"Hah, you owe me a copper." The elf says to the woman sitting next to Helen, a dark-haired human who looks a little bit like she might be related to Amelia. "I told you she was bullshitting us."

"Well, she certainly wasn't lying about how good they look." Her could-be-cousin replies in a throaty purr that brings a flush to Amelia's cheeks. "Oh, you are too easy to get a rise out of." The woman giggles at Amelia's embarrassment.

"Oh, quit teasing her." The redhead, Lianna, shoves her friend lightly, almost pushing her out of the carriage. "Oops, sorry."

"Hey, Babe. Did you have a good lunch?" I ignore her friend's antics, and Amelia's deepening blush, and pull her into a hug. "I was just taking a break when we saw you girls reach the gate, but I'd be happy to get horizontal again now that you're here."

The blonde in my arms turns a bright cherry red when her friends start laughing at my wordplay. It seems that she tends to attract followers of Temmie if their reactions are anything to go by.

"Oh, I like this one." The dark-haired one says while wiping tears from her eyes. "I'm Delilah; this is Lianna and Lauren. And, you already met Helen."

"A pleasure to meet you." I return her wicked smile. "I have to ask, are you two related, there's just something about your eyes."

"Everyone asks that." She shakes her head and then pulls her hair back to reveal a slightly pointed ear. "Lauren and I are third cousins, despite not looking anything alike. But, as far as we could tell, there's no connection between Amelia and myself."

"You should have seen them this one time when Delilah got this potion from a sketchy alchemist to turn her hair blonde. They looked just like sisters." For some reason, Delilah winces when Lianna shares this story. "Well, right up until Del's hair started falling out, that is."

"I told you to quit telling that story." Del shoves her friend hard, but the redhead barely budges.

"Well, let me show you around while Amelia remembers how to speak." I just laugh when she elbows me in the ribs. "I'm glad I tidied up earlier, the place was a bit of a mess before."

"What are those trees?" Lauren has been glancing at them since they got out of the carriage. "How did you get so many different fruit to grow in one tree?"

"Ah, my Franken-trees." I guide us over to them. "I just made these earlier by grafting the similar species together. I could have put all these nuts with the stone fruit too, but it was getting a bit crowded on that one."

"You finally made one?" Amelia finally finds her voice. "Remember that book I showed you guys? Sorrel talking about these trees is why he copied it out for me."

"He's not going to start stitching body parts together next, is he?" Lauren asks with a teasing tone.

"Oh, I had enough trouble just getting that handful of true nuts to play nice together." I wave her teasing away. "Oh, sure, it might be doable in a pinch, but why bother. The girls I have now are already perfect."

"Don't even bother trying to tease him." Amelia warns. "The only time he actually gets embarrassed is when someone tries to praise him."

"Oh? Then you must know that they're calling you the savior of the city for stopping that blight?" Lauren arches an eyebrow, looking to get a rise out of me. "I hear the Baron is organizing the celebration for you personally."

"Cool." I shrug. "I'm sure Amelia can use that next time she's haggling with a merchant for me. Erick already told me about the party, but the whole savior thing sounds neat."

"Heheheh. I think you've met your match, Lauren." Delilah chuckles at her cousin. "Now, who are those little darlings over there, and what are they playing on?"

"Myra's the youngest, her sister is called Willow." The two girls wave when they see us looking over at them. "I made the jungle gym as a little bribe to keep them from climbing all over the exercise equipment that's hiding behind that hedge."

"Speaking of." Helen interjects. "When do we get to see you defy gravity?"

"Forget that, I want to see how he's making silk." Lianna counters.

Lauren's eyes light up and, even though she tries to hide it, her cousin and I still catch it. Sharing a wink with Delilah, I dismiss Lianna's suggestion. "Oh, we shouldn't bother Melanie, I'm sure she's busy."

"I'm more interested in seeing the house myself." Delilah plays along. "Why don't you give us a tour of that first. You can always get horizontal for us later." She nudges Lianna to play along. "A shame about the silk though, some of those designs Amelia showed us would look amazing in silk. I'd love to see some being made."

"Oh, the first thing Sorrel is going to make is some silk stockings." Apricot adds, clearly aware that we're teasing Lauren. "All day, he's been obsessed with the idea of wrapping our legs in soft, shimmery, fabric. Even went so far as to improvise a new spell just so that he could craft some glassware that Melanie needed to make enough for what he wanted."

"Don't forget about the other intimates." I purr back, watching Lauren practically drool out of the corner of my eyes. "I have a whole set planned, all silk and black lace." A barely audible whimper escapes from Lauren at the mention of lace.

"You have to promise not to rip these off this time." Amelia joins in on the fun, glad for the chance to get one over on her friend. "I know you can make as much as you want, but I don't know if I could stand the thought of you tearing such fine clothes to shreds."

