The Vanadium Mines

Contents

Cast of Characters

Galoopius's Proposal

13th July 2478

"I own a Vanadium mine," Galoopius says. He smiles and raises a glass of ice water to his lips.

"Congratulations," Wicklow says.

They sit in the living room of Galoopius's mansion in Dakka, but Galoopius is not master of the mansion today. He has leased his property and its servants to Global Mediation Incorporated from 9th June to 1st September. So he finds himself a guest in his own house. He has come from the mountains of Gowachin to make a business proposal. Sitting upon the couches in the living room are Hocus, Wicklow, Jack, and Heraklese. Martha, Jessica, and Stanley have gone with Bonita to a party at her parents' house. Sallina and Garibaldi have hitched a ride on a journeyman sailing ship to Godiva, to visit their children. Galoopius himself looks well. He appears younger than when they saw him last, in November of the previous year. He has lost more weight too. He is still rotund, but not obese.

Galoopius sets his glass down upon a laquered side table. "Ten years ago, when times were good, this mine I own produced a profit of ten thousand guineas a year. My wife's cousin on her father's side owned it. Now it's almost worthless. The mine is still there, in reasonable condition, from what I gather, and there are a dozen staff and a foreman, a woman actually, who remain loyal to it, but there is no mining."

"Why did you buy it?" Hocus says.

Galoopius laughs. "Because I had it for a good price. My wife's cousin is Viscount Larkin of Mittelmarch, one of the nations in the Dukedomes of Weiland. It is in the foothills of the Kratanak mountains. There are five vanadium mines in this little nation, and none of them are being worked. Lord Larkin fled the nation and came to stay with my wife. It was he who sold me the mine. I paid him ten thousand guineas for it. And that's why I'm here: I propose that you arrange to fix whatever troubles Mittelmarch is facing and get the mine working again. After that, we'll split the profits for ten years."

Wicklow nods. "Interesting."

"Okay," Heraklese says. "Tell us the full story."

Galoopius stares at his hands for a moment before he begins. "Let me start with the Duchess Lucinda Bowles. She has been on the seat of power, if you can call it that, for fifteen years. During that time, she appears to have so mismanaged her accounts that the is in debt to her neighbors."

"Her neighbors?" Heraklese says. "Do you mean, Sally the Washermoman down the street, and His Lordship the Rich?"

The language they are speaking is Latin, which is indeed the language of Belgorash. But Heraklese's Latin has a strong Accent, and Galoopius has to consider before he understands it. "No, I mean the neighboring nations, and some banks as well, actually, if you want to know, or so the Viscount tells me."

"Go on," Jack says."To meet her obligations, she raised taxes. She taxed the rich and the poor. Everyone in the nation was upset about it. And she taxed the vanadium mines. As I said, there are five of them. And vanadium is rare, I hear. There are no other vanadium mines on the west side of the Kratanak Mountains, and the dwarf city east of Mittelmarch buys all that the mines can produce."

Hocus nods. "How big is Mittelmarch."

Galoopius frowns. "I don't know. I'll have to find out. I have been in communication with a friend of Viscount Larkin in Mittelmarch city, asking him about the deeds of the mine, the history of profits, the health of the staff, and the state of the nation's accounts, but I have not thought to ask how big the country is."

"Do you know the population?"

"No. More than ten thousand, but not a million. That would be my guess."

"Go on," Jack says.

"Duchess Lucinda raised the taxes on the poor, but in court, the juries refused to convict their peers of tax evasion, so the tax could not be levied. She came to rely upon the tax on the vanadium mines, which were owned by the aristocracy, who were unwilling to defy her. Her tax was ten percent when she inherited the seat from her father. Two years ago she raised it to eighty percent. Viscount Larkin's income was greatly reduced, but he kept spending as he always had. He has no head for money. This spring he gave his entire estate to the Duchess in payment of back taxes and left the country. He took with him the deeds to his mine. He left behind him a staff that continues to maintain the mine without pay. I don't know how they are surviving. Maybe they are sneaking the stuff out."

"Why don't they mine it?" Jack says.

"Ah, well, that's the interesting bit. Whenever any of the mines try to produce vanadium, criminals come and vandalize the mine. Some miners have been killed. It seems that the people are so dissatisfied with their duchess that they want to starve her out by stopping the mines from producing. Viscount Larkin said the vandals were just criminals, but according to my agent in Mittelmarch, the criminals have the people on their side."

"So what is the Duchess doing about it?" Wicklow says.

"She sends her soldiers to guard the mines, but the people, or the criminals still get in. They appear to be clever. The dwarves in the mountains to the east became so displeased by the lack of vanadium that they sent their own troops to protect the mines. At this point, the people and the Duchess found common cause, and drove the dwarves out, with considerable cost in life, from what I hear, although I don't know the details."

"Dwarves were killed?" Wicklow says.

"I think so," Galoopius says.

Heraklese says, "Why did the Duchess fight the dwarves if they were protecting her source of revenue?"

"I don't know," Galoopius says, "That's a good question. Out of patriotism, perhaps. I don't know. So, after that, the mines operated for a while, but then the criminals stopped them. That's about the time that Viscount Larkin sold his estate and left. Six months later, he solde the mine to me, but only after I spent two months finding an agent in Mittlemarch and checking that his story and his ownership and his right to sell the mine to me were genuine. Of that I am now satisfied. I am indeed the owner, and all it takes is for the political problems of Mittlemarch to resolve themselves, and I will make a good profit."

Wicklow nods. "And that's where we come in."

"Yes. My wife is not so pleased with my purchase. I spent ten thousand guineas on it, and our expenses are substantial. For domestic peace, I want this mine to show a profit as soon as possible. That's why I thought of you."

Our heroes ask more questions, and Galoopius does his best to answer them. They agree to meet with him again in a few days, after they have tried to confirm his story for themselves. They talk also of his antiquities, in hushed voices, and of Stockandsteel, who is living up in the kobold village.

