Weekly Digest 8 (#24 - #26)

The Strangers

It was the most awkward lunch Lori had ever attended, and that included the time her mothers and she had attended a family reunion in another demesne and everyone kept asking who her father was.

Rian had had one of the stone cooking pots brought out. It was still a third full, reminding Lori she hadn't had any seconds yet, and a fire had been lit under it. Wooden bowls of stew were being passed around to the strangers, and many were eating like… well, like they'd had nothing to eat recently but thinly-cut travel rations that had been soaked in water for an hour to get rid of Iridescence. It almost made Lori nostalgic for the days when they're started eating proper hot food again.

Rian was moving between the strangers, chatting like they were old friends, offering spoons and asking if they wanted water. The few that were trying to eat while still holding their spears and shields looked extremely awkward and kept clumsily dropping them, as you couldn't really hold a bowl a spoon and a weapon at the same time–

Lori paused, examined that thought, and had a moment to wonder if Rian had thought of that.

Aaand now benches were being brought out and the strangers were being invited to take a load off their feet. Many of the men were reluctant, but a few sat with relief as Rian continued mingling. He was never too aggressively physically, and he made sure to stay on the side they didn't have a spear or a belt knife or machete hanging from their belt, but he was certainly putting on the charm. He even managed to pratfall twice into the dirt that was being churned into mud by all the slightly dripping strangers. The second time a whole bunch of the strangers helped him up to his feet as he laughed.

Some of her people were getting in on it, having brought the water and benches at Rian's orders. Lori stepped back, considering their options. These weren't all of them, she was sure of it. For one thing, they were all adults and mostly men. No children, or at least none younger than twenty or so. She couldn't detect any other people-shaped voids along the riverbanks, so where they waiting outside the demesne's borders, in the Iridescence? Dangerous, if so. There were beasts out there. So probably not just women and children left behind then…

Lori kept her head down, and her staff out of view. Her hat was in her hands, and she was making sure she was standing behind some taller, wider men than her, who all seemed very nervous when she had hissed at them to stay where they were. Why were they nervous? They were big, muscly men with spears, and it wasn't like they had to hide from any wizards hidden among the strangers like she did. She tried to keep still so movement wouldn't blur the head to toe covering of darkwisps she'd wrapped around herself to protect against any sudden attacks if they had a Mentalist among them.

Her eyes were half-lidded as she tried to concentrate on her sense of wisps and watch the strangers at the same time. Rian was talking to who seemed to be their leader, a fit if slightly paunchy man who seemed like someone who'd once worked for a living but had since had to do a lot of paperwork. He was doing slightly better than his fellows at eating while he kept his spear propped on the crook of one elbow while he talked to Rian, who was holding to wooden cups of water, apparently holding on to the man's drink while he drank from the other one. To show it wasn't poisoned?

"I guess it's been a while since you guys got to eat," Rian was saying over the sounds of more benches being brought out and someone going around giving everyone water. Lori didn't even have to do anything with wisps, he was just talking that clearly. "Did you lose a lot of your supplies because of the dragon a few days ago? It hit us pretty hard too, but thankfully the food was safe."

"It did hit us hard, yes," the man, who'd probably introduced himself but Lori had missed it, said. He was already on his second bowl. He was trying to seem casual and relaxed, but it was too forced, his shoulders too deliberately loose. His legs however, especially his knees, were stiff, betraying his tension.

"I'm surprised you managed to survive, out of the open," Rian said. "We had a dungeon and everything, and it sounded like the end of the world. Things kept trying to get in through the air vents. Your wizard must have been good, to keep you alive out there."

"Yes, they… they were. We wouldn't have made it without them." The man looked away from Rian and stared into his bowl, looking tired. He had a thick accent and drew out some syllables strangely, sounding like he was from the far north and west of the old continent, like one of her professors in school, old whateverhisnamewas. Sanclaus Demesne, or maybe Sokossia Demesne, near the Laru mountains. Instead of pressing him, Rian just sat there companionably, one knee going up and down as his foot bounced.

"Sorry we don't have anything else," Rian said after a while. "We still haven't figured out if any of the plants here are good spices, so all the food's kind of bland. I don't suppose you guys have figured out anything that can help?"

"Well…" the man said, "I don't know how much of a help it would be, but our Deadspeaker has…" He paused, then pursed his lips and closed his eyes. He let out a breath. "Had… been compiling a list of plants that he identified as edible and poisonous. Perhaps that will help you add new taste to your food?"

