"Healed? Your Binder healed all of them?" Rian said, sounding appropriately amazed at such a convenient occurrence. "Well, that's convenient. They'll be able to travel on their own, then."

Grem, however, looked like he'd been condemned to death. "Lasponin… you didn't…" he said pleadingly. "You didn't… not her… I hoped I was wrong, but… you actually got her to become the Binder?"

"It was necessary, Grem," Lasponin said. "Besides, Shana wanted to do it."

"She'll die, Las! She'll die like her father did, and all of you with her! She won't be able to do anything when a dragon comes again! Koshay couldn't do it, and he actually knew what he was doing!"

"We were dying! What would you have had me do?"

"What we discussed! Wait until we can find the demesne upstream and bring their Binder here to claim the core!"

"They'd be a stranger! How could we put ourselves under an unknown tyrant when we left to get away from exactly that?"

Well, they'd have to anyway once she killed whoever this woman was and claimed this demesne. From the sound of it, she'd be doing everyone a favor, if their previous Binder had been unable to protect them from the dragon. How had they survived then? Well, however they had, it had clearly claimed the life of their Binder. Really, killing this completely ignorant amateur would be a kindness and a mercy for these people…

"How did you even manage it?" Grem demanded.

"It wasn't easy, but I remember what my brother used to do when he began learning to be a wizard. All those colorful breathing exercises, at all hours of the day… and I was there when he made our dungeon. Helped him and Laven set everything up, and I was there when Laven took his place, saw what she did. It took us a while, and several tries, but we finally managed to figure how to do it yesterday afternoon."

"Yesterday af–" Grem choked. Rian winced, looking guilty for some reason. "So all you had to do was wait one glittering day…!"

"It's not like we knew you were coming!" Lasponin said. "You all left us to survive on our own."

"We'd have come back!" Grem said. "I did come back!"

"Then no harm done," Lasponin said.

"No harm– you put an untrained person as the Binder of a demesne!" Grem said. "You might object to tyrants, but an incompetent is worse!"

"I'm there to help her," the doctor protested.

"You're a doctor, not a wizard!"

"Should I leave and let you two hash this out in private?" Rian asked.

The two turned to him, as if surprised to see him there.

"No need, Lord Rian, we are done," Lasponin said.

"We're not–" Grem began.

"Great!" Rian said, obliviously bright and cheerful and just a bit forced. It was strange, seeing him need to force cheer. Unnatural. "I was wondering if we could meet with some of the people who'd been injured and needed to be left behind? While we wouldn't force anyone, we have to go back home anyway since you all seem to be doing fine, and we wouldn't mind giving someone a ride to be with their family, perhaps make arrangements for the rest if there's more than our boat can bear."

"Technically, it's our boat," Lasponin said. "My brother made it."

"I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you, but either way, can we leave that conversation for after we've brought people back together with their families?" Rian said. "Because I have a feeling the boat in question is going to be key in doing that."

They all seemed to have forgotten Lori was there. Like she didn't matter. Which was, of course, as intended. After all she was supposed to be just some runner, but it grated. Rian wasn't even looking at her for cues. Not that he should, because that would reveal their subterfuge, but still!

She hated it, having other people decide what she could do.

She glanced outside, wondering how she was supposed to identify who the Binder was as Rian and the doctor talked about… stuff, she didn't really care. Usually you could tell a wizard by the accessories they carried: staffs, charms, the fact most Deadspeakers smelled nice because they never let their skin rot, the odd grace and quickness by which Mentalists moved, that sort of thing. But those were all learned mannerisms from going to schools and becoming familiar with their power. A savant, an uneducated one, wouldn't have any of those signs. They'd look just like anyone else. All that Lori had to go on was that they were female and were the daughter of the previous Binder.

Lori blinked and frowned, glancing at the doctor. The doctor had made mention of a brother, learning… his niece then. It wasn't much, but it helped narrow things down. The man had pale white hair and eyebrows, and hair color ran in families. There was a one in three chance the woman in question would have pale hair as well, if she hadn't inherited her mother's hair. And if her father had also had pale hair… alright, it wasn't much of a way to narrow things, but it was something! Find a young, pale-haired woman, she'll likely have a high probability of being the Binder of this demesne.

Then, after figuring if it's the right person, kill her, then claim the core. She could do that. A healing savant, untrained? All it would take was a stream of water. She was good at that.

Lori could do it. She knew she could. All she had to do was find them. Then she'd be able to claim this demesne.

"I'm sorry we'll have to impose on you for lunch," Rian was saying. "You really don't have to, we brought out own supplies."

