[Imprison, Implement]

  When I jumped back to the bookstore, McCracken and Henry were waiting. I asked them to wait just a second. I jumped to Juliet's World and authored two bags of 500 gold and jumped back to the store. I handed them both a bag of gold, went over the plan again then they portaled back to the theater to pick up their partners.

  It’s amazing but money spent towards a good cause is almost as good as magic, as most people want to do the right thing, just to start with. Mossbeard portaled in from the colony.

  “Juliet wants to know if you got the land?”

  “Mossbeard, tell her yes but then portal back, after we hear from Paula we’ll need to create a couple of portals.”

  Shortly after Mossbeard had left Paula portaled in.

  “Rose at first none of the vendors wanted to deal with us, when they heard you planned on just giving away the food, until you put them out of business and started your own market they changed their tune. All but one. A speciality cheese monger, I got one of the other vendors to start selling it for us.”

  “Perfect Paula, I knew you could do it. Now did they all agree on one central location?”

  “Yes four of them have a warehouse on the same street, Rose, I offered them a five percent discount to pick up from us, the other vendor has farther to go to pick up so I offered him a seven percent discount.”

  “Thank you so much, Paula”

  “Are you kidding, this was really fun,and the guards are going to deny entry to the cartels' wagons at the gate?”

  “Yep, Arthur signed the order today, after the city council meeting. Now I just have to hire the muscle to move the food tomorrow.”

  “What about me, I have muscle.”

  “So do I.” my wonderful girlfriend announced as she stepped through the portal.

  “I was hoping to hire gnomes to do the job until we have the cartel on their knees. But if you could both come tomorrow morning it’d be great in case of any last minute problems.”

  “We’ll be there.”

  Mossbeard portaled back and we all went to the street where the vendors' warehouses were. Paula introduced me to the vendors, they showed me exactly where in the street they wanted the food portaled too. I created the magical field, while Mossbeard drew the portal drawing. Then he portaled back to the tower to have Opal activate it.

  Half of the vendors wanted tomorrow's food right now, so I jumped to Juliet’s world and authored half of tomorrow's food and jumped it back to the street's portal. Paula had given me minute details on each order, I’m sure if they have issues with orders I’ll hear about it. Tomorrow morning at eight, I’d jump in the other half of the food, I had to go to Juliets to author it, it was just as easy for me to jump in. The portal would be useful when the farms started producing. I’d equip each farm with a portal to bring their food to market. But that would be a while, first the forest needed to be cleared, farmhouses and barns built and crops planted.

  We all jumped back to the store Arjun was waiting for me, I’d forgotten about the magical field practice.

  “Hi Rose I came for the magic field lessons but no one was here, is everything alright? Did something happen?”

  “Some rich people took issue with the fact that poor people were getting free food, and the guy who owns all the stables wanted the portal network shut down immediately or no more food would be sold to the town.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “We are starting our own farm cooperative to be owned jointly by the town and the farmers.”

  “What are you going to do in the meantime?”

  “I’ll jump in food from one of my worlds, and when we negotiate lower prices from the cartel, we’ll allow them to start selling again, after we steal all of their best farmers. Then when our farms start producing we’ll drive them out of business by undercutting their prices. The town doesn’t own or tax the farms for the first year. I don’t want to make a profit so our produce will be cheap, but lovingly produced by farmers who own the land, compared to the cartels.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “You already are, you volunteer at the medical clinic, you are already doing your civic duty, everyday.”

  He laughed, “You make it sound like I’ve been doing this for years, it’s my first day Rose.”

  “Well that’s how you do it for years, you start one day and then you just keep coming back. Before you know it, you’ve been doing it for years. Right, one day after another.”

  “I’m afraid that my mother would never let me stay here that long.”

  “Why not? It's a lovely town and ninety eight percent of the citizens are great.”

  “My mother always gets her way in the end. It’s been that way my whole life. I’ll come back tomorrow, to practice.”

  “Don’t skip today, Arjun. Go practice in the lane, remember seven days to form a habit.”

  “I remember Rose, I will go practice at the clinic, see you tomorrow.”

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  “See you tomorrow Arjun.”

  “So what do you want us to do, Rose?”

  “Would you mind portaling to the colony then finding Juliet, she directs things up there. Tell her that Draco, Opal and I are putting up magical fields tonight and that she should have the gnomes put in the farms one row at a time, not columns, that’s important. The gnomes get the first farm in each row. So we want to be fair and not do all of theirs first. Oh and Paula ask one of the gnomes if a saw mill would help. Lu could you go back to the soup kitchen and hire another chef for the new farm site. Then maybe go to the bakery and ask for food to deliver to the gnomes. They have another six to seven hours to work.”

  Paula portaled to the colony, Lu gave me a kiss and told me she loves me, a sentiment and a kiss that I returned and portaled to the pub. A portal demon opened a portal and Henry and Martha stepped out.