"Gods damn you. Stop, please. I surrender." Lauren breaks down. "I'm sorry I tried to tease your man, but that's just going too far."

"Oh, gods." Delilah pants out between laugh. "I think that's the best you've ever gotten her, Amelia. These two are clearly good for you."

"You did bring this one on yourself, Lauren." Helen pats her on the back. "And, clothes have always been your biggest weakness."

"Does this mean we can go see how it's made now?" Lianna asks in a hopeful tone that causes the rest of us to start laughing.

"Sure." I can't help but smile at her exuberance. "I've been wondering how the new spinneret is working out."

...

"Ah, Sorrel. Great timing." Melanie greets me when I lead the way into the lab. "This new jar is working perfectly, we're almost out stuff to spool the thread on. Oh, hello." She adds when she finally spots the other women behind me.

"Hi, Mels." Amelia steps forward. "These are my friends Helen, Lianna, Delilah, and Lauren; they were hoping to see how the silk is being made."

"You're all welcome to." She waves everybody forward. "As you can see, Sorrel reorganized things a bit, so there's more than enough room for everyone. Cat is just using the Albacator to purify another batch of the reagent." Her apprentice is focused on one of the magical devices I didn't particularly understand.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"Is that one of the improvements you found?" I ask, genuinely curious.

"Yes." She beams. "It's somewhat laborious, but running the reagent through the purification process increases its effectiveness by over thirty-five percent. And, that's only if I don't run it through the infuser first. When we do that it jumps to nearly fifty percent. I'm still experimenting with the solution itself, but I need to get a good baseline before I can begin to modify it."

"That is all excellent news." I beam a smile at the alchemist. "May I examine the finished product?"

"Of course." She chuckles and guides us over to a table piled high with makeshift spools.

"Oh, this is much better than that first batch." I pick up a spool of silken filaments and begin spinning the loose fiber into thread. "Much smoother and refined, it seems the glass spinneret is doing the trick nicely."

"It smells better too." Apricot adds after giving some of the silk a quick sniff.

"Yes, I've started giving the fibers a quick run through the calcinator to recover as much of the reagent as possible." Melanie replies. "I've also tried the spell Sorrel showed me, but the quantities are so small that I'm not having much luck."

"Oh, there's an idea." One by one, I start drawing out all the chemicals involved in the process from the thread I'm playing around with, along with anything they might have broken down into. "Apricot?"

"Yeah, that did it." She nods. "It smells just like plain cotton now."

"Bit of a hassle to go through all that every time though." I frown slightly at the thread. "I wonder if I might be able to invert the spell. Instead of drawing one substance out, if I could push away everything that isn't that once substance..."

"Sorrel, Baby." Amelia taps me on the arm before I get completely lost in thought. "Invent a brand new spell later, we have guests right now. Guests who would like to see you do more than wave that thread about."

"Aww, why'd you interrupt him?" Apricot whines. "It's always so hot when he bends magic to his will."

"I'm with the pixie." Lianna says with a laugh. "No idea what he was doing, but damned if he didn't look good doing it."

"He does have a certain aura about him when he focuses on something." Delilah says while smirking at her cousin who just gulped audibly, though I think most of Lauren's attention was for the thread rather than the intense look I get when faced with a new puzzle. "Makes you wonder what it would be like if he turned that focus on you."

"Down girls." Helen bops all three of them on the head. "Amelia found him first, you'll just have to settle for the deep discount she's going to give us when we order clothes from him."

"Heheheheh." I chuckle darkly and wrap my arms around my girl, pulling her embarrassed form into a hug from behind. "Amelia offering a discount? I'm not sure we know the same woman."

""Hahahahah."" Her friends crack up laughing at the indignant look that crosses Amelia's face.

"Shut up." She pushes her way out of my arms. "And, if you four keep laughing like that you can forget about getting any clothes from him."

"N-no need to go that far, Amelia." Lauren's stutter is quickly covered over by her smooth facade. "We were just having a little fun."

"Yeah." Lianna's head bobs up and down. "And, you do have to admit that your new man does have our little merchant pegged."

"Quit digging the hole deeper, girls." Delilah says out of the corner of her mouth while Helen tries to hold back a snicker for the look on Amelia's face right now.

"So, how is the pump on the jar working out?" I come to their rescue with a question for Melanie. "I saw a rune in my books that should work as a good replacement, but I need to work on my enchanting a bit more before I can implement it."

"It's good." She replies with an amused smile for the looks of relief on Amelia's girlfriends. "It takes a few pumps before there's enough pressure to produce a solid thread, but the losses are negligible. Cat, that batch should be done by now, so why don't you fill-up the jar for us."

The young apprentice carefully transfers the blue liquid from the device she's been running it through into the jar I made. She then weighs out a measure of cotton to dissolve into the solution. All the while, she is careful not to even look in my direction.

