Preparing the Blanks

by **Eleret** on November 25th, 2012, 12:41 am

Fall 58, 512 AV
morning

Eleret let several days pass between when she sectioned out the blank discs and when she took on the next step of their processing. This temporal distance gave her mental distance as well; no longer did she reflect back on the cuts she had misplaced, the errors she could have avoided. It let her come to the next stage of her work with a clear mind, ready to tackle the next instead of the past.

As before, it was morning when she set out her tools and poured the discs out onto the room's low table, spreading them out and arranging them all with one side down flat. She had obtained another eleven useable blanks from the second, shorter piece of driftwood, for a total of twenty-four in all; enough that she had some leeway for errors between now and completion. Not that Eleret intended to make any... but there was always something. Better to plan and have extra than to run short.

Before she did anything further, Eleret stepped away from the table, which she had left in its placement beneath the window. She felt more like doing than thinking this morning, so the Konti would use exercise to clear her thoughts and prepare herself for the task at hand. She moved out into the center of the small room and started with a simple series of stretches. Eleret extended her arms out and back in turn, then rolled her shoulders, then her head. She lifted each foot in sequence, catching it in the opposite hand and holding to stretch front muscles; then leaned forward, hands down to the floor, to begin stretching her calf muscles.

She then repeated all of these over again; as warm-up routines went, it was decidedly skimpy -- but she wasn't intending true exertion, so it would suffice. When Eleret had finished stretching to her satisfaction, she picked up her suvai from the bed, its weight resting comfortably in her right hand with the shaft along her forearm and the hilt facing out. Closing her eyes, she let that context bring to forefront the simplest of the routines she had learned previously.

ledger-1 GM for pouch to contain discs

by **Eleret** on November 25th, 2012, 12:41 am

Eleret set her feet the width of her shoulders apart, then moved her left foot forward and the right back, weight balanced. Her left hand, she held out at an angle, forward and low; the right, and the weapon it held, remained near her waist. No more did she attain the stance than she moved; all motions were slow rather than forceful, making them as much an exercise in concentration and focus as of weapon handling.

Eleret stepped forward with her right foot, right hand projecting forward in a strike weighted by the suvai's hilt. Feet remaining fixed to the floor, Eleret then drew her arm back and flipped the suvai over so that the longest prong was turned forward; her arm extended again and came down, making a vertical strike with the blade. She brought her elbow back and punched forward with the point of the suvai, then rotated it back around to place the shaft of the weapon along the outside of her forearm, hilt angled downwards, hand dropping down towards her thigh. Only when these four moves had been completed did she shift her feet again -- right foot back, left foot forward.

Eleret transferred the suvai to her left hand and ran through the same basic moves with that side. These were acted out more slowly still, her right hand being the preferred one; but she had practiced this sequence on both hands, and was relatively comfortable with it. She repeated the series again with her right hand, and again with the left, and again another time still, until she felt sharp and focused, her mind clear and ready to work. Eleret nodded to herself, then walked back to the table, setting her suvai down on a far corner and sinking down onto her knees to consider her work surface.

by **Eleret** on November 29th, 2012, 1:11 am

The carver picked up the first disc, whichever one came easiest to hand; she would work through them all eventually, so the order didn't much matter. She turned it over in her fingers, considering its size and shape -- small, nearly round, not quite an inch thick. Each was unique, with a slightly different profile, a different patchwork of cuts decorating the beveled edges. The slopes on those edges, she knew, would make these relatively difficult to clamp down while she worked. Difficult, not impossible; she had thought on how to set it up.

Eleret placed the disc at the table corner, somewhat back from the point proper, then unrolled her crafting kit. Selecting two clamps, she placed them on either edge of the table, screwing the small plates down on the beveled edge of the disc. By alternately tightening them in small increments, she secured the little piece of wood against the table without causing it to tilt up at an awkward angle. She tightened both down fairly firmly, not wanting it to move readily.

The Konti then shifted position herself, moving from directly before the table corner to just offset on one side, square before the corresponding clamp and the disc it held down. Opening her carver's kit, she took up a flat gouge. This she applied to the flat surface of the disc, pressing gently down and out towards the opposite clamp. A thin curl of gray wood lifted up before it, reward for her care; Eleret took that shaving away and discarded it in a nearby clear space on the table. Keeping the discards contained would make it easy to dispose of them later.

Her cut smoothed the rough surface of the disc's face and widened it slightly, though not yet enough for it to be a useful surface. Eleret continued as she had begun, wearing down through the thickness of the disc until it took more than one pass with the gouge to pare away its entire surface; and beyond that stage further still, until she could press her thumb upon the surface and not completely mask the planed face. It was monotonous work, but simple and easy, and rather quick to finish even though she took off only thin layers with each pass.

