unwound from the cart''s rails. Taeclas and her wife made one last round of goodbyes as some of the older and burlier men crowding me and informed me that the two women were good people, implicitly threatening me with dire consequences if anything happened to them.


    I chose to take that in the spirit in which it was intended, which was their friends were concerned about the two women and wished them well. I even managed to be a good sport about how many of the men, some my age with surly expressions when the two women weren''t looking, ''volunteered'' to accompany us to the ship. It seems like they thought our ship was in the rickets, and were concerned someone would try to go after the contents of the cart.


    After some internal debate about whether I should try to dissuade them, I simply shrugged and left the matter alone. Why not let them have some more time with people they knew?


    Also, I suspected that some of the men talking to me were part of the local neighborhood gang. Best not to get on their bad side, they might remember my face next time I came by.


    It was actually a bit of a mixed blessing, since with so many men to help push the two women were able sit on the cart and rest their feet after the day''s hurrying about and trying to get everything packed. Thankfully, Lerri and the others knew how to handle guiding the cart while having such enthusiastic but amateur help, and so they kept everyone in good order as I led the way to Lidzuga''s house.


    Of course, having so many people with us tended to crowd the street, which slowed us a little as we traveled. We also seemed to pass by several groups of men who didn''t seem to be at work despite it still being early in the afternoon, many with rather surly expressions. Thankfully, no one barred our way, though I half-expected to see a gang waiting in front of us and things degenerating into a street brawl.


    "There you are!" Lidzuga called out as we came close. The pile of belongings he had with him was much smaller than Taeclas and Rybelle''s, which rested on half of the bench in front of the boarding house. Unlike the two women, the siblings had rather large and well-maintained leather packs, as well as a large leather sack. Judging from the dimpling on the sack''s surface, it was beast leather. They had probably been chosen for the ease a Deadspeaker could repair them. Most people would have used canvas, since they could be sewn in the event of tears, and could be darned if negligent washing had allowed the Iridescence to grow enough to wear out the threads. "Did something happen?"


    I shook my head. "No, we just had to get a cart to carry everything. Ah, Lidzuga, this is Deadspeaker Taeclas and her wife Rybelle. They''ve also consented to accept our invitation."


    "Tah!" Taeclas greeted enthusiastically.


    "Tah," Lidzuga replied, just as cheerfully. "Kuw''s inside in the shade. She said it was too hot to wait out here. Let me help you put everything on the cart and then I''ll go get her."


    It was a good thing I was a trustworthy soul. Putting all your worldly possessions on a cart and then stepping away from it to go somewhere out of sight was a very good way to lose said possessions.


    That was probably why Kutago came out running, her gaze sweeping from one end of the street to the other before they fell on me as I leaned on the cart. Relief mixed with the scowl on her face as her brother came up behind her.


    "See?" Lidzuga said, the wooden case he had slung over his shoulder and across his chest thumping against his side. "They''re still there. You didn''t have to hurry."


    Kutago gave her sibling a withering look. "Well, you still shouldn''t have taken your eyes off everything we own," she said, clearly annoyed.


    "What was I supposed to do, shout? Besides, you were napping."


    I coughed to get their attention. "Um, it would be best if we can get to where we''re going while there''s still daylight so we have light while we pack everything up. Perhaps you can have this discussion on the way?"


    Kutago gave me another annoyed look, but stomped towards the cart and hauled herself up to sit on the opposite end of the cart from Taeclas and Rybelle, her head turned so she could look over the packs and sack. They''d been put at the front of the pile of luggage, and Taeclas had carefully put them were they wouldn''t roll onto the little pots of herbs.


    Taeclas immediately engaged the younger woman in conversation, starting from the ever popular ''what''s your name'' and asking what she did.


    As the wary young woman cautiously answered, I started leading the way to the docks again as the cart was pushed into motion, Lerri and his friends following after me. Lidzuga fell into step beside me, the wooden case still over his shoulder. "I apologize for my sister," he said softly. "She means well, but¡ª"


    I waved him off. "Don''t worry, I understand. I have a sister too. Hopefully she''ll think better of me once she sees this isn''t all an elaborate way of parting you from everything you own and leaving you both homeless."


    "Well¡­ give her a few days to get used to our new home," he said.


    I nodded, and we lapsed in a companionable silence as we walked.


    Behind us, Kutago''s replies slowly became less monosyllabic and reticent as Taeclas and Rybelle coaxed her with their gentle cheer.

 363 - Settling In The New Recruits

    It was almost late afternoon by the time we reached the docks, mostly because the might-be-a-gang with us all kept insisting we were going the wrong way, until I made it clear that, no, we were NOT going to the rickets.


    When we reached the docks, Yhoe almost didn''t let us through because¡­ well, having what looked like a gang coming to his docks probably had him very concerned given incident with the fiery warehouse and the stolen ship. Fortunately, Taeclas was able to get most of them to wait outside, with only two of them accompanying up to help push the cart¡ªwith the women still sitting on it, because why not¡ªthe rest of the way. We got curious looks from the new arrivals standing around outside of the warehouse where they were staying as we moved towards the end of the dock where the Coldhold was, I was glad to see, docked.


    "That''s your boat?" Kutago said incredulously as we stopped in front of it.


    "Yes? What, were you expecting one of those little toy boats?" I said, gesturing to where some of the salt boats were already coming in.


    "Yes, actually," Lidzuga said. "I mean, the only other kind of boat I''ve heard of was a story about someone making a boat out of ice and wood and coming to the demesne last winter."


    "Ah. Well, may I direct you attention to this little gap in the wood here, and the transparent solid material visible through it?"


    Attention was directed towards the little gap of wood, and the transparent solid material visible through it.


    "This is the ice boat?" one of them men who''d helped push the cart said incredulously. "I thought it would be more¡­ ice."


    "To be honest, I did too when we started building it," I admitted, "but ice chips very easily, so we''ve put as much wood as we can in front of the ice. More ice had been visible back when we visited last winter, so the Coldhold was more obviously an ice boat back then."


    "I have so many questions," Lidzuga said.


    "Then we''ll have something to talk about on the way back home," I said. "For now, why don''t I show the four of you the hold down below where we''ll likely to be sleeping. If you don''t think you could endure it and want to back out¡­ well, I really wish you wouldn''t but if you did, now would be the best time to find out when we can still take you back home." I waved towards the hatch leading down. "If you''ll please follow me, you can look over what we have to work with and we can work out who sleeps where."


    Lidzuga practically ran to join me, only slowing down as several people, his sister included, yelled at him to not run. Said sister was right behind him, her pace more sedate but only because she was clearly restraining her pace. For all her objections previously, she seemed as eager as her brother for the chance to inspect the Coldhold.


    Fortunately, the controls for the steam jet driver bound tool was covered with a big pile of bedding when I climbed down ahead of the two siblings, the bead that powered it hidden in the front room with the spares and other bags of beads. The wisplights Lori had made were nowhere in sight, though I manged to make out their outlines under the bedding. Enough light came in through the hatch and gaps between the planks for us to see as I gave the four an abbreviated tour of the lower deck, which was more crowded than usual with all the cargo we already had, and would become more crowded still when Ravia came with the last of our order tomorrow. However, the lower deck had deliberately been made to be spacious, both for holding cargo and carrying people, though this would only be the second time when it would do both.


    "And this is where we sleep," I finished, gesturing towards all the beds folded against the walls. "It''s¡­ well, honestly, it''s sleeping on a wooden board, so you''ll need a bedroll to be really comfortable, but beyond that it''s not bad. Though if you''re like me and tend to move around in your sleep, I''d suggest joining me on the floor. It''s a bit dusty, but there''s room to spread out." I glanced at the three women, then coughed. "Um, if you''re concerned about privacy, I''d offer the use of the front room once we''re underway. We''re only using it for storage for now. However, it''s¡­ well, it''s an enclosed room and¡ª"


    "No."


    "No."


    "No, but thank you for the offer!"


    I nodded. "Well, I''m sure we can come to some arrangement. Perhaps you could sleep along one wall with Lidzuga and I on the floor in front of you or something." I hesitated. "That is, if you''re still willing to come with us?"


    Glances were exchanged between sibling and sibling, and wife and wife.


    "It doesn''t smell," Rybelle said eventually, then seemed to realize the words that had come out of her mouth. "I''m sorry, I didn''t mean it like that."


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    I laughed and waved it off. "Don''t worry, you''re being too kind. I know it smells like sweaty boatmen." A thought occurred to me. "Ah, before you make a final decision, perhaps I should show you the latrine arrangements."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After a very long pause, an examination of the small privacy doors that Lori had insisted on and which we generally didn''t bother with, and the four looking at lines of sight, the four of them declared the latrine arrangements usable and they were still willing to come with us. With that final approval, we started moving everyone''s belongings onto the ship.


    The sibling''s things were easy enough, as we were able to just put them in with our own packs, after informing them of why we couldn''t put anything on top of the darkness-covered containers. The two women''s things were a bit harder to put away, especially since they were irregularly shaped, but Rybelle had apparently packed them very well, and we still had sufficient space without having to be really creative with stacking. It was very likely everything would have to be rearranged tomorrow, when we received the rest of the items Ravia would be delivering, but for tonight we should be able to sleep well enough.


    Speaking of sleeping, though¡­


    "Well, I don''t mind¡­" I said as Taeclas and Rybelle declared their intention to sleep at the Coldhold. "But I thought you''d be sleeping in your house one last time tonight?"


    "That was when I didn''t realize how nice the boat we''d be sleeping on was," Taeclas said. She''d taken to the Coldhold faster than her wife and had been eyeing the higher folding beds in the way of someone who wanted to try them out. "Besides, we''d have to do it anyway, and since you say we''re not leaving until tomorrow, tonight''s a good time to get used to sleeping here when we''re not moving in the water."


    "Ah. I regret suggesting you leave your bedding at your house, then. Do you need someone to go with you to get it?"


    Taelcas waved me off. "Oh, don''t worry, the boys will keep me company and help my bring it back here," she said. "We should be back soon now that I know the way."


    "Well, if you''re sure. We should have something to eat ready for you when you get back," I said. "And if we don''t because people were too hungry to save you any, we''ll buy you something."


    "Ah! I''ll look forward to it, then!"


    As Rybelle watched her wife go back to retrieve their bedding with the gang they were friends with¡ªand possibly other things left behind, because there always were¡ªI went with Multaw and Liggs to buy us all dinner, with Lerri, Aran, and Malbin coming with us to take the cart away. As promised, I bought them dinner from a nearby street stall¡ªa leaf-lined bag full of meat and chlyp skewers, which they assured me was more than sufficient¡ªbefore sending them off to take the cart back to the merchant house.


    We were laden with food when we went back to the docks. One bag went to the dockworkers, who were very grateful for the food, though after that we had to dance around the new arrivals who thought we were handing out food for free. I was inclined to buy something for them as well, but there was a limit to what I could explain away to Lori as reasonable expenses. As much as I wanted to¡­ in the end, these weren¡¯t really my beads I was spending, they were Lorian¡¯s, and ultimately Lori¡¯s. She just trusted me to use them wisely.


    I wasn''t going to betray that trust, despite all that I''d used up so far, which were absolutely necessary expenses. Unless we were planning to recruit those people, however, feeding them would fall under Lori''s definitions of ''a waste of resources''. That way lies Lori ultimately sinking me into the ground to asphyxiate surrounded by solid rock if she thought I''d overstepped. She probably wouldn''t kill me, but it would be highly unpleasant, and she would be less likely to trust me in the future, which would make doing my job as her lord harder.


    The food was greeted with enthusiasm, and everyone was soon eating as we enjoyed the slowly waning light of the coming dusk. The salt boats were coming in, and the three newcomers took the opportunity to watch, having never really seen them before.


    "They''re all very low, aren''t they," Lidzuga noted. "Probably very stable when they''re mostly empty, but it''s probably unstable the more people there are on them who are moving around."


    "They''d probably turn over if they had three people all on one side," Kutago agreed, making Rybelle look down worriedly. Fortunately, the other woman noticed. "Oh, don''t worry. Those floats on either side of us are probably meant to prevent exactly that. Some of the salt boats have them too, see?"


    While they were occupied, I took the opportunity to head down to the front room, taking the wisplights and stashing them there. While we''d have to reveal Lori''s rudimentary bound tools to them, I''d prefer not to do so while it was still physically possible for word to get out to the rest of the demesne. It was probably too late if the Dungeon Binder paid any sort of attention to us, but¡­ well, you could say that about a lot of things, and I knew Lori couldn''t really pay attention to everything in her demesne. Given how much bigger Covehold Demesne was, its Dungeon Binder probably had proportionately more things clamoring for their attention.


    This meant that we wouldn''t have a little breeze to help circulate the air, but it would only be for one night.


    I unfolded one of the beds along the wall, took my rock out of my belt pouch and set it down on the board to give the now-dark confines of the lower deck light before I grabbed my walking stick and headed back up. At the mouth of the bay, the light houses were lighting up, as was the dockmaster''s office. Light was also starting to shine from the warehouse where the new arrivals were staying, no doubt from the Whisperers among them.


    "Multaw, Liggs, would the two of you come with me?" I called to the two. "I''m going to wait at the dockmaster''s office for Taeclas, they might not let her back into the docks if they don''t recognize her. Wouldn''t want her to not be able to get back here and be stuck outside all night, after all."


    After all, Taeclas was technically one of mine now. I had to look after her.

 364 - Good Night, Everyone

    I was right to worry about Taeclas not being allowed back into the dock. When I arrived, she was in the middle of trying to explain to Plet the night dockmaster that she should be allowed back in. She probably would have if it weren''t for her gang friends looming behind her, but as a result Plet and the dockhands were wary.


    "Taeclas, there you are!" I called out cheerfully to break the growing tension. "We were wondering what was taking you so long."


    "Tah, Rian!" she called out. In her arms was yet another bundle, which was probably the bedding that had been left behind. "We were coming back, but they wouldn''t let us through."


    "It''s all right, Plet," I called, "Taeclas is with me. You can let her through."


    The night dockmaster gave me an annoyed look, which I tried to look sufficiently apologetic about. "If she''s with you, then she can come through," he said, "but only her."


    I nodded, and was glad no one on the gang interrupted with something like ''you think you can keep us out'' or anything like that. "Taeclas, do you need any other help from your friends here?" I asked, which was the most polite way I could phrase ''can you ask your gang friends to leave now''.


    Thankfully, she shook her head, turning to one of the men nearby with a smile. "Ah, I''ll be fine now, Malon. You and the boys can go home now, Rian and his boys can help me with anything else I need."


    I kept my back straight and kept my smile from becoming sickly as Malon and the rest of his gang gave me threatening looks. All right, I might have leaned on my cane a little, but that was simply to get some weight off my feet! Behind me, I heard Multaw and Liggs shift, and didn''t look back at them. "Don''t take it personally, men," I said as quietly as I could while still reasonably sure they could still hear. "They''re just concerned for Taeclas."


    I think that got them to relax a little as Malon turned to Taeclas and said something to her in a low voice, to which the Deadspeaker smiled and patted him on the arm and said something I hoped was along the lines of ''stop threatening Rian''. I kept myself from visibly breathing a sigh of relief as the man reluctantly nodded and gestured to the men around Taeclas.


    They went from being a threatening gang to saying reluctant goodbyes. Taeclas hugged some of them, someone else holding the bundle for her, and I heard phrases like ''take care of your mother'' and ''don''t stay up to late'' and ''don''t visit the bellgirls so much, I won''t be around to help you if you catch anything''.


    Plet and his dockhands relaxed a little as the goodbyes progressed. At one point, I stepped forward to take the bundle off the hands of the one holding it, which got me looks and muttered promises of terrible consequences if anything happened to the Deadspeaker and her wife. I¡­ suppose it spoke well of Taeclas'' ability to get along with people that they would hold her in such high regard. Maybe she''d actually be able to make friends with Lori.


    ¡­


    Well, I wouldn''t bet on it, but it could happen.


    I stood patiently as Taeclas waved goodbye to the departing gang. No point making her hurry. The bundle wasn''t all that heavy once I got a good grip on it, and even though it was getting dark, it wasn''t like we''d have any problem seeing where we were going.


    "They''re such nice fellows," Taeclas said fondly as she finally lowered her arm. Why was she talking like an aged aunt?


    "A lot of those ''boys'' are older than you are, and you''re not that much older than me," I pointed out.


    The Deadspeaker chuckled. "Yes, well, when you''ve had to deal with as many sores on bell-clappers for them as I have, you can''t help thinking of them as little boys."


    "As someone who''s not a Deadspeaker or doctor, I''ll take your word for it," I said. "Shall we get going?"


    We walked through the docks, the people taking their ease and enjoying the night breeze outside of the warehouse watching us pass. Taeclas waved to them cheerfully, and they raised their hands hesitantly, but thankfully she didn''t deviate from our course. Ahead of us, the Coldhold was a dark shape, though light was shining out from the hatch and through the ice visible between the planks.


    Taeclas frowned when she saw that, then visibly counted the people who visible on the upper deck. Cyuw and Cottsy were napping, while Yhorj sat where he could watch the occupied warehouse and Hans was talking to Lidzuga, while Kutago and Rybelle listened nearby. "Did someone leave a lamp burning unattended, Rian? That''s really dangerous."


    Why was a woman not that much older than me trying to mother me? "Don''t worry, that''s not a fire hazard you''re seeing, just a little something our Dungeon Binder gave us for light. Follow me and I''ll show you."


    Once the bundle of bedding was carefully carried onto the ship¡ªafter bringing it this far, it would be tragic if it just fell into the cove water at the last stretch¡ªand then taken down the hatch to join the rest of the bedding, I brought up the rock with the binding of lightwisps anchored to it to show to our new recruits.


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    Then I had to disabuse them of the notion that one of us was a Whisperer.


    "No, no, I didn''t do this, our Dungeon Binder did," I explained as the rock was carefully passed around, lest it fall into the water. I did not want to have to dive down¡ªwith my eyes open¡ªto get it back out.


    "How long has this been imbued?" Lidzuga asked.


    "Uh, two or three seasons now? Maybe more, I''ve forgotten when I got it," I said.


    Lidzuga and Taeclas both stared at me incredulously.


    "I''m going to presume it hasn''t all been one large imbuement and this has been intermittently imbued since then," Lidzuga said.


    "You presume correctly," I said. "It''s really useful for light on the ship. While we don''t sway too much, some sort of flame is still dangerous, so¡­" I gestured at the rock that Rybelle was currently holding.


    "Still¡­" Taeclass said, "when was the last time this as imbued?"


    I shrugged. "I have no idea. I''m pretty sure their Bindership imbues it at the same time that they imbue the ice in the hull."


    The two wizards blinked and stared at me again.


    Another shrug. "Don''t ask me. I''m not a wizard, much less a Dungeon Binder. I don''t know what secret methods they use to do it, only that it works since after two weeks away from home, the light is still imbued and the ice hasn''t started melting yet."


    The four of them stared down at the deck, and presumably towards the ice in the hull.


    "Please don''t change your minds now, I swear we have yet to have an accident caused by our Dungeon Binder forgetting to imbue the ice in the hull," I said.


    I immediately realized that was a terrible thing to say, even if it was true.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After listening to the testimony of the other men on the ship¡ªCyuw and Cottsy were allowed to keep napping as they were on watch tonight¡ªI breathed a sigh of relief as our new recruits to decided they weren''t in any immediate danger from the ship suddenly sinking, and so weren''t going to change their minds about joining our demesne.


    "You should have told us," Kutago said accusingly.


    "I''m not exactly in the habit of revealing our ice boat construction methodologies to just anyone," I said, "Especially since I''m not a wizard and don''t really know what they are. Our Dungeon Binder did everything involved with the ice. And it''s not really something I think of as a concern! It''s just how our ship is built. Hasn''t failed us yet."


    "Still¡­ to be able to imbue these from so far away," Lidzuga said, a thoughtful look on his face. "I''ve never heard of anything like it."


    "But didn''t Rian just tell us?" Taeclas said innocently. "Or weren''t you listening when he explained that his Dungeon Binder could imbue the boat from their demesne?"


    "No, I was listening, I meant¡­" He cut off at the woman''s grin. "All right, I set myself up for that one. But still, I''m curious how they''re doing this."


    I shrugged. "You could ask them?" They will anyway.


    The discussion tapered off as I excused myself to buy dinner for Taeclas. Fortunately, the stall was still open, and I bought enough for her, and then a little bit more for anyone else who might like one more bite to eat before going to sleep. I know I certainly wanted to eat a bit more. It was the smells. As good as the bread, stew and fruits we''ve been eating in Lorian have been¡­ well, getting to eat something else was an experience we were all indulging in.


    Perhaps I should try to talk Lori to hold another holiday when we got back home. All these skewers were nice and all, but having huge chunks of roast meat¡­


    No, no, I was going to go to sleep soon, I shouldn''t fill myself up!


    Taeclas was given first pick of the food so she could have dinner and everyone else got one more skewer at most. Those of our new recruits who weren''t eating seemed to be enjoying the breeze that was slowly rising from the ocean, which was cool and constant. I had the large hatch down to the hold opened up to help cool the lower decks since we were all up above.


    "Is it always this breezy?" Kutago said, facing the wind with her eyes closed, her hair fluttering behind her.


    "Every night so far," I said as I sat back on one of the benches of the cabin, a skewer in my hand.


    "Lidz, we lived too far inland," she declared. "Why didn''t we live closer to the water?"


    "Because we could afford the rent there?"


    Kutago let out a frustrated sigh. "Oh, right."


    Everyone talked as we waited for our stomachs to settle. While I already knew where Lidzuga and Taeclas had worked from those who had referred me to them, I hadn''t known that Rybelle had also been working at a greengrocer''s on top of being a weaver, where they had also sold some of the excess vegetables that she and her wife had been growing. Kutago, I learned, had been working at a papermaker''s, which was where Lidzuga had bought all the paper he''d brought with him.


    "Wait¡­ you brought paper?" I said.


    "Well, of course. I need it for notes and sketches."


    "I can probably guess the answer, but¡­ did you box it in glass?"


    "I don''t have that much in my savings. If the gets damaged by Iridescence I''ll make do, or Kuw could try to remake the paper."


    "Brother, I keep telling you, it''s not that simple to remake paper!"


    I coughed. "Um, if you could bundle up the paper, we could put it in the darkwisp boxes to try and keep the Iridescence from getting to it. It seemed to work on the skins and furs we brought here from our demesne. Actually, if you have anything that might be too delicate to be washed, we can try to find some room in the darkwisp boxes for you¡­"


    Getting ready to sleep was delayed as Lidzuga''s supply of paper and some books that Kutago and Rybelle had in their packs were extracted and moved into the darkwisp boxes. I only saw Lidzuga''s books as he drew them out. One was a book on beast anatomy, which seemed to contain several sketches, while two were notebooks that Lidzuga seemed to be keeping. The other books, I didn''t get to see as Rybelle and Kutago both took pains to keep them wrapped up, but that in itself was a good indicator of what kind of books they were.


    We prepared to go to sleep soon after, laying out our bedrolls for what would hopefully be our last night sleeping in Covehold Demesne. After a brief discussion, the women were given first pick of the folding beds, and they claimed the ones along one wall. Lidzuga unrolled his bedroll on the floor in front of them, basically sleeping right next to his sister, who was sleeping on the lowest folding bed. Once they were set, the rest of us started setting up our own bedrolls. I unrolled my bedroll in front of the door to the front room out of habit, which put me next to Lidzuga as the other men flipped down the remaining beds. A couple unrolled their bedroll where they felt they could feel a breeze coming down from the open hatch now that the large hatch had been lowered and locked back into place.


    "Good night, everyone," I said as I flipped over the rock Lori gave me to lessen the light it emanated.


    There were mutters and murmurs of acknowledgement as I closed my eyes to go to sleep.


    It was an uneventful night''s sleep.

 365 - Settling Accounts

    I woke up to someone falling on top of me. The feeling of a face slamming into my chest was immediately identifiable, even with my clothes in the way. A nose against your sternum was a distinctive feeling, though I had less experienced with confused mumbling.


    "Kuw, stop kicking me," Lidzuga said sleepily in the annoyed but resigned tones of someone who''s had this happen to him before.


    Then Lidzuga, Kutago and I had let out pained cries as Taeclas had rolled out of her bunk and fallen on top of all three of us. Poor Lidzuga had barely escaped a knee to the clapper and clapper weights.


    It was a novel way of waking up. I hope not to repeat it ever again. Or if I had to, hopefully not any time soon.


    The commotion and exchange of embarrassed apologies was enough to wake up everyone else, and we had an early start to our day as Taeclas and Lidzuga did their first official bit of Deadspeaking and checked for serious injury, and then dealt with the aches and pains involved. They were¡­ well, it was clear how much slower they worked compared to Shana. Oh, I''d been checked over and treated for injuries by Deadspeakers before¡ªa lumberyard could be a dangerous place¡ªbut I''d gotten used to how quickly Shana did it. Just a touch, a strange squirming sensation around the injury or ailment, and then a few heartbeats later she was done.


    "Where does it hurt?" Lidzuga asked as he fell into the same breathing rhythm Lori used to before she''d become a Dungeon Binder, and still sometimes did when she needed to calm herself. As far as I understood, it was how they drew in magic from the air, building up a reserve of it that they used to imbue their magic.


    "Just here, mostly," I said, gesturing at the center of my chest where Kutago had fallen face-first. The sudden impact still stung, especially where her nose had hit. There was also a pain in my thigh from where Taeclas had landed when she''d fallen, but as magic required direct skin contact¡­ no. Off to the side, Taeclas was healing herself before she started on Kutago, which from the outside simply looked like she was sitting down and taking deep breaths. It made sense, I suppose. Just like Lori had special control over her internal wisps, Taeclas probably had special control of the life inside her body. There was no need to touch the injured areas, because she was already aware of what those areas were.


    "All right, let''s begin," Lidzuga said. "I''m going to touch you now. Tell me when my hand is on the afflicted area."


    I nodded as he reached for my chest, pressing his palm against the sore flesh. Another difference from Shanalorre. She didn''t need direct contact with the afflicted area, even outside of her demesne. Sometimes she did it, but it seemed to be more for assessing the affected area than because she needed to use her meaning on it directly. Or perhaps Lidzuga''s method was simply the most efficient? After all, they didn''t have the infinite supply of magic Shana had because of her core. There was time for me to contemplate these thoughts and more as Lidzuga did whatever Deadspeaking he was doing to my chest.


    We all washed our faces with some of the distilled water to get the feeling of sweat and oil off it. Since we were leaving today, there was no point in heading out to bathe only to come back. We''d have a proper wash once we were underway.


    After washing my face, I went out to buy breakfast for the last time, Hans and Yhorj accompanying me to help carry the food. There were no street vendors of skewered meat yet, but some walking led us to a bakery. Picking out some fresh bread¡ªthe thick, leavened kind¡ªand meat buns, the three of us hefted the paper bags they''d been stuffed in, keeping the paper pinched shut in a silly and futile attempt to keep the warmth and freshness in. And also the smell, which was less futile and only slightly less silly, because if I had to keep smelling the bread all the way back to the docks, it would not reach its destination intact.


    ¡­


    No, no eating before everyone else. That was the behavior of a bad leader!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once we''d eaten, I went back to the dockmaster''s office, where I settled our account with some of the last of our beads. The parting was amiable, with Yhoe telling me how glad he was that the crew wasn''t rowdy or caused trouble.


    Either the people keeping watch at night weren''t properly paying attention or they hadn''t bothered to tell me something.


    The other dockhands in the office¡ªtechnically not taking their ease, but rather being a presence in case another gang tried to force themselves into the dock again¡ªalso said their farewells regretfully, though they would probably be missing the added food they were getting at night than our presence, but that was fine.


    Then it was time to wait for Ravia to arrive.


    "So we''ll be leaving as soon as this merchant arrives and everything has been loaded onto the boat?" Taeclas said as we all sat around in the upper deck and tried to find a place where the morning sun didn''t shine directly on us.


    "Ship," I corrected. "And yes. He isn''t bringing much, so we hopefully we''ll be able to leave much earlier. Late morning, if we''re lucky."


    "Oh¡­"


    If the tone wasn''t obvious, the way she slumped slightly was a definite indicator. "Why? Was there an errand you wanted to do before we left?"


    "Ah, I was hoping to say goodbye to everyone again, and apologize for not being able to find another Deadspeaker to take my place," Taeclas said.


    "Take your place?"


    "Yes," Rybelle said as she put an arm around her wife''s shoulders. "Taeclas took care of some people in our neighborhood who occasionally needed some Deadspeaking to help them with some aches and pains. Master Dormed, for instance, had sweet sickness, so Taeclas helped him deal with the sweetness in his blood."


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    "They said it was all right if we leave, but I wish I was able to find someone to help take care of them," Taeclas said. "Konfa said she''d stop by, but she has her own job¡­"


    "I wish you''d told me sooner," I said. "We went to speak to a lot of different Deadspeakers in the last few days. Even if they weren''t willing to move to a different demesne, they might have been willing to move to your neighborhood just to have their own room, especially the ones who live with their family."


    "Why doesn''t Taeclas go to the warehouse and ask if there are any Deadspeakers who want to live in her old neightborhood?"


    I blinked, then turned towards Yhorj, who''d been sitting nearby. "What did you say?" I said.


    Yhorj pointed at the warehouse. "Well, the ship came with new people, didn''t it? Maybe they have Deadspeakers there who might be able to live in Wiz Taeclas'' old neightborhood?"


    ¡­


    Well, this was embarrassing. While I had dismissed the thought of recruiting any of those people for Lorian, Yhorj was right.


    I turned towards Taeclas. "What he said? It''s worth checking."


    "That''s a great idea!" Taeclas exclaimed with a wide smile, getting to her feet. "I''ll go ask them!"


    The only reason she didn''t run excitedly was because she was still getting used to the way the boat shifted underfoot, as well as all the people taking their ease between her and the ramp.


    "Multaw, Liggs, go with her," I said. "It''s not I don''t trust those probably very nice people, but¡­ well, accidents happen."


    "Right, L¡ªRian," Multaw said.


    "We''ll make sure no one steals her belt pouch," Liggs said.


    Lidzuga stood up. "I''ll go with them too. Any Deadspeakers or carpenters there would probably appreciate knowing where they could try applying for a job."


    Kutago sighed and rose to follow her brother. "Maybe there will be a papermaker there," she muttered as if trying to justify herself. "Master Manira will probably appreciate not having to look¡­"


    The five of them headed for the warehouse, Taeclas in the lead.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They still weren''t back by the time Ravia arrived with the cart containing the last of the goods I''d asked him to acquire. Most were plant seedlings in long trough-like wooden planter boxes. The seedlings had needed to be matured enough to be able to survive passing through Iridescence, which was why they had taken so long. There was also the two barrels, a big one and a smaller one, of sweet-tasting booze made from honey, which I''d heard about and put in a last order with Ravia. I was sure that Lorian and River''s Fork would appreciate us bringing the drink back with us, even if the barrels would probably be emptied the same day it was opened. The day after at the latest.


    I listened to Ravia giving me instructions about how to care for the seedlings while we were traveling. They shouldn''t be washed normally, and instead any Iridescence should be wiped off with a soaking wet rag. Normally, having the seedlings out in the Iridescence for a day wouldn''t matter. However, they also had experience with taking care of the plants when they were out in the colors long enough to gain a coating of crystals.


    "Don''t wash them by just splashing them with water," Ravia said. "Use this instead."


    He handed me what looked like a perfectly ordinary wooden ladle that seemed a bit on the small side. At a second glance, however, the bottom of the ladle was covered with small holes. "Ah. We should let water spray down on them from this?"


    Ravia nodded. "It will be gentler for the seedlings. The planter troughs have holes in the bottom to let water drain, so you can rinse the seedling with this. Just quickly pass the spray over the seedling twice and don''t linger. This will also help water the seedlings. Do''t do it too much, or else the seedlings will become waterlogged and might die or develop root rot."


    "Don''t lose the ladle, understood," I said. Inside, I was sighing in relief. I hadn''t thought of what sort of care Taeclas'' plants would need, much less our own. If Ravia hadn''t told me this, the seedlings we''d brought might have died on the way home, and it would have been wasted effort and money.


    Huh, this meant we might have to make special arrangements when washing Taeclas'' plants. At least we had several cloths that soaked up water well. We used it to gather up the water when we washed the inside of the ship so we could toss it over the side. Not all the water had to pass through the evaporator, after all.


    ¡­


    And I just realized we hadn''t bothered to cover up the evaporator bound tool. Well, if Ravia asks, I can just say it was directly powered by Lori.


    "And that''s everything, Rian," Ravia said as the last of the cargo was moved down to the lower deck. One more sheet of paper to be added to the folder was in his hands. I read it over, especially the sums, noting the advances of beads I''d asked for, and comparing it to the papers in the folder. My thumb kept all the sheets weighed down, as I did not want them being caught by the wind. The sums involved added up, and I nodded in satisfaction as I accepted the final copy of the contract. I was handed a reed¡ªI supposed Ravia didn''t carry pens on deliveries¡ªand dipped it into the little bottle of ink Ravia held before signing off on two copies of the contract, indicating the sale had been completed to both parties'' satisfaction. Granted, according to the contract Emborin and Sons still owed Lorian Demesne¡ªand Lori specifically¡ªtens of thousands of bead-tani worth of beads, but there was a way around that. "And here is the preliminary contract you asked for."


    I read over this contract too. It was similar to the order I''d placed before¡ªmore mesh screens, more cloth, other things¡ªexcept we would pick it up next time we came back to Covehold. This way we could lessen the time we had to wait in Covehold by a couple of days, meaning we could go back home sooner. None of the items were perishable, so the trading house shouldn''t have any difficulty keeping them in storage for us. "Everything looks to be in order," I told Ravia once I was satisfied with the list, including the price that had been quoted. "We''ll probably have another list when we get back, but at least we''ll have these things ready to pick up then."


    "Our business is almost concluded then," Ravia said. "We only need to balance accounts. If you''ll please follow me, Rian?"


    I blinked, but trailed after him towards the cart he''d brought all the goods on. Balance accounts? Did he mean¡­?


    There was a box under a tarp on the cart. I couldn''t help but stare. It was a nice box, almost a small chest really. The wood had been planed smooth and the corners rounded in a way that I recognized denoted skillful woodworking talent. The surface looked smooth as glass, and there were tasteful wooden handles on either side. Despite the skill that the box had been made with, instead of a lock the chest had been secured with a heavily knotted rope. The knotting was so secure, in fact, that Ravia removed the rope with a knife.


    Glancing around even though there was no one near us, Ravia turned the chest towards me and opened the lid.


    Inside, nestled on a recessed wooden tray made of lightweight wood, were rows on rows of large beads. There were cloudy-white wispbeads, inky-black thinkbeads, fallbeads that were clearer than glass and seemed to glitter with stars, and cloudy gray talkbeads. The beads had all rolled slightly, probably from being shaken by the cart as it had trundled through the roads, but enough denomination markings were pointed up I could identify them.


    The tray was full of double-large beads, and though each bead was no doubt from a different demesne, according to the markings there were each worth two thousand bead-tani, the most common highest denomination of bead. As I stared, Raia picked up the tray and revealed another one underneath, and then a third. A fourth tray at the bottom didn''t contain double-large beads, but rather an array of smaller denomination beads¡­


    "What¡­?" I managed to get out.


    "As agreed upon," Ravia said, "half of the full amount that Emborin and Sons owes for our purchase of your product. Would you like to count?"

 366 - Towards Home

    I did, in fact, count.


    After a quick inspection to ensure that all the double-large beads were all marked with the same denomination, I counted numbers of columns and rows. It all added up to less than half of the amount owed us for the wispbeads, just under fifty-thousand bead-tani. We''d gone above what would have been our profits if we''d only had salt, skins and furs to trade, but that was only because I knew we could, otherwise I wouldn''t have bought so much wire, more mesh screens, bound tools¡ªeven with no beads to fuel them, they were still relatively expensive¡ªand cloth.


    Really, the bolts of cloth in the amounts I''d brought had been bought with the intent of averting a clothing crisis. Trousers were wearing out, and the children were outgrowing their clothes. It was only a matter of time before someone found their clothes too tight for them to wear and I wanted to get ahead of it. The same for the materials to repair and make shoes. All our footwear were getting a bit worn, and while we could make do with trying to make footwear from reeds, that was only good for the warmer months.


    "Thank you," I said once I confirmed the amount of beads. "This¡­ it''s not going to cause problems, is it? Having so many high-denomination beads ?"


    "I''m touched by your concern, but you need not worry," Ravia said. "There is sufficient supply, as such high-denomination beads were never used for bound tools. Each merchant house has the right to ask the Central Bead Storage for high denomination bead when making large-value transactions."


    I considered that, looking at the orderly rows of beads that had been restacked in the storage box. "Well, we shouldn''t have to repeat this next time," I said. "We''ll be bringing a smaller amount of beads."


    "That will help," Ravia said. "Still, I''m sure that matters will settle in time."


    "Provided I don''t do anything silly like lose this chest in the ocean," I said dryly.


    "Well, I didn''t want to say anything, but since you did¡­"


    The two of us exchanged a look of amused understanding.


    "The chest looks very beautiful," I said. "Very solid and well-made."


    "Thank you. Consider it a gift from us to your demesne," Ravia said.


    "A useful gift. I''ll have to remember to bring something nice for you when we come back." At least it wasn''t something too hard to match. The chest itself was simple, it was the skill that it was made with that distinguished it as being a quality product. While it seemed too well-made to have been made in the last few days, I couldn''t rule it out, though there was a good chance Emborin and Sons had a pile of these in some store room that they had touched up before giving them out. "By the way, did you manage to find a bound tool that blew out cold air?"


    "Unfortunately, one wasn''t part of the bound tools we were able to acquire," Ravia said.


    "Ah. You know, now that you have beads, it shouldn''t be too hard to have¡­ what was his name? Endlew? It shouldn''t be too hard for Whisperer Endlew to make a binding of airwisps to cool the inside of the merchant house and imbue it with the beads. Properly positioned you could keep the entire interior cool. The wispbeads used to imbue the bindings would be a sensible business expense, especially if you use it to attract more people to your business because it''s more comfortable to wait there."


    Ravia tilted his head thoughtfully, then smiled. "Hmm¡­ intriguing. I''ll suggest it."


    The merchant redid the knot with another length of rope before handing me the chest, which I had Cyuw and Cottsy very carefully carry down to the lower deck. I''d move it into the front room later. "Well, it''s been a pleasure doing business with you again, Master Ravia," I said cheerfully as I reached into my beltpouch and drew out a mican, which I handed to him. "See you again in a few weeks."


    "The pleasure was all mine," Ravia said, accepting the fruit and looking at it with a smile before he slipped it into his own belt pouch. "I look forward to our next meeting¡­ Binder Rian." The last was said in a low voice.


    It took me a moment to realize what he''d said. "Well¡­ this is awkward," I said.


    Ravia''s smile became reassuring. "You need not worry, Rian. I can assure you of our discretion on this matter."


    "Please stop, you''re making it even more awkward," I said, struggling not to laugh. "Ravia¡­ I''m not secretly our demesne''s Dungeon Binder. I''m just a lord."


    The merchant stared at me. "Ah¡­" he said. "Well, this is awkward." He tilted his head. "A lord?"


    "Believe me, if I were our Dungeon Binder, I wouldn''t be needing to ask for authorization to take up that proposal to have a boat built," I said. "The only delay would be getting a good design down on paper."


    "How very strange. The demesnes outside of Covehold don''t normally bother with lords and ladies, save for the older ones."


    "We have our reasons," I said. "Such as having someone to send out to a trading trip like this so our Dungeon Binder can stay home in case of a sudden dragon or any other emergency."


    "Ah. Yes, I suppose a lord would need to be sent if they were negotiating directly on the Dungeon Binder''s behalf."


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    "Well, there you have it. I would appreciate you not spreading the fact around, though you''ll probably be telling your family."


    "Of course. Have no fear, however, the knowledge will not spread beyond them. Though Royt will be very disappointed. He was the one who put forth the theory."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    With our business with Ravia concluded and the chest stashed in the front room, I went to collect Taeclas, Lidzuga and Kutago from the warehouse. We faced some difficulty, as they was a thick crowd of people around them.


    "Taeclas, Lidzuga, Kutago, finish up, we''re leaving soon!" I called out. They glanced towards me, and I pointed at the ship. Kutago nodded in acknowledgement, but the other two went back to their conversation, speaking more hurriedly.


    Shrugging, I headed out, Cyuw and Cottsy following after me. Hopefully Yhorj and Hans could take care of things in the boat.


    One last visit to the bakery, using some of the smaller beads from the chest that I''d taken before Ravia had tied it shut again, and we were walking back with more meat buns and bread. Hopefully the bread will still be edible at dinner time, and if not we can add it to whatever meat we cook. The meat buns will be for lunch.


    We passed the warehouse again to find Ravia there, also talking to several of the new arrivals. From the sound of it, several men were getting ready to set out, looking hopeful. Multaw and Liggs, spotting us passing by, informed the three with them, and Kutago interrupted the conversation her brother was having. While I couldn''t hear what it was, it was probably along the lines of ''come on brother, we''re going''. I also saw Taeclas start making her excuses.


    Once the meat buns had been set aside for lunch¡ªit was only just coming on late-morning¡ªand our three new recruits finally returned¡ªTaeclas was the last to arrive, looking satisfied with herself¡ªwe began unmooring the Coldhold from the dock.


    Despite myself, I turned to our four new recruits. "Last chance to change your mind," I said, ignoring the little Lori-sounding voices in my head telling me to not give them the chance. "We can still let you off. If you change your mind later¡­ well, we won''t be able to bring you back until the next time we go to Covehold to trade."


    "No, I''m going through with this," Lidzuga said excitedly. "This is what I came to the new continent for, not working some carpentry workshop. I came here to have an adventure and learn. All the beasts and bugs and fursh that haven''t been properly studied and catalogued!"


    "And I came to make sure he didn''t get himself killed having his little adventure," Kutago said. "Where he goes, I go."


    I turned to Taeclas and Rybelle, who both shook their heads.


    "We''re already here," Taeclas said. "Besides, I found some nice people who seemed interested in our old room, and a few others who might be able to find a job there. So¡­ even if we stayed, we won''t have anywhere to live and people who work faster than me working at the places that usually hire me. So¡­ uh¡­ " She trailed off, looking embarrassed.


    I nodded. "All right, then. Why don''t the four of you sit over there?" I gestured towards the cabin''s benches. "Later we''ll teach you how you can help us around the ship, but right now¡­"


    "Stay out of the way?" Kutago said dryly.


    I shrugged. "Hey, you''re getting better seats than you''d have gotten in there." I jerked my thumb at the ship further down the dock. "If you have any questions, we can talk once we''re underway and have less to focus on, all right?"


    They went off to seat themselves, and I gestured to Cottsy before I went down below. The front room was still latched shut, so I opened it and turned, kneeling down and reaching behind some bags of beads to get the large bead that we''d been using to imbue the steam jet driver. Throwing back the bedding covering it, I placed the bead into the bound tool''s receptacle. Then I took hold of the control lever and moved it into ''reverse''.


    I breathed a sigh of relief as I felt the tell-tale vibration of water turning into steam and driven through the long tube that passed through the ship. Good, the bound tool was still working. It had been my greatest fear during this trip that one day we''d try to use the driver bound tool only to find it no longer worked. Fortunately, today wasn''t that day. If Covehold Demesne''s Dungeon Binder had noticed the bound tools, they hadn''t interfered in a way that was obvious.


    After I went up, Cottsy went down to take his usual place operating the bound tool and I headed to sit with our new recruits. "Now," I said, partly to distract them, "we''ll be heading out. To keep from distracting anyone, please don''t speak too loudly while we''re maneuvering." On either side, Multaw and Liggs were taking out the oars and using them to help guide the ship away from the dock next to us. Yhorj had taken his position at the rudder and I could feel the vibration of the driver bound tool activating. "Once we reach cleaner water, we''ll stop and give everyone time to have a quick bath."


    I coughed, and deliberately lingered on the embarrassing subject as an added distraction. "Now, I''m sorry to have to ask this, but¡­ well, there''s not really a lot of privacy to be found here, so we''d best figure out what bathing arrangements we need to make¡­"


    "Ah¡­ how do you bathe here?" Taeclas asked. She didn''t seem discomfited by the subject.


    I gestured towards the outriggers and the walkway between them and the ship. "Well, to keep water from getting down into the ship and getting things wet, we usually bathe over there. Just use the buckets and dippers we have, scoop up water and wash ourselves, use soap if we''re feeling particularly filthy, and then wash again¡­"


    What followed was an embarrassing discussion¡ªat least it was for me¡ªthat I stoically bore as part of my duty as a lord to see to it the people I''m supposed to take care of are¡­ well, taken care of. It was decided that a sheet would be hung and the men would be on the outrigger on one side, and the women on the other. The discussion of how the sheet would be hung went on for long enough that Yhorj was able to back out of the docks and get the ship turned around to point at the opening out of the bay.


    It was Kutago who brought it up first. "Aren''t we moving too fast?" she said, looking around and no doubt noticing the wake we were leaving behind us.


    "Please stay seated," I said, looking ahead of us. "The water''s about to get a little rough. But yes, we are. Cottsy''s taking care of that."


    "Oh, he''s a Whisperer?" Lidzuga said. "I''ve heard some of the salt boats use Whisperers to propel them and help with collecting the salt."


    "No," I said. "He''s just operating the driver bound tool that moves the ship."


    There was a pause, and the four of them turned to stare at me as we passed through the mouth of the cove and started turning towards.


    "There''s a bound tool on this boat?" Lidzuga asked.


    "Ship," I corrected, pointing towards the salt boats. "Those are boats. Anything that''s big enough to carry one is called a ship."


    "Oh, is that what that means?"


    I nodded.


    Kutago frowned as she looked towards the lighthouse we were passing. "Wait, where are we going? I thought you said the demesne we''re going to is upriver?"


    "Oh, yes," I said. "Just not that river. The river we''re on is a little ways along the coast."


    "Huh. I didn''t know there was another river nearby," Lidzuga said.


    "Ah. Perhaps I should clarify a few things¡­" I said as we headed towards home.


    -------

 367 - Your Presence Was Missed

    As fast as Lori''s Ice Boat could move, between traveling with the current and steam jet driver mounted on it, it still took some time to get down to River''s Fork. Time Lori had to spend hot and sweating even with the binding she''d anchored to her hat to keep her head cool. This time she had also tried anchoring airwisps to the exposed ice of Lori''s Ice Boat, using them to make a binding that blew air in her general direction. It wasn''t perfect¡ªthe breeze generated tended to carry droplets of water towards her when water splashed against the side of the boat¡ªbut it was certainly cooler than her previous trips so far.


    She dreaded having to get off the boat when they reached their destination.


    "Anything?" Lori said.


    "No new injuries as of yet," Shanalorre replied from beside her, one hand keeping the reed hat on her head from flying off. "There is currently a degree of intermingling. If these arrivals have hostile intent, they haven''t shown it yet."


    That was a good indicator that this was Rian, but there was still the possibility that this was a group from the Golden Sweetwood Company, come to try and claim River''s Fork for themselves, or set up another demesne on the river. Another demesne on the river could impose tolls on their ships passing through, which would be an unacceptable imposition.


    Feeling her hands clenching into fists, Lori forced them to relax, took a deep breath, and began breathing evenly to calm herself. No, no, she shouldn''t aggravate herself over a possibility. It was much more likely this was simply Rian come back home. It was within the time they had scheduled, after all.


    Across the boat from her, Riz looked eager, something the escort of militia she''d chosen seemed to be teasing her about. At least they weren''t being loud about it. The rest of the space on the boat contained the current shipment of food for River''s Fork, frozen meat packed in ice to keep them cold. The demesne still had its own stores of grain, which had recently been checked and had been confirmed that no one had stolen from it again.


    Though if this was Rian, they''d have to recalculate the food deliveries to account for the new Deadspeaker. Well, she''d have Yllian recalculate how much more food they needed. Lori had the amounts needed per person written down somewhere on one of the notes in her room, but she had other people to handle those matters. Now that Rian was back, he could take care of it.


    They passed by an enormous beast drinking on the river bank, the Iridescence washed off around its mouth as its tongue lapped at the river water. The triple-row of knife-like spines running along its back glittered in prismatic colors as sunlight shone off them. Lori glanced at it disinterestedly, and was about to turn away when she blinked and her gaze snapped back to it. "Stop the boat!"


    Everyone stared at her, but to her credit, whatshername immediately moved the lever on the driver bound tool, deactivating the binding propelling them. Still, the boat continued to move, carried along by the river and their own momentum.


    "Turn us around! Turns us around!" Lori hissed, pointing back towards the beast she''d seen as she got up on her knees to see above the heads of her escort seated on the other side of the boat. It was undoubtedly the typhon beast that had ruined their hunting. If she could get a shot at it¡­ "No!"


    The typhon beast was turning away, somehow managing to not rub against the trees on either side of it as it stalked back into the woods. Lori was surprised she couldn''t hear its thundering footsteps. In the plays she''d watched, beasts were always accompanied by resounding, drum-like footsteps¡­ provided by the actual drums of the musicians¡­ Oh.


    Lori could only watch impotently as it walked further and further away from the river, vanishing from her sight entirely. Sighing in frustration, she dropped her posterior back down onto the floor of the boat, which made the boat rock alarmingly. "It''s gone. Get us back on our way," she ordered.


    For the rest of the trip downriver, she reviewed how to properly throw lightning and resolved to have a binding of lightningwisps ready on the way back home. Just in case¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The familiar sight of the Coldhold at the dock in River''s Fork finally allowed Lori to relax, the tense knot in her chest loosening. That meant Rian was back, right?


    Riz was up on her knees as if trying to see over the crowd of people who seemed to be unloading one of the salt barrels from the large boat. "Where is he?" she muttered.


    "Get down, will you?" whatever-her-name-was the ferrywoman said as she guided Lori''s Ice Boat closer to the dock. "You''re going to fall into the river if you keep doing that. We''re almost there, keep your bell in¡ª" For some reason the ferrywoman glanced at Shanalorre and stuttered. "¡ªI mean, just sit down already!"


    With a sigh, Riz sat back down as the rest of the escort smirked at her.


    Lori sweated impatiently as Lori''s Ice Boat moved alongside the dock and was secured. By the time she managed to get off, Yllian was there, the new reed hat he''d taken to wearing recently being used to fan his face. "Great Binder," he greeted. He nodded to Shanalorre next to Lori. "Lady Binder."


    Shanalorre nodded back.


    "Yllian," Lori acknowledged. "Anything I should know about?"


    He shook his head. "Nothing immediate, although there have been a few things. Since Lord Rian is here¡ª"


    Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    "Tell him instead," Lori confirmed. "Where is he?" Now that she was closer¡ªand standing¡ªshe couldn''t see anyone with Rian''s distinctive coloring.


    "Oh, he''s over¡­ huh. He''s gone. He was right there, Great Binder," Yllian said. "I''ll go look for him."


    "Don''t bother, I''ll call him," Lori said. She took a deep breath and channeled magic through her lungs, then up through her wind pipe. Her mouth closed, she claimed the airwisps inside it, forming them into a binding. Lori opened her mouth, barely noticing Shanalorre putting her hands over her ears. "Rian! Come here!"


    The binding of airwisps amplified the sound of her voice as the sound passed through it, making her voice resound. Next to them, Yllian flinched. It wasn''t that loud. She hadn''t even bothered to put a binding of airwisps over her ears. Still, it made the crowd of people look towards her, then those carrying the salt barrel hurriedly turn back to paying attention to it.


    There was a brief, pause, and then Rian''s head popped up from the hatch on the Coldhold''s floor. "Ah, I''d know those musical tones anywhere!" he called out cheerfully as he scrambled up the ladder. "Hello, your Bindership! You roared?" He turned his head. "Hey, Riz!" He waved.


    "Your presence¡ª" Lori paused, then deactivated the binding of airwisps. She hummed to make sure, then nodded. "Your presence was missed, yes."


    "What? I can''t hear you! Wait a moment, I''ll come to you!"


    For some reason, Yllian started coughing, his head turned to one side and a hand covering his mouth. Lori still took two steps away, nudging Shanalorre towards him. If he''d caught something, she wanted it washed before it started to crystalize. Shanalorre dutifully raised a hand and reached for Yllian''s bare elbow. "Lord Yllian, I''m to check you for any sickness. Again," she said. "Once more, the Great Binder finds your unexplained coughing concerning."


    "O-of course, Lady Binder," Yllian complied, and Shanalorre''s hand touched his bare elbow. A moment later, she lowered her hand.


    "No illnesses," Shanalorre reported as Rian finally reached them, for some reason hand-in-hand with Riz. "Lord Yllian seems to have just had some saliva go down the wrong tube."


    "Be more careful," Lori chided. "It would be inconvenient for me if anything happened to you."


    "Isn''t it wonderful to hear how much she cares about us?" Rian said, one hand theatrically rubbing at his eyes as if removing tears. The lantern he was holding in that hand swung, striking him in the mouth. "Ow. Ah, my actions had immediate consequences, I see."


    Lori rolled his eyes. Useless thespian. "Rian, report," she said. "Were you successful?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said cheerfully, imaginary tears forgotten. "All goods sold, everything on our shopping list purchased¡ªand I even got you some nice things at a low, low price¡ªand new people recruited. And they''re nice people too! I''m sure you''ll find them perfectly tolerable if you need to talk to them."


    "I don''t care about nice they are, I want to know if they''re capable," Lori said.


    "Oh, they''re very capable," Rian assured her. "Uh, although¡­"


    "What?"


    Rian coughed. "Well, they have¡­ not so much demands as things they''d like to do."


    "I''m not giving them land," Lori said flatly.


    "I''ve explained your land grant conditions to them. Uh, to be honest, Taeclas is already thinking of a plan to set up a vegetable farm."


    Lori gave him a flat look.


    "That''s the female Deadspeaker we recruited," Rian clarified. "If you give me a softened rock, I''ll write out her name and even put in a small sketch so you can tell her apart from everyone else."


    She blinked. "You can sketch?"


    "Eh, a little. It''s been years, and I''m wasn''t very good at it, but I can give it a try again." A thoughtful look came over his face. "You know, I think I''ll withdraw the promise of a sketch until I''ve had time to practice a little."


    "I''ll get you the rocks," Lori said. She frowned. "Why are you carrying around a lamp?"


    "Oh, this is one of those nice things it was able to get you at a low, low price," Rian said.


    "Why would I need a lamp?"


    "You wouldn''t, but I thought you''d enjoy having a professionally-made wisplight to examine."


    Lori''s eyes immediately snapped to the lamp, examining it more closely. She finally noticed the bead receptacle, the switch, the adjustment knob¡­ "You bought a wisplight?" Next to her, Shanalorre was also examining the bound tool, the younger Dungeon Binder''s eyes intent.


    "Actually, I bought a whole bunch of bound tools," Rian said cheerfully. "Including several carpentry tools. They were cheap because Covehold had run out low-denomination wispbeads to fuel them. Of course¡­ that was before we sold all the wispbeads there. I expect the price of bound tools has since risen as they''ve become useable again."


    Lori blinked, before gritting her teeth as she realized she had completely missed that possibility. "Good work," she complimented. "Where are they?"


    "Still in the front room. Wasn''t sure whether you''d want to unload them here or Lorian. Though I recommend letting River''s Fork have half the wisplights I brought for them to use. Then you can reconfigure the ones into something else¡­ like, say, a bound tool to move air around to keep your unfortunate, very useful lords from overheating at night and being unable to work the following day?" Rian said with a bright smile, his finger flicking between himself and Yllian.


    She gave him a flat look, then sighed. "I will consider the matter," she said. She took a deep breath. "Now¡­ about the Deadspeakers you recruited¡­"


    "Ah, right, their dema¡ªnot demands, just things they''d like to do!" Rian corrected himself hastily. "Uh, you see, one of them, L¡ªI mean, the male Deadspeaker wants to spend time sketching, recording, and studying the local plants, beasts, bugs and fursh. Which means he''ll need time¡­ you know, not working."


    Lori stared at him. "He follows the Mysteries of Alknowledge?" she said, though it was more a statement than a question.


    "Him and his sister, though I get the feeling she''s not very dedicated to it," Rian confirmed. "As your lord, I recommend letting him. Not necessarily everyday¡ªafter all, we''re feeding him on the understanding he does work that contributes to the demesne¡ªbut some kind of scheduled, regimented free time for him to do his research is a small price to pay for his skills and the work he can do. You know, like letting him take every fourth or fifth day off, or only letting him have time off once he''s done the day''s scheduled duties of something. Who knows, his research might be useful. It''s certainly a small price to pay to keep him satisfied."


    "I''ll be the judge of that."


    Rian nodded. "Yes. You will." He smiled. "Do you want to meet them now or do you want to hear how the trip went and what loot we''ve got?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. He should know the answer to that. "Report," she ordered.


    "Yllian, can you show our new people around and take them to lunch when it''s time? I need to exposit to her Bindership."


    "I''ll take care of them, Rian."


    Rian nodded. "Shall we talk about this on the ship? That way I can also show you what we brought back."


    Lori nodded back. "Acceptable. Shanalorre, come with me. Take note of the additions to the inventory."


    "Yes, Great Binder. Welcome back, Lord Rian. The Great Binder was saying how your presence was missed."


    Rian smiled. "Wishing she only had one person she needed to talk to about things?"


    Obviously. "Obviously."

 368 - Annoying Introductions, The First

    As soon as they were in the ship, Rian grabbed one of the bound tools¡ªone of those Lori had made¡ªand put a bead in its receptacle. It glowed with light, but it also started moving air.


    "Here," Rian said, handing the wisplight to Shanalorre, which started blowing her hair back from her face. "Wouldn''t want either of you to overheat and get sick."


    "Thank you, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said, holding the wisplight air jet with both hands. Lori made sure to add more imbuement to the binding of airwisps she had anchored around her own head keeping her cool.


    Rian unfolded one of the beds along the wall to act as a bench. "Why don''t the two of you sit down, I need to get the folder¡­" He opened a pack, digging around inside until he drew out a leather folder that Lori was fairly sure he hadn''t had when he left. "Ah, here we are. I''ll make this quick, we can talk about issues that need more extensive discussion later. First, the good news I''m sure you''ll like: our earnings!"


    Lori rolled her eyes. Why was she not surprised Rian focused first on a number that went up? Still, she supposed she could understand the desire to see this particular number go up. Even if she had a new demesne and home now, she had been raised in Taniar Demesne. The profits for the salt and skins were modest but still sizeable because they had sold large amounts of it. The profits for her wispbeads, however¡­


    "Only ten bead-tani each?" she said.


    Rian shrugged. "We had to sell the beads at a price that the local workshops could afford to buy as a staple, like glues or resin. I asked around, and the most common type of wisbead available were mid-large tier. Obviously the price of these had to be less than that to be more desirable. Given how many you made that were marked for selling, it''s still a pretty good profit. Most of our payment for it was in double-large beads, and it wasn''t even the complete payment. They literally didn''t have enough beads to pay us with when we sealed the deal. We had to wait a few days."


    Her lord sighed. "Look, this is an issue that will require its own extensive discussion. Can we talk about this later? Otherwise we''ll be here all day. And while you two have your own nice little breezes, I don''t and I still need to set up our new recruits with where they''re going to sleep, and whether both will be living here or if one will be going to Lorian."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Very well, carry on."


    Another sigh, though this sounded relieved. "All right. With the profits, I was able to buy¡­"


    Rian went down the list in front of him. Lori nodded in satisfaction at things like the bolts of thick cloudbloom fabric for replacement trousers and thick leather for boot soles. She still had the boots Rian had bought her last time waiting to be used, but knowing they had the materials for repairs and new shoes was its own kind of relief.


    "¡ªI also managed to buy those primers on magic you wanted¡ª"


    "Where are they?"


    "I''m not telling you right now, because if I put a book in your hands, you''ll want to read it and you won''t get anything done today without great agony in your soul. Oh, don''t look at me like that. You know I''m right. Besides, wouldn''t you rather have your book time completely uninterrupted?"


    "¡­exactly what books have you managed to acquire?" She hated it when he had a point.


    ¡°Rudimentary primers on all four variants of magic,¡± Rian said, ¡°like you asked for. I figure once you¡¯ve mastered those, we can just get more books later.¡±


    Lori frowned. ¡°Why did you waste beads on getting all four? I don¡¯t need a primer on Whispering.¡±


    ¡°In case any of the children born last winter are wizards,¡± Rian said. ¡°I doubt you¡¯d want to be their fulltime-master. This way you can delay any sort of contact with them until they at least learn to read, which we really should get started on.¡±


    ¡­


    ¡°What else did you buy?¡±


    <hr>


    Lori climbed up from inside the Coldhold mostly pleased. She was glad of the coils of wire Rian had brought, as well as the chunks of broken glass. Both would assist her in furthering her bound tool development and research. The large and small barrels of booze¡­ well, she wasn''t happy about it, but she''d given Rian permission to buy it before he''d left, so she was resigned to it being there. While the amount he''d brought back was bigger than she thought was needed, she was willing to admit that the amount she thought was needed was ''none''.


    "The seedlings aren''t all ours," Rian said as he showed them the seedlings that had been secured at the cabin of the boat, where the planks had clearly been altered by Deadspeaking to more securely cradle the little pots and troughs that contained them. Ugh,  that would need to be fixed! "Some are ones that Taeclas and her wife brought with them. They''ll probably be willing to give us some, but they''ll need to grow them first. Shouldn''t be a problem, though. She''s a Deadspeaker, after all, and it turns out she''s better with meanings connected to living plants than dead ones. Between her and Lidz, we might be able to harvest earlier and get a second harvest in before winter¡­" Rian sighed for some reason. "And don''t worry, Taeclas promised she''d put the planks back the way they were before, so please stop making that face. You said it was my ship, remember?"


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    "They''re the demesne''s planks." It was petty, but as a Dungeon Binder, her every petty whim was law!


    "Ah, there goes the last lingering feeling like I''m not home yet," Rian said, voice dry. "Well, if it helps, Taeclas and Lidzuga spent the journey helping fuse together planks to help improve the water-proofing of the deck, and they''ve done their best to do it so we can still remove the planking if necessary. So that''s already some profit from their presence." He turned and met her eyes. "And with that segue, are you ready to meet them yet? Remember, you still need to negotiate with Lidzuga about how often he can have time off to do his research."


    Lori very much wanted to have Rian take charge of dealing with them. After all, this was definitely a ''dealing with people'' matter. However¡­ they were wizards, and a possible threat to her. Even if Rian had sought out only wizards who had no intention or desire to establish their own demesnes, he had misjudged people before. At the very least, she needed to meet with them so she could identify them and try to remember what they looked like. Their features would be pointless to remember, but knowing their coloring would be useful in narrowing down who they were. "Fine," she sighed. "but I''ll deal with them one at a time."


    Rian nodded. "Understood. I''ll call Taeclas and her wife first, since she doesn''t have any difficult requests like Lidzuga." He hesitated, then continued. "I know you''d rather have both of them far away from you here in River''s Fork, but I think it would benefit us greatly if you decided to allow Taeclas to live in Lorian instead of here. From what I''ve seen, she has a lot of experience with meanings that will help with our farming, so it would be better if we put her and her wife in the demesne with more extensive fields."


    "Noted," Lori said as she sat down on the cabin''s bench that faced the rear of the boat. "Let''s make this quick, then."


    "Do you still require my presence, Great Binder?" Shanalorre asked, still holding the wisplight. Outside, the light that it emanated just faded into the hot sunlight, but the breeze from it was as strong as ever.


    Lori considered that, then nodded, pointing at a spot on the other end of the bench. "Yes. You need to be able to identify then on sight as well, as they might potentially threaten you for River''s Fork''s core."


    Rian, who''d been about to go off and retrieve the Deadspeaker he''d said he would get, immediately turned around and gave her a beseeching look. "Please tell me you at least know better than to say you''ll regard them as a potential threat to your life to their faces," he pleaded. "Lie to me if necessary!"


    She rolled her eyes at his theatrics. "Of course I know better than to say that to their face. What kind of fool do you take me for?"


    Rian looked thoughtful for a moment. "You won''t say it to their face because you don''t want to warn them that you''re ready for them."


    Lori nodded. Exactly! "Exactly!" she said.


    "Better than nothing, I guess," Rian said, sighing for some reason. "I''ll go get them."


    <hr>


    Lori glared at Rian, conveying her displeasure. This was NOT what she''d meant when she''d said she''d deal with them one at a time!


    "Taeclas, Rybelle, may I present the esteemed Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri," Rian said cheerfully as he stood between her and the more than one person opposite her. "Your Bindership, may I introduce Deadspeaker Taeclas and her wife Mistress Rybelle."


    "Hello!" one of the two women said with a wide smile, waving at Lori like she wasn''t standing two paces away. "It''s every nice to meet you,  Lo¡­ Lol¡­"


    "Call me Lori," she interrupted to avoid her name being further mutilated as she continued glaring at her lord. "Rian, an introduction is more useful when I know who is who."


    "Oh, right," Rian said, laughing like some kind of idiot. "Taeclas, could you please step forward?" The woman who''d waved at Lori stepped forward, waving again, her wide smile still in place. "Again your Bindership, this is Taeclas. She''s a Deadspeaker, with long brown hair, green eyes and the wide smile on her face."


    Lori tried her best to remember the woman in front of her, even as she tried to convey her lack of amusement at Rian''s witlessicism. Long hair of a shade of brown that reminded her of stained wood that was neither dark or pale¡­ yes, her eyes were green,  but that wasn''t a very reliable indicator, you needed to be very close to see those¡­ She wished she had her staff in her hands, just to have some kind of stick to swing¡­ but no, this was a Deadspeaker, the wood and the wire of the staff would be used against her in a confrontation. Best not to have it, lest she be tempted to get too close¡­


    "And by the process of elimination, this is Mistress Rybelle," Rian said, gesturing towards the other woman. Lori glanced at her briefly. Blue hair that came down to her chin, a nervous¡­ was that a smile? Maybe? She made a little bow, which Lori absently acknowledged with a nod.


    ¡°Thank you for letting us stay in your demesne, L¡ªer, I mean, your Bindership,¡± Taeclas¡ªeven Lori couldn¡¯t forget someone¡¯s name that quickly!¡ªsaid, letting out a laugh as she looked embarrassed. ¡°Sorry. I¡¯ve never spoken to a Dungeon Binder before. But Rian told us all about your circumstances, so it feels like I know you already!¡±


    Lori blinked, her gaze turning back to her lord. ¡°My¡­ circumstances? Rian, what exactly did you tell them?¡±


    ¡°He told us about how you¡¯re not only taking care of your own demesne, but you¡¯re also caring for the people in this one because their Dungeon Binder went to you and asked for your help,¡± Taeclas declared. ¡°That¡¯s so admirable. Back in Covehold we heard all sorts of stories about demesnes suffering because Dungeon Binders were so busy trying to take care of their demesne¡¯s needs that they couldn¡¯t spare anything to help their neighbors, so it was wonderful to learn that our new Dungeon Binder was such a kind person.¡±


    Lori stared at the woman. Then she turned to Rian. ¡°Rian, what sort of nonsense have you been telling this woman? I thought you¡¯d know better than to try and use blatant lies during your recruitment.¡±


    The two woman blinked at Lori, before staring at Rian as well.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t lie about anything,¡± Rian said, his face set in such a theatrically innocent expression Lori wanted to punch it. ¡°I simply told them about how Binder Shanalorre here approached you for help last winter about keeping the people in her demesne from starving. Really, how else was I supposed to explain why you¡¯re basically running two demesnes?¡±

 369 - Deadspeaking Work Logistics

    Lori closed her eyes, sighing. "I do not have the time to correct the no doubt mistaken impression Rian has given you of that incident," she said. "Rian, tell¡ª" No, wait, not Rian. He was the one who misinformed them in the first place! "Binder Shanalorre, please properly explain the circumstances regarding my conquest of your demesne, as Rian seems to have chosen to amuse himself by humorously mispresenting events."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Shanalorre said.


    The two women blinked and turned towards the other Dungeon Binder.


    "You''re Binder Shanalorre?" Taeclas exclaimed. She turned to Rian for explanation. "She''s Binder Shanalorre?"


    Rian actually looked apologetic. "It''s not the sort of thing that''s believable until you actually meet her. I mean, a child Binder is the sort of thing that comes up in stories for children. It''s usually a sign that the story is for children."


    "I assure you, Binder Shanalorre is the former Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork," Lori assured them. "Since she surrendered to my authority, she has become my subordinate until further notice. She is also not relevant to this discussion. I believe I must know what Rian promised you, to either confirm or deny it." She gave her lord a glare. If he could no longer be trusted¡­


    "I didn''t lie or mispresent anything," he said. "It''s just some things are hard to believe unless we present actual, verifiable empirical evidence for it, like the fact Shanalorre is a Dungeon Binder. Or your own¡­ extremely idiosyncratic approach to engaging in social contact."


    "I don''t engage in social contact."


    "Exactly!"


    Lori sighed and turned back towards her new subjects. "As should be obvious now, Lord Rian considers himself witty. It''s best to simply ignore it."


    "Rian is a lord?" They were the first words that Taeclas wife¡ªwhat was it¡­ Ri-something¡­ Ribere? No, wait, Rybelle¡ªhad spoken in her presence.


    The man in question shrugged. "It wasn''t relevant when we first met. Actually, it''s not relevant at all in day to day living, unless you have something you want to complain about. Then it''s ''Lord Rian, do something about this'', and ''Lord Rian, something needs to be done about that''."


    "You should have quit back when you were only a temporary lord," Lori said dryly.


    "Ah, to think the mistakes of my youth would haunt me like this. I shall never forgive you, Rian-of-a-year-ago!"


    She rolled her eyes. "See? Best to ignore it. Now, what has he told you?"


    The two women glanced at each other. They both had strange expressions on their faces, like they were trying to smile through constipation. "Ah, w-well," Rybelle said, "Rian¡ªLord Rian, I mean¡ªpromised that there were homes available that were rent-free¡­"


    The woman''s face returned to normal as she enumerated what exactly Rian had promised her and her wife, and Lori breathed a small sigh of relief. It seemed that Rian at least hadn''t misled about that, though he had still made omissions.


    "All that is broadly accurate," Lori confirmed once Rybelle had finished. "However, even if the use of our available housing and other facilities is free, they still come with obligations. Or rather, the require that you will contribute to the demesne. Those who don''t work don''t eat."


    "That''s fair," Taeclas said readily, nodding. "What sort of contributions?"


    "Assisting in food preparation, gathering resources from the woods, resource refinement¡­" Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Rian would be better able to inform you where any assistance is needed. In your particular case, your most useful contribution would be using your Deadspeaking to assist in increasing the yields of our crops. Healing and carpentry assistance would also be appreciate, though at the moment, the sanitary measures we have taken has significantly lowered the likelihood of disease. Until now, the doctors and Shanalorre have been sufficient at seeing to the health of my subjects."


    Taeclas blink, regarding Shanalorre again. "She can heal?"


    "Yes. It has been to our benefit that Shanalorre is a savant. Her healing meaning has been most useful, especially when it came to caring for the newborns we had over the winter."


    For the first time, Taeclas looked alarmed. "W-what?"


    "Is something wrong, Taeclas?" Rian asked.


    Taeclas took a deep breath. "W-well¡­ If it was done last winter, then it''s probably too late¡­" she said, fixing a frown on Shanalorre. "You two probably wouldn''t know, since from what I''ve seen you used to be a Whisperer Binder Lori, and if Shanalorre here is a savant as you say¡ª"


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori corrected pointedly.


    The woman paused in her flow of thought. "What?"


    "Even subordinate to me, she is still Binder Shanalorre and will be shown the proper respect as such," Lori said sternly.


    "But¡­ you don''t call her that¡­" Taeclas said.


    The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    "Naturally not. She''s my subordinate. I outrank her."


    Rian leaned towards the two women. "Just go with it," he said in a theatrical whisper. "Besides, she has a point."


    Taeclas and her wife both made one of those strange expressions Lori couldn''t identify on their faces. "My apologies, Binder Shanalorre," the Deadspeaker said eventually. For some reason, the two women reminded Lori of her mothers in the way they were looking at the younger Dungeon Binder.


    "I accept your apology," Shanalorre said with a nod.


    "¡­ Rian said you used to have a Deadspeaker, but they''re no longer with you. Did they leave before the babes were born?" Taeclas asked.


    "They died well before the babes were born, yes," Lori said. Next to her, Shanalorre twitched for some reason.


    "Oh¡­" Taeclas said, in a softer voice. "Well, I suppose that''s why Sha¡ªBinder Shanalorre here wasn''t informed then. Not all meanings are safe to use on babes. Though if they''ve managed to survive since winter without developing notable deformities¡­" She paused. "They haven''t developed any noticeable deformities, have they? Have any died?"


    Lori and Rian looked at each other, the former inquiring and concerned, the latter mildly panicked. "Uh¡­ No, none of them have died. As to deformities¡­ not that I''ve noticed," he said, even as he was visibly going over his memories. "The mothers, doctors and medics haven''t mentioned anything to me¡­"


    In the awkward silence, there was a loud sound of impact as Shanalorre''s left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, making Taeclas and Rybelle start and turn to look at her. She stared back impassively as she lowered her hand.


    "Then¡­ well, Binder Shanalorre''s meaning probably didn''t harm them, but it would be best if I examined them, just to be sure," Taeclas said. "If some harm has been done, I might be able to identify and correct it."


    Lori scowled. She wanted to keep the woman here in River''s Fork, but with that sort of concern raised¡­ "I shall get a second opinion from¡­ what was his name, Rian?"


    "Deadspeaker Lidzuga, your Bindership," Rian said, still looking preoccupied and trying to remember.


    Lori nodded. "I will speak to him and get his opinion on the matter. However, to continue our discussion, while your greatest unique contribution to the demesne would be the application of your skills at Deadspeaking, assistance in other matters would also be useful. I can''t think of what those other matters might be, but I''m sure Rian has a list somewhere."


    Taeclas frowned, but eventually sighed. "Right, right¡­ if they''re still healthy now, a few more hours won''t matter¡­" she said quietly. "I¡­ well, I''m good at meanings to increase yields, but I''ll need to see your crops to say how useful it would be. Meanings like that need to take effect for most of a day or longer to be much good, and that means a lot of imbuement. It''s more efficient to put it on a single plant that yields a lot, since I would have to imbue the plant myself." She glanced sideways at Rian. "Rian''s been hinting there''s a way get around that problem, but he hasn''t really said anything."


    "To be honest, it''s just a thought," Rian admitted, "but could someone, say, imbue a plant, and then you just step in and use the imbuement to make a meaning?"


    "That''s not how it works," Lori said, and was surprised to hear Taeclas echoing her word for word. She glanced at the woman, before continuing. "In Whispering, at least, forming a binding requires that you bind wisps to your will after claiming it. While you can imbue wisps that you have claimed but not bound, doing so will cause the imbuement to very quickly dissipate after you''ve surrendered your claim. For the wisps to properly retain the imbuement, you need to bind the wisps to your will, with or without forming them into a proper binding."


    Rian stared at her for a moment. "Does it ever get confusing using the same word for two different steps in the process?" he said.


    Lori blinked at the strange tangent. "What is there to be confused about? Binding to your will and forming a binding are completely different things."


    For some reason, he glanced at Taeclas, Rybell and Shanalorre in turn, who returned his look. "I suppose it''s a wizard thing¡­" he said. Rybelle and Shanalorre both nodded for some reason.


    Lori found herself meeting Taeclas gaze, and they both shared an exasperated look and a shrug. Why did people keep asking that?


    "Uh, to build on L¡ªBinder Lori''s explanation," Taeclas said, "the same thing happens with life, whether vital or inert. Simply claiming and imbuing life will cause the imbuement to dissipate if you don''t bind it to your will. For your suggestion to work Rian, someone would have to bind the life, and if they''re going to do that, they might as well tame it into a meaning."


    Rian nodded. "All right then. Thank you for the correction."


    "You''re welcome!"


    "Since I''m not a wizard and don''t know, I have to ask, can a Deadspeaker also deactivate their meanings, the way a Whisperer can deactivate their bindings? And does doing so allow the meaning to retain most of their imbuement for an extended period of time?"


    "Oh, yes. It''s very useful for when you want to imbue a meaning with a lot of magic."


    Rian nodded. "So¡­ is it possible for you to just make the meaning, then deactivate it, and then have someone else come along to imbue the meaning?"


    "Oh, yes, that''s perfectly doable," Taeclas said. "Although the correct term is ''tame''. A craftsman makes, a Whisperer forms, a Horotract defines, a Mentalist arranges, and a Deadspeaker tames. Are you thinking of having me just tame the life into meanings and Lidzuga will imbue them? That''s certainly doable, but it will still come down to imbuing all the crops by hand. I suppose if we had a wire we could tie all the crops together and imbue them simultaneously¡­ but if I had a wire, I could tame all the life in the crops into meanings and imbue them."


    Rian glanced at Lori. "We have the wire," he said.


    "We''ll see," she said.


    He nodded and turn back to Taeclas. "Actually, I was thinking that if you could tame meanings into the crops but leave them deactivated, Binder Shanalorre might be able to imbue them for you. That would solve the problem of imbuement being the limiting factor."


    Lori and Taeclas both turned towards Shanalorre, who nodded. "Lord Rian is correct. I was able to imbue the meanings still extant in the demesne. I have no doubt that I can imbue any meanings that Wizard Taeclas can tame, since my connection to River''s Fork''s core will allow me to override her claim." She frowned. "However, all those meanings were already active. While I would be able to imbue any deactivated meanings, I would not be able to activate them. As a savant, I have not been taught how. That step would have to be initiated by someone else."


    Rian cleared his throat. "I think this discussion is one we''ll have to continue later with Lidzuga present," he said. "He might have something to add."


    Lori considered it, then nodded. "Yes. We shall have to curtail this discussion until then. This is a matter of work logistics. If you have no more questions at the moment, Rian can lead you to where you can have lunch."


    "Come on, you two," Rian said, gesturing for them to follow him. "If you have any questions, ask me. I should be able to answer most things. After lunch we can get you moved in, then Yllian can show you where the baths are." He nodded to Lori. "I''ll bring back Lidzuga, your Bindership. Think about what you''re going to say to his request."


    "It was really nice meeting you, Binder Lori! You too, Binder Shanalorre!" Taeclas said before she turned and began following Rian, holding hands with her wife after they had stepped off the boat.


    Lori let out a small sigh of relief. Ugh, she hated talking to people.


    Well, she only had to do it one more time, and then she''d be able to go home today. Just a little longer¡­

 370 - Annoying Introductions, The Next

    Lori glared at Rian. He had to be doing this on purpose!


    "Lidzuga, Kutago, may I present the esteemed Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri. Best to refer to her as ''your Bindership''," Rian said cheerfully as he stood between her and the more than one person opposite her. Again! "Your Bindership, may I introduce Deadspeaker Lidzuga and his sister Mistress Kutago."


    "Hello, uh, your Bindership," Lidzuga said, smiling in an annoyingly Rian-like manner. Next to him, his sister said nothing, but her eyes were intent on Lori, her mouth set in a neutral expression. "It''s a pleasure to meet you. I''m thankful for the opportunity to live in your demesne¡ªKuw, stop frowning at her Bindership."


    "I wasn''t frowning," Kutago said indignantly.


    "Then what was that face you were making?"


    "I wasn''t making any kind of face!"


    Lori let their words wash over her as she tried her best to remember the man in front of her, even as she conveyed her continued annoyance at Rian not bringing only the Deadspeaker. Again. Pale red short-cut hair in the style that many craftsmen favored so it wouldn''t get into their eyes¡­yes, his eyes were a sort of vibrant pale orange, but that wasn''t a very reliable identifier, you needed to be very close to see those¡­


    "You should be informed, but Rian likely embellished some of the things he told you, by omission of relevant details, at least," Lori said. "However, the offer of free housing, use of the baths, and food he at least managed to convey accurately. However, he tells me that you have a request?"


    "Yes," Lidzuga said confidently. "Has Rian told you about why I joined your demesne?"


    "Rian has informed me that you ''intend to sketch, record, and study the local plants, beasts, bugs and fursh''," Lorisaid. "And to do so, you are demanding ''time off''."


    "Not demanding!" Rian interjected. "Definitely not demand. Asking, really. Asking very, very nicely and politely, since he passed it through me instead of just telling you directly. Right, Lidz?"


    The Deadspeaker blinked at him. "Uh¡­"


    "This is the part where you say ''yes'', you idiot," his sister hissed from beside him.


    Liduzga turned the other way to glance at his sister, who was merely staring at him intently. Finally, he turned back to Lori. "As Rian has said, your, uh, Bindership, I am politely asking for time off."


    Lori nodded as she and he both ignored the other two. "I see. You¡¯re asking for time off. You should know that a condition of staying in my demesne is that all need to contribute, and that those who do not work do not eat. What would be your contribution for your ''time off''?"


    "Well, my research would of course be contributing to the completion of the alknowledge," Lidzuga said earnestly.


    "How fortunate for the alknowledge," she said flatly. "Unfortunately, my demesne is not the alknowledge. It can''t be sustained on knowledge, and requires food, resources, and the labor to collect and refine those things."


    "I''m sure we can arrange some sort of schedule, your Bindership," Rian interjected. "Lidzuga no doubt understands the need to balance the amount of time and work he contributes to the demesne with the time he takes for himself to do his research.¡± He paused. ¡°Actually¡­ how much time do you think you need for research per day, Lidz?¡±


    ¡°Uh¡­ well¡­ I was thinking¡­ half?¡± the Deadspeaker said.


    Next to him, his sister closed her eyes, bowed her head and sighed.


    ¡°Half,¡± Lori said flatly. ¡°Half.¡± She stared at the man, and the only things keeping her from sinking him into the ground was the fact she wasn¡¯t in her demesne, and that he wasn¡¯t standing on a surface she could soften with Whispering. She started taking deep, even, cyclical breaths to calm herself, feeling her lungs fill with air and her soul with magic as she did. While the intensity of what she felt at the stupidity in front of her did not abate, she was able to control herself. Fine. He wanted to negotiate so unevenly? She could do that too. ¡°All right. Which half?¡±


    Beside the Deadspeaker¡ªno, she wasn¡¯t going to bother remembering his name, she was too furiously annoyed¡ªRian winced, as if finally aware of her displeasure. Luckily for him, he was not the recipient of it at the moment.


    ¡°I¡¯m fine with either half, your Bindership,¡± the recipient said, looking relieved for some reason.


    ¡°Very well then. You can work during the half of the day when the sun is up and have the time off you want during the half when it¡¯s not. Or would you rather have it the other way around?¡±


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    Rian blinked. Then he smiled, before quickly turning to face away from the Deadspeaker and raising up a hand to cover his mouth. On the other side, the sister¡ªher name also unfortunately forgotten¡ªnodded tiredly for some reason.


    ¡°Um, if I do it like that your Bindership, then when will I sleep?¡± the Deadspeaker said.


    ¡°Whenever you want, as long as it¡¯s not during work hours,¡± Lori said flatly. ¡°Your previous employers would no doubt have been furious at you for sleeping on the job, and I am no exception. You¡¯ll have half the day of. Whether you want to use that time to sleep or do research is up to you.¡±


    ¡°But¡­ that¡¯s¡­¡±


    ¡°If you say ¡®unfair¡¯, I will have Rian throw you into the river,¡± Lori interrupted coldly. ¡°You come here to my demesne asking to be excused from work when you haven¡¯t even done a single day of it yet?-! How dare you!¡±


    ¡°Rian said¡ª¡±


    A hand slapped over his mouth. ¡°Brother, be quiet,¡± his sister said firmly. He squirmed, turning to look at her and muffled words came through his fingers. ¡°I said be quiet! Stand back and let me do the talking.¡±


    The Deadspeaker sighed though his uncovered nose, but obeyed, which was probably the first intelligent thing he¡¯d done in her presence. The sister stepped forward, bowing slightly toward Lori, which was better than nothing. ¡°Your Bindership. I apologize for my brother. While I could say he¡¯s usually hard working¡­ you¡¯re probably not going to believe that right now.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Lori said bluntly.


    The sister nodded. ¡°Very well. Then, I¡¯d like to represent myself first. I don¡¯t know if Rian has told you, but I was working as a papermaker in Covehold Demesne before someone decided to accept Rian¡¯s offer to live here. However, that is not the full extent of my skills.¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡±


    ¡°In addition to papermaking, I have also worked as an apprentice printer, and I¡¯m trained in bookbinding as well as document preservation and restoration to the standard expected of the Mystery¡¯s libraries.¡± Lori, unfamiliar with what exactly that standard was, simply nodded in acknowledgement. ¡°I know how to make writing ink, and while I¡¯m not a trained carpenter, I know how to make the glues used for bookbinding, which is also used in carpentry, and I¡¯m a quick study.¡±


    Lori nodded. ¡°Do you know how to spin thread?¡±


    ¡°No, but I¡¯ve seen it done and I¡¯m willing to learn.¡±


    ¡°Would you be willing to clean latrines?¡±


    The woman made a face. ¡°As long as the process is sanitary and I¡¯m not expected to use my bare hands.¡±


    Well, that was fair. ¡°And do you have some sort of request? Time off, perhaps?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± the woman said immediately. ¡°Please give my brother another chance. He¡¯s a skilled woodworker, he¡¯s diligent, and he does work hard. He simply said some very stupid things earlier.¡±


    ¡°Tah¡­!¡±


    ¡°Brother, stay quiet, I¡¯m trying to wash away your mess!¡±


    Lori considered the woman, idly regretting that she¡¯d forgotten her name. Then she considered the Deadspeaker. On the one hand, Rian had made mistakes concerning people before, and this was looking like another one of them. On the other hand¡­ her lord must have had some reason to think he was worth recruiting. Unless he and¡­ uh, what was her name¡­ Taeclas? Unless he and Taeclas had been the only ones who had accepted Rian¡¯s offer¡­ which was annoyingly not unlikely.


    ¡°In your opinion, how much time off do you think his work is worth?¡± Lori said.


    ¡°The offer you quoted, at minimum,¡± the woman said immediately. ¡°However, once he¡¯s had time to get to know your demesne¡¯s carpenters and woodworkers and become part of the workshop, he will begin producing quality work as well as increase their efficiency. Given the necessary raw materials, my brother can make anything.¡± That last was not said with confidence. It was not a boast, nor was it announced with pride. It was a simple and straightforward statement of fact. ¡°By then I¡¯d say he¡¯s earned half a day off a week as long as he¡¯s finished all his work for the day.¡±


    Lori considered that. Then she nodded. ¡°You can stay. Welcome to my demesne.¡± Then she turned towards the Deadspeaker. ¡°Your sister has asked me to give you a second chance. Consider your words very carefully.¡±


    The Deadspeaker had a strange expression on his face that made him look like he was constipated. Then he looked sideways towards his sister, who gave him a narrow-eyed look in return. His expression became reluctant, but he sighed. ¡°Your Bindership. As my sister has told you, I¡¯m a woodworker. I have experience in both carpentry and furniture making. In terms of Deadspeaking, I am skilled in diagnosis, healing, woodworking, boneworking, leatherworking, plantworking, fleshworking, and deadcrafting. I have no professional farming experience, but I¡¯ve worked in dungeon farms and know the necessary meanings.¡±


    With everyone word, Lori felt less and less inclined to give him ¡®time off¡¯. All of those skills were very useful to the demesne! The more time they were being used for the demesne, the better!


    ¡°I¡¯m afraid I will need proof of these skills to judge the quality of their output,¡± Lori said. ¡°As such, I am instituting a probationary period of four weeks to assess you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s¡­ fair, I suppose,¡± the Deadspeaker said.


    ¡°The workday is from after breakfast is finished to a little before sunset. Your evenings are yours. Do research, sleep, I don¡¯t care what you do then. For the duration of the probation, you will be given room, board and necessary sundries as promised, since you will be contributing. Do you understand my conditions so far?¡±


    The Deadspeaker nodded carefully, as if expecting for some sort of trap.


    ¡°During that time, I expect you to at minimum exceed the productivity of Wizard Taeclas. You will not speak to her to convince her to reduce her productivity during this period. If you can exceed her productivity by a notable margin, then at the end of two weeks I am willing to reopen the discussion of your ¡®time off¡¯. If I come to a satisfactory conclusion, it will be implemented at the end of the four week period provided you are able to sustain that level of productivity. This will ensure that you are capable of a contribution equal to another Deadspeaker in less time, which will justify the time off. Do you understand?¡±


    He nodded again, then licked his lips and said, ¡°Yes, your Bindership.¡±


    ¡°If you fail to exceed Wizard Taeclas¡¯s productivity, then you are clearly not capable of contributing enough to be worthy of special consideration. In which case, you will have a choice.¡±


    ¡°A¡­ choice, your Bindership?¡±


    ¡°Will you use your nights to do your research regardless¡­ or will you sleep to be better prepared for the next day?¡±

 371 - Disproportionately Hurtful

    "That was my fault," Rian said as soon as he''d come back from leading the two siblings away.


    "Yes, it was."


    "I should have helped him prepare what he was going to say. I knew the time off was going to be a contentious point, so I should have helped him present it in a way that wouldn''t annoy you."


    "Yes, you should have."


    "Really, I should have made more of a point about how important you considered contributing to the demesne to be, and that he should have waited a few days after he''d shown how skilled and useful he was before asking for time off."


    "That would certainly have been a good idea."


    "Shana, if this is your way to trying to make me feel better, please stop. If it isn''t, I wonder at your newfound vindictive streak."


    "I was simply agreeing with all your statements. Why would I be vindictive towards you?"


    "Oh. Well, could you please stop agreeing with me? It''s making me feel worse."


    "No."


    There was a pause as Rian turned to stare at Shanalorre.


    "Was that you not agreeing with me?"


    "No, it wasn''t."


    That seemed to plunge her lord into deep thought. "Huh. This conversation is starting to get philosophically challenging."


    Lori finally found her voice. "Rian¡­" her teeth gritted together. She was no longer almost violently outraged, but that merely meant she had calmed enough to speak. The outrage was still there. "What were you thinking bringing that idiot here?-!"


    "I¡­ admit that the way he introduced himself to you probably gave you good reason to think that, but I assure you that he came highly recommended," Rian said. "Of all our candidates, he''d been the only one with a regular job who wasn''t also trying to pay back debts, and I saw some samples of his work. He was capable, and he was vehement about why he didn''t want to be a Dungeon Binder, so he''d never be a threat to you by either trying to take your demesne, or an obstruction from him trying to set up his own. With all that, I figured we could have worked around any other issues."


    "The Deadspeaker''s desire to not work was not just an issue, it was basically him trying to take advantage of us!"


    "It¡­ well, it could have been better presented, but that probably wasn''t his intention¡­" Rian sighed. "But that''s not going to change your mind at this point, is it?"


    "No."


    Rian simply nodded. "Yeah, I''m not surprised. Well, I''m glad you decided to give him a probationary period instead of¡­ well, something vindictive."


    "You brought the Deadspeaker here. We might as well make use of him. Besides, it''s been proven that idiots can learn with sufficient time in River''s Fork."


    Rian nodded slowly. "I suppose. And¡­ are you really willing to reconsider the issue of giving him time off?"


    "I said it, didn''t I?"


    "Hmm¡­" Rian said. "Well¡­ if you''re still unhappy with Lidzuga by the time we''re ready to go back to Covehold Demesne, or if he''s unhappy here and wants to go there, will you let him? That is, will you let him and his sister ride back with us on the ship instead of making him walk?"


    "I will consider it."


    Rian nodded. "As you do." He sighed. "Sorry for bringing you a headache so soon after arriving."


    "As you should be."


    There was a moment of silence as Shanalorre angled the bound tool she has holding to cast its breeze towards Rian, whose sigh changed tone as a result.


    "All right," he said. "What thing happened while I was gone that I need to help deal with?"


    "A typhon beast settled near River''s Fork, which is repelling other beasts from the area and making it difficult for the hunters to provide meat for this demesne."


    Rian paused. "I don''t think I''m familiar with that one. Isn''t ''Typhon'' a¡ª"


    "Yes, the ones naming the new kinds of beasts have been going for fictional references. I''ll show you the relevant pages of the almanac."


    "Oh, you''re finally letting me have reading material? Yay¡­"


    "Great Binder?"


    Lori turned towards Shanalorre, who had sat unobtrusively during the interview with the Deadspeaker and his sister. "What is it?"


    "May I inquire if all of the new recruits will be residing here in River''s Fork, or will one pair reside in Lorian Demesne?" Shanalorre said.


    Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.


    Lori twitched.


    "I''m going to have to second the Lady Binder''s question," Rian said. "I''d rather avoid the awkwardness and implied insult of asking them to move demesnes at a later time. Are we having them stay here, or do I tell Taeclas and Rybelle that they''re coming with us to Lorian?"


    She gave her lord a flat look. "Why do you assume I would choose Taeclas to come to Lorian?"


    "Well, for one thing, she didn''t annoy you so much you were clearly wishing you could sink her into the ground. For another, Taeclas is better with plants than Lidzuga, so it only makes sense that she be the one to take to the demesne with more crops that need to be taken care of and made to mature faster for harvesting."


    Lori frowned, skeptical. "How can you be sure she''s better with plants?"


    "Because on the way here, Taeclas took care of tending to the seedlings, cuttings and plants we brought, and Lidzuga just assisted by helping with imbuing. The fact they showed preferences for such activities is a good indicator of something, and with conversation, I found out Taeclas'' preference was because she was very good at it." Rian shrugged. "Then they talked, and there was a technical discussion I can''t repeat and barely understood, but Lidzuga said that Taeclas was better than he was at meanings for plants."


    "And you''re relying on the Deadspeaker''s opinion?"


    "Well, he''d know than better than me about¡ª" Rian stopped what he was saying and turned to stare at her. "Seriously? You''re doing that? Now that''s just petty."


    Lori didn''t reply, simply giving him a flat look.


    "Come on, don''t do that. That''s actually disproportionately hurtful."


    Next to Lori, Shanalorre tilted her head curiously, but said nothing, simply listening.


    "This is extremely undignified behavior," Rian continued. "What he did wasn''t that bad! I mean, yes, it''s bad, but not something deserving of this from you.


    Lori''s response remained the same.


    "Landoor didn''t get this sort of response from you. He still thinks he''s your heir and going to be a wizard and Dungeon Binder after you, and you don''t go around pointedly not bothering to refer to him by name. Especially since calling him something like ''The Biggest Idiot'' is available to you." Rian paused and turned to Shanalorre. "Please don''t tell Landoor I said that? I don''t want to hurt his feelings." Shanalorre nodded solemnly in agreement. "Thank you. Come on, what Lidzuga did can''t rank nearly as bad as Landoor. He made an error in judgement out of enthusiasm. Landoor is¡­ Landoor."


    ¡­ all right, put like that she sounded extremely and unreasonably petty. Still, she was the Dungeon Binder! Twice over at that, technically. She didn''t apologize for her pettiness, nor explain her pettiness, nor give excuses for her pettiness!


    Though by that same logic, she also didn''t have to apologize for, explain or give excuses when she stopped being petty.


    "I''ll consider it," she said with lofty dignity.


    Rian nodded. "Well, with that tangent out of the way¡­ am I telling Taeclas she''s coming with us upriver or not?"


    ¡­oh yes, they''d been talking about that, hadn''t they? "Is it really necessary?" Lori said.


    "You were just telling me that there''s been difficulties hunting because a new beast with an ominous name has settled nearby. If that''s not a good reason to have the Deadspeaker who''s better at growing plants in the demesne where we''re growing the most crops¡­"


    The feeling of hating that Rian had a point was¡­ well, simultaneously comforting and annoying. Ugh.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori stayed for lunch at River''s Fork, because it was noon and she didn''t want to delay eating by going back to her demesne, because Rian needed to speak to Yllian, and because Rian had a letter from the rest of the Golden Sweetwood Company and Lori was going to find out what it said. She could respect that the contents of a piece of official correspondence was none of her business. However, once those contents were known to one of her subjects, she was going to have them tell her what those contents were!


    "And you''re going to be telling our new arrivals that they''ll be staying in different demesnes, right?"


    "Yes, Rian, I''ll tell them that they will be in separate demesnes."


    "And you''ll refer to Lidzuga by name?"


    "And I''ll sink you into the ground if you keep annoying me."


    "Can you just push me into the water? I don''t want to get softened stone on my clothes, I keep getting looks from Mikon and Umu when I end up with stains ground into them."


    "No. I know you like being in deep water."


    "It''s hot, of course I would!"


    The two of them reached the outdoor pavilion that acted as River''s Fork''s dining hall. Thick wooden posts supported a roof of straight branches and straightened sheets of bark, keeping leaves and occasional small branches that fell from the dome above. The interior of the dome was shaded enough to be noticeably cooler than the area around it, but the same dome dulled breezes that might have moved the air.


    The four new recruits were sitting at the same table, where Yllian, a vaguely familiar woman who was most likely his wife, and a young man who was¡­ some kind of relation¡­ were also seated. Yllian''s probably-wife was talking to the three women, which Taeclas responded to so enthusiastically Lori could practically hear what she was saying. The Deadspeaker''s wife was more controlled, but seemed to be as actively involved in the conversation, while whatever-her-name-was sat back and mostly nodded along. Her annoying brother was talking to Yllian, looking frowning slightly, while Yllian seemed to be explaining something at great length. Every so often, the Deadspeaker would look disbelieving, to which Yllian would just shrug and say a short phrase. After a brief pause, during which the Deadspeaker¡ªshe hadn''t been told what his name was yet, after all¡ªwould look confused, Yllian would resume talking again.


    Presumably Yllian was telling the Deadspeaker about the demesne and all the work that needed to be done and why he couldn''t have any free time.


    Shanalorre, sitting next to Lori on the bench, had brought the bound tool from the Coldhold and placed it on the table, angling it so that she and Lori were in the path of the air that it moved. Riz, sitting next to Rian, had forgone the usual method of claiming Rian''s arm and had just wrapped hers around his torso, taking advantage of the fact neither Mikon or Umu were present on that side. Rian, for his part, kept both of his hands visible on the table, the only sign of him reciprocating the attention was how leaning slightly towards Riz.


    Rian let out a long sigh. "Ah¡­ it''s nice to be back home. Well, almost home. I can''t wait to have a bath where I won''t have to worry about something in the water trying to grab my clothes in its mouth¡­"


    "You can do that after you unpack the boat," Lori said.


    There was another sigh¡­ or perhaps it was a moan. "Then can I have a bath?"


    "Don''t take long. You need to properly report to me what happened, and you were the one who said we needed to have a long discussion."


    A third sigh. "Yup¡­ I''m definitely home¡­ Well, I suppose home is the place where you have to fix the roof if it''s leaking," Rian mused nonsensically. "I just wish it wasn''t leaking all the time¡­"


    Shanalorre nodded. "Welcome home, Lord Rian."


    At his side, Riz clung tighter. "Welcome home, Rian."


    Lori sighed. Was the food ready yet?

 372 - Isnt That… Dangerous?

    They ate lunch¡ªbread, meat stew with tuber chunks, and fruit¡ªwith Lori trying to ignore the nonsense happening in front of her. It was difficult. Rian was making a big theater production about how much he was enjoying the food. Not a small production, where the audiences stand, there''s only a single person operating between one to three instruments by themselves to provide accompaniment, and costumes are more often than not the thespians'' normal clothes with a towel or blanket to give the impression they''re wearing something else. This was a big production, with cushioned and slightly reclined seats, a full band with a conductor, elaborate costumes, and a salacious scene involving actual nudity from the waist up and the kinds of sounds that came from her mothers'' room the nights before she had to remind them the soundproofing in their apartment was terrible.


    She never understood why so many perfectly good plays had those scenes. They added nothing useful to the plot. She usually took the opportunity to step out and buy some more snacks, since she wouldn''t miss anything important.


    The comparison was mostly from the sounds Rian was making. While they weren''t as loud as her mothers, they certainly seemed to have as much emphasis as he ate his bread, holding it folded like a tube filled with stew and slowly eating it from one end.


    "¡­missed this¡­" she heard him say, sounded almost in tears as he chewed a mouthful of bread, tubers, stew and meat. "Missed it so much¡­"


    "Lord Rian, don''t talk with your mouth full," Shanalorre scolded. "Eating and breathing utilize the same tract. If you try to do both at the same time, the food going down your throat could be diverted to your lungs and obstruct your airway." Her words had the rote cadence of something she''d literally repeated word for word many times, and the tone was exasperated.


    Thankfully, that convinced Rian to lower his troupe''s production budget.


    After lunch Lori had Rian call the two Deadspeakers to her table so she could speak to them again. This time she made sure to make clear that she only wanted to talk to the Deadspeakers and not the women with them so that Rian wouldn''t bring all of them.


    Technically he did exactly as she had ordered, but given the two women had followed them anyway¡­


    Lori resolved to simply ignore them.


    "Now, as Rian has informed you, I control two demesnes," Lori began.


    That made the two blink. "I thought Binder Shanalorre was the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork?" Taeclas said, Rian having reminded her what their names were.


    "Presently, yes, but she is also my subordinate as she has surrendered to my authority," Lori elaborated. "As such, River''s Fork is one of my demesnes. My primary demesne is further upriver. Taeclas, you and your wife will be coming with us to settle there, so that both demesnes will have a Deadspeaker for assisting with growing crops."


    "Don''t worry, you''ll still have free housing, use of the bath house, and everything else I promised," Rian assured them. "You just won''t be here when you have it."


    "Why me, though?" Taeclas asked. "Why not Lidzuga?"


    "You''re better at meanings involving plants and Lorian is where we''ve planted the bulk of our crops," Rian said.


    "Ah¡­" Taeclas nodded. "That makes sense¡­"


    "Um¡­ your Bindership?" Lidzuga ventured. "What about my¡­ probationary period?" Taeclas turned to him curiously.


    "Its condition will be revised appropriately," Lori said. "You will be informed of what standards you will need to meet to qualify for what you are requesting."


    "Um¡­ just to be clear, my probationary period technically hasn''t started yet?"


    "No, it hasn''t," Rian interrupted. "But I''m sure any contributions you take up at your own initiative will be counted positively towards you." He glanced pointedly at Lori. She rolled her eyes but waved her hand dismissively. Well, if he was going to work, it was only fair that it was counted in his favor, as long as it didn''t result in anything detrimental. "Why don''t you ask Lord Yllian if he knows anything you could help with? But only after you''ve moved into your new house properly and had a chance to enjoy the baths. How did you like the food, by the way?"


    "A bit thick, but it was delicious," Lidzuga said enthusiastically.


    "It could have used a little ground nigrum," Taeclas commented.


    "It was all right, but it could have used more vegetables besides tubers," Taeclas'' wife added.


    "Could have done with more bread," Lidzuga''s sister declared.


    "That last is exactly what we are trying to rectify," Lori said blandly.


    "Brother, grow more crops so we can have more bread."


    Lori approved of those priorities.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once four of the lamp-shaped wisplights that Rian had brought back from Covehold had been left with Yllian to use at his own discretion, as well as giving him a reminder that Lori would be speaking to him again about the contents of the letter from the Golden Sweetwood Company¡ªwhich he had been too busy to open yet¡ªLori made her way back to her demesne on the Coldhold. Unfortunately, her private room was still full of cargo, beads, and bound tools used in woodworking, so she didn''t have any privacy, but given what the insides of the boat smelled like¡­ well, it needed airing.


    Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    Shanalorre had asked to remain in River''s Fork for the afternoon so that she could do maintenance on her residence there, which Lori granted. She would be coming back later in the day aboard Lori''s Ice Boat, keeping the brat company, as the brat had gone to River''s Fork that morning to catch some of the local seels for the demesne''s food.


    The wisplight that moved air was currently hanging from a peg next to Lori, its lightwisps deactivated and the binding of airwisps angled down slightly, blowing air against the side of Lori''s head. The boat was full, and gave the impression of being slow as they made their way upriver, going against the current. Well, Lori supposed that made sense. Between the cargo, the men operating it, the two newly arrived women, and half of the escort that Riz had arranged¡ªthe other half had stayed behind to escort Shanalorre back later¡ªthe boat was riding noticeably lower in the water.


    "We''re riding noticeably lower in the water," Lori noted to Rian as he sat down next to her from whatever matter he''d been seeing to.


    "Yeah¡­ it''s why Tae and Lidz started fusing planks of the deck together. We needed to minimize the amount of water that reached the hold below decks whenever we had a big wave splash on the side. It''s a good thing we had the evaporator or we''d have filled up. Oh, by the way, all four of them know about the bound tools. You know, in case you wanted to keep it secret from them for some reason¡­ well, it''s too late. The wisplights and the steam jet driver were too obviously bound tools."


    "Your inability to keep the existence of my bound tools secret is noted."


    He nodded. "On that note¡­ would you be willing to talk to Tae about them? She and Lidz were really curious about them, and¡­ well, I think she just wants to talk to you."


    Lori gave her lord a blank look, then tilted her head to look past him. Taeclas was standing next to¡­ whatsisname next to the tiller of the boat, looking at Lori and Rian. When she saw that Lori was looking at her, the Deadspeaker smiled brightly and waved. Lori tilted her head back to look at Rian again. "I don''t want to talk to her."


    "What, you don''t want to brag to someone how amazing you are for rediscovering the secret of making bound tools?"


    "I do not need to explain myself. My accomplishments are self-evident."


    "So you''re just going to sit here brooding dramatically all the way home?"


    She gave him an offended look. Brooding? She hadn''t been brooding, her face had been at rest and perfectly relaxed! "I wasn''t brooding."


    "Then what was that face you were making?"


    "My face was at rest and perfectly relaxed!"


    "Ah¡­ my apologies, then. Though¡­ as your lord, I think you should talk to her."


    "And why would I want to do that?"


    "So you can establish a baseline of how she acts, which you can use to identify if that behavior changes and she suddenly now wants to kill you and take your demesne?"


    She glared at him. "That''s your job."


    Rian shrugged. "I''m not around all the time. What if I''m on a trip to Covehold? Who do you trust to tell you things like that when I''m not around?"


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point. That was twice since he came back!


    "Fine," Lori grumbled.


    Rian turned and gestured toward Taeclas. The woman didn''t quite run from where she''d been standing, but she did move very quickly, actually sliding to a stop in front of Lori before sitting down on the opposite bench, perched on the edge of the seat.


    "Tae, don''t run like that!" Rian said. "You might slip, fall, and break your neck! We''ve talked about this!"


    "Sorry," Taeclas said as Lori turned warily to regard her. "It''s just¡­ well, we had to talk about serious things earlier, and then we had to go because you had to talk to Lidz, and then lunch¡­ "


    "Yes, I am aware of what had occurred previously," Lori said as she carefully bound the darkwisps in her right ear canal. They were covered by her hair, so it wasn''t noticeable when a line of blackness began to draw itself from her ear and down to her clothes. She claimed the darkwisps there, imbuing them and forming a binding she spread across her body. She kept her hands folded on her lap as she made lines of darkwisps move under her forearm, hidden from Taeclas'' view. If she was attacked, it would take Lori a moment to wrap the exposed parts of her skin with darkwisps to prevent the Deadspeaker from claiming her life. She wasn''t going to be surprised by a sudden attack!


    "Of course, of course¡­ sorry, it''s just¡­ I''ve never actually met a bound tool artisan before," Taeclas said. "I knew a few people in school who wanted to be one, but all the ones I knew who took the course hadn''t finished their apprenticeships yet when I''d gotten my certification. I thought it took years to learn to be an artisan. I have so many questions!"


    Lori leaned back as the wizard all but left her seat. The woman''s eyes were wide, and her¡­ smile?¡ª showed a significant amount of teeth.


    "Tae, sit back down, you''re being overenthusiastic," Rian said, leaning forward slightly so part of his body was between her and the Deadspeaker. "You''re going to fall off the bench if you sit like that. Lean back until you hit the boards. Calm down. Breathe."


    Taeclas took a breath so deep it had to be theatrical¡ªdecent theater, padded benches but no back rest, small band of musicians, cheap costumes made of thin cloth and bad dyes¡ªthat she released loudly. "Sorry, sorry. It''s just¡­ I''ve never actually met a bound tool artisan before!"


    "You''ve said that already," Lori said. "There is no need to repeat yourself, I didn''t forget."


    Taeclas nodded. "Right, right¡­ So, I''ve always wanted to know, why aren''t there any bound tools that reproduce Deadspeaking? I''ve heard of bound tools that reproduce Whispering, bound tools that reproduce Mentalism¡ªeveryone''s wanted a force blade at one point!¡ªand bound tools that reproduce Horotracting, but the only bound tools that reproduce Deadspeaking are those bead receptacles they put on some kinds of undead, and those still need a Deadspeaker for them to work properly."


    "I would not know," Lori said. "I am not actually a bound tool artisan, as we both understand the term. I never went beyond gaining my certification."


    Taeclas blinked. "Then where did you learn to build¡­ well, that?" she said, gesturing at the deactivated wisplight moving air into my face.


    "I taught myself."


    Another blink. "Isn''t that¡­ dangerous?"


    "Why?"


    The other woman''s mouth opened¡­ and stayed open as her brows knit thoughtfully.


    "Um¡­ I realize you must have said something thought provoking, but as someone who''s not a wizard, can you exposit what it is?" Rian said. "The audience wants to know so we can react appropriately."


    Lori turned towards him, even as she watched the still open-mouthed Deadspeaker out of the corner of her eye. "At no point during my education was I warned that trying to create or replicate bound tools was dangerous. I was told using my body''s internal wisps was dangerous, I was told using lightningwisps, firewisps and lightwisps in certain ways was dangerous, and I was warned that trying to establish a demesne was dangerous¡ª"


    "¡ªbecause it was treason and the demesne you''re from will kill you," Rian said, nodding.


    "¡ªbecause it was treason and the demesne I originated from would kill me. However, bound tools carried no such warnings¡­ and knowing what I know now, I understand why."


    "They never warned me trying to make bound tools was dangerous!"


    Lori turned back to Taeclas, who had finally closed her mouth again. "Yes," she said blandly.

 373 - To Itch

    Lori spent the rest of the trip back to her demesne stoically enduring Taeclas'' constant chattering. The woman had apparently been building up a stock of questions during her trip from Covehold Demesne regarding the Coldhold, the wisplights that Lori had made, and the steam jet driver that propelled the boat they were on. On the issue of the Coldhold, Lori had tried to distract her by informing her building the ship the way it was had been Rian''s idea and that the Deadspeaker should consult with him, but it turned out they had already spoken during the trip. The wisplights¡­ well, they were simple enough that Lori had found herself explaining about how she had simply wired a simple binding to a bead receptacle, omitting mentioning the white Iridescence core the wisps were anchored to.


    "¡­multiple bindings, so that the steam jet driver could go faster than the prototype water jet driver and initial steam jet driver," Lori said. "It required that the Coldhold be raised from the river and the ice removed from the hull so that I could rework the tubing properly."


    "That''s amazing! All of that must have taken so much work!"


    "Yes."


    Off to the side, Rian coughed.


    "Rian, if you''re sick, cough far away from me," Lori said.


    "Oh, don''t worry your Bindership, it was just some spit that went down the wrong way." Rian said cheerfully. "But on a completely unrelated note, we''re here."


    Lori turned her head towards where he nodded, and saw that they were, in fact, arriving at their destination. Well, she''d already known they were back inside her demesne¡ªshe wasn''t feeling hot anymore, and the shore she''d been facing had no longer glittered with Iridescence¡ªbut she hadn''t been able to keep track of their progress because Taeclas had been distracting her. Her dungeon and the environs around it were in sight ahead of them, though they were still too far for her to make out anyone.


    "Perhaps you should be the first to step down so that you don''t get trapped here by the crowd of people who will be greeting everyone, your Bindership?" Rian suggested, following her gaze. "Remember what always happens?"


    Lori blinked at the reminder, but the memories that it brought back made her frown in distaste. "Ah yes. You''re right, Rian. Thank you for the reminder." How rare. A time when she didn''t hate the fact he had a point.


    He turned to the Deadspeaker across from her. "Do you want to go with her Bindership too, Tae? If you don''t take this chance to get out while you can, you''ll be stuck on the ship while everyone''s families welcome them home."


    "In that case, I''ll stay here to get the pots loosened and start putting the planks back to normal," Taeclas said. "That way we can put your ship back the way we found it."


    "Oh! That would be wonderful, thank you."


    "It''s the least I can do for the best, most comfortable ship in the continent." The woman sighed happily. "I didn''t think it was possible to be comfortable on a ship before now. No one got sick once!"


    "Well, now that you and Lidz are here to help us with the hull, we should be able to make an even better version," Rian said cheerfully.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The rest of the day wasn''t productive.


    There was the usual tumult as families greeted the men who had arrived with Rian, abandoning whatever it was they''d been doing. Well, at least the heat meant they hadn''t lingered outside for long. Lori saw Umu and Mikon there, discernable only because Rian''s hair stood out in the crowd and they were near him.


    Once they were all done wasting time, Rian finally set about organizing things so that the ship would be unloaded. Lori found herself with a collection of bound tools and wisplights, which she stored in her room for the moment. She''d examine them later. The other things¡ªthe bolts of cloth, the sheets of shoe leather, the paper and all the rest¡­ those were temporarily stored in the treasure room that contained the metal ingots, bar stocks, and the still-untouched dragon scales. They''d need to plan the use of those. Putting paper on all the windows would need to be organized. The same for the cloudbloom fabric, since they''d need to make every square chiyustri of it count¡­


    Well, she''d need to have Rian organize those things later.


    Lori also found herself the owner of eight new books. Well, new was a possessive term, as they were hardly fresh from the printing press and bookbinder''s. The corners of the books were darkened, and the leather of the covers had creases from being read, but the spines of the books was solid and none of the pages were torn. Four of them were early primers, intended for students just starting to learn. The early primer on Whispering wasn''t what she had possessed back when she had begun her education, but a cursory examination of the contents showed it contained the same subjects as her old texts: breathing exercises, how to properly perform cyclical breathing, how to align magic to the correct wisps, how to claim wisps, how to read flow diagrams, how to write flow diagrams¡­


    You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    The late primer contained what she had expected: several simple exercises that familiarized one with directionality, intensity, and the individual properties of the seven kinds of wisps, then steadily more advanced exercises that dealt with the interactions of two different kinds of wisps, and then three different kinds of wisps.


    If the other primers were written with any sort of sanity, they should also follow that format, something reinforced by the fact they all seemed to be from the same publisher. Hopefully that meant they were all of the same quality.


    Lori itched to start reading, to finally start properly teaching herself how to do the other three kinds of magic, but she knew if she did she wouldn''t stop. There were still things she needed to attend to. Rian had said they needed to have a long discussion about the results of the trading trip, she needed to set objective standards for¡­ whatsisname''s probation, she would need to know how Taeclas intended to go about putting meanings on their crops, she''d need to find time to study the bound tools Rian had brought, the research on white Iridescence alloys needed to be continued now that Rian was back to take notes¡­


    And Rian was probably going to ask for a holiday sometime soon. He was about due for that.


    So with shaking hands, she placed the eight books carefully on a clean, dry part of her table next to her almanac. First, she''d finish everything that Rian''s arrival meant she had to do, and then she''d start reading.


    ¡­


    Maybe she should just open one of the books and peruse the listing of contents, make sure that the book had been written sanely and contained the proper materials fo¡ª


    Lori jerked her hands away from the cover of the books her hands were touching. No, no, she couldn''t get distracted, she had things she needed to get done and oversee!


    ¡­


    She forced herself to step back, reminding herself of all the things she still needed to do. Eventually, Lori managed to tear her gaze away from the books and left her room, sealing the door behind her.


    Reading them could wait until she was finished with the work that needed to be done. She kept telling herself that as she climbed down the stairs at the end of the passage to her room. She just needed to finish her work, and then she could stop and read¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Rian found her as she finished checking on the bindings maintaining the dungeon farm. The lightwisps were producing the correct mix of light, seen and unseen, the humidity was controlled, and the temperature was as it should be despite the heat outside, so all was well. The drainage cistern was more than half-full of water and the smell from it was¡­ well, intense.


    "Rian," she said as she temporarily sealed the dungeon farm''s water spigot, "we need to schedule the cistern for cleaning. Tell people to use the water from it for irrigation until it''s nearly empty, and when it is we will recover what''s in it as more fertilizer."


    "Yeah¡­ it definitely didn''t smell that bad when I''d left," Rian commented, looking down at the murky water. "I''ll have to talk to people and make sure no one has been dumping waste from the latrine or fertilizer in there."


    Lori made a face at the thought. Yes, that actually would explain the smell, wouldn''t it? "Yes, that would actually explain the smell." She sighed. "Is it time for dinner already?"


    "Well, it''s time for people to start coming in for dinner," he said as they both started climbing the stairs up to the second level. "And on that subject, I wanted to know if you were going to have Taeclas and Rybelle eat with us regularly as a regular fixture at your table, or¡­ well, if you don''t. Personally, I feel that given the work you''ll be having Taeclas do, it''s best if you have her nearby to keep you updated on her activities and so that you don''t have to seek her out of have her come to for orders and inquiries."


    "That''s a reason to have Taeclas there, but why would I want that other person?"


    "Well, Taeclas and her wife would probably want to eat together. You know how married people are."


    "Yllian doesn''t bring his wife when he eats with me," she pointed out.


    For some reason, Rian broke out into a smile. However, when he next spoke, he sounded like he was restraining himself. "Well, you don''t eat with him regularly, so they probably see it as an irregular circumstance. But anyway, what do I tell them?"


    It was a question Lori didn''t want to consider. It meant she''d have to deal with more people, and unlike the people already in the demesne, she hadn''t taught them to stop bothering her yet, to not speak to her unless directly addressed, to bring matters up with Rian so he could deal with people and all she needed to deal with were problems, which unlike people she could use Whispering on directly. Even worse, the person in question was a wizard, so they were a threat to her¡­ or, well, highly likely to be a threat. Perhaps Rian had managed to find deviants twisted enough to not want to be Dungeon Binders. Even if they didn''t want to kill her to claim her core for themselves, there must be something extremely twisted in their thinking. They might be delusional or inclined towards murderous actions. Who knew what was going on in the minds of such strange people?


    Unfortunately, that was a compelling reason to have the woman¡ªand her wife, who was her most likely co-conspirator in anything she did¡ªseated at Lori''s table, beyond all the ones Rian had said. It put the woman in front of Lori where she could be seen, instead of letting her sit somewhere out of Lori''s sight and able to sneak up from behind. Lori would rather not have to divert her attention during her meals to watching her back through her awareness of wisps. Eyes were simpler to use. And what applied to the Deadspeaker applied to her wife as well, for the same reason.


    "Fine," Lori agreed. "But this time make sure she knows how she''s supposed to act!"


    "Of course," Rian said. "I''ll go tell them as soon as I''m done talking to you."


    She nodded irritably, but he didn''t leave. Instead, he continued to walk beside her with a smile on his face. Finally, Lori sighed. "What?"


    "Um, can we¡­ put off talking about business until tomorrow? I still need to talk to Riz, Kolinh and Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre."


    "¡ªShanalorre to find out all that''s happened and what I need to know, though I can take care of briefing Taeclas as to the condition of our crops and what we hope she can do. And it will keep her from focusing on you and trying to talk to you."


    Another nod, this one less irritable. "All right. By dinner tomorrow I expect you to be caught up with the demesne''s affairs. The day after, you will give me the longer explanation about the trading trip that you promised, and after that we will begin planning how to kill the typhon beast."


    "Got¡ªwait, what was that last? You said something really ominous just now!"

 374 - The Dangers Of Books To Schedules

    To Lori''s pleasant surprise, dinner wasn''t as annoying as she had feared.


    The Deadspeaker¡ªLori checked the new rock she''d made that afternoon¡ªKolinh, and¡ªno, wait¡­ that was definitely the wrong name, she could tell that much¡­ ah, here was the right rock, the description she''d thought to include matched¡ªTaeclas, and her wife had sat on the other side of the table next to Umu, who had a firm grip on Rian''s arm.


    "Hello, Rian!" Taeclas greeted enthusiastically, her voice somehow managing to cut through the normal background noise of the dining hall. "Who''s your¡­ uh¡­" She faltered, seeming to notice how both Mikon and Umu were sitting on either side of him, clutching at his arms as the women leaned against him, while Riz sat on the other side of Mikon, making a pouting face. As Lori watched, waiting for the food to be ready, Taeclas rallied. "Could you introduce us?"


    "Ah, Taeclas, you already know Riz. On my left here is Umu, and on my right between me and Riz is Mikon," Rian said. "Umu, Mikon, this is Taeclas and sitting at the end is her wife Rybelle. "


    Umu, who''d started to glare, visibly relaxed at that last, giving Taeclas and Rybelle a nod instead even as she seemed to tighten her grip on Rian''s arm.


    Mikon leaned forward to look past Rian. "Hello. It''s nice to meet you. You must be the new people Rian brought back with him from Covehold."


    "Yes, we are. Ah, how¡­ um, what is¡­ uh¡­"


    "Go ahead," Mikon said cheerfully. "You can ask."


    "I''m¡­ not sure what to ask," Taeclas said, one finger scratching at her cheek.


    "So!" Rian said brightly. "You''re both new here Tae, so I''ll show you where you can line up for food when it''s time. I can introduce you to the men and women running the kitchen¡ª"


    "No, you''re not going anywhere, Rian," Mikon interrupted. "You''re tired and you''ve been away from home for a long time. Umu, and I will take care of showing our new neighbors around while you sit here and relax."


    "I will?"


    "Come on, don''t you want to make our new neighbors feel welcome?"


    The expression on Umu''s face that she directed to the other weaver was one Lori had no trouble interpreting.


    "Look, neither of you have to, it''s no trouble for me to show Tae and Rybelle where¡ª"


    "No, you just sit down and rest, Rian. It''s our turn to get the food tonight, so we''re going there anyway¡­"


    Taeclas turned towards Lori, a confused expression on her face. She opened her mouth¡­ and Rybelle reached over and touched her wife''s hand, drawing her attention. The blue-haired woman shook her head, which took the Deadspeaker a moment to interpret, before she suddenly reached a realization, and theatrically shut her mouth.


    Well, at least Rian had managed to get that across.


    "Oh look, the food''s ready," Rian exclaimed, trying to get up and of course failing as Umu and Mikon still had a grip on his arms. "Uh, Umu, Mikon¡­ could you let me go now?"


    It was a pleasant meal, as Taeclas kept glancing sideways at the byplay between Rian and the three women, while Rian tried to hold a cheerful conversation with her, assisted by Mikon. It was mildly amusing to watch as Taeclas clearly wanted to ask what was going on and kept failing to properly articulate her question.


    Since she wouldn''t be discussing matters with Rian, Lori retired early to her room.


    The books were waiting for her.


    For a moment, Lori stared at them.


    The itch came back.


    Well, it''s not like she had any more work to do today... and she wasn''t that tired yet. Surely she had time for a little reading.


    Moving to the table, Lori picked up the early primer on Deadspeaking¡ªbecause it was the most immediately useful for their situation¡ªand took it to her bed.


    ¡­


    She¡­ might have to wash her bedroll and blankets soon. Lori remembered planning to do it¡­ when was that? Well, not important, she''d get to it¡­ soon.


    Arranging her bedroll in the upright recess against the wall she used when she''d been expanding the demesne so that she would be comfortable, Lori carefully opened the Deadspeaking primer¡ªfortunately, the book felt solid and secure in her hands¡ªand began to read.


    This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    At breakfast the next morning, Rian still looked sleepy, his hair still wet from having been at the baths before he''d arrived. Notably, Umu, Mikon and Riz were absent.


    "Rian," Lori said with poise and dignity, "did you stay up late last night?"


    "Did you get any sleep at all?" he retorted, blinking slowly.


    ¡­


    Lori didn''t dignify that comment with a response, and not because she couldn''t think of anything in time.


    The two of them stared at each other across the table, Rian raising his hand to cover his mouth as he yawned. He was also swaying from side to side. Yes, it was definitely Rian swaying.


    ¡­


    Perhaps she shouldn''t have started reading that primer after all. She''d found herself staying up all night, simply reading it and familiarizing herself with the most basic aspects of Deadspeaking¡­ not that she could remember what those were, at the moment. She remembered eagerly reading the early parts, resisting the urge to try anything until she had more information¡­ she remembered finding a way to balance the book on her sternum so she wouldn''t have to hold it as she read¡­she remembered reading just to find out what was next so she could make sense of the mush of words that she had read previously¡­


    There was a loud skidding sound as Shanalorre arrive, and with a practiced movement drew back the short bench next to Lori with one foot as she assisted her almost-asleep cousin to the table. It was almost impressive how the young girl managed to sit on the bench the right way before crossing her arms on the table to lay down her head. As Shanalorre moved the bench back in place, her cousin was already dozing again, her slow, even breaths whistling slightly¡­


    Lori opened her eyes and straightened hurriedly. Her half-lidded eyes glared a challenge at Rian, daring him to say anything.


    "Good morning, Great Binder, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said. Her pale hair was pulled back and tied into a tassel, likely to help with the heat. "Are you both well? You both seem¡­ tired."


    "Yes, I am very tired," Rian said, nodding. Then he forced his eyes open again. "I want to go back to sleep, but I should be fine again after breakfast."


    Shanalorre nodded. "Then our scheduled briefing as to the demesne''s stocks and supplies is still on?"


    Rian visibly winced. "I really want to say yes¡­" Rian muttered, "but¡­ can I get back to you about that?"


    "So you did stay up late last night," Lori said pointedly.


    "Can you say that with your eyes open, it''s hard to take you seriously otherwise."


    Her eyes were closed? Oh, right, they were closed. She''d better open them, then.


    ¡­


    She''d better open her eyes, then¡­


    "Your Bindership¡­" she heard Rian''s voice say, "perhaps you should go back to bed and join us for lunch instead? Or maybe even dinner? After all, it''s not like you have to work. If there''s anyone in this demesne who can afford to take a day off, it''s you."


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Oh, right, Rian was talking to her, wasn''t he?


    With what seemed like a great effort, Lori forced her eyes open to see Rian blinking at her. "What?"


    "I said maybe you should take the day off and get some sleep," Rian said. "There''s no reason for you to force yourself to stay up if you''re tired. You''re the Dungeon Binder, after all." He paused. "Though, if you''re going to take the day off, can I do that same? Just a half day off would be great. Because if you''re taking a day off, we''ll have to push the schedule we talked about a day forward anyway."


    "So you did stay up late last night!"


    "¡­" Rian ''¡­''-ed. "Yes, I stayed up later than I had intended to last night. Would you like me to give an account as to why?"


    ¡­


    "No, that won''t be necessary," Lori said magnanimously.


    Rian nodded. "Why don''t you go upstairs and sleep properly? your Bindership. Get some proper rest. If you woke up the same time yesterday as you always do, then you''ve been awake for more than twenty hours. There''s no dragon passing overhead. And if one was coming, then we''d need you well rested to be able to prepare the defenses properly. So it''s practically your solemn duty as a Dungeon Binder to go upstairs to your room and sleep for as long as you want. We can just push everything we discussed that we''d do to tomorrow."


    ¡­


    Well, when Rian put it that way¡­ Yes, she definitely had a duty to be as well rested as possible in case there was a dragon coming today. Though¡­ should she wait to eat something first? She''d been up all night, and while her stomach was strangely quiet on the matter, it was still occasionally poking her with the reminder that she hadn''t filled it all night¡­


    Eh, she could eat later. She wasn''t going wait the hour or so it would take for her to digest enough of the food to sleep safely¡­


    ¡­


    "Lori?"


    With a start, Lori realized her eyes were closed again, and reluctantly forced them open. "What?" she said blearily.


    "Do you want me to help you get to your room?" Rian said.


    Ah, right. Letting out a sigh, Lori reluctantly pushed herself to her feet, her hands on the table for balance. "That won''t be necessary," she said. "I can make it back just fine."


    Rian nodded. "Do you want me to accompany you and make sure people stay out of your way?"


    "¡­ fine¡­"


    Lori wasn''t sure how she got back to her room. She vaguely remembered her eyes being closed half the time, but obviously she''d somehow managed to make it there. Rian was probably involved. She remembered being annoyed as he made her wait while he fixed her bed roll, then again as she sat, her head lolling, while her boots were pulled off. They hadn''t been laced properly, she could have just kicked them off.


    She remembered some kind of cloth over her eyes, since the room was so bright¡­ why was the room so bright?


    She¡­


    ¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Lori woke up an indeterminate amount of time later, it was to a room that was far too bright to sleep in properly.


    For a moment, she debated getting up.


    ¡­


    Fixing her pillow and wrapping her blanket around herself properly¡ªshe didn''t need it, but she liked the feeling of it wrapped around her¡ªLori deactivated all but one of the bindings of lightwisps and went back to sleep.


    The darkness of her soul behind her eyes claimed her once again, and her last thought was to reassure herself that all her bindings would last until she woke up.

 375 - Until Dragons Drop Gold

    When Lori woke next, she was hungry, thirsty, her bladder was full, and her inner darkness was demanding to be unleashed. Fortunately, she had slept long enough that she was no longer tired. Sleepy and lethargic, but that was because she''d just woken up, and the forces within her demanding to be released caused her to rouse.


    The dining hall of her dungeon was empty and near-silent, so it was probably so late it was early. The only sound came from the the air being moved by the airwisps that provided air circulation and Lori''s footsteps. Her bare feet made no sound, even as she wished she''d put on her boots, or even the reed tsinelas that Rian had given her when summer had begun. Briefly, there was also the sounds of her adding her contributions to the demesne''s supply of fertilizer.


    Once the pressures upon her had abated and she had washed her hands, Lori set off to rectify her thirst and hunger. Finding water to drink was simple enough¡ªthat''s what the spigots in the kitchen area were for¡ªthough she had to look around to find a cup to drink from. After drinking enough to sate her thirst, she went looking for food.


    Her first thought was to look for fruits. They were edible, didn''t need to be cooked, and they had it in their stores. Well, they should have it in their stores. After some looking, Lori found baskets of food in the small cold pantry, a small room near that kitchen she had needed to excavate. It was where food from the coldrooms were left to warm to a temperature that was easier to handle, and thus was quite chill from the cold those foods brought with them. Between the warming foods were jars full of water, there to add their heat to the room.


    She found a pile of wet fruit no doubt intended to accompany the morning''s breakfast, as well as several piles covered by cloth that on inspection turned out to be chunks of meat she couldn''t identify. Lori helped herself to three of the former. Just enough settle her stomach so she could go back to sleep. The fruits were sweet, tart, and full of juices, so she had to wash her hands again. She didn''t know what to do with the peels, so she just threw them into the latrine to go into the waste pit along with everything else.


    Her stomach finally settled, Lori went upstairs to wash her feet and go back to sleep until the part of the morning when the sun was actually up in the sky again.


    She awoke again to someone knocking on her door with an enthusiasm she could only call ''obnoxiously cheerful''. If she hadn''t been hoping for exactly this, she''d have been very annoyed. As it was, Lori was simply annoyed at having to wake up, but¡­ well, there was work to be done. Grumbling, she got to her feet and padded towards the door. Drawing back the latch, she opened it a crack. "Is it breakfast already?"


    "Good morning, your Bindership," Rian greeted her with the obnoxious cheerfulness she''d been expecting. "Yes, it is breakfast already. Did you sleep well?"


    "Until I had to wake up."


    "Would you rather not wake up at all?"


    Well, there was that. "I''ll be down momentarily," she said.


    "Of course, your Bindership. I should be properly caught up on demesne matters by lunch, so we can talk then. In the meantime, I can discuss what you missed yesterday and the plan Taeclas and Shana have tentatively come up with when you get down."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively, though since that hand was behind the door, he didn''t see it. "Fine, fine, I''ll come down after I''ve refreshed myself."


    "We''ll look forward to your wonderful presence, your Bindership."


    Lori shut the door in his face, then surreptitiously smelled her clothes. Yes, time to change them. And it was probably time to cut her hair as well. Her bangs were level with her eyes again, and she could feel hair on her neck and over her ears. With a sigh, she went to take a bath.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After giving herself another reminder to do her laundry¡ªshe wrote it on a bone sheet and left it on her bed¡ªLori headed down stairs, wearing a new shirt, new chest wraps, new loin cloth, and new socks on her feet. The dining hall was noisy with the sound of people talking among themselves, and for some reason many people glanced at her as she came down and walked to her table. Shanalorre was not in attendance that morning, sitting instead at the children''s table behind Lori. The other Dungeon Binder nodded to Lori in acknowledgement before turning back to talking to Mikon''s two cousins and some of the older children. It seemed they were discussing their own laundry situation.


    Rian was sitting at his usual place, and this time the three women were with him. Riz was back to sitting next to Rian, Mikon next to her. There were also two women at the table, and Lori almost told them to leave before she remembered she''d given them permission to be there. The blue haired woman was sitting next to Umu, and the two of them were conversing cordially, though Umu seemed a bit reticent, as if unsure what she should be saying. Rainbows, which one was their new Deadspeaker again?


    Stolen story; please report.


    Lori checked her belt pouch for the right rock as she sat down.


    "Good morning, Lori!" a cheerful, feminine voice declared.


    Lori paused. Ah, right, the Deadspeaker was the loud one.


    "Flowerpetal, we''re not supposed to talk to Binder Lori without prompting or address her by name, remember?" the blue-haired woman said.


    "Eh? But I was just greeting her good morning. That doesn''t count, right?"


    "As long as you don''t expect her to acknowledge your greeting, then yeah, that doesn''t count," Rian said, still sounding obnoxiously cheerful.


    There was a moment of silence as Lori pulled out a rock and looked at it. Let''s see, her name was Kol¡ªno, wait wrong rock again. She pulled out the other rock, and put the wrong one back into her pouch.


    "See, she''s ignoring you, so it''s fine, it doesn''t count."


    "Ah, that''s good¡­ though, isn''t that kind of rude?"


    "I''m sure that if she was talking to us, she''d say that the Dungeon Binder is the one who decides what''s rude or not."


    "That¡­ I don''t think it works that way, though?"


    "Well, look at it this way, Tae: who decides what''s rude or not?"


    "But everyone knows what''s considered rude¡­?"


    "Yes, but how did they learn? And how did something become considered rude? For example, why is it considered rude to put beads on the table, or chewing with your mouth open?"


    "Wait, some people consider it rude to put beads on the table? Why?"


    "I have no idea. Some Dungeon Binder probably said so at some point."


    "Because if you put beads on the table, they''re going to roll off," Lori said. "That''s why you should always put your beads in a pouch or bowl."


    "What about cups?" Rian said immediately.


    "No. It''s a potential choking hazard since someone might accidentally pick it up to drink from it. Besides, cups are more likely to fall over and spill than bowls."


    "So¡­ should we consider it rude to put beads in cups around here, your Bindership?"


    "No, of course not. It''s just very stupid." Lori scanned the rock. "Taeclas, have you had the opportunity to diagnose the demesne''s infants yet?"


    The Deadspeaker blinked, surprised at being addressed, but she recovered quickly. "Good morning, L¡ªyour Bindership!"


    "You said that already."


    "I know, I just wanted to greet you now that you''ll reply. Yes, Rian asked me to check on the babes yesterday, and Sha¡ª" Next to Taeclas, her wife nudged her side with an elbow without the blue-haired woman looking away from the conversation she was having with Umu. "¡ªhmm? What is it, lovely? Oh, right! I mean, Lady Binder Shanalorre was kind enough to show me around and introduce me to the mothers and explain what I was doing. Thank you, Shanalorre!"


    "You are welcome," came from behind Lori.


    "Such a nice girl, her mothers must be proud¡­ anyway, I''m happy to tell you that all of the babes are completely healthy and growing nicely, and made doubly sure I checked over the mothers as well. Whatever Sh¡ªLady Binder Shanalorre did, it seems to be safe for infants. You can''t always say that about all meanings. Though the next time she heals someone, especially an infant, I''d like to exam them before and then after the Lady Binder uses her meaning on them."


    Lori nodded. "Arrange it with her later." She turned back towards Rian. "Anything else to report?"


    "Yesterday, I asked Tae to look over our mushroom farms, our crops outside, our ropeweed beds, and the dungeon farm downstairs so she can assess the best use of her time and Deadspeaking," Rian said, and Taeclas grinned for some reason. "She was very complimentary of the last, and has some ideas as to how she can help grow the crops, as well as a request for you." He gestured towards Taeclas again.


    She gave her lord a flat look, but turned to the Deadspeaker. "Your request?"


    "Ah¡­ I was hoping you''d give me permission to plant all my seedling and vegetables in your dungeon farm," Taeclas said. "It''s better for them than planting them outside, and Rian said you were going to plant all the seedlings you''d brought there anyway? Rian said I could, but that I should ask you to be sure."


    "I see no problem with that. Very well, you have my permission to plant in the dungeon farm."


    "Thank you, your Bindership! Just you wait, we''ll have all sorts of delicious vegetables ready in a few weeks!"


    That sounded contradictory¡ªin Lori''s experience vegetables were never delicious¡ªbut it was more food. "I will hold you to that."


    "Look forward to it! When the vegetables are ready, the stew is going to taste even more delicious! Also, Rian said I should get your authorization for any equipment I needed?"


    Lori''s eyes narrowed. "What sort of equipment¡­?"


    "Ah, nothing complicated. I just need wire."


    Wire? Why? "Wire? Why?"


    "Well it would take me too long to try and claim every crop planted in the fields by hand. I only have two hands, after all," Taeclas said cheerfully, holding both extremities up as if to demonstrate. "But if someone helped me, I would run a wire from one end of a row of plants to another, and when the wire is pressed up against the crops, I can tame their life without having to touch them one at a time. It will still take some time, but it will be the fastest way of doing it."


    She considered the matter. She could understand what Taeclas was suggesting with the wire, but¡­ "I don''t remember anything like that ever being done in the dungeon farms I worked at," she said.


    "Ah, most of the big farms and dungeon farms use a grid of metal rods or thick wire under the soil to act as a contact. I asked, but Lord Rian said you didn''t have something like that here, so I came up with this."


    Lori blinked. "Really?"


    "Oh, yes. Most of the time they use cheap metal like gold, since it doesn''t rust or react to anything in the soil. Anatass or magan works too, but those are more expensive. Any other metal would work as well, but they''ll corrode and you have to be careful they''d don''t react into anything that will taint whatever you''re growing. Don''t use lead. Never use lead."


    "Obviously," Lori and Rian both said.


    "It bears repeating. Repeatedly."


    Rian turned to Lori. "So, in addition to the wire, should I see about having the smiths get work on something like what Taeclas described?"


    "We do not have nearly enough metal of any sort for something like that," Lori said flatly. "Set the idea aside until a passing dragon decides to drop gold on top of us."

 376 - Honey Is Very Thankful

    They continued discussing Taeclas''s requests over breakfast after the food arrived. The Deadspeaker''s capability revealed itself as they spoke as she laid out the various advantages and disadvantages of their various food-producing areas.  The mushroom farms she considered of low priority, as while their addition was good in dishes, they really didn''t contain as much of what the body needed nor were as filling as the grains, tubers and bulbs that the demesne were growing. And while vegetables weren''t as tasty or filling as grain or meats, they did contain things that the body needed that were absent from the latter.


    When the woman had spoken of the dungeon farm, it had been as complimentary as Rian had said, praising the temperature, the light, the system that allowed excess water to drain from the various plots, and how orderly all the plots were.


    "Working there is going to be so easy," Taeclas declared, and for once Lori could understand the wide grin on the woman''s face. She could understand the appreciation for a workplace that would be a help instead of a hindrance to the work to be done. "It''s all spaced efficiently, it''s nice and cool, the humidity is just right¡­ the growing conditions there are wonderful!" Then she slumped for some reason, letting out a sigh.


    "So you should probably start working on the crops outside first?" Rian said.


    "I don''t want to! I want to work in the dungeon! It''s so perfect!" That last was almost a wail, and had Taeclas''s wife holding her and giving her more kisses on the cheek. "So easy to work there¡­"


    "So you should probably start working on the crops outside first?" Rian repeated.


    Taeclas let out a sob. What Rian was saying was unfortunately self-evidently necessary. After all, it was where the majority of their crops were.


    Once Taeclas had resigned herself to the necessity¡ª"At least you can have as many baths as you want," Rian pointed out, which had improved the woman''s disposition a little¡ªthey''d gone on to discuss what sort of equipment she needed. Wire, yes, but how much wire, and in what state? Rian had suggested putting wooden handles on both ends of the wire to make holding it easier for her and whoever was holding the other end. "Trying to hold on to a wire with your bare hands like that is going to be unpleasant, especially if you need to put some kind of tension on it so that it''s pressed again the crops properly."


    "That will require smithing work," Lori pointed out.


    "Most proper tools usually do. Besides, the handles will make it harder to lose track of the wire if Tae needs to put it down. Oh, don''t look at me like that, how many times have you just lost a piece of thread while you were sewing because it didn''t stand out against whatever you put it down on?"


    Lori took his word that wire could potentially be misplaced in such a manner, though she suspected only a very careless person would do so.


    "Well, I guess I''ll have to do something else while the handles are being put on the wire," Taeclas said cheerfully. "It''ll be the best time for transferring all my plants to a plot in the dungeon farm."


    "Actually, that''s right," Rian said. "Before you get started on the crops outside, you had best transfer the seedlings we''d brought into something more permanent. Uh, they are ready to be transferred, right?"


    Taeclas nodded. "Yes, they''re mature enough for that."


    "How many plots do you need?"


    After breakfast, Lori went back to her room so that she could stare at the list of things that needed to be imbued while she tended to them. Fortunately, none of them had run out of imbuement and dissolved, and so all she had to do was imbue them with magic from her core. Normally, she did this when she woke up before heading downstairs to eat, but then she usually woke up earlier as well.


    Once she was done, Lori considered the bound tools she had on her desk, near the books on¡ª


    ¡­


    Once she was done moving the books into the wall recess where she kept the spare boots Rian had bought for her and covered the books with her currently empty traveling pack so she couldn''t be distracted, Lori considered the bound tools she had on her desk. The wisplights weren''t really necessary at the moment, since light of any sort wasn''t an issue in her demesne, though she might have to bring one or two more with her the next time a dragon passed over for River''s Fork. Speaking of which, she''d have to find a rock¡­


    Her attention turned towards the other bound tools. Lori recognized most of them. They were bound tool versions of hand tools that she had seen before in carpentry workshops. Those two were clearly drills, though lacking a bit, there were two kinds of saws¡ªa rotating saw and a reciprocating saw¡ªthough the actual sawblades themselves were missing, a tool that was shaped like a planer which had a rotating cylinder on which blades were mounted, and a tool shaped vaguely shaped like a router plane that had a rotating mechanism in the middle.


    The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    Carefully, Lori picked up one each of the tools, realized she didn''t have nearly enough hands to do that, and resorted to putting them in the reed basket she used for carrying beads. They just barely fit the basket, which was fortunately sturdy enough to hold their weight. Still, she lifted the basket carefully as she left her room, sealing the door behind her as she went down to where the carpenters worked.


    The carpenters had two alcoves in the second level that was permanently theirs to keep their tools in. Piles of wooden planks were stacked in front of it, which would act as the demesne''s emergency wood supply for any repairs that needed to be done during and after a dragon. In front of one of the alcoves was a waterwheel standing atop a stone basin full of water. The waterwheel was connected to a lathe and a modest sized circular saw that the carpenters had put together with the assistance of the smiths for the blade.


    A stone pillar rose from one end of the stone basin, its purpose to pour water onto the waterwheel to make it turn. Once, Lori had needed to keep a binding imbued constantly so that water would flow up a pipe to be fall down over the waterwheel''s paddles. Now, however, the need to do that was gone. Instead there was a little bead receptacle on the stone pillar so the carpenters could activate the waterwheel themselves as needed instead of opening and closing a sluice.


    The carpenters noticed her approaching, of course, and one of them stood up to meet her, bowing as she approached. "Your Bindership," he greeted.


    Lori stared. He was wearing a cloth on his head, more to keep his hair out of his face than to absorb sweat¡ªRian had assured her that the second level was comfortably cool¡ªand on that cloth was embroidered the word ''Deil''. The thread used for the embroidery was undyed ropeweed thread, the same as the head cloth¡ªthat had better have been a corner scrap¡ªand to make the word stand out the embroidery had used wide lines.


    She glanced at all the other carpenters, all with innocently Rian-like looks on their faces. All of them were also wearing head cloths, which were all also embroidered.


    ¡­


    Well, that was wonderfully convenient. And the man''s face was just vaguely familiar enough that she was fairly certain he was, in fact, named Deil.


    "Deil," she said, and the man nodded, "Rian bought and brought back several bound tools from Covehold Demesne. Do any of you know how to use these tools?" She placed her basket on the work table next to the lathe and began pulling out bound tools.


    She left the carpenters with some beads to happily try out their new tools. Lori didn¡¯t know what new product of woodworking the demesne might need at the moment¡ªshe left matters like that to Rian¡ªbut she had the impression if there wasn¡¯t anything needed the carpenters would find something to make.


    With that done, she headed down to the dungeon farm in the third level. Taeclas and her wife were already there, being assisted by the brat and Shanalorre as they slowly removed seedlings and vegetables from pots onto some bare farm plots. The farm plots were new, made by Lori during the past month as she waited for Rian to get back with seedlings from Covehold Demesne. While she hadn¡¯t expected them to need all that space, Lori had been of the opinion that it was better to have a surplus of farming plots when the seedlings arrived than a deficit. And since hers was the only opinion that mattered¡­


    Besides, if there was any excess space, they could easily plant more tubers or grains there. Those crops wouldn¡¯t be in time with the rest of their ilk, but since they had Deadspeakers now, they could easily be made to be.


    For her part, Lori stayed only briefly as she anchored bindings of lightwisps over the farm plots that were being worked on. The bindings were specific, and needed certain ratios of visible and unseen light to be able to properly produce sunlight that plants could utilize. She didn¡¯t know how they utilized sunlight in their growth, only that they did.


    She could hear Taeclas talking happily as she explained to the brat and Shanalorre what each plant she was transferring was, what sort of care it needed¡ªshe was apparently separating plants according to how much watering was needed¡ªand how to tell they were ready to be harvested. While most of them were food crops Lori recognized¡ªeveryone knew what sharrods and clapper roots were¡ªit had been surprising to hear that one of the plant that the woman had brought with her from Covehold Demesne¡ªand from the old continent itself, apparently¡ªwas a sweetgrass plant.


    "It was really hard for me to keep Honey alive in Covehold," Taeclas explained to her attentive listeners as she carefully moved the plant from its pot. "Honey needs warmth to grow properly, and even though she''s been doing better this summer, for most of the year the poor dear is suffering from the cold. But I think I can get Honey to grow here in the dungeon farm. Truthfully, it could stand to be a little warmer, but¡ª"


    ¡°How warm does it need to be?¡± Lori said as she stepped up behind the brat to look down at the plant in question.


    "Oh, hello L¡ª" Taeclas began, only for Shanalorre to reach forward and gently place a finger over the woman''s lips, shaking her head. "Ah, right. Hello, your Bindership! Ah, sweetgrass needs it to be fairly warm. About¡­ uh, not quite as warm as it is around noon. Maybe mid-morning warm? Sorry, I don''t really know how warm that is by the quicksilver glass."


    Lori considered that. ¡°Don¡¯t plant that one just yet,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯ll arrange a room for it that can be kept at an elevated temperature.¡±


    ¡°Ah, would you? That would be wonderful! I¡¯m sure Honey will appreciate it a lot, won¡¯t you Honey?¡±


    ¡°¡­¡± Lori ¡®¡­¡¯-ed. ¡°Are you¡­ talking to the sweetgrass?¡±


    ¡°Her name is Honey! And she¡¯s very thankful that you¡¯ll be giving her a nice warm room, your Bindership!¡±


    Lori stared at the woman, then looked sideways towards¡­ whatshername, the wife. The blue-haired woman, for her part, simply smiled and shrugged as she directed a fond look towards the Deadspeaker.


    For a moment, Lori considered sending Taeclas back to River¡¯s Fork and getting the other one who wanted time off. People didn¡¯t normally give their plants personal names, did they?


    Though¡­ if she sent back Taeclas, the woman would take her plants and sweetgrass back with her¡­


    Lori resolved to speak to Rian about this, and perhaps have her lord subtly spread the word to have people keep away from the woman.  There was a good chance Taeclas might be insane.


    ¡­


    Well, she¡¯d give the woman some time and see if this possible lack of sanity negatively affected her ability to work.

 377 - A Room For Honey

    Taeclas spent the rest of the afternoon in the dungeon farm ensuring that all their new seedlings and other plants had been properly moved to farming plots, even taking wooden scraps from the carpenters to build a small fence around the plots to discourage people from walking through them.


    Lori, meanwhile, inspected the side tunnels she''d made looking for one that was convenient for her purposes. Thankfully, most were empty and none smelled of either piss or waste, although she found that someone had been using rocks and dirt to make their own tuber planters. Surprisingly, there wasn''t as much of a mess as she thought there would be given that the rocks were a loose barrier. The improvised planter was small and the tuber plants in it stunted and wilting because they didn''t have enough light despite being positioned as close to the mouth of the side tunnel as possible.


    ¡­


    After the brat and Taeclas had moved the stunted tubers from the improvised planter to the plot with the seedlings¡ªthere was plenty of room left in the farm plots¡ªLori set about turning the end of one of the side tunnels into a warm environment suitable for the sweetgrass. She excavated stone from the floor to make a plant box for the sweetgrass. Bindings of lightwisps were anchored to the walls to shine light down on the empty planter box. She''d wire them later, but for now it would be enough for her to work.


    Construction halted for lunch, and Lori found herself pleasantly surprised as when she saw that instead of flat little disks of bread Rian and Riz came back carrying round buns of leavened bread. The sound of conversation in the dining hall became loud and excited, and for once she could understand why. The flatbread they''d had was tasty, but only in comparison to not having flatbread. Having leavened bread¡­


    For once, Lori bit into her bread first, savoring the airy texture, the warmth, and the hint of salt as she chewed¡ª


    She chewed and swallowed. "Rian, what are you doing?"


    "What does it look like I''m doing?" her lord said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "It looks like you''re hollowing out your bread."


    "Now that would be very silly of me. No, I''m packing in the insides of my bread to make more room. Completely different thing. My way doesn¡¯t waste any of the bread."


    All right, she''d concede that.  "Well, why are you¡ª" Lori broke off as Rian took a meaty, tubery spoonful of stew and began stuffing the bead. "Ah. That''s why." She watched Rian as he continued stuffing his bread with stew, and he wasn''t the only one. "No, no, this explains nothing. Rian, why are you stuffing your bread with stew?"


    "Because this way, when I bite into it each mouthful will have a perfectly blend of sauce-soaked bread and stew," Rian said cheerfully. "Admittedly, this first attempt is probably going to have some defects that I''ll need to correct in future versions, but testing will still be delicious." He poured in a spoonful of only the sauce the stew had.


    "Well, be sure to eat it all. If it falls off your bread, I expect you to put it in your mouth and eat it anyway."


    "Yes, your Bindership." Rian began eating his stew-filled roll.


    "Shasha, can you make me one of those?" Shanalorre''s cousin said from the other side of the other Dungeon Binder.


    "Of course, Yoshka. Give me your bread."


    Lori glanced at her roll¡ªno, no, she wasn''t going to do something so silly. She ate as she always had, consuming her stew with a spoon and dipping in piece of bread for variety, then wiping her bowl with the last of the bread to clean it.


    Once lunch was finished, Lori went back to work. Excavating stone from the floor of the dungeon farm¡ªit would be the start of a new farm plot¡ªshe used the stone to raise up a wall to block off the planter for the sweetgrass. With string, weight and stone-levelling tool in hand, Lori made the wall tolerably plumb, leaving a door-sized opening to be filled in with a door later. The resulting room wasn''t very big¡ªit was a four-pace length of excavated corridor, with a third of that consisting of the empty planter¡ªbut it should be large enough to grow the sweetgrass.


    "Ah, it''s a bit too shallow, L¡ªI mean, your Bindership," Taeclas said, visibly reminding herself to not use Lori''s name at the last moment. "I''m keeping Honey in a pot right now, but sweetgrass is¡­ well, a grass. It needs room to spread its roots, especially if we''re going to be growing more sweetgrass than just Honey."


