The next day the boys got dressed with smiles on their faces and a spring in their step. They put on their stars, their guns, their coats, and hats and headed into the office looking for work and excitement but John just laughed and shrugged.
"You two handled everything I had for the last week in one day. When I get something or I need you for something I'll call you. You're free to sit in here and wait for work to come in. or you can patrol the roads looking for danger. I have your warrant checks from the judge." John said handing them the three checks.
"If you get anything have a runner come and find us. We'll work on something better. For now we have a few things to do." Harry said before they walked out.
"Now what are we going to do today?" Neville asked.
"We have a few things to do at the bank. Let's smelt our gold and silver and Hamilton's silver. We'll take it to the bank, along with that box of silver dollars. Then we'll head back to Hamilton and get a new list form them or escort someone back here. Either way Hamilton is on it's last dying leg and they need help. We also have to make a run up to Salt Lake City." Harry said leading them back to the cube.
"You also wanted to sell those guns to Smith. Why don't we split up today. You handle all of this and I'll make the flight to Salt Lake City." Neville said.
"So I'm stuck with all the jobs here in town and you get to go to the big city?" Harry asked with a smirk.
"Seems fare, you're better at talking to folks. They like you. I come off as big and scary." Neville said.
"Well Andy always said you can't argue with the facts or a crazy person and in this case she was right on both fronts." Harry said ducking into the cube to dodge his backhand.
"Smart ass." He said following him in.
"Wait until I smelt this gold and take it with you. Maybe you can get more than $20 an ounce in a bigger city." Harry said grabbing their box of mixed ore and the box of silver ore for Hamilton and going to the living room.
"What spells are you going to use to do this? I don't know anything that can do this sort of thing." Neville said.
"I know a pair of goblin refining spells. One spell holds whatever you want to melt in the air and melts it down to a liquid form. The other spell separates it and forms anything you want. I've never done this with metal before." Harry said dumping the box of mixed ore out on the floor.
"What did you use it for?" Neville asked.
"Disappearing bodies. The spells melted a human body down to liquid carbon and I formed a shitty diamond with the carbon and let the gasses out. It smelled funny but it worked." Harry said sitting down and pulling out his wand.
"And you called me crazy." Neville said laughing.
"Look you can stay in the room but I need to fully concentrate on this." Harry said closing his eyes and raising his wand. The ore floated up and melted into a glowing ball of molten metal. He waved at the floor and the ball separated and formed little bars that floated to the ground and cooled until they were solid when they hit the floor. There was a stack of 8 smaller gold bars, 15 silver bars and a silver slug, 12 lead bars and a bigger slug, 2 copper bars and a slug, 3 iron bars, a tin bar, and sand.
"Wow, I can't believe that worked this good." Neville said looking at a gold bar.
"I made 100 ounce bars to make it easier to sell at different place to see where you can get the best price. We had 800 ounces of gold on the nose. That's 50 pounds. And we had 1,524 ounces of silver." Harry said handing him the gold and silver bars to put in his bag.
"Well, then I'm off. I'll set up a few portkeys when I get there." Neville said.
"Stay loose." Harry said as he dumped out the silver ore. He did the spell again and this time he got 18 silver bars and a 50 ounce smaller bar, he also got more sand, copper, lead, tin, and iron. He banished the sand into a box and put the silver bars in his bag. He tossed the copper and iron bars into his bag as well. He walked back into the dining room to see the girls back at the table working.
"Harry, what are you doing back already?" Hermione asked.
"We did all the work yesterday. The marshal didn't have anything for us so we're going to run some errands today. Neville is heading to Salt Lake to cash in the silver certificates and see if we can get a better price for gold a silver in the big city. I'm going to stay local in case I'm needed. I also want to see if I can help Hamilton some more. I feel bad for this town. They're the living embodiment of the small kid that gets picked on in grade school." Harry said taking the trunk that had the silver in it and filling it with the two dozen shittyer guns from the box as well as the more beat up gun belts. He added all the rusty blades and shrank it. He also took the box with $10,000 in silver dollars.
"Sounds like you found a pet project. We're close to cracking the horse gargoyle. We should have a few of them ready by the end of the day." She said.
"Good luck with that. Neville should be back later. I should be back later too. Can I take a pair of these lanterns or were you using them for something?" Harry asked pointing to the 10 lanterns.
"No we made those for you guys. I figured you can put them around the town." Hermione said.
