“Every Arborean slave in the Petty Queendom of Lull will be released and become a freeman of the state, furthermore, if they wish to maintain their work on the mine, they will now be remunerated with two scudi per month for their contributions. As freemen, they are granted the right to travel and may leave the state if they so desire. Are these terms satisfactory?” I ask Casteddu, who decided to sit down on the grass as we made our final arrangements.

I wish I could remunerate them for their past work, somehow. But with the current treasure paying them for all their and their ancestor’s work is simply not feasible, that will need to wait until a little bit later, I guess.

To properly heal the wounds of hatred, you cannot simply brush the matter under the rug and let bygones be bygones, as a show of respect and for the satisfaction of my own code of ethics. I will pay them for every piece of ore they have ever mined for us.

“How can we be sure you will not renege on the deal?” He was still trying to ensure the safety of his people, ever a good negotiator.

“We can not pay you immediately, as we did not bring sufficient money from the treasury. However, as promised, we have brought some of the surplus grain in the silo of Sarda here, to ensure no Arborean will go hungry for the time being. Once we get to Algatolla we will send back another party with your salaries for this month in advance.” I point to the cart standing beside us, as a show of goodwill I sent Miles back to Sarda to organize a party to transport grain up to here, serfs came with a cart loaded with many sacks that were now being unloaded and brought to the Arboreans’ shacks.

Casteddu looks down, deep in thought.

“To ensure we will keep to our end of the bargain, I also wish you to accompany us. If that’s alright.”

“How can I be sure this isn’t a trap?”

“To some extent, you will simply need to believe me. Instead of killing you, I would much rather offer you a new job, honestly.”

“A new job?” Casteddu betrays some surprise.

“You can read and write, you are one of the Arboreans that was recently bought from slavers, right?”

He nods, “My father was a wealthy merchant back in the Kingdom of Tatari, we were traveling in one of our ships when we were attacked by pirates, my father and most of the crew was killed, I and a few other lucky ones were simply knocked unconscious and then taken as slaves.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

He just closes his eyes and nods once again.

“You can read and write, are a great negotiator and seem to be very knowledgeable, keeping you in this mine is a waste. Do any of the other Arboreans here have any skills of use?”

One of them in the back pipes up, “Sossu, you were a stonemason right?” Another one of them stood up, I guess that’s him.

“Casteddu and Sossu, I’d like to hire both of you. Casteddu as a new minister and Sossu as a stonemason, six scudi per month.”

Miles, who is standing next to me, whispers, “Your Majesty, a Snakeman-”

“Arborean,” I interject.

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“An… Arborean minister?”

“If he agrees to it.” I look back to Casteddu, who himself looks to Sossu, they nod to each other and Casteddu turns his silvery eyes back to me. “This is satisfactory, we will accompany you. To make sure you keep your end of the deal and also as your employees.”

So far, so good. Although promising salaries to people is not ideal either. In the end, even if this brings greater economic prosperity in the short term, there will be problems in the long run, all power in this island still rests with me for now. A benevolent dictator is still a dictator. So I should fix this as soon as possible.

That gives me an idea though.

“I would like a representative of the miners to accompany us, too.”

“A representative?”

“Since you are now minister and stonemason, you are no longer miners. I want someone who will stay a miner to come with us to act as their representative, he will stay with us for a couple months before coming back here.”

“Do you have anyone in mind?”

I look at the mass of Arboreans standing some distance away, “Anyone is fine, you can choose among yourselves for someone you think will be a good representative, I will respect your decision.”

They look a bit confused, Casteddu stands up and walks to the mass of people behind him, they start discussing on their own, huddled so I can't overhear. After a while, Casteddu walks back to me with Sossu and another Arborean, this one a bit on the short side for their species.

“This is Bastia, he will be the representative.”

“Very good,” I turn to Kavanagh “Let us go back to Sarda to organize regular deliveries of food here, this cart of grain won’t last forever. I also want to meet with some people.” Kavanagh kneels and accepts my order and our party prepares to depart.

We go back to Sarda and organize deliveries with the local administrator, under the supervision of Casteddu to ensure no foul play. I then ask the administrator to go send messengers to Piana and Isola further north. The serfs in those regions should convene and choose a representative amongst them, who will travel to Algatolla and will need to stay there for a couple months, the representative’s family will be compensated with some grain from the local silo to make up for their absence.

That last point makes the administrator look at me weird, I guess since they are serfs I’m supposed to just move them around at my will, but that’s too brutish.

Likewise, I round up some of the serfs here in Sarda and ask them to pick a representative, someone they all know and trust, a real pillar of the community kind of person. After some discussion a man called Mahon steps up, I give him the same speech about him coming with me to Algatolla for a while, he readily agrees once I talk about his family being compensated, apparently that really is unusual around here.

I will do the same once we reach Tristan, and get someone in Algatolla, too. Then I just wait for the Piana and Isola people and I can start my plan.

With all that done, we finally depart. A most unusual caravan of 10 humans, soon to be 11, and 3 Arboreans, though you would be forgiven for mistaking it for two caravans that are simply traveling right after one another, the humans and Arboreans are still wary of each other, I guess that much is to be expected.

As we don’t have enough horses for everyone anymore we simply have them carry our supplies while most of us walk. Kavanagh insists that a Queen should not have to march on her own feet, and so I’m the only one still riding, with my horse slowly trotting along, led by a stalwart Kavanagh.

I guess I shouldn’t complain about this little stuff, I should give my knight a break from my constant challenges. It’s a good opportunity to rest too, stuff is gonna get busy soon.

Why am I doing this again? I’m usually not this proactive…

For the people, right, right. I can’t let the lazy routine I had back in Earth start back up, there’s a lot of people who depend on me right now.

Either way, this whole trip was very worthwhile. A literate person and a stonemason! However reckless my actions were, they helped the queendom tremendously, we were wasting resources by keeping those two there. They will greatly help me modernize Lull.

Especially a mason, that was a nice find. However knowledgeable I am, as a modern person, I have huge gaps in my knowledge. I know some stuff about historical metallurgy and even some basic geology but I’ve never worked a furnace or constructed a building before.

I was planning to just trial and error stuff over and over using my incomplete knowledge, but with someone with real experience, the whole process will be much easier, even if he doesn’t know what a blast furnace or a cement kiln is yet, once I show him it shouldn’t take long.

No woman is an island, I nod to myself, which elicits a weird look from the people around me. From the very beginning, the quickest path to progress is by relying on others.