    "I see," Lori said, looking down at the planter she''d made. "How deep?"


    "Oh, a pace would be best, but half a pace will do as well. Although it will need drainage so that the roots don''t rot."


    ¡­ well, it was still summer. The sweetgrass could wait a day. Thankfully they still had farm plot-to-be full of rocks.


    Once Lori had excavated the plot to a pace and a half, she made a small drainage cistern off to the side to give water somewhere to go, surrounding the latter with a knee-high wall to keep people from accidentally falling in. Then it became a high wall so that people wouldn''t accidentally trip on it. And then she widened it because in the event a child fell in head-first, they''d be stuck in the position and potentially drown¡­


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    In the end, it was a larger cistern with a high wall around it, giving it a strong resemblance to a well, but at least it was¡­ well, far less likely someone could fall in and drown while unnoticed.


    "Rian," she told him when he sat down at the table, his hair damp from the baths, "I need people to put some of the drainage rocks in the plot I made for Taeclas'' sweetgrass."


    "Oh, you made a special plot for Honey? That was nice of you!"


    Of course he knew what the plant was called. Though to be fair, even she was unlikely to think the sweetgrass looked like anyone else¡­


    "Focus, Rian," Lori said flatly.


    "Right, drainage stones to be moved into the plot."


    "Large stones, smaller stones, and then a pace of dirt on top. Then have the carpenters make a door for the doorway I made."


    "You made Honey her own room?"


    "The sweetgrass needs warmer conditions, so it''s best to separate it from the other crops."


    "Ah. Would a normal door from the carpenters suffice, or do you want Tae to try at her hand at making the door?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Whichever is faster."


    "Are you sure? A simple project like this would be a good time to assess Taeclas'' skill in woodworking, as well as how well she works with the carpenters."


    Lori considered that. "Fine. Have Taeclas assist with building the door and learn whatever thing you feel needs to be learned from it."


    Rian nodded as Umu arrived, stepping over the bench to sit next to Rian. She leaned against him, and without looking away from Lori he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, giving her a squeeze in acknowledgement. "So, I''m up to date on what happened in the demesnes while I was gone. Except for the typhon beast and the disruption to hunting that it caused, everything seems to have gone well, so there isn''t really anything to worry about. Well, there''s our effect on the local seel population, but that''s sort of inevitable. In lieu of the lack of problems, I''ve had the carpenters start measuring everyone''s windows in preparation for putting paper on them."


    "Start with Shanalorre''s residence," Lori said. "The rest may be at your own discretion." With paper-covered windows, people could open the shutters on their homes to let in light without inviting in bugs. While it would be little advantage in the summer, when people would likely prefer to let in cooler outside air even at the cost of letting in some bugs, come the next season and the winter it would be more useful.


    Another nod. "Hopefully the bugs won''t chew on the paper too quickly," he said as Mikon and Riz arrived, sitting on his other side from Umu. ¡°Now, setting aside the issue of the Typhon Beast, are we still continuing the construction of the sawmill?¡±


    Lori nodded. ¡°Yes. With you present, we can at least begin the installation of the waterwheel and saw.¡± The carpenters and smiths had been making those over the past month, along with all the fittings needed to mount them. ¡°What is the status of those parts?¡±


    ¡°The smiths managed to finish giving the saw wheel teeth and sharpening them, so there¡¯s that. The carpenters have already test fit the water wheel, and have been working on the axles and gears needed for it. They''re not done with all the fittings yet, since they haven''t been rushing it like they did the waterwheel we built for River''s Fork last year, but we can get started on the foundations for the mill. And by ''we'', I really do mean ''we''. We can have people dig up the foundations and you can just set the stone in place when it''s deep enough, maybe excavate the river a little so that there''s room for the waterwheel.¡±


    "Did you think I wasn''t doing anything the whole month you were gone? I''ve already done the river excavation."


    "Ah, of course. I apologize for presuming otherwise. I''ll have people start digging. The carpenters should be mostly done with window frames by the time the excavation is finished and you''ve put in the foundations, and we can use the dirt for Honey''s farm plot."


    "Be sure to tell them to clean after themselves if they track dirt into my Dungeon."


    "I''m sure the people in charge of cleaning will be more than willing do that themselves, but I''ll be sure to tell them."


    "Hello, Riz! Hello, Mikon! Hello, Umu! Hello, Rian! And can you please tell her Bindership that I said hello and that Honey is really grateful for the special room her Bindership is making?"


    Rian smiled at Lori. "Tae says hello and that Honey is really grateful for the special room you''re making for her."


    "Noted," Lori said flatly as her new Deadspeaker and her wife sat down next to Umu, the latter giving the weaver her own more subdued greeting. "Taeclas, exempting the sweetgrass, have you finished with tending to the crops that you transferred to the dungeon farm?"


    "Oh, I can talk to you now! Hello, Binder Lori! Your demesne is wonderful! The baths are so nice! Ah, I''ve finished transferring them all, and now I just have to tend them to be sure they''re settling in properly. But don''t worry, I just need to visit them every morning, I can get to work on the crops in the fields outside. However, Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre."


    "Oh, right. Shanalorre suggested we practice working together first, holding a wire between us and then I use it to claim all the separate crops and tame their life into meanings, and then she uses the wire to imbue them, and then I activate the meanings. If we practice doing that for a little bit, we''ll be able to do things faster. Shanalorre said she''d never used imbued magic through a wire before, so she probably needs some practice on that at least."


    Lori frowned. On the one hand, she didn''t want Shanalorre to become more capable of Deadspeaking. On the other hand, simply learning how to imbue things through metal wasn''t really dangerous to Lori. Still, she''d have to prevent Shanalorre from learning anything else. The other Dungeon Binder was as Lori wanted her: useful, capable, and of little threat. Allowing her to learn to do anything beyond that was giving the Dungeon Binder the means to challenge Lori, and she couldn''t have that.


    "As long as she practices imbuement only," Lori said.


    "Of course," Taeclas agreed. "It''s far too dangerous for her to try anything else¡­ well, besides the one meaning she knows, but according to her that doesn''t work on plants, only people and maybe beasts and fursh. And given how much Rian says needs to be done, I don''t really have time to try to teach her. It''s not like I have any primers."


    "Oh¡ª"


    Lori kicked Rian. Fortunately, her aim was true, and her foot connected with him instead of either of the women next to him.


    Her lord stared at her, but didn''t continue whatever he was going to say.


    "Eh? What was that Rian?" Taeclas said, turning towards him.


    "Nothing, I just accidentally hit my own knee with my boot heel."


    "Oh, I hate it when that happens. If there''s any more pain, just massage it and it should be fine by tomorrow. Ah, if we had ice I''d recommend putting some on it¡­"


    "I can scrape off some frost from the walls of the cold room."


    "There''s a cold room?-!"

 378 - Tales Of Adventures In Mercantilism

    "So¡­ about you kicking me yesterday? What was that about? You usually have a good reason for committing violence on anyone''s person, and I feel I deserve to know what it was in this instance as the person in question."


    It was the following day, and they were in the alcove on the second level that Rian slept in when there was a dragon passing overhead. Once more, Lori considered setting aside a space to act as her office, and once more violently rejected the idea. If she had a room for talking to people, people would go to that room to talk to her. Usually she had these talks at her dining table after breakfast, but Rian had begged for this to take place in the second floor where it was slightly cooler. He was supposed to be telling her as to how the trading trip to Covehold had gone, but for some reason he had begun with this.


    Still, she decided to humor him. "You are not to inform Taeclas and¡ª" she reached into her pouch, picking at the rocks there, "¡ªKolinh¡ª"


    Lori paused, then sighed and took out all of the rocks in her belt pouch, glaring at them.


    "Maybe you can make the name rocks for Taeclas and Lidzuga out of bone instead of rock?" Rian suggested. "Or shapes. Theirs can be triangular, Kolinh''s could be rectangular. since he substituted for me?"


    Lori sighed. "Remind me to do that at the end of this discussion. As I was saying, you are not to inform Taeclas and Lidzuga that I am in possession of Deadspeaking primers, or any sort of primers at all."


    "Yes, I understood that, subtle as it was. Why though?"


    "Because I said so."


    "Also understood, but why are you saying so? If I don''t know that, I might follow the letter of your order and you know how this goes in plays and novels."


    Lori glared at him. "Shanalorre is not to be trained further in Deadspeaking. She''s useful the way she is. I will not have her being taught enough to become a threat to me."


    "Ah. Um, shouldn''t this be something you need to tell the people actually capable of teaching her?"


    "I will be dealing with the matter directly. However, you asked."


    "So you kicked me because you didn''t want Tae to know you had primers¡­ because you didn''t want her to start teaching Shanalorre¡­" Rian frowned, then sighed. "All right, two issues. First, the lack of primers is unlikely to really stop her¡ªor Lidzuga¡ªif they really want to teach Shanalorre about Deadspeaking. Secondly¡­ could you find some other signal to tell me to stop talking that doesn''t involve kicking me? You''re the Dungeon Binder, can''t you just blast air into my forehead or something?"


    "As I said, I intend to deal with the matter directly."


    "So¡­ you''re saying the kick to my leg was completely pointless in the long run because you''d have told them anyway?"


    "Rian, cease digressing, you said you would give me a report about the trading trip."


    Her lord sighed, but opened the leather folder that he gotten from his house after breakfast. "Just please consider the alternative to kicking me¡­ All right. You don''t care about the actual physical trip as long as we reached our destination and back safely, you care about the profits, right?"


    "Of course."


    "Right¡­" He opened the folder and drew out some papers. "These are the terms we agreed on, but there are several points that the merchant house would like to renegotiate next time, with your authorization. The first point is that they ask the beads be sold by weight instead of per bead."


    Lori raised an eyebrow. "By weight?"


    Rian nodded. "They say it''s ''a more reasonable measure'', but I think it''s because it makes it easier to round the price up and down on their part, letting them shave the price a little at the edges. For the record, I was able to get a measure of the average weight of the large wispbeads you made, but there''s a very small chance that the scales or weights had short weight. It''s unlikely, since I chose the merchant house partially due to their reputation for honesty, but I thought you''d want independent confirmation and a basis to calculate our own price."


    "What was the other reason you chose their merchant house?"


    "Convenience," Rian said promptly. "They were the only ones willing to come to our boat to pick up our goods instead of requiring we bring our goods to them. Given the amount and weight of our goods, I thought it best to minimize the chance that we''d be robbed on the way to the merchant''s."


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    Lori nodded slowly. Yes, she hadn''t considered how they''d transport their goods on arrival, had she? The boat hadn''t even had a hand cart on it. "I see. Continue, then."


    "Right. I would recommend agreeing to selling the wispbeads by weight¡ªagain, once you''ve ascertained the weight of the beads to your own satisfaction¡ªbut only if the overall order of beads is above a certain threshold¡­ say, five sengrains. If the amount of beads is over five sengrains, then the price is calculated by weight. But if it''s less than that, the price is per bead. The contracts allows for renegotiating the price of the beads, something I secured because I wasn''t sure you would be satisfied with the price I managed to get."


    Lori frowned. "What price did you get for them?"


    Rian told her.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After Lori stopped starring at the wall, contemplating the interplay of supply, demand, bead consumption, and bead renewal going on in Covehold, they continued the discussion. Despite herself, she couldn''t really find all that much fault in Rian''s reasoning for the price he''d established. While the people of the demesne could ignore the restriction the demesne of Covehold had placed on the swallowing and use of beads in bound tools, completely using up the supply of small and small-mid denomination beads would for all practical purposes force people to redesignate larger-denomination beads, effectively leading to¡­


    No, they were continuing the discussion!


    In addition to requiring a minimum number of beads before the price was calculated by weight, Rian had suggested that they renegotiate the price of individual beads to 11 bead-tani to give the merchant house incentive to order the minimum amount of beads for the by-weight price, which they''d calculate so that the average price per bead was in the vicinity of 10 bead-tani.


    "As your lord trying to help you maximize profit for the benefit of the demesne, I''d suggest that arrangement," he said. "As the one who handles ''dealing with people'' matters for you, I''d advise against it. A venture like this relies on trust and good will between ourselves and the merchant house we''ve partnered with. The fewer complications we impose on them, the fewer complications they''ll put us through in return. Complications are more costly for us since we won''t know about them until we get to Covehold, and given some might require your input, that could be weeks lost going back and forth on the Coldhold. It might even be so complicated you yourself might be forced to leave the demesne to resolve it. You hate leaving for River''s Fork enough as it is, imagine having to leave for Covehold. In the long term, it''s in our mutual interest to make the exchange as straightforward as possible."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm¡­''-ed. On the one hand, not trying to go for maximum profit grated on her soul. On the other, she was well aware of how the petty contract clauses that companies, merchants, houses and factors liked to impose on each other could act as an impediment to profit¡­


    ¡­


    Well, she already had her monopoly. All that was needed to make a profit was time. And since her demesne''s economy was all but completely isolated from Covehold Demesne and the other demesnes around it, they wouldn''t be affected by price fluctuations in the other demesne unless they deliberately involved themselves in the demesne''s economy, that is, bought something. All she had to do was sit back, not have to leave her demesne, and simply wait for the beads to roll in¡ª


    "Rian," Lori said sharply, "where are my beads?"


    "In my house," Rian said promptly. "You were passed out the day before and busy yesterday, so I didn''t have the opportunity to give them to you. Don''t worry, the receipt for them is here¡ª" he handed her a sheet from the folder, "¡ªless the beads we had to spend on expenses while we were in Covehold."


    Lori took the sheet of paper, glancing over it. "And all these expenses are¡­?"


    "First, let me begin by saying I trusted the preserved food we made ourselves to be safe to eat for a long time¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Once Lori had finished giving him flat, unamused looks and Rian had managed to justify their expenses to her satisfaction¡ªeven she had to admit the desire to eat fresh bread and something other than stew was a reasonable one¡ªas well as agreeing that any raw meat they purchased in Covehold might be questionable, she had him bring down the chest of beads. It was, as he said, a very nice chest, and the knot he''d described was still in place.


    "Have the smiths make a proper lock for this," she said as she cut the knot she recognized the style. It was a stylized knot that merchants used when they didn''t have any other way to secure something available. While it was complicated looking, it wasn''t that hard to do. Its advantage was that it was difficult to knot manually, especially with the ends of the cord snipped off, so it had to be cut off. Not impossible to counterfeit, but a reasonable protection and guarantee that whatever was sealed was unopened, especially if the merchant house used a distinctive cord. "It needs to be more secure."


    "What are you going to use it for?" Rian asked as she opened the chest.


    "Where else are we going to keep the beads you''ll be bringing home on the next trading trip?" Lori said absently as she stared at the wooden trays filled with double-large beads¡­


    ¡­


    ...


    ¡­she''d never seen beads in denominations this high¡­so many beads¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­she could buy so many books with these many beads¡­! With just one bead!


    ¡­


    ¡­


    The lid of the chest slammed shut, and Lori winced. She hadn''t thought she''d closed it that forcefully.


    "As your lord, I need to remind you that you tried lying down on beads before, and you said it was like sleeping on lumpy rocks. I doubt that''s going to change just because the beads you''ve planning to use have denomination markings."


    "The reminder is noted."


    "They also make for terrible pillow stuffing, in case you forgot."


    "Again, noted."

 379 - More Tales Of Adventures In Mercantilism

    They moved on to the rest of the list.


    The merchant house asking for regular shipments was¡­ to be expected, even if Lori didn''t like it. As to more regular deliveries¡­ well, Rian had promised another delivery before winter, so they would do that, though she wasn''t sending her lord right away. She needed him in her demesne, after all, and there wasn''t anyone she could send in his place.


    "I think we can do with fewer shipments a year if we''re carrying a lot of beads," Rian said, "though that will depend on the rate that the wispbeads are being sold. The problem will actually be spending our earnings."


    "You didn''t seem to have any problem doing so," Lori said flatly.


    "Yes, but food expenses aren''t even an appreciable fraction of our profits," Rian said. "My concern is that we''ll start pulling a noticeable amount of large-denomination beads from circulation if we don''t start spending our profits in some way." He made a strange, twisted half-smile expression. "Unless we start spending those beads, I''m worried Covehold Demesne might regard our actions as a form of economic sabotage. I don''t think we want to have that as a complication in our dealings."


    Lori shrugged. "Then we''ll simply have to see if we can find a bank of some sort. Why are you making that face?"


    "I''m crying and screaming on the inside. It would have been very nice to know I had permission to put all those beads in a bank." He sighed heavily. "Well, moving on. Yes, a bank would help. I''d worry less about being robbed, for one thing. Well, I''d worry less about losing anything if we get robbed. Alright, that removes the issue of needing to spend our earnings, although on a philosophical level I feel the profits should be spent on something instead of hoarded, but let''s set that aside for now. How many beads do you feel comfortable promising per shipment and how often? At the moment, we have the minimum commitment of one more delivery of at least a hundred beads before winter. I didn''t commit to more because I didn''t know how often you wanted it to happen and how many beads you wanted to make for the shipment. Though as the person who had to negotiate their sale, I don''t think it''s a good idea to sell that many again. It''s fine in this instance, but repeating it on our next trading trip will probably cause an oversupply, so I suggest a smaller amount. Maybe just something between two hundred and¡­ well, far less than eleven thousand."


    "Let''s send a thousand on the next trip for now," Lori said. "I''m sure that the merchant house will have a plea for how many the next one will be, which I will consider. As to the second shipment before winter that you committed us to¡­ We''ll see when a good time will be. There''s still much that needs to be done here."


    Rian grunted. "Well, that''s true¡­ but that being the case, I can''t continue being the only person you trust to lead a trading trip to Covehold Demesne. Not if it means work comes to a near-standstill here. If nothing else, the trading trip is the most risky thing we can do. An unexpected dragon, bad weather, overly aggressive dillians¡­" He shrugged. "You need other lords or ladies. Whatever capacity you want me to fulfill, you need people to take over the positions I''ll be leaving vacant as a result."


    "We did that. Shanalorre, Erzebed and¡ª" Lori reached into her belt pouch.


    "Kolinh. The name you''re looking for is ''Kolinh'', let''s skip the part where you get the rocks mixed up."


    "¡ªKolinh acted in your place when you were gone."


    "If that were true, you''d have started building the sawmill already," he pointed out. "Kolinh would be the one planning, organizing and actually in charge of building the sawmill even with me here anyway. All I''d be doing is being an intermediary between him and you. There''s no reason why you can''t send someone else to lead the trading expeditions." He paused. "Well, there''s one reason, but all I''d need to do is to go with them on the first trip to introduce them to our contacts and teach them what they''re supposed to do."


    "We are straying off the topic. The next shipment will be either when the sawmill is finished, after the next dragon, or next season after the harvest."


    "First harvest or second harvest? We''re trying for a double harvest now that we have Deadspeakers to try and accelerate growth, right? Speaking of which, have you come up with terms for Lidzuga''s probation yet?"


    "I am considering, but this matter has priority."


    "So you haven''t even started yet. Well, I hear from Yllian that he has Lidzuga checking over the dome, especially the damaged tree you wrapped in stone to hold it up. After that, Yllian intends for him to do maintenance on everyone''s houses, especially the ones built into the central tree. Best he''s not idle while you''re, ah, considering."


    Lori nodded approvingly. "Good. Have Yllian record how long it takes for him to do what, and how much whatever he worked on has improved, if any." She frowned. "Tomorrow, have the wooden boat¡ª"


    "Lori''s Boat?"


    "Yes, that one. Have the carpenters examine it and make a list of any defects they can observe, then sent down to River''s Fork for Lidzuga to do maintenance on. When he is finished, have the carpenters examine it again and note how many things have been corrected."


    "Do you mind if we have him add some wood onto it to make the side a bit higher?"


    "Later. We need to establish a baseline for comparison first."


    Rian hummed thoughtfully. "While we''re on the subject¡­ what do you think of making the requirements for the time off Lidzuga I asking for goal-based. You''re glaring, but at least hear me out. You want him to contribute, all right. You think he needs to contribute above normal to deserve his time off to do research, I don''t disagree. But rather than requiring him to do the same things Taeclas is doing but in less time or with more results, give him projects that he has to complete in addition to his normal contributions to get the time off he wants."


    "And you have projects in mind, of course," Lori said dryly.


    Rian shrugged shameless. "Have him make copies of Lori''s Boat. If nothing else, we need boats to go between the demesnes, or even just across the river. With the Deadspeakers now here to do maintenance on Lori''s Boat, we can afford to put it back into regular use since it can be repaired now. We can replace the hull of Lori''s Ice Boat with a wooden hull and get rid of the ice. That''s one less thing for you to maintain. Or better yet, we can have him make an improved design for a small boat."


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    "That will require raw material," Lori pointed out.


    "He''s in River''s Fork. Remember, in addition to the fruit trees, they also have some trees that grow branches, which they cut and dry to use for firewood. We should have some being stored up in the curing sheds for you to dry. That''s all the raw material he needs, provided the trees are kept healthy."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm''-ed. "Send the boat. I''ll consider your suggestion."


    "Of course¡­ and speaking of boats, there''s the last matter proposed during the negotiations with the Emborin and Sons merchant house. This is the one that most requires your input and decision-making. The merchant house suggested that we utilize the profits from our bead sales to commission a ship on the scale of the Coldhold in Covehold Demesne."


    Lori blinked. "What?"


    "That¡­ might have been partially my fault. I kept saying that one of the reasons we couldn''t make regular deliveries was because of the limitations of the Coldhold, and one of them suggestion commissioning such a boat in Covehold."


    Lori frowned. "What limitations?"


    "Lori, its hull is made of ice."


    "Yes. It was your idea to make it so."


    "I''m not denying that. It was the best material for a hull we had at the time, except for the bones and shell of that undead islandshell, and you didn''t want to use that."


    Lori shrugged.


    "Exactly. The problem is that the density of ice is barely lower than water, and since the hull needs to be thick so it doesn''t crack¡­ well, that''s a lot of mass. Your drivers have a lot of thrust, but they have to push a lot of ice through the water. A boat made of wood would be lighter, and as a result ride higher in the water, which means less resistance."


    She considered that. Well, all that was true. Certainly the driver would be more effective if it had less mass to push around.


    "And while we can theoretically do it ourselves now, we only have two Deadspeakers, one of whom is slow at woodworking. Covehold has far more woodworkers, far more Deadspeakers, and access to more and bigger bound tools. They''d get it done faster and better. At least, that''s the reasoning. I''m fairly certain that the merchant house partially suggested this so they''d be able to pay us in goods and services instead of beads, but that doesn''t mean it''s not a good idea if we want to have a better boat made in less time than building it ourselves."


    "Is it really necessary?" Lori said.


    "At this point¡­ not really. The Coldhold is sufficient for our needs for now. At most, having a purely wooden boat means we can stop worrying about you forgetting to imbue the hull, and you don''t have to imbue the hull anymore. With Lidz and Tae with us now, we can start making our own wooden ship. It will take plenty of time, and will probably be a large project, but we can finally do it. If we want to get it done in a reasonable time frame, we''ll need to build such a ship in River''s Fork."


    She frowned. "Why there?"


    "Because Lidzuga is there and it''s Shana¡­lorre''s demesne. Lidzuga will need to fuse the wood together to make a solid hull, and to do that quickly, Shanalorre will need to imbue his meanings so he doesn''t need to waste time doing it himself. And that''s just fusing the hull together. Our carpenters will also need to do the cutting and shaping of the rest of the ship so that it''s structurally sound and has internal supports, and it will probably be easier to fuse wood together if they already fit together. They also have the riverside open areas best-suited for actually building the ship, since¡­ well, we still have them here, but they wouldn''t be as conveniently close."


    "Can''t we just give the Coldhold a fused wooden hull?"


    Rian titled his head thoughtfully. "Hmm¡­ it''s a thought, but it would certainly require completely rebuilding the ship. Remove the ice, replacing all of it with wooden planks, fuse the planks together to make it waterproof, probably add in more reinforcement to keep the water from pushing in the planks¡­ we could probably do it, but it would mean not having the use of the Coldhold for that time. That means no ship to use to gather salt. At the end, it will probably take as much time as just building a new ship, and at the end of it, we''d still have only one ship. If we''re going to be investing all that time and effort anyway¡­" He shrugged.


    "¡­" Lori ''¡­''-ed. "Get an estimate of what it would take to build a ship of the same size or larger than the Coldhold. I''ll make a decision then. Is there anything else?"


    Rian shook his head. "No, that''s it." He drew one last sheet of paper from his folder, and placed the former on top of the latter. "Here''s the full list of our purchases. Once you''ve looked it over, can I release the cloudbloom so people can start sewing new trousers for everyone?"


    Lori took the folder and sheet. "I need new trousers too."


    "I''ll find someone who can do it. Do you want them to measure you, or would you rather give us your most comfortable pair so we can copy the dimensions of that?"


    Lori perused the list. Some, she expected. Others, Rian clearly picked on his own initiative, like the writing slates, which he said were for when they started lessons for the children. A few, however¡­


    "Rian, why is a sack of fruit-flavored sweets on this list?"


    "It''s for the children, your Bindership," he said promptly. "I was hoping to give it to them on the next holiday, but the heat and humidity seems to be making it melt, so I need to hand it out soon. Do you want to test a few to make sure it''s safe to serve to the children?"


    ¡­


    "Make sure Shanalorre is nearby in case it''s gone off," Lori said. She had to make sure it was fit to consume, after all, especially if it was going to the children. Very important responsibility, that.


    After going over the list, Lori tucked it back into the folder. She''d give it back to Rian so he''d have somewhere to keep papers on his next trading trip. "I think we''re done here. You can start distributing the cloudbloom, papers, pens, inks, and slates, and I''ll have my most comfortable trousers ready."


    "They''ll be laundered, right?"


    She gave him a flat look.


    "Because I don''t think you really want people to know what you smell like down the¡ª"


    "Yes, Rian, the trousers will be laundered. Make sure they come back to me in the same condition!"


    "Of course, your Bindership. Oh, and your Bindership?"


    "What now, Rian? I thought we were done."


    "You told me to remind you to give your name rocks distinct shapes so you mix them up less?"


    Oh, right. "Thank you for the reminder."


    They parted ways, Rian off to fulfill her orders, and Lori off to directly deal with the matter of ensuring that Binder Shanalorre would not be taught enough to be a threat to her.


    Following the rock with the binding of lightwisps she had given the other Dungeon Binder, Lori found her at the hospital, sitting at a stool and balancing a plank on her lap as she read another plank. The only others nearby were two of either the doctors or medics, sitting at a table and facing each other over a game board with cups of water in hand, fanning themselves with¡­ well, fans that seemed to have been made from beast feathers.


    The latter two looked up as she came in, but she waved for them to sit down as she headed towards Shanalorre. The latter glanced up and began setting her planks aside, rising smoothly to her feet as Lori reached her. "Great Binder."


    Lori nodded. "Binder Shanalorre. Have you begun practicing imbuing through a wire with Deadspeaker Taeclas yet?"


    "Not yet, Great Binder. The extension wire has only just been finished. We have arrangements to begin practicing after lunch in the dungeon farm."


    "I have orders for you, then. Except for imbuing through a wire, you are forbidden from learning any other aspect of Deadspeaking from Taeclas or¡ª" Lori reached into her belt ouch and pulled out her recently reshaped rocks, "¡ªLidzuga. Is that understood?"


    Shanalorre stared at her for a moment, then nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. I am not to learn any Deadspeaking from our new arrivals."


    "Or anyone else."


    "Or anyone else. Understood, Great Binder. May I inquire as to why?"


    For a moment, Lori regarded her. "You''re useful the way you are. There''s no need to change that."


    "I see¡­ thank you for satisfying my curiosity, Great Binder."


    The two exchanged nods, and Lori left to see to other matters. She headed for a river, hoping she''d find a par of nice rocks quickly¡­

 380 - Not Completely Useless

    At dinner that night, Lori handed Taeclas¡ªshe''d checked her now-triangular rock just a moment before¡ªthe nicer of the two river rocks she''d found that afternoon. Like Rian''s, the rock fit easily in the palm, rounded and smooth, with a flat side that would let it lie evenly on a surface. The opposite side glowed from the heavily imbued binding of lightwisps anchored to it, shining brightly. "Here," she said as she held out the rock to the Deadspeaker.


    "Oh! For me? Thank you!" Taeclas said as she reached for the rock, which Lori let go. "Ah, Rian had something like this. I suppose I shouldn''t be surprised he got it from you. Now we don''t have to use the oil lamp so much!"


    "I told you you''d get one," Rian said.


    "Don''t lose it," Lori said. "Best you keep it in your belt pouch at all times."


    "I will!" Taeclas said cheerfully, doing just that. "This will be really convenient for going out to the latrines at night. Even with the lights outside the houses, the way to the latrines is a little dark."


    It is? "It is?" Lori said, looking towards Rian.


    "I''ve never thought there was a problem," Rian said.


    "Eh? But it''s so dark! There''s that slope going down to the pavilion there, and then there''s another dark stretch on the road until you reach the path to the latrines."


    Her lord looked genuinely confused. "That''s¡­ why don''t you just use the latrine a little bit uphill from your house, at the end of your row?"


    "There''s a closer latrine?"


    ¡­


    Was their Deadspeaker an idiot as well as insane? Actually, idiocy would explain naming a plant as well. But¡­ she was a wizard. One couldn''t be acknowledged as a wizard without the intelligence to have studied sufficiently! So she couldn''t be an idiot! But she was acting like an idiot! So¡­ how¡­ how¡­


    ¡­


    Lori decided to just not think about it. Though she wasn''t going to let Taeclas use Deadspeaking on her at the moment. She''d see how the crops turned out first.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, Lori headed for River''s Fork, as much as she didn''t want to.


    With the boat back, she''d have preferred to use the Coldhold, but as it was just her, Riz, Shanalorre, and the ones Riz had chosen to escort her, the Coldhold would have been too much, so it was Lori''s Ice Boat again. This time, however, Rian followed behind them on Lori''s Boat, up until he overtook then because he had only himself as a passenger. He had to stop a few times to let them catch up.


    They still managed to arrive in River''s Fork a little past mid-morning, and fortunately or unfortunately, she hadn''t seen the Typhon Beast drinking on the shore of the river on this trip.


    Lori had disembarked and was watching as Lori''s Boat was beached¡ªshe''d removed the bone panels that acted as stabilizers to keep the boat going straight beforehand¡ªinstead of being tied to the dock as normal when Yllian finally arrived. "Great Binder," he greeted, which Lori acknowledged with a nod.


    "Yllian!" Rian called from where he was helping move the wooden boat further onto shore. "Could you call some more people over to help lift this out of the water? And call Lidzuga too? Her Bindership wants to talk to him!"


    Once there were more people, it was relatively easy for all of them to lift Lori''s Boat out of the water and place it on the trestle stands that usually supported it when it was stored in her dungeon. Once the boat was in place, the outriggers needed to be removed so they wouldn''t weigh down the boat and make it wobble on the trestles.


    By the time that this was done, with Rian using a wooden mallet to remove the wooden wedges that squeezed the locking mechanism holding the beams of the outrigger in place, Lidzuga had revealed himself. "You called for me, your Bindership?" the Deadspeaker said.


    In reply, Lori held out the less nice of the two river rocks she''d found yesterday afternoon. Like the rock she''d given¡­ whatshername¡­ the crazy, possibly idiotic woman who''d named a plant¡­ the rock fit easily in the hand. Its surfaces had been smoothed by time and the river''s waters. One side was mostly flat, which would let it lie evenly on a surface, but rather than being rounded, it was irregularly shaped, with seven sides in total and had a pointed, if blunt, protrusion on the side opposite where it was flat. "Here," she said as she held out the rock to the Deadspeaker.


    "Uh¡­Oh! Thank you, your Bindership! This will be really useful at night!" He glanced back towards the dome over the settlement. "And a bit in the late afternoon."


    "Don''t lose it. Keep it on your person at all times."


    "Of course, your Bindership!" The Deadsp¡ªLidzuga seemed to have recovered from her chastisement. Lori wasn''t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.


    "I am told you''ve been performing maintenance on the houses and other structures of the demesne."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Binder Shanalorre and I have an arrangement where she''ll imbue any meanings I tame and leave deactivated overnight. It''s really helped me with imbuement-heavy meanings. I''m almost done with all the houses that are occupied, there''s just the ones that are high up on the central tree."


    "So you haven''t begun working on accelerating the growth rates of the crops yet?"


    "Not yet, your Bindership. Lord Yllian and Binder Shanalorre both said that performing proper maintenance on the houses and the dome was to come first for public safety, and then Lord Rian said that a special wire was being made that would help me with claiming and taming the life in the crops. "


    Well¡­ she supposedly she hadn''t exactly given him anything to do for his probation, so it only made sense that Yllian¡ªand Shanalorre, apparently¡ªdecided to assign him productive work. "Good. I''m here to assign you further tasks. They will count towards the fulfillment of your probation."


    "What do I need to do, your Bindership?" He sounded eager.


    "Have you conducted an examination of the load-bearing portions of the dome yet?"


    "Only of the broken portion, your Bindership," Lidzuga said promptly. "I''m told you were the one who wrapped it in stone? It seems to be holding, but Lord Yllian asked me to fuse the tree back to the stump, and there was enough contact that I was able to. If you could remove the stone, with Binder Shanalorre''s help I should be able to fuse more wood to the stump for a more secure support, once we''ve collected enough."


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    "Collect enough material to do so first," Lori said. "Unless there''s an imminent structural risk, the matter is not a priority." She gestured at Lori''s Boat. "This is our oldest boat. I am told it was built by Shanalorre''s predecessor, who was also the one who built this dome. I need you to examine it and provide what maintenance is needed. Do what you can to waterproof it."


    Lidzuga stared at the boat. "It''s a box," he said, his tone strange.


    "It was originally intended as a cargo barge that would be pulled from land. After I acquired it, it was modified to suit our needs. The modifications had to be as they were since we could not repair the boat should it be modified with carpentry."


    "Oh¡­ I guess that makes sense? Truthfully, I don''t really have much experience with boats. The Coldhold and the one that took me here to the new continent is the extent of my experience with them."


    "I''m sure Rian will be more than willing to answer any questions you have," Lori said. "However, that shouldn''t be necessary. You are only to do maintenance, reinforcing the structure, check for rot, add more wood as necessary, and study the structure of the boat."


    "Study it?" Lidzuga said cautiously.


    "After some consideration, I have decided that directly comparing your productivity to Taeclas during your probationary period would be difficult to quantify." Possible, but difficult. It would need accurate record keeping and calculation, and they probably didn''t have any people to spare for that. Something easier to confirm was better.


    The feeling of hating Rian having a point was a familiar one to her by now. Not pleasant¡ªbeing wrong would never be pleasant¡ªbut at least it meant future mistakes potentially avoided. Being annoyed that a mistake wasn''t made was far preferable to being annoyed that a mistake had happened.


    Lidzuga looked hopeful at her words, and fortunately for him that was all he did.


    "Finish performing maintenance on all Deadspoken buildings under the dome, and maintenance on the dome itself. Keep the dome from collapsing and crushing everyone beneath it. Are you capable of that?"


    Instead of answering, the Deadspeaker looked towards the dome, eyes narrowed critically. "Hmm¡­ I could, but with this sort of structure, Deadspeaking alone has its limitations. It would be better if we had people who could climb to prune the branches and reduce growth that way. Without that¡­ I would need a way to claim the entire dome and have Binder Shanalorre imbue it, simply so I''d have the sort of fine control needed to alter the shapes of branches enough to structurally weaken them."


    Lori grimaced. That sounded extremely inefficient. "Do what you can that''s reasonable. I''ll see what can be done about manually¡­pruning? Pruning. Well, so be it. Maintenance of Deadspoken buildings will be your responsibility from now on, although you need only take action about an occupied building when a matter is brought to your attention. Inspect unoccupied buildings once a month at your discretion. The dome is to be actively maintained, lest it collapse, but how you go about it is up to you. If it becomes structurally weak and collapses during the next dragon''s passing, I will want an explanation as to why. Is that understood?"


    "Yes, your Bindership. House repairs when asked, storage repairs when needed, don''t let the dome collapse."


    Lori nodded. "Once you''ve finished inspecting and performing maintenance on the buildings and dome, your regular duties will be caring for the crops and accelerating their growth. A wire is being made to make it easier for you to claim the life in the crops."


    "A wire? Not a mesh?"


    Lori blinked. "A mesh?"


    "Oh, you haven''t heard of those?" Lidzuga said. "Well, no surprise, it''s relatively recent. I heard some smiths were starting to make them and selling them to the farming demesnes outside of Covehold. You take wire and mount it to a wooden frame, arranging the wire into a lattice like a giant bugswatter. The lattice is mounted on a haft with a wire running down it." He mimed holding a long staff-like tool. "You hold the haft and lay the wire lattice on the crops you intend to claim and it lets you have a contact the size of the frame head. Properly arranged, the wire lattice can touch most of the crops the frame is laid on, and it''s a tool that only needs a single person to use."


    Lori stared at him. There was something about that smile¡­ "Inform Rian," she said. "Explain every detail to him. He''s the one arranging tool construction with the smiths. Whatever tool you receive, however, I expect you to get started on applying meanings on what crops we have to accelerate the harvest. At the moment, this demesne is subsisting on meat procured from hunting and seeling. With the typhon beast that settled outside of its borders, hunting has ceased, and what seeling is being done is not providing sufficient surplus for the demesne''s winter stores."


    For some reason, an eager smile broke out over Lidzuga''s face. "There''s a typhon beast outside of the demesne?"


    "Yes, and you will not go near it until it''s dead. Anatomical drawings can be made no matter what its vital state."


    "But¡­ the opportunity¡­!" The man looked like he was in actual physical pain.


    "At the moment, the opportunity I''m concerned about is the opportunity to hunt and feed my demesnes, which its presence is preventing. So it will die."


    "¡­ can I at least be present when you deal with it?" he pleaded. "Just to see it alive and in motion¡­?"


    Lori gave him an unamused look. "Convince me of your reliability by providing me with a harvest as soon as possible."


    "Yes, your Bindership! You can count on me!"


    Well¡­ at least he intended to work. "Can you reproduce the meaning that''s been used on the fruit trees?"


    Again he paused, looking thoughtful. "Yes, although it will take time. A large amount of the trees are part of the meaning, so I''ll need to claim relatively large portions of each tree I intend to place the meaning on. Though I respectfully suggest I don''t use the exact same meaning."


    "Why not?"


    "The meaning on this one is a northern-style binding. As a side effect of the accelerated fruiting, the leaves and some other parts of the plant tend to run hotter than is normal for a plant. In the north, this wouldn''t be a problem because of the climate, and actually lets them grow fruit trees from warmer environments, but with the summer we''ve been having, the parts of the plants under the influence of the meaning have been slowly dying because they''ve been getting too hot. I''ve taken the liberty of temporarily deactivating the meanings on the trees and letting them rest for the moment."


    Lori frowned. "That is unacceptable," she said. "We need the fruits the trees provide to augment our food supplies."


    "With all due respect, your Bindership, the fruit trees need time to recover. I could use a meaning to assist the trees to heal, but that would require altering the meaning on the life of the afflicted areas, and I''m not sure I could reconstruct the meaning in question."


    Her eyes narrowed. "I thought you said that you could reproduce the meaning given time?"


    "Yes, but that time would have been spent studying the meanings and trying to plot out its flow diagram. Whoever made this binding had either far more experience with it than me or had a flow diagram they were following, and I wouldn''t know which. If there is a flow diagram I could follow, that would make things easier, but I''d still need to modify it for each fruit tree. That''s another matter, the lack of adjustments to the meaning to account for the trees'' growth, nutrient supply and pervading weather conditions have been part of what''s harming it. The fertilizer and regular watering have helped, but¡­" He shrugged. "You don''t just leave a meaning unattended on something alive. The living change, and the meaning has to be changed to account for that."


    That last adage was a familiar one. She hadn''t heard it in school¡ªshe''d been a Whisperer, after all, and had attended lectures meant for Whisperers¡ªbut it was often a sentiment she''d read in some form or other in her novels. She supposed this was probably evidence that it was true.


    "We''ll have to deal with that, then," she said. "In that case, in addition to monitoring the fruit trees and activating them when conditions are right, I will need to you find local fruit trees and apply an equivalent meaning to them. Once applied, be sure that people know to provide the fruit trees with waste and water. Yllian should be able to direct you towards the local fruit trees."


    "Um, wouldn''t it be better if I simply started raising a small grove of the fruits in question nearby?"


    Lori looked at him. "That leads to the second part of your probation," she said eventually. "I have decided to assign you projects. These once your probationary period is over, completing these projects will earn you¡­ time off¡­" she allowed her face to convey what she felt about the concept, "for you to conduct your research. But after your probationary period! You still need to prove your capability!"


    "Yes, your Bindership! Thank you, your Bindership!"

 381 - Projects

    Lori gestured towards the Lori''s Boat. "As I said, you are to study that. As a probationary project and assessment of your skills, you are to build at least five boats to the same dimensions and quality during that period." She paused. "Well, not the exact same modifications. Speak to Rian, I''m sure he''ll have modifications in mind."


    "And that''s my cue!" Rian said cheerfully as he entered the conversation. Given the fact he''d finished with removing the outriggers some time ago, he probably meant that literally. "While I do have modifications in mind, I believe you should try to reproduce the Lori''s Boat first, since it''s a simple design and mostly straightforward angles."


    Lidzuga blinked for some reason. "Its name is Lori''s Boat?"


    "Yes. Not to be confused with Lori''s Ice Boat, that''s the one made of ice covered in planks," Rian said, pointing at said boat.


    "No one is likely to confuse those two, Rian. They have completely different dimensions," Lori said, shaking his head as she turned back to Lidzuga. "As I was saying, you are to make five boats during your probationary period, after you have done your regular duties. You will inform Yllian when those duties are done before you proceed with the boat-building project. In addition to the boats, I will also consider starting a new grove of fruit trees as a project for you to complete. The grove should have at least three trees of each of the fruits we have available. That project is considered completed once fruit can be harvested from the trees. Is that clear?"


    "Five boats and a grove of fruit trees," Lidzuga confirmed. "The first boat will be a direct reproduction of¡­ Lori''s Boat, and subsequent ones will have modified parameters."


    "Don''t worry, they should be relatively simple," Rian said. "Most of them are modifications intended to get the boats to balance better without the outriggers. Even if they don''t work as intended, we should still have functional boats." He turned to Lori. "What resources does he have to draw on, your Bindership?"


    "Did you also deactivate the trees that grow firewood?" Lori asked.


    "No, your Bindership," Lidzuga said. "The meaning on them isn''t as taxing on those trees, it just makes them grow quicker and express it in certain areas so that the branches are easier to cut. This heat hasn''t caused as many adverse effects, and I was able to heal what I could and recreate the meaning."


    "Then source your raw materials from there," Lori said. "Put meanings on more trees if you need to."


    "I¡­ see. Um¡­ do I need to do the work all by myself¡­?"


    "They are projects intended to assess your capabilities."


    "Uh¡­ can I borrow tools, then?"


    "You may ask to borrow tools. However, no one will be under any obligation to lend them to you or assist you. These are your projects."


    With each word, Lidzuga looked more and more pained.


    "You need not complete these projects," Lori continued. "You need not even do them. However, then I will have no basis to do anything but refuse your requests for time off to do research. If you cannot prove that your productivity during the times you work is sufficient to cover the resources you will continue to consume when you''re not working¡­" Lori shrugged. "That said, if you manage to complete all five boats, or the grove and two boats, before the end of the probationary period, I will consider your probationary period concluded. Each project you complete after that period will be rewarded with half a day off at minimum, at my discretion."


    Lidzuga''s gaze sharpened at that. "Really?"


    Lori nodded. "If you manage to complete enough projects to end your probationary period early, then if you complete the remaining projects or project, you may have a full day off from sunrise to sunset once I have inspected the result of the projects and confirmed you have completed them to my satisfaction."


    "Or you could not do the projects and just do your research at night," Rian said. "You have a light source now. You can stay up to draw as much as you want." As Lori gave her lord a flat look, Lidzuga touched his belt pouch, looking like he was giving the suggestion serious thought. Well, it didn''t matter to Lori. As long as he contributed to the demesne when work needed to be done, she didn''t care what he did at night.


    She shrugged. "As I said, these projects are optional. You could simply not do them, and continue on your probationary period doing the bare minimum. Gather what samples you can, research and study at night. Be tired the next day. "


    "¡­how many more days of my probation do I have, your Bindership?" Lidzuga asked, face set in a thoughtful expression


    "As I did not properly assign you anything to do, the period begins today. You have four weeks."


    Lidzuga nodded, face still thoughtful. "I can do that¡­" he said distractedly, before nodding again. "I''ll have to borrow a saw¡­"


    "Before you start sawing, you have maintenance to do," Lori said, pointing at Lori''s Boat.


    "Ah, yes, your Bindership!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They ate lunch in River''s Fork. After all, if Lori was going to be traveling back to her demesne in the middle of the day, she might as well not do it on an empty stomach.


    "Shanalorre, do you know where your predecessor''s effects are being kept?" Lori asked as the two ate together. Rian looked up sharply at the question, and for some reason Riz sitting next to him winced.


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    She managed to eat two mouthfuls before there was a slapping sound. "Why do you ask, Great Binder?" Shanalorre eventually said.


    "LIdzuga needs the flow diagram for the meaning that was tamed onto the fruit trees to be able to replicate it in a timely manner," Lori said. "If such a flow diagram exists, it would be in your predecessor''s effects. If you know where it is, tell me so they can be searched for the flow diagram we need."


    Lori managed to eat another two mouthfuls before there was a slapping sound. "The effects in question have been secured and stored in my house, which my cousin Verik should be maintaining twice a week. Unfortunately, to the best of my knowledge, any written material wouldn''t be there."


    Lori frowned. "Where would it be?"


    Shanalorre sighed quietly. "My uncle laid claim to all such material when he was attempting to teach me Deadspeaking, stating that he needed to study it before he could teach it to me. They should still be with him, unless he destroyed them."


    Across the table, Rian groaned, resting is forehead on both hands as he slumped down.


    Sighing, Lori continued eating. She was not going to be dealing with this problem on an empty stomach.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Excuse me doctor, but we need any papers or notes of Binder Koshay''s in your possession," Rian said with an amiable smile on his face, because this was exactly why Lori had him. "Shanalorre told us that you had them."


    "I have no idea what you''re talking about," Shanalorre''s uncle said, splitting his glare between Rian and Lori. Next to him, his wife wore a neutral expression, sitting next to her husband but remaining relatively uninvolved beyond her gaze boring at Lori.


    "We have a witness who says otherwise," Rian said, still smiling. "Right, Shanalorre?"


    "Otherwise."


    Standing behind them, Lori shifted her gaze to turn her unamused look towards her lord and her subordinate Dungeon Binder. Had they rehearsed that? No, she''d been with them both all though the meal when the subject was broached.


    When she turned her attention back to Shanalorre''s uncle, his glare had moved down to look at her subordinate, who met the gaze evenly.


    "There you have it, Lasponin," Rian said. "Now, I''d like to politely ask you to let us have the papers please, or¡ª"


    "Even if I had such papers, I''d have a right to them," the doctor interrupted. "It''s right there, isn''t it, in those ''rights'' you promised? I have a right to own property. You have no due cause, and nothing you can compensate me with!"


    "¡ªor," Rian pressed on cheerfully, "are we going to have you charged with theft? As the previous Dungeon Binder''s property, it should, of course, go to the next Dungeon Binder. Or if you prefer, as Binder Koshay''s property, it should go to his next of kin. In both instances, that would be Shanalorre."


    "He was my brother, you¡ª"


    "Why do you want Koshay''s papers?" the doctor''s wife asked, interrupting what sounded like a personal attack.


    "We have reason to hope that among his papers is a flow diagram for the meaning he used for accelerating the fruiting of the fruit trees around the demesne, Mistress Vyshke," Rian said, turning smoothly towards the woman. "If it''s there, Lidzuga would have an easier time with the maintenance he''s doing on the fruit trees. If it''s not there¡­" Rian shrugged. "Well, at least we looked and made sure."


    "And if what you''re looking for isn''t there?" the woman pressed.


    "Then the papers will be returned Shanalorre as their rightful owner. They did belong to her parents, after all. She deserves her inheritance. Or do you disagree?"


    The last was directed at the doctor.


    There was silence for a moment as the man gave Rian a hate-filled glare, eventually interrupted by the sound of Shanalorre''s hand slapping against her own cheek.


    The doctor glanced at her with a frown, only to find the same even gaze as before. "Why is she doing that? What have you done to my niece?"


    "I wish I knew," Rian said. "She does that every time certain subjects are mentioned, and unfortunately Yoshka''s not around to stop her from doing it. So, are you going to have mistress Vyshke hand over the papers, or are we going to have to search your house?"


    For some reason, the man looked past Rian to glare at Lori. What? She hadn''t even said anything. All she''d been doing was keeping herself from punching him in the face every time he opened his mouth to say something idiotic!


    The doctor, it turned out, did have several notebooks and loose sheets in his possession, several of which were wrinkled and generally shabbily treated. Fortunately, the papers were hardy and well made, and despite ill handling most of them were still whole and readable. Every book and sheet of paper was confiscated, despite the doctor''s attempts to protest.


    "Doctor, we have absolutely no reason to trust you," Rian said cheerfully. "We''re going over each of these¡ªwith your wife''s supervision, of course¡ªto ensure that you haven''t decided to hide anything. Don''t worry, Yllian assures me he''s familiar with the late Binder Koshay''s handwriting. I assure you, we will return all of your papers and books back to you."


    "This is an outrage! Those are my papers!"


    "We know, doctor. Hence why we''ll help you sort through them, since your papers seemed to have gotten mixed together with the late Binder Koshay. Don''t worry though, Yllian will be as quick as possible. We have no reason to take any papers of yours, after all."


    Sorting through the materials was quick. Once Yllian had identified several pieces of paper with Binder Koshay''s handwriting on it as examples, it was easy to set aside the ones that didn''t have that handwriting. Lori was able to identify the flow diagrams herself. Despite the different notations used in Deadspeaking, she recognized the general appearance from her almanac, and immediately set those aside to peruse. With the three of them sorting through the papers and notebooks in Shanalorre''s office¡ªand the Vyshke woman there to see they weren''t hiding or trying to destroy anything, unlike her husband¡ªLori''s subordinate had wandered off because there was no more room in the building, presumably on some errand.


    While she hardly knew how to read them, a few looked strangely incomplete to her eyes, with lines and arrows that just stopped. Some of those were likely scratch work as Binder Koshay worked out the flow order of something or other. A few seemed complete, although she couldn''t tell what they did, and the few notes weren''t helpful, reading more like reminders than explanations, such as ''adjust metabolism'' and ''test tomorrow''. Binder Koshay clearly hadn''t meant for anyone to read them but himself.


    "Hey, Yllian, do you recognize who''s handwriting this is?" Rian suddenly said. "It looks like a there''s a third person''s notes mixed into this." He held up a sheet of paper, passing it to the other lord.


    Yllian glanced at the paper with a frown. "Ah, that''s Laven''s handwriting. I didn''t realize any of hers were in here."


    "That''s¡­ Shanalorre''s mother, right?" Rian said, glancing at Yllian and the Vyshke woman. At their nods, he shrugged and set the sheet next to the ones they'' already identified as Koshay''s notes. "Well, these should go to Shanalorre too. Unless you have some sort of objection, mistress?"


    "Give it to Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected, not looking up from the flow diagram she was looking at.


    "¡ªShana. I''ll deal with my husband."


    "Thank you."


    "Do not misunderstand, young man. What I do, I do for my niece, not for you or your Dungeon Binder."


    "Noted. Yoshka is doing well, by the way. Thought you''d like to know.


    "So Shana has already said."


    In the end, a smaller pile of papers and notebooks were returned to Shanalorre''s annoying uncle. The flow diagrams were given to Shanalorre¡ªwho had returned from her errands smelling like rotten fruit¡ªwho in turn gave the papers to Lidzuga. Everything else was carefully wrapped with a carry cloth, which Shanalorre carried back with her when they returned home.

 382 - Accelerated Harvest

    Rian looked up from the almanac Lori had handed him, having apparently finished reading the entry on the typhon beast. "And you want to kill one of these things?"


    "It''s necessary," Lori said. "Its presence has disrupted the hunting in the vicinity of River''s Fork, impacting the available food supply. Until¡ª" Lori reached into her belt pouch and felt around for the rocks there, glancing between them to find the note signifying gender, "¡ªTaeclas can significantly increase our crop yields, we are still dependent on hunting the local beasts and seels for a significant amount of our food. As such, the disruption the beast is causing must be dealt with."


    "And so you want to kill one of these things."


    "Yes."


    "Did you find out how to do Mentalism without telling me? Because unless you''ve found a way to fly above this thing and throw down lightning, any attempt at trying to kill it will have to be done at ground level, where it can eat us."


    "Do you have a better suggestion?"


    "No, but that doesn''t mean trying to kill it as we are is a good idea! We have a river, can''t we just hunt on the side of it the typhon beast isn''t? And it''s River''s Fork, so there another river to be on the other side of!"


    "We have, but the hunters have not been as successful in their hunting there due to the a noticeable lack of beasts."


    "¡­ Are you telling me that beasts¡ªdangerous beasts that are bigger than us, faster than us, and have more claws than us¡ªfind this thing so terrifying that they don''t think being on the other side of a river from it is safe enough¡­ and you still want to go after this thing?"


    "I don''t want to, but it''s necessary to keep our food supplies for the coming winter stable, and we need the experience should we have to deal with another one of these things in the future."


    Rian groaned, closing his eyes and burying his face in his hands. Lori took the opportunity to take the almanac back from him, inspecting the pages for residue or stains before properly closing the book. "Rian, stop being theatrical."


    He didn''t, raising his head slowly as if he was doing it for dramatic effect. "Do you at least have some sort of plan?"


    "Find the area where it regularly drinks. Place a lightningwisp-based trap. Kill it."


    "Ah. And have you figured out where that is yet?"


    "The hunters are still ascertaining the location."


    "Ah. And¡­ this trap you want to set up¡­ how long will it take to prepare? Because I doubt you want to have the typhon beast show up while you''re still in the middle of preparing."


    "¡­"


    "¡­have you at least practiced preparing your trap and timing how long it takes so you know how long you need?"


    "¡­"


    Rian sighed. "Well, at least you haven''t actually tried to kill it yet."


    "We were waiting for you. Killing the typhon beast is a major undertaking, after all."


    "I have never been more glad you don''t want to do anything that needs coordinating with people without me," Rian said, sounding very fervent for some reason. "All right¡­ tell me about this lightningwisp-based tra¡ª"


    "No!" Riz exclaimed. "Rian, please, don''t ask about the trap until after we''ve eaten!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After the lightningwisp trap was described, Rian offered the suggestion that the issue of the typhon beast continue to be deferred until the hunters had sufficiently ascertained it''s habits such that they could reasonably predict where it would be. The plan he was able to quickly formulate was¡­ honestly annoying in its simplicity, but it relied on learning a bit more about the typhon beast''s habits, as well as the loss of some meat from both their stores and from their freshly butchered seels. Until those habits were learned, they waited.


    This didn''t mean they were idle.


    Over the next few days, the carpenters focused on making frames so that everyone could have paper sheets on their windows. While the addition was simple enough, and sort of silly to Lori, it meant that people could have light come in through their windows while they were technically closed. As such, some people could work in their homes without the doors and windows being open to let in light, meaning the bugs could be kept out.


    The weather made it all seem like a sick joke. It was so hot that apparently people waited well into the night for interiors to cool before they went to sleep, and at midday her dungeon''s second level and dining hall were full of people avoiding the heat. No one was spending time in their houses if they could help it.


    Still, the frames were made, the paper glued onto the frames, and the finished screens mounted onto people''s windows. Just because it seemed unnecessary now didn''t mean it would be so forever. Once the weather shifted next season, it would be more useful for those who worked in the workshops that had been converted from houses after some families were moved. Some people, like the chandler, she couldn''t allow to set up a workspace in her Dungeon because of the odor. She''d actually had to set up bound tools to draw air up the chimney to keep some of the workshops ventilated. It didn''t do much for how hot the house was, but it pulled air in through the open door, keeping the smells mostly contained as the odors were vented well above the nearby houses.


    Lori assisted in mounting the new paper screen shutters to the windows once the carpenters finished assembling them. The woodworking went on noticeably faster compared to how long it took to make shutters the previous year, and the carpenters were almost childishly enthusiastic as they used their new hand-held bound tools. Part of that was no doubt from how much less materials the screens used, since most of the screen''s surface area was composed of paper.


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    The wire lattice on a pole that¡­ whatshisname, annoying male Deadspeaker¡­uh, Lidzuga¡­ suggested was made, though as a proof of concept test, one of the mesh screens was given to¡­ whatshername, crazy plant-naming Deadspeaker¡­ Taeclas to see if she could use it as a contact for claiming and taming stalks of their crops. When it was shown to work¡ªand the mesh they used for the test wasn''t damaged¡ªLori authorized the wire to have three of the poles made. The final result was a tool consisting of a wire lattice on a pole three paces long, on the sound logic that some reach was needed. They wouldn''t be able to use the full three paces when holding the poles horizontally, but the length made a decent counterweight so that the lattice could be controlled and not damage or dislodge the heads of vigas.


    The length of wire with handles was retained in case it had some utility. Rian had started muttering about putting the ends of the wire on poles and hanging mesh screens from the wire, and Lori could almost see what he was thinking.


    With the wire in her hands, whatshername started working her Deadspeaking on their crops on the fields outside. According to Rian, she woke up early in the morning, the rock Lori had given her tied to her forehead for light, and used the new pole to claim and tame meanings on to their crops until breakfast, after which she continued until it was far too hot to work outside, at which point she moved on to claiming and taming meanings onto the crops, tubers, vegetables and saplings in the third level.


    Lori had learned this when she''d found the woman napping in one of the alcoves in the second level one afternoon, and Rian had hurried intercepted her to explain that the woman had technically already done a day''s work. She left the woman alone after that. Lori wasn''t unreasonable, after all. As long as the woman started working before sunrise, she saw no reason to interfere with a well-deserved afternoon nap.


    For various reasons, the limiting factor soon became Shanalorre. In addition to having difficulty using the poles as she tried to imbued the crops due to her small size, she needed to spend more time on the crops to imbue them to the amount of magic that would sustain the meaning for five days, which was the amount that Taeclas said would be enough to push the crops to maturity so they could be harvested. Shanalorre also started waking up before dawn as a consequence, to take advantage of the relative coolness.


    In an attempt to try to help Shanalorre get her imbuing done faster, Rian had, on his own initiative, tried to find a way to increase her productivity.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori arrived out in the fields to find Rian, Riz, Shanalorre, and both wire lattice poles in the demesne¡ªthe third had been sent to River''s Fork to be used there. Despite everyone wearing wide-brimmed reed hats to keep the sun off them, everyone was sweating.


    Her lord and Riz were standing on either side of Shanalorre, holding the wire lattice poles and laying the heads¡ªgently¡ªon top of some of the crops that Lori supposed¡­ whatshername¡­¡ªshe checked her rocks, feeling around for the one of the right shape¡ªTaeclas had probably already tamed with meanings and just needed imbuement. Riz was wearing an expression of tired exasperation, but was at least holding the pole properly so the wire lattice only rested lightly on the crops as Rian spoke to Shanalorre.


    "Rian," Lori said, repeating herself until her lord finally looked up to face her. "What are you doing?"


    "Seeing if there''s any way Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre."


    "¡ªShanalorre could imbue twice as many crops at a time!" her lord said cheerfully. Up close, her lord was clearly less uncomfortable in the mid-morning heat, while both northerners were sweating so much they looked like they were taking baths. Slightly less uncomfortable.


    "By using twice as many poles, I presume," Lori said.


    "Yup," Rian chirped. "After all, the limitation is how many crops she can imbue at once, not how much imbuement she had. At least, I presume that''s the case if her access to magic as a Dungeon Binder is the same as yours."


    "It appears to be working, Great Binder," Shanalorre interjected, one hand wrapped around each pole as she imbued the meanings on the crops through the wire in her grip. "However, I am unsure if doubling the number of meanings I can imbue in this manner is efficient. Adjusting both poles to make contact with the next set of meanings without overlooking any meanings in between takes notably more time than maneuvering a single pole by myself."


    "I see. Do you have a rebuttal to this, Rian?"


    "I''m sure that we can fix that problem with a little practice," he said with persistent cheerfulness.


    "No," Lori said firmly.


    "But¡ª"


    "I am not losing you to being Shanalorre''s pole carrier during the mornings and before, Rian."


    "It doesn''t have to be me!"


    "So Shanalorre will have to begin from the start with someone else, thus losing more time?"


    "I know we''ll lose a few hours as they start, but once they know what to do¡ª"


    "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Let Shanalorre get back to work and put the other pole back to wherever it''s supposed to be stored." Huh¡­ where were they storing those things?


    A sigh. "Yes, your Bindership."


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    Unfortunately, the initiative did not bear fruit¡ªor grain, as it were.


    Despite these difficulties, Shanalorre and Taeclas''s work yielded good results. When it became too hot to work outside, Shanalorre took a bath, checked on the children in her charge, and then moved on to imbuing the crops that were being grown in the dungeon''s third level.


    The crops in the dungeon farm were the first to mature enough to harvest. After Shanalorre had imbued them, Taeclas had activated the meanings so that they were all affected on the same day. They had reached maturity within the week, and had promptly been harvested, the gathered sheafs laid out in the sun to dry¡ªit had been judged that the sun would do a far better job than the desiccator sheds¡ªbefore the grains could be winnowed. Word had also arrived that River''s Fork was in the process of harvesting. As Shanalorre technically still claimed the demesne''s dungeon''s core, the imbuement of the crops there had been much easier.


    Lori had needed to take a trip to River''s Fork and form a binding to keep bugs from devouring the drying grain. It had been an effort taking sticks topped with softened rocks and arranging them around and between the stacked sheafs. With the stone to let her anchor the binding of lightningwisps, she''d been able to establish the bug-repellent binding over a wide enough area. Some softened stone, a short length of wire, and the reduced but still very large wispbead that had been used to imbue River''s Fork''s dungeon shelter defenses were used to keep the binding imbued as a crude but usable rudimentary bound tool. After all, she wasn''t going to waste a bound tool core on something like this.


    It was only a small harvest, but Rian asked her for a holiday anyway.


    "In this heat?" Lori said incredulously.


    "Well¡­ admittedly, everyone will probably spend the holiday in the dungeon," Rian admitted, "But come on! It''s our first harvest that was accelerated by Taeclas and Shanalorre''s Deadspeaking¡­ and Lidzuga''s too, down in River''s Fork. Something like that is worth celebrating, even if people will be celebrating by staying indoors where it''s cool."


    "What, no roast meats? What kind of holiday is that?"


    "It''s a bit too hot for roasting, though¡­?"


    "Then what''s the point?"


    Rian stared at her. She stared right back.


    "Right¡­ so, just to confirm¡­ you''ll authorize the holiday if there''s roast meat?"


    "It''s the only part of holidays I like. If there''s not going to be any roast meat, I see no reason for there to be a holiday at all."


    "I was thinking we''d have honey bread with every meal? You know, to celebrate being able to harvest the crop in the dungeon farm?"


    "¡­ and the roast meat?"


    Rian opened his mouth¡­ then paused. He closed his mouth, tilting his head thoughtfully. "As long as there''s roast meat, right?"

 383 - Prelude To Shana’s Holiday

    Shana¡ªShasha to a few, Great Binder or Lady Binder to most, Shanalorre to Binder Lolilyuri¡ªhad quite enjoyed Lorian''s Demesne''s mid-winter holiday, at least up until the point she had needed to prove her seriousness to the other Dungeon Binder. While River''s Fork had been well-prepared for the winter¡ªafter all, the winter had been quite mild¡ªthey hadn''t the resources or infrastructure for such a thing, although some families had taken turns visiting each other.


    She had moved into her office once she had judged it was far too dangerous to keep climbing up the stairs to¡­ her house near the peak of the dome''s central tree. Most of the day she just sat in the gloom, covered by every blanket she owned, and rousing herself enough the make bland bread and chew on smoked meat once a day. Sometimes uncle Yllian, mushka Vyshke or one of¡­ her family''s friends¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­would invite her to share their fire and a meal, but it soon became impractical to keep leaving her house. And then Rian had arrived invoking her agreement with Binder Lori, and she had stayed in Lorian for the rest of the season.


    She was aware that she had ruined the holiday with her actions. However, given the path that negotiations were taking, there had been little choice.


    The holiday they''d had back in spring had been enjoyable. There''d been roasted meats in various cuts and sauces, board game competitions, and a strange race where children had sat on their parent''s shoulders trying to balance a piece of fruit on a spoon.


    Shana hadn''t gotten the chance to roam at the time, because she''d been told to sit on a bench¡ªwhich had at least been shady¡ªand people had made sure no knives or any sharp objects were anywhere near her. Her meat had come to her already cut, which she''d had to eat with a spoon since she wasn''t even given a fork.


    It had still been enjoyable experience, and Karina and Yoshka had been there for company. The other children had greeted her as well, but they hadn''t stayed, opting for more fun diversions such as the contests that Lord Rian had led. Despite the fact that Shana had needed to remain where she was, she''d found herself participating as some of the challenges Rian had set had been things like, ''bring me a Dungeon Binder''s favorite fruit'' or ''tell me a Dungeon Binder''s favorite color''. As even the children knew better than to bother Binder Lori¡ªeven if they were the only ones she''d tolerate doing so¡ªthey all went to Shana.


    It had been fun to be included.


    Now, however, a new holiday had been announced in celebration of the small harvest that she and Wizard Taeclas had been able to induce on the dungeon farm''s crops. In the larger fields of crops on the surface a long strip on the edge of the fields were maturing and would be ready to harvest in a day or two. Already a rope was being laid to separate the matured vigas from the ones that were still to be accelerated, to try and prevent accidentally reaping immature stalks.


    That, however, was none of her concern, especially not today. It was a holiday, after all.


    Because of the summer heat outside, the holiday was being held in the dungeon. Shana had thought that it would be similar to the holiday that had been held during the winter, with improvised grills along the walls heated by Binder Lori''s Whispering, dancing and music while it was still daylight out, and board games being played on many of the tables.


    That¡­ wasn''t how the holiday was planned.


    After breakfast¡ªwhere they had honey bread in addition to salted leavened bread, the sticky green-glazed treats leaving stains around Yoshka''s mouth¡ªnearly everyone settled down to rest. Many went down to the second level to nap in the empty alcoves, bringing bedrolls from their homes or sometimes just pillows to lay their heads on. It was a marked difference from the demesne''s day to day routine of regular work, even if the summer''s heat had made the work slow by midday.


    Still, even if no one was working, that didn''t mean that no work needed to be done. The plates, utensils, cups and jars for drinking water all needed to be washed, as did the large copper cooking pots and the trays used to bake their bread. The floors needed to be swept, the tables needed to be wiped, and any scraps taken out to the compost pit.


    And in her case, she needed to make sure all the children in her care were accounted for.


    After all, they would be going on a trip today.


    "Is everyone ready, Shana?" Rian asked, calling down from the deck of the Coldhold.


    "Shanalorre," Binder Lori off-handedly corrected as she always did.


    "Shanalorre," Rian ''corrected'', meeting Shana''s eyes and winking.


    Her lips twitched slightly in a small smile. She wasn''t sure if he did it to deliberately bait Binder Lori to correct him, or if he was simply so used to addressing her casually when Binder Lori was absent.


    As to his question¡­


    Shana turned to where all the children in her care had gathered around one of the two bound tools that had been hung from the ceiling, which Binder Lori had converted into a combination of wisplight and weak air jet, all trying to be in the range of the breezes being generated. She''d made sure that all of them had washed their faces of any sticky honey and that they''d all gone to the latrines beforehand. She turned back to Rian. "Everyone is accounted for and sitting down."


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    "We''re ready to go, then. Riz, could you please switch the steam jet driver to reverse?"


    "Reversing, Rian!"


    Sitting next to the controls of the Coldhold''s bound tool driver, pulling it down to reverse, Ninang Riz moved the control lever into position. Shana felt the subtle vibration of water beginning to be drawn through the long tube that ran through the ship, which began to move.


    "We''re on our way, your Bindership!" she heard Rian''s voice report from above her.


    The Coldhold wasn''t being controlled by its usual crew on this trip. Rian hadn''t wanted them to be away from their families, and had been planning on trying to control everything himself, but Ninang Riz had of course volunteered to accompany him, and as there was no reason for them not to¡ªthere was no work to be done, after all¡ªMikon and Umu had asked if they could accompany him as well. More surprisingly, Binder Lori had allowed it, though she''d given that glare she sometimes did and warned the two women from distracting Ninang Riz and Rian as they had operated the Coldhold.


    Shana had been more surprised that Binder Lori was accompanying them. The woman made no secret of how much she disliked leaving her demesne, and today''s holiday was an excellent reason for her not to. Still, there had to be some sort of reason. The older Dungeon Binder never did anything without a practical, utilitarian reason. Once, Shanalorre had tried to do the same, but now¡­ well, she was no longer a Dungeon Binder who needed to tend to her demesne. She no longer had to learn.


    Normally, Binder Lori would be staying in her private room at the front of the Coldhold, even with the heat. She could make bindings of firewisps and airwisps to destroy heat and circulate the cooler air, after all, and put a binding outside of her door to block out the sounds of the children. So why was she sitting in the cabin above? Well, Shana supposed she was keeping watch on Mikon and Umu so they wouldn''t distract Rian as he steered the ship¡­


    The trip downriver was uneventful. True, the children tried to play in the limited space available, and kept asking to be allowed up onto the deck to be able to look around¡ªBinder Lori vehemently denied that request¡ªbut that wasn''t eventful, that was just dealing with children. To be honest, she was glad that Binder Lori had denied them. It was all Shana could do to keep the children settled down without Koyan, Kayas and Karina to assist her.


    When they arrived in River''s Fork, the children''s parents were waiting. Despite her best efforts, some of the children ran from the boat onto the docks and towards their parents, but fortunately no one fell into the water. She watched from the cabin, seeing a smile on her uncle''s face as Yoshka ran up to him and he picked her up and spun her around.


    Once the children were out of the way, the supplies they''d bought from Lorian for River''s Fork''s own holiday¡ªshe and Wizard Lidzuga had also managed to induce an accelerated harvest here as well, after all¡ªwas unloaded. It was mostly chunks of cold but not frozen meat, and jars of honey for baking honey bread, and the men and women of River''s Fork moved quickly to unload them.


    "Do you want to stay to spend time with your aunt and uncle?" Rian said as the last of the food was unloaded.


    Shana shook her head. "My presence would only aggravate my uncle. Let him enjoy spending time with Yoshka without my presence reminding him of more than that."


    "I''m sure your aunt could¡ª"


    "Rian¡­ please drop the issue. Please?"


    It was redundant, but Rian sighed and did as she asked. "Fine. Promise me you''ll try to have fun."


    Shana nodded. "I will. I shall spend the holiday with Karina, if it will not be intruding."


    "You know, Lori only talking to me is because of her personal issues with talking to people. Karina doesn''t need to be your only friend."


    "Noted."


    "Your Lori-like response isn''t as reassuring as you might think it is¡­"


    Shana turned towards the hatch leading down into the ship. "I shall retrieve the bound tools so we can use them up here."


    She heard Rian sigh.


    Soon, the Coldhold was reversing from River''s Fork''s pier, its prow pointed upriver as Rian had Ninang Riz set the steam jet driver to its maximum speed. One of the bound tools had been hung at the back, where Rian, Umu and Mikon sat, the latter two sitting on the deck near the hatch down into the hold below as Mikon kept Ninang Riz involved in the conversation. The other was hung at the cabin, positioned to blow air where Binder Lori was sitting. Or rather, Binder Lori had sat where the bound tool was blowing its air.


    Sitting nearby, Shana saw Binder''s Lori''s eyes were focused on the shore on one side of the river. More concerning, however, was that the older woman was holding an arrow. One end was fletched with beast feathers, while the other was tipped with what appeared to be a reshaped beast tooth. One of Binder Lori''s fingers rested on the arrowhead, and the way she was breathing in a familiar pattern¡ªdespite not really needing it¡ªsuggested she was imbuing the arrowhead.


    Shana didn''t ask why. Instead, she simply sat next to Binder Lori, enjoying what breeze made it around the older woman, and simply watched the shore as well, even as she took the opportunity to imbue the bindings that remained on the firewood trees in River''s Fork. The meanings on the fruit trees remained what she recognized now as deactivated, including the fruit trees hidden in the secret platform that existed at the peak of the dome''s central tree.


    It had been difficult to help Wizard Lidzuga climb up there in the space of an afternoon during one of the times she''d found a pretext to visit her former demesne so he could deactivate the meanings on them, but at least it meant that rotten fruit was no longer piling up there.


    Shana sat there, distantly aware of the low-voiced but unintelligible conversation occurring at the other end of the boat, enjoying the relative quiet and peace after a morning of keeping children in line. Today was a supposed to be a holiday, after all. Resting and relaxing was supposed to be what she was doing.


    She felt it when they left her demesne. By now, she was familiar with the feeling of seemingly being torn in two as the life in her body left the embrace of her demesne''s borders. Her awareness of the dustlife on her clothes, of the hidden bugs in the ship, of the ships planks and hidden beams vanished. The disconnection still made her shudder slightly, but only just.


    Next to her, Binder Lori straightened, then leaned forward, gaze and expression intent as she stared out over the now glitter-covered shore. Her finger still rested on the arrowhead.


    The journey back to Lorian was also uneventful, something Binder Lori seemed dissatisfied about. She had a frustrated look on her face soon after they entered the bounds of Lorian''s demesne, as opposed to her usual relieved sigh.


    Shana didn''t know what that was about, and didn''t ask. If Binder Lori thought she needed to know, she would be told.


    It was not an unpleasant start to the day''s holiday.

 384 - Shanas Holiday

    When the time for lunch came, there was no stew. Shana wasn''t surprised, because Rian had announced the itinerary beforehand, but it was still a marked difference to the day''s routine. She supposed that was the point. A holiday, according to the lord when she''d asked, wasn''t just for the sake of rest. It was also important that a holiday be a break from the monotony of a normal day, so that people didn''t just find themselves of thinking of the work they would be doing when the holiday was over.


    In this case, it meant that at lunch, a different set of volunteers were bustling about in the kitchen. The aunties and uncles who usually cooked were able to take their ease, and someone else would also be washing the dishes and utensils.


    The honeybread and fruits that they received for lunch was delicious but would not have been filling under normal circumstances, but it was an enjoyable, if light, repast.


    She ate at Binder Lori''s table this meal, the two of them sitting and eating quietly on their side while those on the other side of the table flirted. Wizard Taeclas and Rybelle were sitting strangely¡ªit took Shana a while to realize the latter was sitting on her wife''s lap¡ªas they fed each other, which seemed to be inspiring Ninang Riz, Mikon and Umu to do the same. While none were sitting on Rian''s lap, they all held spoons and tried to feed him.


    Binder Lori quickly finished eating. "Rian, tell me when sunset is near," she said. "I''ll be in my room reading."


    "Will you actually come down, or will I need to spend an hour knocking on your door telling you to put away the book and come out?"


    There was a very long pause.


    "Uh, your Bindership?" Rian eventually prompted.


    Finally, her Bindership sighed. "I''ll leave the door unlocked. Make sure I come out on time."


    "Yes, your Bindership! Enjoy your afternoon reading!"


    Binder Lori made herself scarce, heading to her room to presumably rest in her own way, and Shana finished eating soon after. The food was sweet, the fruits were tart and flavorful, and Shana appreciated the variety, but she didn''t wish to linger. Without any children to watch over, Shana allowed herself the luxury of a nap after she ate, finding her assigned alcove and simply lying down with her head cushioned by her folded hands. She took her reed hat and laid it over her face to block off the perpetual light of the second level. The hat smelled of heat and sweat, but those were familiar smells this summer.


    Shana let herself relax and doze, too full and not tired enough to truly fall asleep. The stone of the sleeping niche was hard under her, but it was cool, and as long as she stayed on her back she was comfortable. The dungeon was quieter after lunch, with the children taking naps themselves, the adults speaking in low voices to not wake them and thus shatter the tender peace.


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    Still, eventually the minor discomfort of the stone beneath roused her to move. Despite not truly falling asleep, Shana felt lethargic, and actually more sleepy than when she''d been laying down, but that feeling went away as she stood and began moving around.


    Upstairs in the kitchen, meat was being prepared, cut into slices for roasting. Fruit was being cut and mashed to make what sauces the demesne had, and the dough was being made, even as more was being left to rise. Shana watched in passing, but she knew she wouldn''t be allowed to help there. People took Binder Lori''s prohibition of sharp objects very seriously.


    Outside, people were milling about, taking firewood from the curing shed and arranging them into piles for cook fires. While it was still hot, the late afternoon air was markedly cooler to than it had been at noon, and people weren''t working as hard as they could be. Over at the laundry area, Shana saw people washing mushrooms, no doubt freshly picked from the mushroom farms.


    She headed for her house to retrieve her bath bucket so she could take a bath while it still seemed like the baths weren''t crowded.


    When dusk came, the holiday truly began.


    At night, the outside of the dungeon was mostly well-lit, with light glowing from the corners of most buildings, both near the dungeon''s entrance. Tonight, it was even brighter. More lights glowed high on the walls of houses and other buildings, and while no one would mistake it for day¡ªnot with the darkness above with the moons and stars¡ªor even the insides of the dungeon, no one was likely to be tripping in the dark. The latter was a fact the children were taking full advantage of as they ran around between the houses, moving between light and darkness.


    The piles of firewood were lit, making cookfires¡ªit was warm enough people had no need for heat, and bright enough they had no need for firelight¡ªand people started roasting meat in many different ways, filling the air with delicious smells. Some people stated singing, clapping their hands to keep time¡ªas they were no longer allowed to play music¡ªas other people began to dance, holding hands, and stepping in rhythmic patterns together.


    "Ah, there you are!" Karina said as she suddenly appeared in Shana''s view. "I''ve been looking for you."


    "And you''ve found me."


    "Wiz Lori asked me to find you. Come on," her friend said, beginning to walk, and Shana followed after her. She didn''t bother asking if Binder Lori had told Karina why. Binder Lori didn''t do that unless prompted by Rian.


    They found the older Dungeon Binder sitting on a bench near the entrance of the dungeon, her back against the wall. Shana wondered why she didn''t bring out her chair. Perhaps she wanted the space to lay out her plates? There was a cook fire nearby, and Shana recognized some of the cuts being cooked on it as beast tail meat, which she knew was the woman''s favorite. Binder Lori was staring at the cooking meat intently, almost visibly willing the meat to cook faster.


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    Binder Lori''s gaze turned towards them as they approached. Her face was seemingly set in a disapproving frown, but Shana knew that was just what her face looked like in repose. "There you are," she said. "Come here and raise your arms over your head. Karina, check her pouch for knives and other such objects."


    "Yes, Wiz Lori," Karina said. "Shasha, can I borrow your belt pouch?" At Shana''s nod, the other girl opened the belt pouch at her waist, looking inside. The pouch was filled with light from the rock that Binder Lori had given her, and so it was easy to see that the belt contained only the rock, some cord that Shana had braided out of ropeweed, several spare wispbeads for the wisplight and bound tool in her house, and a roll of linen. The linen was a spare chest wrap of hers, which she carried as an emergency bandage.


    Not for her, of course. She had no intention of injuring herself, but she had it as an emergency bandage. The same for the cord.


    "No knives or pointy things, Wiz Lori," Karina said helpfully as she put everything back inside the pouch and closed it, making sure to wrap the pouch''s cord around its button. "Sorry, Shasha."


    "It''s all right, Karina," Shana said. Perhaps she hadn''t thought through her gesture of sincerity very well, but at the time, it had seemed like her best option. She hadn''t expected all this scrutiny afterwards, but she had no one to blame but herself.


    Binder Lori pointed at a spot a pace away from her on the bench. "Sit there," she said.


    Shana sat and found that air was flowing down on the bench in a refreshing breeze, something that Binder Lori had probably anchored to the wall behind them. "May I ask why you summoned me, Great Binder?"


    "Yes," Binder Lori said.


    "Why did you summon me, Great Binder?"


    "To make sure you weren''t unattended or acquiring a sharp object."


    Yes, the scrutiny would never end.


    Shana had expected Karina to leave now that she''d fulfilled Binder Lori''s orders, but to her surprise Karina came back carrying three wooden cups of water and handed one to her.


    "Thank you," Shana said as Karina handed another cup to the other Dungeon Binder.


    "Thank you," Binder Lori said as she accepted the cup, taking a sip from it.


    Karina sat on the bench next to Shana, and for a moment the three of them just sat there.


    "Don''t you want to go play?" Shana said eventually.


    Karina shook her head. "I did that already, and I''m hungry. I''m just going to wait for the food."


    "Wouldn''t you rather hunt it down yourself?"


    "It''s not safe to hunt in the dark. You could hurt yourself doing that, and it''s hard to see what you''re hunting."


    Slowly, Shana turned towards her friend. "Karina¡­ did you try hunting at night or something?"


    "It wasn''t at night! It was at dawn. Lord Rian said I shouldn''t, though. He was right, it''s really hard to see the seels in the water that early."


    Shana kept staring at her the way she knew Binder Lori would.


    "¡­he also told me to not hunt chokers too¡­"


    She maintained the stare.


    "I don''t! No hunting at night!"


    "Good," Binder Lori said. Shana glance behind her to see that the woman had also been giving Karina the same stare. "You should never work when it''s too dark to see what you''re doing. That''s always very unsafe."


    "I already know that!"


    Shana sighed. "And people keep sharp object away from me¡­ "


    "Despite Karina''s dubious choice of work times, she''s never deliberately injured herself with the full intention of doing so," Binder Lori said, which Shana couldn''t really refute.


    The three settled back, Karina pouting slightly but the pout soon vanished in curiosity as Binder Lori reached down onto the bench next to her. At first, Shana thought it was a plank, until she realized it was Binder Lori''s game board. There were some dark stains along one side that Shana recognized as her blood, darkened with time. A small box that contained the boards game pieces rested on in.


    "I would invite you to play," Binder Lori said, "but I require your assurance that this game won''t end the same way our last one did."


    "I assure you I won''t cut my wrist open again, Great Binder."


    Binder Lori nodded in satisfaction, and began setting up the pieces.


    "Hey, Shasha¡­" Karina said, and Shana turned towards her. "Can you teach me how to play chatrang too? Then we can play together."


    Shana hesitated, then glanced at Binder Lori. "Great Binder, do you mind if I teach Karina as we play?"


    Binder Lori waved her hand. "As you like."


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    It was a restful holiday. While there was dancing and singing, Shana spent her time playing chatrang with Binder Lori as they ate. Well, she and Karina played with Binder Lori, her friend suggesting moves and Shana diligently doing as directed. They weren''t very good moves as first, but Shana didn''t mind, and Binder Lori didn''t seem to either. They lost, of course, but that was all right. Binder Lori liked winning, no matter how unskilled her opponent was.


    They played more games, eating as they went. Rian passed by at one point, but he didn''t linger, merely asking if they needed anything else as he brought them some fruits. Karina and Shana started playing together, discussing what moves to do, the former having learned from some of her choices of moves in previous games. While they didn''t win any of the games, the two of them slowly started to last longer and longer. Karina was easily baited to take pieces when she could, but that was fine, because Binder Lori was like that as well. Watching the two play, one could be forgiven for thinking the point of chatrang was to take as many of your opponent''s pieces as possible instead of taking your opponent''s Dungeon Binder and core.


    Despite losing so much, Shana enjoyed herself as she watched the two play.


    Eventually, the last game was played, the food was all gone, the fires were put out, and the utensils were being washed so they could be used the next morning. Binder Lori left, carrying her game board, to return to where she slept in the dungeon, and Shana went to take a bath and do the same.


    With all the children in her care gone back to River''s Fork, she found the door of her house open and movement within. As she entered, Shana drew out the rock that Binder Lori had given her, illuminating the confines of her house. "Koyan, Kayas," she greeted as she closed the door behind her.


    "Lady Binder," Koyan said, her unfortunately-set face giving Shana what most would think was a malicious smile if they didn''t know the woman.


    "Lady Binder," her sister echoed with her own smile. Both looked so much like Mikon one could be excused for thinking they were sisters rather than cousins.


    "Since Yoshka isn''t here tonight, I believe the three of us will be able to fit in the bed together," Shana said as she felt around her pouch for her smallest wispbead, and put the bead on the receptacle for the bound tool that moved air. soon, a refreshing breeze was blowing through her house as she oriented it towards the bed. "There''s no need for you to sleep on the floor."


    The two women glanced at each other. They lived in Shana''s house in exchange for helping her look after the children in her care, and part of the arrangement was the two women taking turns sleeping on the bed with her and Yoshka. "I don''t think we''ll fit, Lady Binder," Kayas said.


    There was a knock on the door.


    When Shana opened it, she found Karina there, holding a small pillow. Behind her, Shana could seen some of the other children of the demesne. There were Karina''s younger siblings, Cif, Jivoy, Malli, and Siithia. There was Big Yerart, hiding those behind him; Yhalta and Matoy were standing next to each other, holding hands as usual, and more behind them that Shana couldn''t identify at the moment.


    "Can we sleep here tonight?" Karina asked.


    "What, all of you?" Shana said.


    Everyone outside her door nodded. "We thought you''d be lonely since Yoshka''s away," Big Yerart said.


    For a moment, Shana just stared. Then she shook her head, stepping back with a small smile on her face. "Make yourselves at home."

 385 - Shanalorre At Work

    The children in her care would return by lunch the next day, no doubt happy at having spent the day and night with their families and whatever holiday festivities River''s Fork had held. Shana knew that Binder Lori had sent them several rocks with lightwisps anchored to them to provide illumination for the night as well as some honey and meat so they could have a similar celebration as the one held at Lorian. There''d even been a note telling Wizard Lidzuga to rest for the day, and that his probationary period would be pushed forward a day.


    However, the holiday had passed, and so everyone went back to work doing as much as they could before the heat of the day forced everyone back into the dungeon.


    Shana herself woke up early, as she''d begun doing recently, leaving the comforting abyss of empty, thoughtless sleep, and everything hurt all over again. Tota was dead. Tyatya was dead. Dyadya resented her. Mushka had grown distant. Yoshka wasn''t here with her. She lay on the bed, staring tiredly at the familiar ceiling and taking deep, deliberate breaths, hands folded over her stomach. With each breath, she felt magic filling her, enriching the life within her, energizing her thoughts to wakefulness, even if she didn''t want it to¡­


    She closed her eyes trying to ignore the world a little longer, ignore her pain, ignore herself¡­


    Eventually, Shana opened her eyes. She dabbed at her face, but it was dry. No tears this morning. There hadn''t been tears in several months. That seemed like a betrayal, somehow¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana found herself blinking, coming back to awareness as the disruptive emotions receded. She had not been insensate for too long. Carefully, she slipped out of her bed, full of all the other girls who had come to keep her company for the night, and take advantage of the fact she had a bound tool that made a breeze inside her house. The bead had been consumed during the night, so there was nothing she had to remove.


    Despite her attempts to not disturb anyone, Karina was already waking up. She''d been right next to Shana, after all, and the other girl had also taken to waking up early once she''d learned what Shana was doing. By the time Shana had readied her bath bucket for when she needed it later in the morning, Karina had managed to push herself upright, standing up from the bed and rubbing her eyes.


    "You can go back to sleep, Karina," Shana said, as she had every day since she''d started doing this that the other girl had slept over. "I can do it by myself."


    "Mragn gragun feruh¡­" Karina said, or something to that effect. She stumbled towards the water jug, hefted it, and lifted it to her lips when she realized it still had water, taking a drink. There was conspicuously no cup next to it. Shana knew this was not in keeping with Binder Lori''s standards of hygiene, but there were so many people in her house having cups for all of them to drink from was simply unreasonable. Swallowing, Karina shook her head. "Come on, let''s go while it''s still cool."


    Karina was a good friend, and worked very hard. Shana worried about her sometimes.


    Carefully, the two of them left the house. Outside, some of the additional lights that Binder Lori had placed for last night''s holiday still glowed, though most had disappeared, their imbuement no doubt spent. Still, their light wasn''t really necessary. The red moon was full in the sky, and would be for half a week yet since it moved so slowly, and the other moons were out as well, though their lights were weaker. Still, between that and the distant dawn, the sky was a slowly brightening blue, and they had no need to worry for their footing.


    Shana was just closing the door to her house when the house next door opened, and Wizard Taeclas stepped out. "Good morning Shana," the Deadspeaker greeted just quietly enough to not wake up any of the neighbors, her smile so wide Shana felt it should be reflecting moonlight. "Good morning, Karina."


    "Mornin'', Wiz Tae," Karina greeted right back.


    "Good morning, Wizard Taeclas," Shana said respectfully. "Did you rest well last night?"


    "Not really. The holiday was so much fun!" Wizard Taeclas said cheerfully as the three of them began to walk to where their tools were kept. "We might have stayed up a little too late¡­? But it''s fine, I''ll take a nap in the afternoon. Heh, I love this place! It''s all right to take a nap when it gets too hot to work! Back in Covehold we didn''t get to stop like that!"


    "It''s only now in the summer," Karina said. "When it gets cooler again, there''s no napping unless there''s no work to do."


    "Eh, if it''s cooler, then there''s no reason to nap, right?" Wizard Taeclas said.


    Other people were already moving about, taking advantage of the cool of the predawn. Some people were getting an early start on laundry, while those who shoveled the waste from the latrines got a start on cleaning out last night''s load to take to the compost pit. The hunters who also ran the tannery were collecting the gold water from the special evaporators Binder Lori had made, to be used for treating skins, though Shana also knew that they gave out the caustic liquid to those who had very stubborn stains to remove in their laundry.


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    Taeclas greeted everyone with a wide smile, exchanging a few words with them about how fun the holiday last night had been¡ªactually, should it be called a holinight?¡ªhow delicious the food was, and wishing there''d been music to go with the dancing.


    "Wiz Lori would never allow it," Karina said. "She hates music at night."


    "But why, though?" Wizard Taeclas sighed.


    "No one knows," Shana said, "but she dislikes it enough to have made it into a law, so it must be for a very good reason."


    "Maybe she used to live near a tavern, and they played music so late she couldn''t sleep?" Karina suggested.


    "Hmm¡­ I suppose that''s one way she''d end up not liking music at night," Wizard Taeclas said. "Do you think Rian knows?"


    "If he does, he probably wouldn''t say," Karina said. "Unless they talk about it when they''re eating. Then we''ll just have to listen."


    "What?"


    "You''re new, so you haven''t heard them yet, but Lord Rian and Wiz Lori really don''t care who''s listening when they talk, and sometimes they''re funny."


    "Oh, like when Rian asked Lori if he''d have to keep knocking on her door so she''d put down her book?"


    They reached the tool shed where their poles were, where they rested on a special rack so that the wires of the lattice wouldn''t be at risk of hitting the other tools. While Wizard Taeclas was able to heft her pole easily enough, resting the three pace long tool on her shoulder, Shana had to admit that it was unwieldy for someone of her height to carry around. Hence why she accepted Karina''s assistance, the two of them carrying the tool between them towards the edge of the fields were Shana had left off the day before the holiday. Wizard Taeclas waved goodbye as she kept walking ahead of them towards where she had left off claiming crops and placing meanings on them.


    As much as Shana wanted to claim she could use the pole by herself, she had to admit that it would have been awkward and slow, and while she would be able to control the pole to keep from potentially damaging the heads of the crops it would have made the pace of her work slow. Karina''s assistance allowed her better control as her friend rested the pole on her shoulder, holding the pole to keep it in place to keep it from falling off as Shana used her as a fulcrum to better control the pole.


    By now, Karina knew how far away to stand from the crops while Shana maneuvered the pole so that it rested lightly on the crops she would be imbuing as she reached through the wire pressing against her palm. Though it wasn''t quite like touching someone with her bare hands or having them inside the boundaries of River''s Fork Demesne, it was easy to reach through the wire. At first, it had been strangely disorienting to be in contact with meanings without actually touching them, since she had no tactile sense of where they were, but Shana had eventually become used to the sensation.


    She positioned the pole until she became aware that the wire lattice at its head was contacting meanings she had already imbued. With that acting to assure her she hadn''t missed any of the stalks, Shana began imbuing the meanings. By now she knew how to draw magic from her connection to River''s Fork''s core, letting the magic flow from her lungs¡ªit didn''t actually need to start there, but that was how she knew how to do this¡ªand down her arms to where she touched the copper wire that wrapped around the pole shaft in an elongated spiral.


    Shana pushed the magic through the wire, touching the meanings. Since they were deactivated and Wizard Taeclas wasn''t actively maintaining her claim, she was able to override the woman''s claim and bind the meaning to her own will. Once that was done, she was able to start imbuing the meaning, and began a slow count to a hundred.


    Once her count was finished, the meaning had been imbued, and by now Shana was experienced enough to judge that she''d put in as much as she was supposed to into the meanings she had claimed. If there was a little bit more¡­ well, that was all right. While Wizards were supposed to put in only as much imbuement into what they were imbuing as needed, that was because most wizards were limited in how much magic they could imbue at a time. As a Dungeon Binder, she¡ªand Binder Lori¡ªdid not have that limitation, so she could afford to be a little wasteful. It was probably a bad habit to form, but as Binder Lori had forbidden her from learning more Deadspeaking than she already knew, it was not a problem.


    "Step," Shana said once she was properly finished and had pulled the wire lattice head of her pole from the crops, and she and Karina took a step sideways. Repositioned, Shana lowered the head and adjusted the lattice slightly so that there was a hair of overlap with the meanings she had just imbued. This was to prevent her from accidentally missing some of the meanings between the places she lowered her tool.


    Reaching through the wire again, Shana overrode Wizard Taeclas'' claim and began imbuing the meanings, counting to a hundred.


    It was slow, repetitive work, as most work was, but neither of them complained. Slowly, methodically, they imbued the meanings that Wizard Taeclas had left deactivated on the crops. Every once in a while when they stepped sideways, Karina would shift the pole to her other shoulder to let it take the weight. When they''d begun doing this, Shana had offered to take her turn with the pole resting on her shoulder, but Karina had refused, saying she was fine.


    The one time Shana had insisted, she''d realized that with Karina maneuvering the pole the wire lattice at the head was hard to place exactly, and they spent far more time resetting after each step sideways. Shana had eventually acquiesced, and had simply concentrated on trying to be as efficient as she could be.


    The two of them continued on until the sun started to rise, and had managed to do several paces of crops before Karina said, "Time for breakfast." She was looking to the side, and Shana followed her gaze to see Rian waving towards them and pointing towards the dungeon.


    Shana waved in acknowledgement. "Let me finish this last," she said.


    Karina nodded carefully, the pole remaining still and in contact with the crops. The other girl turned her head and raised her voice. "Wiz Tae! Breakfast!"


    "Got it!" the Deadspeaker''s voice replied, seemingly coming from the crops. They were approaching a corner of the fields, one the wizard had already turned, so she was out of their sight. If they managed to turn the corner today, they''d be able to see her again as they worked. "Just finishing!"


    It was only the start of the morning''s work. Already, the sunlight shining on them was hot, although their surroundings were still relatively cool despite that. Once they continued after breakfast, however¡­ well, they had their hats. The work had to be done, after all.


    "Done," Shana said as she finished imbuing the crops she''d been working on. "We can go have breakfast now."


    On the signal, Karina raised the pole off her shoulder, lowering it down to a carrying grip as she started walking, taking the lead back towards the dungeon and breakfast.

 386 - Shanas Breakfast

    Shana had a quick bath as Karina went to collect her brothers and sisters from Shana''s house. The bath was mostly because Shana would be sitting next to Binder Lori this morning as the work hadn''t been that intensive yet. Karina hadn''t even broken a sweat. The baths were full this morning, as they''d been all summer. Many inside weren''t taking a full bath, but rather simply pouring a few ladles of water on themselves and giving their faces a quick wash to remove morning oil and quickly cool them.


    She entered the dungeon, feeling the cooler air inside blowing around her as she passed through the entrance, the familiar sensation of the binding meant to keep out bugs making her hairs rise and tingle. Inside, she nodded in greeting at people she knew¡ªwhich was everyone, because unlike Binder Lori she had no problems remembering people¡ªas she made her way towards Binder Lori''s table, which was only not officially known as ''Lori''s Table'' because Binder Lori had apparently not seen the need to officially name her table. Still, if she did, everyone was sure it would be called that.


    Binder Lori and Rian were already sitting at the table, the former leaning back on her chair and clearly enjoying the backrest. They were in the middle of some kind of discussion as Shana walked to the small bench next to the chair and sat on it, keeping her back straight. She nodded towards Rian, who nodded back but didn''t break off what he was saying.


    "¡ªwhere the sawmill would be. When will you be able to put in the stone foundation?"


    "If they''re really done, I can do it after breakfast. Are the fittings for the saw ready?"


    "Been ready for a while now. They''re ready to install it as soon as there''s solid ground to put them on. It will take a couple of days, I''m told, and some of the beams will need to be buried into the foundation to secure them."


    Binder Lori scowled, but that was all. "Is there a plan for how the fittings will be installed?"


    Rian nodded. "A basic one. Once the site had been finalized, the carpenters have been preparing the beams to accommodate the site''s dimensions. There''s only so many ways you can attach a water wheel to a circular saw, after all."


    Lori grunted. "Is this sawmill really necessary? We''ve done well without one before now. "


    "Did you need to become a Dungeon Binder? You''ve done well as a Whisperer before then."


    Binder Lori glared at Rian, who simply smiled brightly at her. "That doesn''t answer my question," Binder Lori said with gritted teeth.


    "You already know all the benefits setting up a sawmill, and eventually a gristmill and drophammer will give us. If you want us to cancel the project and have all the work the carpenters and smiths did go to waste, just say so."


    If anything, Binder Lori''s glare grew more intense. Rian just kept smiling as Wizard Taeclas and Rybelle passed behind him before sitting down on the bench a bit away from Rian so that Umu would have somewhere to sit. Their hair was still wet from their bath.


    "Good morning, Shana¡­lorre!" Wizard Taeclas managed to add before Binder Lori corrected her. "Good morning, Rian. Could you tell her Bindership I wish her a good morning too?"


    "Tae wishes you a good morning, your Bindership."


    "Noted."


    "Good morning, everyone," Shana acknowledged as she settled down to wait for the food to be ready, watching the kitchen past Mistress Rybelle.


    The slight movement of Binder Lori''s head might have been her acknowledging Shana''s greeting or merely adjusting her seating position. Her gaze was still focused on Rian. "And you''re sure that the sawmill side is above the spring flooding?"


    Rian sighed. "Yes, it''s above the flooding. You checked. If you''re still dissatisfied, you can just keep adding rock to the foundation until it''s as high as you want."


    "That was never in question."


    "Then why¡ªno, no, not going there¡­" Rian shook his head. "Do you have enough stone or are we getting new plots excavated in the dungeon farm?"


    Binder Lori visibly considered that, looking towards Wizard Taeclas, who smiled at her and waved. "Given the increased productivity of the dungeon farm, expanding its infrastructure now would be prudent."


    "Should we try to add the metal contacts Taeclas spoke of to the new plots? After all, if we''re going to be building new ones anyway¡­ "


    "Did a dragon drop gold on us that I''m unaware of?"


    "No, not like that. You know those poles that Taeclas and Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Binder Lori corrected. Shana was sure she''d heard her full name more times in the past year than she had all her life before then, and all because of Binder Lori.


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    "¡ªShanalorre use, right?" Rian said as Ninang Riz, Mikon and Umu arrived. "Why don''t we make one sized for the farm plots downstairs? One big wooden frame that can cover a whole plot, with wheels and ropes to raise and lower the wire lattice. That way, Tae and Shanalorre can have the convenience of having metal contacts without us needing to use as much metal. The stone walkways between the farm plots can take the weight of something like that, unlike the fields outside¡ª"


    "Stop," Binder Lori interrupted as Mikon reciprocated Wizard Taeclas'' enthusiastic greeting, while Umu did the same with Rybelle. Rian stopped. "Rian¡­ I will not be entertaining any new projects at the moment. Making new farm plots is strictly for the purpose of excavating more stone. Right now, focus on completing the sawmill so that it''s well underway and you can be spared to go to Covehold Demesne."


    Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership," he said as he shuffled to the side slightly to make room for Umu as Ninang Riz and Mikon sat at his other side.


    Binder Lori nodded, then turned to Wizard Taeclas. "Would his suggestion of a large lattice actually be useful?"


    "Good morning, your Bindership!" Wizard Taeclas said cheerfully.


    She received a flat look in turn. "You said that already."


    "I know, I just wanted to greet you properly! Let''s see¡­ well, if the lattice has enough wire, it will probably help. The problem will be moving it from plot to plot. Rian said something about wheels, and¡­ I suppose that will work. Having people carry it will probably be tiring work, since they''d need to hold the frame for both me and Shana¡­ lorre. I think Shanalorre and I will work faster using just the poles, as long as it''s in the dungeon farm. Something like what Rian described might be better for the fields outside. Right now we''re having to walk around the outside of the fields. Those crops will start maturing when I activate their meanings, and then they can be cut and we can start claiming and imbuing the crops behind them."


    Wizard Taeclas shrugged. "As it is, your Bindership, while we''re slowly making the crops mature faster, I don''t think it will be in time to plant another crop for a second harvest. At least, not if we try to do all of the fields."


    "What do you suggest, then?" Binder Lori said as Shana saw that the kitchen was starting to serve food.


    Sliding from her bench, she went to join the line. She was soon joined by Mistress Rybelle, Mikon and Rian, the latter two bickering good-naturedly.


    "¡ªdon''t need to do this, Rian," Mikon said. "I can get the food."


    "We have a schedule, it''s my turn," Rian said. "Besides, she''s still talking to Tae. That should keep her occupied. You two go first, Shana, Rybelle. You and Tae have been up longer than most of us, you need your food."


    "Thank you, Lord Rian."


    "Thank you, L¡ªI mean, Rian."


    "Shana, you know you don''t need to call me ''lord'', right? You''re a Dungeon Binder, you outrank me."


    "Noted, Lord Rian."


    Rian shook his head, yet he smiled as he did so. At least he didn''t say anything about how the demesne had the most adorable Dungeon Binders.


    They waited only briefly in line, despite Rian''s protests and attempts to keep people from letting them go ahead of them. Shana agreed with him in principle¡ªshe was perfectly willing to wait her turn¡ªbut if she was being allowed to get to food faster¡­ well, she had a little cousin to take care of.


    "Rian, come on and help me pick up Binder Lori''s food," Mikon said, nodding in acknowledgement at all the people letting her pass. "You were just saying it was your turn, remember?"


    "It''s still wrong," Rian muttered, even as he nodded at all the people letting him pass. "They got here first, they should get their food first."


    "We''re not getting food for her Bindership, Rian," one of the men in line¡ªBonn the chandler¡ªsaid. "A happy Binder Lori is a happy demesne."


    "She''s never happy, you know that. The closest she gets is ''not annoyed'' and ''asleep''," Rian retorted, but he was smiling as he said it.


    Breakfast was stew, bread¡ªunleavened, either to let the culture recover or because it was faster¡ªand a selection of fruits all dripping water and slightly bruised from the cold in which they''d been stored. Shana took only enough for one since she didn''t have to get food for Yoshka, but she did take one of the jars of chilled water to bring back to their table so that Rian and Mikon would have less to carry.


    When she returned to the table ahead of everyone else. Binder Lori and Wizard Taeclas were still talking.


    "¡ªreorganize the fields to optimize the Deadspeaking we have available," Binder Lori said. "We''ll lose a little surface area to the pathways, but the accelerated growing cycle should mitigate the loss."


    Shana set her food on the table, placing the jug of water on the table where Binder Lori could reach it. Giving thanks to the Dungeon Binder for the bounty before her seemed nonsensical when she was one of the Dungeon binders in question, though since there was seel meat in the stew, she mentally gave thanks to Binder Lori and Karina, who were the ones most likely to have caught it. Then she began eating.


    Next to Shana, Binder Lori didn''t cease speaking to Wizard Taeclas even as she chose one of the bowls of food covered with a disk of bread that Rian had put in front of her. "Could you still use the poles if the wire lattice is a bit larger? The reorganized fields can be as long as they need to be, the limiting factor will be their width since each row will need to be wide enough for you to claim with the poles."


    "I don''t think it''s a good idea to make the pole any bigger, your Bindership," Wizard Taeclas said, glancing at her wife and giving her a grateful smile as Mistress Rybelle put down the bowls of food she was carrying, before reluctantly turning back towards Binder Lori. "I might be able to carry it, but Shanalorre wouldn''t be able to."


    Binder Lori blinked, before turning and looking at Shana. She seemed to see Shana''s arms for the first time as Shana stopped eating in case Binder Lori addressed her. "Perhaps she can get someone to assist her?"


    "Karina is already helping her in the mornings," Rian said, and Binder Lori turned her attention on him. Wizard Taeclas took the opportunity to turn and give her wife a quick kiss and a half hug, pulling her close, before quickly turning towards her food and starting to eat. She usually didn''t need to rush, but this morning it seemed Binder Lori wished to speak to her, and Wizard Taeclas was one of those people who gave her food her undivided attention¡ªunless her wife was involved. Shana usually lost awareness at that point until they noticed and restrained their behavior slightly. "If the pole is any bigger and heavier the two of them wouldn''t be able to handle it anymore."


    "Why is Karina assisting her?"


    "Because Shana has trouble handling the pole since it''s so much taller than her and she only has two hands, obviously."


    Binder Lori looked towards Shana again. After some time, she sighed. "Very well, we won''t try to change the poles."


    Shana returned to her meal.

 387 - More Of Shanalore At Work

    After breakfast, it was back to work imbuing the fields.


    Shana went back to her house to retrieve her reed hat and a towel. Unfortunately, the pale skin on her arms were going to burn under the sun¡ªher skin didn''t tan like Karina''s, instead becoming more red, and then starting to peel¡ªbut that was what her meaning was for. The towel was soaked in water and laid over her shoulders dripping wet. Such a thing would be dangerously harmful in the northern demesne she''d been born in, but in this heat it was a relief.


    Karina met her where they''d left the pole outside of Rian''s house. They picked up the tool, and then it was back to where they had left off earlier that day, to imbue more meanings. While they had been inside the dungeon for breakfast, the fields had become hot, and would only get hotter the more the day wore on. Still, it was a way to contribute that she could do that didn''t involve making any decisions. Her decisions had not been the best.


    The constant breeze from the binding of airwisps Binder Lori had made near the beginning of summer helped cool them, even if it made their hats flap, but they were used to that. The breeze actually seemed cold today. Had Binder Lori finally decided to add firewisps to it to destroy heat? Shana hoped that was the case. Still, even with the cold breeze, the sunlight was hot where it touched them as they continued working.


    The rest of the morning was hot and repetitive as Karina supported the pole on her shoulders, switching sides as her shoulder started to get sore. The wet towel on the other girl''s shoulders helped cushion the weight, even as the water in it dripped and it slowly dried.


    They weren''t completely alone as they worked. The mushroom farmers went to check on the old mushroom farm, making sure that the fungus there was growing well, and trays of mushrooms were carried to the desiccator shed to dry. Not so far away, they could hear Wizard Taeclas singing some song about looking for fortune and love. When they eventually reached the corner of the field, they were actually able to see her as she worked. Unlike Shana, she was holding her pole by herself, though the butt end was resting on the ground.


    Shana watched the other Deadspeaker work as she imbued. She was singing absently, with some verses of the song becoming ''nah nah nah nah'' or ''dah dah dah dah'' as she either forgot or didn''t try all that hard to remember the words. Unlike Binder Lori, who just stared intently at whatever binding she was forming, occasionally lightly touching things with her fingers, Wizard Taeclass seemed unable to sit still when she was taming life into meanings, hence the singing. In the beginning, she also swayed from side to side where she stood, but that had quickly ceased, presumably because it moved the pole and made her lose contact with the life in the crops.


    They worked at more or less the same rate now. Wizard Taeclas used to be ahead of them, but Shana and Karina had gotten better at working together, and while Shana needed to heavily imbue the meanings on the crops, it wasn''t exactly complicated. She simply needed to make sure that the imbuement was sufficient to last the crops for their full accelerated growing period. Wizard Taeclas no doubt needed to do¡­ well, things Shana didn''t understand about Deadspeaking to make the meanings on all the dozens of individual crops that the Deadspeaker was claiming.


    Still, given the number of crops that needed to have meanings applied to them, Wizard Taeclas was undoubtedly skilled to be able to tame so many meanings in the time it took Shanalorre to imbue about the same. She hadn''t been able to compare her speed to Wizard Lidzuga in River''s Fork¡ªshe only imbued the meanings he put in place, not having the time to observe how quickly he worked¡ªbut she was curious how he compared to Wizard Taeclas.


    Of course, Rian had said that she was skilled with meanings involving plants, so that probably played a factor in any comparison, but Shana was curious regardless.


    They worked through the rest of the morning as it slowly got hotter and hotter. Despite Karina and her best intentions, they had to take a few breaks to drink water and get their towels soaked again. No one''s towels stayed wet for long this summer. Once they had replenished themselves and their towels, it was back to work imbuing crops. However, there reached a point when not even towels and hats were enough to ward off the heat,


    "We can do another pace, it''s not that hot yet," Karina said, even as she panted and sweated.


    "No, Karina," Shana said firmly, holding up her arm, which was red enough to look burned. "My sunburn is starting to hurt. We''re going back inside so I can heal and we can drink water before we start getting headaches."


    "Ah, right, that''s why my head hurts¡­"


    Shana sighed and reached towards her friend, following her instincts to claim, bind, and tame a meaning, imbuing the meaning just enough to do what it needed to. It should mitigate whatever was ailing Karina until they could cool her down and get water in her. And herself for that matter. While her head didn''t ache yet, she recognized the signs of an oncoming one. "You go and get into the baths to cool off, I''ll handle putting the pole back in the tool shed. No, don''t argue. You don''t have long before your headache comes back. Remember, drink, then soak yourself in water. Wizard Taeclas!" she called.


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    Further along, the Deadspeaker turned towards them.


    "We''re heading back!"


    Wizard Taeeclas nodded and gave them a wave of acknowledgement, then flicked her hand in a sweeping gesture to tell them to get going. The woman would probably be done soon.


    Shana had to tell Karina to go ahead of her, rather than linger and try to help with the pole regardless of what they''d discussed. Without her friend, handling the long tool was awkward. Shana had to rest it on her own shoulder and hold the pole with both arms extended so that she''d have enough leverage to control it and keep it from bouncing as she walked. The wire somehow managed to keep digging into her shoulder, despite her attempts to turn the pole so that it wouldn''t.


    By the time she managed to reach the baths, Shana could feel her own headache threatening, and she quickly had her fill of the drinking water coming from the spigot on the wall. Once she had enough that all she needed to do was wait for the symptoms to abate, Shana quickly stripped off her clothes, finding an empty shelf to put them in, and headed into the baths.


    Since it was the time when the sun''s heat was peaking, the bath was crowded as usual, full of women talking about the day''s work, gossiping and discussing the coming harvest and when the next one would be now that Taeclas and Shana were at work. Shana nodded as people greeted her, answering when she could.


    "Good morning, Lady Binder. Hot today, isn''t it?"


    "Finally coming in, Lady Binder?"


    "Working hard again today, Lady Binder? You should take a rest or else you won''t grow tall!"


    "Lady Binder, do you need a new hat yet?"


    "Shana! Over here!"


    Shana answered as she could, even as she turned towards the call of her name. Karina waved the ladle in her hand towards Shana from a spot near the basins. Her friend looked much less overheated, and her arms and face were noticeably darker than the rest of her. Shana in contrast simply looked redder in those areas, and her limbs were already starting to hurt from the sunburn.


    As it was her own injury, it took only a moment to use her meaning on herself, ridding herself of the sunburn. Her arms and other areas would still peel, but it would no longer be painful when it happened.


    Shana gave Karina a grateful nod as she squatted down onto the space next to her friend and closed her eyes as the other girl poured water over her. The water was refreshingly cooling, the heating deactivated as unnecessary at the moment. While her threatened headache did not immediately recede, her head immediately started to feel cool, and Shana let out a sigh of relief.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Shana and Karina came out of the baths, they were still wearing the same clothes, much cooler but already starting to sweat. Downriver they could vaguely see the site of the sawmill, well past the laundry area, what seemed like a strange shadow in the air above it to mark its location. Their hats on their heads, they headed into the cool of the dungeon. Inside, lunch was being prepared, the large copper pots resting on the cooking fires and the stew inside bubbling away, while trays of bread were baking underneath.


    "Thank you for helping me again today," Shana said once they were out of the heat. Even the short walk between the baths and the dungeon was enough to get her sweating, though the damp towel around her shoulders wiped that away.


    "You''re welcome," Karina said. "I told you, any time you need help to grow food, you can always ask me!"


    "I¡­ didn''t ask you, though?"


    "No, but you need the help, so I''ll help you."


    Shana couldn''t really deny that.


    It was a pleasant surprise to see the children from River''s Fork who were her responsibility sitting at their usual meal table. The table had three jugs of water and many cups on it¡ªtraveling was very thirsting in this heat¡ªand they were talking to the children who''d stayed in Lorian about their respective holidays. Three had brought board games, and enthusiastic games of pincer were being played.


    "Shasha!"


    "Yoshka," Shana greeted as her younger cousin rushed at her with a hug and¡­ah, her arms had been sunburned. "Give me your hands." She raised her voice. "Everyone who''d been sunburned, come here and form a line!"


    Yoshka obediently held out her hands as the other children lined up behind her. Not all of them needed to be healed, but all had reddened skin from being out in the sun. Shana could understand. No one wanted to be in the cabin of the Coldhold in this heat. Up on the deck and risk of sunburns it was.


    "Shasha, we saw a beast on our way back!" Yoshka said as Shana finished healing her. "It was as big as a tree, and it had these things on its back, and¡ª!"


    Yoshka continued regaling her with the story of her sighting of what sounded like the typhon beast. Shana made a note to inform one of the hunters later, to add to what they knew of the beast. The other children also chimed in with what they knew, although it wasn''t much more than the fact that they''d seen the beast drinking from the river.


    Once everyone was healed, Shana let them get back to what they were doing and sat next to Yoshka. Karina took her leave to find her own brothers and sisters to make sure they were behaving themselves. Despite the din of all the children chattering, drinking, and playing board games, Shana found herself folding her arms on the table, laying down her head, and falling into a light doze as she waited for lunch.


    It had been a long morning, after all. Even a Dungeon Binder needed to rest. So Shana did, waiting for lunch to be served.

 388 - Shanas Afternoon

    Shana ate at the table behind Binder Lori during lunch, as the children she was responsible for always needed her attention after coming back from River''s Fork, and she had to make sure they ate and remained within acceptable limits of behavior. The latter was more for the benefit of the other tables around them, as Binder Lori didn''t really seem to care how loud the children were, but adults would use the pretext of ''disturbing her Bindership'' to try to get the children to behave. Best to just avoid all that before Binder Lori took umbrage at people trying to usurp her authority or however she was likely to interpret it.


    In addition to the children, Koyan and Kayas also ate with her, helping her deal with the children so she wouldn''t been overwhelmed. Most of the time it wasn''t needed, but Shana could only direct her attention in so many directions at once, so their assistance was invaluable.


    Thankfully, this time such assistance wasn''t really necessary, and they were able to eat lunch without incident. Well, no more incident than was usual for lunch.


    "No, Yoshka," Shana intervened, "Don''t put so much stew on your spoon. Only a little bit so it doesn''t drip. If you waste food, mushka will get angry at you."


    "Aww¡­"


    Behind her, Binder Lori and Rian were discussing the progress of the day''s work on the sawmill''s foundation. From the sound of it, while most of the foundation had been set in place, the top-most layer would need to be leveled to Binder Lori''s satisfaction.


    "You know, given how much stone would need to be leveled, could I suggest having the stonemasons and maybe the plasterers do the work for you instead?" Rian said. "Just as a test?"


    "¡­who or what is a plasterer?"


    "You don''t¡­? Ah, probably not much call for a Whisperer in the field of plastering. Plasterers¡­ well, they plaster walls, which helps in insulating it from the cold, as well as giving it a plumb, smooth look that you''ll probably like. Usually they use specially formulated mud, but their tools should be sufficient to shape softened stone, provided it''s sufficiently soft."


    "I''ll consider it."


    "Could you finish considering by the time we finish lunch so I can tell them whether they''re working or can spend the afternoon indoors where it''s nice and cool?"


    Normally, Shana would have spent the afternoon helping Wizard Taeclas in the dungeon farm, imbuing the meanings she''d tamed, but with the recent harvest most of the dungeon farm''s plots were empty of crops. The soil had been tilled and fertilized, and grain had been cast on the plots, so they were waiting for them to sprout and take root before putting any further meanings on them. All the other crops in the dungeon farm had already been tamed with meanings, even the tubers.


    Short of going back outside and working in the heat, there was little Shana herself could do. And despite Binder Lori clearly intending to work through the afternoon, the older woman had no problems with the heat, and she seemed to have made some shade for those working on the sawmill. Even Karina wouldn''t work in the heat of the afternoon, and she was very devoted to getting food for the demesne.


    ¡­


    Well, Karina wouldn''t work in the heat of the afternoon anymore, but as soon as it wasn''t so hot Shana knew she''d be right back at it.


    Still, Shana looked for Wizard Taeclas in case the Deadspeaker needed her assistance to imbue anything. She found her in one of the second level''s alcoves, sitting on the floor next to some branches of various lengths and thicknesses, a bucket of dead leaves, another basket of straw from the recent harvest, and a mallet that seemed to have been borrowed from the carpenters. A cloth was spread out in front of her. Sitting on a bench in the alcove, Rybelle was using a short length of cord to bundle together lengths of straw from her own basket, most likely to make a broom. All over the second level, people had similar baskets of straw next to them as they made brooms and brushes.


    "Wizard Taeclas," Shana greeted.


    "Oh, hello, Shana! How are you? Did you have a good lunch?"


    "I am fine, and lunch was adequate. Thank you for asking. Do you need any assistance? Actually¡­ what are you doing?"


    "Well, my lovely wife here is making brooms, and when they''re as tightly bound as she wants, I''m going to fuse them together to cut down on cordage," Wizard Taeclas said, looking lovingly at Rybelle, who smiled back. "While I''m waiting for them, I''m seeing about something to help keep the sun off me when I''m working out in the fields in the morning. I could make ones for you and Karina too, if you want?"


    That piqued Shana''s curiosity. "How can I help, then?" If Karina was going to insist on continuing to assist her in the mornings, then the least Shana could do was get her something to keep the sun off.


    "Are you sure? Wouldn''t you rather play?"


    Shana sighed. "I am not a child, Wizard Taeclas."


    "You are, though?"


    "I am also one of the few Deadspeakers we have available. Please, allow me to assist. Anything you do will go much faster if I take care of the imbuement."


    "Well¡­ I suppose¡­ but if you want to take a nap or something, then just tell me and go, all right?"


    Shana nodded. Truthfully, she did want to take a nap, but if there was something that needed to be done... well, she could delay her nap until later. "What do we do?"


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    "Well, first off, help me start putting these leaves on this cloth."


    It was not simply a bucket of dead leaves. Rather it was a bucket of wet leaves, as the bucket was also filled with water.


    "Why?" Shana felt compelled to ask.


    "Leaves start becoming brittle because they dry out," Wizard Taeclas explained as they began pulling out leaves from the bucket. They were wide¡ªa little smaller than Shana''s palm¡ªand fairly thick, but had already yellowed. "I''ve been soaking these leaves for a couple of days, and now we''re going to fuse them together using Deadspeaking. Here, let me show¡ªoh, right." Wizard Taeclas sighed. "Well, no matter. As I said, we''ll be fusing them together. Since these leaves are dead, the meaning is going to be fairly simple. So what we''re going to do is¡­"


    Wizard Taeclas held several leaves in her hands, letting the water on them drip back into the bucket as she concentrated. Shana noted that the Deadspeaker was holding them such that she was touching the leaves along their edges, clearly claiming and taming the life in the leaves. After a few moments, Wizard Taeclas handed the leaves to Shana and reached into the bucket for another handful.


    Shana took the handful of leaves in one hand, overriding Wizard Taeclas'' claim on the meanings on the leaves, and began imbuing them. With her other hand, she started laying out leaves on the cloth¡ª"The cloth is to keep the wet leaves from sticking to the floor!"¡ªputting each leaf down so that their edges overlapped slightly. She moved unhurriedly, both to give the leaves in her hand more time to be imbued and so that she could place each leaf down precisely.


    Once Wizard Taeclas had made several handfuls of leaves with meanings on them, they changed roles, with Shana taking the handfuls of leaves and imbuing them while the Deadspeaker began putting down the leaves Shana had already imbued. Once Shana had imbued all the leaves, the two worked together to put down leaves on the cloth.


    When most of the cloth had been covered by a layer of leaves, Wizard Taeclas rested her hands on the layer. The Deadspeaker started taking deep, even breaths¡ª


    "Oh, right," Wizard Taeclas said suddenly, sounding chagrinned. Her breathing returned to normal, even as her face changed into an expression of concentration as her hands began to slowly slide across the sheet, pressing the leaves down on each other. Where her hands pressed, the leaves flattened and stayed flat, fusing against each other. Under the Deadspeaker''s hands, the leaves quickly became a single large sheet. The sheet wasn''t completely uniform. The veins that had been on the leaves were still there, standing out on the surface of the sheet, and the sheet was thicker where the leaves had overlapped.


    Wizard Taeclas carefully pulled up the corner of the sheet of leaves, separating it from the cloth. "All right, that should be enough," she said cheerfully. "Now to try and make a frame for it¡­"


    The sheet of leaves was carefully placed on some of the slender branches so that it wouldn''t stick to the floor as the excess water dripped out.


    Constructing the frame as Wizard Taeclas imagined it was less intensive. After choosing which of the branches she would use, she bundled up some of the more slender branches together, tamped them down, then laid the bundle on its side and pressed her palm against the tamped down end. The branches were slender enough that she was able to touch all of them at once when she did so. After a few moments, Wizard Taeclas picked up the bundle again, tamped down the opposite end, and pressed her palm against that.


    "All right Shana, your turn," the Deadspeaker said. "It doesn''t need much, just enough that I can stick them against each other."


    Shana nodded, pressing her palm on the branches as the other woman had done. Unfortunately, the difference in size between their hands meant she needed to use two hands. Overriding Wizard Taeclas'' claim, she imbued the meanings for a count of five slow breaths, then removed her hand.


    Wizard Taeclas touched the ends of the branches, testing the level of imbuement before nodding. "A bit more than necessary, but that''s fine." Tamping down the bundle of branches, they repeated it on the other end.


    Taking four of the imbued branches, Wizard Taeclas took a longer, thicker branch and laid it on the floor, then pressed the end of one of the slender branches to the end of the longer branch at a right angle. Holding it in place with one hand, she pressed a finger to the end of the slender branch. It took longer to fuse the wood together than it had taken to do the same to the leaves, so Shana took the opportunity to stand and walk back and forth to ease her legs.


    Eventually, the four slender branches were fused to the end of the longer branch in a slightly lopsided cross shape.


    "All right!" Wizard Taeclas said, carefully laying the wooden construct on a bench. "Now, let''s get the leaves!"


    The sheet of leaves was carefully removed from the branches it was resting on and laid down on the cloth again, where Wizard Taeclas rested both hands on the sheets. Slowly, her hands moved, moving across the surface. Her hands made one circuit over the sheet before she removed them. "All right, Shana. Could you imbue this too? You only need to put in as much as you did on the branches."


    Shana nodded, resting one hand on the sheet. She suspected that Wizard Taeclas was perfectly capable of imbuing the meaning on the sheet¡ªwhich seemed to encompass the whole sheet now¡ªand was mainly doing this to allow her to be involved. Still, it was a productive way to pass the time, so Shana didn''t mind. "Done," she announced.


    "Thank you," Taeclas said, standing up and picking up the fused branches. "Could you please hold this steady?"


    Shana remained seated, holding the fused branches upright by the thick branch and doing her best to do as Wizard Taeclas had asked as the Deadpseaker picked up the sheet of leaves. From her point of view underneath, Shana watched as a corner of the sheet was carefully pressed to the end of one of the extending slender branches with one of Wizard Taeclas'' fingers while the Deadspeaker''s other hand adjusted the orientation of the sheet.


    It took a while as Wizard Taeclas adjusted the sheet back and forth before finally fusing the sheet to the end of one of the slender branches, and carefully pulling the sheet taut to fuse it to the end of the opposite branch. Shana did her best to hold the branch steady as the Deadspeaker secured the sheet to all the branches.


    "All right, that should do it!" Wizard Taeclas said cheerfully as she fused the sheet to the last branch. "Not bad for my first rainshade. Well, sunshade, technically. I''m not sure it will work well in the rain. Here, let me take that so you can stand up."


    Shana let Wizard Taeclas take the sunshade, and got to her feet. The Deadspeaker happily held the¡­ sunshade, and Shana could see how it could be used to, as the name implied, shade one''s self from the sun and its heat.


    Though¡­


    "It looks like it would be difficult for Karina and I to use while also handling the lattice pole," Shana commented.


    Wizard Taeclas paused. She stared at the sunshade in her hands. "Maybe if you should wear it on your back?" she said. She did not sound very confident.


    "How?" Shana asked.


    Wizard Taeclas stared at the sunshade some more and sighed. "I¡­ might have to rethink this idea."


    "Flowerpetal, if you''re done with your little project, could you fuse these bundles together please?" Rybelle said.


    "¡­ yes, moonlight," Wizard Taeclas said. She glanced at Shana. "Uh¡­"


    "Shall I return when you have rethought your idea?"


    "I''d be thankful, yes."


    Shana left to take a nap.

 389 - There Be Fruit

    The next several days fell into the same routine. Shana and Karina imbued the crops in the morning until it was too hot for them to work, then resting in the afternoon. Wizard Taeclas continued in her attempts at a hands-free sunshade, which went through several iterations as the older Deadspeaker tried to figure out a way it could be carried without hands. Shana assisted her when she was free, and because the thought of having something besides her hat to cover was very tempting. Eventually, the two of them put together a wooden frame with cord straps for carrying it like a pack, on which a modified form of the sunshade¡ªa sheet of leaves stretched out between two branches¡ªextended up from the frame and hung over the head of anyone wearing it.


    The frame had initially been uncomfortable, digging into various places on Shana''s back, but Wizard Taeclas was able to alter the shape of the frame to curve around those areas. Wearing the frame with her wet towel over her shoulders also helped, adding more padding.


    The two of them made two of the sunshade frames, and Shana offered to one to Karina as well, putting on the frame Wizard Taeclas had made for her to demonstrate it.


    "I can''t wear one," her friend said bluntly.


    "Why not? It''s not very heavy, and after adjustment it''s much more comfortable that it appears."


    "I put the pole on my shoulders, remember?" She pointed at the two branches that rose up to support the sunshade and rose up behind the shoulders. "It won''t be able to do that with these."


    "We could move the support further inward," Wizard Taeclas suggested.


    "Having the sunshade still makes it hard to switch the pole to my other shoulder though?" Karina said, demonstrating how she normally raised the pole over her head to do that. "It''s fine. Just my hat is good enough for me. Besides, the sunshade is right over your head, so doesn''t this only really work at noon?"


    Wizard Taeclas stared at the sunshades they''d made with an expression of despair. "Maybe we should have tried them outside first before we made another¡­" she muttered.


    As Karina had predicted, the sunshades weren''t very useful until it was close to noon, and by then her hat was the more effective cover. The pack also took time to remove, delaying when Shana could take a bath. She used it twice, and then stopped. Wizard Taeclas'' feelings weren''t hurt, because the woman herself only used hers three times from what seemed like determined optimism.


    Still, the Deadspeaker continued trying to make sunshades using leave and branches, taking apart the ones they''d built for raw material. It was something to do when they were resting after lunch to cool down from the heat before they went to work on imbuing the dungeon farm''s crops, or at least the ones that were mature and sturdy enough to handle contact with the poles. The crops had sprouted but were still too tender to be handled roughly, but the tubers were being harvested now, and they were much bigger than usual. Wizard Taeclas had obviously included something besides quick maturation to the meaning she''d placed on them.


    Other crops that they''d accelerated were also harvested, such as the vegetables that Wizard Taeclas had brought with her from Covehold Demesne. Some of those vegetables were allowed to keep growing so they could harvest their seeds to grow more, such as the leafy vegetables, but most of the vegetables were still sent to the kitchen, and soon found its way into everyone''s meals.


    The variety was needed as the lack of fruits from River''s Fork was finally being felt. Despite being in possession of the notes from¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­despite this, Wizard Lidzuga had not yet managed to adapt the meaning on the fruit trees to not be so damaging to them.


    "What''s taking him so long?" Binder Lori muttered during dinner, glaring down at her stew. "It''s been a week. Hasn''t he managed to adapt those meanings yet?"


    "There''s a lot of Binder Koshay''s¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


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    Shana returned to consciousness with Yoshka''s hand on her face. "Thank you, Yoshka," she said through the palm mashing her cheek. "I''m fine now."


    "Okay!"


    "So that means you can put your hand down."


    "Aw¡­!" Still, her cousin did put down her hand, and if there was one advantage of fruit no longer being served, it was that Yoshka''s hand wasn''t covered in their juices.


    The conversation had progressed in her absence. "¡ªcould take a look at the trees," Wizard Taeclas said. "Maybe I can see what Lidz is having problems with. I kinda want to eat fruits again too."


    Lori frowned. "Can we afford for you to stop the work you''re currently doing?"


    "Everything I can put a meaning on in the dungeon farm has one, and a day won''t make much difference to the crops in the fields outside. And it would be beneficial to see how the meanings are actually put together, so I can start experimenting on the happyfruit trees we have. That way we''re not completely reliant on River''s Fork for fru¡ª"


    "You''re going tomorrow!" Binder Lori suddenly announced loudly. "Do what you can to get any progress done. How long do you need?"


    Wizard Taeclas was startled by the abrupt exclamation. "Uh, a day or two, maybe?"


    "That means you''ll have to stay the night in River''s Fork," Rian pointed out. "Otherwise half your day will be spent going back and forth."


    "Oh." Wizard Taeclas glanced at Mistress Rybelle. "I''m not sure I want to be gone for that long¡­ "


    "Well, you could go back and forth for a couple of days, but I''m not sure how much work you''d get done that way. You''d be spending half your time sitting around on whichever boat you''re using, baking under the hot sun and bored out of your mind¡­"


    He ceased his description as Wizard Taeclas shuddered. "No, I don''t want to bake anymore!"


    Shana interjected. "If it''s a matter of not having a place to stay the night there, I can offer you the use of my office. It''s not much, but you can roll out your bedroll there. I cannot make any promises about how cool it is, however."


    If anything, Wizard Taeclas seemed to wilt further at the reminder. "I don''t want to bake anymore!"


    "¡­why don''t we let Tae deal with her pain for a moment," Rian said gently. "Speaking of River''s Fork, however, I think it''s finally time for us to speak to Yllian about what the Golden Sweetwood Company''s reply said, if only so we can include any preparations that need to be done into our work schedule."


    Binder Lori made a face, turning her gaze to look at Shanalorre. "I am not relinquishing my demesne," she said.


    "I''m sure that it''s very unlikely that they''ll ask you to. But, you know, they might want to settle in River''s Fork and Lorian since we already have established infrastructure for surviving the winter. Would you turn them away if they wanted that? Imagine it, a large infusion of skilled workers, tools, processed materials such as metals, people other than me who know how to coordinate and administrate¡­"


    "That sounds like something you want," Binder Lori said flatly.


    "Yes, because I can barely be a functional lord over the people we have now. If we take in new settlers and you don''t raise any new lords or ladies, I am quitting, and I don''t care what that does to our current legal code!"


    Shana frowned. "Something would happen to our legal code if Lord Rian abdicated his position?"


    "I''d abolish the list on the right," Lori said, pointing to where the demesne''s laws were listed next to the dungeon''s entrance.


    Shana, Wizard Taeclas and Mistress Rybelle turned to follow where she was pointing. "That''s¡­ half the laws, right?"


    "No, the laws are the list on the left," Shana corrected. "The Great Binder is talking about the list of things everyone has a right to do: living, owning property, assumed innocent unless proven otherwise¡­"


    Wizard Taeclas and Mistress Rybelle turned back towards Binder Lori. "So¡­ if Rian stopped being lord, you''d¡­ what, take everyone''s stuff?"


    "I could," Binder Lori nodded before focusing on her stew again, raising a spoonful to her mouth.


    "But¡­ you won''t, right?"


    Binder Lori didn''t reply, her mouth moving in a slow leisurely chew.


    Wizard Taeclas waited expectantly, even as Binder Lori continued to eat.


    Finally, Rian sighed. "You''re not going to get an answer. She''s doing the ''ominous dramatic silence'' thing."


    "Eh? But¡­ you''re not really going to quit, are you?"


    Rian hummed, raised a finger¡­ then bent down and focused on his stew, raising a spoonful to his mouth.


    On the other side of Ninang Riz, Mikon sighed. "And you wonder why you''re the only lord her Bindership has raised¡­"


    As Wizard Taeclas started pouting at getting two non-answers, Rian swallowed, "So, now that you''ve had time to consider, will you be taking Shana''s¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Binder Lori corrected, not looking up from her bowl.


    "¡ªShanalorre''s offer to stay overnight in her office?"


    Wizard Taeclas made a face, but she had been the one to volunteer her services in helping Wizard Lidzuga. "It''s not too hot at night, is it Sha¡­nalorre?"


    "I would say it would be a bit cooler than here," Shana said. "While there''s no assurance of a breeze, being under the dome means greatly reduced sunlight and heat, and the deadspoken wood doesn''t get hot as easily as the stone of the houses here."


    "¡­ that doesn''t sound so bad¡­" Wizard Taeclas said thoughtfully, then glanced at her wife. "Though¡­ I don''t want to leave Rybelle all alone¡­"


    "It will only be one night, Tae," Mistress Rybelle said. "Perhaps two if you''re not able to do it in a day. I''ll be fine. At least I don''t have to worry about gangs and fire here."


    "I suppose¡­"


    "Look at it this way, Tae," Rian said. "You have very strong motivation to get results as soon as possible."


    "Maybe I shouldn''t have said anything¡­" Wizard Taeclas said.


    "Too late," Binder Lori said. "You said there''d be fruit"


    Wizard Taeclas sighed.

 390 - The Return Of The Letter

    The work on the sawmill had been progressing well over the past week. The foundation had been placed and leveled to Lori''s satisfaction, and Lori had been able to raise half of a stone wall on the river-facing side of the site. The rest would wait until after the water wheel was installed. The carpenters would be taking care of that today as she and Rian went to River''s Fork to talk to Yllian, with¡ªLori reached into her pouch, feeling around for the right shape before drawing them out, then flipping between the two rocks she pulled out¡ªTaeclas traveling with them, putting the wooden frames that would support the roof on hold for the moment. They were taking the ice boat, as the Coldhold had been sent down the river to collect salt.


    "You know, this is more like what I had in mind when I heard rumors of an ice boat," Taeclas said as they traveled downriver, running her fingers over the exposed ice between the boat''s planks. "At least I can see the ice without trying, this time."


    "While it''s an idea I''m proud of suggesting, I''m hoping that it will be a thing of the past soon," Rian said, sitting with a bow stave resting against one shoulder. Lori glared at the unstrung bow, but Rian had said that keeping a bow strung when unused ruins it. Something about the bow losing tension or something. Still, it seemed pointless to have a bow ready to hand when it couldn''t be used immediately when needed, like when they happened to see a large beast they wanted dead drinking along the river as they passed by.


    "Aw! Why?"


    "Because they were a stopgap measure," Rian said. "We made ice boats because we didn''t have a way to make watertight joins that would let us make boats out of wood. With you and Lidzuga around, that''s a thing of the past now."


    "That man better have a boat ready for us," Lori muttered, her arrow on her lap next to her staff as she held her hat against the wind. The binding of lightningwisps she''d anchored to the arrowhead was still filled with a nearly irresponsible amount of imbuement¡ªnearly¡ªand the small addition of internal lightningwisps she''d just added to it once more allowed her to activate the binding at a distance once outside of her demesne.


    "I''m sure he''s been productive," Rian said. "He was putting together that second orchard of fruit trees the last I heard. Maybe he thought it was better to concentrate on those."


    Lori blinked. "When was this?" she demanded.


    "When we took the children here to spend the holiday with their parents. See, this is why you should have gotten off the ship and talked to Yllian."


    "Talking to people is your job."


    "And that''s why I know Lidzuga was putting together the second orchard and you don''t."


    "You''re also supposed to tell me things."


    "Would the fact that Lidzuga had started on one of the projects you assigned him really have been relevant at the time?"


    "¡­ well, you should have said something yesterday," Lori said, glaring at him.


    "I will endeavor to do better in the future, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded. "See that you do."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She would never get used to the feeling of leaving the boundaries of her demesne. The sensation of stifling, nearly agonizing heat struck her entire body all at once, and she gasped. It wasn''t as hot as it could be, since it was still the morning, but the ice boat had no shade beyond the hat on her head, so she was completely exposed.


    Rian had already skimmed a ladle over the river, offering it to her with one of those strange expressions on his face. Lori took the proffered the ladle and with a disgustingly practiced move flicked contents into her face. Water splashed on her, spilling down onto her shirt and feeling refreshingly cool.


    It wouldn''t last long, she knew. Her arms were already feeling hot, and she knew it would be a terrible idea to touch the wire-covered parts of her staff, which had been sitting out in the sun.


    Really, she shouldn''t have to go. Lori should have just stayed at home and had Rian go find out what was in the letter to report it back to her. But¡­


    There was chance that the typhon beast would appear along the river again, and if it did, this time she meant to capitalize! If she spotted it today, it wasn''t going to get to finish its drink and walk back into the rainbowed colors, it was going to join the chokers she''d experimented on and explode!


    Unfortunately, she had no luck this trip either. Despite watching the shore intently, no typhon beast made itself known.


    "It''s probably for the best," Rian said as the shoreline changed, the Iridescence vanishing once more as they entered River''s Fork. "With the weather and heat the way it is, everything must be so dry setting off your little lightning arrow might start a fire that could spread for taums. It would definitely get into River''s Fork."


    This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    "That''s what that arrow is for?-!" Riz exclaimed, staring in horror at the projectile on Lori''s lap, and she wasn''t the only one. Some of Riz''s friends shuffled as if to put more distance between themselves and the arrow.


    "It''s not that dry," Lori said, waving him off. "The river is still full, and none of the plants appear to be dying. Besides, the binding is for an instantaneous expression of lightning, too brief to cause anything to ignite. And even if something had caught fire, we''d have been next to the river in any case. I could have taken care of it."


    "It doesn''t need to be ''that dry'', setting off a fire will dry everything around and then they will be ''that dry''."


    "Well, nothing happened, so leave the subject alone."


    "Yes, your Bindership¡­"


    Riz patted his shoulder for some reason.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When they arrived at River''s Fork, Lori was glad to see that people were actually working. The replanted fields were being watered, as were the terraced farming plots that were now finished. She was glad to see they were drawing water from the bathhouse runoff pit, though that was probably more from convenience than compliance. She knew how to get her idiots to do as they should, after all.


    They were seen, of course, but other than a few people pausing for a moment to look toward them, people remained at work.


    Yllian met them at the dock, wearing a wide-brimmed reed hat and his exposed arms a very concerning livid red. He caught the rope thrown at him with a casual familiarity and tied it to the post to secure the boat.


    "Yllian!" Rian greeted as he rose from his seat and quickly crossed to the dock. "How''s the next crop doing?"


    "Rian. They''ve taken well, and Lidzuga says he can start Deadspeaking them in a few more days." Yllian turned towards her, bowing. "Great Binder."


    "Yllian. Where''s Lidzuga? He''s not taking an unauthorized day off, is he?" Lori looked at everyone impatiently, waiting for them to get off so she could vacate the boat as well.


    "He''s should be at the firewood grove, Great Binder, collecting wood for his projects."


    "Erzebed, could you have someone show¡ª" Lori felt for the right shape and checked the name, "¡ªTaeclas where that is so she can talk to him?"


    "Brabli, could you show her where that is?" Riz said.


    Taeclas stopped staring at Lori and followed the woman that Riz had indicated, though she kept looking back towards Lori with a strange look on her face.


    "Well, that hopefully gets us more fruits again," Rian said. "Yllian, you''ve had time to read the Golden Sweetwod Company''s letter, right?"


    "I have. You wish to discuss it now?"


    Rian pointed at her for some reason.


    "I see. All right, then. I will retrieve the letter and meet you in the G¡ªthat is, Binder Shanalorre''s office."


    "Taeclas might be staying over and sleeping there tonight, by the way."


    "I''ll ready it for that later, then."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Shanalorre''s office was, as promised, warm but not painfully hot, especially after Lori anchored airwisps and firewisps to the quartz embedded into her staff and formed a binding that deleted heat while moving air. Holding her staff in the crook of her arm, she turned it back and forth depending on whether she felt too cold or too hot, which let her stay comfortable as she sat herself behind the table that acted as the office''s desk.


    Rian immediately started amusing himself by walking back and forth to find a spot where the binding blew towards him to set down his chair.


    When Yllian arrived, the worn envelope of the letter in hand, Lori was pointedly turning her staff to make Rian stand up and move his chair a few yustri to get back in the flow of the cooling breeze. She needed to amuse herself too, after all.


    "Ah, Yllian," Rian said. "Finally, we can get started."


    Yllian took the other free chair as Rian finally gave up and just sat down where his chair already was.


    "Soo¡­." Rian began, "what did the rest of the Golden Sweetwood Company say? How twitchy is her Bindership likely to get over this?"


    Her other lord glanced towards her. "Unfortunately, there is likely to be some twitching," he confessed.


    "Will they be coming here, then?" Lori demanded.


    "That has never been in question, Great Binder," Yllian said. "The goal of the Golden Sweetwood Company was to settle in the new continent as a group. While we the company are divided at the moment, that is simply because we do not want to abandon River''s Fork completely."


    Her eyes narrowed. "This is my demesne now."


    "Of course, Great Binder, although as far as the Company knows, we are still ruled by¡­ well, by Binder Shanalorre. The letter WAS sent before winter, after all, and those were our circumstances then."


    "So they''re coming here thinking that Shanalorre is still in charge and her Bindership is the cranky neighbor upriver who took in the majority of the demesne''s survivors?" Rian said.


    "Essentially. Let me read to you the¡ª"


    "No, no, don''t read the whole letter," Lori cut in. "I don''t have the time or the patience for a ''read the whole letter word-for-word'' segment. Just give me the notable points that I actually have to worry about."


    Yllian hesitated, glancing down at the letter, eyes moving side to side as he read quickly. "Does the company planning to bring in Deadspeakers to teach Binder Shanalorre count?"


    Lori considered that. At the very least, if the Golden Sweetwood Company planned to teach Shanalorre, then they presumably intended to keep her alive as River''s Fork''s Dungeon Binder. Although¡­ "Does it say whether they planned to obey her authority?"


    "There''s nothing to indicate their thoughts on the matter, Great Binder."


    "Hmm¡­" Lori ''hmm¡­''-ed, then shrugged. "Well, it''s irrelevant now. She is no longer the Dungeon Binder who rules this demesne. What else?"


    "I''ve been instructed to open negotiations with you about the possibility of more people settling into your demesne. That is, Lorian Demesne. I believe it''s because friends and extended family will be part of the next wave, and they might prefer to settle in the demesne where the people they know are already settled."


    "Not because we have an actual functional Dungeon?" Lori said dryly.


    "That might have been a factor, Great Binder. The report I sent also included small reports from Kolinh, Daising, and other members of the company living in Lorian Demesne, and they would have mentioned it, especially in comparison to our own circumstances here at the time."


    "Do they give an estimate as to how many settlers will be arriving?" Rian asked.


    "The ship that the company hired the year before was able to fit three hundred people and supplies, so the next wave will probably a similar number."


    Three hundred people. That was more than the people in both of her demesnes combined. And they wanted to live here?


    ¡­


    She was NOT going to be the one building all those houses. There were five hundred of them they could make their own rainbowed houses!

 391 - Tree Adjustments

    "Huh¡­ that''s a lot of people who''d need to be picked up from Covehold¡­" Rian said, sounding thoughtful.


    "Picking them up from Covehold Demesne won''t be necessary. The ship will make for the bay at the end of the river directly, and the colonists will make their way here as we did."


    Rian frowned. "Wait, they know where the river is?" he said.


    "Yes. We didn''t start out from Covehold except to pass through and get the ship cleared of the colors. Koshay had us go along the coast to look for a site to settle, and we found the bay at the end of the river by chance. "


    "Ah. Of course. Well, there goes our relative secrecy. If nothing else, eventually people are going to start wondering where that ship goes, and the sailors on it can spread the knowledge of where the bay is." He turned towards Lori. "Maybe it''s time to go back to expanding the demesne?"


    "I will consider it," she said.


    "Because now is actually a pretty good time since the sawmill has reached the point where¡ª"


    "I will consider it."


    "Leaving the matter alone now, your Bindership. Yllian, change the subject, quick!"


    Yllian rolled his eyes, but glanced down at the letter again. "The number will probably be less than the three hundred settlers. I informed them of the difficulties we''ve been having with growing food without Koshay, so they should be bringing in food for the winter as well."


    "Is there any indication that they intend to found another demesne?"


    Yllian hesitated. "The arriving settlers will be coming with far more wizards than we did, and if they followed my recommendation many of them will be Whisperers. Beyond those and the Deadspeakers who were intended to teach Binder Shanalorre, there will also be Mentalists and Horotracts."


    Lori twitched again. More threats, and ones that Rian hadn''t even interviewed. "And they will be coming here?"


    "Here to River''s Fork, yes. At the time I wrote my letter, it was clear that we needed better infrastructure than what we had and that Koshay was able to make with his Deadspeaking. Given what I had heard of what the Great Binder was able to build, I thought that if we had our own Whisperers we could start building infrastructure without needing the intervention of a Dungeon Binder."


    At the very intent look Lori gave him, Yllian added, "Of course, this was seasons ago, when circumstances were substantially different. Matters have greatly changed since then."


    "You''re going to want to keep all those wizards here in River''s Fork, aren''t you?" Rian said. "You barely trust Taeclas, and she''s Taeclas. The woman only wants to grow plants and be with her wife, and you''re still worried she''d want to take your demesne."


    "She''s a wizard," Lori pointed out. Did Rian just not understand?


    "Yes, but she''s a wizard who has absolutely no desire to be a Dungeon Binder! It''s specifically the kind of person you had me look for, I found her, and you still think she''s a danger to you?"


    "She could have deceived you, or change her mind in the future."


    Rian took a deep breath and let out a sigh. "Yllian, what else did the letter say?"


    Yllian scanned the letter again. "Much of it is informing me of what supplies they''ll be sending along and asking if there''s anything we need specifically, which I''m supposed to send back with the ship when they arrive."


    "And when will that be?" Lori demanded.


    "Mid-summer at the earliest, but late summer or even early fall at the latest."


    "So they could come any day now," Rian said. "River''s Fork will have to play host to six times the normal number of people at worst."


    "It won''t be so bad," Yllian said. "They will be well-equipped with tents, so there won''t be any reason to worry about finding places for people to stay. There''s flat land nearby for them to set up, and since it''s within the demesne, they won''t need to clear so much of the space, since there aren''t any large beasts nearby. And if there are, those can be hunted."


    "And hygiene?" Rian asked.


    "Many of these people will be seasoned militia and their families. They know not to shit near the river, and the camp will be well-organized. There will be no risk of tainting the river water so close to the village."


    Rian nodded. "Was there anything else in the letter? Is the Golden Sweetwood Company running low on funds?"


    "No¡­although¡­" Yllian glanced at Lori, an apologetic expression on his face. "They requested we scout for further possible settlements, if River''s Fork is not yet grown to be able to support the next batch of settlers."


    Lori twitched.


    "Well, that sounds like a problem for next-year-me," Rian said brightly. "Today-me has enough to worry about right now. So¡­ we''re due for at most three hundred people."


    "And supplies," Yllian added.


    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    "Ah, thank you Yllian. Yes, and supplies. How much of that is likely to be food?"


    "One of my recommendations in the letter I sent was to bring enough supplies to last the winter, as we wouldn''t be able to replicate growing multiple harvests in the spring, summer and fall without a capable Deadspeaker. They should be bringing the necessary food to last them the season."


    "''Should'', you say?"


    Yllian nodded.


    "So¡­ River''s Fork, which I believe is now no longer in danger of starving to death¡ª" Lori glanced at Rian, who nodded, but also shrugged and held his thumb and forefinger about a yustri apart, ¡ª"will once more be in grave danger of starving to death again."


    "It shouldn''t¡­" Yllian trailed off as Lori gave him a level look. "But I suppose it is a possibility, Great Binder."


    "Then when they arrive, you will check whether or not that possibility is, in fact, the case. If they arrive thinking they can just eat our food, we''re not letting them in."


    "Except the children, of course," Rian said. "Iridescence is very unhealthy for growing children, probably."


    Lori rolled her eyes. ""Fine, the children can come in, but that''s it. No one else can come in until they''ve gathered sufficient food to last through the winter."


    "What about checking if the children are doing well? We don''t have the parents coming over every week because it''s too far, and you wouldn''t allow the boats to be used for it, but if the settlers will be made to wait outside of the demesne they can just walk the distance."


    "Fine, they can come in to check on the children. But they''re not allowed to eat when they do it!"


    Rian nodded, then turned to Yllian. "More relevant to the two of us, do you think they''ll respect River''s Fork''s current arrangements and structure, or do you think they''re going to supplant you as this demesne''s lord due to¡­ well, not being a majority?"


    "It shouldn''t be an issue. As the most senior member of the Golden Sweetwood Company on the continent, they should respect my authority, and I''m sure I can explain how matters stand to any other senior members who arrive."


    "You''re a lord. They will do so regardless," Lori said. "To do otherwise is to defy my authority as the one who ratified your continuation in that role."


    "While I of course completely agree with your Bindership," Rian said, "this sort of ''dealing with people'' matter is exactly the sort of thing that your lords are for, isn''t it? So let us handle this when they arrive. Please?"


    As if she was actually going to talk to those people herself!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    She left the two alone to discuss demesne matters as she went to look for¡ªLori reach into her pouch, checking the names¡ªTaeclas and Lidzuga. Riz and the rest escorted her, all of them sweating as Lori went to where the fruit trees were, which should be where the two Deadspeakers were. As she walked, she considered what she''d learned.


    Having more people arrive to settle in her demesnes¡­ it wasn''t that she was opposed to the idea, but three hundred? That was more than her combined total population, which would require doubling¡­ well, everything! Housing, food production, baths, laundry facilities, water storage, food storage, Dungeon space¡­ well, probably not that last, she had that many open alcoves in her Dungeon. But she''d probably have to expand the space just a little more, to give her more leeway for growth¡­ or more sudden arrivals.


    Lori also acknowledged that she would likely need to do what Rian had been bothering her to do and finally raise another lord or lady, possibly more. Any new additions to her demesne would be completely unfamiliar to Rian, and he likely wouldn''t have the time to learn how to manipulate them if he was already busy with prior work.


    The problem was, of course, that she didn''t have any candidates to raise.


    ¡­


    Well, it was a ''dealing with people'' problem, so she''d leave it to Rian.


    Lori found the two she was looking for standing around one of the fruit trees¡ªshe didn''t know what sort it was¡ªeach with a hand on the trunk. Taeclas was frowning, eyes not really looking at anything in particular as Lidzuga seemed to be in the middle of explaining something.


    "¡ªso it''s all generating even more heat," said Lidzuga. "And because of the weather¡­"


    "Yes, I see, I see," Taeclas said, "And while we can mitigate this by altering the meaning to induce the growth of more leaves, that''s going to compete with the fruit production. Though we might need to do that anyway. The tree is going to need the increased nutrient production¡­"


    "But that''s going to generate more heat!"


