Demesne 512 - Doesn’t That Sound Wonderful?

“—izards are still being a bit slower than you, but Yllian said they’ve been getting used to the work so they’ve gotten faster than before,” Erzebed said as Binder Lori ate. Mikon couldn’t help but think the two of them were much better at eating while other was talking. Rian directed all his attention at Binder Lori or whoever he was talking to when he spoke, which was very respectful, but it also meant a not uncommon way for the Dungeon Binder to tell him that she was done listening to his report was to remind him to eat. “The Lady Binder thinks they should be finished expanding the mine passage by tomorrow, and so far there hasn’t been any collapses. But she says she doesn’t know if they’ve been following your order to not use magic to reinforce the stone, and was wondering it was possible to use the rock you gave her to test it?”

Mikon just sat quietly and tried not to look like she was doing anything that might draw the Dungeon Binder’s annoyed look. She missed her games with Binder Lori, but the woman had been very busy lately, and at that moment she looked like she’d prefer to go straight to bed rather than linger at the table. Perhaps Mikon could ask her tomorrow? Someone really needed to distract Binder Lori from the fact that Rian wasn’t around before she got too withdrawn and moody. Well, more moody.

“—need new series of doors and metal sheets for the new entrance of the mine. Yllian asked me to remind you that they don’t really have the tools to make the new doors themselves, and that we were the ones who made the originals here in the first place.”

Across the table, Binder Lori groaned, even as her face frowned in thought. Eventually, she nodded. “Fine. Send one or more of the carpenters to get measurements for new doors and get the copper back so we can reuse it.”

“Yllian had all the doors set aside so that they can be used again, and I brought the copper-sheathed one back with me so the smiths can get the copper off the door.”

Lori nodded. “Good. Do we still have copper for more plating?”

“I’m not sure… I’ll ask the smiths if they think what we have is enough. If it isn’t, there there’s raw copper ore in River’s Fork, but that will need to be melted.”

“Smelted,” Binder Lori corrected. Mikon didn’t know what the difference was, they sounded like the same thing. “Ugh, I’ll have to do that myself, won’t I? I doubt any of those wizards have any proper smithing experience…”

On the other side of the table, Tae was listening and wearing the face of someone dreading being asked to do something that she could do but didn’t want to, clearly hoping they didn’t ask her to do carpentry. From what Rian had said, she wasn’t actually bad at it, and was quite thorough at what she did. He suspected she only had an aversion to carpentry work because she’d kept getting yelled at to be faster, then yelled at more when going faster meant her work wasn’t as good. Mikon had heard the carpenters laying on the flattery like sawdust whenever Tae had come over to fuse their offcuts and scrap wood together. Perhaps that had been Rian’s suggestion, to help her get over her reluctance? Although given the sorts of work that Tae probably made much easier, perhaps they just simply meant it.

Mikon and Umu finished their meal well before Erzebed and Binder Lori did—discussions at dinner time tended to go long because this was when a lot of things were told to Binder Lori and she often had decisions to make—taking away the dishes as they went. She gave her woman a quick kiss on the cheek, murmuring something about seeing her later. It made Binder Lori eye her suspiciously from the other side of the table, but no more than that. Erzebed smiled nervously, eyes darting towards the Dungeon Binder, and nodded, one hand rising slightly before she obviously thought better of the gesture. Still, Mikon felt Erzebed’s gaze on her as she walked away, and she put a little sway to her hips just for fun. Erzebed didn’t really look there that Mikon had noticed yet, but the flirtatious invitation would be obvious.

Outside, the breeze that was blowing from the river was starting to grow cool. It was a natural breeze now, no longer a constantly blowing thing to make the hot summer nights and days more bearable, made by Binder Lori’s magic. It was something that never really gets brought up in stories about Dungeon Binders. It was always fire, lightning, floods, and light so bright armies were burned away leaving only their shadows behind. A constant breeze that kept a whole village from getting too hot during the day and almost comfortable at night? Not in any of the stories. Perhaps whoever was telling them thought it was too boring.

If the past year had made anything clear, it was that the ‘boring’ magic was the most wonderful.

With the air now less windy, people were setting up little fires in front of the shelters and baths again. They weren’t necessary for light, but everyone enjoyed the simple warmth of the flames, occasionally surreptitiously roasting some bugs that they’d managed to catch and clean. It was a food that Binder Lori didn’t really keep track of, and was bothersome enough to prepare that everyone took the view that you deserved to keep it for yourself. The front of their house had its own firepit, which Rian used sometimes when he needed to talk to people, but with him away it was empty except for some char and ashes.

When they opened the door, the house was dark save for the slight glow coming in through the paper over the windows from the magic light on the outside of the house, making them both sigh. Ah, nice to know it hadn’t just been Mikon who’d forgotten. They had gotten so used to the glowing rock Rian had that they’d both forgotten it was with him and not at the house.

“We banked the coals, right?” Mikon asked, already knowing the answer.

“No, we didn’t,” Umu sighed. “Do you want to get the wood or the fire?”

It didn’t take long to build a fire again. There were people outside making bonfires, getting a flame wasn’t difficult. Once they had a fire going, they had enough time to make some new rushlights from some dried ropeweed that had been gathering dust in the back of the shelf, soaking the ropeweed in some dirty tallow. It had been something Mikon and her cousins had used do in their old village so they’d have a little light a night before going to bed. While the stems she was using was different, she knew just what to do, though she used one of the reeds to move them around so she could keep the fat off her hands.