"Actually that would be a big help, thanks!" Rian said. "Can I talk to him? We don't have much to trade, but for a list like that I'm sure we can put your people up and help feed you for a night or two, let you rest up a little before you continue."

"He's… not with us anymore," the man said.

"Oh," Rian said, and his face became a perfect mask of sorrow and empathy, as if the other's pain was something he could feel like it was his own. It was stuff like this that made Lori want to keep an eye on the man. It was too colorfully suspicious! "I'm sorry for your loss. Look, if you people need to stay even longer than a day or two, I'm sure we can arrange something." There was beat, probably for the sake of comedic timing. "Um, no offense, but he didn't happen to die from something he ate, did he?"

The man let out a coughing laugh, looking surprised that he'd had it in him. The men with him looked up in surprise at the unexpected sound.

"Water?" Rian offered. "That sounded like a nasty cough. If you have the time, we have a couple of doctors. I'm sure they can figure that out."

"No need, no need," the man said. "I know exactly what that was. Though as it happens, there is something you could do for us."

"I'm sorry, but we don't have any booze," Rian said. "Someone confiscated our only still to use as a fertilizer barrel."

"N-no, that wasn't what I was going to ask, but I am sorry for your loss." The man took a deep breath. "Are you someone in charge?"

"I'm technically Lord Rian, if that helps," Rian said.

"Very well, Lord Rian," the man said. "My people and I would like to petition to join your demesne."

There was no dramatic reactions, no gasps of astonishment. Rian just nodded, as if he expected this. "You realize it's not up to me, right?" he said. "I mean, I'm not the Binder. This is probably a Binder-level decision."

"Don't they trust you to decide these things?"

"They trust me to bring it to their attention," Rian said. Huh, did she? "Are you sure about this? Wouldn't you rather found your own demesne with– ah."

"Yes," the man said. "If it helps, we did. It's downriver, a couple of days travel. But he died. And so did his wife. So we had to find somewhere else to go, or die. We were lucky someone found one of your spears floating down the river."

"How did you know it was one of our spears?" Rian said as Lori straightened suddenly, eyes widening in realization.

"It had a rope around it. None of us would have put a rope around our spears, and we had plenty, so we didn't need to figure out how to make any from the local plants."

"Yes, I can see that…" Rian mused. "One of the children probably lost it. They use it to catch seels."

"Where was the demesne?" Lori demanded.

The man did not jump, jerk or comically drop his bowl of stew. Instead he stood very, very still, and turned around to look toward her. Rian did the same.

"Why do you look like a shadow come to life to kill me in my sleep?" Rian said.

Lori blinked and looked down, realizing her body was still covered by darkwisps. "Reasons," she said simply.

"Ah. You're, uh, not going to kill anyone in their sleep, are you?"

"If I needed to, that would be the best time," Lori said. "They’re less likely to feel it. Very merciful. Where was the demesne?"

"Grem, Dungeon Binder Loliyuri," Rian said, for some inane reason making introductions. "Binder Lori, this is Grem, formerly a captain in the Lomabuyar Demesne militia and acting director of the Golden Sweetwood Company."

Lori gave him a look that conveyed her complete and utter apathy and inquired why he was was bothering her with this nonsense.

"He's in charge of these people," he said smoothly. "And he just asked if they could join Lorian. I'm sure he'd like some kind of answer before they needed to sleep for the night?"

What was he implying? Lori knew he must have been implying something but… no matter. Lori focused on Grem, who stood smoothly in what she recognized from her mother as 'at attention', Rian helpfully taking his bowl and, when he made no protest, his spear. She supposed the faster she dealt with this, the better.

"Are there any wizards among your men?" she demanded. Ugh, he was tall. A whole head taller than her, maybe more.

"No, Great Binder," he said. Lori rolled with the title. "None of my men hear are wizards. This I swear."

"And among the women and children you left outside?" Lori said.

The man stilled slightly, but took a deep breath. "Among the women, there are none as well. As to their children…some are still young, Great Binder. There is no way to say how they will grow."

Lori gave him an intent, displeased look. It took her a while to realize he couldn't make out her expression because of the darkwisps. "Open your shirt and step forward," she said imperiously.

The man didn’t waste time looking confused. Instead, he unhooked the wooden buttons from the loops on the front of his shirt. Lori stepped forward and theatrically rested the tips of her fingers just above his heart, not actually touching his skin. She circulated the lightningwisps in her body as she did so, and she knew he felt it when all his hairs stood on end.

"Are you, or any of those with you, a murderer?" she demanded. "Answer truthfully or I will know."

