"Good evening Your Majesty." I greet the Queen with a bow after hopping down from the lead truck of the little convoy I drove over.

It consists of five big trucks, each carrying twenty dirt bikes, along with twenty-five lightweight Humvees loaded with an assortment of engines and motors. It made for quite the sight, and drew a fair bit of attention on the way over, despite my taking side roads wherever possible.

"A very good evening indeed." She smiles at the new force multipliers I've delivered to her army.  I parked them, and set up the conduit in the area that was set aside near the training grounds.

"Hello Faye." I give the princess a wave as she stares at the cars rolling into place. "Don't worry, I didn't forget you either." I materialize a go-cart fit for a princess. "I have some new movies, and a new game for you too." I add, but don't think she heard me.

"Mommy?" She stares up at her mother. "Can I? Please." The Princess begs.

"Just for a little bit dear." Vivian sighs. "It is safe, isn't it?" She asks me while her daughter runs over to the cart.

"Of course, Ma'am. The speed is currently limited to a fast jog, and I've included Motion Magic enchantments to protect her in case of a crash." I reassure her before showing Faye how to buckle in and make it go.

"Woo, look at her go." Apricot laughs as the princess starts driving around the courtyard.

"Hahaha, remind me to make a cart racing game next."

"Oh, she's never going to want to get out of that." Vivian says with her own laugh. "So, Oliver mentioned surprises." She prompts.

"Yes." I float a copy of each engine and motor out from the nearest Humvee. "These are the basic Fire Mana engines. But, these two are magnet based. This one uses a complex Magnet enchantment and this one a simple Electric Rune to generate a magnetic field. The former is more efficient, but the latter is easier to build."

"They're much smaller than the others." She comments.

"Yes, these should work well for smaller jobs than the Fire engines, though they still need some improvement, mostly in the magnets. I just haven't found the right metal, neodymium, or had enough time to figure out a work-around."

"I've never heard of this neodymium." Oliver says.

"It's not so much rare, as geologically isolated." Or, at least that's how it was back on Dirt. "If alloyed with iron and boron of all things, then it becomes an exceedingly strong magnet." I only know this because my sister got me one of those magnet toys for my birthday one year, and it came with a little information sheet.

"We'll keep an eye out for it in the future." He guarantees before turning to the last device. "And, this one?"

"Pure motion magic." I explain and start it up. "This one seems to get more efficient the larger it goes, and I thought it might be a good replacement for the weak wind... and water mill Runes. Hold on a second, I just thought of something else."

Amelia laughs nervously and apologizes for me. "Sorry, he tends to get like this when an idea hits."

I build a quick and dirty air compressor. It's just a metal tank with a one way valve that the Rune will feed air into until it reaches a set pressure. Attached to the tank is a linen and rubber hose with a simple air valve at the end. A quick test easily raises a puff of dust from the ground.

"Sorry about that." I say as Oliver clears it away. "If you replace this blower with some sort of an enclosed fan, then it could be used as a high-speed motor. But, I'll leave the design up to your team."

"Hah!" Apricot crows. "Look at your face. Didn't you see him enchant the stuff in the game room?"

"I was focused on the pool table." He smiles ruefully. "I knew you were fast, but that was less than a minute from idea to completion."

"It's just a simple Rune that's not even fully done." I shrug. "The hard part will be testing out fan designs to find the best one."

"What more does the rune need?" Vivian asks with a mix of curiosity and humor in her eyes.

"An on-off switch and a way to adjust the pressure higher or lower. That and a way to pull water from the air before it gets compressed so it doesn't rust out the tank." I draw the few droplets that have colected inside of it to the end of the hose before blowing a light mist up into the air. "Maybe an automatic shut off if the hose gets cut too, or at least a warning that it's not pressurizing. And, speaking of the hose, right now it's just clamped to the blower and the tank, but ideally you'd want some sort of connector, so you can swap out tools, or add extra hose."

"Anything else?" She laughs.

"Probably, but that's all I could come up with off the top of my head." I write the Rune diagram and my ideas out on paper using magic, along with a warning not to use too much pressure or the tank will explode. "Here you go Oliver, you can hand it off to Deluca or whomever else you've got working on this stuff."

