Crafts, Trades, and Labor

[Naiya]

78th Day of Summer, 515 AV
Seventh bell of Morning

Naiya strode through the market with purpose the realization of their shortcomings as a pavilion sending her off on a mission. With a growing herd of zibri, horses, and perhaps soon hunting cats, it was amazing that they hadn't realized the mistake sooner.

None of their animals had Satalu. No mark of ownership, no association to the pavilion. It had occurred to Naiya when she visited the magic chest, turning in her markings of the Amethyst Clan, jewels, clothing, and ornaments all, that she could have removed the Satalu from the previous family's possession of the animals. Of course, they were not there, removed when the animals were sent home to Naiya's new family.

So nearly two seasons had passed with no claim to their animals, where anyone could have contested their ownership. It was a problem she intended to solve today. First, she needed supplies, which was how so came to be in the market. Her approach to the pavilion that sold whole cloth and spun thread was a familiar one, and the daughter of the woman who ran the shop jumped up from her work, weaving something on a small loom, to greet her.

"Naiya! Naiya, come see what I am working on!" She cried, her enthusiasm difficult to ignore. Naiya let the girl take her hand, but her mother's voice saved Naiya the child's explanation of her work.

"Greetings Naiya, it is good to see you." Her kind words halted the young girl, but did not stop her from clinging happily to Naiya's hand.

"Hello," Naiya spoke, halted from signing by the child's grasp, "It is good to see you as well, Nisa." Naiya smiled, scooping the persistently tugging child up into her arms before she could wear out her shoulder.

"What can we do for you today, dear? Have you used up all the wool so soon?" Nisa asked, shooting a quickly disapproving look at her daughter who had begun to braid Naiya's hair while the two adults spoke.

Reassurance, not bothered Naiya signed where the child couldn't see. "I'm here on personal shopping today, actually. I'm crafting Satalu for the animals of my new pavilion." She informed the elder woman, happy to chat with her as she usually did on business calls.

"I see, and you are still taking well to the change? How is your husband?" The woman was gently concerned they had spoken before when the child was away, about the troubles Naiya faced with her husband. Aware of the child in her arms, Naiya just shook her head,

"No change, I'm afraid. Love and protection with my new family, don't misunderstand, but no change." She admitted, she had made no progress in surpassing the issues Shahar seemed to have with intimacy. Or perhaps it was merely that he wasn't interested in being intimate with her.

"I see. Have you spoken to him, or to your wife on the subject?"

She shook her head, disrupting the child who put her hand gently on Naiya's face, "Be still, Naiya, you'll mess up your hair." She informed her with the authority of repeating words she had undoubtedly been told in the past. Naiya stilled, catching sight of the growing braid in the corner of her eye.

"I am very sorry, Ahmii." She responded with great seriousness, but her attention quickly returned to her friend. "I wouldn't want to tread on toes, I have only hinted and hoped." She replied, memories of long evenings, and poor results bringing a thoughtful frown to her lips.

"Perhaps I am being silly, to think he would be angry with me for broaching the subject, but, Nisa, what if he did become angry? I can hardly stand the thought of putting further distance between us. At least now I sleep beside him, wake next to him." She tried to explain, but she could still see the dissaproval in the woman's eyes. "I love him, Nisa, I am lucky to have him at all. I won't risk losing that, losing him, not over something so small."

"You know how I feel about you undervaluing yourself that way." Nisa told her, but her tone was gentle as though she had already given up on the argument. She probably had, it was one they had often. "So you'ye looking for cotton thread, for Satalu? What colors did you want?"

Naiya, careful to keep still lest she disturb Ahnii, offered an unsure to the woman. "I was thinking a couple colors of brown. Ranging from dark to light. Nothing that might be mistaken for topaz. I wanted to seek advice on that, too, do you think we can manage some pretty browns? Or should we stick to black and gray?"

"If you want browns, we can find some that will work. You'll need two spools of each color, unless you think you'll need more?"

With eighteen animals of various sizes, and soon more on the way, she should still have plenty with eight spools.

"No, eight is fine. I've got 8 silvers for you in my coin purse." Naiya informed her. Ahnii continued braiding madly, the first braid thumping firmly against her back when the little girl dropped it.

"Eight is too many, Naiya." She chided, sorting through the spools she had. "Two and a half is all I'll take." She informed, pulling the first two spools, both dyed a rich brown.