The man looked like he was trying not to breathe. "Some of us have killed, Great Binder. We were militia."

"But have you, in your heart, murdered?" she said.

"No, Great Binder," he said. "I am not a murderer, and I know these men and these women. They would not be murderers."

"Are you, or any of those with you, a thief?" she said.

"I have stolen in my youth, Great Binder, and I suspect others have as well," Grem said. "The winters were long and hard."

"Are you, or any of those with you, a rapist?"

"No, Great Binder. I am not a rapist. None with me are rapists that I know of."

"Are you, or any of those with you, a molester of children?"

"No, Great Binder! I am not, and none with me are as well! If they were, I would have killed them myself!"

"Do you, or any of those with you, play music in the hours of night?"

Grem blinked. Out of the corner of her eye, Lori saw Rian looking intently at the bowl of stew, biting his lip. "Music, Great Binder?"

"Answer the question!"

"Many of us play music, Great Binder! Some can play all night! It is traditional, during long northern winters!"

Colors. These people might be trouble…

Lori pressed on. "Do you, or any of those with you, urinate in public?"

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Some of the answers were less than satisfactory. Apparently, Lomabuyar Demesne was very lax about public vulgarity. Still, Lori reluctantly allowed them to join her demesne on a probationary basis.

It wasn't at all because she was called Great Binder. That was just a rote, formalized title. He probably didn't mean it at all.

For some strange reason, when she announced their probationary status, there was a cheer, both from her people and from… well, her new probationary people, she supposed.

Ugh, she supposed this meant her Dungeon would have to be a dining hall a little longer, at least she could build a new shelter for more people. maybe they had tents.

"Grem," she said as everyone cheered, and he faced her, a big smile on her face.

"Yes, Great Binder?" he said.

"You said you left your demesne because your Binder died," she said. "I need you to take me there as soon as possible."

There was a core out there. An unclaimed core, and unclaimed demesne. If she could claim that core…

She just barely managed to hold the laugh in.

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Rian's List and Reasons

Even with the news that there was an unclaimed core lying around, Lolilyuri couldn't just run off and claim it, adding a second Demesne to her holdings (a second demesne!), no how much she really, really, really, really, really, really, REALLY, REALLYwanted to. After all, with it unclaimed, it would be surrounded by Iridescence, meaning she'd need a guide to even find the approximate center of the abandoned demesne, never mind the core itself, which would likely be very well-hidden.

Still, she took solace in it being extremely unlikely that someone would just trip over it and claim it by accident, despite what all those stories uneducated people liked to tell each other would have one believe. If there were any other wizards in the Golden Sweetwood Company of settlers, they'd have claimed it already, and wouldn't be here begging for refuge.

After they sent someone to bring in the women and children waiting outside the demesne, as well as the small barge they were using for transport, the probationary settlers had numbered over 73. Seven families and a lot of former unmarried soldiers who'd apparently retired to other occupations. They had apparently started out with two hundred, with a second, larger group of the company to follow from the old continent in two years once they'd established themselves, which… all right, that was a lot better organized than this group had been.

Honestly, Lori had just found the cheapest boat to Covehold that gave her a discount for doing Whispering to keep them moving and washing off iridiation, then joined the first group desperate enough to have her. In hindsight, maybe she should have joined one of these settler companies like her Ina had kept suggesting…

Well, too late for that, she was here and doing well for herself! You couldn't argue with results.

It also meant she definitely wasn't getting her Dungeon back any time soon. Rian was suggesting putting them up in the former dining hall and the hospital while she built a new shelter. Which would take at least a day, which have to be tomorrow, which means would be another day before they could carry the tables out. Colors of death, her Dungeon was supposed to be a mighty fortress, highest seat of her power, not an eating establishment!

Maybe she should run off and claim that other core after all. She could live there, alone, and just take care of building from a distance. Let someone else have to check the latrines.

…

Maybe after she'd turned all the gold into wire.

She left Rian to make the arrangements of who slept were while she worked on making expansions to the kitchen to handle more cooking, more washing, and generally more, even as it annoyed her to do so. The new kitchen addition to the dungeon had been built along one wall on the inside of the outter cliff face, for ease of venting heat and smoke. She added a new stove, which was basically a raised stone cube with a hollow in the middle for fuel, a wooden door that she'd smeared rock on one of side to act as an insulator so that they could close it to trap heat, and holes leading upward to the stovetop to direct heat. Apparently the kitchen partially cooked each ingredient separately before adding it to the overall stew or something.