"Good, I'm going to set up a pair of them in Hamilton." Harry said shrinking two of them and adding them to his bag before walking out.
He headed to the bank first. The going rate for silver was $5 an ounce. But again the purity of the bars Harry had were worth almost twice as much. He talked Bobby up to $9 an ounce. It came to $16,650 for the stack of bar from Hamilton. They handed him a big stack of bills and Harry put a band around them and put them in his coat pocket. Next he cashed the three checks and took the thousand dollars in $50 gold coins. He also cashed in the $10,000 in silver dollars for bigger coins. The box went from almost overflowing to a third of the way full. When he left the bank they closed up shop for the day because they were out of money. He stopped off at Smith's shop next.
"Harry, what can I do for you today?" He asked standing to greet him with a smile.
"The Marshal said you buy guns and I have a bunch of shitty guns." Harry said opening the trunk.
"You do have a bunch of shitty guns. But it's nothing a good reparo charm can't fix. They also make for good project guns. Let's see what we got here." Smith said taking the guns out of the trunk and setting them on his counter. There were a dozen cap and ball guns, nine colt single actions that were badly damaged, and three Scofields. There were four winchester rifles and a rusty Henry repeater.
"So what can I get for the lot?" Harry asked.
"I can do $3 a piece for the cap and ball colts and remingtons, $7 for the single actions, and $9 for the scofields. I'll give you $8 a piece for the rifles. The ten gun belts and the blades you can sell to the junk shop at the end of the street. You won't get much for them. I'd advise you cast the repairo charms on them before you take them into the shop. It's won't fix everything but they will look better." Smith said.
"Good call." Harry said hitting the blades with a reparo charm as Smith added it all up on a piece of paper. It fixed most of the blades but they still looked old and beat up.
"That comes to $166 dollars." Smith said.
"Do you have any .45 colt in smokeless like the .45-70 rounds?" Harry asked.
"I do but not much, I can make more, I just have to mix up the powder and fill the cartridges. how much were you looking to buy?" Smith asked.
"I'll take 20 more boxes of the .45-70, 30 boxes of the colt .45 for now, I'll take an order like that every month if things keep going like this. Also do you have another set of colts like the pair you sold me?" Harry asked.
"All shiny and engraved? No. But I can work on a set. It will take about a week to make a set like that." He said
"What if I don't want the gold engravings? Can you make me a set of colts in nickel with the ivory grips, and the enchantments like I got. How long with that take?" Harry asked.
"Three, maybe four days." Smith said.
"Deal, also start making a another set of schofields for my brother in .45lc." Harry said.
"I can start making them today. Each set is going to run you a $100. I think I have a few boxes of smokeless I can give you now." Smith said pulling out an ammo crate and stacking five boxes of 45-70, and ten boxes of colt 45 on the counter
"So what's the difference?" Harry asked.
"$134." Smith said doing the math.
"Let me know when my guns and the ammo are done." Harry said handing over the coins.
He stopped off at the junk shop and sold the 14 swords, 31 knives, and 10 gun belts for $75 before he flew to Hamilton. He was greeted like a hero and even though Harry usually hated people fawning over him he felt proud when they called him marshal. He walked into the Mayor's office and Roy's face fell as soon as he saw him.
"Jimmy didn't make it did he?" Roy asked.
"No, he's gone, all we found was blood and a tipped over cart. I have the cart, I repaired it and shrank it. I set it up outside your office. I also took your ore and smelted it with magic. You ended up with $16,650." Harry said setting the big stack of bank note on his desk.
"How did you get so much?" Roy asked.
"All I did was smelt it, formed it into bricks, and exchanged it at the bank." Harry said.
"This is more than twice what we get for our silver. We have to pay Williamson to smelt it for us, and the process cuts our profits in half and it's still not pure silver." He said looking excited for the first time.
"Well, the next time you have ore like that I'll smelt it for you. It took me a few minutes to do it and you lose nothing. Now, on the matter of your supplies. I didn't find the list, but if you give me a list I can get what you need, or if you prefer I can escort someone to and from Eureka." Harry said.
"Marshal, you've already gone above and beyond. We can't ask you to keep sacrificing your time to help us." Roy said.
"I don't have anything better to do and I'm independently wealthy. Now am I headed back alone or with someone?" Harry asked with a easy smile as he lit a cigar. What started out as a spaghetti western joke was turning into a habit. Thank god wizards couldn't get cancer. His six cigarette a day habit became a ten mini-cigar a day addiction.
