“A sign that someone has won your trust is when you could make arrangements for the distant future and still know that they would be there, as promised, without fail, come hell or high water.” - Old folk saying.
“Yeah, sorry about that. I’m afraid it might still take another generation or two before things change enough that they’d consider letting foreigners into the forest,” said Illydia apologetically when Aideen broached the topic about a possible visit to the forest. “If it’s any consolation, though, those on my side intend to make these trade runs to Alfheim a regular occurrence, with a caravan coming every week or so in the future, so you can like find us here if you need to contact us.”
“Good enough, I guess,” said Aideen with a nod of acquiescence. It was a distant possibility to begin with, and she only asked just in case it was actually possible. That the elves of the Great Emerald Forest still weren’t allowing foreigners in was well within her expectations. At least she had much more up to date news from the Forest thanks to Illydia and her people. “I assume you will also try to extend your trading routes, given time?”
“That is a contentious topic, but we are attempting to push for such an allowance, yeah,” said Illydia with a shake of her head. “It might not happen anytime this century, but we are hoping to include Boroes, Clangeddin, and maybe even the dwarven kingdom as part of our routes. It’s a rather difficult topic to broach, though. We will probably need to keep a bunch of councilors well-bribed for a couple more decades at the least before this could become an actual possibility.”
“I can imagine that,” replied Aideen with an amused chuckle. Regardless of the race, corruption and bribery remained relatively commonplace barring exceptions like Ptolodecca, though one benefit of actually having corrupt people was that the flaw could actually be used for good, at times. It would have been much harder to get the long-lived and stubborn elves of the forest to agree to such changes if not for some of them wanting their bribes to keep flowing.
“If you do run into one of our caravans in the future and you don’t see anyone you recognize, just mention my name. I think I should be in a good position to stay alive at least for my natural age,” added Illydia with a chuckle of her own, alluding to how her caravans had gotten so profitable that there was little chance that anyone would try to get rid of her at this point.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Will do. Have a good trip, Illydia,” said Aideen in farewell as the elven woman hopped on board one of the caravans and headed out to the north, on her way back to the Great Emerald Forest.
The information Aideen got out of their conversations was plentiful, and the youths inside the forest wanting change was a good sign for the future. Change took time, so she knew better than to force things, and besides she had all the time in the world anyway. As such, she temporarily shelved ideas to visit the Forest out of her mind and readjusted her plans for the time being.
Given the distance, Aideen did not exactly need anything from the elves of either Alfheim or the Great Emerald Forest for her plans, but if she could get some sort of working relationship, be it some sort of alliance or acknowledgement of status, it would still help a great deal. With Alfheim’s development into a major trade hub, it was easy enough to work some deals with them.
For that purpose, Aideen and Illydia had met with representatives from some of the largest elven-owned trading houses in Alfheim just two days ago, in the evening. The trading houses were ones Illydia already worked with, and what Aideen offered was a potential trading partner that would be able to supply them with rare items found only in the Forest of Despair, after her plans came to fruition.
It was not a plan for the short term, as Aideen could only give an estimate within the next four to five centuries or so at the latest, but the elven traders were used to such ideas, and were far more receptive of it compared to other merchants. They discussed Aideen’s plans and were satisfied with the sort of preparations she was making, which gave them confidence that her plans would indeed work out, given time.
Mere acknowledgement of the nascent city-state’s independent status after it was built in exchange for favorable tariffs and trade deals was something those merchants found to be an extremely acceptable arrangement, since it basically cost them nothing for a good amount of potential benefits. That none of those benefits would be available anytime soon was of no importance to them, as they planned for the long term, as was their habit.
Aideen also made promises to contact Illydia once more in the future once she founded her own city, to see if they could collaborate together. Of course, that required Aideen to have succeeded in her goals and Illydia to have succeeded in getting permission for her trading caravans to venture much farther than they were allowed presently, but those were worries for the future.
Both of them were confident that they would succeed, given time and effort, and neither woman was likely to come up short on the effort side of the equation. Aideen was Unliving, while Illydia was still very young for an elf, only around two and a half centuries old. She still had at least six or seven more centuries ahead of her, more likely than not, which was plenty of time to make her dreams come true.
As Aideen watched the elven caravan ride out of Alfheim towards the Great Emerald Forest in the north, she reminded herself once more of the promises she made, for she had every intention to keep them.