Back in Eryndor. Days went peaceful again.
Or so I thought.
The tomatoes were not ready.
I knew this because I had planted them, tracked their growth daily, and calculated the approximate date they would reach harvest based on soil temperature and sunlight hours. Four more days minimum.
The squirrel did not know this.
Or it knew and had decided it wasn't relevant information.
I was crouched at the edge of the plot in what I had determined was the optimal monitoring position, which had the secondary benefit of putting me at eye level with what was currently happening to the third row.
A single squirrel, small, fast, completely unbothered by my presence, was filling its cheeks with unripe tomatoes with the efficient focus of someone running a timed operation.
I watched it.
It watched me back briefly, while it chewed, then went back to work.
I extended two fingers toward it.
The spell I was constructing was precise. A targeted pressure point, small enough to avoid disturbing the surrounding plants, calibrated to be instantaneous. The squirrel would not suffer. The tomatoes in the immediate vicinity would be entirely undisturbed. It was, by any reasonable measure, the correct solution to the problem.
I refined the calibration further.
Behind me, a laugh broke the morning quiet.
Benneth was standing at the edge of the plot with both hands on his knees and his whole face involved in his amusement.
"Are you." He stopped to breathe. "Are you trying to kill a squirrel with precision magic."
"It's eating the tomatoes." I said. "They're not ready."
"I can see that." He was still laughing.
"It's a pest." I said. "Pests damage crops."
"That is technically accurate." He straightened up and walked into the plot, moved toward the squirrel with a calm, unhurried pace, and waved his hand once.
The squirrel looked at his hand. Considered the situation. Then took its full cheeks and left at speed into the grass at the field's edge.
Benneth turned back to me.
I was still crouched with two fingers extended at where the squirrel had been.
He looked at my expression and read it accurately.
"Leigh." He said.
"A containment field." I said. "Perimeter ward. Something that discourages entry without harming anything. Low mana cost, passive maintenance-"
"No." He said.
I lowered my hand.
"Why." I said.
Benneth looked out across the farmland, then up at the fence line along the northern boundary where two birds had taken up positions, sitting in plain view in a spot that had been empty all winter.
"Squirrels. Birds. Small animals coming into the fields." He looked at me. "Leigh. Do you know what that means?"
"Something is eating the crops." I said.
"It means Eryndor is safe." He said. "Small animals don't move into areas with monster activity. They don't nest near anything that frightens them. The squirrel helping itself to your tomatoes means the forest around us has settled. You did that. The walls, the barriers, everything you've built. The territory changed." He picked up his hoe and rested it on his shoulder. "Think of them as paying guests. Annoying ones, but a good sign."
He patted my shoulder once, firmly, and walked back to his row.
I remained crouched.
The squirrel came back.
It sat at the edge of the plot with empty cheeks and clear intention.
I extended two fingers.
The squirrel relocated to approximately eight meters away and sat there reassessing. I lowered my hand, stood, and walked to check the peppers.
Behind me came a small sound of renewed activity in the tomato row.
I did not turn around.
Benneth's laugh carried across the field without him looking up from his work.
I had almost achieved a workable equilibrium with the squirrel situation when I noticed the Glowfruits.
Three birds. Working along the same cluster of Glowfruits in the orchard with the systematic efficiency of creatures who had found something good and intended to extract maximum value from it.
They weren't eating the fruits whole. They were pecking holes. Small, precise holes, through which they were drinking the juice while the fruit remained on the branch, slowly hollowing out from the inside.
I stood at the edge of the orchard and looked at the birds.
The birds looked back at me between pecks with the particular unbothered quality of animals that had correctly assessed they were not in immediate danger.
One of them pecked another hole.
I turned my head toward the northern slope.
The banana trees were at the far corner of the farm where I had been carefully managing the temperature with a localized climate adjustment spell for months, coaxing a tropical species into producing fruit in conditions it had no business tolerating. It had worked. The first bunch had come in three days ago, full and yellow and the first of their kind in Eryndor.
Nobody had eaten them yet. Nobody had even suggested eating them. They had been standing around looking at the bunch with the reverence appropriate to something that had taken months of daily intervention to produce.
There were four monkeys in the banana trees.
They had found the bunch.
Two of them were eating with comfortable focus. One was passing a banana to a fourth who was sitting slightly apart from the group on a higher branch, receiving the deliveries with the ease of someone accustomed to having things brought to them.
I walked to the trees.
The monkeys watched me approach without interrupting their work.
I stood at the base and looked up at them.
They looked down at me.
The one on the high branch peeled its banana slowly, maintaining eye contact, and took a bite.
I turned and walked back toward the residential zone.
"Frostina." I said, loudly enough to carry.
She appeared around the corner of the workstation with Flame beside her, both of them reading my expression and adjusting their own accordingly.
"Dragons can communicate with animals." I said. "Go tell those monkeys and the birds that the crops inside the settlement are off limits. Tell them I'll plant separate fruit trees outside the walls for them. Anything inside the fence is not for them. Make it clear."
Frostina and Flame looked at each other.
The look lasted slightly too long.
"We can communicate with other dragons." Frostina said carefully.
"And?" I said.
"And large magical creatures." Flame added.
"Squirrels." Frostina continued. "Birds. Monkeys." She paused. "Those would be in the jurisdiction of earth dragons. Or elves. Elves can communicate with most animals."
I looked at her.
"You cannot talk to the monkeys." I said.
"We cannot talk to the monkeys." She confirmed, with what I noted was insufficient regret about this.
"Or the birds." Flame said helpfully.
"Or the squirrel." Frostina added.
"I know about the squirrel." I said.
I turned back toward the banana trees and stood there for a moment, working through the available options and finding them limited.
An earth dragon was not something I had on hand. An elf was also not something I had on hand.
A ward would work but Benneth had made his position on wards clear and I had a reasonable suspicion that if I put one up quietly he would notice within a day.
Something hit me on the shoulder.
I looked down.
A banana peel. Partially eaten. Sitting on my shoulder and then sliding off onto the ground.
I looked up.
The monkey on the high branch was looking at me. It had a second banana in its hand. It peeled it with one slow, deliberate motion, still looking at me, and took a bite.
Then it looked away.
The others continued eating without comment.
I stood at the base of the tree in silence.
Frostina made a sound behind me. It was a very controlled sound. The sound of someone using significant effort to not make a different, louder sound.
Flame had turned slightly to the side and appeared to be examining the fence line with great interest.
I reached up and took the banana peel off the ground.
"I need an elf." I said.
Nobody disagreed with me.
I turned and walked back toward the Sequoia tree at a pace that communicated that the conversation was over and nothing that had just happened was worth discussing further.
Behind me, Frostina and Flame waited until I was far enough away.
Then they didn't bother waiting anymore.
Their laughter followed me across the farm.
I did not look back.
The monkeys continued eating the first banana harvest Eryndor had ever produced, and the birds continued working through the Glowfruits, and the squirrel was almost certainly back in the tomatoes, and I walked to the Sequoia tree and sat down and thought about where one found an elf.