The blue stone lay under three feet of ordinary rubble.
Chaska found its source in a cut above the station, where old quarry work had exposed a narrow vein. Rain had carried the small pieces downhill. Getting enough meant moving the overburden, breaking the softer seam, and carrying the clean fragments back.
There were no tools left in the station except a split hammerhead and a hooked bar which Ashaun regarded with deep suspicion.
“Military?” Ysabet asked.
“Broken.”
That problem, at least, was straightforward.
They fitted the hammerhead to a fallen branch, wedged it with slivers from the unburned door, and bound the joint with cord. Ashaun tested it against a stone. The head held. The handle shivered unpleasantly.
“No overhead swings,” she said.
