Part MMXVIII: Of Spirals and Bells
Of Spirals and Bells
First Day of the Third Month 293 AC
The deal is swiftly struck, the notion of salvaging any and all plunder from the giants met with some ambivalence, since most of it would have been stolen from House Adjar's caravans to begin with. However, on the other end of the scales you had no way of knowing how much of said plunder the Steel Gougers had squandered. Shaitans are not by natural inclination gamblers and thus as you had hoped are more willing to accept previous losses as permanent as opposed to paying a fixed sum and then hope to recover more of it from the coffers of their enemies.
Unfortunately the request for books on dragon lore proves to be far more of a stumbling block than you had assumed, since Alyneah's bothers do not possess the texts, instead having studied in the Endless Spiral, an ancient repository of lore built within the Opaline Vault where one may only study a book of the vast collection so long as one brings a copy of an equally valuable text as tribute, and even more strangely where one may never take any more knowledge than 'can fit the breadth of one's mind'.
On hearing this Lya's eyes flash with a refined form of greed at the secrets that must be held within mixed with the outrage that it would be so strenuously guarded. "...most senseless thing I ever heard. The more knowledge is spread the more others will be inspired to expand upon it," she mutters under her breath in the tongue of her birth.
For her part Alyneah looks on with the the distant sympathy of one recognizing sincere passion thwarted, though she does not share it. "Our own libraries might be opened for a price of course, though I imagine you might wish to wait until you have more time to study them."
"Yes, that would probably be for the best," Lya says sheepishly as she hands her list of reagents over the table. Rather than a single piece of parchment it had grown to something resembling a small book, with the handful of mundane trade items scribbled in the back. Among them is iron for the legions, gold and jewels to hopefully begin a new luxury craft that would, besides dyes and liquor, revitalize Tyroshi trade.
Thinking of precious metals, something prods your memory... a plant that would not be much use in this city where silver and even gold is counted a base metal, but it might be of great worth indeed if brought to the world under the sun. "I find myself interested in rare flowers, if one of your agents could find the blooms known as silverbells...."
The shaitan lady's face darkens at the words, not in anger but concern you think, though it is no easy thing to read a countenance of stone. "Be wary what you feed those..." to your surprise she glances at Xor. "There is a history of a sorcerer who sought to use the fecund flesh drawn from Beyond to make of it silver for his uses."
"I take it that did not end well?" Xor asks, almost seeming to wilt under the reminder that most interactions with his realm end poorly for those constrained to the spheres.
"The event is marked as 'The War of Rotted Silver' in the Halls of Remembrance..." she explains shortly. Not lightly does such as a colossus as the Peerless Empire proclaims something a war.
"I can assure you, my lady, that none here have any interest in meddling with the boundaries to That Which is Beyond, nor was my own entrance into the Spheres facilitated by any of my friends," Xor is quick to assure her. "We met by serendipity you might say."
"Given your courtesy I can well believe it," Alyneah nods with a smile. "I will see to it that our agents seek this flower or at least news of its location."
"One more request then," you reply. "This city we find ourselves in is built as much of laws as stone and metal, thus to avoid any accidental mishaps I would very much desire a copy of them," you add with a touch of careful flattery.
"All of it?" the shaitan lady asks, almost disbelieving. "Commercial law alone is over five-hundred-thousand tablets. I must confess I never thought to ask what the full scope of it is as the precious revelation played a part in taking up the glaive," a fleeting smile passes over her somber features. "I reasoned that at least here I would be able to stab some of the things that make my life difficult."
The jest is so unexpected it even draws a smile from Ser Richard.
How do you wish to handle the project of transcribing the laws of the Peerless Empire?
[] Reveal the Calligraphy Wyrms and set them to the task
[] Pay to have it transcribed
-[] In full
-[] Only certain portions (Write in)
[] Let the matter drop for now
[] Write in
OOC: The mage who used aberration growths to make his silver was not entirely insane. Organic life is not that much more common pound for pound than silver on the Plane of Earth.
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