Demesne

The work on the sawmill had been progressing well over the past week. The foundation had been placed and leveled to Lori's satisfaction, and Lori had been able to raise half of a stone wall on the river-facing side of the site. The rest would wait until after the water wheel was installed. The carpenters would be taking care of that today as she and Rian went to River's Fork to talk to Yllian, with—Lori reached into her pouch, feeling around for the right shape before drawing them out, then flipping between the two rocks she pulled out—Taeclas traveling with them, putting the wooden frames that would support the roof on hold for the moment. They were taking the ice boat, as the Coldhold had been sent down the river to collect salt.

"You know, this is more like what I had in mind when I heard rumors of an ice boat," Taeclas said as they traveled downriver, running her fingers over the exposed ice between the boat's planks. "At least I can see the ice without trying, this time."

"While it's an idea I'm proud of suggesting, I'm hoping that it will be a thing of the past soon," Rian said, sitting with a bow stave resting against one shoulder. Lori glared at the unstrung bow, but Rian had said that keeping a bow strung when unused ruins it. Something about the bow losing tension or something. Still, it seemed pointless to have a bow ready to hand when it couldn't be used immediately when needed, like when they happened to see a large beast they wanted dead drinking along the river as they passed by.

"Aw! Why?"

"Because they were a stopgap measure," Rian said. "We made ice boats because we didn't have a way to make watertight joins that would let us make boats out of wood. With you and Lidzuga around, that's a thing of the past now."

"That man better have a boat ready for us," Lori muttered, her arrow on her lap next to her staff as she held her hat against the wind. The binding of lightningwisps she'd anchored to the arrowhead was still filled with a nearly irresponsible amount of imbuement—nearly—and the small addition of internal lightningwisps she'd just added to it once more allowed her to activate the binding at a distance once outside of her demesne.

"I'm sure he's been productive," Rian said. "He was putting together that second orchard of fruit trees the last I heard. Maybe he thought it was better to concentrate on those."

Lori blinked. "When was this?" she demanded.

"When we took the children here to spend the holiday with their parents. See, this is why you should have gotten off the ship and talked to Yllian."

"Talking to people is your job."

"And that's why I know Lidzuga was putting together the second orchard and you don't."

"You're also supposed to tell me things."

"Would the fact that Lidzuga had started on one of the projects you assigned him really have been relevant at the time?"

"… well, you should have said something yesterday," Lori said, glaring at him.

"I will endeavor to do better in the future, your Bindership."

Lori nodded. "See that you do."

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She would never get used to the feeling of leaving the boundaries of her demesne. The sensation of stifling, nearly agonizing heat struck her entire body all at once, and she gasped. It wasn't as hot as it could be, since it was still the morning, but the ice boat had no shade beyond the hat on her head, so she was completely exposed.

Rian had already skimmed a ladle over the river, offering it to her with one of those strange expressions on his face. Lori took the proffered the ladle and with a disgustingly practiced move flicked contents into her face. Water splashed on her, spilling down onto her shirt and feeling refreshingly cool.

It wouldn't last long, she knew. Her arms were already feeling hot, and she knew it would be a terrible idea to touch the wire-covered parts of her staff, which had been sitting out in the sun.

Really, she shouldn't have to go. Lori should have just stayed at home and had Rian go find out what was in the letter to report it back to her. But…

There was chance that the typhon beast would appear along the river again, and if it did, this time she meant to capitalize! If she spotted it today, it wasn't going to get to finish its drink and walk back into the rainbowed colors, it was going to join the chokers she'd experimented on and explode!

Unfortunately, she had no luck this trip either. Despite watching the shore intently, no typhon beast made itself known.

"It's probably for the best," Rian said as the shoreline changed, the Iridescence vanishing once more as they entered River's Fork. "With the weather and heat the way it is, everything must be so dry setting off your little lightning arrow might start a fire that could spread for taums. It would definitely get into River's Fork."

"That's what that arrow is for?-!" Riz exclaimed, staring in horror at the projectile on Lori's lap, and she wasn't the only one. Some of Riz's friends shuffled as if to put more distance between themselves and the arrow.

"It's not that dry," Lori said, waving him off. "The river is still full, and none of the plants appear to be dying. Besides, the binding is for an instantaneous expression of lightning, too brief to cause anything to ignite. And even if something had caught fire, we'd have been next to the river in any case. I could have taken care of it."

"It doesn't need to be 'that dry', setting off a fire will dry everything around and then they will be 'that dry'."

"Well, nothing happened, so leave the subject alone."

"Yes, your Bindership…"

Riz patted his shoulder for some reason.

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When they arrived at River's Fork, Lori was glad to see that people were actually working. The replanted fields were being watered, as were the terraced farming plots that were now finished. She was glad to see they were drawing water from the bathhouse runoff pit, though that was probably more from convenience than compliance. She knew how to get her idiots to do as they should, after all.