Even though she'd done this before, it always surprised her how long it actually took to build something. By the time she was done, she had to leave so people could cook. Apparently, just because it was her Dungeon didn't make it her kitchen. That was a familiar argument. She walked away before she did something that would have felt very satisfying but would have delayed dinner, her mothers' joking arguments about kitchen supremacy wafting from the pit of memory.

Rian found her sitting near the saw pit, next to one of the newly rebuilt curing sheds still being filled with planks. The sawyers were finishing up for the day, putting away that day's lumber, packing away the saws to bring them to the shelters to keep them safe and getting ready to wash up at the baths.

"Hey," he said, putting down the plank of wood he was carrying and leaning back against the packed earth shed next to her. "We need to talk."

"Did you find someone's dead body and now we have to figure who here finally snapped and killed someone?" Lori said.

"Wha– no! Why would you even think that?" Rian exclaimed, staring at her.

"Just wanted to get it out of the way. Did someone grab one of the children and–"

"Stop!" Rian said, holding up a hand in a gesture she wasn't familiar with. Must be something regional to his demesne. "No, no one broke any of the laws on your list."

"Oh, good."

Rian gave her a sideways look. "I needed to talk to you, temporary lord to Binder–" Lori didn't bother rolling her eyes, "– and I figured you didn't want me intruding on your beauty sleep."

"About what?" Lori asked. Beauty sleep? Was that supposed to be flattery or an insult?

"First, I think you might need to make Grem, or at least someone from the Golden Sweetwood group a lord," Rian said. "I know you're all about being the absolute power, but this way at least if they have any issues or needs, they'd send just him instead of everyone bothering you individually. Instead they bother him, and he bothers you."

"Like you do," she said.

"You're welcome to actually bother remembering everyone's names, and what they do, and which name goes with which person–" Rian said dryly.

"I'm not a Mentalist and can't be bothered to work out how to do it yet," Lori said. "Yes, I suppose you're right. With nearly double the people, another lord will be of use, and if he's their acting director, we'll already have experience dealing with annoying minutiae I don't want to deal with directly. "

"You're welcome." More dryness.

"What's the other thing?" Lori asked.

For an answer, Rian picked up the plank and held it out.

"It's been a long day, I'm not standing up to read that," Lori said.

Rian rolled his eyes, picked up the plank then repositioned it next to her, close enough to read.

Lori frowned as she started to read, her head titling in confusion. The frown and the tilt deepened as she kept reading downwards.

"You'll have to explain, this just looks like a weird list of nonsense to me," Lori said.

"You made a list of laws," Rian said. "Basically, a list of things that, if violated, you would be extremely unhappy about and would express your unhappiness with flogging, exile and execution. It's a list that exists not because everyone collectively came together and voted that everything on that list was heinous and should not be allowed, but because you were letting everyone know what youwouldn't allow."

"Must you mention your strange voting fetish?"

"It's not a fetish, it's… never mind. The point is, your list was too one-sided," Rian said. "You listed what you wouldn't let them do. True, it was a list of… mostly terrible things–"

"If you feel that strongly about it, I'll give you special dispensation to urinate anywhere you want."

"Funny, but not right now, please, I'm being serious. My point is, you gave them a list of what you most definitely won't let them do." Rian wobbled the plank. "So I propose a list of things that you will not only allow them to do, but will protect them against anyone trying to prevent them from doing it."

Lori blinked, then reread his list. "All right, first off, all of these items are needlessly complicatedly phrased."

"I'm sure we can simplify them."

"Secondly, this list is longer than mine!"

Rian rolled his eyes. "Why am I not surprised you bring that up?"

"Thirdly, why would I even want to do such a thing?" Lori demanded incredulously.

"You told me to find a way to keep what happened with Missus Naineb from having to happen again," Rian said. "Something to make violence rare."

"And this is what you came up with? How is this supposed to keep idiots from challenging my authority?"

"By explicitly stating that you are using that authority to protect everyone's personal interests and property."

"But I'm not. I don't care about their interests and property."

"You explicitly have a law against stealing," Rian pointed out.

"Yes, but that's supposed to be about stealing from me. They're lucky I don't flog them all for just going in and out of my Dungeon."

"Do you secretly have any children I don't know about too, then?"

"If they were secret, you obviously wouldn't know about them."

"Ok, I set myself up for that one. Look, it's one thing to have a law forbidding people killing each other. It's another to have a law saying you'll protect them from anyone trying to kill them."

