Demesne EX SS 35 – Learning With Kutago! (Patreon)

"This is all your fault," Kutago said, leveling an annoyed look at her brother.

He sighed, but didn't protest the accusation. "I know, I know," he said, not meeting her gaze and focusing on his breakfast.

"We could have been living here, but no, you just had to ask for days off as soon as you opened your mouth."

"I know, Kuw, I was there."

"And it turned out you didn't actually need to, because it was too hot to work in the afternoons anyway, so if you'd just kept your mouth shut you would have had half days off anyway…"

"Yes Kuw, I know, I had to work those afternoons, remember?"

"Well, you don't have to worry here," Rian said cheerfully from further down the bench. "Evacuating to the dungeon because of a dragon is practically a holiday around here. Your biggest problem will be boredom, Kuw. Lidz, as one of the few wizards we have, you're on standby for emergency healing or whatever else. You only need to go and see to the crops down in the dungeon farm if you're bored."

"They have a dungeon farm, Lidz!"

"Yes, Kuw, I heard, I was sitting closer to him than you were." Her brother sighed, clearly not properly hearing her outrage. "I have a question."

"I probably have an answer," Rian instantly replied. "I can't promise it's a good one, though."

Lidz nodded, blinking sleepily. He clearly hadn't slept properly last night, the dungeon's unchanging light too bright. "Why are we all sitting on this side of the table when there's space over there?" he said, pointing at the other side that was empty save for a single chair. "Wouldn't it be more comfortable for some of us to sit there?"

It wasn't that tight at the table, though given that Kutago was sitting at the end of the bench and thus had plenty of elbow room on one side, she supposed she could understand her brother wanting some space.

"Because that's the Dungeon Binder side of the table," Rian said. "Lori sits there, and when she's eating with us, Shana."

"Shanalorre," Taeclas cheerfully corrected.

"Really?"

"Someone has to do it, since her Bindership isn't here."

"But… she isn't here," her brother pressed. "Can't we use that side, then?"

"You'd think that would be the case, wouldn't you?" Rian said, still cheerful. "Though to be honest, we don't usually have this many people sitting on this side. Tell you what, at lunch we'll ask Shana—"

"Shanalorre!"

Sigh. "—Shanalorre if we can borrow her bench and someone can sit at the end of the table. She probably won't want to eat with us in for the foreseeable future anyway."

"No, I won't. No offense intended to your persons, Wizard Lidzuga, Mistress Kutago," the small child who was somehow a Dungeon Binder sitting at the table in front of Kutago responded without so much as turning to look towards them, seemingly intent on making sure the smaller girl next to her—her cousin, apparently—was eating properly.  "I'm sure you are wonderful company."

"No offense taken…?" Lidz said, sounding unsure. Kutago rolled her eyes.

When her brother had sensed the approaching dragon during dinner last night, Kutago had expected that they would be joining everyone else in River's Fork dragon shelter. While it was also an active mine, the actual shelter accommodations had been… well, better than Covehold's. There was no groundwater slowly seeping through the walls, no hidden patches of mold that all the Deadspeakers actively had to look for and kill when they occupied the shelter, no need for the Horotracts to artificially expand and extend the dimensions of the space…

Yes, main shelter had been smaller than the one in Covehold Demesne—or at least, smaller than the shelter meant to house the people living in their area of the city—that she and her brother went to when there was a dragon, but that dragon shelter had been intended to house several neighborhoods. With only fifty people to fill it, the dragon shelter in River's Fork had seemed luxuriously large. And given the fact that the demesne's main food storage was also in the mine, they wouldn't be expected to endure eating dried rations washed down by water reclaimed from the latrines.

Then in the middle of the preparations to move things into the shelter, the boats from Lorian Demesne—the demesne upriver that Binder Lori actually lived in—had arrived, and Binder Shanalorre had started gathering the demesne's children to take them to Lorian's Dungeon… as well as Lidzuga and Kutago.

"You are considered persons of importance, and as such Binder Lolilyuri has left orders that you are to be taken to Lorian Demesne to better ensure your survival against the coming dragon," the disturbingly un-child-like child had explained. "Please collect your effects and any personal tools you wish to ensure preserved and come with me."

What followed had been a rather harrowing boat trip in the dark surrounded by crying children, with Kutago terrified that the boats—which had all looked far too small to be safely moving at the speeds they’d been going—would roll over and toss them into the river. While she’d occasionally seen the boats in question during the day—even the one more obviously made of ice than the Coldhold—they had usually been already docked. The one time she’d seen one approaching the dome—a term she considered more accurate than ‘town’ or even ‘village’—it had been moving at an almost leisurely pace.

The boat trip had not been leisurely. It had been fast, reaching speeds she had thought one needed to be a Mentalist or actively falling to one’s death to achieve. True, they had arrived at their destination safe and sound, but the experience had been terrifying.

On arrival, they had followed Binder Shanalorre’s directions and had gone with the children, which had led them into a clearly artificial cave mouth and into the demesne’s dungeon.

