Green Canyon Magic - Ch.11 - A Very Generous Offer (Patreon)

"Hello again Theo, Stef, Stella!" Gaia greeted us with a wide smile as she joined us in our little cave cottage. "I got your message, that's..."

Her voice trailed off as she started at me for a moment. Then she muttered under her breath, "Three tails? I could have sworn it was just two yesterday."

Hearing that left me with a few new questions, mostly about the water and its magic and whether or not she knew how it actually worked. But before I got a chance to ask she'd already moved on, literally and figuratively.

"Anyways I got your message," Gaia announced with a wide happy smile as she wandered past us into our vacation home, "It's wonderful that you're all eager to join me!"

Stef nodded, "Yeah! We saw your speech last night and we all talked it over. We want to help you, we want to see the world get better."

The Earth's avatar began wandering around the small space as she asked, "Before we make it official do you have any other questions? Anything special requests, or anything you need to know?"

I nodded, "We'd really like to make this place our home. Like full-time?"

"Can we keep living here while we work for you?" my enbyfriend asked. "And if we can, is it also possible to get power here, and internet?"

"Yeah," I agreed. "And running water? I guess as much as we love our little cottage, it has a ways to go before it qualifies as an actual home."

"We also need food," Stef added. "We're almost out, and we didn't get out to do any shopping yesterday after all."

Theo commented, "I've offered to teach them both how to hunt but they seem reluctant. And their claws don't look as sharp as mine. They don't have proper fangs either."

Gaia finally held up her hands in a 'stop' gesture, "Ok slow down there gang, let's take things one step at a time."

Once the three of us were quiet the teenage Mother Nature continued, "All right, first things first. Yes you can stay here and make this your home. How about I give you all the forested or otherwise undeveloped land that's currently under the direct influence of my new mountain, south of the Thaya river and east of Merkersdorf? That includes the whole eastern half of Thayatal National Park, and the undeveloped land south of the park down to that road... I think you call it Federal Street number thirty? That should be about fifteen square kilometers in total, that the three of you can call your own."

It took me a moment to figure out that 'Federal Street thirty' was just B30 that connected Retz to a couple villages like Hofern and Niederfladnitz. Then I completely forgot all about that as it struck me just how much land she was actually offering us. And from their stunned silence I knew Stef was just as shocked as myself.

We'd been hoping she could say we'd live in the cave, and maybe thought she'd grant us a few dozen square meters of the mountainside around the entrance. Perhaps she'd have even let us have a few hundred square meters at the top of the plateau just south of us, to use as farmland.

Instead she was offering to give us half of Thayatal park plus a chunk of adjacent forest and wilderness, that amounted to something like than fifteen-hundred hectares. In fact it was so massive I realized I'd probably need to see it on a map, just to truly comprehend how big it really was.

While my beautiful enbyfriend and I were still reeling from the offer Theo spoke up, "That sounds perfect! That's plenty of room to roam and hunt!"

"Indeed it is Theo," Gaia responded with a smile. 

I finally shook my head and asked, "Wait how can you just give us the National Park? Doesn't that belong to, well, the nation?"

"And if I remember right the woodlands you're talking about extends past the border," Stef added. "Some of the land you're offering us is Czech, isn't it?"

"Ultimately it all belongs to me," Gaia stated in a matter-of-fact tone. "And as Mother Earth, I'm the final authority on who gets what land. I don't plan on abusing that too much though, which is why I'm only offering you the parkland and the undeveloped forested areas. I'm not including any of the settled farmland or the villages inside the affected area around my new mountain."

After a brief pause she added, "Not yet anyways. Depending on how things go in the future I could give you everything from Hardegg to Retz to Znojmo."

Once again neither Stef or I knew how to respond to that, which led to another short awkward pause.

