After dinner, Lori should have been sleeping. Her bedroll was on her bed, and her pillow and blanket atop it, ready to give her a good night's rest. The only one she'd have for some time, given where she'd be going the next day.

Instead, she was restless.

Try as she might, Lori couldn't sleep. Despite not being hungry, all she could do was lie in bed, staring up at the names on the ceiling that she never seemed to get around to removing, even though she couldn't remember why it was there. The names themselves were stuck in her memory now, though except for Umu, Mikon, and possibly Deil and Tackir she wouldn't be able to tell them by face. And the last two she might get mixed up.

She tried reading her almanac, but Lori found she couldn't properly concentrate on the words. The book sat open on her lap, and she found she'd been reading the same opening paragraph over and over without remembering what it said. When she tried to switch to something else, a flow diagram for a controlled burn of forest undergrowth—she'd chosen it because it had been the only thing that had piqued her curiosity—she had ended up simply tracing the diagram with her fingers.

Eventually she put away the almanac, lest it be damaged by her carelessness. She got to her feet, thinking to walk about to, if not exactly clear her head, then at least expend some of the energy that seemed to be imbuing her. The dining hall below was quiet when she stepped down. The lights were as bright as they always were since they had been connected to the core, but the kitchen was oddly empty and still without any people bustling about there. She was so used to that area being occupied, full of people cooking or preparing to cook, that the lack was simply strange.

The doors of her Dungeon were closed, and she stared at them for a moment, before shaking her head. Pulling them open wasn't difficult—they weren't barred, though the wooden beam that would secure it lay to one side, ready in case of a dragon—and she would have left them open behind her when a thought occurred to her. She turned and pulled the doors shut. Even with the binding to keep bugs out of her Dungeon, there was the possibility of chokers or something smaller skulking about.

She took a moment to look at the illustrations made from lightwisps that she'd anchored to the walls of the entryway to her Dungeon, then sighed. While they had looked suitable when she and Rian had originally made them, now some of them were clearly blurry and slightly lopsided. The lines of the illustrations they'd copied were sharp enough that what they were depicting was easily identifiable, but still…

Lori shook her head, lest she start staring again, and continued walking. The air around her was pleasantly cool, a coolness that didn't change as she felt a breeze on her face, so it was probably colder. She could see a bonfire had been lit near the baths, next to the collections of benches to the side. There were people huddled there, talking among themselves. Huh. She'd have thought if people would be staying up late, they'd be doing it in her Dungeon.

She shrugged as she let herself wander, turning right past the entryway. To her left, the corners of the houses of her demesne glowed with lightwisps anchored to the stone walls. A little ways ahead of her, a lone house that was smaller than the others and looking like a child's drawing—it had a door in the middle of the wall facing the path, with two square windows to either side—was the last beacon of light. Beyond that house was darkness and moonlight, the red moon bathing the land in its colors. Past Rian's house, she could barely make out the shape of the food dehydration shed, though she could hear it faintly as it continued to circulate air even now. She wondered what was being dried in there. Mushrooms? Or had people decided to convert it to drying laundry while they were gone?

…

It occurred to Lori she hadn't really left anyone in charge of the idiots in her demesne while she was gone. Rian was with her, so clearly he wasn't keeping them in line, so who…?

…

She was just going to assume that Rian, who had always shown he was very capable, had thought to put someone in some sort of charge. For some reason, Umu came to mind. Lori could even imagine it: Rian would be wondering who he could leave in charge of the demesne while they were gone, to keep people from doing something stupid, and Umu would be right there saying, "I can do that for you, Lord Rian!" and of course Mikon would use the opportunity to try and ring Umu's bell by assisting her…

…

Yes, Lori was just going to assume that was how it had all played out, because she didn't want to think of the alternative and—she was going to have to inspect everything in the morning to make sure her idiots hadn't done something excessively idiotic while they'd been out of her sight, wouldn't she?

