Thaumaturge

by Terry Mancour

  Most of the settlement on the plateau before the invasion had been isolated hamlets and freeholds, with a few Wilderlords in their small castles and fortified manors, here and there. There had been a few small market villages, but those were nearly gone, as were most of the remote abbeys and temples on the plateau. The gurvani had swept most of that infrastructure away in a wave of burning, killing, and looting. Getting people back into those abandoned properties had begun last autumn, but the resettlement had been a trickle when it stopped with winter, he explained.

  The arrival of the Tudrymen helped improve things tremendously, even as it introduced more problems. Gareth merely made them step two. Most of the artisan class and several prominent burghers who had lost everything at Tudry came to Vanador with the promise of new opportunities. Gareth began using them the moment they arrived, with funds from a chest of coin Pentandra sent for the purpose to keep them motivated.

  If a man had been a carpenter in Tudry, Gareth set him to building. If a potter, he was directed to a lot on which he could build a shop, and told where to find clay. One by one each new caravan had been quickly integrated into Vanador’s developing townlands by some master plan known only to Carmella and Gareth.

  It was a testament to Gareth’s skill that he was able to work closely with introverted Carmella, Azar the Overbearing, and contentious artisans from Tudry with equal dexterity. Indeed, the lad seemed universally liked in Vanador, despite the constant temptation of the newcomers to blame him and his office for their immediate woes. It helped that he had a generally positive and encouraging outlook, when he spoke. His optimism was infectious, and when he did take a negative turn, he did not let it become personal.

  It wasn’t the usual approach one takes to administering a feudal town. But I couldn’t argue with his success. By the time Dad and I pulled into town, there was actually the beginnings of a town to pull into.

  Gareth and Carmella seemed to have envisioned everything – not for a small country market town, but a vast city spilling out from the protective shadow of the Anvil, surrounded by productive agricultural estates. When we arrived, Vanador was a small collection of construction sites and half-finished homes and acres and acres of wooden stakes and hempen rope sketching out the future. The sheer scale of the plan demonstrated a grand vision. A very optimistic vision, Gareth explained, enthusiastically.

  “Most towns arise from villages, which get clustered along a crossroad or along a road,” he said as we crossed a wide circle, apparently the central hub of the town. “As they grow, they do so in a depressingly inefficient fashion, and by the time they’re large enough to require a wall, every street in town is a mess. In Vanador, we knew about how big the city was going to be, so we planned accordingly. Instead of clustering everyone around a main square, we spread things out, to allow for future growth.”

  “That makes an uncommon amount of sense,” I agreed. “I wish I could have done that in Sevendor.”

  “Sevendor is where I got the idea – I’m avoiding all the mistakes you and Banamor made,” he said, smugly. “While importing all of the brilliant ideas.”

  “And adding a few of your own,” I agreed. “I saw the overhead magelights, last night,” I said, looking up at the imposing rock. “That was a great idea.”

  “That was easy . . . and I’m just getting started. Right now, they just give us a bit more light at night. By the time we’re done, they’ll mimic the positions of the stars overhead, to keep it from feeling so cramped under here. But we’ll have magelights throughout the city,” he said, enthusiastically. “They reduce the number of casual fires from lanterns and tapers, for one thing. And keep the place from getting too smoky. We’re digging underground sewers, too, like they have in Castabriel and other real cities,” he boasted.

  “Have you had any problems with the clergy?” I asked, as we passed in front of a small shrine on the circle dedicated to Ishi. Across the street was a slightly grander one to Briga. Both lots had halls and temple buildings under construction.

  “Not yet, except for perpetual requests for things I don’t have and can’t get,” he chuckled. “Most of them are from Vorone and know each other already. I mostly leave them alone and let them do what they do.

  “But from here,” he said, as he suddenly stopped and turned around, “we can see the Temple Quarter, the Merchant’s Quarter, the Iron Quarter, the Market Quarter, the Artisan’s Quarter, the Thaumaturge’s Quarter and the Enchanter’s Quarter,” he said, pointing in different directions. “Over there is Rael’s Wizard’s Mercantile shop, though her warehouses and office are over there, under the southern ridge. They sell just about anything.”

