Weavercraft Hall - Dye Area
Little more than a space squared off under a large canvas supported by poles, this area is marked by a scent, bordering on the nauseating, slowly being diffused by the open air. Here are resting several large vats, some brewing over high flames, some idly cooling. Deep soupy colors can be seen churning within each as weavers of different ranks hover about. Boxes and crates can be found pushed off in corners during the day where more people are bent over preparing ingredients for future batches of dye.
Contents:
Kagora
Obvious exits:
Kagora is making a deep yellow dye. Onion husks have been ground and placed in a basket while she adds them to boiling water and mixes each into dye. She's got goggles, an apron and gloves on, and her hair is pulled back with a length of stained and worn muslin.
Serina walks into the dye room with her arms full of bolts of cloth that have yet to be dyed and remain the natural color of linen, a dirty white. "Ma'am, where would you like these?" Her tone squeaks a little bit as one bolt tries to slide off the top and she leans back to keep it in place. Her face is half-hidden by the cloth, but her wrinkled brow and eyes can be seen. It is quite possible that the nose is scrunched up as well at the smell of the dye vats, or the latrine overflow from the hall. Feet move from side to side to keep the bolts balanced on her arms as she moves further into the room.
Kagora points off to the side, near baskets of dye materials. "Over there, lay them flat." She says absently. She scrutinizes each vat of dye in turn. "Alright. Do you know how to make dye? I'm making yellow and I could use the help. There's a strainer pole over there."
Serina half walks and half sidesteps towards the pointed table and carefully unloads her arms. After making sure the bolts are rearranged so as to be made flat, she turns back to Kagora. "No ma'am, I haven't yet learned how to make dyes, though I would be interesting in doing so." This is said with a gleeful tone, her eyes dancing around the room to find the strainer that was mentioned. Once found, it is grabbed and taken over to the master. "How…how do you make dye? Is that onion?" Her finger points to the husks floating in the bubbling water.
Kagora sighs, takes a deep breath, and then lifts the safety goggles. "You must be Serina, the new apprentice I heard was coming in. Okay then, making dye is easy." She motions for the other to watch. "This is a vat that's ready to have dye made. Since its onion yellow, we can't add anything to it or it will turn green instead. I have a basket of ground herbs, you put it into the vat and let it bubble, not boil but simmer, and stir every so often. When its done." Kagora takes a stick very much like a lacross stick, and then starts skimming the onion husks out of a finished vat. "And then remove the vat from the grate." She still has her gloves on, and hauls the vat from the heat. "And when it cools, you bottle it and there's your dye."
Serina nods at the mention of her name. "Yes, that is me ma'am." Her eyes then turn to watch the dye vat intently. If her ears could swivel, they would have to catch every infliction of tone during the mini lecture. "How do you know when it is done?" The simmering she got, the timing she didn't. "And how long will the dye last?" Surely it isn't useful forever and her eyes turn to Kagora's expectantly, a large grin on her face. Her hands even tremble in her excitement, and the smell long forgotten. "Um…do I need to get some of those too?" Right hand motions to Kagora's goggles and apron.
Kagora points to three eggtimers. "Onion dye takes about half an hour to make. These are all set to go off 15 minutes apart." She explains to the apprentice. "That way I have time to get them off the fire. Other than that, just stir for a little bit." Kagora may have sounded stern when Serina entered the room, but now her smile is much warmer. "And yes, you'll need safety equipment, if onion dye splashes into your face, won't hurt you too bad but it /stings./"
Serina scrunches her nose up at the mention of it stinging and looks around the room for these safety equipment. They are found by the door, and quickly dons them, tying the apron on deftly. "So is all you are making onion dye? How do you get the other colors?" A gleam at being able to work with purple, rumored to be the hardest to create. Her hand deftly grabs the stirring rod in the nearest pot and begins stirring with slow circling strokes. That grin has not lessened in intensity until the stinging smell of onion gets near her eyes and it fades slightly. "Oh man, onion always made me cry." There would be dabbing at her eye if it wasn't for the goggles.
Kagora nods. "Today I'm just making yellow, my favorite to make is Indigo. But that takes more care. And walnut brown takes a whole two hours to make." She adds. "Ferns and fellis make a lovely rich green." She adds.
Serina nods and wishes she had a pad to write down these notes on. "So makes yellow and ferns and fellis make green. What about red?" She may be curious about purple, but she'll learn that eventually. Her hands keep up the stirring the liquid in the pot.
Kagora picks up a pad from the desk. "Here Serina, this is the most common ones." She smiles. "That way you can take notes to study later." She moves to one set of vats and pours more in. "And one and two and one and two and one and two." She chants as she stirs the vat.
