The expression of the two negotiators was both irritated and disgusted at the fact. They were already hugely uncomfortable just visiting Coralost. Having to work here in a White Mana Zone every day? “Truly?” Cameron asked urgently. “That seems like an unreasonable restriction on the methodology...”

“Extremely unreasonable.” I gestured around us with the coffee cup. “Consider how much time and effort went into building this facility. To finding the skilled people who could work here. To obtain the machinery, and to arrange for the supply chains. I daresay the start-up required for this enterprise is easily ten times that required for a similar alchemical project using the methods the Dow and DuPont Families have made so famous, and the simple fact is that ongoing expenditures to keep this process going are continually accruing.

“However,” I went on calmly, as the two men hung on every word, “trying to produce this product in a normal setting of Elemental Mana and the like would require ten times or more the cost in material components, along with being subject to easy disruption of supply, as their resulting exclusivity makes one vulnerable to those who control the natural resources.

“Those resources also would happen to include the regular murder and harvesting of Beasts able to use the Healing Element.” My eyes narrowed sharply, and Cameron Dow had the grace to grimace. “I doubt that would actually stop the Families you represent from pursuing research into such areas, but the consequences of such actions against the Beasts would be catastrophic. The Beasts value their Healers as much as we do ours, and if Humans go after them, the slaughter that they will unleash will be immense.”

Plenty of past precedent about that, too.

“As long as the Families don’t have to bear that particular cost, some of them will be utterly fine with that avenue of production, even if it becomes incredibly high, because the power of Healing is so very attractive and will naturally swell their own coffers.

“That is why we’re making the Potions in a White Zone, with materials that are readily accessible and nearly impossible to monopolize, like, oh, Johnny Good apples.”

Cameron flushed, glancing at his lawyer, who simply shrugged. “Ah. So, you know...” he murmured, as shoe number two dropped.

“Well, of course. Actually, we were watching the whole time, and when your little consortium started offering the orchards we bought from the multi-year contracts, we just laughed,” Sama grinned mirthlessly.

I flicked up a list of names, twenty in total, in Aztec so they couldn’t read them. “Here is the list of the alternatives to buying Johnny Good apples. The apples weren’t even the cheapest, just the most readily available from nearby, so we were supporting the local farmers.

“We told all the farmers to take your contracts and laugh all the way to the bank,” Sama assured them, and Cameron’s face fell, although he was definitely amused by the irony of the situation. “Also, no hard feelings for them. They were totally willing to gaff you all when they heard what the apples were for, by the way.

“We also told the normal buyers of Johnny Goods that a consortium was buying them up to resell to us at high prices, so they might want to set up alternate acquisition sources. So, when you buy all those apples for the next few years, you’re going to find yourselves sitting on a lot of fruit no one is going to be needing to buy when we don’t,” Sama went on cheerfully, and his face fell further as he sighed. “Oh, cheer up. If you act quickly, you can tell your Family you discovered some important news and you have to get rid of those contracts before it all blows up in your faces badly. You’re going to lose the premium you thought you’d be grafting out of us, but at least you won’t be just dumping the apples for cattle food somewhere at thirty cents on the dollar.”

Cameron inhaled as his eyes flashed with a gleam of thanks for the tactful consdieration. “Well, then, thank you for informing me of that move. I will... take advantage of it.” Saving the Family from a bad situation wasn’t the same as negotiating a good one, but it was something to bring back. “It may seem facetious, but I did not encourage such a move. It was something of a pet project among several Families, an experiment to see how you would react, and test to see if they had identified a weakness. I was more interested in pursuing collaboration, if possible.”

“Tepper,” Sama said simply, and the lawyer’s hands clutched abruptly on his glass of ice water. It was far too tough to be broken by his strength, however, startling him, and he even looked at it in shock. Cameron just blinked, looking at the lawyer, and back at her.

