Winds of Change
"What on earth happened here over the winter?"
Sophoros of Torcello, whose family had made trade with Iceland their livelihood for generations, scratched his head.
His homeland, as the name suggested, was the Torcello autonomous territory of the Serbianus Kingdom. Yet to Sophoros, Iceland was as good as a second home. No—if he measured by the time he had actually spent walking its ground, this place was more familiar than the land of his birth.
He had started as a peddler racing about on foot and climbed until he became a merchant of national standing. Ask this great merchant—envied and respected by his peers—for the secret of his success, and he would answer without hesitation: action and practice.
Unlike those who only sat in comfortable chairs and twiddled quill pens, merchants who truly succeeded never spared the effort of going out themselves to survey markets and trends. Some people asked whether it didn't wound a man's pride for the master of so many enterprises and such a vast caravan to move about in person like that.
Nonsense! Of course pride and honor mattered to a merchant, especially when dealing with nobles—but pride and honor were intangible values that could always be set on the scales against money and, if need be, laid aside. And for Sophoros, surveying markets faster than anyone and seizing trends first was worth that temporary surrender of honor and pride.
That was why he always made for Iceland the moment the weather broke, and this year was no different. He had gone from tavern to tavern in Coldon in search of information. All the news of a city gathers in its taverns, after all.
And the instant he stepped through a door, Sophoros knew something was afoot.
"Ugh, Iceland's fine in every other way, but can we do something about this spring damp? It isn't even hot here—it's cold—and still a man sweats like a pig."
"There, there. Stop grumbling and try a little Bulmason powder in that stew. For folks from the warmer continent, weather like this spring is perfect. It draws the damp right out of you—works wonders."
"Bulmason? You mean Red Witch's Finger? Are you mad!? This bastard's trying to feed me poison he—"
"We ate the stuff all winter long. What, you scared?"
"Bah! Give it here! Tastes like nothing and just burns the tongue—wait, what? Huh? Huuuh?"
"Heh heh heh! Starting to get it, aren't you?"
...Red Witch's Finger? Wasn't that a poisonous herb?
The same scene played out in every tavern Sophoros visited in Coldon. Locals were pressing food laced with poisonous herb powder on laborers and adventurers suffering through the cold, damp spring weather—weather that felt almost affectionate to him by now. Naturally the ones being urged refused, and some even answered with violence. But once they tasted it, the look in their eyes changed completely.
Of course Sophoros, wandering Coldon on market research, could not leave without ordering a bowl himself. And he understood at once why.
The first spoonful struck the tongue with a heat fiercer than pepper. Right after came a surge of scorching warmth rising from deep inside the body. Even in the cold he grew so flushed that he was soon sweating freely. More than that, the stew he had once shoveled down like fuel became something almost worth eating once it had been simmered with Bulmason.
And Sophoros realized why the locals were so wild for Red Witch's Finger.
Why did people of cold lands drink liquor as if it were water? There were many reasons, but the greatest was the cold itself. A man might strut about bare-chested through midwinter to show off his manhood, but only for a moment; the rest of the time he wrapped himself in furs to keep the chill at bay. Of course the culture had twisted in places like the Duchy of Lecherus, where they drank until someone passed out—but Iceland was not that sort of place. In the end it all came down to the cold.
And food—or powder—laced with Bulmason worked the instant it was swallowed. From the moment it passed the throat, heat bloomed deep in the body and the temperature rose. Unlike usual, Sophoros had to peel off his heavy coat even though it was spring.
Now he understood why Red Witch's Finger was spreading so fast among the people.
Instant effect. Potions that worked the moment you drank them were expensive. They were not something a laborer who earned his bread day by day could buy lightly. But Bulmason was different. Food cooked with it cost only a penny or two more than ordinary fare.
Sophoros had to revise his thinking. Red Witch's Finger was not some rare magical herb sought only by the occasional mage. It was a spice. A spice hotter than pepper—one that raised the body's resistance to cold the moment it was eaten.
"Sir Haifon. It seems Coldon saw great changes over the winter."
"Ah, so even you noticed, Sophoros. Well, from noble to commoner, Red Witch's Finger is all the rage in Coldon right now."
"Indeed? Even Coldon's nobles like yourself are seeking out Red Witch's Finger?"
"A tiny handful of nobles refuse to eat the same thing as the common folk and load their food with pepper instead. But the flavor of Bulmason and the flavor of pepper are not the same."
"Pepper is subtle, while Red Witch's Finger is fierce, you mean?"
"Exactly. Taste, price, and how relatively easy it is to obtain—the fashion has been racing across the whole of Iceland the moment the weather broke."
"Oh-ho."
"I heard it secondhand, but His Grace intends to put large-scale fields under cultivation for it. Rumor has it the Mage's Tower is already researching it as a cold-warding potion."
"My word..."
