The rest of the day was unremarkable as Lori cured the wood in the shed. Nearby, people were moving in and out of the firewood dehydrator shed—though in practice it was a wood drying shed—putting in cut but wet branches and deadfall, and taking out dry pieces to bring back to their homes. When it was time for dinner, Lori took a moment to take a detour, walking briefly along the riverbank on the other side of the flood barrier. The water level had gone back to the way it had been when they'd arrived the year before, revealing small stones, plants, and short stalks of new ropeweed that were already growing quickly.

Lori found what she was looking for and finally headed back to her room to take a bath and dry her clothes.

When she came back down, she was bemused to find that the table next to hers was full of children. The brat was there, as was Shanalorre and her cousin, so Lori assumed that the others were the ones they had brought from River's Fork yesterday. However, there were too many children at the table for that. She might have difficulty remembering people's faces, but she could count, and there hadn't nearly been this many children yesterday. Some of them were probably local children, then.

"Rian, what's going on?" she said, the din at her back slightly irritating as she put down her game board and started setting up for a game of chatrang. Next to Riz, Mikon smiled when she saw the board.

"Shanalorre gathered the new children together, then went around asking if the other children could eat with them," Rian said, leaning on one elbow, knuckles resting on his jaw as he watched over Lori's shoulder, head slightly tilted. Next to him, Umu also seemed to be watching the children. "I think this is her way of helping them adjust, making sure they're around people they know and helping them make friends." How would forcing them through the terrible ordeal of 'making friends' possibly help? "I think she also plans to invite some more to sleep over at her house tonight, so that sleeping at her house seems more like a fun gathering than a refugee camp."

Lori glanced over her shoulder. There were some game boards on the tables, and the children seemed more intent on those than getting food. No one seemed to be getting food. "No one seems to be getting food."

"Well, it's the first night, some flaws in the process are to be expected." He glanced towards the kitchen. "Speaking of which, it's my turn tonight to get food tonight. Excuse me…"

Rian stood up to fetch the food, accompanied by Umu. Lori wasn't exactly sure what arrangement they had to decide whose turn it was, since it was never the same pair all the time, so there was probably some sort of rotation involved, but she'd never really paid enough attention to figure it out. Given the din behind her, it sounded like Shanalorre was gathering everyone to have them get food as well.

She and Mikon had begun a game by the time Rian and Umu came back with the food. Lori took one of the bowls and some bread. "So, what do you have to report?"

"The carpenters have started working on Shanalorre's shelves. They said they can do the mounts for shelves tomorrow, if you'll be there to soften the stone," Rian said, letting the other three get their own bowls first before he took the last one. "Do you think you have time to before we leave?"

Lori frowned, then sighed. "Fine. After breakfast, we'll bury the mount in the walls. Is the boat ready to go again?" She reached out and moved her Mentalist into a defensive position.

"Everything's been resupplied, and Dormin was willing to come back to try to hunt more food for the demesne. Although with the seels finally coming back, it's been suggested it might be safer to have people seeling for meat instead, since they can do it from inside the demesne's borders."

"Does anyone there know how to seel?"

"The children from the families who used to live here? Though I wouldn't suggest having them do it. Or at least, not just them, since their parents will probably try to hide the meat and keep it for themselves, or worse."

Lori grunted as Mikon moved one of her militia. "Who's available to learn seeling so that they can do it, then?"

"Unfortunately, there's not a lot of people to spare in River's Fork to do that," Rian said. "They still need to finish planting the fields—thankfully there's still enough grain for that—as well as clearing more land to plant more crops, since the land they currently have is just barely more than what they originally had when their old Binder was alive. And the only reason that was enough was because he used Deadspeaking to accelerate the harvest."

"Wouldn't that deplete their supplies of grain even further?"

"With the fruits, the seels, the hunting, and what grain is left after planting, they should survive until harvest provided we can stop the stealing… admittedly, that's a very optimistic prediction. If we can spare some tubers for them to plant, that's another source of food for the demesne… provided that no one tries to steal or hoard it."

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"You know, since we started tending to River's Fork, you have increasingly assumed the worst in the people there," Lori noted. She also moved one of her militia. It would be threatened soon, but in her next move she'd put her Whisperer near it.

"Yes, I know. Depressingly, people stealing and hoarding things is something I'm familiar with." Rian sighed heavily. "Hopefully when they're eating regularly and have a secure supply of food, they'll stop this behavior."

"How likely is that?"

"Please don't ask, I don't want to think about it."

"So… you're procrastinating."

"I can only deal with so many problems at once. I'll leave these hypothetical future problems for when they become more definite nearly-today problems."

––––––––––––––––––

Lori was almost finished with dinner when Shanalorre approached her, standing respectfully to the side as she waited to be acknowledged.

