High over Drache's docks and aboard the airship 'Black Sheep,'
Resque LeGrande Maessen was submerged to the neck in a steaming *furo
bath. His cleanshaven face was red and wet with perspiration from the
water's extreme heat, and he was enjoying himself immensely for there
were few things he enjoyed more than a good sweat. It was just after
sunrise.
"Dew neh loh moh on you, Drache, and your ball-shrinking cold
weather!" he expostulated for the benefit of the large windows across
from the deep wooden tub, splashing some water at them before lifting
a soaked and manicured hand from the bath, forefinger extended, and
shaking it at the freezing city below. "Hear that? *Dew neh loh moh
on you, by Gods! You'll not shrink my balls! Hah!"
Satisfied with his outburst, he leaned over the side of the tub
and helped himself to another cup of *sangua from the small porcelain
decanter atop the low table beside his bath. Drink in hand, he eased
back into the hot water, groaned contentedly and thanked his joss for
his current position.
He then proceeded to curse every God he was aware of, informing
them all that he would piss on their shrines, shit in their offering
pots and worship the meanest idols should they cease to favor him in
following days. This was done noisily (Some Gods were quite hard of
hearing) and in each God's favored language: Sharnylian, Arangothian,
Nipponese, Xiunlan and Alesian (Resque could speak all of them). It
took quite awhile.
Ayeeyah, he lamented, but it was a giant pain in the ass having
so many different souls!
Resque drained his cup of sangua in a single swallow, discarded
it on the table and sunk lower into the steaming water, propping his
head on the tub's edge to study the ornately engraved ceiling panels
with an appreciative frown. Taken together, the tiles formed a mosaic
depiction of the bustling Nipangui harbor of Kenyo, and there simple
beauty--the delicacy of the burned wood lines--never ceased to calm
him. Such was the reason he had set them in the bathroom. What better
place to meditate than in the bath? he had reasoned. Then, just as he
was engrossed in the depiction of a fishing junk, someone knocked on
the door, then spoke.
"*Sekkou-sama?"
"Hai?" Resque answered in the same language.
"So sorry, my liege, but the moneylender has arrived," came the
voice through the heavy wooden door. It belonged to Genda, the chief
of Resque's ronin bodyguard. Genda's seven ronin were distinct among
the rest of the crew insofar as they were the only ones allowed free
access to Resque's quarters; none of them spoke common.
"Arigato, Genda-san. Show him into my office and I will be with
him directly," he replied, again in Nipponese, knowing good and well
that the ronin was scowling on the other side of the door; it was the
Nipponese's belief that women should deal with moneylenders. And they
did not differentiate between moneylenders and bankers. Joxki was a
banker and Maessen was, in Genda's opinion, doing a woman's work. Not
that Resque cared. Business was conducted according to the customs of
the place in which you carried it out, and he was in Drache.
"Hai, Sekkou-sama," Genda said and padded away.
Resque lay in the bath for another five minutes before easing
out of the tub, leisurely toweling himself dry and pulling on a heavy
white bathrobe. He took a comb from the marble sink and combed back
his long hair into a smart ponytail, held it to with a small clip of
blue Xiunlan jade. Then he pushed open the bathroom door and stepped
across his bedroom, the rich carpets cool beneath his bare feet. He
passed through another door and into his office to greet his private
banker, Anre Joxki of Joxki & Sons, one of the oldest and most secure
*Mingit banking houses in all Drache.
"Morning, m'boy!" said Joxki, cheerful as ever as the two men
embraced. As banker to three generations of Maessens, the old Mingit
enjoyed an almost familial bond with Resque, a bond that would endure
for all eternity--or until House of Maessen's ceased to be solvent.
"Morning, Anre." Resque clapped the other man on the back, led
him over to one of two companion situated about a low table before a
pair of large windows looking out on the ocean. "Breakfast?"
"Grand idea," said the old Mingit as he sank into the indicated
chair. "Today's the day. How are you feeling?"
"Lucky," said Resque and tugged one of three ropes on the far
wall; somewhere in the distance a bell rang. "You?"
"Lucky. And proud. Rawlie would be proud too. You're doing good
by the house, m'boy."
"And yours." Resque took the chair adjacent Joxki's, painfully
aware of Joxki's fees: 5% of every transaction conducted, another 5%
of all accounts per anum as a maintenance charge. Letter of credit
transactions cost you an extra 1% on top of the 5. Ayeeyah, but the
overhead was a huge pain in the ass! But there was no choice. If you
traded, you either got raped by the market or were wise enough to let
yourself get lightly sodomized by a good banker like Joxki. That was
how it went; lose a little for security or lose it all.
"And mine."
"So tell me where I stand?"
"*Lathvek got his 5,000 yesterday afternoon. Tok's took out the
allotted 2,500 for 'expenses,'" Joxki punctuated the last bit with a
chuckle. "And then I gave him the extra 1,500 after he complained--as
you said he would--that the 2,500 was not enough. And as you asked, I
made him fight mightily for it. As for his buying account, I gave him
50,000, to be spent only on buys from the names on the list you gave
me. If he wants more than that, I've told him that he'll have to come
to you and make the requests personally."
"Good, good," said Resque, nodding. That Lathvek had his 5,000
meant the Port Authority would give him no problem while he unloaded,
and Tok had 4,000--dew neh loh moh on him and his progeny!--and face
for prizing 1,500 of it, face that he would lose if he tried to spend
a penny more than 50,000 buying out the other importers in the city;
it would be more than enough when the market tanked. "What about the
Ebon Hammer?"
