It took a month of planning and preparations, but our new expedition was ready to go. Our group was comprised of Adam, Duncan, Grace, Eilian, and , with Dr. Ross the head of political sciences and two others tagging along. Jenna from the militia was there as personal security for Dr. Ross, while Tom was the assistant.
Before we made our way out of the Avonside mountains, I had to help the three newbies move into their temporary rooms down in the guest quarters in my grove. I t them out in the main quad of the campus with a smile. “Dr. Ross, Jenna, nice to see you both again!”
Of all the faculty heads, Dr. Ross was the one I had the least problems with. He was calm and thoughtful — both traits I found admirable in an authority figure. His slim stature, kind, handso face, and salt-and-pepper hair, all combined to create the image of a kindly teacher. Whether he was one, I had yet to figure out.
The professor stepped forward as I offered my hand, and we shook. “Yes, yes, you too Ms Belrose,” he said. “And this is my assistant, Tom.”
Tom was your typical dude by all visual trics. He was around six feet tall, with brown hair that would have a grandmother talking incessantly about haircuts, and the type of smile that was like catnip to girls who like nerdy boys.
I gave him a nod, then turned my attention back to the professor and gestured to their small packed bags. “You know you can take way more than that, right? We’ll be gone for months, I’d suggest bringing pretty much anything and everything you want.”
“Are you sure?” Dr. Ross asked, confused. “How do we carry it all?”
“We don’t,” I grinned. “We bring it into my grove where I’ve had my people build the three of you a small apartnt offshoot from my tree. Each day we’ll travel, but then instead of camping at night, we transfer into my grove where we have all the anities of a proper ho.”
“This grove of yours sounds like a cheat code to life,” Tom said, speaking for the first ti.
Dr. Ross made a noise of agreent and said, “I am very interested in how this all works. Would you mind if we saw the accommodations before deciding what to bring?”
“Absolutely,” I smiled. “Shall we go now?”
“I don’t see any reason not to. Where do we go?”
“Nowhere,” I laughed, and touched each of them with a tendril of telekinesis.
Green leaves and magenta flower petals swirled up around us in a rush, and for a brief microsecond, we hung between realms. It was the sort of stutter in your perception of ti that made you wonder if you’d just blinked or the lights really had gone out for a mont. Then we were in my grove, standing in the shade of my enormous Christmas tree ho.
“Welco to—” I began to say, when I had a light-bulb mont. “—To Stormpine, my ho.”
Finally, a freakin’ na for the tree. For an extra little bit of theatrics, I spent so of my own growth energy to create a sign above the large entryway. Stormpine. Now that was a na worthy of my tree.
My inner grove had developed significantly in the ti we’d been at Avonside. Since the battle with the steel ones, I'd regrown the hedge garden that surrounded Stormpine. The area surrounding the garden was now covered in small gently rolling hills, with pathways and streams snaking through them.
The forest beyond was a temperate jungle of exotic plants, trees, and all the small fauna that kept a woodland healthy. Birds chirped and sang, wild bees humd rrily as they collected pollen from compatible plants, and various other insects buzzed around. Regular cottontail rabbits had even been caught and introduced by the buns, although only after their breeding rate was nixed significantly.
My spells felt stronger when the plants were in part maintained and grown in a more natural way. Of course, we still grew normal food crops in a more organised fashion among the hills under the tree, and the lower caldera had farm animals now.
I could even see— hold on, was that a hobbit hole?
Frowning, I levitated upwards a tre or so and cast a magnifying spell.
Sure enough, over near the tunnel to Cee's grove was a small village under construction. The aesthetic wasn't entirely hobbit-inspired, with a style that was more rustic, and little square towers with pointy triangular roofs poking up out of the hills from each house.
It took a mont longer for to notice the much more alarming change. Of the fifty or so buns I could see working to finish the village, about half of them were bipedal like Cee.
“Those little shits!” I exclaid, touching down.
“W-wha?” Jenna sputtered, turning her attention away from gawking in wonder up at Stormpine.
All three of them had been staring around in open wonder at my grove, but now we were all watching the buns in bemusent.
“Fascinating,” Dr Ross murmured, his intelligent eyes tracing the fluffy miscreants as they went about their unsanctioned work. “They’re more intelligent than I thought they were.”
“We all underestimated them at first,” I agreed. “The upright ones are actually mages. That’s the form the fruit gives them when they transform. From speaking to the first of them, I’ve been able to gather that the language centres of their brains aren’t as well developed as a human’s, but empathic sections are greatly heightened. They’re able to sll emotions on people to a certain extent, and they’re very clued into body language.”
“Absolutely fascinating,” he repeated again. “And they have an organisational structure? Politics?”
Snorting with private amusent, I replied, “Only vaguely. They’re very communal creatures, so most of what they do is done in broad and chaotic telepathic discussions. One is a leader among them, though, who’ll generally have the final say in a matter. Then they all listen to … most of the ti."
"Telepathic group decision making…" he mumbled, still watching my buns. "How incredible. I look forward to eting and speaking with them."
"They'll probably love that," I chuckled. "They seem to enjoy telling us humans that we're overcomplicating everything."
We continued to discuss the buns and my grove while I led them towards the newly nad Stormpine. As we walked, I noticed more and more bun-ddling. There were crude little sign posts and shrines along the road. Wild berries had been planted in neat little hedges too, and there appeared to be the beginnings of pastures enclosed by stone fences. It felt like I'd stepped into an old English children's book universe.
The apartnt I had built for the three guests was the first addition to the tree that hadn't been grown. It looked like a cute little cottage tacked onto the side of the tree at the third floor, and that's pretty much what it was.
It was pretty funny seeing them begin to realise just how much nicer things were inside the grove. When they saw the balcony cafe, there were more than a few exclamations of envy. The bunrista even had coffee ready for them when we arrived.
From there, we inspected the cottage itself, and it was about then that the reality of things set in. They could bring anything and everything they owned on the trip, they'd sleep in the sa bed each night after a hot shower, and there was even power and a network connection.
The interior consisted of a tree-standard bathroom setup, complete with hot tub. They haf a large sitting room with a small kitchen and study nook, plus the three bedrooms. There were also two storage closets in case they decided to bring a lot of stuff.
"I don't know what to say, Ms Belrose," said Dr Ross, slumping back into an armchair. "This is nicer than my rooms in Avonside, and the view…"
"This is only the upper caldera," I said with a gesture out the large windows of the sitting room. "Beyond the edge of the crater is the lower caldera, where the Order is based. It’s much bigger than what you can currently see."
“Are we allowed to visit it?” Jenna asked eagerly. “I have so friends who joined. They were really cagey about things in here and it should be fun to catch up with them now that my clearance has been raised.”
I gave it a mont’s thought, but couldn’t think of any reasons to say no. “Yeah, whenever you have ti.”
“Sweet!” she said, pumping a fist. “Have you got a pub yet?”
“It’ll be finished by the ti we leave, I think,” I replied.
Truth was, we didn’t have any pub planned, but as of right now I knew we needed at least one of them. It needed to be a proper fantasy tavern too, with multiple floors all piled one atop the other, barrels of ad everywhere… oh, and a bun minstrel! It was going to be aweso, and I knew just the construction crew for it…
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