She shook her head, forgetting the chiding from the child in her arms. "Seven then." She countered. In her arms the little girl squirmed, grasping Naiya's face between both hands, gentle, but with strength as well.

"No moving, Naiya, now I have to start over!" She chided the elder Drykas, clearly disappointed with Naiya.

[Naiya]

Laughter trickled past her lips, much to the displeasure of the little girl who held her with such seriousness. Ahmii ducked her head, little fists crossing her chest in a pout. Frustration, hurt were clear in her body, as if they needed further indication.

"I am sorry, Ahmii," Naiya began to explain, "No one does my hair except me, so I forget to be still. I will try and do better." She gave the child on her hip a little bounce to brighten her mood, and it seemed to help.

Once the little fingers began to twine in her hair once more, Nisa spoke, "Three silver." She countered Naiya's offer of seven.

Naiya began to sign with barely concealed mirth, Vehement decline, cannot accept.

"Six." Naiya's counter came more reluctantly, this was hardly a fair deal. Nisa nodded condition in her hands.

"Five," She ammended, "And you can remove the hemming in Ahmii's dress. She has grown too tall for it."

There was a proper offer, Naiya accepted with more pleasure. Pulling a hem was simple work, but it wasn't done for free. It would balance their trade nicely. Nisa moved away to gather both thread and the dress, so Naiya turned her attention to the girl whose weight was beginning to strain her arm despite resting on her hip.

"Are you nearly done, Ahmii?' Naiya asked, knowing she could not hold the girl and do the work that was asked of her. The little girl's fingers halted their motions in her hair, her body tensing as she thought.

"Ummmmm." She pawed through the work she had managed in her hair, considering before her hands picked back up the rapid tempo of the braiding. "Just…. a….. minute……” She stretched the words out, holding the vowel sounds to give herself more time. “There!” Her exclamation was loud in Naiya’s ear, but the girl seemed to realize, her hands appearing in Naiya’s face to sign an apology. “I’m not done, but you can put me down now.”

Naiya was happy to part with the girl, her arm trembling just slightly as she placed the girl on the ground once more. She would likely be sore come morning.

Just then, Nisa returned with an armful of threads in an assortment of possible colors, and the dress to be fixed. Naiya took the dress from her with care, but she was not pleased with the colors of the thread. She hesitantly sifted through the colors, finding only one that she really liked.

“Do you have more like this?” She asked, holding up a red-touched bronze thread.

“As many as you need.” Nisa informed her with a smile. Naiya nodded, safe for the moment from disturbing Ahmii who waited impatiently for her.

“Good, I’d like five of them.” She requested, considering for a moment before adding, “Also, if you have them, one each of brown, black, and white.” The neutral colors would serve her well in other sewing projects. Hesitant, changed, “We can renegotiate price too, since I’ve changed my request.” Naiya settled into a sitting position on a floor cushion while Ahmii found a place behind her.

Disregard, dismissal the signs flashed on Nisa’s hands, “The number of spools hasn’t changed, Naiya, I’ll not let you fight me further over the price.”She paused a moment, looking to the two girls. “We don’t have a tool for removing the hem… will you be able to do it or will you have to take it with you?”

Naiya considered the question, looking at the hem of the dress, considering the job. After a few ticks she decided, “I can do it here, if it doesn’t need to be re-hemmed. Daggers are good for more than just stabbing.” She teased, hand moving to her belt at the mention of the weapon.

“Are you ready yet?” Ahmii reminded Naiya of her impending hairdo, bored of waiting. With a gentle laugh, Naiya nodded.

“Yes, Ahmii, I’m ready now.” She felt the girl lift her hair, finding sections and previous braids fairly quickly. Naiya turned the dress inside out and began to examine it, seeking loose threads or pouching of the fabric. It looked like the hem was quite old, in many places it had begun to loosen. It would be an easy enough task to free the rest of the fabric.

She tugged carefully at the thread that held the hem, feeling not dissimilar to the motions of Ahmii’s hands in her hair as the braids began to pile. Her process was less work though, she wes merely trying to make enough space to carefully cut the thread without nicking the fabric of the dress. The sewing kit at home had a ripper, sharp on one edge with a cap that kept you from cutting the fabric.

Eventually she had tugged a loop that was large enough for her comfort, she pulled her dagger and used the very tip to cut through the thread. Her blade went right back into the sheath, Ahmii was too young, in her opinion, to trust with anything sharp near her.