They were seen, of course, but other than a few people pausing for a moment to look toward them, people remained at work.

Yllian met them at the dock, wearing a wide-brimmed reed hat and his exposed arms a very concerning livid red. He caught the rope thrown at him with a casual familiarity and tied it to the post to secure the boat.

"Yllian!" Rian greeted as he rose from his seat and quickly crossed to the dock. "How's the next crop doing?"

"Rian. They've taken well, and Lidzuga says he can start Deadspeaking them in a few more days." Yllian turned towards her, bowing. "Great Binder."

"Yllian. Where's Lidzuga? He's not taking an unauthorized day off, is he?" Lori looked at everyone impatiently, waiting for them to get off so she could vacate the boat as well.

"He's should be at the firewood grove, Great Binder, collecting wood for his projects."

"Erzebed, could you have someone show—" Lori felt for the right shape and checked the name, "—Taeclas where that is so she can talk to him?"

"Brabli, could you show her where that is?" Riz said.

Taeclas stopped staring at Lori and followed the woman that Riz had indicated, though she kept looking back towards Lori with a strange look on her face.

"Well, that hopefully gets us more fruits again," Rian said. "Yllian, you've had time to read the Golden Sweetwod Company's letter, right?"

"I have. You wish to discuss it now?"

Rian pointed at her for some reason.

"I see. All right, then. I will retrieve the letter and meet you in the G—that is, Binder Shanalorre's office."

"Taeclas might be staying over and sleeping there tonight, by the way."

"I'll ready it for that later, then."

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Shanalorre's office was, as promised, warm but not painfully hot, especially after Lori anchored airwisps and firewisps to the quartz embedded into her staff and formed a binding that deleted heat while moving air. Holding her staff in the crook of her arm, she turned it back and forth depending on whether she felt too cold or too hot, which let her stay comfortable as she sat herself behind the table that acted as the office's desk.

Rian immediately started amusing himself by walking back and forth to find a spot where the binding blew towards him to set down his chair.

When Yllian arrived, the worn envelope of the letter in hand, Lori was pointedly turning her staff to make Rian stand up and move his chair a few yustri to get back in the flow of the cooling breeze. She needed to amuse herself too, after all.

"Ah, Yllian," Rian said. "Finally, we can get started."

Yllian took the other free chair as Rian finally gave up and just sat down where his chair already was.

"Soo…." Rian began, "what did the rest of the Golden Sweetwood Company say? How twitchy is her Bindership likely to get over this?"

Her other lord glanced towards her. "Unfortunately, there is likely to be some twitching," he confessed.

"Will they be coming here, then?" Lori demanded.

"That has never been in question, Great Binder," Yllian said. "The goal of the Golden Sweetwood Company was to settle in the new continent as a group. While we the company are divided at the moment, that is simply because we do not want to abandon River's Fork completely."

Her eyes narrowed. "This is my demesne now."

"Of course, Great Binder, although as far as the Company knows, we are still ruled by… well, by Binder Shanalorre. The letter WAS sent before winter, after all, and those were our circumstances then."

"So they're coming here thinking that Shanalorre is still in charge and her Bindership is the cranky neighbor upriver who took in the majority of the demesne's survivors?" Rian said.

"Essentially. Let me read to you the—"

"No, no, don't read the whole letter," Lori cut in. "I don't have the time or the patience for a 'read the whole letter word-for-word' segment. Just give me the notable points that I actually have to worry about."

Yllian hesitated, glancing down at the letter, eyes moving side to side as he read quickly. "Does the company planning to bring in Deadspeakers to teach Binder Shanalorre count?"

Lori considered that. At the very least, if the Golden Sweetwood Company planned to teach Shanalorre, then they presumably intended to keep her alive as River's Fork's Dungeon Binder. Although… "Does it say whether they planned to obey her authority?"

"There's nothing to indicate their thoughts on the matter, Great Binder."

"Hmm…" Lori 'hmm…'-ed, then shrugged. "Well, it's irrelevant now. She is no longer the Dungeon Binder who rules this demesne. What else?"

"I've been instructed to open negotiations with you about the possibility of more people settling into your demesne. That is, Lorian Demesne. I believe it's because friends and extended family will be part of the next wave, and they might prefer to settle in the demesne where the people they know are already settled."

"Not because we have an actual functional Dungeon?" Lori said dryly.

"That might have been a factor, Great Binder. The report I sent also included small reports from Kolinh, Daising, and other members of the company living in Lorian Demesne, and they would have mentioned it, especially in comparison to our own circumstances here at the time."

"Do they give an estimate as to how many settlers will be arriving?" Rian asked.

"The ship that the company hired the year before was able to fit three hundred people and supplies, so the next wave will probably a similar number."

Three hundred people. That was more than the people in both of her demesnes combined. And they wanted to live here?

…

She was NOT going to be the one building all those houses. There were five hundred of them they could make their own rainbowed houses!