From Londoner To Lord

Ustaimo felt a great deal of pleasure seeing the frown on Zoricus' face when the fat bastard heard that the Count wanted to postpone borrowing more gold from him. He suppressed his glee and began, "It's hard to say, milord. Usually we get above a thousand gold from Tiranat every year in the autumn, but my sources have told me that even before the southern road closed due to snow, merchants had already stopped going there because of a risk of bandit attacks. So Tiranat might not have made enough sales of coal by the start of winter to be able to pay even that much. Anyway, I can only tell the final amount we'll get after I have gone through their accounts ledger."

"But that amount was at the previous rate of a fifth of revenue, wasn't it?" Ebirtas frowned. "Wouldn't it be higher at the current rate of one fourth of their revenue as taxes?"

"It certainly will be," Ustaimo agreed. "If we assume they have sold the same amount of coal as last year, we could get nearly 1300 gold from them this year at the new tax rate, but it will likely be lower because of their correspondingly lower revenues in autumn. Whether they will still have the gold to pay it at this point is a different question altogether, since their previous baron was coming with all their taxes in the last autumn when he was killed and all his gold taken from him by the bandits. We are basically asking them to pay double the taxes on the same revenue they earned."

Before the Count could say anything, Zoricus glared at Ustaimo. "So what if the previous baron died? It is hardly our concern! Tiranat has to be made to pay every single copper they owe us, no matter what! What else are we giving you knights for? Use them however you need to, but you have to bring back all the overdue taxes!"

Count Ebirtas gave a quick nod, agreeing with his financial backer. "Not a single copper less than what they owe! We are already doing them a favor by not charging interest for them being late on paying taxes. We should have gotten that gold back in autumn!"

"Exactly," Zoricus grinned before looking at Ustaimo. "Tell them that if they aren't able to pay the full taxes at this time, we will have to charge triple the going rate of interest on the overdue amount, starting from when it was due back in autumn. That will make them fall in line easily enough." He smirked, "They have to follow the same rules as all the other barons living in the domain of Count Cinran - doesn't matter if Tiranat's new baron is a son of the Duke. That boy has to be a good-for-nothing if he was exiled to that place by the Duke, doesn't he?"

Ustaimo was smart enough not to give any answer to the rhetorical question. He never wanted to agree to any statement by Zoricus, but he also wouldn't risk his neck by criticising the Duke's decisions. It just wasn't his place as a commoner to question any nobles.

Zoricus continued with a shrug. "Anyway, you shouldn't have too many problems in recovering the taxes with the knights supporting you. From what I've heard from my sources in Ulriga, most likely that boy Kivamus doesn't care about anything else as long as he gets his regular supply of wine and a few whores to accompany him. Just threaten him that you will take those away if he doesn't pay the gold, and you should be able to recover everything." He smirked again. "Regardless, it's not our problem if they don't have enough gold to pay our taxes. If that's the case, just bring a couple dozen villagers of Tiranat as slaves when you return, and we should be able to recover our overdue taxes by selling them in the marketplace here."

As much as he wanted to, Ustaimo kept quiet and did not point out that it was the Count whose taxes were overdue, not Zoricus'. No matter how much leeway that fat bastard thought he got by giving loans to the Count, as Cinran's tax collector, he did not report to Zoricus! As of now he still worked for the Count. He pointedly looked towards Ebirtas. "It will be as you wish, milord. If you give me three or four knights, I will bring back all the gold, no matter what. Or I'll bring enough slaves to cover for any shortfall."

Zoricus smirked. "That's the way you should be thinking!"

The knight commander frowned. "Do you really need four knights for this?" Looking at the Count, he added worriedly, "With everything that's going on in the east, we don't really have many free knights to spare for anywhere else right now..."

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"I know that," Count Ebirtas nodded, "but this is just as necessary as protecting our borders. Getting that 1300 gold will go a long way to keep paying for the knights and our other armed men." Once the knight commander gave a nod of agreement, the Count looked at Ustaimo and waved him off. "Well, carry on then. You will get the knights to accompany you when you are ready to leave."

Understanding that he had been dismissed, Ustaimo began to get up, while the Count looked towards the knight commander.

"We really need that gold from Tiranat," Ebirtas commented, "it will help us a lot in arming our knights better. Especially in these troubling times."

"Certainly milord," the commander agreed. "Binpaaz is getting bolder and bolder these days. We never know when..."

Ustaimo was walking towards the door while listening to the conversation, but the door opened before he even reached there, and a squire walked inside with a worried look on his face. Ustaimo turned around and looked curiously as the squire quickly walked to the knight commander and whispered something in his ear.

"What did you say!" The commander roared while looking at the squire. "There were a dozen Binpaazi knights seen near the eastern outpost just yesterday?"

The squire nodded weakly. "They had already set a few local huts on fire by the time the scouts at the outpost chased them away, but we still don't know if they returned to their country after that or not."

Ustaimo wanted to stay back and listen to what they decided to do about this, but Zoricus looked towards him with a raised eyebrow. "That will be all, Ustaimo. Close the door on your way out."

Ustaimo simmered inside on being ordered by the money-grubbing baron. He should have already expected that a commoner like him would never be allowed to participate in serious matters, but he did not work for that fat bastard, damn it! How dare Zoricus order him!

However, with the news the squire had brought, he knew that this was no time to protest against his treatment to Count Ebirtas, whose forehead lines and wrinkles around his eyes had gotten even deeper after hearing the news, which just went to show that the Count really was getting too old by now.

Giving a sigh, Ustaimo turned around towards the door and started walking again, not giving any acknowledgement of Zoricus' order. He worked for the Count, not that gluttonous baron. As he exited the hall, he reminded himself that he still had a lot of work to complete before he left for Tiranat, and that's what he should focus on instead of the impudence of that fat bastard.

Taking care of all the accounts and balances of the Count's treasury, as well as recovering the overdue taxes from some merchants in Cinran was only a small part of it. While it was certainly very concerning that a dozen Binpaazi knights had entered Reslinor, that was for the knight commander and the Count to worry about. This was hardly the first time it had happened, but the increasing frequency of such raids did mean that the coming times were not going to be easy for Reslinor. But like he had done for all his life, he would just focus on his own tasks, and keep his head low. That was the only way for a commoner like him to keep surviving in this place.

*******

~ Kivamus ~

Kivamus was taking a round of the manor around noon while waiting for Hudan and enjoying a rare day where the sun had come out from behind the ever-present clouds of the long winter in Tiranat. Although the sunlight barely held any warmth in it today, it still felt nice for a change after seeing the cloudy sky for so long. It also hadn't snowed for many days by now, and hopefully, it wouldn't be long before the gathered snow on the ground started to melt and merchants from Cinran started coming again.

Feroy had left for Kirnos in the morning with a total of eight guards protecting the caravan, including the ex-mercenary and Hyola. While Duvas had still been frowning when seeing a woman being sent along with the caravan, Hyola had been overjoyed to get the opportunity to show her prowess with a crossbow in case there was a bandit ambush. It was true that protecting the caravan better was certainly the major factor behind Kivamus' decision to order the young woman to be added in the protection detail of the small caravan, but he also wanted the local men to mentally accept women as their equals.

It would go a long way in ensuring gender equality in the future, which was going to be a primary requirement for TIranat to progress in the future. They just couldn't keep ignoring half the workforce just because they were women, especially when the village already had a serious labour shortage these days.

Anyway, the caravan should reach Kirnos by tomorrow afternoon or evening, and hopefully they would remain safe, despite Duvas' fears that sending a woman out of the village on the dangerous roads was certainly going to be a bad decision.