Demesne 23 - The Importance of Lunch (Patreon)

For several days, the entire settlement worked to rebuild. In a way, the fact that not many houses and buildings had been raised was lucky for them, as there wasn't much that had been damaged. There was still a lot, but not every family had lost their house. Most of what did need to structural repairs was left to Lori, which meant she was up and working all hours of the day, and had to go back to a Dungeon that was still being used as a dining hall and hospital. She also still hadn't gotten her bedroom back, meaning she was back to sleeping on rock in an enclosed, secure alcove, and hoped no one got the bright idea of using smoke to kill her in her sleep. It wouldn't work, but it might asphyxiate other people in the cave, and that would be annoying.

Most who weren't Lori were cleaning up, gathering the debris that had fallen in the dragon's passing for any valuable or useful materials. The remaining roof that was no longer wood had been stripped off and set aside to be replaced in case it was dangerous or poisonous, and Lori had claimed it for something to study. The fields of wild edible plants they'd set up had… well, some had things fall on them, some had grown wildly, some had fused together with the other plants next to them, but most had been completely unaffected. A lot of the men and some of the women were armed with spears (which Lori had to make) in case one of the dragonborn abominations wandered close, and there had already been three encounters.

Fortunately no one had died, but a man had hurt his arm from a beastly abomination biting it, and it had been pure luck the thing hadn't been able to get any of its claws to bear. Lori and Rian had been able to drive it off and later kill it, but now she was down a worker with a mauled arm. It could have been much worse, since when they finally killed it the thing turned out not to have any teeth, but instead crushing ridges in its jaws. It hadn't been the man's dominant side, but that still meant he was laid up in her cave, recovering so the arm wouldn't need to be amputated.

Really, why did all these things have to happen to inconvenience her?

Still, after several days and much hard work later, the settlement was finally back to where they had started.

Tables and benches had been recovered from the collapsed dining hall, and they'd repaired what they could since it was faster than building new ones. The furniture been brought to the Dungeon so the settlement would have someplace to eat while the dining hall was being cleared and rebuilt, and Lori had needed to rebuild the kitchen facilities so they wouldn't have to keep staining the floors of her Dungeon with soot.

The reservoir was constantly being refilled using stone piping and waterwisps now, and she'd added more lavatories. When the pit outside the dungeon she'd been pulling the waste into had threatened to overflow, Rian had suggested desiccating the waste. Lori had to admit, pulling all the water out of the waste certainly helped compact it and cut down on the smell. When they could finally start farming, they'd have a good cache of fertilizer, since the latrine field had become overgrown.

"Ugh…" Lolilyuri groaned, lying face-down on one of the rebuilt tables that they'd pulled from the dining hall. They'd rubbed it down with sand from the river to smooth it, but she felt she could still feel the debris on it, and thought it felt lopsided. It probably wasn't but it certainly felt like it. Her feet hurt, her socks felt … crusty, the waterwisplings she'd caught had… well, 'died' seemed as good a descriptor as any, despite her carefully binding and imbuing them, and the reverberations of people eating and talking was giving her a headache and making her long for her nice, big, empty Dungeon. She still hadn't found time to do her laundry, not helped by the fact most of her clothes were under piles of metal in her room. With things finally rebuilt, that should change later today, and she intended to be on hand to watch in case anyone made off with what little she had. "All this work, just to be right back where we started."

"Not completely where we started," Rian said, handing her a bowl of food. She accepted it when she saw it had a spoon in it. "We have some new metal now. It's not a lot, but the smiths think they can use it for more tools. We even found some gold for you."

Lori supposed that was true. Gold wasn't useful for much except art since it was too soft to build with, but wizards prized it as a very good conductor of magic. With gold, she could draw wire, and with wire, she might finally be able to start on her ideas for a binding that would automatically and constantly be imbued by her core. It was a nice thought, and actually made Lori smile. It was certainly something nice to look forward to.

…Even so, her socks still felt crusty. Sighing, she started to eat their usual meal of stewed unspecified meat in unspecified meat stock with added unspecified wild plants.

"So, I spoke to the doctors, and Mister Havin's arm doesn't seem to be getting infected," Rian said. "I'm having him help watch the children on seeling duty so he'll have something to do while he's recovering. The dining hall should be finished by tomorrow, and then after that the carpenters can go back to putting roofs and houses. All told, it could all be a lot worse."

"Does this mean I get my Dungeon back?" Lori said.

"Yes, we're moving all the tables out tomorrow," Rian said. "So if you can make the entrance bigger to fit all the tables, we'd really appreciate it. Then you can go back to living alone in your big, empty cave."

"Dungeon," Lori corrected.

Rian rolled his eyes. "You actually like living like this, don't you? All alone in a hole in the ground, by yourself?"

"It's quiet and it's all mine," Lori said. "I'm even willing to be lenient about music past sundown as long as I can't hear it."

"How generous of you," Rian drawled.

"I'd rather they do it out there instead of in here where it echoes," Lori said.

"You used to live next to a musician, didn't you?" Rian said.

Lori shook her head. "No, our apartment was in too good a neighborhood for a musician to afford to live there."

"Huh. I'd have thought… why do you have a problem with music, then?" Rian said.

Because every time a dragon passed their demesne, people would always start playing music and dancing in the shelters while Lori was trying to sleep. "That's my business," she said.

"All right, fair enough," Rian said.

They ate in silence for a moment.

"Are you getting as bored with this food as I am?" Rian said.

"It's all we have, and it's meat," Lori said, though she was getting bored of it, yes.

"If you want to increase morale, you can help the children catch one or two of the fat, adult seels, and we can render down its fat for oil," Rian sighed. "I think beast meat would taste great fried."