"I'll have to ask for volunteers. We also have to borrow a few horses to pull the cart." Roy said thinking out loud.
"You know what you need? A set of reusable portkeys. You're so close to Eureka that … Why am I not just doing it?" Harry asked
Harry reached into his bag and pulled two bars of iron out, he cut a quarter off each bar and turned them into two thick credit card sized plates using the smelting charms. One said Hamilton and the other said Eureka. He waved at the two bars and each one had a town name. He picked up the Eureka set and held them in his hands. They slowly started to glow until they flashed. He did the same with the other set. He handed the two cards to the Mayor along with the Hamilton bar.
"There, now keep this bar on your desk and I'll put this bar in the Marshal's office. When you want to go to Eureka just hold the Eureka card in your hand and say 'Eureka please' and you'll land in the marshal's office. It's the same with coming home. Also when you get to Eureka there will be a set of leather carpet bags waiting for you in the Marshal's office with an expansion charm and a featherweight charm on it so you can load up on supplies and still portkey back." Harry said.
"Harry we can never repay the debt we owe you." Roy said standing up and shaking his hand.
"Your friendship and the safety of this town is reward enough for me. And those portkeys are not just for supply runs. If you need help send for me. The same for things like doctors and things like that. You folks are all alone out here, with a wood wall and old wards to protect you. So if things go south on you folks send for help. That reminds me. I have two magical lanterns. I'm going to install them on the top of your guard towers to light up the road." Harry said.
"We will use the portkeys. You can count on it Marshal." Roy said walking him out.
"Call me Harry. Have a good day and again, sorry about Jimmy." Harry said pulling out his broom and flying to the guard towers. He attached the lanterns before flying off.
The trip back to Eureka only too three minutes if he took a direct path. He stopped off in the junk shop again and took the four leather carpet bags they had for $5. They were a miss matched set but they ranged from a small 10 inch doctor's bag all the way up to a 24 inch wide 15 inch tall bag. Harry repared them back to well worn but mostly new and cast the expansion and featherweight charms on the bags making the doctor's bag the size of a steamer trunk and the large bag big enough to sleep in. Harry put the four bags in the office along with the bar and told John about all of it. The old Marshal agreed with everything Harry was saying.
"That was a good call son. You just saved that town's life. Say You up for some work today?" He asked.
"I always am boss. What can I do for you?" Harry asked.
"Well your search for Jimmy reminded me that we haven't had a mail delivery in a week, now that's nothing new. But with what happened to Jimmy?" John said shrugging.
"I see your point. Where does the mail come from?" Harry asked.
"I comes from Salt Lake City. Now the fancy well funded marshal's office in the city takes care of the roads to the Nevada border, but the road leading to Ely and from Ely to here is our job and with the loss of my last deputy we haven't been cleaning those roads I know you just came from Hamilton but could you check the roads leading to the border town of West Wendover. It's a small border town that stays afloat be being a rest stop on the way out to Nevada. I need you to recheck the road to Ely and then check the road leading to West Wendover. The road is long. 120 something miles long. But it needs to be done." John said.
"Will do boss, I'll head out there right after lunch if you don't mind." Harry said.
"No hurry really, if the mail's been late for a week, a few hours won't make a difference." John said.
Harry headed back to the cube and found the girls working on two small eight inch toy horses made of a black metal. They were locked in small vices and they were carving small runes on the horses with tiny gold tools and working through magnifying glasses on tripods made of wood and brass. Harry made lunch of steak sandwiches and fresh cut steak fries for everyone. When he was done he took two of the less beat up leather gun belts out of the trunk and tried something hoping it would work. He set the two gun belts on the table and cast the smelting charm at them. They lifted up and melted together. He waved at the table and a double gun over the shoulder rig was sitting on the table.
"How did you do that?" Hermione asked.
"Goblin magic. It's the set of charms I used to smelt the gold and silver ore and turn it into bars." Harry said pulling on the rig that consisted of two holsters suspended over the shoulders by straps with a belt that went around his belly and back and held the rig in place just under his pecks. It was an idea he got from Doc Holliday in Tombstone.
"And it works for anything?" She asked.
"Apparently. We'll test it out later when I get back. I have to patrol the roads up to Utah." He said as he took out the colt he cleaned the day before and a second colt single action from the trunk. He cast the repair charm on it and cleaned it up with a cleaning charm.
