By the time he reached the end of the flattened section of wire, Baelin had a nice collection of wedge flecks. He fished one of the rings out of the bowl and laid it flat. Carefully picking up one of the wedges, Baelin inserted it into the ring’s pierced slit. Pushing with the pad of his thumb, the wedge worked its way a bit further into the ring until it was good and stuck.
Reaching over to the end of the worktable, Baelin grabbed a pair of setting tongs. Similar to the shift, the setting tongs were just a modified pair of pliers. A divot was gouged into one face of the pliers, giving the rivet a place to mold into.
Baelin positioned the pointy end of the wedge into the divot in the setting tongs, then clamped down on the tongs’ handles. Releasing his hold, he held the riveted ring up close to inspect it. The wide end of the wedge rivet was near flush with the flattened surface of the ring, and on the other side the wedge had been molded into a dome shape. Baelin tested the give of the ring, checking that the rivet held fast.
Satisfied with it, Baelin set the ring to the side and picked up another. Sinking into the repetitive motion, Baelin continued to push the wedge rivets into the rings’ slits, squeeze the setting tongs tight, and slide the riveted rings off to the side. He continued until he had gotten through about half of the bowl, then set down the setting tongs and gave his hand a little shake. A muscle running near his thumb twitched irregularly, throbbing in a way that was more irritating than painful.
Now for the weaving. Dragging over four of the riveted rings, Baelin laid them down on the worktable in a square. He nudged them close so that all four were touching each other, with the riveted side on the left and the domed part of the rivet facedown. With another nudge, Baelin pushed the two rings on the right until they were laying half on top of the rings on the left.
Picking up one of the rings from the bowl that had yet to be riveted, Baelin gently pried it open with pliers and then threaded it through the top two rings. Wiggling the open end of the ring underneath the bottom left ring, he pushed it up and through the bottom two. Now with all four of the riveted rings threaded onto the open ring, Baelin squeezed the open ring shut with pliers and then jammed a wedge into the ring’s slit. Switching to the setting tongs, Baelin pressed down on the wedge until the tip peened and the flat end was close to flush.
Baelin held the four-in-one section up and gave it a little wiggle, watching the closed rings rattle against each other. Dropping the section to the side, he pulled over four other riveted rings and aligned them in a square. He would continue to make these four-in-one sections for a while longer, then connect the sections into a ribbon. Once he had ribbons, he could connect those to each other and have a decent sized portion of mail. It was long, repetitive, and tedious work. And by the time he’d run out of rings he would only have a small portion of the mail shirt finished. But… Still. Baelin felt the comfortable tug of tedium pulling at his thoughts, allowing him to sink into a mindless calm. All that mattered was weaving iron rings and squeezing rivets into place. All was good.