"I made an effort to befriend him," Galoopius says, "He's polite, but he's shown no interest in keeping company with me. It's a pity. I miss talking to Dreadmanifold. He was always interesting, if terrifying."

"Stockandsteel is cranky," Jack says.

On his way out of the house, Galoopius takes time to enter the small room to the side of the entrance hall, where an image of Polyamen, Goddess of Belgorash, sits in an alcove with a prayer mat in front of it. He lights an insence stick and kneels for a full five minutes. Our heroes wait for him outside.

"Thank you," Galoopius says, when he emerges, rubbing his knees. "I have missed her, as she is here."

"You're welcome," Jack says.

The two sons of the butler stand beside the doorway. Galoopius ruffles their hair and gives them each a silver piece as he leaves.

Research

One of the first things our heroes do is go to the Belgorash Library and look for books about the Dukedomes of Weiland. Wicklow reads the following in one of them.

Five ranks of peer exist in the Dukedoms of Weiland, in descending order, these are: duke, earl, viscount, and baron. The title "Lord" is used most often by barons who are rarely addressed with any other. The style of this address is "Lord X", for example, Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, is commonly known as "Lord Tennyson". The ranks of earl and viscount commonly use Lord as well, with viscounts using the same style as used for baron. However, earls have a slightly different form of address where they can be called either the "Earl of X" or "Lord X". Dukes also use the style, "Duke of X", but it is not acceptable to refer to them as "Lord X". Dukes are formally addressed as "Your Grace", rather than "My Lord".

Heraklese finds an old book about Mittelmarch. It mentions two vanadium mines, and provides a map of the country. Heraklese makes a sketch of the map.

Figure: Mittelmarch and Environs, Northern Dukedoms of Weiland. Note the location of the Ottoman Tunnel, which runs thirty kilometers beneath the mountains and the Kratanak Outlands to Weiland. For a larger-area map with populations of some countries marked, as drawn by Hearklese, see Northern Dukedomes of Weiland.

The nation to the south of Mittlemarch is named after the vanadium ore that occurs in the sedimentary rock of the foothills: Patronite. There was a time when Patronite had a dozen working vanadium mines, but today they are all exhausted. The only remaining mines that produce more than a few tonnes of patronite per year are the five mines in Mittelmarch.

Our heroes agree to go to Mittelmarch as Galoopius's agents and investigate the state of the Larkin Mine. This mine is north of Clapton. In Clapton, they will find a lawyer called Onkian Goldman, who has been acting as Galoopius's lawyer.

At the end of August, Global Mediation Incorporated pays 2664 guineas for new suits of armor for Jack, Wicklow, Martha, and Heraklese. They equip themselves with luminous stones that fit onto their helmets. They have a small pick-axe, two jeweler's loupe's, and the space bridge thruster mechanism. They decide to leave the bench and ropes behind, to save weight. Hocus learns to make the ropes and a bench with a spell.

On the 7th September, Loose Lips arrives in Godiva on the coast of the Dukedom of Brickwater. Here they are reunited with Sallina and Garibaldi and stay as their guests in Tonbridge Manor a few kilometers to the north of the city. This large house is home to several other families of sailors, all former colleagues of Sallina and Garibaldi. Also living there are Sallina and Garibaldi's son and daughter, who are the superintendants of the establishment.

Tonbridge Manor belongs Horatio Tawnish, whome everyone there refers to only as The Captain. Heraklese and Bonita met in Mizzen Island at the Mayor's Party. He was captain of the Reliant, the first ship that Sallina and Garibaldi sailed with, twenty-five years ago. The legendary assassin Dan Milatos was surgeon on this ship, and Margaret MacLoghanlogh the dwarf locksmith was and remains Dan's wife. It was Margaret who made the lock for Dreadmanifold's cave. Dan and Margaret were at the Mayor's party. Dan is now over eighty years old. He is training Scythe and Cleopatra Amashintra (alias Grellian Ptumash). Horatio and his wife, a native of Chiin, spend half the year in Mizzen and half the year in Tonbridge Manor.

Sallina takes our heroes to the library to see what they can find about Mittelmarch and vanadium mining.

Patronite, the ore, is vanadium sulfide, with chemical formula VS₄. It is a dark brownish-black fine-grained rock with metallic luster and hardness 2. You can scratch it with your fingernail. Its density is 2.8 g/cm³. Historically, patronite sells at the mine for $100/kg. Vanadium itself is a soft, ductile, silvery-gray metal that resists corrosion. It is used in corrosion-resistant steel alloys. It melts at around 1900°C, compared to iron at around 1500°C. Historically, vanadium ingots sell at the foundry for $1000/kg.

There is no mention of a vanadium foundry in Mittelmarch. All the ore makes its way to the dwarf city of Kilmahog under the mountains to the north-east.

In recent newspapers, there are brief, second-hand accounts of an invasion of Mittelmarch by the dwarves of Kilmahog, and their repulsion with loss of life. The dire state of the Dukedom of Mittlemarch's finances is mentioned in other articles, along with speculation that Duchess Lucinda Bowels, who came to power fifteen years ago, has accumulated debts amounting to a hundred million dollars. Here creditors are the dukes of Halchester and Patronite, as well as several banks in various nations. The loans were issued on the strength of Mittelmarch's vanadium ore deposits, and Lucinda's ability to tax their revenue. For the past two years, the mines have been shut down by a series of murders among the miners, and what appears to be a popular movement against the Duchess. The dwarves of Kilmahog are now paying $500/kg for patronite and selling vanadium for $2000/kg. The only other source of vanadium ore is in Telaran in Ursia, on the other side of the continent.