"Anyways let's move on," the planet's avatar decided after a second or two, "I wasn't expecting anyone to accept my offer so quickly, and unfortunately I'm not ready to put all my plans into action just yet. So for now I'm going to suggest you make that trip to Hardegg and buy whatever food you want. You should be quite safe, now that you're working for me you're under my protection."

"That's not to say you can act with impunity among the humans," she added. "To the contrary as my representative and ambassadors I'll expect you to behave accordingly. But if any of them try and harm you or detain you without reason, I will intervene. My protection means that human aggressions cannot harm you."

The Earth Mother paused briefly then added, "And I should point out, none of you are defenceless or helpless. Between the three of you you've access to heat, air, and earth magic. If the situation calls for it, you can use that magic very effectively against belligerent humans."

For the third time in a row I was left speechless as I processed what she'd just said. 

Stef had already learned to use their air magic to cut and carve wood, it'd be trivial for them to do the same to a cop or soldier who was trying to shoot us. An even easier option would be to just pull all the air away from someone attempting to hurt us and let them suffocate in silence. And with his heat magic, Theo could probably cook a person just as easily as he got our firewood burning or boiled our water for tea. 

As far as I knew my earth magic wouldn't directly affect humans, but I could make walls and pits pretty easily. And from there it wasn't hard to envision comic book or horror movie applications, like instant spike traps or simply having the ground open up and swallow people whole.

I quietly shuddered at that thought, while Gaia seemed to pick up on my discomfort. Or maybe it wasn't just me, I noticed Stef looked a little uneasy too.

"I don't expect any of you to become front-line fighters," she stated in a soft compassionate voice. "I'm hiring you to be diplomats, not soldiers."

Her tone became more sombre as she continued, "Having said that, this is a war and there will be casualties. Humanity has been doing battle against me and all my other children for a very long time. Now that I'm taking a stand and fighting back, several nations have already branded me as a terrorist or public enemy number one. Once it becomes known that you're working with me, some of them will seek to attack you as well."

I glanced at Stef, just as they looked over at me. 

The cat-kin nodded slightly as they stated, "I'm still in. Fuck capitalism, fuck landlords, fuck the oil industry, and eat the rich."

"But not literally," I responded with a smile as I glanced towards Theo. "Billionaires are probably all bitter and full of gristle."

Gaia added with a little smile of her own, "They might make good fertilizer though. Many of them are full of bullshit, after all. Or maybe I'm thinking of politicians..."

I smiled a little wider before my expression became serious again. I told her, "I'm still in too. I don't really know much about being a diplomat, but I think I'd rather be that than a soldier."

Stef asked the Earth's avatar, "So you'll protect us and we can fight with magic if we need to. And for now you want us to get our food from Hardegg after all?"

Gaia nodded, "For now. And I'm going to ask you not to tell anyone you're working for me just yet. I'll let you know when we're ready to go public with that news, but until then it would be best to keep that detail to yourselves."

"Why?" I asked. "Just out of curiosity, if we're supposed to be your representatives and ambassadors, why keep that a secret?"

She sighed, "You saw my speech last night, so you know there are others like you around the world. Once humans know that the people I've chosen to work for me are easily identifiable by their ears and tails, there's a good chance they'll start hunting my people down. And not all of my people have grown as adept with their magic as you three. I anticipate about a week, perhaps two at the most, before we're ready to make that relationship public."

"That also gives me some time to work out a few more details," she added with a grimace. "Like how I'll be handling your food requirements, among other things."

Stef and I looked at each other then we both nodded in agreement.

There were still some questions we hadn't covered yet so I reminded Gaia, "We're grateful you're letting us live here, and all the land you mentioned is incredibly generous. But we're still hoping we can get power and internet in here? And we have some ideas for running water, but none of us have water magic so..."

"And I hope this doesn't come across as greedy," Stef added, "But as long as we still have to buy food and other supplies from stores we're going to need more money. Does the ambassador job come with pay?"

