The biggest sticking point was that the gestalt, for some inscrutable reason, wanted to bring its entire room of black-glass stone with it. It wasn’t impossible, but it was an expensive and time-consuming endeavor. I countered with an offer to relocate the ‘tree’ itself and all of the floor within twenty feet, which was about the biggest section my phantom space could hold now.

The gestalt wasn’t convinced, but gave up when I countered with transporting slabs of the walls if it was willing to cut them into sections small enough to move. When it admitted it didn’t have the power, we went with my original plan. The ants cleared out of the tree and surrounding area, and I used a modified stone shape spell to cut out a foot-thick stretch of the floor to stash in my phantom space.

The tree resisted entering, probably due to the connection the gestalt had with it. Closing my phantom space might sever that, so I held off on stashing it for now. While the ants gathered, I created a temporary portal to Eyrie Peak. “Ready?” I asked.

‘As we can be for such a momentous change,’ came the answer.

The portal finished unfolding and the ants began streaming through. I pulled the tree into my phantom space, holding the connection open for just a second while I stepped through the portal myself. I immediately ejected the tree back out, allowing my phantom space to snap closed and the gestalt to reaffirm its link.

‘We are exposed here,’ the gestalt said.

“We’ll burrow into the cliff face,” I told it. “It’ll take a few hours, plus I’ll need to inform the brakvaw of your presence and introduce you. Incidentally, are you able to cast audible illusions?”

‘To mimic speech? This is within our capabilities.’

“Good. The brakvaw leader is tied down to a physical location and will almost certainly speak to you via a projection spell. You may find it difficult to reach his mind over such a vast distance.”

‘We will find a way,’ the gestalt said. I got the feeling it was including me in that ‘we’ this time, which was fair. I was the architect of this plan, and it was my responsibility to overcome any problems that cropped up.

Briefly, I wondered how it would go if I introduced Querit to the gestalt. Being a living golem with no actual mind, it was an existence completely outside the gestalt’s understanding of reality. Would the colony of psychically connected ants be able to comprehend Querit?

That was a fascinating question, but it was too low on my list of priorities to be answered any time soon. Of more immediate concern were the trio of brakvaw winging their way toward me. Considering we’d been standing here for about half a minute now, their response time left something to be desired. If enemy mages had come through any of the portals, they would have had plenty of time to flee.

Grandfather’s projection appeared in front of me in his typical human shape. “Keiran,” he said. Warily, he peered past me at the transparent ant swarm rolling out of the open portal, then up at the stone tree behind me. “An explanation, if you please?”

“I have discovered a gestalt entity in need of a new home and food source,” I said. “I’ve agreed to provide transportation in exchange for the entity keeping an eye on the portal networks on our behalf. It will require… Hmm…”

I trailed off and eyed the swarm. How much meat did a single ant need in a day? And how many of them were there? I had no doubt I hadn’t seen even a fraction of the gestalt’s total numbers, even with them being as exposed as they currently were here.

“Fifty pounds of meat a day?” I asked.

Mana danced through the ant swarm like a constellation of stars, and a soft, almost feminine voice said out of nowhere, “Double that. Part of this promise was room and resources for us to expand the colony.”

“There you go,” I said. “One new neighbor with a vested interest in keeping the brakvaw safe in exchange for one afternoon snack a day.”

Grandfather pondered that for a few seconds, then glanced at the empty portal ring on the cliff face. “Does that mean you’ll be opening the Green Plains portal again?”

“Not for another few weeks,” I said. “Once Ammun’s forces establish their own path to the island, there won’t be much point in keeping it closed. Until then, I’d like to avoid giving them any shortcuts. I know where the moon core is now, thanks to our new friends; it should take less than a day to retrieve it.”

“You will be staying here to assist with our relocation first,” the gestalt said firmly. “It would not even be needed if not for your interference.”

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I shrugged. “You were free to refuse my offer.”

“And be left to starve,” the gestalt pointed out.

“Keiran, did you strong-arm a powerful mind-magic wielding entity into living in the middle of my flock?” Grandfather asked, his voice tight.

I thought about that for a second, then nodded. “Pretty much, yes. Really, though, this is for the best. All of us are going to benefit from this.”

“You could have at least discussed it with me first,” the old bird said.

“I’m under a bit of a time crunch right now. It was faster to just go ahead and convince you after we got here. Now, I’m assuming you want this tree back underground?” I directed that question to the gestalt.

“Correct.”

“Any caves under this plateau?” I asked Grandfather. Not waiting for his answer, I sent scrying spells sweeping down the side of the mountain to find out for myself, and cast a quick earth sense spell to get a better look at exactly what I’d be working with.