"Yes we will, those two charms might be the key to solving a lot of problems we're having." Hermione said.
"Like I said we have to test it out. They are not easy to cast and they take a lot of power to work." He said as he loaded all four of his guns with the smokeless powder rounds and loaded his gun belt with the 50 smokeless rounds. He tossed another box of 50 rounds in his bag and put the four guns in the four holsters. He pulled on his suit jacket and long leather coat.
"Well good luck out there, and we'll see you tonight. We should have these horses done by then." She said.
"Good luck with that." He said adjusting his hat on his head before he headed out.
Harry tracked down the road but unlike the day before were they stuck close to the road Harry headed a thousand feet up and scanned for threats on both sides of the road for miles. He also scanned for the mail. If he spotted something he would fly over and shoot it. By the time he got the to border town he added another 27 undead to his kill count, four more huge spiders, and a pack of six huge wolves the size of horses. As he got closer to the town he saw something off the road a few miles and as he got closer he felt the urge to chrap himself.
It was a rattlesnake. A 26 foot long 4 foot wide rattlesnake with a head full of teeth and two 4 foot long fangs. Harry hovered a hundred foot away and pulled out his rifle. He took steady aim and blasted the huge snake in the top of the head. It reared back and hissed as it's rattle started going. It sounded like a truck full of maracas all shaking at once. Harry popped it nine more times emptying the rifle and it still was hissing and snapping at him. Harry put away his winchester and pulled out his .300 rifle and shot it five more times in the head to finally put it down. Even when it was dead it twitched, jerked, and the rattle was still going. Harry shot it three more times in the head to make sure it was dead before he floated down closer. He transfigured it into a fire hose and packed it in a trunk before he put it in his bag. He put away his rifle and continued searching for the mail. But this time when he cast the spell the wand pointed towards the road. He followed it to a double set of heavy leather saddle bags left in the dirt by the side of the road. He checked the bags and found letters addressed to Ely, Hamilton, and Eureka. He shrank it down and put it away as he continued to West Wendover. When he got to the small border town of about a thousand people he dropped a few portkeys in the town, introduced himself to the town marshal, and flew back to Eureka on a direct route. He killed another spider and a six foot coyote by the time he made it back to the town at three.
He walked into the marshal's office and saw John getting ready to take his five hour shift at the front gate.
"Did you find the mail?" John asked.
"I did, I did not find the mail carrier but I did find the mail close to a 26 foot long rattlesnake that took more than a dozen head shots to bring down." Harry said dropping into a chair next to John's desk.
"You killed a King Diamondback!?" John said looking shocked.
"Is that what they're called?" Harry asked with a shrug.
"Harry, no one man kills a King Diamondback. It takes teams of hunters to kill one. Not even wizards kill them without help. Their skin is magic resistant like a dragon and an inch thick. How the hell did you kill one?" John asked.
"I flew above it and blasted it with my rifle in the head until it died. It hissed and spit venom at me the whole time but I was far away from him. I turned him into a fire hose and keep him. Is there anything good in them you know besides the venom, and skin?" Harry asked.
"Yes, the meat is good. And the teeth make good weapons. Also the rattle beads are magical. You should talk to Alice." John said.
"I'll do that. I need to get this mail delivered. I'm going to leave the Hamilton mail in here for now and they can pick it up with the portkey." Harry said leaving a pack of mail bound together with twine on John's desk as he got up and headed out.
He left the mail with the post office. He stopped of at Alice's shop and she pointed him to the farm run by her daughter in law. Harry dropped the big snake off along with the 6 wolves and the coyote to be processed. He flew to Ely and dropped off the mail. He also gave them two lanterns. He flew back just as the sun was going down. It was dark by the time he got back to the cube at four. He flew up a few hundred feet and the saw the lantern light from Hamilton and Ely in the distance. He landed and called it quits for the night. He saw Neville sitting at the table when he came in.
"How was your day?" Harry asked with a smirk.
"Good, the trip to Salt Lake City was easy. It took about two hours. The city itself is built like the great walled cities of europe. I checked in with the local marshals, I traded in the $100,000 in silver certificates for $10,000. I managed to find a bank that would give me $24 an ounce for gold and $12 and ounce for silver. I traded in some of it for less than that at other places trying to find the best price but I still ended up with $17,670 for the gold and $15,450 for the silver. I found a few magic shops and set up portkeys around the city. Really I spent the day walking around the city looking in shops. What about you?" Neville asked.