Though finished was a relative term; when the one face was whittled down to her satisfaction, Eleret undid the clamps, flipped the disc over, and did the same thing all over again on the other side.

by **Eleret** on November 29th, 2012, 1:25 am

Planing down the opposite face was easier and went somewhat more quickly; with a flattened surface now against the table, she was less concerned that the disc might slip out of position. When it too was pared down to the same rough endpoint, Eleret removed it from the clamps and held it up, examining the altered surfaces both by eye and by feel. Both sides were now marked by tiny ridges, outlining where one pass or another with the gouge had cut that little bit deeper than others. The beveling was narrower, as the thickness of the disc had been whittled away; the center of the disc itself was perhaps half an inch thick, or maybe somewhat less.

All told, she was quite satisfied with its state. Eleret set this first-shaped disc aside on its own new quadrant of the table and took up another. This second piece was arranged and planed down as the first had been. So too the next after it, and the one after that, and on until the sun slipped away around the side of the inn, taking the best of the room's illumination with it. The Konti had paused from time to time in the process to shake out her hands, to stretch, and to perform brief exercises; first after every other disc, then between each one, and finally between each individual face. Despite that, she felt a distinct need to get out of this room and away from the atmosphere of intense concentration she had impressed upon it; to get out into the sun and the sea breeze, and walk for a while.

Fortunately, the next part needed no specialized tools whatsoever.

Eleret had pared down sixteen of the blanks in this session, a number she was happy enough to move on with. Those sixteen, she scooped up and placed in the little pouch; the remainder, she left lying on the table. They would be a task for the morrow. She also took up her cloak from where it lay folded on the end of the bed, wrapping it around her shoulders against the cool autumn air. Then she made her way outside, departing the inn altogether.

by **Eleret** on November 30th, 2012, 12:19 am

Outside, the air was brisk, winter beginning to set its teeth into the Isle's atmosphere. It made Eleret quite appreciate her cloak. She set off through the city in an unhurried, even rambling fashion, always moving in the direction of the lakeshore but taking a decidedly indirect route. Adding to her delay were the friends and acquaintances she met along the way, the city of Mura being a small world in truth; and even if Eleret had had reason to hurry, she would never have descended to rudeness.

Without need for haste... Though not even the driest point in Mura could be termed far from Silver Lake, by the time she reached the shoreline proper, Syna had started her descent down the curve of the heavens. Eleret judged she had between two and three bells before dusk fell -- likely closer to two than not. While it had taken her quite a while to get here, two bells was still plenty of time for Eleret to both relax and continue with her project.

The first thing she was going to do with this time, the very first, was go for a swim.

It was an impulsive decision, but practically inevitable from the moment she decided to go to the lakeshore; if there was water, the Konti would almost certainly swim in it at some point. Now suited her perfectly. She shed her clothes and folded them neatly, setting the entire bundle and the pouch of shaped discs aside at the foot of a sun-warmed boulder. Eleret then waded out into the lake until the water reached past her waist. As she stood in the Silver Lake, rather than the sea, Eleret murmured a greeting to Avalis, pressing her lily-marked left hand to her lips. Upon completing her salutation, she ducked beneath the surface and struck out for deeper water, the better to swim.

by **Eleret** on December 2nd, 2012, 10:35 pm

The waters of Silver Lake enveloped the Konti in a cool, pervasive embrace, as familiar and beloved as the city which had been built across its edge. Eleret couldn't claim to know all of the lake intimately -- for one, rumor had it the deepest parts were dangerous to assay, and she'd never been drawn to unravel their mysteries in any case -- but the shallows and shelves nearest Mura, she did frequent. The waterscape here, she knew well.

Eleret kicked out beyond the shallows, webbed toes spread to maximize displacement, her arms held still along her sides. The lake bottom dropped out beneath her as she swam, giving way first to darkness, then to the swaying fronds of a kelp stand which reached up out of those depths. She tilted one hand away from her body, webbed fingers splayed, and turned forward motion into a shallow arc; tilting her body downwards sent the Konti deeper, into the submerged 'forest'. The living ribbons, pale green in hue, parted before the swimmer, sliding over her skin as she passed by; tiny fish dashed away into cover as she disturbed their surroundings, or poked their heads curiously out from the safety of less-disrupted fronds.

Eleret smiled to see them dart about, and paused in the middle of the kelp stand, coming about to an upright pose. There she tread water, keeping the movements of her hands and feet as small as she could and still remain bobbing in place. This reduced her effect on the kelp, and as the stalks gradually straightened, they shrouded the Konti in a pale green dimness. She waited there, no more than an oddly-shaped fish, until the smaller, faster darters overcame their caution and began to consider her as just another piece of the waterscape.

The little silver shapes flickered past her, going this way and that about their fishy business, drawing another pleased smile from Eleret. A few ducked into her hair as it drifted in the water, perhaps thinking it another sort of pale waterweed. Others brushed up against her skin; she thought one even nibbled on her ear, but fortunately found Konti not to its liking.