"Sounds like a lot of work, and I'm already doing a lot of that," Lori said dismissively. "Fried, you say?"

"Yup, all we need is a good pan and some seel oil, and we'd have some nice fried beast," Rian said. "Fried leg meat would be delicious. It'll be all soft and juicy…"

"Rian, you're already eating, why are you drooling?" Lori said, even as she had another spoonful. Why did the food suddenly taste even more lacking than it already had?

"Tail meat might be good too…" Rian went on, not seeming to hear her, off on his own little demesne. "Not breast meat, that's always too dry…"

"Rian, I'm trying to eat. Stop mentioning hypothetically more delicious things, you're turning me off my food," Lori said sternly.

"It's too bad we don't have any flour of anything, flour-covered fried meat is even better…" Rian sighed with a lust usually reserved for lascivious fantasies and lewd talk.

Lori kicked him under the table.

"Ow!"

"Stop fantasizing and eat your food," Lori said. "I probably worked hard at some point to kill it, don't let it go to waste."

"I'm almost sure this is seel meat," Rian said.

"Even worse. Do you want the children's efforts to go to waste?"

"You don't actually care about that," Rian pointed out.

"No, but you do."

"You've got me there," Rian said, and went back to eating his repetitive, brothy stew.

Lori did as well and tried to put the thought of fat-fried beast meat out of her mind.

"Speaking of how well we did, I need to talk to you about the Dungeon," Rian said.

"My Dungeon," Lori corrected.

Rian rolled his eyes. "Fine, your Dungeon. Given our current population, how long do you need to get it ready so that the next time a dragon comes by, everyone in Lorian can just drop what they're doing and shelter in it? I'm talking ventilation, air circulation, food stores–"

"Not needing to lose my bedroom?" Lori said.

Rian nodded. "Yes, that too. How much time do you need just working on your Dungeon?"

Truthfully, it had been a subject Lori had been giving a lot of thought to. A Dungeon was meant to be the demesne's most secure stronghold in addition to being the center of the Dungeon Binder's power. It should theoretically be able to hold the entire population of the demesne, or at least the capital city around the Dungeon's core.

"I'll need more space," Lori mused. "More excavating… reinforcement… maybe another floor? Three days? Five? The food stores… it would be convenient if the food was already there instead of needing to be moved from the dining hall." She blinked and gave Rian a suspicious look.

"You said it, not me," he said blandly.

"I am not turning my Dungeon into a public space."

"I wasn't asking you to."

"Yes, you very clearly didn't ask to permanently turn my Dungeon into a dining hall."

"Again, you said it, not me."

"We will simply have to divide our food stores," Lori said, ignoring him. "We should have been doing that anyway."

"I'm sure that's not going to start any rumors about you hoarding food for yourself while decent people something-something," Rian said.

Lori glared at him.

"You asked me to find a way to keep things like that from happening again," Rian said "This is how I'm doing it."

"I'm not turning my Dungeon into a dining hall."

"Still wasn't asking you to."

"We have a perfectly serviceable dining hall. We just need a plan for quickly getting the food stored there here in an emergency."

"As you say, Binder Lori."

"I can make wheels, we can have some kind of cart or wagon."

"Smart idea, Binder Lori."

"Rian, stop acting like a sycophant and agreeing with what I say, you sound like an idiot."

"I refuse," he said with a grin.

Before Lori could make up her mind about whether she should kick him or not, someone ran up to the table. It was a brat– not one Lori was familiar with, she was certain the brat she knew was a girl– with his trousers rolled up and mud on his feet.

"Lord Rian, Lord Rian!" he cried, completely ignoring Lori's presence. "There are people coming up the river!"

That drove every other thought out of her head. Lori's eyes snapped shut, delving into her awareness of wisps. The river flickered, too full of plants and animals… the voids of everyone in the Dungeon… voids rushing towards the dungeon from the river, most too small to be adults… and voids walking along the river banks, coming from down river. They all dripped with water, and the things they had with them seemed soaked with it.

Her eyes snapped open and met Rian's. "People coming," she confirmed. "From outside. They've been washing Iridescence off themselves for long enough most of what they have is soaked." She grabbed her staff, checked the coalcharm, grabbed the bag of cut firewood she'd set aside to sit down and started tying it back to her belt.

Rian, meanwhile, stood up. "Everyone!" he cried, gathering everyone's attention, as if the brat's– the boy brat's– announcement hadn't already done that. "It looks like we have visitors from outside the demesne." A murmur rose among the people eating in Lori's Dungeon. "I know everyone's concerned, but let's not all panic. For safety's sake, all the children should stay here. Everyone else, grab what you need and let's get ready to meet them. After coming all this way, I'm sure they'll appreciate a warm welcome."

There were grim nods and for once Lori was glad Rian was so stupidly good at giving heroic and inspiring speeches. People looked determined, but not afraid, and at the back, someone was already handing out spears form the rack near that door that she'd put it because they kept falling over and became a tripping hazard.

"All right!" Rian said. "Let's go out there and greet these people, whoever they are, and show them how we do things in Lorian!"

There was a cheer, that had Lori wincing and rubbing her ears. Still, she had to admit, his words were effective. Whoever these people were, Lori was confident– not that she hand't been before, of course!– that she could handle them from the safety of a wall of people!

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"Hi! Welcome to Lorian. Have you had lunch yet? We've got plenty to eat, so help yourselves," Rian said to the strangers as they gathered near the river.

Lori was fairly certain she wasn't the only one feeling betrayed as Rian held out a wooden bowl filled with today's lunch stew.