Demesne 140 - Chimneys (Patreon)

After breakfast and another quick game of sunk with Mikon, Lori set off towards the housing at the top of the rise where the people who were previously from River's Fork lived, Riz in tow. In front of them, a mass of stone from the pile of excavated rock flowed, the binding of earthwisps Lori was actively controlling making it all move like a viscous, fluid mass. At this point, she didn't even have to think of it beyond whether she would hit anything in front of her as they headed for her temporary Rian's house to put in their first chimney.

Around them people were out and about, doing laundry, irrigating the crops, emptying the latrines, going outside of the demesne into the Iridescence to hunt some beasts for food or towards the river for seels, gathering wood, going across the river on Lori's Boat to harvest ropeweed and firewood, turning over the stems breaking down in the retting tank, spinning fibers into thread on distaffs in the shade of the aqueducts and generally being productive. One of the first generation houses Lori had built was having its roof worked on, some people carefully rooming the roofing planks, while others cut assembled a beam outside. A few went against the trend and were standing in line at the Um without shame, but that wasn't Lori's problem, distasteful as it was. And perhaps they had already finished their work for the day and had free time, in which case Lori reluctantly had to applaud their efficiency. Hopefully, some of the people whose homes she could visit after lunch to put in their chimney were preparing, otherwise she was inclined to just skip them.

"This way, Great Binder," Riz said, leading her towards one of the segments about a third of the way along the row of houses. "Everything should be moved away from the back wall by now, and if it isn't I can move it for you. I should let you know, we have a loft above the back wall. Um, if that will affect your building plans?"

"It shouldn't," Lori said. "I'll be knocking a hole in the back for the chimney, so unless there's anything behind your house, there should be no problems."

Riz nodded, hastily moving forward to open the door for Lori. She stepped inside, leaving the pile of rock outside. The house inside was familiar in a general way, since she had built it. Six paces long and over four paces wide, with high walls to allow for a high ceiling, there was a wooden platform at the back on which various bedrolls, pillows blankets, and a few other things had been stored, leave most of the floor clear. There was no kitchen or food preparation area, since everyone ate at the dining halls, and along the walls there were beds that could fold down, similar to what Rian had had installed in the Coldhold. The beds were high enough they could either be used as tables or, more likely, so that someone else sleeping beneath them could sit up without hitting their head. Possibly both.

There were bags along one wall similar to what Lori had used to carry her own belongings when she had been traveling, and from the slightly disturbed way they were arranged, they were probably usually along the back wall, which was currently blank save for a bed folded against the wall.

Riz glanced at her, the cause of her concern clear, but Lori waved her off. From that she could see, while the bed was slightly secured to the wall—she vaguely remembered softening the stone so the wood recessed into the wall—but from what she could see a chimney was unlikely to cause affect the stability of the bed. It would probably be too hot to sleep in comfortably with a fire in the chimney, though.

As Riz watched, Lori began her work, touching the wall were her hands curled in such a way the actual point of contact with the stone were her fingernails. She didn't really need to anymore—as a Dungeon Binder, the entire demesne acted as her body, letting her lay claim to all the wisps within it not within a living body—but she liked to keep in practice, in case she was forced to have to leave to do business in River's Fork or something. She took a deep breath, her lungs filling with and her being with magic, a familiar sensation from before she had become a Dungeon Binder. Then she channeled that magic through her bones and the earthwisps there, up her arms and then out through her nails into the stone they were touching. She bound the earthwisps at the point of contact, imbuing them with magic. Lori reinforced the stone, strengthening it so it could more capable of supporting its own weight.

Then she made a hole in the middle of the back wall under the folded bed. The stone flowed like a viscous liquid, leaving an opening about a pace wide and three-fourths of a pace high in the middle. Carefully, Lori shaped the upper part of the hole into an arch so that it could support the weight of the rest of the wall. It probably wasn't necessary, since even without the reinforcement from the binding the wall was thick and strong, but she liked a stable structure.

Humming as she fell into the familiar mindset of working, Lori knelt down in front of the hole and used the excess mass of stone to create a surface for the fireplace, making sure to recess in a little below the floor level of the house and dishing the surface slightly to create a lower point. She made sure the stone there was solid, with no bubbles of air so that nothing would explode if heated. Once she was satisfied with the surface, Lori pushed herself up to her feet. For a moment, she wished she knew enough Horotracting to allow her to walk through the hole in the wall to the other side, or perhaps Mentalism so she could just lift herself over the building for the same result.

Unfortunately, both still evaded her despite the fact that being a Dungeon Binder should have given her access to all forms of magic. Her attempts to teach herself at night were… completely unsuccessful. She had done her best, performing basic breathing exercise to fill herself with magic and try make herself aware of the vistas, thoughts and life that the other forms of magic manipulated, but she still only managed to perceive wisps.