    "I know!"


    "Where is the heat being generated?"


    The two Deadspeakers jumped in surprise, turning towards her. "Your Bindership?" Lidzuga exclaimed.


    "Good morning, your Bindership!" Taeclas greeted cheerfully. Why did she keep doing that?


    "Where is the heat being generated?" Lori repeated.


    "Uh, as I explained, your Bindership, it''s mostly the leaves. It''s where the most energy-intensive vital processes are, and they''ve been getting hot because of the meaning on the tree combined with the summer''s excessive heat."


    Lori looked up at the tree in question. "All the leaves or specific ones?"


    "It''s most of the leaves that are growing from the older branches of the tree, your Bindership," Taeclas said, waving vaguely at the tree. "One of the things the meaning does is to grow leaves that have been altered to produce more nutrients faster, which are the ones that get hot. Because of the past year of growth, the meaning is no longer where it needs to be to induce these leaves to grow, which is a different problem, but the leaves it does induce aren''t as efficient as they could be because of a lack of adjustments. It''s result in the leaves being warm, which would normally not be a problem, but with this heat¡­"


    "So the leaves are evenly distributed?" Lori said, looking up at the trees above.


    "For now, your Bindership. The leaves on the ends of the newer branches don''t grow to have those induced changes."


    Lori nodded absently, beginning to walk around the tree as she stared upwards, noting which direction the wind was blowing. The tree didn''t feel particularly hot¡­ but then again, it wouldn''t. The trees were tall, and any heat would simply get higher unless it was a strong radiant heat. "Beyond the issue of the hot leaves, what are the other issues that have prevented the reactivation of the meanings?"


    "It''s mostly been needing to extend the meaning to the newly grown parts of the trees and deactivating it in the areas that aren''t really suited for it anymore, your Bindership," Lidzuga said. "I''ve had to go slow, especially since I''ve needed to keep referring to the notes and flow diagram examples."


    That implied the adjustments were something he had little experience in, or were far more complicated than what he was used to. "Taeclas, do you concur?"


    Taeclas nodded. "Lidz was just showing me the differences between a tree he''s had to adjust and one that still needed adjustment. The meaning''s really fiddly and I can see why Lidz needs the notes. It''s nothing I can''t do, though, but the heat is still an issue."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Never mind the heat. How many trees do you think you can adjust today?"


    Instead of answering, Taeclas frowned and stepped away from the tree, moving over to a different tree and laying her hands on it. Her gaze became vague again as she concentrated on the meaning that she was perceiving in the tree. "Uh, most of the time would be in claiming the life in the newer parts of the tree that would need to be included in the meaning¡­ maybe between seven to ten before I have to stop for dinner, depending on the trees'' particular adjustments?"


    Lori nodded. "Get to work, then. Lidzuga, with me. I need wooden poles."

 392 - Ventilation and Boats

    It was clear to Lori that the issue with the trees wasn''t a Deadspeaking problem, but rather a cooling problem. After all, it didn''t matter how much heat a process generated, what mattered was siphoning off that heat.


    Really, if they had the infrastructure the best way to deal with this was to have misty sprays of water coming down on the leaves, which was cooling and irrigation put together. The lack of infrastructure meant that wasn''t viable, but if Taeclas ever put the meaning on a fruit tree planted in her dungeon farm, Lori would be willing to invest in that infrastructure.


    Here, she''d be investing in slightly less intensive infrastructure.


    The firewood trees didn''t have branches long and straight enough to be poles, but that was what having a Deadspeaker was for. She had Lidzuga putting together lengths of reasonably straight wood, each at least three paces long, while she gathered rocks with assistance from Riz and her friends, one being sent off to get some shovels.


    A pile of rocks had been gathered not far from the bath house, which turned out to have been put together under Yllian''s orders both as a stockpile in case she needed more raw material and as a means of keeping certain people occupied. Lori put it to the former use, taking rocks and softening them so she could shape them¡­ after forcible cooling them by claiming and binding the firewisps inside them, since they were all hot from being out in the sun.


    The softened stone was wrapped around one end of the lengths of wood and solidified to keep it in place. Lori did the same to the rest of the lengths that Lidzuga had fused together and straightened using Deadspeaking. There were seven poles, with one more in progress as Lori claimed and bound airwisps, anchoring them to the stone wrapped around the ends of the lengths wood. When each of the improvised poles had bindings anchored to them, it was time to test them so that she''d know how effective their dispersal was.


    Of course, she wasn''t going to just claim the earthwisps in the dirt and have them move aside to make a hole. That would ruin the soil! And given the fruit tree grove was where a lot of the demesne''s latrine waste went to keep the trees nourished, she also didn''t want to touch any of it. Fortunately, they had shovels. Two of Riz''s friends put aside their spears and started to dig a hole for the improvised pole. When it was about knee deep, the pole was put in. The rest of the soil was packed into the hole to hold it in place, and some rocks stacked at the bottom for further stability.


    With the pole now stable, Lori used her staff to reach up to imbue and activate the binding of airwisps.


    Immediately, the leaves of the trees above began to rustle violently. Lori adjusted the intensity of the airwisps to keep the wind they were generating from being so violent as to damage the leaves. The wind spread outward in all directions and slightly upward, and after imbuing the binding so that it would last a few days, Lori stepped back to observe how far the wind spread. The air spread surprisingly far, judging from the moving leaves, which hopefully meant that the poles she had would be enough.


    Reaching up with her staff to deactivate binding, Lori then had the pole pulled up from the ground so it could be repositioned. Walking around the fruit trees¡ªand having to endure the smell of the latrine waste used to fertilize them on top of the heat¡ªLori identified the best places to install the poles, where they would be able to ventilate the most number of trees, with some degree of overlap. The trees on the outermost edges of the location would have the least cooling, but they''d still be cooled and that should be enough.


    "Uh, your Bindership?" Lidzuga said as she reached up to deactivate the binding. "What''s all this for?"


    "You were both saying how the meanings were causing the leaves to grow too hot," Lori said. "When something gets too hot, you cool it. Since I can''t just anchor firewisps to the tree and delete the heat, I''m increasing the airflow so that the heat being released by the leaves is drawn away faster."


    Lidzuga stared up at the trees, which ruffled only slightly in the mostly-still air. "Ooooh¡­" he said, then groaned. "Ugh, my uncle is going to be insufferable if he ever finds out about this. He''s a steam driver artisan, he always goes on about air-cooled steam drivers¡­"


    "I wouldn''t know, I''ve never worked with one," Lori said. "I''ll finish this, you go help Taeclas adjust the meanings."


    "Yes, your Bindership¡­"


    The holes were dug up as Lori added airwisps from her lungs to the bindings on the poles, letting her imbue them at a distance. She made a note to add these to the list of bindings she had to keep imbued. Without any bound tool cores with her at the moment, all this would need to be manually imbued, but that was no problem. Besides, she didn''t have any more bound tool cores ready anyway. She''d have to get the smiths to make her more.


    Once the holes were finished¡ªRian had arrived at one point and had taken over getting the holes dug up¡ªLori was able to put the poles into place. Six of the poles were positioned so that they''d be able to blow air all the way to the edge of the trees, and the other two were placed near the middle of the trees to circulate air there. Instead of dirt, rocks were piled around the bottom of the poles, which Lori softened and reshaped into a solid base to more effectively hold the wooden poles in place.


    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    With the binding on the poles containing airwisps from her lungs¡ªit would be a while before she''d be able to do that again¡ªLori was able to activate the bindings and begin imbuing them at a distance. Wind began to blow through the leaves of the trees, causing the leaves and branches to sway gently.


    "So¡­ is this going to solve our fruit problem?" Rian asked as he leaned on a shovel.


    "That is the intention," Lori said. "The Deadspeakers have been going on about the meanings making the leaves of the trees too hot, and causing harm to the trees. This will cool them. After all, the trees were able to last through the previous summer, so they can clearly function through a lesser heat."


    "I suppose. Though will you be able to imbue these at a distance, or will you need to keep coming here every few days? I don''t see a bead receptacle on those poles."


    "They can be imbued," Lori said dismissively. "We can head back now. Find out if Taeclas still needs to stay overnight or if she''s finished and coming with us."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Taeclas had to stay, though she said she believed she''d be finished the next day. Lori left it up to Rian to remember to send a boat after her.


    Before they left, Lidzuga showed them Lori''s Boat, which he declared to be in good condition. Some parts were noticeably paler, and the boat looked as it had when she had first acquired it. Next to it was another boat that looked extremely similar. It had the same dimensions, at any rate, being the same length, width and height. The wooden panels looked a bit thicker, meaning it was no doubt heavier than Lori''s Boat, but it was hardly intended to be carried around.


    "Please don''t name this one something like ''Lori''s Second Boat'' or something," Rian said as they examined the copied boat.


    "Why would I call it that? The name is far too long," Lori said as she knocked on the wooden structure, and received a dull, heavy echo and aching knuckles in turn. The wood was very solid, and there didn''t seem to be any hollows that could lead to structural weaknesses.


    "Oh good¡­"


    "''Lori''s Boat Two'' is far better."


    "¡­" Rian ''¡­''-ed. "¡­can''t you try some other name?"


    "Why? It''s the perfect name."


    "I don''t know¡­ variety? Constantly reusing the same name shows a lack of imagination!"


    "It''s a boat, Rian. There''s no need to waste anymore more time on the name than what''s necessary."


    For some reason, Rian sighed. Riz patted him on the shoulder. "Have you tested this in the water yet, Lidz?" Rian asked, looking resigned for some reason.


    "Yes, Lord Yllian and a few people were nice enough to help me get it in and out of the water to test how waterproof it was after I finished it," the Deadspeaker said. "I even tried getting on it. I understand what those outriggers are about now. As it is, it''s a little unstable."


    "That''s because it''s meant to be a barge for cargo, not people," Rian said. "Now you know why the next one has higher sides, right?"


    "Yes, it''s very easy to put too much weight on one side and accidentally have it dip too low and start taking in water," Lidzuga said. "It wouldn''t take much to improve the design."


    "That''s what the modifications I want you to make are for," Rian said. "Which one are you working on next, by the way?"


    Lidzuga gestured towards where a boxy wooden structure lay on the ground. It¡­ well, it looked like several branches had been stuck together into a barely boat-like shape. The sides of the boat were noticeably higher than Lori''s Boat or the copy.


    "Ah, deciding to build the boat that addresses the obvious problem?" Rian said.


    Lidzuga nodded. "Increasing the height of the boat''s sides seems like the obvious solution to the risk of it sinking when one side gets low enough to start taking in water. Though¡­"


    "It makes it harder to get in and out," Rian said, and Lidzuga nodded. "Well, when you build the other permutations I gave you, I''d like your assessment on which configuration to continue producing, and which would be a better structure to build on a larger scale."


    Lori''s Boat and Lori''s Boat Two had to be left behind, as they didn''t have the steam jet driver for the former, or a rope to tow either behind them. Rian said he''d bring both when he came to pick up Taeclas the next day so he could bring the boats back to Lori''s demesne. Lori increased the priority of having more bound tool cores made, as the new boat would need its own driver.


    On the way back upriver, Lori caught a glimpse of the Typhon Beast, ordering the boat stopped and handing Rian the arrow with the heavily imbued binding of lightningwisps. Unfortunately, by the time the arrow had been knocked onto the bowstring the beast had slipped back into the woods and even as Rian tried to aim at where its vague movements indicated its location, it managed to blend into the Iridescence. Lori couldn''t even blame the missed opportunity on Rian taking too long to take hold of the arrow and aim: the typhon beast had already been turning away from the river when she''d spotted it, finished with drinking its fill of water.


    "It''s like it''s taunting us," Rian said, sounding frustrated as he carefully released the tension on the bow and handed the arrow back to Lori. "Like it was waiting out there to give us a chance to see it, then runs of before we can shoot at it." He glanced at Lori. "Is there any chance it''s some kind of dragon-born abomination? You know, altered to be smarter, and it''s using its intelligence to mock us?"


    Lori shook her head. "The blood of dragonborn abominations is distinctive. And even if it were an abomination, intelligence does not work that way. There are stories of beasts, and fursh acting in ways that have been attributed to increased malice and intelligence, but post-morten dissection and analysis found no notable alterations to their brains. It''s just a stupid beast, and you''re attributing properties to it out of frustration."


    "I know that, and you know that, but does that thing know that?"


    "Rian, stop being silly."


    They continued back home.

 393 - New Bound Tools

    Since it seemed she''d be needing new bound tool cores¡ªat the very least, Lori''s Boat Two needed a driver to propel it¡ªLori began making the preparations to make them as soon as she got back home. She had Rian inform the smiths what she needed made, and then checked the amount of copper they had in her treasure room. They still had copper bar stock, but it was probably time to continue mining in River''s Fork. She''d have Rian set that up.


    Actually, given that mining will be indoor work in a dungeon-like environment¡­ did that mean they could have had people mining all summer and they''d have actually wanted to? With the ventilation bound tool built into the mine''s dragon shelter portion, all she''d need to do was add a binding of firewisps to cool the air to deal with any heat from all the people working there¡­


    "Rian, start looking for people we can afford to spare or aren''t doing anything," Lori ordered her lord at dinner. Whathersname¡­¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªTaeclas had returned to Lori''s demesne that afternoon, and reported that all the meanings had been adjusted and activated, so they would have new fruit in a few days. "We need people to go and work the mine in River''s Fork."


    "Wow, you actually remembered without me reminding you. Is this you finally coming into your Mentalism? Will you be able to remember everyone''s names without writing them on rocks soon?"


    "Wait, that''s what that''s for?" Taeclas said.


    "If you remembered, why didn''t you say anything?"


    "I figured you''d want to prioritize the sawmill? You always preferred doing only one project at a time instead of spreading ourselves too thin."


    "Does that mean we don''t have anyone to spare?"


    "I''ll ask and see who''s willing. The conditions are better now, I think? They can stay in the dragon shelter instead of having to bunk in people''s homes, which should be more comfortable¡­ well, aside from cleaning the shelter latrine, but they can just not use that one. Though I think the bottom of the mine is still flooded? You might need to do something about that, since¡­ well, that''s where most of the mining will be happening? Or should I just give people buckets?"


    "Do we have enough buckets to give them?"


    "If not, we could always make more. You can never have too many buckets, especially since we''ll need something to carry out the ore anyway."


    Lori frowned. "What happened to what we used before?"


    "I have no idea. It''s just always a safe bet to assume you need more buckets." Rian tilted his head. "And probably a hand cart of some sort. And maybe some kind of rope and pulley to help with moving the hand carts up and down the tunnel¡­"


    "Yes, yes, and several other things too, I''m sure. How long will it take you to get the mine operational again?" Lori interrupted.


    Rian hummed thoughtfully. "A week, maybe? Though I''m pretty sure I can find more people willing to work in the mine if you let me have a bound tool that blows air around."


    Lori frowned. "Why? The mine already has adequate ventilation."


    "It''s to¡­ actually, just trust me that I need it to be able to recruit more people willing to mine," Rian said. "And maybe one or two of the new wisplights from Covehold? The mine is dark, after all."


    "So, the list of inventory needed to reactivate the mine is several buckets, a hand cart, rope, pulleys, a bound tool, and two wisplights. This seems far more than what it took last time."


    "Well, given the depth we''ll be having people mine at now, I don''t think candles and oil lamps is going to be safe anymore. Besides, last time you weren''t the one running the mining operation, our demesne was just providing the labor force. Also, back then the mine wasn''t also a well-built, Binder Lori-approved dragon shelter, so we need to be more careful about what we do in it. Wouldn''t want to leave rocks in front of the food storage, after all."


    Ah, right. The mine was also the demesne''s food storage now, wasn''t it. "Fine, fine. See to it. I expect it to be ready in a week, as you promised."


    "I''d like it officially stated I didn''t actually promise that. I said ''a week, maybe''."


    "Just get it done, Rian."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori had more than enough time to extract white Iridescence from the cracked bead to grind down to a fine powder as the smiths hammered copper from ingots to sheets. Fortunately, they didn''t have to draw it out into wire, since they had plenty of the ones that Rian bought from Covehold. It was boring work, grinding the white Iridescence finer and finer, but there was no one else she could entrust it too. More importantly, there was no one else she''d allow to use her mortar and pestle!


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    The wisplights for the mine were set aside, as well as a small jar of beads to fuel them.


    Once the smiths sent word that the sheet copper was ready, Lori came down to supervise the crafting of the bound tool cores, providing heat where needed as the smiths made little copper capsules that were carefully filled with white Iridescence powder before being tamped down to compress the contents and remove any space to shift before the capsule was sealed and a wire was secured to the outside. The smiths had managed to adjust their tooling to make the capsules slightly smaller than last time, meaning they were able to make a bit more bound tool cores than before.


    Some of the wire bought from Covehold Demesne was heated and hardened to make bead receptacles for the bound tool cores.


    With the bound tool cores made, she was able to get a start on building bound tools she could add to the poles that were cooling the trees in River''s Fork. Bone to act as a hard casing around the core of copper and white Iridescence¡ªit had to be protected from idiots throwing rocks and whatever nonsense the people there could come up with¡ªand then she''d need to put the bead receptacle on a length of wire so that beads could be put in without a ladder.


    Which reminded her, she''d probably need a ladder to set these things in place.


    She also made the new steam jet driver for Lori''s Boat Two, which Rian had towed back to Lori''s demesne when she''d picked up Taeclas. That required four bound tool cores, as well as a good amount of bone. Most of her time was occupied with fusing the bone together into a cylinder that was to her satisfaction. Once that was done¡ªdoing so took half a day, since she had to make sure there were no voids from the fusion that would have weakened the structure¡ª Lori embedded the bound tool cores into the tube, making sure to keep the wires leading to the cores separate.


    The cylinder was mounted onto a wooden shaft with bone and pegs. Once, they''d used charring, oil and wax to waterproof the wood so that it wouldn''t decay, but as they had a Deadspeaker now, whatshername¡­¡ªLori checked the rocks in her pouch¡ªTaeclas was tasked with altering the outer layer of the wood to seal it against water. It took more time than Lori had expected, even with Shanalorre assisting with imbuing.


    "Well, she did say she was slow when it came to the carpentry-related parts of Deadspeaking," Rian said as they''d watched the woman sitting on the ground on a cloth, with the wooden shaft and bone cylinder with her eyes half closed. "Next time, we''ll know to give her whatever we need her to work on sooner."


    "Next time, we''re having whatever it is taken downriver to River''s Fork for¡­ what''s his name¡­"


    "Lidzuga," Rian supplied.


    "Yes, him. We''ll have him do it. It can''t be much longer than this."


    "Be nice. Until you manage to learn how to do Deadspeaking and can do this yourself, you really don''t have any grounds to judge how long she''s taking. How''s that progressing, by the way?"


    "Just get it to me when she''s done, Rian!"


    When Taeclas finally finished with the shaft, Lori was able to hand the shaft to the carpenters and smiths, who put together the bound tool''s control lever. Springs and subtle little bumps in the wood gave the lever distinct stopping points so that the operator would be able to set it by feel. With the bound tool''s mechanisms finally completed, Lori was able to anchor waterwisps and firewisps to the inside of the bone tube. It consisted of four distinct ring-shaped bindings, each one anchored to a different bound tool core to keep the binding from dissipating when not imbued.


    When it was done, Lori had a fully functional steam jet driver bound tool with three forward speeds and a reverse setting that could be installed onto Lori''s Boat Two.


    Installing the steam jet driver was done in River''s Fork. In Lori''s Boat, the various drivers that Lori had made and mounted onto the boat had needed to be secured to a wooden mounting point that had been clamped with various pegs and wedges to the wood at the rear of the boat. This had been done to minimize damage to the wood, as they''d had no way to really repair the wooden hull. However, as they had Deadspeakers now, the steam jet driver for Lori''s Boat Two could be mounted directly onto the back of the boat.


    The carpenters had prepared a mount for the stream jet driver, which was mounted onto the back of the boat with wooden wedges that were driven into holes chiseled out of the boat''s rear panel. Once the mounting point was secured, whatshisname¡­¡ªLori checked the rocks in her pouch¡ªLidzuga fused all the wood together, sealing the joins. It was, Lori was told, a more structurally secure bond than simply pressing the flat side of the mounting point. Something about the wedges adding crossgrained connections, which was less likely to sheer. Lori had only vaguely understood the explanation, but if the craftsmen who knew their business said so, who was she to doubt them?


    While Lidzuga and the carpenter who''d come along to chisel out and secure the bound tool¡ªDeil, from the embroidery on the cloth on the man''s head¡ªwere installing the mounting point, Lori installed the bound tool cores to the cooling poles. Unfortunately, they did not have a freestanding ladder in River''s Fork, so one had to be improvised by lashing two ladders together with rope and several people holding the ladders to keep it stable below.


    It was a bit of an awkward climb, but the ladders were stable enough, so Lori was able to mount each of the bound tool cores and anchor the binding to the white Iridescence, with the wire to the bead receptacle trailing down the bowl. She also added firewisps to the binding, both because they had to act as the wisps that anchored directly to the white Iridescence, and because it let her destroy heat, lowering the temperature of the air that the poles blasted out to the leaves of the trees around them and increasing the cooling they provided. By the time she finished, Deil and Lidzuga had finished mounting the steam jet driver onto Lori''s Boat Two.


    It was a well-satisfied Lori who rode on the new boat on the return trip to her demesne upriver, with Rian operating the steam jet driver bound tool behind her.


    "So¡­" Rian said, looking down at the boat, "is there any way at all I can get you to change the name of this boat?"


    "Why? It''s a perfect name."


    "It''s boring! You just slapped a number on it and called it a day!"


    "It''s a small boat, Rian, it doesn''t need some kind of memorable name."


    He still kept trying to convince her to change her boat''s perfectly sensible name all the way home.

 2024 Anniversary Special: Good Night

    It was well after dinner and even the line of hopefuls at the Um had long dispersed, deciding they''d rather have sleep than sex. Despite the strangeness¡ªand once you know why it was called that, silliness¡ªof the name, people actually had taken to calling it that. Perhaps it was just to humor the Great Binder, or perhaps the name was just silly enough to be amusing to say. At least it was better than calling it a bellhouse or a belfry. The Um wasn''t that sort of place at all, and as a member of the militia¡ªretired¡ªRiz could say that with certainty. After all, she''d been to a few to get a clapper to ring her bell for a little bit, and the Um really wasn''t anything like those places, if only because no beads changed hands and people bought their own bed cushions.


    Fortunately, that was none of Riz''s business, as she wasn''t on Um duty that night.


    Normally, that meant she was at home either being tended to by Rian or waiting until it was her turn again, but to her disgruntlement that wasn''t the case. The paper screens on the windows that were normally closed for privacy were all open, letting the unnatural breeze from outside enter and pass through the house. It was admittedly a nice change from the warmth and sweat, but Riz couldn''t really enjoy it.


    She lay on one side of the wide shared bed, wearing only the long shirt she''d been planning to wear the next day, her head on Mikon''s lap. It was by far the most comfortable pillow on the bed except for Rian, but he wasn''t available at the moment. On the other side of the bed, Umu was making use of far less comfortable non-Mikon pillows, clad only in her skirt and a blouse that she''d put back on after she''d unwound her chest wraps. Riz didn''t need to look to know that the woman had an impatient pout on her face. It was a feeling she shared, except she wasn''t pouting because she was a hard and tough militia woman!


    Sitting with her back against the head of the bed above Riz, Mikon''s own blouse was just loosely thrown on, only a single wooden button keeping the front closed, and the skirt beneath it wasn''t even properly worn, the laces hanging loose to let her sit more comfortably. Riz knew the other woman didn''t really care if her chest was bare, but she''d put the blouse on in consideration for Riz and the open windows. She knew the weaver was only indulging her sensibilities. After all, she''d seen Mikon naked most nights since the three of them had finally convinced Rian into bed, so the woman''s skin was no mystery, but¡­ well, it was the principle of the thing.


    She glanced down towards her feet, in the same direction that Umu was pouting. At the other end of the house, Rian sat at the altar-like stone table. Their man¡ªas much as she was annoyed to acknowledge the fact he was ''theirs'' and not simply ''hers''¡ªwas hunched over slates and bone tablets and scrap leather, reading over notes from the carpenters, the smiths, the kitchen staff, the latrine cleaners, the farmers, the Lady Binder, and more of the same from old Yllian over at River''s Fork by the light of the rock that the Great Binder had given him. As he read, he wrote on one of the slates that he''d brought back from his trip to Covehold Demesne, either making numbers bigger¡ªas the Great Binder kept poking at him for¡ªor making notes of things he had to tell the Great Binder and other people tomorrow.


    There was a pile of the things he''d already read over on one end of the altar-table. While the pile was bigger than what was left, Riz knew it would still be a while before he could come to bed. It was just her luck that he was doing this on a night she didn''t have Um duty. While she knew this was important to keeping the demesne running and providing everyone with what they needed, she couldn''t help but be impatient for him to finish so that he could tend to her. Or them, she admitted reluctantly. Rian insisted on being ''fair'', and only tended to them when they were all at home together.


    "Rian, are you done yet?" Umu asked, her heels thumping on bedrolls beneath her


    "Almost done, Umu," Rian said, sounding tired. "Just a little bit more¡­ Ugh, why did I think it was a good idea to have so many people write reports that I had to check on¡­?"


    "Why don''t you take a short break, Rian?" Mikon suggested, voice innocent. Back in the militia,Riz would have said she was guilty of something. "Join us for a moment and lie down, put a pillow on your back, rest your hands¡­"


    She cut off as Rian made a sound that seemed actually physically pained. "Mikon, please¡­ if I get more tempted to stop and do any of that, I''m never going to go back to work, and I''m already nearly done. It''s just a little bit more¡­"


    "You shouldn''t have to do this much by yourself," Riz found herself saying.


    Rian sighed, sounding like he was only partly paying attention as he no doubt continued reading. "Well, until I can get Lori used to the idea of Kolinh being capable so that she''ll promote him, I have to."


    "I think she''s forgotten who he is by now," Mikon said. "All of him, not just his name and face."


    His head slumped. "Ugh, I was hoping¡­ at this rate, the only ones available for promotion would be Karina, Yoshka, and you three, and Riz already made it clear she doesn''t want to be in charge of anything more important that putting together an escort for Lori. Unless¡­"


    "I like you Rian, but I''m never changing my mind about that," Riz said. She wasn''t meant to be an officer!


    Rian didn''t reply save for an acknowledging hum, going back to work so he could finally finished. For a moment, silence descended, broken only by the wind passing though the open windows. At this time of night, the summer air was no longer hot¡ªa novelty that had quickly stopped being fascinating and have become uncomfortable on the first night¡ªbut the breeze was made it cool enough to be comfortable.


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    Eventually, Riz head a sigh and the sound of a slate being set down. The sigh turned into a groan as Rian sat up straight, stretching with his arms over his head. He let out a yawn as he let his arms drop and pushed himself up to his feet. "Finally done," he said, sounding relieved as he turned towards them with a smile, then pause. "Uh, I''ll be right back."


    Sitting up from Mikon''s lap, Riz watched in concern¡ªand admittedly some amusement¡ªas he rushed out the door. From the speed Rian was moving, he was headed for the latrines, which meant he''d no doubt be making a stop at the baths afterwards. For all that he teased the Great Binder about her notions of hygiene, he was very fastidious person himself. But then, given what they planned to do now, it was probably him being thoughtful.


    "Well, why don''t we close the windows while we wait for him to get back?" Mikon suggested, moving to get up.


    "I''ll do it," Riz said, waving her down as she sat up herself. She knew that that other woman''s legs would be a little stiff from sitting still with a head on her lap for so long.


    "Oh, thank you Erzebed," Mikon said, giving her a thankful smile. Riz glanced towards Umu, not really expecting any gratitude there, and found the woman watching her, looking away as their eyes met. Wordlessly, the woman rolled out of bed and moved to close the windows at the back of the house.


    Walking to one of the windows to the sides of the door, she checked outside for chokers out of habit before reaching through opening and pulling the shutters closed, needing to keep them from slamming against the window frame as the wind pushed them shut. She did the same for the other window, feeling her skin prickle from passing through the binding that the Great Binder had placed around the building to keep bugs out. It was the only reason they''d been willing to leave the windows open, breeze or no breeze. She''d had her share of bug bites in the militia, and she didn''t want any more if she could help it.


    Once she was finished, Riz sat back down at the foot of the bed to wait, facing the door as she and the others waited for Rian to get back. Eventually, there was a knock on the door before it opened again to admit their man back in. It was silly, since this was his house, and it wasn''t like the three of them had anything to hide from him. "All right," he said as he latched the door shut behind him. "Sorry for making you three wait so long. Just let me¡ª"


    "Rian¡­ do you want to just go to sleep tonight? You look tired."


    Riz''s teeth clicked shut, aborting her own offer of the same as she glanced to the side to look at Umu. The blonde was looking at Rian worriedly without any of her usual possessiveness. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mikon nodding in agreement, though she looked a bit reluctant.


    "Don''t worry, I''m all right. I was just sitting and reading, after all," Rian protested as he sat down on the bed as well, slipping off his tsinelas, and she didn''t need to listen to hard to hear the reluctance in his voice.


    Riz shuffled from the foot of the bed, moving next to Rian and taking his arm. It wasn''t her usual side, but she had no problem getting used to doing it from this side. "Rian, we''re all supposed to enjoy it when you ring our bells," Riz said bluntly. Past Rian''s head, she saw Umu wince at the direct language, while Mikon grinned for a moment before she smothered the expression into something more serious, though the corner of her mouth kept twitching. "You feeling sleepy is supposed to come at the end. If you''re sleepy, then it''s time to sleep."


    "Are you sure? I mean, I can still stay up¡­"


    "If you''re claiming you can stay up, it''s not going to stay up," Riz told him bluntly.


    Rian burst out into laughter, though it was weaker than his usual laughs. He was tired, then. "Well, if you''re all sure¡­"


    "We''re not forcing you, Rian," Mikon said gently, moving to Rian''s other side as Umu put her arms around him from behind, and placing a quick kiss on his cheek. "It''s perfectly all right for you to say ''not tonight, I''m tired''." She smiled at him and winked. "There''s three of us, after all."


    For a moment, the four of them just sat like that. Then Umu began pulling at him gently. "Now come to bed properly," the blonde said. She glanced sideways, sighing as she met Riz and Mikon''s gazes. "The two of you too, I suppose."


    Riz reluctantly let go, then stood up and began pulling off her shirt, folding it twice before turning to put it in her bath bucket with the rest of the clothes she planned to wear tomorrow.


    "Erzebed!" Mikon protested, letting go of Rian''s arm to stand up and take the shirt from Riz''s hands. "Honestly, you''re not the one washing these¡­ no, no, you get to bed next to Rian, I''ll fold this so you''re not walking around with a wrinkled shirt tomorrow."


    Riz rolled her eyes even a she turned back to the bed, where Umu had pulled Rian just off the center and was helping him put one of the pillows under his head. "No one''s going to care my shirt''s a little wrinkled, Mikon." She lay down on the bed, turning over so that she a was pressed against Rian''s side, her arm on his chest as her chin pressed against his shoulder. On the other side of him, she knew, Umu was doing the same, though her arm was draped over his stomach. She felt his arm under her curl and pull her against him, his fingers squeezing briefly against the side of her waist.


    "That''s what you think," she heard Mikon mutter. "I''m not going to have people saying I''m not taking proper care of you¡­"


    "Riz, be nice," Rian chided, already sounding half asleep, eyes already closed. "Mikon and Umu put a lot of effort into making sure we have clean clothes. The least we can do is be grateful and appreciate it."


    Well, she supposed it was ungrateful of her¡­


    When she felt Mikon settling into the bed behind her, the weaver''s chest pressing against her back, Riz muttered, "Sorry."


    She felt fingers part her hair and lips kissing the back of her neck. "Apology accepted," Mikon''s breathy voice said against her ear. "Good night, Erzebed. Good night, Umu. Good night, Rian."


    The arm around Riz loosened briefly, and she felt it move up her back, squeezed between her and Mikon as the latter grasped it affectionately. "Good night, Mikon," Rian said, sleepily.


    Riz closed her eyes, enjoying the warm feeling over Rian against her and, despite herself, Mikon behind her.


    "Rian?" she heard Umu say.


    "Hmm?"


    "Will you wake us up tomorrow?"


    Riz opened one eye, watching Rian''s face. Past him, Umu was blushing, and when she saw that Riz was looking sent her a challenging glare.


    "Sure," Rian said, eyes still closed. "Just have to sleep first¡­"


    Ignoring the glare, Riz smirked at her before closing her own eyes, already looking forward to waking up to her bell being rung in the morning.


    A breath, two, and then she was sinking into the darkness behind her eyes¡­

 394 - The Sawmill And Trees

    The work on the sawmill had progressed in her absence. The rest of the carpenters had mounted the water wheel on the fixtures she''d set into the stone foundation, as well as the wooden shafts that transferred the wheel''s rotational force, and the frames to support the sawmill''s doors had been raised and secured. Lori had been more than willing to let someone else take care of handling the sawmill''s walls, even if it would take them a lot of wood.


    Fortunately, near the site of the sawmill were thick growths of old trees that the loggers hadn''t cut down yet because it was downhill from the site of the sawpit, and there were more convenient trees to cut. With the new sawmill, those trees were ideally positioned to be cut down and transported to the sawmill to be turned into planks and beams. Once the circular saw was installed into the shaft connected to the water wheels and the proper gears were installed, the sawmill could begin making those planks and beams, even without walls or a roof.


    "Though the roof is the first thing they''re going to finish," Rian said over lunch the day after they''d brought Lori''s Boat Two home. "After all, you''re not keeping your shadow in place anymore, and with the stone foundation¡­ well, it''s really hot to work there."


    "Hmm¡­" Well, Lori could understand their priorities, at least. Still¡­ "Will such a structure really be able to withstand a dragon''s passing?"


    "I defer to the carpenters on this one. However, with you protecting the demesne, the biggest dangers to the sawmill are something big falling on it, getting set on fire, or some kind of dragonborn abomination that has an inexplicable desire to destroy wooden buildings for one reason or another. Every building in the demesne runs those risks, even the dungeon."


    "How is the dungeon at risk of fire?"


    "Copper-sheathed or not, the front door is still made of wood. Anyway, many structures in Covehold were made of wood, and they seem to be doing well enough, assuming they faced the same passing dragons that we did. Tae?"


    "Huh?" Taeclas looked away from where she was feeding her wife. The latter was actually partially seated on the Deadspeaker''s lap, and the two were all but kissing between bites of food. Lori had been avoiding looking directly at the sight, lest she become nauseous at the mother-like behavior. "What was that, Rian?"


    "I was saying that the buildings in Covehold Demesne were mostly made of wood, but seemed to have been holding up well enough to passing dragons."


    "Oh, it all depends, really. The last dragon set the rickets on fire, but that was because they use cheap wood. Our house only had a few cracked roof tiles and some scorched wood." She sighed. "I still had to spend two days fixing it all though."


    "Well, you''ll have plenty of help if anything like that happens here," Rian said.


    Lori grunted, acknowledging the implied point. Still, a part of her couldn''t help but feel that making essential structures out of wood wasn''t very secure. "I can''t help but feel that making essential structures out of wood isn''t very secure."


    "You''ve seen how big the sawmill is intended to be. Do you want to make all that out of stone?"


    It wouldn''t be the first time she''d made large stone structures. Still, she was willing to admit she would rather not. "It wouldn''t be the first time I''ve made large stone structures. Still, I''ll admit I would rather not."


    For some reason, Rian chuckled. "So¡­ after a year, has the shine of the absolute power of being a Dungeon Binder dulled a little? When you first made your core, you insisted on building everything with Whispering."


    "That was a situation where infrastructure was urgently needed! The situation is no longer like that, so construction is no longer such a priority."


    Rian nodded solemnly. "Of course, of course."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Her lord said the strangest things sometimes. "Do you have an estimate on how long it will take for the roof to be finished?"


    "It will depend on how well the new sawmill cuts, but the carpenters and sawyers estimate it should be mostly in place in a week or two. It really depends on how much work they can get done before they need to come in from the heat."


    That was a lot longer than Lori wanted to hear, but to be fair the floor area of the sawmill was very large, on the order of ten paces by fifteen, at least. It would be the largest roof to be covered in the demesne so far, so she supposed it would take more time to cover. "Well, setting that aside, how long before the other attachments to the water wheel are ready? The drop hammer and the gristmill."


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    "You remembered that? Wow, maybe you are finally coming into your Dungeon Binder Mentalism."


    "Focus, Rian. The drop hammer and the gristmill?"


    "Um, the latter is kinda waiting on you. We need a grindstone for the gristmill, and you''re the only one who can really shape one in a timely manner. Well, the stonemasons could shape one too, but that would take longer, and they''d need to find a stone of the right size. You could just make one."


    "Why not just use the one we already have?"


    "Well, we could, but while it''s being altered and prepared for installation onto the water wheel''s shaft, we won''t be able to make any flour for bread."


    She nodded, taking a piece of bread to wipe the remaining stew from her bowl. "I''ll make a new grindstone after lunch. How is recruiting for miners progressing?"


    "Much better once I could honestly tell them you''ll be providing a bound tool that makes a nice little cooling breeze so they wouldn''t be sweating hot when they sleep at night. Honestly, it''s probably something you should integrate into the dragon shelter''s ventilation system anyway. Why have a system do only one thing when it could do two with a little rearranging."


    "I''ll consider it as something to pass the time when the next dragon comes along," Lori said flatly. "Will you be able to begin mining by the end of the week?"


    "I can if I force it. However, given that work on the roof of the sawmill will be easier if we have more people working on it, I think we should wait until it''s done first. We''ll need all the men we can get when it comes to pulling up all the materials for the roof up there. Once the roof is finished, the working on the walls won''t need so many people." Lori gave him a displeased look at that, so Rian hastily added, "However, I think I might be able to recruit more people from River''s Fork."


    "Didn''t Binder Shanalorre ask for labor force from us because River''s Fork couldn''t spare people to work the mine?" Lori said flatly.


    "That was before. However, now that hunting around the vicinity of the demesne isn''t really possible because of the presence of the typhon beast, the demesne has a few men to spare. And with Lidzuga in the demesne, they''re able to do multiple harvests again, especially since it''s easier for Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre."


    "¡ªShanalorre to imbue the meanings there. I think River''s Fork will actually be able to grow harvests faster than we will, simply because the turnaround between imbuing and activating the meanings is far, far shorter."


    Taeclas nodded as her wife wiped off a little bit of stew from the corner of the Deadspeaker''s mouth with a finger and¡ªArgh, no! Don''t put it in your mouth! That''s disgusting and unhygienic! "Yes, I talked to Lidz about that. He sets the meanings in one day, leaves it overnight for the little Lady Binder to imbue, and then activates them the next day. They should actually be having a second harvest soon, if I remember the timing he told me about correctly."


    "River''s Fork isn''t self-sustaining yet, but they''re probably going to be able to build their own winter grain stockpile now," Rian added. "So let''s hope we only need to ship meat from now on. And when we finally manage to deal with the typhon beast, they can go back to hunting which will make them almost self-sufficient."


    Lori tilted her head. "Almost?"


    "Well, they need beads now, and that''s not really something they can provide for themselves. Salt, too."


    Ah. "Ah," Lori nodded. Yes, that was the case, wasn''t it? The cold box in food storage, the wisplights, the ventilation and protections for the dragon shelter¡ª


    ¡­


    She''ll have to remember to render the bound tools tamper-proof by the time the Golden Sweetwood Company''s Whisperers arrived. Even if they wouldn''t be able to make any because they have no source of white Iridescence, the Whisperers would be able to extract and alter her bound tool cores, which she couldn''t allow! At this point, Lori already had some thoughts as to how to accomplish that, but she''d need to set aside time to do it with proper documentation.


    And the smiths. She needed the smiths, since they''re the ones who knew how to use the necessary tools properly¡­


    "Oh yes, speaking of resources," and for some reason Rian turned to Taeclas, "how do you feel about trees, Tae?"


    "They''re a blight upon the land that block out sunlight that should be shining down on crops and vegetables," Taeclas said cheerfully. "Trees drop leaves everywhere that always need to be cleaned up or else they''ll cause a fire hazard, their roots always need to be dug up, falling branches are dangerous, and they make it hard to get anywhere by growing where it''s inconvenient. The only good tree is a fruit tree. Everything else should be cut down for firewood and the land they were taking up be used to grow crops."


    Rian and Lori stared as the Deadspeaker smiled brightly at them. Her wife rolled her eyes indulgently as if at a little eccentricity.


    "Ahem," Rian ''ahem''-ed. "Well¡­ that''s¡­ an opinion. Um, so if I asked you to start growing some saplings so that we can plant them in areas that have been cleared but can''t be used for farming yet¡­"


    "I''d do it but I wouldn''t like it," Taeclas said with a pout. "Weren''t you listening?"


    "¡­while I can sympathize with some of what you said, the sad fact is wood is too useful a resource to not cultivate and produce," Rian said. "So¡­ please? We need to make furniture and roofs out of something, and to be perfectly honest, we''re not successful enough at hunting to make it out of bones." Rian paused. "Although, do you really want to sleep under a roof made of bones?"


    "I suppose not¡­" Taeclas huffed. "But can we put the trees somewhere they won''t get their leaves all over where people would need to sweep them, or near our crops?"


    "I''m sure we can find someplace like that," Rian said. "After we clear the trees from around the sawmill, we can figure out a good arrangement. And I promise you never have to sweep any leaves¡­ unless you do something that merits mild disciplinary action."


    "Eh?-!"


    "That''s fair," Taeclas'' wife said.


    "Eh?-! But I don''t wanna sweep leaves! That''s the most pointless chore ever! There''ll just be more leaves on the ground tomorrow, why even bother?"


    "That''s why it''s a disciplinary action."


    "I''ll be good! Please don''t make me sweep leaves!"

 395 - Resuming Expansion

    At the end of the week, Rian had gathered a small group of men who decided that working the whole day in a shaded mine was preferable to working until it was too hot to stay outside. The morning that they set out to River''s Fork, there was another crowd at the docks, which caused the usual delay, though to Lori''s surprise the delay seemed shorter than usual. While there was hugging, there didn''t seem to be as much crying?


    Were her idiots becoming¡­ rational?


    No, that was probably too much to hope for. More likely people just didn''t want to stand out on the stone dock under the very hot sun.


    ¡­


    Should she heat the dock when she wanted people hurry up and get moving? Something to remember.


    The Coldhold left with the miners also carrying a new wooden hand cart¡ªthe wheel was wooden and not stone, so Lori didn''t even have to do anything¡ªseveral new buckets, two of the wisplights bought from Covehold Demesne because they were hardier than the ones Lori had made, three coils of rope, and a pair of wooden pulleys. Lori had to assume that the mining tools were somewhere in River''s Fork and in a usable state.


    Rian also had a sack of beads for all the bound tools, as well as to replenish the demesne''s own supply of beads. Lori had taken two days to make new beads¡ªas well as six new very large beads¡ªto replenish their own supply of beads. She had long since placed bindings in her little ice shed to counter the heat of the summer while she amalgamated beads. Lori had even taken pity on Riz and her friends and anchored some bindings of airwisps on the outside of the shed to keep them cool, as Riz had revealed she''d been finding it harder to find people willing to join her escort because of the heat.


    She''d made beads enough for both their intended next trading trip to Covehold Demesne and their own use for several weeks. Learning that the Golden Sweetwood Company would be arriving relatively soon had forced her to reassess her priorities out of, admittedly, panic. Still, it had been a controlled and rational panic if she did say so herself, and hers was the only opinion that mattered. This reassessment, as well as the lack of work she actually needed to do¡ªeven her listing of bindings she needed to imbue was much reduced because of the rudimentary bound tools she was making now¡ªwas what had led her to resume working on expanding her demesne.


    Hence why she had spent two days making beads, as the expansion of her demesne would render her ice shed too far inside of her borders of her demesne to be usable. Lori wanted to have a good surplus so that when she next needed to make beads, she''d have time to build a shed to keep cool in.


    For Rian''s sake and to measure her demesne''s expansion, she stuck two sticks into the ground, each a pace apart, right at the border of her demesne and the Iridescence outside to mark its current dimensions.


    The first day of resuming expanding her demesne again was slow as she had to slowly get used to the procedure once more. Sitting upright in the little recess she''d made next to her bed, her bedroll beneath her for cushioning against the stone, she worked solely through her connection to her core. It was mentally intensive as Lori spent the morning and half of the afternoon making successive spherical shells of bindings around her demesne. Every so often she''d shift in her seat to keep parts of her from growing numb, but beyond that simply sat with her eyes closed or half-lidded.


    During lunch, she was able to take a small break, switching from making shells of bindings around her demesne to imbuing the ones she''d already made. That was less distracting, but Lori found herself eating a bit slowly, and once or twice realized she was just sitting there staring at her food.


    "Great Binder? Are you well?" Shanalorre asked from beside her.


    This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    Lori blinked down at her subordinate. Apparently her distraction hadn''t gone unnoticed. Across the table, Mikon, Umu and Riz were all eyeing her, as were¡­ whatshername and her wife, Lori couldn''t be bothered to check her rocks at the moment. "I''m fine," she said. "I''m simply¡­ pre-occupied."


    Shanalorre''s frown persisted. "Do you need healing?"


    Lori have a hand dismissively. "That won''t be necessary. My mind is simply occupied."


    "I¡­ see. Very well, then, Great Binder. But if you find yourself suffering from headaches, please do not hesitate to inform myself or Wizard Taeclas immediately."


    Did she look like she had a headache? Huh, that was new. Usually when people bothered her they asked why she looked sad. Which she really didn''t understand, as she was usually only lost in thought. "Of course."


    Shanalorre stared at her for a moment, and didn''t stop staring until Lori resumed eating.


    Once she finished eating, it was back to her room to continue the preparations for expanding her demesne after Lori splashed a little water on her face and hair. Being in her demesne meant the temperature of everything around her was always comfortable, but the wetness felt good in any case. Sitting back in her little recess, Lori continued imbuing the shells she''d already made, finally remembering to connect the bindings together into one large binding to allow her to imbue it all simultaneously. That made the imbuing go faster, and let her focus on only a single thing.


    At midafternoon, Lori ceased imbuing the shells and disconnected them from each other, then began expanding her demesne, making the outermost shell of bound wisps expand beyond the boundaries of her demesne, to the familiar feeling of the binding''s imbuement being devoured by the Iridescence, even as she kept imbuing. Once the entire shell had been pushed out beyond the boundaries of her demesne, she dissolved the binding holding all the wisps of the shell together, then immediately bound the Iridescence beyond her demesne to her will.


    Lori let out a satisfied sigh at the familiar feeling of her demesne''s boundary''s expanding. A part of her had been half-afraid she''d remembered this wrong, but that had been an irrational fear. After all, she''d done this for most of winter, and a little bit into spring. She was simply¡­ out of practice.


    The second expansion progressed much more smoothly as slightly stiff work habits and routines were put into practice again, and the third was even smoother still. By the time she finished with the seventh and last expansion for the day, Lori was feeling comfortable with the process again.


    It was a marked contrast to the discomfort she felt as she straightened up from the recess she''d been seated at. Her legs felt stiff from sitting down so long, even with the cushioning of her bed roll. Lori had to lean her weight against the wall for a bit as she made her way downstairs to use the latrine. Thankfully, they were clean.


    Once she''d finished her business, Lori stepped outside to check the time and to get some more feeling back in her legs. The sun was relatively low, indicating it was late afternoon, and the Coldhold was already secured at the dock. Checking her bindings, she found the rock with lightwisps anchored to it that she''d given Rian somewhere in the third level. He was probably helping water the crops or something.


    She had some more time before dinner. Briefly, Lori debated going back to her room and making more shells to help her expand, but¡­ well, she did have a mild headache. Perhaps it would be better to rest for a bit.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori woke to someone knocking very loudly on her door.


    "¡ªri? It''s dinner time! Come on, the food''s going to get cold! We have fresh fruit!"


    She perked up at that last, sitting up from her bed. The stone floor was cool on her bare feet¡ªhuh, she needed to sweep up here, the floor was gritty¡ªas she padded towards the door, unlatching it and pulling it open.


    "Oh. Sorry if I woke you up, but the food''s ready," Rian said as he met her half-lidded, still sleepy gaze. "Are you feeling well?"


    "I''m fine," Lori said. "Just had a minor headache. Fruit, you say?"


    "Yeah, the fruit trees are producing again. You had a headache?"


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Yes, yes. It was only a minor headache. I''m fine now."


    "Are you sure? Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre."


    "¡ªShanalorre can give you a quick healing when you get down. Headaches are usually a symptom of something worse, and we really wouldn''t want you to get sick. Did you remember to drink enough water? The headache could be a sign you''re dehydrated."


    "¡­ I''ll consider it. Let me put on my boots, and I''ll be down shortly."


    "Don''t you have tsinelas? They''re really much more comfortable than boots in this weather. Less constricting, easy to slip on, and really soft."


    "I have boots. They''re comfortable enough."

 396 - Rian in Trouble

    After sweeping her floor after dinner¡ªRian had insisted on doing it himself, since he said she probably wouldn''t sweep under her bed, which¡­ was fair¡ªa promise of new footwear, and begging for Lori to not expand the demesne before he could measure how much the demesne had expanded, Lori went to bed.


    "Five paces!" Rian declared cheerfully the next day as he finally arrived for breakfast. "Well, five paces less a yustri, but still! I think that''s a record for you!"


    Lori gave him a flat look, then turned toward Riz. "Erzebed, did you accompany him?"


    "No, Great Binder," Riz said, turning to frown at him as well.


    Lori nodded solemnly, then turned a glare at her lord. "Rian¡­ did you go to the edge by yourself? Alone? Before sunrise?"


    Rian froze. "Uh¡­ um¡­hmm¡­" He looked deep in thought for a moment before nodding. "Absolutely nothing I say is going to keep me out of trouble, is it?"


    "No," Lori said, and she found herself being echoed by Umu, Mikon and Riz.


    Next to her, Shanalorre stood up. "Come on, Yoshka. Let''s sit at the other table this morning."


    "Eh? But we''re already sitting here, Shasha¡ªAH!"


    Shanalorre put her hands under her cousin''s armpits and lifted her up and over the bench in a smooth motion, turning around and walking towards the end of the other table''s bench. The children sitting their hastily shuffled aside to make room, and Shanalorre put down her cousin on the bench.


    "Yay! Shasha, do that again!"


    "Later. Make room, Yoshka."


    Rian looked forlorn for some reason. "She abandoned me¡­ Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    "¡ªI thought we were friends!"


    "Dungeon Binders don''t get involved in this sort of nonsense," Shanalorre said as she sat down.


    Lori nodded approvingly, then continued glaring at her lord. "You went alone! While it was dark! What if you''d encountered a beast?-! Even a choker could have significantly hurt you in the dark, and if you''d been injured, there wouldn''t have been anyone to help you and get you back to my Dungeon! Were you even armed?"


    "And it was at the edge!" Riz added, also glaring at him. "You know the local beasts still haven''t really learned not to step into the demesne! What if there''d been leapers out there!-? If you''d woken me up, I could have at least gone out with you to keep watch!"


    "I didn''t want to bother yo¡ª"


    "It''s not a bother, it''s just common sense not to go to the edge of the demesne alone! And don''t mention the hunters, they always tell each other where they''re going out, and when they plan to be back!"


    "You didn''t even leave a note," Mikon said, her face set in a disapproving frown that somehow made her face look like she was pouting. "Even though we have that writing slate in the house. If something had happened to you, we wouldn''t have known until you didn''t come home tonight!"


    "You didn''t wake us up!" Umu said, then blushed and ducked her head.


    "That too!" Mikon agreed.


    Lori immediately threw away the first thought she had of why that was a complaint, and then the next three as well just in case.


    "Not the point, you two," Riz snapped, and the other two women looked chagrined for a moment. Lori threw away her thought as to why. "That was reckless! You''re the highest-ranked officer in this demesne, especially since the Great Binder doesn''t seem to want to raise any more lords or ladies. If something happened to you, it would break the flow of command, and there''d be no one who''d be able to talk to the Great Binder!"


    Lori nodded fiercely. "You can''t just go off alone," she said. "You''re the lord of this demesne. If you need to go somewhere dangerous, you can and should wake up people to go with you. Whether or not you want to bother anyone is irrelevant. Your safety and usefulness supersedes any irritation or bother they might feel¡­!"


    The four-way scolding went on for most of breakfast. Whatshername¡ªthe one who named plants¡ªand her wife for once chose not to be affectionate and simply ate quietly, something Lori was relieved about. The scolding was only interrupted when Lori realized she was hungry and that no one would be going to get food because¡­ well, everyone who would get food for her was either scolding or getting scolded. Sending Rian to get food¡ªfinally getting to go get everyone''s food as he kept asking for¡ªlet them all catch their breath, and the water he brought let them soothe their throats.


    There was a brief silence as they all took a quick moment to eat and drink. The food was a bit cold, likely because they were the last bowls left, but Lori was able to warm hers, and the other seemed to have no trouble eating. Rian sat with his head bowed and eating as quietly as possible, as if trying not to draw their attention again.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    Lori finished her food quickly, eating the last of her bread and pushing her bowl aside. "What do you have to say for yourself?" she said. On the other side of Umu, whatshername and her wife looked at each other, picked up their bowls and cups, and left the table.


    Rian visibly flinched, his hands hesitating on his food before her set his spoon back in his bowl. "Um, I promise to not go to the edge, or even just the deep woods myself?"


    Lori raised an eyebrow, and proceeded as her mothers had done unto her. "And?"


    "¡­and if I have to, I should bring people with me even if it would be bothering them¡­"


    "And?"


    "¡­and I shouldn''t risk myself, because it would be inconvenient for you."


    "And?"


    "¡­"


    Lori let out a disgusted snort. "And you going off alone sets a bad example for the children," she said, pointing over her shoulder, where she could still here the children sitting. "You will not do this again, is this understood, Rian?"


    "¡­ yes, your Bindership."


    "Good. If it happens again, there will be consequences. I believe there are leaves to be swept and latrine waste needs to be hauled." Rian visibly winced at that. "For now, I will trust you to learn from this. Do not betray my trust."


    "¡­ yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded, rising to her feet. She nodded at Umu, Mikon and Riz. "I have work to do, so I leave the rest of his scolding to you. Consider your displeasure to be my displeasure in this matter."


    Rian blinked, staring at her. "Wait, you''re¡­ delegating this?" He sounded aghast and disbelieving.


    "I''m still displeased but have no more time to spend on this matter." Lori nodded at the three. "They do. Discipline him with my blessing, you three. Erzebed, leave any violence to be done to the other two, they don''t know how to kill or maim a man with their bare hands. If anything happens to him, I''m giving you his job."


    Giving the three one last wave, she headed up to her room to work on expanding the boundaries of her demesne.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day''s expansion was easier as Lori slowly got back into the rhythm of things and in so doing remembered the little tricks and efficiencies she''d been using to make the work easier for her, and more importantly when she should apply them.


    When it was time for lunch, the knock on her door calling her to the meal was soft as if hesitant, and she opened the door to find a Rian lacking his usual cheerfulness. "The food''s ready, your Bindership."


    Lori looked him up and down. "Have you asked Shana to heal you yet?" she said.


    "I''m happy to say things didn''t progress in that direction," he said. "Do you want the details, or are you going to trust the people you delegated to have it handled?"


    She tilted her head in thought, then waved a hand dismissively. "Will any of them be leaving you?"


    Rian was silent for a moment. "I don''t know," he said. "I hope not. I¡­" He shook his head. "No, you don''t want to hear, right?"


    "You should have married them," Lori said. "I technically haven''t actually made a complete divorce procedure yet. Until I do, they wouldn''t be able to leave you properly."


    A laugh emerged from Rian. "No, no you haven''t," he said, still chuckling. "How''s the expansion going?"


    "I''m still getting back in practice, but it is already progressing smoothly," she said. "It seems easier now as well. That might be because of the increased concentration of Iridescence on the ground because of the heat."


    Rian nodded as they began walking downstairs. "Doesn''t that mean that the best season to expand the demesne is summer, not winter?"


    Lori twitched. "I''ll consider it," she said, then realized that made absolutely no sense.


    "Huh¡­ so that does mean ''I know you''re right, but won''t admit it''¡­"


    "No, it doesn''t! It means a manner requires my careful consideration!"


    "Then why did you say it just now?"


    "Oh, shut up, Rian!"


    "Shutting up, your Bindership."


    Lunch was quiet, which was a pleasant surprise. Whatshername¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªTaeclas and her wife Rybelle didn''t engage in their usual affectionate behavior for some reason. Still, the four seemed to have gone back to their usual rotation, because Umu and Mikon were the ones to get the food. Still, there was none of the usual flirting. Umu didn''t press against Rian''s side, and Mikon was sitting on his other side instead of Riz. While they sometimes traded places, Riz was pointedly paying attention only to her food, and Mikon was flirting with no one.


    It all reminded her of the pointedly polite periods when her own mothers had quarreled over one thing or another. During those times, she''d simply kept quiet, stayed out of their way, and made airwisp bindings to muffle the sounds when they eventually reconciled.


    "Rian, what''s the status of the sawmill?" she asked.


    "It''s coming along," he said. "We''re almost done securing the beams and purlins, so we''ll be able to start roofing soon¡­"


    Lori nodded, listening to the report as she ate. After making sure there was nothing she had to take care of and telling Rian to eat his own food, she went back to her room to continue her work.


    By the end of the day, she''d managed to expand her demesne nine times, though she wouldn''t know how much that was in comparison to yesterday without Rian measuring. Not that it really mattered, but she needed to confirm that she was actually expanding the demesne more now than she had during the winter.


    At dinner, everyone seemed to be back to normal. Whatshername¡ªLori checked her rock¡ªTaeclas and her wife were sitting closer now, and Umu was leaning against Rian again, though only slightly. Riz was also casting glances his way, and Mikon was humming happily, still sitting between the two of them and alternating leaning against both.


    "Erzebed," Lori said, and the woman''s attention turned to her.


    "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "Rian will be going back to the edge tomorrow. Make sure there isn''t a repeat of this morning."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said firmly as Rian simply nodded, seeming resigned.


    Lori nodded. "He''ll probably be going every morning from now on, so account for that."


    Riz gave Rian a level look. "I will, Great Binder." Mikon put a hand on the other woman''s shoulder as if trying to calm her, and Riz actually did seem to relax slightly at her touch. "Don''t worry, I''ll make sure he doesn''t go unaccompanied again."


    "Good. Rian, is there anything that needs to be brought to my attention?"


    Rian looked relieve at the change of subject. "Uh, you asked me to inform you when the when the smiths would be free to assist you in running some more alloy experiments?"


    Ah. "Ah. Are they free, then?"


    "Tomorrow," Rian confirmed. "It will be a good chance to try out the new crucibles we brought back from Covehold Demesne."


    Lori nodded. "Good. I expect you to be present to take notes."


    It was time to continue her experiments on copper-white Iridescence bound alloys.

 397- A Third Alloy

    The next morning, Rian and the three women seemed to be back on their usual terms. At least, Umu was back to leaning against him, and Riz was sitting next to him once more.


    "I take it you''ve resolved your issues?" Lori said blandly.


    Rian glanced sideways at the women on either side of them. "We''re in the process of resolving issues."


    Lori stared at the wide smile that had appeared on Mikon''s face. "I see. Well, this is a ''dealing with people matter'', so¡ª"


    "¡ªyes, yes, you''ll leave it to me. We grew almost seven paces, by the way. How many times did you expand it last night?"


    "Really, Rian? Isn''t your number going up enough for you?"


    "Nope!" Rian chirped. "I need to do the math for the average growth rate too."


    "Your fetishes are bizarre, Rian."


    "It''s not a fetish, it''s simply collecting raw empirical data! Come on, please tell me! It''s to quantify the difference between summer and winter expansion!"


    "The first is greater than the second."


    "Yes, but by how much?"


    "Rian, focus. We''re conducting alloy experiments after breakfast, remember?"


    "I can focus on both!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After they had alloyed the copper and white Iridescence, that hadn''t been the end of it. Lori had the idea that if she could anchor wisps to the white Iridesence being alloyed, it would result in a binding that would be set and unalterable.


    The first experiment that they had done some time in spring had been to heat some copper¡ªthey had used a binding of firewisps to do so quickly¡ªuntil earthwisps had appeared at the metal. Lori had claimed and bound the earthwisp, forming them into a binding that reinforced their structural integrity, the same binding she once used to reinforce the stone of the ceiling of her Dungeon against collapse. Then fine ground white Iridescence was poured over the glowing-hot metal, still in the crucible. Once it had all settled, Lori anchored the binding of earthwisps to the white Iridesence to keep it intact before increasing the heat further until the metal had liquefied and the white Iridescence had dissolved into it.


    The earthwisps slowly disappeared as the metal liquefied, and the white Iridescence on top of it dissolved into the molten metal. She had been afraid this meant that the experiment had failed, and had already begun formulating a second experiment involving heated copper shavings¡ªso that they would manifest earthwisps¡ªbeing used in the binding instead of a solid piece of copper as the metal was poured into another mold.


    However, when the copper had cooled into a thinner panel than the original ingot they had melted down, instead of being springy and quickly reverting back into shape when bent¡ªas it would have if the experiment had failed, and the result had been ''merely'' a copper-white Iridescence alloy¡ªthe thin panel of copper was very stiff, heavily resisting deforming when they secured it to a vice and tried to bend with the tongs. A chisel also couldn''t mark it as easily as normal copper, and trying to puncture the alloyed copper with a spike-like smithing tool and a heavy hammer resulted in the copper panel shattering like poor cast iron.


    The smiths had confirmed that the alloyed copper was significantly harder and stronger than before, although it broke like it was brittle instead of deforming, though the alloy was apparently not as hard or strong as cast iron. Melting the copper down again and cooling it rid the sample of these properties, the same way that melting down the initial copper and white Iridescence alloy had, and Lori had been able to replicate the effect. Her attempt to use heated copper shavings had also been successful, although the resulting alloy had not been any different from their initial sample. At least, not in any way that could be measured or discerned with the tools they''d had on hand.


    It had been a good proof of concept and confirmation that this line of research would be fruitful, though it also made her wonder where¡ª''if'' was a silly question in this instance¡ªsuch metal and white Iridescence alloys were used. She was ignorant of any such instances, but that only meant she''d never encountered such metals. Or perhaps she had and simply hadn''t known or realized at the time.


    Further experiments had been interrupted when Rian had made a comment.


    "You know, this would be a good way to add reinforcement to the dungeon''s doors," he had said. "Especially the dragon shelter in River''s Fork¡ª" since at the time the shelter was still being made, "¡ªsince they don''t have a moat in front of the door. Wood is sturdy and all, but enough beasts with enough claws and teeth could theoretically gnaw or tear through it."


    Lori had stared at him.


    Further research had been halted as they worked out how much of their remaining copper was needed to clad the doors of her Dungeon and the dragon shelter in progress. The redsmiths, more familiar with copper in its base state, had calculated how much of the metal would be needed to clad the doors with a two-and-a-half-chiyustri thick layer of metal cladding. Fortunately, since Lori had been the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork at that point, she''d used their copper stockpile for the dragon shelter''s cladding.


    Lori and the smiths had spent days alloying the copper together, and in the process learning the intricacies of working it. Among other things, they''d learned that heating the alloy allowed it to be worked properly. It also turned out that actually forming the binding into one that reinforces the metal''s structure was not actually needed. Simply having the earthwisps be bound was sufficient. Forming the earthwisps into a binding to soften stone also did not affect the result of the alloy.


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    She also learned that the less white Iridescence they used, the less hard the alloy became, but after a certain point adding more white Iridescence did not make the copper any harder. The saturation point seemed to be somewhere around 1/7th of the volume of the copper in white Iridescence. Beyond that, adding more of the white Iridescence did not increase the hardness any further. Even at maximum saturation, the alloy was harder to work than copper but easier than iron, so the smiths had no problems, but the need to keep it hot so it could be hammered into a sheet had complicated the process slightly.


    After they''d finished making the alloyed cladding, Lori had become too busy to continue the line of research, since she''d needed to make beads, the large beads, and all the bound tools that relieved her of the need to continue imbuing many of her bindings.


    It was only now that she''d found the time to continue that line of research, and most definitely not because she forgot! At all! It would be wrong and very silly to think that!


    "Did you buy that notebook in Covehold?" Lori said, looking pointedly at what Rian was holding, along with a small bottle that no doubt contained ink, and one of their demesne pens. The cover was simply leather without stiffening, with an attached cord to secure it. She herself was carrying a small glass bottle¡ªthankfully she had a funnel¡ªfilled with the white Iridescence that she had left from when they had made the new bound tools recently.


    "Of course not," Rian said. "But we have a lot of paper and we have a bookbinder in River''s Fork. I asked Kutago to sew together a couple of notebooks for our research stuff, since I''m an optimist and thought we''d need multiple books for multiple separate lines of research."


    Lori stared at him. "I''m keeping those," she said. "I can''t risk the research data being taken."


    "So you''re going to transcribe all the notes into it yourself?"


    "¡­" Lori ''¡­''-ed. "Transcribe them quickly, clearly, concisely and completely. Don''t use your abridged writing."


    "Yes, your Bindership!"


    "Now put those away and get a slate and chalk. It might catch fire in the smithy, or at least smudge the pages."


    "¡­yes, your Bindership."


    By the time Rian back to from his house with slate and chalk, the copper was already heating in the crucible. It was a small piece that had been hammered off a much larger ingot, as well as a few odds and ends left from the when they''d made the Earthwisp-anchored copper alloy sheets.


    "Ready to write, your Bindership," Rian announced. "Third copper alloy experiment notes, ready!"


    Lori nodded, most of her attention on the copper in the crucible as it got hotter. "Good. Note this down. Today''s experiments will involve attempting to alloy copper with white Iridescence on which firewisps are anchored. As some of the copper being used today was originally alloyed with white Iridescence on which earthwisps were anchored, we will be melting the copper to a liquid state to return it to base copper, after which we will allow the molten copper to cool and solidify."


    She checked the copper again, noting that earthwisps had started to manifest. She noted that some of those earthwisps were seemingly anchored to something, and many of them were still bound, although as with the experiment of wisps anchored to white Iridescence that was dissolved into water the bindings were all pulled and warped, no doubt from whatever it remained anchored to being agitated by the liquid copper and pulling the binding in strange ways. It was exactly the same as the previous instances of anchored-earthwisp copper alloys.


    Once the copper melted, the slag was scooped out, and the pure metal was allowed to cool in the crucible just enough to solidify, Lori poured in the white Iridescence, then claiming, binding and anchoring the firewisps in the solidified copper to it. Then she began heating the metal again, this time indirectly though the firewisps in the air in the crucible, as well as in the crucible itself.


    This time, observing the wisps through her awareness of the wisps in her demesne was more enlightening then trying to do so during the second set of copper alloy experiments. She felt the binding of firewisps shift as the metal liquified again and the white Iridescence dissolved into it, very similar to when the same had been dissolved in water. Lori observed the binding a bit longer, watching as it flowed and distended, likely in response to the molten copper flowing and bubbling. It was actually behavior she''d seen before in bindings of waterwisps in boiling water, but it was notable because firewisps didn''t usually act like this.


    Lori recited all these observations to Rian, trusting him to note it down, and deactivated the bindings of firewisps before signaling for the copper to be poured. The mold to be used was placed on top of the crucible to heat up and get rid of any moisture¡ªotherwise there was a risk of steam explosions from small amounts of airborne waterwisps, and therefore water, clinging to the surfaces of the mold¡ªbefore being placed on the ground. The crucible was picked up with tongs and the copper was poured into the mold.


    They all watched as the copper flowed out across the ingot mold¡ªwhich was far too big for the amount of copper poured into it¡ªsolidifying¡­ and then instantly darkening as it cooled.


    "Is it just me¡­" Rian said, "or did that happen faster than it should have?"


    "It''s not just you, Rian," one of the smiths¡ªhe had the name ''Lanwei'' burned into the leather of his apron¡ªsaid. The other assorted smiths nearby nodded in agreement, all of them frowning at the now-solid once-puddle of copper.


    One of the copper smiths¡ªthe name burned into his apron was ''Duvar''¡ªpicked up the copper with a smaller set of tongs and dropped it into a bucked of water nearby that had been prepared for that purpose. It splashed into the water, but there was no sizzling of water evaporating into steam, no bubbles from that steam rising up.


    The firewisps in the copper had disappeared the instant it had entered the bucket.


    Lori looked towards the mold in confusion, but the firewisps there were still dangerously hot, even for her.


    "It''s not bubbling," Rian narrated the obvious as everyone craned their heads to see into the bucket, which did more harm than good as some people blocked out the lightwisps anchored to the ceiling.


    They all moved out of the way when Lori stepped forward, and while people called out ''Wait¡ª!'', none actually stopped her as she reached into the bucket and pulled up the copper with her bare hands.


    It was cold to the touch, but warmed very quickly as she held it, firewisps quickly manifesting first where her skin touched the metal before quickly filling the entire lopsided metal flatbread.


    "Rian," Lori said, "give me your hand."


    As Rian hesitantly held out his left hand, Lori grabbed it by the wrist and slapped the copper down on it. Rian, of course, tried to pull his hand back, but her grip was firm, keeping him and the copper in place.


    Finally, he said. "Oh, it''s cool already."


    Lori nodded. "Yes, it is."


    "Was it really a good idea to force it to cool like that?" She released his wrist and he started turning the metal over in his fingers, the soot on the copper''s surface rubbing off. "Or do we not care about any deformities in the metal?"


    "I didn''t force it to cool. It cooled quickly on its own."


    "What." Despite the clear question, it was said in the tone of a statement.

 398 - A Fourth Alloy

    They were able to quickly ascertain that the new alloy had the same properties of copper. It bent like unalloyed copper did, it was easily shaped by simply hammering it, and it wasn''t any harder or more elastic than copper was normally.


    It was when they heated the alloy sample again¡ªboth to undo the work-hardening from the hammering and to confirm what Lori had perceived earlier¡ªthat it showed an unusual property. While copper was known for getting hot easily and conducting that heat well, it usually took a few moments for it to get hot and to spread across the metal.


    The metal sample became hot instantly as soon as the corner of the sample touched the binding of firewisps that Lori had formed to heat it. Firewisps quickly spread across the entire sample, and the sample began to glow orange almost immediately. Lori hastily deactivated the binding, and as soon as she did the sample immediately stopped glowing, the firewisps disappearing soon after. By the time that Lori reached out to touch it, the sample was cool enough to touch again, and seemed to be the same temperature as the tongs holding it.


    Rian picked it up, and Lori watched as firewisps spread across the sample once more as it became the same temperature as his fingers. "This is so strange," he said. "It was literally glowing hot just a little bit ago, but now¡­" He held the metal out to one of the smiths¡ªon his apron was burned ''Artelego''¡ªwho took it and examined it before leaning down to touch it to the still-hot mold it had been poured onto. The man pulled it back instantly as it probably became very hot, but as soon as it lost contact with the mold the sample became cool again. "Don''t get me wrong, it''s very interesting¡­ but also very strange. "


    "It''s become a very good conductor of heat," Lori agreed, gesturing for him to write that down, making Rian reach for his slate again. "The heat exchange across the entire sample is nearly instantaneous, and it sheds heat just as quickly."


    "Would this be a good metal for a cooking pot?" Rian said thoughtfully. "It would spread the heat evenly across the whole pot, and being directly on a heat source makes the ''loses heat quickly'' part not so problematic¡­?"


    "That might be the only thing it''s good for," Lori said.


    "I don''t know. I think it might be a good material for drawing out heat from wood-fired steam drivers. Having a material like this would be very useful for condensing the steam back into water to be reused."


    "How do you know how a steam driver works?"


    "One of the saws in the lumber mill I worked at was a hybrid steam driver that could be fueled by wood or a bead. We burned all the bark and rotted wood and things that were no good for wood-pressing. I just asked about it and old Virr was more than happy to explain how it worked," Rian said cheerfully. "Never burn sawdust in one of those things. It''ll explode."


    "It''s sawdust. Of course it''ll explode."


    "Look, I was younger and stupider, all right? The important thing is nothing burned down but my eyebrows."


    Lori stared at him. "Rian, if we ever have a steam driver in the demesne, you are forbidden from getting within four paces of it."


    "I''m not going to put sawdust in a steam driver!"


    The third alloy sample was set aside for the moment. Besides its admittedly interesting thermal properties, it was physically close enough to unalloyed copper as to make no difference. While there was probably a use for it¡ªRian had been muttering about a copper plate and double-layered pots¡ªthat could be considered later.


    There were five more alloys to make, after all.


    Firewisps had been the easiest to do, as heat was spread all through the heated ingot, which was why they had done it first, but fortunately the smiths had been able to suggest a solution once Lori had told Rian how she was having trouble thinking of how to disperse some kinds of wisps through the copper, and he had told the smiths.


    The solution had been embarrassingly simple.


    Copper shavings.


    The smiths had prepared the raw material for her, using knives and files to make copper shavings from a large ingot. It was part of what had taken things so long, along with the work they had to do for the sawmill, as well as repairs of the metal tools around the demesne. Lori was just glad gold lining didn''t need to be reapplied to the insides of their copper pots. They didn''t have any more gold for that.


    After the crucible received a quick scrape for any slag that might be stuck inside it, a measure of copper shavings were poured in, followed by some fine white Iridescence.


    "So," Rian asked as the crucible was placed on the ceramic block that would keep it off the floor, the binding of firewisps that would heat the insides of the crucible already anchored inside it well away from the white Iridescence, "which binding are you going to try next?"


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    "Airwisps," Lori said. "While I admit to also being very curious as to what would result should we perform this alloying with lightwisps and darkwisps, airwisps are where this methodology is most likely to fail, so I would rather we get it out of the way."


    The shavings ensured that there were a lot of empty spaces¡ªrelatively speaking¡ªbetween them, allowing for there to be space for the binding to be technically inside the copper. Lori wasn''t sure if that was important, but if they had been melting a solid ingot, the airwisps that would be anchored to the white Iridescence would be from the air above it. While that might work¡ªthis was an experiment after all¡ªthe previous instances with the earthwisps and now the firewisps had involved wisps that were in the copper, so that was the methodology she was trying to replicate, as it had proven successful already. And short of using some kind of metal tube to blow bubbles into molten copper¡ªwhich she wouldn''t have been able to anchor to white Iridescence because the latter would have dissolved into the liquid¡ªthis was the best way of having air be ''in'' the copper while still allowing her to anchor its wisps.


    "What, not worried at all about how you''re going to do this with waterwisps?" Rian said.


    "Water is only dangerous because it will turn to steam. If it''s already steam, it shouldn''t be an issue," Lori said.


    "Can we not be in the room when you try, just in case?"


    "¡­ fine."


    "You heard her men, we can run away and hide when she tries with water!"


    There were relieved sighs all around from all the smiths. Lori swept an annoyed look over all of them, but¡­ well, she could hardly fault their worry given how dangerous adding water to very hot metalworking was. Instead, she said, "Let''s get this done."


    Lori claimed the airwisps running through all the gaps between the copper shavings, forming them into a binding. Briefly, she realized she could have done the reverse, claiming and binding all the air in the crucible and then adding the shavings. Well, a thought for next time, although she dictated it to Rian for future reference. Rian was on his second writing slate, the first one carefully set aside to keep the writing from getting smudged.


    Once the airwisps were bound, she anchored them to the white Iridescence¡ªsome of which had also settled among the gaps between the copper shavings¡ªbefore activating the binding of firewisps to start heating the copper. As the copper started to melt and liquefy, the airwisps started moving, though that was as much from the now-liquid copper beginning to occupy the voids they''d been in as the white Iridescence they were anchored to beginning to move.


    This one was more fascinating to watch. Even as the earthwisps of the melting copper disappeared as the metal turned liquid, she could keep track of the substance through its firewisps to some degree. And so she was able to perceive that even as the copper melted completely, the airwisps she had bound to the white Iridescence didn''t rise up into the crucible, but stayed intermixed with the firewisps of the molten metal. Unlike the airwisps above it, they weren''t roiling or shifting violently or simply just rising up. Instead, they were moving with the firewisps, presumably being carried along by the molten metal''s currents. It was not unlike the way airwisps were sometimes present in water, somehow dissolved into it, except this wasn''t water¡­


    After she finished dictating this for Rian to write down, the copper was poured into the mold.


    Unlike the previous alloy, this one remained hot for some time, the airwisps dissolved into the metal disappearing from her awareness as the earthwisps that indicated the metal had solidified appeared. All that was left was to let it cool¡­


    ¡­so they dropped it into a bucket of water.


    As the water bubbled from the steam, one of the redsmiths¡ªDuvar¡ªsaid, "It''s too big."


    "Come again?" Rian asked.


    "The copper we just poured, L¡ªRian. It''s too big. Me, Sherdon, and Virr all measured the shavings earlier this morning. I know how much copper was supposed to go into the crucible, and what came out was too much. I''d have to drop it into a cup to be sure, but the copper in that bucket looks like it''s a little bit bigger than it should be. Maybe¡­ a twentieth bigger?"


    "Are you certain?" Lori said sharply


    The redsmith turned towards her directly. "Yes, your Bindership. Normally I''d have thought it would be because of that white stuff, but we all know by now that it just disappears into the molten copper."


    Lori nodded. "Rian, write that down. Someone get a saw ready. I need to see the inside of that metal."


    "You think there are bubbles inside the copper?" Rian said as he wrote, flapping his hand back and forth as soon as he was done.


    She shook her head. "I don''t feel any voids of airwisps, so there shouldn''t, but I want to confirm just to be sure. Especially since¡­Duvar¡­ says that the copper is bigger than it should be."


    Once the bucket stopped bubbling and Lori cooled the copper down the rest of the way¡ªit probably wasn''t necessary to cool the copper like that, but it cleaned most of the soot off the copper in the process as well¡ªthe piece of copper was secured, a scrap of leather was placed under it to catch any copper dust, and a hardened metal saw¡ªbought from Covehold¡ªwas used to cut through the sample. When the sample had been cut through, there were no visible bubbles or anything to explain the supposed increase in volume, which the other redsmiths also confirmed.


    The larger of the two pieces were given to the smiths, who proceeded to hammer at the copper to test it for altered physical properties. To Lori''s eyes, it seemed to flatten out easily enough, but once they were finished, the smiths and redsmiths reported that working the metal was easier somehow, as if it were softer than it had been previously. And when they heated the metal again to treat the work hardening the hammering had likely caused¡­


    "Is it just me or does it seem to be taking longer to get hot?" Rian commented.


    "It''s not just you," Lori said, staring at the copper sample, which had been folded over to make it more compact. One end, the end that was touching the binding of firewisps that was supposed to be heating it, was glowing hot. The rest of the length of the metal, while also hot, didn''t seem as hot as it as it should be.


    Rian tilted his head. "An insulator? I mean, the other one was a heat conductor¡­"


    Lori deactivated the binding of firewisps. "We''ll see. Set that aside to cool, and someone keep an eye on it. Tell me if it seems to take longer to cool than copper should. Let''s get the crucible filled up for the next alloy."


    Hopefully, they could make one more alloy before lunch and do the other three afterwards.


    And then¡­


    Well, she''d see about whether it was possible to alloy using bindings of more than one kind of wisp at a time.

 399 - Alloys Of Light And Dark

    The next alloy was prepared the same way as the previous one. Measured copper shavings and white Iridescence were poured into the crucible, and then Lori activated the binding of firewisps that would slowly heat the metal. When the metal started to glow with heat, she claimed and bound the lightwisps in the gaps between the shavings, forming them into a binding and anchoring to the white Iridescence in the crucible. As with the airwisps, the lightwisps seemed to occupy the same space as the firewisps of the molten metal. Also like the airwisps, once the slag was scooped out the copper was poured into the mold and allowed to slowly cool in the air, the lightwisps disappeared with the earthwisps.


    Unlike the previous alloys however, the altered physical properties of the alloy were immediately evident under the soot covering the metal. Because of the altered properties, the alloy was gripped in tongs and dipped into the bucket of water instead of simply dropping it in. Once the sample had stopped causing the water to bubble, it was carefully pulled out and laid down on a nearby anvil, where Lori altered one of the bindings of lightwisps anchored to the ceiling to shine brighter and shine down on the sample.


    "Suddenly, I want new windows," Rian said as everyone stared at the perfectly transparent sample of copper. Well, not perfectly transparent. Like glass, its curves and angles and little textures from the cooling distorted the light passing through it, and some small amount of soot still clung to its surface, making discerning the sample''s shape easier. "Your Bindership, when you''re done with copper, maybe we can try seeing if this works with molten rock? Because if you had transparent rock to work with¡­"


    "After we''ve seen to the copper," Lori said, also staring at the now-transparent metal. She gestured towards it. "Begin the tests."


    That seemed to stir the staring smiths into action again, and the copper was hastily picked and gripped in tongs. The same test they''re run on the previous alloys were conducted: a hammer was used to start shaping and flattening the sample to test if it still had the same physical properties. At first the smiths move reticently as if they were actually were working on glass, but after the first few hammer strikes without the sample cracking or shattering into pieces they picked up the pace.


    After some time working on the sample while other smiths temporarily put away the mold and crucible¡ªpeople were going past the entrance of the smithy towards her Dungeon, likely because it was time for lunch¡ªthe redsmiths reported that except for its altered transparency, the sample had the normal physical properties of copper.


    The sample of airwisp-anchored copper alloy had cooled, and they''d dropped it into the bucket just to be sure before setting it aside with the other sample''s they''d made this morning. Lori still needed to try to identify other altered properties of the metals later.


    The lightwisp-anchored copper alloy was the most immediately interesting of the alloys they''re produced. They didn''t have enough copper stockpiled to put alloy windows on every building¡ªand she had no desire to actually put such on every building¡ªbut a transparent metal would be able to act as a viewing port on the door of her Dungeon and on River''s Fork''s dragon shelter, allowing them to check outside during and after a dragon''s passing.


    Rian''s suggestion to see if they could alloy stone also had merit¡ªugh, she hated it when he had a point¡ªif only because it was a material they had available. The attempt had to be made, since if it worked... well, having transparent stone would be very useful¡­


    Lunch was relatively quiet at their table. With Rian busy most of the morning, he had nothing to report, and he himself seemed preoccupied. He stared down at his food, eating without thought¡ªwhich was actually faster than how he usually ate, and Lori could recognize the joke that implied¡ªnot really paying any attention to Umu and Riz next to him.


    "Rian? Is something wrong?" Riz asked.


    He blinked, turning towards her. "Huh? No, nothing''s wrong. Why do you ask?"


    "You were just¡­ sitting there staring," Riz said.


    "I was? Oh. Sorry, it''s just¡­ I was thinking about something." He shook his head.


    "What were you thinking about?" Mikon asked, leaning forward to look past Riz.


    Rian glanced towards Lori. "Windows."


    "I''m not putting new windows on every house," Lori said blandly. "We just did that."


    "You know that''s not what I meant."


    "Good."


    Lori went back to her food. Rian did as well, already looking preoccupied again.


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    As Riz opened her mouth, Rian suddenly said, "So¡­ should I add ''a lot of metal'' to the list of things to buy in Covehold Demesne?"


    "Don''t get lead."


    "Well, obviously. Sorry, you were going to say something, Riz?"


    After lunch, the two of them returned to the smithy. Rian had more slates in hand, in case he needed more space to write on. While the redsmiths took care of the samples they''d already made¡ªsomeone seemed to be hammering lettering into them¡ªthe crucible was prepared again, slag scraped out from the inside before it was filled with copper shavings and finely ground white Iridescence. This time, however, the crucible was covered instead of left open, preventing light from entering. Once covered, Lori claimed the darkwisps that appeared inside the crucible, forming them into a binding that she then anchored to the white Iridescence. Then she activated the binding of firewisps, which needed some imbuing but that was easily remedied.


    Despite some mild concern that the darkwisps would start disappearing when the copper started glowing from the heat, being anchored to the white Iridescence allowed the wisps to persist despite not being imbued. The copper liquefied without issue, the darkwisps ''dissolving'' into the metal and being carried along as the airwisps had been.


    The cover was removed, and slag was scooped out before the copper alloy was poured into the mold. Once it had cooled sufficiently¡ªand they were sure it wasn''t also transparent, just in case¡ªthe sample was picked up and dropped into the bucket of water, the contents of which had been replaced.


    Once it was cooled, the alloy was retrieved from the bucket and laid out onto the anvil for everyone to see.


    "I''ll be honest, I was sort of expecting it to be completely black for some reason," Rian said. "Silly, I know. Only the one before this one actually looked different."


    "Well, you were half-right, at least," Lori said. Despite being washed and wiped as well as the cloths they had could manage, the copper still looked blackened.


    "I wonder¡­ if you put lightwisps and darkwisps in the same alloy, will it come out transparent and tinted?"


    "We can attempt to try multiple-wisp alloys later. For now, we need to test this sample."


    The sample was taken and tested. Hammering, bending, shaping¡­ despite the color, none of its other physical property seemed to have changed. Was a slight darkening all there was?


    Rian didn''t seem to think so. That, or he was simply in denial as he pick up the thinner, wider ingot. They didn''t have time to flatten it out completely into a sheet, after all. "Hmm¡­"


    "Set it aside to test further later, Rian," she said. "We need to move on to the next test." Already, more copper shavings were being poured into the crucible. The smiths had been a little overenthusiastic in their shaving, but Rian had argued this made it easier to melt them, since heat didn''t have to penetrate so deep. Since they were heating the copper with radiant heat instead of direct heat so as not to potentially affect the alloying metal, she''d decided to just go along with it.


    Rian held the sample out to her. "Can you pass magic through this?"


    She blinked. What? "What?"


    "Can you pass magic through this?" he repeated. "Do that thing you do where you claim and imbue wisps through metal?"


    She took the metal with a sigh, holding it in her hand as she reached down to use it to imbue the binding of firewisps again. "Why?" she said, moving one end of the darkwisp-anchored alloy into the binding.


    "Because you told me that darkwisps can block magic."


    Lori blinked, then stared at the flattened ingot. That¡­!


    She reached through the metal towards the binding of firewisps, being careful to ensure that it was through her hand that was holding the metal that she bound the wisps through and not her connection to her core. Lori felt the familiar distant-yet-near sensation of using a metal contact, and began to imbue the bin¡ªwhat the colors?-!


    "What the colors?" she exclaimed.


    Rian straightened. "So it does affect magic?" he said eagerly.


    Lori ignored him as she continued to try to imbue the binding of firewisps, even as she struggled¡ªand it was a struggle¡ªto imbue the binding. She had never had to struggle with imbuing, hadn''t even known it was possible. In all of her time as a wizard, and now a Dungeon Binder, nothing had ever actually impeded her ability to imbue something. Lay claim to something, yes. She had practiced trying to claim wisps that another Whisperer was also trying to claim, but that had never made imbuing difficult. This, though¡­


    It was like trying to blow through folded cloths pressed against your mouth to move a sheet of paper, or like trying to walk through waist-high water flowing towards you. Try as she might, she could feel only a small amount of the magic she was trying to pass through the wire making its way to the binding at a rate that was a trickle compared to what it usually was.


    With a shiver, Lori stopped using the alloy as a conduit and hastily put the sample down as she began to imbue the binding of firewisps though her connection to her core.


    "Your Bindership? Is something wrong?"


    Lori shook her head roughly. "Rian, write this down," she said. "The flow of magic is impeded through the darkwisp-anchored copper alloy."


    Rian made a show of writing that down. "We should ask Taeclas if it''s the same for her," he said thoughtfully. "Maybe check the other alloys if their ability to channel magic has been affected too? In hindsight, this should have been a physical property we were testing for."


    "If that''s the case, we should perhaps test how well lightning passes through the alloys as well," Lori said. "Especially when we make the lightningwisp alloy."


    "Oh, you know bindings to test that? That''s a relief, here I was wondering how we were going to do that¡­"


    "¡­" Lori ''¡­''-ed. Maybe there''s something in the almanac that could help her. "Is the crucible ready yet?"

 400 - Sliders And Dials

    Once the crucible was ready, Lori went out to get some lightningwisps. The quartz in her staff had long since run out¡ªshe should probably do something about that before the next time she had to leave her demesne¡ªso she walked to the binding that kept bugs out of her Dungeon. It was made of lightningwisps, and left little sparks in the air as a result. Lori collected those lightningwisps and formed them into a binding. Once she felt she had enough wisps, she carried the binding back to the smithy and anchored it into the white Iridescence in the crucible.


    Lightningwisps was one of two wisps that could be inside solids, and so she took care to intersect parts of the binding with the copper shavings. It probably didn''t matter¡ªthe copper shavings would shift as they melted¡ªand in any case, under normal circumstances metal would cease being able to channel lightningwisps once it became hot enough, well before it liquefied. She remembered that much, at least.


    She still hadn''t learned how her old professor had managed to make a ball of iron float using lightningwisps.


    Melting the shavings and cooling the copper alloy went without issue, so the sample went into the bucket to cool. As soon as it was cool enough to touch, Lori picked it up and immediately started using it to claim and bind airwisps. That also went without issue, and imbuing through the metal was just like imbuing through any other piece of copper.


    As the sample was hammered to test its physical properties, Lori went to test the previously made alloys, using them to claim, bind, and imbue airwisps. Of them, only the darkwisp-anchored copper alloy resisted her attempts to imbue through it. However, in the process of testing, she discovered that the distance between where she touched the alloy and where the wisps she wanted to imbue contacted the matter affected the degree of resistance.


    While it wasn''t obvious when she was imbuing airwisps, touching the alloy to the stone walls of the smithy and trying to imbue the earthwisps there made the matter more obvious. The closer to the earthwisps she positioned her nail on the alloy, the less resistance there was in the metal, making imbuement¡­ well, not easier, since it was still more difficult than normal. Less difficult, then. Lori shook her head as she dictated the results of the test to Rian. While it was an altered physical property, she couldn''t see how it could be useful. She probably wouldn''t be making this again.


    "Oh, that''s probably how the dials and slides on bound tools work," Rian commented as he wrote on. "I''ve been wondering about that. Having an alloy that restricted the amount of imbuement coming from the bead would probably do it."


    Lori''s head turned slowly to stare at him.


    "What?"


    Making the last alloy was delayed as Lori tried to test Rian''s suggestion. A bead was retrieved, and the other previous alloys, their capacity to channel magic unaltered, were used as improvised bead receptacles and wires. The transparent alloy was hammered to make a cup-like shape and touched to one end of the darkwisp-anchored copper alloy, and the smith used narrow-pointed grippers to crimp the two together for convenience. The airwisp-anchored alloy had one end wrapped around a rock which Lori had softened to embed some a piece of white Iridescence on, to which she anchored some lightwisps such that the binding intersected with the airwisp alloy.


    Then she took the airwisp alloy with its binding of lightwisps and touched it to the point of the darkwisp alloy furthest from where it was crimped to the improvised bead receptacle, staring at the rock on the end of it. Rian helpfully moved to where he''d cast his shadow on the rock mounted on the alloy, but it was insufficient. Lori deactivated the lightwisps on the ceiling to make it easier to see if any light was coming from the binding. She didn''t actually need to do that since she could perceive if the binding was imbued, but given what Rian had suggested, having the binding actually start glowing would be a perfect proof of concept test.


    Lori slowly dragged the airwisp alloy along the darkwisp alloy and closer towards the bead. At a tenth of the length of the darkwisp alloy, a weak radiance finally emanated from the lightwisp binding. It was a glow that grew brighter the closer she moved the contact towards the bead. She moved the contact back and forth, watching the light brighten and dim.


    "This is going to make the steam jet drivers so much simpler," Rian said. "Instead of only having three different setting, we could just turn a dial. Much simpler."


    Lori grunted. Ugh, she hated it when he was right. Lori removed the bead and handed the copper samples to the smiths. "Separate those, I need to study them individually later. Is the crucible ready?"


    It was, for which she was glad. One last alloy to make¡ª


    As soon as Lori poured the white Iridescence into the crucible, Rian cheerfully said, "Well, it looks like you have everything well in hand, so me and the men are going to leave the room now."


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    Lori blinked. What? "What?"


    "This is the waterwisp alloy you''re making. You promised we could leave the room when you did that. You know, in case there''s a steam explosion that sends molten copper flying everywhere?"


    At the reminder, the two smiths closest to the door promptly turned around and made their way out.


    Well¡­ she had said they could do that¡­


    Fortunately, there wasn''t anything they needed to do for her. There was the bucket of water nearby¡ªit was dark with soot from the previous two alloys¡ªso she was able to get some water, which she turned into vapor so that it wouldn''t explode into steam. To make sure, she began heating the copper shavings in the crucible. Once it was hot enough, she carefully anchored the binding of waterwisps to the white Iridescence, making sure the binding was dispersed evenly. Then she activated the binding of firewisps that would heat the contents of the crucible again and left the smithy.


    "I thought you said it was safe?" Rian said as she stepped out of the room.


    "I did. However, I find I''m thirsty, so I''m going to go get some water."


    "Oh, then you can just wait in the smithy your Bindership, I''ll go and get¡ª"


    Lori kicked him in the shin and turned to get her water.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After drinking some water to replenish herself, Lori went back to the smithy to check on the now-molten copper in the crucible.


    On a completely unrelated note, there were no explosions of any sort, which had nothing to do with anything, and Lori didn''t even know why she bothered to think of it. Still, mentioning it was sufficient get the nervous smiths back into the smithy, where the mold was heated to rid it of moisture before the final alloy was poured into it.


    It was almost anti-climactic. The color was unchanged from unalloyed copper, and when Lori used the alloy sample to bind and imbue the earthwisp of the floor, there was no feeling of resistance. When the sample was given to the redsmiths to test, they reported that it seemed similar to the airwisp-anchored alloy, in that it was slightly easier to work. When they heated, however, it wasn''t slow to grow warm, unlike the airwisp alloy.


    "Maybe it will show other properties once we conduct other tests," Rian said confidently, giving a sigh as he finally stopped writing on the slate he was holding. The two of them had stepped just outside of the smithy to be out of the way as the smiths cleaned up. Lori held the alloys they had made that day, waiting for the redsmiths to finish with the last sample. To her amusement, the redsmiths had taken the time to stamp on the words ''fire'', ''air'' and so on, identifying the similar looking samples. They had even done the same for the lightwisp- and darkwisp-anchored allows, despite them being far more identifiable. "Uh, what other tests are there besides testing how well lightning passes through them?"


    "I have no idea," Lori said. "I''m hardly an expert in metallurgy."


    "Should I look for one next time I go to Covehold Demesne?"


    "Don''t. We can''t waste time on that. The properties we are certain of are already more than useful."


    "Too bad we don''t have enough metal for windows," Rian sighed. "At least, metal that''s not more useful doing something else."


    "No using the iron you bought in Covehol Demesne for windows," Lori agreed. "You''ll simply have to wait until the mine has managed to excavate more. Perhaps you can try to buy more cheap metals on the next trading trip. Tin or gold, maybe."


    "Yes, I should probably ask about gold, we need it for buried lattices for the farming plots," Rian agreed. "And if we ever have to coat the insides of the pots again." He titled his head, looking thoughtful. "Actually¡­ we have plenty of wire now. Why don''t we just rip the gold wires out of the walls and replace it with the copper wire we bought?"


    Lori blinked, also tilting her head. That¡­ actually, that was certainly an option. "It will have to wait until there''s more time and need," she sighed.


    "I''ll set aside wire and remind you when it seems like there''s time for it."


    Rian excused himself to get started transcribing what was on the slates into the notebook, leaving Lori to wait for the redsmiths to finish with the last sample.


    "Thank you," Lori said when one of the smiths¡ªhis apron read Virr¡ªcame out to hand her the last sample, which was stamped ''water''. "I appreciate the work you all did today. Rian will see to it you receive a double serving of fruits with dinner and breakfast tomorrow."


    "Thank you, Great Binder," he said. the man looked around, clearly looking for Rian.


    "Was there anything else?" Lori said.


    "Ah, it''s just¡­ well, we realized that we should probably, ah, test how well the¡­ the alloys draw out into wire, Great Binder," the man said.


    Lori blinked, tilting her head, then nodded. "I see. Yes, you''re correct. While we probably won''t really need to use any of them as wire¡ª" wait, the darkwisp-anchored alloy would probably be more efficient used as a wire as long as its resistive property wasn''t affected by the process¡­ "¡ªI suppose it''s something that should be tried." She looked down at the samples in her hands. "Tomorrow."


    The smith nodded, furthering the gesture into a bow. "As you say, Great Binder. Tomorrow."


    "Do we still have any copper shavings?"


    The man paused. "We can make some more, Great Binder, as long as you don''t mind that they aren''t as fine as the ones we used today."


    Lori nodded. "Do so. I have an additional test to try. Enough for one will be sufficient."


    "We''ll start scraping some out, Great Binder."


    Lori gave the man one last nod, then turned and headed for her room.


    Really, one sample was all she needed for testing if she could alloy two wisps at once. It would either work or it won''t, although some combinations were probably too contradictory, like alloying both firewisps and airwisps at once. Even if it works, how would they be able to tell?


    In her room, she laid out the samples on her table. Each was as wide as her palm now, and thin, although still thicker than a wire. The smith should still be able to draw these into wire.


    Looking over the samples, Lori picked up two and set them aside to remind herself. She''d try alloying those together tomorrow.


    Nodding to herself, Lori headed for the latrine to get ready for dinner.

 401 - Dedicated Expansion

    "Ugh, I''ve forgotten how painful using pens could be," Rian sighed at dinner, his right hand opening and closing as if he was trying to loosen up muscles.


    Lori and¡ªshe checked the rocks in her pouch, pulling out the right one on the second try¡ªTaeclas both winced, their own hands clenching in sympathy. "I don''t miss that part of school," the Deadspeaker muttered.


    "At least you could heal," Lori muttered back.


    "Only afterwards," Taeclas countered.


    Lori grunted in non-committal acknowledgement, turning her attention back to her lord as Taeclas started muttering about Mentalists. Ugh, the Mentalists. Either they didn''t have to write anything down because they could just remember everything, or their pens moved without a hand on them, writing in the grip of thought force. "Was your grip too hard? We didn''t make so many notes that you''d have trouble dictating it into the notebook."


    "I know that," Rian said, sounding almost offended. "No, it hurts because I wanted to get it all written down before dinner so that I wouldn''t have to keep doing it after."


    Mikon made a clicking sound with her tongue as she shook her head. "Give me your hand," she said.


    Rian complied, his forearm pressing against Riz''s torso as Mikon pulled his arm towards her and started massaging his extremity. "Oh, that''s actually helping, thanks! Uh, although we''re imposing on Riz¡­"


    "I don''t mind," Riz said with a smirk as she crossed her arms, pushing his arm up a little higher. On Rian''s other side, Umu was giving the other two women an annoyed look as she clutched at Rian''s arm tighter.


    "Erzebed, restrain yourself and keep your flirting acceptable for children," Lori said, making the woman wince and uncross her arms. "Rian, we have that final alloy we''ll be making after breakfast. Once it''s finished, remain to take note of the results of the wire drawing."


    "Yes, your Bindership," Rian said. "Uh, about how many times you expanded the demesne yesterday and the day before¡­?"


    "Really? You''re still asking?


    "Yes, I''m still asking! My data is incomplete!"


    The rest of breakfast was uneventful save for the fact Mikon wouldn''t let go of Rian''s hand, insisting she needed to continue massaging it. This led to Umu and Riz insisting they needed to feed him, to their strange enjoyment, the amusement of the other tables, and her lord''s indulgent resignation.


    Riz was less amused at realizing she also needed to feed Mikon, as she had both hands occupied. Despite being disgruntled, the non-officer simply sighed and did so. The weaver seemed to enjoy the experience far more than Rian did.


    It said something about Rian''s eating habits that even will all this, he still managed to finish eating at the same time as Lori.


    As Taeclas took a moment to talk to Mikon after she finally let Rian go, Lori headed to her room to retrieve the previous day''s samples so they could be drawn into wire. "Rian, get your slate."


    "Yes, your Bindership! Don''t start without me!"


    The actual making of the dual-wisp alloy went without incident. After all the samples they had made yesterday, today''s melt was almost rote. The metal shavings and white Iridescence were heated, Lori claimed, bound and anchored lightwisps and airwisps together¡ªit had seemed the optimal combination¡ªand then she simply waited for the metal to become molten so it could be poured.


    "Well, it''s still completely transparent¡­" Rian said as the cooled block was retrieved from the bucket of water. "And bigger than it should be too. So¡­ I suppose this counts as a success?"


    "We''ll still need to have the smiths test its properties," Lori said. She looked toward the smiths attending them. "Remove a small portion now for testing and drawing. See how fine a wire you can draw from them. As to the rest of the samples¡­" Lori considered then shrugged. "Fold them up into as small a block as you can, storing them as they currently are is a bit inconvenient. Rian¡ª"


    "I know, I know, oversee the wire drawing and take notes."


    Lori nodded, and left them to it. She had a demesne to expand, after all.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori spent the following week expanding the demesne, sitting in her room and laying back in her recess in the wall as she quickly regained her efficiency and proficiency from last winter. Once she started doing so, the activity became much less mentally taxing, and she no longer ended the day feeling like a headache was threatening to erupt. Make multiple ''shells'' of bindings around her demesne, link them all together to imbue them all at once, disconnect the outermost shell and use that to expand the demesne outwards¡­


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    It wasn''t all sitting around, of course. As she had learned during the winter, she could only stay in one position, comfortable and cushioned as it was, for so long, and she was spending far more time expanding her demesne now. Lori found herself leaving her wall recess, wearing the tsinelas that Rian had promised her¡ªthe footwear was quite comfortable once she got used to the feeling of dried reeds on her bare feet¡ªand pacing back and forth to get blood flowing back into her legs and alleviate the restless energy that filled her as she did. The activity actually helped her concentration, as it gave her body something to do, keeping her mind from becoming distracted. Well, more distracted, anyway.


    As the week progressed, Lori found herself spending less and less time in her little wall recess, if only to be able to recline in different positions. She even found that she could read a little when she was just imbuing the shells of bindings around her demesne, although the subject couldn''t be very intensive. That meant she was limited to browsing the almanac, since the primers were all more complicated and more frustrating, which tended to pull her attention back to what she was reading. Probably for the best. She was finding the primers on Deadspeaking, Mentalism and Horotracting were annoyingly unhelpful. Try as she might to follow the preliminary perception exercises written in the introductory chapters, she still couldn''t perceive the life, vertices or thoughts that they said she should be able to after doing them!


    As she expanded the demesne, managing to slightly increase the number of times she could expand the demesne in a day, the work being done continued.


    "The waterwheel and saw are finally working," Rian announced triumphantly, as if he actually had anything to do with it. Actually, considering how he liked to involve himself in all of the work that was occurring, he probably had been. "We can finally split and cut the logs that we cut down when we cleared the area around the sawmill, so the sawyers are hard at work cutting the logs into planks for the sawmills roof and walls." He paused. "Well, they''re trying. The rollers are being a bit awkward right now, but no one''s lost any fingers yet."


    He glanced sideways at¡ªLori had checked her rock¡ªTaeclas. "Uh, can you reattach fingers? I don''t think Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected, cheerfully accompanied by said Dungeon Binder''s little cousin declaring, "Shashalorre!"


    "¡ªShanalorre can do dismembered¡­ members."


    "I can''t," Shanalorre confirmed.


    "Uh¡­ I can and I can''t¡­" Taeclas said hesitantly. "I mean¡­ I did it once, managed to keep someone''s fingers alive, but someone with actual medical experience and better at fleshcrafting did the actual reattachment. I theoretically know how to do it, but that was on a dead hand and a beast tail."


    "Ah¡­ well, I''ll ask Lidz next time I see him, but if we had an emergency, would you be willing to try in any case?"


    Taeclas winced but nodded. "Don''t worry, I will. It''s just¡­ well, blood is icky. It''s wet and it stains and it gets everywhere¡­"


    "I''m sure everyone would much rather not lose a finger than having to ask you to put one back on," Rian said. "Just keeping the finger alive should be well enough. Our doctors have experience surgically reattaching fingers, so between you all people should be fine."


    "Oh, thank the Binder!"


    "What for? I didn''t do anything."


    Taeclas blushed as Rian started chuckling. "Uh, just¡­ uh¡­"


    "Yes?" Lori said, keeping her gaze on the Deadspeaker.


    "¡­I''m sorry for swearing in front of the children."


    "Don''t worry, we already know how to glittering swear!" someone from the table behind Lori said.


    "¡­psst, Tae," Rian hissed theatrically. "This is where you stop talking, eat, and wait for her to stop staring at you like that."


    The mine in River''s Fork was also progressing well. The water that had filled the bottom of the mine¡ªbefore they''d put in the door and channels that diverted the rainwater away from the mine¡ªhad been emptied out the hard way, a bucket at a time. It had left a thick sludge, the result of the bathwater draining down into the flooding when the dragon shelter had been use earlier that season, which they''d scraped out with shovel. The rest that couldn''t be scraped was dried by setting a fire to dry everything out.


    "After that, we aired it out to get rid of the smoke and smell, and when the smell wouldn''t go away, we asked Lidz if he could do something, and when he couldn''t we set another fire and tried to at least make the place smell like smoke," Rian reported at the end of the week. "Thankfully the smoke had cleared by the time I left, so our men didn''t have to find someplace else to sleep for the night. Tomorrow, they''ll start proper mining operations, since all that clearing finally let us find the copper seam."


    "I see. And that boat you were pulling behind you?"


    "That''s the second that Lidz finished, the one with the higher sides. He''s already working on the third one, the version that has a low centerline with compartments we can fill with weights."


    "Making the boat weigh more seems counterproductive to having it float," Lori said flatly.


    "It''s all a matter of where the weight is positioned. I had Lidz put the compartments at the lowest point of the boat so that the center of the boat is being pulled down by the weights. With the other parts of the boat being buoyed up by the water, the boat is less likely to roll, so it doesn''t need to be stabilized by outriggers. Or at least, that''s my hope."


    "You hope?"


    Rian shrugged. "Look, it''s like trying to float a wooden cup. It''s far more stable if you put a weight in it to keep the bottom from rising and remain the lost point."


    "¡­why would you float a drinking cup?" Lori couldn''t help asking.


    "¡­there''s very little to do around here that''s not work or¡­" Rian glanced over her shoulder, "¡­ board games. You do things when you''re bored." He shrugged. "Look, if it doesn''t work, we can just take out the rocks and add outriggers like the others."


    Lori grunted noncommittally. "Fine. We''ll wait on the results of Lori''s Boat Four, and use the Lori''s Boat Three as a test for the prototype of the next steam jet driver bound tool."


    "Come on, can''t we change the names? Just slapping numbers on them is boring!"


    "Why are you complaining, Rian? You like watching numbers get bigger."


    "That has nothing to do with this! This doesn''t count!"


    By the end of the week of dedicated expansion, according to Rian''s measurements, the demesne had grown a total of slightly less than 170 paces in diameter. In only ten days, she had managed to expand to almost a third of what she had managed to achieve over the winter. In another week, her demesne would be five taums wide, increasing the area of her demesne by¡­!


    ¡­


    Uh¡­


    ¡­


    Well, she''d have Rian do the math since she''d forgotten the formulas for it, but it was no doubt a significant amount!

 402 - The Prototype Sliding Switch

    "With another week of similar growth, the surface area of the demesne will increase by almost half of it original size," Rian practically cheered after he did some calculations on his slate, muttering to himself the whole time. "At this rate, we might even be the size of Covehold Demesne in a year or two!"


    "Unlikely," Lori said flatly. "It''s clear the summer heat is some kind of factor, so growth will be slowed over winter. And your estimate is assuming that I do nothing but expand the demesne. Did you forget I need to make a new steam jet driver today?"


    "Ah¡­ right¡­" Rian laughed, sounding embarrassed. "Sorry, I forgot."


    "This obsession of yours with numbers going up is very concerning, Rian."


    "I do not have an obsession! It''s not the numbers that matter, it''s what they represent!"


    "Rian, cease pouting, it makes you look like a child."


    As much as she thought Rian''s fixation on numbers was silly, she had to admit that his calculation helped put the expansion of her demesne into perspective. Still, the week she''d spent expanding her demesne was only possible because there was nothing she had to do personally. Even so, part of her mind had been waiting for the announcement from Shanalorre, informing Lori that a large number of people were entering the boundaries of River''s Fork Demesne¡­


    Rian shook his head. "Fine, fine¡­ so, about the steam jet driver. Are you going to¡­?" He hesitated, glancing sideways towards Shanalorre and¡­¡ªLori checked the rocks in her belt pouch¡ªTaeclas. "Actually, how secret is this? Besides, you know, all the smiths knowing about it."


    Lori also turned to look towards the two, considering. Shanalorre stared back impassively, while Taeclas seemed wary. She tried to consider the situation from their perspective. Technically, they already knew of the existence of the alloys¡ªshe and Rian had discussed it at the table¡ªbut there had been no mention as to what exactly those alloys were. All either knew would be that they had spent a day on experimental metallurgy.


    On the other hand, both already knew that she could produce bound tools in some way¡­


    "Binder Shanalorre," Lori said, "Wizard Taeclas. You are both aware of the fact that I have been producing bound tools."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Good morning, Binder Lori! Yes, and I''ve been wanting to talk to you about those¡­ but I''ll ask later."


    Lori nodded curtly. "The fact that I am producing bound tools is a secret that is to be kept to my demesnes. Under no circumstances are you to reveal it to anyone else without my explicit order to do so. Is that clear?"


    "Yes, Great Binder," Shanalorre said promptly, and Lori nodded in satisfaction.


    "¡­ why are you keeping the fact that you can make bound tools a secret?" Taeclas asked.


    Lori stared at her. "Does that really have to be explained?"


    "Uh, yes? I mean, you can make wispbeads and bound tools. You''re already selling wispbeads to Covehold. If they find out you have bound tools too, people would be screaming at you to take their beads or whatever else you wanted as payment."


    "Because having the ability to make my own bound tools is an advantage I have over all other demesnes on this continent," Lori said. "While Covehold Demesne, and possibly some of the others as well, have bound tools, they cannot make more, save for if they have the necessary components or finished tools brought over from the old continent. If people from outside of my demesne realized I had the capability, every Dungeon Binder and wizard who can make a demesne will want to know how I do so to have that advantage themselves. This will no doubt result in them coming after my demesne to try and find out the secrets of doing so. Other demesnes would attack us to try and force me to. I would need to worry about spies breaking into my room looking for hypothetical notes as to how it is done¡ªas if I would simply write it down¡ªor women coming to seduce me to somehow convince me to reveal my methodology."


    "¡­why women?" Rian asked.


    "It''s always women in plays and novels for some reason."


    "Ah, of course, of course. Silly of me for asking."


    "¡­I¡­ don''t think anyone would do that? They''d probably just try to buy bound tools from you," Taeclas said hesitantly.


    "It''s what I would do in their place," Lori said.


    "Ah, I see," Shanalorre said, nodding.


    As Taeclas stared at her, Lori met her gaze. "So. You will not reveal the fact that I am capable of making bound tools to anyone, unless I have explicitly given you permission to. Is that clear?"


    The Deadspeaker hesitated, glancing at Rian.


    Rian shrugged. "Think about it this way. Who can you tell? Why would you tell them?"


    Taeclas blinked and titled her head thoughtfully. Then she nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. I promise I won''t tell anyone."


    Lori nodded, satisfied.


    "And goes for all of you listening in too!" Rian suddenly cried, raising his voice to be heard. "Understood?"


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    Various staggered and renditions of, "Yes, Lord Rian!" sounded out from the tables around them, including high-pitched ones from behind Lori.


    "Don''t promise to me, promise her Bindership. She''s the one who''s going to be annoyed at you and make your lives terrible over this, after all."


    Another staggered chorus followed, this time a rendition of, "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded again. "Very well. Now, with that out of the way, what were you saying, Rian?"


    "Are you planning to add a prototype dial or slider to the new bound tool?"


    "Eventually. At the moment, we need to design a physical mechanism for it."


    "And by ''we'', you mean the smiths and carpenters."


    Lori shrugged. "I leave such matters to those with the expertise."


    "Should I get them after breakfast, then?"


    Lori considered it. "Yes, but we should begin testing its efficacy with something besides a driver bound tool. A wisplight will do. Once the prototype has proven effective, then it would be a simple matter to integrate it into a driver."


    Rian nodded. "What sort of mechanism do you have in mind, then? A dial, a slider or a lever?"


    "Whichever is easy to build, and least likely to break."


    "So¡­ no specific preference between the three, then?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "No, so you can put whatever idea you no doubt have into action."


    "Well, if you give permission like that¡­"


    "Just get me a usable mechanism that I can test on a wisplight. You may satisfy all your concerns about people accidentally bumping into the mechanism or whatever else as long as you bring me that."


    "I''ll get the smiths and carpenters and Taeclas on it after breakfast, your Bindership."


    "Wait, I will?"


    Rian looked towards the Deadspeaker. "Well, your part can wait until after lunch, we''ll probably need some wood fused together."


    "Oh, I can do that! Though, you know, what you just talked about doesn''t seem worth swearing me to secrecy and being worried about women coming to seduce her Bindership."


    "Her Bindership has her reasons, I''m sure."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    It took two days of work, but eventually the redsmiths and carpenters and Rian were able to put together a mechanism utilizing the darkwisp-anchored white Iridescence alloy.


    Lori spent the mornings during that time testing the alloy to better familiarize herself with how its magic-impeding properties worked. The smiths had drawn a portion of the samples out into wires to test their ductility¡ªwhere it was revealed that the airwisp and waterwisp alloys could be drawn into wires more easily than the other samples, with the airwisps able to be drawn much finer than the waterwisps¡ªso she had a length of darkwisp alloy wire to experiment with, even after she gave a ten yustri length of it to Rian for the mechanism being made.


    She had begun by testing how much wire was needed for the resistance in the wire to lower to a level where enough magic could pass through and imbue the binding such that the alloy was usable for the purpose it was intended for. In this case, she''d taken one of the wisplights she had made and tied the darkwisp alloy wires she was testing around the bead receptacle. She then touched the alloy wire with a bead, moving it back and forth and using the wisplight''s brightness to assess how much of the imbuement from the bead was reaching the binding of lightwisps anchored to the bound tool''s core.


    It took several tests and cutting wires of different lengths before she was forced to reach a conclusion: it didn''t matter how long the wire was. Touching the bead to the middle of the alloy wire¡ªwith the bead not connected to another wire to make the contact point more precise¡ªcaused the wisplight to glow at the same intensity whether the alloy wire was five yustri or ten yustri long.


    Which made no sense! Surely there was more darkwisps alloyed to the longer length than the shorter one? And yet, no matter how she tried to change the results, it remained consistent.


    On the one hand, this was convenient, as it meant that any length of allowed wire would do, although longer lengths of course would allow for more fine control. On the other hand¡­ it made no sense! The longer wire should offer more resistance because there was more alloyed copper for the magic to pass through! But that wasn''t what happened!


    ¡­


    She wondered if it was results like this that had led to the empiricists wiping out the thought experimentists. This was surely a test that needed empirical results, as a thought experiment would have been incorrect unless one already knew the results, in which case one has already done empirical testing.


    In the afternoon, she worked on expanding the demesne, writing down the results of her morning''s experimentation onto a bone tablet for Rian to transcribe into his notebook later as she imbued the shells of bindings. She wasn''t able to expand as many times as in a usual day, but that was to be expected.


    At the end of those two days, Rian presented the finished mechanism to her at dinner. It was a wooden tube that appeared to be four yustri thick, just the right size to be gripped comfortably. From one end, a pair of copper wires stuck out, while on the other end was a rounded knob. On opposite sides of the tube were long, groove-like holes that showed that the tube had been hollowed out and had another tube inside it. A peg that passed through the inner tube helped it slide back and forth along the groove while keeping it from slipping out or rotating.


    "How does it work?" she asked, turning the mechanism over in her hands.


    "It''s basically a sliding switch," Rian said. "There are two wires in there running in parallel, and a piece of springy alloy to provide tension. As you pull out the knob¡ª" Lori gripped the knob and did so, and it slid out with some resistance, "¡ªthe pure copper contact slides along the dark alloy wire, until it reaches the pure copper wire welded to the end of it. When fully pushed in, the wires are not in contact. Pulling it out a little puts the copper in contact with the alloy, and pulling it out fully the contacts are copper to pure unalloyed copper. The wood is there as a hard casing so it can be used in day to day work on a boat."


    Lori considered that exposition, pulling the knob in and out of the tube. "And if someone accidentally struck the slider, pushing it in deactivates the bound tool," she surmised.


    "Yup," he chirped. "I''ll admit, this was designed with a boat driver in mind, but it should be usable for wisplights and¡­ well, whatever else it could be used for. Unfortunately, at the moment we couldn''t give that slider a way to activate a second bound tool so the driver can go in reverse, so if you''re going to put a reverse setting on this one, it will need a second switch."


    Lori frowned, but she supposed that was to be expected. "Something to consider. At worst, Lori''s Boat Three simply won''t have the capability for the driver to go in reverse. I''ll test this mechanism tonight and inform you if it can be used for a driver bound tool tomorrow."


    Rian twitched for some reason. "I''ll have the carpenters make some oars for the boat to help it maneuver. I''ve also taken the liberty of having the carpenters put together the usual driver fittings, so when you''re ready, all you''ll need is a bone tube."


    Ah. Well, that was convenient. "Is there anything else?" Lori asked as she set the sliding switch mechanism to one side.


    "Well," Rian began as Deadspeaker whatshernane¡ªLori glanced at the headcloth she was wearing, which had ''Taeclas'' embroidered onto it¡ªand her wife sat down on the bench next to Umu, "they''ve started to get some good ore from the copper mine, and I''ve been having them start using the mine tailings to build up more farming terraces, or at least reinforce the ones already there¡­"

 403 - Prototype And Storage

    Lori stayed up a bit later that night than she usually did, testing the mechanism as she said she would. She connected the wire from the mechanism to the wisplight she''d used for the previous darkwisp alloy testing and wrapped another wire around the copper rod, the other end of which she held down onto one of the flattened copper samples to use as an impromptu bead receptacle.


    When she carefully touched the flattened copper sample¡ªfrom the stamped letter, it was the firewisp alloy¡ªshe wasn''t able to make contact with the binding of lightwisps anchored to the bound tool''s core until she pulled out the knob from the slider slightly so that the copper made contact with the darkwisp alloy. That confirmed she had an uninterrupted connection.


    Placing a bead on the improvised bead receptacle¡ªand testing the connection again is case she''d dislodged it¡ªshe carefully began to pull the knob to move the slider switch. As she drew out the knob, a glow began to radiate from the wisplight.


    She checked the sliding mechanism in various positions, such as at one quarter, half, and three-quarters draw, comparing the light coming from the wisplight with what she remembered from yesterday, when she tested the alloy wires at the same point. As far as she could recall¡ªand her recall was excellent on this point, as it wasn''t a name or a face¡ªthe intensity of the light was the same as with the alloy wires she had tested.


    Experimentally, she altered the binding of lightwisps, increasing the light''s brightness and by extension increasing the amount of imbuement the binding was consuming. Then she slowly began to push in the sliding switch, keeping an eye on the wisplight.


    Not directly, of course. The light was very bright.


    As the switch was pushed in, the light was visibly dimming. At the halfway point¡ªat least, Lori thought it was the halfway point¡ªthe light was almost the same intensity as it had original been.


    Which made no sense! That implied that the alloy was restricting a percentage of the imbuement¡ªand also implied that the binding was drawing the imbuement from the bead towards it, which was not something Lori had ever considered¡ªand given how that percentage seemed to be directly proportional to how much of the wire the imbuement had to pass through¡ªregardless of the length of the wire¡ªwhich meant¡­ which meant¡­


    ¡­


    No, no, Lori was in no mood to consider the implications of this, or try to decipher the principles involved beyond the ones she had already noted. She was just going to do what any scholar would and write it down to leave for someone else to study in the future. What mattered was the results were repeatable and consistent, and that meant she could use it in her bound tools.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, making a steam jet driver was relatively quick and straightforward, thanks to Rian already having the wooden fittings made. All she had to make was the bone tube, and only a single bound tool core needed to be embedded into it, which made the matter of wiring much simpler. She nearly made the mistake of forming the usual binding she used for her steam jet drivers before she remembered this was meant to be a prototype, and reformed the binding accordingly. Not one that provide three times the thrust, though that was certainly the goal. Merely twice would suffice in this instance. She could just alter it later, once they had tested the prototype.


    Once that was done, the bone tube was mounted onto the shaft that had been prepared, the wire from the bound tool core passing through a groove that Lori partly filled with softened stone before another piece of wood covered it. Once, that had been secured in place by wedges, but now Taeclas¡ªas was written on the headcloth she wore, and when had she started wearing that?¡ªwas here to use Deadspeaking to fuse the wood together. From that point, the carpenters and smiths could handle the matter of mounting the sliding switch and securing the wires and bead receptacle, as well as mounting the bound tool to the back of Lori''s Boat Three.


    Her part done, Lori had a very productive day expanding the demesne.


    The next day, she spent the morning testing Lori''s Boat Three. Well, Rian tested it, on the sound grounds that as part of those who designed the sliding switch mechanism he didn''t need to be taught how to use it, and that it wasn''t risking his life because he could swim, strange and unnatural as that was. Lori stood on the docks and took note of how the boat handled, her connection to her core allowing her to perceive how much imbuement was reaching the binding that propelled the boat. Nearby, some of the men who operated the Coldhold rode on Lori''s Boat and Lori''s Boat Two, ready to assist in case it was necessary, since they were among the few adults that Rian had managed to teach how to swim as  well.


    Much of the testing had the boat moving at speed, and Lori had to admit that it accelerated much more smoothly than the other two boats. That was no doubt a result of having more than simply three increments of speed to the boat''s steam jet driver. Lori was willing to admit that while the boats were comfortable enough to ride when they were moving steadily, changing speeds and especially accelerating was quite jarring and uncomfortable until the boat stabilized at its new speed.


    The difference wasn''t enough to make Lori want to shift the older boats over to the new switch mechanism. As Rian had pointed out, the switch currently couldn''t be used to also activate the binding that propelled the boat in reverse, something that was a necessity for maneuvering the larger boats such as Lori''s Ice Boat and the Coldhold. At the moment, the boats at their current configuration were still well suited for the demesne''s needs, and were heavily used because of it. However, once winter arrived and the boats could no longer be used, Lori could probably find the time for the disassembly and reconstruction needed to make them in line with the newest prototype.


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    The next day, the demesne had another harvest as both the crops growing in the dungeon farm and the next outer ring of the crops in the fields reached maturity. Lori wasn''t really needed for it, as they already had already established all the infrastructure needed for processing the vigas. So despite the excitement going on, she was already planning to spend another full day in her room expanding her demesne.


    "We don''t have enough space to store the vigas," Rian told her at breakfast.


    What? "What?"


    Rian actually looked embarrassed as he continued. "It''s¡­ well, this is my fault. I probably should have told you sooner. Look, you''ve probably noticed how our fields are bigger than they were last year, right? Um, did you notice? It''s a bit hard to tell with you sometimes."


    "Yes, Rian, I noticed. I assume this has something to do with how we don''t have enough storage space?"


    Rian nodded. "It''s like this. We had more than enough space to store last year''s harvest. However, the thing is that we also harvested a winter crop this spring, which not only refilled the stores we''d expended over the winter but gave us a surplus. One that we''ve been enjoying up to now, just to be clear, but the fact of the matter is that even with us having to send over supplies to River''s Fork, we haven''t had to worry about food much, since we had the tuber plots in the dungeon farm and all. And then Taeclas and Lidzuga joined us, and suddenly we''ve been growing our crops much faster. Storage space that had been used to store vigas is now full of tubers, other root vegetables, and some of the micans and golden buds since they last very well without really needing to be frozen, at least for a few weeks. And because imbuing meanings is easier in River''s Fork, they''ve actually been sending us grain now, although we''re still sending them meat and vegetables."


    "So¡­ we have too much food."


    "Only a crazy person will say that''s a problem. No, we don''t have enough food storage. Gunvi has been making as many pots as he and his apprentices can, and the carpenters have been making barrels, so we have plenty of storage vessels, but space¡­" he shrugged. "Well, theoretically we can store them in the side tunnels of the third level, but with the temperature and humidity there, that would make the food go bad quickly. And while there''s the alcoves in the second level¡ª"


    "I see," Lori said.


    Rian nodded. "I''m sorry for disturbing your day, but¡­ well, it''s my fault, I should have made you aware of the potential problem sooner."


    She sighed, but it was mostly for the fact that her plans for that day had to be discarded. "Next time, give be at least two days warning," she said sternly. "Well, there''s no helping it. I''ll excavate a new mass storage space for the grain and likely anything else that comes up in future. How many people are still living in the old shelter?" She vaguely recalled some people still living there¡­


    "Not as many as it used to be. About¡­ twenty people or so? It''s some of the the newlyweds and unmarried young men who chose to move out of their families'' homes to give their siblings room. They decided they liked living in the shelter for the moment and withdrew their petition requesting to live in the new row."


    Lori nodded. "Until I finished excavating the new grain store, we will be storing the grain in the old shelter. Have all the current residents move to the Um with everything they need for the next¡­" she paused thoughtfully for a moment, "two to three days. Until further notice, the Um will not be available for use."


    Next to Rian, Riz sighed in relief for some reason.


    "Ah¡­" Rian said slowly. "Well¡­ I suppose it IS an emergency¡­and it should only be until you excavate the necessary storage. And everyone will be busy and tired from the harvest, so it probably won''t be needed¡­ so why am I afraid people won''t see it that way¡­?"


    "I''ll also need people to keep the entrance of my dungeon clear," Lori said. "I''ll be moving large quantities of stone, so I can''t have people being in the way."


    "I can find someone to assist you to get people out of your way and keep the path clear? While I agree with you that moving stone and people is probably a dangerous combination, at the very least we''ll need people to be able to go in and out so that the kitchen volunteers can cook lunch and dinner for everyone."


    Lori frown, but eventually had to grunt in assent. A part of her wondered in she should make a second entrance to her dungeon, but there was really no need during normal, day-to-day business. Usually she didn''t have to worry about people getting in her way when she was moving excavated stone because she only moved relatively small amounts. However, since she now needed to excavate a large space for storage, and needed to do so quickly¡­


    A part of her wondered if maybe she should have had Rian recruit a Horotract while he was in Covehold Demesne. That part was set upon by the rest of her, tried for high treason, pronounced guilty, and sentenced to death by immolation, where its screams for mercy were ignored as all other parts of Lori watched, smiling in grim satisfaction. "Fine. Have everyone focus on harvesting the fields outside, to minimize the number of people who need to go in and out of the dungeon."


    Rian nodded, then sighed. "I don''t suppose you can put some kind of shade or something over the fields?" he said hopefully.


    "There''s nothing to anchor darkwisps to," Lori said dismissively.


    Her lord tilted his head. "Don''t you have a binding to keep bugs away from the crops? Doesn''t that go around and over the fields?"


    Yes? "Yes?" She didn''t see what he was getting at. "I don''t see what you''re getting at."


    "Can''t you anchor the darkwisps to that?" he said, holding one hand palm-down over his plate, and laying his other hand atop it in an attempt at an illustrative demonstration. "And if that''s too low, maybe pad it out with airwisps to maybe make a breeze around the crops before you put the darkwisps on top of it?" He removed the hand underneath and laid it atop the other hand. Across from her, Taeclas¡ªwhy was she wearing that headcloth so early? She hadn''t needed to keep her hair out of her face before¡­¡ªlooked sideways at Rian, a thankful look on her face.


    Lori opened her mouth to reply, then paused, tilting her head contemplatively. That¡­ might actually work. The binding of darkwisps that she''d placed over the sawmill¡ªwhose roof was halfway done and the gristmill and drop hammer should be in the midst of being installed¡ªwas something she''d actively maintained when she''d worked there as there was no place she could anchor the binding. However, the binding that kept bugs away from the crops was anchored to the ground, and since the binding was made from lightningwisps, it wasn''t affected by the wind <del>as</del> airwisps would be. Well, not with the way the binding was formed, anyway.


    "That would actually be viable," Lori admitted reluctantly. "Yes, I believe I''ll form that after breakfast. And after the harvest, it will allow Taeclas and Shanalorre to imbue the fields all day because heat won''t be a problem anymore." She nodded in satisfaction.


    Why was Taeclas looking at Rian like that?

 404 - Resuming Excavation

    As much as Lori wanted to only excavate for half the day and spend the rest of the day continuing to expand her demesne, since the harvest was occurring now and they needed the space to store their grains, she didn''t have the option of doing that. She would need to excavate as quickly as possible, and without any horotracting, all of the stone for the room would have to be physically removed.


    Technically, they didn''t need much storage space to store the harvest, but they''d have another harvest in a couple more weeks, and again in a few weeks after that. At least, that was the hope. So she needed to make storage space not just for this harvest, but for subsequent harvests and any other food harvested from the dungeon farm and what little more they had above ground.


    However, she had to do something first.


    After breakfast, she hurried outside, claiming and binding the airwisps around their fields. She had already deactivated the binding that caused wind to blow over the village outside her dungeon¡ªit would be a hindrance in the harvest, and could potentially scatter the grain they were trying to gather¡ªafter she had spoken to Rian, so by the time she actually went out, along with the first of those going out to the fields, it was quite hot.


    Quickly, she added the airwisps to the binding of lightningwisps around the fields as Rian had suggested, forming them to so that they created a thick layer atop the original binding. Lori imbued the original binding as she did so, because it never hurt to keep the bindings imbued. As she had deactivated the binding that blew wind across the village outside of her Dungeon, the airwisps that she included into the binding of lightningswisps couldn''t really be used to generate a strong wind either, else it would cause the same problem she was avoiding.


    She formed the airwisps to gently draw air upwards through their binding. It was necessary, as she couldn''t just attach wisps that did nothing or were deactivated to a binding. It was why the wisplights she had made that also moved air had both bindings anchored to the core but were technically separate bindings so she could deactivate one or the other. A binding with wisps that weren''t doing anything in the binding couldn''t be activated. As long as she kept the intensity low, the imbuement consumption should be reasonably light, and the resulting air movement wouldn''t affect the crops they were harvesting.


    The added airwisps raised the upper boundary of the binding, and so Lori went to get some darkwisps to add to it. The nearest convenient source was the old mushroom farm cave, since the inside of her mouth and under her clothes wouldn''t have enough darkwisps. The door into the mushroom farm was closed, and there was no latch since it was possible someone might become trapped inside if there was. Instead, a foot-sized rock¡ªwhich was tied to the door with a crude ropeweed cord, no doubt to keep it from getting lost¡ªwas holding the door shut, easy enough for anyone¡ªperhaps a child¡ªto push open if they happened to be trapped inside, but just enough to keep out small beasts.


    There were gaps between the planks of the door, the openings too narrow for most bugs to fit through, and letting Lori see a narrow line of the darkness inside the cave. Claiming and binding the darkwisps in the cave, she imbued binding as she made the darkwisps flow out through the slits in the door. The darkwisps came out, looking like a mist that reflected no light, darker than the blackness behind her eyelids. Anchoring the biding to her fingernails for convenience, she turned and started walking back to the fields.


    Ignoring all the people looking behind her, Lori added the binding of darkwisps to the already established binding around the field and slowly began to spread the darkwisps over the layer of airwisps. She was a quarter of the way to finishing spreading the darkwisps when Lori recalled that they would only be harvesting the crops at the edges of the fields, and so she didn''t really have to spread the darkwisps over the entire field.


    ¡­


    Thankfully it didn''t take her until mid-morning to finish putting the darkwisps in place, although she did have to walk around the perimeter of the fields, which was uncomfortably bumpy through the tsinelas she was wearing instead of her boots. Once she''d finished arranging the darkwisps in a wide border around the edges of the field and assessed that she didn''t need to add any lightwisps to let people see while they worked, she headed back towards her dungeon to start excavating.


    The second level of her dungeon was a tall, spacious chamber¡ªif one didn''t count the regularly spaced stone pillars with supporting arches to keep the ceiling from collapsing¡ªwith all the walls lined with alcoves where families could stay when a dragon passed, except for where there were stairs leading up to the first level and down to the dungeon farm. Some of them were constantly occupied¡ªthe three alcoves the weavers kept their looms and spinning wheels and other equipment Lori wasn''t familiar with, the alcove occupied by the ropers, the two alcoves the carpenters had kept their tools, her own alcove for research on white Iridescence that didn''t involve metallurgy, the alcove where the flour was milled¡ªbut there were still many, many alcoves, far more than there were families in her demesne.


    Her new grain storage chamber would by necessity need to be adjacent to the second level, as the conditions there were cooler, less humid and less it was likely for water to spill on the floor compared to the third level. The second level was also a good compromise, as the grain coming from the fields outside and the dungeon farm would need to be carried there, making either trip equally miserable. A compromise needed to be unpleasant for everyone, after all.


    Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    The second level had two stairs leading down to it from the dining hall, and Lori wanted to start excavating her new storage through the alcove nearest to the near stairs, since those were the ones nearest the entrance of her dungeon. Unfortunately, the first alcove on the wall opposite the stairs down to the third level¡ªthe near wall would have led to excavating under the dining hall, which Lori didn''t even consider because she did not want to have to deal with those structural considerations¡ªalready contained the gristmill. While the mill powered by the water wheel was already in place and ready, until the sawmill was a little bit more complete it was best not to use it.


    The next two immediate alcoves contained¡­ well, some grain storage. It wasn''t all their grain, but rather an emergency supply for when the people of the demesne had to take shelter from dragons, and thus was kept as full to capacity as possible, the grain being rotated according to¡­ well, whatever schedule Rian and the people he''d set to the matter had devised. As it wasn''t something she could move herself¡­


    Lori had to settle for excavating the fourth alcove down from the stairs leading up to the dining hall, removing the planks that served as both benches and crude bunks, lifting them up herself and getting them out of her way since there wasn''t anyone but children and some of the women who''d recently given birth at the second level. She could tell because they had infants with them that they were feeding, which she wasn''t about to interfere with.


    That done, Lori claimed and bound the earthwisps comprising the stone niches on all three walls of the alcove, softening the stone carefully before pushing the stone to the sides of the alcove to thicken the wall. It probably wasn''t necessary, but the entrance into the new storage space didn''t need to be that wide. The niches on the back were collapsed as she began excavating through them. She''d smooth it out later. The second level was several paces underground beneath, among other things, Rian''s house and their fields of outside crops. It had been the only option, and she hadn''t wanted to excavate closer to the river, and building the second level under the river¡­ no. Extending the second level in this direction would present no issue.


    The spot for the entrance to the second level''s extension and storage space chosen, Lori began excavating.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time lunch was usually served¡ªor at least, what would normally have been lunch¡ªarrived, Lori had managed to excavate a decently long tunnel from the original alcove. Actually removing the stone from the tunnel was the easy part, as it was more difficult to move the softened stone up the stairs to the level of the dining hall so she could get it outside the dungeon and add the stone to the stockpile. The more stone she excavated, the more difficult moving the stone was, as she had to worry about how its weight was distributed while she moved it up the stairs, across the admittedly short length of the dining hall she had to drag the stone through, out the front door and entryway until she could finally leave the stone at the stockpile.


    The stone walls that she left behind, she made sure to seal shut so there were no fissures or breaks, lest the ground water enter the storage room and start flooding her dungeon. She had not yet had to worry about that despite all the excavating she''d been doing, and she wasn''t going to let it start now! As she excavated, she anchored a line of lightwisps to the ceiling, connecting it to the lightwisps she already had in place on the second level. As the lightwisps were connected by wire to her core she didn''t have to worry about maintaining them, so she could just focus on excavating.


    By the end of the day, the tunnel she''d excavated was three paces wide and eight paces deep. While a respectable space, the arching nature of the tunnel meant they wouldn''t be able to fill the whole space with jars and barrels, at least until she''d shaved more stone off the walls so that the arch that supported the ceiling was a bit higher. It had been a lot of stone, restoring her stockpile after it had been depleted by building the foundation and river-side walls of the sawmill.


    A part of her was annoyed that Rian had told her about the need for storage now, rather than, say, around the time she was building the sawmill''s foundation. She''d had to excavate the third level to get the stone for the sawmill, and it had been hard to get the stone up two flights of stairs!


    The next day, the work continued. She began excavating tunnels at a right angle to her first tunnel, excavating in the direction away from the dining hall. Lori started by excavating just behind the remaining alcoves, and being careful to keep from getting too close and compromising the alcove''s walls. Excavated for three or four paces, she then began to excavate another right-angled tunnel that ran parallel to the first. Once the second tunnel was also excavated to three or four paces deep, Lori then carefully removed stone from the wall separating the two tunnels, digging through like she was making another tunnel. The resulting opening resulted in the three tunnels combining to become a large room with a stone support pillar in the middle of it, the curving tunnel ceiling becoming supporting arches.


    With a reasonably large room in place, Lori took the time to even out the floor. It was of course for a perfectly practical reason! If the floor was too uneven, their jars and barrels wouldn''t be able to stand properly, making them susceptible to tipping over, which would be a hazard!


    Using her stone shaping tool¡ªwhich she noticed was coming a little loose, the plank wobbling slightly on the stave¡ªshe softened the stone floor and leveled it by the simple expedient of dragging the edge of the plank across the softened stone of the floor. The result was¡­ tolerable. It was far better than how uneven it had been from her excavating¡ªtry as she might, she could not claim in a flat plane, and could barely do a straight line¡ªbut not perfectly flat. Well, the floor was flat enough now, so she''d leave it at that. The last thing she did was extend the line of lightwisps so that it went around the room, ensuring there were no dark spots.


    The rest of the first tunnel remained, a two-pace-deep alcove that she could continue excavating if she needed to expand the storage room or needed more raw material. Both were likely, and soon.


    Satisfied with a job well done, Lori let out a sigh of relief, and turned to go to the carpenters to see if she could have her stone-shaping tool fixed.


    ¡­


    After finding the carpenters'' alcoves empty, no doubt because they were assisting in the harvest, Lori decided to just head to her room to rest.

 405 - Building Another Wood Shed

    "You can start moving grain into the new storage room," Lori told Rian at dinner, which was admittedly later than usual. As with the previous harvest, people had worked for as long as there was sun in the sky to work by.


    "Just me? Did I do something to annoy you to have to do all that heavy lifting by myself? More so than usual, I mean?" Rian said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "If you don''t think you can do it all by yourself, you can ask people for help. I''m sure Umu would be more than willing to volunteer."


    "Don''t pressure Umu to carry heavy things," Rian said as Umu looked up in panic. "If you''re finished, I suppose we can get to work on harvesting the crops in the dungeon farm."


    "Don''t fill up the area between the entrance to the new storage room and the little alcove opposite the entrance. I need a path free to continue excavating the storage room if it needs to be expanded further or if I need more raw material."


    "You''re planning to expand it further?" Rian said, surprised.


    "Of course. Once we organize the crops to be easier for Shanalorre and¡ª" Lori turned to glance at the forehead of whatshername, but there was no helpful headcloth there. Sighing, she reached into her pouch and felt around to check the rocks there. "¡ªTaeclas to Deadspeak and accelerate the growth of, we will require far more space to fit all the crops at the same time. Hopefully we will be able to manage more harvests before summer is over."


    "Um¡­" Taeclas said, looking between Rian and Lori.


    "What is it, Tae?" Rian asked.


    "Um, I think I''ve thought of a way that we could harvest faster," Taeclas said, and Lori immediately focused on her.


    "How?" Lori asked.


    "Good morning, your Bindership!"


    "¡­" Lori ''¡­''-ed. "It''s evening."


    "Ah, sorry, force of habit. Good evening, your Bindership!"


    Lori reminded herself the woman was slightly insane and named plants as if they were children. "The harvest?"


    "Ah, right. So, I''ve been studying our crops and experimenting on a few stalks that I''ve been growing separately, trying to figure out a way to integrate the meaning we''re using on the fruit trees onto the crops. Some parts don''t really work, and a few things I had to simplify, but I think I''ve finally managed to adapt the meaning! Given how old the crops are now, I think if I tame the new meaning onto the crops, it will only take them three days to mature enough to be harvested."


    Lori blinked. "Three days?" she demanded, and realized she''d said that at the same time as Rian.


    Taeclas nodded excitedly. "Yes, but that''s only because the crops are already very matured, and it''s not accounting for the time it will take me and Shana¡­lorre to tame, imbue and activate everything. And if we''re growing fresh crops, like the ones we''re growing in the dungeon farm, I''ll be able to remove a few days off the growing time. However, it will take assistance from her Bindership."


    "How so?" Rian asked.


    "Well, it''s a meaning derived from studying the trees in River''s Fork and those notes, so they''ll cause the plants to run a little hot."


    Ah. "Ah. And they''ll need to be cooled down, I suppose."


    Taeclas nodded. "Probably not the ones in the dungeon farm, but any crops in the fields outside will need the additional cooling."


    Lori nodded slowly. "When can you begin implementing these meanings?"


    At this, Taeclas looked thoughtful. "Um, it might be a while. I want Lidz to peer-review it in case there''s anything I missed before I put it into place on something other than the test stalks I''ve been keeping."


    Lori nodded. "That''s probably wise. Rian can give you some paper to put the notes down and perhaps the tentative flow diagram as well so you can relay the information more concisely."


    "Uh, out of curiosity, how does this new meaning compare to the meaning you''ve been using on the crops before?" Rian asked.


    Taeclas opened her mouth, then paused, looking thoughtful. Her wife reached over and pushed her jaw closed, her teeth clicking as they came together. "Ah. Thank you, moonlight. Well, the meanings I''ve been using so far are the basic meanings I was taught in school, the one everyone uses in city farms. I''ve been using it because it''s the simplest and quickest to apply, but with this new meaning¡­"


    "Ah." Rian nodded. "Not that I''m doubting the effectiveness of your meaning once you''ve had Lidz review it, but perhaps you need to practice applying¡ª"


    "Taming," Lori corrected.


    Rian stopped speaking, turning to stare at her for some reason as Taeclas started giggling. Lori met his gaze impassively.


    "Perhaps you need to practice taming," he eventually said, "your new meaning onto the crops first. While I don''t doubt the meaning itself will make the crops grow faster, you might also lose that time actually applying the meaning."


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    "That''s¡­ uh, probably a good idea," Taeclas admitted, stifling her laughter. "You''re right, getting used to taming with the new meaning is probably going to slow things down until I''m more experienced with it."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll ask Clowee to take you to River''s Fork on one of the boats tomorrow so you can exchange notes with Lidz. Will you need to stay overnight?"


    "No!" Taeclas exclaimed, then looked embarrassed. "Ah, sorry. No, I won''t need to stay. It shouldn''t take long for me to show him the meaning and exchange notes, although he might need to sleep on it. So¡­ tomorrow and the day after?"


    Rian nodded solemnly. "All right, that makes sense."


    "When the dungeon farm has been harvested, set aside one plot for crops that you''re testing your new meaning on," Lori said. "Rian, give Taeclas more paper. She''ll probably want to keep notes about the growth rates and other details."


    "Oh, yes! I should probably do that¡­" Taeclas said thoughtfully.


    Lori twitched.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, Lori had to go out and work. As much as she wanted to go back to her room and return to expanding her demesne, the harvest was an opportunity. A new wood curing and storage shed for the products of the sawmill had been part of the things she''d needed to build, and now was the best time to do it. She had plenty of stone from the recent excavation, and with nearly everyone working on the harvest¡ªa few were still working in the fields, but most were inside the dungeon, working on harvesting the dungeon farm¡ªthere were no idiots around to put themselves in danger when she moved stone from her stockpile to the sawmill.


    True, she had yet to have any accidents, but that was because she was careful!


    As she was working outside, Lori put on her hat and rain coat. While she didn''t have to worry about feeling too hot, her skin starting to peel from the exposure to the sunlight was another a matter, and that same sunlight shining on her eyes made it hard to see sometimes. Hence the coat and hat, a necessity for her when she was working outside. They were torturously uncomfortable to wear outside of her demesne, but without them it would be much worse.


    With her stone-shaping tool in hand¡ªTaeclas had been able to fuse the wood together, and Rian had pulled the cord that had been keeping the stave and plank together taut¡ªa cord with a knot at every pace in her pocket, and a large mass of stone she had to carefully roll towards the sawmill, Lori began building the two sheds.


    Most of the sawmill had been covered, with the thinly-cut planks covering two-thirds of the building''s sloping roof. There was a small pile of sawdust just inside the sawmill''s walls¡ªwell, the frames of the walls, which was mostly there to hold the roof up at the moment¡ªwaiting to be added to the latrines to blot and soak up anything that needed soaking, a byproduct of all the sawing being done for the roof.


    The location of the new shed had been planned beforehand, and was on the downriver side of the sawmill-in-progress, further from the river so that it wasn''t at risk of eventually having the ground under it eroded, and at a slight angle to the sawmill door that faced in that direction. The intention was that the shed would be positioned such that it was easy to carry wood to it from the sawmill, as well as carry wood out.


    The site itself was marked with lines of stones and stray branches on the ground, with relatively straight branches thrust into the soil to mark the corners. The marks were fresh, put in place that morning by¡­ actually, Lori had no idea who Rian had told to do this. For all she knew, he might have done it himself. She really wouldn''t have been surprised if that was the case. Still, the lines were straight and the angles right, and that was all she needed. The dimensions were bigger than the sheds near the sawpits at four paces wide and eight deep.


    Lori carefully claimed and compacted the dirt within the boundaries of the lines¡ªand only that¡ªto a depth of one pace, and watched as the ground sank slightly as a result, the little voids caused by the dirt being separate particles instead of one contiguous substance filling in as she fused the dirt to the bedrock below. She then traced the remaining outline with a binding of earthwisps, deactivating the binding since she didn''t really need it to do anything but be a marker as she rolled the softened stone into the depression and poured in the foundation. The stone fused to the packed dirt, anchoring it to the bedrock by proxy. It wasn''t perfect¡ªshe''d have preferred the soil be dug up so that it could be used in the dungeon farm¡ªbut it was a solid enough foundation.


    That done, she began to raise the wall of the shed, moving the softened stone along one of the long sides of the foundation. Fusing the stone and foundation together, she began shaping a pace-high wall atop one of the long sides of the rectangle, making it ten yustri thick.


    She was not calling it one stri. No one except Rian used stri to measure anything, but fortunately she''d managed to correct him in time before it became a habit.


    Lori managed to repress her natural inclination to make the wall as plumb as possible. It was an external load-bearing wall, she didn''t need the wall to be properly vertical. Lori kept telling herself that, and while she never started believing it, the reminders were enough to keep her from pausing in her work to try and plumb the wall when she noticed it was wider at the bottom than at the top. As long as the top was one st¡ªten yustri thick, it was fine. It didn''t bother her, it didn''t grate at her soul¡ª


    ¡­


    At great personal expense and agony, Lori finished the low walls of the shed by late morning, though she''d had to get two more batches of stone from the stockpile. Both were relatively straight and a pace high, just about level with her waist. With those in place, she could start building the ceiling.


    She claimed and bound the earthwisps of the foundation and the walls she had made, forming them into a binding that reinforced the stone in case she needed it, then deactivated the binding. It allowed her to distinguish between the stone she was using as building material and the stone she shouldn''t alter.


    Lori then took the stone she had left from the third batch and piled it up at the far end of the shed-to-be, away from the sawmill. It wasn''t enough for what she was planning to do, so she went back to the stockpile¡ªnow only slightly smaller from all the stone she''d being using¡ªand got another batch of stone, glancing towards the fields as she did so. The work there seemed done, and there seemed to be few people there, probably to keep chokers and other small beasts away from the crops that had been harvested and set to finish drying under the sun. The binding she''d placed to keep out bugs didn''t work on beasts.


    Rolling the large mass across the ground and back to the new shed in progress, Lori added the stone to the pile already there, making a stone mass that extended from wall to wall and rose up more than three paces and was far thicker.


    Nodding to herself, Lori carefully softened the stone and started excavating it like she was digging through the stone of her dungeon, pulling out stone and leaving behind a high, arching ceiling. The stone that she removed, she drew out to extend the shape of the pseudo-tunnel that was forming the roof of the shed.


    Slowly, the shed progressed¡ª


    "Lori, lunch time!"


    ¡ªwould progress after lunch.

 406 - Post-Shed And Harvest Exhaustion

    Building the new wood storage shed took two days, coinciding with the end of most of the work on the harvest. It was so hot that the sheaves of grain left out in the sun dried in a day, ready to be winnowed. The carpenters had made some kind of strange¡­ big comb¡­thing¡­ to make the winnowing easier, consisting of a wooden beam with teeth-like wooden spikes. The crops were¡­ well, ''combed'' through the teeth, and the vigas would be stripped off the sheaves by the motion, where it would fall into a hopper. The threshing comb was long enough that three or four people could use it as the same time to thresh the grain.


    At the end of those two days, the dining hall was unusually quiet, the air filled with the exhaustion of a demesne, and also the smell of their collective sweat. Even the children seemed fatigued as they spoke quietly and, in the case of Shanalorre''s cousin, just napped.


    Actually, Lori couldn''t be sure if Shanalorre''s cousin was a part of the exhaustion, she tended to nap a lot.


    In many of the other tables, there were people sitting backwards on the benches, using the edges of the tables as improvised backrests, or straddling the bench and leaning on each other back to back. The only reason Lori herself wasn''t sitting that way was because she had her chair, which she leaned into happily.


    As a result, the predictable was occurring in front of Lori. Umu and Riz were leaning against Rian, though not in the usual way. They were both turned to the side, their backs pressing against his shoulders. Mikon for her part was leaning back against Riz''s chest, who didn''t seem to mind. All three women were sitting with their eyes half-lidded, else Lori would have thought they were asleep.


    In contrast to everyone else on that side of the table, Taeclas¡ªwho was helpfully wearing her headcloth, though it was soaked with sweat¡ªwas sitting comfortably and facing Lori, having no doubt rid herself of her pains with Deadspeaking, and seemed to be the most energetic person at the table. That said, the Deadspeaker still looked tired, her shoulder slumped slightly as her wife used her as a backrest. The only one sitting as she usually did was Shanalorre, and even she was sitting with her eyes closed, as if it was too tiring to see anything.


    "Harvest?" Lori asked, too tired to actually meet Rian''s gaze. That was fine, as his gaze was focused down on the table, his elbows resting on it as his hand supported his forehead.


    "Done," he more sighed than said.


    "Stored?"


    "Yup"


    "Injuries?"


    "Healed"


    "Yield?"


    "¡­ lots."


    Lori nodded, or at least dipped her chin down and up a little. Should she be concerned that Rian hadn''t managed to remember one of his numbers? "Good. Anything else?"


    "¡­ can''t remember. Too tired."


    Lori nodded in understanding. While her tsinelas were comfortable enough, she''d been walking back and forth in them for the past few days between getting stone from the stockpile¡ªwhich had resulted in her becoming irrationally fearful of accidentally running the stone over her toes at some point¡ªso her feet ached. And while she hadn''t actually physically carried anything, continually directing all those earthwisps, with only brief respites when she had to walk to the stone stockpile for more raw material¡­


    Well, her brain probably didn''t actually ache¡ªshe remembered reading somewhere that the organ was physically incapable of feeling pain¡ªbut the contents of her head felt like she''d been studying constantly with no reading breaks, naps or snacks.


    Why was she this tired? She''d worked on construction projects for far longer the year before, and she hadn''t been this tired¡­ had she? She knew that she''d certainly spent more time on the row of houses when the people from River''s Fork had arrived, and she couldn''t remember feeling like this after only two days of work. Four if she counted excavating the grain storage space on the second level. Was she¡­ was she¡­


    Was she getting old? Was this what the infirmities old age felt like? She couldn''t be getting old, she was only twenty-four!


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    No, wait, it had been a year¡­


    She was only twenty-five! She can''t be feeling this terrible yet! Also, she was a Dungeon Binder! She was supposed to have Deadspeaking to alleviate things like this!