On the 10th September, Loose Lips sails for Pidemouth. Here, Hocus, Wicklow, Jack, and Martha disembark. The ship sets off for Cloghlogan, where Sallina will sell their rough diamonds. On board are Jessica, Stanley, Heraklese, Bonita, Sallina, Garibaldi, and Stephanix the Demon.

Hocus, Wicklow, Jack, and Martha buy maps enough for everyone, oilskins and hats. Hocus carries with him the walkie-talkie box that contains all the bridges between GMI members. He will tune these once a month to keep the bridges working. On 13th September, they buy horses and set off on the East Road towards Niester.

On Horseback

13th September 2478

The sun is setting at the end of a warm, late-summer day on the road to Niester. Hocus rides behind Martha on a fine, brown gelding. Behind them walks another horse without a rider, and on either side are Wicklow and Jack on their own horses.

"I thought you were an expert at buying horses," Hocus says.

Jack grunts. "I never said I was an expert."

A rider gallops up the gravel road behind them. He passes with a pounding of hooves. He has mail bags on his saddle. The sides of his horse are shiny with sweat.

"That looks like a good horse," Hocus says, "I want one like that. A fast one."

"He will be changing his horse every twenty klicks," Jack says.

Martha pats the neck of her gelding. "I'm very happy with this one. He's worth twice what you paid for him."

They walk on in silence.

Martha cries out. "Get that thing off me!"

Ratty the rat has crawled out of Hocus's pocket and into Martha's lap. Hocus reaches out and grabs the little brown animal and stuffs him into the left pocket of his oilskins. This left pocket has a soft lining sewn by Jessica for ratty's benefit.

"Honestly," Martha says, "Crawling around in my lap."

"He's my familiar," Hocus says, "He likes you. Think of him as an extension of me."

"That's exactly what I'm thinking. Now keep it in your pocket."

They arrive in Neister at dusk and spend the night in the Duke's Arms. The next morning, they buy a new horse for Hocus. Jack takes his time looking through those that are available. They trade in his old one.

They ride to the River Pide and cross by rope-drawn ferry. On the other side, they walk their horses off the ferry into Mittelmarch. Two signs with the Duchess's seal upon them quote two laws of the land.

Mittelmarch Code 2476 Chapter 3 Section 6 Page 4. No person shall go about armed in the dukedom, a knife longer than twenty centimeters being considered a weapon, and truncheons being excepted.

Mittelmarch Code 2472 Chapter 2 Section 21 page 1. The transport of any quantity of patronite without permit shall be punishable by not less than one year in prison.

Our heroes sit on their horses and contemplate the laws. Their swords are on their belts. Ratty the rat is on Hocus's shoulder. Martha looks at him and smiles. "Not mentioned is the law prohibiting the bearing of possessed rodents."

Hocus strokes Ratty's nose. The rat grabs at his finger with its little paws.

Jack leans forward to watch Hocus. "You should keep Ratty in your pocket. It's obvious that he's no ordinary rat. Nothing says sorcerer like an animal familiar."

Hocus puts Ratty in his pocket. They dismount and store their swords and Hocus's dagger as best they can, wrapped in their cloaks.

Martha holds up her bow, which is unstrung, but within easy reach at the back of her saddle. She looks at Wicklow. "You're sure bows are okay?"

"It doesn't say bows, so I'm keeping mine out. Unstrung, though, so not so threatening."

Martha nods and straps her bow in place next to her quiver of twenty arrows, each with an adamantine tip.

They mount their horses and proceed west along the road. Martha steers around a pot-hole so large that it occupies half the width of the road. The road itself is more mud than gravel.

"Well," Jack says, "We now know that the Duchess does not award a high priority to the repair of her nations roads."

"So what does she spend her money on?" Wicklow says.

Before them is a large public house with a sign saying The Roaring Lion. "Let's stop here for lunch," Jack says.

After lunch, they take to the muddy, cratered road and head east. It's late afternoon when Hocus's horse begins to limp.

"What are you doing to those horses?" Jack says.

Hocus dismounts and leads the poor beast the last few kilometers to Clapton.

The Red Dragon Inn

Late Afternoon, 14th September 2478

According to the owner and manager, Clair Martin, the Red Dragon Inn of Clapton, Mittelmarch, was once a favorite stopping-place for wealthy merchants and famous adventurers on their way to and from the Ottoman Tunnel. So great was its reputation for good food and warm comradery that travellers were wiling to add a day to their journey to Pidemouth in order to ride into Mittelmarch and make their way to Clapton.

She shows them the mantle over the common room fireplace. "Look, see here?" She points at the side-end of the great oak slab. They look. There is a name carved in the wood, and a date. The name is Torque Edwards and the date is 2408.

"Is it genuine?" Hocus says.

"Yes!" Clair says. "But that's not all. There are a bunch of other famous names here." She moves along the length of the three-meter mantle. "I'll let you find them for yoursleves. But I want to show you this one in particular." She points to another carving opposite the first.

Martha, Wicklow, and Jack stand and look around the common room. Hocus peers at the carving. "That can't be genuine also, surely?"

"What is it?" Martha says.

Clair answers. "It's Torque Edwards again, but this time in 2370, forty-two years before he was borne. And below it is his father's name, Garath Edwards, on the same day. They were here together in 2370. You can read about it in the third volume of his autobiography."

Hocus nods. "That's pretty special."

"I'll show you to your rooms," Clair says. And she does.

Clair's brother Joseph and sister Jessy work with her at the Inn. Also working there are two carpenters, Chris and Julian. "They are out-of-work miners from the Larkin mine. I hired them as a favor to the forman, Charlotte Nigglebottom."

That evening, our heroes dine in a private room. Clair sits with them for several periods of ten or fifteen minutes, and during these intervals they learn a good deal about recent goings-on in Mittelmarch. Clair won't insult the Duchess, nor will she discuss her own response to the new tax laws, but she does say that these laws are poorly enforced.