Gaia nodded, "Right, compensation! I did look into that just before I came over to see you. I admit I'm not as familiar with the numbers as you, but how does five thousand Euros each sound? As a starting salary I mean?"

Once again my enbyfriend and I glanced at each other. Our combined incomes from working retail and fast food was less than five thousand a month, so getting five thousand each was more than doubling our income. And considering we wouldn't have to worry about paying rent or utilities or any of that stuff anymore, it sounded pretty good. Throw in the instant transitions, the magic, and all the other perks and it was actually kind of awesome.

I knew it was probably a lot less than real ambassadors would make, but I assumed Gaia was factoring in our inexperience against all the other benefits we'd already received. Plus she said that was just the starting amount, so maybe it'd go up as we got some on the job experience.

While I was still thinking about it Stef asked, "How will that work? Direct deposit to our bank accounts? And silly question but how do we handle taxes and stuff?"

"I was thinking I'd just magically send you cash every week," Gaia replied with a little shrug. "And to be honest I wouldn't worry about taxes anymore. Think of yourselves as working for a higher authority. Rather than being citizens of a human nation, you're among the first citizens of something much bigger."

"Like a new world order," the cat-kin smiled.

Meanwhile I was a little hung-up on something else Gaia just said. I stared at her in surprise as I asked, "You're going to pay us every week? Five thousand Euros each? Per week? In cash?!"

"Yes," the teen nodded. "I hope that's ok? I'll pay each week in advance, beginning today. That should cover any immediate expenses."

Once again I found myself momentarily speechless. I thought five thousand a month was more than fair, but she was actually offering us four times that. 

"As for your duties," Gaia continued, "For now I'd like you all to continue working on your magic. Go ahead and work on expanding your new residence here, add some more rooms, make it a proper home. Maybe even start building out your ideas for running water. We can work on the details later."

After a brief pause she added, "Oh right, electricity and internet. Those are still a work in progress on my side, but I'll get something sorted in the next week or two. I know other groups like yourselves will have similar requirements, so I'm preparing something that'll be suitable for all of you."

"So food, electricity, and internet are things I can't deliver just this moment," she sounded almost apologetic about that as she continued, "But you have the land, my protection, and you'll be paid starting immediately. As I said, your assignment for now is just keep practicing your magic. Keep doing what you've been doing, and in a week or two we'll be ready to move forward. Does that sound good?"

I nodded, "That sounds perfect!"

My beautiful enbyfriend agreed, "It's a very generous offer."

"Yeah," Theo agreed. 

"Do we need to sign something?" Stef asked. "Or shake hands or something, to make it official?"

Gaia smiled, "Only if you want to? Otherwise it's all effective as of now. Theo, you're officially one of my representatives. Stella and Stef, you are two of my ambassadors."

"And this is your first pay," she added.

Three stacks of cash appeared on our stone table, neat little piles of notes in various denominations. My eyes widened at the sight of fifteen thousand Euros, but before I could react to that I was completely distracted by something else.

My ability to sense things through the ground suddenly seemed to expand outwards, until it covered the whole of our land. I didn't need a map after all, I could feel it all through the stone floor beneath my feet. It wasn't all perfectly clear or detailed, it seemed to work more like sight in that the further away I tried to 'look' the more fuzzy and indistinct things got. Even so, I quickly focused in on a disturbance about three kilometers south of our cave. I felt something that worried me.

"There's humans out there," Stef half-whispered. They had a distant look in their eyes, while their ears and tail twitched around. "I can feel them in the air. About two dozen I think?"

I nodded, "Yeah. They're approaching from the south, maybe from near Retz? They seem to be heading towards the new mountain."

"A lot of them have guns. But I don't think they're normal hunters," Theo warned quietly. 

My enbyfriend grimaced, "I think most of them are soldiers? Austrian Armed Forces."

I gave them a worried look as I asked, "What are we going to do?"

*** This chapter is brought to you courtesy of Lucy who commissioned it! ***