With the thread undone, she simply had to sit and pull the loops back through the cloth. It was the opposite of sewing, undoing the hem one stitch at a time.

“How does my hair look, Ahmii?” Naiya asked, casting a glance at Nisa who was working on spinning thread. Nisa looked up, checking on the two, and grinned at her. Ahmii didn’t pause, her little fingers twisting and piling her hair like a professional.

“It is very pretty.” She told Naiya, but the elder woman’s smile had Naiya slightly concerned. Softly, out of the line of sight of the little girl, Naiya signed Bad?. Nisa shook her head, her response spoken aloud.

“It looks good honey, but if you leave all the braids hanging, they will be odd. You should put them up.” That was a skillful way of telling Naiya what she needed to know. Now, if nothing else, Naiya would know to manage a ponytail after she left. At least until she could unravel the braids.

She turned back to the work, plucking away the thread until she had the first half free. Since her cut hadn’t been at the knot, she had more work to do, only one of the two sides of thread was free.

[Naiya]

She plucked at the string, nails kept slightly long just for such work aided her task. Catch, tug, loosen. It was the repetitive motion that made the work go quickly, not far off the repetitive motion of braiding that took place on her head.

She found the knot finally, tucked in the middle of the segment she had remaining. It wouldn't be of any help. If it had been the end, she might have been able to use it to pull the last few stitches loose. Instead they would just tighten on either side. She went back to the steady plucking, grasping each thread in practiced fingers and removing them from the cloth.

Eventually she finished, removing the last of the thread and flattening the hem. She righted the dress, shaking it out before turning it right-side-out once more.

"You know, Ahmii," Nisa's voice caught Naiya's attention, "If you add some ribbon, and a few beads, Naiya will have a whole hairstyle soon." That was a curious comment, so Naiya, careful not to move, considered how she could phrase her question without causing offense.

"Ahmii, I have your dress ready to try on, are you at a stopping point on my hair?" The little girl appeared before her, filled to bursting with excitement.

"Yes yes! I wanna try it!" She was half way stripped before Naiya was even standing, and once her clothes were piled on the ground, Naiya pulled the dress over her head for her, little arms worming their way into the sleeves.

"It is a bit too long now," Naiya noted, more for Nisa than fro the child who was twirling about in her finery, "I can take it home and re do the hem up an inch or two." She offered a critical eye on the dress, but the motions of Nisa's hands caught her attention.

Not needed, grow fast, polite decline her point was quite reasonable, so Naiya just nodded, accepting the words without argument.

A persistent hand on her pant leg brought her attention back to Ahmii, who done dancing now wanted desperately back at her hair. Naiya nodded, settling back into her seat, but first she ran gentle hands over her scalp. She had expected hair, but instead she found that the braids had taken tight rows from her temples to her crown where the braids continued falling loosely around her shoulders. The middle and bottom still hung loose, waiting for her quick fingers to form the strands into the woven trios.

"I will get some beads, and maybe some charms if we have some loose. Ahmii, you should loosen one or two from the top so you can add decorations." Ahmii nodded, setting back to work as Naiya settled herself in to wait. She even managed to think ahead enough to grab a spool of the thread she wanted for the satalu, beginning that work would give her something to do.

Had Shahar had a pavilion he hailed from, she would have taken part of his family's design, and part of the Nightsong design and worked until they formed a joining of the two. Instead, she would just modify the Nightsong design until she had a pattern new and distinct.

She began with two strings, measured about one hundred centimeters. She tied them together with a knot similar to the one she used for sewing, wrapping the loop around itself to pull the ends through. The next part was directly in line with the beginning of the pattern of the Nightsong's, a third cord tied around the first two right in the middle. This gave her four strings to work with as she patterned the knots.

Nisa returned with a little jar of hair pieces, charms, beads, and even a few quills. Ahmii began to braid with abandon then, her mother stepping in to teach her how to add the decorations and to halt her hand when she would grow too excited.

"This is more than I bargained for, Nisa, I can not keep these trinkets." She told the woman, as she began the square shaped knots that would form her satalu. The woman clicked a disapproving noise in return, the chiding clear even without sign or word.

"If you are so worried, I'll send you home with a shirt that needs patching at the shoulder. It caught on a branch while I was riding and nearly pulled my sleeve clean off. Besides, how often do I get to teach Ahmii on hair other than my own?"