"My biggest complaint, as an inn owner, is the quality of the roads. We used to have fine roads. Now they are a disgrace. The Duchess says she spends lots of money on them, and maybe she does, but the roads are still bad."

In the Mittelmarch Courier of the 13th September, Wicklow reads that Matilda Edwards of the Miner's Relief Fund has been arrested on a charge of Undermining the Authority of the State, and is being held pending trial.

15th September 2478

In the morning, go with Jeff, the groom from the Red Dragon Inn, and buy another horse for Hocus. At 7 Beech Street, Clapton, they meet Mrs. Goldman and make an appointment for the next day with Mr. Onkian Goldman.

In yesterday's Mittelmarch Courier, a single broad-sheet newspaper, there is an editorial by Reverend David Bradford of the Church of Amaethon. He argues that the people and the Duchess should cooperate to pay the Church Tithe of fifty million dollars a year or else their failure to pay will show a lack of respect and gratitude to God. That is the purpose of the tithe, to show recognition for the kindness of God, even though his favors would be valued at ten times the tithe were they for sale.

Wicklow lowers the paper in the common room, where he is sitting opposite Jack in a leather arm-chair. "Popluation fifty thousand, tithe fifty million. That's a thousand dollars per person per year. Not much. They should pay it." He looks down at the paper. "Says here that old people are not getting longevity drugs and young people are not getting treatments that can be delayed. Lord Amaethon wants his money."

Okian Goldman

16th September 2478

Meet with Onkian Goldman in his office, which is on the ground floor of his house. He is a gentleman of sixty-two years. His wife serves tea and pastries while Okian examines their papers with through his gold-rimmed spectacles.

He looks up. "Well, gentlemen, I am convinced that you are the people I have been expecting. So, what can I do for you?"

"We have questions," Wicklow says.

"Ask them. But keep in mind that I answer as a lawyer, not as a man with opinions."

"Understood," Wicklow says. "How much money did the Larkin mine make when it was running well?"

"I have the records here," Onkian says, and taps a ledger on his desk. "Until two years ago, the mine production was a steady twenty tonnes a year. Revenue was consistently twenty thousand guineas a year. Ten thousand guineas paid the ten miners, the carpenter, and the foreman. The remaining ten thousand was profit."

"What do the miners spend their time doing?" Martha says.

Onkian stares at her for a while. "Ah, you do not know what a miner does in a mine. He breaks rock and carries it out. It is hard work." He looks down at the ledger. "The ten miners carry out twenty tonnes of rock per day. The rock is suitable for making houses, and they sell it for one guinea a tonne, but they sell only a small part of it."

"How much money do the other mines make?"

Onkian leans back in his chair. His lips move for a few seconds. "All told, the mines used to produce roughly a million guineas of taxable income a year. The four other mines are much larger than the Larkin mine."

"And who ownes these other mines?"

"They are all owned by Earls of Mittelmarch." He takes a fresh piece of paper and writes upon it. They wait. He reads from the sheet of paper when he is finished. "Earl Elizabeth and Earl Jackson own the first Hanson mine. Earl Mark Delaroy owns the second. Earl Samuel Akton owns the third. Earll Henry Windsor owns the mine just north of Mittelmarch. The fifth is owned by your employer, Galoopius Maximus."

"Why did the mines stop producing vanadium ore?" Jack says.

Onkian smiles. "That's a complicated question. I'll give you some facts and let you draw your own conclusions. Two years ago, in August of '76 I believe, a miner in Hanson was murdred on his way home from the pub. According to the Lord Chancellor, the Duchess received a letter from an organization called the People's Front of Mittelmarch in which the organization claimed responsibility for the murder."

"And this murder caused all the miners to quit work?" Jack says.

"There had been threats and various rebellious demonstrations before the murder, in which gangs of protestors demanded that the miners stop work so as to deprive the Duchess of her eighty-percent share in the profits. These protestors claimed that the Duchess should improve the roads and pay the tithe to the church before she receives more money."

"That sounds self-defeating," Hocus says.

"And well it may be. I did say that the matter was complex. There have been another eight murders since then, however, all of miners who have been working the mines. The most recent was only two months ago, when the Duchess persuaded the miners at one of the Hanson mines to start work again."

"Did the People's Front claim responsibility?" Martha says.

"No. They did not. Nobody knows who is killing the miners. It's not gangs of thugs. The miners are found dead in the morning, after moving around at night, or even just taking out their trash."

"And it's true that the dwarves of Kilmahog invaded Hanson?" Martha says.

"Yes, last September. They started the mines again, with their own miners, and paid the Duchess her eighty percent tax. Our Lord Chancellor announced that the drarves were offering to assume the nation's debts and manage the country. But nobody liked that idea, other than the dwarves. The Duchess mustered her army and a militia and drove the dwarves out. A hundred of our people died, and a dozen or so dwarves. The mines operated for a month or two, but three more murders put a stop to it again."

Wicklow writes in his notebook.

Martha wipes puts down a pastry and wipes her mouth. "If the Duchess were to be deposed, who would take her place?"

"Do you mean who is the next in line for the seat?" Onkian says. "There are two possible replacements. One is her younger brother Candor Bowles. He left the country fifteen years ago when his sister came to power. Nobody knows where he is."

"Nobody?" Jack says.

Onkian smiles. "Somebody knows where he is, I'm sure. His closest friends, perhaps. But I don't think the Duchess knows where he is."

"And the second?"

"Estelle Masterman is the Duchess's cousin. She is married to the Lord Chancellor, Francis Masterman."

"That's interesting," Martha says. "What's this Lord Chancellor like?"

Onkian shakes his head. "I'm not expressing my opinion."

Later, in the common room of the Red Dragon, our heroes look over their notes and tries to make sense of the state of the mines.