  “I’m sure the competition doesn’t sit well with the artisans,” I pointed out.

  “Thankfully, everyone needs so much of everything, it hasn’t been an issue,” he reported, cheerfully. “That doesn’t mean they haven’t been a problem. We had some argument over guilds, when the Tudrymen came, so to compromise I had them pool their efforts and construct a common guild hall for their crafts, for now. They share it among the established trade guilds, and while no one is happy about it, they can’t argue about the low overhead.

  “The Enchanter’s Quarter starts there,” he continued, “which will be the Vanador Bouleuterion, someday. And, as per your request, that entire quarter there will be the Thaumaturges Quarter. That lot there will be the local chapterhouse of the Arcane Orders, and there’s plenty of space for expansion. As long as it’s okay with Carmella,” he amended.

  “Why would Carmella object?”

  “She wouldn’t, as long as it doesn’t conflict with her master plan,” he agreed, as he continued toward his office. “She put a lot of work into this place. She doesn’t want you to mess it up.”

  “I understand,” I chuckled, as we went inside the long, low hall that served as Gareth’s base of operations. He had eschewed any pretension of a palace, or even a proper laboratory or workshop. This was an office, like a counting house, complete with clerks, files and an intimidating amount of parchment.

  Gareth’s headquarters as Pentandra’s deputy was nowhere near as opulent as his former mentor, Banamor, had built for himself. Instead of offices over a vast warehouse, Gareth had elected to erect a simple hall on the main circle at the center of town. It had a feel more like a Karshak lodge than a palace of civil administration. But I suppose that since most of Vanador’s business was construction, at the moment, the comparison was apt.

  Maps of the region adorned the wall instead of tapestries. Each one detailed a different section of the town, down to the individual lots. Another section of wall had maps of surrounding regions, some detailed by estate or freehold. Most were marked as vacant, I noted.

  “This is where I run Vanador from,” he announced, as he casually waved to a few of the clerks in the hall. “This is where people come to find me when they need something.”

  “Which begs the question, what do you need?” I asked, as we went to his private chamber . . . which seemed to have as many maps and diagrams within as the exterior chambers had. A magelight formed over his desk the moment we entered, the kind of useful enchantment all High Magi cultivate.

  “What do I need?” he asked, somewhat startled by the question. “I need Vanador to run right,” he said, taking one of the seats in his office. I took the other. “I need the markets to run well. I need the artisans to be able to work. I need people headed out from the refugee camp to farm, this spring,” he listed.

  “I was speaking in more practical terms,” I countered.

  “Well, then I need money,” he decided, with a sigh.

  That wasn’t what I expected. “Money? I thought we were funding the effort . . .”

  “No, no, that’s not what I mean,” he sighed, heavily. “We have plenty of funds . . . on parchment. And that’s the problem. We have more money on parchment than we do in coin, and it’s having an effect. We need more local coin in circulation than we have, right now, so that we can st
op keeping track of how much who owes who, because no one has enough actual pennies in their pockets. Letters of credit are dandy, until you realize that they’re often for more than the local temple actually has on hand. In the meantime, we’ve been . . . improvising.”

  Gareth’s interim solution to feeding the refugees was simple: each man was given a hastily-contrived lead token at the end of a day’s work clearing fields, gathering brush, digging latrines, or other duties around the vast encampment which could be exchanged at the camp’s kitchen for a set amount of food, either cooked or uncooked.

  The tokens had been hastily made in Enultramar and stamped with the seal of the Ducal Almoner on the obverse, keeping the tokens from being used for payment of taxes or other debts. The reverse side was stamped with Pentandra’s acorn symbol, as she was technically baroness of this land. A larger token was worth five of the smaller, and was stamped with an oak tree. They were called ‘Nuts’ and ‘Trees,’ respectively.