"You are more than fair, Nisa." She acquiesced, her hands continuing across the lines of string, cross over, tuck under, and pull towards the inside. Two knots for each string each turn. She cut and added two more strings to each side, catching the interest of Nisa,

"What are you doing there?" She inquired, "I've never seen anything like it." Naiya shrugged, it was a rather unusual tactic.

"The Nightsongs used to do this, it gives you strings to move in a new direction, so you can change the pattern without loosing the form. It is how they had the circle in the middle of their satalu." The explanation was lacking in detail, but she didn't have any more explanation. The woman could watch to find what she meant, or she could leave the girl to her work. Naiya didn't mind either way.

She fell quickly into the pattern, a shape forming beneath her fingers that she happily mirrored as the band came to it's middle. The falling side leaving her with something she was pleased with.

"What do you think of this, Nisa?" Naiya asked, offering the completed project to the woman.

"It is quite pretty." She answered slowly, seeming to consider something as Ahmii's fingers tightened and arranged the last of her braids. "Perhaps you should sell these instead. The pattern would make bracelets or necklaces easily."

The fingers left her hair, and so Naiya gave her head a shake. "I am not in the business of making jewelry, Nisa, it would take too much of my time."

"Of course." Came the simple reply, not offended, but not entirely confident in the choice Naiya was making.

"Is my hair all done, Ahmii?" Naiya asked, artfully shifting the subject away from what was quickly becoming a tense pause.

"All done! All done!" Ahmii chanted, dancing around the women once more. "It is so pwetty!" She called, her voice falling into the child's pronunciation.

"It is so, what, Ahmii?" Nisa's voice begged a correction.

"Pretty." She replied, sobered by the change in subject.

With her threads in hand, and the shirt retrieved, Naiya was ready to leave, so she turned to both mother and child.

"Thank you both for your help today." Gratitude, pleasure.

LedgerFive Spools of red-bronze thread, one spool each of white, black, and brown thread - 3 Silver Miza (and work exchanged)
One ribbon, 9 wooden beads, one porcupine quill, one copper charm - exchanged for work.

[Naiya]

The people she encountered as she made her way through the market were no more surprising than usual, no one she knew well enough to speak to, although she offered greetings or an inclined head to those she made eye contact with.

Merchants called their wares, and Naiya stopped at one tent, interest caught by a pale colored leather. She caught the man's eye mild interest she informed him, reaching to feel the material. It was soft, but sturdy, it would last a long while.

"I think I'd like this hide. How much do you have in a similar color?" The hide was large, enough foe her to make herself a nice new pair of pants. She would buy perhaps two more hides, if the man was reasonable.

"Four others ma'am." He told her showing her the similarly pale hides. "It is antelope, nearing eight yards for each hide."

"I'd like three. I can give you seven silver per yard." Naiya offered, hoping the bulk of her purchase would make him generous in his price.

"It is fine leather. Usually I would ask fifteen per yard." He told her, not denying her offer, but telling her she had not swayed him. She smiled kindly, hoping to help sway his decision with her appearance and the offer to buy more.

"How about eight and a half, and I'll take twenty yards of linen, a sewing kit, and a set of needles as well." She countered his offer, and he considered a long moment.

"We will call it fifty total." He informed her, upping the price a few more gold miza worth.

"Quite the deal, sir, I appreciate your kindness." She thanked him gratitude in her posture as she waited for him to bundle and wrap the material for her. He smiled at her as he worked, flirtatious in return until he spotted the cheva's mark on her neck, revealed by her new hair style. The flirtatious gleam faded, leaving just contentment with the sale.

"Did you need anything else today, Ma'am?" Naiya shook her head, instead fishing the gold from her pocket and handing it over.

She took the bundles, adding them to the shirt she carried, and continued home, seeking the quiet relief of her pavilion.

Her home was a welcome sight as it came into view, the Zibri mulled about, her strider perking to attention as she approached. She took her purchases to the covered wagon, stowing them away except for the needles and thread.

First thing to be done was to repair the shirt, which was as described when she examined it. The sleeve was barely attached to the bodice, hanging by just an inch of stitching. It hadn't ripped the cloth, just the fragile thread that had been used to form the shirt. It was a shame that such poor quality thread had been used, but it had saved the shirt. If the fabric had torn instead it wouldn't have been salvageable.

The shirt was white, so she fished her new white thread out, the colors not quite perfectly matched, but more than close enough to suffice. She settled in to work, threading her needle and tying off the ends. She began in the underarm where the sleeve was still attached, refreshing the stitching there in case the force of the tear had weakened the thread. It had certainly ripped loose the knot that tied the original thread in place.

She started from the inside of the sleeve, the cloth turned inside out to help hide the stitching. Then looped the two edges into place, grabbing one side with a stitch and pulling it to meet the other once more. The stitches she pulled tight, securing the cloth together, rejoining the two pieces. As she worked around the circle, she had to move the sleeve to lay out of the way, shifting the folded material to one side or another to keep from sewing it closed or attaching more to the bodice than she intended.

Her hand was fairly steady, only wavering occasionally, although she managed to poke her thumb twice in the process of the repair. After the second stab, she put the work aside, moving to her new sewing kit where she sought a thimble. She was going to bleed on the white cloth if she wasn't careful, and then she would owe a bigger project than she was ready to tackle.

So thimble in place, she returned to the work, finding that she had to tie off her thread and cut a second section to complete the sleeve, her first estimate having been too short. She knotted the thread again, setting right back to stitching the shirt.

Once the sleeve was reattached, she tied the thread off, only slightly bothered that there were now four knots in the thread of the sleeve rather than just two. They would hardly be noticeable, but it bothered the woman that she had misjudged her length, she thought by now she was past such silly, novice mistakes.

She set the shirt aside, a break presenting itself to her in the form of Aani plodding across the grass with a pronounced limp. She moved to the elderly mare, patting her neck and offering a gentle reassurance to the creature as she moved to lift her hoof.

There was a large stone embedded in the hoof, which Naiya picked away easily enough with her fingers, but she decided that she didn't like the look of the rest of the rocky dirt there, so she had to leave and fetch the grooming tools. She discarded some of the less familiar tools, seeking instead the hoof pick that was her go to tool. Dirt fled the path of the pick, leaving the hoof clean, and just to be sure, Naiya moved to the other legs of the horse, lifting each foot and giving it a good cleaning with the pick, careful not only to clean the underside of the hooves, but also to scrape the dirt away from the sides and top.

Hooves properly seen to, she began to examine the rest of the horse, looking for burrs, cuts, or scratches that might be bothering her. She found none, but she did have to remove two ticks, one from her chest, and the other from high on her back. The first had been newer, likely having only just found the mare, the other had begun to swell around the tick, a sign he had been on the mare a while. She would keep in mind to check them more often.

ledgerAntelope Leathers- 20GM
Black Linen- 6GM
Sewing Kit- 18GM
Set of sewing needles (five gauges, two each)- 4GM
2GM to even out the sale
Total -50 GM

[Naiya]

She gave the gentle mare a pat, she would groom her fully in the evening when she usually saw to the horses, but for now she wanted to check on the others. Wildfire was closest, so she moved to him first, greetings in her hands as she approached. He nickered in return, not moving from his position, grazing happily on the grass. She lavished him with more attention, petting his cheek and scratching his forehead before moving to examine him.

He had a scratch on his leg, up high above his knee, it didn't seem to be bleeding anymore, perhaps just a brush against a study bush, or a stumble. It wasn't swelling, and it was scabbed over. She prodded gently at the wound, and Wildfire snorted, smacking hie with the long hair of his tail. "Okay, okay, it's fine, I get it." She mumbled, rubbing the stinging lines on her arm. She moved away from the wound, lifting his hoof instead to pick it clean with the tool in her hand. The dirt fell away in clumps, even the bits stuck on the top of his hoof. Beyond that she learned that his leg seemed fine, not giving him trouble while she pulled and prodded at his hoof. It meant the scratch was not anything to worry about.

His other legs were bare, no marks nor swelling as she ran her hand down along the joints. He lifted each hoof with steady patience, not pulling or leaning on her in ways that would make the work difficult. They were partners, they worked together, not against one another. She checked him for ticks too, finding none, which was a relief, although it led her to wonder where the zatvian mare had gone to find hers. She checked over the other horses who were present, picking their feet and pulling ticks when needed.

All too soon she was done, she repacked the hoof pick with the other tools, stowing the kit away in the travois. She returned to the shirt, flipping it back right side out and checking the look of her work.


