Chapter 308: The Lord’s Answer
Ren walked through the flowers and down to the silver shore, where Orun and Sethe were keeping the approach clear. The craftsperson waited beside the rock shelf with its tools laid out. Eira stood at the water’s edge, and Bolt turned toward him in the shallows.
The frame began to hum before he reached the beach.
Pale light filled the opening. Vesper came through with Mistwhisker at her heels, while Tarin crossed through the water behind them. Pell and Riptide followed into the shallows, leaving the deeper channel clear for Ward.
The whale came last, with Keep’s cradle dry above the water.
Ren counted all six entries and Mistwhisker as they cleared the frame. No one appeared hurt. Ward drew alongside the shelf and waited while the craftsperson steadied the cradle. Eira released Keep from its seat and lifted it clear before the Glassfire began loosening the carrier straps.
"The padding hasn’t shifted," Eira said. After a brief examination, she set Keep down on the flat stone. "No fresh injury."
"Let it rest. We won’t need any more reports today."
Ren helped gather the straps as the empty cradle came off. Once everything was clear, Ward moved away from the shelf.
Vesper joined him beside the packs.
"Anything we should change?" he asked.
She drew a wet strap out from beneath one of them. "These fold under the packs when we set them down. I had to pull them clear before I could lay the next load beside them."
"Give them their own place before Ward comes alongside?"
"Yes. Whoever clears the empty packs can do it."
Ren noted it. "The last unloading went well. You had the space ready."
"Tarin took the container first. I could get straight to the pack fastening."
Tarin had come up to the bank. Ren turned toward the spear carrier.
"And you brought back all four from those two caches, then helped get Ward clear. Good work."
He looked down at Riptide and Pell waiting nearby. "Both your routes mattered. Pell, we’ll mark your burst range properly after you’ve rested."
Pell’s flame dipped once.
"That goes for the whole squad. No hauling or guide runs until you’ve had a rest. I’ll arrange any work that needs doing."
Vesper closed her notebook and began putting away the empty containers.
"The prize is for the young Pyreborn under the tree," Ren added. "A nurture medium to help her develop. I collected it after the final."
Eira looked up from Keep. "You have it?"
"And the full instructions. I’ll bring them down when we’re finished here."
Bolt was still in the shallows. Ren went to the water’s edge while the others dispersed.
"Your flank was sound. Leaving you out was about the loads we needed to carry through those narrow channels. It wasn’t because you couldn’t compete."
The jetmaw turned beside him, then swam toward the sheltered side of the cove.
Beyond Ward, Wake came around the rock arm and approached the cleared shelf. Ren stayed to meet it.
"You and Bolt held west while we took east," he said. "We needed that pool to stay ours."
He rested his hand against the whale’s side for a moment. When he stepped back, Wake turned toward the pod beyond the mouth.
— • —
Orun crossed the beach once the returning squad was clear.
"I checked the stretch past the second headland. The warmth holds below the surface too. I went down twice."
"Can the families reach it from the shore?"
"Without a load. The way down is broken, but the water approach is clear. They need level footing at the edge to unload."
"Show the craftsperson where. Have the stone measured and cut before the next supply run, and take it with that load."
Orun nodded and went over to the shelf before the tools were packed away.
At the frame, the return was checked against the event manifest. The receiving staff confirmed the six entries, Mistwhisker and the declared equipment. Ren waited until the last item was accounted for, then the light faded from the opening.
Later, he met the official assigned to collect the frame on campus and brought them into his world himself. He accompanied them down to the cove, where they checked the fittings, released the sections from their supports and packed them into a carrying case.
Ren escorted the official and the dismantled frame out, then returned to the shore.
He stopped in the strip he had kept clear for the crossing. Small waves reached the sand where the supports had stood, and he could look out between the rock arms without the frame above the water.
— • —
On the empty path above the Worldroot, Ren took the sealed case from his System storage. He carried it down to Eira and unfastened the two procedure sheets from its strap.
She sat on the bank and read both pages, going back once to check the section on administration. Ren waited beside her before they compared the storage instructions with the spaces above the pocket.
They chose a dry recess beside a root, above the waterline and away from spray or direct heat. Ren set the case upright, with enough room for Eira to lift it out without tilting it.
"Keep the sheets beside it," he said. "You should be able to reach everything here."
Eira laid the folded pages next to the case, then went down to the water.
The princess was awake in her sheltered pocket. Roots ran through the water beneath her, and Loom maintained the slow circulation across the shallow end. Wick waited on the bank with its light falling over the surface.
Eira knelt to see where she could work. As her hands moved above the water, the princess turned toward them.
"She’s watching Eira’s hands, Ren."
Kaia’s voice reached him privately. He crouched where the princess could see him, waited for her gaze to shift toward him, then returned to the preparations.
He checked the water at the pocket’s mouth, beside the roots and near the outflow. Eira adjusted her position on the flat stone until she could reach the working area without leaning over the princess.
"Here," she said. "The jar can sit beside me. I won’t have to reach across her."
Ren looked along the bank. "I’ll clear this approach so nobody has to pass behind you while you’re working."
"Leave enough room to bring the case down." She checked her reach once more, with both hands empty, then sat back. "She can stay where she is."
The jar remained sealed above them while Ren cleared the approach. He kept the work on the bank, leaving the roots and Loom’s flow undisturbed. When he finished, he checked the same places in the water again. The warmth had held while they worked.
Eira compared the pocket with the preparation section on the sheet.
"We’ll check it again before we start," she said. "The circulation stays as it is, and so does the support from the roots."
"How will you compare any change without repeatedly handling her?"
Eira took out her folded drawings. "From the same place I’ve been watching. These show what she could hold together on each visit." She laid two beside one another. "I’ll keep the angle the same. If anything changes, I can mark it here."
Ren looked from the drawings to the pocket. The princess had turned toward Wick again, her small hand resting against a submerged root.
Before leaving, he checked the recess once more. The case stood dry and upright, away from the warmer rock beside the pocket. Eira returned the procedure sheets to its side and kept her drawings with her.
— • —
Sol was outside the hall when Ren returned to campus. Behind him, an attendant was taking the old round notices off the boards.
"Did the file help?" Sol asked.
"It had the site conditions and dates. They also marked which observations had been checked."
"Good. Worth asking, then." He took a loose sheet from his folder and wrote an address at the top before passing it over. "Messages reach me there. If you find another useful entry in the catalog, send it along. I’ll do the same."
Ren wrote his own contact beneath it, and Sol tore the sheet so they each kept the other’s address.
Halvern was in his garden, with a flat wooden box open on the table beside him. He waved Ren to the other chair.
"Your win has brought some interest," he said. "Two institutions have asked for your public world record."
"Through you?"
"These requests came to me." Halvern took the papers out of the box. "They want a name for the world, a contact for access inquiries and the resident arrangements you’ve declared."
Ren sat down and read the first request. "I haven’t supplied a world name."
"I know. The field is still blank."
"Does answering this give them permission to visit?"
"No. It gives them a contact through which to ask. You still decide whether to admit anyone."
Ren turned to the second paper. It asked for the same details.
"And the resident arrangements?"
"The declared terms under which people live there. They haven’t asked for a list of individuals or a count." Halvern placed a separate sheet beside the letters. "You can use this to prepare the information. Read it through before you send anything."
Ren drew the sheet toward him. The contact field gave him somewhere to put an address he would receive himself. Beneath it was space for the resident arrangements. Both were matters he could answer from what was already settled.
He went back to the first heading, with its empty line beneath it.
World name: