For the Light

[Lani Stranger]

14th of Fall, 518AV

“Hey, hey, hey, you.”

“Lani, my name is Lani.” She understood the Nari words, but answered him in common. The Avora snapped his finger and tapped his head.

“Yup, I’ll get it eventually.” He said in a dismissive tone. This slightly infuriated the half-blood, and she tried not to frown, brushing her hair behind her head. She wore the new clothes she had bought at market day. They were loose and showed her mid-drift, which made her uncomfortable, but the Inarta had few of the regular tight fitting clothes she was used to, and they were expensive, made for foreigners. She was determined not to be a foreigner.

“Yeah, can you please go to the backrooms and help Dani make candles? We are running low.” He said, turning back to the scroll he was marking up on his desk.

“Of course, Kavisan.” Lani said, using his name in an effort to make him remember to use hers.

“The Bryda suits you, Lani!” He called over his shoulder in common, and she could hear the accent of the Nari word. Still she smiled because he had made an effort to use her name. Lani inhaled the beautiful scent of books as she passed. Knowledge, these wooden shelves that held the ghosts of dead trees held so much knowledge waiting to be unlocked. Of course, hardly any of it was in common, but that didn’t feel like an obstacle so much as an opportunity.

By the time she reached the backrooms, she heard the sound of someone already rummaging through things.

“Hello.” She called out one of the only words she knew in Nari. Dani didn’t speak common, as far as she knew, but Lani put an effort in to try and communicate. The Chiet Inarta was not too fond of having to work with a mixed blood, but she was cooperative. Surely, the language barrier didn’t help.

“Hey, half-wit.” Lani didn’t recognize the nickname that Dani had started calling her, but she smiled in greeting anyway. “Here to help with the candles?” Dani spoke very fast, but Lani caught the words ‘here’ and ‘help’ and assumed it was for the candles. So she nodded. She felt so stupid in this language, she hardly understood anything.

“How do you say it?” She repeated the phrase that she knew, hoping she was pronouncing the soft tones correctly.

“Say what?” Dani asked, plopping a few blocks of wax on the table, next to the containers she had already set out. Lani began looking around for a brazier or something, that she figured they would need. The shelves were full of carefully packaged paper, rolls of twine, leather, and different cutting tools for the binding of books. Nothing that looked like a brazier, but she did think the candles would need a wick. Trying to help the tall half-Eypharian stepped over to a shelf, relieving it of one of its’s spools of twine, and set it on the table beside the other candle making supplies.

When Dani returned she dropped a canvas sack on the table, and huffed, looking at what Lani did. Dani grabbed the twine, and shoved it back to Lani, who tenderly took it.

“This isn’t right for candlewicks.” Dani jabbered at her in Nari, and Lani didn’t understand any of it. Seeing that the mixed blood did not comprehend, Dani sighed, and slowed her words. “Put. It. Back.” It didn’t feel mean, but it did feel humiliating to be talked to like she was stupid. Lani nodded, frowning, and put the twine back where she got it.

When she returned, Dani had pulled out another ball of twine, rolling it toward s Lani over the large table. Lani scooped it as she walked back around, examining the difference. “Oh.” She immediately realized which was apparent in her voice. The twine that was made for the wick was thinner, smoother, cotton with a coating of wax already on it. She knew that wax was a catalyst for fire, and perhaps it was also useful for keeping the wick in place while the wax cooled. Now it made sense to her why there was a special thread for the wick.

“Mhmm.” Dani said, realizing what Lani discovered. The mixed blood walked back over to stand by her side, silently and patiently, watching Dani unpack things.

[Lani Stranger]

“Here, fill that with… water.” The Inarta began jabbering at the tall girl, but remembered the language barrier and slowed her wording, handing her a large, deep bucket. Dani made filling motions with her hands, and then pointed Lani in the direction of the spicket, near the waste rooms. Lani grabbed the bucket, heading towards the spicket, and placing the bucket down below it. The first pump was always the hardest because the water had time to settle, but within two pumps, Lani had gotten the bucket mostly filled. She had figured out that this was for a double boiler, so she left enough room to place the other bucket inside.