"We're going to need more people if you keep coming up with new Runes like this." It's his turn to laugh.

"Speaking of new Runes." I materialize a box with a dozen cases inside, each with the same all-in-one console and four controllers as I gave to Lan. "Here's some copies of the new game, it's more multi-player than the others, so I made it so they can talk to each other using the phone relays."

"Now that you mention the phones." He looks up from examining one of the new controllers. "How many relays do you think it would take to make the phones work throughout Larendath?"

"Define throughout." I respond. "Do you want every square meter covered, or just the roads and towns? Either way, it's hard to say beyond 'a lot'. It all depends on the terrain, as hilly and heavily wooded areas will need more relays than flat ground. I needed to place more than twice as many towers heading up north as compared to the run to Riverton."

"Mhm." He stares off into the distance like he's thinking of something. "Well, either way, they can wait until after you get back and the rest of the vehicles are completed."

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"That works." I agree. "I'm working on a big update for them too, and need a bit more time to finalize the design anyways."

"Still seeking perfection?" Vivian chides me slightly.

"Heheh, no." I laugh and shake my head. "But, they'd be much more useful if they could send more than sound. I took the first step down that road with the new game, but that's a slow and clunky addition to the existing system. If I re-design it to incorporate that from the ground up, then it should be possible to transmit live movies." Once I figure out how to encode movies into binary that is.

"We could send an Air Mage up with one and have the commanders see exactly what the enemy is up to." The Queen's eyes light up at the possibility.

"Why waste the Mage?" I craft a latex balloon and attach the new camouflage Rune to it. "Just launch a few of these from upwind." I let it go before activating the Rune. My dragonfly golem would actually be perfect for this, but if they want drones, they can build 'em themselves.

"What?" Oliver snaps his attention to where it disappeared and starts scanning the surrounding area. "Where did it go?"

"He's got it floating right above your head." Apricot says with a laugh.

"No, there's..." He starts to say but stops after waving his arm right into the balloon. "Uh... How?"

"That's the outer layer of the new concealment Rune." I turn it off and move it to his hands. "Though, you could, and probably should use it underneath the darkness Runes you already have."

"I was still able to track it." Vivian speaks up.

"This is just the pared down version I made for the engines." I explain. "It only covers the six basic elements in order to conserve Mana. The full Rune covers every type of Magic."

"Well then, we should get it installed, shouldn't we?" She says with a relieved smile. My demonstration of how easy it was to access her apartments must have been weighing on her.

It takes me almost an hour to get the Royal wing and the treasury outfitted with the new Runes. Most of that time was spent fine-tuning the camouflage, and making sure the existing Darkness Runes didn't interfere.

"This is fantastic." The Court Wizard crows. "You even included fake servants and guards."

"They're on a simple loop, but it should be good enough to fool casual observation." I don't add that if they've got someone doing even that, then they've got problems. Their mages have been working on their detection spells, so we'll just have to hope that it's enough.

While I was setting up the Runes, Amelia and Apricot were showing Faye and Vivian how to play the new game. Teasing the princess with it was the only way to get her out of the go-cart.

"The Runes are all hooked up and running perfectly." I announce to the Queen.  "The Gems should last a month, but they're tied into the conduit, so I can charge them from Riverton if need be."

"Thank you again Sorrel." The look of gratitude on her face is enough to make me uncomfortable. "Even if we had emptied the entire treasury, it wouldn't have been enough to hire an enchanter from overseas."

"You are welcome." I bow my head to her. "I had a good need for the Runes myself, and it would have been foolish not to share them with you." I refer to the nuclear reactor sitting in my basement.

"Even so, if there is ever anything that We can do for you, then you have but to ask." I don't know how she does it, but you can clearly tell when she uses the royal 'We'.

"Thank you Vivian." I give her a more formal bow this time. "So, how do you two like the new game?"

"I love it!" Faye shouts after blowing up one of her mom's worms.

"Yes, it is rather fun." Vivian agrees. "I can see that your trip up north had something of an influence on you."

"Hard not to be influenced by that great -honking thing." Apricot censors herself just in time.

"I had started working on a simple slingshot based puzzle game on the way up." I display a simplified version of angry birds. "But afterwards, it morphed into this." I gesture to their game.

