The basics of leatherworking, Jinyel had seen from a distance. He understood the basic steps: the skin had to be soaked, in water if the fur was to remain intact, in a quicklime solution if the fur was going to be scraped off. Warthog fur wasn’t particularly soft, useful, or pleasant to look at, so he found no need to keep it.
The excursion into the wilderness with Rickith ― on purpose this time, with an intention toward safety ― had given Jinyel a convenient schedule to work his newfound treasure. Because none of the hunters currently at the headquarters could track a deer in the dark, the leatherworker’s area was mostly quiet, save for the occasional professional who was given a cowhide after slaughter. Jinyel was free to use the space unbothered, after trading the boar’s heart to one of the professional leatherworkers in exchange for using her quicklime barrel. He’d thrown in the hide, departed for the wilds with Rickith, and returned to a skin fully cured to be scraped.
The scraping, of course, was another one of those things Jinyel had seen many times at a distance, but never actually done. The skin was spread on a worktable before him, fur facing up, and his knife was in his hand. The knife that he was going to use to scrape off the fur, gently, and somehow without harming the actual hide at all.
Jinyel chose the farthest corner of the shoulder to start, because he assumed knives were harmful to anything. He was proven right immediately, when he cut a corner of the hide clean off.
Too rough.
Jinyel tried again, but his second attempt was too gentle. The blade slid across the hair and accomplished nothing.
“Against the grain!” laughed the woman overseeing the area, the same one who had let him use her quicklime. “Turn that thing around.”
Oh. Against the grain. That made more sense.
Hiding a blush, Jinyel rotated the hide all the way around. He dragged the flat side of his knife against the flow of hair and watched it flick. Then, carefully, he turned the edge against the skin.
It was a bit like shaving, he supposed, although in a permanent way. The first few strokes did indeed cut the hair, but there remained a bit of stubble left behind.
“Don’t be afraid of it!” the woman laughed. “It’s got no teeth to bite you anymore!”
With a little more confidence, Jinyel scraped another stroke. Too much confidence. A thin strip of skin came up underneath the hair.
“There you go,” she said. “Little more gentle, a little more stern, and that hair will come clean off.”
Just the right amount of confidence? Jinyel tried another stroke. Two. Each one brought him close to the balance until eventually, he realized the trick was to press instead of slice. The quicklime did something more than water. It somehow loosened the hair from its very follicles, and with a bit more experimenting, he determined that the blade didn’t need to touch the skin at all.
The excursion into the wilderness with Rickith ― on purpose this time, with an intention toward safety ― had given Jinyel a convenient schedule to work his newfound treasure. Because none of the hunters currently at the headquarters could track a deer in the dark, the leatherworker’s area was mostly quiet, save for the occasional professional who was given a cowhide after slaughter. Jinyel was free to use the space unbothered, after trading the boar’s heart to one of the professional leatherworkers in exchange for using her quicklime barrel. He’d thrown in the hide, departed for the wilds with Rickith, and returned to a skin fully cured to be scraped.
The scraping, of course, was another one of those things Jinyel had seen many times at a distance, but never actually done. The skin was spread on a worktable before him, fur facing up, and his knife was in his hand. The knife that he was going to use to scrape off the fur, gently, and somehow without harming the actual hide at all.
Jinyel chose the farthest corner of the shoulder to start, because he assumed knives were harmful to anything. He was proven right immediately, when he cut a corner of the hide clean off.
Too rough.
Jinyel tried again, but his second attempt was too gentle. The blade slid across the hair and accomplished nothing.
“Against the grain!” laughed the woman overseeing the area, the same one who had let him use her quicklime. “Turn that thing around.”
Oh. Against the grain. That made more sense.
Hiding a blush, Jinyel rotated the hide all the way around. He dragged the flat side of his knife against the flow of hair and watched it flick. Then, carefully, he turned the edge against the skin.
It was a bit like shaving, he supposed, although in a permanent way. The first few strokes did indeed cut the hair, but there remained a bit of stubble left behind.
“Don’t be afraid of it!” the woman laughed. “It’s got no teeth to bite you anymore!”
With a little more confidence, Jinyel scraped another stroke. Too much confidence. A thin strip of skin came up underneath the hair.
“There you go,” she said. “Little more gentle, a little more stern, and that hair will come clean off.”
Just the right amount of confidence? Jinyel tried another stroke. Two. Each one brought him close to the balance until eventually, he realized the trick was to press instead of slice. The quicklime did something more than water. It somehow loosened the hair from its very follicles, and with a bit more experimenting, he determined that the blade didn’t need to touch the skin at all.