The smoke from Maud Venn’s second bisque firing hung low over the drying yard. It smelled of scorched river silt, dried fern kindling, and the oily fat of sheep fat lamps.
Fellis Dain knelt on a clean straw mat beside the western stacking shed, an assortment of four shaped wooden paddles laid out across his knees. He was nineteen, with the square, rope-scarred wrists of a kiln rigger and a habit of pressing his tongue into the corner of his cheek. Just then, he planed ash wood down to a true edge. Around his collar hung the loop of linen cord he used to gauge rope width by thumb-feel in the dark.
“Alder wood,” Fellis said. He held up the first paddle between two calloused fingers so Kezra could inspect the grain. “Light enough to carry on a pack strap all day without bruising a rib, but dense enough that a mountain gust won’t snap the neck if you drop it on scree. I boiled the slats in salt water for two hours before carving. So the grain won’t twist when the forest mist hits it.”
Kezra turned her head slightly to the right. That brought her undamaged ear into the line of his voice. Meanwhile, her left side faced the steady, low hiss of steam escaping a cooling chimney pipe. “And the shapes?”