"Well, I can't wait to see what you come up with next." She says while looking at the projection, but I get the feeling that she's talking about more than just Rune games.

Once their game ended we had a lovely dinner, after which Faye talked us all into playing a few more matches with them before it was time for her to go to bed. Vivian thanked us all again, and re-iterated her promise to me before we left for home.

***

"Are you sure you're willing to leave the reactor behind?" Amelia asks me with a teasing tone the next morning as we're eating breakfast with her parents.

"It's as safe as I can make it." For now. "And, once I make a larger version we won't be able to haul it around anyways."

"Just making sure." She says with a smile.

"Oh, quit teasing the man." Her mom chastises her. "Now, are you three sure that you have everything you'll need?"

"Yes, mom." The tone in Amelia's voice makes me smile. "Even if we forgot something, Sorrel can just make a new one. And besides, we’ll only be gone for a week or two."

"It'll be nice to take our time for once." Apricot adds. "Can we have a new rule that says no more driving through the night anymore?"

"Barring any more surprise armies or mega-worms, then sure." I chuckle.

"You should have just supersized your Embiggen spell and had Mittens fight it." She laughs right along with me.

"Because he's such a great hunter." Amelia rolls her eyes, and passes the kitty a piece of sausage. "I think Sorrel's dragonfly is the only thing I've ever seen him catch."

"We'll just have to train him up." I take a minute to enchant a laser pointer. "Go on Mittens, get the dot." He ignores it in favor of the sausage. "Here, you can play with him later." I pass the pointer off to Apricot who immediately points it at my forehead.

"Not going to be much room for him to run around in the Rocket." Amelia says, ignoring her wife's antics.

"It's starting to get colder out too." Not that that means much between our stats and magic. "I could shift the car to something bigger." I project some images of various vans, motorhomes, and busses.

"Ooh, that one's cute." Amelia picks out a classic VW van.

"As long as it's not called the Rocket, I'm fine with it." Apricot faux pouts.

"No, it has the amazingly well thought out name of Camper Van." I change the picture into a 3D projection of a pixie-sized vehicle.

She shrinks down to check it out. "Yeah, this works. Maybe get rid of that bench in the back and just have a mattress on the floor so I can sprawl out."

"That's easy enough." It's meant to fold out into a bed, but with just the three of us, four if you count Mittens, it's not really needed.

We finish up breakfast after that, and say goodbye to Amelia's parent before loading into the new van.

"Is that what you're going with for your heraldry?" Turner asks when he sees the image I put in place of the VW emblem.

"Yeah, it's what I've been toying around with, at least." I shrug. "The front was too empty without something there, and it was this or a rearing worm." The heraldry is Luna moth alighting on a bunch of red sorrel flowers that are leaning over rippling water against a forest green background.

"It's alright." Kaitlyn defends my artwork. "And, it's not like the other noble's heraldry is any better." She's not wrong, most of them just have some fierce looking animal against their favorite color.

"I like it." Apricot runs her fingers over the embossed flowers.

"It's alright." Amelia nods.

"That's good enough for me." My next best idea was a three-part design consisting of an apricot flower, a loop of vines wrapping around each other, and a water drop. "Unless you prefer this. Or the worm." I show them my alternative, and one with Mittens rampant facing off against a rearing worm.

"I don't think Mittens has ever looked that fierce." She laughs before waving away the images. "What you already have will be fine."

"Well, come give us a hug before you all leave." Her mom orders. "And, stay safe on the road." She adds after pulling us all into one big hug.

"We will." Amelia promises. "You take care too, and see if you can get a good lead on a shop front. I'm sure Sorrel will have even more stuff for us to sell after we get back."

"The first thing I'm going to work on is a fix for Mittens, now that his magic has settled down." I pet the invisible cat in her arms before climbing into the driver's seat.

"That'll be nice." She says with a smile for her little displacer kitten. "I still find myself reaching for his illusion all the time."

"Yeah, I get startled every time he jumps in my lap." Her mom agrees.

"Alright." I say. "We all good to go? Anyone need to use the toilet before we leave?"

"Mrow." Mittens actually answers.

"Uh... Okay." Amelia lets him down and he runs off into the garden for a minute. "Well, that happened." She laughs as he runs back and hops on her lap.

***