"The Fractal is a way of seeing not just magic but also the world as magic sees it. Structured magic, what I did with the stone and a great many people working together did for the language magic, is sculpting the world using that language. You can also shape your magic directly to do simple things. Just start off small until you're sure you know what you're doing. A little magic can do a lot. One part in six sixes of six sixes of your magic could light a house better than a lantern."

Ðani is conflicted — on the one hand, everything Maenik says raises additional interesting questions about the nature of magic and what she can do with it. And on the other hand, it will be so much more efficient if a few people can learn from her at once, and maybe take different things away from the explanations or at least remember everything she says better than one person can alone.

"What is the difference between structured and unstructured magic? Is it just whether you're ... using the right language?" she asks, before she can catch herself. "Or — no, wait, please only answer that if it's not the kind of answer that would more usefully be given to a group of students; I definitely don't want to waste your time explaining things several times."

"I don't see saying things twice as wasting my time. I can see the argument if it's an hours long conversation but a few questions aren't a big deal. The difference between structured and unstructured magic isn't a firm line. People can learn to form simple arrangements in magic without thinking about the corresponding symbols and magic inside your body will default to healing you. In theory, with enough practice you could teach yourself to form more complicated structures the same way but most people use templates for any structured magic."

"Oh! So you don't do structured magic directly, you use the insight from the Fractal to make objects like your metal block or that stone that guide the magic into a particular pattern?" Ðani clarifies.

"Exactly, you can also store templates in your magic or inside your body."

She makes an affirmative gesture and thoughtfully stares out toward the lake.

"So how do you actually make a template? I don't think you could just push magic into it, because it feels like they sort of ... have areas with less magic in them, and that ... pulls on the magic? But I don't know how I'd do that, exactly, since if I put more magic in it wouldn't ... I don't know if I'm explaining this well."

"You're explaining fine, making templates is a little counterintuitive. Templates don't actually have magic in them. You can't store magic to use it later, well not directly anyway. As far as we can tell, what happens when you're making a template is telling magic to pay attention to an object so that when someone channels magic into it in the future the magic does what you told it to. As for making templates, doing it manually is really hard. There's templates you can use to make it easier."

Ðani groans.

"It's another tongs problem; Lhemur will be delighted," she replies. "He's the smith — he's fascinated by things like that. Tongs, yoghurt, and so on."

She thinks for a moment more to see if there are any obvious follow-up questions.

"If templates are hard to make, does making them become a dedicated profession, like being a smith or a potter? People don't just make their own?"

"It is for the complicated ones. The template I used for sharing languages with you is the result of more than six sixes of six sixes people working together for more than two sixes years. For the simple ones like the the rock I made designing it took me a couple hours a year or two ago."

Ðani raises her eyebrows at the description of that much effort.

"Wow. That's like, as big a project as the Archive, maybe bigger. Even if it's not continuous. And your people must have made more than just one template like that ..."

She frowns.

"... do they break down? Over time, or with use? Build up inaccuracies from copying?" she asks. Her tone of voice is tense, as though she suspects she has found the downside to the whole practice.

"I'm curious about the Archive project you mentioned but to answer your question not as far as we know. If you destroy a rock with a template in it then the template is gone but it's fairly easy to make exact copies of templates so I don't think we've lost any that people really cared about."

The villagers are quiet for a moment, in the face of that declaration.

Ðani makes eye contact with Penþa.

Penþa takes a moment to collect their thoughts.

"The Archive is ... our civilization's great triumph against the forces of decay. A single repository of nearly every written work the world has produced. It is enormously expensive to maintain — both the organization that supports it, and just the simple work of copying and recopying books, often in dead languages, without letting errors creep in," they explain. "We pay a yearly tithe, to support it. Not much, but ..."

"If you have a truly durable way to record information — or, well, as durable as stone is. And so dense that the work of so many people can fit in a single block of metal ... you must visit the Archive and teach them the technique, before you go. Please. Even if there's some reason it can't be used for general writing, and can only store magical techniques, the Archive would still want to safeguard any templates you're willing to share, for future generations."

"I think in general my culture's approach to preservation is redundancy. Any physical object no matter how durable can be destroyed. That said, you can use templates to store generic information with a bit of creativity and I'll be happy to explain how that works.

"You can also use magic to write information into physical objects in ways that you can subsequently read from. We've found that there are substantial tradeoffs between information density and reliability but there are formats we think strike a good balance that are probably denser than anything you have access to. I have with me means of storing information that contain more than a writing-net the size of the whole lake's surface."

Penþa is speechless for a moment.

"That— wow. Um. Yes, of course redundancy is necessary for anything to be preserved in the long-term," they agree. "But it's not actually sufficient — you need to have some kind of organization dedicated to maintaining that redundancy, because otherwise you might not realize something was the sole remaining copy ..."