"But I won't. I won't care enough to go around watching everyone to make sure no one is trying to kill them. Besides, punishment after the fact is easier than trying to prevent it from happening. If someone really wanted someone else dead, nothing I say would stop them."

"…" Rian closed his eyes, one hand over his face. He took several deep breaths. Eventually, he put down his hand. "But it will make people think you care, which will make them like you more, because people are naturally more inclined to care about people who care about them. This will make them less likely to think of poisoning you or spitting on your food, or asphyxiating you in your sleep with smoke, or stabbing you in the back and forget about how this means the demesne collapses, and all the other reasons you always make sure we share food and you keep asking me to get your food for you, and that you pick the bowls I'm holding at random, and that I eat from my bowl first before you do, and why you always sleep in a room that's impossible to get into."

Lori said nothing.

"It's pretty obvious, you know," Rian said. "To me, at least. As paranoid as you are about your safety, you're not very good at it. Real paranoia means not leaving clues for people to figure out that you're paranoid, or they might realize you're on to them. If they're really out to get you."

Lori kept saying nothing, very eloquently.

"Everyone just thinks you're weird or stuck up, or were born touched in the head so you don't do well with crowds," Rian said. "Missus Naineb is terrified of you now, but most thought you had a point, even if they think you were overbearing about it. Some think you're running away from a tragic past that's made you untrusting of people and that I'm slowly charming you to open your heart to love again–"

He stopped talking as Lori started gagging at the thought.

"Yeah, I think it's pretty stupid too. But between making up stories about our nonexistent tender romance and just randomly fucking everywhere, which would you rather they be doing to pass the time?"

Lori kept on gagging, looking positively ill.

Rian sighed. "Look, you're a smart, well-read woman. This is a political move. Pretend to give people something you don't actually have to give or really care about in exchange for ensuring good will and smoother progression in the future. It's a foundation. You can always go back on your word later. After all, you're the Binder, you can do what you damn well please. So why not make them think that what you damn well please is something they want you to do?"

Lori grimaced, and looked at the list again. Aside from the overly complicated language, which were probably paraphrasing or quoting of actual laws like it, they… seemed to be the sort of optimistic drivel Rian liked to espouse. Very selfless and heroic.

"Why?" she said quietly. "Why are you helping me? You don't like things I do or agree with what I say. Why keep helping me do it?"

Rian was silent. He stared down at the ground, his forehead furrowed.

"You do ever wonder if you deserve the food you're eating?" he eventually said.

Lori blinked at the seeming non sequitur.

"I do," he said. "I'm not like you, the one-woman building company. I can't catch seels like the children, I'm slow as shit when it comes to cutting wood, I don't have any carpentry training, I can't cook, I'm apparently completely blind at telling wild vegetables apart from stuff you can't eat, I don't know how to hunt or dress an animal and too squeamish to learn, and I can't even do my own laundry. I'm lucky Umu and Mikon keep making off with my dirty clothes and washing them for me, then sneaking them back into my stuff, and I'm a terrible person for taking advantage of them like that."

"You sound like you're completely qualified to be a lord," Lori said.

Rian chuckled darkly. "Yeah, I suppose I am." He looked up and met her eyes. His were brown, she realized. What an odd color. "I contribute nothing to this settlement," he said definitively. "I don't build anything, I don’t gather any food, I'm a complete and utter parasite on everyone else here. Literally the only thing going for me, the only work I can do to continue deserve eating food that I didn't help prepare or provide or meaningfully contribute to, is being your lord and mediate between you and everyone else. And I'm not even any good at doing that! But it's the only thing I can do, so I'll do it. I'll help you protect this demesne, even if it's from yourself."

"You'll help me protect this demesne… from me," Lori repeated, bemused.

"Well, yeah," Rian said. "You'd be a pretty good leader if you could be bothered to actually deal with people without being annoyed by them. And at the end of the day, that's all I am. I'm you're shield to keep everyone else from annoying you. I'm here so you never have to remember a single face or name, so you never have to hear about anyone's problems or have to put up with socializing. I'm the one who tells you what you want to hear. Yeah, I don't like how you're an absolute ruler with nothing to hold you back but your own conscience… but that's not personal. I wouldn't want anyone to have that much power. Power can corrupt. But I also trust your conscience. So I'll help you. I'll protect you from them, and protect them from you, until the day you don't need me anymore."

"A big promise from someone always saying he's going to quit," Lori said.

"And if I promise not to quit?" Rian persisted. "If I promise– if I give you my oath that I'll be by your side forever, as long as you need me?"

