Demesne

Lori stayed up a bit later that night than she usually did, testing the mechanism as she said she would. She connected the wire from the mechanism to the wisplight she'd used for the previous darkwisp alloy testing and wrapped another wire around the copper rod, the other end of which she held down onto one of the flattened copper samples to use as an impromptu bead receptacle.

When she carefully touched the flattened copper sample—from the stamped letter, it was the firewisp alloy—she wasn't able to make contact with the binding of lightwisps anchored to the bound tool's core until she pulled out the knob from the slider slightly so that the copper made contact with the darkwisp alloy. That confirmed she had an uninterrupted connection.

Placing a bead on the improvised bead receptacle—and testing the connection again is case she'd dislodged it—she carefully began to pull the knob to move the slider switch. As she drew out the knob, a glow began to radiate from the wisplight.

She checked the sliding mechanism in various positions, such as at one quarter, half, and three-quarters draw, comparing the light coming from the wisplight with what she remembered from yesterday, when she tested the alloy wires at the same point. As far as she could recall—and her recall was excellent on this point, as it wasn't a name or a face—the intensity of the light was the same as with the alloy wires she had tested.

Experimentally, she altered the binding of lightwisps, increasing the light's brightness and by extension increasing the amount of imbuement the binding was consuming. Then she slowly began to push in the sliding switch, keeping an eye on the wisplight.

Not directly, of course. The light was very bright.

As the switch was pushed in, the light was visibly dimming. At the halfway point—at least, Lori thought it was the halfway point—the light was almost the same intensity as it had original been.

Which made no sense! That implied that the alloy was restricting a percentage of the imbuement—and also implied that the binding was drawing the imbuement from the bead towards it, which was not something Lori had ever considered—and given how that percentage seemed to be directly proportional to how much of the wire the imbuement had to pass through—regardless of the length of the wire—which meant… which meant…

…

No, no, Lori was in no mood to consider the implications of this, or try to decipher the principles involved beyond the ones she had already noted. She was just going to do what any scholar would and write it down to leave for someone else to study in the future. What mattered was the results were repeatable and consistent, and that meant she could use it in her bound tools.

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The next day, making a steam jet driver was relatively quick and straightforward, thanks to Rian already having the wooden fittings made. All she had to make was the bone tube, and only a single bound tool core needed to be embedded into it, which made the matter of wiring much simpler. She nearly made the mistake of forming the usual binding she used for her steam jet drivers before she remembered this was meant to be a prototype, and reformed the binding accordingly. Not one that provide three times the thrust, though that was certainly the goal. Merely twice would suffice in this instance. She could just alter it later, once they had tested the prototype.

Once that was done, the bone tube was mounted onto the shaft that had been prepared, the wire from the bound tool core passing through a groove that Lori partly filled with softened stone before another piece of wood covered it. Once, that had been secured in place by wedges, but now Taeclas—as was written on the headcloth she wore, and when had she started wearing that?—was here to use Deadspeaking to fuse the wood together. From that point, the carpenters and smiths could handle the matter of mounting the sliding switch and securing the wires and bead receptacle, as well as mounting the bound tool to the back of Lori's Boat Three.

Her part done, Lori had a very productive day expanding the demesne.

The next day, she spent the morning testing Lori's Boat Three. Well, Rian tested it, on the sound grounds that as part of those who designed the sliding switch mechanism he didn't need to be taught how to use it, and that it wasn't risking his life because he could swim, strange and unnatural as that was. Lori stood on the docks and took note of how the boat handled, her connection to her core allowing her to perceive how much imbuement was reaching the binding that propelled the boat. Nearby, some of the men who operated the Coldhold rode on Lori's Boat and Lori's Boat Two, ready to assist in case it was necessary, since they were among the few adults that Rian had managed to teach how to swim as well.

Much of the testing had the boat moving at speed, and Lori had to admit that it accelerated much more smoothly than the other two boats. That was no doubt a result of having more than simply three increments of speed to the boat's steam jet driver. Lori was willing to admit that while the boats were comfortable enough to ride when they were moving steadily, changing speeds and especially accelerating was quite jarring and uncomfortable until the boat stabilized at its new speed.

The difference wasn't enough to make Lori want to shift the older boats over to the new switch mechanism. As Rian had pointed out, the switch currently couldn't be used to also activate the binding that propelled the boat in reverse, something that was a necessity for maneuvering the larger boats such as Lori's Ice Boat and the Coldhold. At the moment, the boats at their current configuration were still well suited for the demesne's needs, and were heavily used because of it. However, once winter arrived and the boats could no longer be used, Lori could probably find the time for the disassembly and reconstruction needed to make them in line with the newest prototype.

The next day, the demesne had another harvest as both the crops growing in the dungeon farm and the next outer ring of the crops in the fields reached maturity. Lori wasn't really needed for it, as they already had already established all the infrastructure needed for processing the vigas. So despite the excitement going on, she was already planning to spend another full day in her room expanding her demesne.

"We don't have enough space to store the vigas," Rian told her at breakfast.

What? "What?"

Rian actually looked embarrassed as he continued. "It's… well, this is my fault. I probably should have told you sooner. Look, you've probably noticed how our fields are bigger than they were last year, right? Um, did you notice? It's a bit hard to tell with you sometimes."

