A Promise of Iron by Brandon McCoy (the reading list .txt) 📕

I declared to the auditor I knew still to be listening. With a nod, Lira bent down and produced a leather mat and a pair of shallow clay bowls. She placed them on the countertop and folded her hands behind them. I opened the first two purses that held my Rukish currency and counted them along the edge of the leather mat. I counted five strips in iron, eight gold, nine silver, and seven copper left after the two and two paid for the borrowed iron. The loose bits I piled into one of the clay bowls.

I opened the last two purses that held my Cyllian coin and turned them out over the other bowl. What tumbled out was a menagerie of thinly pressed metal coins. I counted them out as I moved them into stacks: nine iron stars, six gold crowns, nine silver nobles, and one copper penny. I rounded up a few loose bits that had tumbled out and placed them in the bowl with the rest. I poked my finger around and counted out three more strips of copper, two in silver, one in gold, and two iron. In total, I had nearly ten and six, maybe ten and five in iron after the exchange tax. It was my entire life savings and more coin than I would make at the shop in a decade.

“Gods, Faerin, you have a fortune here,” she said, sliding the strips and coins down into the cut notches on her counter. With nimble fingers, she took the bits and placed them four at a time next to in the grooves sectioned for the primary metals. Now that all the pieces were in place, she reached below and pulled out the tablature she used for counting. She set it on the countertop and began flipping a series of polished colored stones from one side to the other- making tallies on a blank sheet of paper as she did so.

“I count ten and seven in Cyllian Iron, one crown, two nobles, and a copper bit,” she said as she finalized the count with her signature.

I grinned.

Once I paid for my ten, I would have about six iron stars left. With quins grace, I might have just enough to get a worn short sword in need of some work. Worse case, I could wait a few days and get a bronze longsword when the raid returned, and coppers reverted to their regular price. With a sword of my own, I could take some lesser commissions while working myself back into iron. In the end, I would have stars and a sword within six cycles of chasing iron.

I would have freedom, too; a writ of ownership came with a writ of passage. I would be free to travel the Empire, the real prize. Forhd was to be a temporary home, the only place I knew outside of Cyllia. The plan was to lay low while suspicion eased with the cooling of the grave. That was many years ago.

“That will be ten and six in iron, five crowns, and three nobles after the conversion tax,” she said.

I grinned again.

A six-point conversion tax was one of the lower exchange rates. Supply and demand and the controlled flow of currency held considerable sway on the value of the exchange, but more often, it was the war effort that truly governed the tax.

The lower the interest rate, the more likely the population would turn in strips and bits to be melted down and sent south. The more metal is flowing south, the more weapons and conscripts the military could procure. The higher the rate, the more likely people were to sit on what metal they had, which would lead to a costly acquisition warrant. These typically resulted in the loss of life more than any accumulation of wealth, however- not that the life of a Ruk was anything of value.

Considering all official transactions were conducted in Cyllian coin, there was always an influx of new metals, regardless of the exchange rate. The Cyllians were smart enough to know that you can milk a cow many times but butcher it only once. As dispassionate as they tended to be towards Ruks, depopulating a province to shake out a few extra coppers was just bad for business. Who would be left to farm? Who would be left to mine? Bureaucratic banditry was a far more effective method of lining the Imperial purse.

“How would you like them broken down?” she asked.

“Full stars, the rest in silver.”

She nodded and called out, “Changing ten and six irons.”

The fat auditor stood once more and ambled over. Lira repeated the gesture with her hands and stepped clear of the counter. The auditor took her ledger book as he looked over the stacked coins and strips in her tray.

“You did not apply the conversion tax to the bits,” he said with a blank expression.

Lira looked down at her feet as he left to retrieve the proper currency. I thought to say something, but her look said that silence was the only course of action. He returned a few moments later carrying a wooden tray with the count in hard Cyllian coin- the correct count. He set the tray on the counter, traded out the strips for coins, then took the reed pen from the inkwell and signed below her ledger book. With a final nod, he trotted back to his seat.

Lira resumed her place at the counter and slid the tray of coins towards me. “I can’t believe I botched the calculation.” She groaned. “Gods know what kind of reprimand that fat little toad will think of.”

“Sorry, Lira, I wish I could—”

“Don’t be, it’s not your fault,” she said as she grabbed her wooden divider. “But I’d better go put this fire out before it spreads.”

She placed the divider in the slot, closing off her counter.

This was not the first time she was reprimanded or likely the last. Luckily for her, she was of proper birth. Her reprimand