"Nothing much, I made this with that smelting and forming charm." Harry said showing off the gun rig.
"Nice, I want one." Neville said.
"I'll make you one later. I also helped Hamilton by making them a reusable portkey to the marshal's office. Let's see what else did I do? Oh I know I killed a 26 foot long 4 foot wide Diamondback rattlesnake that ate the mail man." Harry said dropping the loot he took of the undead into the trunk.
"Say what?" Neville asked.
"John sent me to scan the roads to West Wendam on the border with Utah and find out what happened to the mail. I tracked the road and killed a bunch of nasty things like huge wolves and spiders. Not to mention all the undead I found. But as I got closer to the town I saw the big fucking snake. It took all ten shots from the winchester and five more .300 win mag rounds to go down. Alice's daughter in law is carving up the King Diamondback as we speak. John said no one has ever killed one by themselves." Harry said with a grin.
"That's crazy! So was it harder or easier to kill then the basilisk?" Neville asked.
"Easier. This one didn't even get close. I stayed in the air and shot it. It would have been nice to talk to it to confirm he ate the mail man but I haven't been able to do that in almost twenty years. You know I miss that, being able to talk to snakes. Snakes, oddly enough make for good conversation." Harry said.
"So you killed a great big snake, what are you going to do with it?" Hermione asked.
"Well I was thinking, King Snake stew sounds interesting. A set of King Snake fang scimitars sounds cool as does a few snake teeth knives, and a snakeskin vest and duster sounds downright fashionable. Aside from that and the venom, the rest we'll sell or give away. I know I want a wolf fur lined leather coat." Harry said.
"You know there are easy tailoring charms that you can use to make whatever you want and it will work better than the charms you used earlier." Abby said.
"Really?" Harry asked looking at the girl.
"Yes, and I could tan the hides you got today with an old native American spell. The furs work with the same set of spells too. You end up with soft fur on one side and supple soft leather on the other side. I learned the spell in Salem. I make most of my leather goods and clothing with these spells." Abby said.
"Awesome. Let me go get the hides and we can work on that. Although I don't know how far along Kate is with her work it's only been an hour." Harry said.
"I could help with that too. I was an avid hunter growing up in Texas and I was raised on a cattle ranch so I know how to skin and butcher almost anything." Abby said.
"Really? Are there any other skills you have? We all know each other here but we could really use your full resume if you don't mind." Harry asked.
"Not at all. Like I said I grew up in Texas, I shot junior three gun as a kid, I was state champion in 2003, 04, and 05. After that I focused more on academics. As my file most likely says I spent a lot of time in Massachusetts at Salem and Harvard. It's been a few years since I've carried and I didn't have a gun on me in the field. If I did there would have been one dead Indian and we'd still be in our timeline." Abby said looking frustrated and emotional.
"Hey, Abs, you have to relax. Have you been holding that in over the last few days?" Harry asked coming around the table and crouching down next to her.
"Yes. It's my fault we're stuck here. I was studying the glowing red rock and I saw him approach me from the corner of my eye. He blitzed me and grabbed the wand out of my hand. I was on the ground and he was standing over me and I couldn't do anything about it. The next thing I know I'm being woken up by Hermione. If I was carrying I would have ended him and called for backup." She said crying.
"Abby, it's not your fault. It's our fault for not just shooting him as soon as we came in. It's the department's fault for sending you in without backup and without a gun to begin with. And it's the local auror's fault for not staying with you. You are a young researcher, on your first real mission, and now you're on a different mission altogether. You're stuck with us in a bizzaro past and we have to stick together. If you feel responsible for getting us here then I have to thank you. I killed people to save the world. That was my job. But the work I did in the last two days has made me feel more important and more useful than the last two years of Operative work I did. So thank you. I needed a change and I didn't know it. Neville what about you? What's more fun, assassinations from the shadows, or being a big god damn hero?" Harry asked with a smirk.
"You kidding? Look at the way I'm dressed. I'm loving this. I'm thinking we invent the car and the motorcycle Harry. What do you say?" Neville asked.
"Sounds like fun. Mia, how about you? What's more fun? Be honest. Think about all the shit you can invent. You're not stepping on anyone's toes either. Half the people in this country died when the rift opened." Harry said.
"I have to admit this world has the potential to be better than the one we came from. That being said I miss electricity." Hermione said with a smirk.
