When it was time for lunch everyone put aside their tools, and the forge was banked to save on fuel. Lori wordlessly gave the die form she'd made to the coppersmiths, who wordlessly accepted it and, after examining it briefly and hitting it a few times with a hammer, nodded in satisfaction and acknowledgement. It was… probably just them humoring her, but at the moment it wasn't like there was any other way they could get a proper die form for something like this.

Lunch was unremarkable, save for Rian practically vibrating. He kept glancing towards the doors of the Dungeon, just beyond which was the smithy, as he gave his report on the demesne's condition.

"—never handled bound tools outside of the demesne," he said, even as his gaze was towards the door. Lori was very tempted to use the distraction to take his bread for herself. "Not even simple ones for making light or heat. They used oil lamps for that. Though he tells me he's heard of bound tools being used outside of the demesne, but it was always the equivalent of rumor story. Someone heard from someone who heard from someone. No confirmed primary sources, that sort of thing."

"I see…" Lori muttered. Well, at least that told her it was… well, not exactly possible, but probable. Though if the only source was stories… "Are there any stories of people using bound tools outside of a demesne? I don't mean confirmable, factual stories, I mean the nonsensical ones."

Rian actually looked at her as he visibly considered this. "Not off the top of my head, no…" he said slowly. "It's always finding cores buried somewhere and somehow becoming the most powerful and competent Dungeon Binder in the world, with a demesne so big they're clearly compensating for something, amazing magic they just made up that apparently no one has ever thought of doing like that before, and killing everyone who's so much as looked at them funny. We're all very glad you're not like that, by the way."

"You don't think the magic I've done is amazing?"

"I refuse to answer that. That's clearly the wizard equivalent of 'does this dress make me look fat'."

"My mother told me the response to that is 'take it all off, I need to compare'."

"Please tell me they waited until after your growth spurt to tell you that. Lie to me, if necessary."

"She waited until after my growth spurt to tell me that. You don't think the magic I've done is amazing?"

"No, that dress doesn't make you look fat."

Lori gave Rian a flat look that was returned in kind.

"… anything else?"

"Karina has been seeling. A lot. Seeling enough for it to be notable."

"I believe she wishes to bring some of what she caught here to River's Fork to make up for her time away, hence why she is trying to acquire a greater bounty than is usual for her," Shanalorre said from beside Lori. "At least, that is the conclusion I came to. She has not actually said so."

"Yeah, it is! Can I, Lord Rian? We always have room on the boat when we go there, and people always need more food!"

"She has said so," Shanalorre said blandly.

Rian glanced at Lori. She waved a hand dismissively. "Binder Lori says she doesn't care, so we can try, Karina."

There was a pleased exclamation from behind Lori.

All in all, there wasn't much change from how the demesne had been earlier that morning. The crops were well, the chokers were under control, the choker eggs had apparently hatched and the juvenile chokers were carefully being raised to try and domesticate them. The young beasts didn't need a Deadspeaker to make them lethargic and less aggressive, and the ones tending to them were hoping to train them to accept only food from them and to be better behaved as they got older.

"Though they might need a secured dragon shelter pen for when dragons pass overhead," Rian finished.

Lori stared at that last. "What?"

"A dragon shelter pen. You know, someplace we can secure the chokers when it's dragon time. I don't think you'd want them in the dungeon with everyone else, especially since they might get violent surrounded by people they're not used to, but we can't just leave them outside. It would be a waste of the time and effort invested into them, and they are food, after all."

Lori groaned, letting her head slump down.

"You don't need to do it now," Rian said. "If something happened to pass by tomorrow, we can just stick the chokers in one of the incomplete tunnels on the third level. Or better, just make a pit in the third level and throw them down there. We can worry about cleaning it out when everything's down. I'm just saying, when we finally do have a decent number of domesticated beasts, they'll need somewhere to be safe."

"Noted," Lori sighed. "All right, when we have something bigger than a few chokers, I'm building one. For the moment, however, they're going into a pit."

With her luck, a dragon would arrive tomorrow, requiring her to, in fact, excavate a pit in the third level.

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Fortunately, her luck held enough that a dragon didn't make its coming known during lunch. When she returned to the smithy, she found the tinsmith and coppersmith already at work putting a large piece of white Iridescence into a gold wire setting. The wire appeared to have been hardened by the expedient of gently hammering the wire, taking pains to not get it so flat that they couldn't turn it on its side to continue hammering. Even so hardened, the gold was still soft enough to be shaped by their tools.

The capsule-like copper protective shell that was meant to go around the setting to protect the white iridescence from water and contact was still in the process of being made, but it was almost finished. The smiths had even taken the time to shape the other end of the gold wire on which the sample was mounted into a spiral that formed the shape of a little saucer to better hold the bead. Rian must have been the cause of that.

A part of Lori wanted to take the setting as soon as it was completed to start anchoring bindings on it, but she repressed such childishness. Without the shell, it was basically just another demonstration of bead seepage. No, any subsequent experiments would need the copper shell around the setting.