When Lani returned to Dani, Dani had found a brazier and was trying to light it. The Chiet was having trouble getting the sparks to catch on the tinder inside the Brazier, and it took Lani less than a second to recognize why. The lighting tray was removable. Carefully, so she didn’t upset the Inarta, Lani reached over, and pulled the door to the tray all the way open, and then wiggled the metal pan out. She straightened the tinder, removing the coals and then held her hand out for the flint and steel. Dani looked at her, irritated, but sighed. This was not a skill this Inarta was used to, clearly.

With quick and knowledgeable hands, Lani hit the flint and steel just right, setting a few sparks skittering across the table, but most importantly, setting the tinder aflame. Once it was good and going, she set one coal in it, waited for it to light, and then another… then finally the third. She dipped her hands in the water and wiped them on her pants to clean them. Afterwards she slid the tray back in and closed the door, watching the glow of the fire through the slots in the brazier.

Dani set the bucket of water on top of the brazier, and then pulled two planks of wood out of the bag. In it were three sets of nails. Each nail was on the edge of the plank of wood pointed in, with one directly opposite to it. There were three rows of this, and she could see the well-travelled marks of wax where the wicks laid.

“Here, watch this.” Dani tossed four nails at Lani and kept four for herself. She then picked up the roll of wick and two metal tubes. She handed Lani one, and the first think the girl did was peer in it like a telescope. It had a bottom so she couldn’t see through, but the mixed blood hiked one foot up on an imaginary rock, held one hand on her hip, and pretended to look out over the horizon like a sailor. When she was done with her skit, she looked at Dani with an expectant face. The Inarta frowned at her.

“Whatever, you don’t have a sense of humor anyway.” She muttered in common, setting the tube on the counter again. Lani didn’t grasp the meaning of the Nari, but knew it wasn’t the reaction she was looking for anyway.

[Lani Stranger]

“Ready now?” Dani asked, waiting.

“Yes.” Lani said in Nari, resigning the attempt to make too friendly a company out of Dani.

“Measure out the wick to the length of the tube, then double it.” Dani said slowly, still remembering the language barrier. Still, the words were a little too complex for Lani, so she paid attention to Dani’s actions. The Inarta held the wick up to the length of the tube, gave an extra few inches, then folded it over and measured out another tube-length. She sliced the thread with a knife, then handed it and the blade to Lani.

Copying her movements, Lani measured the length of the tube, gave a few inches, and measured the next length, and then cut. When she glanced back at Dani, the Inarta was already fastening the extra nails to each end of the long strings. Quickly, Lani copied, and while she did that, she saw Dani beginning to cut another long wick. Lani hurried to fasten the nails, pulling the knots taut, then pulling another string.

Dani was going fast, probably from memory, but at least the steps weren’t hard. After weighting the two threads, she set them aside just like Dani. She watched Dani fill the tube with blocks of wax, and did the same. At that point, they could hear the water had not yet begun to boil, and Dani set her own tube in on one side, hooking the handle on the edge of the bucket. Lani filled hers up as well and set it in.

“Now, you have to make sure these are even.” Lani turned back to Dani in time to see her holding up the plank with the nails and draping the wicks over them, so that each weighted end hung down. She adjusted them so that they hung even, and then looped each end around the nail to secure it in place.

Lani attempted to copy the same thing, not having understood the complex Nari, even though it was spoken slowly. However, the trying to mirror was Dani was doing, but opposite to her point of view, Lani got confused. Where Dani had let the wicks hang even over the plank and then looped them over the nails to secure them, Lani tried to loop them first, making them fall uneven. Dani gave a frustrated huff and snatched the project from Lani. The half-blood sighed in defeat, watching Dani fix her own for her. She could guess the language barrier was not the only reason Dani had little patience for her.

[Lani Stranger]

Once Dani handed it back to her, Lani inspected it to see how Dani did it. She could already see there was spatially a better way to do it, and so with the her second one, she ignored Dani. She laid the wicks across the plank so that they were at a slight angle, one side of the wick fell in front of the nail on the left, and the other side fell behind the nail on the right. That way, once she had two on there, they were angled far enough away from one another to have enough room to be dipped. Because of this, she realized there was room for one more.

Lani took the initiative to grab another length of wick, fastening the weights to it, and then laying it similar to the other two. Now this dipper held six candles instead of just four. Dani was watching her carefully, and didn’t seem to say anything. Lani when she was does she held it out silently for the Inarta to inspect. Dani took it from her, just holding it by the plank. After a long moment of judgement, Dani sighed and nodded.

“Yeah, sure.” She remarked, handing it back to Lani. Lani grinned, pulling another length of wick and passing it back to Lani, assuming the Inarta would follow her obviously more intuitive plan. Although by the way the planks were set up, it seemed as if this was how they were expected to be. Except Dani did not. So now Lani had twelve potential candles, and Dani had eight. This meant if Lani fucked up too bad, she would have ruined twelve candles.

Lani would have been nervous, except candles were easily melted down and redone if so. Regardless of how they turned out, they will still burn, it wasn’t that hard.

Except now they simply had to wait. Dani peered into the bucket, and Lani peered in after her, seeing the trees of small bubbles standing up the side of the bucket, an indicator that it was beginning, but not ready to boil. Lani leaned back against the table, lettingher eyes wander the workroom. This room was mainly used for binding and repairing books, There were shelves of paper, leather, twine, ink, and various other supplies for creating and repairing books. In the center where they worked, there was a large open table for working. In the corner, under a shaft of light there was a smaller, thicker table, with gridlines etched into the stone, and two large blades that can be pulled down to cut paper. There were spools on the wall with various thickness of twine. In the other corner there was a small door to the washroom, and outside of it there was a spicket over a large tub of water, which Lani could only guess was used for soaking wood and things.

While Lani was looking around the room, Dani was shuffling the things on the table into organization. There was an uncomfortable silence, filled with the tension of two people who did not quite know each other, and perhaps thought one another annoying. Suddenly Dani said something in Nari, and Lani looked over, not understanding. The Inarta was holding up a blade, not to hand it to Lani, but to show her.

[Lani Stranger]

“Blade.” She said again, and then held it out to Lani to give to her. The mixed blood scrunched her brows in confusion, but took the blade out of habit. She held it lightly, unsure of what she was supposed to do with it. As far as she knew, it was a learn-by-following type of day. She was not sure what to do with this. “Blade.” Dani said again, and then nodded to her.

“Blada?” Lani repeated, trying to put a questioning infliction on the word, Dani nodded.

“B-L-A-D-E.” She repeated, sounding it out better for the mixed-blood.

“Blade.” Lani said resolutely.

“Good, now…” Dani took the blade back, set it down, and picked up the ball of twine. “Twine.” She said, twisting the end of the string between her fingers, before handing it to Lani.

“Twine.” Lani repeated. Turning the ball in her hand, and then handed it back. Dani picked the ball up, tossed it between her own hands, and then made the motion to toss to Lani. Lani held her hands up, ready, and Dani underhanded it the short distance.

“Ball.” The inarta said.

“Balle.” Lani repeated, tossing it back. Dani shook her head.

“B-A-L-L.” She repeated, slower. Instead of tossing it she brandished the sides, showing the curve of the twine, and then setting it on the table, she made the same motion with her hand, creating a ball in the air. Lani understood it was not the throwing motion she was naming, but the shape.

“Ball.” Lani repeated in Inarta, nodding as if she understood, and then making a ball shape in the air with her hands too.

“Ball of twine.” Dani said.

“Ball of twine.” Lani repeated the phrase, unsure of the new word in between the two she just learned. “How do you say… of?” She asked, knowing that question was not quite the correct.

“Of.” Dani answered, simply, also suspecting that was not quite what Lani meant to ask.

“No, no… umm.. How do you mean?” She changed her question slightly, knowing it probably didn’t make grammatical sense.

“Oh, um, I haven’t the faintest clue how to explain ‘of’ to a Common-speaker. Just go with it.” The language was too quick for Lani, and she nodded blankly, pocketing her question away for Kavisan.

“Ball of twine.” She said, not sure what the ‘of’ sound meant, but deciding to go with it. The beginning stages of learning a language was dominantly vocabulary anyway, learning the grammatical rules of Kontinese had been frustrating.

“You got it!” Dani smiled at her, giving her a thumbs up, and Lani grinned back. By the time the girls had finished with the short short lesson, they could hear the water boiling. Dani took a stick and twirled the wax in her pitcher, which was already half-way melted, and then handed Lani the stick so she could do the same. Instead of going back to another grammar lesson, she adjusted her wicks to match Lani’s. The hallfblood didn’t say anything, realizing that now that Dani didn’t hate her so much, it was probably easier for the Inarta to acknowledge that she was right. No matter how dumb she sounded in Nari, Lani was not actually stupid. She just couldn’t communicate.

They sat in silence for a few more minutes before the wax was completely melted.

[Lani Stranger]

“Okay, now follow me.” Dani spoke up, picking up her plank that now held six wicks, and checking the level of them once more, before positioning them over the wax. In a quick movement, she dipped the wicks down into it, and pulled it back up. Lani saw the weights kept the wicks straight so they did not crumple and float in the wax. Dani let the wax drip from the strings for a few seconds before removing it from over the pitcher, so that Lani could do hers as well. She copied Dani exactly, it wasn’t a terribly hard skill to do, although this was one of the easiest candles to make, she knew that. Why else would be she starting on it.

“Oh shoot, I forgot.” Dani thrust her drying wax towards Lani, and she took the plank automatically, not having heard what the Inarta had said in Nari. Dani grabbed another long bucket and went to the spicket to pump water into it. While she did that, Lani took the wax, which appeared quite dry, and stuck each one into the pitchers quickly, before pulling them out and letting them drip and dry.

“Watch this.” Dani carefully pulled her plank back, dipping it into the cooler water, and then letting the water drip right off the wax. Lani realized what she was doing, quickly cooling the wax so she could keep dipping. Lani copied her, dipping her wicks in the water, where they bounced with the buoyancy. They were still weighted so they didn’t float too much, but the wax was less than the water, so it floated a little. After the water had dripped off, Lani dunked it back into the wax.

“Ten.” Lani recognized the Nari number, and looked at Dani in confusion. Ten what? Candles? They needed more than that, for sure. “Ten dips.” Dani repeated, dipping the wicks into the wax with emphasis, and Lani understood. She nodded, and did the same.

Wax, water, repeat. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

After Lani and Dani had done ten successful layers, the strings were looking like actual candles. The wax had gathered on the weights on the end which made an unsightly clump with cooled drips hanging of the end, but once they dunked the candles in the water one last time, Dani began unhooking hers. Lani did the same, abandoning the new candles on the table like her Inarta counterpart had. Quickly, Dani began stringing up six more wicks, and Lani waited for the string and blade to do the same.

It took her an extra tick or two while she remembered how she had laid them, in front of the left, behind the right, so they laid diagonally across the plank, secured by the nails. Then she went straight to dipping. The second time around was much easier.

Wax, water, wax, water, wax, water… ten times.

Again, once the candle seemed the appropriate thickness, Dani and Lani abandoned their finished candles on the table and begun stringing up more.

[Lani Stranger]

About twenty-four candles later, the wax in each of their pitchers was less than half way. Dani picked up her pitcher and poured it into Lani’s before setting up her next set of wicks. This time they traded off on dipping. It took slightly longer but they tore through the melted wax much quicker, creating twenty four more candles before it was too low again.