"Then invent it egghead." Harry said smirking.
"Blow it out your ass Harry. I'll do it when I'm good and ready. For now I have to make sure you two fools don't get yourselves killed playing big damn heros." She shot back laughing.
"I haven't heard that laugh in a while. It sounds good. Now get back to work nerd." Harry said earning him a shocking spell to the butt which made him jump.
"You totally deserved that." Abby said with a smile and wet eyes.
"I did, but we have to stay loose guys. We're future people with future weapons and knowledge. Relax. We've got a hundred years to live and at some point we'll get a philosopher's stone and add even more time to our lives. I want to see 2016 but not our 2016. A better time. Now get off your ass and quit your crying. We need to go skin a snake so I can have a bad ass snakeskin coat that's bulletproof." Harry said with a smirk.
"Well in that case let's go fearless leader." Abby said wiping her eyes as she laughed.
"How comes he gets to be the leader?" Neville asked.
"I give the best motivational speeches." Harry said without missing a beat as he handed Abby out of her chair. "And you little lady, we need to get you a proper gun. Both of you. The cloverleaf guns were for purse carry. You both need proper double gun belts and real six shooters with enchantments and engravings. The whole nine yards." Harry said helping her with her coat.
"I would like that." She said as Harry pulled on his coat.
"We need to find a shooting range so you two can test out a wide range of guns to find what you like." Harry said as they walked out. Hermione and Neville looked at each other from across the table and laughed.
Harry was about to lead them to the farm at the edge of town when he turned around and headed back into the cube, he came back a minute later with a gun belt and a colt single action and handed it to her.
"We're headed outside the gate but not outside the wards of the town. In fact the ranch is more protected then the town but still, better safe than sorry. Also I grabbed a few other guns and I figured we could shoot things to see what you like and head to Smith's in the morning to see if he has something nice on hand or if he can make you something." Harry said as she put the belt around her waist and shrank it to fit her. She pulled the colt and checked to make sure it was loaded before holstering it.
"I feel better already. I need to get one of those undercover rigs and a real gun too. Something I can keep on me all the time. I'm never getting caught out again. I'm also going to spend time practising. It's been almost six years since I fired a gun and even longer since I shot a handgun, and I've always used a semiauto." She said following him to the back of the town and out a back gate to the farm where all of the dairy, eggs, and meat the town lived on came from.
The farm like the town was nestled between two mountains. The farm was located in the v were the two mountains met making a huge fifty foot tall rock wall that surrounded the farm on three sides and the back gate of the town made up the fourth side. The farm was comprised of a half a square mile patch of grass with four barn style buildings and a house. The magic of the farm was palpable. You could feel the wards surrounded the small patch of land.
All the lights were on and a glowing ball of light was hovering above the front yard of the house where the huge snake carcass was being worked on by a woman in her late thirties with red hair and a plain but pretty face and three farm hands. They were all covered in blood and half the snake was missing. They had three piles on the grass around the snake carcass.
One pile was a stack of 4 foot by 12 foot sheets of snake skin. Another pile was slabs of meat. The last pile was viscera and bones. Next to that pile was the head. When Abby saw the head she looked like she was going to pass out.
"Jesus Harry." She said standing next to the huge head.
"I know. Look at how thick this skin is. If I was on the ground with this thing I would have been dead." Harry said.
"Yes you would have. This is the biggest Kingsnake I've ever seen. I ran a test on the venom, you would have died from one bite. Which is what happened to these poor souls." Kate said coming over to them
"Them who?" Abby asked.
"These three people. I'm sure we'll find more." Kate said pointing out the three decomposed bodies in the pile of bloody mess.
"Oh God." Abby said looking green.
"The food chain is funny like that, you never really think about being lower on the list. Would you look at all this meat! We'll be able to feed all the local towns for a week with this much meat." Harry said walking over to the big stack of meat blocks.
"YOu're going to eat the snake meat even after you saw it ate people!?" Abby asked literally holding back lunch at this point.
"Yeah?" Harry said.
"Meat's meat, and despite how it looks Kingsnake meat taste like tender juicy white meat chicken. This is a few thousand pounds of meat. Enough to feed a lot of hungry people." Kate said.
"I guess so. I'm usually not squeamish about things like this. In fact I've had things like snake, bear, wolf, and coyote before. Hell I've even had dragon. It's just you pulled people out of it." Abby said trying to get her hunter's nerve back.