The meeting with Sir Haifon of Bearpond—Sophoros's best source of Iceland intelligence—drove the thought home like a nail.
Spice. Potion. Large-scale cultivation. The Duke of Iceland himself was taking a hand. When a high noble who was practically a king in his own domain moved...
The state of Coldon. The fashion spreading through Iceland. Red Witch's Finger already rising in price from scarcity. Sophoros was certain.
This would make money. No—there was no time to sit still.
Even if the Duke of Iceland prepared vast fields at top speed, there were clear limits. Crops had to grow, the shortage had to ease, and enough stock had to be secured to dominate the market. Even with magic, the physical time required would fall short. Someday the problem would be solved. But until then—
That delicate gap between shortage and readiness. He had to ride this wave before the big players finished preparing!
"It will take a long time, of course, but—"
"Thank you for the excellent information. I show my regards every year, but this time I have made them a little more sincere."
"Ha! Between you and me, Sophoros? Let's meet safe and sound again next winter."
Of course. The value of what he had gained this time was far beyond a mere purse of gold.
Having shown Sir Haifon a generously lined purse, Sophoros ended the meeting in haste—even knowing it was rude.
"Ah, President. You've arrived? We just finished the dealings and were about to buy the goods we—"
"Cancel everything! We return at once!"
"What!? The ships will all sail empty!"
"I'll cover the losses out of my own fortune. Make for the Berseingeto branch immediately!"
In the cold northern reaches of Europa, Red Witch's Finger was a magical ingredient, yes—but it was also an extremely common poisonous herb. And beyond Iceland there were the Duchy of Lecherus, the Aska Settlements, the Svalbard League, and any number of other frigid northern realms.
Sophoros drew a deep breath. The smell of empty wagons and the dung of the beasts that pulled them filled his lungs. Yet through it all he could catch the brilliant scent of gold.
In one corner of the bustling great hall, Iona was preparing sweet-and-spicy pork ribs when he absently spoke his thoughts aloud.
"Ahh... looking at all this truly brings the years flooding back."
Time had passed and generations had turned; fewer and fewer people remembered the old days. Yet for Iona the past of decades ago still rose vivid and fresh.
Once, the people of Iceland—commoner and noble alike—had lived only to survive. The reasons were many. Beasts and monsters that threatened civilization. A barren land that had never once known a bumper harvest. A merciless cold that even the northern front lines, guardians of Iceland's civilization, could not keep at bay. Beyond the walls and palisades lay a savage wilderness where not even nobles, let alone commoners, could guarantee their safety.
Close his eyes and it felt like only a few days ago. Yet decades had already slipped by, and now a table of abundance stood before Iona's eyes in the great hall.
That was the achievement of this generation's Duke of Iceland—Alfred Felwinter.
He had listened carefully to a mere merchant, thrown his full support behind the man, opened the markets of the Adobis New Kingdom, held them, expanded the business, and begun drawing in laborers and adventurers. Year after year Iceland had changed. And Iona's lord had not been content to stop there.
Red Witch's Finger, newly rediscovered last winter. The moment Alfred grasped its lack of toxicity and its astonishing effects, he had acted. Every evening in the great hall dishes featuring Red Witch's Finger appeared, while carefully cultivated rumors spread the fashion from Coldon across the whole of Iceland.
"Time we filled our bellies with something delicious, not merely something that fills them."
Unlike the powerful, who had long since invited foreign chefs so they could eat well no matter what, for thousands of years in Iceland fine dining had been pure luxury. In a land where mere survival was struggle enough, and where no crop but meat ever tasted of anything, the idea that commoners might enjoy every meal was something no previous Duke of Iceland had even imagined, let alone dared to change—until Alfred.
Iona skillfully tore into a pork rib so the sauce would not cling to his beard, and cast a sidelong glance at the boy who had been the starting point of it all.
"Well now, lad. Think you can finish that great slab of meat all by yourself?"
"Of course. I'm eleven and still growing."
"True enough. The youngest young lady eats just as fiercely, so I suppose you can manage."
"Ah—matching Lady Alicia is impossible. Her appetite is simply off the scale."
Iona could not hear the words, but he read every syllable on the boy's lips. He decided to let the irreverent remark pass. In Winterhome, Alicia's appetite was already an open secret. At first a few people had tried to smother the gossip—the Duke and Duchess Felwinter themselves, for instance, or Baroness Poppins the governess, and various others—but they had given up long ago. Rumors only spread faster when you tried to suppress them, after all. And among nobles, gluttony was a symbol of power and authority. Whether that was a gain or a loss for a young lady was another matter entirely.
"Honestly, even a bear cub wouldn't eat as much as Lady Alicia."
The words were outrageous, yet Iona silently agreed. By the Goddess of Winter he swore it: the appetite of the young lady he loved like a granddaughter was astonishing when you considered her sex and age.