Jackson studied the land. “Back home, the land stretches out and you can see a long way. Here it won’t be as easy to keep track of a herd.”

“You may want to purchase a couple of all-terrain vehicles that the farmers and livestock wranglers can use,” Jerry said. “Steve wants a couple of them for the cassandra sangue campus along with a couple of small carts that can be attached to haul gear or feed.”

“Or the humans could use horses,” Simon said.

“If you want horses, you should talk to Liveryman. But you’d need to build some kind of shelter and a place for feed. The ATVs could be stored in the old industrial building.”

“Some of these houses will belong to terra indigene. Most will not have a car and the garage will be empty. Wouldn’t a garage be big enough for a horse?”

Jerry scratched the back of his neck. “I’m not saying it wouldn’t be useful to have a couple of horses here, but you’ll do better to build a structure meant for a horse than to try to refit a garage into a safe stall. You could store feed in a garage if you put wooden pallets on the floor to keep the hay dry, but that will attract mice that will get into the house through the attached garage. I suppose you could get a couple of cats.”

“The Panthergard don’t usually eat mice because it takes a lot of little rodents to make a meal,” Simon said. “But there are other terra indigene who would eat mice.” If the Others promised to consider them nonedible, maybe having a few domestic cats living in the community would reassure the humans. With the way humans hoarded possessions where mice could nest, cats that lived with humans would find hunting in a house easier than an Owl would. Maybe there were spare cats on Great Island?

Horses, cats, and all-terrain vehicles. More things for the list the next time he talked to Steve Ferryman.

“Anything else you need?” Jerry asked.

Simon shook his head.

“Almost forgot.” Jerry opened the passenger door of his truck and pulled out a carry sack, which he handed to Simon. “We have tennis courts at our community centers, both on the island and the mainland part of Ferryman’s Landing. Don’t know if any of your folks play the game, but Ming Beargard saw Pam Ireland throwing a tennis ball for her dog, and he thought you might like a few of the balls for the youngsters.”