They all soon paused for a break from their various activities and gathered to have lunch. Rory felt a little guilty for grilling them about different things when they were trying to peacefully enjoy their food, but at least he wasn’t being too overbearing about it. It was only about asking for reports from party members he hadn’t accosted yet.

The people who had been collecting Mana had come with good news. They had scoured all over the place grounds to gather up as much Mana as they could, and after half-a-day’s worth of work, they hadn’t even recovered half of what had fallen. That was excellent news for everyone. They wouldn’t have to worry about running out of Mana anytime soon.

At the same time, the patrols they’d kept continuing had spotted monsters outside the Safe Zone’s boundary. The creatures outside hadn’t been able to get past the shimmering golden hemisphere bordering the palace, but it was still frightening to see them attempting to do so.

“How many did you see?” Dez asked. “And what kinds?”

“A lot.” Ned had joined the patrol after he had healed some more. He could zip around with his Burnwing appendages, patrolling the entire perimeter of the Safe Zone far more effectively than anyone else. “We spotted some of those Rockbacks trying to slam through the boundary, some Emberteeth trying to burn it down, and some Dreadraptors flying across its surface.”

“Anything else?”

Ned crunched down on his hard sandwich. “More of the same, but nothing worrying.”

“Except when we go outside,” April said.

“Do we need to?” Bo asked. “Now that we have everything we need—”

“More survivors?” Viv peered sharply at him. “We need to see if there are any others still alive out there.”

“Fair, but I don’t expect a lot of people to still be alive in the area.”

“Let’s not count our apples before they’ve fallen.”

“Agreed,” Rory said. He finished his packet of old juice before continuing. “We’ll make efforts to help anyone not within the palace. But at the same time, we don’t have to go out until we’re sure of anything. The Wraiths can keep looking for us. So, in the end, I don’t see that being a major problem.”

They paused to get some more food. Their stores were a little low, and they desperately needed another trip to get the rest of the groceries they hadn’t yet brought in. At the same time, April promised they’d have their first batch of fruits in a couple of days. That was an exciting prospect. Their very own produce to keep them well-fed.

“How’s the infirmary looking?” Rory asked.

Evelyn rubbed at her mouth with a napkin. She looked tired, with her skin looking sallow and the deep shadows under her eyes, but her eyes were focused and sharp. “We’ve made a lot of progress.”

“I stand proof of that,” Dez said, flexing one of his arms.

Evelyn smiled gratefully at him. “Most of the injured are recovering well. A day or two more, and they should be well enough to start practicing with their Sigils. I’d still caution against going outside and potentially getting into hairy situations.”

Rory nodded. “What about the rest of them?”

Evelyn frowned. He wondered if she’d thought he would miss her talk of “most”.

“They’re coming along fine as well,” Vern said. “Evelyn and Dr. Jace did a great job with them. But they’re still going to need a little bit of time.”

“That’s a bit vague. Any particulars? How’s Sue doing?”

Evelyn grimaced. “I’m not sure. Her wounds are getting better, and her body is physically doing… well, not good, but it’s certainly better than before.”

“Could it be a head injury?”

Rory’s eyes involuntary turned towards May, who was being fed some walnuts by Dr. Jace. As though sensing his attention, the older doctor looked at Rory.

“That might be the case,” she said. “There’s no way for us to tell for certain, but she does have wounds around the head.”

Rory took a deep breath and tried not to let it out as a sigh. What strange fate to have both sisters suffer grievous head injuries.

“We’re working on it though,” Evelyn said. “And the others are coming along well too, as Vern said. Gracie should be up and about in a few days, once she’s woken up.”

Rory was about to ask who Gracie was when he recalled the old woman who’d been the old man’s partner. Then he remembered how the cranky old man had died. He sighed. The old guy had never been endearing the short time they’d all known him, quite the opposite in fact, but being crushed by falling debris had still been a horrific way to go.

What were they going to tell poor Gracie when she woke up?

They focused on food for the time being. It was good to take a moment to simply enjoy the meal and the little things in life, regardless of looming worries. After all, Rory had established this Safe Zone so they could worry less about whether they’d be alive come the next day.

Once lunch was done, they all took some time for a mental and physical break. Some of them napped, some of them paired off and chatted. Trish and Allen disappeared to spend some time together. Malcolm busied himself playing with Darcy. Leanne was reading a book.

For his part, Rory was sad he couldn’t pay as much attention to Viv as he might have. They tried chatting about little things for a while, but conversation was simply difficult.

So instead, their quality time came out to inspecting the gates they needed to rebuild.

“Would this be a good spot to build a storefront, you think?” Rory asked.

Viv glanced at him in surprise. “I’d nearly forgotten about that. Such a small, mundane thing, setting up a giant sign saying open or something like that.”

“Well, we probably need it to say more than that. Which reminds me, what should we name our business?”

Viv laughed. “I haven’t named anything since Alex, dear. You’re not really asking the right person.”

Rory snorted. “That’s true.”

“But yes, we need to get that storefront up. It’s actually more important than the gate itself, now that I think about it.”

It was. Weird as it would be to have a store sign up without a gate underneath it, in Rory’s opinion at least, it was the sign they needed to set up the business. Not a gate.

In fact, since that was the simplest thing to take care of, Rory got to work on it. He pulled in some of the others who weren’t particularly busy with anything and told them to gather everything they’d need. That included wood, some tools, nails, ladders, and paint for the actual sign.