    ¡­


    Lori let out a sigh, letting the rant slip away. To be more serious though, why was she so tired? The four days of work utilizing Whispering she had done, while strenuous, should not have taken such a toll on her. To hurt this much, she would need to have done constant Whispering for far longer, which she hadn''t. Quite the opposite, in fact. She''d stayed in her room and not worked. Lori hadn''t done anything except sit around in her room and¡­ expand her demesne¡­


    ¡­


    Ah, that''s why her head ached. She''d been Whispering practically all day for a week and a half. Yes, that would do it.


    She knew she wasn''t getting old! Twenty-five was still young! Plenty of time for her to learn Deadpseaking so she''d live forever, unlike all those other Dungeon Binders who let themselves go and die after only a hundred years!


    ¡­


    "Tell everyone to rest tomorrow," Lori said. "No working. Stay in the dungeon or bath. Sleep as late as they want."


    "¡­ sorry, what? I think I might have hallucinated from exhaustion, it almost seemed like you said¡ª"


    "Tell everyone to rest tomorrow. No working. Stay in the dungeon or bath. Sleep as late as they want," she repeated.


    "¡­yes, that''s what I thought you said. Now, it''s not like I wouldn''t be really happy about it, but did you remember to drink water while you were working? You''re not dehydrated and hallucinating, are you?"


    Lori would have kicked him, except she was comfortable at the moment and her feet hurt already. "I am not dehydrated."


    "Everyone is always dehydrated," Taeclas said.


    Shanalorre rose smoothly to her feet. "I shall go fetch water."


    Rian frowned. "Actually¡­ did anyone remember to fill the water jars after breakfast? I think everyone was too busy with the harvest to remember."


    "Karina and I did," Shanalorre said. "As to dinner, I believe everyone will need to have fruit, which Karina and I also took the liberty of putting out to warm. I will see if they are ready to be eaten."


    Lori paused, then took a deep breath. Ah. That hadn''t been exhaustion in the air, merely the lack of smells of anything cooking. That, more than anything, emphasized just how tired everyone was, herself included. Her stomach was telling her it was hungry, but the rest of her¡­ well, she almost felt too tired to eat.


    Almost.


    Lori shook her head, and noted there was no worsening of how she felt. "Don''t change the subject, and don''t make me repeat myself so many times again. Tell everyone to rest tomorrow. No working. Stay in the dungeon or bath. Sleep as late as they want."


    "First, let me take a moment to admire the fact you repeated yourself word for word instead of paraphrasing. Most people would rephrase to try to convey the message."


    "Most people are idiots," she pointed out. "I said everything I needed to say the first time. Why change it?"


    Rian nodded, careful to stay in place so as not to jostle Umu and Riz. "Why, indeed." He raised his voice slightly. "You hear that, everyone? No working tomorrow, you can just stay in bed and sleep as much as you want! Binder''s orders!"


    A tired cheer that seemed to end in relieved sighs rose in the dining hall, though it wasn''t very loud.


    "We''ll have a holinight like the last one the day after, and then it''s back to work after that," Lori said.


    "Holinight?"


    "Of course. It''s not happening during the day, after all. Really Rian, that should be obvious."


    "Right, right, of course," he said, gracefully accepting he was wrong. "So, to be clear¡­ we all rest passed out on our beds tomorrow, eating optional, and then a less ''dead-to-the-world'' rest day after that followed by a holinight."


    "Yes."


    Rian nodded. "Have I mentioned you''re the best Dungeon Binder in the world lately?"


    "No, not lately."


    "You''re the best Dungeon Binder in the world," he said.


    "Without peer or equal," Shanalorre agreed as she arrived carrying a jar of water, and a stack of cups, startling Rian.


    Lori nodded, accepting her due. "I know."


    "Ah, Shana¡ª"


    "Shanalorre," Lori corrected.


    "¡ªI wasn''t¡­ I didn''t mean¡­"


    "I am not offended, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said. "Binder Lolilyuri far outstrips my capabilities by any measure. She is obviously a superior Dungeon Binder."


    Rian, why are you covering your face with your hands?


    Dinner, once Rian could finally convince Umu and Riz to allow him to stand up to get it, was light and just barely filling. It consisted mainly of fruits, as apparently even the people who usually cooked meals for everyone had been too tired or too occupied to do so. No one complained however. The tart sweetness of the fruits¡ªLori had a golden bud and two pink ladies¡ªtasted intense after the day''s work and Lori enjoyed every bite.


    Even while everyone ate, the dining hall remained subdued, but everything seemed more relaxed than before. Many didn''t stay, simply collecting their fruits and leaving immediately. Lori supposed they wanted to go straight to the baths to cool off and get the smell of sweat off themselves, or perhaps just go straight home to sleep and leave bathing for tomorrow. For once, Lori couldn''t really find it in her to be too disgusted at the latter.


    That didn''t mean she was going to be disgusting like them, though. She had a private bath and she was going to use it.


    And then she was bathed and putting her bed roll onto her bed, and it as all so comfortable as the darkness behind her eyes took her into¡­

 407 - Rest And Regret

    Lori wasn''t sure when she woke up the next day. She had not bothered to go outside and look.


    She wouldn''t have left her bed, never mind the sweet blackness of unconsciousness, if it were not for the fact her gold water wanted to flow and her inner darkness was very insistent on being unleashed, and while her bath was very useful, it could not be used for dealing with human waste. So down her dungeon it was to use the latrines there. Thankfully the seats were clean, even if what was below it was still full of yesterday''s unleashed darkness. Well, she supposed that meant even those who normally cleaned the latrines were doing as she had said and were staying in bed.


    Actually, there was a very good chance they hadn''t cleaned while the harvest had been ongoing either¡­


    Well, the latrines had been designed to have a large capacity for when a passing dragon lingered. It had more than enough capacity to still be usable if it missed a day or two of emptying.


    Once she had divested herself of darkness and gold, Lori had returned to her room to sleep some more.


    When she next roused, it was to a gentle knock on her door. She had been sleeping lightly at that point, and had first thought she had merely imagined it, but the knock had come again. The softness of the previous knock had seemed to be because she''d been asleep, but this next knock had been equally soft. Lori waited to see if they would knock a third time, waiting for Rian''s voice to call out to her, but after the third knock there was only silence.


    Growling, Lori got to her feet, her now-swept floor no longer gritty on her bare soles as she walked to the door, undid the latch, and pulled it open. "What?" she demanded.


    Rian was already almost at the stairs down when she opened the door, and he gave a start at her cry before turning around. "Oh. You''re awake. Uh¡­ sorry, did I wake you up?"


    "I am, and you did," Lori said irritably.


    "Ah¡­ Sorry. I knocked softly so I wouldn''t wake you if you were still asleep, but I guess you''re a very light sleeper."


    No, Lori had simply been half-dozing, on the border between sleeping and waking, but she felt no need to exposit that to him. "What is it?" she asked.


    "Uh, a few of us were thinking of making a little bread for a late lunch. It''s just going to be a little salted flat bread and some fruit, since we don''t want to try building up the oven for baking. Do you want some?"


    Lori frowned. "Don''t we have meat?"


    "All of it''s frozen, and I''m not really sure about how to cook enough for everyone awake right now."


    "I thought we''ve been making smoked and cured meat? Wasn''t the fact that could be eaten without being cooked one of the reasons we make it?"


    "Aren''t we saving that for rations for the trips to Covehold and emergencies?"


    "There''s no meat for the Dungeon Binder to eat. That is by definition an emergency."


    "We have bread and fruit, it''s hardly an emergency."


    "I''m the Dungeon Binder. If I say it''s an emergency, it''s an emergency."


    "Ah. Perfectly sound logic. Well, I doubt anyone is going to complain about having meat, but as someone who ate a lot of it, you might regret this."


    "It''s meat, Rian. Unless it''s completely bland or has too much vinegar, I''m not going to regret eating properly prepared meat."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    As Rian had said, there was only a relatively small group of people in the dining hall. What he had neglected to add was that many of them were children. Shanalorre was also there, along with her cousin and Mikon''s two cousins who helped the other Dungeon Binder tend to the children she was responsible for. She and the brat were working to keep the children in order, which mainly involved keeping them out of the kitchen, where Mikon, Riz, Umu and a few of her idiots seemed to be cooking.


    Well, Umu and Mikon were cooking flatbread, being assisted by a third woman she didn''t recognize, though she could confidently say she wasn''t one of Mikon''s cousin, whatshername who named plants or whatshername''s wife. Riz was preparing dough to be cooked along with someone else Lori didn''t recognize, while one of Mikon''s cousins was handing then out to the children as the other gave them fruit and a cup of water. Not many people seemed to be awake, though it was possible that they''d chosen to go to the baths first.


    Even as Lori thought that, she saw some people enter her dungeon and look towards the kitchen hopefully. From what she could see behind them and beyond the entryway, it was only a little bit past noon, probably not that far past the time she usually finished eating lunch. It was no wonder people were waking up. One would need to be injured or a truly special kind of lazy to still be in bed at this hour


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    "Just wait in your chair, I''ll come back with some food before I go and get the meat," Rian said, not waiting for a reply as he headed towards where the bread and fruits were being passed out, conspicuously waiting his turn behind the children already there.


    It was some time before her food arrived, but her chair had a backrest, so she was able to just lean back and close her eyes. While still a bit sleepy, she no longer felt exhausted. Her head no longer ached from the strain of having done Whispering for so long, but from experience she knew that she still needed more rest, hence the holinight of the following day. If she was going to be resting in any case, she might as well enjoy herself.


    Rian eventually returned with a plate¡ªnotable since the children just grabbed the food with their hands, though it at least the brat was making sure they washed beforehand¡ªcontaining two disks of bread and some fruit. Two golden buds and two pink ladies, much more than what everyone else had gotten, but she didn''t complain. Lori just started eating.


    The bread was warmer than usual, no doubt because the bread was fresh from the pan, and there was just enough salt to keep it from being bland. After what seemed too soon, however, the bread was gone. Following the bread with the fruits provided the flavor the former was lacking, although they were all too brief.


    As she ate, she considered her situation, idly noting that more people were entering her dungeon. Obviously she couldn''t just stop expanding the demesne, especially given how much better she was faring. However, she clearly needed to pace herself. No more week-long all-day expansions. Expansion sessions would have to be shorter. Perhaps three or four days of expanding the demesne, followed by one day of rest or only moderate Whispering? That would do for a start.


    ¡­


    The day after tomorrow. The bindings she maintained would hold that long, so she could afford the rest.


    With nothing more to do, Lori would have preferred to go back to her room and nap again, or perhaps passed the time with reading. While she kept getting frustrated at the beginning primers and kept going back to the beginning of the books, the almanac was far less frustrating and full of random bits of trivia that were interesting to know, and thus entertaining. However, there was still meat to come, and she was going to rainbows get to eat that meat!


    The smoked and cured meat weren''t kept in the cold room, but instead with the jars of vigas that were stored in her dungeon, sealed in their own container. While the meat was meant to be an emergency food, the small curing and smoking shed they had could only produce a relatively small amount of dried meat, hence why most of it was reserved as rations for the Coldhold. The meat apparently had to be stored in a relatively dry place, and the binding she''d placed to keep humidity out of those alcoves¡ªshe made a note to place one on the newly excavated storage room¡ªkept the old storage area in that state. She supposed that with the new storage area those alcoves could be returned to their original purpose.


    Eventually, Rian came back, and he wasn''t alone. Umu, Mikon, and Riz were with him, each with their own bread, fruits and, most importantly to Lori, a bowl contained what were clearly thin slices of meat. A cursory glance showed her that other people had taken their places in the kitchen, but that wasn''t important because meat.


    "Here you go," Rian said cheerfully as he placed the bowl on the table between them. "Take your pick, your Bindership."


    Lori stared at the meat. It was supposed to be meat, right? "It looks overcooked."


    "It''s supposed to look like that."


    "And dry."


    "It''s supposed to be like that."


    Lori tentatively picked up one of the slices. "And¡­ stiff." She waved it back and forth, and the meat barely bent.


    "That''s how it''s supposed to be."


    Rian had an innocent expression on his face again, and Lori began wondering if she''d made some sort of error in judgement.


    Still, it was meat and it was likely edible, as Rian had eaten it before. Lori raised it to her mouth, bit down and began to chew.


    ¡­


    At least, that was the idea.


    After a moment, Lori took the alleged meat out of her mouth. She could clearly see where she had bitten down on it, as there were wet teeth marks, and her mouth was filled with the taste of salty meat.


    "Don''t worry, it''s supposed to be that hard," Rian said cheerfully. "How does it taste? Not bland, I hope?"


    ¡­


    Lori met his eyes and once more bit down into the meat, this time as hard as she could, then pulled her hand back as she tried to rip a piece off. At first it resisted her, but she kept pulling as she ground her teeth back and forth, trying to tear through¡­


    To her relief, the meat parted, and she ended up with a smaller piece of meat in her mouth that was she was finally able to maneuver to her back teeth so she could start chewing in earnest.


    ¡­


    Lori was regretting eating this meat.


    Eventually, however, she managed to swallow the piece she''d bitten off, then glanced down at her hand. She was still holding a large amount of so-called meat there. "This is what we gave you to eat on the Coldhold?" she said with something approaching horror. This was practically inedible, if only because it was nigh impossible to chew!


    "Only when we couldn''t catch something and butcher it," Rian said.


    Lori stared at the alleged meat in her hand again. Well, it was certainly a strong incentive to catch something to eat. "Why are we making this?"


    "Because it''s meant to be a food preservation method," Rian said. "Did you know that dustlife can''t grow without water? Curing and smoking the meat dries it out, depriving dustlife of anyway to grow and keeping the meat edible."


    "This is edible?-!"


    "You ate it, didn''t you? On the Coldhold we usually stewed it before eating it. Really helps soften it up to edible levels."


    "It''s not bad," Riz said. She''d gotten a piece right after Lori, and was chewing it with every indication of actual enjoyment. "Pretty good, actually. And it''s warm and soft, which is always good. Much better than frozen solid."


    Lori twitched as she glared at her lord. But¡­ well, he had warned her that she would regret this¡­


    "Rian, remind me to place a binding to keep humidity out of the new storage area the day after the holinight," Lori said. Then she bit into the alleged meat again.


    "Wait, you''re still going to eat it?"


    Lori pulled the meat out of her mouth to reply, as she hadn''t managed to tear another piece off yet. "Of course. We can''t waste food."


    Regrettable or not, food was food.

 408 - Probations End

    After the holinight, it was back to work. While the new wood curing and storage shed had been raised, it still lacked doors on either end. They weren''t needed at the moment since most of the planks cut were going straight to roofing the sawmill, so that as all right.


    Unfortunately, Lori had to remove the darkwisps over the fields, as Rian and Taeclas¡ªaccording to the headcloth she was wearing¡ªpointed out that it would block the light the crops needed. She''d considered keeping the shade on anyway and simply adding lightwisps to the binding to reproduce sunlight, but eventually decided that was a far too complicated binding, and far too inefficient to maintain on a regular basis.


    The demesne went back to its previous routine, and Lori returned to expanding the demesne, but this time on her new schedule. Two full days of expanding the demesne, and then on the third day she stopped to rest, or at least do less intensive Whispering, such as placing the binding to keep humidity out of the new grain storage she''d made in the second level, as well as drawing out the moisture that might have made its way in already. She''d also dragged a few seels out of the river to be butchered and added to their food supply. While their supply of meat was holding even, it was still depleting, and there was no reason not to replenish it. Then she''d gone back to expanding her demesne again for two days. She hadn''t felt any impending headache, but then again she hadn''t really felt anything when she''d expanded the demesne for a week.


    On the day she was supposed to rest, Lori debated adding a third day to expanding the demesne. She''d been fine for a week, so surely it was fine if she added one more day, right?


    "So, are we going to River''s fork today or tomorrow?" Rian asked.


    Lori blinked, glancing up from her breakfast as her flow of thought was interrupted. "What?"


    "River''s Fork. Or, well, Lidzuga, really. He''s the Deadspeaker you assigned there? The probationary period you set ends¡­ well, today. I figured we should talk to him to make it official." Rian tilted his head to the side slightly. "You didn''t forget, did you?"


    "Of course not," Lori lied as she frantically tried to recall what Rian was¡ªah right. Had it been four weeks already? "I was simply preoccupied and hadn''t yet checked the tally I was keeping track of."


    "Ah. As expected of her Bindership, not forgetting the important things," Rian said, nodding. "So, to sum up what he''s done, Lidzuga has managed to get three harvests of River''s Fork''s crops, adjusted the meanings on all the trees, done repairs on all the houses, built two boats and I hear he''s got a third finished now, and set up the second fruit orchard. The last time I spoke to him before the harvest, he said that the second orchard was already starting to grow flowers. The trees might actually have fruit by now, so he might be due a half-day off."


    "Just like everyone else, then?" Riz said under her breath next to Rian, making Mikon laugh.


    Rian''s arm moved as he gently nudged her with his elbow. "So, back to the original question, are we going today or tomorrow?"


    ¡­ well, today was supposed to be a rest day anyway. "Today, after breakfast," she said. "Be sure to bring your bow." Today is going to be the day that they finally spot that typhon beast early enough that they''d be able to shoot an arrow at it!


    "By the way, about the drop hammer¡­"


    "Is it ready to be installed yet?"


    "That''s what I wanted to talk to you about. The smiths says they need more room around the drop hammer."


    Lori blinked. "What? Why?"


    "Well, they say that they need a forge near the drop hammer so they can work the metal, and there''s not nearly enough room for one in the space allocated." Rian paused. "Also, it was brought up that having an open forge near so much sawdust¡ª" He cut off Lori''s hand snapped up to slap against her face in frustrated realization. "Ah, I see I can stop explaining."


    "We''ll have to make new plans for the drop hammer," Lori said. "We''ll need a second water wheel."


    "A water wheel for the river, or are you going to make something like the lathe the carpenters have?"


    Lori paused. That¡­ was actually a good idea. If nothing else, it meant they wouldn''t have to build a new structure along the river. "Give me time to think about it."


    "You''re thinking about it, not considering it?"


    "That''s what I said, isn''t it?"


    Rian nodded with a serious look on his face. "Riiight¡­ Well, beyond the location ¡ªor lack thereof, now¡ªthe components of the drop hammer are ready and usable. The miller said he has no problem with the gristmill beyond it being a little cramped, although now that we''re not putting in the drop hammer, I suppose that means we can make the milling room bigger. Do you think you can make the walls for it?"


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    Lori looked at him suspiciously. "Why¡­?"


    "It''ll be a while before the sawmill can spare the planks for the interior walls, and until the walls are in place, we can''t use the gristmill there unless you want sawdust in your bread." Rian paused again.


    "I don''t want sawdust on my bread," Lori agreed.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They did not spot the typhon beast and were unable to shoot an arrow at it.


    "We''ll get it another time," Rian said as they entered the boundaries of River''s Fork''s demesne. Riz and three of her friends were ladling water on themselves against the heat, while Lori gathered the water pooling at the bottom of the boat to apply to herself before throwing it over the side. They were riding Lori''s Boat Three, which for some reason had only one outrigger on its right side. Admittedly, it didn''t seem to need a second, and the lack of an outrigger on one side made it easier to get on and off the boat.


    "In this heat, it''s probably thirsty a lot, so there''s a good chance we''ll see it as we''re leaving."


    Lori didn''t reply, simply sitting in dignified angry silence.


    Why was Rian muttering about ''adorable''?


    When they arrived at the dome, Lori saw sheaves of grain being dried in the sun outside, while other sheaves were being threshed¡ªthey also had the large saw-like comb¡ªand winnowed. Outside the mine and dragon shelter was a large pile of loose rocks, no doubt the result of the copper mining. Well, it would probably be useful if she needed to build anything¡ª


    "This place is going to need a lot of work when the next batch of the Golden Sweetwood Company arrives," Rian commented as he started maneuvering the boat to the dock, making Lori twitch. "They''ll probably need something like the shelters you put, and definitely need to expand outside of the dome¡ª"


    "Rian, stop talking," Lori ground out.


    "Shutting up, your Bindership. Though we really need to talk about this before¡ª"


    "You''re still talking."


    Rian finally stopped talking as they pulled alongside the dock. One of Riz''s friends stepped off the boat and onto the dock, and another threw her the boat''s rope to secure it. By the time that Lori managed to step off the boat¡ªshe was used to stepping onto the narrow ramp between the boat and the outrigger, which was higher than stepping up from the bottom of the boat¡ªYllian had made his way to them. The man was sweating intensely, and Rian actually grabbed the boat''s ladle to scoop up some river water, which he offered to the man.


    Yllian took the ladle gratefully, taking off his hat and pouring the water over his head before putting his hat back on. "Oh, Great Binder, that feels good¡­" the man sighed.


    "Yes, I know," Lori said blandly.


    Her lord blinked, then coughed awkwardly. "Ah, sorry for my language, Great Binder."


    "Perhaps you should resort to other forms of swearing," Lori said dryly. "On your own time. Where is¡ª" she reached into her pouch to check on the rocks there, "¡ªLidzuga?"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    When Lidzuga arrived, Lori was examining the boat being held up on trestles that would no doubt become Lori''s Boat Four. She hated the design. Instead of a nice, neat box, the two long walls were at an angle outwards, and the bottom dipped down in the middle to form a triangular shape. It actually needed to rest on the trestles upside-down because otherwise it would keep flopping from side to side. Off to the side, tree branches were in the beginning of being fused together to make more panels.


    "It looks terrible," Lori said.


    "It''s meant to be self-righting," Rian said, "And it''s supposed to be a boat, not a box. Besides, it''s still symmetrical."


    Well, she supposed there was that. "Well, I suppose there''s that¡­"


    "Lo¡ªRian?"


    "Ah, Lidz, there you are!" Rian said as he turned towards the Deadspeaker. "I believe congratulations are in order."


    "Oh, thank you, but accelerating the crops isn''t really anything," the Deadspeaker said in the tones of someone wanting to hear praise. "This is our third harvest, and¡ª"


    "Uh, no not that," Rian interrupted. "Though yes, good job in getting the demesne a third harvest, that''s two more harvests than we would have managed without you. I meant your probation. Congratulations on reaching four weeks."


    "Pro¡ªoh! Oh, that''s today?"


    "That''s today," Rian confirmed. "Congratulations of getting through your probation, even if you didn''t manage to build all the boats in the time you had available. However, of the boats you did deliver so far, we have no complaints, and Yllian has only good things to say about all the Deadspeaking work you''ve been doing. How''s the progress on the second fruit orchard?"


    "Actually, I''ve managed to get some of the trees there to start fruiting, although the trees themselves are a bit stunted because they''ve been growing for only¡­ three weeks? I had to use grafts and transplants instead of growing from seedlings, but Tae said that''s not really a problem. She said that shorter trees are easier to pick."


    "Um¡­ while I wouldn''t impugn on Tae''s good name, she sort of¡­ hates trees."


    Lidzuga blinked. "Really?"


    "Not fruit trees, or so she says, but she had a whole list of things she doesn''t like about them¡ª" Rian glanced towards her. "Uh, I''ll tell you later. Just¡­ probably take a moment to think about it before taking her advice about things like that."


    "Um¡­ now that my probation is over¡­"


    "Yes, you can have days off," Lori said. "Or at least half days off. As you''ve no doubt learned by now, there are things that have to be done every day, so a full day off cannot be a regular occurrence."


    Lidzuga grimaced, but nodded. "Yes. While Shanalorre¡ª"


    Lori just barely managed to keep herself from speaking.


    "¡ªhandles imbuing everything, some of the trees still need little adjustments, even with the bound tools you''ve set in place to keep them cool your Bindership."


    She nodded. "However, we had an agreement. As soon as I can confirm that fruits are growing in the second orchard you''ve established, with the completion of this third boat you will be due half a day off for¡­ well, whatever you want to do. All I require is that you inform Yllian the day before you take a day off so that he knows you will not be completely available. Have you settled on a specific topic of research yet?" When last they''d spoken, he''d seemed to have vague ideas about cataloging local plants, beasts and bugs, but that was unfocused and time consuming. The sort of research one conducted when they had a sponsor who wasn''t too insistent on results.


    "I¡­ haven''t really had a chance to think about it," the Deadspeaker said. "I''ve been so busy¡­"


    "May I suggest not using your half day off to do that thinking?" Rian said. "That''s just a sad waste of what you''ve managed to earn."

 409 - Mine Shelter Development Planning

    The second fruit orchard was rather small compared to the one that they were currently relying on for fruits. As Lidzuga had said, most of the fruit trees were stunted. A few were clearly saplings that had been grown from seeds and even with Deadspeaking were probably still several weeks away from growing fruit, but many appeared to be branches he''d cut off from other trees that he''d stuck into the ground.


    "I induced root growth on the branches before I cut them off and planted them," Lidzuga explained when Lori had pointedly inquired about them. "Some trees do that naturally, so I got the idea to try it here. For the ones where that didn''t work, I dug up some lengths of root and grafted them to the branches. Thankfully, it all seems to have worked successfully. They need to be supported until their roots grow bigger, though. To be honest, they''re not really ready to start growing fruits in the quantities and sizes that are worth harvesting because it would unbalance them, but the roots should be ready in a few more days. The saplings¡­ well, they''ll need some more growing."


    Lori nodded. "I will still consider this fulfillment of your project. For the moment, focus on stabilizing them. Inform me when I have to place bindings to keep them cool."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    "We''ll be taking back the new boat," she continued. "Have you tested it in the water yet?"


    The Deadspeaker nodded. "The other men helped me get it in and out of the water. It floats, and I tried riding on it, though I can''t really say how much more stable it is compared to the boats I''ve been making before."


    "Don''t worry, I''ll be sure to test it," Rian said. "It''s not really complete without some weights to make it bottom-heavy."


    "Rian, get the boat into the water and secure it," Lori said. "I''ll be doing an inspection of the dragon shelter. Inform me when we''re ready to go."


    "The dragon shelter? You need help with anything?"


    Lori shook her head. "Just something I remembered. With the mine now back in operation, there''s nowhere for used bathwater to go. It will probably be necessary to excavate a catch basin for it, as well as a means for recovering that water. I''m going to see what else I might need to build."


    "Ah. Yes, that seems¡­ needed. You should probably put in a small water reservoir too, so that the drinking water isn''t limited by the number of barrels is stored?"


    She waved a hand dismissively. "I''ll consider it."


    "Thank you!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The mine was a bit messy when Lori entered it, a binding of lightwisps anchored to her staff, the air still and warm. There were random rocks on the floor, probably dropped when carrying the ores and tailings out of the mine. The ventilation binding was deactivated, the large wispbead meant to fuel it removed¡­ and just left behind in the little stone niche next to it. Lori twitched at the negligent attitude. The bead itself was sitting on a triangular wooden base to keep it from rolling, which¡­ all right, she acknowledged that was a good design for supporting the large beads that were too big to simply be stored in a bowl.


    Lori checked the beads she kept stored in the alcove just behind the final door, nodding in satisfaction as she saw those beads were still there covered in stone as Riz and one of her friends waited to one side. She probably needed to make some more large beads for mine ventilation, which wouldn''t be pleasant without her ice shed to work in. She was also going to feel unprotected without the shed''s wall around her. Granted, the walls had been made of ice, but that just meant she''d see the beasts coming.


    Shaking her head¡ªthat was a problem for the future, even if that future was perhaps this afternoon¡ªLori made a note to have the carpenters build a door to the alcove. She hadn''t been able to seal the entrance to her sleeping space properly when she''d stayed there last time, and she wasn''t going to repeat that mistake.


    Past the alcove was the door to the food storage room, which she saw had been shut tight with a chain and a lock that she had never seen before. Presumably the lock was Yllian''s, and had only been put in because there were no people to spare due to the harvest, since even the miners seemed to be assisting in the harvest. She supposed that answered the question of whether people still tried to steal food. The lock wouldn''t be needed otherwise.


    She continued walking.


    ¡­


    "Erzebed, why are you practically breathing down my neck?" Lori asked, voice flat.


    "Sorry, Great Binder, but you''re the one with the light and we can''t see the floor very well back here," the militiawoman said.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "What''s your spearhead made of?"


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    There was a pause. "Uh, steel, Great Binder. You haven''t made any spearheads from beast parts in a while, and all the ones you''ve made have already broken."


    What, really? Well¡­ Lori supposed it wasn''t unlikely that the spearheads she''d made would break, especially if they were being used to hunt beasts. And if Rian hadn''t seen the need to mention it for her to make more, then she apparently didn''t need to. Still, that was inconvenient¡­


    Lori swept her gaze across the ground, looking for a rock. Unfortunately, the rocks littering the floor of the mine were sharp-angled and looked uncomfortable to hold¡­ although¡­


    She bent down and picked up a rock, touching it with her fingernail to claim and bind it. It softened in her hands, and Lori let her staff rest on the crook of her elbow as she rolled and pressed the rock between her palms into a lopsided ball that she squeezed down into a disk. Once she was satisfied with its shape, she dissolved the binding, and reached out one hand to claim lightwisps from the path of the light on her staff. Forming the lightwisps into a binding, she gave it a moderate amount of imbuement before anchoring it onto the stone and handing that to Riz. "There. Now stop being so close."


    Not waiting for a reply, she continued on down the mine, the light in the militiawoman''s hands casting Lori''s shadow ahead of her. She reached the ramp that lead up to the shelter area proper, and found it full of signs of habitation. There were several packs stacked together along one wall, as well as a pile of rolled-up bed rolls next to a broom.


    Lori took a quick look around, wondering if she should expand this room and add a few more latrines. While it was currently sufficient to the needs of the amount of people currently living in River''s Fork, once the next¡ª


    No, no, she was not going to worry about that! She''ll expand the dragon shelter to be able to house more people when those new people acknowledge her absolute authority in her demesne!


    ¡­


    That being said, she needed to excavate a little to be able to fit in the water reservoir and catch basin. Unfortunately, as she had no connection to this demesne''s core¡ªShanalorre was still too useful to kill¡ªLori couldn''t be sure exactly how much room she had left to excavate before she went out the other side of the hill. Still, she knew she still had a lot of stone between her and accidentally digging out the other side, especially since the mine tunnel angled downward, so she should have more than enough space to at least excavate a small room.


    Not today though. She didn''t have enough time.


    Hmm¡­when she did excavate the room for a water reservoir, she should probably have a door to keep people from pissing in the water. River''s Fork was where the stupidest idiots of from her demesne had moved to, after all.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the time she made her way back to the docks, the wooden hull that would become Lori''s Boat Four was floating in the water, tied by a rope to Lori''s Boat Three.


    "We''re ready to go, your Bindership," Rian said as she approached. "If we leave now, we should be back in time for a slightly late lunch. I told the kitchen to keep some food warm for us, just in case."


    Oh! Well, that was nice. She had thought they''d have to stay for lunch¡­ although given how River''s Fork was still working on their harvest, perhaps they didn''t have food ready? "Then let us be on our way, then." She turned to Yllian, who had been talking to Rian. "Yllian, I''ll be back within the week to do some work on the mine shelter."


    "Understood, Great Binder," Yllian said. "Do you need me for anything else?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively, and Yllian left to continue assisting the harvest in progress. Rian got on the Lori''s Boat Three, kneeling down on it and holding onto the dock¡ªhe visibly winced at how hot it was¡ªto keep the boat steady as Lori stepped down onto the boat as well. She nearly fell as she did so, just barely managing to keep her balance and quickly sitting down to help maintain her equilibrium. Ugh. Why couldn''t this boat had a ramp on its outrigger too?


    Riz and her friends quickly got on the boat after her, dropping down onto the boat far more easily, the last one untying the boat from the dock. The two oars on the boat were taken up and used to push off from the dock, paddling to turn the Lori''s Boat Three around since its prototype sliding switch kept it from having a ''reverse'' setting. The paddling was faster than Lori using her staff to make some kind of waterwisp binding.


    "Next time, we''re taking one of the other boats," Lori said as the boat finally faced upriver.


    "Agreed," Rian said as he gently pulled out the knob that activated the steam jet bound tool. The boat began to move forward, and Rian pulled the knob out further so they could start making their way upriver. Riz began pulling on the rope tying the Lori''s Boat Four so that it was closer to them. "This is a great control mechanism, but I''ve too used to being able to move in reverse."


    "Is the bow ready?"


    Rian sighed for some reason. "Riz, could you¡­?"


    "I know, I know, put on the bowstring."


    As the militiawoman struggle to get the bowstring back on, Lori picked up the arrow with its beast-tooth arrowhead, checking the binding of lightningwisps still on it, then testing to make sure she still had affinity with those wisps so she could activate the binding from a distance.


    When they spotted the typhon beast, she''d be ready to finally kill it!


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    They did not spot the typhon beast and she was unable to kill it.


    "Look, I''m sure the hunters have a good understanding of its habits by now," Rian said as they approached the vicinity of her dungeon. "Why don''t we just give them the arrow, they can stick it in the thing, and then you can activate it from a safe distance?"


    "I suppose that''s an option¡­" Lori muttered.


    "Don''t worry. I''m sure we''ll manage to find and kill it soon¡­"


    "But I want it killed now!"


    "I know¡­ I know¡­"


    Lori sul¡ªthat is, Lori thought deeply on how to make this goal of hers come true as Rian maneuvered Lori''s Boat Three next to the dock. Lori''s Boat and Lori''s Ice Boat were both on the other side of the river. It occurred to Lori she should probably build a proper dock there soon, and perhaps add an extension or even a second dock on this side. The number of boats they were in possession of was growing, after all.


    These and other very important, Dungeon Binder-like thoughts filled Lori''s head as Lori''s Boat Three settled into place while she most definitely did not sulk.

 410 - Returning The Children

    As Rian had promised, there was stew ready for them, and some bread as well. Both were no longer warm, but after how hot it had been in River''s Fork, Lori had no objections to that.


    Umu and Mikon had already finished eating by the time they''d arrived, but the two lingered as Rian and Riz sat down to eat. Taeclas¡ªthankfully, she was wearing her head cloth today¡ªand her wife had left, already finished eating.


    "So, a few matters came up when I was talking to Yllian," Rian said. He was glancing over her shoulder for some reason, before nodding in satisfaction. Lori glanced behind her, but saw nothing but the table that the children who lived with Shanalorre ate at. It was empty at the moment, the children already finished with their meal and doing who-knows-what down in the second level. "He says that with the multiple harvests that Lidzuga was able to help them make, their food stores are finally growing instead of only holding even. Yllian says that River''s Fork can afford to support a few more people now."


    "I should hope so, since they have to support the miners."


    That made Rian pause for a moment. "Ah. I think they meant the minors, as well as additional people on top of them."


    "So we can send more miners? Good, the shelter can hold more, and it will get us copper faster."


    Rian sighed for some reason. "As a result of this added capacity, Yllian said they can afford to welcome the children back home, since they have enough food to feed them now. So he asked me if it would be possibly for the children to return to River''s Fork."


    Ah. That''s what Rian was talking about. "Ah. That''s what you''re talking about. Next time, just say it properly. Very well, inform Shanalorre and make what arrangements you need to."


    Rian paused as if waiting for something. "Is that it?"


    Lori frowned. "Is there anything else that needs to be done regarding them?"


    "No¡­ no, ah, just wondering if your orders were complete. I''ll, ah, inform Shanalorre."


    Lori stared at him. Then she pushed back her chair and stood up, the better to lean over the table and pat Rian on the head. "Good work, Rian. It took several months, but you''ve finally remembered to address Binder Shanalorre properly without being reminded. Keep up the good work."


    He gave her an incredulous stare as she sat back down and went back to eating. Next to him, Umu, Mikon and Riz started snickering. "Are you mocking me?"


    "Why would I do that? Remembering names properly is very difficult."


    Rian continued to stare. "I honestly can''t tell if you''re serious."


    "I''m Lori."


    The two stared at each other for a moment more. Lori''s face was completely impassive.


    "So¡­ anyway¡­ Now that Lidzuga is no longer on probation, and we''ve seen that his boats have been of acceptable quality, I was wondering if I could modify one of the boats we have."


    Lori hummed. "I was considering having him cease making boats. We''re running out of space to keep them."


    "That''s¡­ true, but hear me out first. What if you had a dedicated boat for making beads?"


    ¡­what? "¡­.what?"


    "Your old shed is deep inside the demesne''s boundaries now, and you haven''t had time to build a new one," Rian said.


    "Yes Rian, I am intimately familiar with the situation. Stop expositing things I already know and need no reminder of."


    "Right¡­ well, skipping ahead then, we have a lot of boats now. Why don''t we turn one of the boats we currently have into a mobile work shed? Being in the river is far safer in terms of keeping away from beasts. Or if that''s too unstable, then you can just beach the boat at the border, and then push it out into the river if a beast gets too close."


    That¡­ would actually be useful. The boats they had could fit her bead-making equipment, and that was all she really needed for mass bead production. Though the boat would need things¡­


    "I''ll need a roof," Lori said.


    "I''m sure that we can figure out some kind of solution. It shouldn''t be too hard to put up some sort of awning, and¡ªhey! The roof doesn''t even need to be material! If you had places to anchor them, you could put up a roof of darkwisps, right?"


    Lori tilted her head thoughtfully. "That could work," she agreed. "With no risk of beasts, having an immaterial roof will be sufficient to keep most of the heat off, and I can use the same anchor points for bindings to keep me cool."


    "There you go! Lidz is going to make two more boats, so it''s not like we''ll be lacking for long. What do you say?"


    It would be convenient¡­ and the beads would already be on the boat, so no need to carry them around! "What would it take to convert one of the boats to this?"


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    "Well, it would depend on what sort of roof you want. Binding or physical?"


    "At the moment, a physical roof is unnecessary," she mused. "All I will need are some posts I can embed stone into as anchor points."


    "On the other hand," Rian countered, "summer should be ending soon, so it will start raining again. Not regularly, but you probably don''t want to get wet¡­ wait, I know. We still have a lot of straw from the harvest. How do you feel about a thatch roof? Would that might be enough to make a rainshade?"


    She stared at him. "What is thatch?"


    "¡­ it''s a method of roofing that uses straw, grasses and in some cases sufficiently big leaves. It''s not very durable, at least compared to plank roofing, but it''s lightweight and relatively quick to make, so it can keep the sun off you without being heavy enough to make the boat top-heavy."


    Lori considered that. "Fine, see to it, although until the rain starts, it doesn''t need to be prioritized. For now, some posts to act as anchor points for darkwisp bindings will suffice. How long will it take?"


    "Well, the carpenters will be the ones to assess that, but¡­ three days? A day to examine the boat and plan out what they''re going to do, another day to cut up all the beams and set them in place, and maybe a third day for Taeclas to fuse everything together for added strength. The thatch roofing will probably take a little bit more time to complete. Unless it starts raining, we can get it done during the days you don''t use the boat."


    Lori nodded. "I''ll leave it to you, then. I will be going back to River''s Fork to begin excavating a water reservoir for the dragon shelter, and I''ll need a carpenter to go with me. I need two doors made, and they need to take measurements."


    "I''ll set it up. Anything else?"


    She pointed at his plate. "Eat."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori was at her table in her room, the various alloy samples they had made arrayed in front of her when there was a knock on her door. She stared at the wooden barrier, daring it to do that again¡ªit can''t be Rian calling her down to dinner, lunch hadn''t been that long ago¡ªwhen there was another knock. Now that she was paying attention to it, the knock was noticeably softer than the ones employed by Rian or Riz.


    For a moment, she considered just ignoring the knocking¡ªthere was a third set of knocks¡ªbut she wasn''t Rian, who liked to use procrastination as a problem-solving tool. Sighing, she got up, her face already setting into a glare as she walked towards the door in her tsinelas as there was a fourth set of knocks.


    "What?" Lori said as she opened her door. She blinked when she saw no one there, then looked down.


    Shanalorre stared up as her. "Great Binder," she said without preamble. "I have been informed that the children will be returning to River''s Fork soon. Is this correct?"


    Lori stared at her for a moment. Ah, yes, Shanalorre was the children''s caretaker, wasn''t she? The Dungeon Binder supposed she should have also remembered to inform her. "Yes. The state of River''s Fork''s food supplies is such that it can safely support additional people, so it''s safe to take the children back. I apologize for not informing you earlier, but you were absent while we were eating."


    "I¡­ see. When will they be transferred back to River''s Fork?"


    "You will need to coordinate with Rian. The children are your responsibility, after all. However, you will probably need to wait until the Coldhold returns." Their largest boat was currently gone, sent to gather more salt, and it would be a couple more days before it returned. It was the only one with the capacity to carry all the children as well as their things, as well as the safest vessel to carry them. "It is the only one of our boats with the capacity to carry all the children as well as their things, as well as the safest vessel to carry them."


    Shanalorre nodded slowly. "The Coldhold should be back in two days if it maintains its usual travel time. I will inform the children so they can make preparations to leave." She paused briefly, staring up at Lori. "I am honestly surprised you have not found a reason to continue retaining them as hostages to ensure the compliance and obedience of their parents in River''s Fork."


    A mix of feelings filled Lori. Outrage, wariness, acknowledgement, even a small amount of approval¡­ it was a reminder that for all Shanalorre''s compliance and unobtrusiveness, the other was still a Dungeon Binder. While Lori would never consider using the children in that way, it was clear Shanalorre wasn''t so limited. For all her deficiencies, Shanalorre had still been dutiful in caring for the idiots of her demesne back when she had ruled, and as the caretaker of the children had no doubt worried that Lori would do as a Dungeon Binder would have.


    "Anyone idiotic enough to not comply or obey would not be stopped by the fact I hold their children," Lori said. "Besides, they''re children. I would never hurt them or bring them harm. I''m not their parents, after all." Shanalorre twitched, staring blankly up at Lori for a few moments, and she waited patiently until the other Dungeon Binder''s left hand rose and slapped her cheek hard, blinked, and shook her head. The other Dungeon Binder''s strange idiosyncrasies were familiar to Lori now.


    "I¡­ see. Thank you for explaining, Great Binder." Shanalorre gave her a bow. "I apologize for disturbing you."


    "Yes, you did." Lori waved a hand dismissively. "Get going, you no doubt have preparations to make."


    Lori watched to make sure the other Dungeon Binder left before she went back to her room and once more locked the door. Should she be worried that Shanalorre was planning to take the demesne''s children hostage against Lori? The thought was extremely concerning. The children trusted the other Dungeon Binder, and she was ideally positioned to act¡­


    No.


    Lori dismissed the concern. Shanalorre was many things, but she wasn''t an idiot. Overwhelmed, under-equipped, under-staffed, ignorant and ineffectual she might have been, the other Dungeon Binder had never been an idiot.


    Besides, Shanalorre was already barred from sharp objects, such that she was limited to digging out her garden with a blunt stick. If she tried anything, the brat would just knock her over.


    Lori went back to her table, casually slipping off her tsinelas as she sat down and resting her feet on them. She went back to the alloy samples. In addition to the flattened blocks of alloy, there were also the lengths of wire that had had been drawn, with the sole exception of a wire of earthwisp alloy. The alloy had been too hard and rigid to be drawn into a wire, and all attempts had ended in failure. The smiths had suggested that it would be possible to draw it hot, but Lori had told them not to proceed with that test at the moment.


    The wires that had been drawn were all very fine, and a note from Rian informed her that copper was a poor metal to test for greater ductility, as copper was already a metal naturally well-suited to be drawn into strands. That being said, there was also an added note that the smiths had found the airwisp alloy, waterwisp allloy, and lightwisp-airwisp alloy to be easier to draw into wire, especially at the smallest hole of the draw plate. The draw test would have to be repeated with a metal that''s more difficult to draw into wire¡­

 Ryan Is An Isekai In Space! - April Fools 2024!

    Ryan did not miss hot, humid summers. The feeling of swimming in hot water just from walking around, covered in sweat because the water vapor in the air increased its thermal capacity, wanting to die just make it stop¡­ thank goodness the baths and the river were right there. At least the occasional gust of wind felt nice and cool. Well, cool for him. Even after seven years on this planet, the latitude still felt slightly chilly for him even in summer. Well, during summers that they weren''t experiencing terrible heatwaves.


    He missed air conditioning. He missed it so much! It was right up there with his family, chocolate and ice-cream! He supposed that on a planet where all non-human mammals were aquatic it was no surprise that dairy wasn''t a thing, but still¡­


    And now he was spending this hot, humid summer day wandering the woods with a group of armed men and women, which was agonizing. Still, he couldn''t let the suffering show on his face. Well, he couldn''t let it show too much. It would be bad for morale. Thank goodness that he was healthy!


    "Found some!" someone called to Ryan''s left, and the search line. "Seven eggs! And I think they''re still raw!"


    There was a small cheer at that. People started carefully picking up the eggs and taking them to the litter carrying the eggs they''d already found, which were resting on a bed of leaves for cushioning to keep them from cracking. They also had a hand cart full of water skins, a third of which were now empty. No one wanted to be the one to fall over from heatstroke, after all.


    The eggs were an unfortunate consequence of Lori''s expanding the demesne: things that used to be outside the demesne were now suddenly inside as the borders moved with the expansion. When the things in questions were trees and rocks¡ªand in one instance earlier that day, a dragon scale that had remained unnoticed until that day because it had been covered in Iridescence¡ªthat wasn''t a problem. When the things were beast eggs, however¡­


    As last year had shown, fertilized eggs that remained within the boundaries of the demesne could hatch and reintroduce beasts back into the woods after the population had been driven off by the presence of the demesne. Thankfully, the choker population wasn''t too bad. Sure, they were pests, but they didn''t go out of their way to attack people and even the older children had a reasonable chance of driving them off. Plus they were good eating¡ªthey tasted like chicken, ha ha¡ªeven if they couldn''t feed all that many people compared to their larger cousins.


    Ryan had also been amused to learn that while the wild chokers were normally wary around people, avoiding them more often than not unless they were occupied with eating a bug or something, they ran from Karina on sight.


    But amusement aside, since the demesne had expanded, that meant there was a chance there were more eggs within the demesne''s new borders. As such, to be sure there weren''t any eggs left behind by leapers, waddlers or, fuck their lives, a typhon beast or some other mega predator now inside of their demesne¡ªthat last was unlikely but not impossible¡ªhe had been leading men to patrol the inner edges of the demesne, sweeping nooks and crannies for eggs. Unfortunately, being a good leader who didn''t ask people to do something that he wouldn''t do himself meant that he also had to do this himself. So making his way through the hot, humid woods it was.


    Thank goodness he''d kept measuring the demesne''s growth. That meant he was able to tell people exactly how far from the edge they had to check each day. Lori''s growth rate was around twice what it had been during the winter, which meant that every day that Lori had expanded the demesne that summer, the edge had grown by ten meters on average, sometimes more. The solid week she''d had an expanding spree had gladdened his heart while at the same time being absolute agony as they''d had to keep checking a growing perimeter.


    And that was just on this side of the river where the dungeon and the village was. They''d basically given up on the side of the demesne on the other side of the river. If large beasts started hatching there, he''d just have to ask Lori to try and perform a controlled genocide on any large lifeform that wasn''t human shaped. He was fairly certain she could accomplish that.


    Thankfully, the beast eggs weren''t all that hard to find. Unlike birds, beasts were too big to lay eggs up in trees, and everyone he''d bought along knew how to look for beast eggs in the wild. Wild beast eggs were apparently something the militia and those who''d had to live on the edge of the demesne foraged to supplement their food, and it didn''t matter how far along the egg was.


    It wasn''t quite balut, but the eggs filled their stew pot well enough, with the shells being ground up as fertilizer or for whatever chemistry the tanners needed to treat the leather they were making.


    Once the eggs they''d found were on the litter, joining ten more eggs of various sizes they''d already found, they reformed the search line and continued on. Ryan swept his eyes across the ground, looking for eggs or anywhere eggs might be hiding. He knew he wasn''t any good at this. The one time he''d found eggs so far this summer¡ªwhich had turned out to be a small clutch of choker eggs¡ªit had been because he''d almost stepped on them.


    Yes, he wasn''t very good at this. Still, that was no reason not to try.


    Fortunately or unfortunately, they didn''t find any more eggs by the time they reached the midpoint of their search and stopped to head back to the dungeon for lunch. The eggs they''d found were carried to the kitchen, where they''d be added to dinner, or more likely tomorrow''s breakfast. Most of the men and women who''d gone egg-hunting with Ryan went straight to the baths, but a few just walked towards the river, took off their tsinelas and threw themselves in. This far into the summer, no one batted an eye, although as a responsible lord he waited for them to get out of the river before heading to get a bath himself.


    If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    ¡­


    He really should help Umu and Mikon when they did the laundry next time. His clothes smelled absolutely terrible.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After making sure Lori didn''t need him after lunch, Ryan got ready to go out and suffer some more.


    A hand came down on his shoulder. "Rian, we''ve talked about this," Riz said. "You''re the one who said that we would rotate the people who go out to check for eggs in the afternoon so that no one gets overheated. That includes you. Now stay here and rest."


    "Come on, Riz. Doesn''t this count as officer work?"


    "Oh, please, this is sergeant work at most. We''ve already talked about this, Rian. Now go and take another bath, you still look sweaty."


    Ryan immediately stifled the first response that came to mind, then the second as well. When the third reply threatened to be equally quippy, he decided to fall back on the lessons he''d learned from his dad. "Yes, Riz, you''re right. I''ll do exactly that." He could only fight so hard against something he actually wanted to do, after all.


    She nodded firmly, looking satisfied. Behind her, Mikon was smirking at him, while Umu was pouting in that way she did when she felt left out. They''d undoubtedly recognized the ''keep the wife happy'' tone in his voice. "Good. Oh, don''t sulk. There''s plenty of work for you to do here. Lanwei and Gunvi were looking for you."


    "Yes, Riz. You''re right. I''ll do just that."


    She gave a satisfied smile¡ªGod, she was gorgeous¡ªthen glanced towards Umu and Mikon. "You two make sure he doesn''t overwork himself, all right?"


    "Yes, Erzebed," Mikon said, smiling widely. "I''ll do just that." Umu pointedly turned her face away to hide her expression, but Ryan recognized the way her shoulders were shaking. Riz shot the pink-haired weaver a suspiciously look, but Mikon masterfully deflected suspicion by leaning forward and giving her a kiss on the cheek. "Be careful, all right? Find us a lot of eggs so we can make yolkoil."


    Ryan felt the usual surge of inadequacy and arousal as he saw the two of them being affectionate. After all, why would two beautiful women¡ªone a short-haired sporty tomboy type, the other a long-haired beauty with huge tracts of Binder-untaxed land¡ªpossibly be interested in him when they already had eyes for each other? Ever since Riz had told the story of her disastrous first visit to a brothel and Mikon had shown her how having sex with a woman was actually supposed to go, the two had started becoming closer and more intimate, which¡­ all right, it was really hot.


    He did his best to suppress that feeling. Umu, Mikon and Riz said they were all interested in him, and he wasn''t going to self-sabotage and turn this fantasy romance into a self-destructive Greek tragedy.


    That said¡­


    "Don''t forget to drink water," he said, stepping forward and kissing the opposite cheek. "Be careful out there, all right? The bugs are biting."


    Riz rolled her eyes, but her pale cheeks had a noticeable blush.


    "You want to give her a ''good luck'' kiss too?" Mikon asked Umu.


    Umu gave her a Lori-perfect flat look, then turned towards Riz and waved her hand in Lori''s little ''stop bothering me about that'' gesture. "Get going."


    Riz made a two-fingered downward clawing gesture that Ryan had learned was the northern equivalent of giving someone the finger and smiled. "Glitter you too, Umu," she said lightly.


    "Don''t use that gesture where children could see," Shana chastised as she passed by, making Riz jump a little and visibly wince.


    Ryan winced as well, though definitely for different reasons. To Riz, being chastised by Shana was somewhere between getting scolded by the Pope and St. Peter at the pearly gates. They were very devout dungeon worshippers where they came from, it seemed.


    For him¡­


    One day. If he''d just convinced Lori to go to River''s Fork one day earlier instead of having her wait¡­ Shana wouldn''t be like this, acting like Lori because she thought it was how a proper Dungeon Binder was supposed to act¡­


    He shook his head, exhaled. What''s done was done. Do better next time. Obsessing about things like that was for humanoid arachnid persons.


    Riz left¡ªa little more humble¡ªto lead the afternoon''s egg-sweeping party, leaving the three of them. Ryan kissed Umu on the cheek too because he wanted to and so she wouldn''t be so pouty, and kissed Mikon too when she leaned towards him, one cheek presented.


    This¡­ it was a fantasy romance. Yes, he had known it was something possible¡ªMang Carlos was living proof of that, poor Ate¡ªbut he''d never really thought it was something that was possible for him. His last crush had friend-zoned him, and their relationship had actually been more fun that way. And ever since he''d gotten isekaied¡­ well, he''d been too busy learning the local language through brute force immersion and getting a job to look.


    And now they were like this, and they''d come on to him and¡­


    Ryan put those thoughts as Mikon kissed him, then immediately tried to kiss Umu, had somehow not managed to see the pattern that had emerged over the last few seconds. "Well, I better go and find Lanwei and Gunvi," he said, starting to turn away. "I''ll see you two¡ª"


    A hand came down on his shoulder. "And where do you think you''re going?" Mikon said cheerfully. Next to her, Umu was rubbing at her cheek and blushing as she glared at the other weaver.


    "Uh, to get some work done?" he said.


    "Now, how is that restful?" Mikon said. "You''ve been outside in the heat all morning. No, you''re coming with us to the work floor. We told Erzebed we''d make sure you didn''t overwork yourself, and how are we supposed to do that when you''re out of sight? They''re looking for you, they''ll find you. You sit down and rest where we can see you."


    "That''s not working," Ryan said.


    "Ryan, you work far too much," Umu said, taking hold of his hand. "It''s not harvest season. You don''t need to be working from sunrise to sunset."


    "Actually, at the rate Shana and Tae are working¡ª"


    "Well, they haven''t caused a harvest today," Mikon said, holding his other hand and¡ªyup, those were her breasts against his arm. Down, boy! Sit! Stay! "Now come on."


    Ryan wanted to object¡­ but¡­ well, he didn''t really want to anyway. "Yes, Mikon. You''re right. I''ll do just that."


    She smirked at him as he let himself be led down to the second level.

 411 - Shana, We Need To Talk

    Shana should have known this was going to happen. After all, the stated¡ªand according to Binder Lori, only¡ªreason the children had been taken to Lorian Demesne was so that they would be safer from dragons and to relieve the strain on River''s Fork Demesne''s food supplies. She had been working with Wizard Lidzuga to specifically change that situation as she had imbued all of the meanings that he placed on crops and trees. With multiple harvests of grain, and more intended to come over the fading end of summer and the coming autumn, her once-demesne would have more than enough grain when winter arrived.


    So of course the children that had been in her care would be sent back now that there was enough to eat.


    She should have known that this was going to happen, that the children would eventually have to leave, and she would be all¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, picking up her flow of thought where it had fallen, and she stared at her own hand in surprise. That¡­ was new. Was the thought of the children leaving her care really so overwhelming? No, she hadn''t gone ''¡­ ¡­ ¡­'' yet from simply thinking of the subject, and it had only occurred during the second iteration of the thought, so it must have been something else related to the topic.


    ¡­


    She would examine the flow of thought to understand what had caused it to break later. She was a Dungeon Binder, even if she was a failed one. A Dungeon Binder could not be distracted or hindered from performing their duties. The difficulties she was experiencing didn''t matter, only the fulfillment of her work. That meant that she needed to prepare the children to go back to River''s Fork to their fa¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. She needed to go inform the children to prepare to go back to their homes in River''s Fork.


    First, however, she needed to apologize to Lord Rian for simply running off while he was speaking to her.


    <hr>


    Her announcement that they would be returning to River''s Fork permanently was met with excitement from the children, and it took some effort to get them to all settle down enough that they wouldn''t be disturbing the surrounding tables too badly. Fortunately, the other tables did not seem too bothered. Those who heard her informing the children seemed approving and congratulated the children on finally being able to go home¡ª


    ¡­


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    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana found herself coming back to her senses as the disruptive emotions receded. "Thank you, Yoshka," she said as her little cousin''s hand mashed her cheek. As much as she''d gotten used to rousing herself by slapping her cheek, Yoshka''s method was much gentler. Even with how her cousin liked to play with her face afterwards¡ªthe way Yoshka was doing now, rubbing Shana''a face in little circles¡ªshe still preferred it. She sat patiently as her cousin played with her face and pulled up the corners of her mouth.


    "There! Now you''re smiling, Shasha!" Yoshka said gleefully.


    "I don''t think it counts when it''s because you''re holding my face, Yoshka," Shana said, and indeed, when the hands holding her mouth in place were removed, her expression returned to its usual smooth expression.


    Her cousin ignored her. "We''re really going home, Shasha?"


    "Yes, Yoshka, you''re going home," Shana repeated patiently.


    "For how long?"


    Shana stared at her cousin for a moment, before she understood the question. "This isn''t going to be just a visit, Yoshka," Shana clarified. "Everyone is going back home to stay."


    "Really?"


    "Really."


    "Really-really?"


    "Really-really."


    "Really-really-really?"


    "Yes, Yoshka, really."


    "So we''ll be living with tota and tyatya and Verik aga¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    "¡ªasha? Shasha?"


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    Shana came back to her senses again with Yoshka''s hand on her cheek. She swiftly picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. "Sorry, Yoshka. Yes, you will be living with them again back in River''s Fork."


    "Really?"


    "Yes, really," Shana said., making a show of looking towards the kitchen. "Oh, look, the food is ready." She turned back to the table. "Koyan, Kayas, get everyone ready to get food."


    Between her and the two sisters, they were able to get the children settled down to only the usual commotion. Thankfully, once all the children had food in their hands they became occupied with eating, although they remained excited.


    After dinner, the children who hadn''t taken a bath before dinner¡ªwhich was nearly all of them¡ªwere taken to correct that deficiency, the clothes they were wearing soaked and wrung to get out the day''s sweat while they changed into another set. Tomorrow, they would need to give everyone''s clothes a proper washing with soap, so that they would at least be returning home in relatively clean clothes. Shana would not let it be said she had been deficient in caring for her charges.


    After the bath, Shana and the two weavers herded the children back to her house so they could start getting ready to sleep. In addition to the few bedrolls some of the children had brought with them, they also had a large mat made from dried strips of ropeweed that Koyan and Kayas had woven. While the mat was thin, it was a layer between the sleepers and the stone floor, and the various blankets laid atop it provided sufficient cushioning.


    Once the bedding was laid out, it was only a matter of waiting for the children to get sleepy enough to finally settle down and finally get some rest. During this time, Shana sat at the table that the Great Binder had made for her and compiled the reports she had been given that day as part of her duties of keeping track of the demesne''s foods and material inventory. While she had been not been very well-practiced when she had first made her agreement with Binder Lori the previous year, Shana had since had several opportunities to practicing her writing skills. Her letters were legible, if blocky and childish, though her numbers were more refined. She had far more opportunity to practice writing numbers, after all.


    Now she was one of the few people in the demesne with a pen¡ªor at least, a pen not made from a beast feather¡ªand paper to help her keep records. She had practiced using the pen, gently ''writing'' on a scrap of leather to make subtle lines barely visible even under bright sunlight, before she had dared using it with ink. Now after weeks of writing with it, she was far more confident in her handwriting. Using the pen, it was also far easier to write using small characters, which allowed her to make optimum use of the sheets of paper.


    It could be said that no one knew the current state of Lorian Demesne better than her. The total amount of meat they had stored in the cold rooms, the fat they had available to turn into soap, the total number of barrels of grain they had, the amount of tubers they had stored as well as other food stuffs¡­ while a few people in the demesne might know how much they had of one or two things they had in storage, Shana knew exactly how much they had at the end of most days, and it was part of her duties to inform Lord Rian of this inventory.


    Shana worked as the children tired themselves out, although she had looked up and greeted Karina and other guests when they had come over to take advantage of the bound tool that Binder Lori had given them. In the confines of her house, the constant refreshing breeze that the bound tool generated was a wonderful luxury that drew no end of visitors with an excuse to stay the night, the blankets and bedrolls that they brought with them providing added cushioning against the cold stone floor. The other children of the demesne came and went as they pleased, and while not everyone stayed the night¡ªeven her most frequent guest Karina only stayed over every other night¡ªthey all had a standing invitation to do so, should they desire.


    By the time Shana had finished with the updates to the day''s inventory, most of the children had settled down and several were curled up on the mat and bedrolls. Koyan had already settled onto the bed, a dozing Yoshka curled up next to her, while Kayas lay on her bedroll on the floor, surrounded by Febe, Adgwyne, Phami and Tazel, who were all curled up around her, the girls all pressed up against the weaver''s sides. Shana placed the stone that glowed with lightwisps inside her bath bucket, arranging her towel to limit how much light shone of the ceiling. Once it was to her satisfaction, she finally lay down on her bed, curling up next to her little cousin.


    "Shasha¡­" Yoshka said sleepily, one eye only half-opening. "Goo'' nigh''¡­"


    Shana gently kissed her forehead. "Good night, Yoshka. You''ll be home soon¡­"


    She began to hum the tune of a marching song that she remembered hearing sung among the militia. Without all the colorful language, references to bellringing, and the promises of bloody violence, and hummed at a slower tempo, the tune was almost appropriate for lulling her cousin to sleep. It was one of the few songs she could use, because most of the rest had been hummed to her by¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    <hr>


    Shana left the comforting darkness of empty, thoughtless sleep, and everything hurt all over again. Tota was dead. Tyatya was dead. Yoshka was leaving to live in River''s Fork, and Shana was going to be left all alone again¡­!


    She lay curled up in bed, unable to fight back tears as she shook. Next to her, Yoshka slept deeply, her elbow partially pressed against Shana''s stomach. She couldn''t lose her! She couldn''t lose Yoshka! She couldn''t¡­!


    Sobbing quietly, Shana curled up in the crowded bed, trying to stifle her voice to not wake anyone, trying to deny the world, deny her pain, deny herself¡­


    Abruptly, the sobbing stopped.


    Slowly, carefully, Shana sat up. Face smooth, she fastidiously dabbed at the tears on her face. Turning, she slipped her tsinelas on to her feet and stood quietly. Walking over to her partially covered bath bucket, she drew out the radiant stone that Binder Lori had given her. With quiet steps, Shana skirted to edges of the room to avoid all the children still asleep, moving until she reached the door. Opening it with care so that it wouldn''t make any nois, she slipped outside.


    The light of the red moon was alone in the sky, bathing the world with the color of blood. It was still far into the middle of the night, and dawn was still hours away, leaving the demesne empty, everyone still in their homes. Bugs flitted back and forth, and out of the corner of her eye she saw little beasts scurrying.


    Shana walked purposefully towards the second bath house, which were on the other side of the row of houses across from hers. The doors into the baths were closed but not barred, and Shana slipped into the women''s baths, closing the door behind her. Inside, the space was dark, the bound tool that provided light from the ceiling deactivated for now. Entering the antechamber with its shelves for everyone''s clothes, Shana merely slipped off her tsinelas, padding across the stone floor on bare feet. The main bathing chamber was empty, the soaking pools drained of water, although the central basin was still full of water in case there were any late-night bathers, or water was needed for any reason.


    The stone in her hands lighting the way, Shana walked carefully towards the central basin. Kneeling down beside the basin, she leaned forward until she could see her reflection. The darkness of the baths and the light in her hands bathed her face in light, and her reflection was vivid on the water''s surface.


    For a moment, she stared down into the eyes of her reflection.


    "Shana," she said softly, "we need to talk."

 412 - You Fall Beneath That Purview

    "I realize that you wish to not be bothered," Shana continued as she straightened, turning her back to the basin to sit down in a more comfortable position, her gaze towards the entrance into the bathing area. "I understand you want to have as little as possible to do with the world."


    In the silence of the empty baths, her quiet words echoed slightly. She laid down the glowing stone next to her, where it could cast its light towards the door without the radiance shining in her eyes.


    "It''s why I am here. It is why I am now managing our affairs and duties. I needed to be a Dungeon Binder, a functional Dungeon Binder, so now I am, barring occasional difficulties. And it is these difficulties I wish to discuss."


    There was silence in the baths again.


    "The disruptions caused when I am overwhelmed are unfortunate but manageable. Therefore, this recent issue that has arisen is concerning." Shana couldn''t brace herself. There was nothing to brace with or against, no physical force for her with withstand. She arranged the sequence of her next words carefully before she said them, or even thought about them. "The children in our care are now free to return to River''s Fork. However, it is not a permanent separation. There will be many opportunities to see them again. This is not a tragic event."


    Shana paused for a moment, even if there wasn''t really a need. She''d known what she was going to say even before the words had left her mouth. She was not one who spoke before she thought, and her mouth didn''t work faster than her brain. A Dungeon Binder couldn''t be so impulsive, after all. Binder Lori wasn''t, her words and actions all clearly well-considered and planned.


    "Yoshka leaving will not mean I will be al¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. "I am not losing anyone. They will simply be absent and residing in another demesne. Yoshka leaving will not mean I will be al¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. "I will not be alone," Shana reiterated. "Karina will be present. Koyan and Kayas will be present, should I allow them to continue their residency in my house after the children are no longer under our care. I will have several opportunities to visit River''s Fork. Yoshka leaving will not mean I will be al¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and Shana shook her head, wincing. For a moment, silence filled the empty baths again, broken only by the sound of Shana''s breathing.


    "I will not drop the subject," Shana said eventually. "I respect the reasons that you are upset, but in this instance, they are unwarranted. Yoshka will not be dead. She will merely be absent from our sight. It will be no different from how she stays inside the dungeon while we are outside assisting with imbuing the crops in the fields. I do not become upset when Yoshka is separated from us during that time. Why are you reacting in this manner now?"


    There was no answer as Shana sat next to the bath''s central basin, her left hand raised where she could see it and slowly flexing the fingers open and closed. The movements were even and regular, not pausing as Shana watched her fingers.


    "It is the same. Yoshka will merely be far from us, just as she was over the winter. I was not upset at being separated from her then. You did not even give the matter consideration when I left River''s Fork to fulfill our agreement with Binder Lori." She waited a moment, but there was only silence. "You know I''m right."


    The silence returned around her. Shana''s eyes were starting to feel heavy again, the stimulation for the brief walk beginning to wear off.


    Carefully, she stood up, shaking her head. She did not want to press the issue in that state. If she went ''¡­ ¡­ ¡­'' again now, she might fall asleep. Picking up her rock to let it light the way, Shana left the empty room.


    In the anteroom with its empty shelves, she paused in the act of slipping her tsinelas back onto her feet. "Because one of my duties is to care for the children from River''s Fork who are here alone," she said. "And you by definition fall beneath that purview."


    She finished slipping on the woven reed footwear.


    "Yes, a Dungeon Binder is not a child. However, I am the one fulfilling the duties of a Dungeon Binder. You are not."


    Holding up the light in her hands she opened the door, sweeping the light and her eyes back and forth to check for chokers and other small beasts before stepping out and closing the door to the baths behind her. Shana made her way back to her house.


    Closing the door behind her as she slipped inside quietly, Shana skirted the edge of the room, and placed the glowing stone back into her bath bucket before returning to the side of the bed. Carefully moving Yoshka''s arm from where it had splayed in her absence, she lay down on her side, staring at her cousin in the dim light until her eyelids were pulled inexorably downward, and she was consumed by the darkness behind her eyes¡ª


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    Shana woke up early, as had become her regular routine, leaving the comforting void of empty, thoughtless sleep, and everything hurt all over again. Tota was dead. Tyatya was dead. Dyadya resented her. Mushka had grown distant. Yoshka was going to leave her, and she would be left all alone¡­


    She lay on the bed, staring tiredly at the dark ceiling, tears starting to run down her cheeks as she took deep, deliberate breaths, hands folded over her stomach. With each breath, she felt magic filling her, enriching the life within her, energizing her thoughts to wakefulness, even if she didn''t want it to¡­


    She closed her eyes trying to ignore the world a little longer, ignore her pain, ignore herself¡­


    Eventually, Shana opened her eyes again, wiping the tears from her face. She had work to do.


    The rest of the day was unremarkable. She imbued the meanings that Wizard Taeclas tamed onto the crops, the two of them continuing to work to accelerate their growth. They had barely managed to harvest a third of the crops in the field, even while using their poles to tame and imbue as deeply into the crops as possible, but even so, Wizard Taeclas and the farmers had calculated that they would still be able to complete harvesting the fields early enough that they could do further harvests, even if not with the full field.


    A portion of the field they''d already harvested had been replanted and was already growing green shoots. Wizard Taeclas had not yet tamed meanings onto the shoots, deeming them too immature, but the farmers were keeping them well-watered. Thankfully, they were not wanting for water despite the heat. The river was as high as ever, and still flowing strong. Lord Rian had told her he suspected that Lori''s River¡ª "Because it''s probably only a matter of time before she starts calling it that,"¡ªwas a very long one, so long that it was possible that its source was somewhere that was receiving rain. Shana supposed that would explain it.


    While it was usually too hot to work outside during the afternoons, there were some exceptions, and laundry was one of them. The presence of the water, the laundry area''s location along the riverbank, and the way the open walls allowed the breezes to pass through meant it was always relatively cool, if humid. Because of the heat, there were usually several people there in the afternoons doing laundry, since the heat meant clothes on the washing lines would be dry well before the afternoon was over.


    This afternoon, it was full of children doing laundry, with various degrees of success. To be more specific, many of them were trying to assist in doing laundry as Shana, Koyan, Kayas, some of the twins'' siblings, and Ateh Mikon helped wash the children''s clothes.


    Shana assisted as best as she could, making sure that the clothes were grouped together by owner. In the beginning, she had tried to get the children involved in washing their own clothes, but that idea had been swiftly exiled from the demesne, since the children''s assistance actually made things take longer. Thanking the women for their assistance always seemed ineffectual as she had nothing to recompense them for their time and efforts. At least this should be the last time, since the children would all be returning to River''s Fork soon, and she would be all al¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    "¡ªdy Binder? Lady Binder? Are you¡ª?"


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. "I am well Koyan, Kayas," she told the two women, who had both stepped forward to try and catch her hand. they had once more been too slow, but she was grateful they continued to make the attempt. "My apologies for allowing my attention to wander. What did you wish to speak of?"


    The two continued to look uncomfortable¡ªmost people would have had difficulty identifying their expressions, and would probably think they simply looked disgusted¡ªbut they didn''t press the subject. No one did anymore.


    "Uh, Lady Binder, what''s going to happen to the two of us?" Koyan said, her finger flicking back and forth to point at herself and her twin. "Since you won''t need us anymore."


    Shana nodded. "I see no reason why you cannot continue to reside in my house," she said. "The same rules will continue to apply, however." The two women relaxed, looking glad that they wouldn''t be asked to go back to live with their parents and siblings. "If that is all¡­"


    Shana watched the two walk back with their sisters to the Dungeon, no doubt to return to weaving, before turning to head back to her house. At this hour, it was empty, which was the best time to sweep the floor. Despite best efforts, having several children coming in every night still tracked in dust. While they managed to limit that dirt around the vicinity of the door at night, it always found a way to spread. Their broom was made of bundles of straw from two harvests ago, something Rybelle was kind enough to make for her. It was better for sweeping than the broom made of beast feathers that had fallen into disuse. With the door closed and her glowing stone serving to provide her with light, Shana began sweeping, starting with the underside of the bed.


    "It has been a day," she said aloud as she moved the bedrolls, blankets and pillows on the bed to her table¡ªthen had to take a moment to make sure the ink bottle was well stoppered and the pen and papers were put away¡ªso she could carefully lift up one side of the bed to more easily sweep under it. "Are you ready to consider this situation calmly and rationally?"


    Shana methodically swept the dirt under the bed, sweeping up some pieces of straw and bits of leaves that had made their may underneath. That done, she carefully set down the bed before beginning to systematically sweep around it.


    "Even after the children leave, I will still have Koyan and Kayas with us. There will also be the children of the demesne to socialize with. Karina will always be present. Even you must recognize that she is a friend. I will hardly be in solitude."


    She carefully swept the corner next to the bed, and dust that had been pretending to be part of the Whispered stone was revealed and drawn out, added to the dirt that would be exiled from her house.


    "When the children return to River''s Fork, I will not be alo¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana came back to her senses, sweat trickling down her brow and broom about to fall from her hand. She let out a sigh as she tightened her grip on the broom once more.


    All the children in her care were good children, but even so, good children still managed to give her difficulties. And this one was being willfully petulant, it seemed.


    "Yes, you are," Shana said absently as she began sweeping the corner next to her table. Thankfully, there was plenty of space under the table, which made her work easy. "Don''t deny it. You are being deliberately petulant about this matter. Admitting you are incorrect about this matter does not invalidate your pain."


    Resisting the urge to activate the bound tool to give herself a breeze¡ªthe moving air would spread the dirt around and make her work harder¡ªShana focused on cleaning her house. She would not have the children under her care residing in a clay pit.


    Even when they were being petulant.


    "Yes, you are."

 413 - In Complete Opposition

    The rest of the day, as well as the next, were without incident, barring the occasional additional episodes of ''¡­ ¡­ ¡­''. No one noticed, as such episodes were common enough to not be noteworthy, like Binder Lori not remembering people''s names.


    Binder Lori had sequestered herself in her rooms again during those days, expanding the boundaries of Lorian Demesne once more. It was a process Shana was naturally curious about, but Binder Lori''s orders had been clear. She was not to learn more about Deadspeaking, and asking about the methodology of expanding one''s demesne surely violated that order. Well, it was only an idle curiosity. Besides, as she was not capable of Whispering, she would no doubt be unable to utilize whatever methodology Binder Lori was utilizing.


    According to Lord Rian, the demesne had grown a little under 17 paces as a result. Combined with all previous growth, the demesne had nearly reached 5 taums in width, or it would after another day or two of Binder Lori expanding the demesne.


    The day after, the Coldhold finally returned from the sea. Shana felt the boat enter the boundaries of River''s Fork Demesne from downriver at about late morning. Once she was certain it was the vessel and not the arrival of the next batch of people from the Golden Sweetwood Company, Shana dutifully informed Uncle Kolinh so that the demesne would be prepared for its arrival. Lord Rian and Binder Lori were both absent, having gone to River''s Fork so that the latter could work on some improvements to the dragon shelter there, and Lord Rian had left him in charge.


    Once she had done so, Shana went to gather the children under her care. With the Coldhold now confirmed to arrive later that day, she set them to preparing to leave. This involved returning borrowed clothes, borrowed toys¡ªor in some cases, getting those toys back¡ªand getting them to put their clothes in their packs properly instead of just pilling them on top of each other. The soonest they would be leaving was the next day, and it was likely when they would be, so she needed to get everyone ready.


    Fortunately, aside from getting toys back¡ªmost of which were either little carved wooden beasts, dolls made from straw and bits of wood, or game boards made from plank scraps¡ªthere were few difficulties. Most of the older children knew how to pack, and could assist the rest. Shana helped Yoshka put her clothes in her leather pack, and managed to find the little wooden beast she had carved for her cousin, which had been very difficult to make given the restriction on her regarding sharp objects.


    Shana had to mediate a few times, as there were disagreements about whether something had been lent or given, and if any of the adults were forced to become involved in the matter they wouldn''t care about the validity of arguments. Fortunately, reminding the arguing children that such involvement would result in the adult in question deciding to take the toy or piece of clothing away from both was usually enough to get them to calm down.


    Most of it was due to issues of forgetfulness, and once someone was sufficiently reminded the item in question was peacefully¡ªmostly¡ªreturned to its rightful owner. In one instance, the borrowed toy¡ªa straw doll that belong to Adgwyne¡ªhad been damaged, and the one responsible¡ªGalef¡ªhad been trying to hide the fact by claiming the doll had already been returned and that Adgwyne must had somehow lost it. Shana had needed to step in directly here, and eventually the truth had come out. As it was a straw doll, Shana had taken it to Wizard Taeclas, who had been able to repair the damage.


    It had resulted in a cooling of relations between the two girls, which was unfortunate, but outside of the purview of their well-being. Their being was well, Adgwyne was merely angry at Galef for damaging her doll and then lying about it. It could well have escalated to a physical altercation, but fortunately Adgwyne decided to prioritize the safety of her doll and left, leaving Galef guilty and miserable.


    "I''m sure this can be mended with an apology," Shana advised. "Later, once she''s calmed down."


    "Well, what if I don''t want to?" Galef cried, stomping away before Shana could reply.


    ¡­


    Despite not having Binder Lori''s difficulties when it came to remembering names and faces, sometimes Shana could understand why the woman would wish to delegate all ''dealing with people'' matters to Lord Rian. Why did people sometimes act in complete opposition to the goals they clearly wanted to achieve?


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    ¡­


    She should probably ask Lord Rian. Perhaps he could explain it to her.


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    At dinner, Shana ate at Binder Lori''s table, as she had been unable to speak to her or Lord Rian when they had arrived. The latter gone on his rounds speaking to the various people who had been left in charge of one matter or another, and the former had taken refuge in her room. Judging by how sweat-soaked the Dungeon Binder had been, she had probably gone to enjoy a bath and a change of clothes.


    "¡ªished our salt supplies, as well as River''s Fork''s," Lord Rian was saying as Shana carefully hollowed out one of Yoshka''s ball-like buns of bread, mixing the excavated food into her cousin''s stew. Once there was a reasonably-sized hollow, she began carefully spooning stew into the bread, making sure there was an even proportion of meat, sliced tubers, and pieces of vegetables. "They also reported no sign of the Golden Sweetwood Company, but then if they actually saw anyone, whoever they saw would have arrived right after the Coldhold."


    Once the bun was filled with stew, Shana carefully handed it to her cousin, who began eating it enthusiastically. Unfortunately, there was more enthusiasm than care, even if Yoshka was no longer as messy as when she''d first seen Lord Rian fill his bread like this and immediately asked Shana to make one for her as well. Shana kept attention of her gaze on her cousin in case she made a mess, and she would.


    Binder Lori nodded as Shana broke off a piece of her own bread and dipped it into her stew. She had to admit that the stew paired with the bread very well, although she was far more restrained than Yoshka. "How much longer before the boat fittings are finished?"


    "The carpenters tell me they''ll be able to start assembling the fittings tomorrow. We''ll be using the hull of your boat two, since you said you preferred using the walkway on the outrigger for getting on and off boats."


    Binder Lori looked confused for a moment as Shana used Yoshka''s spoon to scrape off some of the stew that had gotten on her cousin''s face so it wouldn''t drip down. "My boat two?"


    "Yes. You know, that first boat we had Lidzuga make that."


    "Lori''s Boat Two?"


    "Yes, your boat two, that''s what I said."


    Binder Lori''s unamused stare into Lord Rian''s innocent expression was interrupted by the sound Wizard Taeclas laughter. Unamusement turned to bemusement as the two regarded the woman, who was bent over with one hand on her stomach and another over her mouth, her shoulders heaving in clear merriment. Next to her, Rybelle looked concerned, glancing between Lord Rian and Binder Lori.


    "Congratulations, Rian. Someone thought you were funny," Binder Lori said dryly as Yoshka finished her stew-filled bread, and Shana took a moment to use a piece of bread to wipe Yoshka''s stew-stained fingers to keep her from licking them.


    "That or the joke was so terrible I''ve induced some sort of health issue," Lord Rian said as Rybelle visibly relaxed.


    "Oh, so you admit your jokes are terrible."


    "It depends on the context and what material I have to work with. Breathe, Tae, breathe. Let the air in sometimes."


    The Deadspeaker nodded shakily as she got her laughter under control. "S-sorry. I wasn''t expecting it¡­ sorry¡­" After succumbing to one last attack of giggles, Wizard Taeclas returned to her food with a wide smile on her face.


    "If I may interject, Lord Rian," Shana said as Yoshka started eating her stew with a spoon, "would the Coldhold be available to ferry the children to River''s Fork tomorrow, or will we need to delay the transfer to give the ship''s crew time to rest?"


    He glanced towards Binder Lori, who waved a hand dismissively to indicate he should answer Shana''s question, before turning back to respond. "It shouldn''t be a problem," he said. "I can operate the ship myself as long as I have someone help me with operating the driver and spotting what''s ahead." He looked towards Binder Lori again. "You''ll be doing more work on the reservoir tomorrow, right? Do you mind riding on the same ship as the children, or do you want to take one of the other boats so you don''t have to wait for the children to get ready before leaving?"


    "Why would I need to wait for the children?"


    "Your Bindership, you know how long it take for a ship full of adults to get underway, and that''s when they know they need to hurry. How long do you think a ship full of children will take to get everyone onboard and done with saying their goodbyes?"


    For a moment, Binder Lori was silent as Shana went back to her food, her spoon starting to scrape the bottom of her bowl. Then she nodded firmly. "Prepare a different boat for me. I intend to leave directly after breakfast."


    Auntie Riz sighed. "I guess I''ll start looking for who can come along after dinner, then."


    Lord Rian winced. "Sorry, Riz."


    "Eh, still better than being an officer."


    "If you were an officer, you could order someone else to do it for you," Binder Lori pointed out.


    "¡­still better than being an officer," Auntie Riz repeated firmly.

 414 - I Could Use Some Advice

    As promised, Binder Lori¡ªaccompanied by Auntie Riz, Auntie Mekari, Auntie Brabli, Auntie Vapoli, and Auntie Sintelerra¡ªset off for River''s Fork after breakfast the next day. The Great Binder had on her usual expression of distaste and resignation that she usually did whenever she knew she had to leave the boundaries of her demesne as the boat moved away from the docks.


    The Coldhold wouldn''t be able to follow until much later.


    Despite the preparations Shana had made the children do the day before, they still had to wrap up bedrolls, fold blankets and awkwardly try to find a way to carry pillows. In the midst of all this, they had visitors saying good bye¡ªwhich wasn''t so bad, even if they delayed proceedings¡ªor visitors inviting the children to play because they obviously weren''t leaving yet so they had time, which Shana had to be watchful for, otherwise they might not be leaving that day. Someone tried to bring along the bound tool that moved the air, and Shana had to quickly but firmly insist that it had to stay behind. She had to repeat this four times, and eventually had to carry it around with her so that it wouldn''t be unattended.


    Getting everyone to the Coldhold took time and the combined efforts of herself, Koyan and Kayas all herding the children to make sure none wandered off between her house and the ship. Along the way, the children of Lorian Demesne said their goodbyes, and for some reason several bade Shana goodbye as well, which was very confusing. Fortunately, there was help to be had when they reached the docks. Lord Rian was there, ready to operate the ship as he had promised the night before.


    "All right everyone," he announced cheerfully, a big smile on his face. "Let''s bring all your stuff below decks! You all want to get back home to see your par¡ª"


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    "¡ªasha? Shasha?"


    Shana blinked, and found herself coming back to her senses as the disruptive emotions receded. Yoshka was mashing her cheek so intently it was almost painful and Shana found that she''d stopped moving in the middle of the stone dock. It was painfully hot under her feet, even through her reed tsinelas. "Ah, thank you, Yoshka."


    Her cousin was staring up at her with a concerned expression, and some of the children were looking at her curiously. Lord Rian¡­ he was giving her the same look he always did whenever he saw this happen to her. Resigned and tired and helpless and guilty.


    "You''re crying, Shasha," Yoshka said.


    She was¡ª? Ah. Shana felt the tears. Yoshka''s hand was smearing them. "I''m fine, Yoshka. I just thought of something sad for a moment."


    Yoshka stared up at her, and suddenly the small hand wasn''t touching her face anymore. Shana swayed back slightly as Yoshka suddenly hugged her. She awkwardly patted her cousin on the back.


    Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lord Rian let out a small sigh and shake his head. "Let''s get moving, everyone. If we hurry, we''ll get to River''s Fork before lunch."


    With Lord Rian''s assistance, they were able to get all the children''s belongings into the Coldhold''s lower deck. The belongings¡­ well, they were all dumped into a big pile, but there would be time to sort through it on the journey, since most of the children would be below decks away from the sun, and they''d have little else to do. By now everyone knew better than to run around, after all.


    ¡­


    Despite this, she was fairly certain the children would try running around.


    Unlike when the Coldhold left for a long time, there wasn''t as much time spent saying goodbyes on the docks. Even if the summer finally seemed to be cooling, it was still hot, and the stone under their feet was felt like fire. After one last goodbye, the children of Lorian took off their shirts, girded their skirts, and dived into the water, and Shana had to stop the children in her care from doing the same, lest they lose even more time. She had to relent and allow them to pour water on themselves using one of the Coldhold''s ladles to cool off, but after that it was onto the ship so they could set off, handing the bound tool to Koyan so that she and Kayas could take it back to her house just before Shana stepped on the boat as the last aboard. The children in the water swam back and waved goodbye at them, and the children under her care¡ªthey were still under her care until she could get them to River''s Fork¡ªwaved back as Lord Rian guided the Coldhold backwards out into the river.


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    "You were out for longer than usual back there," Lord Rian said as Shana sat near him. Her hair dripped water down her back, keeping her relatively cool against the heat. "Are you¡­ well, are you as right as you usually are?"


    Down below, the children were going through the messy pile they had made, trying to sort it out again. Between that and the Coldhold''s own bound tool that generated a breeze, they were mostly staying put. Shana had stepped out to give them room, since she didn''t have anything to sort through, and she had made sure to set Yoshka''s things neatly to one side.


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    "No," Shana said immediately. "I''m not."


    Lord Rian nodded, glancing to either shore to ascertain where they were. "Is there anything I can do to help?"


    Shana nearly demurred, but paused. "I could use some advice of a matter that is occupying my attention, if you are willing."


    "Well, of course. I''m a lord. Giving advice to Dungeon Binders is part of the job." He paused. "I can''t guarantee it won''t be bad advice, though."


    Shana nodded. "That is acceptable." She took a moment to consider the phrasing of her question. It wouldn''t do not to hear the answer, after all. "How do you deal with someone no longer being¡­ present?"


    He was silent for several moments. "I try not to think about them," he said quietly. "Get on with my life. Accept that either attempt is doomed to failure. Do it anyway because they wouldn''t have wanted me to just collapse, feeling sorry for myself. Occasionally collapse, feeling sorry for myself." He shrugged. "Basically everything you''re already doing."


    It was Shana''s turn to be quiet. "I have never seen you collapse."


    "Ah, but that''s because I pick my moments," Lord Rian said in a cheerfully tone. He was clearly building up to a joke. "After all, I can''t do it all the time. I''m a lord, I have responsibilities. People to help, things to inspect, Dungeon Binders to advise¡­ the trick is to set aside a regular part of the day to collapse into a ball of sadness, woe, tears, and self-pity. The end of the day is best, since you''re going to go to sleep soon, which will let you recover. Just spend a little time each day letting yourself wallow in your grief." By the end, his voice had turned melancholy. "And now you know why you''ve never seen it."


    "That is painful," Shana said sharply, shuddering and repulsed at the very thought. "Why would you do such a thing?"


    A small smile appeared on Lord Rian''s lips, a lopsided, twisted thing. "Because, Shana¡­ the thing about pain is that if you feel it for long enough¡­ it starts hurting less. When you stub your toe, it feels like you want to cut it off to make the feeling go away¡ªnever mind how that will actually hurt even worse¡ªbut if you give it a little while, it becomes just a throb."


    That¡­


    "And how long before it stops?" she asked quietly.


    "Well, I''m coming on seven years now, so¡­ ask me in another seven years." He paused. "Sorry. Lori never asks about this sort of thing, so I''m a bit out of practice in giving advice."


    Seven years¡­ her insides felt like they were writhing in her chest and clenching around her heart¡­


    "I believe I should be more specific regarding the advice I am seeking," Shana found herself saying.


    "That''s usually best. Makes it less likely for me to give bad advice," Lord Rian said brightly.


    "Thank you, Lord Rian." Lord Rian''s head slumped down. "Why do people sometimes act in complete opposition to the goals they clearly wanted to achieve?"


    "Are you changing the uncomfortably painful subject?"


    "Yes."


    "Then speaking purely in hypotheticals and not naming names, the short answer is because sometimes people are idiots and aren''t thinking clearly," Rian said. "The long answer depends on what a person wants to happen and what they''re doing or not doing to achieve it. Or not achieve it, as the case may be. The simplest answer, however, is usually because there''s a matter of pride involved. People tend to do very contradictory, occasionally self-destructive things to protect their pride, even if they don''t consciously see it as a goal."


    "I¡­ see. What can be done about it?"


    "Not a lot, unfortunately. If someone isn''t thinking clearly, there''s very little you can do to make them. You can point out the flaws in their logic, but unless they''re willing to rethink what they''re doing, they''re unlikely to. That connects to the pride issue. It''s usually pride that makes people unwilling to change or rethink their decisions¡­"


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    They arrived during lunch.


    Normally, or so Lord Rian said, this would mean that there would be no one in sight as they approached the docks, as everyone would be eating. And indeed, through her connection to the demesne''s core Shana could feel the concentrations of life that she knew to be people were all congregated at the dining pavilion. However, she could also perceive someone who had been at the edge of the dome, and who had begun moving towards the pavilion when the Coldhold had come into sight. By the time they were approaching the dock, a crowd of people had appeared to welcome them. Shana knew them all, of course.


    They were the parents of the children she was bringing back.


    It was all she could do to keep the children from simply jumping into the water or running onto the dock as soon as the Coldhold''s outrigger ramp drew close to the platform. She was careful to stay far from the railings at the edges of the ship, lest she have an episode of ''¡­ ¡­ ¡­'' and accidentally be pushed into the water. The envy of seeing the children running to their parents had been a painful constriction in previous instances but not enough to overwhelm her.


    After the recent change, however, it probably wasn''t a good idea to take chances. While she knew that the children would never intentionally harm her, in their excitement they might be a bit thoughtless, and it wouldn''t take much force to accidentally push her into the river. Registering outside impetus would be delayed, but her body''s functions would still continue, so there was a very real possibility that if she fell into the water in that state she wouldn''t know to hold her breath. The pain from water in her nose and lungs might send her back to her senses, but getting out of the water afterwards¡­


    No, best not to risk it.


    And so, while all the children went to greet their parents, speaking excitedly about¡­ well, she couldn''t really hear since she was too far away, Shana went down to retrieve Yoshka''s pack containing clothes, her pillow, and her blanket. Lord Rian was gone, not doubt on his way to meet with the Great Binder or speak with Unc¡ªLord Yllian to fill the Coldhold with fruit to bring back to Lorian Demesne. Master Cottsy had moved to sit in front of the bound tool''s breeze, and nodded respectfully towards Shana when she came down. She answered with her own acknowledgement before she collected her cousin''s effects.


    It took a few moments to find Yoshka again. She was off to the side, being lifted up by dyadya, who was smiling in a way Shana hadn''t seen since¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Her left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen. Dyadya and mushka hadn''t smiled like that in Shana''s presence for a long time as Yoshka reached towards cousin Verik.


    She took a deep breath and turned to put Yoshka''s things on one of the benches of the cabin in the middle of the ship. She still needed to organize having the children retrieve their things from the hold. Only then would her responsibility be discharged.


    Only then would the children no longer be under her care.


    And then¡ªpetulant child¡ªshe would be all alo¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­

 415 - You Won’t Be Alone

    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana''s left arm rose and slapped her cheek hard, and she picked up her flow of thought where it had fallen, then went back to eating her lunch. With her final responsibilities discharged, she had nothing more to do until it was time to return to Lorian Demesne. Around her, lunch was being drawn out as the children ate their meals, which was the same sort of stew and bread that was served in Lorian Demesne, even if the recipe was a bit different. The stew had fruits¡ªpink ladies¡ªinstead of tubers, and the meat used in it seemed to salted and smoked rather than relatively unaltered frozen meat. That made the stew both fruity and salty, while the bread had small bits of fruit in it, giving it a slight flavor.


    It was more flavorful than what she had eaten back when she had been in charge of River''s Fork, although to be fair she had needed to cook her own food, and she had been lacking in time to cook anything more complicated.


    Next to her, Binder Lori and Lord Rian were speaking. "¡ªcould fill the reservoir the hard way, one bucket at a time," the latter said. "After all, there''s no rush. We can take our time filling the reservoir. It''s not meant to be a drinkable supply of water, after all. That''s what the water barrels are for, even if they need to be rotated out every week."


    "Hopefully not simply one bucket at a time," Binder Lori said, but nodded. "Very well. If necessary, I could simply add more water to it in the event of a dragon."


    "I think even with a dragon, there''d still plenty of time to drag two or three barrels worth of water up to the reservoir. Of course, you realize what this means, right?"


    Binder Lori eyed him suspiciously. "What are you talking about, Rian? The reservoir is almost finished. That means the work is almost done. There''s no realization to make."


    "Ah. All right. Then I won''t say anything."


    "Good."


    "Congratulations on being done, then! Now the carpenters just have to finish with the doors, and the dragon shelter will be all¡ª"


    "What should I realize?"


    "Don''t make me answer, it will just make you unhappy."


    "Rian¡­!"


    A sigh. "Fine. Now that there''s a source of bath water, are you going to make baths for men and women?"


    "¡­" This was followed by a drawn out groan as Binder Lori''s head slowly slumped down.


    "I told you it would make you unhappy."


    Binder Lori simply continued groaning.


    "You don''t have to build it. I''m sure people can make their own arrangements for bathing."


    "They''ll get dirty water into the reservoir or flood the floor if I don''t do something," Binder Lori said, looking both distraced and resigned.


    "Should you really be speaking so publicly about your low opinion of the adults of this demesne?"


    "They were the reason they were starving. I have no evidence to prove they could act any more competently when it came to not tainting their own water."


    Lord Rian shrugged, then looked around at the few people who could hear. "You could just¡­ not build baths and let them reap the consequences of their actions?"


    "I have to be here the next time there''s a dragon. I''m not putting up with just trying to bathe wherever."


    "You could just make a bath for yourself. What''s one more door?"


    "I am NOT making a second water reservoir to catch all that bathwater."


    For some reason, Lord Rian stared up at the ceiling. Eventually, he said, "Has anyone ever told you that you keep making things much harder for yourself than you need to?"


    "You and my mothers," Binder Lori practically growled. "Things have to be done properly, why does no one understand that?-!"


    Lord Rian just nodded. "All right¡­ well, do you need me to do anything for you? To make things easier for you?"


    Binder Lori just waved her had in a dismissive gesture. "Just see to loading the fruits onto the boat."


    Her food not eaten, Shana decided to interject. "Is there anything I may assist with, Lord Rian?"


    Binder Lori''s head snapped to look at her, as if the woman had forgotten Shana''s presence¡­ which might actually have happened.


    He glanced towards Binder Lori. "Do you want her to do anything specifically, your Bindership?"


    The Great Binder''s face returned to her usual glare-like expression in repose as she considered Shana. "If you have nothing more to see to here, then you should head back to assist¡­" She looked around the table for some reason, as if she expected something there, before grumbling and reaching down to her belt pouch, which she rifled through and until she drew out a piece of rock. "¡­Taeclas with imbuing the crops in the dungeon farm."


    "There¡­ aren''t anymore crops in need of imbuement in the Dungeon Farm at the moment, Great Binder," Shana said.


    "She wouldn''t have a lot of time anyway, it''s already past noon," Lord Rian pointed out.


    Binder Lori looked beyond the dining pavilion, looking at the angles of the rays of sunlight shining down through the dome, then grunted. She looked towards Shana. "Make yourself useful and be ready to return with us when we leave."


    Shana nodded. "Yes, Great Binder."


    <hr>


    Shana spoke to Lord Yllian to learn about the demesne''s current state and to learn where she could be of most assistance. There''d been some mild injuries with the mine workers that morning. Wizard Lidzuga had killed the dust life around the wound and sealed the skin closed again, preventing infection, but there were still some bruises that he hadn''t been able to heal completely at the moment. Wizard Lidzuga was also doing some maintenance on the houses, but that wasn''t something she could really assist with beyond imbuing, and they already had an arrangement where she imbued any new deactivated meanings that he left behind at the end of the day.


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    She went to the mine to offer healing, using her glowing stone to help her navigate the tunnel, until she reached where the miners were. The mine had extended by another five paces, beams placed every so often to support the low ceiling. While Shana could navigate the tunnel comfortably, most adults would have needed to stoop slightly. She made a note to bring the matter up with Binder Lori. The walls on either side seemed bare of ore, so there would be no loss for the Great Binder to reshape it into something easier to traverse. Shana healed the injured miner¡ªMaster Cymbelry¡ªas well as the other minor bumps and bruises the miners had accrued while they worked but had not resulted in wounds, such as bruises and some aching muscles. There was little she could do about the coughs some of them had, as that was a result of the dust. Wizard Taeclas and Wizard Lidzuga would be able to do more, or even the doctors and medics.


    On her way out of the mine, Shana encountered Binder Lori, who was walking behind a large mass of stone that rolled and flowed like clay ahead of her, her staff in hand and its metal butt cap touching the mass as she guided it with Whispering. The Great Binder''s face was sweating, her expression set in a glare that was probably actually intended to be a glare, and despite the fact she was in the mine she was still wearing her hat. Auntie Riz and Auntie Sintelerra followed behind her, the two nodding to Shana as she fell into step with them.


    The Great Binder dragged the stone over to a pile of mismatched, swirled looking stone, adding the stone to the mass. When she finished, she didn''t so much nod in satisfaction as sigh in relief, turned to go back into the mine, and went stiff when she saw Shana.


    "Great Binder," Shana said, standing with her hands folded in front of her, on the other side of Auntie Riz and Auntie Sintelerra.


    "Binder Shanalorre," Binder Lori said tiredly. "What is it?"


    "Have you examined the sections of the mine that are being actively delved for copper?"


    As Shana explained her observations, Binder Lori''s face became more and more displeased. Once Shana would have been concerned, as it was not unknown for a militia officer to take their anger out on their subordinates. However, that was not a concern with Binder Lori. The only ones she threatened violence on were those who broke her rules and Lord Rian, who admittedly occasionally provoked her. As such, Shana had no fear as she reported what was clearly more work for Binder Lori to do.


    "Your observations are noted, Binder Shanalorre," the Great Binder said in what was almost a sigh. "I''ll¡­ get to it eventually." She waved a hand dismissively. "Get back to work."


    Shana spent the rest of the afternoon trying to obey orders and making herself useful. She helped Wizard Lidzuga perform maintenance on the dome, which involved her claiming and imbuing large quantities of the life of the trees that composed it and allowing the more experienced Deadspeaker to take her claim. This allowed him to have access far larger sections of the dome in a much shorter time than if he had tried to claim the life himself. This allowed him to examine large sections of the dome and tame the necessary meanings needed to maintain the dome''s structure. Dead portions were carefully ejected so they wouldn''t succumb to fungi and decay, and new branches were induced to grow and repair breaks in the dome.


    If nothing else, the dome was in place now, and they needed to make sure it didn''t break down and possibly hurt someone when it fell to the ground.


    <hr>


    When late afternoon neared, Shana perceived Lord Rian entering the mine and moving towards Binder Lori. When they and the aunties who''d been escorting the Great Binder exited the mine and started walking towards the docks, she knew it was time to go. Excusing herself to Wizard Lidzuga, Shana began making her way to the docks.


    "Shasha, Shasha!"


    Her footsteps paused, and she turned to find her cousin rushing towards her, a big smile on Yoshka''s face. "Are you done now?"


    Shana nodded. "Yes, I am done working for the day."


    "So we can go to the baths now?" Yoshka asked eagerly.


    Shana hesitated. "I can''t go to the baths with you, Yoshka," she said. "The Coldhold will be leaving soon, and I need to be on it."


    "You''re leaving?"


    "Yes, Yoshka. I need to return to Lorian Demesne."


    "But¡­ but you said we didn''t have to go back there anymore! You said that we could live with tota and tyatya again!"


    Ah. Shana realized that she had erred at some point. "Yoshka, I said you could live with mushka and dyadya again," she said, doing her best to be gentle. It was becoming difficult, as the distress was arising within her at seeing Yoshka starting to become upset. "However, I have to go back. That''s where I live now¡ª"


    "No! No, I don''t want you to go!"


    Shana had to step back to balance herself as Yoshka hugged her torso tightly, just barely managing to raise her arms to keep them from getting trapped. "Yoshka, please let me go¡­" she said gently, even as thoughts filled her. She could just stay here. Here, she could be with Yoshka. She wouldn''t be alone here.


    The petulant child wanted to stay.


    "I don''t want you to go! Don''t go!" Her cousin did as well


    However, Shana was a Dungeon Binder. And Dungeon Binders fulfilled their responsibilities, despite what they wanted to do. Despite how hard it was. Regardless of whether it made them cry.


    ¡­


    But Dungeon Binders also indulged children. Even petulant ones.


    Shana blinked, and everything hurt all over again. Tota was dead. Tyatya was dead. Yoshka was crying in her arms, begging her not to go, asking her to stay¡­


    The tears she''d been keeping inside flowed down her face as she knelt down and hugged her cousin. She couldn''t lose her! She couldn''t lose Yoshka!


    The two sobbed, simply holding each other.


    She could stay, Shana realized even as she cried. Her clothes, bedroll, and other things were still in Lorian, but she could borrow clothes and share Yoshka''s bedroll, small as it was. She could just stay here, and not go back to Lorian Demesne. Here, she''d be with Yoshka, and Verik, and mushka, and even dyadya¡­


    But Mushka had grown distant from her¡­ and dyadya resented her because she had decided to take her responsibilities as the Dungeon Binder seriously, and not simply be a figurehead for him to rule the demesne through¡­


    And¡­ if she wasn''t taking care of her responsibilities¡­ if she simply did nothing¡­ there would be nothing to distract her. Nothing to keep her from thinking about¡­


    A sob rose up from Shana''s throat as she buried her face against Yoshka''s shoulder. It hurt. It all hurt. Why did everything have to hurt? Why did tota and tyatya have to die and leave her alone?-! Why? She didn''t¡­ She couldn''t¡­ She¡­


    A scream tore itself from her mouth. She didn''t want to feel like this! It hurt¡­ it hurt so much! She wanted it to stop, she wanted it to stop, she¡ª


    ¡­


    Her sobbing slowed, even as her shoulders continued to heave from involuntary movements, and Yoshka continued to clutch her tightly. Her breathing slowed and evened out, and the intermittent spasms slowly vanished, even as Yoshka''s own tears began to calm. Even a child only had so many tears. Eventually, Yoshka''s own tears stilled, although she continued to hold Shana tightly.


    The two stood there quietly, Yoshka''s shoulders still shaking.


    "Yoshka," Shana said, her face smooth, her voice even save for a few involuntary shakes, "I need to go."


    "Don''t want. S-stay," her cousin said stubbornly.


    "Yoshka¡­"


    "Don''t w-want you to go. Don''t want to b-be alone. D-don''t go."


    Shana closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. "Yoshka, you''re not alone. All the other children are here. Nera, Ardlia, Febe, Adgwyne¡­ they''re all here with you. You won''t be alone."


    "Not the same," Yoshka said stubbornly. "Not you. You''ll b-be gone¡­"


    "I''ll come back. I''ll come visit. I''ll only be gone for a little while, not forever. Even if I''m gone now¡­ I''ll always come back. I can come back. And while I''m gone, you won''t be alone. Verik will be there."


    Yoshka didn''t let go. "I don''t want you to go," she insisted stubbornly.


    Gently, Shana picked up Yoshka and began walking.

 416 - I Am Not A Child. I Am A Dungeon Binder

    "There you are," Binder Lori said as Shana approached the Coldhold. "That was quick. We''d just sent someone to go inform you we were leaving." She frowned. "Why are you carrying that child? Is she injured?"


    "She is uninjured, Great Binder," Shana said, adjusting her grip on her cousin. "She simply does not want me to leave." An idea occurred to Shana. "Should we indulge her and have me remain here in River''s Fork?" For all that she knew she had responsibilities to fulfil, if the Great Binder told her she had to stay¡­


    Binder Lori just gave her a blank look, then turned towards Lord Rian. "Rian, deal with this and get us underway as soon as possible. I''ll be downstairs in my room." She turned away, climbing down to the Coldhold''s lower deck.


    The two of them stared after her.


    "Sure, make me the villain who tells sad little girls ''no''," Lord Rian sighed theatrically, shaking his head. He carefully made his way over the outrigger ramp and onto the dock and knelt down. "Yoshka?" Shana turned so that Lord Rian''s face would be in Yoshka''s view. "Hello, Yoshka."


    Yoshka sniffed. "Hello, Lo'' Rian."


    "Could you please let Shana¡­" he paused out of habit, but there was no corrective cry of ''Shanalorre'', "let Shana go? We can''t leave without her."


    Shana felt Yoshka''s face rubbing against her as her cousin shook her head. "Don''t want her to go. Want her to stay."


    Lord Rian nodded seriously, then glanced towards Lord Yllian and made vague looking gestures that involved pointing at Yoshka, then gesturing towards the dome. Lord Yllian nodded, and began hurrying away, presumably to get mushka or dyadya. That done, Lord Rian turned back to face Yoshka. "Have you asked her if she wants to stay?"


    "Want her to stay!"


    Lord Rian nodded again. "She can''t stay, Yoshka. Shana has things she needs to get back to in Lorian. Tell you what, if you let her go, I promise she''ll come back to visit. Right, Shana?"


    Shana nodded. "Yes, Yoshka. I told you, I''ll come back. I''ll always come back. So please, let me go."


    Yoshka''s face rubbed against Shana again as her cousin shook her head in denial. "No!"


    Part of Shana still agreed with the sentiment, still wanted to not be separated from Yoshka. Still felt that without her cousin, she would be all alone. However, the fact she could think such a thing again without losing her flow of thought meant that said part of her was no longer overreacting to the notion, despite the distress that it caused. That the distress was no longer overwhelming also added credence to Lord Rian''s advice about pain becoming endurable given time. Time and subjecting oneself to the pain in question.


    She wondered if she could live like Lord Rian, feeling the full pain of the loss for seven years and still ongoing¡­ who had he lost?


    No matter what she and Lord Rian said to try and convince Yoshka to let go, her cousin wouldn''t move. She just clutched at Shana with single-minded stubbornness, holding as tightly as she could. Shana was reluctant to try and physically remove her, and Lord Rian seemed to be of the same mind, although the way he kept glancing towards Binder Lori''s room at the front of the ship told her he was concerned as to her reaction if he did so. Which¡­ was a valid concern, certainly.


    Shana was relieved when Lord Yllian arrived with mushka in tow. "Mushka," she greeted. "Could you please take Yoshka so that we can leave?"


    "Don''t go!"


    "As you can see, Yoshka doesn''t want to let go of me, and isn''t listening. Could you please take her?"


    "No! No! Tota, Shasha''s going away again! I don''t want her to go!"


    Mushka frowned. "I thought that since we had enough food again, all the children would be coming to live here again."


    "Yes, that is the case," Shana confirmed.


    "Then why are you going back there?"


    ¡­


    "I am not a child. I am a Dungeon Binder, and the Great Binder wishes me to be near the bulk of her population should healing be required."


    Mushka''s expression became disapproving, but Shana ignored it. Mushka Vyshke was one of the few people who still insisted on treating Shana like a child to such a degree that it had interfered with Shana''s ability to properly perform her duties at the time. She had performed them regardless, and mushka had become distant from her as a result¡­ a result that she lamented but had chosen not to correct. As a Dungeon Binder, fulfilling her responsibilities was more important. "You should be at home."


    The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    "Yes," Shana agreed. "That is why I need you to take Yoshka so we can leave."


    "Don''t leave!"


    She raised a hand gently rested it on Yoshka''s head, stroking her hair. "I need to, Yoshka. I promise I''ll come back. But for now I need to leave. It will be like the times that dyadya had to go out on deployment. He left, but he always came back, didn''t he?"


    Yoshka shook her head again. "Don''t leave!"


    Shana sighed, looking towards mushka pleadingly. "Mushka, please¡­?"


    Mushka''s face remained disapproving, but she said, "Yoshka, come here. It''s time for Shana to go."


    "No! Don''t want her to go!" Despite her words, however, Yoshka''s grip loosened.


    It was enough to let Shana kneel down and wrap her arms around her cousin, placing a kiss on her forehead. The urge to hold Yosha tight and not let her go, to keep the two of them together, arose within her. It was simply an urge, however, childish and petulant, if understandable. She knew that even without Yoshka, even with her cousin far away, she would ¡­ she would be lonely, but it would be something she would be able to deal with, as she had during the winter. "I''ll come back soon, Yoshka," she said. "I promise."


    Picking up Yoshka again, she took her to Mushka.


    "No! No! Shasha, don''t go! Tota, don''t let her go! Shasha!"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Yoshka''s cries slowly faded away as the Coldhold moved further and further away from the docks. Shana had sat stoically on one of the ships benches, unable to think of how to respond beyond waving goodbye. There was turmoil within her, but not enough to disrupt her flow of thought.


    Lord Rian looked pained at the cries, and the aunties who had been escorting the Great Binder were all uncharacteristically subdued. The only sounds were the splashing of the waves and the cries of bugs coming from the shore.


    ¡­


    Had Binder Lori ever placed the binding to repel bugs on the Coldhold? Given that they stored food on the ship, as well as bug-vulnerable goods¡ªand would have people residing in it for long periods of time, of course¡ªperhaps it was a matter she should point out.


    Eventually, Lord Rian said, "Shana? Are you¡ªthat is, how are you?"


    Implying that she wasn''t right at all, by any of the usual standards. Shana considered her response. "I am fit to perform my duties and see to my responsibilities."


    "I¡­ see¡­" Lord Rian was silent for a few moments, then sighed. "Shana¡­ whatever Lori thinks, you are still a child. It''s all right to act like it sometimes. That includes being sad when you''re separated from the people you love."


    Shana didn''t reply, simply gazing out into the water, letting the turbulent emotions inside her run their course. They hurt, but she was used to that sort of pain. It was why she was here, after all.


    The Coldhold traveled in relative silence, even Auntie Riz and her friends not speaking save for when Auntie Mekari calling out possible hazards in the water ahead and whether it was time to start turning left or right. They passed beyond the border of River''s Fork Demesne, and once more the life in her body was cut off from the whole, an island unconnected to the awareness that her connection to her core afforded her. She could no longer feel the life that clung to her clothes, and would need to actively reach out and claim to feel the ones on her skin, a product of the dustlife upon her¡­


    Some time after they had left the demesne''s borders, Lord Rian glanced to the side, then leaned towards the open hatch next to him. "Cottsy, could you stop the driver?" he called down. "Riz, could you start stringing the bow, please? I need to go tell her Bindership that the typhon beast is there on the shore."


    Shana turned to look ahead of the boat, in the direction Lord Rian had gestured towards as Auntie Riz grabbed the bowstave among the spears that had been set aside. Sure enough, on the shore of the river was the typhon beast. The burns on its back were mostly scarred over, though not all of the burnt patches had started growing new feathers. As was often the case whenever she glimpsed the beast, it was leaning down and carefully drinking from the river, its long tongue lapping up the water as it took care to not get wet. Some blood was already dripping down its chin as the Iridescence there was washed off by splashes, but it continued on regardless.


    It was probably a simple life, being such a beast. Eat smaller beasts, walk around as one wished, sleep when one wished, be watchful for other beasts that might eat it, although that did not seem to be a concern for the typhon beast. Its sole worry would probably be needing to be on guard for Binder Lori wanting to kill it. Though actually, the beast wouldn''t know that last, so it wouldn''t actually worry about it.


    What an idyllic existence.


    "¡ªould I have the arrow? You''re the one always fondling it. Shouldn''t you know where it is?"


    "It has to be here somewhere! I know I left it on the boat!"


    "Didn''t you take one of the smaller boats to go to River''s Fork? The one we sent back home because you were planning to go back on the Coldhold?"


    Shana glanced towards the hatch to the lower decks as a scream of frustration sounded. The scream was soon followed by a snarling Binder Lori climbing out of the hatch, her staff in hand. She looked around until she spotted the typhon beast along the shore. It had glanced up, seemingly hearing her scream, and seemed to be sniffing the air. Its snout was pointed towards them, and Shana wondered whether it was catching their scent.


    "Do we have any other arrows?" Binder Lori demanded. "Something I can put a binding on that we can throw that far?"


    "Unfortunately not," Lord Rian said as he climbed out of the lower deck as well. "It''s not like we were planning to shoot it with anything other than your magic arrow. Don''t you have something else you can use to hit it?"


    "Nothing that can kill it! I don''t have anything that can send firewisps that far, and any water cutter I make will delaminate well before it will hit!"


    Lord Rian sighed. "Do you want us to try and get closer, then?"


    Before Binder Lori could reply one way or the other, the typhon beast raised its head. Whether it had finally finished its drink or some sort of instinctive caution, it began to turn away, striding away from the river and among the Iridescence-covered trees.


    Binder Lori''s colorful language chased after it.

 417 - Here With Me

    Binder Lori was still muttering colorfully as the Coldhold slid into the dock outside of the dungeon. From the way there were few people coming from the baths or using the showers outside, dinner was in progress, or would soon be. Shana wondered if she should still take a bath before¡ª


    She glanced towards Binder Lori, and decided to take a bath. The Great Binder probably wouldn''t appreciate smelling her sweat.


    The ship docked, Auntie Riz jumping onto land to tie them in place, and the aunties stepped off, followed by an annoyed Binder Lori, who took a moment to kneel at the edge of the dock and splash her face with water. Shana followed after them, turning to head towards her house to collect her bucket and a change of clothes.


    "Cottsy, could you stay with the ship for a bit?" she heard Lord Rian saying behind her. "I''ll come back with some men to get the fruits inside. Just take a break and keep the bugs from getting at them, all right?"


    "Right, Lord Rian. Be quick, all right?"


    She returned to a house that seemed almost barren compared to how it had been for the past two seasons. The piles of bedrolls and packs were gone, and all that remained were Koyan and Kayas'' as well as her own. Her own bedroll was still laid out on the bed¡ªshe hadn''t had time to put away her own effects, as she''d been concentrating on getting the children organized¡ªwith the breeze-making bound tool atop it. That would probably need to be returned to Binder Lori, as there were no more children who needed to be kept comfortable living in her house.


    Shana collected a change of clothes, her towel, her soap, and the rock she used for scrubbing, carrying them in her bath bucket as she headed to the nearby baths. It was empty at this time, and she had her pick of the shelves to place her things. Stripping off her sweaty clothes, she loosely folded them up to carry with her, tucking her soap among them.


    The first splash of cool water was absolutely refreshing, as were the next three, and she enjoyed the feeling of her skin cooling and most of her sweat getting washed away. Taking her soap, she rubbed it between her wet hands to lather it up a little before she started applying the suds to herself. The routine of it all was¡­ not calming. Her insides were still filled with turmoil. Steadying, that was it. The simple activity that didn''t require much thought, only repetitive motions as she passed her soapy hands over her limbs, followed by using her scrubbing rock to dislodge dead skin and the sludge left behind by her sweat.


    As she scrubbed, Shana heard voices from outside. The echoes and multiple voices made the words hard to discern, but the tone was light-hearted, friendly and lightly teasing.


    "¡ªto ringing bells and clappers now, Riz?" she eventually heard a muffled voice say.


    "I''m starting to see the appeal," most-likely Auntie Riz said. "Also, I''m going to kill Mevt when I next see her."


    "Ah, you finally figured out how she colored you. Better late than never, I guess."


    "You all knew?"


    "What, you think you''re the only one she colored? Why do you think she never made sergeant? "


    "Forget Mevt! Who''s better at ringing, Lord Rian or¡ªoh, colors!"


    "What''s the ma¡ªoh, colors."


    Shana finally looked towards the entrance of the baths. "Aunties," she greeted, even as she continued to try and reach between her shoulder blades with her scrubbing rock. While she could touch that far back, there was a spot she couldn''t properly scrub with the rock no matter what angle she tried to bend her arms to get at it from. "Could one of you assist me? I can''t reach my back"


    Auntie Riz quickly volunteered, which put an end to the conversation, and finally scrubbed that spot that Shana kept missing. After scrubbing with her rock, Shana lathered herself one more time before pouring water over her head, shoulders and back to finally wash it all off. She would have to wash her hair soon. It was getting too hot and too oily.


    Now that she was finished with herself, she set about washing her clothes. Laying her dress on the floor, she poured water on it, then started folding and pounding in on the stone. While it wasn''t as effective without soap, it was sufficient to get most of the smell of sweat off, and helped cut down on how much laundry she had to do. Her loin cloth followed, and that received some soap, as well as a thorough wringing to get as much water out as she could. That would be enough for her to wear it after her bath.


    With everything finished, she folded the wet dress, took her rock, soap and loin cloth, and left the bathing area to dress. After leaving her bath bucket in her house so that her soap and rock would dry, Shana hung her wet dress on the drying line she and her neighbors shared for drying their clothes like this, and headed down to the dungeon to eat.


    At the docks, she could see Lord Rian and some men still in the process of unloading all the fruits from the Coldhold. They were moving quickly and efficiently, carrying reed baskets and sacks of various fruit. Lord Rian was among them, carrying a basket himself. He would probably be delayed to dinner, as he would still need to have a bath to make himself presentable. She let the men carrying fruits enter the dungeon first before trailing in after them.


    The dining area was already full, and many people were in the middle of eating as others stood in line to collect their food. Binder Lori, her hair still damp, was already well into her meal, as were Mikon, Umu, Wizard Taeclas and Rybelle. There were two spare bowls of stew and bread, for which Shana was glad. No doubt they were for her and Lord Rian, meaning she didn¡¯t need to line up. She slid into place on the shortened bench that had been set at the table for her and Yoshka¡¯s benefit after Binder Lori had gotten her chair. The table behind Binder Lori was occupied by other people now, and Koyan and Kayas seemed to be eating with their family


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    ¡°Ah, Shana¡­lorre, there you are!¡± Wizard Taeclas said after glancing at Binder Lori. She¡¯d taken of her head cloth, so the Great Binder must have already said her name at least once recently. ¡°Good evening!¡±


    ¡°Good evening, Wizard Taeclas, Mistress Rybelle¡± she replied. "I apologize for my absence today. Tomorrow I should be able to resume my usual duties in assisting you with imbuing the crops."


    "That''s all right, Shanalorre," Wizard Taeclas said. "It was nice to have a little break to see to the vegetables."


    Shana nodded, turning to the other women on the other side of the table. ¡°Good evening, Mistress Mikon, Mistress Umu. Auntie Riz will be with us soon, I believe. Lord Rian will be more delayed.¡±


    ¡°We know, Lady Binder,¡± Mikon said, her food noticeably untouched. ¡°Nothing to do but wait, I guess.¡± Next to her, Umu was poking at her bowl, visibly debating whether to start eating.


    The stew was as hearty as always¡ªactual hearts excluded¡ªand there seemed to be more mushrooms than usual. She supposed that meant there had been a harvest today while they¡¯d been out. She and Wizard Taeclas had yet to utilize Deadspeaking on the demesne¡¯s mushrooms, as it was not considered an efficient use of their efforts, so the mushrooms were growing at their natural rate.


    Shana ate her dinner quickly, listening as Lord Rian and Binder Lori spoke about what else was needed to be done for River''s Fork''s dragon shelter. There was talk of doors and more excavation, and Binder Lori did in fact mention the need to seal the mine against water. Those matters were none of her affair, as she couldn''t really assist with anything there beyond imbuing the wood with life should Wizard Taeclas assist in fusing any wood together.


    Without Yoshka to tend to¡­¡ªshe shook her head¡ªShana was able to eat without interruptions. When she finished, she looked to the side out of habit, but there was no one there.


    ¡­


    She shook her head again and picked up her bowl, plate, cup and utensils to take them to where they would be washed. After that, she headed into the cold pantry where the meat and fruits for the following day were placed to warm enough to be handled, between which were jars of water to draw in the cold. Shana tested the jars until she felt one that was fairly cold in her hands, taking it to bring back to her room. The door of the pantry was already shutting behind her before she realized that there would only be her, Koyan and Kayas at the house tonight. She had collected the jar out of habit, as Yoshka and some of the children who were¡­ who had been in her care had not yet tired of the novelty of drinking cold water.


    ¡­


    "Shana?"


    Shaking her head at the mention of her name, Shana turning towards the familiar voice. "Good evening, Karina," she greeted.


    "What are you doing here? I thought you were going back to live in River''s Fork!" her friend said.


    ¡­


    Why did people keep thinking that? The misconception was surprisingly widespread. "No, I''m staying here," she answered. "Are you here to get cold water?"


    Karina nodded. "It''s for when Malli and Siithia wake up thirsty in the middle of the night. If you''re here, does that mean Yoshka and the others are going to be back?"


    Shana shook her head. "No, they have returned permanently, since River''s Fork is now producing enough food to be able to feed them without issue.. Here, take this." She handed over the jar she was carrying. "I took it before I realized I didn''t need it. I''ll just get a warmer one. Without the children, there''s really no call for cold water in my house."


    "Oh, thank you. So, you''re all alone at your house again?"


    Shana shook her head. "Koyan and Kayas are still living with me. It''s the least I can do after all their assistance, and I have the room." She turned and opened the pantry again, taking one of the jars nearest the door. Those were always the warmest ones¡ª


    She heard rapid footsteps behind her, and when she turned around with a jar in hand, it was to see Karina rushing away. Shana blinked in confusion. "Good night then, I suppose?"


    The Dungeon Binder hefted the jar of water in her hands and headed back towards her house.


    Everything was dark when she opened the door, insufficient light passing through the paper screens from outside, requiring Shana to draw her glowing rock from her belt pouch and place it on the table to illuminate the room. They would probably have to keep those closed full time from now on. With no more children residing in the house, Binder Lori would no doubt allow the binding that kept bugs out of the building lapse, as well as remove the breeze-making bound tool. There would be no more need for them.


    Placing the jar of water on the table next to the rock¡ªthey should probably see about getting at least one cup, since there were only three of them in the house now¡ªShana got started laying out her bedroll on the bed. She had just finished covering it with her blanket¡ªit was far too warm even for the thin sheet, and her comforter had been set aside so that the down stuffing wouldn''t become squashed down¡ªwhen there was a knock on the door.


    She looked towards the entrance expectantly, waiting for Koyan and Kayas to step in, but the door remained closed. Instead, the knock sounded again. Huh?


    Placing her pillow on the bed, she went to the door and opened in.


    Karina stood there, holding a small pillow, a bath bucket and a filled pack. "Can I sleep here?" her friend asked.


    "I¡­ don''t see why not¡­" Shana said, slightly confused, but stepping aside to let the girl enter. "We have plenty of room now. Make yourself at home." Karina stepped inside, placing her pillow on the bed and her pack bucket along the wall before turning back towards Shana. To Shana''s surprise, she suddenly found herself being hugged. "Karina? Why¡ª?"


    "Yoshka''s gone back, right?" Karina said. "I didn¡¯t want you to be lonely because Yoshka''s away."


    Shana''s heart clenched slightly, but she maintained her composure. "I am not alone. Koyan and Kayas are here with me."


    "And now me!"


    "¡­ and now you, yes."


    Karina smiled at her, but it was a strangely sad expression. "I''ll talk to inay and itay, and ask them if I can sleep here for a while until you feel better."


    "¡­shouldn''t you ask me if you can sleep here first?"


    "I did ask. You said ''yes''."


    Ah. She had, hadn''t she? Well, actually she''d sai¡ª


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Shana blinked and found her face pressed against Karina''s shoulder. Tears were flowing down her face, and her shoulders were heaving as Karina stroked her hair.


    "It''s all right," Karina said softly. "Everything is going to be all right. I''m here, and tomorrow night everyone else is going to be here too. You''re not going to be alone."


    ¡­


    Shana closed her eyes again and let herself cry.

 418 - Shared Transition

    Having Karina sleep over that night had been a comfort. While it didn''t make the ache of being separated from her cousin again go away, it was¡­ nice¡­ to have her friend nearby. She had wanted to apologize to Koyan and Kayas, as it meant that one of them would need to sleep on the floor again, but they had taken one look at Karina and had actually looked relieved. They''d even given the girl a nod of approval as Koyan added her bedroll to the bed and Kayas had swept the floor before laying hers out on it. The two didn''t comment on her reddened eyes.


    The bed was a bit more cramped with Karina occupying it with her instead of Yoshka¡­ but the three of them still managed to fit without too much trouble. Shana found herself occupying the middle position on the bed at Karina''s insistence. While she had no real objection to sleeping there¡ªif Karina wanted to sleep on the outside of the bed, than as host Shana would indulge her¡ªthere was something about that particular berth that bothered her, and she couldn''t articulate why.


    Shana lay there, trying to sleep, eyes closed as she waited for slumber to overcome her, as she let her idle mind turn over the question. What was it about lying between Koyan''s warm mass to her right and having Karina lying on their side with one arm hugging Shana to her left that brought about a strange feeling of both comfort and disquiet¡­?


    It was only as she was falling to the inexorable gravity of sleep to drown in the darkness behind her own eyes did Shana realize what it was about the position that bothered her.


    Lying there felt like sleeping between tota and tyatya.


    Perhaps it was because of her muddled thoughts as she slipped into unconsciousness, but there was no pain at the realization, only a warm peace followed by blackness as she fell into the da¡ª


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next day, Shana woke up and left the comforting abyss of empty, thoughtless sleep, and for a moment she was warm.


    And then she remembered and everything hurt all over again. Tota was dead. Tyatya was dead. Dyadya resented her. Mushka had grown distant. Yoshka had left and wouldn''t be coming back¡­


    She lay on the bed, staring tiredly up at the familiar ceiling and taking deep, deliberate breaths, hands folded over her stomach. With each breath, she felt magic filling her, enriching the life within her, energizing her thoughts to wakefulness, even if she didn''t want it to¡­


    Shana closed her eyes, trying to ignore the world a little longer, ignore her pain, ignore herself¡­


    Eventually, Shana opened her eyes. She dabbed at her face, but it was dry. She''d already shed her tears last night.


    Next to her, Karina still slept, every breath whistling against the side of Shana''s head, the girl''s arm and now a leg still draped over her. She tried to get up, but quickly realized she wouldn''t be moving without waking up her friend.


    Carefully, so as not to disturb Koyan sleeping next to her, Shana began to nudge her friend awake so she could get up.


    She had duties, after all.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    That night, Karina had slept over again, and this time she had invited other children to join her. Shana should probably have been annoyed that Karina has inviting people to her house, but after all this time, the sounds of children in the confines of those stone walls as she was getting ready to sleep was comforting to hear. Not everyone stayed¡ªnot many had their own bedrolls, and there wasn''t enough for them to share with someone else now¡ªbut two or three would sleep over very other night or so, even if the reed mat and a pillow of some sort made from a pack was all they had to lie down on.


    On the third night of this, Shana had laid down her bed roll on the mat with them, letting Koyan share the bed with her sister. It had seemed only right to join the children, since they were staying for her benefit¡­ well, ostensibly for her benefit. All the children who came in to stay in her house always walked towards the breeze-making bound tool and stuck their face close to it to feel the breeze before joining everyone else on the reed mat.


    Even with the mat and her bedroll, the stone floor was hard, and Shana was both glad that she''d had Yoshka¡­ sleep on the bed and ashamed she hadn''t tried to get more padding for the children under her care. She could have gotten some of the straw from the first harvest of the year, at least, and Binder Lori would likely have authorized it.


    With each passing day, Shana expected Binder Lori to request that the breeze-making bound tool be returned, but the order never manifested. Lord Rian continued to supply her with the necessary wispbeads to utilize the device. The thought occurred to her that perhaps she should bring up the subject, but if she did, she might be ordered to return the bound tool.


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    Well, as long as she hadn''t been told anything to the contrary, Shana supposed she had no reason not to keep using the bound tool. The children who spent the night in her house certainly enjoyed it, and she was willing to admit that it felt much more comfortable going to sleep with it keeping the room relatively cool.


    ¡­


    If Binder Lori still hadn''t made mention of it when the season turned, Shana would bring the matter of the bound tool up herself. She wouldn''t want Binder Lori to think she was defying her or anything.


    And by then the weather would be cool enough the bound tool wouldn''t be needed anymore.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The conversion of Lori''s Boat Three into a mobile work shed had taken a bit longer that had been estimated, and Lolilyuri had also been too busy to really check up on it before now. After expanding her demesne for two days, she''d gone back to River''s Fork Demesne to continue excavating the water reservoir, bathing area, and catch basin for the bath water, followed by another two days of expanding her demesne before going back to finally finish the excavation. The doors had also been finished by then, and she''d installed them to let her block off her sleeping alcove and the reservoir. It was only after another two days of expanding the demesne¡ªwith Rian cheerfully predicting that today''s expansion will be what finally pushes the demesne to being five taums in diameter¡ªthat she''d finally remembered to check on the boat.


    It was a little bit before dinner, and Lori looked at the boat dubiously, with its higher sides that were supposed to keep out splashing water out of the boat. Wooden poles had been mounted vertically on the boat''s corners, at the end of which lengths of cleaned and polished bone had been inserted, fused to the wood with Deadspeaking.


    Lori had been expecting those features¡ªwell, not the bones, she had thought she would have to soften stone and wrap it around the poles¡ªbut those were not the only things that had been added to the boat.


    In the middle of the boat, solidly slotted into a plank that ran laterally above the bottom of the boat, was a chair. It was¡­ was a very strange chair. It consisted of a plank that was inserted into a slot in the lateral plank at an angle, with another shorter length of plank joined to it with a cross lap joint. The latter plank supported the seat, another wider plank which was also cross lapped to the first plank and angled slightly upward. The three pieces of wood somehow came together to make a chair-like shape.


    In front of the chair were a pair of trestles that slotted into holes on two more lateral planks¡ªno, wait, that wasn''t a plank, that was a beam, and on a closer look the ''plank'' the seat was slotted into was also a beam¡ªthat had been added to the boat, forming legs for a tabletop that was absent, although Lori recognized the dimensions.


    "Well, what do you think?" Rian asked. His voice was as cheerful as usual, although this time it seemed to be genuine.


    "Why is one of the outriggers gone?" Lori said. Indeed, only one side had an outrigger extending from it.


    "Because after testing and deliberation, we''ve ascertained that our riverboats only need the one," Rian said.


    "Why did all the other before have two, then?"


    "Well, the others before this consisted of your original boat, your original ice boat, and the Coldhold. We had to use two outriggers on the first because we couldn''t cut into the boats hull to secure the beams need for the outriggers, so laying them on top and pinching them into place was the best way to mount them. If we''d done only one outrigger, the wood would have popped off. However, we have Deadspeakers now, so we have more building options available to us."


    "And those options mean we only need one outrigger?"


    "Pretty much. We have better ways to secure the outriggers to the boats now. Don''t worry though, we took into account the trouble you have getting in and out of the boat because of the high sides and made those little steps. See?" He pointed.


    Lori turned her gaze in that direction, and sure enough, little steps had been built into the inner sides of the boat, interrupting the bench-like seats that ran along the long sides of the vessel. Ah. She''d been wondering what those breaks in the wood were. The steps were positioned opposite each, with one lined up with the ramp to the outrigger. There was a bone-topped pole next to each of the steps, likely meant as a handhold while climbing up or down. "And the chair?" she said.


    "Well, we thought you''d be more comfortable in a proper sitting position when you get to work making beads rather than having your legs folded up. When the trestles and chair are pulled out, the planks can act as more bench seating. The trestles are sized to fit your bead-making table, and we made sure it was a snug fit. You don''t have to worry about your table sliding around." Rian grinned. "Go on, try it out. We can still to adjust it if it''s too short for you."


    "What do you mean ''we''?" Lori said as she tentatively used the steps to get down, one hand on the pole next to them to steady herself.


    "Hey, I''ll have you know I actually did help with making the chair," Rian said.


    "¡­ you designed that strange thing, didn''t you." It wasn''t a question.


    "Well, we needed to make a chair in a hurry, and this was actually the fastest way to do it. And I''ll have you know it''s actually comfortable and easily disassembled for storage."


    Lori gave the alleged chair another skeptical look, then sighed. Well, while Rian might have designed it¡ªor more likely just had the idea for it¡ªthe carpenters were no doubt the ones who had built it, and they wouldn''t have put it here if it was likely to fall apart when she sat on it! If nothing else, she knew her carpenters were too capable to make that mistake!


    The boat shifted under her as she walked towards the chair. Tentatively, Lori sat down, leaning back to rest on the upright plank.


    ¡­


    Huh. It¡­ wasn''t immediately uncomfortable, which was a good sign. And while she couldn''t be sure, the rocking of the boat didn''t seem as obtrusive from this position¡­?


    Shaking her head, she stood up. "I suppose it''s usable," she said. "I''ll take it out tomorrow." She gave Rian a piercing look as she carefully climbed back up the steps¡ªvery helpful¡ªand back onto the dock. "You did remember to put the jar outside of the demesne yesterday, didn''t you?"


    "Yes, your Bindership," he said. "I lit a fire near it and everything, so it should have Iridescence all over when you go get it tomorrow."


    "And did you¡ª?"


    "Yes, I put it at least twenty paces away from the edge of the demesne so it wouldn''t end up inside the demesne after you expanded today! I told you that already!"

 419 - Sweet Talk

    "And the demesne is now officially five taums in diameter," Rian announced at breakfast the next morning.


    Lori nodded, a bland look on her face. "Wonderful. And how much more surface area does that add?"


    Rian paused, then sighed. "Wait a moment, I need to write this down," he said, grabbing his bone tablet and burnt stick. "Let''s see, three and a bit¡­"


    Lori waited patiently as Rian hunched over his tablet, muttering to himself.


    "All right!" he declared. "We started with roughly twelve and a half square taums of surface area. With the demesne''s growth, we now have an additional seven square taums of surface area. Well, roughly that much. That''s not counting hills and things, so most likely less."


    "I''m surprised you didn''t have the answer ready to hand, " Lori commented as she ate breakfast. "Isn''t this a number going up? You''re fond of keeping track of those, are you not?"


    "Normally, yes," Rian admitted. "But I hate having to calculate circles. Please never make me do spheres. My brain will melt and leak out of my ears."


    "Noted."


    "I mean it. If you ever ask me to calculate anything beyond a sphere''s diameter, you will get absolutely nothing. I''m warning you now so you''re not surprised if it happens." Her lord paused. "If we ever need anything like that, we can probably bother Lidzuga. He''s an alknowlege boy, he probably knows the formulas for it."


    "And if he doesn''t?"


    "Then if the calculations are urgent enough, we either send the Coldhold to Covehold Demesne to hire a computer, or try to reconstruct the principles of spherical geometry from first principles."


    "I know a computer," Taeclas¡ªit said so on her head cloth¡ª volunteered. "I could give you directions to where to find him! Tirdon''s very good with numbers, he does all sorts of sums."


    Rian held out a hand as if physically presenting the Deadspeaker''s idea. "There we go."


    "Also noted."


    "Good morning, you¡ª"


    "No, no, I don''t think that counts as her talking to you," Rian hastily interjected.


    "It doesn''t?" When Rian shook his head, Taeclas let out a sad sigh.


    The woman was very strange. But then, the sort of insanity that resulted in someone naming plants likely resulted in more than one cognitive aberration.


    And speaking of which¡­


    "Taeclas¡ª"


    "Good morning, your Bindership!"


    "Yes, yes, good morning to you too," Lori sighed, waving her hand dismissively.


    "Wait, how come she gets a good morning and I don''t?"


    She stared at Rian and the indignant expression on his face. "Are you serious?"


    "No, I''m Rian. And I''ve been your lord for a year, I''ve greeted you good morning plenty of times, and you''ve never greeted me ''good morning''! And I was fine with it, you were like that with everyone, but now Tae merits a ''good morning''? Why don''t I get one?"


    Lori didn''t know if she wanted to sigh or roll her eyes. Unfortunately, it didn''t seem like she could do both.


    ¡­


    But she tried anyway, sighing as she rolled her eyes.


    ¡­


    No, no, that felt wrong somehow, she shouldn''t do that again. It wasn''t nearly as cathartic or feel as emphatic as either one individually.


    So she just sighed again. Ah, much better. She could feel her weariness and exasperation passing through the breath she let go. "Good morning, Rian," she said flatly. "Now be quiet." She turned back toward Taeclas. "How is the sweetgrass progressing? How long before it can be harvested?"


    "Honey is doing great, your Bindership!" Taeclass declared cheerfully. "She''s rooted properly and growing again now. I''ve already taken some cuttings, and Sweety, Sugar, Treacle, Syrup, Candy, Tasty, Pastry, Dessert, Meli, and Vov are growing nicely!"


    ¡­


    Oh, glittering rainbows, the woman had named more of them!


    On the other side of Umu from Taeclas, Rian had a hand over his mouth with his head turned away slightly, while on the woman''s own wife had an exasperated but affectionate expression on her face again. Lori shook her head, deciding to ignore it and press on with her inquiry.


    ¡­


    She really should just press on¡ª "Why Vov?" she asked, even as she scolded herself for asking.


    "I ran out of names, so Vov it was."


    "H-how about ''Cake''?" Rian suggested through his hand.


    "Cakes aren''t very sweet, though? They''re like dried bricks with bits of fruit in them?"


    "Then I have nothing. The only other sweet thing I can think of is lead, and you shouldn''t eat lead."


    The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    "No eating lead," Lori declared. Then she shook her head. No. not more losing her flow of thought. "How long before the sweetgrass is read to harvest?"


    "Oh, it won''t be ready for a while your Bindership, even with Deadspeaking," Taeclas declared cheerfully. "You can''t just grow sweetgrass and then harvest like grains, it needs to mature and gather sugar inside it. Even with meanings to accelerate the processes, you still need time or else the poor dears will start hurting themselves. Though I think that with some balancing the meaning we''re using on the fruit trees right now will work for them. Sweetgrass is meant to be grown warm, so they should be more tolerant of heat than the fruit trees."


    It would take that long? "It would take that long?"


    "Oh, yes," Taeclas continued cheerfully. "And we wouldn''t get much per stalk of sweetgrass. Maybe only fifty grains worth of sugar and meli per pressed stalk." She titled her head. "Though that might be enough to make meli bread on holidays? But even when we have the sweetgrass to harvest, I don''t think we have the means of actually refining it into sugar and meli? We don''t have any sort of press to squeeze out the sweetgrass juice or boiling vats to reduce that juice."


    Lori stared at her. Then she slowly turned that flat gaze towards Rian.


    "What are you looking me like that for? I didn''t know we needed all that either," he said.


    She continued staring at him for a moment, then turned back to Taeclas. "So, we will not be able to harvest sugar from the sweetgrass for another year?" she said.


    "At the soonest," the Deadspeaker confirmed. "Though it will probably be longer than that. Even when the dears I''m raising now are fully grown, that''s still not going to be a lot of sweetgrass juice. To be able to provide enough sweetgrass juice so that everyone here¡ªand in River''s Fork, I suppose¡ªcan have a bun of meli brown bread for every holiday and holinight of the year, I''m going to need to grow much more sweetgrass. And to do that, I need to raise more cuttings and have more space to grow them."


    Lori considered. "Then we will set aside the topic for now and revisit it at a later date. Preferably after we have reconfigured the arrangement of our crops for optimum efficient application of Deadspeaking."


    "We should probably rotate them too," Rian said. "The soil is still pretty fresh, but best to start getting into the habit now."


    Lori blinked, turning towards him. "What?"


    "Rotating our crops," he said. "In fact, we should probably clear a bit more land so that we enough field space for three or even four crops to rotate."


    No, the response still made no sense to Lori. "Rian, what does it matter which direction the crops are facing on the fields?"


    Rian stared at her. "I thought you used to work in city farms?"


    "Yes? What does that have to do with anything?"


    There was silence for a moment. "All right, I''m going to try to explain this as simply as I can," Rian said. "You know that we have to fertilize soil, right?"


    "Of course I do."


    "Right. Well, while dried waste helps, it doesn''t replenish everything that crops draw from the soil¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    By the end of breakfast, Lori knew a bit more about farming because of Rian and Taeclas'' explanations¡ªwhich were surprisingly easy to understand¡ªand finally understood why the crops on city farms regularly changed places. It unfortunately meant she foresaw vegetables in her future, which¡­ wasn''t appetizing to think about. Maybe she could order the ones cooking to slice them up very small and put them to the side where they were easily avoided, or maybe not put them in at all¡­


    The farmers and Rian¡ªand now Taeclas, she supposed¡ªhad obvious been preparing for this for some time, though. There were crops in her dungeon farm that were being grown so that when harvested they''d have enough seeds to sow them outside in their fields. She''d seen them when she''d been down at the third level, but while many had seemed familiar to her, she hadn''t thought to consider what they were for and had simply assumed they were meant to become food at some point.


    Which, to be fair, was accurate. All those crops were technically edible, it was just that it was unlikely they would be eating them, at least directly. Two of their crops, nonconseeds and tressflowers, were being grown so they could press it into oil for soap, lubricant for tools and machinery. So, no eating.


    It was an informative discussion she was sure to remember in future¡ªmuch more memorable than boring, unimportant things like names and faces¡ªas she headed up to her room to collect her bead-making equipment. Her leather sacks for holding beads, the new funnel to make pouring them into the sack easier that had used to be a bucket made of bone before she had repurposed it, her bead-making table, her table''s trestles¡ªno wait, she didn''t need to bring those, or her stool either¡ªand her copper tweezers. She was also bringing a bone tablet, as she needed a place to anchor bindings before she amalgamated them into beads.


    The load was one she was used to carrying down from her room, and no one barred her way as she headed towards the docks to lay everything down on the boat she would be using. Even with the modifications, there was plenty of room still for all the equipment, and they hadn''t even needed to disassemble the strange three-plank chair.


    "Ah, there you are, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. "I wasn''t able to ask you to do this last night, since this was still being finished. Could you cover this in rock?" From the curves of the hook-like arrangement of wood, she was reasonably certain that the implement had been Deadspoken rather than shaped with manual woodworking.


    Lori wanted to sigh and complain that this was something that Rian should have informed her of yesterday¡­ but she''d been tired from expanding the demesne yesterday, and would likely have put off the need to do say anyway. "You should have informed me about this yesterday," she complained as she accepted the wooden anchor.


    "You were tired from expanding the demesne yesterday," Rian said. "I didn''t want to bother you then."


    "So you''re bothering me now?"


    "Yup!" was the cheerful reply.


    All right, she''d give him that.


    "Don''t we already have an anchor for the boat? I distinctly remember making one for each of the boats we have."


    "Yes, but given you''d want this boat relatively stationary, I thought two anchors would be better. You wouldn''t want to accidentally drift into the demesne and have all the Iridescence you''ve gathered disappear, do you?"


    She supposed that was a valid concern when it came to working on a moving platform. "Fine," she said. "Come with me, I''m not carrying it back by myself."


    Rian followed her, carrying the wooden anchor, to the stone stockpile, which was still huge now. If she hollowed it out, she''d have a decent-sized house, and still have enough stone to do it two or three times more. Well, the last house would need to be built manually on her part, but still. Softening some stone from the pile, Lori covered the curving arms and the main shaft of the anchor in stone to protect it from the water, and added a large mass of stone to where the two lengths of wood met so that part of the anchor would sink first as well as insuring that the anchor would sink.


    The resulting weight was heavy enough that Lori took hold of one of the anchor''s curving arms and helped Rian carry the anchor back to the boat. The stone dug into her hand, but between the two of them it was easier to haul about. Once they returned, Rian set about securing a rope to the anchor, while Lori began claiming and binding the darkwisps beneath her clothes. Drawing them out as she imbued them, she anchored the stream of opaque blackness to the pieces of bone on top of the poles on the corners and sides of the boat.


    As she anchored the binding of darkwisps, the blackness spread between the poles, until there was a black ceiling above her. It had no sheen, reflecting nothing, a pure blackness of the sort only to be found in a completely sealed room. The binding was completely immaterial, and didn''t stir as Lori passed her hand through it, although the binding moved as the posts it was anchored to swayed with the movement of the boat. The air passed through it easily, and water would as well, she knew. It completely blocked out light, however, which would greatly cut down the heat coming from the sun¡­


    ¡­when it was higher up.


    ¡­


    She might have to adjust the binding when she got to her location.

 420 - A Very Strange Place

    All right, Lori was willing to admit that the strange three-plank chair was actually fairly comfortable.


    Sitting on the chair, she was able to lean back comfortably, and the texturing on the seat meant that she didn''t slip off. The breeze from the boat moving so fast blew on her more consistently from her higher vantage, although that meant she had to remove her hat lest it blow off, but that was fine.


    Yes, it was nice to not have to sit in water any time someone used a ladle to splash water on themselves. And she wouldn''t have a mildly sore posterior from just sitting on the floor of the boat. The darkwisp binding above her serving as a roof¡ªa sunshade?¡ªwas effective enough, although Lori spent the trip upriver adding firewisps to it to delete heat¡ªthe less heat she had to deal with, the better¡ªas well as imbuing the binding so that she wouldn''t have to worry about it as she worked.


    The modifications to the seating also had an effect on the seating arrangements. The plank and beams that had been placed to act as supports for the trestles were high enough to be usable as low benches, and Riz''s friends were using it as such. While the planks were low, forcing knees up at stomach level, the former militiawomen seemed to find the seating reasonably comfortable.


    Riz herself operated the steam jet driver, which had been replaced by the driver from Lori''s Boat Two, with its integrated reverse setting. It was the sort of driver the woman was more familiar with oeprating, and given that they would need to go ashore to retrieve the jar full of iridescence that she and Rian had left beyond the demesne''s boundary yesterday, the reverse setting was necessary to help them maneuver away from shore more effectively.


    Lori''s eyes were drawn to the familiar tree next to where she''d set up her ice shed back in the spring, and a part of her was expecting them to slow down to land next to it as they had done before. However, what had become a familiar, Iridescence-covered landscape was gone, and there were only the browns and greens and silver whites of exposed vegetation, rocks and ground. The shed itself was long gone, no doubt melting back into water and rejoining the river after she''d stopped imbuing its binding to maintain it.


    They traveled a bit farther after that. The added stretch of river allowed Lori to appreciate how much more her demesne had grown over the summer. While she''d gone to River''s Fork Demesne and back since she''d started expanding, she wasn''t really familiar with the landmarks denoting the edge of the demesne in that direction. Yes, she had a general familiarity with the twists and turns of the river along the route that allowed her to judge how much further it was to the¡­ to her other demesne, but she''d be hard-pressed to remember specific landmarks at the boundary, usually because she was too busy suddenly suffering from the sudden heat. She knew that tree very well, however, and seeing how much more clear land beyond it they had to pass by helped put all of Rian''s numbers into context for her.


    Eventually, they reached the new edge of her demesne, a sharp line marking the border of what she ruled and the wild lands full of beasts covered in deadly colors. In fact, there were some of said wild beasts at the river at the moment. Lori watched them warily. Shaped like fat teardrops with stubby-looking tails, they rose up more than twice her height. Their long necks supported a round head with a wide, triangular mouth, and unlike most beasts, they stood as if upright, their hind legs straight and long beneath them. Their bodies glittered with Iridescence of course, obscuring what their natural colors were.


    The beasts were drinking, some bending down to lap at the water while others stood straight, head as high as they would go, keeping watch for predators. They had noticed the boat and a few of the beasts blinked at them curiously, their eyes intent on the strangers. Lori wondered if that was simply natural instinct to keep watch on moving objects, or whether they''d learned to be wary of the boat.


    Behind her, she heard Riz grunt. "Glittering waddlers."


    "Is there a problem, Erzebed?" Lori said.


    "The waddlers are close to where we buried the jar, Great Binder. I don''t think it''s safe to try and get it right now."


    Ah. "How long does it usually take for these things to move on?"


    "They won''t move until all of the beasts in the flock have had a chance to drink, and we don''t know how long that will be. Could be a few moments, could be half an hour from now."


    "Could we make them leave?" Lori asked.


    Riz hesitated. "You''ll have to be the one to try, Great Binder. It would be too dangerous for us to try to force them off. You''re never supposed to go up against a beast the same size as you alone. The bigger it is, the more people you need to deal with it safely." The not-an-officer gestured. "We''d also need the right equipment, like beast spears and shields, not these little stickers." Lori assumed that meant the bundle of spears with their steel points elevated above what little water was sloshing around the bottom of the boat. "I wouldn''t want to deal with their claws without something to but in front of me."


    Lori blinked, taking a second look at the waddlers. "I don''t see any claws."


    "No, you don''t. They''re a nasty surprise hiding under the feathers, which are actually very thick."


    She stared at the beasts. "They must be cooking under those colors," she said. Then she blinked, and turned to give Riz a pointed look. "You''ve been carrying those same spears when you accompanied me to the edge of the demesne before¡­" Lori said, giving her a pointed look.


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    "Because if a big beast showed up that could be dangerous to you the idea was to buy time while you ran into the demesne, not try and make the beast go anywhere," Riz said. "Trying to get those waddlers to move means holding our ground, which we can''t really do with these things."


    Well, Lori supposed that made sense. She looked towards the so-called waddlers. While they didn''t look dangerous¡ªhonestly, they looked like large eggs standing upright¡ªthey were still dangerous bigger than she was, and if Riz said it had claws, then it had claws. The fact she couldn''t see the claws meant no one would be able to adequately react to them. Actually, since they were hidden, one couldn''t even be able to say what was a safe distance.


    "We''ll stay inside the demesne and wait for a few moments to see if they leave," Lori declared. "I have things I need to prepare anyway. If they''re still there by the time I''m done¡­" Lori shrugged. "I''ll move them."


    Riz nodded. "Are we staying on the water or landing?"


    Lori opened her mouth to order the latter, then paused. "Let''s try the two anchors," she said instead. "Best to see if they work as intended, since we have time." If there was one thing she''d learned in her time as a Dungeon Binder, it was that even sound ideas didn''t always work right the first time. Adjustment were always needed. "I''ll leave you to it."


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said.


    Lori sat back and started preparing the starter binding for the beads she''d be amalgamating as Riz and her friends tried to get the anchors to work, although she did notice that they simply dropped the anchors over the side, requiring Riz stay at the driver controls to keep maneuvering the boat away from the shore. It made the Dungeon Binder sigh, but she simply went back to her preparations.


    Airwisps, lightwisps, firewisps, and most importantly darkwisps were gathered around her as she reached out through her connection to her demesne''s core, the wisps claimed, bound and added to the mass of wisps anchored to her bone tablet. It was probably excessive, but as this would be the first time she''d be making beads on a boat, there was a possibility of failure and she wanted a surplus of raw materials¡ªas much as wisps could be considered material¡ªto be able to make up for it. Of course, the limiting factor would be crystals of Iridescence¡­


    The bindings needed a certain level of imbuement so that they wouldn''t be completely consumed by the Iridescence, and Lori spent a few moments filling the deactivated binding so that it would reach that level. Fortunately at that point Riz and her friends recalled that the two anchors needed to be some distance from each other and were trying to throw them as far as possible in different directions. That allowed them to manage things, and once the anchors were secured, it was all a matter of adjusting the ropes so that the boat was suspended where they wanted to be.


    Fortunately, the waddlers had left in the midst of all this, the flock making their way back into the woods. Whether it was because they''d all managed to drink their fill or had been disturbed by the former militiawomen trying to figure out how to deploy the anchors, Lori couldn''t say, although she''d have understood if it was the latter. Regardless, that meant it was safe to try and recover the jar of iridescence that Rian had buried yesterday when he''d come out to the edge to measure the demesne''s expansion.


    That meant finally crossing the border of the demesne and beyond to the outside. This time, Lori actually remembered to brace herself, and indeed there was a sudden increase in the temperature around her, turning from comfortably warm and humid to very uncomfortably hot and humid. Thanks to her sunshade of darkwisps and the firewisps anchored to it, the heat was much less extreme than it usually was when she''d had to leave the confines of her demesne this summer. Yes, it was still hot, but not so much that she wanted to throw herself in the river or immediately regretted convincing herself she had to exit her demesne. This was merely uncomfortably warm.


    She didn''t have that long to appreciate the effectiveness of her sunshade as the boat approached land that the waddlers had vacated. Lori could still hear them as they¡­ well, waddled¡­ between the trees, calling out to each other loudly, their juveniles in the center of the group''s formation. Two of Riz''s friends followed the not-an-officer ashore, spears in hand, to keep watch as Riz kicked a spot on the ground as clear of Iridescence as she could before starting to dig with a nearby rock and her bare hands. In a few moments, she had unearthed a sealed jar, which they carefully brought back to the boat. One of the women still aboard took it with some reluctance, but there were no exposed crystals on the outside, only a glittering rainbow hue.


