When they returned back to her dungeon on the late side of mid-afternoon, they did so with five beads of various sizes sitting heavily in Lori's hand, since she forgot to wear her belt pouch. She had lost track of the time during experimentation, so when they'd gotten back she'd resigned herself to being hungry and therefore irritable, only to learn that Rian had asked the kitchen to set some food aside for them.

Thankfully, Riz's friend had not needed to be told she wasn't invited, and sat eating at a different table where others were gathered. Occasionally, some people would send looks towards Lori. She ignored them, staring down at the five beads sitting in a wooden bowl in front of her.

Beads. She'd made beads. All it had taken was a freakish, random accident and—

"Lori? Your Bindership?" Rian prompted as she continued to stare down at the beads. "Should I be worried? Getting ready for more work?"

What had been a secret procedure only Dungeon Binders knew and could perform had been surprisingly easy. All she had needed to do was create a binding of wisps of all kinds—subsequent tests using only waterwisps, lightwisps and darkwisps had all failed, and it was only when at least five different kinds of wisps, which had to include darkwisps, had been part of the binding had a bead formed—heavily imbue the binding, and use the binding to try to claim Iridescence.

She stared at the five beads again. While close, none of them were any of the standard sizes. Lori could tell that much even without precise measuring equipment. They didn't feel right in her fingers, which had years of practice at being able to tell the size of the beads in her pouch. There had been six, but she'd swallowed one to see what happened, and it had acted like a bead, dissolving in her stomach to allow her to access the magic locked within it… though now that she knew what it was made from, she just had more questions…

It was so easy. Anyone could do it. Why hadn't they? If she'd known it was this simple to make her own beads, she'd have run off to the edge for a day or two and just made some. Or a lot. They wouldn't have been legal tender, since they didn't have denomination markings, but it would have been useful in her classes and in some of her more difficult jobs where they hadn't provided her with any beads despite the work needing it.

Or perhaps it wasn't that simple. Perhaps she did need to be a Dungeon Binder to make it. And… the procedure for it was very similar to creating a dungeon core, and could only be done outside the demesne, in the presence of Iridescence. The location and the laws and treaties about how creating a demesne is considered treason would probably be sufficient to discourage the sort of experimentation that would lead to this discovery. And given how she herself had been staying within her demesne as much as possible and not experimenting with bindings when outside its borders…

That made anyone else in the continent replicating the steps she took to discover the process unlikely. First, she had been expanding her demesne. Then she had experimented with using a massive binding for easier imbuement before expansion. Then tried to expand while all of the wisps she planned to use to expand were still part of a binding. Given how only Covehold itself seemed to have expanded at all, and they had imposed a restriction that only beads from the old continent could be used for transactions…

"Your Bindership, aren't you going to eat?" Rian said, interrupting her flow of thought.

Lori blinked, shook her head to clear it and focused on her food. It had grown a little cold but that was easily fixed, and soon she was eating warm food as she filled her empty stomach. Her eyes wandered over to the beads, and across from her, she knew that Rian and Riz were doing the same.

"So… Rian, does this mean we're all going to get paid now?" Riz asked.

"Probably not," Rian said.

Lori swallowed the mouthful she was in the middle of. "No," she said firmly.

Riz raised an eyebrow. "Not that I'm implying anything, Great Binder, but everyone knows that not paying a militia is the fastest way to get that militia to quit or revolt. Or anyone else, for that matter."

"You're not militia, you volunteered to come along because Rian," Lori pointed out.

"We can't pay anyone yet, Riz, because of two very important reasons," Rian said. "It took her Bindership… what, half a day to make five beads? There are over two hundred people in the demesne, counting the children. If we pay everyone a daily wage, that means her Bindership will need to make at around a thousand beads a day, assuming a daily wage of four beads, which… is unlikely to happen for practical reasons. Secondly, if you, at this very moment, had any beads… what would you spend it on? You don't need to pay for food, firewood, use of the baths, use of the tools, or anything else. So what do you need money for? It's only useful if you have something you need to spend it on."

"Rian, even in the militia, we had food, firewood and baths," Riz said. "Admittedly not as good, but we still had them, and we were still paid."

Rian nodded. Both seemed to have forgotten Lori was there. "A good point. All right then. Let's say everyone here is paid for their work. You and your friends are paid for your turns administering the Um, everyone who works in the kitchen is paid for cooking our meals and cleaning up the dishes and things afterwards, people on woodcutting rota are paid for cutting wood, those who go out to hunt beasts for meat… would you say that's fair?"

"Well, of course," Riz said suspiciously. Lori recognized the inherent distrust of someone in a conversation with leading questions.

Rian nodded. "Now, in this situation where you're all getting paid, should use of the baths, getting firewood from storage, and food still be free?"

"We can all provide for ourselves, Rian," Riz said dryly. "Cut our own wood, hunt for our own food, even take baths in our own house."

Rian nodded. "So the woodcutting rota, the kitchen staff, the hunting parties, and the ones who look after the baths are all out of work and don't need to be paid then, is what you're saying?"

Riz paused. At the other tables, people were listening intently. Lori continued eating, wondering what point her lord was rambling towards. He always had one, he just needed time to get there so her idiots could catch up…

"By the same logic, people don't need to use the Um," Rian continued. "They can do that at home. If no one is using the Um, no one has to be paid to administer it. So those people aren't being paid either. Since no one is getting paid, no one needs money."

Riz made a face, as if she thought this was wrong but couldn't think of how to argue how…

"Of course," Rian continued, "it's possible that eventually, people realize they really don't want to have to cut their own firewood, so they pay someone else to do it. That's the woodcutters getting paid again. And the woodcutters could be too tired after a day of getting firewood to cook for themselves, so they pay someone to cook for them. That's the kitchen staff being paid again. And the kitchen staff need material to cook with, so someone pays hunters to go out and hunt beasts for meat, since they might be busy in the kitchen or gathering firewood."