"Then the gossipmongers will be left feeling vindicated, I suspect," Lori said dryly.

Rian chuckled. "All right, I better rephrase that. Look Lori, we need this. You want to be a megalomaniacal, all powerful, absolute ruler of all you survey? Fine, I'll help you do that. And it starts with these. I know it doesn't seem like it, but the demesne needs you to give them these laws… no, these rights. It needs you to look your… your subjects in the eye as their ruler and protector and promise that these things, these rights, you will use all your power to keep safe on their behalf. Do that, and they will do everything in their power to make you stronger, because when they do, they protect what they hold dear."

Lori stared at him. Then she stared at the board, where he had written things. Touching her coal charm, using firewisps to keep from being burned, she scorched a block dot next to six of the items on his list.

"These six," she said. "I… suppose they'll do."

"If I suggest one more law for you to add to your list that you forgot, will you be willing to add in another right?" Rian said.

"You're wheedling," Lori said. "What law could I have possibly forgotten to write on my initial list?"

"No sex or any other acts of indecency in public areas," Rian said.

Lori blinked and stared at nothing, eyes widening. Then she sighed. "Fine, you can pick another one to add."

"No, you do it," Rian smiled. "That way you have no one to blame but yourself."

Lori gave him a level look. "You are a very petty man, Lord Rian," she said.

But she was smiling slightly as she said it.

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That evening, as the people of Lori's Demesne, Lorian, had their first dinner with the new probationary people of Lori's Demesne, Lori walked up to the tablet of laws she's set into the wall– she had moved the list of laws to the inside since people were eating there now– and placed next to it another one, then did something to the tablet that had previously been there. Then she left to have a quick bath before dinner.

In her head, in the part of her that could perceive all the wisps in her demesne, she felt the voids of living bodies crowding around the tablets she'd just left.

Somewhere behind her, some idiot who thought he could survive without Binders found himself being given a barrel half-full of seel guts.

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Inconsistency

It wasn't much of a ceremony. Grem, the assorted probationary subjects he was eating with, Rian to take over when she was done, and anyone else who might be in hearing range, which from the murmur of voices having breakfast in the Dungeon's dining hall wasn't a lot. There was a murmur of excitement in the voices around them that reminded her of the first day of school year at the academy, when classes were slightly reshuffled and people wasted time trying to get to know who they'd been reshuffled with.

"…you are hereby recognized as probationary Lord Grem of Lorian Demesne, under the authority of Lord Rian of same," Lori finished.

There was a moment of stunned silence followed by applause, but Lori didn't stick around to have to deal with it. Behind her, she heard Rian sigh.

"She's like that," she heard him say. "Probably off to build something. Come to me when you're finished eating, I'll tell you what you have to do. It's not very hard… "

She was, in fact, building something. The new shelter for the probationary subjects needed to be built, and she'd already built the shelters twice. A third time was routine, if with the modifications she'd made to the other ones after rebuilding them, like pillars and building it with the door higher than ground level and only ramping downwards one inside. She was done by lunch.

Afterwards, Rian asked her to help with the clay pit. Or to be more specific, the kiln at the clay pit, the original of which had unfortunately fallen when the dragon came. The clay pit discovered some weeks ago had proven surprisingly profitable, and not just because some of the pots and cups and things that had been drying and waiting to go in a kiln, as well as splotches of clay in the pit itself, had been found turned to various materials like metals, salt and lodestone after the dragon's passing, which had all gone into the impromptu vault of mineral wealth. However, the amount of clay itself had proven surprisingly plentiful. The potter, Gu-someone-or-other, thought the whole bank might be rich in clay. Some delving and checking of consistency with her earthwisps had tentatively agreed with that assessment, and so Lori was going to shore up the side of the of the pit closest to the river with packed earth in case there was annual flooding they didn't know about– and there probably was, given they hadn't live there long enough to say otherwise– as well as to help construct a new kiln.

'Help' construct this time, because the potter– Gunvi! That was his name, Gunvi!– had already put the kiln together. It was meant to be a reusable kiln, and while they apparently didn't have the right kind of clay to make firebricks, the clay they had would do in a pinch, and they were in a pinch. Lori was at least familiar with the kind of kiln the man had built, one with a firebox underneath that would lead to the chamber where the pieces to be fired would rest. The whole thing had been made of clay, and then had dried for some days to prepare to fire that clay. Only then would it be properly ready to start firing other pieces.