  A Nut token bought one small loaf from the camp bakery or three measures of grain, Gareth explained, if the freedman wanted to grind and bake it himself, or make porridge with it. Similarly, he was entitled to three sticks of firewood and a bundle of faggots, and a single draught of small beer for redeeming the tokens. A Tree could be redeemed for five measures of the above, as well as a thin blanket or a clay pot from the Landbrothers who oversaw the camp exchange. Occasionally, some cheese or sausage was issued with the rations, as well, but those were mostly reserved for the women and few children who had escaped the gurvani.

  The women were given tokens for service in the camp’s kitchens or in the spinning and sewing tents Gareth’s staff had erected. The freedmen had arrived on the plateau wrapped in threadbare rags, and while some basic clothing had been distributed, there was always a great need for better garb. A simple linen tunic could be purchased at the camp store for three Trees, which required a man to be enterprising and thrifty.

  Of course, once a medium of exchange had been established, commerce erupted. Tokens began to be exchanged for other goods and a variety of services. Those with skills and ambition quickly raised their circumstances. Those who were lucky at dice found Ifnia as fickle a bitch in poverty as she was in wealth, and tokens moved according to her whim. Some enterprising and lusty women exchanged their favors for lead tokens as easily as they would for silver.

  Though the camps had shrunk since their establishment, and the new town of Vanador had brought copper and silver to the region, the leaden tokens were still commonly used in and around the camp for small transactions. But they were hardly real coinage.

  “Would it interest you know that I have an answer for that?” I asked, mischievously. “Banamor suggested I consider that matter, before I left Sevendor.”

  Gareth rolled his eyes. “Of course he did. Is he arranging a transfer of specie?” he asked, hopefully.

  “Better,” I assured him, as I pulled out some examples to show him. And then I explained the little project I’d stuck Banamor with, after he’d pointed out the issue to me.

  As Count Palatine of the Magelaw, it was within the scope of my rights to coin money, a highly-coveted and oft-abused right among the senior nobility. I knew from setting up shop as a spellmonger in Boval Vale that the Wilderlands had always suffered a dearth of good coin; what little there was came from Vorone or Tudry, or the domains closest to Gilmora.

  Before the invasion, the most common coin was an iron slug that was theoretically worth one tenth of one copper penny. The actual exchange depended on who was doing the accounting. Larger transactions were counted in half-ounce copper coins known as Starlings, for no particular reason. A heavier one-ounce copper coin known as a Bell was supposedly equal to one silver penny, but again, it depended upon who was counting. Silver was far rarer, and gold almost unheard of in regular transactions.

  That had led to many deals being brokered in uneven coin, or in direct barter. That led to fluctuating markets, usury, and more than one of the famous Wilderlands feuds. Things had gotten a little better under Anguin’s tenure in Vorone, as he spent his borrowed funds liberally on defensive and restoration projects, but there was still far less coin in the Wilderlands than there needed to be. That had always bugged me.

  So, I’d arranged to make my own coins. Banamor spoke with the Karshak lapidaries and got them to indulge outside of their craft a bit. To fund the endeavor I’d authorized him to make use of the gold, silver and copper spheres of bullion the Vundel had traded me for my mountain. While I’d been rolling across the Wilderlands with Dad, the Karshak had been literally making money, back in Sevendor. There were chests of it in the Riverlands awaiting distribution.

  We minted a whole new slate of coinage to handle the projected demand. Banamor was certainly enthusiastic about the project, despite his grumbles, and the Lord Mayor of Sevendor Town had a surprising number of practical suggestions for size and denomination.

  We began by standardizing the currency. If the Magelaw’s coins gained a reputation for soundness, then they would be even more highly valued in trade. We minted new copper pennies, at one-tenth an ounce, strengthened with just enough nickel to keep them hard. In Pentandra’s honor I had them minted with a design of her new anvil device on the obverse, and a flattering silhouette of the Baroness of Vanador on the reverse. The coins known as Anvils became the workhorse of the market.

  A heavy, one-ounce copper coin was inscribed with the Baron of Lotanz’s square-knot device, as well as a fair profile of him, and were known as Knots, of course. We added the Kasari motto across the reverse side to give the coin an exotic flare.