They were lucky to find all they sought within the palace. All the salvaging they’d been performing over the last few days had been effective. Unfortunately, Rory wasn’t the most brilliant at the kind of crafting needed to put up the sign itself. It was a good thing there were others who were.

One of the former Neophytes, called Shelly, was actually good at woodworking. She had apparently run a gift shop selling wooden figurines, little statuettes that she used to carve herself. It had been a nice business. Now, she was ready to apply the same skill to a somewhat larger surface.

“How big do we want it to be?” Shelly asked.

“About as long the gate.” Rory looked up, trying to see if he could gauge the length by simply looking. “That might be fifteen or twenty feet or so, I think.”

“Hmm, we’re thinking that’s closer to twenty-five feet.”

“Wait, really?”

“That is our estimation.”

Rory was less surprised at his misestimation as he was at the use of Shelly’s “our”. He knew she and the other former Neophytes were in sort of hivemind situation, but it sounded as though they had all observed the area around the gate and concluded about its length together.

“Well, if you say so,” Rory said. “Do you think you can carve the wood? Will it last?”

Shelly inspected the large wooden board for a while. It wasn’t twenty-five feet long. Maybe half that length, and as it was the longest piece they had, they’d have to join a few more boards to it. “I cannot say for certain. Do you know of a way to make it last through the ages?”

“I might have some solutions.” Rory was figuring out his Sigil options that could be applicable here. He might not be the best at woodworking, but there were other ways he could contribute. “How long do you think it’ll take for you to carve it all into shape?”

“Hmm, what was the name we came up with?”

“Uh, I don’t think we did.”

Rory gathered up the others to come up with potential names. He had to admit that he was little better than Viv when it came to titling things too.

Ned hummed. “Maybe Sigil Sellers?”

“Could work,” Rory said, not really liking it but trying to be polite and leave it open for other suggestions.

“How about The Sigil Emporium?” Miles had an excited gleam in his eyes. Rory smiled at seeing the kind of enthusiasm he had seen around the time he’d first met the guy. “Doesn’t it sound good, gramps? Majestic. Enchanting.”

Rory laughed. “It sure does.”

“Enchanting!” Leanne said. “Sigil Enchanting. Because Rory doesn’t just use his Weaving, he’s got his Warding too.”

“That’s a good point. We need to figure out what exactly we’ll be selling.”

“Yes, I agree,” Viv said. “We need to figure out what exact services we’re going to be providing, and to whom exactly. There might be limits we’re not going to be crossing. I can already think of hypothetical situations where we might want to refrain from letting them use Rory’s Weaving ability.”

Rory found his eyes falling to the ground. She was right. What if the Otherworlders wanted an insane Sigil that could wipe the Homeworlders off the face of the world? What if the Homeworlders found a similar secret, and Rory was the final key they needed to defeat the Otherworlders completely? In essence, he’d be the deciding factor in the war then, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that possibility.

For, if the war was over, they’d have little further need of someone like him.

“Weaving and Warding,” Rory said, coming to a temporary decision. “That’s what we’ll keep my active side of the business to. I’ll accept commissions to Weave and Ward Sigils, but only if I agree to what the Sigil might be used for.”

“I can see things getting hairy with that kind of stipulation,” Evelyn said.

“It will be fine,” Shelly said. “Freelancers in general reserve the right to accept or deny any commissions they are made.”

“You make me sound like an artist,” Rory said with a little laugh. “But yes, there’s no point worrying about hypotheticals when we don’t even have the first thing about a business set up yet. So, let’s take care of that first. Any other naming suggestions?”

“How about Sigil Weaving Services?” Trish suggested.

Rory nodded. “I like that. Though, we’re going to cut out the Weaving part just to be safe.”

“And accurate,” Leanne reminded them.

Rory smiled. “And accurate. We’ll be Warding, and we can sell some of our surplus Sigils too, the ones we don’t have specific uses for. Especially the couple of really higher-Tier ones.”

Shelly nodded and got to work. Some of the other Neophytes had joined her too. There were others among them who were good at working with wood and handling tools, but none of that could replace the efficiency of communication provided by a hivemind.

It took only an hour or so before they had joined the wooden boards and carved the large letters Sigil Services. At the bottom of the sign, Rory had requested a subtitle as well.

Looking for solutions to you Sigil problems? Look no further!

Once the board was finished, he tasked the others with lifting it up into the proper place above the gates. There were two columns on either side of the broken gate. Rory was able to Weave some Sigils of Support from sections of the palace that fallen into disrepair, like areas with broken walls and cracked ceilings. No one was going to be able to use those areas anyway.

The former Neophytes were able to lash the wooden board to the columns with ropes. Rory warded the Sigils of Support into the ropes to keep the contraption steady.

Afterwards, he threw some icy bolts from his Staff of Deadly Winter to freeze over one of the fallen trees. He used his Weaving on the frozen log, focusing on the preserving effect of the ice to obtain some Sigils of Preservation. Rory Warded the new Sigils into the wood to help it last longer.

Finally, he focused another bout of Weaving on the weak sunlight around them. He Warded the Sigils of Sunlight into the board to make them glow with their own light, since they’d be harder to spot at night.

Miles ran off suddenly and they all watched until he came to a stop farther down the driveway, near the exit to the rest of the hill that led to Hillhard. He raised both hands high. Rory peered and thought he saw two, big thumbs-up.

“It looks great!” Miles shouted.

Rory laughed. “Thanks!”

He walked out of the ruined gateway and looked back at the sign. The sight of his newly-established storefront brought a smile to Rory’s face. They had done it.

They had taken care of a big step towards legitimately setting up their business.