It was neat enough, the stitches hardly noticeable from the outside despite the colors being slightly different. Gentle tugging on the sleeve assured it was completely attached, and that a child pulling on one's sleeve would not tear the cloth back apart. With Ahmii around, that was an important detail. She checked the seam of the other sleeve, but it was firm and well in place so she wouldn't need to do anything to that one.

That was good, it meant she could start on the satalu finally. She set the first one she had made beside her as she took a seat on a log beside the fire. She folded the shirt neatly, ready to be taken back to the woman at her earliest convenience, but she really needed to begin the satalu before she left again. She cut her strings, two long, four shorter, and then began the process, her hands weaving over and under, pulling ithe strings inside or out as the curves of the design changed. Each motion was doubled, two knots formed before she picked up the next string.

It was simple work, but it called for her full attention while she mastered the pattern. She formed the first quarter, checking the work against the first she had crafted while the child had styled her hair. It matched, and so she began the next section, the two arms of the outer curl branching inwards to cross one over the other forming the spaces between the outer edge and the knotted pattern of the inside. The inner pattern crossed, becoming the outter pattern once more while the outer bands turned inward to complete the knots. No matter which way the overall shape was moving, the knots were the same, under, over, through.

The next bell passed much the same, her hands busy and her mind focused as she crafted the calling cards of their pavilion. The knots formed steadily, and she had completed her second satalu and begun a third before the bell was through.

[Naiya]

She continued the pattern of knots the loops curling about their center, the square shape formed the knots a twisted loop that curled the thread in the direction of the pull. The loops of the satalu were curved, and she had to watch carefully for when she had to change the direction so that she could keep the outer edge the smooth half circle she desired.

Her hands worked happily, soon enough the pattern came to a close at the point of the end. That was three now. Not near enough for all the animals, but she should show her husband before she continued any further. If he did not like the satalu, she did not want to have too many to be rid of. Although, she supposed, she could take the word from Nisa and turn them into jewelry if it was needed.

All the same, she had other work to do as well, the Blackwater man had asked her to craft him a tabard. She had a plan in mind, the linen she had purchased would go over the scales, concealing them from enemies and adding additional padding.

She wanted to have the solid ixam scales, a layer of hard leather in the middle, and then the linen over top making the entirety of the armor three layers thick. It might be a bit heavy, but she intended to leave the arms bare and the linen open on the sides. Her first bit of work would need the scales and the cloth that would hold them. In order to make the layer of oblong scales difficult to penetrate she would have to do two layers, one slightly askew to the first. That would allow the small gaps between the rounds to be covered by the second set of scales.

First she measured the material, long enough to cover from neck to midway down the thigh. She wanted the material to fall wide across the shoulders, adding two half circles to cap the shoulder. The caps wouldn't help if he was caught with his arms up, but it would keep him safe so long as his arms were shoulder height or lower. Chalk sketched lines on the fabric, a rectangle of cloth three yards long, the small round caps the only deviation from the shape.

She folded the cloth over so that her cut would give her a double layer of cloth with one edge still whole. She cut the fabric along the one edge, shaping the pattern to begin filling with scales. Her first stitches were closing the bottom edge of the cloth, a triple layer of of stitches that would hopefully keep the tabard in one piece. She continued a few lengths up the open side leaving just enough room for her to begin the first layer of scales.

She had to consider for a moment how she would keep all the scales in place, if they moved at all, they would leave holes in the armor. She would have to cage each one in place with stitches, at least partially. She put the first two in, slightly overlapped to see if she could manage the armor in one layer instead of two.

She had to cut and retie the string on her needle, carving a track of stitches around the top of the first scale, using the fabric to trap it in place, the second scale met it about a quarter of the way down the line. When she reached it she had to tie off the thread and start a new line of stitches, curving around the top of the second scale. Once she hit the quarter mark she tied the thread off once more, cutting the rest of her thread free. She moved to the bottom, stitching a gently curved line around the bottom edge of the scales, cutting and tying off once more to catch the bottom of the second scale as well before she added the next one, edging the bottom of that one too before tying off and checking the top. Stitches began again, continuing along the same pattern of bottom and top around the scales until she reached the sealed edge.

Her first row done, she moved the cloth around, rotating and flipping as though she were pulling it over her head. When she flattened it back out, all the scales were still in place.