  The silver penny was one-tenth an ounce, and was pegged as equivalent to the Knot. We stamped the hammer symbol I had chosen as my device on the obverse with a mage star on the reverse, and they became Hammers.

  Ten silver Hammers bought you one full ounce of silver, a coin called a Tower. They had a stylized pele tower on the face. We did them in series, and inscribed the name of each mage’s tower in turn. There were Salik Towers, Traveler’s Towers, Rognar Tower, etc., with the tower’s keeper’s name on the reverse.

  Twenty Towers purchased one full ounce of gold in a heavy coin called a Dragon, in honor of the attack on Vorone. It had a beautiful image of a dragon skull on the obverse, and my picture in profile on the reverse. I looked quite regal in gold, I thought.

  Anvils, Knots, Hammers, and Towers, with Dragons to support them all. They were minted with pure bullion, undiluted. And they would stay that way.

  It’s not unusual for an enterprising lord with the right to mint to melt down pure coins and illegally reissue them diluted with lower-quality metals. If they were clever enough forgers, they could re-stamp the coins with the original insignia, maintaining the value based on the reputation of the coin, not its actual worth.

  That couldn’t happen with the coins of the Magelaw. Each one was enchanted, mage-hardened against losing surface value through handling. Instead of becoming steadily worn after hundreds of transactions, the coins would be as sharp and clear as they were when minted. More, the enchantment kept them from melting, until the enchantment was broken. Anyone trying to adulterate our currency would waste a lot a fuel. Nor would the silver tarnish or the copper corrode, thanks to enchantments.

  “We can start issuing the coins immediately,” I informed Gareth, as I showed him examples of each coin I carried. “Starting with the lowest denominations, first. We can release them in the form of pay to control the flow and keep the market from becoming overwhelmed. But they should mark our new land with distinction. And make things a lot easier at market.”

  “They are an incredible improvement over the nearly-blank slips of copper, iron, and adulterated silver used in the markets now,” he agreed, enthusiastically. “I can start spending them at once, too. Half of my crews and all of my staff are weeks behind in pay, because there just isn’t enough in the shrine to Ifnia to cover the letters of credit I have issued. This will help dramatically.”

>   And they did. By the time we issued the first Towers, our coin was preferred everywhere for its clear value. Gareth continued to collect rents, fees, and fines in any kind of coin, but only repaid in Vanador coinage. Unsurprisingly, the standardization brought a lot of regulation to the markets in Vanador, and eventually in Vorone, as the standardized exchange was easier to calculate than weighing out coins and guessing their purity.

  It helped that there was a lot of coin flowing out of my coffers. Technically I was paying the work crews in specie, now, instead of daily livery and written promises to be redeemed later. Gareth unexpectedly buying back all that paper put a lot of coin in the market. Our soldiers, likewise, suddenly received their pay in coin, which most spent immediately in Vanador’s nascent taverns.

  The pennies flowed quickly into the regular markets in the weeks that followed. I had the exchange house Gareth set up quietly buy up old coinage at a discount, to speed adoption. By summer’s end most of the coinage in the Magelaw was ours.

  That had the added benefit of keeping the courts cleaner. The appointed jurist of Vanador, who acted as the town’s magistrate, was Lawfather Amberose, and he had far fewer cases to hear involving fraud or broken contracts than before, thanks to the coinage. I suppose the clean slate helped. There simply hadn’t been enough time since Vanador’s founding for a lot of financial mischief to happen.

  “I am so glad you finally made it, Master,” Gareth said, in calm, confident tones, once we put the coin samples away, and he retrieved a battered set of winecups and a bottle of something cheap, sweet and red from Enultramar. He’d really matured in his self-imposed exile to the Wilderlands, I reflected, as he poured. Alas, he’d matured enough to know how to escalate problems to his superiors.

  “There are a number of matters that need decisions to be made, and Lady Pentandra quite cruelly left me without guidance,” he began, as we sipped. “Indeed, she has largely insisted that they be postponed until the arrival of the Spellmonger,” he admitted, with a guilty smile.