“That's a lot of iron,” Ravina whispered as she looked over the financial report. It was simple, two scraps of paper really. Simple and easy, right on top of a few other documents the butler had pulled for her. Yet these two slips of paper was all that she needed to see a certain pattern.
“Seit.” She called when she saw the slow degrade. “Call for that one guy, the miner.”
“Kelmin?” Siet asked to confirm.
“Yes, Kelmin,” Ravina confirmed. Rising from her seat turned to the maid. “See if you can have him meet me today.”
“I don't… I’ll try.” She hesitated for a moment, then agreed. Hoping the butler would be able to guide her as she left the room.’
“I'm sure I’m right,” Ravina whispered. “I mean it seems a little obvious, and yet…” It seemed too obvious. If she could figure this out then anyone could, so why wasn't it thought of before? Ravina paced in thought, walking the length between the window and her door. Could this be the answer to this test?
Ravina tested the durability of her floor until her maid returned with a knock.
Φ Φ Φ Φ Φ
Kelmin once again found himself in the blue room of the Ravenshield Manor. In the past week, he wore his father's old suit more times than he ever did before. He barely had time to dress properly and when the house butler greeted him he dragged him into another room to fix his suit. Somehow he made the old suit fit him better. In those five minutes, the man fussed over him and dropped him off in the blue room. Some might even mistake him as respectable.
The butler led him into the room, announcing his name to the girl who was already there waiting for him. “Ah, Mr. Kelmin you have been well I presume.” She said, greeting him with a smile. Her maid had already prepared tea for them and Ravina had just finished a cup.
“Y-yes ma’am. I’ve been well,” he answered, twirling the hat he held in his hand.
“That's good, please have a seat.” Ravina offered, indicating the chair in front of her. Kelmin did as she asked. Walking over and sinking into the blue leather seat.
With a bow, Mathus bid his farewell, “Then I shall leave you to it, my lady.”
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“Yes, thank you.” With that the butler closed the door behind him, leaving Ravina, Kelmin, and Seit alone. The adult in the room was more nervous than the children. After all, they held the most power here.
“Please enjoy the tea.” Ravina offered. “I think I have a theory on what may have happened with the mines. But first I want to confirm something with you.” She pushed forward the copies of the mine export reports. “Can you review these and tell me what you think?”
Kelmin pulled the papers and reviewed them. “It's very… generalized.” he noticed as he looked over the large, overview reports. “Usually they need to keep a weekly track on…huh.” Kelmin fell into silence as he looked between the reports.
“Well?” Ravina asked, unable to wait for him to look over the documents any longer. It was just two slips of paper.
“Well,” Kelmin frowned, his lips twitching. “It looks like both mines are starting to dry up.”
“Yes, that's what I thought.” Ravina clapped her hands together, causing the nervous man to jump a little. She continued excitedly. “It seems that it falls at least half a percent per month.”
“Half a percent?” Kelmin raised an eyebrow. “Well whatever that is, it's falling steadily. Have they been dropping people?”
“I don't know about that. The Goldwel did hire three more people and I don't think Venchenci would want to fire anyone as they are more of a legacy thing than anything else.”
“Well, if the workers did not decrease then it might mean the mines are drying up.”
“And both parties would notice this? I mean I don't know much about mine and I figured it out.”
“Well, there could be additional factors, some mining companies like to slow down the operation for market costs. Pulling a stop to the sale can help raise the price or deeper mining efforts can cause a slowdown. There could also be a problem with the workers or payments, some people try to stop working when they think they deserve more money. Hardly works though, plenty of young blood going around these days.”
“Oh.” Ravina's heart fell. She was sure she had it but it seemed…
“Still, that doesn't make sense for both of them. You said they collapsed into each other? So they're close. Selling less makes sense for Goldwel, it's a large company and these numbers make sense for something like that. They can affect the market and store up some good ore—or even sell it on the sly, report a little then export the rest to sell in another country.”
“Is that even legal?”
“Oh hell no—oh I mean n-no. Ahem, it's just yeah, yes. But it can be profitable. Any-anyways the large company might do something like that but this smaller one, Venchenci won’t care to do something like that. They might if they were in league with Goldwel, but because of the complaint I don't see why they would rush a mine for this.”
“I see… so the mines are definitely running dry?”
“Definitely is a strong word,” Kelmin hesitated. “But if I had to say I would bet on it. Still, there are a lot of unknown factors we don't know about.”
“But you're saying there's a chance.”
“More than likely. Although…” Ravina was starting to not like this man. “I just can't be sure with this… it's so generalized. Why is it only showing months?”
“It's our house records. There not much time for me to get there.”
“I see… yeah… I… huh…”
For the next few minutes, Ravina had to struggle through the miner’s indecisive nature.