…

Well, she probably should anyway. Make sure nothing had broken unexpectedly or needed repairs, see to it no one was pissing in the unfinished excavations on the third level, that no one had turned the dehydrator into a clothes dryer…

Lori stood there for a moment, staring out into the dark past the shape of the food dehydrator shed. Even if this was her demesne… she wasn't going out into that. Not alone, in any case. She had far too many vivid recollections of that kind of darkness and moonlight hiding beasts. She turned around and began walking back, even as the sudden itching on her neck kept making her glance behind her. Silly, she knew. Her awareness of wisps told her there weren't any voids nearby that could be a beast, even a small one like a choker, but…

Her step quickened, and she didn't slow until she was back near the entryway of her Dungeon.

…

Why were so many people still awake?

It wasn't just the people sitting around the bonfire in front of the baths. Someone had also lit a fire near the short wall of the flood barrier, between the stairs to the laundry area and the stairs to the docks. Benches had been moved there, and people were sitting around waiting. Some of them were children, who seemed to have fallen asleep where they sat, the warmth of the fires letting rest comfortably.

A few seemed to be talking quietly to each other, probably in deference to those sleeping, but most simply sat there. One, a young man by his build, was pacing back and forth, occasionally turning to walk up the steps that led towards the dock, and then simply stood there as if looking out over the river before turning away to walk down and resume their pacing.

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At the top of the stairs over the flood barrier, two women were standing.

Lori should not have been able to tell who they were. From where they stood, their hair colors were unclear, and the skirts and shawls they were had nothing distinctive about them. She had nothing to use for reference to their height, and they were both standing still, not interacting with each other. The only movement about them was the way the night breeze played with their hair and clothes, blowing it back and forth. When one tucked a stray lock back behind an ear, there was nothing distinctive about the movement.

Despite that, Lori was almost completely certain that the pair was Umu and Mikon.

…

Were the two of them waiting for Rian to come back? That… seemed the most likely. Lori glanced at the other people waiting around the bonfires, especially the one who kept pacing and occasionally climbed up the stairs. Did that mean that these were the family of those they'd left behind this afternoon, the ones Rian should be returning with? All of them just waiting for the Coldhold to come with Rian and their families aboard?

…

That was probably what they were doing, wasn't it? They were all just out here, waiting for the boat to finish making the round trip back from River's Fork. A round trip that, Lori realized, would probably take a portion of the night to finish, since the Coldhold didn't have any light to navigate by except for the glowing rock she'd given Rian. They'd have to travel slower so that they didn't accidentally run into anything. And the rock wasn't exactly easy to hold out in front of you without fingers getting in the way of its light, so it was distinctly likely that Rian could drop the rock into the water.

Then the boat would be adrift in the dark, and they'd either have to stop for the night and continue on when there was light out, or try to continue with the moonlight, and hope the clouds didn't come in for a midnight drizzle.

…

It all sounded worryingly plausible in Lori's head. Had these people thought the same? Or were they simply waiting, impatient for someone in their family to come home?

…

Well, not her problem. That was a 'dealing with people' matter, and Rian wasn't here. Shanalorre was, but Lori didn't know where she was. Sleeping in the shelter, most likely, but it seemed pointless to wake her up for a matter that didn't actually need to be solved immediately. One way or another, it would be resolved with time. Either the boat would arrive later tonight, or it would arrive the following day since they had to stop and sleep.

…

Lori found a dark corner next to the entry way of her Dungeon and bound some earthwisps from the stone, pulling out a small ledge she could sit on. Closing her eyes, she reached through her affinity with her blood and the light from her eyes. Light… the Coldhold needed light. Exterior lights, at that. Unfortunately, all the lights she had given it had been interior, to illuminate the space within the hull. Why had she never considered they'd need lights outside? How had they managed during those weeks they'd been traveling to Covehold?

