"Sure, I'll ward stuff after lunch."

Is it Hylian-style?

It's not quite Hylian-style! It's very much its own thing. Spiced beans, roasted and fried meat, salt and gravy, grilled fish, and fried starchy things, fruit jellies and butter on biscuits. Fruit and nuts are available but have had much less processing done to them.

"We really need to find some chickens," one guy complains, "I miss eggs! Guv, you know if chickens even exist around here?"

"Yeah, there's birds that lay eggs, you can probably find some around here... maybe not in winter, but I've gone egg-hunting before and gotten a meal from it. I like how you cook, this is great!"

"Egg-laying birds aren't chickens, though. Quail eggs are a rich folks' thing. And there's no dairy cows either... Well, there's always butter. And we'll have beer before summer's out, mark my words, someone will make an' sell it."

"Don't mind him," Katherine tells Valanda, "We're glad you like it! This is heavier fare than is perfectly healthy. We'll eat our fruits and veggies when we can actually grow 'em."

"There's cows, we raise them for meat but I know they make milk, otherwise their babies would starve. There's frozen fruit available now if you need it, vegetables are harder but you could make a trip to the mainland and harvest some wild ones."

"Maybe we will. Meanwhile, we'll make do. He's just griping. Right, Eric?"

"Uh, of course, ma'am. I think we all miss home, but the thing to do is to move forward and start again."

"So what did you want me to ward for you?"

The glass in the greenhouse roof. They might want it done to some building frames too, eventually, but aren't entirely sure how indestructible things play into a structure yet.

"Yeah, there's whole books on that, the safest thing is to ward them against fire and leave them alone otherwise but you can improve on that if you're careful and know what you're doing. If there's a chance you'll want to redo the greenhouse I can make it shatterproof but leave it so you can melt it down and remake it later if you don't like your first design."

"That shouldn't be necessary. Most of what we're building for now is copied straight out of architectural textbooks. This's almost an exact copy of Greenhouse Five from Cambridge, it'll serve fine."

"That's good, I hope they work as well here as they did there. What's Cambridge?"

"It is - was - a city with a famous and revered university nearby. I was referring to the university." Sigh. "It's where we got the seeds, remember? An old, proud institution, reduced to nothing. By weather. Isn't that the way of things though?"

"Oh, there. Yeah, it did seem like someplace I might've liked to see when it wasn't buried in snow. I'm sorry."

She nods pensively. "It's sad. But I can be sad, or I can roll up my sleeves and work and make a New Cambridge some day. So that's what I'm going to do."

"I can't wait to see it when you do."

"That's the spirit! I'd toast you if we had any booze!" She raises her glass of water.

"To the future!"

"And may we all prosper in it!"

As Valanda finishes protecting the glass sheets, they start raising the glass into place on the greenhouse's frame. Rows of planters and pipes are being installed at the far end. 

He's so proud of them.

He flies back and goes looking for Nikolas.

The inventor guy has been off in the wilderness somewhere for most of the past week, but he did hire a force mage to dig a large hole and tell them he'd be back by nightfall.

Valanda waits for nightfall.

Nik is looking more tired and ragged than usual. "Oh. Hello. No problem with my foundation prep, is there? I'll start the actual building t'morrow. Hopefully."

"No problems so far as I know, I was just wondering if I could ask you some things. If now's a bad time it can wait."

"I'm just tired. Most people I'd blow off at least until tomorrow, but for you, since you let me move in, happy to offer advice. Here, or back at your government tent?"

"Back at my tent if that's okay. How's ninety-six rings for probably less than half an hour of questions sound?"