Infinitely more valuable to me than the gems and gold were my friends. Each of the male centaurs were pregnant with their third foals. When they gave birth it was a sight to see. Petras had Evede, Bemix and Doreus. Jeran did his best to raise Talous, Evelis and Kasite. Casone had given birth to Lakones, Semala and Artades. There was something nice about them keeping the Brownflank tribe alive. Neither Casone nor Enetes had been knighted by the Swifthearts. They were not too keen on more nonhuman knights. I could see that being the case. Enetes was the big shaman of the expanding tribe. He was the mother of Agamos, Simandro and Asedes. Argaia was very proud of herself. She had every right to be. She had strong 4 mates and 12 children. 10 sons and 2 daughters at that. We might need to go and find more centaurs to mate with their children. That would be better than all of them leaving to find their own mates. The centaurs were the only nonhumans that were residents of the town I lived in. Petras and Jeran were knights under Anthony. They had full rank and title.
Very quickly, we sent the caravan on their way. We gave them the goods and the letter for the king and the royal court. I also had a letter to Sir Killroy. It was basically the complete copy of the original letter. I really did not want it getting accidentally "lost" on the way back to the capitol. It was going to take them about 4 months. They were not going straight home. They were on a mission to trade. That meant that they were going to take as many pitstops it took to make as much money as possible. All their goals that would not be perfectly aligned with ours. It was not something I would expect either. All we could do was wait for the response. Hopefully a royal representative would come to check out the place. Once the crown confirmed the completion of our mission, we could get the title for it. We had supplies and food. The animals of the area were good for hunting. There was also a pretty wide river nearby that was filled with fish. Having multiple food sources meant that we were not in any risk of dying of hunger. Diseases were neutralized by our shaman. We were doing very well now.
We were doing so well that no one batted an eye when I asked the builders to add a guest house to the property I owned. The Swifthearts had a 5 hectare plot of land. It was a pretty big space. As the only noble family, they all were entitled to it. The hectare was the metric unit of area used here. It was equal to a square with 100-meter sides. That meant 10,000 square meters. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometer. 100 meters was the same as about 328 feet. All knights were given 1 hectare plots. The baron had a retinue of his 5 most trusted and skilled knights. There were also the 2 guards raised in order to attend to Fabien. Most of the knights here came from a minor noble family. They wasted no time plotting out homes that filled the space. They had several bedrooms, a massive kitchen and pantry, a dining hall, a study, a library, a sitting room and an armory. I wanted a big yard, so I told the builders to make my house to my measurements. My house was 70x90 meters. I wanted a nice alley on each side. Our houses had 2 floors. Builders had 1. Half of the space too.
Xenophobia was clear to see among the people of the town. They did not like the idea of the non human free folk staying among us. When I proposed the idea of letting them integrate and live in the town to bolster our numbers, the speed they shot it down shocked me. I made it very clear that it would be unwise to mess with them. We were new to the area. A war would be costly. Jeffery Swiftheart, our leader agreed with me. "Elves are known for their magic. We would not stand a chance as we are currently." he said. All of the interlopers were shooed away non violently for this reason. None of them had any hostile intentions for us, so they often just walked away if a rough looking mercenary told them to leave town. My guest house was 25x50 meters in the right hand corner of my plot of land. It had a kitchen, dining room, sitting room and 2 offices. There were several bedrooms. My main home was a wide 90 meters. The 5 meter alleyway on the right hand side led to the front door of the guest house. We had 2 outhouses outside to do our business. 2 was enough. I hoped so.