"What is it?" Lori said as she tapped her Deadspeaker to revive one of her fallen militia, placing the revived piece where it could act defensively.

"Great Binder, I have a request," Shanalorre said.

"Hmm?" Lori 'hmm'-ed, glancing sideways at her subordinate. "What request?"

"If possible, I wish to remain here instead of returning to River's Fork tomorrow. The children have not yet properly adjusted to the living conditions here, and I believe it would be best if I were to remain to help them acclimate. In addition, I also do not wish to leave Yoshka unattended in a new place."

Lori nodded, still waiting for Mikon to make her counter move. "Yes, I agree. You should stay here to take care of the children. What resources will you need?"

Shanalorre hesitated. "I shouldn't need any resources. The intent is to get them acclimated to living in the demesne, as well as helping them deal with being separated from their families and sleeping in an unfamiliar environment."

Lori nodded, then reached down into her belt pouch. She felt around, and pulled out a rock. "Here, take—" She glanced at the rock. "—no, wait, this is my rock with Yllian's name." Putting the rock down at the table, where Rian was giving the rock an exasperated look, Lori searched through her belt pouch again. "Ah, here it is." She drew out a rounded river rock, one end a smooth ovoid, the other consisting of ridges that have had their edges smoothed by water over an unknown period of time. "I've been meaning to give this to you."

"A… rock, Great Binder?"

Lori held up the rock, anchoring passing lightwisps to it, which she then began to imbue. She reached out through her connection to the core towards the other bindings of lightwisps in the demesne, checking them for reference, before configuring the binding on lightwisps anchored to the rock. It began to glow as she imbued it, and she held out the rock towards Shanalorre. "Here."

With the dining hall already brightly lit by lightwisps, the glow from the rock wasn't really all that blinding, and was simply a slightly brighter glow in the air. Shanalorre hesitantly took the rock. "Thank you, Great Binder."

"It's for your house," Lori explained. "To help illuminate it should you need to work on Rian's numbers. When you plan to go to sleep, simply put your bucket over it to obscure the light."

"Ah… I understand then, Great Binder. I'm sure it will be very useful. Thank you again."

Lori waved a hand dismissively. "I will be coming by later to attach lights to the outside of the house, since I had neglected to do so while they were being constructed. In the meantime, sit. I still need to speak to you."

Shanalorre nodded, turning to someone behind Lori. "I will just speak to Binder Lolilyuri for a moment, everyone. Why don't you all go to the baths? I will meet with you all there when I am finished. Karina, could you please help Yoshka until then?"

"Sure. Come on, Yoshka, let's go and do as Shana says," Lori heard the brat say as there was an outburst of excitement from the other new children at the idea of taking another warm bath again. Mikon finally made her move, using her Mentalist to remove Lori's Horotract. Lori winced, but had resigned herself to that happening.

She heard the din the children were making recede as they all started moving away towards the entrance of her Dungeon. Shanalorre started to take a seat next to Lori, hesitated, then walked around the table to sit on Umu's other side.

"What did you wish to speak of, Great Binder?" she said, holding the glowing rock that Lori was still imbuing so that it was covered by her hands.

"In addition to the inventory matters that Rian has you doing," Lori said, "I am making you directly responsible for the wellbeing of the new children. That means making arrangements for bath buckets to be built for them, and to have some of our leather stores be used to make them proper footwear. Rian, see to it that the carpenters and… uh, whoever else know that I'm authorizing Shanalorre to make these arrangements."

"Got it, your Bindership," Rian said cheerfully. "If she needs help, I'm sure Karina can tell her who to find for what she needs."

Lori nodded, still focused on Shanalorre. "In addition, I want you to supervise having more tubers planted where there's space, in preparation for transferring them to be grown to River's Fork for additional food."

"I… see."

"It shouldn't be difficult to find time to plant some things in the ground. Just do as much as you can while we're gone. Use your own judgement as to how to proceed, and limit yourself to a reasonable expenditure of resources."

"Ah…"

"By supervise, you mean not actually do it herself, right?" Rian said. "Who can she ask for help?"

"I'll leave that to her discretion, provided it's for this planting," Lori said.

"I… will do what I can, Great Binder."

"Excellent." Lori turned towards the game she was still playing with Mikon. "That will be all, then. You are dismissed. I'll be out to anchor lightwisps outside your house when I finish here."

It had been some time since she'd played chatrang, and she was going to enjoy herself.

"Well… congratulations, I suppose?" Rian said to Shanalorre, sounding unsure. "You finally got your own glowing rock too. How long before Yllians gets one, do you think?"

Lori paused. Then she sighed. She supposed she'd have to find a rock tomorrow…