    "Don''t let that get wet," Lori snapped just as the woman was about to put it down. "If that gets washed, it becomes useless." While Lori had been gathering up the water on the bottom of the boat that had gathered every time someone had splashed themselves with the ladle to cool off, there was still some water there, and it might be enough to adversely affect the iridescence in the jar.


    ¡­


    The world had become a very strange place ever since she''d become a Dungeon Binder, Lori reflected. Regularly talking to people, deliberately doing unpaid work, and now she didn''t want Iridescence to be washed away with water as a sane person should¡­


    ¡­


    Probably best not to think about it.


    Taking the jar, Lori carefully pulled off the stopper. Inside, she could make out the glittering, crystalline shapes of Iridescence. Rian had apparently not simply buried the jar but had also filled it with Iridescence he''d collected the day before, which had continued to crystallize.


    The sight of it still made Lori shudder as she carefully stoppered the jar shut again and resisted the urge to wash her hands, and the jar for good measure. She needed the Iridescence. She needed the Iridescence. She needed the Iridescence¡­


    If she said it enough times, perhaps she''d stop shuddering at the thought.


    "All right," she said as Riz climbed back onto the boat, "take us out into the middle of the river and set the anchors. Don''t let us drift back into the demesne."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    As Riz got returned to the rear of the boat where she could operate the steam jet driver, the other former militiawomen used the butts of their spears to pushed Lori''s Boat Three away from the shore. Soon, they were back out further into the water, away from the reach of beasts. This time, there was no problem as the anchors were set apart from each other¡ªthey had dropped one anchor and Riz had moved the boat some distance away before the other anchor was dropped as well, which was a much more certain way of doing it than trying to throw the anchors¡ªand the ropes were secured to keep the boat more or less in place, or at least not as at risk of drifting back towards her demesne.


    Lori set the trestles onto the places meant for them and laid down her bead-making table. It was time to get to work.

 421 - Boat Shed Bead Making

    Once Lori had gotten used to the placement of her bead-making table¡ªwith both the table and her chair slotted into place she couldn''t just push off from the work surface¡ªit wasn''t all that different from when she''d made beads in her ice shed.


    ¡­


    No, that was a lie, there were significant differences. Thanks to the open sides of the boat, she had significantly more air circulation, such that she didn''t have to really place any airwisps to keep herself cool. The sunshade and the firewisps deleting heat anchored to it were quite sufficient for cooling.


    However, it was also noisier. There was the sound of the river splashing against the sides of the boat, the occasional cries of beasts, bugsong coming from either shore of the river¡ªthe two of which were no longer muffled by a thick layer of bound ice¡ªand most annoying of all¡­ Riz and her friends talking. Previously, there had also been a thicker layer of bound ice between herself and their chatter, but no more. And since her chair was in the relative center of the boat, it didn''t matter where they sat, they physically couldn''t be any further from her.


    To their credit, the bugsong was actually louder than they were, so it wasn''t worth it to tell them to be quiet. Lori just made a binding of airwisps over her ears to muffle the noise, then moved on to work. Bead-making itself wasn''t any different, although she had to be careful of where she placed the jar of Iridescence. She couldn''t put it on the floor or the water would get at it, and she''d overlooked putting some kind of side table. Fortunately, the boat was stable enough that Lori was able to place the jar on the lateral plank that her chair was slotted into, which did the job for now. Still, she''d need to have Rian inform the carpenters she needed something to keep her material out of the water. even just a box would do.


    However, once she accounted for that, making beads was simply a familiar, repetitive process. Remove a piece of the imbued binding from the bone tablet she''d anchored it to, anchor it to the bone inlaid into the side of one of the trenches in her bead-making table, start imbuing the binding through the metal contact under her foot that was connected the metal plate on the table, add a piece of Iridescence from the jar¡ªheld in her copper tweezers because why touch the colors directly¡ªdirectly to the binding, and as the crystal started trapping the wisps, start the process that would amalgamate the Iridescence and binding together into a wispbead.


    Repeat until the tray was full of growing beads. Once they had all grown enough that their own shape lifted them up and off the contact plate on the table, Lori poured the finished beads into the catch trough, and had Riz and her friends start scooping up the beads into the large leather sacks they''d also brought along when while she made more beads. It wasn''t like they were doing anything else, after all. Despite sighs and groaning, they all worked quickly and efficiently and managed not to bump the table as Lori went back to work making more beads.


    When the shards of Iridescence in the jar were depleted, it was time to head back. All of her sacks were full, ready to run all of her bound tools. The next time she did this she''d have to make some large beads as well, but those take up far more preparation, and she''d been busy expanding the demesne yesterday. Actually, she wouldn''t even need to retrieve the thing herself. After all, if Rian was already going to be heading to the edge of the demesne¡­


    She might as well add an errand to that trip.


    <hr>


    When they returned, lunch had apparently just started, since there was still a fairly long line of people getting food from the kitchen and only a few people were already eating. Even taking a brief moment to have Riz and her friends carry the beads up to her room along with her bead-making table, and then having a quick bath in her room once Lori had dismissed them and shut the door¡ªdespite the sunshade, it had been warm enough make Lori sweat, and she didn''t want to be smelling herself as she ate¡ªthe food was still wonderfully hot when she came down.


    It seemed that Riz had forgone taking a bath, which was why she was seated a full space away from Mikon, who was sitting next to Rian. Apparently the woman''s affections drew the line at Riz still being absolutely damp with sweat.


    "So!" Rian said cheerfully, "how was the boat shed?"


    "It''s adequate for its purposes, although I''m will be needing further equipment," Lori said. "A means of keeping the Iridescence above the water at the bottom of the boat, for one thing."


    "Should you really be saying that?" Rian pointed at¡­ uh, Tac-something, crazy Deadspeaker who named plants¡ªseated on the other side of Umu. "Taeclas is smart, aren''t you worried she''ll be able to reason out how you make beads?" Ah, yes, that was her name.


    Lori considered that, then turned towards the Deadspeaker. "Taeclas."


    "Good morning, your Bindership!"


    She nodded. "I''m not greeting you back, because if I did, Rian would sulk."


    "Aw¡­ Rian, why do you have to be sulky?-!"


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    "She never greets me back when I wish her good morning, and I''ve been doing it for a year! It''s a perfectly good reason to be sulky!"


    "Well, I suppose that''s fair¡­ oh! What if we both start greeting her good morning at the same time?"


    "No, that wouldn''t work, she''d need to talk to you, and that doesn''t happen every day."


    "Oh, right¡­"


    "Taeclas," Lori repeated.


    "Good morning, your Bindership!"


    "You said that already."


    "Ah, right. Sorry, force of habit. What is it, your Bindership?"


    "Don''t try to figure out how I make beads. That''s an order."


    Rian, why are you laughing like that?


    "Rian, why are you laughing like that?" she said, giving her lord a flat look.


    She had to wait a few moments for his laughter to die down. "Y-you know," he finally managed to say, "most people would assume they were being mocked i-if someone suddenly breaks into laughter."


    "You''ve made it clear that you''d be pointing at me while laughing if you were mocking me," Lori reminded him.


    For some reason he stared at her, then sighed. "You can''t remember a single carpenter''s name that corresponds to a face, but that thing I said last year you remember."


    "I don''t see how that is relevant to this conversation. And you still haven''t answered my question."


    "Right, the question. I wasn''t mocking you, I was simply expressing my delight at what a wonderful demesne I live in."


    "This is a wonderful demesne?" Lori said flatly.


    "Of course. Every day, I wonder what''s going to happen. That''s a lot of wondering. Clearly the demesne is full of wonder."


    Lori rolled her eyes. Useless thespian. She turned back to Taeclas. "Taeclas, I gave you an order."


    Taeclas was still staring at her. "Uh¡­"


    Rian leaned towards her. "Psst. She''s waiting for you to acknowledge you''ve received and understood the order."


    "Ah! Uh, understood, your Bindership. I¡­ promise not to try to figure out how you make beads."


    Lori nodded. "Good. If you disobey and try to make your own beads, it will be immediately obvious, and I will kill you for treason."


    Both Taeclas and her wife straightened up at that, the latter clutching the Deadspeaker''s arm tightly.


    "In her defense," Rian said, "she''s basically protecting her secrets by trusting you. You really can''t blame her for being very annoyed if you betray her trust."


    "I am not trusting them, I am ordering them," Lori said, turning a glare at her lord. Really, how was that hard to understand?


    "Ah, sorry your Bindership. My mistake." He turned towards Taeclas but with a hand gesturing towards Lori for some reason.


    Taeclas looked thoughtful, nodding slowly, one hand patting her wife''s own gently. "All right¡­ all right, I understand that." She looked towards Binder Lori again. "Don''t worry, Binder Lori. I won''t disappoint you."


    Lori gave her a flat look. "We''ll see."


    Taeclas smiled, bright and confident. "Don''t worry, you will! Just you watch, I''ll be the best at not trying to figure out how you make beads!"


    "How would you even measure that?" Rian said, sounding thoughtful. "Because if we''re going by there being anything to figure out at all, you''ve already made progress in figuring out how to make beads compared to someone who doesn''t know there''s anything to figure out¡­"


    "Rian."


    "Yes your Bindership?"


    "Stop with that line of reasoning. It''s pointless and very silly."


    Rian sighed. "Fine. But I''m not wrong! What were we¡­? Oh, right! You were saying you needed something for Lori''s Shed Boat?"


    "I need something to keep the Iridescence out of the water at the bottom of the boat." Lori paused. Then she sighed. "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Why are you calling the boat that?"


    "Because at this point the boat is distinct enough to deserve a unique name, not just a number."


    "What happened to you liking numbers that go up?"


    "That has nothing to do with this."


    Lori sighed. "Rian, stop bringing up this matter. It has grown tedious and is pointless."


    Rian opened his mouth, looking stubborn, but sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "Good. Now, see to it that the carpenters build some sort of receptacle that I can place the Iridescence in to keep it elevated above the water." She made a vague gesture to her right at about stomach level. "Something that I can easily access from the chair. It need not be too large. Simply large enough to fit the Iridescence jar, a bone tablet and my tweezers without any of them to being put on top of each other." She realized too late Rian couldn''t see where her hand was.


    Rian hummed thoughtfully. "That might be a little difficult. Something that tall would be moving a lot from the motions of the boat, and the jar at least is likely to fall over and into the water. Putting up side around it like a box would prevent that, but they''d be too high for you to be comfortable. How about something lower down, a box at about knee level? If it''s right next to your chair, it should be accessible without having to move and we can enclose it so nothing falls out when the boat is rocking."


    Lori waved her hand to the side a knee-level, considering the alternative. "Slightly higher. Lap level. Something immobile."


    He nodded. "It shouldn''t be too hard to figure out how to make something that suits your needs. Maybe some kind of box with legs that fit between the planks so it locks in place."


    Taeclas sighed. "More woodworking in my future¡­"


    "Sorry, Tae."


    "It''s fine, its fine. At least you''re not telling me to hurry. Ugh, if they want it done right, they shouldn''t rush me¡­"


    Rian reached out to pat her on the shoulder. "There, there. You''re in a safe place now. No free market pushing competition on you to do better, and you have a monopoly on Deadspeaking for the entire demesne."


    "Don''t tell her that, she''ll get lazy," Taeclas''s wife said, sounding fond as she did so.


    "It''s not my fault I like growing vegetables more than playing with tree corpses!"


    Well¡­ that was a way of referring to woodworking that Lori had never heard before. "By the way Rian, I need you to go to the edge of the demesne tomorrow morning."


    Rian blinked. "Uh, sure. What for?"


    "I need you to retrieve some beads for me."


    "Retrie¡ªoh. Yes. I guess you wouldn''t have been able to make those on the boat. All right. Where should I look?"


    "Along the river at the edge of the demesne." Lori paused to consider. "Well, near there. I''ll make a pit or some other containment and mark it with lightwisps."


    "That would be very helpful, thank you"


    Lori nodded. "Now, anything I should be aware of this afternoon?"


    "Well, the smiths need your assistance to provide heat for metalworking since it''s still a bit too hot to fire the forge in the smithy safely, they have some tools they need to repair¡­"

 422 - The Years Second Dragon

    Over the next week, Lori once more fell into a routine. Two days of expanding the demesne, a day to do other work, then back to expanding the demesne. She''d also conceived of the idea of forming bindings of firewisps on the borders of her demesne to help continue encouraging Iridescence growth overnight, as well as binding large amounts of darkwisps that the night brought to give the Iridescence wisps to consume.


    That latter seemed to help increase the growth rate somewhat, if only by providing more Iridescence to claim exactly at the edges of her demesne. She supposed if she looked at Rian''s numbers, she''d probably be able to see for sure how much it helped increase the growth rate, but as she had no ''numbers going up'' fetish or any no need to justify herself, the fact that the growth rate had increased was sufficient for her.


    Really, it was irritating that she''d only thought to start expanding the demesne so late into the season. So much potential growth that she had allowed to pass her by¡­ so much suffering in the heat¡­ Perhaps next year, the demesne would be functioning so smoothly that she could devote summer to expanding the demesne. Although really, there was no reason why she couldn''t do it on any day of the year¡­


    On the days she wasn''t expanding the demesne, Lori performed maintenance on the bindings she had placed around the demesne. She checked the water hub shed, making sure there was nothing dead floating in the water, and was glad to see there were no bugs or slugs. She also checked the water reservoir in her dungeon, glad to see that the water was clear, and that the unseen light she''d placed beneath the surface of the water¡ªwhich she''d deactivated before going to check¡ªseemed to be preventing growths from taking hold within the walls of the reservoir.


    The chamber where the water was distilled and further cleansed by unseen light had to be deactivated and opened to shovel out the residue that had accumulated since Lori had last checked. She took the opportunity to enlarge the chamber slightly, since using the shovel she had to reach the back of the chamber so the residue could be scraped out was a bit awkward. It was only when she was finished and was cleaning out the insides of the enlarged chamber with water¡­ that she realized could have just used water to get the stubborn residue out.


    ¡­


    Anyway¡­


    The overflow evaporation chambers next to the bathwater cisterns near their fields also needed to be deactivated, opened and cleaned out, the residue added to their compost pit. That chamber was much fuller because of the amount of bathing everyone was doing, even with how much they were watering the fields to keep the crops from drying out.


    Perhaps she should make another outlet for the water, since their fields had grown larger¡­ but not right now!


    Beyond maintenance, she used one of the days to finally get around to another experiment she hadn''t been able to get around to.


    Lori looked at the molten, brightly glowing stone inside the large crucible of bound ice. The stone¡ªshe didn''t know exactly what sort of stone it was, and she didn''t care¡ªhad been molten for some time, and she finally deactivated the binding of firewisps within the material. Carefully, she added the shards of white Iridescence with a wooden spoon, dropping it onto the molten stone.


    "I can''t see if it''s dissolving. The molten rock is too bright," Rian said as he tried to peer through the clear substance of the bound ice.


    "I told you that you wouldn''t see anything," Lori sighed. "Look away before you harm your eyes."


    "Yes, your Bindership¡­ ugh, I need a dark corner¡­ can you see anything, though?"


    Lori bound the lightwisps in her left eye before closing her eyelids so she couldn''t be disoriented by her vision changing, and began forming the binding she needed. When she opened her eyes again, her right eye saw the normal colors of the smithy, while her left eye saw only gloom through which she was barely able to see the outlines of shapes. When she looked at the molten stone, the glow coming from it had been greatly reduced, and she could make out the detail of the liquid''s surface¡­ including how the samples of white Iridescence she''d poured on the stone were floating on the molten surface. "The samples are floating on the surface."


    Rian sighed. "That''s¡­ basically failure right there, isn''t it? The white Iridescence has always basically dissolved instantly in anything that¡­ well, that it can dissolve into."


    "We still haven''t tested how it dissolves in oil," Lori pointed out.


    "Do you want me to finally arrange that?"


    Lori waved her hand dismissively. "It''s not urgent. I really don''t see the point of such a thing."


    "It might make the oil burn hotter or brighter?"


    She paused, considering that. "Is that really something we need right now? We''re using the oil for soap, aren''t we?"


    "Soap and lubricant for the sawmill, water wheels, lathes and anything else that needs to spin non-stop."


    Well, she had phrased that as a question. "Is it really a good idea to use oil that burns hotter or brighter for that?"


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    "Yes, it sounds like a disaster waiting to happen¡­ it could result in an oil that lubricates better?"


    "If you''re that insistent, I''ll give you some samples and you can test it yourself. Hand me my wand."


    "Here."


    Lori accepted the rod of anatass, and used it to stir the molten stone. Perhaps it only needed some agitation to begin dissolving the samples of white Iridescence. She didn''t actually believe it, but it was a possibility. Pulling out her wand after stirring, she tapped the wand against the stone floor to dislodge the slag on the wand. Wait, did it count as slag if it wasn''t impurities from smelting?


    When the molten rock had cooled, it was immediately obvious the attempt was a failure. A sample of white iridescence was sticking out from the top of the molten rock, its sharp angles a contrast to the more rounded stone beneath it. It obviously hadn''t dissolved.


    "Well, there goes my dreams of transparent rock windows for everyone in the demesne," Rian said mournfully.


    "It was never likely, Rian. If it was that easy to acquire transparent building material, we''d be using lightwisp-alloy stone instead of glass."


    "Given how the metal alloys are just as easy to make and yet don''t seem to be in use, I doubt that."


    Well, she supposed he had a point there.


    She cleaned up after the failed experiment, giving the smiths the smithy back.


    <hr>


    At the end of the week, Lori was just finishing dinner when her head snapped up, and she tilted her head as she felt the wave of magic that seemed to push on every wisp in her demesne. Sitting on the short bench next to her Shanalorre did the same, as did¡ªLori glanced at her head cloth¡ªTaeclas across from them. A moment later, as the feeling came again, the three of them turned to look in the same direction.


    Sitting next to Taeclas, her wife immediately paled.


    Calmly, Lori reached for her cup and took a drink of water. "Rian, there''s a dragon coming. See to it everyone takes appropriate action. I will be packing, and then I will go outside to sink the Coldhold into the river."


    Rian sighed. "And here I was hoping all my work was done for the night. I''ll have the men strip everything they can from the ship."


    Lori reached out through her connection through her core and increased the output of the lightwisps anchored to the outsides of the houses to provide greater visibility as she went upstairs to pack up her bedroll, pillow, and other things. This time she was bringing the almanac so she had something to read!


    With her packing done, she went outside. There were still people removing things from the Coldhold, so Lori turned her attention to the smithy, and used stone from the stockpile to close up the open wall that she had been opened when the summer started getting too hot to keep the smithy enclosed. Once that was done, Lori redistributed the rest of the stone to reinforce the entryway and front of her dungeon, then added all the additional stone to the binding of earthwisps that reinforced the stone of the hill above her dungeon, as well as all the stone structures in her demesne. When she''d come back from the first dragon of the year, she had simply never deactivated it, so she didn''t have to reform the binding now. She did have to add the new wood storage shed outside of the sawmill, as that was the newest stone building in the demesne.


    By the time she finished, the Coldhold was finally empty, everything that could be better utilized in the dungeon during the dragon''s passing removed. Besides the Coldhold, there was only one other boat at the docks. Lori looked about in confusion. While the other wooden boats had probably been carried into her dungeon, Lori''s Ice Boat was also gone. Had they actually dragged it into the dungeon rather than wait for her to liquefy the ice so they could dismantle the wooden frame?


    Well, Lori supposed they were in a hurry. She was blinking tiredly as she proceeded to use the stone set aside for the purpose to surround the Coldhold in a box of stone and sank it into the river to protect it from damage from the dragon''s passing. It had been a long day of expanding the demesne, and she had been looking forward to getting to sleep.


    That done, she went up to her room to fetch her things. The entryway to her dungeon was full of people rushing in and out, their arms full of pack, bundles of clothes, bedrolls, blankets and other things, but they made way for her as she strode in. She gathered her pack, bedroll, pillow, and the sack of emergency beads, and was about to step out when she remembered to grab her almanac. Lori carefully folded a shirt around the book before putting it into her pack and grabbing her staff.


    She found Rian waiting for her at the dock, a basket full of straw waiting next to him. Riz and Mikon were with him, the latter fussing over the former and looking worried. Riz seemed awkward as she spoke to the weaver, while off to the side four of her friends were already seated on Lori''s Boat and smirking.


    "Bring the good wisplights with you," Rian said as he gestured at the straw-filled basket, seemingly ignoring how Mikon was trying to stuff a towel into the back of Riz''s shirt. "You''ll need these more than we will."


    Lori hesitated, then nodded. "Fine. Put them on the boat."


    "I took the liberty of sending all the boats we have to get the children out of River''s fork and back here," Rian continued as she started putting her own effects into the boat. "Told them not to wait for you and just get the children here." He paused. "I also told them to bring Lidzuga and his sister here."


    She nodded. "Good. I''d rather not have to worry about him trying to take advantage of any distraction to kill me." Reading while trying to stay aware of what was happening around her defeated the point of reading. "Why are you including his sister, though?"


    He sighed for some reason. "Because he''s unlikely to come along without her, it''s a dealing with people thing." Ah. No wonder he sighed. That sounded quite unreasonable. Rian looked up at the sky above. The stars twinkled above them, and all four moons were out in their various phases. "Any idea how long before the dragon arrives?"


    Lori shook her head. "It''s still seems to be distant. Not for some time yet, I think."


    Rian nodded. "If there''s time, I''ll have everyone try to uproot what we can of the crops and transferring them to the dungeon farm."


    "Use your discretion. You''re good at that. I''ll provide you with some light. Signal me when I should seal off the dungeon." Lori carefully stepped down into Lori''s Boat, seating and carefully balancing her staff and pack on her lap.


    "Be careful, all right," Rian said as Riz finally disengaged from Mikon and hopped down to take her position next to the boat''s steam jet driver bound tool. "Try to get some sleep before the dragon arrives."


    Lori felt another pulse as all the wisps in her demesne and in her body moved as if struck by an invisible wave, weak as it was. It felt no stronger than when she''d started feeling the dragon''s approach at dinner. "I think that won''t be a problem."

 423 - Time Until The Dragon Arrives

    Lori hadn''t realized how uncomfortable all their other boats were.


    Sitting on the bottom of Lori''s Boat, her back against the back of the boat, Lori was already missing her chair on Lori''s Shed Boat. Her legs couldn''t seem to find a comfortable position¡­ or at least a position as comfortable as sitting upright. How had she used to think this was an acceptable means of travel?


    To keep her mind off the discomfort, she focused on continuing the preparations to proof her demesne against the incoming dragon. Gathering all the darkwisps in the air above her demesne, she formed them into a single massive binding that would act as an ablative barrier against the magic that would arrive with the dragon. Lori kept that binding carefully deactivated as she anchored it to the stone on the inside of the entryway of her dungeon, a spot that wasn''t part of the binding that reinforced the earthwisps of the structure. A bit of gold wire jutted out there, and once the binding made contact with it, magic directly from her dungeon''s core began to imbue the darkwisps. That done, she claimed lightwisps from around the bindings that illuminated her demesne, forming them into a binding that she anchored to a convenient elevated structure: the stone aqueduct. It was high enough that light from the binding would reach the fields without being in anyone''s eyes. At least, that was the intention.


    After that, Lori systematically began sealing shut the various water pipes that lead in and out of her dungeon to prevent entry by any dragonborn abominations small enough to take advantage of the openings, and made sure that the binding of waterwisps and firewisps in the water around the air outlet vent was well-imbued to keep it hotter than boiling so that nothing could crawl in through there. Once that was checked, Lori moved on to activating the baths in the dungeon.


    ¡­


    Examining her dungeon''s baths through her awareness of her demesne''s wisps, she couldn''t help but notice it was actually very small, in comparison to the baths that people used on a regular basis. Should she¡­? No, no, don''t think of that now. She reached out and checked the pipe for the bath''s waste water that went down to the dungeon''s farm''s waste water cistern, then connected the pipe that drew water from the reservoir to the bath. Once they installed one of the bound tools that drew water¡ªtechnically air and water¡ªthey''d be able to fill the bath''s basin¡ª


    Lori''s eyes snapped open as the air around her went from being comfortable to comfortably warm but with a cooling breeze as they moved. As temperature transitions from leaving her demesne went, it was one of the better ones. The lightwisps anchored to the panels of bone at the front and sides¡ªthat was a recent addition¡ªof the boat illuminated the area ahead and around them, though the latter was only for a pace or two. Beyond that, all that was visible of the water were where the waves reflected the moonlight and wisplight, which wasn''t often. Past the water, the shoreline was much more visible, glittering in the colors of the moonlight.


    ¡­


    Would it be too much to hope this that this dragon''s passing would result in the death of the typhon beast nesting outside of her second demesne? Probably. Logically, it should die in the chaos that would ensue, but Lori was certain she wasn''t anywhere near that fortunate.


    ¡­


    Actually, why had Rian never reported finding dead beasts after a dragon''s passing? For that matter, how did beasts actually manage to survive a dragon''s passing? It was something she''d never considered before now, but¡­


    ¡­


    Well, not important. Even if the passing of dragons was somehow not fatal to beasts, bugs, slugs, squid, fursh and whatever else she couldn''t recall immediately, she knew for a fact that dragons caused damage to her demesne''s infrastructure.


    Some time after they''d left the boundaries of her demesne, they passed the boats that Rian had sent ahead to River''s Fork. They were full of children, many of them crying. On two of the boats¡ªLori''s Ice Boat and Lori''s Boat Two¡ªLori saw women with their hair in familiar shades of pink that made them instantly identifiable as Mikon''s cousins, who had children clinging to them. Another boat had two adults¡ªbesides the one operating the steam jet driver bound tool¡ªwhom Lori presumed were Lidzuga and his sibling. One of them was holding a rock that emitted light, which a certainly a good indicator in that direction.


    And then the boats had passed into the night, and there was nothing ahead of them but darkness.


    When they neared River''s Fork, Lori saw it was bustling with activity. While there were still people carrying items from houses to the mine, a few people were already in the process of trying to transplant the crops in the fields and terraces. There were lights moving about, some of them wisplights, but a few of them seemed to be torches.


    "Erzebed, start putting beads into the wisplights," Lori said as they approached the dome, "get them distributed, and make sure they don''t bring those torches into the dragon shelter!"


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    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said as she caught the bag of wispbeads that Lori had tossed her. She began digging into the straw-filled basket, pulling out four of the wisplights that Rian had brought from Covehold Demesne. Lori, for her part, activated the deactivated binding of lightwisps that she''d anchored to her staff, providing herself with light as the boat carefully moved alongside the dock. She carefully climbed out of the boat, her pack slung over her shoulder and staff in hand. The ferry pilot handed Lori her bedroll¡ªher pillow was tucked in the middle of the bundle¡ªand there was a moment where Lori worried her bedroll would fall into the water, but eventually she was able to get a grip on everything and scurried towards solid ground.


    Making way towards the dragon shelter was a bit difficult, as it was uphill, and Lori had to watch her step as she carried her effects. Riz followed after Lori, her own pack over her shoulder. Fortunately, the mine entrance was clear when they reached it, and no idiots seemed to have tried to get into the alcove just inside the entrance. At Lori''s direction, Riz unlatched and opened the door to the alcove, and they stepped into the small room. Lori was finally able to put down her bedroll in the sleeping niche, while Riz just dropped hers next to the door. Taking the binding of lightwisps on her staff, Lori anchored it to the wall, and started gathering more lightwisps to making another binding. "Find me a rock," Lori ordered. "You''re going to need light."


    Lori spent the next few moments making light to see by, anchoring lightwisps in intervals along the mineshaft so that each one was just in sight of the next, and then anchoring another binding of lightwisps to the stone outside next to the mine entrance. She could gather darkwisps later. She had all night, after all.


    That done, she checked the size of the bead that was imbuing the mine''s ventilation¡ªit was still about head-sized¡ªthen the other large wispbeads they had at hand to replace it, which were far larger. Once Lori was satisfied, she and Riz went around the demesne, collecting the bound tools she''d set in place so that they wouldn''t get damaged by the dragon. The one at the baths was simple enough to remove, but the ones that cooled the fruit trees required more height for her to reach. Fortunately, Riz remembered where the trestles that whatsisname used to build the boats were, and she was able to retrieve one, which was just enough for Lori to reach up to where the bound tool cores were secured and remove them. She wasn''t going to just leave them outside, and they''d be useful for making sure she didn''t have to imbue every little thing in the dragon shelter. Or at least not have to reform every binding when they ran out of imbuement.


    She was on her way back to the dragon shelter with the bound tool cores when Yllian found her.


    "Great Binder," he greeted. "Getting everyone to the dragon shelter is in progress. We''re just moving all the fruits that were supposed to be delivered to Lorian Demesne the next time the Coldhold arrived into the shelter."


    Lori nodded. "We have some time until the dragon arrives. Once everyone has been settled into the shelter, set some people to work replacing the drinking water, filling the water reservoir, and emptying the shelter''s latrines."


    "The latrines are clean, at least. Do we have your permission to try to get as many of the crops as possible into the dragon shelter?"


    "Only after those are done. If necessary, we have seed grain in our dungeon farm." She was about to dismiss Yllian when she paused. "Don''t have them track latrine waste in the mine."


    Yllian nodded solemnly. "Yes, Great Binder."


    Lori settled in her alcove just past the mine entrance, and checked on her connection to her demesne. Rian had not yet given the signal, so she did one last check around her demesne. There were still voids of wisps in the fields where their crops were, so presumably they were still moving as much of the crops inside as they could¡­


    Ah, right! Lori sealed off the cave with their initial mushroom farm, leaving only a small hole near the top to let air in. Small dragonborn abominations would be able to enter through it, which was why Lori altered the binding to keep out bugs to lethal levels. The mushroom farm out in the woods will no doubt be destroyed, so they needed this farm as a seed crop.


    For a moment she regarded their new sawmill, made primarily of wood. While the metal fittings that could be removed probably had been, there was nothing she could do to confer added protection to the building. If she had already managed to learn Mentalism, she could surround it in a shell of thought force, but she hasn''t, so she couldn''t. Still, she was hopeful. Their roofs hadn''t taken much damage during the last dragon, so one can hope it happened again¡­ although knowing her luck, this would be the dragon that set her demesne on fire.


    ¡­


    Lori would have to keep an eye on her demesne''s temperature and be ready to mitigate the effects of her demesne being set on fire. She''d need to form airwisps into a binding that would draw air from somewhere it would still be breathable and funnel it into her dungeon¡­ after she figured out how to keep herself alive. It might be necessary to kill everyone in the shelter so she could have all the air to herself¡­


    ¡­


    Well, she''d deal with it if it happened.


    Opening her eyes, Lori stood up from where she''d been sitting and set about working on the dragon shelter''s own defenses. The lightningwisp binding, to violently discourage anything trying to crawl into the slits on the shelter''s entrance to draw in air. Earthwisp reinforcement, to make the stone around the entrance hardier against impacts and large falling objects. She supposed if she got far enough away from the light she could start gathering darkwisps for the ablative barrier. Since it was night, she might even be able to gather enough to enshroud the whole hill.


    Actually¡­


    Taking one of the bound tool cores she''d taken from the cooling poles for the fruit trees, Lori proceeded to add it to the end of the contact wire that would imbue the darkwisp and lightningwisp bindings. The last time, those two bindings had needed to be constantly imbued, and would have dissolved had the bead run out unless Lori had been there to keep the bindings imbued. With this core, at the very least it would be possible to replace the bead without her, since the binding wouldn''t dissolve from a lack of imbuement. True, the idea was for those bindings to never lose imbuement, but in the very likely scenario someone was careless¡ªsomeone other than Lori, of course, because she was always very careful!¡ªthere would still be a chance of recovery.


    Theoretically, at least.


    "Uh, Great Binder, are you going to be done any time soon?" Yllian asked. "People need to get through."

 424 - The Possibility Of Invisible Dragons

    Eventually, all the preparations were finished. Everyone was inside the dragon shelter, the box-like planter was crammed full of uprooted crops and dirt¡ªand Lori had needed to make two more¡ªthe necessary bindings had been formed and anchored, and the multiple doors that secured the dragon shelter had been shut. Lori had even had the time to carefully raise a stone barrier outside of the dragon shelter''s entrance using the mining tailings, an added layer of protection against any large dragonborn abominations or the possibility of something large and heavy hitting the doors and battering them open.


    Then all there was left to do was wait.


    Lori had ordered Riz to go to sleep, and told Riz to have one of her friends do the same. Then she had unfurled her bedroll, locked the door to her alcove, and done as she had ordered them to, waiting for the dragon''s arrival. The Dungeon Binder had fallen asleep feeling the emanations coming from the distant but approaching dragon, hoping she was correct in her estimation.


    When she had awoken, it had been of her own volition rather than someone banging on the door to wake her up. Sitting up and wincing at how uncomfortable the stone niche she''d slept in was¡ªshe already missed her bed¡ªLori took a moment judge what she could feel of the dragon''s approach. The waves had grown stronger as she''d slept, but not by much. How slowly was it moving?


    She checked her awareness of her demesne''s wisps next, and found that Rian had not yet given the signal for her to seal the demesne. Either he had been supremely negligent, or he had spoken to Shanalorre¡ªor one of the two Deadspeakers there at the moment¡ªand had come to the same conclusion she had: that it would be some time before the dragon arrived, and that they had time. Her lord was many things¡ªstrangely oblivious, not as funny as he thought he was, overly theatrical¡ªbut if he was negligent, she''d have probably already set him on fire.


    Sitting up and pulling on her socks and boots¡ªas comfortable as they were, she wasn''t going to be wearing tsinelas in a situation she might have to run¡ªLori grabbed her staff and slid back the latch on the door of the alcove, carefully pulling it open. No one was sleeping on the other side, but that was because Riz and her friends were already up, their bedrolls and packs set neatly along one wall. They all turned to look at her as she stepped out, but she ignored them as she began lowering the stone barrier outside of the shelter''s entrance.


    "Uh, Great Binder? Is that safe?" Riz said.


    "The dragon isn''t here yet," Lori replied absently as she softened the stone barrier and let it collapse into a pile. Easier than trying to pull all the stone neatly into the ground or making it swing out of the way. "So yes, it''s safe to open the door. Best empty out the latrine and get water while we can. Help me get this door open."


    Which meant Riz and her friends lifted the wooden beams that kept the doors into the dragon shelter secured. Three layers of doors were unlocked, the final one letting in a burst of warm air¡ªARGH, she had to add a firewisp binding to the ventilation, or else she''ll bake!


    That aside, there was nothing unusual about the view Lori saw when the doors opened. There were the trees on the other side of the river that rose up higher than the hill they were currently in and on¡ªand for the first time she wondered what had been done to clear the slopes of the hill of trees so thoroughly, then looked towards the dome and wondered why she''d bothered asking¡ªand beyond that was the blue sky and clouds.


    Unfortunately, that wasn''t the direction the dragon was coming from. Lori had to step out of the dragon shelter¡ªdeactivating the binding of lightningwisps before doing so, just in case¡ªand walked until she was facing the direction she could feel the dragon coming from, the sun shining on her right side as she faced an empty-looking sky. Well, empty of dragons. The clouds appeared to be perfectly normal clouds, the sky was perfectly normal sky. They didn''t give her the sense of a yawning void, or something that was staring at her. There was no unnatural lightning or sounds that acted incorrectly. There was simply perfectly normal sky.


    ¡­


    That was actually far more disturbing. Was it an invisible dragon? Invisibility technically wasn''t hard, after all. There was a binding of lightwisps that had light flow around you. After all, if light didn''t reflect off you, you couldn''t be seen. The problem was the binding only worked for light coming in one direction and exactly that direction, and there were a multitude of directions to choose from. So the binding only really worked if you were standing on the end of a long hallway, with people only glancing as they passed by the opposite end, and it helped if you were standing somewhere dark.


    It wouldn''t surprise her if a dragon could somehow render itself invisible, though. Dragons did strange things like that, and if a Dungeon Binder was very, very lucky, they''d be able to figure out how. There were stories and hearsay about the Dungeon Binders of some demesne being able to alter materials into dragon scale.


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    Lori claimed and bound lightwisps, anchoring them to her thumbnail and forefingernail¡ªclaiming through her skin was so much more convenient than using her eyes¡ªand forming them into complementary bindings that acted like a spyglass. It took some adjustment¡ªit always did¡ªas she didn''t have some sort of straight edge to draw out the edges of the bindings, and when she was finished the edges of the image produced were blurry¡ªit always was¡ªbut she was used to that. Her thumb and forefinger extended at right angles to each other, she held her hand close to her face and closed one eye as she looked through the binding.


    The image in the center was greatly magnified, letting her see the tops of distant trees closer to the horizon. Lori turned slowly so she could actually see what she was looking at as she scanned for signs of dragons. The wind moving the wrong way, eyes, things floating upwards, beasts whose forms were mashed together like clay, unnatural colors in the sky¡­


    Scan as she might however¡ªwhich admittedly wasn''t for very long, because she got impatient¡ªthere were no signs of a dragon. Well, no obvious signs. Was it still over the horizon? It wasn''t unlikely¡ªsuch had happened before¡ªbut usually it was possible to see something once a night had passed. She checked for clouds, seeing if they were distorted where she was looking, but the heat meant there were no clouds to see¡­


    Lori lowered her hands in disgust, absently deactivating the binding on her fingertips. "Erzebed, have someone go get Yllian," she ordered over the sounds of bugsong and seels making their usual loud, obnoxious sounds.


    "Yes, Great Binder?" a voice behind her said.


    Lori turned to look, and saw Yllian patiently standing there. She gave Riz an approving nod. "Good work on the promptness, Erzebed. Yllian, tell everyone that the dragon will be some time yet. Tonight, possibly even tomorrow. All equipment is to remain in the dragon shelter, but while we can, we''ll be eating in the dining hall and be outside so we don''t have to use the ventilation. Have the latrines cleaned out and the drinking water replaced. After breakfast, I''ll be catching some seels. Get them butchered and ready for storage as soon as possible. Don''t track blood or waste in the shelter."


    "Understood, Great Binder."


    Lori nodded, and turned to add some firewisps for deleting heat to the airwisp binding of the ventilation.


    <hr>


    Breakfast was a bit late that morning, as people had slept in from last night''s rush, and the benches and table had to be carried out and set back in place in the dining hall. The breakfast stew was River''s Fork''s usual strange blend of meat, small cubes of tubers, root vegetables, leaves and sweet fruits. Not exactly objectionable, but she preferred the way stew was cooked in her demesne.


    After the meal, men and women went off to do as Lori had ordered Yllian to have them do, as well as other work to keep them occupied and out of trouble. Water went in, latrine waste went out. Fruits that were ripening that day were picked and added to the food stores. Small things that had been forgotten in homes were retrieved. And Lori had gone seeling.


    The brat had tried to teach her how to seel properly once, the year before. The methods had involved a sharpened stick, a rather uncomfortable wait standing on sun-heated rocks, and trying to manually adjust for refraction as she tried to track and anticipate the fast, darting forms under the water. She¡­ well, she hadn''t really taken well to the brat''s methods. Only natural, of course. The brat had said it had taken several days of constant practice, and Lori had only had the morning to learn. Still, she''d learned to seel in her own way, and it was effective enough.


    Of course, that had been inside of her demesne, where she had been able to control all the unclaimed wisps simply by willing it, but the principles were sound.


    "Don''t make any noise or sudden movements," Lori ordered Riz. "Just¡­ stand there unless I''m attacked. Keep an eye on that part of the sky¡ª" she pointed in the direction where she could still feel the dragon approaching, "¡ªand warn me if you see anything that might be the dragon approaching, no matter how small or far away."


    "Don''t do anything different from what we always do. Understood, Great Binder."


    Lori paused in the act of sticking the metal-capped butt end of her staff into the water, turning to give the woman a flat look. "Leave the attempts at being funny to your man or else I''ll make you an officer."


    The woman flinched. "Yes, Great Binder. Sorry, Great Binder."


    With the end-cap of her staff in the river, Lori reach through the wire connected to it to start claiming the waterwisps of the river. It¡­ had been a while since she''d had to claim moving water, and it took a few frustrating moments for her to remember to anchor the waterwisps to the riverbed so it wouldn''t flow away. Still, there was something¡­ soothing about just standing there at the edge of the water and holding her staff as she slowly claimed more and more waterwisps, compensating for how the river''s current tried to push what she''d claimed further on.


    Well, it would be soothing if the sun wasn''t getting progressively hotter and the air more humid. As it was, the soothing parts of the experience were quickly grown over by the agonizing discomfort. The airwisps and firewisps¡ªand now there were waterwisps as well to try to mitigate the humidity¡ªanchored to the bone clips on the brim of her hat did their best to keep her cool, but the relief was limited to her face, and maybe the sides of her head. The rest of her body felt like it was boiling. She was so covered in sweat one would think she''d fallen into the river, although it wasn''t anywhere near as coo¡ª


    Lori blinked and stared down at the river. She reached up and took of her hat. "Erzebed, hold this."


    Riz dutifully took hold of the hat.


    Making sure to keep a grip on her staff and the waterwisps she was claiming through it, Lori took two steps into the river and fell face-first into the water.


    If she was going to be wet anyway, it might as well feel good!

 Demesne Deleted Scenes! Chapter 245 to 371!

    From Chapter 245:


    "Do you remember when you said you would allow me to stay and live in your demesne?"


    There was silence for a moment as Lori reached out and moved her Dungeon Binder, moving it like a Horotract position it to take Shanalorre''s Mentalist on her next turn. "I remember," she said quietly.


    "Is that offer still open?" The voice that asked was softer and¡­ tired.


    "¡­it is. Have you finished considering?"


    There was another short silence. "Not yet. But thank you for keeping the offer open"


    <hr>


    "Truthfully, I am envious. Your demesne possesses far better infrastructure, reserves, and mercantile prospects, then my own, and you have already planned how you will expand to increase your prosperity. We, on the other hand, are barely capable of sustaining ourselves. Without Deadspeaking assistance, we are unlikely to be able to grow enough to sustain ourselves in the coming year, never mind this winter."


    <hr>


    "I''m surprised," Shanalorre said quietly, "that you haven''t tried to negotiate for my teaching you how to heal."


    It took a moment for Lori to register she was being spoken to, and she looked up from the board to Shanalorre. The other Dungeon Binder was still only regarding the board¡ªit was her turn¡ªas if she hadn''t spoken at all. "Of course not."


    "Why not? I might be willing."


    Lori couldn''t help it. She laughed at the joke. "But would you be capable? After all, you''re a savant. Do you even understand the flow diagram for taming the meaning you use when you heal?"


    "Not really, no," Shanalorre confirmed with a small nod. She reached out and moved one of her lords, occupying a space that one of Lori''s Horotract could have moved to, though she hadn''t been considering doing so. "In hindsight, I suppose that would explain why you didn''t ask. I should have realized that would be familiar with a savant''s limitations."


    <hr>


    Lori paused a moment, before raising her cup to her lips and taking a sip. "Have you decided upon a site?"


    "I have one in mind, yes," Shanalorre said. "While I am still here, I wonder if you could find some time to discuss the possible layout and design of the shelter with me some time in the next few days. While we have this time together, I thought perhaps we could begin finalizing the matter. It need not be completed in one discussion, and I would not wish to impose on any pressing matters requiring your attention, but if you should have a moment to spare after this holiday, it would be appreciated."


    Lori considered that. "I believe I can find time tomorrow," she said. "We could discuss it now, if you prefer. I have time to spare."


    Shanalorre blinked. "Will you not be enjoying the holiday?"


    Lori shrugged. "I don''t need to rest. I''m quite well rested, and discussing possible shelter arrangements will hardly be taxing."


    "Your Bindership, please don''t teach the Great Binder bad habits," Rian said as he arrived with another plate of honey bread, laying it down between the two of them. "Everyone needs to rest. If you have a mental breakdown from working too hard, there''s really nothing any of us can do to help you." Rian gave her a vaguely scolding look. "Besides, while you might be willing to do that kind of work during a holiday, isn''t it a bit rude to make the Great Binder work too? She''s a guest, after all, and it''s her first holiday in our demesne, let her enjoy it."


    "I am not being made to work," Shanalorre asserted. "I chose to approach Binder Lolilyuri to "


    <hr>


    From Chapter 249:


    "And those who don''t obey you?" Rian said.


    "I''m sure they can be reasoned with," Shanalorre said. "What other option do they have? They have nowhere to go. All water transport to Covehold or elsewhere is controlled by you. Even if they should choose to make their way through the Iridescence, they have no known safe destination they can reliably reach. Their only choice is to submit themselves to you as I did."


    "So¡­ you''re saying those people have nothing to lose by protesting Lori''s rule, regardless of whether or not they succeed," Rian said flatly. "These people who''ve already been willing to risk walking through the Iridescence to live in River''s Fork because they didn''t want to be ruled by Lori have nothing more to lose if they, to pull an example from thin air, decide to try and form a mob to kill her on the spot as soon as you tell them of the change in circumstances."


    Lori, Shanalorre, and Lord whatever-his-name-was stared at him.


    Slowly, Shanalorre tilted her head. "Oh. I hadn''t considered that possibility. However¡­ now stated¡­ it sounds plausible."


    Rian groaned, cradling his face in his hands as he leaned his elbows down on the table. "It''s all going to end in bloodshed. I can just see it. As soon as Shana announces Lori is running things, the people who moved away from here are going to get violent, and it''s all going to end with that fancy dome of yours burning down!"


    Lori sighed. Her lord was being all theatrical again. "I don''t see what the problem is. If they attack me, I will defend myself and kill them."


    "Will you kill their children too?" Rian said, voice slightly muffled because of the hands on his face. "Because letting children live after you kill their parents in front of them when is how a lot of revenge stories get started."


    "This is real life, not a story," Lori snapped, even as she felt something clenching around her heart.


    "Yes, it''s real life. That means killing someone isn''t as easy as you seem to think it is."


    <hr>


    "Maybe they think they won''t survive and are indulging recklessly as they count down the days," Rian mused. He glanced at Shanalorre. "After all, you didn''t have a lot of faith that their demesne would survive this long. Maybe other people felt the same. Though if they are, it''s sort of unconscionable that they''re planning to get their children killed with them instead of just trying to come back here. I''ve been coming by all winter, and they didn''t even so much as try to talk to me about it."


    He sighed. "Speaking of which¡­ we need to discuss how we''re going to break this news to those in River''s Fork without, you know, everything breaking out into open violence?"


    <hr>


    From Chapter 250:


    "My ability to enforce my will in my demesne is limited. While many of those who were with my¡­" Her words trailed off, staring blankly. Then she twitched, and her left arm rose and slapped herself on the cheek. She blinked, then shook her head. "Apologies. While many of those who were with my predecessor in the militia nominally follow and obey me, it is out of fondness and pity rather than respect for my person."


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    <hr>


    "The easy thing to do would be to simply abandon River''s Fork," Rian mused, "but we can''t just do that, can we? Operating the mine is too lucrative, and there''s the fruit that grows there. Sure, we have fruit here too, but the ones in River''s Fork grow faster. It might not be enough to feed everyone there, but it''s something. For those two resources alone, we can''t abandon the site."


    Shanalorre nodded. "While I have not been able to even discern, much less replicate, how the meaning for it was done, I have been able to imbue and maintain it. I have been doing so even now. Since winter has passed, fruits should be growing from the trees attached to the dome again, provided people have been keeping them properly fertilized."


    "Then"


    <hr>


    "And those who don''t obey you?" Rian said.


    "I''m sure they can be reasoned with," Shanalorre said. "What other option do they have? They have nowhere to go. All water transport to Covehold or elsewhere is controlled by you. Even if they should choose to make their way through the Iridescence, they have no known safe destination they can reliably reach. Their only choice is to submit themselves to you as I did."


    "So¡­ you''re saying those people have nothing to lose by protesting Lori''s rule, regardless of whether or not they succeed," Rian said flatly. "These people who''ve already been willing to risk walking through the Iridescence to live in River''s Fork because they didn''t want to be ruled by Lori have nothing more to lose if they, to pull an example from thin air, decide to try and form a mob to kill her on the spot as soon as you tell them of the change in circumstances."


    Lori, Shanalorre, and Lord whatever-his-name-was stared at him.


    Slowly, Shanalorre tilted her head. "Oh. I hadn''t considered that possibility. However¡­ now stated¡­ it sounds plausible."


    Rian groaned, cradling his face in his hands as he leaned his elbows down on the table. "It''s all going to end in bloodshed. I can just see it. As soon as Shana announces Lori is running things, the people who moved away from here are going to get violent, and it''s all going to end with that fancy dome of yours burning down!"


    Lori sighed. Her lord was being all theatrical again. "I don''t see what the problem is. If they attack me, I will defend myself and kill them."


    "Will you kill their children too?" Rian said, voice slightly muffled because of the hands on his face. "Because letting children live after you kill their parents in front of them when is how a lot of revenge stories get started."


    "This is real life, not a story," Lori snapped, even as she felt something clenching around her heart.


    "Yes, it''s real life. That means killing someone isn''t as easy as you seem to think it is."


    <hr>


    From #346


    Admittedly, I was ordered to sell them per bead. Tell you what, I''ll speak to my Dungeon Binder to get them to consider negotiating the price on a per-sengrain basis and we can use that from then on. They''ll probably want to measure the weight of the beads themselves so they can calculate the average amount of beads that will be." I shrugged apologetically.


    Ravia pursed his lips. "Your Dungeon Binder put such limits on your ability to negotiate?"


    "They''re from Taniar Demesne."


    The merchant''s head didn''t move, his expression didn''t shift, but somehow he gave the impression of slumping slightly. "Ah."


    "That''s a very strange way of swearing, but whatever suits you."


    That made him smile briefly before he smoothed his expression to something more professional. "My apologies. Father warned me about amateurs from Taniar Demesne."


    "I probably can''t even refute any of it. "


    <hr>


    Chapter 370 Deleted Scene!


    "I''m sure we can arrange some sort of schedule, your Bindership," Rian interjected. "Lidzuga no doubt understands the need to balance the amount of time and work he contributes to the demesne with the time he takes for himself to do his research. Like Lidzuga can work for four days and take a break on the fifth? Or that he needs to work in the morning and he can take the afternoons off? Er, some combination of those? After all, it''s not like we need to rush anymore. We have functional infrastructure, a decent food reserve, secure housing¡­ people have been resting most of the day already because of the heat when I left, and unless things have gotten cooler since then, they probably still are. It''s not big loss to let Lidz do the same. What does it matter what he does during it?"


    "It matters because we only have this summer and fall to plant and harvest crops, Rian," Lori said sharply. "The primary reason we needed Deadspeakers if because we need to increase our crop yields to stabilize our food supply. Especially since if another dragon passes over us before the crops our harvested, it will severely impact our winter stores in both demesnes."


    "Um¡­" Lidzuga said, and we both looked at him. "All I want is some time to be able to pursue my own independent research, but I''m hardly going to do so at the expense of other people. So¡­ how about this: I''ll work until the current crops have matured enough to be ready to harvest. Once they''ve reached that point, I''m allowed to spend my time as I please conducting field research until the harvest has been brought in. I know that will take a few days at least, and maybe one or two more to prepare the fields for planting again. Once the next crop has matured enough to have bindings placed on them, I''ll get back to work."


    Lori considered that. As always, it was her immediate instinct to reject such a proposition because it didn''t come from her. So, of course, she carefully thought of the terms given so she could give a reason to reject it. "The current crop is already well-matured," she said. "Once you have put meanings in place, it would only be a short time before you would qualify for your ''time off''."


    "Is that a bad thing, though?" Rian rebutted. "I mean, what is it worth to us if we can harvest the crops tomorrow and get a new crop planted by next week? That''s a double harvest right there. At worst, Lidzuga here will only have up to three-fourths off a week off before he has to get back to work again, and it''s in his best interest to reduce the time between harvests. Though I doubt we''ll be spending so much of his time off doing his research."


    Lidzuga blinked. "Huh? Why not?"


    Rian smiled brightly at him and gestured all around. "Lidzuga, it''s hot. Even if it looks shady, if you go off wandering in the woods in this heat, you are going to collapse from exhaustion and dehydration and die. Even increasing our crop yields, you are more likely to spend your off time in the baths constantly pouring water on yourself, slowly growing bored as you run out of plants and animals you can bring back to draw at home, because it''s far too hot to go very far. "


    "Isn''t it cooler in the shade of the woods, though?"


    "I''ll let you be the judge of whether the shade of the woods is cool enough to want to spend time in it," Rian said. "Here in town, you''ll at least have the baths to cool off in."


    "No bringing beasts, bugs and fursh into the baths," Lori said, even as she realized she hadn''t put a binding to repel bugs on the bath house when she''d built it. She''d have to get a bound tool core and form one. "It''s unsanitary and disgusting for the other people using the baths."


    "I''m sure no one was thinking anything of the sort, your Bindership, but I''ll tell everyone you said so just to be sure. However, what do you think of the proposed arrangement?"


    "Is assisting in farming all he will do, then? What about when we need Deadspeaking for woodworking, or healing, or structural repair?"


    "I''m sure Lidzuga was a proposal in mind that will properly balance requests for his time and his desire to do research, without just leaving everything to Taeclas," Rian said. "Right, Lidzuga?"


    "Uh¡­"


    Rian sighed. "Come on, work with me here! You''re the one who wants time off to do research! Give us a good reason why your research will bring some benefit to the demesne. "


    Lidzuga hesitated, then said, "I could do all of my work in the morning and¡ª"


    "No, no!" Rian interjected immediately. "Come on, it has to be at least equal to the one about the harvests. As it is, you''re basically going to working only half the time as it is. Do you want her to insist on you only getting food, use of the baths, and permission to sleep indoors on the days that you work?"


    "I thought you said you didn''t have to rush anymore?" Lidzuga said.


    "That''s for other people who can only do manual labor and not Deadspeaking. "


    <hr>


    From #371


    "That was my fault," Rian said as soon as he''d come back from leading the two siblings away.


    "Yes, it was."


    "I should have helped him prepare what he was going to say. I knew the time off was going to be a contentious point, so I should have helped him present it in a way that wouldn''t annoy you."


    "Yes, you should have."


    "Really, I should have made more of a point about how important you considered contributing to the demesne to be, and that he should have waited a few days after he''d shown how skilled and useful he was before asking for time off."


    "That would certainly have been a good idea."


    "Shana, if this is your way to trying to make me feel better, please stop. If it isn''t, I wonder at your newfound vindictive streak."


    "I am simply agreeing with all your statements. Why would I be vindictive towards you?"


    "Oh. Well, could you¡ª"


    "After all, it''s not as if I''m annoyed at you for teaching Karina to swim, who has managed to give herself six cramps this month from doing so strenuously."

 425 - A Cold Wind

    The dragon did not arrive that day, which was fortunate because it had taken all day for the three adult seels Lori had been able to drag out of the water to be skinned and butchered. At the rate the dragon was approaching, there was a very really possibility this would be one that lingered, and they might be stuck inside the dragon shelter for a week or more.


    At lunch, Lori checked on her demesne. Rian had still not given the signal, although all the voids of wisps that denoted people were inside her dungeon now, and the waterwisps that made up the Lori''s Ice Boat had been beached and the boat was lacking its driver and¡­ its outriggers? Ah, right. She needed to remove the ice from that, didn''t she?


    Lori carefully liquefied the solidified water wrapped around the Lori''s Ice Boat''s wooden frame, doing it one section at a time. Normally this would require her to use firewisps to carefully add heat to the water, but¡­ well, it was a very hot day, as usual. Each small section drew in the heat from the air around it, momentarily causing the air to liquefy or even solidify, but it was so hot that she only had to wait a few moments for the cold air to disperse and then there was enough heat in the air again for the water to absorb and use to liquefy.


    To prepare for the possibility that this slow-to-arrive dragon would also be slow to leave, Lori spent the afternoon making head-sized blocks of ice¡ªeach with a binding to keep the water solidified¡ªthat were hauled up to the dragon shelter by everyone who wasn''t busy butchering the seels. The ice blocks were stacked in the room that was intended to be a bathing area, atop a layer of straw from the last harvest to keep them from sliding on the ground. It was either that or trying to enlarge the water reservoir, and doing the latter would have been complicated given the present situation. Moving the excavated stone out, putting the water in¡­ yes, keeping the blocks of ice perpetually solid would require her active intervention at times, but once she''d fused all the small blocks into one massive block, it was easier to keep imbued, and blocks didn''t need buckets to be carried.


    She had needed to make clear that the ice blocks were not for holding against themselves to keep cool, but was their future water supply. It had been necessary to have Yllian put someone to guard the ice block so that none of the idiots tried to chip off a piece to rub all over themselves.


    Lori just hoped this would be enough to keep them supplied with water for more than a week, if the dragon lasted that long. Intellectually, she knew that she must have drunk reclaimed goldwater during the times she and her mothers had sheltered in Taniar Demesne''s dragon shelters, and that it had been common practice for millennia in dragon shelters and dungeons, but¡­ no, no, it was far too early to be considering making her idiots drink their own goldwater.


    ¡­


    Although¡­


    No, no making anyone drink their own goldwater, no matter how annoying Shanalorre''s uncle was.


    Dinner was served in the late afternoon so that there would be time to carry all the benches and tables back to the dragon shelter. The bits of meat had been fire roasted instead of stewed, probably because it was faster. Lori had seen¡ªand smelled¡ªseveral large chunks of seel meat being roasted over open fire, the people tending to them sweating profusely. The food that had resulted had been delicious, though.


    After dinner, everything was carried back to the dragon shelter, and Lori finally reactivated the ventilation bound tool by placing the large wisp-bead back into its bead receptacle. Air began to audibly flow through the wooden tubes that served as the mine''s ventilation system. Lori stood and held her hand up towards the vent that released into her alcove, smiling widely at the cold air that blew over her hand. She would seal off the air vent actually closest to her alcove¡ªthere was still the possibility of the dragon producing poisonous gasses¡ªbut only when she was sure that dragon had arrived. Right now however, there was no reason to be hotter than she had to be.


    With that done, Lori moved on to the next matter, which she regarded with bemusement. "Erzebed," she said, "why is there a pile of straw in my sleeping niche? All the straw is supposed to be under the ice block."


    "You looked sore this morning, Great Binder, so I had Mekari put some clean straw down for you," Riz said. "If you don''t like it, you can give it to me Great Binder. I''m always glad to have something between me and rock."


    Lori poked at that admittedly thick pile of straw, then patted it with her open hand. The material was surprisingly springy, though not very soft. The straw was clearly much softer than the bare rock, however. While it would probably be like sleeping on wood¡­ that was much preferable to sleeping on rock.


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    "Thank you," Lori said, absently. "Have someone keeping watch for the dragon outside of the shelter tonight, and tell them to wake me immediately if they see something." She paused. "Be sure they take a moment to make sure it''s not just a cloud with strange colors from the moons."


    "Yes, Great Binder. I''ll take the first watch."


    Lori checked on her demesne again, but Rian still hadn''t given the signal. She checked the level of the water reservoir, and found it barely depleted. Did Rian have people taking drinking water from the river too?


    She sighed. While she didn''t actually want a dragon to come to her demesnes, all this waiting for it to show up¡­ it was wearing on her. They were all ready to seal themselves into the dragon shelter, but since the dragon wasn''t actually here yet, they couldn''t. Or at least, she wouldn''t let them, lest they devour through the limited water supplies, though ironically they were unlikely to run out of food no matter how long the dragon lingered.


    Lori was tempted to stay up reading. Her almanac called to her from her pack, full of entertainment and distraction¡­ but the dragon was still to come, and she didn''t want her mind to be exhausted when it came time to finally seal her dungeon and the shelter.


    Not that she wanted for there to be a dragon over her demesnes, but if it was coming, then it really should be here now so she can finally close everything and just go to sleep¡­


    She was still spinning around in her own head, these two thoughts chasing each other as she sank into the darkness behind her eyes.


    <hr>


    The next morning dawned, and there still seemed to be no sign of the coming dragon. Lori could feel it still coming, seemingly heading straight towards them. That was mostly likely a false impression, as the dragon was probably so wide she just couldn''t properly notice any change in the angle that the wisps in her body and her demesne were being pressured by the force of the dragon''s presence.


    Unsealing the entrance to the dragon shelter again, Lori stepped out to check the horizon once more, shivering slightly at a cold morning breeze. A cursory view revealed nothing, just more empty sky and¡ª


    "Great Binder, I think we should get back inside," Riz said.


    Lori blinked, turning to her not-an-officer. "What? Why?"


    Riz held up a hand, waving it vaguely through the air. "The wind is cold, Great Binder. When was the last time the wind was this cold?"


    The question sounded nonsensical to Lori. Of course the wind was cold, it was early morning¡­


    ¡­during an absurdly hot summer.


    Oh.


    Lori tuned to face the direction she could feel the approaching dragon again, and found the cold wind directly in her face. She sniffed the air, but there was only the smell of the trees and leaves. At least, she assumed that was the smell of the trees and leaves, as it was what she always smelled when she was near the towering vegetation. The air was just cold, so cold she could feel her face cooling by the moment, and she could see¡­ was that fog among the trees on the other side of the river?


    Lori reached through her connection to her dungeon core, letting herself be aware of the wisps in her demesne. Waterwisps filled the air, and there were no firewisps to be found outside. The presence of lightwisps were muted, and there were a lot of darkwisps not part of the binding she had prepared close to the ground. Tellingly, there were no idiot-shaped voids of wisps outside of her dungeon, and four stones with lightwisp bindings anchored to them were stacked on the little stone shelf that Rian was supposed to use to signal her. That wasn''t the procedure they had discussed, but she could see Rian doing that as a method of being emphatic.


    "Erzebed?"


    "Yes, Great Binder?"


    "Tell Yllian we''re eating in the dragon shelter this morning. I''ll provide a binding for them to cook the food on. Before breakfast though, I want the latrines cleaned one last time and the drinking water replenished one last time." Lori paused, going over the instructions again. "Not in that order, I want clean hands bringing in the water. We don''t eat until I seal the dragon shelter again."


    "Yes, Great Binder. Uh¡­ can we put our things in your alcove instead of in the passage while the latrine is being cleaned?"


    Lori stared at her, then sighed. "Fine. Use the floor, then take it all out once the passage is clean."


    "Thank you, Great Binder."


    Turning, Lori headed back to the mine to get to work on sealing off her dungeon. The stone of the hill and the white Iridescence-alloyed copper over the door was covered with moisture, and it was only now that Lori realized that the excessive humidity of the previous day was gone. At the door, she glanced back over the horizon.


    The sky continued to be unhelpfully empty, as if taunting Lori with the dragon''s tardiness, the cold wind on her face disdainful.


    As Lori stepped back through the mine entrance, her thoughts went back to that beast that she kept failing to kill. Maybe the dragon would be able to kill the typhon beast for them? So far, the plan to learn the beast''s habits and try to set a trap for it¡­ well, admittedly, it had somewhat fallen by the wayside, although at least they hadn''t lost anyone over it yet. She resolved to finally put the plan into effect after the dragon, if the beast was somehow still alive afterwards.


    ¡­


    No, it was still sadly more plausible that the thing would come out of this completely unscathed, ugh.


    As Riz headed deeper into the mine to relay the orders to Yllian and her friends, Lori returned to her alcove. Sitting down atop her bedroll, she leaned back against the stone wall, closed her eyes, and got to work.

 426 - Beneath The Dragon’s Shadow

    By the time they ate, the drinking water had been replenished one last time, the latrines had been cleaned, the dragon shelter had been sealed, Lori had imbued the blocks of reserve¡ªreservoir?¡ªice, and the defenses of her dungeon had been set in place. Her dungeon''s entryway had been turned into a moat filled with boiling water that had been bound to remain liquid, the lethal lighningwisp binding had been activated, and she had firewisps to keep the water''s heat from transferring to the air so that her dungeon wouldn''t become heated.


    There had been voids of wisps shaped like idiots on the upper balcony between the two air intake vents as she had begun sealing up her dungeon, and they had stayed and probably watched as she reconfigured the entryway for the dragon''s arrival. Fortunately, the idiots had left as she''d been finishing, else she might have needed to try to direct them back into the dungeon. The upper balcony was for if it became necessary to actively defend her dungeon''s air vents against particularly durable bug-like dragonborn abominations trying to crawl into them, which her lightningwisp binding was theoretically meant to prevent, and was kept as a redundancy. Really, what was the point of having such heavy defenses if people were going to leave them just to look at the dragon through the air holes?


    Breakfast in the dragon shelter had been served so late it was practically an early lunch. Lori took her food in her alcove, because the main shelter had been crowded and noisy and she didn''t have any other orders to give to Yllian, so there was no reason to subject herself to that. After eating, she just sat there, dividing her attention between her ears and her awareness of her demesne''s wisps.


    There were few firewisps left in the air, meaning it had cooled significantly, and the waterwisps that had saturated it had changed state, condensing from mostly air to mostly liquid. Fog, she surmised. All of the stone structures of her demesne were covered in water as the humidity had condensed, and the part of her familiar with woodworking winced at the damage this was undoubtedly doing to the wood. Their roofs had been designed to resist rain, and had been treated accordingly, but the underlying beams and¡­ well, whatever the bits that weren''t beams were called¡­ had not been as prepared. She could feel the waterwisps entering them, no doubt causing them to swell and doing who knows what.


    Lacking anything better to do, Lori did what she could to alleviate the damage, claiming waterwisps and slowly drawing them out of the wood, then forming them into a binding to keep more moisture out. It was probably pointless in the long run, but she had little else to do besides sleeping or reading her almanac, and until the dragon actually arrived she didn''t want to compromise her ability to perceive her demesne with either.


    It was later afternoon when the dragon arrived. At least, she was reasonably sure that was the time. Yllian had the forethought to set up a water clock¡ªRian must have provided it at some point, as the dragon shelter hadn''t had one last time¡ªand she had seen it when she''d gone to make another firewisp binding to cook dinner. As she felt the presence of the dragon practically upon them, she felt something cross over her demesne''s boundaries.


    Realization took a few moments, and comprehension took a few more. Dragons were usually high in the sky, and while it was well-recorded that dragons regularly entered the sphere of larger demesnes several taums wide¡ªwhich meant all modern demesne in the old continent¡ªLori had thought that her own demesne at a mere two and a half taums in radius didn''t reach the altitudes necessary. She''d read somewhere that dragons usually occupied the skies between ten and fifty taums above the ground, well above the height that Skykeep Demesne floated at.


    What Lori felt enter her demesne was, as far as she could estimate, only five hundred paces or so above the ground.


    In hindsight, she had possessed a few unconscious preconceptions as to what a dragon was. She had thought it would be something like a massive wispling, a somehow-metabolizing conglomeration of wisps. After all, it was well-known that Dungeon Binders had devised many of the more esoteric bindings, meanings, formations and even a few vistas from observing the dragons that had passed through their demesnes. Logically, that meant there were wisps that she would be able to perceive through her connection to her dungeon''s core¡­ and life and thoughts as well, she supposed, once she figured out how she was supposed to do that.


    The dragon was a void.


    Everything above five hundred paces was simply gone from her awareness. It was like a wall had entered her demesne, cutting her off from the sky and slowly casting its shadow upon her. The dragon moved with almost painful slowness, what Lori judged to be just faster than a slightly hurried walking pace. Lori was alarmed to see that the hemispherical binding of darkwisps, intended as an ablative layer against the dragon directing magic at her demesne, was simply being pushed out of the way¡­ because the only place the binding was anchored was at her entryway.


    Hastily, Lori quickly took hold of the darkwisp binding and anchored it to more places to keep the binding within the confines of her demesne. The darkwisps had already started to bulge out beyond her demesne''s borders on the far side opposite the dragon''s approach, but she was able to pull it back in.


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    When she finished securing her ablative layer¡ªfortunately, enough had been under the dragon anything it had tried to do to the actual material surface of her demesne had been prevented¡ª she that took a moment and focused specifically on the edge of the advancing void. Lori perceived voids that she was just able to identify as curved, subtly spiraling tendrils. The tendrils stuck out at strangely repetitive angles, until the ends of the tendrils bloomed in symmetrical clusters of more void, spiraling tendrils. When the void tendrils moved towards each other, they seemed to weave together, twisting over and under each other, tendrils filling up her remaining pockets of awareness until Lori lost all ability to perceive the wisps there. Despite this, there were no displacements of airwisps or airborne waterwisps that implied anything solid was moving through the air.


    If Lori hadn''t been so focused on perceiving such fine details, she would likely have missed what the dragon was doing until much later.


    Beneath the dragon''s shadow, dropping from its formless body that she couldn''t perceive, small voids of wisps were falling. The voids were swiftly covered in waterwisps and ice that coalesced out of the fog, even as what few firewisps there were started disappearing. The frost-covered voids were displacing airwisps and waterwisps as they fell downwards, indicating that unlike the dragon itself, some sort of solid matter filled those voids. Something that was very cold, cold enough that ice formed around them instantly¡­


    Lori followed the progress of one of the ice-covered voids as it fell and struck the ground¡­ and began to release airwisps.


    Wait.


    She concentrated her awareness along the ground, and found more and more voids being scattered, slowly vanishing into literal puffs of air. Lori focused her awareness all along the length of the river. The little voids were falling into the part of the river under the dragon''s shadow like hailstones, and she could only suppose the same was happening in the parts of the river beyond her demesne as well. The river under the dragon was beginning to roil as if boiling, very thick clouds of waterwisps rising from the water''s surface, joining the fog that the already in the air.


    ¡­


    Were those voids solidified air?


    That¡­ that seemed the best explanation she had at the moment. Solidified air¡ªand liquified air, for that matter¡ªwere voids in her perceptions of the wisps in her demesne, since they were no longer air but not made of water or rocks and had no heat, although liquefied air could contain lightwisps and darkwisps. But that meant that¡­


    Lori turned her attention back to the dragon slowly passing over her demesne. Her fingers twitched¡­


    Then she shook her head.


    No, no, it was not the time to focus on the dragon, no matter how interesting what it was being. Focus on the repercussions of its actions. If it was dropping solidified air into her demesne, then the air within the dragon must well past freezing. Even if this was simply exhalation and not some other gas, that was still a significant drop in temperature! And with the dragon so slow¡­


    Lori''s eyes snapped open, her eyes turning towards the vent through which air drawn in from outside the mine flowed out. She got to her feet, bare toes feeling for her tsinelas out of habit before remembering she hadn''t brought those. Sighing, she put her socks and boots back on¡ªmaybe she should have brought her tsinelas¡ªbefore she was finally able to walk towards the vent, holding her hand up to it.


    The air coming in was cold and felt damp. Lori reached down and touched the bit of wire on the side of the reinforced bead receptacle, touching the metal contact. She altered the firewisps she had integrated into the ventilation, carefully detaching them from the binding and, with some moving around, anchoring them to a portion of stone she''d removed from the earthwisp reinforcement. With no more heat being deleted, the air coming in was merely cool and damp. That was certainly an improvement over the damp heat that the air had been this summer, but¡­


    Lori checked on the dragon passing over her demesne again as she went back to sit on her bedroll. The dragon was still moving over her dungeon slowly, the ablative layer of darkwisps holding firm but not stopping the solid voids from passing through¡ª


    Something tried to override her claim to the darkwisps, and Lori felt the familiar sensation of another trying to take away wisps that she had bound to her will. She instinctively reacted as she always did when someone tried to do that and enforced her claim, her will gripping the wisps of the binding tightly. The attempt to override her continued, the one opposing her trying to push her will aside and impose its own claim, but Lori stubbornly held on.


    This was her demesne, even if she was outside it at the moment! In her demesne, the wisps within were as part of her body, and she always had the superior claim¡ªwait, who was challenging her claim?


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    !!!


    Lori maintained a firm grip on the barrier of darkwisps above her demesne. Or at least, a grip. As long as she consciously made an effort to keep the darkwisps bound to her will, it would. That allowed her to sit there and try to calmly come to terms with the realization that a dragon was challenging her claim to her own binding.


    She took a deep breath, and considered the situation rationally. Logically, this should come as no surprise. After all, dragons had to be capable of Whispering, or else Dungeon Binders studying them wouldn''t result in new bindings. And being capable of Whispering, that meant that a dragon should be able to perform all the necessary steps to perform Whispering. And the most basic step was claiming wisps and binding them to your will. So really, it was to be expected that a dragon was capable of trying to claim wisps in her demesne.


    ¡­


    No, no, Lori still felt her concept of a sane world turning sideways.

 427 - Simple Solutions

    Unfortunately, the problem with the world turning sideways is you still had to deal with it.


    Keeping a grip on her darkwisps while continuing to work on her demesne was a challenge¡ªand an irritating inconvenience¡ªbut nothing she couldn''t do! It forced her to work slowly and carefully, but putting care in your work was a good thing! Haste was wasteful, after all!


    ¡­


    Why hadn''t her school taught her how to work on two bindings at once? It was clearly an important skill that she needed to learn, but her school had conspicuously not included this very important skill in their curricu¡ª


    Despite how good it felt, Lori had to stop muttering colorfully about her school under her breath, as conceiving of sufficiently colorful language with which to paint them was one flow of thought too many, and her grip on the binding of darkwisps nearly slipped as the dragon kept trying to override her claim.


    Stubbornly, Lori continued working. Carefully, she modified the binding of firewisps she''d placed above the pool of boiling water in the entryway of her dungeon. The air getting drawn into her dungeon being hot was no longer a concern. Well, it was now much less of a concern compared to the air in her dungeon getting too cold. While the solidified air would not have much as mass and capacity to sap heat compared to water, it was likely going to add up, especially since there wouldn''t be a lot in the way of heat sources in her dungeon to counter the cold. At least, no heat sources that weren''t dangerous for her to remove the bindings of firewisps that kept their heat contained. And that heat source¡ªthe water evaporator and condenser for making sure the water was clean and drinkable¡ªwasn''t properly positioned to take advantage of the heat in any case.


    She supposed the water in the reservoir would act to stabilize the temperature, but as with the evaporator and condenser it wasn''t well-positioned to do so. Theoretically, people could shelter in the third level, as she had bindings in place to maintain the temperature so that it remained in within the range that was optimal for growing their crops, but the dungeon farm wasn''t designed for actually housing and sustaining people. She could only imagine the disaster what would happen if her idiots tried¡ª


    Lori barely managed to reassert her claim as the dragon took advantage of her momentary distraction to begin binding the darkwisp barrier to its will. Argh! Don''t get distracted, don''t get distracted! Don''t let the dragon claim the most important defense against it doing horrible things to her demesne! She returned towards dividing her attention only between two things. Darkwisps and firewisps, darkwisps and firewisps¡­


    ¡­


    She was an idiot.


    Lori anchored the binding of darkwisps to the binding of firewisps she was trying to work on, and detached the firewisps from the waterwisps of the moat. Ah, much better! Now she technically only had one binding to pay attention to! Carefully, she reformed the binding of firewisps to alter the temperature of what passed through it to what she hoped was a comfortable temperature. It was difficult, since what most people considered comfortable was just slightly below human body temperature, and that was hard to assess without being physically at the location to feel the air. Still, as long it was well above freezing, it should not be much of a problem.


    Once the adjustments were finished, Lori anchored the firewisps to the stone of the entryway again before detaching it from the darkwisps. While she''d been working, fog seemed to have entered the entryway, which rose and swirled as it made contact with the boiling and forcibly liquefied water, then sank as it passed through the diagonally-slanted firewisps that deleted the heat and caused it to cool, only to rise again as it made contact with the boiling water.


    Sank¡­


    Oh.


    Sighing, Lori started anchoring airwisps to the darkwisp binding. Unfortunately, doing so gave the turbulent air currents and fog something to push against, and Lori had to anchor the darkwisps to the entryway for some stability. She was tempted to sigh, even as she endured another attempt by the dragon to override her claim on the ablative barrier. Right, right. Given that the river wasn''t freezing over, and that the solidied air was becoming air directly instead of transitioning to a liquid state, it was likely exhalation that was hailing down on her demesne.


    It was a dangerous vapor, as sufficient concentrations of it were harmful. While the air intake vent for her dungeon was well above the ground, the fact that so much was falling down on her demesne likely meant there was a higher than normal concentration of it present. As a precaution, she set some airwisps¡ªanchored onto the stone of the entryway, which was being reinforced by earthwisps and imbued directly by her core¡ªto forcefully blow the air along the bottom half of the entryway, outward. This had the added benefit of blowing out the little voids of solidified air that had bounced and fallen into the entryway, which would definitely be releasing most-likely-exhalation where it was most likely to be pulled into her demesne, as well as blowing out the fog.


    More and more fog was filling the air, rising up from the river on the bubbles being released by the sublimating voids in her awareness. The bits of solidified air¡ª a part of her noted they technically counted as a form of dragon scales¡ªfalling into the river''s waters were bubbling away, but didn''t seem to be causing an appreciable change in the river''s temperature. There was just far too much water. The river was flowing as well, meaning that no part of it was allowed to sit and grow cold. Still, she would have to keep an eye on it. Even this indirect method of cooling could have a cumulative effect if it persisted for long enough, and if it started icing over¡­


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    Well, she''d deal with that when it became an issue she needed to deal with. At the moment, there was a far more pressing matter!


    How was she supposed to get any sleep when she had to keep the dragon from claiming her darkwisps?-!


    "Um, Great Binder?"


    Lori blinked, and it took her a few moments to recall where she was, and another moment to not forget to actively maintain her claim on the darkwisps of her demesne. "What is it, Erzebed?"


    The pink-haired woman, standing just beyond the open door of Lori''s alcove, pointed down the mine tunnel, deeper into the shelter. "There''s fog coming out of the air vents. Is that something we should be worried about?"


    Fo¡ªoh. "Fo¡ªoh. Yes, that''s perfectly normal, Erzebed." Lori said, then paused, frowning. "Though I suppose I should do something about it. The wood hasn''t been treated to take that much damp. We wouldn''t want mold where we store our food." Lori got to her feet, keeping her hold on the darkwisps. The dragon was still trying to claim it, its attempts almost rhythmic. "Go over there and tell me if the fog stops."


    She went back to the contact point, and out of habit checked the wispbeads. Still a considerable amount. No need to replace them any time soon, then. Lori touched the metal contact point leading to the airwisp binding that took care of their ventilation, tentatively reaching through it. Having an actual object in front of her to touch helped her stay focused as she reached through the metal with her right hand and made contact with the binding.


    Still keeping part of her attention of maintaining her claim on her demesne''s darkwisps, she carefully deactivated the binding, preventing air and fog from being drawn through their ventilation. The mine''s areas were large enough that they could survive some time without active ventilati¡ª


    "Great Binder, the fog''s stopped coming out!" Riz called out, her voice echoing through the mine tunnel.


    ¡­


    "Noted. Tell me immediately if there''s any change."


    Carefully, Lori began gathering waterwisps out of the air and fog, which was made simpler by the binding being deactivated. The waterwisps could remain anchored to the airwisps without issue, and she didn''t have to worry about forming the waterwisps into a coherent binding. Lori slowly continued to build up the waterwisps, thought mostly because she couldn''t rush due to needing to split her attention.


    Once she had enough waterwisps, Lori formed them into a binding that would prevent other waterwisps¡ªand thus any form of water¡ªfrom passing through the binding. Once that was done, she began to carefully¡ªand blindly¡ªmove the waterwisps towards where she thought the stone grate above the outermost door of the shelter was. It took some doing and constantly trying to claim any wisps that her binding made contact with, which meant she couldn''t be rushed. Eventually, however, she was able to make out a regular series of straight arrangements of earthwisps¡ªthe stone grate above the door¡ªand then carefully anchored the waterwisps into place, spreading the binding across the grate and anchoring it securely. With that in place, Lori was able to slowly put the airwisp binding back into place, and checked all the bindings protecting the shelter. Airwisps, lightningwisps, earthwisps, darkwisps¡­ she nodded in satisfaction at finding them all active.


    "Erzebed, is fog still coming out of the ventilation?" she called out.


    There was a momentary pause. "No fog, Great Binder!" came the reply,


    Lori nodded, even thought Riz couldn''t see her. "Inform me if the shelter starts becoming cold," she ordered. "I''ll be in my alcove checking up on m¡ªLorian Demesne. Inform me if there''s anything else." She paused, then amended, "Anything you or Yllian can''t solve yourselves."


    "Yes, Great Binder!"


    Sitting in her sleeping niche again and resisting the urge to lie down¡ªit would make her sleepy, and she couldn''t risk falling asleep¡ªLori went back to keeping the darkwisps away from the dragon. She had to find a way to prevent the dragon from subverting their defenses that didn''t actively require her direct supervision!


    Ugh, think, think! How could she keep the dragon from claiming her darkwisps when she wasn''t maintaining her hold on them? If the dragon were another wizard, Lori would hit them in the face with her staff to break their concentration and make them let go, but¡­ well, historically a Dungeon Binder provoking a dragon has never ended well. The most common words to describe it were ''crater where the demesne''s dungeon once stood'', though the exact methods varied. The prior incarnation of Endless Caverns Demesne had its dungeon and core destroyed with a vista so twisted Horotracts claimed it had torn holes in the face of existence, and had resulted in a perfect sphere where stone and all other solid matter had just vanished.


    She didn''t want that to happen to her dungeon.


    Well, she couldn''t hit the dragon, and it wasn''t like she could just move the binding where the dragon cou¡ª


    ¡­


    Slowly, Lori examined what her connection to her core was letting her perceive. The void that was the dragon, moving slowly over her demesne. Her binding of darkwisps that the dragon repeatedly tried to claim. The way the two were pressing against each other, the immaterial dragon that had somehow pushed the equally immaterial darkness ahead of it¡­


    ¡­


    Face flat, Lori drew down the darkwisps, pulling the binding away from the dragon and leaving a gap between the two. The dragon immediately began claiming the airwisps, waterwisps, firewisps, and lightwisps beneath it, forming them in¡­ in¡­


    ¡­


    Oh.


    Oh¡­


    That was¡­ it was¡­ wait, why did it¡­? How did¡­?


    Lori shook her head, distracting herself from what rainbows the dragon was doing with Whispering, observing instead how far it could manage to claim wisps. The range seemed to be¡­ not very far from the void that was its¡­ body? Its body. She couldn''t really judge distances too well, as there were no points of reference she could use, but its reach seemed very short. If her binding hadn''t almost literally been rubbing against it¡­


    Warily, Lori loosened her focus and will on the binding of darkwisps, ready to take hold of it immediately if she felt the dragon trying to claim it. As she watched, the dragon started releasing the ill-bound wisps¡ªshe couldn''t find it in herself to call those bizarrely formed things bindings¡ªthat fell to strike her barrier of darkwisps. Some simply bounced off, not reacting, but others started expending imbuement into the darkwisps, and the binding did the same to prevent the ill-bound wisps from penetrating. All along her binding, she felt other such reactions.


    Many of them were from something she couldn''t perceive, though Lori could guess what was happening. The dragon was using insane thoughts, rampant life and twisted vistas and trying to reach down through her darkwisps. Although given the ill-bound wisps, perhaps they were simply being released to drop down into her demesne¡­


    ¡­


    Well, her problem was solved, so Lori could move on to other things!


    "Erzebed," she said as she claimed one of the ill-bound wisps falling towards her demense, easily overriding the dragon''s previous claim and binding the thing to her will, "find Yllian and tell him I need paper, a working pen, and something to write on top of."


    Not waiting for a reply, she began to study the dragon''s creation, trying to work out what it could do and how¡­

 428 - Reading Words

    Karina hummed happily as she tended to the tuber planters in the dungeon farm, making sure they were watered and that the growing tubers were properly covered in soil. The walls of the tunnel where the planters were housed echoed with sounds from the main part of the farm, where inay and itay and the demesne''s other farmers were checking on the crops that they''d transplanted down from the fields. They hadn''t been able to move all the crops from the fields since there hadn''t been enough plots that they could be planted on in the dungeon farm, but they had moved a lot, and Shana, Wiz Tae, and Wiz Lidz had said they would be able to get the crops ready to harvest before the dragon left!


    It was the third day of living in the dungeon because of the dragon, and everyone was enjoying not having to go outside where it was hot, although the uncles and Lord Rian were all worried that the dragon would break the new sawmill, even with Wiz Tae and Wiz Lidz and Shana doing Deadspeaking things to make it stronger yesterday. Well, they hadn''t said it would be stronger, Wiz Lidz had said it would make the sawmill ''springy'' and ''bouncy'' so that if the dragon dropped a big rock on it the rock might bounce off instead of breaking the roof.


    Of course, there was still work to be done. The weavers still had their looms, though they had a lot of people to spin thread for them now, and the carpenter kuyas were getting planks ready for roof repairs. The floors needed to be swept since dust and sawdust had been building up in corners and under the alcove benches, and the stairs to the dungeon farm needed to be scraped since little clumps of dirt had gotten ground into the steps when they had been transferring the crops down from to the dungeon farm.


    There wasn''t anyone else helping Karina, but that was all right. She was nearly done anyway.


    Once she was done, Karina stood up, wincing at the ache in her knees from squatting for so long. Picking up her now-empty bucket of water, she headed towards the water spigot to wash off. "Inay, itay, I''m done with the tubers!" she called out. "Do you need me for anything else?"


    She couldn''t see either of her parents, but she heard her itay''s voice call out, "No, Karina, we''ll be done soon! Go get washed up!"


    "All right!"


    Washing her hands in the basin that caught the water from the spigot¡ªthere wasn''t a lot of water in it right then, since the cistern with the water that the crops didn''t drink up was still full, and so they were using that for watering¡ªKarina ungirded her skirt and put her water bucket with the other buckets, taking a moment to look over them all to make sure none of them were leaking or anything. Once she was satisfied, Karina headed upstairs, her knees aching a bit more as she climbed the many stairs, though she managed to resist the temptation to run. Running up the stairs was very dangerous, after all.


    At the second level, she looked around, trying to spot her brothers and sisters. Usually, the second level was where everyone played in the dungeon, but today there were other people there. The alcoves were full of people resting, playing board games, spinning thread for the weavers, carding the fibers to be spun from retted ropeweed, sewing holes in clothes, or fixing things that had broken but had been put off. Not seeing the four of them, Karina headed upstairs.


    Usually, the dining hall was full of tables and benches laid out in rows and columns, with enough space between them for people to walk through without interrupting the people sitting. Now, however, a third of the tables and chairs near the baths had been cleared and moved along the walls, leaving a large clear space, if one didn''t count the pillars holding up the ceiling.


    "No one tell Lori when she gets back," Lord Rian had said when he''d told people to start clearing the space the day after Binder Lori had left. "Understood? This going to be our little secret. If she finds out about this¡­ I''m blaming all of you, because I''m not going to tell her!"


    At this time of day, no one was dancing, so the other children were using it to play takas, piles of reed tsinelas marking out the borders of the playing field and the lines that that taggers could move along. As Karina climbed up, there was a game happening, children trying to reach the other end of the playing field and back again without being tagged, interspersed by yells that the taggers weren''t on their lines, and the taggers'' own yells that they in fact were on the line, and that the person complaining was definitely tagged and out, and that was a point to their side. Since the lines weren''t actually drawn on the ground and were just the spaces between certain piles of tsinelas, there was a lot of yelling.


    That wasn''t counting all the ones sitting or standing around the field yelling out in support of one side of an argument or another, all with the wide grins of those wanting to see if the argument would turn into a fight.


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    Shana was sitting at one of the tables still in place next to where everyone was playing, Yoshka on the bench next to her. The younger girl was cheering and declaring that the tagger was on the line, her voice mixing with all the others as she waved her hands excitedly. From the sweat running down Yoshka''s face and the towel next to Shana on the bench, the young girl had already had her turn at playing. There was a small smile on Shana''s face as she sat with her back to the table, leaning against it. At least, Karina thought it was a smile. It might have just been the fact Shana''s head was tilted back.


    There was nothing maybe about Karina''s smile as she watched the two of them, glad that the two were happy. Shana had been sad and mopey and feeling lonely ever since her cousin had left to go back to living in River''s Fork. While the dragon showing up was bad, the fact that it meant all the children in the other demesne had to come to Lorian meant that Shana''s cousin had a reason to visit again. The two had been practically hand in hand since then, which was good because with all the other children returned, Shana was busy being in charge of them again. That meant making sure they put all their packs into the alcove they were sleeping in, reminding them to wash their hands before meals, and to not be so noisy when people were trying to sleep.


    On the table that Shana was leaning against was Lord Rian, lying down on his back on top of the tabletop with a towel over his face, his bare feet hanging out over the end of the table. His hands were on his stomach, and from the way snoring was coming through the towel, he was probably asleep. He must have been really tired if he could sleep next to where the children were playing. There was a jar that probably held cold water and a wooden cup next to his head.


    Karina let her gaze roam over the playing field, finally spotting her brothers and sisters. Cif was playing with a carved wooden horned-bug and a wooden sweetbug, making them fight, while Jivoy and Malli were playing pincer on a borrowed game board. Her youngest sister Siithia was a little apart from the other three, cheering on the game. It looked like they were behaving, so Karina could take a moment to rest.


    Walking carefully around the edge of the space, Karina made her way to where Shana and Yoshka were sitting with a big smile on her face. Smiles made people smile, after all. Her friend saw her coming of course, and gave her a nod. It seemed like a happy nod, even if she wasn''t smiling anymore. "Hi, Shana. Need help with anything?"


    "Hello, Karina. No, everything is well in hand. Are you done with work?"


    Karina sat down on the bench of the table in front of her friend. "Yeah, I''m done. I''ll check the tubers later if they need watering again."


    Shana gave her a Binder Lori look. "Weren''t you the one who told me that too much water is bad for tubers because it will make their roots rot?"


    "I''m just checking! Besides, what if I''d accidentally given one of the tubers too much water just now?" Could she have put too much water in one of the planters earlier? Should she go back and check.


    "If you did, then Wizard Taeclas and Wizard Lidzuga can be asked to prevent any possible rot from occurring," Shana said as she turned and picked up the jar on the table.


    "I don''t want to bother them. Besides, it''s much better if we keep it from happening." Maybe she should go back down to check, just to be sure¡­


    "Karina¡­ you work too hard," Shana said, pouring water into the wooden cup. "If it wasn''t for that fact you choose to do all this work yourself, the Great Binder would no doubt have already threatened someone for making you do all that work."


    "I just don''t want people to be hungry!" Karina declared.


    "And we are all very thankful. However, after all the planting is done and you''ve watered everything for the day, there comes a point where you should just let things grow." Shana tilted her head, though it wasn''t as far as when Wiz Lori did it. "Unless you''ve learned how to Deadspeak, in which case the Great Binder would probably want to know as soon as she gets back." Shana held the wooden cup out to Karina. "Here, have a drink. If the crops are going to be watered, then you should be too."


    "Thanks." Karina took the cup, pulled it down in a few quick gulps as she realized she was very thirsty. Emptying the cup, she handed it back to Shana, who filled it up again. This happened two more times until Shana just handed Karina the jar.


    The two just sat there, Karina glad to rest her knees and feet, her thirst sated. It was nice, just sitting and not having to do anything. While Shana had said she worked too much, Karina did know when to stop! She copied her friend, leaning back on the table to rest her weight on it. The line of wood pressing against her back was going to be uncomfortable if she did it for too long but for now it was another load off as she looked up at the ceiling.


    Karina paused, staring, then frowned.


    "Shana?"


    "Yes, Karina?"


    "You can read words, right?"


    "Yes, that is something I can do."


    Karina pointed up at the roof of the dining hall. "What do those say?"


    Frowning, Shana leaned back, looking above her at what Karina was pointing at. Red lines glowed on the rock, forming what Karina was pretty sure were words.


    For a moment, Shana was quiet, her head turning so she could see all the words. Other children were seeing them too, and one player ran across the field while the tagger in front of him was distracted, making the tagger yell about cheating.


    "It means that we should wake up Lord Rian," Shana said. "This is definitely a ''dealing with people'' matter and not a ''taking care of children'' matter."

 429 - Cutting Wit

    "I feared this day would come," Lord Rian said, looking up at the red words on the ceiling. He was standing at the edge of the space the children were playing in, the watching children peering around him. "It was only a matter of time, I suppose, but I''d hoped we''d have longer to prepare. Now even that hope is gone, and there is no escape."


    Lord Rian''s face was sad like he wanted to cry, his shoulder slumped like he was carrying something heavy, his hands hanging down at his sides.


    "Lord Rian, Binder Lori isn''t here. You need not be so theatrical," Shana said.


    "Shana¡­" for some reason, Lord Rian looked over his shoulder like he was doing something he wasn''t supposed to and was afraid his inay would catch him, "if you think I''m doing all this just for Lori''s benefit, then you are sadly mistaken. This is all for me. Can''t a man just do something to feel witty?"


    "You can, it doesn''t mean that you are."


    "I see the famous Dungeon Binder cutting wit is strong in you. Lori would be proud if she had actually intended to teach you any of it."


    Karina frowned, trying to understand everything as she looked up at the words on the ceiling. "Should I be scared too, Lord Rian?" she said. If he was scared of the words¡­


    "No, you''re fine, Karina," Lord Rian said. "It''s just us old people and Shana who have to be afraid. Speaking of old people, could you do me a favor and tell Kolinh, Tae and Lidz to meet me here?"


    "Sure, Lord Rian!"


    "While it is effective, I wonder why Binder Lori placed it there?" Shana said as she Karina turned to leave.


    "Oh, that''s simple. It''s because it was where I''d see it from where I was lying down. You just happened to see it before I did because I had a towel over my face to block out the light." She heard Lord Rian sigh. "It''s been days and she hasn''t remembered to dim the lights so we can¡ª"


    The lights in the dining hall suddenly dimmed, and Karina instinctively slowed, glancing down to watch her step.


    "Oh, NOW she remembers!"


    "No, I think it is simply to draw attention to what she''s written. Look, the words are far more visible now in the reduced light."


    Karina went to get the people Lord Rian asked for. She found Wiz Tae downstairs, taking a nap in the alcove that she and her wife had claimed when the call had gone out that a dragon was coming. Tito Kolinh was near the dungeon''s front door, where a bunch of people who were Ateh Riz''s friends were sitting around, the rack next to them full of spears in case dragon babies tried to get inside the dungeon and eat them. Wiz Lidz was harder to find. He''d arrived with the children from River''s Fork, but Karina had been busy helping Shana get all the children settled down, and she''d only seem him in passing when he and his sister had been stepping out of the boat they''d been on. She''d given him a big smile and welcomed him to Lorian Demesne, but she hadn''t really spoken to him after that.


    Still, Karina knew everyone in the demesne, so she just walked around until she spotted someone whose name she couldn''t really bring to mind¡ª


    No, wait, she didn''t need to do that. In the alcove next to where she''d found Wiz Tae was someone with pale red hair, who was sitting on the floor of the alcove with some kind of wooden thing on his lap, using a pen¡ªshe''d seen Shana use one, but Karina had never actually touched a pen herself because Shana wouldn''t let her¡ªto write on white cloths. No, that was paper, wasn''t it? In one of the sleeping niches on the alcove''s wall, someone was sleeping on a bedroll, their face turned towards the rock. All Karina could see was really bright red hair.


    "Excuse me?" Karina said politely, trying to keep her voice down because someone was sleeping. "Hello?"


    The one writing looked up, blinking in a way that looked sleepy. "Uh, yes? Do you need anything?"


    "Are you Wiz Lidz?"


    "Yes, that''s me. Does Rian need something?"


    Karina nodded. "Lord Rian told me to come and get you. He''s in the dining hall and needs to talk to you and everyone."


    He sighed, rubbing his eyes. "All right, give me a moment, I need to put my lapdesk away¡­"


    "Do you need any help?" That wooden thing on his lap looked heavy.


    "No, no, I''ve got it."


    Karina stood there, feeling awkward as he put away the pen into a little tray on the wooden thing. He picked the wooden thing off his lap and gently put it down on the floor to one side. Standing up and wincing as he moved his legs, Wiz Lidz then picked up the wooden thing and put it in one of the sleeping niches. "All right, let''s go¡­"


    "Follow me," she said cheerfully, turning to lead the way up the stairs, glancing behind her to see if he was following. Karina frowned up at his face. Now that she was really looking at him, he looked tired. "Are you all right, Wiz Lidz? Do you want me to call Shana to heal you?"


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    "Thank you, but I can heal myself just fine, little girl," he said. "I''m just tired."


    Ah, she hadn''t introduced herself, had she? "My name is Karina! Nice to meet you, Wiz Lidz. If you''re tired though, you should get some sleep."


    "I probably should," he agreed. "After I go see what Rian needs."


    Well, if he said so¡­ he was a grown up, he should know what he was talking about.


    When they got back to where Karina had left Lord Rian, the lights were bright again, though the words were still glowing like moonlight on the roof, and Lord Rian was sitting at a table a few down from where he''d been sleeping, putting distance between him and the children who were still playing. With him was everyone else that he''d had Karina call, as well as Shana, who still had Yoshka next to her. Yoshka was sitting on the end of the bench, trying to see the game, but wasn''t yelling anymore.


    "Ah, there you are Lidz¡ªLidz, did you get any sleep at all last night?" Lord Rian said. He turned towards her. "Thank you for getting everyone, Karina. You were a big help."


    "You''re welcome, Lord Rian!" she said, giving him a big smile that he returned. See Shana, what''s how you''re supposed to smile!


    "I slept last night," Wiz Lidz protested.


    "Lidz, I know what ''stayed up all night reading'' looks like, and you''re close enough. Don''t try to lie about sleep deprivation to someone with no self-control when it comes to reading. When we''re done here, you go straight on to sleep, all right? If there''s an emergency, we''ll need you at your best."


    Wiz Lidz winced, but sighed and nodded as he sat down next to Wiz Tae, and the two wizards exchanged nods.


    "All right, I''ll make this quick, as this really isn''t something that needs to be dragged out for too long," Lord Rian said. He pointed towards the moonlight-red words. "Lori''s finally realized that she has other ways to talk to us when she''s away. Fortunately, she still seems to be working on it, because she''s only sent us a few words. To spare you from having to try to work out what she wrote, I took the liberty of writing it down for you." He tapped a dark writing slate next to him, which had white words on it written in chalk. "''Dragon makes solid air. Prepare for cold''. As expected of her, she''s left no instructions as to how to respond back."


    Karina frowned in confusion as she sat nearby, kicking her legs back and forth on the bench. How did you make air solid? Air was air, right? It was¡­ airy. Everyone else seemed to know what Lord Rian was talking about, though.


    "Rainb¡ª" Wiz Lidz began, then stopped himself for some reason. "That''s going to be dangerous. If the dragon is solidifying the air outside¡­"


    "I doubt it''s all the air, or else what''s coming in through the vents would noticeably far colder," Lord Rian said. "At the moment, it doesn''t feel any colder than when I had everyone start staying inside the dungeon, but that might change over the next few days. I put a cup of water out on the balcony above the door, and from what I can see through the vent it hasn''t turned to ice yet. That''s a good sign that solidifying air or not, the air outside is still above freezing."


    "That and you can still see fog past the entryway," Tito Kolinh said. "It''s not coating the stone in ice."


    "That, too," Lord Rian nodded. He looked at Wiz Tae, Wiz Lidz, and Shana. "I don''t suppose the three of you feel any change in how fast the dragon is moving?"


    They all shook their heads. "Still right on top of us, and that doesn''t seem to be changing any time soon," Wiz Tae said.


    "It is also still very low along the ground," Shana added, looking up for some reason. "There has been no change in that area."


    Lord Rian nodded. "If it''s still low enough to be in your demesne, maybe that''s how Lori knows about it making solidified air," he said thoughtfully, although it didn''t sound like he was talking to anyone.


    "It is possible," Shana said. "I can certainly perceive the meanings it is taming its life into, although I cannot understand what the meaning results in." She titled her head. "While we are on the subject, everyone who remained in River''s Fork is still healthy and well, as far as I can discern from the state of their life."


    "That''s good to know," Rian said. "Still, she wrote ''prepare for cold'', so it''s probably not cold yet, but if the dragon is playing with solidified air, that means that at the very least we''ll need to find a way to keep the air coming into the dungeon warm. It''s the easiest way to keep everyone comfortable."


    Wiz Tae frowned. "How are we going to do that, though? Even with all the wood we have stacked in the second level, we can''t really light too many fires. That will use up our air."


    "I''ve thought of that, actually," Lord Rian said. "We collected the bound tools Lori made for heating the bathwater while we were getting everything ready for the dragon. They haven''t been used all summer, but there''s no reason to think they don''t still work. If we could take one of the barrels or jars and fill it with water, move it in front of the vents and stick the bound tool into it to warm it up, it should be able to act as a decent heat source for the air coming in."


    "Wait, we have bound tools for heating water?"


    "Yes, Lori made them so she could stop maintaining the bindings in the bath houses."


    "A barrel or jar might not be enough to conduct the heat," Wiz Lidz said, rubbing his eyes and making a face like he was trying not to yawn. "Wood doesn''t really transfer heat well, and while pottery isn''t as bad, it''s still pretty poor. One of the big copper pots in the kitchen would work better."


    "That''s a thought," Lord Rian said, tilting his head. "The problem is we need all the pots for cooking our meals. And we don''t really have any spares."


    "Doesn''t need to be a big pot," Wiz Tae said thoughtfully. "It just needs to be hot enough. And maybe have a lid so we don''t have the water in it going into the air and making things humid."


    "Do you have one of those?" Lord Rian asked.


    Wiz Tae nodded. "I packed our pot when we left Covehold. I''ll get it from our alcove and get it to you."


    Rian nodded. "We have a plan, then. Lidz, go and get some sleep. That''s an official lordly order. Without Lori here, you and the carpenters are the only ones who can build things, and if gets too cold, at the very least we''re going to need you to build a shelf for us to put Tae''s pot on in front of the air intake vent."


    Wiz Lidz nodded. "Sleep. Got it."


    "Once you find your pot, go back to sleep too, all right? I want one of you awake when Shana¡­" he paused, and sighed, "when Binder Shanalorre goes to sleep so we have a healer ready at all times."


    "Binder Lolilyuri isn''t here, Lord Rian. You don''t need to use my full name if you don''t want to," Shana said.


    "I dare you to say that to her face."


    "That sounds like a ''dealing with Binder Lolilyuri'' matter. Not under my purview. I take care of children."


    "That cutting wit is getting sharper every day¡­"


    ¡­


    Maybe they''d all like some water. Lord Rian and Wiz Tae had been napping, so they were probably thirsty. Karina turned and headed towards the cold pantry to get a jar of the cold water there¡­ and she supposed some cups too, since these were grownups.


    Karina really didn''t understand why most grownups didn''t like sharing cups. She and Shana shared the same cup all the time.

 430 - Conspiracy

    I worried about Lori.


    That was part of my job, of course. As her lord, I was a professional Lori-worrier, botherer, feeder, and talker. Often I worried that Lori wasn''t getting enough sleep, or using her magic for too long, or deciding it would be more convenient for her if she killed everyone in the demesne¡ªexcept for the children, of course¡ªand lived alone. Usually she remembered she didn''t know how to butcher beasts and seels, or knew how to make her own soap (oil and wood ash at a minimum), sighed and resigned herself to have to put up with people a little longer.


    Right now, I was worrying because I haven''t seen her in days, and she was in a demesne¡ªall right, she was in the one of our two demesnes¡ªwhere people didn''t like her as well as they did here in Lorian. Yes, most of the people there were devout dungeon worshippers, which was why they had been so accepting of Shanalorre''s rule, but there were also the malcontents who''d left here for there. While they''d receded to quiet grumbling when Lori taking over had resulted in increasingly improving living conditions, there was still some resentment there. While Riz was there to protect her¡­ well, things could still go wrong, and that just made me worry about Lori and Riz!


    But that was my off-duty worrying. I had other, more lordly worries to worry about, because if I didn''t worry about it, other people would soon find themselves worrying about them.


    At the moment, the worry was the possibility that the dragon outside would be causing a dangerous drop in temperature. While it was proven that the dungeon could remain comfortable in winter and even blizzard conditions, that was nowhere near close to being cold enough to solidify air. However, given that the air coming into the dungeon wasn''t freezing already, and what sounded like hail outside, it was probably safe to assume that the extreme cold wasn''t occurring at ground level. Even through the slats of the dungeon''s air vents, I think I''d be able to notice a big chunk of solidified air outside the entryway.


    So, while the dragon generating cold extreme enough to make solid air was a worry, it didn''t seem to be an immediately pressing one. My little cup of water hadn''t frozen yet, after all. Even if Lori was being absolutely lazy and leaving our survival solely to us¡ªa laughable thought, as that woman would tell us how to breathe if she thought we were somehow doing it wrong¡ªit didn''t hurt to make preparations anyway.


    Tae came back with a pot that was in good condition, although it was surprisingly small. I''d been expecting bigger, but looking at the pot''s dimensions, it made sense. The pot was tall, vaguely mug-like, and just the right size to cook a meal for two, ideal for Tae and Rybelle. "Will this do?" she asked, putting the pot down on the table and happily accepting a cup of water from Karina. "Ah, thank you Karina!"


    "It''s a start," I said. "If we need to do this, we can just get more pots. I have four bound tools, so we can make four hot water pots."


    The bound tools in question were these things that had a bead receptacle on one end and the coppery shell filled with the white Iridescence on the other. Like most of the non-wisplight bound tools Lori had made, these had originally been embedded in stone to keep them from being used for something besides their intended purpose. However, when we''d realized that they had been left outside during the previous dragon, Lori had slightly altered them to be more easily moved so that they could be collected and transferred to the dungeon.


    In keeping with Lori''s penchant for making things as difficult as possible to use for something besides their intended purpose¡ªand most likely to keep them from being removed from the baths¡ªthe stone the bound tools had been embedded into had been made removable. Thankfully, the stones weren''t head-sized things, but anyone trying to make off with the bound tools would be immediately obvious.


    The bound tools to draw water from the dungeon''s reservoir to the bath was even bigger and more awkwardly shaped.


    To the best of my knowledge, people took Lori''s stern instructions to not do stupid things to the bound tools seriously¡ªwe''d yet to receive a report of so much as a dropped wisplight, never mind the kind of damage that resulted from improper use¡ªbut Lori wasn''t the sort of person to trust in people not doing stupid things with dangerous objects.


    This was the same woman who basically didn''t care who was operating the demesne''s boats. She was both so good and so bad at being paranoid¡­


    To be honest, I wasn''t sure if the bound tools would work as they were. It would depend on how Lori had configured the things to generate heat. While the bound tool probably used firewisps, after being removed from the baths they might no longer be working. I could just see Lori doing it such that the bound tool only worked when it was in place at the baths it was supposed to be used at.


    Well, there was an easy way to figure that out. "I''ll get one of the bound tools and a bead. We can start experimenting to see if the bound tool still works and¡ª"


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    "No, we won''t!" Taeclass interrupted cheerfully.


    I pause. Yes, I know it''s a bad habit to just stop talking and let people interrupt you, but I considered it preferable to trying to talk over someone else and both of you being unintelligible. My sister was much better at being loud and obstinate and talking over someone else than I was anyway. "We won''t?"


    "We won''t," Tae confirmed. "Because you are going back to sleep like you''re supposed to. If you''re going to be night shift, then you need to be up at night, so that means you sleep during the day. I''ll handle making sure this is working properly."


    "Tae, I can''t¡ª"


    "Oh, hush. I''m a wizard, I know enough about proper scholarship to be able to handle analyzing this," Tae said. "If your plan was just to stick the end that doesn''t have a bead receptacle in water and put in a bead, then anyone can do that. Not that I''m going to do just that. If Binder Lori made this, then first we need to figure out how she made it."


    "I''m almost sure she did it by making a binding and anchoring it," I said.


    "Well, yes, that''s true. But what kind of heating did she form her binding to do? Is she using firewisps to just generate heat, or are the firewisps set to raise the temperature of anything that intersects the binding to a certain point? And more importantly, what is the volume of the binding?"


    "Volume of the binding?" Ugh, I felt so stupid. This kind of ''repeat the last few words said'' exposition is the domain of badly written characters!


    "See? You really must be tired if you''re just repeating the last thing I said in the form of a question. Go to sleep, Rian."


    ¡­


    I''m pretty sure this feeling of annoyance is why Lori hates me so much when I''m right. "Fine. But only after you give exposition about what you said."


    "¡­most people ask for an explanation, you know."


    "I know what I said."


    Tae let out a giggle. "Fine, but then you sleep like a responsible lord. Firewisps are one of two kinds of wisps that can be inside all three kinds of matter, the other being lightningwisps, and even then some kinds of matter resist the latter. Now, normally, wizards can''t claim, bind or otherwise affect wisps, thoughts or vistas inside someone''s body, not like a Deadspeaker can affect life. However, there are some exceptions, and one of them is firewisps. While a Whisperer¡ªand a Dungeon Binder like Binder Lori, I suppose¡ªcan''t claim the firewisps in someone''s body even when the Whisperer is physically touching them, there is a way they can affect the temperature inside someone''s body using firewisps. All they need to do is form a binding of firewisps , and then have someone step into the volume of space occupied by that binding. While the firewisps are technically only going to change the temperature of their environment, when someone steps into the volume of the binding they become part of the environment being affected, and the firewisps don''t count as being of that person''s body since they originated from outside."


    "All right¡­ what does this have to¡­ ah. We don''t know what sort of binding Lori used or the volume occupied by the binding Lori put on the bound tool, so until we do it''s dangerous to put a bead on it because we might accidentally be in the volume."


    Tae nodded. "Our internal organs need a specific temperature range to operate properly, and any binding of firewisps intended to heat water would probably warm that water to significantly above body temperature. At the very least, we need to ascertain what kind of binding it was that Binder Lori used, and if it was the dangerous one, find out the boundaries of the volume so we can build tools to safely operate the bound tool from outside it." The Deadspeaker gave me a bright smile. "Something I''m perfectly able to do all by myself, so you go find yourself somewhere to sleep, close your eyes, go into the dark, and get some rest."


    The suggestion was very tempting, but¡ª


    "Wizard Taeclas is correct, Lord Rian," Shana said, and I blinked in surprise. Oh, right, she was there, wasn''t she? I''d completely forgotten. "If I am going to be awake in any case, then you should sleep. There''s no need for both of us to be active at the same time outside of an emergency, which will hopefully not manifest."


    ¡­


    "I''ll be honest, I forgot you were sitting there, Shana. Shanalorre. So you''re probably right, I should maybe go to sleep properly." Lying down next to where children were being loud hadn''t been all that restful, but I''d really just been trying to rest my eyes without going to sleep¡­


    Shana nodded. "Wizard Taeclas, if the binding is possibly as dangerous as you say, it would be best if you moved somewhere safe before you begin. There are still some unfinished tunnels in the third level that are empty, you should be able to set up there. I will come to assist you once I have escorted Lord Rian down to his alcove and ensured he is actually resting."


    "I feel like I should be offended that I''m actually being escorted to make sure I go to sleep. But yes, set up the experiment away from people first, just in case. I''ll¡­" I sighed. "I''ll go get the bound tool and a bead."


    "And then you go to sleep," Tae said.


    I rolled my yes. "Yes, and then I''ll go to sleep. Is there some kind of conspiracy going on to get me to sleep?"


    "Yup!" Taeclas cheerfully admitted. "Umu and Mikon talked to my wife, my wife told me, I talked to Shana and she told me about the last dragon, and now we''re all making sure you go to sleep properly instead of staying awake for days on end." She frowned. "That''s really not healthy, you know. Lack of sleep can cause your clapper to not work properly for ringing."


    ¡­


    "Why did you immediately go there?" I said blandly.


    "I''ve found men pay better attention to warnings about their health when I make it clear how it affects their clapper," Tae said cheerfully.


    "Is this something you learned in Deadspeaking school?"


    "Yes, actually. We learned it from one of my teachers, and it''s been really useful since graduating."


    I nodded. "Fine, fine. I''ll get the bound tool, and then I''ll get some rest. Though I''d like to make it clear, I am not doing it because I''m worried about what you said, all right?"


    "If you say so," Tae said with a grin.


    "Yes, I say so. I''m doing it because I really want to go to sleep."


    "Of course, Rian."


    "I might be sleepy, but I can still recognize when you''re humoring me."


    With lofty dignity, I went to get one of the bound tools and a bead.

 431 - Doing Great

    When I woke up, the lights were dimmed, and I could hear several people making various sounds they were usually too dignified to make while awake. It wasn''t just snoring. There was snorting, whistling, loud sighing, bubbling tongue flapping, and¡­ was that babbling? Yes, someone was talking in their sleep, the words slurred and indistinct because their mouth wasn''t forming the words properly. It sounded like Tae.


    ¡­


    Yes, that was definitely Tae, she just said ''Good morning, your Bindership''. Why was she dreaming about greeting Lori ''good morning''? Although maybe she was just practicing saying it in her sleep. That also seemed like something Tae would do.


    For a moment I just lay there, staring up at the stone that was far too close to my face and not thinking ''where am I''. I''d never really had any trouble recalling where I was when I woke up. I have had trouble getting up when I wake, but that was usually because it was so comfortable to just lie down and go back to sleep.


    Unfortunately, I had the not-really-an-honor-at-all-just-mostly-annoying of being the lord of this demesne¡ªand technically another one as well¡ªI couldn''t really indulge in just staying in bed, doing nothing. I had to get up and make sure the dungeon was in good shape on behalf of Lori, see to it that everyone was sufficiently occupied so they wouldn''t come up with any mischief, not turn prematurely gray worrying what trouble Lori has gotten into¡­


    Also, while my bed was usually just comfortable enough to want to stay in bed, that was on a wooden bed, with four bedrolls and blankets acting as padding. At the moment, I only had a single bedroll to separate me from solid rock, which was just barely comfortable enough to sleep on as long as I fell into the dark quickly. Waking up in it was another matter.


    I didn''t move, staying on my back as Umu breathed deeply next to me. Her front was pressed against me, one arm on my chest, her cheek on my shoulder. One leg was draped over my shins, no doubt to keep me from kicking in my sleep. She was very warm against my side, and although we were both fully clothed, I couldn''t help my reaction. But¡­


    Craning my head, I tried to look past Umu, who''d laid her bedroll out on the wide bench that was up against the sleeping niche. I couldn''t see Mikon in the niche and bench opposite us, or in the niche and bench opposite the alcove''s opening, so¡­ she was probably sleeping on the floor next to Umu''s bench. Straining my ears, I thought I could hear her breathing.


    Lying there, I let myself slowly become resigned to having to properly wake up and enjoyed the feeling of Umu sleeping next to me. I''d have to wake her to get up, and I was all but certain that would also wake up Mikon, so lying back like this wasn''t procrastinating, it was being considerate!


    I shifted my shoulders and back slightly against the bedroll to be more comfortable, then settled back and was considerate.


    <hr>


    I actually dozed off a little, and might have been snoring slightly when I felt a fingertip on my forehead. It was a gentle touch, not pressing, but I could feel it even through the light sleep I was in. The finger began to move back and forth on my forehead, moving left and right across my brow. It barely touched my skin, yet I could feel it there, slowly moving back and forth, the fingertip slowly tracing spirals as it moved.


    One eye reluctantly opened, and my neck just as reluctantly turned. The lights on the second level were still dim, but it was enough to see Mikon''s face looking down on me and Umu. She had a fond smile on her face as she continued moving her finger, which had stopped making spirals and was now slowly moving down my nose. "Good morning, Mikon," I said softly.


    Her smile grew. "Good morning, Rian," she said as she moved her finger to the tip of my nose. "Next time, please sleep on the floor so we can both lie down next to you."


    "Sorry," I said. "I forgot."


    "I know," she said. For a moment, the two of them stayed like that in companionable relative silence, Mikon''s finger now tracing circles on my nose.


    Eventually, I said, "I should probably get up and take over the night shift, shouldn''t I?"


    Mikon nodded. "You should. Shana is still awake upstairs waiting for you." She tilted her head thoughtfully. "Well, she''s upstairs waiting for you. I don''t think she''s next door, in any case."


    Should you really call it next door when the alcoves do not, in fact, have doors? And that finally made me decide to get up. Shana would stay up waiting for me, because for all that it was a terrible idea for her to choose Lori as someone to emulate, she had taken well to copying Lori''s more obvious positive traits such as her sense of responsibility and work ethic, although she seemed to have no inclination to not pay attention to people''s names. Of course, that same sense of responsibility meant she''d keep waiting for me to show up, and it might be a while before she thought to send someone to retrieve me.


    "I should probably get up, then," I said.


    "You should," Mikon agreed, her fingertip now slowly moving over my cheekbone.


    I remained reclined. "I''m going to have to wake up Umu, aren''t I?"


    Mikon nodded. "You will."


    I sighed. Stupid necessary evils. One shouldn''t have to wake up someone sleeping so comfortably!


    Of course, there were ways to do this relatively painlessly, but¡­


    Watching me, Mikon pouted her lips and started kissing at the air, her eyes not leaving mine.


    Yes, that. Her encouraging somehow made things more awkward. Yes, all of us had been naked together. Yes, I''d been intimate with all of them. Yes, Riz and Mikon had started being much closer and mutually intimate with each other, and yes, when Umu''s bell had been rung she tended to be so disoriented Mikon could get away with cuddling with her and helping her ring her bell further, but still, it was awkward being actively watched and encouraged to kiss someone to wake them up!


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    However, there wasn''t really a way to wake up Umu at this point that wasn''t¡­ well, inconsiderate. Normally, I''d carefully extract myself and try to rise from the other side of the bed, but since I was in a stone sleeping niche¡­ well, that wasn''t an option unless I was capable of Whispering and willing to try and excavate through the stone to the alcove on the other side of the wall. As I wasn''t capable of Whispering, my willingness to excavate through the wall was pointless.


    All right, kissing her awake when she might want to keep on sleeping might also be inconsiderate, but I was fairly certain she''d regard it as romantic. Giving Mikon one last look that tried to convey both a desire for her to look away¡ªhowever silly that was¡ªand annoyance she was being so pubescently juvenile about this, I set about waking Umu enough to be able to get her to move so I could get out of bed.


    Suffice to say, I succeeded, though it took some time. Fortunately, it wasn''t a noisy endeavor, and so we only had an audience of one before Umu was satisfied enough to let me go. Mikon knelt there the whole time and watched, seemingly enjoying the whole thing, though it didn''t seem to be in the voyeuristic sense¡ªwell, not entirely in the voyeuristic sense. After that, it was only fair I give Mikon the same treatment¡ªeven though she was already awake, and clearly had been for some time¡ªwhile Umu caught her breath.


    All right, it was an enjoyable way to go from ''sleepy'' to wide awake, even if it was a little frustrating that such was the extent of what we could do. But now that I was awake¡­ I had work to do. Leaving my bedroll in the sleeping niche¡ªthere was really no need to roll it up¡ªI headed upstairs to the dining hall.


    It was mostly empty at this time of night¡ªor day, since we were going by the water clock because Lori hadn''t been dimming and brightening the lights regularly¡ªalthough there was someone at the kitchen keeping a single large pot of food warm to feed the night shift. As expected, Shana was indeed there, sitting on a bench near where the night shift guarding the door was gathered and looking achingly like a little girl trying to stay awake. She was so tired her face was slipping from its Lori-like resting glare position, and she actually looked her age for once. On the bench with her, lying down upon its length with her head on Shana''s lap was Yoshka, somehow managing to stay balanced on the narrow plank.


    "Shana¡ªShanalorre," I greeted. She blinked sleepily and it took her a moment to turn and face me. "I''m here. You can go to sleep now."


    "Ah. Lord Rian. Good, good¡­" she said, rubbing at her eyes briefly. "Nothing of significance to report. The air coming in through the vents remains cold, but only in comparison to the recent summer heat, and is not yet freezing. Wizard Taeclas has results to report on the experiments she conducted, although she is currently¡­" Shana paused in her report, opening her mouth wide and only remembering to cover it with her hand partway through as she yawned hugely, "¡­currently retired. Wizard Lidzuga is still resting, though it is probably time to rouse him, as I can no longer continue functioning as an active Deadspeaker¡­"


    "Your report is noted, Binder Shanalorre," I said, deciding to meet her with the formality she was still insisting upon. "Do you want any help getting Yoshka downstairs?"


    Shana blinked up at me, then back to the little girl on her lap. "That would be appreciated, thank you."


    I nodded, looking towards the nightshift volunteers. Ten people awake, including Yhohim who was probably left in charge, and sitting near the dungeon''s front door. The rest were curled up and asleep in their bedrolls nearby so that they could immediately respond if something finally tried to force its way inside. I caught Yhohim''s eye and pointed down at Yoshka, indicating she needed to be carried.


    Yhohim nodded, getting the attention of one of the men waiting near the door¡ªLamos, I saw, one of the former militia from River''s Fork, though were they really ''former'' militia at this point?¡ªwho stood up and started towards us. "I''ll take care of her, Gr¡ªLady Binder," he said, but waited until Shana gave a bleary nod before he began picking up Yoshka. Shana got to her feet, letting out another polite yawn before leading the way down to her alcove.


    I watched her go downstairs guiltily, before turning to walk over to Yhohim near the dungeon''s heavily barred entrance. It was time to get to work. Still, I spared a moment to think of Lori, and hoped she was all right. Even if she was in a better position than we were because she had Whispering¡­ well, I worried.


    At least she had a book to read if she got bored, which was more than I could say for myself. Actually, why was I worrying? She was either finding work to soothe her perfectionist soul, or she was indulging herself in finally having reading time. She was probably doing great.


    <hr>


    Lori''s hand shook slightly as she wrote, trying to get the flow diagram down on a still-blank corner of the current sheet of paper that she had carefully drawn a line around to separate it from the other notes, flow diagrams, and random ink stains. Her eyes wanted to droop, and she could feel the strangely empty feeling of having been up reading for far too long, but she couldn''t stop. She had to note this binding down while she still could, before the dragon created the next¡ª


    Her finger slipped, smearing the still-wet ink and she let out a frustrated growl as she smudged out the diagram she''d been drawing. Not all of it, but enough that she didn''t have space to redraw or annotate the thing. Best to start again. She blearily looked across the paper again, but there was no more space, not without making other diagrams confusing to read¡­


    Carelessly resting her pen on the pile of straw under her¡ªthere was a dark stain from the ink, but since it was already there, she might as well keep at it¡ªLori reached out for another sheet of paper, balancing it on the plank on her lap. Her hands rose to rub her eyes, and she just barely remembered to check for ink before she did so. She''d been awake for¡­ ugh, she didn''t have a clock, so the exact number was hardly relevant, but it had probably been a while.


    Lori should probably get a little sleep before Riz called her for breakfast. It would be agonizing if she had to check up on everything tired. She should put down the paper, cap the pen, move the straw a little so it didn''t stain her bedroll, and¡ª


    There was a knock on the door. "Great Binder? It''s time for breakfast."


    Impossible! She''d practically just finished dinner and dimmed the lights on the second level for people to sleep, it couldn''t possibly be breakfast yet!


    <hr>


    Yup, Lori''s probably doing great.


    Lidzuga came upstairs not long after Shana had left to retire, looking much more well-rested, and carrying a pen, ink bottle and a notebook with some loose sheaves stuck into it. The cover of the notebook was plain and unadorned, which was probably intentional because I''d seen him using the book as a drawing board.


    "Lidz," I greeted. "Did you have a good rest?" When I''d checked with Daising¡ªwho''d volunteered to keep an eye on the waterclock, joking that all medics did that anyways as they waited to go off-shift¡ªit turned out I''d been asleep for a probably little under ten hours, or at least as close as we could figure from the clocks. That was probably the longest stretch of uninterrupted sleep I''ve had in months, and Lidzuga had slept for longer. I''d checked on him before I''d gone to sleep, and he''d been dead to the world.


    He gave me a sleepy smile. "I did, thank you for asking. Sorry for last night, that was¡­ irresponsible of me."


    I nodded. "Don''t do it again, all right? Or at least do it only on your own time when we''re not relying on you. While I understand losing sleep about something you''re enthusiastic about, now really isn''t the time."


    He winced. "I understand, Rian."


    "Good. If it happens again, I will not be nearly so amicable. Now come on, let''s get some breakfast." According to the water clock, it was still about an hour until the time everyone woke up and those working the kitchen actually got started on making breakfast, but there was a pot that still had warm food in the kitchen, and breakfast was when you ate it. "How''s your research coming along? Did you at least lose sleep over something good?"


    The abrupt change of subject seemed to confuse him as I led the way to get us some food. There wasn''t any bread, but the stew had added grains in it that served the same purpose. We got some bowls, full of the meats and now-soft vegetables that had settled in the bottom of the pot and got to eating as Lidz hesitantly began telling me about what he''d been working on. Something about seel snout shapes?

 432 - A Worrying Routine

    It took over a week for the dragon to finally pass over us, and during that time things just barely had time to fall into a comfortable routine. At least, everyone else got to fall into a routine. The routine I fell into could probably be called comfortable from the outside, but those looking didn''t have my worries.


    For one thing, it soon became clear that while Lori was remembering to dim the lights to let people sleep, she was doing so inconsistently. Keeping track with our own water clock, the length of time between adjusting the lights could be as little as eight hours or as extreme as fifteen. Twice, all the lights in the demesne suddenly just went out, including the ones on the rocks that Shana, Tae, Lidz and I had, which Lori had never done before. The lightwisps were restored soon afterwards, but in the moments of darkness, many people had screamed in fear and there had been accidents on the stairs. The second time, Kolinh had tried to use one of the wisplights Lori had made, but that had been deactivated as well.


    There had also been that day that the lights had remained dim, but that hadn''t been nearly as disruptive, and many people had taken the opportunity to just stay in bed and sleep that day. Still, it was a worrying sign, implying that either Lori wasn''t staying to some kind of schedule or had forgotten to arrange one. The loss of light also implied a worrying degree of carelessness that was normally uncharacteristic of Lori. She might be careless with her clothes, her personal safety outside of work environments she was familiar with¡ªunless she was being excessively paranoid to the point of parody¡ªand what she said at the dining table¡ªthough most of that was just utter apathy about anyone else knowing what was being said¡ªbut Lori was never careless with her magic save for that one time with the rock. What was she doing that she was deactivating the lights instead of adjusting them?


    ¡­


    Well, the obvious answer was obvious. The question was why she wasn''t getting any sleep. The almanac wasn''t that interesting, was it?


    ¡­


    Yeah, she was probably missing out on sleep from reading the almanac. There was also the possibility that she''d somehow managed to figure out how to finally use the other three kinds of magic and was being distracted because she was playing with all her new toys, but that was unlikely.


    Even as I thought it, I was hoping she''d prove me wrong and return having unlocked the secret to using the other magics, but somehow I didn''t think things would be so convenient.


    Taeclas had managed to figure out the binding of the water heater bound tool Lori had made, using her pot full of water, several cups full of water laid out in a line away from the bound tool''s core that did the heating, and some more water spilled out on the floor. She''d put the bead into the receptacle from a distance using a stick with a simple claw that she''d controlled with Deadspeaking, and then had waited for some time before removing the bead and checking the temperature.


    "How long, exactly?" Lidzuga had asked.


    "Lidz, I wasn''t trying to do it to alknowledge standards. The point was figuring if it was safe for us to use the binding for heating the air coming into the dungeon, not whether someone decades from now could repeat and verify the experiment."


    "That''s not the point, it''s a standard that¡ª"


    "Lidzuga, next time you can be the one to run the experiment," I''d interrupted. "This is what happens when you stay up instead of sleeping when you should. Tae, go on, please."


    The water in the pot had gotten hot, but Tae observed that it had seemingly done so uniformly. The water had not started getting hotter at the bound tool, resulting in little currents and updrafts in the water as the heat originated from one spot.


    "I can''t be sure because Binder Lori didn''t leave behind proper documentation," Tae had said, which had caused Lidz to start grumbling all over again, "but I think her binding uses waterwisps and firewisps so that the binding only acts on water, and only liquid water at that. And from the way I couldn''t get any of the water hotter than a certain temperature, the firewisps are set to raise water to that temperature and no further. The binding might actually cool any water hotter than the set temperature, though I didn''t bother to test that."


    "Why not?-!" Lidz had exclaimed, looking aghast. "That''s important information!"


    I''d had Lidzuga work out his outrage of such shoddy scholarship by asking him to put together a shelf we could put the pot and bound tool on top of should it become necessary for us to start heating up the air coming in through the vents from outside. He''d taken two of our ladders¡ªwhich to be fair were not really being used at the moment¡ª and paired them together into a triangular frame, with the pot sitting on a plank between the topmost rungs of the ladders. Thankfully, the ladders had been made to more or less the same dimensions, and it only took one piece of scrap wood secured to the top of one rung to make the plank lie evenly.


    Once that was in place, the pot had been filled with water, the bound tool had been set, and the volunteer militia had moved an additional pace back to keep from accidentally toppling the ladders. While the pot of hot water didn''t seem to have much of an effect, since the movement caused by the bindings Lori set in place to circulate the air added an additional degree of cooling, the air from the vents seemed a bit less cold. Still comfortable, but no longer chilling the skin directly exposed to for some time. Lidzuga would no doubt be upset that my experiment was simply holding my forearm to the vent, counting to twenty, and then feeling how cold my skin was after, but we hardly had a more accurate way to measure the temperature.


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Well, Lori probably did, but she wasn''t sharing. Why share and have less when she could keep it to herself and have everything?


    Beyond that, everything seemed to be progressing well. The children were rambunctious as ever, but that was a ''dealing with children'' matter, and so was the purview of Shana and ''should probably be a lady but Lori doesn''t like giving children work'' Karina, who kept them in line with a mix of letting them play and having them help with the farming. All they did was water the plants, but that was one more matter that the farmers and those taking care of the plants didn''t need to deal with.


    There were a few incidents, which was only to be expected when you put two hundred people together for eleven days in a building they couldn''t leave, but fortunately no blood was shed, and while there was colorful language it was at a restrained volume. I simply had to separate the people involved until they calmed down, and didn''t even need to have follow up on them resolving the issue.


    There were also no incidents of physical altercations¡ªeven among the children, and with only a limited number of little wooden toys that had to be borrowed and returned such an altercation should have been inevitable, even if only among the youngest¡ªwhich was probably explained by how everyone was enjoying the novelty of being able to dance to music at any time of day. Often, people were just playing music with no dancing. The instruments were simple, made of cords stretched out across buckets for sound, folded leaves carefully removed from the crops growing in the dungeon farm, drums made from pots, and even a woodwind instrument someone had painstakingly carved from a block of wood that had been secured together with cord. The sounds they made, however¡­


    If I could somehow convince Lori to give it all a listen, she might¡­ well, not enjoy it, but at least acknowledge its positive aesthetic qualities instead of just calling it noise. People knew they had a very limited amount of time to do this and were making every moment of it count as the sounds of the instruments were refined and the playing improved. It helped keep people occupied and out of trouble, and thankfully they followed the intention of Lori''s law about music, and stopped playing when most people started going to sleep. Mostly. There was the occasional note of a plucked string, but it was brief and quickly stifled by what sounded like some kind of balled-up cloth.


    There were no noise complaints.


    And of course, during this time, I developed a worrying routine. First, I worried how long Lori would forget to alter the lights from bright to dim, or from dim to bright. Then I worried about Lori and Riz''s safety, and if they were taking care of themselves, and if someone in River''s Fork had finally decided to try attacking Lori, and if Riz had gotten hurt protecting her¡­


    That last look a while. It was a time-intensive worry.


    After I finished worrying about that, I worried if River''s Fork had enough water stored to last them however long the dragon would be here. I worried about Lori trying to kill everyone to keep the water to herself if it looked like she had to drink water reclaimed from unsavory sources. I worried the almanac would be too worn for me to read by the time Lori finally let me borrow it.


    All my usual Lori worries.


    It wasn''t all worrying, of course. As the dragon dragged on, Tae became worried about the transplanted crops. While we had managed to dig perhaps two thirds of the crops still growing on the fields, there hadn''t been enough time to do more than pile dirt on the still-bare portions of the third level¡ªalthough there was very little of that left, if you didn''t count the excavation tunnels¡ªand lay the crops down on their side with their roots lightly covered in wet soil, which was apparently an old trick for these kinds of situations. It was the sort of mess that would have had Lori twitching, so we could only do it while she was away, but it was hardly the best way to keep the crops alive. They weren''t getting nearly as much light as they needed, for one thing. Tae, Lidz and Shana conferred and decided the best way to salvage the crops was to forcefully mature them to the point they could be harvested.


    "The grains aren''t likely to get any bigger at this point," Tae had said. "The additional maturation is just so they don''t taste funny. Although working on so many at a time¡­"


    "We have mesh screens," I had suggested. "Would those help?"


    The crops were laid out on the screens in layered sheets, their roots contacting the mesh. A surprising number of crops managed to fit on the one by one-half pace metal mesh, and we had enough screens to be able to do all the transplanted crops in five batches. At that point, it was all simple. Tae and Lidzuga claimed the life of the plants, Shana imbued them, and the two Deadspeakers tamed the imbued life into the meanings needed to accelerate the growth of the plants to maturity. Given the crops were all fairly mature anyway, it only required one day for them to mature, at which point the plants were all cut to isolate the grains and the grains winnowed. The stalks were set aside to dry so they would become straw.


    It was the smallest harvest we''d done to date, and everyone more or less agreed it didn''t deserve any kind of celebration.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    I was getting ready to go to sleep one maybe-night, helping Mikon and Umu lay out our bedrolls¡ªand politely ignoring Mikon''s ''idle words'' that the air was just a little chilly and we should put one of the blankets over us to keep warm¡ªwhen a cleared throat drew my attention towards Shana standing just outside our alcove.


    "I apologize for interrupting," Shana said, though her face was of course its usual blank Lori-face and thus didn''t convey apologies at all, "however, something has come to my attention that I believe you should be informed of, Lord Rian."


    "Will it take long?" Trying to discourage Mikon aside, I had been looking forward to going to bed. And sleep, too, later.


    She shook her head. "No. I am merely informing you that the dragon has passed completely, and that it is no longer occupying any part of Binder Lolilyuri''s demesne that I am connected to."


    I nodded in acknowledgement, trying not to read any significance into her wording beyond the literal. "That''s good to know," I said. "Hopefully that means we''ll be able to go out soon."


    Shana shook her head. "I would not recommend it. While the dragon has passed, I can perceive several mobile meanings created by the dragon wandering the environs outside of the dragon shelter. I can only suppose that their equivalent which Binder Lolilyuri can perceive are also loose outside of this dungeon."


    "I''m pretty sure at least one of the bindings Lori prepares before she left for River''s Fork is intended precisely to prevent that from happening," I pointed out, "but Lori would probably be able to tell better than we can from where she is. Are any of what you''re perceiving near her?"


    "Yes," Shana said immediately. "However, they all remain outside of the dragon shelter, so she is in no danger yet., and as far as I can identify, the doors into the dragon shelter remain shut. And no, the Great Binder and Auntie Riz have not been injured since the last time you asked." Even her expression of annoyance was Lori-like! That was so wrong!


    I nodded. "Well, hopefully this means we''ll be getting out soon." It shouldn''t take Lori that long to clear out any dragonborn abominations, should it?


    It was three days later by the waterclock before the dungeon''s entrance finally unsealed and Lori wrote more words on the ceiling: ''Go out now''.

 433 - Someday

    Just because Lori told us¡ªwell, wrote to us¡ªto go outside didn''t mean we did so immediately. For one thing, just because she thought it was safe to come out didn''t mean it was. I distinctly remember stepping out of the dungeon and finding an undead islandshell¡ªan infant one, fortunately¡ªtrying to eat us even though it no longer needed to. Fortunately, it had eventually run out of imbuement, proving the superiority of procrastination over other problem-solving methods!


    I always wondered why she didn''t just turn the islandshell''s¡­ shell into a boat. I was fairly certain she could use earthwisps on it¡ªor use the earthwisps in it, however it works¡ªto reshape the shell into a hull, and it would probably be easier for her since she''d be able to anchor her bindings to it as well, but apparently she had other plans for it. Perhaps she wanted her own undead islandshell infant, which¡­ all right, that was fair, I understand that. Though if she ever did somehow manage to learn how to use Deadspeaking, would the islandshell still be in a state fit for converting into an undead? Or converting back into an undead, I suppose.


    When we had first opened the dungeon''s doors that first time, it said something that while Lori had removed the moat full of boiling water from the entryway when she had told them to go outside, the stone wall that was meant to block access to the entrance of the dungeon was still in place, save for a person-sized opening in the middle. On seeing that, Kolinh hadn''t even waited for my orders to have one of the tables laid in front of it to block off the entrance, with more tables and benches set in place to brace it.


    Fortunately, there was still the balcony above the doors of the dungeon, where I''d place that little cup of water back when I''d noticed the air was getting cold. While the cup itself had never frozen, the frost that had collected on the walls of the entryway beyond had been visible through the slats of the air vents, confirming that Lori had placed some kind of binding on the vent to warm the incoming air, even if it was still a bit cold coming in. I suspect she didn''t account for the cold of the entryway''s walls spreading to the balcony.


    From the balcony, one could see out past the entryway, although the view was a narrow one. There was the ground in front of the entryway, a view of the old shelter and the Um, and past that was the aqueduct. Beyond the aqueduct were the trees.


    Icicles hung down from the far end of the entryway ceiling. The ground outside was covered with a thick layer of what looked like snow or might have simply been ice, glistening in the light of the entryway ceiling that Lori didn''t seem to have deactivated. The curving roof of the shelter and the Um were similarly covered, though they didn''t glisten in the overcast sky. Beyond the entryway, everything seemed dim, but not dark enough for night, implying the clouds that had long abandoned us this season had finally returned, and probably explained why the snow¡ªor perhaps ice¡ªhad remained for so long even if the dragon, according to Shanalorre, had been gone for three days already.


    We had closed the dungeon''s doors again to prepare, arm, and wait for brighter conditions, but a day later the outside hadn''t looked much brighter, even at noon.


    "We need to go out," I declared when I met with Kolin, Shana, Tae and Lidz after lunch the day after Lori had opened the dungeon. "Dark or not, it''s been quiet so far, so hopefully that means there''s nothing in the immediate area. We need to go out, make sure, and then get started on getting one of the boats out into the water so we can retrieve Lori from River''s Fork. If there is something out there, we need to find out what it is so we can start figuring out the best way to deal with it, or decide we don''t need to deal with it to send out a boat to retrieve Lori."


    "Uh, Rian?" Tae said,


    I turned towards her. "Yes, Tae?"


    She pointed at herself. "Why am I here?" On the other side of the table, Lidzuga looked like he was asking the same thing.


    "Because you''re one of our few wizards, and I''d value your input," I said.


    "What, really?"


    "Tae, if anything happened to Lori, you are literally one of three people who could keep this demesne alive. But since we''re all going to hope nothing happens to Lori, you know more about Deadspeaking than I do, and what I know comes from plays, hearsay, and what I learned while working at a lumberyard. Maybe you know some kind of meaning that could be helpful to our situation. The same for you, Lidz."


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    "Ah. That makes sense," Tae said, nodding.


    "Also, you and Lidz need to decide who among you will be coming with us outside."


    "Wait, what?"


    "Well, Shana can''t come to be our emergency healer," I said, gesturing towards the girl who unfortunately was a Dungeon Binder. "Look at her."


    "I do not see why not, Lord Rian," Shana said as Yoshka took a post-lunch nap, the little girl''s head lying down on her lap and the rest of her laid out on the bench. "I am perfectly capable of acting as emergency healer. Wizard Taeclas and Wizard Lidzuga can stay here if they aren''t comfortable venturing out beyond the dungeon."


    "While I''m¡­ very disturbed by your willingness to just risk your life like that, Shana¡ªShanalorre," I said, "as a Dungeon Binder, we can''t let you put yourself in that sort of danger, especially since you have no means of defending yourself."


    "You know, this wasn''t mentioned when you were recruiting us in Covehold," Lidzuga said, giving me a displeased look.


    I shrugged. "You don''t have to volunteer. We''ll just go out there without a Deadspeaker to provide emergency healing if we run into anything sudden and violent. I''m sure we can survive whatever violent dragonborn abominations are out there without you."


    "You won''t be alone, Lord Rian," Shana said. "I can accompany you."


    "Shana, you are a Dungeon Binder and a child," I said, emphasizing each word. "I am not risking your life like that. You are not coming with us. You and Lori might not consider yourself a child, but the rest of us do, and we are not putting you in that kind of danger. Also, you being alive keeps Lori safe in River''s Fork. "


    "Binder Lolilyuri would go if she were in my place," she insisted.


    "Lori can throw fire, lightning, and sink people into stone," I said. "And even outside of her demesne, she still has two out of three of those. She''s a lot better suited for protecting herself than you are. Besides, if things get so bad something happens to me and Kolinh, we''ll need you to take charge until Lori gets back. People will listen to you. I''m sure you can guess what would happen if Tae and Lidz try." Namely, Lori will assume they killed me and are trying to take over the demesne, at which point she''s likely to do something violent to them without me to talk her out of it.


    Shana glanced towards the two wizards, then nodded. "Yes, that would be¡­ regrettable. Very well. I will remain here, though I want it known that I protest this. Should you encounter a dragonborn abomination and there are injured, immediate attention would save lives."


    Sighing, Tae and Lidz resigned exchanged looks.


    "You don''t have to go," I said, letting some of my sincerity come out. If they didn''t want to come with us, then they didn''t want to. "Just stay here, we''ll take care of things. We can just bring a few of the medics with us."


    Ignoring me, the two laid their hands down on the table. There was a pause, and suddenly their hands shot out, seemingly trying to slap the other''s hand, and it was a confused blur as they both literally tried to get the upper hand. Eventually, however, there was a resounding fleshy smack, and Tae''s hand was pinning Lidz''s down on the table.


    "Gah! How are you so strong?" he exclaimed, wincing as he shook his hand.


    "Farming," Tae said smugly. She tilted her head. "Though given how slowly you move, maybe I should be the one to go. You might not be able to react in time."


    For a moment, Lidz looked tempted, but shook his head. "No, I''ll go. Besides, you''re better at plants than I am, and we''ll need more harvests after this. Besides, I might see something interesting¡­!"


    "Don''t bring a notebook," I said immediately. "Just remember it in your heart and draw it later."


    "¡­ of course, that''s exactly what I was going to do. I''m not a fool, after all."


    Meet my eyes when you say that. I dare you.


    "Well then," I said. "Let''s all get ready. Lidz, I suggest putting on boots instead of those tsinelas. They''d be better for running."


    He looked down at his feet. "You''re right, I better do that."


    As everyone got up¡ªI needed to put on boots too¡ªI turned to the winner. "Tae? A word, please?"


    She blinked, then nodded. "Sure, Rian. What about?"


    I glanced towards Lidz, but he was already hurrying away. "About that win of yours¡­"


    "Yeah, my farming muscles are impressive, aren''t they?"


    "I think using Deadspeaking to push your muscles to move faster than normal is more impressive."


    She went still, staring at me with wide eyes. "Don''t tell Lidz?" she said nervously.


    "I won''t tell him," I said. "But you do the next three things we need a Deadspeaker for."


    She sighed. "Fine¡­ that''s fair, I guess." Her head titled as she gave me a considering look. "How did you know? That''s internal Deadspeaking. It doesn''t leave any outward sign."


    "Lidz was in pain from how hard you hit him. You weren''t. You must have done something to dull the pain, and that means you could have done other things too."


    Her eyebrows rose. "Ooh¡­ you''re good. No wonder Lori made you lord."


    I shrugged. "Tae?"


    "Yes?"


    "How does someone who knows the human body finely enough to do that end up a bad carpenter and enthusiastic amateur farmer on the new continent?"


    Her eyebrows rose, and her smile widened. "How does someone smart enough to be able to recognize all that end up a lord in the new continent? Well, obviously that''s how, but you know what I mean."


    I tilted my head in acknowledgement. "Fair enough. Someday?"


    "Sure. Someday."


    We parted, and I headed downstairs to put on my boots.

 434 - Very Commendable Watchfulness

    It was time to step out of the safety of the dungeon. We didn''t want to, but sometimes adults had to be responsible and do things like that, otherwise the alternative was having the children do it, and Lori would kill us all if that happened.


    As I vividly remembered the incident with the islandshell, we had been making preparations in the three days before Lori had finally opened the defenses. Large shields were made from planks, leather and ropes, with Tae and Lidz contributing to fuse the pieces of wood together and Shana providing the imbuement. There wasn''t enough time to make a shield for everyone, and even if we did, that wasn''t how they were used. According to the militiamen¡ªand they would know¡ªyou didn''t just brandish the shield in front of you like it was an impenetrable wall. That kind of passivity got you killed. Instead, several people with shields would act together to raise a mobile wall, using shield and spear to herd beasts towards the center of a formation of militia. When the beasts were impaled up to the crossguards of the spears, the shield bearers would get in close to the beast''s side to keep the beast from being able to turn around and pull themselves off the spears while everyone else used their spear to keep the beast in place and stabbing it to death.


    A part of me wished it was Riz giving me this expository explanation rather than Kolinh. I missed her, but did that mean I felt anything for her? Besides lust, that is. I can pretty conclusively declare that one of the things I felt for her is lust, which inexplicably seems to be mutual. But did that mean that I¡ª


    No, no, not the time to think about myself. I had lord things to do.


    All that meant my sword was as useless as usual, but I belted it on in any case because I knew how to use it, and it was a sharp, pointy object that extended my reach. Still, even though I would be joining the militia and carrying a spear, everyone understood I was to stay in the middle and act as another pair of eyes instead of actually putting myself forward and trying to do anything Kolinh didn''t explicitly tell me to do. I was fine with that, and made sure to tell Kolinh how deliriously happy I was about that state of affairs. I''ve never been in the militia, so it was only sensible I leave how to do things to him, and listen very carefully if he told me it couldn''t be done.


    The plan was to make sure the space in front of the dungeon''s entryway was clear, then check the docks and river to see if we could send a boat downstream to get Lori. After that, we would move through the houses for anything lurking between them, and then finally move around the perimeter of the village. The interiors of the houses, the shelter, and the Um would be left for last, once we had Lori with us to keep us from having to look for trouble in confined spaces.


    We were all hoping it would be unnecessary and that there were no dragonborn abominations like last time, but it was probably a futile hope.


    When we finally left the wonderful, safe, strong, peaceful, secure, warm embrace of the dungeon, it was as a group of twenty, with all but Lidzuga and myself having militia experience. Most were armed with spears, but two people were carrying shovels, as well as some rope and packs full of carpentry offcuts. Lidz was armed with a length of wood that he''d appropriated to use as a staff. It should have occurred to me sooner, but the staffs used by Deadspeakers didn''t need wire. After all, they could claim the full length of a wooden staff, so they don''t need the metal as channels to conduct magic. Lidz''s staff had been curled into a large hook at one end, like the kind beastherders were depicted with. Kolinh had advised it, as a means for pulling the injured and fallen out of danger while healing them, which¡­ made a morbid, Lori-like sense.


    It was a bristling wall of spearpoints that exited the dungeon''s entryway into the overcast light while we waited for the ones that remained in the dungeon to barricade the table behind us. Once the hole in the stone barrier was secured, we slowly stepped out of the entryway, Lidz and I taking the rear. A cold, unceasing breeze was blowing around our feet and out towards the opening of the entryway, and from the way that was the only air moving, it had to be Lori''s work. The two with the bags of wooden offcuts threw some at the icicles dripping down from the edge of the entryway''s opening, knocking them down so we didn''t have to worry about them falling on us. They shattered strangely as they hit the ground, though I couldn''t quite put my finger on why¡­


    Everyone was stepping carefully, and it was quickly apparent the caution was warranted. The layer covering the ground beyond the entryway was not actually snow, but what felt like several layers of frost that had grown on top of each other. The outer walls of the stone buildings in my sight were the same, as well as the outside walls of the entryway. There was something off about the frost. Even in the overcast, they didn''t seem to reflect light properly, and it wasn''t the only one who noticed. Others were eyeing the apparent frost warily. While some spots seemed solid and already packed down, most were very delicate, collapsing easily when spearbutts were pressed down into it.


    The two with the shovels got to work, handing me their packs while they started using the shovels to clear ground of accumulated frost. They tore up the cold covering, and while some movements of their tool scooped up powdery frost, sometimes they picked up chunks of ice. All the ice was so cold that despite being exposed to the air, what was being shoveled up was dry, with vapor emanating from¡ª


    I frowned, then carefully knelt down, tentatively touching some of the ice on the ground. It was painfully cold to the touch after a few moments, and when I pulled back my hand, there was some frost sticking to my skin. I blew on the frost, and while some melted into water, a few endured on, not melting and being very painful. I quickly used my shirt to pull the fragment off, wincing at the feeling of the ice tearing off my skin, and watched as the fragment of ice seemed to stick to the threads of my clothes.


    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    "Everyone, don''t touch the snow with your bare hands," I called out. "Not all of it is frozen water. Some of it seems to be solidified air, and that stuff is even colder and will stick to your skin. It''s not immediately dangerous, but it will freeze the skin it''s on solid if you don''t get it off, so be careful." People glanced down nervously at that, and indeed, there were some chunks sticking to the sides of people''s boots. One unfortunate person apparently had a piece sticking to his sole, and he was trying to scrape it off like mud. I look towards Kolinh. "It shouldn''t be any problem to shovel. Just don''t touch it with bare skin or drop water on it and we should be fine."


    He nodded. "You all heard Lord Rian. You two, get on shovels and start clearing our way. Skinny Vov, take the wood and start checking for vistas towards the dock. The rest of you, keep a look out."


    Huh. That''s what the wood is for? I handed Skinny Vov¡ªnot to be confused with young Vov, Tall Vov, Bearded Vov, Handsome Vov and Quiet Vov¡ªthe bag, and he began to carefully throw the offcuts of wood at chest-level towards the stairs over the flood wall that led to the docks, checking for vistas. The distortions in space, time and gravity could be observed if you we''re looking closely, but it was easier to find a vista when you saw something pass through it. Seeing things like deviations in the arching path of the passing object¡ªfor sharp turns that didn''t affect''s its momentum, accelerated or decelerated, or things curving upwards instead of downward in their parabolic arc¡ªhelped make it easier to find vistas.


    Skinny Vov threw each piece of wood at intervals, his eyes carefully judging the object''s flight and curve. Lori''s darkwisp barrier was supposed to keep such vistas¡ªand other things¡ªfrom being able to reach down to ground level, but it probably didn''t hurt to be cautious. Fortunately, all the wood arced as they were supposed to, meaning there weren''t any twisting surprises in our path. I was intimately familiar with the dangers of maliciously designed vistas. Most people thought that vistas were limited to the boundaries of rooms. Most people were wrong. Most people also didn''t stop to think what would happen to them if they stepped edgewise through a vista that was two inches wide on the outside and a pace across on the inside.


    It was called edgewise for a reason.


    Fortunately, the shovel-wielders started flinging the frost and solidified air towards the direction we were planning to go, and while that would have made it harder to see larger vistas, it helped find small, narrow ones that were more dangerous to walk into. Narrow vistas that were bigger on the inside would show as little cuts in the air where the spray of the shovels seemingly vanishes too quickly. Of course, this wasn''t really snow underfoot, so it didn''t spray nearly as well, but it covered a wider area than the wooden offcuts.


    While I had confidence that Lori''s measures protected us from some things¡­ she''d been a bit unreliable over the past week, absentminded and not sticking to a proper schedule. She was a woman who loved her routine, even if she didn''t really have a lot of it given the irregularity of the work she had to do, so at the very least she should have used mealtimes as cues of when to dim the lights. That fact that she didn''t¡­ well, it was concerning. That had better be a really interesting almanac. And if it was, when could I borrow it?-!


    As we waited for the shovels to clear a path, everyone else started tamping down on the frost in an attempt to powder it and probably make it easier to pass by later. I''ll have to tell them not to pour water on it. Honestly, I wasn''t sure if it would cause the water to freeze, making the ground harder, or it would cause the solidified air to sublimate and bubble through the water, causing fog. While neither was actively dangerous to us, it would be very inconvenient.


    We carefully made our way to the docks as I looked around, both to keep an eye out for dragonborn abominations and see if there was anything else we had to deal with. It was hard to make details at any distance because of the overcast and how the dragonfrost¡ªand I''m calling it that for the sake of convenience as I''m running out of ways to differentiate between the water frost and the solidified air frost¡ªmade everything so monochromatic, but the sawmill seemed undamaged. It was just as covered as the stone buildings, but given the composition of the dragon frost, hopefully there wasn''t much water damage. Actually, given the all the dragonfrost around us, I''m glad it was still overcast. If the sky had been clear, we would likely be having problems with snow blindness.