"Nonsense, it's the least we can do," the doctor said. "And we can make the announcement about you willing to bring people back with you then. You can even spend the night, if you wish. No visitors' tax."

"That's very generous of you," Rian said, "But we might not all be able to accept. Our Binder is… mildly paranoid? They might opt to sleep alone on the boat in the middle of the river."

Lasponin rolled his eyes at Lori's perfectly reasonable measures of personal safety. "And this is the man you want leading you? Having power over you?" he asked.

"Paranoia is a good thing," Grem said staunchly. "Keeps Binder alive instead of dead and buried and people having to put incompetents in charge."

"My niece is not incompetent, she's merely untrained," Lasponin snapped.

"Yes, exactly. Not competent," Grem snapped back.

"I will be training her!"

"Oh, have you secretly been a wizard all this time? Doctors aren't Deadspeakers."

"I helped Koshay study to become one, I know as much as any man who is not a wizard!"

"Hah!" Grem declared. "You always wanted to be a wizard like Koshay! You can't do it yourself, so you'll live through Shana!"

"What sort of man do you take me for?"

"A fool who's willing to have his niece and everyone around him die just so he can feel important for a few months more!"

"Stop it! Don't fight, please don't fight!"

Lori's head snapped up, looking towards the curtained door, which had been pushed aside. A girl about the size and age of the brat stood there, with long, slightly dirty, pale white hair.

Pale white hair…

Grem moved surprisingly fast for a man of his bulk. He leapt at the girl, but the doctor was there first, and there was a scalpel in his hands, slashing at Grem's face. The bigger man snapped his head back, then raised an arm to protect his eyes and tackled the doctor. The knife went into the meat of Grem's bicep, and the rest of him slammed bodily into the smaller man, slamming the doctor into the wall next to the girl, knocking the wind out of him. "That's her! Kill her, now!"

The girl screamed, diving back behind the curtain, out of sight. Lori heard footsteps on the stairs leading up towards them, turned and barely recognized the four people who'd been following them. She leapt up, kicking the bench she'd been sitting on towards the open doorway, where it tumbled down the stairs and slammed into shins as Rian leapt up from his bench and–

–punched Grem from behind so hard his head slammed into the wall and bounced back. The next punch took the bigger man in the temple, knocking him to the side and away from the doctor as Lori stared at her subordinate in surprise. Indeed, the doctor was glancing back and forth with equal surprise, looking between Grem, Rian and Lori as Rian bore the larger man down, punching him in the head as opportunity arose and causing his head to bounce on the floor.

"You fuck! You coward! You knew, you coward! You knew she was a child!" Rian was yelling between blows.

The people coming up the stairs finally untangled themselves from Lori's bench, only to stop as Lasponin raised a hand toward them. Not the one with the scalpel, Lori saw, which was bloody.

As Grem's head bounced off the floor against, Rian managed to get his arms around the dazed man's neck, putting it in a triangular hold as he pressed down with both arms.

Pale white hair…

Realization came over Lori. Her head snapped towards the curtain door, in front of which the doctor was still standing. The doctor, noticing her glance, held up his bloody scalpel warningly. Lori ignored him, still staring at that curtain.

Eventually, Grem stopped moving, his face bloody from all the times it had bounced off a surface after being punched. Still, Rian didn't let him go, grimly holding on as he slowly began counting…

––––––––––––––––––

"I apologize for that," Rian said as two former militia stood to either side of him, both casually holding short lengths of firewood that did very well for clubs. "I swear I didn't know he was going to do that." Grem had been dragged away, still unconscious, apparently to be taken somewhere he could be held.

"I'd like to believe you," Lasponin said, two other former militia standing behind him. A third was in front of the curtained door, armed with a naked sword blade. Rian had been divested of his sword, which was now leaning on the wall behind the doctor. Despite the fact they were all wearing simple trousers and shirts like them, with no identifying marks of any kind, they were definitely former militia, since they stood with watchful patience and held their clubs as if they knew how to use them.

"I did punch him repeatedly," Rian said. "In fact, I punched him more than you did."

"Yes, he might be concussed," the doctor agreed. "Despite my oaths as a healer, I can't really bring myself to care right now."

"What a coincidence," Rian said. "Despite my responsibilities as his lord, I can't bring myself to care either. See, we're a lot more alike than we are different. I'm sure this will lead to a beautiful friendship in future."

