1 Soul Bound
1.1 Finding her Feet
1.1.6 An Innocent Profaned
1.1.6.11 Fair exchanges
A little while later Tomsk came in to check on her, and he held her until she was ready to move. It felt rather nice being held so protectively by him. He was always there for her. After ten minutes or so, guilt kicked her in the shin and she could make no more excuses to herself for why she should keep lying down, so she got up and they went outside to see how Nicolo was doing.
Nicolo, it turned out, was playing tag with a pale faced teenager with gangly limbs and worn hand-me-down clothes. The teenager had a remarkably mobile expressive face, and he had Nicolo in stitches, barely able to walk for laughing, by putting on a series of impressions. Now he was the cook waddling and shaking a spoon, now he was the old nightwatchman on his steady cautious patrol, now he was Vittoria, working up a storm and hugging all the little ones.
Kafana walked over to an amused Vittoria and asked: “Who’s that? He’s fantastic with the young ones, isn’t he?”
Vittoria: “Pierre’s one of us. He grew up here. He had to leave 2 years ago, because the Sanctum can’t afford to support the kids past the age of 14 when they can become apprentices and support themselves. But he always comes back here, every chance he gets. We’re the only family he has, the only ones who accept him rather than try to change him. I just wish we were the only ones he trusted not to screw him over.”
Tomsk: “There’s someone he’s now also trusting, who is not worthy of that trust?”
Vittoria: “Perhaps. The day he turned 15, we received an unexpected visit from an important man. He’s a pharmacist, known for healing difficult cases, but he’s also a lot more than that. They call him Dottore. He said that he’d heard of the lad who didn’t talk, and wanted to see what he could do to help him. He offered to take Pierre in and give him a way to earn his living, and so the lad accepted. He’d always been made fun of for not talking, by those not used to him. He was sick of being treated as stupid. How could he say no?”
Tomsk: “So he went with this Dottore. What happened?”
Vittoria: “I don’t know. But it has been a year, and he still doesn’t speak. More to the point, Dottore loaned him out to the Messengers Guild, where day after day he keeps being sent on dangerous missions. I fear for him. He stops by us each time on the way out of the city, and I always set someone to watch for him by the gate, so I know he’s returned safely.”
Pierre had changed into a Messengers Guild uniform now, leaving his old clothes behind again, waiting for the next time he returned to play, gave Nicolo a big hug, and headed south with a distance eating lope, his long limbs finding their purpose in life.
Antonio, who’d been talking with Bungo while Nicolo played, now went over to him and had a brief conversation with him too, before giving him a fierce hug and heading off as well.
Bungo came over to join Kafana, Tomsk and Vittoria, leaving Bulgaria and Wellington still answering questions from the orphans about the village of Celleno and its offer to teach them farming.
Bungo: “What’s dangerous about the missions the Messengers Guild sends him on? I thought that, by tradition, messengers stayed neutral in affairs between Houses and were pretty much untouchable, partially because attacking them would violate Cov’s taboo against violating the laws of hospitality, but mainly because by treaty everyone else in the city is obliged to help destroy the party that attacked the messenger?”
Wellington joined them: “Traditionally, yes. But according to Marco, it can still happen if the stakes are high enough. It just means that killing the messenger and sending them to respawn isn’t enough. Either you delay them non-violently so you don’t get attacked, or you go all the way and assassinate the messenger so there are no witnesses left to testify against you. Or stage an accident. Or use a cat’s paw. There are a number of methods.”
Tomsk: “So what missions is Pierre being sent on?”
Vittoria: “Carrying ship manifests from Punto Reale to The Azioni. It’s the most dangerous route the guild has. Five messengers have gone missing in the last seven months.”
Kafana had been getting a nasty premonition, and she had to ask:
“You said the lad’s name is Pierre?”
Vittoria: “Yes, our innocent little Pierre.”
Nicolo: “You grew up with him, Vittoria. Nobody else calls him that.”
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Tomsk: “What do they call him, Nicolo?”
Nicolo piped up, as though it were obvious: “Pierrot. He’s Pierrot.”
Bungo: {Pierrot? As in the guy The Immortals are going to ambush?}
Kafana replied angrily: {Not “ambush” Bungo. “Torture then permanently kill”. Get your wording right.}
Bungo: {You’re not going to let this drop, are you?}
Kafana: “Wellington, explain the stakes to me here. I have a feeling it is going to be important, so use simple words, please.”
Wellington explained: “There are 4 exchanges in Torello.”
