"Any idea what's going to happen to him?" Rian asked.

They stood around the outside of Grem's impromptu prison under the light of the late afternoon sun. It felt… strange… to Lori to not have any work to do at this time of day. Usually she'd be desiccating the contents of the latrines and emptying them to make more room, or checking on the various stone plumbing for leaks or blockages, or curing wood so they could be used within the next few days.

The Vyshke woman shrugged. "That is not my decision," she said coolly. "My niece is the 'great'–" Lori could feel the quotation marks, "– Binder now. As she does not seem to want to talk to me at the moment, I should go see to my husband. Good day to you Lord Rian. I thank you for your assistance, and for choosing not to murder my niece."

She turned and walked off, not even acknowledging Lori.

"Soooo…" Rian said, glancing at the militiamen around them. "Are we under arrest? Do we have to leave the demesne?"

"The Binder will have to decide," the man who'd seemed in charge said. "When she gets around to it."

"And if, hypothetically, she doesn't?" Rian said. "Purely in the spirit of inquiry, not pressuring her or anything."

The man grunted. "You're free to leave if you want. She hasn't said anything. But that one stays." He jerked his head at Grem's prison.

Rian nodded. "If we, uh, were to spend the night… do you have any objection to us camping out in front of here? Or would we be obstructing a public road?"

The man eyed Rian suspiciously, then Lori as well for some reason– why? She wasn't anywhere near as suspicious as Rian!– before grunting. "You can all stay in there," he said, pointing at another Deadspoken wooden structure within sight of Grem's prison. "No one is using it anymore since the family moved out. Just don't do anything stupid."

"Thank you Mister Yllian," Rian said, making Lori wonder who he was talking to before realized it must be the man's name and promptly forgot about it. "Uh, if something is decided about him, could you inform us? It's for paperwork purposes, need to witness what happens and all that." They did?

"Get out of here," the man said, shooing them off.

Rian did just that, walking back towards their boat. After a few moments, he turned around and started pulling Lori along after him. Having nothing better to do, she let him

"So… what now?" Rian asked. "About Grem, I mean."

Lori glanced at him. "I hope you don't expect some sort of foolhardy rescue mission or any sort of heroic nonsense like that."

"No, he can rot in there for all I care, but I've learned not to assume I know what you're thinking," Rian said. "So, in lieu of heroic nonsense, what kind of nonsense should I expect?"

"Why do you assume it will be nonsense?"

"You used the word 'nonsense' first, I just assumed it was a blanket term for any sort of plan we come up with."

"I thought you'd learned not to assume?"

"Clearly the lesson didn't stick very well,"

Lori rolled her eyes. "Let's get back to the boat and make sure the idiot didn't damage my staff. I need to think."

"And I need to find someone who will actually answer my questions about people who want to reunite with their families who are now at Lorian," Rian said, sounding exasperated.

"Do that after you find out if they're feeding us for the night," Lori said. "And see if you can get more bread."

"Yes, your Bindership!"

––––––––––––––––––

Thankfully the idiot didn’t damage her staff, although the butt was wet and covered in dirt from negligent handling. Each of the quartz also had a little dark stain. It took her a while it realize it was dried blood. The idiot Landoor also kept looking down at Lori through his nose until Rian had pulled him aside and told him that they weren't pretending he was a Binder anymore. Surprisingly, the idiot had protested until one of the other two, Deil, had kicked him hard in the shin, and there'd been a quick, frantic, three-way conversation that had Rian's hand on his face.

Lori had looked upon this and turned to the other sensible person on the trip, Tackir. "That idiot believed some weird story about how having my staff put me in his power, didn't he?" she said.

"Worse, your Bindership," Tackir said with a sigh. "He believed a stupid story about how a Binder's staff was the source of their power, so now he was your heir."

Lori nodded solemnly. Really, she was surprised this kind of nonsense hadn't happened sooner. "Feel free to foist off as much work on him until we get back to the demesne as you want, as long as it doesn't slow us down," Lori said. There was nothing in the rights about work distribution, after all.

Tackir blinked, then smirked. "Yes, your Bindership. Justice and discipline, coming up."

"Don’t hurt him," Lori reminded. "He has rights, after all. Just make him suffer."

"Yes, your Bindership," Tackir said, sounding much more cheerful.

Petty? Extremely, but that idiot needed to be dissuaded from believing in baseless stories, especially when they made him rub his blood on Lori's stuff! He was a grown man, after all!

Lori watched in some annoyance as the boxes– made from valuable cut planks slotted together with joinery, when had someone found time to make them?– of preserved meats were hauled out of Lori's Boat to be given to whoever was in charge of the food at this demesne. Surely there was someone, right? Still, there was nothing to be done about it. Despite his annoying initiative in not consulting her about this use of their resources, it probably wouldn't hurt to try and buy cooperation and influence with food.