The bright flames in the fireplace were starting to dim to a smolder by the time Erzebed finally came home. “Ugh,” she groaned as Mikon carefully lit one of the rushlights and set it on the stand on the table… which was some rocks that could let the rushlight stand and keep it from rolling. “I’m finally done for the day…”

Her tired sigh was interrupted as Mikon danced towards her and planted a kiss on her cheek. “Welcome home, Riz,” she said as she greeted her woman home. Her chest gently pressed against Erzebed’s arm as Mikon embraced her around the shoulders, taking a deep breath of her woman’s hair and letting her do the same. It was every way Aunt Kasco had greeted her uncle when he came back home after a long day out in the fields, though without the enthusiastic grabbing of his seat. Erzebed still instinctively struck out when someone did that, not yet seeing it as a flirtatious invitation, which was understandable. It was something one learned to see as an affectionate gesture and not something to punch someone in the face for. “Why don’t you lie down and I’ll make you feel nice?”

That made Erzebed perk up slightly. “What kind of nice?” she asked.

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Erzebed moaned as she lay back on the bed, legs raised as she closed her eyes. On the other side, Umu had a long-suffering look on her face as she undid her chest wraps to ready herself to sleep. Mikon put her out of mind for the moment as she carefully massaged Erzebed’s feet as they rested on her lap, her fingers carefully pressing and squeezing the way Rian had taught her after she’d asked him to teach her. Doing Rian-work for Binder Lori seemed to involve a lot of walking around to talk to people, and while Erzebed might say that militia were used to marching, she never refused an offer to have her feet massaged.

“How’s that?” Mikon asked as gently kneaded the meaty flesh on the soles of one foot.

Another groan was her reply. “Why do I keep agreeing to do this? I’m not an officer. I hate doing officer things.”

“Because you can’t tell Binder Lori ‘no’?” Mikon suggested, letting the tips of one hand trail up along Erzebed’s leg and up her bare calf, her touch light. She felt Erzebed shudder at the touch and smiled, going back to massaging her feet.

“It’s hard to tell her no! She’s the Great Binder! And she’s right there, and she’s got that look like she’s seeing right into you…”

Mikon made a noise of agreement as she switched back to Erzebed’s other foot, making sure to get both of them equally relaxed. She kneaded every toe, rubbing and squeezing every yustri of muscle and skin, gently every joint to stretch out muscles that normally didn’t get to move like that, occasionally trailing her fingers Erzebed’s legs. Her woman let out a sigh, shifting slightly on the bedroll as she settled in to enjoy the ministrations. Outside of the occasional crackle of the fire and rushlight, silence descended on the house. For a moment, it made Mikon long for the familiar presence of her cousins… until she remembered what that would mean and shook her head to dispel such silly notions.

The house had fallen into a comfortable silence when Mikon finally said, “All right, done,” and gently slid down the bed so she could set down Erzebed’s feet without making her move. Her woman reluctantly roused, opening her eyes as Mikon got up and made her way up to her face, kneeling down so they could be eye to eye. “I know what you want to do now,” the weaver said in a breathy, suggestive voice.

Erzebed swallowed.

Mikon leaned forward to put her lips to her woman’s ear. “You want to me to wrap you up in your blankets so you’re nice and warm. Then you can finally close your eyes and sleep after a long day.” Her words were met with an expression of such surprise and gratitude that Mikon nearly laughed. Instead, she put on her most sultry smile and winked. “Doesn’t that sound wonderful?”

Her woman gave a slightly dazed, sleepy nodd, and Mikon gave her another smile, then leaned forward to place a gentle kiss on Erzebed’s lips, soft and warm. Erzebed kissed back, tired but still roused.

Eventually they broke apart. “Up a little,” Mikon said, and her woman raised her head slightly, letting Mikon pull the blanket from where it had been neatly folded under the pillow. Letting it fall open, she covered up Erzebed, making sure it went up to her neck and even tucking in the end of the blanket under her feet. She left the blanket draped loose on the on Erzebed’s left side, so she could slip into it later.

By the time she was finished, the rushlight was burning low, almost hidden among the rocks it was leaned against. With what little light was left, Mikon pulled away a large ember and carefully buried it in ashes so that it might last until morning before adding a little bit more wood to the rest. She blew carefully to kindle some flames until the wood caught alight as well.

Satisfied, Mikon stood up and finally got to doing her own preparations for going to bed. Checking that the door had been secured properly—it hadn’t, so she slid the latch into place—Mikon opened her blouse and undid her own chest wrap, letting out a sigh of relief as they came off. Rolling up the wrap for use tomorrow, she them aside, then reached under her skirt so she could undo her loin cloth setting them next to her wraps. They were fresh enough for another use in the morning. Mikon considered putting on socks, but the night wasn’t that cold yet.

Carefully, she crawled up the bed into the space between Erzebed and Umu, where Rian usually lay… eventually. With him absent, the three of them didn’t have to sleep on their sides as tightly, a treacherous thought that she couldn’t stop herself from having. Even Rian sometimes wondered if perhaps they should have a larger bed—the bed they had used to be Binder Lori’s before she got her current one, its width a luxury for a single person but still not as wide as the beds made for whole families—but he always dismissed the idea as being frivolous.

Mikon loved him, but sometimes her man took being simple, humble and hard-working too far!

Finally getting her head up to the pillow, she kept her own blanket in place to make it thicker as she carefully slid under the covers with Erzebed, lying down on her side as she draped one arm around her midsection. Erzebed grumbled slightly, but placed her hand atop Mikon’s as she settled back to sleep. Mikon closed her eyes as the room darkened until the rushlight finally burned itself out, and only the muted glow from the fireplace remained.

Behind her, she heard surreptitious movement as fabric began to rustle quietly, and Umu’s quiet breathing began to grow heavy.

Mikon smiled.