Belated, Lori realize they hadn't specified some sort of support rod for the thing, meaning the gold wire would be bearing the weight of the setting and shell. She considered having a copper rod fabricated, before dismissing the idea. She'd just do something with bone or stone. The setting would be used in controlled conditions—or at least, conditions she controlled, which was much the same thing, in this instance—and as Rian had said, as the only Whisperer in the demesne, she was the only one who could make any bindings that might interact or intersect with the experimental prototypes anyway.

While she waited for the shell to be finished and mounted, Lori positioned herself near the two coppersmiths working on the rest of the sheet metal copper. They were using her die form to shape the sheet they had, which they had first bent and folded in a close approximation of the intended dimensions, before beginning to hammer down the other two sides. It was awkward work, as they didn't have a clamp to hold the sheet in place, meaning one of them had to press down on the sheet while the other hammered. Still, they seemed to be making progress. Lori didn't interfere except to make sure the stone die form was imbued and reinforced as strongly as possible.

When the first prototype was finished, Lori had Rian called. It wasn't out of sentimentality or anything of the sort. She merely had need of a capable note-taker! When he arrived holding his tablet and burnt stick, she handed him one of the bone tablets she had made and a new stylus, a beast tooth mounted on a rod of bone. "Write on this," she said. "The side of the tablet facing you has been softened so you can write on it directly."

Rian took the stylus and tablet, and thankfully didn't turn it around so as to potentially lose track of which side was which. Instead, he used the stylus to make a few test lines on one of the tablet's corners, presumably to get used to the feeling of writing on it. "So, I ask you to erase any writing errors I have or do I just strike it through and live with our notes having indelible corrections on it?"

Lori twitched at that. "Don't make any mistakes," she said sternly.

"You realize that means I'll have to write slowly and carefully? I'm still getting used to this, after all."

She frowned, but… well, she supposed that was only reasonable. "Fine, fine. I'll try to speak slowly." She cleared her throat, preparing herself to dictate as the smiths who had made the prototype watched, waiting to hear what she'd say of their work. She hadn't really examined it yet, not wanting to have any thoughts on it before Rian arrived to record them.

Only now did she look at the completed prototype. Well, almost completed. It would have to be put on a base and there was still the bone rod to give it support, but for all intents and purposes, it was complete. "The first prototype consists of a white sample, measurements approximately three yustri long, one yustri thick in all its other dimensions, secured in a setting consisting of hardened gold wire. The sample and setting were then covered with a copper shell that completely encases the sample but does not make contact with it. The only point of contact is along the length of gold wire connected to the setting, which has been reinforced with copper sheets that have been folded and pressed to provide reinforcement."

Lori glanced at the two smiths, who nodded in confirmation. Rian was still writing, so she waited for him to finished before continuing. "The whole prototype is approximately thirty yustri long. Original length of gold wire used was approximately forty-five yustri, but some length was lost as a result of hardening for the portion that could make the setting. The remainder has been shaped into a spiral saucer…" Lori described the receptacle for containing beads. It currently wasn't ideal, but that wire wasn't hardened and could conceivably be reshaped, so that was fine. "Gold wire is not perfectly straight, but has been straightened for the purposes of presentation. Wire has not been hardened. Quench hardening was not possible while sample was not yet encased." She looked at the two smiths, gesturing to Rian to let him know not to dictate what followed. "As it is, do you think you can quench harden the wire without damaging the casing or letting any water inside?"

The redsmith frowned. "It might be possible, your bindership, but since you specified that the shell be air- and water-tight, heat might cause the air inside to expand."

Lori nodded. "Very well. It might be necessary to harden the length of the wire at some point. If it can't be reasonably work hardened, we might need to quench it. At worst, removing the shell and setting might be needed. Do you think you can rebuild it if needed?"

The two exchanged looks, then nodded.

"Very well. I shall have Rian inform you should it be needed. Thank you for your efforts. This is fine work. I will provide compensation as soon as I am able. You may return to you normal work."

Gently, she picked up the prototype. While it didn't matter if the wire was bent, that seemed… unseemly. "Come Rian. We need to test the prototype."

"Your Bindership?"

Lori paused, then turned towards the tinsmith who had spoken. Well, she supposed she had been talking to them. "Yes? Was there anything else?"

The man hesitated, glancing towards Rian. The latter, for his part, had smiled and nodded, which seemed to encourage the man. "Could you… could you tell us how well it works, when you're done doing… what you're going to do?"

Lori blinked at the request, but… well, she supposed it was only natural for two craftsmen to want to know the quality of their work was. "You will be informed," she said, then couldn't help adding, "I might have notes for improvements of the next iteration of the prototype."

Thankfully, the two had nodded, seemingly accepting that the prototype was unlikely to be perfect the first time. At the very least, even if Lori's experiments were successful, changes would have to be made to use fewer resources and make production easier.

Lori waited, but smiths said nothing more. She turned away. "Are you done, Rian? We have experiments to do."

"Ready, your Bindership," he said cheerfully. "Uh, could you remove this correction? And, uh, this one? And…?"