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“Always the fucking turkeys,” I chuckled. “Yes, I was starting with the predators.”
“That’s why I added the turkeys,” he drawled. “I thought you were kidding about them being so fucking mean but seriously, they were trying to get us. They have no restraint or brains to try and pick a fight with us.”
It was funny but true. I’d heard about what happened and I’d laughed so hard for a while. There had been thousands of turkeys that had tried to stampede at the nobles who had gone to check out the situation.
What would that have really done? The turkeys did chase them out basically because we didn’t want them dead.
Yet.
“Also deer, otters, and foxes,” I read off. “Turkeys and falcons. Fish and fish in Lake Eerie. Also some frogs and rattlesnakes.” I blinked at Cerdic who had worked on this with several of the nobles we trusted. “How the fuck are we supposed to handle frogs and snakes?”
“I suggest the shifters we have who might hunt them, but we are fast enough to catch the little fuckers.” He snorted. “You step on a ton of them if you move in certain areas. It’s like overrun with both. The snakes are dangerous to humans, and I think a few can make shifters sick but not lethally.”
“If their animals are prey,” Trisha confirmed. “Unfortunately, they don’t have the immunity to certain toxins that can affect humans like us predators can. And those of us who are both like falcons and such.”
“That’s so weird,” I muttered, not worried about offending her because I knew she agreed. “We can figure out how to manage that situation, but does anyone even want the snakeskins or whatever?”
Apparently, some people did. I knew they used to be made into fancy bags and boots, but… Whatever. Not wasting it was better.
“I’m offering all of the culling to your princesses,” I said as I stared out at the group. “Pelts and all. We have piles for Nora’s guy to handle and don’t need to break him. By our estimates, we’ll need to cull two thousand deer from there alone. That’s two hundred and fifty thousand pounds of deer or a hundred and fourteen thousand kilograms.”
I’d gotten pretty good at putting things in the metric system since that was what pretty much all of the other covens used. Why did the US like to be the oddball out of things?
“And about two million turkeys. No, we’re not kidding,” Cerdic drawled. “They are everywhere. Most won’t survive the winter they’ve exploded so much and are fighting for everything. Better to not let them die and rot and feed people.”
“And you will ask what for this extreme generosity?” Winston repeated.
“I’m not done,” I chuckled, nodding when there were more shocked reactions. “We are willing to offer half of the bullets we are finding in excess, but aren’t the ones we need so many of, if you have someone who can convert them into the ones we need for the bigger caliber weapons.”
“We have dozens who can do that in our coven, Princess,” someone blurted. “We will take that deal and greatly need the bullets ourselves. Handguns too for tight clearing areas and spots.”
“We can work with that,” I promised, glad when others seemed ready to jump on that too. Good. We had so many bullets it was ridiculous and were always finding more. It was time to work on some long-term goals of stockpiling what we needed better.
“Anything else?” someone teased.
“Yes, I’m giving a hundred cows and a thousand chickens to each of your princesses. We’re not going to have an outpost in Indiana, and we found several farms that are ridiculous. So we’re going to offer them live so you can start having the security your coven will want that the food won’t go away.”
“Aether bless you,” someone rasped, sounding choked up.
I nodded. “I’ve heard repeatedly from all of you that people are being greedy and any deals for more food you’ll take. I get it and do not judge your people. We all suffered too much, and there are years of too little food to recover from. I also know how terrifying it is to not know where your food will come from tomorrow or next week.
“I’m the one person who can take that worry off the shoulders of your princesses and covens, so I will. I will for my friends who didn’t fuck me over with these deals. We all know how easy it could have been with fourteen covens versus us. Even with the deterrents and who I’ve married from the covens involved, it could have happened.
“But it didn’t. And I’m grateful to your princesses for being honorable. And helping us. We would have been screwed too many times if your covens didn’t step up. I know there were days you helped us that you didn’t count on the total or ask anything for. That’s generous too. So this is my sincerity.”
“A few have cows already, my love,” Kristof said when no one seemed to know what to say. “Could they have pigs instead? There are several areas we found that contain farms we can’t take over or manage.”
I shrugged. “I’m fine with that if people can handle the transport. We were planning to easily drive them to St. Louis and load them on ships to go down the Mississippi.” I had a better idea. “I will add in pigs for a later date for all if they will take a day and help transport the pigs to where we can handle them. I know a few of the outposts said they wanted to get more before winter.”
“I hate to keep pushing this point, but what do you want for all of this, Princess Inez?” Winston interjected again, looking worried like he knew it would cost them a lot if I was willing to give a lot.
True, but not as much as he would think given I really did want to be generous.
“We need more manpower. No matter how much we do, we keep accepting more in. I was just informed that five more clans would like to become my knights and the smallest clan is over six thousand.” I nodded when several people winced. “And we have more settlements we need to bring in before Keres tries to infect them all.
“So to answer your question—I want more days of help from your covens.” I let out a slow breath. “For every three days of raiding, I want two where you help the coven. We can figure out how and jobs, but a lot of it will be jobs you old guys can do faster.” I hurried on when people looked ready to reply. “I did the math and you still come out ahead with half. Especially with—”
“Our coven will do more,” Sebastian pledged, others nodding.
