Fara’s kiln was cold when Iven reached the pottery. The door stood open, and the shelves inside were empty.
She met him in the yard with a broken ceramic sleeve in her hands. Its surface had a dark streak across it, and the edge had crumbled where she held it.
“Six of twelve survived,” she said. “The rest split while cooling.”
“Why?”
“I’m finding out.”
She laid the sleeve on a table beside three others. Each had cracked near a thicker band at one end. The sound pieces had the same band but showed no visible crack. Fara had marked them with charcoal numbers.
“The wall was even when they went in,” she said. “The band dried more slowly. I left them longer than the first batch, but not long enough.”
“Can the band be thinner?” Iven asked.