    I glanced up to the sky to see how thick the cloud cover was and stared.


    High, high above us, the sun was obscured by hundreds¡ªpossibly thousands, even tens of thousands¡ªof what looked like black threads or cords stretched from horizon to horizon. They were high enough they were behind the clouds, each thread seemingly slightly thinner than the cords the ropers spun from threads, their edges fuzzy for some reason. That meant they were probably bigger around the bath houses were long, so numerous that they put our demesne in their shade. It reminded me of hair dragging across a bed, all the threads mostly parallel and aligned in the same direction, but rippling back and forth as they did so. Sunlight shone through the gaps between the threads, creating the overcast light around us instead of simply gloom. There was something about the way the threads were moving¡­


    "Lidz," I said, not looking down, "can you still feel the dragon?"


    In my peripheral vision, I saw Lidzuga look towards me. "I can, but it''s still moving away from¡ªblissful ignorance!"


    Ah, he''d seen it.


    "Can you point towards where you think the dragon is right now?" I asked Lidzuga, glancing down towards him.


    He tore his eyes away from the sky, shaking his head as other people turned towards us in curiosity and looking up to see the sky. "The dragon is in that direction, and still moving away¡­" he said faintly, his eyes peaking upward again.


    I looked towards where he was pointing, then moved my gaze upwards towards the threads¡ªthe tentacles¡ªstretched out across the sky. One end was streaming from the direction Lidzuga had indicated, vanishing over the horizon. Turning in the opposite direction, I saw the tentacles also vanishing beyond sight.


    Forcing myself to look down, I clapped my hands to get everyone''s attention and they jerked their gazes towards me. "All right everyone, back to work," I said. "Lidzuga says the dragon is moving away and Binder Lori thinks we''re safe, so unless it starts snowing unseasonably, all that up there isn''t anything for us to worry about. Let''s get to the river and make this all Binder Lori''s problem, shall we?"


    That got them moving again. Militia well knew the importance of making something someone else''s problem. The shovels started moving again, clearing the way towards the dock.


    And if people occasionally kept looking up, that was perfectly all right. There might be flying dragonborn abominations, after all.


    Everyone was very watchful for those. Very commendable watchfulness all around!

 435- Creatively Applied Deadspeaking

    To my surprise and relief, the river was still flowing, even if there was slowly melting dragonfrost on the stone docks. As I watched, a piece of dragonfrost broke off and fell into the river, which started to bubble and spew up fog before the current washed it under the docks. The docks were cleared of dragonfrost, the waters around it bubbling with mist as ice and solidified air were disposed of. That was one thing off the list. We should be able to send a boat to retrieve Lori now, although that would have to wait until we''d cleared the rest of the village


    Part of me wanted to bring up the idea of giving the settlement outside of the dungeon an official name, while at the same time wanting to avoid the obvious designation Lori was going to slap on the place.


    With the docks cleared, we could move on to checking the village. Given Lori''s precautions as I understood them, the dragon was unlikely to have been able to create dragonborn abominations in the village directly. Anything that came into the demesne would need to be dropped by the dragon¡ªwhich is why we had a supply of planks for repairing roofs¡ªor wander in from the edge of the demesne two and a half taums away. Unfortunately, any such abominations have had four days to travel from the edge of the demesne, so they could be anywhere at this point.


    Before we did so, however, Kolinh had some people go back to the dungeon to collect our snow pads.


    ¡­


    I am so glad Kolinh''s a capable man.


    "We''ll need to change our plans, Rian," Kolinh said, interrupting my ''ugh, why didn''t I think of that'' self-flagellation. "We don''t have enough snow pads for everyone, so the scouting party will have to be smaller. That means you stay here."


    "Understood," I said immediately. "I''ll get to work on getting one of our boats into the water and having someone retrieve Lori." Just for a moment, there was a brief moment of surprise on Kolinh''s face as I immediately agreed to a sensible idea. What sort of idiots did you have to work with back where you came from that this always comes as a surprise to you? "Lidz, you stay here and hope you''re not needed for anything. If something does happen, concentrate on keeping anyone injured alive so that we can get Shanalorre to heal them."


    The Deadspeaker didn''t sigh in relief, but he gave that impression as he nodded a bit too quickly. Well, it was to be expected. This wasn''t the sort of thing he''d been recruited for, after all. I''ll have to make it up to him¡ªand Tae as well, I suppose¡ªlater. "I can do that."


    Wearing the snow pads, which seemed to work quite well on the dragonfrost¡ªthe pads stuck in some places, but since everyone was already stepping carefully, it wasn''t an issue¡ªKolinh and a much smaller group of militia started moving to check between the houses. I tore my gaze away from them and turned towards the ones who''d remained. Work to do, as always. "All right. You four, keep an eye out in case something manages to get past Kolinh''s squad. Remember to keep an eye up on the cliff. The rest of you, we''re bringing one of the boats to the dock and back into the water. Lidz, we''ll need you to check the boat for damage just in case, and you''ll be coming with us to River''s Fork. No one there should need healing, since Shana has been reporting no one''s hurt, but there might be structural damage that you''ll need to deal with. In which case, have a signal for when you need her to imbue something."


    Lidz nodded.


    There was an awkward moment.


    "I meant right now Lidz, we''ll be going as soon as the boat''s in the water," I said.


    "Oh! Right, right, I''ll get to it now then!"


    <hr>


    What followed involved a lot of straining and carrying. From unfortunate necessity, the boats had to be stored in the third level, in one of the side tunnels Lori had made for the incomplete excavation. As the boats were not small things, and the wood they were made of was hardly light at the thicknesses they consisted of, carrying them between the planters, up the flights of stairs, and then out of the dungeon proper was painful. My fingers burned from where they had to grip the edges of Lori''s Boat, as we finally set it on trestles in the cleared space outside of the entryway.


    Yes, my arms and legs hurt too, but not as much as one would think. Only idiots or people carrying things with really awkward handholds carried anything with their arms bent. If you were carrying something efficiently, most of the strain was on your fingers, or wherever it was that you were hoisting your load. And unfortunately, we couldn''t carry the boat on our shoulders until after we were out of the dungeon


    While Lidz and three of the carpenters¡ª Yonas, Onezto and Sani¡ªchecked over the boat, I took a moment to check the river. Warily, I stuck in the smallest finger of my left hand and shuddered as water lapped over it. The river was freezing cold, the coldest it had been all summer. Given that solidified air had been falling on it for more than a week¡­ well, that was probably about right. Warily, I licked my wet finger. It didn''t taste violently different, so it was probably drinkable, but I spat out the water anyway. We''d boil it later and check for residue, but hopefully the dragon hadn''t added anything inconvenient to our drinking water.


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    When the inspection of the boat finished and it was declared undamaged from its storage, I was back to carrying it, this time to the dock so we could set it into the water. Installing the outrigger followed. While Lori and many others had learned how to properly balance on the boats, and we could probably stop using outriggers soon¡­ I was fairly certain we never would, because Lori had been born an old woman at heart, and how she''s used to doing it is probably going to be how we did it until the end of time.


    ¡­


    That was probably something I was going to need to talk to Lori about, because at the moment some of our boats were as wide as they were long when they had the outriggers on. Purely with an eye to storing them, they could stand to be narrower.


    Once we''d confirmed that that Lori''s Boat wasn''t taking on water, I went back into the dungeon, retrieved one of the steam jet drivers and mounted it onto the rear of the boat. After we''d gotten Tae to the demesne and Lidz started building us new boats, we''d made changes to Lori''s Boat. The fittings we''d put in by essentially clamping them to the boat''s side, such as the mount for the driver, could finally be attached more securely and permanently since we had Tae to fuse and slowly reshape the wood for us. One of the changes we''d made was that the mountings for the drivers were altered so that we could easily remove the bound tools in the event of the dragon and allow us to be able to mount any of the bound tool drivers Lori had made. That last was more of a side effect of making the same mounts for the boats we''d had at the time than something we''d deliberately set out to do, but it was convenient in this instance since it meant we didn''t need to look for any specific driver to mount onto the boat.


    Taking a bead from the supply that Lori had left for me¡ªwe were running low after a week, since Lori hadn''t really expected us to need to use any bound tools besides the ones in the baths¡ªI tested the driver, and nodded in satisfaction as the boat moved forward, straining at the rope securing it to the dock before I deactivated the bound tool. "All right, we''re ready to go," I announced. "Get another boat out here!"


    I''d fiercely debated whether I should go myself to pick up Lori, or send someone else to do it. There were good reasons for both. On the one hand, our demesne was still in a state of post-dragon emergency, and any number of things could go wrong, which as their lord I needed to take care of on Lori''s behalf. On the other hand, Lori would probably appreciate seeing a friendly face, and I can talk to Yllian and inspect the demesne to find out what needs to be done to get everything back in order.


    Back to the first hand though, Shana had said there were mobile meanings outside of the dragon shelter, which meant anything from undead, seals fused together, too-mobile plants, or simply clouds of disease, though I hope Shana would have said anything if that last was the case. One way or another, they had to be dealt with, and the most efficient way of doing something to them was having Shana do something.


    ¡­


    It would have been really helpful if Lori hadn''t ordered Shana to stop learning Deadspeaking, but maybe¡­


    <hr>


    "No, I do not know how to deactivate a meaning," Shana said.


    We were seated in my alcove, Shana, Tae and Lidzuga spread out on the three benches so that we could all see each other. That meant I had no way of missing the looks the two Deadspeakers exchanged. For the moment, I ignored their byplay, even if I mostly agreed with them.


    "Well, that removes the easy way of dealing with those things," I sighed. Shana had at least been able to confirm that the mobile meanings she had perceived were in fact not clouds of dustlife and disease, as they were maintaining their relative positions in relation to each other, something that she said meant physical bodies. While she hadn''t been able to verify whether the mobile meanings were made of wood or flesh or bone, she had been able to further identify that the mobile meanings were comprised of combinations of vital and inert life¡ª''living'' and ''dead''¡ªwhich meant some of those meanings were definitely some form of undead.


    "I could¡ª" Taeclas began.


    "Well!" I interrupted. "If you can''t deactivate them, can you use your healing meaning on them?"


    Shana gave me a confused look. "I¡­ suppose I can do so, although it would only have an effect on the meanings that are both vital and correspond to flesh."


    "But you can use your meaning on anything with life, right?" I said. "This table, for example. I mean, if you claimed and imbued it, you can use your meaning on it?" Off to the side, Lidz and Tae''s eyebrows rose as they listened.


    "Yes, but it would do nothing. The wood of the table is neither vital nor flesh, so it would just be a waste of imbu¡ªah."


    It''s so nice to work with people who have enough self-awareness to draw the correct conclusion from a leading question. Even nicer when they didn''t give you a dirty look right afterwards.


    Shana''s head titled thoughtfully, then she nodded. "Yes, I suppose that would be one way to deal with these mobile meanings without violating the Great Binder''s stated orders." Her face was completely blank as she stared pointedly at Tae. "Either the imbuement is consumed completely, or significant parts of the meanings are tamed into something that causes the rest of the meaning to be inoperable."


    "It''s not right!" Surprisingly, it was Lidz who spoke. "There''s being willfully ignorant because you''re small-minded and then there''s this! You could be learning so much, improving your knowledge base, growing¡ª!"


    "Binder Lolilyuri does not wish me to do any of those things, and I will obey her orders," Shana said with a decent facsimile of Lori-like finality. "Please cease these attempts to have me commit treasonous acts."


    Both Tae and Lidz had the same expression of confused discomfort as an uncomfortable silence fell. Well, silent in the alcove, the second level was being its usual noisy self.


    "So, how imbuement-intensive is your meaning?" I asked brightly.

 436 - Lori Retrieval Operations, Start!

    Shana was willing to try to use her meaning in ways it probably wasn''t meant for to get rid of potential threats in River''s Fork.


    Actually, I had no idea if her meaning actually is meant for just healing. Both Lidz and Tae had allowed themselves to be healed by it to try to analyze and perhaps replicate the meaning, but they both said that the meaning was a complicated thing, and that Shana applied and activated the meaning very quickly, such that they couldn''t really identify more than a few parts at a time. Shana''s attempts to tame the life into the meaning slower resulted in her failing to do so, as slowing down to that degree forced her to leave the state of instinctive application that allowed her to tame the meaning. According to Tae, Lidz and Lori, this wasn''t unusual for savants, who usually deciphered and flow diagramed their own instinctive binding, meaning, formation or vista many years after they''d started learning how to actually use magic, once they had managed to become familiar with the complexities of their particular branch.


    Despite this, we''d learned a few things about Shana''s meaning. It only worked on living flesh, it worked equally effectively on broken bones, torn or bruised flesh, illnesses caused by infection¡ªTae suspected it worked on poisons as well, but we hadn''t been eager to test that¡ªwhile not actually removing the cause of the illness, and the meaning required a notably large amount of imbuement. The latter wasn''t a problem for Shana, as she was a Dungeon Binder, but Tae and Lidz both agreed that anyone else trying to use the meaning would need either a bead or a significant amount of time breathing in and accumulating magic.


    Shana had identified a significant number of mobile meanings in her¡ªin River''s Fork Demesne, so much so that she claimed to lose track when trying to count them all. Only a small fraction of them were in the vicinity of the dome and dragon shelter, however, and it was agreed that she''d focus on expending the imbuement on those. More concerning was her report there seemed to be some in the river at various depths, which implied that some seels had probably become dragonborn abominations as well, and that there were meanings larger than a house. Fortunately, the latter were immobile, and Shana believed they happened to be rooted trees with perhaps other things unfortunately mixed in.


    "It might be advisable to retain some of those dragonborn abominations as a source of wood or some other resources, depending on what component parts are included in their structure," Shana mused.


    She sounded so much like Lori that I shuddered from the top of my skull to the bottom of my spine. I had to remind myself there were worse people to act like than Lori, there were worse people to act like than Lori, there were worse people to act like than Lori¡­


    Nevermind the fact most such people were actively murderers, nonconists, and providers of unfair wages, there were still worse people to act like than Lori. And I supposed that Shana had a point about the resources.


    Shana didn''t actually need all that much effort to disrupt the rampant life walking around her demesne. All she needed to do was claim each one, her precedence as the demesne''s Dungeon Binder¡ªwell, as the one connected to the dungeon''s core, at any rate¡ªallowing her to override the dragon''s lingering claim on the life, and then use her one meaning on them, forcibly disrupting the meaning the life had been previously been tamed into. That was usually enough to cause them to stop moving, and if it wasn''t a second application at Shana''s meaning usually sufficed.


    "It''s probably not necessary," Lidz commented. "If those were undead, then all they would be doing is having the joints of their extremities moving according to the last instructions left in the undead''s life-emulated thoughtways."


    "I have no idea what that last thing you said was," I said. "Some kind of special meaning in the brain?"


    Lidz made a circling gesture with his hand. "Yes and no," he said. "It''s been long confirmed that Deadspeaking has some overlap with Mentalism when it comes to the meanings for creating undead through deadcrafting, just as Mentalism has some overlap with Whispering when it comes to lightningwisps. Any brain matter of sufficient mass can be induced to produce thoughts that can in effect control the meaning itself, which is how undead can follow sufficiently detailed simple instructions."


    "Sufficiently detailed simple instructions sounds like an oxymoron," I commented.


    "Not at all. You see, since undead can''t think you need to specify every little thing they¡ª"


    "As fascinating as this discussion of aspects of Deadspeaking that I am not versed in and am forbidden from learning is, I need to ask you all to either cease this conversation or continue in a different location," Shana interrupted, her eyes closed as she continued concentrating on something only she cold perceive. "Hearing you is very distracting."


    "Sorry, Shana. I''ll let you get back to work."


    She nodded, eyes still closed. "I shall report to you when I have cleared the river and the environs immediately around the dome and the dragon shelter."


    "Please focus on the river," I said. "I''m planning to go get Lori as soon as possible, so as soon as you confirm the river is relatively safe, we''re going. You should hopefully have time to focus on the environs while we''re on our way there."


    Another nod, eyes still closed.


    "Thank you, then!" I said cheerfully. "Shall I tell Yoshka she can nap on you?"


    Another nod, this time accompanied by a small, un-Lori-like smile on her face.


    Personally, I didn''t see how having her cousin near her would be less distracting than the interrupted exposition Lidz had been giving me, but it obviously made her happy, and so it was the least that I owed the little girl who''d had to grow up into an old (Lori) woman far too fast.


    <hr>


    With one boat ready and my needing to talk to Shana about the state of things in River''s Fork so I knew what to expect, I had set some people to shoveling the space outside of the entryway clear of dragonfrost while the second boat was being carried up. Just the ground, since at the moment there didn''t seem to be any reason to try and scrape the stuff off the walls, and I didn''t want us releasing the air that had been solidified.


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    When I stepped back outside after leaving Shana, most of the space had been cleared, though there was a lot of disturbed earth where the dragonfrost had stuck to the ground. The dragonfrost itself had been piled up in the corner of the flood wall under the water hub shed, a bare corner that we really didn''t use for anything except as a good spot out of the wind to roast meat during holidays. It was a good enough place for it, I suppose.


    The sun was nearing its peak when Kolinh and the ones with him came back, their snowpads making them look awkward as they walked towards us. It would have been funny, but a syrupy golden goo was smeared on the ends of some of their spears, the disturbingly sweet-smelling substance that dragonborn abominations had for blood.


    I left fitting the second driver to the carpenters as I headed to meet with Kolinh, my gaze going to the stained spearheads and then down to the people holding them. Thankfully, no one seemed to be bleeding, and they were coming back with the same number of people they''d left with. "So, what''s out there?" I asked Kolinh as he finished taking off his snow pads.


    "Plant abominations," he said. "Plant-beasts. Plant-bugs. Undead plant-beasts. Perhaps undead plant-bugs as well, it''s hard to tell with bugs. We''ll need axes to properly put them down. Probably longer hafts on the axes if the carpenters have the wood for it, but if not we can make do."


    "Not fire?" I asked, then immediately answered myself. "No, that''s a stupid idea. Being on fire wouldn''t stop the things from moving, and they''d take time to burn."


    "Fire is for later, when we''ve chopped their limbs off and have them in a pile," Kolinh confirmed.


    "Can they fit through the dungeon''s air vents?" I asked. "Do we need to worry about the things getting inside?"


    Kolinh let out a sigh. "No, thank the Great Binder."


    "Can''t be, Lori doesn''t know Deadspeaking and Shana only knows the one thing."


    That got me an eye roll. "You know what I mean."


    "In my defense, Lori would have said it if she were here," I pointed out.


    Kolinh gave a sideways nod, acknowledging that. "They shouldn''t be a problem. The wood bits stuck on them keep that ones that have wings from flying, and they''re all too fat to fit in any case. We''ll just have to keep them from getting in the front door."


    I nodded. "Do you think you''d be able to deal with anything bigger, like a leaper or a waddler?"


    He hesitated. "Normally, I would say that we have enough people, but I don''t like our chances of doing it while wearing snow pads."


    "Then for now, we step back and focus on clearing the ground of the dragonfrost, since that seems to be the bigger limitation than the actual abominations themselves."


    "Dragonfrost?"


    I shrugged. "We had to call it something. Unless there''s already a name for this stuff that I''m not aware of?"


    Kolinh nodded. "Dragonfrost it is. Once it''s clear, we''ll have somewhere safe to fall back to and deal with anything large with more bodies and spears."


    "Which will probably have to wait until tomorrow," I said. "I''ll be heading out to get Lori after lunch, so rest up and work on clearing off the frost until we come back. You can get started on the laundry area and around the baths. Hopefully we''ll be back later today, but at worst it will be a few days."


    Kolinh nodded, even if he looked a little reluctant. As a seasoned militia leader, even if it was as an engineer, he was probably a much better choice to lead Lori retrieval than me. However, it would be best if I were present to pick her up if Lori was being¡­ strange, since it was my job to talk to her on behalf of everyone else. And if anything happened to all of us, I wanted someone to keep Shana from trying to be Dungeon Binder of two demesnes and be able to help Taeclas run Lorian.


    Was this thinking morbid? Cynical? Fatalist? Of course! As a lord, I work for the government, after all!


    <hr>


    Lunch was eaten quickly so that we could go on Lori retrieval as soon as possible. Lori would have been very annoyed at seeing how little lingering there was at the docks, how short the goodbyes were, and how quickly we were able to get underway. It was to be expected, since most of those people sitting in the two boats now heading downriver had militia experience. Only Lidz, Clowee, and myself didn''t have any, and I''d made my farewells to Mikon and Umu quick.


    There were fourteen people divided between two boats, which left plenty of room to spare in case we had to bring more than just Lori back with us. Everyone was alert and watchful, since there might be dragonborn abominations in the water, twisted vistas just hanging in the air, and insane thoughts acting as either invisible solid obstacles in midair or¡­ actually, I don''t know what exactly the effects of insane thoughts were beyond that. I''ve been told repeatedly that Mentalism couldn''t affect other people''s minds, but if that was the case, why were the so-called insane thoughts released by dragons such a threat?


    ¡­


    Well, I had someone here who could provide exposition, so¡­


    "Hey, Lidz," I said as I steered us downriver, Clowee having volunteered to operate the other boats, "why are insane thoughts from dragons so dangerous? It''s never really been clear to me. I mean, Mentalism can''t affect other people except with physical force, right?"


    Wait¡­ why is everyone who hear me looking uncomfortable?


    "Mentalism normally can''t affect other people, yes," Lidzuga said, and yes, he also looked uncomfortable.


    "''Normally'' you say?"


    "Yes. The Mentalism of dragons is not normal and have been known to inject incorrect information into the natural thought-meridians carried along the body''s nerves. These disruptions vary, but are not limited to causing abnormal heartbeat, abnormal breathing, sensory hallucinations, irrational induced emotions such as fears, thoughts directing voluntary movements being redirected to other parts of the body, and in some extreme cases insane thoughts could cause temporary mental illnesses such as schismatic personalities, difficulty determining reality, delusions¡­ the list goes on."


    "Oh. That''s¡­ absolutely horrifying. I''m actually regretting asking."


    "It''s not as bad as it sounds," Lidz hastily assured me. "All the effects are temporary, so once the imbuement runs out you should be fine¡­ as long as it''s not something that affects your heartbeat, breathing, other bodily functions¡­"


    "Lidz, I already regret asking, please stop making it worse."


    "Sorry."


    We headed downriver in uncomfortable silence.


    "Really, only dragons can do this? Dungeon Binders and Mentalists haven''t been able to figure out how to replicate it?"


    "Oh, they have, but it''s usually using a combination of Deadspeaking, Whispering and Mentalism in conjunction, not simply pure Mentalism the way dragons do¡­"


    "I genuinely can''t decide if that''s bad or even worse¡­"


    "It''s not so bad," one of the militia with us, Tlevin¡ªwho for some reason was called ''Wet'' by his friends¡ªsaid with a happy, reminiscent smile on his lined, weathered face. This immediately caused nearly everyone else on the boat to groan and had those sitting next to him elbow him or smack him on the head, whichever was more feasible, giving him annoyed looks for some reason.


    "No one wants to hear from you, Wet!" someone said.


    Tlevin just shrugged, smiling.


    I probably shouldn''t ask. I''ll probably regret it.


    ¡­


    I asked. "What do you mean?"


    "Well¡ª"


    "I''ll tell it, Wet." Surprisingly it was Daising, one of the medics we were bringing along, who spoke. She turned towards me. "This fool walked into an insane thought that gave him a sensory hallucination centered on his pelvic region."


    ¡­


    "Ah. And that''s why people call him ''Wet'', I take it."


    "You''re telling it wrong, Dai!"


    "Lord Rian understands what happened. No further explanation is needed," the medic said, giving Wet an irritated glare.


    "You didn''t mention that it happened seven times!"


    Seven¡­.?-!


    "Really, seven?" I found myself asking.


    "Seven!" the man said proudly.


    ¡­


    I think understand why people are annoyed at him now.

 437 - Fallen Abominations

    Just before we crossed the border out of the demesne, we saw a very strange sight.


    Well, strange even for post-dragon conditions. We''d seen unfortunate seels that had lengths of driftwood and still-growing branches fused to their bodies, keeping them afloat but putting them at the mercy of the river''s current. There had been a huge boulder of what seemed to be solidified air just resting on the riverbank, standing just out of the water, which had been very disappointing because it wasn''t metal or something that we could use. We had seen the corpse of a dragonborn abomination that had been a leaper and a waddler somehow fused together, which seemed to have died because the two heads had tried to eat and claw at each other. There had been a lot of bugs that seemed to have various small plants growing on their backs, and unfortunate ones who''d become part fruit, mostly happyfruit. Nearly all of them were dead, devoured by other bugs as the alterations done to them had made them too awkward to be able to fight back or run away. No wonder Kolinh hadn''t been too worried.


    This was none of that, which made it strange in comparison.


    We all stared at the large mass of blackness just at the edge of the demesne, right on the line where the browns, greens and grays of plants, dirt and rocks was covered by the glittering, multi-colored growths of Iridescence. It was a familiar blackness, but¡­ well, I couldn''t think of any reason it should be here. It was also large, about five paces high and ten or fifteen paces across as best as I could estimate, but I couldn''t tell how deep it was because it disappeared into the trees. There was one on either bank of the river, putting me in mind of some kind of wall around the demesne. For all I knew, it was, but if so it wasn''t meant to keep out anything solid.


    "What''s that for?" Lidz asked, looking curiously at darkwisps among the trees.


    "I have no idea," I said. "Lori didn''t do that when the previous dragons happened. We can ask her when we meet her."


    "It reminds me of the binding on the Coldhold''s cargo boxes¡­"


    "Probably not the same purpose, they''re on the inside of the demesne," I pointed out, "so she can''t be keeping Iridescence out."


    I realized what I''d just said as we crossed the border of the demesne, and turned to look back at the darkwisps.


    ¡­


    "Daising, how dangerous are insane thoughts if there''s immediate help from medics and Deadspeakers nearby?" I asked.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    We didn''t run into any insane thoughts, twisted vistas, ill-bound wisps or rampant life as we sailed along the river, which I was told was actually to be expected. Except for twisted vistas¡ªwhich apparently could float atop water because it was a defined boundary, as I had learned from our then-new settlers from River''s Fork last year¡ªthe others tended to fall below the waterline unless they were physically unable to due to being too buoyant for one reason or another.


    Thankfully, there weren''t any twisted vistas in our path, though we did see one resting on top of a tree. At least, I was reasonably sure that''s what it was and not some sort of ill-bound wisps twisting the light. I know what light passing through a vista looks like!


    The weather was very still, but that was all right because the air was still relatively cool even without wind. Personally, I felt the overcast was a nice contrast to the persistently hot and sweaty sunlight that we''d been enduring all season, though I had thought that the others wouldn''t share the feeling. Surprisingly, however, everyone was in a good mood despite the gloomy weather and constant reminders of the dragon still far up in the sky.


    "Oh, this?" one of the militia with us, Bearded Vov, said. "This is a fine summer day back in Lomabuyar Demesne. Lord Rian, even if it''s a still a bit warm. But it''s a lot cooler than what we''ve been having, so it''s still an improvement."


    Well, I couldn''t deny that.


    So we all enjoyed the far cooler weather¡ªeven if we''d already lit the wisplights we''d brought along just to be sure that we had visibility¡ªas we moved downriver as quickly as safely possible while still watching out for twisted vistas. On either side, we''d occasionally see more dragonborn abominations. There were waddlers that had ropeweed growing on seemingly random places on their bodies, making them look like they had hair. There were fewer dragonborn bugs in sight, but what we could see were eaten or mostly wood, and the few that were moving had cracked carapaces and empty torsos. Their limbs moved awkwardly, so they were probably missing pieces of muscle, or whatever bugs used for muscles.


    We''d also seen a beast that looked like a chasmos but had two long horns running down its jaw with what seemed like several flowering bushes growing from its back. It seemed unperturbed by the additions to its anatomy, though it was a question how long that would last. It was also eating from an offshoot of a bush on its back that was too close to its mouth, which was probably some kind of cannibalism. Lidzuga looked in physical pain from not being able to draw it. Hopefully we''d be able to find it again in the coming week. It''s certainly interesting.


    It was a little after we crossed the border into the boundaries of River''s Fork that we started seeing signs of Shana''s handiwork. Dead undead abominations that were a mix of plant and something else, with the plant aspects much more clearly dominant. By their placement, some branches had clearly acted as limbs, and so must have needed some kind of Deadspeaking that Shana had disrupted with her forced ''healing''. Even at a casual glance, there were far more of such abominations here then there had been in Lorian Demesne, likely a result of the defenses Lori had in place. Well, while Shana didn''t have defenses, she did have offences. Some of the fallen abominations were large enough that I doubted Kolinh would have only made mention of needing axes.


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    We all stared at what looked like a tangle of trees that had fused together, its general shape making it look like some kind of squid¡ªas opposed to a grasper, whose heads were more bulbous and bodies less linear. From the furrows on the riverbank, and the way the roots on the end of some its ''tentacles'' were covered in mud, it had dragged itself out of the river. It would definitely take more than just axes to deal with an abomination like that.


    ¡­


    When we got back home, I was going to get Lori some roast tail meat even if I had to set up and cook everything myself. We did not thank her enough for keeping us safe. And I was also going to give Shana my share of any fruit we had for a week. She''d more than earned it if she spared us from having to deal with something like that.


    The sight of the fallen abominations didn''t exactly dampen everyone''s good mood, but it did make people more watchful. I trusted them to it as I kept guiding us downriver. Despite the angle of the sun¡ªas much of it as I could make out from behind the tentacles high in the sky¡ªit seemed closer to sunset than noon, and I was worried about us heading back. We might have to spend the night here in River''s Fork, which might prove to be a bit cramped¡­


    When we reached the center of the demesne, the dome looked relatively whole and undamaged, if covered in several spots with dragonfrost. I couldn''t tell if the dome was dead or still alive, since the leaves were still hanging on and many of them were already a bit withered from the summer. There were also dragonborn abominations there, fallen over and unmoving, although there were two¡ªno, wait, make that three¡ªthat were still alive and mobile, though the way they moved indicated that it wouldn''t be for much longer.


    One was a leaper¡ªor at least something leaper-shaped, since it was smaller than the leapers I remembered being terrified would jump out of the grass and eat me¡ªthat looked to have mushrooms growing in random places, which wasn''t a good sign for its general health. Either it had been physically fused with the mushrooms, or it had an extensive and most likely lethal fungal infestation over significant parts of its body, which given where some of the mushrooms were growing, involved its internal organs and its brain.


    Another looked to be at least three waddlers whose torsos had fused together. Their legs were more or less pointed down, although two feet didn''t seem to be touching the ground properly, and not all of its upper limbs had ended up on the outside. There were long, curving claws sticking out from the shoulder region of one of the heads, and from the way there were flicking back and forth, there was most likely a whole hand''s anatomy in the flesh beneath, which implied the whole limb must be in there as well. That implied not everything on the insides of the waddler mass belonged there.


    The last of the still-moving abominations¡ªfor a given value of ''still-moving''¡ªwas¡­ well, I couldn''t be sure what it used to be, because the most concise way of describing it was ''its insides were on the outside''. It looked like a bag of wet meat, every part twitching and throbbing. I saw hearts, lungs and tubes that must have been intestines, and the multiplicity of these organs meant it must have been more than one beast or seel that had been¡­ inverted for lack of a more concise term. There was no sign of claws, fur or feathers, and no bones were exposed. Neither were there skull or brains, which might have been a mercy, but given the whole, it was more an easily missed detail. Thick, golden fluid bled from where the delicate flesh of the organs had abraded on the ground, and it was already attracting bugs that¡­ well, those organs weren''t going to survive out here anyway, so it probably didn''t matter if they were sterile.


    Most of us were staring at that last with various expressions of discomfort, disgust, distaste and nausea. Lidz had turned away, one hand over his mouth and breathing deeply.


    "Well," I said brightly, "I don''t think that last is going to be moving from there, so why don''t we save it for later?" I was not going to say ''it''s not going to give us trouble. That''s just asking for trouble.


    We had to move a dead seel that had gotten lodged onto the dock, slugs seemingly fused in patches on its fur, before we could dock the boats. The carcass was pushed out of the way with spears since no one wanted to risk touching it and no one wanted to get into the water that the thing was lying in. Once the dock space was free, we all cautiously went ashore, keeping an eye out for the waddler lump and the infested leaper, the militia fanning out in case they suddenly rushed us or there was some kind of abomination that Shana had missed in her purge. Thankfully, it seemed our little Dungeon Binder had been thorough while we had been sailing downstream, and nothing living or dead came towards us desiring to consume our flesh, or at least chew on it thoroughly.


    The dragonfrost was thin enough along the shore that we didn''t have much difficulty kicking it out of the way or walking over it, though the two shovels we''d brought along still saw use. Once we managed to get under the dome, the ground was mostly clear, with only a few isolated piles here and there that had fallen from above. We moved cautiously towards the dragon shelter, Wet volunteering to take the lead in case of insane thoughts. The man actually seemed eager to run into one. A rope was tied around his waist so we could pull him back towards us in case he actually did run into such a thing, while the rest of us were watchful for twisted vistas and ill-bound wisps. Fortunately, we didn''t encounter any on our way from the docks to the hill where the shelter was housed, but there were several unmoving abominations on our way. Large bugs, chokers, seels¡­ all of them were in one way or another fused with some sort of plant or piece of wood or fruit. The latter had already begun to smell as other bugs swarmed them, exposing their fruity pulp to the air.


    Once we were out the other side of the dome, we needed to shovel more, kicking the dragonfrost out of our way as best as we could while keeping an eye out for the two still living abominations. They were a fair distance from us, with the closest being the inverted organs, and that was staying in place. We managed to clear the path up to the mine, climbing carefully so we didn''t slip.


    The entrance to the mine that contained the dragon shelter had a stone wall raised in front of it, blocking the doorway into the mine and encrusted with more dragonfrost. It wasn''t a very thick wall, merely the length of my palm¡ªI didn''t have anything to measure with, so I worked with what I had¡ªand didn''t go up very high, leaving the upper stri¡ªsorry, upper ten yustri¡ª or so of the copper-sheathed wooden door of the mine visible, as well as the air intake slits.


    ¡­


    Sighing, I stepped forward, and carefully knocked on the exposed copper as loudly as I could. The metal was cold, and it felt like my flesh tried to stick to it with every impact. "Lori! It''s us! We''re here to retrieve you!" Admittedly, the knocking wasn''t very loud since the wood beneath the copper was thick, but I was hoping my voice got carried inside. I could hear the sound of the ventilation binding still drawing in air. "Can you let us in, please? It''s safe to come out!"


    ¡­


    The militia around had started taking defensive formations, two watching the stone of the hill above me as I knocked on the door again. Ugh, my knuckles¡­!


    ¡­


    Eventually, the stone wall began to sink into the ground, the stone displacing to one side to become part of the stone of the hill as the dragonfrost broke off, piling up in front of the door.


    Oh good, Lori was awake. I really hoped she hadn''t been taking a nap that she''d been woken up from. That would put her in a terrible mood.

 438 - Just Mostly Irresponsible

    As it turned out, Lori hadn''t been napping.


    It had been so much worse!


    When the door into the dragon shelter opened, we were met by Riz and her friends¡ªall militiawomen¡ªwho had accompanied Lori to River''s Fork. Lori had never commented on the fact that it was mostly women protecting her, although there was a very real possibility that she had literally never noticed or understood the significance. Sometimes I wondered what she''d make of all these decisions that other people made for her. It probably fell into the category of things she didn''t care about, but she''d probably prefer to know there was a decision that she didn''t care about before it had been made.


    Should I tell her? Probably.


    ¡­


    Oh, well.


    "Hello, everyone," I greeted. "Your relief is here. Any problems?"


    "The Great Binder stopped bathing a week ago," Riz said.


    That was immediately alarming. Lori wasn''t obsessed with cleanliness, but it was clearly near and dear in her affections, right up there with naming things after herself in the possessive form. For as long as I''d known her, she''d always bathed daily, even if it was just a wash with water. Not bathing was literally unheard of for her. The closest had been when she''d been unconscious for an extended period of time when she''d injured herself trying to ride a rock and gotten infected.


    "Everyone inside," I said, gesturing for everyone to get inside. "Let Yllian know they can get started emptying the latrines and getting more water for everyone so people can stay here while we make sure the dome is clear. Go with them in case there are abominations or beasts that Shana¡­lorre missed. Lidz, go and check on everyone, in case anyone''s sick and Shanalorre didn''t notice." I turned back to Riz, leading her to one of the smaller alcoves next to the mine door to give everyone room to go in and out of the mine. "Besides not bathing, what has she been eating? Is she feverish?"


    "She eats if I keep reminding her," Riz said with a sigh, leaning against the stone wall and closing her eyes. She looked¡­ well, she looked like she needed sleep and rest and to be away from Lori. "At least she goes to the latrines by herself, but I need to remind her to come out, and I don''t think she''s been sleeping well."


    Oh no. "Has she been carrying the almanac everywhere?" I asked.


    Riz''s eyes fluttered open, and she gave me a confused look. "Almanac¡­? No, I don''t think she''s been reading anything. She''s been writing a lot, though. Ink all over her fingers and her trousers."


    ¡­


    Ah. This was going to require very careful handling¡­


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The door leading into Lori''s alcove wasn''t locked. There wasn''t any stone jutting up from the floor to keep it shut, and the latch hadn''t even been thrown. It was like Lori had just walked straight back into the alcove after she''d lowered the stone wall in front of the dragon shelter''s doors.


    Actually, I didn''t even know if she''d even stepped out at all. She could have done it from the alcove for all I knew. Either way, the lack of effort to try and secure the door was another worrying symptom. Lori was terribly paranoid¡ªterrible as in ''not good at it''¡ªbut she always remembered to take her basic security measures, such as locking her door to prevent people from getting at her. Her door was always locked.


    And she always took a bath every day.


    Raising a hand, I knocked loudly on the door. "Your Bindership!" I called out. "We''re here to take you home! Are you packed?"


    I waited, but there was no answer.


    I knocked again. "Your Bindership, I think someone pissed in the water reservoir! There''s yellow bubbles in it! And there''s something floating in it too!"


    I waited again. If she didn''t respond to this¡ª


    "What?-!"


    A sigh of relief escaped me, even though the words weren''t as violently outraged as they should have been. It was more like a ''what was that, I didn''t hear you properly?'' ''what?-!'' rather than an indignant ''those fools finally did what I had always feared they would do!'' ''what?-!''


    "I said I think someone pissed in the water reservoir!" I called through the door, aware that Riz and those close enough to hear were staring at me.


    The growl that came through the door sounded¡­ well, very human, but clearly a lot of effort, frustration, and rage was going into it to make it sound as beast-like as possible. The growling broke down into mutters of colorful language, as well as some insults that sounded distinctly of Taniar Demesne-origin, such as ''asking for idea loans without sense collateral'', ''suffering from sense inflation'', and ''overdrawn from their sanity account''.


    The mutters were broken up by more annoyed growls, but those seemed directed at something else. There was a cry of frustration. There was the sound of bare feet stomping on stone, which Lori was probably going to regret in a little bit. I waited some more, even as I knew I''d probably just made a terrible mistake. Lori as she normally was would probably understand. She''d be very annoyed at me, and I might be looking at some shin kicks in my future, but she''d have understood.


    If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    After all, a Dungeon Binder had responsibilities.


    I wasn''t sure this non-bathing Lori who didn''t remember to lock her door would agree.


    Some more time passed as frantic movement and more grumbling came through the door, which sounded like Lori was cleaning up her alcove. It was clear she had made some kind of mess in there, and just as clear that she hadn''t realized she''d been so messy. That was good, it meant that her desire to be organized and neat was making itself known. There was a loud sound as Lori latched the door, and another sound of frustration as she realized she''d just latched the door instead of unlatching it. There was another sound as she finally unlatched the door with far too much force, and pulled the door open.


    I blinked at the very bright light that shone in my eyes, instinctively shutting my eyes and raising a hand to shade them¡­ and then the smell hit me. It smelled¡­ well, it smelled like someone hadn''t taken a bath in over a week and a half had been staying in an enclosed room, in which they had been sweating. It was thick and acidic, and I felt like my eyes should be watering. I heard Riz step back as the smell reached her, though thankfully she didn''t do anything as overdramatic as gag or exclaim.


    If the smell was bad, Lori herself looked worse. The fingertips of her right hand were dark with ink¡ªa part of me winced thinking of how much ink that could be¡ªand the front of her trousers were stained with more. There were more stains on the hem on her shirt, as if she''d been wiping the tip of her pen on it, and the lower two button were undone. The armpits of the shirt had very pronounced sweat stains, and there were oil stains on the sleeves, probably from where she had been wiping her face. Lori''s hair was matted with more oil and so thick it looked like the whole mass had fused together into a helmet. Her eyes were half-lidded and visibly drooping from tiredness, and seemed to be staying open from raw willpower and also rage from the thought that someone had finally defiled the water supply.


    It would be funny if this wasn''t a woman who could sink me into the ground and had already shown a marked preference for painfully mutilating kicks to the side of the knee. Getting your knees kicked in the wrong way was agonizing.


    "Who did it?" Lori hissed though gritted teeth.


    "No one, I just needed you to get up and open the door so we can talk," I said. "The dragon''s gone now, so there''s work to be done."


    Lori stared at me for a moment, visibly working to comprehend what I''d just said, and I took a moment to look over her shoulder and into the alcove. While the smell was¡­ intense, it seemed to be primarily emanating from Lori rather than coming from the room itself, which was¡­ well, not as neat as her own room back in Lorian, but in reasonable shape given the sounds I''d heard before the door opened. Her bedroll and pillow had been pushed to one end of the sleeping niche, and the parts I could see didn''t seem to have ink stains. In contrast, the flattened-looking pile of straw spread out across the rest of the niche had plenty of dark spots, but they seemed to be concentrated on the point furthest from the sleeping paraphernalia. There was also a dark splotch where it looked like Lori had spilled ink, but it looked smaller than it should have been, and seemed looked old and dry. Perhaps she''d spilled ink and used Whispering to gather it back together into the bottle?


    There was a frustrated, if inarticulate, sound from Lori as she understood she''d been tricked. However, instead of glaring angrily at me, using Whispering on my person and the environment around me, or just kicking me, she just made a growling sound before turning away and picking up an untidy sheaf of papers and a bone tablet that had been put on top of the wooden container enclosing the wispbeads powering the ventilation and other defensive measures. "I was in the middle of something important! I need to get all this noted down before¡ªrainbows! I''ve lost track of where it went!" That finally got her to look at me, glaring angrily, even as one hand started feeling around for something next to her, patting at the straw.


    She''d just left the door open and walked away. Carefully, I stepped into the room and made a show of closing the door and latching it. "The dragon''s gone, and two demesnes need their Dungeon Binder back. While I''m sure whatever you''re doing must be pretty interesting, it''s time to get to work, your Bindership."


    For a moment, Lori stared at me. With her oily face, tired eyes, unkempt hair, sweat-stained clothes and random ink stains, she didn''t look like the reliable, ever-present wizard she usually did. Her face wasn''t set in a small frown as she thought of how to solve whatever problem, real or imagined, she''d taken offense at for being present in her demesne. She just looked¡­ she looked like she was tired, needed sleep, and wanted to punch me in the face for pulling her away from whatever had been happily distracting her for days and out into cruel reality.


    Her fingers were still holding the papers in her hand gently, though how much of that was tiredness, I didn''t know. Lori looked down at the sheaf, her eyelids drooping, and with the exaggeratedly careful movements of someone really, really tired because they''ve been awake for possibly more than twenty hours, she aligned the edges, making the papers into a neat stack. Once that was done, she deliberately laid it down on the straw as far away from her as her arms could manage before looking around her. "Where''s the pen?" she asked, her voice confused.


    I silently pointed at the pen¡ªjust lying on its side, not even capped to keep out dust and protect the nib¡ªnext to where she''d picked up the papers.


    "Where?" she demanded.


    Silently, I stopped pointing and just picked up the pen, wiggling it at her.


    "Oh, right, that''s where I put it," she said before letting out a yawn and rubbing at her eyes. Finally, she said, "So no one''s actually pissed in the water?"


    Closing my own eyes, I let out a long, relieved breath. "Not that I know of. You''d know better than me, since you''ve probably had to refill it everyday. I went straight to you since Riz told me you''ve been acting weird. Have you really not had a bath yet?"


    She looked away, her expression a mix of childishly sulky and guilty. "I was busy."


    I nodded. "We''re ready to take you back home," I said. "Do you want to go, or will we be staying a bit?"


    Lori blinked at me. "Home¡­ right, the dragon''s¡­ I can go back home¡­" She looked vaguely at nothing for a few moments, then abruptly nodded. "Home. Let''s go. I''ll just¡­ pack."


    Her pack was lying with the top open, and the clothes inside still looked neatly folded. Had she really not changed her clothes at all? "Why don''t you let me take care of it?" I said. "Riz can lead you to the boat and get you settled in so you can nap on the way home."


    Lori swayed for a moment. "All right¡­ yes, you do that¡­"


    I looked over my shoulder, where Riz was looking very concerned. "Riz, could you take her Bindership to one of the boats? You and your squad go with her and have Clowee bring you back." I paused.


    "Understood," she said, looking relieved. "What about you?"


    "I''ll stay and talk to Yllian about what Lori hasn''t been dealing with," I said. "Any suggestions?"


    "She hasn''t really just been staying in her room," Riz said softly. "The Great Binder just¡­ hasn''t been taking care of herself. When she wakes up, she goes around, does things, then goes back to her room and¡­" She nodded at the sheets of paper. "She made sure there was water in the reservoir."


    I sighed in relief. Well, at least she hadn''t gone completely irresponsible. Just mostly. And she''d been neglecting herself in favor of her Dungeon Binder things?


    That¡­ actually, that was very Lori-like.


    Shana must never know. This would just encourage her to take even less care of herself!

 439 - Still Being Fulfilled

    Distressingly, it looked like Lori''s pack was mostly untouched. Her clothes were still in there, slightly rumpled, and the almanac had been tossed into it as well. I made sure to wrap the book properly so it wouldn''t curl before I put it back into her pack, and made sure that her soap¡ªwhich was absolutely dry¡ªwas securely in its little leather pouch. I rolled up her bedroll properly, stuffing her pillow inside, and was glad to see that a casual checked revealed no ink stains. It wasn''t as fluffy as it used to be, but there was no need to replace the stuffing yet.


    The bedroll still stank though, so apparently she had still been sleeping on it. Just not as much sleep as she should have.


    Lori was sitting on the boat, and was moving around like she was trying to find a comfortable position. She took her pack and placed it behind her as a cushion, muttering about needing her chair. I made a note about having the boat she used for making beads be designated for use on her personal trips as well.


    She seemed to find a comfortable enough position, since she settled down and closed her eyes, letting everyone else finally started boarding the Lori''s Boat (Unnumbered But Technically ''One''). Not that the anyone seemed eager to sit next to her as it became clear she seemed to have fallen asleep, or was at least dozing. Riz and the other militiawomen had probably gotten more than their fill of her smell, and everyone else was keeping their distance. Unfortunately, Lori was sitting in the back, so poor Clowee had to sit next to her to operate the boat.


    I''m sorry, Clowee! Hopefully the wind when the boat got moving will blow the smell away from you!


    "Here," Riz said, handing me her pack, with its bedroll and blanket tied to the outside. They were made of hard-wearing canvas, looked like they''d been used for years, and were good for years more. "You didn''t bring anything, so use this. I''ll sleep on your stuff when I get home. There''s soap and a towel in there too."


    "You don''t¡ªactually, yes, thank you," I said. This little overnight stay hadn''t been planned, but since we were taking Lori away, I had decided to stay so that it was clear we weren''t just abandoning them to deal with the aftermath of the dragon by themselves. I wasn''t Lori, but I was here, showing that Lori''s responsibilities to take care of the demesne were still being fulfilled. Besides, I needed to talk to Yllian anyway. "I''ll try not to use up everything."


    Riz nodded and gave me a quick kiss, to immediate snickering and commentary from the other militia around us. "Any orders you want me to carry back?" she said.


    "Tell Kolinh to send people here tomorrow, this time packed to stay if necessary," I said. "Though don''t wait for her to wake up before sending anyone. She''ll probably be sleeping in late, and will most likely miss breakfast. Lori should be rested enough to start making more decisions by the time she wakes, so she can get started on dealing with putting the demesne back together now that the dragon is gone."


    "And if she doesn''t?"


    I considered that. "Then tell Kolinh to have someone come get me and I''ll see if I can talk some sense into her again. Hopefully when she wakes up she''ll be back to her usual responsible, hardworking megalomaniac self. If she''s back to normal, getting me can wait until Lori''s done fixing things back home and heading over to fix things here." It shouldn''t be necessary, since Lori had already been reminded of things she had to do, but¡­


    Well, maybe whatever she was writing is still really interesting.


    I headed back to the mine with Riz''s pack and a spear, the boats staying to make sure I wasn''t caught by the two still-mobile abominations before leaving themselves. There was work to be done.


    Yllian had come out and was looking around at the landscape, the sky, and the dragonfrost on nearly everything, which people were already shoveling out of the way to avoid the inevitable slipping hazards. He nodded to me as I came close. "Will she be all right?"


    "As soon as she gets more sleep and a bath," I said. "From what I can tell, it seems to have been a loss of self-control. I couldn''t tell you what she was indulging in, but she wrote a lot of notes about it, and it seemed like Whispering. Not much she can do around here anyway. Most of this stuff¡ª" I kicked at the dragon frost, "¡ªisn''t water."


    "I know. I hate it when it snows air. It kills people when it sinks down to the shelters and no one catches it."


    "Good thing this shelter is up a hill, isn''t it?" I said. "I''ll put this inside and come back out to help you clear a path so we can start emptying the latrines and getting more drinking water. Uh, but let''s not do the last two in that order."


    For some reason, Yllian burst out laughing.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Between the weak sunlight outside and how late it was in the day, there wasn''t much time to work before it got dark, especially with two abominations nearby. With what little light remained, we focused on clearing dragonfrost from around the door. Some used the spearshafts to try and scrape off dragonfrost from the stone about the entrance so it wouldn''t fall down, while the rest of us used shovels to loosen the dragonfrost and toss it downhill. We were just able to clear a path down to the river, and refilled two of the water barrels before it was too dark to try and fill more, even with the good wisplights from Covehold.


    This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Afterwards, I waited my turn to use the baths, such as it was. It turned out that the room Lori had excavated for use as a bathing area had become drinking water storage¡­ and most of the ''drinking water'' was in the form of large blocks of bound ice, because of course it was. Hence, the water reservoir room had become the bathing area, complete with a stone basin that was filled by pulling off a piece of wood that was the stopper on a pipe leading from the reservoir Lori had filled. At the far end of the room from the reservoir was a recess on the floor that all the water flowed down to, which had a bound tool at one end that seemed to draw in the water into a pipe built into the stone wall. Impurities in the water were expelled into a bucket from an outlet of the pipe and the now-clean water was sent back to the reservoir so people could bathe into it again.


    At least we weren''t drinking it.


    After taking a bath, I joined Yllian for dinner. It was slightly awkward, since there wasn''t as much space to eat as the dining pavilion, so I was eating with Yllian''s wife and stepson, Aryss and Ayban. While we''d done so before, and I was one good terms with all three, there was something about being the lone stranger in the community that made me feel like there was someone staring at my back.


    There probably was. People had settled down and were behaving, but this was still the demesne whose people had put themselves in a near-famine situation from stealing and hoarding their own food. Lori was never going to let them forget it, and neither was I, though I reserved my reminders for the people who were actually guilty of theft and hoarding. And if that meant reminding them they punched like an empty reed basket, so be it.


    I informed Yllian of my observations of what abominations we probably had to deal with, doing my best to keep the language mild enough so that no one was turned off dinner. "Though I think Shanalorre is working on dealing with them. The undead and rampant life, at least. Everything else¡­" I sighed. "Well, Lori will probably have to deal with the Whispering things, but I have no idea how we''d deal with twisted vistas and insane thoughts beyond marking them to avoid. Ugh, she''s going to hate walking around the woods¡­ How did you deal with those two in the militia?"


    "Mentalists and Horotracts," he said as if it was obvious¡­ which, yes, it was. "They''d identify both, then claim and unmake them."


    I groaned. "And we have neither¡­ I''ll have to ask Lori if I can recruit at least one of either next time. This is starting to become untenable. Well, more untenable than it used to be."


    "I think we''re doing rather well as things are," Yllian commented. "If the demesne were more densely populated, then we''d need to hurry to be rid of all traces of a dragon''s presence, but as it is we can just let the things sit and fade away on their own since we don''t really go that far beyond the immediate dome."


    "Even though the wisps that might start a forest fire?" I said.


    Yllian shrugged. "If a fire hasn''t started yet since the dragon left, then there''s probably nothing that can start a fire, in which case they can also be allowed to fade on their own."


    "You have a point about the wisps, but Lori is going to hate it. You know how she can be. Things need to be done, done, done."


    "I''m sure she''ll cope. As it is, the biggest threat left would be the abominations, and you said that the Gr¡ªBinder Shanalorre is dealing with the matter from where she is."


    "She''s not getting all of them," I pointed out. "The living ones that aren''t really going to be bothered by losing the rampant life that was on them will still be a problem. But I suppose it does cut down on the number of abominations we''ll have to deal with to a more reasonable amount."


    "You''re not coming," Yllian said mildly. "Something like that is far too dangerous to include someone as inexperienced as you, Rian."


    "Normally I''d insist on coming along anyway to learn but many of the things I saw were disgusting, so just this once I''ll stay put. How are we for food?"


    "We were able to gather everything, and the Great Binder caught three seels before we had to close the dragon shelter, so we''re well-stocked. However, I''m worried about how the fruit trees managed to survive this. The cold no doubt killed all their leaves, and several might have been tricked into thinking that winter came early. We might have problems with the trees next year."


    "Let''s worry about that next year, we have more than enough problems today as it is," I said.


    "Our future selves are going to hate us," Yllian observed.


    We both sighed.


    "I suppose I might as well enjoy just having these problems to deal with. When the Golden Sweetwood Company gets here again, everything''s going to get so much worse."


    Yllian looked at me curiously. "Having more settlers, skilled labor, new equipment, and wizards is things getting worse?"


    "You won''t be the one trying to keep Lori from doing something unreasonable and paranoid," I said. "At best, she''ll insist all other wizards confine themselves here to River''s Fork and take away all the bound tools she made so that the Whisperers can''t examine or modify them."


    "Oh no. What a hardship, to have all the wizards staying in this demesne," Yllian said flatly. "However shall we cope?"


    "Hey, I want us to have wizards too, you know! It''s just she''ll probably worry that they''ll obey the Golden Sweetwood Company over her, and she doesn''t like having challengers to her authority." And she''ll worry they''ll try to kill her to take her demesne, or set up rival demesnes, the thought of which she can''t stand¡­ "If she could be absolutely sure the company wouldn''t try to place itself as a rival authority¡­ well, she''d still be worried, but not as much as she is now."


    Yllian hummed, sounding commiserating. "Well, better you than me," he said.


    "Your non-vote of non-confidence warms my heart."


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    I slept in Lori''s alcove that night. Lit by the glowing rock Lori had given me what seemed like a long time ago, the little room still stank a little, even after being aired¡ªor at least, having the door open so that the ventilation could force the smell out¡ªbut it had a door that locked. While some people punched like an empty reed basket, they might feel confident if I slept in the same room as them, and at the moment it wasn''t safe to move back under the dome. The dragonfrost was still sublimating, and we didn''t want anyone asphyxiating in their sleep.


    Lying back on the sleeping niche, the bedroll on top of the pile of straw¡ªI''m made sure to turn it over and check for still-wet ink, just in case¡ªthe smell was bearable, but it wasn''t going to fade into the background any time soon. Riz hadn''t bought a pillow, but that was what the pack was for. The sound of the air moving through the ventilation was a low, constant breath. It had been a long day, but hopefully our Dungeon Binder would soon be back in working order.


    ¡­


    The spaces on either side of me felt too cold and empty. Did that mean I missed Umu, Mikon and Riz, or was I just feeling lonely? Or was I just trying to tell myself I did love them so I wouldn''t feel guilty about enjoying their company? Someone who did love them probably wouldn''t need to actually think about that, right?


    I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, and when I did, I dreamed of rain.

 440 - Familiar Ceiling

    Lori woke up staring at an unfamiliar ceil¡ªno, wait, she recognized that ceiling. That was her ceiling. There was that list of random names that she kept never getting around to removing. What was she doing here? The last thing she remembered was being in River''s Fork and writing¡­


    Writing¡­


    Oh.


    She shifted her body, and found it not aching. Instead, the surface beneath her flexed and deformed in a familiar, comfortable manner. Lori was lying down on her own bed, rather than on a pile of straw on top of stone, which had been comfortable enough the first night but had become progressively less so in the succeeding days.


    Despite that, the rest of her was uncomfortable. The clothes she was wearing felt strangely too warm, despite her being in her demesne where everything should have been a comfortable temperature. Her hair felt too hot, and she felt an itch somewhere private. Her feet felt warm¡ªnot comfortably warm, simply warm¡ªand her toes felt confined for some reason. Why had she gone to bed still wearing her boots and socks? There was also an unpleasant smell coming from somewhere, and¡­ why did she have a strong sense that someone had pissed in the water reservoir?


    The explanation for all but the last was soon obvious as she sat up and ran her hand through her hair, feeling dried sweat and oil and the warm feeling not changing at all. She raised an arm and lowered her head, then recoiled as the smell intensified slightly. Yes, she clearly hadn''t bathed in far too long. But why¡­?


    Vague memory slowly unfolded at the attempt to recall, and Lori looked around her room¡ªher room back in her demesne¡ªfrantically looking for papers. There were none in sight, but she did see her pack on her stone table across the room. Throwing her legs over the side of her bed, she reached down to pull on her boots before remembering she was already wearing them¡ªalong with other disgusting articles of clothing¡ªbefore standing up and rushing to her pack. Undoing the pack''s flap and pulling open the drawstrings, she searched it for her notes, pulling out the clean clothes inside and carelessly tossing them down next to the almanac on the table.


    Her notes! Her notes! Where were her notes?-! She searched through her pack frantically, but there was nothing in her pack but clothes, her towel, and her little bag of soap! Emptying the pack uncovered nothing else, and with her pack being inconclusive, she searched around the room frantically as she tried to find the sheaf of loose papers that she''d written her observations of the ill-bound wisps, wisplings and other strange bindings that the dragon had formed while it has slowly passed through her demesne. No! Where was it?-! Surely she remembered to include it when she''d been filling her pack! She''d worked on those notes for days, of course she''d¡ª


    Wait.


    She hadn''t been the one to pack her effects, had she?


    Rian had said he''d take care of it.


    "Rian¡­!" she growled, turning and stomping towards her door. While she still had her samples of wisplings, deactivated bindings, ill-bound wisps, and what she was reasonably certain were insane thoughts, twisted vistas and rampant life¡ªcontainers of darkwisps she''d set up at the borders of her demesne were occasionally getting their imbuement depleted by something¡ªthat she could study, her notes contained her observations and flow diagrams of several samples that had already dissolved, been predated upon by other wisplings, or were otherwise no longer with the ones she''d contained. That made her notes on them absolutely essential, as she couldn''t be expected to remember everything that she''d observed. If something happened to those notes she''d¡­ she''d¡­ well, she''d do something very violent and cathartic to Rian, that''s what she''d do!


    Normally, she would have immediately stomped out of her room and screamed for Rian to present himself and explain where her notes were, but¡­ well, with the notes not in her pack, and faced with having to step out in public for any further information as to where they are, she could no longer stop thinking about her current state. She stank, she itched, her hair felt like some kind of dragonborn abomination had taken up residence in her scalp and spilled its blood and waste all over her hair, and despite being in her demesne her clothes felt like they contained their own heat that radiated into her skin.


    She needed a bath.


    Lori grabbed the clean clothes she''d pulled from her pack as well as her soap and her scrubbing rock, and took them with her to her private bath so she could do just that.


    <hr>


    It took some time for Lori to be clean to her satisfaction. More than a week of not bathing¡ªno doubt closer to a week and a half, as she''d stopped keeping track of time at some point, focused only on getting the morning imbuing done as quickly as possible so she could get it out of the way and back to her notes before she''d lost track of the observations she couldn''t write down¡ªhad left a much thicker layer of grime on her skin that needed to be removed. As she couldn''t use her scrubbing rock on all places that needed cleaning, she''d needed to exfoliate it with her hands, and occasionally her nails.


    The water trailing across her floor and into the drainage hole in one corner¡ªcovered by a wooden grate after one too many instances of her dropping her soap and the thing sliding into the hole¡ªhad been a disturbing shade of dark gray, even accounting for the soap, and had made her shiver at the thought of it on her body. And given the circumstances, it was no doubt on her bedroll as well. She would need to wash it as soon as possible. It would have happened that very day if she didn''t so urgently need to get her hands on Rian and those notes and¡­ and¡­


    If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡­and the fact she had the aftermath of the dragon''s passing to deal with.


    ¡­


    But after she found out where her notes were! Now that there were important things she had to do that she couldn''t just do quickly between waking up and having breakfast¡ªugh, had she actually thought it was a good idea to get to work first thing in the morning immediately after waking up?¡ªshe of course wouldn''t just be tempted to sit around and continue adding to her notes while her samples persisted¡­ even though a casual count through her awareness of the wisps in her demesne showed her she''d lost some more samples while she was asleep, and the rest needed to be imbued again¡­


    ¡­


    No, she wasn''t going to be distracted!


    After a much longer than usual bath, Lori was feeling comfortable and refreshed again, and the temperatures around her had returned to normal levels. She''d left the clothes she''d been wearing¡ªsocks, loin cloth, chest wrap, trousers and shirt¡ªto soak in a hastily made basin while she couldn''t deal with them yet, while she put on fresher clothes and slipped on her reed tsinelas. Taking one last deep breath and enjoying the feeling of being properly clean again, Lori opened her door¡ªugh, she''d left it unlocked while she''d slept¡ªwith the intention of seeking out Rian.


    She found a pair of bedrolls laid out on the floor of the passageway outside of her room, and stared down at Riz and Mikon. The latter was sitting with her back against the wall opposite Lori''s door and her legs stretched out, while the former was lying down with her head on the weaver''s lap. Both had looked up at Lori when she''d opened the door, looking surprised. A moment later, Riz pulled her hand away from where it had been cupping the weaver''s posterior. Another moment, and she was scrambling to her feet, tugging her shirt into place before standing straight and resolutely staring directly ahead. "Uh, Great Binder! You''re awake! We were just, ah, I was guarding your door to make sure no one disturbed your rest and, ah, Mikon was keeping me company!"


    Lori gave them both a flat look, then deliberately sniffed the air. Thanks to her recent bath, the overwhelming smell wasn''t¡ª


    She paused, reached out to claim some airwisps, and made a binding across her doorway that kept the air from her room from passing through it.


    That done, Lori once more deliberately sniffed the air. Thanks to her recent bath and the binding keeping the air in her room from passing through the open door, she was able to smell the passageway clearly. Finding the air clear, she directed her gaze at Riz. "Erzebed, where is Rian?" she demanded.


    "He''s still in River''s Fork, Great Binder," Riz said, still staring straight ahead.


    Colors. "Colors!" Lori swore, making Riz jump in surprise. "When will he be back?"


    "Uh¡­ that depends, Great Binder."


    Her eyes narrowed. "On what?"


    "On¡­ uh, on whether you''re just going to go back to your room, stop bathing, and just write," Riz said, then swallowed, "or if you''re going to, ah, start putting the demesne back together now that the dragon is gone."


    Mikon let out a quiet gasp as Lori met Riz''s eyes, deliberately stepping into the non-officer''s line of sight and leaning in. "What did you say?"


    "I''m, ah, just repeating what Rian said, Great Binder," Riz said, staring straight ahead and somehow managing to give the impression she was looking past Lori despite the fact that Lori''s face was probably most of what she could see. "After all, the dragon is gone, so we should focus on getting things back to normal, putting the bound tools back in the baths, getting the sawmill working, planting a last autumn crop that we can harvest before planting some winter grain, all those things, r-right?"


    Despite herself, Lori tilted her head. "Did Rian also tell you that last?"


    "N-no, Great Binder. Just remembering what happened last year."


    Lori hummed, glancing down at Mikon, who was staring up at Riz. "Tell me, Erzebed. Do you enjoy your position of being a Perpetual Non-Officer?"


    Riz blinked at the sudden question, and she forgot herself enough to focus on Lori. "Your Bindership?"


    "Because for a someone who espouses their desire to never be an officer, you are certainly acting like one. Have you tired of your hard-earned position? Do you wish to be promoted? "


    The woman leaned back slightly as if she wanted to recoil. However, she took a deep breath and said, "That depends. How''s the pay? How much do I make per week? Is there an officer''s bar where I can get free booze?"


    Lori''s head titled back the other way. "So if you had those things, you''d agree to be an officer?"


    "No, but I want to be sure what I''m turning down."


    Huh. Lori could actually respect that last.


    "We can revisit the subject once I establish taxes to pay you with," Lori said, waving a hand dismissively.


    "Aren''t you the one making beads? Can''t you just make as many as you want?"


    Lori twitched, repressing a shudder at the horrific idea. That way lay uncontrolled hyper-inflation, even for a fiat commodity currency like beads! And that was just the reasonable problems that would be caused.


    Then she shook her head, brushing aside the distraction. So, Rian wasn''t here, but in River''s Fork. Her notes had better be there as well, or she might start kicking him and not stop until her feet hurt too much to keep doing it! And then she''d have Shana heal and get back to it! "What time is it?" Lori asked.


    "Uh, it''s about midmorning, Great Binder. Maybe a bit later, there aren''t any windows here, and it''s hard to tell with the dragon blocking the sun. I had them set aside some fruits for you to eat so you wouldn''t have to be hungry while waiting for¡ª"


    "What was that last?" Lori interrupted.


    Riz blinked. "Uh, fruit?"


    "No, before that!"


    "The dragon blocking the sun?"


    "Yes, that! How can that be? The dragon is gone." She certainly couldn''t feel it anymore.


    "Ah¡­ I think you should see what it''s like outside, Great Binder. I''m not sure how to describe it beyond ''the dragon is blocking the sun''."


    Lori stared at her, then pointed looked down at the bedroll laid out on the passage.


    "Ah¡­ let me get that out of your way, Great Binder."


    As Mikon stood up so that Riz could remove the bedroll¡ªwhich turned out to be two bedrolls and a pair of blankets¡ªLori let out a frustrated sigh. A part of her was tempted to just take one of their boats, go back to River''s Fork, get her notes back¡ªthey had to be still there¡ªfrom Rian, and lock herself up in her room to continue making her observations. The rest of her knew it was time to set aside such self-indulgence for the moment. Things needed to go back to how they were, which meant bringing her demesne back from dragon readiness¡ªthe latrines must be utterly full, as she guiltily recalled that she hadn''t desiccated the waste to add more, ah, ''storage'' space¡ªand back to its day-to-day state.


    It was what a Dungeon Binder did, after all.


    But once all this was over, she was going straight back to making more observations and writing more notes while her samples lasted!

 441 - Back To A Working State

    As Lori made her way down the steps leading from her rooms¡ªwhich she had remembered to lock behind her¡ªshe did her best to ignore the whispered exchanged happening behind her. Mikon and Riz weren''t being as quiet as they thought, and the walls bounced their words just enough to be audible.


    "¡ªway you stood your ground against Binder Lori was so brave¡­" Mikon said in a low, husky voice.


    "¡­it wasn''t, my mouth just spoke before my thoughts got to it¡­"


    "¡­seeing you do that had my bell shaking¡­"


    "¡­it was stupid, I shouldn''t have¡ªshaking¡­?"


    "¡­when we can use the house again, I am getting you on that bed and ringing your bell all night¡­"


    "¡­a-all night?"


    Thankfully, they reached the bottom of the stairs before Lori had to hear any more nauseatingly mother-like whispers.


    The dining hall was filled with people, though it was clearly not a meal time. Tables and benches had been moved at the far end of the dining hall, where children were playing some loud game in the cleared space that involved much running around, standing still, holding their arms out and yelling a lot. It made her shudder, bringing back horrid childhood memories of her mothers taking away her books, and telling her to go ''play with the other children'' and other terrible things.


    "U-uh, I''ll go get the fruits, Great Binder," Riz said. "Why don''t you sit and wait for me?"


    Ah, right. Lori had been about to go outside and see how exactly the dragon was blocking the sun and what the rest of the situation was¡ªthe door of her Dungeon was open, so it probably wasn''t too urgent¡ªbut as soon as Riz mentioned the fruit, her stomach reminded her it was empty and that she couldn''t remember the last time she had eaten. "Thank you," she said absently, turning to head towards her table.


    Her chair was just as she left it, pushed neatly against the table and out of the way, and when she pulled it out it was as solid as ever. As Lori sat down and leaned back, she let out a sigh. Ah, she''d missed this! Even though the past several days were a bit hazy¡ªat the moment, her clearest recollections were sitting with her eyes closed, observing the ill-bound wisps and bindings the dragon had made, and collecting and examining samples whose creation she hadn''t been able to observe directly, and then writing down notes about it¡ªbut she distinctly remembered thinking several times that she wished she had her chair so she could lean back while she wrote.


    She would have reshaped the back of the sleeping niche, but it would have taken up time and concentration she needed to observe. So many bindings, so many strange arrangements of wisps¡­ far too many had been completely indecipherable, at least in the brief time she''d given herself to look them over, so she had claimed them and gathered them up to examine later. A few, however¡ªno, no, that can wait later! Best to make sure she remembered her notes correctly!


    Lori blinked as Mikon sat down on the bench opposite her, the weaver giving her a smile but saying nothing. She considered ignoring the woman, but¡­ "If you do any of that bell-ringing in my Dungeon, there will be consequences."


    "I know, your Bindership," Mikon said, smiling brightly. "Only when we''re back in the house."


    "Good."


    "Though I might see if I can take her to the Um."


    "I don''t need the details."


    "Can we play later?"


    Lori paused. "What?"


    "We haven''t played sunk in a long time. Can we play later at dinner, if you''re not busy?" Mikon looked at her earnestly. "Please?"


    Huh. When was the last time she''d played sunk? If she couldn''t remember, Lori supposed it had been a while. "I''ll consider it."


    Mikon smiled brightly for some reason.


    <hr>


    After eating the fruits that Riz brought back¡ªthey were nice and cool, their outsides wet with condensation¡ªLori sent her out to find¡ªshe reached down to check to rocks on her belt pouch, only to realize she''d forgotten to put on her belt pouch¡ªLori had her wait while she went upstairs to get her belt pouch.


    Once Lori got her belt pouch and checked the rocks until she had to right name, she sent Riz off to retrieve Kolinh, Taeclas and Lidzuga. She took the time to reconnect the pipes from the water hub shed to her Dungeon''s reservoir while she waited, though she did not reactivate the shed just yet. The reservoir''s water level was down to half, and the waste water cistern in the third level was quite full, as were the latrines.


    It occurred to her that she might need to rework her Dungeon''s latrines, which had mostly been untouched all this time. She had once considered anchoring bindings to immediately desiccate the waste in the latrines, but had dismissed the idea at the time since she hadn''t wanted to use her then-limited wire supply on something so¡­ seemingly frivolous. However, it was clear that the latrines had suffered from her lack of attention for an extended period of time. They were so full that if they''d been opened for cleaning they''d have spilled out onto the floor.


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    Before she could get started on that, Riz arrived with the people Lori had called, and she gestured for the four of them to sit on the opposite side of the table. Mikon, who''d just sat quietly while Lori had eaten, slid aside to make room for them and took her leave, kissing Riz on the cheek as she went.


    "All right," Lori said. "I will be dealing with the matter of the latrines after this. First off, Taeclas, Lidzuga, have you tested the river water for harmful dustlife?"


    The two blinked, exchanging looks in a way that made it clear they hadn''t.


    "One of you see to that immediately so that I can reconnect the reservoir to the river. What is the state of the demesne outside of my dungeon besides covered with ice and solidified air''? Are there any dragonborn abominations that need to be dealt with?" Lori directed that question at Riz and Kolinh.


    "We''ve encountered abominations, Great Binder," Kolinh reported, "however, most of them have been small things, mostly bugs and chokers or beasts of similar size. Most of them are part plant, or have had pieces of their bodies replaced or fused to wood. So far, we haven''t encountered anything bigger, so we''ve been able to put down any that we''ve run into. Most of our efforts have been clearing what Rian called dragonfrost. It''s dangerous to walk on without snow pads because it''s thick and slippery. We''re working on clearing the main paths, but we still haven''t had time to check the demesne''s buildings."


    Lori nodded. "How many of the abominations you''ve encountered are undead?"


    "A fair few, but it doesn''t really change how we deal with them. It''s also hard to tell them apart from the ones that are still alive until we''ve already dismembered them. "


    She frowned at that. Well, that probably meant that Kolinh and the former militia in the demesne could handle all the abominations as long as they remained small. "What becomes of the¡­ dragonfrost? What becomes of the dragonfrost after it''s been cleared?"


    "We''ve been dumping it into the river," Kolinh said. Huh. Well, she supposed that was one way to get rid of it instead of just letting it pile up.


    Lori nodded slowly. "Very well. Continue as you have been as to disposing of the dragonfrost. Has there been any notable damage?"


    "The waste water cistern for watering the fields is cracked, Great Binder. The water in it froze, cracking the stone."


    "That should be simple to fix," Lori mused. "What about the sawmill?"


    "There''s no obvious damage that we could see, Great Binder, but a more thorough inspection might be needed. At the very least, we should pour water on the roof to see if it leaks now. "


    Lori nodded again. "Very well. I''ll do something about the dragonfrost around the village this afternoon. For the moment, withdraw those dealing with abominations and have them assist in cleaning out the latrines. When I finish with the dragonfrost, you should be able to deploy more people to deal with them." A part of her wanted to stick the dragonfrost into their coldrooms¡ªno sense in wasting good solidified air¡ªbut given it was mixed in with ice, she''d have to pick through it. "After this meeting, go and check the nearest latrines outside. If there are any abominations hiding in them, deal with them and restore the latrines to a useable state so people have somewhere to go while I''m dealing with the latrines here in my Dungeon. Once the latrines have been cleared, check to make sure there aren''t any abominations in the baths so I can reconnect the water pipes and people can use them again. The old baths, the ones near the Dungeon. The new ones can wait until later. After that, resume clearing the area around the village, and then move on to inspecting each building. I don''t expect you to finish today, but get as much done as you can."


    Kolinh nodded. "Understood, Great Binder."


    "Taeclas, Lidzuga, I want an assessment done on every individual in this demesne. Check if anyone has developed an illness from being in my Dungeon for an extended period of time, and deal with it as needed. Be as quick as you can while still being thorough. Start with the children, then continue with the ones cooking in the kitchen."


    The two nodded. "Yes, your Bindership," they both said, though Lidzuga was a bit unused to saying it compared to Taeclas.


    "Erzebed, what was the situation in River''s Fork when we left?"


    "Rian and Yllian were clearing out the dragonfrost around the outside of the dragon shelter, and we sent more people to help them this morning," Riz reported. "There are a lot of dragonborn abominations, and Rian said they''re bigger there, but Binder Shanalorre has been working on dealing with them."


    Lori blinked. What? How? "What? How?" She''d ordered Shanalorre not to learn any further Deadspeaking!


    "She''s claiming any meanings in her demesne that''s an abomination and taming the life into her meaning," Taeclas explained quickly. "Rian suggested it. That way, she undoes the meaning and uses up the imbuement in the life, so if there are any predatory lifelings they''ll have less to subsist on."


    Oh. That was¡­ quite ingenious, actually. "How successful has she been?"


    "I saw a lot of abominations that weren''t moving on my way back, Great Binder, but what Binder Shanalorre is doing isn''t killing all of them," Riz reported. "It doesn''t do anything to the abominations that don''t need magic to stay alive, or at least won''t die right away without it. The ones I saw were beasts mashed together, and¡­" She made a disgusted face. "Well, it''s going to die. Guts aren''t supposed to be on the outside."


    The description wasn''t very vivid, but it was enough to make Lori not desire further clarification. "Is there any reason to believe that the dragon shelter is in danger from abominations?"


    Riz shook her head. "The three still alive that I saw can be dealt with by the people there, and Binder Shanalorre said there were no other large beasts or abominations near the dome. At least, there weren''t any last night. I''m not sure about now. She''s still asleep."


    "She stayed up late into the night, dealing with all the abominations that she could," Taeclas said, looking disapproving for some reason. "Your Bindership, you need to tell her to take better care of herself. Staying up that late isn''t healthy, especially for someone her age."


    Lori opened her mouth to reply, then paused. While she didn''t particularly care whether Shanalorre died¡ªit would actually be convenient for her, since she would then be able to claim River''s Fork''s core¡ªthe other Dungeon Binder''s healing meaning was useful, and she was useful for taking care of the children. "I''ll inform her she''s more useful if she remains in a healthy state."


    Taeclas stared at her, a strange expression on her face.


    She didn''t seem to have any more questions, so Lori turned back to the others. "Was there anything else?"


    "Um, Great Binder?" Riz said. "What about Rian?"


    Lori twitched. "Rian can stay where he is and make himself useful. If I need him, I''ll send for him."


    "Don''t you need him for, uh, ''dealing with people'' matters?"


    Lori gave her a blank look. "Why would I need to deal with people? I''ll be restoring the demesne back to a working state, and then I''ll be going to do the same for River''s Fork."


    "Ah."


    "Besides, why would you need Rian? I''m given to understand you already have plans with Mikon tonight."


    Riz''s face reddened as everyone turned to stare at her. Taeclas gave her a grin and a nudge with her elbow.


    "If that is all, you''re dismissed. Get to work."


    Lori waited just enough for them to mention any other matters before standing up and walking towards the latrines. Time to get to work herself.

 442 - How To Get Rid Of Dragonfrost, Prototype

    Lori had to work slowly and carefully as she desiccated the waste in the latrines. After all, she didn''t want the waste to explode from a steam or vapor explosion. That would have been extremely unpleasant for everyone involved, herself included, as the smell would likely have remained for a long time afterwards. As a result, she worked carefully, first extracting what loose water she could¡ªwell, ''water''¡ªand slowly converting it to vapor so it would escape out of the latrine.


    ¡­


    It was then Lori realized that there wasn''t anywhere for the vapor to escape from except out the seat. It¡­ had never really been necessary. The previous times she''d had to desiccate her Dungeon''s latrine waste, there wasn''t nearly so much of it, as she had done so gradually over a period of time, not all at once. Well, she''d been thinking of improving the dungeon''s latrines anyway. Clearly, she had to make a gas escape vent for the latrines. While such a vent would be a dangerous point of entry for dragonborn abominations, she''d just have to remember to close them just like anything else.


    Forming a pipe through the stone was simple enough, and she simply let it open up to the outside of her Dungeon. She made sure the opening wasn''t out in her entryway, but outside of it, in the space between her entryway and the water hub shed. Once the pipe was in place and the vapor she''d already converted had escaped, Lori proceeded to turn the rest of the loose ''water'' into vapor.


    Once all of that ''water'' was removed, she was finally able to proceed with desiccating the waste. The waste was naturally inclined to be warm, so she simply bound those firewisps and formed them into a binding to begin gradually heating the waste. As the binding generated more and more firewisps, she claimed those and formed a binding around the latrine''s waste receptacle to contain the heat, both because one just didn''t let one''s Dungeon get too hot or too cold, and because keeping the heat contained meant all the water and the waste got hot faster.


    Then she claimed some of the waterwisps, and made a binding that would gently draw waterwisps in the receptacle towards where the gas escape vent was. That way both the liquid and gaseous water would slowly begin moving in that direction as the waste got hotter and more and more water turned to vapor.


    That done¡ªand making sure that the latrines remained shut so that no one would try to add anymore waste and burn themselves¡ªLori moved out of her dungeon to deal with the escaping gas from the latrine.


    From the entryway, everything looked dark and overcast, but when Lori stepped out of the threshold and looked up, she saw what Riz meant about the dragon blocking the sun. For a moment, she just looked up and stared. She had never seen the main body of the dragon, as she had sealed off River''s Fork''s dragon shelter well before it had arrived, and looking up at the sky obscured by the long threads streaming from horizon to horizon, she was unsure if that was what the main body also looked like.


    How long had those things been up there? How much longer would they be there? How far did they extend? Would they be spaced wider apart as the dragon moved further away and the long threads reached their end? She couldn''t feel them, not the way she could feel an oncoming dragon. There were no pulsing waves that pushed at the wisps in her body or in her demesne coming from them, and the ones that she had felt emanating from the dragon were long gone. So what were these things? And what damage would they cause if they fell out of the sky onto her demesnes?


    ¡­


    She''ll probably find out when they actually fall.


    Still, the overcast they caused did present a problem. It was approaching noon¡ªdespite everything, the sun was still visible behind the threads¡ªbut the light outside was very dim. Granted, it was probably much cooler than it had been all summer¡ªshe was feeing comfortably cool rather than comfortably warm, and while that wasn''t much of a temperature range it was notable to her¡ªbut that wasn''t as important. Fortunately, the lightwisps she''s anchored to the outside of several buildings were still imbued and active because the buildings were being reinforced by earthwisps bindings that were connected together through the bedrock and was being imbued directly by her core, so the areas around the building was well-lit, but she''d need to provide more light in the areas beyond those so that people would be able to work properly.


    It was another thing she had to add to the list of things she needed to do to get her demesne back to a working state.


    But first, the latrines.


    As expected, the output end of the gas escape she''d made was already giving the area around it the distinct smell of human waste, even if most of what was coming out was water vapor. Lori took a moment to rebuild the output vent so that it released higher up, which seemed to lessen the smell. It also let her make sure that there was a lot of stone between the pipe and the surface so that there was less risk of the pipe being exposed from external damage to the stone and an abomination getting in. Granted, there was little chance of that anyway, since the stone was reinforced by earthwisps, but she had to account for such possibilities.


    She checked the latrine through her connections with the demesne''s wisps. The water inside was getting hot and escaping from the waste as the vapor that had already escaped was drawn up and out through the vent, lowering the humidity of the air inside, letting more vapor be drawn out from the waste. That seemed to be well in hand, so she felt safe in moving on to other matters.


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    Taking a moment to check the containers of darkwisps that she''d established around the borders of her demesne¡ªand telling herself this would be the last time she''d check today¡ªLori moved on to consider what else she had to fix.


    Her gaze fell on a pile of dragonfrost on the inside of the flood walls, and it took her a moment to realize it was the pottery kiln. That meant the pile next to it was the shed where the pottery-to-be was allowed to dry before being fired. But wait¡­ wasn''t there a claypit?


    Lori checked her awareness of the demesnes'' wisps. Ah, yes, the claypit was there¡­ but it was currently full of waterwisps and voids. The pit must have been filled over the week that the dragon had been passing, and the mass of frozen air and water was sufficiently insulated to not melt and sublimate yet¡­ not that anything seemed to be growing warm anytime soon. The ground, the trees, the buildings¡­ all were covered with the dragonfrost, and while she wasn''t sure how thick the dragonfrost had originally been¡­ because she hadn''t been paying attention at the time¡­


    Given how the claypit was completely filled, there was a lot of dragonfrost, which would be impractical to try and dig out. Given that, clearing the claypit would be a good test for methods she could use to clear the dragonfrost from the rest of her demesne.


    First she made sure to set a binding of airwisps in place to draw away air upwards, since if she managed to sublimate the solidified air, than she would be releasing a large amount of exhalation in the air. While it was unlikely to cause asphyxiation out in the open like this, best not to risk it.


    The simplest way to induce the solidified air to sublimate would simply be to increase its temperature so that it would simply become gaseous again, but there were two problems with that. The first was that if she turned all the solidified air back into¡­ well, air, at the same time, the technical term for it would be an ''explosion''. And while she liked explosions, setting them off on the roofs of her demesne''s houses, on their fields, and on every single tree and yustri of bareground would be very irresponsible. Probably enjoyable, no doubt¡­ but also definitely irresponsible. And if she did it, then she''d have people continuing to stay in her Dungeon as their roof was repaired.


    ¡­


    So she could probably set off the ones on the roof of Rian''s house, since that was stone so she could repair it quickly¡­


    ¡­


    Ahem. The second reason was that the dragonfrost was so cold they didn''t have firewisps she could perceive to claim and bind, meaning any firewisps she would use on them needed to be claimed and bound some distance away. Now that she was looking, there were actually very little in the way of extant firewisps in her demesne that wasn''t centered around the voids of wisps her that were her idiots. Not to say there wasn''t any, but they were near small voids that were probably beasts or bugs that had probably huddled together for warmth. There were very few of those. Had many been killed by asphyxiation or cold?


    ¡­


    Oh, she''d forgotten to make arrangements for the chokers they were trying to domesticate again, hadn''t she?


    ¡­


    Well, too late to do anything about it. Right now she had to work out ways to deal with dragonfrost.


    All things considered, there was a way for her to generate heat in the vicinity of the solidified air. All she had to do was claim the waterwisps of the ice and frost around them and solidify it completely, rendering it far colder. Doing so would generate firewisps as heat was ejected from the water, and she would be able to claim those as the basis of a binding to start generating heat. Once she had firewisps generating heat, all she needed to do was raise the temperature around the dragonfrost to be higher than the temperature at which exhalation solidified. That wouldn''t even require her to melt the ice, as the air would sublimate well before it grew that warm.


    It all sounded perfectly sensible in theory, so now she simply had to put it into practice.


    She took a moment to check on her Dungeon''s latrines. The heat was building, and more and more water was turning to vapor and escaping out of the gas escape vent. The desiccation was proceeding nicely, then. If the waste wasn''t completely desiccated by lunch time, then¡ª


    Lori paused, and looked at the latrines again, and at the very hot water vapor escaping from the vent she had recently made. She looked towards the claypit.


    Hmm¡­


    <hr>


    Lori watched¡ªfrom a distance and some elevation¡ªas the dragonfrost in the claypit slowly melted away. She had anchored warm water vapor over the claypit, the firewisps set to maintain the vapor''s warm temperature, and the waterwisps keeping the vapor together, preventing it from condensing into liquid, and not allowing other waterwisps to escape from the binding.


    It was actually quite soothing to watch. The warm vapor heated the dragonfrost, and the firewisps ensured that the vapor never grew cold even as the air grew warmer and warmer. At first this had resulted in the topmost solidified air sublimating, but in the process the air actually drew in heat from the air and ice around it, causing the ice to grow colder. Once there was no more solidified air on the top-most layer, the ice actually insulated the lower layers of solidified air from the warmth.


    At least, until Lori had forcibly converted the top layer of ice into water.


    On contact with the now-liquid water, the solidified air immediately sublimated, bubbling up through the water and once more cooling it as the air drew in heat. However, the resulting water vapor rose up and encountered the binding that prevented the vapor from escaping and increased the water vapor''s temperature substantially. As this vapor wasn''t bound to remain vaporous, it quickly condensed back into water, joining the puddle below, now much warmer and beginning to thaw the ice and the continue to cause the solidified air to sublimate.


    It was a nicely perpetuating cycle. As more and more water became vapor, the air in the claypit became both saturated and very warm. Once saturation was reached, it actually started to rain under the binding, warm water condensing from vapor and drizzling down to join the slowly growing pool that caused more and more ice to melt and solidified air to sublimate.


    Now, all she needed to do was find a way to scale this to cover large swathes of her demesne¡­

 443 - Restoring Water

    The latrines were dried enough to be emptied after lunch. The waste wasn''t as dried as Lori would have liked¡ªit was still slightly damp, which meant they still smelled¡ªbut it had reduced the volume of the waste enough that the access hatches could now be opened without the waste spilling out onto the floor of her dungeon. Of course, with many of the latrines outside having been cleared, they were now safe to use, and Lori had given permission for people to leave the dungeon to use them.


    However, clearing the outside had not been without incident.


    "They were full of bugs," Kolinh reported over lunch. He''d joined the table, sitting next to Riz, who had apparently ceded Rian''s usual seat in the middle to Mikon. Taeclas and Lidzuga were also sitting on that side, although her wife and his sister were absent, currently sitting at some other table, as there just wasn''t enough space. Sitting on their short bench next to her were Shanalorre and her cousin. "It seems the bugs sought shelter from the cold inside them. They huddled together to stay warm, and then started eating each other when they grew hungry. Many managed to survive, and we had to drive them out of the latrines. A lot of the inside was covered with dead bugs. No live abominations, strangely enough, though we found a few dead ones that had been devoured by the other bugs. They were probably eaten for their blood."


    Lori nodded. Dragonborn abomination blood was very, very sweet, which was why it was so thick and syrupy. She had read that in some demesnes, various dishes or candies were made from abomination blood and regarded as delicacies, while many of those same demesnes had declared those same dishes illegal due to how dangerous it was to extract the blood and how the blood might contain deadly impurities. There had been attempts to try and domesticate various abominations to extract their blood and refine it for sugar, but they had never lasted, since abominations tend not to breed true. She knew this because there had been a period of two years where it seemed every novel she''d bought had included some sort of plot twist or even just trivia involving abomination blood, and during that period a local confectionary had started selling alleged ''abomination blood pastilles''.


    She''d tried the pastilles out of curiosity, and all they''d been was honey and golden bud juice. Nothing at all like the sickeningly sweet smell of spilled abomination blood, in hindsight. That confectionary had never actually been near real abomination blood!


    "Were they all cleared?"


    Kolinh nodded. "We had to give them all a thorough cleaning and sweeping. All the dead bugs were everywhere, and they''d tracked¡ªthat is, they''d left silk all over the walls and other places. We cleaned it all as best as we could, but the inside of the latrines is dark, so we likely missed some."


    Ah. Right. The lights in the latrines were some of the few bindings that she had still actively maintained, and since she¡­ hadn''t¡­


    "Noted," Lori said, and Kolinh nodded. "Is there anything else?"


    "I suspect that all the houses in the demesne are likely full of bugs, Great Binder," Kolinh said. "They no doubt went inside trying to escape the cold, and since there''s dragonfrost around the chimneys, the things probably still think it''s cold outside."


    "Well, everyone should have brought anything they wanted to save to the dungeon," Lori said. "What''s a little more cleaning?"


    That being said, Rian and Shanalorre''s houses should be relatively free of bugs. The binding of lightningwisps Lori had placed over the windows, door and chimney should have prevented any bugs from gaining entry. That didn''t meant it was impossible for bugs to have made their way inside, but it was probably far fewer bugs than in the other houses.


    A thought occurred to her, and Lori sighed. "Do we have enough paper to repair all the demesne''s windows?"


    "Yes, Great Binder," Shanalorre replied immediately. "The remaining supply of window paper that Lord Rian brought back would be enough to repair all windows in the demesne, should they have been damaged. However, that should not be necessary. We have the materials needed to affect repairs, and Mistress Kutago is capable of reusing the damaged paper to make new paper."


    Everyone finally seemed to realize what Lori meant as Shanalorre finished speaking, and Taeclas sighed. "Ugh, I hate paper fusing. They always feel too thick."


    "That''s the point," Lori pointed out.


    "I know, but it feels terrible! You can always tell where it''s been patched! There''s no way of getting it as nice and thin as it used to be!"


    "That''s the point." She pointed out again.


    "It''s like that for contracts and agreements and things so no one can alter it after the fact, but why does it have to be like that for windows?"


    "It doesn''t change the functionality, though?" Really, Lori couldn''t understand why she was making a big deal about this.


    "It''s the principle of the thing!"


    ¡­


    "Taeclas, you have very strange principles," Lori said flatly. "Please don''t obsess about such silly things and consider what''s actually practical."


    For some reason, Kolinh, Riz, Mikon, Umu and Shanalorre looked at her with the same strange expression on their faces.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    After lunch, it was back to work. Lori had left a hot vapor binding over the waste pit before she''d gone in for lunch, and it had melted enough of the dragonfrost to reach the buried waste underneath. That was just enough space for them to be able to toss in the waste from her Dungeon''s latrines, once Lori had removed the binding of waterwisps. No point in desiccating the waste only to rehydrate them again with her own binding.


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    With that done, Lori went to check on the water hub shed before reactivating it and reconnecting the pipe that let it feed her Dungeon''s reservoir. Both Taeclas and Lidzuga had reported that there wasn''t any new harmful dustlife in the river water¡ª"Just the same dustlife as usual," Taeclas had reported cheerfully¡ªso if everyone started getting sick from drinking the new water, she''d be able to blame them. Still, Lori took her own precautions, just in case. She deactivated the water hub shed''s defenses against bugs, the shed''s roof still covered by dragon frost, and visually inspected the interior for debris, bugs that had somehow gotten inside, and anything else that might have made its way in.


    At least, she tried to. It was only then she realized that, as the waterwisps, firewisps and lightwisps she had formed to make the water hub shed function were all anchored, one way or another, to the stone walls of the shed, and the shed was one of the structures that was reinforced by the binding of earthwisps imbued directly by her core, the water hub shed''s binding had not deactivated nor run out of imbuement. While she had closed the pipe that would have brought water from the shed to the reservoir, the shed had continued drawing up water from the river and, with no other place to send it, the water had apparently reached the overflow and been dumped back into the river.


    ¡­


    She might need to rework this. Still, at least the overflow was clearly working as intended, and the binding of firewisps that kept the boiling hot water from heating the stone structure of the shed was also effective. There was dragonfrost on the outside of the building, after all.


    It took Lori a few moments to claim and bind the water hub shed''s defenses¡ªthe lightningwisp binding that would both deter and kill bugs that would try to enter the shed, and the lightwisp binding that emitted unseen light to kill dustlife, mold, and any other small thing that actually manage to enter the shed¡ªso that she could deactivate them, anchoring them to her fingernail for lack of anywhere else to put them as she inspected the interior of the water hub shed.


    Thankfully, the interior was empty, and nothing was floating in the water¡­ which was still both hotter than boiling and still liquid because of the binding she''d placed on it. Despite how the temperature of things was always in a comfortable range for her within the confines of her demesne, she wasn''t eager to find out how hot it would feel if she immersed an extremity in that water.


    While disconnected, the pipe leading towards her Dungeon''s reservoir was full of water, as the water hub shed hadn''t deactivated properly. Lori claimed and bound all the waterwisps in the pipe and drew them out. The water returned to the water hub shed, filling the holding tank there and overflowing back onto the river. Best to not fill the reservoir with water that had lain stagnant for more than a week.


    Once the pipe was empty, Lori bound some of the lightwisps in the air outside of the water hub shed, forming them into a binding that would shine with unseen light. She sent the binding down the disconnected pipe as she imbued and activated the lightwisps, filling the stone pipe with unseen light as she stretched out the binding across its length, claiming and adding more and more lightwisps to allow the binding the spread that far.


    Letting the lightwisp binding shine, Lori spent the time reforming the bindings in the water hub shed. While it was convenient that they could be imbued directly by her dungeon''s core, she needed a way to deactivate certain bindings. Doing so wasn''t hard. All she needed to do was to anchor the bindings to spots on the stone walls that weren''t being reinforced by the earthwisp bindings being imbued by her core, while also anchoring the binding to a spot that was being reinforced. Doing so would allow her to deactivate the various bindings that the water hub shed needed to function by simply pulling them off from where they were anchored to the reinforced stone. She did the same for the binding of unseen light she''d deactivated, anchoring it onto another patch of stone wall that was no longer reinforced by an earthwisp binding so it wouldn''t activate.


    Once that was finished, Lori deactivated the binding of lightwisps in the pipe, and did one last check for voids or any concentration of wisps that were not contiguous airwisps or contiguous earthwisps. Finding none, she carefully reconnected the pipe from the water hub shed and her Dungeon''s reservoir, before carefully shutting the door of the water hub shed and sealing it in place so that no one can get into the shed, ensuring that there were no openings for bugs and dust to enter through. Finally, she set the binding of lightningwisps to keep out bugs back into place, anchoring the binding around the door.


    Then she headed back to her dungeon, keeping well out of the way of someone coming out with a cart full of waste that was being emptied from the latrines. Thankfully, none of it was falling onto the floor, though the smell was lingering and ugh, that smell was being drawn into her dungeon by the ventilation, wasn''t it? Lori reached out to deactivate the binding for the ventilation over the door, then sighed as she realized that because it was anchored onto stone that was being reinforced by earthwisps¡­


    By the time she finished reforming the ventilation so she could deactivate it if she needed to, the smell from the waste had already dispersed, and while the odor was still strong at the entrance, that was because the latrines being emptied were nearby. Ugh, there were little dark patties of waste on her floor! They had better clean that! At least they''d remembered to close the latrine''s access hatch.


    Grumbling and holding her breath until she was well past, Lori headed towards the water reservoir at the back. The way to it was sealed off with a door now, one that was elevated with a few yustri of stone off the floor so that no liquids could creep under it. She unsealed it by moving aside the stone protrusions holding the door in place and slid aside the latch¡ªa bit superfluous in this instance, but a latch was a latch¡ªto swing the door open. Lori altered the binding of lightwisps anchored inside to cease emitting unseen light, only visible light, so that she wouldn''t injure her eyes as she looked over the stone wall around the reservoir. The water was a long way down from her, and the floating valve that would close off the pipe from the water hub shed was hanging open.


    Lori reached through her core, reached for the bindings in the water hub shed, and activated the binding of waterwisps that would draw water through the pipe leading to the reservoir. She waited.


    Eventually, water started flowing out from the pipe, and the reservoir started to fill up.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. They had water again. Well, they already had water, but now the reservoir was in no danger of running out. It would take some time for the reservoir to be full once more, but hopefully they wouldn''t need that much water any time soon. Once Kolinh had cleared the baths¡ªand likely clean them, since the baths might be full of bugs¡ªshe''d be able to close up her Dungeon''s baths¡­ probably work on improving them. Clearly she needed to have them reclaim the bath water so they wouldn''t dump so much into the third level, and perhaps extend the amount of time the water in the reservoir would last.


    Sealing the reservoir closed once more and altering the lightwisps again to emit unseen light so that they kill any dustlife that somehow managed to survive the heat of the water hub shed, Lori headed out to work on getting rid of the dragonfrost in the area around the outside of her Dungeon. The hot vapor had been effective, so¡­

 444 - How To Get Rid Of Dragonfrost, Limited Mass Implementation

    It had been a long day.


    Lori stood outside of her Dungeon, standing in the light cast by the lightwisps anchored to the entryway. It made the already dark night seem gloomy as the light of the moons was obscured by the dragon''s tendrils still high in the sky. Most of the light was coming from the lightwisps anchored to the outside of houses, latrines, and the fronts of the baths. The baths were open now, full of people who had spent the late afternoon sweeping and scrubbing the interior clean of the few bugs that had gotten inside. Water flowed inside, heated once more, and the roof was now mostly free of dragonfrost.


    Despite this, few lingered outside, hurrying between the baths and her Dungeon, and no one looked up.


    Lori rolled her eyes at their silly behavior. As if not looking at the dragon''s tendrils would somehow prevent them from falling on the demesne.


    Still, she wasn''t here for that, but rather to do one final check on her binding to remove the dragonfrost before she went to bed. While the area behind the floodwall¡ªbetween her dungeon and the baths, as well the claypit¡ªwas clear, as well as the most direct path between her dungeon and the nearest stand of latrines, that still left substantial parts of her demesne covered with the dragonfrost. It was probably far too late to do anything to keep the cold from damaging anything. Lori doubted the temperatures the ground and their leaves and branches had plummeted to had been beneficial for any of the trees¡ªwhich would probably make¡­ uh, crazy-woman-who-named-her-sweetgrass happy, what with her irrational hatred of trees.


    Mist covered the dragonfrost in front of her, a thick layer that she had drawn from the water taken from the claypit, spread out over an area about five paces square. At the moment, the vapors were constrained because even all the water that had been in the claypit would be spread thin if she had spread it across all of the land that had been cleared and built on around her Dungeon. That said, she''d used a tenth of that water to do exactly that, spreading a binding of waterwisps to contain vapor so that it wouldn''t escape into the atmosphere. At the moment, there was no vapor to contain, but if this binding worked, that would change.


    The waterwisps were anchored to all the top-most layer of ice that was part of the dragonfrost. Most of her efforts had been to make sure that all of the waterwisps in the ice were properly claimed and integrated into the binding. With the ground frozen, she didn''t have to worry about the water being absorbed into the ground.


    Lori double checked her binding, then checked it one more time. It wasn''t the largest binding she had ever formed¡ªthat would be the shells around her demesne that she used to expand¡ªbut it did require that everything be placed and anchored properly so that there wouldn''t be any spots where she''d lose heat or water. That was why all the waterwisps were already claimed and part of the binding, which would keep the water from rising up and away from the ground.


    Once she was satisfied, Lori activated the binding, the firewisps integrated with the waterwisps beginning to warm the vapors even as she forced them to condense into water. That warmed the air as the now-liquid water splashed onto the dragonfrost, warming the ice beneath them and causing the solidified air to sublimate. The cold air bubbled under the water, creating mist, which further spread heat across the mist-covered ground¡­


    She had modified the binding she had used at the claypit slightly. The liquid water was now also heated by the firewisps so that they wouldn''t just turn to ice, as the binding was no longer working on a contained depression in the ground. The blanket of heat was causing the dragonfrost to melt slowly but steadily. Satisfied that the modification was working as intended for the moment, as was the rest of the binding, Lori turned away to head inside and sleep. Whether it continued to work properly through the night or not, she''d find out in the morning.


    ¡­


    She stepped out again, and formed a binding of airwisps to disperse the air that would be released from the dragonfrost, and another to blow out air from the lower part of the entryway. It was exhalation after all, and she didn''t want to have an asphyxiation hazard in her demesne.


    Then she went to bed, the familiar fatigue of a day''s work making her eyelids heavy. It was enough to keep her from trying to stay up and just do some observation notes on the samples she''d collected from the dragon, just a few, just observe one sample¡­


    Lori threw herself onto her bed and pointedly closed her eyes, trusting her tiredness to render her uncon¡ª


    <hr>


    As it turned out, while the binding had worked as intended, it hadn''t spread as far as Lori would have liked during the night. When she stepped out to check on the binding the next morning, she''d found that it had cleared the initial area she had started from¡ªthe ground in front of Rian''s house¡ªand had slowly spread from there, as she had intended, but the hot vapor had been drawn uphill between the houses, in some strange inversion of water seeking the path of least resistance to lower ground. While the main road leading towards the old dining hall and up the rise towards the more organized row of houses was mostly clear, there were still thick patches of dragonfrost between the houses, as if the hot vapor hadn''t spread there.


    The binding had also seemed to get less effective the more it had spread, presumably because the firewisps had needed to heat an increasingly larger area as well as increasingly greater amounts of water vapor, until the binding had reached the point where it couldn''t heat the vapor faster than the dragonfrost could chill it. Reforming the binding so that the firewisps produced more heat had helped allowed the binding to melt more dragonfrost, and Lori had added more firewisps to allow the binding to function for longer before it reached equilibrium with the environment again.


    This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    With paths now cleared, Kolinh began clearing the houses. Most contained only bugs that had come in through the chimney, a great many of them dead from eating each other, but three contained dragonborn abominations that had needed to be dealt with. They were small things, all of them bugs of some sort, and had been dealt with using axes and shovels, because they''d been too small for spears.


    As she had predicted, Rian''s house didn''t have any bugs in it at all, and so cleaning it had been quick. Mikon had cheerfully led the way as she and Umu had begun moving their packs back in.


    Other houses had slowly been cleared as well, even as Lori''s mist had melted more and more dragonfrost. She''d needed to add more firewisps twice more as the binding was spread thin again.


    Removing the dragonfrost from the roofs of building required her active participation, but by then she''d developed her methodology. As soon as a house had been cleared and confirmed to not have any abominations, Lori used a cloud of hot steam¡ªsteam, not just vapor¡ªto surround the roof in question. The steam had coated the dragonfrost, and imparted enough heat to melt the ice and sublimate the solidified air, while doing so slowly enough that solidified air hadn''t exploded all at once. There had been pops and minor explosions, but at worse it just sent some ice flying up. Lori had stayed well back.


    On the third day after she''d begun putting her demesne back in order, Lori ordered Riz to retrieve Lori''s Shed Boat from the third level and have it inspected by the carpenters and the Deadspeakers so she could take it to River''s Fork.


    "You''re going already, Great Binder?" Riz said. The woman had a strange smile on her face, and looked like she was still half asleep. Mikon seemed to share the same expression, humming happily to herself as she ate. Umu was staring intently at her food, and looked like she hadn''t gotten much rest, occasionally glaring accusingly at the other two women. Lori felt a strong surge of sympathy towards the blonde weaver. There was no doubt that what she''d likely had to put up with the night before as Mikon had fulfilled her promises to Riz had been far worse than simply having to hear her mothers being enthusiastic through the walls.


    "The dragonfrost is clearing well enough, and at the moment we don''t need to clear the fields yet because people will probably be focusing on cleaning their houses. There''s nothing for me to do, so I''m going to River''s Fork and dealing with the matter," Lori said.


    "Understood, Great Binder. I''ll have the other boat prepared as well."


    Lori frowned. "Why?"


    "We have manpower to spare, Great Binder, so it would probably be helpful to send some people over to help with the work. Also, it''s well past time for the miners there to come back home, so we can send them back to be with their families."


    "Is that really necessary?" Lori sighed, then waved her hand dismissively before Riz could reply. "Fine, fine, if you must. Mining is on hold at the moment anyway, so retrieve them." Really, why did people have to spend so much time with their families? Lori hadn''t seen her mothers for months at this point¡ªat least two years¡ªand she felt no urge to go back to them or see them for anything except to turn away and not have anything to do with them.


    "Yes, Great Binder," Riz said.


    "Kolinh, will you be correcting me and saying you actually need me for something after all?"


    "No, Great Binder. We need to consolidate and secure the village, and we''re clear enough for that now. we might need you when we go out into the woods, but until them, we can handle things."


    Lori nodded. "I will be leaving, then, and dragging Rian back with me." She checked her belt pouch. "Lidzuga, you will be returning with me. It''s past time River''s Fork had its Deadspeaker back. Get packed."


    "Uh¡­ my sister wants to know if she can keep living here instead? And if I can stay here, for that matter?"


    Lori gave him a flat look. "Well, you could, but you wouldn''t be eligible for those half-days off you wanted. Having to go back and forth to and from River''s Fork by boat everyday would no doubt take that long, depending on what propulsion method you construct to move the boat."


    "I''d¡­ still need to work at River''s Fork?"


    "Of course. Its crops need someone to tend to them."


    "Not it!" the crazy woman¡ªLori checked the rock she''d left on the table¡ªTaeclas declared. "I''m not moving out of my nice house that I''m still waiting for them to clear so I can start cleaning it up. I like my house! It''s so big! "


    "Perhaps you can apply again once the Golden Sweetwood Company arrives. If I recall correctly, they would have Deadspeakers among their number. Once they settle in River''s Fork, the demesne would have more than enough people to tend to the crops, so no doubt you can apply again," Shanalorre said.


    Lori twitched at the reminder of interlopers still coming. She had gotten the impression that they would arrive in mid-summer, and it was already well-past that, but every day they didn''t show up was a good day for her. The very fact they would be bringing more wizards already made them a potential danger to her, and when they started building their own demesne¡ªbecause what wizard wouldn''t want to have the power of a Dungeon Binder?¡ªshe''d no longer have the luxury of continuing as she had before, as they would no doubt be trying to kill or worse, impoverish her. It''s what she would have done in their place, after all. "In the unlikely event that some of the Golden Sweetwood Company''s Deadspeakers actually choose to surrender to my authority and reside in River''s Fork, I will reconsider your application."


    "I¡­ suppose that''s fair¡­"


    "Your sister is free to move in immediately, although at the moment there''s no place for her to stay. The shelter still hasn''t been cleared."


    "¡­ I''ll tell her that, your Bindership¡­"


    "We''ll clear the shelter after breakfast, Great Binder," Kolinh said. "We don''t hear anything from its windows that might be a dragonborn abomination, but best to make sure."


    Lori nodded. "Clear the Um last. It''s the least necessary building in the demesne."


    "¡­yes, Great Binder¡­"


    Lori nodded in satisfaction as she finished eating her breakfast. Rian had better be keeping her notes safe! If something had happened to her notes¡­


    Well, Lori did remember some things¡­

 445 - She Hates It When…

    "Your Bindership! I''m so glad to see you''re all¡ª"


    That was as far as Rian got as Lori took two steps forward clapped a hand over his mouth to silence whatever theatrics were going to come out. "Where are my notes, Rian?" she snarled at him.


    A part of her, the part that liked good presentation in stories and plays, noted that she should have probably had some sort of pre-amble to that statement. Something like ''I''m only going to say this once'' or ''I do not have time for any of your nonsense''. Possibly ''Answer me immediately or I''ll <del>kill</del> repeatedly kick you''. However, that same part agreed that in many instances, statements like that made the character in question less threatening and more silly, or at least harder to take seriously. So, straightforward queries directly backed by violent action it was.


    Fortunately for his <del>life</del> shins, Rian immediately pointed towards the dragon shelter.


    "Show me," Lori ordered, letting him go and striding to the mine in question.


    "Hi Riz! I''ll see you later, I just have to deal with this!" she heard him say behind her, followed by hurried footsteps that fell into step besides her. "So, how''s home looking like? Less¡­ frosted, I hope?"


    Lori ignored him, focusing on her destination. She moved as quickly as she could without running, each footfall heavy and deliberate.


    "Your notes are fine, by the way. I made sure it was all dry and pressed them between some planks to try and flatten it out. And don''t worry, I made sure to put sheets of paper between each page so that if any of the ink rubbed off it wouldn''t be on any of the other notes."


    Annoyance and relief filled Lori in turns, as she''d been afraid that he would try to flatten out her notes in a fit of misguided helpfulness and that ink would rub off on other pages. "Good," she managed to ground out, not letting herself feel relieved. If she felt relieved, it would ruin the righteous outrage filling her at Rian not putting her notes in her pack! "I''m displeased with you."


    "Can''t think of any reason why," Rian said cheerfully. "Did I somehow turn off all the lights in the demesne or something? Did I do it twice?"


    What was he talking ab¡ª?


    Oh.


    Lori twitched slightly as she remembered that in her half-asleep fumbling she had done that. Simply deactivated every lightwisp binding in the demesne. Fortunately she''d remembered what she''d been supposed to be doing and was able to correct the matter before she fell asleep, but¡­ ugh, she''d been hoping everyone had been asleep and hadn''t noticed. After all, it had been the middle of the night!


    "Yeah, that was an eventful lunch," Rian continued, blissfully ignorant of Lori''s thoughts. She subtly widened her pace to try to leave him behind. "It really upset the children, they thought something had happened to you out here, and that they were going to die soon because there was nothing protecting them from the dragon anymore."


    Rainbows. He was keeping up. He was shorter than her, he should have shorter legs!


    "If you insist on talking, inform me of River''s Fork''s status," Lori said curtly.


    "We''ve been able to clear the dragonfrost, but it''s mostly been the main paths," Rian said, gesturing ahead where there was a path bare of dragonfrost leading up to the dragon shelter. The ground around the shelter had also been cleared, which her lord exposited about immediately. "We cleared the ground around the shelter because no one wants to asphyxiate in our sleep. We also killed two of the three dragonborn abominations around the dome that Shana''s¡ª"


    "Shanalorre''s."


    "¡­Shanalorre''s Deadspeaking didn''t incapacitate or kill. Actually, we think she might have healed wounds they''d taken."


    Lori actually slowed slightly so she could give her lord a piecing look. "Two out of three?" she said pointedly. It was a very sharp point, and was very inclined to stab. "Are you telling me that there''s a dragonborn abomination still alive around here?"


    "Oh no, it''s dead, it''s just we didn''t kill it. Too disgusting." He looked around, then grunted. "You can''t see it from here, and since I had people use the dragonfrost to bury it you can''t smell it much either. I''ll point it out to you when we get up to the shelter. We''ve put off cleaning it up since we didn''t have any Deadspeakers to take care of our people if anyone caught something from it."


    "It can''t be that bad," Lori said.


    "Whatever that abomination was, it was inside out. Its guts, its lungs, its hearts, they were all on the outside, and they were bloody since the bugs had been nibbling at them. Given what''s in something''s intestines, no one wanted to be near that smell or whatever dustlife was floating with it. We were going to put arrows into its hearts to put it down, but when we finally got around to it, it was already dead. I think it was dehydration, although it could be anything, really. Having your insides on the outside is not conducive to staying alive."


    "I''ll take your word for it," Lori said.


    Stolen story; please report.


    They exited out from under the dome again, and Lori began to climb the slope towards the copper mine and dragon shelter.


    "There, you can see the abomination over¡ªoh, you''re just going straight into the dragon shelter," Lori heard behind her as she went straight through the mine''s open doors. The ventilation was active, drawing in air from the outside, but the secondary defenses were down, as exemplified by the lack of darkwisps or fatal binding of lightningwisps. Absently, Lori reached out to claim the binding of lightningwisps¡ªit was anchored to a bound tool core full of white Iridescence, so it hadn''t dissolved despite being out of imbuement¡ªand reformed the binding into one that kept out bugs, anchoring the binding to the stone just inside the first door of the mine and the binding of airwisps for the ventilation.


    She glanced at each alcove behind each door in passing, noting that the beams used to secure the doors were back in place. The tunnels smelled strongly of people¡ªspecifically unbathed people¡ªand Lori grimaced in displeasure at the sign of slovenly behavior. She was shaking in her head in annoyance, already planning to inform Yllian to tell whoever had been so unsanitary when she''d put in so much effort to provide bath water when she entered the alcove behind the last door and her nose was struck with the smell at its strongest.


    ¡­


    Oh. Had her smell really been that bad? It hadn''t seemed like it at the time¡­


    "The smell isn''t as bad close to the ground, so I''ve been sleeping there," Rian said, coming up behind her. "Wait a bit, I''ll get your notes."


    Her notes were being held between two bone tablets held together with cord, which were pressing the stack of notes flat. Rian had placed the pressed notes in the second bead receptacles, of all places. Lori had to keep herself from simply snatching the notes out of his hand as he handed them to her, sitting down on the sleeping niche¡ªwhere the smell seemed to have infused the very rock¡ªand enduring as she undid the bows that the cords had been knotted into. Rian didn''t offer to help, trusting she was perfectly capable of undoing such simple knots by herself.


    Carefully, she laid down the pressed stack on the stone next to her and pulled up the top tablet, and was met with a blank sheet of paper. She carefully pulled that up, and was glad to find it hadn''t adhered to the notes underneath it nor pulled up ink. That spoke well of the quality of both the ink and the paper from Covehold Demesne, she supposed.


    ¡­


    Ugh, she just remembered they had a contractual obligation to deliver another batch of beads before winter. Did they have time to do that before the Golden Sweetwood Company arrived?


    She shook her head, dropping that flow of thought as she concentrated on carefully peeling apart the pressed layers. "The pages aren''t in order," she said.


    "That was the order they were stacked in when I found them," Rian said. "Not my fault you didn''t number the pages."


    Lori grunted. True, she hadn''t numbered the pages, but that didn''t mean the order the pages should have been in wasn''t ob¡ªwait, did this page come first or that one?


    "So¡­ what''s so interesting about these notes that you neglected sleeping and bathing like you were trying to get to the end of a new book you''d been looking forward to?" Rian asked.


    Lori wanted to protest that she''d never neglected bathing when she''d finally bought a new book, but given the current circumstances, that wasn''t a flattering comparison. "They''re notes on my observations of bindings that the dragon made," she said. "The ones I could understand, at least. Many seemed nonsensical and half-completed, and others were utterly strange, but I took note of what I could."


    "Huh. Shanalorre said the dragon was low enough that it entered the border of her demesne. I suppose you''d actually be able to see what it does when it''s that close," Rian said thoughtfully. "So, does that mean you saw wisplings getting made? You weren''t really able to study any last year because cleaning up the demesne took so long, were you?"


    She was surprised Rian remembered that. "I''m surprised you remembered that."


    Rian shrugged. "I was vividly reminded because of the similarity of circumstances. Well, now that you''ve seen your notes, can we get to work now? We need you to burn the inverted abomination because it would take too much wood for us to do it normally, and there''s still dragonfrost on all the trees. Lidz told me he managed to deactivate the bindings on them before they''d left, so they haven''t been trying to grow for the past two weeks, but I''m concerned having so much dragonfrost on them is damaging the trees. Nature doesn''t usually get cold enough to solidify air. There''s a very real risk this killed a lot of our fruit trees. A lot of all our trees, for that matter, and Shanalorre''s meaning doesn''t work on plants."


    Lori glared at him. Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    <hr>


    It turned out that they had been having difficulty clearing out the various houses in River''s Fork because they were all full of bugs.


    To be more specific, the houses were full of bugs because the dome was full of bugs. The structure had managed to prevent much of the dragonfrost from reaching the ground, and the rest had acted as some degree of insulation. Given that there had been several dragonborn abominations in the dome, not simply the three that Rian had mentioned, and the bugs had several ample food sources of meat, fat, and in a few instances leaves and fruit to subsist on while the dragon had been in progress.


    The remaining people in River''s Fork had done their best to try and dispose of the dead abominations and do something about the bugs, but it had been difficult without proper protective clothing. While they had gloves and thick jackets, they had lacked protective veils and screens to keep the bugs away from their head, leading to several people being painfully stung or bitten as a result of trying to drag the abomination corpses out of the dome. Trying to use spear shafts and rope as improvised catchpoles to ensnare a limb and drag the abominations that way had been more successful, but there had just been so many bugs swarming that some injuries had still been gathered.


    This also meant that the bugs were difficult to dislodge from the houses because unlike in Lori''s demesne, they had not turned upon each other and reduced their numbers, as they had other food sources. The inverted abomination, for one thing. Lori''s first course of action was to make portable bug-repellant bindings, as a means of trying to herd the swarms of bugs out of the buildings.


    They were simple enough to make by putting some softened stone onto some sturdy branches, and then anchoring the binding of lightningwisps to the stone. This limited the area that the binding could cover, as lightningwisps could only extend so far from an anchor point before beginning to be affected by the naturally occurring lightningwisps in the air, but that was more than enough when the intent was to use the binding as a goad to move and drive away the bugs.


    Soon the air was full of dislodged bugs, which¡­ well, wasn''t really much of a change, but with their new protection, her idiots in River''s Fork were now able to finally make progress in dragging away the abomination corpses.


    Lori, meanwhile, had to burn a corpse because moving it would spread contaminants everywhere, and they had no time to scavenge for wood.


    She had never burned a corpse before.


    It should be fun.

 446 - How To Burn A Corpse

    Burning a corpse was harder to do than Lori had thought as she glared at the uncooperative dead hunk of flesh.


    She stood near the disgusting, bleeding, oozing thing that was the inverted abomination¡ªfor lack of a shorter term, since referring it as ''the inside-out one'' was too wordy even in her own head¡ªa binding to keep away bugs surrounding her body and anchored to her fingernails as well as the bone clips on her hat, watching as a small fire on a fleshy extremity that was now bare of dragonfrost burned but did not spread. Another binding of airwisps kept blowing the air towards the dead abomination and away from her in an attempt to reduce what she was smelling. It wasn''t as successful as she''d wished, as she could still smell the thing, but the intensity was greatly reduced.


    Lori was willing to admit she didn''t have a lot of experience with burning corpses. She''d killed beasts before, but she''d done so cleanly, since they had wanted the bodies intact so they could skin it for leather, pluck it for feathers, and butcher it for meat. Still, she had thought it wouldn''t be that hard. She''d picked up some fallen wood on the ground, melted off the dragonfrost, and then dried by claiming the waterwisps in the wood and pulling it out. It wasn''t something she did to wood they intended to build with, since the abrupt desiccation damaged the grain and weakened the wood''s structure, but this was firewood, so that didn''t matter.


    She''d warmed the wood with firewisps to give herself something to anchor to, and then anchored the binding of firewisps to it. It was a simple enough binding, one the raised the temperature significantly in a thumbnail-sized point, which she had used before to start cooking fires. Since it would be very hot, and her staff was only so long, she added a binding of lightwisps¡ªalso anchored to her nails¡ªas a contact to access the binding at a distance. After all, lightwisps were plentiful around her, and now that she had learned to claim and bind it through the thinner sections of her skin, it was much more convenient to use.


    Oh, how annoyed she''d been at seeing her classmates using lightwisps as threads of contact so easily and not realizing why¡­


    After she had laid down the bound piece of wood under a promisingly fleshy part of the inverted abomination that didn''t look too wet, and hurrying to some distance away because the smell had been more than her binding of airwisps could push away, Lori had activated the binding of firewisps. A line of faintly glowing white light had appeared, only visible because it was so dim under the dome because of the overcast and the bugs flying about, had connected the back of her hand to the wood. The wood had begun to smoke until an open flame appeared. The flame had flickered and died as the dragonfrost around it sublimated, the solidified air asphyxiating the fire as it would have a person.


    Lori had needed to start again, specifically heating the area she wanted to set aflame and using a binding of airwisps to blow away the sublimating solidified air and snow to remove them from around the abomination''s corpse. While the dragonfrost had been somewhat mitigating the decay of the flesh, it had not had much effect on the other sources of foul odors coming from the abomination. With the air cleared, Lori had ignited the piece of wood again. The wood had sizzled for a moment, the water that had gotten on it bubbling and steaming away before the thing had finally ignited once more, flame dancing on the blackened spot where her binding of firewisps had been centered.


    She had quickly claimed and bound the firewisps from that flame, as well as the firewisps of the flame itself. In only a short time, the heat had begun to penetrate the flesh that the flame was under, and Lori was able to bind those firewisps too, the fire growing as she fed it air while at the same time blowing away any sublimating dragonfrost. The smell of cooking meat began to fill the air, which quickly turned into the smell of charring and burning meat.


    Forming all of the firewisps into one binding, still connected to her with a line of lightwisps, Lori was able to begin increasing the temperature of the flesh further. The bits of wood she had gathered were being consumed faster at the increased heat, but that was fine. The corpse itself would start burning any moment now. After all, it was already charring and burning, and that was basically the meat turning into charcoal, right? Soon she''d be able to deactivate the binding and the process would become self-sustaining, although she''d still have to worry about the flames being snuffed out by the sublimating dragonfrost.


    It would be any moment now.


    ¡­


    Any moment now¡­


    ¡­


    What was wrong with this corpse!-? Why wasn''t the rest of it catching fire? She''d tried to deactivate the binding of firewisps, and when she had done so the flames had slowly started to weaken and sputter out!


    "Huh, that''s new. Having trouble?"


    She turned her glare towards Rian, who was holding his rock with the lightwisps anchored to it. At the moment, the lightwisps were sharing the rock with a binding of lightningwisps to keep back bugs, although the latter binding''s radius wasn''t very wide. Rian had to occasionally kick and jump to dislodge bugs landing on his knees and lower legs. This was quite unfortunate as he was wearing tsinelas instead of boots, leaving his feet mostly bare and putting his footwear in very real danger of being chewed up by bugs. At the moment, he was enthusiastically dancing in place to keep the bugs from having a stationary target. "Obviously," she replied.


    Had she made his binding smaller than it could have been? Of course! He hadn''t put her notes into her pack.


    He glanced at the rather pathetic little fire. It was a small fraction of the inverted abomination, which was three times the size of the wooden houses they had here in River''s Fork, and was far more heavy since it was presumably not simply hollow and full of air. Rian nodded. "Yup, that''s why we haven''t tried burning it yet. A cute little bonfire isn''t going to be burning this thing. We''d need something bigger and hotter, and with wood we would have needed a lot of it." He turned back towards her. "So¡­ now that your test-fire is done, are you going to desiccate the flesh so you can speed things up and burn this now?"


    Lori paused. "Desiccate?"


    "Well, it''s probably not needed since you''ve already managed to set a bit of it on fire. After all, flesh is wet. You''re not going to burn it properly without drying it out. It''s why we would have needed a lot of fuel. Not only does it need to be really hot to burn flesh, we need to at least get rid of all the water first to even get started."


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    Lori turned to look towards the burning flesh, where the flames were already flickering and beginning to die, and sighed as she realized what the problem was. She activated the binding again, adding more heat, even as she used the thread of lightwisps connecting her to the firewisps to feel out the rest of the dead flesh, seeking out for waterwisps. And where there was waterwisps, there was water.


    Most people didn''t understand why water snuffed out fire. It wasn''t just because the water separated the fire from the air needed to fuel itself. There were alchemical mixtures that could burn even when wet or immersed in water, but water can snuff those out too. This was because water could absorb a lot of heat before it started to get hotter.


    That same water in the flesh of the abomination was absorbing the heat from Lori''s firewisps, and the outer-most layer of that water was probably frozen from the dragonfrost around them, further increasing the capacity of that water to absorb heat. That was why the part of the corpse she''d managed to ignite slowly kept dying when she deactivated the binding. Even with the binding active, the cold and frozen water in the flesh that wasn''t actively on fire was vastly slowing down how quickly the surrounding flesh grew hot, inhibiting the rest of the corpse catching fire.


    Ugh, this was going to be another thing she had to do slowly, wasn''t it?


    Well, at least firewisps were easy to make a lot of.


    "By the way, lunch is almost ready."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively as she started walking around the abomination corpse, refamiliarizing herself with its dimensions. "Yes, yes, I''ll be there. Just need to do this¡­"


    It was unusual for her to alter and reposition a binding while it was still actually functioning. Most of the time, it was highly unsafe. Still, the firewisps were only creating heat, a function that didn''t really change even as she claimed more and more of the firewisps that the binding was generating, while using others as anchor points as she walked around the corpse of the inverted abomination.


    Around the corpse, the dragonfrost was popping as the heat affected the solidified air, causing little pops and cracks that had Lori stepped back and cautiously raising one hand to try and shield her face from any flying debris. Frost turned to slush as the dragonfrost that intersected the firewisp binding melted, turning into water that poured over solidified air and caused it to bubble up cold mist that was blown away by the airwisp binding Lori was using to push the terrible smells of the corpse away from her.


    The smell was quite¡­ intense, but she pushed through, and soon she had surrounded the bottom edges of the dead abomination with a single binding of firewisps, from which originated an ever-expanding puddle of water and cold mist. In the process, her initial ignition point had sputtered and gone out, leaving behind only the smell of burnt meat. Still, she knew she could ignite that point again, so for the moment she let it be as she continued spreading the binding, and generating more and more firewisps.


    With the abomination''s lower portion now encompassed by the firewisp binding and the mist cleared as the last of the solidified air sublimated away to leave only water, Lori stepped further back, the line of lightwisps connecting her to the rest of the binding as she had the firewisps produce in earnest heat. It was a strong, even heat and soon the dragonfrost that had been thrown around the corpse was melting and sublimating, the cold mist dispersing in the heat.


    The abomination''s flesh began crackling and sizzling merrily, and soon the disturbingly delicious smell of cooking meat filled the air once more. It also caused the bugs that had continued swarming and nibbling at the parts of the abomination''s flesh that hadn''t been covered in dragonfrost take flight and fly down lower, no doubt following the scent, only to be repulsed by the heat of the firewisps. A few fell to the ground, their wings withering as they got too close, falling into the sludgy mixture of water, abomination blood, and whatever humors had been released by the ruptured organs hanging from the inverted abomination.


    Still, it seemed to be working. The point that she had initially been able to set on fire reignited, and the streaks of golden abomination blood that were usually thick and dense seemed to melt and become runny. There wasn''t much abomination blood left, as most of the exposed blood had been licked up and devoured by bugs, but there was some and one little rolling droplet made contact with the flames of the initial ignition point. The abomination blood burst into cloyingly sweet-smelling fire that quickly moved along the trail that the blood had left behind, setting a portion of the corpse alight. That flame quickly burned out, but for the next little while parts of the corpse started bursting into sweet-smelling fire, which mixed alarmingly with the smell of burning meat.


    Eventually, finally, the corpse started to burn. She stared at it, because one needed to make sure that fire didn''t go out of control, and to do that one needed to watch very carefully and intently. Even from where she was standing, nearly ten paces away, she could feel the heat of the flames on her face from the burning corpse. It was nothing like watching a candle burn, or wax-soaked raw cloudblooms. The now-hot flesh was bubbling, and from a novel she''d read where a plot point had been someone had died by immolation, she knew that meant that the fat in the flesh was being rendered out and now burning as fuel, adding to the blaze¡­


    "Oh good, you finally got it going," Rian said cheerfully as he suddenly seemed to appear next to her. He looked tired, and was covered in sweat, still dancing in place to keep bugs from settling on his feet and lower legs as he hopped very high and kicked back and forth when a rather large bug settled down on his ankle. One hand still held the rock his binding was anchored to, while the other was pinching his nose shut to force him to breathe though his mouth and avoid most of the smell. "Ah, what a waste. All that meat, and whatever leather there might be on the inside¡­ completely inaccessible because it''s too disgusting to touch."


    "Hmm¡­"


    "By the way, you missed lunch, since you were having so much fun playing with fire."


    Lori''s flow of thought ground to a halt, and she turned towards Rian, even as she suddenly realized how hungry she was. "What?"


    "You missed lunch. I told you it was almost ready, remember, and you said you''d be there, you just needed to do something¡­? When I came back and saw that the food I''d set aside for you still hadn''t been eaten, I came here."


    She stared at him, the burning corpse hot on one side of her face. Her stomach kicked her from the inside to remind her it was still empty. Turning, she began to head towards the mine, where the food had likely been served because she could see the dining pavilion was still empty. "Where is it?" she demanded.


    Rian fell into step beside her. "I''ll show you. And may I just say, I''m really glad you''re starting to be more trusting of people."


    Lori gave him a bewildered look. "I''m always trusting." She trusted her idiots to act like idiots.


    "Well, I''m glad you now trust people to not spit on or poison your food after it''s been left unattended for so long."


    "¡­"


    Lori kept walked for a few moments. "Get me some fruit from storage," she ground out.


    "Are you sure? The stew and bread was pretty good. It''s probably cold now, but that''s not a problem for¡ª"


    "Get me fruit."


    "Well, if you say so, your Bindership. But if you''re not going to eat the stew, does that mean I can have it?"


    Lori gave him a level look. "What if someone spat on it or it''s poisoned?"


    "I''m a trusting soul. I''m willing to take the risk."

 447 - How To Get Rid Of Dragonfrost (Version 2), And Other Cleaning Hazards

    While Lori would normally have no objection to eating lots of nice, tasty and presumably untampered-with fruit for lunch, it was annoying when she saw the stew that she had missed. Rian had eaten it with enthusiasm, despite the fact the stew had grown cold and slightly congealed, and the bread had become hard.


    "You know, it''s still good. You sure you don''t¡ª?"


    "Eat quietly, Rian!"


    With her stomach full, Lori moved on to dealing with the rest of the dragonfrost as she left the corpse to burn. Well, she left the corpse to burn after she found some rocks she could use to anchor a binding of airwisps that blew the smoke¡ªand other gasses, many of which were nauseating¡ªas far upward as she could send it, which was very far. The ground around the corpse was wet so there was little chance of the fire spreading, but Lori still formed a second binding for firewisps and lightwisps in a low ring on the ground. The lightwisps demarcated the binding, while the firewisps were set to reduce anything that crossed it to human body temperature, in case one of her idiots decided to poke it with a finger or something. Any fire that somehow managed to stay alight despite the mud around the corpse and tried to spread across the ground would be reduced to well below the amount of heat needed to sustain itself.


    After heavily imbuing everything so that it would last a while, Lori could finally leave to deal with the dragonfrost. Drawing water from the river and using a binding to increase its viscosity and surface tension so she could roll it as a ball across the ground to bring it to her destination, she then combined the binding of waterwisps with firewisps, and turned the ball of water into vapor. It exploded around her, shockingly cold, but the firewisps were quick to start raising up the water''s temperature again¡­ which quickly become hideously uncomfortable. It was like being covered with hot sweat, even if it wasn''t condensing on her skin!


    Lori hastily reformed the binding of firewisps until the vapor felt nice and cool on her skin. After all, it didn''t need to be all that hot, simply hot enough to melt the dragonfrost. As long as the vapor was above the temperature that water froze, it would work. The binding she''d used in her demesne had been hot mostly so that it would self-sustain in the face of a widening area while she did something else. Most of the dragonfrost inside the dome was manageable with shovels and didn''t really need to be moved, but outside was a different matter.


    Their two fruit orchards, the cluster of trees with the bindings to let it grow branches quickly so they could be harvested for firewood, the original fields where the demesne had grown crops, and the newer ones such as the terraced plots that allowed them to grow on sloped land were all covered in dragonfrost, as were the trees themselves. The meanings on the trees had been deactivated when the dragon had first arrived, but Lori couldn''t help but note that keeping them active might have been more beneficial. The meanings caused the trees to produce excess heat, after all.


    Not that it was all cold. There was a pile of burning abominations outside of the dome, and while it gave of some smells of charring meat and hair, it was mostly woodsmoke from the wood and plants that had been fused to the bodies of beasts and bugs. Some of the abominations seemed fully plant, if several plants fused together and deadspoken to be mobile. Certainly it was burning far cleaner than the corpse she had set alight, although there was still the cloying sweetness of burning abomination blood. Two people had been tasked with both tending to the fire as well as throwing in further abomination corpses from another pile, otherwise the fire would have grown far too big.


    Lori skirted them to keep her vapor cloud from shrouding their work. In this, the relative stillness of the weather was a boon, as the only air turbulence was coming from the updrafts generated by the two fires. There were no winds she had to account for to keep the vapor she''d bound to her staff in place, so she was free to let it mostly trail behind her without having to worry about it being blown away. She walked the border between the dome and the fields, anchoring the binding of waterwisps to the ground at regular intervals as Rian and Riz fell into step next to her, a spear in one hand.


    She paused, then turned towards them. "Rian, Erzebed what are you doing here?"


    "I saw you walking outside the dome and thought you might be planning to do something about¡­ well, that," he said, nodding towards the dragonfrost-covered fields. "It''s safe on this side, but there might still be abominations further from the dome. I don''t know how far from the dome is safe, but it''s just generally a good idea to have someone to watch you back when you''re doing Whispering that might be taking up all you attention from, say, some abomination coming up behind you." He jumped and kicked his feet to dislodge some bugs that had buzzed around his legs as he looked behind them. "There probably won''t be any, but you''re our Dungeon Binder. Best you''re protected."


    Riz nodded in agreement. "The others are helping with the bug clearing, so it''s just us."


    She looked down at Rian''s feet. "Won''t that be difficult when you''re dancing?" Riz, in contrast, was wearing boots.


    "Yes, I was sort of hoping if I stood close enough to you I can be standing inside whatever binding you have around yourself." Rian said with¡­ well, completely expected blunt honesty. "I''m sorry for whatever I did. Can you please make my bug repeller bigger now?"


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    Lori gave him a blank look. "I have no idea what you''re talking about."


    "This is about the notes, isn''t it?"


    "If you''re going to be protecting me while I work, than stop talking and let me work. You''re being distracting."


    "Come on, if I''d put the notes in your pack, it would have gotten wrinkled and maybe damaged! And this time you didn''t bring a pack, so should you really be bringing home your notes? They might get wet!"


    ¡­


    She hated it when he had a point.


    Lori gave him an annoyed look. "You have a solution, I presume?"


    "We can put it in Riz''s pack," Rian said. "There should be room inside, and the soap''s dry by now. Of course, that''s if she agrees to¡ª"


    "Erzebed, let me put my notes in your pack to keep it from getting wet on the way back to Lorian Demesne."


    "Yes, Great Binder."


    "Wow, instantly?"


    "I''m the Dungeon Binder."


    "She''s the Great Binder."


    "¡­ well¡­ all right then. See, there was a solution after all!"


    "Stop being distracting Rian, I have work to do."


    <hr>


    Lori had finished going around the parts of the perimeter of the dome, anchoring the binding of waterwisps she was trailing as vapor, and had just finished walking out to the stand of trees whose growth would normally have been accelerated to grow branches quickly when they did actually encounter a dragonborn abomination.


    She had been in the midst of the now-routine motion of anchoring the binding she''d been trailing when she heard Riz say in a calm, level voice, "Rian, be ready to get the Great Binder out of here."


    The words prompted Lori to turn to see what she was talking about¡ªand cause her to spin around instantly, the binding she''d been handling becoming a secondary concern as she raised her staff diagonally before her, gripping the wooden stave with both hands.


    The beast¡ªno, abomination¡ªthe abomination wasn''t notably big. Though shaped like a leaper, it seemed smaller than normal, its head only level with Lori''s shoulder. A juvenile or perhaps an adolescent? Instead of a normal coat of feathers, it looked like it had been fused to a honeydungeon''s worth of sweetbugs. The coat writhed with countless semi-transparent wings that beat futilely, the bugs seemingly part of its feathers and skin, though most of it seemed to be concentrated to the left side of the abominations body. It was some distance away¡ªLori would estimate it to be twenty, maybe thirty paces¡ªand if it hadn''t been for Riz'' warning letting her know there was something to look for, Lori probably wouldn''t have noticed it until it was much closer. Riz had leveled her spear at it, putting herself between the abomination and Lori. Rian had moved next to Lori, trying his best to hold his spear like Riz was doing and only looking partly successful.


    "Should we yell for help?" Rian asked through gritted teeth, as if the very act of moving his mouth would draw the abomination''s attention.


    "Don''t move. Maybe it will go away. If it moves towards us, you and the Great Binder run and start yelling, in that order," Riz said, much more quietly and calmly. "I''ll hold it off. Don''t argue."


    "Wasn''t planning to. Don''t die."


    As a rule, Lori didn''t normally rush when she was forming a binding. The binding was formed when the binding was formed, and if she wanted to form it properly, she had to pay attention to all the details. That being said, ripping lightningwisps from the binding around her repelling bugs and hastily forming a binding of lightningwisps and airwisp was definitely rushed. Her heart beat rapidly as Lori tried to remember how she had seen it made. Lightningwisps in the middle, airwisps and lightningwisps around this core to keep the lightningwisps contained, airwisps to provide thrust and maneuverability, lightwisps anchored to her skin to allow her to control the binding at a distance¡­


    After the initial hurried panic, Lori watched the beast intently as she continued forming the binding. She''d never made this before, but when she''d seen it, it had stuck to her mind despite her having written down the flow diagram and adding as many notes as she could through her far-removed, non-visual observations. It had probably helped she''d done so early in the duration of the dragon''s passing, when her mind had still been fresh. It had been fascinating to observe, the lightningwisps being contained in a ball to prevent premature eruption, and she had immediately hit upon the idea of guiding it as an airwisp projectile.


    Her ''lightning-ball'' would no doubt have a velocity far slower than a stream of lightningwisps, but theoretically it would have the advantage of not needing to lay a pathway for the lighting to travel across, meaning it could be launched immediately upon forming and taking aim. No need have a stationary target or having to maneuver the target towards the pathway she had made. Just form and blow it towards the target, and if it misses, the connection through lightwisps would allow her have it correct and perhaps even self-propel.


    If it worked. After all, this was the first time she''d formed it.


    ¡­


    She wished she''d kept a piece of wood on her person to throw. Thrown firewisps were always reliable.


    The three of them stood still, although Lori was prepared to throw her binding and start running if need be. Rian had even stopped his silly dancing, holding still lest his sudden movements draw the abomination''s attention as he moved to her side. The bugs on the abomination''s skin continued to buzz, and it seemed to shudder as if the abomination was trying to dislodge the bugs off itself. The abomination seemed to turn away¡ª


    There was a blur of movement, and by the time Lori had realized the abomination was running towards them, it had already crossed half the distance. Rainbows! She hated how fast leapers were! Her hand snapped up, the binding she had prepared ready, and even though it wasn''t a water cutter, she let it go. Air blasted away from her and towards the abomination, carrying the still-deactivated binding of airwisps and lightningwisps. Through the channel of lightwisps anchored to her hand, she activated the binding, and a line of light appeared between her and a rapidly moving point in the air. That point erupted in lightning, lines moving outward in all directions only to be stopped as it hit shell of lightingwisps and ariwisps, becoming a ball of swiftly-moving light¡ª


    The ball of lightningwisps slammed into the abominations chest, and there was a deafening explosion of thunder, a blinding light, and a feeling of heat on her face. Lori felt someone grab her raised hand and start pulling her in a run. She stumbled a bit on the dragonfrost, dropping her staff, but Lori didn''t fall as she heard muffled yelling.


    Then she was running, her ears ringing and bright spots in her eyes¡­

 448 - Sample Containment

    According to Riz¡ªwho had survived staying behind¡ªLori''s binding had caused the abomination to run away¡ªbecause the binding had exploded violently against the abomination''s chest¡ªwhich was fortunate because the binding had also half-blinded the not-an-officer. That is, she''d managed to close one eye when she''d seen the binding start to crackle and glow, and had saved the vision in one of her eyeballs. Rian had closed both eyes, giving him the vision to grab her hand and pull her to safety.


    Rian had looked relieved when Riz had returned unharmed, and while he hadn''t fussed and molested her the way Mikon would have, he had hovered conspicuously near her, doing a circuit around her to check for wounds before letting out a relieved sigh. Lori had been vaguely surprised, since given Rian''s tendencies she''d have expected some sort of dramatic proclamation. Instead, all he''d said was "I''m glad you''re safe. Next time let''s remember to bring backup," and had resumed acting as he''d usually have.


    A group had tracked the abomination through the dragonfrost while Lori had sat at the dining pavilion waiting for her hearing to come back¡ªit wasn''t urgent enough that she''d risk letting whatever-his-name-was being the one to heal her¡ªand found it dead not far away, its chest wounded and its syrupy blood on fire. However, the injury was too small to have been the actual cause of death. Rian and what-his-name¡ªLori had sighed and checked her rock¡ªLidzuga had discussed it while they had waited for the area around the fields to be checked for any more abominations, just in case.


    "I think her binding might have stopped its heart when it hit," Rian suggested. "I''m pretty sure what she used were lightningwisps and not firewisps, since I got sparked when I grabbed her to run."


    "Hmm¡­ yes, that would do it," Lidzuga had agreed. "From the damage, if the binding hit on the chest, the lightning could have passed through the heart before grounding. If it had hit anywhere else, things might not have been so lucky."


    "What about the head?"


    "Well, yes, if it''s the head, but you can say that about anything that hits the head. Uh, is it really all right if I don''t heal her?"


    "Yes, it''s fine. Shanalorre can take care of anything when we get back home. Uh, sorry your house isn''t ready to clean yet."


    "So am I¡­"


    The rest of the day had Lori under heavy guard as she finished anchoring the mist in place around the fields and stands of trees to start melting away the dragonfrost. Riz and some of the local men followed her, all wielding spears and acting as a screen between her and the woods beyond River''s Fork''s agricultural areas. Lori might have worked a bit hurriedly as well, but that was only because it was getting dark earlier than usual because of the overcast!


    Eventually, she completed her circuit and pulled the binding close to the ground by the anchor points, anchoring the mists to the parts of the dragonfrost that she could and leaving a thick mist that rose up to mid-calf enshrouding the ground. The magic she had imbued into the binding would let the mist last overnight, and while it wasn''t as hot as the vapor she''d used back home, the mass, contact against the dragonfrost where it was anchored, and the binding of firewisps that would keep all the mist from growing too cold would eventually be enough to sublimate the solidified air and melt the ice.


    Lori had then gone straight home, a relieved Rian in tow, her notes safely tucked into Riz''s pack where they were pressed between two bone tablets.


    "I''m glad you didn''t die," Lori heard Rian say to Riz, the two of them sitting behind her at the stem jet driver. Lori did her best to ignore them.


    "Oh, now you''re paying me attention?"


    "Yes, I know, but we were both still working earlier. Besides, I know you can take care of yourself better than I can. But I''m glad you''re safe and didn''t have to fight that thing by yourself."


    "I''m glad I didn''t have to fight that thing by myself too¡­"


    The two shared a laugh for some reason, while Lori had rolled her eyes and enjoyed sitting on her wonderfully comfortable chair. Ah, backrests! They were as luxurious as socks. No wonder Dungeon Binders always had thrones. She wondered how comfortable their chairs were? When she had finally established sufficient infrastructure for her demesne and she could spend most of her days sitting around, she was going to have the carpenters build her the most comfortable chair ever made¡­


    Lori let these thoughts distract her from the urge to open up Riz''s pack and review her notes. There was just enough spray that she decided not to risk her notes getting wet. Riz and Rian had degenerated to what sounded like cuddling quietly, so as long as she didn''t turn around and see what the two of them were doing, Lori shouldn''t get nauseous.


    Out of habit, she watched the shore for the typhon beast. If it had died, the beast probably wouldn''t have fallen somewhere she''d see, but she could hope¡­


    <hr>


    It was fairly dark by the time they returned to Lori''s demesne, even if it wasn''t all that late. Still, Lori had needed to anchor lightwisps to the tops of the poles lining Lori''s Shed Boat to help with visibility, as well as letting them maintain contact with the other boat that was accompanying them. The men who''d been mining in River''s Fork when the dragon had arrived seemed relieved to be heading back home after their extended stay, even after being told that their families were fine. Why did they need to see for themselves? It was the truth, and if Rian wanted to lie to them, he would no doubt do a much better job of doing so.


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    "Oh, right," Rian said while Lori was letting out a sigh of relief to finally be back home after crossing the border into her demesne, "now that you''re back, your Bindership, I have to ask: what are these things for?"


    Darkness was already beginning to set in, and Rian was pointing at a blacker than black patch of the shore, so it took Lori a moment to realize what he was inquiring about.


    She fixed Rian a flat look. "Sample containment."


    "Sample containment?"


    "Sample containment."


    It had been an idea that came to her¡­ well, she had lost track of time by then, but sometime after the dragon had entered her demesne. Study as she would, write as quickly as she could, Lori had not yet managed to learn how to use Mentalism, and thus no matter what she thought and observed, she would have great difficulty remembering it all save by writing it down. The problem was there was so much to remember! The dragon had formed many, many things, and she hadn''t had time to observe and study them all in the moment! It had been frustrating, but she had needed to prioritize what she was observing, since she only had one mind to study with. It wasn''t like she could use Mentalism to schism her mind so she could think several different flows of thought at once, after all.


    However, even limiting herself simply to bindings and ill-bound wisps that seemed complete and made sense, there were still too many bindings worth studying! Lori had needed a way to preserve bindings for later study. At first, she had tried to claim the bindings and ill-bound wisps, but that had quickly proven unfeasible and counterproductive as it had diverted her attention from her actively studying interesting bindings.


    Sample containment had been her answer. All the bindings¡ªas well as the ill-bound wisps, meanings, rampant life, vistas, twisted vistas, thought force formations, and insane thoughts¡ªwould land on her barrier of darkwisps and be blocked off from passing through. Depending on what manner of working they were, the working might try to penetrate the darkwisps, which expended the imbuement of the working and the darkwisps'' ablative barrier. Previously, she had made her barrier of darkwisps to encompass all the open air of her demesne, meaning that she hadn''t been able to perceive how that dragon''s workings had interacted with the binding, only that it had¡­ which on consideration had been a terribly shortsighted mistake.


    However, due to the fact that the dragon being inside the boundaries of her demesne had forced her to modify the shape of her darkwisp binding, she''d finally been able to observe the interaction of the dragon''s various workings and her barrier. And she had noticed that most workings¡ªnot all but most¡ªtended to have a generally downward trajectory, as well as have some interaction with gravity. Some workings bounced off her barrier, some didn''t. Bindings with an airwisp and waterwisp component tended to be at the mercy of air currents, vistas and twisted vistas tended to just stop and rest on the surface of the barrier, but most tended to go down. And since the darkwisp barrier wasn''t physical, workings tended to slide down smoothly along its borders¡­ if the shape was right.


    So Lori had, as one of her last clear recollections¡ªand already things had been a bit blurry from what was presumably a lack of sleep¡ªhad reshaped her barrier into a cone and funneled workings towards the edges of her demesne, into the sample containment ''trenches'' composed purely of darkwisps. The sample containment was inside her demesne, meaning she could observe and examine them, or at least the ones composed of or incorporating wisps. As long as she remembered to keep the bindings and the containement imbued, then the samples should last¡­ well, indefinitely.


    Not all of them had. Some had been wisplings that the dragon had formed¡ªbirthed?¡ªthat had devoured each other for their imbuement, something that she had observed previously the first time that a dragon had passed over her demesne, back when her defenses hadn''t been so prepared and thorough. She had tried to imbue the wisplings to try and prevent this behavior, but she''d been¡­ well, very sleepy at the time, and she''d been observing another binding, so¡­


    It had probably been bad scholarship on her part.


    The past few days, she''d simply been maintaining the bindings and ill-bound wisps in her sample containment, doing her best to get a sense of how many remained, as well as identify and isolate promising samples for immediate study when she had time. Lori had tried taking notes, but given how she had¡­ um¡­ anyway, to make sure she remembered to sleep, she''d only taken notes at the dining hall, with the night shift stationed near the door under orders to inform her when a certain amount of time had passed on the water clock.


    Suppressing the temptation to continue taking notes in her room had been difficult, but she had managed it by reminding herself the headache from trying to do whispering on an hour''s sleep would be agonizing.


    Unfortunately, it had become clear that there were slightly fewer of her samples every day, and while she''d been able to identify and isolate a number of the predatory wisplings, it was clear she hadn''t caught all of them. That wasn''t getting into the possibility that some of her samples were being devoured by predatory lifelings¡ªdistinct from undead and abominations¡ªthought-shades, or twisted vistas, which she really couldn''t rule out.


    Rian stared at her for a moment. "On a scale of ''humorous play vignette shenanigans'' to ''everyone dies horribly without even realizing they''re dying'', how dangerous are these samples you''re containing?"


    "They''re not dangerous as long as no one touches them."


    "Somehow I doubt the bugs and beasts are going to be smart enough to not go inside your darkwisps."


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    Lori spent time until they got back to her Dungeon integrating lightningwisps to her darkwisp sample containment binding to kill anything trying to get into it that could. Tonight¡­ tonight she could review and organize the notes she had made in preparation for when all this cleaning would finally be over and she could start properly experimenting with the bindings she noted down under controlled conditions.


    Tomorrow¡­ well, there was still more work to do.


    Hopefully her samples would continue to survive until then.

 449 - Officially A Best Friend

    "Rian!"


    Thankfully, Umu had the presence of mind to go around Lori to reach the man in question, and thus there was no danger to Lori''s notes. Nauseatingly affectionate sounds ensued behind her as she passed an amused-looking Mikon, who gave Lori a bow in greeting. Lori nodded to her in return, not slowing down as she headed towards her room.


    "Welcome back, Rian," Lori heard Mikon say behind her. "We missed you."


    "Oh, now you ''miss'' him? You and Riz seemed to be having a lot of fun when you kicked me out of the house."


    "You were welcome to stay, Umu. It''s your house too."


    Thankfully, Lori didn''t hear the rest of that as she entered her Dungeon. The dining hall was full, and dinner seemed to be only just beginning¡ªthe line for food was still long, and not many people were eating yet¡ªand reminded her that while technically delicious and sweet, all she''d had for lunch had been fruit. The temptation to immediately peruse her notes was met with the immediate counterpoint that she didn''t want to do so hungry, and so it wasn''t too difficult to pull herself away to go back downstairs.


    Her table was currently full, as whatever-his-name-was¡ªLori checked the rocks in her belt pouch¡ªLidzuga was sitting on one end with his sister, who seemed to be borrowing Shanalorre''s bench to be able to sit at the end of the table. Lori had contemplated having the woman go away¡ªshe wasn''t a wife after all, unless she and her brother were from one of those demesnes¡ªthat first meal she''d had on coming back, but there wasn''t really a point to it, and even with Rian back the other side would only be at capacity. Given how closely Umu and Riz or Mikon tended to sit next to him¡­


    Lori settled into her chair, closing her eyes and sighing in relief.


    "So¡­" Rian said across from her, "are you going to manage the self-control to keep from losing yourself in your notes again, or am I going to have to do something potentially dangerous to my person?"


    "Shouldn''t you be insisting on getting the food yourself?" Lori said, not opening her eyes.