"Yes, Rian, I noticed. I assume this has something to do with how we don't have enough storage space?"

Rian nodded. "It's like this. We had more than enough space to store last year's harvest. However, the thing is that we also harvested a winter crop this spring, which not only refilled the stores we'd expended over the winter but gave us a surplus. One that we've been enjoying up to now, just to be clear, but the fact of the matter is that even with us having to send over supplies to River's Fork, we haven't had to worry about food much, since we had the tuber plots in the dungeon farm and all. And then Taeclas and Lidzuga joined us, and suddenly we've been growing our crops much faster. Storage space that had been used to store vigas is now full of tubers, other root vegetables, and some of the micans and golden buds since they last very well without really needing to be frozen, at least for a few weeks. And because imbuing meanings is easier in River's Fork, they've actually been sending us grain now, although we're still sending them meat and vegetables."

"So… we have too much food."

"Only a crazy person will say that's a problem. No, we don't have enough food storage. Gunvi has been making as many pots as he and his apprentices can, and the carpenters have been making barrels, so we have plenty of storage vessels, but space…" he shrugged. "Well, theoretically we can store them in the side tunnels of the third level, but with the temperature and humidity there, that would make the food go bad quickly. And while there's the alcoves in the second level—"

"I see," Lori said.

Rian nodded. "I'm sorry for disturbing your day, but… well, it's my fault, I should have made you aware of the potential problem sooner."

She sighed, but it was mostly for the fact that her plans for that day had to be discarded. "Next time, give be at least two days warning," she said sternly. "Well, there's no helping it. I'll excavate a new mass storage space for the grain and likely anything else that comes up in future. How many people are still living in the old shelter?" She vaguely recalled some people still living there…

"Not as many as it used to be. About… twenty people or so? It's some of the the newlyweds and unmarried young men who chose to move out of their families' homes to give their siblings room. They decided they liked living in the shelter for the moment and withdrew their petition requesting to live in the new row."

Lori nodded. "Until I finished excavating the new grain store, we will be storing the grain in the old shelter. Have all the current residents move to the Um with everything they need for the next…" she paused thoughtfully for a moment, "two to three days. Until further notice, the Um will not be available for use."

Next to Rian, Riz sighed in relief for some reason.

"Ah…" Rian said slowly. "Well… I suppose it IS an emergency…and it should only be until you excavate the necessary storage. And everyone will be busy and tired from the harvest, so it probably won't be needed… so why am I afraid people won't see it that way…?"

"I'll also need people to keep the entrance of my dungeon clear," Lori said. "I'll be moving large quantities of stone, so I can't have people being in the way."

"I can find someone to assist you to get people out of your way and keep the path clear? While I agree with you that moving stone and people is probably a dangerous combination, at the very least we'll need people to be able to go in and out so that the kitchen volunteers can cook lunch and dinner for everyone."

Lori frown, but eventually had to grunt in assent. A part of her wondered in she should make a second entrance to her dungeon, but there was really no need during normal, day-to-day business. Usually she didn't have to worry about people getting in her way when she was moving excavated stone because she only moved relatively small amounts. However, since she now needed to excavate a large space for storage, and needed to do so quickly…

A part of her wondered if maybe she should have had Rian recruit a Horotract while he was in Covehold Demesne. That part was set upon by the rest of her, tried for high treason, pronounced guilty, and sentenced to death by immolation, where its screams for mercy were ignored as all other parts of Lori watched, smiling in grim satisfaction. "Fine. Have everyone focus on harvesting the fields outside, to minimize the number of people who need to go in and out of the dungeon."

Rian nodded, then sighed. "I don't suppose you can put some kind of shade or something over the fields?" he said hopefully.

"There's nothing to anchor darkwisps to," Lori said dismissively.

Her lord tilted his head. "Don't you have a binding to keep bugs away from the crops? Doesn't that go around and over the fields?"

Yes? "Yes?" She didn't see what he was getting at. "I don't see what you're getting at."

"Can't you anchor the darkwisps to that?" he said, holding one hand palm-down over his plate, and laying his other hand atop it in an attempt at an illustrative demonstration. "And if that's too low, maybe pad it out with airwisps to maybe make a breeze around the crops before you put the darkwisps on top of it?" He removed the hand underneath and laid it atop the other hand. Across from her, Taeclas—why was she wearing that headcloth so early? She hadn't needed to keep her hair out of her face before…—looked sideways at Rian, a thankful look on her face.

Lori opened her mouth to reply, then paused, tilting her head contemplatively. That… might actually work. The binding of darkwisps that she'd placed over the sawmill—whose roof was halfway done and the gristmill and drop hammer should be in the midst of being installed—was something she'd actively maintained when she'd worked there as there was no place she could anchor the binding. However, the binding that kept bugs away from the crops was anchored to the ground, and since the binding was made from lightningwisps, it wasn't affected by the wind as airwisps would be. Well, not with the way the binding was formed, anyway.

"That would actually be viable," Lori admitted reluctantly. "Yes, I believe I'll form that after breakfast. And after the harvest, it will allow Taeclas and Shanalorre to imbue the fields all day because heat won't be a problem anymore." She nodded in satisfaction.

Why was Taeclas looking at Rian like that?