The woman—Lori checked her hand, where she'd written a name in lightwisps—Vanessa had been amenable, at Rian's prompting, to enclose her… well, it was technically a smithy, since it was used for working and shaping metal, but the lack of furnace and forge made Lori not want to call it that. Workshop, perhaps? Whatever it was called, she was amenable to raising up metal panels in front of the open wall to enclose the room, using that strangely thin fabric as a curtain to cover the remaining opening as a door.

"After all, we wouldn't want the others to see Lori here and panic," Rian said, "or worse, talk to her."

"Yeah, that… would probably be bad," Vanessa agreed.

Lori said nothing, merely standing up against the far wall—the one covered by dirt on the outside—to protect her back and absently binding some lightwisps to illuminate the now darker room. The metal walls provided nothing to anchor the wisps to, so she warmed a spot with firewisps, and anchored the lightwisps there. She and Vanessa were left alone in silence as Rian went out to collect the ones he thought Lori needed to speak with. Fortunately, she didn't bother making small talk. Instead, after one last glance at Lori, the woman had gone back to making shovels. Naturally, Lori had watched.

The woman had started with a sheet of metal, which had appeared after she had traced her fingers over the metal table. Lori had been amused to see her take a stencil made of leather and use a metal stylus to trace out an outline on the metal. She had run her finger over the outline, and the metal had simply separated at the outline. Vanessa had then simply tossed the excess metal to the side, letting it clatter to the floor in a way that made Lori wince. She was about to pick up the metal—if the woman didn't want it, she was taking it—only to see that it was starting to dissolve. The solid-seeming metal was breaking apart, reducing into a silvery dust that eventually started to shimmer and fade away. In moment, the cast-off metal was gone, leaving nothing behind.

…

Ah. That was what was meant by the metal ceasing to exist. Yes, not really something they could sell without it being a fraudulent product.

The woman—Lori checked her hand—Vanessa began to shape the shovel-head-to-be, working it in her hands. It acted like stiff paper, flexing in her hands, yet holding its shape when she let go. Every change was accompanied by that strange heat haze shimmer, which was probably a result of her actively using whatever strange, deviated magic she possessed. Lori remembered the old aphorism, of how magic was the means through which the soul affected the world beyond without the intervention of the body. Of course, by that criteria there were people who argued that meant art, music, and discourse was a form of magic, which was simply absurd…

The shovelhead was being attached to a branch—there some lengths stacked next to one wall—when Rian entered the workshop. He had regained his usual annoying cheerfulness, because he announced himself with a jovial "We're here!" as people followed behind him.

"Oh, shit," the first person entering after Rian said upon seeing Lori.

Vanessa nodded, her smile a bit sickly. "Yup, that's what I said."

The dark-haired newcomer—she had the same dark hair as the metal-creating woman, face as sun-tanned but arms slightly paler—frowned, glancing towards Lori. She mouth opened slightly, visibly changing what she was planning to say. Finally, she turned towards Rian, and her frown deepened. "I thought we had an agreement, Rian?"

"I agreed not to tell her about you, and I didn't," Rian said. "But I never agreed to lie for you, Katherine. Keeping yourselves secret was on you, and unfortunately for you, Binder Lori asked where all the tools were coming from. If it helps, she didn't try to kill Vanessa on sight, but she'd like answers now."

The next person to come stepped inside, took one look at Lori, then abruptly turned on his heel and started to walk out again.

"No, you get back here," the new woman said, raising her hand towards him, her fist clenched as if she was holding something. There was a shimmer, and for the first time Lori saw the shimmer had a slight tinge of a vivid yellowish green before it formed into a long metal rod with a hooked end. The hook caught his bicep, there was another green-tinged shimmer, and now there was a loop on the end of the rod, shackling the arm loosely. Slipping out of the loop would have been easy, but the way the new woman was holding the rod, it would be difficult for them do that. "If we have to deal with this, so do you."

"I didn't agree to that," the man said dourly. Still, he turned away from the door, leaning against one of the metal walls with his arms crossed, pointedly looking at the metal ring around his arm. Ring and rod shimmered and vanished as the new woman turned to face Lori again, her arms also crossed over her chest.

"The others should be here soon," Rian said. "Yoctoha is helping with the butchering, so Seraphine has agreed to attend on their group's behalf."

