King's Landing. The Red Keep. 295 AC.
Lord Axel Arryn / Hand of the King.
After the Night of the Falcon, an enormous amount of work descended on him at once. His actions had stirred up the swamp known as King's Landing. Lords were running about like headless chickens, scrambling to find a powerful patron. This was not a consequence of the raid itself so much as a reminder that all n were mortal. Lord Bigglestone, Ser Ruttiger, Lord Byrch, and a handful of other minor lords, along with a dozen aristocrats, had paid with their heads for their cris. Now the rest were running about licking everyone's boots in the hope that they would not be next.
Despite the propaganda, the smallfolk were also unsettled, even as they actively helped his n. People love stability and hate upheaval. They were like small animals, forever frightened of everything, ready to bolt for their holes at the slightest disturbance. There were those who tried to fish in the troubled waters, but they were quickly put in their place.
The Reach rchants once again showed their worst side. During the unrest they had raised the price of food, which would have reflected poorly on him. He had prepared for this in advance and, drawing on old contacts, established a trading arrangent with Myr. The Free City currently had a surplus of food thanks to its control of the Disputed Lands. He offered them certain trade concessions and a promise to buy all the food they brought at a fixed price for the span of a year.
He understood that trade with Myr could not feed all of King's Landing, but even a third of the supply would be sothing. The rchants grew brazen because they were confident their goods would sell regardless. He was offering people an alternative, and the rchants would have to lower their prices if they did not want to be left with nothing. To give an example: before his intervention, a sack of wheat cost five coppers, when its real value was three. He purchased food from Myr at four coppers and resold it to the smallfolk at the sa price. The rchants had no ans of stopping him and were therefore forced to lower their own prices and sell at four coppers as well.
People had been promised change when he took up the post of Hand, and they had received it. Criminals of every rank had been executed or brought before a court, food had beco cheaper, and trade had grown sowhat more lively. Give people bread and spectacle, and you will be a hero in their eyes. The toasts raised in his na and the praises sung in his honor gave his inflated ego a pleasantly satisfying scratch.
There were also negative consequences to his energetic approach. He had been forced to borrow money from the Lannisters, two hundred thousand gold dragons. His plans required money, and the treasury was empty. Baelish had proposed debasing the gold, but that plan was poor for any long-term outlook. If the manipulation ca to light, people would lose faith in the reliability of the Mint and stop doing business with the Crown.
The monetary system of this world was in complete disorder as it was. The lowest coin was the minted copper half-penny. From there the system ran as follows: a half-groat equaled two pennies, a groat equaled four pennies, and a star equaled eight. Then ca the silver coins: a stag equaled seven stars, which was fifty-six pennies; a moon equaled seven stags, which was three hundred and ninety-two pennies. And crowning everything was the gold dragon, equal to thirty moons, two hundred and ten stags, and eleven thousand seven hundred and sixty pennies.
Whatever the septons might say about the seven-pointed faith, the disparity between the coins had arisen from the actual ratio of gold, silver, and copper mines. Essos held abundant wealth, but its trade was fractured by a dozen different currencies, from Volantene honors to the square iron coins minted by the Iron Bank of Braavos. Westeros, by contrast, relied on a unified currency backed by its rich veins of gold and silver. The gold mines of Casterly Rock, Castare, and the Golden Tooth were only the most celebrated of them, with more scattered across the Westerlands. Silver was drawn from the earth as well, most notably from the deep, wealthy mines of White Harbor.
His father had economized on everything in the effort to keep the treasury from going under. He had managed it poorly and to little productive effect, and before long it would co back to haunt the kingdom. To correct this, money was needed, and it had been borrowed. Hiring n to repair roads in exchange for food, expanding the port, reforming the City Watch, expanding the rchant fleet and the fishing vessels, and a great deal more besides. There were never enough people, and every one of them wanted to satisfy his vanity with a personal conversation with the Hand.
Since Robert had removed himself from the business of governing, Axel had effectively beco the one running the country. He was bewildered by the state of affairs in the Crownlands. They had simply been strangled economically. He could understand such asures in the years imdiately following the rebellion, but at present the backbone of the royal army could field no more than ten thousand peasant levies. In the past, the Crownlands had been able to put nearly twenty thousand swords in the field, and these had been well-equipped soldiers, with at least two thousand heavy cavalry among them.
He had to address that as well, repealing many of the taxes, granting concessions and incentives for the founding of new villages, and issuing loans for that purpose. With any luck, the new settlents would increase the food supply in ti and reduce dependence on the other regions.
He had a great deal to do, and he was already tempted to curse this world and go ho.
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