They shake their head.

"That's not important. The Archivists can explain their methods far better than I can, anyway. ... Assuming you wish to make the trip. It is a quite long way. Months of travel on horseback. I suppose we should really make preparations to send someone with the spring caravans, anyway ..."

Ðani stares out toward the surface of the lake, trying to imagine how much you could write across it.

She turns the en-templated rock over in her hand, feeling it with her magic senses, and trying to imagine that the channels within it are the threads of a net.

"That's amazing," she notes when Penþa trails off. "That you can just ... walk around with a library in your pocket."

"It really is. That's part of what I like about visiting people like yours who aren't accustomed to the wonders I am. It reminds me over and over again just how amazing they are. As to travel, I can sustain much faster speeds than horses unless the ones you know are a lot faster than mine. I think even getting to the other side of the planet is something I could do in a week at most though I couldn't easily bring anyone who doesn't know the right magic with me."

Penþa blinks.

"Well, in that case ... let me see. The world is supposedly six sets of six sixes kilostadia* in circumference. A horse can go perhaps two sixes of sixes miles* in a day, in best conditions, or half that for sustained travel on a single horse. Which is about one and a half sixes of six sixes stadia, or a quarter of a kilostadia. So in about four months ..."

As they speak, they count on their fingers, to avoid losing track.

"I think you could probably fly to the Archive in less than a day, then," they venture. "Which ... well, if you're planning to range that far afield, you probably will need to pick up some additional languages. That's well outside Marnesi. Although they will have translators in the City on the Mouth of the River, the closest city to the Archive, almost certainly."

* Translator's note: units are approximations of Marnesi customary units, and should not be taken to be particularly accurate. Also, Penþa is mistaken about the size of the planet by approximately a third, relying as they are on estimations made from the length of shadows by a civilization that does not have pocketwatches.

"It doesn't quite factor like that but I think I might be able to. The week figure works for getting anywhere by going above where the air is so it doesn't slow me down. It's helpful to know that I'll probably need more languages to talk with everyone. Do you have suggestions of where I can meet people who might be open to an exchange like that?"

"As it happens, I know a bit of Cold Sea Trade Language that I'd be happy to share," Oskeli volunteers. "Since we used to be accountants up there in our youth."

Oskeli says 'accountants' in approximately the same tone that someone from a more fantastic setting might say 'adventurers'.

"But if you're traveling south, that's not too much help."

"We do have a few people who have settled down here after traveling," Penþa continues. "I can introduce you at dinner. I'm not sure how many speak something useful, exactly, but it doesn't hurt to ask."

"Certainly. I assume that means the Archive is to the south? Also, what does it mean to be an accountant in your society. I understand that it means being someone who works with finances but that leaves a lot of possibilities."

"Yes — the Archive is south of here, beyond the warm sea, on the northern coast of the desert, in the lands that never grow cold," Oskeli agrees.

"As for your other question ... well, there are different kinds of accountants. When we were young, we worked as a messenger between two large banks — primarily, we did sometimes have a trip to a smaller bank as well — carrying receipts and orders. So a lot of travel, lots of time spent on a ship, punctuated by exchanges with our counterparts at other banks. Mostly they were pretty routine, but sometimes the numbers wouldn't match up, and we would have to investigate the discrepancy," they recount, with the cadence of someone dragging up old, fond memories.

"I quite liked the investigations, really. Bardamma had to get us out of some tight scrapes, but we were usually able to reach an agreement with the parties involved. And, of course, it was our investigative work that dropped the Island Without Trees Bank's loss rate enough for them to qualify as a safe trading partner with the Cold Sea Trade Alliance. I got a nice woolen jumper from their organizer as thanks, actually. It wore out a few years ago, but it was really the best for long winter nights ..."

"Accountancy isn't all heroics, though — we also spent a good deal of time as a circuit-accountant with one of the trading caravans. That was a lot slower. We spent a lot of time teaching math, actually, and the rest helping audit the caravan records to make sure everything balanced. And then one year, on circulation, we realized that we were a little too pregnant to keep traveling through the winter. We wanted to make it to the next city, but there was a bad storm, and we ended up staying here long enough that it made sense to winter. And we met the most gallant man, so we stayed a bit longer ... and then our accounting days were behind us."

Ðani, recognizing the signs of a ramble, slips away early, and returns just as Oskeli finishes with another girl in tow. They have a conversation in hushed voices.

"How interesting. Am I understanding correctly that loss rate is a comparison between how much an organization expects to have and how much it actually does?" It also says interesting things about their mating customs but that tends to be a more sensitive topic so she'll avoid it for the moment.