"It's up over there, the entryway wizard increments it every time a Prestidigitation runs down."

-Nod.

"Manual clocks, what has the world come to..."

So, when's the next session for any of those? If it's not soon, probably... Read the treaty.

She could actually get in on a Taldane class but she speaks Taldane quite well right now, which is also why she can read the treaty.

It's probably still worth it! Thinking about the language in trying to learn it terms- Well, there's some amount of time pressure on making the heater designs-

She'll skip that, then, and lock in on heater designs, writing them out in her own notebook, because working is very engrossing and distracting from how she's in a STRANGE FORT with STRANGERS (who, admittedly, seem very reassuringly orderly), far from home, with no expectation of a hot shower or seeing her mom.

Anything happen for the hour or so she'll be writing in the mess hall in her tiny notebook with a tiny pencil?

People do look over her shoulder, otherwise no.

...Hmm but what if... That could... If she took that part out...

The spark flows sluggishly for some of it, making her a bit more energetic and animated as she plans. Lots of math and some diagrams are on the 4 pages she uses up.

And then at the end, neatly tallied, three designs for efficient-heat-production: One that will just take some rocks or bricks and time and effort putting them in the right shape, one marked as needing ~3lbs scrap iron that will include a self-starting turbine and mostly work faster by forcing air through (theoretically could be used to do other useful work) but is around the same amount of efficient, one that is marked as using a fairly critical component of her power saw and also rope and a few other things that apparently will be much more efficient due to some mechanism involving evaporation and condensation - producing double to six times the amount of heat per unit of wood input, depending on the outside temperature of this other component where it's stealing heat from, which must be placed outside or on a roof somewhere with a clear line to where the heat will come out-

...Back towards the boss's office?

It's right where she left it. There's a guy stationed outside the door asking her business.

"I have design proposals for improved-efficiency heaters. We discussed earlier and I said I'd write them up to see if they're worth fort resources, as I understood it."

"- yes, let's have a look."

Here is a hand sized piece of paper!

"So, the cheapest is this one which really just needs some time and effort to chip rocks into shape and maybe a bit of mortar or something, the wood goes in here, air goes down here, and then air coming out of here will be stronger and hotter than a normal fire and there will be much less smoke. The hottest part is this, which can be a cooking surface. Easily twice as much heat per unit wood burned compared to an open fire.

This one is closely related to the cheapest one, but I'd need about three or five pounds of scrap metal to beat into shape. Basically, it's a little better because of forcing more air through faster, reaching higher temperatures in the inner chamber. But it's hard to say just how much better without trying it.

This one I don't expect you'll want but, well, Spark, it's what I call a heat pump and would be around three times as much heat per unit wood burned as even the optimistic estimates of the second type, since it's moving heat from outside to inside, but it would require, well, a bunch more stuff, the list here is approximate and adaptations are possible, but representative of the kinds of materials I might need. It also requires the heat engine from my power saw, which is, uh, maybe not."

"I think we have that much scrap metal available in the form of broken arrowheads or bent horseshoes. What's the time expenditure on any of these?"

"Ehhh... I'm not very used to using literal rocks as materials... The spark helps but... Eight to twelve hours work," number one, "Ten to fourteen," number two, "And the heat pump would take like six hours if I had everything in my workshop and only keeps going up the less good the materials are until it's impossible. Call it forty plus hours of work. Maybe less once the Spark is active, those are conservative estimates."

"Would you need to kick the smith out of his smithy?"

"Oh, I could help in a smithy! - For a couple hours yes, for type two."

"We have only the one smith posted here at the moment so you could perhaps work while he's sleeping, if your sort of sorcerer can tolerate the schedule adjustment."

"That's fine once I get used to it yes."

"That would put your hours at..." Paper shuffling. "2200 hours up to 0600."

It's really rather relieving to have a Specific Schedule set! Even if she might... Leave.

Yeah, she might.

Didn't she want to leave? See the world?

She doesn't have to do it right now. She might want, like, a coat. And a functioning weapon. And to have read the treaty.

"If I work to make improved heaters at whichever of the first two designs you pick, will this work feature in your consideration for whether I can get a coat or other things for personal use, should I decide to leave towards, uh, Kenabres?"

"If your heater works sufficient to reduce the amount of fuel we go through for cooking and heating by the factor you describe I would value that at approximately..." He does some figuring. "A coat, a pair of boots, and about a thousand dollars, though I only have that in paper Chelish money and if you choose to leave you will need to exchange it for coinage."

"Oh, nice. I don't need boots, I think, my work boots appear to be holding up acceptably to the cold. It's just the work outfit that isn't. How many 'dollars' is an enlisted soldier paid per day? I'd really rather be paid in materials, but I imagine the logistics of getting them out here is... Dubious."

He can show her the pay schedule for various ranks. A thousand dollars is apparently a lot. "I can requisition things, but turnaround is slow. We have some things but were not expecting your sorcerer varietal."

That's... A lot of money, actually. She tries to compare it to heatstamps and ends up concluding that it's about two months of her pay back in Frostbound? Is sparkwork just that valuable??? Maybe no Sparks are around here? They haven't been really... Recognizing it. It'd explain the general lack of technology, except for the esoteric mental effects...

Or maybe she was being cheated and exploited at home, the captain is suspicious and they put so many restrictions on her work-

Down, Spark.

"-I haven't read the treaty yet, I made these designs first. I think I'll - 1000 to 0600 hours you said - does that leave me with just four hours of sleep or am I misunderstanding? I'm trying to see if I should try to go back to sleep immediately or not."

"1000 to 0600 is a period of eight hours. The blacksmith is not in his shop during all other hours, but it is to be reserved for his use during those hours unless you come to an arrangement directly with him. The rest of your time you can develop more plans like these, attend classes, sleep, eat, play cards, sign up for patrols if you fancy them."

"Oh, an evening to morning distinction. - Oh, it may be difficult to relocate once complete, being large and unwieldy, I should know where to build it. And whether you want type one or type two, I have been assuming type two since we are discussing use of the smithy."

"I can have someone show you to the kitchen, and, yes, I meant type two."