His smile this time was icy. “Interesting. Something I’m not privy to?” He reached forward, took the coffee pot, and slowly poured himself another cup. “Tepper, Tepper... I seem to remember a mercenary and Archmage by that name, down in Raleigh. Heads up the Carolina Panthers?” He sat back, sipping rather loudly in appreciative schadenfreude. “Given the colorful history of yourself and that mountain you call your man, I am going to infer some manner of bad blood there... are some of the Elders talking to him?”

“Your lawyer here is indeed a Member of Merlin Marven... and he is also a former student of David Tepper.” I lifted an eyebrow at the man, who had a death-grip on his glass of water at Sama’s words. I think he realized that if he let go of it, he was going to die messily. “I’m not sure of his purpose here, perhaps some attempt to probe the White Mana Zone, which has been keeping his mentor from getting his throat slit in the night for over five years now.” Sama lightly took a sip of her coffee as Lawyer Trent swallowed. “David Tepper is indeed a half-Sage working out of Raleigh.” Read, probably dominating the city, and possibly a good chunk of the state. “He blames us for the death of his second son during an altercation in Florida. The fool got himself eaten by a Noble Alligator down in the Everglades, along with most of his Hunter Team.”

-Seriously?- I had to /ask.

-Sure, after I stuffed his headless corpse down its jaws, and those of the rest of his entire team after they tried to gank us on a Hunt. Being able to talk to Beasts is such an underestimated skill.-

-Competitive situation, or revenge for another time?- Whiskers of the Wild was indeed valuable, as I knew from personal experience.

-The latter. We messed up him harvesting the eggs of a White Elders Owl colony in the Appalachians. The Owls ended up shredding the first team of the Carolina Panthers, who are Hastings’ pet Hunter team. They’ve been spoiling for revenge for years.-

“A half-Sage,” Cameron said thoughtfully, not an idiot. Herbert, the patriarch of the Dow Family, was also a half-Sage, his time past when he could advance, his greatest wish now being to see a member of his Family make it to Sage. A half-Sage was basically the lowest level your Guiding Elder could be at to call yourself a Family, after all.

The Great Families all had a Sage heading them up. Michigan didn’t currently have a Great Family that I knew of, although it had a disproportionate number of fairly young Families. Most of the Great Families stayed on the coasts, or had their own areas they basically ruled by fiat, regardless of what the local State Governor might say. They wouldn’t ignore the direct attention of the Federal Government there, but anything short of that was basically elective... and it was a status that all Families desired greatly.

On the other hand, every Family and Great Family in America was basically self-made, and they were extremely patriotic about that and the style of government here. Being a member of a Family meant great social status, but you were immediately frozen out of the government and military by Constitutional law. It didn’t mean you couldn’t buy favors or pressure them, but you would never hold a political office higher than Mayor here, or Colonel-equivalent in the military, without pulling some major and dangerous strings, and even then, not for very long.

Naturally, the Mayorships of the biggest cities were mostly held by Family members, and they were often more influential than the Governor of the states they were in. In places where unions were strong, it was less the case, but the political machines were often dominated by the money and influence of the Families, and the allies and alliances among them.

“He’s been looking for a weakness in the White Mana Zone for years now, hoping for a quick moment where he could kill or destroy as much as possible in a sneak attack. Seen him floating about in the distance a few times, thinking we didn’t know he was there.” Sama took another drink, her eyes never blinking as she regarded Trent. “Only the existence of the White Mana Zone keeping him from actually bothering us has kept him alive.” Very slowly, her too-blue eyes moved over to Cameron, who appeared unruffled by the attention. “The fact your elders are talking to him is not a good sign, Cameron.”

“I would hazard Ilitch probably brought him in, as some sort of expert on you,” he offered by way of apology.

“’Red Wing’ Ilitch also has a grudge against us,” Sama said calmly, her bland face indicating she was totally unsurprised by that name, too. “We fucked up a Seal hunt on him, while making off with about ten tons of Frostshank Walrus Ivory that he nearly stole from us, too. Of course, the Icecrown Bear Noble whose territory he was hunting in wasn’t sympathetic to either of our parties, but we, at least, didn’t kill any of his vassals.”