It had been bright. It had been clean, with no rocks and rock dust littering the ground and air. Save for the regular arch-topped pillars holding up the stone above, it had been wide and open, as had the second level below, and she’d been informed that there was a third level below that. Instead of needing to find a bare corner that they could settle at and essentially camp on the floor for however long the dragon would be present, warily keeping watch on their temporary neighbors lest their effects be stolen, they had been directed to take one of the alcoves on the second level as essentially their own room, with more than enough space for each of them to sleep without having to be close to the other.

It had been a long hot day, and the boat ride to Lorian had been stressful and terrifying. Despite the bright lights of the dungeon, Kutago had quickly fallen asleep soon after rolling out her bedroll in one of the wall niches and lying down with a towel folded over her eyes.

And now it was the next day, and so far the dragon had not yet arrived despite Lidz, Taeclas and Binder Shanalorre all insisting it was still coming. This meant that the dungeon had not yet been sealed shut, and so Kutago had been directed to use the latrines outside of the dungeon to rid herself of her inner darkness.

What she’d found outside had been… well, far different from the conditions in River’s Fork. There had been stone-walled and wood-roofed buildings, the former having the distinct swirled appearance of Whispered stone. There had been the fields, which was already full of people making preparations to transplant the crops into the dungeon. There had been the bath houses, larger and more extensive than the little thing they had in River’s Fork, with outdoor showers for those in too much of a hurry to take an extended bath. There had been a place specifically for doing laundry!

And that was just outside. The dungeon itself…

Kutago and her brother had originally been from Stargazer Demesne, which had originally been founded deep within the natural cave system of an isolated valley in the middle of the extensive mountain range known as the Many-Angled Mountains. While there were several valleys to be found among the mountains, most had been damned up to be used as water storage using centuries' worth of excavated stone, used for food production and housing extensive farms, or were growing lumber for the demesne's use. Historically, most of the demesne’s population lived in an interconnected series of underground villages that were offshoots of Stargazer Dungeon, excavated by Whisperers over the centuries.

It was only in the last five hundred years that the demesne’s boundaries had reached beyond the mountains and onto relatively flat, fertile land. She and her brother had grown up in the dungeon town of Copperseam, which had been a mining site centuries ago before the seam had been depleted and tunnels had been converted from resource-industrial to residential. Their childhood had been spent between stone walls and stone ceilings and stone arches and wide open stone domes that had been larger than the one growing over River's Fork's dungeon village.

Lorian Demesne's dungeon was comfortable in a way the flimsy wooden buildings of Covehold Demesne or the far too organic wooden buildings of River's Fork demesne hadn't been, at least for Kutago. Her brother had never been bothered by such things, and his Deadspeaking and affinity for woodworking meant he liked wooden buildings since he could mold and shape the dead trees, but Kutago had always preferred good, solid stone. Not that she was one of those unfortunates with an irrational fear of the sky or wide open spaces, but she preferred not to rely on a building material that could be ignited, be eaten by dustlife, or became structurally unstable in the continued presence of mere water.

Stargazer Demesne was also one of the few demesnes where most of the population didn't need to fear or even think about dragons, something that she hadn't really had to think about before she'd left home. Ironically, dragons were more of a nuisance to the rich, who had a habit of building towers and houses high on the cold, cloudless peaks of the mountains, and were therefore the most vulnerable to their passing. But then, they were rich and could afford to rebuild, which they often had to. For the common people… well, there'd been more than one instance of a passing dragon incinerating everything outside of Stargazer Demesne's tunnels down to the bare soil and rock, and no one inside really noticing it happen until after the fact when the militia had needed to be sent out to begin replanting forests and farms for raw resources.

Lorian Demesne's dungeon didn't look like it was from Stargazer Demesne. The pillars were crudely shaped, and probably didn’t have metal structural reinforcement inside them. The structural arches were too thin in her eyes, and far too plain, looking like a child's crude building rocks writ large. The floor was rough and not always perfectly level, not smoothed by the footsteps of generations. There was also far too much impermanent wooden furniture, save for the stone sleeping niches and the water basins in the rather small public bath.

It was still the closest thing to home she'd found ever since she'd decided to follow her brother on this color-brained scholarly adventure to explore strange environs, seek out new beasts and new information, and go where few had gone before.

And because of her brother, she couldn't live here! At least, not beyond the dragon's passing. It had already been made clear that they would be returned to River's Fork with the children. And while Kutago was legally allowed to change her residence to Lorian Demesne, she doubted her brother would be allowed to do the same, since he was essential for River's Fork being able to repair itself, feed itself, and provide additional food to Lorian Demesne. And annoying as he was, she wasn't going to leave her brother alone. If he was out of her sight, he'd do something stupid like not feed himself because he'd be doing field research, not sleep because he was busy writing his notes, or reading, or drawing illustrations of samples for his notes…

"This is all your fault," Kutago said, leveling an annoyed look at her brother.

He sighed, but didn't protest the accusation. "I know, I know," he said, not meeting her gaze as he finished his breakfast…