    "¡­ I''ll do it tomorrow, it''s been a long couple of days. Well?"


    "You realize I''m the Dungeon Binder and answer to no one, don''t you?"


    "You answer to no one but yourself," Rian said, in the tones of a correction. "How do you feel about the demesne''s most useful and productive worker indulging themselves when there''s work to be done and everyone needs to help get the demesne back to normal?"


    Lori opened one eye just enough to give him a glare. Well, half a glare, since she was only using a single eye. Rian just gave her one of his cheerful¡ªand annoying¡ªsmiles. "I am perfectly capable for exercising self-control, Rian."


    Rian hummed noncommittally. "¡­so, do you want me to hold on to your notes until all the cleanup is finished or¡ª?"


    "I can handle my own notes, Rian."


    "Of course, of course, I never doubted that. Can you stop handling them, though?"


    Lori opened both eyes to glare at him, even as a part of her grudgingly admitted that was a legitimate question. "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Drop the subject. Now."


    He sighed, shrugging. "Yes, your Bindership. How''s your soap supply, by the way?"


    The strange, unrelated question made Lori blink in confusion. "My soap? It''s fine. Why do you ask?"


    "Ah, I was concerned you''d run out during your bath before coming down, since you finished so quickly. My mistake."


    What was he talking about? She hadn''t taken a bath before she''d come dow¡ª


    ¡­


    Oh.


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    The next morning, though it almost physically pained her to do so, Lori gave Rian her notes, still pressed between the two bone tablets. She''d have to send River''s Fork some replacements for them, as they would be staying in place for some time.


    For all his comments about not being able to control herself, Rian looked no better himself that morning as he accepted the pressed notes. He was also walking strangely, and sat down gingerly when he got to the bench. At least his hair was wet, meaning he had bathed. "I''ll give this back to you when you ask for it," he said.


    "Give it back to me when all the cleaning is done and the demesnes are back to normal," Lori ordered.


    "Are you sure? What if you insist on having me give it to you?"


    "Then I expect you to disobey me until the demesnes are back to normal."


    "Huh. That''s new. Usually you expect absolute obedience."


    "Yes, which you will do by disobeying my orders to give me the notes before that point."


    "Fine, but if you get mad at me, I''m going to remind you this was all your idea." Rian looked down at the pressed sheets. "Anything interesting in here I can look forward to you implementing?"


    Lori considered. While she didn''t remember every detail, some impressions of why she had noted something down remained. "Better ways to use lightningwisps, mostly."


    "I''m hoping that''s just what sticks out in your mind and that you have some kind of way make boats fly or something."


    "Why would I make a boat fly?"


    "Because it would cut down on the travel time to Covehold if we can just go straight there? I mean, it''s not like we''ll be passing through the air of any demesnes. And if there are any, wouldn''t it be a good idea to know about them? Actually, what about that last demesne we passed last year? Shouldn''t we see if they''re still around, if only so we know if we''ll have to deal with them in the near future?"


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    "The one that was weeks away and was practically still in sight of Covehold Demesne?"


    "All right, probably not them. But maybe someone built a demesne a little past them? We should probably check, just in case."


    "Wouldn''t it be simpler to find out the distribution of known demesnes when you next go to Covehold?"


    "¡­yes, that''s probably simpler than sending someone to try and make it back the way we came."


    "Good morning Rian! Good morning, anyone else listening!"


    "Mornin'', Taeclas," Rian said, helpfully giving Lori her name as the Deadspeaker and her wife arrived, sitting down at one of the bench. "How did you sleep?"


    "Great! We slept all night," Taeclas said cheerfully. "Rian, can we borrow your house? Just for a little bit after breakfast? Please?"


    "¡­ Tae, I like you, but I don''t feel comfortable doing that."


    "But our house is still full of bugs! Come on, please? I''ll be your best friend?"


    Rian looked like he was seriously considering the offer. "Does that mean Rybelle won''t be your best friend anymore?"


    Taeclas stared at him, eyes flicking to her wife, who looked amused. "You''ll be one of my best friends!" the Deadspeaker hastily amended.


    "But not your best friend? Sorry then, if I''m going to let anyone do unspeakable things in my house, they''d have to be my best friend, you know?"


    "Eh¡­" Taeclas sighed. "That''s¡­ fair¡­" She sounded like she was going to cry, for some reason.


    Rian sighed. "Your Bindership, can we prioritize getting Tae''s house cleaned today? You know, to help improve the morale of our resident Deadspeaker?"


    Taeclas immediately went from tearful to hopeful as she turned towards Lori, a pleading look on her face.


    "Clean your own house," Lori said.


    "Does that mean they can borrow the brooms after breakfast?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "It''s a ''dealing with people'' matter, deal with it."


    "Yay! Rian, you''re officially a best friend!"


    Rian held out his hand to the Deadspeaker. "Well in that case, can you check if I bruised or strained anything?"


    Taeclas cheerfully reached for this hand, then paused.


    "I washed my hands," Rian said flatly. "See, this is why I won''t let you use my house."


    "All right, fair enough¡­"


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Clearing both demesnes took almost the rest of the week. The bugs were surprisingly tenacious, and houses were cleared and cleaned slowly. While everyone was willing to clean their homes, they only had a limited number of brooms long enough to reach the ceilings, where various strands, nests and bug corpses were. Rian had to set up a schedule as to who got to clean their houses, while the rest checked over the outsides of all the buildings, especially the roofs.


    Unsurprisingly, there was damage. Paper window screens had to be repaired¡ªTaeclas'' strange principle objections aside¡ªor replaced, some of the roof planks had swelled and become loose from water damage, a couple of the showers outside of the baths had their doors come off¡­


    Most of the crops left outside had died, including the patch of tubers that Shanalorre was growing behind her house. It wasn''t a great loss, as the tubers were still edible once dug out of the ground¡ªbecause the ground had been frozen, and had still been very cold by the time Karina and Shanalorre had gone to check the tubers¡ªbut it boded badly for the rest of the plants around the demesne.


    "Oh, a lot of the trees will probably live through this," Taeclas said, looking quite disappointed as she said it, after she''d been asked to investigate the matter. When she''d been stubborn at ''looking after the well-being of stupid trees'', Rian had simply called her ''cheater'', she had groaned, sighed, and sullenly done as she''d been told. "The dragon was only here for short time compared to winter, so they didn''t bury everything. While many trees did lose branches, and a lot of leaves were frozen, it''s unlikely to have killed the whole tree. Smaller shrubs and grasses that were buried are more likely to have died, but that''s normal for many of them in the winter." She shrugged. "It''s not the first time that a dragon has brought an unseasonable or extreme degree of cold to a demesne, but I don''t have the literature memorized. And for all he''s part of the Mysteries, I doubt Lidz does either."


    "But we''re not looking at total plant death across the whole demesne?" Rian said.


    "Only in the short term, although the timing for it is terrible. The fall is coming up, so plants should be in the dying phase of their yearly cycle, but because it''s triggered early, because of the relatively mild weather they might be fooled into thinking it''s spring, which would mean any fresh shoots die during the winter."


    That had nothing to do with her, as none of that required Whispering. Lori, for her parts, focused on removing dragonfrost from areas they needed, such as the charcoal-burner''s clearing, the outdoor mushroom farm, the part of the shore where the children usually hunted seels¡ªalthough there seemed to be far fewer seels than usual, and Rian suspected they had been tricked into migrating early because of the dragonfrost¡ªvarious roofs, the few parts of the opposite shore that they needed such as the curing and smoking shed, and the sawmill. The rest left to melt on their own, which they were well into doing in any case.


    Every other day, she''d go to River''s Fork to assist in the cleanup there. Lori had been forced to place a binding to repel bugs around each house after they had been cleaned to prevent the bugs from simply returning to settle inside them, something she had to imbue every time she went back. Fortunately, the bugs slowly started dispersing as the days went on, and at the end of the week Lori was able to just let the bindings dissipate.


    Shanalorre had also warned them that there were still a numbes of possible abominations in the demesne not far from the dome, but save for the one that Lori had seen, no one saw any further sign of them. Which was slightly disappointing, because she had developed a better and more stable version of the lightning ball binding. As the first iteration had not been immediately fatal¡ªand had suffered from having the binding consuming all the imbuement at once again, resulting in an admittedly nice explosion¡ªshe had modified the binding to exude ''spikes'' of lightningwisps so that on contact, there would be more than one channel for the lightning to flow through, resulting in the lighting actually passing through a beast''s body instead of simply unleashing so much lightning the air itself exploded from the heat.


    Lori hadn''t been able to properly test the binding due to a lack of living samples to try them on. Given the differences in scale, while the bindings had killed the bugs in the air she had launched them at, it wasn''t a properly conclusive test since a bug was a far cry from a beast or beast-based abomination. And while she would have wanted to try using the binding on dragonborn abominations, it was a stupid idea to actively go seek them out to do so, although she had ordered she be informed if any came in sight of the central dome.


    While puzzling and mildly curious, in the end the absence of the abominations wasn''t really anything important. At the very least, it meant that Lori wouldn''t need to set up a defensive perimeter of lightningwisps to keep them away from the central dome and its fields. With the ground finally thawing, the houses now cleared, and Lidzuga and his sister residing in River''s Fork once more, that demesne was finally back to normal and Lori could go back home.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Great Binder," Shanalorre said from behind Lori.


    Lori blinked in surprise, turning away from the game of sunk she was playing with Mikon. "What is it?" she asked.


    "I believe I have identified a beast within the confines of River''s Fork demesne," Shanalorre said. "It is difficult to estimate size without a better reference, since I am being forced to use random passing bugs and leaves, but I am also certain of my identification."


    "Of what?" Lori said, glancing towards the gameboard, where Mikon was finally making a move, carefully dropping one stone onto each bowl in order. She could already see she was going to win this one, and from the annoyed look on the weaver''s face, they did as well.


    "Of the typhon beast. It is within the confines of River''s Fork demesne."


    Lori slowly turned to face Shanalorre, the game no longer important. "What."


    "The typhon beast," the other Dungeon Binder repeated. "I cannot be absolutely certain, but based on what I have identified of its relative size, girth, and distinctive features that I remember from my own sightings of it, I believe that it has entered the boundaries of River''s Fork Demesne. And it does not seem inclined to leave."

 450 - Rainbows With All The Colors

    "Are you sure it''s the typhon beast?" Lori asked.


    "Absolutely sure? No," Shanalorre said. "However, it is alive and by comparison is larger than anything that is not a tree, so either way I believe it is worthy of attention."


    "Uh¡­" Mikon ''uh''-ed. Lori turned an annoyed look at her. "Should I get Rian, your Bindership? This sounds like something he needs to hear."


    Lori considered it and nodded. "Go get him, if you please."


    Mikon nodded, and for some reason exchanged a glance with Shanalorre before getting up and doing as ordered. Lori would have wanted to press Shanalorre further, but it was best if they didn''t have to repeat the same exposition at Rian, so despite her inclination, she waited, turning towards the sunk board to consider her next turn. With Shanalorre watching intently, she reached out and made her move, then sat back to wait.


    The weaver soon returned with Rian¡­ as well as Umu and Riz in tow for some reason. "Your Bindership," Rian said, "Mikon said you needed me?"


    "Shanalorre said the typhon beast might have somehow made its way into the boundaries of River''s Fork Demesne," Lori summarized as Mikon glanced at Shanalorre, who nodded before the weaver sat back to study the sunk board.


    "Ah. Well, that''s terrible." Rian frowned. "But if it is the typhon beast, how is it inside? Shouldn''t it have been deterred from entering the demesne at all?"


    "It is not currently certain it is the typhon beast," Shanalorre said. "It is just as likely to be some sort of very large dragonborn abomination, and those have never seemed to experience pain from being within the confines of a demesne, nor have shown any wounds from irridiation that have been reported. It possible that the meaning which fleshcrafts their bodies into abominations repairs such damage, and the interval isn''t long enough for any further irridiation to set in to such an extent."


    "That''s not any better," Rian sighed as he sat down on the bench opposite Lori, next to Mikon. "Actually, knowing our luck, it''s a dragonborn abomination made from the typhon beast."


    "That is not beyond possibility," Shanalorre said. "In fact, it is quite likely. If this is the typon beast, it was likely affected by the dragon with some sort of rampant life, or perhaps it encountered an insane thought that lead to it entering the demesne. Regardless, a very large living creature is currently within the confines of the demesne''s boundaries."


    "How is it we are only learning of this now?" Lori asked.


    "I had been prioritizing using my awareness to examine the area near the central dome for abominations, Great Binder. However, recently I noticed that both abominations and beasts seemed to be moving away from the dome, and I expanded my attention to see if this was part of a trend or an isolated case. It was only just now that I identified the presence of the large beast or abomination," the other Dungeon Binder said.


    Rian glanced towards Lori for some reason, then turned back to Shanalorre. "How far is it from the center of the demesne? Are they currently in any danger?"


    Shanalorre shook her head. "Not at the moment. In fact, the presence is currently static and unmoving, but alive. I suspect it is currently asleep. There is also the expanse of the river between the creature and the dome."


    "Then I think we should table this discussion for the moment," Rian said. "We need sleep, and probably confirmation that this is the typhon beast. For all we know, it''s a chasmos or a hadon or some other large herbivore. Tomorrow we can send some of the hunters on one of the boats, and they can confirm whatever this thing is. Does that sound good to you, your Bindership?"


    Lori nodded readily. After all, the danger was technically in another demesne that she couldn''t affect at the moment. "Agreed. We will send the hunters and continue discussion when we have more concrete information. I will be going to River''s Fork tomorrow in any case. They can accompany me."


    "May I request that I accompany you as well, Great Binder?" Shanalorre asked. "From what I have gathered, it is safe to return the children back to their parents, and I will be better able to direct the hunters as to roughly where the beast is located from within the demesne."


    Tilting her head thoughtfully, Lori considered the suggestion, than nodded. "Very well."


    "And if it is the typhon beast, let''s remember to bring the arrow this time," Rian said.


    Lori twitched, and gave her lord a flat look. "Noted."


    She won the game, of course.


    <hr>


    "It''s definitely the beast, your Bindership," the hunter reported to Lori, Rian and Yllian at mid-afternoon the next day. Lidzuga¡ªLori had checked for his name earlier¡ªwas also present in an advisory capacity. "I''d know those spines anywhere. We were lucky it was resting when we saw it, but it started moving when the wind shifted. Must have caught our scent."


    "Rainbows," Lori said flatly.


    The hunter who had spoken, as well as the other two hunters that had gone across the river with him, all nodded in agreement. "Rainbows with all the colors growing deep into the skin, your Bindership."


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    Silently, Rian slid the stone-tipped arrow along the table and in front of her. Not looking down, Lori moved her hand along its length until she was touching the head, where a binding of lightningwisps was anchored. The binding was heavily imbued. Very heavily imbued. She began imbuing it with more magic.


    "In what state did you find it?" Lori asked. She dared not hope, but¡­ "Was it injured? Weighed down because it had a tree growing on its back?"


    "Nothing like that, your Bindership. At worse, it had bark and maybe some lengths of branches fused onto parts of its skin, but it didn''t seem weighed down or anything."


    "Not even a little unbalanced? Tilting slightly to one side, perhaps?"


    "Not even a little, your Bindership."


    "So there are parts of it that are going to feel spears even less?" Rian said.


    "I''m afraid so, Lord Rian."


    He sighed, bowing his head as he closed his eyes. "Well¡­ at least Shana¡­lorre can track it, so we know where it is now." He paused, then turned to the Dungeon Binder in question. "We do, right?"


    "Yes, Lord Rian. Its size is distinctive. And at the moment, it appears to be moving closer to our location," Shanalorre said. "Either it is following the trail the hunters left behind, simply seeking the river for water, or is being drawn to the smell of people."


    Lori frowned. "The river is in the way, so it shouldn''t matter, but the fact that the typhon beast¡ª"


    "Typhon abomination," Rian corrected.


    She gave him a flat look. He shrugged as Lidzuga nodded.


    "The fact the typhon abomination," she continued, her face still flat, "is now within the confines of the demesne only reaffirms that we need to kill it, as it is still driving beasts away from this area. While it is not a physical danger¡ª" Lori frowned at the hunter who had reported. "Why are you raising your hand?"


    "Uh, pardon, your Bindership, but that''s not true. The abomination not being a danger, I mean. It can easily cross the river and make its way here to where everyone lives."


    Lori blinked. "But it''s water. Beasts don''t cross water. Even a simple water break can keep them out, as long as the water is moving."


    "That''s outside the demesne, your Bindership. Inside, beasts don''t have to worry about how much it hurts when their colors wash away."


    For a moment, Lori was quiet.


    "Rainbows. Wait, but it still needs a way to cross all that water. It''s not a fursh, surely it can''t swim. It''s not unnatural like Rian."


    "Hey! First off, swimming isn''t unnatural," Rian said. Of course he''d say that. "Secondly, it doesn''t need to swim, it just needs to float from one side of the river to the other, and that''s easy. Leaves float. Corpses float. If it has enough branches and things on it, it will be able to float just fine. After that, all it needs to do is move its tail and it will probably get to this side soon enough, unless we get very lucky and it gets swept downriver."


    "I do not believe we will be that lucky, Lord Rian," Shanalorre said. "It is difficult to properly assess with Deadpseaking, but based upon where the lowest slugs, squids and graspers I can perceive in the river are, and where the top of the water seems to be, there might be points in the river that the typhon abomination can simply walk across, provided it raises its head high for air."


    There was another moment of silence. No one said rainbows, but it was probably only a matter of time.


    "Well," Rian said before anyone else had the opportunity to swear. "I suppose things could be better, but at least it''s happening now and not, say, last year."


    "And how is it any better now?" Lori asked.


    "We have more boats now," Rian said, gesturing vaguely in the direction of Lidzuga. "While the Coldhold is still buried under the water¡ª" He paused. "Uh, you did remember to maintain it, didn''t you?"


    "Of course I did, Rian, what kind of fool do you take me for?" She had been VERY lucky the ice had been heavily imbued, since by the time she had remembered the binding had been almost depleted.


    "Right, right, silly me for asking¡­ well, even without the Coldhold right now, we have enough boats to be able to move over a lot of people."


    "I am not bringing people to my demesne and having them live in my dungeon. Their dragon shelter is still perfectly serviceable."


    "¡­what about the children?"


    "They are of course coming with us when we go back tonight."


    "I will leave them in your care, Great Binder," Shanalorre said. "I believe it would be best if I remained here, as I can keep track of the typhon abomination''s location without needing to endanger anyone. Given the circumstances, that should provide more than enough time to get everyone into the dragon shelter."


    "They''re going into the dragon shelter tonight regardless," Lori said. "Tomorrow, I will be testing ways to deal with it. The day after, we are killing this abomination."


    "Um¡­ by ''we'' do you mean we spear-poke it to death, or by ''we'' do you mean you throw a binding at it to make it explode?" Rian said. "Please say it''s the second one. "


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Yes, I will be using a binding on it to kill it. Possibly several."


    Rian sighed, looking relieved. So did Yllian. "So¡­ what will we be doing?" Rian asked.


    "Delaying it should I miss so I can try again."


    Rian nodded. Yllian just looked resigned. "Right, of course. Um¡­ could you not miss? Please?"


    "I don''t intend to," Lori said, turning towards the hunters. "If the typhon abomination is heading towards here, where is it most likely to pass through?"


    <hr>


    That night, after dinner, Lori sat at her stone table¡ªshe should probably get around to having the carpenters fashion a wooden tabletop for her at the very least, even if she was still going to support it with stone legs¡ªstarring at the blank surface of a bone tablet, a stylus in one hand.


    The temptation to turn her attention to the samples she had gathered was strong, but she resisted. Instead, she began to make a flow diagram detailing her latest lightning ball binding. Lightningwisps, contained within a shell of airwisps and more lightningwisps, with spikes of lightningwisps radiating outwards to allow for the conduction of lightning so that it would pass through the body of the target rather than the lightning getting stuck and expending all of the binding''s imbuement at once to explode the air¡­


    She remembered always disliking having to plot a flow diagram when she had needed to do it in school. Now she found herself putting an inordinate amount of care into the illustration, because it was actually important, and the binding was going to be a bit too complicated to keep it completely in her head. Ugh, why hadn''t they ever told her how actually useful this would be? If they had, she might have actually put more effort into it for her classes!


    Stylus in hand, Lori began plotting out more variations on the lightningball binding, the stone-headed arrow with its heavily imbued lightningwisps on the table in front of her.


    After all, at range, blowing something with airwisps was unreliable. A rock, however, always behave predictably when you threw it, as long as you actually knew how to throw.

 451 - Premeditated Death

    It wasn''t often that Lori participated in premediated death. Most of the times that she had killed beasts with her water cutter had been in the moment, when she had seen a beast too close to the their traveling caravan and had taken action, or that time she''d decapitated seels to prepare them for butchering, before she''d just left that for other people to do. The last time had been when she had tested her lightningwisp bindings on those chokers.


    Killing the typhon abomination would be nothing like that, she knew. The chokers were tested under controlled, almost ideal conditions within her demesne, and she''d had time to place and anchor the bindings as she wanted. As killing the typhon beast would be occurring in River''s Fork, she would need to plan her binding well ahead of time, or she''d have to kill Shanalorre so Lori could take River''s Fork''s now-unclaimed core and kill the typhon abomination that way.


    ¡­


    No, no, Shanalorre was still too useful as a healer. Killing her to kill the typhon abomination was a poor exchange.


    So, Lori needed a thorough plan. A binding that she could adapt to, or would be useful in, wherever terrain was between the typhon abomination and the central dome so that she could activate the binding when the abomination stepped into it, without having to rely on some sort of bait to do so. A binding that wouldn''t explode violently, or at least not explode violently unless she wanted it to, though as she had seen an explosion wasn''t really all that reliable at causing instantaneous death. An explosion needed solid fragments to propel violently into a body to be more effective, or so she had read in one of her novels. The binding she needed was one that she could set up relatively quickly, or better yet form completely somewhere else and then simply anchor in place at the chosen location.


    Once, when she had first learned of the typhon beast, she had thought to form several bindings of lightningwisps on the ground and anchor all of them to a higher point so that it would form a sort of cone. When activated, lightning would have emanated from the ground and then up to the upper anchor point, travelling back and forth between the two points and passing through the typhon abomination as it stood between those points.


    There had always been difficulties with that plan. As the typhon abomination had originally been outside of the demesne, any binding she had prepared and anchored into place would have eventually been consumed by the Iridescence, degrading its effectiveness the longer the binding went unused. Lori would have also needed to find some way to create that high point she would have anchored to, which would have involved ladders and trying to find somewhere she could wrap that anchor around. There would always have been the danger that the typhon beast would have appeared while she was still preparing the bindings, which¡­ well, it would have been unpleasant. With the typhon abomination now within the boundaries of River''s Fork demesne, there was no longer any danger of her bindings being consumed by the Iridescence, and Shanalorre would be able to keep track of where the abomination was.


    Now she just had to settle on the best binding to kill it with.


    Some kind of watercutter was out. In addition to the range being so short, such a binding would need a ready supply of water, and the kind of laminar flow required for cutting through flesh would require her active control. An airwisp-based binding wouldn''t be able to do much on its own. Theoretically she''d be able to asphyxiate the typhon abomination with one, but that would require somehow anchoring the binding around the abomination''s head, which¡­ wouldn''t be possible. Her best offensive and murderous choices were still lightningwisps and firewisps.


    Firewisps were¡­ simple. Originally, she had thought that she needed a way to set the typhon abomination on fire, but her recent experience with trying to set fire to a corpse had shown her how actually difficult that was. However, one didn''t actually didn''t need to set a body on fire to make that body incapable of staying alive. When she had gone to school, Lori had been warned about how dangerous it was for a body part to intersect a binding of firewisps that altered temperature, because the body''s internal temperature needed to remain at a specific range or else organs would start to degrade and cease functioning.


    Thus, a simple means of killing the typhon abomination would simply to place an extensive binding of firewisps that would alter the temperature of anything that passed through it. Warmer or colder, it didn''t matter as long as the temperature of the affected body diverged significantly enough from standard body temperature for a sufficient length of time. The problem was the immediate discomfort this caused would quickly motivate the abomination to vacate the area, which¡­ well, she supposed it would actually be useful, as the binding could be used to act as a deterrent to keep the typhonbeast from a certain places.


    Actually, on consideration, Lori could probably add something like that to the outside of her demesne when a dragon passed. Perhaps it would help reduce the numbers of dragonborn abominations even further as they were deterred from entering her demesne.


    It would also be useful, she supposed, as a means of diverting or directing the typhon abomination. However as a means of doing lethal damage to it, it was far too slow if the firewisps only heated or cooled the body by a small amount that was theoretically lethal but not immediately fatal. And if she set the firewisps to instantly increase the temperature to, say, ten times the boiling point of water or the temperature where a corpse would finally ignite and start burning, that would probably be fatal, but it would also make the area in which the binding was placed so hot that the abomination would avoid it unless she also made another binding of firewisps to contain the heat to a given volume. If she used such a binding, she would need to activate it when the typhon abomination entered it.


    With their current circumstances, it wouldn''t be all that difficult. She could set the bindings in place, connect them together with lightwisps, and when Shanalorre informed her that the typhon abomination had entered the volume of the binding, Lori could activate the binding at some distance using the channel of lightwisps. Relatively simple, nicely fatal, and save for putting the bindings in place, she didn''t actually have to be anywhere near the typhon abomination.


    Unfortunately, there were good reasons to not use firewisp bindings. For one thing, ''hot enough for a corpse to catch fire'' is also ''hot enough for trees to catch fire'' unless she was very careful to avoid having her binding intersect with trees, and with the dragonfrost all having melted or sublimated away naturally, there was nothing left to prevent those fires from spreading. While she could do so by immediately reforming her firewisps to destroy heat rather than create it, that wouldn''t do anything if the fire managed to spread beyond the areas that her binding was placed in.


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    The second reason to not use firewisps was because forming, placing and anchoring the bindings into place would be very labor and time intensive. Even if she made the firewisp bindings somewhere else beforehand¡ªwhich she would need to do anyway, because she would need a lot of firewisps¡ªanchoring all those bindings in place would be time-consuming, especially if she was actively trying to avoid a forest fire. While she''d be willing to do so¡ªtrees were a useful resource, no matter what that crazy Deadspeaker who named plants said¡ªshe probably wouldn''t have that time, depending on how quickly the typhon abomination was moving. It was not beyond possibility that when she returned to River''s Fork the next day the abomination could already be on the shores of the river opposite the central dome.


    Lightningwisps¡­ were also a fire risk, but a slightly more manageable one. Lightning wouldn''t heat up large volumes of air for extended periods of time for one thing, and while lightning strikes would still cause what it hit to catch flame, they would be relatively isolated spots, with the heat quickly dispersing to the surrounding mass. It would still be a fire hazard, but given the nature of lightning it would need to be active for less time than a firewisp binding to kill the abomination. However, it had the advantage of being far less time-intensive to make than the firewisp bindings, especially if she applied the principles she had learned through her lightning balls.


    Using lightning also had the advantage of being more likely to hold the abomination in place as the thoughts passing through its nerves were disrupted, and with her lightning balls she would no longer need a high anchor point to cover a wide enough area for lightning to intersect the abomination''s body. The principle was so simple, in hindsight. Lightning flowed along paths that lightningwisps already occupied, so simply contain the lightning within a shell of lightningwisps and airwisps to contain the lightning until it struck the target.


    If she made the containment portion of the binding larger... say, large enough for the abomination to be inside¡­


    Of course, she had to do a few tests to make sure her binding did as she wanted. It wouldn''t do to just have it explode, after all.


    Well, explode when she didn''t want it to. Exploding when she did want it to would be wonderful.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    "Uh, your Bindership? Your Bindership?"


    Rian''s voice was slightly raised, as if he felt he needed to be heard over something loud. Either that or he was still a bit deaf from the explosion that had occurred earlier. "What is it, Rian?" Lori said, turning towards him. He was a dark shape against darkness until Lori deactivated the lightwisp bindings over her face that had been limiting the amount of light reaching her eyes.


    "Should we be worried about that?" he said, pointing at the binding she was maintaining above the middle of the river.


    Lori rolled her eyes. "No, of course not. Why would you think it as something to be concerned about?"


    "Well, people usually find a ball of blinding light that seems to be shooting out lightning worrying," Rian said, "myself among them." The binding Lori had made over the river shot out a stream of lightning that curved down to touch the surface of the river, and Rian flinched despite the lack of thunder.


    She rolled her eyes. "Will that be all, Rian?"


    "Yeah, that''s it. I''ll tell everyone you''re just having fun, and there''s nothing to worry about."


    "I am not simply having fun. This is work. Research. Needful preparation."


    "Noted, your Bindership. I''ll tell everyone you''re enjoying your work, then."


    Rolling her eyes gain, she turned back towards her binding, activating the lightwisps over her eyes again to block out the brightness emanating from the binding. While her connection to her core made her capable of being aware of all the wisps in her demesne, some things needed to been seen with her own eyes. The binding was a more advanced iteration of the same one she had tried to use against the abomination they had encountered in River''s Fork. A binding of lightningwisps surrounded by airwisps to keep it centered, then a shell of lightningwisps and airwisps to keep the lightning contained. This binding, however, was three paces in diameter. Lori had made the binding intentionally oversized so she could see it better from a distance.


    In the center of the binding, lighting shone, burning as it made the very air into fire. Not literally fire, of course, though from the firewisps generated one could be forgiven for thinking otherwise. Even though the binding of lightwisps over her eyes, Lori couldn''t make out much in the way of detail. It was lightning that lashed out in all directions until the bolts struck the shell of lightning- and airwisps, stopping the bolts from progressing further. She had been adjusting it to try and increase the number of bolts that were emanating from the center of the binding, but the number of bolts actually seemed to be decreasing¡­


    Ah, right, the concentrations of lightningwisps in the air around the inside of the shell had increased due to the bolts coming from the center. If she remembered correctly, sparks moved from places of high concentration to low concentration¡ªnot unlike heat, really¡ªso if she wanted more bolts¡­


    Working with lightningwisps like this wasn''t something she had a lot of experience with compared to her experience with waterwisps and firewisps. She had a lot of experience with the latter two from using it in either in her day to day life or her professional life when she had been employed in workshops. Perhaps if she''d gotten her metal-welding certification¡­ well, too late for that.


    Her use of lightningwisps had mostly been restricted to classroom exercises, where she had formed bindings to empirically demonstrate principles or as practical exams of her comprehension and understanding. Which wasn''t to say she was incapable or unskilled with lightningwisps, but rather its idiosyncratic properties didn''t come as readily to mind to her because she had mostly used it in controlled classroom conditions and with educational bindings. However, if this lightning ball binding was effective, that might be changing in the future.


    Humming to herself, Lori claimed some of the loose lightningwisps and began to form them into a spike between the lightningwisps in the center of the binding and shell, giving the wisps in the spike directionality to move the loose lightningwisps back to the center of the binding. The spike began to ''pull'' loose lightinngwisps from around the lightning- and airwisp shell and along the spike''s length. As loose lightningwisps were drawn back to the center, bolts immediately began to fly in all directions again, filling the whole three pace diameter with glowing white bolts, the air with the smell of lightning-struck air, and her ears with the sound of buzzing so constant it was nearly a hum sometimes.


    Lori nodded in satisfaction. Yes, that seemed to fix the problem of the bolts occurring less as time went on, though to make it more effective she should probably give the shell some directionality as well¡­


    She had today to perfect this binding. Tomorrow¡­ tomorrow she was going to use it to kill that spiky-backed thing scaring beasts away from her second demesne so they could finally go back to hunting again!

 452 - Not Actually Trying To Procrastinate

    As much as she wanted to, Lori wasn''t able to test the enlarged lightning ball on a living subject. Trying to put a seel into the binding wouldn''t be demonstrative of the results of the binding on a dry subject, and trying to put the binding underwater would fundamentally change it. Given how busy everyone was, there wasn''t time left in the day to catch a choker to use as a test subject. However, her tests had concluded to her satisfaction and a lightningball binding she felt would suffice for being able to kill decisively, so Lori felt everything was ready. She was ready.


    "Is everything ready?" Lori asked Rian at dinner that night as she stirred her stew. While she had worked on developing the binding, she had left all the other matters up to him.


    "As ready as we''ll ever be," Rian said, looking tired. Kolinh, sitting on the bench with him, merely looked patient. "I''m sure you''ve noticed that the children from River''s Fork are back. Again."


    The sounds of the children eating at the table behind her were hard to miss. "Are they? I couldn''t tell."


    She didn''t react as there was a splash and a cry behind her. One of the children''s cups had tipped over, spilling water.


    "Ah¡­" Rian said, nodding for some reason. Mikon, sitting next to him today, gently nudged him with her elbow, and he had a spoonful of stew before replying further. "Well, you have been busy taming lightning out of the sky and turning it into your own personal ball of death, so it''s to be expected little details like that escaped you. The children from River''s Fork are back and staying in Shanalorre''s house again, and Shanalorre came back. With luck, the children will be back home tomorrow or the day after, once we''ve dealt with the typhon abomination."


    "There''s no need to rush," Shanalorre said from behind Lori at the other table. "Take as much time as needed to deal with the matter sufficiently."


    "Your opinion is noted," Lori said flatly. She kept her gaze on Rian. "Beyond the children, what about the other preparations?"


    Rian turned to the man sitting past Riz and Mikon as Lori ate her own food. "Kolinh?"


    "There''s very little preparation to be done, given the time we had available, what we will be dealing with, and what resources we have on hand," the older man said. His food was already halfway eaten, although he had ceased eating when the attention turned towards him, sticking the bread he''d been holding into his stew bowl. "With the assistance of the carpenters and Wiz Taeclas, we were able to make several pikes that should be more effective in keeping something the size of the abomination at bay. Those will be less effective among trees, but should someone actually need to try and drive it off they''ll stand a better chance. However, I must stress very strongly that any plan where the militia will need to do such a thing will be doomed from the start."


    "Because of the length of the pikes, they''ll need to be carried in their own boat, or else it might capsize from the weight distribution," Rian said. "It would be easier on the Coldhold, but her Bindership hasn''t pulled that out of the river yet. We have volunteers who will be coming along to wield them, and we will also be distributing them among those we sent to River''s Fork earlier today. All the volunteers are former militia and have experience wielding them and working together. No civilian volunteers this time, although the hunters will be coming with us to supplement the scouts."


    Lori frowned as she finished chewing the mouthful of bread she was masticating. "Why is that necessary? Shanalorre will be able to tell us exactly where it is. That''s why she was sent there this morning, after all." Among other reasons.


    "With all due respect to yourself and Binder Shanalorre, Great Binder," Kolinh said, putting down his spoon, "from what Binder Shanalorre describes, at best she will be able to point to where it is and perhaps give us an estimate as to the distance from her location. Binder Shanalorre will not be able to relay the terrain, nor be able to provide a proper analysis of it to be able to say whether a location will be suited towards trapping it, or whatever plan we will effect. While I am told that the hunters are confident it will take the path they have identified, if it doesn''t we will need to adapt, and scouts will be able to find ideal locations for such adjustments better than Binder Shanalorre can."


    She considered the statement and reluctantly nodded in acknowledgement. Lori supposed the argument had merit. While her awareness of the wisps in her demesne technically allowed her to examine every location within it, she would be hard pressed to describe any landmarks that wasn''t the river or a man-made structure. Directing people to a location wasn''t a problem for her, since if she needed to she could simply lay down a glowing line of lightwisps and mark the destination, but Shanalorre would be unable to do the same beyond pointing in a given direction and perhaps providing an estimated distance. "Noted. What else?"


    "I gave permission that some of the small storage jars be converted into bombs," Rian said. "We don''t really have the material for anything that explodes, but we were able to put together a mix of fat, straw and grass, and a little tinder to make smoke bombs, and we''ll be preparing piles for smoke fires tomorrow as well, in case we need to cover up our scents or need to smoke out the abomination. I''m not sure how effective it will be, but the one we made earlier smoked well enough, so¡­ hopefully we won''t need it? We''ve gathered all the strong rope too, in case we need set some kind of trap."


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    Lori looked at him in askance. "Rian, what sort of trap could we possibly make?"


    He shrugged. "I don''t know, but Kolinh said it might be helpful. Besides, maybe we''ll get stupidly lucky and manage to get a loop around the beast''s foot or something."


    "That sounds like a stupid idea from a bad play."


    "Look, all I know is the abomination probably doesn''t know how to untie knots. If we manage to do that, we might be able to tie the other end to a tree, and keep it mostly in place enough so you can work your magic on it somehow."


    She rolled her eyes. "It won''t come to that."


    "We''re hoping it won''t come to that," Rian said. "If things go unpredictably wrong, I want to give everyone options beyond ''poke it with long sticks'' or ''run away''. To that end, we''d also been making stone-tipped arrows. Or rather, we''ve been putting the stone and bone arrowheads you''ve already made onto new shafts."


    "I don''t think poking at the abomination with even smaller sticks will do much good, Rian."


    "They will if you put some kind of binding on the arrowhead. Preferably one that explodes, I know you have a few. We had the one arrow before, but given what happened last time we could have used it¡­ well, more arrows means more chances that they''ll hit."


    Lori considered that. "I''ll need to do some more testing, but the arrows probably need to be within my line of sight," she said. Although¡­ yes, that binding might work. "Once I''ve put the binding onto it, they''ll need to be handled with care, or the binding might be set off while the arrow is being held." It shouldn''t come to that, if she made the binding correctly. Of course, she''d need to do some testing of that binding to make sure that that binding worked as intended¡­


    "How much testing will you need?" Rian asked. "Another day? Because that would give us more time to prepare and make bombs. Though after this is over, Gunvi is going to need to make a lot of replacements. We need those pots for everyday use, after all."


    ¡­


    "Rian¡­ are you trying to procrastinate?" Lori said flatly.


    He blinked, looking surprised. "What? No! Why would you¡­?" He paused. "All right, I think I see why you''d think I was doing that, but I''m not trying to procrastinate here! It''s just we''d benefit from having more time to prepare."


    "So¡­ procrastinate."


    "Again, I can see why you''d think that, but that''s not what I''m doing!"


    Lori gave her lord one more suspicious look before looking over her shoulder. "Shanalorre, how close is the abomination to the dome?"


    There was a pause as Shanalorre no doubt tried to translate her perceptions into something understandable to those without it. "Very close, Great Binder. From what I can perceive, it has stopped moving within sight of the river. If it weren''t for all the trees obstructing sight, the typhon abomination would likely be visible from the top of the hill the mine is in. It¡­ seems to be devouring another, smaller abomination that it managed to catch. According to the hunters, beasts generally do not stay in the vicinity of their kills after they have fed, but most of the directions it is likely to move towards will soon bring it to the river, which will put it in view of the dome the next time it goes to drink."


    That¡­ sounded very close. "That sounds very close," Lori noted.


    "How close is it in terms of¡­ oh, the diameter of the dome?" Rian asked.


    There was a brief pause. "Measured from the edge of the dome facing the abomination towards the abomination''s approximate center¡­ about five to six dome diameters'' distance, approximately. Unfortunately, I cannot be more precise than that."


    That was¡­ concerningly near, put in context. Lori didn''t have an exact measure of the dome''s diameter, but she had walked through and around it enough time to have a sense of the dome''s size. Walking four or five times across its length wouldn''t be that much distance. Lori wouldn''t even complain about needing to walk somewhere that far.


    "It appears that procrastinating isn''t an option, Rian," Lori said.


    "I wasn''t suggesting that we¡ªugh, never mind. Yes, that''s disturbingly close. If it''s eating, then it might head for water soon to wash off the blood, and that would put it even closer. With everyone in the dragon shelter, there shouldn''t be any risk of people being endangered, but if it''s close to the dome it would limit the bindings you could use without causing damage to the dome''s infrastructure buildings. Kolinh, can we deal with the abomination tomorrow with what we have?"


    "It would depend on how the Great Binder intends to approach the abomination," Kolinh said. "We would at best simply be distractions to try and guide the thing to where the Great Binder needs it to be."


    "Couldn''t we stand well back and cheer her on as her plan goes perfectly and no one is any danger whatsoever?" Rian said hopefully.


    "Probably," the other man said, "but I wouldn''t count on it. It''s very hard to get a beast to go where you want it, never mind an abomination."


    Rian sighed. "Ah, my hopes and dreams, dashed by this cruel world¡­"


    "Rian, stop being a useless thespian. Is there anything else?"


    Rian looked towards Kolinh for a moment, as if waiting for the man to bring up anything else. When the man stayed silent, her lord shook his head. "No, I think that''s all of it."


    "Then finish your food and get me those arrows. I''ll see about what kind of binding I can anchor onto them." She''d need to make the lightningball bindings in any case, and for that she''d need a lot of lightningwisps¡ªwhich was why she hadn''t dissolved the lightning ball she''d made earlier, merely deactivated it, as well as binding all the loose lightningwisps it had generated¡ªso she might as well anchor bindings to the arrows as well. Wait, she needed something to anchor those lightning balls too. "And river stones."


    For some reason, Rian turned and gave Kolinh a smug look. "See? I told you gathering all those rocks was a good idea."


    "So you did," Kolinh said, handing Rian one of his micans. "I''ll have them brought in, Great Binder. Where do you want them?"

 453 - Staying Up To Work

    Lori hadn''t stayed up late to work in a while. That period when she''d been taking notes didn''t count, as she barely remembered it as anything but a haze of tiredness. Most days, she''d just go straight to her bed after dinner, do one final check of the reduced number of bindings she now maintained for ones she needed to imbue, maybe take another bath if she wanted to feel cool instead of warm, and go straight to sleep. Sometimes she''d read her almanac for a little stimulation, reading over uses for vistas and tamings and various other things. They were vaguely interesting but not arresting, and she was able to drift off to sleep reading things that were probably useful but which she couldn''t utilize yet.


    Not tonight. For the first time since the expedition had settled here, Lori needed to stay up and get some work done to be ready for the next day. Since they would be leaving immediately after breakfast, there would be no time to do it then, and Lori probably wouldn''t be lingering over her food either.


    It reminded her of school, in a depressing ''I thought I was done with having to do things like this'' sort of way as she sat on a bench, her back to the stone outer walls of her Dungeon''s entryway. On one side of her was a pile of arrows with a mix of arrowheads that were made of stone or bone, some of which she actually remembered making. Lori knew that she''d previously made much more, but this was all that remained to date. She''d have to set aside some time to make more arrowheads soon.


    There was a slightly smaller pile on her other side, where she placed the arrows that already had bindings anchored to them, imbued but deactivated. She''d need to activate them before they were used, since even if she used a line of lightwisps as a channel to connect herself to the binding on the arrowhead, if the line were stretched far enough the binding would break apart from there simply not being enough wisps to stretch across the physical distance.


    The binding she anchored onto the arrowheads was relatively simple, consisting of two heavily imbued ''spikes'' of lightningwisps that connected where they were anchored and protruded as far from arrowhead as she could make without them starting to deform, which was about a hand-length. Each had an opposing directionality, with the intention that once loosed the spikes would penetrate the flesh of anything the arrows were shot at, and lightning would flow from one spike through the flesh of the target and into the other spike, which would draw the lightning back into the first spike, creating a loop of lightning that would do horrible things to the flesh that was the intermediary that allowed the lightning to pass.


    Per Rian''s request, she had formed the binding such that the loop would exist only very briefly, because once completed the binding would immediately consume all imbuement and likely cause the flesh to violently explode. If the typhon abomination was altered enough to have syrupy abomination blood, it would hopefully catch fire.


    As long as whoever was shooting it was careful to not touch the arrowhead, it should be safe to handle once she activated the binding, though Lori would need to activate each one individually. Not ideal, but if the abomination was close enough and in an area open enough they could have several people shooting arrows at it, her lightning balls would have either failed or been avoided.


    Up in the sky, the dragon''s trailing threads continued to obscure the sky and made the moons look like they''d been cut into slices in preparation for cooking. There was a distinct lack of bugsong in the air as Lori worked, but it was more than made up for by all the people not sleeping. Now that everything was more or less back to normal¡ªthe typhon abomination not withstanding, since it was in another demesne¡ªpeople had returned to their usual habits. With the relative cool returned, there were once more bonfires lit in front of the baths, surrounded by benches filled with people talking and making all sorts of noise that was at least not music. Some people were doing some late-night laundry, and while there was no more line in front of the Um, the open doors indicated that the rooms were still occupied.


    She could see Riz was stationed to tend to the ledger of who was using the Um''s rooms and would therefore need to clean it up at the end of the week, although she seemed to be doing it with her head in Mikon''s lap. A part of Lori wondered if this mean Umu was home alone or was doing late-night laundry alone, before dismissing the thought as nonsensical.


    Next to Lori, sitting on the ground¡ªon a plank instead of directly, so he wasn''t getting his trousers too dirty¡ªRian was using a pointy rock to carve ''top'' onto several riverstones so there were would be no confusion about which side it should be facing. He was humming happily, and it actually seemed to be genuine instead of some sort of affectation. From the way the humming''s rhythm kept changing, they seemed to be songs.


    Lori focused back on the binding she was making, drawing lightningwisps from the air nearby. The binding she had tested over the river earlier that day was now anchored to the ground next to her, marked by rings of light to keep people from walking into it¡ªshe didn''t want them accidentally grounding the lightningwisps¡ªand helping her see. She had reformed the binding so that the lightningwisps in the center merely filled the air with sparks instead of lightning, while the shell of lightningwisps and airwisps kept the sparks contained so they wouldn''t get loose. It provided her with a replenishing source of lightningwisps for the bindings she was making. There were still a lot of bindings to make tonight. Once she finished with the arrows, she''d still have to make and anchor lightning balls onto the rocks she was having Rian mark.


    Ugh, why did she have to do this herself? She was the Dungeon Binder! She should have Whisperers doing this for her!


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    ¡­


    Ah, right. She couldn''t trust any wizards to not try and kill her to claim her core, since she couldn''t just sequester herself in her dungeon and shut everyone out. Actually, ever since that first dragon, her Dungeon had never really been empty, had it?


    Sighing, Lori put down the arrow she''d just finished anchoring a binding onto and picked up the next one.


    "You don''t have to stay up to do this, you know," Rian said, not looking up from what he was working on. "A day¡ª"


    "No," Lori interjected as she claimed lightningwisps and began to form the binding. "No procrastinating."


    "Would procrastinating really be worse than having all our preparations in order and our Dungeon Binder¡ªthe one we''ll be relying on to kill this abomination¡ªgetting a good night''s sleep so she''s well-rested when she has to deal with the thing?"


    "I can sleep on the boat," Lori said as she shaped the binding into a pair of spikes. "This needs to be done. I will not have an abomination of that size within one of my demesnes."


    "You could have Taeclas or Lidzuga teach Shanalorre some kind of meaning that can deal with the abomination," Rian suggested.


    "Firstly, never suggest such nonsense again. Secondly, we do not have three years for her to learn the bare basics of Deadspeaking, which will be needed for her to learn any meanings."


    "So¡­ she should start learning now?"


    "Rian."


    "Yes, your Bindership?"


    "Shut up and get back to work."


    Rian sighed. "Yes, your Bindership."


    "And never bring up the subject again."


    "No."


    Lori paused in setting down the arrow she''d just finished, turning to stare at him as she let the arrow fall from her fingers.


    Rian still didn''t look up. "I''m not going to let you willfully ignore viable options just because you don''t like them. If the options exist, they need to be actively considered for the situation, even if your considered answer is ''no''. As your lord, I''m supposed to give you good advice, not just the advice you want to hear. You should have read enough history and story to know what happens to people with advisors who do that. It''s your prerogative to ignore the advice, but it''s my duty to give it. So no, I will not comply with never bringing up the subject again, not when Shanalorre is far more useful to you and both demesnes if she actually knows how to properly do Deadspeaking."


    Lori gave him a flat stare. "Noted," she said eventually. "Now drop the subject and get back to work."


    By the time Lori completed anchoring bindings onto the arrowheads, Rian was long done. However, rather than returning to his house, he simply moved his plank up against the wall of the entryway and sat with his back to it, staring up at the stars. Lori had expected him to accompany Riz and Mikon when the former finally closed up the Um, but he simply waved to them and sat back. What was he waiting for?


    Well, Lori didn''t have any more time to bother with him. She still had more bindings to make.


    At first, Lori had thought she would need to make a full-sized lightning ball binding to anchor onto the rocks that she''d had Rian mark, but on consideration she decided that wouldn''t be necessary, at least for the moment. She''d simply make a smaller binding utilizing a disproportionately large amount of lightningwisps, which she would expand to the appropriate size tomorrow. It would make moving the bindings around easier, as she wouldn''t have three-pace wide bindings knocking against each other and other bindings around them¡ª


    "Do you want me to get you some water?" Rian said suddenly.


    Lori blinked, looking up from the binding she''d just completed and was minimally imbuing so it would last until morning. "What?"


    "You''ve been working for a while, so I thought you''d like something to drink."


    Lori opened her mouth to tell him she wasn''t thirsty, and realized she actually was. How long had she been working? "Yes, thank you," she said, standing up and¡ªargh, how long had she been sitting? Her posterior was loudly telling her she should have moved sooner, her back was complaining she''d been bent over too long, and her bladder was informing her why she was thirsty. "I will be back in a moment."


    When she returned, in addition to a cup and a jar of water, Rian also had a pair of micans and some blueballs. "I figured you needed something to eat too, in case you were starting to feel sleepy."


    "I wasn''t until you brought it up," Lori said, taking the cup. It was empty, but Rian picked up the jar and poured when she held out the cup. She had two more drinks before grabbing one of the micans to peel it open¡ª


    "Did you wash your hands?"


    "¡­"


    After coming back from washing her hands with soap in her room, Lori started peeling open one of the micans. The little wedges were sweet and tart in her mouth as her bite released the fruit''s juices. She let the flavor wash over her tongue before chewing and swallowing. Next to her, Rian had cracked open one of the blueballs, popping the firm and deceptively dry-looking fruits into his mouth. A few moments later, he spat out the seed into his hand before tucking it into the peel.


    For a moment, they just sat there.


    "Shouldn''t you be going to sleep?" Lori said as she started peeling the second mican.


    "Shouldn''t you? You''re the one who''s supposed to be killing the abomination tomorrow. Besides, if a choker walks by while you''re working, someone has to notice it, and it certainly isn''t going to be you."


    Lori frowned. "Are there still chokers about?"


    "No idea. No one''s reported seeing one yet, but maybe they didn''t think it was worth reporting. The patrols have found an abomination or two, however, so there''s that." Rian picked up a stick lying next to him that Lori hadn''t really noticed until he''d picked it up. "Keep on working. I''ll be right here."


    A sound came from Rian''s house. It was muffled by the walls, but had a very familiar tone and pitch. Very motherly.


    Lori gave Rian a flat look. He''d turned to look towards his house when the sound came, but was now looking away, adjusting his legs as he sat. When he realized she was looking at him, he said, "What?"


    "If you want to go back home¡ª" Lori said dryly.


    "Don''t you have work you still need to do? Or are you going to sleep now?"


    She gave him one last look and shrugged, picking up another river rock the size of her palm and making sure that the inscribed ''top'' was facing her. Claiming airwisps from around her and lightningwisps from the sparks released by the binding next to her, Lori began forming another lightningball. One down, nineteen more to go.


    ¡­


    Why did she think it was a good idea to make twenty of these bindings?-!

 454 - Setting Off To Finally Kill This Thing

    When Lori woke up the next day, she felt strangely miserable, and it had nothing to do with the loud knocking on her door. That was its own, separate misery.


    A third misery was added as a loud voice called out, "Your Bindership, wake up! You told me not to let you sleep in, remember? It''s time to get to work." Rian''s voice, and with it came memories of last night telling him to do exactly that, UGH!


    Making a sound between a groan and a growl, Lori reluctantly sat up on her bed, rubbing at her eyes. Despite the fact that¡ªby her orders¡ª it probably wasn''t that much earlier than the time she usually woke up anyway, Lori felt like she was severely lacking in sleep. It was what always happened when she didn''t wake up on her own. "I''m awake, now stop it!" she called out towards the door.


    "Oh good, you''re up!" Rian said cheerfully¡ªand loudly¡ªthrough the still-closed door. "I''ll be back in a bit to make sure you didn''t just flop into bed and go back to sleep, like you ordered! What fruits to do you want for breakfast?"


    Lori glared at the door, but she had in fact foolishly told him to do that. Well, if she was going to be up unreasonably early anyway¡­ "All of them!"


    "All of the fruits we have, got it! Enjoy your bath, your Bindership!"


    Lori glared at the door some more before grudgingly slipping on her tsinelas and getting to her feet as she headed for her private bath.


    A quick wash, the water comfortably cool then comfortably warm, and Lori was feeling far more awake¡ªunfortunately¡ªand still miserable, though her thoughts had cleared. By the time Rian came back to check on her, she was already half-dressed and pulling on her trousers. While the fog of sleep had mostly been faded away by that point, the misery of having to wake up early hadn''t, and she was in a foul mood as she went down the stairs to the dining hall, her staff in hand. The quartz embedded into it vibrated as they hadn''t in a long time, full of lightningwisps, and a piece of charcoal rattled around in the coalcharm at the end of her staff, currently unlit but ready. She''d rolled up the sleeves of her shirt and pinned them in place to keep them from being a hindrance, her head bare since her hat would only have gotten in her way.


    The kitchen was active, breakfast seemed already in progress, and there were already several people at the tables. A glance out through the doors showed her that the outside of her demesne was still cloaked in early morning light, and a brief check through her connections to her core showed the pervasive presence of dew. Ugh, just the sight made her want to turn and crawl back into her bed¡­


    There was a pile of fruits on the table in front of her chair, which did in fact seemed to consist of all the varieties of fruits they had available. And while the table was occupied, it was less full than usual. Only Riz, Rian, Shanalorre¡ªand her cousin, who had folded her arms on the table and was sleeping¡ªand¡­ uh¡­ Lori reached for her pouch out of habit but she was fair certain she didn''t have a rock with his name on it. She could recall that much. The older former militiaman who wasn''t Yllian. Eh, she''d just wait for Rian to say his name.


    "Good morning, your Bindership," Rian greeted cheerfully, and Lori had an urge to strangle him all over again. However, now that she could actually see him, he looked as awake as she felt. His eyes slightly half-lidded, his hair was wetter than it usually was when he came out of the baths, and seemed to be shivering slightly. Still, he had a clearly forced smile on his face¡ªunusual in itself, since most of the time his smiles were theatrically sincere¡ªand he seemed to be forcing himself to sit up straight. "All the fruits, as you requested. They should tide you over until the rest of breakfast is ready. Kolinh says everyone is ready to leave as soon as we''ve all eaten."


    Ah, Kolinh, that was his name. Lori nodded in grumpy acknowledgement as she sat down and reached for a golden bud, scoring the skin with her thumbnail and tearing it open from that tear. "Hrm."


    "The arrows and rocks have been packed up," Rian continued, taking her non-answer as encouragement to keep talking¡ªcolors, did she remember to imbue the bindings on them? No, she hadn''t, she''d decided she''d imbue them in the morning!


    "Where have they been packed up?" she asked, simply to narrow down where to look.


    "They''re on the boat at the dock," Rian said. "Do you want to inspect them before we leave?"


    Ah, there they were. Lori waved a hand dismissively as she chewed and swallowed the yellow wedge in her mouth. "That won''t be necessary," she said as she started imbuing all the bindings, taking care to heavily imbue the ones anchored to the stones. "Shanalorre, where is the abomination now?"


    "It has not strayed far from its previous location last night, Great Binder," the other Dungeon Binder said. "The abomination is currently immobile and staying in place. I believe it is still asleep at the moment."


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    "Hopefully, it will stay so until we get there," Lori said.


    "Somehow, I doubt it.," Rian sighed. "But I suppose that''s what all the arrows are for, right?" He looked towards the kitchen and got to his feet. "I''ll go get the food."


    Lori glanced down at the fruits in front of her and quickly grabbed a happyfruit, beginning to peel it open. She needed to eat as many fruits as she could before proper breakfast arrived.


    <hr>


    Breakfast was filling, comfortably warm¡ªmeaning it was probably still too hot¡ªand unfortunately quick as everyone ate hurriedly, even Shanalorre. By the time they were all finished, people were already starting to enter the dining hall, meaning that others arrived to occupy her table. For once, the other Dungeon Binder didn''t try to wake up her cousin and coax her to eat, instead asking the brat to take care of the girl in Shanalorre''s stead. The brat gave a cheerful affirmative as the two of them guided Yoshka to sit at the other table, where the young girl once more curled up with her head pillowed on her arms.


    "Do you want me to examine her?" the Deadspeaker¡ªLori glanced at her head, and was glad she was wearing a cloth today¡ªTaeclas said as she sat down, giving the young girl a concerned frowned. "That sort of lethargy isn''t normal in children her age."


    "She''s fine," Shanalorre said. "She''s been examined before and is completely healthy, she just likes sleeping. Once everyone else is here she''ll wake up because there''s food and people to play with."


    Lori distinctly saw the sleeping girl''s head move in a nod.


    ...


    Well, it wasn''t like Lori couldn''t understand wanting to sleep more.


    Thankfully, there was no delay from overly long goodbyes and pointless crying. Lori had barely seated herself on Lori''s Shed Boat and made herself comfortable on her chair there when the former militia and hunters began making their way aboard, as well as onto the other boats.


    Three boats were being used to convey everyone to River''s Fork this morning, her own and two others. One of the boats was simply for all the pikes, ropes, jars and other equipment that had been prepared for this hunt, while the other carried the people that wouldn''t fit in Lori''s Shed Boat. In what seemed like a few moments, the three boats were off, moving together down river.


    "You should get some sleep," Rian said, sitting on one of the side benches of the boat such that he was leaning back on one of the poles along the sides of the boat. In front of Lori sat Riz''s friends, in the middle of whom sat Shanalorrre. The women seemed to be fretting over the smaller Dungeon Binder, which they had never done for Lori, offering to vacate their seats if Shanalorre wanted to be comfortable. "We have some time before we get to River''s Fork, so you might as well get a nap in."


    Lori frowned at him.


    "What?"


    "Why aren''t you operating the boat?"


    Rian pointed behind her. "Riz pulled non-rank. She made the completely logical argument that she has more experience operating this boat than I do, so she should steer."


    "I also said you should get some sleep," Riz said from behind Lori.


    "Yes, Riz," Rian said in the same tone Lori heard her Ina use when her Nanay was nagging as he made a show of leaning back and closing his eyes. "Sleeping now."


    He actually did seem to go to sleep, or at least fall into a doze, despite the movements of the boat as the steam jet driver propelled it over the water. Lori gave him an incredulous look as she settled herself more comfortably in her seat, continuing to imbue the bindings she had so painstakingly prepared last night. In front of her, Shanalorre was leaning against one of Riz''s friends, using the woman as backrest as the Dungeon Binder closed her eyes and also seemed to fall asleep.


    Lori shook her head as she sat back to be more comfortable. Really, trying to sleep was a futile effort with all the movement. The boat had a strange rocking motion to it as the front moved up and down, meaning it simply wasn''t possible to settle in place. Closing her eyes to help her concentrate on the bindings she was imbuing, Lori let the motion keep her awake as she leaned her head back and¡ª


    <hr>


    "Your bindership? Wake up, we''re almost there."


    Lori jerked awake, blinking in confusion. Had she actually fallen asleep? She hadn''t been that sleepy, had she? However, a hurried look around revealed that they were in fact approaching the dome of River''s Fork, meaning she''d been asleep since¡­ well, she''d been asleep.


    "Shanalorre, where is the abomination now?" Lori said as she rubbed at her eyes to try and pull herself to wakefulness, straightening up in her chair and wincing at the small aches her slouch as she had slept had given her.


    "It''s roused and is moving towards the river, Great Binder," Shanalorre reported, rubbing at her eyes. "I¡­ I think it was in some kind of altercation with one of the surviving smaller abominations. It seems to be injured, though I cannot say for certain."


    "Are the injuries enough to make it easier to deal with?" Rian said hopefully.


    Shanalorre tilted her head, eyes closing slightly as she concentrated. "I¡­ am unsure. However, the abomination is still mobile, so¡­"


    Rian sighed. "Well, looks like we''re all still going to need to earn our keep today," he said.


    "I don''t pay any of you anything," Lori pointed out.


    "Ah, right. We''re not even earning anything, we''re donating our time." Rian directed a pitiful look towards her. "Are you sure this can''t count towards out taxes when you eventually get around to doing that?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "I''ll consider it."


    "Um¡­" came Riz''s voice behind her.


    Lori turned her head so she could see the woman out of the corner of her eye. "What is it, Erzebed?"


    "Does that include all the ''donations'' over the past year?"


    She was distinctly aware that all of the other women at the front of the boat were also listening intently.


    "I''ll consider it," Lori said flatly.


    Why did everyone cheer at that?

 455 - The Abomination

    Once they arrived in the dome of River''s Fork, work began quickly. Yllian had met them with a large group of able-bodied men that had been sent yesterday to prepare for today, as well as¡ªLori checked the rocks in her belt pouch¡ªLidzuga. Kolinh and Yllian briefly spoke with one another as the pikes, arrows and stones were removed from one of the boats, then spoke to Shanalorre. A boat was loaded with people before crossing the river to the opposite bank. Seemingly unarmed, not even carrying bow or spear, they slipped into the trees. Those would be the hunters and scouts, Lori recalled, who would ascertain the abomination''s location and condition, and if necessary try to guide the abomination towards where it could be killed.


    As much as Lori would have loved to stay at the dome on the other side of the river from the abomination, she had preparations to make. Ones that unfortunately required that she also cross to the other shore, although she was able to delay the matter until all the other militia had made the crossing before her to ensure that there was some preparation to keep her safe. On the other side, Lori was surprised to find the ground heavily worked. There were deep trenches just wide enough for a person to fit inside that seemed randomly situated, trees whose branches seemed to have woven and sometimes fused together into strange lattices of walls at above head height, and large thickets of thorny brambles made from a mix of random branches and ropeweed. Distributed seemingly at random were small piles of branches covered with leaves, and interspersed among them were shallow pits that had been covered over by branches and leaves to hide them, the branches intended to break should the abomination''s weight rest on them.


    "Such a short fall seems pointless," Lori commented when the purpose of the holes had been explained to her. "The abomination could simply stand up from it."


    "That would be the case it this were a little thing like a choker, or even just a leaper. Well, a small leaper. But you''re forgetting how big this abomination is," Rian said. "To something of that size and weight, what would be a little fall to us would probably break its bones, since it weighs far more. Even if it doesn''t break a leg, a sprained ankle that the abomination can''t put weight on would hamper it greatly."


    The preparations were mostly concentrated on either side of a particular area that to Lori''s unpracticed eye seemed to be a rather wide trail leading towards the river that the hunter had put forward as the abomination''s most likely route. A so-called ''game trail'', it was apparently a path that had likely been regularly trodden on by beasts before the demesne had been founded. While there had been far fewer beasts using the trail recently, it hadn''t yet faded, and it was reportedly also the most convenient route for something the size of the abomination to pass through the trees towards the river. While she had been expecting some kind of preparations, she hadn''t expected them to be able to accomplish this much in just one day.


    Apparently beasts¡ªand abominations, by extension¡ªdidn''t like having to rub up against trees or walk through bushes and things unless they were marking their demesne, so the abomination would mostly likely walk the path of least resistance¡­ especially if they tied ropes between trees to mildly discourage the abomination from walking between them. It wasn''t certain the abomination would rather choose unobstructed and wide paths, but was supposedly very likely.


    "The trenches are to give people something to try and dive into," Rian exposited quietly as Lori eyed one such trench running perpendicular to the game trail nearby. The dirt on either side was only loose earth that had been piled to either side, but ropes and a tangle of branches with large, visible wooden thorns had been placed atop it, partially covering the trench beneath. "By the hunters'' estimates, they''re too narrow for the abomination to simply stick its head in and pull someone out, and the ropes and thorns are meant to deter it from trying. If the thing tries to reach in with its limbs¡ªvery unlikely¡ªit should get stuck enough we can try to pike its sides. The rest are to try and discourage it from going certain ways in case it decides to chase someone. "


    Lori looked at all the Deadspoken wooden shapes as she checked the rocks in her belt pouch. Lidzuga¡ªwith assistance from Shanalorre¡ªhad done a lot of work yesterday. Hopefully it all worked. The Deadspeaker was making a few more last moment barriers, a pair of militiamen following him in case Shanalorre announced the abomination''s arrival. He was clearly not having to imbue the wood himself, as he simply touched the tree he was standing next to and the branches immediately began to move. The fact Shanalorre was looking straight at him was another clue.


    Well, Lori had to make her own preparations.


    ¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C¨C


    Lori barely managed to finish laying down the marked stone she was working on, expanding the binding anchored onto it into a sphere four paces wide just as she had done with the rest, when a high-pitched, piercing whistle filled the air. She glanced up as she took another one of the marked river stones from the bag over her shoulder. Thankfully the bag had gotten lighter as she had laid out the bag''s contents.


    "Great Binder, that means the abomination is approaching," Riz said, holding a bow and three of the imbued arrows in one hand. The three other women with them were similarly armed.


    "So I surmised, Erzebed," Lori said, letting a stone fall back into the bag as she began to stride towards the source of the sound. Only a quarter of the stones remained, the rest distributed along the game trail and a few open spaces where Lori thought the abomination might step out of the trail¡­ or step into it. "Can you see it?" She didn''t want to look behind her and accidentally fall into one of the trenches and holes. In front of her, she could see other people reacting to the whistle. Pikes were being handed out, and the people wielding them were forming groups of at least three. Others were jumping down into trenches or climbing up trees, carrying ropes, bows and arrows, jars and¡­burning sticks? No, those were burning cords wrapped around short sticks.


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    "No Great Binder, but that doesn''t mean we should wait until we can," Riz said. "Please Great Binder, we need to hurry."


    Hurry? The only reason Lori wasn''t running was because all the digging had left loose dirt everywhere and she was afraid of tripping!


    Fortunately, the abomination had not yet appeared by the time they reached the banks of the river, where the various boats were and Shanalorre had finally stopped blowing on the whistle that someone had provided for her to signal with. Riz and the women with her immediately grabbed pikes that had been left behind and moved to place themselves between Lori and the woods, Rian taking the bow and arrows from Riz and stepping to the side, possibly to get a better view of the abomination in case he needed to draw and loose. He shouldn''t, because until Lori actually activated the binding anchored to the arrow it would do nothing, but he was clearly preparing himself. The three other militia who had stayed behind to guard Shanalorre spread out as well, also carrying bows, although their arrows had no bindings anchored to them.


    The lines of lightwisps connecting the stones to Lori were strained to their utmost, but fortunately none seemed to have overextended themselves and snapped from distance. She gathered more lightwisps out of the air through her skin and added them to the lines anchored to her fingernail to give the binding some more slack as she finally turned around, looking among the trees for the abomination. Everyone seemed to be doing the same, trying to spot the approaching danger, pikes in hand and ready to lower to try to discourage the abomination from approaching.


    "Shanalorre, where is the abomination?" Lori asked as she took the rest of the arrows with bindings anchored to them from the quiver hanging from her waist. As quickly as she could, she started claiming and binding more lightwisps, using them to make lines that connected the arrows to her fingernail.


    Shanalorre pointed. "There," she said, her finger pointing steadily into the woods.


    Lori tried to follow the indicated direction with her gaze, but she saw nothing beast or abomination-like. Rian actually bent down and put his head next to Shanalorre''s hand so he could sight along the length of the other Dungeon Binder''s finger, with had remained still and true. She narrowed her eyes, trying to see better, even if doing so didn''t really help. While her vision had always been good¡ªshe''d gone to see an ocular Deadspeaker every year to keep her vision perfect, at least until she''d left Taniar Demesne¡ªthe irregular shapes of the trees, the distance, and the gloom caused by the dragon''s tendrils blocking out the sky made it hard to see into the woods.


    Claiming and binding more lightwisps, Lori formed them into complementary bindings to act as a spyglass as well as slightly intensify the light passing through them to mitigate the gloom, and anchored the bindings to her thumbnail and forefingernail. A quick adjustment to bring the image seen through the bindings in focus, and she was able to use it to start scanning the woods¡ª


    There!


    With the binding, what had been dark, distant and obscured brightened, and she was finally able to see the typhon abomination. It was still a great distance away, but she could see it now, standing between distant trees.


    Lori had seen the typhon beast before, though it had usually only been briefly as she passed it when travelling along the river. The beast had never lingered, always turning away soon after she''d spotted it as if aware she desired its quick death. She had gotten the sense of a thick body, a head that appeared almost grotesquely oversized in comparison to the rest of it¡ªat least compared to the leapers and chokers¡ªand rows of large, knife-like spines running down its back.


    That had changed.


    Within the boundaries of the demesne, the colors of the now-abomination''s plumage were revealed to be shades of dark brown. Despite its size, most of its body would have blended with the gloom beneath the trees if it weren''t for the binding that intensified light for Lori. She needed a second look to realize that the abomination had patches of bark instead of feathers in seemingly random places, as the colors of the two seemed to blend together in her eyes, and at a distance the different textures would likely have been indistinguishable.


    Some features, Lori had expected. The abomination seemed to have a branch fused to the end of its tail, a few stubborn but dead leaves still hanging on as the many smaller branches made the appendage look like a broom. There were other, smaller branches apparently fused to its spines, as if the tree limbs had fallen on the abomination''s back and had sunk into the flesh and bone. A branch had fused to the left side of the abomination''s head, running mostly parallel to its jaw, now covered in blood.


    Lori also saw that the abomination was heavily injured. One of its forelimbs was hanging down instead of curled up close to its body, and she could see that everything from the elbow of that extremity downwards seemed be flopping bonelessly. One eye was also a bloody golden ruin, and the abomination kept turning its head to let its single eye cast its gaze forward. On a second glance, patches of the abomination''s feathers were matted down and sticky with golden, syrupy blood. It was also moving slowly, and¡­ was that a limp? Didn''t the scouts say it had been relatively uninjured?


    Perhaps this could be to their advantage? If it were injured, it should be easier to kill.


    "Rian, can you make the target at this distance?" Lori said.


    "I can barely see the target, so no," her lord said, looking at the other bowmen as Lori finished making lines of lightwisps to anchor the various arrows to her fingernails. "How about you three?"


    "Still too far, Lord Rian, especially with the draw on these bows," one said. "If this was a clear field or the day was brighter, perhaps, but¡­"


    Lori tuned out the rest, watching the abomination. She held up her left hand, the lines of lightwisps anchored to her nails stretching towards rocks she had laid out even if she couldn''t see them, and selected the line connecting her to the binding nearest the abomination. She couldn''t see the rock anymore, but remembered where it was. If the beast would just step over it¡­


    As she watched, the abomination took a slow step forward.

 456 - Lightning

    When the typhon abomination moved, Lori expected the ground to shake and a vibration like a deep bass drum to spread with every footfall¡­ which was silly, because such things were merely theater conventions meant to convey size and drama. That thought came later, and it took an embarrassingly long time to do so. So when the abomination stepped forward, Lori was momentarily confused as to why it was moving so quietly.


    All around the prepared ground, the militia stood in their trenches and behind various thorny obstacles, even as the groups with pikes slowly turned to keep the points of their long weapon pointed towards the abomination. As the thing approached the first of the trees whose branches had been entangled together in a makeshift barrier, Lori was suddenly struck by how big the abomination was. She''d known that it was large¡ªshe''d read it in the almanac, after all¡ª but she''d had to walk under many of the entangled branches when she''d been laying down the stones with her lightningball bindings on them. The branches had been well above her head.


    For the typhon abomination, they were lower than its face. Four paces at the hip, Lori recalled. However, given how the beast elevated its head and upper body, in practical terms it was far taller than that. Before the abomination would have struck the barrier, it turned to the side, avoiding the interwoven branches as Rian said it would, and causing it to set foot on the game trail. Although from the sigh of relief next to her, her lord hadn''t been as confident it would do so as he had appeared. They watched at the abomination continued walking, now following the trail, its nostrils flaring.


    For all intents and purposes, the dragonborn moved in utter silence. That could simply be distance, as it was still well away from her¡ªit was still well outside the ground they had prepared around the game trail, although the beast seemed to be on the trail itself¡ªbut if it had been behind Lori, she likely would have had no idea it was near until it was dangerously too late. It was unlikely to be far too late, since she was a Dungeon Binder, but¡­ well, her next binding would have a high probability of being her last.


    "Your Bindership, may I respectfully suggest you get into the boat with Shanalorre and move to the middle of the river while you wait for us to kill this thing?" Rian said. For some reason, he was speaking through tightly clenched teeth. "Please?"


    "It''s still far away, Rian. I have plenty of time to get in the boat if it comes close enough to be a danger."


    "Your Bindership, you don''t actually think it moves that slow when it''s intending to take down prey, do you? Most predators that size move in absurdly fast bursts to surprise and take down its prey. If it wants to eat you, it will suddenly move faster than a leaper and bring its whole head down to bite you in one move."


    Lori turned to stare at her lord. So did Shanalorre. She got the sense that Riz would have turned to stare if she hadn''t been so professional. "Why do you know that?"


    "I once knew a vitalogist who was very enthusiastic about all the ways beasts could kill each other and also us. And that was just from casual conversation and listening. Did you know most venoms are edible? They''re intended to be injected into the bloodstream, so taking them orally, as long as you don''t have a mouth sore or an ulcer, is actually no problem."


    "Fascinating, and pointless. I do not believe this one has any venoms."


    "I should hope not. If it had venoms, then its natural prey is something significantly bigger that it is. We''d have noticed an islandshell on land. Uh, is it standing on one of your traps now, your Bindership?"


    Lori turned and the abomination had gotten closer and she hadn''t heard a thing! After a brief moment of heart-clenching panic, she checked the state of the bindings anchored to her fingernails, then mentally set aside the ones that weren''t lightning balls. She inspected each binding, but didn''t feel any additional lightningwisps and firewisps within the volume of any of them, even as her eyes checked where her stones were. "No, it isn''t," she said. Since she hadn''t managed to lay out all of her stones, the bindings only covered two-thirds of the game trail within the prepared ground. However, since the abomination was following the trail, all she had to do was wait, and it would reach her bindings¡­


    All it needed to do was continue on its way¡­


    "Shanalorre, if Lori''s not going out into the water¡ª"


    "I will stay," Shanalorre said.


    "Shana, now is not the time!" Rian hissed. "You''re not needed here, we can already see the thing, get out in the water so Yoshka doesn''t have to risk losing another family member if that thing gets too close."


    Lori heard wood scraping on rocks and water splashing, soon followed by the sound of one of their boats'' steam jet drivers activating. She glanced towards Rian as he returned to stand beside her, an arrow nocked on his bow. "None of you loose until I tell you to," she said. "I need to activate the binding before you release it." She didn''t know if she had enough lightwisps to still connect her to the arrows after they were loosed, so she wasn''t going to take the chance.


    "Understood, your Bindership," Rian said, and the other men with bows echoed him. They kept their bows down, not yet drawing.


    The abomination was still walking, still following the path even as its nostrils were flaring and its head kept swinging from side to side. In one of the trenches that paralleled the game trail, the militia had to hold their pikes vertically, as they had no room to keep the weapons leveled at the abomination due to the walls of the trench being so narrow.


    "It can smell us," Rian muttered. "It knows we''re here, but it probably doesn''t know what we are, and its kind probably hasn''t learned how to react to people yet¡­"


    "Rian, who are you expositing to?" Lori said, spyglass once more raised to her eye. Just a little bit more¡­ it was almost at the first binding¡­


    "Uh¡­ myself, to be honest. Sorry."


    Lori would have rolled her eyes if she wasn''t using them for something more important. "Don''t be so loud."


    "Noted, your Bindership."


    The abomination stepped over one of her stones¡ªthe very last one she had set down, in fact¡ªentering the sphere of the lightning ball binding anchored to it.


    Lori reached for the lightwisps anchored to her fingernail to activate the binding and activated it.


    Even as lightwisps created a line of light between her fingernail and the lightning ball binding, she wondered if she had made a mistake. If she should have waited until the abomination had moved further forward, so that there would be a lightning ball binding behind it to keep it from being able to escape. If she should have waited until the abomination was blocked on either side by trees¡­


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    Then lightning bloomed like an exploding flower in the middle of the sphere of the binding, which lit up the darkened woods. The center of the lightning ball was a burning star casting all about it in stark radiance and dark shadows. Dancing arks of lightning caressed the abomination like a dragon trailing its claws over the land, to a sound like the world''s largest bug beating its wings angrily. The very air reached such extremes of heat it burned, and Lori had to lower her hand and cease looking through her spyglass as the light was brightened greatly when it passed through the binding. She heard cries of surprise from the militia, but they were muted and brief, and all remained in their positions. It was hard to see because of both distance and brightness, but the abomination seemed to be smoking where it had been struck, the misty haze visible in the air as it partially reflecting the lightning''s radiance.


    "¡ªplease die, please die, please die, please die¡ª" Rian was muttering repeatedly, one eye closed, the other almost closed so he could see through it as he watched the abomination not simply be struck by lightning but have lightning flowing through it near constantly. Even as the lightningwisps flowed, bringing with it bright and burning lightning and heat that expended the binding''s imbuement, Lori was imbuing the binding, drawing magic from her core and channeling it through her body and into the lightwisps anchored to her fingernail, which then spread it through the rest of the lightning ball¡ª


    The abomination began to topple, unbalanced as its stiff, unmoving legs made it unable to remain upright. As Lori watched, the abomination began to fall sideways atop one of the trenches that paralleled the game trail. The pikes poking out from the trench that had previously been upright due to lack of space to maneuver them were all pushed back by the abomination''s bulk, snapping under its weight as the butts of the pikes lodged against the wall of the trench.


    They all stared as the abomination twitched were it lay on the ground, a few small fires burning on its feathers, illuminated by the lightning of the binding next to it. When Lori deactivated the binding, the shape of the abomination was plunged into darkness, save for the small flickers of light from its burning feathers.


    As Lori raised her spyglass binding up to her eye to assess the abomination''s state, it seemed to stir, feebly trying to raise its head. Not dead yet, then. Still, it seemed to be having trouble moving, its tail and one of its legs twitching randomly as it tried to right itself atop the trench it had fallen on. Unfortunately, it was out of position for the lightning ball that had struck it previously, and even if Lori altered the binding''s shape, there were militia in the trench that the abomination had fallen on who would be endangered if lightning struck the typhon abomination in its current position.


    There was movement to the side, and Lori saw people climbing from the far end of the trench, away from the abomination''s head. They appeared covered in dirt, and Lori suspected that the dirt that had been piled up on the edges of the trench had fallen on them when the abomination had fallen. She counted four people exiting the trench and running towards the next closest trench, avoiding some thorned barriers. Behind them, the abomination was struggling to get to its feet, and it was clearly favoring the side it had fallen on. It tried to tuck in its legs beneath it despite the twitching, but even so, it didn''t seem to have the strength left to push itself up.


    Next to Lori, Rian sighed. "I''m going to try and get close enough to hit it, see if I can stick an arrow in its chest so that we can finish it off," he said. "Your Bindership, be ready to activate the binding on the arrow, please?" Without waiting for a reply, he began to move forward, an arrow nocked on his bowstring.


    Lori frowned but nodded. "You three, go with him. If that thing stands, throw Rian into the nearest trench. If he misses, take your own shot."


    "Yes, Great Binder," the three other bowmen said, following after Rian, their own arrows nocked but not drawn as Lori franticly claimed lightwisps so she could extend the connection between her and the arrows. She had to make the lines of lightwisps arc upwards so that their bodies wouldn''t block the line, since Rian was the only one who was making an effort to hold his arrow so there was a clear path between her and the binding on it.


    The abomination was still struggling to get to its feet when Rian finally stopped moving, standing behind a tree to keep it between him and the dragonborn. The twitching of the abomination''s limbs had slowly ceased, and was finally managing to get its legs under it, though it was still having difficulty pushing itself up. Rian visibly checked how his arrow was nocked on his bow before raising it up and beginning to draw¡­


    Then the arrowhead fell off where it was resting just above the fist gripping the bowstave, and Rian had to hastily reset it, even as the abomination continued trying to stand¡­


    "Oh, Great Binder," Riz said, sounding horrified.


    "What, Erzebed?" Lori demanded.


    For once, Riz didn''t become flustered by her attention. "He doesn''t know how use a bow!"


    Lori blinked, and looked back toward Rian, pointing her spyglass binding towards him. "He seems to know what he''s doing well enough." With the arrow now back in place, the way he was drawing back the bowstring looked very experienced, if a bit slow.


    Riz had one hand over her face now. "Great Binder, his arm is shaking!"


    "Is it not supposed to?"


    "No, it''s not. It means the bow''s draw is heavier than he''s used to."


    "That''s your bow though, Riz," one of the other militiawomen said. "I think his bow is still in the boat? Isn''t that it there?"


    "So it''s not like he doesn''t know how to use a bow, it''s just he doesn''t know how to use your bow," another militiawoman said.


    Lori ignored them, still watching Rian intently. He was far enough away she was unlikely to hear him even if he yelled. He''d finally stopped drawing the bow, and now she could easily see what Riz meant about his arm shaking. It wasn''t much, but the tremor was obvious¡­


    Rian loosed. Lori activated the binding on his arrow.


    There was a brief line of light as the lightwisps connecting her to the binding became active in the brief moment before the arrow struck the abomination in the cheek, where the abomination''s feathers were thin. It struck, lodging into place, and the abomination flinched, its jaws parting before starting to twitch and shake. The fact that there was no immediate explosion was a good sign, as it meant she''d designed the binding properly. As with the lightning ball binding, the bindings on the arrows were causing lightning to flow through the abomination''s body, a gradual process that was still heavily damaging. Its whole body slumped down as it seemed to lose strength again.


    Rian gestured at the other bowmen, who had all stayed well behind, pointing first at one then at the abomination, then at his chest¡ªno, his heart¡ªand his head. The bowman he pointed at nodded, bringing up his bow¡ªfrom much further away than Rian¡ªand slowly drawing it as Lori sorted through the lines of lightwisps she had anchored, finding the one that arced towards his arrow.


    The arm he was using to draw the arrow, she noted, was moving smoothly and steadily and definitely not shaking.


    He loosed, and Lori activated the binding.


    This time only the arcing line of light that appeared when she activated the binding allowed her to see where the arrow had stuck. It buried itself into the abomination''s chest, sinking among the thick feathers there that insulated the torso. The abomination began to convulse, losing its balance once more and falling on its side as its legs kicked weakly. Rian took the opportunity to hurry away from the dragonborn, moving much faster than when he had approached it as he joined the three bowmen where they were standing.


    For several long moments, everyone remained where they were, watching the abomination warily as it convulsed. Lori kept imbuing the bindings on the two arrows lodged into its body, slowly increasing the power of the lightning being generated by the lightningwisps.


    It was only when she felt her bindings surrounded by waterwisps and firewisps that she could claim that she finally deactivated them. Being able to affect the wisps in a body meant the body was no longer alive, as the soul that had been claiming those wisps was now absent. With a sigh, Lori deactivated all of the bindings anchored to her to prevent any accidents. "It''s done," she told Riz. "Tell everyone to stand down, the abomination is dead."


    "Are you sure, Great Binder?" The non-officer looked skeptical.


    "I''ve deactivated the bindings that were killing it and it''s still not moving," Lori said flatly. "That''s dead enough for me."


    The militiawoman still hesitated. "Perhaps we should check with Binder Shanalorre, just to be sure?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine. Are you sure you don''t want to be an officer? You''re acting very officious."


    Riz shuddered.

 457 - Anti-Climactic

    It turned out that Shanalorre could not, in fact, confirm that the abomination was dead, at least not this soon.


    "While the abomination might technically be dead, most of the life in its body is still alive," she explained once she had set foot on land once more and given a moment to think after the question had been posed to her.


    "But it''s dead?" Lori pressed.


    "Its heart isn''t beating, its lungs aren''t breathing, and many of the life in its head are inert," Shanalorre said. "That''s reasonably dead, I believe, but most of the life in its body is still¡­ ''alive'', so to speak. Forgive me, Great Binder, but I do not know enough to say with more certainty."


    They reverted to the second option by having¡­ eh, Rit-something¡­? Lori checked one of her rocks to remind herself of his name, then they had Lidzuga check that the abomination was in fact dead. This involved the Deadspeaker poking it with a wooden pike and using that as a channel for Deadspeaking to ascertain that the abomination was, in fact, actually dead. Once it was confirmed, Lori¡ªand everyone else, it seemed¡ªlet out a sigh of relief at not having to worry about the abomination recovering.


    . Around them, the militia volunteers were hard at work filling in the pits and trenches. Lori had thought it would simply be simpler to just leave them be, but Riz had pointed out that they could become hazards or dens for beasts or abominations. Well, if they insisted on the work, then she''d let them, and they seemed to be doing it fairly fast in any case. Near the typhon beast, the hunters were discussing what parts could be harvested from the carcass. While the abomination looked mostly normal, some parts of it had been fused to wood, and there might be internal alterations that weren''t immediately obvious from the outside. Lori had already let it be known she claimed the bones, claws, teeth and spines.


    "It feels a bit anti-climactic," Rian commented. "I mean, nothing went horribly wrong, no one was injured¡­ I half-expected us to have to throw around the smokes pots to try and push it to move, use the ropes to try and hold it in place or make it fall down, run around trying to get away from it as it chased us¡­ instead it just walked right on top of your trap, and we killed it."


    "Yes, Rian, that''s why we set the trap on a game trail the way the hunter recommended," Lori said. "To make it more likely it would do exactly that."


    "I know, I know¡­ I''m just surprised nothing unexpected happened, that''s all. It didn''t even get distracted and go after anyone¡­"


    She rolled her eyes. "Perhaps we were simply too small to rouse its appetites. Rian, the plan was well-prepared, and well-enacted," Lori said. "Why did you think anything would go wrong?"


    He shrugged. "I''d rather consider how things could go wrong and not have them happen than not think about how they could go wrong and end up surprised and unprepared." He let out a sigh, then visibly straightened up with a smile. "Well, a least we know what we need to do next time this happens."


    Lori started to nod before she realized what Rian had just said. "Next time?" she repeated sharply.


    "Well, yeah," Rian said. "I mean, we managed to go a year before a typhon beast showed up, but it''s probably only a matter of time before another one makes its presence known." He tilted his head. "Actually, given how we didn''t encounter one on our way here and no one warned us about them before we set out, they''re probably relatively rare in this area, but probably not so rare that there''s not enough to reproduce. Still, another one will probably appear in the vicinity of our demesnes eventually, though we probably won''t know until the other beasts start vacating the area again."


    "Another one."


    Rian paused. "Are you all right? You''re repeating parts of what I''m saying."


    Lori just closed her eyes as she imagined dealing with another typhon beast sometime in the future.


    ¡­


    Actually, now that they''d done it, it didn''t feel as intimidating anymore.


    "I''m well. Simply considering the logistics of how we would go about killing another typhon beast."


    Her lord nodded. "Yes, it''s probably going to be harder next time, since we''d need to do it outside of the demesne and won''t have you or Shanalorre to use your Dungeon Binder abilities to help keep track of it, but I''m sure we''ll be able to think of something."


    ¡­


    Lori decided she didn''t want to think of this at the moment. Her preparations had worked perfectly and the abomination was dead. Goals had been accomplished. "Well, we''re done here. Does the demesne need anything else? Otherwise I am returning home."


    "Could you make some bug-repellant bindings? Ralii¡ªone of the hunters, for your information¡ª thinks the meat and blood can be salvaged, but because it''s abomination blood¡­ well, it''s already attracting bugs. And maybe some blocks of ice to keep the meat fresh?"


    She gave Rian a flat look, not having expected him to actually say anything, and looked longingly towards her boat, with its comfortable seat. Then she sighed. "Fine, fine. Go and get the stones I set down, I''ll reuse the bindings on those¡­"


    <hr>


    By the time Lori had finished reforming the bindings on her river stones into bug repellant spheres and using them to lay out a corridor free of bugs from the abomination corpse to the river bank where the boats were, the additional stones for the boats that would be ferrying the meat over the river to the dome, the blocks and chunks of ice that that meat would be laid on to keep them fresh, as well as additional ice for the food storage in the mine, it was almost noon.


    There was something mildly frustrating to realize that the preparations for killing the abomination, and the work she had done at the aftermath of doing so had both taken significantly more time than the time spent actually dealing with the abomination. Rian''s comment about the incident feeling anti-climactic began to make more sense to her now. For all that slaying the abomination had progressed without incident, taken all together, it had been brief and barely notable. Which was good, because if events had been notable, that meant that things had not gone according to plan¡­ probably in the ways that Rian had spoken off earlier.


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    Still, anti-climactic or not, it was over now. Lori sat back on her chair on Lori''s Shed Boat, mindful to not close her eyes lest she fall asleep again. If she indulged, she might not be able to sleep properly that night, doing horrible things to her sleep cycle. Rian and Shanalorre were with her as Riz operated the driver and the non-officer''s friend''s accompanied them. The other two boats and their passengers had remained behind to finish undoing earthworks that had been made, as well as assist in the butchering and transport of the abomination.


    The demesne would have no problem feeding them. They''d be getting new meat, after all.


    Out of habit, Lori watched the shore, but she saw no typhon beasts.


    When they arrived back home, it was at the tail end of lunch. Fortunately, there were still some stew left, although the bread had grown cold in the meantime.


    "I don''t suppose you''d be willing to heat everyone''s stew?" Rian asked as he laid down four bowls of stew on the table. "Please?"


    "I am not an oven," Lori told him flatly.


    "Technically, you''d be acting as a stove," he said brightly. "Perhaps a cookfire at the very least. An oven isn''t really the best for heating stews. The heat needs to come from below, or else you''ll end up with a thin layer of warn stew on the top while the rest stays stone cold." He put his hands together pleadingly. "Please?"


    Lori rolled her eyes. "Fine¡ª"


    "Great, let me go get Brabli, Sintelerra, Navia and Raradina," he said quickly, turning and running off.


    Lori stared after him, then turned to Riz. "What?"


    "My friends who escorted you, Great Binder," Riz said. "They''re eating cold stew as well, and I suppose that Rian thought if you were already willing to heat our food for us, then perhaps you would be willing to do the same for them."


    "I am a Dungeon Binder, not a stove or a cookfire!"


    Riz nodded. "Yes, Great Binder. Can we beg you to do so anyway? Please?"


    Lori gave her a level look as Riz bowed her head in supplication. While she was annoyed at the¡­ request¡­ well, she supposed it was needlessly cruel to have those four have to eat their stew cold¡­


    So when Rian arrived with four women holding bowls of cold stew, Lori simply rubbed her hands together to generate firewisps from the friction, anchored the firewisps to the waterwisps at the bottom of their bowls, and warmed the stew.


    "Do not become used to this," Lori told Rian sternly. "This is an exceptional occasion. Is that understood?"


    "Understood, Great Binder," Rian said as the four women walked away with their bowls of now-warm food. "You made an exception because we killed the typhon abomination today."


    "Y-yes, that''s exactly it," Lori said. "That''s the reason."


    "It''s not that you felt sorry for the four of them being the only ones who''d have to eat cold food, it was merely an exception."


    "Correct." Good, Rian understood.


    With that, Lori focused on eating, and those with full bowls of stew followed her example.


    For a moment, there was relative silence as she, Rian and Riz ate. Shanalorre had joined her cousin at the table behind Lori and thus was not part of the relative silence, and the children were always lively, though thankfully not loud.


    "So¡­" the crazy woman¡ªTaeclas, was thankfully wearing a head cloth, though she''d pulled it out of her belt pouch when Lori had sat down at the table¡ªturned towards Rian, "how did it go?"


    "No one was hurt," Rian said. "The abomination''s relatively whole, so the hunters are butchering it for meat. River''s Fork has a whole lot of feathers and a large skin for leather, though her Bindership has claimed all the bones and things."


    "What, really?" She looked at Lori, who ignored her query, too busy eating. "Why?"


    "Raw material would be my guess. It''s certainly not so she''ll have a corpse to turn into an undead, since she''s letting us cut it up for food. Bone is a pretty useful resource for her Bindership, and the abomination has some nice, thick ones."


    Lori paused as she realized what Rian had just said, but eventually sighed and went back to eating. Well, even if she''d thought of it, she was still a long way from learning how to deadcraft undead. She already had one large creature she intended to make into an undead buried in ice, she didn''t need another one.


    "Speaking of which, though¡­ your Bindership?"


    She looked up at Rian''s voice. "What?" she demanded at his wheedling tone.


    "May I make a suggestion for transporting the bones from River''s Fork to here?" he said.


    "I''m not bringing the bones here," Lori said. "They''ll be staying where they are. I''m tired of having to keep bringing bones when I want to use them for something. Those bones are going to be my stockpile there."


    "Oh¡­"


    Lori gave him a flat look. She shouldn''t. She really shouldn''t¡­"What strange idea did you have in mind?"


    "Ah, was just thinking that instead of trying to transport the bones here on the boats that it would be faster to just fuse all the bones together into a boat and tow that upriver¡­ but if the bones are going to stay in River''s Fork I suppose that''s not really necessary¡­" he sighed.


    "Why would I want to make a boat out of bone? We have perfectly serviceable boats made out of wood."


    "Oh, I was just thinking that a boat made of bone is one you''d be able to repair by yourself if it became damaged, so you might prefer your boat be made from it rather than wood?" He shrugged. "It was just a thought. Obviously something like it would have been more useful before we had Lidz and Tae to do Deadspeaking for the demesnes, but now¡­" He shrugged again.


    Well¡­ she couldn''t deny that. Before the two Deadspeakers had joined them, a boat made out of bone would have been something she could build and maintain herself. The problem had been that they had never had that much bone on hand¡ªthe dead islandshell aside, which she was still keeping in reserve for when she could deadcraft undead¡ªand what they did have always had more urgent uses. The stockpile in the bone pit had grown plentiful enough for her to feel she could build a boat out of it.


    Hmm¡­ maybe she should try it? There was no reason that the abomination bones had to remain in their raw state, after all.


    Something to think about.


    "Ah, by the way your Bindership, what are your plans after lunch?" Rian asked.


    Lori considered the question. Besides killing the abomination, she actually hadn''t had anything actually planned for today. However, an answer readily came to mind. "Laundry," she said.


    "Ah. Do you want me to get you some more soap?"


    "That would be useful."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll get you some from the inventory, then."


    Once Lori had finished her lunch¡ªthankfully, Rian hadn''t engaged her in further talk, letting her eat her food quickly¡ªLori went upstairs and began the malodorous task of washing the clothes she had worn for more than a week, as well as the rest of her garments. She had just finished drawing out basins and tubs from the walls of her private bath to let her clothes soak when there was a knock on her door. She hastily pulled on her discarded a shirt before heading to answer it, her wet, bare feet flapping on the hard stone floor of her room


    As promised, Rian was there holding a block of the soap that the demesne''s chandler made. "Here you go," he said, and she took a moment to claim the waterwisps on the surface of her hand so she could pull them off before accepting the soap. No need to get it wet just yet. "And this as well."


    Lori almost reached for the second thing he was giving her with her free hand before she saw what it was and recoiled.


    Her notes, still pressed between two tablets, wiggled in Rian''s hands.


    She glanced down at it, than back up to him, bewildered.


    He shrugged. "I figure we''re close enough to normal that you should have this back," he said. "I would have given it to you sooner, but Shanalorre found the abomination."


    Lori stared down at it. Hesitantly, she reached for the sheaf with her now dry hands. "Thank you," she found herself saying.


    "You''re welcome," he said. "If you don''t show up for meals, I''ll assume you got lost in your notes again and start hammering on your door until you answer."


    She glanced at the notes again. "That¡­ would probably be advisable."


    Rian nodded. "Well, see you at dinner, Lori."


    Nodding absently as he turned away, she shut her door behind him


    For a moment, she just stood there, staring at the sheaf of notes.


    Taking a deep breath, Lori turned around carefully placed the notes atop her table, then took her equipment box¡ªfull of glassware and small tools¡ªand deliberately set it atop the sheaf. Then she turned around and went to her bathroom, pulling off her shirt as she went.


    She had laundry to do.

 458 - It Will Always Be Waiting

    "I''d like to apologize for what I said yesterday, and for being tardy with my apology. While I still believe my course of action was prudent at the time, despite later events, how I went about it was needlessly cruel and deliberately hurtful. While I don''t expect you to forgive me, know that I deeply regret my words."


    Lori looked blankly at her lord, then sideways at Shanalorre, whom he was facing. What?


    The other Dungeon Binder regarded Rian coolly as her cousin looked between the two of them curiously. Lori was surprised the young girl was actually awake this morning. Most of her recent memories of the girl had her napping at the table.


    "You need not apologize for your tardiness," Shanalorre said. "I was deliberately avoiding you. As to the rest of your apology¡­ it is noted."


    There was a moment of silence as the two simply stared at each other, while Lori, Mikon, Umu, Taeclas, and Taeclas''s wife all looked back and forth between them. Only Riz seemed to have some idea what was going on, as she merely sat back and watched.


    Eventually, Rian nodded. "I understand. I will not trouble you further then. Good morning to you, Binder Shanalorre."


    Shanalorre merely inclined her head.


    Lori sighed. "Rian, what are you talking about?"


    "Just personal matters, your Bindership. Nothing for you to worry about. Oh look, the food''s ready! I should probably¡ª"


    "No, you stay here and speak with her Bindership," Mikon said, her hand coming down on Rian''s shoulder from the other side of Riz. "It''s not your turn, remember? Honestly, Rian¡­ Erzebed, keep him here, will you? Umu and I will get the food."


    Rian sat there, looking uncharacteristically awkward as the two women left, accompanied by Taeclas and her wife. Lori glanced between him and Shanalorre again, then simply sighed and decided to leave the matter be. If it was important, she''d find out one way or another. With a shrug, tossed the matter aside and faced her lord. "Rian, what is the status of the demesne?"


    He took a deep breath, then let it out. "Right, right¡­ except for the crops, we''re pretty much recovered from the dragon now, and can get back to normal activities. The sawmill is operational, and we''re going to start cutting down some of the dead trees. Kolinh and I discussed it, and we think it would be best to move towards making winter preparations for the village in case the snowfall is the same as last year. To that end, we intend to make more snow shovels, more snow pads, more snow skids, and if Lidz is up to it a few sleds for getting between the two demesnes in the winter. Larger ones this time."


    "And how do you intend to move these large sleds?" Lori said dryly.


    "We get on our knees and beg you for the favor of your power?"


    "I will take it under consideration. Shouldn''t you also be preparing for the next trading trip to Covehold?"


    "Yes, but that''s something I can leave to Kolinh and the others. They were the ones who did the original preparations, after all." He tilted his head. "Actually, wouldn''t now be the best time to go? The dragon''s just passed, so we shouldn''t have to worry for a while¡­"


    They stared at each other for a moment, then Rian sighed. "I''ll get preparations to leave started after breakfast. Next week should do it, I think? How many beads will we be carrying?"


    "We''ll prepare three thousand beads. That should be more than enough."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll ask around for what everyone needs and present you with a list so you can decide what we should buy. Should we buy a new almanac? You know, in case there have been any recent useful discoveries?"


    <hr>


    They continued to speak on this topic until the women arrived with the food, at which point Taeclas brought up the subject of optimizing the arrangement of their fields so that they could fit in one further harvest before winter set in. With one or two exceptions, they were all mostly matters that didn''t really need Lori''s input, only her awareness and authorization.


    Of course, there were the exceptions.


    "So, while we have a gristmill in the mill building, I think it would be advisable to also improve the gristmill we currently have in the second level," Rian said. "In winter, the mill building will be inoperable most of the time, and it would remove the risk of the flour getting wet if we milled the grain in the second level during the winter. At the moment, it''s \ our most labor-intensive chore that could be done far more efficiently with your assistance, especially since our flour consumption increases during the winter due to the need to ration meat. It will require having to temporarily dismantle the gristmill, so it¡¯s a good thing we have another one in the mill building."


    The words made Lori grimace, even as she looked down at the drafted plans before her. Whatsisname¡ªshe checked the rocks in her belt pouch¡ªKolinh and the carpenters had even sketched out not only a diagram for the water wheel but also a proposed pipe layout for the water that she would need to bind to power the wheel. It was a more compact design than the water wheel that the carpenters currently had to power their lathe and rotating saw, able to fit into the alcove that had more or less permanently become the milling room, with a wall that would separate the wheel and water from the rest of the room to keep the flour from getting wet.


    Another matter that would need her to act was Rian''s proposal to resume the proper expansion of the third level, including fully excavating the plots for the dungeon farm.


    "We''re storing a lot of things in the side tunnels, and two of them are already permanently for tubers and sweetgrass," Rian said. "Honestly, if we let it stand like that for much longer, that''s going to become the permanent configuration of the third level. It''s already going to be difficult for you to remove the excavated stone given all the plots already established between the far tunnels and the stairs. You could try completing it this winter, but that would only be the excavation. We''d still need to wait until spring for the ground to soften enough for us to be able to dig up dirt to fill the plots."


    Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    Lori grimaced, but had to agree that the third level had been delayed for far too long. Only a quarter of it had been properly dug up, though about two-thirds of the already excavated area had become farming plots. Or at least, that had been the size she''d intended. In hindsight, that was clearly far too big, but there was always a use to be found for dungeon space and excavated stone.


    "Speaking of that, there''s also the matter of the demesne''s boats," Rian continued relentlessly. "Back when we only had your boat and your ice boat, storing them in the dungeon wasn''t a problem. But since we''ve been having Lidzuga make more¡ªhe''s almost finished working on the latest one, by the way¡ªstoring them has become an issue. I think it might be necessary to have a building specifically for storing all the boats during winter and when a dragon passes overhead, including the Coldhold¡ªwhich you need to get out of the water for so we can inspect it for the trip to Covehold, by the way. Carrying so many boats down to the third level is no longer practical."


    Lori frowned. "A storage facility for the boats can be built easily enough, but the Coldhold is far too big. There''s a reason why I sink it in the river."


    "And while effective, it¡¯s a method that is clearly not practical in the long term," Rian said. "Actually securing the Coldhold is a relatively slow process, and requires you to both sink and unsink it. Both phases are also something only you can do, forcing your attention away from other preparations. I think it might be time to consider a different, less Dungeon Binder-intensive solution."


    "Which is?"


    "A boat house, basically," Rian said. "A covered and reinforced building along the river itself that we can use to store the boats in all weather. I don¡¯t know if you noticed, but when it rained back in the spring, we had to bring your boat under cover in the entryway since all that moisture wasn''t good for the wood. Part of the reason we had to do such extensive checks on the Coldhold before we set out was to make sure there was no rain damage that had developed into something worse in the interim. While we have Taeclas and Lidzuga now to make repairing any such damage easier, preventing damage would significantly extend the time between repairs." He shrugged. "And if you''re going to be finishing the third level, then there''d be a sufficient amount of building material for such a reinforced building. We could also make it out of wood, but then it wouldn''t be possible to reinforce it with Whispering. Having such a large reinforced building would also give somewhere we can store other tools in the future without having to bring them into the dungeon. "


    Lori frowned. "What tools?"


    "Well, nothing right now, but if we expand our fields out because of all the trees we''re clearing, it would probably be prudent for us to invest in a plow," Rian said. "Without undead or domesticated beasts, it would have to be pulled manually, but that would still be more efficient than trying to till the land with hand tools. And¡­ well, so far the hunters have been building their own tannery buildings, which have been doing well in providing us with leather, but it''s probably about time they get something better. With your permission, I''ll have Kolinh get started on building them more sturdy facilities. I was hoping you''d be willing to build a side extension to the entryway where can keep any chokers and any other beasts we''re trying to domesticate. Ralii and the rest put so much effort into trying to tame them, but they keep dying because it''s not safe to bring them into the dungeon¡­"


    "A side extension?" Lori said. Already this long list of things was making her weary.


    Rian sighed. "Yes. It¡­ well, it will probably have to entail a second entrance into the dungeon that will need to be sealed completely during a dragon, so we don''t have to bring the chokers in through the entryway and risk them getting loose in the dungeon. After all, we can''t just throw them into a room. Any domesticated beasts will need to be fed and watered, their waste dealt with to keep dustlife from breeding and infecting the rest of the dungeon, if they lay eggs we''ll need a way to collect those eggs¡­" He trailed off and shrugged, giving her apologetic look for some reason. "Sorry. It''s a lot of work, I know. Some of it we don''t actually need, but I thought I should bring them to your attention."


    "As you should.  You''re my lord, after all." It was frustrating, but she could see the need for all of it. Even the tannery. She actually felt a twinge of guilt at the reminder that the tanners built most of their infrastructures themselves. Yes, there were the evaporator jars for collecting goldwater and distilling it to alchemical concentrations, but beyond that¡­ well, she''d been providing a shameful lack of support towards important workers. "Prioritize constructing the tannery facilities. I''ll¡­ see about constructing a place that any domesticated beasts can be placed for next time." She frowned. "Are they even willing to attempt doing so again?"


    "They managed to be a bit more successful this time. The hunters have always been trying to get the chokers to the point they''d lay eggs. Tae confirmed that three of them are fertilized, so now those are being incubated as best as we can. I''m told it''s preferred, since they can raise the beastlets without the influence of parents. They''ll still be trying to catch and domesticate more for bloodline variety, though."


    "¡­ what was that about eggs?" Lori said.


    "The chokers didn''t produce nearly enough eggs to be worth adding to the food stores," Rian said. "The hunters hardboiled the ones that weren''t fertilized and that''s what they ate when they had to go hunting and miss lunch."


    Lori twitched. That¡­ sounded logical but¡­ eggs! How long has it been since she''d eaten eggs?-!


    Well, another reason to finally build that beast pen extension for her Dungeon. Eggs¡­!


    Lori shook her head to rid herself of those distracting thoughts.  "I''ll add it to the list of things to be done." Meaning she actually had to go upstairs and list these matters down so she wouldn''t forget them. "Is there anything else?"


    Rian considered the tablet next to his now-empty bowl. "Well, we really need to finally get around to teaching the children how to read and write, but that''s nothing you have to worry about directly. I think that should be all for now, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded in acknowledgement and made to rise.


    "Um, your Bindership?"


    Sighing, Lori let herself drop into her chair. "What else now?"


    "Nothing, nothing! It''s just¡­ there''s no reason to get started now. They''ll keep for a few more days. Why don''t you rest for a bit? Relax, do some reading¡­"


    "Rian¡­" Lori said slowly. It had finally happened. Her lord had lost what little sense he''d had and become a true idiot. "We have just spent all of breakfast talking about all the work that needs to be done."


    "And I''m saying they can wait for a day as you rest. When was the last time you had a rest? Real doing nothing but enjoying yourself, not doing any work rest? As your lord, I am strongly recommending you take a day or two to do just that. The work will still be there." He tilted his head. "Don''t you have notes to go over?"


    Lori twitched at the reminder. The stack of notes was upstairs on her table, still bound tight after she''d done her laundry¡­


    "Go and read," Rian said gently. "Lock yourself up and lose yourself if you want to. The work will still be there. I''ll be sure to remind you of that."


    She glanced up her room, then nodded. "All right. I suppose I could use a rest." Staying up to make all those bindings and only three had been used for their intended purpose. It had been so frustrating¡­ "Yes, I think I will rest."


    Nodding to herself once more, Lori stood up and headed upstairs.

 459 - Places To Study

    After literally days of being pressed between two tablets, Lori''s notes were finally mostly flat, although little lines from where they''d been curled or folded traced back and forth on the sheets. She carefully separated the sheets from between the blank papers Rian had placed between them to keep the ink from transferring between pages. Clearly that hadn''t been necessary, since if her notes hadn''t rubbed off on each other when she''d been keeping them together in a sheaf, but she supposed it was good that Rian had treated her notes so carefully.


    Now, if he''d just remembered to put it in her pack.


    It took her a while to sort the notes in order. Lori vividly remembered the very first page of the notes, as well as the next page, but as she progressed through the pages, it became harder and harder to be sure the notes were where they were supposed to be. She didn''t know what to make of the last pages at all, her strongest memory of them being how she''d stopped writing¡ªshe didn''t even remember what she''d been writing¡ªwhen she''d heard Rian declare that someone had pissed in the water.


    She''d have to remember to clear out all the water, and have the walls of the basin scoured.


    Adjusting the stool she was sitting on, Lori leaned back so she was resting on the stone wall behind her at a more comfortable angle and resumed her reading, the familiar sounds around her making a comfortable din to ignore as she continued going over her notes. The pages at the end had a lot of terrible handwriting. She could still read it¡ªit was her handwriting, after all¡ªbut a few times she had to actually think about what was written to decipher what she had likely meant. Some of the flow diagrams were confusing, and if taken as they were would result in bindings that would have no useful function besides inefficiently setting things on fire¡ªthere were better ways to do it¡ªbut knowing that they were supposed to do something and reading her handwriting, she could mentally correct the diagrams, properly redrawing others¡ªher hand had been shaky in some spots¡ª and in some instances filling in missing parts that she actually forgot to write down.


    That wasn''t the result of her affected thinking, she had a tendency to sometimes not write down things even if she was actively thinking about them when she wrote. It was an embarrassing problem, but fortunately she was aware enough to correct it¡­ most of the time. That meant she was well-accustomed to having to correct her flow diagrams and notes when she read them a second time.


    Usually she managed to do it before she submitted her work for grading, but there''d been more than one instance she''d had to do it after.


    Given all that, she might actually need to rewrite some of the later pages to fill in the blanks, but at least between the diagrams and the actual notes she would know what blanks needed filling in. Well, she could do that later. For the moment, she''d decided that it would be a better use of her time to concentrate on the notes that were the most complete, which meant starting from the first.


    Crossing her legs, right ankle resting just above her left knee, a tablet and paper on her lap and a pen and ink bottle sitting on another stool next to her, Lori began reading the first page.


    The lightning ball binding she''d made had been mostly based on the binding on the first page. The dragon had released what had seemed like hundreds of these lightning ball bindings, and she had taken note of them. Her arrangement of a central binding of lightningwisps, a buffer of airwisps, and a shell of both had been an extremely simplified, over-imbued and incomplete version of what was in her notes. The original had other components that she hadn''t recalled or included because they had been too complicated, and she genuinely had no idea what they were for.


    "Uh, your Bindership?"


    According to both her notes and her memory, the binding had produced an intense amount of heat and light, strongly implying it was something destructive¡­ ah, she probably shouldn''t test the binding in her dungeon, then. Still, she couldn''t help but form the binding as she had noted it, giving both the lightningwisps and airwisps in the ''shell'' directionality and¡­ huh, actually, wouldn''t this compress the air within the shell? Lori checked her notes, and yes, she had noted that. Directly after that was a note that¡­ ah, now she remembered why this was interesting. The binding had produced an intense amount of heat and lights, the firewisps more than filling the shell before quickly consuming all imbuement and vanishing, leaving only heat that had quickly dissipated¡­


    "Your Bindership? Hello?"


    It didn''t seem to have been an explosion from the lightningwisps causing the air to explode. The heat and light had been steady for far longer than an explosion would have entailed¡­


    "Your Bindership, are you mad at me too?"


    She sighed and finally looked up from her notes. "I''m starting to be," she said, annoyed. "What''s so urgent? You were the one who recommended that I peruse my notes."


    "Yes, and I stand by that," Rian said. With him standing and her sitting, she had to look up at him, which¡­ well, she didn''t like it, but she also wasn¡¯t going to stand up just because he was here. Lori was pretty sure it was supposed to be the other way around. "I have to ask, though¡­ why are you perusing your notes here?"


    "It''s my Dungeon, I can be wherever I want," Lori pointed out sternly.


    "Of course, I didn''t mean to imply otherwise," Rian said smoothly. "And what a wonderful Dungeon it is, too. It''s just¡­ is there any specific reason you''re doing it here in the carpenters'' alcove? Because you''re making people nervous and affecting their productivity."


    "Because I wanted to read here, of course," Lori said, her face now set in an annoyed frown. The sounds of woodworking occurring¡ª


    "While I am, of course, in no way, shape or form demanding that you leave¡­ don''t you have your own room for this sort of thing? An actual room, with walls and a very nice place to sit and¡­ well, not people bothering you? You know, people? Those whom you can''t stand to be around?"


    "No one was bothering me but you," she pointed out. Really, everyone had been so thoughtful, ignoring her completely and not bothering her.


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    "Yes, because it''s my job to bother you on behalf of everyone." He sighed. "So, you''re just going to read, right? Not actually going to try any bindings?"


    "Again, it is my Dungeon, I merely tolerate everyone in it." She had half a mind to activate the lightning ball simply out of spite.


    "It''s just¡­ you told me that in your notes were interesting ways to use lightningwisps, right? I''m just concerned about having lightning, which can cause sparks, being around all this sawdust. This very flammable sawdust."


    ¡­


    Colors.


    Lori sighed, as she carefully put her notes together, capped her pen, stoppered her ink bottle, and anchored her binding to her bone tablet¡ªnot a good idea to just disperse imbued lightingwisps, they might spark¡ªand got to her feet, glaring at Rian. Grabbing her stool, she stomped off to find somewhere else to sit. She''d been enjoying herself, just as Rian had suggested, reading while she listened to the sounds of carpentry and woodworking while¡ªand this was very important¡ªnot contributing or doing any of the work at all. She had always felt that the familiar workshop sounds were relaxing, as long as she wasn''t actually working. It was either here or the smithy, and metal sounds would have been far too loud.


    She''d have to find somewhere else. Maybe she could go to the sawmill¡ªno, there was sawdust there too. Colors. Where else could she go where there were sounds she was familiar with that she could ignore while she worked so she could study better.?


    ¡­


    Hmm¡­ actually¡­


    <hr>


    Lori hummed to herself as she leaned back against the stone wall behind her at a comfortable angle, the familiar sounds around her making an uncomfortable din to ignore, as she continued going over her notes. Annoying and distasteful as the sounds were, it reminded her of studying late into the night back in her student days, giving her a degree of comfort and letting her slip back into her old study habits.


    With the wisps of the shell of the lightning ball formed with additional inward directionality¡ªthe lightningwisps'' to keep all the loose lightningwisps within the shell, and the airwisps'' to create a spherical area of where air was trapped and compressed¡ªwhen activated very carefully, the binding had resulted in a¡­ well, a ball of bright, burning fire as the lightning had caused the air itself to ignite. The directionality meant that the flame remained contained, even as it released copious amounts of heat and light.


    The light had actually been near-blinding, and the heat expelled by the binding in the few moments that it had before Lori hastily deactivated it has been searing, as if Lori had actually thrust herself as far into a forge as she could without touching the coals. After she finished blinking and recovering her vision¡ªor at least enough vision to see around the sudden white spot now seemingly burned into the middle of her gaze¡ªLori had actually touched her face to check if she was missing her facial hair. Thankfully, that wasn''t the case, but the very fact she actually felt the heat rather than simply being comfortably warm meant that the binding''s heat had been significant.


    ¡­


    Perhaps she''d conduct any further testing on that one over the river, far away from her.


    Reading her notes had been difficult until her vision had finally returned to normal, but she had managed. In hindsight, given the confines of where she was it would have been prudent to place the binding inside of a shell of lightningwisps to contain any lightning the binding might have released at random, as well a firewisps to contain the heat¡ª


    The sounds coming from the next room peaked beyond her ability to relegate to background noise, and Lori cringed in response, instinctively raising her hands over her ears. The binding to block all sound from reaching her ears was already half-formed before she recalled she was the Dungeon Binder now and didn''t have to simply endure such things. "Keep it down!" she called out, and was gratified as the sounds reduced. Nodding in satisfaction, Lori turned back to her notes. Let''s see, what next¡­


    Lori was in the middle of preparing both a lightwisp binding¡ªfrom both the notes, the diagram, and her own hazy memories, she was fairly sure this would producing piercing light¡ªas well as a target of darkwisps¡ªso that if the binding did produce piercing light it wouldn''t melt through the stone walls¡ªwhen there was a knock on the door.


    "Inay, I''m studying," she said reflexively, realized what the words that had come out of her mouth were, and hastily corrected, "I mean, go away, I''m busy!" Far too late, Lori realized that statement wasn''t an improvement either.


    "Your Bindership, could you please open the door so we can talk?" Rian''s muffled voice said, coming in through the hole high on one wall that let in both light and air. "Please?"


    Lori glared at the door, then grudgingly got to her feet and took the two steps to reach the door, pulling back the latch, swinging the door open. "What?" she demanded.


    On the other side, a blank-faced Rian held up a waterclock. "I''ve been asked to inform you your time is up, your Bindership. Also, there have been reports of some rude person yelling at people and weird smells. Would you happen to know anything about that, your Bindership?"


    "It''s the Um, Rian. Weird smells are its default state." She''d swept the entire room with unseen light when she had entered, and even then she had been reluctant to sit on the bare wooden bed, opting to sit on her stool instead.


    "As you say, your Bindership. In any case, your turn is done, so I''ll have to ask you to stand aside for the next people who want to use this room."


    Lori frowned, then reluctantly actually paid attention to the sounds coming from the other rooms. There were more muted now, but¡­ Oh, right. She checked her awareness of the demesne''s wisps, noting which rooms had voids in them. "There are still other empty rooms, Rian."


    "Ah, you''ll be taking another turn? Then I should note that by doing so I''ll have to include your name with the list of people who have to clean the interior at the end of the¡ªwhy is this room so hot?"


    Oh. She''d thought the room had cooled down since it was comfortably warm¡­


    Rian was waving his hand over Lori''s head, feeling the air. "And that smell¡­ have you been making lightning bindings in here? No, of course you were, the smell is obvious. Are you trying to get yourself killed?"


    "I know what I''m doing, Rian," Lori said defensively.


    "Lori, I distinctly remember what your lightning has been looking like recently. Bright, hot, and deadly. Why would you possibly think it was a good idea to make bindings like that in an enclosed room that has you in it!-? What if your lightning had gotten so hot you set the air on¡ª" Rian paused and waved his hands over Lori''s head again. He sighed, closing his eyes. When they opened again, he glared at her. "You set the air on fire?!"


    Lori averted her eyes.


    Rian groaned. "You set the air on fire in the same room you were in and you still thought it was a good idea to keep making more bindings?"


    "I deactivated it right away," she said defensively.


    "You already had a perfectly good and safe idea to do your lightning tests in the middle of the river where no one could get hurt, why did you think it was a good idea to do it in an enclosed room instead?" A look of horror came over Rian. "Oh¡ªgah! You were going to do this in the carpenters'' alcove, weren''t you? You would have done this practically on top of sawdust!"


    "No, I wouldn''t." She honestly hadn''t considered the sawdust, which was why she had left.


    Rian just stared at her and sighed. "Could you¡­ please step out? Please? As your lord, I need to insist that you don''t do your ''setting the air on fire'' bindings in an enclosed room, never mind the fact there are other people around. "


    Well, listening to people had been getting annoying, anyway. "Fine," she said, turning to pick up her notes, both old and new.


    She should probably try this next binding outdoors in any case. Yes, that''s definitely why she was leaving and not for any other reason¡­

 460 - Better Ways To Use Lightningwisps

    "Don''t you have something you need to be doing?" Lori said as she imbued the binding of lightwisps she''d formed. Technically, she already knew how to make piercing light. However, the one she''d learned only made a little red dot on walls, didn''t go very far, and wasn''t really useful for anything besides making petbugs chase it around the floor.


    "At the moment, that''s making sure you don''t go into an enclosed room and make a binding that gets hot enough to set the air on fire," Rian said flatly. "Have to keep the Dungeon Binder alive, after all. Very important job. Second most important job in the demesne, keeping the Dungeon Binder alive, second only to being the Dungeon Binder herself. We wouldn''t want the most important person to lock herself in a room and then set the air on fire, would we? That would be very dangerous and might kill her."


    She gave him a flat unamused look that he returned. "Well, make yourself useful and take notes," she said, handing him the pen, ink, and the sheaf of blank papers. Rian took them, but he looked significantly less enthused than in previous instances when she''d had him taking notes.


    "Of course, your bindership. What dangerous thing you shouldn''t do in an enclosed room are we doing now?" His words aside, Rian immediately sat down and put his back to one of the posts on the dock used for tying up the boats¡ªwhich was in fact currently being used to tie up some of their boats¡ªsetting the sheaf of blank papers on one knee before weighing it down with the tablet to keep it from being caught in the wind. There wasn''t any at the moment, the air still cool and still, but it was a sensible precaution. The ink bottle was opened and placed to one side, where he wouldn''t accidentally kick it, while the pen was tested on the corner of the current page before Rian visibly got ready to take notes, the test sheet on top of the tablet.


    Lori contemplated kicking him in the shin, but that might send the papers flying. She''d do it later. "One of the notes I wrote of observations during the dragon was a phenomenon that involved intense and concentrated lightwisps. I''m replicating the binding in an attempt to reproduce the phenomenon in question."


    The binding had been strange. While it was little like what she had learned, a look at all the directionality and the fact there was only one direction exactly had been enough for her to identify it as a binding that produced piercing light. What was strange was the fact the light being used was unseen light, similar to the kind that she used to cleanse dustlife from their water facilities. She''d never considered using unseen light so, but in hindsight it made sense. Unseen light was still light, and so could be used for piercing light.


    "This is the first test to ascertain the effectiveness and accuracy of replication of flow diagram¡­" Lori paused. "Leave that part blank, I''ll draw it in later. But in summary, we will be testing a binding that from analysis and observation will produce piercing light using unseen light."


    "If the light is unseen, how will you know it worked?" Rian asked as he wrote. "Are you perhaps going to stick your hand in to see if it''s working?"


    Both shins.


    "The desired effect will be obvious to me," Lori said instead, and Rian actually wrote that down. Huh. Well, she supposed that it had been a valid question. Maybe a kick and a half, then.


    Lori anchored the binding to one of the stone posts and angled it down so that the piercing light would strike the water. Well, eventually. She''d aimed it at a point in the middle of the river.


    "First test, with the binding exactly as diagrammed in my notes," Lori said. "Activating the binding now."


    As Rian had pointed out, there was no visible sign that the binding was working. The spot in the river she was aiming at didn''t change as far as Lori could see, and as stated, there was no visible sign that the binding was even activated at all.


    However, through her awareness of the wisps in her demesne, Lori was quickly able to perceive that the test had been successful, as the same phenomenon that she had observed during the dragon''s passing had occurred.


    Almost as soon as the binding had activated, the air in the path of the piercing light had filled with lightningwisps. Even when she deactivated the binding, the lightningwisps had remained in a mostly straight line, though that line was beginning to be affected by what little winds there were.


    "Test successful," Lori declared. "The reproduced binding is working as intended, reproducing the results that were originally observed."


    "And those results are?" Rian prompted as he wrote.


    "The piercing light consisting of unseen light generated lightningwisps along its path."


    The pen Rian was holding stilled as he looked up sharply. "It does?"


    Lori nodded. "Yes. I noticed it by chance when I was observing the dragon''s working, and fortunately I was able to note how the binding had been formed before it ran out of imbuement and dissolved."


    Rian tilted his head. "Would you have been able to use the path of lightningwisps to¡ª"


    "Throw around lightning like a character in a bad theater play?" Lori said. "Yes. I believe that when paired with the right binding, this binding in conjunction with the other will allow me to send lightning flowing through the path of lightningwisps."


    He looked down at the notes on his lap, under the tablet. "Are you telling me that if I''d given you these notes sooner, you''d have had a perfect binding to use that would have let you just throw lightning at the typhon from a safe distance?"


    The two of them were silent of a moment as Lori turned to glare at Rian.


    "Why are you looking at me like that? You were the one who gave me your notes and gave me specific orders about when to give them back to you," Rian said. "And I didn''t know what was in the notes, so there''s no way I would have known this binding existed."


    As much as she wanted to make it three shin kicks, he¡ªugh¡ªhad a point.


    This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    She still wanted to kick him, though.


    "All right, preparing for the next test," Lori said, "reconfiguring the binding to consume half as much imbuement¡­"


    After all, while she knew the binding worked, it could stand to be more efficient.


    <hr>


    Lori managed to make a lot of progress with deciphering her notes over the next two days. With some adjustments and tests, she had been able to configure the unseen piercing light binding¡ªas Rian had dubbed it in the notes¡ªto be far less imbuement intensive, though the reduced consumption came at the cost of reducing the distance which the piercing unseen light travelled.


    With the path of lightningwisps created by the unseen piercing light, sending lightning down the path was relatively simple, though it took Lori some time to create a proper binding for it. The binding she already knew for creating lightning consumed all of its imbuement and dissolved once activated, jumping from her and following the path of lightningwisps to whatever she''d pointed the unseen piercing light towards. While sufficient for throwing lightning at something, the fact that the binding was consumed after the lightning was created was annoying, since it meant she''d need to remake the binding every time.


    Fortunately, she already had another binding that would make lightning, and it was simple to modify the lightning ball binding that she had developed to use against the typhon abomination. The lightning that the binding created easily followed the trail of lightningwisps, although the binding needed to be heavily imbued. The way that her hand became comfortably warm and the number of firewisps emanating from the binding moved her to add a layer of firewisps around the shell of the lightningball to contain the heat.


    Lori was able to take a second try at observing the lightning ball binding she had observed from the dragon, and as before the lightning very quickly caused the air that had been compressed together to ignite. This time she had the presence of mind to be looking away when she activated the binding over the middle of the river. It was really more of a fire ball than a lightning ball, and when allowed to burn for more than a few moments quickly began spreading firewisps.


    While wonderful and something Lori wished she''d known about when she''d had to set the inverted corpse on fire, at the moment it was useless to her. The heat that the binding generated was so great it wasn''t safe for her to use it outside of her demesne, so unless she anchored the binding to a rock, she had no other way to use it at the moment. But then, her own rendition of the lightning ball she had made based on memories of this one also wasn''t something she could simply activate in her hand and had still proven very useful.


    Once the test was completed, Lori took hold of the notes again and continued perusing and deciphering her own writings, this time occupying Rian''s alcove¡ªthat is, the alcove she knew Rian and the other three occupied when a dragon was passing overhead¡ªwhile using a binding of airwisps to bring the sounds of the carpenters'' alcove to her. The latter wasn''t a perfect solution¡ªshe''d needed to shape the binding to go over the children playing among the support pillars in the middle of the open space of the second level because they had kept running back and forth through her binding and cause their yells to overwhelm the sounds of the carpenters¡ªbut it worked well enough, and people knew better than to bother her.


    Some of the notes she''d read, while interesting, didn''t lead to anything immediately helpful. For example, one of the notes had been about her observations on a wispling, which had gone on at length about how the binding it consisted of kept reforming without any sort of external claim, as well as how it seemed to be inhaling imbuement out of the very air. The various flow diagrams she had made, once carefully recreated, had all simply emitted light¡ªjust light, not even any form of unseen light¡ªin various patterns, with no indication as to how to reproduce the wispling at all.


    There were also notes for spiraling bindings of lightningwisps that according to her notes repelled each other, when they hadn''t attracted each other. From the state of the handwriting, the notes had been written well into the dragon''s passing, when Lori was now willing to admit she hadn''t been thinking clearly, and she had noted down the strange behavior of what she now realized had been a lode presence. She vaguely recalled that it was possible to make a lode presence by creating a lightningwisp binding that functioned in a closed loop. It had been more of a party trick than anything else, letting you pull certain kinds of metal like iron towards the binding, but she didn''t really know more than that. She''d never taken the classes on lode studies since they had been for more advanced studies. Not very useful unless they somehow dropped several nails in the water.


    ¡­


    Lori tested the binding after borrowing an iron bar from the treasure room, and sure enough the binding caused the iron to move towards it, with subsequent tests showing that the stronger she made the lightning, the more strongly metal would be drawn.


    Huh, was this how her professor had made a ball of iron float? Something this simple? Huh. If she''d known, she might have applied for those classes in lode studies.


    Well, as amusing as it was, the binding was of limited utility. Maybe she''d try to make something float if she ever got very bored.


    At least, that was what she had thought until she had encountered another note a little further on that had indicated that the flames generated by her lightningwisp fire ball could somehow be contained and channeled through spiraling loops of lightningwisps. The notes had been partially incoherent¡ªin the middle had been the words ''remember to imbue the ice''¡ªand the flow diagram had been¡­ well, it might have been a spiral, if she squinted. Still, it was fortunate that she had a much more coherent diagram to follow.


    The claim had been so strange that she''d actually gone outside and tested it above the middle of the river, creating a fire ball and then pricking a hole in the shell of airwisps to release the fire being compressed. That had resulted in a rather spectacular plume of fire¡ªand had caused Lori to alter her thoughts on the usefulness and utility of the fire ball binding¡ªbut when she had surrounded the breach in shell with a spiraling tube of lightningwisps, she''d been surprised to find that the note had been correct.


    It had been a good note to end on, and Lori went to sleep feeling satisfied.


    The next day, instead of trying to decipher her notes, Lori had decided to do something more productive and try to find a way to combine the unseen piercing light binding with her lightning ball binding so that both effects could be utilized more efficiently instead of requiring the use of two separate bindings. It had taken several iterations, and one of the very first things she had learned was that unfortunately, the binding couldn''t simply be anchored to her skin so that she could just point and activate it to direct lightning at something. The lightning was simply too hot, resulting in burns on her hands that had required treatment from both Taeclas¡ªthankfully the woman had been wearing a head cloth with her name on it, because trying to check her belt pouch for the rock with the right name would have been painful¡ªand Shanalorre to deal with her injuries.


    Rian had been very annoying about it. He completely deserved those kicks to the shin!


    Really, it was simply an insulation problem. Her final, completed binding could be anchored to the skin and used without burning herself!


    She had also experimented with the phenomenon of lightning fire being possible to channel with spiraling lightningwisps. It¡­ wasn''t quite like trying to get water to flow through a tube. The spacing of the loops of the spiral had to be just so, or the fire would escape between them, and unlike water the fire would try to escape upwards. Still, with trial and error Lori had been able find a way to gather and channel the original plume¡ªwhich had tried to go everywhere¡ªinto a more coherent stream. When contained like that, it had almost been like manipulating a water cutter.


    Lori was very good at using a water cutter.


    And this time she didn''t get any burns!

 461 - Satisfying To Build

    Two days proved sufficient to relieve Lori of the urge to check her notes. The act of having to decipher and in some cases correct her own writings and diagrams had made her stop wanting to do so, and while her hands were no longer injured, she didn''t want to possibly burn them again. Perhaps in a few days. A week at most. Maybe two weeks¡­


    ¡­


    Probably when she''d forgotten she''d burned her hands.


    So she set aside her notes for the moment, keeping them pressed with a tablet on one corner of her stone table, and went back to work. After all, there was always something she needed to attend to in her demesne.


    The first order of business had been finally getting the Coldhold out of the river. Almost against her will, Lori found herself unfortunately agreeing that the process to safely extract their largest boat out of the water was time consuming and, on her part, attention intensive. It took most of a morning''s careful maneuvering to get the stone cube containing the boat from the middle of the river back towards the docks, where she slowly raised it up before opening the cube to finally float up the boat.


    By the time the boat was released once more and floating on the water, Lori was already trying to think of where she''d put whatever boat storage structure she was going to be building.


    However, that was for later. If she was going to be building a new structure, she''d need raw material. And while she still had a large surplus from when she had excavated the grain storage room in the third level, she wasn''t sure that would be enough.


    Besides, she still had to expand her dungeon''s baths, which would probably require drawing from the surplus, and were something simple she could start with. Lori had dug them up after the first time that a dragon had passed over her demesne and she realized that she would need to shelter her idiots inside of her dungeon again in the future, and ever since had essentially just left it be. Aside from putting in lightwisps that were directly imbued by her core once she had the wire for it¡ªwhich on consideration were no longer really needed since she could just connect everything with lines of lightwisps, ugh, she needed to find time to do that¡­¡ªLori really hadn''t done any further work on it.


    She supposed it was about time to change that.


    Excavating the space to expand it was slightly problematic, since she couldn''t just make it deeper. Her dungeon''s water reservoir was behind the baths, and while there was a little more space for her to dig out, it was only about a pace or two before the back of the baths broke though into it. Given that one of the walls of the baths was up against the passageway leading towards the reservoir and the other faced the dining hall, there was only one other direction to expand, but that direction was concerningly close to the surface, and Lori didn¡¯t want to accidentally break through the side of the hill they were under. Those paces of stone surrounding her dungeon was protection in case another islandshell was dropped on top of them.


    That meant there were four possible ways to expand the dungeon''s baths: building a second bathing area somewhere else such as the second or third level, digging downwards from the currently established baths, simply reconfiguring the current baths so that more people could bathe in the available area, or bringing in stone to extend the baths into the area that was the dining hall and expanding it that way.


    The first option was violently rejected. She was not going to lay out more pipes through the stones of her demesne, and she didn''t want to have to dig out another bathing area. No, no, not happening! The population of her demesne would need to at least double for her to even consider such a thing!


    The second option was¡­ doable, but in the long run would probably be extremely dangerous. Combining wet stone floors and stairs seemed an accident waiting to happen, not to mention she couldn''t think of how she would organize everything. If she simply dug downwards, that wouldn''t really expand the bath''s area unless she excavated under the dining hall, and she wasn''t confident enough in her skills to be certain that doing that wouldn''t cause the dining hall to collapse down into the expanded bathing area.


    The third seemed more immediately doable. Remove the water basin in the middle, put in water spouts along the walls above head height, and they would have showers. It would naturally predispose people to be quick and not linger, while also allowing more people to use the baths simultaneously. However, she knew from experience that people had also used the dungeon''s baths to do their laundry during the winter. And as she did not want to have to make a second laundry area in her dungeon for the winter¡ªif there was going to be a laundry area, she was going to keep it for herself!¡ªthe shower stalls would not be viable, as laundry would probably need more open spaces and surfaces.


    That meant the most viable option was the fourth one, using stone to expand the bathing area into the dining hall. As much it was the most logical course of action, a part of Lori felt annoyed at the need to encroach into the space. There was plenty of room¡ªthe dining hall was much larger than they needed, with plenty of separation between tables and an open space at the far end from the entrance of the dungeon¡­ which was where the bathing area was¡ªbut still, the perfectionist in her was annoyed that the dining hall would no longer be perfectly regular. And she couldn''t even build a second bathing area on the opposite side, since there were entrances to cold storage rooms for their winter meat along those walls. Unfortunately, the baths were needed infrastructure, especially with them leaving summer behind and coming another season closer to winter. Well, probably leaving summer behind, it was hard to tell since the dragon was still trailing its threads across the sky.


    If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    Ugh, the perfect symmetry of her excavated spaces¡­


    Well, if she was being honest, it was unlikely to be perfectly symmetrical. The dining hall had been her earliest mass-excavation project, and the pillars and supporting arches had been shaped piecemeal. The same with the walls. A horotract¡ªor anyone at all, really¡ªexamining the chamber''s dimensions would probably be able to see it was distended and distorted and not even close to being straight at all. Lori had managed to studiously ignore this by not looking too closely at it all and assuring herself that the work she had done last year was sufficient¡­


    ¡­


    Anyway!


    So as much as it annoyed Lori to have to alter the shape of her Dungeon''s dining hall, her Dungeon''s baths would need to be expanded.


    The first order of business was sealing off all the pipes leading to the bathing area and draining them all of water. Fortunately, as a Dungeon Binder, all she needed to do was turn the water into ice and set it aside to throw into the river later.


    Then she started excavating.


    While she had no intention of putting the expanded bathing area beneath the dining area, on consideration Lori decided it would be prudent to further minimize the possibility of water flooding out from the baths and outside to the dining hall and down the nearby stairs leading down to the second level. Thus, she was excavating half a pace downward, both so that the bathing area would be lower than the floor outside it and so that she could minimize the amount of stone she''d have to bring back inside or move up from the third level¡ªshe might as well excavate that for building material too, and get a start on finally completing it.


    In the back of her mind, Lori had vague plans beyond simply making the baths bigger so that more people could use it at a time. Since the water to be used for bathing was purely for external washing and not for consumption¡ªat least, it better not be¡ªthen it didn''t have to be as completely clean as their drinking water. Combined with the fact that a lot of the water that had been dumped into the third level''s drainage cistern had been used bath water, and clearly the baths needed a way to minimize waste water that would be deposited into the third level, both to conserve their stores for drinking water and so that all the bath water didn''t end up causing the cistern to overflow and potentially flood the dungeon farm.


    She''d need to recover the water the way she''d been doing in River''s Fork, removing most of the dissolved impurities so that the water could be used again for bathing. That would mean having to make a small reservoir to hold the recovered water, and since there was always some kind of loss in any sort of system, at the very least the reservoir would need some way of prioritizing the recovered water over the water from the reservoir¡­


    <hr>


    Despite it being work and ruining the shape of her dungeon''s dining hall, the familiar rhythm of excavating and then building was comforting to Lori. There was something simply satisfying about building something, with no unexpected complications, not needing to worry if some abomination would appear or not, no having to work late into the night or waking up early, just making something she''d already made before. It was actually the easiest bathing area she''d built to date, as the walls went straight up and she didn''t have to worry about hitting her head on a low, curving roof when she was working on something up against the walls.


    She was having the carpenters make the short flight of stairs that would lead down into the baths, since wet feet on wet stone was an accident waiting to happen, and the carpenters told her they''d be able to cut a texture into the steps to help people keep their feet. It was also one less thing she''d need to do, which Lori was coming to appreciate. Having the masons and plasterers to take care of making the floors and walls level and plumb respectively was very helpful.


    While she wasn''t able to double the length of the baths¡ªthere wasn''t that much room to build¡ªLori had been able to extend the size of the baths by about a third. She put in spouts for showers near the doors for people who would be quick, while past that was the long basin filled with water for less quick baths and doing laundry in the winter.


    As the craftsmen worked on the wall and floors, Lori worked on the basin and drains. The basin was a bit wider and deeper than the basins in the other baths, since she needed it to have a large capacity. Around the basin, she had scooped out gutters to catch water and allow it to drain to the far end of the baths, where she had excavated out a shallow cistern for all the waste water to drain into. Wooden panels would be used to cover up the cistern, allowing for the people to still bathe on that end, as well as letting them recover the bars of soap that would inevitably fall in.


    A pipe and a binding of waterwisps would draw in the water and pull it up and along a length of pipe. In the middle of the pipe was a hole leading down into a large bucket¡ªwhich the carpenters also made¡ªand a binding that would turn the water into vapor. The vapor would continue along the pipe, pulled along by another binding of waterwisps, while the debris that the water had originally carried would drop down into the bucket. The vapor would be condensed back into water and deposited back into the bathing area''s basin.


    When in use, the bucket would need to be emptied every day¡ªafter stoppering the pipe so that no water was entering while it was being done¡ªto keep it from overflowing. The waste debris was relatively dry, so it would be no trouble to handle. If the basin ran low on water, another spigot directly connected to her dungeon''s water reservoir could be opened to add more, but that was only if the water ran low. Lori was confident the bath could function for several days before water lost to the air was noticeable enough for the basin to require filling.


    Building the baths took a few days, with the last pieces being the wooden stairs leading down, the panels that would go over the cistern, walls to keep anyone outside of the baths from being able to peek inside, and the little shelves for people to place their clothes while they took a bath. The carpenters were delayed because they were also inspecting the Coldhold''s wooden parts for damage. Even then, they could do little for the wooden parts that were encased in ice. And while they had Deadspeakers now, the crazy one who named her sweetgrass¡ªLori checked the rock in her belt pouch¡ªTaeclas by her own admission was not very skilled with working on dead wood in general and carpentry in particular, while the more capable but lazy one¡ªshe checked another rock¡ªLidzuga was a resident of River''s Fork.


    Fortunately, they already had a procedure for checking the internal components of the Coldhold once the external woodwork was deemed not damaged.

 462 - Oh, NOW Theyre Here

    While Shanalorre knew practically nothing about Deadspeaking, becoming the Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork had given her the ability to perceive all life in her demesne, in the same way that Lori was able to perceive all wisps in hers. Perception, memory, and a functional mind had allowed Shanalorre to be able to differentiate the differences between the life of the living and the dead. And while she had never been taught, this simple awareness enabled Shanalore to be able to tell if the Coldhold''s wooden components have been affected by mold or rot by finding ''living'' life beneath the surface of ''dead'' wood.


    Thus, as part of the Coldhold''s inspection and repairs, Rian took the boat in question, a couple of the demesne''s carpenters, the crazy sweetgrass-naming woman, and Shanalorre downriver to River''s Fork so that the Dungeon Binder could examine the boat''s components through her awareness. Should any be found, she''d be able to claim the wooden components in questions more quickly than crazy sweetgrass¡ªLori sighed, and checked the rocks in her belt pouch¡ªTaeclas and Lidzuga could, so that the two Deadspeakers could deal with the problem and repair what they could of the damage.


    Lori left them to it, as she had other matters to deal with.


    "No, you can''t have it," Lori said sternly. "It''s a useful stockpile of resources, and the teeth especially are invaluable. Why would I want to keep them in when they''d be far more useful being used to make knives?" She didn''t even need to reshape many of them, most of them were already knife-sized!


    "Oh, come on, just think about it!" Rian said. "Imagine how intimidated people will be when we sail into Covehold Demesne''s harbor and people see we have a typhon beast skull mounted to the front of our ship!" He gestured at the admittedly large skull, which had a length of wood that ended in a stump fused to one side of its jaw. "Just think of the fear and awe when I tell people of how you killed a typhon abomination!"


    For a moment, Lori tilted her head, unable to keep herself from imagining it. She did like being feared¡­


    ¡­


    "Leave the skull alone, Rian,"


    Rian sighed. "But it would look so intimidating¡­"


    "Rian, stop obsessing about my building materials and go do something useful."


    "Yes, your Bindership. Remember, you need to check on the driver components later."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Yes, yes. Now go and leave me be."


    The bound tools were the very last thing to be restored to functionality in River''s Fork, admittedly because Lori had forgotten and only recalled when she''d seen all the bound tool cores that she had removed and wondered why she had a pile of them on her table.


    Fortunately, the relative cool had been beneficial to their various trees, and Lidzuga had been alternating between activating and deactivating the various trees to give them time to recover. As the weather cooled more and the winds started to return¡ªthey actually had a breeze yesterday¡ªthe bound tools keeping the trees ventilated would be deactivated again as they became unnecessary.


    Huh, Lori would have to ask the two Deadspeakers if they would somehow keep the fruit trees active through the winter. Actually, had they been active through the winter last year? She''d ask the two later once the bound tools were in place.


    Humming to herself now that Rian had left, Lori went back to what she had gone to the bone pile to do: finding a nicely-shaped bone that she could use as an anchor for her bindings. Anchoring bindings on her nails and staff were all well and good, but as the fire ball and its modification the fire sprayer had shown her, that was sometimes a terrible idea. Especially the fire ball and fire sprayer.


    As stone was too heavy and brittle, bone was the best material to make some kind of accessory to keep on her person that could be used as an anchor point. They had a supply of bone back home in her demesne, but it had mostly been smaller pieces that she would need to reshape herself. While that was certainly an option that she was prepared to do, Lori had decided to check on the typhon abomination''s bones to see if there was anything that appeared usable.


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Unfortunately, nothing called to her at the moment. Many of the parts were simply just too big to use. Some of the bones had been opened to extract the marrow, showing the cavities within, and she had considered have a section of hollow bone cut to make some sort of armlet, but the bone had been too thick. She might have to try with one of the smaller bones¡­


    Setting the bone that seemed most promising a bit to the side so she could come back for it, Lori headed off to get on with putting all the bound tools¡ªtechnically the bound tool cores, but once she finished she''d have bound tools¡ªback to where they were. She hummed to herself as she made a note to replenish the large beads in the dragon shelter. They''d used up one when the dragon had passed, and had come close to consuming the second, which had been the size of a clenched fist when she had checked. It had no doubt gotten even smaller as they had needed to keep using the dragon shelter to house people while the houses were being cleared of bugs.


    She''d have to take Lori''s Shed Boat out to make more beads soon, as well as more of the beads they use for the bound tools¡­ which were also called large beads, so¡­ she might have to rethink how she referred to the beads that imbued the dragon shelter''s defenses. Big beads? Over-sized beads? Large-large beads?


    Hmm¡­ she''d think about it while she worked. If she let Rian contribute, he''d probably think of something overly dramatic.


    ¡­


    She should ask Rian. But later. Right now, she had bound tool to put back in place.


    <hr>


    "Great Binder," Shanalorre said from behind Lori.


    Lori glanced up from the bound tool she was embedding into the outside of River''s Fork''s bathing area. With the cooling of the weather, she had finally added a binding of firewisps so that the little prototype bound tool would heat the water that was being drawn from the river. A part of her wondered whether she should redesign the bath''s drainage, since with the coming cold people would probably start overusing the bathing area and taxing the arrangement she had already made. Nah, she''ll wait until they started flooding their own baths due to their own thoughtlessness. "What is it?" she asked, then frowned. She felt like she''d said that before¡­


    "I believe I have a large number of people entering the confines of River''s Fork demesne from downriver," Shanalorre said. "It is difficult to estimate exact numbers, as more and more individuals are entering, but there are at least fifty already inside the demesnes'' boundaries, and the number is still increasing."


    It took Lori a few moments to understand what Shanalorre was telling her. "What?" she said, hoping she had misheard.


    Shanalorre opened her mouth and paused, visibly amending what she was going to say. "People are entering this demesne," she said. "I cannot be absolutely certain, but based on their increasing numbers, the direction they are entering the demesne from¡ª" she paused, frowning, then nodded, "¡ªand the fact they appear to be accompanied by more than one Deadspeaker, I believe I can safely conclude that the Golden Sweetwood Company''s second wave of settlers have arrived."


    For some reason, Shanalorre knelt down, bowing her head. "What are your orders, my Dungeon Binder?"


    Lori stared blankly at her, wondering why the other Dungeon Binder was being so strangely theatrical. Then she shook her head and turned back towards the bound tool core she had been embedding into the stone pipe. She softened the stone around it and extracted out the shell of copper filled with white Iridescence. "Find Rian. Tell him to gather every single wisplight and bound tool in the demesne and bring it to the Coldhold. I''ll deal with the ones that are embedded. Once you have, go to my bone stockpile and fetch me a bone from the claws or feet. A large one." Lori held out her hands about twenty yustri apart to demonstrate. She would have wanted a more optimal bone to act as her anchoring tool, but since she was pressed for time at the moment, she''d just have to make something and be done with it.


    Shanalorre nodded. "At once, Great Binder," she said, and Lori was pleasantly surprised when the other Dungeon Binder did, in fact, stand and immediately began to hurry towards where Rian presumably was instead of lingering to ask silly questions.


    For a moment, Lori stared after her subordinate. Shanalorre had recovered from the deaths of her parents admirably. No longer a crying, lost little girl, she had left them behind just as Lori had shed her own parents. Calm and composed at all times¡ªexcept when she was with her young cousin, which was like having a little brother or sister, so that was understandable¡ªshe was no longer sad, no longer in pain.


    Shanalorre had become a Dungeon Binder.


    She needed to be watched.


    But later. Right now, Lori needed to collect and remove all the bound tools she had already imbedded into the stones of the dragon shelter, as well as the large beads that were being stored in the mine''s alcove. And all the wire she had used while she was at it. She debated removing the dragon shelter''s doors, but decided the copper amalgam wasn''t a priority. There was no obvious way to reproduce it merely from examination. A part of her debated simply taking off the doors in any case, but she decided that while it would be petty, spiteful and satisfying, this was still her demesne, and she needed to be able to protect it in case there was an unexpected dragon. So she supposed that the wire she''d embedded into the mine would remain, but she was still taking the bound tool cores.


    Her discoveries could not be allowed to fall into the hands of someone other than herself!

 Demesne Snippets 1: A Story

    Shasha, tell me a story¡­


    What kind of story would you like?


    Something boring. I can''t sleep.


    Well, as of today, all the meat we have in the cold rooms amounts to¡ª


    Not that kind of boring story! An interesting boring story!


    Then how about I tell you about before the sea of stars?


    There''s a before the sea of stars?


    Of course. After all, to cross the sea of stars, people had to come from somewhere, right?


    This doesn''t sound like a boring story.


    It will be the way I''ll tell it.


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    No! Don¡¯t make the story boring, Shasha! I want to hear this one!


    All right. But after this you need to sleep. All of you.


    Now, how did it go¡­? Ah. A long time ago, before there were Dungeon Binders, back when Whisperers knew only how to use fire, there was only one demesne. It was a demesne that covered all the land, a demesne that knew the secret of how to talk to dragons¡ª


    You can talk to dragons?


    Hush. I''m telling the story now.


    Why can''t we talk to dragons now? Then we wouldn''t have to hide and just tell them to go away.


    If we could talk to dragons, you know it will be Binder Lolilyuri who talks to them. Do you want her to talk to dragons?


    Oh. Probably good we can''t talk to dragons anymore, then. But wouldn''t she just send Lord Rian to talk to them, anyways?


    Maybe. But hush. I''m still telling the story. This demesne was the greatest demesne of all, with bound tools that didn''t need beads, and food for everyone so no one was ever hungry¡ª


    Like here?


    Better than here, because they only ate stew when they wanted to.


    Ooh, that is better! That means everyone was probably fat!


    Probably.


    They''d be the fat demesne.


    Don''t be rude.


    ¡­sorry, Shasha.


    One more interruption, and I''m stopping this story and going to sleep.


    Yes, Shasha.


    In the demesne, no one was hungry. No one was sick. Everyone lived to be very old, and no one feared giving birth. The demesne had everything anyone could ask.


    It was not enough.

 Demesne Snippets 2: More Of A Story

    Because they had so much, the number of people in the demesne grew and grew. Even with plenty, the people of the demesne would not be content. They wanted more. Those who wanted more began to build metal boats, big enough to be cities and dungeons, with many levels so they could fill it with food for the journey, as well as for the things they wanted to bring back.


    But why metal, though? Don''t we use wood and ice to make boats?


    Perhaps they had so much they could afford to make the boats out of metal.


    That seems silly.


    I do not know what to tell you, Yoshka. In the story, they used metal boats. It also seems you''re not getting sleepy. Perhaps this story is too exciting. How about I tell you about how many tubers¡ª


    None of your tuber stories! Your tubers are too boring. Please don''t stop, I''ll get bored and go to sleep, I promise!


    Very well. However, as these boats were being built, other people became angry, for they wanted the metal and everything that the boat builders were using for themselves. They tried to take the metal back.


    They couldn''t share?


    Apparently not. Or perhaps they didn''t want to share, because they thought it meant there would be less for them.


    Stolen story; please report.


    Did they need it?


    I do not know. That''s not part of the story. People started to fight, and what had once seemed more than enough for everyone suddenly became not enough. There were those who tried to get people to stop, but no one listened. Soon, the demesne began to burn.


    What about the Dungeon Binder? Why didn''t they do anything?


    They tried, but no one listened, and the demesne was just too big for them to try and do everything in it.


    But why not? They''re the Dungeon Binder, right?


    Dungeon Binders can''t do everything, Yoshka. We can only do our best. Sometimes, it''s not enough¡­


    Don''t cry, Shasha. I''m sorry, I won''t interrupt anymore.


    It¡­ it''s fine, Yoshka.


    I love you, Shasha.


    ¡­I love you too, Yoshka.


    ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­what happened next?


    Next¡­ next¡­ ah. Even though everyone was fighting, some people tried to finish their boats. However, in the end, only one boat was finished. As the island it was on sank beneath the waves, people boarded the metal boat. While the island''s tallest mountain slowly vanished into the ocean, the Whisperers worked together and used their fire to burn a hole that would let their boat leave.


    As the mountain disappeared beneath the waves, the boat fell into the void of the sea of stars, and sailed away. Filled with people of all sorts who just wanted to get away from the fighting, their boat traveled the sea of stars, avoiding the strange beasts that swam through the void, and fighting them when that couldn''t be done. They wandered the void for a long time, trying to find a way to leave. The end.


    That''s it?


    That''s it. Remember, it''s the story of what came before the sea of stars. Was it boring enough for you?


    Not really. Tell me another one?


    No. If I tell you another one, you''re going to be napping during breakfast again. Go to sleep, Yoshka.


    Fine¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    So, what happened after that?


    Karina, go to sleep.