"From what Onkian tells us," Hocus says, "The mines should be making a hundred million dollars profit a year. Even at ten percent tax, that's ten milliion a year. If the Duchess's debt is a hundred million, she could pay the interest with that tax. The tax on the rest of the population is supposed to be ten percent of income."

Jack raises a finger. "But Onkian and Clair says nobody can understand the definition of income in the tax laws."

"That may be," Hocus says, "But average income is around twenty thousand dollars a year. So fifty thousand people is around a billion dollars a year. Ten percent of that would be a hundred million. Compare that to her debt of a hundred million and the tithe of fifty million. Her income should be sufficient."

"But the people are not paying the taxes and the mines are shut down," Jack says, "And maybe she owes a lot more than a hundred million."

"Who gains from the stopping of the mines?" Wicklow says. "Not the Duchess, who needs the tax revenue. Not Amaethon, who wants his tithe. Not the dwarves of Kilmahog, who want the ore."

"Clair's theory," Martha says, "Is that Halchester or Patronite is trying to force the Duchess to default on their loans, thus giving them a pretext for invading the country and seizing the mines."

"That does not make sense either," Hocus says, "The profit is only a hundred million dollars a year. A soldier in the field costs a hundred thousand a year. If they invade with five thousand troops, they'll be spending five hundred million dollars a year on the invasion force alone."

"It could be that Halchester and Patronite have not performed that calculation," Martha says, "Or they performed the calculation and came up with another answer. When you talked to Heraklese, did you run the numbers by him? He's our accountant, isn't he?"

"I can multiply numbers as well," Hocus says. His nose twitches.

"What about the people?" Jack says. "They don't like the Duchess. They don't like taxes."

"Maybe," Wicklow says, "But what about the health care from the church? That's being cut."

Jack shakes his head. "If they don't like her, they'll put up with that for a while."

"I don't think the people are murdering miners," Martha says.

Our heroes ponder in silence.

"We're missing something," Wicklow says.

Jessy Martin brings them a plate of cheese and fresh bread. She puts it on the low table between them. "Anything else I can get you. Ah!" She cries out and points at Hocus's lap. "A rat!"

Charlotte Nigglebottom

17th September 2478

It is twenty-five kilometers from Clapton to the Larkin Mine, riding northeast along the Barnstable Road. Hocus, Wicklow, Jack, and Martha set out in the morning. The road is four meters wide. Its edges are overgrown. A single pair of wheel tracks, twenty centimeters deep in places, and spaced two meters apart, drifts from one side of the road to the other, avoiding the frequent pot-holes.

The horses pick their own way between the cart tracks and the pot-holes, while the riders admire the countryside. On their left, the land is cleared for crops. They see ripe corn, maize, wheat, and several low-lying green plants whose identity they cannot agree upon. On their right are more fields and some woods, and a few kilometers back, grassy hills. Two carts pass, going the other way, each laden with heavy sacks. The cart drivers exchange hearty good-mornings to the adventurers.

"I like this country," Jack says. "It's good to see the land all around you, instead of being hemmed in by trees. It's like the country I come from."

"Except for the weird low-lying green crops," Martha says.

"I'm telling you, those are beets."

"Alfalfa," Martha says.

"Hah!" Jack says.

A horseman overtakes them from behind and canters past without a word of greeting. The road descends slowly into a valley where a wide and vigorous river flows out of the east. This is the River Apt. Here the road crosses the river with a wooden bridge twenty meters long and three meters wide. Its central span is ten meters between supports sunk into the river bottom. Jack halts his horse upon the bridge and looks down into the water.

"Trout!" he says, pointing. "Look at that one. He's a monster."

The river flows between banks of slate and sand. Wicklow dismounts and kneels to examine the bridge. He leans over the edge and watches the water sliding past. There are new poles set in the suports. Upon the bridge surface there are many new planks. The rail along either side is freshly-made with rope and varnish.

"The bridge is in perfect repair." He says. "There's no metal used in the construction. It's all wood joints and rope ties." He jumps up and down upon the planking. "Solid."

Jack mounts his horse. "I think we should do some fishing while we're staying in this country. I think I'll buy a fishing rod."

"I'm not much of a fisherman," Wicklow says.

They ride up the other side of the valley. The pot-holes in the road are filled with gravel, and the entire surface is covered with the same, dark gravel in low-lying places. Wicklow inspects the gravel and deems it to be made of pulverized slate.

They ascend the Barnstable Road with the hills rising on either side. A stream tumbles noisily through the trees nearby. The chirping calls of insects rise from the undergrowth all around them. Butterflies flash their bright wings in the grass by the side of the road. The grassy slopes of the hills are broken by slate cliffs. In places, orange sand slides out from between the layers of slate, and where the sand gathers in a drift, red-barked pine trees take root and tower up into the sunlight.

A flock of twenty sheep grazes upon a slope one thousand meters away. Through his binoculars, Jack sees a shepherd lying in the sun, his eyes shut. A cart descends the road, driven by a woman. A man sits beside her on the bench.

"Is this the way to the Larkin Mine?" Jack says.

"Yes," the driver says, "Follow the road to Barnstable. You can't miss it."

As the cart passes, Wicklow sees that it is laden with slabs of cut slate. Wicklow considers asking the cart-driver where they obtained the slate and whether they work at the mine, but decides against it. He and his colleagues have been debating about secrecy, as they have done many times before. This morning they debated whether or not to wear armor and carry weapons. Armor along marks them as soldiers or adventurers, and weapons are against the law.

Today they are wearing armor and carrying their bows on their saddles. Their swords are locked up in the safe at the Red Dragon Inn. But Hocus has his adamantine dagger. "The blade is only twenty centimeters long," he said, "And the length of the handle is of no importance to The Law."