Even as they spoke, the fabric sheet that functioned as the door was pushed aside, and Lori tensed. She claimed the darkwisps within her clothes, under everyone's clothes, under the table, and hidden in the spaces among the little pile of branches, imbuing them and getting ready to put them between her and the Mentalist who had just entered. Though Lori didn't move save to tighten her hold on her staff, Lee Fei—of course she'd remember the name of a potential threat!—slowed, looking wary. "I have no quarrel with you, Binder Lori, nor do I seek your power. You need not fear me." She directed an annoyed and accusing look towards Rian, however, one that Lori found herself mirroring.

"Rian, why is she here?" She'd already known about the Mentalist.

Instead of answering, Rian turned to Lee Fei as some more people entered the workshop, pausing slightly as they saw Lori was there. "It's now or never. Well, now or later, but I don't think choosing later will make her any better disposed towards you."

The Mentalist's face remained completely impassive, but she became unnaturally still, in that way only Mentalists—and, Lori supposed, Dungeon Binders using Mentalism—could achieve. Eventually, she said, "To cultivate knowledge, let us be rid of lies." It had the sound of a quote.

"Wonderful," Rian said. "Then let's just wait for the others."

Lori didn't relax, even as Lee Fei visibly made a point of moving to stand at the point of the room farthest from Lori, and closed her eyes, her hands folded over her stomach. However, she didn't have the luxury of concentrating only on one person. Lori claimed the airwisps within the room, the earthwisp beneath and around the metal, the loose lightwisps in the air, and the firewisps around—

"Are you well?" Lori found herself saying, glaring intently at the man leaning against the wall.

The man raised a single eyebrow. "I'm fine. Why do you ask?"

"The air around you is far too hot. You must be feverish."

"Huh, you can tell that from all the way there? No, I'm fine. This is a normal body temperature for me. I naturally run a little hot."

"That sounds dangerously unhealthy. Have yourself examined by a medic as soon as possible. We cannot afford anyone being sick." They had medics, she distinctly remembered that…

He rolled his eyes at her. "As one of those medics, I examine myself and declare I'm in good health. Thank you for your concern."

"Get a second examination from someone else," Lori said flatly.

"See? I told you she was nice," Rian said cheerfully.

"You have low standards of nice, Rian," the new woman said. "Vanessa, it looks like we'll be meeting in your space, so…"

"Chairs coming up, boss," Vanessa said, setting her unfinished shovel aside for a moment. Lori watched with interest as she began producing metal chairs out of thin air in a shimmer of—Lori saw now—red heat haze. Unlike the shovel, she didn't need to bend and shape these. Instead, they seemed to grow from her hand instantly, tubes of metal seemed to grow from her hand to form the familiar shape of a chair's legs, back, backrest, and seat. Instead of being flat metal panels, the seat and back had a slight curve, and for some reason were perforated with little decorative holes. Vanessa made the new chairs quickly, clearly having far more practice with these than with the shovel heads. Soon, there were chairs all around the metal table, which also received extensions to make it a bit larger.

As she finished, four other people arrived, prompting one more exclamation of 'Oh, shit'. One immediately drew Lori's attention.

"What is he doing here?" she said, pointing at the dark-haired young man who she recognized as one of the annoying ones who primarily spoke the same unintelligible dialect.

"He's been invaluable in keeping his fellows from finding out about this place," Rian said, nodding towards the other man, who nodded back, even though he looked uncomfortable and out of place. "How about everyone sit down so I can facilitate introductions?"

"Why bother?" the feverish man said as he pushed off from the wall and grabbed one of the chairs. It scraped across the strange metal floor in a way that made Lori wince and had some people glaring at him. He ignored it, sitting down on the hair and slouching so far the back of his head was resting on the backrest of the chair, and it was not a high back. "She'll just forget all of them."

"Well, we can write your names down on the table in front of you so she'll be able to tell you apart," Rian said, rolling his eyes.

"Vanessa, if you'd make us some name plates, please?" the other metal-creating woman that—Lori checked her hand—Vanessa had acknowledged as her boss said.

Vanessa sighed, even as she started making lengths of triangular tube. "Vanessa do this, Vanessa do that…" she started to mutter.

"Vanessa, stop complaining," was the response as the tubes were set down on the table in front of the chairs.

"Hostile work environment! I'm complaining to HR."

Rian pulled back the chair that had been placed at one end of the table. "Binder Lori?" he said, a clear invitation.

