Iron Age (1)
After the People of the Summit left, saying they needed to speak with the Great Elder and the Chieftain about the Grace of the Summit, Chester and Monia set about cleaning up the mess the visitors had left behind.
Over the course of several days they restored everything piece by piece, starting with the fields. Unlike the days when Chester had built it all alone, a little explanation was enough for Monia’s newly capable hands to craft and help with skill, so they rebuilt their foundation for living far faster than expected.
Hunting was out of the question for a while anyway—not just near the house, but the entire surrounding area had been thoroughly wrecked. After a brief circuit of the zone to check for any serious problems, Chester and Monia found themselves with plenty of free time.
Rather than head to the Seaside Villa, they decided to put that spare time to use with what the People of the Summit had left them.
Namely, the heap of ore they had been given in bulk.
“We got a lot more than I expected, didn’t we?”
Chester had imagined they would bring back a few pieces of ore at most. Instead they had returned with an entire pile.
“Yeah. Well, when they left I did explain how to make a campfire and went through a bunch of different fire layouts.”
He had described various kinds of campfires that even Monia, who was always at his side, had never known about—simply because he had never needed them before.
“So how are we going to melt the ore?”
“First we need more heat. We’ll trap the fire in a tight space to concentrate it, then force air into it like crazy to make it roar.”
A small red-hot coal, blasted with strong air, could set tinder alight. Leave that same coal sitting quietly on the tinder, though, and it would go out without even managing to burn the carefully prepared kindling.
“Air feeds fire, so we’re going to stuff it full.”
As he spoke, Chester stacked small stones into a round frame. It was the same method he used for kilns, only far smaller. The kiln for firing clay rose as high as his solar plexus when he stood; the smoking kiln came up to his waist. The one he was building now barely reached his knees.
Once the kiln was shaped they waited for it to dry. When it had, they packed the hollow with firewood, lit it, and let a proper blaze finish the job.
While Chester built the kiln, Monia shaped cups of every size and thickness—vessels meant to hold the ore while it melted. As she made as many varieties as she could and set them out to dry in the sun, Chester cleared the stones from one side of the kiln where no clay had been applied and fitted a length of bamboo against the opening.
“…That should do.”
He coated the bamboo in clay. When the clay had dried enough, he pulled the bamboo free, leaving an air-injection channel. He fitted the channel into the kiln’s opening and sealed the join with more clay.
“How are you planning to force that much air in? Are you going to blow into it yourself?”
“No way. I’d collapse in no time. We’re using this.”
Chester brought out bark, sticks, cord, and the press-drill.
“Oh—it’s been ages since I’ve seen that.”
“Right?”
The press-drill was a tool he had made to start fires more easily and to bore holes. With little need for drilling and the arrival of a lighter that made fire-starting trivial, it had sat forgotten in a corner of the storehouse.
“This first.”
He laid two sticks side by side and began cutting bark. It was the same bark he always used for rope and cord—the kind that stayed as rough as coarse cloth unless the fibers were carefully teased apart. Between the two sticks he carefully bound short, thin strips of bark, then wove longer strips through them in a crossing pattern, repeating the process.
“What is that?”
“A little fan.”
He waved the finished piece so a breeze brushed Monia’s face.
“I’m going to make a bunch of these.”
“All right.”
After making several identical fans, Chester took the press-drill, removed the bit from its tip, and began fastening the fans to it. Once eight fans pointed in eight directions, he set the press-drill on the ground and worked it a few times.
“Yeah. That works.”
A good wind rose. Now he only needed to wall it in so the breeze could travel in one direction only—straight down the kiln’s air channel.
He immediately began framing a housing sized to the fans on the press-drill. He shaped a broad, deep, round clay bowl, connected it to the channel, and set the press-drill inside. Judging by eye, he made a lid, then split it in half. The board that drove the press-drill made it impossible to drop a whole lid over the top, so he fitted the two halves from either side and sealed the seams with clay.
He also fashioned a lid for the top of the kiln where the ore would melt. While Monia’s cups finished drying, he spent the remaining time digging drainage ditches around the kiln to keep rainwater away and building a roof and walls.
“Are we firing them now?”
Another few days passed. When the clay of the cups had dried to a satisfying degree, Monia turned one of her creations this way and that and asked.
“Yeah. I’m just going to throw them straight into the fire.”
“What?”
Chester pointed at the ore.
“If a pot cracks under the heat while we’re melting ore, we’re in real trouble. So I’m going to fire them hard in open flame first.”
“Won’t they just break?”
Wasn’t that exactly why Chester had gone to the trouble of building an indirect-heat kiln in the first place—because pots kept shattering when fired directly?
“Probably. With luck a few will survive.”
At that blunt declaration Monia found herself smiling wryly before she could stop it.
“We try everything.”
“All right. Let’s do it that way.”
She was a little reluctant to see the cups she had carefully made crack, but for people working by feel and experience without proper knowledge, broken pottery was simply part of the process. No matter how much care they poured in, most of what they made shattered and became useless. Testing them in open flame—whether they broke or not—wasn’t a bad idea.
“How are you going to fire them?”
“Like this.”
Chester first packed the metal kiln’s chamber with twigs, then loosely layered firewood and wedged more sticks into the gaps, taking care that air could move freely between them. He fashioned a bit of tinder on a stick, lit it with the lighter, and once the firewood had caught steadily he went to the press-drill and began pumping the board hard.
The fans spun. Air poured in. The flames swelled greedily and began devouring the wood. When the logs had burned down enough, Chester gripped a long stick reverse-handed and crushed them down, packing them tight. Once a bed had formed he beckoned to Monia.
She carefully lifted one of her clay cups with a pair of crossed wooden poles bound in the middle like tongs and lowered it into the kiln. More firewood went in, the lid closed, and they set to work in earnest—pumping the press-drill and feeding the fire.
“Whoa.”
Every time the press-drill was worked, flames leapt through the gaps in the closed lid and then sank again, proof of how fierce the heat had become.
“How long are we going to keep this up?”
“No idea. I don’t know how long it takes for ore to melt…”
Because the press-drill had to be pumped constantly, they couldn’t simply stack wood and walk away the way they did with other kilns. Chester and Monia took turns—one working the press-drill, the other adding wood when it ran low and checking the cups—repeating the cycle for days.
How many days did they spend at it? After burning through entire days just firing clay cups, they finally held in their hands a single vessel that had endured prolonged direct flame without cracking.
“Haa… finally.”
“I’ve been pumping that thing for days. My arms are killing me. How many times did we press it?”
“Haha. I have no idea either.”
Chester tossed the blackened clay cup into the air, caught it, examined it from every angle, then walked over to the pile of ore.
“Now all we can do is pray.”
“Pray?”
“Yeah. Pray that this kiln has enough heat to melt that ore.”
And if it didn’t?
If it didn’t…
I have no idea what else we could even try.
They would just have to pray it worked.