After two hours ride from the bridge, they hear a regular sound over the babble of the stream. The sound comes every minute or so and grows louder as they advance up the road. They round a corner and see before them a hamlet of twenty houses at the base of two valleys. One valley slopes up in front of them to the north. The other rises out of view to their right. The stream they have been listening to is visible now upon their left. Farther up, in the middle of the hamlet, the stream is constrained by a wier. The water slides over the wier and roars over a bed of sand and slate. Above the wier is a wide and peaceful pond. The twenty houses are gathered around the pond at a distance of a hundered meters or so. The space around the pond is filled with a lawn and several broad and ancient trees.

The road branches at here, below the wier. To the right and east, it proceeds up one of the valleys. A lichen-covered stone marker says, "Larkin Manor". A splendid pot-hole fills the road another fifter meters father on. To the left, the road crosses the stream with a freshly-made wooden causeway and proceeds past the hamlet, across fields sown with crops and vegetables, to the base of the north valley, directly in front of the adventurers. The road ends at a gate in a wall.

This wall is not quite two meters high, and made of gray slate. It runs up from the valley to the summit of a hill on the west side of the valley and descends again to meet itself and enclose the entire eastern face of the hill. The circuit of the wall is three or four hundred meters across. The summit of the hill is over a hundred meters above the gate. Large wood doors cover cave entrances half-way up the slopes. Several large sheds with sloping rooves sit upon shelves cut into the hill-side.

Jack raises his binoculars to his eyes. "Looks like a mining compound to me."

Within the compound are towers and trellaces of wood scaffolding that rise tens of meters into the air. The towers and trellace are adorned with wheels, pipes, walkways, and ladders. Several tremendous piles of slate rubble lie inside the lower portions of the wall. Higher up are smaller piles of gravel, and a few stacked piles of square-cut stone. Beyond the scaffoldings are neat, conical mounds of sand. Throughout the compound, well-worn tracks mark the passage of men, wheelbarrows, and carts.

A single water-wheel turns high up within one of the towers. Water pours onto the wheel from a wooden aqueduct. This aqueduct runs to the north, away from Jack, supported by its a trellace until it comes to ground just within the slate wall on the far side of the compound. The aqueduct passes through the wall and makes its way up the valley.

"They are using water from the north stream," Jack says.

Without warning, a pillar drops beneath the water wheel and a cloud of dust explodes below. Jack lowers his binoculars. The dust rises and drifts across the valley. Several seconds later, a boom reaches their ears.

"What was that?" Martha says.

Hocus clears his throat. "My guess is they are crushing rock to make gravel."

The Larkin Mine first opened eighty-three years ago, with horizontal shafts dug into the hillside. Eleven years ago, the horizontal shafts were exhausted. But there was hope that substantial deposits of patronite existed at greater depth, below the water table. Mining below the water table requires pumps. The design and maintenance of pumps requires a master-miner. The late Viscount Larkin, father of the current Viscount, employed master-miner Charlotte Nigglebottom to sink the shafts, pump them out, and manage the subsequent mining operations, should she find the hoped-for ore. This is the story the adventurers hear from Charlotte herself, sitting in her foreman's shet after she serves them a lunch of fried saussages, this morning's bread, and fresh plums.

"I did find ore," Charlotte says, packing tobacco into her pipe. "Enough to please his lordship. But the old fellow died soon after. That was nine years ago."

Charlotte is a lean, gray-haired woman, sixty-two years old. Her thick, denim overalls are dusty but in perfect repair. Her teeth are yellow from her pipe, and slightly crooked on one side to accommodate its mouthpiece. She opens the metal door upon her brick-and-morter stove and inserts a taper.

"He was a good man, the old viscount," she says. "He and I, we had an understanding." She lights her pipe with the taper and puffs on it. "We still have an understanding. His son, on the other hand, was not the kind of man I would choose to work for. A nice enough fellow in person, and his heart's in the right place, but irresponsible. I have very little patience for irresponsible men." She smiles. "My first husband was irresponsible. Got himself killed in a cave-in thirty years ago, the silly bugger."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Martha says.

"Now this new viscount, he had no head for money. He would have dug the mine out in a year if he could have, and given up ten years of ore to do it."

"How would he give up ten years of ore?" Wicklow says.

"If you don't dig it out right, you undermine the foundation of the hill and compromise the bedrock. After that, mining gets harder. It can get so much harder that the value of the ore you pull out can't cover the wages of the men doing the digging. So the ore is lost."

"But if the price of patronite went up," Wicklow says, "That ore might be viable."

"You're right. And the price is high now. All the mines are shut down, or almost shut down."

Wicklow looks up from his notebook. "Why do you say almost?"

"Some of the Hanson miners are smuggline ore out of the mines, we're pretty sure of that, but it's hard to stop. This mine is the only one I'm certain has produced no patronite at all for two years."

"Who do you think is responsible for the murder of miners?"

"I'm guessing its Patronite, the nation, not the ore. Their mines are not viable at a thousand guineas a tonne. Some are viable at three thousand, and most at five thousand, which is where the price is now. If they can keep the price up, they will start their mines again. Until then, they are a country named after an ore they can no longer produce at a profit."

"That's embarassing," Martha says.

Charlotte smiles. "I've always thought so."

"May we see the mine accounts?" Hocus says.

Charlotte shows them her ledger, which gives an account of every tonne of ore recovered from the mine, and every tonne or half-tonne sold, and at what price. Recently, it gives the price of every tonne of gravel, slate, and sand manufactured, separated, and sold by the mine. "This is my book, you understand. I copy the essentials out for the viscount and sign off on them once a year, in triplicate, and give a copy to the viscount. But I don't do the taxes myself. The mine owner does that. So Mr. Maximus will have to do it next year, or Mr. Goldman more likely."

"How easy would it be for the viscount to halve the quantity of patronite in the records," Wicklow says, "So as to halve his taxes?"