She found her connections, and became aware of the bindings of lightwisps and waterwisps she was distantly connected to. She began to imbue them as she considered her options. The bindings moving water through the water jet driver, she dismissed from consideration, though she still kept imbuing them. The ice that made the hull… she couldn't really affect that, not without being able to see what she was doing. The evaporator… no, nothing she could do to that which would be useful.

Could she make the interior lights brighter? Bright enough to glow through the hull, between the gaps of the planks? Perhaps that would help? Though… no, that was more likely to simply blind those inside, and it was even likely they'd covered up the lightwisps so they could sleep. She could try moving the lightwisps… but in what direction? Relative to what?

Lori rose and started to pace around in a circle, her restlessness moving her. She really should stop worrying about this. Rian would be back when he came back, and there wasn't really anything she could do to accelerate the process. She should just deal with her restlessness and then go back to sleep, and when she woke up, he'd probably be back, and she'd have skipped all the waiting. Being preoccupied about all this was simply pointless.

She had stopped pacing, thought the restlessness within her hadn't changed. Lori found herself staring up at the pale moon and its stark white surface. Even with only a wide crescent visible at this time of month, it was still bright, even if the light it cast seemed weak compared to the bloody illumination of the red moon—

…

Lori's eyes widened slightly as an idea came to her. Perhaps… perhaps there was a way to give the Coldhold some light after all?

With the moons out and shining, the air was filled with lightwisps, even if it didn't seem like it. But they could see, so of course there was light. Through her connection to her core, through her demesne, Lori claimed those lighwisps, and began to gather them at the highest point of her demesne. Two and a third taums directly above her Dungeon, she bound those lightwisps together, gathering more and more lightwisps from the light of the moons and stars. There was nothing to anchor them to save airwisps, and that would simply blow them about, so Lori consciously held them in place with her mind as she imbued the simple binding.

Then she made the lightwisps shine.

High up above, a soft light suddenly came into being, glowing like a fifth moon. As people, those paying attention anyway, looked up in confusion, Lori altered the binding, making the light grow stronger. The illumination intensified, the fifth moon turning into a twilight sun, the darkness around her washing away.

Lori claimed and bound a second group of lightwisps next to the light above her Dungeon, shaping them into a wide disk and giving them directionality that caused them to reflect the light being generated. She wrapped that disk around the shining binding, limiting the direction the light could go. Not up and not down. The direction of upriver was also blocked off, as was the direction of both the river's shores.

Finally, all the light shone only downriver. The light was actually visible in the air, reflecting off minute dust and vapor, revealing a wide cone. Pulling it down to an altitude of merely two taums above her core, she was able to get a better sense of the direction the light was going as it created more lightwisps in its path. Carefully, she began to angle it downward, until the bottom edge of the cone of unclaimed lightwisps reached the edge of the surface of her demesne.

She wondered how bright that light was, to anyone looking towards it. It was only visible light, bright white and carefully stripped of any unseen light lest it become warm or harmful. Directed away from her, she only had a small sense of its intensity, but given it was lighting up the very air…

That should be able to give the Coldhold enough light to navigate their way faster… right?

Lori sat back down on her ledge, her limbs suddenly no longer as restless as they'd been before. She leaned back and closed her eyes, her mind focusing on keeping the binding of lightwisps imbued as she ignored the stares of the people sitting around the fires, and the gazes of Mikon and Umu…

––––––––––––––––––

"Lori?" a gentle voice said. "Lori, wake up. Your neck is going to ache if you keep sleeping like that."

Lori jerked awake. What…?

She tried to sit up, only to find she was already sitting up and her neck was annoyed with her because her head had been lolling to one side. Wincing, she blearily moved her head as she tried to relieve the aching muscles, as she rubbed her eyes of sleep sand.

Rian was crouched in front of her, one side slightly illuminated by a glow coming from his open belt pouch, smiling.

"Who died," she muttered in annoyance at being woken up, "and what are you doing in my room?"