Under the shadow of a towering, cylindrical granary, a stout merchant with a thick beard patted a sack of unhusked wheat on his wagon. He looked at the men before him. "A full wagon like this, including the draft horse and the cart? I'll take three hundred and fifty silver stags. What say you?"
Brother Gale stepped forward. He didn't look at the grain; he pried open the horse's mouth to check its teeth. He did the math with a cool, practiced silence. "By the current market, a foot-stone of raw wheat is worth a silver stag and two copper stars. This wagon holds one hundred and sixty foot-stones. That's one hundred and ninety-two silver for the grain. The wagon itself is common oak—I'll be generous and give you twenty silvers for it. That brings us to two hundred and twelve. You're asking one hundred and thirty-eight silvers for a ten-year-old nag? Master Adrian, your price is a bit high, don't you think?"
The merchant shook his head. "The price is fair. The cart is cheap wood, aye, but King Renly—rest his soul—pressed every beast in the Reach into his baggage train when he marched north. Livestock prices have doubled. If Tumbleton weren't so close to the Crownlands, you wouldn't find a draft horse for love or money. You can buy all the grain in the world, Brother, but how do you plan to move it without legs?"
Gale patted the old horse's head, and the beast let out a soft puff of air. "It is still high, Master Adrian. A discount now would go a long way toward a lasting partnership."
The fat merchant let out a short laugh. "Brother Gale, let's leave the 'future' for the singers. Tell me truly: do you think this small band of yours can actually get this grain home? Tywin Lannister's supply lines on the Golden Road are being hounded by River-lords and outlaws every day. He won't send a train out now without a hundred men-at-arms. You lot look like a gift-wrapped delivery for the first bandit you meet."
"I have settled the matter of safety," Gale replied calmly. "We have the protection of Master Rosen's men."
The merchant shrugged. "Fine. If you have a plan, I'll say no more. The price stays, but... if you have the coin today, I'll throw in an extra foot-stone of wheat per wagon as a gesture of goodwill."
Rosen, the intermediary who had brought them to the granary, leaned in. "Gale, Adrian is one of the few men in Tumbleton with this much weight ready to move. If you walk away, you'll spend a week riding to the next town or waiting for me to find another seller. You can wait. I can wait. But can the bellies at the monastery wait?"
The question hit Gale hard. Before they had left St. Maur's, the influx of refugees had turned the stores into hollow shells. The hunting parties led by the Freefolk and the fishing boats on the lake hadn't produced the bounty they hoped for. The monastery was already on rations.
Gale whispered with Caden for a moment, then turned back. "Fine. Three hundred and fifty silver stags for the full kit. How much can you move?"
Adrian looked at his ledgers. "I can supply eighteen wagons. At the exchange of two hundred silver per gold dragon, that's thirty-five gold. Pay in coin, and you can take delivery in three days."
"Agreed," Gale said.
As they left the warehouse, Gale turned to Rosen. "The grain is bought, but eighteen wagons need eighteen drivers. I don't have the hands for that."
Rosen frowned. "My own carters are busy, and if I let my wagons sit empty, my business dies. But I can find you experienced carters here in Tumbleton. Pay them their wage and find your own guards. It'll be cheaper for you in the long run."
Gale was relieved. "How much do they cost?"
"Twenty days to the Gods Eye," Rosen calculated. "A silver stag a day is the standard. Pay them forty silvers for the round trip. As for me, I'll take my ten percent commission on their wages as we agreed."
"Very well, Master Rosen. St. Maur's remembers its friends."
"I hope so," Rosen laughed. "The Riverlands will have peace again one day, and a merchant with a friend in the Church is a merchant with a future." He lowered his voice. "But Brother... you need more swords. Eighteen wagons of grain is a fortune on wheels. You'll be a target for every 'Broken Man' between here and the lake."
"Ser Caden will handle the steel," Gale assured him.
Caden, trailing behind with Jasmine, had tuned out the talk of ledgers and commissions. Adrian's granary was essentially a subsidiary of House Footly, and while the merchant was shrewd, his reputation for quality was solid. Finding a reliable supplier was half the battle; the other half was the road.
Gale and Rosen headed back to draft the contracts. In Westeros, a contract meant little without a Lord's seal to act as witness. They would have to take the scrolls to the Footly keep and pay a fee for the privilege of arbitration should the deal go sour.
Caden, whose literacy was limited to identifying tavern signs and bounty posters, knew he would be useless in a room full of ink and parchment. "I'll leave the paper to you, Gale," he said. "I have men to find."
He took Jasmine back to the Four-Leaf Clover. In Westeros, there were no "Guilds" for adventurers. There were only sellswords—men who lived for the next silver and the next drink. Caden knew their scent: the smell of rust, cheap ale, and desperation.
He sat in the corner, observing, before approaching a man with a handlebar mustache and short-cropped hair. "Mercenary or hedge knight?" Caden asked.
The man set down his cup. "No spurs for me. Just a man with a sword. You buying?"
"Escort work," Caden said. "Grain wagons heading for a monastery southwest of the Gods Eye. Interested?"
The man's brow furrowed. "The Riverlands? I heard the Lions are being bled on the Golden Road. Raiders everywhere."
"If there were no raiders, I wouldn't need your steel," Caden countered. "Two and a half silver stags a day. That's the market."
"The Riverlands is a graveyard," the man grunted. "Three silvers, or I stay in the Reach."
Caden paused, then nodded. "Three it is. How many men do you have?"
"Myself and six brothers. All veterans."
"Be here tomorrow night. I'll buy the first round."
"Rodney," the man said, extending a hand.
"Ser Caden Storm."
Caden then found Walter, the town guard he'd met in the alley. Walter was a local "fixer," and within a day, he had rounded up another eleven sellswords looking for a way out of Tumbleton.
The following evening, the tavern was a roar of voices. Rodney's crew, Walter's recruits, and Caden's seven Sunwalkers huddled together. By the time the moon peaked, the mercenaries were shouting toasts to their new "Lord" and "Brother."
Gale watched them from the door of the inn, his face a mask of worry. "Caden... they look like a rabble. Can we trust them?"
Caden, who had remained remarkably sober for the first time in years, smiled. He patted the hilt of Petal-Breaker. "They are a rabble, Gale. In a real fight, I'd trust none of them further than I could throw them. But they look numerous. Most bandits are cowards who count heads. If they see fifty armed men, they'll wait for a smaller target. We aren't here to win a war; we're here to buy time."
The grain was ready. The guards were hired. The path was set.
Though the grain had cost only seventeen gold dragons, the cost of the wagons, carters, and sellswords had tripled the total expenditure. Gale winced at the loss of Aldric's hoard, but he knew the alternative was starvation.
Caden, however, felt a different sting. Lord Alex Footly had taken his best men to King's Landing with Lord Tarly. The men left behind in Tumbleton had no authority to spend three thousand dragons on a "Valyrian" blade, and Lune Merrick had never returned.
His secondary mission—selling Petal-Breaker to fund the Order—had failed. But as the Lightbringer had told him: So long as the steel is in your hand, the gold is still yours. It just hasn't changed form yet.
At dawn, the train of eighteen wagons creaked out of the Tumbleton gates, turning north toward the shadow of the war.
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