Charlotte puffs on her pipe and exhales a cloud of blue smoke. "The tax is on the profit, not the tonnage. He could fiddle the books any way he liked, but he'd not get away with it for more than a year or two."

"Why's that?"

"The tax men come by every few years to look at my records. I'll not lie for the viscount. I'm a master-miner of the guild. I'd lose my license."

"There is a miner's guild in Mittelmarch?" Wicklow says.

"Of course there is. We meet once a month in Hanson. I go to every meeting. Leave my son Emmett in charge of the mine and take a few days off."

"Oh, Emmett is your son. I thought you looked alike," Martha says. "What about the carpenter we met with him outside?"

"Calvin? He's my cousin once removed on my father's side."

From outside the shed comes the sound of several dogs barking, and a man's voice. Hocus turns the pages of the ledger and adds up the quantities for the year 2476. In that year, the mine produced twenty tonnes of patronite, which it sold at the mine gate for a thousand guineas a tonne. The mine's expenses, which included timber, rope, iron tools, and the wages of its carpenter, lead miner, eight general workmen, and Charlotte herself, amounted to ten thousand guineas. Hocus flicks through the earlier years. The ledger begins in March 2467. Starting in 2469, production is close to twenty tonnes per year, every year.

"Remarkable how consistent production has been," Hocus says.

"I do my job well," Charlotte says.

Hocus nods. "And then production stops two years ago."

"When the first miner was killed for going back to work, I saw the writing on the shed wall. I flooded the mine." She taps the spent tobacco out of her pipe into an iron bucket. "I told his young lordship we had a problem with the pumps. I diverted the aqueduct into the mine and we had it filled in ten days. If I had left it to nature, the mines would have taken months to flood." She leans back in her chair. "After that, I refused to pump the water out, saying our people would be at risk. He knew I was right. He's a decent fellow underneath. He didn't want anyone getting hurt."

They discuss the mine for another half-hour. At their request, Charlotte takes them for a tour of the compound. They see the water at the bottom of the main shaft. Above ground, Calvin and Emmett are at work smashing slate into gravel with a ten-meter oak pillar. This pillar is bound with steel straps and capped with four-millimeter steel plate. The water-wheel raises the pillar up inside a scaffold and a lever releases the pillar to fall down upon the gravel. The noise of the impact is deafening, but none of the miners seem to notice the noise as they describe the functioning of the aqueduct, the pumps, the wheels, and the elevators.

The pumps are made of wood pipes bound with vanadium steel straps. The pump mechanisms themselves are made entirely of steel, but these are stored in the caves, safe behind locked doors. The pipes must be kept wet, or they will spring leaks. Every day, Calvin and Emmett run water from the aqueduct through each of the pipes.

"In the past ten years," Charlotte says, "We excavated twenty thousand cubic meters of rock. The first shaft goes down five meters to the first mine level. Another shaft goes down five meters to the second level, and a third shaft descends five meters to the third level. We have pumps pulling water up each shaft, all worked by ropes and belts from the water wheels. You can't suck water up more than ten meters under the best of circumstances. Five meters is easy. We can pump ten liters of water a second when the north stream is flowing well. We could pump out the entire mine in fifty days."

The remaining eight employees of the mine are working off-site. Two renovating the Red Dragon. All their families receive food from the Miner's Relief Fund. The mine itself has been making a small profit selling gravel and cut stone, as well as sand. When they are not busy with paid work, the miners maintain and repair the road from the River Apt.

"We built the wall as well," Charlotte says, "It won't stop someone getting in who wants to, but it has legal value. There are signs posted saying no trespassing. And it keeps the dogs in. We let them loose at night." She smiles. "Any assassin marching in here will have our dogs to deal with."

"That's good," Jack says.

"Now all four of you is wearing armor," Charlotte says, "That makes you soldiers. You don't have your swords. That's respectful of the law. I'm glad of both. Because if you're poking around here, and going about the country asking questions, you'll be stirring up interest in our little mine. And if that's going to happen, my crew will need protection."

Jack bows at the waist. "Madame. We are Global Mediation Incorporated. It is our business to mediate for our employers and protect his allies. We have many means of persuasion at our disposal. I assure you that anyone going after our side, and you are on our side, will meet with stiff resistance and unrelenting persuit."

Charlotte chews on her pipe and smiles. "Well, I like you sir. I'll not deny it." She turns to Hocus. "And you're a strange bird, aren't you? You don't have the hands of a working man or a soldier. Your nails are too clean. But you know engineering all the same. I couldn't peg you at first, but I think in the end I have you figured.

"You do?" Hocus says.

"There's a man at court, working for the duchess. Made her a multicolored robe of some strange magical material. She wears it all the time, from what my second cousin tells me. His name's Niel Blessed. About your age, maybe older. Bad skin like an adolescent's, and shy like one too."

"Doesn't sound like Hocus," Martha says.

"No, but I'm not finished. He has a cat that crawls all over him and follows him everywhere. His familiar it is."

"Oh," Hocus says. "He's the court wizard. Very interesting."

"Yes. I thought you'd be interested in the cat. On account of that rat you keep in your pocket."

"Oh," Hocus says. "You mean Ratty the Rat."

They stand in silence. The gravel-smasher drops. Martha squints at the deafening crash. A cloud of dust drifts overhead. Charlotte laughs. "Well, and there's the fact that Mr. Maximus wrote to me and told me you were a wizard. Would never have figured it out on my own. It's as well he warned me, or I might have brained that rat with a wrench before I knew what I was about." She slaps Hocus on the arm. "You don't look like that spotty little kid at all. Quite handsome, in fact."

"He's my man, you know," Martha says.

"I figured that all on my own," Charlotte says. "Now, you'd better go down and stay in the Miner's Arms tonight. It's two hours till sundown and a long ride back to Clapton."

