"This is the coarse salt you boiled down?"
Gaemon stared at the grayish-white lumps inside the iron pot and looked up at Jon.
"Yes, Your Grace."
Jon answered without hesitation.
"So this is what unfiltered salt looks like. It'll need proper refining before anyone can eat it safely—otherwise it could kill a man."
Gaemon muttered the words mostly to himself. Thank the gods he had once watched short videos on ancient salt-refining methods in his previous life. Without that knowledge, he would have been completely lost. Coarse salt really could be deadly if eaten raw.
"Good. Did you prepare everything exactly as I asked?"
"Everything is ready, Your Grace."
"Excellent. Everyone else, out. Jon and Amber, you two stay."
"Yes, Your Grace."
At his command the other men filed out of the wooden hut and pulled the door shut behind them. The already dim interior grew even darker.
Now only Gaemon, Jon, and Amber—who never left his side—remained.
With the room cleared, Gaemon began.
He set the iron pot on the stove, dropped the lumps of salt inside, then added a ladle of fresh water. He waited quietly while the salt slowly dissolved as the temperature rose.
When the lumps had melted completely, Gaemon picked up a long wooden spoon and stirred steadily. Once the brine was clear, he had Jon and Amber lift the heavy pot—still steaming and hissing—and carry it across the room.
Gaemon stretched a square of fine linen cloth tightly over the mouth of a large wooden basin and motioned for them to pour. The hot brine passed through the cloth in a steady stream.
When the basin was full, Gaemon lifted the cloth away. The filtered liquid beneath was noticeably clearer.
"Your Grace, the brine really is much clearer now," Jon said, impressed.
"Good. That step worked. Let's keep going."
Gaemon poured the filtered brine back into the iron pot, then picked up a second basin filled with the wood ash he had ordered prepared earlier. He tipped the ash into the brine, stirred vigorously until everything was evenly mixed, and set the spoon aside. His eyes never left the pot. This was the moment that mattered.
Time passed. The temperature climbed. Sediment began forming at the bottom—exactly what he had been waiting for.
When the dregs had settled, he carefully decanted the clear brine into a second pot, discarded the sediment, and set the new pot back on the fire.
The brine boiled again. Gaemon stirred constantly while Jon tended the flames, reducing them to a gentle simmer. They kept the liquid moving as the water slowly evaporated.
Gradually, white crystalline powder began to appear along the edges of the pot.
When the last of the moisture had vanished, a thin layer of snow-white salt coated the inside of the iron vessel.
Gaemon scraped the delicate crystals free with a small shovel, letting them pile up at the bottom. He transferred the powder into several glazed ceramic jars on the table.
Everyone stared, transfixed by the pure, snowy grains.
Gaemon pinched a small amount between his fingers and let the fine salt trickle back into the jar like falling snow.
"Your Grace… we did it?" Jon asked, almost afraid to believe it.
"Yes! I didn't expect it to go this smoothly. I thought we'd need several tries, but it worked on the first attempt."
"Your Grace, even though we've succeeded here, we still don't have the royal license to produce or sell salt. We'll need the Crown's permission before we can operate openly."
"The license is my concern—you don't need to worry about that. What I need you focused on now is how to scale this up. We have to be able to produce refined salt in large quantities."
Jon accepted the answer without question. After all, Gaemon was a prince of the blood; securing a royal license would be simple for him.
"Your Grace, this method requires a great deal of labor and fuel. The charcoal alone would be expensive at scale, and we're still short on hands. We'd need many more people before we could produce in any real volume. We should wait until the domain has more settlers."
Gaemon nodded, acknowledging the point.
"I also know another method—sun-drying. The boiling method we just used relies on fire to evaporate seawater. With sun-drying, we can build salt pans along the coast and let the sun and wind do most of the work. It uses far less labor and fuel."
"I think I've heard of that, Your Grace. Isn't that how they produce salt at Saltpans?"
"Whether they do or not, sun-drying is cheaper and requires fewer men. Since others are already using it, we have to adopt it too. Otherwise we'll never compete on price."
"I understand, Your Grace. I'll have the men start planning the salt works at once."
Gaemon gave a satisfied nod, then glanced at the jars.
"We'll make a few more batches. I'll take them back to the Red Keep tonight to show my father—and to request the official license. Only then can we sell openly."
"Yes, Your Grace."
The three of them worked for hours and finally produced six small jars—roughly a pound of refined salt in each.
Gaemon stretched his stiff back and let out a tired sigh.
"No wonder they say making salt is brutal work. I understand why now."
"Tell me about it, Your Grace," Amber grunted, speaking up for once. "This is worse than a full day of sword drills."
Jon simply slumped onto a stool, too exhausted to stand straight.
The constant stirring had left all three of them drained.
Gaemon divided two of the jars between Jon and Amber.
"These are for your hard work today. Pack the rest—I'm taking them back to the Red Keep."
"Your Grace, this is salt you made yourself. We couldn't possibly—"
"Take them. I don't want to hear another word. When I give something away, it stays given."
"Yes, Your Grace."