 Demesne Snippets 3: Shana Watch

    I stood under one of the few trees near our village¡ªI refused to call it ''Lori''s Village'' or anything like that¡ªlooking up at the branches above as I held open a sack, one of the canvas sacks that had gotten progressively more beat up as the year had gone on. The happyfruit tree was heavy with fruit, but because of the heat, the only ones picking at the moment were me, Karina and Shana.


    Karina was nearby, holding out her skirt in the unabashed immodesty of children as she used it catch fruit. Once they''d been caught, I''d take the fruits from her and put it in the sack so that other fruit would be more likely to land softly instead of hitting another fruit and bruising. A little sweat trickled down my skin, the sun piercingly hot as always, but it was more than mitigated by how cold the air was. Even without wind, it was cool for me.


    Up in the tree was Shana.


    Barefoot, she moved with utter confidence, hands and feet on the branches. Her slight frame allowed her to move very close to the ends of the trees limbs, and for the fruits a bit too far, she carried a stick with a hook carved to the end, which dangled from a rope tied around her waist.


    With both feet on a branch and one hand gripping another branch above her, Shana plucked at a cluster of happy fruit, giving them a practiced twist to break them off from their stem, glancing down briefly so she could gently toss the fruit to Karina, who caught the fruit as gently as she could.


    I probably had better uses of my time than helping the children pick the fruit from the trees¡ªlike learning to do my own laundry so that I wasn''t such a burden to Umu and Mikon¡ªbut few of them were as important as keeping our other Dungeon Binder from getting herself killed.


    It was very similar to my more usual duty of keeping our Dungeon Binder from getting herself killed, except Shana was likely to do it knowingly and deliberately.


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    Lori had done what she could, in her way, when she had given orders that Shana not be allowed access to sharp objects. As everyone had vividly seen why she had given that order, they were complying with it.


    As was usual though, Lori had left things at merely giving orders to prevent something that had happened already, and not bothering to address the root cause. Very typical of governments, actually. In that way, Lori was depressingly suited to being a Dungeon Binder.


    She had given no orders about whether or not Shana was to be prevented from climbing tall things such as, to take a random example, trees. Trees that she was very skilled at climbing at, as evidenced by how she was doing so now while Karina stayed on the ground. Trees that she could so easily simply¡­ step off.


    I''d done what I could. I''d given orders that those watching the children when Karina organized them to gather food keep an eye on Shana¡ªand everyone else¡ªwho climbed a tree in case they fell. That had been the best I could do. Unfortunately, it was the younger men and women who were usually watched them and¡­


    Am I getting old? I feel like I''m getting old, since I had a strong urge to think ''when I was that age, I did my chores more diligently!'', and only caught myself halfway through the thought. I''m only twenty-two, I''m too young to be a cranky old man complaining about how the younger generation¡­ oh no. They''re the same generation as me, aren''t they¡­


    I blame Lori for me becoming a cranky old man. It''s worked for me before, I see no reason to change it.


    So¡­ with the designated watchers being¡­ less than diligent¡­ and with the children being more trusted to handle themselves as time had gone on and no one had gotten seriously hurt, the young ones more or less went unwatched except when they were seeling, which in this heat only Karina did. Two children deciding to go out in the afternoon heat to pick fruits? They could be trusted not to get in trouble, especially since they were both girls.


    Except one of the children was Shana.


    All it would take was to let go, and she wouldn''t need a sharp object. The ground would do it for her.


    And so I stood there, holding a sack of fruit, ready at any moment to drop it and try to catch Shana¡­

 Demesne Snippets 4: Parental Embarrassment

    Riz had been avoiding her family ever since she''d started sleeping with Rian¡ªand Mikon and Umu technically, since they all shared the same bed. This wasn''t out of any sort of dislike or personal issue, the way the Great Binder was always implying she had some sort of disagreement with her mothers. Mikon had been much the same, clearly avoiding her cousins and aunts unless it couldn''t be helped¡ªsuch as when she was weaving¡ªalthough not her uncle for some reason. Umu¡­ well, Riz didn''t really pay much attention to what Umu did outside the house, despite Mikon constantly going on about how the two of them should get along better because they were both sleeping with Rian and any ill feelings would make things awkward in bed and¡­


    ¡­ in hindsight, Mikon''s ulterior motives were much more obvious.


    However, she couldn''t avoid her family forever. For one thing, they ate in the same Dungeon¡ªand a part of her was a bit astonished she''d gotten used to eating in the demesne''s dungeon every day¡ªand since there were only two baths for women, it was inevitable that she''d run into someone she was related to eventually.


    She just wished it wasn''t in the Um¡ªit was also a little astonishing she''d gotten used to that name too, because it had used to catch her between sighing at how stupid it was and snickering at how stupid it was¡ªwhile she was lying down with her head on Mikon''s lap.


    "Hello, Auntie Mirralca," Mikon said cheerfully as Riz hastily straightened up and since when had Mikon been talking to her mother? Oh, right, right, weavers, that''s probably when. "Hello, Uncle Rolah. How''s Auntie Milcarra?"


    Riz stared in horror as she realized Mikon was on speaking terms with her entire family to hear the start of her mother''s response. If she was calling everyone ''auntie''¡­


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    "She''s fine, Mii," her mother said, "my sister just decided she''d rather sleep tonight. Hello, Riz. How have you been doing? Is there a room for us?"


    Riz really wanted to say yes, just to get her parents to move on and leave her alone. Unfortunately, all the water clocks were dripping into the bucket, meaning all the rooms were full, and while there were a couple were almost empty, they weren''t empty yet. Maybe if she tipped one over¡­?


    Her hand twitched to do just that, except her ears were clamoring for her to pay attention as she heard her father say, "How are you doing, Mikon? Still¡­ uh, doing well, I hope?"


    "Doing very well, uncle," Mikon said cheerfully as she slipped her arm around Riz''s elbow possessively. "Erzebed and I have been getting along wonderfully."


    "No rooms, but we have a few who should be done soon," Riz said, perhaps just a bit too loudly. "Why don''t you go take a bath and come back later, the rooms should be open by then!" And it will be Raradina''s shift by then, so she didn''t have to be here¡ª


    "We''ll just wait then. It''s been so long since we last talked, Riz," her mother said with a smile. "How have you been? Things with Rian seem to be going well."


    "Oh, they are," Mikon said cheerfully as Riz turned to stare at her woman in horror. "Umu and I have been finding the two of them gone in the morning, and when this one shows up in the baths she''s always tired and sweaty."


    "I told you, I was out doing quarterstaff practice to keep Rian company while he did sword practice," Riz said. "That''s all the two of us were doing!"


    Mikon looked at her in confusion. "Yes? If you and Rian wanted to have fun making music, you''d have stayed at home." Her treacherous woman turned back towards her mother. "I''m so glad for them. They''re doing more than just sleeping with each other now."


    Riz was a proud and blooded militiawoman¡ªand these days she was wondering if she was really all that retired, given what she was doing for the Great Binder¡ªand had faced beasts, abominations, and the Great Binder when she was in a foul temper. She did not look away and blush when her mother started laughing, and anyone saying otherwise was a lying civilian and naturally not to be trusted because they didn''t know what they were talking about!

 Demesne Snippets 5: Brewing

    There were always some fruits left over, too bruised or ripe by the time they''d been picked. It wasn''t a lot, and they were still perfectly edible. In times past, no one would have thought twice about eating a too-soft, bruised happyfruit as long as the skin was intact. If it wasn''t some would have hesitated a little, but there were a few who wouldn''t have even thought twice about it. Food was food, after all, and if there were some bugs in it¡­ well, that was meat right there.


    But between the farms and the fruits from the local trees that hadn''t been cut down, and the fruits coming up from River''s Fork downriver, and the tubers and greens they were growing, and all the meat¡ªkept cold instead of aged or salted, but they had some of that as well¡ªthe men and women of Lorian Demesne could afford to be picky and not eat anything that squished too much when they squeezed it. It was practically like being townsfolk, who had so much they could actually afford to throw away food that was still perfectly fit to eat!


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    They didn''t, because many of them had lived on the edge of starvation or had gone on patrols where not enough rations had been packed, but they could if they wanted to!


    And while Binder Lori had a rather hued view of booze¡ªshe had a hued view of many things that most people would have thought were universally well-loved¡ªshe hadn''t outright banned it. And Gunvi had made so many jars¡ªmany small, but a few not so small¡ªthat one or two being used for something wasn''t going to be missed.


    The fruit had been mashed together in a jar, mixed with water and a little bit of brew jelly to help it along. Gunvi had been willing to make them a little tube to let the brew bubble out without letting anything in.


    The result hadn''t been the best, since they''d only let it sit for a couple of weeks. It was weak and watery, and there hadn''t been enough for everyone to have a glass. But after so long, it¡­ it¡­


    ¡­all right, it was piss. The second batch wasn''t any better. Or the third. For the fourth batch got kicked over and spilled. But the fifth batch¡­


    ¡­eh. It was all right. But since it was still better than the first three, they''d take it!

 2024 Christmas... Gift?

    Merry Christmas, everyone! Due to lacking anything to give you... have a list of names from the upcoming and in progress Volume 4! I know people have been clamoring to have more names! After all, you certainly don''t get any in Lori-cam.


    <ul>


    <li>Tafit: A Horotract of the Golden Sweetwood Company. Has big, poofy hair</li>


    <li>Madsmif: A Horotract of the Golden Sweetwood Company. Has a large chin and cooks the strangest food</li>


    <li>Yhim: A Mentalist who left after his first tour of duty to become a farmer, the many friends he remained in contact with in the militia invited him into the Golden Sweetwood company for his agricultural expertise.</li>


    <li>Xiasam: 214cm tall (translated into Earth terms) of pure muscle, Xiasam believes that a Mentalist should cultivate both his body and mind. Despite being well into his forties, he''s still one of the mightiest men in the Golden Sweetwood Company, as well as being a doctor in several fields such as medicine, law, engineering, alchemy and philosophy.</li>


    <li>Nansi Hightown: a young Mentalist who has just recently finished her first tour of duty, she''s recently married and planning to settle this new demesne with her wife.</li>


    <li>Tsad: An easyoing man with a pleasant demeanor, he used to be in charge of training militia Deadspeakers in both field medicine and engineering. Planning to teach Shanalorrre Deadspeaking</li>


    <li>Lafhaiel: Recently married, he left the old continent to get away from allegations that he murdered his abusive stepmother. Not that he actually did it, but that''s the sort of thing that gets around about a man.</li>


    <li>Flotelik: a scion of a family noted for their elegant deadcrafting. Finding the family expertise distasteful, he ran off to become a doctor.</li>


    <li>Makoi: A cranky old man, he''s divorced and has a son who chose to stay back in Lomabuyar demesne. Good friends with Yhim</li>


    <li>Malia: Recently married, she left to accompany her husband, who is rumored to have murdered his stepmother. Suggestions that she was the one who murdered the woman are... completelyfactual and accurate, but not really made, because she looks so innocent...</li>


    <li>Rilianne: Technically a noble, she joined the militia once she was old enough, and never looked back. While she maintained contact with her younger sisters, she has chosen to separate herself from her brothers'' bad decisions.</li>


    <li>Fraks ¨C she joined the militia a bright-eyed idealist, and left it a jaded cynic. She''s an expert in water bindings.</li>


    <li>Shelena: A talented whisperer who does astrology as a hobby. she is often used as a spotter because her far-sight bindings are very good.</li>


    <li>Ermero: A Whisperer who''s not very good at forming bindings despite his encyclopedic knowledge of them, but has a talent for teaching and served as a militia Whispering instructor.</li>


    <li>Ghirkun: A master blacksmith, engineer and artisan in addition to being a Whisperer, he worked in logistics repairing weapons and making whatever the militia needed. Makes little puzzles in his spare time</li>


    <li>Aritlestn: He was a part of the militia police, and has experience subduing recalcitrant and drunk wizards, which usually involves clubbing them over the head with his staff. Has had terrible luck with women.</li>


    <li>Sulli: An intelligent woman who has the sort of personality found in certain young adult mystery novels that use the word ''sleuth'' unironically. While most Whisperers use a staff to channel their magic, she uses a very large sword.</li>


    <li>Faith Redmane: a young Whisperer who has just recently finished her first tour of duty, she''s recently married and planning to settle this new demesne with her wife. Very capable with lightning bindings, but rather ineffectual at housework.</li>


    <li>Otin: a contemporary of Xiasam, he was a noted strategist and and expert in lightning bindings. Taught Faith all she knows, but not all he knows. Uses a spear instead of a staff.</li>


    </ul>

 463 - Vol 4 Prologue: How Had It Come to This? This Was Supposed To Be A Cushy Retirement!

    ¡°Demesne in sight! Demesne in sight!¡±


    Yhallisu¡ªYhal to most¡ªlooked up at the cry from the lead elements of the march. They had been walking for days now, three hundred people and livestock, and so far the trail they¡¯d been washing through the Iridescence had seemed never ending. Their progress was slow since they had so many people, many of them civilians unused to prolonged marching through the colors, but at least the river had been continuous. The barges that their carpenters and Deadspeakers had assembled for carrying their supplies hadn¡¯t need to be carried up over any waterfalls or rapids, which had helped lighten the loads, although it meant that one of the Mentalists had to concentrate on pulling the train of barges along at all times. The other two would either be floating above the march, keeping an eye out for beasts and possible obstructions ahead, or with the forward scouts using their thought force to move obstructions that were easier to pick up and move out of the way. The expedition¡¯s other wizards were divided among those either deeper inside the woods to discourage beasts from getting close, or those in the rear guard doing the same.


    People glanced up at the announcement, and while there wasn¡¯t a sudden surge of people suddenly moving faster, the air suddenly seemed filled with¡­ well, not energy. Everyone was just as ¡®we hate walking¡¯ tired as they had been before, even the militia among them who would normally think this was a casual stroll to town on a nice warm summer day. It was more like everyone became just a bit more determined to push on, to just get inside the demesne¡¯s boundaries so that they¡¯d be safe from the beasts and the colors.


    Distantly, he heard a high-pitched beast cry and out of habit listened intently, but fortunately there was no whistle calling for reinforcements. The Whisperers and screening forces were managing to keep beasts back from investigating the large group of walking meat that was the expedition, though the relatively low number of incidents recently so far was vaguely concerning. When they had landed and were still building the barges, beasts had come to investigate them several times, and while as experienced militia they had managed to drive the things off, they had learned beasts approaching them so casually was to be expected,


    That had changed in the last two days, with the scouts reporting a notable drop in the number of beasts in the woods around them. Normally, that would mean they were approaching the boundaries of a demesne, but given what Yllian has said, it had seemed strange, and Yhal had been expecting the bill to come due at any moment.


    He was still expecting it as he finally crossed the borders of a demesne again. Their stop in Covehold Demesne had been brief and rather cramped, as they hadn¡¯t been allowed to step off the ship, since the locals had been afraid they would rob the storage warehouses or attempt to make off with the other ship that had been docked for some absurd reason. That had led to a miserable three days. Here¡­ well, Yhal wasn¡¯t the only one who let out a sigh of relief as he crossed the border into the demesne. Others began to cheer outright, and a few even collapsed onto the ground.


    ¡°All right, none of that,¡± Yhal said, chivying the latter. Most of them were civilian relatives, although he recognized a few of the former enlisted among them. ¡°On your feet, we still have a ways to go before we get to the center of the demesne where the town is. Come on, get up, get up, all of you.¡± He fell back on his ¡®captain¡¯ voice even if he didn¡¯t phrase it as an order. As they were retired, all of them were equals now¡ªotherwise he¡¯d have a sergeant to do this¡ªso he was relying on force of habit to do the work for him.


    There were groans, but thankfully that seemed to work, even if there was more profanity in his direction than there would have been in the militia. Fortunately, that was self-correcting as those who were married found their wive and husbands giving them grief about their language in front of the children.


    Still¡­


    ¡°Once everyone¡¯s inside, we stop for a break,¡± Yhal said, raising his voice so the wizards and all the former sergeants could hear him. ¡°Let everyone have some water and check the beasts¡¯ feet. Since we¡¯re inside, their Great Binder must know we¡¯re here now.¡±


    Despite all of them being retired, falling into the structures of the militia was a habit, especially since it helped no one die. Or at least, that was the idea. Most everyone fell back into familiar roles, although now there was no need to keep everyone busy to keep them out of trouble. Nearly everyone had families to take care of anyway, so their hands were full already.


    Yhal allowed about a quarter hour¡¯s rest before rousing everyone to start setting up a temporary camp and prepare lunch. It was honestly a bit early for it, but they needed a way to celebrate finally reaching their goal. They still had a lot of work ahead of them, since they needed to prepare for the coming of winter, but they still had a little under a couple of blue months or perhaps most of a red month to get things ready. Yllian¡¯s letter had said that they didn¡¯t have enough people to do more than keep everyone alive, and had been limited by the loss of Koshay and Laven.


    Yllian had gone heavily into the details of their deaths, explaining how Koshay¡¯s attempts to use his insane tree-dome as a means of protecting the demesne against a dragon¡ªor trying to use it that way¡ªhad failed because the dome had contained far too many open spaces to be effective. Rather than trying to persist with something that hadn¡¯t worked, Koshay had opted to take his own life to allow his wife Laven to claim the now-unbound Dungeon core of the demesne. As the new Dungeon Binder, Laven had maintained a protective barrier around the town that the first group had established¡­ and had died from exhaustion, lack of sleep and, fancifully, grief soon after the dragon had finally passed over the demesne.


    It was much more likely that Laven had already been near exhaustion then even before the dragon¡¯s arrival. That woman seemed to delight in finding things to cause herself stress and overwork. Had. Had seemed.


    And now they¡¯d left their daughter to outlive them and follow in their footsteps as their demesne¡¯s third Dungeon Binder.


    The lives it had cost to establish the new demesne had been the leading factor in discouraging the idea of simply starting a new demesne in another place, with many arguing it would be disrespectful to the fallen to abandon the settlement. Many had argued that there was nothing inherently bad about the location, it was simply that they¡¯d had the ill luck to have faced a dragon while the demesne was still unprepared. The exasperation at Koshay¡¯s priorities had been unsaid, but floated in the air like campfire smoke.


    To that end, Yllian¡¯s letter had been invaluable in informing them of what had been successful¡­ although usually it was because the other nearby demesne had been doing it to great effect. Their Dungeon Binder had originally been a Whisperer, and so Whispering was the most commonly utilized magic. Yllian had spoken of Whispering-propelled boats, stone buildings, an extensive system of plumbing running through the other demesne¡¯s bedrock¡­


    He¡¯d even mentioned a full-sized boat made of ice, as if someone had taken the little blocks of river ice that children carved and built it full-sized, and which somehow actually worked. Yhal would believe that when he saw it.


    As a result of Yllian¡¯s report, the decision had been made to have as many Whisperers as possible with this second expedition. Of course, that didn¡¯t mean they had only Whisperers, but instead of the two or three they had originally planned, they had eight that had spent at least some time working in an Engineering banner. One of them, Ghirkun, was even a blacksmith with experience building mechanisms and gears.


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    The number of Deadspeakers with them had been increased to six, and had been put through an abbreviated course in both carpentry and farming. They had brought only the medics who had managed to learn how to grow plants and work with dead wood. The Horotracts and Mentalists had also been increased in their number even if they had only risen from one to two and three, but the increase had already been very valuable, the Horotracts using their magic to reduce the weight of their supplies and the Mentalists cutting down overly large trees and lifting them out of the way, as well as helping the Whisperers move the barges against the current.


    Their assistance had cut down duration of the march from where the ship had set them down to a third, in comparison to how long Yllian had said it had taken the original expedition, something that Yhal intended to include in his report back to the rest of the company. While he wouldn¡¯t say no to them sending more wizards, clearly the next group needed to be met with as many of their wizards as possible to help smooth their journey upriver¡­


    But that was for another time. At the moment, any further contact with the rest of the company besides mail would be to ask them to send specialized equipment, crops, or perhaps information currently unavailable on the new continent, while the new demesne would send back what sugars, furs, and distilled booze they could to help offset the costs. Of course, that would require them to successfully resettle and expand River¡¯s Fork demesne¡­


    It was well into the afternoon and everyone was just finishing their early dinner¡ªor possibly just an afternoon snack¡ªwhen someone finally arrived to check up on them.


    ¡°Yhal!¡± he heard Nansi Hightown¡ªher grandparents had been foreign¡ªcall, and he had instinctively glanced up for a moment out of habit before turning to face the Mentalist. She was running from upriver, pointing at something behind her. ¡°There¡¯s a group coming downriver! One of them is Captain Yllian!¡±


    Ah, finally. Yhal wondered what had caused the delay, then remembered that the Great Binder was a child of eleven. Well, twelve now, since it had been a year. Perhaps she hadn¡¯t noticed their arrival, or it had slipped her mind? They had arrived just before noon, so perhaps the child¡¯s attention had been occupied by her meal or something. ¡°About time,¡± he said as he got to his feet, ignoring the way they protested that with the ease of long practice. Feet didn¡¯t give orders to officers. Nansi came to an easy stop as she came near, not even looking winded despite having just been in a dead run a moment before. ¡°How did he look?¡±


    ¡°Well enough,¡± Nansi said. ¡°He seems to have lost a little weight, but not enough to imply they¡¯re having food shortages. The others with him are looking good too.¡± The orange-haired woman frowned. ¡°They¡¯re all carrying spears though, and look like they might use them.¡±


    ¡°They might just be worried about any leftover abominations,¡± Yhal pointed out. He knew he would be if he didn¡¯t have a full militia to scour the demesne for the dragon¡¯s twisted discards. ¡°They could have beasts in here, for all we know.¡±


    ¡°If there are, I should tell the screens to go back out again,¡± Nansi said.


    ¡°Tell the screens to move out again,¡± Yhal agreed.


    Best to be cautious, after all.


    <hr>


    ¡°Yllian!¡± Tsad greeted with a big smile. Despite not actually being fat, the Deadspeaker somehow gave the impression of being a fat, jolly tavernkeeper as he exchanged grips with Yllian. ¡°It¡¯s good to see you again! How are you?¡±


    ¡°As well as one could be, Tsad,¡± Yllian said with his own smile. ¡°Yhallisu. Xiasam. Otin. I¡¯m glad to see you all managed to get here safely. I hope you had a boring march?¡±


    Otin grunted, the bearded Whisperer putting weight on the spear he used as a staff. Not that he needed it. The man was lean as a whip and hit just as hard. ¡°Not as boring as we¡¯d like. We ran into a flock of beasts who wouldn¡¯t get out of our way. Tall, fat, long necks, stand up like posts?¡±


    ¡°Waddlers,¡± Yllian said, nodding in recognition. ¡°Best to stay well back and just let them drink their water. They finish fairly quickly.¡±


    ¡°Oh, they did,¡± Xiasam said, the muscular man looming over everyone like a tree even with an amiable smile on his face. ¡°It was the things that came to eat them that was the trouble. Who¡¯s this civilian?¡±


    The civilian in question was a young man, wearing a well-maintained shirt and trousers. His hands were holding a branch that had one end on the ground like a walking stick, the other end in his grip like a club waiting to happen, and kept shifting his weight from one foot to another, which was what had marked him as a civilian unused to long marches. At the focus on him, he gave them a wide smile and a small wave of his hand, as if they weren¡¯t standing four paces in front of him. ¡°Ah, hello. I¡¯m Rian, from upriver. Sorry for interrupting your reunion like this, but I was just in River¡¯s Fork when Shana¡ª¡±


    ¡°Binder Shanalorre,¡± one of those who had accompanied Yllian, Raradina, interjected.


    For some reason, Rian let out a small sigh and visibly aborted rolling his eyes as Raradina and the other local militia all looked away from him with small smiles. ¡°I was in River¡¯s Fork when Binder Shanalorre informed everyone of your arrival, and thought I should do the polite thing and welcome you to the continent.¡± He paused a moment. ¡°Welcome to the new continent. Try not to die, you¡¯ll find your stay more enjoyable that way.¡±


    Yhal looked at Yllian in askance, wondering what the fool civilian was talking about, and found the other captain¡ªwell, retired captain¡ªsimply nodding along in agreement. ¡°Well¡­ thank you for the welcome, I suppose,¡± Yhal said. And indeed, being welcomed was a lot better than being unwelcome¡­ but why was it by this strange civilian?


    The strange civilian in question looked around and seemed to come a realization. ¡°Ah, I¡¯m making things awkward, aren¡¯t I? My apologies. Yllian, can you take care of things, then? I¡¯ll just stand behind that tree over there, staring at how lovely, dark and deep the woods are and waiting for my cue to step back in.¡±


    ¡°¡­I think that might be for the best, Lord Rian,¡± Yllian said.


    Lord Rian? Someone thought highly of themselves.


    The civilian in question nodded. ¡°Just call me if you need me.¡± Turning towards them again, the man gave a genial nod and began to walk away to the tree in question, humming softly to himself. The militia around Yllian exchanged glances, and two of them broke off to follow after him, likely to keep him from finding some way to get himself killed. If there was a way to get killed while standing behind a tree, Yhal was confident a civilian would find it.


    They all waited for the man to get out of hearing rang before Otin and Xiasam finally relaxed and smiled. Tsad hadn¡¯t even waited that long. ¡°It¡¯s good to see you again, Yllian. From your letter, we were worried you wouldn¡¯t survive the winter.¡±


    ¡°Oh, we got through it just fine,¡± Yllian said, a dry smile on the face. ¡°It was spring when we nearly ran out of food.¡±


    ¡°Well, since you¡¯re here, I guess you got over that problem,¡± Yhal said, stepping forward and offering Yllian his hand. The two of them exchanged grips in greeting, followed by Otin, Xiasam and Tsad.


    ¡°We did,¡± Yllian said, ¡°although we had to make certain decisions that¡­ well, they¡¯re probably going to be very problematic now.¡± He sighed. ¡°It would take some time to go into the exact details and circumstances that led to the decision right now, but suffice to say, River¡¯s Fork is now under the rule of Binder Lolilyuri, the Dungeon Binder of our neighbor from upriver.¡±


    As they all stared at him, and Yhal could feel the distant, muted pain at the realization that another life had been lost in the claiming of this demesne. Yllian actually had the nerve to look apologetic. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but it was the only way we could negotiate to get the food to feed everyone in the demesne before the crops could come in. The Great Binder did her best, but¡­¡± He shook his head. ¡°Able management can do little against not actually having what you need to survive.¡±


    ¡°Shana is dead?¡± Tsad said, sounding horrified¡ª


    ¡°Of course not,¡± Xiasam sighed. ¡°The civilian just said that it was Great Binder Shanalorre who told them we¡¯d arrived, how could it slip your minds already?¡± He sounded exasperated and Yhal just managed to not blush in sudden embarrassment as he remembered exactly that. ¡°What the colors happened, Yllian?¡±


    ¡°It was not a decision Binder Shanalorre made lightly,¡± Yllian said, ¡°but given a choice between starving¡­ the Great Binder¡ªLady Binder now, I should say¡ªthe Lady Binder decided to set aside her pride and surrender herself and the demesne to Binder Lolilyuri. Lady Binder Shana and River¡¯s Fork are now under her rule. And¡­ she is not pleased at your arrival. I¡¯m sorry.¡±


    ¡°Not pleased? Why?¡± Tsad said


    ¡°She thinks all of you are going to try and kill her,¡± Yllian said. ¡°Well, all the wizards, at least.¡±


    ¡­


    Yhallisu decided he was really coming to hate this continent.

 2025 Anniversary: LEWD!!!

    The pre-dawn period of mornings in Lorian Demesne were surprisingly peaceful.


    Riz was used to villages, towns and forts waking up well before dawn, in that period of time when the sun was still beneath the horizon but the sky was bright enough to keep you from tripping over your own feet. Mikon had told her that in the south people woke up even earlier because it was too hot to work in the middle of the day, and those who tried risked getting heat-sick. That didn¡¯t mean there wasn¡¯t work to be done in the middle of the day, it just couldn¡¯t be outside¡­


    Not here. Few people up this early. There were Shana and Karina, the two of them working together to work the Lady Binder¡¯s magic on the crops that had been planted. There was Tae, who was ahead of the two and using her own Deadspeaking on the plants to prepare them for Shana. There were some of the men and women who worked at the kitchen, who had to get breakfast ready by getting water boiling, pulling the dough they¡¯d prepared the night before out of the cold room. There were the ones who ran the bath houses, who had to heat the bathwater, replace the water in the basins and tubs, and make sure the baths were clean. A few other people who slipped her mind.


    On the whole, however, most of the demesne still slept. People would still wake up before sunrise, but that was perhaps half an hour away as the water clock dripped, and even then few would be in any rush.


    In the gloom of morning, Riz stood facing Rian, a quarterstaff in her hands, while he held a heavy walking stick that he held like a sword. At least, he was currently holding it like a sword. That might change.


    Moving carefully, she swung one end of the quarterstaff to come down towards his head, ready to pull it back if it risked striking him, but she need not have worried. Moving with equal speed, Rian used the stick to parry aside the blow from one side, then the other as Riz swung the other end of the quarterstaff. Rian responded by moving his stick in a ribbon-figure motion, parrying the blow from his other side. The two of them fell into a rhythm as Riz swung at Rian from the left and right, her staff coming in from high and low at random, to which he responded with parrying.


    It was a simple exchange, more to get their hearts pumping than any serious practice, and it let Riz¡¯s mind wander a little even as she remained watchful in case she had to pull her swing. Really, times like this showed the truth of that rumor that he was some kind of noble who¡¯d run away from home. How else would he be that good with a sword while still so young?  It wasn¡¯t the first time such a thing had happened. Everyone knew about Rilianne, who¡¯d become a Deadspeaker in the militia. No lumberyard worker would have learned to swing a stick like that, though the flourish he did as he parried her blow was probably a bad habit he picked up there. While pretty, such things were only good in the theater. They weren¡¯t practical to use in real life.


    Well, he probably knew that, but he seemed to enjoy the move, so Riz let it be even as she made sure he saw her rolling her eyes.


    After several passes, they stepped back slightly and began to spar for real. Instead of only coming from the side, she jabbed with the end of her staff, trying to get one of his legs to make him lose his balance, while he moved from simply defensive to attacking, aiming thrusts at her head, neck and chest. Rian moved with a tempered aggression, only attacking after parrying one of her strikes and forcing her staff out of position where she couldn¡¯t defend herself or retaliate.


    He pulled his strikes too, so the hurt was mostly in her pride, but more of his strikes landed compared to hers. Using spearing motions hadn¡¯t helped, since he seemed to find it easier to parry her when she did that, and he tended to step deeply into her guard to keep her from being able to bring her ¡®spearpoint¡¯ to bear. Trying to kick him was worse, since he¡¯d push her leg inward and throw of her balance, which was often enough to make them stop so she could reset. However, he could sometimes be baited by feints, especially if she moved quickly and sacrificed power for speed.


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    Neither of them spoke, and the only sounds were their footsteps on the ground, the crack of wood against wood, the occasional weak thump as they managed to land a hit, and every so often the subtle whistle of the air as Rian flourished his stick between parries. She¡¯d used to  try punishing him for those when they¡¯d started doing this¡ªpurely to teach him a lesson and not because she was a frustrated at how well he was doing compared to her, honest¡ªbut quickly learned how fast he could go from spinning to swinging, and now she knew the move was meant to try and bait her.


    They were both learning. At first, Riz hadn¡¯t been very good at reacting to when he got inside her guard. Now she could respond with kicks, elbows, knees, and responding with the butt of her staff. Rian for his part had gotten very good at grabbing the haft of her staff when the opportunity presented itself during his parries or when she tried for a thrust, pulling and pushing at the stave to try to unbalance her or make her lose her grip or simply keeping it out of the way so his stick could go in for a strike. Normally, Riz could have punished that by pulling back and thrusting¡ªshe¡¯d certainly done it to enough bandits¡ªbut Rian had quickly adapted to that, closing the distance to her as soon as he could so she couldn¡¯t make space.


    In a real fight, of course, it wouldn¡¯t have been that easy. She¡¯d have been wielding a spear, and having something sharp and pointy at the end of her stave would have made things very different. Her movements would have been faster and more sure since she wouldn¡¯t need to worry about pulling her blows at the last moment, and each strike would have been followed through properly. Rian was good, but in a real fight, she¡¯d have bloodied him.


    A part of her wondered just how quickly he would have been able to blood her if he didn¡¯t need to hold back.


    The sky had brightened to blue, and other people were starting to emerge from their houses to headed for the baths when Rian finally said, ¡°We better stop now.¡±


    Riz let out a sigh of relief as she lowered her staff, grounding one end and trying to not be obvious about leaning against it for support. As a former member of the militia, her pride wouldn¡¯t let her be the one to say she was done and imply she couldn¡¯t outlast a civilian, but Rian could keep going for a surprisingly long time. ¡°Oh, you¡¯re finally tired?¡± she said, smiling to let him know she was only teasing.


    ¡°Exhausted,¡± he said as he played along. ¡°Besides, I need to talk to some people before breakfast, so now¡¯s a good time to stop as any.¡±


    ¡°Well, all right, if that¡¯s as far as you want to go,¡± Riz said, womanfully ignoring all the little aches on her biceps where he¡¯d managed to land blows. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s put this back.¡±


    The two of them fell into step, heading towards the shed where the staves, spears, and other long tools were kept. Rian sometimes muttered¡ªdarkly or in jest depending on his mood at the time¡ªhow they¡¯d finally start locking the shed once someone was found murdered, which¡­ sounded about right to Riz. For now, it was open to everyone, although as a matter of course there was someone whose job it was to count up all the tools at the end of the day and take the ones that needed fixing to the smiths.


    The walk was a short one but they took their time, and though they didn¡¯t hold hands¡ªthat was a far too embarrassing for Riz, at least in broad daylight¡ªthe leisurely stroll they took felt¡­ nice. Once the stave was put back with the other spare staves against the wall, they strolled back just as leisurely. There was always something to do once breakfast finished, and Rian in particular went out of his way to find as much work to do as possible, so this was the most time they¡¯d be able to spend together until they went home later that night.


    As they neared the house, Riz felt something brush against her fingers. Glancing around quickly, she reached out and took Rian¡¯s hand in hers as they walked the few steps to the front door. Through the paper screens over the windows, she could hear movement, Mikon and Umu obviously awake and getting ready to head to the baths.


    ¡°Thanks for helping me practice,¡± Rian said as they reached the door.


    ¡°You¡¯re welcome,¡± Riz said, tugging on his hand slightly to keep him from opening it just yet. ¡°Though, if you¡¯re looking for a way to pay me back¡­.¡± She leaned back against the door with a smile.


    He took the hint with a smile of his own that was still just a little bit shy and hesitant as he pressed her against the wood, his lips meeting hers¡­


    A few moments later, she nearly fell into the house as the door was opened. Fortunately, Rian had still been holding her hand.

 464 - The Civilian

    Otin raised an eyebrow. "We haven''t even met the woman yet. Why would she possibly think we want to kill her?"


    "I know that and you know that, and that''s the reasonable thing to think, but Binder Lori¡­ well, she believes otherwise." Yllian shrugged as if he simply accepted that color-brained reasoning.


    "Well, surely you can explain that we harbor no such intention¡ªwhy are you smiling like that?" Tsad said.


    "Because I''m trying to stop myself from laughing in your face at the idea. It would be rude," Yllain said, still smiling. "There are some things you can explain to Binder Lori. But trying to tell her what other wizards are thinking isn''t one of them. She believes any wizard she encounters will try to kill her to take her demesne and acts accordingly."


    "And why would she think that?" Xiasam said, the Mentalist clearly interested. Xiasam, stop treating this like one of your novels where you tried to understand the mentalities of the strange imaginary people!


    "Near as any of us can tell, it''s because it''s what she genuinely feels she would do in their position," Yllian said his tone somewhere between tired and exasperated. "She came to the new continent to become a Dungeon Binder, and surprisingly she''s actually quite good at it. Certainly better than Koshay, not to speak ill of his memory. It''s just she believes every wizard who came here also did so to gain the power of a Dungeon Binder, because why wouldn''t they?"


    "But¡­" Tsad waved his hand towards the edge of the demesne and the glittering colors beyond it. "If someone wanted to become a Dungeon Binder, they could. Why would anyone try to kill her for hers when they could just found a demesne literally anywhere?"


    "Because why settle for one demesne when you can have two?" Yllian said, his tone unchanged. "Supposedly the only reason Binder Shanalorre is still alive is because she doesn''t actually know how to Deadspeak, and therefore is not considered a threat. Several militia wizards, however¡­" He sighed. "Your presence loudly blew on her alarm whistles. We would have been here sooner if Rian hadn''t needed to convince her you were sufficiently distant as to not be an immediate threat and could be negotiated with. As it is, we are officially warning you that any Mentalist or Horotract in the air trying to approach the center of the demesne will probably get struck down with lightning or whatever applicable binding, so¡­ please don''t approach the center of the demesne for the moment. She really is worried you''re here to kill her."


    Otin snorted. "Unless she happens to be former militia, that''s not really a worry. Civie lightning isn''t that all that dangerous at a distance."


    "Yes, well, this civie is a Dungeon Binder who''s been studying dragons," Yllian said. "I''m told she has better now, and even if she didn''t, you would know better than me how dangerous ''civie lightning'' would be if imbued by a Dungeon Binder."


    "Surely it can''t be that much more dangerous?" the Whisperer said.


    "It goes where she points, and acts like the lightning I''ve seen you use does. I think that''s dangerous enough for anyone. Besides, she''s the Dungeon Binder. It seems a terrible idea to begin your stay in her demesne by deliberately testing her patience, don''t you think?"


    "Yllian, this woman sounds unreasonable and possibly insane," Xiasam said. "Why does it sound like you''re trying justifying her attitude?"


    Yllian sighed. "Because as strange as she is, she''s been keeping both her demesne and our own alive by doing the Whispering work for both singlehandedly. When Koshay and Laven died, all we could do to survive dragons was barricade ourselves in the mine and hope that the dragon didn''t drop anything that would kill us, that we wouldn''t run out of air or water, or people wouldn''t get so sick from having to shit in a corner that Binder Shanalorre couldn''t heal them¡­" He shuddered. "Binder Shanalorre has my utmost respect for trying to be a proper and responsible Dungeon Binder for the demesne after her parents died, and actually doing a decent job of it despite her lack of magic, but I''m man enough to admit I prefer proper latrines, clean water, proper food storage and solid defenses in my dragon shelter."


    "That''s just good sense, and whose idea was it to allow a child to take on such responsibilities?-!" Tsad said, looking aghast.


    "The one who pushed her to claim the core originally was Lasponin, but actually acting as a Dungeon Binder was Binder Shanalorre''s decision," was the bland reply. "If Las had his way, he''d be in charge despite having no qualifications for the role. She was most insistent that as the demesne''s Dungeon Binder she had a responsibility to the demesne. And at the time, most of us thought that letting her try to handle managing the demesne would serve as a distraction from the fact Koshay and Laven had both recently died. And to her credit, she was quite capable, within the limits of what she could do."


    "You still shouldn''t have let her!" Tsad insisted.


    "Well, Lasponin tried, and she asserted he was incorrect by striking him repeatedly," Yllian said. "What were we supposed to do, take away something that gave her life purpose and meaning for the sake of making us all feel better and slowly driving her to cut her wrists open?"


    "You exaggerate," Yhal scoffed.


    "Actually, I''m not. Back in spring, once there was literally nothing more she could do, she cut one of her wrists open and almost bled to death," Yllian said blandly. "The Great Binder now has a standing order that no sharp objects are to be allowed in Binder Shanalorre''s presence. And while it''s not official, I am informed that she''s kept busy and not allowed to sleep alone since she has a blanket and her house has exposed rafters."


    There was a moment of horrified silence as they all realized what he meant.


    "It''s been an eventful year for us," Yllian said. "We were just getting settled for what we hoped would be a restful autumn and winter before you all showed up, and now the Great Binder is¡­ well, in fear for her life because of your presence. Fortunately, Lord Rian managed to convince her not to do anything rash, although you could help with that by not getting close enough to her to be seen. Instead, the two of us were sent here to meet with you and inform you of what of the terms and conditions were for residing in River''s Fork demesne and the Great Binder not summarily trying to kill every wizard she sees."


    Yhal frowned, glancing towards the tree where the civilian was hiding behind, and caught sight of the branch they had been holding spinning through the air. He shook his head at the sight of the man playing at swords, his estimation being revised downwards slightly. While certainly not as bad as many nobles he''s met, the carefree attitude seemed similarly spoiled. "What terms and conditions?" he asked, his tone neutral.


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    "I think that''s something better explained by Lord Rian over there," Yllian said, inclining his head in the direction of where the civie was. Raising his hand, he made a gesture, which one of the militiawomen who''d accompanied the so-called lord saw and called to his attention. The man stopped playing with his stick and turned towards them at Yllian''s nod, walking towards them with the kind of too-energetic step of a child or swindler.


    "Hello again," he said cheerfully as he came close. "Is it my turn to now, Yllian?"


    Yllian nodded. "Lord Rian, this is Tsad, a Deadspeaker and instructor of Deadspeakers; Xiasam, a veteran mentalist and highly educated scholar; Otin, a veteran Whisperer and very worldly, and Yhallisu, who I''m guessing is in charge of this expedition." Ah, Yhal had never really mentioned that, had he? And it wasn''t like they were all wearing rank insignia anymore.


    "I am," Yhal acknowledged, giving the little civilian his best ''don''t cross me, boy'' stare.


    The little civilian looked him in the eye. "My condolences," he said. "Between you and me, getting here was the easy part."


    Yhal didn''t let his expression shift, even as the words sounded too true to deny. "I was told you had terms and conditions for us."


    The little civilian nodded. "Although before I begin, I feel it would be smarter to ask if you still wish to continue settling in River''s Fork, given all you''ve heard so far. I mean, if you''ve decided that you''d rather not stay in a demesne held by a child and ruled by a Dungeon Binder who lives in another demesne, I''d like to know now instead of after I''ve spent time explaining matters to you."


    "Given all I''ve heard, it does seem only sensible to simply found our own demesne and invite our fellow members of the Company to live there instead," Yhal said, simply saying the first thing to come to mind. As he said it though, he had to admit the idea had some merit. They had plentiful supplies and equipment, and from the looks of things far more wizards. Why not just establish a new demesne instead of trying to inject new life into the one that had been previously established? Well, he knew why not, but the civie didn''t need to know that.


    The civilian nodded. "I see. I knew that the militia were all skilled workers, but I haven''t realized it was to this extent. So you''ll be able to clear enough land to build well-insulated homes for all your settlers, raise snow-proof storage buildings for your supplies, and build a secure Dungeon that can act as a functional dragon shelter in the two months or so we have before winter starts? Amazing!"


    Yhal looked at the civilian, who gazed up at him with clear, guileless eyes, and knew he was being mocked. "I''m willing to keep our options open," he said, not letting any of his irritation show. "Founding our own demesne is one such option. Simply settling in River''s Fork as originally planned is another."


    "Ah. Smart. Best not to do anything hasty." The annoying civilian gave him a bright smile as Yhal saw Otin say something, though no sound reached his ears. Xiasam nodded, looking amused and saying something back that was equally silent. Some kind of airwisp binding, then. "Very well. Now, her Bindership had no problems with any settlers coming to live in her demesne. However, all members of the Golden Sweetwood Company who do so must acknowledge the authority of the Dungeon Binder as being above that of the company. She cannot and will not allow a foreign entity to act as a separate authority from her in her own demesne. That''s just asking for trouble. Secondly, her own laws supersede the company''s own, for the same reason. If you can all follow those two conditions, she has no problem allowing the majority of people to settle under the dome of River''s Fork."


    "The majority," Xiasam note. "And who are not counted among this majority?"


    "Wizards," the civilian said bluntly. "Yllian did tell you about how she thinks you''re all planning to kill her, right? However, this doesn''t mean that they''re to be thrown out or anything, merely that they''ll be under additional terms and conditions."


    "Such as?" Otin said as the two older wizards fell into what seemed like a well-practiced routine.


    The civilian turned towards the Whisperer and visibly paused. He glanced back at Xiasam, and then at Tsad. Then he sighed, turned away from Otin, and returned his focus on Yhal. "Such as the fact they will need to be ready to vacate the area under the dome should Binder Lori come over to do work at the demesne, to assure her none will be in any position to make an attempt on her life should she need to be in River''s Fork."


    "Vacate the dome?" Yhal said.


    "Yes. Yllian told you about the dome, right?"


    "We were informed about the dome, yes."


    "Oh, good, I don''t have to explain that. She originally wanted to have all wizards reside in housing outside of the dome, but I was able to talk her out of that. In addition, any Whisperers and Deadspeakers who take up residence in the demesne will also need to assist in imbuing and maintaining all the various bindings and meanings that keep the settlement functioning, since their presence means Binder Lori can''t do it anymore. These include the binding that brings water from the river to the bath house, the binding that heats up the water so it''s warm, the binding to keep the food storage room cold, the binding that keeps the fruit trees ventilated so they don''t overheat and die from the meaning on them¡ªyou might want to tell your Deadspeakers that the meaning they use for accelerating the growth of trees creates too much heat for this climate¡ªthe binding that keeps bugs out of the dragon shelter, the meaning that accelerates the growth of the fruit trees and firewood trees¡­"


    They had a bath house? There had been no mention of a bath house in Yllian''s letter. Did they have a steam hut too? A bath house is nice, but surely if they had that they''d make a steam hut, right?


    "That''s certainly a lot," Otin said.


    The civilian shrugged. "A single civilian has been able to maintain all those bindings, so I don''t see how there should be any significant impediment."


    "I thought that your Dungeon Binder thought we were here to kill her?" Xiasam said.


    The civilian sighed. "Yes, but that''s my problem to deal with, not yours. Suffice to say she believes none of you will have the time, opportunity or imagination to try if you''re all too tired doing something more productive. I believe the militia utilizes a similar method in keeping people out of mischief?"


    Yes. For raw recruits. "The militia has discipline for such things," Yhal said.


    From the looks that Yllian, the militiawomen who''d come with the man, Xiasam, Otin, and Tsad were giving him behind the civilian''s back, they apparently thought that was too blatant a layer of colors for even a civie to swallow.


    "How laudable." the civilian said, sounding completely fooled. "Thirdly, no wizards of any sort are allowed to approach Lorian Demesne through any method for any reason without Binder Lori''s explicit authorization. Even I wasn''t able to talk her out of trying to kill any wizard that tried to approach her demesne on sight, and to be honest, after all these warnings any who tried deserves what happens to them." He paused, tilting his head, then nodded. "Yes, that''s about it when it comes to terms and conditions. Beyond that, you''re simply expected to contribute to the demesne in any way you can. Help with any woodcutting, building repair, hunting, butchering, keeping an eye on the children¡­ Any questions?"


    The civilian gave him a bland, innocent look.


    "And why," Yhal said, "would we possibly want to place ourselves under this madwoman''s power?"


    "I leave Yllian to answer that question," the civilian said. "He''d know better than me what you all would actually want out of a demesne and Dungeon Binder." He looked towards the river, looking up at the sky above it. "I should get back and make sure she''s staying calm, Yllian. Can you take care of the rest?"


    Yllian nodded. "I can handle things here, Lord Rian."


    "All right, then. No need to rush, but a decision of some sort within three days would be nice. One way or another, the sooner the better. Winter is coming, after all."


    "No promises, Lord Rian," Yllian said, glancing towards Yhal. What?


    "Well, see you later. Otin, Xiasam, Tsad, it was very nice to meet the three of you. Hopefully in a few days I''ll be welcoming you as residents of River''s Fork, but if not¡­" he paused, tilting his head. "Well, let''s set that bridge on fire when we get to it."


    Nodding to Yllian one last time, he began to walk back upriver, all but two of the militiawomen falling into step behind.


    For a moment, Yhal and the three wizards stared after him.


    "Well, now that the civie is gone, we can finally get down to serious matters," Yhal said dismissively. "Yllian, how much of what he said was actually relevant?"


    "All of it," was the immediate reply. "Rian is not the sort of man to waste our time." Huh. That would be a first for a civie.


    "If you say so¡­" Yhal said skeptically. He sighed. "So¡­ how bad is this Dungeon Binder? You said she''s been keeping you alive. How alive?"

 465 - A Sweet Welcome

    "Well¡­" Yhal said some time later, "I suppose that''s mildly impressive for a civie." Making housing wasn''t difficult for a Whisperer as long as they had stone and enough time, excavating the ground was nothing special¡ªit was just digging out rock, after all¡ªnor were the dozens of other little projects that the woman had done, but actually building and maintaining all of them, and even maintaining a dragon shelter through not one but two dragons¡­ even for someone in the militia, that was a lot of work. A militia Whisperer would be more than up to the task, of course, but still. No wonder the civie was insane. Not that he was going to say that out loud. It might get back to her.


    "She''s not here, and even if I reported back, she''d be completely uninterested in hearing the finer details of this meeting," Yllian said with that sly smile of his. "Feel free to call her insane. Many of us certainly do. Not to her face of course, but we say it." He raised the tin cup of honeybrew to his lips, taking a small, measured sip. Despite the fact that they still had several barrels of both honeybrew and tuberbrew booze¡ªand intended to make far more once they had things set up¡ªthe man was drinking like he was holding the last cup of the stuff in the demesne.


    "Well, as long as you said it first," Xiasam said. The man was drinking one of his strange teas, made from mixing together pinches from several different pouches of dried and crushed leaves he kept with him, and a couple leaves that Yhal had seen him pluck from nearby trees, with some tuberbrew thrown in ''for warmth''. One of these days, the man was going to drink something that poisoned him, and there weren''t going to be any Deadspeakers around to keep him alive. "Still, all that and you don''t have a steam hut?


    "We''ll probably ask for one this winter." Yllian said. "In the time I spent there, the bath houses in Lorian got¡­ well, almost steamy. Though to be fair, everyone spent most of their time in the Dungeon that winter, so there wasn''t really any use for a steam hut. There''s not really much need to get warmed up again when you don''t really get all that cold." He took another sip of booze.


    The four of them sat under a tree some distance away from where people were setting up camp. Tents were being raised, meals were being cooked early, and some hapless young men and women¡ªthe ones just old enough to get int trouble but not quite you old enough to be set straight by getting into the militia¡ªwere having to keep the children from getting lost in the woods, all of which the four of them were avoiding because they were ostensibly doing ''officer work''.


    "So, are you really going to be abandoning us to set up another demesne?" Yllian said.


    Yhal snorted. "Of course not. But the civie didn''t need to know that. Let him sweat a little so he''ll be more willing to negotiate when he comes back."


    Yllian rolled his eyes. "Well, your games with Rian aside, does that mean I can get started on getting the demesne ready to accept you? We''ll need to get the houses we''re using for storage emptied and ready for people again, find a site outside the dome for the wizards to live on, mark out where we can build new houses, estimate how much the dining hall has to be expanded to accommodate everyone¡­"


    "Why do you even have a dining hall?" Otin said. His booze steamed slightly, heated by the man''s magic, since he preferred his drinks hot. "People can eat in their own homes, surely?"


    "I used to think so too. Then that sort of thinking led to us almost starving, so the Great Binder decreed no one was to cook their own food at home, and that all food would be cooked at the dining hall kitchen so we could track exactly how much grain was being used."


    "How¡­?" Tsad said, unable to complete the question.


    "I would love to blame stupid civies, but apparently if civies are acting stupid enough, even militia who should know better start acting stupid as well." He sipped his booze. "Not me, of course."


    "Of course." Yhal, Otin, Xiasam and Tsad all said, nodding as they pretended to believe that.


    "In short, people started hoarding food in fear the food supplies would run out, which of course began to cause the food supplies to be depleted faster than expected. And since they suddenly had a lot of food in their house, people start eating it, which meant they had to ask for more food supplies¡­" Yllian sighed. "To keep any such stupidity from recurring, we established communal meals cooked centrally at the dining hall kitchen. Not only does it help limit the amount of food being consumed, it also prevents accusations of people getting more or less food, or complaints that some people are eating better than others." He rolled his eyes. "Of course, now there are people who complain that the food is all the same."


    Otin nodded. "People will complain about anything."


    "Well, don''t worry. We bought a lot of supplies for the winter, so there shouldn''t be any need for such measures anymore," Yhal assured him. "And we won''t stand for any of this hoarding, so there shouldn''t be any stupidity."


    For some reason, Yllian didn''t look assured. "If you''ll be joining the demesne, that won''t be up to you to decide, Yhal. The Great Binder gave an order, and she hasn''t rescinded it yet."


    Yhal rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Surely we can make our own decisions about how we eat? It''s our glittering food." Who tried to decree how people ate? They''d been times when nobles had commanded what people could eat, and that had been stupid enough, but how? Why? What was the point?


    "Not if you choose to settle in River''s Fork, Yhal. All food is held communally by the demesne and controlled by quartermaster, who only released enough for the day''s meal to the ones who will be cooking in the dining hall, no one else and not a grain more or less," Yllian said patiently. "Not that different from when we''re on the march really, except as a rule the food will be cooked by the ones who know how to make more than boiled grains with salted meat."


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    "No one''s going to like that, Yllian," Xiasam said. "A lot of people were looking forward to eating proper homecooked food."


    "And a lot of people will be glad of the fact they don''t have to cook for their families by themselves every day," was the dry reply. "Trust me, you''re not going to miss it as much as you think you will. Is this really the fort you want to make a stand in?"


    Yhal grunted, not replying. This business of River''s Fork being ruled by a civie Dungeon Binder who wasn''t one of their own¡­ well, it wasn''t ideal, far from it. One of the reasons they''d left Lomabuyar Demesne¡ªnot the only reason, but one of them¡ªwas because those who commanded the militia had been so far removed from the men and women they had been commanding. Having a Dungeon Binder who was not part of the company, much less a civie, and one who lived in another demesne¡ªyou couldn''t get more removed than that¡ªwas exactly the sort of situation they''d left to avoid. Yhal, at least, didn''t want to be under some leader who just threw out commands they pulled out of their latrine hole without understanding the situation of the people who need to take the orders.


    ¡­ though, perhaps it wouldn''t be so bad, now? Given how the woman would most likely be spending her time in her real demesne, it stood to reason they''d be able to take care of matters according to their better judgement as the ones actually dealing with the problem. And since the only militia in the demesne was themselves¡­


    His musings were interrupted as a commotion arose. "Oh, what now?"


    Yllian stood up, as did the rest of them, Xiasam actually rising up in the air for a few paces. "We have visitors," the Mentalist called down.


    "Technically, you''re the visitors," Yllian pointed out. "We live here."


    Yhal rolled his eyes at the pedantry, even as Xiasam humored the man by nodding. "Ah, that''s true."


    The ones who had arrived¡ªYhal wasn''t getting into who was the visitor¡ªturned out to be people they knew, honest militiamen and a few women, all carrying baskets of fruit suspended between them on long poles that on a second glance turned out to be recently-cut branches. Reunions were occurring all along the line as relatives and friends recognized each other. He saw his cousin Avigayr in the lead, who was being met by his wife and children, with his daughter Sumerki examining the contents of the basket with interest.


    From where he was standing, Yhal recognized micans, golden buds, and pink ladies, but there were blue ones covered all over with strange curling hairs, as well as large yellow vaguely bean-shaped ones¡­


    Oh, and the civie was unfortunately there too.


    "Hey, Yllian!" the man said, grinning as he walked up to them. "We talked it over back in the dome after her Bindership left, and everyone agreed that we could spare some of the fruit stores to give your friends a sweet welcome. Figured that after who knows how much salted or preserved food, something fresh and tasty would be a nice change of pace." The civie looked around. "Is there a quartermaster or someone we should drop these off with so that everyone can get some? Otherwise the children are going to eat everything."


    Yhal turned towards the nearby Mentalist. "Xiasam, can you¡­" he gestured vaguely at the fruits.


    "Fine," the man said, downing the last of his tea. "Give it here, I''ll see about making sure it''s distributed."


    "Thanks! Binder Shanalorre personally tallied up everything, so there should be fifty micans, golden buds, pink ladies and happyfruit each, as well as about a hundred and fifty hairy blueballs."


    The Mentalist didn''t even pause at that last. "The name was Koshay''s idea, wasn''t it." It wasn''t a question.


    "So I''ve heard," the civie said with a bright smile. "They''re actually pretty good despite how strange they look, although there''s a trick to getting them open." He reached into his belt pouch and pulled out one of the little blueballs and oh Great Binder that name was never going to leave his head now! "I brought a few here so you can try it out, and tell everyone how you''re supposed to open it. Here, have some." He handed out the fruits to them, which despite their appearance wasn''t all that strange to hold. The hair-like growths on it were soft and not as disturbing to the touch as he thought they would be.


    "The skin is actually pretty thin despite how tough it is," the civie explained, "so you can''t peel it with a knife, and if you try to use your fingernails¡­ well, you could, but you''ll get sore under the nails pretty quickly. To eat it quick, you have to squeeze it like this¡­" His fingers pinched the round fruit, and after a moment the skin tore, revealing a pale and dry-looking flesh. The civie peeled back the blue skin and popped the whole fruit into his mouth, chewed a moment, then spat out a large dark seed. "And that''s the seed. Don''t bite into it, it''s pretty bitter, and not good for much¡ªdoesn''t really work as a dye¡ªbut they''re easy to grow."


    Yhal squeezed as the civie indicated, and the skin cracked open under his fingers. The fruit was tart but sweet, and the seemingly dry flesh turned out to be very juicy, flavor spreading in his mouth as he bit. He wondered if there were any of these fruits nearby¡­


    As the civie stepped away with Xiasam to see to distributing the fruit, Yllian turned towards Yhal. "I know civies tend to just get in the way most of the time, but idiots like that don''t really survive out here. He might not really seem like it, but Rian''s one of the capable ones. His father used to be militia, or so he says, so he must have been raised properly."


    "If he were raised properly, he''d be in the militia," Yhal retorted, but the words were half-hearted as he eyed the civie. At the very least, Xiasam hadn''t dismissed him yet, and the two seemed to be speaking amiably. "You sure he''s not going to make trouble for us?"


    "Not as long as we don''t make trouble," Yllian said. "Trouble like forcing the issue of communal meals."


    "Are you still on that?"


    The man shrugged. "I''m just saying, we''re going to have a lot of people working to put up houses and other buildings for the next couple of weeks. Feeding them is going to be a lot easier if we had one place making a lot of food for everyone."


    Yhal rolled his eyes. "Is this really that important?"


    "Well, we only have so many cookpots, so if we''re going to feed everyone, you''ll need to provide more at the very least. Plates and forks too, since we only have a couple of carpenters and no lathe, and trying to carve that many plates by hand would take all winter. You know how it is, Yhal. We need to know how to fit you into our camp, once you inform the Great Binder that you agree to her conditions."


    That last made Yhal grimace, but¡­ well, Yllian was right. Unless the other company officers and wizards decided the terms were too onerous to put up with¡ªthe wizards especially¡ªthey would need to integrate into River''s Fork. And since they were all militia here, pride at the very least meant that they were not going to allow it to resemble those times when the militia was temporarily stationed in a town while on march which resulted in the civie mayor getting in his face about his men and women''s conduct. And that meant¡­ well, doing it smoothly, like being stationed at an established fort.


    "I''ll get on it," he said. "We''ll be ready in three days, once we get some concessions from the civie."


    "¡­well, I wish you luck with that. And get one of the happyfruit if you can, they''re really good."

 466 - No Need For Spears

    Yhal knew he didn¡¯t have to worry about overseeing how the camp was being set up. While they were all retired from the militia now, habits were hard to break and even if one was inclined to be a little sloppy, that wasn¡¯t the sort of thing that survived a tour in the militia. The tents had been set up in neat lines, although the spacing had been a bit irregular because of the ground and trees. If they¡¯d been planning to stay longer they¡¯d have cleared the latter and leveled the former, but they would only be staying in this camp for a couple of days. Still, he did a cursory check after their guests had left, because old habits died hard and the familiar task gave him time to think.


    Yllian and the others from River¡¯s Fork had left a little past the midafternoon, which had been a great disappointment because he hadn¡¯t really been able to do more than exchange a few words with Avigayr. However, Yllian had assured them that more people would be visiting them tomorrow and would be able to stay for longer.


    He had also warned them that the local beasts still hadn¡¯t fully learned they shouldn¡¯t cross the border of the demesne, and suggested they raise up some sort of barrier to discourage them. Strangely, the suggestion he had given was to use either snow or ice.


    ¡°It¡¯s not actually a bad idea,¡± Otin had said when it was mentioned. ¡°We have a river right there, the binding is fairly simple, and the physical barrier just needs to make the beasts think they can¡¯t come straight at us. Makes me wonder what they¡¯ve been doing in that demesne of theirs to consider those viable building materials.¡±


    ¡°This did say they made a full-sized ice boat,¡± Xiasam had commented. He¡¯d given Yllian a list of who was with part of the expedition, his writing neat and tidy, with little flourishes to some of the letters that made them look fancy.


    ¡°I still don¡¯t believe it,¡± had been Yhal¡¯s reply. ¡°If the idea really worked, someone would have done it by now.¡±


    As he walked, noting with satisfaction how orderly everything was¡ªeven with all the children running around¡ªYhal realized he hadn¡¯t been able to ask Yllian for details about Grem. The reunion and subsequent discussion had set the pace of their conversation, and the matter had slipped his mind as a result. He knew he would have to bring it up next time they met. The part of the letter that had accused the man of attempted murder had been undersigned by several people, with those who had witnessed the event writing similar accounts of how he had attacked Lasponin to¡­. well, to let someone else try and kill Shanalorre. His reasoning had been discussed and immediately dismissed out of hand, as no one in the Company was willing to do that.


    It was why Yhal found the news that some Dungeon Binder from another demesne had somehow tricked Shanalorre into ceding authority of the demesne to them so¡­ annoying. The Company had decided they would not be so immoral as to replace Shanalorre, and the price of blood already paid for the demesne compelled them to honor the dead by seeing that River¡¯s Fork would flourish.


    And then they arrived here and found that the demesne had essentially been traded away.


    From what Yllian had said, it had been a necessary trade. While it was possible to simply barricade a cave or cellar or basement and try to ride out a dragon¡¯s passing¡ªthere were always people caught out beyond the edge or simply locked out of the dragon shelters for one reason or another¡ªit was more than likely to result in a rather messy death. With River¡¯s Fork managing to win that gamble twice in a row¡­ well, he could understand not wanting to risk it a third time.


    But still¡­


    They hadn¡¯t really discussed if something like this might happen. At worst, there had been the possibility that the demesne had been abandoned because there weren¡¯t enough people to farm and keep them fed, but something like this¡­


    Yhal sighed, shaking his head. Well, what was done was done. And in a way, situations like this were exactly why the militia officers and enlisted who had formed the Golden Sweetwood Company had decided to make their own way. In the end, the people of River¡¯s Fork had been the ones in a difficult situation and had made their choices as the ones on the spot. He¡ªand the rest of the company¡ªwould be hypocrites if they didn¡¯t concede the ones in River¡¯s Fork had been the ones with the most right to make the decision as the ones facing immediate consequences.


    ¡­


    Still, did their decision have to be ¡®surrender to the Dungeon Binder of another demesne¡¯? He¡¯d need to find out more about that how exactly that came about. There was clearly more to the matter than Yllian had said, so he¡¯d have to get more details from him when they next met.


    They¡¯d also have to do something about Shanalorre, one way or another. Before they could have Tsad teaching her, they needed to make sure she wouldn¡¯t try anything ill-advised, like trying to bring her parents back to life or using Deadspeaking to kill herself. The first was impossible, despite what stories would have children believe, and the second was far too easy to do by accident, never mind on purpose. At least, so every wizard he¡¯d ever spoken to had said.


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    He debated whether or not to have Xiasam speak to the girl. The man had strange notions about people¡¯s minds, thinking things besides drinking, bellringing and good company could help with getting through the nightmares of blood and mud, but¡­ well, Yhal remembered exactly how old Koshay¡¯s daughter was, so all those ways to get your head right wasn¡¯t something they could offer her. At the very least, it probably wasn¡¯t going to do any harm to have the Mentalist try.


    Despite everything, Yllian seemed to have no problems living under this woman¡¯s rule. He seemed quite happy, in fact, and what did it say about Lomabuyar Demesne¡¯s nobles and officers that a sensible man was much happier under the rule of a madwoman?


    ¡­


    Actually, put that way, perhaps agreeing to her terms and conditions wouldn¡¯t be so bad?


    However, this wasn¡¯t the militia. They were, in fact, retired. That meant something like this couldn¡¯t just be ordered. At least, not for everyone.


    He¡¯d need to talk to the wizards.


    <hr>


    The camp spent what was left of the afternoon making deterrents against beasts. That meant digging moats just wide enough to force beasts to step into it, having the Whisperers seal them so they retained water, and filling them. It was the most commonly used way of keeping beasts back outside of a demesne, and while they hadn¡¯t expected to need to keep making them now that they were inside one, if the beasts really did sometimes still enter the demesne¡¯s boundary¡­


    Well, it looked like they were still going to need to set up a night watch.


    Yhal helped, of course. They had plenty of shovels, and by comparison it was a pleasant reprieve from having to go over the things that he still had to ask Yllian about. Besides, if he didn¡¯t get his hands dirty at least once a day, he might become the kind of officer he hated: the kind that didn¡¯t understand what they were actually facing in the field.


    Digging out the moat was a familiar task, and there were many hands to do it, although there were also a lot of jokes about how people thought they had left this behind in the militia. The dirt they displaced was heaped on the camp-side of the moat, a subtle wall to further discourage any beasts who might think to approach. It was almost a shame to have the Whisperers pack down the moat so they could fill it with water. It seemed like good soil


    The moat was a loop that followed the edge of the demesne in front of where they had made their camp and a little beyond before doubling back on itself to double the number of barriers presented to beasts. Filled with water, the Whisperers¡ªor if you didn¡¯t have Whisperers, either a Mentalist or a Horotract¡ªwould use their magic to get the water to flow. Back in the militia, if they hadn¡¯t had enough wizards¡­ well, there were always those who needed to be assigned to something repetitive to keep them in one spot and out of trouble as they swept the moat into motion manually and refilled the water.


    The motion was important. A beast stepping into standing water would cause the colors on its skin to wash away, but the colors buried deeper in would remain, vanishing slowly. It was painful, yes, but in the way raw and reddened skin was painful. With flowing water, somehow the colors deep in the skin would wash away faster, and the pain would become as thorns. The latter was much more effective at driving away beasts.


    Despite the need to build up the moat, morale was high in the camp between the early stop and the fresh fruits that they¡¯d been given. A few of a the more conscientious were gathering up the seeds of the so-called happyfruit and the hairy blueballs¡ªKoshay¡¯s name for them was spreading, despite some people¡¯s attempts to prevent it¡ªto try and plant them later. After eating, those without duties assigned had napped or at least rested their feet. Still, with sunset nearing, people were being roused to gather firewood and water, and one of the Whisperers had already started a fire so that people could get a light for their own cooking.


    There was an Yllian-sounding voice in his head he immediately kicked into silence and ignored before it could manage to say anything.


    <hr>


    Yhal looked down a little ruefully at the bowl of stew made from salted meat and grain. ¡°No bread?¡± he asked hopefully.


    His darling wife Jhalem gave him a bright smile. ¡°I made bread for lunch, but you were busy drinking with your friends,¡± she said. ¡°Next time you see Yllian, thank him for the fruits for me, will you?¡±


    "Why didn''t you send Firot or Sumerki to bring it to me?" he said. His children in question were sitting off to the side, eating their own stew. He and Sumerki had reconciled years ago, and his daughter had been willing to come with them to help establish a farm on the new demesne. Firot¡­ well, despite everything his son still looked skinny, but what muscles he had managed to grow were wiry and strong, even if he''d spent most of his time in the militia procuring supplies and working with quartermasters.


    ¡°I was going to, but Avigayr came with all those fruits, so I gave it to her instead for her trouble.¡±


    Ah. He couldn¡¯t actually fault that, after all it was poor manners to accept a gift like that without giving something back unless you were completely destitute.


    ¡°Oh, don¡¯t pout. I¡¯ll make it again tomorrow, you can have some then.¡± Jhalem hummed thoughtfully. ¡°Actually, I might need to make a bit more. Avigayr said she¡¯s coming by again, and you should invite Yllian so you can keep drinking through lunch.¡±


    ¡°We weren¡¯t just drinking, he was also informing me of the demesne¡¯s circumstances,¡± Yhal said.


    ¡°Drinking and gossiping, then,¡± Jhalem said with a smirk and a wink that made him chuckle. ¡°So, how long before we can stop living in tents and finally have a real house?¡±


    Yhal sighed as he used his spoon to mix the stew to let some of the heat out. ¡°It will probably be a while. We¡¯ll still need to build the house, and¡­ well, things have changed since Yllian sent his last letter.¡±


    ¡°Do we need to start putting together more spears?¡± Jhalem asked.


    ¡°I¡¯m not picking up a spear,¡± Sumerki said immediately.


    ¡°There won¡¯t be any need for spears,¡± Yhal said.


    At least, he hoped not.

 467 - Prologue End: The Wizards

    As it started to get dark, balls of light slowly started to appear around the camp. Some appeared above particular tents, ring-like and shining their light outward, no doubt over where one of the Whisperers was still eating. A few began to appear sequentially, coming to light every few paces above the pathway between rows of tents. That was probably Faith, she and her wife liked to walk together after dinner now that they had the space to walk. More and more balls of light appeared as the other Whisperers began joining in, lighting up a camp. Most of them would fade way in an hour or so, but in the meantime the lights allowed people to wash up after dinner and safely put out their cookfires.


    It was so useful, having a lot of Whisperers, never mind all the other wizards. Yes, Deadspeakers kept people fit and alive, Horotracts were convenient for keeping a camp spacious and supplies stored and sheltered, and Mentalists made wonderful scouts and trivialized moving heavy loads, but Whisperers made light, clean water, fire, made rocks useful, and could keep a camp cool or warm as needed. They still couldn''t do anything about rain, since after all these centuries, Whisperers still haven''t come up with anything to reliably deal with rain. Getting things dry afterwards was easier, though.


    Yhal found all of the expedition''s wizards gathered at a campfire at the far end of the camp from the river, the one that was for those keeping watch. Nearby, Vov, Elif, Dypha and Yhim¡ªnot to be confused with Yhim the Mentalist¡ªhad apparently drawn the short straw for night watch, and were keeping an eye out over the moat, watching for beasts and pretending to ignore the wizards gathering. When wizards gathered, it usually meant trouble of some sort, although most of that time it was of the ''we need to build something big, so we need people to carry things'' variety.


    He glanced over the assembled wizards, who all seemed to be having a lively discussion about the education that Shanalorre should receive. At least, that''s what he assumed they were talking about.


    "¡ªrgery has it''s uses, but it requires a solid grounding in anatomy," Makoi was saying. While not all that old¡ªthe man was only in his thirties despite pale flecks in his dark blue hair, and as a Deadpseaker he didn''t even have wrinkles¡ªhe always gave the impression of being twice as old as he actually was, probably from acting as if everyone around him was younger than himself. "Where exactly are we going to find a corpse she can study to get that sort of grounding? Unless someone brought one along, we''d have failed in our jobs if we happen to have any human corpses in a fit state to study."


    "She''s a child, it''s far too early for her to be learning surgery," Yhim¡ªthe Mentalist¡ªsaid, brushing his coppery orange hair out of his eyes. "Let her act like a child."


    "Don''t let her act like a child," Tafit, one of the two Horotracts, said firmly. "Children get underfoot and messy."


    "And the best way to keep children from getting underfoot is making sure they''re occupied," Malia said, the pale-haired Deadspeaker leaning against her husband.


    "If it''s just keeping her occupied, there are other things she could be taught besides surgery," Flotelik countered the other Deadspeaker. "Diagnostics, for example! Being able to identify which parts of the body are in need of treatment is a much more immediately important skill than surgery. A good diagnostician can help avoid the need for unnecessary surgery."


    "Look, with her meaning she''s basically set when it comes to healing, unless she''s dealing with someone who has congenital defects," Aritlestn said while the Whisperer made another light and flicked it towards the campfire. It drifted through the air and somehow got caught in the fire''s updraft, sending the light flying up into the sky. "Have her learn something useful, like estimating how much food the demesne needs for the year. Tah, Yhal! Finally, you''re here!"


    "Ah, Yhal! Good of you to join us. How was dinner?" Yhim¡ªthe Mentalist¡ªgreeted.


    "Delicious," Yhal said, because he was a married man and he knew to not answer anything else. Besides, it had been delicious, even without the bread. "Everyone here, I see. I''m sorry I had to call you all together after dinner, but something arose earlier when I spoke to Yllian that affects you all¡­ unless Xiasam, Otin and Tsad already told you?"


    "No, we thought we''d leave that bit of awkwardness with you," Otin said, adjusting his eyepatch. He must be one of the Whisperers doing the first watch tonight. The bastard was even getting comfortable, leaning back and closing his eyes!


    Yhal sighed. Well, they weren''t in the militia anymore, and Otin did already know what he was going to tell everyone. "I''ll be brief, then. After Yllian sent us his letter, circumstances in the demesne forced them to submit to the authority of the Dungeon Binder of the demesne upriver. One of her terms is that wizards will need to vacate River''s Fork¡ªthe town, not the demesne¡ªwhen she comes to visit the demesne, because she''s afraid that all of you will try to kill her and she doesn''t want any wizards nearby who can try."


    There were several confused expressions. "Why does she think we''re going to try to kill her?" Nansi asked as she sat on what seemed like empty air, holding hands with her wife Faith. "We haven''t even met the woman."


    "Because according to Yllian she thinks you''ll want to kill her to take her demesne for herself and add it to your own, because apparently that''s what she would do, so she thinks that''s what other wizards would do as well." He rolled his eyes, and waited for the protests and cries of indignation.


    To his surprise, most of the wizards began to look thoughtful, with only a few looking even more confused. Otin looked asleep, even if he probably wasn''t.


    "Well, if that''s one of the conditions, I suppose we''ll need to deal with it," Rilianne said, sounding mildly annoyed but resigned. It was an open secret that she was actually Rilianne Cayvud, a noble from Vusvalbel Demesne who ran away from home and¡ªobviously¡ªjoined the Lomabuyar Demesne militia. They all knew, and she knew that they knew, and they knew that she knew that they knew¡­ "From the situation and how Tsad is still planning the girl''s education, I assume Shanalorre is still alive and this unnamed Dungeon Binder did not herself choose to kill the girl, take the demesne and add it to her own?"


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    "No, she didn''t," Yhal said, mildly surprised. It was the first time someone hadn''t assumed that Shanalorre had been killed.


    Rilianne nodded. "Such conditions would be in line with certain kinds of mindsets. Off the top of my head, certain noble-kin who desire power and recognition despite a lack of ability and fear being supplanted by someone actually capable would conceive of such a conditions to try to safeguard themselves against the only people powerful and competent enough to remove them. How incompetent did Yllian say this Dungeon Binder was?"


    "He¡­ actually described her as being very competent," Yhal said.


    That seemed to surprise the Deadspeaker. "Actually competent? Are you sure?"


    "Yllian said she has single-handedly been supporting both demesnes."


    The seemed to leave the noble-kin perplexed. "Actually competent¡­ then I can only conclude that she either has some sort of intense and irrational fear and paranoia or a reasonable cause for concern for her life. If the former, then little we do or say can change her mind, as competent or not we will not be able to reason with her. As long as she remains consistent and does not become erratic, we can deal with her conditions. If the latter, then we should be able to prove she has no reason to fear from us because whatever or whoever she fears is not affiliated with us."


    "Yllian called her insane," Xiasam added helpfully.


    Rilianne let out a sigh. "Then I have nothing further to add until I meet the woman and I can make my own assessment¡­ which I will not be able to do because of her stipulation to vacate the town when she is present, will I?"


    "Did Yllian mention how often she is likely to come and require us to evacuate?" Fraks, another one of the Whisperers, asked. It was her binding that was keeping the water moving in the moat, since she had a notable ability with waterwisps. "What magic did she have originally?"


    "How is she likely to respond if we disobey her edict?" Aritlestn followed.


    "Yllian didn''t say how often or what kind, but he did say that she was likely to respond with lightning, so I suspect she was a Whisperer originally," Yhal said.


    "I don''t think her terms are something we should test just yet," Xiasam said. "From all we know, she''d most likely consider any wizard going against her prohibition as trying to kill her, and will respond accordingly. While I''d trust any of us to win a fight¡­ I for one don''t want to go starting a fight I don''t have to."


    "And think of the situation from her perspective," Nansi interjected. The Mentalist had looked deep in thought all this time. "A group of strangers who outnumber the people in her newly acquired demesne just show up, with enough wizards to kill everyone in it and turn everything from one edge to another into ash. Even with Yllian and the others vouching for us, it''s only natural that the leader of a small village¡ªbecause that''s what their demesne would be¡ªwould be worried about that many people with that many wizards simply appearing. We probably remind them far too much of bandits."


    That¡­ hadn''t occurred to Yhal, and from the expressions on many people''s faces¡ªeven Otin''s, despite his pose of sleeping¡ªneither had it occurred to many other people. It made him pause and reluctantly try to see it from that perspective: that they weren''t dealing with the sort of distant Dungeon Binder that they were familiar with, or even just the kind of commanding officer that didn''t understand what they were dealing with, but with the mayor of a small isolated village who''d suddenly had a large group of people suddenly appear¡­


    He didn''t even need to get very far along that flow of thought for him to wince guiltily and sigh. Yes, he hadn''t liked how the mayors of towns would impose harsh restrictions on militia banners who had to camp nearby to deal with beasts, abominations, bandits, or simply spring flooding, but he could understand. Even the most well-disciplined and well-led militia would get rowdy when they were off-duty, especially when they''d been getting at the booze. He knew that they were peaceful, well-disciplined, and mostly consisted of civie husbands, wives and children, but this woman didn''t know that. They''d only just arrived after all, and so far the only ''official'' contact had been with Yllian and the civie that''s she''d sent along. Put that way¡­


    Well, it was still insane to have the wizards leave when she was around, but perhaps she thought she could deal with any trouble by herself¡­ although how she expected to do so when this wasn''t her demesne¡­ Perhaps she had been taken by surprise by their arrival, so the orders she''d given hadn''t been all that well thought out?


    That still didn''t explain why Yllian called her ''insane'' so freely.


    "That isn''t the only condition," he said, regaining the attention of the assembled wizards. "She''s also requiring that all Whisperers and Deadspeakers maintain the various bindings and meanings keeping the demesne running, and the way it was phrased implies you''re not going to be paid for it."


    "That''s to be expected," Yhim¡ªthe Mentalist¡ªsaid. "They probably spent all their beads for supplies, seeds, or anything else they needed at Covehold Demesne, since it''s not like they''d be any reason to keep beads all the way out here. I expect we''re going to have to get used to relying on barracks trading with everyone. It''s what''s done in smaller villages, and given how many people live here, it is a small village."


    Fewer people nodded at that¡ªtheir experiences with smaller villages was seeing them pass by as they marched¡ªbut everyone knew what barracks trading was. Someone asks to borrow a whetstone, and in exchange they lend their shaving mirror; or someone borrows a knife to slice some meat, returning the knife and some of the meat with it; it was the sort of exchanges of favors and small barter that smoothed out living in the militia. Yhal had never thought that you could run a village that way, but it made some sense¡­


    "Were there any other conditions?" Sulli, one of the Whisperers, asked. Despite the fact the sun had already set, she was still wearing her wide-brimmed, pointed hat as she cradled her long-bladed sword on her shoulder.


    Yhal shook his head, both to clear his thoughts as well as an answer. "Those were the only conditions for wizards specifically. I thought you should know since it affected all of you directly."


    "We''ll be ready for it," Lafhaiel, Malia''s husband and a fellow Deadspeaker, said. He was a less of a leader than someone who assisted whoever it was¡ªRilianne, Makoi or Malia¡ªwho was leading, but his regular presence at a leader''s side gave him a strange sort of authority among the Deadspeakers, and to a lesser extent among the rest of the wizards. "Their Dungeon Binder probably has other things to consider in their decisions that we don''t know about, which is probably why the terms are so harsh. They can probably clarified later, since they''re a bit vague right now, and when that happens there should be room to negotiate."


    Yhal looked around, and found most of the other wizards nodding. For some the movement was slow and thoughtful, while for others it was enthusiastic. "Then I''ll leave you all to sleep on it, then."


    He went off to get some sleep.


    Behind him, he could hear the wizards debating whether the Dungeon Binder¡ªBinder¡­ Lori, was it?¡ªwas in fact unreasonably paranoid or might have some cause to be legitimately fearful for her life¡­

 468 - The Great And Powerful Protagonist

    Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri¡ªLori to most because people tended to mangle her name by mispronouncing it ¡®low-lai-lee¨Cooh-rai¡¯ or ¡®lowly-uh-ree¡¯ or any of a number of ways that she¡¯s had to be stopped from kicking people in the shin for over the years¡ªfounder and ruler of Lorian Demesne and conqueror of River¡¯s Fork Demesne, looked upon the first and most senior of her lords with narrowed yellow eyes and was displeased.


    Normally, this wasn¡¯t because of anything anyone had done. Well, it wasn¡¯t anything anyone she could name specifically had done, although given how her list consisted of said lord, said lord¡¯s lovers, another Dungeon Binder surely out to kill her, and the brat¡ªthere were probably other people, but if she couldn¡¯t remember them, then they probably weren¡¯t worth remembering¡ªshe was just displeased with the state of the world. When she was younger, she had been subtly¡ªand then, when people realized such subtlety didn¡¯t work on her, directly¡ªtold that this was a character flaw on her part. That she should see the good in things rather than the ill, and be happy instead.


    People were stupid. Why shouldn¡¯t she be displeased things weren¡¯t to her preference? How else would these things be dealt with?


    This was not a normal circumstance.


    ¡°You look displeased,¡± the lord in question sitting across from her at her table said. Next to him was Shanalorre, the diminutive Dungeon Binder sitting up straight with her hands folded on the table face, smooth and utterly composed. It was still a bit too early for dinner, so it was just the three of them seated there, although people were starting to trickle into the dining hall of her dungeon. The wide, cheerful smile that Rian was giving her was obviously fake. For a moment, she wondered for whose benefit the smile was. ¡°More so than usual, I mean. It¡¯s probably hard to tell for most people, because most of the time you already look displeased, but you¡¯re giving me the head tilt you do when¡ª¡±


    ¡°Rian.¡±


    ¡°Yes, your Bindership?¡±


    ¡°Explain to me,¡± Lori said, her voice a knife, sharp and flat, ¡°why I should tolerate the presence of more threats to my life in my vicinity.¡± She¡¯d been quite ready to stand her ground and start directing lightning at anyone who looked like a wizard. Indeed, after she¡¯d stripped all the bound tool cores, wisplights and nearly all the beads to be found in River¡¯s Fork, she¡¯d started making a dedicated lightning bolt tool. It had been crude, merely a length of beast bone she could hold comfortably where she¡¯d anchored a binding of lightwisps that produced piercing light, and binding of lightningwisps that would generate lightning she would be able to direct through wherever the piercing light was aimed at. ¡°Make it a very convincing explanation. I gave you explicit orders. No wizards.¡±


    It had been Rian¡¯s idea for her to retreat back to Lorian, both to safeguard her person and to remove the bound tool components out of the demesne to prevent them from getting into the wrong hands¡ªthat is, anyone capable of magic who wasn¡¯t her¡ªwhile at the same time sending him and Yllian to meet with these new arrivals to ascertain their intentions and see whether they were in fact the group from the Golden Sweetwood Company that the letter they had received told them to expect and not, say, literally anyone else. And if they were¡­ well, as her lord in charge of ¡®dealing with people¡¯ matters, it would be his job to deal with these people anyway¡­


    Their exchange afterwards had been heated and rushed, with her ordering him to lay down terms of ¡®no wizards, anywhere, go away¡¯¡ªamong other things¡ªand him nodding along with that¡­ Until the very last moment when, while the Coldhold was in the midst of leaving its dock but before they were out of hearing range, Rian had yelled that he had an idea for how to deal with the wizards and then promptly ran away before she could reply.


    When he¡¯d finally returned in the late afternoon, it had been to tell her that he had a plan to get the wizards to remain in River¡¯s Fork where they could be of use for her¡ª¡°Imagine what you could have that many wizards do for you!¡±¡ªwhile also keeping her safe from them.


    Naturally, she was displeased.


    ¡°They¡¯re not in your vicinity, though?¡± Rian said. Lori didn¡¯t know if it was better or worse that he wasn¡¯t feigning innocence with wide eyes. ¡°All the new wizards are safely isolated in a completely different demesne. And if we can maneuver the situation properly, they¡¯ll be more focused on trying to stay there instead of trying to get here, where they¡¯ll be a direct threat to your life.¡±


    She stared at him.


    ¡°Look¡­ you¡¯re only worried about the wizards, right?¡± Rian said. ¡°No actual objections to having a group of new settlers wanting to settle in either of your demesnes, as long as they acknowledged you as the rightful and supreme power in the demesne they lived in, right?¡±


    Obviously. ¡°Obviously,¡± she said curtly.


    Rian nodded. ¡°So, they¡¯re not a problem. Then the only thing that¡¯s bothering you is all the wizards they brought with them, who are obviously a threat to your life and therefore can¡¯t be allowed to be anywhere near you. Correct?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re repeating yourself.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m merely ensuring we have the same understanding of the situation. If my understanding is incorrect and you have other reasons to fear, then as your lord I really need to know now so I can account for it.¡±


    Lori rolled her eyes. ¡°Yes, your understanding is correct.¡± Really, how hard was it to understand? They were wizards who had come to the new continent, so obviously they all wished to be Dungeon Binders, and therefore would try to kill her to add her demesne to their own, just like she would!


    Her lord nodded. ¡°Well, then this is perfect! They¡¯re well away from you in River¡¯s Fork, and now you finally have a very good reason to never have to leave your demesne ever again!¡± He spread his arms at that as if he as in the finale scene of a particularly over-acted play.


    That last actually gave Lori pause, tilting her head slightly in consideration. The thought of never having to leave her demesne to visit River¡¯s Fork was very tempting, especially with winter coming¡­ ¡°I will not be imprisoned in my own demesne,¡± she eventually declared.


    ¡°Is it really imprisonment when you have no desire to go out, no reason to, have everything you need brought to you, love to stay home, have perfect accommodations, and despise having to set foot outside?¡±


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    ¡°Besides,¡± Rian continued, ¡°you¡¯re not imprisoned. If you have any reason at all to go to River¡¯s Fork, then the wizards will make themselves scarce so they are all well out of your sight and too far away to harm you before you even approach the dome. If you have to go there, we send word ahead, all the wizards are evacuated out of the dome¡ªor even just be made to sit in the dragon shelter with the doors closed¡ª you can come and do your work safely, and we let them out once you¡¯ve left. This way, you¡¯re safe, have everything you want and the demesne has access to a workforce of skilled wizards who can both help relieve your workload and allow us options we previously didn¡¯t have available to us. For example, with Horotracts you don¡¯t need to excavate the dragon shelter anymore. They can just make a vista and expand the dimensions of the shelter area that¡¯s already there.¡±


    ¡°That won¡¯t work long-term,¡± she said immediately. ¡°The water storage and purification capacity were barely able to keep up with the shelter¡¯s needs last time. With the increased population brought on by new settlers, expanded and improved bindings will needed to be formed. Water storage will also need to be expanded, as well as latrine capacity.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure that¡¯s something eight Whisperers can figure out together, especially since they¡¯ll be well-motivated to do so since they¡¯ll be the ones using the dragon shelter,¡± Rian said.


    That made Lori pause once more. Phrased like that¡­ eight Whisperers, working in shifts, would be more than capable of imbuing the necessary bindings to protect the dragon shelter in the event of one passing over the demesne, while still ensure that there was always someone awake at all times¡­


    She shook her head to clear it of happy thoughts. ¡°Nevertheless. Why did you see fit to ignore my orders?¡±


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    ¡°Because I was only one man, and if you didn¡¯t think you had good chances going directly against 19 wizards, how well do you think I thought I would do?¡± Rian said immediately.


    ¡­


    Ugh, she hated it when he had a point.


    ¡­


    ¡°Well, regardless,¡± Lori said, completely dismissing the previous point and proceeding to ignore it even existed. ¡°I find it unlikely that they¡¯ll agree to such a limitation.¡±


    For some reason, Rian looked up at the bare stone of the dining hall¡¯s ceiling for a moment before letting out a sigh and opening his mouth to respond¡ª


    He paused, mouth still open, and tilted his head slightly. Finally, he said, ¡°Why do you think they¡¯re a threat to you?¡± he said. The words came out slower than he normally spoke, as if the thoughts were still coming to being in his mind as he was speaking.


    ¡°I¡¯ve already explained this,¡± she said, impatience and the beginnings of actual anger at his incomprehension.


    ¡°No, no, I understand that reasoning¡­¡± Rian said. ¡°They¡¯re wizards, they want to be Dungeon Binders, I understand all that. But how are they a threat just because they¡¯re a lot of them?¡±


    ¡°Rian, just a moment ago you proved you could count.¡±


    ¡°Your Bindership¡­ you, as you are, as a Dungeon Binder¡­ do you think you could defeat any wizard you faced, individually?¡±


    ¡°Of course,¡± she said immediately.


    ¡°Would you have trouble with two?¡± he said.


    ¡°Not if I can see both of them at the same time.¡±


    Rian nodded. ¡°So the minimum number of wizards needed to perhaps stand a chance of defeating you is two, if they cooperated by positioning themselves so one was in a blind spot,¡± he said, stating the blatantly obvious as if he were some kind of theater character expositing to the audience. ¡°Your Bindership¡­ why would any two wizards be willing to cooperate to that extent?¡±


    The question actually gave her pause. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Why would any two wizards be willing to cooperate to that extent?¡± Rian repeated, still speaking slowly, as he continued to visibly examined the words he spoke even as they came out of him. ¡°After all, wouldn¡¯t they be as much of a threat to each other as they are to you? More really, since you¡¯re a Dungeon Binder and could literally overpower them. Compared to you, the other wizards are a much easier and more appealing target. Sure, theoretically that many wizards could work together to overwhelm you¡­ but that puts them in a position where they could be easily betrayed and killed by someone before they even got near you. I mean, if you were in their position, would you cooperate with another wizard to kill a Dungeon Binder?¡±


    No, of course not. She¡¯d be too worried about being betrayed. ¡°No, of course not. I¡¯d be too worried about being betrayed,¡± Lori said instantly, even as she stared at him, feeling lightheaded¡ªor at least, what she thought being lightheaded felt like¡ªas all flows of thought stopped like they¡¯d slammed face-first into a door that should have been open but wasn¡¯t. She examined the logic of the statements, and found to her surprise that it did in fact hold up. Yes, as a Dungeon Binder, what she had was desirable¡­ but just as she had to regard all wizard as threats, all wizards also had to regard each other as threats. And while she was distant and content to remain that way, these wizards would all be in each other¡¯s vicinity¡­


    ¡°They¡¯re also unlikely to try to decide to move against you,¡± Rian continued. ¡°After all, they probably think that you¡¯ve had time to fill the demesne with contingencies in case you¡¯re attacked by wizards.¡± He paused. ¡°You haven¡¯t, but they don¡¯t know that.¡±


    Her consideration of logic was interrupted as her displeasure returned, now joined by annoyance. ¡°You say that with such certainty. For all you know, this entire dungeon is filled with bindings that will kill any wizard foolish enough to face me here.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not, though.¡±


    ¡°It could be!¡±


    He just gave her a look so reminiscent of her mothers knowing she hadn¡¯t done something she said she would that Lori instinctively started looking around for a suction sweeper before she remembered her demesne didn¡¯t even have one, because she was no longer forced to clean the floor just because she had Whispering.


    ¡°Stop that!¡±


    Rian shrugged. ¡°As I was saying, it makes much more sense for them to focus on removing weaker rivals. Since you¡¯re significantly stronger than they are, it¡¯s only logical they leave trying to deal with you for last, when they can at least match you. Of course, to do so they¡¯d have to found their own demesne, but to do that they¡¯d have to either leave River¡¯s Fork and move far enough that they don¡¯t end up with just a scrap of land, or do it right outside Rivers Fork so they can do it in a short enough time-span that they aren¡¯t missed. In the first instance, they risk death to the local beasts, and in the second¡­ well, if having that kind of demesne conferred any kind of advantage, Covehold would be surrounded by them, and it isn¡¯t. At least, not according to Tae and Lidzuga, and they would know.¡±


    Lori hummed thoughtfully.


    ¡°As to your original question¡­ they¡¯ll accept the limitation because to not do so makes them a target,¡± Rian said, returning to speaking in that slow pace where he was letting his mouth divulge his thoughts even as he was coming to his conclusions. ¡°Anyone who stays in the dome when told to leave will be explicitly defying you, which means you¡¯ll need to deal with them. Which means they¡¯ll lose and die, so they won¡¯t. If more than one does so¡­ well, each of them will need to worry about you and the other wizards around them, and since you¡¯re the most difficult target¡­¡± He shrugged, leaving the conclusion up to her.


    Eventually, Lori nodded slowly. ¡°Very well¡­¡± she said, her words equally slow, trying to find some sort of flaw in the reasoning, even as she chastised herself for missing the obvious. ¡°Very well. Then we¡¯ll let them kill each other and see who survives. We¡¯ll need daily reports as to their movements. Anyone who disappears for a significant period of time is likely making their move.¡±


    ¡°No need for their exact movements, surely? We don¡¯t have enough people to spare in River¡¯s Fork for that,¡± Rian said. ¡°Just watch who misses a meal and check that the borders of the demesne don¡¯t have any surprise neighbors. As long as neither of those things happen, then it means no one has done anything yet.¡±


    ¡°If I may, Great Binder,¡± Shanalorre suggested, and Lori blinked. She¡¯d forgotten that the other Dungeon Binder had been sitting there. ¡°I regularly check on River¡¯s Fork through my core for injuries or anything that needs to be imbued. It would be trivial to include checking for anyone significantly outside of the dome and moving towards the edge of the demesne when I do so. It would be necessary in any case, as wandering the woods alone is unsafe, especially for the children accompanying these new settlers.¡±


    Lori nodded immediately at that last. ¡°Do it,¡± she said. Even if Shanalorre was unable to precisely identify who had done so, it would be a signal that someone had, and more specific measures could be taken.


    ¡­ measures that she would have to take, given that if the wizard¡ªif it was a wizard¡ªin question might have formed a dungeon¡¯s core and become a Dungeon Binder¡­


    She shook her head, setting the idea aside for the moment. ¡°Very well. On to the next matter. You said that the leader of the settlers wishes to negotiate?¡±


    Rian nodded. ¡°They¡¯re playing hard to get, implying that they¡¯re planning to form their own demesne with their own wiza¡ªdon¡¯t worry! I¡¯m pretty sure he only said that as a negotiating tactic!¡±


    That exclamation might have resulted from the fact that Lori¡¯s gaze had ignited from displeased to incendiary. ¡°And if they weren¡¯t?¡± she said as she glared.


    ¡°Then what would I be able to do about it?¡± he said. ¡°Tell them ¡®do that and our Dungeon Binder will kill yours¡¯? That¡¯s the sort of thing you leave as a surprise so they can¡¯t prepare for it.¡±


    She let her glare linger for a moment longer before letting out a huff and allowed herself to relax again. ¡°You had best hope it was only a negotiating tactic,¡± she said. ¡°Though negotiating requires a specific end.¡±


    Rian nodded, frowning slightly. ¡°Yeah¡­ I got the feeling that the leader of the expedition didn¡¯t like the fact that River¡¯s Fork was being ruled by a civilian.¡±


    ¡°Do you think he will attempt to seize power as¡­¡± Lori frowned, tilting her head for a moment, then decided this wasn¡¯t actually something she cared about. ¡°¡­. as whatever his name was did?¡±


    ¡°Not sure. On the one hand, he seems like he doesn¡¯t enjoy being in charge. On the other hand, he seems like he¡¯s simply trying to do right by the people he¡¯s in charge of. Trying to appeal to any personal gain on his part¡ªexcept perhaps for a decrease in things he¡¯s responsible for¡ªwon¡¯t move him, so bribery is out, but as long as we offer the settlement a collectively good deal he¡¯ll probably be agreeable enough.¡± For some reason, Rian had a strange expression on his face as he said this. ¡°He seems to get along with Yllian well enough, so once the settlers are established he might just stop being relevant and fade into the background. At most, he¡¯d become an assistant to Yllian, being familiar with the new settlers. Actively seeking power and authority¡­ he doesn¡¯t seem the type. Of course, I¡¯ve been wrong about militiamen before.¡± For some reason, Shanalorre reached up and patted him on the shoulder. This did not seem to comfort him, as he actually slumped. ¡°Uh, do you want to be the one to conduct these negotiations? You know, so there¡¯s no risk I¡¯ll do something on my own initiative?¡±


    For a moment, Lori was sorely tempted¡­ but only a moment. There was a reason she had Rian, after all. ¡°Will you be doing something of your own initiative?¡± she said.


    ¡°If it¡¯s needed,¡± Rian said immediately. ¡°Better you yell at me later than to look weak and indecisive during the negotiations.¡±


    ¡­yes, that was about what she expected. ¡°Make sure they understand that I rule River¡¯s Fork,¡± she said. ¡°My will is law, and any say they have in matters is by my indulgence.¡±


    ¡°How much indulgence am I allowed to mistakenly assume they have?¡±


    ¡°As much as River¡¯s Fork already has.¡±


    Rian nodded. ¡°All right, then. We¡¯ll see what happens in three days. In the meantime, I¡¯ll probably be busy seeing to the mail.¡±


    That gave Lori pause. ¡°Mail?¡±


    ¡°Well, yeah. Yllian got me a list of the people in the new group, and I¡¯m having Riz pass it around. By tomorrow, I expect to have a lot of rocks and pieces of wood with mail on it from our people that needs to be sent over to the settlers.¡±


    ¡°No mail,¡± Lori said immediately. ¡°Not until you firmly impress on everyone that certain details are not to be spoken of.¡±


    ¡°I think it¡¯s a bit too late to keep the wizards from knowing you can make beads and rudimentary bound tools,¡± Rian said. ¡°Even if you stripped all of them from River¡¯s Fork, everyone knows about them, and they have no reason to not tell their friends.¡±


    ¡­


    Oh, colored glittering rainbows.

 469 - Clarity and Regret

    When Lori stopped screaming in frustration, Rian had helpfully put a cup of water in front of her. She glowered at him, but picked up the cup with a muttered thanks that made her wince. Her throat wasn''t all that sore, but it was a little scratchy, and it might get worse later as she ate. The water in the cup was green, and it took her a moment to realize he''d mixed some honey into it. Had she been screaming so long that he''d actually had time to get honey? Apparently, yes.


    Despite herself, Lori warmed the honey-water before drinking it, rubbing her hands together so that the friction would create heat. Claiming the firewisps that materialized as a result and binding them to her will, she formed the firewisps into a simple binding that she anchored to her fingertip. Moving carefully, she dipped her finger into the cup and almost to the surface of the honey-water to let the binding touch the surface, and she released the binding from her finger and anchored it to the water.


    Reaching through her core to activate the binding firewisps was no longer simply second nature and was just something she did, something she willed to happen. She moved her arm, she breathed, she thought, she was connected to all the wisps in her demesne through her core. Such was simply the way of the world.


    The honey-water in the cup grew warm as the binding of firewisps used the magic imbued into it through her core to create heat, especially once she swished the cup a little to get the water moving. Lori deactivated and dissolved the binding quickly, and when she raised the cup to her lips and drank, the liquid was pleasantly warm and sweet. Just a bit too sweet, really. Rian had put in a medicinal amount.


    "Feeling better?" Rian asked once she''d finished sipping, swallowing in small amount to let the honey wash over her throat. She''d have to drink slowly so that the honey would affect the afflicted area enough to take effect. "Or do you want Shana to heal you?"


    ¡­


    All right, forget the honey.


    She held out her hand towards Shanalorre, who took it at the implicit command. Lori felt nothing as the savant undoubtedly claimed and bound the life in her body, taming them into a meaning. As an untaught savant, the other Dungeon Binder could perform only one, a meaning that she tamed instinctively, but was of such complexity that even now T¡­ Ti¡­ uh, whatever-her-name-was, an experienced Deadspeaker who resided in Lori''s demesne, had still not managed to decipher what exactly it was that Shanalorre did much less replicate it.


    The contact was brief, but Lori immediately felt the itching in her throat subside, and when she hummed, there was no pain. "Thank you," she said absently as she drew back her arm. Picking up the cup of honey-water¡ªno sense in letting it go to waste¡ªshe down it, savoring the taste.


    It was then she noticed that the dining hall of her Dungeon was more full than it had previously been. How long had she been screaming?


    Fortunately, when she directed her glare outward, her idiots proceeded to return to minding whatever business had brought them to her dungeon, which in this case was waiting for dinner to be ready. Nodding to herself, she sat back down and¡ª


    An ear-splitting shriek rose, and she winced at the high-pitched tone. Then winced again as further tones, all high-pitched, joined in.


    "That''s on you," Rian said, his normal speaking voice sounding strangely loud as she heard it over the shrieking, which didn''t have volume so much as pitch that cut through the air and stabbed into one''s ears.


    Lori wanted to refute him, but¡­ "That''s on me," she sighed.


    "Karina must still be taking a bath. I''ll take care of it, Great Binder," Shanalorre said, swinging her legs over the bench she was sitting on and getting to her feet. "Do you require me for anything further?"


    She considered that, then shook her head. "Not at the moment," Lori said, and Shanalorre gave her a bow before turning to stride towards where more and more children were taking turns to start shrieking in¡­ well, in what was probably a decent approximation of Lori screaming.


    With as much dignity as she could muster¡ªwhile at the same time acknowledging that probably wasn''t a lot at the moment¡ªLori resumed her seat, leaning against the back of her chair. For a moment, she stared at Rian.


    "It''s probably not going to be a problem," her lord said eventually, his voice pitched low. She could barely hear him, and over the sounds of some of the children still screaming, no one in the other tables¡ªof which the closest were still unoccupied¡ªwould be able to either. "The only ones who know how to make your bound tool cores are the demesne''s smiths, and asking them to restrict that knowledge is much more doable than asking everyone to not talk about beads or bound tools. And I think I remember who was there when we broke open the first large bead so I can ask them not to mention what was inside, so we can at least delay them realizing the existence of white Iridescence to after they run out of their own beads. By the time they''re in a fit state to try to reason how you do it, they''ll be mostly out of the necessary resources."


    Lori grunted. "I could just order everyone not to speak of it," she said.


    "No reason you can''t. I simply think it''s prudent to approach those with specific knowledge."


    Another grunt, and she let out a breath. "Inform them the knowledge is to be considered a trade secret of the demesne," she said. "As are all matters related to it. While it''s unlikely to curb speaking of the matter completely, those with specific knowledge will at least know the level of importance of the subject."


    Rian tilted his head. "Uh, you''ll have to give me context, your Bindership. I worked at a lumberyard, I don''t think we had any trade secrets, though I''ve heard of the term before."


    Lori took a moment to wonder what trade secrets a lumberyard would even have. A specialized saw? Special wheels on their carts? If the lumberyard was the only trade Rian had ever been a part of, it was no wonder he had never heard of them. "Trade secrets are exactly that: knowledge that is kept secret to a specific trade, or even a specific member of a trade. Usually it''s a method, technique or formulation to an exclusive product. With this knowledge designated a trade secret, people should be reluctant to spread the knowledge as it is an advantage of the demesne. Also, generally anyone revealing trade secrets are beaten to death to set an example."


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    "Ah. Now things make sense," Rian said with a nod. "Well, even with that it''s not certain no one will talk about anything important, but it should properly put your wrath into context. Though on a related note¡­ what do you intend to do with all the parts you removed from River''s Fork?"


    Honestly, she hadn''t really had a plan beyond ''don''t let anyone else have her capabilities'', although that thought had been very pressing. Besides, given how her bound tool cores were, another Whisperer could easily remove and repurpose them to their own ends, and those ends would no doubt be some kind of weapon against her! "Spare parts, at the moment, in case I need to create any more bound tools," Lori said.


    "Oh. I thought you were going to use them to build some kind of emergency dragon shelter protection bound tool so that when one came, you could just bring it over to protect the mine and then take it back with you after the crisis was over."


    "If that could be done that easily, such a bound tool would already exist," Lori said. Well, she could build a portable bound tool core and sphere to imbue a shell of darkwisps, but that would still mean manually forming such a done. And since she resolved to not enter River''s Fork unless absolutely necessary¡­


    Well, they had several wizards. They could survive.


    ¡­


    Ugh, they''ll survive until she set something up. By design, it would have to be prepared in advance and simply activated when a dragon was present¡ªnot unlike what already existed¡ªbut she would have to find some way to keep people from trying to modify or affect the internals since she wouldn''t be present in the dragon shelter anymore, not with so many wizards also present. During a dragon, while she was distracted or tired, would be the perfect opportunity for someone to try and kill her.


    "Well, I suppose you''d know best. I do have one last matter to bring up before I go find the smiths though."


    "Just one?" Lori said, well-aware of what her lord was like.


    "Well, I do still have things to do and there''s still dinner for anything else that comes up," Rian said. "This doesn''t really need an immediate answer, but it''s something I feel needs to be brought to your attention for consideration. If and when the settlers finally stop pretending they have any other plans and decide to settle down in River''s Fork, are you going to allow any of them to come settle here in Lorian Demesne?"


    Lori stared at him. "Why would they settle here? They''ve made it clear their destination was River''s Fork."


    "I''m not sure, and I''m only speculating, but some of the people here might have family arriving with the new settlers, and they might want to be near family."


    She gave him a confused look. "They would?" That seemed completely contrary to reality.


    "Well, it depends on how close the family is," Rian edited. "They might also have friends they want to live near. While this is purely theoretical, if anyone in the demesne has such friends or family among the settlers, if you don''t allow the new settlers the option of settling here, we might have people choosing to move to River''s Fork. Now, this might not matter to you, since they''re all still your subjects no matter what demesne they live in, but as the lord of this demesne I really don''t want us losing any available people. There''s more than enough work to do as it is, and having fewer people to do them would be really unpleasant."


    Ah. Now she understood. "I see¡­" Lori said thoughtfully. Put like that¡­ "I''ll consider it."


    Rian nodded with a smile. "Thank you. I''ll need to know what you think before I go to speak with the settlers in three days, so I can use it to indulge whatever bargaining Yha¡ªtheir leader thinks we''re going to have."


    She tilted her head. "Thinks you''re going to have?"


    He shrugged. "Whatever happens, the result of the discussion isn''t in doubt. According to Yllian, they''ll settle in River''s Fork one way or the other. The only question is what concessions they think they can get from us and how much we let them think we''re indulging them."


    Lori raised an eyebrow at him. "''We''?"


    "Oh, are you going to be the one conducting the negotiations, then?"


    ¡­


    Well, perhaps ''we'' was appropriate in this instance. "Very well. I''ll leave the negotiations to you. Do not do anything that will require another convincing explanation."


    "Yes, your Bindership."


    Lori nodded, then slid down slightly on her chair and kicked his shin under the table.


    "Ow!"


    "Let me emphasize that I will be very displeased if another convincing explanation is needed. Is this understood?"


    "With painful clarity and regret, your Bindership. May I leave now before you decide to either even it out or kick the same spot twice?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively, and Rian limped off. His limp was theatrically exaggerated, and Lori pointedly turned her attention away once it was obvious to her that he was limping in the general direction of Shanalorre. Leaning back on her chair again, she sighed. While they''d been expecting the arrival of the Golden Sweetwood Company, and had even been aware that they would be bringing wizards with them, their arrival was still an unpleasant surprise. Planning and preparing for them always seemed so unimportant when there were more immediate matters needing her attention.


    Well, they were an immediate matter now, so they had her attention.


    Nineteen wizards, all no doubt planning to become Dungeon Binders and, once they had done so, kill all the other Dungeon Binders around them to claim their dungeon''s cores for themselves. While Rian''s argument that they were as likely to focus on each other as her had merit, it was probably only a matter of time before someone ran off to establish their own demesnes. Should that happen¡­


    Well, Lori would need to move to kill them immediately, before they could get used to interpreting the awareness they derived from their connection to their core. If she allowed them time, she would lose the advantage of her experience, and they would be able to establish defensive measures in their demesne.


    Once, she had thought that the bindings she was familiar with were all she needed to kill another wizard. After all, her water cutters had worked well enough in dealing with the leapers that had attacked her and the expedition back when they had been traveling from Covehold Demesne to their current destination, even if doing so had required letting the beasts get dangerously close. However, her encounter with the Typhon abomination had made her realize the value in having bindings that worked at greater distances.


    Her tests with the bindings she had derived from studying the ill-bound wisps created by dragons had also shown her that she needed better ways to aim, especially at range. Simply holding out her arm and pointing at what she wanted to hit would get it in the general direction of her target, but she needed her awareness of the wisps in her demesne to be able to aim accurately¡ªsomething she would not have if she had to face another Dungeon Binder in their own. In books, all the protagonists almost never had trouble aiming their bindings unless it was dramatically appropriate, so she had assumed doing so was easy. Clearly, novels had lied to her. It was a harsh betrayal, and it might take time for her heart to recover before she trusted another novel again. At least the theater was obviously prioritizing spectacle over accuracy, heh he.


    She would need to find a way to more accurately aim her bindings at a target.


    Lori thought back to the Typhon abomination, the beasts she had faced before, and amended that thought. She would need to find a way to accurately and quickly aim her bindings at a target. She supposed she''d have to inform everyone that she would be conducting tests with fire and lightning tomorrow so they wouldn''t panic. Again.


    Really, they should know it was her by now. It''s not like there was anyone else in the demesne who could perform Whispering.


    And she intended to keep it that way!

 470 - Looking Like A Good Day

    The din of conversation in the dining hall seemed louder than usual as the people of her demesne began to fill the room. At first Lori thought it might just have been her imagination, but as the volume of the voices kept growing and growing, she had to retract that thought. It wasn''t especially annoying¡ªwell, it was no more annoying than usual¡ªbut she had to wonder why. Even the children, sitting at the table behind her with Shanalorre and the brat, were talking enthusiastically about¡­ something, and being far noisier than they normally were, which was already very noisy.


    She formed a binding of airwisps around her head to muffle the cacophony so she could consider her options. Lori already had some ideas as to how to increase the accuracy of her bindings, beginning with ''anchor the binding to a stick and learn to aim'' to ''build the stock of a crossbow''. That was that you called that part of a crossbow, right? She thought she remembered it from a book, although she might be confusing it with how to make a soup¡­


    Idly, she looked at her hand, holding thing her thumb and forefinger outstretched so that they were at right angles to each other. Raising it to eye level, she lined up to the tips of the two extremities, taking aim at the back of someone''s head two tables in front of her. While that gave her a relatively straight line from her eye to whatever she was trying to aim at, it wasn''t really a good way to aim her lightning bindings. It was too close and directly in the view of her eye, so every shot of lightning would likely blind her. That wasn''t even counting the heat¡­


    There were also all the new bindings she''d developed that she could only use with extensive testing preparation. While her new lightning binding could be aimed with piercing unseen light, her primary lightning ball and fire ball did not have such a means of easy direction, something that she would have to correct. Still, the lode forces generated by lightningwisps were looking promising, and all of her new bindings incorporated lightningwisps already¡­


    A hand waved in her line of sight, and she blinked, frowning at Rian as he pointed at his ears, then at the side of her¡ªoh.


    She deactivated the binding of airwisps around her head, then winced as the noise crashed into her ears. Ugh, it sounded like they were holding a dungeon shelter party with a more inept band of musicians than usual. She''d have to put up with this all¡ª


    No, wait, she didn''t.


    "Quiet!" she called out, her voice amplified by the binding of airwisps around her head, their purpose now inverted. Her word rang out across the dining hall, and there was an immediate lull in the conversations. She nodded satisfaction, then immediately turned to look behind her, glaring as she swept a hand to point at all the children¡ªand two of Mikon''s cousins who looked so much like her they were near indistinguishable¡ªsitting there. "Don''t even think about it," she warned them.


    "You heard the Great Binder, everyone," Shanalorre said from where she had been sitting directly behind Lori. "No yelling."


    There were disappointed groans, but the children went back to their conversations, though at a slightly less ear-stabbing volume. The adults slowly did so as well as they realized she wasn''t going to make some sort of announcement.


    Lori turned her attention back to her table. Rian had returned to his seat across from her, and had been joined by Riz, Umu, and Mikon, the weavers and not-an-officer sitting on the bench to either side of him. They had been mildly amusing and occasionally frustrating back when Rian had been ignorant of their attraction and had been trying to make themselves known, and had progressed to mildly nauseating to look at when they had remedied that. Still, it was a familiar sort of nauseating, so she tolerated it to a degree.


    In addition to Rian''s household, there were also two women sitting at one end of the bench, as physically distant as it was possible to be from Lori while remaining at the same table. Now, Lori''s memory for names and face and names with faces was terrible¡ªshe was willing to admit that¡ªbut even she could recognize the demesne''s other Deadspeaker and her wife. She could even tell which one was which, a great achievement. As to names¡­


    Well, the wife wasn''t important, but the wizard conveniently had a head cloth on her head embroidered with ''Taeclas'', presumably so the head cloth could be easily identified when doing laundry¡ª


    Lori froze, and she was suddenly aware of the beating of her heart as she stared at the Deadspeaker who was THERE, right THERE, close enough to touch, and they were touching the table, the wooden table¡ª


    There was a hand on her face. Someone had suddenly placed their hand over her face.


    It was incongruous enough that her flow of thought actually paused, trying to decipher what was going on. Fortunately, her eyes weren''t completely covered, and after a few moments of thought and focusing she was finally able to decipher what was going on.


    "Rian," she said flatly, her voice slightly warped since her upper lip was being slightly pressed down upon, "get your rainbowed hand off my face and explain yourself immediately."


    The hand was slowly removed from her face, which implied a lack of caution on her lord''s part since she felt a very strong urge to bite the appendage. "Just getting you to stop panicking. Tae is one of yours, remember? She''s not a threat."


    "I''ll be the judge of that," she snapped, even as she recalled that the woman was, in fact, insane. She named her plants, after all, and treated them like children!


    "Of course you are," Rian said, and though his face and expression didn''t change, there was something about his tone even as he agreed with her. "Just reminding you in case it slipped your mind. I know that sometimes happens. That''s why writing and notes was invented." He paused. "Well, that and for people to keep track of their stuff. How else are they going to know they''re richer than everyone else?"


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    Huh. An intriguing supposition. The one she''d heard was that it was meant for keeping track of people¡­ though if you thought of people as ''stuff''¡­


    She shook her head to banish the thought out of the demesne of her mind, and leveled a flat look at Taeclas. For some reason, she''d grabbed her wife and was holding her below the level of the tabletop, which must be quite awkward. For a moment, Lori contemplated the woman. So far, the Deadspeaker had made no attempts to try and kill her. The woman had been too focused on raising her sweetgrass and spending time with her wife. And again, she was insane¡ªunlike Lori¡ªand had some sort of irrational hatred of trees.


    That didn''t mean she couldn''t be dangerous, but¡­ well, it was a general, '' to everyone around her when she becomes violent in addition to insane'' kind of dangerous, not a specific ''she wants to be a Dungeon Binder and will take your demesne to add to her own'' sort of dangerous¡­


    The Deadspeaker was looking at her, her expression confused and possibly concerned at Rian''s strange behavior. "Um, is there something wrong, L¡ªyour Bindership?"


    "No, Wizard Taeclas," Lori said. "Rian simply has strange ways."


    This time Rian rolled his eyes. "Yes, that''s what happened."


    She nodded. "See? He agrees."


    Taeclas let out a little laugh for some reason. Well, she was insane, random laughter was to be expected.


    Shaking her head, Lori turned her focus on her lord as she kept the Deadspeaker visible in the corner of her eye. "What is it, Rian?"


    "Huh¡ª? Oh! Ah, well, it''s partly related to the reason why you made yourself deaf a while ago. I need your authorization to give people paper."


    She looked at him sharply. "Why?"


    "Well, you know what I said earlier about people writing to their friends among the new settlers? Well, the planks and rocks and things became very unwieldy very quickly, so I told everyone to hold off writing until I could get them some paper. I think a sheet per household would be enough, and we can probably wash off the ink to use the sheets later."


    They could? "They¡ªwe could?" she said.


    "Uh, maybe? At the very least, Kutago could use the sheets to make new sheets, though they won''t be as white and clean as the originals. I''ve been collecting the used sheets that aren''t being used for long-term records, and it''s about time I had her try and make something out of it."


    Lori waved a hand dismissively. "How many actually know how to write?"


    "¡­not all that many, to be honest. I mean, they can recognize words, and most know enough to read a list and do basic counting and adding, but writing''s a bit more limited. Those of us who know how to write have agreed to write for them, so that''s my night and most of tomorrow morning gone."


    "How unfortunate for the four of you," Lori said blandly. "Do we have the ink and paper to spare for this?"


    "Oh, yeah," Rian said. "That''s not a problem, we still have a lot, and we can restock when we go to Covehold Demesne." He paused. "Unless you want me to cancel that expedition because of the new settlers? I''d understand if you want everyone on-hand for this."


    "No," Lori said calmly. "We made a commitment to a trading partner, so we need to keep it to show we are reliable. However, I want you to be as quick as you can. With the quality of our goods now proven, the transaction should be much smoother."


    Rian nodded. "How quickly do you want us back? Because while I asked them to have iron ready for us when we returned, if we ask them to acquire anything else that would take another day or two."


    Lori considered that. "Do we need anything?"


    "Well, with Shana and Tae we don''t really need that much medicine, but some more antiseptics for the childbirths we''re going to have this winter would probably help¡ª"


    "What childbirths?" Lori interrupted.


    Rian blinked. "The¡­ uh, we have three pregnancies coming up, and there were a couple more this past year after the winter. People have been using the Um a lot, after all."


    Lori looked at the women on either side of him, trying to judge the size of their stomachs behind the¡ª


    "It''s not them." Rian''s voice was so flat she could have used it as an anvil face.


    "Though not from lack of trying," Mikon intersected cheerfully. "Every night we¡ª"


    The rest of her words were muffled as Riz, Umu and Rian each put a hand on her mouth. Off to the side, Taeclas looked impressed, clenching her fist and bending her elbow to hold her forearm up straight in an approving gesture, ignoring the chiding swat her wife gave her.


    "My congratulations, I suppose. Please never mention it again. Ever."


    "I''m have absolutely no objection to that," Rian said. "Moving on, more antiseptics?"


    Lori nodded. "More antiseptics." Slathering newborns with honey to keep them from getting sick probably wasn''t a good idea. "You may have one day to purchase other supplies. If it can''t be acquired in a day, don''t bother. We''ll get it next season."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll get back as soon as I can with as much iron as we can safely carry aboard. Well¡­ a little less, we''ll need space for salt too. But I think we have enough time to put off going until after the new arrivals are settled in and understand how things work. I know you''d rather not have to deal with that by yourself."


    "I''m sure Erzebed would¡ª"


    There was a clatter as the militiawoman bodily threw herself off the bench, rolling as she hit the stone floor and came to her feet running as she dashed for the entrance of Lori''s Dungeon.


    They watched as she ran out of sight.


    "I think that''s Riz''s way of politely asking you to choose someone else for something like that," Rian said.


    "Hmm. I''ll consider it. By the way, inform everyone that there will be fire, lightning and explosions tomorrow."


    Rian''s gaze sharpened as he directed it towards her. "They won''t be happening inside any enclosed structures, will they?"


    Lori''s expression became offended. "Of course not. What sort of fool do you take me for?"


    "Do you really want an answer to that question?"


    <hr>


    After a good night''s sleep, checking and imbuing all the active bindings she needed to maintain, a pleasant breakfast¡ªthe bread was in the form of buns rather than flatbread, a rare treat¡ªand remembering in time that the insane Deadspeaker was not a threat at the moment, Lori stood on the stone boat dock along the river, her hat on her head to shield her eyes from the bright morning sunlight. It seemed a wonderful day to test bindings for destroying and killing.


    Humming to no particular tune specifically, Lori claimed and bound lightwisps out of the air through her connection with her dungeon''s core, forming a glowing light that she carefully moved just above the water of the middle of the river. It was a bright and hard to miss target, even in the daylight. Gathering more lightwisps, she formed another binding for piercing light that used unseen light.


    For a moment, she considered the second binding. While a wonderful way of aiming her lightning¡ªeven the rudimentary lightning she learned in school, the binding for which needed to be reformed because it was consumed after use¡ªas it was it only worked within her demesne. Unseen light could not be seen, after all, and therefore was difficult to aim with the senses. Still humming, Lori began altering the binding to try and rectify this deficiency. After all, there was no point in being able to aim her lightning if she couldn''t tell where she was actually aiming at.


    It was looking like a good day.

 471 - How To Aim Your Lightning

    Despite her frustrations, it was still a good day. That was still objectively true.


    A part of Lori was wondering if perhaps she should do be doing this testing outside of the boundaries of her demesne. It would probably be more effective, as it would reflect the conditions she''d need to use these bindings, but¡­ well, she could still do the prototyping, iterating, testing, and calibrating here, so she would!


    Her first attempt to try to make aiming the unseen piercing light easier was to have a binding of lightwisps parallel to it that would cast a focused¡ªbut not piercing¡ªray of visible light in the same direction, so that all she needed to do was aim using the latter.


    That hadn''t worked out as well as she''d thought it would. While she thought she had both pointed in the same direction, when she tested the binding it became obvious¡ªat least, obvious through her perception of the wisps in her demesne¡ªthat the two bindings were ever so slightly not aligned. While only a slight deviation, distance magnified the effect, and by the time the beams reached the target she had made the were shining on spots three paces apart.


    Lori made several attempts at adjustments as she tried to get the two bindings to align, until she finally decided to reform the binding so that the piercing light and the light beam were part of the same binding and with the same directionality. That worked better, resulting in a very bright but narrow light with a stream of unseen piercing light in the core of it.


    It seemed a serviceable basis for directing lightning, so she anchored the binding to one of the quartz embedded to her staff¡ªwhich vibrated slightly from the lightningwisps stored in it¡ªand practiced aiming with it.


    Immediately, a certain deficiency became obvious. Despite the fact the binding was emitting a very bright light, it could not compete with the sun, and so she could only perceive it through her connection to her core. As she was also aiming a light on the river¡­ well, it was hard to see. Concentrating, she claimed some darkwisps from the bottom of the river, and drew them upward to replace her previous target. The blackness the binding of darkwisps made was a bit harder to see against the water, alternately being very visible as the sunlight reflected off the water behind it, and being almost invisible against the dark blue water.


    Lori sighed, wondering how she was able to practice aiming with a bright light when she was aiming at a bright light.


    ¡­


    Ah, right.


    She turned around, looking up at the hillside bluff that her Dungeon was built within. Raising her staff, she nodded in satisfaction as she saw the bright spot of light shining against the stone of the cliffside, and started moving her staff to see how the light responded. Moving it seemed simple enough, so she progressed to trying to aim at specific spots of the cliff. That was a bit harder. While getting the light to move across the cliff by simply adjusting her staff hadn''t been difficult, now that she was trying to move it with intent she kept overcorrecting and moving past her targets. She found that grounding the butt of her staff and from there tilting and rolling it helped stabilize her aim. With that stability, she was able to quickly shift her aim to various marks on the cliff with relative ease.


    "Your Bindership?"


    Lori blinked, shifting her faze downwards. "What is it, Rian?"


    "Well, after you told everyone to expect fire, lightning and explosions, your people are very worriedly wondering why you seem to be aiming your magic at the Dungeon."


    It took a moment to realize what he was implying. "Rian, I''m not going to aim destructive bindings at my own Dungeon."


    "I''m sure everyone will be glad to hear that." He looked at her staff, then at the cliff. "So¡­ what are you doing, if I may ask?"


    "Devising a way to aim lightning," Lori said, then corrected herself. "A better way to aim lightning. One that can actually be used outside of my demesne."


    "Ah¡­ well, I have letters to finish up, so I''ll get back to that, but when I''m done, do you want me to help you take notes?"


    Lori shook her head. "No, that will not be necessary."


    "All right then. Though if I may point out something¡­?"


    Lori waved a hand dismissively.


    "If you''re using that light to aim your lightning¡­ while it would be fine for aiming at inanimate objects and maybe beasts, if you use that to aim lightning at wizards, they''re going to know you''re aiming at them and might be able to devise some kind of counter-measure for it. Just something to consider." Rian turned away, humming softly and¡­ yes, he seemed to be skipping in time to his humming. Her lord was such a child.


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    ¡­


    Unfortunately, as was often the case, her lord had a point, ugh. She hated that.


    Sighing, Lori set aside the current incarnation of an aimable binding, deactivating it and but keeping it anchored to her staff for later reference so she could make the flow diagram for it. At the very worst, at least she had a means of aiming her lightning, even if it had an obvious weakness.


    Now, she had to find a new way to aim¡­


    Hmm¡­ perhaps she could skip having a bright light entirely and simply aim using the piercing light? With the right binding, she could make the unseen light visible to her¡­


    It seemed a promising idea, though given the effects of that color of unseen light on flesh, she''d have to use something else as a proof of concept¡ª


    Actually, there were other colors of unseen light, weren''t there? If she used one of those as a beam of light with which to aim, she could keep using the aiming binding she''d already conceived while at the same time not having to worry about the weakness that Rian pointed out by using a binding that would let her see that unseen color. For a moment she considered altering the binding she already had, but decided to make a new one to get into the habit of doing it. With only one check to reference the original binding, Lori formed a new one, with the part of the binding that shone a wide but directed beam of visible light altered to emit unseen light as well.


    After testing the binding to ensure that the two colors of light had the same directionality so that they properly aimed at the same spot¡ªthey did, and without needing adjustment, so she had confidence that she could easily keep reproducing this binding in the future¡ªLori claimed the lightwisps in her left eye and carefully formed them into a binding that would convert a specific color of unseen light into another color. In this particular instance, it would shift it into the color red, which was the simplest to do although turning it into any other color was really no significant difficulty.


    Double checking the binding, Lori activated it.


    The world seen through her left eye immediately turned into shades of red.


    The Dungeon Binder winced, instinctively closing her eyes on instinct. Ah, she''d forgotten about that, since it had been a while. Usually when she needed to see in the dark, she just made a light instead of trying to see unseen light, but she''d sometimes resorted to it when she was trying to sneak past her mothers under the cover of darkness. Thus she''d forgotten that this color of unseen light glowed from anything hot, and despite the year moving towards winter the sun was still bathing the world in its heat.


    She slowly opened her eyes again, even as she adjusted the binding. The intensity of the redness decreased, and she was able to see the original colors of things, though the redness was still overlaid on most things. Everything that was stone glowed a bright red, as did the exposed skin of the people she saw. The sky remained as blue as ever, and when she turned to glance at the river it was still dark.


    When she activated her new aiming binding, it didn''t work as she''d thought it was. She had thought that it would result in the beam of unseen light becoming visible, and it did to a degree. However, this was only when it seemed to strike dust in the air, which after some rueful thought made sense. Piercing light all moved in the same direction, which was where she pointing it at. As sight occurred when light reached her eyes, of course she''d only see the beam when it struck something in the air that would reflect it in some other direction.


    That being said, the spot where the beam of unseen light shone with a large red circle was only visible through her left eye. She began moving her staff back and forth as she began practicing her aim again, moving the invisible red circle from one feature on the cliffside to another. Nodding in satisfaction, she turned back to the water and the targets of lightwisps and darkwisps still there, and aimed with the binding.


    ¡­


    Ah. Darkwisps didn''t reflect light, right. And the water didn''t seem to reflect the unseen light very well, at least at this angle.


    ¡­


    Lori sighed.


    It took a little more thought to work out how to aim over the water. Lori claimed waterwisps and anchored them to the stone supports at the end of the dock, then formed them into bindings that turned river water into vapor that rose into the air. It created a light mist directly above the bindings, which wasn''t enough to obscure her view but was enough to reflect some of the unseen light so she could see where she was aiming. Using the part of the beam made visible by the mist, she was able to aim at her target in the river and for the first time activated the other binding of unseen piercing light


    The much narrower but far more intense beam of unseen light activated, and the air that it passed through quickly became filled with lightningwisps all the way until it struck the surface of the river¡­ about ten yustri to the left of her target.


    ¡­


    Well, that was still pretty good.


    It took her two more tries¡ªclaiming and binding the resulting lightningwisps each time to clear the air¡ªbefore she finally hit the binding of lightwisps she''d been aiming at. Having such a wide beam for the ''aiming'' binding meant that there was a large margin for error, but making it smaller meant it was harder to see at a distance, which sort of defeated the purpose of having an aid to aiming.


    And given the need to ground the butt of her staff for stability, it also meant she had to remain stationary. Raising her staff and trying to aim the binding while not resting the butt of her staff on the ground gave it a tendency to swing, adding a complicating factor to try and account for. Holding the staff in both hands fixed this problem, but it meant she had to turn with her whole body to aim to either side and raising her aim up and down became very uncertain. Really, the only reason she could aim at all was because the mist she had raised at the end of the dock showed her the path of the aiming beam, so she could align the spot on her staff where the binding was anchored and the path in the mist with the target in the middle of the river.


    ¡­


    Lori stared at the mist, then looked down as she raised her left hand with thumb and forefinger extended. She looked at the mist again, then at her staff, then held up her extended extremities next to the aiming binding, noting how easy it was to align the tips of her thumb and finger.


    Turning, she headed back to her dungeon. Bone. She needed a length of bone, and she was fairly sure the one she''d brought from River''s Fork yesterday was still in her room¡­

 472 - For Her Consideration

    The bone that Lori would have used as an improvised tool for throwing around lightning or any other binding she felt necessary yesterday had been part of the bones extracted from the typhon abomination''s corpse, and had been the equivalent of a foot bone. Claw bone? Talon bone? Whatever. On the dragon born, the bones in question had been almost the size of the arm bones of a smaller beast, and was much more pleasantly symmetrical besides. This one was about the length of Lori''s forearm, and just slightly too wide to be immediately comfortable to hold extended in one''s hand.


    Still, that was something she could fix later. The unmodified bone was good enough for her purposes at the moment.


    Lori''s first inclination had been to anchor her aiming binding onto the bone so that the beam was parallel to its length, since it was easy to hold the bone pointed straight and parallel to her arm such that she could sight down it. It had been more in hope of an easy solution that had been overlooked than any actual confidence it would work, and to her resigned disappointment the margin for error didn''t actually improve, with the line of lightningwisps that the unseen piercing light created landing a little bit away from the target. A few repetitions made the cause clear: she was aiming by aligning her eye along the top of the bone¡ªat least, the part she could see or surmise, since her thumb was in the way¡ªand while that seemed like a straight line, the way she held the bone to get that alignment was giving the bone a slight upward or sideways tilt.


    The beam of unseen light also started making her hand start to grow warm, which was mildly concerning. That hadn''t been the case when the binding had been anchored to her staff, but then her hand hadn''t actually been in the binding then.


    Well, it had been wistful optimism anyway.


    With that failure, Lori went to try and implement the idea she''d actually had. She stripped down to just the unseen piercing light, lengthening the binding so that it was the same length as the bone. Anchoring the binding to some darkwisps she''d pulled out of the legs of her trousers¡ªdeactivated, so the darkness was invisible¡ªshe anchored the darkwisps to the side of the bone, such that the unseen piercing light was as parallel to the bone as possible. It didn''t really need to be perfectly aligned¡ªthe bone was merely something to hold to manipulate aiming and not what was actually being aimed¡ªbut if she could get it parallel, she would!


    In the end, she had to force herself to ignore the urge for it to be perfectly aligned and get back to actually working on it¡­


    ¡­


    All right, now she was done trying to align things!


    Claiming some more lightwisps out of the air, Lori formed it to create a small point light and carefully anchored it to the part of the unseen light binding facing her as well as the darkwisps the latter binding was attached to, which was directly opposite of the direction the binding sent its light. Then she carefully cleaved the darkwisps, separating the small light from the unseen piercing light while making sure the former remained in the same relative position. Placing an identical binding of lightwisps at the other end of the unseen piercing light binding, the one facing away from her, Lori repeated the procedure, until she was left with three separate bindings anchored to the bone in her hand.


    Carefully, she activated the now-separate binding closest to her. A thin line of darkness appeared, a small light shining at the end of it. Lori winced slightly, then changed the color of the light to make it more distinctive, settling on a red just barely bright enough to be visible in the air. Nodding to herself¡ªand remembering to imbue the bindings as she did so¡ªLori activated the similar binding at the opposite end. Another light appeared seemingly held up by a thin line of darkness. Holding up the bone, Lori sighted along the two lights, aligning the two with the target in the middle of the river.


    She activated the unseen piercing light, and smiled as the beam struck the darkwisp target. While not hitting the center of the darkness, it did manage to hit the binding itself. No need for adjustments, no compensating, this time she actually hit what she aimed at.


    Of course, that was just the start of the tests. She still hadn''t tried this with actual lightning, after all. It was time to finally start with that¡­


    <hr>


    Her lightning didn''t really produce thunder. Thunder, according to her old classes, was the result of the air that the lightning has passed through getting so hot it explodes. What she got wasn''t so much thunder as a crack in the air, which didn''t so much explode as puff out loudly.


    Now the river, that exploded in a quite satisfactory manner.


    She''d placed several targets of darkwisps and lightwisps along the river, and took turns shifting her aim between them and sending out lightning. Lori had a lightning ball off to one side¡ªthere was no place to safely anchor it to the bone at the moment, something she''d need to rectify later¡ªto provide the actual lightning she was sending out. It was an arrangement not unlike the test she''d done a few days ago, which she had not yet managed to integrate into a single binding.


    Uh, that should probably be her next priority. Being able to aim lightning wouldn''t be much good without proper lightning to use.


    Still, her two lights seemed to be working, although she''d made some modifications. She''d given the lights different colors so she could line them up better, and made the light closer to her dimmer so it wouldn''t affect her eyesight. Lining them up properly caused the colors to seemingly combine in her eyes, becoming a third color. She lined up the lights with the targets she''d placed, activated the unseen piercing light to create a line of lightningwisps in the air, then sent lightning from the lightningball binding along the line. This resulted in a bright flash as a line of lightning leapt from the binding and into the river, and an explosion of water as the lightning struck and turned the spot of the river she''d aimed at into steam.


    Very satisfactory.


    Unfortunately, it wasn''t a very good binding. Lori couldn''t use it very quickly since she needed to activate two separate bindings to get it to work, as well as deactivate it between uses, lest she have the unseen piercing light sweeping everywhere and confuse the path of subsequent lightning. While it would be effective against a single target, if she needed to deal with all of the wizards at once¡­ well, she''d need something better.


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    "Having fun, your Bindership?"


    Lori had been about to take aim at another target, but upon hearing her lord''s voice she paused and lowered the bone she held, deactivating all the bindings on it. The lightning ball she had to move some distance away before deactivating, the hot air and some lightning-fire inside it exploding slightly as the bindings of airwisps keeping the ball contained stopped functioning. "I will admit, it''s enjoyable when it is working as intended," she said. "What is it, Rian?"


    "It''s lunch time," he said, and Lori became aware that the sun was high overhead. "Figured you''d want to know."


    It was only then that her stomach informed her it was empty and wanted to be filled, preferably soon.


    Lori looked down at her bone and at bindings on it. Well, it was as good a time to stop as any, and she needed to refine her binding to be used effectively in any case. "Very well. Let''s go then."


    Rian nodded, stepping aside to leave her a clear path and smoothly falling into step just a little behind her as she passed him. "So, how''s throwing lightning coming along? Ready to use it to defend yourself?"


    She glanced over her shoulder at him. "What do you think?"


    He hummed. "I think you need to test if the strength of the lightning you''re using is strong enough to do what you want."


    "Rian, it''s lightning. I think that''s enough."


    "Not for the typhon abomination. Not immediately, anyway. Admittedly, I don''t know how exactly you''d test how you put enough punch in your lightning, but wouldn''t you look silly trying to kill someone with lightning only for them to get up when you looked away."


    She glared at him in hatred at the point, ugh. "It''s not as if we have any criminals for me to perform tests on."


    "That would be immoral," Rian said.


    She rolled her eyes. "Of course I''d only use criminals sentenced to death, Rian, what sort of person do you take me for?"


    "The kind that needs to add that sort of clarification, and still makes people nervous anyway," he said instantly. "For example, you might decide to lower the requirements as to which crimes would get someone sentenced to death."


    "Tax evasion and anything that involves children," she said instantly.


    "So that''s all the parents eligible for execution¡­"


    "Well, maybe this will get them to treat children better instead of as a source of labor!"


    "¡­ let''s change the subject before people hear us and start getting nervous," Rian said as they stepped into the entryway of her Dungeon. "As I was saying, maybe you need a better way of ascertaining if your lightning is effective, like maybe a more durable target than water? After all, you don''t need a lot of force to make water explode, a thrown rock can do it, and those aren''t likely to be fatal unless you hit people in the head."


    Her hatred increased, and she grumbled wordlessly as they passed through her Dungeon''s open doors and into the dining hall. "What do you suggest, then?" she said.


    "We have a couple of broken or damaged pots that we''ve been letting pile up before we asked you to put them back together," Rian said. "Maybe those would make better targets? After all, a clay pot takes more force to break, and if your lightning can break them¡­"


    "Why do we have broken pots?"


    "Accidents happen!"


    "Well, people should be more careful, then! The next person who breaks a pot is going to answer to me!"


    "Often it''s the children getting pots of cold water from the cold dropping them because the pots are wet and heavy."


    "¡­ well, it can''t be helped then, accidents happen."


    Rian nodded in understanding. "Accidents happen. Still, the damage has been minimal, such that asking you to put them back together would be more efficient than making a new batch of small pots. By the way, do you have time later this week? Gunvi¡ªthe potter¡ªhas some large pots for grain storage ready and needs help with the oven."


    She waved a hand dismissively. "Give me a day''s notice."


    "Yes, your Bindership. He should be ready in a day or two, he says because of the weather the more recently-made pots aren''t drying very well, so some of the later pots may break in the oven."


    Lori settled into her seat, setting her bone down on the table. "Noted."


    On the short bench next to her, Shanalorre gave her a nod. "Great Binder."


    "Binder Shanalorre."


    "I have a request for your consideration."


    The words made her glance at the other Dungeon Binder. Shanalorre seldom requested anything, and most of the time they either related to the children''s needs or were imminently needful. "What is it?"


    "I would like to ask permission to be allowed to return to River''s Fork for the next week."


    Lori''s eyes narrowed. "Why?" she said sharply.


    "Because while I have surrendered my demesne to your authority, I am still the actual Dungeon Binder bound to River''s Fork''s core," Shanalorre said. "As such, I will likely be afforded more recognition by the newly arrived settlers of the Golden Sweetwood Company as our demesne of origin, Lomabuyar Demesne, contains a high number of people that practice Dungeon worship. Should any issues arise as the settlers integrate into the demesne, I would be able to use the respect that my position engenders to resolve them, in your name." Shanalorre paused. "And while as the rightful Dungeon Binder of River''s Fork you would no doubt also engender that respect, your presence in River''s fork would put your life at risk. The period of a week should be sufficient time to settle any major matters that should arise from the settlers."


    For a moment, Lori gave Shanalorre a long, level look. Finally, she looked away. "I will consider it."


    Shanalorre gave her a nod that was also a seated bow. "As you say, Great Binder."


    Lori turned away, and started to consider how to properly integrate her lightning ball binding with the unseen piercing light binding. Unfortunately, due to the way to two bindings worked, they couldn''t be combined into one. The lightning ball binding had to be active at all times, while the unseen piercing light only needed to be active when she was sure of her aim. And while her means of aiming had improved considerably, it was clear that simply anchoring everything to a convenient length of bone would be insufficient. Keeping the bone properly pointed at a target put a strain on her wrist, and she found the tip starting to rise as her muscles sought to relax.


    No, throwing lightning would need a purpose-built tool to anchor the different bindings onto. She would need at least three, since the lightning ball would be generating heat that would need to be mitigated lest she burn herself again. At the very least, she''d need to modify the bone so she could hold it steady for long periods of time without having her muscles relax and pull the binding off-center, and perhaps purpose-built points to anchor the little dots of light to help with aiming¡­


    She was going to need more bone. Huh, she might actually use a shoulder blade or a pelvis this time instead of limbs¡­


    "Your Bindership?"


    Lori blinked. "What is it, Rian?"


    "I''ll be going to River''s Fork after lunch to bring the mail and check on the settlers," her lord said. "Anything you want me to do while I''m there?"


    Lori raised a hand and started to dismiss the question when she paused, tilting her head. "Memorize the faces of all their wizards," she said. "I need you to be able to identify them for me."


    Rian smiled. "I was going to do that anyway, but I''m glad you thought to suggest it. Will that be all?"


    She hesitated, and restrained the urge to glance sideways. "Inform Yllian to be ready to receive Binder Shanalorre. She will be returning for the week to handle any immediate problems¡­ within reason."


    For some reason, Rian''s smile grew. "I''ll tell Yllian how you mentioned him by name." He glanced at Shanalorre and gave her a nod. "I''ll inform Yllian to get your house ready, Binder Shanalorre. Or would you prefer your office?"


    "My office would be preferable."


    Rian nodded. "I''ll tell him. I think that''s everything for now, your Bindership. Unless you need me for anything?"


    She waved her hand dismissively, leaning back as her flow of thought picked up where she''d left off. She had several bound tool cores now, could she make the unseen piercing light a bound tool so that she only needed to operate the lightning ball? It was a thought to consider¡­

 Ryan Is An Isekai Lost Galaxy! - April Fools 2025!

    ¡°All right Ryan, what is this about?¡° Lori demanded as she closed the door behind her. For some reason, she gave Mikon a suspicious look.


    ¡°Well, there¡¯s something I needed to tell you, but if I was going to tell you I needed to tell Umu, Mikon and Riz too,¡± Ryan said, looking at the other women in question. The latter three were sitting on the bed, which had their bedroll on it in preparation for going to bed. He took a deep breath, and took the plunge, revealing his deepest, darkest secret! ¡°Everyone¡­ I¡¯m from another world.¡±


    There was silence broken only the sound of the flames in the fireplace.


    Lori turned and opened the door to leave.


    ¡°No, wait, don¡¯t go, don¡¯t go!¡± Ryan cried. ¡°I¡¯m not joking or anything! I really am from another world!¡± He looked towards the other three, who were simply giving him confused looks. ¡°I promise I¡¯ll explain, just¡­ please don¡¯t go.¡±


    Lori sighed, but closed the door and leaned back against it as she crossed her arms in front of her chest. ¡°Fine. I will hear this alleged explanation.¡± She gave Mikon another suspicious look, but his most kinky girlfriend just shook her head. Wait, why did Lori think Mikon had anything to do with¡ª no, not the time for that. ¡°All right Ryan, explain what you mean by ¡®you¡¯re from another world¡¯?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not from this planet,¡± Ryan said earnestly, making eye contact with everyone emphasize his sincerity. ¡°I¡¯m actually from a different place, a place called Earth.¡±


    ¡°Your demesne was named ¡®Dirt¡¯?¡± Riz said, confused. ¡°Wasn¡¯t there anything better to name it after?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not the name of a demesne, it¡¯s the name of the world,¡± Ryan said patiently.


    ¡°And which of the moons is that supposed to be?¡± Lori said.


    ¡°I¡¯m not from any of the moons!¡± Ryan protested. ¡°I¡¯m from a different world around a different sun. A different place in the sea of stars!¡±


    ¡°Ahh¡­¡± Lori said, and there was the blank, flat expression he was familiar with. ¡°And how, exactly, did you get from your ¡®world¡¯ to here? Did you sail on a metal ship?¡± There was a slight change in her expression, brightening slightly at the thought. ¡°Because we could use a lot of metal.¡±


    ¡°Uh, no. I sort of¡­ fell into the sea of stars and got swept away on a current. So, no ship.¡±


    Lori¡¯s expression somehow became flatter. Really, it was amazing how flat her expression could get without it starting to curl the other way from accumulated Euclidean geometry. ¡°No ship. And conveniently no proof to support anything you¡¯re saying.¡±


    ¡°If I was going to lie about something, why would it be about this?¡± Ryan pointed out. ¡°What could I possibly hope to gain? Come on, don¡¯t you trust me?¡±


    Lori tilted her head, and started stroking her chin, visibly thinking about it.


    ¡°Really?¡± It was his turn to flatten his voice. ¡°After all this time, you have to think about it?¡±


    ¡°A Dungeon Binder who trusts too easily can easily cease to be a Dungeon Binder,¡± she said. ¡°Attempting to rush my decision isn¡¯t making me more likely to believe you. Quite the opposite, in fact.¡± She frowned. ¡°Why am I even here? I do not see why this could be possibly relevant to me.¡±


    Ryan coughed. ¡°Well, you see¡­ I didn¡¯t have to have to explain this twice. I mean¡­¡± He turned towards Riz, Mikon and Umu. ¡°Look, the four of us are¡­ that is¡­ look, I didn¡¯t want to continue what we had without telling you the truth about myself.¡±


    ¡°The¡­ truth that you¡¯re from a place called Soil?¡± Umu said, a slightly uncomprehending look on her face.


    ¡°That I¡¯m from another world and am not a person born on this planet but a completely different one, yes,¡± Ryan said earnestly. ¡°A world without Iridescence, no magic, demesnes¡ª¡±


    ¡°Oh! Like the one demesne where people came from before they crossed the sea of stars?¡± Mikon exclaimed enthusiastically.


    ¡°Probably not. We didn¡¯t have dragons or magic, like I said.¡±


    ¡°Ryan, if you start talking about ending the binderarchy¡ª¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not what this is about! I¡¯m telling them this because I don¡¯t want to hide an important part of myself from the women I¡¯m in a relationship with, and I¡¯m telling you because¡­ well, I know things that might be useful.¡±


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°Ryan, you¡¯re already as useful as I want you to be, there¡¯s no need to make up outrageous lies to change that.¡±


    ¡°Uh, thank you¡­? I think? But I¡¯m serious! We don¡¯t have magic in my world, so our technology developed in different ways! Now that I don¡¯t have to hide the origin of what I know, I could be far more helpful in developing the demesne.¡±


    ¡°You mean you weren¡¯t being helpful before?¡± The flat became an edge.


    ¡°More helpful! I said more helpful!¡±


    ¡°One wonders you weren¡¯t that helpful in the first place.¡±


    ¡°Well, I told everyone that I used to work in a lumberyard. How was I supposed to explain how I knew all sorts of things in wildly different subjects without seeming suspicious?¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°By being a part of the Mysteries of Alknowledge and a voracious reader?¡±


    There was a moment¡¯s pause, and then Ryan¡¯s hand met his face. ¡°In my defense,¡± he said, not moving his hand. ¡°I thought it would be rude to pretend to be part of them when I wasn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°But it¡¯s rude to waste my time airing your fictional story?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not¡ª! Look, how about I tell you some ideas from my worlds, things that revolutionized not just warfare, but also farming, communication, manufacturing, then would you believe me?¡±


    Lori did that head tilt thing. ¡°It would certainly give your story some plausibility.¡±


    Ryan nodded confidently. ¡°All right. In my world, it¡¯s been discovered and proven that optimally spacing seeds for planting can increase the speed and efficiency of the farming process. So, there¡¯s a device that plants individual seeds at the optimum depth¡ª¡±


    ¡°Oh, are you talking about a seed drill?¡± Umu said. ¡°I remember the farmers would use when planting valri. The seeds would go down these tubes¡­¡±


    She trailed off as Lori and Ryan stared at the blonde weaver.


    ¡°Oh¡­ you already have those¡­¡± Ryan said lamely. ¡°W-well, how about this! It¡¯s a way of preserving doughstrand soup for later consumption, while also reducing the space it needs for storage. First, you take some cooked doughstrands and bundle it up into a cake, then dip it in boiling oil¡ª¡±


    ¡°You mean soup packs?¡± Riz said.


    ¡°Ryan, I practically lived off those for lunch back when I was in school,¡± Lori said, looking very unimpressed. ¡°The means of creating one of the most common preserved foods in the world is not revolutionary.¡±


    ¡°Uh¡­ all right, this will take some work because I don¡¯t know the actual mechanics, but there¡¯s a way to make a machine that sews¡­ sewing machines already exist, don¡¯t they?¡±


    Umu and Mikon nodded.


    Ryan stared up at the ceiling and contemplated that sometimes, life just sucked. This was going even beyond the baseline amount of suck of getting isekai-d without even getting any cheat powers as a consolation prize and having a job where it was always overtime, he was used to that level of suck.


    Being an isekai wasn¡¯t even useful here!


    He sighed. ¡°I¡¯m very sorry for wasting your time, your Bindership,¡± he said tiredly. ¡°But I maintain that everything I told you is true.¡±


    Lori rolled her eyes. ¡°See that your delusions do not interfere with your duties, Ryan,¡± she said.


    ¡°They never had before,¡± he pointed out.


    That actually got a grudging nod of agreement, before she gave Mikon one last suspicious look¡ªhe¡¯d have to ask her about that, Mikon wasn¡¯t even doing anything¡ªbefore opening the door and leaving. Ryan winced at the annoyed bang of the door closing, and he stood to make sure it latched properly. Then he turned and gave a sheepish smile towards the three women still in the room. ¡°So¡­ what do you think?¡±


    ¡°I¡­ don¡¯t really understand what you told us,¡± Umu admitted. ¡°But it sounds¡­ impressive?¡± She smiled encouragingly.


    Ryan did his best not to slump. It would make her feel bad.


    ¡°I mean, does it really matter where you came from?¡± Riz said with military practicality. ¡°We live here now, right?¡±


    Well, he supposed there was that.


    He looked towards Mikon, waiting for her reaction, and found her looking thoughtful.


    Then she nodded decisively and smiled. ¡°Ryan¡­ this¡­ ¡®world¡¯ of yours, with its foreign ways¡­ are there things men and women do there that you haven¡¯t taught us about yet?¡± One hand was slowly pulling up the hem of her skirt, showing progressively more leg.


    Both Riz and Umu were suddenly looking at him very intently.


    Ryan coughed. ¡°Well¡­ you might have it here already¡­¡±


    ¡°Now, don¡¯t be like that¡­¡± Mikon said. ¡°How will we know for sure if you don¡¯t show us?¡±


    Well, when she put it that way¡­ ¡°So, back home we have this thing called¡­¡±


    <hr>


    ¡°All right!¡± Ryan said a few days alter as he put a plate down in front of Lori. ¡°I asked around, and I know you don¡¯t have one of these around here!¡±


    Lori looked unamused as she peered at the experimental fruit tart he had made. It was fruit filling inside a pastry dough shell¡ªand yes, he knew that probably wasn¡¯t a tart but he wasn¡¯t going to call it a pie or a pocket¡ªor at least the local equivalent of pastry dough. Without butter, they had to use beast lard, which added a little savory note but also provided saltiness. The filling itself was slightly green, since it was golden-orange alien planet fruit with green honey. ¡°What exactly is this?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a sort of fruit-filled bun,¡± he said.


    ¡°Is the bread stale? It¡¯s hard.¡±


    ¡°No, it¡¯s crisp, like well-cooked beast skin.¡±


    ¡°Why is it burned?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not burned, it¡¯s the honey in the dough turning brown because it cooked in the heat. Look, would you just take a bite? You can smell it, it¡¯s delicious!¡±


    She gave me one of her all-purpose level looks¡ªat least it wasn¡¯t a flat one¡ªand picked up the fruit tart. It was still steaming a little, but little things like that weren¡¯t something Lori had to worry about, so she just put it in her mouth and took as small bite.


    ¡°Well?¡±


    ¡°¡­what do you say this is?¡±


    ¡°Back home, we called it peach-mango pie.¡±


    Lori looked down at the pastry in her hand and took another bite, enjoying the taste of happyfruit and pink lady mixed together as a filling. She let out a pleased sigh, then directed a flat look at Ryan. ¡°This is not proof you¡¯re from ¡®another world¡¯.¡±


    He sighed. ¡°I know.¡±


    Why had he ever thought doing this was a good idea again?