“I do not believe so,” he said, confirming what I’d already determined for myself.

“Perfect. This should be close enough to the portals. Hmm, unless you’d prefer to take over the wall behind the portals? You’d need to be careful about opening micro-tunnels to the surface,” I told the gestalt. “The rune structures are delicate enough that too many tunnels could break them.”

“Fifty feet straight down from here is sufficient,” the gestalt said. “We are able to sense your weavings from here.”

I started opening the ground while a flock of agitated brakvaw circled overhead. Grandfather scowled at me, but I ignored that. He’d forgive me, or he wouldn’t. Either way, life would go on. Unless the gestalt tried to take over the brakvaw and claim the whole eyrie, this was a win for everybody. And if it did do that, I’d just kill it. A few explosive fire blasts would do in the majority of its bodies, and I had some more targeted spells to clean up the remnants.

It took well over an hour to plant the black-glass tree in its new underground home, which was only a fraction the size of its old one. The gestalt complained about the reduction in size, loudly, but I just reminded it how much more food it was about to have available. It would be doubling in size quickly and could regain lost ground easily enough.

With the transplant complete, I moved to step through the portal leading back underground, but Grandfather stopped me. “I would like a word,” he said. “In private.”

“Of course,” I said. “Shall I meet you at the roost?”

“Please.”

The projection vanished, and I spent a moment seriously considering walking back through the portal instead before I reluctantly flew up to the top of the mountain. Grandfather was there, as always, his immense bulk in the middle of the eternal stream of mana holding up the brakvaw graveyard high above the clouds.

“What were you thinking?” he demanded as I landed nearby. “Inviting something like that here! It’s a threat to all of us.”

“What? No it’s not,” I said. “It’s a gestalt made out of an ant colony. Even with millions of members, it’s barely got human-level intelligence.”

“That’s what it is today, but what about in a year? How big will it grow before it decides it doesn’t need us to deliver food when it could just eat us instead?”

“You’re worried about nothing. Even if it decides to try that, any brakvaw, even a freshly-hatched chick, can defeat it. Did you notice the crystalline body structure? Its bodies are vulnerable to sonic attacks. A loud enough screech will scramble their internals and fracture their exoskeletons.”

“All well and good, unless they start by attacking our minds.”

“A possibility,” I acknowledged. “And if it does that, I’ll destroy it. All you have to do is let me know. That reminds me, I have a transmission stone for you to reach out to me with. This is for emergency use only. I’ll hear your words directly into my mind no matter what I’m doing, so use it responsibly.”

I produced one of the stones from my phantom space and tossed it to Grandfather, who caught it in his magic and brought it up to his eye to examine it. Apparently satisfied with what he saw, the stone zipped off into the interior of his roost.

“I’m not happy, Keiran,” he announced. “You don’t own the brakvaw. You don’t run our home. You don’t get to make decisions like this without even so much as consulting me. Don’t get me wrong; I am grateful for all the assistance you’ve given my flock and me personally, but this was a step too far.”

“And if I had more time, I would have spoken to you first,” I said. “Unfortunately, I do not. This meeting is a courtesy to assuage any fears you might have. I have to get back to work, unless you have anything else to talk about.”

I was aware of the effect I had on people. Dozens of rulers over the centuries had looked at me with the exact same frustration Grandfather felt right now. It was hard for them to accept that some people were beyond their control. Sometimes they got angry and tried to prove that no one had more authority than them. That never ended well for them.

Usually, logic and sense prevailed, and they bowed to the inevitable. That was the case with Grandfather. He might have thought that he could prevail if it came to an open conflict, and truth be told, if the entire flock descended on me, I’d be forced to flee. But he knew the cost that would come with that: no more portals, renewed violence between humans and brakvaw resulting in deaths on both sides, me razing their civilization to the ground to eliminate a threat and harvest their mana.

It was better for both of us to remain cooperative, just so long as he understood that we weren’t equals.

“No,” Grandfather all but snarled. “That was everything.”

“Then I’ll be on my way.” I started to fly away, but paused and turned back. “For what it’s worth, I truly believe the gestalt’s presence has a positive effect on the security of the portals, and not just for my own sake, either. If an army of mages comes through here, there’s every possibility that the brakvaw will come under attack as well.”

“That thing won’t give us more than a few seconds of warning. How much good could it possibly do?”

“You are misunderstanding its nature,” I said. “It’s going to spread through the portals to the other side. As long as they remain open, it will be able to monitor both sides and the surrounding area. You’ll know well before anything comes through. Trust me, for the price of a deer carcass a day, you’re getting the better end of the deal.

“And if it decides to act against you, I’ll annihilate it. On that, you have my word.”