Page 33 of Knowing Trust

Lageos blinked at me a moment and swore under his breath. “Yes, we should absolutely do that, and I apologize we have not done both already. I did not think of that.”

“Neither did I,” Taeral grumbled. “I will get it set up. All of your packs or those friendly with you all staying put in Faerie so we can locate the remaining ones.”

“As inconvenient as it would be, we would need to do off hours,” I told him. “Starting on one continent at like midnight.” I glanced at Lageos. “I assume there’s a range on this?”

“I find so, but I’ve found never to put a limit on you, Daughter,” he said with a chuckle. “On Earth, I would assume so. Here, I wouldn’t think it for animals since you are the conduit even if you never, not ever tap into Faerie, this planet is… Made for you in a way.”

I nodded. “This would also be useful for finding packs and groups that are outside the system. No matter what the councils always said about it was them or the Underground, I always thought that was bullshit. There are jaguars and there’s no jaguar council.”

“Yes, and once you’re queen and bored with Faerie being healed and perfect, you can go try to help them and find them all. Any of the groups off the map.” He cleared his throat. “Even the vampires who are more monster than person. All of it.” He reached out and cupped my cheek. “I need you to have all the tools possible for when I’m gone.”

I swallowed loudly and mumbled a thank you. I covered his hand on my face and nodded that I was ready, feeling his magic.

He brought us to the nearest animal on the massive list for us to hunt. It was a type of elk. He froze it while others ran away and walked over with me. “I don’t remember this part it’s been so long. I would think you simply need to scan it and get a read for it?”

I nodded, holding out my hands and sort of petting the animal as I let my magic play. I nodded again when I had it and read my dad, feeling his magic to locate the next closest animal.

We only went about twenty feet away, but it still worked, and I understood the process.

I sort of told my magic to multiply the reaction or interaction between the sense of the animal and what my father had done. I wanted the biggest group of them as possible.

It sort of fluttered to let me know it was ready and I brought us there.

And into a massive herd of them.

“Well done, Daughter,” Lageos praised. “I don’t think I even managed this my first time and I did copy my brother as you did.” He nodded. “Yes, I think it was this magic that I learned in this way.”

I opened a cloaked portal to the hunters who were helping us with this so as to not disturb the animals. Taeral came through and glanced around before flinching. “What?”

“This is the dark realm,” he told me, pointing to a castle in the distance. “That’s a noble’s castle in the dark realm. I’ve been there. Your magic could sense this large herd exceedingly far from where we started. Did you feel Faerie or it try to work with you?”

I shook my head, giving my dad a look that I was being honest. “Faerie is still in that bubble. I swear. I won’t mess with that. This was totally a vibe of the area.” I studied the castle. “I’ve seen that before. I’ve been near here waking fairies.”

“That might be the key or trick then for it to work for long distances,” Lageos surmised. “It might have to be places your magic has touched before so the nature there can communicate with your request.”

That seemed way too out there for my mind to really process. It was a bit too close to magical email or something trippy like that, but then again, it wasn’t remotely the weirdest thing I’d probably ever done or seen so far.

I frowned when I saw the hunters shoot bows and arrows to take down the elk. Some didn’t die fast and it all seemed… Mean. I knew it was for food and I wouldn’t stop being a carnivore anytime soon, but we had magic.

Wasn’t there some way to do this better?

Seriously?

The first auction was tomorrow, and there was going to be a series of them over the next six weeks every Saturday. There had been talk of one big one, but this was too last-minute for people to plan, and not everyone could drop their lives on our whims. Plus, that meant too much crazy.

No, we needed to limit the crazy. I had also made the comment about butchering all the animals so fast and keeping them preserved.

Right, I should have known there was a rune for preserving animals. Of course, there was, but I wasn’t wrong on how difficult it would be to get the animals slaughtered. Fast and done right didn’t always go hand in hand.

Luckily, Mrs. Diaz and Katrina were working with us on this and agreed with me. Juan had handled “purchasing” where the future butcher would be that would raise more funds for Faerie and have a protected storefront, but for now was ready to handle what we needed. And it had a portal to Faerie.

No, it hadn’t been a property owned by a fairy. It had been owned by a hawk.

But it had once been owned by a fairy many, many years ago. It was a horribly kept secret that they had taken possession of the property with underhanded means but had a portal.

Luckily, the family were monsters still, and I had taken them down in one raid of corruption and crimes or another.

I honestly forgot which.

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