Eleret could have stayed down, not forever, but certainly the rest of the day. However, she had more to do in the air-breathing world before this day was done; eventually, she had to admit a need to return to the surface. She kicked straight up, sending the fish all scurrying into hiding once more, until she broke the surface and could sight on the rock by which her things had been set. Then Eleret ducked back under and swam for shore.

by **Eleret** on December 4th, 2012, 11:25 am

Wading back out of the lake, Eleret shook as much water as she could from her limbs, then reached up to wring out her hair. With a sheen of water now coating her skin, the autumn air quickly chilled the Konti; she wiped off as much as possible using only her hands, then gratefully grabbed her cloak from the top of the clothing pile and shook it out, using its fabric as an impromptu towel. In a warmer season, she might simply bask in the sun to dry -- but this was not that season.

When she was as dry as she was going to get herself, Eleret put her clothes back on; between them and the sun, she felt distinctly warmer, enough so that she spread the cloak out on the ground to dry rather than putting it immediately on. It would have dried eventually either way, but this would be better, and she didn't need it now to be comfortable. She glanced up at the sun, noting that she had a bit more than a bell left before dusk.

Eleret stepped away from the boulder to collect some of the rushes growing in and beside the lake's edge. A muted green in color, with black and white bands at intervals, their stalks were distinctly coarse in texture; they were remarkably effective for polishing wood. Going back to sit on the rock, she took up the pouch of discs and carefully spilled them out onto its surface. She took up one, cupping it in her left hand, and took up a length of reed, bending the end back into her grip to create a stiffer, broader surface. Then she applied it to the worked flat of the disc, the better to smoothen out the remaining cut marks and irregularities.

by **Eleret** on December 5th, 2012, 1:08 pm

The flat was small, and the ridges to be smoothed out rather minor in the grand scale of things; the sanding of that side went comparatively quickly. She flipped the disc over to similarly smooth out the other side. By the time that was done, she had worn the tip of the rush to little more than green strings; Eleret remedied this before continuing, by expedient of snapping off the used length and folding the new last inch over again.

Abrasive renewed, Eleret transferred the disc to the rock she sat upon, pinning it down with her thumb and bracing the side with her fingers. Now she ran the rush-end back and forth along the beveled edge, turning the disc as needed, until the rough edges of its facets were smoothed. She didn't try to polish out the facets altogether, only to wear it down until her fingertips no longer caught when she brushed them over the surface. The same to the reverse, then -- and thus was the first blank tile completed.

Eleret paused then, setting the rush aside and picking the disc back up for closer scrutiny. She regarded it partly with a sense of accomplishment, and partly with the self-critical perspective of its maker. The tile was not a perfect round, because she had made no efforts to 'correct' the shape of the wood. It was perhaps half again the thickness of a classic fortune-telling tile, one she could have bought from any of various shops on the Isle. And while its rough style had what might be generously termed character, it was anything but elegant or pretty.

But she had made it. Her hands had shaped it, and smoothed it, and in the future would carve and finish its surfaces. For her own personal fortune-telling tools, Eleret thought that might be a boon -- in any event, she was sure it couldn't harm. Thus, while it was an unremarkable item in and of itself, Eleret was quite satisfied with the blank -- imperfections and all.

by **Eleret** on December 5th, 2012, 10:22 pm

Eleret returned the sanded disc to the pouch, a solitary occupant for now, but soon to be joined by more. She took up another roughed-out blank and set about sanding it down in the same way -- first one face, then the other, then around both beveled edges. Compared to earlier steps, whether cutting down the parent wood or paring at the faces, this process required fairly little concentration on her part. Patience and persistence in plenty, yes; but her attention could in part turn to other things.

So Eleret spent the last bells of the day enjoying the atmosphere of Silver Lake. She listened to the soft lapping of water against the shore, watched the osprey who occasionally cruised above the lake. As the sun descended further and dusk approached, she began to hear fish about their evening feeding, splashing back into the water after each leap for an insect.

All the while, she worked on polishing the roughness from each blank disc in turn, testing the surfaces with her fingertips, relegating each to the pouch as she deemed it satisfactory. The rushes wore out often, a small pile of discarded lengths growing beside her boulder; twice, Eleret had to go collect more from the shoreline. Her cloak dried out completely, and the air begin to chill; but she continued until the last one was finished, the sun having just slipped below the horizon.

Task completed at last, Eleret rose, the last polished disc still in her hand. She collected the rush fragments from beside her rock and scattered them over the reed bed, where they rightly would have fallen if they had died in the natural course of things. Then she turned to the lake, hefting that final disc in her hand and considering the waters before her. The Konti smiled softly, then flicked her hand to cast the bit of wood out into the water; she watched as it skipped off the surface once, then plopped down to vanish into the lake. A token of appreciation for the lake's gifts to her; whether or not anyone else noticed or cared, to Eleret's thinking such acknowledgement was only right.

She lingered a moment longer, as dusk settled in over the lake; then Eleret collected her cloak and pouch, and turned away to make her way back into Mura proper.