"Stop right there," Riz said. "I can already hear the ending. 'It's basically what we have already, except we're passing beads around', right?"

Rian shrugged, smiling innocently. "You said it, not me. Though I point out not everyone reaps the same benefits. Those being paid to cook will only cook for the ones paying them, those cutting firewood will only cut for those paying them, and so on."

"It sounds simple when you say it like that, Lord Rian!" someone at another table called out. "But what about the farmers? Shouldn't we get paid for our work?"

"I'm pretty sure the farmers all got to use the baths, the Um, the laundry area, and got food to eat along with everyone else, Etwart," Rian called out, glancing over his shoulder at someone as Lori finished the soup in her bowl. "In that sense, they're paid just like everyone else."

"But the grain we all worked to raise isn't ours to keep," the person protested. There was something familiar about it… a feeling of… annoyance…

"Etwart, are you really trying to build up to saying how you're taken advantage of and that the harvest raised from the sweat of your brow was stolen from you by someone who's just getting fat on the work of others?" Rian said. "Are you really trying to build up towards that, when you're sitting in a room literally built by one woman who doesn't even need it? Who'd probably have done the tables and benches to if we hadn't gotten ahead of her? Come on man, we've talked about this! You've even agreed it's for the best! Stop complaining about settled matters."

"We brought a lot of that grain with us from River's Fork, Etwart," someone at another table said. "So don't be a slug. You don't hear us glittering complaining about people who want a share of grain that they just helped with and didn't actually own!"

That got another laugh, mocking and pointed.

Rian turned back to Riz. "Now, it's not that we don't want everyone to be fairly paid for the work they do, but right now, paying them with beads brings complications we're not ready for, and without really improving everyone's overall lot. In fact, it'll just make it more complicated. I'm sure you can imagine the troubles we'll get with people losing beads, accusing people of stealing their beads, and so on." Rian paused and said, "But mainly, does Binder Lori look like she's willing to make that many beads when she's already making that annoyed face when we're just talking about the subject?" Rian gestured towards Lori. "Besides, you want to talk about people getting paid, consider this: who is paying Binder Lori to make all those beads?"

Riz blinked. So did Lori as she considered the question.

"You bring up good points, and I agree with them," Rian said. "But if you're going to ask about people who aren't paid, what about our Dungeon Binder? Shouldn't she be paid for her work? If you want to talk about people who're being taken advantage of by someone who's just getting fat on the work of others…" He didn't finish the sentence and just shrugged.

Eventually, Lori found her voice. "Rian, don't be absurd," she said. "I don't need to be paid. If I want something in the demesne, I'll just take it."

"Of course, your Bindership. Do you want me to tell the kitchen to make honeyed bread and roast tail meat tomorrow?"

"Rian, what have I told you about holding holidays?"

"As you say, your Bindership. Still, it's not all bad. Even if it'll take time to move on to a bead-based economy again, there's already a wonderful upside to you being able to make beads."

"There is?" Riz said.

Rian nodded, smiling broadly. "We can sell them in Covehold," he said cheerfully.

Lori stared at him. "Explain."

"I don't think Covehold or the other demesne near it have worked out how to make beads on their own yet," Rian said. "Otherwise they'd be making their own and not insisting all goods and services be paid for with Taniar-certified beads. However, that means the only source of new beads is from ships coming in with people and supplies to buy relatively cheap furs."

Lori nodded in understanding. The furs were about the only thing she had heard of being exported by Covehold Demesne when she had still been a student, which had become expensive status pieces from those with more beads than sense who valued that kind of thing. From what she had seen when she had been passing through on her way to here, the demesnes around Covehold simply didn't produce enough surplus of grain or other resources to be worth exporting over the ocean in amounts that made it economical.

"However!" Rian said triumphantly. "That means beads that wizards and bound tools can use are ultimately a limited resource, since to use them for either will deplete the overall bead reserves of this continent as a whole. This is on top of the beads already being removed from the local economy to buy products from the old continent. "

Riz looked like she was barely able to follow, though Lori nodded at her lord's reasoning. Some people in other tables were nodding as well.

"Now, though, our demesne, and you specifically," he grinned at her, "has just become a new source of beads. Not for using as money, because if Covehold allowed that we'd literally end up owning them, but for use in bound tools and for their wizards. Until someone else comes forward with a Dungeon Binder who knows how to do it, we—I mean, you—are literally the only ones in the whole continent that can provide a steady supply of this resource."

Lori stared at him. She looked down at the beads on her bowl. "I see…" she said slowly. She began to grin herself. "As a resource for sale, they become subject to market forces of supply and demand."

"And there is currently little supply and a lot of demand, so we can set out own price! Though it probably can't be that simple," Rian calmed down and cautioned. "There's a good chance Covehold put a law or something in place in preparation for someone finding out how to do this before they did, like some outrageous fifty-percent tax. I'll have to go back and find out more before trying to sell beads. "

"You're not going," Lori said reflexively.

"You're not going!" Riz cried. "I don't want to be temporary-Rian again!"

"I don't want her being temporary-Rian again," Lori agreed. "She is only barely adequate at it."

"See, this is why you need another lord or lady," Rian sighed. "We'll talk about this later. But right now, you might want to consider becoming this continent's one and only exporter of beads for wizards and bound tools. Until someone else figures out how to do it themselves… you'd have an absolute monopoly."

Absolute monopoly… absolute monopoly… absolute monopoly…

Oh… to think she might be able to make two childhood dreams come true in one lifetime.