"I can solve this issue really easy. Abby you said you had dragon, was it in Texas?" Harry asked.
"I have. I got it at a place in Texas." She said.
"You're talking about Big Bob's Bar and Grill?" Harry asked smiling.
"How did you know?" Abby asked.
"I shut down Big Bob's last year, do you know why? He was selling unregulated dragon meat from dragons he was killing in Mexico. Now as you know Mexico did not have a dragon preserve. Those dragons were wild, wild dragons eat anything that moves. Anything. Including humans." Harry said.
"Oh no." She said.
"Oh yes, and I hate to break it to you, we didn't shut him down because he was selling wild dragon. We shut him down because he was leaving the dragons in tact and bringing them back to his restaurant where he didn't have a freezer big enough to hold a big beast like that and carving the meat off as he was selling it. Old, hot, smelly, long turned green, dragon meat." Harry said making her lose her lunch. Harry grabbed her hair as she wretched.
"Oh God." Abby said.
"Yeah that about sums it up. Now, what we need is some cold storage trunks. Why don't you head back and help my sister." Harry suggested.
"No, I'm good to go, I can never look at dragon again. Nor can I eat any of this I don't think. But I can help carve it up. I can also show you the spell to tan this hides." She said pulling her canteen out of her bag and washing her mouth out.
"You sure? You could test out the guns too if you wanted." Harry said.
"We will, but after we help. Work and then play time like my granddaddy used to say." She said pulling out a small knife in a leather sheath with native american bead work. She pulled out the knife and he saw a 5 inch drop point knife. When he saw the knife Harry pulled his stealth kill knife out.
"So that's what this is for? Skinning?" Harry asked showing off his knife.
"Yes, why? What do you use…. Oh, never mind." She said nodding.
"Is yours razor sharp? If it's not I have a few more of these in my bag, they're my favorite knife." Harry said pulling out a second one.
"No, this one is enchanted and I'm used to it." She said with a grin.
They went to work helping take apart the beast after making a call to the cube. Neville and Hermione showed up twenty later with four trunks. With eight of them working to carve it up and stack the meat in the trunks it took just one more hour to finish the snake, the five wolves, and the coyote. When they were done they had six big soft fur hides, and six 4x12 foot rough looking snake skin leather sheets that were soft to the touch. The tanning charm fused the scales together and flattened them out leaving them with half inch thick textured leather that had to be worked with magic because it stood up to their magical blades, bullets, rifle rounds, and spell damage. Harry handed Kate five $100 bills and she handed four of them back.
"Harry that's way too much. We agreed on $100 for the whole job and even that was too much." She said.
"Okay, how about this, $200 for the job, and another $100 to use the mountain wall on the side of your house here as a gun range?" Harry asked handing her two more bills back.
"Fine, but I'm bringing you fresh milk and eggs until I think we end up even." She said trying not to laugh.
"That's a good idea, here's another $100, throw in some bacon and I'm coming back at some point next week to buy a cow from you. In fact how much will that run me?" Harry asked pulling out more bills.
"For a whole cow? $35." She said.
"Butchered?" Harry asked.
"No, that's another $5." She said.
"Here's $50, set aside a fat cow for me and I'll come by next week when we run out of meat." Harry said handing her more money as she laughed at him.
"I will Harry. I got a big heffer that's fat and ready to go." She said.
"Good. Now if you'll excuse us our girls here need to test out some guns." Harry said walking over to the side of the house to the rock wall. He made two ten inch targets and set them up on the wall. He cast a muffling charm around the area.
"Okay, let's start with the colt single action." Harry said taking the two colts off his belt and handed them each a gun.
It took a half hour but they had their preferences. Hermione liked the colt lightning for it's smaller grips and lower recoil .38 long colt ammo it took. Abby however prefered the colt single action like Harry. But what stuck with Harry was Abby's form. When she said she shot three gun she wasn't kidding. She stood square with the target. She worked the hammer and pulled the trigger with quick and precise movements and she was dead on accurate.
"I thought you never used a revolver?" Harry asked.