Lori sat at the back next to the door, only one former militia standing guard over her. She tried to ignore the woman, but it was hard. She had a really annoying intent stare, and kept rubbing her shins for some reason. Still, Lori kept taking even breaths, drawing it in and letting it out in a calm fashion.

"Recent events have cast doubt on your kind desire to reunite families, lord Rian," Lasponin said.

"People can have more than one reason to do something," Rian said. "In fact, it's preferred. And I'll admit, the fact we were told there was an unclaimed demesne in the middle of nowhere was a consideration for our Binder, or else they'd never have left. And Grem knew that too." Rian titled his head. "If we'd gotten here sooner, would you have let us claim the dungeon instead of pushing it on a child?"

"So you admit you were here for the dungeon," Lasponin said.

"Our Binder was here for that," Rian said pointedly. "I literally just said so. I wanted to see if I could help."

"Do you consider trying to kill our Binder help?"

"Again, I was hitting him more than you were," Rian pointed out.

The doctor grunted, unable to really deny that inconvenient fact. "You could still be in league, trying to get us to drop our guard."

"Drop it more than having you up against the wall while one of us could have run past you?" Rian said, nodding towards the curtain door.

"Are you threatening my niece?" the doctor said.

"Okay, I'll bring up 'punched him more than you' one last time," Rian said. "We're a civilized people. We don't hurt children."

"Grem did," Lasponin said.

"He tried. And wasn't he from here originally?" Rian said blandly. "Look, the fact is, our Binder could have killed yours at any time and didn't. Grem aside, we came here with peaceful intentions. We wanted to help. If the Dungeon had been unclaimed, we'd have claimed it, gotten the rainbow death out of everyone's systems, and worked out a way to co-exist as a people under the same Binder. When we saw it was claimed, well, our Binder was disappointed, but killing was never part of the plan. We came here to help reunite people with their families, if they wanted to."

"You're obviously lying," the doctor said. "No one can be that naïve."

"What does your Binder say?" Lori suddenly said.

Everyone turned to look at her.

"She's there, right behind that curtain, listening to what we say," Lori said. "I can see her feet." Everyone looked in time to see the feet shuffle back. "What does she think? Doesn't she get a say in deciding the fate of the man who just tried to save her?"

"Shana is too young to have to decide this," the doctor said.

"But not too young to be a Dungeon Binder, obviously," Rian said. "Not too young to be responsible for keeping everyone in her demesne safe."

"I'm her uncle!" Lasponin snapped. "I decide things for her."

"Oh?" Lori said. "I thought you didn't claim to speak for your Binder?"

The doctor opened his mouth–

"Uncle," a small, scared, but surprisingly firm voice said.

The curtain was pushed aside, and a young girl stepped out. She wore a simple, faded brown skirt and undyed blouse, and her boots were worn and had obviously seen long use. Pale green eyes regarded them, but she took a deep breath. "I'll take it from here."

Lasponin frowned. "Shana–"

The hand of one of the former militia– though now that Lori thought of it, they might be shedding the 'former' part of that title soon– placed a hand on the doctor's shoulder. The doctor looked in surprise at surprisingly firm eyes.

Reluctantly, he stood aside, leaving the bench in front of Rian empty. The girl took a deep breath and sat on it as the militiaman with the sword moved to stand beside and slightly behind Rian, and the two that had been willing to flank the doctor from behind suddenly stood between the lord and the young Binder.

The girl coughed nervously. "You are… Lord Rian?"

"That's right, your Bindership," Rian said, somehow managing not looking awkward at having to show respect to a little girl.

"On behalf of River's Fork demesne, I greet you, Lord Rian," the girl said. It sounded like something she was repeating, like a line from a play. "I am Dungeon Binder Shanalorre."

Lori coughed.

Rian turned his head ever so slightly in her direction, but kept his gaze on the young girl. "My apologies, your Bindership… or do you prefer 'Great Binder'?"

"Um, either is fine," the girl said.

"Then I must apologize, Great Binder," Rian said. "But it's not me you should be talking to."

Glancing warily back at the militiaman standing behind them, Rian stood, leaving a vacant bench in front of the girl.

Lori stood. The militiawoman moved to bar her way, but Rian was suddenly there, smiling at her, keeping her from Lori as the Whisperer walked past him and sat down on the vacant bench. Lori was aware of the man with the sword behind her but…

Well, Rian was there. She trusted him to act heroic should it be needed.

"Greetings, Binder Shanalorre," Lori said as the doctor and militia stared at her in dawning comprehension. "I am Dungeon Binder Lolilyuri of Lorian Demesne." What had that phrase Rian had used been? "We come in peace."