Lori hated it when Rian had a point.

However, as she thought about his proposal while she ran the curing shed, she found that she couldn't really refute his points. And if she was being honest with herself—and that was the only person to whom honesty mattered—the thought of having another wizard about to do things she couldn't, things she had taken for granted as being done back when she had lived with her mothers… it appealed.

She couldn't even really argue his suggestion to recruit a Deadspeaker. Shanalorre could do little with her connection to her demesne's core—already as surprise, because Lori had thought she could do nothing—but one of the things she had confirmed she could do was to imbue meanings that had already been created by someone else. If they had a Deadspeaker… well, River's Fork's impending food crisis, while probably not solved, would certainly be greatly alleviated. Accelerating the growth rate of the crops, turning the need for weeks into mere days…

They'd actually have a significant surplus. Even with the proposed limitation of restricting the recruit to River's Fork, with the proper infrastructure, allocation of workers, and possibly pointed and painful public examples should the malcontents be… well, malcontent, they might be able to start being able to use the vigas for more than bread. They'd have a large emergency supply in the event of a dragon. They'd be able to replant and recover their crops faster in the event of a dragon.

Of course, this would require sending the Coldhold to Covehold. It would be several weeks, and to make the voyage worth the effort, they'd need materials to trade for goods they needed. While they had salt, it was unlikely that others weren't also operating in that market. Most likely, they had managed some kind of profit because they had arrived before the winter, when people had been busy trying to preserve food, and there had been high demand. This early in the year, while there would still be a demand, the prices might not be as high. More people might have also moved into the market as well. Even if people had somehow not thought of building a boat out of ice before, the idea would almost certainly have been introduced by the Coldhold's visit.

Rian would also need some days to try and see if her unmarked beads could be sold to those who wished to imbue their bound tools, or at least those made by Whisperers. That added perhaps a week to the expedition. Given how the Coldhold was currently occupied transferring herself and other things to River's Fork, it was unlikely they would be able to mount a return trip any time soon. Possibly not until summer. So she'd have plenty of time to give the idea more consideration, then.

Lori was most definitely not procrastinating! She wasn't Rian, after all.

Unfortunately, the matter of the brat's proposal was, according to Rian, not something she could put off. She tapped away at the thought all day, her flow of thought going around in circles. Ultimately, however, she reluctantly decided to take the brat's offer. Despite being a child, she had knowingly volunteered—Lori didn't understand why, but that was perfectly normal for her when it came to most people's motivations—without being prompted, indicating a willingness to do so for her own reasons. In doing so, she alleviated a difficulty Lori was having, and could potentially train others to take over for her.

Despite the logic of her decision, it still made her neck itch in what might almost have been guilt.

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The next day, they were slightly delayed as the new door meant for River's Fork's food storage area was loaded onto the Coldhold. Unfortunately, its dimensions were just a bit too wide to fit through the hatch that went down to the boat's main storage area.

"Yeah… that was a bad oversight of our parts," Rian said as they considered the problem. Below, the barrels were still being secured. "We might need to have the carry the door behind us on your ice boat. It will be more stable laid down on. Our other alternative would be to lay it out on its side on the deck, and to be honest that would be far too disruptive, along with a risk of it falling overboard."

"Lori's Ice Boat," Lori corrected.

"That's what I said, your ice boat."

"…fine, get it done."

Rian nodded. She'd told him she was taking the brat's offer at dinner last night, and ordered him to see to any preparations needed for it: talk to her parents, talk to her, inquire what the brat needed, whether the parents were willing to come to River's Fork and assist with the farming there, all those things. "Right. Come on, men, let's get this door off so we don't need to worry about it falling off our boat and make it Clowee's problem. Also, someone get Clowee, we need her to bring this down to the Fork with us."

People laughed at that for some reason, even as Rian and some of the men picked up the door to carefully try to get it off the boat and back on the dock. Clowee, it turned out, was the ferrywoman who operated Lori's Ice Boat on a regular basis. They stayed long enough to watch the door be carefully placed on the ice boat before the Covehold finally got underway.

Once they arrived, the door had to be carefully removed from the smaller boat and taken to the mine, where Lori was finally able to mount it to the stone walls. It took some adjusting to make sure it didn't scrape against the ground, or any other part of the stone frame around the door, but fortunately a year of mounting doors like this gave Lori enough experience to adjust the door herself without any of her demesne's carpenters.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

With the food storage now secured by a door that could be barred—they were still working on a lock, since that was a bit delicate, and Lori wanted one that couldn't just be opened by someone with a carved stick—Lori's peace and quiet in the mine was broken as people started transferring food from the root cellar. Fortunately, Lori had to be outside anyway to make ice for the meat that had recently been brought in by the hunters with them. It gave her something to do while people labored to move the food, while Riz, Rian and other people had kept an eye out for people trying to steal said food.

