Belmarniss points at the parts and bits.

Shrug. Sigh.

Okay, she can get lost in fussing with these PRIMITIVE PARTS in POOR WORK CONDITIONS. That's fine, it's all FINE, sooner started sooner finished. The wires still need insulation if she's going to wind them into a proper magnetic loop... Maybe she can make something with the leftovers from the saw to hold the thread in place and make that easier...

(She is getting parts and pieces out again, now.)

Belmarniss disappears again and is gone until the time the halflings come by with dinner.

"-Hello," she says to the halfling, glaring at messy thread and fiber under the red glow of a strange machine. "Food?"

"Yes," says the halfling. She puts some by Waltana and another portion on Belmarniss's desk.

"Thank you. Oh. Uh- Do you know, eh-"

She holds up thread pieces.

...Her brain catches up and she blinks.

Shit. She can't be giving the slaves more work.

"-Nevermind. No, sorry, thank you."

Via gives her a weird look, then bows her way out of the room.

Waltana...

Stretches and does some sit-ups and a few other body exercises, actually. For a couple minutes, at least. It helps work out some of the malaise she's feeling. Then she eats, down to the finger-swiping dregs, then she brings the empty dish and goes and looks for water to drink, carrying her light. If the water source is obvious she'll just take some, otherwise she'll ask the first person she sees, "Water?"

There's a basin with a dipper in it.

She suddenly notices how thirsty she is and drinks a fair bit. Leaves the dish near the chamber entrance, uses the chamberpot, and gets back to work fussing with the cloth and thread, the most useful thing she can do without better tools or a proper place to set up yet.

Belmarniss comes back, collects her dinner.

Grumble grumble wires.

"...okay?" asks Belmarniss.

"Bored. Tense. Miss home." In Germanian. "...Can work," in Drow.

Nod.

Belmarniss goes to hammock not too long after dinner.

At least soon she will have enough insulated wire to wrap it into a little motor core. She keeps fussing, quietly, driven to work by the stress. For a while, at least.

In the morning, "I teach you? You teach me? Or, you go out?"

"I go out, you go out with me."

Oh! "Okay!"

She packs things into her pockets and deals with all the morning ablution in a suddenly better mood.

She still has her light, but the sawblade is fixed to a handle so at least it can be swung around.

Belmarniss leads her through a multitude of twisty passages, humming a tune.

It's not sitting still and fussing with thread! Yay! She tries to build a mental map, and loses track of it immediately.

After a while they're going to have to do some climbing and ducking. Belmarniss has a spell that makes it feel really obvious where your feet are, which helps in the iffy flooring.

She likes feeling more competent! 

Her boots seem to be extra clingy with something black on the bottom, too.

And then Belmarniss shows off her find.

It's a steep slope on the way in, almost a slide - Belmarniss in fact takes it sliding - with a rough choppy side on the left that will probably serve as handholds on the way up. Past that there's a broad empty cave, only about six feet high - so, a little claustrophobic, but no risk to their heads. A small trickle of water descends from some tiny aperture in one spot and disappears likewise. There are a few further chambers, with lower ceilings but enough space to store some things. There's some stalagmites they could slice the points off to use as tables.

'Inconvenient to get to' is both a plus and minus. She's already having thoughts about a pulley near the top, or stairs, if this is to become a long term thing. She puzzles over it for a bit, mentally arranging equipment, but... Eventually gives it something halfway between a handwobble and a thumbs up, and says, "Good. Comprehend Languages?" (She mispronounces the second part.)

Comprehend Languages!