“The largest is The Azioni. Suppose someone, let’s call her Alice, owns a company and wants to retire. The company is being run for her by a manager called Carole, but Carole can’t afford to buy the company from Alice, and Alice wants to buy a nice house in a country where she can relax. She needs to find someone to sell the company to, but what if no one person can afford the whole thing?”
“Alice can divide the ownership of the company into 10,000 shares and then sell some of those shares directly to Bob. Both Alice and Bob end up with a copy of a signed, witnessed contract which gets registered at an office in Centrale, and Bob can sue the company if Carole doesn’t send Bob his share of any dividends. Bob knows that if he finds himself in need of some quick cash, he might not be able to find another buyer, Dave, to sell the shares onto. Bob also knows that if the company goes bust, he will end up with a share of the debt owed by the company. So under those circumstances, Bob is unlikely to offer Alice a good price, and her retirement will be hard.”
“But if Alice’s company is large and profitable enough, she may be able to get it listed on The Azioni. The company will have to meet certain conditions, but in return the maximum debt the company can end up owing will be limited and the exchange will match up people wanting to sell shares in ownership of the company with people wanting to buy those shares, thus producing a ‘market price’ at which the supply matches the demand. Because Bob can look at how this price has varied over time, he gains confidence in how much your company will be worth in the future, were he wanting to find a Dave to sell his shares onto, so buying them doesn’t seem so risky to him and he ends up offering Alice a good price for 40% ownership, leaving Alice to enjoy an easy retirement sipping wine in her new villa.”
“The nominal head of The Azioni is Ugolino Trinci; it is actually run by a board consisting of representatives of all Torello’s exchanges, the 5 largest companies, the 6 houses primus, and 5 guilds representing shipping lines, accountants, lawyers, bankers and traders. It is one of the oldest and most tradition bound institutions in Torello, with by-laws governing its meetings that, together with the commentaries and records of precedents, fill most of a small library.”
Kafana grew afraid he'd start listing each one and, hoping to indicate she understood and hint that it was definitely time to move on, she nodded as firmly as she could. His expression didn't so much as flicker, leaving her wondering if he'd not understood or just not felt it was unnecessary to let her know that he had.
“The second oldest exchange is The Bancario, in Mercato, whose nominal head is Pantalone. It is actually run jointly by the guilds, although it has always been hosted at the goldsmiths guild. It started off as a precious metals exchange, although it soon branched out into facilitating the exchange of coins and promissory notes from accredited banks in other cities. If you are a ship’s captain newly arrived from Kalzburg, and you want to exchange a large quantity of gold bars and notes upon a Teutonic bank for silver bars and local Etruscan coins, you go to The Bancario.”
“Then there’s The Titulos, also in Mercato, nominally run by Kafana’s friend, Claudio Landi. He’s not a usurer himself. What he does is help match up companies who need money to expand their business with investors who are willing to buy the bond documents issued by the companies that promise to pay back the debt, plus interest, by a certain date. You’d expect that exchange to have been run by the banks, but there was too much conflict of interest for people to trust them to be their own watchdogs.”
She fixed an alert expression upon her face and settled back, picking out just the bits that seemed most relevant and letting the rest wash past, just as she did for Daris on the rare occasion he wanted to voice all the worries he had for his relatives, naming each of his grandchildren in turn, and each member of their families. You could always ask again about a detail, if later it turned out to be more important than you'd thought.
“And finally there’s The Sostanza down in the Arsenal, nominally run by Fabrizio Ruffo, and rumoured to be run by a syndicate of crime families. That’s probably just slander, but the Sostanza keeps its dealings private and its books closed. They list prices on all fungible commodities stored in bulk in the Arsenal’s warehouses or held on board ship just outside the city’s jurisdiction. Including metals, much to the annoyance of The Bancario.”
“There’s a legal battle that’s been waged for decades between House Ruffo and House Trinci over paying taxes and tariffs, and allowing inspections for illegal or embargoed goods. Trinci say that Ruffo is a law breaking parasite. Ruffo say the cargoes going through the private wharves owned by noble houses on Alto never receive more than a token inspection, and that Trinci are just suppressing the free trade that’s always been the city’s true source of wealth.”
Kafana spoke up as brightly as she could, to prove she'd been paying attention: "So that's all four of them. Azioni - shares. Bancario - currency. Titulos - bonds. Sostanza - commodities. They're old, they're rich and they never change?"
Bungo: "Something must have changed. If it were random, there wouldn't be such a clear change in the pattern of attacks upon messengers."
Wellington's expression still didn't alter but, unlike her, Bungo received a slight nod, as if Wellington had rated his comment as being just worthy enough to acknowledge. Kafana felt her own expression droop.