The most common excuse, not all of them from simply the malcontents, seemed to be that they'd had to eat their house's emergency food cache because they hadn't been satisfied after a meal. People honestly seemed to think this would get Rian and Yllian—Lori checked her rock. Yes, his name was Yllian—to let them keep the food they were blatantly stealing. Perhaps it would have, had Shanalorre still be in charge of River's Fork.

"Twenty lashes each for theft." Yllian had a darkly satisfied look on his face.

"If any children are willing to step forward and admit to any such wrongdoing because their parents goaded them to, they'll be let off with a warning," Rian said. "I know how hard it is to tell your parents no, even when what they're asking you to do is something you know is wrong."

Five adults had their hands secured to posts and punished while the work paused a moment for people to watch. Lori didn't know if it was mercy, or Rian's own form of cruelty, but instead of a knotted rope, leather belt, or supple branch, they were lashed by what looked like a soaking wet towel that was twisted before each lash. It left interesting wet spots on their clothes, but from the sounds it was no less impactful.

Once they were done, Rian smiled at their pained or glowering faces. "Now, we're not unreasonable. If you ate your emergency supply, then of course we'll allow you to replenish it. We wouldn't want you all to starve in an emergency, after all. Dormin, you and the boys are going hunting this afternoon, right?"

"Yes, Lord Rian."

Rian nodded, and exchanged looks with Yllian. The two of them nodded at each other for some reason, and Rian's smile actually widened. "Well, the five of you are excused from work to help Dormin, Aska, and some of the other men go hunting outside of the demesne," he said brightly. He spoke loudly over their exclamations. "No, no, no need to thank me. I'm sure you're all eager for the chance to get as much food as you want with your bare hands and replenish your home's emergency stores. Going out there and having to kill beasts yourself will let you do just that! Don't worry, it'll be easy! If it wasn't easy, I'm sure you five would have had far more qualms simply taking food from the stores like you were doing, so of course it must be so simple anyone could do it! Right?"

He stopped and made a show of listening to their exclamations for a moment. "All right, all right, I'm not unreasonable," Rian said. "if you truly think don't have what it takes to go out there and help our brave hunters and ferrymen risk their lives to bring back some fresh meet, then you don't have to… provided you can beat Yllian or myself in a fist fight. Yes, even you Missus Asil. Everyone is equal under Binder Lori's laws. You have as much right to punch someone in the face as the men do."

Rian spread his arms invitingly as Yllian moved to stand with his fellow lord. "So, who wants to try? Which one of us do you want to face? We'll even give you a chance. Circle rules. Manage to force us out of the circle, and you win."

After that, transferring the food to the new food storage went much more smoothly. It would mean that her mine wouldn't be as peaceful anymore, since there'd be people coming in to get food for lunch and dinner, but Lori was resigned to that. In fact, people were coming and going the whole day as they filled the barrels with fresh water from the river.

When one was filled, Riz would indicate it to Lori, and she put a binding of lightwisps to fill the container with unseen light before it was sealed shut. It wasn't a perfect measure—a part of her wanted to boil the water, but they didn't have the time or the equipment beyond just using bindings—but given the circumstances it was the quickest and most efficient way of making sure the water was pure enough to drink when it was needed, for now. Other methods could be worked out in the future, when the water was replaced to keep it fresh.

It took the rest of the day to move all the remaining food supplies once the thieves had been sent off with the hunters. The next day, Lori was able to get back to excavating. The change in arrangements allowed them to free up people from having to protect the food, since Riz and those with her would effectively be doing the same as they watched over Lori.

On the last day, with more space excavated, Lori used the stone to build a protective stone building around the water wheel and ventilation fan. Making an arching roof would normally have been difficult, especially since she didn't have her connection to her core to be able to control the earthwisps at a distance, which was why she'd been leaving the stone she'd been excavating around the water wheel, letting the piles build up. On the last day, she had enough mass to make the stone piles rise up, and then, very slowly and carefully—using both her staff and her wand in either hand so she could control the earthwisps of both at the same time—meet in the middle. After that, it was all a matter of trimming the excess stone away, leaving an arching roof over the structure that supported its own weight over the water wheel shaft, and fan.

Unfortunately, she had to leave it at that, since without her connection to her core, she had needed to move slowly, such that it was dark by the time she'd finished. Rian had even come over to check up on her and remind her it was dinner time, then had left to bring food for her, Riz, and the others with Riz who hadn't gone to the dining hall because Lori had still been busy.

By the time Lori had finished, everyone else's bowls were empty, and the last remaining bowl that Lori had chosen when he'd first arrived was cold in his hands. Fortunately, it wasn't anything she couldn't rectify with some firewisps. By the time they'd walked back to the dining hall—which only had a few people left—the bowl had cooled down enough for her to eat it as Rian moved some of the brazers that had no one near them and still had some fuel over to where she sat.

Yllian was one of the people still there, and he joined Rian sitting opposite her as she ate. Neither of her lords said anything as she ate several mouthfuls, chewing on the boiled vigas. Finally, she swallowed and said, "All right. What do you have to report?"