Lori put that out of her mind as she walked down the length of the row of houses so she could go around the end of it and gain access to the back, bringing the stone rolling along with her. There, she found the hole she had made and the little surface where the fire would burn while the fireplace was in use. Humming, Lori pulled stone from the pile with her and began building the back of the fireplace.

She enclosed the back of the fireplace with stone, making sure the stone had no bubbles of air, then built the chimney vent upwards, a simple half circle curve that fused directly to the wall. At the peak of the wall, she gave it a sharp, right angle turn to one side, and then opened a vent on the underside of the horizontal tube. She figured that would allow the smoke to vent out without any risk of water or snow getting in, though it probably wouldn't stop bugs.

Still, that wasn't her problem.

It was only as Lori finished that Riz was standing nearby, apparently having continued watching to see if Lori needed anything. Well, might as well have her be useful. "Erzebed, get some firewood, will you? We need to test the chimney."

"Yes, Great Binder!"

Riz went to the storage shed Lori had recently made to do just that, while Lori considered bringing the excess stone back down before shaking her head and deciding to just leave the stone there for when she had to do the rest of the houses. Though she did move it to one side so that it wasn't completely blocking the way. She walked back around to the front of the row of houses to wait for Riz for come back with the wood, though she had to peak through the windows until she saw the fireplace since she hadn't really been paying attention to which house they'd entered.

Riz came back with a small armful of wood, which was a bit too much in Lori's opinion. "That's a bit too much," Lori commented. "We only need to see if the smoke goes up properly."

"We can use the rest tonight," Riz said cheerfully.

Lori tilted her head. "It's not that cold."

"You can never be too warm," Riz declared, still cheerful.

Lori shook her head, then shrugged. "Well, put the wood in the fireplace, let's see how well it works."

Riz nodded happily, and led the way to the new fireplace, kneeling down in front of it and putting in some of the smaller piece of wood, stacking the rest next to the fireplace. Then Riz reached towards her belt, and Lori instinctively stepped back as Riz drew a belt knife and a small piece of rock—

"Erzebed, I'm a Dungeon Binder, I can start the fire myself," Lori said blandly.

Riz paused. "Ah right, of course Great Binder," she said, sounding slightly embarrassed at having forgotten. She got back to her feet, stepping to one as if afraid of being set on fire herself.

Lori rolled her eyes, then reached out through her core and bound the firewisps in the wood. There were always firewisps in everything, though there tended to be perceivably more in objects that were hotter than the Whisperer's body. The wood was just hot enough from contact with Riz and from their brief exposure to sunlight for Lori to bind the firewisps in the wood, then gathered them together to one spot on the surface of one of the smaller pieces of wood in the pile, at the bottom, and imbued them to do the simplest thing one could do with firewisps, which was to make something hotter.

At first, there was no change. That was perfectly understandable. Wood could take a surprising amount of heat without really showing any sign of it, but eventually, a stream of smoke began to rise, and then the point where Lori had gathered the firewisps burst into flame as enough of it reached the wood's ignition temperature. After that it was just a matter of maintaining the heat and making sure the flame had air, but they quickly had a small fire, the flames full of firewisps and generating lightwisps in all directions.

Lori hummed thoughtfully as the fire burned. "Does it seemed like the smoke is all going up the chimney?" she asked her temporary Rian.

Riz, who had been pacing back and forth in front of the fire, as well as moving in front and behind Lori, waved a hand negligently. "If you don't start coughing immediately, then it's a good chimney," she said. "What's more important is how well it warms the room."

Lori raised an eyebrow. "It's a fire, of course it'll warm the room."

"Yes, but it's a question of how much of the room it warms," Riz said absently. She gestured. "How widely the heat spreads."

"I'll take your word for it," Lori said. "Well, come on."

Riz blinked. "Great Binder?"

"It not yet lunch, but you need to make sure that people have cleared the wall of their house I'll be working on," Lori said. "And that they cleared the rightwall. I wouldn't put it past these idiots to try to get me to put the chimney in some other wall for their own inane reasons."

"Ah…" Riz made a face. "Yes, I understand, Great Binder."

"I'll also need you with me when I'm making the chimney," Lori continued.

Riz opened her mouth. Paused. Visibly changed what she was about to say. "To keep people from talking to you, Great Binder?"

"Yes," Lori said, filling the word with all the loathing at the thought she could muster.

Riz nodded. "Ah. I see, Great Binder."

"I doubt it, but you don't have to as long as you do it," Lori said. "I'll be in the third level excavating more stone. Come get me for lunch after you make sure people who need to be ready are ready."

She went off to dig more stone.

Behind her, she just barely heard Riz sigh. "Do this, we won't tell you why, just do it," she heard her temporary Rian muttered. "I'm supposed to be an officer right now, why do I still feel like a glitter crawler?"