Lori gave him one last annoyed glare—she would definitely be having words with him after all this was done, but for the moment she still needed him—before she took the seat at implied the head of the table. Tellingly there was no other seat at the opposite end of her, even though there were nine other people. She gave Rian another look and pointed at seats to her left. He took the hint, sitting where indicated. A still-muttering Vanessa deliberately took one of the triangular tubes, scribbling on it with the metal stylus.

The tip of the stylus shaved off metal like it was soft wax—didn't she say the metal was supposed to be steel?—and when the triangular tube was set down, it had Rian's name in all capitals, lopsided handwriting like that of a child just learning. Or an adult who couldn't be bothered to do better, which was in fact the case. Fortunately, it was still perfectly readable, though a part of Lori twitched to look at the sloppy writing.

One by one, everyone sat down. Lee Fei sat furthest from Lori at the right of the table, an empty space opposite her, her hands flat on the tabletop. The feverish one sat down next to her, still slouched. Next to him was yet another dark-haired woman, her hair showing brown at the edges where light managed to pass through it, who's smile was wide and reminded Lori far too much of Rian's. The next seat closer to Lori was occupied by the second metal-creating woman, whose face was smooth and composed, her hands on the table with the fingers interlaced together. Between her and Lori sat a dark-haired young man who looked suspiciously like one of those idiots with the unintelligible dialect.

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On the other side of the table, opposite the feverish man, sat a woman about Lori's height, with pale blonde hair that had been pulled back in a tail with a strip of leather cord. Lori vaguely recognized her as one of three people close to Hatarine who didn't obviously obsess about her. Disturbingly, she had a curved sword hanging from a belt at her waist. Next to the blonde was either a child or a very small woman. Notably, unlike the others who were wearing simple shirts or blouses, and cloudbloom trousers, this woman was wearing a dress. It was a well-made, hardy dress, but clearly a dress, of the sort worn by more well-off women when they were being idle in public at cafes. Her impractically long, more brilliantly bright blonde hair was held in place away from her face with metal hair clips, and Lori suspected that, seated as she was, her hair was touching the floor. On the table in front of her, her hands resting on it possessively, was a thick book that had actual metal hinges and fittings, with what looked like a locking mechanism of all things keeping the book shut. Vanessa and Rian sat in the remaining places, the table in front of the former full of metal shavings that were slowly dissolving into non-existence.

"All right, then," Rian began. "You've already met Vanessa, and you actually remember Lee Fei. Next to Lee Fei is Stephen, one of our technically-medics, cooks, and alchemist. He's keeping himself secret because if they knew about him, some people would pester him to make black powder for them. He only really represents himself and his friend Anna, but since they're the most experienced medics we have, I thought you should meet."

"Damned eehsecays," he sighed.

"You're a 'damned eehsecay' too, Steve," the woman next to him said cheerfully as Vanessa moved one of the triangular tubes in front of him, angled so that the crudely written name on it face Lori.

She was met with an annoyed elbow for her trouble. "Don't call me 'Steve', Mary Sue."

"And on that convenient transition, the woman next to him is Marissa," Rian said smoothly as the two started to elbow at each other like children. "She's one of our hunters who goes out to kill beasts and bring them back for butchering. She's here to represent the simbohls." The what?

"Hi!" The woman waved at Lori for some reason as Vanessa push one of the name triangles towards them.

"Vanessa's boss there is Katherine dela Rosa, Katherine for short. She's the leader of the gising." He said the last word strangely, stressing the two separate syllables. It was either some dialect term, or a completely made up word.

"Which means what, exactly?" Lori demanded.

"I am told it means something like 'Awake'," Lee Fei said from the end of the table. "Fascinating word. Meaning and usage is completely contextual, with no change in form or structure to denote alteration of meaning…"

"Oh, the stories I can tell you…" Marissa said.

"Moving on," Rian interrupted. "This is Senou Kaede-san—"

"Hai hai, Kaede desu."

"—who, yes, is one of the Japanese eehsecay. He's one of the more level-headed of them. Well, there are a lot who are pretty level-headed and just want to get along, get by and survive, but unfortunately the loud, disruptive idiots are the ones who stand out. He's been a big help in helping us keep the Industry Complex secret from his fellows."

"Don't want baka get sword," he said, shaking his head fiercely. "Worse, gun."

"We won't give them any anyway, but having them bothering us about it will be a pain in the ass," Katherine said.

"Also, Kaede-san got lucky and saw someone doing magic that they shouldn't have been able to," Rian said.

Kaede—Kaede-san? His name triangle read 'Seno Kaideh'— shrug. "Luck stat, es-es-ar-eeh-ecks."