<OOC> Kagora says, "http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Dungeon/5995/Encyc/colours.html#dyeherb"
Serina laughs softly and keeps stirring, glancing up to the timers every so often between reading over the list. "Oh, this is a good list. I'll need to find my notes pad and write it all down. Though I always do tend to learn best by doing." That was how she learned how to spin and knit anyways. Watching only does you so much good. "Do you always keep time with your stirring?" A large grin with a flash of her brown eyes, then she returns to stirring her own vat. "How much yellow dye are we making anyways? Can this dye only be used once and what do we do with it when it won't dye any more cloth?" The girl is full of questions today, but they only scratch the surface on the intricaces of dyeing.
Kagora shakes her head. "Only when I'm feeling perky." Kagora tells the apprentice. "You're just glad I'm not in a nerd mood. When I go science on an apprentice their eyes glaze over." She says with a wink. "Okay, those two over there need to be removed from the heat and then skimmed." She points to a pair of vats.
"Science on them?" Serina's curiosity draws her eyes again to Kagora with a smile, before nodding and leaving the vat in front of her take the others off the heat. With a lot of grunting and groaning, as her arms are not the most fit, she manages to move both vats one at a time off the fire. Panting, the strainer is retrieved and she begins skimming the onion husks out of one. "Um, where do you want these?" She's only peeked in here before, so never learned where all the used dye materials go.
Kagora points to a dirtbin. "Over there." She explains to the apprentice then. "I like reading science files from the AIVAS database, as well as history. But when I feel like being really nerdy, if I get the chance, well….. the apprentices tend to glaze over with most of the things I've read, since its advanced stuff."
Serina nods and moves over to deposit the husks into the dirt bin so motioned to. "I haven't been lucky enough to read anything from the databases, but I heard about them while on the way here. Being from a minor hold has its downsides." Like not being able to afford to trade in any extra food for one of those fancy computers, or have the threat of starving over the winter. "I would like to read some of it sometime. Especially if it contains anything about how to make better threads from various fibers." Like a linen-cotton combination for example. Once the husks are picked out of the strainer and disposed of, she returns to finish up the first vat and strain the second. "Sorry for that ma'am, I only learned what my mother and sisters knew about spinning, which was only about wool."
Long distance to Shellie: Serina sighs. I think my determination of the weaknesses in the argument is weak in and of itself.
Kagora nods patiently and stirs at another vat. "That's why you're here. Your job is to learn. And my job is to teach you." Kagora says with a nod. "I'm the apprenticemaster, so if there's anything you need, anything at all, just come to me. I'll see if I can schedule you a trip down to landing. My little sister is a dragonrider you know."
Serina raises an eyebrow and turns around briefly to eye Kagora, then returns to dumping the husks into the dust bin. "I…I didn't know you were Kagora..ma'am." She is stuttering horribly and her face turns bright red. Luckily her back is turned to the woman now. "You could schedule a trip to Landing for me? I've only been here for a sevenday now. Surely the senior apprentices get that privilege." This comes having her older siblings getting all the perks first of course. It will take a good month before she can really settle into hall life. "What would you like me to do with these vats now?" The vats have been strained and she has turned back to Kagora, looking a little sheepish but still bright red in the cheeks.
Kagora shakes her head. "I actually mix the classes who come along with me. The newest need more experience, and the oldest need practice." Kagora explained. "The new apprentices need to be challenged from the getgo. Only through a challenge can a person truely learn. So practice practice practice in the daytime, and at night, contemplate and sleep."
Serina ohs and looks even more sheepish now, realizing her assumptions had been wrong. "Ah, ok." Her tone a lot more sure than she actually felt. "It..it will take some getting used to I suppose. I only got to learn anything new during the evening or during the winter. We were always required to be in the fields otherwise."
Kagora nods and smiles at the apprentice. "Well, you're here now, and your only job is to practice, get better at your work, learn, and make friends. Think you can do your job Serina?" Kagora lifts her goggles to look the apprentice in the eye, her eyes just as warm as her smile.
Serina smiles and looks through the slightly foggy goggles at the woman, then laughs. "Yes, I think I can manage that. If I can learn how to work with cloth and fiber, it would be better than weeding the fields day in and day out." The smile turns into a grin and she turns to move the vats of cooling dye out of the way of the walkway. "I'm going to move these over here. Don't need someone trip into them."
Kagora looks up as the egg timers all begin to ding. "Alright, these have to be removed from the heat before they overboil. Take your gloves and help me remove them." Kagora pulls her goggles over her eyes and begins to remove the vats. "They have to cool completely so they can be bottled, so when you've pulled them all from the fire you can go, I'll skim them away." Kagora tells her.
Serina reaches over the counter where she left the pair of gloves she was using and pulls them on. Luckily, they aren't that big on her. The other vat that Kagora hasn't touched yet is carefully moved off the fire and placed aside to be skimmed. "Does that mean they won't be able to bottled until the morning?" Once the vat is far enough away from the fire, she takes her gloves off and puts them back where she got them so others can find them. Yet despite the fact that she was told she could leave, she waits with a large smile and takes off her goggles and apron, hanging them back up near the entrance.