She sat on the boat, guarding the stuff they were definitely not giving away, one elbow casually resting on the metal wire poking out from the bone support strut. The bone was still in good condition, with no breaks or any structural problems, so she left that be, though she reminded herself to reinforce it when they set out. The water jet had bled off some imbued magic since she'd deactivated it this morning, and she took the time to imbue it again for the journey back. They wouldn't need much. At worst, they could leave early and get back to at least the border of Lori's Demesne by nightfall. That was actually a fairly convenient travel distance, all things considered. A part of her sighed in despair at not being able to claim this place for herself. Hopefully the probationaries had also brought grain crops with them and were even now planting it in her Demesne so they'd eventually have bread…

Huh, actually, she hoped they hadn't planted yet, she hadn't had time to consider a good site for a more established field. They had some plots for wild vegetables, but those were small, experimental things as people tried to figure out how to best grow them. An actual field for crops would be different… but wait, the probationaries probably didn't have that many on them to safely transport… did they? Ugh, she'll have to ask Rian and see if he knew how much the probationaries had managed to bring with them…

These regretful thoughts filled her as she sat back on the boat, imbuing the water jet and waiting for everyone to get back so they could unload the rest of the things on the boat for the night and finally let her push it back out into the river to sleep, because there was no way she was going to sleep in the same room as them. No, not safe, not safe at all. She might not be inclined to kill their Binder, but she wasn't quite sure the reverse was true. Although… sleeping in the middle of the river would leave her vulnerable…. Ugh, where could she sleep where she was safe?-! Maybe she could find an abandoned house in the middle of the night and sleep there? Though that left the problem of doing so unseen…

She was still considering the problem when Rian came back. "So, wonderful news," he began with a bright, happy smile.

"Bread?" Lori asked.

"Bread!" Rian sighed with pleasure.

The two grinned at each other before Lori coughed and looked aside, mindful of her dignity. "Ah, wonderful news indeed," she nodded, trying not to salivate at the thought of bread for dinner. "Was that it?"

Rian nodded. "Still no word on what's going to happen to Grem. Though I'm getting the impression it's being kept quiet right now. The only ones who seem to know are the two of us, Missus Vyshke, her husband, and those militia. I guess they don't want anyone taking matters into their own hands without their Binder's decision. Personally, I think they should all get together and come to a rational decision as a group–"

"Please don't embarrass me by espousing your ridiculous voting fetish to the people here," Lori said

Rian gave her an incredulous look. "You think I'll embarrass you? And it's not a fetish, it's a rational, intelligent way of making decisions–"

"It's a bizarre fetish the way you fixate on it," Lori said flatly. "Please don't encourage the power-mad uncle by enabling him with a childish fantasy of how a demesne could be run by ignoring the decisions of its Binder in favor of other people."

"Is that how you see it?" Rian said.

"A demesne that defies its Binder is already asking to get messily murdered by that Binder," Lori said. "A demesne encouraging another demesne to defy its Binder is asking for a war after the messy murdering. Let's not complicate Binder Shanalorre's life any further, shall we?"

"But–"

"Rian," Lori said sharply. "That's enough. Leave it be. You probably think you're helping. You're wrong. Whatever they decide to do here, we can't be accused of being part of it. Understand?"

Rian blinked. "Oh…" he said in a small voice. "This is one of those 'can't do anything because anything would look bad' situations."

"Finally," Lori said. "Yes, Rian. Theoretically, any sort of organized decision making will help… but we can't be seen to have influenced the formation of that organization. It would erode Binder Shanalorre's authority and credibility."

"Weren't you planning to let her die the next time a dragon passed by so you could claim this place?" Rian said blandly.

"I'd rather not set the precedent that people can erode my authority by gaining the support of another Binder and living to tell about it," Lori said. "So no 'innocently' telling people about voting, understood? If they come up with it, it must be by themselves. We have nothing to do with it." She paused. "That is not an oblique hint that you inform them so in secret. You are not to inform them at all. Understood?"

"Almost childishly clear," Rian said dryly. "Fine. So we just sit down, not get in trouble, let Grem hang to whatever justice they come up with, and go home, right?"

Lori nodded. "I suppose you can still look for those wounded left behind by their families," she said.

"Not left behind completely," Rian said. "The ones left have at least one family member staying with them, at least from what Grem told me on the way here. Though, since she's a healer, they're probably not wounded anymore. We might still have to take two trips though, probably three, depending on how many and how much stuff they have."

"I will, of course, leave you to take care of that," Lori said.

Rian rolled his eyes. "Of course. Do you want to go see the house we'll be staying in or do you want to risk sleeping out here. It's kind of bare, but it has an internal wall dividing it into two rooms, so I can help you barricade yourself in."

Lori blinked, considering. "Yes, I suppose that will do," she said. "You're sleeping in front of the door."

"You sure you trust me with that?" Rian said, with a twisted smile.

"Probably not, but you're all I have," Lori said.

"Your faith in me makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside," Rian said blandly.

"You should talk to a doctor about that, those can't be healthy symptoms."

"Should you really be irritating the man you plan to have guard your door?"

"I'll give you a little of my bread."

"How little?"

"Very little."

"Fine, I'll take it."

Feeling like she won and lost at the same time, Lori followed Rian to see where they would be sleeping for the night.