"Back at the end, we have Mara Clara, or simply Mara. She's also one of our medics, and is the one who accompanies hunters out into the Iridescence in case anyone gets injured."

"Not that it is often need," Mara said. "Those who venture forth have learned to git gud and are not unskilled."

Lori frowned. "What was that?"

"Git gud," Lee Fei said. "It is difficult but the meaning can be roughly translated as 'attain excellence'. It denotes one who has honed their skills to sharpness, cultivating their technique to ascend to the heavens."

For some reason, the feverish one—Lori checked his name plate—Stephen started coughing.

"Are you sure you're not sick?" she said sharply.

"Sorry," he said, his voice deep and strained for a moment. "Spit went down the wrong way. I'm fine."

"While Mara isn't the leader of her group—that's pretty much Hatarine, at least in essence—she's the most level-headed person among them, and they trust her to represent them properly."

"And they don't trust any of the others to use their absence to not get some sort of advantage with Hatarine," Stephen said dryly.

"That as well," Mara confirmed, even though the statement made no sense to Lori.

"Haremu skeellu es-es-ar-eeh-ecks," Kaede said, whatever that meant.

"And finally, we have Seraphine," Rian said, which by the process of elimination was likely the hopefully small woman with the impractical hair. The alternative was that she was a child. "She represents the other shardessi, who can't be here because they're busy butchering our meat for storage or are still out on the hunt."

"Binder Lori," the small woman nodded, her voice too deep to be a child's, confirming Lori supposition as Vanessa put the last name triangle in front of her. "I give you my word that none in our group wishes you any harm, or desire any sort of position or influence in your government. If we could live out… there—" she waved in the direction of the Iridescence, "—without being in any danger of Iridiation, we would do so. None of us wish to usurp your position of power and leadership. We just want to live quietly and do our research. "

"Join the club," Stephen said just loudly enough to be audible.

"Your words are noted," Lori said, glancing one last time at Rian. "We shall see the truth of them. Answer me this: who is the Whisperer in hiding?"

Whatever they were all expecting, it wasn't that. There were confused expressions, and some exchanged looks.

"To my knowledge, there are no other Whisperers in the… the demesne," Katherine said slowly.

"Then explain the lightningwisps around the long building," Lori said, pointing towards one of the walls, on the other side of which would have been the large lean-to-like building.

"Lightni—oh!" Katherine said, snapping her fingers for some reason. "The bug repellant field." Was that what that was? "That's Trini's work. She set it up to keep away bugs being drawn in from all the smells. She's not a Whisperer. She's a gising, like Vanessa and me."

Lori suppressed the, admittedly facetious, urge to correct her grammar. "Not a Whisperer," she said flatly. "She controls lightningwisps, but she's somehow not a Whisperer. Do you take me for a fool?"

"She's not a Whisperer because she's like us," Vanessa interrupted. "Because she's gising. I told you I can control temperature, right? Well, Trini can control ele—lightning. Like me, her magic has nothing to do with Whispering."

"Your magic," Lori said, voice still flat. "Your magic that involves creating metal and fabric, and controlling temperature."

"Or lightning," Katherine said, and Lori turned to face her. "Or weight. Or light and sound. Or time. Or force. Or magic itself."

"Huh. That explains a lot," the woman next to her—Lori couldn't be bothered to check the name—said, sounding thoughtful. She seemed to be counting on her fingers. "Just those?"

Katherine glanced sideways at her. "Yes, just those. As I understand it, Whispering controls heat, light, shadows, mineral solids, water, and air. And you can't make metal. Not out of the air, at least. The very fact that we can create dreamsteel should already be a big sign we're not Whisperers, even if there's some overlap. From what I have heard, both Whispering and Deadspeaking can change the shape of teeth and bones, and Mentalists can perceive lightningwisps to a degree."

That… was true…

…

There was a logical conclusion to be reached from this. One that Lori had been avoiding. One that was the obvious conclusion to reach when she first saw Vanessa making metal out of nothing.

"You possess a new type of magic," Lori said slowly. "One that is neither Whispering, Deadspeaking, Mentalism, nor Horotracting." Or an old one. One that predated memory. "How?"

"We don't know," Vanessa said. "We just… woke up able to do this."

"We had to teach ourselves," Katherine said. "We didn't trust the government not to just lock us up for study. Or use us. Or try to breed us."

"Yup, that sounds like the government, all right," Stephen said, nodding amiably. "Assholes."