"Sorry, forgot," Joxki replied. "2,000 for twenty days. They're
ready to go on twelve hours notice--time enough for them to get their
men out of bed and study a route for the wagons, they said. In total,
and with my fees, it comes to roughly--"
"61,350 gold Arangothian. Exactly."
"As ever, m'boy, your mind works like an abacus, m'boy. 61,350
exactly," Joxki had done the figures on paper. "That buys a cornered
Arangothian opium market."
"With luck."
"Aye, with luck." Joxki said and thought that the 61,350 and a
cargo of cheaper--and more pure--than market opium turned luck into
an extraneous factor. "Now, come to Menxvan time. I've been kept in
the dark long enough, son. How much do you have in the holds? I need
to know if I'm to put out good rumors, don't I?"
"Thirty-five tons."
"Ye Gods!" cried Joxki, stupefied. "And you're going to sell it
at what?"
"I'm going to start at 119 gold Arangothian per chest," Resque
said thoughtfully, easing back into his chair. "That's twenty less
than current market, and about two-and-a-third more than the lowest
price during the poisoning."
"Menxvan's hurtling spheroids!" Joxki began to laugh. "Nobody
is going to believe me!"
"No, not you alone, they won't."
"Who else knows?"
"The Port Authority will break silence later today and my crew
will go ashore on leave; they're not known for discretion. I've had
words with others as well," Resque said but didn't elaborate. He had
also paid Alexandra Kaisa; she'd spread the word to the remainder who
hadn't heard already. "That's this morning. The market ought to hit
bottom late this afternoon. Tomorrow morning I'll unload and with as
much spectacle as possible. It'll be week's end, so we'll have a nice
audience for it."
"Tok's going to have a busy day of it," Joxki laughed and shook
his head, still reeling from the numbers. He took a moment to collect
himself before speaking again. He wanted to ask how much it cost to
produce thirty-five tons of opium but didn't. He knew he wouldn't get
an answer, and knew that would be uncomfortable them both. "How long
do you expect it to take? For the other importers to quit?"
"The legal importers like Asprolta and 3P will be out by later
this afternoon, I think. They'll hang on to whatever they've got at
hand, wait for me to hike the price and then sell their holdings at a
profit. I'll win a price war, and still profit. Opium's too expensive
to import legally as is," said Resque after taking a moment's pause;
he seldom spoke without first considering his words. "Most small-time
smugglers will drop whatever they've got but a bit later. They aren't
going to quit until their buyers start going to Tok. And that should
happen by the time we've unloaded and gotten things stowed away. All
in all, I reckon it'll take two weeks. Perhaps a bit more. Your guess
is as good as mine, Anre."
"Aye, that was my guesstimation as well," Joxki said, slapped
his hands on his knees. "And then turn to the Isles of Myst, eh?"
"Pardon?"
"I'm old, boy, but I'm not yet deaf or blind. You wouldn't be
cavorting with Dirilette of Mysts if you were looking for a tumble; a
night with a dozen of Dasmia's Diseased would be safer than a whole
five minutes with that viper," the Mingit said with a canny smile. "I
heard and reckoned you were looking for an importer. At least, that
better be all you're looking for, son."
"Aye, it is."
"Good, keep it in your pants, m'boy. From what I hear of that
cow, she'd bite it off, by Menxvan." Joxki nodded gravely. "If you're
looking to be legitimate, you'd be wise to keep clear of her."
"So long as I'm bountied in Mysts, Anre, there's not much else
I can be but illegitimate," said Resque, effectively ending that line
of conversation. "Your warning is taken. Now, what say we behave like
gentlemen and finish our talk over breakfast?"
"Heavens, is it nine already?" Joxki said and let himself be
led toward the dining room.
* * * * * * * * *
When it came to spreading rumor, Drache functioned much in the
same way as a small village and a story--especially when greased with
money--spread very quick indeed. By the time Anre Joxki had finished
having breakfast with Resque and returned to his office in the Mingit
District, the first stories of soon-to-be flooded opium market began
in those inns where inspectors of the Arangothian Port Authority, who
were predominately Korthai, took their meals. From there, the story
passed quickly to the city's merchants and traders. Anxious to avoid
the low prices and lost profits that would come of a bottomed opium
market, the merchants and traders looked to dump whatever they had at
hand but--to their utter chagrin--those who ran the dens or stocked
the drug in their stores already knew that prices were tumbling and
steadfastly refused to buy until the cost bottomed.
Frantic, the merchants and traders turned to paid informers and
rumor brokers, and found their salvation in the unlikely person of Wu
Wang Tok. Wu Wang Tok--brilliant restaurateur, warm body and holder
of an account at Joxki & Sons (Old Man Joxki confirmed he had 110,000
gold to a coin, by Menxvan!)--might buy, if you haggled with him long
enough, one's opium somewhere near the old market price. But it was a
long line outside the Xiunlan's ramshackle establishment--that hole
called Hou Zuk (It meant "Good Food)--and not all the merchants were
able to remove themselves of their burdensome commodity. The more Wu
Wang Tok spent, the lower the price began to sink.
Arangoth's opium market was being taken over and--for the first
time ever--without force.
*furo bath - scalding hot Nipponese bath
*dew neh loh moh - Xiunlan curse meaning "F*%k your mother's hole."
*sangua - Xiunlan rice wine
*Sekkou - In Nipponese it means "Mason." Transliterated from Resque's
family name of "Maessen."
*Lathvek, Harlst Mhern - Korthai and Regency Councilor; being a chief
among the Korthai he controls the Port Authority who just so happen
to be predominately Korthai (Setting's equivalent to the Irish in the
old New York Port Authority?)
*Mingits - those folk who live in the Mingit District of Drache, they
make stable bankers (Setting's equivalent to the Swiss?)
--JD
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