This time, Dani pulled a mold out of the bag, and the stir stick. She cut a length of wick, tied it to the stir stick, and then dropped it into the mold to measure height. Lani pulled another mold out and copied her, tying a wick to the stir stick and measuring the height of the mold. Dani attached another weigh to this end, and Lani followed suit. Now she dipped the wick into the mold, she heard the clink of metal on metal as the weight hit the bottom. Her wick folded though, so she loosened the knot on the stir stick, and raised the wick slightly so it lay taught when she put it on the mold.

Dani gave her thumbs up, and then motioned for the taller woman to take the pitcher out of the boiling water. Grabbing a cloth so she didn’t burn her hands, Lani did so, pulling the pitcher out of the boiling water.

“Now pour it into the molds.” Dani instructed in slow Nari, while making the motions with her hands. Lani realized why the much shorter Inarta had her do this, when she nervously tilted the pitcher until the golden liquid wax poured out. Her aim was almost true, and she got most of the wax in the first mold, a large drip pooling on the outside of it, but it was otherwise fine. Lani moved to the next one and did the same pouring action, although this was easier because the pitcher was now lighter, and Lani got all the wax into the mold, and on the stir stick of course, but not on the table.

“Okay.” She heard Dani’s disappointment in the not-quite right way of pouring it, but they both knew that Lani did better because of her height.

[Lani Stranger]

By the time each mold was poured to the brim, there was a small amount of wax left, but not enough to do anything with. Lani assumed it would be saved and used next time, but instead Dani pulled out another mold, a small metal one, and opened it to show Lani. The tall mixed blood leaned over to look at the inside of the mold, and it appeared to made a long hexagonal stick of sorts. Immediately Lani understood it as a wax stick, used for sealing letters. But she had rarely seen a plain beeswax wax stick.

“Dye?” She asked in common, pointing to it. Dani cocked an eyebrow because she didn’t understand, and continued rummaging through the supplies bag for something. Lani placed the wax back into the boiling water to make sure that it didn’t harden before Dani did whatever she was going to do with it. The Inarta pulled out a small jar of powder that was a deep black color. Upon closer inspection, Lani could see hints of red in the dark powder and realized that it was a dye of sorts. Of course.

“Just a little bit now.” Dani said, pinching the air with her fingers to motion that there was only a little bit that was needed, and then handed Lani the dye, while pulling out a long stir stick. Lani uncapped the jar and held it over the was, gently tilting it and shaking it to try and let the powder own carefully. It came out in even shakes, and when Dani put her hand up to stop Lani, she pulled the jar back up. Immediately Dani stuck the stir stick in and began stirring the dye into the wax. As they melted together, the red powder exploded into a glinting bloody color that filled the wax bowl with just a few stirs. Dani seemed to stir it a little more for good measure, and then motioned for Lani to pour it again.

This time Lani did so slower, because there was so little wax left, it would travel quickly. So it did, pouring out of the tube with quick vigor, and into the wax mold. Lani was able to rein it in and fill the wax stick mold half. Dani then closed the mold, and she noticed a little hole that allowed her to finish the fill, and then she did so.

Once the mold was done, Dani set it aside, along with the pillar candle molds, and the tapered candles. Wordlessly, she began putting the different utensils away, leaving the wax on the stirring sticks, and setting the wax tube aside to let the wax that rested on the walls of the metal thing to dry.

“We are going to let it cool, and clean it up tomorrow morning once they have hardened.” Dani jabbered away in Nari, making hand motions as she did so, and Lani didn’t understand the Nari completely, but understood the intent. They would leave it there, and clean it later. She wasn’t sure when later was, but she was sure she would be notified to help when so. In the meantime they straightened up the rest of the items, putting them away and pushing them to the end of the table as well. Candle making wasn’t so rough.

Word Count: 4,203

[Ssezzkero]

Socialization +5, Wilderness Survival +1, Candlemaking +5, Candlemaking: Supplies needed for tapered candles, Candlemaking: Supplies needed for pillar candles, Lighting a Brazier, Candlemaking: Dipping multiple candles at once, Candlemaking: Weighting the wick, Nari: Ball of twine, Candlemaking: Dip tapered candles in water after wax to harden, Candlemaking: Pillar candles use molds