"Present company exempted, I'm sure," Rian said cheerfully.

"Oh, like being set on fire is any better for most people." He looked at Lori as he said that.

"I currently lack the facilities to contain anyone for study," Lori said. "And you have made yourself of use of your own volition. And breeding is disgusting." Slowly, she looked towards the others. "I know why the… the gising—" for some reason, people winced. Ugh, well, it was her first time trying to pronounce it! "—are in hiding. The draw of unlimited metal tools… unlimited metal and fabric… However, by the fact you identify as separate groups, you are not all gising." Was that closer? Ugh, she hated pronouncing terms wrong! It made her look uneducated! "Why do you hide?" She looked at Stephen. "Surely it can't be simply to hide your skill with alchemy."

He nodded towards her. "To clarify, even though you call it firewisps, you can't actually control fire, right? Not the actual, burning fire."

A pointedly leading question, so Lori simply nodded, even as she concentrated on her connection to her core, her awareness of her demesne's wisps…

He raised his finger, and suddenly there was a flame dancing there. It was a clear, yellow flame like a candle flame, but…

"Wait, what are you burning?" Vanessa exclaimed. "An open flame needs fuel! You can't be burning the air, it's the wrong color!"

"Oh, right, you haven't seen this before," Katherine muttered.

"Is it your finger? Are you burning fat from your pores? That's it, isn't it!"

"You know the answer is 'magic', right," Stephen said with a smirk.

"Bullshit!" What? "There are rules! For there to be flame, something needs to be burning, even if it's just the molecules in the air!"

"Magic. It's burning my magic as fuel."

"So, what, you can convert your magic into a flammable substance?"

"Magic is fire. Fire is magic." The feverish man shrugged, and the flame disappeared. "The magic itself is what's burning, with no need for intermediaries like fuel. Although I'll admit, they do help."

Firewisps. Lightwisps. Heat and light, as would have been natural for an open flame… and yet, it was like the wisps had simply spontaneously appeared. No source. No bindings.

Slowly, Lori turned her attention to Lee Fei.

"I am not a Mentalist," the woman said immediately, "though it was a convenient, if dangerous, ruse and obfuscation for this one to allow you to believe so. While there are curious commonalities that I wish to study further should I ever meet a true Mentalist and risk revealing myself in this manner, in mechanism we differ greatly and our similarities are superficial. I am in truth a zian, one who seeks the ascend on the path of immortality by cultivating my mind and skill through effort and study. To that end, I study and learn from the world to be better study and learn myself."

Oh. Someone from the Mysteries of alknowledge. Well, she supposed a particularly driven one could be mistaken for a Mentalist. In fact, this one had been. She supposed zian was some kind of rank or position within the Mysteries, probably from some distant demesne she'd never heard of.

Lori simply nodded, and turned towards—she checked the name on the triangular tube—Marissa. "And you? You represent the… simbohls, correct? What are you, exactly?"

Marissa grinned. "Simbohls are the pretty guardians, the warriors of truth, love and justice! With the powers love, hope, faith, righteousness, fear, anger, and despair, we—"

"They're Magical Girls," Stephen said blandly.

"Hey! Did I interrupt your little show? And that's reductive! We've got guys too!"

"Oh. Faceless. That explains much," Lee Fei said.

"You have despair powers?" Vanessa said, sounding incredulous. "Did anyone happen to make a contract with—"

"Enough!" Lori snapped. Fortunately, everyone quieted. That didn't always works with her. "Spare me the theatrics and give me the explanation."

"Simbohls can use powerful magic, but only when they're in a state of emotional extreme," someone said. "Those emotions are love, hope, intense belief in an external force, intense personal certainty, fear, anger or despair. Each person has a specific emotion they must feel intensely to manifest their power. In practice, many potential simbohls never realize their power, as the probability of attaining the correct emotional extreme is highly improbable. This is not helped by the fact that until they simbohlays, usually by facing possible death while in the correct emotional extreme, there is no way to know for certain if someone is a sihmbol or not."

Slowly, everyone turned to look at the diminutive—Lori checked her name—Seraphine. The book in front of her was open, and she was perusing a page near the front of the book. At their looks, she shrugged, closing her tome. There was a click as the lock sealed shut again. "Simbohls are not unknown to us. Neither are payrotergists." What?

For some reason, the dark-hair—Lori checked. Seno Kaideh—sighed. "Riajuu…" He sounded both bitter and exasperated.