The Red Wings were considered one of the most elite Hunter organizations in the state, and Ilitch was both their sponsor and their leader. Being on his bad side was definitely not good for Sama or Briggs, but it was obvious they didn’t consider the matter all that important. Him working with Tepper, now...

“This coalition of yours also includes the Strkyers, the Davidsons, the Fords, and the Darts,” Sama continued evenly, her eyes moving back to Trent, his face growing longer. “The Strykers had us guide a team to the Torshungto Snow Mother, ostensibly to gain some shed antlers from the Sacred Elk of the North. That turned into an attempted assassination attempt on her once we ascertained her normal movements for them, and they brought in the Blue Jays and Cavaliers to take her down.”

Not having been here long enough to ask about all the fun times in Sama’s history, this was news to me, but Cameron winced theatrically.

“The ones that ran into the Noble Wolverine Old One-Eye, who almost wiped both teams?” he had to ask.

“And we survived and didn’t tell them ahead of time there was one in the area, so obviously it was our fault,” Sama purred. “As if most Wolverines have a set territory.” -And we totally told it about the attack, too,- she /added in a mental aside. -Retribution probably would have taken out the whole state.-

-Agreed,- I /said simply.

“The Davidsons?” Cameron had to ask. “I don’t know why the Pistons would be angry with you...”

“They contracted opposite us on a Coyote Hunt, and we beat them to the prize,” Sama shrugged. “They are sore losers, that’s all.” -And they fucking tried to steal the kill, and we beat Gus Davidson within an inch of his goddamn life, too,- she /added to me.

“I... had heard that you might have been involved with the death of the Dart boys?” Cameron asked cautiously.

“If you’re asking if Briggs was involved in Thomas and his cronies ending up in the stomach of Princess Karegnondi after they tried to hunt her, no. If you’re asking if we were involved in the sharknado Robert and his fucking insane group of arseholes started out in the Grand Caymans which killed seventy thousand people before it petered out against Havana, the answer is also no.

“Of course, the Family doesn’t believe us, especially their grandfather.” -They tried to use Briggs as bait in a chum storm for the hunt, killed a dozen Hunters there with him, and he slaughtered the lot of them before the Princess showed up and cleaned up everything.- Karegnondi was the name of the Duchess Pike of the Great Lakes, one of the most well-known Beast Nobles in North America. Not quite a Totem, but certainly a defender of the Great Lakes and not something that normally interfered with random Humans. -Thomas was a fucking spoiled brat being tapped to inherit the Family, and about as narcissistic an idiot as you could imagine.

-His younger brother Robert never forgot Briggs was the only survivor, and sponsored a Shark Hunt out in the Caymans for a Tiger Shark that was reputedly harassing his territory. It was a basically a trap to kill us, except, well, we did indeed kill a Tiger Shark who had just made Baron by carving it from the inside out after getting swallowed by the thing.

-The Sea Emperor decided that such a fine and bloody Shark Hunt killing so many Sharks deserved one in return, and Turned the Sky into the Sea, sending hundreds of thousands of Sharks out to hunt Humans across the islands.

-Fidel Castro and a dozen Archmages killed themselves shattering the spell that allowed the sharks to fly, sending them back into the seas or down to die on land. Dart and his conspirators didn’t survive, of course.-

-Surprised they didn’t come after you?- I /asked, rather surprised at Fidel’s heroic ending.

-Oh, no non-Noble Shark will come near us now. We had to deal with some nasty opportunistic Aquatics at the time, but the Sharks would and will eat everything around us, but never attack us directly. I don’t know if it’s the Sea Emperor’s will, or some Aural leakage from killing the Baron like we did.

-Any Aquatics with Shark backgrounds happily go right for us, however. They can only feel that we’re an enemy of Sharks, not what we killed.- I had noticed those Warrior Blue Finmen seemed pretty eager to get at the two, and had left themselves hugely exposed as they sought to engage the pair of them with claws and jaws a-snapping.