"Sounds like a good idea," Jack says. "Can I buy a fishing pole in town?"

"You can buy a fishing pole from anyone you meet. That's all the men around here thing about: fish and sheep."

"Not women?" Martha says.

"Hard to believe isn't it," Charlott says, and spits a yellow lump on the packed sand at her feet.

From Wicklow's Notebook

The following is from the page Wicklow's notebook that is marked, "Miner's Arms, Barnstable, 17th September 2478." Wicklow uses the short-hand notation for writing thousands and millions that he learned from Heraklese. He uses Olympian Dollars for money. At that time, one full-weight pure guinea on Clarus was worth a hundred Olympian dollarsk, although the same guinea, if passed through to Olympia, would be worth around seventy-five dollars. Almost all countries on Clarus use gold and silver as a basis for currency. Ursia is an exception, with the Ursian Dollar, which has no basis in anything other than the Ursian Government.

Francis Masterman, Lord Chancellor. Chief administrator under Duchess Lucinda Bowles. Estelle Masterman, his wife, is Lucinda's aunt's daugher, Lucinda's cousin. Population of Mittelmarch 50k × $20k/yr income = $1B/yr national income. In past, income tax of 10% for Duchess, revenue $100M. Tithe for church is $1k/yr × 50k = $50M should be paid by Duchess, leaves her with $50M for roads, personal income, government, soldiers. Not police of individual villages and towns, these paid for by taxes raised by local Earl or the town itself.

5 patronite mines produce 1000 tonnes/yr. Price use to be $100/kg so revenue was $100M per year, of which $50M profit for mine owners. Tax on this used to be $5M. Duchess raised tax to 80%, hoping to obtain $40M. Murders began. Mining stopped. People won't pay 80%. Juries won't convict citizens for tax evasion. Tax revenue may now be lower than before. Lucinda's collectors seizing assets from wealthy citizens. Delays and corruption in the courts.

500 miners in all, would need 500 soldiers for protection against murder × $100k/yr cost of soldier = $50M to protect mines, which exceeds tax from mines when patronite sells for $100/kg. Now selling at $500/kg, so 1000 tonnes is $500M/yr. If mines can get going, cost of production $50M plus soldiers $50M leaves $400M profit divided into $80M for mine owners and $320M for Duchess. But price would drop if production rose again to 1000 tonnes/yr. Nation of Patronite is opening some of its old mines. Current production unknown. Only other source of patronite is in Ghermez Moutains in Ursia. If Lucinda owes $100M, interest is $10M/yr, small compared to 10% income of $100M, even after paying tithe to church.

Clapton mine produces 20 tonnes per year. Suspect mine could produce more, but Charlotte limited production. 20 tonnes × 1000 kg/tonne × $100/kg = $2M/yr. Cost of production is $1M for salaries of miners and for materials and tools. Profit was $1M. Make $1M/yr for owners after 80% tax when patronite sells for $300/kg.

From the page marked, "Chimera Pub, Hanson". Hanson is the site of three of the largest patronite mines, producing a total of 900 tonnes/yr. Our heroes travel from Barnstable to Clapton on the 18th and from Clapton to Mittelmarch on 19th. They leave their swords behind in the Red Dragon Inn but wear their armor and bring their bows. They stay in the Sphynx Inn, owned by Ian Martin, Claire's father. They find city a thousand meters across, surrounded by a five-meter high slate wall. The main streets are in good repair. The next morning, they depart for Hanson. In Hanson, they check into a hotel, but they hold their discussions in the common room of the Chimera Pub, which is the favorite watering hole of rebels and discontents. They find a town in depression, with people sitting on the streets and in bars. In the town center, the Miner's Relief Fund is running a soup kitchen, and is handing out food.

Met with Chief of Police Erasmus Porkchop [sic] at 3 pm. Eight miners murdered in two years. 7 in Hanson, 1 at mine to south. 2 women no families, 6 men of which four had families. 1 was a formena and master miner. Three rebels claimed they committed one of the early murders, but their confessions did not agree, and turned out to be lies. Two men: Henry Bloomer, Patrick Gulche. One woman: Gertrude Downes. All in the Hanson jail serving one year for perjury, will be released in three months. Murders at night, in gardens, in streets, always when victim was alone. Foreman was being guarded by three men he paid for himself, but was killed while walking from outhouse to back porch at night, with guards at front and back gates, and another inside house. Guards heard no sound. Found him when he had been dead for a few minutes. This foreman, name Lincoln Kilnmaster, was known for loyalty to Duchess, and was running his mine.

Two priests also murdered in past year. Both had been preaching that miners go back to work and people support Duchess. This was in Mittelmarch and a village to the south. Erasmus does not recall their names. But deaths similar to those of miners: knife in back, garrotte around neck.

In Chimera: customers open about their disliking of Duchess. Hate her taxes, call them "robbery". Hate her rules. "Treats us like children." Furious about lack of medical care. "Robbing us and letting our children die." Furious at emprisonment of Matilda Edwards, director of the Miner's Relief Fund. Determined to tough out the bad times. Believe the Duchess cannont survive without her taxes much longer. "She'll break before we do."

News from Loose Lips. Sallina sold diamonds as a lot to dwarf friend of hers for 3000 guineas cash. Money is in strong box on the boat. Crew has delivered 20 kobolds to Plantinak, returned to coast of Belgoria, just picked up 20 more and are on their way east. Motion sickness hooche worked well on previous outward journey, had fair weather. But kobolds terrified of water. All had a miserable time. Sallina can speak to them, took care of them. Arrived safely. New bunch just as scared. Have a total of 200 to transport, which is ten trips, weather is going to get worse. Sallina thinking of asking Richard Manchester recommend a single, reliable, big ship to finish the job in one trip. GMI being paid 10,000 guineas to transport all 200. Dreadmanifold and Stardiamond flew low past the boat this morning.