"This model works well." Melanie continues. "But, I am a little worried about the bubbles that escape from the bend in the pipe. Could you make one with a built-in acid bath? That way the spinneret could just poke straight out."

"That shouldn't be a problem." I say and then chuckle a little bit. "Honestly, I'm surprised you haven't loaded me up with requests for glassware yet."

"Don't worry, I will be." She returns my laugh. "Just wait until we start production for real, especially if you can enchant it too."

"Yeah, I was planning to spend most of tomorrow working through the books Ro gave me." I nod. "I still need to make that music recorder for Lori, and speaking of. Have you had a chance to experiment with the hard rubber yet?"

"Sorry, not yet." She shakes her head. "Between Catherine and the silk, I just haven't had a chance to get to it."

"That's alright." I wave her concerned look away. "Your apprentice should be your focus right now. Feel free to hire some more help if you need it. I don't know about the Albacator, but surely you don't need an alchemist to stir stuff or spool thread."

"I was thinking about doing just that." She replies seriously. "I've been testing the rubber gloves you made and they're perfect for this. There's no reaction to either the reagent or the acid bath, so as long as they're wearing those any regular worker should be fine running this."

"I'll make some goggles too." I add. "I can adapt the enchantment for the music player into a spinning fan to increase ventilation, and I can also add some of that pickle crisp to charcoal to make an excellent air filter."

"Of course you can." She laughs. "I know Delainey is going to want to see those along with the gloves. But, it looks like the solution is ready to go now." While we've been talking Cat has been stirring in cotton, dissolving it until the mixture resembles honey in consistency.

"This is so cool." Lianna says exuberantly. She and the others have been closely following the now nervous-looking apprentices every movement. "You can really turn it back into string?"

"If we had some spools for it to go on, sure." Melanie replies with a pointed look in my direction as she seals the lid on the jar. A moment later she has a crate full of empty spools. I even slip all the thread off of the pencils, stirrers, and test tubes she's been using, freeing them up for their regular duties.

"You really outdid yourself here." I compliment her after taking full stock of all the thread while she produces even more. "There's more than enough here for what I had in mind. If we're already making this much, I'm going to have to step up looking for a weaver and a seamstress. Too bad I don't know anyone who seems obsessed with clothes, or I'd ask them for a recommendation."

"Heheheheh." Delilah can't help but snicker at the look on her cousin's face right now. "Yeah, that's a real shame; it could even set back the whole release of this new fabric. It could take you weeks or even months to find someone suitable."

"I might know a few people in the textile business." Lauren venture coolly.

"Oh, I couldn't impose." I wave my hands in negation. "I mean what's a month or two, really?"

"Damn you, Amelia." The elf's haughty exterior cracks. "Did you go out of your way to find someone like him just to mess with me?"

"Hahahaha." All of her friends crack up laughing at Lauren's loss of control.

"Yeah, yeah laugh it up." She endures their taunting laughter. "I'm still coming back here tomorrow with the best seamstress in town; she has her apprentices do all the weaving for her too."

"Well then, I'm sure you'll need a sample to... entice her." I sidle closer and lower my voice an octave. "There won't be much leftover, so it will have to be something small, delicate even." She flushes slightly and swallows audibly when I say that.

"Ohh?" Her voice catches when I reach up like I'm about to stroke her cheek.

"Yes, a scarf!" I say, all bright and cheery while pulling in to view the sheer length of fabric that I wove behind her back. "And, don't you just love this floral pattern? I thought she'd like to see what some of my dyes can do."

"Damn, Amelia. This one is dangerous." Delilah chokes out between howling laughter for her cousin's bright red face. "Please, tell me that you're keeping him around."

"I'm not sure Ren will survive if I do." Amelia replies with a soft titter of her own. "I don't think I've ever seen her blush, let alone that deeply."

"You guys suck." The elf snatches the scarf from my hand before turning away with a pout.

"Aww, Ren-Ren." Delilah gloms onto her cousin's back. "Don't be like that. At least let us see the scarf first." She laughs and tries to peel it out of Lauren's grasp.

"Hey, hey, hey." I raise my voice when the playful tug-of-war looks like it's going to turn serious. "No roughhousing in the alchemy lab, please. I'd rather not have to heal any acid burns today, or ever preferably."

""Sorry."" They both hang their heads in the same motion.

"It's alright, this time." I say. "But, we really should get out of Melanie's hair." I start herding the women out of the lab. "Sorry for bothering you, Mel. And, thank you for all the hard work. I'll get you that fan and the air filter as soon as I can."

"That's fine." She nods. "Thank you for putting on the show, that was the most entertainment I've had in a while. Might have been a little too stimulating for some, though." She laughs while looking at the pink cheeks of her apprentice.