  “That’s a lovely little town you came from dear. We spoke to Mayor Tomlin, Told him the trouble that the cartel was causing and offered him one hundred gold to refuse buying from them. He said his daughter went to school with you and as far as he was concerned if the cartel tried to do that to us, what’s to stop them from doing the same thing to them, they won’t buy from them and no need for payments, that’s just what neighbors do for each other.”

  “Thank you Henry, Martha, I just knew you’d make excellent ambassadors.”

  “You are more than welcome dear, it was nice seeing more of Emain Ablach.”

  “Eventually, I’d like to set up free portals between cities, but for now we have the portal muffins.”

  Then they portaled back to the theater. I only hope that McCracken and Gigi were making out half as well. Just before I was going to close the store and go home, a portal opened and a smiling McCracken and a giggling Gigi stepped through. I’m not sure I wanted to know what she was giggling about.

  “Okay Rose, their Mayor and council agreed, for two hundred and fifty gold a week, they’d refuse entry to the cartel, it’s not like they need the food, they already have their own steady suppliers.”

  “Perfect, I can’t believe the cartel will make it more than a month without a sale before they come back to the town on their knees. By then I’d love to have hired their best farmers. How would the theater company like to put on some traveling plays? Where we can advertise free farms for one year's labor. If you can get someone to sketch what such a wagon should look like, I’d have it delivered to your door tomorrow morning. I’ll even write Groucho a speech for the advertising part of the production. You could just do a few scenes from a Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

  “You can stop Rose, you already sold me. We’re theater folk, we love to perform and you’ve given us a good reason too. I’ll be by tomorrow with a wagon design.”

  “Thank you both so much.”

  With that they portaled back to the theater. I closed the store, said goodnight to EG and portaled to the tower. Draco and Opal were waiting and we portaled to the colony. From there we walked North of the colony. The gnomes had already cleared the forest for the first row of farms. When Alvyn saw me arrive he came right over.

  “Rose, did you mean that offer of a lumber mill?”

  “Yes, I have a friend I can ask to design it if some gnomes want to build it, I thought maybe it’d make the farmhouses and barns easier.”

  “Yes, it would make things easier and more crucially faster.”

  “Alright there is another thing, Draco and Opal and I are going to enclose all the human owned farms in magical fields. That way the temperature is always fine to grow crops year round. Crops don’t need water, but the limited sunset in the winter does make the crops mature slower. We’ll be happy to do the gnome farms as well, we just want the colony's permission first. Also it’s a huge job and will take weeks or months for us to complete, as our magic supply is limited.”

  “How much would that cost Rose?”

  “Nothing, we're not charging anyone for it, we just want to make sure all kids go to bed well fed and as we aren’t farmers, we’re just trying to do our part.”

  Alvyn chuckled, “doing your part, I think you did that when you bought this huge plot of land so that you can give it away. I’ll check with the other elders but I can’t even imagine those knuckleheads turning down free magic farms. Thank you Rose, Opal and Draco.”

  “Just so you know, Alvyn, it’s Draco and Opal who’ll be generating the bulk of the magic, I’m painfully bad at it.”

  “Somehow I find it hard to believe Rose. I’ll go speak to the elders.”

  With that Alvyn left. Lu and Paula were building a stove where Juliet had instructed them to build the soup kitchen. I had to be very careful, I couldn’t push myself too hard tonight, I had a ton of stuff to do tomorrow, so I had to make sure I didn’t put myself into bed for the next twenty four hours. But I did have a lot more magic available to me than when a meter sized ball was my limit. Plus I could jump to Juliets world and refill and come back.

  “Draco would you and Opal like to start on the first farm, I’ll try to handle the soup kitchen.”

  “Sure Rose”

  “Thanks sweetie.”

  “Don’t overdo Rose.”

  “I won’t, Draco, I’ll jump to Juliet’s world to recover if I need to.”

  I went to where Lu and Paula were building the stove and started a magical field, first my one meter ball then expanding it to portal size and just to be safe I jumped to Juliet’s World authored my magic one hundred percent, took a minute to rest and jumped back. I doubled the size of the field and jumped again to refill, I kept cycling like that until I had a magical field the size of a two story building. I jumped to refill my magic for the last time.

  “Wow that stove looks perfect. If you weren’t great bakers and bards you’d make excellent builders.”

  I went to see how Draco and Opal were doing, they had completed a whole farm.

  “Hey, isn’t that too much, you two?”

  “No Rose I’m fine I’m still at thirty five percent.”

  “Good sweetie, what about you Draco.”

  “I’m fine Rose, twenty six percent and we are done for the day, Opal and I will portal back.”

  “Thank you both, you are really making a difference for the town.”

  I went back and chatted with Paula and Lu as they finished the stove, then we all portaled home for the day. Tomorrow should be exciting.