She placed the next two scales on top of the first row, nestling the scales in the crevices between the previous scales. She hemmed these in with the same stitches as before, tying off the threads and beginning again tracing only the top curves of these, the top of the previous row acting as the bottom of the second. It would keep the scales in place. The short length of the stitching allowed the scales on the top row to overlap the scales beneath it.

[Naiya]

This was just the right way to get the armor to be safe. But she did have something that needed to happen before she continued much further up the cloth. She laid the cloth flat once more, the space in the middle between the two cap shoulders needed a hole for the man's head. She cut a long shallow line in the two layers, removing the strip of cloth and checking the size.

It was too thin, she cut once more making the line a bit deeper. This one she had to lift up and check, sliding the tabard over her own head. It was plenty wide, perhaps a bit more than she had wanted, but on a man it should not fall too low, still protecting the chest and shoulders. She continued the stitches, adding one scale at a time to the armor sealing up the edge each time she added a row.

She had to take a break, a glance to the sky telling her perhaps three bells had passed. The gentle burning of the sun on her skin was a sign that the sun was growing to its zenith. She would have to seek the shade, she likely would have a burn later if she stayed in the direct light too much longer. Usually, if she had intended to sit in the sun, she would have sought a vial of sun balm from the riverflower, or if she couldn't do that, she'd use dirt, mud, to protect her skin.

She didn't need that today, the could sit in the shade of the tent, or sit inside with the doors tied open to let in the breeze. Whatever she decided it would need to be soon.

She sealed off the fifth row of scales, sewing shut the open edge and sliding the last scale into place. Once she had finished all the scales she would come back and reinforce the outer edges, adding extra stitches with a stronger thread. The one she used now was thick, strong, but she would use one meant to handle greater strain to reinforce the edges. Hopefully the stitches inside wouldn't need such thread, they shouldn't be pulled on or strained much. If they were, there would be bigger problems. If something reached the middle scales, it would have cut through cloth and leather before hand. Such a thing would mean that the scales would be the protection and the entire tabard would need repairs.

With any luck, such things would never come to be. It was always the hope that armor would rust or wear away before it needed repair. The cloth would need replacing, or the thread would wear from friction, or age would soften the leather beyond usefulness.

Armor was made to protect flesh, but one always hoped it would not be needed. The watchman was more likely than most to need the protection of armor like this, that he had trusted such work to her was a great honor. She would need to check and double check her work, make sure there were not gaps or holes in the coverage of the scales. They would be his last line of defense, so they should not be slipshod protection.

She moved into the shade, bringing her supplies with her so that she could finish two more rows of scales before calling the work done for a while. Judging by the path of the sun, they would need to ready for the evening meal soon, more than that, she would need something to tide her over until then.

When her hands tired of the stitching she set the work aside, leaving it for later. She stirred the fire, seeing if the flames would bite the scattered ends of fuel in the pit still. Perhaps someone would return home soon, or maybe she would invite Seirei into the market to see what the vendors had to snack on while they waited for supper.

[Tribal]

G R A D E S

Naiya Dawnwhisper

Experience

• Socialisation: 3
• Planning: 3
• Mathematics: 2
• Childcare: 1
• Observation: 3
• Sewing: 5
• Cosmetology: 2
• Rhetoric: 2
• Weaving: 3
• Negotiation: 1
• Animal Husbandry: 2
• Grooming: 1
• Intelligence: 1
• Drawing: 1
• Wilderness Survival, Plains: 1

Lore

• Satalu: How Drykas mark their animals
• Shahar: Has intimacy issues
• Sewing: Re-hemming a dress
• Children quickly grow into loose clothes
• Weaving: Modifying designs
• Weaving: Satalu knotting
• Ahmii: Nisa's girl
• Sewing: Using a thimble
• Animal Husbandry: Using a hoof pick
• Observation: The look and feel of Ixam scales
• The uses of armour

Penalties

-50gm 3sm for yarn, leather, sewing kit, 20 yards of linen

Notes

Beautiful writing, Nai. I can't help but feel it might be time for a job change? She doesn't seem to be feeling it like she was! You have a lot of skill and lore updating to do on your CS before you submit anymore grades as your skills don't currently show a true reflection of the PC (smack, smack). Fix it because if you don’t, I’m not allowed to give you anymore grades! Enjoy the rewards!

Edit: Make sure that money is deducted from ledger asap.