"I never said never. I said I only ever had semiautos. My granddaddy had a ruger blackhawk. I shot it a few times to get used to it but I mostly used a Wilson Combat 1911 in 9mm for my 3 gun competitions. I used to compete in the classics division. A 1911 with iron sights, a pump action 20 gauge shotgun with a 6 round mag tube, and a bolt action rifle in .308 and a detachable 10 round box magazine or a Ruger mini 14 with a scope and 30 round mag. Some competitions required a .22 rifle, a .22 pistol, and a .410 double barrel shotgun. Like I said before, if I had a gun on me, any gun at all we wouldn't be here right now." Abby said quick drawing her revolver and drilling all six rounds into the target in two seconds before half cocking the gun, dropping the loading gate and ejecting the spent brass.
"Well I'll talk to Smith in the morning about getting you both a set of guns." Harry said feeling really turned on watching her shoot.
"They should test out the rifles too." Neville said handing his smaller wife his 45-70 winchester rifle.
"Good thinking. Here see how you like this." He said pulling his rifle out of the bag and handing it to her.
Abby dropped into a olympic rifle shooting stance with her back and legs stiff and her left elbow buried into her hip to balance the gun. She took a deep breath, held it in, pulled the trigger, let her body take the recoil as she let out the breath, and worked the lever action. She took a deep breath and repeated this action nine more times before she handed the gun back to him with a nod.
"I like it, it's nice and smooth and the action is crisp. The stock brass plate on the back hits the shoulder hard but with a leather pad it would be a nice gun." She said.
"I agree." Hermione said handing the rifle back to her husband and flexing her shoulder.
"So a set of colt lightnings, a set of colt single actions, and two winchester rifles in 45-70 for the ladies." Harry said collecting all the brass and leading the group back to the cube.
Harry cooked dinner as they finished working on the horses. After dinner they cleared off the table and Harry worked with Abby to learn the tailoring charms she knew. It took some trying to get it right and Harry ended up messing up a cowhide trying to make a vest. But after a few tries he got it right and he used the goblin charm to turn the lopsided leather vest back into a sheet of leather which confused and baffled the two smarter girls. As Harry got the hang of the charms he started making some really nice things.
He made a shoulder rig for Neville and an undercover rig for Abby that Hermione took and started enchanting. He made a snakeskin double breasted waistcoat that buttoned all the way up to almost his neck. The vest had brass buttons he made from the spent shell casings. He cast a color changing charm at the vest and turned it a dull black. He pulled it on and it only needed a few adjustments to fit well. The vest was stiff but he knew it would break in over time and he knew he had his vest. He copied his long rifle frock coat in snakeskin a with brass buttons and made it black. When he put the coat on over his vest he had three layers of magical leather hide over his shirt and his thin dragon his vest under his shirt.
"Hey Nev, shoot me in the chest?" Harry asked and before the girls cold say anything Neville pulled out his Scofield and shot Harry right in the center of his chest.
"Jesus! You two are going to kill each other one day playing with guns!" Hermione yelled.
"It's fine Mia, I have like an inch of magical snakeskin on over my dragon hide vest. That hurt like a bitch by the way. Good job." Harry said waving at his chest and casting a healing charm at his ribs.
"Hay Harry, can you make me a set like that?" Neville asked.
"Shure, the same or something different?" He asked as he added a cushioning charm to the vest.
"The same. I like that color, it absorbs the light." Neville said.
"Easy enough." Harry said making a copy of his vest and coat but bigger.
"Nice, thanks Harry." Neville said putting on the vest and coat.
"Once I got the hang of it I can make this work all day. And look we still have 5 whole snake skins and," Harry waved at the snakeskin scraps and they melted and turned into a smaller 3x3 foot sheet.
Harry took a small bit of leather and turned it into a sling for his riffle. The sling had 50 bullet loops for more 45-70 ammo. He made it black and made one for Neville without being asked. Hermione handed Abby the shoulder rig back after enchanting it. Harry dug through the trunk and handed her a stainless steel Wilson Combat classic 1911 in 9mm from the trunk. He found a few wilson combat 9mm magazines and handed them to her along with a ammo can full of NATO 9mm.
"There you go, and there are a few of those in there, it's like bad guys like wilson combat, Kimber, and Sig 1911's." Harry said.
"Nice, it's just like the gun I used to use." She said loading the gun and putting it in the shoulder rig cocked and locked.
"Good, now if you'll excuse me, all this magic has kicked my ass and I need to sit in front of the tv and pass out." Harry said walking out of the room.
He was asleep on the couch fifteen minutes later as Django Unchained was playing on the tv. Neville sat on the chair next to him and watched the movie. When it was over he woke him up and they hit the sack. For the second night in a row Harry slept with a smile on his face.