It was only Lori's time working at a potter's herself– that had been a hot and exhausting job, and the pay had only barely been worth it– that kept her from being impatient with all the time this would need. Even with a kiln heated by firewisps to keep the temperature steady and even, firing took time. And it would let them fire large pieces. Lacking metal for hoops, they couldn’t exactly build barrels, so large clay pots would have to do for food storage.

They ended up with a kiln arrangement that was a pace high, wide and deep, and had ledges that they could theoretically put metal or pottery grills on for more space for smaller pieces. There was a firebox, tunnel and chimney arrangement that would allow air to keep circulating through, and the direction of the wind was consistent enough for it to be reasonably reliable, even if Lori hadn't already resigned herself to having to keep firewisps imbued for this thing every time they needed to fire something. Gunvi had been skeptical– apparently he'd never worked with a Whisperer to heat his kiln before, which made sense, since not many places on the peripheral edges of a demesne could afford it– but after Lori had demonstrated the sustained, consistent heat she could generate, he seemed more amenable to the idea.

Hopefully this meant she could stop making everything out of rock.

With a small fire to start with, Lori was able to imbue and bind the firewisps that resulted to maintain an even temperature and spread evenly across the kiln-to-be for the however long the thing would need to be fired. Then she sat to wait it out.

It was not unlike sitting down and maintaining the curing sheds. Sure, she could imbue it and let it persist, but it had been long drilled into her not to leave firewisps unsupervised. She spent the rest of the afternoon sitting next to it, doodling on a stone tablet, while Gunvi checked the temperature and had her increase or decrease the temperature according to how he thought it was doing. Eventually, she had him start putting in firewood so she could go to dinner. She passed someone going to other way to bring Gunvi food.

Rian met her at one of the tables at the end, away from everyone, and he had two bowls with him. She took one and they both sat down. For a while, they ate in silence.

Eventually, though she had to speak up. "Who is this?" Lori said, pointing to the young woman eating her dinner while sitting next to Rian. She was probably a probationary subject, as she looked completely unfamiliar, as opposed to looking vaguely familiar but ultimately unimportant. Also, NO ONE ever sat on the same table as her and Rian. Or at least the same table as her.

"Oh, this is Erzebed," Rian said brightly, seemingly completely oblivious to the glares of the two other women sitting at the table behind him. "She's with Golden Sweetwood. Riz was telling me about how she used to be in the militia."

"Great Binder," she said, in the same thick accent as Grem. "I hope I am not disturbing your dinner?"

"Consider your hopes dashed," Lori said bluntly. "Please don't do this again."

That made her blink, and she hesitantly picked up her bowl and moved to further down the table. And then a bit further down when she saw Lori was still looking. Only when she was far enough and at a completely different table did Lori look away and resume eating.

"That was rude," Rian said disapprovingly, even as the two women behind him smirked triumphantly.

"It wasn't rude," Lori said. "She asked and I answered. I even said 'please'. I was perfectly polite."

"You're being deliberately obtuse about this, aren't you?" Rian said.

"I have the right to be who I am, and it would be against that right to impose any sort of dictates on my behavior," Lori smirked.

"Oh f– you're going to be using that argument a lot, aren't you?" he sighed, dropping his head in his hands.

"I find your idea of rights to not be so bad after all," Lori kept smirking.

"This is my fault now?!"

"Whose idea was it?"

"You picked them!"

"And they wouldn't have existed for me to pick if you hadn't insisted on bringing them to my attention," Lori said.

"Well, at least you're coming around to the idea," Rian said. "So did you have something to talk about or were you just being aggressively antisocial?"

"Have you gotten a list of the occupations of our probationaries?" she said.

"Not a complete list," Rian said. "Just some generalities. Six of them are trained medics, and another is an actual doctor. Apparently two others stayed at their old demesne."

Lori suddenly frowned. "Wait, stayed? Why?"

"They had injured from the dragon they couldn't safely transport," Rian said. "Broken bones, things like that, they said. Grem told me after you left. Their families stayed behind to take care of them in the hope that Grem and his group would confirm the existence of another demesne upriver, and come back for them. Grem was telling me about it, asking to go back and get them, and I told him to wait, that you'd want to know before you decided to allow anyone else to be brought here."

Lori frowned. "How many more are we talking about?"

"Around thirty to forty people?" Rian said. "Grem thinks there might be less than that now, from succumbing to injuries"

Lori gave him a flat look. "He wants to bring them here?"

"If I hadn't told him you needed to know, he'd have gone back today," Rian said.

"Why did you wait until now to tell me?"

"Honestly?" Rian met her gaze. "To see if he'd wait."

She stared at him, surprised.

