"What's the range of habitable altitudes?"

"Approximately 100 kilometers to approximately 300 kilometers? There's some flex, but below 120 or above 250 begins to be uncomfortable. The atmosphere is mostly the same at every point between those altitudes despite not having an immediately apparent reason to work that way."

"How peculiar. It doesn't thin noticeably as you ascend? Then how do you maintain a position within it?"

"It does thin, just not as dramatically. I meant the temperature and relative composition of gases is consistent in that range."

"Oh. I wonder why. I could probably figure out but I think it is less important than making sure everybody can have lemons."

"Lemons are a critical life experience, are they now? By the way, you will probably object to many towns' governments. They vary widely in several respects. Effectiveness, morality, structure. That's why I fly between them."

"Then I will just have to outcompete and/or harpoon them, won't I."

"And it's pretty hard to outcompete making stuff from nothing."

"I will exploit this unfair advantage."

"Can you turn my library, such as it is, into something less combustible? Possibly attached to a compiter?"

"Computers run on electricity. They're not, in advanced forms, particularly prone to catching fire, but you definitely should not open one up, get it wet, or subject it to mechanical stress. If that seems like an improvement, yes, I can render your library as a computer file with a computer to match."

"Stone-age here, remember. The computer will be competing with paper that's been recycled dozens of times and ink that eventually devolves into unrecognizable smudges. Thank you."

"They also need to be charged. I can make you a solar generator or a wind powered one?"

"Let's say solar. Sun is easier to come by than a wind differential sometimes."

"Sure. Where do you want that mounted?"

"Top bow of the ship?"

"Show me?"

"Right this way." He clicks a bone-lever into place and a few other mechanisms snap to a halt. He goes back out to the hall, opens a wooden door to open air (the ship is moving downright sedately by modern standards, the wind can't be more than twenty miles an hour), ties a knot to his belt in a well-practiced motion, and starts climbing up ridges that form a ladder built into the (stone?) hull.

Cam doesn't climb; he just leans out into the air and catches wind and flaps up.

"I can do wireless electricity. And you don't need to drill anything, I can stick it in a case that attaches like it grew there. Any requests before I make it?"

"Not green. Too much green makes the ship look like a Jellywing and could attract squid."

"Black all right?"

"Yeah, black's fine."