"What? Just because I get along with people doesn't mean I trust everyone I meet right away," he said. "These are former militia. That's a big spectrum ranging from a bunch of people getting together and doing patrols as an excuse to try each other's booze to actual trained and experienced soldiers, and most of them came to us armed. I know some of the men stayed up last night with their spears next to them, and they're probably going to do the same thing tonight and tomorrow too. By the way, you might want to change your door, give it a few sharp turns when you close it. As it is, an arrow can get to you through it."

Rian paused to take a spoonful of stew, and Lori realized she'd stopped eating. She followed his example.

"So he waited," she said eventually. "What does that mean?"

"It means he has self-discipline, and understands that we'd be stupid to trust him right away," Rian said. "He's willing to wait a little to earn our goodwill. And his people trust him, because they didn't bring it up or insist on it, despite those injured possibly being friends or family of theirs. It means they're disciplined too."

"They could have just written those people off as dead," Lori suggested.

Rian was already shaking his head. "Soldiers, good soldiers, have traditions about leaving people behind. They don't," he said simply. "It's a bad precedent to set. After all, the person getting left behind might be them some day."

"You know an awful lot about soldiers," Lori said.

"I did have a life before coming here, you know," he pointed out.

"But if they don't leave people behind, why didn't he tell me about them when I asked him to show me where their demesne was?" Lori said.

"I don't know," Rian said. "And that's worrying me. Maybe he just didn't want to ask favors of you right away. Maybe he always intended to ask for help for them and it just slipped his mind right then because your little interview weirded him out. Maybe I'm completely wrong and he didleave those people behind to die, essentially writing them off and only now bringing them up out of guilt. Or…"

"Or?" Lori prompted.

"Or there's something about the people left behind," Rian said. "Something he's not telling us. Something he needs us at his back for. In which case, they might not have been left behind because they were injured. They might have been left behind because of a disagreement."

"You are being very pessimistic and untrusting," Lori said. "It's vaguely disturbing. Will you kindly please stop it?"

Rian fell silent, going back to dinner. Lori did as well.

Eventually, he said, "What do you want to do?"

Eventually, she answered. "You're suggesting either this is all a result of Grem either being polite and holding off a request, being forgetful, having some sort of change of heart, or having a fundamental disagreement with these people ostensibly left behind in their old demesne. Well, it doesn't matter. Either way, there's an unclaimed demesne out there, and I want it."

"And if the story of an unclaimed demesne is bait?" Rian said softly.

Lori frowned at him.

"It’s a story too good to be true, for a wizard," Rian continued. "An unclaimed demesne, ripe for the taking. The only thing a wizard might possibly leave their demesne for."

A heartsick cold gripped Lori's heart. She sat there, filled with a twisting disquiet, as around them the sounds of dinner, of vague conversation, of random laughter and the other sounds that she'd learned to take for granted surrounded her, a comfort she hadn't realized she'd come to rely on.

She took a deep breath, drawing in the familiar feeling of magic dissolved in the air, filling her lungs, letting it pass through her body and out again, binding the air around her breath by breath. The familiar exercise didn't calm her so much as ground her, giving her something to concentrate on as she waited out the sudden tension in her body.

If they were lying about there being another wizard… if they were lying about their demesne collapsing…

She could see it all too well. After all, she'd been willing to jump at the mere mention of an unclaimed demesne. If, instead, she had a chance to lure another wizard out of safety so she could take theirs and add it to her own…?

Lori found she honestly didn't have an answer to that question ready. But then she recalled the sheer desire she had when an unclaimed demesne was mentioned…

Eventually, she said, "Do you trust them?"

"I want to," Rian said. "They seem like nice people. But I have to think of these things in case you didn't. If I'm wrong, you'll just be angry at me for wasting your time. If I'm right… then we have a big problem."

Lori took one last deep breath. "You're better than me at judging people. If you say they seem like nice people, they probably are."

"And if I'm wrong?"

"Then I'm blaming you," Lori said flatly.

"Putting all the pressure on me?" Rian said.

"It's called delegating."

Rian snorted. "I should have quit when I had the chance. What's the plan?"

"I'm delegating that too," Lori said.

He rolled his eyes. "Wonderful. There goes a good night's sleep." Sighing, he finished his bowl quickly. "Well, in that case, there are people I need to talk to…"

Giving her a nod, he rose and left the table.

Lori didn't watch him go. She just stared at her bowl and forced herself to eat.

When she finished, she went to add two right angle turns to the slit she used as a door into the small alcove she slept in now...